System Supervillain, Chapter 192 (Patreon)

A reminder that I will be heading to DragonCon next week. Last chapter update will be Dark Fate on 9/1. I'll be leaving Wed 9/2, and will not be posting chapters until Wed 9/9.

If you want to see me at the con, I will be helping with the newbie tours on Thursday from 12-4. I will also be on several panels during the con:

Fri, 9/4 14:30, Hyatt Embassy AB - Humor in Space Opera

Fri, 9/4 16:00, Hyatt Embassy CD - We're 40! Welcome to Perimenopause! Exploring Characters with Experience

Sat, 9/5 20:30, Mariott M302-M303 - Fanfic 101: Worlds Collide - The Joy of the Crossover

Sat, 9/5 22:00, Hyatt International South - Dating Game

Sun, 9/6 14:30, Mariott M302-M303 - Built on Big Ideas: The Renaissance of Hard SF Media

I'm happy to chat and/or sign things, but as you can see some of those panels are back to back, so please forgive me if I have to cut things short.

Chapter 192 – Unified Action

Once more, I found myself in a painfully average office, with a perfectly average size and shape. The walls were white, and completely void of anything that would give them personality. The drop ceiling was completely average, with the ceiling tiles interrupted only for fluorescent light fixtures that would not be out of place in any corporate office anywhere in the world. A grey carpet stubbornly refused to show any marks or character at all, and the table and chairs were common models available at any business supply store, completely untraceable.

On the surface, at least.

The Archivists had plenty of defenses in place, of course, hidden in the walls, the ceiling, the windows, the floors. Everywhere except the table and chairs, honestly. But the main defense for this meeting place was that it was so eminently unforgettable that people would not think to look twice at it. When something was so completely boring as this room was, people didn’t see the need to dig into things, unless they already knew that the boring façade was just that, a façade.

“Iceblade, Web Mistress, good day to you. I must say, it was a surprise for you to be reaching out to us, asking for a meeting.”

The man who greeted us could have been the same one I met last time, but there was no way I could know for certain. Like the ‘John Doe’ I met last time, this one was a white male with average height and weight, dressed in a grey business suit with white shirt and grey tie. Average men’s haircut, with no distinguishing facial features, brown hair, and brown eyes. His own mother would have trouble picking him out of a lineup compared to all the other corporate drones in the city. Just like the other one. The only reason I wasn’t certain they were the same was because his voice sounded just a bit deeper, but that could have been my imagination.

I nodded once. “Yes, I can imagine that it would be. However, there was something we needed to bring to the Guild’s attention, and it was not something that properly fit into any of the other departments’ purview. It involves some information that Web Mistress pulled from the servers of the Superhuman Defense Initiative’s new North American Headquarters. Which, for full disclosure, we raided on commission from the New York Knights.”

The man’s face did not naturally lend itself to expressions. That was part of being the perfectly average type that the Archivists liked for this position. However, his eyes widened a bit at that. Despite the Guild being neutral, there were relatively few times where heroes and villains worked together, outside of events like alien invasions or natural disasters, and even fewer where heroes commissioned villains to take on jobs. And for the villain to then come to the Guild to report on the information discovered? Almost never happened. Which meant John Doe knew exactly how important this information was.

“Please, tell me more.”

I looked to Web Mistress, and she pulled out a stack of portable storage drives with everything she had pulled off the SDI mainframes. “These drives contain everything we pulled off their computers. Six hundred and ninety-seven terabytes of information, including the SDI’s complete global superhuman threat registry database. However, the important part is on the first drive, which has the details for their different ‘direct action’ and ‘containment’ plans. The Gel-Nak invasion, and their stated plans of using bioweapons to ‘order’ humanity, forced the SDI to move away from most of direct action plans, and move into a damage control stance.

“However, that does not mean that the organization has given up on its plans for ‘containment’ of superhumans. There are multiple containment plans in the information we recovered, but the three most prominent, and concerning, ones were titled Project Sentinel, Project Colonial, and Project Chlorine. It is Devastation’s belief that the Guild will be understandably concerned with all three of these projects, and will likely wish to take action.”

John Doe frowned slightly at Web Mistress’s words. “Due diligence requires me to confirm that these data drives are clean before checking any of the data on them, you understand.”

“Of course,” Web Mistress nodded. “I would be offended if you didn’t. I can tell you that I have gone through them to ensure that no viruses or malware that I can detect are present in the files, but you should obviously check for yourself on stand-alone systems before making any decisions. I am, after all, only one person, and having multiple sets of eyes on the data could find things that I missed.”

“Your file does not indicate this degree of humility, as a rule.”

Web Mistress smiled at him. “I am honest when it comes to the extent of my abilities. This is one of those situations where manpower works better than individual skill. The extra time required for even someone like myself to get the same results as having the number of analysts and hackers that the Guild has access to going through the information is substantial. When one adds in the ability of those analysts to crosscheck between individuals and the other information that the Guild has access to, the efficiency goes up even more. Acknowledging that fact is honesty, not humility.”

She took a breath, more to separate the last statement from what came next than actual need, and then said, “The first project of note, and the one closest to completion, is Project Sentinel. This project mandates the creation of automatons designed to hunt down and capture or kill superhumans. Beyond the obvious points, the aims of this project is to delegitimize and replace superheroes, as the Sentinels could do the job without having problematic personalities like Patriot in the mix. Once superheroes are no longer visible, supers in general are easier to target with legislation designed to restrict and control them.

“Members of Devastation faced three prototype Sentinels in the SDI facility we raided, and destroyed them. However, when one considers that the Sentinels managed to land significant blows on former members of the Squadron Supreme, one can imagine how less-capable supers would fare against them. And these prototypes had not yet been given the abilities envisioned for the production runs, which includes adaptive defenses and weaponry, allowing them to adapt to enemy attacks and target weaknesses.

“However, these prototypes were by no means weak. In fact, analysis of the battle suggests that if the three prototypes had been facing any single member of Devastation, their chances of successfully capturing or killing them would be roughly sixty-eight percent, for the individuals who were fighting. More for the ones who are less-focused on direct action.”

“I see,” John Doe said, evenly. “And, knowing how powerful the core members of Devastation are, that definitely puts the threat these Sentinels pose in perspective. But you said this project was only the one closest to completion?”

“Yes,” she nodded. “Project Colonial is a long-term containment plan, which has been advanced thanks to the Gel-Nak invasion making colonization of the solar system more viable, as well as the new extrasolar holdings of several Earth nations, thanks to the war. The project first suggests making the new UN Space Force, or whatever successor organizations that spawn from it, ‘human only’. Not explicitly by rule, but in fact. Since most superpowered individuals are either useless or an active hazard when considering the realities of space-based combat, this is a hard point to counter. Especially since even the few supers who can easily operate in space have trouble operating at the ranges and speeds that space combat typically takes place at.”

“Really? I would have thought that seeing Stolen Victory and Titania take on those Gel-Nak ships that were attempting to destroy Cairo would have indicated otherwise.”

“Mr. Doe, the distance from Earth to the moon is roughly 1.28 light-seconds. For most stellar navies, a range of two light seconds is a comfortable engagement distance. And with kinetics you can theoretically start planetary bombardment from anywhere within a solar system, if you do the math correctly. The System will give you penalties on the attack due to range, but a planet is not known for being extremely maneuverable.”

“Ah, that puts things into perspective. And controlling the navy is step one for this Project Colonial?”

“Yes. The second step, though it would be implemented concurrently, is to encourage the use of supers in the initial stages of colonization on the moon, asteroid belt, and other planets in the system. Again, this is a clever ploy, as, unlike the navy, this is an area where many superpowers would be quite useful. Which makes it difficult to argue against, on the face of it.

“However, the end goal of Colonial is to eventually create laws mandating that all superhumans are transferred to the colonies, while political and economic power is centered on Earth. And if any of the colonies object to this treatment, then the navy, which would be pure human by that point, would be the ones to respond, and crush rebellions. And control of media narratives would easily allow disconnected colonies to be painted as terrorists that needed to be put down, for the public good.”

“That is a disturbing level of sophistication in the thought process behind these plans.”

Web Mistress nodded. “Yes, but it is Project Chlorine that brings us to you today, and why we think that the Guild will want to take unified action against the SDI.”

John Doe’s breath caught in surprise, though his face remained impassive. He hadn’t expected her to use that phrase, obviously. Understandable, since it was one that was written into the Guild charter itself, and was left deliberately unused in the world of supers. “You do understand that the Guild’s neutrality mandate means that there are only a few very particular instances where we can take ‘unified action’, yes?”

“I am aware,” she said, grimly. “But I believe that you will find that it is well and truly warranted in this case. Project Chlorine is a eugenics program, involving the infiltration of medical centers and turning healthcare professionals into accomplices. The goal is to use prenatal genetic testing to determine the likelihood of an individual expressing superpowers later in life, and then causing miscarriages to force the termination of pregnancy, followed by sterilization of the women in question. As the program expands, its long-term effects would compound, especially when used in conjunction with Project Sentinel and Project Colonial.”

For the first time, John Doe was unable to keep his emotions from showing. His skin went deathly pale as his eyes went wide, and his mouth clenched in the way it does when the body cannot decide between bellowing in rage or vacating the contents of one’s stomach on the floor. As one might expect, he understood the implications of what Web Mistress was saying.

When he spoke, his voice was grave. “You are certain of this?”

“The data has been cross-checked and verified as much as is possible without engaging in an organized sweep through the wider internet. I will, however, add that I did run a check through the list of doctors, nurses, and healthcare administration workers that are set to be the pilot program for Project Chlorine. Thirty-six percent of them are identifiable in public databases, already working in their respective fields. Another sixty-two percent have been cautiously identified under reasonable aliases, like using one’s middle name instead of given name, or registering as ‘Jake’ instead of Jacob. The remaining two percent have not yet been identified.”

“And these people know about this… abomination?”

“Evidence is unclear from my cursory research. A high percentage of the identified individuals do have social media presences which suggest anti-super ideology, but whether they have been brought into the project, or were merely identified as those who could be brought in and used as the test program, is unknown. This information was acquired two days ago, and proper investigations of this magnitude and scale require time. Especially if one is trying to do it without causing witch hunts or engaging in other actions that may further radicalize others in the field. Moving too quickly risks creating martyrs, after all.”

John Doe nodded slowly. “Thank you both for bringing this to the Guild’s attention. I will ensure that our people look over this thoroughly, and confirm the information. If we do get confirmation, then it is likely that the Guild will be taking unified action for the first time since the Summerland biological threat in 1973.”

We both winced slightly at that. The Summerland threat was a biological weapon that had been developed on the Isle of Man, designed to cure all diseases, grant individuals increased power, and halt aging. What it actually did was create a zombie plague where the zombies all got powers, and kept any powers they had in life. Thankfully, the Guild had caught word of it, and invoked a unified action decree. That resulted in the complete termination of all life on the Isle of Man, with the island itself being scoured down to bare stone, and eighty square kilometers of the Irish Sea being flash-boiled until the sea floor was glassed, and the Guild forcing governments to agree to a forty-year quarantine on the island, until it was confirmed that no new instances of the threat had emerged.

There was a reason why the Guild did not invoke ‘unified action’ carelessly.