System Supervillain, Chapter 164

Chapter 164 – Technical

Obviously, Lucy and I were dressed by the time Technician showed up at the Rhuk’s airlock. She wasn’t alone, either. Brittania, Silver Cutlass, and Black Dragon were with her, too.

Brittania was your standard super-soldier type of heroine. Faster, stronger, more durable than a normal human. Peak human capability, plus a little bit more. Nowhere near as powerful as Stolen Victory, but she was well-balanced, as supers went. No overwhelming strengths, but few weaknesses or vulnerabilities to exploit. And that was before you added in whatever abilities were in her costume, or the twin pistols on her hips.

Black Dragon, on the other hand, was your quintessential ‘mystic martial artist’. The name came from the black dragon tattoos on his arms, because without them he was basically a white MMA fighter from Manchester. High-end human, but still human. With them, though, his punches and kicks had the force of magic behind them, and his body was far more resilient than even a peak human could be. His big weakness was that, if magic was nullified in an area, he became just a well-trained fighter.

Silver Cutlass was far more stylish, in that regard. Leather boots, pants that were tailored to show off every curve, a black pirate shirt with a leather belt around her waist, with her magic cutlass hanging in its sheath. The clothes were made by the Enchanters, giving her protections and increasing her abilities somewhat, and the bracers she wore were from the Tailors, and had several tricks in them, like the grapple guns she could use to swing around, or project an energy shield to deflect bullets.

And then, there was Technician. A mousey looking thing, just barely five feet tall, with brown hair. Her eyes were hidden behind goggles that Web Mistress assured me had a lot of sensory upgrades, and her costume was a fairly basic protective suit from the Tailors, but with augments she’d designed, including a blaster pistol on her hip. But the real threat, where she was concerned, was with her Gadgeteer ability, a variable power pool like my own Cryokinesis, allowing her to whip up gadgets on the fly, assuming she had something to work with. That, and her strong Psychological Limitation that made her compulsively look to break down and rebuild any unfamiliar technology to better understand it.

Which is why I met her outside the airlock, and pinned her with my gaze as I spoke to the three others with her. “I am taking you to Thraxl Secunda as a kindness. There will be no dismantling or tinkering with my ship. If any of you, especially Technician, so much as open a control panel, you’re going out the airlock, and we’ll see how long it takes you to float to the planet. Am I understood?”

The other three nodded, but it wasn’t until Britannia elbowed Technician, hard, that she finally sighed, and promised to keep her tools to herself. Passive scanning only. I allowed it, because trying to go further than that would only make her compulsion worse. Britannia promised to keep her under control, which was enough for me.

Nemesis’s voice came over the intercom as we headed towards the bridge. “Unit Technician is reminded that systems are armed with lethal intrusion countermeasures. Unauthorized disassembly of equipment will be considered a hostile action.”

Black Dragon looked over at me. “Cheerful sort, isn’t he?”

I just shrugged. “The Rhuk is Nemesis’s body, the computer core its brain. Would you appreciate someone like, say, Doctor Uplift tinkering around inside your body, just to see how they can ‘improve’ it, without your permission?”

“Fine,” Technician muttered. “I get it. I’ll be good.”

“Good girl,” I said, and chuckled when I saw the slight shiver in her spine as the words hit. All of them had the Life Support ability to breathe in vacuum, so they weren’t affected by the pheromones my ring caused me to emit, but I was still, as Web Mistress once said, literally at demigod levels of physical attractiveness to most women, with a magnetic presence. Even if I wasn’t actively trying to seduce someone, women in my presence always noticed me, and responded accordingly.

Britannia cleared her throat as we stepped onto the bridge. “So, how long before we lift off?”

“We lifted off immediately after the airlock door closed, Unit Britannia.”

Technician blinked. “What? But I didn’t even feel any change! Not even a vibration in the deck plating!”

Lucy laughed as she leaned against the doorframe. “This ship was built by the Mechanics, with the Prince of Darkness as the chief designer. As if he would have such lax standards!”

Technician blinked. “Prince of Darkness? But I thought he died in the London attack!”

Lucy shook her head. “It takes more than an alien invasion to kill a full-blooded demon, you know. However, the mortal shell he was using while he played musician was wearing out, so he saw the invasion as a good chance to step away from that public persona. Either way, he is still one of the best ship designers in the underworld.”

“Unit Lucy_Morningstar is correct. Though there are slight sounds, tremors in the hull plating, and other such things, these are not inherent to the operation of the ship, and are, instead, cosmetic items designed with fleshbag psychological sensitivities in mind.”

“What Nemesis means,” Web Mistress chuckled, “is that humans do not react well to perfectly still environments. If there isn’t some background noise or sensations, it can quickly lead to behavioral issues. That’s part of the reason why people dislike electric vehicles, after all. The sound and vibration of an internal combustion engine feels ‘right’ to them, while the much quieter and stiller electric engine makes them wonder if things are actually on, and just gives a general feeling of unease.”

“Huh,” Black Dragon said. “I never thought about it, but that makes sense. I thought it was just because people liked the increased power that the gas guzzlers offered over the electric models. Even if most people never actually use the power, like the wankers who have the big tires on their trucks that have never seen mud or a work site in their lives.”

I chuckled. “At any rate, Nemesis, ETA to Thraxl Secunda?”

“We are proceeding at sublight speeds due to the task not being time-critical, as rapid use of the FTL drives will increase maintenance demands. Due to the orbital positions of the planets involved, Thraxl Secunda is approximately fifty million kilometers from Thraxl Prime, or just under 2.78 light-minutes. Flight time from Thraxl Prime’s atmospheric limit to Thraxl Secunda’s atmospheric limit is 2 hours, 47 minutes. Calculating in atmospheric maneuvering on both ends, total travel time will be approximately 4 hours.”

“Not wanting to get there quick?” Silver Cutlass asked.

I shrugged at that. “The people on Secunda have been there for well over a year, at this point. They can wait a few more hours. In the meantime, we have things to discuss.”

“Like what?” Britannia asked, eyes narrowing.

I smirked at her. “Oh, don’t be like that, Britannia. If I was going to do something underhanded, you wouldn’t see it coming. And all four of you are the reasonable sort of supers, on either side of the law. Even the mad genius, there.”

Technician squealed in happiness. “You really do think I’m a genius! This is awesome! I’m going to rub it in the face of all those stuck-up lab coats on the forums! They said I was lying when I told them what you said before!”

I glanced at Web Mistress, who grinned. “There’s a dedicated subforum on the Guild forums for the tech and science types. They tend to be separated into Makers and Scientists, and there’s some rivalry between the two, since the Scientists put more weight on research, theory, experimental data, and academic qualifications, while the Makers are primarily focused on actionable technology and real-world applications. I am on the subforum, though largely independent of the two factions, primarily because they tend to be only basic-level coders, if they don’t outsource it.”

Technician shook her head. “Is anyone above ‘basic-level’ compared to you?”

“Oh, certainly. When it comes to pure coding skill, without additional abilities, there are some hacker collectives, and the AI conclaves, which can rival or exceed my own abilities. With me using my full skill set, however, only the AI conclaves can slow me down if I am hunting.”

Britannia looked at Black Dragon, and said, “And this is why the Green Knight and the Knave agree that Web Mistress is the most frightening member of Devastation.” The martial artist just nodded, not taking his eyes off Web Mistress.

I clapped my hands to bring attention back to me. “Anyways, as the senior System Administrator in the system, I wanted to know how Technician was going to make a portal, given the nature of her ‘Gadgeteer’ power, which tends to make single-use items, not permanent effects. Because if you accidentally rip a hole between worlds, or some other science bullshit, I’m the one who will need to clean it up.”

Technician starts to complain, but Web Mistress whispering ‘Isle of Man’ in her ear cuts her off, bringing a blush to her face. “Fine. I admit, I can’t just whip up a permanent portal with my abilities. The thing would destabilize once I tried to turn my attention anywhere else. However, I’ve designed a gadget that can make the machine that will create the portal. I won’t have any direct control of it. The portal will be a smaller version of the ones that we came through on Prime. I’ll need to hook it in with the power systems on Secunda to jump-start the Zero Point Generator, which will allow it to remain active for the next sixty years, give or take a decade based on frequency of use. The portal will allow us to bring people from Secunda to Prime or back just like they were stepping through any other doorway, with dimensions being one meter wide, and two tall.”

“And you didn’t subvert or cut out any of the safety protocols the Guild put in the larger portals in order to ‘save space’ or ‘optimize the hardware’, right?”

“I haven’t done that with other people’s technology since I messed up tuning Kallinikos’s Greek Fire Blaster! Still say that’s a stupid name for the weapon, but I learned that other people’s designs are sometimes not as great as mine, so I should leave their safety features in until I have fully mapped and studied the systems.”

I nodded slowly. “That’s fine, then. Because if I have to get heavy-handed in cleaning up a mess, then I’d be forced to put restrictions on your abilities before letting you out of Quarantine to keep it from happening again. Maybe even reworking your Gadgeteer ability into a restricted Multipower setup, like I did with Reality Slash. Or there’s what happened to Warpsmith.”

“Y-you’re threatening me?”

“No, I’m giving you a clear indication of direct cause and effect. Break the world, and the System Administrators have to make sure you can’t do that again. And since they’re likely going to be pissy at having to do all the extra work, they’re not likely to have a soft touch about it.”

Technician gulped once, and then nodded. “I understand.”

“Good,” I said, before turning my attention to Silver Cutlass and Black Dragon. “Now, as for you two. The old Local Administrator for the Thraxl system caught a bad case of ‘nuke to the face’ last time I was here. Which means a new Administrator is needed, to keep things from getting out of hand after I leave. The Knave suggested one of you two would be the right kind of ‘sensible villains’ to have take up the role. The question is which of you two to pick.”

Silver Cutlass shook her head. “I don’t really want to stick around Thraxl, honestly. Especially with the planet being mostly dead? What the hell would I do for fun, here?”

Black Dragon shrugged. “The harsh environment as the ecosystem recovers from the artificial ice age will make for a good training environment. I will take up the responsibility, while I seek to improve myself.”