War Stories of a Supervillain, Prologue

Oh, yes, I'm not just going to leave you guys hanging! You ready for the war?

Also, two notes. First, Memoirs of a Supervillain is being 'processed' by Amazon as we speak, so expect that sometime soon, in both ebook and dead tree format (and yes, I plan to do an audio version as well). Second, the Complete version of Rules-Free VRMMO Life is available as an ebook, with Volumes 1-20 all in one ebook (too damn huge for a print version), available on Kindle Unlimited!  https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07R5CHNNP 

War Stories of a Supervillain

A Frozen Soul Story

Prologue – Prelude to War

For all of our history, humans believed that we were alone in the universe. For thousands of years, we looked up at the night sky, and wondered, “Is there anyone else out there?” For thousands of years, only the cold silence of the space answered us. Extraterrestrial life became the stuff of conspiracy theories, internet memes, and tin foil hat societies.

New life was lent to the idea of alien life being out there on June 30, 1908, when the Tunguska Event caused a worldwide stir. An explosion in the Tunguska region of Siberia happened without any seeming cause, flattening large areas of the forests. It was estimated that the blast was in the 3-5 megaton range, three hundred times the level of the atomic bomb that would later destroy Hiroshima. But there was no wreckage at the site, no burn patterns, nothing except a circle of downed trees. In their ignorance, some people claimed that aliens must be responsible for it.

However, the global interest in possible aliens soon faded away, as there was no further sign of their existence. No first contact, no little green men, no mysterious crafts sighted in the night. And soon, people forgot, as their minds quickly turned to other things. For the effects of Tunguska were far more extensive than a single explosion that knocked down some trees.

Something changed after Tunguska. Whatever it was that caused the Tunguska Event, it had changed Humanity forever, and we did not even know it until days or weeks later, as the first mutants began to Emerge, gaining superhuman powers the likes of which would not be out of place in some fantasy story. On Christmas Eve of that year, the Ottoman man known as Karanlik became the first mutant on record as he used his shadow powers to defeat a rebellion by loyalist forces who wanted to restore the old regime. From that time on, mutants were well and truly a part of the global landscape.

Some of these mutants would become known as superheroes. Whether they were actually all that heroic was open to interpretation, as they would often flout the law in the pursuit of their vigilante activities, and some merely used the veneer of heroism to hide their more villainous deeds in the shadows, but as the world marched to war, the mutants marched with it, changing the landscape of the world forever. Recognized, now, as an important resource, mutants began to gather some measure of actual power, allowing them to be sworn in as actual deputies of the state, so that those who were on official teams were no longer vigilantes, but had official standing. Magic-users and supernaturals would later emerge from the shadows, standing alongside mutants to take their place in the world.

But where there are heroes, there must also be villains. Whether it was because of mental illness, a facet of their powers that forced them out of society, a lust for adventure, a greed for power, or some other, darker reason, there were many reasons why those who had powers would turn to the life of a villain. Some people simply found it stifling to live within the confines of the law and ‘polite’ society, and wished to rebel. Others had an ideology, and were not afraid to use powers to advance it. Regardless, for every hero there were at least five villains standing ready to defy them.

So, as the decades passed on, and the world was enveloped by war a second time, the thought of aliens faded from people’s minds. When the cold war between the rival powers pushed mankind briefly to the stars, and we found no life in our vicinity, we lost hope of finding others out in the universe. That idea was relegated to a simple ‘wouldn’t it be nice’?

But the aliens were real, and they had been watching us all along. Unbeknownst to anyone at the time, a race of aliens known as the Asguard had, long ago, detected our fledgling civilization, and set up watch over our planet, using their superior technology to shield us from our nearby neighbors. Transmissions were blocked, and ships that violated the system were destroyed. Indeed, it was the destruction of a ship that nearly slipped through the blockade that caused the Tunguska Event. They swore to continue their watch, until such time as we proved ourselves ready to step out into the universe on our own two feet.

We never knew that we were being watched, being protected, but others did, and they resented the fact that we stood in the path of their progress, our system blocking them from contacting other areas of the galaxy. We never knew that the Asguard were up there, sheltering us. So, when they were called away by a threat greater than any they had faced before, we never knew they were gone. But others knew, and they saw an opportunity, if they could strike quickly enough.

On December 5, 2016, there was a burst of tachyon particles out on the fringes of the system. Few facilities on Earth were even equipped to detect tachyons, and fewer still were looking for them in the great dark of space. And, against the infinite blackness of space, the fleet of ships that emerged from the warpgate were nigh impossible to see, unless they happened to pass between a star and a telescope that was positioned at just the right spot with just the right focus at just the right time. We did not have the sensors we needed to reliably detect the ships, even if they did not have some measure of stealth technology.

We were babes left suddenly for the wolves, and they had come with the whole pack, intent on devouring us all. We did not even know enough to know how gravely in danger we were. December 5th was just another day, like all the ones before it. People went about their business, went shopping, or simply went and spent time with their friends and family. We thought ourselves wise, and that we knew the horrors that the world could visit upon us. In truth, we were still innocent, unknowing of the true horrors that awaited us out in the void.

--Iceblade

(December 7, 2021, for the Fifth Anniversary of the beginning of the Kratuan War)