A Perfectly Logical Guide to a Superhuman Apocalypse: 43 (Patreon)

A Perfectly Logical Guide to a Superhuman Apocalypse: 43

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Wordcount: 2500

Commissioned by Arksoul

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Giant floating fortresses with unlimited energy and factories pumping out drones.

An army of superhumans supporting a half-built biomechanical god along with thousands of regular army units.

A submersible carrier helmed by a genius and backed by the remains of the Japanese government.

Maelstrom on standby.

An AI with factories on the very top of the world providing armies and orbital weapons.

Yeah, this was why I mostly worked with normal people who hired superhumans and not superhumans directly.

“You’re good to go!” I yelled into the shipping container after delivering it. The doors burst open and Gynoids covered in armor ran out. Atop the modified shipping container was an array of sensors and weapons that started firing. I barely paid it any attention before going back to India. The yard filled with containers filled with cyborg warriors was empty and replaced by one of the servant forms beside a table already prepped with a meal. “Ah, thanks. I was getting hungry.”

A rotor-version came by and dropped off a screen, before buzzing away, as the servant-form covered in pure white clothes spoke.

The screen turned on and I found myself looking at the battlefield from a myriad of vantage points.

“I am currently experiencing resistance on multiple fronts. Both Shin and the reigning Shogun wish to keep the citizens in the city.” That sounded like what two megalomaniac villains would do. The cover of the meal was taken off and I found myself looking down at a large plate with at least half of a chicken on it, deboned and covered in a thick sauce, alongside a large helping of rice with chopped vegetables. Healthy, filling, and just what I needed. I tucked in and took sips of ice-cold water, while Parvati explained. The little reserve of energy I had began filling up almost immediately, but very slowly. The plate was enough for about a quarter of my reserves, but it’ll take time before I could eat again. My stomach could only eat so much. “I am mostly encountering their massed infantry or drones, but I am sure they will deploy stronger forces soon.”

“The shipping container locations can get filled up and I can make another round trip. We’ll put them in… safehouse 23? It should be day over there still, I think.”

“They’ll need resources and supplies and guardians. I’ll coordinate with Maelstrom. You need to focus on regaining your power. How are your reserves?” I was tempted to lie. Okay, I was tempted to lie more than I needed to, however, I was also interested in people not dying from me slacking off. This was another reason why I didn’t pick sides when superhuman fought one another. I didn’t like being responsible for other people’s lives.

“At eighty percent or so. Looks like my practice paid off.” I didn’t spend all my years in the bunker just watching thousands of movies, playing games, and spending time with my dog. Working out, eating right, and making sure that I knew my powers worked and could use them all helped. I was also semi-competent at loading ammunition, but not good enough to make it my day job. Yet. “I’ll be ready to go after this plate.”

“Good, because it seems that the Shogun’s creation seems to be steadily gaining power.” The creature that burst out of the main building was close to thirty meters tall and initially lumbered around unsteadily. Now it was walking around on wider streets and using its power to armor itself against the continuous swarms of drones from the aircraft above. Every now and again, it shot a massive, fuck-off laser beam, too. Yikes. Glad that I’m not dealing with that thing. “I need three more orbital strike satellites.”

Usually, I’m a bit more withheld when it came to orbital weaponry being deployed via my powers. I didn’t want people to realize that I’m literally the best way to leave the planet, and a great method of making a jump-off point to expand into the solar system. That sounded like a job that would be great for a few years, until people started stealing my blood, tried cloning me, or tried honey-trapping me. Not interested in any of that being things that I had to watch out for 24/7.

When giant flying fortresses with energy shields and humanoid giants come into play, though, I was way more lenient with my policies.  If you’re lenient on these sorts of things, they tend to show up and ruin your day sometime in the future. It’s basically like taking care of weeds or overly aggressive wildlife.

No, I’m not comparing people to plants and animals.

I’m just saying that people make problems and issues that I have to deal with early, otherwise they mess up my daily life.

Anyway, I finished my meal, stretched a little, and gave Parvati a thumbs up.

“Alright. Good to go. Where are the satellites and where do you want them?”

“We are making a small constellation above Japan. Deploy them within fifteen meters of the first two you sent up.”

“Got it.”

To conserve energy, Parvati brought a hovering platform to take me to the manufacturing location, while I did the ‘math’ to get things where I needed to send them. Idly, I checked on the battle with my power and frowned.

I hoped that I was wrong, but there were areas that were getting ‘fuzzy’ to my power.

I could still get through, but if the interference kept climbing, I wouldn’t.

The only thing that slowly built up over time and blocked me that came to my mind was radiation.

And, that couldn’t be good.

…

Parvati confirmed things, just as we reached the end of the assembly location of the satellites. I approached the three, universal-container-sized machines just as the bad news was confirmed.

“It seems that you’re correct, Egress. The various drones being destroyed are leaking light amounts of radiation. Shin seems to have modified them once it was clear that you delivered troops onto the battlefield. They must be a countermeasure against the Shogun’s own teleporter.”

“Well… that’s not good.” This was why I didn’t like to show off. You do it enough times and people start making plans to use against you. Once a location locks me out, that pretty much just turns me into a barely-mobile array of teleportation fields that shredded anything that went at me. Those shields could be disrupted with enough power, and there was the fact that I’d also have limited air without a connection outside. The rebreather and air canisters for my mask helped, but that gave me two hours max with very shallow breathing. Not the best for combat. “Can you get the civilians outside of the drone range? Along with the shipping containers?”

“Those that can reach the containers before the energy threshold is reached will be going there. Others, I shall try to shepherd out of the metropolis. It will be very difficult.” Parvati furrowed, and I took the moment to touch the new satellites and send them where they needed to be. Seconds after I did, one of the manufacturing gynoids gave me a thumbs up to confirm that they were working. Orbital supremacy achieved. It’d be great if things weren’t going to hell now. “When you go there, it is likely that you will be engaged by the Shogun’s own teleporter.”

Limited timeline to deploy an asset means that the asset needs to be deployed.

“Do you have the grenades that I asked for?”

“Better. I’ve created a custom wingman for your current task.” A large quadrotor came forward, about the size of a kid’s toy wagon. I only noticed it, despite its size, because it somehow managed to be whisper-quiet and have stealth capabilities at the same time. Guess that Parvati’s going past the gynoid phase and converting over to purely practical machines. Well, I hoped that was the case. There better not be a brain in that thing helping it compute and react. “You don’t desire a weapon system from me that can endanger you, so you can simply teleport with this machine while it remains outside of your protective fields. It has an energy emitter approximately five times stronger than what I used to trap you. It should be able to blast through the fields you created to protect yourself at that moment.”

“That’ll fry the guy, just so you know.”

“Making enemies with a person with your powerset and aspirations for more than a comfortable home is unwise. Logic dictates I do my utmost to make this individual disappear, rather than allow them to be a thorn in my side.” Parvati signed the death warrant of the other teleporter in the world without much fanfare. I suppose, from its perspective, the guy couldn’t be tolerated. If I went around helping oppress other people and transport armies, while it had the intention of rebuilding the world better than what it once was, I’d be a target. “Do you have any complaints?”

“I’d rather not be an accessory to murder, and I’d prefer it if you just stunned the guy and kept him imprisoned a place surrounded by electrified chicken wire.” I shrugged and gave my thoughts on the matter as plainly as I could. No point in hiding it. Therefore, the best course of action was just to speak my mind. “Personally, I was planning on pinning them down and maybe handing them over to the Japanese to deal with… but I’m not going to stop you, if you get to them first.”

“I see.”

I’m not a paragon of morality. Mercy is something only the strong have the luxury of giving. Loads of people would say I’m making myself an accessory to murder. However, I’d like to point out the fact that the Shogun and his entire organizational structure overthrew the government, literally have breeding programs to make superhumans, and aren’t doing much to alleviate the hunger of their constituents, even though they’re expanding their military. I mean, I’m not a philosopher, but overthrowing the military dictatorship with so many problems to put the last, elected government back into power didn’t seem like the wrong move.

“Then, are you ready to return to the field and begin evacuating civilians?”

“Yep. Good to go. Ready to get people out of there and onto a nice beach filled with supplies and people to keep them safe.” I gave Parvati the thumbs up, while the heavily-armed, invisible drone with a powerful energy weapon went over next to me. I could detect that it existed because I felt an object beside me, but besides that I couldn’t notice it. “If we hit a radiation zone, it needs to lean against me. Make sure that’s visible and give me a ding, so that I know where it’s coming from.”

“Understood. Beginning evacuation at Landing Site 1. Now.”

With that said, it was go time, and I shifted over to Japan.

For a second, my eyes met with that of a shocked set of civilians in traditional Japanese clothing, and some patchwork modern clothing, stacked inside a shipping container.

I extended my hand without a word and sent them on their way.

“Site 2.”

With a thought, I did the same again.

“Site 3.”

Pop in. Send people elsewhere. Pop out.

“Contact.”

In an instant, the strategy changed as I found myself locked into a location by a sudden bombardment of energy. It felt like a torrent of water and wind combined into a rushing pillar that washed over me. I couldn’t see it with my own eyes, but my more esoteric senses picked it up, and there were other clues that I wasn’t growing crazy. My shifting fields and eddies of teleporting ‘essence’ absorbed as much as they could of the energy. From my experience, countering energy weapons was all about being mindful about how much my field could absorb, so I made sure to have my defensive barriers act like flowing currents when facing energy weapons.

Flat panes worked better for ballistic weapons, since kinetic energy travelled through my fields with ease, but it was all the other forms of energy that was the problem. I never worked with anyone to get the right information, but my own experiments and experiments told me what I needed to know: slap aside or absorb as much energy as possible, then go ahead and run or counterattack.

So, since I couldn’t run with the constant stream of power surging my way, I counter attacked by holding steady and giving the drone version of Parvati an opening.

‘Firing.’

Parvati didn’t disappoint. For a second, the invisible weapon came into view, then its whole frontal portion came alight with light. A solid, visible beam that was bright red in composition burst out of it. Even through my helmet, which dimmed and deployed a secondary visor the moment it detected the light, I had to turn away from the sudden brightness. My filters were fully functional and my oxygen tanks were ready, so I didn’t smell what happened, but I saw what occurred.

Beneath the beam, there was molten stone. The large, flying machine’s sleek sides opened and red-hot radiators rapidly disgorged heat into the atmosphere and made the air steam up. The AI-designed machine struggled to keep invisible and its back end opened to shoot out heat-sinks that launched out of the drone and started to melt rock.

Yeah, it was no wonder how Parvati’s more powerful assault forms managed to destroy whole countries.

‘Heatsinks arriving. Enemy contact has disappeared.’ That was an understatement. My opponent probably felt the coming energy and committed everything to leaving. A risky move that would’ve sapped their power as they tried to leave and tried to repel the attack at the same time—oh, that wasn’t what Parvati meant. The place where the attack hod come from, a nearby rooftop overlooking the landing zone, was non-existent and an arm holding a large weapon of some sort fell and hit the ground. ‘I am not detecting any of the energy signatures you expel when you come or go, Egress.’

“Sounds like he tried to get the jump on me, but you just made him disappear.” Death came quickly, but I never got used to it, even with all that I’ve seen. My fellow teleporter thought he’d take me out with an energy weapon, I defended, and Parvati counter-attacked with a weapon it developed to blast through my defenses completely. The end result was my counterpart being vaporized save for an arm… and the attention of the other parties in the battle. The ground was quaking and the flying fortresses seemed to start turning our way. “Uh, Parvati? We’ve got more incoming.”

‘I am aware.’

Solve one problem, then two more pop up.