Young Justice: Doom & Rebirth]
by Spaceman
Start: October 3, 2022
DISCLAIMER
I do not own Young Justice or any of the related characters. The Young Justice series is by Brandon Vietti and Greg Weisman and owned by DC Comics. This story is a work of fanfiction and is for entertainment only. I am not making profit from this story. All rights of Young Justice belong to DC Comics. All other characters other an OCs beyond to their respective creators and owners. This is a fanfiction for non-profit entertainment.
Notes:
Chapters are over ten thousand words long, some are over twenty thousand words, and the final chapters are over forty thousand words plus a bonus chapter. I'm currently working on the Final Chapter – Chapter 46 – and it's already over 42 thousand words long.
Why do I write such absurdly long chapters? I hate puny chapters that are less than five thousand words. I treat fanfiction like food, if I want to read, I want a meal not a snack.
Reviews for Ch 38:
Alan
The Death Note is a little redundant. Also, Death Notes come with ghoulish Shinigami.
Cyanea will be important in the future.
OmniIBIB
OG Doomsday is nigh indestructible, but Ash is intelligent, has bonuses against Doomsdays, and most importantly has allies.
(5) Yes.
OmniIBIBUltraInstinctGodzilla
Thank You.
*DOOM*
Chapter 39 – More Monsters & Magic
*DOOM*
Fate No More Aftermath
July 2016 – Me, Rorschach, and My Six Wives began the "Fate no More" Quest and travelled to Fate-Unversed Earth. After a couple of opening battles, we joined forces with Chaldea Security, summoned our own Servants using the Gamer Summoning system, and destroyed the cores that protected the Tree of Fantasy. One Boss fight later and we all got power-ups. It took several days for Rorschach to transfer Fate-Unversed into his cyber-verse.
*DOOM*
Doomsday Bunker
[DB Site]
August 2016
1POV
I'm currently sitting on a couch watching a magical girl anime with my daughters.
Magical girl or mahō shōjo in Japan is a subgenre of Japanese fantasy media (including anime, manga, light novels, and live-action media) centered around young girls who possess magical abilities, which they typically use through an ideal alter ego into which they can transform. Originally it was pure witches and girls fighting for love, but there are more mature titles Puella Magi Madoka Magica, Symphogear, Magical Girl Spec-Ops Asuka, and Fate/kaleid liner Prisma Illya. We are currently watching something that didn't exist in my original universe – an anime adaptation of Magical Record Lyrical Nanoha Force manga. Currently, we are watching the first villain introduction, showing three dead nuns.
Some parents would be concerned about showing their daughters such dark, violent, bloody images. Then you must remember that these are not normal little girls.
Daniya Fenton-Grey is the extradimensional daughter of Danny Phantom and Raven, making her a mix of human, demon, and ghost. Raven has been training her daughter, so that Trigon and other demons can't exploit her abilities. The training made her desensitized to the imagery of actual Hell, so a more violent magical girl show is tame in comparison.
Abigail Williams-Grey (formerly Abigail Williams) is a Servant born from the Salem Witch Trials and is the avatar for Sut-Typhon (Yog-Shoggoth). One good thing about be connected to a Lovecraftian Outer God is your sanity survives in some form, you can become extremely tolerate to situations and relationships. A normal Puritan girl would probably be offended by the average Superheroine outfit, let alone magical girl shows, but Abigail only comments that she thinks Thoma and Lily are a cute couple.
Altera Grey (Altera-Larva) is currently dressed in more modern civilian clothing enjoying the anime. She is the core of deity-killing White Titan who became the leader of a tribal empire consisting of Huns, Ostrogoths, Alans and Bulgars, among others, in Central and Eastern Europe. She is also considered one of the most powerful rulers in world history. She has also seen more blood than a thousand hardcore slasher films. Altera only comments that the magi-tech weapons used by the fighters remind her of her own weapon Photon Ray.
Tia Grey (Larva-Tiamat) is more interested in the candy she is eating, than the anime, letting out happy whistles. Rorschach hasn't solved her speech problems yet, but she is getting better over time. She was given a tablet so she can communicate with others that are not Servants or me. Rorschach did solve her "heavy horns" problem, using a pair of special rings to shift the horns into another dimension and disguising the devices as cow horn hair ornaments.
Jackie "Jack" Grey (Jack the Ripper) was born from a collection of aborted child souls of prostitutes and sought to return to the womb and their one moment of happiness. She is the world's most famous serial killer with her legends drenched in blood. Watching the anime, Jack looks a little bored.
"Where are our brothers?" asks Jack, looking over at me.
"Hakudōshi is playing video games with Howard. He's hoping the Amusphere community will make him less of a shut-in."
Hakudōshi is the Immortal core of the Demon King of Fantasy World. He may be an incarnation of evil, but he's also the fierce big brother to Daniya, Eri, Ace, and the other little girls, which now includes Abby, Altera, Tia, and Jackie. Hakudōshi may look like a little boy with purple eyes and long lilac hair, but pedophiles and kidnappers have been torn to shreds and worse by him.
Howard Phillip Lovecraft is the Child Servant form of the writer of weird, science, fantasy, and horror fiction, best known for his creation of the Cthulhu Mythos. Rorschach has been improving the boy's understanding of math and science, while I've been helping the boy get used to different types of people. The fact my wives are a mix of European, Asian, and African descent also helps. Devouring his Noble Phantasm Grimoire Necronomicon seems to have improved his mental health immensely. It was the crystallization of his legendary writing, but it was also his fear and madness given physical form.
"What are our mothers doing?"
"Raven and Jade are doing magical training to control their divine cores."
When we returned to Earth-DR-Prime, there was a massive surge in the mystical forces that was felt by every magic user and psychic on Earth. Thankfully [Rorschach's Inkwell] is shielded on many levels including the metaphysical levels, so it didn't reach the extreme level it could have.
An unshielded god appears in the world in manner against their laws. A God of the Sun appearing in a forest can create a sea of flames, a God of the Ocean can cause immense flooding, and a God of War can cause a country to descend into murder and bloodlust.
Raven's Divine Core of Love taken from Kama would have caused the country to be consumed with pleasure and sexual desire, to the point people would have died of the overload of sensations. Even now, she is training hard to control the Eye of Balor which is now connected to the power of her core. She also must deal with the Gods of the East, the Hindu Gods, since she inadvertently joined their pantheon as another incarnation of Kama.
Her being a half-demon doesn't faze them in the slightest since they also have demon goddesses like Hariti. Hariti, also known as Guǐzǐmǔ(shén) and Kishimojin, is the demon goddess that protects children, promoting easy delivery and happy child rearing on the positive side and terrorizes irresponsible parents and unruly children on the negative. She once committed crimes but repented and became enlightened. Kali - Goddess of War, Anger, Time, Change, Creation, Destruction and Power – is also far more intimidating than a heroic half-demon.
At least Trigon's connection to her has weakened as her Divine Core of Love can easily match his corrupted Divine Core of Hatred.
Jade's Divine Core of Darkness completed by her interactions with Ashiya Dōman is even deadlier. If she had stepped onto the Earth unshielded, the entire world would have been covered in darkness in an instant and souls of all living things not able to resist her would have been harvested.
"Starfire and Blackfire are greeting refugees from the Vega system."
Due to the intel and weapons supplied by Cognito Inc., the Citadel Empire that once dominated the Vega System has been annihilated. Without the military might of Citaldelian clone army or the scientific might of the male Psions, it was easy for the planets to rebel. Even the Spider Guild and Gordanians have been decimated, but of course that means they are dealing with space piracy and extra-vegan species invading their space, trying to take advantage of the war-torn systems.
"Priss and Max have taken the female Servants out shopping."
The female Servants include Rorschach's Artoria and Simo, Raven's Serenity (who thanks to a magic bracelet won't poison people accidentally), Oda-chan, and Jeanne alter, Starfire's Sienna, Priss's Casca, and Max's Gerudo Link. Guts with a magically enhanced artificial hand is staying close to Casca and got roped into carrying packages (thankfully Rorschach supplied him with dimensional storage devices).
Jade is keeping all her Servants with her during her training.
The remaining female Servants - Leonardo Da Vinci (Rider) and Blackfire's Yoruichi Shihōin are with Rorschach. The former conducting magical research and later keeping an eye on Urahara.
As for the remaining Servants, Tesla is with Rorschach at the R & D, Saber-Adam is playing bodyguard to the Tamaranean sisters, and James Bond is at the British branch of Cognito. Sun Wukong is at Cognito Inc Chinese Branch helping the people of China as a Monkey King-themed superhero (not very original as there are already a few monkey-themed heroes running around). Zorro is also doing hero work in Cognito-Mexico, which is odd since Zorro is fictional in DC Comics.
Last time I saw Genghis Khan, he was conducting research on his counterpart in this universe - Vandal Savage.
*DOOM*
The LIGHT
VR Discussion
August 2016
3POV
"What has Cognito Inc done now!?"
"Stop being so dramatic."
"They travelled to a dying universe and gained familiars."
"Familiar spirits aren't unique. Any magic user can use them and many of the new metas since they are powered by the elemental planes can summon them. Even some of the Digimon in the Cyber-Verse can be considered Familiars and the higher levels ones can summon their own Familiars."
"These ones are special. They are familiar versions of Heroic Spirits – spirits of legendary people ascended to a quasi-divine level by fame and worship."
"How many were summoned?"
"30."
There is some commotion. Ash's collection is the first displayed.
"The Indestructible Monster summoned a girl from the Salem Witch trials, a female version of Atilla the Hun, a child version of a primordial goddess, and the world's most infamous serial killer as a little girl?"
"He also adopted them."
"Whose Mastemon?"
"Some sort of angel, possibly Mastema. Our contacts in the Church are unsure, since the Angelic Sigils are working properly unlike the Demon Sigils. None of the Demon Sigils have worked since Obsidian Black began his purge of Hell."
"Rorschach summoned an alter universe of Nikola Tesla and a Da Vinci in the form of a child Mona Lisa."
"So Cognito now has access to two of the greatest minds in history, which have been enhanced by their fame and historical significance."
"Doctor Genus may be making the largest waves, but this is also going to create ripples. The Zataras are descended from Di Vinci, and Tesla was more than an inventor in our world."
"He also summoned a dark female version of King Arthur, the legendary sniper of the Winter War, and Genghis Khan. "
"What the Fuck!?"
"L-1. You were Genghis Khan and now they have a Genghis Khan."
"This is going to be a one strange meeting, and I mean strange even for my immortal life."
"Raven Grey summoned a masked assassin that we believe to be a member of the Order of Assassins - Ḥaššāšīn."
"The predecessors to the League of Shadows" says L-2 (Ra's al Ghul), "They were dissolved a few decades before my own birth and were my inspiration for the Shadows. "
"She also summoned a young female version of the Japanese warlord Oda Nobunaga."
"Why all the gender bending?"
"No clue."
"Next is Edmond Dantès from Le Comte de Monte-Cristo."
"A fictional character?"
"One with very real powers. Ones we don't understand because they weren't in the book!"
"The last two are a dark version of the Saint Jeanne d'Arc and a child version of horror author HP Lovecraft."
"I'm getting a headache."
Their headaches get even worse with the reveal of Raven and Jade's Divine Cores, which essentially means they are newborn Goddesses.
*DOOM*
Meeting Room.
Watchtower, Orbit.
Same Time
3POV
"What has Cognito Inc done now!?"
"Stop being so dramatic."
"They travelled to a dying universe and gained familiars."
"Familiar spirits aren't unique."
The Justice League's core members are discussing Cognito's acquisition of Heroic Spirits as magical familiar spirits known as Servants. Many of the points brought up eerily parallel the thoughts of their enemies - The Light. There are some differences.
"Ash and his harem adopted their Servants?" asks Wonder Woman.
"All of Ash's Servants with exception of Mastemon are small children or at least have the form of small children." says Superman. Due to Ash's genetic connection to him, those girls can be considered part of the family. He can also imagine the Kents being sent messages, as Ash is extremely open with information (if somewhat blunt).
"So, we have quasi-divine Heroes from history and legend, beings literally fueled by the stories told of them." says Batman, "Cognito now has another massive advantage over us. Not only do they have significantly greater numbers and firepower than us, but they also now have greater cultural and historical significance. People out of their childhood storybooks and legends are working for Cognito Inc."
"Not just Cognito. The Servants are willing to work with anyone that can fulfil their dreams. Several homo magi around the world have reported forming contracts with Servants, not all of them are aligned with benign forces."
"Why haven't the Lords taken action?" asks Batman, looking at Doctor Fate – a fusion of the Helmet of Nabu and an Atlantean Priest.
"The Heroic Spirits are manifestation of Alaya – the collective will of humanity and part of the planetary spirit Gaea. They were originally meant to defend the planet from otherworldly threats and threats to all human life, such as the coming of the White Titans which wiped out their Greek Gods." says Doctor Fate, "Since they are part of the planet's immune response, even if it's a parallel world, they are considered a force of Order. At the same time, their inclusion in the world much like the rising of metahumans and techno-organics is considered a chaotic event. As such the Lords of Order and Chaos have decided to remain hands off."
"So, if a magical force works both sides, magical bosses consider it even and stay out of it?" asks Flash.
"Essentially, yes."
"Just great." says Batman drinking coffee from his "Super Sons Dad" Mug, one identical to the one Superman is drinking from. Both Gifts from Ash Grey. "What's next on the list."
"New sex cult in India that worships Raven as an incarnation of Kama and ninja cult in Japan that worships Jade as their dark goddess."
"This is sixth or seventh topic that involves Cognito or their employees."
*DOOM*
The Metropolis Mall
Same Time
3POV
Priss, Max, Artoria (Salter), Simo, Serenity, Oda-chan, Jeanne (Jalter), Sienna, Casca, and Gerudo Link were enjoying their shopping trip. A little disguise technology allowed the girls to look like normal civilians and enjoy the trip. Even Guts was handling things well, since Rorschach's devices enabled him to reduce the weight of the packages and store them in dimensional storage when no one is looking. He's also enjoying the happiness on his beloved Casca's face.
What has disrupted their trip is a fight that broke out between metahumans. These two are not supervillains or irate superheroes, instead they are just ordinary teenagers.
One is a young man standing 179cm (5'10) with green eyes, freckled skin, and curly red hair. He's dressed in a black shirt, black pants, and green/black sneakers. He also wears a black/green jacket. What makes him unique is a very Irish looking gold necklace with a green/gold four-leaf clover. He's currently glowing with a spectral orange aura that's disrupting nearby electronic devices.
The other is an older man standing 185cm (6'1) with a more muscular build, brown eyes, and a shaved head. He also has numerous tattoos that denote neo-Nazism. He's wearing biker leathers with a white shirt with a white supremacist theme. He has a flickering yellow aura with violet sparks in it. It resembles a slightly larger version of the manifester. when it is active and causes some people to get headaches.
"Hold it!" says Max, pulling out a badge, "Cognito - SPB Division. What's going on here?!"
She could have let the police or local heroes take care of this mess, but she was worried the Servants would jump in. Most Servants can do a lot more damage than your average metahuman. Rorschach also gave all of Ash's wives the Cognito Inc ID Badges, so they could act freely with official capacity.
"I was just enjoying a day of shopping with my fiancée." says the Irishman, indicating an African American woman with microbraids in a pink top. "Then this racist maggot comes up to me!"
"Stay out of my way, [racial slur]. This [country slur] disgusts me and I'm going to show him that real Americans won't tolerate... "
The white supremacist goes on a long toxic rant that literally makes everyone in the crowd angry. You don't want Guts to get angry, you don't want him to go Berserk. Then, the fool does the one thing that dooms him he not only insults the Irishman's fiancée, but Priss, Max, Serenity, Oda, Sienna, Link, and CASCA. The racist rant is cut off when Guts pulls out the Dragon Slayer from his dimensional storage (he never goes anywhere without his blade).
"Christ on a bike!" says the Irishman.
Guts swings his massive slab of iron and the white supremacists' aura shatters like glass. If Guts had used the edge of his sword, the bald man would have been cut in half at the waist. Instead, Guts merely slaps the fool with the flat of the 130-kilo slab of iron. Being hit by a superhuman Servant with a sword that weighs more than he does, sends the racist bald fool tumbling across the ground into a support pillar of the mall. The white supremacist falls to the ground unconscious along with small fragments of the pillar.
"Piece of garbage." says Guts looking down at the unconscious man, showing a lot of restraint.
Casca raises an eyebrow at him.
"If I killed that sack of shit, their would-be annoying people."
*DOOM*
Empress Jade's Palace
Shadowlands
Same Time
3POV
Jade began her existence as a mere shadow doppelgänger of the human Jade Chan. Through her own efforts and struggles, she eventually became an Oni Queen and the Queen of the Shadowkahn. In this world, she became the ruler of the Shadowlands – the realm of darkness that is the power source of all darkness manipulators.
There is a difference between being the most powerful sorceress of the Shadowland and being the newborn Dark Goddess of the Shadowlands. Her evolution changed her rule from mere dominating by sufficient power into an Authority.
Authority is a classification of special abilities possessed by the likes Divine Spirits/Gods. They are on the level of creating a world, this includes event shifting, time-flow manipulation, kingdom-building, and other such powers of that level. When she returned to this dimension with a Divine Core of Darkness, the Shadowlands became an extension of her very soul. All those possessing powers over darkness and shadow, must have the blessings of the new goddess.
Jade's Palace is a castle created from her memories, fantasies, and desires, brought into physical reality by her divine power. Originally it was just a section of the Shadowlands sealed off by magical boundaries, a place where she could talk to her minions and experiment with her growing powers when she was not with her husband in the human world. Now, the Palace is a holy land of darkness, a place where only her family and most loyal followers can enter.
Jade's ascension from the Queen of Shadows to the newborn Goddess of Shadows has even affected her Shadowkahn, causing the enhancement of various tribes. Her Ninja Khan servants now possess form-fitting dark clothing with bone-white masks resembling those of Hashshashin Assassins of Fate. Neither the red eyes nor blue-grey skin can be seen. Razor, Bat, Sumo, and Samurai also have updates to their appearances. Squid, Crab, Mini, and Mantis have changed into far more monstrous forms.
The evolution of her own personal tribe the Kunoichi-Kahn has been far more dramatic. They are now a tribe of Kijin-Kahn. They possess short, but powerful Amazonian bodies clad in dark clothing like Serenity. They have the horns, sharp nails, and pointed ears of Oni-Kind. Their faces are covered completely by bone-white masks. What makes them truly deadly is they now possess the Zabaniya, the Noble Phantasms of all the nineteen people who have taken the title of Hassan-i-Sabbah in the Fate Universe. While weaker than the original, it still means Jade can summon thousands if not millions of Servant-level Assassins.
Inside the Palace, Jade sits cross-legged in the center of an immense magical seal. Around her are many discarded books and scrolls of mystical knowledge from both the East and the West.
"The Spirit's Scroll of Talismans, The Spirit's Silence Book, The Dragon's Manual, The Scroll of Alchemy, Book of Shamans Divination, The Supreme Scroll of Shadows, The Grand Grimoire, Book of Shadows"
Jade looks at each text, looking bored and drinking soft drink provided by one of her Kijin-Kahn.
"That reminds me, I must return Raven's Demonic Studies and Practical Necromancy books."
She summons a Kijin-Kahn next to her.
"Return those text to Raven's study at the Bunker."
The Kijin-Kahn silently picks up the books, bows, and vanishes into the shadows.
"Demigods' Transfiguration of the Shadowed Bone?"
It was a scroll she acquired for her library of mystical texts when she took dominion over Shadowland. According to the attached notes, the scroll was created by a monk following the teachings of Xuanwu. Xuanwu – The Dark Heavenly Highest Deity connected to the Black Tortoise of the Four Symbols. Xuanwu was man who cultivated the Tao and who one day after helping the manifestation of Guayin (Goddess of Mercy) give birth, tore out his own viscera to clean his sin. He was made Immortal by the Jade Emperor. His viscera became a demonic turtle and snake, who Xuanwu subdued and made his subordinates.
"I thought it was next to useless because it required Divine Power. "
She removes a bone blade from her inventory. This is ceremonial dagger crafted by Ash from his own bones and given to Jade as a gift. The Athame has been designed to embody Ash's mystical aspects without containing poison or anti-magic traits, so Jade could safely use it.
She then removes another item from her inventory. It's the arm of a woman with blue-gray skin and black nails, identical to Jade's own right arm. It's currently floating in a clear liquid inside a cylindrical glass container with a decorated gold base and cap.
While training with her Shadowkahn, one of the Samurai Kahn sliced through her shoulder and severed her arm. She was able to use magic to regrow the arm, but she kept the severed arm as a reminder to herself.
Jade has a smile on her face, which can only mean one thing - "Trouble.".
*DOOM*
Prophetess has the appearance of a young beautiful woman with glowing white eyes and a marking on the side her face like a tattoo. She is dressed in white robes like a nun or priestess while floating cross-legged in the air. In front of her is a crystal ball that shines with opalescent light.
"The New Goddess of Darkness will gift knowledge to the New Goddess of Love. Their bond has survived their ascension and marriage to the God of the End."
"I know the actions of Gods are important, but I usually talk to Jade and Raven when I go out for ice cream." says Queen Maxima, wife of Rorschach and Warrior Queen of Almerac.
"A Fallen King of Darkness will rise as the Goddess' Knight and Set into the Sun without Fear."
"A former villain is going to work for Cognito Inc. That happens all the time."
"I am taking a vacation." says Prophetess as the glow leaves her eyes and she unfolds her legs to land on the ground.
*DOOM^
Raven's Nevermore Castle
Same Time
3POV
Ravens Nevermore was the nickname given to Raven's personal magical training area crafted in a pocket dimension using a combination of her magic and resources from Cognito. It was constructed based on memories of Azarath, Raven's mental landscape, several Atlantean training areas, and Rorschach's own creation. It's supposed to be a private area where Trigon's worst rage becomes less than a whisper in her mind.
Raven's ascension into a magical Goddess changed Nevermore with her Authority. Now the structures include architecture from the Hindi pantheon and relics from other cultures connected to love, lust, beauty, and fertility. Even the dark forest and barren plains of the realm are now covered in flowers and verdant plants.
Raven needs to keep her realm closed while she trains, or it would attract all manner of spirits and creatures connected to love and lust. To distract herself, she is currently organizing her collection of magical texts and individual spells.
"Fiends' Communion of the Cenotaphs of Darkness" says Raven, "Allows demons and those with demonic cultivation to call on the spirits of darkness for knowledge and power. This sounds like something Jade would want."
Some of the spells are very Questionable.
"Infernal Ray of Champaigne. A magic spell disguised as spray of sparkling wine that drains the fortune and luck of the target into the user."
She switches to the next Scroll.
"Holy Rite of Pasta? Isn't Pastafarianism a social movement that promotes a light-hearted view of religion. Then how can there be a spell that transforms Pasta into sacramental food with holy effects?"
"Conjure Fertilizer Golem? I think Rorschach already has this one."
*DOOM*
META/STAR ACADEMY
[Time Unknown]
3POV
Izuku Midoriya – known as "Deku" - is darting around the battlefield, his body covered in glowing lines and crackling with emerald lightning. With help from his friends and Cognito Inc., he is gaining control of his inherited Quirk [One for All], including the awakened Quirks of the previous users – [Gearshift], [Fa Jin], [Danger Sense], [Blackwhip], [Smokescreen], and [Float].
He's recently received help from the Magi of Fate-Unversed like Leonardo, Tesla, and members of Chaldea. In the Fate Universes, Magi have magical circuits, pseudo nerves that generate and conduct magical energy in the body. Magi families can give those circuits a more stable form and implant them in the next generation, with each generation making it more complex and powerful. The core of the Quirk [One for All] is very similar. As a result of experiments, Deku was able to refine his abilities using a modified form of Magecraft.
"SMASH!"
Izuku leaps into the air and before swinging around to deliver a roundhouse kick to the opponent's face. The massive robotic opponent, more than three times the hero's height and more than five times the hero's mass, is sent flying like a child's toy. If this place was outside, it would have pierced the clouds. Instead, it slams into the hidden ceiling, dissolving the artificial sky. The robot comes apart and falls out of the crater it made in the foam and metal.
Izuku looks worried but a Cognito technician merely smiles and waves it off. The crater pops back out and repairs itself. The broken robot is separated into pieces and taken away by flying drone robots. Then a much larger, more armored, and meaner looking robot is assembled for Deku to fight. The green-haired hero looks more nervous.
*DOOM*
Taylor Hebert – known as Weaver and formerly known as Warlord Skitter– has also been experimenting with magecraft under strict regulations. What's interesting is the Egyptian Servants – Ozymandias, Nitocris, and Cleopatra have taken interest in the girl. This could be because if she hadn't been kidnapped by Cadmus, she would have become Khepri of the Golden Morning to combat the threat the alien god Zion. Khepri is the scarab-faced God in ancient Egyptian religion who represents the rising or morning sun.
Taylor's meta-ability, which is based on her alien-spawned parahuman power, is the ability to control all arthropods within a certain area with absolute dominance and an absurd level of precision multitasking. The most logical step was the study of familiars. Although a different entity, familiars are seen as an extension of the magus as there is both a mental and physical connection between the two.
There were also many magi in the Fate universe that use Arthropod familiars such as the Bee familiars of the Borzak Clan, Crystal mayflies of Touko Aozaki, the Illusionary butterflies of Orlocke Caesarmund, and the horrific Crest Worms of Matou family.
Cognito Inc. also has access to materials that most magi can't even dream about.
The scientists and magicians watch as a cloud of beetle familiars resemble giant golden versions of Scarabaeus sacer, the sacred scarab beetles of Ancient Egypt. The beetles form a huge grid, hovering in place in perfect unison. Each beetle familiar then forms a magical seal, before they collectively fire magical lasers at the target robot. The robot would barely notice a single beam, but the thousand plus beams cause immense damage.
Cognito Cable shows anime from different dimensions, some of them from different timelines. As such Taylor watched a 2022 anime called My Isekai Life, where the protagonist Yuji became powerful with the help of an army of tamed slimes. The Queen of Escalation saw the weak familiars working together and was inspired.
*DOOM*
META/STAR Academy Residence
Outer Heaven, Moon.
August 2016
3POV
Scott Summers, also known as Cyclops, is not a happy mutant. His life started to take twists when his family was involved in a major plane crash. He suffered brain damage and was separated from his brother, then later awoke an uncontrollable ability to fire optic blasts from his eyes. Thanks to Professor Charles Xavier, he was able to control the beams using a pair of special ruby quartz glasses. He joined Xavier's school for mutants, meeting a beautiful psychic mutant – Jean Grey. Life was still rough with Jean foolishly dating an idiotic quarterback Duncan and his encounter with the amphibious mutant Todd "Toad" Tolensky.
Things took a severe turn when Toad was believed to be dead, murdered by Magneto, which shook him and his friends. They only found out when Fred "Blob" Dukes went on a rampage inside the school in which he tried to kill (Principal) Mystique.
It was later revealed that Toad had survived being tossed into a swamp from a plane. He had been found, healed, and adopted by the craziest team of soldiers in the world – GI Joe. He found a father in the rhyming soldier Roadblock and found love in the form of water-manipulating Althea Delgado, daughter of the craziest Joe Shipwreck. He was more annoying than ever, but part of Scott was happy he found people to care for him.
The chaos continued to grow with the X-Men and New Mutants forced to join in the military training, kidnapping by Magneto and his Acolytes, and the former Brotherhood reforming into GI Joe sponsored Team – The Misfits. Since then, the chaos has continued to grow more and more.
He even learned his brother Alex was alive and a mutant in Hawaii, his still living father was now a Space Pirate rebelling against the mad Shi'ar tyrant D'ken and his mother was now a brain inside a spaceship!? He also learned he had a psychotic older brother Gabriel/Vulcan who was taken by the mad scientist Dr. Nathanial Essex, also known as Mr. Sinister.
"Scott, you're making yourself depressed." says his wife Jean Summers (nee Grey), one of the world's most powerful psychokinesis users and telepaths, and host for the cosmic entity of Death and Rebirth – The Phoenix Force. Also, due to a freak accident in this world, she consumed Tori Tori no Mi, Model: Phoenix- a Mythical Zoan-type Devil Fruit from the world of One Piece which bestows the power to transform into a phoenix (and phoenix hybrid) at will. Due to the Phoenix Force, Jean's transformation was far beyond "normal" even for the "One Piece" world.
"Sorry, Jean. The psychologists have been talking to me about my perfectionist issues. I've been letting the chaos of the Misfits and others stress me out." says Scott, cleaning his glasses. Thanks to Cognito nanomedicine, the brain damage that made his power uncontrollable has been fixed, so he can look at his beautiful wife and children with his own eyes without fear.
On a nearby screen there is an advertisement for META/STAR Academies.
Those Academies are growing faster and faster, unlike Xavier's School which got destroyed half a dozen times. Even with the Misfits causing chaos, Cognito Inc. handles them far better than its original world. Cognito Inc.'s construction technology is so advanced they can literally build faster than the Misfits can break things. Something the X-Men thought was impossible under the laws of physics.
"It's so strange. Cognito Inc. has such immense power and influence that instead of the world panicking about the surging number of metahumans like our world and mutants, they made an entire Hero industry." says Scott, as he watches heroes on a nearby television - one of the heroes Rainy Season Hero: Froppy looks like a cute female version of Toad!
"This world has a lot more than natural borne metahumans (PR word for mutants)." says Jean drinking her coffee, "This world has mutants, metahumans, parahumans, magi, Atlanteans, extraterrestrials, half-demons, oni-kind, transcendent extraterrestrial machines, and techno-organic life forms. We recently got legendary figures incarnated into magical familiars."
"I still don't know why more than half of them are female versions of historically male figures."
"Rorschach said in an infinite number of universes, an infinite number of histories are recorded as fiction. A common universal law is pictures of cute girls sell." says Jean.
Red Witch wrote the Misfit series as a mix of humor and drama. Scott always thought his life was a Joke, but confirmation was crushing to his ego. The fact the series was named after the Misfits also didn't help.
"Did you hear about what happened in New York. Toad got high on some sort of sugary sweet and placed thousands of lawn gnomes around the city."
"Did they think it was advertisement stunt like the last time?" asks Scott.
"It broke an ancient curse that a clan of actual Gnomes – the elemental spirits of the Earth – were under. The spell stated that until a gnome stood on every sky-reaching tower of the most populated city of a country, they would be as frozen in time. Toad, while high, managed to get around heroes and Cognito security and place gnomes on the top of over three hundred skyscrapers." says Jean, "The Gnome King gifted his savior with the fortune and fertility of the Earth, whatever that means."
"I know what it means."
Althea Tolensky (nee Delgado) walks in, looking a little shocked. Althea is the daughter of the world's craziest sailor Hector X. Delgado and a former Cobra experiment. One of five biological mutant children possessing amphibious and water manipulating abilities. She is the leader of the Misfits, Water Master of the Arashikage ninja clan, and host of half of the Destiny Stone – the Aqua Seraphim. On this new world, she has also connected to the elemental plane of water known as The Clear.
"What's wrong, Althea?"
"It happened Again!?" says Althea holding up a Cognito-Brand Pregnancy Test, which is showing a very clear Positive and even showing the number of weeks (1.5).
"I thought Cognito Inc. supplied you with contraceptives. Cognito-brand contraceptives." says Jean.
Cognito can only give fertility to any sentient being (and non-sentient animals), but their tech is advanced enough to sterilize an entire country's invasive species population without harming domestic pets or genetically close native species. Cognito Condoms are said to be able to stop metahuman shots that can pierce steel without dulling the sensitivity (this is a little exaggerated).
"They did. Somehow, machines that aren't supposed to malfunction more than once every five hundred years, malfunctioned when producing my dosage and it was somehow not detected by the primary, secondary, or tertiary backup sensors. We even used Cognito-brand condoms and they failed as well. Toddles is currently strapped in a lab as the scientists try to find out how he broke the odds."
"Well, congratulations?" says Scott
Scott is splashed in the face by his own drink. "Do you not remember our trips to alternate earths, you saw our possible futures. It's the reason I'm so concerned with Contraceptives, other than having Shipwreck for a father and the three evil ones as sisters!"
Wavedancer is pregnant again. There is going to be another Misfit. Scott needs a drink.
*DOOM*
Cognito Inc R&D
[Location Classified]
Same Time
3POV
"Fertilizer Golem version 3.0" says the Green Mage next to Alexander Armstrong - Rorschach's "Weird Science Rick" actor Persona.
The Green Mage is a young woman with green eyes, dark ochre skin, and dark green (almost black hair) dressed in protective Cognito Hazmat clothing
Fertilizer Golems are golems made of clay, soil, and fertilizer used for farming and gardening. They can dig ditches; plant seeds or saplings; devour stones, old roots, and pests; and deposit magically enhanced fertilized soil. The fertilized soil can accelerate the growth of plants like the Plant Growth ability of Green-based metahumans.
The Golem in question is a vaguely humanoid pile of dirt, mud, and other substances covered flowery vines and a goofy-looking clay mask. On the forehead of the mask is "אמת", "truth" in Hebrew.
"What's with the mask?" asks Alex
"Two reasons. One, it makes it easier to control the Golem as the symbols can be placed on it. All you must do to shut it down is remove the aleph from the end or break the mask. Second, it helps make it look less offensive."
Alex can understand that as version 1.0 was made with manure and literally looked like a walking pile of stinking crap. Version 3.0 could be very useful on Cognito Farms.
"I've also been talking with Servant Avicebron about terraforming Golem."
"Make sure he supplies Cognito with reports, I don't want his creation trying to turn New York City into a Jungle. We'll let him complete his creation, but we choose the target site!"
Solomon ibn Gabirol was an eleventh-century poet and philosopher. He was born in Malaga, Spain, and although he did not have the glory of a knight or king or the recognition of having produced works of art that would prosper for thousands of years, he coined the name of an entire thaumaturgical system, Kabbalah, and was one of the starting points of the process leading up to the European Renaissance. His Noble Phantasm Golem Keter Malkuth: Royal Crown - the Light of Wisdom was a golem, a recreation of Adam meant to recreate the Garden of Eden.
Alex continues to inspect the other projects.
*DOOM*
Marjani - A young Atlantean girl from the Arabian Sea, under the rule of Tritonis. She graduated as a student of Conservatory of Sorcery and is now working on a project using Cognito Inc resources. With those resources, she has made more progress in the last year than her predecessors have in ten thousand years.
"How goes the project Esoteric Oceanography?"
Oceanography is an important Earth science, which covers a wide range of topics, including ecosystem dynamics; ocean currents, waves, and geophysical fluid dynamics; plate tectonics and the geology of the sea floor; and fluxes of various chemical substances and physical properties within the ocean and across its boundaries. Esoteric Oceanography deals with supernatural elements.
"We have managed to create a complete ethereal map of The Clear and how it interacts with the world. Atlantean mages have been trying to map out the flows since Atlantis conquered the world's oceans, but they didn't get 0.2% of this!"
The holographic screens display a translucent globe of blue covered in a very complex pattern of moving white lines. There are some spots that glow brightly, which Alex recognizes as the sites of Atlantean city-states, the Ocean Cleaners, and areas associated with famous water, like the Dead Sea, the Great Lakes, and Niagara Falls.
"They didn't have access to Cognito Satellites which can scan multiple dimensions, including elemental planes of existence.", says Alex, "Anything interesting to Cognito?"
"Clear Vortices. When a new Metahuman connected to the clear appears, vortices appear in the Clear's spiritual flows. Jake over in geothermal studies says something similar happens in the Burn and Melt."
"This could make it easier to find new Metas."
*DOOM*
"What is this one again?"
On screen, microscopic machines fit a metal ring around a bone and lock it in place. The ring itself is made of a titanium alloy with microscopic symbols laser-edged on it.
"Runic Immunology – A tiny metal ring edged with runes and placed around a bone in the body. These runes create a barrier using the blood that prevents a named pathogen from entering the body. It doesn't matter how the pathogen mutates and evolves, be it mundane, alien, or magical. If the pathogen shares the name of the original, it can't enter."
Dr. Axel Borg is a Scandanavian Doctor from an old magi family. Unlike his other family members, he wasn't born with impressive magic, just an impressive mind. His family did support his mundane pursuits of becoming a doctor, specializing in immunology. He was able to use the combination of ancient runes and modern science to cure a magical plague that was used to attack his community. When Cognito came recruiting, he accepted.
"The test example is Influenza. It doesn't matter if it's a strain from 6000 BC China to modern to a strain that won't exist until the 40th Millenium, the subject will never contract the flu. ", explains Dr. Borg, "This is how I was able to save my hometown from Daemon Dagon's plagues. The arrogant named every one of his creations after himself."
"How was Daemon Dagon killed? Cognito hasn't gotten the report."
"Daemon Dagon, whose original name was Dan Dagson, broke into my office when he learned I ruined his plans. He unleashed all his magic against me, but thanks to DD Implants I was immune. When he tried to physically kill me, I stabbed him with one of the implants. Since those implants were basic anti-individual attuned to his magic, it got... messy."
"Messy?"
"My janitor, who has cleaned up all manner of vile mundane and magical materials, quit after looking at my office."
*DOOM*
"What's next? Magical Metallurgy." says Alex as he looks at his PDA.
In fiction, especially fantasy, a metal is shiny stuff with wonderful properties like super strength, lightness, magic resistance and so on, often not resembling any of the metals found in the periodic table. Cognito learned to create Fantasy metals such as Mithril, Orichalcum, and Hihi'irokane (Scarletite) by infusing magical particles into mundane elements like silver, copper, titanium, and other metals.
The scientist is a tall, lean elderly man with blue eyes, short white hair, and gray goatee. He's dressed in dark gray protective clothing with numerous orange bands for visibility. He also has dark protective goggles on his forehead.
"Report."
"The metal sample you acquired can't be created in our universe. We had to create it inside a simulated dimension using altered physical laws. Once we had a large enough sample, we were able to experiment, and the new metal was made."
The Metallurgist activates a pillar and an Ingot of metal rises. It's a sparkling opalescent silver metal, like something out of a fantasy anime.
"Meta-metal 374. Starlight Adamant is a fancy name. A sparkling opalescent silver metal that can only be shaped by molecular rearrangement technology and high-level magic. Under mundane physics, the metal is nigh-Indestructible able to withstand the heat and force of a thermonuclear bomb. It also reflects all forms of light and radiation." says the scientist, "Sir, if I ask, where did Cognito get this metal."
"A Hero's Sword from another world. During a medical scan, we found the fragment imbedded in the arm of one of the Hero's former companions. The Hero's Sword chipped fighting the Demon King."
"Since this stuff makes tungsten carbide look like soft cheese in comparison, I hate to be that Hero."
"Any news on WIDE or Lunar Shadowmetal?"
White Iron of Dark Elves – (Hvittjern) A white metal crafted by the Dökkálfar. It's a special metal that is strengthened by magical energy and when damaged the metal weapon or tool will repair itself. It appears to be the magical equivalent of shape-memory alloy which can be bent when cold and return to its original form when heated. The metal itself without magic is quality steel level.
"The Hvittjern is a strange metal. It doesn't matter how much a sample is broken apart by non-magical means, even if it's ground into powder. One small mana charge and it reforms like the T-1000. Only I know how the T-1000 effect was accomplished, straws and liquid mercury. I still can't determine the attraction method. Do you have any possible suggestions?"
"Magical enhancement of quantum entanglement concept."
"Ah! I see."
"What about the LS?"
Lunar Shadowmetal – A ultra-black metal materialized by Goddess Jade. Its weight is variable, and it can have an edge that is less than nanometer. The reason it's called Lunar Shadowmetal is because it needs to be made from lunar regolith.
"I like challenges when they are possible, but LS is impossible. It's the manifestation of a dark goddess's power and lacks physical data. Even Cognito's sensors can't detect any energy fields or particles, either physical or metaphysical. It absorbs light, but I have no idea where the light goes. I'm struck."
"Honestly, I wanted to make sure you would admit it."
"?"
"Obsession is a bad thing. If you had ranted about how, you would solve it no matter what, you would have been sent to Psych Evaluation."
"?"
"Did you hear about Shimmering Revelation?"
"The swirling, pulsing, thick potion that is purple in color. It smells and tastes like sugar." says The Metallurgist, "When the Norse God Odin wanted to learn the Primeval Runes, he hung himself from a branch of the world tree and impaled himself with his own spear. The potion was supposed to increase one's spiritual awareness and perception to the point they could still see the Runes while alive. "
"That was the plan. Instead, she took her experiments too far and saw something normal humans are not meant to see. I had to remove her recent memories and replace two years' worth because of contamination. Even with the cleansing, she now has a minor obsession with cephalopods and esoteric sex rites."
"Holy Shit."
*DOOM*
"Magitech with Da Vinci-chan."
Rider-class Servant Leonardo da Vinci has made herself at home in the Cognito Inc R&D. The child copy of the scientific genius of the Chaldea Security Organization is invested in development of magi-tech. It's a whole new world and she has been given an infinite number of resources to work with.
"Good morning, Alex. How are you?"
"Working hard as usual. Cognito produces solutions to everyone's problems, but it requires us. Doctor Genus can't be doing everything by himself." says Alex, "How's Chaldea and Earth-Unversed doing?"
"After being transferred to the Cyberverse, everything has stabilized. The red sky is gone, the Unversed has been cleansed and now everything including the people are being rebuilt." says Leonardo, "Since Doctor Genus' systems are automatically conducting repairs, Ritsuka and Mash have taken Pip's offer to interact with the other worlds of the Cyberverse."
"So, how's the new Magitech going?"
"Take a look."
One young assistant is a Japanese American girl with dark eyes and long black hair tied back in a ponytail. She is currently working on a PDA, while a translucent holographic arctic fox rests on her shoulders.
"Totem Chip - A special chip that allows the user's totem animal spirit to interact as an AI-framework digital assistant. In some cases, the Totem can manifest in the physical world much like a Digimon."
"Everyone has a different totem spirit, so the results would be different depending on the person."
"This is why I want to request some of the Spiders for the trials."
The Spiders are the male and female Spider people which includes many versions of Peter Parker. Due to their issues, they an entire branch of the Psych section dedicated to them. They also all possess the same Totem spirit - The Spider.
"You can pick the most stable members, but I don't want to hear that the Spiders have taken over the Web."
The next Assistant is a slightly overweight young man with brown hair. He's currently standing in a circle surrounded by floating eyeball cameras and robots. One of the robots opens fire with Nerf foam bullets, but they bounce off an invisible surface. The robots then fire rubber bullets with the same effect. The ammo continues to change, test after test. When the robots reach the final test, they are firing armor-piercing 50cal rounds and each hit is causing cyan ripples in the invisible shield.
"Amulet Barrier - A small amulet that can produce a magical barrier to protect against minor magical and mundane attacks. It can also provide protection in magic contaminated areas."
Suddenly, one of the robots throws a large projectile at the man, which passes through the shield and hits him in the face.
"Banana Cream Pie." says the man, face covered in the remains of the pie, "Classic. Cognito-brand?"
"The barrier doesn't stop non-magical objects that lack the energy to inflict harm." says Leonardo with her Mona Lisa smile, "It could be a problem if the object was a chemical or explosive."
Assistant number three is another young woman, a Caucasian with short red hair and green eyes. Assistant number four is another young Caucasian woman with long blonde hair and blue eyes. They are using remotes to control toy cars, identical to the real sports cars produced by Cognito Auto. They are competing, moving around a toy racetrack.
"Rune Drive - An engine that operates using runes edged on wheels and discs instead of any form of combustion or electric motor. Filters absorb either from the environment or fuel cells." says Leonardo.
"The cars still need maintenance as discs can become worn or crack" says the redhead, concentrating on the race.
"We don't want to make it out of a super metal because we don't want anything we can't shut down." says the blonde, "Hey! No fair!"
"I told you my rune sequence was better." says the redhead, before her car speeds into a way.
"You were saying?" says the blonde, "You owe me a Coffee."
The next assistant is a handsome young man with dark green eyes and short dark brown hair. He used to have bad skin, bad teeth, and glasses, but Cognito can make anyone look like a supermodel. He's currently looking at a lot of coding on a computer screen, while another screen displays a map of Cognito satellites (at least the ones that are not cloaked spy satellites).
"Thaumaturgy Grid - A hyper-dimensional network set up to allow greater use of Magi-craft without upsetting the planet's own natural magic. It's a lot easier to set up on this world because Gaea isn't activity trying to stop you."
In the Fate Universe, Gaia is the planet's will to survive. Gaia protects all creatures on Earth by using Nature Spirits and creatures of the Earth, but as mankind becomes independent, Gaia increasingly perceives humans as a source of threat due to their reckless destruction of the environment. While humanity has improved on this Earth, Gaia still exists in some form.
As they walk through some secure door, Alex and di Vinci-Chan see a small group in protective gear working in a sound-proof chamber. Through the monitor, they watch as the scientists power up a large engine, while others get readings on its operation.
"The Ether Drive - A magical FTL drive and perhaps the ultimate creation of Cognito's Magitech division." says Di Vinci-Chan, eyes filled with emotion, "I know this universe has other methods of FTL, but this is the first magical FTL drive."
I'm guessing The Pioneer of the Stars skill must resonate with this project.
*DOOM*
Alex and Di Vinci-Chan finally reach the weapons testing area of the Magitech Division.
There are three weapons being tested today.
The first is a young swordsman dressed in black protective gear with orange-yellow safety stripes and a helmet. He's wielding a MagiTech broadsword called Sigil Edge Sigma. The swordsman can change the properties of the sword. He breaks down a barrier by making the sword blunt and heavy, then makes the blade lighter and absurdly sharp to cut through ballistic gel dummies. He extends the edge of the blade of the sword with an energy field creating a sword beam to hit distant targets, then makes the blade intangible to inflict stun on targets without physically damaging them.
The second is a young Japanese gunwoman with short brown hair and dark eyes. She's wearing an orange-marked black safety vest, protective goggles, and ear protection. She is holding a black gun with glowing turquoise lines. The futuristic handgun also has an extended magazine. She aims at a bunch of test dummies dressed as terrorists.
The first bullet merely pierces through the target, but the second bullet is like a cannonball, smashing the target instead of piercing it. The other bullets also have clearly magical effects as dummies are corroded by acid, frozen solid in ice, incinerated by fire, electrocuted by lightning, and even rotted away by necrotic decay magic. The Spell Bullets are successful.
The last tester looks like he was an emo goth during his teenage years. He's a pale skin man with piercing dark eyes, pale skin, and long messy black hair half covering his face. It's only Cognito cosmetics that allow him to pull off the pretty boy antihero look. He's wearing wraparound protective glasses, hidden ear protection, and protective clothing with a non-regulation scarf around his neck. He's holding a golden gun with three barrels and three bullets filled with different color powders.
"The soil charge triad to use on you has been decided! The origin of all things, Mother Black! A heat that will scorch all creation, Fire Red! The critical point of everything, Burning Gold! Burn up! I summon you! Phoenix!"
Three beams – black, red, and gold – burst from the gun, swirl together, and collide to summon a creature. The summoned creature is a Phoenix that incinerates the targets.
"WTF?" says Alex, "I thought all the assistants were put through psych screening."
"They were screened for dangerous instabilities, if they would be a danger to themselves, other people, and the projects. We didn't want traitors or supervillains getting Cognito tech. We didn't screen for being overly dramatic with chunni tendencies." says Di Vinci-Chan, "Half of the Servants wouldn't pass screening if we did."
Including yourself? Thinks Alex.
*DOOM*
Throne of Atlantis
Poseidonis, Central Atlantic Ocean
Same Time
3POV
Annax (High-King) Mera Nereus sits on the throne of Atlantis listening to the complaints and problems of her people. Sometimes she wonders why she took the job from her husband, but the obvious reason is she is a better ruler than he was and he's now free to continue his heroics and care for their family.
"We have some news from Golden Sands."
"The new Cognito training facility." says Mera
Cognito Inc has set up Meta/Star Academies, also being called Hero Academies, around the world. This includes Atlantean schools that train mostly metahumans and Atlanteans connected to The Clear. The students include those who control water, those that can transform into water, those that can transform into aquatic animals, and those who can communicate with marine animals. There are a few students not connected to The Clear, but they are mostly metahumans that can live underwater due to Cognito's science.
"There is a minor conflict with colony of Imbocans and Aquanarians"
The Imbocans were once Cadmus Genomorphs, but a mutagenic virus harvested from Ash Grey transformed them. When they appeared in Atlantis as refugees, they were hybrids of Genomorph and Axoltl. Over time, they continued to evolve, growing from paedomorphic salamander hybrids into a magically powerful humanoid race who named themselves after HP Lovecraft's works.
The Aquanarians are an extraterrestrial race of human descendants. They are amphibious humanoids with water-manipulating abilities and aquatic technology. They have taken refugee status on Earth, while Cognito fixes the ecological disaster that has ravaged their oceanic home world. Due to their appearance, they have become close with the Imbocans.
There is also a race of non-humanoids that have joined the two. A race of giant extraterrestrial cephalopods with vast intellect and psychic abilities. These peaceful creatures are as large as small trucks and have mental abilities strong enough to lift an ocean liner. They also have a one-time-use ability to transform into a planet's native species, adopting the planet as their own.
"So, what's the problem?"
"Many of the colony are nudists. They have walls, but since we are underwater, students can just float above them. Traditional teachers and noble children are complaining it's impeding their work."
"What the? Aren't there laws against public indecency?"
"They only apply when the observers are minors, not students over the legal age." says the advisor, "Nudism has been permitted for centuries due to the Free King."
The Free King was a rather infamous King of one of Atlantean city-states. For centuries, tradition demanded the rulers wear more and more elaborate make-up and costumes for official functions. After his son nearly died of an allergic reaction to make-up, King Katharó Neró introduced the Free Clothing Law, which permits Atlantean citizens to wear as much or as little as they want. While disliked by the central religion at the time, several smaller religions and cults supported the act.
Suddenly, there is a flash, and a package appears Infront of Mera. This frightens the guards and officials, but Mera is quick to realize the package is marked with the Cognito Logo.
"It seems Cognito Inc. has sent us another gift."
Inside the package is a set of water-proofed books. She takes out each one reading each title but puts it on a table.
"Ritual Geology – The study of geology to find the best ritual sites. The attached note says we only have 2% of the sites recorded and less than 45% of the major ones."
Thump.
"Ritual Physics – The study of physics to determine the best metaphysical conditions. The attached note says our ritual work is good, but it could be better."
Thump.
"Spiritual Archaeology – The study of ancient civilization by study and communion with spiritual forces. The attached note says this will seriously help us recover our lost history."
Thump.
"Statistical Runes – Runes for determining the numerical quantifiable statistics for metaphysical forces. No attached note, but I'm sure the bureaucrats will be interested."
Thump.
"Thaumaturgic Statistics – Metaphysical statistics for miracles... I'm not sure how the Church is going to react to this."
Mera then pulls out a letter.
"Doctor Genus also included a design for an improved ward system. He says our current set up is so low quality, the average lost teleporter could port inside the throne room by accident."
This makes a few people wince as the Conservatory of Sorcery put a lot of effort into the throne room's protection. They will follow the instructions since Doctor Genus is the most intelligent mammal in the Universe and Cognito Inc. is allied with Atlantis, but the good doc doesn't care about Tact.
"The last is a Letter saying he will set up a Censorship System to fix the mess at Golden Sands?"
Doc's sense of timing is crazy.
A couple days later, the Imbocan/Aquanarians were hit by a unique spell. Long ago, a small town in America was hit by a spell that made their clothing invisible to all but themselves. This included the two heroes that appeared - Superman and Wonder Woman. The Privacy spell is an inversion, the Imbocans/Aquanarians see themselves bare, but everyone else can't see certain body parts like a blurred/smeared image.
*DOOM*
JL Watchtower
Earth Orbit
Time Unknown
3POV
"I'm so happy I don't have to deal with issues like Mara anymore." says Aquaman, looking very relaxed, holding his Cognito coffee. "I don't know why, but the Imbocans are a bunch of sex-crazed nudists. Many human Atlanteans are joining them. Thank the gods of for the censorship spell."
"In the Shadow of Innsmouth, Obed Marsh and the Church of the Esoterica got fish and gold from the deep ones in return for human sacrifice and women for breeding. By the time the protagonist arrived at Innsmouth, most of the town's people were Deep One hybrids." says Superman, drinking his own Coffee, "In Imboca, Alex Marsh and his fellow former Cadmus experiments sell Cognito products and farm produce. They also attract more and more people to their little commune."
"In the book, the Deep Ones planned to take over the surface world." says Batman with his coffee, "In our world, Cognito is well on their way."
"At least it's not a violent takeover." says Flash, getting a glare from Batman, "I mean Cog has enough firepower to glass planets, but instead they are bribing humanity. Can you imagine fighting Rorschach or Ash? It would be a massacre."
There is a long pause as they sip their Cognito-brand Coffee.
"How did the book end?" asks Wonder Woman.
"The protagonist - Robert Olmstead - learned he was a descended of Obed Marsh and a Deep One Pth'thya-l'yi, through their foreign-educated daughter Alice. He also learns he's changing into a Deep One, frees his 'deformed' Cousin Lawrence Williamson from an Asylum and joins his family under the sea." says Superman, "I don't think we have to worry about being taken over by Cognito."
Behind them, Robots deliver more Cognito-brand Coffee.
*DOOM*
Doomsday Bunker
[DB Site]
August 2016
1POV
I'm once more sitting on the couch. I'm by myself right now as my wives took the kids on a playdate. The Cognito children and League Children have all become close. There is no need to worry about super villains, terrorists, or governments, because Doctor Genus and Cognito have continued to upgrade the play facilities. These facilities have even become holy grounds fueled by two goddesses and protected by both the most powerful robots and quasi-divine shadow elementals armed with the skills of legendary assassins.
The League and Cognito Heroes are working together to keep the crime rates at an all-time low. Even the Light is keeping things quiet, keeping the most powerful and loyal close to them and eliminating radicals. Very much like how a crime family can stabilize some areas by getting rid of rogue criminals.
Chaos hadn't vanished from the world. There are still random disasters that Cognito Inc. doesn't always stop, the occasional terrorist that slips through the information net, and random metahumans who either lose control, lose their minds or let their new power go their heads.
Recently, a horde of demons escaped their imprisonment because the demon contracts failed. They failed because the demon lords that supported them were killed by my incarnation Obsidian Black and the magic simply ran out. Constantine and the league supernatural division - Justice League Dark were quick to act. So was Cognito Inc. London Branch and within two days, the demons were turned into glass, ground into powder, and portal-ed to Hell.
"Cognito Special News Report – Two Rheelasian fighter jets were over the Pacific Ocean when they suddenly became an adult blue whale and a potted plant. A Lemurian sorcerer in the area was able to save the whale from its fall and the animal is now being treated by Atlantean marine biologists and wildlife conservationists. The potted plant on the other hand died due to the seawater and impact."
"Klarion is in the eldritch catnip again."
I click off the News. I've never liked watching the News, ever since I was a kid. It's mostly depressing, boring stuff about places I don't care about. The weird comic book stuff of this world makes it only slightly better.
I activate the anime viewing mode which places me in a temporal virtual bubble. This allows me to watch seasons of anime without needing many days to watch it. I click the remote and scan through the menu.
[Archive] [On Cognito TV] [Cognito Stores] [New Selections] [Advance Search] [Options]
"New anime selections. No sequels today. Let's try these ones."
I'm quick to notice thar some of the selections look like weird crossovers.
"A crossover between Tokyo Mew Mew and 3x3 Eyes? "
Young girls are brought back as immortal warriors by having their souls absorbed by an ancient demon princess. The only way for them to regain their humanity is for the demon princess to become human and that will only happen once all other members of her former demon kingdom are killed. These warriors can absorb the souls of rare animals to gain animal-theme magical powers to assist them in hunting down demons.
12 Episodes later. Despite being an extremely dark and violent magical girl anime, the story had a power of friendship ending. The resurrected demon king drained the power of all the remaining demons, including the demon princess which killed her. Instead of despairing, the magical girls linked their powers and pulled off what looked like an animal-themed spirit bomb. The magical girls became mortal again, keeping some of their powers, and demon princess was reborn as the daughter of main heroine and the demon hunter prince.
"A crossover between Petshop of Horrors and Ranma ½!?"
A young high school student and natural martial artist accidentally releases a horde of dangerous magical creatures while training with his con artist/thief father. The owner of the magical animal sanctuary curses both turning the father into an animal and the boy into a girl. The only way to get their original bodies back is to clean up the mess they made. Things are complicated by a family of demon hunters, dark sorcerers, and insane martial artists combined with school drama.
2 Seasons and 26 Episodes later. Many of the episodes were either stand-alone or two-part episodes. The general setup is when someone discovers a magical animal and its abilities. At first being the "owner" is wonderful, then a rule is broken, and the horror begins. The gender bent martial artist must stop the horror and retrieve the magical creature. The final episode has the Sanctuary owner depart for another realm and magic fading away, only the martial artist now has a sister!
"A crossover between Saber Marionettes and Ghost in the Shell!? Seriously!? Ghost in the Shell is a cyberpunk, spy, and psychological that occur on post-war Earth, while Saber Marionettes is a sci fi romantic comedy with harem elements. One is about a kickass Major tearing apart mysteries, while the other is an idiot in a world where all women are robots."
In a distant future, man and machine have become one. Humans can discard their weak bodies for full-prosthetic cyborg bodies and are cared for by Ai and robots. This change hasn't eliminated crime, as a female cyborg police officer investigates crime and protects the innocent. Her latest case, the minds of a group of young amnesiac women placed in powerful Gynoid bodies.
"The opening plot is like the 2nd film that was based on the GITS manga. Foreign orphans are placed in machines that copy their mind into gynoid sex dolls repeatedly, eventually "whitening" their souls. It's basically sex slavery with more steps. The big difference is the Marionettes are superpowered combat models."
25 Episodes later. That's an Interesting Twist. It turns out everyone was descended from colonists that crashed into a hostile world. To survive, everyone was transformed into cyborgs and supported by androids and AI. When the colony became unstable, a puppet master program was used to give people false memories. It made them believe they were humans on Earth.
It reminds me of Dark City. In that movie, a group of slowly dying psychically powerful extraterrestrials abducted a city of people and conducted experiments in pursuit of the soul. Nobody realized their city was fake and floating in the dark depths of space because of memory manipulation.
Going to the next anime.
"A crossover between Monster Rancher and Neon Genesis Evangelion!?"
WTF? You can't get more dissimilar. Monster Rancher is based on a game about farming monsters that can be summoned from CDs and DVDs. The anime was about the protagonist Genki and his friends searching for the legendary Phoenix to stop their equivalent demon king Moo. NGE on the other hand is an Apocalyptic Mecha Psychological drama that some people consider a deconstruction of Mecha anime.
"OK. I'm curious."
The crossover story takes place in a world of humans and fantastic monsters, a world that was once dominated by an advanced MagiTech civilization that was destroyed by war and greed. Now ancient monsters – The Titans - from that era of war have awakened and seek to annihilate humanity and the only hope is a small group of teenagers that can tame Ancient Titans. The problem is, will their souls survive long enough to save the world?
26 Episodes later.
The main protagonist is a weird hybridization of Monster Rancher's hyperactive Genki and Eva's emotionally damaged Shinji. He's strong and adventurous when it comes to monsters but doesn't trust humans at all. The Asuka and Rei analogues are tsundere daughter of a Monster researcher and human/monster clone created by the hero's father.
In the end, the secret society secretly ruling the government is massacred by the hero's father, who merges with the Godzilla-size King of Monsters to reach some dimension that his wife's soul in, not caring about the rest of the world. In the end, the three heroes merge with their Titans to slay the demon king and are reborn as humanoid monsters in a more peaceful era.
I add that one my Archive.
The brain-breaking 5th anime is a crossover between Read or Die and Gundam SEED.
I thought the previous two were different.
ROD is about supernatural agents with the ability to manipulate paper (Yomiko Readman in the film and the Paper sisters in the tv series). In the movie, Yomiko (known as The Paper) and her partner Miss Deep fought against a bunch of revenge-crazed superpowered clones of famous writers. The Paper Sisters were detectives until they had to stop the British Library from taking over the world.
Gundam Seed on the other hand is a military giant mecha anime with morally diverse characters. In Seeds' case it was a conflict between the genetically enhanced space-dwelling Coordinators and their earth-bound Natural counterparts, and the people caught up in the war.
The crossover is a different world of both science and magic, where two races conflict with each other. One race is natural born, conceived like normal humans. The other race are artificial people created by MagiTech to be superior. Both races have magical abilities with the strongest members able to summon giant armors, but the strongest one is paper-manipulating bibliophile.
The ending is a mess. There are three separate plots. First the leaders of the fascist anti-homunculi terrorist group attempt genocide on the homunculi colony only to be annihilated by the quick-thinking heroes. Then the leaders of the homunculi attempt to use to ritual to take magic away from the Naturals, only for them to be killed by a member loyal to the protagonist's group. Then, a third group attempts to destroy all magic, so both groups need to work together to stop the final plot.
"That's enough anime for now. I would say it's rotting my brain, but I don't have one."
It's not that I'm stupid, but as a Doomsday, I don't have any internal organs.
*DOOM*
Cognito - New York HQ
The next day
Earning morning
3POV
"You guys must be the dumbest criminals in America." taunts a heroine.
She is a short, but athletic woman with gold eyes, light skin, and long flowing golden blonde hair done in a braid. She's dressed in a white-detailed black European military uniform with white gloves covered in red symbology. She also wears a red coat with an alchemic symbol on the back.
She is currently standing in front of a bunch of heavily armed cyborg terrorists. They are currently encased in translucent crystal up to their chins, unable to move. Cognito security robots are quickly closing in to make the arrests.
"Seriously, you tried to attack a Cognito Inc. building. If I hadn't stopped you, the security robots would have liquified you fools."
Juno Justine, the Jewel Alchemist – The heiress of a noble family of homo magi who specialize in Gems and Crystals. Her family is very wealthy due to their ability to create artificial gemstones and investments in the mundane world. Due to her connection to the Meld, she awoke with a crystal manipulation ability that surpasses even the Legendary members of her own family. She then went against her family's desire and joined Cognito Inc because of the company's unlimited resources.
Most people can guess her hero persona was based on anime/manga series Fullmetal Alchemist, the first anime she ever watched. It wasn't something her parents or the traditionalist elders would want her to watch, but she saw the maid's daughter watching it and recognized some of the alchemic symbols. When her tutor tried to prevent her from watching future episodes, she did something so horrifying that nobody stopped her from watching anime ever again.
Juno watches her collection of captured criminals. Their skin swells and turns red-purple, steam rises from their skin, their cybernetics spark, and their skeletons can be seen. The terrorists realize they can't escape the crystalized rock and activate their self-destructs.
The crystal bound criminals are then covered in a layer of ice. The super cold ice prevents the criminals from reaching the temperatures they need to explode; instead, they melt like wax statues inside their stone and ice prisons.
The other heroine is a young woman with dark eyes, dark skin, and long dark brown hair. She's dressed in a blue outfit with white fake fur that screams ice user. It's also clear to any fanboy that if the blonde was inspired by the classic anime Fullmetal Alchemist, then the other was inspired by the American animation Avatar: The Last Airbender and The Legend of Korra.
The Jewel Alchemist can also sense something special on the newcomer's body.
"Arctic Moonstone?"
Arctic Moonstone - A magical moonstone containing power over water and ice. Even in the hands of a mundane person, they would have abilities comparable to a master water bender under the full moon. In the hands of someone blessed by the Clear, its powers are almost divine in nature.
"As expected from the Jewel Alchemist. My Hero name is Lady Polaris, since I triggered in Cognito City: Polaris. I received the stone recently."
"I've encountered a few people with special stones. A shadow heroine with the Eldritch Opal and mob boss with the Royal Blood Diamond. My family was looking for those gemstones for centuries and I find them within months of being a hero."
"Superhero luck."
Eldritch Opal – A powerful mystical opal that grants immunity to illusions and mind manipulation spells, while granted the ability to cast illusions. This gemstone was not born of Earth but originated from the chaos born Gemworld. It was used on Earth as the power source for three superheroes and two villains.
Eldritch Opal is currently in the hands of one of Goddess Jade's followers. Jewel Alchemist encountered many followers of the Jade Shadow Queen while working for Cognito.
Royal Blood Diamond – A magical red diamond that would be one of the largest and most expensive gemstones alone. It was originally a tiny stone, but magic made it grow over generations. A blood mage father sacrificed himself to create a ring to protect his son, granting a level of strength and protection. The ring was passed down and with every generation, the stone grew and so did the power it granted.
The current heir is a mob boss with a body harder than diamond and strong enough to toss tanks like they were made of hollow foam. She was almost killed by the King of Diamonds as he called himself. Then Ash Grey of the SPB Division showed up. The King punched Grey and his fist cracked against gray skin that was impossibly hard. Ash Grey proceeds to smash the King of Diamonds like a training golem. She does wince at the memory of Ash Grey consuming the Royal Blood Diamond – all that wealth and knowledge destroyed as a monster's snack.
*DOOM*
Blackstone Manor
England
3POV
John Constantine is in trouble again. This phrase is so common, you might as well be saying the sky is blue and water is wet. He was working with members of Justice League Dark investigating some missing people and supernatural elements surrounding them. Despite his many years of experience, they still fell for a trap set by one of the people responsible.
John Constantine is currently stripped down to his pants and tied to a metal cross. He has black binds marked by runes around his neck, wrists, shoulders, chest, and waist. He also has binds around his ankles, as they don't want the infamous sorcerer from moving.
The man in charge of the mansion – Mr. Blackstone – walks into the chamber. He's a very tall man with dark eyes, curly black hair, thick eyebrows, and a thick beard. He's dressed in a dark hooded robe like most cultists with a fancy blood red amulet around his neck.
"Constantine, have you had a chance to see my collection?"
"It's not easy when your tied up like a gimp."
"Oh of course. My apologies. Advanced Dark Arts, New Dark Arts for the Magus, Ancient Dark Arts for Magi, A Manual of Alchemy" says the man, listing off a few titles. "We even have Eastern texts - The Silent Treatise of Virtue, The Immortal's Scroll, The Three Alchemists Manual, and The Crane's Transformation Book."
"So why are we talking about your bloody library collection?"
"The reason is to show my family's dedication to magic. My family has maintained our wealth and influence through many contracts with many unholy beings. We sacrificed people for their blood and souls, including members of our family. We offered our bodies so new half-bloods could be born. We slaughtered demon slayers and magicians who got in our way or the way of our allies."
"You missed a few, mate."
"You were on the list Constantine. The problem was everyone was fighting over your soul, but once we got that sorted out, you would have gotten a 50 Cal." says Mr. Blackstone, "The Decimation of Hell changed everything."
The Decimation of Hell began when Ash Grey and Raven of Azaroth began their campaign against the demon lord Asmodeus. It truly began after their departure from Hell and the monstrous Obsidian Black began his slaughter all things Infernal. The seventy-two demons of Solomon are now dead, their once vast armies annihilated, which has removed a major source of dark magic from the world.
"While it's true that our blackened souls no longer belong to hell, and we don't need to pay tribute anymore, we are now cut off from everything Hell supplied us with. We can't even use the demons of pocket dimensions outside the seventy-two because Obsidian is clawing into them as well." says Mr. Blackstone, "Your Justice League Dark and Cognito's own supernatural division have been making things even more difficult for us."
"Glad to hear it."
"You won't be happy to hear what is going to happen to you."
*DOOM*
"The demons will no longer answer our call. The contracts have faded away. To regain our lost power, we shall call upon the gods."
John Constantine and the other members of Justice League Dark find themselves placed around an altar. Only the human members are present, with the less human members farther away in magic cages. Constantine also notices that the all-male cultists must be perverts or chauvinists, because while the male members were stripped down to their pants, the women have been completely stripped bare. Runes on the bindings and the bars make sure nobody can use magic or supernatural abilities. Even the man with ghost powers can't escape the bars of his cage.
The cultists chant in a dead language, praying to dark gods, asking they come before them. The chants also have many words of flattery. Constantine knows this because he's heard similar chants from many, many other cultists and demon worshippers. A pillar of black flame erupts from the center of the altar meaning the chants caught the attention of some higher power.
Everyone in the room feels an immense presence. It's like the place was just cast in the dark depths of the ocean, an immense, oppressive pressure pressing down on them. It's too much for most of the cultists, as they collapse to the ground unconscious or dead. The ones that are still awake know this is the presence of a God, the aura of a God's Authority.
As the pressure fades, Constantine is breathing heavy on his cross, profusely sweating, and bleeding from his mouth and nose. He barely stayed conscious during the summoning, and he hopes his comrades have also survived. Constantine raises his head as the black flames vanish and reveal the divine beings, while the cultists keep their heads to the ground.
"Constantine. We have got to stop meeting like this." says Raven.
You could hear a pin drop.
"Since when did you become a goddess?" asks Constantine.
"Recently. Another strange adventure with strange consequences."
"What is happening...?" says Mr. Blackstone before Jade glares at him.
That is all it takes as the cultist leader is annihilated. An unseen force hits Blackstone like shockwave, disintegrating his body into a dark mist that is blown away. Not a trace of blood, bone, or fabric remains. Constantine can still see the Cultist's damaged soul with eyes filled with absolute horror before it's pulled into the darkened shadows.
Raven raises her hand and without needing to chant, the magic-blocking magic-resistant bindings on the prisoners break apart and disintegrate. She also catches the ones that are unconscious or too weak to stand her power. Another wave her hand and the women are now clothed in simple black silk dresses.
Constantine hears breaking metal and turns to see female demons tearing the doors off the cages. The magic of the runes fades and soon the ghost and super intelligent chimpanzee can move around again. He can also feel the presence of another Goddess, this one connected to shadows and darkness.
"Jade?" asks Raven, as Jade emerges from the shadows.
"Give me a second, the reception is terrible even with a Cognito phone" says Jade with her cellphone. She whips out with her fist and Constantine can feel the Mansion's entire warding system break. It took him and the members of JLD hours to bypass the powerful wards on the Mansion, but with a flick of divine power the wards are gone. He also imagines any electronics are also burnt out due to the EMP. "Got it. Cognito Hospital located."
Constantine is picked up a shadow elemental resembling a cross between a Japanese Oni and a Ninja. The Kijin-Kahn grab all the sacrifices and their allies from the cages. They then travel through the shadows and appear in a hospital.
"Why did I agree to join again?" says Constantine, looking like he wants a drink.
*DOOM*
Cognito Candy Store
Outer Heaven, Moon
A couple days later
3POV
Hakudōshi is wondering how he ended up in such bizarre circumstances. He's currently being dragged around by a bunch of girls, who have been invited to try the latest candies. It's a safe peaceful place and he didn't have an interest in candy, so why did the girls convince him. He hopes he isn't picking up any traits from his father Ash Grey.
The seven girls - Eri, Daniya, Ace, Abby, Altera, Tia, and Jack - are all having a good time. They are all cute girls with complicated backstories and absurd amounts of power. If someone tried to mess with them on Earth, they wouldn't last ten seconds against them. Hakudōshi's train of thought is interrupted when Eri pops chocolate into his mouth and the girls giggle at his expression.
The Cognito Candy Store looks like something out of original Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory from 1971, which was based on 1964 novel Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl. Cognito supplied the kids with many films and Willy Wonka and the 2005 remake directed by Tim Burton. According to his father, the 2005 version was more accurate to the book, but updated to the modern era, except for Tim Burton's daddy issues.
"So, what will you try next little ladies. Minty Chocotruffles? Swiss Mocha Ecstasy? Chocolate Gooey Bunches? Cosmonutty Fudge? We even have the latest version of Ultrafudge candy. Version 6.6.6 is the latest creation by the great chocolatier. "
The great chocolatier is not Willy Wonka in this world, but a former European supervillain who Cognito forcibly recruited. Cognito's solution to superpowered criminals is either complete de-empowerment and looting of any useful abilities and/or knowledge or forcibly recruitment and reformation. This has not always ended in complete success.
Next to the Candy Store is Cognito Chips and Snack foods, which is most famous for their Potato Chips. Backyard Barbeque, Salt and Vinegar, Sour Cream and Onion, Sweet and Spicy Jalapeno, Flamin' Hot, and Roasted Chicken being the most popular flavors. The inventor must have slipped back into his original madness because he somehow made Pickled Chimichanga with Sweet-and-Sour Sauce chips. These chips also had the bizarre ability to make people act like Deadpool. After the villain was recaptured, an exorcism was performed to remove the eldritch parasite that managed to escape Cognito's scanners.
Hakudōshi has had enough candy and turns to look around the mall, when he sees someone, he didn't expect.
"John Constantine!?"
The infamous British occult detective turns at the voice and is surprised it's a child with long lilac hair. People yelling at him is Very common, but most of them are either angry men, angry women, or angry demons. Normal kids don't know about him.
"That's the name, kid. Who are you?"
"Hakudōshi, son of Ash Grey."
"Ash Grey." says Constantine, remembering his past encounters, "You don't look like him?"
"We are all adopted?"
Constantine looks at the collection of young girls. His supernatural senses are detecting something hidden, which is putting him on alert.
"All of you?"
"Eri is the adopted daughter of the Quirk Heroes. Ace is the adopted daughter of Rorschach. He has other girls, but they are busy. Abby, Altera, Tia, and Jack are Ash's newest daughters."
Constantine raises an eye and Hakudōshi can guess the unasked question.
"As your guess, none of us are what you would call normal."
"I can tell that by the hair colors, but I'm also sensing something. It's a feeling I get when I'm around people that are way stronger than they appear."
"You can keep secrets, so I guess full intros." says Hakudōshi, "I'm the immortal heart of a fantasy world's demon king."
"Wha? Your serious? Reverse Isekai?"
"How do you know the Japanese term?"
"A few years ago, some delusional kids got the idea of reincarnating into another world. Their souls didn't end up in a fantasy world."
"Eri is a metahuman who can reverse time on a person or object."
"She is a sweetheart. Ultimate healer, huh?"
"Daniya is from an Alternate Universe. The daughter of Raven and Danny Phantom. This means she part-human, part-ghost, part-demon metahuman sorceress."
"I'm aware that Raven is Trigon's daughter. So, we also have Trigon's granddaughter. I hope her mother's ascension keeps her safe."
"She has a ton of protectors." says Hakudōshi, with a confidant smirk, "Ace was the test subject of a government black ops project. They were trying to create psychic warriors, until Rorschach shut them down hard."
"Psychic warriors. Bloody Morons. Those kinds of projects have been around since the 1940s and nearly every single one has ended in disaster. Those wankers are either destroyed by subjects rebelling or other factions that learn about them."
"Government Intelligence is an oxymoron." says Haku, "Abby, Altera, Tia, and Jack are the newest additions. They are also from another universe, one where figures of history, myth, and legend can be summoned. They are Servants – familiar incarnations of quasi-divine Heroic Spirits."
"So, who are they?" says Constantine, not recognizing the children. There aren't many child heroes in history or mythology that he can think of. It's possible they are child incarnations of heroes, but then who they can be, can be anyone.
"Abby is Abigail Williams from the Salem Witch Trials. I won't go into all the details, but her power involves an Outer God."
Constantine pales at that. While he has fought against the infernal beings of hell, he tends to avoid cases that involve eldritch abominations and alien gods. He would rather deal with enemies that he knows how to combat, than an unknown horror.
"Altera is a female child version of Atilla the Hun, who in that universe was the core of a god-slaying alien horror."
Constantine wishes he didn't ask questions. Haku understands why his father takes joy in revealing horrific truths to others.
"Tia is a child version of Tiamat – the Mesopotamian primordial goddess of the sea."
"A child goddess." says Constantine with a sense of defeat.
"Jack or Jackie is Jack the Ripper."
"You have got to be joking."
"I'm aware that Jack the Ripper in this world was Dr. Jonathan "John" Kelsey, a doctor who operated near Whitechapel."
"How do you know that!? I only know that because of murder demon Calibraxis."
"Dad told me some interesting stories. Did you know one of the victims would have made a cure for cancer that would have also made blood poisonous to vampires? Did you known one of the victims would have a child with Jason Blood and become a despot worse than Hitler?"
"How does he know this stuff?"
"He read about it in another world." says Haku, "Jackie is different than Dr. Kelsey. Her true nature is that of a collection of wraiths born from the aborted children of prostitutes in Whitechapel, London".
"I just remembered why I came to this place."
"Yes?"
"The Bar. I was going to get memory-destroying drunk. Thank you for reminding me."
*DOOM*
John Constantine walks into the pub and sits down at the bar. The bartender – a tall handsome muscular man with perfect black hair and a handlebar mustache – walks over to the man.
"What will it be, Mr. Constantine?"
"How do you know my name?"
"You're infamous in the occult circles and many patrons have come to this place to forget about you."
"Ouch. So, what's your strongest drink?"
"Our Top Three are Cognito's most feared mixed drinks.
The first photo resembles a wine glass filled with ice that sparkles like diamonds.
"Ancient Diamond Horror – Also known as Drevniy Almaznyy Uzhas is an extremely strong Russian drink that undiluted causes terrifying hallucinations. If prepared with ice, it looks like sparkling crystals, causes Euphoria and awakens the most pleasant memories. It was crafted a Russian witch to help her poor grandson punish an evil nobleman. When the boy drank it, he could not feel the whip of the nobleman and could only remember the good times with the woman he loved. When the nobleman drank the undiluted form, he went mad and committed suicide."
The next is a dark translucent red-purple drink in a shot glass. Constantine recognizes the drink immediately, as he was the one that invented it.
"The Unholy Brew – A drink crafted by John Constantine using arcane plants. It's capable of making even the most powerful magi with poison resistance severely intoxicated with a single cup. Even the scent of the drink can make normal human act intoxicated. If not made with Holy water, it's literally toxic to both the body and soul."
"How the bloody hell do you know how to make it!?"
"You sold the rights to the drink to The Immortal. That guy was only immortal due to a demon contract and when that demon was destroyed by Obsidian Black along with the rest of Hell, he became mortal again. He went into Cognito's witness protection, and all his property ended up in Cognito's hands."
"You do know The Immortal was serial killer and dark sorcerer, right? He used to sacrifice a dozen people a year for hundreds of years, and he only stopped because I got him addicted to that drink."
"When Cognito gave him a new life as a mortal human, we wiped his memories and sealed his magical abilities. I think he's selling life insurance now." says the bartender.
The last drink photo is a clear liquid with opalescent bubbles, served in a metal cup.
"Cognito Cranium Crusher – A mixed drink based on Rick Sanchez's Recollection Remover. It's a powerful drink that guarantees the drinker will not remember the past three hours, no matter what the alien science, psychic ability, or magical spell. "
"That one sounds very good."
*DOOM*
Cognito Inc R&D
[Location Classified]
Same Time
3POV
"What happened!?" demands Dr. Alex Armstrong as he looks like a smoking crater inside a force field.
"The Sonic Screwdriver..." says one stunned scientist, shocked by his near death.
A Sonic Screwdriver is a multifunctional tool in the British science fiction television program Doctor Who and its spin-offs, used by the Doctor. After acquiring one from Cadmus, Cognito Inc was able to mass-produce lesser versions for the R&D sector.
"What about it!?"
"We were using a Sonic Screwdriver to tune the reaction, but..."
"But it caused unstable reaction."
Dr. Armstrong, merely an incarnation of Rorschach as is Doctor Genus, easily figured out what happened.
The reaction was supposed to generate Albedesium – A silvery-white meta-metal resembling platinum. It was designed to have aspects of various metallic elements, including the conductivity of silver, the ductility of gold, the strength of titanium, and heat resistance of the element tungsten. The process would also generate a substance called Toxigen – an extremely poisonous waste product of the process.
"Take Doctor Smith and assistants to the cloning labs, they are going to need new bodies."
"What do you mean!?" says the scared Doctor.
"The Toxigen from the explosion inhibits cell division, prevents regeneration, inhibits magic, and interferes with nanomachines. It would be too resource-intensive to cure you, so it's best just to grab new bodies. Don't worry, Project Phoenix Insurance covers this."
"Completely new bodies." says one of the assistants, sounding hopeful.
"Yes. We can have you placed in a female clone. Cognito Inc is aware of your transgender desires and will accommodate."
"Best! Job! Ever!"
*DOOM*
Cognito-Gotham
Gotham City
Late Evening
3POV
"Why do people join large noisy and violent mobs? It is because it gives them anonymity. In mob, you are not a person who must face the consequences of your actions, you're a group of unknowns that can act as a group. As a person, you must obey the law, at least on the surface. As a mob, you can let go of the rules." says Rorschach, in front of an incapacitated mob, "What happens when I take that Anonymity away?"
Minutes ago, almost a hundred anti-Cognito protesters began to riot. They had protested Cognito Inc. taking away jobs from people, destroying Gotham heritage, and oppressing the citizens. In truth, Cognito Inc. got rid of many incompetent people from jobs they should never have possessed, destroyed parts of the city that were nests for criminals and illegal activities, and came down like a hammer on criminals.
The mob thought they could yell, throw trash and Molotov cocktails, and maybe fire a few shots off with their illegal guns. They were wrong.
The Crowd Control Disruptor – A non-lethal wide-range directed energy weapon that disrupts the voluntary muscle movements of the targets. One shot of this weapon and the entire crowd flopped to the ground, unable to move, but able to hear Rorschach's speech. Also, thankfully, there are Cognito robots flying around to provide medical aid to those that fell to the ground wrong and extinguish the two that fell on their flaming bottles of gasoline.
"Cognito cameras have taken pictures of your faces and you have all been identified. Look at that, half of you have long criminal records and most of your employers were organized crime bosses. Even if Cognito hadn't eliminated those fools, either one of the Bat family, another of the crime families, or a super criminal would have wiped them out in less than six months."
One of the faces of the rioters appears on a huge holographic screen visible to everyone.
A thin man with brown eyes, short brown hair, and a long narrow face.
"You were fired from Trident Intercontinental Shipping. You only got the job because of your cousin, you were drunk on the job, and you accepted bribes to look the other way for certain shipments. If someone competent was doing this job, maybe abducted children wouldn't have been shipped out."
A once handsome blue-eyed blonde with a gaunt face and deep bags under his eyes.
"You were manager of the Regal Hotel, until you failed the drug test. You could have gotten the job back with a little rehab, but you couldn't give up the Cocaine. Cognito also had nothing to do with your wife leaving with the kids, she was in love with a much better man and the kids were his."
An overweight Asian man with dark eyes behind glasses and bowl cut hair style.
"You ran a computer repair store and online otaku shop. You were shut down when Cognito noticed the tax evasion. While I can't arrest you for being an obnoxious internet troll, I can arrest you for distributing underage porn."
A tall, muscular weightlifter with green eyes, a military buzzcut, and a growing waist.
"Your girlfriend left you to be with a Cognito employee. I guess she liked a strong handsome sober guy who's willing to romance her over an alcoholic loser who spends all his time with frat buddies. You also weren't fired due to the Cognito employee, your employer discovered those racism comments you made and the unsanitary work at the restaurant."
A tall, lean man with pale blue eyes, unhealthy pale skin, and long stringy black hair
"You are serial killer responsible for the deaths of eight women and two children. You haven't been able to kill anyone in six months due to the Cognito Camera surveillance. You will be taken to prison and with the evidence collected by Cognito, you will never see the light of day again."
Batman and Robin are watching from a nearby rooftop. They watch as images of Rorschach appear in front of each rioter and reveal their history.
"Wow. Without the anonymity of the mob, most rioters would be too scared to cause trouble. Cognito doesn't care about privacy and will investigate anyone for anything." says Robin, "Most companies don't have the resources to go after every single problem they encounter, but Cognito doesn't have that problem."
"It also means Cognito Inc is untouchable. They can do anything they desire, and nobody will attempt to stop them without risking their own reputation." says Batman with a frown, "Cognito creates their own rules."
"Didn't Cognito donate to the GCPD?"
*DOOM*
Gotham City Police Department
3POV
"So, what fancy new gear did those Cognito guys donate?" says Detective Harvey Bullock.
A Tech Support Guy – a typical nerdy looking guy standing tall and thin with messy hair and glasses – opens the first Cognito box and pulls out black vests.
"Cognito-Brand Body Armor. Composed of patented nanomaterials it can stop multiple shots from firearms including armor-piercing shots from 50 Cal anti-material rifles. The body armor is also stab proof from knives and piercing weapons, and most importantly contains directed energy diffusion fields."
"What fields?"
"It's designed to spot directed energy weapons like lasers and ray guns. With the advance in new age weapons and the increase in extraterrestrials this is a good idea," explains the Tech Support Guy, "The vests are also hydrophobic, stain-proof, and regulate temperature even in scorching summer or freezing winter. They made OP Armor that is super comfortable!"
A Tech Support guy opens the second Cognito box and pulls out a thick looking high-tech gun. A second case contains the shells for the gun, which makes it look like a grenade launcher.
"NI-50 - A weapon designed to fire a cloud of nanomechanical infiltrators designed to disable electronic and electrical devices, without harming organic beings. It can be used to shut down everything from vehicles to Lexcorp powered armor. It doesn't work on techno-organics or high-tier Cognito technology."
"That would have been useful a few months ago, when Gotham had a bunch of lunatics with gadgets running around." says Bullock.
The Tech Support Guy pulls out a rifle-like weapon, sleeker, but the same matte black as the previous gun.
"The Web Bombardier – A large rifle-like weapon that fires a nano polymer adhesive net used to entangle targets. It has a Brute-rating so it can stop those with superhuman strength like metahumans and those on the Venom derivatives. It comes with cartridges of web fluid and a spray meant to remove the net."
"Sounds like it would be fun to use. Like the time I buried my cousin in silly string." says one cop.
"Don't forget these weapons were meant to take on people far stronger than us. If we get careless, we will get ripped apart like wet tissue paper." says Commissioner Gordon, the symbol of good cops in Gotham City.
"They also included something just for you commissioner." says the Tech Support, handing the man a metal case. Inside is high tech weapon resembling a revolver. As Commissioner Gordon picks up the gun, there is an electronic voice.
"ID Confirmed. ID Lock Released."
The Tech Support quickly explains.
"It has a biometric sensor in the grip, so only you can use the gun. According to the instructions, it's a Variable Blaster Magnum – A directed energy handgun with variable rays."
"This would also mean Cognito has my biometric data in order to program this." says Gordon, looking at the gun with suspicion.
"What does 'variable ray' mean?" says a confused Bullock.
"Rorschach has fancy ray guns with a bunch of effects. This one gun can fire multiple kinds of shots." says the Tech Support, "It can fire an incapacitating stun shot, an anti-metal shot for machines and armor, a penetrating force shot, a blinding flare, an anti-magic bullet for supernatural targets, and light bullets that imitate real bullets. Holy shit, this gun has Infinite Ammo! It's also self-cleaning and self-repairing, so it never needs to the serviced."
There is a lot of noise from the surrounding cops, Commissioner Gordon got an OP weapon and some of them are Jealous.
"There is also a note from Cognito." says the Tech Support guy before reading the laminated note, "Cognito has removed most of Gotham's organized and super-criminal elements, making it easier for normal and extraordinary police officers to maintain peace in Gotham City. In this new era, the greatest threats are those criminals with access to advanced technology and metahumans that choose crime over stable jobs, so we have supplied the police departments we the needed hardware free of charge. Keep doing the good work."
The police officers seem to be happy at those words.
"PS. We gifted the Variable Blaster Magnum to Commissioner James Worthington "Jim" Gordon for multiple reasons. Even among the finest of the GCPD, he is exceptional and has stood against the most corrupt of Gotham City. "
There are some cheers from the surrounding cops
"You are also the most trusted ally of Batman and the Bat Family, so we believe you need additional protection. The last thing the city needs is a more moody, vengeful Batman running around because a good cop got hurt."
The surrounding cops get the idea.
*DOOM*
Doctor Genus's Control Room
[Classified]
3POV
The head of Cognito Inc., the smartest mammal in the universe (if not multiverse), and the super genius incarnation of Rorschach, sits on a floating throne surrounded by holographic screens. The floating throne is designed for the ultimate comfort to help keep Doctor Genus's stress levels down, while he works on solving the problems of the universe. Doctor Genus has even installed a stereo music system so he can listen to music while doing his work.
"Next on the Agenda: Planets with Problems" says an electronic female voice.
[Planet 3465-2743 "The Girly Planet"]
One screen shows a blue-green world rotating on its axis. A second screen shows its inhabitants. They all resemble humans, but they have inhuman hair colors of green, blue, and purple. They also have sclera the same color of their irises and patterns of tiny spots the color of their hair going down the sides of their bodies. Most are (barely) dressed in translucent form-fitting clothing, but some are dressed in flowing elaborate white robes decorated in gold and silver. There is also a dark-skinned girl dressed in less expensive clothing with a collar indicating she is a servant/slave. The screen then shifts to show the same kind of people dressed in radically different clothing, indicating a different culture.
The Girly Planet – Thousands of years ago, a dark witch unleashed a magic plague and wiped out the male gender, so only women exist on the world. To survive, they called upon the power of a goddess to allow them to perform parthenogenesis, essentially giving birth to genetic copies of themselves. This led to a strict magicrastic theocracy with a caste system. Due to the actions of a rival goddess, one group developed technology. Eventually with the development of biotechnology that could replace magical parthenogenesis with a diploid form, their rebellion became open.
"Diploid is a superior method of reproduction as it allows the combination of genes and diversity to breed out weakness. The rebellion against the theocracy would be more open to Cognito, so Cognito will support the rebels. Destroy the Goddess Pillar and assassinate the Royal family."
[Termination of Goddess Pillar]
[Assassination of Royal Family]
"With the Goddess Pillar destroyed, the followers will be cut off from their Goddess on the material plane. The destruction of the royal family, the Goddess's chosen, will shatter society. This should allow the rebellion to advance and change society".
*Click*
[Planet 3948-8646 "The Metal Blob"]
The planet on screen is not a normal, healthy planet. Instead, it's rotating orb of gray. The surface view is even more horrific as everything is an amorphous mixture of metallic gray substance and translucent goo, with numerous matte black cables forming a mesh throughout the translucent substance. It's like tons of plastic, metal and electrical systems had been melted down and sculpted into a giant-size model of the muddy ocean floor. A tiny screen shows a test where a white lab mouse (the most generic test animal in existence) was dropped on the surface. In seconds, black tendrils extend into the mouse's twitching body, then the mouse turns into a gray blob that is completely absorbed into the surrounding mass.
The Metal Blob Planet – A century ago, an extraplanetary meteorite crashed into the planet containing a techno-organic virus. It transformed various organisms into a fusion of flesh advance machinery. The planet was at mid 1940s technology level, so they weren't able to resist the spreading infection of all-assimilating creatures. Eventually all life was transformed into a planet-spanning techno-organic blob. Sensors indicate the minds of all assimilated life forms continue to exist in a dream-like collective consciousness.
"Begin creation of a virus to separate the various minds of assimilated and separate them into techno-organic bodies."
[Creation and Plantwide Implementation of Techo-Organic Conscious Origin Generating Virus]
[Name shortened to TO-COG Virus]
"Once they have their own bodies, they will need a lot of psychological help to recover. Estimate the number of sentient humanoid patients."
[2.3 million]
"This is the reason I'm creating vacation spots and planets of psychologists in the microverses. Have the patients transported to the PSI-1 who accelerated mental health."
[Acknowledged]
The next plant is dirty yellow-brown color which is not a good sign. The surface level shows deserts, sickly plants, burnt out decaying cities, and massive craters filled with contaminated water. This looks like a world straight out of Fallout, a world that has been ravaged by global-scale nuclear war. A change of screen shows pale-skinned humanoids with large black eyes, white hair, and pointed ears working in an unground bunker when they are attacked by large black robots that tear through the walls.
[Planet 8662-8895 "The Mostly Dead Planet"]
The Mostly Dead Planet – Two centuries ago, a late twenty-first century civilization's population of ten billion was wiped out in violent war and the aftermath. The post-apocalyptic world is inhabited by bioroids constructed in underground shelters. The bioroids are peaceful, but superior physiology and less extreme emotions. The problem is the AI war machines that seek to destroy the "non-citizens".
"Eliminate the war machine factories and implant AI Killer virus into their network. Solve environmental problems with Terraforming Project Six."
[Total Destruction of Hostile AI War Machines]
[Deployment of Genesis Seeds]
"The Genesis Seeds will restore the planet's biosphere and consume the radioactive particles, but it will also mean the people will permanently lose access to all nuclear technology. A small price to pay for a healthy world."
[Planet 8895-6479 "Flying Snowball"]
[Planet 8895-6480 "Unlucky World"]
Two worlds appear. One is a faintly spinning gray-and-white planet producing a trail of ice and fragments like a comet. The other is a common habitable blue-green world. The surface scans are also very different. One is a frozen world completely covered in ice and oceans of liquified gas with a starry sky above. The other is a verdant world with structures and technology around those of Medieval Europe. The natives are also humanoid, but have deep blue skin, black eyes, and have a single stripe of hair like a natural mohawk. Silver necklaces also seem to hold some sort of religious and cultural significance.
The Flying Snowball Planet – Due to the use of a proto-matter-based super weapon, all gravity and fusion ceased inside the home star and the planet was thrown into the depths of space. The lack of a home star has resulted in planet being completely frozen, including ice oceans and liquification of the atmosphere. The Ice Planet is now on collision course with another inhabited world with medieval level technology.
"The Unlucky World is too primitive and remote to be useful. If they were I would annihilate the Flying Snowball when it was close to the Unlucky Planet as a demonstration of Cognito superiority." Says Doctor Genus, with a mad scientist smirk, "Portal the Flying Snowball into a pocket dimension, use a stealth screen so the Unlucky World doesn't notice. No point in scaring the primitives when it doesn't benefit you."
[Acknowledged. Portal Plan in Progress.]
A pale blue world from orbit with numerous artificial satellites orbiting. Satellites are important because the Cognito probes must avoid the sensors of the spy satellites. On the surface, the humanoid natives have the large, pointed ears and layer of fur their animal ancestors possessed. Most have fur ranging from white to black, going through all shades of yellow brown with varying stripes. They also have sharp teeth and black claw-like nails.
News reports show odd looking members of the race dressed in orange with metal bands around their necks and ankles. These unique members of the race either have unique markings or radically different colors like aqua blue and fiery red. The News then shows a scarlet-red female releasing fire from her hands at black-clad soldiers.
[Planet 9096- 8785 "Meta Fascist Planet"]
The Meta Fascist Planet – On a world where humanoids developed superpowers, this occurred a hundred years ago when their technological level late 21st century. The governments oppressed those with powers, forcing them to either work for them or be imprisoned or having then killed in camps. The last group is an island nation of free superhumans that is about to be invaded by the world's militaries.
"Have a copy of 9096-8785 made in a microverse and transfer all surviving SPBs to that world."
[Construction of Planet 9096-8785-B in Micro 2093-6544]
[Name "Freedom Planet" assigned to Planet 9096-8785-B]
[Planning Teleportation of 285,353 SPBs from Fascist Planet to Freedom Planet.]
"Pause." says Doctor Genus as he looks over the history of the Fascist Planet. "Major economic and social problems dating back a century before the appearance of SPBs. The governments were using the SPBs as scapegoats for their own corruption. 85% chance of major government collapse within 10 years of removal of SPBs. 78% of Global war with Class 4 Apocalypse... No big loss to Cognito. Continue. "
The next world is a cotton candy pink planet. On the surface are huge verdant forests, massive fields, and pink trees. The sky is blue and clear, with the occasional streak of rainbow-color light. Civilization includes many small houses, including tree houses, surrounding a castle made of pale purple-pink crystal. The natives are sentient mammalians capable of bipedal and quadrupedal movement. They also have huge expressive eyes and glittery fur all the colors of the rainbow.
The image shifts and now instead of a nauseatingly cure scene, the scene more resembles a heavy metal poster. An arid wasteland with fiery streaks going through the dark red sky like falling stars. The natives of this world are tall, thin humanoids with long limbs ending in sharp black nails. They are hairless with scarred skin that is different shades of brown, mouths of sharp teeth, and large bat-like ears. Their eyes are shining gold with black sclera, and they have horns ranging from small and few as one to five long curved horns. Unlike the Cute race, they are dressed in clothing with armor and weapons.
[Planet 9752-5260 "The Cute Planet"]
The Cute Planet – A planet of adorable little animal creatures that live in forever abundant farms and flowering fields. A place where love, kindness, and positive emotions fuel magic that heals, protects, and purifies.
"A complete Sugar Bowl. It's so saccharine, I'm getting a toothache and nausea from the video."
A place that has an alternate universe filled with powerful demons that constantly fight for resources and adapt to an ever-changing environment. Beings that can turn negative emotion into magic that changes and destroys targets. Occasionally, a small number escape to the sweet world and battle its guardians for resources."
An image of mural appears. The mural depicts a humanoid female with immensely long hair with her clapped hands above her head. On one side is a peaceful flowery world and the other is a savage violent world. Another bit of video shows a woman with rainbow-color eyes and long flowing white hair that sparkles like snow in sunlight. She is sitting on a throne of crystal and looks like she is centuries old. She also has features like both demons and cute creatures, and wears clothing.
"Vile Villain, Saccharine Show" says Doctor Genus, referring to a trope where sweet shows can have intimidating and frightening villains, "This dimensional divide isn't natural. The world was supposed to have both positive and negative magic, but some airhead princess with divine blood created the divide. Thankfully, creating this barrier permanently drained her divine power so she can't do it again or do something equally stupid."
Doctor Genus pauses, then gives command.
"Destroy the barrier between Cute World's light and dark dimensions."
[Complete Destruction of Cute Planet's Barrier]
"I have a feeling this world would cause problems in the future."
*DOOM*
Kent Household
Metropolis
October 15, 2016
18:15
1POV
I'm visiting the Kent Household. The place looks a little different due to Cognito making a few upgrades. They wanted to make sure nothing would ever happen to Superman's family, so they added all kinds of security and childproofing. Hidden sensors and security cameras monitor things, even capable of detecting the League of Shadows using magical camouflage or stealth tech. The building itself is even reinforced, with so much super advance nanomaterials, to the point it could survive a nuke. There is even a panic room and Cognito escape teleporter
Nearly four-year-old Jonathan Kent can walk and climb the room without fearing getting hurt. What I want to know is why he's clinging to me!?
"Still nervous around babies and toddlers?" asks Lois, holding her daughter Lara.
"I can face unimaginable horrors and slaughter entire armies with a smile on my face, but when it comes to babies, I'm a wreck. I'm terrified I could harm one." I admit, glad I'm not blushing in embarrassment, "I was the same way in my previous life. I was a big man, but I couldn't hold my niece for more than minute without nearly getting a panic attack."
"Have your wives talked about having children?"
"No. I've never hid my nervousness, so they know, and according to the Docs my ability to have children is linked to my feelings."
"You do have many adopted children."
"There is a big difference between a tiny helpless baby and a bunch of kids who can take on armies. It doesn't help that I am Doomsday, I can Break Anything."
I don't want to think about what will happen when my adopted daughters start dating.
"What are they thinking!?" comes a loud shout and I glad for the distraction.
I walked into the next room to see Matt looking at his Cognito brand tablet.
Matt, formerly known as Project: Match, was a failed clone of Superman created by Cadmus Alpha, the predecessor to Project Kr (Superboy) and Project Qliphoth (Me). Without Rorschach and Cognito Inc, he would have degenerated into a hideously deformed feral creature. Instead, Rorschach was able to heal him completely and allow him to live a normal life. Since he's pure-Kryptonian (instead of possessing human DNA like Connor), he possesses all the Kryptonian superpowers including X-Ray Vision, Heat Vision, and Flight. He's a Cognito-brand Corporate Hero, but he still hasn't decided on an official permanent Cape name and ended up with dumb names on the forums.
"Another dumb name?"
"They are calling me Powerman."
"Like the band or the Marvel character?"
PowerMan 5000 is an American rock band who I mostly remember for "Drop the Bombshell". The name Powerman was used by three Marvel Heroes – the size-changing Erik Josten, the unbreakable Luke Cage, and qi-powered Victor Albvarez.
PowerMan can also be considered the male equivalent to the Earth-Two counterpart of Supergirl - Power Girl.
"It sounds so dumb. Super-man and Power-man."
"It could be worse."
"How?"
"Lady Cola, Marshal Salt, and Lord Hamster."
Three Heroes with very dumb names.
Lady Cola – A corporate superheroine sponsored by a carbonated soft drink company – Coca Cola. She is a Clear Metahuman, but instead of merely manipulating water, she can manipulate any form of liquid matter from oil to liquid plastic to liquid metal. Her limitation is she can't change the temperature or other properties of the liquid and she can only control a limited amount of mass and volume.
She considers herself a rival of Blue Rose – the Cognito-sponsored Next heroine of Cognito who also has a deal to be sponsored by the soft drink company PepsiCo.
Marshal Salt – A corporate hero and former US Marshal. While transporting a group of dangerous metahuman criminals to a secure facility, they attempted to escape. The Marshal was badly injured and triggered his meta-ability, which transformed the prisoners into salt. He left the Marshal service because the government was taking an unhealthy interest in him, and he ended up becoming a Hero for a snack food company who is best known for processed nuts. He has the Melt meta-ability to manipulate any form of Salt, but he hasn't displayed his transmutation ability since that day.
The former US Marshal is now nearly as famous as Mr. Peanut – the top hat and monocle wearing mascot of the Planters snack foods company.
Lord Hamster – A chubby Red-type Metahuman whose power is the ability to transform into a Giant Hamster. Despite looking like a cute pet enlarged to immense size, he possesses immense strength and surprising agility for its size. He's even able to enhance the fur to block steel weapons and can burrow through concrete and stone, making him ideal for search & rescue operations.
He's also considered one of the least-offensive heroes with tons of photos of him being hugged by people, mostly children. The only problem he has caused is when his fur caused an allergic reaction, but one trip to Cognito medical and not only was her reaction cleared, but she no longer had any allergies.
"You have a point." says Matt, "At Least we aren't caught up with that mess with American Sentinels."
American Sentinels is a non-Cognito corporate Hero Team on the West Coast. Their five main members are called Agent Sigma, Jade Avenger, Trickster Phantom, Kid Poison, and Marshal Tremor.
Agent Sigma is one of the many clones of Slade Wilson created by Cadmus. This one was an experimental clone that was released by Rorschach and has turned itself into a hero team leader. Dressed in patriotic clothing and a white mask, he reminds me of the marvel superheroes known as Citizen V.
Agent Sigma recently found out he's going to be a father.
Jade Avenger is a green-skinned woman who possesses immense strength and a love of nature. She reminds me of She-Hulk, only an environmentalist and botanist instead of a Lawyer. Any person dumb enough to pollute the area around her is going to end up in a dumpster.
Jade Avenger recently found out she was pregnant with Agent Sigma's child.
Trickster Phantom is a former phantom thief that has the powers of flight and intangibility. Since the victims of his crimes were all revealed to be heinous criminals, the courts were willing to let him go if he joined a sponsored team.
Trickster Phantom was dating Jade Avenger, until he learned she cheated on him and was pregnant with Agent Sigma's child.
Kid Poison in his stylish hazmat suit can generate chemicals that can both heal and harm. His story is rather twisted with his father poisoning his mother to get her money and her survival due to him absorbing the poison in the womb. His father was arrested, but he was born generating dangerous toxins.
Kid Poison was a part of the Team until he learned of Agent Sigma and Jade Avenger's affair. It turns out he has strong opinions about extramarital relationships.
Marshal Tremor can manipulate the Earth around him, molding it with simple movements. A friend of Marshal Salt that triggered in the same metahuman prison transport escape. He did work for the government for a time, but when his handlers ordered him to chase a criminal instead of helping people trapped in a collapsed building, he knew he needed a career change.
Marshal Tremor that doesn't care about the Affair as he's dealing with problems with taxes and his agent.
How do I know all this crap? The local news won't shut up about it.
"Any trouble finding a birthday gift for Jon?" asks Matt, changing the subject.
*START OF FLASHBACK*
Metropolis Mega Mall
A few hours ago.
1POV
The Metropolis Mega Mall is an impressive place. It makes the Avalon Mall in St John's Newfoundland look tiny in comparison. I remember going to that mall many times, always getting something to eat at Mary Browns in the Food Court and sometimes getting books at Cole's. I used to buy movies, too. I'm currently eating warm buttery soft pretzels as I look for something appropriate for Baby Jon, the future Superboy. I'm horrible at buying gifts for other people as I never know what they want unless I ask them. My best hope is to buy a bunch of Gift Cards at the Toy stores and let Jon pick out what he wants. I also want to get Gift Cards from the Bookstores since I want the kid to read.
"I should also get the same for Damian."
Suddenly, there is a bunch of loud shouting.
On one side is a businessman, his wife, and his daughter. The man is short, round, and overweight with blue eyes, bald head, and a thick gray beard. His wife is tall, curvy, young beauty with blue eyes and long blonde hair done in a ponytail with a thick lock cover her right eye. The daughter is blue-eyed blonde in pigtails and a pink party dress.
"It's not my fault!" says the businessman, in front of his wife and daughter, "I told you there would be side effects."
On the other side are three weirdos. One is a huge man standing over two meters tall and has the weight a sumo wrestler. He has red eyes, milk-white skin, and not a single hair lacking even eyebrows and eyelashes. One is a tall, lean man standing a little taller than the first man (2.1m) with solid white eyes, white skin, and long flowing white hair. The third is a very short (1.3 m), very muscular man with red eyes, white skin, short white hair, and a white goatee. They are all dressed in form-fitting black bodysuits with white jackets marked with a corporate logo.
"Side effects – we look like albinos." says the first man, almost crying, "I also had wonderful hair, just like my mama. Now, I'm bald!"
"I thought that elasticity would be fun, but I haven't been able to get it up since the transformation. I'm married you jack ass." says the second, "My wife wants kids! Now, I'm a wet noodle."
"At least the two of you got to stay tall, I was a basketball player and now I'm shorter than Peter Dinklage!"
"Who?" asks the little girl.
"He plays Tyrion Lannister on Game of Thrones." says the third to the little girl.
"Oh!" says the mother and daughter with recognition.
"Excuse me." I say, showing my Cognito SPB ID to both groups, "Ash Grey – Cognito SPB Division. What seems to be the problem?"
"These men are threatening me and my family!" says the businessman.
"And your side?" I ask the third man, who looks the sanest of the three.
"We used to work for this guy. He said he wanted Heroes for his company but didn't want to pay a fortune for them. Instead, he made us an offer. We would go through a process to gain powers, then the company would market us as their heroes. We would even be allowed to get sponsorship from other companies."
"So, what went wrong? As if I can't guess."
"We should have known he would use cheap crap and when we didn't end up as photogenic as he wanted, he fired us!"
"Why didn't you go to Cognito Medical? They could easily fix your problems."
"We signed a contract that we couldn't reveal the source of our powers."
"That's Illegal." I say, looking at the squirming businessman. "So, is the distribution of unlicensed meta-awakening drugs."
"So... We can get cured?" asks the big one.
"Yes. You can also talk to legal about suing this man."
"What about the threats they made!?" says the Businessman.
"Do you have evidence they made a threat? They have evidence you messed up their genetics."
"Augustus, you Bastard! I'll kill you and your family!" screams a voice.
I turn to see a fourth man dressed in a tattered uniform. He's taller than number two and wider than number one, but he's disfigured with huge asymmetrical limbs and white skin that looks like pulsating melted wax. His eyes, including the sclera, are blood red and instead of hair he has strips of white plastic-like flesh. He's charging like a crazy berserker, foaming at the mouth, and damaging the floor in his charge.
I step in front of the businessman and his family, as the monstrous man leaps into the air and comes down with a strike with his largest deformed limb. The force is immense enough to cause me to create a crater beneath my feet. I don't bend, but I'm like a chisel being hammered into marble.
I respond with my own punch. The mother and the little girl are smart and protect their ears. The three fired employees are protected from the vibrations by their elastic powers. The businessman is rendered deaf by the shockwave, but Cognito Medicine can easily fix that.
As the mutated employee, he's sent soaring into the air, rattling the windows in the shops. He will probably land in Gotham Bay assuming no Hero catches him.
"Aren't you glad we discussed things like normal people?" I say with my shark smile.
"Yes, Sir." says the nervous three.
"I'd better phone this in."
*END OF FLASHBACK*
"Nothing worth noting."
*DOOM*
Cadmus Cloning Lab "Last Order"
[Location Classified]
October 15, 2016
Late Night
The masked mercenary walks down the dark hallways of the abandoned Cadmus facility with caution. The abandoned labs of amoral scientists cannot be considered safe. Many times, he has entered such places, only to be attacked by feral Genomorphs, insane clones of both scientists and soldiers, out of control security robots, and horribly mutated life forms. A former comrade of Slade compared them to the hardcore levels of Resident Evil franchise. A comrade that ended up melted into a muddy puddle, bones and weapons included.
"I'm not getting paid enough for this freakshow."
Slade Wilson, world famous mercenary, adventurer, and assassin known as Deathstroke the Terminator, looks at the various maturation chambers filled with protoplasmic ooze. Years ago, he donated his DNA to The Light under contract. It was one of the worst decisions he has ever made; outside the ones that cost him his wife's love and his son's health.
The Light decided to expand their Cadmus operations, creating massive bases around the world to conduct their numerous experiments. They need personnel to conduct the experiments, perform maintenance, and provide defense for each base, without authorities becoming aware of the facilities. Their solution was cloning. They created clones of scientists and clones of himself, with modified memories.
He wouldn't have known or cared about the "security guard" clones, but then Cadmus Beta conducted their last experiment – Project Qliphoth. An indestructible monster, who would become the closest ally of the feared Rorschach and their supreme master Cognito Inc. A monster who forced the awakening of the Cadmus Beta clones and brought them to light before the Justice League.
Since then, he has encountered many clones. Some of them are living mundane lives employed by Cognito Inc, finding people to love and protect. Some are working as soldiers hunting down criminals, from common cartel to war criminals to super villains on the run from Cognito. Some of them attempted to hunt him down for his own actions as a mercenary or crimes committed by other clones. Some of the clones from other raided bases have become unstable, from trying to act like a Bond villain to foaming at the mouth insane. It's terrible for both his patience and reputation.
Slade turns and points his gun at someone standing in the shadows.
"Would you kindly not point that gun at me. I'm unarmed."
Slade lowers his gun, but still demands, "Who are you!?"
"The new head of the Light's R&D after the tragic passing of Brain and his primate life partner." says the Man – Doctor Anton Barthalomew Sevarius. "Since Cognito has made it hard for us to operate, we have decided to move operations off the world. My creations also need space to spread their wings."
Doctor Sevarius chuckles as he walks closer and Slade instinctively takes a step back, sensing danger.
"Would you kindly not move?"
Slade stops moving and he notices with growing horror, he can't force himself to move.
"That look of horror. You must have believed you were the real Slade Wilson. It must be horrible to realize you're not the person you believe you are. I can understand, I haven't been the person I was in a while" says Dr. Sevarius as his eyes glow and pulling out a vial of red liquid. "Don't be scared or sad. You're about to experience something the original could never even dream about."
*DOOM*
END OF CHAPTER 39