This Chapter describes Lila's plan for Earth Bet. Keep in mind, just because she is super-smart, doesn't mean she has all the information. Her projections on humanity's extinction reflect that.
Lila and Taylor turned a corner in her maze of workbenches to find a holographic projection of suit of armor already waiting for them.
"SANDI, verbal mode," Lila ordered. "Adjust armor for physical manipulation."
"Confirmed," SANDI's voice responded through one of the many speakers in the room.
"Who's Sandy?" Taylor asked. "Is she an actual person sitting in an office somewhere or something else?"
Lila chuckled, "SANDI's a virtual intelligence that I programmed to help me out with things. It stands for Super Advanced Neuro Derived Intelligence. Don't give me a hard time, I was fourteen when I named her. Say hi to Taylor, SANDI."
"Hello, Taylor," the VI responded obediently in a pleasantly feminine voice.
"Any thoughts on what you want your armor to look like?" Lila asked. "Mom really didn't care, so I went with strictly utilitarian. She looks like a SWAT cop, or a PRT officer. That's the basic beginner build," she said, pointing at the projection in the middle of the workspace.
The image in front of them looked exactly as Lila described her mother's armor. Padded armor covering the entire body, including a helmet and face shield.
Taylor appeared to be in deep thought for a minute before speaking. "What's it going to be for?" she asked. "Is it just to protect me, or does it do other things?"
Lila looked at her friend for a moment before answering, "It will enhance your strength a little, but not much. Almost nothing can get through the projection as long as the power lasts. A little under twenty minutes. I thought you should have it, just in case. Brockton Bay isn't the safest city in the world. If the armor cuts on, it'll send me an alert."
"Then what?" Taylor asked, "You come rescue me like Superman rescuing Lois Lane? What do I do if you don't get there in the nick of time?"
"Why wouldn't I get there in the nick of time?" Lila asked. "At most you're on the other side of the city. I can cover that distance in less than five minutes."
"Yeah," Taylor agreed, "but what if I don't want to be rescued? What if I want to rescue myself?"
Lila looked at Taylor for a moment, tuning her psychotherapy and interpersonal skills up to twenty-five percent each, using 100% of her brain. Taylor wouldn't be one to walk away from a fight if she could make a difference. She wasn't asking for armor to protect herself. She was asking for something that would help her protect others.
"I guess I should have expected that," Lila said to herself out loud. "I mean, I'm taking responsibility for humanity, why would I pick a best friend who wouldn't do the same?"
"Best friend, huh?" asked Taylor. "You haven't even known me for a day."
"True, but look around," Lila said gesturing around the room, Taylor following the motion. "You see all this stuff and armor that can make you safe and what is the first thing that comes to your mind?"
"I could be a hero with this." Lila spoke the same words as Taylor at the same time.
"I guess you want to know why I'm not then?" Lila said. "It's a little complicated."
"Well, I'm your best friend," Taylor said with a wry smile, "I think I'll understand."
"Okay," Lila responded before saying to the air, "LAPP, display Project Ark."
The armor disappeared and a new picture formed in the air. It looked like an old fashion water wheel. A British-sounding male voice began speaking, "Current human technology is, relatively speaking, still in the early industrial age. The current level of human technology can be best depicted as shown. Human's use water to move a mechanical wheel in a circle to generate force to produce a workload."
The image quickly shifted from a water wheel crushing grain into flour, to a water wheel producing electricity, then a dam with industrial turbines, and finally a nuclear power plant turning turbines with steam heated by a nuclear reaction.
"The best energy production human technology has to offer is using water to move a motor to produce electricity. There are other methods to move a motor," pictures of wind turbines, gas and diesel turbines. "None of these methods are as energy efficient or renewable as water. There are alternative methods," flashes of solar panels, windmills, and a variety of batteries, "but they each have their own issues...inefficient production, difficult or dangerous biproducts, and environmentally unsound methods of gathering raw materials.
Humanity may seem to have their immediate power problems solved, but this is not true. Even first-world countries must occasionally deal with power grid failures from natural disasters or more critically, Endbringer attacks. Humanity's overall energy production has dropped by two percent over the last five years. With the current frequency of Endbringer and other parahuman attacks, this will lead to a decentralization of all power production no later than the year 2021. Isolated power production can extend the expected survivability of humanity, but only in geographically isolated areas. This will increase the damage and death toll from Endbringer attacks."
"Hold on a minute," Taylor said, and LAPP automatically paused the presentation, which was currently displaying a megacity structure. "Things can't get that bad that quick, can they?"
Lila regarded Taylor for a moment. She could see that Taylor knew as she watched the presentation that it was true. She was just looking for some ray of hope. Lila wouldn't lie to her.
"Taylor, I hate to have to tell you this, but Humanity will be effectively extinct between eight and one hundred fifty years from now," Lila pronounced.
"But…how? Why?" she asked.
"LAPP, pause Project Ark and show Apocalypse One," Lila ordered.
"LAPP, pause," Taylor said. "How many are there?" she asked. When Lila didn't meet her eye, she asked again, "How many?"
"I have eighty-three scenarios spanning one hundred fifty years," Lila replied.
"Why doesn't anyone know," Taylor almost yelled.
"Do you know who Accord is?" Lila asked.
"Yeah, he's some villain in Boston," she replied. "What's he got to do with anything?"
"When I first got my powers, I had a super-intelligence and a brain with direct access to the internet. What do you think the first thing I did was?" Lila asked.
"Read everything you could?" Taylor guessed.
"Yup," Lila responded. "It took me three weeks to read pretty much the entire public internet, plus most of the stuff that's private, but requires registration. Accord used to work for the PTR. His power is just *planning things*. The bigger the problem, the better he is at planning. He wrote up books, compendiums on everything from how to stop world hunger and how to safely generate electricity, to how to plan for and recover from Endbringer attacks. He has all these plans posted on the public internet. He sent his plans to every government on the planet. What do you think they did with them?"
"Nothing?" Taylor guessed.
"Yup," Lila replied, "absolutely nothing. So, he figured if he was a villain, he could at least do something. I think he lost his way, somewhere. Now he just does plans for his own criminal enterprises and other villains. It's so much easier to just do this all myself than trust in a government to do the right thing. Plus, there are some variables out there that throw off my calculations. Simple things, like which cities the Endbringers choose to attack, throw the numbers all over the place. If I were the government, I wouldn't believe me. Just another crazy parahuman who doesn't know what she's talking about."
"Yeah," Taylor said with a thoughtful look on her face as Lila paused. "I can see where that could be an issue. I don't need to see the apocalypse show. Just show me what you're going to do."
"LAPP continue Project Ark," Lila said with a smile.
"Stage one of Project Ark," The VI continued," positions advanced power generators in strategic positions throughout the world," The VI displayed a map showing hundreds of locations and wire diagrams of power generators. "CREEC generators will provide a stable power source for regional areas, including hard-light generators to provide defense against Endbringer assault. The hard-light generators will eventually include a device to counter Simurgh influence."
"WHAT!?" Taylor interrupted causing LAPP to pause his presentation automatically. "You can counter the Simurgh?"
"Uh, no, not exactly," Lila replied. "Not yet anyway. I have to be able to measure whatever energy she is using to mess with people's heads. To do that, I have to go where she is."
"Oh," Taylor said, subdued. There was a reason that the Simurgh was called the Hopekiller. Nobody wanted to be around her when she sang.
"Keep going, LAPP," Lila said.
"Stage two of Project Ark involves destructive strip mining of all available surfaces on the planet. VI-operated hard light mining equipment will mine ore and process it into usable materials. Each megacity population will be responsible for the construction of their own Ark under VI guidance. During Stage two, seed pods will be launched and directed at the planets Venus and Mars. These pods will contain chemical cocktails that will begin the terraforming process. VI operated hard-light miners will mine asteroids and comets within Jupiter's orbit to provide additional raw materials for terraforming, delivered to the planets' surface as needed. Construction of Ark ships and terraforming will be done simultaneously for efficiency and to reduce the time required for the human population to live aboard the arks. Expected embarkation of the Arks is stage two plus twelve years. Expected completion of the terraforming process is stage two plus fifteen years for Venus and stage two plus twenty-three years for Mars. Stage three..."
"LAPP discontinue projection," Lila said before turning to Taylor. "The entire presentation is three hours, and you have to be home in an hour and a half. You can watch the whole thing later if you want. I just downloaded it to you e-reader. It's not quite as cool without the 3D effect though."
"What is the Protectorate doing during all this," Taylor asked, a thoughtful look on her face.
"Well," Lila replied, "ideally, they'll be protecting the mining and manufacturing equipment, although I can't *make* them do that. Hopefully they'll see it as necessary by that point. Then when the Arks are gone, we'll see if we can clean up everything on Earth."
"Wait a minute," Taylor said looking at Lila suspiciously. "Why isn't the Protectorate going to Mars and Venus with everyone else? Why would they want to stay on Earth with everyone else leaving?"
"Taylor," Lila replied, "the plan doesn't work if parahumans go with the Arks. All that does is move some of the same problems to other planets. Eventually the parahumans become warlords of their own little kingdoms and the problems continue to grow. If parahumans help like they should, they can be part of the restoration of Earth. With the population out of the way, we should really be able to open up on the Endbringers and hopefully have the planet back in shape in fifty years or so."
"How exactly do you plan to keep the parahumans off the arks when they leave?" Taylor asked worriedly.
"Exclusion field with hard-light generators and sensors to detect active Corona Pollentia in the brain," was Lila's reply.
"So, everyone gets to leave except parahumans?" Taylor asked. "What about you?"
"I'm a parahuman." Lila replied. "I can't make an exception, especially myself."
"There has to be a better way," Taylor insisted.
"Thinker supercomputer," Lila responded pointing at her head.