For extra bonus points, Adamant appears to have shown up in the interim between DOOM (2016) and DOOM Eternal - which means that it's entirely possible that the Slayer's Armor is going to be getting Clockwork Magitech upgrades, in addition to his normal VEGA-tech and Sentinel tech upgrades. DOOM Slayer with a Clockwork Multimode Rifle like that used by the Knights, anyone?
Scattered Gears (Titan of Steel/Multicross)
- Thread starter We Just Write
- Start date
- Original Crossover Superhero
Earth Bet 2 (Clockwork Knight Catherine)
We Just Write
Blatantly Plural
- Location
- New England
- Pronouns
- Plural
(POV: Clockwork Knight Catherine)
In the aftermath of me demolishing most of Ellisburg, I found myself chatting with Emily Piggot over lunch at the nearest PRT department. Well, it was lunch for her at least; seeing as I didn't need to eat. I suppose it could also technically be considered an interrogation, but I didn't really mind; I rather liked the lady's no-nonsense attitude, and it's not like anything I was telling her about the Republic of Amali would really hurt them. Mana mechanics were possibly in that bin, but at this point I'd spread enough Mana around that it getting everywhere on the planet and subjected to scientific analysis was just a matter of time. It wasn't like I could actually stop it, so I might as well make sure things went smoothly to avoid people getting hurt.
Either way, our conversation started with a specially reinforced chair rated for my immense weight being provided. I was moderately curious where the PRT had gotten it on such short notice, but I wasn't about to question the comfortable seating. Shortly afterwards, Emily asked "So, from reports you mentioned that you apparently run on magic? Would you like to explain that?"
Briefly depressing my sensor turret to imitate a nod, I noted "So, to be more specific most of my systems run on Mana, which isn't exactly matter or energy in the conventional sense. That said it can easily be converted to or from matter, energy, or cognitive activity. The conversion ratios are pretty unbalanced, meaning that by conjuring a sufficiently energy-dense fuel you can actually get a net Mana gain."
After another few moments of thought and a bite of her sandwich, Emily said "So, going by what you've told me, I'm guessing that you're powered that way? It would make sense given that you don't seem to have any sort of port for taking in fuel or recharging your batteries."
Another simulated nod, and I replied "Got it in one; the fuel I'm burning is Protonium, a synthetic nucleus made out of one thousand protons and zero neutrons. Technically it's a form nuclear fission."
This actually prompted a chuckle from Emily, as she said "Best to be on the lookout for Scion then; he's made an occasional hobby of trashing nuclear weapons."
There was another pause, before Emily sighed and finally got right to the point, asking "So, to make a long story short, apparently you mentioned that super-powered individuals can be produced by prolonged exposure to high levels of Mana coupled with specialized training regimes. Would you mind doing that for us?"
Leaning back a bit, I noted "It's actually already happening, and I couldn't stop it even if I wanted to. Though a small amount, you're actually producing your own Mana already just from being around me, as has anyone else I've interacted with. They've doubtless encountered other people and kickstarted their Mana generation and so on. Inside two years environmental Mana levels will be high enough for just about anyone to develop capabilities that would currently be described as superhuman if they put their mind to it."
Looking mildly shocked, Emily responded "But I don't feel any different? Shouldn't I be able to tell if I suddenly had magic powers?"
Thinking for a moment, I noted "Well, you're only generating a trickle of Mana and you've had it for less than a day, so that's not surprising. That said, I can probably teach you how to control your Mana along with the basic four spells right now if you like."
Looking around, Emily asked "In the cafeteria? Are you sure that's a good idea?"
My reply was a simple "Good point, practicing the smokescreen or repulse spell in here is probably a bad idea. On the other hand, the Theme Ping spell will be easy for me to verify if you've managed it, and will be almost totally nondisruptive. So, first thing's first, you need to get really introspective to feel your Mana system the first time; you haven't developed a cohesive set of thematics yet, so it should feel like a vague warmth along your nerves, with a major concentration in your brain. Once you can feel it, you should be able to move it around without much trouble."
Emily blinked, incredulously asking "Are you seriously telling me to meditate for superpowers?"
I mimicked another nod, before bluntly saying "Yes. Now do you want to learn magic or not?"
And with that, Emily closed her eyes and slowed her breathing. I waited patiently with my Mana Thematograph active, watching the woman's nascent Mana system gently diffusing Mana into the environment. I didn't have to wait long until I saw a significant contraction towards her brain, followed by a rebound. Emily's eyes snapped open, and she said "Wow, that's a serious rush. It's like there's an entire part of me that I didn't know was there before now."
In response, I remarked "That's because it didn't exist until your initial Mana exposure. Anyway, here's how the Theme Ping spell works. First, you need to understand the basics of how Thematics work. Basically, almost all Mana has a distinct Theme to it that informs what sorts of things that Mana is useful for. As such, if you can identify what themes of Mana someone has, you can get a general idea of their capabilities. Anyway, to do a Theme Ping you just need to fire out a bit of Mana after imprinting it with the idea that it bounces off stuff and picks up on the Themes it hits."
Shrugging, Emily remarked "Sounds simple enough." pointed straight at me, and fired a pulse of Mana. After a few moments, she asked "Atomic Clockwork and Holy? Mind explaining those to me?"
I was about to start when a man's voice from off to the side asked "What's this I hear about magic? Imitating Myrrdin?"
Both Emily and I turned to look, seeing what I recognized as one of the Protectorate's "capes", namely a flying telekinetic codenamed Grav. He was floating over towards us with his lunch tray in his hands. Well, until he got within six meters of me, at which point he fell to the floor with a confused yell that was interrupted by him briefly burying his face in his mashed potatoes.
Immediately I dashed over and helped the man up, asking "Are you alright?"
Shuddering, Grav answered "Not sure, my powers have never crapped out on me like that before."
Thinking fast, I said "One of my systems may be responsible for this. I'm turning it off, try now." at the same time as I deactivated my Dimensional Jammer. Immediately, Grav floated back up by a few inches before I noted "Turning it back on." which lead to him falling again as soon as I reactivated the Dimensional Jammer.
Everyone in the room was looking at me for several moments of stunned silence before Emily asked "Wait, you're a power nullifier? Why didn't you tell us?"
In response, I answered in an extremely serious tone "Because the system responsible was never intended to nullify powers; it's the jammer technology used to block dimensional travel. The only possible way for it to nullify powers is if those powers are external to Parahumans, and are being provided by an extradimensional agent. I had found the entire idea of Parahumans rather suspicious before now, and those suspicions have been largely confirmed; so many of the oddities surrounding the phenomena make much more sense in light of this information. I'm going public with this before some idiot can classify it; your world is under extradimensional assault and everyone needs to know."
(POV: Third Person near Rebecca Costa-Brown)
The Cauldron conspirator currently undercover as Chief Director of the PRT had been enjoying a relaxing chunk of time mercifully free of paperwork, when suddenly an aide showed up and dropped a bulging manilla envelope on her desk that had been stamped with a big red [TOP PRIORITY] [DELIVER TO CHIEF DIRECTOR IMMEDIATELY] [INFORMATION PUBLIC]
Information public!? The only way that could happen and get a Top Priority stamp is if something so massive and impossible to hide happened that the information control teams simply gave up. So, dreading what she was about to read, Rebecca opened the envelope.
What followed was several incident reports, the first of which recounted how an extremely powerful sapient combat robot accidentally arrived in Ellisburg from another universe and subsequently leveled most of the city to put down a murderous biotinker. Then there was a report of this self-identified "Clockwork Knight Catherine" successfully inducing powers in a PRT strike team leader just by talking to them, along with anecdotal evidence that a substance called "Mana" was now uncontrollably spreading and would allow nearly anyone to develop superhuman capabilities if they put their minds to it. Honestly, those first two reports were more a boon than anything else, since it would allow the PRT to massively increase the number of powered personnel available through dedicated training programs.
Then there was the third report. Apparently, Catherine had a dimensional interdiction system installed in her chassis, which became relevant when a Protectorate member who'd been nearby went to join the conversation and wound up getting their powers nulled. Catherine had immediately put the available evidence together and arrived at the accurate conclusion that powers were being provided by extradimensional agents and that Earth Bet was under extradimensional assault. She then proceeded to teleport out to a concealed location and hijack every television and radio broadcast over a significant portion of North America using a ten Gigawatt radio transmitter informing everyone tuned into those media of her identity, her findings, her intention to make Dimensional Jammers widely available as soon as possible, and that she had chosen to do this for the explicit purposes of keeping "some short-sighted fool" from classifying the information.
This left Rebecca caught between a rock and a hard place. On the one hand, if she authorized the mass deployment of the jammers, she would completely cripple Cauldron's operating capabilities. On the other hand, if she were to obstruct the jammers' deployment it would almost immediately expose her as not having the public's best interests in mind. Then there was Clockwork Knight Catherine to consider; that robot had leveled half a city to save lives (as strange as that sentence sounded) and singlehandedly deployed one of the most powerful radio transmitters on Earth Bet to get her message out to the public. Something told Rebecca that someone like that wasn't terribly likely to stand aside from what she would obviously view as incompetence.
So, after thinking for several minutes about her course of action, Rebecca signed the forms to force the jammers through the most rigorous and red-tape laden Tinker-Tech evaluation she could think of, Doored to HQ, and told Doctor Mother that Contessa would be needed to eliminate an interloper.
In the aftermath of me demolishing most of Ellisburg, I found myself chatting with Emily Piggot over lunch at the nearest PRT department. Well, it was lunch for her at least; seeing as I didn't need to eat. I suppose it could also technically be considered an interrogation, but I didn't really mind; I rather liked the lady's no-nonsense attitude, and it's not like anything I was telling her about the Republic of Amali would really hurt them. Mana mechanics were possibly in that bin, but at this point I'd spread enough Mana around that it getting everywhere on the planet and subjected to scientific analysis was just a matter of time. It wasn't like I could actually stop it, so I might as well make sure things went smoothly to avoid people getting hurt.
Either way, our conversation started with a specially reinforced chair rated for my immense weight being provided. I was moderately curious where the PRT had gotten it on such short notice, but I wasn't about to question the comfortable seating. Shortly afterwards, Emily asked "So, from reports you mentioned that you apparently run on magic? Would you like to explain that?"
Briefly depressing my sensor turret to imitate a nod, I noted "So, to be more specific most of my systems run on Mana, which isn't exactly matter or energy in the conventional sense. That said it can easily be converted to or from matter, energy, or cognitive activity. The conversion ratios are pretty unbalanced, meaning that by conjuring a sufficiently energy-dense fuel you can actually get a net Mana gain."
After another few moments of thought and a bite of her sandwich, Emily said "So, going by what you've told me, I'm guessing that you're powered that way? It would make sense given that you don't seem to have any sort of port for taking in fuel or recharging your batteries."
Another simulated nod, and I replied "Got it in one; the fuel I'm burning is Protonium, a synthetic nucleus made out of one thousand protons and zero neutrons. Technically it's a form nuclear fission."
This actually prompted a chuckle from Emily, as she said "Best to be on the lookout for Scion then; he's made an occasional hobby of trashing nuclear weapons."
There was another pause, before Emily sighed and finally got right to the point, asking "So, to make a long story short, apparently you mentioned that super-powered individuals can be produced by prolonged exposure to high levels of Mana coupled with specialized training regimes. Would you mind doing that for us?"
Leaning back a bit, I noted "It's actually already happening, and I couldn't stop it even if I wanted to. Though a small amount, you're actually producing your own Mana already just from being around me, as has anyone else I've interacted with. They've doubtless encountered other people and kickstarted their Mana generation and so on. Inside two years environmental Mana levels will be high enough for just about anyone to develop capabilities that would currently be described as superhuman if they put their mind to it."
Looking mildly shocked, Emily responded "But I don't feel any different? Shouldn't I be able to tell if I suddenly had magic powers?"
Thinking for a moment, I noted "Well, you're only generating a trickle of Mana and you've had it for less than a day, so that's not surprising. That said, I can probably teach you how to control your Mana along with the basic four spells right now if you like."
Looking around, Emily asked "In the cafeteria? Are you sure that's a good idea?"
My reply was a simple "Good point, practicing the smokescreen or repulse spell in here is probably a bad idea. On the other hand, the Theme Ping spell will be easy for me to verify if you've managed it, and will be almost totally nondisruptive. So, first thing's first, you need to get really introspective to feel your Mana system the first time; you haven't developed a cohesive set of thematics yet, so it should feel like a vague warmth along your nerves, with a major concentration in your brain. Once you can feel it, you should be able to move it around without much trouble."
Emily blinked, incredulously asking "Are you seriously telling me to meditate for superpowers?"
I mimicked another nod, before bluntly saying "Yes. Now do you want to learn magic or not?"
And with that, Emily closed her eyes and slowed her breathing. I waited patiently with my Mana Thematograph active, watching the woman's nascent Mana system gently diffusing Mana into the environment. I didn't have to wait long until I saw a significant contraction towards her brain, followed by a rebound. Emily's eyes snapped open, and she said "Wow, that's a serious rush. It's like there's an entire part of me that I didn't know was there before now."
In response, I remarked "That's because it didn't exist until your initial Mana exposure. Anyway, here's how the Theme Ping spell works. First, you need to understand the basics of how Thematics work. Basically, almost all Mana has a distinct Theme to it that informs what sorts of things that Mana is useful for. As such, if you can identify what themes of Mana someone has, you can get a general idea of their capabilities. Anyway, to do a Theme Ping you just need to fire out a bit of Mana after imprinting it with the idea that it bounces off stuff and picks up on the Themes it hits."
Shrugging, Emily remarked "Sounds simple enough." pointed straight at me, and fired a pulse of Mana. After a few moments, she asked "Atomic Clockwork and Holy? Mind explaining those to me?"
I was about to start when a man's voice from off to the side asked "What's this I hear about magic? Imitating Myrrdin?"
Both Emily and I turned to look, seeing what I recognized as one of the Protectorate's "capes", namely a flying telekinetic codenamed Grav. He was floating over towards us with his lunch tray in his hands. Well, until he got within six meters of me, at which point he fell to the floor with a confused yell that was interrupted by him briefly burying his face in his mashed potatoes.
Immediately I dashed over and helped the man up, asking "Are you alright?"
Shuddering, Grav answered "Not sure, my powers have never crapped out on me like that before."
Thinking fast, I said "One of my systems may be responsible for this. I'm turning it off, try now." at the same time as I deactivated my Dimensional Jammer. Immediately, Grav floated back up by a few inches before I noted "Turning it back on." which lead to him falling again as soon as I reactivated the Dimensional Jammer.
Everyone in the room was looking at me for several moments of stunned silence before Emily asked "Wait, you're a power nullifier? Why didn't you tell us?"
In response, I answered in an extremely serious tone "Because the system responsible was never intended to nullify powers; it's the jammer technology used to block dimensional travel. The only possible way for it to nullify powers is if those powers are external to Parahumans, and are being provided by an extradimensional agent. I had found the entire idea of Parahumans rather suspicious before now, and those suspicions have been largely confirmed; so many of the oddities surrounding the phenomena make much more sense in light of this information. I'm going public with this before some idiot can classify it; your world is under extradimensional assault and everyone needs to know."
(POV: Third Person near Rebecca Costa-Brown)
The Cauldron conspirator currently undercover as Chief Director of the PRT had been enjoying a relaxing chunk of time mercifully free of paperwork, when suddenly an aide showed up and dropped a bulging manilla envelope on her desk that had been stamped with a big red [TOP PRIORITY] [DELIVER TO CHIEF DIRECTOR IMMEDIATELY] [INFORMATION PUBLIC]
Information public!? The only way that could happen and get a Top Priority stamp is if something so massive and impossible to hide happened that the information control teams simply gave up. So, dreading what she was about to read, Rebecca opened the envelope.
What followed was several incident reports, the first of which recounted how an extremely powerful sapient combat robot accidentally arrived in Ellisburg from another universe and subsequently leveled most of the city to put down a murderous biotinker. Then there was a report of this self-identified "Clockwork Knight Catherine" successfully inducing powers in a PRT strike team leader just by talking to them, along with anecdotal evidence that a substance called "Mana" was now uncontrollably spreading and would allow nearly anyone to develop superhuman capabilities if they put their minds to it. Honestly, those first two reports were more a boon than anything else, since it would allow the PRT to massively increase the number of powered personnel available through dedicated training programs.
Then there was the third report. Apparently, Catherine had a dimensional interdiction system installed in her chassis, which became relevant when a Protectorate member who'd been nearby went to join the conversation and wound up getting their powers nulled. Catherine had immediately put the available evidence together and arrived at the accurate conclusion that powers were being provided by extradimensional agents and that Earth Bet was under extradimensional assault. She then proceeded to teleport out to a concealed location and hijack every television and radio broadcast over a significant portion of North America using a ten Gigawatt radio transmitter informing everyone tuned into those media of her identity, her findings, her intention to make Dimensional Jammers widely available as soon as possible, and that she had chosen to do this for the explicit purposes of keeping "some short-sighted fool" from classifying the information.
This left Rebecca caught between a rock and a hard place. On the one hand, if she authorized the mass deployment of the jammers, she would completely cripple Cauldron's operating capabilities. On the other hand, if she were to obstruct the jammers' deployment it would almost immediately expose her as not having the public's best interests in mind. Then there was Clockwork Knight Catherine to consider; that robot had leveled half a city to save lives (as strange as that sentence sounded) and singlehandedly deployed one of the most powerful radio transmitters on Earth Bet to get her message out to the public. Something told Rebecca that someone like that wasn't terribly likely to stand aside from what she would obviously view as incompetence.
So, after thinking for several minutes about her course of action, Rebecca signed the forms to force the jammers through the most rigorous and red-tape laden Tinker-Tech evaluation she could think of, Doored to HQ, and told Doctor Mother that Contessa would be needed to eliminate an interloper.
You are all dead. This isn't hyperbole. You guys have given the entities access to infinite energy, it is literally the only thing that could have given scion the motivation to actually fight and plan and test. And there is nothing in
Anyone can do against a motivated entity.
Also pretty sure abbandon has this world under surveillance and the secret is out. So expect octillions of entities that are all better at mana manipulation than everyone else combined. That multiverseal cluster is gone.
Anyone can do against a motivated entity.
Also pretty sure abbandon has this world under surveillance and the secret is out. So expect octillions of entities that are all better at mana manipulation than everyone else combined. That multiverseal cluster is gone.
- Location
- Puerto Rico
Awesome chapter.
Huh, question, what would happen to Dragon if the Jammers were turned?
Though there is one person who will be happy for the Jammers, and that is Ash Beast.
Actually, given how exactly the entities function, the dimensional jammer might actually kill them outright as their dimensionally folded bodies are suddenly no longer connected across those dimensions. It's even possible that the D-jammers just straight up nullify most of the entity's capabilities completely inside their area of effect. Honestly, if I were in Rebecca's place I'd have gone straight to summoning up Catherine for a debrief consisting of "I'm annoyed that you don't seem to understand operational security but we could really fucking use your help."
That said, I have a feeling that her actions here are more than just her being involved with her decision making. Her powers are directly related to her being able to do that whole living thing so it's entirely possible that she is also just scared out of her wits for something that has the potential to kill her outright.
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Funnily enough, though, I could actually see the entities, upon receiving mana-based infinite energy (and the possibility of using it to create brand new universes, thus satisfying their "infinite space" requirement), deciding to just up and leave - possibly while leaving behind their now obsolete, non-mana based shards.
Heck, given infinite energy, Scion would probably actually not be inclined to destroy the planet - that would take more energy than just using a protonium reactor integrated into his shards to power their propulsion throughout the universe.
Dimensional jamming is easy enough to beat . Just push power enough to beat them. And scion has the power of stars.
That would be the case for a normal logical beings. But the entities are spitefull manchildren and blowing up the planet is a way for them to reproduce, which is their entire purpose.
We Just Write
Blatantly Plural
- Location
- New England
- Pronouns
- Plural
Scion is also depressed and basically lobotomized from firing off all his Thinker Shards. Even if that weren't the case, he's still seriously mentally deficient in several types of intelligence.
There is also the bastard angel. And she has infinite energy too.
And they have more advanced science and principles than the clockwork knights and angel is better at using its precogntion.
But my point is, they could probably beat scion. It was done without help before.
Its the other entities i am worried about.
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We Just Write
Blatantly Plural
- Location
- New England
- Pronouns
- Plural
Check your timelines, the Simurgh isn't active yet.
Also, please bear in mind that Clockworks have a shorter doubling time than Entities. Much shorter.
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Um, that depends entirely on if the jammers can be overpowered by the method the entities use, that the energy requirements aren't ruinous, that the entities can totally pull a Tim Taylor and just throw an arbitrarily large mount of energy around without burning out the organs they use and that the jammer doesn't just straight up kill them.
That said, given Hatchet Face's jamming probably works on a similar principal it is entirely possible that they do have the capability to push through such interference.
This all assumes that Scion is even paying attention and has the will/brain power to devote to actually understanding the implications.
So, I'll say that one potential spin you could put on this is "hey, we don't know that the cause of powers is hostile, but we do know that putting up these dimensional jammers will lead to the clockwork lady suddenly being the most powerful being on the planet, seeing as how it will get rid of all of our parahumans, and we don't know if it will do jack-diddly to Endbringers, so maybe we are under extradimensional attack, but it is from this robot lady". Just saying, but while we know Catherine has the best interests of humanity in mind, her word is still just one data point, and honestly, people would be right to be paranoid about some superpowered robot showing up and saying "hey, mind deploying these to turn off all other powers except for mine?"
We Just Write
Blatantly Plural
- Location
- New England
- Pronouns
- Plural
She could do that. If it weren't for Mana-based powers coming on the scene.
I'm thinking that some kind of mana black hole or device to generate a mana vacuum has to exist, if they're able to manipulate mana to extent shown. Not sure if Catherine could build them fast enough or big enough to suck up all the mana in Earth Bet, but it should at least be theoretically possible.
The other interesting question is how the Jammer will interact with those parahumans more affected by the shards, like Alexandria or the Case 53's. They are essentially puppets controlled by the human consciousness running on shard hardware, so they could end up falling dead on the spot until the connection is restablished.
The other interesting question is how the Jammer will interact with those parahumans more affected by the shards, like Alexandria or the Case 53's. They are essentially puppets controlled by the human consciousness running on shard hardware, so they could end up falling dead on the spot until the connection is restablished.
- Location
- america
Re: Entities want infinite energy
I recall reading some posters speculation elsewhere on the forums that they just want to do what they did to their home planet. 1. Reproduce until there's nothing else left. 2. Come together for a big meeting. 3. Blow up every iteration of theplanet universe.
I recall reading some posters speculation elsewhere on the forums that they just want to do what they did to their home planet. 1. Reproduce until there's nothing else left. 2. Come together for a big meeting. 3. Blow up every iteration of the
- Pronouns
- Yes
To be fair she has no reason to approach the clock work knight close enough for the jammer to matter, I'm sure Contessa could have come up with a plan to deal with a parahuman that had the powers the Clockwork knight displayed so far.
@I just write Nice chapter (although amusingly I found the 10GW radio transmission jarring - amusing because with everything else going on that's the bit that had me stop and go "it doesn't work that way").
One thing that does bug me, while the Clockwork knight's leap of logic is not impossible, and given they're background it's logical for them to make it, everyone else accepting that "powers rely on something external"="Earth is under attack" is considerably less likely, for that matter even just everyone accepting that the Clockwork Knight was telling the truth.
Fake Edit: Oh wait, Words of Truth works over the radio, right? So everyone will be sure the Clockwork Knight is telling the Truth, that should terrify the government and possibly lead to a kill order against such a terrifyingly powerful Master.
- Location
- Poland
Or maybe Words just inform everyone that she believes what she says like in Eragon there is a language you can't lie in so it's impossible to read fiction aloud and even if something happened if someone does' t believe it's possible...
- Pronouns
- Yes
That's what I assume it does, it's still a terryfingly effective Master power (or at least will seem so to the government) as while it won't allow you to directly control people, it does make you appear trustworthy and honest to everyone your transmission reaches. Couple that with actually being a decent speaker and that would be Master 2-3 even if you needed to talk to people in person, if you can magically transmit your words to every radio and TV in the country...
Potterverse 2 (Clockwork Knight Beryl)
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- Location
- New England
- Pronouns
- Plural
(POV: Clockwork Knight Beryl)
After our somewhat rocky introduction, Dumbledore and I had managed to settle down to a relatively civil conversation, each of us sitting in a chair we'd magicked into existence. We'd already gone over my origins, the basics of the hidden society of magic users lurking about, how Harry came to be living with the Dursleys, and the fact that I would get physical again if he tried to wipe the memories of any of the police officers. We'd been chatting for several minutes, before I noted "I don't think that what you call magic and what I call magic are actually the same thing. They behave far too differently."
Looking thoughtful for a moment, the elderly wizard replied "You may very well be right, though I would like to hear your reasoning."
I answered "The biggest difference seems to be how magic spreads in each case. The magic you wield seems to be a purely inherited trait, with no possibility for someone born without it to ever use it. Mana on the other hand gets absolutely everywhere, spreads exponentially, and simply doesn't care who's using it." Idly pointing at one of the police officers watching us at random I noted "I could probably already teach that lady a few basic spells of the sort I know, but I highly doubt you could say the same."
Nodding, Dumbledore confirmed "No, I don't believe I could. Nor am I quite certain what will happen once this Mana you've described spreads to every person in the world. Wizarding society is deeply traditional and is unlikely to accept such a drastic change as this easily."
Releasing a simulated sigh, I said "They won't have much choice in the matter. I've run the projections, and those outside the wizarding world will have sufficient esoteric defenses up to render your memory wiping coverup teams ineffective within a decade at the longest. People won't take kindly to the knowledge that elitist magic users have been violating their minds for centuries."
A sad look on his face, Dumbledore agreed "Yes, this doesn't seem to be a change that can actually be avoided. I just fear the bloodshed that will occur when hidebound old wizards collide with an onslaught of justifiably upset empowered muggles."
A saddened hum, as I noted "Yes, that doesn't seem to be completely avoidable, and we both know that lots of innocent people will get caught in the crossfire when that happens. Still, there has to be some way to mitigate the casualties aside from the brute force approach of making an army of Clockworks and arresting most of the planet's population."
Thinking for a few moments, Dumbledore said "I actually have a fairly sizable amount of political influence within the British Wizarding World. If I apply it carefully I might be able to gradually loosen the restrictions on secrecy to a degree and get Wizards and Witches used to going out in public once the new magic starts taking off. That might help with the backlash from my side of things somewhat at least."
I replied "Not sure what I can do about the outer world's reaction so long as the memory wipes remain standard operating procedure. When that gets out, people are going to be absolutely furious. I'm expecting lynch mobs."
Making a saddened sigh, Albus said "You are quite likely correct in that regard. That said, stopping Obliviation is going to be an extremely hard challenge, since the laws mandating its use reach beyond my sphere of influence. I simply don't have the capacity to unilaterally stop it."
That prompted me to ask "What if I made a bunch more Clockworks and we visit all the various centers of wizarding governance to explain the problem and 'persuade' them to see reason? Worst case scenario of that is needing to coup most of the wizarding governments, and being completely honest they aren't long for this world anyway once everyone else notices."
Dumbledore went silent for a few minutes as he thought about the idea, before he said "Sadly, that might actually be the best of a lot of bad options. I certainly can't see any other way to stop Obliviation from happening worldwide, and as you have mentioned, the use of Obliviate is one of the major issues that will turn the outside world against us Wizards and Witches."
"Am I to take that as permission to go ahead with the plan?"
To this, Dumbledore shook his head, before saying "I know it probably won't work, but I would like to try my hand at the diplomatic route first. If it doesn't work, I will contact you again by owl."
I hummed in confirmation, before saying "On a somewhat less grisly topic, I still have every intention of adopting Harry and raising him as best I'm able. Do you have any remaining objections to that?"
Sighing, Dumbledore said "Only one, though it seems surmountable. The last Dark Lord still has a lot of old bitter followers around who believe in his ideals, and I'm worried that without the protective enchantment being recharged by proximity to blood relatives he may be at risk."
In response, I simply answered "Understood. By the time Harry is accepted to Hogwarts, I'll have trained and armed him to the point that I would gladly have served alongside him at the Battle of the Hellrift. You have my word on that."
There was another brief pause, before I noted "Just remembered something important. When I first met Harry, he had a soul fragment from someone absolutely evil lodged in the scar on his forehead. I got it out. Do you think that had anything to do with the former Dark Lord?"
Immediately, Dumbledore stiffened, before he admitted "Probably. I now have a much better idea of how Voldemort was such a seemingly invincible presence prior to his sudden disappearance, but I will need to do a bit of research to confirm my suspicions."
(POV: Third Person near Harry Potter)
It had been a few days since he had been adopted by Beryl, and as far as Harry was concerned, events had taken a turn for the bizarre. Beryl's first priority was getting a place to live, which proved mildly problematic for the simple reason that Beryl had absolutely no money to purchase or rent a residence. After asking around for a few hours and determining the local homeless shelters woefully inadequate for raising a child, Beryl had informed Harry "Good news, you're going to be an astronaut. We're going to be building a moon fortress to live in, since no-one will actually be able to enforce a squatting complaint that way."
Looking up at his new mechanical caretaker, Harry couldn't help but ask "Er, doesn't going to the moon need a rocket?", vaguely remembering how history class mentioned that the Americans went to the moon.
That's when Beryl responded "Indeed, that is the case." and began growing a space launch vehicle the size of an SUV designed to seat both Harry and Beryl. One brachistochrone trajectory and a custom-made space suit later, Harry Potter was standing on the moon, looking at Earth on the horizon.
It took several moments for him to process this sudden change of locale, but eventually Harry remarked through the suit's comms "It's going to be really lonely on the moon. I hope we can have visitors over regularly."
Looking up from the construction site for the initial center of the moon fortress, Beryl answered "I promise you, I'll make sure you get plenty of chances to interact with other children. Come to think of it, would you mind if I were to adopt more siblings for you?"
Immediately, Harry spun around and almost fell over in the low gravity before he exclaimed "Really? You'd do that for me? And you wouldn't let them bully me, or anything?"
Taking a break from the construction, Beryl knelt down and gave Harry a gentle hug as he replied "Of course."
After our somewhat rocky introduction, Dumbledore and I had managed to settle down to a relatively civil conversation, each of us sitting in a chair we'd magicked into existence. We'd already gone over my origins, the basics of the hidden society of magic users lurking about, how Harry came to be living with the Dursleys, and the fact that I would get physical again if he tried to wipe the memories of any of the police officers. We'd been chatting for several minutes, before I noted "I don't think that what you call magic and what I call magic are actually the same thing. They behave far too differently."
Looking thoughtful for a moment, the elderly wizard replied "You may very well be right, though I would like to hear your reasoning."
I answered "The biggest difference seems to be how magic spreads in each case. The magic you wield seems to be a purely inherited trait, with no possibility for someone born without it to ever use it. Mana on the other hand gets absolutely everywhere, spreads exponentially, and simply doesn't care who's using it." Idly pointing at one of the police officers watching us at random I noted "I could probably already teach that lady a few basic spells of the sort I know, but I highly doubt you could say the same."
Nodding, Dumbledore confirmed "No, I don't believe I could. Nor am I quite certain what will happen once this Mana you've described spreads to every person in the world. Wizarding society is deeply traditional and is unlikely to accept such a drastic change as this easily."
Releasing a simulated sigh, I said "They won't have much choice in the matter. I've run the projections, and those outside the wizarding world will have sufficient esoteric defenses up to render your memory wiping coverup teams ineffective within a decade at the longest. People won't take kindly to the knowledge that elitist magic users have been violating their minds for centuries."
A sad look on his face, Dumbledore agreed "Yes, this doesn't seem to be a change that can actually be avoided. I just fear the bloodshed that will occur when hidebound old wizards collide with an onslaught of justifiably upset empowered muggles."
A saddened hum, as I noted "Yes, that doesn't seem to be completely avoidable, and we both know that lots of innocent people will get caught in the crossfire when that happens. Still, there has to be some way to mitigate the casualties aside from the brute force approach of making an army of Clockworks and arresting most of the planet's population."
Thinking for a few moments, Dumbledore said "I actually have a fairly sizable amount of political influence within the British Wizarding World. If I apply it carefully I might be able to gradually loosen the restrictions on secrecy to a degree and get Wizards and Witches used to going out in public once the new magic starts taking off. That might help with the backlash from my side of things somewhat at least."
I replied "Not sure what I can do about the outer world's reaction so long as the memory wipes remain standard operating procedure. When that gets out, people are going to be absolutely furious. I'm expecting lynch mobs."
Making a saddened sigh, Albus said "You are quite likely correct in that regard. That said, stopping Obliviation is going to be an extremely hard challenge, since the laws mandating its use reach beyond my sphere of influence. I simply don't have the capacity to unilaterally stop it."
That prompted me to ask "What if I made a bunch more Clockworks and we visit all the various centers of wizarding governance to explain the problem and 'persuade' them to see reason? Worst case scenario of that is needing to coup most of the wizarding governments, and being completely honest they aren't long for this world anyway once everyone else notices."
Dumbledore went silent for a few minutes as he thought about the idea, before he said "Sadly, that might actually be the best of a lot of bad options. I certainly can't see any other way to stop Obliviation from happening worldwide, and as you have mentioned, the use of Obliviate is one of the major issues that will turn the outside world against us Wizards and Witches."
"Am I to take that as permission to go ahead with the plan?"
To this, Dumbledore shook his head, before saying "I know it probably won't work, but I would like to try my hand at the diplomatic route first. If it doesn't work, I will contact you again by owl."
I hummed in confirmation, before saying "On a somewhat less grisly topic, I still have every intention of adopting Harry and raising him as best I'm able. Do you have any remaining objections to that?"
Sighing, Dumbledore said "Only one, though it seems surmountable. The last Dark Lord still has a lot of old bitter followers around who believe in his ideals, and I'm worried that without the protective enchantment being recharged by proximity to blood relatives he may be at risk."
In response, I simply answered "Understood. By the time Harry is accepted to Hogwarts, I'll have trained and armed him to the point that I would gladly have served alongside him at the Battle of the Hellrift. You have my word on that."
There was another brief pause, before I noted "Just remembered something important. When I first met Harry, he had a soul fragment from someone absolutely evil lodged in the scar on his forehead. I got it out. Do you think that had anything to do with the former Dark Lord?"
Immediately, Dumbledore stiffened, before he admitted "Probably. I now have a much better idea of how Voldemort was such a seemingly invincible presence prior to his sudden disappearance, but I will need to do a bit of research to confirm my suspicions."
(POV: Third Person near Harry Potter)
It had been a few days since he had been adopted by Beryl, and as far as Harry was concerned, events had taken a turn for the bizarre. Beryl's first priority was getting a place to live, which proved mildly problematic for the simple reason that Beryl had absolutely no money to purchase or rent a residence. After asking around for a few hours and determining the local homeless shelters woefully inadequate for raising a child, Beryl had informed Harry "Good news, you're going to be an astronaut. We're going to be building a moon fortress to live in, since no-one will actually be able to enforce a squatting complaint that way."
Looking up at his new mechanical caretaker, Harry couldn't help but ask "Er, doesn't going to the moon need a rocket?", vaguely remembering how history class mentioned that the Americans went to the moon.
That's when Beryl responded "Indeed, that is the case." and began growing a space launch vehicle the size of an SUV designed to seat both Harry and Beryl. One brachistochrone trajectory and a custom-made space suit later, Harry Potter was standing on the moon, looking at Earth on the horizon.
It took several moments for him to process this sudden change of locale, but eventually Harry remarked through the suit's comms "It's going to be really lonely on the moon. I hope we can have visitors over regularly."
Looking up from the construction site for the initial center of the moon fortress, Beryl answered "I promise you, I'll make sure you get plenty of chances to interact with other children. Come to think of it, would you mind if I were to adopt more siblings for you?"
Immediately, Harry spun around and almost fell over in the low gravity before he exclaimed "Really? You'd do that for me? And you wouldn't let them bully me, or anything?"
Taking a break from the construction, Beryl knelt down and gave Harry a gentle hug as he replied "Of course."
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We Just Write
Blatantly Plural
- Location
- New England
- Pronouns
- Plural
Beryl: "I am not a signatory of the Outer Space Treaty. It's your own fault for relinquishing basically all jurisdiction beyond the bounds of your atmosphere."
Honestly, I could more see the nations of the world being concerned that Beryl would claim the moon as her own territory. Once she cleared up that she was just living there because it was more convenient for her, I could see at least some politicians chilling out about it.
Funnily enough, NASA (and most other space agencies) would probably be chomping at the bit to get access to the same sorts of tech she used to get to the moon so casually. Because Protonium rocket tech is not only thermodynamics violating (and thus also leaves the tyranny of the rocket equation in the dust), it's also arguably just as clean (if not cleaner) from an environmental standpoint as hydrolox rockets are, but with vastly superior specific impulse.
Funnily enough, NASA (and most other space agencies) would probably be chomping at the bit to get access to the same sorts of tech she used to get to the moon so casually. Because Protonium rocket tech is not only thermodynamics violating (and thus also leaves the tyranny of the rocket equation in the dust), it's also arguably just as clean (if not cleaner) from an environmental standpoint as hydrolox rockets are, but with vastly superior specific impulse.
- Location
- Puerto Rico
Awesome chapter.
Okay, is world just Harry Potter or a multicross Earth? Cause there are so many fictional children we know of that would love to be adopted and raised in the moon by a kind multidimenional robot.
Speaking of the moon, is MLP Luna there?