Scientia Weaponizes The Future

I was making a reference to the U.S., which routinely coups democratically elected governments. Is that not enough to rouse Scientia's ire?
I can't think of an example IRL since Paraguay in 1989, but in any case the sorts of places that the real U.S. supported one political faction or another are largely warlord regimes (parahuman or non-parahuman) on Earth Bet, not democratically elected governments.

Alright this is my suggestion for an image:

First there is the whole idea of a tech-tree/diagram as a semi-faint background of the image. It would start in this Da Vinci like style of ink on parchment at the base -representing the basic knowledge- but then progress to a more blueprint like diagram, that finally slides over to a futuristic circuit board. The tree would be quite stylistic, with small icons at the end and the branching of each line, representing the different fields of knowledge.

Then on this background the main illustration is Scientia standing in her armour with the helmed under her arm, but seen from behind, with her head lifted in half profile and looking up towards a star. Said star would on closer inspection have the structures of the stellar lifting facilities surrounding it. Maybe have Scientia stand side by side with Dragon while they're gazing at the star - which both represents their hope for where humanity's future is going, and a reminder of the civilization Scientia's knowledge came from.

(The tech tree might need to either be inverted and go from upper-left to lower-right, or be represented as several smaller trees that then intersect and mixes, as a way to fit it in the image. It's the illustrators choice to see what works.)

That's my suggestion :) Unfortunately I don't have the skill to paint it myself :(
This is a promising idea, I'll keep it in mind.
 
I can't think of an example IRL since Paraguay in 1989,
To speak of something very recent, Bolivia.
but in any case the sorts of places that the real U.S. supported one political faction or another are largely warlord regimes (parahuman or non-parahuman) on Earth Bet, not democratically elected governments.
Well, if it helps the story you want to tell, I suppose.
 
To speak of something very recent, Bolivia.
Or for that matter Venezuela.

And, yeah, the level of US involvement isn't 100% confirmed, but why would it be? There's certainly no reason to think that the institutional culture has changed w.r.t. their willingness to do such things.

But anyway, for the purposes of this story, it won't unring that bell, so Scientia's course of action if she finds the CIA to still be doing that sort of thing would be to make them cut it out going forward, not to punitively overthrow the US government for past incidents, however recent. Her primary goal is to fix the world, not to punish the people who messed it up.
 
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To speak of something very recent, Bolivia.
An international organization of which the US is a member making an inaccurate statement about elections that's used as a propaganda piece by a domestic military coup is a stretch for the US government actually causing a coup. Even in the Venezuela case where the actual US government sent money to one side in a political conflict, that's still not really to the level of outrageous conduct. Rude by international standards, but the US isn't even the primary cause much less the 'let's help rebels slaughter the democratically elected government by sending them guns, special forces, and bombing sorties' level of conduct that's really just plain unacceptable.

Well, if it helps the story you want to tell, I suppose.
There just aren't a lot of democratically elected governments left on canon Earth Bet. Africa and South America are both a mess, and the CUI conquered a fair portion of East Asia. Most of the Middle East wasn't particularly democratic in the first place. That just leaves Europe, maybe what's left of Russia, North America, and a few countries in East Asia and Oceania.

But anyway, for the purposes of this story, it won't unring that bell, so Scientia's course of action if she finds the CIA to still be doing that sort of thing would be to make them cut it out going forward, not to punitively overthrow the US government for past incidents, however recent.
Yeah, there are a lot of less absolute interventions than overthrow if need be. In the CUI's case a dramatic approach was unavoidable because the rot was severe and went all the way to the top.
 
Ah, ha ha ha ha ha haha ha... oh wait, you were serious. Let me laugh harder. AH HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! Yeahno. Russia is, and always has been an oligarchy/dictatorship masquerading as a democracy. Go ask Putin about term limits. I dare you. I double dog dare you.
Oh sure, real world Russia is a dictatorship. No question. Earth Bet Russia? I don't know if we have any data on what sort of government it has. Especially after Moscow got thoroughly destroyed.
 
Oh sure, real world Russia is a dictatorship. No question. Earth Bet Russia? I don't know if we have any data on what sort of government it has. Especially after Moscow got thoroughly destroyed.

Russia would still be the Soviet Union (Yelson's coup failed), so some form of Polit Bureau, Premiere and Communist Party. Perhaps Prarastoika worked in Bet?

Not that the USSR is in a good position. It's like a star. The Market Economy is driving what economic the Soviets possess, but it can't allow too much freedom, or not only will the Polit Bureau loose power, but the Soviets will prove the West right.

If I remember correctly, like China, the USSR had mandatory registration. Unfortunately the KGB botched it up by creating brainwashed super patriots who each think -they- are the only ones who can save the Mothetland. Unlike the Yagban, these super-patroits don't work well together, and regularly slip thier handlers.
 
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Russia would still be the Soviet Union (Yelson's coup failed), so some form of Polit bureau, Premiere and Communist Party. Perhaps Prarastoika worked in Bet?
The USSR still fell, but because of the population's lack of faith in its ability to stop S-Class threats like Endbringers (and presumably Sleeper). No Protectorate-equivalent, there are some military capes and ex-military capes turned mercenaries. Anti-parahuman witch hunts.

The 90s economic reforms worked with parahuman (unspecified but presumably Thinker) assistance, though.
 
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Isn't Russia where Sleeper hangs his hat? I would think having some random dude who is about as OP as any character in the setting randomly moving around in your country would make it difficult to remain stable.

Please note that I haven't read much Ward(felt too weird to root for Raine because of his part in his cluster) but I have read enough spoilers to know that Sleeper does, at least kinda sorta, show up in that fic. However, I've only read what other readers have posted elsewhere so my information on Sleeper and his abilities are inaccurate.
 
Ah, ha ha ha ha ha haha ha... oh wait, you were serious. Let me laugh harder. AH HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! Yeahno. Russia is, and always has been an oligarchy/dictatorship masquerading as a democracy. Go ask Putin about term limits. I dare you. I double dog dare you.

Ah yes, let's talk about the real-world politics in a thread about a Worm fanfic, that'd go great.

Russia is an oligocracy, yes, but the problem with Putin isn't that he's a dictator, the problem with Putin is that he's actually a democratically elected president. I'm not his greatest fan, and even then I am more than a little worried about what will happen when he retires/dies.
Oh sure, real world Russia is a dictatorship. No question. Earth Bet Russia? I don't know if we have any data on what sort of government it has. Especially after Moscow got thoroughly destroyed.

Even more authoritarian and simultaneously more decentralized would be my best guess. With the new capital in St. Petersburg and a bunch of corporations mostly based in Siberian cities and duking it out with each for the oil and gas deposits, probably employing parahumans as their deniable assets and industrial espionage/sabotage black teams.

basically, Shadowrun shenanigans with superpowers.

With the ongoing tendency for centralized authority on Earth Bet to either collapse or turn increasingly dictatorial with parahumans setting themselves up as either warlords or the paramilitary law enforcement arm of the government, it would really depend on whether Russia successfully managed to create a coherent parahuman organization, PRT or Protectorate-style using the Ministry of Internal Affairs.

The problem is, Moscow and the surrounding suburbs are the largest population center in Russia, containing the absolute majority of its administrative apparatus, not to mention the financial, cultural and political center of the country.

Depending on the radius of Sleeper's beach sphere of deathly doom, that's between ten and fifteen millions of casualties in the 90s. Roughly tenth of Russia's population and probably half of its administrative infrastructure. Like, imagine Leviathan simultaneously wrecking New York, Boston, Philadelphia and Washington, drowning them down below the coastline, that's the kind of damage I'm talking about relative to the USA.

So what I'm saying is, even if there was an organization like that in the making during the nineties, Sleeper most likely decapitated, decimated and destroyed it for all intents and purposes.
 
the problem with Putin is that he's actually a democratically elected president.
Perhaps this is a matter of definitions, but when someone outright fabricates election results (my favorite was that time he reported greater than 90% of voters voting for him in a province that had just been in armed revolt against his rule, but there are many other examples) and ensures that no domestic political rivals are free and/or alive to challenge his rule, I don't think that's a democratic system. It's a farce made to grant a veneer of legitimacy to people who don't look closely or don't want to acknowledge what's really going on.

The strategy there is that if the waters are muddied then some people won't agree with the simple truth that Putin is a brutal dictator who needs to be overthrown for the public good. He needs the public disunited and flooded with so many lies that many people believe them. All because he knows that maintaining power is a matter of his personal survival. Dictators don't have retirement plans waiting at the end of their reign. Only death at the hands of a successor or an angry mob.

I do like your ideas about the state of Earth Bet's Russia, though.
 
Rule 4: Don’t Be Disruptive - We're not having lies about the election being stolen in a Worm thread thank you
Perhaps this is a matter of definitions, but when someone outright fabricates election results (my favorite was that time he reported greater than 90% of voters voting for him in a province that had just been in armed revolt against his rule, but there are many other examples) and ensures that no domestic political rivals are free and/or alive to challenge his rule, I don't think that's a democratic system. It's a farce made to grant a veneer of legitimacy to people who don't look closely or don't want to acknowledge what's really going on.

The strategy there is that if the waters are muddied then some people won't agree with the simple truth that Putin is a brutal dictator who needs to be overthrown for the public good. He needs the public disunited and flooded with so many lies that many people believe them. All because he knows that maintaining power is a matter of his personal survival. Dictators don't have retirement plans waiting at the end of their reign. Only death at the hands of a successor or an angry mob.

I do like your ideas about the state of Earth Bet's Russia, though.
Probably isn't completely what you were talking about. But my favorite election was, when biden fabricated his election, a lot of the people who "voted" for him were actually long dead.
 
Perhaps this is a matter of definitions, but when someone outright fabricates election results (my favorite was that time he reported greater than 90% of voters voting for him in a province that had just been in armed revolt against his rule, but there are many other examples) and ensures that no domestic political rivals are free and/or alive to challenge his rule, I don't think that's a democratic system. It's a farce made to grant a veneer of legitimacy to people who don't look closely or don't want to acknowledge what's really going on.

The strategy there is that if the waters are muddied then some people won't agree with the simple truth that Putin is a brutal dictator who needs to be overthrown for the public good. He needs the public disunited and flooded with so many lies that many people believe them. All because he knows that maintaining power is a matter of his personal survival. Dictators don't have retirement plans waiting at the end of their reign. Only death at the hands of a successor or an angry mob.

I do like your ideas about the state of Earth Bet's Russia, though.

I honestly would have preferred him to be a brutal dictator who indiscriminately muzzles dissent and doesn't look out for anything beyond his death. At least that would have made this whole clusterfuck make sense, but unfortunately, I'm not living in a fairy tale with heroes and evil overlords.

But for one thing, I have to tell you that he is in power because the majority of the people living here want him to be in power. If you think otherwise, you vastly overestimate our desire for social liberalization, which, I personally think is a mistake that most of the people living in the Western countries make when they look anywhere east of Ukraine and south of Greece. Probably because most of the people on western forums actively oppose instead of tacitly supporting the existing regime. A bit of a confirmation bias, that.

The problems Russian citizens are preoccupied with by and large are the flagging economy, the declining population, the lingering threat of internal instability and the second round of mass privatization as the oligarchs carve up the remaining functional industries, liquidate them and then jump ship to countries with better living standards. Most ordinary people consider the western model of democracy in Russia discredited and ineffectual, rather than something to aspire to in the future.

Personally, I consider the western model of democracy to be a more dishonest form of what's happening in my country, with an established class of officials and ruling elites replacing one person and his followers, and a bureaucratic apparatus more focused on accommodating the military-industrial complexes and transnational corporations than administrating the country replacing a bureaucratic apparatus that does this and also engages in open and widespread corruption. It's an improvement, yeah, but not as sizeable as I'd hoped.

in other words, the topics we find prevalent are related to subsistence rather than prosperity. I honestly believe we'd reestablish the tsardom for whoever pulls our economy off the terminal dependency on the export of raw resources, but it's probably only going to happen in the fifties when most of the oil reserves dry up, the climate change is in full swing, and the country itself starts rapidly disintegrating and getting carved up into spheres of influence by China and whatever is going to be in the place of the EU. Maybe even the EU, as national republics start seceding and trying to apply for membership.

Also, our supposed liberal-democratic party is led by an idiosyncratic and anti-semitic nationalist, despite his Jewish mother, lol. I swear I heard this joke somewhere, and it wasn't funny the first time around.
Socially, we are much closer to Afghanistan or China than to Germany or the USA. Only with a bit less religious fundamentalism or corporatism.


Anyway, in Worm this disintegration would be happening much more rapidly, with maybe even CUI occupying parts of Outer Manchuria under the pretext of securing their economic interests, with the regional capital still being in Vladivostok.

Siberia would be left alone for a time, mostly because it's a nightmare to actually conquer and administrate from Beijing, with CUI probably busy consolidating their gains in other regions and the Russian North Pacific Coast to attempt this ambitious undertaking.

European Russia would face increasing pressure from nationalistic/religious elements rocking the boat and either trying to secede or take a more privileged position in the federation. The surviving government would be tied up dealing with that and, unable to deal with the CUI situation through the implicit threat of nuclear retaliation, largely ignore the issue in hopes it'd go away.
 
Personally, I consider the western model of democracy to be a more dishonest form of what's happening in my country, with an established class of officials and ruling elites replacing one person and his followers, and a bureaucratic apparatus more focused on accommodating the military-industrial complexes and transnational corporations than administrating the country replacing a bureaucratic apparatus that does this and also engages in open and widespread corruption. It's an improvement, yeah, but not as sizeable as I'd hoped.
I found the reverse-cargo-cultist!

Sorry, couldn't resist. It's one of my favourite neologisms.

Also, our supposed liberal-democratic party is led by an idiosyncratic and anti-semitic nationalist, despite his Jewish mother, lol. I swear I heard this joke somewhere, and it wasn't funny the first time around.
Here in Australia, the Liberal Party is actually the conservative (centre-right) party, and the centre-left party is Labour.
 
I found the reverse-cargo-cultist!

Sorry, couldn't resist. It's one of my favourite neologisms.

That's actually a very interesting topic for me. Specifically, the uses of state media as a governmental propaganda machine and a source of tension and fear of foreign influences, real or imagined.


Russian television media is often called unsophisticated, and the message it delivers too overblown. I'm just calling them lazy. There is much less competition in TV industry, because most of it is state-sponsored, so they don't really care how too-on-the-nose the message is, since they still earn money for it. It's a shitshow, yeah, but a pretty entertaining one, if you watch it in moderation. I used to watch a lot of TV but by now I'd say an hour a week is unusually much for me.

In the US, you have to contend against at least one side that says the party you are voting for is shit and should not be allowed to win the elections under any circumstances. To explain the views I hold that conform to the term you used relating to what we are discussing using this contrast, (btw, the term is hilarious, but I also don't really see how it came into being since cargo cults are somewhat removed from this topic, eh ) Russian government and Russian media hold a semi-monopoly on, respectively, the actions they take in the external and internal politics of the nation, and how to present them to general populace. Free market theory says it's a pretty shitty situation, since the holder of the monopoly can arbitrarily change the prices and quality of finished product, the product in this case being the impression of an ordinary citizen that they participate in shaping the fate of their country and hold actual agency.

When you have competition, however, you have to do all those little things like using big and complicated words, checking facts for contradictions, making sure the position you present stands under scrutiny for a little longer than air time. You have to get creative, to explain exactly why your opponents are dumbasses and why you should vote the way you do, present a clear position on questions of climate change, human rights, economic disparity, interventionism and isolationism.

As a plus, you have someone to blame, aside from "foreign influences" and, sometimes, yourself, a little. For example, the media scandals during the US withdrawal from Afghanistan, how disastrous it was, and who should take blame: Biden's administration for fumbling it or Trump's administration for sabotaging it.

The product, however, remains the same. Namely, an impression of the citizens taking part in steering the course. Common people have absolutely jackshit to do with anything involving the actual governance. Chinese don't get to vote for their foreign policy same as Russians, Americans and pretty much everyone else on the globe. The central belief of the reverse-cargo-cult, if that's how it's called, is that the product isn't different on the West, it's just sold in a flashier package.

The difference between the nations and the governments isn't in how much influence people have in the daily going-on in their country, but how much soft and hard power the government would use to stop them from voicing their disagreement with the policies when the tensions reach the boiling point, in which case, yes, Western democracies are more attractive, because they use less of those things that could be considered human rights violations and sometimes maybe even admit they are the ones in the wrong.

Here's the kicker though: in Russia, this quality isn't actually considered very attractive among the majority of the population. In relatively recent history, we had: two revolutions, one civil war, dissolution of the country, whatever you would the circus that happened in the 93rd, open gang fights during the nineties, mass privatization and mass emigration of both intelligencia and capital across the border, not to mention Boris Yeltsin. Yes, he drank just as much as you've heard, no, it wasn't really conductive to running the country, as you can imagine.

All those things are considered to be the symptoms of the collapse of central authority. Because the authority wasn't powerful enough, because it wasn't stable enough, it was overthrown and, as a result, millions of people suffered. You will have a lot of trouble convincing an average Russian citizen that the collapse and anarchy as the result of systemic issues the government didn't address through reform shouldn't have been resolved by the government taking decisive action and taking as many measures as it needed to prevent the crisis. Freedom isn't the quality an ordinary Russian citizen yearns for the most. Freedom is nice, sure, but stability is seen as more important. Not becoming jobless and homeless overnight is important.

This is not the quality that appeared in the last century, even. For as long as the concept of an East Slavic nation existed, the rulers of those states and the people living in them used external threats as the de facto reason to band up together, almost always against someone else. If not fellow Slavs, then Scythians, if not Scythians, then Polovetskys and Bulgars, if not them then Teutons and Mongols, if not them then Poles, Ottomans, Swedish, French, Germans, etcetera etcetera. This is obviously a myopic and pretty hypocritical worldview, since Russian states did a lot of invasions of their own, but it's a very attractive narrative that has the benefits of being grounded in actual reality. According to it, the government has to be strong and the people should support it, or else the foreigners will invade or the state will collapse, and the people will suffer. This is pretty much the reason for the historic displays of patriotism throughout centuries. The government might treat their people badly, but they trust the foreigners to treat them fairly even less, with good reasons and many examples.



Anyway, most of the opposition uses newspapers, so if you really want sophistication and diversity in the landscape of Russian political views, you go there instead.

Welp, yeah, that's too much time spent raving on the Internet. I will read replies ( if any ), but I won't reply. Firstly, because this is not a politics thread, yeah, sorry about that, secondly, because, well, I fulfilled my weekly political arguments quota.
 
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I don't know why, but this fanfic reminds me of Manifold Trilogy.

I haven't read those books since they came out, so I had to refresh my memory, and I think I figured it out. From Wikipedia:

Each one of the main novels deals with a possible resolution to the Fermi paradox. The first, Time, is set in a universe that is completely devoid of intelligent life beyond that of mankind and its creations (i.e. A.I. and uplifted animals).

The second in the series, Space, proposes the opposite: that life is endemic to the universe, and there is intelligence in nearly all possible places of the cosmos. The solution to the Fermi Paradox in this novel is that intelligent life is continually wiped out by cosmic disasters before it has time to spread too far.

The third novel, Origin, is set in a multiverse that is a compromise between the ideals in the first two novels: that life is only on Earth, but at the same time is everywhere. This novel solves the Fermi Paradox by suggesting that intelligent life is segregated into separate parallel universes.

Quite a bit of overlap in concept, there.

Thank you for saying that the story reminds you of good hard science fiction. That's high praise.
 
Scientia Ch. 38 - Through the Grapevine
Acting: 2
Artificial Intelligence: 5
Biology: 4
Chemistry: 6
Computer Programming: 7
Cooking: 2
Cybernetics: 7
Electrical Engineering: 8
FTL Travel: 3 (Limit)
Guns: 4 (Limit)
Governance: 4 (+4)
History: 1
Languages: 2
Lying: 2
Manufacturing: 4
Martial Arts: 4 (Limit)
Mathematics: 3
Mechanical Engineering: 10
Medicine: 6
Nanotechnology: 5
Personal Armor: 5 (Limit)
Physics: 9
Piloting: 3
Psychology: 1
Security: 2
Sociology: 1
Stealth: 2
Tactics: 5
Tailoring: 1
Teaching: 5


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♦ Topic: Cape Overthrows CUI

In: Boards ► News

Bagrat
(Original Poster) (Veteran Member) (The Guy in the Know)

Posted On Feb 10th 2011:

For anyone who hasn't turned on a television lately, a mysterious cape by the name of Scientia, believed to be based in the United States, appears to have overthrown the Chinese Union Imperial after fending off what she claims was a CUI kidnapping attempt.

Information is moving quickly on this, so expect this post to be updated frequently. If you have firsthand knowledge of any of these events that can shed light on things please don't hesitate to contact me. There is a secure email address in my profile with instructions for how you can send me an encrypted message.

This post is a collaborative effort that owes thanks to the work of a number of other citizen journalists for reporting and help locating sources in places outside my beat. In particular I would like to recognize the efforts of @C0nstant, @BMX, and @Straightened.

As a final note, be aware that much of the evidence (video, primarily) for these events is known to be or may be from Scientia herself.

Here's the working timeline of events so far:

10:57am EST (Eastern Standard Time) - Narwhal abruptly flies out of a PR event in Toronto, citing an emergency.

~11:00am EST - Sources in Brockton Bay report a Dragon combat suit landed in the road, followed by a demand for surrender, very loud noises, and a vessel that resembles the one seen fighting the Dragonslayers in Toronto appearing out of thin air to pick up one or more people from inside the van before once again disappearing. We have one cell phone video here.

~11:15am EST - Seven full-size Dragon suits in various configurations are seen headed west from Vancouver B.C. out over the ocean. A source on a fishing vessel reports hearing multiple sonic booms approximately twenty miles off shore. The suits are seen landing at Kadena Air Base in Okinawa, two to six hours after they left Vancouver.

~11:30am EST - Tinker cape Dragon of The Guild reports six dead Yàngbǎn operatives in a van in Brockton Bay, New Hampshire to the United States State Department, FBI, and PRT. She claims that they were killed in self defense during an attempted kidnapping of a U.S. citizen, but refuses to identify the victim, citing privacy laws.

12:32am CST (China Standard Time) - Server logs indicate that Chinese government and military networks and telecommunications systems stop responding to pings.

11:43 EST - A lone figure in white armor consistent with that worn by Scientia during the killing of the Slaughterhouse Nine assaults the CUI Embassy in Washington D.C., apparently to deliver a document to the ambassador. Apparent security camera footage uploaded here, with no audio. The poster claims the document was a written declaration of war. There are comments here and here with best guesses of the Ambassador's words by posters who claim to be lip readers.

~12:50am CST - The CTBTO - the international organization that maintains the monitoring stations that listen for nuclear detonations in violation of the test ban treaty - detects a suspected strategic scale nuclear detonation in mainland China from several seismic and infrasound sensor stations. Our current best guess is that this was the destruction of the central Yàngbǎn bunker complex by a large, exotic explosive device of some sort. CTBTO monitoring stations have not detected an upswing in radioactive fallout.

~12:50am CST - Assaults by what are believed to be flying drones using some sort of active camouflage stealth technology begin on numerous CUI military and government targets. The known targets include sites associated with CUI national police, suspected internment camps, and CUI military bases and command posts. The drones demand surrender, and those who resist are mostly struck with containment foam. Some fatalities occur. Reports suggest that at least some of those killed attempted to use heavy weapons against the drones.

A police source in India reports that an attack by drones on an apartment building in Mumbai occurred around this time. Indian authorities arrested five foamed parahumans believed to be Yàngbǎn and found one dead after apparently attempting escape.

~12:55am CST - The Imperial Palace is stormed by a lone armored figure that was evidently Scientia in person, backed up by more drones. Drone video shows her cutting through the South gate with the same melee weapon used against the Slaughterhouse Nine and ignoring hails of gunfire from members of the Imperial Household Guard, who are quickly foamed by her drone support.

~1:10am CST - A drone assault liberates the first of a series of prison camps, believed to be occupied primarily by CUI political prisoners and oppressed minorities. According to one account two guards are beaten to death before the drones stop further violence by foaming a number of former prisoners.

1:25am CST - The CUI firewall that drastically limited internet traffic between the CUI and the rest of the world goes down.

1:26am CST - Every connected phone, television, and computer in the CUI plays the Emperor's surrender and Scientia's accompanying speech. The video is livestreamed internationally on every major video site, along with video captured from the perspective of Scientia's drones showing a selection of assaults, camp liberations, and the destruction of what appears to be a fortified bunker (suspected to be the Yàngbǎn central command/barracks) by a missile that causes a large mushroom cloud. The last is believed to be the source of the explosion detected by the CTBTO stations at 12:50am CST.

Reports by independent computer analysts don't yet have a consensus on how Scientia achieved what appears to be total control of CUI networks and connected devices in such a short time. No traces of foreign software have been detected on affected devices in the days since, suggesting whatever was used erases all traces of itself afterward.

1:29am CST - An NOAA weather satellite shows a brief thermal bloom consistent with an ICBM launch in Southeastern China, according to a poster here who claims to be a retired analyst. The bloom disappears suddenly while the possible missile is in the early ascent stage.

~12:35pm EST - Reports from several active duty US service members indicate that every US military base and ship locked down and went into high alert. I have one report that an order was issued to set DEFCON 2 for at least some forces, specifically including Air Force Global Strike Command and the U.S. Pacific Fleet. Locals near multiple major airbases report observing a constant stream of military aircraft taking off. Sailors report receiving emergency recalls to warships abruptly making ready to leave port.

~12:35pm to ~2:00pm EST - Reports from service members in a variety of other countries of their militaries entering similar high alert status.

~12:40pm EST - Marine One seen landing at the White House and taking off shortly after, headed in the direction of Andrews Air Force Base.

1:42am CST - The first foreign news agency rebroadcasts the surrender video on Western television and some of the livestreamed drone video.

~12:50pm EST - An alert is sent out to off-duty Protectorate members to be ready to assemble on fifteen minutes' notice.

~2:00am CST onward - Some locals report that their phones asked them if they would be willing to assist with tasks, mostly escorting captured CUI military and security services personnel to jails or liberated prison camps or providing medical and humanitarian aid to liberated prisoners. They report that the phones sounded male and were fully capable of responding to questions and carrying on conversations in their native languages. No evidence of unusual software has been found on any of the affected devices so far.

~2:10am CST - CUI state media goes dark. Seventeen minutes later live anchors return with the tenor of coverage changed from denial to openly speculative.

~4:00am CST - Several volunteers with medical credentials report responding to a lab on a military base in Hubei province where they provided medical aid to several parahumans and a larger number of non-parahuman prisoners who appear to have been the unwilling subjects of human experimentation. Drones had foamed the guards and staff at the facility and directed volunteers to take them to a nearby prison. The volunteers reported a large morgue at the site with autopsy tables, a crematorium, and room for several hundred bodies in refrigerated storage bays.

~8:00pm GMT onward - Several sources in European domestic law enforcement organizations report that they began to make arrests of suspected CUI agents after they were tipped off to their identities and whereabouts.

~8:20pm GMT - A source in Her Majesty's Diplomatic Service reports that the CUI ambassador to the United Kingdom makes a formal request for political asylum to the UK government for himself and his staff.

~6:00am CST - Residents of the (former) CUI begin receiving phone updates, evidently from Scientia. Residents of former countries invaded by the CUI are told that votes on whether or not they would like to be independent of the new Chinese state will be held electronically in a week's time. Everyone is told that elections for delegates to a constitutional convention will be held electronically in two weeks' time, and instructions are given for a nomination process. They are also informed that votes on immediately important local or national policy questions may be held sooner, but with at least 24 hours of warning.

Most government workers are told they can continue going to work if they like, and will be paid as normal. Some are told to stay home and reassured that they will receive pay. The largest group of these appear to be the CUI's censors.

~6:00pm EST onward - At least some world governments appear to begin gradually standing down their alert levels.

6:35pm EST - The White House Press Secretary makes a prepared statement that the U.S. government is carefully monitoring the situation but does not believe there is an immanent threat to the United States.

~9:30am CST - A street riot is reported in Wuhan, the cause of which is unclear but may have been attempted looting of storefronts by a large group. The regular police disperse the riot with tear gas and an unusual amount of restraint. No fatalities are reported, pictures of the aftermath show property damage to vehicles and storefronts. Several other riots are reported in other cities over the course of the day, including in Bangkok, Busan, and Chongqing, with apparently similar results.

~10:00pm CST - Drone attacks appear to have ceased by this point, with an unknown but substantial number of CUI government officials, security service personnel, and military personnel in custody. Some military bases and vessels in port are ordered completely emptied by drones. Expert opinion is that these locations have a high probability of being sites with CUI WMDs.

~10:00pm CST onward - Several reports from legal experts inside and outside former CUI territory being asked by their phones if they would be willing to serve as defense counsel, prosecutors, or judges in potential crimes against humanity trials. A source inside the International Criminal Court says the Court was approached by Scientia for assistance, but that the sheer number of potential defendants is beyond their ability to address alone with their existing staff and funding.

Showing Digest

►PinkFrostedCake

Replied On Feb 11th 2011:

Scientia just roflstomped the biggest tyrannical government on the planet as hard as she stomped the Slaughterhouse Nine.

I find myself hopeful and scared at the same time. Anybody else?

►DangerDanger

Replied On Feb 11th 2011:

Gods. First it was those scientific papers she started publishing, then it was the Nine, and now the freaking CUI?

Is there anything she can't fix?

►Leftover Girl (Unverified Cape)

Replied On Feb 11th 2011:

@DangerDanger, she can't bring back the dead. For personal reasons I called the number she gave for capes who need help and asked. I didn't really expect the answer to be yes, but...well. She really does send money to people who just want to stay out of the cape game, though. I could have joined the Protectorate but they would have wanted me to fight and hurt people and...I don't want that. And I don't want to want it, either, if that makes sense. Thanks to her I can afford to take some time now. She even helped me find a therapist who I can talk to about things without having to worry.

Given what we're hearing about people getting directions from their phones in China, maybe the person I talked to wasn't even the real Scientia, but I don't really care. Whoever I talked to was nice, and she helped me. I must have spent half the time on the phone crying and she didn't get impatient once. She even told me it was okay to call back if I ever had trouble, or just needed someone to talk to.

Some people are worried that she's some kind of supervillain, but I just can't see it.

►Artificial Cat

Replied On Feb 11th 2011:

I don't know if anybody else has done the math yet, but going from Vancouver to Okinawa in two hours means the fastest Dragon suit averaged around Mach 4 across the whole Pacific. Even for Dragon that's hauling serious ass. And they left before the attack on the CUI started, which means Dragon knew or suspected what was about to happen.

A vehicle believed to be associated with Scientia was seen in Toronto fighting the Dragonslayers (and lighting the sky on fire) before U.S. fighters and Dragon herself arrived.

Add to that the fact that Dragon was the first to respond when the CUI apparently attempted to kidnap Scientia, and it really paints a picture.

I'm thinking Dragon and Scientia are working together, or at least Scientia is keeping Dragon informed of what she's doing. It would make sense; they might be the two most powerful tinkers alive. (Or non-tinker, if Scientia's claim to not be a parahuman is credible. I have my doubts.)

►ManWithAPlan

Replied On Feb 11th 2011:

@OnlySaneMan, what about Scientia's travel time? If she went from Washington D.C. to Beijing in about twelve minutes?

►OnlySaneMan

Replied On Feb 11th 2011:

@ManWithAPlan, that would be an average travel time of over mach 45. I can't imagine how a craft could do that in atmosphere without it being really, really obvious. Air explodes when you hit it that hard. Any craft at that speed would look like a falling meteor. Even a suborbital hop doesn't seem realistic, it'd take longer than that to get in and out of the atmosphere at either end at any reasonable speed.

I think it's safe for us to conclude that Scientia has access to some means of teleportation for her and all of her hardware. Whether it's a parahuman or technology, I couldn't tell you. I suppose she could have hired Strider, he'll work for anyone who pays his rates and isn't an outright villain. But there are tinkers who've demonstrated matter transmission like something out of Star Trek, so if Scientia is some kind of super tinker it stands to reason she can do it too.

►PenIsMightier

Replied On Feb 11th 2011:

Are we all going to just ignore the fact that a lot of the Yangban were kidnapped and forced to work for the CUI? We don't know if they were mastered or what, but the fact that they were kidnapped means they probably didn't want to be there.

And Scientia just killed them all! Did she even give them a chance to surrender first? A lot of these people were slaves, and she murdered them!

►ParrotPal

Replied On Feb 11th 2011:

@PenIsMightier, I want to share some personal history with you. It's heavy stuff I prefer not to think about, much less talk about, but...it's important.

I worked for three years as a mercenary in Africa. Mercenaries get a bad rap in movies, but we did good work there. Mostly guarding aid convoys and refugee camps. There are a lot of absolute fuckers there with their own petty little armies - oversized gangs with too many guns, really - who always want to steal supplies meant for refugees so they can keep their own power going. They don't care how many people suffer or die as long as they're kings of their own little dungheaps.

Those pieces of shit, one of their favorite things to do is find desperate, impressionable kids who don't know better. Usually orphans. They'll take anyone old enough to carry a gun and stick an AK in their hands, then point them at us and tell them we've got all the food they could want but we won't give them any, so they'll have to take it.

Those kids, fuck, some of them looked as young as maybe eight. And they'd try to kill us. Me and my mates weren't bulletproof. When someone shot at us we could die or stop them by shooting back.

So I've killed kids. I'm never going to forget their faces. Especially not in my nightmares. But the thing I want you to understand is that the world failed those poor kids long before I ever got there, and it was beyond my power to do anything to save them. The world is a shit place, and I did the best I could.

It's easy for you to say that Scientia should have saved anyone in the Yangban who didn't want to be there. But how many Yangban were there? More than a hundred at least, right?

If most of them were in one place, that's...really terrible odds for anyone, @PenIsMightier. Over a hundred parahumans, all coordinated, maybe mastered to work together? Every one of them with gods know how many powers?

Fuck. That.

Christ, I think even the Triumvirate would think twice about picking that fight.

If she had demanded they surrender first they probably would have attacked her, or just teleported away and scattered to cause mayhem, and either of those options could have been a disaster.

Like I said, the world is a shit place. If you're a good person you save the people you can save. If you're a wise person you recognize your limits. If you get yourself killed trying to be a hero you can't save anyone ever again.

I don't know Scientia, but from what we've seen of her she's trying to do her best. She has a whole lot of information that we don't about what she can and can't do. I'm willing to give the benefit of the doubt that she did the best she could for as many people as she could.

And I'm damn thankful she's not like one of those fucking warlords who cared only about using whatever they had to make themselves petty tyrants.

►Oldtimer

Replied On Feb 11th 2011:

For those who don't know, Air Force Global Strike Command is what used to be called Strategic Air Command back in the day. Those are the guys with strategic bombers and ICBMs.

And the Pacific Fleet has ballistic missile subs.

It doesn't take an analyst to figure out that when the report of a possible nuclear detonation came in, followed by an ICBM launch, somebody at the top - the President or Secretary of Defense - ordered the remaining U.S. nuclear deterrent forces into high alert until they could figure out what was happening and if it would spread.

►Goose Sandwich

Replied On Feb 11th 2011:

She says she's not going to make herself Empress, but even if we take her at her word, the prospect of her interference will loom over the former CUI and the rest of the world, now. Even if she does nothing, the threat that she might do something will be something that people in power weigh carefully. 'If I do this, will a swarm of drones be blowing off my doors an hour later?'

That's power and influence whether she wants it or not.

I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing. I hope, if she interferes any more, it'll be in ways that only discourage stuff that deserves to be discouraged. I don't envy Scientia the scrutiny she's going to have on her now.

End of Digest. 0, 1, 2 ... 1419, 1420, 1421



Daily Intelligence Update
Creator Eyes Only


February 12, 2011
Items for your attention, Miss;

Present Force Summary
  • 537 combat drones
    • Creator protection detail: 24
    • Danny Hebert protection detail: 12
    • Lisa Wilbourne protection/monitoring: 6
    • QRF One: 120
    • QRF Two: 120
    • Former CUI territory assignments: 255
  • 24 foam removal drones
    • QRF One: 4
    • QRF Two: 4
    • Former CUI territory assignments: 6
    • Reserve: 10
  • 2412 camera drones
    • QRFs: 400
    • Creator security operations: 843
    • Intelligence operations: 1,169
  • 719 manipulator and construction drones
    • TW Hydrae construction: 499
    • Hope's Promise construction: 212
    • QRF One: 4
    • QRF Two: 4
  • 412 zero gravity ore harvesting drones
  • 4 FTL capable drone carriers
    • QRF One Transport: 1
    • QRF Two Transport: 1
    • Intelligence operations camera drone transport: 1
    • CUI operations drone transport: 1
  • 4 FTL capable zero gravity harvesting and mining vessels
    • TW Hydrae: 4
  • FTL capable personnel carrier Spark
    • Creator transport detail
  • FTL capable heavy weapons vessel Gunboat Diplomacy
    • Creator protection detail, heavy support reserve
  • FTL capable planetary scout vessel Seeker
    • Scouting Hope cluster

Items of Global Significance

  • A number of governments are in the very early stages of increased investment in military drone and anti-drone technology, camouflage and anti-camouflage systems, autonomous weapon control, and railgun and coilgun weaponry. (Estimate at least five years before any of the programs produce field operational equipment. - Hephaestus) Lisa believes that crash program efforts will be hampered by unproductive attempts to shortcut development with tinker assistance.

    Surveillance confirms that these programs are aimed at finding counters to your demonstrated capabilities, or mimicking the demonstrated effectiveness of stealthed combat drone warfare.

    (Like the introduction of the horseman, or gunpowder, or the aircraft carrier, you've changed the paradigm of future warfare by confronting a titan of the old way and humiliating them with something new. Earth's governments will scramble, but they have a long way to go before they can compete. Advanced autonomous VI, synthetic matter armor plate, chameleon metamaterials, negative mass exotic matter flight systems; making drones like yours is much harder than it looks. Countering your drones is less challenging than reproducing them, but we can adapt too, and faster than they can. I don't foresee a loss of our military superiority for a long time, even if you continue an uplift program. - Ares)

  • Worldwide public reaction to the overthrow of the CUI is universal shock, some optimism, and some fear. A significant portion of the global population is on a path to idolizing Scientia as a source of real hope. Others are more reserved, and some are spreading conspiracy theories that you are a conqueror in disguise, a villain with aspirations of world conquest and adoring masses of 'sheeple.'

    Lisa's analysis is that a decisive defeat of the Simurgh would swing many in the reserved category into the openly supportive and hopeful category.

  • Non-Chinese inhabitants of the territories the CUI conquered are largely jubilant. Ethnically Chinese inhabitants (shifted in large numbers into these territories in a colonialist policy of the Imperial administration) are concerned. In the medium to long term there is a significant likelihood of racial tensions and even open armed conflict without your intervention. There is also a substantial likelihood of various forms of unofficial or official persecution by new national governments of ethnically Chinese inhabitants.

  • The Three Blasphemies (combat androids with a history of targeted attacks evidently aimed at destabilizing political systems - Hephaestus) slaughtered 84% of the employees of the International Criminal Court in a coordinated eight minute assault on the Court's offices in the Hague yesterday before escaping. There is a high likelihood that this is related to your request to the Court for assistance in conducting crimes against humanity tribunals of former CUI officials. The Blasphemies (suspected VI, but AI possible - Hephaestus) may have been motivated to prevent the positive effect to international tensions or to your reputation that would have resulted from international involvement in tribunals.

    Drone Carrier Two arrived as the Blasphemies were exfiltrating ahead of local law enforcement and heroic response. Combat and camera drones are tracking the three targets and awaiting orders.

    (I recommend launching an attack when the three are en route between cities in order to minimize potential collateral damage. As the targets have a history of splitting up, an attack should be made as soon as possible. Based on video of previous engagements demonstrating extreme durability, heavy weaponry is likely to be necessary to destroy the targets. Antimatter warhead or Gunboat Diplomacy main gun deployment may be required, and are available at your discretion. - Ares)

  • The participants in two further nascent coup plots by former CUI military personnel have been detained. Surveillance measures on military and government personnel continue.

    (The military is running critically short on senior officers, and would not presently function effectively in combat without your intervention. Drastic downsizing of the excessively large force to match the size of the remaining officer corp would be the fastest course for a successor government to return it to useability as a defensive force, if required. - Ares)

  • Deployment of the remuneration program for non-villain parahumans is expanding. A significant subset, particularly those who have been helped with deeply personal situations or who want to use their powers for something other than combat, appear ripe for recruitment if given the opportunity. There also exist parahumans in the former CUI who successfully avoided government notice and conscription, but projections suggest a high likelihood of fearful responses to overtures at this time due to ingrained fear of authority.

  • With Eidolon reporting pacification of Behemoth and Leviathan, Simurgh behavior is unpredictable. Attempts by Lisa to gather information from live camera feeds were unproductive. Given the focus of the Simurgh's efforts over the last month, an attack on you may be likely.

    (The longer we wait to strike the harder we can hit, but the higher the likelihood that she attempts an attack first. As you are already aware, we cannot use any weapons with the remotest chance of destroying her in Earth's atmosphere without likely unacceptable amounts of environmental and collateral damage. Simulations do suggest several possible approaches to fend off an Earth attack scenario, but with the full extent of her abilities unknown simulations cannot be relied upon. - Ares)
Brockton Bay

  • Kaiser has called a meeting of local parahumans at the bar Somer's Rock tomorrow at 10:00pm. With the news reports of the attempted kidnapping by the CUI being in Brockton Bay, it is now public knowledge that you live in the city. The proposed topic of discussion is how the city's villains should react to your presence and possible actions.

    (An opportunity. - Ares)

Research and Development Project Status

  • Dragon, Lisa, and Hephaestus are working on deciphering a usable shard communications protocol using the brain tissue taken from Jack Slash. It remains to be determined whether commands can be given artificially from the host wetware to the shard.

  • Mannequin's brain remains alive and is available for research into the viability of neural deprogramming of Simurgh victims at your convenience.

  • Six camera drones fitted with specialist sensor packages are ready for experimental measurement of parahuman powers with pronounced dimensional interactions. You wished to be reminded to try them with Doormaker portals when you had time.



Saturday Evening, February 12th, 2011
Hope's Promise, Hope System
Hebert Residence

Status, I thought.

Neural repairs complete. Neural lace maturity 100%, expanded storage, full military augments.

User Advisory: Combat augment mode available.

User Advisory: Simulative user interface possible.

User Advisory: Primary data transfer mode available.

Engage primary data transfer mode?


I took a deep breath. Yes, I thought.

User Warning: Insufficient external storage for download.

How much do I need?
I thought.

I got a number. A number beyond all reason. Some quick math put it at something like a planetary mass's worth of the densest memory I knew how to fabricate.

I could only think of one thing which could possibly be that large.

It was the origin civilization. All of it. Every last one of them, human and AI, stored as mindstates.

They were still alive, and waiting for me to rescue them.

User Warning: Secondary data transfer initiated remotely.

I had just enough time to feel surprise before I found myself somewhere else.



Thanks to @JVR for feedback on this chapter.

Next time on Scientia Weaponizes the Future, Scientia crosses a bridge.
 
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