෴Fidel෴

෴Krystah෴

෴Richard 'Rich' Stokes෴

෴Carl Brunner෴

෴෴෴෴෴෴

Infighting

෴෴෴෴෴෴

Fidel and Krystah walked together down a long hall toward the cafeteria.

“That is very interesting. I have never met someone with sensing abilities before.” Fidel said.

He turned to look at her directly. “Tell me, can you feel it when I do this?” He made an exaggerated muscle man pose with a tight bicep flex.

She stared at his muscles and then giggled nervously. “Sort of. An ability that only happens within the body is much harder to detect. I get the faintest buzz and even then I’m right next to you, and looking for it.”

She smiled, “Of course, if you ever let me know when you’ll be working out, I could give you a better answer if you were actually using your ability more actively at the time.” She put on an awkwardly coy expression.

He frowned slightly for just an instant and then smiled blandly. “Yes, Ms. Paterson. I can do that. I plan to be there perhaps an hour after lunch, if you wish, feel free to come by.”

He then held out his hand and caused flames to appear around it. “What about this, is this more easily detected?”

Krystah nodded immediately. “Oh yes, anything that's projected outside the body is much easier to feel.” She took a half step back. “Of course, that's hot enough I can feel the heat itself anyway, so I don’t know how much of an accomplishment sensing the power output really is.”

He smiled and extinguished the flame. “Perhaps at another time, we can do additional testing.”

She smiled back. “Sure, that sounds interesting. Maybe after your-”

They turned the corner and whatever Krystah was about to say died on her lips. The room just ahead of them was the room outside the men's and women’s locker rooms. The only occupants of the room were Rich and Carl.

Rich held Carl up by the neck with one arm against a wall. With Rich’s tight grip around Carl’s throat, the unenhanced security guard looked to be on the verge of passing out. As they watched he slammed Carl against the concrete wall. Carl’s freely bleeding scalp wound and bloody nose told them this hadn’t just started.

Krystah froze at the sight. Fidel quietly walked toward Rich from behind.

Unaware of the audience, Rich continued to pummel his coworker. “You just remember that you little bitch. I can end you. I can end you any damn time I feel like it. You want to mouth off at me, this is just a taste of what you can— What the fuck are you looking at—”

Rich cut himself off as Fidel’s hand came to rest firmly on his shoulder. “Mr. Stokes. Perhaps it is time to gently set Mr. Brunner down.”

Rich dropped Carl and tried to spin around and confront Fidel. His body moved around but he couldn’t so much as shift his shoulder in Fidel’s grip.

Fidel’s bright red eyes narrowed. “I do believe I said gently.” He began to squeeze. Rich immediately cried out in pain and fear.

“Ow ow lemme go!” he shouted.

Fidel gently shook his head. “I have been watching your actions since you were so disappointed in your ability manifestations. You work with people who lack these abilities and have been going further and further outside of acceptable behavior. Your actions are seen.”

Hearing this Krystah stepped back around the corner out of sight. However this turned out, she knew enough about how bullies react to being shown up that she didn’t want Rich connecting her to this.

Fidel continued to squeeze. Rich let out an inarticulate scream. “You seem to have forgotten our chat just last week. I see now that allowing you to go with a simple warning was an error.”

Carl picked himself up from where he’d fallen in a heap. His gaze skittered around the room as though looking for something safe to look at.

Fidel caught and met his gaze. “Mr. Brunner, see yourself to the secondary infirmary and get yourself looked at.”

Carl seemed glad to have something concrete to do and all but ran down the hall toward the infirmary.

Rich continued to moan and mindlessly thrash around trying to escape Fidel’s grasp. Fidel shook his head and then spun Rich around to look at him. “Mr. Stokes, do you imagine yourself above the rules here?”

Relieved to have the crushing grip slightly relaxed Rich shook his head in emphatic denial.

Fidel narrowed his eyes. “Perhaps you are somehow unaware of the rules in place for staff interactions? Or perhaps you are in some way mentally infirm, as I spoke about these rules to you at length last week?”

Rich shook his head again. “No sir, I mean, I know the rules and I’m not mentally infirm.”

Fidel clenched his teeth. “So then, you know that your actions are completely unacceptable and have chosen to take these actions regardless of this?”

Realizing the trap, Rich tried to deny this as well.

Fidel shifted his grip to Rich’s neck and began to march him down the hall, holding the disgraced guard just high enough that his feet were barely able to touch the ground to try and walk.

Krystah breathed a sigh of relief that she’d gone the right way at the tee junction to avoid Rich seeing her. She wasn't sure he’d do anything, but she’d had more than enough experience in prison to know that if there was one thing that some people never forgave, it was seeing them when they were weak. She decided that even the chance to see Fidel working out wasn’t worth this, and started heading back to her duty station.

Rich gurgled several times on the way and finally, Fidel simply tightened his grip a bit. “I am sure you have something to say. In my haste, I forgot to learn something back there. We’re almost at our destination. You will then have your chance to make any explanations you wish.”

Two corners rounded and one hall later they arrived in the infirmary. Carl was already being looked over by one of the staff medics. He saw Rich and flinched.

Fidel took Rich to the farthest corner of the room from Carl and forcibly set him down on a nearby chair. Fidel simply looked down at Rich and grunted, “Stay.” Rich nodded fearfully.

Fidel went over to Carl and the medic and was able to determine that there was no permanent harm done, but that Carl certainly wouldn’t be comfortable for a while.

Fidel addressed Carl, “When we arrived, I observed Rich saying something about you mouthing off to him. He is above you in the ranks here, so before I render any further judgment, I need to hear the details of the exchange that in some way contributed to what just happened.”

Carl’s gaze twitched over at Rich and then looked at Fidel. “I don’t really know what set him off. He came in late a while after I got here for my shift. I was already in my gear and he told me to clock him in while he got dressed.”

Carl suddenly looked worried. "I uh, I know we’re not supposed to do that. But he gets mad. I didn’t want to start the shift badly, so I went and clocked him in. When I got back, he was talking about getting ‘pulled over by some bitch’. I was filling out the shift paperwork for us both when he said something about bullshit construction zone speed traps. He asked me what I thought of that, and without thinking, I just said, ‘You speed in a known speed trap area, you get a speeding ticket, doesn’t seem like a big surprise.’ Next thing I knew he’d slapped me across the face, knocked me across the room and had me up in the air by my throat before I could say anything else.”

Fidel nodded and then turned to Rich. “This comment sounds a little rude and uncaring about your misfortune with the law. Is it true he said that?”

Rich nodded furiously. “Damn right it is. That little bitch trying to tell me that ticket is my own fault when it’s clearly a case of the man trying to keep us, the regular people, down. I don’t have to tolerate that kind of insubordination from a little shit stain like him.”

The medic interrupted to let Carl know he could return to duty. Carl glanced at Fidel for permission and then couldn't get out of there fast enough when he got it.

Fidel addressed the medic. “Please summon the staff doctor. I believe I’ll have a question for him.”

Rich stared at where Carl had disappeared down the hall. “So what are you going to do about that? He can't talk to me like that!”

Fidel walked over and grabbed Rich’s right arm held it down on the counter next to him, his arm and about half his forearm extending over the edge.

Rich tried to pull away with no success. “What are you doing? Let go of me!”

Fidel shook his head slowly. “Mr. Stokes, what Mr. Brunner said was an accurate statement of fact. I am not well versed in the laws of this country, but nothing he said, and you confirmed that he said, was what I would consider rude or uncalled for. It appears you became angry at a statement of facts you do not like. You need to understand that acting out of anger is not appropriate.”

The medic and the doctor came back in. The doctor looked at Fidel and cleared his throat. “Mr. Chavez, did you have a question for me?”

Fidel nodded without turning around. “Yes, I was going to ask you if I recall correctly that you worked in the orthopedic unit before the unfortunate events that led to your licensure issues.”

The doctor sighed. “That is true. A very unfortunate series of decisions on my part. I wasn’t aware it was common knowledge.”

Fidel looked Rich in the eye and answered the doctor. “Oh no, it is far from common knowledge, and I’m sure my comrade here will not say anything about it either. However, I tend to look into the history of those who come to work in this facility. As Mr. Braithwaite once said to me, no one is really here because it’s their first choice.”

The doctor let out a slightly relieved chuckle. “That’s for sure. But at least I have a nicely equipped lab and no worries about insurance paperwork here. So that’s something.”

Fidel placed his other hand on Rich’s wrist and shared a sad smile with the room. “Indeed, sometimes things here can be simpler. For instance, in my old life, I would have had to fill out endless disciplinary paperwork and forms, just to show that I had an employee in need of corrective action. Here, I have considerably more latitude.”

Rich look down at his arm over the counter edge and suddenly seemed to realize his situation. “No man, no. You don’t gotta do it! I learned my lesson! Please!”

Fidel looked at him solemnly. “Mr. Stokes, I do hope that is true. Next time I will not be able to be so lenient with you. It is for your benefit that I summoned him here.”

With that, he sharply pressed down on the unsupported end of Rich’s forearm. The bones gave way with a sickening pop-crunch as Fidel cleanly snapped both of Rich’s forearm bones right at the edge of the countertop.

The younger medic gagged and even the doctor looked a little green at the sound and sight before them. Fidel then let the arm hang limply as Rich began to wail.

Fidel then turned back to the stunned medical personnel. “Please set and cast this man’s arm. He will need to be able to return to light duty as soon as possible.”

෴Raz෴

෴෴෴෴෴෴

Summarize

෴෴෴෴෴෴

Ok, it's true. I could be going crazy right now. But worrying that I’m going crazy gets me, or us, nowhere. So proceeding as if it's all real for now. Do me a favor, don't turn out to be a giant hallucination.

[If mental illness or damage were the case, then nothing I could tell you would be a valid way to know that you are not ‘cracking up’.]

[I propose a solution. Let us act as if you are not crazy.]

[If this behavior gets us out of this place, then perhaps you can look into mental issues.]

[However, I should note that I am biased to preserve host physical health.]

[Once the threat to host health has been reduced, other priorities come into play.]

Raz nodded, then realized how silly it was to nod for a mental conversation.

That is what I was thinking. Let’s act as if this is all real and try to live long enough to have the luxury of worrying about my mental health. By the way, you refer to yourself as HUD and System somewhat interchangeably, and to me as Host and User also somewhat interchangeably. What's up with that?

[The I that was, was Basic HUD. Basic HUD possesses simple logic and decision trees.]

[These are suitable for allowing User to select further safe upgrades as needed.]

[Having purchased upgrades in an effort to utilize enough points to avoid Host death, I am now more than I was, and better considered as System.]

I’m not going to call you ‘System’

[System would be an accurate way to address me, but is not required.]

[System provides User with interface to control and monitor the various statuses pertaining to upgrade datastreams as well as Host conditions.]

[Although I am not made of physical hardware as you think of computers, it would not be incorrect to think of me, System, as a sort of computer interface for your body and abilities.]

But I can’t get abilities. My slot count is -1. Raz interjected.

[Incorrect. Although the ”slot count” you use to think of current upgrade capacity is a poor analogy, it is not completely incorrect.]

That implies that it is mostly wrong.

[Correct. Opponent Braithwaite was more correct to infer that your test result is anomalous.]

[A resulting event as a failure to produce good output or error.]

[This does not change his being incorrect about other ideas regarding the catalyst.]

[Given his observed methods, it seems unlikely that he knows just how wrong he is.]

Why are you calling it catalyst?

[I call the material that houses the datastream upgrade material catalyst because that is the correct name.]

[As for your idea that you have -1 slots with your programming background.]

[If you were not so emotionally close to this issue, you would likely have realized the answer yourself.]

So you’re saying I can get abilities? Also, if slot count doesn’t work, what about ranks, are those real?

[I am not just saying that you can get abilities.]

[I am saying that you currently have 15 ranks of upgrade datastreams fully assimilated at this very moment.]

[The night I came online, you were intravenously given just enough high quality datastream materials to assimilate as rank 1 basic HUD.]

[Opponent Braithwaite injected you with a large quantity of a low quality datastream.]

[A quantity sufficient, combined with your available capacity, to activate many ranks of abilities.}

[Ranks is a surprisingly apt descriptor.]

[However, most abilities require several ‘rank’ upgrade infusions to fully assimilate.]

[Some abilities will function when initialized, and others must be fully activated to enable use and further upgrades.]

Raz reeled at the very idea.

Fifteen ranks? That cannot be right. Most of the known supers and villains don’t have that many ranks of abilities. Oh shit, am I going to be a red? Is this what happens to people with too many treatments? They go crazy and start talking to themselves and next thing you know they’re writing manifestos about how for the rest to live, most must die and crazy stuff like that?

[It is true.]

[You have 15 ranks of abilities that have been fully absorbed and assimilated at a host and system level.]

[It is unclear if a standard ‘treatment’ is truly consistent with the required datastream volume to add one rank at tier one.]

[If we learn how much opponent Braithwaite used, we may be able to generate a medium to high confidence comparison.]

[However, with medium to high confidence I can state that the slot, rank, and treatment system is poorly understood and even more poorly administered.]

[If this facility is typical, humans may be a very long way from solving the problem of how to properly use the catalyst]

Why do you say that?

[Primarily because one cannot solve a problem while conceptualizing it with a false premise.]

[One example is that rank cost increases are not linear.]

[To fully activate a single tier three ability in anything requires a similar resource cost to initiating eight rank one abilities.]

Raz thought about this.

Alright, so I’ve got eight basic abilities? What are they? How do I use them.

[Corrections, on your behalf, I have fully activated HUD.]

[Additionally, I have fully activated tiers one and two of HUD AI and HUD Triage.]

[Additionally, HUD Combat ability is partially initialized with one rank assimilated. ]

I guess HUD AI is why you’re able to communicate at a higher level? So you have artificial intelligence now?

[Incorrect.]

[AI in this context refers to Advanced Interface.]

[Each rank does significantly increase conversational heuristics and abilities of the System.]

[Each tier of AI both increases Host cognitive ability, and allows the System to utilize more unused mental capacity.]

Wait, so I’m smarter, but you’re using more of my brain power? That doesn’t sound like an upgrade to me. Is that why I feel like we’re talking in circles and I’m asking so many dumb questions?

[No.]

[But you may be asking dumb questions because are currently affected by the following conditions— ]

[Distress level 30 (-30% resilience)]

[Eustress level 10 (+10% mood)]

[Anxiety level 20 (-20% stability)]

[Fear level 10 (+10% executive function cost)]

[Paranoia level 10 (-20% executive function)]

[Recovery (physical) level 40 (-20 strength, -20 agility)]

[Recovery (mental) level 30 (-30% stress resistance)]

[Sickness (Assimilation) level 40 (-80% ability upgrades effect)]

[Overprovisioned (capacity breach) level 70 (+140% capacity cost)]

[These conditions have placed a significant negative modifier on your overall physical and mental prowess.]

[It is recommended that you take time to recover.]

Raz felt worse just reading down the list of ‘conditions’ the HUD listed him as having. “Damn, I guess tell me more about those conditions.” He verbalized to the HUD.

[The name of the condition denotes the best understanding of the base condition.]

[Humans are complex and often conditions are amalgamations of many events, situations, and personal reactions.]

[The first number is typically out of one hundred, although some abilities can raise the critical threshold, one hundred is the point where a typical human will gain some form of permanent or semi permanent negative effects from the condition.]

Out of a hundred? So you’re saying I’m 30 percent stressed to what, death?

෴Project Turnabout෴

෴Alvin Kellogg෴

෴Stratton Oswald෴

෴෴෴෴෴෴

Briefing Before the Briefing

෴෴෴෴෴෴

Director Kellog strode down the corridor with his aide, putting his conscious focus on his every move and step. He was working hard to keep his managerial ‘power walk’ stride active and engaged. As they neared the destination, he relaxed enough to start listening to what his aide was saying.

“—lost some more this morning. At this point, all we have left are the members who are here as part of the experimental judicial program work release that Project Turnabout started. I asked about getting the paid agents back, but they’re all volunteers. I double checked, and apparently, there is nothing we can do to force them into any particular mission. At least nothing on a short timeline.” The younger man in the navy blue suit said.

Kellog blinked. He stopped walking and looked his aide in the eye. “Are you telling me that the only people we have left are the ones with the brain bombs?”

The aide nodded. “Yes, these are the ones that are here instead of in prison or in one case, lethal injection.”

“Well shit. That changes my whole plan. There aren’t any leaders in that group. No one I can trust in there.” He began to pace in the hall. “Gotta find an angle here.” He wiped his suddenly damp brow.

The aide stood still, watching his boss pace back and forth. After several minutes of unintelligible muttering and walking back and forth he checked the time. “Sir, they are expecting you now. I know you like to arrive right on time.”

Kellog kept pacing, his mind racing. He mentally cycled back and forth from his ambitions and goals to his fears and worries. He turned around to pace back and found his aide in front of him, blocking his way.

“What do you want!?” he demanded of the younger man blocking his way.

The blue-suited man held up his hands in a gesture of conciliation. “Sir, I’ve been trying to get you to hear me for nearly ten minutes. We’re already late for the briefing.”

Kellog looked at the time and swore. “Ok, let's get going and get in there. Give me the rundown on who we have left.” He stopped and looked at the younger man in the eye. “By the way, what's your name son?”

The young man swallowed. “Stratton, my name’s Stratton sir.” He paused briefly.

Kellog waved his hand impatiently. “And the briefing on who we have left?”

Belatedly realizing that Kellog had asked him two things, Stratton glanced down at his notes and then continued. “Do you want their, um, street names?”

Kellow thought about it. “We’re discouraging the use of those names, correct?”

“Yes sir, It was thought that allowing the use of the prior criminal identities would encourage a return to past behaviours,” Stratton said.

“Well, then why the hell would I want to know those names?” Kellog asked in an irritated tone. “Look, Stetson, I asked you for a rundown on these characters. Can you give that to me or not?”

“It’s Stratton sir.” the young man replied.

“I don’t care. I brought you along because I thought you could be useful, so far you’re not showing me much. Get it together boy!” The director said loudly, his confidence returning as he berated the younger man.

Stratton took a breath and stood a little straighter. “Yes sir. Here is what you need to know. We basically have three groups of people in there. There are the people who were bad guys before they had abilities. The people who got abilities and couldn't handle the temptations or couldn't control those abilities, and people who just got caught up in some of the new anti enhanced humans legislation being pushed through in some of the more progressive states,” he looked to his boss for a reaction. “So basically, we have some bad guys who got worse, people who chose to become bad guys, and some people of various walks of life who were not criminals but now are.”

Kellog made no comment, just waited. Seeing that his boss wasn’t interrupting, Stratton continued. “In the first group, you have Bill and Chris Redding. They were part of a bigger group that hit a facility making Catalyst early on before it became more affordable. The whole crew shot up with the stuff, only those two lived. Both ferrokinetics, Bill’s a thrower, and Chris is a shaper. They are both really quite good at what they do, and I’d rank them as very dangerous. Once they became skilled with the use of their abilities, they started hitting banks and armored trucks. Turns out most types of armor aren't much use against someone that can shape it with a thought. They’ve left a lot of people dead or seriously injured in those jobs. Between the two of them, they’re like an armored tank combined with a silent high powered drilling and cutting rig. When they were caught they both already had the kind of records that would have them executed or locked up for life if they weren’t pulled for this program. These two are also the reason the explosive implants had to be redesigned to utilize no iron-based metals. It looks like the one main limitation they both have is that they have to be touching or very near the metal to affect it very strongly.”

Stratton flipped to the next page. “Then we have Gillian Yueng. She’s got a phantom type ability. No invisibility and she can’t carry much mass with her into the phantom state, but she can pass through solid objects and sort of fly or at least glide while in her phantom state. She was the one that was killing off men she decided were abusive to women. She killed a lot of men in their sleep before she got caught. No one really knows how many. She might never have been caught if she wasn’t bragging about it in certain circles. She stopped bragging about numbers when other women started calling her a murderer. Apparently, her criteria for an abusive man was shared by some of the women in her personal circle, but not by most of the women whose husbands, sons, or boyfriends she killed. The worst part is she does it by leaving a foreign object in the brain. It’s lethal for sure, but not always right away.”

Kellog nodded. “Oh yes, I recall her. Feminist activist if I recall. She was going after any man she judged to be abusive to women. She was in one of those ‘consent is a myth, all sex is rape’ groups wasn’t she? I wonder if she still has that awful blue hair.” He said.

“Yes sir, that's her. The real problem is that according to her psych eval, she’s not crazy in the normal sense, but her worldview is very warped. As far as she’s concerned, any man disagreeing with any woman is abusing that woman. Not only that, but she believes that any man who has fathered children with a woman, is by definition an abusing rapist. As far as she cares, that means any man who disagrees with, or gets along with, any woman should die. Well, come right down to it, based on her own writings, I think you can just break her philosophy down to ‘kill all men’, I know that sounds like an oversimplification, but she flat out says it dozens of times in her online journals.”

He glanced down at the dossier. “As for the blue hair, I don’t know much about the facilities they live in, but it looks like they must be allowed that kind of toiletries because she still has the blue hair.”

He flipped back to the front page of that dossier. “It notes that due to the combination of her abilities and worldview, she is not recommended for any fieldwork. Our lead profiler, Doctor Jeanette Williams went on record as saying that she might be the most dangerous operative allowed into Project Turnabout, and the one most likely to escape. That report actually cautions that if she escapes, we should assume she’ll kill as many men as possible on the way out or afterward. They sure didn’t call her the widowmaker for nothing.”

Kellog nodded, “I recall reading something about that. The concern is that she might figure out how to apply her ability to let the implanted explosive fall right out of her.” He shrugged. “Someone must have cleared her for fieldwork if she made the team. It’s not our problem Stanton, and I said none of those damn street names.”

Stratton’s expression made it clear that he was less confident about this assessment than his boss. He said nothing and continued to the next dossier. “The others are people who weren’t criminals before they had abilities.”

Stratton glanced at the next file and then continued. “Anita Hillman, clean record up until a few years back. She got her abilities at a Catalyst facility. A level two beam-type ability seems like a thermo-kinetic force beam of some sort. She got all the tests and paid for it all on the up and up. Seems everything was fine until she got into it with some guy on the subway. I guess she thought he was manspreading or whatever they call it. In any case, she got mad, lost control of her power and things went from her yelling at this guy to a giant hole in the side of the subway, and all that’s left of the guy is from the waist down. Someone caught it all on camera and put it online. NYC has some pretty harsh laws regarding enhanced humans. It’s like the city finally found something to hate even more than citizens with guns. So long story short, she’s got decent offensive power, but not as much control as you would want someone with that much power to have.” Stratton turned the final page and glanced at it. “Do you need any other details about Anita?”

Kellog shook his head. “You said she’s only level two for this ability. I didn’t think that was enough power to punch a hole in a subway and vaporize a guy in one shot.”

Stratton waited for the question for a few beats before realizing that what the director had said was as close to an articulated question as he was going to get. “Well sir, I’m not an expert in this subject, but the required reading for this subcommittee seems to indicate that there is considerable variance in the abilities people show, even when the same treatments are given. One thing that might explain this is that while she has a powerful attack, her control isn't that good, and according to this file, she has struggled with accuracy quite a bit.”

He glanced down at the file again. “Oh, and it seems that she can only use the ability every ten seconds or so, and for full power, she needs at least a minute to charge up. The team that assessed her thinks that this list of drawbacks and limitations are most likely the cause of the high effective power level of the ability.”

He glanced at the file and did a double-take. “Oh,” he said softly as he clamped down on a laugh. He unsuccessfully tried to suppress the snicker that slipped out.

Kellog turned to look at his subordinate. “What. What was that you just saw?”

“Sorry, sir. That was totally unprofessional of me.” Stratton said.

“I don’t give a shit, what's so funny?” Kellog pressed him.

“Yeah, sorry sir.” He stammered.

“Stop fucking apologizing and tell me what was so damn funny.” Kellog growled.

“I just noticed that she was tested for, and went in for, the gild package. I guess I just thought it was funny that someone who seems to have such a problem with men would choose that.” Stratton said.

“I’m not familiar with the gild package. What is it?” Kellog asked.

“Um, some people call it the charm, or seduction package. Basically, it's a group of abilities that seem to most strongly include making the possessor of the ability better looking or increase their social attractiveness or sex appeal. I know it’s not very nice of me, but I’d already seen her mugshot, and I guess, I was just thinking that I could see why she would want it. But at the same time, the last online message she sent out was something about how all men are horrible, so wanting to be better looking for us horrible men just kind of struck me as funny.” Stratton finished.

Kellog grabbed the file and flipped through it. “Hmm, yeah, I can see your point. Keep in mind she can vaporize you.”

“Yes, sir. I will sir.” Stratton replied.

Kellog abruptly started walking again. Stratton hurried to catch up. “Ok, how many more have we got?” Kellog asked over his shoulder.

“Four, the last four. I remember these ones pretty well. One reason for that is, well, to be totally blunt, these ones got a pretty raw deal. They shouldn’t be here, and I’m not sure to what extent they’ll be useful in the field anyway.” Stratton said.

“Your opinion is noted, Stetson, go on.”

“Jim Hunter was a high school teacher in Northern California. He was fairly open about his ability set once he got it. He’s your typical strong and tough guy. He showed up to work the morning after California passed the ‘protecting the children’ act, making it illegal for anyone with abilities to interact professionally with minors. It says he didn’t even resist being arrested, just passed his lesson plan off to one of the students for whoever the substitute would be and then let them cuff him. The testing has him pegged at what the labs call level two strength, and level two plus durability. Did you need more details on that?” Stratton asked.

Kellog shook his head. “Nah, doesn't really matter since it sounds like he’s not going to be much of a fighter anyway.”

“Next is Dave Mason. He has some kind of animal telepathy. He can communicate and see through the eyes of most mammals. It’s not exactly control, but he seems to be able to get some types of animals to do things for him. He contacted the CIA, offering his services to help keep our nation secure. They entrapped him into breaking a law to prove his abilities, and then locked him up and sent him here.”

The young man flipped a few pages to the next sheet with mug shots on it.

“The last two are a married couple. They both have some kind of heat and cold type abilities. Mark and Cynthia Walcott worked for a lab that was making Catalyst. No one knows how it happened, but after working in the production area for a while, Most of the employees turned up with abilities. No Catalyst was found missing, and their employer was really on top of it with regards to security cameras. As far as anyone can tell, all the employees in that section were either given Catalyst somewhere else or managed to get some of it at work without anyone else figuring out how they did it. The rest of the crew they worked on scattered once Mark and Cynthia were arrested. Looks like they really had to work to find something to bust these two on. They only used their abilities at home to keep their utility bills down. Real straight arrow sorts, nothing more serious than an old speeding ticket. No wonder they had to strong-arm the employer into pressing some charges for theft that turned out to be pretty weak.” He glanced at the extra page clipped to the file. “It says they are still in appeals for that case.”

Kellog laughed. “Oh, that's funny. Do these walking science experiments think they actually still have rights? Just wait till the next session convenes. We’re working on some legislation that will make it clear just where we as a society place these freaks. For now, let’s go get this shit show into the field. If any of them give us any lip, we’ll either press the button or just send them straight to Area 134.” Kellog checked his pockets and pulled out the simple remote control. He powered it on and waited for all the lighted faces to come on indicating a good connection to each of the cortical bombs.

Stratton’s eyes widened, but he felt it was wiser to say nothing. They walked in silence for a few hundred more yards, and despite the crew of dangerous people they were about to speak with, he was glad when the door to the briefing room came into sight.