Julian Ivo/Eggman

I watched Colin for a brief time through the cameras in the MCR, but I had to keep it short. Colin was competent, I’d designed him that way after all, and I had other stuff to do. The surgery, even with a superhuman AI moving at top speed, would take hours. More than 24 most likely.

In the meantime, despite my worry for Gordon the walking EMP, I needed to keep my eyes on the ball.

Which meant keeping an eye on the developing Vought situation.

What I remembered of the Boys timeline wasn’t exactly the wiki. I had a perfect memory of every Eggman life, not my own. No matter how smart Eggman made me, he couldn’t make my own memories perfect.

But I was positive I had it right.

While I had skipped a step, Annie still met Hughie in the park. Hughie would next go to Butcher and agree to leave a bug at Vought. Then, Translucent would follow and get kidnapped. The next day, he’d die, then Homelander would later kill the mayor of Baltimore. Nice and simple.

But hey, why should Butcher be the only one to leave a bug in Vought? I’d hacked into some of their systems, but a direct listening device within their base would be good. Maybe even a way to listen in on Stan Edgar.

Worth the risk, that.

I went into my office and was surprised to find Mechelle there. Looking at… ah.

“Mechelle,” I grunted, sighing when she looked over at me from the screen she’d been gazing at. “What are you doing here?”

“I came to visit,” she said. Then she sharply turned to look at the screen again. “What is this?”

“Something… well, something I’ve been working on from the side,” I stood next to her. On the screen was a video, a rudimentary moving blueprint really, of a flat structure folding and unfolding itself into a variety of designs. A crane, lizard, tiger. Over and over, shifting between them. The video then transitioned into an image of the internals of the flat structure.

“This isn’t Eggman tech,” Mechelle said. Not accusing. Not judging. Just saying it.

“...I kind of came up with it based on some stuff I’d seen in my own world,” I admitted. “It’s probably going to be used on the Eggman side of things. And I’ve barely got any clue on how I’ll make it possible, but I wanted the Eggman to use something I made myself, rather than just modifications or copies of previous designs. So uh… the Origami bot-line. A set of robots designed to fold and unfold into a set of designs, changing functions to suit what they need. All capable of being stacked together like pieces of paper.”

I demonstrated this by waving at a box of papers near the printer. About 500 sheets inside. Heavy, yes. But also, a lot of paper, in a small space. I sighed. “Can’t get the design quite right though. They’d be too thick. I have this idea, too, that the folding would bring the circuitry together in different ways to allow different abilities…”

Mechelle searched my face. I relented. “I’m grateful for Eggman’s experience and knowledge. But if I ever end up meeting that villainous magnificent bastard, I’m going to have some shit of my own to show him beyond just cribbing his style… Got to be my own kind of bad guy.”

She seemed to accept that. “Can I help?”

I chuckled, giving her a one-armed hug that got me a surprised look. “Always.”

Despite the robotic look she always carried, I could tell that made her happy.

Being a super-genius meant a lot of things were easier. But it also meant I had trouble with some things I hadn’t expected. Like obsession. I thought it was bad in my world, where I could get so into writing or gaming that I would forget to eat, but it was way worse now. I’d sometimes wake up covered in oil with blueprints in front of me and a belly roaring with hunger after a two day stint.

Mechelle kept an eye on me from then on, but being as smart as Eggman was an addiction in itself. Having an idea and immediately forming the exact things you needed to make it happen, right down to the final wire soldering and bit of code. It was a heady feeling of power, knowing physics were under your command and only time kept you from true power.

The other part was that I wasn’t sure what to do when Bradley approached me about making an official contract with the US Military. Eggman was a genius. But he was a supervillain, and he never had to worry about having a good relationship with any government. In some realities he was the government. No tyrant in human history had ever reached the level of power he’d obtained. ‘My rule is law’ was literal there, sometimes including laws of reality.

Point is, he didn’t have nearly as much paperwork.

In my office, I sat behind my desk reading a set of papers. Across from me, Bradley, my favorite military man, was looking a bit disapprovingly at me, not sitting down just yet. It could have been my clothes. I’d been working out before this meeting, and was still sweaty and wearing a pair of shorts and a shirt, rather than my usual lab clothes.

Healthy body, healthy mind. Until later at least.

“Bradley, I’m not sure how much of this I can agree to,” I said with a frown. “I’m an American, I don’t want to sell my weaponry to any country that we aren’t allied to. But we aren’t just a weapons manufacturer.”

“I know,” Bradley watched as I sipped from a protein drink. “This isn’t about the rest of your technology. While we are interested in your computer tech, your military tech is the only thing I've been told to lock down. The fact is, you’ve become a valuable commodity. It was crazy enough when you made the new guns and other shit. But then you brought a mech out. Not just those half-assed pipe dreams with battery life like a fucking gameboy. But a viable piece of honest to god robust engineering.”

Bradley leaned back, finally sitting down. “The shit you’ve made might as well be goddamn magic, Julian. I hear you’ve got someone ready to have cybernetics applied to them as well?”

“For a very exorbitant price,” I pointed out. “Tommy King is going to be healed, but the materials I’m putting into it are actually going to cost more than four Abrams tanks and a couple of A10 Warthogs.”

“It’s a start,” Bradley tapped the papers I’d handed over. “We aren’t offering you peanuts here. You’d become one of our industry partners, working with DARPA. They’ll be working closely with you, along with some other partners. And I promise you. This will become a very lucrative deal for you.”

“Be careful how you say that,” I said with a sigh. “Way too many companies end up taking advantage of that government check.”

“You’re too arrogant for that.”

“Oh? How do you figure?”

“I think I have you pegged,” Bradley smirked. “You don’t give a shit about money. Just the stuff you can make with it.”

“...Well, you aren’t wrong.”

“Ha!” he chuckled. “Yeah. I don’t think you’re gonna be one of those soft-serve fuckers pulling us along while taking cash. You? You’re more likely to bankrupt the US because you can’t stop making new shit for us to buy.”

I smirked. "I will be honest with you. The ideas and possibilities in my brain do sometimes terrify me."

Reaching into my desk, I pulled out a large blueprint and handed it to him. As good a time as any other to share this.

"As an example. How would the army like an attack helicopter of sorts that can match or even outperform the Warthog in the speed department and run rings around its maneuverability? This is just one of many things bouncing around my brain. Hell, I could have a prototype ready soon with my... Well I think I will keep those cards close to my chest. Got to keep some proprietary company secrets to not lose my edge. Suffice to say I have methods to speed up a lot of steps of manufacturing in house. You interested?"

Bradley looked over the plans for the copter in question, a single seater. One I’d copied from a game this world had never made.

“Fucking hell. Yes, I’m interested. A top speed of-... You better not be messing with me.”

“I never lie about science or technology.”

Bradley chuckled. “Yeah. Yeah. Oh. Just in case, I’m also going to recommend upping your security.”

“Worried about me?”

“Worried about the people who might be against changing the status quo,” Bradley shrugged. “This is a competitive business. War always is.”

“War, huh?”

I hummed to myself. Yes. War. I had memories of war. But no real experience. This should be valuable for me. Starting small.

I signed the papers. Let the government believe they had a hold on me.

At least as long as I let them live with that ignorance.

The next day, I was watching a screen on my own. In a small kitchen in the city, I watched three men shout and yell at each other. Frenchie, Butcher, and Hughie. Thank you, The Boys tv show, for giving me a massive amount of establishing shots from which to find the building I needed.

In the room next to them, I knew that a certain super ‘hero’ would be sitting naked in an electrified cage. As long as the trio weren’t idiots, as long as Hughie was still the same as he once was, then that hero would soon be chunks all across the kitchen. A shame, I’m sure.

By the way, funnily enough, I hadn’t actually needed to track the building I needed. Frenchie’s girlfriend had bought a Ivo Phone and laptop, so I was able to use the, impossible for anyone but me to find, backdoor into then hack into Frenchie’s phone as well. She was quite the tech fiend apparently.

I could worry about my recent lack of respect for boundaries or privacy some other time.

In any case, I turned away from the screens when a call came in. Colin. I brought the call up and his face appeared. He looked… refreshed? Ecstatic? Accomplished, that was it.

“Colin. How did it go?”

“Incredibly,” he sighed, shaking his head. “I do have some new questions about the nature of these powers, especially the fact they seem to ignore the laws of physics. If he wasn’t dead I might be inclined to recommend we hire Dr. Vought.”

“I’ll consider it if I make a time machine. How is the patient?”

“Healed, for lack of a better word,” Colin moved the camera over to show off Gordon. The EMP generating young man was asleep, and otherwise looked exactly the same as before. Except for the lines of silver along his cheeks, pectorals, and abdomen. He was naked except for a pair of shorts, more lines of cybernetic silver running along his knees, shins, and ankles. Most importantly, two silver disks rested at his wrists.

“The young man will need therapy. I took some of his brain and replaced it, but healing the damage caused by long-term exposure to electromagnetic pulses is easy. The PTSD from a long period of torture and solitude is more of a problem.”

“Therapy doesn’t exist in fiction,” I joked lightly. “Or comic universes.”

“Sopranos and Doctor Leonard Samson,” Colin countered with a roll of his eyes. “And I’m serious, Julian. If you want him to become a halfway healthy human being, he needs therapy. As for your dreams of having him on the payroll, I don’t see that happening for a while.”

I shrugged. “That’s fine by me. It’s like the man said. Investments are a risk, but the big ones have great returns.”

Colin seemed to accept that. “Gordon will require at least a week of rest. Extended time for physical therapy as well.”

“Done. He’ll get a nice vacation on that beautiful beach island as well,” I said with a smile. “Come on back home, Colin. We’ll leave the rest to my Eggman body.”

“See you soon,” he hung up. I rubbed my chin, rising up to my feet and walking out of my office.

In Ivotech, every building had someone working in it 24/7. We had to, to keep up with the demand for our products, and thus had shifts switching between each other constantly. I’d gone out of my way to make sure the contract for working with me was very lucrative, and very open on hours. Overtime was allowed, but I had Mechelle and my managers making sure we weren’t overworking people.

So whenever I left my office, I was surrounded by people. I walked past men and women, some in lab coats, some in ‘bunny’ suits (body encompassing white suits to prevent lint, hair, and other things from contaminating computer ships), and some covered in oil while wearing jumpsuits. The roar of machinery from the creation of guns, computers, and mechs filled the air.

I stopped briefly in front of one door. Inside, my favorite creations sat, still being made. I watched the inky black figures being worked on for a moment, admiring the efficient designs before walking away. Bradley had no reason to worry about my security. Not once those got started.

The thought about my company’s current problems made me frown. With Gordon, I would need to hire a therapist. More likely, several, for a variety of reasons.

I’d also need to hire security. Real security, in the form of trained men and women capable of wearing armor and weapons of my making, some of them with experience in espionage. Sad as it was, there were plenty of veterans I could hire on who had trouble finding work.

Tomorrow I’d speak to Colin, Mechelle, and Destiny, and work out a plan for us to expand. A pair of new facilities was also in the works and Destiny should have some results on our deal with hiring a third party to make the Big Foot mechs.

Exhilarating. Truly. But in the end, the only reason it mattered was that it supported Eggman.

I walked back into my office and sat down, sending a message out to Colin, Mechelle, and Destiny. On the screens, Hughie pressed a button. Red flew about the room. I reached over and idly pressed a button of my own. Once the Boys were done cleaning up the body and tossing it into the ocean, the next part would be easy enough. Then, I’d need to make another attack.

Couldn’t let Vought rest too easily. They’d never have a moment to forget that Eggman was out there, ready to embarrass and harass them. Hm… I’d done a bank robbery. Maybe next, a good old fashioned… yes. That would be FUN.

Wall Street was open for business.

Beneath the Waters of the Hudson Bay

A silver-colored zinc trunk lay at the bottom of the river, under a harbor. Earlier, a porpoise had swam up to the trunk, inspected it, then left after a while. That was when the next visitors moved up.

The first was a strange combination of goofy and terrifying. Purple in color, it was shaped like a child's drawing of a shark, with massive goofy looking eyes, a tiny fin on its back, and a propeller rather than a tail.

The terrifying part was the massive steel jaws, with teeth like butcher knives. The badnik, called a Jaws, swam up to the crate and took a position near it, circling slowly in a guarding position.

Another robot approached the crate itself. It was pink in color, with a large bulbous head. More importantly, it had 8 long limbs. Using those arms, the Octus badnik unclasped the crate and pulled it open. Within was a set of words spray painted in black.

‘Coming For You’

There was also a set of black plastic bags, chunks of meat laying within.

The octus reached in and took several portions of the corpse, sucking them into itsit’s mouth to be contained within it. Then, it placed a small sticker to the inside, a barely noticeable piece of tape that blended into the crate. Once done, the badnik closed up the crate. With the Jaws as it’s escort, the Octus swam off into the ocean together, heading down river. They left long before a man in a green suit would encounter the same crate.

Superhuman corpse chunks acquired.