Lair by Carl Stubblefield (recommended reading TXT) 📕

lower extremities were now a writhing mass of legs, tentacles and pseudopods. An odd assortment of tools, as each iteration had a specialized use besides mere propulsion and movement. He had, at one time, been revolted at how the changes had altered his appearance, but had long ago turned it to his advantage.

He was also much more aware of his surroundings from the information they transmitted to him, subconsciously allowing him to sense vibrations in the ground, and detect various changes in the environment. His arms were similar but could be coalesced into the resemblance of normal arms, albeit thick and muscular. This time he stretched, allowing the tendrils of his arms to unfurl and expand, reaching farther, thinning as they were pushed to their limits. It felt good to expand in this manner after being in a compressed, dormant state for so long.

Seeing that the light came from a golden orange flow of magma that was contained on the far side of the cavern. Methiochos extended two of his specialized tentacles toward the super-heated rock. Dipping them in, the Dark Nth there began extracting the kinetic and heat energy from the magma and transformed it into something Methiochos could use.

There was a sharp sensation of discomfort that resolved into a relaxing and soporific sensation of comfort. With the energy flowing in, he became more… his true self, somehow.

Methiochos closed his eyes and exhaled deeply. As he relaxed, the dream-like state returned, and he felt like he was underwater once more. In his mind’s eye, he imagined he could see the fish again, darting around the fringes of his imagination. Connected with the energy as he was, he noticed he was emitting an orange glow, that was becoming brighter and brighter.

One of the fish approached, coming close to his face, examining this new wonder. By instinct, he reached forth his hand, which had long thin ribbons trailing from his fingertips, like a psychedelic afterimage. The fish stayed there, trusting his intent instead of dashing away. Turning his palm upward, the ribbons rose and fluttered in the water like a small forest of seaweed. The fish swam to the ribbons and as it nestled into one of the streaming extensions, it disappeared in an orange poof.

###!###

45 years ago…

The plan would work. Methiochos was a great general and he had almost all the players in place. While the Archon was in charge of things now, Methiochos hoped that he could bring some new ideas and leadership that were sorely needed in the world. Supers could not continue as they had always been. There had to be structures in place, to direct and guide those powers. And he aimed to be that guide.

First, manage some of the wild ones so they would not destroy the planet or each other. Second, police and punish those who did not obey the agreed upon laws. Third, form some kind of government that was not based on the ‘might makes right’ mentality, but that could utilize the best of the best that was in humankind, regs or supers.

Archon believed that people should be honorable, and honor guided many of his leadership decisions. Methiochos felt that mindset protected weaknesses and that weakness could be exploited. It was very passive and Methiochos believed that there were many times when you had to take action as soon as possible. To whit, the preparation for the new base.

Manticorps existed as both a business and as a collection of supers. The organization had funneled immense amounts of money into the making of a base that would have functionality for all its many supers, allowing them to grow and progress even after hitting high levels. To minimize attacks against their new headquarters, very few people were privy to the island’s exact location. Methiochos would use this to his advantage. They would be able to rival any Faction with just a decade of the manor’s advantages.

The island was secluded enough that only a few people knew about it, and large portions of the manor were being built by androids, and even terraformed by specialized robots to minimize revealing the location and having to ‘deal’ with the witnesses. The robots would then be able to modify their function to become service and maintenance droids. It was the perfect transition, reduced costs, and avoided messy executions.

Methiochos was the project lead and had found the perfect location. He scouted it himself, finding it to be large enough to house thousands of people, but remote enough that invaders would be easy to detect. The security firm he was dealing with had a couple prototypes that he knew could be game changers, especially if Methiochos could convince them to come onboard and design for Manticorps exclusively. He had dealt directly with the project lead, Roger, who wanted to be a super very badly.

Methiochos used this to his advantage and confided in him how regs could become supers, in the cases where a super dies. The abilities could transfer to another human being if this transfer was done within a certain amount of time after the death of the donor; there was a good possibility that Roger could be at the front of the line, if he were a part of the team.

Supers died all the time, but regs never knew how the supers got their powers or why powers manifested at different ages. It was a closely guarded secret. People were even showing up with isolated skills that resembled the powers a super had, but these skills were anomalies, which were not able to be upgraded, so they were just a hair above regs. No nanobots were involved with these mutants either. Definitely not in the class of supers.

Regs also knew nothing about the nature of how supers saw the world in an augmented way, or how they had skills they could upgrade and improve. Those who even hinted at revealing this to the world suddenly developed a ‘vanishing’ skill.

These odd prodigies did seem to take to the transformation