Primate Typings

From the Desk of the Dictator:

Welcome back from your weekend everyone.

When I took over as leader of the Technefarious, I’d hope to reduce the frequent moves of our base of operations. Unfortunately, all I have seemed to be able to do is make our transfer to a backup base run more smoothly. Part of that is simply having the facilities already built and outfitted ahead of time. If our current base has to be shut down, we have three others ready to go tomorrow. I prefer to have four, but reconstructing the teleported rubble of our previous site takes a few weeks. Sure it is expensive, but if we can’t raise the dough, why would we think we could conquer the world?

The tracking tags we used to coordinate the transfer of everyone’s possessions will certainly be worth a bundle once teleportation technology goes commercial. GPS units going mainstream was a huge revenue boost for a least five supervillain organizations that I know of (and one superhero, the Golden Explorer, but Green Needle recently gained control of the majority shares of his company, so at least there’s that). Our procedure of inserting tags into our possessions so that our teleport systems can easily find and deposit them in tidy pile for unpacking is a sure moneymaker once the infrastructure exists to make it worth marketing. Sure, it creates an easy way to keep track of you and your stuff, but if you cannot trust your fellow supervillains, whom can you trust?

Speaking of which, if anyone is wondering what happened to Henchman 14T-6L (Maxwell) of the transportation department, I executed him using the improper misappropriation of tagged items from his fellow henchmen during the evacuation. It turns out you cannot trust your fellow supervillains. How about that?

The science department’s examination of the biopsies we recovered from the Soil Six last week is producing results. In addition to moving Project Jelly Doughnut forward, they are also turning out other interesting tidbits. For example, the Soil Six’s resident siblings, Little Quartz and Time Sand, had two different fathers. As far as I know, the fact that they are only half-siblings is not something generally known, not even to them. Our propaganda department is looking for ways to turn that information to our advantage.

To celebrate settling into our new facilities, we’ll be holding an international pizza party in the cafeteria. Come try freshly teleported pizza pies from 108 different pizzerias scattered across the globe.

Now you will have to excuse me, Saber-Cat needs to speak with me.

Have a good week everyone. And remember, the world is already ours – it just doesn’t realize it yet.

Your Leader,

Dr. Photius Callaway

The Killing Man

From the Desk of the Dictator:

Welcome back from your weekend everyone.

Well, last week’s Operation Big Question certainly ended with mixed results. On the one hand, the real goal of the mission succeeded six times over. On the other hand, when it was done, we had to move our entire base of operations.

As I revealed at the final briefing to all teams involved, retrieving the stone eggs of Granquartz the Magnificent was a cover to prevent leaks of our true goal. Among the Parazlying Field Multiplier darts in every henchman’s ammo load were Teleport Retrieval Energy Needle darts capable of penetrating even Sediment’s rocky hide. After gathering a sample of the flesh of the target through its needle, the darts could teleport a short distance to a nearby Extraction team. Gathering biopsies from the Soil Six, in whose base Granquartz lives, was our real goal. I was hoping to get samples from two of the superheroes and would have been happy with just one. In the end, our crack Assualt and Extraction teams retrieved samples from all six of them, from Ground Shock to Compost. Bonus money will be awarded to all henchmen whose darts delivered the goods.

Our after-action analysis suggests that where things went wrong was in actually succeeding in our cover objective. Yes, Extraction Team Gamma with assistance from Assault Team Y managed to hold off Granquartz, Little Quartz, and Time Sand long enough to get away with one of the dragon’s stone eggs. At that point, we believe Granquartz tracked the egg back to our base while the Soil Six tagged along. From there, only ones in Technefarious that do not know what happened are those of us that had to be cloned back to life. Like the dragon she is a statue of, Granquartz tore through our defenses and smashed our buildings. Between being able to track her egg and the ease with which she wrecked our base, our occult and science departments are revising its theories on how the living dragon statue is put together. Once our real world location was revealed, Faultline of the Six got the ball rolling on siccing the Establishment on us, prompting our evacuation of the site after the Soil Six withdrew. We can field a pretty strong crew, but I’m not going to pretend we can stand up to the Establishment when they have time to assemble.

Despite the disruption of our infrastructure, we had only one permanent loss among our staff. Henchman 98B-3O (Carl) was eaten by Granquartz during the egg theft. Everyone else who got killed had their souls retrieved by the soul catchers, so the occult department speculates that it his was somehow trapped by the dragon statue. Research into how to retrieve his soul is underway. 

To give everyone a chance to settle into their new digs, there are no new special events scheduled for this week.
Have a good week everyone. And remember, the world is already ours – it just doesn’t realize it yet.

Your Leader,

Dr. Photius Callaway

The Killing Man

From the Desk of the Dictator:

Welcome back from your weekend everyone.

If you had not heard, the ceremony to rebuild the soul catchers finished late last week. The reconstruction was successful but not without complications. Henchmen 41T-6Y (Roger) of the occult department did not have his personal wards as tight as they should have been during the work. When a Facet Wraith took the opportunity created by the ceremony to slip into our dimension, the monster drained the life from him faster than I could kill it. If anyone knows anything about his possible heirs, please contact human resources.

With the soul catchers back up, we have been deep in preparation for Operation Big Question, the next step of Project Jelly Doughnut. Our objective is to capture the stone dragon eggs of Granquartz the Magnificent. The living dragon statute Granquartz lives deep within the cliffside base of the Soil Six. An assault on their cliff-embedded dome should divert their attention from an attack through the earth by the drill sleds. Even with the distraction, units on the sleds should expect only a limited amount of time before the Six respond to their prong of the attack. In addition, Granquartz is unlikely to leave the eggs even during a fight, so the armory will distribute sonic weapons help keep her at bay. As always, unit leaders should keep interference from unanticipated superheroes in mind. Assault teams Z, X, and W will be assigned to the frontal assault, supported by Extraction team Alpha. Assaults teams Y and V will provide cover for extraction teams Beta, Gamma, and Delta as they recover the eggs. Extraction team Epsilon will be held in reserve. The motor pool and armory should have all equipment for the operation ready to go by Wednesday night. The medical and occult departments should be ready to deal with causalities once the operation gets underway this Thursday.

The relic department has announced that this weekend will see the kickoff of their latest show. The one will focus on the Renaissance, including several pieces on loan from the Grand Connoisseur’s Collection of Stolen Art. That means they will be taking down the trans-dimensional items displays late in the week, so if you have not checked out the Collapsed Echo Universe or the Cracked Man’s Deed to the Earth, you only have a couple more days before they go back into storage.

Have a good week everyone. And remember, the world is already ours – it just doesn’t realize it yet.

Your Leader,

Dr. Photius Callaway

The Killing Man

From the Desk of the Dictator:

Welcome back from your weekend everyone.

I’m happy to announce that the soul catchers should be back online tomorrow. The first of the materials was gathered last Tuesday. It was a simple enough matter for the occult department to summon a demon. Negotiations for some of its ichor broke down quickly, so naturally we supervillains turned to violence to get what we wanted. Eleanor Flask kicked off the festivities by dashing holy water across the circle, burning our visitor and ruining the glyphs containing him. Frigid kept the demon off balance with an oversized snowball (seriously, Frigid, a snowball?). That made time for a taking-a-leave-from-his-leave Bleach to whitewash the monster, draining it of color and power. Having suitably weakened it, I immobilized the demon in solid stone by running it through with the Sword of Statues. One cordless drill and a beaker later, we had enough ichor to rebuild the soul catchers and pursue a few other side projects. Keeping an annoyed demon around qualifies a ludicrously dangerous, so I cut a deal with him before sending him back to hell. In exchange for not pursuing revenge against me or my people, I gave him the Void Cask. We will see how well that works.

Getting the fresh angel feathers took a bit longer to arrange. Oddly, the angels of good are often reluctant to meet with supervillians; I cannot imagine why. Despite my unsavory reputation, Marvela the Mystic Medium agreed to arrange a visitation for me with one of heaven’s lackeys. While I cannot recommend bargaining with demons, their divine counterparts are another matter as angels rarely try to exploit loopholes once a deal is struck. In return for a selection of her feathers, I gave the angel the soul of the hero Marble Crusader, a prize left over from my earliest experiments with soul catchers. While I am sure this will bite me in the ass in the long run, it was better than the alternative. Unlike the denizens of hell, the residents of heaven rarely betray one another by spilling each other’s blood, so attacking one angel tends to bring the rest of her host down on your head. Keep that in mind if you ever have to deal with one. 

Unfortunately while the soul catchers were down, a simple car crash took the life of Henchman 84E-9J (Robin) last week. Her maintenance work in the motor pool was essential to keeping our operations smoothly. Our condolences go out to her family.

Necro-Craze is visiting us this week to assist in rebuilding the soul catchers. While he is here, he has agreed to give a lecture on advanced Necrolife theory. Catch him in Auditorium A on Wednesday night. The annual fumigation of the biology labs will take place Thursday, so expect limited access to the northeast facility that day. I am sure this is unrelated to the fumigation, but the cafeteria menu lists Friday’s special as “Culinary Surprise.” I don’t know about you, but I think I will eat out. 

Have a good week everyone. And remember, the world is already ours – it just doesn’t realize it yet.

Your Leader, 

Dr. Photius Callaway

The Killing Man