Primate Typings

From the Desk of the Dictator:

Welcome back from your weekend everyone.

The Fogurols invaded lasted week. They are aliens bent on conquering the Earth, requiring the superheroes and supervillains to band together drive them off, blah, blah, blah. Unfortunately, there are always a few casualties from this sort of thing. This time, the vigilante Pinnacle numbered among our dead.

“But wait,” you say, “wasn’t killing Pinnacle the focus of Project King of the Mountain? Are you trying to tell me they succeeded where our illustrious leader failed?”

First of all, “illustrious?” Suck up.

Second of all, no, I just want the rest of the world to think Pinnacle died during the latest world crisis, which was the plan all along. Considering his connections to the Board of Directors for the Establishment, it was safer for Technefarious if their attention wasn’t focused on wiping me out. I added enough trouble for us by killing Record Holder during my little safari.

So, having pissed off Pinnacle to the point where he would follow me into a trap to get at me, I then had to wait for a worldwide event to distract from our little fight. Those little dustups happen every couple of months on our Earth, so I didn’t expect to be holed up in my cave for too long.

Did I mention the trap was in a cave? Originally enchanted to hold the Thunder Beast’s Shadow long before humans tamed fire, Technefarious annexed the underground prison after the Shadow escaped in the 1960’s. We’ve augmented it over the years with psionic baffles and entropy stabilizers, creating a battleground that nullifies 99% of superpowers. It doesn’t work on me. My physical powers are expressed in my muscles and bones, and fields that cut off external power sources don’t affect those. The insights I get on how to kill anything are trickier to trace, but I’ve never found anything that can block them either.

Interestingly enough, all the power drainers we had at work were not perfectly suited to stripping Pinnacle of his powers either. Even within the cave, my special insights suggested scenarios that would require widely divergent responses on my part to finally bring him down. Frustratingly, my powers were vague on exactly what acts he could perform that wouldn’t be stopped by our fields. Superpowers are just a giant game of rock, paper, scissors sometimes.

Still, the dampening hampered him. That slick power armor he uses to enhance his strength and speed had to come off. As for his famed gadgets and utilities, the fields stripped away their battery power, turning half of them into so much junk. Sure, he still had his smoke bombs, submission sprays, and low ignition chemicals available, but it as a fair fight. After all, I had a knife.

Our battle lasted two hours and six minutes. I suffered seven broken bones, lost three teeth, and had my left ring finger cut off second knuckle. The knife I started with changed hands five times. I was glad when the fight finally finished, because by the end I really, really needed to pee.

After I patched myself up, I dressed Pinnacle in his armor, damaged it to match the injuries he had received during our fight, and then dumped his body in one of the battle sites with the Fogurols. The Establishment will find him there and assume he fell defending the planet. They’ll figure out the truth eventually, I’m sure, but by then, something else will have come along to distract most of the world’s superheroes from what I’d done.

Let’s hope that distraction is our successful enforcement of our rule over the world.

Have a good week everyone. 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 still waiting for the right time to send Pinnacle his invitation. I’m still bored hiding out in my trap for him. Tried to practice the mediation techniques I learned as a child while being raised by a cult of assassins. Became really bored. Felt less bad about killing every last one of them as an adult. Not that I ever really felt bad about it, or I probably wouldn’t have done it in the first place. Or at least not all of them. I’m rambling. I’m bored.

Maybe this will be the week will be the right time to contact Pinnacle. I hope.

Have a good week everyone. 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.

You’ve probably noticed I am not at our headquarters. Instead, I’m hanging around my trap for Pinnacle, waiting for the right time to reveal the location to him. I probably shouldn’t be sending this note except that A) I’m pretty sure he won’t be able to trace this and B) I’m bored.

Oh well.

Have a good week everyone. 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.

After I killed his old sidekick Record Holder last week, Pinnacle finally decided to send someone to hunt me down. Something, anyway. I’m still not sure if it was a person or not.

The hero of Lowplain decided to begin by delivering a message to me by hacking into our computer network. Our firewall would have normally just blocked the attack, except it happened to come encrypted with D.O.C.T.O.R.’s personal communication codes. Naturally, the Elite Triad likes to keep an eye out for their creator, so it was held for their examination. Taking it apart, they found a longitude, a latitude, and Pinnacle’s signature.

It was a trap for me, but I’d already accepted that probability by taking the fight to him at the beginning of this project. The only question was how long I was going to wait before showing up. Should I try to take him by surprise by showing up quickly or let him stew while he waited around for me to show up? I focused on killing Pinnacle for some insights on which would be better, but my powers suggested no actions on the matter that would bring me closer to my goal. My curiosity piqued by this anomaly, I teleported to right away into the trap and nearly got my ass blown away.

The Collector Colossal, one of Pinnacle’s supervillains, likes to collect large machines. He’s particularly fond of death traps, and apparently had one that was triggered by incoming teleports. Luckily, my reflexes are well above average, and he had chosen rockets as the payload for this particular trap. I had planned on taking evasive maneuvers upon arrival anyway, so I was a good position to get out of the blast radius with nothing worse than getting bumped around when the shock wave hit me.

The Collector himself was not around. Pinnacle just borrowed one of his facilities to wear me down before our final confrontation. By “our” I mean myself and something dressed up as Pinnacle. After battling my way through a swarm of mechanical hornets, busting through a maze of mirrors filled with deadly lasers, and batting away nine innings worth of deadly baseballs (don’t ask), I faced off with my antagonist. He was built like Pinnacle, moved like the superhero, and even fought like him. However, I knew killing him would not result in Pinnacle’s death. I wondered if this was a robot or an android or a homunculus but decided it did not really matter.

Our fight was strenuous, rolling through a factory line for poisonous pies, a deadly dark ride, and ending in a bowling alley of doom. I used the OSHA unapproved super-fast ball return system to sever the doppelganger’s hand and pinned his shoe to the ground to keep him from wandering away while I explained to him what was going to happen next. I was going to leave him alive so he could pass a message along to his master. The next time, Pinnacle had better face me himself or I would switch to killing my way through his associates. I would deliver the time and place to the hero at the address he had sent his message from.

The science and propaganda department will provide this week’s special event at headquarters. Apparently their mass mesmerizing machine has entered its beta stage, and they’re ready to try it on a large audience. They promise it will provide a unique entertainment experience for the audience. I won’t be participating. I need to go prepare my own trap for Pinnacle. Try not to become lobotomized zombies while I’m gone.

Before I pack, I thought you all might like to know that the Golden Web sent their latest package in our weird exchange of junk. They sent me a light bulb certified to have been in CBGB’s bathroom in the late 70’s. I’m afraid to touch it. Lord knows what it’s carrying. I am curious how it was officially certified, though.

Have a good week everyone. 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.

My pursuit of the superhero Pinnacle has extended into yet another week. Our intelligence tells me that he’s been active in the city Lowplain while I’ve been here, but he still hasn’t sought me out. I’ve been pretty public in my search for Pinnacle, but you wouldn’t know that from his lack of response. It’s technically possible that he’s been dropping hints in order to lure me into a trap and I just haven’t noticed. However, he is used to dealing with far dimmer supervillains than me, and it’s not like I would avoid walking into a trap at this point even if he made it really, really obvious.

Unfortunately, I did cross a line yesterday that I think will draw a more direct response from him. Well, crossing it wasn’t actually unfortunate; I just got to it more quickly than I had planned to. Instead, I had intended to spend this week teaming up with one of Lowplain’s local supervillains and helping them out with the caper of their choice. To that end, I approached Missy Poodle, Crime’s Best Friend. She was hesitant to accept my assistance. We’d never been at odds, but her crimes tend not to require a cold-blooded killer for their execution. We were discussing the exact nature of my utility when our negotiations were interrupted.

Record Holder was Pinnacle’s kid sidekick years ago. I strongly frown upon hurting underage superheroes and avoid it when I can. Luckily Record hasn’t been a kid for years. He was also very energetic in his delivery of his objections to my visit to his city. My three broken ribs, pulverized knee, and chipped tooth suggest that he holds the records he’s named after honestly. Of course, my own name is every bit as accurate. He won’t ever add world oldest living man to his titles now.

Unless he comes back from the dead, that is. He’s a superhero, so he probably will. Still, he’ll have to die at my hand a few more times to make that a record. The current leader is Bad Penny. I’ve had to kill him five times, so far. Dude hates me.

I’m told that while I’m gone this week, I will miss our annual ice sculpture contest.  Frigid will judge, as she is ineligible to participate for obvious reasons. I want to remind everyone that Frigid has full authority to deal with any sabotage against your opponents that annoys her. Anything that doesn’t annoy her is, of course, fair game.

Have a good week everyone. 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, my hunt for Pinnacle continues into a second week. My harassment of the criminal establishment of Lowplain has been bloody but has not drawn out the city’s premier superhero to face me. I’ve moved on from attacking criminal enterprises behind closed doors to attacking crime conducted out on the street. It’s been a bad week for the muggers, rapists, and thieves of the city.

I’ve also managed to annoy one of Lowplain’s regular supervillains. The Jugular Juggler was conducting a bank robbery that I stumbled upon. Unfortunately, his henchmen weren’t wearing costumes, so I assumed it was just the usual sort of heist and started sticking sharp objects into them. The unexpected arrival of a throwing knife into my upper arm alerted me to the presence of a fellow costume at the party. The Juggler might be nuts, but he’s actually pretty good at close quarters combat. I trying to avoid pissing off the local supervillains too much this week, so I decided I better only maim him. Still, it took a full fifteen minutes to properly subdue him. For a psycho with no proper superpowers, he’s pretty tough.

By then, the cops had arrived. As you can imagine, they weren’t happy to see either of us. Technically, there were shots fired in our direction before proper warning was given, but I can’t bring myself to file a complaint. If the cops thought what I’m doing to the local criminals was reasonable, they wouldn’t have gone into law enforcement.

The switch to public shenanigans is pleasing the city’s civilian population as much as it’s pissing off the cops. The Technefarious propaganda department tells me the bump in local approval derives from the appeal to their baser instincts combined with how bad Lowplain crime problems normally are. I’ll enjoy the freedom this give me for as long as it lasts, but experience tells me their approval will disappear once I do something to anger or scare them.

While I was busy with Lowplain, I’m told another Photius Callaway from a different dimension stopped by our Technefarious looking for recruits. On his Earth, all the world’s religions had fused into a single monotheism. That’s well within the normal range in differences for this sort of thing, but in this case, Heaven had already conducted its Rapture and turned the Earthly plain over to Hell. Unfortunately for the forces of Hell, that Earth was A) technologically advanced, and B) chock full of superpowered mortals. Since supervillains usually outnumber superheroes, humanity really didn’t suffer that much of a drop in combat power from the Rapture. The devils are getting their asses kicked, but the reduction in Earth’s civilian population has made maintaining the world’s infrastructure a trial. That Photius and the other new leaders of Earth decided to see if they could hire additional henchmen from the parallel supervillain organizations on parallel Earths. I’d like to wish Henchmen 41F-4E (Fly), Henchmen 66F-9R (Lucy), and Henchman 96O-7P (Stan) luck, safety, and profit in their new dimension.

Have a good week everyone. Remember, this Earth 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.

This week, I kicked off Project King of the Mountain in which I will kill the superhero Pinnacle. Except for my immediate support staff, most of you won’t notice any changes in your usual routines during this project. Frankly, the times I would need to use all of Technefarious to kill one person are few and far between and would usually involve enemies foretold by things like the sky burning or a plague of frogs.

My presence at our home base will spotty for a while. For this project, I’ll be spending most of my hours in Pinnacle’s hometown of Lowplain. Ideally, this assignment would consist of a single strike against the urban vigilante himself. Unfortunately, despite a career spanning decades, no one knows who Pinnacle is. Careful computer analysis of the historical records suggests that this isn’t always the case, but the knowledge of his identity gets purged from our world shortly after his exposure. It is unclear if this is due to magic or some other sort of reality distortion source. We’ve been unable to pry his identity loose using our own tools from those fields since we’ve became aware of his interest in Technefarious, so we’re having to go after him using the roundabout methods of my own “kill anything” powers.

Whatever the full nature of the Pinnacle’s powers, everyone agrees that his combat abilities are those of a highly trained human with access to exotic technology and magic. That I can handle. The hard part is going to be getting him to face me alone. With the death of his spy, I don’t think there’s much way to hide that I’m going to come after him. The problem then becomes how I do I draw him out without him bringing along half of the Establishment with him. Push comes to shove, I could probably still kill him if he did, but I’d like to avoid the war with the Establishment that would kick off.

So, I’m in Lowplain this week. I may not know how to find Pinnacle, but I do know how to get a message to him. Lowplain is notorious for its organized crime, despite Pinnacle’s efforts. The city acts as a gateway to too many locations to stem the tide of illegal goods flowing through it for long. Every time Pinnacle and local law enforcement drives one set of goons under, another set immediately takes their place. I’ve spent the last couple of days entertaining myself by locating dumps of illegal goods and dens of vice. Once I find them, I make it a point to kill the onsite management and most of the armed guards. I leave a few alive and let them know that I’m looking for Pinnacle. I’m sure it will get back to him pretty quickly.

I suppose I could have just highjacked the local airwaves and done the same thing, but I’d like to do this without upsetting the civilian population too much. Our propaganda department tells me that when regular people find out that the killer of the Titanium Android is hunting someone, it tends to upset them. Civilians are much more comfortable when they just think of me as the current leader of Technefarious. After all, Technefarious has failed to properly enforce its rule on the world for decades. As the Killing Man, however, I assassinated the world’s greatest hero.

I’m a bit jealous of those you back at home base this week. The science department has updated the live action Portal course with the new content from Portal 2, so those of you who want to replicate the new game in the real world should have a blast. Please, no more requests to have the lethal threats in the game be made just as deadly in the course. That’s not why I built the Soul Catchers. Besides, the janitorial staff doesn’t want have to clean up corpse after corpse just for your amusement.

Finally, while I was off terrorizing the criminals of Lowplain, I had Frigid arrange our next shipment in the nonsensical gift exchange with our enemies at the Golden Web. I’m curious to see how they’ll react to receiving five semis full of ping-pong balls.

Have a good week everyone. 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 will admit there have been times after doing an interrogation that I felt like I needed to take shower. The one I attended last Friday was the first one I literally had to take one afterwards.

The techniques used to send dragons back to the their home dimension two weeks ago revealed a previously undetected transmission coming out of our facility in the psychic communication bands. Admittedly, our psychic defenses aren’t the most cutting edge on the planet, but they aren’t so bad that it was considered a realistic possibility. Naturally, the sensor data gathered during the repulsion of the dragons were poured over by the science department as part of their study on the event. Within the data was a pattern indicating a communication took place during the attack. The science department tells me it was a telepathic conversation that was distorted by the reality shifts surrounding the dragons so that it fell within a range observable by our sensors. Most troubling, the content suggested that the participants were the Pinnacle and one of his agents.

The Pinnacle is an urban vigilante based out of the city of Lowplain. He has a career spanning decades that includes crippling widespread criminal organizations like ours. That his attention has fallen on us is less than thrilling, but now that we know, I’m more than willing to change the game so its terms favor us.

To do that, we first needed to root out his agent to see what he already knew about Technefarious’s operations. The record of the communication did not give us enough anything to identify the agent. For a psychic communication, it was remarkably clear of the clutter of random thoughts and background processes that usually accompany telepathy. The occult department’s attempts to ferret him out returned gibberish worthy of a palm reading hack at a street fair. Security turned up nothing useful, just the usual black market shenanigans you expect among henchmen.

Finally, I had to turn my ability to kill anything to the problem, which was a pain. Without a stronger focus than “I want to kill Pinnacle’s spy in Technefarious” I had to wade through every single way of doing that which my powers suggested. That may no sound too bad, but the simplest way to take care of the problem consisted of killing everybody in Technefarious except myself. There is a ton of ways to go about that, and I think we can all agree that none of them would be a perfect solution. After a couple of days of work, I finally pieced together a method that could end in just the spy’s death but not immediately kill him. My powers still didn’t tell me who he actually was, so I set up a sting operation to trap him and caught him on Friday.

Pinnacle’s spy was Henchman 45I-2V (Ralph), a low ranking security guard. That is pretty much all we know about him. None of the intelligence we have on him seems to connect to whatever life he had before he was Ralph. Pieces is about we have left of him, too. After his capture, I took him to an interrogation room. When I told him what we knew about him and that we planned to see what else we could get out of him, he exploded, spraying liquefied human all over me. The science department speculates this was a side effect of the disintegration of his DNA, but speculation is all we have. They don’t know why it happened and neither does the occult department. From studying Pinnacle’s history as a hero, it seems unlikely that he would arm his spy with a suicide pill, but if it was an escape, it’s one that my powers say killed Ralph in the process.

Either way, I expect Pinnacle will step up his operation against us now, so I plan to take the fight to him first.

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

Your Leader,

Dr. Photius Callaway
The Killing Man

Too heavy for this week. Put it in next week.
Golden web gifts? Whose turn was it. And where is this story thread going? Ah, going to be part of downfall.