POWERNAUT 2011!

The Powernaut is publishing his story of The End Of The World, in usual Powernaut manner - as a comic strip. One of his rules is, every strip has to mention the Powernaut. But I think the story might deserve some more commentary about the non-Powernaut parts. The U.S. Gov thinks so too. They keep me on payroll, and commentary is part of why. They surely didn't make me a sworn Federal agent just to beat up people. I can barely beat up stupid magicians. (2011/endgame2.txt)

So, commentary. Here goes.

Yes, I talked with the Vice-President. Or as he likes to be called, the Vice-Badass in Chief. Crusher Joe Corrigan actually likes to do the dirty work, which frees President Obama to hand out the warm fuzzies. Everyone's happiest that way... Anyway, I recall our conversation like this.

Crusher Joe: Wyatt! Give me ideas!

Wyatt: okaay... (insert recap of what Crusher Joe just told me about Wyoming and meteors) At times like this, I look for the Cosmic Reset Button.

Crusher Joe: Ha Ha.

Wyatt: No, really. Remember 1999? The world died then too! (me1999.htm#hung) But the gods helped us press a reset button, and we got better!

Crusher Joe: Then how 'come I don't remember that?

Wyatt: Could be the reality shift of 2000. Or 2002 and 2022. Or 2004 and 45 B.C. Or 2005. Or 2006 and 1941. I saw most of those.

Crusher Joe: Okay, I get it. Sounds like we need a time machine.

Wyatt: Unfortunately, the only one we have will only take us to 1911. (2009/porfiriato.htm)

Crusher Joe: ehh... Whatever. So tell me more about this god reset button.

Wyatt: We have to go into The Dreamtime to press that. Not just dream, we have to go there physically. The gods hate it when humans do that. There are a lot of challenges on the way, more than ever now. Were you there when all the superhumans did that in 2005? (2005/journal_melon.htm)

Crusher Joe: Yeah. It sucked. But it sounds like we gotta be ready to. Who's high-powered we can send?

Wyatt: There're Ellipses... (2011/useless.txt)

Crusher Joe: Not them!

Wyatt: Yeah, I agree... I guess there's the Powernaut!

I'll have plenty to say about Ellipsis and the multiple Ellipses in future episodes. Suffice it to say, I do prefer the Powernaut.

All the links here can be found under http://www.eilertech.com/stories/ .

The historical record is kind of loose, but there have been Powernauts around since at least 1968. (ref: 2005/powernaut.htm) Their common theme is power; they're as powerful as they need to be. That could come in handy right now.

The current Powernaut surfaced in 2005, at the time of Hurricane Katrina. (ref: 2005/powerpatrol1.htm, Power Patrol) I met him, of course; I meet almost everyone. For a while, he and I were the only superhumans on Earth. He's been in the public eye a few times since then.

This year, Vice-President Corrigan assembled a team to try to move the Earth - literally. On that team, the Powernaut had to go fight the Council of Ordered Realities. (ref: 2011/discontent3.txt, The Summer of Discontent) The Mighty Tim speaks highly of him. So Crusher Joe would like to have him on the team again.

All the links here can be found under http://www.eilertech.com/stories/ .

I promise I'll talk about Ellipses after the next episode. Right now, I feel the urge to talk about evil mages. Though I prefer the term "magic pricks".

World's simplest explanation: People may be pricks or not-pricks, and they may get superhuman powers from either science or magic. The pricks who have magic powers like to call themselves Black Mages. They go on and on about how liberating it is to practice the Black Arts. Pricks.

Every four years including 2011, they have a Black Arts Competition, kind of an evil magic Olympics. Winners get moved up in their pecking order, which buys them some extra evil magic. For the 2007 challenge, they basically set Greece on fire. Pricks.

Right now there are four pricks at the top of their pecking order. There used to be five, until the Mighty Tim, Doctor Lithium (!) and I took down Gaio Matrix. You're welcome, it was our pleasure. (2011/endgame2.txt) Here's who's left:

• Lady Ebony. (2011/surprise.txt) Also known as the Mom of the Devil's Brat. (2008/devilwar.htm) Also known as Black Girl from Indianapolis in 1971. (2011/1971.txt) She and I go way back.
• Mary Mystery. (2009/mary_mystery.htm) She and I are almost family; I almost married her great-aunt. Mary's the one who stopped me. Nothing against my ex, but I should probably thank Mary. (2010/judy.htm) Now she's sixteen, still filled with Goddess-powers, and almost as mature as a ten-year-old.
• The Spectral Torch. That was him setting Greece on fire. (2007/others.htm#fire) Also known as the Trepannator. Also known as Captain Horror. Also known as the Candlemaker. Also known as the Harvester of Eyes. He's tried a lot of things over the years, and they haven't worked out well for him. Hence his current aspect as a spectre. But he's really John Valsi. He probably hates me more than anyone else does. But his archenemy is Mary of Nazareth. Yes, *the* Mary. He picked a fight with her. That failed so spectacularly, the entire city of Little Rock, Arkansas became holy ground. (jehovah.htm#mary)
• Flack Chasterman. He's new, and I haven't run across him. But he's the one who blew up Yellowstone. (Though I suspect the Spectral Torch helped.) That put Flack at the top of the pecking order, which Lady Ebony doesn't like at all. (2011/endgame2.txt)

All the links here can be found under http://www.eilertech.com/stories/ .

Last time, I mentioned people who get powers from magic. This time, it's powers from science in a big way. That is to say, Ellipses.

The original Ellipsis was (and is) a mutant supergenius. Twenty years ago, while he was still in college, he invented a portable energy field called the Ellipsis Field. Unfortunately the field tended to drive people crazy, including himself at times. Just this year, he got that fixed and went open-source with the tech. Now there's a small swarm of engineers flying around with the equivalent power of nuclear bombs. (2011/useless.txt)

Does that make you nervous at all? The U.S. Government isn't terribly happy about it. And evil mages hate all that science in the air. But the general public is taking it better than I expected. People only hate things when other people can do them and they can't.

... You're kidding, right? The Powernaut and the things he does cannot be explained by science, no matter how hard people like the Ellipses try. He's basically magic.

Nobody's quite sure of the source of the Powernaut's power. I'm pretty sure there's a link to the extradimensional city of Hypergaard, though. There they have hyperscience, which is basically magic. I actually heard an explanation from them once, but you'll have to excuse me 'cause I was eight years old at the time. (Powernaut 1969, yet to be published)

All the links here can be found under http://www.eilertech.com/stories/ .

We wanted the Powernaut to storm the Dreamtime, but he was going to smash a meteor. There was a lot of public outcry about the U.S. Gov not doing that themselves. Suffice it to say, Ellipses had it covered. We just couldn't quite depend on them, so we couldn't announce it.

Still, we had to start recruiting for The Boot. I'll spare you the dialog, but we considered:

• Lucianus Autonomus. By then, we suspected evil mages were opposing either Ellipses or the Powernaut. So we needed good mages. Their leader Lucianus Autonomus was ready to help. It surely was good just to see him in the room, 'cause he's so experienced and reasonable. The V.P. surely should have made him his National Security Advisor instead of me, but Lucianus wasn't interested. Thirty years ago or so, he defected to Cuba. (lucianus.htm)
• Vara Hosea. She's Lucianus's deputy champion. I used to be her deputy champion... for Death. (death.htm) She's kind of sensitive, but she knows everyone. So she was good to have here too.
• They wanted Stonewater as a conduit. She'd been in the Dreamtime for the last year, serving as a nature goddess. (2010/deathtrap.htm) But Crusher Joe had first call. She was in Cairo, Illinois. The U.S. Gov needed her to talk with the continent of North America. Really. (2009/journal.htm#northamerica) So they had to settle for...
• Doctor Lithium. He was there in town; I'd escorted him there! He'd just come out of the Dreamtime - for much longer than Stonewater had been there! (2011/endgame2.txt) Vara Hosea didn't especially like him, but she'd worked with him for much of the 1990s in the Total Conversion battle squad. So she vouched for him. Crusher Joe was fine with him too, as long as he took his meds. But he wasn't up for field missions. So...
• Leo the Pirate Vampire King. (2009/journal.htm#leo) The mages wanted to stay on Earth, because their enemies had specifically barred them (and me) from the Dreamtime. But someone still had to go into the Dreamtime to press The Boot. Leo had actually been there - and he was in town for a state visit, representing Tuvalu (the land of the Vampire Pirates). He volunteered, before I even had a chance to be considered. Thanks, Leo! But I have to say, you look less dangerous when you trim your whiskers.

We'd basically all worked together at one time or another - even Vara Hosea and the Powernaut. (2011/discontent3.txt) For sure, they have different ways of approaching life. You can tell that just by the way they dress. Let's just say, the Powernaut's exceptional in that respect, just as in every other; he adds color to every room he walks into. Even Leo the Pirate Vampire King dresses like pirates, vampires, and kings, but the Powernaut just dresses as himself. As far as anyone including myself can tell, he has no secret identity. He's just the Powernaut.

All the links here can be found under http://www.eilertech.com/stories/ .

The Powernaut with a Pentahedron is kind of like Superman with a Green Lantern ring. So I know what you're all thinking...

• What's a Pentahedron really look like up close? It's actually a hyper-tetrahedron, a four-dimensional solid with triangular surfaces. (2005/pentahedron.htm) When you look it it, it looks like a pyramid with four shiny pyramid shadows that make your vision of everything else go blurry. If you blur your vision of the Pentahedron just right, it looks like a pentagram.
• What does a Pentahedron do? Yeah, I said it's a power object, but that's like Alexander Graham Bell calling my smartphone a telephone. I've heard of Pentahedrons used as power sources, computers, navigators, communicators, and dimension doors.
• How exactly did the Powernaut get one? I'd guess, sometime after the extra-dimensional city of Hypergaard helped him move Hurricane Katrina, they left one with him in case of dire emergency. (2005/powerpatrol1.htm)
• Why hasn't he used it before now, say to smash meteors better? Well, Hypergaard did probably say dire emergency. Besides, he just wouldn't be the Powernaut if he didn't try to do things himself. It's worth noting, he only brought his Pentahedron out to avoid having to wait for mages. Oh, he must have hated sitting through a Sunset Door ritual. (2011/discontent3.txt)