In a secure chamber deep underground, three men and two women sat before an ancient, bulky CRT screen, watching a video for the seventh time. The shaky images illuminated the gloomy area, reflecting against walls of rough, grey-black metal that seemed to suck all color and left everything appearing washed out like an old photograph that had stayed too long in the sun.

The oldest of them, a tall, thin man in a military uniform with many medals was not looking at the video; he had, after all, seen it before. His cold eyes were watching his four companions, coldly taking in their reactions as the images of a brief, very fast-paced battle went by in what appeared to be fast-forward but was actually slow motion many times over. The middle-aged pudgy guy in the lab coat was staring at the screen with obvious hunger. The younger military man in the fatigues devoid of rank or other insignia showed no reaction, as he had been trained. The fifty-something civilian woman was in a bit of a shock, actually flinched when the most violent bits played. But the most interesting reactions of all in the old man's mind were those of the youngest person in the room. If her clenched fists and flinty glare were any indication, the young woman barely had a handle on her rage.

The last and slowest playthrough came to an end, the old VCR player clicking and clacking before starting the slow rewind of the tape. None of them spoke for a minute, digesting the new information. "Well?" the General finally demanded, disinclined to giving them more time. In his experience, this particular crew had a tendency to overthink things and if he allowed them too much time to stew they'd probably stop being productive and start sniping at each other... again.

"General Rinaker, sir," the younger military man begun first. "What was the actual duration of the fight? Halfway through everything but the combatants looks..."

"Frozen?" the General smiled mirthlessly. "Our new drones caught it with billion-frames-per-second cameras. From the moment the action speeds up till the explosion it's only eleven and a half seconds. Both targets were hypersonic for the majority of the action." And wasn't that a nasty surprise? Many supers could move quickly, especially flyers and teleporters but to actually fight at such speeds in melee was much rarer and often was the super's only major ability. "Conventional countermeasures were deemed insufficient," which was the biggest understatement he'd heard in the past six months, "so this is where your areas of expertise come in."

"None of our first-tier operatives would be more than a speed bump in a hostile encounter," the rank-less military man admitted with a frown. "Not even if we deployed all of them at the same time. Second-tier... we have a few that might land a hit but from what we have on her durability... no." He shook his head. "In an ambush or subtle attack they might manage it but not if we are on the defensive. As the other problem cases have shown time and again, numbers are least effective when working above their tier."

"What I want to know is why she called those black bolts the drone was launching 'Null Lances'," the researcher interrupted. "There is nothing like them on record, or from witness statements, or even the conflicting reports we have of the invasion itself. The enemy did not use cybernetics or technological weapons, they used extradimensional energies."

"Magic, Dr. Brown," the youngest woman said with the air of repeating something for the umpteenth time. "They used magic. You could tell from how they could raise the dead, summon monsters and control the weather."

"Magic is just science we don't understand," the Doctor countered. "There is nothing magical about creating tools to control previously unknown energy forms or enhancing peoples' bodies to do the same."

"Oh really?" The young woman gestured and a golden bar fell heavily on the steel table, making it ring like a gong. "When I do this I don't control any form of energy. I don't access cybernetic implants, or any other tools. I don't apply any sort of new knowledge or methodology. Gold appears because I want it to appear."

"And do you really understand what you're doing? We humans have used our bodies for thousands of years before we learned how they actually wor-"

"Enough!" the General interrupted the argument with a booming voice that could not be denied. "We're here to come up with solutions to our many problems, not cause more of them by infighting. Dr. Brown, what did you discover about the items the target gave us?"

"The gold was very lightly irradiated and contained trace elements not usually present in gold deposits," the Doctor said, eagerly accepting the change of subject. "Said trace elements formed microstructures that do not form during any known smelting process but exist in some naturally occurring minerals. From that we are fairly certain the gold was produced via nuclear transmutation of existing matter. We even tracked down the potential origin of the original minerals and you wouldn't believe what we-"

"The Seventh Fleet fought a giant monster off the coast of Japan the day before yesterday," General Rinaker interrupted drily. "The extent and capacity of my beliefs has been greatly expanded of late, Dr. Brown. Where did the gold come from?"

"Meteors. It contained trace elements common in certain meteors but almost impossible to find in earthen minerals at the same ratios." Dr. Brown's eyes gleamed with excitement. "We don't know the specific point of origin, too much of the original mineral was transmuted, but it definitely wasn't Earth. Either our new friend intentionally used a meteor rock to create her gold, or she can travel to outer space!"

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"She caused a nuclear explosion over New York City," the older woman scornfully interjected for the first time. "That maniac is a loose cannon and definitely not our friend."

"Technically, the explosion was not nuclear but an extremely intense burst of charged particles with no traces of gamma radiation. That's why it was so easily caught by the planet's atmosphere and-"

"Nobody cares that it wasn't nuclear, Doc," the younger woman shot back. "All we care about is that she could level a city if she tried. Every single person with powers has gone off the reservation at least once; it's a prerequisite for getting powers because you either did something horrible or had something horrible done to you. Who's to say they -we- won't do it again?" The young brunette clenched her fists and the walls groaned. "That's why we need to have a counter for anyone with powers above a certain level."

"Speaking of which, Warden," the General spoke up again, "how goes the construction?"

"Well ahead of schedule, General Rinaker, sir," she responded stiffly, as if trying to stand at attention despite still sitting at the table. "We can now contain first-tier individuals indefinitely, regardless of special abilities. Second-tier is still hit and miss but as the power-resistant metal we can produce becomes more effective we hope to complete construction of the second-tier facility within two months." The young woman's -Warden's- eyes flicked to the screen where the video had been played and she sighed. "However, we are still nowhere close to dealing with higher-tier threats."

"That's OK, Warden," the old man told her in a tired tone that carried the weight of all his six decades. "The best we can do is the best we can do. Sarah, what's the word from our backers?"

"Screaming for blood, running around like headless chickens, or hiding their heads in the sand depending on the faction. You know, the usual," the older woman said with a shrug. Her shoulder-length, thin grey hair added to her wrinkles and lack of makeup to make her seem older than she really was. "Our new problem child's latest stunt is going to boost our funding by at least fifty percent in the short term, but long-term the economy can't afford to support our current rate of development. In the face of continued enemy action their confidence is going to tank no matter how much nationalist bullshit we ram down their throats." She frowned. "That reptile cyborg thing was enemy action, right?"

"Unfortunately," General Rinaker informed the group. "Added to the giant lizard off the coast of Japan, the fog-making spiders in Texas, and what we recovered from last month's attack in Norfolk, we're up to eleven incidents involving artificial monsters. Someone is making those things and deliberately targeting either our operations or high-value conventional targets with them."

"Great, more crazies. Just when the Everymen and the Valkyries stopped bothering us and started their little spat, another group rears their brainless head," the Warden grumbled and both the Doctor and Sarah nodded in agreement. "At least this time they went for the bait and not for our bases." She looked at the others, the General most of all. "That was a baiting operation, no?"

"Need to know, young lady," the General shot down that line of questioning but everybody in the room knew that meant 'yes'. "Doctor, what about the other artifact our new prospect left us? Any progress finding out how it manages perpetual motion?" Because while gold was a nonissue and knowing their new recruit had nuclear powers was important, engines that did not need fuel were a big deal.

"Unfortunately, our tests were inconclusive," Doctor Brown admitted. "Nothing we tried has discovered any mechanism for how the disc keeps spinning. What we do know is that it isn't any form of telekinesis or other effect that applies extraneous force. Our latest scanner can detect any kinetic manipulation down to a few nanojoules and revealed nothing. Stopping the disc or moving it around does not interrupt the effect either; it starts spinning again if stopped. Though if turned upside-down it will stop then start spinning in the opposite direction."

"Keep working at it," the General ordered. "And look into developing a broader power detector, if possible."

The rest of the discussion was just minutiae of individual projects that were of less interest to the General and more about exchanging ideas. These meetings were the only way they could do so as securely as possible, with the Warden providing the latest in power-blocking measures, the Doctor bringing in improved versions of analog technology information-manipulation and super-hacking powers could not affect and more mundane measures plus several layers of subterfuge disguising the fact that the meeting had taken place at all. By the end of the two hours they had available, everyone was somewhat relieved that their funding, security, powered forces and power research were going as well as they could have, under the circumstances.

"That will be all, ladies and gentlemen," the General said. "Dismissed. Warden, stay behind for a moment."

"Another covert assignment, General?" the young brunette asked as the heavy metal doors closed and sealed themselves with a loud hiss after her three older compatriots' departure.

"Not this time," the old man denied. Then he took out a cigar, lit it with a flick of his finger, then puffed out a small cloud of acrid foulness. The smoke shifted and momentarily took the shape of a five-headed dragon before being sucked in by the ventilation system. "What do you know about Maya Wennefer?"

"...Sir?"

"None of that, now," the General said, blowing out two more puffs of smoke. One shifted into the image of a horned giant stepping on skyscrapers that barely reached its knees, the other condensed into a bullet that struck the back of the giant's head and burst it open. "I was in the command center back when we lost half the state of Florida, you know. Did search and rescue in the Hell left after the invasion, too, so I know quite a bit more than those that weren't there that day." One last puff of smoke, taking the shape of a caped, catsuit-wearing girl in flight. "Is she who I think she is?"

"Unfortunately," the Warden admitted as the scene of the giant being killed played again. "Any one of the original survivors would recognize her on sight. She probably was the strongest of us."

"Interesting..." The General's cigar turned to dust, the dust carried away by a puff of wind and into the ventilation system. "You will tell me everything you know about her. Then we'll brainstorm all the ways our knife-edge balanced operations could be messed up by another original survivor and what we could do about it."

"Yes, sir."

"And Warden?" All the smoke in the room was sucked away into the ventilation by unseen currents. "Not a word to the others."