I turned my attention back to the large-browed Inhuman martial artist. “No one in this room is a danger to me. If I drop my Astral Ward, you, Master Karnak, will lose your eyes the moment you look at me from Negapsi rebuffment. General Gorgon cannot hit me hard enough to harm me, and the force waves he emits I can absorb as easily as water flows down a drain. Her Highness Crystal’s ability to wield the four Alchemical Elements is almost child-like in my eyes. Lord Triton’s ability thrives underwater, and he isn’t even in King Namor’s league, let alone mine. Queen Medusa’s hair would conduct a massive discharge of lightning and drop her as soon as she touched me with it.
“As for your king, his voice would be absorbed directly upon striking me to no effect, and without it, I can defeat him with literally one finger.
“I bathe in the fires of the sun, less than a hundred miles from its surface, to relax, Master Karnak. That is equivalent to bathing in an ongoing nuclear bomb explosion.
“I am in the High Guard, Master Karnak! I routinely have to confront starships, cosmic beasts, entities, and other annoyances who could idly reduce this whole city of yours to scrap with a single barrage or blow, and yet they are only among the more mundane of the forces and opponents we have to face down.
“I realize that you don’t aspire to stand with us against all the horrors of Creation looking to smear our little planet into space dust, but underestimating us is still a very bad idea, sir.”
It was his turn to look away. He thought he was dangerous, and maybe he was in the right circumstances, but without surprise, he was literally an eyeblink and dust to me, and being a Fifteen Martial Artist in Crystal Breaker wasn’t going to impress me.
Gods and Totems, if I had to, I could take out this whole city of theirs in a couple seconds. I knew what I had to be able to do to serve on the High Guard, after all.
“You described my control of the elements as childlike.” Crystal was definitely a little sullen at that description. “I am at least twenty years older than you are, Lady Dynamo!”
“You are a Ten. I am a Twenty Alchemist, Your Highness,” I replied calmly, and she jerked in shock. “Although my specialization is Modern Alchemy and not Classical, attempting to use the Classic Elements against an Alchemist of my ability borders on the ludicrous, Your Highness. I would also point out that I have been an associate of the Fantastic Four for many, many years, and they are all Avatars of the Classical Elements. You really don’t want to contest my skills in that area, Your Highness.”
I was sure they knew the Core Disciplines, although they concentrated on their own Skills and Feats and the like. Only Karnak had actually taken outside skills, probably because he had once seen Briggs use Crystal Breaker, and realized how perfect it was for Sundering and breaking stuff.
Crystal was a Noble/10; Archer/5. She basically ran her powers on Masteries or something similar. I could take away any Elements she controlled effortlessly and use them against her. It would not be pretty.
Black Bolt made another gesture. I had Polyglot, and knew several forms of sign language. That wasn’t a true language, probably because it only had a couple hundred words. He was using some sort of particle effect to convey more information directly to their nervous systems.
“Black Bolt would like to hear your arguments as to why we should allow Marks, and to open the city.” I arched an eyebrow at the silent King of the Inhumans. “You clearly have great personal power, learning, and skills, in addition to your Cosmic Awareness. I confess that we were not expecting such a formidable combination of talents,” Queen Medusa went on.
“Reason One: What would happen if you all popped your Mindblades?” I asked calmly.
They all blinked despite themselves, as they did not have Mindblades.
“Lady Medusa’s hair would suddenly not be intruding on her thoughts all the time with all its sensory feedback. Lord Triton would not feel uncomfortable out of water. Princess Crystal would not feel quietly tempted by the urge to tear apart the world and manipulate it. General Gorgon would not be constantly aware that he could shatter whatever he trod upon, and Master Karnak would not see the whole world as a place ready to fall over with a slight push.
“Your Majesty... would be able to speak freely.” His blue eyes blinked in shock.
“Your Alpha Primitives would no longer be reduced in intellect, save for when they needed to work. Your people would look like any other humans, their Terrigenesis forms saved for when their powers and abilities were needed.
“Most notably, your Kree-spun urges would not be there in the bodies you were born with.”
They all followed my finger as I lifted it, sparking with energy. “I could Open each and every one of you now, speed dependent on the size of your Core. You would throw off this programmed clinging to the intentions of the Kree and do what is right to rejoin the human race.”
They stared at my finger, glancing at one another, and then away.
“Reason Two.” And I broadcast my telepathy.
Well, Sersi’s telepathy. I was just a lot better at it than she was, courtesy of Kwannon.
It was the equivalent of looking at me in Markspace. All their jaws dropped despite themselves.
“Your arrogance and superiority towards normal people will have no relevance in Markspace. Such will be seen for what it is. Only the mind and soul are relevant there, not the physical superiority you revel in.
“There are Good people there. Millions of Good people. They want to make the world a better place. They trade information freely, they inspire others to get out and do things, and they seek to become better.
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“I am one of those people in the Markspace. There are a lot of people who look up to and want to follow me. We are united in cause and purpose as no group of people have ever been on this world, without the unthinking mindset of fanatics, the crazed devotion of the overly-religious, or the massive self-interest of the too-pragmatic.”
I let my telepathy go, and they all released held breaths despite themselves. I looked from one to the next, and they all flushed despite themselves, as I was literally looking right through them.
“Reason Three: Master Karnak is the only one of you who has broken Ten, and he has done it because he is being constantly challenged by outsiders to increase his skills. The rest of you have largely relied upon your powers to remain relevant, and without any challenges applicable to you, you have simply stagnated.
“Your Majesty, you have lived long enough to become by far the greatest master of kiai-jitsu alive, yet you cannot even control your own whispers.” My eyes shifted over as his lips pursed. “Your queen should have gone through the Black Widow training decades ago, and become one of the most dangerous women and rulers in the world. Still a Ten, a mere stepping stone for the Widows, and a limit you should have long stridden past.” She flushed despite herself.
My eyes moved left, on to Triton. “You should be one of the most powerful hydrokinetics in the world. I laud your skills at ecological water management and devotion to its principles, but your personal skills and power are mediocre in the area you have the greatest talent with, because your people have no way to develop them.” He blanched despite himself.
I moved down to Crystal, who flushed deeply under my eyes. “You are the greatest disappointment here. You could be one of the greatest matter manipulators on the whole planet, the Head Professor of Kinetics at Cynosure, and here you are, still a Ten, still constrained by your genetics on what you could actually become, because your people cannot help you embrace your own potential.” She shuddered and could not meet my eyes as I gestured dismissively and moved on.
I moved across the aisle to General Gorgon, who twitched as our eyes met. “You, General, are an entitled noble first, a warlord second, and warrior least of all, sir. You have no true strategic or tactical ability, because you have fought almost nothing and experienced nothing with any troops you have. Your personal prowess is more akin to brawling.
“You should be the greatest master of the Demon-Slaying Kicks on this planet. Your hooves have the power to bring down titans and crack the earth asunder, becoming a true and great champion of this whole world... and yet, here you are.”
He couldn’t get angry, he could only flush his head in shame and lower it, a child who had been told he had squandered his potential on noble high-living.
“Master Karnak, your gift could be applied many ways, but the toll it is taking on your psyche is obvious.” He blinked at me in shock. “You, sir, need to take up architecture and sculpture. You must build, not break down, and learn how even how everything with flaws and weak points can be beautiful and well-made. It will take far more precise hands and thoughts to accomplish than what you have now, to shape stone and steel into things worth the making, their flaws creating only more strength and wonder to look upon... and you cannot learn it here.” He could only consider that in silence, any responses strangled as he remembered that telepathic view of me, and how I had pressed down on him so firmly.
What mental weaknesses I had were still greater than his strengths!
“Reason Four: You will all both shatter the hold your Kree-spun genetics have on you, yet increase your numbers considerably as you break those chains. You will do with numbers and diversity what you used to do with your eugenics program, returning freedom to live and love to your people, to have as many children as you like, and if some of them respond not to Terrigenesis... it will not matter, for there will be a thousand ways to train them to greatness that don’t involve having your genecode spun up by the genetech of alien slavers!
“Imagine, if you will, a world where no Inhuman needs fear becoming an Alpha Primitive. One where the randomness of Terrigenesis does not affect your future, but your own efforts and willpower are of far more weight.
“It will be a world without an Inhuman King or Queen, and yet, you will still have that bond, chained into your genetics by stolen Celestial code. Inhumans will know one another, and if there is need, they will still look to someone to lead them.
“But only if needed. This life you have at the top of your society will no longer be there. You will have to find a place in something greater.
“At the same time, there is nobody in your society that can say you are making this move for your benefit, and not for theirs.
“The benefits to be gained by accepting Marks, if you are deemed fit, opening your city and destroying the society designed by the Kree who hold your leashes yet, far outweigh any and all such things that could be gained by staying irrelevant recluses tucked away in the mountains, waiting for a doom you cannot fight and reliant on the protection of those you disdain to ward it off.”
I held off for a moment, looking away, down alternate timestreams from here. They were a mazy mush, made worse by Briggs’ Source field, but there were some prominent themes.
“Briggs is scouring the past, present, and future of other alternities, as well as having assembled the greatest collection of geneticists in the world, to break open the secrets of the X-gene and whatever else the Celestials have made of us.
“At some point, he’s going to crack it, and there’s only going to be the Powered, and those who are Forsaken, the quiet cores of humanity. There will be no Inhumans, mutants, or mutates.
“If you have talents in psionics, we can teach you. If you have talents in chi, or in magic, we can teach you. It is all there, waiting and available.
“If you are Forsaken or Primos, you can still learn the Core Disciplines, still gain strength, still become strong and dangerous if you wish.
“What you call science now is below the threshold now extant in the more advanced places on Terra, and certainly on LaGrange. The Xandarans are here, and their science is a level beyond the Kree, a level that we are aspiring to. We are reaching for the stars, and you are hiding in a glass dome in the mountains.”
They were silent as I continued looking away, at other things.
“Reason Five is that you have no defensible reasons for remaining as you are. None. Your traditions are programmed shams. Your desires are programmed instincts. Your arrogance is a lie. Your superiority is non-existent. Your racism is a terrible weakness and a crutch. Your reclusiveness is cowardice and an unwillingness to take responsibility for the danger you are to the rest of the world.” I returned my eyes to them. “At some point, the world is going to get tired of you, and throw you out. You will perish without us soon afterwards. The Kree are already waiting to wipe you away.”
Black Bolt held up his hand, and I shut up. It hadn’t been a monologue, as I had far too many Diplomacy Ranks for that. They couldn’t have stopped listening, even if they wanted to. I had been driving spikes into them, and they couldn’t get them out now.
“Can you make a Mark?” Queen Medusa asked directly. “Black Bolt would see this Markspace himself.”
“Yes,” I confirmed.
She glanced at him once, her hair ruffling. “Will we be able to speak in this... Markspace?” she asked carefully.
“Actually, the telepathic connections between Marks can be used freely between recipients, or with physical contact.”
No way to misinterpret the flicker in her eyes. “I will take a Mark at the same time as my husband,” she declared promptly.
I carefully did not smile as I drew a box of Tatting Tools from my suit’s Masspack.