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Sensualist
Super-Earth
- Joined
- Sep 7, 2014
- Location
- New Zealand
The entrance to the world's most secure hypermax prison lay on a nameless, lonesome, windswept island in the Aleutian archipelago, blasted by arctic cold and patrolled by a ring of airborne armed drones. The prison itself, however, did not lie on the island – it could not, in fact, be said to exist anywhere on Earth. Codenamed the Catbox, it was surrounded by an opaque quantum negation field which rendered any form of communication, energy, mass or information transfer from within the prison to without, or vice versa, impossible. Like Schrödinger’s famous thought experiment, the interior of the Catbox simultaneously existed and did not exist, and everyone within it was simultaneously alive and dead – a neat way to seal away the most dangerous and devastating supervillains and monsters in the world without getting into the legal problem of the death penalty.
The winter-gear swaddled soldiers guarding the entrance looked up as two figures sailed through the air towards them and landed on the concrete pad. They were Mr. Potence and Mrs. Might – husband and wife and two of the world's most formidable and respected superheroes, collectively known as the Power Couple. The soldiers shouldered their laser rifles and kept them aimed at the pair, who seemed unaffected by the biting winds as they waited for their IDs and visitation permits to be checked out. When they were cleared the Power Couple entered the semi-circular concrete tunnel that extended only a few yards into the frozen hillside – and vanished.
They reppeared elsewhere, on a dark metal grill floor faced with an array of beam weapons, power nullifying antennae, sensors and screens. The Catbox's automated security scanned their genetic makeup and energy signatures, confirming they were who they claimed to be and that they were carrying no contraband into the quantum prison, then a door slid open and Warden Grayves came to meet them. A shaven-headed, solemn man, he shook hands with the Power Couple and grimly welcomed them.
“We're here to see...” Mr. Potence began, but the Warden cut him off with a nod.
“I saw the papers. God help us all if you're desperate enough to ask him for help. He's this way – in the Luddite wing.” The Warden explained as he walked the Power Couple to an elevator. They descended through the prison like it was the nine circles of hell, passing malevolent masterminds, rampaging brutes and rapacious thieves trapped in a variety of forcefielded and sealed cells. Many of them had been put there by the Power Couple themselves, and hooted, hollared and swore revenge as the heroes passed. “There's no technological security in there... the risk of him subverting it, sabotaging it, or dismantling it and turning it into some kind of deathray is too great. The Luddite wing uses more classical security measures... steel bars, concrete floors, and manacles.”
At last, they reached the low-tech wing where insane or just plain twisted supergeniuses were kept isolated from anything more advanced than a plastic spork. The Warden lead them to the final cell door, a massive slab of vanadium-steel that would have been difficult even for Mr. Potence or his wife to move by hand. It was so exquisitely balanced, though, that once the multiple locks had been opened by multiple keys, the Warden was able to push it open with a light touch. Inside was a blank sphere of concrete five yards in diameter, with a metal platform built in the centre of it. On this stood, or rather hung, an unremarkable figure in an orange jumpsuit, shackled by six sturdy chains to the top, bottom and four points on the equator of the cell walls.
“Olympus,” the Warden said grimly.
The winter-gear swaddled soldiers guarding the entrance looked up as two figures sailed through the air towards them and landed on the concrete pad. They were Mr. Potence and Mrs. Might – husband and wife and two of the world's most formidable and respected superheroes, collectively known as the Power Couple. The soldiers shouldered their laser rifles and kept them aimed at the pair, who seemed unaffected by the biting winds as they waited for their IDs and visitation permits to be checked out. When they were cleared the Power Couple entered the semi-circular concrete tunnel that extended only a few yards into the frozen hillside – and vanished.
They reppeared elsewhere, on a dark metal grill floor faced with an array of beam weapons, power nullifying antennae, sensors and screens. The Catbox's automated security scanned their genetic makeup and energy signatures, confirming they were who they claimed to be and that they were carrying no contraband into the quantum prison, then a door slid open and Warden Grayves came to meet them. A shaven-headed, solemn man, he shook hands with the Power Couple and grimly welcomed them.
“We're here to see...” Mr. Potence began, but the Warden cut him off with a nod.
“I saw the papers. God help us all if you're desperate enough to ask him for help. He's this way – in the Luddite wing.” The Warden explained as he walked the Power Couple to an elevator. They descended through the prison like it was the nine circles of hell, passing malevolent masterminds, rampaging brutes and rapacious thieves trapped in a variety of forcefielded and sealed cells. Many of them had been put there by the Power Couple themselves, and hooted, hollared and swore revenge as the heroes passed. “There's no technological security in there... the risk of him subverting it, sabotaging it, or dismantling it and turning it into some kind of deathray is too great. The Luddite wing uses more classical security measures... steel bars, concrete floors, and manacles.”
At last, they reached the low-tech wing where insane or just plain twisted supergeniuses were kept isolated from anything more advanced than a plastic spork. The Warden lead them to the final cell door, a massive slab of vanadium-steel that would have been difficult even for Mr. Potence or his wife to move by hand. It was so exquisitely balanced, though, that once the multiple locks had been opened by multiple keys, the Warden was able to push it open with a light touch. Inside was a blank sphere of concrete five yards in diameter, with a metal platform built in the centre of it. On this stood, or rather hung, an unremarkable figure in an orange jumpsuit, shackled by six sturdy chains to the top, bottom and four points on the equator of the cell walls.
“Olympus,” the Warden said grimly.