New Olympus Saga (Book 4): The Ragnarok Alternative by C.J. Carella Page B
Authors: C.J. Carella
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for the worse, and there wasn’t much I could do about it, not without bringing up stuff we’d agreed not to bring up.
It’s amazing how far you can get on sheer denial. Having work helped, of course. We both spent a good fifty hours doing Legion stuff that week, everything from PR shit to putting satellites in orbit. There were no new crises, no natural disasters, mad geniuses trying to take over the world, nor any international conflicts. That was true of most weeks, of course – on average there were maybe four or five Legion-worthy incidents a year – but a part of me felt like this was the proverbial calm before the storm, and the storm was going to be a royal bitch.
I had no idea.
The Invincible Man
Off Florida’s East Coast, July 14, 2014
For nearly fifteen years, no hurricane had reached any populated land mass in the world, courtesy of the Freedom Legion’s Weather Management Program. A dedicated team of climate controllers made sure of that.
What Neos could make, other Neos could destroy, however.
The monstrous cyclone moving ponderously towards Florida wasn’t natural. Someone had seized upon a minor tropical storm and injected enormous power into it, creating a swirling mass of wind and rain, over three hundred miles wide, producing wind speeds exceeding two hundred miles an hour. If the hurricane made it to land, the loss of life would be catastrophic. The freak storm was moving too fast to evacuate most of the people in its projected path.
We’ll just have to make sure it doesn’t get there , John Clarke thought.
It was easier said than done, however. The Legion and assorted auxiliaries had to figure out how to stop a heat engine with an output in the order of two hundred exajoules, almost a hundred times the planet’s total electrical generation, concentrated in a relatively small area. The Legion’s weather wizards had tried to dissipate the storm by the usual means of cooling the waters beneath it and sapping its power, but whoever was controlling Hurricane Thanatos was having none of it. As of the last report, Tempesta and Ocean Goddess had both collapsed after pushing themselves well past their limits in a vain attempt to stop the cyclone. The remaining weather-oriented Neos were acting as a reserve that would try to minimize the damage if the worst happened and the hurricane made landfall on schedule, less than an hour away. Tropical-storm winds and rain were already lashing Florida’s coastline.
It was up to Freedom Squad One to prevent the worst from happening.
The seven figures flying towards the mass of swirling clouds that filled the horizon were less than specks of dust in comparison. To expect them to stop the storm seemed insane.
Their plan was simple: find the Neo responsible for the hurricane’s creation and stop him or her by any means necessary.
“Twenty seconds before we hit the storm’s front,” John announced through his comm implants. The team was already facing fifty, seventy miles an hour winds even this far away from the hard core of the hurricane. Visibility and maneuvering would be severely compromised once they reached it, especially for relatively weak fliers like the Fairy Godfather. This was going to be tricky. “Anybody have eyes on the target?”
“He’s somewhere near the eye,” Dark Justice reported. “That’s where all the Source energy powering the storm is coming from.”
“Concur,” Brass Man said. “My sensors confirm the point of origin and have narrowed it down to a one-mile radius. We’ll need to get closer to give you a better vector.”
“Very well. Dark Justice, Brass Man and I will go in. The rest of you remain outside the eye wall to serve as reserve.”
Everyone acknowledged the order, even Face-Off, who would resent being kept away from his girlfriend. Too bad .
John led the way, spinning his body as he pushed his way through the strengthening winds to provide a wake for Brass Man and Dark Justice to follow. He and
It’s amazing how far you can get on sheer denial. Having work helped, of course. We both spent a good fifty hours doing Legion stuff that week, everything from PR shit to putting satellites in orbit. There were no new crises, no natural disasters, mad geniuses trying to take over the world, nor any international conflicts. That was true of most weeks, of course – on average there were maybe four or five Legion-worthy incidents a year – but a part of me felt like this was the proverbial calm before the storm, and the storm was going to be a royal bitch.
I had no idea.
The Invincible Man
Off Florida’s East Coast, July 14, 2014
For nearly fifteen years, no hurricane had reached any populated land mass in the world, courtesy of the Freedom Legion’s Weather Management Program. A dedicated team of climate controllers made sure of that.
What Neos could make, other Neos could destroy, however.
The monstrous cyclone moving ponderously towards Florida wasn’t natural. Someone had seized upon a minor tropical storm and injected enormous power into it, creating a swirling mass of wind and rain, over three hundred miles wide, producing wind speeds exceeding two hundred miles an hour. If the hurricane made it to land, the loss of life would be catastrophic. The freak storm was moving too fast to evacuate most of the people in its projected path.
We’ll just have to make sure it doesn’t get there , John Clarke thought.
It was easier said than done, however. The Legion and assorted auxiliaries had to figure out how to stop a heat engine with an output in the order of two hundred exajoules, almost a hundred times the planet’s total electrical generation, concentrated in a relatively small area. The Legion’s weather wizards had tried to dissipate the storm by the usual means of cooling the waters beneath it and sapping its power, but whoever was controlling Hurricane Thanatos was having none of it. As of the last report, Tempesta and Ocean Goddess had both collapsed after pushing themselves well past their limits in a vain attempt to stop the cyclone. The remaining weather-oriented Neos were acting as a reserve that would try to minimize the damage if the worst happened and the hurricane made landfall on schedule, less than an hour away. Tropical-storm winds and rain were already lashing Florida’s coastline.
It was up to Freedom Squad One to prevent the worst from happening.
The seven figures flying towards the mass of swirling clouds that filled the horizon were less than specks of dust in comparison. To expect them to stop the storm seemed insane.
Their plan was simple: find the Neo responsible for the hurricane’s creation and stop him or her by any means necessary.
“Twenty seconds before we hit the storm’s front,” John announced through his comm implants. The team was already facing fifty, seventy miles an hour winds even this far away from the hard core of the hurricane. Visibility and maneuvering would be severely compromised once they reached it, especially for relatively weak fliers like the Fairy Godfather. This was going to be tricky. “Anybody have eyes on the target?”
“He’s somewhere near the eye,” Dark Justice reported. “That’s where all the Source energy powering the storm is coming from.”
“Concur,” Brass Man said. “My sensors confirm the point of origin and have narrowed it down to a one-mile radius. We’ll need to get closer to give you a better vector.”
“Very well. Dark Justice, Brass Man and I will go in. The rest of you remain outside the eye wall to serve as reserve.”
Everyone acknowledged the order, even Face-Off, who would resent being kept away from his girlfriend. Too bad .
John led the way, spinning his body as he pushed his way through the strengthening winds to provide a wake for Brass Man and Dark Justice to follow. He and
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