Chapter 30

There were two main categories of people in media . The good and the evil.

Black and white . But in reality it wasn't so clear cut . Most fell on the spectrum, and some switched up depending on circumstances.

Most humans hung in there leaning to one side or the other slightly. Hence the age old question are humans inherently good or evil would never have a correct answer.

However there were anomalies, humans that didn't care in the slightest for such distinction, in fact they cared so little , it was outsiders who designated their actions . They created their own spectrum centered around themselves.

Benefits or losses

Short term or long term

And anything that could be weaved in between.

That was these three ' boys' ( all 17 ).

Good ? Bad? Right? Wrong?

They hardly cared .

The three grouped humans the way they thought of the world .

Daniel . The most rational ( and most insane) , categorized people by how willing they would go to achieve their goals no matter what obstacles were in their way.

Hence Jay and Eric were ranked insanely high .

Jay grouped people into useful and useless , He was the true rational one .

In public /( outside his brain) all humans were important, even the useless ones were useful as platforms for the useful to shine bright . Hence Daniel and Eric were deemed useful to him.

Eric grouped people into threat level .

to have witnessed the apocalypse for over sixty years he has an idea of the powerful people . Hence Daniel was a serious threat . Not only did he not exist in past timelines , he now couldn't start the regression from the beginning to hide his secret from him or erase him.

Eric had faught Daniel before , in this timeline, but he also fought him in a future where he got to witness Daniel's true terror. The more desperate this adversary/ally of his was , the more terrifying he became

He'd successfully offed Jay after many tries , ridding Daniel of the support ,and the single tether to his sanity left. With his best friend gone , Daniel seemed to have speed up a certain development. All of Kansas State's life was wiped of the map, and him soon after

The scheming son of a bitch had long done something, either that or he could be planning . Most likely ,contingencies had been put in place. Meaning Daniel had threatened him through time . And the worst part of it was that he couldn't go further back to prevent said contingencies.

Formerly Jay could also be considered a threat , just that it had only been a few weeks since the beginning of the apocalypse.

His growth was 10 times faster than the previous timeline, but Eric already knew how to counter him he couldn't be considered a serious threat . At least not for a couple more years.

Out of the three Jay was the odd one out. His need for community and society was so deeply rooted in him.

Daniel and Eric were loners , but they were different kinds. Daniel was just honest . Unlike his closest friend he didn't lie just concealed some truths. moreover , to him society was a kind of background to his life, it wasn't as important to imerse himself in it, but it's continued existence made living colourful .

Eric however treated everyone as an adversary , truthfully the reason he spoke to people he himself didn't know. Maybe it was a genetic' defect' left within humans

Their personas were all whack . But cooperation was possible. Primarily because Eric had seen personally what happened in any other situation.

In a timeline where he left them alone , nothing happened, his identity was kept secret. But on the flip side he no longer had access to the 'building '

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" We are doomed. " Jay said with a frown .

" I knew our situation was bad , but I really underestimated the scale ." Daniel held his temples in worry.

Currently as a show of good faith , Eric gave them a glimpse of what the next decade could look like .

Daniel had things to do , check on his lab , 'vomit' out the Agricultural equipment he disassembled, and the special animals he stored in his body to run some tests , study the new body he possessed . Then go back to pick up his future companion.

But his plans were delayed yet again.

He really wished he had two bodies and more time by the stuff he'd just heard.

Daniel had meet with strong beings. Till now he didn't know who would win in a pure physical combat face off between himself and the blue bug( if he didn't have spacial punches). But that could be considered the weakest . Then there was Eric , Daniel was sure he wouldn't win , moreso now . He could defend and run , but he wouldn't win . He could kill him , but it wouldn't be his fists that did the job.

The next powerful being was the thing Eric was afraid off. It managed to grant a stray worm a larger body , and near perfect kinetic projectile defense! And the gap between Eric and that thing was ridiculous! .

And then there was the thing that created the rift in the building, just that thing alone was enought to possibly wipe all of humanity from the face of the earth. Daniel was 78% sure nucs didn't come close harming that thing . And Daniel faced off against three, and possibly one even stronger than that . Although he had assistance from the very law of space as an impossiblity.

And the most powerful he'd come across till date . 'The gaze's different from the ' reality ' that gaze had an independent intelligence. Reality might also have one , but Daniel hadn't met it , the lighting strike was probably how humans had anti bodies.

But that ' gaze ' belonged to a being . And Daniel dared not refer to the entire being . It's gaze alone struck fear into him . Honestly he was suffering from PTSD , he just approached it the way he approached his parents passing. Acknowledge you could do nothing about it , and hyperfixate on another more manageable problem.

These were the powerful entities . And Daniel was aware of them

He didn't think reality or the gaze had a problem with them( ie humanity) and their enemies from the rift probably couldn't step over , and that's why they sent their coloured bugs .

So his plan was to make up for the human to bug population issues , and get rid of them . He also was off the mind that the rate of emergence from the rift would decrease , because even with the time difference, how could you spawn soo many bugs for more than 5 years at that rate.

Also he didn't think humans would self sabotage too much during this period.

Wrong wrong wrong . If Eric's words were to be trusted , humanity was doomed in the next decade . No wonder Eric behaved the way he did . No he'd explained what happened in the fist decade, so what did he mean by he lived till 60? Did he think it was worth surviving past that point?

" We have stood here for a while , I think we need to take a seat and discuss our plan of action " Jay added , but you could tell from his tone that he was depressed.

This problem was soo big Daniel made a decision.

Eric lifted some seats and placed them down forming a circle/ triangle of three.

" Listening to you , I have come up with a solution."

' Soo quickly ? ' the both thought .

" What's that . My plan was to use all the resources available to strengthen one man, and a select few to take care of the problem. " Eric said.

" And that man is you right ? "

" Who else could it be ? I'm a regressor I'm the most suitable "

" What is your plan Daniel? " Jay obviously disagreed . The plan was sound , just that sooo much could go wrong , and human disliked leaving their lives in the hands of others.

" Have you watched superman? " The question confuses both present, but they believed he was on to something

" Yh , who hasn't."

" So if the baseline humans are elevated to the status of superman , wouldn't our problems be solved? "

The two just stared at him

"Are you stupid?".

" I won't lie , It may take more than a decade , but it's possible. If I had access to more resources I could make it possible. " Daniel didn't say that even if they rejected , he was still going to persue his goal.

He had watched movies , and the thing that bugged him the most was that aliens were stronger than humans , and only a handful of humans could deal with aliens. He always thought that if he got super intelligence , he'd evolve humans whether they agreed to it or not . Finding out on the first hour of the apocalypse , that human biosciences could have done that a century ago pissed him off rightfully . The study of medicine might hit a road block , but Soo what ? . Now he would evolve them , And to Daniel baseline humans should be kryptonians without red sud or green kryptonite weaknesses .

That was the issue with his decade long time assessment.

There were certain things he wanted his evolution to achieve.

Easy production cost

Easy production methods

Only baseline human evolution superhumans , animals , plants and extraterrestrial aliensbe exempt.

Heritage, all subsequent offspring of baseline humans should be just as strong if not stronger.

And finally worldwide effect.

If he didn't want to achieve Soo much , his genius brain could do this in 6 months. This was his initial plan for himself plus some bigger body mass until it was ruined by the gaze.

The worst part about this was that his current body was probably better than whatever he was going to cook up . It held so many secrets but he was determined to get back on track his [perfecting oneself] plan was just temporarily on hiatus until he understood his body as well as he understood baseline human bodies.

It cannot be expressed how very different his anatomy was from human . As anyone lived they were only aware of their external oragans . And so was he . But because he lived in a vastly different body for 17 years before having a switch , he didn't know if more could be done with the same looking external oragans (eyes ears etc)

Example was that he could kind of feel colours with his skin and smell the hormone concentration in a person's body . There were more .

" Rejected . We need a workable solution. I propose we form an earth alliance, I'm sure in the future you experienced, the world was divided. If we manage to pull all of human strength and wisdom together , it might be possible to overcome this challenge , and any that come after"

" Rejected. Do you know what it would take to form a working alliance? , a decade isn't enough time , plus I thought the reason you rejected Daniels proposal was because it exceeded a decade , we need a solution that can work in 5 years at most ." Eric added

" There is nothing we can do that's why we are 'doomed' even if you were able to regress to the first day of the apocalypse, nothing would change . Communications went down on the first day , humanities enemies aren't stupid . All our plans are good , but time isn't on our side . Strong elite as you said should be persued . They will surve as our civilizations line of defense. A unified humanity should also be pursued . This will ensure global coordination. Even with the risk of internal sabotage, this is still viable .

My plan might not immediately prove useful , but I can promise you that if it success, not only will the population of humans rise again , but the collective strength would be infinitly better than whatever it currently is.

If ten baseline humans would be needed to overcome one malevus , the future we can possibly witness one human take down a hundred of them ! And so an army would become relevant again . " Daniel explained.

" What about discipline? If we do go through with this plan who will discipline those that go wayward? " Jay voiced his concern.

" Before the apocalypse, how did humans discipline each other? Institutions ! If we reestablish our institutions, everything will fall into place. Not only that but if all humans are elevated , no one human being can become a problem."

" For some reason I feel this is unachievable, how can we mass produce humans theoretically as strong as kryptonians? , even if one can be evolved , I feel they would consume too many resources." Eric voiced his concerns .

" I would have thought the same a few weeks ago , but no longer . I have deconstructed what the media of our civilization has decieved us into believing, That the collective humans shouldn't be stronger past a certain limit , . Do you know how vast the solar system we reside in actually is ? So much resources sitting there so much space for expansion unused for only one intelligent species. If we run out of resources here we should collect from the wilderness, or plunder from our enemies.

The possibility of attacking our attackers might also be opened up to us. "

"Human Elite , Human Engagement, and Human Elevation . Let us raise these pillars of power for Humanity "