The Logic Engine

 

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Amnesia

My tale begins when I woke up in an alleyway, not remembering who I was. The only thing I could remember was that I had the ability to teleport instantly anywhere within sight. I dug through my pockets and found a piece of paper, it contained an address for an apartment complex. I asked around for directions, but people seemed reluctant to point me in the direction of the apartment complex. I could see why people didn't like the place, it was obviously a poor district. The buildings had broken windows and rundown doors. The people walking around looked miserable and oppressed. Most of those people had similar traits, brown hair and eyes, stocky bodies, square jaws, small nose, pale skin. I thought that it was most strange. I finally arrived after a thirty minute trek. I looked once more at the piece of paper and entered the building. The building stood out from the rest, it had iron bars in the windows and the entrance door was a huge metal gate with an electronic padlock. There was also a pair of keys in my pocket, one was inscribed with the lock code and the other was a dull old key that had been snapped in half. Once inside, I headed towards the apartment, which was located on the top floor, I used the key with the combination inscribed and stepped into the shelter. There wasn't much in there, just a table, a chair, a refrigerator and an odd blue plant. On the table there were many letters, each categorized by sum of money. Those letters were assassination requests. I wondered if I had been some hired gun before loosing my memories, incidentally all letters were addressed to a thing called Blur. Meaning if it was me, it gave me no clue as to who I was. I stayed in my presumed house for a couple of hours, eating and reading the letters. Some of the requests went for upwards of fifty million dollars, while the cheaper ones went for ten dollars. I searched the place for a weapon, but I couldn't find one. When night fell, I heard the door open, and in came a small woman. She was in her early twenties and had beautiful blue eyes and long silky hair. She was smaller than five foot five inches and her hair was a blend of white, pink and black. She saw me and looked scared. She screamed for help, but I shut her up in time. When she calmed down I explained the situation and she sat there listening. Then I asked to tell me about herself. From what she told me, I learned that she is an information broker by day and messenger by night. She explained that she had the power to tap into any written document still in existence, whether it be on paper or internet. All the letters were her writting down what others wrote to Blur. She continued saying that she was hired by him to find jobs, she got about ten percent of his earnings. She told me that she never actually met Blur in person, he contacted her through letters and drop off points. When she left something somewhere at the designated location it would disappear before her eyes. After that we continued talking for the rest of the evening, she taught me that all humans have powers, except for guards. This was made possible by an invention made two hundred years ago by an Irish engineer. The machine is dubbed the logic engine. I learned that we are in the year 2307 and that world war four is about to commence.

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History

 During our conversation, she gave me a little history lesson on the world. World war three had started because someone built a bomb so powerful it shook a tectonic plate and sunk South America. Everyone was blaming other countries and it degenerated into two years of chaos. Meanwhile in Africa, everybody was being killed by a mysterious disease named blue foot disease. The disease spread fast and like its name suggests turns your feet blue. Everyone who contracts the disease dies within three days, there are no documented survivors. Today there isn't anyone left in Africa. The war was stopped by a machine built by an Irish engineer, who incidentally is the original guard. The machine caused everyone to gain powers. The war stopped because politicians didn't know what to do, so they called a cease fire to sort out the situation. Every government called for its citizens to submit their powers, those who didn't were hunted and killed. The war didn't restart for each country was scared of the potential superhumans other countries had. During the war, France had been conquered and divided into five parts, each part belonging to a different country. From this was born a terrorist group called La Résistance. Its leader was Elizabeth Nightngale, she was given the power of immunity to all diseases, this grants her immortality. The dates aren't important only the events. The aftermath of the war led countries to fuse together. United States of America, Canada and Mexico became the United Countries of America.  This wasn't the only union, most of the asian countries, including Russia, had signed a treaty. This treaty made it so that there would be one man to govern all external affairs, the countries could self govern and make laws and policies with members of the republic. The representative would be voted by the people of the republic. But when president Zhu was assassinated a man by the name of Victor Kraust came to power and imposed dictatorship. He was blessed with immortality and is still in power today. When La Résistance killed the king of Great-Britain, there was a huge witch hunt for any members. Anytime anyone would kill a member or inform the police of one they would receive money. This quickly became a genocide of the French. This led the members to start what is called the assassination wars. They hired assassins to kill important political figures and framed it on other countries. This led to countries hiring all sorts of people to kill off other important people in other countries. This ended when Mr Kraust decided he didn't like guards. He funded a government project to make people with more than one power. The people born of that experiment were called hunters because they hunted the guards. On average a hunter had four powers, with the maximum amount being five. They were incentivized to kill guards by prolonging their one year life span by a month each time they killed one. The other unions weren't happy with this and developed certain couter mesures against hunters. This led to guard ghettos, places where registered guards can live without fear of hunters. A guard is a person without powers, but they are the only people able to come into contact with the logic engine, a guard's child is also a guard. That's about it on the relevant events.

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Police

 I proceded to leave the apartment the next morning, I waved her good bye and went out of the door. My objective today was to try and get information from the police, so I went right ahead to the police station. Upon arriving, I was greeted by an investigator, he seemed to know me, so I followed him. He led me to his office and we started chatting. To him I seemed to be a hero or someone of great value. I learned that I often helped with his investigations. I told him what I had been through and he seemed intrigued. He wanted to know about the woman who had sheltered me. I told him everything I knew about her and Blur and in exchange he told me everything he knew about me, but I didn't get my name from him. Because of confidential resons, I couldn't give my name to him. He told me that if I told him what my power was, he could find my name. This was because everybody had a unique power and every registered person could be identified by power. I felt that knowing my name wasn't particularly important, so I declined. He understood that I didn't want to reveal my power and so ended our conversation in the office. He offered to shelter me for the time being, I accepted. He took me to go get some breakfast. During our breakfast he asked me what he should call me, I responded with Ghost. I thought it was an appropriate name, since I had the power to teleport instantly and I was amnesiac. I swung back to the woman's apartment and apparently it had been raided by the police, I felt responsible in a way, but she hadn't been found. She probably found out by tapping into the report the investigator was writing. He had given me some currency to shop with. I decided to buy a nice new set of comfortable clothing and a trench coat. My final purchase was that of a communication device. It was a small glass bead that was meant to be shoved into your ear. If you said "communicate with ___" it would call the device assigned with the pronounced code. I called the investigator to let him know I wouldn't be staying. He was apparently going to arrest me, because when I broke the news to him he yelled in anger and ended the call. I wondered where to go next. I wandered into an abandoned building and spent the night. It was quite comfortable, maybe not as much as the bed in the apartment. I had found a garbage bag to sleep on. I felt like going to Africa to lay low for awhile, even with the risk of disease  I would still go.

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Teleportation

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La Résistance

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The shadow doctor

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Historic roots

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Miniature Giant

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Victor Kraust

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