Zero Sum

Stratosphere Entry Reinforcements

From outside Earth space, two super enabled beings enter the atmosphere. One of them is flying by his own power, dressed in a gaudy blue and white outfit and cape, his long bushy blue hair flutters against the intense air resistance. Clearly his body is extremely modified to withstand extreme temperatures, velocities, and pressures. 

The other of the two enters riding on a silver motorcycle ride. Although to call it a motorcycle would be like calling the hoover dam a bridge. This "motorcycle" is fitted for interplanetary space travel and re-entry. The shining chrome body is shaped in the form of a dragon. Its front has a dragon head which can open and shut to devour enemies, or it can generate an enormous energy blast from its mouth. The rear of the vehicle comes with an extendable tail. Which equipped with bladed scales can be swung whiplike to slice up enemies as the moto turns and maneuvers. 

As they enter the atmosphere, blue hair spots a person falling off a building from several miles away with his enhanced vision. In a burst of blue and green aura he wraps himself and blasts off towards the victim at beyond supersonic speed to catch him on time.

His partner scoffs as he watches him leave. He himself is in no hurry to save anyone. He is more interested in finding a landing zone for his vehicle. In earlier days it would have been easy for him to land wherever he wished. But with the abundance of the super enabled, there came new restrictions on their comings and goings. 

For instance, because the hard landings that often accompanied a super enabled touching down on the ground from above, it became necessary to designate specific zones fortified to withstand such harsh landings. The alternative was buildings or roads wearing down and collapsing from frequent landings and such super activities.

Super enabled ended up being the colloquial term to refer to the myriad of individuals with enhanced powers. These powers could come from enhanced genetics, advanced tech, alien martial arts, ESP powers, or a variety of combinations of these. The term super enabled also allowed for the all-important inclusivity factor. Earth society just could not tolerate the idea that some individuals were better or worse than others for having had developed or acquired superpowers. 

It allowed the world to distinguish between the powered and non-powered, and also avoided the thinking that having powers made you either better or worse than others. Believe it or not there was conflict in thinking over the arrival of super beings. Some thought it made others better, some actually thought it made them freaks. So, with super enabled, the term implied that powers were neither a disability nor an advantage. In case it was not obvious, egalitarianism, or at least the principle of it, was all the rage.

The novelty of having super enabled seemed to have worn off long ago. It was not uncommon for alien species to arrive and be treated like an everyday occurrence. Sort of like seeing a celebrity on Hollywood boulevard. They were out there, but everyone knew about it so it was no real surprise. That or humanity was just apathetic enough to treat the supernatural occurrences happening around them with a familiar "meh". 

The dragon motorcyclist found his parking spot, the blue burst found and saved his victim, to all the fanfare that amounted to what can be best described as a golf clap. Humanity would take a photo or post online about a fantastic story and then just go on about their days.

The word humanity had taken on new meaning as well. These aliens that arrived were often not so alien looking to begin with. There were some species that looked alien enough, sporting gills, scales, tentacles and the like. But most of them looked just like human beings. 

Despite this, they were extremely altered forms of humans, to the point that it was a stretch to still call them humans. Some lived for thousands of years, many had hyper enhanced abilities, or technologically advanced bodies that made them seem more machine than biological. 

The thinking was that all humankind did originate from the same genetic template, but some had adapted to other alien world environments and become something else entirely. Others had created civilizations that practiced now ancient martial arts, which when wielded would give the practitioner amazing telekinetic power.

Contrary to popular thinking however, the aliens were not here to conquer or were not even at war with one another. The whole of their civilizations had organized into a collective of worlds. They shared their resources, perhaps tenuously, with each other. But the main goal was to find other human settlements, perhaps welcoming them into the collective, exchange resources, terraform worlds, and colonize new planets.

There was conflict of course from time to time. However not as depicted in popular fiction, one world against another world in an ages old grudge match. Rather if there was war, it would involve groups of the collective perhaps even between members of the same worlds on opposing sides. Instead of world against world it was philosophy against philosophy. 

The main philosophies or schools of thought were divided into three broad factions. The peoples who thought it was best to aggressively expand to other worlds and assimilate with as many as possible. The neutral ones who believed it was best to leave other planets as is and allow them to develop on their own and if deemed worthy only then to allow them into the collective. Then there were the other party who argued against expansion, thinking it was better to build up their own societies and further the advancement of their own peoples. Liberals, neutrals, and conservatives.