[Article] History of Section 20

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Dakarne
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[Article] History of Section 20

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I'm moving, I'm moving. :P Here's a bit more on the history of Section 20, detailing World War II.

History of Section 20 - WWII

Outbreak of War
Section 20 was established in 1939 as a response to the rising threat of Nazi Germany's so-called Overman Project, or Ubermensch Project in which they were attempting to build an army of perfect 'master race' individuals; post-humans with powers beyond any ordinary man or woman. This threat was originally considered to be an empty one, in 1935, until more public reports reached the United Kingdom of a bulletproof man in America with amazing strength, among several other proven reports of magicians who could alter reality and people who could turn invisible. Britain's response, at the immediate behest of Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, was to found another section of Military Intelligence, which was labelled Section 20, specifically geared towards dealing with the new threat of post-humans. Originally referred to as MI20, the organisation was headed up by the now-famous biological and paranormal researcher known as Dr. Quentin McKelvey. His solution was to match fire with fire, but not to play with eugenics as the Nazis were attempting to; he very immediately recognised that individuals with incredible abilities were naturally-occurring.

In 1939, he began the first stages of what he called Project Aegis, in an attempt to find and assemble a group of people who could perhaps work as an elite force against the first waves of the Nazi threat. Though many super-humans were already undoubtedly at service in the military, he focused on finding a group that would work best to combat the specific threat of the Overman Project, and all of the deadlier results that it would generate.

His first discoveries were the twins John and Jane Davies from Swansea, Wales. John, calling himself Thunder, possessed greatly superhuman strength and resilience, being able to resist everything up to and including artillery shells; and Jane, calling herself Lightning, had the ability to run and react to danger at greatly super-human speeds. Between them, they had formed a 'superhero duo', dedicated to battling ruffians and criminals on the streets of their home city. Quentin met with them, seeing their potential, and hired them immediately to be the first two major members of the team, which would simply be recognised later as Section 20. Though they were young, at seventeen years old, they accepted their new duties with perfect willingness to involve themselves in the defence of Britain against the Axis superpowers.

His next two discoveries were a little more odd. Word of the project had spread, and he was met inside his own locked office by a beautiful blonde woman and a tall, aristocratic man with crimson-coloured eyes. The blonde woman introduced herself immediately as Miranda Ferguson, explaining that she was a powerful witch looking for a way to assist the war effort, and she introduced her colleague as a demon who had been active on earth since the early 16th century. In addition to choosing her codename of Hecate on the spot, as well as labelling her colleague Lord Belial, she gave Dr. McKelvey information on where he could find a fifth and final member of the team. And the very member of the team who would serve as leader.

She gave his name as Roger Kingston, a little-known artist from West Sussex. It was revealed that Kingston had the ability to generate and shape a form of 'solid light', and was able to use it for a number of things up to and including bolts of energy that could annihilate a tank with a single shot, and personally-generated flight. When approached, Kingston was originally leery of joining the organisation, being unwilling to take part in anything particularly unethical, but when offered the job of leadership he became quite happy to accept. Even in his rebellious mind, it was better to be in charge of the beast than to be uninvolved with it and let it run rampant. He was given, to his chagrin, the codename of Union Jack, which is not the name he wished to be given as it defeated the point of him being something of a rebel, but he accepted the codename begrudgingly and began to acquaint himself with what was to become his team.

The five of them were trained in group tactics from the August of 1939 to the July of 1940, by which time they were deemed ready for active duty. After dealing with a few minor cases of infiltration, Section 20 finally revealed themselves to the world some months later, in the middle of November, by publicly thwarting an attempted attack on London during the Blitz by a small group of the Overman Project's creations. Lauded as heroes, they began from that point on taking the fight to the enemy, using their powers to track down and defeat the more villainous aspects of the Overman Project. At first, they were entirely successful, tackling many different foes throughout the Nazi-controlled portions of Europe, with the assistance of several of France's own superheroes. In the beginning of 1941, they were joined by Sophie Archer, the first incarnation of Britannia to join the group.

Many of the projects found were based off of creatures from Hitler's heavily favoured Germanic mythology, such as a trio of women with psionic powers who were called the Norns and a deranged Nazi magician who went by the name of Woden. To begin with, the projects were easy enough for the team to defeat, but a few of them had a habit of vanishing before they could be properly dealt with.

Grim Horrors
Their first truly disturbing case came about in 1942, when the team encountered the infamous Project Valkyrie. A sixteen-year-old girl, known only by the name of Claudia, was found in a heavily-guarded laboratory in western Austria, just outside of Innsbruck. She was at the time being experimented upon by the scientists there in one of several attempts to create the perfect superhuman. Section 20 attacked the laboratory, and sought to free the girl from her prison, as well as finding out what they intended to do with her. Though many of the files on the project were burned before any of Section 20's members could properly read them, what they managed to find out was that Claudia, codenamed Valkyrie, was meant to represent the pinnacle of the advancement of womanhood, to be a suitable bride to another, greater, project known as Ubermensch Prime.

When they tried to rescue her, she was confused and scared, reacting with a violent outburst that literally sent Thunder through a brick wall. But after that one moment, she calmed down. It seemed quite evident, when the girl displayed various feats of flight, superhuman strength, superhuman speed and various superhuman senses - including a limited precognition that allowed her to predict actions before they were made - that the effort of creating a superhuman was at least partly successful.

Excepting the occasional outburst of anger and various emotions, Claudia went with them relatively willingly to their home base in London. Through interviewing her, they managed to discern that she had no memory of her life before Project Valkyrie, but also that the conditioning to make her perfectly subservient to the Nazi party and the mysterious Ubermensch Prime was without total success. As was put by Hecate, 'The pages of her book have been blanked, but not yet rewritten.' It was ultimately the decision of Union Jack that Valkyrie be put under the care of Section 20, and she was made an official member, though was not allowed to join in official field missions just yet. The time came, however, roughly a year later when she was ultimately needed to aid the group.

In 1943, Ubermensch Prime came looking for his wife. The crazed young man revealed powers far greater than any of the actively fighting members of Section 20, and managed to decapitate Lightning with a single blow to the neck. The synchronised nature of the twins' latent telepathic powers caused Thunder's brain to shut off completely, killing him. Ultimately, with Valkyrie's unexpected help, the group managed to win out and wound Ubermensch Prime badly enough so that they could escape his wrath, but at the cost of two valued members of their team. Though they wouldn't encounter Ubermesnch Prime again for quite some time, the experience had sent them reeling, and they spent some few months focusing on only strategic attacks on the Ubermensch Project, as opposed to outright battling against it.

The Japanese Front
In 1944, the remaining members of Section 20 were officially transferred to Japan in order to help their American counterparts, the Association, battle against the forces of the Tagawa Clan. Section 20's place in Europe was was taken by a minor continent of the much larger Association, headed up at that time by Gladiator. Styled as a private clan of Samurai warriors, and led by their namesakes, the Tagawa family, the Clan was Japan's own answer to the Section 20 and the Association. Their operational methods were similar in style to their American and British counterparts, made up of those who had been hired as opposed to those who had been abducted or appropriated in order to be experimented upon. Section 20's battles against the Tagawa Clan were often more cynical, with both sides knowing in a way that neither side was truly a puppet, and merely fighting for their side, in a sense; the Tagawa Clan was far more like Section 20 than Project Ubermensch, and in a sense it could be seen from a long distance that they would not walk away from this with as much of a grudge.

But still, war is war. The fights were still ferocious and still brutal, though none of the members of Section 20 were killed. Not at first. In 1945, however, some months before the war ended; the Nazi supervillain, Ubermensch Prime turned up once again to battle Section 20, and attempt to perform what he saw as a rescue of his wife from the evil British lies that had corrupted her. He was, however, met by not only Section 20, but by members of the Association as well. Joined by the heroes known as Lady Liberty (an American equivalent to Britannia), Archangel (a powerful cosmic entity), the Winged Avenger (a man who had wings strong enough to carry him through the air, and who was skilled in the use of a magical bow) and the Phoenix (an immortal who could transform into fire), Section 20 managed to fight off Ubermensch Prime more easily, but still at a great cost. The battle took place over the oceans between the islands of Honshu and Shikoku, and less than a minute into the fight, Union Jack, the leader of Section 20, was hit hard enough by Ubermensch Prime that he lost control of both his flight and his shield, and plunged straight into the ocean. And then Ubermensch Prime turned his attentions to Lady Liberty before snapping her neck. Though they ultimately defeated Ubermensch Prime - still not managing to kill him - the losses to both the Association and Section 20 were quite severe.

Attempts to find Union Jack proved useless, and Hecate eventually, and reluctantly, took up the mantle of Section 20's leadership, and declared that Roger Kingston had obviously been killed in the fight, or had drowned afterwards. Soon afterwards, the war ended, and Section 20 found itself back in Britain, with nowhere to go and seemingly nothing to do.
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'For the moment, mortal, they find the thought of killing me more desirable than that of killing you.'
'And what are their chances?'
'The answer to that is evident in how long they've been hesitating, wouldn't you think, mortal?'

-Anomander Rake and Ganoes Paran in Gardens of the Moon by Steven Erikson
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