Ganyak

Ganyak (pronounced /ˈgænjæk/) is a super Earth with the somewhat disquieting characteristic that its supers—heroes and villains alike—have a tendency to disappear without explanation. This isn't to say that this fate happens to all supers, but it does occur significantly more than one would probably expect, and certainly more than on the vast majority of super worlds—and it seems to be disproportionately the most powerful supers that are subject to it. Most recently, Radon, one of the most powerful and respected heroes of the world, vanished while on, or en route to, a goodwill trip to South Korea. Given his status as one of the most prominent superheroes of the world, his disappearance has especially shaken up supers and nonsupers alike, but it was far from unprecedented.

For the most part, the inhabitants of Ganyak, not having other super worlds to compare their own to and not realizing the unnatural extent of the phenomenon, assume that the vanished supers were defeated in some unknown battle against an enemy. And indeed, quite often a villain does claim responsibility for the disappearance of some renowned hero, or vice versa—though that doesn't mean those claims are true. (Korean supervillain Smallpox has come forward to take credit for Radon's disappearance, but few people believe him.) This situation has made the supers of Ganyak, if anything, even more respected (or held in awe, in the case of the villains) than they are elsewhere. After all, clearly the life of a super is a dangerous and too often a short one; those who use their powers to fight evil, or for anything else, are running a significant risk.

As with most alternate Earths (or at least, most alternate Earths that are unaware of others), the inhabitants of Ganyak simply call their world "Earth"; "Ganyak" is only a name used by convenience in the Wongery, and is never used by the world's natives. Indeed, such a name wouldn't occur to them at all; "Ganyak" is a very rough transliteration of the most common term the Tham use to refer to the world, and few if any of its human inhabitants have any understanding of the Tham's language (and even if they did, they certainly wouldn't use it to name their own world).

New supers

In contrast to the frequent disappearances of established supers on Ganyak, the number of new supers to appear seems to be accelerating. While there's no obvious common cause in their empowerment—some supers gain powers from radiation, some from chemicals, some from what can best be described as magic, some from other sources still more esoteric—, it seems undeniable that a greater proportion of Ganyak's population are developing superpowers now than in the past. Some historians and carrologists have extrapolated this trend backward, and suggested that the development of supers seems to follow an exponential growth rate, though this is purely an empirical observation with no compelling explanation having been offered. The most popular explanation that has been advanced is that it's simply a matter of increasing technology; many supers are empowered by means that simply didn't exist earlier. Most experts find this explanation unconvincing; while technological advancement may account for part of the increased rate of empowerment, even the number of supers empowered by nontechnological means has increased, and tracking back through history the rate of empowerment doesn't seem strongly correlated with any measure of technological increase.

Whatever its cause, if valid, the exponential model would imply that eventually the entire population of the world would be supers—a hypothetical event sometimes referred to as the Serimian point (often shortened to "S point") after the Armenian mathematician who first popularized the notion. While in principle it would be possible to calculate the time it would take for this to occur, in practice the difficulty of measuring the proportion of supers in different years has led to wide variance in the estimated timeframe, with some futurists prognosticating that the S point will come within the next century, and others maintaining that it is still as much as eight hundred years off. And, of course, not everyone agrees that the S point is inevitable at all—even its eponym Areg Serimian maintains that he only raised the idea as a provocative possibility and is not convinced of its reality. Some dismiss the exponential extrapolation altogether, while others, while accepting that the growth may appear exponential, point out that with the limitations of the data a logistic curve is at least as likely a fit, implying that the growth of proportion of supers in the population will eventually level off and more or less stabilize at some level which could still be significantly below one hundred percent.

In any case, whatever the future holds for the population of supers, the relatively high proportion today already causes some issues. Some undeveloped parts of the world have become more or less continuous war zones between battling supers, the unfortunate locals who lack their powers forced to do their best to avoid getting caught in the crossfire. To avoid meeting a similar fate, most developed societies have found it necessary to establish schools specifically tailored to teach emergent supers how to use their powers, and how to employ them responsibly. These "super academies" are still new enough that their overseers and faculties (most of whom are supers themselves) have not yet determined exactly how to run them most effectively, and the frequent mistaken, mischievous, or malicious misuse of a power can make them dangerous places—though probably still less dangerous than leaving the fledgling supers to try to figure everything out on their own. Among the largest and most noted of the academies are the Aqiq Academy in northern Al Rayyan, Qatar; the Château du Moine in Ollon, Switzerland; the First Western Academy in Pecos, New Mexico; the Hainan Academy in Wuzhishan, China; and the Sardellikoulu in Uusikaupunki, Finland.

History

While in many super worlds supers arose in appreciable numbers only recently, on Ganyak they seem to go back thousands of years. While some historians have found dubious evidence of even older supers, the oldest known super of whose existence scholars are relatively confident was either Siddhrannama of Vedic India (more technically, from an area corresponding to modern-day Pakistan) or Senetaset of ancient Egypt—the available evidence is insufficient to determine which of the two was first (and it's possible, though not particularly likely, that they were contemporaries). During the subsequent centuries, supers seem to have been uncommon but not unknown; particularly notable examples include the Grecian Zyphon, Mayan Ku-Kuk, Mongolian Xen Han, and Parthian Aaphrades. (Presumably there were also supers in North America during this time, but unfortunately there are no written records from this continent prior to European settlement.)

During the Middle Ages, Europe was largely a battleground between supers, not unlike much of the third world today. Many supers set themselves up as kings, leading to a number of petty and typically short-lived metarchies, usually passed on to their founders' descendants who may or may not have any superpowers themselves, and especially if they didn't may have found it impossible to hold onto their dominions. Other supers served as famous knights, or devoted themselves to the church. Imperial China, during roughly the same period, was somewhat less chaotic; while similar conflicts between superpowered warlords often raged, they were interleaved with periods of relative peace under dynastic rulers. The most stable metarchies, however, arose in Africa and South America. The prosperous Ivory State in what is now the southern Congocame to be modern Angola and Zambia is still today considered something of a mystery and has left ruins that have yet to be fully explored. Centered in what would eventually be Colombia, the civilization of Quamaci was founded by a super who left the Inca Empire to establish his own state, attracting followers from his former homeland.

While supers, then, have existed on Ganyak for millennia, the current standard of many supers using code names and costumes didn't really become commonplace until the early nineteenth century, and even then they were mostly a matter of showmanship; most supers made little attempt to hide their real identities. As the fights between superheroes and supervillains escalated, though, more supers on both sides saw the wisdom of hiding behind an alias, and by the mid-twentieth century most supers assumed costumes and code names as they do today.

Geography and politics

Geographically, Ganyak mirrors True Earth; it has the same continents, and mostly the same countries. The same is mostly true politically; for the most part, the same countries exist in Ganyak as do on True Earth. The existence of supers, however, and in particular the high regard in which they are held, have some political consequences. Supers with political ambitions tend to find their powers a boon to their objectives. Few supers have actually become heads of state—partly because they have loftier aspirations, and partly because, as much as they esteem their heroes, the people have some reluctance to elect to their highest offices people who might go missing at any moment. Nevertheless, while rare as heads of state, supers are not uncommon in slightly lower political positions, such as senators, ministers, or governors.

Still, if not common, super heads of state do exist on Ganyak. A handful of nations have elected supers to their highest offices: Kyrgyzstan is currently led by the Austringer, El Salvador by Cellisca, and Mozambique by Madame Many. Moreover, some supers have staked out new metarchies for themselves where there were previously no established nations. The Australian ingeniate The Spanner has enabled the settlement of a large territory in Antarctica called Apparatia, constructing huge devices to keep the area at a habitable temperature. Ylem has created and claimed rulership over a new island in the Pacific Ocean called Pernovia; Majungaman has founded the subterranean nation of Agarta; while 4D has through use of her multum in parvo powers created a new state, Poschia, between Germany and the Netherlands without diminishing the areas of either of the preexisting states it borders.

Aside from the direct effect of supers in leadership positions, the existence, and number, of supers on Ganyak has had indirect effects on the world's political landscape, as well. Due to the efforts of superheroes, or the exigencies of working together for a common cause, some nations are closer allies on Ganyak than they are on True Earth. Conversely, due to resentment at a supervillain's activities or some other cause, there are a few cases of nations being more hostile toward each other on Ganyak. Perhaps one of the best examples of such altered relations is that of China: the regard in which its Hainan Academy is held leads to many other nearby populous nations, notably India and Japan, sending some of the most promising or best connected of their tyronic supers to be trained there, which in turn has strengthened relations between China and these other nations.

Heroic organizations

Some of Ganyak's most famous and powerful heroes, such as the Beam, the Cuttlefish, and the Conjurer, operate mostly on their own, occasionally forming temporary partnerships but never working with other heroes for extended periods of time. Many heroes, however, find strength in numbers, and team up with other heroes into organizations that coöperate and pool their resources the better to fight the villains they oppose.

Worldwide, the two best known organizations are the Angels' Guild and the Order of Archytas. While these two organizations are active throughout the planet, however, other organizations may be better known and more influential in smaller areas. Examples are the North American Preservers, the Chinese Cloud Guardians, and the Indian Thousand Hands.

More recently, some organizations have arisen from groups of former fellow students at Ganyak's super academies. Most of these teams are of very recent origin and are still of little more than local interest, but a few have managed to make their mark and become better known. Among the most famed of these schoolmate teams are the Golden Dragons from the Château du Moine, the Friends of Justice from the Sardellikoulu , and the Famous Six from the (otherwise undistinguished) Instituto Chilote in Achao, Chile.

Threats

Though Ganyak has more than its share of superheroes, they wouldn't have much opportunity to exercise their heroism if they didn't face some threats they had to fight against. While some superheroes may use their powers to protect people against ordinary criminals or natural disasters, there are more exotic threats facing the world as well.

Supervillains

The most obvious threat to security on Ganyak is, of course, that of the supervillains who exist all over the world. The exact number of supervillains is hard to pinpoint, and depends on how one defines a supervillain, whether one includes petty bullies who use superpowers to get their way but have no obvious criminal tendencies, or whether one limits oneself to those with loftier ambitions, or to those who use costumes and code names, or to those that meet some other criteria. Nevertheless, there are certainly tens of thousands of supervillains by even the most conservative estimates.

Obviously, not all of these supervillains are equally powerful or equally dangerous. Many of them are strictly local menaces, kept in check by a single hero to whom they can be a significant irritation without having noticeable impact outside their areas. There are some particular supervillains, however, who have made enough of an impact to be known and feared throughout the world. Among the most notable supervillains of Ganyak are Big Mama, a woman originally from Brazil who was granted powers by strange cult in the Himalayas; the Blue Queen, whose mischievous nature in combination with her immense powers make her a significant danger; Clockwork, a villain who has replaced his own body parts piecemeal by mechanical parts and who commands formidable automatous servants; The Locust, whose power comes more through her finances and connections than through any real superpowers; and the Sand Hag, a sinister cloaked figure who seldom shows her face but who enjoys puissant apparently magical powers.

Like Ganyak's superheroes, its villains have joined up into organizations of their own, though to a much lesser degree; villain organizations are both less numerous and, on average, smaller than their heroic counterparts. Still, there are a few that have risen to notoriety. The Coterie is a vicious international superpowered crime ring jointly led by the Visor and Welladay; the Brothers of Brine are a superpowered pirate organization that terrorizes the seas. The Blackheads are a very loosely structured supervillain organization the decentralized nature of which has made it relatively easy to deal with locally but very difficult to stop for good.

Unity

In the late 1950s, an ingeniate named Tanaki Takumi created a number of artificially intelligent mechanical beings—which is to say, seins. He was not the first ingeniate of Ganyak to do so, but what made Tanaki's creations different was that he gave them the ability to reproduce themselves, to create more seins and augment their numbers. As their numbers grew, the seins, which referred to themselves as "units", demanded more space and more resources, and in time some of them saw themselves as in conflict with humanity. A veritable war resulted between the units and some of Tanaki's heroes, the late Horizon prominent among them, crushed the robotic leadership. A truce was eventually called, and the units agreed to leave the Earth and create a new home for themselves in the L₅ Lagrangian point of the Earth's orbit. Their new home the extradited seins called Unity.

This, however, turned out not to be the end of the conflict. In their exile, the units' numbers continued to grow, as they mined asteroids and other sources for materials both to extend their colony and to expand their numbers. From time to time, some unit would covet Earth, or some part of it, and would gather forces to launch an incursion. These robotic aggressions occur relatively frequently now; perhaps once a month somewhere on Earth a strike force from Unity arrives and has to be fought off. Their tactics vary; sometimes they use straightforward attacks, and sometimes they attempt a more subtle infiltration. Occasionally, a group of units has allied with the supervillain Clockwork and his servants, or (more rarely) with another supervillain, though these alliances never last long.

The units are not, and never were, universally hostile to Earth. Even in the days of the Digital War, the units that were actually fighting humanity were a minority—just an especially noticeable one. Now, most units are content to have a peaceful existence in Unity, and those that come to assault the Earth make up, again, only a small but highly visible minority. The full might of Unity has never been brought to bear against the Earth, and probably never will be—though if it ever were, it would certainly be a significant threat.

The Tham

Perhaps the most mysterious major threat to Ganyak is a group of bizarre organisms called the Tham, which apparently originate from some other world or plane. While (mostly) flesh and blood, the Tham resemble no Euterran species. Nor, for that matter, do they necessarily resemble each other; the Tham are not a single monolithic race, but a collection of many different kinds of being that all seem to have a similar origin and goals. What those goals are remains uncertain, but they often seem to involve attempts to claim large parts of Earth's territory, attempts that must be thwarted by vigilant heroes.

Unbeknownst to nearly all of Ganyak's citizens, who see the Tham as only one of several threats facing them, the Tham are not only probably the greatest danger to Ganyak but also the reason why supers exist there in the first place. With possible rare exceptions, all supers on Ganyak have their powers because they have been insiliated by Tham. The accidents that often seem to be the source of their powers actually only weaken them briefly enough for a Tham to enter them. Once inside, the insilient Tham does grant its host superpowers, but at a cost; the longer the Tham remains there, and the more powers it grants, the more it connects with the host's body, and the more power it gains over it. When the Tham has gained sufficient mastery over the host's body, it is then it will take control, transfiguring the host into a powerful alien form over which the Tham has dominion. This has been the true fate of most of the supers who have vanished; they exist now as great grotesque monsters, slaves to the Tham. And as the numbers of the Tham's thralls have grown, so too has their ability to insiliate themselves into others, which accounts for the increasing numbers of superpowered individuals.

Among the major supers of Ganyak, the only one who has figured out what the Tham are really doing, and recognizes the true peril they pose, is the supervillain Big Mama. In addition to taking measures to learn how to protect herself from possession, Big Mama is carrying on a secret war against the Tham, attempting to drive them out or at least to slow down their scheme. However, at the same time she still finds herself often at odds with heroes trying to put a stop to her schemes—sometimes rightly, since she does often still concoct plots to increase her own power at the cost of others, but sometimes in the mistaken (but understandable) assumption that something she's doing to fight the Tham has a more sinister purpose. Recognizing the difficulty of fighting a battle on two fronts, or rather two simultaneous but largely separate battles, Big Mama knows things have to change soon, and is considering telling some heroes what she knows and trying to form an alliance with them—or, instead, perhaps trying to somehow form an alliance with the Tham.