SCORPION

The SCORPION is an original character from my current story project - the time-consuming IN LAK'ECH Mythos, still in initial stages of development.
As you can tell by his armor's design, it's inspired by the eponymous arthropod, some science fiction and tokusatsu influences, but also directly derived from another design, that of the original "GAMMA" armor, one of the 12+ armors from the Alpha-Omega series that I've designed last year. Each of them has an unique power and also play a major role in the IN LAK'ECH Mythos. The Scorpion's customized GAMMA armor allows him to resist almost any kind of physical damage, and also enhances his senses and abilities greatly.


THE INSECT SYNDICATE BEGINS
In the IN LAK'ECH Mythos, the SCORPION is a member of the Insect Syndicate, a semi-official enforcement/security group headquertered in Chinchaysuyu (equivalent to the northern Peruvian Coast), a State/district of Tahuantinsuyu (named after the original Inca Empire, in the IN LAK'ECH Mythos a larger modern State which spans from Colombia in the North to the northern regions of Chile and Argentina in the South, encompassing areas from Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia. It's divided into four "suyus" or regions, and the capital, Moche, is located in Chinchaysuyu). The Syndicate's leader and founding member, the ICHNEUMON, is himself the major military authority of the Chinchaysuyu region, and an official "MALLKI" Cyborg General (named after the Inca royal mummies, the Mallki are the highest military authorities of Tahuantinsuyu, each one is assigned to a suyu) from Tahuantinsuyu.
    The Insect Syndicate was officially founded in September 2009, when riots had just resumed in the metropolitan area of Chinchaysuyu after Tupaq Amaru III, a popular, yet controversial figure who was a guerrilla leader, revolutionary indigenous socialist captain during the era of the Peruvian Empire (that was replaced by the Socialist Republic of Tahuantinsuyu in 1969, following the victory of Tupaq's fellows and the capture & execution of the Peruvian emperor, Urcon Verbo, a dictator who was more like a CIA puppet) and the eventual President of Tahuantinsuyu from 1979 to 2000, when he went missing (and reports of his supposed death began to rise). He returned on March 2009, and on April 1st was appointed by Tahuantinsuyu's current president, Herrera Humala (from the traditional Communist Party of Tahuantinsuyu, Humala took the position in 2006, shortly after Julio Huanca, the current president since 2005's elections, from the left, social-democratic opposition party PSP has resigned), as Prime Minister. This move was poorly received by several sectors of the international community as a threat to democracy, but the Tahuantinsuyuan government, like all others, really didn't let its own population take charge of any effective measure over the decisions that concerned their own living (can democracy even exist, if in the end most of the people that compose a mass society are rather obliged to live in these conditions than they do it willingly?), and through its security forces often committed human rights violations, supported by its own corrupt law system and perpetrated by it's police (it's what police does, afterall).

THE SAQRARUNA
    Between 2009 and 2011, the ICHNEUMON and the FIREFLY were the only two members of the Insect Syndicate, however their main sponsor, SPECTRO, the head of the secret intergalactic    Saqraruna Organization (that operates in Tahuantinsuyu for centuries), already had interest in capturing, customizing other super-powered Alpha-Omega armors and recruiting genetically fit users to don these armors and operate within the Insect Syndicate. Until May 2010, most of these were owned by the AXIS Institute, a private military academy (or rather bounty hunter academy), sponsored by the armors' so-called developers, the american military technology corporation ABEL Inc. and the Teutonic (German) Ulhaden Corporation. Because of inner disputes and the threat of exposing its darkest secrets, the AXIS was closed and the ownership of each armor divided between different figures, some more and some less related to the aforementioned military companies. Before SPECTRO's minions could start the harvest, however, some armors (Psi, Iota, Epsilon, Alpha) have been previously located and stolen by traditional enemies of AXIS, like the inhuman lizard-man Cuetzpalin Paynal, and ultimately fell to the hands of independent, paramilitary anarchists across the globe, leading to the creation of armed affinity groups. Other armors (Ni, Mi, Sigma, Pi) were held tighter by far-right nationalists.
    The members of the Insect Syndicate operate accordingly to the orders given by their leader ICHNEUMON, who in turn operates accordingly to "the interests of the State of Tahuantinsuyu" as the MALLKI Cyborg General of the province of Chinchaysuyu. These interests are dictated by Tahuantinsuyu's Council for Advanced Scientific, Technological, Industrial and Energy Development, a not so public organ from the State which most recent public relations manager as of 2009 is a cyborg ("post-human") named Choque Illa. From behind, the council is merely a mask for the Saqraruna Organization, which leader, SPECTRO (reputedly, a "Yakuruna" alien. Actually, a centuries-old Artificial Intelligence), has been a long-time ally of Tupaq Amaru III (even before he was called as such. Tupaq the Tahuantinsuyuan leader is actually a vessel for an ancient Elemental God of Darkness). But that's a story for another day. Like with the MALLKI Cyborgs, the identities behind each Insect Syndicate member (if they have one) are hidden even among their own. Most of them live in Chinchaysuyu as citizens, but while activated for a mission, they dress up and only refer to each other with their respective "Insect identities". The public also have absolutely no contact to the IS missions or goals, all they've got to know is that they're some kind of Tahuantinsuyuan secret agent. Despite that, each member have a very different background, several of them aren't even of Tahuantinsuyuan nationality, and have been recruited under equally different circumstances (all, however, have been meticulously chosen and approached, and surpassed life-threatening tests).
    The true loyalty of the Insect Syndicate is to SPECTRO, someone they don't even know (save perhaps for Ichneumon, and after some time, the Firefly, the SCORPION and the HORNET). Like all, they also aren't used to the fact that their very armors haven't actually been developed by ABEL Inc or Ulhaden Corporation, instead they were given to personnel of these enterprises by a secret supplier named Archimedes (from a secret organization, the Novus Civilizatio), and both ABEL and Ulhaden were merely tasked to modify them and adapt them to human usage (the armors' raw material secretly comes from biomechanical aliens, the Dzolob and Aluxob, from the planet of Sothis, colonized by Archimedes and his sponsors). Of course they turned the armors' customization into their latest products, promising generations of super soldiers for the West (as long as the human subjects survived the usage of such armors. In several cases, they resulted in side effects, and that's why the AXIS Institute employed so many scientists and spent so many resources on investigating the armors, rather than just handing it to any apt agent), what inadvertently subverted the armors' original goal (at least according to the cryptic Archimedes) - these armors are symbiotes that interact with their users, and were "meant to bound to the most genetically apt human vessels". They have a major role to play in the ongoing process of Human Automation, and Archimedes has an untold connection to the Saqraruna.

GAMMA
    The armor which was modified into Scorpion's since his recruitment in January 2011 is the original Gamma armor, catalogued by the ABEL Inc. since 1977, supposedly developed in ABEL's branch of New Mexico. The third armor of the series, it was trusted to Edwin Murdock, a private agent of ABEL who alongside others has participated in a conflict on the state of Antofagasta, on northern Chile, which included international interventions from the CIA and KGB on local conflicts between Mapuche rebels, socialists, Tahuantinsuyuan soldiers, chilean nationalists. Alongside Murdock, the Alpha and Epsilon units were employed by private agents (respectively, Angus Houston and Neil Ford), but they were defeated by the official Mallki guardians of Tahuantinsuyu, including Ichneumon.

Ichneumon, the latest Mallki to be introduced, was reported by agent Ford to look almost exactly like the stolen Beta armor - the second of ABEL's Alpha-Omega series, it was sold to the japanese military in 1974 but never made it to their hands, instead, a popular japanese thief, Kenshiro Shimada, stole it and started to use it as a vigilante, "Bumblebee", exposing corrupt relations between the government & military and some cells of the Yakuza mafia. The vigilante was captured, and the armor would finally reach the military, as Shimada's execution was announced in 1981, but it never happened. This led Ford, the last survivor of his team, to believe that whether or not Ichneumon was still Shimada, the Tahuantinsuyuan government may be involved with this crime. Because of the secret nature of the Alpha-Omega project, however, ABEL's CEO, Joseph Bridges, faced difficulties in earning any valuable reward from the UN and even his traditional client the CIA, and once again the Tahuantinsuyu emerged victorious on Latin American ground, as several communities from northern Argentina and Chile expected it's annexation into Qollasuyu as a modernization. That was the last expansion Tahuantinsuyu would reach in the following years, as eventually with the dissolution of the USSR the Tahuantinsuyu slowly returned diplomacy with some of its original enemies. Moments of tension between both US and Tahuantinsuyu would return in 1997, when Tupaq and some of his military were visiting Cuba and some islands near Mexico's Atlantic Coast, what some agents reported as a planned attack. There were also reports of his presence in Arizona, though these have also happened in 1974. Following Tupaq's mysterious disappearance in 2000 (no official claim about his death was launched, however after some years several people started to believe he died. Some people know better what happened, but guard that as a secret), Tahuantinsuyu has left aside its Socialist name - becoming the Republic of Tahuantinsuyu, and its Communist Party, the traditional power since the victory of 1969's revolution and following the return of elections in 1979, has ceded some of its bureaucratic positions to new social democrat or centre-left parties, such as the PSP.

    In the 1981 mission which saw Ichneumon's reveal to the world, Murdock had gone berserk and brutally killed agent Houston. The cause of Murdock's "insanity" has remained unknown, but ABEL's staff agreed to adopt the possibility the Gamma armor wasn't ready yet, and for decades it would remain under study by its New Mexico branch, no longer employed on CIA missions, unlike the others in the series. The only time the Gamma armor would make it outside the lab was in 1997, when New Mexico branch's lab assistant, Cade Gilson, has stolen the armor for his own. On this occasion, Earl Lennox, ABEL's private agent using the THETA at the time, was activated to capture and eliminate Gilson, and return Gamma to it's confines, but he died in the conflict, not before reporting how Gilson went insane, in a manner similar to Murdock in 1981. One of ABEL's scientists, the japanese xenobiologist Dr. Yao Wu, would develop "Gamma suppressors" especially designed to null the powers of the deadly armor, and with the help of that and his own Theta armor (he was chosen as Theta's user following Lennox's death), has managed to kill Gilson and return the armor to the lab.
    Three years later, following the failure of ABEL's secret Operation: MILLENNIUM which was launched by request of the CIA and planned to capture the Tahuantinsuyuan leader Tupaq Amaru III when he was reported to be visiting the Death Valley Desert in Arizona (where, unknown to all, there's an underground lab from the secret Saqraruna Organization), ABEL's reputation in accordance to the CIA and international security forces, including the traditional INTERPOL, would only be healed by an agreement between it and the Teutonic Ulhaden Corporation, that would become the sponsors of a Gallia-headquartered international, private military academy - the AXIS Institute, the legal owner of most of the super-powered Alpha-Omega armors. Like with ABEL, the Ulhaden corporation was a facade to the secret origin of the armors and even then suffered the deaths of several agents in the late 20th century, during the failed Operation: RED ISLAND, which ended with the destruction of Bermeja, an island at the Atlantic region of Mexico - the same event where Tupaq was trapped into the Absolute Darkness by some of his brothers and rivals, the Elemental Gods. A great intel was lost as well, and traditional corporations like the Catholic Church and private military forces under public facades, headed by UN's current secretary of security, Brazilian ex-general Wagner K (who used to be a bounty hunter at the time Tupaq was a revolutionary, and later a dictatorship general during the seventies and eighties), were instrumental to forge AXIS and its own role in the international politics, while ABEL and Ulhaden should keep working on more armors and more tests. The secret breeding and enslavement of "demonoids" within AXIS' grounds would keep its own atmosphere less suspicious to its inner staff. The Gamma armor, however, would remain unused, and left at ABEL's New Mexico branch's lab, as if it was irrearably damaged by Ichneumon/BETA's poison.

GRAND THEFT
    In late January 2009, on the wake of indigenous rebellions at the Sonora desert of Mexico, somewhat inspired or restrengthened by the lone-wolf anti-State "terrorist" (direct action is a better name, but the mass media will never refer to it as such) campaigns of the super-fast, inhuman vigilante known as Cuetzpalin Paynal (from the nahuatl "Fast Lizard"), ABEL's lab at New Mexico was breached by some rebels, in the action supported by a southern Mexican indigenous paramilitary rebel leader, Lanzo Zalacosta, who appropriated the OMEGA armor stored there. On the lab's raid, the GAMMA was recovered by Jacob Mills, an African-American nanobiologist/geneticist based in Santa Clara County, California, who was used to help Lanzo's EMLN rebels from Chiapas with some donations and social projects. They were introduced to Cuetzpalin Paynal, who convinced them they could storm ABEL's base and salvage useful equipment. Only after amassing a certain amount of people and equipment for the action, they left Mexico for the US, and made their way back - not before losing several of their own rebels at the hands of border security and AXIS agents, namely PI, ALPHA and ETA. Marvin Chad, agent Alpha, was captured and brought by the rebels back to their base at Chiapas, from where other AXIS agents would trace and rescue him, and later identify the current status of the other two armors.
    The theft of the Gamma armor posed a new threat to AXIS' secrets, for the armor's existence itself was kept hidden from some staff, personnel and alumni for years, as they believed another armor was Gamma. This opened up rumors about the existence of more "secret armors" which ABEL and Ulhaden didn't sell to AXIS, and also disputed or conflicted with official claims and the belief that the armors were owned by AXIS in the first place, as from what it seemed, the armors were fabricated by ABEL and Ulhaden and the AXIS wasn't merely "sponsored" by those corporations, but a facade controlled by them to create bounty hunters.

    Jacob Mills has been a controversial figure, despite especially regarded by the scientifical community because of his transhumanist research approach, and his studies concerning human self-sufficiency, the application of genetic editing techniques to reduce suffering of wild animals, and also his critique of the centralization of technology, in special to the political role of transgenic food enterprises, and also his support of peoples' autonomy, what had him vocally defending the righteousness of the Sonora and Chiapas rebellions. Jacob has been a close friend to fellow scientist Morgan Eckstein, a Teutonic chemist, besides a researcher for Ulhaden and later even an AXIS instructor. It was through Morgan that Jacob has got more contact with the blueprints of the super-powered Alpha-Omega armors and the potential which they showed in enhancing human bodies. Jacob has become a rival to fellow geneticist Dr. Eric Hobson, who was employed to a Norrlander (Scandinavian) enterprise especialized in the development of genetically engineered food, who tried to disqualify Jacob's scientifical studies as politically oriented (against some corporations Eric worked for). Eventually, Jacob's positions in defense of radical indigenous autonomous communities and their stand against mining, pisciculture, monoculture and animal agriculture industries (it's worth to mention Jacob is a 'vegetarian', albeit his position is arguably very different from Paynal's, who is a vegan) had him expelled from the university he used to lecture, and in some years his research had to be stopped for the lack of funds. He left US for Mexico, where he especialized in mechanical engineering, and started to collaborate directly with Lanzo on Chiapas, and that's where he met Paynal for the first time.

By 2009, Paynal's actions were known worldwide, and had already caused a lot of damage on the latin american food industry, states and overal social hierarchy - this super-fast lizardman not only raided slaughtehrouses, farms and liberated animal, some other direct actions of his targeted politically influential individuals tied to traditional landlords and industrial conglomerates, he sabotaged roads, police offices and distributed weapons to indigenous communities where he sought to plant radicalized autonomist organization, in order to break them free from State bureaucracies and also religious organizations which held them back in favor of reforms. This lone warrior became an enemy to both left and right wing liberals, and he's installed chaos over social scenarios where previously only misery and hierarchical order reigned. Despite that, he wasn't a public figure and never intended to become one - his very identity, that of Cuetzpalin Paynal, despite borrowed from an ancient indigenous prophecy, is a fabrication. His main motivation is nothing short of a complete liberation of animals, a complete annihilation of industry, civilization (cities, mass society, bureaucratic organization) and a mass reduction of human population. Despite often called a misanthropic for his own apettite for torturing victims such as millionnaires that profit from child slave labor, he's not like the official animal slaugtherers, and doesn't do that for money. He's also not your average animal rights activist who prefer to talk rather than break a jail, for he takes the largest risks he can, because of his super human speed.

    Jacob heard of Paynal before, like Lanzo did, as in South America some indigenous rebellions were rising and organizing against the State's genocide policies, after years of intense suffering at the hands of industries and landlords, thanks to Paynal's actions. This network of resistance has brought them to know of the lizardman's deeds, and this inspired Jacob to continue some of his research - the Cuetzpalin claimed to be one of the last members of a non-human species that inhabited the American Continent centuries before the spanish invasion - and that developed complex relations with native humans. If there were more Cuetzpalin out there, what caused their die-off? How could the animals, human and non-human, learn from this event, and what their experience among humans could tell of the humans' current experience with other non-human animals? The Cuetzpalin's very existence challenged the currently predominant views on history, anthropology, genetics, biology and overall science. If Jacob could get a little portion of his knowledge, that could benefit his research greatly.
    Things changed around late August 2009, when after some missions Paynal's popularity among the indigenous resistance kept decreasing at incrdible rates - because of his own actions, as he killed hunters on sight, in defense of non-human animals, in actions deemed by other "leaders" as "not strategic". After a massacre against some of those he claimed to defend, Paynal was challenged by Lanzo, while Jacob stood by and watched. After a fight, Paynal was knocked down, and both Lanzo & Jacob confirmed that Paynal wasn't born a Cuetzpalin, but was actually a human who with help from a symbiotic organism (that was, or at least used to be a Cuetzpalin) was able to transform into a Cuetzpalin. It was new for Lanzo, but not for Jacob, who already had met Omepaynal, another Cuetzpalin from Brazil, who's a journalist that supported some sectors of the local pro-land reform groups. Paynal's mask may have fallen for some of his then closest allies, but it wouldn't fall for the public in a long term, as Jacob put their differences aside, in an advanced state of their struggle. William (the young man behind Paynal) really didn't know how deep Jacob had went into his research, or how vast his knowledge of things like Teyoliatl (a green substance which heals the Cuetzpalin and run in their organism, that could be found on the American Continent before the spanish invasion) and the destruction of Bermeja (in other words, the capture of Tupaq Amaru III by the elemental gods, the very fact that Tupaq's an elemental god himself and that some Jötunn - frost giants - exist disguised as humans, some employed in key positions, such as Eric Hobson) was. Both Paynal and Jacob (who was simply known as "Gamma" with his suit put on) became enemies to the Saqraruna Organization because their actions directly threatened its intergalactic sovereignty and long-term mass destruction plans.

NECOC YAOTL
    In 2010, Jacob and Paynal, alongside other Cuetzpalin who were building up an international network of armed indigenous resistance, were involved with the frustration of AXIS' "Mission: ATLANTIS", and in doing so have not only salvaged more AXIS equipment for some of their anarchist allies, but also rescued some indigenous people kidnapped by an underground network of slavers working for AXIS' own sponsors - and needless to say, those of Wall Street too. This effort was only a front by which AXIS' existence became unsustainable, ultimately leading to its extinction, and the defection of some of its past members to the forces standing on it's opposite. After the network was established - some called it "Necoc Yaotl", from the nahuatl "Enemy of Both Sides", but it was neither a political movement, a collective, an army or organization. It was an invisible, voluntary, unidentifiable network, an interchangeable, anarchism-directed affinity group of weapon distribution and military training composed by international, more or less involved part-time paramilitary individuals that not necessarily knew each other - Jacob and Paynal managed to get their hands over more refined military equipment, including a Mech of Jacob's own design, a product of his customization of mechs from other corporations. It was urban guerrilla brought to a whole new level - it was even able to travel to space!
    Eventually, Jacob pretty much became the Necoc Yaotl's "technology guy", responsible for managing armors, vehicles and equipment which most people wouldn't be able to engineer with their own limited resources. His activities resorted more and more often to repair and build new war machines as these independent "conspirers" attacked the corrupt police and military of the States which tried to enslave all of them, including their own and their enemies alike. Jacob grew unsatisfied with the world war that installed in 2011, the growth of nationalist forces like the self-proclaimed, Church-backed "Holy Roman Empire", as well the pursuit of liberal fascism perpetrated by the EU, UN and other so-called "liberal social democracy" defenders that caused more damage to the autonomy of indigenous peoples - through the growth of their industry and concentration of capital - than their imaginary enemies. Despite used to recurring to extreme survival measures under poverty and also engineering most fascinant craft out of virtually no sponsorship, Jacob felt like he was trapped in a cycle of building something that could help tons of individuals and not being able to share it with most of humanity or non-human animals because of bureaucracies or limitations which weren't even his own. He needed more than resources or sponsors, he needed effective ways to collectivize access to military technology and genetic engineering, but that pursuit found some direct ethical conflict with Paynal's plans - Paynal was always on the fringe, while people were still arguing about democracy and class struggle, he would go far to argue about the urgency of reducing human population, immediatly stopping animal exploitation - a.k.a activities which include animal usage, domestication, confinement, slaughter, etc. Those differencies were ignored on some urgent occasions, but kept popping out all while the secret force of the Saqraruna continued their intergalactic persecution of dissenters and their projects of mass destruction - like the construction of an artificial satellite on a distant solar system that could destroy Earth's solar system should it ever approach, and hell it would if someone didn't stop it in time.

    Alongside other "Necoc Yaotl" related personnel, Jacob would identify the Solar System from where the Yakuruna, the aliens that composed most of the Saqraruna's highest staff came from, and there they'd find out their plans in creating such a devastating weapon, in what began as a rescue mission - Fafnir Hreidmarsson, a dragon and ally to Paynal, was captured by figures mistakenly identified as Saqraruna, or at least a bounty hunter working for them (he was actually working for another group). After an ellaborate espionage plan, the intel they collected pointed out to that point in space, and with some of their advanced mechs, they reached that solar system in a secret missions that most people on earth would never know about, for the sake of saving a non-human friend. On the occasion, Montezuma, a Cuetzpalin, had his powerful Spear of Time stolen by a Saqraruna agent, and under fire, they were forced to retreat. Fafnir was saved, despite his memories about his kidnapping were confusing, and Jacob stood behind to cover them in their teleporting escape - something which cost his Mech, and as far as his allies knew, his life.

AWAKENING
    His allies left him behind, however Jacob opened his eyes once more, under a blinding light, as a voice crossed his mind. That voice, he acknowledged as SPECTRO's, the apparent head of the secret Saqraruna Organization, that has been acting behind the Tahuantinsuyuan technological development council for decades, had plans much more ambitious than they sounded, and weren't actually limited to Tahuantinsuyuan territory - that, too, meant a lot. Jacob didn't realize at first, but he had a hint that SPECTRO was somehow involved in the development of the super-powered Alpha-Omega series "armors" - he was bound for too long to notice the Gamma had some consciousness of its own, and like the others it was a symbiote, rather than an armor. He knew, too, that some Saqraruna technology had much more conditions to effectively reproduce some of these symbiotes' qualities than even the ABEL and Ulhaden industries, that were still suspiciously regarded as the armors' inventors. In that near-death situation, Jacob was given an offer he couldn't refuse, and suddenly SPECTRO wasn't an enemy anymore, their goals weren't the same - unless Jacob agreed the earth's population of human and non-human animals should be severely reduced, if not completely replaced by genetically enhanced post-humans and post-non-human-animals, not to mention artificial intelligences that could reduce the damage and suffering caused by some natural needs such as rest, entertainment and feeding. Jacob found out neither SPECTRO nor several of his creations (including the bounty hunter CORAXO and the soldier/agent/researcher PACASNA) were "Yakuruna" aliens in the common sense, but artificial intelligences that could take Yakuruna forms as much as they could take human ones. They were the next step of evolution and Jacob not only acknowledged that, he acknowledged their potential in reducing suffering on earth.
    By preventing the reproduction of several kinds of sentient animals, human and non-human at rates of billions, they could also prevent the increase of their suffering and all the processes inherently related to it, increasing the life quality of the next generations, that would grow only accordingly to their aptitude of enjoying a life where the suffering could never outmatch the enjoyable experiences. A life still dictated by genetic commands, albeit modified to match genetic commands which would make possible their own thriving. For that, of course, resources such as gene editing techniques and processes which could null the individual intelligences' needs for food, rest, consumerism and so on, should be researched and made available. SPECTRO, claiming to "have observed Jacob's progress in scientifical development while working for his enemies these last years", assured his captive that "such resources exist and are being used by the Saqraruna as they speak". Ancient knowledge resounded from the artificial intelligence that for years Jacob had mistaken for an alien, millennia-old knowledge that SPECTRO himself had never experienced, as they were passed by his creators, including the knowledge about the original inhabitants of an ancient planet turned into a mobile, artificial, self-sufficient satellite that roamed light years with its own artificial atmosphere, hydrosphere, geology and resources. Its inhabitants, among them humans and non-humans - including non-human civilizations of Jötunn, Chronpuchians, Arthropods, Yakuruna and the Yana Phuyu - had experienced millennia ago, in first hand, their transition into something new. This all would sound terribly centralized and controlled to Paynal, but Jacob thought rather on the consequences than on the intentions, and his reason was more aligned to SPECTRO's in that sense. To reach such a state, he only needed to accept an offer. If he didn't - he also asked, out of curiosity - he'd simply choose the natural way of things (death?) He chose to take the offer - keep the Gamma symbiote, albeit under watch of the Saqraruna, and determined to follow their requests whenever requested. In return, he would reach a post-human state, devoid of need for consumption of food or rest, save for a small portion of time destined to recharge energies via a genetic battery developed and exclusively owned by the Saqraruna, in the same manner other AIs function.

    Jacob was now the SCORPION, the third member of the Insect Syndicate (despite scorpions aren't insects, the IS is still called that. Arthropod Syndicate would suit best, but the security department didn't want to change that), and his mission on earth was more focused in reclaiming the remaining Alpha-Omega armors to its original developers. According to SPECTRO, the Alpha Omega armors were for most of the time unfit to bond with humans, but the Saqraruna had means to perfect their bonding without causing major side-effects to its users, which were common since before the AXIS was created. That alone meant Jacob had "knowledge and means to save other Alpha-Omega armor users", including his friends Lanzo & Morgan, from the same terrible fate of people such as Murdock, but he was allowed to act only under Saqraruna's orders, and while they claimed they had ways to modify every single A/O armor, SPECTRO clarified him that not all of the current members were genetically fit to the symbiotes. That second part, however, was a bogus - SPECTRO had his own sadistic agenda and personality, and that alone ignored the pseudo-scientifical "genetic match" speech, that was pretty much built after the "coincidence" that the latest user of the YPSILON armor (that would later become the WASP), Nina Roux, had regenerative powers before she started using the armor, which power is regeneration. That was no coincidence - unknown to Jacob, Nina was chosen to join AXIS and to become the Ypsilon's user because she was found out to be the daughter of a host of a super-powered, genetically engineered Cuetzpalin, Axayacatl. It would be equivalent to choosing William as the next user of the Kappa armor. Either way, the Scorpion proceeded on his missions, kidnapping some people for the forces behind Tahuantinsuyu, and keeping some contact with the ICHNEUMON & SPECTRO himself, believing that with his influence and Saqraruna's resources, SPECTRO could be reasoned with and despite his will was dictated by other needs such as "Human Automation", he could end up performing greater benefits to sentient beings than Jacob could have ever done with the war-mongering, resources limited Necoc Yaotl. Anyone basically sane such as the bestial Nagual could realize that was a trap, however Jacob did have a point - nature's a hell to sentient animals, and sometimes reason leads one to cooperate with its enemies working for a better goal. Perhaps he only failed to see he was in no position to bargain with SPECTRO for the benefit of the sentient beings. The dimensions of SPECTRO's deceit were astronomically larger than that, however, and the Scorpion, still amazed by the homeworld of these artificial intelligences, would still play a role in messing up the lives of people like Nina, who tried to reform her own life, and just ended up back at investigating the true developers of the Alpha-Omega suits. Sometimes, the quest for knowledge really means trouble and powerlessness. But it's far more satisfactory to be negatively affected this way than to keep a boring life with no questions.

"DOING GOOD, BETTER. DOING BAD, EVEN BETTER"
In an answer to Nina just following her recruitment into the Insect Syndicate on December 2013, Jacob claimed The aliens that command the Saqraruna organization are from a species called the Yakuruna, and they have followed steps very similar to those we humans are taking, they reshaped their entire habitats and have a great deal of resources able to control and reshape nature. If we're able to take it into responsible hands, drones that can prevent diseases before they happen, technology that can grant us sustenance and food without killing, just imagine how we would save not only the lives of billions, but make it better! This sounded a little too off into the future for Nina, but it made her question: what are Jacob's actual goals in all this espionage thing? Is there a way the Human Enhacement can be a good thing? Then why its designers have a suicide death squad like the IS at their service? The Pentagon would stop at nothing to own this. Greedy bastards like Joseph Bridges and Ephraim Frére. The worst kind of politicians, these bloodsucker parasites that thrive upon misery, instead of using their vast resources to help. Are the Yakuruna any better? If not, we, here, have higher chances of making it than alongside some people that will have no future but poverty anyway - answered Jacob. While the Nagual ended up becoming everyone's enemies, some of his past acquaintances like Jacob and Nina seem to be adapting into the social castes forced upon them, and "make a change within the system". But is that even possible? For Jacob, the actual matter has never been on which side of history he may be, but how far can he go.