With This Ring (Young Justice SI) (Thread Fourteen)

Darko · Apr 2, 2024

Chojin Patriarch said:
What, no other species in the galaxy fight amongst themselves?

The last time he's been out and about the rest of the galaxy was probably fighting him and his boss, so they'd be united.

Plus even if they weren't, it's possible that they weren't stupid enough to try to use radioactive weapons on their own homeworld.

Chojin Patriarch said:
Until something like a threat big enough to need dozens of Ranger teams shows up. Interesting perspective, though. When your best soldiers are equal to armies... Why use armies?

Well holding territory may be useful work for an army since one person may not be able to do it unless they have some kind of power for that.

Chojin Patriarch said:
A very good point. I doubt even Rita wants to rule over a snowball made of charcoal

Like I said above, the whole post-apocalyptic waste may honestly fit nicely with an evil overlords sense of style.

Mr Zoat · Apr 2, 2024

Chojin Patriarch said:
The other country took their apart

Thank you, corrected.

Hush, Squatt, the adults are talking.

No, that was Goldar. The SI said something that he actually liked, so he paid him respect by using what he thinks is his actual name.

Sockmonkey · Apr 2, 2024

Darko said:
Maybe Rita and some of the others like having an idiot around to make themselves feel smarter.

When your whole team is outright evil, You have to walk the fine line between "smart enough to be useful" and "smart enough to successfully mutiny and take over" when choosing minions. It's safer to err on the side of idiots if you can put up with the annoyance. Tyrants do not set up a system that can function without the tyrant.

On a side note, I'm a little disappointed that Earth basically got wrecked in the main story. I was looking forward to seeing the fruits of all the uplifting, but now it's practically rebuild from scratch.

Austin Pharos · Apr 2, 2024

Agumentic said:
No we didn't. Assuming all of the ~60k warheads we had at the peak of nuclear arsenal had the yield of one megaton and were all spread out and detonated without overlap, the area of third degree burns - generous for "nuclear fire" - would only be a little more than the continent of North America.

"We" may be referring to humanity instead of a specific country. The overall nuclear arsenal probably could cover the majority of the world no?

Chaoswind · Apr 2, 2024

Austin Pharos said:
"We" may be referring to humanity instead of a specific country. The overall nuclear arsenal probably could cover the majority of the world no?

Peak was around 60 to 70k nukes, however you need a lot less than that to cause significant damage and his metrics of the fire ball needs to burn people to death to count are moronic.

Smyter · Apr 2, 2024

He is getting the minions to collect the nuclear weapons, which means the theft will stick. Now he just needs someone to prepare them for detonation and then have a putty hit the detonator to destroy the moon palace.

Steelplaza · Apr 2, 2024

Chaoswind said:
Peak was around 60 to 70k nukes, however you need a lot less than that to cause significant damage and his metrics of the fire ball needs to burn people to death to count are moronic.

I mean… he's trying to sell them a story here. You call it "moronic", I call it pretty smart to use a story where if they tried to double-check him with a quick internet search they'll find "many people are saying" something similar.

hkim · Apr 2, 2024

Also, "teleporting up there with a tactical nuclear device" was like the third thing he suggested on his way to Zordon. Maybe he's decided that teaming up with Rita falls on the wrong end of "Live Free Or Die"?

Chaoswind · Apr 2, 2024

Steelplaza said:
I mean… he's trying to sell them a story here. You call it "moronic", I call it pretty smart to use a story where if they tried to double-check him with a quick internet search they'll find "many people are saying" something similar.

The dude said 60k to 70k nukes wouldn't be enough to cover the USA and kill everyone with the fireball, that argument is absolutely moronic, you can pretty much destroy the USA with a few dozen nukes and an equal number of Cobalt/Salted enhanced devices to destroy the breadbasked and box survivors to allow radiation to kill them. Apply that same deployment strategy globally and you pretty much end humanity with nukes to spare on the isolated islands with enough biodiversity to survive on their own.

Agumentic · Apr 2, 2024

Austin Pharos said:
"We" may be referring to humanity instead of a specific country. The overall nuclear arsenal probably could cover the majority of the world no?

~60k is the peak nuclear arsenal of the whole of humanity.

Chaoswind said:
The dude said 60k to 70k nukes wouldn't be enough to cover the USA and kill everyone with the fireball, that argument is absolutely moronic, you can pretty much destroy the USA with a few dozen nukes and an equal number of Cobalt/Salted enhanced devices to destroy the breadbasked and box survivors to allow radiation to kill them. Apply that same deployment strategy globally and you pretty much end humanity with nukes to spare on the isolated islands with enough biodiversity to survive on their own.

Well, first of all, I literally said that it would be enough for the whole of North America, much less US - you could get all of US even if you took the more reasonable 400 kilotons yield, I think. Second of all, "consume the entire surface of the planet in nuclear fire" means a lot more than destruction of one country or humanity as a whole.

Mr Zoat · Apr 2, 2024

Neither I, nor the SI, were trying to be completely accurate with that statement.

Ngamer11 · Apr 2, 2024

Mr Zoat said:
Neither I, nor the SI, were trying to be completely accurate with that statement.

It's sometimes hard to tell when Paul is purposefully spouting BS.

Chaoswind · Apr 2, 2024

Agumentic said:
~60k is the peak nuclear arsenal of the whole of humanity.

Well, first of all, I literally said that it would be enough for the whole of North America, much less US - you could get all of US even if you took the more reasonable 400 kilotons yield, I think. Second of all, "consume the entire surface of the planet in nuclear fire" means a lot more than destruction of one country or humanity as a whole.

I see the issue, you are taking what Paul said literally. The fire doesn't need to be literal fire for the statement to be true, "nuclear fire" could refer to large enough amounts of fallout covering the earth (it does burn your skin) and for that metric the nuclear arsenal during peak was plenty so long your nuclear deployment strategy is adequate.

Mr Zoat · Apr 2, 2024

Ngamer11 said:
It's sometimes hard to tell when Paul is purposefully spouting BS.

I mean, if someone wants to argue the point they could at least list all of the nuclelar armed countries and their armaments in detail.

Ardy · Apr 2, 2024

Mr Zoat said:
I mean, if someone wants to argue the point they could at least list all of the nuclelar armed countries and their armaments in detail.

Nice try, Xi.

WereDragon · Apr 3, 2024

Sockmonkey said:
On a side note, I'm a little disappointed that Earth basically got wrecked in the main story. I was looking forward to seeing the fruits of all the uplifting, but now it's practically rebuild from scratch.

Sometimes you have to knock an old building down before you start construction on a better replacement.

Status quo is dead, the established power blocks are in ruins and heroes are finally opening up their toy boxes for widespread use. Earth is in a great place to start rapid uplift.

Vaermina · Apr 3, 2024

Ngamer11 said:
It's sometimes hard to tell when Paul is purposefully spouting BS.

In contrast to all the times he's accidentally spouting BS.

Mr Zoat · Apr 3, 2024

17th November 2017
03:29 GMT -5

Adam stares down at the infamous pentagonal building. "You sure he's in there?"

I nod. "Yep."

"It's the middle of the night, and he should be an old man by now."

"He's part of the America government's efforts to utilise alien technology and superpowers. My best guess is that he got called in either when I hit Kazakhstan or Area Fifty One." I nod my head to the right. "Outside chance they picked up my boom tube on Themyscira." I check his position. "You alright flying on your own?"

"This isn't flying. It's telling the universe where I am." He turns his head towards me. "What do you expect me to do, here?"

"I didn't even want to come here. I've got a guy to break out of a prison in China. My advice: disintegrate the wall and ceiling, fly in like you own the place, tell him what he did in front of witnesses, really get it out of your system, and then drop a couple of copies of my binder around the place." I fan my arms out. "Or just kill him. He has it coming. Him and the others. Then-."

"Randy and Peggy.. would..."

"There's no good way to find out that the man who raised you is an arsehole. But if you can't bear to act on your vendetta, we can leave and you can pretend to be someone else. You know Lemar had it coming, and if you've decided to take the high road there's no one else who got hurt except for some soldiers in Vietnam. And people didn't care about them at the time, much less now."

"Which room?"

I make a targetting reticle on the side of the building. "There. Now there's a big yellow light that they can easily see from inside. And-."

A spotlight swivels to shine on us. Subjekt-17 glares at it and it shatters, the soldiers manning it shrinking back in case it explodes.

"And so you've got a time limit."

"Fine."

He moves forwards, his movement even less 'flighty' than I do with my rings. He just leans in the direction he wants to move and drifts that way. One of the people taking part in the meeting ducks his head to look out of the window as Captain Adam raises his hands and-.

And the roof and wall are momentarily wreathed in purple vapour before evaporating, revealing the meeting room to the outside world as Adam gets into a good position to glower at the people inside.

But I can't accuse Eiling of not being on the ball. "Guards! Get in here!"

They breach the door immediately, guns raised and searching for a target. They're only thrown off by the lack of wall for a moment as they orientate on Adam.

"Give it your best-"

CHM-CHM-CHM-.

"-shot."

Not even a ripple in the silver material making up his epidermis.

"Though you might wanna be careful." He drifts down to float at the head of the table, the area around his hands glowing like plasma globes. "I think I might be radioactive under this."

I could shout down that he's not, but… Let him have this.

Subjekt-17 flies back from looking at the White House. "Those are the humans who hurt him?"

"One of them."

"Why is he delaying?"

"That's complicated, and I don't think-" One of the officers tried to leave through the door as the soldiers reload, and Adam fires a purple beam through the wall next to his head. "-that you have a frame of reference for it."

"Nothing to say, Eiling?" He-. Oh, good power move! He flies through the table, the purple glow splitting it lengthways as he moves. "Unlike me, you've had fifty years to think about it."

Eiling, who held his ground a little better than the others, stares at Adam. It takes a moment, but there's a slight glimmer of recognition.

"Nate? Nate Adam?"

"The very same. I hear my pardon got lost in the mail."

Eiling relaxes a little. "Hey, I tried. And no one here is trying to defend Nixon. So, you… Got out."

"With help." He reaches the end of the table, which falls into two halves with a thunk. "C.I.A. put you up to it, huh?"

"C.I…. What? What are you talking about?"

I send a copy of the folder down, and Adam catches it. "You, Lemar, Yarrow…" He holds the folder out to Eiling. "See if this jogs your memory."

Eiling takes it, because if I remember rightly he wanted a super-powered soldier and a little office renovation would be a small price to pay to get Adam onside, particularly on a world like this where they're so rare.

"Okay, what is-." He sees the summary page, and respect to him, he doesn't twitch. "This. Is this your own work?"

"No, an alien gave it to me."

"They were right about Yarrow, but Lemar didn't have anything to do with it. Whoever this alien is, they fed you a line. Next time try checking your sources before blowing a hole in the Pentagon."

He tries to hand the folder back. When Adam doesn't take it, he hands it to an aide.

"Look, we can fix the pardon. We already got enough new evidence to prove that you're innocent, and I know Randy and Peggy would love to get to know their father. And we can fix the wall too, so don't worry about that. I don't know if you've heard about it yet, but we had a bunch of super powered aliens try to destroy the Earth last year, and the US needs someone of our own who can fight at that level. You'll be a hero."

Huh. Good delivery. And if we hadn't already telepathically interrogated just about everyone on that list with Hippolyta acting as a disinterested party it might well have worked.

"I can't believe that you're seriously going to try that." He raises his right hand, purple glow crackling. "Did you really think I wouldn't have checked something like that-."

Two red beams hit him in the chest and send him flying back out through the hole!

What? Heat vision doesn't have mass and there aren't any living kryptonians on this planet. Who-?

J'onn J'onzz is flying invisibly through the air after Adams. Ah, some sort of focused telekinesis?

"Why would one Subjekt attack another Subjekt?"

"There are a lot of possible reasons. He could be a trustee, getting privileges for guarding against the other inmates. He might not be a Subjekt in the sense that you mean it. As I said, you were unlucky."

J'onzz fires again but Adam ducks under the shot and fires upwards towards the source. He narrowly misses, most likely because he can't see his target and is having to guess his location. I doubt that either of them are careless enough to create another Metropolis, even if this is Washington and so would be far less of a loss.

Still, we've rooted out Martian Manhunter. I can't imagine a Justice League without him, and this would force him to get involved… I'll take it.

But we've got other places to visit.

"Adam! We'll be in China! We'll pick you up when we're done!"

Darko · Apr 3, 2024

Mr Zoat said:
chest and red him flying

"send"

boo600 · Apr 3, 2024

I see Grayven's plan is coming together nicely.

I'd expect things to go wrong now, but… this is Snyder's crippled horror of a world. There's nothing here smart or strong enough to cause issue, here - possibly including Darkseid himself, going by the Snyder Cut.

Mr Zoat · Apr 3, 2024

Darko said:
"send"

Thank you, corrected.

RichardWhereat · Apr 3, 2024

You wrote Our when you meant Out

Chojin Patriarch · Apr 3, 2024

Mr Zoat said:
17th November 2017
03:29 GMT -5

Adam stares down at the infamous pentagonal building. "You sure he's in there?"

I nod. "Yep."

"It's the middle of the night, and he should be an old man by now."

Sadly, if whoever they're after is as powerful and influential as they think, he's going to be top of the totem pole on super-powered affairs. and someone with that kind of portfolio is going to be on call 24/7, no matter the age.

"He's part of the America government's efforts to utilise alien technology and superpowers. My best guess is that he got called in either when I hit Kazakhstan or Area Fifty One." I nod my head to the right. "Outside chance they picked up my boom tube on Themyscira." I check his position. "You alright flying on your own?"

"This isn't flying. It's telling the universe where I am." He turns his head towards me. "What do you expect me to do, here?"

I see he's gotten used to his powers quickly enough for government work. Mostly in the 'fly around, zap stuff' field.

"I didn't even want to come here. I've got a guy to break out of a prison in China. My advice: disintegrate the wall and ceiling, fly in like you own the place, tell him what he did in front of witnesses, really get it out of your system, and then drop a couple of copies of my binder around the place." I fan my arms out. "Or just kill him. He has it coming. Him and the others. Then-."

"Randy and Peggy.. would..."

Your kids? They'd barely remember you. At this point, you'd just be another freaky guy flying around.

"There's no good way to find out that the man who raised you is an arsehole. But if you can't bare to act on your vendetta, we can leave and you can pretend to be someone else. You know Lemar had it coming, and if you've decided to take the high road there's no one else who got hurt except for some soldiers in Vietnam. And people didn't care about them at the time, much less now."

"Which room?"

Ah, did that push him over the line? Not surprising, that shit was bad then and it still is, up to the point we're allowed to talk about.

I make a targetting recital on the side of the building. "There. Now there's a big yellow light that can easily see from inside. And-."

A spotlight swivels to shine on us. Subjekt-17 glares at it and it shatters, the soldiers manning it shrinking back in case it explodes.

Well, there' the anthill poked. No doubt troops are scrambling to respond...

"And so you've got a time limit."

"Fine."

Well, the Renegade is on a schedule, you know. No telling when the old man is going to realise Steppenwulf is AWOL and decides to do it Himself.

He moves forwards, his movement even less 'flighty' than I do with my rings. He just leans in the direction he wants to move and drifts that way. One of the people taking part in the meeting ducks his head to look out of the window as Captain Adam raises his hands and-.

And the roof and wall are momentarily wreathed in purple vapour before evaporating, revealing the meeting room to the outside world as Adam gets into a good position to glower at the people inside.

Add a little eye-glow and pants shall be darkened...

But I can't accuse Eiling of not being on the ball. "Guards! Get in here!"

They breach the door immediately, guns raised and searching for a target. They're only thrown off by the lack of wall for a moment as they orientate on Adam.

Well-trained, all of them. I get the feeling Eiling may have been expecting something after hearing about Area 51...

"Give it your best-"

CHM-CHM-CHM-.

"-shot."

Do watch out for ricochets, though. Friendly Fire isn't.

Not even a ripple in the silver material making up his epidermis.

"Though you might wanna be careful." He drifts down to float at the head of the table, the area around his hands glowing like plasma globes. "I think I might be radioactive under this."

Admittedly, doing the 'absorb all the kinetic energy then let the spent bullets fall off' trick works pretty well for intimidation.

I could shout down that he's not, but… Let him have this.

Subjekt-17 flies back from looking at the White House. "Those are the humans who hurt him?"

Those who gave the orders, anyway. Those who are ultimately responsible.

"One of them."

"Why is he delaying?"

Because unlike you, Sev, he isn't that angry. Not blindingly so, anyway.

"That's complicated, and I don't think-" One of the officers tried to leave through the door as the soldiers reload, and Adam fires a purple beam through the wall next to his head. "-that you have a frame of reference for it."

"Nothing to say, Eiling?" He-. Oh, good power move! He flies through the table, the purple glow splitting it lengthways as he moves. "Unlike me, you've had fifty years to think about it."

Ah, the good old 'Black Adam' move. Physics bows to the unstoppable force, and nothing here is an immovable object.

Eiling, who held his ground a little better than the others, stares at Adam. It takes a moment, but there's a slight glimmer of recognition.

"Nate? Nate Adam?"

And once the full details are spilled, he's gonna realise he just damned himself.

"The very same. I hear my pardon got lost in the mail."

Eiling relaxes a little. "Hey, I tried. And no one here is trying to defend Nixon. So, you… Got out."

You sound a little nervous, Wade. Something weighing on your conscience?

"With help." He reaches the end of the table, which falls into two halves with a thunk. "C.I.A. put you up to it, huh?"

"C.I…. What? What are you talking about?"

No, no, don't give him an out. He'll pass the buck like a hot potato.

I send a copy of the folder down, and Adam catches it. "You, Lemar, Yarrow…" He holds the folder out to Eiling. "See if this jogs your memory."

Eiling takes it, because if I remember rightly he wanted a super-powered soldier and a little office renovation would be a small price to pay to get Adam onside, particularly on a world like this where they're so rare.

It is interesting that supers aren't more common. Guess the Snyderverse tries to play a little more realistic with their physics. No Metagene, for instance. Or they're simply keeping their heads down. What with things like Wonder Woman or Batman's more public outings, back in the not-yet-conceived-of day.

"Okay, what is-." He sees the summary page, and respect to him, he doesn't twitch. "This. Is this your own work?"

"No, an alien gave it to me."

Prepare your bullshit detectors, folks. Watch they don't blow the dial off.

"They were right about Yarrow, but Lemar didn't have anything to do with it. Whoever this alien is, they fed you a line. Next time try checking your sources before blowing a hole in the Pentagon."

He tries to hand the folder back. When Adam doesn't take it, he hands it to an aide.

And look, they're already getting a high reading.

"Look, we can fix the pardon. We already got enough new evidence to prove that you're innocent, and I know Randy and Peggy who love to get to know their father. And we can fix the wall too, so don't worry about that. I don't know if you've heard about it yet, but we had a bunch of super powered aliens try to destroy the Earth last year, and the US needs someone of our own who can fight at that level. You'll be a hero."

Huh. Good delivery. And if we hadn't already telepathically interrogated just about everyone on that list with Hippolyta acting as a disinterested party it might well have worked.

I have the feeling he's had that little speech prepared for years, memorised just in case Adam showed up again.

"I can't believe that you're seriously going to try that." He raises his right hand, purple glow crackling. "Did you really think I wouldn't have check something like that-."

Two red beams hit him in the chest and send him flying back out through the hole!

Huh. That was unexpected.

What? Heat vision doesn't have mass and there aren't any living kryptonians on this planet. Who-?

J'onn J'onzz is flying invisibly through the air after Adams. Ah, some sort of focused telekinesis?

Ah, there you are. Ditching his disguise as a senior military man in favour of defending his 'allies'. No doubt Lieutenant-General Swanwick ducked out of the room (assuming he was even present.)

"Why would one Subjekt attack another Subjekt?"

"There are a lot of possible reasons. He could be a trustee, getting privileges for guarding against the other inmates. He might not be a Subjekt in the sense that you mean it. As I said, you were unlucky."

And they may not even know he was there. Invisibility and shapeshifting can work wonders for infiltration.

J'onzz fires again but Adam ducks under the shot and fires upwards towards the source. He narrowly misses, most likely because he can't see his target and is having to guess his location. I doubt that either of them are careless enough to create another Metropolis, even if this is Washington and so would be far less of a loss.

Still, we're rooted out Martian Manhunter. I can't imagine a Justice League without him, and this would force him to get involved… I'll take it.

No doubt once the fight's done, Jonn'll slip off to Gotham and involve Batman, who'll call in Wonder Woman, Flash and Aquaman, as in the original plot-line.

But we've got other places to visit.

"Adam! We'll be in China! We'll pick you up when we're done!"

...And now the Americans know where you're going. Not that they'd tell the Chinese that.

More loud, blatant and highly-visible appearances by the Renegade and his growing team. By now, other parties are probably getting into motion to counter them, or take advantage of the messes they're making. And if one of those parties happens to be a certain Dark Knight, well... By the time the Renegade finishes up in China, he may find himself meeting some of them...

But if you can't bare to act on your vendetta...

But if you can't bear to act on your vendetta...

I make a targetting recital on the side of the building.

I make a targetting reticle on the side of the building.

Still, we're rooted out Martian Manhunter.

Still, we've rooted out Martian Manhunter.

hance1986 · Apr 3, 2024

Mr Zoat said:
I doubt that either of them are careless enough to create another Metropolis, even if this is Washington and so would be far less of a loss.

Very politically savage. As an American I love it.

Darko · Apr 3, 2024

Chojin Patriarch said:
You sound a little nervous, Wade. Something weighing on your conscience?

He'd have to have one for something to weigh on it.

Mr Zoat · Apr 3, 2024

RichardWhereat said:
You wrote Our when you meant Out

Actually helpful sentence that explains where that word is in the text said:
I fan my arms our.

Chojin Patriarch said:
But if you can't bear to act on your vendetta...
I make a targetting reticle on the side of the building.
Still, we've rooted out Martian Manhunter.

Thank you, corrected.

thebishop8 · Apr 3, 2024

Mr Zoat said:
J'onn J'onzz is flying invisibly through the air after Adams. Ah, some sort of focused telekinesis?

I didn't even know that character was in those movies. Sure, of the DCEU I only saw Wonder Woman (on a plane) but I would have figured I'd have seen a clip with him in it or heard of it somehow.

Lord Ernest · Apr 3, 2024

thebishop8 said:
I didn't even know that character was in those movies. Sure, of the DCEU I only saw Wonder Woman (on a plane) but I would have figured I'd have seen a clip with him in it or heard of it somehow.

It's in the Snyder Cut, if memory serves right.

Honestly, I enjoyed watching that more than most of the other movies in the DCEU. I took it as a mini-series, watching 1 hr or so of it for a few days.

I know, being better than the original release of Justice League isn't a high bar, but hey, it's like appreciating the good moments in the Star Wars Prequels after seeing the Disney Sequels; now you know it could be worse, so enjoy the entertaining bad ones I say.

Dur'id the Druid · Apr 3, 2024

Mr Zoat said:
But we've got other places to visit.

"Adam! We'll be in China! We'll pick you up when we're done!"

Is he really just bugging out just when another super appears? At least give Adam a few pointers about fighting him.

Also, where is Queen H? Didn't see her mentioned in this attack on the pentagon.

Mr Zoat · Apr 3, 2024

Dur'id the Druid said:
Is he really just bugging out just when another super appears? At least give Adam a few pointers about fighting him.

Why? He want Adam to be an overt threat to human civilisation, or at least kill Eiling. Once he checked they weren't going to start levelling buildings there wasn't much point.

Also, where is Queen H? Didn't see her mentioned in this attack on the pentagon.

She was deposited on the ground, and snuck away to try and work out how telephones work so that she could contact Diana.

With This Ring (Young Justice SI) (Thread Fourteen)

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