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

Frozen20XX · 2026-04-24T04:20:23+0100

Mr Zoat said:
Tarrant frowns at me. "So are you dating her Dad..?"

Just caught this, 'Taggart'.

Someguy Somewhere · 2026-04-24T05:16:28+0100

I guess I was mistaken with the demon statement, going off the angel answer quoted there and his general manner of operations being the classic Deal With A Devil.

If he isn't a demon or fallen angel type, he had to have gotten his understanding of the silver city's operations from somewhere, because he was far too well integrated into that soul prison stuff to just sneak in.

Unless his whole gimmick applies to Angels just as strongly as humans, which is a terrifying thought that ratchets my degree of horror to new levels.

If not of the abramhamic faith we'll be left with Gods, new and old. After all Mr miracle proves you can boom tube to heaven and hell.

Mr Zoat · 2026-04-24T06:25:20+0100

1st September 2013
15:08 GMT

I risk tearing my attention away from the living image of Boss Smiley to glare at Mister Andrews. "Oh, you idiot."

"Hey Paul, last name unknown! How have you been?"

I fire an incendiary round at his face, enveloping the entire shrine in white fire. That sets off the fire alarm and sprinklers. I generate a construct wall around the shrine and shut off the alarm and I keep watching the shrine.

And while I do that, I remove the gag.

"Explain. Now."

"I think I want to talk to a lawyer-" I apply electrical current. "-ghah!"

"I wish to be very clear, Mister Andrews. You have used my company, a company which I bought to ensure the provision of quality mid-market chocolate to the masses and expanded to ensure that vital supplies would reach those who needed them, for selling narcotics. I have had to intervene to prevent your work killing people, and where Boss Smiley is concerned I am not inclined towards generosity. You are participating in an ongoing attack on the human species and if the next words out of your fetid piehole are not the whole and unabridged truth I'm going to rewrite your soul so that you can do naught but what I want and do my level best to render you permanently incapable of using magic, am I clear?"

He glazes at me with the expression of a career gambler who just got his bluff called, then considers the burning shrine for a moment.

"Yes."

"Boss Smiley. What?"

"Look, he's not a demon, he-."

"He's a spirit-. Or god of, political corruption and social decay, I know. Did you contact him or did he contact you?"

"I was… Looking for a patron, and he made contact. His terms-."

"And Roger Hayden?"

"He was in a coma already when my lord showed me where to find him. Something about him losing his mask did something to his brain, but since it wasn't magic I can't tell you anything about it."

"'My Lord'?"

"It pays to be polite with individuals that powerful. But I'm not a cultist! I don't.. worship him."

"What has he given you?"

"He taught me the ritual that makes the patches, powers it, and guided me in getting this far. I can't compete with your level of brute force. Have you encountered him before?"

"I think you misunderstand how interrogations work. How do the patches convey the emotional content? What is Mister Hayden's involvement?"

"His body can be induced to produce a sort of extra-planar fluid."

"What, you're draining his blood?"

"No, nothing so crude. It merely created a connection to the possible reality where the user is experiencing the desired emotion. Most of the rest of the potion is just binding that effect to the user, though I had to work out that portion myself."

"And there's no backup plan if Mister Hayden's not available?"

"There's probably some other way to make it work, but it would be impractical without him."

"Alright. Why did you try to kill-?"

My construct wall shatters as a white-gloved and sleeved arm punches through it!

What the heck?

"You know-" The fire dies, the core of the shrine unburned and a second arm now extruding from it, taking a firm grip on the ground. "-something, I can't help but feel that I'm being disrespected."

"That's because I don't respect you."

"No." Arms gripping, he pulls, and his face pulls outwards from the shrine and into the room. If his proportions hold up he'll be far taller than a normal human, though not as tall as he was when he used the Statue of Liberty as his focus. "You don't like me. No, you actively dislike me. But I always got the impression that you respected my power."

Torso out of the shrine and yet somehow not pressing against us in what appears to have been a small storage cellar.

"But fire?" He pulls his legs out. "Not even a-?"

I shoot him in the face with a mage slayer round.

He catches it. "Exactly! Now I feel better."

You know, seeing him up close like this emphasises his size in a way that him sitting back on a throne didn't.

"Paul, do you understand what this is about?"

"I tried to improve the world, you tried to mess it up. It's what you do."

He shakes his weird round yellow head. "Let me show-"

A volley of crumbler rounds do nothing… Somehow. Crumblers and x-ionised knives similarly fail to achieve-.

Ghk!

He grabs both of us around the chests, my external constructs vanishing at once!

"-you."

He walks… Up the stairs, which are now somehow big enough to accommodate him. I'm in his right hand, Mister Andrews is in his left.

"How is-? Ah, my lord, how are you doing this?"

"I'm not a demon, Charlie. I'm a part of the world. I can't be bound or warded against." The door opens ahead of him and he strides out into the car park. "I'm just here."

"You already tried to get me onboard. I'm not more interested now."

"Did Charlie tell you why this happened?"

"You told him where to find Mister Hayden and how to use him."

"Did you not notice how he skipped the first part?"

"What, his squatting in a hotel using magic? We spotted that without him telling us."

"That he was already looking for an angle, for a way to profit."

"And you gave it to him."

"I made him aware of this particular one after he asked for it. You see, after I played our conversation back in my head, I realised that you came down with the wrong idea. Corruption doesn't happen because of me. Yes, I encourage certain kinds in the name of stability, but I also discourage others. I am not, or have I ever claimed to be, the source and creator of all human vice. If it wasn't this, then it would have been something else."

"So? You're making the situation worse and not making it better."

"Aren't I?" He looks down at the crowd gathered in the car park, and then back at me. "Are you sure that you're making a fair comparison? How confident are you that Batman is making things better?"

Mr Zoat · 2026-04-24T06:27:27+0100

Frozen20XX said:
Just caught this, 'Taggart'.

Thank you, corrected.

DeathlessProficiency · 2026-04-24T06:32:44+0100

I wonder if there's any relationship between the author's profile picture and Boss Smiley

Ngamer11 · 2026-04-24T06:44:10+0100

Mr Zoat said:
"I'm not a demon, Charlie. I'm a part of the world. I can't be bound or warded against." The door opens ahead of him and he strides out into the car park. "I'm just here."

If that's true, how badly did the the Anti-Life affect him?

McGraww · 2026-04-24T06:52:32+0100

Mr Zoat said:
"Aren't I?" He looks down at the crowd gathered in the car park, and then back at me. "Are you sure that you're making a fair comparison? How confident are you that Batman is making things better?"

I mean, Batman before or after he got Yellowed? Before, that's an absolute success. He didn't make Gotham a utopia but he absolutely improved quality of life and decreased corruption.

Post-Yellow, well I mean that's an open question, right? Batman is sus as hell right now, I just don't think Paul has had the time (or manpower, frankly, given he's going up against Prepgod Batman with a power ring) to deal with him.

Signaller · 2026-04-24T06:53:09+0100

Mr Zoat said:
"You know-" The first dies,

Fist.

Also, Zoat, have you seen the new Acme trailer, and have any Paul's ended up in a looney tunes world?

chxenocide2 · 2026-04-24T07:00:19+0100

Mr Zoat said:
"How confident are you that Batman is making things better?"

That rather seems to be a nonstarter. Batman might -might- be messing up one area in his work to make things better, but Boss Smiley has actively making things worse as his whole schtick.

Chojin Patriarch · 2026-04-24T07:24:46+0100

Mr Zoat said:
1st September 2013
15:08 GMT

I risk tearing my attention away from the living image of Boss Smiley to glare at Mister Andrews. "Oh, you idiot."

"Hey Paul, last name unknown! How have you been?"

Oh hell, he was paying attention. And unless OL has learned something new, he doesn't have the right tools to apply against the bastard yet. So this is going to go poorly, no matter what OL does...

I fire an incendiary round at his face, enveloping the entire shrine in white fire. That sets off the fire alarm and sprinklers. I generate a construct wall around the shrine and shut off the alarm and I keep watching the shrine.

And while I do that, I remove the gag.

Getting information out of him is more critical than avoiding any kind of vocal tricks right now.

"Explain. Now."

"I think I want to talk to a lawyer-" I apply electrical current. "-ghah!"

Not that I expect Andrews to know much of anything about the grinning asshole.

"I wish to be very clear, Mister Andrews. You have used my company, a company which I bought to ensure the provision of quality mid-market chocolate to the masses and expanded to ensure that vital supplies would reach those who needed them, for selling narcotics. I have had to intervene to prevent your work killing people, and where Boss Smiley is concerned I am not inclined towards generosity. You are participating in an ongoing attack on the human species and if the next words out of your fetid piehole are not the whole and unabridged truth I'm going to rewrite your soul so that you can do naught but what I want and do my level best to render you permanently incapable of using magic, am I clear?"

Ugh, OL, you know you never say his name directly. Though it is nice to see him showing this much anger. He's definitely off-balance because the the git.

He glazes at me with the expression of a career gambler who just got his bluff called, then considers the burning shrine for a moment.

"Yes."

Yeah, pretty big signal of 'do not fuck with OL right now' there.

"Boss Smiley. What?"

"Look, he's not a demon, he-."

<wince> And again with the name... You've definitely got his attention now. That's bad.

"He's a spirit-. Or god of, political corruption and social decay, I know. Did you contact him or did he contact you?"

"I was… Looking for a patron, and he made contact. His terms-."

I have the feeling that's a gross oversimplification of what the yellow-headed git is.

"And Roger Hayden?"

"He was in a coma already when my lord showed me where to find him. Something about him losing his mask did something to his brain, but since it wasn't magic I can't tell you anything about it."

It's because of his contra-temporal memory, isn't it? Psycho Pirate has always been connected to Crisis stuff.

"'My Lord'?"

"It pays to be polite with individuals that powerful. But I'm not a cultist! I don't.. worship him."

And again, to name a thing is to connect to it.

"What has he given you?"

"He taught me the ritual that makes the patches, powers it, and guided me in getting this far. I can't compete with your level of brute force. Have you encountered him before?"

Asking a lot of questions given you're the prisoner here, fella.

"I think you misunderstand how interrogations work. How do the patches convey the emotional content? What is Mister Hayden's involvement?"

"His body can be induced to produce a sort of extra-planar fluid."

Dimensional stuff again, eh? I bet that's also how the attack effect worked too.

"What, you're draining his blood?"

"No, nothing so crude. It merely created a connection to the possible reality where the user is experiencing the desired emotion. Most of the rest of the potion is just binding that effect to the user, though I had to work out that portion myself."

So effectively, it's not connecting them to someone else in this world, but instead across timelines to themself.

"And there's no backup plan if Mister Hayden's not available?"

"There's probably some other way to make it work, but it would be impractical without him."

Good, less chance of replicating it the better.

"Alright. Why did you try to kill-?"

My construct wall shatters as a white-gloved and sleeved arm punches through it!

What the heck?

Dangit, OL, you know saying his name triggers something going wrong almost immediately. And this is definitely wrong.

"You know-" The fire dies, the core of the shrine unburned and a second arm now extruding from it, taking a firm grip on the ground. "-something, I can't help but feel that I'm being disrespected."

"That's because I don't respect you."

...Wrong in so many ways... This is going deep into horror territory.

"No." Arms gripping, he pulls, and his face pulls outwards from the shrine and into the room. If his proportions hold up he'll be far taller than a normal human, though not as tall as he was when he used the Statue of Liberty as his focus. "You don't like me. No, you actively dislike me. But I always go the impression that you respected my power."

Especially with this Slenderman style he's playing with.

Torso out of the shrine and yet somehow not pressing against us in what appears to have been a small storage cellar.

"But fire?" He pulls his legs out. "Not even a-?"

Space itself warping. This is getting creepier and creepier all the time.

I shoot him in the face with a mage slayer round.

He catches it. "Exactly! Now I feel better."

I doubt it would have done much if it hit anyway. The grinning bastard seems empowered beyond mere magic.

You know, seeing him up close like this emphasises his size in a way that him sitting back on a throne didn't.

"Paul, do you understand what this is about?"

At least he's old-fashioned enough to want to monologue.

"I tried to improve the world, you tried to mess it up. It's what you do."

He shakes his weird round yellow head. "Let me show-"

Ah, he sees a fundamental misunderstanding between them? But given the evidence he's been presented so far, is OL wrong?

A volley of crumbler rounds do nothing… Somehow. Crumblers and x-ionised knives similarly fail to achieve-.

Ghk!

He grabs both of us around the chests, my external constructs vanishing at once!

Not doubt annoyed a little by OL's interruptions while he's trying to talk.

"-you."

He walks… Up the stairs, which are now somehow big enough to accommodate him. I'm in his right hand, Mister Andrews is in his left.

Comic Book logic. The panel and the page always accommodates what the artist is trying to present, regardless of realism.

"How is-? Ah, my lord, how are you doing this?"

"I'm not a demon, Charlie. I'm a part of the world. I can't be bound or warded against." The door opens ahead of him and he strides out into the car park. "I'm just here."

A useful clue. The question then becomes how is he part of the world? Is he as fundamental to the universe as the Source? The Emotional Spectrum? Physics itself?

"You already tried to get me onboard. I'm not more interested now."

"Did Charlie tell you why this happened?"

And if OL remembers the story of Prez Rickard, he knows how working with the yellow bastard can go wrong..

"You told him where to find Mister Hayden and how to use him."

"Did you not notice how he skipped the first part?"

"What, his squatting in a hotel using magic? We spotted that without him telling us."

I get the feeling the git is trying to make a deeper point about this.

"That he was already looking for an angle, for a way to profit."

"And you gave it to him."

Why do I feel like button-face here is trying to make a point about him and OL being similar, being tied to Desire.

"I made him aware of this particular one after he asked for it. You see, after I played our conversation back in my head, I realised that you came down with the wrong idea. Corruption doesn't happen because of me. Yes, I encourage certain kinds in the name of stability, but I also discourage others. I am not, or have I ever claimed to be, the source and creator of all human vice. If it wasn't this, then it would have been something else."

I'm sure it would have. And OL or someone else would have interfered with that too...

"So? You're making the situation worse and not making it better."

"Aren't I?" He looks down at the crowd gathered in the car park, and then back at me. "Are you sure that you're making a fair comparison? How confident are you that Batman is making things better?"

I have to wonder if the people around them are even aware of their presence right now? It seems the sort of thing he'd do to conceal himself.

And now throwing his failure with Batman in OL's face. Somehow, I get the feeling this is going to lead to the grinning asshole claiming he's 'Just making the Story more interesting' or something, probably by 'making sure the heroes have villains to fight'. Like he's acting as some universal countermeasure against external influences like OL...

mastermenthe · 2026-04-24T07:28:30+0100

The fact that BS is even having this conversation means he wants OL on his side.

Hidden Variable · 2026-04-24T07:56:17+0100

DeathlessProficiency said:
I wonder if there's any relationship between the author's profile picture and Boss Smiley

Do you think Boss Smiley might be a more literal foil for Paul than just a literary one? Like Marvel's Sentry creating his own dark mirror?

Vaermina · 2026-04-24T08:12:44+0100

Mr Zoat said:
"Aren't I?" He looks down at the crowd gathered in the car park, and then back at me. "Are you sure that you're making a fair comparison? How confident are you that Batman is making things better?"

He's absolutely not, and Orange Lantern is functionally ignoring it because he doesn't want to confront the fact that he made things worse.

Duke Long · 2026-04-24T08:17:46+0100

Mr Zoat said:
"No, nothing so crude. It merely created a connection to the possible reality where the user is experiencing the desired emotion. Most of the rest of the potion is just binding that effect to the user, though I had to work out that portion myself."

I wonder how this works. Is it a parallel universe? An alternate timeline? Or something else?

Mr Zoat said:
My construct wall shatters as a white-gloved and sleeved arm punches through it!

What the heck?

"You know-" The first dies, the core of the shrine unburned and a second arm now extruding from it, taking a firm grip on the ground. "-something, I can't help but feel that I'm being disrespected."

'fire'?

Holy shit. I did not think Boss Smiley could do that.

Mr Zoat said:
"No." Arms gripping, he pulls, and his face pulls outwards from the shrine and into the room. If his proportions hold up he'll be far taller than a normal human, though not as tall as he was when he used the Statue of Liberty as his focus. "You don't like me. No, you actively dislike me. But I always go the impression that you respected my power."

'got'

Personally I did not respect his power. Sure he's the Prince of the World, but I didn't think he could win a straight fight against a high-tier superhero, let alone this easily.

Mr Zoat · 2026-04-24T08:38:53+0100

DeathlessProficiency said:
I wonder if there's any relationship between the author's profile picture and Boss Smiley

Maybe the real Boss Smiley was the avatar I had all along?

Signaller said:
Fist.

Thank you, corrected.

Also, Zoat, have you seen the new Acme trailer

No.

Duke Long said:
'got'

Thank you, corrected.

GhostKing 666 · 2026-04-24T08:46:46+0100

You know, after everything Paul's done, after all the demons, gods, angels and Lords of Whatever that Paul has either personally killed or kicked from power, Boss Smiley has got to be pretty much the only supernatural being left on the planet with the sheer balls to continuously mess with him.

He kicked Zeus off his throne; he put a puppet in charge of Hell after taking down the previous rulers(including the First of the Fallen) and even the Silver City couldn't hold him. And that's just some of what he's done. The name "Orange Lantern" is probably up there with Constantine in supernational circles even discounting how he gave Constantine the power to back up his bullshit.

At this point even gods probably think two or three times before they decide that involving Paul is worth the risk and yet not only does this smiley fucker do so freely, but he's also gotten away with it every time he's done it too.

While he's clearly the type to prefer working in the shadows with nobody really knowing about him... Paul has pretty much done wonders for Boss Smiley's street cred.

EgyptianDio · 2026-04-24T08:55:31+0100

Mr Zoat said:
He glazes at me

I think you meant 'gaze'

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

Getting sticky.

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