"Boy, ah am disappointed. The way Boss Smiler's been carrying on about you, ah thought you'd have me all added up the moment ah stepped down from that there chair."
"One of his favourites, then. Or an aspect of him?"
Impressive, that the Smiling Git actually thinks
that highly of OL. Seeing in him a worthy opponent, perhaps?
"Ah suppose you could say that we're all aspects of him. And we get along well enough. Never been one for changing things that aren't broken, though ah am not averse to doing some breaking."
He hesitates for a moment, regarding me curiously.
No doubt wondering if he can get away with breaking
you.
"Perhaps the issue is one the difference in culture on the other side of the Atlantic. Allow me to illuminate the matter."
He takes his hat off his head and taps the stovepipe. It immediately inverts, the horizontal bars being replaced by vertical stripes and the ring of stars moving the to rim. He looks at it for a moment, smiling, then puts it back up upon his head.
Ah...
Darko did indeed
call it! Because, folks,
that motif...
"That clear things up for-."
"Johnny Reb. How have you outlived your country?"
...Is representative of the
Confederate States of America, rather than the United States.
"A people, a political community, are not defined by lines on a map, boy. Elsewise, every nigger born in the country would be the equal of every white man. It's culture. And while I will admit that I have taken a licking, I'm going to hang on until the final bell."
He glances behind me as The Brass fires its remaining cannons, a colossal pillar of dust and rubble erupting from the ground!
And of
course he's as racist as he was a hundred and fifty years earlier.
Pity any
discussion of that would probably run headlong into Rule 8, screaming madly all the way...
"People are impressionable creatures. Tell a lie often enough and they forget the truth. Even when the truth is written down plain as day." He reaches up to tap his hat with his right forefinger. "There are still folks today who say this was about freedom from the Federal Government, as if slavery wasn't guaranteed under the constitution. That's where The Brass's chains come from, in case you were-"
CLANG!
On the upside, he does seem to
love the sound of his own voice, so he's bound to let something
important slip while he monologues.
Oh,
right. Because those
aren't attached to the battleship guns.
"Ah seem to recall hearing that you aren't entirely of pure stock yourself."
Warning!
A reference to OL's rather eclectic family lineage, from a number of European nations, huh? Ah, right. Gypsy blood in the family tree, as OL told his Earth-10 acquaintances. To someone as...
Old-fashioned as Johnny here is, that even 1/16th means a
hell of a lot.
Yes, yes, I know.
I'm wrapped in chains from top to bottom. I can still see out through the gaps, but I focused to much on Johnny and lost sight of-! Can't just slide out as there isn't physically enough space, except-. Ring, can my armour stand the pressure these chains are applying?
A
good Lantern doesn't need to
move to win a fight, after all. And OL is certainly
well past good.
Armour can withstand highest demonstrated chain pressure.
Which would make sense as the chains slaves wear aren't supposed to actually kill them, they're supposed to bind and suppress them. Drop construct armour and make my environmental shield skin tight.
Leaving just the energy drain and whatever Johnny-boy wants to do to you as the only real threats.
Brought down to earth, eh? No doubt Johnny thinks you're on your last legs.
"I see you know your place."
It's uncomfortable but survivable. And the drain has… Stopped?
Of course, he's going to be in for a
shock once you get rolling.
No, but it is reduced.
Extrude a rope under my right foot. Is the additional drain measurable?
Heh. Been a while since we saw him employ the old 'filaments through the presumably solid terrain' trick.
Yes. One hundred eighteen-. One hundred sixteen-.
Got it, drill down.
Ouch. Not a pleasant speed.
Compliance.
Try and find a corridor. If you can't, get send it towards the Memorial through the ground. Show me what it's seeing.
Because Johnny wouldn't have been using it for a throne, nor have the Brass plugged into it, if there weren't
something of significance there.
Compliance.
Not a lot, and then… We're through. Tunnel, some lighting, lots of worms moving with a purpose, some carrying things while others are just sort of oozing over the equipment. Equipment leading toooo…
Goddamit, now I'm picturing them more like the videogame Worms characters. Except...
Eviiiil.
Oh no.
Leading to Uncle Sam, strapped to a gurney, chest bare and with the left side… Cut open. Tubes of… Something, are being fed into it and flow from it. Not sure what's happening there but I doubt that it was done with friendly intentions.
...Well, guess
that answers the question of where he's been. Presumably Johnny and the Yellow-faced Asshole nobbled him during a moment of weakness in the Seventies...
So, objectives: free Uncle Sam and have bit beat the stuffing out of Johnny Reb. Can't do much else about Boss Smiley in this regard. Then… Get out, with Uncle Sam's help.
Ring, plug into the tubes going in and find out what they are.
Because
whatever they're pumping into him, it can't be anything
good.
Compliance.
The chains holding me part slightly, freeing part of my helmet. Johnny Reb walks closer, some sort-. That's a branding iron, and the brand is red hot.
I hope that armour is rated for
extreme temperatures. Then again, this might well be magical conceptual bullshit that can bypass any
mundane protection.
"Been a good long while since ah've gotten the opportunity to use one of these on a living man."
Glowing red iron is… Probably not going to go through my armour, but it's magical and I should assume things. The worms don't really have eyes, and-. Plug in there-.
Thank goodness for
that. Handy for making sure they don't see anything they shouldn't, but not great for having them be on watch.
Blood and powered kaahuite. Where did he get that-? They're pumping blood mixed with solid pieces of evil
into him. Because that makes it count as
his blood? Blood type…
A Positive, naturally. Install filter and disintegrator.
Compliance.
A for
America, of course! And no doubt
boiling hot with the fires of freedom. Kaahuite, by way of a quick Google, appears to be an elemental metal inimical to Angelic energies. Presumably to poison him and keep him weakened enough to hold him here...
"I've been branded before."
"Then you're used goods, boy. Can't get full price for yah!"
Part of his soul tattoos, right? Though he
was kind of magically drunk for a lot of the process...
"Slavery violates the Thirteenth Amendment."
"But you must remember that ah'm cut from a different cloth, and that Article One Section Nine of the Confederate Constitution describes things rather differently. Doubled down in Article Four in case somebody forgot."
Ah, something of a 'Take That!' at the politicking that drove them to
secede, eh? Petty and small-minded. He's definitely showing what he's made of, then.
"Alright, but I don't understand why that makes you align with Boss Smiley. By the standards of the time there wasn't anything particularly corrupt about owning people."
Blood is flowing back into Uncle Sam's body and I think it's time to rush the final stages.
Yes, do blab all your secrets to the fellow you're about to dispose of. So glad this guy has likely
never heard of the Evil Overlord's List, if he's aware of the Internet at all, outside of its use as a control medium...
"Corruption is a tool, boy. Boss Smiley opposes change that he doesn't control. Why would ah want to change a perfect civilisation? Why would ah want less control?"
"So… Just to check, you aren't part of the magical reflection of the United States of America? You're separate?"
...That kind of makes him
expendable, doesn't it? On the upside, destroying him might well make America-16 a better place.
"You'd best believe it, boy. Now-."
"Then I have no reason to leave you alive."
Ooh, dropping a line like that when he thinks he has you beat? Here comes the turnabout.
Construct chains lash out below us, worms dragged to the side of the room as a construct chirurgeon quickly and carefully removes the outflow in Sam's heart. His eyes start focusing almost at once… Yes, low blood pressure, best leave the in tubes in for a moment. No easy way to get rid of kaahuite but I can work on that later. Blood pressure… Normalising, that'll have to do. Tubes out heart sealed chest closed.
"And how exactly-?" His eyes dip down. "Your feet are glowing, boy."
Bet he's been having all manner of dark, depressing visions while he's been down there. Like, say, the sort seen in the '
U.S.' Comic...
He lunges, brand burning into the armour of my helmet as I redirect a construct upwards from below, and smile at him.
"So are yours."
Construct hands punch up through the pavement and drag him down!
Brave show, but you have
got to be running low on charge by now... Best hope Sam gets his striped keister topside right quick...
