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

Vantavendi (part 22)
21st October 2012
19:17 GMT -5


Richard presses a few buttons.

"Or… No. We don't."

"We don't?"

He brings up… A missing persons report for someone called 'Anita Fite'-.

"Is that her real name?"

"Her dad's name is Donald Fite, so I guess so. She went missing… Sometime after the last of these meetings happened. Looks like we're too late."

Beryl calls up the file and starts flashing through it. "Her dad's an FBI agent. Someone kidnapped an FBI agent's daughter?"

"Did he know she was a superhero?"

"Probably not." Richard's looking at Batman's intelligence records. "Apparently, he… Really doesn't like superheroes. I don't think he'd let her out of the house if he found out what she was doing."

I connect my ring to the League database and extract the relevant files, blinking as my ring's AI orders them for my mental consumption. "A natural talent for vodun-style magic."

Beryl raises her eyes from her screen for a moment. "Do you think she was turning people into zombies? I read the report on Papa Midnite."

"Ah… I wouldn't have thought so. She's in her early teens. Unless one of the more powerful spirits took a real shine to her for some reason, that's not going to happen."

"She's a voodoo witch who can't make zombies? I feel cheated."

"She could probably animate corpses somehow. Sticking a weak demon in a corpse isn't hard. But creating vodun zombies requires some complex soul manipulation that I don't think a teenager with little access to tuition could manage."

I sigh.

"I can't think of a vodun spell or ritual that would produce the results we've seen. And I can't imagine anything that a teenager could cast that Doctor Balewa couldn't detect."

"So…" Beryl slumps slightly. "That's it?"

Richards nods, once, slowly. "We can send a report to Batman, which he'll send to the FBI. But at this point… There isn't a whole lot more we can do. If she's on her own, then… She'll show up on camera eventually. But she could be… Anywhere. And if she's getting help…"

Beryl brings up her psychological profile. "But why would she do it?"

"There's her crime lord grandfather. But I can't see why he'd care about low level American superheroes either."

"And there's no record of her having any contact with him, and her mother came to America specifically to get away from him."

Richard shrugs. "It's another lead, but I'm not sure we really want to tip him off that she's disappeared in case he finds her."

"Then that's it. We've got a suspect we can't find and…" I look at Beryl. "No motive?"

She shakes her head. "Nothing I can see. Maybe Batman will have better luck."

"Then, yeah."

Richard nods. "I'm gunna go through these files some more. See if I can learn anything."

"Yeah." Beryl nods. "It's only five hours ago in England."

"Okay. I've got a few things to do before I head off. Let me know if you need me for anything."

I get a couple of absent-minded nods as they give their screens their full attention before I

step out

and reappear a short distance away from… Blitzen, in civilian clothing. A suit, feminine cut, complete with a trilby. I'm sure she's trying to communicate something with that, but I've got no idea what.

"Hay!" She frowns at me. "Vhat if I had been on the toilet?"

"It would have to be a very large toilet."

We're in… A motorway service station, with attached fast food restaurant. Not particularly busy at this time of day, and in civilian clothing and with a minimal environmental shield glow I don't attract that much attention. Since my particular form of teleportation doesn't cause a lightshow or any noise, people who see it generally just assume that they just happened to not notice me approaching.

I sit down opposite her.

"Any news?"

She shrugs.

"I vent to their little get-together, said hallo, told them about vhere I'm from. If they are going to do something, they have marked me in their books."

"I have a little news on that score. We've taken the guns out of commission and the person we think was marking the targets has vanished."

She moues, nodding.

"Vell, it got me out of the house. Anything else?"

"That doesn't mean that you won't be targeted. Or that we aren't interested in how the Alliance works from an insider. But it's less likely than it was."

I fabricate a data stick and slide it across the table to her.

"That's a summary of our discoveries to date, and this-"

I take a spell eater out of subspace.

"-is an anti-magic ward. Not one hundred percent reliable, but better than nothing. Please destroy the datastick after reading."

She nods, both items disappearing as her right hand blurs.

"Not vorried about me passing the vard to the people at home?"

"Your world doesn't have the arcane infrastructure to make more, and you'd need wizards to make anything like it." I lean forward slightly. "You can't just crib off the kryptonians for this one."

"You mean the superior men from the future?"

I narrow my eyes slightly. "You don't actually believe that version, do you?"

She rolls her eyes. "I don't inhale everything that comes from the Führer's arsehole, no. Did you know they're going to publish a history book that calls the whole period of the First Great Var through to the end of the Second Great Var a single conflict?"

"Um. Why?"

"So ve can pretend ve didn't lose anything. Just a temporary setback. Ve conquer the whole vorld and our ego is so fragile. Stupid."

"Supermen don't need to tell themselves that they're super. They just are."

"Yah, but vhen your Führer is balding and asthmatic it doesn't pay to say things like that out loud. Anything else?"

"No, that's it. Thank you for your help. Have a pleasant evening."
 
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Beryl raises her eyes from her screen for a moment. "Do you think she was turning people into zombies? I read the report on Papa Midnight."
His last name is 'Midnite', and I believe that's also how his moniker is spelled.

"Ah… I wouldn't have thought so. She's in her early teens. Unless one of the more powerful spirits to a real shine to her for some reason, that's not going to happen."
That should say 'took'.
 
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To be fair, we have already reached the point in histiography where study of the first and second world wars had entailed the consideration that we should look at the second world war in many ways as a continuation of the first.

(Or in much the same way as we look at the wars of religion i.e. the 30 years war).
 
more powerful spirits to a real

'spirits took'

She could probably animated corpses

'animate'

"Did he know she was a superhero?"

"Probably not." Richard's looking at Batman's intelligence records. "Apparently, he… Really doesn't like superheroes

No kidding.

Your world doesn't have the arcane infrastructure to make more, and you'd need wizards to make anything like it."

They have Atlantis. Though they hate them.

They have Africa. Though they may make it so that the wards end up summoning demons that rape them as revenge.

You mean the superior men from the future?

They're still using that?

. Did you know they're going to publish a history book that calls the whole period of the First Great War through to the end of the Second Great War a single conflict?"

"Um. Why?"

"So ve can pretend ve didn't lose anything. Just a temporary setback. Ve conquer the whole vorld and our ego is so fragile. Stupid

It's a fairly common fascist tactic to try and rewrite history.

Supermen don't need to tell themselves that they're super. They just are."

Seeing as the Nazis aren't supermen, they kinda need to tell themselves that they are.

And to be honest it would kinda be more impressive if they left the fact that they lost the war but managed to conquer the world later on.

They basically lost and their country was devastated, but they still managed to overcome that and become the most powerful country in the world.

It's still horrible and they only did that because they got lucky and stumbled on some advanced tech, but still.

report on Papa Midnight."

'Midnite'
 
God damn it, I still like Blitzen.

And isn't a bit weird to give up just like that?

That woman's mind/soul was somehow so repressed that even demon guns and apokalyptian gods could not find anything. That speaks of something major, anti-life being prominent among them.
 
And isn't a bit weird to give up just like that?

That woman's mind/soul was somehow so repressed that even demon guns and apokalyptian gods could not find anything. That speaks of something major, anti-life being prominent among them.
The League and Co. are not giving up, but when you've exhausted all of your leads it isn't really an active investigation any longer.
 
Okay, if you're going to give me an easy question. Sozin was a nationalist.
I imagine that at some point in his life he also ate cabbages.

You know who also ate cabbages? Appa.

Those Sand Benders clearly saved the world.
Okay, now that I've had a few minutes to think about it, let me explain this a bit better.

Demonising by association is not a reasonable argument. It does not make sense to say:
Person A is a member of Group 1
Person B is a member of Group 1
Therefore, person A believes everything that person B does.

Or to put it another say, Tenzin is a nationalist. The moment he found out that more Air Benders were being born his first instinct was to try to persuade them to leave their homes so that he could restart Air Nomad culture, completely ignoring their lives and the cultures they lived in. That does not mean that he was biding his time until he could conquer the world.

In addition, I asked for examples of things that Kuvira said or did in order to prove that she wanted to expand further. Saying that Sozin wanted to expand doesn't answer my original inquiry.
 
21st October 2012
19:17 GMT -5


Richard presses a few buttons.

"Or… No. We don't."
Oh, for... Of course their one lead has vanished into thin air, hasn't it? Which is itself worrying, given what she has for a passenger. Still, these days, when someone gets disappeared, it's a lot harder for them to stay disappeared...

"We don't?"

He brings up… A missing persons report for someone called 'Anita Fite'-.
...You can tell 'Young Justice' the comic didn't take itself seriously, can't you?

"Is that her real name?"

"Her dad's name is Donald Fite, so I guess so. She went missing… Sometime after the last of these meetings happened. Looks like we're too late."
Either the Crimson Avenger hit her, or whoever set all this up decided not to leave her in the wind...

Beryl calls up the file and starts flashing through it. "Her dad's an FBI agent. Someone kidnapped an FBI agent's daughter?"

"Did he know she was a superhero?"
...Teenage girl. What secrets wouldn't she keep from her father? Especially if she knew he wouldn't like it.

"Probably not." Richard's looking at Batman's intelligence records. "Apparently, he… Really doesn't like superheroes. I don't think he'd let her out of the house if he found out what she was doing."

I connect my ring to the League database and extract the relevant files, blinking as my ring's AI orders them for my mental consumption. "A natural talent for vodun-style magic."
...That's one way to interpret what she did. Probably things she learned from her grandmother.

Beryl raises her eyes from her screen for a moment. "Do you think she was turning people into zombies? I read the report on Papa Midnight."

"Ah… I wouldn't have thought so. She's in her early teens. Unless one of the more powerful spirits took a real shine to her for some reason, that's not going to happen."
And no, her grandfather doesn't count. He's only called The Baron.

"She's a voodoo witch who can't make zombies? I feel cheated."

"She could probably animated corpses somehow. Sticking a weak demon in a corpse isn't hard. But creating vodun zombies requires some complex soul manipulation that I don't think a teenager with little access to tuition could manage."
On the other hand, an unnoticed Anti-Life fragment could count for a lot.

I sigh.

"I can't think of a vodun spell or ritual that would produce the results we've seen. And I can't imagine anything that a teenager could cast that Doctor Balewa couldn't detect."
Nor why those who were targetted were. That's still an unknown.

"So…" Beryl slumps slightly. "That's it?"

Richards nods, once, slowly. "We can send a report to Batman, which he'll send to the FBI. But at this point… There isn't a whole lot more we can do. If she's on her own, then… She'll show up on camera eventually. But she could be… Anywhere. And if she's getting help…"
So, this was basically a dangling loose end. Perhaps someday it'll get tugged on to unravel a greater conspiracy...

Beryl brings up her psychological profile. "But why would she do it?"

"There's her crime lord grandfather. But I can't see why he'd care about low level American superheroes either."
Not unless they somehow interfered in something he had his fingers in. But I doubt it...

"And there's no record of her having any contact with him, and her mother came to America specifically to get away from him."

Richard shrugs. "It's another lead, but I'm not sure we really want to tip him off that she's disappeared in case he finds her."
Welp... I guess the team can't do much more at this point.

"Then that's it. We've got a suspect we can't find and…" I look at Beryl. "No motive?"

She shakes her head. "Nothing I can see. Maybe Batman will have better luck."
You can but hope...

"Then, yeah."

Richard nods. "I'm gunna go through these files some more. See if I can learn anything."
Little thing called sleep, Dick. :rolleyes: You still need it, even as a member of the Batfamily...

"Yeah." Beryl nods. "It's only five hours ago in England."

"Okay. I've got a few things to do before I head off. Let me know if you need me for anything."
Heading back to the Reach front? Ah, well, so much for Earth storylines for a while.

I get a couple of absent-minded nods as they give their screens their full attention before I

step out

and reappear a short distance away from… Blitzen, in civilian clothing. A suit, feminine cut, complete with a trilby. I'm sure she's trying to communicate something with that, but I've got no idea what.
If I didn't know better, she's probably trying to affect a noir detective look. But I can't see films with that sort of character being legal in Amerika.

"Hay!" She frowns at me. "What if I had been on the toilet?"

"It would have to be a very large toilet."
Besides, he does get a general idea of their surroundings when he pings someone to lock onto...

We're in… A motorway service station, with attached fast food restaurant. Not particularly busy at this time of day, and in civilian clothing and with a minimal environmental shield glow I don't attract that much attention. Since my particular form of teleportation doesn't cause a lightshow or any noise, people who see it generally just assume that they just happened to not notice me approaching.

I sit down opposite her.
People are very good at convincing themselves things are more mundane than they look.

"Any news?"

She shrugs.

"I vent to their little get-together, said hallo, told them about vhere I'm from. If they are going to do something, they have marked me in their books."
Pity the hitwoman is currently in the wind, but unarmed.

"I have a little news on that score. We've taken the guns out of commission and the person we think was marking the targets has vanished."

She moues, nodding.
"So, all that mingling for nothing..."

"Vell, it got me out of the house. Anything else?"

"That doesn't mean that you won't be targeted. Or that we aren't interested in how the Alliance works from an insider. But it's less likely than it was."
At least until she gets recalled to Earth-10. Because I doubt this little holiday is intended to be too long.

I fabricate a data stick and slide it across the table to her.

"That's a summary of our discovery to date, and this-"
I assume she has some sort of local computer gear.

I take a spell eater out of subspace.

"-is a anti-magic ward. Not one hundred percent reliable, but better than nothing. Please destroy the datastick after reading."
Heh. Nothing she can replicate at home, of course.

She nods, both items disappearing as her right hand blurs.

"Not vorried about me passing the vard to the people at home?"
It took a thaumaturgic genius months to bring the design to where it is now. I don't think a culture with no native magic will do very well attempting to copy it beyond the purely physical...

"Your world doesn't have the arcane infrastructure to make more, and you'd need wizards to make anything like it." I lean forward slightly. "You can't just crib off the kryptonians for this one."

"You mean the superior men from the future?"
Pfft, like she buys that crap.

I narrow my eyes slightly. "You don't actually believe that version, do you?"

She rolls her eyes. "I don't inhale everything that comes from the Führer's arsehole, no. Did you know they're going to publish a history book that calls the whole period of the First Great War through to the end of the Second Great War a single conflict?"
Because historical revisionism. :rolleyes: "We didn't lose, we merely stopped fighting until we could rebuild our army."

"Um. Why?"

"So ve can pretend ve didn't lose anything. Just a temporary setback. Ve conquer the whole vorld and our ego is so fragile. Stupid."
A mighty empire... Ruled by petty little men.

"Supermen don't need to tell themselves that they're super. They just are."

"Yah, but vhen your Führer is balding and asthmatic it doesn't pay to say things like that out loud. Anything else?"

"No, that's it. Thank you for your help. Have a pleasant evening."
I bet he's been taking full advantage of every bit of Kryptonian medical science to extend his life as long as he can.

And so the episode ends, not with a triumph, but with a fizzling groan. Honestly, this was not the League or the Team's brightest hour. Kind of lived up to the title ('A little bit of black', remember?) Still, some interesting seeds laid for future plots, and a fun little side-trek into an alternate Paul's day, so not a complete waste. And OL's headed back into space soon, so things should get a little more lively soon. :D
 
Okay, now that I've had a few minutes to think about it, let me explain this a bit better.

Demonising by association is not a reasonable argument. It does not make sense to say:
Person A is a member of Group 1
Person B is a member of Group 1
Therefore, person A believes everything that person B does.

Or to put it another say, Tenzin is a nationalist. The moment he found out that more Air Benders were being born his first instinct was to try to persuade them to leave their homes so that he could restart Air Nomad culture, completely ignoring their lives and the cultures they lived in. That does not mean that he was biding his time until he could conquer the world.

In addition, I asked for examples of things that Kuvira said or did in order to prove that she wanted to expand further. Saying that Sozin wanted to expand doesn't answer my original inquiry.
Wait, wasn't republic city literally a part of the earth kingdom until after the war? I might be misremembering it's been a while since I watched Legend of Korra.
 
You can tell 'Young Justice' the comic didn't take itself seriously, can't you?

There was a character named the Might Endowed.

You do the math.

Either the Crimson Avenger hit her, or whoever set all this up decided not to leave her in the wind...

I think Anute may have behind the Crimson Avenger.

Remember Scott and Barda said that someone could be doing what the Key did and channel the AL Equation.

If I didn't know better, she's probably trying to affect a noir detective look. But I can't see films with that sort of character being legal in Amerika.

Yeah, I doubtbrhe government would be fine with a franchise and genre that tends to portray authority figures and the cops as corrupt or incompetent.

Because historical revisionism. :rolleyes: "We didn't lose, we merely stopped fighting until we could rebuild our army

As I said, a common fascist tactic.

A mighty empire... Ruled by petty little men.

Behind every great war and empire is just someone that's insecure in themselves.

Kubrick kinda had a point about that.
 
Wait, wasn't republic city literally a part of the earth kingdom until after the war? I might be misremembering it's been a while since I watched Legend of Korra.
The land was part of the Earth Kingdom, then the Fire Nation occupied it under Sozin. I don't think it was stated whether they conquered an Earth Kingdom settlement of just started building on an unoccupied area of coastland. Sozin called it a 'colony', but that might just have been propoganda.

Then he had his fight with Roku and lost. I don't think we were told what happened to the colony during this period.

Decades pass, then he killed Roku and wiped out the Air Nomands. At this point, the colony formed the starting point for his invasion of the Earth Kingdom.

100 years pass, with the Fire Nation doing their best to settle/indocrinate the place. Then Aang beats Ozai and his friend Zuko takes over the Fire Nation.
Hey, Mr Zoat, is Hera ever going to show up in your side story, 'In Praise of Eros'?

I'm asking here because I don't want to necro that thread.
Probably not. When I find time the next two hookups are going to be Dr. Quinzel and Dr. Sivana.
Yeah, I doubt the government would be fine with a franchise and genre that tends to portray authority figures and the cops as corrupt or incompetent.
Not at all. Race traitors and secret jews infiltrating society in order to corrupt it are common villain archetypes.
'is a anti-magic ward'
should be 'an'
Thank you, corrected.
 
I would like to point out that Paul has once again forgotten all about the search for Constantine that he has sworn to do.
It seems like every time he decides to look for Constantine something bad happens, which knowing Constantine may well be a defensive spell he cast.
 

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