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

They're basically the same age range as The Team, and are certainly still kids by New God standards.

...as such, they believed they were Sierra Hotel, and augred in accordingly...

 

A very effective interrogation session for Paul. Hopefully the New Gods will see this and learn the need to adapt one's behavior in order to get someone's trust/intimidate someone in order to get info.

 

Heh. Establishing control right out of the gates. It's a subtle thing, certainly. She tried to make something happen without his permission. it didn't happen. Something you'd hardly notice, if you weren't looking for it. OL's playing this well.

Spoiler: Commentary spoilered for length

Establishing that you consider her weak. That you are in control.

And now acknowledging her. Not hostile, not friendly, merely indifferent to the berrith's presence.

Though she's hardly a threat to you. Teeth and claws against an environment shield strong enough to tank artillery? So you can afford to be dominating.

Allowing her action now that you've acknowledged her. Letting her carry out your command.

Cut them some slack, OL. They're only idiot teenagers.

If I remember correctly: Some berrith got their hands on stray Orange Rings from Larfleeze's stash. That's how they got offworld in the first place, right?

Calculating the angles, analysing his demeanour and deciding to play along. She's almost there.

Leave her no doubt who is in charge. Nicely done, OL. I'll bet the Forever People's jaws are hanging open right now.

Given that he has no scent with his Environment Shield up, that's probably unsettling for her.

Playing her like a fiddle, OL. Benefit of cultural knowledge.

A neat summary of that little episode.

Ah, now she's worried he's angry at her. That she may be in his sights...

As seen here, at the climax of 'Congeniality'. And quite messily killed, too. Though not entirely with your ring, not that she needs to know that.

One of the incorrect images of course. Another test.

Heh. The others didn't even think about that, did they? A predatory species would naturally have a good sense of smell.

Getting closer. But she's definitely a good lead.

Now, the real test. Handily, the Ring is great for managing your reactions.

And we have a winner!

Presumably not a large community. But they're still very lucky that they got a good catch this quickly.

Yes, now that she understands what he wants, she's being very helpful.

Protagonist's luck, coming in handy again.

See, Forever kiddies, that's how you interrogate someone with an ingrained hierarchical instinct.

And now she gets rewarded for her help.

I bet she's suddenly worried that the 'alpha' thinks she's behaved badly.

Wow. She's positively progressive for a berrith, it seems. Or has a good understanding of consequences.

No, no. Don't be embarrassed, little mother. No shame in having feelings.

Ooh. Don't tell me, the h'Ivenites don't have as keen a sense of smell, and thus didn't realise the berrith do?

Ideally, like adult females, or parents? So that the younglings would accept them as dominant.

Fixing a problem he didn't even know about beforehand. Nicely done, OL.

An impressive display of gathering information, and quite educational for the Forever People, no doubt. Once OL explains what he did and how. Although he's quite lucky he found someone who knows someone who might have seen Ub'x. Though given that the berrith population might not be that large, it's understandable. Remember, these are the remnants of a relocated people. There can't be that many of them to search through...

---

She looks around, and then focuses on me, sniffing quietly.

While she's reconsidering the wisdom of her agreeing to talk to me, I take the photo out of subspace.

 

Reminds me of when he changed tack dealing with Canis:

"Canis, this is why you shouldn't do- scratch that. Canis, don't do it again."

 

Shouldn't Paul avoid using the word please? He did berate the new gods about using subservient language with them, so it's odd for him to turn around and make the same mistake.

 

Depends how the ring translates it. There are perfectly polite ways to ask someone to do something that conveys that there’s no choice but to do it. You clearly have never been voluntold your helping someone.

 

He's already won the dominance battle. An Alpha can afford to be polite to a helpful beta.

 

It's sometimes said that only the truly strong can be polite and compassionate, as well as not take offense to even blatant insults since they're so strong that the consequences can't touch them.

 

Thank you, corrected.

 

I like how the aliens in this story are actually alien, yet still rational

 

Or in other words, the Lord Vetinari method.

 

Spoiler: Spoilered to save space

And he can do this because he has such good control over his desires that he can want to hold his breath until he loses consciousness, even if it's potentially harmful.

A man can hope can't he?

Green-eyed monster snake attack?

I am mildy concerned about your search history

Darn, the link doesn't work.

This is honestly the first time I've seen Paul get nervous like a normal person.

Unless something has been changed, I believe Paul originally had no body hair after editing his body with the ring?

When life gives you lemons, you should use them to make a battery and run DOOM on a calculator.

I suppose nothing really changes for the farm animals unfortunately.

Wonder if he's discovered Internet porn

I'm starting to think that he may have been waiting for that a bit too eagerly.

I hope "let off" doesn't mean what I think it means.

I honestly wonder what he would think at being called that.

Buy him now for 9.99 at your local Target!

Interesting analogy

Let's hope to god his armour is rigid enough to hide that.

I'm fairly certain the first can easily be done by his Motherbox, and the other two things are probably unnecessary for New Gods.

Breaching?

He's beginning to learn.

And he knows that off the top of his head for some reason?

Ah, DC techno-magic bullshitery.

Heh.

That's interesting, the Anti-Life is kind of making them into Anti-Versions of themselves.

Afraid of mercury? As in the mercury in a thermometer, which he would be unwilling to use lest he spread his relatively unknown microbes around?

Was not expecting that here, what a pleasant surprise.

Well, it seems like someone decided to poke their noses in and do some editing of their world history and I'm willing to bet that it might be Krona.

If only she knew.

Surprisingly close to describing some of the more generic Supergirls out there.

What is this a reference to?

Oh shit.

Must be the beard.

It only took him a few seconds to do all that?

I hope they do to be honest.

Let's hope all of Paul's preparation has paid off.

And he might just succeed at this rate.

Ah, that's a bit of shock. Although I do distinctly remember a few posts here and there about Holly and Karon being affected by the Anti-Life, but I didn't expect it to get this bad this quick.

After all of this passes, I don't think they'll still be together. Or if they are, it probably won't be in the same way.

So he got high to resist the Anti-Life and then used an antidote for the drug so that he was back to normal. How on Earth does that work?

There's a scary thought. Unassuming paintings that are secretly nudging you into thinking a different way. Although I'd doubt Canis would do something that subtle.

This makes me wonder about Canis' more esoteric art-based abilities, which I hope we eventually get a list of.

I mean, you can't really blame them.

After school debate club in the middle of an apocalypse. Cool.

And isn't that depressing.

Interesting, so Anti-Matter Earth is like Earth-16, but with some things that have been mirrored in a more dark or twisted way.

So, a speedrunner doing a 100%, no-hitspeedrun?

He has to be less efficient in order to make sure he gets everything.

Vengeance, since that's why he became Batman in the first place.

Paul should get his tailor's number.

Ah, I'm honestly a bit saddened at the fact that Canis finally realized that Darkseid never really liked him.

It's honestly surprising that a realization like this is finally what broke him, instead of the continued Anti-Life assault he faced since birth.

Seems like a lovely tourist destination.

That should probably be printed across his armour or something.

Heh.

I believe you mean "Moonrider"?

Unfortunately true.

Almost everything about Paul is.

He knew about the risks and did it anyways, give Paul a break.

Batman is less willing to physically injure his victims.

1)Is the Nth metal in this universe as overpowered as it is in the other continuities, or is it just a really strong anti-gravity metal here?
2)Can anyone please remind me how many Supergirls there are in Earth-16, along with a small amount of background info? It's getting hard to keep track of which one anybody's talking about.
3)Where did you get that one picture of Holly from, in the "In Praise of Eros" storyline?
4)What do the Berrith actually look like? Are they just really furry humanoids?
5)What made you want to do a nsfw series?

Thank you for your work.

 

The Berrith are basically werewolves in SPACE...ACE...ACE.

Spoiler

 

Green-eyed monster = attack of greed
Snake = penis

You knew what website you were on when you signed up.

In a tuck-friendly format!

Thank you, corrected.

A concern that has been raised about certain vaccines is that they contain mercury compounds.

Yes.

Very well.

Thank you, corrected.

It can do a little more than that, but if it was an 'I win' button then the Seven Devils would still be around.

Three, I think?

The internet. It was probably in Catwoman originally.

This place infected me.

 

If you mean how many people go by Supergirl, then there are three women: Kara Zor-El, Linda Danvers/Noriel, and Kara Zor-L. If you also count counterparts who go by other names, there's also Overgirl. Kara Zor-El is a Kryptonian who's still trying to adapt to life on Earth, Linda is a bad girl who got a mental rewrite due to getting the memories of an angel downloaded into her brain, Kara Zor-L is an alternate universe counterpart of the local Kara who's much more interested in being a hero, but is also a lot more naïve, while Overgirl is a woman from a Nazi dominated world who got Kryptonian powers thanks to unethical human experimentation and is trying to think of a way to rehabilitate her world.

Mr Zoat, just to confirm, does Overgirl still stick around Earth 16, or has she permanently gone back home to Earth 10?

 

She's gone back to Earth 10, being replaced by Johanna Garrick.

 

When did Grayven go to earth 50? Like not this specific time I mean for the first time

 

Batman 50 ordered Grayven to follow him through a portal when he was sitting in jail for killing Klarion.

When did Batman 50 die. And how.

 

You sorta forgot to mention the fact that you basically put the brain of a Nazi robot into her head.

So you forgot the Nazi robot?

 

Wait, when did Batman 50 die? I don't remember that being mentioned at any point. Nor even when Scott and Barda 50 came, or when Grayven visited Kara 50 before.

 

Remember he's missing a bunch of memories due to being Grayven shot with magic arrows to think he was Renegade.

 

I'm not sure how aware Grayven is of how much influence the Eradicator had on her (since I don't think it was anywhere near as simple as that) - or rather, it seems like he's trying to figure that out.

 

When Grayven 50 invaded Earth and blew the Watchtower up with his dreadnaught, it was on screen. They never did find the body, though, so who knows.

 

Ah, visiting Kara In-Ze, Supergirl of Earth-50 (Specifically, the Justice Lords alternate universe.) I see the Renegade is still concerned about Kara Zor-El's behaviour. And well he should be. But this is quite the greeting.

Spoiler: Commentary spoilered for length

Yeah, animated Kryptonians are extra-broken.

Not wanting to waste time for it to regenerate normally, eh, Renegade? Or is it just that smashed flat that you need to reset it first?

...That's the neck section of the armour, for those not familiar. And I assume it's a fair chunk of plating, given the size of his neck.

Aw. I guess it has been a while since you last visited, Renegade.

...Who? Oh, right, the SHADE folks in the Anti-Life-contaminated bunker he got Lynne from. ...Was it SHADE? Been so dang long...

Yes, they were the smart ones, leaving as soon as they could...

Heh. Those dad-habits keeping him from getting too blue with the language, I see.

Probably not quite as developed, being in her mid-teens and all, compared to Kara-50's adult figure.

Heck, with their designer genes, why limit yourself to shades of black, reddish-brown and yellow?

Hey, you said it and the implied joke, not him, hon'.

And technically, barring other members of their species surviving, they technically are the only black- and blonde-haired Kryptonians... In this universe, at least.

Oh, that caught her off-guard nicely.

And it might not be a great idea to mix and match from two different universes without some very detailed tests. Don't want to make Bizarroes or something worse...

Not as such, no. 'Slave' implies they wouldn't be serving him entirely willingly.

Yes, an entire army of super-men and -women. It's a pleasant thought, isn't it? Probably gives the Grayven part of the Renegade a warm tingle down low.

As noted, they'll want to pay him back for what he's done for them thus far. It's positively insidious... If he intended it with any malice in the first place.

Probably safer than trying it the old-fashioned way with a human man. A reversal of the 'Man of Steel, Woman of Kleenex' meme, if you will.

A sarcophagus with an Eradicator protocol installed. Which I now realise he may not even have thought to check for.

Different universes, different histories and cultures, Renegade.

And depending on Rao's colour at the time, that must have been a feat.

Yes, putting all your culture's knowledge in the hands of an AI with what turned out to be untrustworthy goals worked so well..

What, you haven't earned a little vacation time in the last few years?

Ooh, clever girl. The DCAU always did have a Superfamily willing to break out the lead suits, if nothing else.

I mean, it's not like he could do you any harm if he got angry about it...

I do hope she isn't wearing the same blue-black and white styling, at least.

Mind filling us all in? I'm drawing a blank. It has been a while since I've dived that deep into the archive. I'm assuming it was a 'heroic sacrifice' thing... <@Agumentics posts> Ah, I see. Yeah, that'll do it.

Too bad it's not like he can return to his life as Clark Kent... That probably got burned during the events that sent them into 'superhuman dicators.'

At least the Renegade is smart enough to have an inkling that maybe he effed up somewhere with Kara Zor-El. And seeking aid is probably the best way to get started on fixing it. And a little bit of quid pro quo for Kara In-Ze's aid, I see. I wonder what would happen if Superman-50 met Superman-16R? Mutual disappointment? A sad admittance that the former wished he could be the latter again? I suppose we'll see eventually.

---

It's possible, as I noted in my commentary, that he didn't even know it was installed in the pod. His metaknowledge is a bit spotty, after all he's been through.

---

Delete 'with'...

Two occurrences of 'krypton' where it should be 'Krypton'.

 

During the Stars Crossed episode. Starts here.

During Conqueror's Moon. Starts here.
As to how, he was standing on an unshielded space station when it was shot with an Apocalyptian strategic weapon. As the renegade points out there would be no body to find. Just a cloud of atomic dust.

 

Does anyone remember the episode where Batman 50 appeared? I'd like to reread it.

 

This may actually be a continuity error, I think. Since back in Conqueror's Moon, Kara-50 was specifically noted as having discarded the 'S'-

- very specifically discarded it in fact.

 

When Grayven 50 had his fleet destroy the Watchtower.

I didn't forget. Grayven doesn't know.

Thank you, corrected.

She changed it back.