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

Gotcha, so when OL innevitably puts his foot in his mouth, ys to religious outcry but no attempted assinations and suicide bombings from religious extremists.

As for that, it's easy. Ask for Diana to lend the lasso and get Zauriel. Arrange for a live broadcast and not tell anyone what he's gonna ask and keep it secret until it's too late to keep it hidden. Then, boom. Straight from an angel's mouth that Jesus was Gabriel's rape baby.

OL's done things like these, overblown, and over the top retribution to get back at someone that hurt what was his, but didn't fully think about the splash back.

Hu...No wonder he fits so well with the Olympians. Never thought of it that way.
The outcry already happened after Paul revealed that he's been to the Garden of Eden. He just doesn't bother with the hatemail he's been receiving. Also, Diana would never agree to doing that and I don't think Zauriel would consider a Q&A a productive use of his time.
 
Every bell curve has a shallow end, though admittedly hitting the sweet spot where you're smart enough to perform the magic while being stupid enough to perform the magic is a bit rarer.

Not that difficult to hit that spot, as you say. Some magic and rituals are apparently simple enough that you just need to follow the instructions to accomplish the spell.

More idiots can't manage it because of actual magical rituals and spells not being as easily acquired. I imagine faux magical books were always available, with the sporadic presence of real spells or rituals in them, while the real books, tomes and grimoires are more closely managed or watched by people in the know.

It reminds me of how John Constantine cursed his father by following a simple ritual, thinking that it wouldn't work, and then had to find a way to break the curse because the poor fellow couldn't even move on or something? It was mentioned in the fic but my memory fails me a bit.
 
The outcry already happened after Paul revealed that he's been to the Garden of Eden. He just doesn't bother with the hatemail he's been receiving. Also, Diana would never agree to doing that and I don't think Zauriel would consider a Q&A a productive use of his time.
Hence why Paul won't tell Diana what he's gonna do with the lasso, or tell Zauriel he's airing it live. He could easily frame it as him wanting to confirm a piece of information that he needs verification for.

If it's for their own good and Paul's pissed enough about the issue, he'll go behind people's backs.

And yeah, Paul getting hatemail is like water off the duck's back. Hence why it's a hypothetical about him getting pissed off on someone else's behalf.

Plus I imagine the outcry from "Paul breaks into Eden" would be different from "Jesus was a fraud and Gabriel raped Mary" verified by an angel via lasso of truth.
 
I do think with all the focus on souls and afterlife, the actually appealing thing about Christianity as compared to these old time religions sometimes gets a bit occluded.

Christianity says (and often fails to meet the mark but at least it says it) that there is dignity in weakness and sacrifice, that the last shall be first, that the poor will be received into heaven while it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to get there. That being powerful doesn't make you have more inherent moral worth than other people, only more responsibilities. This is very appealing as most people are on the bottom of the pyramid.

All these old time religions say the exact opposite. I mean, the story made a big deal a couple of arcs ago about the Aztec gods eating hearts, but that's just a matter of degree. If Hades wanted to eat hearts, he could eat all the hearts he wanted and he wouldn't be in the wrong. In the Greek religion, there's no moral condemnation if Zeus rapes someone. He's powerful, and he had the right to do it. Hesphation was more powerful than Zeus and overthrew him, so now Hesphastion gets to do whatever he wants to do. Gods get to do whatever they want and you just got to suck it up, but it's not just gods, it extends all the way down. It's virtuous that the powerful dominate and the weak submit, and there's no duty that the strong try to protect the weak other than as a pure mercantile exchange of protection for submission.

Oh, and if you cross a god you're fucked. Medusa had no way of getting back in Athena's good graces. Whereas with the Silver City, if you repent they're obligated to forgive you. If you're a Morgan Edge (pretend for a minute that Edge was sincere and what he pretended to be) and you want to worry about your afterlife after a lifetime of evil, the Silver City is a way better option than Hades. Hades has no obligation to forget all the evil shit you did earlier in life just because you're sorry now. The Silver City has to give every sinner a chance.

So yeah, definitely some arguments here for not just picking some old time god and pledging to them.
 
I do think with all the focus on souls and afterlife, the actually appealing thing about Christianity as compared to these old time religions sometimes gets a bit occluded.

Christianity says (and often fails to meet the mark but at least it says it) that there is dignity in weakness and sacrifice, that the last shall be first, that the poor will be received into heaven while it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to get there. That being powerful doesn't make you have more inherent moral worth than other people, only more responsibilities. This is very appealing as most people are on the bottom of the pyramid.

All these old time religions say the exact opposite. I mean, the story made a big deal a couple of arcs ago about the Aztec gods eating hearts, but that's just a matter of degree. If Hades wanted to eat hearts, he could eat all the hearts he wanted and he wouldn't be in the wrong. In the Greek religion, there's no moral condemnation if Zeus rapes someone. He's powerful, and he had the right to do it. Hesphation was more powerful than Zeus and overthrew him, so now Hesphastion gets to do whatever he wants to do. Gods get to do whatever they want and you just got to suck it up, but it's not just gods, it extends all the way down. It's virtuous that the powerful dominate and the weak submit, and there's no duty that the strong try to protect the weak other than as a pure mercantile exchange of protection for submission.

Oh, and if you cross a god you're fucked. Medusa had no way of getting back in Athena's good graces. Whereas with the Silver City, if you repent they're obligated to forgive you. If you're a Morgan Edge (pretend for a minute that Edge was sincere and what he pretended to be) and you want to worry about your afterlife after a lifetime of evil, the Silver City is a way better option than Hades. Hades has no obligation to forget all the evil shit you did earlier in life just because you're sorry now. The Silver City has to give every sinner a chance.

So yeah, definitely some arguments here for not just picking some old time god and pledging to them.

The only positive we know is WoG from Zoat is that they take insanity defense seriously from the example of Joker being cured and arriving in Heaven as Jack Napier, and I'm not sure if that's just Zoat trying to not make the Silver City 100% worthless by having Joker go to Heaven as himself since iirc, that's how Hellblazer's take on Heaven and Hell goes, if you feel guilty even if you're a good person, you go to Hell, if you're a virtuous person or a sociopath and psychopath incapable of guilt? Both go to Heaven.

Honestly, I was shocked when I found that WoG when browsing the TV tropes page for WTR regarding Jack Napier. Canon's mechanics for Heaven and Hell are perfect ammo for discouraging people from Abrahamic faiths, I always wondered why Zoat didn't stick to it. I'm not complaining mind you, just wondering why they drew the line there.

And even then, Paul has no way of knowing that, plus most people would just hear "Joker goes to Heaven" and be outraged.

And again, that's precisely why OL doesn't like it. It exhaults weakness, OL's a transhumanist with alien morals and ethics whose entire operating M.O is utilitarianism and advancement.

OL runs of Avarice, he's incapable of thinking in a way that doesn't involve a transaction or echange of mercantile services or some other stripe of thinking. His response to the question of "a civilization's true worth being how it treats its prisoners" was it being crap because prisoners are worthless, they're an active drain on resources and thus owed nothing.

Completely missing the point that it's because they're owed nothing that how they're treated when there's no threat of retribution or reward from the treatment of prisoners is how they'd truly act.

Aside from his loved ones, everything is a "cost, benefit" cold calculus with him.

People that are content with being weak sheep? Unable and unwilling to better themselves or advance? Yeah, he's proven time and time again not to give a shit about those. He'll save them if they're about to die I guess, but it's hard enough already for him to care about individuals outside his loved ones, let alone masses of strangers he fundamentally disdains.

He was an atheist before, and only became a Hellenist out of a cost, benefit analysis not because of genuine faith or finding religion. Something as ephemeral and immaterial as faith is fundamentally alien to OL, especially post "Enligtenment". Hence why his view of better religions to follow can be summed up to a cost, benefit pamphlet or brochure given out like chosing you're career options.

And since Zoat's using Hellblaizer's continuity as a major part of the setting, the Silver City is factually a horrible, foolish choics of an afterlife because angels are basically just demons with better PR, or maybe that's just some angels, since earlier in the thread, Zoat did acknowledge that most angels just a goos hit to the head to come to their senses unlike demons.

Edit:

Sorry about the rants, no offense intended to Zoat or anyone else, I just tend to get heated and wordy and long winded when I get worked up about a topic
 
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But do you seriously expect Paul to tell people that something useful came out of the Presence? No way.

He honestly may not care all that much.

Plus, he may not want to advertise the existence of the Life Entity on Earth since that could attracts more attention from the likes of Darkseid.

And yeah, Paul's gonna trigger a religious outrage and outcry one of these days

He already did it once.

As for that, it's easy. Ask for Diana to lend the lasso (since he's confident at lending and leaving the Spear of Destiny to Hecate permanently, and he's got the rapport with Diana to ask to borrow it) and get Zauriel. Arrange for a live broadcast unbeknownst to Zauriel and not tell anyone what he's gonna ask and keep it secret until it's too late to keep it hidden. Then, boom. Straight from an angel's mouth that Jesus was Gabriel's rape baby, with the lasso of truth making sure it's the entire sordid truth. Boom, Christianity takes the biggest hit it's ever had in recent history at the least

That's assuming the Lasso would even work on Zauriel.

Also, it's assuming that Zauriel knew about the rape.

He may honestly think that it was all consensual, or that there was no sex involved and Gabriel just waved his hand and Mary was pregnant.

and I don't think Zauriel would consider a Q&A a productive use of his time.

Ehh, he might, if only to potentially help clearing up any misconceptions people may have that could lead to religious conflicts.
 
It reminds me of how John Constantine cursed his father by following a simple ritual, thinking that it wouldn't work, and then had to find a way to break the curse because the poor fellow couldn't even move on or something? It was mentioned in the fic but my memory fails me a bit.
He didn't manage to break it. He just put the dead cat in formaldehyde so that it stopped decaying, then after his father died he set it on fire to destroy it because it was anchoring his father's soul to the world.

Turns out that was a mistake, but it's not like Gemma could read lips.
 
I found the quote that confirms that Zeus is still sponsoring Billy.

Yeah, but in a post below that one he mentioned that he forgot about Susanoo.

And after Zeus was deposed Billy couldn't turn back into a kid until after Susanoo went to the Wizard and offered his power.

After that Billy could change back easily.

Plus, even if Zeus could still sponsor Billy, why would he do it?

Billy is an ally of the guy that helped overthrow him.

Helping him could put him into the good graces of his new king, but he may be too prideful for that, and Heph never said anything about him needing to sponsor Billy.

When they were still fighting the Anti-Life, Dr. Mist mentioned that Zeus may fight Manheim due to pride, but the Shinto may ally with him.

Not sure why he'd mention that unless one of their own was helping them.

Though I'm sorry but I can't find the page where he said it.
 
Most pantheons didn't do anything to stop the Anti-Life, so they may still not get any converts.
Ironically Zauriel, and via him the Silver City, are the only one's who would have been actively seen as doing anything.


The only positive we know is WoG from Zoat is that they take insanity defense seriously from the example of Joker being cured and arriving in Heaven as Jack Napier, and I'm not sure if that's just Zoat trying to not make the Silver City 100% worthless by having Joker go to Heaven as himself since iirc, that's how Hellblazer's take on Heaven and Hell goes, if you feel guilty even if you're a good person, you go to Hell, if you're a virtuous person or a sociopath and psychopath incapable of guilt? Both go to Heaven.
That's not actually Hellblazers take on it, it's solely Mr Zoat's.

Hellblazers actual take, is that the only thing keeping a Soul in Hell, is their own belief that they don't deserve to be anywhere else. And actual good people, only go to hell if they are dragged there by a demon, or they sold their soul.
 
Improbable breast-waist-hips ratio, flawless skin without makeup, purple hair and… I sniff. Yes, a mild aphrodisiac scent. None of that is impossible for a metahuman, but a metahuman wouldn't suffer burns from the sanctified iron.

In this guy's defense, if you're going to sell your soul for a temporary succubus GF, Akeno isn't the worst choice.
 
He honestly may not care all that much.

Plus, he may not want to advertise the existence of the Life Entity on Earth since that could attracts more attention from the likes of Darkseid.



He already did it once.



That's assuming the Lasso would even work on Zauriel.

Also, it's assuming that Zauriel knew about the rape.

He may honestly think that it was all consensual, or that there was no sex involved and Gabriel just waved his hand and Mary was pregnant.



Ehh, he might, if only to potentially help clearing up any misconceptions people may have that could lead to religious conflicts.
We have multiple confirmations from several angels during the arc where Paul got killed that Jesus was a nephilim. Zoat's going with Hellblazer's take, and it explicitly mentions Gabriel raped Mary, in his own internal narration too

And Zauriel knew about Jesus, I doubt they'd be kept in the dark about it.

Ironically Zauriel, and via him the Silver City, are the only one's who would have been actively seen as doing anything.



That's not actually Hellblazers take on it, it's solely Mr Zoat's.

Hellblazers actual take, is that the only thing keeping a Soul in Hell, is their own belief that they don't deserve to be anywhere else. And actual good people, only go to hell if they are dragged there by a demon, or they sold their soul.


Potato, potahto. But, looks like I misspoke

Or, did you mean the Jack Napier thing?
 
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Hey this is kind of random but I just wanted to pop in and say thank you for continuing to write this story (at least I think you are from a quick skim; I didn't look too deep to avoid any potential spoilers but seeing the OP last edited in November 2023 and you posting here gives me good vibes.)

I'm kind of behind but I'm a good chunk of chapters in. Page 26 on the SV site. It's kind of lame how they banned you for an opinion (at least from what it seems, didn't look much into this since it seemed like uninteresting drama); I don't necessarily agree with a lot of your SI's actions but that doesn't stop me from reading the story, as it's still interesting and entertaining. Although, it's kind of frustrating seeing how he approaches romance thus far and how it feels like certain allies disrespect him too much and he just rolls with it... But I can gloss over it because the other stuff is fun.

Anyways I'm rambling so I'll stop and go back to lurking. Thank you again and sorry if I bugged you. :)
 
Reconstruction (part 4)
26th February 2013
10:57 GMT -6


Wallace frowns in distaste as we watch the news broadcast of Superman and Lex Luthor shaking hands on his arm computer. Mr. Luthor… Two days ago he appeared from wherever it was that he was hiding, and has been marshalling LexCorp's resources to aid in reconstruction efforts since then. Which means he's actually been back for at least a week, if he was ever completely out of contact. The only plus side is that unlike just about everyone who stayed, he didn't get any contact with the Life Entity.

"Are we supposed to take that seriously?"

I float a new batch of cars off the road onto the ersatz car park around him

"'There is no profit in the end of the world.'"

I get a small smile from him as he starts opening the doors and… Recovering the people inside.

"What's that quote from?"

"Spider-Man. A guy with the ability to make portals lets one get out of control to the point where it threatens to suck the entire planet through. Once he realises what's happening, the main supervillain of the story stops trying to blackmail him and starts offering him the use of his resources at no cost. When he asks 'why', the supervillain explains by saying 'There is no profit in the end of the world'."

Wallace nods. "I wish real supervillains said stuff like that."

The bodies appear in a line, laying on their back. There's a slight blur in the air as he pauses and takes a picture of their faces to be submitted to Mr Atom's facial recognition system, along with their driving licence if a quick rummage through their possessions located one. Not all that many people decided to die in their cars on major highways, but the shock of the initial Anti-Life broadcast was so intense that a lot of people crashed.

These bodies are mostly intact, deaths coming from the collision itself. There's a pile-up with fire-damaged remains a little way ahead. I study it for a moment, then return my attention to him as he finishes the current batch.

"Are you..? Going to be okay with..?"

He sighs, spotting what I was looking at. "No. But I can-. I can cope. I saw enough people during the Sheeda…" He looks away for a moment. "I've seen it before."

I nod, and pick up the crashed cars with a construct claw.

"How 'bout you?"

I move the empty cars off to the side and pick up the fire-damaged vehicles ahead of us.

"Barely register it."

"Huh." He frowns as I set the cars down next to him. "When was your..? First?"

"The first time I saw a human corpse?"

"Yeah."

The first car appears to have had a slow fire. I hope that the people inside were dead before it.. caught them, but blackened bones are all that's left of them now. Wallace sprays what's left of each of them with a quick-setting foam before moving on to the next vehicle.

"The Santa Prisca mission. Fresh, and riddled with bullets. You?"

"About a month after I started."

Oh? My eyebrows rise. "Was Flash trying to put you off?"

"Yeah, but not like that. You know how Snart avoids killing people?"

"Yes."

"Right. So someone goes around with a freeze-. I mean, a cold gun, and we thought it was him. Turns out it was some guy called Chillblaine who got one of Snart's old cold guns. He used it on full power." He completes a circuit and I snip through the roll cages with construct shears to give him easier access. "I didn't even realise the guy was dead to start with. Not until Flash started freaking out."

"'Freaking out'?"

"Not because of the body. Because I was there. He didn't want me anywhere near it. And I argued about it with him, because I didn't know why he wanted to get rid of me, and I didn't know why we weren't just breaking him out of the ice."

"And you were… Fourteen?"

"Yeah. Once I worked it out I just did what he said and left. Compared to Santa Prisca, I didn't really see all that much."

"You were younger."

"Your world doesn't have superheroes though. You weren't used to seeing violence in the streets."

"True."

The wrecks cleared, I shift them off to the side again, my eyes momentarily alighting on a small pile of solidified foam before moving on to our next objective, the road bridge. Several cars crashed into the support pillars, badly cracking the concrete cladding. Combined with the fire damage, it's not safe for travel at the moment.

I fly over to it and begin analysing.

"What's Mister Atom had you doing?"

"Running town to town, telling people what's happened. I didn't realise how many places had bad phone signal." He walks over, watching me work. "How about you?"

"Reactivating nuclear power plants."

"Was he hungry?"

"Coal needs regular shipments of coal. Gas plants need gas pumped into them. Oil needs shipments-."

"Yeah, and nuclear reactors just need someone keeping an eye on them. I guess I'm just surprised you didn't replace them with something."

"What, like hydrogen? Hydrogen plants would need a whole new infrastructure base to keep them supplied."

"How about wind power?"

"Not reliable. And they need grease to keep them from jamming. And when it gets cold they freeze up and the standard method for de-icing them involved spraying them with a flamethrower."

"Huh."

"Yeah, they keep quiet about the amount of oil those things use."

"What about those.. bleed torsion generators? They don't need any fuel."

"It would be a little harder to integrate them into the power network. And no one could maintain them."

"So? Just take them out once things get going again."

"And then there's the issue of one government or another half-inching them and doing something stupid with them. I'd rather not put temptation in their way."

"I don't think anyone would do that. Governments… Most countries barely have governments. And… A lot of people saw the Life Entity at the end, and… People are behaving differently."

"Maybe. But then there's the question of why I didn't just release them in places other than New York."

"You want to improve the world. Maybe you need to take the risk?"
 
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"'There is no profit in the end of the world.'"

I get a small smile from him as he starts opening the doors and… Recovering the people inside.

"What's that quote from?"

"Spider-Man. A guy with the ability to make portals lets one get out of control to the point where it threatens to suck the entire planet through. Once he realises what's happening, the main supervillain of story stops trying to blackmail him and starts offering him the use of his resources at no cost. When he asks 'why', then supervillain explains by saying 'There is no profit in the end of the world'."
I don't know where this is from. Can you clarify what comic/tv show/movie this comes from?

"Running tow to town, telling people what's happened. I didn't realise how many places had bad phone signal." He walks over, watching me work. "How about you?"
That should say 'town'.
 
There is no profit in the end of the world.'"

The Vogans may disagree with that.

main supervillain of story

"of the"

Wallace nods. "I wish real supervillains said stuff like that."

Well, they kinda do.

You want to improve the world. Maybe you need to take the risk?

Weird that someone is saying this to Paul.
 
Weird that someone is saying this to Paul.

Agreed…it's really weird. I actually thought he'd be gung ho about the rebuilding and upgrading. Plus…this is exactly why Paul chose Eris as a patron, change and progress, no matter who's stomped on and what industry is destroyed or the negative consequences if the overall change is a net positive no matter the chaos it causes

Mr Zoat Paul has no hesitation telling transportation businesses that he doesn't give a crap about their complaints or how many jobs will be lost with the implementation of Dolmen Gates since the end result is better for the overall transport infrastructure , why the sudden hesitation? Isn't he doing a disservice to Eris? Being too cautious and not making the most of the chaos to bring about better infrastructure? Let no crisis go to waste and all that?

Yowch.

Even the team is realizing Paul's been hit by the Reed Richards is Useless bug at this point.

Yeah, it's really weird to see. I would've thought he'd be full on "let no crisis go to waste" mode and replacing all these "obsolete" systems.

On the bright side, nice to see OL hang out with Kid Flash again.
 
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Remember that Paul lost his fight with Smiley and then had a massive personality shift towards what Smiley wanted, which was a much slower change to status quo. He was out with Smiley having direct access to his soul for an unknown period of time and then woke up in one of Heaven's experimental soul washers.
 
26th February 2013
10:57 GMT -6


Wallace frowns in distaste as we watch the news broadcast of Superman and Lex Luthor shaking hands on his arm computer. Mr. Luthor… Two days ago he appeared from wherever it was that he was hiding, and has been marshalling LexCorps resources to aid in reconstruction efforts since then. Which means he's actually been back for at least a week, if he was ever completely out of contact. The only plus side is that unlike just about everyone who stayed, he didn't get any contact with the Life Entity.
Amusing. Lex completely misses out on the most profound experience all of humanity has shared thus far. Though most didn't experience all that much, I suspect. Still, at least he's doing the right thing, even if he stands to profit from it. And I don't doubt he has so many plans to buy up real estate and other things cheap before things get settled.

"Are we supposed to take that seriously?"

I float a new batch of cars off the road onto the ersatz car park around him
Clearing roads choked by abandoned or wrecked cars, I see. It'll make shipping easier, of course.

"'There is no profit in the end of the world.'"

I get a small smile from him as he starts opening the doors and… Recovering the people inside.
...Ah, right. Because plenty of people would have been on the road when the signal went live. And not all of them would have stopped safely.

"What's that quote from?"

"Spider-Man. A guy with the ability to make portals lets one get out of control to the point where it threatens to suck the entire planet through. Once he realises what's happening, the main supervillain of story stops trying to blackmail him and starts offering him the use of his resources at no cost. When he asks 'why', then supervillain explains by saying 'There is no profit in the end of the world'."
I assume that's a comic plotline involving the Spot. Wonder what the kids think of OL just dropping random-sounding superhero names like that, though. o_O "Spider Man? What, is he all Batman-but-spiders or something?"

Wallace nods. "I wish real supervillains said stuff like that."

The bodies appear in a line, laying on their back. There's a slight blur in the air as he pauses and takes a picture of their faces to be submitted to Mr Atom's facial recognition system, along with their driving licence if a quick rummage through their possessions located one. Not all that many people decided to die in their cars on major highways, but the shock of the initial Anti-Life broadcast was so intense that a lot of people crashed.
So the death toll from this sort of thing isn't going to be huge, but the aftermath will be nasty. Think about it: two months of decay...

These bodies are mostly intact, deaths coming from the collision itself. There's a pile-up with fire-damaged remains a little way ahead. I study it for a moment, then return my attention to him as he finishes the current batch.

"Are you..? Going to be okay with..?"
Because the sidekicks here are just teenagers, and while Robin may have seen a corpse or two in Gotham City, well...

He sighs, spotting what I was looking at. "No. But I can-. I can cope. I saw enough people during the Sheeda…" He looks away for a moment. "I've seen it before."

I nod, and pick up the crashed cars with a construct claw.
Growing up a lot faster than he needed to, I guess. Still, he chose this life.

"How 'bout you?"

I move the empty cars off to the side and pick up the fire-damaged vehicles ahead of us.
One thing Wally can't do, I guess. Joy of taking a speedster build rather than a powerhouse. :p

"Barely register it."

"Huh." He frowns as I set the cars down next to him. "When was your..? First?"
Oh, now this is a morbid line of discussion...

"The first time I saw a human corpse?"

"Yeah."
And funerals don't count. Much too much stage-management and dressing there. If they were even open-casket types anyway.

The first car appears to have had a slow fire. I hope that the people inside were dead before it.. caught them, but blackened bones are all that's next of them now. Wallace sprays what's left of each of them with a quick setting a foam before moving on to the next vehicle.

"The Santa Prisca mission. Fresh, and riddled with bullets. You?"
Probably a good thing he could control his normal reactions by then.

"About a month after I started."

Oh? My eyebrows rise. "Was Flash trying to put you off?"
Because that seems kind of an extreme way to do it. And the Rogues usually try to minimise body counts anyway.

"Yeah, but not like that. You know how Snart avoids killing people?"

"Yes."
Because charges like theft and public affray are one thing but manslaughter or murder? Not what he wants to deal with.

"Right. So someone goes around with a freeze-. I mean, a cold gun, and we thought it was him. Turns out it was some guy called Chillblaine who got one of Snart's old cold guns. He used it on full power." He completes a circuit and I snip through the roll cages with construct shears to give him easier access. "I didn't even realise the guy was dead to start with. Not until Flash started freaking out."

"'Freaking out'?"
Heh. A literal copycat. But without the more reserved moral code of Captain Cold...

"Not because of the body. Because I was there. He didn't want me anywhere near it. And I argued about it with him, because I didn't know why he wanted to get rid of me, and I didn't know why we weren't just breaking him out of the ice."

"And you were… Fourteen?"
It could have been worse. Some Wally Wests got started younger than that.

"Yeah. Once I worked it out I just did what he said and left. Compared to Santa Prisca, I didn't really see all that much."

"You were younger."
Though I bet he spent quite a bit of time thinking about it later.

"Your world doesn't have superheroes though. You weren't used to seeing violence in the streets."

"True."
Not the super-powered kind, anyway. Sports riots or political stuff, maybe, but not in person, I hope.

The wrecks cleared, I shift them off to the side again, my eyes momentarily alighting on a small pile of solidified foam before moving on to our next objective, the road bridge. Several cars crashed into the support pillars, badly cracking the concrete cladding. Combined with the fire damage, it's not safe for travel at the moment.

I fly over to it and begin analysing.
Because if there's one thing OL is good at, it's repairing infrastructure.

"What's Mister Atom had you doing?"

"Running tow to town, telling people what's happened. I didn't realise how many places had bad phone signal." He walks over, watching me work. "How about you?"
I guess the word has to get out somehow, and speedsters seem a good way to manage it.

"Reactivating nuclear power plants."

"Was he hungry?"
Ha! and after the discussion about Atom eating that fuel rod after his last appearance, that's made even more amusing.

"Coal needs regular shipments of coal. Gas plants need gas pumped into them. Oil needs shipments-."

"Yeah, and nuclear reactors just need someone keeping an eye on them. I guess I'm just surprised you didn't replace them with something."
I mean, are there enough reactor technicians available right now to handle the job? Some of them might have died or decided to get a new line of work after the event.

"What, like hydrogen? Hydrogen plants would need a whole new infrastructure base to keep them supplied."

"How about wind power?"
Because those plants can't make the hydrogen themselves that easily.

"Not reliable. And they need grease to keep them from jamming. And when it gets cold they freeze up and the standard method for de-icing them involved spraying them with a flamethrower."

"Huh."
Seriously, that shit's more complicated than it seems...

"Yeah, they keep quiet about the amount of oil those things use."

"What about those.. bleed torsion generators? They don't need any fuel."
And if something goes wrong? Who do they get to fix it? Because OL is a busy man and he can't come running very time there's an issue.

"It would be a little harder to integrate them into the power network. And no one could maintain them."

"So? Just take them out once things get going again."
And if someone prefers the 'flash gordon' stuff? Honestly, think about it: clean energy for minimal cost and even if they have exotic requirements for maintenance, the engineers will start to learn.

"And then there's the issue of one government or another half-inching them and doing something stupid with them. I'd rather not put temptation in their way."

"I don't think anyone would do that. Governments… Most countries barely have governments. And… A lot of people saw the Life Entity at the end, and… People are behaving differently."
Plus, I seem to remember that the generators are the ultimate in fail-safe designs. Mess them up and the worst you get is a 'blorch' noise as the field collapses.

"Maybe. But then there's the question of why I didn't just release them in places other than New York."

"You want to improve the world. Maybe you need to take the risk?"
...He's got a point, OL. Now would be a damn good time to kick Humanity in the arse about their power sources.

Honestly, there's also the other big super-science elephant in the room: The Knight technology. How has OL not though of the Cosmic Converter devices yet? I mean, sure, Vandal Savage or someone had the patents on lockdown, but after all this, I don't think anyone's going to object to them becoming public.Though I suppose finding engineers trained to operate either kind of super-generator is an issue...

...with a quick setting a foam before moving on to the next vehicle.
...with a quick setting of foam before moving on to the next vehicle.
 
"Spider-Man. A guy with the ability to make portals lets one get out of control to the point where it threatens to suck the entire planet through. Once he realises what's happening, the main supervillain of story stops trying to blackmail him and starts offering him the use of his resources at no cost. When he asks 'why', then supervillain explains by saying 'There is no profit in the end of the world'."
Found another error. That should say 'the'.
 
Remember that Paul lost his fight with Smiley and then had a massive personality shift towards what Smiley wanted, which was a much slower change to status quo. He was out with Smiley having direct access to his soul for an unknown period of time and then woke up in one of Heaven's experimental soul washers.
Fair enough, that is a plausible reason for that.

Though what about the much vaunted "Orange Enlightenment"? Want the ends, want the means. Shouldn't Paul be aware that his desires have been tampered with?
 
I believe he only gained that after the tampering would have occured.
What? He gained orange enlightenment literally after being freed from Ophidian's first possession of him.

Are you telling me Mr Smiley was tampering with his non existent soul? Because Paul didn't have a soul back then
 
Agreed…it's really weird. I actually thought he'd be gung ho about the rebuilding and upgrading. Plus…this is exactly why Paul chose Eris as a patron, change and progress, no matter who's stomped on and what industry is destroyed or the negative consequences if the overall change is a net positive no matter the chaos it causes

That's what he says, but he actually isn't all that gung-ho about how he does stuff to progress. He even consulted a God disguised as a Greek Minister (can't recall his name) to find out if what he was implementing would have too many negative effects. When he fills he has to do stuff by himself because nobody else will, then he might be more blatant, like the refreezing of the ice caps or cleaning the plastic patch. But when it's a concerted or group effort, he usually just does his part.

Remember that Paul lost his fight with Smiley and then had a massive personality shift towards what Smiley wanted, which was a much slower change to status quo. He was out with Smiley having direct access to his soul for an unknown period of time and then woke up in one of Heaven's experimental soul washers.

That would be interesting, and plausible, but thr Illustres has had his even his soul obliterated since then, I think? That Qwa bomb the disintagrated him also blew his soul away, so much that he had to reconstruct it and regather his parts to recuperate his Enlightment I believe.

If that didn't remove any manipulation or noxious elements, he might have lost even some normal parts of his soul, then I don't know if there would even be a fix for it.
 
Wallace sprays what's left of each of them with a quick setting a foam before moving on to the next vehicle.
'quick-setting foam'
And when it gets cold they freeze up and the standard method for de-icing them involved spraying them with a flamethrower."
Is the flamethrower bit actually true? I tried looking it up and I couldn't see anything about use of flamethrowers for deicing.
 
Agreed…it's really weird. I actually thought he'd be gung ho about the rebuilding and upgrading. Plus…this is exactly why Paul chose Eris as a patron, change and progress, no matter who's stomped on and what industry is destroyed or the negative consequences if the overall change is a net positive no matter the chaos it causes

Mr Zoat Paul has no hesitation telling transportation businesses that he doesn't give a crap about their complaints or how many jobs will be lost with the implementation of Dolmen Gates since the end result is better for the overall transport infrastructure , why the sudden hesitation? Isn't he doing a disservice to Eris? Being too cautious and not making the most of the chaos to bring about better infrastructure? Let no crisis go to waste and all that?



Yeah, it's really weird to see. I would've thought he'd be full on "let no crisis go to waste" mode and replacing all these "obsolete" systems.

On the bright side, nice to see OL hang out with Kid Flash again.

Personally, I think it's because Paul is a lot nicer than most people
Give him credit for and he's sick and tired of harmful chaos and all that. People as a whole are in a really bad spot in-canon and he's deliveratley attempting to not make it worse or do something that blows up in his face like the Batman situation no matter how good of would be long term, so treating the world with kiddie gloves it is.

On the bright, I think a lot of people are going to start seeing things his way real soon, so that's all good on that front
 

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