TFTwink
Making the rounds.
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- Apr 26, 2024
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No, you gotta pspsps Paul first.
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Modes come down largely to what he feels like doing at any given moment. I'm sure the software itself has many, many delineated functions, but to the average user, it just looks like 'Do the thing' is all you need...18th July 2013
11:31 GMT -5
Selina moves another piece into the 'blue with medium purple lines' table, before giving me a frustrated glare. "Doesn't your ring have a puzzle-completing mode?"
"A mode?" I shake my head as I try and persuade the pieces to attach themselves together. "It's a basic function. Unfortunately, this looks like it's a piece of New God technology. I didn't know it was here until I opened the door which means that it either has stealth and disguise as one of its fundamental properties, or it's messing with my ring specifically. In either case, exposing New God technology to exotic energy isn't a good idea when you don't know what it does."
I mean, he already had anger issues. You just got him the full subscription."And the reason you haven't called someone who does is..?"
"Scott Free and Big Barda are very busy. Canis… Didn't take finding out that Darkseid didn't keep sending assassins after him as a test and genuinely wanted him dead particularly well. I haven't seen him for a while. And I'm persona non grata on New Genesis after I made their crown prince mentally ill-"
Sadly, unlike the Maltusians, there aren't that many offshoots."At least you're in the right city."
"-and I don't want to try Apokolips, and I don't know where else I could find a New God."
Do you really need it functional, though?Selina looks at a couple of the pieces. "Do you have some kind of space glue?"
"Yes, but that would coat the circuits."
...Not that kind of puzzle, sadly."Then how are we sticking it back together?"
"Either I work out how to recombine the fragments, or I make a big transparent sphere to hold them as we slot them together." I frown. "Unless Gotham has a puzzle-themed criminal that I don't know about."
Honestly, given everything so far, if you didn't know otherwise, you might think he was a neutral-ish rogue if you were told about him."Eddie doesn't do literal puzzles. Neither does Cluemaster. I think you've actually found an original theme."
"Yay. Can you-? If you find pieces that look like they go together, just lay them next to each other?"
As long as it's not the sort of incidental music from game shows used to raise tension. You know, like the 'Jeopardy' thinking tune."Yes, I do know how puzzles work, Paul."
"Would you like me to put some music on?"
In other words, only in the sense that it has sharp edges and broken metal tips."Just focus on making the alien thingy work." Something appears to occur to her. "This isn't dangerous to me, is it?"
"If I knew what it did, I could answer that. But I can't see a power source and there isn't a New God nearby, so I suspect that it's just 'regular' dangerous, rather than 'super' dangerous."
That'd have to be a strange gag he was pulling."I'm sure that the Joker did something like this once, but for the life of me I can't remember when."
"Nothing in my files."
Hey, you don't grow up on the streets of Gotham City without developing a solid danger sense.Okay, these two pieces… Yes, they're supposed to go together like that, and that one goes there… And… Dreamer did say that I felt like a New God…
"I've got an idea. You-." She's already on the far side of the room. "Should do that."
Now that would be an amusing team-up, but no..."This isn't my first rodeo. Or the first time I've been down into the sewers with a superhero who's a few bats short of a belfry."
"It hadn't even occurred to me to ask you if you knew The Question."
Ah, dipping into his more shamanistic toolset. Always a fascinating moment.Okay, unfocus, and… Perceive the world in terms of patterns of desires, needs, wants, fixations and obsessions. Oooh yes, that's lighting up nicely.
"He's the guy with no face, right?"
I suspect he's starting turn a little ethereal, and possibly a little serpentine...Feeling out environment, seeking useful knowledge, reaching for safety without giving information away.
"He has a face-."
An entirely reasonable precaution when this happens."Ah… Tell me when you've finished."
Keep the crazy man where you can see him and stay out of the blast radius.
Huh. I guess he did have a bad reaction to the Anti-Life, then.Not sure what that's about. Returning my focus to the objects I can… See something of Tetch himself. He need for physical reality to be unreal, and for the people in his head to be made manifest. And as I.. turn a fragment over-.
It's… Stronger. Like… He was calm, if not entirely happy, and then almost frenzied in the frantic need to get back what he… Lost. The delusion. The dream.
And I would bet the fragments in question are now lifting off the table and swirling about in front of him...I've felt that way once or twice myself. The realisation that something you'd desperately like to be true just isn't, the loss of possibility and your ability to believe in it. And that…
Yes, I see it. Fragments of the desire, linking to one another, this one to this to this to this to this… All little parts of a whole which-
Heh, Selina calling for advice while he goes all Orange Light mystic."Robin? Yeah, it's Catwoman. What do I do when Orange Lanterns starts… Glowing more than usual." … "About ten feet. Why?"
-make something more and bigger. Fragments to fragment, the delightful delusion on one side and the bitter desperation of denial on the other and the shapes-.
Amazing how a few words from his mentor can shake him out of a trance like that."Ah, hey, Alan? It's Orange Lantern. He's gone a bit… Yeah. Yeah. I'll pass you over."
"Paul, knock it off. You're scaring people. Again."
And back in the room, standing in front of… I'm not sure what.
In other words, don't go anywhere. He may need help in a hurry."But I'm being ever so productive." I turn, looking past the phone into Selina's slightly worried face. "I think I'd have been alright, but well thought out."
"You back to firing on all cylinders, son?"
"Yes, Alan, don't worry-. Actually, do you want to keep talking to Selina while I try and work out what this thing is?"
A thing which is now fully reassembled, more or less?"Ah… Maybe I should. Just in case."
Selina looks.. mildly puzzled, but pulls her phone back as I return to stare at the… Thing.
Fascinating. Not the foggiest as to what it does, but fascinating all the same.Okay, so at the base it's a.. large globe. I think. There are a load of other lines on it, and I'm not really sure what they represent… Some of the.. intersections are places where there were Anti-Life broadcasters…
But I've got no idea how that ties into the desires I was seeing.
...Wow, that is concerning. He's looking at it, yet the Ring has nothing.
Makes you wonder if there are other things like this out there, undetected by Ring scans much like a scry ward...
It can't even render a simple sphere near it?
Huh. Some manner of geomantic map? Odd that the travel routes line up, though...Because you can't see this globe. Okay, just… Show globes with… Ley lines, shipping routes and air travel routes.
Compliance.
Some overlap, but I don't know why these ones are significant and others aren't. Alright, how about I-?
I suspect that's the best option. Although he'll have to be careful who the device interacts with, just in case."…like the way he's looking at it." I awkwardly turn towards Selina. "Does he come with a spray bottle?"
"Heh. I'm afraid not."
"Okay, I can take a hint." Selina raises her eyebrows, and on the phone's screen I see Alan raise one of his. "I'll move it to a specialist and avoid touching it myself. Happy?"
Nothing in my files."
Okay, these two pieces… Yes, they're supposed to go together like that, and that one goes there… And… Dreamer did say that I felt like a New God…
Keep the crazy man where you can see him and stay out of the blast radius.
Not sure what that's about
Thank you, corrected.
What about the New Gods of New Cronus?"-and I don't want to try Apokolips, and I don't know where else I could find a New God."
It's been a while, but didn't almost all of them die?
If you mean the alien planet inhabited by descendants of Rhea, then aren't they in a coma?
Canis… Didn't take finding out that Darkseid didn't keep sending assassins after him as a test and genuinely wanted him dead particularly well. I haven't seen him for a while.
It's… Stronger. Like… He was calm, if not entirely happy, and then almost frenzied in the frantic need to get back what he… Lost. The delusion. The dream.
So there's something interesting here. We just saw how Paul could barely let Catwoman alone when she's dealing with fairly minor romantic problems, how he felt compelled to give her a better costume so she wouldn't deal with mild discomfort. When there's a problem, he wants to solve it. And he knows Canis is having serious problems... but Paul hasn't been trying to solve them.
Where have we seen that before? Well, it seems to be a symptom of guilt. The same way he didn't want to interfere with Batman further. When OL feels guilty about a problem, feels like he caused it in some sense, it makes him think that further interference will only make the problem worse.
I think OL feels guilty about Canis because he knew Canis was under a delusion and didn't try to convince Canis of the truth, or at least gave up on convincing Canis of the truth. It was just easier and more convenient to use Canis, and that meant that when Canis found out the truth it was in the worst way possible. At least, that's the only explanation I can come up with for why Paul would leave Canis alone like this when usually he's all-in on trying to "fix" people who are close to him and whom he owes. (And Canis did a lot for the team and for
There were several others that left Sparta's side.One of them joined the Orange Lantern Corps and is the go-to New God tech guy for the Corps even as he insists he's not really a technology god. I forget his name. Theoretically Paul could go show it to him, though the guy might be busy fighting the war and such
It's important to remember that psychologically Canis is very off compared to most of the people Paul deals with, so he honestly may not know how to help him.
Selina is also friends with Holly and Caron, who Paul cares about, so he'd try to help Selina.
Canis may be a member of the Team, but I'm betting that most of them try to keep their distance since he's off-putting.
There were several others that left Sparta's side.
One of them was a guy that just wanted to heal people.
Rhea was brought back as a full divinity, no body or active mind. It seemed like she was going to turn the soul-marbles into similar disembodied gods in the thaumospnere, until the "dead" can pull themselves together. They aren't actively leading the world anymore exactly, at least.
Allyn is actually a pretty cool character. In the followup he's part of the team that pulls Jade out of her infiltration mission in the Citizenry. I think they also take Knock-Out prisoner during that one and may have ended up recruiting her in some fashion
SHe was supposed to spy on Grayven for Darkseid, but Grayven realized it and dumped her and she can't go back a failure.)
My understanding was they did a ritual that essentially dumped the seeds into the planets thaumosphere, strengthening it massively. Also let's them stop boom tubes from opening into their space without their leaders permission. Some if them were out into a coma when Sparta stole the seeds but they recovered when they got them back and the ritual was done.
She has. When Zartok's team plus Allyn assisted the Darkstars in investigating a stranded Citizenry ship which had Jade on it, Knockout was on that ship as well. Grayven showed up long enough to tell the Lanterns and Jade that they can keep Knockout and admitted that he orchestrated the malfunction to get rid of her. This happened in Episode 133: Counterpunched.
I think the Titans are still in a coma, but Athyns used the Seeds and Rhea's body to activate the world's magic.
No. He's going into cakeman mode.Catwoman is being pretty pretty whiny about him using his ring to put this thing together.
Its not like he started singing or anything, he's just concentrating.
I just want to point out that this is Paul failing because he's too much of a face puncher now to make a construct of a video camera.Ring, compare this to-.
Object not found.
Still?
Object still not found.
Okay. Overlay… Ley lines?
Overlay not available.
Because you can't see this globe. Okay, just… Show globes with… Ley lines, shipping routes and air travel routes.
If he makes a construct then it still wouldn't work.I just want to point out that this is Paul failing because he's too much of a face puncher now to make a construct of a video camera.![]()
The rings scanners can't detect the tech.If he makes a construct then it still wouldn't work.
The construct would still be the ring doing its own scanning and recording functions, the only difference being is that it's doing that through the form of a camera.
And the ring can't scan the tech, so making the scanner into the form of a camera wouldn't help.
I'll repeat myself because you clearly didn't read my post.The rings scanners can't detect the tech.
A camera construct would bypass those scanners, so the only way it wouldn't work is if the technology was also invisible to cameras.
In which case he could just make a construct eye, because he already confirmed that the naked eye can see it.
No. When a ring creates a construct of a camera it's a camera that works on the same physical properties as a regular camera. Not just the ring pretending to be a camera.I'll repeat myself because you clearly didn't read my post.
The construct would still be the ring doing it's scanning and recording function, it would just be doing it in the form of a camera.
And if the ring, which is one of the most advanced pieces of tech in the universe, can't scan the tech, then it's unlikely that other lesser forms if tech could do anything useful.
I hate to agree with Vaermina, but Paul already demonstrated way back when he first merged with the Ophidian that scrying wards can be bypassed by making eye constructs and looking through those instead of scanning normally. Constructs really do work differently from the ring's normal processes.I'll repeat myself because you clearly didn't read my post.
The construct would still be the ring doing it's scanning and recording function, it would just be doing it in the form of a camera.
And if the ring, which is one of the most advanced pieces of tech in the universe, can't scan the tech, then it's unlikely that other lesser forms if tech could do anything useful.