With This Ring (Young Justice SI) (Thread Twelve)
- Thread starter Mr Zoat
- Start date
- Status
Last edited:
Grind (part 18)
- Location
- Hampden Park
2nd November
22:40 GMT -5
I remember the film 'Ghost Dog'. There was a quote… I don't remember where it was from originally. Ring? Ah, Hagakure. And apparently the line in Ghost Dog 16 is 'In the words of the ancients, one should make his decision within the space of seven breaths. It is a matter of being determined and having the spirit to break through to the other side.'
I'm not a wannabe samurai. I'm an Orange Lantern, but that entails that I do what I want to alter the universe to be more like I want it to be. It is a way which encourages introspection, but only outside combat. Mr Sage is watching someone through a periscope, a passive action which contains a minimal risk of discovery. And I'm not scanning with my super advanced xenotechnological hyper-tool because they might be able to detect that.
I carefully pull both rings from my fingers, then manually trigger my armour's phasing system to drop through the floor.
Irritating thing about encountering an ability I don't even begin to understand is that I don't know what else I don't understand that the user can do. If the person out there is something to do with this and not just picking up their house keys then they might have detected my phasing and killed the man we're trying to recover. Or they might have installed some sort of sensor in all of these buildings and know we're here already. Or they might have had some disenchanted Kobra Bestowed muck around with local magic, take a payoff and leave them to their own devices.
I don't know, and I don't know what it is that I don't know.
I drift through the ground in the direction of the car. One of the systems that got cut back to make this armour was the flight system: it's there, but it's not what you'd call fast. Now, how to approach this? I saw the direction in which the figure went, and I can easily keep the car between myself and that building. In addition to being invisible. Does it matter-? Agh! Annoying!
I drift up through the ground, the underside of the car suddenly being right there as my head pierces the asphalt. Drift up a little further, careful-. Someone ins-! No. Some body, tied to the passenger seat by the cord around their neck. Body still somewhat warm. Recent, then.
Not here for their house keys.
In most cities I'd inform the local police at once. In Hub… I think I'll leave it until we're done here. Without using a light or the ring I can't get a good view of their face… Given their approximate dimensions, there are any number of people on Hub City's missing persons list it could be. But the great thing about being dead is that your condition is unlikely to deteriorate.
I move around to the front of the car. This number plate hadn't been reported as stolen an hour ago, but if the owner was murdered when it was taken there's no reason to believe that it would have been.
I sigh. Nothing.
Okay, check the angle… Phase in, attach a tracking device to… The underside of the wheel arch. Tap twice to activate the molecular bonder, hold for a second… Done. It won't let us track the car, because if we can track it then so can anyone else with the right gear. Instead, it will respond to a particular sort of energy wave and give us its location when we choose to look for it. Safer, but less useful.
No point attaching a second. If they can find one, they can find two. If they can't find one, adding a second just increases the chance they'll find either of them. But… What now?
Were I a less enlightened Orange Lantern, I'd either be charging in or having some sort of episode trying to hold myself back. As it is, I'm… Confounded. There is no way for me to know the course of action most likely to keep the last thief alive. Assuming that was him. Assuming that he's in there. I would let him die if that was what it took to locate the ultimate perpetrator, but there's no guarantee that would work. Another body gets me no more information than I already have.
Tracking device on. The options are fall back and wait, or advance. And it's my decision. Yes, I could pass it on to Kaldur or Batman. I'd need to leave the area to do so, and there's the risk of detection… But any form of monitoring risks detection. And I'm well aware that I'm already verging on paranoia now, but… If they couldn't detect observation, what are the chances they could stop me? Heck, motivated like this I could simulate the parts of the brain that were collapsing as they collapsed and replace them when the effect ended. So: intervening it is.
Do I get extra help? I could retreat and call in… Who? Doctor Balewa and Angelica both have skills which I lack, but neither have specific knowledge of this case. And from the description in the team's reports, death happens quickly once the process begins. Something that matches my examination of the injury. John Fate might be similarly useful… Really, the time to call him in was when Mr Sage started driving, except there was no way to know this would actually lead to a contact and I'm sure that he's a very busy man.
Alright then. I'm going in, but I'm not going to rush things. I walk around the car-.
There's a note in the driver side window. Couldn't see it from the other side, but in the starlight I can just about make out the orange sigil drawn on it. Settles that question. I take a half-step away from the car and slide my rings back on, keeping my environmental shield to minimum. Immediately I regain the ability to see my surroundings. The person inside… Male, black, business-casual dress. As far as I can see the envelope is just paper. I can't see any poisons, electronics or arcane sigils.
Ring, scan the writing.
Compliance.
'To the Acolyte of Greed'
Close enough.
'What you seek is inside, and will be offered to you freely if you have the wit to take it. Come without fear.'
Lure or genuine offer?
Again, an imponderable. My presence in Hub City isn't a secret, but I can't know if they just put this here on the off-chance or if they actually know I'm here. Does luring me in actually get them anything? The sort of weapons that would be needed to successfully ambush me don't really care about precise relative locations. At most, it would buy them a fraction of a second. And it may be pride talking, but I'm increasingly dubious about my own worst imaginings.
Okay, going in. I raise my left hand towards Mr Sage's window and send 'going in' in Morse code ring flashes. Then I phase and drift towards the unit the car driver headed into. Not the front door, obviously. Assuming that the units were built according to a standard design I can go through the wall here and enter the neighbouring unit. Empty of anything concerning. I drift further in, heading towards the back of the building. Turn up empathic vision a little… Two people, both shot through with… Veins of black? One is otherwise fairly normal, while the colours in the other are translucent. Barely there at all. Something weird is going on, but frankly I've seen worse. And since they're not reacting I can assume they can't feel this.
Excellent.
Phased and invisible, I float through the wall behind them. The main lights are off, but there's a window letting in starlight and I can just about make their faces out. Karl Wilson, thirty seven, from Nebraska. Pale skin, orange hair and moustache, faint colours and not wearing any sort of concealing gear. Like the others, no significant criminal record. Almost certainly the thief. The other person is a bald mixed race woman with many scars and a number of facial piercings which would shock me if I hadn't met Raquel. I don't recognise her face. She's dressed in baggy trousers and a tube top, but it looks like it's a sports bra type thing rather than a normal garment. Something for exercising in. The other distinguishing items of clothing are the bandages wrapped around her forearms.
She… Reminds me of something. I'm not sure what. I've read so many comics -and League intelligence files- that… Well, they don't blur together, but there's a lot of very similar looking distinct things in my memory. Nothing about her triggers one specifically.
Oh well. I'll ask in a minute, when she'll want to give answers as much as I want to hear them. I could phase in and brand them both, but the displaced air might clue them in that I was there fast enough to trigger the suicide effect. Another approach. Record her face.
Compliance.
I float back through the wall, phase in, then send a filament underground in the direction of Mr Wilson. Tagging his foot is fine… Physically healthy. Nothing odd in his blood or bone or muscles… Or peripheral nervous system.
That black. Not as all-encompassing as Dark Druid, not as controlled as Ms Sackville. I could paralyse the woman right now, but… They both have the black. Could be sympathetic, magic or thought-activated… No, I need to purge them both at the same time.
Ring, filament to her as well, then brand.
22:40 GMT -5
I remember the film 'Ghost Dog'. There was a quote… I don't remember where it was from originally. Ring? Ah, Hagakure. And apparently the line in Ghost Dog 16 is 'In the words of the ancients, one should make his decision within the space of seven breaths. It is a matter of being determined and having the spirit to break through to the other side.'
I'm not a wannabe samurai. I'm an Orange Lantern, but that entails that I do what I want to alter the universe to be more like I want it to be. It is a way which encourages introspection, but only outside combat. Mr Sage is watching someone through a periscope, a passive action which contains a minimal risk of discovery. And I'm not scanning with my super advanced xenotechnological hyper-tool because they might be able to detect that.
I carefully pull both rings from my fingers, then manually trigger my armour's phasing system to drop through the floor.
Irritating thing about encountering an ability I don't even begin to understand is that I don't know what else I don't understand that the user can do. If the person out there is something to do with this and not just picking up their house keys then they might have detected my phasing and killed the man we're trying to recover. Or they might have installed some sort of sensor in all of these buildings and know we're here already. Or they might have had some disenchanted Kobra Bestowed muck around with local magic, take a payoff and leave them to their own devices.
I don't know, and I don't know what it is that I don't know.
I drift through the ground in the direction of the car. One of the systems that got cut back to make this armour was the flight system: it's there, but it's not what you'd call fast. Now, how to approach this? I saw the direction in which the figure went, and I can easily keep the car between myself and that building. In addition to being invisible. Does it matter-? Agh! Annoying!
I drift up through the ground, the underside of the car suddenly being right there as my head pierces the asphalt. Drift up a little further, careful-. Someone ins-! No. Some body, tied to the passenger seat by the cord around their neck. Body still somewhat warm. Recent, then.
Not here for their house keys.
In most cities I'd inform the local police at once. In Hub… I think I'll leave it until we're done here. Without using a light or the ring I can't get a good view of their face… Given their approximate dimensions, there are any number of people on Hub City's missing persons list it could be. But the great thing about being dead is that your condition is unlikely to deteriorate.
I move around to the front of the car. This number plate hadn't been reported as stolen an hour ago, but if the owner was murdered when it was taken there's no reason to believe that it would have been.
I sigh. Nothing.
Okay, check the angle… Phase in, attach a tracking device to… The underside of the wheel arch. Tap twice to activate the molecular bonder, hold for a second… Done. It won't let us track the car, because if we can track it then so can anyone else with the right gear. Instead, it will respond to a particular sort of energy wave and give us its location when we choose to look for it. Safer, but less useful.
No point attaching a second. If they can find one, they can find two. If they can't find one, adding a second just increases the chance they'll find either of them. But… What now?
Were I a less enlightened Orange Lantern, I'd either be charging in or having some sort of episode trying to hold myself back. As it is, I'm… Confounded. There is no way for me to know the course of action most likely to keep the last thief alive. Assuming that was him. Assuming that he's in there. I would let him die if that was what it took to locate the ultimate perpetrator, but there's no guarantee that would work. Another body gets me no more information than I already have.
Tracking device on. The options are fall back and wait, or advance. And it's my decision. Yes, I could pass it on to Kaldur or Batman. I'd need to leave the area to do so, and there's the risk of detection… But any form of monitoring risks detection. And I'm well aware that I'm already verging on paranoia now, but… If they couldn't detect observation, what are the chances they could stop me? Heck, motivated like this I could simulate the parts of the brain that were collapsing as they collapsed and replace them when the effect ended. So: intervening it is.
Do I get extra help? I could retreat and call in… Who? Doctor Balewa and Angelica both have skills which I lack, but neither have specific knowledge of this case. And from the description in the team's reports, death happens quickly once the process begins. Something that matches my examination of the injury. John Fate might be similarly useful… Really, the time to call him in was when Mr Sage started driving, except there was no way to know this would actually lead to a contact and I'm sure that he's a very busy man.
Alright then. I'm going in, but I'm not going to rush things. I walk around the car-.
There's a note in the driver side window. Couldn't see it from the other side, but in the starlight I can just about make out the orange sigil drawn on it. Settles that question. I take a half-step away from the car and slide my rings back on, keeping my environmental shield to minimum. Immediately I regain the ability to see my surroundings. The person inside… Male, black, business-casual dress. As far as I can see the envelope is just paper. I can't see any poisons, electronics or arcane sigils.
Ring, scan the writing.
Compliance.
'To the Acolyte of Greed'
Close enough.
'What you seek is inside, and will be offered to you freely if you have the wit to take it. Come without fear.'
Lure or genuine offer?
Again, an imponderable. My presence in Hub City isn't a secret, but I can't know if they just put this here on the off-chance or if they actually know I'm here. Does luring me in actually get them anything? The sort of weapons that would be needed to successfully ambush me don't really care about precise relative locations. At most, it would buy them a fraction of a second. And it may be pride talking, but I'm increasingly dubious about my own worst imaginings.
Okay, going in. I raise my left hand towards Mr Sage's window and send 'going in' in Morse code ring flashes. Then I phase and drift towards the unit the car driver headed into. Not the front door, obviously. Assuming that the units were built according to a standard design I can go through the wall here and enter the neighbouring unit. Empty of anything concerning. I drift further in, heading towards the back of the building. Turn up empathic vision a little… Two people, both shot through with… Veins of black? One is otherwise fairly normal, while the colours in the other are translucent. Barely there at all. Something weird is going on, but frankly I've seen worse. And since they're not reacting I can assume they can't feel this.
Excellent.
Phased and invisible, I float through the wall behind them. The main lights are off, but there's a window letting in starlight and I can just about make their faces out. Karl Wilson, thirty seven, from Nebraska. Pale skin, orange hair and moustache, faint colours and not wearing any sort of concealing gear. Like the others, no significant criminal record. Almost certainly the thief. The other person is a bald mixed race woman with many scars and a number of facial piercings which would shock me if I hadn't met Raquel. I don't recognise her face. She's dressed in baggy trousers and a tube top, but it looks like it's a sports bra type thing rather than a normal garment. Something for exercising in. The other distinguishing items of clothing are the bandages wrapped around her forearms.
She… Reminds me of something. I'm not sure what. I've read so many comics -and League intelligence files- that… Well, they don't blur together, but there's a lot of very similar looking distinct things in my memory. Nothing about her triggers one specifically.
Oh well. I'll ask in a minute, when she'll want to give answers as much as I want to hear them. I could phase in and brand them both, but the displaced air might clue them in that I was there fast enough to trigger the suicide effect. Another approach. Record her face.
Compliance.
I float back through the wall, phase in, then send a filament underground in the direction of Mr Wilson. Tagging his foot is fine… Physically healthy. Nothing odd in his blood or bone or muscles… Or peripheral nervous system.
That black. Not as all-encompassing as Dark Druid, not as controlled as Ms Sackville. I could paralyse the woman right now, but… They both have the black. Could be sympathetic, magic or thought-activated… No, I need to purge them both at the same time.
Ring, filament to her as well, then brand.
Last edited:
- Location
- Lynn, MA
- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
wants, she'll want, or she will want
answers
RichardWhereat
Feanor did nothing wrong.
- Location
- Australia
The rot perhaps...
- Location
- Hampden Park
Thank you, corrected.
- Location
- U.S.
See, this is why the fact souls exist here is irritating. Sure, you get a fairly foolproof get-out-of-death-free card, but at the same time it prevents you from doing clever things like this to people who are already dead. It's... admittedly not a subject that modern science knows a ton about, but as far as anyone can tell, true informatic brain death occurs long after normal death in most cases.
With a tool as advanced as a power ring, you could even recover from partial loss/decay by just filling in the blanks as best as possible (with memory and personality loss in severe cases). Heck, if it weren't for all the people in this case specifically being brain scrambled Paul could probably revive them all.
But... no. Souls and shit. If your soul leaves you're dead-dead, because even if your brain is still alive it just stops working, even though it demonstrably does not need a soul at all to work. Fucking magic.
Think you might need the white lantern.
Except in the most literal sense of the word.
- Location
- Tampere
Odd how common forms of observation are not apparently detectable by magic. You would think that since sight, mirrors and lenses have been around for so long they would be part of the default protection package for magic users.
I kinda feel like the sitution should be the other way so that new or exotic forms of observation are the only ones that can be used safely against magicians.
I kinda feel like the sitution should be the other way so that new or exotic forms of observation are the only ones that can be used safely against magicians.
- Location
- Hampden Park
Research. The SI doesn't recognise her, but I thought that showing you might be helpful. He's mostly thinking of Sister Shard.
Such wards almost certainly do exist, but they're fairly impractical.
KillingYouNicely
I've seen things. They weren't really interesting.
- Location
- Australia
I'm just happy that Paul's started dragging his head out of his power ring's arse enough to remember that he has so many other abilities beyond scan and make constructs. Honestly, it's been getting rather annoying.
The Bushranger
In the Danger Zone
- Location
- TSAB Asura
When you have the ultimate hammer of hammering blessed by the holy hammer of hammeration, even if you also have every other tool in the Craftsman catalogue past present and future, you're gonna be preferentially using that hammer.
I suspect that's part of the problem; there's simply too many eyes (human and otherwise) and too many reflective surfaces. It probably wouldn't be hard to detect them; what would be hard is dealing with all the false alarms.
It's probably simpler to just turn outright invisible or use the "ignore me, I'm not here" spell Constantine used earlier in the story.
Plus, mirrors and lenses can be stopped by just keeping the curtains closed.
Lone Courier 6
Devilish Fool
- Location
- United States of Quests
Yeaaah, except i doubt Paul is capable of being a white lantern period, everything being tinted orange kinda throws off the balance
HogarthThree
Mostly Harmless
- Location
- USA
It seems to me the SI is not being sufficiently paranoid here, and should not have gone in.
He doesn't know how the thieves were mind controlled, so what makes him think that he is immune?
Yes, he is highly resistant to just about every form of attack that he has encountered so far, but he's just been telling himself that he doesn't know what he doesn't know.
I am officially worried.
He doesn't know how the thieves were mind controlled, so what makes him think that he is immune?
Yes, he is highly resistant to just about every form of attack that he has encountered so far, but he's just been telling himself that he doesn't know what he doesn't know.
I am officially worried.
Last edited:
- Location
- Germany
I really like this paranoid interplay of trying to out-guess the other party.
I do think OL should have sent up warning flares the moment he detected the black.
Does he have an automatic warning system build into his suits that notify someone if he losses consciousness or something?
I do think OL should have sent up warning flares the moment he detected the black.
Does he have an automatic warning system build into his suits that notify someone if he losses consciousness or something?
ThrawnCA
Carbon-based biped
- Location
- Australia
missing persons list
the chance they'll fine
the chance they'll find
pass it onto
pass it on to
actual get them
actually get them
The both have
They both have
If one wants to be sufficiently paranoid, this is a trap to get him to do exactly what he's doing based on someone running a predictive model of how he'd react.
If this is Black Lantern shenanigans (and the text color deal is leaning me that way) then OL running a filament and branding is creating a channel for the Black to infect him.
If this is Black Lantern shenanigans (and the text color deal is leaning me that way) then OL running a filament and branding is creating a channel for the Black to infect him.
Lets see, psychic resistance training, magical nullifying items, magical tattoos, and hell if they even actually use the soul and can get to his it happens to be composed of Orange. I'm having a difficult time here thinking of many things that can actually take over this guy without at least a decent warning or fight lol
- Location
- Hampden Park
He's seen black in normal people more often that in supervillains. Suicidal people -or anyone with suicidal thoughts- shows up as having black in them. Certain other sorts of thought processes show up that way as well. Given that he suspects at least one of them is a cultist, 'product of cult indoctrination' seems more likely than anything else.
No. He considered it, then decided that the difference between 'dead' and 'disabled' was so small that it wasn't worth worrying about. Anything that can disable him will either kill him immediately or have been disabled itself. If the former, there's minimal chance that anyone could get to him to retrieve him. If the latter, he'll almost certainly be able to fix himself before anyone else could.
Thank you, corrected.
- Status