Life Ore Death - DC Feruchemy [Young Justice]

[BRBonobo]

Omake: Unraveling

I was reading The Cycle of Deicide, and I was a bit inspired by the idea that Wheel of Time is a little like Scadrial if Preservation had a total victory. Without Ruin, nothing ever really changes. Renka, as a shard of Ruin, could do a lot to shove the pattern off of it's course. I wrote a little omake of Renka showing up in the middle of the Seanchan Empire in The Wheel of Time. I figure she is going to be trouble in an empire run by slavery and control via torture collars. This is a little snippet where she is sneaking into the palace, when she comes across Semirhage torturing the Empress to death and intervenes.

-=-=-=-=-

The Wheel of Time turns, and Ages come and pass, leaving memories that become legend. Legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth comes again. In one Age, called the Third Age by some, an Age yet to come, An Age long pasT, a wind rose in the Mountains of Mist. The wind was NOT the beginning. There are neither bnnings _or ENDINGS to the rnng of the Wheel of Time. But it w-s-- It was the winds that weathered, the storms that broke, the timeless waves running slowly, slowly, slowly, to a stop as the sun and the planet cooled to nothing.
...Must not all things, even worlds, someday end?

--------
Fortuona Athaem Devi Paendrag, Daughter of the Nine Moons, Heir to the Crystal Throne, Hope of Seanchan, by Luthair and The Light, protector of the realms and territories.
Your servant in all things Suroth Sabelle Meldarath High Lady of Asinbayar and Barsabba.
I write Your Imperial Highness with grave and tragic tidings…

--------
Derain was having a terrible day. He was in The Empress's bedchamber, which was currently occupied by two dead women. Finding the soe'feia, Anath Dorje, dead and mutilated would be a nightmare on any other day. She was So'jhin to the Daughter of the Nine Moons, and had recently returned to Seandar bearing news of the campaign in the Old Empire. Her death, so soon after that of the previous Truthsayer, would cause upheaval, and many of the Deathwatch would die after such a failure; and yet, it was the other body that drew his focus. Laid upon the bed was the Empress Radhanan herself.

Even in death, her features were twisted into a rictus of pain and terror. Her body was laid out as though sleeping, relaxed and loose, but her face showed that her death had not been easy. Deep crimson pools had formed on her dark cheeks where blood had run from her staring eyes, and the white pillow beneath her braided head was stained where blood had flowed from her ears.

A cleared throat brought his attention to his right.

"Report, Lieutenant."

The officer bowed low, before beginning.

"It appears that The Empress died first. There are signs of torture, but not of a struggle, suggesting that Her Majesty was restrained. There are no signs of rope being used, nor marks on the wrists or ankles, suggesting that there was a damane used in the commision of the act.

"The soe'feia died some two hours later, and in a very different manner. She appears to have fought her attacker, and signs point to her use of Power in her defense, as shown by the razor-thin cuts and scorch marks on the walls. I can only conclude that she was somehow a secret uncollared damane."

Derain hissed through his teeth in shock. Taking a cautious step away from the body of the former seer.

"Damane!?"

"Yes, General. We have no idea how she was able to slip through our detection and get into a position so close to The Blood, but I fear she may have been an enemy agent. It is unclear if she was responsible for Her Majesty's death, or if her mysterious attacker was. There is some evidence that the attacker was making a statement."

"This just gets worse and worse Lieutenant. What makes you say that?"

"This sir." He said pointing to a trail of dirt on the floor.

On second sight, it wasn't dirt, but rather dark ash, forming a strange symbol.



"It seems that a tin wedge was driven into the forehead, followed shortly by an iron nail into the heart. For an unknown reason, this did not kill her immediately."

"What?"

"Just so sir. From what our investigating Sul'Dam tell us, she went still at that point, and the attacker continued to mutilate the body for some time before she died.

In addition to the two pieces of metal left in the corpse, there were several more wounds matching these two but for the nails having been taken back out, and none of these nails were found on site except for this one."

The Lieutenant pointed to a burned part of the room. A puddle of greenish metal with brass highlights seemed to have burned through the floor and settled in a small hole.

"They tell me that this was another nail, this one aluminum with a bit of copper mixed in. It was driven into the top of the skull, then removed and melted down. There was no source for the heat, so there must have been another damane here.

"Finally, one nail was stabbed into each finger, and one into each palm, before being removed."

"Well, Lieutenant, let's not pretend we don't know who this was. We've both seen that symbol before, when the watch arrives to find broken Sul'dam and missing damane or da'covale, a'dam lying next to the mark of ash. They are beginning to call it Unraveler, for the way it unmakes the a'dams and leaves powerless remnants behind."

"Yes sir. I hear that someone finally heard it speak, just before it fled the scene of another one.

"A guard yelled out to it, 'We have you now! You're done!'

"It said, 'Nothing is truly complete until the day it is finally destroyed.' And disappeared into the fog."

-=-=-=-=-

Renka has gone a bit off the deep end even before she stole channeling and knowledge from a Forsaken. She also removed Semirhage's connection to the dark one with duralumin hemalurgy, and then melted the hemalurgic spike into slag.

 

[Obloquy]

Dear Readers,

I enjoyed writing these and they helped me break some nasty writer's blocks, but with my evolving understanding of the story, plot, and characters as I continue to write Life Ore Death over time, I have had to remove some of these from LOD canon.

To avoid spoilers, I'm not going to tell you which ones no longer apply, or why, but you'll find out more as the story progresses.

I'll keep these posts Preserved for posterity, so you can still reference/read them if you want, but they're no longer 100% accurate to LOD.

Batman Facts!​

1. Other than changes in his parents' histories (due to JSA activity, etc.), the main detail that separates Earth-16 Bruce Wayne from the majority of his counterparts is his impatience to become the Bat, and the consequences thereof. Most iterations of Bruce Wayne's Identity first become Batman between the ages of 23-26, after having spent the past 5-8 years traveling the world to train and prepare. On Earth-16, Bruce Wayne also spent several years training to prepare for becoming Batman, but he started at the far younger age of 21.

Brucie cannot, for instance, believably be a total moron at social events; it is a matter of public record that he attained his high school diploma at age 16 and then sought emancipation (which freed him up to begin traveling the world to train). Instead, he plays the Drunken Dunce.

An established "fact" of Gotham Society is that Brucie is an alcoholic. A highly functioning one, yes, but an alcoholic all the same, often carrying a hip flask from which he sips throughout the day. It is only at parties that he downs drinks rapidly and "lets himself go," resulting in tongue-tied mistakes, moronic comments, and sad statements from his "friends" of how pitiable it is but, but understandable, and aren't there worse vices?


2. While he is not alcoholic, Bruce did, arguably, abuse steroid treatments throughout his adolescence. His mother was fit from her training, but slender, and Thomas Wayne was not a large man. Bruce figured that strength and size would benefit The Mission. He self-medicated with carefully calculated hormone and nutritional supplements through his teen years, on top of working out and exercising fanatically. He disguised the doses by emptying out One-A-Day vitamin bottles and replacing the contents; Alfred is deeply ashamed of having never caught on.

Since becoming an adult, he's taken to not hiding it (from Alfred), and switched formulas to include more precise and better qualities of chemicals with his periodic injections of antitoxins to Smilex, Fear Gas, Ivy's Enthrallers, etc.

However, Bruce has absolutely forbidden Dick from doing the same thing before hitting adulthood. His own life is one thing, but Bruce Wayne will not risk his ward's health with that drug regimen, no matter the benefits to fighting crime.


3. As for the aforementioned details in his parents' histories… Clark Kent, stung by the Jor-El AI's words, once asked Bruce how he reconciled being the violent vigilante son of two philanthropic pacifists. Bruce asked how Clark kept his job as a reporter, if that type of ham-handed inquisition was Clark's version of background research. (The burgeoning fight fizzled out when Diana cut in and reprimanded Bruce, saying he had no cause to complain about Clark respecting his privacy and only asking for what information Bruce was willing to share.)

Bruce answered Clark, in the end, with the observation that while everyone remembered both parents' generous philanthropy and his father's career as a surgeon, they tended to forget what his mother was busy with before she settled down to get married in 1973, at age 30.

Martha Wayne née Kane (1942-1986) was an alumnus of West Point's second ever co-ed class, and a Vietnam veteran. She was Bruce's first teacher in martial arts, and in the mornings he still practices a wake-up routine she taught him. Before Batman, Bruce had considered fighting evil by following in her footsteps, but his distaste for guns - and the contents of her personal journals - persuaded him otherwise.


4. Bruce Wayne believes in magic and the supernatural, and has always done so due to the overwhelming historic evidence, such as WWII records of Doctor Fate in the JSA. While he does not practice them, he is well-informed enough to recognize when a threat may be of mystic origin and take the appropriate precautions. He originally sought to study under Zatara for the man's escapology skills, but when he learned the man possessed genuine mystic powers as well he nearly dove into basic arcane studies. He does not practice it because the of Monkey's Paw concern.

Bruce has run the numbers. It is far from a precise art, but at age 25 his life contained a statistically significant number of unlikely co-incidences: a familiarity with Selina Kyle long before she became Catwoman; how quickly Bruce caught the attention of Ra's al Ghul despite his incomplete training in the Shadows; and connections between others in his life as Bruce who would become significant for separate reasons to Batman.

Bruce is not religious and - despite his father's lapsed Catholicism and his mother's Reform Judaism - he does not worship the God of Abraham, though he acknowledges that there is some significant "supernatural" energy behind artifacts like the Spear of Destiny. He has, however, run the numbers. There is some supernatural force interfering with his life - there are statistically too many coincidences for there not to be - and if he ever isolates its existence and identity, he fully intends to make it wish he were merciful enough to kill.


5. While he drinks enough to acquire a trained palate and a healthy immunity to alcohol's effects, his alcoholism is carefully faked through sleight of hand and suggestion. Bruce Wayne's tendency to sleep around, however, is not. His self-medication as a teen came with increased hormonal responses as a side-effect; development of his mental discipline and physical fitness were aided by his desire to not be a slavering horn-dog.

He lost his virginity a few months before he turned 15, he had a pregnancy scare with his then-girlfriend the month he turned 16, and he abstained for almost all of his time traveling abroad, because so many of the women he met were poor enough that he'd be taking advantage of them. Since his return to Gotham, he has used at least two types of prophylactics per encounter, and he has religiously made clear with each date - ahead of time, and while they were both wholly sober - exactly how far their activities that night would potentially go.

He did not anticipate having children as Batman, but was not originally averse to the idea; it was only after Poison Ivy appeared in Gotham that Bruce had a vasectomy, unwilling to risk how close he had come to falling under her control. He plans to discuss having it reversed with his wife, if he ever weds, but short of that he had long given up on parenthood until the day Dick Grayson entered his life.


6. Bruce first knew Andrea Beaumont through his cousin, Kate, as they met at her 11th birthday party. They weren't especially close, at the start, but grew closer in high school as she - being a bit older than him - was willing to help him in his summer school classes and advanced studies.

Andrea was one of the people he subtly bounced ideas off of in developing how he would pursue The Mission as an adult; she was also his first introduction to the extra-normal aspects of Earth, privately coming out to him as a closeted meta-human capable of short-range teleportation.

They broke up when her father fled the country, unable to sustain a long-distance relationship, but Bruce bought a ring shortly after he and she returned to Gotham. Had she been willing to forgo her revenge… As it is, he tries not to dare to hope. (It's hard not to hope: she let Joker live because he was too crazy to be accountable. If she'd only stick around and stop killing people, he would happily cover it all up to protect her.)


7. Bruce met Selina Kyle when he was 14, although she never met Bruce Wayne until after he became Batman. Instead, it was "Matches" Malone she knew first, after he strolled into and joined Wildcat's gym, where she was doing laundry & janitorial duties. Ted Grant taught Matches basic boxing, but Selina was the one who introduced him to street-fighting when she beat him with a handful of chalk dust thrown in his eyes.

He challenged her to a rematch (including an obligatory "re-Matches" joke corny enough to make her wheeze with laughter) on the condition that it be a fair fight, with the stakes that the winner bought dinner for the loser. He threw the fight for a date with her, and they grew closer over the three months she worked at the gym before she pulled up her stakes and vanished to home. When they met again as adults, Bruce recognized both her manner, and her mild kleptomania. In the painful aftermath of losing Andrea, he pulled out every technique he had to charm her.

She never committed to him, not in either identity, but they've had a few flings over the years, which has contributed to Batman's slightly less than zealous pursuit of Catwoman. He's certain she doesn't know the truth about him, and while he has a ring that would fit her finger, he can't trust her enough to tell her his secret; Bruce knows she won't stop committing crimes for him because she doesn't need to in the first place. Selina steals because she wants to, and his only hope is that she will one day realize why theft is wrong, even from the rich.


8. Talia is the only one of the three who is younger than him, assuming she was honest about her chronological age. Bruce believes her to be honest, though. That is a fundamental part of their relationship: in a world where he deals regularly with many of Gotham's filthiest crimes, Bruce Wayne can still believe that Talia al Ghul is a fundamentally good person; he can hardly fault her for loving her father so dearly.

He considers it a case of, "Love alone isn't enough," but he will always leave the door open for her; even after the end of their relationship, he programmed the DNA sniffers to lower other security features for her, should she try to enter the Bat-cave. Talia was in her mid-teens when Bruce began training with the Shadows; Master Duvall's unexpected decree that he would supervise his students' first kills was what brought things to a head. Bruce planned to refuse and dared to obliquely confide in Talia. She secretly had the prisoners they were to kill released.

Duvall found out. When the fight was over, and the other 5 students rendered unconscious, Duvall told Talia that their father would not be informed, and arranged for Bruce to study under Elijah Snow. It was not until a few years later that Bruce and Talia met again, when she accompanied Ra's on his mission to investigate the failed operations in Gotham, only to recognize Bruce. He has a ring for her as well, kept with the other two, but despite his hope that Talia will eventually find the strength to leave Ra's, he isn't sure he will live long enough to see it.


9. For the first few years of his career, Bruce had a complex about accepting the World's Greatest Detective title Old Man Snow had said was his to use. Despite his investigative success, even Ra's began addressing him as "Detective" before Bruce could privately admit to himself that he was. The personal turning point, where Bruce acknowledged his own abilities in the matter, came in 2007.

The exact details of the case shall remain lost to other minds for the moment, but once Bruce could pride himself on unraveling the intricacies of a past event that had been retconned out of existence via time-travel, then he could confidently call himself the World's Greatest Detective.


10. "Insane (adj): being in a state of mind which prevents normal perception, behavior, or social interaction."

Massive emotional trauma as a child leading to aberrant behavior as an adult? Bruce Wayne fits the bill, and he knows it.

Among other things, he can lie through his emotions without a flinch and declare his drunken devotion to any particular date of an evening, but Bruce cannot say "I love you," to Dick at all easily, despite his ward prefacing almost every evening's "good night" with those sacred words.

In many ways, he considers Batman "the ultimate failure," rather than a wonderful accomplishment. Bruce has to watch people he doesn't deserve to care about suffer, because they care more for him than he deserves and he makes them watch him kill himself day by day by day. Worse, every time he looks at someone he cares about, his training has him cataloguing how he could take them down, lethally or otherwise. His meditation techniques help him clear his mind of that as well, but it's become a habit with him, and one more horrible cost he has to live with.

Even so, there are some days - when he's training or patrolling with Robin, when he sits down for an hour with Diana and Clark, when he sees a criminal brought to justice or a victim brought closure or a person who's turned their life around - when he feels, however briefly, happy.

Bruce knows he does not deserve to be happy, but he allows him to enjoy it while it lasts all the same, because the people who love him don't suffer to suffer through seeing more of his self-flagellation. He has made a difference, and while he will never be at peace with it, precisely… what's well begun is half done, and he considers this an acceptable beginning, no matter that he will still try to improve upon it.

 

[Obloquy]

Dear Readers,

I enjoyed writing these and they helped me break some nasty writer's blocks, but with my evolving understanding of the story, plot, and characters as I continue to write Life Ore Death over time, I have had to remove some of these from LOD canon.

To avoid spoilers, I'm not going to tell you which ones no longer apply, or why, but you'll find out more as the story progresses.

I'll keep these posts Preserved for posterity, so you can still reference/read them if you want, but they're no longer 100% accurate to LOD.

​

Superman Facts!​

1. Kal-El of Earth-16 né Krypton-16 is separated from many of his alternate iterations in a few important ways, most prominent of which are that he is less pressured to be perfect, and less lonely. The existence of martians has been public knowledge since Ma and Pa Kent were in their early twenties, before they even met, much less married. Clark Kent grew up on Earth-16 grew up aware that he was strange even before he learned that he was an alien, but J'onn had been publicly active for over a decade by the time Clark's spacecraft brought him to Earth.

After he learned of his heritage from Ma and Pa, and the basic recorded message sent along in his spaceship, he briefly tried to contact Martian Manhunter, only for the "out" alien to have returned to Mars for a visit. By the time J'onn returned, Clark had already begun his adventures as Superman, and was a bit too busy to seek the Martian out again. Still, as he was growing up, he knew he was not alone in his unusualness, and so many of the people before him were great heroes like the JSA and All-Star Squadron. Is it any wonder that he chose to put on a colorful cape and tights as an adult? (Yes, Ma made the first outfit he wore. Others followed her design but came from the Fortress.)


2. He does not wear his underwear on the outside; Clark keeps his undergarments on when he changes into his Superman outfit, although the red briefs are made for modesty. The speedo look-a-likes adhere to the shirt and pants hems of his uniform's parts, keeping them from separating so that he doesn't flash his belly button around town. They're also lined with lead, because he kept getting embarrassed when he looked at himself with x-ray vision, and they prevent an inconvenient blood-flow problem from distracting him by making it unnoticeable.

…Also, if people are making fun of him for the look, then they're too busy laughing to be afraid of the flying, invulnerable, super-strong alien.

Clark is a bit embarrassed that he hadn't thought of it like that; Bruce had assumed it was the reason for his outfit from the moment he started wearing them (which wasn't until two months into his adventures; the shorts were added on to address the aforementioned issues).


3. Lex Luthor likes to style himself the only man to make Superman bleed, or at least the first. Superman hasn't quite had the whatever necessary to tell Luthor that two people beat him to it.

The first person to make Clark bleed was Kenneth Braverman, when they were in school. One winter, bitter that Clark had outdone him on the Smallville Tigers, Kenny got some friends to help him pelt Clark, using snowballs he made with rocks.

Some of these rocks were meteor shower shards, containing Kryptonite, though no one knew it at the time. Clark got a cut on his brow and collapsed from kryptonite exposure, much to the terror of Lana and several unknowing participants. Ma cursed herself a fool as she drove to the hospital, having never gotten clark's biology too closely tested for fear of his situation being discovered; she'd gotten him an exemption from vaccinations because she knew the needles would never pierce his skin. As it was, he recovered pretty quickly and wasn't outed.


4. The other person who beat Lex to making the Man of Steel bleed red is Diana. She was the first fellow 'flying brick' he had encountered in his lifetime, so between helping organize this Justice League thing they were starting together and talking to J'onn and Hal about everything alien he could conceive of asking them, he found time to ask Diana for a match.

He came off as just a little too cocky when he issued the challenge, and he paid for it: Wonder Woman flattened him, and he included a split lip and broken nose in his list of injuries suffered by the end of it. She apologized for her bit of temper, and Clark said that if she'd show up to meet his Ma, Martha Kent being a tremendous fan, all would be forgiven and then some.


5. Superman's sun-fueled powers arrived in batches as he grew up. He was always invulnerable and strong for his age/size, but those traits have been gradually increasing each year as he grows older and is more exposed to sunlight. His skin would repel needles as of weeks after he arrived, but he wasn't tough enough to survive a theoretical hit-and run until age 7, and while Wonder Woman could bloody his nose with her bare hands in 2003, she lost the ability to overwhelm his resilience sometime around 2007.

His senses were the next things to be altered, around the onset of puberty. It started with sharper hearing, and then he learned that he could squint or let his eyes unfocus, and he'd be able to see things differently. (No, he did not use his x-ray vision to peek on (girls) people, and never even tried; x-rays meant he was only seeing vague outlines of flesh around their skeletons anyway, so he didn't feel guilty about accidents.)

His heat vision was what arrived next, just after he graduated high school and spent that summer working in the fields every day. Heat vision is also his least favorite power to use. Not only is it a little too destructive, but over use can leave him exhausted, irritable, and comparatively weak. A medical work-up had Bruce and his AI at the Fortress agree: it was because he was expending the stored reserves of solar energy used to fuel his powers in large amounts. If he theoretically used it and stayed out of the yellow sun, he'd drop to baseline human level.

Flight was the last of his powers to arrive, and he didn't learn to fly until after his first year of being Superman. Prior to then, Clark could only leap tall buildings in a single bound, which is why Earth-16 has that phrase about him in the first place.


6. His favorite board game is SORRY, which he claims is unrelated to his skills at making innuendo and vague insults with a straight face (he's lying). His favorite card game was War, because if he accidentally looked through the cards it made no difference to the outcome and wasn't cheating. He hasn't played much since he got better control over his eyes, but he has played Uno with a bunch of kids during his hospital visits, and he's become very fond of it. They all laugh at the opportunity to Skip Superman or make him Draw 2, and he loves to play it up.

Growing up, when he wasn't helping out on the farm, Clark acted in several school plays (at Ma's insistence that he needed to learn how to act in case people got suspicious) and played on a baseball team, the Tigers. The latter and former helped perfect his "Clumsy Kent" routine.

Clark played on the Tigers even though his strength gave him an unfair advantage, because he was not quite moral enough to not enjoy some benefits of being him, but it also gave him the chance to practice being careful. He could hit the ball pretty safely provided he didn't swing to hard, but it was dangerous for him to try throwing anything in the heat of the moment; instead, he single-handedly scored more people out than any three other players on the team, mostly by catching the balls before they hit the ground, hiding the subtle use of his powers.


7. He knows… quite a lot about Krypton, albeit all 2nd hand. The base of what would become the Fortress of Solitude were included in the rocket that brought Kal-El to Earth, along with an AI patterned off of Jor-El, who gave him access to stored data. (For a comparison, this data container was about a 6 inch radius prism with mostly hexagonal sides. Think of how much humans can store on jump drives, or video game chips, and then remember that Krypton was a century or more ahead of Earth. Yeah. He needed Green Lantern's help to set it up, though.)

On top of all that, not long after the Justice League was formed - while they were still installing everything after hollowing out Mt. Justice, even - Hal took Superman to Oa, where he formally applied for access to the Guardians' non-restricted files on his home planet, which they granted, as well as allowing him to interview Lantern Tomar Re of 2813.

While good things came of the meeting, it also broke the Last Son of Krypton's heart further to learn that not only was Krypton gone, but its sister planet Argon had been razed to a cinder by means unknown, while the other two inhabited planets of the Rao system, Dheron and Thoron, had declared a Cloistered War as per their Green Lantern Corps treaties, meaning they could not visit either world.


8. More than Lex Luthor, Mxyzptlk, the Lord Superman alternate who makes his head hurt to think about, or any other, it was Jor-El himself who came closest to making Clark Kent hang up his cape. Suffice it to say, the AI remnants of the scientist was incredibly unimpressed by Kal-El's activities as Superman.

To its eyes, the equivalent on Krypton would be Clark either serving as a foot soldier in the military (fighting crime), or acting out as a criminal (illegal vigilante). The AI Jor-El's scathing evaluation of Kal-El wasting his life gave Clark Kent a severe crisis of conscience, and he had to ask Bruce and Diana for aid in reconciling the points and providing counter-arguments.

This conversation, among many other things, was part of why Earth-16's League moved to secure a UN Charter for their operations, as that level of formal authority satisfied many of the AI's arguments. It still isn't happy about the violence, but those results speak for themselves.


9. Superman does still need to eat and breathe… but it's possible he needs to less than he used to. Clark isn't sure, and doesn't quite want to find out, for fear of feeling even less human than he already does. He can hold his breath for more than an hour in outer space (he can fly unaided to the Watchtower), but not underwater; with the former lacking an atmosphere that reflects some of the yellow sun's rays, while the latter lacks as much light, this makes sense to him, and he's never tested if going further from a sun has an effect. (Ferris will change that.)

His sense of touch functions like a normal person's, and his skin feels normal unless someone applies sufficient pressure across a certain area (such as fingernails). Caffeine can affect him if he's under a red sun, but not with his powers active, and it tastes inexplicably foul to him. His sense of taste can't distinguish between sourness and salt, and alcohol won't affect him at all, but tryptophan can get him pleasantly high. Lastly, cinnamon will give him a sugar rush, while white sugar has only a fraction of its effect on humans; brown sugar still works fine for him.

The drug Venom will make him break out in hives on contact, aspirin or anything with willow bark will give him a runny nose, and a dose of Vitamin A might give him migraines without his powers, but just makes his eyes itch with them; that last one isn't unique to Kryptonians, but is symptomatic of a neurological condition he inherited from his mother. Other than that, he treats most foods and medicines normally, and Clark happens to be immune to most diseases on Earth (which is good, as he's never received inoculations).


10. Despite a number of suggestions, Superman has refused to take boxing lessons, citing the fact that anything not going down when he hits hard as is won't go down more easily by hitting it harder. He has, however, learned wrestling from Diana, to better use his strength safely on fragile foes through the application of pins, holds, and joint locks. Clark has also taken some supplementary skill lessons from Bruce, including in public speaking, investigation, pratfalls, and disguises (because if someone slugs Clark Kent, Clark will need a black eye for a few days).

Clark also refuses to look too closely into ways to evade his kryptonite weakness, other than a clunky and obvious hazmat suit. Krypton had personal radiation shields (not keyed to Kryptonite, because the planet hadn't exploded yet, but still), but precisely because of his power, Clark believes it important for Superman to still have weaknesses. He gave Batman access to Kryptonite for a reason, and until perfect defenses against mind-control are discovered he wants to have insurance. If that means Superman might be taken down… well, he has always been willing to lay his life down in the name of his principles. Why should he think of this as any different?

 

[Obloquy]

Life Ore Death​

** Episode 44 ___ More Than a garage Sale

* June 19 [Superman PoV]

When we had discussed my doubts about her proposed approach to the situation, Renka had suggested that I take some time to think about trust, what it meant, and what it meant to the people I trusted. 'I could give you a lecture on what it means to me,' she had said, 'but my advice is a coin-toss, I think. Ask the people you trust about whom they trust, and see if they agree with me.' So I had.

It hadn't been as straightforward as either of us had expected:

Lois was a snoop and naturally suspicious; her career was built on not taking people at their word

Jimmy had been a bit busy packing and preparing to leave, so he hadn't had time to really think it through before answering

I'd caught Conner at a bad time; he irately turned it back on me, about my not trusting him, before rushing off

Snapper had been apologetically busy, but grimly reminded me of when he'd been trusted with the League's secrecy

Dan Turpin had been busy, but identified himself as naturally suspicious, and too often proven right

Bruce and Diana… I knew well enough what they would say, and they had more important things to do than helping me

Ma & Pa had lived for years in fear of some spook taking me away to cut me open, so they knew a lot about not trusting the government

'But Pa still gave me the best idea I've heard about it,' I reflected as I waited for our guests by the Zetas. The briefcase Renka had given to me—to dispense with according to her idea or not as I believed best—sat heavy in my hand despite my super-strength.

On Pa's advice, I'd gone online and run a search about TRUST to see what rang true with me. It gave… mixed results.


A single lie discovered is enough to create doubt in every truth expressed. The thing is, even I've lied about things, like my identity.

Life is full of fake people! Trust no one. That was what Bruce would preach, even if he didn't and couldn't wholly practice it.

I find it hard to trust when all you have from the past is evidence to why you shouldn't. Bruce again, if I made him justify himself, I bet.

Earn trust, earn trust, earn trust, and then you can worry about the rest. But I had been earning trust since 1998. When would it end?

Never lie to someone who trusts you, and never trust anyone who lies to you. Never? This one made me feel guilty, too judgmental.

A man who does not trust enough will not be trusted. Better, but that put the burden on me. Should it be? Have they trusted me?

Trusting someone is my decision. Proving me right is their choice. It was ultimate summation of my current conundrum…

I find it hard to trust, and people often ask me why. I ask them why is it so hard to keep a promise. An apt descriptor for Bruce, again.

Once you choose to trust the people in your life, they will feel and act more trustworthy. Yet so many people hadn't in my past.

Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God. I believe, yes, but 'God helps those who help themselves,' right?



Xenophobia doesn't benefit anyone unless you're playing high-stakes Scrabble. That quote had at least made me laugh amid all of this.



Don't believe what you see! Even salt looks like sugar. I saw far more truth there than I was comfortable with, but still….

I call it love, to give another the power to destroy you, and trust them not to. I believed that. I trusted Diana, Bruce, J'onn, Barry….

Something I learned about people… if they do it once, they'll do it again. I disagreed with this. People can change. They do change.

The best place to find a helping hand is at the end of your own arm. Trust yourself! But could I, when I could do so much harm?

Relationships are about trust. If you have to play detective, it's time to move on. Was I doing that here, watching them? But then, Lois….

Untrustworthy people want to drag you down to their level. If you know any, use them as an example of how not to behave. Bruce….

Saying "sorry" works with mistakes, but not with broken trust, because forgiving is easy, but forgetting may be almost impossible. ….

The people when rightly and fully trusted will return that trust. –Abraham Lincoln


The thought of that last quote, the one attributed to Lincoln, made me think of Icon. He had lived through the Civil War, and Jim Crow, and the Civil Rights movement; all the while, he was not only identified as colored, but he was also secretly an alien fearing discovery.

I'd told him what we were doing, obviously, and my reservations about it, but while he'd agreed to come with me for this meeting, and the plan, I was only now realizing that he hadn't exactly expressed his opinions about it. 'He deserves more respect than that,' I resolved.

"Arnus," I asked, turning to him, "do you believe we're doing the right thing? There's a tremendous risk if these are misused….?"

He shifted slightly. "Truth be told, Kal-El, with the stories I've heard about Ferris, I wonder if this is a bit of a scam," he admitted.

"A scam?" 'I don't think she…' "Of who, and how, exactly?"

"To my understanding," Icon answered, "the government already had the pieces for this x-ionization process, and some weapons made with them, after the arrested Wade Eiling and confiscated his supplies. The government already had a small supply of weaponry and armor capable of cutting you, or myself, or Wonder Woman. What are they going to cut with these that they couldn't cut already? If they didn't need Ferris for some part of the x-ionization process, then they didn't really need her help at all, because x-ionized adamantium-,"

<Recognized-, > the Zeta network chimed as our guests arrived.

"-will cut you as sharply as iron would," Icon finished, and the two of us strode forward to meet our guests.

I felt a bit awkward about them, about working with these specific people, but I could also see the reasoning here….

"General Lane, Warden Waller," I greeted with a nod. "I'm sorry to take you away from your families on Father's Day, but-,"

"We wanted to discuss the exchange as soon as possible, yes," Sam Lane interrupted gruffly, but at least he still shook my hand.

Waller, shaking Icon's hand, told him, "You are not the black, planetary immigrant hero I was expecting to see today. Amanda Waller."

"Arnus, of the Terminian race," he replied. "There was an unreported attack back on Thursday, when one group of the raiders tried to pillage Superman's home base." I didn't quite squirm at the familiar falsehood, but I hoped it wouldn't set the tone for this situation; I'd asked Arnus along because he was experienced and unbiased, after all. "Ferris subdued them, and she's gone to Thanagar to testify about it to the Thanagarian government. While we're on a roll," Icon invited drily, "might as well get any other commentary out of the way."

Waller and Lane shared a look, which I hoped was a good sign. 'They're both controlled enough that I can't tell with my senses. Still....'

"Dare I ask about how much this place cost?" Waller asked drily, motioning around the Watchtower.

"Or whether you have immigration papers?" General Lane added with a less than serious snort.

"The Green Lantern Corps donated a decommissioned outpost base after the events that led to Star Sapphire's rehabilitation," I summarized, sharing my own look with Icon. "A few League members provided the decorations out of our own pockets and spare time."

"As for papers, I got mine with my freedom in eighteen sixty-five, same as the rest of the plantation slaves," Icon added. I could tell from the slight starts both gave that they hadn't expected his answer, but I believed that they believed him. "I've been here a while, General."

"Maybe we should find some seats," I offered as they processed that. "This way?"

The four of us filed into a meeting room and sat.

Pleasantries concluded, we settled in to do business.

"Is that them?" Waller inquired; Sam Lane outranked her, but he seemed willing to let her do the talking here.

"Yes." I put the case on the table, opened it, and flipped it around. "Eight knives of x-ionized adamantine. May I demonstrate?"

"Please do." I'm not sure what Waller expected me to demonstrate with, but I didn't have an issue touching the tip to the back of my hand and drawing blood. It was sort of refreshing, in a way; I was feeling things without kryptonite or Red Sunlight Exhaustion to hurt me.

'Even pain is a feeling, and as valid as any other,' I reflected, flexing my fingers so that my skin pulled at the small cut.

"They work on more than Kryptonians," Icon added, drawing blood from his own skin with a second box-cutter knife.

I sanitized both blades with my heat vision, and we put them back in the case.

"There are also the other metal samples, as Ferris mentioned," I noted, gesturing vaguely at the ingots she had procured.

"Yes." Waller was frowning slightly. "Ferris never named a specific price for selling these to the government. Has the Justice League come up with one to negotiate about?"

"First, if you don't mind," Lane interrupted, "I'd like to know how many other knives there are in this style. I saw serial numbers…?"

"Ferris asked the developer to include serial numbers for easier tracking; as you can imagine no one wants these weapons to get into the wrong hands. If they are misused, we will be able to track where the leak was." I took the last knife in the line-up and extended it.

Then, with more effort than it should have taken me, I handed it, handle first, to Warden Waller.

"Sixteen," she noted, reading the Roman numerals XVI.

"There would be seventeen," I admitted, "but her proof-of-concept model ended up being… destruct tested, let's say." We had agreed to leave out its interactions with Nth metal until she had reported it to Thanagar's government. "Offering you half of the sixteen seems reasonable to me." 'I certainly can't imagine what you'd want to do with more than two or three, if not use them on me, Diana, Icon….'

"That assumes we decide to buy all eight," General Lane commented. I couldn't believe that he would pass up a chance at a weapon able to hurt me, but it might have been a matter of the potential, yet undecided price.

'That, and what she said….'

"Renka said something that has stuck with me, when she first proposed this," I began. "She said that we – everyone in this room, I presume, and our allies – we all want the same thing. We want the world safe for good people to live, free and happy, without fear of coming to harm from those with evil intentions. It was reminiscent of something I, in turn, had said to her some time ago: while it is far from the greatest difference between us, one important difference between heroes and villains is the matter of what each would do without the other.

"In a world with no heroes, no warriors, no champions or law enforcement," I continued, and I could see them watching me, thinking about what I had to say, and it gave me hope, "the criminals and super-villains would take over, running wild and abusing innocents with abandon to gain from it, or vent their rage and envy. On the other hand, in a world where all crime and criminals had disappeared, the majority of us would just… stop, or so I imagine. Oh, I might do disaster relief, and supplies delivers, and public awareness campaigns, but there would be no need to continue fighting when I didn't need to protect anyone. Fighting for its own sake is violence, and that's not who I am. I imagine you two are much the same: when dangers rears its head, we can buckle down and get to serious business, but at the end of the day, we want to go home, have dinner with our families, talk about our days and spend time together.

"Because of my powers, General, Warden, you've previously believed that I might threaten that some day. I… can't entirely blame you," I admitted. "Not long after Batman and I met each other, I gave him a sample of Kryptonite, to use against me if it was ever necessary.

"Six months ago," I finished, my voice harder, "it was nearly necessary. The same cabal of super-villains responsible for the Disappearance Disaster put into action a plan that mind-controlled most of the Justice League, as well as affiliates, and members of the JSA. Our partners, many of who are still children, risked life and limb to save us, and to save the world from us before the Light turned us loose on innocent people. We still don't know what half-a-dozen of the Justice League, myself included, were sent to do for sixteen hours before they called us back. If Savage had turned us on the cities of the world in those hours, there could have been millions of casualties."

With that said, I pushed the case across the table to the two of them. Both looked 'befuzzled,' as Ma would put it. I nodded to Icon.

"Are you seriously giving us these for free?" Waller wondered skeptically.

"No," Icon said, "but the exact price is not important. What is important is this: we now have a common enemy in the Light, whom we know seek to throw the world into chaos and endanger all the people we love for their personal gain." He produced two pens, and two sheets of paper. "What we want from you is not a legal contract bound to exact letters, terms and phrases. We want an alliance of principles.

"If you want to leave here with everything Ferris prepared for you, all you have to do is sign for it; write that you intend to use these to protect innocent lives, that you take responsibility for keeping them from misuse, and that you will cooperate with us and repay us within reason in the future. Then sign your names, and you can go."

"That won't be legally binding," Waller said skeptically, but she took the pen.

I knew it wasn't what she was thinking about, but my frustration welled up again; I dropped my palm on the table and gave it voice.

"Both of your names were linked to government funding for Cadmus," I reminded them sharply. "Nothing illegal—there's nothing to prove that you knew about them cloning me, or making living beings they treated as weapons and slaves—but trust requires a track record. Right now, I wouldn't trust either of you not to loophole your way out of any contracts you could sign." 'Breathe.' "Fortunately, I don't have to.

"Renka believes, and I believe too," I declared, "that you both believe yourselves to be good people. We believe that you value Leadership." 'It's a helpful mnemonic, LDRSHIP.' "Loyalty, Duty, Respect, Selfless service, Honor, Integrity, and Personal courage," I continued, listing the stated values of our armed forces. "I don't know whether you knew what Cadmus was doing, but the both of you are parents; even if you did know-," It was difficult to continue, but I had to, it was what I had resolved was right to do. "-then I'm willing to let it go, and forgive you. Things have changed, now, because you know about the Disappearance Disaster, and any cooperation you could possibly have with those people… I don't believe you can ever justify that to yourselves, not without tearing your beliefs at the seams."

It wasn't exhausting, not exactly, to say all that, but I was quite relieved to let Icon step up and speak again.

"You believe the Justice League may be a threat. We believe you may one day turn against us when all we want to do is help," he assured them. "Even so, we all know, right now, that the Light is a threat. If they could kill us all and take control, they likely would. The only way we can ensure that Earth remains free from their tyranny is to work together; our differences are matters of opinion beside that.

"We will take it in good faith that you will work with us, and not betray us. Write that you will do so, sign, and if we are betrayed, then at least we will know for certain where you stand. The specific price is unimportant; anything Ferris might ask from you in repayment," Icon promised, rephrasing what she had told him before she left, "she would ask as a personal favor, or in the interest of advancing our common goals. You would be free to refuse with no obligation.

"If Savage had turned the Justice League against the cities of the world – or if he manages to control us again and do so – then you will be Earth's best hope for survival and freedom. If Professor Strange and General Eiling had remained in positions of power," he continued, and I felt some grim satisfaction as both of our guests gave expressions of distaste, "then we would be your best hope for a better world, after they inevitably removed you. If you will not abide by the spirit of a deal, then it is not worth trying to work with you at all."

Both of our guests thought it over.

Waller picked up her pen first, and began to write. Before she finished, Sam Lane had begun to write as well, and she waited for him to sign. Then she put the pen down, handed the paper back to me, and waved me off when I tried to pass her the case.

"I knew that Cadmus was cloning tissue, and human cells," she said flatly. "It was advertised to me as experiments to improve organ donations, limb replacements, skin grafts… with my family's history, you can understand why that appealed to me."

"I knew about the Genomorphs," Lane added gruffly, "but not that they were sentient." I bit back on my instinct to correct him: they were sapient, more than sentient. "Genetically bred animals: beasts of burden, better than guard dogs, that's all they were supposed to be. I toured a few floors of Cadmus underground, several years ago. I wouldn't have wanted any more of you running around, though; one Kryptonian is enough of a threat." He paused. "I don't suppose I could ask you about that boy who helped stop the Ice Fortresses, Kal-El?"

'That's… direct. God help me, but I believe him, even if I can't tell. Although… Renka is correct that unexpected humor can be revealing.'

"It turns out Luthor's obsession is more perverted than aggressive," I answered with a blithe smile, tapping into my best Cornflake Kent mannerisms. "Lex grew a half-him, half-me baby in a test tube after the first Kryptonian clone… Well, that's a sad story. Still, Kon-El has been perfectly stable since we liberated him, even if he lacks some of my superpowers."

"Literally, half of him and you?" Waller wondered suddenly. "Is that something a DNA test could prove?"

I bit my lip. "Almost certainly." 'But why would you want or need access to our DNA?'

"I may be licensed to practice interstellar law, but custody hearings are a bit beyond me," Icon warned, straight-faced.

"Not that," she snapped, though Lane and I chuckled. He gave a start, surprised we'd both found it amusing. "Superman, we still don't have much on Luthor, legally. We've had your testimony that someone matching his description was involved in the Light," Waller explained, "but he's had alibis we've confirmed for some of those time periods, and that evidence isn't easily admissible. A blood test proving that his DNA was involved could get us a warrant to put him under longer-term, stricter surveillance, no matter how many judges are in his pocket."

I inhaled sharply at the possibility of that man finally facing Justice. "I'll speak with Kon-El to see if he's willing."

"Thank you." Waller stood. "Get back to me- to us," she amended as Lane stood up with her, "as soon as you know for certain. Until then, I'm going to go through my sources with a fine-toothed comb and see what I can dig up. If that's everything?"

"You should take the case with you," I objected, as they both seemed ready to leave without it. "It is why we're here, after all."

They shared another look.

"Keep it for now," Warden Waller told me. "If nothing else, I still need to vet the places I'd store these."

"Neither of you are holding onto them personally?" I questioned, trying not to sound judging in either direction.

A long moment passed.

Warden Waller and General Lane both reached over and took one box-cutter each.

"Might as well, if I've signed for it. We'll pick the rest up when we're ready to keep them," Waller decided.

"I expect we'll be seeing a lot of each other over the next few weeks," General Lane agreed, slipping his knife into his jacket pocket.

We shook on it, and it felt like when we first founded the Justice League: the start of a shining new era.

 

[CocoaNerd]

So, I haven't yet decided whether or not to commit to a full Young Cosmere crossover fic, but I threw together a little bit of an omake for this. At first it was 'what if Renka was a compounder twinborn as opposed to a full feruchemist?' and then to make it fit better I changed things a little bit so that 'Ferris' is an Era 2 descendant of Renka's who inherited a little of her ancestor's predilection for strategically Ruining people. So, here's Filtering parts 2 and 3, Reprise (warning for some physical and psychological torture in the vein of the original):

Spoiler: No points for guessing what type of Compounder she is.

* August 8 [Cheshire/Jade POV]

About fifty minutes had passed by the time I finally returned to lucidity. Almost thrice what my internal clock would have suggested. 'Thanks for leaving the clock on the wall, morons.' The overhead florescent lights sent needles into my eyes; ropes and cuffs attached to multiple cookie-cutter school desks pulled my arms and ankles apart, as well as wrapping around my waist. I was on my back, flat on the tile floor, stripped of my most obvious weapons, and my mask was off.

Artemis stood in the doorway with Aqualad, keeping watch in the hall and keeping her back very much to me.

My stomach tightened, but I quickly forced the feeling down and smoothed it over. 'Stop. Heroes are bound by their stupid laws, and the Little League here can't really do anything to hurt me.'

'Wait, they have a freakin' telepath,'I remembered, and did my best to begin calculating pi as I had been taught, with only a fraction of my mind devoted to interaction, snarky comments, and lies. I was confident that even with that handicap, I still outmatched them all total in a battle of wits, and with Artemis involved it should be more than a fair fight.

An uneven, arrhythmic tapping was coming from the not-Artemis unknown bitch who hadn't demonstrated any stand-out abilities so far beyond high proficiency in a martial art I hadn't recognized. 'Though even that, paired with wearing that much jewelry to a fight, is… concerning.' The tapping was coming from some sort of small yellowish metal pin she held in her right hand, while the left one fiddled with the hilt of one of my sai, and the micro-expressive muscles in her face kept twitching and jumping even if she did her best to keep her eyes on me. If she was already fidgeting, then this was either so routine for her that I would be in for a long night, or she was thoroughly out of her depth. I hoped for the later.

The Martian sat like a good girl in a kiddie desk, smiling far too pleasantly at me. At some point she'd shifted to look more human, with a Caucasian skin tone and yellow dress. I couldn't fathom why she'd done it, unless she somehow thought she could put me at ease so I'd lower my- 'Shit, right, Martian! Three-point-one-four-one-five-nine-two-six-five_'

The Atlantean stood in the doorway, leaning against the doorframe, positioned to stare either at me or down the hall as he chose.

Artemis was still in the hall, facing diligently away, and no matter how badly her shoulders twitched she refused to look back at me.

I'd been lucid for well over a minute, and if they weren't going to begin the interrogation soon I would be tempted to bend the rules on my basic training and start taunting them.

"Hello!" the unknown chirped, and… that was not the tone I was expecting at all. Her tapping ceased and she dropped down to crouch by my ribs. She smiled and extended an arm toward my face. "My name is Alishwym and I will be your in-terror-gator today. It is nice to meet you. What is your name?"

'She is the stupidest good-cop I have ever encountered, and I'm not even certain how much of it is an act. Please tell me I didn't get fought to a near-standstill by an un-powered bimbo.'

"Bite me," I answered.

"It is a pleasure to meet you, Bite Me. My name is Alishwym. I hope we can be friends. Do you work for the League of Shadows?"

"Ferris," Aqualad said softly, "you are not supposed to give away your secret identity so easily."

Her head snapped around to look at him; her eyes went hilariously wide. 'Please, oh please, let this just be a stupid act,' I mentally begged for the sake of my pride.

"Oh, right, yes! But does it matter with her?" she asked. One of her eyebrows twitched, but I couldn't quite guess what that tic meant for her.

"Hmm. I suppose… it will depend on how this interogation proceeds," the Atlantean murmured.

"Okay." She turned back to and smiled again. "Hello, please forget what I just said, Miss Bite. My name is Ferris and I will be your in-terror-gator today! I hope we can be friends."

'Oh gods, I think she actually might be a bimbo pretending to be less of a bimbo and getting it too much in the wrong direction. Why the hell are the others Martian. Don't get distracted.' I began counting off pi again.

"Now, again, are you for the League of Shadows?" Ferris asked.

"Bite me," I repeated. Ferris gave an exaggerated pout, then held my sai up to my neck and pressed it to the skin, hard enough that the point was slightly painful but not enough to draw blood. In spite of myself, I felt my confidence wane slightly.

"Please do not be difficult," Ferris asked. "If you do, we will be forced to fall back on more ex-stream methods."

"Am I supposed to be afraid?" I asked, a mocking tone to my voice. "Superheroes don't torture people. Hell, you wouldn't even know where to start."

Ferris hesitated for a moment, then sagged and sighed, removing the sai. "You're right, of course."

pain.

"The hell! You're not allowed to do that!" I snapped, reflexively trying to move my bound right arm to clutch at where the bitch had stabbed her pin into my unarmored upper right leg. More like a small nail, really.

I'd suffered so much worse than this so many times that it wasn't important. 'Pain is nothing,' I boasted to myself. 'She just caught me off-guard, and I wasn't braced for it.' I was even able to convince myself I believed it.

"None of us are trained in the use of ena- enhank- of using pain to get answers," she explained slowly, while pulling out another pin from a compartment on her uniform. She sounded genuinely regretful, but that could have easily been an act. "But we cannot afford to let you or your friends hurt Doctor Roquette, and this is, I think, the best choice we have. Now, I asked about your job. Are you-"

"Since when do superheroes use fucking torture?" I threw at the Atlantean.

"-a member-"

pain.

"-of the League of Shadows?"

It was hardly sensitive information, so I decided to answer the obvious and save the un-mangled remainder of my leg (I'd had much, much worse than this in torture-resistance training, but I wanted to be in good enough shape to kick her teeth in myself, later.) for delaying later questions. 'If I can play out for time long en- Martian. Three-point-one-four-one-five-nine-two_'

"Yes. I am a member of the League of Shadows. Why would you stab me if you didn't know that?" I asked. 'Telepathic illusions aren't supposed to cause intense, specific pain,' I knew, but part of me wondered if this was some sort of graduate studies League of Shadows so-you've-been-caught-by-the-crazy-capes test I'd been dumped into. Ferris cocked her head, and her jaw muscles twitched in silence for several seconds.

"There are many people who might want Doctor Roquette dead. Many. Many many many people. It might have been the Russian government or the Tea Party or the European Union, or even the dreaded UNISEC," Ferris lectured me soberly. "We had to be sure."

"Well since when do you attack bound prisoners? What will the Justice League do if they find out about this?" I challenged. The Atlantean looked directly at me and held up a radio.

"We are not the League. Robin has confirmed that the Batman regularly does worse than this to criminals in Gotham who are not also career killers. Also," the Atlantean continued, voice hardening, "it is your own fault that no one here will speak on your behalf. Kid Flash was never fond of these proceedings."

'Crap, he used past tense. Did I miscalculate? Does being a speedster somehow equate to drowning faster?'

"Aqualaaaad," my interrogator whined, "you proooomised that she could be my prisoner because I've never got to do this befoooorrrre. Stop messing me up and don't talk to heeerrrr."

"I'm still willing to take over if you can't get anything," the Martian chirped. The Atlantean nodded once.

"Good! Now, Miss Bite, please tell me how many more people we will need to greet tonight."

"Over nine thousand, just like in that-"

"And how will they try to kill me?" she continued, shoving her pout in my face.

I tried spitting in her eye, but sadly couldn't make the distance.

"They will be as unending as the night, as dangerous as the unknown, and devoted unto the death, just like I am, foul heathen," I recited drily.

'And I really hope I live long enough to see Black Spider web you up like a piñata so I can stab you a few times before Claw twists your head off like a bottle cap,' I envisioned viciously.

"And when can we expect them to arrive, because do I need time to cook enough food for nine-thousand growing teenagers like you?"

'Since I didn't report within the hour they should be here any shitty freaking Martian!! Three-point-one-four-one_'

"I haven't the foggiest," I snapped.

"Is that like the weapon fog?"

"No, and stop pretending to be an idiotic, airheaded, football-team's-bicycle bimbo, I know yo-"

pain.

"It is not nice to call names," she chided, a third nail now in my left leg, and I had a momentary flashback to that man saying the same thing to Artemis after she'd disrespected him and been unable to back it up.

'Artemis.' My eyes moved to my erstwhile sister, wondering if she was really cold enough to leave me like this. 'No, she shouldn't be, even after spending years stuck with him.'

'Years where she was alone, after I abandoned her to him.'

'Okay, yes, maybe she could.' But if she wouldn't acknowledge me as family- '"family loyalty is the first contract you ever sign, baby girl and you will never break a contract," he had chided more than once,' -then dammit I wouldn't be torn up by it.

"When can we expect our nine-thousand guests to arrive?" Ferris repeated patiently.

I refused to break. 'Our trust we will stay, and I will not betray. It's not even an hour; I can just last out the clock!'

"I don't know!" I pretended to confess with a sob. "Whenever they get suspicious. Maybe now, maybe already, maybe not until morning! I was the only one at the base when we got the call to go here, and I don't know when the others will start to get back."

Ferris weighed my words for a moment, turned back and conversed silently with the others over what I assumed was a telepathic link 'Martian! Three-point-one-four-one_' then eventually stood up with a stretch, pouting.

"Fine. If you will not co-op-er-ate then, I think, we will have to use the Plan Bee."

'What, all that and she's just giving up now? Unless…' "Shadows serve to the death without fear," I recited, fishing for a reaction.

Ferris, along with the Martian, looked down at me, aghast. "Kill you?! Miss Bite, we are heroes. We do not kill prisoners."

"Just torture," I countered dryly.

She shifted uncomfortably. "Desperate times, yes? But lives are precious and must be Preserved. Mars, I think from what Miss Martian has told me, knows this well."

The other girl nodded. "We never really developed the death penalty on my home planet, 'cause of telepathy, right? If one of us dies violently, it causes psychic ripples that damage everyone who's too connected. Which leads me to, um…"

There was an odd span of silence. The three – only three, because Artemis had twitched to almost look at me but never fully turned around 'and is that still worrying me after I resolved to give up on our happy perfect family?' - shared a long, silent look. Arm gestures, head shakes, and shrugs flew between the three of them. It took maybe seven second for them to finish and turn back to me.

"So, what's the plan? Oh, oh, I know! The untrained little alien girl is going to tear my mind apart with her years of ruthless experience and training and steal all my secrets. I could just cry."

'Three-point-one-four-one-five-nine-two-six-five-three-five-eight-nine-seven-nine-three_'

"Actually, I'm sixty-four," she admitted, because what? "Martians can shape shift, you know, so why should we actually look like our age or even gender? Although I really am a girl so no need to get creeped out guys, I swear," she added quickly. I opened my mouth for another commen-

"But yeah, that's pretty much the plan!" the Martian crone (apparently) confirmed cheerfully, standing up and shifting her skin back to green. "I mean, you've been resisting my telepathy okay this whole time, so I don't think it'll work, but we figured we'd try things the hard way first, as a courtesy."

I cocked an eyebrow. "Don't you mean the easy way."

She shook her head. "Nope, hard. I don't really know how you humans got things backwards, but you all kind of seem to assume that reading a mind is easier than just rewriting it to be more agreeable. Maybe it has something to do with how you default to auditory communication?"

My throat went dry as the meaning of her words set in. I was pretty sure I could feel my bravado draining away.

"N-no," I managed to choke out through my regulated breathing, "there's no way you can expect me to believe you go around Ludovico-ing people behind the scenes. Martian Manhunter's been here for decades and he's never-"

"It is not good for ad-ver-tise-ment, yes?" Ferris challenged. "Also, The Wonder Woman's Lasso of Truth can compel people, and that The Green Lanterns can 'manipulate will' is meant very literally."

I was beginning to wonder if that talk about the idiot-heroes of America had been propaganda for the even stupider masses, and 'Shit! Didn't Lady Talia once mention that Batman was trained by the Shadows?'

The Martian reached down to place her hands to my temples, and I instinctively tried to pull away.

"Do not worry, please. If Miss Martian does have to do things the easy way to you as well, I promise that it is not a painful thing, and you feel very nice after it is done."

My stomach churned at the implication, and suddenly the gap between the two extremes of her behavior made a sickening amount of sense.

"Artemis!" I shouted, voice cracking slightly in fear. "Artemis, don't let them do this!"

The others looked at her in surprise, and for just a moment I felt like I had achieved something.

Silence hung like a noose as I stared at my baby sister's tensed shoulders.

'She's grown up so much,' I realized. 'I wasn't even as tall as her when I left the house, and I never got to see her grow. Does she even remember that she has a sister? I can barely remember what Mom's face was like, it's been so long, and- Oh gods, do I even deserve to call us sisters? She would have been so small when I left her, left her all alone with him. Why didn't I give in and take her with me? Artemis, what happened to you that you ended up like this?

'Calm down,' I ordered myself, though my body wasn't listening. 'If it's all an act, then I'm safe no matter what. And if this is actually a real, demented situation, then she'll still step in because she was always so soppy about our family loyalty bull.'

My not-so-little sister turned around, and from across the room she looked me dead in the eyes.

For the first time in the better part of a decade, we saw each other again.

I saw her assess me. I saw her recognize me. I saw her not care.

"She killed Kid Flash, plus who knows how many other people. A new lease on life is already too good for her. Do it."

Her voice echoed in my skull. I'd thought I'd misheard until I felt the Martian's touch press on my mind.

Raw, undiluted panic surged through me. In that shining moment of perfect clarity, I learned that despite Sensei's best efforts there were, in fact, still some things I was afraid of.

'It's no less than I deserve from her, but… damn it all... I guess we poor souls really are our father's daughters.'

My brain revolted against my training in a last-ditch attempt to save itself, and my mental defenses dropped. I didn't even have the will to feed her false information; everything was laid bare.

Once the Martian retreated from my mind, the fear abated somewhat, but it did not disappear.

"I got what we need," she reported to Aqualad, who nodded in response.

"Good. Ferris… see to the prisoner's wounds and remain behind to guard her. See to it that she is not harmed any further. The rest of you, with me."

Being left behind with that freak set my nerves on edge. It only seemed marginally better than being left with the alien.

After the others left, Ferris reached down and unceremoniously yanked all three nails out of my legs. There was a little blood, but she'd apparently managed to avoid any major arteries. The pain must've been getting to me worse than I realized, because a wave of relief washed over me as soon as they were out. 'Wait a minute.'

Little Miss Psycho pulled out a handkerchief from somewhere and wiped off the spikes before returning them to their storage, but she seemed distracted, her body language and facial expressions twitching in time to an unseen conversation. Eventually she pinched the bridge of her nose, stalked over to the far wall, and pulled up a chair to stand on.

'What is she-? Why that little' I started mentally listing off appropriate curse words in three different languages as I realized they'd been pushing me mentally off-balance from the start, right down to setting the clock forward a half hour. 'Alright, play me once, shame on me. But now I'm onto your tricks.' "So, what'd you dose those needles with? Fear compound? Hallucinogens? Miniaturized neural override arrays?" I asked, aiming for a conversational tone. It was hard when all my hair was still standing on end, but I managed.

Ferris glanced back at me, eyes critical. "That is not, I think, the sort of thing one should discuss with her enemies." She chewed her lip. "Rusts, but it is fair, after you told us everything," and didn't that barb just sting, despite being exactly what I was hoping for. "Maybe you can glean enough information about me to buy the Mercy of your masters. Former masters?" She nodded, apparently coming to a decision. "A game. For each question of yours about me that I answer, I ask one and have it answered in turn."

'Too easy.' I smiled. "Deal. So, the needles?" I asked again, eager for information.

"Mmm. I create metal-minds, to enhance cognitive traits. On my world, I am what is called Twinborn, someone who can use two metals. Brass," she fished out one of the needles, then jangled the rings on one hand, "and zinc. For helping your fear while they were in you and sharpening my mind, re-spec-tive-ly." 'I truly can't tell if she has trouble with polysyllabic English words, or if she's still trying to play dumb.' "It took weeks of meditations to make needles with this level of Connection. My turn. How do you know Artemis?"

"What, you don't trust your teammate enough to ask her yourself?" I threw back at her.

"Is that your next question?" she riposted.

"Only if that's yours… Dammit, fine. She's my little sister. Was. I don't know if I've got the right to call her that anymore, after…" I trailed off, uncomfortable regrets settling in the pit of my stomach.

"I see. I do trust my teammate, because people I trust trust her, but I do not think I trust you, and I wanted to know if she was in danger, and if danger followed her. Your turn."

"So, are you really here because the Martian put the mind whammy on you, or was that all part of the production?" I'd already figured out the answer, but throwing her a soft question or two would hopefully drop her guard and let me fish for more valuables.

"Not by her," she responded without hesitation, and I snapped to attention, searching for any signs that she was leading me on. As near as I could tell though, there weren't any. "And it is not why I am here. But I have been… 'mind whammied' in the past."

Ice ran down my spine, and I failed to suppress a shudder.

"Why did you join the League of Shadows, please?"

I snorted. "Like you even want to understand."

"I do. And I can," she said, sounding sincere.

I mulled it over. 'I could always just refuse to answer, but then she probably would too. Plus, she just used psychological warfare capable of beating out Shadows training. Hero or not, she isn't clean. …Actually, that's something I need to check instead of just assuming.' "Because sometimes life doesn't give you a choice."

"No," she said. "Everyone always has choices, I think. But there are not always good choices, only less bad ones, so I am not- do not ask to judge. Only to know why you joined the Shadows, specifically."

I rolled the question around in my head. "Because I was strong, but not strong enough, and the Shadows were an escape and a way to get even stronger. Because I refused to roll over for other people while there was still a chance I could make a better life for myself."

"Ruining others to avoid being Ruined," she mused, nodding as if it made perfect sense. "Surviving. I do not, now, agree. But I do understand."

"How much of that show back there was your idea?"

"Most of it," she admitted blithely. "I did ask for details and ideas over the telepathic link, which I think you noticed. You will hopefully, even if it is a small hope, be relieved to hear Kid Flash is not dead." And I was, if only because it meant less of a chance of a barely sub-luminal fist through my chest any time soon. "I am… not sorry, but I think I would not have done it quite the same, knowing what I do now. I am still learning where the lines are, here. What is good, and what is not. What is different from home, and what is the same."

"Where is 'home,' anyway? You said 'my world' earlier. Are you even human?"

"Three questions in a row," she faux-chided. "I will answer, but then you will have to answer more of mine." She thought for a moment. "I will only answer this because I want it to be eventually public knowledge. According to The Batman when he looked at my dee-en-ay, I am human, but not an Earth-human. Home is Scadrial. It is very much like Earth, but it is not I think a 'parallel timeline.' Your land and stars are all wrong, to start, and we do not have any major satellites. Luna, or anything like it."

"…The moon?"

"Mm, yes. It is very nice, by the way. We are at… I think Kid Flash said about nineteenth or early twentieth century development, with some outliers in either direction? That is all I will tell you right now, you will have to buy the news papers if you want to know more. Why did you abandon your sister? Do you regret it?"

My throat went completely dry for the second time that night. How dare she- "I'm not answering that," I hissed. "Not to you." 'It was the smart thing. She would've… would've slowed me down. Shit.' My emotions might be more taught and frayed than they had been… since I left, actually, but I would not start tearing up in front of an enemy operative.

"We are done then, I think, after I ask my last question."

"I just said-!"

"If you had a chance at a new start, would you take it?"

I blinked, then barked out a laugh. "You just told me Martian Girl back there couldn't rewrite my mind!"

"No, I told you she did not rewrite mine. She could, I think, do it with practice." And there was the fear again. "But that is not what I meant. If you could escape your past debts. Change your name. Stop fighting, or fight only to protect. Perhaps… rusts what is the term, 'mend fences' with Artemis? Would you take it?"

"…"

She must have eventually gotten tired of my silent glaring, because she sighed and turned around and away from me in her seat.

"…I don't know. I don't think they really make those kinds of deals. Not for people like me. And especially not after already getting all the information they could ever need," I added bitterly.

She turned back to face me. "If you are right, then they are fools. It is better to pay harm done by doing good than by not doing more harm. But I think you are wrong. If about nothing else, then about you only being worth what someone else could learn from a look through your mind, without your life to give them experience." She scrunched up her face. "I do not think the words did what I wanted there. But I hope you understand."

"…I still don't know. But maybe."

---

Author notes, in no particular order:

In case it wasn't already clear, this Ferris is a Zinc Twinborn. With the exception of the little bit of violet love for Artemis and the red rage for Sportsmaster, the colors were different emotions she was rioting in Cheshire. She pulled a sort of reverse-"the frog does not realize it is being boiled" trick, rioting Cheshire's confidence and determination hard as soon as she woke up and then easing off it whenever the team acted agressive, making it feel like her will was eroding faster than it should and thus making her doubt herself. And then after they'd stirred up plenty of fear (and inserted a few telepathic back doors under the guise of torture), she flared Zinc and pushed that fear as hard as she could, to give M'gann and opening to read everything without having to tear Cheshire apart to get it.

Since Ruin isn't around in Era 2, Alishwym is not the Sliver of Entropy. The 'mind whammy' she refers to is actually something she inadvertently did to herself early on while getting used to her Twinborn powers. She compounded way too much acuity without storing any and trapped herself in 384 subjective hours compressed into the space of under a minute. The only reason her sanity didn't shatter irreperably is that she had a Pathian spike earing in and Harmony was able to keep her some degree of company while she was trapped.

Yes, those are hemalurgy spikes, which she knows how to make thanks partially to some general knowledge passed down from great-whatever-grandma Renka, and partially because she figured it out on her own from observation (remember, she has a spike earring and has talked to Harmony). She charged them from feeder rats, and they don't confer any powers, they're just wedges she uses to make bigger openings for her zinc allomancy (and, in this case, M'gann's telepathy). She's also running multiple layers of obfuscuation around information about Hemalurgy. Cheshire thinks (though she knows she could be being fed bad info) that the spikes are actually the source of the rioting, and that they're formed using some kind of meditation, and that they're the same thing as a metal mind. The Team knows it requires sacrifice, but again, they've only seen it with rats, and they only know she can use the spikes to open telepathic back doors. Nobody knows about the different metals or that Hemalurgy can steal traits. Part of it's because this Ferris didn't have all the same traumatic experiences with Hemalurgy that Renka did, and part of it's a "spill a lesser secret to hide a bigger secret" thing. They're brass because it's the pair metal of zinc, so she can better play it off as being directly linked to her rioting. The only reason it's not zinc is because stapling the emotional fortitude of an animal to a human does much worse things than just sticking a 'null spike' in them.

Funny fact: I couldn't really think of a way to fit it in, but Ferris was tapping acuity to communicate with the team over telepathy the whole time she was playing the questions game with Cheshire.

M'gann's statement about rewriting brains being easier than reading them was an outright lie, but it was a lie based in how emotional allomancy works. About the closest you can get to mind reading on Scadrial, short of holding Preservation, is highly enhanced perception or maybe compounding Connection. By contrast, soothing and rioting are much more readily avaliable.

I am never writing something with this many colors again.