Life Ore Death - DC Feruchemy [Young Justice]

[Grigori]

I speak as a Ron Weasley fan (no MoRon bashing from me!) when I say that I consider Kid Flash the Ron Weasley of the Team in many ways. He fakes having more self-confidence than he does; he's a talented kid who couldn't recognize the ways he was already special when he wanted to be more conventionally (heroic) special; and he succeeded in getting in on the front lines, only to end up a little over his head in some ways.

Even so, Wally (like Ron) is a fundamentally good guy from a normal background who is trying to do things right, even if he still has trouble figuring out what the right thing is at times. If he knows the world isn't all black and white, he still wishes it could be, and he isn't going to stand for something he genuinely believes to be wrong, even if he arguably should due to circumstances. But he's willing to bend when people reason with him, and he's willing to withhold judgement or re-evaluate when faced with new evidence.

I like the 'heroes are human too' thing, but I don't think it should just be gritty. People who do the right thing despite/because of their human flaws are, to me, better and more interesting than the inherently good.

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Suppose the fact that I dislike Ron too doesn't help then... In fairness I also disliked Harry when I originally read the series, I can be an unforgiving arse. Dunno, maybe the strong reaction to those two in comparison to slaughtering a load of people while slightly unhinged from mental assault is just the negative relatability. Same way people react worse to Umbridge than Voldemort because she's a more realistic and personal villain.

 

[shmone else]

Regarding the Team explaining who they are... actually, I have questions now. Because they would be talking in English, and Ferris would probably be tapping-duralumin at the time to understand them... If she lost her memory of learning English and tapped a copper-mind, would she understand people speaking in English? Because she understood them when she was storing...

Anyone want to argue for or against? I haven't decided on my opinion yet.

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She'd still understand the conversation, because you're storing the associated meanings along with the literal words.

Related thought experiment: if she tapped Zinc in a memory, would that time pass in a blur or would she experience the slowdown in her memory as well? If she tapped Tin, would she remember the results of her enhanced senses? Both of these answers seem like an intuitive 'yes', which means that she should be able to remember the associated meanings from Duralumin even if she no longer remembers the language itself.

 

[Kurkistan]

Regarding the Team explaining who they are... actually, I have questions now. Because they would be talking in English, and Ferris would probably be tapping-duralumin at the time to understand them... If she lost her memory of learning English and tapped a copper-mind, would she understand people speaking in English? Because she understood them when she was storing...

Anyone want to argue for or against? I haven't decided on my opinion yet.

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Given the terrifyingly subjective nature of memory/experience, I'd wager that she'd retain all the semantics perfectly well.

That aside, there's already a large amount of evidence that she shouldn't have any trouble with recalling Duralumin-boosted conversations. After all, what's she doing on a daily basis but remembering past conversations? It's not like she suddenly loses all understanding if she thinks back to some conversation later in the day—when she's no longer tapping. This especially early on, when she needed Duralumin for all communication.

The question, then, comes down to if storing a memory in a coppermind captures these deeper meanings along with simple sensory data. I would imagine it does. If it doesn't, then the "metadata" would either get wiped when she stored the memory (unlikely since nothing from Sanderson/the books have suggested any "hollowness" to fCopper memories) or have to stick around and get re-associated when she taps the memory later: this second option would leave it open to brain-wiping, but seems unnecessarily complicated.

Bands of Mourning spoilers

Spoiler

In addition, we get a PoV of tapping someone else's coppermind in the last scene from BoM. Here Wax gets a POV from (presumably) Kelsier, with a lot of metadata associated with it: context, half-remembered memories from Kelsier that the situation brings to Kelsier's mind, etc.

There's a slight possibility that the depth of the memory is a side-effect of copper compounding or the like, but assuming not it's fairly compelling evidence for memories being heavily meaning-laden.

EDIT:

Related thought experiment: if she tapped Zinc in a memory, would that time pass in a blur or would she experience the slowdown in her memory as well? If she tapped Tin, would she remember the results of her enhanced senses? Both of these answers seem like an intuitive 'yes', which means that she should be able to remember the associated meanings from Duralumin even if she no longer remembers the language itself.

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I don't think this is quite the right comparison to make. The extra "data" from both the Tin and the Zinc examples you give here (though arguably less so the Zinc) can be relatively easily dismissed as of a different type from the "meanings" that Duralumin uniquely provides, if one is so inclined.

An example would be if you compared Renka's visual memory to a video camera: if that camera had a zoom lens put onto it or started shooting more frames per second to get "slo-mo" that's all just changing what/how well the camera sees. But tapping Duralumin would be like the person watching the camera feed being better able to interpret the images the camera captures. If you take out the recording from the camera a day later, but now aren't tapping Duralumin, then you won't be as able to interpret it as you were that first time.

None of this is to say that that's how I think it would work (see: the rest of my post), but I don't think the example of using other more "sensory" powers in conjunction with fCopper should sway us either way.

 

[Lokpik89]

Impractical. The Team works on a global scale, there are frankly too many places in the world for that to do more than a handful of cities, and honestly? a wrist computer would do a better job and be up-to-date.

Now, before going into a mission she can take the map, any important person profile related to the location or mission and their general plan, and store that, and/or toss in the watching of a recording of the briefing.

There are exceptions to that, Flash has killed, he does have villains that are just as bad as the worst of the other leaguers, who want him and everything he cares about dead and have zero morals about how to go about it. Tho whether it has happened in this continuity, and whether Kid Flash was exposed to it or received advice based on it, is up in the air.

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Hmm coppermind of demolition's, architecture, material sciences, chemical engineering, and all FBI training manuals, I hope Renka starts going out with a gun, every bullet needs to be accounted and the desire not to have to use it but have it if it is necessary for but not only could she store a small charge in it, We saw how dangerous the world is and it is spiralling towards ruin in the years to come. She has expierence with distopia's and I hope a few of her comments get to members of the league, (the team is a good strike force but and irregular force but humanity needs a stronger regular force. Batman would do more good by finding 50 bog standard humans of good enough moral standing and train them into a metahuman task force, with Robin and Artemis as aides for 8 months. showing that even the young unpowered people could overcome metahumans, and what have you through tactics, pragmatism, training and equipment.) selecting five o those fifty after 18 months of service to train other's could build a strong and growing force able to aid the team and the justice league when continental or global threats occur.

 

[aabbcc]

Haha no, that soldier plan is terrible.
Even if those 50 are Robin levels of talented, plenty of metahumans will chew through them like knives through butter with that little training. What you'll produce in so little time is dead meat.

Many metahumans are strong and tough enough to simply mow through them, others have enough firepower to wreck this large force, much like they do with the army or the police. Others are plain better trained, like Sportsmaster or even the regular shadows assassins. You think those 50 will have any chance against, say, Cheshire when she was able to get past a good chunk of The Team?

Others are better trained and equipped, to the point there's not much difference between these 50 and regular police. Like, say, Intergang.

You take an enormous amount of time from not one, but three heroes for over half a year, and get nothing.

Defer the initial training to others across the globe or even regular training, use someone who's time isn't in that much demand like, say, Ted Grant, or regular Amazons, extend the training time considerably and only use a hero at the end of the training to teach them to adapt that combat training to law enforcement, and then you may begin thinking about it.

The coppermind plan is also unfeasible, to start with, because coppermind is for storing memories, and you're talking about skills and things that require comprehension, hell, most of the list are things that once she has comprehension, she doesn't need encyclopedic knowledge about it.
To follow it, we're talking memorizing a library here, and not a small one either. The same counter I gave towards the map counts here.

 

[shmone else]

I don't think this is quite the right comparison to make. The extra "data" from both the Tin and the Zinc examples you give here (though arguably less so the Zinc) can be relatively easily dismissed as of a different type from the "meanings" that Duralumin uniquely provides, if one is so inclined.

An example would be if you compared Renka's visual memory to a video camera: if that camera had a zoom lens put onto it or started shooting more frames per second to get "slo-mo" that's all just changing what/how well the camera sees. But tapping Duralumin would be like the person watching the camera feed being better able to interpret the images the camera captures. If you take out the recording from the camera a day later, but now aren't tapping Duralumin, then you won't be as able to interpret it as you were that first time.

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Eh, yes and no. Tin might be a bad example but Zinc at least shows that the memory is from Renka's perspective, rather than being some kind of strange third-person viewing like Pensieves in Harry Potter; from there we can extrapolate that she retains the subjective perceptions she had at the time of making the memory, including accelerated thinking/thought time or associations generated by Duralumin, rather than reverting to some kind of objective/outside observer status.

With that said your point about how she's remembering conversations on her own that she had with Duralumin rather than forgetting the content of those as soon as she stops tapping is a stronger argument.

 

[Lokpik89]

Haha no, that soldier plan is terrible.
Even if those 50 are Robin levels of talented, plenty of metahumans will chew through them like knives through butter with that little training. What you'll produce in so little time is dead meat.

Many metahumans are strong and tough enough to simply mow through them, others have enough firepower to wreck this large force, much like they do with the army or the police. Others are plain better trained, like Sportsmaster or even the regular shadows assassins. You think those 50 will have any chance against, say, Cheshire when she was able to get past a good chunk of The Team?

Others are better trained and equipped, to the point there's not much difference between these 50 and regular police. Like, say, Intergang.

You take an enormous amount of time from not one, but three heroes for over half a year, and get nothing.

Defer the initial training to others across the globe or even regular training, use someone who's time isn't in that much demand like, say, Ted Grant, or regular Amazons, extend the training time considerably and only use a hero at the end of the training to teach them to adapt that combat training to law enforcement, and then you may begin thinking about it.

The coppermind plan is also unfeasible, to start with, because coppermind is for storing memories, and you're talking about skills and things that require comprehension, hell, most of the list are things that once she has comprehension, she doesn't need encyclopedic knowledge about it.
To follow it, we're talking memorizing a library here, and not a small one either. The same counter I gave towards the map counts here.

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The sad and disquieting thing is those fifty troops would always be paying the butcher's bill in combat situations They are more a proof of concept,what bruce does as batman is impressive and valuable but The Leauge is taking to reactive an approach. Batman is the pinnacle of an unpowered human hitting above his weight class, he and the leaugue are irregular forces, able to dish out more damage than their size would indicate, hell their is more than one person in the league who could wipe out all life on earth by themselves Counters need to be developed and contingencies need to be made in case this happens. we understand These are the type of people who are used in a strike against a vastly larger or more powerful foe, but The world needs regular forces that work beside the justice league and its affiliates with the training and more developed system of operational procedures. Who better than either Batman, or Ras could train people without powers to be a better equipped and trained force against some of the threats in the universe. The coppermind thing is more a function of how I learn, I grasp concepts behind things really quickly but the data (the math tends to vanish from my memories within Minutes of having read something, Its annoying as heck) plus learning vehicle and structural maitanance and sabotogue could be helpful, Could she have a memory of looking at a page of data, store it and then review and learn it later? also its not so much law enforcement Im thinking of, more mercenary than that, because Batman would be their administrator, maybe alfred or someone designated by the league, Though then we get the whole they are building an army nonsense of JLU. Government officials being influenced in D.C. happens all the time, and Luthor is an influencial man.

 

[aabbcc]

First of all: for the love of fuck, the Enter key will not give you cancer or cause a baby seal to die if you use it more often. Please use it more often.

Continuing on, to the army: they are a proof of a terrible concept, because the concept and training plan sucks.

That you mention Ra's and you can't grasp why this is an unworkable idea is baffling. Name me one metahuman threatening enough to require more than police action that wouldn't mow through the rank and file of the Shadows by the dozens.

Oh, sure, the Shadows also produce quite gifted individuals, but that's taking the very best out of the chaff and giving them individual attention. Chaff that is recruited on a worldwide scale.

If Ra can't do better with an entire lifetime of training, if The Master can't do better, if Lady Shiva can't do better... What makes you think that Batman, with his heavy dislike of guns and his restrictive approach to lethal action, would do a better job in 8 months? and not only a little better, but at least an order of magnitude better?

The Robins, Batgirls and the like of the world? he can train even in a short timeframe. Small groups of exceedingly talented individuals who mesh well with his way of fighting crime and are empowered by Protagonist Power, and whom he can give individual attention during training. A large group of people? no.

That's without even going to the international reaction of the JL, already worryingly powerful, starting an army. Quite a lot of powerful people are going to start asking why they aren't training NATO forces instead, something squarely within the control of the UN.

Which, of course, is not going to happen. Batman is the very last leaguer you want training gun-wielding soldiers. Just about anyone else would be more accepting to the idea.

The coppermind thing? your clarification is even worse. You want to go from memorizing a library to, quite frankly, a library per subject. Because knowing the schematics of an F35 is rather worthless when what you have in front of you is a Su-35. Repeat this for every aircraft in use, every vehicle type, every weapon type, every.. everything.

 

[Lokpik89]

I concede it was poorly thought out, but the league should devote some effort into acclimating and giving specialized training to a force of soldiers for when it will save more civilian lives to bring them; they do answer to nato sort of right, despite covert ops against their charter namely the team.
D.C. Is a messed up universe in the extreme.

 

[aabbcc]

They answer to the UN, not NATO. To a political organization, not a military alliance.

Exactly what kind of situation are you envisioning that these.. mooks, because they are, after all, nameless mooks, would be useful to bring? situations that it would make it worthwhile to invest time, effort, money and political capital to train? extra political capital to give them latitude to act across the globe?

Mooks that aren't even that numerous, a small group, really, and whom, at best, can only carry a limited amount of firepower (gee, here it is again, guns. Alongside the league, particularly Batman), because it's simply unfeasible to deploy them on the scale the league operates otherwise.

Because getting civilians away? they can use the local police, relief efforts? no need for special training. Large scale anything, and frankly, they don't have the numbers or the gear to matter.

So it needs to be big enough that the police can't handle it with a couple swat teams, time-sensitive enough that the army can't get there in time, small enough that mooks can handle it...

Of course, any leaguer would be worth a dozen of these groups, far more if it's a heavy hitter. So all the leaguers need to be simultaneously busy for them to be of any use, as well as the Team, and any JL potential candidate, and any Team candidate.

Hell, even not-entirely-amoral mercenaries and villains would do a better job if they can be convinced to team up, so they need to be out of the picture as well.

The conditions keep piling and piling. You're not being convincing that they are worth the effort.

Now, writing a manual so that the police can better act in metahuman situations and back the hero? awesome, massive return of investment for time spent. Donate to increase their funding and gear? also great. Improve how they can investigate superpowered crime and contain criminals? sure! have a retired or injured hero give a seminar, film that crap and spread it over countless police forces across the globe? excellent. Suggest to governments to tighten emergency plans? great!

These are things that consume time and resources, yes, but a limited amount, and the effect reaches thousands, easily millions of policemen and military across the globe. It's the kind of thing that can save countless lives from everyday use, and more still on a global crisis.

Granted, many of these are things they are likely already doing, Bruce Wayne does not sit idly on his fortune. Tho it could be interesting to show them.

But mooks... why train 50 mooks when you can train 1 Robin with the same amount of effort?

 

[Lokpik89]

Large crisis'es hell someone tried to blot out the sun on the first episode. Bringing some sniper's and into these combat situations, could be useful. During planetary invasions, In some situations fifty rifle's are better than one batman.
Though I concede that my earlier posts were not well thought out. The thing is Lots of people die in D.C. comics off screen/off panel. support and combat forces being deployed with the league could save lives. something I believe should be considered, though number fifty was just a random number I put down.
Having Dr. Roquete creating a modified version of the fog with a few hour operation life before deactivation/self destruct for a area denile weapon. Great for creating temporay save zones. or used on Various things, such as modified Venom Buster Plants.
Renka Was close with Spook, who became a leader to the remaining people, Even If she does not possess the ability to lead I hope her outsider perspective can give the people around her a more realistic outlook, rather than Idealistic outlook that tends to get told. Superman is incredibly hard to kill, and his stance on his Ideal is quite inspiring to many but if it ever comes down to your own life or the life of a foe, unless their death consigns lots of people to death you should choose yourself and I do not think Wally see's this.

 

[Obloquy]

Actually, I think the basic 50 trainees idea is workable. In need of refinement, but not terrible. Something like it will be brought up at one point, when Ferris starts learning how different countries from the USA view/handle heroes and meta-humans (members of the Great Ten will appear in Life Ore Death).

The key will be in remembering:

1. They are not taking random people off the street and dumping them into training. They can look for military veterans, Olympian athletes, experienced martial artists, notable scientist, and people who have experienced and survived fights before. Then, give them more advanced training (for like a year before they take the field) and equipment after sorting out who you're willing to trust. Equipment is important too; Clayface has been taken down with chemicals and tasers, and most trained normal people could have done so if they had the know-how.
2. They are not expecting the trainees to turn into the next Batman or Green Arrow. But the trainees can study known villains and the general strategies employed against different types of powers. They are neither expected nor supposed to tackle major threats like Black Adam or Wotan; but five guys with training to keep calm and follow a plan when they know what they're up against... they could probably beat Mr Freeze, Killer Frost, Abra Kadabra, Bane, Black Spider, Atomic Skull, etc.

If the trained fighters just need to hold the line until a League member arrives after putting out other fires, they can do that and stand even odds of winning against most people. If a major heavy like Deathstroke or Amazo shows up, they're in trouble. But keeping other, simultaneous threats busy while League members handle Wotan or Red Volcano would be the point of the team.

Imagine a team of 3-5 former soldiers. They've spent the past 6-12 months getting extra training every other evening in more advanced martial arts and acrobatics, and practicing and staying fit on their own time. One of them was a chemistry major in college, and another one worked in an auto shop on engines in his teen years.

They have moderate body armor. They have melee/short-range tasers. They have the pellets that burst into that immobilizing plastic foam. The have a few small explosives. They have a canister or two of Robin's type of knockout gas. They may or may not have guns. They have run mock fights against co-operative meta-humans, including members of the Justice League, as part of their training. They have the comms the Team uses in their ears.

Sometime in the last week, they have read a one-paged, 12 point font, double-spaced briefing on whoever they happen to be sent to stop today.

They have two minutes to discuss a plan between when they get the alert that X is going on a rampage while the Justice League is busy keeping the sun from being put out, and when they arrive on the scene to fight.

I defy you to tell me they could not beat Mr. Freeze, the Terror Twins, Clayface, etc., with better than even odds.

They definitely could beat Ferris: one would get into grappling range when she moves in and catch them both in a plastic foam prison while the others taser her until her gold-mind runs out.

Isn't that the whole point of people like Sportsmaster, Green Arrow, and David Cain being such high-level threats?

Renka Was close with Spook, who became a leader to the remaining people, Even If she does not possess the ability to lead I hope her outsider perspective can give the people around her a more realistic outlook, rather than Idealistic outlook that tends to get told. Superman is incredibly hard to kill, and his stance on his Ideal is quite inspiring to many but if it ever comes down to your own life or the life of a foe, unless their death consigns lots of people to death you should choose yourself and I do not think Wally see's this.

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Leadership ability is... she has some, but she isn't comfortable with it.

Teaching and guiding? She's a lot better at that. We will see her start giving lessons to people and experimenting with what their powers are capable of, and the results... will speak for themselves.

(I need to remember not to drop spoilers and gloat unless people ask for them. D'oh! )

 

[Lokpik89]

Yes, This is what I was trying to convey, but I am not the best a getting my thoughts across. something that got to me when I first watched Young Justice, Either the death rate on that earth was insane meaning people do not react how I would consider them to after some of the insane stunts that get pulled, Or it was written as off-screen deaths happen but do not get mentioned.

When Zoat went to the Roanoke episode and did the realistic approach, the feels got to me. Though to be fair I Approved of the ending of man of steel

Spoiler

when Clark stopped zod despite them both killing a lot of people in the process.

 

[Obloquy]

Life Ore Death​

** Episode 10 - Undertow

* September 5 [Ferris PoV]

"Will you be able to swim with those?" Aqualad asked uncertainly. I supposed he had good reason, as I was literally wearing every metal-mind with a charge that I had somewhere on my body, as well as a few small ones that I intended to charge. I couldn't be bothered to calculate, but I was wearing somewhere between ten and twenty percent of my weight in metal.

I was uncertain and uncomfortable after having my mind twisted and mutilated, and I did. Not. Care about letting my team know about it. I wanted every weapon I had in easy reach, I wanted my empty metal-minds filled, and I wanted it all as immediately as I could manage.

The only reason I was even coming along was because Kaldur had somehow got The Martian Manhunter to okay M'gann for going to visit Atlantis, and I did not want to be left alone in the mountain.

"Yes, but I may use you to tow me around. I can even it out by storing weight. I would like to mediate again now, please." I shot the nervous M'gann a quick smile, hoped she had not realized how force it was, and closed my eyes to slip into a trance.

I did not care about the beautiful view I missed as the bio-ship passed beneath the waves, nor did I worry overmuch about making sure that everyone else was well. Connor had showed no obvious troubles in the aftermath of the mission, Kaldur had only suffered minor medical problems, and despite M'gann's most harrowing experience, her uncle had permitted her to come with us on the visit to Atlantis. I had cleared the air with her as much as was possible so soon after all the events, and 'I am entitled to de-stress and unwind, Rusts take it all!'

We were leaving after dinner and would arriver slightly past midnight, Atlantean time. I had several hours in which to do nothing but recharge and try to un-freaking-tense a little.

I began to breathe slowly, and started to store away my identity in my aluminum-mind. From there I would move on to each in turn and maintain them until I was storing as much as was safe.

Time passed.

~

"It is a pleasure to meet you," I recited when I shook hands with Kaldur'ahm's father, and then his mother. Calvin Durham spoke English very well – and the explanation he gave for Atlantean naming practices caught and held my attention without my needing to tap a duralumin-mind – so I ended up interacting with them more than I had expected, instead of hiding at the back.

I did notice Connor was more reserved than M'gann, but I could not discern if it was awkwardness and uncertainty, or just my same type of tiredness and unwillingness to interact.

I also got to see Kaldur express strong emotions when his parents both told him how proud they were of him. It made me feel less awful.

It was when Mr. Durham, with some amount of chagrin, admitted how he had first come to Atlantis that I started really paying attention. Kaldur was a bit defensive of his father, but Mr. Durham took my semi-aggressive interest more easily.

"You were born a human. With no gills," I double-checked.

"That is correct. My gills were created with science to allow me to breathe underwater. Black Manta had intended that we be his vanguard and infiltrators. But I found love and left his service." He smiled and laced his fingers with Mrs. Sha'lain'a, still very much in love after all of their years together.

"But was the same thing done to Kaldur? Was he born with gills?" I pressed.

"I was born with gills," Kaldur affirmed. I stared at M'gann and Connor. She didn't seem to get the problem, but he was at least frowning in mild confusion. I threw up my hands as I turned back to the family.

"If you weren't born with gills, and you weren't born with gills, why was your son born with gills? Inheritance! Does not! Work! That way!" I panted for breath a bit, and when I thought about panting for breath underwater I got my breathing under control fast, no matter that I was wearing more than three different types of safety and breathing gear.

"Ah," Mr. Durham chuckled. "Yes, I see your problem, but this case more closely resembles Epigenetic Theory, rather than the Lamarckian Inheritance Theory. Also, the science used to create these gills was gene therapy, rather than surgery." I gave him a flat look as I ticked through thoughts in my mind.

'Even if the magic here makes almost no sense to me, I had at least thought that most of the Physical Plane's laws and organization remained the same. I will admit that I've hardly parsed through everything I learned about bodies through the Pool, but this goes against almost everything I thought I knew. Unless he actually means Spiritual Genetic therapy, in which case Earth somehow has a way to create Hemalurgic constructs without Hemalurgy's blood sacrifices and tendency toward insanity. And if that is the case then I want and need to know all the more.' I firmed my resolve.

"Kaldur'ahm," I said oh so sweetly, "I would like to borrow your father. This goes against what I thought I knew about bodies, and I hope talking with him can fix that." Some part of my actual turmoil must have leaked through my mask's cracks, or so I judged from the others' expression, but I did not particularly care. That unease was to my benefit.

Mr. Durham at least took it better than the nervousness of everyone else in the room. 'Of course,' I considered, 'he was a servant and warrior under this Black Manta for no short period of time. He undoubtedly has seen blood and battle.'

"Oh-ho!" Kaldur's father laughed. "I wouldn't mind stepping aside to talk with you, Miss Renka, but I'm afraid I will only be of limited help. Science was never my strongest point, and if I had been better educated I would never have fallen for Black Manta's lies and promises. I don't know so much about what was done to me." I gave him a far flatter look.

"You don't know about the changes in your body." It was not a question only by dint of sheer deadpan.

"Sorry," he replied carelessly.

"You don't know what they did to make you change," I repeated. He shrugged in reply. "Meaning that you don't remember what they told you would happen to you and other Black Manta servants while they did it, or instructions and warnings for after." He looked less certain now. "Meaning, you don't know how or why those gills work, and you cannot be certain that they will not suddenly stop working any day now and you will drown in your home." He opened his mouth to say something but I continued over him undaunted. "Did you know your son would be born with gills before he was, and do you know that he won't have health problems because you found out about these-,"

"Ferris!" Kaldur interrupted. I looked to him. "Renka, please speak with more respect to my parents, especially as you are a guest in our home," he said firmly. I nodded once, in concession, but I wanted him to see my points as well.

"After your gills and body made problems in the desert, why should I lack concern over your health? You nearly died," I reminded him.

"You found me, and aided me." I rolled my eyes, turned an idea over in my head, and decided I was willing to trust Connor and M'gann with a few more tidbits that did not reflect well on me.

I did not care what his parents would think when they knew, as long as they were silent about it.

"Kaldur'ahm," I told him soberly, "we already discussed on our return that I had three… three times as much memory loss than the rest of you all. I have told you about my childhood. If I had lost yet more memories, the me I used to be would have easily left you behind, I think, or killed you while you slept to take your supplies. You. Very. Nearly. Died," I repeated, "and you do not know what else you may have happen. If Black Manta made the gills, do you know that he cannot make them stop while you are deep underwater?"

"Wait," Mrs. Sha'lain'a interjected. "Kaldur'ahm, what is this about you nearly dying?" Mr. Durham did not look particularly happy either. "I would like to hear these events," she instructed. M'gann and Connor shared an uncomfortable look.

"Can we talk now, or after this story?" I asked Mr. Durham. He looked me over slowly.

"You have made good arguments," he allowed with no little concern in his voice. "Let me see what I remember from my years of foolishness, and I will hear this story from Sha'lain'a later. Though, Kaldur'ahm." He drew his son's attention "Remember, we are proud of what you have accomplished, and we knew that you would face danger when we set foot on this path. We simply want to know what this danger is, so that we may support you. And your friends."

It was said as much to Mrs. Sha'lain'a as the others, and though she did not appear to be mollified, his words did make my teammates relax more. He and I together swam outside; I was still much more ungainly than he in the water.

Beginning with when he was asked/instructed to undergo the procedure by Black Manta, Mr. Durham slowly worked through what he remembered of his change. It had included drugs that he did not know the composition of, and the only surgeries were to ease the process rather than enable it.

When I reminded him that the human body had tens of trillions of cells that each had a nucleus with fleshthread material (it was called Deoxyribo Nucleic Acid or DNA on Earth), and asked what risks he could imagine if the drugs had missed therapizing even 0.1% of those cells, meaning that he had two genetic codes in potential opposition in his body, he became more serious. His humor did not improve when we walked each other through the gene recombination (meiosis, in Earth terms) that preceded the creation of each parent's genetic contribution, and the birth defects that could happen even with un-therapied genetics.

"Queen Mera," I began, and noted that his reaction did not indicate whether or not he was surprised that I knew her, "told me that Atlantis believes removing or altering the 'grafts,' that give them fish traits is believed to be impossible. Most Atlanteans with different grafts cannot have children, I think?"

"There are some exceptions, and history records indicate that it may have happened more in the past than in the present, but those records are unreliable. In general, Atlanteans with different grafts have trouble conceiving and carrying children, yes."

"More in the past?" 'Would that indicate degradation or more bleed over from the spiritual Realm to the Physical body over time? If so, both or which?' I put it to the side. "Can Atlanteans have children with humans? Humans without gills," I clarified. Mr. Durham gave me a surprised look.

"Yes. I am surprised you did not know. Our own King Orin, Aquaman, is the son of Atlantis's previous high queen and an unmodified surface man by the name of Thomas Curry." If I had ever known that, I had not bothered to remember it. "I have never heard of his majesty suffering any problems, beyond mild bigotry and culture shock. And the headaches of court politics."

"What grafts are on the royal family, please?" I asked slowly. I would have bet good money that they were purebloods, indistinguishable from humans, but it would be good to be certain.

"Purebloods," Mr. Durham confirmed. "The late queen and her younger son Prince Orm are purebloods, and while the most conservative Atlanteans only consider King Orin to be half-pureblood, generally consensus identifies him as a pureblood. His wife, Queen Mera, is also a pureblood."

"Is it possible for not pureblood Atlanteans and humans to have children?" I asked, because that would be the crux of the matter to me. Mr. Durham frowned.

"I am uncertain; there are very few humans and Atlanteans who would want to," he pointed out. "I… have heard rumors that triton-graft women, mermaids if you will, have occasionally had triton children by air-breather fathers, but I am not certain."

"Can purebloods and other graft Atlanteans have children?"

"Yes. I have heard of it happening, mostly as scandalous gossip more than by meeting such families I admit."

"Are the children pureblood-grafts?" I asked. He let out a startled bark of laughter.

"You," he told me, "may well be the first person I have heard refer to a pureblood graft. Most everyone else just calls them purebloods. I never thought much about that before. Mm, I cannot remember hearing a story where the child was referred to as a pureblood, although that may have been prejudice about the impure parent rather than because of the child's appearance."

'I will try to look into that. Okay, data: puregraft + othergraft = mostly othergraft, but I need to double-check; puregraft + human = puregraft in at least one case; puregraft + therapized human = therapized human, I think, but I don't know enough about Kaldur's body to check all the differences; othergraft + human = othergraft according to unreliable sources; othergraft + samegraft = samegraft; othergraft + differentgraft = no child in most cases, but it can happen….'

"If two Atlanteans are not pureblood-grafts and not the same graft can have children, what graft is the child?" I asked slowly. "And if more than one child, are they all the same graft?"

"I… am not certain. I do not know." I gave Mr. Durham a look before I could censor my actions.

"I am sorry," I told him with a sigh. "I am… the mission was bad for me, and I am now being bad to you. I apologize," I offered, with the best underwater bow I could manage. He laid a hand on my shoulder.

"I know the feeling," he reassured me. I don't think he quite understood how much his ignorance – of his own body's and his son's health, of the people he lived alongside for many years, and even of fellow mixed marriage families in his adopted home – upset me or why, but I did my best to bury the churning bitterness away from my surface thoughts as he spoke. "It may not help, but I would assume that different grafts may have different… variables, the word is?"

"Yes," I sighed. 'That's what I thought, but even if it would make more sense it makes my attempts to figure this out all the more difficult.' "Also, which parent is which may be different." I didn't think I communicated that as clearly as I could have and started wracking my brain. "If female triton and man air-breather have triton children, will man triton and female air-breather have air-breather children?" I asked as an example.

"Ah," he sighed. "Again, I do not know. But if Queen Mera also does not know, she will likely be able to find out."

"Yes, and I like to work with her, but she is also a Queen," I pointed out. Continuing our discussion, we drifted back toward the house of Kaldur's childhood.

 

[Teocraso]

Don't really know much about Mistborn, so Renka's aggression was kind of jarring in that I have no idea where it's coming from. It all seemed like nitpick-y pedantry, excessively paranoid, and none of her business to begin with. It's like I was suddenly reading a versus debate with a particularly anal debater who got hung up on small things that don't really matter?

Given that she apologized I get that she was supposed to come off as aggressive, but then the other characters sort of go along with her tailspin into paranoid "what-if" scenarios.

Love the story, just found this scene very strange.

 

[Grigori]

I was uncertain and uncomfortable after having my mind twisted and mutilated, and I did. Not. Care about letting my team know about it. I wanted every weapon I had in easy reach, I wanted my empty metal-minds filled, and I wanted it all as immediately as I could manage.

The only reason I was even coming along was because Kaldur had somehow got The Martian Manhunter to okay M'gann for going to visit Atlantis, and I did not want to be left alone in the mountain.

"Yes, but I may use you to tow me around. I can even it out by storing weight. I would like to mediate again now, please." I shot the nervous M'gann a quick smile, hoped she had not realized how force it was, and closed my eyes to slip into a trance.

Click to shrink...

So I suppose she isn't handling it as well as I thought, back to being annoyed at Wally. I did enjoy this chapter though, paranoid Renka trying to get some manner of control as she helps her teammate by bullying his father.

 

[Draculthemad]

Don't really know much about Mistborn, so Renka's aggression was kind of jarring in that I have no idea where it's coming from

Click to shrink...

Mistborn magic is genetic, and her people specifically were the subject of rather intense repression and a concerted genetics program to stamp out their inherited form of it.

Terris

 

[aabbcc]

Large crisis'es hell someone tried to blot out the sun on the first episode. Bringing some sniper's and into these combat situations, could be useful. During planetary invasions, In some situations fifty rifle's are better than one batman.

Click to shrink...

Large crisises they are worth shit. Because they are large, and usually imply foes that are so far beyond them that they are not any more useful than an old lady with a wiffle bat.

Wotan? they are not going to be useful there. Ronoake? wrong side of the child/adult barrier to be of help, Injustice League plants or team? Darkseid? I'll take a hundred police already in place over these 50 guys clogging the zeta tubes.

they could probably beat Mr Freeze, Killer Frost, Abra Kadabra, Bane, Black Spider, Atomic Skull, etc

Click to shrink...

Mr Freeze, likely.

Killer Frost's power level varies a lot depending on writer and on how much she has absorbed, but it includes a sheet of frost across her skin that give her increased durability, the ability to kill any of these guys with a touch, and the ability to flash-freeze any containment, she's a little more trouble than she first appears, or a whole heap of more trouble. A middling or high end appearance of her, and these guys are seriously out of their league.

Abra Kadabra employs future tech, lots of it, and seems to carry whatever the plot needs of him at the time. I would be hesitant to bet against the guy who could easily be carrying an anti-firearm device, or a small forcefield. Failing that, illusions and trickery are a mainstay for him: invisibility, false duplicates and similar tricks are common, as well as teleportation.

Bane, I will point out that while armed people can defeat him (and his thugs), it is in no way a sure thing, he's brilliant, and he's perfectly willing to bring his own backup. If this is happening in a city turning it into a firefight might actually be a bad idea from a neighborhood perspective. If he is captured this way, be very certain that it will not work a second time. I will also note that they're going to need something heavier than the gear you suggested, the only thing that'd work for sure nonlethally is the foam.

Black Spider, sure, but why would Black Spider make it into a straight fight? if he can almost stealth past the team, what chance does the squad have of preventing him from reaching his objective? add some selective use of explosives to sow chaos and serve as distraction and I don't see them stopping him from his task.

Terror Twins are stupid enough to fall, but on the other hand, super-strength means it's incredibly likely they will take casualties and see civilian deaths, and they are tough and mobile enough that a long range takedown is on the unfeasible side. A single thrown car could spell the end of a team member, and they are badly equipped to stop this, or stop it from squishing some random mother strolling her baby.

Atomic Skull: I don't think we see enough of the YJ version to tell. Varying levels of durability and strength are not unknown to the character, and they may have done a composite with other characters of the same name.

Clayface, I will note the sheer cunning of the thing, the ability to be any wall, ceiling or floor and jump to ambush at point blank, plus it's strength? deadly. The sewer fight? they are dead. The warehouse fight, they have a chance, but will Clayface fall for this a second time?

So out of that list of 8, I give better than even odds only to, at best, half of them, at worst, only two.

They definitely could beat Ferris: one would get into grappling range when she moves in and catch them both in a plastic foam prison while the others taser her until her gold-mind runs out.

Click to shrink...

Depends on Ferris not seeing the plastic foam grenade coming with her enhanced senses and souped up mental speed, like she's done so against other thrown projectiles through the fic. Even if she restricts herself to melee their chances are not all that great if she starts to draw heavily from speed, much like how Sportsmaster got beat hard.

Their chances drop to near zero if you remove the lethality restriction. Which is a problem, because a lot of metahuman threats won't care about not killing them either. Now, to be fair, Ferris is both fast and strong, a problematic combination.

Another issue is the lack of mobility. They can get to any city fast with the zeta tubes, but what do they do from there?

I do agree that the plan is a lot more workable, deferring the training and having a far more stringent entry requirement, and more usefully, it would prove valuable experience to the team. Tho the group feels far too small to be anything more than speedbumps even to individual members once they are aware of their tricks. On the downside, these people are tied to their individual militaries, militaries full of moles from the light, and who would make it difficult for other countries to accept their presence in their cities, even if they are an international force.

Isn't that the whole point of people like Sportsmaster, Green Arrow, and David Cain being such high-level threats?

Click to shrink...

I will point out that these people are bullshit. They are on the inhuman side of durable (I'd like to see a regular person take a hit from, say, Amazo, and only have a slight arm injury instead of ending in traction), covered in Named Character plot shields, implausibly skilled, and always with the right equipment on hand.

If you're working with a stock of this much potential, you're no longer taking 6~12 'normal' skilled soldiers, you're taking 6~12 named characters already on the street level hero scale. You're not taking Bob the sapper, you're taking the Michael Holts, Helena Bertinellis and Renee Montoyas of the world.

You're doing that? then sure, they can be as bullshit as you like. These people have beat the conservation of ninjutsu, skipped the red shirt and taken the bright tights and fancy titles with both hands, with the ability to mow through mundane opposition that comes with wearing your underwear on the outside, as well as the extra chance of survival against villains. Unless it's a crisis, then their death toll ramps up.

Joking aside, narratively, these people have a weight behind them, and a ready excuse for being far too good in far too many skills, or becoming combat capable in far too little time. Bob? he doesn't. Bob becoming a match for Robin in a few months feels like a sue, Barbara Gordon doing so is just a comic book character catching up.

 

[Chunq]

"There are some exceptions, and history record indicate that it may have happened more in the past than in the present, but those records are unreliable.

Click to shrink...

and historical record

I assume this is a plot hook, possibly around the underpinnings of Orm's insurgency.

 

[Obloquy]

Life Ore Death​

Undertow - part 2

*September 6 [Renka PoV]

I slipped in several more hours of storing my metalminds during our trip in the bio-ship to Poseidonis. I was beginning to feel more confident in my ability to handle myself in case of any problems, but my combat-use metal-minds were still laughably small compared to what I wanted them to be, and that would take a week or more to change.

Truth be told, in many ways I was a worse wreck than when we first left the mountain. It was only by tapping large streams of Identity from my collection of four aluminum-minds that I could function in polite society without snitchy twitches, whimpers, or displays of violence. Fortunately, I had been storing identity every day to practice but almost never tapped it, leaving me with at least enough for a day of almost personable interaction.

Connor and M'gann had tensions of their own, but they both relaxed more as we entered Poseidonis and Kaldur got us through the heightened security around the city perimeter. When I deigned to look out the window on the trip to the palace, I was again reminded that there had been an attack here not so long in the past. I by no means had memorized the city's… sky line?

'Whatever it is called, buildings are broken or gone now that were not before. I can see they are rebuilding quickly… According to Kaldur, many of buildings are grown out of "coral," I think. Are these fixes being made with some type of healing magic, or with construct earth magic? It could be either or both, from what I see. I will have to ask, later.'

"It is much better?" I asked in response to M'gann and Connor's comments about how quickly the city had recovered from the attack. I hadn't forgotten that they'd volunteered to assist in the clean up, but beyond repeated confirmation that I still couldn't safely handle the pressure I had only paid perfunctory attention to their stories.

Once we seated the bio-ship and traveled into the city, I could conclude that M'gann and Connor had downplayed their own efforts in the rebuilding process.

"You! You're the girl from the Justice League who pulled my brother out of the rubble in the bazaar," a pure-graft Atlantean girl gushed. "Thank you, thank you, bless you! The medics say he can be out and about in another few days; if he'd been left under there for much longer Ara'male'en might have choked on the grit before they could save him."

M'gann looked less overwhelmed as she spoke with this woman than she had when confronted by each of the previous three who had recognized her. Meanwhile, two octopus-graft parents half-heartedly scolded and tried to pull their children off of Connor. While awkward, he unmistakably smiled at the attention as the kids tried to smother with affection the boy responsible for freeing their trapped class from a collapsed school building.

I tapped enough bronze and electrum to muster an honest smile for Kaldur. "This is what being a hero is all about," I told him in Atlantean. "I am a little jealous of them, I think, but they deserve all this and more."

"In my early days, I had always thought of my service in terms of combatting those who would do evil, but it is not," he agreed.

"No matter how much evil you destroy, destruction is still destruction. We must also Preserve, Cultivate, and create to make a better life. Less evil is not the same as more good." We shared a nod, and I released those metal-minds again.

A part of me wanted to begrudge them their recognition, but it was a small part. If I wanted such things for myself, I had long resolved, I would simply have to earn it as they had.

Our path through the morning clamor of the Poseidonis streets was slow and meandering. We had an hour before it was the local lunchtime, and Aqualad had pointed us in the general direction of a place he had frequented in his Conservatory years, but we were in no hurry.

"Kaldur'ahm!" Topo met us at the corner that led to the eatery, which was a favorite for conservatory students on lunch break. I made a point of hugging the squirmy little octopus boy – I later learned that Topo was older than Kaldur by several months, but he was too small and cheerful for me to have processed it – because Topo probably lacked hugs in his life, and I shook hands with a girl named Lori, who was a triton-graft.

M'gann took the opportunity to make her own triton tail, and Lori couldn't quite cover her discomfort.

'Is M'gann that oblivious, or has she met Lori before and is intentionally pulling her… pulling her hair?' I wondered. I was not quite certain how perceptive of body language versus thoughts M'gann was, and how good she and I were comparatively at discerning people's displayed versus actual feelings. 'And that's assuming that I'm not misreading Miss Lori's reaction and she actually doesn't care or is flattered.'

"Kaldur," I murmured in English as we selected a table, "does Atlantis have a nudity taboo?" He shot me a confused look. "He," I nodded to Topo, "wasn't wearing anything when I met him, and now he is."

"He was not? He was?" Aqualad frowned. "No, we do have a nudity taboo, and Topo was definitely clothed when we met."

"I do not remember that."

"I am certain of it. He was wearing a dark uniform, and it was skintight; you may not have noticed the differences in the murky lighting, as we were underwater."

That… was not impossible, I allowed. I had also been remembering Topo as being much smaller than he was now.

"What are you two talking about?" Topo asked. I glanced to Kaldur. I didn't particularly care if he brought up a slightly embarrassing misrememberence on my part. He decided to cover for me anyway.

"We were discussing your outfit; Renka liked the color of your shirt. Is that a new acquisition? I seem to remember that you usually prefer more muted colors." Topo shifted, but Lori had overheard and answered first.

"No," she all but snarled, "but it's the only thing he has soft and loose enough not to aggravate his scars."

"Lori!"

"""Scars?""" we all demanded.

"Scars. Tell him, Topo; Kaldur'ahm needs to know, and you know he would never judge you." Topo shrank back from the group's attention. I decided not to get involved and leaned back to listen.

"Topo. If someone has hurt you," Kaldur began.

"Beating up bad guys is what we're here for," Superboy finished grimly.

"I-," he managed, "I don't want to talk about it." If I had been more involved, that would have been my clue to back off.

'But will they take it? I... Rusting conscience.' Just to avoid being a hypocrite, I left my seat and got in front of him.

"If he does not wish to talk," I said in English, "he should not be have to." The others hesitated. Lori did not.

"If he won't, I will. Topo was attacked by a bunch of purists just for how he looks!"

"""He what!""" He really did cringe back from our volume, and even I had spun around. I eyed his shirt, tempted to pull it up and check, but I did not want to humiliate him like that in a restaurant.

"Can I-," M'gann began.

"After lunch," I interrupted, forcefully, pulling on even more identity and determination than I had been before, "in private, I want to hear more about this. ...If it is okay. Lori," I turned to her, "what are these purists like?" What followed over our meal was an introduction to modern Atlantean bigotry, instead of the historical versions I had heard from Kaldur before.

It… did not make much sense to me.

"So," I summed up, attempting to organize the confusing hypocrisies. "Purists are pure-graft Atlanteans who think Atlanteans with fish traits are impure and should be killed off."

"Basically," Lori agreed.

"Despite their talk," Kaldur put in, "I doubt many of the people who say they espouse this doctrine would be willing to endorse mass murder. If things were that bad, then we would not be worrying about individual attacks by cowards, but open civil war in the streets."

"According to the genomorphs, people said the same thing about Ubumwe," Connor argued, which redirected the conversation into past atrocities on the surface. After listening for things that I wanted to research later, I caught Lori's attention.

"Purists think impure Atlanteans are beneath pure Atlanteans," I repeated privately.

"Yes?" she agreed, probably uncertain why I repeated something so obvious.

"Purists also believe they are superior air-breathing humans, even though the purists are humans who were made impure by breathing water," I continued. Something about that offended Lori, I recognized the way she swelled up before she spoke, but either through my tapped connection or through her own self-discipline she held her tongue. What she did answer wasn't her first reaction, and I wondered what that would have been.

"Please do not call us, any of us, impure," she asked. I shrugged.

"I will not. But, using Purist thinking," I emphasized, "pure-graft Atlanteans are impure humans, the same way they think other Atlanteans are more impure." Lori frowned.

"I… suppose you could say that. I've never heard anyone call them pure-grafts before. Just purebloods, or pure Atlanteans." I shrugged in reply to her observation. "That… I sort of like that."

"Kaldur's father said the same thing. He was born a pure human and got gills, so he has a unique perspective." Lori's eyes went wide and she turned across the table. 'I really hope I did not make a rude comment or innuendo in Atlantean Greek.'

"Kaldur'ahm, your father used to serve Black Manta!"

After her yell, I caught the lack of sound from everywhere else in the restaurant. 'That is never a good sign.' I resisted the urge to turn and scan around the room with my eyes. Kaldur sighed. Lori, mortified, had clapped her hands over her mouth.

"That is… a complicated matter, and one I do not wish to discuss in the open. I will pay the bill, and we can speak more at the Conservatory."

~

"Wait. Wait please," I said at the end of our discussion about the Ocean Master, the Purist movement, and the Black Manta. 'I have a worse headache, and it has little to do with telepathy pain.' "It… I… The Ocean Master is a purist, and the leader of the purists; he wants to kill all of the non-pure-graft Atlanteans?"

"Yes," Lori answered shortly.

"He espouses the purist dogma, yes, but very few purists would claim to agree with his extreme measures. Even among purists, much less the more rational pure-grafts, the Ocean Master is quite reviled. He has been known to injure or kill purists in the past who attempted to protect impure Atlanteans from his assaults," Kaldur clarified. None of those, however, were the things giving me the most mental problems.

"The Ocean Master believes Atlantis is superior to the surface world, and believes pure-grafts should be supreme within Atlantis. If he wins, he would enslave or cull other Atlanteans and end contact between Atlantis and all the countries above?"

"Essentially, yes," Kaldur agreed.

"But this great purist leader has as his second-in-command, not other pure Atlanteans, but an army of surface humans, and they are led by a surface human whose stated goal is to conquer Atlantis for his own army?" Kaldur and Lori both nodded. I threw up my arms in Earth's 'I can't believe this' gesture. "Power," I concluded dismally. "No one believes in anything, they only just want power, power, and more power."

"Not surprising," Connor grunted.

"How so?" M'gann asked in confusion. I briefly wondered if she were using her telekinesis to swim, because she moved differently than Lori did but kept up the speed just fine. I decided it was not important.

"Pure-graft Atlanteans are the… dominant, social group?" Using that particular word struck a bad chord in me, but it was the most appropriate for my question.

"In Poseidonis, yes. Other Atlantean cities, like Nanavue, have much smaller pureblood- pure-graft Atlantean populations. But as Poseidonis is the seat of the senate and of High King Orin-,"

"Even here the pure-grafts aren't a large majority," Lori interrupted. "I think the ratio is sixty to forty, and the next highest pure-graft populated city has maybe one-quarter or one-third of its population being pure-grafts. I forget which."

"I see," I muttered. Then I returned to M'gann's question. "Ocean Master, in his heart, does not care whether an Atlantean is triton-graft or whale-graft or shark-graft or fish-graft. All he cares about is power, but he shouts pure-graft ideals because purists will follow him and give him more power." M'gann frowned.

"But, why wouldn't he call for equality then? Couldn't he lead all the other Atlanteans, who outnumber the pure-grafts, and get more power that way?"

"Because," Kaldur breathed, and he seemed to realize something. "Because if Ocean Master were not agitating the purists and sowing dissent, there would not be so much oppression and strife about the matter."

"Oh, I doubt that," Lori answered.

"No, Lori, Topo, please consider it. Before we were born, and before Ocean Master appeared after King Orin was enthroned, there was so little purist sentiment in the popular consciousness that the Senate was willing to enthrone King Orin, who has an human father, over pureblood Prince Orm, who was also the son of an honored general and well known to the public, while King Orin was not. History books have not had purist beliefs as such a major influence in politics and culture since two centuries in the past. It was only after Ocean Master appeared that the sentiments he espoused… oh."

"What is it, Kaldur'ahm?" Topo asked, while Lori seemed to be thinking through the ideas.

"He made a self-fulfilling prophecy, much like in Oedipus the King," Kaldur explained. I had no clue what the person or story he referred to was, which was odd because Superboy seemed to recognize the title. "By attacking 'impure' Atlanteans and calling for their subjugation-," he fingered his gills, "-our subjugation, he made purebloods who did not hold purist views feel unsafe and fear that the 'impure' Atlanteans would blame them for the Ocean Master's actions. Those Atlanteans who were not purebloods, at the same time, were made to wonder who did or did not secretly support the Ocean Master."

"And after several years of this, and our generation growing up like this," Lori continued in a sickened voice, "both sides are starting to feel like they have to pick a side, because everyone is feeling like people are only either with them or against them." She looked extremely nervous. "Kaldur'ahm, what do you think Ocean Master's true goal is, if we're thinking about this the right way? Would he really genocide people, us, if he took power? I don't- have King Orin and Queen Mera ever thought about it from this perspective? I always thought purists just were hateful bigots, but if Ocean Master is actually trying to inspire people to become hateful bigots…"

"I am almost certain they have, now that I remember a number of comments I did not understand at the time I heard them."

"I wonder something," I mused.

"What are you thinking?" Topo asked.

"If an impure Atlantean who believed, genuinely believed he was impure - believed that the pure-graft Atlanteans should be dominant over him-," and the word from home made my stomach roil. "If he tried to join the purists, do you think they would let him?" The three Atlanteans shared stupefied looks.

"I can't believe that would ever happen," Lori answered.

"Nor can I. But… yes, I see what you meant about hypocrisy and power," Kaldur said. "If purists practiced as they preached, they would want to recruit impure Atlanteans who also believed." He grimaced. "A part of me always… hatred," he sighed. "It is like that surface world saying: the man berates the boy who kicks the dog who bites the cat who chases the mouse."

We digested that imagery in our heads.

"Wait, does the boy kick the dog before or after the man yells at him?" Connor asked.

"Is there a difference?" M'gann asked.

"Yeah. If the boy kicked the dog first, maybe it was because the dog bit the cat. If not, then why is the boy being yelled at?"

"I th-think," Topo volunteered nervously, "that the point is that it doesn't matter why the boy is being yelled at. He can't yell back because the man is m-more, stronger, bigger, whatever it is, so he goes and hurts something weaker than him the way he was hurt. The cycle of hatred."

"The cycle of hatred indeed, where malice and anger spread like ripples," Kaldur agreed. I hummed.

"If it is a cycle," I volunteered, "then maybe the man yells at the boy because he is angry he cannot catch the mouse that ate his breakfast." After a moment, Superboy started chuckling. M'gann wilted.

"That's accurate," he said.

"But it's so unfair. No one feels any better and it doesn't fix any of the problems anyone has," M'gann complained. "Everyone just makes everything worse."

"That is why there are heroes," Kaldur said. "We try to feed the mouse so that it does not eat men's food, and we stand up for the boy before the man, and protect the dog from being kicked by the boy." Around the table, we four shared an almost physical feeling of pride.

"Um," Lori asked, "I'm sorry, but can someone tell me what a cat, a dog, and a mouse are? I don't know much about surface world animals."

 

[Chunq]

The colors are an anachronism. Popular to do because of With This Ring, but doesn't fit for the cosmere unless we're talking Nalthis.

If the almost-illegible purple is alluding to the shard of Dominion, I don't see why it should have any negative connotation to her.

 

[DarthThrawn]

The colors are an anachronism. Popular to do because of With This Ring, but doesn't fit for the cosmere unless we're talking Nalthis.

If the almost-illegible purple is alluding to the shard of Dominion, I don't see why it should have any negative connotation to her.

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The coloring might be in reference to the shard, but the badfeel is likely due to her memories of the Final Empire (divided into ten Dominances) and the Lord Ruler (who seemed unusually fixated on the word).

 

[Lokpik89]

a quick question, If renka gains a power ring could she transmute and invest the two god metals?

 

[Obloquy]

Don't really know much about Mistborn, so Renka's aggression was kind of jarring in that I have no idea where it's coming from. It all seemed like nitpick-y pedantry, excessively paranoid, and none of her business to begin with. It's like I was suddenly reading a versus debate with a particularly anal debater who got hung up on small things that don't really matter?

Given that she apologized I get that she was supposed to come off as aggressive, but then the other characters sort of go along with her tailspin into paranoid "what-if" scenarios.

Love the story, just found this scene very strange.

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So I suppose she isn't handling it as well as I thought, back to being annoyed at Wally. I did enjoy this chapter though, paranoid Renka trying to get some manner of control as she helps her teammate by bullying his father.

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Comparatively speaking, Renka is handling most of the stress very well, but there's so much overall that the comparatively little bits that slip through are still really straining her. She is in a bad place, and she is not as good as she thinks at hiding it. Nitpick-y pedantry and excessive paranoia regarding magic and things going wrong are exactly what I was going for, because they are how I think she's supposed to react to this mix of stressors.

Given that she's used to magic and science having sensible rules, the sheer horrific number of things that could go wrong from Mr. Durham not understanding what's been done to his body... yes, she got extremely paranoid. Because if she were an evil villain (like Black Manta or TLR) she would build in safeguards to keep her elite forces from doing what Mr. Durham did in turning his coat: drugs that were required to keep the changes stable, devices implanted in his body without his knowledge, a way to remove what was given on command...

She thought she was safe sharing a mindlink with the Team, and then Psimon whammied her, which she didn't think was possible. She has had Hemalurgic spikes at a time when Ati was still in control of Ruin, and she didn't know the side-effects at the time.

The others are mostly humoring her, but she's sincere enough to get Mr. Durham worried as well, because he can't say that it's impossible for Black Manta to shut down his gills and kill him. the fact that he knows how nasty Black Manta is and Black Manta still hasn't done it to him in the past 15 years is the main reason he doesn't get more worried, but as the only traitor known to defect from Black Manta's troops, and the adoptive father of Black Manta's biological child, Mr. Durham knows that Black Manta must really have a hate-on for him, and if there wasn't a way to do it before he still may have invented one since.

Paranoid Renka trying to get back some measure of control and security in vast, confusing Earth, is exactly what is happening here, and most of the others are hiding how worried that makes them, because she is mostly coping enough.

Yes, This is what I was trying to convey, but I am not the best a getting my thoughts across. something that got to me when I first watched Young Justice, Either the death rate on that earth was insane meaning people do not react how I would consider them to after some of the insane stunts that get pulled, Or it was written as off-screen deaths happen but do not get mentioned.

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Depends on Ferris not seeing the plastic foam grenade coming with her enhanced senses and souped up mental speed, like she's done so against other thrown projectiles through the fic. Even if she restricts herself to melee their chances are not all that great if she starts to draw heavily from speed, much like how Sportsmaster got beat hard.

Their chances drop to near zero if you remove the lethality restriction. Which is a problem, because a lot of metahuman threats won't care about not killing them either. Now, to be fair, Ferris is both fast and strong, a problematic combination.

Another issue is the lack of mobility. They can get to any city fast with the zeta tubes, but what do they do from there?

I do agree that the plan is a lot more workable, deferring the training and having a far more stringent entry requirement, and more usefully, it would prove valuable experience to the team. Tho the group feels far too small to be anything more than speedbumps even to individual members once they are aware of their tricks. On the downside, these people are tied to their individual militaries, militaries full of moles from the light, and who would make it difficult for other countries to accept their presence in their cities, even if they are an international force.

I will point out that these people are bullshit. They are on the inhuman side of durable (I'd like to see a regular person take a hit from, say, Amazo, and only have a slight arm injury instead of ending in traction), covered in Named Character plot shields, implausibly skilled, and always with the right equipment on hand.

If you're working with a stock of this much potential, you're no longer taking 6~12 'normal' skilled soldiers, you're taking 6~12 named characters already on the street level hero scale. You're not taking Bob the sapper, you're taking the Michael Holts, Helena Bertinellis and Renee Montoyas of the world.

You're doing that? then sure, they can be as bullshit as you like. These people have beat the conservation of ninjutsu, skipped the red shirt and taken the bright tights and fancy titles with both hands, with the ability to mow through mundane opposition that comes with wearing your underwear on the outside, as well as the extra chance of survival against villains. Unless it's a crisis, then their death toll ramps up.

Joking aside, narratively, these people have a weight behind them, and a ready excuse for being far too good in far too many skills, or becoming combat capable in far too little time. Bob? he doesn't. Bob becoming a match for Robin in a few months feels like a sue, Barbara Gordon doing so is just a comic book character catching up.

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The YJ canon story was about the heroes and their lives, not the world's overall actions and reactions that would have taken over and swallowed up the plot and time constraints if it was explored as deeply as it could have been. WTR is about the larger effects on the world because of OL's ability to teleport around the world and his desire to change the entire general standard of living, etc.

It really depends on whether you look at it from the comic perspective, or from the world perspective. If you're going to look at it from the comic perspective with Red Shirts being expendable until you get Named Characters, then sure, the troops are mooks. But try looking at it like a person living in that world who doesn't have a big characters list in their head.

USA alone has a population of 300 million. Big cities have police populations of 3 or 4 digits, and even small townships have a dozen or two, usually. There are currently 1.4 million people serving in the US military: people who have been through some form of boot camp, learned discipline, learned to use firearms and close combat skills and a stringent fitness regime.

If you didn't read comics and didn't recognize the name Barbara Gordon, who would you expect to do better against a group of 4 thugs or one lower tier meta human: a teenage girl (admittedly the daughter of a police commissioner) who has had some martial arts and gymnastics training over the past 5-8 years, or the 32-year-old ex-marine who has been deployed into hostile territory, is a second dan in at least one martial arts, and has had training in guns, combat, and fitness for the past 10-15 years?
...
My entire point was that the program wouldn't take Bob the Sapper, it would look for the Renee Montoya's, the 1965 era Nate Adams's, the men who could have been beside Deathstroke in the super-soldier program back when he was normal. The ones who have the drive to be heroes, but not the opportunity or powers.

Even mundane thugs can be a threat to powerful people with the right back-up. Victor Zsasz is physically fit and crazy, and that's about it. Penguin basically relies on tech and mercenaries if I remember right.

A hedge wizard could spend a few hours putting 'pierce through things' spells on bullets, and a normal guy with them could theoretically shoot Superman. Would other things be required to make it more likely? Yes, but not all of those other things are hard to arrange. The same trick could be used against Ultraman if you caught him unprepared.

You want to talk about named characters? Let's talk about the number of low-level metas and 'super criminals' who don't need League-level force but could still take down a few police officers. Focusing on them so that the few League members don't have to - and providing back-up, delaying tactics, and suppressing fire against heavier hitters - is what this would be for.

Would a heavy hitter like Wotan mop the floor with them? Sure, but Wotan would mop the floor with half of the League members (Superman, Green arrow, Black Canary, for sure, better than even odds against Flash, Hal Jordan, Aquaman, Captain Atom, Red Tornado by my guess) in one-on-one. The League providing back-up against each other's rock-paper-scissors match-ups is part of why it was formed.

A mid-rank threat like Clayface? The first time, Clayface would probably win, but one of them might get lucky, and it wouldn't be a total loss. (You also can't just argue that Clayface would casually kill them all after beating them when Clayface didn't kill the Team when he knocked them out.) Freeze capsules and concussive grenades are not hard to imagine options, and there's no non-meta reason why Robin should be noticeably better at throwing a grenade down Clayface's throat than a veteran who's had extra training.

Lower-tiered threats? Those, and lots of them, would be what the group was for. They'd be a specialty unit for if July Fourth's Ice Villains attack happened after the League all had to go stop Wotan, etc.

We can keep lobbying ideas back and forth, but it might be better to do it in a Discussion than on the thread. There's some plot-relevance to LOD, but at this point it's getting distracting.

The colors are an anachronism. Popular to do because of With This Ring, but doesn't fit for the cosmere unless we're talking Nalthis.

If the almost-illegible purple is alluding to the shard of Dominion, I don't see why it should have any negative connotation to her.

Click to shrink...

The coloring might be in reference to the shard, but the badfeel is likely due to her memories of the Final Empire (divided into ten Dominances) and the Lord Ruler (who seemed unusually fixated on the word).

Click to shrink...

If I remember Elantris right, dark purple is the color of Dominion's investiture, like Preservation is white, Ruin is black, Honor is deep blue, Devotion is pale blue, Odium is bright red, etc. You should have seen me do similar colorings with Ruin, Preservation, Autonomy, and Odium in the past, and you'll see them again.

I also don't think it was coincidence that TLR was so heavily focused on taking over and dominating Scadrial and using that exact term while he so. Things may take a while to bubble up, but...

a quick question, If renka gains a power ring could she transmute and invest the two god metals?

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She could transmute chemical and sub-atomic materials into the structure of atrium or lerasium, yes, but ingesting / storing into those wouldn't work. It would be like cloning a person and expecting the clone to be that person without giving them any of the memories or life experience. The physical structure of the god metals would be spiritually sterile.

Any transmutation / transubstantiation / creation of god metals would be a major ritual, on par with Klarion's splitting of the world in Misplaced, or something of similarly epic requirements.

 

[Chunq]

If I remember Elantris right, dark purple is the color of Dominion's investiture, like Preservation is white, Ruin is black, Honor is deep blue, Devotion is pale blue, Odium is bright red, etc. You should have seen me do similar colorings with Ruin, Preservation, Autonomy, and Odium in the past, and you'll see them again.

I also don't think it was coincidence that TLR was so heavily focused on taking over and dominating Scadrial and using that exact term while he so. Things may take a while to bubble up, but...

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I don't remember that color coding from Elantris or any of the books. Here's some colors that are associated, which is why I don't think color coding applies at all:
Preservation - blue iron/steel lines, white mist (Harmony the same), metallic colors, lerasium is green
Ruin - black mist, atium is silvery and is the physical body of Ruin
Dominion - Elantris' magic is a combination of the shattered Dominion and Devotion.
Devotion - flash of light (assuming white) from active Aons, Chay Shan, Forgery, and Dhakor bone. Dhakor liked red armor. Seons come in a variety of colors.
Honor - stormlight is white when it leaves a gem. Syl is light blue, Pattern is black, Ivory is presumably white, and Wyndle is a presumably green vine studded with clear quartz.
Odium - red light in the everstorm and the transformation.
Endowment - all the colors of the electromagnetic spectrum, white.
Autonomy - no real indication. The malevolent aura Sazed was "keeping back" was red. That's theorized to be either Autonomy or Odium. Autonomy more likely than Odium because of the stated goals of Trellism.
Cultivation, Ambition - nothing much.

Dominion was shattered by Odium long before the events of Mistborn. "Dominance" was just a neat label for the Final Empire's holdings.

Considering DC's emotional spectrum, the colors don't fit. Whatever you're creating further up ahead, I hope you keep some of this in mind.