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Pound the Table | An X-Men Self-Insert

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Blinktwice13 said:
So on the one hand, I do share this modern sensibility.

On the other as someone who grew up in the 90s, this is possibly one of the nicer bad reactions someone of this age group could have.

Homophobia was baked into culture, as anyone who's seen more than three movies from the 80s can tell you. Not to say that there wasn't low key support for non-cishet people, but it didn't have the mainstream momentum that would build over the late 2000/2010s.

Also? She's twelve. Middle school is bar none the worst part of a person's life, not least because emotional regulation is a quaint suggestion at best. Hormones be like that, and right now she is Feeling A Lot.

So despite being a thirtysomething cis-queer and empathizing mostly with Noa, I do at least understand the reaction. Therefore, while giving her a stern yet gentle explanation is definitely on the table? Hitting a child for having reactions based on these circumstances seems. A bit much.

______

As an aside, isn't Kingpin like the Final Boss of street-level Marvel? That's big, right?
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I get what you mean, hell I don't know if I would better respond better at her age. I said truely cringe shit in middle school, and it was really baked into the culture. Ma would tan your hide if you said 'fuck' or 'damn', but saying 'gay' wasn't a problem. Sure I new they existed and were people, but my teenie tiny hormone addled brain didn't put two and two together and remeber ALL people deserve care and respect until they prove otherwise. Someone's sexuality or gender have little to no bearing on that subject.

On a different subject, King Pin is definitely the final boss. He has stages and even a final form.
 
Well be real interesting to see which version of Kingpin this is, I always liked the idea of him being something of like the comic book supervillain version of Robert Moses, or at least, the apprentice to Moses' status as dark lord of the sith :V
 
Woahhhh, nice one Noa for bagging a xmen hottie here, hope you don't mind the mind reading and possibly wild telepathic sex that comes with psychics like her, just like logan and scott with emma frost and jean grey, those four really need a break and an open relationship and only few good things come from hickman's krakoa era of x men comics.

Also deadpool and wolverine movie trailer just showed up, which is crazy and awesome, fingers crossed that wade "marvel jesus" wilson will save the mcu from its present disaster.

And hopefully miss Daye you might answer my previous questions and post. Also happy valentines day to you and the rest of ya'll.

JJ_judas_6767 said:
Then have you ever had a case that's screams "way about my clearance/pay grade" especially by the fed government in the USA?

Cuz I was reminded of your DC comics omake with noa working with a reformed harvey dent/twoface, and she's (Noa) at least in touch with batman, so my few questions related to DC universe Noa is this, has Noa had ever prosecute with a overwhelming evidence against amanda waller and her task force x aka the suicide squad for their "misadventures" ala the lawyers who blow the lid on the iran-contra scandal and watergate scandals?

Since I was reminded of the omake itself and by the new suicide squad game (which I think it's ass, especially what their trying to put a live service lootbox cash cow, just like the square enix avengers. Let alone what they're doing with idiotic "woke" shit like in the game lex luthor's "praise" of wonderwoman's society and especially the indignified death of batman)

My other question I have will be relating to the doom patrol, since your dc omake and your main one is on marvel, how would Noa if ever had to handle legal troubles of the doom patrol since they're more or less DC comic's version of the Xmen, but much weirder with a metahuman who's reality warping powers are by flexing his muscles (flex mentalo), a mixed race neanderthal little girl with her version of reality warping powers are literally bringing her imaginary friends to life (dorothy spinner), a metahuman doom patrol member with D.I.D with superpowers by the name of kay challis (crazy Jane aka DC's genderbend version of legion) and a literal sentient street named Danny.

Especially their "chief" by the name of niles caulder in both new earth and new 52/rebirth is the cause of some of their current predicament in all of them by robotman, elistiwoman and negative man, (I've only know them by the doom patrol series by HBO which is awesome) who with his frankly insanely logical reasoning of why some people get superpowers after a dangerous accidents and trauma on them, perhaps the rest of the doom patrol would want to sue Niles and ask Noa to represent them in court, that's without even getting in on their equally weird rogues gallery like Mr nobody and the brotherhood of Dada.

And since Noa is also somewhat well-versed in magic in marvel (and I assume the same as well in the DC Comics omake) she might have some run ins with the rest of the justice league in the magical side with wonderwoman, aquaman and especially zatanna, doctor fate (the helm of nabu especially with lords of order and chaos) and even john constantine, the specter and even the likes of etrigan the demon and even the phantom stranger (not to mention DC comic's lucifer morningstar).

And last but not least question for this time is, since I would assume there would be version on Noa in these superhero universes like invincible (series version for ease), watchmen (movie or HBO series version would work, even the comics and doomsday clock are great) and especially the boys series (comic version is somewhat showing its age), how would she handle her legal and firm in these various universes, in invincible would she handle the grayson family's legal issues pertaining omniman? In the watchmen verse how would she fit in there?, and lastly in the boys, would she be a "supe" in there, reluctantly working for vought, or be like victoria "headpopper" neuman, be a graduate of godolkin university, an escapee of vought or even somewhat an individual "helping" the boys or even a part of them, especially how would she handle the seven, from professional, legal to even personal, with homelander's chip on his shoulders and even soldier boy?

Especially since season 4 is up and coming....

I'm very curious how she/her versions would fair in these worlds.

Hope you answer these in your time and in good spirits, thanks.
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Huh. Is that actually something that could happen, reaction-wise? Because I was about to cry foul about the whole 'jump straight to Hikaru Genji scenario and barricade herself in the room' being wildly unrealistic, but other readers reply as if it's plausible? Ridicule or scorn I could see, but recoiling away as if she found half a kilo of cesium in a plastic baggie seemed... over the top?
 
Tavarokk said:
Huh. Is that actually something that could happen, reaction-wise? Because I was about to cry foul about the whole 'jump straight to Hikaru Genji scenario and barricade herself in the room' being wildly unrealistic, but other readers reply as if it's plausible? Ridicule or scorn I could see, but recoiling away as if she found half a kilo of cesium in a plastic baggie seemed... over the top?
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Nope. She's in early puberty and just doesn't want to deal with it, so she's hiding until the cognitive dissonance goes away. Peak "if I ignore it, it will go away", which is pretty mild behavior for the era. Remember, that would go on to become US military policy two years later than the story, and that was Clinton doing an end run around both Congress and military leadership to at least try to improve things.
 
October Daye said:
He said two words. Two simple words, words that made the whole world stop making sense.

"The Kingpin."
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If Kingpin is gonna appear, then his enforcer/adopted daughter Maya Lopez a.k.a. Echo will make her appearance as well.

This is gonna be interesting to see how Noa handle it. She better call in Matt Murdock since he knows Kingpin as his nemesis and how the latter operates.
 
Tavarokk said:
Huh. Is that actually something that could happen, reaction-wise? Because I was about to cry foul about the whole 'jump straight to Hikaru Genji scenario and barricade herself in the room' being wildly unrealistic, but other readers reply as if it's plausible? Ridicule or scorn I could see, but recoiling away as if she found half a kilo of cesium in a plastic baggie seemed... over the top?
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Firehawk242 said:
Nope. She's in early puberty and just doesn't want to deal with it, so she's hiding until the cognitive dissonance goes away.
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Having grown up around some very religous raised kids, it absolutely is. Specifically the "is that why?" felt like the beginning of "is that why you took me in?" Because certain groups of people had the idea that anyone not straight was a child molester.

May not actually be what Lorna's thinking, but even being her age around the 00's I knew kids who thought that way.
 
There is one thing that I don't understand very well, why is the kingpin so dangerous?, more than any other big mafia I mean?, because it often gives me the impression that the only reason for What he stands out from the rest is that as he is the most popular mobster in Marvel he has a +20 in plot armor.

Also yes he is fat so they give him super sumo power.
 
Carcer said:
There is one thing that I don't understand very well, why is the kingpin so dangerous?, more than any other big mafia I mean?, because it often gives me the impression that the only reason for What he stands out from the rest is that as he is the most popular mobster in Marvel he has a +20 in plot armor.

Also yes he is fat so they give him super sumo power.
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Because while it's true that Kingpin is not someone who can destroy planets and do some cosmic-level feats, he controlled most of New York city (where the superheroes who happened to live there) under his thumb from the shadows and he doesn't need superpowers to do it, just his cunning, ruthlessness and intelligence of a mastermind that ensured his criminal empire remain strong and stable for a long time. Along with knowing how to play smart in his schemes and be several steps ahead of his enemies before they even know it.

Even if Kingpin would be brought down, New York City will be thrown to chaos and anarchy by other criminal gangs and villains taking opportunity of the huge power vacuum that Kingpin left behind and they will fight each other for dominance and taking his place. Which would result a lot of civilian casualties caught in the crossfire that the heroes would be very hard pressed to stop and contain it.

And also sumo wrestlers aren't fat. They are stronger than they look for they have trained in body and mind to be capable of fighting with force and finesse.

Kingpin had actually trained with several martial arts experts he hired in order to hone and utilize his large body to become a big mean fighting machine and he made his foes badly regret for assuming that he'd be easy to take down and underestimate him.
 
Lorna reaction is kinda understandable. As a kid, beyong the basic of the talk, the only expore to relationship are through movie, tv and other media. Back then, same sex relation didn't realy exist in those media, except rare case that were not good.

Hell, when I was a kid of that age, I don't remember hearing about same sex relationship until way later in my live. And probably didn't consider it real until later in life since there was nobody I knew into one near me.
 
It feels a bit weird that Lorna is staying at all. Since she is at Xavier's school she has an obvious location to flee to which is super prepared for students that feel unsafe at home.
 
Tavarokk said:
Huh. Is that actually something that could happen, reaction-wise? Because I was about to cry foul about the whole 'jump straight to Hikaru Genji scenario and barricade herself in the room' being wildly unrealistic, but other readers reply as if it's plausible? Ridicule or scorn I could see, but recoiling away as if she found half a kilo of cesium in a plastic baggie seemed... over the top?
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This is on the tail end of the aids epidemic, it was a fairly wide belief that being gay was contagious and would get you killed. You see basically the same belief in transphobia today, with the "groomer" and "social contagion" allegations
 
Dracovictorious said:
Having grown up around some very religous raised kids, it absolutely is. Specifically the "is that why?" felt like the beginning of "is that why you took me in?" Because certain groups of people had the idea that anyone not straight was a child molester.

May not actually be what Lorna's thinking, but even being her age around the 00's I knew kids who thought that way.
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That belief wasn't even restricted to the very religious in my experience. Back when I was in 5th grade, in the year 2000, we went on a class trip and learned pretty early on that one of the people working in the youth hostel we were staying in was gay. And the prevailing, at least the openly stated, opinion around my classmates was that we should better watch out, or he'd molest us. Which confused the heck out of me, because I couldn't understand why you'd think that someone was "interested" in kids just because they were "interested" in their own gender.

But it was a widespread opinion, and I don't think many if any families of my classmates were super religious. And I mean "super religious" in the context of being in Germany, which feels to be a lot less religious than the US anyway. So yeah, I absolutely think it would've been worse in the late 80s early 90s.

Right now, Lorna is probably very confused. With her experiences and feelings with Nora telling her one thing and what she "knows" about homosexuality telling her something completely different. Especially, since that "knowledge" makes her question her experience. It's very believable and I hope someone she trusts is able to speak with her asap.
 
Dracovictorious said:
Having grown up around some very religous raised kids, it absolutely is. Specifically the "is that why?" felt like the beginning of "is that why you took me in?" Because certain groups of people had the idea that anyone not straight was a child molester.

May not actually be what Lorna's thinking, but even being her age around the 00's I knew kids who thought that way.
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It could also be related to the thought process of "she wants a kid, but doesn't want to get pregnant, am I just a stand in?".
 
Warmachine375 said:
Because while it's true that Kingpin is not someone who can destroy planets and do some cosmic-level feats, he controlled most of New York city (where the superheroes who happened to live there) under his thumb from the shadows and he doesn't need superpowers to do it, just his cunning, ruthlessness and intelligence of a mastermind that ensured his criminal empire remain strong and stable for a long time. Along with knowing how to play smart in his schemes and be several steps ahead of his enemies before they even know it.

Even if Kingpin would be brought down, New York City will be thrown to chaos and anarchy by other criminal gangs and villains taking opportunity of the huge power vacuum that Kingpin left behind and they will fight each other for dominance and taking his place. Which would result a lot of civilian casualties caught in the crossfire that the heroes would be very hard pressed to stop and contain it.

And also sumo wrestlers aren't fat. They are stronger than they look for they have trained in body and mind to be capable of fighting with force and finesse.

Kingpin had actually trained with several martial arts experts he hired in order to hone and utilize his large body to become a big mean fighting machine and he made his foes badly regret for assuming that he'd be easy to take down and underestimate him.
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He's basically a less photogenic Captain America if Cap was a rat bastard.
 
Firehawk242 said:
He's basically a less photogenic Captain America if Cap was a rat bastard.
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True, although Kingpin really did train hard to perfect his fighting skills, strength, and agility that made him a formidable match against the likes of Spider-Man and Captain America in unarmed combat.

Two of the heroes were enhanced to their superhuman peak in their respective origin stories (Spider-Man got bitten by a radioactive spider and Captain America drank the Super Soldier Serum) while Kingpin was just a badass normal who happened to literally look large and in charge.
 
First off, this chapter was an emotional roller-coaster. For the first half, I was happy to be getting some cuddly slice-of-life and then the Lorna thing happened. I'm personally hoping that she's cutting herself off solely due to how she reacted initially (talking about a "him" instead of using "they" or "them" until she knew for sure). Kids can act weird when something unexpected like this comes up. Maybe she's just hyper embarrassed because of how she fears she alienated Noa by her preconceptions. I'm choosing to believe positive intent until shown otherwise by the author.

Then, at the end, seeing either Blob or Cain Marko(could have been either based on the initial description) at her door made me wonder if Eric might have something going on since he has a relationship of sorts with both. Should have known from the initial clue that Bain being a kinda professional fighter that it was Blob in retrospect. Anyways, I'm thinking something shady going on with Eric. Only for Kingpin being thrown out there? That's a threat of an entirely new kind than Noa has faced in this story and I can think of several, several different ways that this could go badly. He's crazy smart, has all sorts of connections, extremely strong for a non-Mutant(yes, he's completely normal for what that matters, and he knows how to fight(he fought Cap to a standstill once). This could explode.

I mean, this whole chapter was nothing but whiplash for me. Don't get me wrong, it was a fun read but I have to be honest. It was also kinda anxiety inducing. To me, this is the largest cliffhanger chapter that I've read in this story and I AM including where Galactus introduced himself.

Edit: Just realized an error in my thoughts. I read Bain but my brain misinterpreted that as Bane, as in DC villain. Oops. I'm going to leave my mistake in my post as evidence of my stupidity so future generations can enjoy laughing at my error.
 
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Carcer said:
There is one thing that I don't understand very well, why is the kingpin so dangerous?, more than any other big mafia I mean?, because it often gives me the impression that the only reason for What he stands out from the rest is that as he is the most popular mobster in Marvel he has a +20 in plot armor.
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I would argue that's what Kingpin is. Really, Kingpin's power mostly comes from editorial reasons, IMO -- he exists so you don't need to make a new character every time you want to write a mob bass.

He's certainly both physically powerful (for not having any powers) and intelligent, but he's not like, Lex Luthor smart. He's just a very ruthless, very well-connected mob boss.

Of course, when you're a lawyer and not a superhero, a very ruthless and well-connected mob boss is actually a serious threat.
 
Ferrite said:
For the first half, I was happy to be getting some cuddly slice-of-life and then the Lorna thing happened. I'm personally hoping that she's cutting herself off solely due to how she reacted initially (talking about a "him" instead of using "they" or "them" until she knew for sure). Kids can act weird when something unexpected like this comes up. Maybe she's just hyper embarrassed because of how she fears she alienated Noa by her preconceptions. I'm choosing to believe positive intent until shown otherwise by the author.
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Yeah, Personally, I'm hoping that there's a minor misunderstanding here: i.e. that Lorna's reaction isn't a homophobic "Noa is gay, yuck", and more a stereotypical teenage "wait, my mum fucks? Wait, does mum fuck <person>? TMI!", and now she's just to embarrassed to face her, in the same way she might if Noa was straight and had a "loud & successful" date night… She's just worked out that the "sleepovers" might not have involved as much actual sleep as she first thought.
 
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