With This Ring (Young Justice SI) (Thread Fourteen)

[Duke Long]

I shrug. "Impossible to say, really. I'd say 'Apokolips', because they can remove the possibility to resistance by completing the Anti-Life Equation while the Reach are 'merely' a large social and military force. But if it turns out that the Anti-Life is really hard to finish, then we might have thousands of years with Apokolips just sitting there, committing unpleasant but ultimately small scale atrocities."

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'of resistance'?

I suppose we know that Apokolips originally would just sit there, since they clearly hadn't taken over the universe in the Sheeda future. But the future has potentially been changed.

Easily. He would make it fly off his finger and never come anywhere near him again.

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Ah, he values the sanctity of his mind too highly? I suppose he couldn't deal with it the same way he dealt with the Anti-Life, since filtering unwanted thoughts would probably also make it much harder to actually use the ring.

 

[WereDragon]

18th August 2000
04:31 GMT

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An interesting contrast. And one of the extremely rare aspects where Grayven is definitively worse off than Illustres.

One is a psion, which suggests that someone did something very unwise; i.e. they gave a psion a power ring.

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Sometimes you need to actually carry out the stupid experiment just so you can be sure it is actually stupid.

"Ah… Don't think so. Humans are weirdly compatible with a load of exotic stuff. Coluans… Not so much. It's a penalty you have to pay for being the most intelligent mundane species there is."

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It is a nice comforting illusion to think that there is some fundamental balance to the universe.

 

[BoML]

"No Apokoliptian has hard limits. What we have are situations where our metaphysiques are stronger. My concepts are civilisation-building, improvement, domination, organisation… Things of that ilk. I can insult and belittle enemies freely, but I would violate my nature to treat an ally like that unless it was specifically to build them up again afterwards. Of course… I'm not obliged to tell them that, or be gentle about it. If they break, too bad for them. Better for everyone else to get them out of the way before someone depends on them and they fail to cope."

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The bolded and underlined part, based on my understanding, should read "but it would violate my nature", because if "I" is accurate, then sentence after that turns into "by treating an ally like that".

Honestly, this is a bit tricky...but up to you, Mr Zoat.

 

[BartlettMagic]

I suppose we know that Apokolips originally would just sit there, since they clearly hadn't taken over the universe in the Sheeda future.

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now that's an interesting concept for a 'What If?' comic. "What If the Sheeda routinely harvested lowlies from Apokolips instead of Earth?"

 

[Mr Zoat]

'of resistance'?

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Thank you, corrected.

Ah, he values the sanctity of his mind too highly? I suppose he couldn't deal with it the same way he dealt with the Anti-Life, since filtering unwanted thoughts would probably also make it much harder to actually use the ring.

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The idea of connecting his soul to the desires of the unwashed masses all organic life would horrify him.

now that's an interesting concept for a 'What If?' comic. "What If the Sheeda routinely harvested lowlies from Apokolips instead of Earth?"

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Either 'no one would notice' or 'Darkseid exterminated them for setting foot in his domain'.

The bolded and underlined part, based on my understanding, should read "but it would violate my nature", because if "I" is accurate, then sentence after that turns into "by treating an ally like that".

Honestly, this is a bit tricky...but up to you, Mr Zoat.

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I'll modify it.

I stopped reading this a while ago and decided to get caught up. Last I remember the Earth was being bombarded by Anti-Life and OL was going around checking on people like Holly. Can someone give me the arc name or at least a ballpark?

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I don't own a ballpark, so I can't give one to you. The Anti-Life got expunged and the Earth is rebuilding but something is very wrong with Batman.

 

[Signaller]

I can insult and belittle enemies freely, but I would violate my nature where I to treat an ally like that unless it was specifically to build them up again afterwards.

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Where -> were

 

[Zig]

I think it's just that they'd be more immune to corruption.

However they'd may still need yo have the required emotion in sufficient quantities in order to use it.

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Worked out great for Orion

 

[Mr Zoat]

Where -> were

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Thank you, corrected.

 

[NightmareWarden]

I stopped reading this a while ago and decided to get caught up. Last I remember the Earth was being bombarded by Anti-Life and OL was going around checking on people like Holly. Can someone give me the arc name or at least a ballpark?

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The beginning of the Antilife was December 31st on this page in the archive thread. Page 89 in that thread has the resolution of the Sheeda arc and Lord Malvolio's appearance, which should be reviewed at some point before Paul returns to Earth for the climax of the Anti-Life arc.

 

[BartlettMagic]

Either 'no one would notice' or 'Darkseid exterminated them for setting foot in his domain'.

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canonically valid in the grand sense, but the whole 'time manipulation' angle could be reasonably stretched enough to make a limited series set in an alternate universe, with Darkseid plotting to destroy the Sheeda who, at every turn, manage to outmaneuver him for a few centuries and come back smarter/harder. they manage to sneak in and quick attack/defend just enough to harvest a quota of lowlies and low-level New Gods for the Sheeda to level up for the next encounter. i imagine it as a kind of grim setting where there's no clear heroes or winners.

 

[BR549]

It is a nice comforting illusion to think that there is some fundamental balance to the universe.

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"You know, I used to think it was awful that life was so unfair; then I thought, wouldn't it be much worse, if life WERE fair, and all the terrible things that happen to us come because we actually deserve them. So now I take great comfort in the general hostility and unfairness of the universe." - Marcus Cole, Babylon 5

 

[JeckJack]

Is that year correct? I thought it was 2013 in the last Renegade chapter, and this most recent one reads 2000.

 

[Mr Zoat]

19th November 1995
04:39 GMT

The mutated form of the Queen Metalia-possessed Queen Beryl smiles up at me from a throne carved of ice. Arrayed in gibbets to the left and right are… The corpses of young women dressed in costumes somewhat like the one worn by Sailor V. The other Guardians, then. I half-thought that she might have kept them around as preferred torture victims, or turn them into youma in a display of dominance, but… No. She just killed them.

I don't see the cats…

I land just in front of her dais.

I raise my eyebrows slightly and smile politely. "May I ask who I'm talking to?"

She smiles broadly, her gaze sharp. "The goddess-queen of this world! The mightiest being to ever walk upon the Earth!"

So, less eldritch abomination and more megalomaniac. But how did she get to this state?

"Oh, well done. But I was really hoping for a name. The body appears to be that of Queen Beryl, but I notice that there have been some changes..?" She keeps watching me. "Is Queen Metalia in residence?"

"Queen Metalia is 'in residence' of more than half of this planet!"

"Quite impressive."

I wait to see if she'll continue, but instead she tilts her head slightly to the side.

"How is there another you here?"

"Honestly? Not sure. There are a lot of mes around the place, I've met some before, but I've got no idea why we all got sent to the places we got sent."

She perks up slightly. "There are more of you?"

"Yes. At least thousands."

"Good. You shall all make such excellent vessels for Metalia's will."

"Ohhhh!" I smile, understanding dawning. "She's a dark energy-. You're a hive mind, with the dark energy connection binding you all together! And with that expanding all over the Earth…"

"We will all be Metalia. Except for the weak souls who cannot withstand us."

"Neat! And then what?"

"And then what? We will be magnificent! The Dark Empire will become the Dark Millennium, its might growing beyond all compare!"

"To what end?"

"Because I can!" She raises her hands, black… Ribbons of energy crackling around them. "Now join-."

My crumbler round hits her right in the jaw, the manifestation of dark energy fading slightly… Then she recovers, her jaw disappointingly uncrumbled.

Fine. Hard way, then.

She snarls ferociously, black energy cracking around her hands as she lunges towards me. I transition upwards, forming a laser construct and firing at her face once more. The ultraviolet beam… Just sort of peters out before it reaches her.

And she smiles.

And she turns her left hand slightly-.

Oh, that's where his power ring went.

She flares orange as she rises into the sky, black lightning blasting out… Surrounding us as a sphere about a mile across.

Singularity beam.

In a stretched out second I see her eyes widen a little before she draws her right hand across her face and… Batters the graviton beam away. Great, dark energy can do just about anything, and she's got a planet's worth to work with. Or maybe it's a magic thing, don't know.

Confidence restored, she pulls her hands apart, a wave of-

Transition.

-dark energy howling through the air between us. Snow and ice explode in all directions, and then the energy… Is absorbed by the wall at the edge of the 'arena'.

Efficient.

I try a cold beam next. She tries to batter it away again, but this time all it does it trigger the kinetic energy nullification effect right next to her. The air around her turns white as water and oxygen both freeze and precipitate out of the air, and for a moment she gasps as her lungs… I'm not sure if they're damaged by the cold or just can't cope with pure nitrogen.

Sonics.

WOOHN!

Which knock her flying, but she's not injured in the slightest! That's it, from now on I'm keeping a mageslayer in my harness. And it-.

AGDH!

GaH!

"Weren't you listening?!"

The black.. lightning sphere around us-. Of course she can still control it! It's like it's… Crawling in my skin, like my construct armour isn't even there!

"I am dark energy!"

"A' an ah'an-"

Oh, just stop. I can't see into her but I don't think she's lying about anything and she shouldn't have plugged herself into me using an energy she knows that I can feed on.

"-'ah."

Take my desire to build a functional society.

The stolen ring on her finger glimmers and she gasps, clutching her left hand with her right.

And the black lightning is… Being a bit less invasive, because as any number of gestalt consciousnesses have found out, being able to get every one of you hit by a telepathic attack all at the same time because one of you had a point of vulnerability is a bit of a liability. But it's not completely gone, because… I don't think that all of Queen Metalia is sentient. I think she's more of a force, and if the thought I just thrust into her avatar can't interact with her fundamental self then it's not going to disrupt everything.

But with her off balance I can feed, and unlike my local alter ego I can incorporate dark energy as part of a structure. Which means that unless this outweighs everything then I don't have to worry about youmaisation.

A moment of… Disorientation, and I'm free, and-.

"Y-argh!"

Metalia-as-Beryl… Tears off her ring finger and tosses it aside, glaring at me in animalistic fury.

"You stole it."

She-. Flings her arms our, black energy crackling… Along the gibbets..? It appears to focus around the cages, intensifying as she-.

The corpses start to move.

 

[Mr Zoat]

Is that year correct? I thought it was 2013 in the last Renegade chapter, and this most recent one reads 2000.

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Thank you, corrected.

 

[CrazyNoVa]

Uh-oh. Zombie Scouts incoming.

Well, on the plus side, since Usagi is the moon princess, we can make all the Thriller and Moonwalker jokes we want at her expense.

 

[Ngamer11]

Thank you, corrected.

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Just checked, and the version in the story only thread still says 2000.

 

[Mr Zoat]

Just checked, and the version in the story only thread still says 2000.

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Thank you, corrected.

 

[john doe 777]

Wait did Paul steal her ring did she tear it off so he couldn't mess with her. Last bit is confusing

 

[Bigreader]

So why couldn't the local version of paul do the same thing with the dark energy?

 

[Cuchulin]

So why couldn't the local version of paul do the same thing with the dark energy?

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Probably lack of experience and lack of a Soul made up mostly of Orange Light.

 

[Ngamer11]

So why couldn't the local version of paul do the same thing with the dark energy?

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Lack of a soul meant he had no way to resist it?

 

[BR549]

Moden problem: aside from Venus, the Sailor Scouts are all dead because Metalia killed them.

Modern solution: get Metalia to resurrect then for you.

Wait did Paul steal her ring did she tear it off so he couldn't mess with her. Last bit is confusing

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She stole it from local!Paul.

OL just made her tear it away.

So why couldn't the local version of paul do the same thing with the dark energy?

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Local!Paul wasn't Enlightened.

 

[Mr Zoat]

Wait did Paul steal her ring did she tear it off so he couldn't mess with her. Last bit is confusing

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He didn't steal the ring. He used it to implant a desire in her, and she tore it off to stop that.

 

[Rebu]

Crawling in my skin, like my construct armour isn't even there!

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Your wounds they will not heal? Is fear how you fall? Are you -

and she shouldn't have plugged herself into me using an energy she knows that I can feed on

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...consuming what it's real?

 

[Chojin Patriarch]

19th November 1995
04:39 GMT

The mutated form of the Queen Metalia-possessed Queen Beryl smiles up at me from a throne carved of ice. Arrayed in gibbets to the left and right are… The corpses of young women dressed in costumes somewhat like the one worn by Sailor V. The other Guardians, then. I half-thought that she might have kept them around as preferred torture victims, or turn them into youma in a display of dominance, but… No. She just killed them.

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Huh. Why do I get the feeling it's not quite as it appears? At any rate, they can still fix that. If Lushun can get Sailor Moon back on her metaphorical feet and they feed her enough energy, she can use the Silver Crystal to undo everything.

Spoiler: Commentary spoilered for length

I don't see the cats…

I land just in front of her dais.

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Probably atomised, they aren't exactly tough. Then again, they didn't come here with the Senshi. They spent the finale battle laid up at Usagi's house after getting beaten by Kunzite...

I raise my eyebrows slightly and smile politely. "May I ask who I'm talking to?"

She smiles broadly, her gaze sharp. "The goddess-queen of this world! The mightiest being to ever walk upon the Earth!"

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No indoor voice, eh? And no small amount of ego, for sure.

So, less eldritch abomination and more megalomaniac. But how did she get to this state?

"Oh, well done. But I was really hoping for a name. The body appears to be that of Queen Beryl, but I notice that there have been some changes..?" She keeps watching me. "Is Queen Metalia in residence?"

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I'm guessing this was a lot more stable than the mutated form of the 90's anime's final battle, 'Super Beryl'.

"Queen Metalia is 'in residence' of more than half of this planet!"

"Quite impressive."

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I wonder how metaphorical she's being with that. It is an energy being, after all, and an infectious one at that.

I wait to see if she'll continue, but instead she tilts her head slightly to the side.

"How is there another you here?"

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What, wanting to know if you can do that trick with Endymion? I'm sure Beryl would appreciate a clone harem of him.

"Honestly? Not sure. There are a lot of mes around the place, I've met some before, but I've got no idea why we all got sent to the places we got sent."

She perks up slightly. "There are more of you?"

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Just imagine if she was facing the Regenade. He'd no doubt be snarking her six ways to Sunday.

"Yes. At least thousands."

"Good. You shall all make such excellent vessels for Metalia's will."

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Fortunately, a lot of them have protections against outside influences.

"Ohhhh!" I smile, understanding dawning. "She's a dark energy-. You're a hive mind, with the dark energy connection binding you all together! And with that expanding all over the Earth…"

"We will all be Metalia. Except for the weak souls who cannot withstand us."

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That sounds boring. Only yourself to talk to, since Youma aren't known for their conversational skills.

"Neat! And then what?"

"And then what? We will be magnificent! The Dark Empire will become the Dark Millennium, its might growing beyond all compare!"

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Barely outgrown the 'Kingdom' title and already looking at expanding? Ambitious, isn't it?

"To what end?"

"Because I can!" She raises her hands, black… Ribbons of energy crackling around them. "Now join-."

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Ah, do-anything dark magic. Sadly, you can't zap away all your problems...

My crumbler round hits her right in the jaw, the manifestation of dark energy fading slightly… Then she recovers, her jaw disappointingly uncrumbled.

Fine. Hard way, then.

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Time to break out the big guns, collateral damage bedamned.

She snarls ferociously, black energy cracking around her hands as she lunges towards me. I transition upwards, forming a laser construct and firing at her face once more. The ultraviolet beam… Just sort of peters out before it reaches her.

And she smiles.

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Energy absorber, of course. And evidently able to soak kinetic energy fairly well too.

And she turns her left hand slightly-.

Oh, that's where his power ring went.

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Oh, dear. Let's hope she's shit at using it.

She flares orange as she rises into the sky, black lightning blasting out… Surrounding us as a sphere about a mile across.

Singularity beam.

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Let's see how she handles gravity, hmm? Metalia came from the sun, so it probably associates high gravity with that...

In a stretched out second I see her eyes widen a little before she draws her right hand across her face and… Batters the graviton beam away. Great, dark energy can do just about anything, and she's got a planet's worth to work with. Or maybe it's a magic thing, don't know.

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Yep, didn't like the mental association, but its magic prevented damage.

Confidence restored, she pulls her hands apart, a wave of-

Transition.

-dark energy howling through the air between us. Snow and ice explode in all directions, and then the energy… Is absorbed by the wall at the edge of the 'arena'.

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Why bother aiming when you can saturate the area with damage? And then absorb what misses.

Efficient.

I try a cold beam next. She tries to batter it away again, but this time all it does it trigger the kinetic energy nullification effect right next to her. The air around her turns white as water and oxygen both freeze and precipitate out of the air, and for a moment she gasps as her lungs… I'm not sure if they're damaged by the cold or just can't cope with pure nitrogen.

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Probably an instinct courtesy of Beryl's humanity. Plus, what is cold but the absence of energy?

Sonics.

WOOHN!

Which knock her flying, but she's not injured in the slightest! That's it, from now on I'm keeping a mageslayer in my harness. And it-.

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Energy absorption again. That or beyond-human durability.

AGDH!

GaH!

"Weren't you listening?!"

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Ah, she's finally got her balance back. Time for OL to tank for a bit.

The black.. lightning sphere around us-. Of course she can still control it! It's like it's… Crawling in my skin, like my construct armour isn't even there!

"I am dark energy!"

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No, you are a meat puppet beign animated by a stupid being made of dark energy. Just because you can spread through it like bacteria does not make you it.

"A' an ah'an-"

Oh, just stop. I can't see into her but I don't think she's lying about anything and she shouldn't have plugged herself into me using an energy she knows that I can feed on.

"-'ah."

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Ah, now that's a way to hurt them. Beryl was a decent enough person before she met Metalia, and Metalia will have no idea how to deal with a mental attack like this.

Take my desire to build a functional society.

The stolen ring on her finger glimmers and she gasps, clutching her left hand with her right.

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Hurts, doesn't it? Feeling something that you know you could have done but didn't. Something so alien to part of you that it burns like a vampire touching blessed silver?

And the black lightning is… Being a bit less invasive, because as any number of gestalt consciousnesses have found out, being able to get every one of you hit by a telepathic attack all at the same time because one of you had a point of vulnerability is a bit of a liability. But it's not completely gone, because… I don't think that all of Queen Metalia is sentient. I think she's more of a force, and if the thought I just thrust into her avatar can't interact with her fundamental self then it's not going to disrupt everything.

Click to shrink...

But it's doing enough. If it can't act through Beryl and the youma, then it's not nearly so dangerous. It's power, but without a medium to act through, a lever to affect the world...

But with her off balance I can feed, and unlike my local alter ego I can incorporate dark energy as part of a structure. Which means that unless this outweighs everything then I don't have to worry about youmaisation.

A moment of… Disorientation, and I'm free, and-.

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And Metalia is probably feeling pain for the first time in its existence as part of itself is ripped away...

"Y-argh!"

Metalia-as-Beryl… Tears off her ring finger and tosses it aside, glaring at me in animalistic fury.

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Oh, yes. Not so much fun when it's you getting drained, is it?

"You stole it."

She-. Flings her arms our, black energy crackling… Along the gibbets..? It appears to focus around the cages, intensifying as she-.

The corpses start to move.

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Huh. Puppeteering, or were they just in suspended animation?

So, the Senshi are moving. Alive, youmafied, or corpses puppeteered by Metalia's energy? I suppose we'll see momentarily. Though if they're up and moving, perhaps OL could snag them, heal them and purge them of dark energy to effectively raise them. And from there, it's just a matter of getting Usagi to Princess up, summon the Silver Crystal and make a wish...

---

On the topic of OL being safer than the local Paul with the dark energy absorbing: Picture their soul as a jug. A normal human's is filled with clean, pure water. OL's is filled with a tangy mix of orange juice, water, salt and all manner of other flavours thanks to his tattoos. Local-Paul's was mostly empty, holding only a trickle of clean water and a little orange juice. And then you pour in the thick, bitter goop that is dark energy...
The human's jug gets a little dirty, but only goes off if there's too much mixing in. OL's mostly spills the dark energy over the rim. Local-Paul's? filled right up with the bad stuff...