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

Thank you, corrected.

So someone who knows nothing about the subject?

 

Grayven is a busybody. It makes me a little uncomfortable how hands on he is with Adom and the witch lady, especially compared to regular Paul.

 

Did Scott fail in his efforts to rework the League's security measures? I remember in the episode where Renegade took down the rest of Light the topic of blocking hush tubes was mentioned and how Renegade bypassed them before. Scott sounded like he was going to try and prevent it from happening again.

 

No, but he isn't blocking the entirety of Happy Harbor.

 

More than a bit.

Yes, yes he can.

And it's much, much worse in the comics.

There he wanted to conquer Atlantis and either enslave or wipe out the natives so he can establish a nation for black people, who he thought were cheated out of a nation and the only way to get one was to take it from someone else.

Truly his sense of justice is so great that even the Marines from One Piece would applaud him.

Even Killmonger cannot claim such accomplishments.

Renegade told him.

When Manta was asking for more things of the Light renegade revealed to him that Kaldur was his biological kid.

Before that he just suspected it but didn't know exactly.

 

If the goal is uplift, sure. If the goal is "create supersoldiers" no

 

The goal is 'recruit officers who know how to fight with space ships'.

 

There are a handful, but they're either government employees or aliens.

When was the last time submarines shot at each other in anger?

 

Zoat will sometimes make a choice that doesn't make much, if any, sense, but will refuse to admit that he's in the wrong.

 

Not a serial killer, a terrorist mercenary. The second usually has a bigger killcount but didn't do it for pleasure, although a mix of the two isn't rare.

Hard to get into contact with your son when he is trained to become a soldier by the country wanting you dead, when he is personally trained by your nemesis or when he is surrounded by highly trained warriors that will kick your ass on sight.

Edit: Maybe he wanted the contact but didn't want to take him from his family. And mercenary life inside a submarine isn't a place for a child to grow up

 

Zoat said that he would have taken him if he knew he was his son.

Also, Manta himself may have grown up on a sub, or at least surrounded by mercenaries.

When renegade told him Kaldur was his son, Manta mentioned that when he was his age he led strike teams.

 

Zoat has a point here. Pretty much any submarine officer in the world is likely a naval officer associated with a nation to a large degree who would always have questionable loyalty to Star Fleet.

But Hyde holds no allegiance to any nation. He is uniquely qualified to help train up their ranks.

 

I'm still waiting for someone to tell me who they think has that training.

 

Eh, Kaldur is working for the Justice League not for Grayven. And for me, getting his criminal father to go from criminal to legally hired mercenary is a good thing. Sure he is still going to be killing people but not people from Atlantis.

"What? Would you have preferred if he got killed fighting your king? If he keep being a criminal? Is that how a Hero should think?"

 

As was mentioned previously, soldiers who have served in submarines.

Though I can now see how Mantas lack of allegiance to a nation may be helpful in some ways.

Though he could have also done what Manta did.

That being hire dissatisfied former soldiers who may not care all that much about their government and who have served in a submarine.

That way he can get his soldiers, and not sour relationships with a powerful kingdom.

 

Space ships don't work like submarines. And even if they did, how many people currently serving have ever engaged in submarine versus submarine combat?

 

And yet you had your character recruit a guy who previously mostly used a submarine.

Edit:Someone beat me to this.

Given that this is a comic book universe, I wouldn't be surprised if that number is very high.

Also renegade has a lot of contacts and resources, so he may be able to hire humanoid aliens that have the same physical attributes and abilities as humans, and who have served and fought in spaceships, to teach his new soldiers.

By doing this he gets highly trained soldiers and avoids pissing off Atlantis.

 

Nobody on Earth has spacecraft training, that's rather the point. I don't have any trouble with this "bring in Black Manta" plot, it works on a comic book level and stirs up character drama.

That said, why not hire offworlders with actual space combat training to train up a cadre of Earthers instead of going for this "hire someone everyone hates who has an approximation of the relevant skills" approach?

E: Did Grayven wipe out all of the Gordanians? Seems like he could keep enough of them under control to form a training program.

 

I can't say whether Manta is the right man for the job Grayven wants, but I also don't really care.

I just find myself really disliking Grayven throughout this part.

Like, all I know about Manta really is that he looks stupid, and tries to kill Aquaman a lot. I think he's killed Aquaman's child at least once? In one continuity that is.

I honestly can't see any reason why Kalder and his parents wouldn't just set up a nice trap, and Kill Manta the second they get the chance. Yes obviously they don't have the time to set it up now, and yes, obviously Grayven would act to prevent that.

I dunno, while I'm sure this will go just fine for Grayven's plans, and he isn't fucking anything up. I'm just filled with a sense of "You're fucking everything up."

Then again, I'm a person that honestly feels like Rene-Paul has simply been blundering through one stupid choice after another since his Grayven-ing. Which, I honestly feel is the point of the character.

Hmmm....I guess I just keep putting myself in Kalder or his Father's (Calvin) shoes, and that leads me to where I would say. "Grayven...you're an absolute Cunt. You always are. I don't know why, other than you being strong enough to prevent it, anyone let's you live to keep fucking up the world and people's lives. I hope you die screaming, never bother me again."

Again, I don't have any issues with Zoat's choices, this is all my feelings for the in-universe people.

 

Zoat has made decisions that don't make a whole lot of sense before.

And I'm betting this one may be something the new Light has decided.

Like say, they don't want non-human influence on their defenses.

Even though one of their members is an alien, or at least they think he is, and another is basically a brain attached to a hand.

And they have also used alien tech before.

Just because the new Light is more sane-ish than the old one, that doesn't mean they can't be hypocritical in a big way.

No, I think he conquered them and now they'rе keeping their heads down and not causing trouble.

The Gordanians may be salvageable, unlike the Psions or Citadelians, who are both genetically and culturally made to be as evil as possible.

Although the Psions may be becoming less evil since renegade took over.

Also the Gordanians may not be such a good idea, since they're big lizardmen, so they're experience in spaceship fighting may not be quite suitable for a humanoid.

Still there are probably a lot of humanoids out there that he could hire.

They risk breaking the law is one reason.

Even though most of Atlantis may be happy that Manta is swimming with the fishes, Venturia might demand they be tried for murder.

Also Kaldur isn't really the type of guy to do something like that.

His father may have also abandoned the violent ways of his past after defecting from Manta.

Don't know much about his mother and how she would react.

Honestly don't think there's much in canon about her.

I know that in some other fics, like Assimilation, the SI there said she was an accountant, and in Life Ore Death, Orm mentioned she used to be some kind of fighter that specialized in poison magic.

But I don't think there's anything about what she does or what she used to be in the Canon material.

You're not the only one.

I don't think Kaldur would say this, unless he's really, really angry.

His dad might though, don't know that much about him.

Kaldur may just ask renegade to never speak to him again and to not try and interfere in his life ever again.

 

To this, all I can say is that Kalder is, or was, the leader of a off the books, Justice League black ops team.

Beyond that, taking the law into their own hands is basically what Super-heroes do.

Kaldur is a soldier, so killing people is kinda part of the job.

After that, all I can say is my default. I don't care, it's what I'd suggest/do. I honestly can't see any reason, for people who are not Grayven, to not drop Manta on the spot.

Well that's nice. Que "You are not alone" from Final Fantasy 9

Yes well, as I said, it's what I would say were I Kaldur.

 

Live fire? Not many. However, wargames, including submarine wargames, are conducted regularly, which still provides functional experience. I don't know how often navies other than the US Navy run wargames, but I can't imagine the Chinese and Russian submarine forces don't run their own wargames. I always got the impression that global military spending in the various DC universes was higher than in real life, so there's every chance that quite a selection of recruitable veteran submariners are out there in various countries (and the Light's space force is supposed to be multinational by design, right?).

I fully buy that Black Manta and his crew are the most experienced group in subsurface warfare against nontraditional targets, but did he have more than a skeleton crew for one attack sub? Would they have any experience coordinating with other vessels in an allied squadron, or other skills necessary to operate as part of a larger, official military force, as opposed to as pirates?

 

True, but the Team didn't really do assassinations.

And some superheroes are uncomfortable with killing people, even though they take the law into their own hands.

Most soldiers tend to kill if they're defending someone or something, or if they're ordered by a superior.

Fair enough.

 

No, as it wasn't required. But at the same time, they were created to subvert the charter the League (agrees to) operate under. Furthermore, Orange Lantern WILL kill, and did even while on the team.

Well yes, creating new supervillains is a pain in the ass. Never throw away a good design or gimmick.

That would be quite a shock to all the soldiers who kill while attacking something. Literally every invasion ever.

 

Which they tend to do because a superior ordered them to do it.

 

I could quote myself, but it seems that you're both pulling a Vaermina here. As I already stated, Mr. Hyde and crew have cross trained in a wide variety of combat environments. They generally deploy from a stealth submarine, but they have pilots and drivers, infantrymen, infiltrators and artillerists. They aren't a perfect fit, but that doesn't exist.

No. It isn't.

Submarines are expensive and require a lot of support. The small countries who could fight wars after the Second World War generally didn't use them. Occasionally you got someone like Manta who managed to acquire them, but frankly they're not that attractive a prospect.

It also completely negates the point of the exercise: humans uplifting themselves.

 

Trust me, every base has "That guy". Which can spread to entire platoons of "That Guy".

To say nothing of all the times soldiers on the field somewhere decided "Hey let's kill those people".

And of course you could argue that Kaldur killing Manta could be a defensive move to protect himself and his parents...and that's not even taking into account all of Manta's terrorist actions against Atlantis.

As I recall, Kaldur was uncomfortable/took issue with movies portraying Pirates in a positive light during a movie night with the team.

But back to the point. Soldiers kill. Everything else is just window dressing and justifications. There is no Honor floating around on the battlefield.

 

Harsh words, but it doesn't exactly change the fact that renegade could have recruited other people that have done those things, and whose recruitment wouldn't piss off Atlantis, as well as other nations that may hate Manta.

Maybe, though I think the fact that the Light uses alien technology, has received help in magic from a non-human from another universe, as well as an alien planet of sorcerors, and one of their members is an alien, or at least everyone else thinks he is, kinda makes that point a bit moot.

Hiring aliens to train them isn't them leaving the defense of the planet in the hands of aliens, but rather just getting some training from them and defending it themselves.

 

Gasp! He spoke the forbidden word!