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

16th September 2012
15:03 GMT -5

Okay, that's… Beatriz, that's…

Um.

Okay, I've got no idea who that is. But this is quite a lot of superpeople that I'm having to grin insanely-

"Do you hear the voices too?"

-at.

"Clearer than ever!"

I think I've made a friend.

Regular cultists move with purpose through the Fortress, but like Overman said they're not interacting directly with the superhumans. Other than my escort, they're just sort of… Hanging around. I'd guess that listlessness is a consequence of the control spell Wolf Krieger is using because I've never known people under the influence of demon magic to be anything but effusive.

"Who is his prophet?"

"His prophet is his prophet. We will be the heralds announcing his glory to a new world."

Sounds like I'm in the right place. I'd guess that his extraordinary mental focus is the reason that he's still moving about rather than just barely responding to external stimuli like the rest.

"He has ordered this?"

"His prophet has ordained this."

But does the Demon care or not? Yes, a highly tainted person might enjoy listening to the screams of a slowly dying world, but he's not going to want to do that forever. Demons can be very short sighted, but it's not a class-defining trait. Demons can plan. Does he care about this one? Did he actually give Wolf orders?

We pass through an archway into a large internal space.

Will he actually…

"Great prophet! It is as you foresaw!"

Wolf Krieger isn't in his customary Thule Society robes. Or in any sort of disguise. Rather, he's wearing a robe of blue and red with a prominent yellow 'S' on the back, front and shoulders. Same face I remember, plus the Glasgow grin and mildly glowing eyes. The Spear of Destiny has been stabbed into a crystal monolith and Wolf himself is grinning extra wide as he stares at me.

"Orange? Well, it hardly matters. Come here, my good man."

I walk forward, making a show of being unconcerned by my environment but curious about what's going on. I'm not… Familiar with cutting edge Kryptonian technology. I know what their military was like before they went into isolation, and I know what the mid-to-high tech part of their civilian society looked like, but…

That looks like it could be a teleportation gateway. Possibly. Kryptonian crystal technology was fairly unique, but there are other societies that found other paths to the same ends. Kryptonians weren't big on teleportation but I've seen this general design before. I don't think I can risk scanning it without tipping Wolf off, but I'm going to keep a little distance between myself and it.

"You are his prophet?"

"What else could I be? I spent my life searching for the ultimate strength, only to have it revealed to me at my life's end. But before the end I will open the way, that ALL may know his might."

Okay, he's definitely responsible. I could probably kill him now. Except that he'd go to Hell, and he might come right back. I don't have a handy focus of thematically appropriate magic to use his own weapon against him this time. No one who can work out what magics he's using and unbind them, and I can't rely on my ability to burn it out. It's not like turning him back into a Thule Society Nazi would be an improvement over him being a demon cult leader.

And then there are his followers. What will they do if unconfined? I think I should try to keep him talking.

"What do you mean?"

"One of the technologies he had here was a planar portal. I have located a world with no magical defences and sent through those who know of his majesty and are marked by him. With every mote of mana and every drop of blood they carry his presence with them. Soon, soon the connection will be strong enough to open a portal permanently. His loyal slaves will flood through and brand their world with his sigil. Then, he will grant me the privilege of consecrating his conquest with my death."

Consecration by death, yes, avoid killing him for now.

"How can I serve him? Tell me how I can serve him!"

"Advanced parties are already moving amongst their populations, spreading his word and shedding blood in his name."

Overman's people didn't get them all. They presented an obvious threat so that the more subtle team members would be ignored, while… What, moving to places of magical significance? Overman said that arcane science was underdeveloped on his Earth. Would they even know where to protect?

"You will go through with the next group. Engage their champions so that his hidden followers may complete their work."

"Will he not want to face them himself?"

"If he does, you may fall back once the way is secure."

Right, because the superhumans didn't show anything in the way of self-preservation. 'I' wouldn't be asking 'what if he decides to kill me for my impudence' because 'I' would be fine with that. I'd be asking 'how can I minimise the offence caused to him while maximising my service to him'.

"When will the way be open?"

"I was waiting until we had gathered more strength. But with you here..."

He pulls the spear free, and green bonds snap into place around me!

"Did you think we could not tell one who was bound to him from one who is not?"

I shift my face back, strands of orange light working their way through my bonds until they collapse.

"For a minute there?"

Railgun construct load crumbler rounds fire fire at the green light user!

"B-h!"

Grab his body as Wolf throws lightning at me shield thrust the body at the arch and tear so that the blood soaks it!

Wolf gestures and-

Warning! Spell eater overheating!

-he's doing something as the portal flickers into life as the result of the blood sacrifice. I can detect motion in the corridors as superhumans rush towards us, their passivity instantly removed as a threat appears.

I need to go.

"Superman." I fly at the portal. "Target located."

"Kill him!"

And I'm through.

 

21st May 2013
21:43 MTZ

The tiny human female groans quietly, her eyes adjusting to the dim light of-. Wait, her hands aren't bound. She was in Knock Out's trunk, then-.

Next to her, her overweight companion rubs his head as he sits up.

"What just happened?"

"I did."

She looks-. She looks up at the twenty foot tall purple robot-. A new Autobot-? No, she thinks as she sees the dark-purple-and-silver face on her wings. Decepticon.

Her companion glowers. "What, did you and Knock Out have a fight over who gets to hand us over to Megatron?"

"Heh. I don't work for Megatron. We're freelance peacekeeping agents. If your government will pay for our work, they can have you right back."

"'Freelance-?" He scowls. "You're a mercenary."

She makes a dismissive motion with her right hand. "Football, soccer."

"And who's 'we'?"

"Down here."

They both look down, spotting the purple jumpsuit-wearing human standing next to her left leg. He waves.

"I'll get in touch with General Bryce. You're worth a few tanks of energon, aren't you, Agent Fowler?"

The man frowns. "The United States government does not negotiate with terrorists."

"Yes you do? And you certainly pay private security operatives. We did rescue you from Knock Out. What do you think, a couple of barrels for you and Nurse Darby?"

"The United States government has no knowledge of any 'energon'."

The robot smiles. "We'll see. I suspect that your General will be quite interested in Cybertronian technology he can just buy."

Agent Fowler hesitates. While the Autobots kept up their end of the agreements regarding technology trades, they weren't exactly open-handed, and… Well, the US army was usually happy to buy any advantage it could. There were plenty of people in government and the top brass who would find a simple monetary transaction for an immediate payoff preferable to the slow drip Prime's team gave them, regardless of prior agreements.

The human man notices his hesitancy and smiles. "I'll go and get in touch now. Keep an eye on them, Slipstream."

The human man turns away, giving them both a quick glance at the cybernetic implants sticking out of the back of his neck. As he walks behind Slipstream to head towards the door he reaches up and-.

And slaps her on the as-. Aft as he goes.

Both remaining humans blink in surprise, while Slipstream just glances back with an amused expression on her face. "Do that again and I might just slap you back, partner."

A moment later the room's door slams shut behind him, and she goes back to watching their 'guests'.

"He said it was something humans do as a sign of physical attraction." Slipstream leans in closer, left eye narrowing. "Unless he was making that up. Was he making that up? Because if he was, then he's sleeping outside my cockpit tonight."

Nurse Darby and Agent Fowler glance at each other.

"No." The nurse decides to field that question, fearing all too much that a question that she'd carefully been avoiding asking her son and his 'partner' was about to make itself heard. "No, it-. Certainly can be. I'm.. just a little surprised."

Slipsteam straightens up slightly. "Why?"

Agent Fowler raises his hands. "Oh, we're not trying to imply that you're not an attractive.. giant.. robot.. woman..?"

Nurse Darby shoots him an incredulous look, and he shrugs helplessly.

"I'm not a woman."

"And there's nothing wrong with that. But you're still.. gi-"

Nurse Darby elbows him.

"-ant-?"

Slipsteam stares at him for a few moments, trying to work out how to bridge the obvious gulf in comprehension. Then she puts her left hand on her hip and points at Nurse Darby with her right forefinger.

"You're a female human, right? You have an internal factory unit for making smaller copies of yourself?"

"That's… Not exactly how it works."

Her finger move to Agent Fowler.

"And you're a male? You have a bio-data exchange injector?"

"Ah…"

Slipstream smiles. "Don’t worry, I've seen them before."

"In… That case, yes."

"Why did you assume that I'm female?"

"Well…" Agent Fowler glances at Nurse Darby for help, but she's content to let him take the lead. "Your build, your voice, some parts of how you behave..."

"I have almost exactly the same build as Starscream." She frowns for a moment. "At least, the build he had last time I saw him. It's been a while." She shrugs. "We're both light frame aerial models. Seekers. I don't have any sort of internal fabricator. Very few Cybertronians do, because we don’t make more of ourselves like that. My voice? I changed my default voice-" An unpleasant, screeching, grating and far lower pitched voice issues from her mouth. "-a long time ago because I wanted something unique, and I never had any reason to change it again. It's just a setting in my vocal processor; it doesn't signify anything."

Nurse Darby looks slightly interested. "Then how do you reproduce?"

"I was built on a production line during the Quintesson occupation of Cybertron. Other than when my spark case was brought online the entire process was automated. There might be other ways; they didn't bother telling slave soldiers anything they didn't need to know."

Agent Fowler's eyebrows shoot up. "You're a slave?"

"I was a slave. Most Decepticons were. That was why the uprising happened." She frowns. "Didn't Prime explain that to you?"

"The Decepticons… Were slaves-? Of the Autobots?"

"Mostly." Slipstream waves her right hand nonchalantly. "Not all Autobots owned slaves, but most of the old High Council did. And not all Decepticons were slaves. Megatron earned his freedom in the gladiator pits and I think Starscream ruled a city or something?"

"But you were a slave."

She nods.

"In Kaon, which was the first city Megatron liberated. And fighting as a Decepticon was better than being a slave. The food was much better, and we got some time to ourselves. But as the war ground Cybertron to scrap, I kind of lost my enthusiasm. Paul says that when I was freed I just traded one person giving me orders for another, and I think he's on to something. I need to be more selfish, you know? Finally find out how I want to live. Which is why I'm trading you back to your own people, rather than giving you to Megatron."

Agent Fowler clearly needs a moment to process that, so Nurse Darby decides that now is as good a time to ask as any.

"This… Paul. He's your partner?"

"That's right."

"Do you mean… Romantic partner?"

"That's not exactly how it works. I told you: we don’t reproduce like you do. I'm not looking for someone to provide half the schematics for my 'minicons'. We don't have the family structures that you do, because we don't need to arrange everything around propagating ourselves and guarding our mini-mes."

"So he's a work partner?"

"Yes, but that means more than you think it does. We don't have 'parents' or 'children'. Our strongest emotional relationships are usually with the people we work with. A Team might work together for hundreds or thousands of Earth years, and get so used to each other that they can't imagine being apart. It's not really a romantic relationship in the way organics have them, but I suppose it's the nearest equivalent."

"What happened to your team?"

"The last of my team died in the war, and…" She pulls back slightly. "Paul is… There."

Fowler shakes his head to clear his daze. "How does that work? I mean… Physically."

Slipstream shrugs. "He has a cybernetic implant that makes it possible for us to engage in binary bonding."

"'Bonding' as in..?"

"We meld into one. Not like humans would; I don't have the components. And since we don't reproduce like that it probably doesn't have the same mental relevance to me. But it's extremely intimate and…" She smiles lasciviously. "Quite a lot of fun."

Nurse Darby shakes her head. "But if you don't have the comp-. The right parts, how does it-?"

"I can adapt to an entirely new body form in a few seconds just by scanning a vehicle. I switch from the mental patterns needed to control my robot form to the ones needed to control my aero fighter mode in less than a second. Adapting my cognition processors to stimuli that I couldn't normally experience isn't much harder. And it's a real rush." Her eyes narrow. "Why are you so interested? Do you have an eye on someone?"

"No! No. But my son insists that he's Arcee's partner-."

Slipstream's eyes light up.

"Does he want the cyber surgery? I can give him a discount. Since we're friends."

"No he does not want cyber surgery. He's sixteen!"

Agent Fowler looks at her sceptically. "When I was sixteen, if I'd had an opportunity to get it on with a hot alien woman who was also a cool motorbike, I'd-."

"Thank you Agent Fowler." Nurse Darby takes a moment to calm herself. "At least that explains why Arcee was so reluctant to call him her partner. Is that..? Sort of thing common where you're from?"

"On Cybertron? A planet with no organic life? No."

"But when you meet other species. Does it happen a lot?"

Slipstream smile becomes more cruel.

"Bulkhead's on Prime's team, isn't he? Why don't you ask him about his old team mate Seaspray? I'm sure he could explain how it works."