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

That should say 'Beetle'. Also, when did Ted Kord become a superhero? Last I checked, Paul's influence made it so that he was fine as an inventor and company owner who could do good work through his inventions and company.

 

Oh god. Oliver Queen and OL talking? This is almost as bad as Ollie and the iconic Hawkman, Katar Hol, debating politics. At least they're not likely to come to blows. Though I doubt it could reach the coolness level of Hal and Ollie's road-trip.

Spoiler: Commentary spoilered for length

I don't know what they're talking about yet, and I already get the feeling Ollie's revving up for a big screed about something.

Ah. Of course. And yes, nukes are too messy, with a tendency to flatten everything within their effective radius.

If only it were that easy in real life... Well, besides the sarcasm.

Ollie might be idealistic, but he's not that naive.

To be fair, life on Earth is fairly lucky it still exists at all, after multiple mass extinctions and at least one theorised asteroid hit.

A few tungsten rods flung from orbit could erase most any city from the face of the Earth, after all. A really big firework doesn't really compare.

Certainly be a good idea to have a few pairs of suspicious eyes on him, after all. Guy is sneaky smart.

Yeah, I doubt OL could ever really manage the angelic side of a debate. Too much of a realist.

...You're smart enough to know if someone's pulling something shifty, and blunt enough to confront them about it?

And somehow that's still the most normal person on the team. Says a lot about the League, huh?

Yeah, not exactly a lot of options for 'normal person' logic, are there?

Don't sound so eager, OL. Honestly, you know how super-villain you sound sometimes?

Knowing it happened is one thing, knowing details is quite another.

...I see Batman elected not to share said details, then.

Right on both counts.

Because I can understand Clark being especially worried about messing with Bruce's head. Never mind if it happened to him.

It's be kind of hard to miss, after all. I'd be more worried about him liking the change, which fortunately, he doesn't seem to have.

Got it in one. And when an Orange Lantern wants to punish themselves, it can get quite intense.

Wait, do you mean Ted Kord in tights, or Jaime Reyes in the Khaji-Da scarab suit? Because either of those things is significant for different reasons.

...Let's just stuff that idea somewhere well-buried for now, eh?

Oh come on, how bad could it be, Ollie?

Yes, that worked so well in Superman IV... Even without Lex's meddling, that would probably not have ended well eventually.

Sadly, even an idealist has to bend to reality sometimes...

Pfft. I know you heard OL's opinion of them. Like he'd want to keep them?

Ah. I see... He wants to set something up to handle the heroes, eh?

How illuminating. So Lex is either pushing for a support organisation for the League, or a more pro-active role in world affairs than what they've had thus far. But the former would be tainted by his involvement, and none of them would trust it to be on the level, while the latter would be crossing personal lines held by a lot of the League...

 

It's definitely not Jaime. Not only would the Illustres easily identify and try to take care of a Beetle infiltrator, but last thing I remember Mr. Zoat mentioning that the Beetle itself is probably in some safe storage and Ted Kord is not set to die anytime soon.

So it probably is Ted Kord, but I don't clearly remember when he entered superheroics either.

 

Maybe he decided to step up offscreen due to the Anti-Life crisis?

 

So what does let actually want to do, because they spent the whole chapter dancing around it.

 

‘regions’

‘you think’

Well, depends on whether you want to really wipe out ALL life on Earth.

’do you’

 

I believe both YJ and Zoat went with the "Dinah grew up with all the Justice Society as her honorary uncles" background from JLA Year One.

I don't feel like that fits the criteria of normal childhood even grading on the curve against her fellow Leaguers.

 

Is rebuilding the infrastructure actually hard? Agree on a plan, have Paul link up with Best Snek for a minute, et voila!

 

Thank you, corrected.

Not really an option for Superman.

I think that's correct.

No. The idea is that if they implement a change now it's harder to complain about.

Yes.

He hasan't been doing much superheroing, but I don't think I wrote that he didn't do any.

 

Thank you, corrected.

I can just change it to say 'Ted Kord' if that's better?

Thank you, corrected.

 

That might be better, unless you would prefer to have it so that he took up the mantle of Blue Beetle because of this crisis.

 

My memory might be failing me, but from what I remember, when the Illustres started associating with Ted he noted that the latter wasn't superheroing. And since then he has been relatively busy and no particular mention has been made of him getting into the Blue Beetle identity, so that's why the mention is a bit jarring.

 

Changed.

 

One good thing that might come of this mess (for a given value of good) is the fact that all of Earth's defenders will go nuclear (metaphorically and literally maybe) on any Reach members the very nanosecond they show up.

I think blue beetle is just a title that Kord took up during the antilife because the world needed leaders for cities/settlements. I doubt he's using the scarab, though it's possible the Anti-Life drove him to somehow awaken it on purpose or by accident.

 

What happened to Mannheim? I can't imagine what is left of the world governments left him alive even with the heroes of the world vouching the Anti-Life wasn't actually him.

 

With the way everyone was exposed to the life entity, I wonder if there’s little willingness to kill anyone among the general population? They have a strong personal impetus to preserve life. It doesn’t really matter in the comics if only superheroes are exposed, but here the life entity could have an effect on everyone

 

I think that should say 'make money from it'.

I wonder if Ollie is slightly regretting wanting to act as a conscience for the League now that he's being asked his opinion on complicated matters like this.

Considering how well Ollie and Paul are acting as two sides for an argument, will this become a regular or semi-regular thing?

 

Yeah, taking over DC China is probably the best bet there.

 

...Dude, do Kahndaq. That'd be hilarious and The Mighty One would probably tell everyone to be okay with it.

 

Right, that is a lot bigger a step than what I thought it was. Not that any of the other options would be great either. But dropping such advanced technology on a population still recovering from a global mind-whammy might be a bit extreme, and likely to backfire...

Spoiler: Commentary spoilered for length

Well, I suppose that would have depended on whether people could reproduce them. 'Give a man a fish', and all that...

Ideally, once the holdouts catch on that said clean technology is A: Cleaner and B: Cheaper, I could see them reconsidering.

Since about two weeks have passed in universe since the start of the episode. And what's the bet their equivalent of 'Big Oil' is trying to cover their beloved profits. Probably with lobbying about 'Unproven mad science' or 'Think of the cost!'

Ah, I see Lex is pulling out the Knight technology, then. About time it saw use, even if it is making Lex richer.

Because now Ollie is going to be laying awake at night sweating about 'Couldn't find it' instead of 'Nothing there.' And I thought Renegade was a troll.

As long as neither technology can run out of control, consuming all Magic or drying up the planet, or something like that.

Which raises the question of why is it suddenly out there now? Did someone have a breakthrough back before the Anti-Life thing and only now manage to get things together?

...And now I'm getting Cyberpunk flashbacks, with their fuel oil replacement, CHOOH₂, that's produced by engineered bacteria. Made the companies that produced it extremely wealthy and powerful...

The trick is making something that can do the job, is easy to produce but won't breed out of control. Our world is still working out the first part, never mind the second or even the third...

Because they're obstinate, and being too cautious about the costs involved. It would take billions to switch over, and you have the issue of maintaining power in the process. And that could make for angry voters.

Ah, Lex. Your control freak tendencies biting you in the ass.

It would also force China to work with him to maintain them, since their own engineers would struggle to do so without training.

Not on the same level, though.

And it's easier to ask forgiveness than permission. But the message it would send...

Think a little, Ollie. How would the Chinese government react to an American Superhero, an icon of their ideals, interfering in the Party's sovereign affairs? 'Explosive' would be an understatement.

While playing the 'belligerent victim' card. And probably demanding reparations from anyone involved they can think of.

Yes, but again, how would they maintain them? Especially if Lex decides to play keep-away with the training and scientific knowledge need?

By proxy, at least. With the risk of said proxy being decried as a mouthpiece for 'Imperialist, capitalist American interests.'

He's really learning just how much of a headache dealing with OL's unique perspective is, isn't he?

As long as you can prevent it form being weaponised, which someone will eventually try to do, and given the hypercognitive potential of DC humans, might well manage to. Never mind what Lex will do with it, because you know he will get his hands on it no matter how they try to avoid it.

Well, there's another clean energy source for you. Just make sure they can't be turned into solar-powered death rays or something and you're fine.

And that issue brings it back to 'dependant on one source for paradigm-changing tech.'

I bet OL's feeling such a tingle of smugness, seeing how much Kal is struggling with this. He might not be proud of it, but he's feeling it.

Either is a good option, though the former smacks a little of a subtle form of conquest.

Well, whatever nations they approach would become pretty significant in no time. Though I agree, Kahndaq probably would jump at the chance, with a little persuasion from OL. If nothing else, though, it's good to hear that humanity is starting to step away from the 'primitive' methods of electric power generation. Saving the planet, one power plant at a time.

 

Why are they bending on lex on having him control things, versus being so pessimistic on nuclear in china?

 

‘LexCorp’s’?
Extraneous ‘it’ in second sentence.

‘The way’

’dependent’

Fun chapter. I like a bit of talking about fantasy infrastructure.

 

Latveria.

Wait, Sokovia

I which universe are we again?

 

Both of those are Marvel.

Someone might have better knowledge than me, but DC doesn't have any or as famous fictional Eastern European countries. They have more in Africa, Middle East and Latin America, for some reason.

 

Greece might be a good pick if they go this route. Not an enormous country, not the best economy pre-crisis, and a large tourism industry that's likely to take a long time to recover. Add in a god of economics that OL has worked with before, a new chief god with technology in his portfolio, and Eris being OL's patron, it seems like a perfect target (assuming they can get Themyscara and Olympus back).

Alternatively Khandaq - Black Adam would probably be on-board with a full uplift of his country.

 

I don’t think Greece would work tbh, OL’s a Themysciran citizen, not mainland Greece, plus using the crisis to basically topple the Greek Orthodoxy woth a resurgence of Olympian influence while perfectly in character for Paul, might get pushback from the rest of the League, if nothing else, they do not need the added headaches of making such a transition on top of everything else.

On the other hand, Teth Adom is a close friend, is very competent while equally as open to anything that’ll make his country more prosperous and thriving. Plus, OL did note that thanks to Teth Adom using his power to block out the Anti-Life in his territory, it’s likely Khandaq will expand if only due to the rest of the continent being on the brink of collapse or facing tons of issues and Khandaq being the only island of stability there. So uplifting Khandaq as a Step 1, then, once it shows results, spreading it to the rest of the newly acquired territory seems like it’ll do the most good.

 

Thank you, corrected.

 

Or both Greece and Khandaq, and maybe one or two others elsewhere. That would allow the beneficiaries to compete with each other, increasing the speed of results.

 

Hmm... Clark's a farm kid. I'd say give him something he already gronks to focus on first.

Grab the Kryptonian Farmer's Almanac and head for...Not Just Kansas, but maybe all the plains states. Hit Farm Country, which needs more local food production to cover the damaged international shipping and trade. And likely more man power from the sheeda raids and Anti-Life.

Get some local Crystal Grown Solar Energy production and Kryptonian Robots tilling the fields. Get the Bread Basket producing again, and Call in OL's 'teach some folks to use Elf Gates' to handle shipping?

Get that set up as your Example to The World, then open it up for Local Franchises or just Open Source the stuff in use....China will snap it up on their own.

EDIT: Also gives a chance to get some Kryptonian Brand Foodstuffs out there, which could be sold with a percentage of funds going to charity...at least once there's an economy enough to support it. Always got to remember the power of Marketing.