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

Discussion in 'Creative Writing' started by Mr Zoat, Jan 27, 2019.

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  1. Pinklestia

    Pinklestia Well worn.

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    The place is a literal desert that was set for development. The Buffalo didn't complain at all, not about the railway or the town, until they started to plant trees.

    This works fine as a episode but doesn't work as an allegory of anything because the situation depicted is quite ridiculous.

    And as show in the episode, the ponies were willing to compromise.

    That's why the whole "Daring Do suddenly is a thief and the bad guy, nevermind her enemies LITERALLY TRIED TO KILL HER AND DESTROY EQUESTRIA IN A PREVIOUS EPISODE!" makes no bloody sense.

    Just like you know, throwing a literally kid into a max security prison without trial like Twilight Sparkle did.

    More so since said kid had no magic of her own or any special abilities besides talking to others. Just put her in a regular prison with a muzzle so she doesn't talk, not in the closest Equestria has to Hell.

    Yes she is a sociopath but so is Twilight Sparkle on a bad dad, and she is also NOT a reality warping Unicorn strong enough to defeat a Princess.

    So honesty, trying to apply common sense and human decency to Equestria doesn't work because ponies do not think like humans. You can as as easily be forgiven for trying to destroy the world as throw into Tartarus without trial.

    More like "That place you go on vacations once a year? We are turning into an apple farn."

    "What do you mean is you ancestral vacation spot?"
     
    Last edited: Jan 18, 2022
  2. Impatient_Quill

    Impatient_Quill Versed in the lewd.

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    "It is where my people have come every year since (local time-moon God) got drink and (local sun-seaeon goddess) started chasing him around the sky. Who are you to dictate what we can do with what the gods gifted us?"
     
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  3. Whenever Possible

    Whenever Possible Versed in the lewd.

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    Just a reference to the Elgin Marbles, not an actual thing that has been referenced before in this fic or in MLP, as a joke about a rl set of artifacts (so much as massive sculpted marble friezes decorating the walls of a temple can be considered artifacts) taken under dubious circumstances that the nation of origin wants returned by the present holders.
     
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  4. Enochi

    Enochi Having way to much fun with AI.

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    I don't like this. Which is rare for me to say for Renegade chapters as I typically find them more enjoyable. However this chapter is using invented reasons to make a characters like Daring Do and Rainbow Dash unsympathetic to make the author avatar seem Holier then thou. When as many have pointed out he is being more then a little hypocritical.
     
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  5. Whenever Possible

    Whenever Possible Versed in the lewd.

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    Plot Twist for the next chapter: Grayven doesn't care about the artifacts that Daring Do has taken, he's just trying to play nice with the locals because they represent the best lead he has on magic capable of controlling stars, which provides him with both a nice thing he can do for Luna and a potential superweapon to use in his ongoing struggles against Apokolips
     
  6. Enochi

    Enochi Having way to much fun with AI.

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    Honestly while that would fix the Holier then Thou Grayven issue. It still doesn't fix the "Inventing 'victims' to make DD and RD look bad" probelm.
     
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  7. rkyeun

    rkyeun Cabbitus Maximus

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    I expect him to straight up own it, Perfect-Cell-style.
    "You do it all the time!" "Yes. And I'm a monster."
     
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  8. Mr Zoat

    Mr Zoat Dedicated ragequitter

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    You know it's... Canon, right?
     
  9. preier

    preier I trust you know where the happy button is?

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    I've been wondering if people had missed that.
    check season nine
     
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  10. Enochi

    Enochi Having way to much fun with AI.

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    Well what do you know. I honestly had no idea. My apologies.
     
  11. Cuchulin

    Cuchulin Versed in the lewd.

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    Lots of things have been returned, to Egypt at least, even if there are lots more items that haven't. That said the POSSIBILITY is there, if only because it's relatively easy to locate and a museum is very unlikely to sell it off to someone else, lose track of it or throw it away as well as being more susceptible to public pressure.
     
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  12. PDV

    PDV Revelation That Uncertainty Is Itself An Answer

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    below

     
    Last edited: Jan 18, 2022
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  13. Enochi

    Enochi Having way to much fun with AI.

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    Honestly the whole last several seasons once they started the school made for some very.... Questionable situations. For example Cozy Glow while very much evil, is still very young. And they pretty much execute her at the end of the episode. (No ages are given but she seems to be crusaders age which would put her likely around early teenager at best possibly much younger.) Also ponies seem to have significantly longer lifespans then humans given that it was stated Ponyville was founded "Hundreds of years ago" and Granny Smith was there at the founding as a filly. Though....what equates a "year" on Wilson might be a different unit of measurement then earth by far.
     
  14. Coda

    Coda Versed in the lewd.

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    I don't know which one's right, but it's seems likely that at least one of them is wrong.
     
  15. Mr Zoat

    Mr Zoat Dedicated ragequitter

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    No problem.

    See, if you look at the episode it's relatively obvious that something is up. Caballeron has an artefact and sells it. Nothing there is illegal. Ahuizotl turns up and takes it. Possibly theft, but then it turns out that he knows the site it originally came from. Not only that, but the ponies who are helping him are dressed in a similar enough way to him and to the site that it looks like they're from the same culture. They even have cutie marks to go along with it. That means that this isn't some abandoned ruin, it's part of an existing culture. It's not someone finding a tomb deep in the Egyptian desert, it's someone taking a crowbar to the floorboards of Westminster Abbey.

    Everything else we know about Ahuizotl comes from stories written by someone who considers herself his enemy.
    I saw a program a while ago about an archaeologist who smuggled things out of modern Egypt. His justification was that there were small find all the time, and the building companies that made them usually had the relics quietly destroyed. If they did what they were supposed to do and hand them over to the government agency, that would mean that all building work would have to stop for months or years while a full excavation happened. Since that would cost them money, it was easiest to just pretend it never happened. Unless a smuggler who could keep quiet if they got access was on hand. The smuggler gets cut price antiquities, the building firm gets to keep building and the world doesn't lose irreplaceable historical artefacts.
    Rainbow Dash mispronounced it.
    Thank you, updated.
     
    Last edited: Jan 18, 2022
  16. nick012000

    nick012000 Gone for Good

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    It'd just be a stereotypical Mexican accent, most likely. Remember, the Aztecs were called the "Mexica" when they were still around; they only got called the "Aztecs" after their empire fell as a way of distinguishing their empire from Spanish Mexico.

    Moreover, Nahuatl, their language, is still spoken by over million people in Mexico.
     
  17. Flightless Man

    Flightless Man Versed in the lewd.

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    It usually comes across (at least to me), as if Grayven, just wants the other person to care enough to have an actual debate with him. I think Grayven, would love a genuine debate without the other side getting emotionally invested. Especially with Grayven, he's a god of Conquest. It seems like he's just trying to conquer the conversation/debate, but almost never has an emotional stake in what he's disecting. It's either debate people and conquer their minds, or beat them up and physically conquer them. I don't think Grayven can help himself, but he doesn't actually care about his own points themselves, only as a means to making people agree. It's like his divine nature forces him to turn even a simple conversation between potential rivals into a contest.
    ...

    Side note: I'm still having a hard time reading the pony chapters (horses terrify me to the point they are the scariest thing in game of thrones). But I just pretend they are all easter bunnies instead and it usually works fine until hooves/haunches/manes get mentioned.
     
  18. Darko

    Darko Connoisseur.

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    This might actually explain things and it can expand on how his divine domain may be changing him.

    Of course the other explanation is that he's just an asshole, which can also fit, seeing as he was an asshole long before he became a god.

    Ahh...okay.
     
  19. Impatient_Quill

    Impatient_Quill Versed in the lewd.

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    A lot of mummies were eaten before that started happening.
     
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  20. Mr Zoat

    Mr Zoat Dedicated ragequitter

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    Try Care Bears, I guess? They're basically the same.
     
  21. Bramble Thorn

    Bramble Thorn Verified Silhouette

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    Sorry, apparently I was being unclear.

    Saying nations assert claim of authority within their boarders and not outside them is a pointless statement when they also can choose to claim anything as all as being within their boarders, without any reasonable claim at all.

    Without going into modern politics, I think I can still talk about stuff like the northwest passage. Where before it was ever discovered/charted, multiple nations had already decided they owned it. Even if people weren't sure it existed, if it turns out it did, it was their property. Even if some some other nation discovered it instead of them, nope, it is still theirs, because they say so.

    Or nations can claim land they don't currently occupy, and are not really policing, or providing services for, and are doing fuck-all with. There are many uninhabited islands out there in the middle of the ocean, that are claimed by some country or other. If you happen to wash up there, Chances are you starve to death. The claiming country doesn't regularly patrol it, doesn't have a stash of emergency supplies and shelter there. Basically doing nothing useful at all there, except claiming the ability to punish anyone else who tries to use it.

    And also stuff like deciding they own some foreign peoples land, and then selling it to someone else, despite the first group actively using it.

    Equestria claiming the sun as their territory on account of their ruler being able to magically swing it around like a wrecking ball is on the more tame and reasonable side of the usual governmental shittery.
     
  22. Pinklestia

    Pinklestia Well worn.

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    Honestly, I lost all interest in Daring Do once they made her a "real" character, well real for the show. It doesn't help the episode were that happens is basically as if Rainbow Dash was writing fanfiction.

    Then the next two Daring Do episodes? One basically kills the character and the other exists for writers to tell fans that pretend thar the newest seasons of the show don't exist that they suck.

    Worse, not even actual Daring Do in that episode.

    There, rant done.
     
  23. Radix

    Radix I trust you know where the happy button is?

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    Mexica was the wider culture. Aztec could also be used to refer to the Hegemonic alliance that dominated the area.

    Grayven is a complete troll. He likes to argue goe the sake of it or just to rile people up. He cant resist getting reactions out of people. He did it to Robin and KF plenty early on, and it was part of what tortured him when he was anti-lifed.

    Unfortunately that experience didnt break him out of it completely. True to habit he still slips back into it when someone pisses him off. Or if he is bored.

    I actually think that the Sheeda ordeal has definitely caused him to regress a bit.
     
  24. Doccer

    Doccer I trust you know where the happy button is?

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    Probably more accurate for him to say to go after either of her castles. Which I suppose he wouldn't
    I believe he was talking more about the Celestia bashing, and or hypocrisy, than the Daring Do side of things? Which I still agree with besides my following response.
    I actually haven't gotten to Season 9 yet. I think I stopped off after that goat centaur Teltic whatever attacked and was beaten.
    But I did look up Daring Do's Antagonist character prior to this and I don't believe that just because Daring Do ain't as much a good guy as that episode insisted on was means Ahuizotl was any less a villain. Even if she struck first, his response was still to set off 800 years of scorching sun, which if successful, he would have caused untold ecological disaster world wide. Plus, you know, all the death, sentient and otherwise. No way would moving the sun closer would have only affected the what? 30 miles or so of the immediate jungle area they lived in?
    Now how that is supposedly gonna kill off one pony that he had tied up suspended over a piranha pit and could have killed off anytime I don't know.
    At best the ponies that helped him could get away with this literal crime against nature with being told one thing by him in their native tongue and being unable to make heads or tails of what he was threatening to the stupid foreigners in their strange language. They did just admit to being unaware. But he did verbally state his intentions with that particular artifact Infront of Daring Do and the Mane6. Plenty of witnesses.

    If we are supposed to take Daring Do's books with some hefty salt because she wrote him as the bad guy then we should take his books with her as the bad guy with the same. It's not as if either books weren't written with an agenda right?

    He said to create 800 years of scorching sun, not now that he's finally gotten his people's heirlooms back home where they belong he wasn't going to let her steal them again.
    1 is a green flag that all is clear and Daring Do is correct, the other is a red flag that something is very wrong and not as it should be.
    The existence of ponies in the appropriate garb and marks following his commands is secondary to the immediate disaster he is actually saying he'll unleash.
    The thefts and the doomsday weapon\plan are 2 separate matters. I don't see why the near mass murder should get off lightly just because the one to thwart him wasn't keeping her nose clean. And that is assuming this was the ONE time he ever did, and ever was going to get people and animals killed. He's not innocent just because she's guilty. If both did two different crimes then they should both get two different appropriate times

    Also, how do his people feel about having the sun beat down on them for 800 years with heat stroke and watching all their crops and various water sources dry up? Think Ahuizotl Think!

    That is an interesting point, and would fit with his actions...
     
  25. ForeverShogo

    ForeverShogo Not too sore, are you?

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    I'm pretty sure there was also another episode where Caballeron was basically using the fact that locals in a region hated Daring Do because her adventures tended to destroy their property, including a statue considered sacred, as a cover for his theft of . . . . something I can't remember. Just that he was spreading rumors that Daring Do was the actual thief, and her already garbage reputation with them meant that they were inclined to believe him.

    So it's not like there isn't precedent.

    Of course people also have a point that if you're presenting yourself as a big bad evil guy threatening to doom the world, you don't really get to complain if someone takes you seriously and decides to beat your ass.

    The twist with Ahuizotl is basically meaningless because he still acted like a goddamn supervillain instead of being remotely reasonable.
     
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  26. Flightless Man

    Flightless Man Versed in the lewd.

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    I mean to the degree and frequency he's been doing it since the Sheeda arc (I'm glad you noticed the same time of being more frequent) which seems like when he was relying on his divinity more.

    Paul and the other versions do it too, but Grayven post Sheeda does it with nearly every single conversation.
     
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  27. Darko

    Darko Connoisseur.

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    Yeah, when he was in Sheeda land he was using his divine nature more than ever, so it makes sense.
     
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  28. Threadmarks: Workhorse (supplementary, Renegade Option)
    Mr Zoat

    Mr Zoat Dedicated ragequitter

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    27th September 2012
    08:14 GMT -7


    "In here."

    The ziggurat we just climbed up is… Actually kind of unimpressive. There are no vine-covered houses abandoned due to some natural disaster surrounding it, no piles of dust where the people failed to outrun a pyroclastic flow. It's just kind of there, far enough up the valley wall to plant itself over a spring whose waters flow into the Basin proper but not so far up as to be easily visible.

    Parts of the stonework have clearly been corroded by time, but in other places I see where someone has been making repairs. Not poor quality by any means, but noticeably of a different age to the slabs around it.

    The fires in the braziers are obviously fairly recent, given that several large cats are curled up around them.

    "Those are Ahuizotl's cats!"

    I glance at Rainbow Dash, then at the diminutive example of felix catus currently licking its rear left leg. It raises its head for a moment to look at me, then returns industriously to its licking.

    "Good show. Ah, Chief Grain Store, I've been wondering. You've got all these marvellous stone buildings, but you live in small huts. What's up with that?"

    "Many generations ago, we began expanding outside of the Basin into lands where it was easier to farm. Then there was a civil war, and most of the survivors decided to make their homes in the new lands. And… Honestly, living in a home that is filled with death traps is not a pleasant way to spend time."

    Rainbow Dash squints. "Why don't you just, y'know, turn them off?"

    "They wouldn't be very good traps if you could just 'turn them off'. And even if you could, you would end up walking half way down a corridor and then thinking to yourself, 'Did I remember to turn it off this morning?'. And then you'd turn it off but you did turn it off that morning and now you've turned it on."

    One of his bodyguards nods sombrely.

    "And then there is the seepage. They were great buildings in their day, but only a few people would want to live there now."

    I frown. "Okay, but if everyone else left, why are you still here?"

    "These are some of the greatest monuments our people ever created. We still live here so that we can protect them and maintain them. Each tribe spends a year here on rotation, and tend their own lands the rest of the time."

    "How many of you ponies are there?"

    "Why would I tell you?"

    Makes sense. Despite what modern Equestrian myth-making would have its citizens believe, there's no obvious reason why all of the ponies fleeing Ponyland would have gone in the same direction.

    Grain Store trots up the steps to the small room at the top and knocks his left forehoof against the stone.

    "Guardian Ahuizotl! Guests!"

    The curtain serving as the chamber door is pulled aside in an instant, and the large black and blue baboon-looking creature stands proudly in the doorway.

    Except that his left eye isn't quite focusing. And his tail-hand has a plaster cast with several decorative hoofprints on it. And while his fur covers it up fairly well, I can see patches of stuck-together fur where he's been cut and the wound has scabbed over. And his stance is lopsided where he's trying not to put too much weight on his left hand.

    Whatever he is, he clearly doesn't come with accelerated healing.

    He grins, taking a deep breath, presumably preparing to launch into some great villainous diatribe. Those are always fun, and I've been on both sides in my day. Then he sees something and deflates slightly.

    "Chief Grain Store. Why are our 'guests' not tied up?"

    "Because they're guests. Not… 'Guests'."

    "Oh. Well, what do they-?" He blinks, then walks past Grain Store and towards myself and Rainbow Dash. "What do you want?"

    I smile. "It has been brought to my attention that far from being a respectable archaeologist, Daring Do is in fact a serial antiquities thief who should face the full force of the law. I was interested to see if you would be willing to provide testimony for the investigators and eventually in court."

    Ahuizotl stares at me for a moment. Then he blinks in confusion.

    "What do you want?"

    Ah, concussion. I nod, and a purple ray drone materialises behind him and shoots him with a purple healing beam. Grain Store takes a step back in surprise, but Ahuizotl himself blinks and starts to stand up a little straighter. Then he focuses on us.

    "The blue one! You dare to face me?!"

    "Ah, yeah, look, I've…"

    "To the piranha pit!"

    Grain Store shakes his head. "We don't have one. It was in the Fortress, and..."

    "Oh. Crocodile pit?"

    Miss Dash flies up to hover in front of him. "No pits! Look, it… It sounds like Daring Do was basically just stealing a bunch of stuff from your old buildings or whatever-" Ahuizotl's mouth falls open slightly and he stares at Miss Dash. "-but I still wanna know why you threatened everypony with eight hundred years of scorching heat."

    Ahuizotl twists his head to the side.

    "If I could actually bring about eight hundred years of scorching heat, don't you think I'd have done it by now?"

    "Wait. So you-? It wouldn't have brought about eight hundred years-."

    "No! I just had a great idea. What if rather than stealing all of the Tenochtitlan Basin's greatest treasures, I just make up a story about a fake one, make a pile of rings out of cheap stone and paint it gold and then put it somewhere where I can trap her! If she didn't take the bait then I wouldn't really lose anything, if she did then maybe I finally get her. At worst, she gets a worthless fake."

    Miss Dash blinks in confusion.

    "But… The whole Fortress collapsed."

    "Yes." He nods sadly. "Seepage. It's very bad. The ancient ponies who lived in these lands built many remarkable buildings but knew basically nothing about drainage."

    "So they couldn't control the sun?"

    "Of course not. How would a-? They were made of chalk. I'm surprised they didn't fall apart when you picked them up."

    Miss Dash opens her mouth to complain, then drops to stand on the stone surface of the ziggurat. Perhaps not entirely clear what she would be complaining about.

    I take a step closer. "Mister Ahuizotl, would you be willing to detail all of Daring Do's thefts? I intend to lean on the Equestrian government to charge her criminally for her actions. Would you be prepared to testify?"

    "She will be put in prison?"

    "Yes, and the artefacts she stole will be returned and I imagine that Princess Celestia will want to establish some sort of regular government contact to prevent this sort of thing from happening again."

    "Will there be piranha in this prison?"

    "Probably not."

    "Crocodiles?"

    "No. No crocodiles. But how long has a crocodile actually been able to keep hold of her?"

    Ahuizotl mutters to himself indecisively for a moment.

    "I will testify. But can I be there when she is arrested?"

    I nod. "I believe that we can make that happen."
     
    Last edited: Apr 15, 2022
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  29. Darko

    Darko Connoisseur.

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    I'm getting the feeling that they've done that before.

    'your ponies'

    'Grain Store'

    Not unless you didn't want to do it before, or somehow couldn't do it before.

    'really lose'

    'built'

    Not unless they're sapient and are either prisoners or work there.
     
  30. Mr Zoat

    Mr Zoat Dedicated ragequitter

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    No, that's correct.
    Thank you, corrected.
     
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