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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. NightmareWarden

    NightmareWarden Versed in the lewd.

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    Hmm. Khan wants money and valuable items. Question: do you think that the full schematics of every device Paragon-Paul has in his ring’s extradimensional storage would be valuable enough to pay Khan to leave? After this conflict is over, I mean.

    I think so.
     
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  2. Darko

    Darko Connoisseur.

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    He probably has most of that data in his own ring and Paragon may not have any interest in whether he stays or leaves.
     
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  3. Xelloss

    Xelloss Know what you're doing yet?

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    I'm still salty about the reclassification of what are planets.
    - Dwarf planets are not planets because otherwise the solar system would have 15+ planets and somehow it's bad.
    - There are only 8 planets in the universe, because one has to orbit Sol to be a planet (otherwise they are "exoplanets", which arent planets either).
     
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  4. Rafin

    Rafin Not too sore, are you?

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    Ah yes. Rapidly cooling down a massively heated solid. Always a good idea.

    Wasn't Pluto returned to planet status? Also, I read somewhere that the conference that changed in the first place didn't actually have consensus among astronomers. Especially the guys at NASA working on a mission that would do a flyby of Pluto were massively pissed.
     
  5. BR549

    BR549 This is filth! FILTH!!

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    The whole "Pluto-a-planet" thing both amuses and depresses me.

    Amuses, because Pluto is a planet, has always been a planet, and will always be a planet. 'Minor planets' are a subclass of planets. The Big 8? "Major planets". Pluto, Ceres, etc.? "Minor planets". All of them together? "Planets".

    Depresses, because people (including some very famous ones) have and continue to raise a stink over it, when, see above, and, the number-one argument they make is "I grew up with Pluto being a planet". We don't do science like that. People grew up with the four biggest Jovian moons classified as planets and people grew up knowing the Earth was the center of the solar system (the universe, even) but science marches on.regardless of their anguished cries of "IN MY DAY!".
     
  6. PurpLexed

    PurpLexed (The Girl(!) in the Snow)

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    At least he's self aware, I guess. Thats a step above most CEO's and shareholders
     
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  7. nick012000

    nick012000 Gone for Good

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    I'm not too familiar with the comics version of Manga Khan, but he seems to be a bit less corrupt than Bill Clinton arguably was based on his wiki article. No suspicious "suicides" of his people who might pose threats to his political power, no facilitating the selling of drugs to fund shady government agencies (Clinton has been alleged to have been involved with CIA drug trafficking during his time as Arkansas governor), no sex scandals or lying under oath, etc.
     
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  8. WereDragon

    WereDragon Bookwyrm

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    ...he is wearing a Power Ring. An Orange power ring. He doesn’t need to know how a computer works to ripe data out of it.
     
  9. Xmaster3000

    Xmaster3000 Know what you're doing yet?

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    Ah, but he does need to want it!
     
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  10. Khornelius

    Khornelius Overlord of the Underworld

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    Yeah, with characters like Wade and Lobo, you can never be sure what will put them down.
     
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  11. Doccer

    Doccer I trust you know where the happy button is?

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  12. Mr Zoat

    Mr Zoat Dedicated ragequitter

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    Thank you, corrected.
    As in, he's punching holes in the metal with them.
    There are only so many sylables. If anything it would be stranger that they had the same name for that galaxy that we do.
    Thank you, corrected.
    No, she headed back to the periphery to show off on behalf of the Orange Lantern Corps.
     
  13. Cuchulin

    Cuchulin Versed in the lewd.

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    Agreed! We don't want Tsathoggua or Cxaxukluth to wake up.
     
  14. Mr Zoat

    Mr Zoat Dedicated ragequitter

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    Lord-Lantern Manga Khan was not born a United States citizen.
     
  15. pervyshyguy

    pervyshyguy Getting sticky.

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    Neither was George Washington :p
     
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  16. rkyeun

    rkyeun Cabbitus Maximus

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    Yes he was. It was just America's birth that made him one, not his own.
     
  17. Ace Dreamer

    Ace Dreamer Questioning The Nature of our Realities

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    If you want to understand something, you look at the boundaries, the fuzzy bits, when and where it joins with other similar things, both in time and space. This is why Platonic Idealism breaks-down, fails. It tells you to look at the central body, the 'core', the 'important bits'. When, the important bits are the boundaries, where that thing turns from, or into, something else.

    You may not believe that, think it's a lot of philosophical... waffle, playing with words. But, some people, like Wittgenstein, spent their entire lives picking-away at those words, trying to find what truth they might contain, and found they were often a language game.

    So, if someone comes up to you, tries to sell you an Orange Ring, says 'take it, think how powerful it will make you', you look at the boundaries, where it gets its power from, how you recharge it, how it affects you, not just the shiny bit which draws your eyes. :)

    (Philosophy? The Queen of Sciences? Maybe, but, yes, she does have teeth, and they can be very sharp. :) )


    You might want to read about this song...

    Why is this song about drinking? Maybe after you dig deep into philosophy making your head stop hurting with a drink or two (or three, or...) seems the only thing sensible. :)
     
    Last edited: Jun 30, 2020
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  18. Threadmarks: Plutonian (part 16)
    Mr Zoat

    Mr Zoat Dedicated ragequitter

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    12th April
    11:40 GMT


    "You still can't see through the walls?"

    "No. But given what Doctor Mist was saying… Just waiting until the spell runs out of power is a perfectly viable option, if you want to take it slowly."

    "Unless they're sacrificing the hostages for power."

    "Ah-? No, that wouldn't work. Magic… Short explanation: while magic energy is universal, unless they're tapping directly into the Dream, magic users are generally manipulating pre-existing structures using pre-existing power flows. Out here there's no system and no ready power source. Ritual sacrifice won't work because there's nothing to respond to it; you can't ritually violate arcane taboos which don't exist."

    "You sure they know that?"

    "This wouldn't be possible without specific preparation."

    "You willing to bet their lives on it?"

    I shrug, though the armoured plates covering my shoulders don’t move.

    "There's nothing stopping them ordering their thralls to kill themselves anyway."

    "Illustres Paul?" Koriand'r is looking back through the open hull towards the still-enthusiastically erupting Pluto. "Should that planet be behaving like that?"

    "There was a theory that it had subterranean oceans. Depending on their chemical composition and location, that's certainly within the realms of possibility. If you want to see something really impressive, I'll take you to the Rao system when we're finished here."

    Major Adams shakes his head.

    "No one's going to fire a giant laser at a planet for no reason. The hostages take priority, but we need to find out what that reason is." He looks at Lantern Khan. "There a good place for a command post through there?"

    "Yes? Several. I command from wherever I am, and I need to be-"

    "That's fine. Just take us to the closest."

    "-seen and heard to my best advantage, that I may inspire-"

    Major Adams looks at me. I just shake my head.

    "-my serfs-. I mean slaves-. I mean thralls-. I mean scum-. I mean valuable employees-. No, wait, that's completely wrong. I don't even know why I said-."

    "How about you go inspire them right now?"

    "Yes!" He flies towards the closest doorway, a construct butler forcing it open for him and a potted plant being thrown out by the air pressure shift and hitting him in the face. "My people! I come for you!"

    Major Adams gives me a low-level glare as we fly after him, and I'm forced to catch the remains of the plant as it slides off Khan.

    "Why does that guy have a power ring?"

    I repot the plant and set it aside.

    "Not all Orange Lanterns are supposed to be combat-orientated. He's a surprisingly -very surprisingly- skilled economist."

    I accelerate after Lantern Khan. No other members of the crew are immediately in sight. I can see where they ripped out a dividing wall, presumably to make moving materials to the mining laser easier.

    "I feel a corporate motivational speech coming on!"

    The automated defences deploy as we cross what I.. think was a raw materials store room. Pulse laser batteries this time. I generate a shield construct for Major Adams while the beams reflect off Lantern Khan's shiny armour and burn slashes across the inside of the room.

    Khan makes an identical line of pulse lasers and destroys their metal cousins in a single volley.

    "There's a factory oversight centre just up-"

    He creates giant hand constructs and pulls the door -and a chunk of the wall- open.

    The Star Hunter in the middle of the room blinks, then red lightning leaps from the tips of its tentacles and reduces Khan's armour to smouldering slag! The thralls around it are armed with-

    Major Adams fires a scintillating beam of energy from his forearms at the Star Hunter, and I see the circuit runes embedded in its skin light up as it works to shield itself.

    -some sort of arcane gun, though they look somewhat bodged. The Star Hunter's red lightning continues crackling out, passing though my construct barrier and striking my armour before being soaked by my spell eater. I form railguns and fire mage slayers as the facially mutilated thralls rouse themselves and-.

    Alan's drawn his purple healing ray and he uses it to shoot the closest thrall in the face. The cuts steam and vanish and the thrall collapses.

    **Will not stop us. Can not stop us.**

    The wards around the room-. No, the entire ClusterShip fail, and I see the trapped desires of the people the Star Conquerors are puppetting twisting and writhing, unable to express themselves-.

    Alan shakes me, and I blink as I see that we've pulled back into the cargo area. He backs off slightly as I come to my senses.

    "You feeling yourself again?"

    I nod. Clever starfish.

    Lantern Khan's gaseous form is lurking near the ceiling, orange ring glowing in cover while he takes shots at the thralls with Alan's purple ray. Major Adams is going all out in his assault on the Star Conqueror, trusting Koriand'r to shield him from small arms fire.

    Why did that-? My spell eater is dripping down my cuirass, overwhelmed by whatever the Star Conquerors did to try and take me down. I replace it and generate a coilgun as Alan goes back to pulling injured crew out of the line of fire.

    **All will be one.**

    Message to Batman: Star Conqueror presence confirmed. Engaging.

    Message sent.

    Major Adams suddenly stops shooting, arms dropping as he lolls in the air. His spell eater has gone into meltdown, and-.

    Tiny pieces of debris hurl themselves at his face, only to be defeated by his dilustel epidermis. Trying to cut a star shape? So it doesn't require contact.

    I tag Major Adams with a replacement spell eater -need to emphasise how they aren't actually a replacement for a field magician- and then fire an ultraviolet laser at the Star Hunter. Kind of a shame I didn't melt down Nabu's helmet to make an Ace of Order, because that's clearly chaos magic it's using. The laser does nothing but make it realise that I'm mobile again, which means that its shield is general purpose rather than specific.

    Brute force and ignorance it is, then.

    I don't even bother with a construct. Thick orange beam from my ring to the ward, just enough kinetic force to make it activate and a whole lot of effort draining it. Because-.

    The Star Hunter collapses to the deck, the runes in its body flickering out. The few remaining thralls-

    "Aaaagh!"

    -drop their weapons, staggering as the bleeding wounds on their faces are suddenly a pressing concern. I scan the Star Conqueror, and… It's barely alive, but it is still functioning.

    Major Adams appears to have recovered, and Lantern Khan reconstitutes his armour and raises his arms high.

    "My people! I have returned!"

    Most of them don't throw anything.
     
    Last edited: Jun 30, 2020
  19. RichardWhereat

    RichardWhereat Aia airëa Fëanáro.

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    Perhaps another genocide is in order? Off through the stars, to kill the star conquerors.
     
  20. Vaermina

    Vaermina Well worn.

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    Paul really needs to stop declaring unproven assumptions as absolute fact.
     
  21. Idkusername

    Idkusername Versed in the lewd.

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    Paul has a number of researchers working on exploring the Dream and its relation to magic, has himself learnt magic theory, has regular contact with gods and other mythological beings.

    You really need to stop declaring in-universe facts as unproven assumptions.

    I think an extinction event would be more suited to the species.
     
    Last edited: Jun 30, 2020
  22. Ace Dreamer

    Ace Dreamer Questioning The Nature of our Realities

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    'There's'?



    Nice battle scene!

    Wish I could write those half as well as you do... :)
     
  23. Citizen

    Citizen Well worn.

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  24. NightmareWarden

    NightmareWarden Versed in the lewd.

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    So this Star Hunter was using magic. Perhaps by drawing power from the “lifeform” under the recognized-by-magic “planet” Pluto?
    I’m not poking at the Dwarf Planet status, but at the theory that 90% of this Pluto is frozen starfish.
     
  25. Mr Zoat

    Mr Zoat Dedicated ragequitter

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    If Major Adams was using proper grammar it would be 'Is there', but I think it works for spoken dialogue.
     
  26. Queshire

    Queshire Not too sore, are you?

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    Personally I'm not a fan of having magic restricted to just planetside, but Zoat's made it pretty clear that's what he's using here.

    I'd probably excuse the lack of magic in space based superhero stories by saying that the majority of super science sci fi tech out in the galaxy is some level of magitech and that most races simply don't differentiate magic from science.
     
  27. Ace Dreamer

    Ace Dreamer Questioning The Nature of our Realities

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    I thought that with 'there' at both ends of the sentence stuffing-in an apostrophe 's' sounded better. Military man might be trained to avoid speaking so he might be mis-understood? Dunno.
    Tricky bit is the question of what are the limits of physics?

    Then, you run into the whole 'Clarke Tech' issue...
     
    Last edited: Jun 30, 2020
  28. Silverias

    Silverias Know what you're doing yet?

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    This coming from you drips with so much irony that you need gutters installed.
     
  29. Vaermina

    Vaermina Well worn.

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    Theory =/= Fact

    Further, he has no real idea how they are doing what they are doing, so his assumption that they are operating under the same theoretical limitations as Earth based magic users is not just stupid, but dangerously stupid.
     
  30. Ace Dreamer

    Ace Dreamer Questioning The Nature of our Realities

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    You might want to think about whether they feel they've got time to consider what 'model' of space-magic they should be using?

    The 'suck it and see' approach. :)
    (Yes, I'm aware, this is QQ. :) )
     
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