NationStates Jolt Archive

The multiverse, a many-layered structure too complex for even most gods to imagine, stretches out into the far reaches of infinity.
An infinite number of universes make up the bulk of the multiverse, each universe accomodating dectillions of galaxies. Each of these galaxies contains trillions of planets and many planets contain billions of life forms.
In one such galaxy, in one such universe, there is a planet known to its inhabitants as Earth. This is a fairly common name, it being a description of what the planet is made of. What is striking is the similarity in other areas, such as the chemical composition of the atmophere, the type of life forms, and even the shape of the continents. Yes, it is one of those interesting twists of reality that the multiverse is home to so many nearly-identical planets.
This particular Earth had a severe problem: a problem called Apokolips. This was the name given to the planetoid that was currently in orbit above the Pacific Ocean. The only reason that entire countries were not wiped out by Apokolips's graviational pull was the effort of a woman known both as Lorena Marquez and Aquawoman.

On Apokolips, fierce battle raged. Six people stood between the armies of Darkseid and the people of Earth. They were losing.
An enormous, grey-skinned creature held a red-caped man in his powerful hands.
"You disappoint me, Con-El," he said "You're not half the Superm,an your father was."
With a grunt of pain, the Superman wrenched himself from Darkseid arms and delivered a punch to his enemy's head that could deflect a missile. Darkseid was stunned for long enough for the woman behind him to slip a golden lasso around his throat.
Two other men hung back from the fight in the remnants of a half-destroyed palace. One wore a yellow and red bodysuit and moved close to lightspeed. His job was to keep the bloodthirsty away from the second man, clad in black body armour and a flowing cape. He hunched over an alien looking device, sweat beading on his brow.
"How you doing there, Tim?" the speedster asked while scissor-kicking an ogre-like creature into a gaggle of mutated insectoids.
"It takes time, Bart," he said through gritted teeth "He's got some serious security on these things."
Darkseid swept aside the two super-powered warriors only to have a large green octopus wrap itself around his face. He roared in fury, incinerating it with his Omega beams. Three more immediately clung to his body, but were quickly blasted away.
He charged toward the back of his former palace, an unstoppable force of fury, rocks smashing to dust beneath his huge feet. A yellow and red blur collided with him only to be tossed aside. He towered over the one named Tim, his eyes glowing with rage. The human below him looked weak and feeble by comparison, but he was laughing. A quiet chuckle at first, but quickly grew to a crescendo.
"What are you laughing at?" Darkseid growled.
He stood up and turned around to face his enemy, the bat symbol on his chest glinting in Apokolips's perpetual red twilight.
"I've just finished. I've got control now."
"So you have a Mother Box. I'll still--"
"Not a Mother Box. They're all connected at the most fundamental level, gravelface. I have just hacked into every Mother Box on Apokolips and every one of them is under the control of... her."
He pointed upwards, Darkseid's gaze following. Floating about a hundred feet above them was a thin, pale woman dressed all in black.
"No," the Apokoliptian overlord croaked, suddenly sounding weak and terrified "You have no idea what that kind of power--"
"Raven, attack!"

The world went white.

Shouts of pain could be heard, screams of rage, stone exploding, crieds of "Into the Boom Tube! Now!", as well as entirely unidentifiable sounds. Then everything faded.

Six bedraggled people pulled themselves up off the ground.
"Is it over?" Superman whispered, his cape torn to shreds
"Yes," Batman managed to choke out, leaning against his old friend for support.
A humanoid creature covered in green fur knuckled its way to the top of a mound of smashed stone and twisted metal, sniffing the air as it went.
"Wrrrong," it growled.
"Garfield is right," Raven said "We are not back home. We have been transported somewhere else."
"I don't understand. This is Earth, isn't it?"
"Look at the stars."
The new voice was a smooth, dulcet one that came from a tall, athletic woman with flowing blonde hair, her golden breastplate reduced to shards of useless metal.
As one, the seven looked up at the night sky. The stars were wrong.
"This is Earth," she said "But where is that?"

In a different galaxy, in a different universe, there was already a planet known as Earth. Now, there are two.

OOC: *sniff* no one likes me.

Hmm so what do we play as?

OOC: Your nations. This is a Nationstates rp like any other. Mine happens to have superheroes in it.

tag

oocness: Lots of assumptions made - I'm assuming a ~ 20th century earth (Fifties would be awesome, but I guess it's more at the 20th/ 21th century boundary plus superhero kit?), and hope I'm not too wrong. Hum. And I hope you don't mind the somewhat surreal touch of the comics existing in standard NS reality <.< Couldn't resist that one >.>

"I feel pretty,"

The body twirls about, collecting and putting on clothes as it goes, within the - admittedly cramped - confines of the ship's quarters.

"Oh, so pretty,"

The body is feminine - very feminine, in fact - and, while not exactly what one would describe a supermodel as, certainly pretty enough to justify its excitement, which in turn fuels singing and dancing alike.

"I feel pretty and witty and bright!"

It could be embarrassing, of course, but Sophia does seem to be pretty alone in there - nobody there to peek, and she'd made it very clear to the ship that she'd frown on being observed.

"And I pity"

Some more twirls, she seems to be almost done - pretty indeed. If risque. But then, public nudity isn't exactly rare within the Hypocrisy, and compared to that, she looks almost conservative.

"Any girl who isn't me tonight."

Too bad the quarters are still cramped, which sort of inhibits movement. A bit. One can, for example, bump one's head on a shelf.

"Ow!"

Sophia rubbed her forehead, feeling the bump developing, and cursed softly. Not so pretty anymore, I guess...

"I can take care of that, if you wan-"

Sophia looked up, surprised. "What? I thought I told you not to peek in!"

Bloody ships. Never know any privacy. And it was a bit awkward to have to talk to a disembodied voice, too. Well, talking to the wall usually worked, and one got used to it, over time.

"I know, I know... I didn't, until just now. By the way, very pretty dress you have there."

"Thanks... I guess."

"Made it yourself?"

"Well, compiled it. My sewing skills are- Wait a moment. Why are you playing voyeur?"

The ship - the Interstellar Exploration Unit Goose Bump - sounded wounded, hurt. Even embarrassed. "I'm not. Well... Not intentionally. In any case, I've recently stumbled over an... Interesting observations, and thought I'd share it with you."

"You could've waited, you know. And by doing so, avoid the doubtlessly blatant sensorlock you've on my cleavage."

"You know, if I wanted to, I'd just log your showers... Anyway. You're rather fond of 20th century earth, yes?"

Sophia had finally gotten over it, and was pretending to be busy checking her dress, getting out a few bumps, and generally looking, well, neater. "Not really. I'm into its pop culture. Not really its, erm, politics. So if you found a cold-war era world about to blow itself up, hand it over to the specialists, please."

"Popculture is just about right, considering the logs I've of the planet's radioband emissions..."

"Eh?" Sophia's curiosity was piqued. Admittedly, her curiosity was centering around the Goose Bump's mental health, but still...

"You wont believe me as such, so I suggest you just look for yourself..."

A few hours later

Sophia was still wearing her dress - rather inappropriately so, all things considered - but she was no longer in the mood for 'Pretty and witty and bright'. She was still excited, though, but for a reason that differed considerably from 'Getting laid tonight' (Although given the planet's usual array of TV- and radio transmissions the ship had intercepted, well, in certain cases she wouldn't mind...).

They'd gone through the EM inevitably emitted by every civilisation capable of, lets say, building radios, and they'd learned a lot - not that the things they'd learned had really made sense (For the first few hours, the Goose Bump had thought it to be broadcasts of mere shows, rather than the real thing), but still.

And now they were curious. Very curious. And nervous. Just a little bit, but still...

"You know, I feel like I just stumbled into a positively weird sixties' era SciFi episode..."

"You probably did," the ship - which had by now switched to a proper avatar. It didn't like them much, but it was better to have a proper representative, in this kind of situation - replied, as the Goose Bump was slowing to sublight velocities and eventually dropping out of the realms that made up space (tm). "In any case... Given that they've Superman flying about, I doubt it'll take them long to notice us..."

"Personally, I'm rather more fond of Batman... You've read 'Man of Steel, Woman of Kleenex', yes?"

The ship's avatar smiled. "Already feeling tingly?"

"Oh, just shut up already."

Pretty View

For people watching from afar - which in this case meant 'Sitting on a planet and staring into orbit with telescopes' -, the Goose Bump did - depending on the quality of the telescope - appear as a slightly less than a kilometre long (And half as wide, and then again half as high as wide) ellipsoid thing with pimples - sensory domes mostly, plus a for an explorer perhaps slightly overkillish amount of weaponry - all over it, coloured in a neat blueish-purple scheme, but otherwise unremarkable.

Well, 'Unremarkable' was perhaps the wrong word when orbiting a ~ 20th century planet, but then, they were supposedly used to all kinds of alien menaces showing up and promptly being defeated by their local array of superheroes. They were probably starting bets on just how long it'd take their heroes to do it again this very moment...

And when the other side has Superman on its side, it's probably a good idea to properly introduce yourself before being thrown into the local sun (Granted, the Goose Bump could take it, but still).

CCOM@1e-1; Beamspread x 1; SL 0
From: Interstellar Exploration Unit Goose Bump
To: Assorted Earth Organisations (You know who you are, guys!)
Subject: Hello there

Hello - we, ah, stumbled over you, well... Appearing here, and thought we'd check it out - it isn't every day that a planet switches universes. Not that we're worried about you (Although the local universe can be hostile at times) - looking through your EM, we noticed that you've a somewhat unusual array of people living among you, so you should be more than safe.

But it's only polite to visit a new neighbor when you happen to wander past, isn't it?

Yours sincerely,

~ IEU Goose Bump

OOC: It's the early 2020s. The technology is better than you'd expect, but not up to Star Trek standards. It's an alternate future of the DC Earth based on the Titans Tomorrow storyline. Basically, the Teen Titans have grown up and replaced their mentors. Tim Drake is Batman. Conner Kent is Superman. Cassie Sandsmark is Wonder Woman. Bart Allen is The Flash. Lorena Marquez is Aquawoman. Garfield Logan is Animal Man. Raven is still Raven. However, they are fascist despots. Most of the world is united into a single government which presents the illusion of democracy, but in truth, the Titans run the show. Most of the old-guard superheroes have been eliminated, and so have almost all the villains. Corporations have a great deal of power too, especially Lexcorp and Wayne Enterprises.
Also, before I reply, was that message in English or do we have to do the translation thing?

zOMG oocness: Ah - well, close enough to today to not require me to edit anything, so I'm happy. And the message was indeed in english. Figure that the ship hasn't really gotten the fascist bit just yet, so it's rather more friendly than it'd usually be under these circumstances.

On a side note, *Smacks self* I actually have villains - well, one villain - who could've made first contact, too >.< Well, some things you remember too late...

President Sheng put her head in her hands. "Okay... so, if I am to correctly understand the situation, our entire planet has been transported to an entire different section of space."
"Yes, Madam President. The Titans made their report of the battle and the current theory is that the sheer power of using all those Mother Boxes at once has punched a whole in space-time itself--"
"Spare me the details, Senator Belkowicz. How does this affect us?"
"Well, we seem to be in the orbit of another sun quite like ours, though slightly bigger and we're orbiting a bit further out. Things will be a little colder and the year will be about two weeks longer, but we're really very fortunate--"
"And now an alien space ship is contacting us."
"Yes. In perfect English."
She sighed. "All right. Find our best interplanetary ambassador and reply. I want to oversee the diplomatic proceedings. Alert the Titans, too. I want them there."

"Most esteemed Goose Bump,
Our cordial greetings. If you would be so indulgent, the Democratic Empire of Earth would very much like to meet your representatives in person. There follows the coordinants of Metropolis spaceport, where you may land if you wish.
Humbly,
Nathan Tidwell,
Designated interplanetary ambassador,
Earth."

OOC: Trying to get into FT with my FT nation... might as well take this opportunity.

IC: The Heiarchy probe popped into the system out of hyperspace. It did a quick scan of the system, detecting a single planet with a moon, it hyperspaced again, this time into around the planets orbit.

This time it noted the ship. About a kilometer long, etc. etc. But it probably wouldnt notice the probe. Not until it was too late that is. Anyways, it quickly scanned the planet.

The planet had civilization, that was a bonus to harvesting operations, and apparently with early post-industrial age society. Not that much of a threat unless nuclear weapons were used, those would have to be taken out in advance.

The probe, however, failed to take into account any superheroes... as the Heiarchy didnt even imagine the concept. The probe quickly located the planets nuclear weapons stock pile, uplinked its data to the nearest Heiarchy stationed, then self-destructed. The entire process, from arrival in orbit over the planet to self-destruct, took two seconds.

30 minutes later, A 2.3 kilometer Heiarchy Battleship, two 1.8 kilometer Heiarchy Heavy Cruisers, three 1.3 kilometer Heiarchy Destroyers, and five 900 meter Heiarchy Frigates hyperspaced in just past the planets moon. They immediatly began moving towards Earth via sublight engines.

Soon after they arrived, TV and Radio signals all over Earth were hijacked, and began to repeat over and over again, in the Heiarchy's odd sounding language.

"We are the Heiarchy Unification... we have come to harvest, those who submit to us and join the Heiarchy shall not suffer the fate of your fellow species."

"And there is their reply... A sec."

CCOM@1e-1; Beamspread x 1; SL 0
From: Interstellar Exploration Unit Goose Bump
To: Nathan Tidwell
Subject: Hello there

Your Honour,

Thank you very much for your kind reply - and a visit can certainly be arranged. I figure it'll be me and Miss Sophia Ramsey, visits by my other inhabitants may follow on a more informal basis.

Expect us to be down in about half an hour - it is, admittedly, not a very long time in terms of preparation, but I guess that a touch of less-than-formal attitudes may not be entirely out of place, nor unexpected, given the occasion.

Yours sincerely,

~ IEU Goose Bump

"We're not using the displacers?"

"There's still a one-in-thousand chance of us ending as a submolecular mist if we use them, my dear. It'd be terribly embarrassing if that happened."

"True."

Later

The shuttle - there was no need to have the entire ship land. Besides, it being ellipsoid-ish, landing was actually a comparatively complex and power-intensive effort one could just as well spare oneself - was quite an unremarkable (Though by no means ugly - some style was very much desirable on such occasions, and the shuttle reflected this, a smooth, whitish-silvery hull radiating a sense of, well, neatness) thing, and sped through the atmosphere, rapidly decelerating from its original velocity of around seven km/s to a few metres per second, and less.

On board, Sophia was once more fiddling with her dress, permanently dissatisfied with her arrangements, and cursing the ship's haste - she wasn't exactly a professional diplomat (If, in a sense, rather qualified for this particular situation), and her nervousness, while not tangible, was certainly noticeable.

The ship's chosen avatar - hosting a copy of its mindstate, sans some functions that were only relevant for the 'Big' ship itself, but not overly limited by the 'Small' hardware - made notably less of a fuss, at this time being an ebony black, and vaguely masculine (Though gender couldn't really be identified, if one disregarded its blatant lack of mammary glands) figure clad in a perfectly boring tuxedo, top hat included.

"Annnnnnnnnnd..."

Thump.

"We've landed."

"Great." Sophia briefly fought (And for the moment won) against her visible nervousness. "So, when exactly are you going to learn to land without subjecting us to thumps?"

"I always thought they were stylish..."

The conversation continued, doors opened, and the two figures stepped out of their transport, with a remarkable lack of self defence measures (Other than those inherent to their physique, that is), the Goose Bump having decided that this planet - unified under one government, and - some probably repressive oddities in their system aside - generally devoid of serious internal or ideological issues, was more than safe enough for this kind of entry.

A second later, their feet were firmly planted on Superhero-earth.

Orbit

Oh, look at that...

FTLCOM@1E10&EM1E-1; Beamspread x 1; SL 7
From: IEU Goose Bump
To: TEU Freudian Slip
Subject: See that?

I failed to properly consider a previous intrusion, about half an hour earlier - given the speed of the operation, equivtech capabilities in terms of reaction times, and equivtech+ capabilities in terms of FTL (Tactical) can be assumed, although this particular entity's economic capacities are probably significantly inferior to our own - otherwise they wouldn't need to - as it looks like - attack civilised planets. But this doesn't matter on a tactical scale, unfortunate as this is.

Thought they wouldn't be too hostile, given the information embedded in the local EM. Analysis of debris (Material composition, likely powersource and tolerances) included.

A few too many for me alone - remember, I'm a pseudo-civilian -, although I suspect that this particular Earth' locals can deal with it on their own, assuming that it is actually an attack (Which is, of course, exceedingly likely). Might be fun watching.

Oddly enough they're ignoring me, please don't ask me why. In the meantime, could you drop by? You're my escort for a reason.
-
[Freudian Slip] On it. Might want to contact the locals, too.
-
[Goose Bump] I [i]am.


CCOM@1E10&EM1E-1; Beamspread x 1; SL 0
From: IEU Goose Bump
To: Whom it may concern; Earth (This one)
Subject: Hum.

As for your most recent visitor - well, I'm not exactly 100% certain about your self-defence capabilities vs. interstellar threats, but judging by the information we collected over the past few hours, I guess you're not exactly what one would call defenceless.

Still. If you need a hand, just say so. We're nothing if not concerned about the fate of fellow sapients.

Yours sincerely,

~ IEU Goose Bump

By this time, the Goose Bump was already quite happy to spread various pieces of ordnance in a .1 lightsecond radius around itself, happily keeping missiles and bombs loitering, some blatantly obvious, others - the majority - kept hidden behind not inconsiderable ECM and black body configurations. Subcraft - glorified point defence platforms with propulsion added almost as an afterthought - were distributed as well.

The Goose Bump was certainly not a military ship - but as an explorer, it still had something like 50% of an equal-sized milship's firepower, which wasn't entirely inconsiderable, plus positively absurd EW capabilities, which - rather than being added with EW in mind - simply derived from its job as an explorer - you had to have some pretty damn good perception when doing that, and as a side effect, you could also act as a sort of gigantic spacedy-AWACS.

Of course, for now, it did nothing, other than preparing itself for the worst. Something it didn't consider too likely, come to think of it - if things were to progress as it, well, not quite expected, but certainly hoped, its presence would be quite superfluous.