Nananananananana Debriefing Time!~

Batman appears through the teleporter, moving to stand just in front of the training room's holographic display. Via some mysterious Bat-magic (or via Miss Martian noticing a new mind and prompting people), the others file in from the kitchen and form a loose line.

"I've read your reports. Let's start at the beginning. Robin, you became aware of the emergency via the Bat-computer's police scanner. Once you were aware, you moved here to rally the team. All of you then efficiently decided on the allocation of your limited protective equipment. Then Kid Flash called for you all to move out. It wasn't in any reports — did any of you consider contacting Zatara to ask for the additional amulets, or Martian Manhunter to provide additional telepathic support? Why or why not? Would that have been a good tradeoff to make, with the information that you had at the time?"

The bystander effect strikes again. There's a general shuffling and glancing as people figure out who's going to answer first.

She raises her hand. 

"I considered asking after the amulets, but I thought that it was that the matter was too time sensitive to use a communication channel where I didn't have any particular expectation of an immediate response? Besides, most of the protection that additional amulets would offer wouldn't be obviously much better than what we'd have just having me and miss martian on hand, by my estimation at the time. I also assumed that if robin had that information, that it would also be available to any league member who was otherwise on call and looking for actionable intel and that if they wanted to they would have been able to reach out to us or make it to the site themselves with whatever resources they felt were appropriate to gather? I'm not certain that decision was correct, but it doesn't seem obviously wrong in retrospect." 

Batman nods.

"Good. Yes, the League had access to the information, and we would have gotten someone there if necessary. At the time, all the available League members were asleep, busy, or off-planet, which is why the alert wasn't marked as handled by the person on duty at League headquarters before it pinged Robin. As for whether it was the right choice — I think in hindsight it might have been wise, given that Miss Martian got injured overextending to protect you all. But I agree that with the information you had at the time that wasn't possible to know."

"How can you avoid having to make a tradeoff like that in the future?"

"Make sure we have all necessary equipment close to hand," Robin confidently answers. "Which in this case mostly means waiting for Topaz to be able to produce more mental shielding amulets, but it also means that we should probably go over what emergency equipment is stored here in the mountain, and where. And we should talk through our equipment with everyone so that they know what's available and what's not."

"Reasonable," Batman agrees. "Any other thoughts?"

"I think that we were reasonably well prepared, given the givens about what the league had available in general? My understanding is that we only have Zatara, Martian Manhunter, and Miss Martian who have specializations that might have been appropriate for dealing with unknown telepathic entities, with a handful of other members of the league with varying levels of largely purely defensive advantages against telepathic effects. I think the team that we fielded was probably considerably better protected than what the league would have expected to plausibly have available say, a month ago, and that it's not necessarily realistic at the moment to expect to be able to have redundant specialists in fields like telepathy or broad spectrum magic use available for operations where there isn't a clear, well defined need for them? I do agree that having more forces available with more tools is generally better, but we do need to keep in mind the practicalities of the situation."

She hums.

"I think the only way we could look to avoid making tradeoffs like that in the future with our resource situation would be if we were had superior intelligence on what was going on with Cadmus Labs - having several different metahuman adversaries with different skillsets, a large fire, and a first contact situation all happening at once is the sort of thing I would likely think justifies at least having someone senior on call for oversight, if we knew in advance that was happening. It's possible that some sort of metahuman with informational powers would have been able to help with this, or some sort of magic intelligence system might have been able to help with making that kind of prioritization decision without access to enough conventional intel? I suppose I could look into some sort of omen generating magical system, perhaps...?"

"But I think given the intelligence we had, you would probably need to have a considerably larger force available to be able to consistently respond to threats like these with the level of safety margin you're asking for? Some sample ways to do that include me producing a considerable number of power rings or equivalent in emotional spectrum equipment and training a large force in their use, some broader military and political alliance with atlantis or mars allowing for a large expeditionary mage or manhunter force to be regularly available to deploy, or some sort of larger scale expansion and recruitment of metahumans into the league? I think that's out of scope, though, so I would second Robin's recommendation for doing an inventory of equipment availability and equipment needs, given our current logistical situation." 

Plus, they're irregulars, ultimately, right? And a bit of power use strain feels like the sort of thing that she'd expect from an unexpectedly big operation, not something that you need to plan around not happening next time, as best she can tell, for all that it not happening next time is a better result. 

...She doesn't mention her idea of creating some sort of metahuman or divine eugenics program 1) because it feels like it would be in poor taste and 2) she doesn't know how much accelerated development technology exists here, but that would probably also be an option, given a sufficiently large time horizon? Unfortunately, most of the hellenic goddesses who work with wonder woman have some sort of sworn virginity arrangement, and the associated gods aren't exactly the most reliable people, either. Still, it's not... entirely unworthy pursuing, perhaps? She'll see if she can bring up some sort of question of the divine alliance network later, and consider if it makes any sense to try to incentivize only after having some idea of what it would actually look like. That's definitely a later thought, though. 

"Yes, I do think that kind of large build-up is out of scope," Batman agrees. "And for bigger disasters we have existing allies with larger forces from which we can request aid."

He nods at Kaldur, who is a member of the Atlantean military.

"That actually brings up an important aspect of what I'm trying to do with this debriefing, though — I'm not trying to lead you to some pre-established idea I have of how you could have done better, I'm trying to make sure that you've actually thought it through. Getting into the habit of looking for things that you can do better next time is a big part of continuously improving, as heroes and as people. And frequently there actually won't be anything that you could have done, within the available limitations, but it's still important to check, just in case."

"Case in point — the League has a technological news-scanning and prioritization system for responding to disasters, but you're right that a mystical oracle would probably cover gaps in our information. I'll have to do some research into what is known about such oracles."

"So at that point, you left through the teleporter and ran to the scene. Kid Flash was able to get there almost immediately, and Miss Martian kept you in contact so that he could guide you. What are your thoughts about how contact with the firefighters worked out? What could have been more streamlined there?"

And so Batman leads them through the encounter point by point, encouraging people to voice ideas. Miss Martian suggests telepathic sparring with Martian Manhunter for her, and telepathic resistance training for everyone else. Robin suggests getting Kid Flash a grappling gun or something so that he can traverse vertically as needed — "Can you climb at super-speed? Seems worth checking." Kaldur suggests working out a standardized set of signals and formations for different situations, so that they don't need to figure it out en-route.

But over all, everyone is mostly satisfied with how things turned out, feeling that they did do the best they could.

"Alright — I'm satisfied with both your handling of the event and with your plans for improving in the future. There's one last item to bring up, however: the kryptonian you recovered has finished with their medical checkup, and seems to be stable now that they've recovered from being woken in the pod. Mentally, Martian Manhunter says that they're approximately a teenager, although somewhat atypical because of the manner in which they were educated. As such, I've offered to let them stay in the mountain for the time being while they figure out what to do from here. They should arrive from the infirmary in the morning."

Yeah, they did pretty well! She still feels a bit awkward about the equipment situation - it's hard to strike a balance between being willing to be helpful without necessarily charging and not being willing to just provide everything gratis, up to and including to members of military organizations? She'll have to talk about it in a bit more detail later, oh well. Zatara was able to appraise her work - perhaps there's someone in the atlantean chain of command who'd be willing to compare and contrast that to what's otherwise available, there? 

She nods lightly. 

"Anything we should know about how they are doing so far? They were pretty erratic, last time we saw them." 

"We think that the pod triggered emergency revivification in response to the fire, and that this woke them up with temporary neurotransmitter and hormone imbalances. Given time to sleep naturally and a few hours under observation, they seem much more aware of where they are moment-to-moment. But that is one reason that I want to keep them in a known location for a while, in case further medical complications come up."

A quick acknowledging nod. 

"Are they going to be solar empowered while they're here?" 

Kryptonians do just fine without it, but she wouldn't be suprised if they got best results from their recovery when empowered by yellow sunlight. She's not exactly... eager at the prospect, but she supposes that it's hardly an unmanageable situation either way. 

"Unfortunately, they absorbed some sunlight while on the surface after being evacuated, and we don't have a safe way to drain a kryptonian's solar charge. But yes — the fact that this base is entirely underground, and lacks additional natural sunlight is another reason I recommended it."

Another little nod. 

She's not sure how rivalrous red sunlight and yellow sunlight are for kryptonians? It probably doesn't make a huge difference, and if he's not too empowered it's probably if anything good for him to be a little more durable in a superhero basecamp. 

With the briefing having finished up, the team starts to disperse again — Kid Flash back to the kitchen for seconds, Kaldur out into the ocean to contact Atlantis about bringing visitors from the surface world to visit. Miss Martian whispers something to Robin, who shows her how to configure the training room to have a holographic couch.

...Cute! 

For now...

She goes and showers, changing into a cute teal tanktop and a fresh pair of pants, fusses with her hair - for now, a loose tie in the back will do. She does a little bit of work on growing her crystals a little more, idly muses on what to make for her next projects, and spends a little time just meditating on hope and will to make sure that her rings are fully charged as she can make them for the trip out. She reads and pokes a bit more at the magic to fill the little bits ot time where a new idea doesn't come to mind, and just - chills! 

When the time comes, she's feeling energized and not a little bouncy. 

Joan arrives exactly three hours after their last text exchange. Hey — if you've got the universe's most accurate portable timepiece on your finger, why not use it?

But this is meant to be an informal outing, so she wants to show a bit of a sense of humor from the start. On the other hand, she wants to look nice ...

When she arrives, it is in a perfectly tailored Chauffeur's outfit, complete with tiny hat and Green Lantern cufflinks. She holds up a cardboard sign reading "Topaz".

"Ready to go?" 

Aww! 

That outfit looks great on her - really shows off her style. She ducks her head for a moment with a bashful warm smile, and saunters up. She really does feel underdressed, but there's something... fun about being a little more exposed, honestly? 

"I'm all topped and readied up!"

What, that quickly?

She holds out a hand to Topaz, and then transitions them to the air above the Great Barrier Reef, where it is mid-morning. She's picked one of the less-trafficked sections (although still out of the actual conservation areas, because those aren't open to casual tourism), so while there are boats out on the horizon, they have the clear blue water to themselves.

"Do you know how your ring does with keeping clothes and things dry?" she asks. "I'm happy to keep my environmental shield extended around you while we're here, but there is something nice about diving entirely under your own power."

She reflexively happily squeezes her hand for a moment before drifting apart, floating merrily in the sky. 

"Oh, I'm not too worried! Came out of a fire and wasn't touched by it at all. Should be as comprehensive as can be." 

"Great!"

With a flare of green, Joan switches to a one-piece swimming costume that does wonderful things to her figure, and drops her own flight aura, falling feet-first into the water.

She vanishes under with a splash, and then surfaces again, grinning.

She laughs brightly, swings up into the sky with a burst of blue light, then 180s in the air to dive down behind her, a wide smile blossoming on her face. 

The Great Barrier Reef is home to more than 1,500 separate species of fish. It ranges from low islands all the way to 60-meter depths. This particular part of it is about 5 meters deep, although it drops off to the north and rises to an atoll in the south.

The Reef is also home to a number of cetaceans (relatives of whales and dolphins) found nowhere else in the world. It covers an area of 344,400 square kilometers, and is visible from space.

Brightly colored fish swarm and dart, hiding in the coral at shadows and coming out to peer at the glowing interlopers. An octopus sinks down and mimics the coral around it, hiding from them.

"You mentioned that you had wanted to visit here one day — do you do a lot of swimming?"

Her voice comes through clearly, even as she ducks back below water, hair spreading around her like a cloud of fine black fronds.

Ahhh...~

There's something magical about - being surrounded, like this, dappled light and little delightful fishes filtering through, schools and scales and darting little currents. She feels - not quite wet, but there's something - soothing cool, about being wrapped up in the ocean with her hopes and will. 

"My grandparents had a cottage that I used to go swim at, sometimes? I really loved getting to dive into the water and feel the crisp rush, and play around for hours and hours. I loved that so much. I've never gotten into scuba diving, or anything though - just stumbled across so many little shiny possibilities for places to go to and things to see online." 

"Ah, yeah, that makes sense. My cousins had a place up on Lake Erie, and they would invite us up every July. That was really my only chance to swim outside of a pool until adulthood. There's just something different about swimming in the open ocean, though."

She kicks down toward the sea bed, reaching a hand out to an eel that looks more brave than its fellows.

"... oh, actually, I just realized. My ring lets me communicate with animals if I try — does yours do that? I've never been clear whether the translation is a function of the light or of the ring's programming; the documentation is really unclear."