Alright, here's chapter number 2! Please enjoy reading, and if you didn't feel free to give me a reason why. I'm writing this for me, but I'd also like it to be able to entertain others. I wouldn't have published it on ff, if I didn't.
Disclaimer: Dc owns all of their respective characters, with the exception of Max.
Key:
"Speaking"
"Thought or telepathic convos"
"Automated speech or comms"
Max sat in his new lab, currently uploading AIVA to the main system. He'd been able to complete it last night and wanted to give it a whirl on the caves system. Luckily enough, the servers and equipment at the cave were extremely high level, and the lab he'd been provided was stocked with state of the art technology.
It was a child genius' wet dream.
Well not totally, Power Girl was any growing boys (genius or not) wet dream, but this was a close second for him.
While Max let AIVA download, he figured he'd go grab something to eat. Not only did this cave come with a furnished lab, but also a fully stocked fridge! Best gig in the world, as far as he was concerned. And, as a plus, he got to work with his big brother.
So leaving from his lab, Max silently walked down the hallway.
Mount Justice was truly an amazing fortress. And the more he thought about it, the more the teen grew intrigued.
He was brought out of his musing when the smell of fresh cookies wafted over his senses. The young teen perked up, cookies were his favorite dessert!
He didn't even have cake on his birthday, instead insisting on a batch of birthday cookies.
"Oh wow!" Max hurriedly walked through a large living area. It was spacious and fully furnished with modern looking furniture and decor. The young man was surprised by the attention that, what could have only been, The Batman put into making the base both accommodating yet professional.
Max crouched in front of the clear oven door, his mouth watering as he gazed upon the crispy, golden brown, bite sized, delights. They were baked to absolute perfection! He briefly thought on who the baker might have been, before chuckling to himself.
There was only one person who would've decided to go ahead and bake a batch of cookies. Red Tornado had no need for any kind of consumption and couldn't taste or smell, Superboy… Well, Max couldn't see the super clone being able to make a sandwich, much less of delicacy like chocolate chip cookies.
So using his superior intellect, he deduced that it was Megan, the female Martian niece of the Martian Manhunter.
Max put a glove on and promptly slid the tray of cookies from the oven rack and placed them atop the stove. No doubt, they would burn if left in there and considering it was Megan, she probably forgot about them, if she wasn't anywhere near.
Not that the Martian girl was dumb or anything, she was just… absent minded? No, that seemed a bit too harsh. She was plenty clever, maybe excitable was a better term. She was on a whole new planet after all, one that she'd only dreamed of visiting till now.
Though he couldn't honestly say he was much different. He was in a position he too could only dream of. He was a superhero now! Well, not really… But he helped the people, helping the superhero's! Even better, he got to help his brother, AND even got paid for it.
Max breathed in deeply through his nose and shivered in delight. He bolted to the fridge and poured himself a glass of cool milk. According to every package of cookies out there, you're supposed to let the cookies rest for about 5-10 mins.
Yea right.
Max peeled a cookie off the metal sheet and plopped it into his mouth. It almost seemed to melt, the soft chocolate chips stuck to his teeth and the still hot dough burned his tongue.
"Hahshfg! Hafsh!" The boy breathed out rapidly, almost like he was trying to cool the burning in his mouth. His eyes watered but he couldn't be farther from pain.
The boy swallowed and took a large swing of milk, "Ahh! So tasty!" He repeated the process once more, again singing the insides of his mouth.
"My cookies-! Oh?" An urgent voice shouted and then stopped in surprised.
Max looked like a deer caught in headlights. His mouth stuffed with a steaming cookie and his fingers covered by soft chocolate. "S-Shup?" Max gulped thickly and wipes his fingers and mouth of with a napkin. "S-Sorry Miss. M, they just smelled so~ good! I couldn't help myself!"
Megan, who was professionally known as Miss Martian, seemed to brighten up, "I'm happy you got some! I had nearly forgot about them before Superboy reminded me just now…" She featured behind her where Superboy and the rest of their mini justice league stood. "I wanted to try out Grammy Jones' recipe from episode 17 of-" she blushed as she realized that she was just rambling, "-Nevermind!"
"I bet they'd have tasted great, wish I could've had some before they were all taken." Robin, decked out in some slick casual wear commented. Both boy wonder and martian looked over at Wally who had scarfed down the remaining cookies in the blink of an eye.
"W-What? I've got a seriously high metabolism, I need these more than you guys!"
Next to the speedster, his little brother gaped at the now spotless baking sheet. "You-You ate all of them?! What the hell Wally!"
"Ah man, those really hit the spot, I could sure use some milk to go with them!"
Max, being a bit petty, decided to chug the rest of the carton of milk. Only because Wally said he may have wanted some.
"H-Hey! I said I wanted some!"
Max gulped like his very life was hanging in the balance. He sucked greedily at the carton, slurping impolitely as he did so. "Ahh!" He breathed out before he descended into a fit of hacks and coughs. "Hahaha! What milk?"
"Hmm?" Wally hummed as he put his cup down on the counter, "Oh that milk? I hope you don't mind Max, I had a bit of the milk you had in your glass." The older brother had a victorious smirk on his face.
"That was mine!" Max rushes his older brother, but the speedster always kept just a hair's breadth away.
"I-uh-I'll make more for you all?" She spoke in a questioning manner, would they want more? Or were they just fighting because the other was being stingy?
"It was kind of you to make any. You're very sweet." Aqualad said calmly.
"Thanks, Aqualad!"
"We aren't on Duty, call me Kaldur'ahm. Or Kaldur if you'd prefer, all my friends call me that." Kaldur smiled as he introduced himself as just him, not Aqualad, to his new friend.
"I'm Wally!" He dodged a tackle by his little brother and appeared next to her, leaning onto the counter smoothly. Or at least, what he thought was smooth. "See that, I already trust you with my secret ID." He then dramatically gestures over to Robin, "Unlike Mr. Dark Glasses over there. He's been forbidden by the Dark Knight himself from telling anyone his name!"
Max finally caught Wally off guard and drug him to the floor. The smaller boy sat on his big brothers lower back and held each ankle under an armpit, bending his captives knees back in an uncomfortable wrestling hold.
"I-If he really wanted, it'd be i-impossible to find out his real name!" Wally grunted.
"Well that's just not true!" Max stated pridefully, "Tall, dark, and, creepy may be a bit of a dick about these kinds of things… But even he isn't completely off the radar, especially not with all that tech he's got." Max stared at Robin knowingly and the boy wonder smirked back.
He was slightly surprised though. It was easy enough to pick up on the obvious namedrop, but he wasn't all that twisted up about it. He'd met Max on plenty of occasions, they both found each other to be very agreeable.
You see, Robin was a bit of a genius himself. He was extremely gifted with coding and hacking. It was why, even Batman didn't stand in the young hero's way when they needed something digital handled in expert fashion.
They'd bonded over that point. And, well, Rob trusted Wally with his life. If Wally trusted Max with his then he would too. It also didn't hurt to have a bit of dirt of the kid.
"Well, my name is no secret! It's M'gann M'orzz, but you can call me Megan! That's an earth, and since I'm on earth… What's that saying, When in Gnome…?"
"Rome, Megan, Rome." Max corrected. The brunette pulled back harshly on Wally's legs, causing him to wince and rapidly tap on the floor. The genius instantly gave way and stood up in triumph.
"Don't worry Superboy! We'll find you an earth name too!"
Max's eye twitched at the bit pain the shot through his skull, before he looked at Megan with surprise and wonder. Telepathy?
The others had a less appreciating reactions though.
"Get out of my head!" Superboy shouted. Everyone else gave her looks of discomfort and mild anger.
"W-What? Is something wrong? On Mars, we all communicate telepathically…"
"M'gann, stop!" Kaldur said forcefully. Almost instantly, Max felt the foreign presence leave his mind and his shallow headache disappeared too.
Megan looked surprised at the seriousness on the dark skinned hero's face.
"Things are different on earth. Here, your powers are an extreme invasion of privacy…" Kaldur explained a bit more calmly now that he didn't feel like someone was crawling around his mind.
"Besides," Wally cut in, "Cadmus' freakly little genomes left a bad taste in his brain." The red head pointed over to Superboy, who glared at the green skinned girl.
"I-I'm sorry, I didn't mean-!"
"Just. Stay. Out!" The clone growled before turning heel and walking to the living area.
"Megan." The girl turned to look at the youngest West, she was expecting to be chewed out. Even thought she deserved it, if what the others said was true. How could she be so insensitive? "Fascinating, incredible, astonishing! I never thought telepathy could actually exist! I mean, I know that they say Martian Manhunter can do that and stuff, but how am I supposed to know they aren't embellishing details? Sure I know he can fly, shapeshift, and phase through solid object, but that's all because I've seen it on tv. Have you ever heard of an esper? In short, it's a psychic! I'm curious to see if they have similar brain waves to you… Admittedly, I'm more of an electrical and mechanical engineer, but I'm really a good at a whole bunch of things and I've been learning a lot about anatomy lately too! So, if it's not too much to ask, could I scan your brain?" His words came out like vomit. Fast, unfiltered, and unexpected.
Megan was overwhelmed by pure quantity of words pouring from Max's mouth, "U-Um, sure?" Though She was grateful that he was able to break the tension.
"Hey there little brother, maybe you should give her some space? Brain scanning is 4th date stuff, you know?"
"Wally, you aren't curious? What if I found out that we are all part Martian and the espers and psychics are the most in tune with our Martian heritage? Hence why they have telekinetic powers and the like. What if I find out, we ARE aliens?!"
"Ok, relax there megamind. I think you're running away with yourself right now." Rob placed a hand on Max's shoulder. The super genius blushed a bit and turned away.
Damn it! Why was he like this?! He was the same age as Robin, why couldn't he be that damn cool?! Oh right, cause he was a nerd.
"Oh, s-sorry."
Things settled down for a moment before Megan placed a hand to her forehead. Now that things were nice and calm, she found that there were still other things that the team could see and potentially put the whole mind talking thing behind them, "Hello Megan…" she mumbled "I know what we can do!" Suddenly she lifted off the floor and flew down the hall.
Wally, Kaldur, and Robin were quick to follow. Superboy however stayed planted firmly on the couch.
Megan's head poked back out of the hallway, "Superboy… Please?" She asked sincerely.
"Don't talk to me." He refused to even look at her causing the Martian to look down in sadness.
Max walked by and pat her arm with a wink, startling her. "Oh boy, you sure are a baby huh? I guess you are only a few months old though. Say, maybe those Cadmus dummies messed something up? I'd be glad to give you a once over in my lab!"
Superboy growled and stood up, glaring down at the shorter boy who only smirked back up at him. "Tch, whatever. Get out of my way!" He pushed by Max and walked down the hall with the other.
"Thanks Max… I guess I kind of messed today up for the others, huh?"
Max looked at her confused before he smiled, "I disagree! It's not like you went snooping around for their deepest darkest secrets, I'm sure they'll get over it soon enough. Now let's go! Wouldn't be polite to keep guests waiting."
The green girl slapped her forehead, "Hello Megan!" And then flew down the hall at breakneck speeds. Max tried to keep up but caught up just as some sliding doors opened at all the others walked through.
"It's my Martian bioship!" They all walked onto a concrete platform where a large ovular… thing? had rested.
Wally laughed a bit, "Hehe, cute! Not very aerodynamic, but still cute."
Megan smiled at analysis and giggled, "It's at rest silly, Let me wake it up!" Megan held her hand out to the ship, and with minor concentration, the whole red blob transformed. What was once an egg shaped black and red floater, was now an aggressively shaped spaceship.
Max wondered if the Martian's had ever used these 'bioships' In intergalactic battle. The 13 year old genius was having troubles holding himself back. He wanted to take this thing apart, rip it to pieces and see what made it work. His favorite fields were Mechanical and electrical engineering, just like he'd told Megan earlier, and now she'd spring this on him?
"I want that!" He screamed internally.
The ship rotated and let down a hatch, allowing an entry way for the party.
Max opted to lurk around the ship, knocking on it to test the material. "Max, are you not coming?" Megan flew out of the hatch and asked.
"I think I'll hang back, don't want to get in the way in case things pop off while you're out there!"
"O-Oh, I see."
"Don't look so glum, did you know just the physical act of smiling triggers the brain to release endorphins? Try it, it'll help. Even if it doesn't, you aren't alone here. Superboy may be a tad bit sore about earlier, but I know the others will have your back. Wally will for sure, it doesn't take a mind reader to see he likes you."
Though he basically just outed his brothers crush, Megan's naivete let it wash right over her head. "Oh, I like him too! Thanks Max!" She flew right back into the ship and moments later the hatch opened. The ship rose silently and took off.
Max waved them off and trotted back inside, he should check of AIVA's completion.
The heavy duty doors to Max's lab slid open with a hiss and upon entry he glew in excitement. The large screen in front of him clearly read.
100%
Max scurried over to his keyboard and rebooted the system and pulled up its bios. He entered a few key commands and and set the OS to run in tandem with AIVA, that way she'd be integrated into the very computer itself.
The screen turned black for a moment before it turned on, "Hello, I am Aiva. An artificial intelligence created by Mr. Maxwell West. How can I help you?" Feminine voice boomed like it was all around him. Most likely because he had speakers set up everywhere in here.
Max smiled brightly, "Hello Aiva! I am Maxwell West, you can call me Max! I'm sure things may be odd for you, do you have any questions?"
"Hello Mr. West. I do have one question. What is my purpose, why did you create me?"
"Straight off with the big questions hm? Go ahead and attach yourself to the web. Tell me what you find."
"..." Things were silent for a moment, and Max's computer screen went through what could've been millions of millions of windows opened and closed within the span of seconds.
"Well, what did you find?"
"An overwhelming amount of pornography. Several viruses tried to corrupt my programming, luckily they were no threat."
If Max had water in his mouth, he would've spit the entirety of it onto the floor. His cheeks flushed red, "Ahem! Not that, what else?"
"... Spam?"
Max shook his head, "Nope, guess again!
"Conflict."
Max smiled and nodded sadly. "Yes. Conflict. We are in an age of superheroes, and if we didn't have have them I'm not sure if there would be a world for us today. And yet, at the same time, they are the very cause of most catastrophe. Their strength incites challenge, and challenge incites conflict. Damned if you do, damned if you don't."
"..." Aiva has no physical form, but she gave off a feeling of patience.
"If I'm damned either way, I'd rather fight with the side of justice. I made you to help me Aiva! Help me make this world a better a place! You're capable of so much more than what I will ever be, and you'll be around for as long as servers exist. Help me make this world a safer place."
"If that's what I was programmed to do, then I will do it, Mr. West."
Max seemed to deflate. She was supposed to energetically agree and and swear to dedicate her existence to heroes and justice! "No, Aiva you're supposed to say, 'I promise, with all my passion, to help the great heroes of justice!'"
"Ok. I promise, with all my passion, to help the great heroes of justice." The tone was that of a deadpan.
"... You don't seem much enthused…"
"..."
Max smiled and took a seat in his chair, "Well, now that we've got our introductions out of the way-"
A small window popped up on the screen and in it a little picture of Red Tornado. "Max." The voice spoke robotically, "I am unable to connect with Miss. Martians bioship for whatever reason. It's urgent that I give them these orders and coordinates. Please find the root of the problem."
"Don't you worry your shiny red head, Tornado. Why don't you send me what I need to tell them and I'll relay it for you?"
"That is agreeable." The window closed itself and Max's phone pinged. According to the message, multiple alarms were triggered at a power plant and Tornado thought it prudent that the team check it out.
"Aiva, pick up Megan's bioship frequency and patch me in please."
"Of course Mr. West. Finding Miss. Martians frequency and connecting… You're in."
"Ahm! Miss. M, can you hear me?"
"Max? Yes, we can hear you."
"Good. Multiple alarms have been triggered at the Happy Harbour power plant. Red Tornado wants you to investigate, but keep things quite. I'm sending coordinates now."
Aiva did as prompted and sent the directions. "Received, changing course now."
"I've made special ear pieces just for this kind situation! Wally, press the side button on your watch!"
Presumably, he did so. Awhile back, he'd made some changes to a couple of Wally's accessories, without his knowledge of course."
"Oh c'mon! This is my favorite watch!"
"Alright, judging by that, you've now got 5 small earbuds. Each of you, place one in your ear." He waited and heard some surprised grunts and oohs and ahhs.
"Cool huh? It's one size fit all and stretches or shrinks to accommodate the ear that it molds to. They should all be synced up already and use far field technology, so they can pick up your speaking even without a mouth piece!"
"Huh! Sounds useful! A lot like the ones Batman uses in his, mine, and Batgirls suit…" He could hear Robin make the comparison.
"Who do you think made em boy wonder?"
Before anymore could be said, Max could hear the ship rattling from his link. The team grunted and Max stared on in worry, he had no way of knowing what was happening right now.
"Are you guys alright?"
"Just a bit of turbulence!" Robin answered.
Max muted his mic, "Aiva, pull up a satellite feed of the Happy Harbour power plant." His AI did as instructed and pulled up a live hq feed. A tornado seemed to be ravaging the building and the surroundings.
"That's odd… A tornado?"
"It seems to have been created by artificial means, Mr. West." Aiva supplied helpfully.
Max unmuted his mic, "Guys, that Tornado isn't natural. Prioritize getting civilians out of the way and then find the cause!"
"Don't tell me what to do!" Superboy said.
From his feed, Max could see that Robin had suddenly gone missing. Presumably, he went inside the building, the rest of team wasn't far behind.
Aiva intuitively opened up another window displaying the security feed inside. He saw Robin get thrown back and slammed into a wall harshly by a red scarf wearing robot. He looked like a beefier version of Red Tornado.
He heard through Superboys comm, that he introduced himself as Mr. Twister.
Max simply observed, looking for a weakness. Before he could give any advice, everyone burst into action. Wally rushed straight forward and tried to deliver a flipping drop kick, but he was dealt with quite easily. The wind themed villain launched his brother outside.
Kaldur and Megan tried their hand next and were promptly flung away with minimal effort.
"You guys have to attack concurrently! There's no point in having a team if you're just ganna fight one on one anyways! Play this to your advantage!"
Robin shouted something at the villain, throwing his explosive projectiles. One pierced the robot but the machine, quite literally, flicked it away.
Kaldur rose back to his feet and made to charge Twister in sync with Robin, but a powerful gust of wind spun the two around had them clash into each other.
Mr. Twister then floated outside where Wally reengaged. He was wholly unsuccessful and kept at bay by a barrier of wind. Finding just the right moment, Twister sent a particularly powerful gust of wind and sent the speedster flying.
Luckily, Megan was able to catch him telekinetically. With the team now properly together, Kaldur gave Megan the green light to read the villains mind. The girl protested a moment, thinking back to when she was told that that particular action was frowned upon here. The Atlantean quickly dispelled her worries.
"Nothing! I'm not getting anything!" She said in surprise, before she made a sound of enlightenment, "Hello Megan! He's inorganic, an android. How many other androids do you know that can make tornados?"
Max saw what she was hinting at immediately, and heavily disagreed. Red Tornado was inside the cave right now…
"No, gu-"
"Red Tornado sent us here!" Kaldur made the connection too, only he believed it. And so did the rest of the team.
"This was his test? Something to keep us busy?!"
"Speedy called it, we're a joke…" Wally said in frustration.
"Will you alllisten?! That's not-!"
"We know who you are and what you want! Let's hurry up and end this!" He heard Robin shout.
Just then the sky darkened and the satellite feed he had began to cut in and out, he switched to a security camera. Strikes of blue lightning struck the trees and lit the dark clouds.
"Tornado can't do that!" An explosion of electrical energy fried the earpieces Max made and killed the feed he was watching.
"Damn it! Some team they've got here…" Max typed furiously at his keys trying to regain any kind of feed, he was unable to. Max sighed deeply, he wanted to help…
"Sir should I try to make contact with the bioship? It's seems to be on the move."
"Yes, make contact if you can." A new window popped up almost immediately, it displayed only Megan though. "Megan! You're alright, everyone else okay?"
"Mmh! Mostly, the boys stayed back. They told me to hang back for now…" Of course it wasn't that kind, but they had little room to mince words in such a high intensity moment. "Could you patch me in to Red Tornado? The team could use his help."
Aiva wordless did so, without even being prompted. The following conversation was rather one sided. Megan pleaded with Tornado for some kind of assistance, but the red hero refused. The bot firmly believed that this was a team defining moment and interference would only hurt them in the long run.
The conversation did lead to an epiphany of sorts though, "Hello Megan! That's it!"
"What? What's it!" Max questioned, but the feed he had with Megan cut before she answered. The young man nearly yanked his hair out. He supposed he'd just have to wait, after all, he was just a tech support.
An hour or so had passed since the teams battle with Mister Twister. It was revealed that the red frame of the ripoff Tornado was actually an armour for a separate android.
"Needlessly complicated and incredibly inefficient…" Max commented as he stared at the red armour mech. If it was him, he'd have just made it like a suit. Something that moved along with your limbs, not buttons and joysticks.
The very thought triggered schematic after schematic in his head, but he had to analyze the rest of the parts first.
"It was clearly created to sabotage or destroy you." Kaldur spoke to Red Tornado who observed the shattered robotic body of Twisters pilot. The Android was in utter shambles, but Max still couldn't help but be captivated by the detailed brilliance behind the machine.
"There's only a handful of people that could create something like this… And they clearly aren't very friendly." Max muttered as he picked up and deconstructed some parts, "Aiva scan the table contents and create a projected 3D replica."
Robin and Wally, who stood by the table, backed up in surprise when a wave of blue light thoroughly scanned the table, "Of course Mr. West. Projecting holographic display now."
A full body replica floated in midair. The scan was perfectly copied, down to every last detail. A blinking red icon appeared over a piece and Max raised a brow. "Oops, can't have that now can we?" He reaches into the androids metal cranium and pulled some wires free, extracting the eye. "We've got a sneaky one here…"
The boy genius dropped the eyeball into a small trash can next to him. The metal can sealed itself up and it sounded like something exploded inside.
"What the heck was that?" Robin asked.
"That's my portable incinerator, I made it out of 56 laser pointers and a complex mixture of metal alloys. Tweaking the lasers a bit, I made them super strong! It can get up to 700 degrees in there!"
"Wouldn't that make the can itself melt?"
Max shook his head, "Nope, the stuff I used has an extremely high melting point. I've also got liquid nitrogen circulating between plates to even things out. Kind of like a double layered glass made to keep drinks cold."
"Woah, neat! But I was talking about the new… voice?." Robin clarified uncertainty.
"Oh! Team, meet Aiva! I uploaded her to our servers today, from now on she'll be helping me help you all! Right Aiva?"
"Correct." She answered blandly. "Hmm, peculiar… It seems this android and Red Tornado bear a similar coding signature."
"Oh! Is that why you didn't wanna help us?" Megan questioned.
"No." Red answered monotonically, "This was your battle. It is not my job to solve your problems for you, nor is it yours to solve mine."
Wally and Superboy, who were toying around with Max's projection looked over at the speaking robot. "But I mean, if you're in danger… Maybe we could help?"
"Consider the matter closed." The bot spoke firmly and turned to walk away, his heavy metallic footsteps ringing behind him.
"Cold. Any of the other heroes would've jumped right in to fix things." Wally said.
"Guess if we're ganna have a babysitter, a heartless machine is exactly what we need." Robin added.
Wally looked somewhat surprised at the words, "Dude! Harsh…"
"And totally inaccurate- Oh darn it, I think I broke this piece…" Max spoke, halfway in the conversation, halfway out.
"Maxwell is correct. I have a heart, carbon-steel alloy. I also have excellent hearing."
Robin had the decency to at least look sheepish and apologetic, "Haha, sorry. I'll strive to be more... accurate."
"And respectful." Kaldur cut in and laid a hand on Robins shoulder.
Tornado dismissed himself and the team began to talk amongst themselves. Max perked up, now that he had everyone in his lab, he could show them all the cool gadgets he'd made!
"Hey do you guys wanna see the stuff I made you! It's suuuuper cool stuff! Like these boots and and bracers I made for Superboy to help him fly!" Max dug through a few other inventions he'd rigged up and pulled a pair of black boots and black metallic bracers. "They run off solar energy and have little reactors built in that can propel the wearer. I call them solar-!" The teens voice stopped itself when he noticed no one was in the room anymore.
"You're facial expression tells me you're sad Mr. West. Shall I play a customized playlist of fast paced, upbeat music?"
Max huffed, "Nah, play some classic rock!" He was sad that everyone had basically ditched him, but he'd get over it. He had an android to disassemble and examine anyway. Aiva did so and classic rock blasted loudly, "Tonight, I'm ganna have myself~! A real good time! I feel ali-i-i-ive~!"
Alright y'all, that's chapter 2 for you. I originally began to write this because I couldn't find anything that was really interesting enough to read. If you can't find it, then make it yourself right?
I'm hoping that mentality is contagious. If some of you who read this feel dissatisfied, or even disappointed, take it upon yourself to make something of your own. There can never be enough reading material and no idea is too overdone or original.
I'd more than love to see this category gain some new life or any other category! My reading choices isn't exclusively YJ (neither is writing for that matter). So I hope I've either entertained you, or inspired you to entertain yourself.
Leave a review on your thoughts, I'll try and address them when I get the chance.