Mother Box - Powers and Abilities

Powers and Abilities

• Mother Boxes can access the energy of the Source for various effects; they can change the gravitational constant of an area, transfer energy from one place to another, control the mental state of a host, communicate telepathically with a host or other life form, manipulate the life-force of a host to sustain it past fatal injuries, open and close boom tubes, take over and control non-sentient machines, evolve non-sentient machines, merge sentient beings into a single more powerful being, sustain a life form in a hostile environment such as space, and do many other things. Mother Boxes have an affinity for the Source and are believed to draw their power from it. In that sense, they can be seen as a computer that links man to God.
• To the New Gods, they are common appliances (used much like a PDA on Earth), in as much as a sentient device can be called an "appliance". Other DC characters are given access to them at specific times, when they are in need of aid. Notably, Superman was given one when he went in pursuit of Doomsday, which managed to open boom tubes to take Superman to Apokolips, heal Darkseid (when Superman needed his foe's aid against the Cyborg Superman after he'd taken a serious beating from Doomsday), give Superman a power boost to battle Doomsday in the form of various high-tech weapons such as an ultrasonics gun and a laser sword, used Waverider's gauntlet to send Doomsday to the end of the universe, and healed Superman's injuries (simultaneously restoring his original clothes) at the end of the battle, although this last act drained it of power.
• Mother Boxes can only be manufactured by a being born either on New Genesis or Apokolips, and not all of them can do it (at least one on Apokolips failed). This is accomplished through much training. It is implied in the books that the maker's character influenced the successful construction of a Mother Box. This applied to all the Fourth World books created, written, and drawn by comic legend Jack Kirby. Later writers altered the fabrication and capabilities of the Mother Box to include its making and usage to humans and beings from other worlds.