thefluffyone
Big Ego for Something so Small, eh?
- Location
- Earth
Dat dastardly tinker memory.
Firebird, a Worm AU/Xover?
- Thread starter chibipoe
- Start date
Dat dastardly tinker memory.
chibipoe
May I tell you of the glory that is Catradora?
- Location
- Astoria, Oregon
I thought about exploring Sophia too, but the chapter was already going long and I don't like her headspace. Suffice to say, Sophia's had weeks of stress as her favorite target has been avoiding her or had people getting in the way, so she had a plan to put an end to that and wreck Taylor's life... but something went wrong and she was trying to fix it when Taylor showed up, which lead to her thoroughly unwise decision there as this was just another instance of Taylor screwing everything up.
As to the other bit, I have no idea what you mean as the only uses of power explicitly outlined in this chapter were from Sophia and Taylor.
- Location
- West Michigan
Minako was zen as fuck the whole time. Since when is anyone on Earth Bet that calm?
(Regent doesn't count.)
chibipoe
May I tell you of the glory that is Catradora?
- Location
- Astoria, Oregon
He isn't? He's trying to ascertain if a civilian girl has powers to facilitate offering her a Wards spot. He's not trying to expose someone's cape identity. He likely has access to a database of active capes(as alluded to) in Brockton Bay and by simply reviewing them, he could make a reasonable argument that Taylor isn't one of those.
- Location
- Internet
To be honest, reading through the story again Sophia did seem panicked for some reason prior to Taylor confronting her. So her extreme reaction might be because she was literally being back into a corner she hadn't anticipated.
As for the two of them, they have given suspicions, but none that the Protectorate or PRT can act on.
And then Ninja'ed
So far as I see the rules, they only apply when you become an active Parahuman, or apply to the situation of publically revealing someones Parahuman identity.
They aren't investigating to blow up Taylor's life by shouting out the fact that hey, this girl is a still unaffiliated Parahuamn! Free shots at her!
They are trying to figure out who put a big fuck-off huge Bird made of Fire in the night-sky.
The fact that they do now actively believe Taylor to be a Parahuman is only a side-effect of that. It would be breaking the rules if they tried to use that fact against her, which they actively didn't. Miss Militia brought it out in a private talk, made the offer, and Taylor turned it down and then they all left it there.
Both of the Duo were entirely too cool for being interrogated by what amounts to the parahuman FBI.
Even innocents are unsettled by law enforcement investigators, so when you couple their performance with Minako's previous takedown of multiple gangers?
That's enough to get anyone even moderately competent into digging into their backgrounds.
And running biometric matching software on known parahumans in the city.
Given that the best defence of secret IDs is obscurity, any investigation will turn up actionable intel.
Now, the rules do say they can't do anything with it. Still, it'll be in the databases.
In a city where Coil has hooks into the PRT structure.
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CV12Hornet
Riter.
- Location
- Tacoma, Washington
Ah, I always love seeing any member of the trio frantically dig themselves deeper in an attempt to get out of their situations. This and Aftermath are satisfying that urge very well.
chibipoe
May I tell you of the glory that is Catradora?
- Location
- Astoria, Oregon
A fair point. But Coil doesn't conscript every cape not affiliated with the Protectorate into his service. There's supposed to be a lot of independents in BB and they can't all be working for Coil. Prior to getting Dinah, I always had the impression he was very low-key because it didn't serve him to stick his neck out and make big moves all that often.
As to their cool under stress. Catherine's a military brat and likely has a decent amount of experience with authority figures breathing down her neck. As to Minako. Well, she's just very zen. Or so she would have everyone think.
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- Location
- Internet
The thing with the rules as I understand them is that if you do find out someones identity, you don't use that fact against them. That's the big caveat. And also, since when as the PRT followed the Unwritten Rules word for word? I fully expect that if Piggot could have the names of ever villain in Brockton in a closed folder somewhere, she would. Just so she can have it as ammo if she needs it.
That's the true spirit of the rules as I understand them. Somebody somewhere is going to figure out who you are sometime eventually. In a world with Thinkers and Pre-Cogs and five-billion different flavors of super-powered bullshit, expecting a perfect secret identity is beyond insane. The Unwritten Rules are there to basically provide a spirit of cooperation in the vein of respecting someones secret identity as long as they are following the rules.
Remember the scene after Levi when Taylor saw Sophia as Shadow Stalker? The whole thing there was that in order for there to be peace, they wanted her to unmask to Sophia. Just Sophia. Taylor unintentionally found out her identity and they wanted to make it even by the rules. If Taylor tried anything with Sophia's identity, then Sophia could retaliate.
Not to prevent the discovery of someones secret identity, but to prevent the exploitation of it.
- Location
- Internet
Well, that could be true. He could do that.
But enough of the Unwritten Rules. Lets talk about the good things given to us this chapter.
Taylor's telepathy is starting to properly tune in, and she's getting conscious use out of Telekinesis. That is good. She's also thinking more heavily on how her powers could be impacting others.
And I don't know about you, but this sure felt like the end of the first arc.
chibipoe
May I tell you of the glory that is Catradora?
- Location
- Astoria, Oregon
Pretty much. The next bit will either just be a wrap up that sets the stage for the next arc, or we'll jump into the next arc. I have some solid ideas in either direction.
I know right
.Sure.
But the PRT are not the only ones with interest in that kind of thing.
And we do know that PRT data security is not all it could be; TT used to hack in, even if she never advertised the fact, and Coil simply bought what he wanted.
Remember what Coil did with the E88's identities?
And Tagg's example shows that elements of the PRT are not above playing hardball when it suits them.
So yeah, teens.
Never as smart as they think they are.
Yeah; he gathers that info and sits on it until it suits him, or the stakes are big enough.
And then he kidnaps a Dinah, or pulls an E88 as a distraction.
Especially when you are small fry enough to be sacrificed.
Do note that Coil owned the two unaligned Tinkers in Brockton Bay: Leet and Chariot; he just hid his involvement.
Ditto the Undersiders and Travellers.
Dude has a record of acquiring, or trying to acquire/neutralize useful parahumans to deny them to others.
If he got the idea that the Duo are possible handles on Taylor? Damn right the thumb screws would come out.
And a certain birdie might get....... irritated.
Yeah, not buying it.
Especially if Armsmaster is running around with a panopticon installed with possible biometric identification features.
Competent!Armsmaster might not have hard info at the moment, but I expect him to smell the bullshit as well; experience with Wards means knowing teenagers.
Still, it's entirely possible he'll be too busy to immediately follow up on it; he's a busy man, after all.
You may handle it as you wish.
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notmi
Super Koala God Super Koala
I understand that Taylor is not entirely herself anymore, what with Jean bleeding through and the general influence of the Phoenix, but really, she reacts to reading someone's mind with "huh, that's cool". Aside from the fact that it's explicitly not a thing in worm, and thus important, it's also heavily associated with Ziz, to say nothing of the huge violation of privacy that she doesn't seem to care about in the slightest. With the additional powers, telekinesis, mental influence, and precog, I'd have expected her to at least make a comment about the similarity.
She just seems, in general, way too calm about everything. No hesitation when confronted by a person with a crossbow, especially when she seemed to have panicked the last time she was put into a combat situation, seems strange to me.
She just seems, in general, way too calm about everything. No hesitation when confronted by a person with a crossbow, especially when she seemed to have panicked the last time she was put into a combat situation, seems strange to me.
Looks to me like Sophia's world was crumbling. Her chosen prey was outmaneuvering her at every turn and had recently crippled her. Sophia needed to reassert dominance ASAP so she pulled this whacky plan of calling in a threat and then framing Taylor. I think her original plan was to phase the bag of weapons into Taylor's locker, then either call in an anonymous tip or tell a teacher she saw Taylor putting a suspicious bag in her locker. That plan fell apart when Taylor caught her before she could plant the bag in the locker. Then Sophia completely fell apart. Her fallback plan, throwing the bag at Taylor's feet and then putting a crossbow bolt through her heart was dangerously flimsy since Taylor's fingerprints wouldn't be on the bag or any of the weapons unless Sophia put Taylor's hands on them post-mortem, which would be risky as hell as it would be blown if anyone walked by unexpectedly while she was staging the scene.
Anyone who is pushed into a corner (or feels that way) is going to get desperate and act in ways that will make sense to them, but seem stupid or even suicidal to an outside observer.
I would really like to get inside Sophia's head, as it were, for this sequence and find out exactly what the hell she was thinking and why she seemed so desperate and cornered.
chibipoe
May I tell you of the glory that is Catradora?
- Location
- Astoria, Oregon
They really aren't. And we don't even need Tagg as an example. Piggot was willing to play hardball just fine, she simply had a better sense of when to do it.
But even so, the database he references is just basic information. This person is roughly x-height, whatever distinguishing characteristics can be gleaned(such as hair/eye color) and powers. Nothing that can't be obtained just be putting surveillance out in the areas they operate in. Colin thinks he might be able to put a thing to gather that will let him compare that data against the student body, with Dragon's help, not that he has one. And I doubt he'd leave the info where it could be easily accessed.
Did he own Leet? I thought he'd just taken advantage of Leet losing his buddy.
Yeah. Coil would be patient. I honestly think having Dinah was a bad thing for him. Sure, it let him act more aggressively, but I think that was a problem in and of itself and he reached too far.
As to using Catherine & Minako as handles on Taylor. Hm. An interesting thought.
As to small fry & sacrifices. Eh. Maybe. I can't see him exposing some low-key independents the way he did the E88. There simply wouldn't be any sort of gain. That set the E88 reeling and preventing them from having a safe haven of their home. They were a major power, after all.
Now if the indies were a severe thorn in his side, then I could see it.
Oh, he smells bullshit, don't mistake it. They were too composed, in his opinion, so he knows there's something up with those two.
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- Location
- Internet
It's already been said that there was something else happening in the background that we didn't see that led up to Sophia's more extreme reaction when confronted. Until we figure out that, I would hold judgement personally.
Citation please.
I've seen people repeatedly mention this in fanfiction, but I've not gotten any canon citation for this.
So please, can you give me a citation for this claim?
VolantRedX
Official Conscience of Worm Fanfiction!
Taylor might be accidentally making Sophia more hostile by telepathically pumping her own aggression for Sophia at her.
chibipoe
May I tell you of the glory that is Catradora?
- Location
- Astoria, Oregon
Well, we saw Taylor fearbomb those two guys who jumped her, so it stands to reason she might be able to use other emotions.
- Location
- AUS
Worm 3.11 is the closest thing, I think.