Let's read Worm and its sequel Ward by Wildbow (One chapter/every day)

blackarrow · Jul 20, 2018

Vegetalss4 said:
I formulated my questions in an unclear way, my apologies.
I meant, what gave you the impression that Skitter went after the Nine to save Cherish? I always read it as her trying to kill Jack (and the rest of the Nine) before he left Brockton Bay thus preventing him from destroying the world.
(and the same for my other question)

She said here:

I wanted to head back downtown, to help my teammates and friends, but I couldn't shake the nagging doubt in the back of my mind.
The difference between Jack and Bonesaw going downtown and their going to the coastline was that the former was almost kind, taking care of a teammate. The latter case allowed them to inflict some terrible torture on an ex-teammate of theirs.
It was the most inconvenient possibility, but my gut told me they'd go after Cherish.

For me, at least, is clear that she wanted to save Cherish because her tone sounded like she felt sorry for whatever "terrible torture" they'll inflict on her. Besides, if she wanted to kill them, she wouldn't stand any chance anyway, and she knew that. She was barely able to fight Jack and Bonesaw. Now count Mannequin, Hookwolf, and especially Siberian too. What chances Skitter had against all of them? 0%. Not even the entire squad of Undersiders would have stand any chance against all the S9 members left. Maybe with the help of Travelers, but Siberian is too much for everyone anyway. And her master is well hidden. So, what Skitter tried to do was to take S9 by surprise, save Cherish and fly away with her, not try to kill them. This is how I interpret her actions. I wonder what other people think. Please, more opinions?
I still have no idea why she couldn't read the decoys with her bugs, even if she had a suspicion. I still think that the Miasma did something to her mind because her behavior was pretty irrational and odd.

Vayhle · Jul 20, 2018

"A figure stood behind Yan. Her costume was barely recognizable – She wore a short cape of tattered black cloth over her body armor, a skintight black suit beneath that, and there were folds of black cloth draped around her legs like a dress or a robe. The entire fabric seemed to ripple and move. It took Sierra a second to realize it was crawling with a carpet of insects.
The disconcerting part was the girl's face, or lack thereof. Her expression was masked behind a shifting mass of bugs that moved in and out of her hairline. Sierra couldn't even tell where the bugs ended and the scalp began, as the small black bodies crawled into and onto the black curls. There was a hint of something like glass where Skitter's eyes were, but the bugs ventured far enough over her eyelids and around the frames that nothing was visible in the way of goggles, glasses or skin."

This is one of my favorite things in the story to this point. It is so rare to have seen Taylor from another point of view, this was just wonderful in a fantastic interlude. See Skitter from someone else's eyes, experience.

rafuki22 · Jul 20, 2018

blackarrow said:
Hmm, where you see heroism, I see stupidity. To save a criminal, especially one like Cherish, is not a heroic feat. Even Miss Militia- a HERO- told Taylor to put a bullet in her head. Would you have tried to save someone like Cherish? Someone who will continue to kill because she can't help herself? The blood of Cherish's next victims will be on your hands, you know. Because you helped her to escape. But, everyone with their opinion. I see things in my way, you see things in your way.

I have not said that it is heroism, but Taylor, in my opinion, would see it that way, besides, nothing indicates or says that she would save cherish.
Besides, Miss Militia was a soldier, they are different.

blackarrow · Jul 21, 2018

Vayhle said:
"A figure stood behind Yan. Her costume was barely recognizable – She wore a short cape of tattered black cloth over her body armor, a skintight black suit beneath that, and there were folds of black cloth draped around her legs like a dress or a robe. The entire fabric seemed to ripple and move. It took Sierra a second to realize it was crawling with a carpet of insects.
The disconcerting part was the girl's face, or lack thereof. Her expression was masked behind a shifting mass of bugs that moved in and out of her hairline. Sierra couldn't even tell where the bugs ended and the scalp began, as the small black bodies crawled into and onto the black curls. There was a hint of something like glass where Skitter's eyes were, but the bugs ventured far enough over her eyelids and around the frames that nothing was visible in the way of goggles, glasses or skin."

This is one of my favorite things in the story to this point. It is so rare to have seen Taylor from another point of view, this was just wonderful in a fantastic interlude. See Skitter from someone else's eyes, experience.

I definitely agree. First time when I saw Skitter through someone else's eyes was during Tattletale Interlude in Leviathan Arc. Tattletale saw her as someone vulnerable and pitiful. On the other hand, Sierra sees Skitter as a scary, creepy and unnerving villain. So, we have two different point of view involving Skitter. I wonder how the heroes that she interacted with or her enemies see her. I encourage more Interludes presenting Skitter through the eyes of other characters.

blackarrow · Jul 21, 2018

rafuki22 said:
I have not said that it is heroism, but Taylor, in my opinion, would see it that way, besides, nothing indicates or says that she would save cherish.
Besides, Miss Militia was a soldier, they are different.

If Skitter wouldn't want to save Cherish then why she went there? She knew that she won't be able to fight S9 by herself, neither to kill Jack when he's surrounded by his teammates. I'm not trying to underestimate her skills and abilities, I'm just being realistic here. Even Skitter have her limits. Maybe she can take Jack down by herself, but not when Siberian is there to help him, for example. Anyway, this whole scene was one of the most mysterious, odd and inexplicable things that Skitter ever did. Thanks God that she wasn't hurt during her daring....whatever she wanted to do.

blackarrow · Jul 22, 2018

Hello, friends, and welcome to the second Interlude of this Arc. Accidentally, I noticed Legend name in this Interlude so its safe to say that this will be his Interlude. The first Triumvirate member with an Interlude. I'm pretty much ok with this. Time to learn more about Worm-verse Superman's cousin (in fact, Scion is more close to Superman than Legend -being, you know, both superpowered aliens, but I personally like to compare- from time to time- Legend with my favorite hero of all times

) I only hope for one thing: that Legend will not be another corrupted hero, an agent for Cauldron, as I'm afraid he might be (because he kind of tried to help Siberian's master escape, as I deducted during their fight). Hope this fear of mine will turn out to be untrue, just an illusion of my general paranoiac mind.
But before I start, I want to talk about an observation of mine. Its seems like there's another Triumvirate (besides the Protectorate one) but the differences are that they're not working together and its more like a Triumvirate of Evil than anything else. A Triumvirate of Evil who represent through its members the corrupted version of human society, in some of its main spheres. I'm talking about the corruption of domestic sphere, of politics/business/ military sphere and the humanity in general. There are 3 characters who are the most evil and vile characters from this entire story. Jack, Coil and Heartbreaker. Jack represents the corruption of anything that is moral, ethic and good, the corruption of the very core of humanity, he's the destructive psychopath with a personal hate (and war) against humanity, Coil represents the corruption of politics, business/military, being the corrupted and greedy politician/businessman who only cares about his personal gain and nothing else and is ready to destroy everything in his path as long as his interests are served and Heartbreaker represents the corruption/destruction of family as he's the totalitarian and abusive patriarchal figure of the family, but he can be also the cult leader who enslave people, making them his helpless puppets. All 3 men represent everything is evil and rotten in the society. They're also great manipulators, they use kids as their main weapons (Coil- Dinah, Jack- Bonesaw and Heartbreaker- his own kids) and they're all repulsive people to everyone they meet. Well, Jack is charming, compared with the other two, but even he becomes repulsive when you know with what kind of man (beneath his harming facade) you're dealing it. I want to count Bonesaw too as the corruption of science but I'm still undecided if she acts 100% of her own will or if she's not manipulated by Jack (besides being a sicko herself) who "help" her acting more like how he likes than how she really wants. I hate her and I'll enjoy her death but I still have this uneasy feeling that there must be something more with this child than pure, unstrained madness. Especially given the fact how good Jack is to manipulate people. Alright, this is my opinion about 3 main forces of evil in this story (I'll not count Endbringers because they're animals/aliens and I'm referring here only at the evils of humanity) now let's start this Interlude Interlude 14.5 (Bonus Interlude)

"It's just going to be another minute or two. The data has to compile and upload. It's not my work, so I played it safe and went for the slowest, heaviest compression method that I could. It's going to take a bit."
"That's fine. Thank you."
Kid Win shifted position uncomfortably, falling silent.
You don't have to be intimidated. I'm just a man.
Legend stared out the window. He wouldn't miss this city. There weren't happy memories here, and there was little he was proud about. Most of the time, he was able to feel that he'd made an impact, that the world was a better place for his being there. That wasn't the case here.
"How long have you been in the Wards?" he asked, to make conversation.
"Two years."
"I've seen your records."
Kid Win cringed.
"No, don't act like I'm going to say something bad. The Deputy Director in charge of the Wards, I can't quite remember his name, he had some glowing praise for your ability to engage with the public."

"Engage with the public? I don't remember doing much of that."
"Something about speeches to other youths at school?"
"Oh. That wasn't a big deal."
"The guy who's rating your performance seems to think it was. Can't quite place his name, the suits sort of start to blur in with one another-"
"Deputy Director Renick," Kid Win supplied.
"Yes. Thank you. He seemed to think you connected with the crowd, and you did it better than any of your teammates. You were frank, open, honest, and you stood out because of how you handled yourself when the students started getting rambunctious and heckling you."
"Director Piggot yelled at me for drawing the gun."
"It was something that could have backfired very easily, but you struck the right tone and you defused the situation with humor. I think that's a good thing, and so did the staff at the school. The teachers sent emails a few days after the event, commenting on the overall positive impact you had on the students, the hecklers included. And when I say you, I mean you specifically."
Kid Win shrugged, tapping a few keys on the laptop to rotate through a series of progress bars and graphs. "Nobody told me about that."
"That's a shame," Legend said, turning his gaze to the window to relieve some of the pressure his very presence seemed to put on Kid Win. "The ability to manage yourself with the public is crucial if you intend to go on to make a career out of working with the Protectorate."
"It's kind of weird, that someone as important as you are is making such a big deal out of an event I barely remember."
"I study the records of everyone I intend to work with, and I studied yours. I try to make a note of individual strengths. That event stuck in my mind when I was reading through your files. It was a very easy mental picture to put together, especially the part with the gun."

Aww, this is so very cute. Deputy Director Renick and Legend praise Kid Win for being so honest, opened and sociable with people. Maybe this praise, especially coming from one of the most powerful parahumans, will help him build the confidence he NEEDS because he always put himself down, even if he's so smart and brave. Just like Taylor and Amy.

I noticed how different Kid Win and Armsmaster are from each other. I mean, they're both talented Tinkers (Armsmaster still have more experience than Kid Win, given his age) but while Armsmaster is anti-social, cold, introverted, dedicated only to his work (and now to his personal revenge on S9) but he have a lot of trust in his own capabilities (too much trust, I'd say), Kid Win have zero trust in himself but he's friendly, warm and sociable and while he's dedicated to his work, he's also able to live his life like any teenager of his age. Classifications and some powers might be the same, but each individual is unique.

Kid Win smiled a little.
"You remind me of Hero."
The smile fell from Kid Win's face. He looked startled. "Really?"
"I imagine he was very much like you when he was younger."
Kid Win looked uncomfortable.
"You can talk about it," Legend assured him. "It's okay. It was a long time ago that he passed."

"I sort of modeled myself after him."
Legend studied the boy. Red and gold body armor and a red-tinted visor. There were additions that seemed to be more recent, judging by the lack of wear and tear, but if he looked past those, if he imagined the boy with a helmet covering that brown wavy hair, replaced the red with blue chain mesh, he could see the resemblance.
"I can see that."
"I didn't mean to copy him, or to ride off his fame or anything. I was younger when I started, I totally meant it to be respectful-"
Kid Win stopped as Legend raised a hand.
"It's okay. I think he would be flattered."
Kid Win nodded, a little too quickly.
"He was the first real tinker, you know."
"Before we knew tinkers have specializations," Kid Win added.
"I've thought about it. The disintegration gun, the jetpack, the sonic weapons, the power sources and explosives that were surprisingly effective for their size. I suspect his specialty tied into manipulating and enhancing wavelengths and frequencies."
Kid Win's eyes went wide. He glanced at the laptop.
"I know enough other tinkers to know that look. You just had a stroke of inspiration?"
"Sort of. More like a bunch of half-assed ideas all at once."
"Don't let me distract you. If you want to take a minute to make some notes on whatever came to mind, I won't be offended in the slightest."
"It's okay."
"You sure?"
"Yeah. I-" Kid Win paused. "I guess I'd rather keep talking to you than write down ideas that probably won't work out."
"Thank you. I'd say you shouldn't worry too much about trying to emulate Hero. It's heartening, if I had to put a word to the feeling, that you look up to him and carry on his legacy. But you have your own specialization and your own strengths."

Awww, I can read for HOURS this conversation between my favorite Tinker and my favorite Triumvirate member (leader). I have tears in my eyes, I'm moved by how much Legend praises and encourages Kid Win who decided to take Hero (the poor hero assassinated by Siberian in such a gruesome way) as his role model. Thank you, Legend, thank you for being so kind towards Kid Win, you're a good man (please, don't disappoint me later).

Kid Win nodded. "I'm figuring that out. I spent a long time trying to be like other tinkers and struggling. Ninety percent of my projects just stopped before I finished it. The stuff I finished, I finished it because it was simple. Guns, the floating hoverboard… well, I used to have a floating hoverboard. I sort of copied Hero's approach. 'Board instead of jetpack, but I made the guns, tried a few disintegration rays. Maybe part of the reason I finished that stuff was because I felt like I'd be insulting Hero by trying to copy his style and making a mess of it."
"Makes sense," Legend spoke, primarily to show he was listening.
"But lately I've started to relax about that. Maybe it helps that we've been working as hard as we have. I've been too tired to keep to the rules I thought I was supposed to follow. Still have to spend time in the workshop, I think I'd go crazy if I didn't, but
I'm winging it more. I'm trusting my instincts and spending less time using the computers to get the exact numbers and measurements."
"To help compensate for your dyscalculia?"
"I didn't know you knew about that. I didn't know the PRT knew about that."
"Dragon's talents make for very comprehensive records, sorry."
Kid Win frowned, his expression changing fractionally as he stared down at the keyboard in front of him. He seemed to come to terms with the idea, because he moved on. "Anyways, I think it's working for me. I'm getting the feeling that I do have a specialization, but it's more of an approach than a particular field. Equipment with multiple settings and uses, modular weapons, gear that's adaptable to different situations, I guess?"
"That's fantastic. The fact that you've struggled and then found your strengths the hard way could be an asset."
"An asset?"
"If you wind up leading the Wards or a team in the Protectorate, it means you'll be better equipped to help out teammates who are having their own problems."
"I'd be horrible in a leadership position."
"Hero said the same thing, and I think we'll both agree that he was wrong."
That seemed to give Kid Win pause.

"Think about it."
"Okay," Kid Win replied. "Not that I'm not majorly grateful that you're giving me the pep talk, but you said you were in a bit of a hurry and I think we're done here."
"The compiling is done?"
"I could refine it further, try to give you some additional features, but the coding and the hardware I'm working with here is so tightly structured that I think I'd do more harm than good. It's like the techie equivalent of trying to put toothpaste back in the tube after you've squeezed it out… you can't, so maybe you try to make more tube that sticks out of one side, but you keep doing it and you wind up with this kludgy mess that you can't even use for its original purpose. For getting toothpaste."
"I think I understand what you mean. Thank you for this. It's already uploaded?"
"Yeah, and it was my pleasure, really." Kid Win smiled.
Legend stood and stretched a little.
The goodbyes had already been made and he'd had his meeting with Emily. Business was wrapped up here. He'd called home to let Arthur know he wouldn't make it to dinner but that he hoped to be back before midnight.
A light smile touched his face. He even felt a little giddy at the thought of getting home, wrapping Arthur in a hug. Growing up, he'd never thought that he'd feel giddy about his husband after six years of marriage.
But he had something to take care of first. The notion put a damper on his pleasant mood.
"I'm going to go, then. You and I," he promised Kid Win, "Should talk again sometime. You can tell me if you've figured out your specialty, and if you're leading a team."

Kid Win already have more confidence than he had during his Interlude. Kid Win's confidence gives me LIFE.

So, Hero was the leader of Triumvirate before Legend took his place. Alright. Kid Win created a program for Legend and I have no idea what it is about, maybe it isn't an interesting detail of the story. What is more interesting than a computer program is....WHERE THE HELL LEGEND IS GOING? He said that he's not going home right now, hoping that he'll be back in his husband's arms before midnight. And he doesn't look so happy about the whole deal. Legend, are you going to confirm my suspicions?

"Maybe the next time you're in Brockton Bay?"
"Maybe." Legend smiled, but he was thinking, does he know? This whole region might be condemned.
Maybe Kid Win was being optimistic.
Legend turned and opened a window, then let himself float through. He took a second to get his bearings, to inform himself of which direction was up, down, north, east, south and west, then he took off.
Powers were classified into categories, and the 'breaker' classification was used to mark those powers which were limited to one's own body and their immediate vicinity. Though it had initially been used to cover individuals who could make themselves stronger, denser, larger or change the materials they were made of, it was slowly expanding to include others. There was a theory that was gaining traction, suggesting that the breaker classification was one of the most common powersets, if not always the most pronounced. Innumerable people with powers had also adapted innate defenses that kept their own powers from harming themselves. Pyrokinetics tended to be resistant to flame. There were automatic shutoffs, biological and mental, for various other powers. Even beyond that, there were other adaptations that were so subtle as to be almost undetectable. His weren't.
Legend's flight powers let him accelerate to a speed that exceeded sound and continue accelerating, to no hard limit. The soft limit was that he had breaker powers that kept the acceleration from tearing him to shreds, altering his body into something else entirely as he gained speed. The drawback to this was that his brain also shut down on a cognitive level as the transformation occurred. He had never let himself go so fast that he lost the ability to consciously control his movements.
There were other benefits too. He was better at registering and processing light waves, regardless of which state he was in. He could see with perfect clarity up until the point that an obstactle intervened or the atmosphere occluded his vision.
If an opponent attacked and struck him, he instinctively transitioned into his energy form for a split second. In that state, he absorbed energy of a variety of kinds, including the kinetic energy that was transferred with a punch or with a bullet. His opponents were forced to whittle him down, each attack only a fraction as effective as it might otherwise be. Even then, a share of that small amount of damage was healed a second later as he used the absorbed energy to mend his body. Conversely, his enemies could try to hit him with enough speed and force that even a hundredth of a second of contact was sufficient to take him out of the fight. Leviathan and Behemoth had managed to land blows of that magnitude.
Siberian has as well. He set his jaw and increased his speed a notch.

He traveled over the Atlantic Ocean, moving so fast that the water appeared to be one flat plane. His thoughts became a blur, and he was forced to focus on his destination, letting all other thoughts and doubts fall by the wayside.
It was refreshing, in a way, cleansing himself of the responsibilities and the thousands of problems he was forced to handle as the leader of the Protectorate. Still, it always scared him just a little.
It took him only an instant to reach a complete stop. He let himself settle down into his real body once more.
He'd wondered sometimes if his ability to fly was meant for travel on an interstellar level. What if he kept accelerating? His breaker power would let him weather the void of space, his ability to see would be that much more powerful if there was no atmosphere to occlude his vision over miles… even the boredom of traveling for years was nothing if his conscious mind shifted into a rest state.
Not that he'd ever test it.
He'd absorbed light, heat and ambient radiation while he flew, and he felt restored. Even the mildest wear and tear had been tended to, his body restored to peak condition.
His mind was another matter, his emotions. It was like waking up in a warm bed, the man he loved beside him, only to experience a sinking feeling as he came to dread the coming day.
He drifted closer to the oil rig, and settled down on a fence, using a touch of his flight ability to stay balanced. In every direction, as far as the eye could see, there was only water.
"Any time now," he said.
It began as a pale square in mid-air, then unfolded rapidly, three-dimensional. When it opened up further, the interior of a building loomed in mid-air, the exterior absent.
He floated forward and set foot on the white tile of the hallway.

I was going to comment about his sun-recharging powers (like Superman) but then the portal to Cauldron appeared and he's revealed to be Cauldron's agent.

I'm seriously disappointed, Legend gave me hope then in the next moment he crushed it. Why working for the same people who want Mr Voyeur to escape despite the fact that he made Siberian to kill Hero? Hero was your boss and friend and you...you just betrayed his memory by selling your soul to....Cauldron, his killers (Mr Voyeur was/is Cauldron and they all have a collective responsibility for Hero's death. Especially since they don't want to stop their (former) colleague from killing even more heroes and civilians). People will lose their trust in heroes if they'll ever discover what you're doing, for who you're working. I won't be surprised if Eidolon works for Cauldron as well.

See, my friends? This is one of the reasons why I'd like to be vigilante more than a hero. Because heroes can be corrupted to work for evil people while vigilantes will tell to evil people "fuck you" while sending a bullet between their eyes.

He felt the distortion as the space shifted, felt the rush of wind as air pressure adjusted. It took only a couple of seconds. When he glanced over his shoulder, the oil rig was gone. There was only more hallway behind him.
He walked onward, confident in his ability to navigate the maze of rooms and corridors.
When he pushed open the double doors and stepped into the conference room, there were a few looks of surprise.
"Legend," the Doctor spoke, "I thought you were occupied in Brockton Bay."
"Jack escaped."
"That's… really unfortunate," Alexandria said.
"Quite," the Doctor replied.
Legend glanced around the room. Alexandria leaned back in her chair, her helmet on the table in front of her, a star-shaped scar at the corner of one eye. Beautiful, Legend was sure, but more in the way a lioness was beautiful. In her black and gray costume, she was intimidating, her expression regal.
Eidolon was the opposite. He had lowered his hood and removed his glowing mask, revealing a middle-aged man with thick eyebrows, thinning hair and heavy cheeks. He looked more like an average family man who was getting dressed up as Eidolon for a costume party than he looked like Eidolon himself.
There were others around the table. The Doctor: dark-skinned, hair tied into a prim bun with chopsticks stuck through it, wearing a short white dress beneath a white lab coat. The Number Man, with his laptop set in front of him, looking more like a businessman than one of the most influential and lesser-known parahumans on the planet.

Fuck, not only Eidolon is involved, but Alexandria is a traitor too. Great, just great. I kind of want the public opinion to find out about what kind of "heroes" Triumvirate is formed from but in the same time I don't want people to know because everyone will lose their trust in heroes, in all heroes, even the ones who are heroic for real and not just pretend to be heroes, while working for "almost" evil organisations. Doctor fucking Mother wants Mr Voyeur escape, despite Mr Voyeur being an insane asshole who killed Hero and countless of other heroes and civilians. His former colleagues show a "great respect" to his memory. I doubt they don't know about Doctor Mother's plans.
Alright..............NUMBER MAN FINALLY APPEARED. Yes, of course I remember him. He's the villain banker who works for Coil. He also works for Cauldron (confirming my suspicion, that Coil is a Cauldron's agent). He's a (I hope badass) nerd who knows about numbers and shit. I'm sure he's going to be very boring once he opens his mouth, but if he's a badass nerd for real, his power probably allowing him to even fight like an awesome fighter, then I might tolerate him or even be strangely fascinated by him (because I have a weakness for badass fighter nerds, even if they're evil)

But I still don't like the fact that he's Cauldron.

There was also the woman in the black suit, who had never introduced herself or been introduced by name. Whenever Legend came here with the others, the woman was there with the Doctor.

Insurance, he thought. The Doctor thinks that woman can face us if we turn on her.
Would she win? Legend harbored doubts. He'd met a lot of powerful individuals over the course of his career, and he'd learned how to measure them. This woman didn't relax for an instant, where someone who was assured of victory would be more willing to let down her guard. More likely that she's supposed to stall or stop us if there's a problem, buying the doctor time to escape.
"Jack escaped. What about the other Nine?" the Doctor asked.
"We suspect that Bonesaw and Siberian also escaped, with Hookwolf as a new member of their group."
"I see."
"It's unusual for you to show any interest in what's going on outside the realm of your business and research. Any reason for the curiosity?"
The Doctor smiled. "Hard to keep track of what goes on beyond these walls, sometimes."
Legend nodded. He took a seat to Alexandria's right. He considered for a moment, then spoke. "There are some things that concern me."
"Is this tied to why you came here today?"
"Yes. Let me begin by saying that there's apparently a precog in Brockton Bay that's pretty damn certain that the world's going to end shortly."
"Precogs are notoriously unreliable. I tell many of my customers that when they express interest in seeing the future. I think I even told you. Or was it Alexandria that I discussed it with?"
"It was," Alexandria replied.
"You're right," Legend said, "Most precogs are vague. They have to be, because the future is vague. But all reports point to this precog being very specific. Jack Slash was mentioned as the catalyst for an event that occurs in two years. More specifically, she said this occurs if Jack escaped Brockton Bay alive, which he did."
There were nods around the table.
"What do you mean when you say the world ends?" Eidolon asked.
"Thirty-three to ninety-six percent of the population dies in a very short span of time. I assume the aftermath of this scenario leads
to more deaths in the long run."
The Number Man spoke. "Depending on the circumstances of death, the demise of even one in three individuals would lead to further casualties. Lack of staff for essential services and key areas, health, atmospheric and ecological effects of decomposition on a massive scale, destabilized societal infrastructure… The best case scenario is that Earth's population drops steeply over twenty years, until it settles to forty-eight point six percent of where it currently stands. Three billion, three hundred and ninety-one million, eight hundred and three thousand, five hundred and four. Give or take."
"That's the best case scenario?" Alexandria asked.
The man shrugged. "It's unlikely it will occur. The bare minimum of people would have to die, there couldn't be any bodies, and there wouldn't be anything left unattended that could cause uncontrolled fires or nuclear incidents. If I were to ballpark a number, talking about events that could kill one-third to nearly all of the world's population, I'd say roughly seventy-two percent of the earth's population are likely to die. That leaves one billion, nine hundred and fifty million alive. More than half of those individuals would die over the following twenty years, and more than half of those who remain would die in the ten years following that. Keeping in mind these are estimates, of course."
"Of course," The Doctor said, "Precogs are unreliable. I'm surmising this girl doesn't know exactly how this occurs?"
"No. Her employer didn't say anything on the subject."

I was RIGHT when I said that Number Man will BORE me when he's opening his mouth to speak. I don't like the way he's talking in percentages, like he's a fucking human computer, good only to calculate. But at least I can understand that if a part of population will die then everyone else will die in time because the small number that will remain afterwards will be unable to survive. This man is right, he might be boring, but not stupid. He's also one of the most influential parahumans in the world and I wonder how....Does he's working for other important politicians/businessmen (apart from Doctor Mother and Coil)? His power is one of the most powerful powers on earth? His mind can compete with an AI like Dragon? Interesting first apparition of this character, that's for sure. Maybe he's not that badass in combat (or maybe he doesn't know how to fight at all) otherwise he'd be Doctor's bodyguard, not that woman in black suit with no name. Not even Legend knows her name or powers.
They talk about Dinah. I think Doctor Mother knew about her before but she pretends that she doesn't know about her. This woman is very good to manipulate and LIE people. She's almost as good as Coil.

"We'll take measures," Eidolon said. "Evacuation, we'll also push for automatic shutdown controls on power grids and nuclear facilities. With the Endbringers out there, it would be sensible to do it anyways. We can reduce the potential damage."
"Unless," Alexandria said, "The numbers the precog provided are already accounting for us having this conversation and taking the extra measures. If she does view the future, it's very possible she saw this very meeting and everything that followed, in a manner of speaking."
That was sobering.

"We'll do it anyways, of course," Eidolon said.
Legend and Alexandria nodded.
"Let's remember," the Doctor said, "The numbers already pointed to an endgame situation at the twenty-three year mark. If the Endbringers continue doing the damage they've been doing at the current rate, things won't be sustainable. We'll be forced to withdraw from damaged and dangerous areas, populations will condense, the Endbringers attack those pockets… and that's without considering the possibility that they achieve something big in the interim. We've talked about the crisis scenarios: Behemoth triggering a nuclear winter, Leviathan obliterating or tainting the world's renewable water supply."
"You're saying we're already facing an end of the world situation," Alexandria said, "And this is just accelerating the timetable."
"Yes. Any measures we take are still vital. They'll help here, with this scenario, but if it never occurs, it will still help against the Endbringers."
"Are we assuming the Endbringers are at the core of this end-of-the-world scenario?" Eidolon asked.
"Likely," Alexandria said, "But let's not rule anything out."
"Provided this is really occurring," the Doctor spoke.
"We can't afford to say it's not," Legend said. "You have precogs among your staff and customers?"
"Some," The Doctor answered. "I can ask them about this end of the world scenario."
Legend nodded. "Good. Eidolon, you want to try your hand at it?"
"If my power lets me. It only gives me what it thinks I need, not what I want."
"We need all the help we can get. Let's see if we can't figure out how this happens, so we can stop it or mitigate the damage.
There's a lot of capes out there with the thinker classification. Get the word out, call in favors, offer favors. Anything to get
more information on this."
There were nods and noises of agreement from his fellow Protectorate members and the Doctor.
Legend quietly cleared his throat, glancing around the table. "Speaking of great minds… there was another point I wanted to address, that came up during my stay in Brockton Bay."
He had their attention.
"Alexandria, I expect you read the reports already. You didn't seem that surprised when I talked about the precog and her end-of-the-world scenario, you've probably read up on my notes here."
Alexandria had originally named herself after the Library of Alexandria, though she'd ceased mentioning that, choosing to leave enemies in the dark instead. As strong as she was on a physical level, her mind was equally formidable. She never forgot a detail, absorbed information quickly, reading two pages of a book with a glance, and she learned quickly, retaining everything she picked up. She knew most commonly spoken languages, no less than ten styles of martial arts and she could match some of the best non-tinkers in the world when it came to computers. Not only was she rated well in the brute classification, but she held high scores in the mover and thinker categories.
"I read what you provided, though I'm not sure what you're referring to specifically."
"Siberian."
He saw a change in her expression, saw Eidolon flinch as if he'd been slapped.
"I'll explain for those of you who lack access to the PRT records or the time to peruse them. Siberian is not a brute-class cape. Siberian is a 'master', and the striped woman is a projection. I caught a glimpse of the man who is creating the projection before they retreated."

Now I think that Doctor is a better manipulator than Coil, she's almost as good as Jack. The more I read about her the more I DISLIKE her. She's not well-meaning, that's for sure. Or, if she's well-meaning through a miracle, she's probably a delusional bitch who thinks that she's protecting the world by doing the most unethical and wrong things possible (I know characters like her, they seem cool and admirable people at first glance but underneath they're all huge hypocrite assholes/bitches). She obviously lies the Triumvirate about Siberian, not mentioning that she wants her Master alive ans well. So, they don't know many things Doctor Mother is doing behind their back. They're corrupted, but not completely. Now I feel a little better. Maybe they really trust Doctor's fake promises.

"And?"
"And he had Cauldron's mark tattooed on the back of his left hand, a swan on his right."
With the exception of himself, the Number Man and the woman in the suit, everyone present reacted with surprise.
"You don't think that was William Manton?" Alexandria asked. "But why the mark on his right hand?"
"I don't know. It doesn't fit on a lot of levels. A top parahuman researcher becoming one of the Nine?"
"It happened to Alan. To Mannequin," Eidolon said, his voice quiet.
"There's nothing in the records," Alexandria said, "Nothing saying he was present at any of the places the quarantine protocol was put in effect."
She would know. She read every record, could call them to mind with perfect accuracy.
"He could have stolen someone's identity."
Alexandria nodded, "True."
"We have confirmation he's alive," Eidolon said, his voice quiet. "We suspected, but-"
"We made assumptions, and we were way off base. That's what concerns me." Legend leveled a hard look at the Doctor. "See, we've been going by the assumption that William Manton, from the time he left Cauldron to the present day, has been continuing his work. We've been assuming he's traveling across the world, experimenting on human subjects, giving them powers with physical mutations as a side effect, then releasing the victims back into society with Cauldron's symbol tattooed on their bodies. Or at least, that's what youtold us."
"You're implying I lied?" the Doctor asked. She didn't look bothered in the slightest.

"I've looked at the timelines. It's not likely that William Manton could be conducting experiments to give some poor girl tentacles in Illinois at the same time Siberian's busy attacking people in Miami. Not to mention he barely looked capable of taking care of himself, let alone conducting research."
He glanced at the others. Eidolon's brow was creased in concern, while Alexandria looked pensive.
"The pattern doesn't fit," he said, to drive the point home. He looked at the Doctor, "Which leaves me to wonder just who is conducting experiments on human subjects."
"We have no need for human experimentation. The Number Man can calculate the odds of success for a given formula."
"Maybe that's the case. But just who is conducting experiments on human subjects, who knows enough about Cauldron to tattoo or brand them with the mark while simultaneously having access to these kinds of resources?"
"It's not us," the Doctor spoke.
Legend stared at her, studying her. "And you don't know anything about how William Manton is connected to all this?"
"I'm as mystified as you are. If it would assuage your suspicions, you can examine this complex," the Doctor suggested.
"You and I both know this place is far too large to explore in one lifetime," he answered.
"True."

FUCKING ANNOYING LYING BITCH DOCTOR MOTHER!!! You're the one who make experiments on poor people because you want to create an army of personal parahumans to either take over the world or to save it from a destruction that may or may not happen (despite Dinah's predictions) then to proclaim yourself as its savior queen. You're no better than Coil or Jack, you have people kill for you instead of killing with your own hands and you have a sweet way with words, despite your mind being a diabolical one. You're lying, I don't believe a single word coming out of your mouth, you're manipulating the whole Triumvirate. So, Number Man is confirmed to bullshit super-calculate everything. This is how I'll call his power from now on: bullshit super-calculate (insert anything here).
William Manton is Mr Voyeur? The same Manton who discovered the Manton Effect? Gosh, this man is a lunatic cannibalistic asshole.

"And if we were to surmise that you're the culprit here, there's nothing saying you couldn't have your doormaker maintain a path to another alternate reality where you have captives stashed away. It would even explain why there haven't been any real missing persons cases that we can link to the case-fifty-threes, if you're simply snatching them from another reality and depositing them in our reality when you're done."
She spread her arms wide. "I don't know what I can say to convince you."
"You trust me, don't you?" Alexandria asked.
"Yes," Legend said.
"I've trained myself in kinesics. I can look at a person's face and body language and know if they're lying. And I can tell you the Doctor is telling the truth."
Legend sighed. "Right."
"We're okay, then?" the Doctor asked.
Legend nodded. "I'm sorry to accuse you."
"It's understandable. This situation doesn't make a lot of sense."

"I can't add anything here, and my power's not volunteering anything that could help to solve this particular mystery," Eidolon spoke. "I guess we have yet another unanswered question on our hands."
Legend sighed, "More than one. William Manton and his link to Siberian, the tattoo on his right hand, our end of the world scenario and the role Jack plays as the catalyst. Too many to count."
"None of this has to be addressed today," Alexandria said. "Why don't you go home? We'll consider the situation and come up with a plan and some likely explanations."
Legend nodded. The thought of holding Arthur and Keith in his arms energized him.
The Doctor turned to Eidolon, "You want another booster shot?"
"Probably another Endbringer attack coming up, it's best if I'm in top form."
While the others talked and planned, Legend stood and left without a farewell.
An opening between realities unfolded before he was half of the way down the alabaster white hallway. He stepped through the opening to the oil rig, and then began his flight back to New York City.
But he didn't go home.
Instead, Legend descended on the rooftop of the NYC Protectorate offices. A tinker-made scanner verified who he was and opened the doors for him in time for him to walk through.
He nodded a greeting to everyone he passed. When people asked him how things had gone, he offered them a response that was polite but short enough that it was clear he wasn't looking for further conversation.
He reached his office and closed the door.
He was careful to start up a virtual operating system preloaded with the standard PRT databases and software. Nothing that would leave a trace on his regular OS. He unplugged the fiber-optic cables and disabled the wireless.

I have a feeling that Alexandria knows that Doctor is lying CONSTANTLY but she covers her. She's the corrupt one, Eidolon is probably too naive to believe what the Doctor Bitch is saying and Legend...now I realized that he's in fact an undercover agent. He's not corrupted neither naive (they gave him his power, just like they did with Alexandria and Eidolon) and he pretends to be by their side while working to gain enough information about their work and expose/stop them. This is for what Kid Win's program is: to either record them or to expose Doctor Mother's lies. Now I understand. I'm not disappointed anymore in Legend. He's a true hero, ready to fuck up Cauldron. Also, Cauldron is on another parallel earth. Their doormaker parahuman can open "doors" in another worlds. Why they don't evacuate all the people from this world to empty parallel earths if Doctor Mother really wants to save the world? This is the best way to save the world, not through criminals and experiments. I hope that someone else (preferably Undersiders) to get their hands on this doormaker parahuman and convince/force him to help evacuate everyone if the world will truly ends. Anyone else is better to save the world than this greedy manipulative woman.

The precautions were little use if he was already being watched, but it made him feel better.
Once his computer was isolated from outside influences, he withdrew a USB cable from one drawer, plugging one end into the keyboard. He reached up to one ear and withdrew an earbud. The other end of the USB cable connected to it.
ASCII art of Kid Win's face popped up as the earbud connected to the computer, along with the text, 'thank you'.
He couldn't bring himself to smile.
Problems of self-confidence aside, Kid Win had produced an interface that was easy to use. Legend clicked on the yellow button and waited. Voices played from the computer's speakers. He adjusted the volume and listened.
"We suspect that Bonesaw and Siberian also escaped, with Hookwolf as a new member of their group."
"I see."
"Any reason for the curiosity?"
"Hard to keep track of what goes on beyond these walls, sometimes."
Text appeared, transcribing what was being said. The program paused, the image of the yellow button popping back out. A red word appeared below the last statement: LIE.
A vague lie, but not a damning one. His pulse was pounding as he hit the waiting yellow button to resume the record.
"We have no need for human experimentation. The Number Man can calculate the odds of success for a given formula."
LIE.

He clicked again.
"…Who knows enough about Cauldron to tattoo or brand them with the mark while simultaneously having access to these kinds of resources?" His own voice was the one playing from the speakers.
"It's not us," the Doctor's voice answered his.
LIE.
He sat staring at the screen, horrified.
Cauldron had given him his powers, had given him what he needed to be at the very top, to lead the largest collection of superheroes in the world. They hadn't wanted much in exchange. He kept an eye out to make sure nobody got too curious about
Cauldron, diverted them if they did. He'd greased the wheels for some of Cauldron's top customers. He was also ready to defend Cauldron if and when it became public knowledge. It was for the greater good, he told himself. There was no way for Cauldron to operate otherwise, lest the world's governments fight over the ability to create whole armies of people with powers and interfere with the organization's ability to operate.
It would operate, he knew, it obviously wasn't in a location where it could be raided or seized by military forces, but it wouldn't be able to reach nearly as many people, and capes would come under scrutiny with the possibility that they'd purchased their powers.
He'd committed to this because Cauldron was essential. With the rise of the Endbringers and threats like the Slaughterhouse Nine, the world was in need of heroes. Cauldron produced more heroes than villains, because there was none of the trauma of a trigger event to throw them off. Even for those individuals who turned to crime, Cauldron was able to leverage the favors that were part of the contract in order to guide their path. More superheroes meant better chances for everyone when it came to fighting the Endbringers and dealing with the big threats.
It struck him that this wasn't necessarily true. If the Doctor had lied about human experimentation, she could have lied about those details as well, too.
Human experimentation on a large scale. Unwitting, or perhaps unwilling to connect the dots, he'd helped it happen in a way.
His hand shook as he reached for the mouse. He clicked the button once more, hoping there would be something he could use to convince himself that this was a mistake. A false positive, a clue that Cauldron was really a force for good after all. Hadn't
Armsmaster said that his lie detection system was imperfect? Or maybe Kid Win had generated errors in the code. The alterations had been minor but comprehensive: Legend hadn't wanted to be informed in real-time about the lies, lest he give something away.
"And you don't know anything about how William Manton is connected to all this?"
"I'm as mystified as you are."
LIE.
He knew what came next, with the conversation fresh in his memory. He didn't want to press the button again, but there was little choice.
"I've trained myself in kinesics. I can look at a person's face and body language and know if they're lying. And I can tell you the Doctor is telling the truth."
The red text popped up as the last four and a half words appeared. LIE.
Alexandria knew. Of course she had. Her ability to read people, her vast troves of knowledge, her ability to see patterns. And she was the most willing of their group to take the hard, ugly road. Had been since Siberian had hospitalized her.
Click.
His own voice. "I'm sorry to accuse you."
LIE.
Had he been lying? He supposed he had. He didn't like the Doctor, and he hadn't truly felt sorry for his suspicions. Ever since he'd seen William Manton with the Slaughterhouse Nine, he'd harbored doubts about what was going on.
Those doubts had become quiet conviction after he'd gone to see Battery in the hospital. One of Bonesaw's mechanical spiders had cut her suit. He knew exactly the kind of disorientation, hallucination and waves of paranoia she would have experienced as the gas took hold. While she reeled and tried to get a grip on reality, she'd likely left herself open for further attacks. Whatever the case, one of the spiders had injected her with a poison Bonesaw had devised.
Her death had been slow, painful and inevitable. It had been engineered to strike those notes in a way that millions of years of evolution had yet to refine a plant's toxin or an animal's venom. Lying in the hospital bed, still delirious, Battery had used halting sentences to tell him about Cauldon, about buying her powers, and about Cauldron asking her to help Siberian and Shatterbird escape. She'd planned to pursue the Nine, to offer assistance and then kill one or both of the villains. Battery had begged him for affirmation that she'd tried to do the right thing, that he would find the answers she didn't. He'd reassured her the best he could.
She'd died not long after.
He almost couldn't bring himself to click the yellow button again. Alexandria had been lying to him. And that only left…
Click.
Eidolon's voice came from the speakers. "I can't add anything here, and my power's not volunteering anything that could help to solve this particular mystery. I guess we have yet another unanswered question on our hands."
The word was in red letters on the screen. It could have been his own pulse behind his retinas, but the letters seemed to throb with a heartbeat of their own. LIE.
"All lies," Legend whispered the words to himself.

Fuck, I'm crying. Poor Battery, I was so right that she was the one who followed Skitter, "Grue" and "Tattletale" during Agnosia Nightmare, trying to kill the S9 members. And she died, slow and painful. She was corrupted, yes, but she realized in the last moment what kind of MONSTER Doctor Mother is and decided to tell everything to Legend, who blindly believed everything before her confession and death. RIP, Battery....Jamie, I forgive you. Your Ethan is so pissed right now, I'm sure. Pissed on S9 and pissed on Skitter as well. I don't condemn him, I'd be pissed too. Skitter is innocent, yes, but he doesn't know this. He only knows that Skitter tied Battery up in spiderwebs, allowing "Tattletale" to kill her. Legend now is starting his personal vendetta against Doctor Mother and her confirmed evil organisation. Doctor Mother lied all the fucking time, even when she said that she's interested to create more heroes than villains. Bullshit, she's interested to create more CORRUPT heroes to serve as her army. Its a difference between heroes and corrupt heroes. The same difference as it is between cops/judges AND cops/judges who work for mafia. Everything is bullshit about Doctor Mother and Cauldron and now I don't have any doubts. I'd rather prefer to see the world burning than being "saved" by this Doctor. Or even BETTER, being saved by the main character of the story, of course. Skitter should do something as big and noble as world saving, this is her protagonist's duty, after all.

Eidolon is not a naive "hero" but a liar, just like Alexandria. Manton hospitalized you and you still want to save him, Alexandria? Gosh, girl, I don't want to judge you, but Doctor Mother messed quite a lot with your mind and morality. I still hope you and Eidolon will see one day how WRONG you're and do the right thing. Just like Battery. Until it is too late for you. Because for her...was already too late.

I think that I'm going to add Doctor Mother next to the Triumvirate of the most evil characters in this story. She'll be like an addition, showing the corruption of science.

Good night and sleep well, my friends.

fabledFreeboota · Jul 22, 2018

blackarrow said:
Especially given the fact how good Jack is to manipulate people.

It's scary to think about how close he came to making Amy into another Bonesaw.

ExNihilo · Jul 22, 2018

blackarrow said:
Fuck, not only Eidolon is involved, but Alexandria is a traitor too.

Traitor may be a strong word. After all, you can be a member of two organizations at the same time.

blackarrow said:
I have a feeling that Alexandria knows that Doctor is lying CONSTANTLY but she covers her.

Alexandria is a high-level thinker.

blackarrow said:
Doctor Mother lied all the fucking time

If she's so good at manipulating people, why did Kid Win's program still see through it?

Also, so much I want to say but you have to RAFO.

blackarrow · Jul 22, 2018

fabledFreeboota said:
It's scary to think about how close he came to making Amy into another Bonesaw.

So, he made Bonesaw like this, eh? Thank you for confirming what I kind of suspected.

PS: Please, mods, don't block/suspend him, he only confirmed what I suspected. Thanks.

fabledFreeboota · Jul 22, 2018

blackarrow said:
So, he made Bonesaw like this, eh? Thank you for confirming what I kind of suspected.

No, I'd meant in the sense of "youth that he has torture and mutilate people for him in ways that should not be physically possible"

EDIT: what with what we know of the s9's backstories so far, what do you think to what Taylor says when Coil first shows them off?

Then there were the really dangerous ones, the people who had probably been monsters before powers were even on the table, and then they got worse.

-10.6

blackarrow · Jul 22, 2018

ExNihilo said:
Traitor may be a strong word. After all, you can be a member of two organizations at the same time.

Alexandria is a high-level thinker.

If she's so good at manipulating people, why did Kid Win's program still see through it?

Also, so much I want to say but you have to RAFO.

Legend is a member of two organizations, but he's now sure that Cauldron is an evil one and wants to stop it. I'm sure Alexandria knows that Doctor is lying but she accepts these lies and worse, she lies Legend too. That's the reason why I call her a traitor. A hero who works for evil and knows it is not a true hero. But maybe she'll change with time and turn against Doctor Mother and her people. I'm still hopeful about her.
Maybe Doctor Mother is good at manipulating people, not computer programs too. Coil is good too at manipulation but Bitch didn't believed him at first and now nobody seem to believe him anymore. But Doctor Mother seems to me a very good manipulator. And a ruthless person.
I don't think I'll change my opinion no matter what Doctor Mother is planning. But if she'll surrender herself to authorities and admit her CRIMES then maybe I'll consider her a redeemable person. Nobody have any right to make experiments on people and help criminals to escape. Under no reason.

rafuki22 · Jul 22, 2018

blackarrow said:
Hello, friends, and welcome to the second Interlude of this Arc. Accidentally, I noticed Legend name in this Interlude so its safe to say that this will be his Interlude. The first Triumvirate member with an Interlude. I'm pretty much ok with this. Time to learn more about Worm-verse Superman's cousin (in fact, Scion is more close to Superman than Legend -being, you know, both superpowered aliens, but I personally like to compare- from time to time- Legend with my favorite hero of all times ) I only hope for one thing: that Legend will not be another corrupted hero, an agent for Cauldron, as I'm afraid he might be (because he kind of tried to help Siberian's master escape, as I deducted during their fight). Hope this fear of mine will turn out to be untrue, just an illusion of my general paranoiac mind.
But before I start, I want to talk about an observation of mine. Its seems like there's another Triumvirate (besides the Protectorate one) but the differences are that they're not working together and its more like a Triumvirate of Evil than anything else. A Triumvirate of Evil who represent through its members the corrupted version of human society, in some of its main spheres. I'm talking about the corruption of domestic sphere, of politics/business/ military sphere and the humanity in general. There are 3 characters who are the most evil and vile characters from this entire story. Jack, Coil and Heartbreaker. Jack represents the corruption of anything that is moral, ethic and good, the corruption of the very core of humanity, he's the destructive psychopath with a personal hate (and war) against humanity, Coil represents the corruption of politics, business/military, being the corrupted and greedy politician/businessman who only cares about his personal gain and nothing else and is ready to destroy everything in his path as long as his interests are served and Heartbreaker represents the corruption/destruction of family as he's the totalitarian and abusive patriarchal figure of the family, but he can be also the cult leader who enslave people, making them his helpless puppets. All 3 men represent everything is evil and rotten in the society. They're also great manipulators, they use kids as their main weapons (Coil- Dinah, Jack- Bonesaw and Heartbreaker- his own kids) and they're all repulsive people to everyone they meet. Well, Jack is charming, compared with the other two, but even he becomes repulsive when you know with what kind of man (beneath his harming facade) you're dealing it. I want to count Bonesaw too as the corruption of science but I'm still undecided if she acts 100% of her own will or if she's not manipulated by Jack (besides being a sicko herself) who "help" her acting more like how he likes than how she really wants. I hate her and I'll enjoy her death but I still have this uneasy feeling that there must be something more with this child than pure, unstrained madness. Especially given the fact how good Jack is to manipulate people. Alright, this is my opinion about 3 main forces of evil in this story (I'll not count Endbringers because they're animals/aliens and I'm referring here only at the evils of humanity) now let's start this Interlude Interlude 14.5 (Bonus Interlude)

Aww, this is so very cute. Deputy Director Renick and Legend praise Kid Win for being so honest, opened and sociable with people. Maybe this praise, especially coming from one of the most powerful parahumans, will help him build the confidence he NEEDS because he always put himself down, even if he's so smart and brave. Just like Taylor and Amy. I noticed how different Kid Win and Armsmaster are from each other. I mean, they're both talented Tinkers (Armsmaster still have more experience than Kid Win, given his age) but while Armsmaster is anti-social, cold, introverted, dedicated only to his work (and now to his personal revenge on S9) but he have a lot of trust in his own capabilities (too much trust, I'd say), Kid Win have zero trust in himself but he's friendly, warm and sociable and while he's dedicated to his work, he's also able to live his life like any teenager of his age. Classifications and some powers might be the same, but each individual is unique.

Awww, I can read for HOURS this conversation between my favorite Tinker and my favorite Triumvirate member (leader). I have tears in my eyes, I'm moved by how much Legend praises and encourages Kid Win who decided to take Hero (the poor hero assassinated by Siberian in such a gruesome way) as his role model. Thank you, Legend, thank you for being so kind towards Kid Win, you're a good man (please, don't disappoint me later).

Kid Win already have more confidence than he had during his Interlude. Kid Win's confidence gives me LIFE. So, Hero was the leader of Triumvirate before Legend took his place. Alright. Kid Win created a program for Legend and I have no idea what it is about, maybe it isn't an interesting detail of the story. What is more interesting than a computer program is....WHERE THE HELL LEGEND IS GOING? He said that he's not going home right now, hoping that he'll be back in his husband's arms before midnight. And he doesn't look so happy about the whole deal. Legend, are you going to confirm my suspicions?

I was going to comment about his sun-recharging powers (like Superman) but then the portal to Cauldron appeared and he's revealed to be Cauldron's agent. I'm seriously disappointed, Legend gave me hope then in the next moment he crushed it. Why working for the same people who want Mr Voyeur to escape despite the fact that he made Siberian to kill Hero? Hero was your boss and friend and you...you just betrayed his memory by selling your soul to....Cauldron, his killers (Mr Voyeur was/is Cauldron and they all have a collective responsibility for Hero's death. Especially since they don't want to stop their (former) colleague from killing even more heroes and civilians). People will lose their trust in heroes if they'll ever discover what you're doing, for who you're working. I won't be surprised if Eidolon works for Cauldron as well. See, my friends? This is one of the reasons why I'd like to be vigilante more than a hero. Because heroes can be corrupted to work for evil people while vigilantes will tell to evil people "fuck you" while sending a bullet between their eyes.

Fuck, not only Eidolon is involved, but Alexandria is a traitor too. Great, just great. I kind of want the public opinion to find out about what kind of "heroes" Triumvirate is formed from but in the same time I don't want people to know because everyone will lose their trust in heroes, in all heroes, even the ones who are heroic for real and not just pretend to be heroes, while working for "almost" evil organisations. Doctor fucking Mother wants Mr Voyeur escape, despite Mr Voyeur being an insane asshole who killed Hero and countless of other heroes and civilians. His former colleagues show a "great respect" to his memory. I doubt they don't know about Doctor Mother's plans.
Alright..............NUMBER MAN FINALLY APPEARED. Yes, of course I remember him. He's the villain banker who works for Coil. He also works for Cauldron (confirming my suspicion, that Coil is a Cauldron's agent). He's a (I hope badass) nerd who knows about numbers and shit. I'm sure he's going to be very boring once he opens his mouth, but if he's a badass nerd for real, his power probably allowing him to even fight like an awesome fighter, then I might tolerate him or even be strangely fascinated by him (because I have a weakness for badass fighter nerds, even if they're evil) But I still don't like the fact that he's Cauldron.

I was RIGHT when I said that Number Man will BORE me when he's opening his mouth to speak. I don't like the way he's talking in percentages, like he's a fucking human computer, good only to calculate. But at least I can understand that if a part of population will die then everyone else will die in time because the small number that will remain afterwards will be unable to survive. This man is right, he might be boring, but not stupid. He's also one of the most influential parahumans in the world and I wonder how....Does he's working for other important politicians/businessmen (apart from Doctor Mother and Coil)? His power is one of the most powerful powers on earth? His mind can compete with an AI like Dragon? Interesting first apparition of this character, that's for sure. Maybe he's not that badass in combat (or maybe he doesn't know how to fight at all) otherwise he'd be Doctor's bodyguard, not that woman in black suit with no name. Not even Legend knows her name or powers.
They talk about Dinah. I think Doctor Mother knew about her before but she pretends that she doesn't know about her. This woman is very good to manipulate and LIE people. She's almost as good as Coil.

Now I think that Doctor is a better manipulator than Coil, she's almost as good as Jack. The more I read about her the more I DISLIKE her. She's not well-meaning, that's for sure. Or, if she's well-meaning through a miracle, she's probably a delusional bitch who thinks that she's protecting the world by doing the most unethical and wrong things possible (I know characters like her, they seem cool and admirable people at first glance but underneath they're all huge hypocrite assholes/bitches). She obviously lies the Triumvirate about Siberian, not mentioning that she wants her Master alive ans well. So, they don't know many things Doctor Mother is doing behind their back. They're corrupted, but not completely. Now I feel a little better. Maybe they really trust Doctor's fake promises.

FUCKING ANNOYING LYING BITCH DOCTOR MOTHER!!! You're the one who make experiments on poor people because you want to create an army of personal parahumans to either take over the world or to save it from a destruction that may or may not happen (despite Dinah's predictions) then to proclaim yourself as its savior queen. You're no better than Coil or Jack, you have people kill for you instead of killing with your own hands and you have a sweet way with words, despite your mind being a diabolical one. You're lying, I don't believe a single word coming out of your mouth, you're manipulating the whole Triumvirate. So, Number Man is confirmed to bullshit super-calculate everything. This is how I'll call his power from now on: bullshit super-calculate (insert anything here).
William Manton is Mr Voyeur? The same Manton who discovered the Manton Effect? Gosh, this man is a lunatic cannibalistic asshole.

I have a feeling that Alexandria knows that Doctor is lying CONSTANTLY but she covers her. She's the corrupt one, Eidolon is probably too naive to believe what the Doctor Bitch is saying and Legend...now I realized that he's in fact an undercover agent. He's not corrupted neither naive (they gave him his power, just like they did with Alexandria and Eidolon) and he pretends to be by their side while working to gain enough information about their work and expose/stop them. This is for what Kid Win's program is: to either record them or to expose Doctor Mother's lies. Now I understand. I'm not disappointed anymore in Legend. He's a true hero, ready to fuck up Cauldron. Also, Cauldron is on another parallel earth. Their doormaker parahuman can open "doors" in another worlds. Why they don't evacuate all the people from this world to empty parallel earths if Doctor Mother really wants to save the world? This is the best way to save the world, not through criminals and experiments. I hope that someone else (preferably Undersiders) to get their hands on this doormaker parahuman and convince/force him to help evacuate everyone if the world will truly ends. Anyone else is better to save the world than this greedy manipulative woman.

Fuck, I'm crying. Poor Battery, I was so right that she was the one who followed Skitter, "Grue" and "Tattletale" during Agnosia Nightmare, trying to kill the S9 members. And she died, slow and painful. She was corrupted, yes, but she realized in the last moment what kind of MONSTER Doctor Mother is and decided to tell everything to Legend, who blindly believed everything before her confession and death. RIP, Battery....Jamie, I forgive you. Your Ethan is so pissed right now, I'm sure. Pissed on S9 and pissed on Skitter as well. I don't condemn him, I'd be pissed too. Skitter is innocent, yes, but he doesn't know this. He only knows that Skitter tied Battery up in spiderwebs, allowing "Tattletale" to kill her. Legend now is starting his personal vendetta against Doctor Mother and her confirmed evil organisation. Doctor Mother lied all the fucking time, even when she said that she's interested to create more heroes than villains. Bullshit, she's interested to create more CORRUPT heroes to serve as her army. Its a difference between heroes and corrupt heroes. The same difference as it is between cops/judges AND cops/judges who work for mafia. Everything is bullshit about Doctor Mother and Cauldron and now I don't have any doubts. I'd rather prefer to see the world burning than being "saved" by this Doctor. Or even BETTER, being saved by the main character of the story, of course. Skitter should do something as big and noble as world saving, this is her protagonist's duty, after all.
Eidolon is not a naive "hero" but a liar, just like Alexandria. Manton hospitalized you and you still want to save him, Alexandria? Gosh, girl, I don't want to judge you, but Doctor Mother messed quite a lot with your mind and morality. I still hope you and Eidolon will see one day how WRONG you're and do the right thing. Just like Battery. Until it is too late for you. Because for her...was already too late.
I think that I'm going to add Doctor Mother next to the Triumvirate of the most evil characters in this story. She'll be like an addition, showing the corruption of science.

Good night and sleep well, my friends.

I think I know how Jack got his powers, are you interested to know?
Also,about cauldron ... JAJAJAJAJAJAJAJAJAJA.

rafuki22 · Jul 22, 2018

blackarrow said:
Legend is a member of two organizations, but he's now sure that Cauldron is an evil one and wants to stop it. I'm sure Alexandria knows that Doctor is lying but she accepts these lies and worse, she lies Legend too. That's the reason why I call her a traitor. A hero who works for evil and knows it is not a true hero. But maybe she'll change with time and turn against Doctor Mother and her people. I'm still hopeful about her.
Maybe Doctor Mother is good at manipulating people, not computer programs too. Coil is good too at manipulation but Bitch didn't believed him at first and now nobody seem to believe him anymore. But Doctor Mother seems to me a very good manipulator. And a ruthless person.
I don't think I'll change my opinion no matter what Doctor Mother is planning. But if she'll surrender herself to authorities and admit her CRIMES then maybe I'll consider her a redeemable person. Nobody have any right to make experiments on people and help criminals to escape. Under no reason.

Two things, first, you are too idealistic and second, your opinion of morality is very partial.
After all, I know how this story ends (I do not affirm or deny anything, maybe I'm trying to confuse you.)
...
...
...
NYEJEJEJEJEJEJE.

Prince Ire · Jul 22, 2018

rafuki22 said:
I think I know how Jack got his powers, are you interested to know?
Also,about cauldron ... JAJAJAJAJAJAJAJAJAJA.

To elaborate, Jack's tirgger isn't revealed in story, it was revealed during a discussion by Wildbow. I don't really think its a spoiler, but ultimately up to you whether to have rafuki22 reveal it or not.

Vegetalss4 · Jul 23, 2018

Prince Ire said:
To elaborate, Jack's tirgger isn't revealed in story, it was revealed during a discussion by Wildbow. I don't really think its a spoiler, but ultimately up to you whether to have rafuki22 reveal it or not.

It might be worth nothing that Wildbow later said he regretted revealing Jack's trigger at all.
Also some people might say that revealing that Jack's trigger isn't revealed in the story is a spoiler in and of itself.

squibble · Jul 23, 2018

blackarrow said:
I have a feeling that Alexandria knows that Doctor is lying CONSTANTLY but she covers her. She's the corrupt one, Eidolon is probably too naive to believe what the Doctor Bitch is saying and Legend...now I realized that he's in fact an undercover agent.

So I know you're just really mad at Doctor Mother here, but I can't help but interpret this as Bitch being a licensed medical practitioner.

blackarrow · Jul 23, 2018

Hello, sweethearts "hugs for everyone" A new week, a new day, a new Arc, a new Chapter. Last Interlude was truly awesome and heartbreaking. Battery's unfortunate death made me cry (I was still hoping that she survived Bonesaw's mechanical spiders), Doctor Mother was a cunning devil hidden not so well behind an angelic facade, Triumvirate of Heroes seriously disappointed me but I'm proud of Legend's final choice- to not believe Cauldron's "good" intentions and to find proof about their obviously amoral practices, and I still hope that Alexandria and Eidolon- despite knowing more than Legend knew and still being by Cauldron's side- will turn themselves against Doctor Mother and expose her/arrest her. Speaking about Doctor Mother, I still have no idea about her power but she's surrounded by some powerful parahumans. One who can open portals to other worlds, one who can bullshit super-calculate stuff and is very influential (I'm pretty curious to know more about this Number Man, he picked my interested in a couple of paragraphs

) and her personal bodyguard, a woman in suit with unknown powers. If Legend said that he's sure that she can fight by herself against Triumvirate if she have to protect Doctor Mother, then she must be hella powerful. Someone like...Siberian? Maybe she's not a real human but another projection, projected by Doctor Mother herself (its possible that this is Doctor Mother's power, to project the woman in suit. At least she's not PERVERT like Manton....) I still can't believe Manton is the perverted murderer behind Siberian. I never thought that it was him, maybe because his character appeared only in other people's conversation and never in reality (not even in a flashback) so I considered him more like a very, very minor character, not someone so freaking important to the story. My mistake.

Maybe Doctor Mother and William Manton drank the vial with the same power- the one to project disturbingly dangerous women and of course they share the same power now. I wonder if Woman in Black (this is how I'm going to call her until I'll know her real name/codename/whatever Doctor Mother calls her, ok?) can make Doctor Mother immune to any attack, since Siberian can't do such thing with her perv master? Ok, enough with talking, let's start....Colony and see with what twisted ideas Wildbow have in story for me. I survived Mannequin (I still survive and I'll survive him), I survived Brian's grotesque torture, I survived Agnosia too. Wildbow, my man, bring something worse than everything I just mentioned. I challenge you.

Colony 15.1

Bentley lunged in my direction, and I could feel my people backing away behind me. I stood firm. The mutant bulldog landed with both front paws first, the impact so heavy that spittle and moisture was flung from his massive body.
A low, guttural noise tore its way from Bentley's throat as he surged forward again. I could hear yelps and shouts of alarm from the crowd behind me.
Wood splintered, cracked, and finally gave way. Behind Bentley, the husk of a fire-scorched building collapsed. Chains that had been lashed to the building's wooden supports trailed from the dog's harness as he bounded toward Bitch. Of everyone present, only Bitch and I held our ground as the dog barreled into his master, practically bouncing with joy.
Bitch, for her part, wrapped her arms around his head as he lifted her off the ground. "Good boy!"
He's just a dog. Beneath the three-thousand-ish pounds of muscle and the exterior of tangled muscle and bone, he was still a dopey dog who adored his master. Bitch had given him what he'd been yearning for since he was abandoned or abused in his past life. She'd offered him the affection and companionship he'd been wanting for years.
I could relate. Not in terms of Bitch, specifically, but I could relate.
"Get to work clearing that up!" I ordered. My swarm augmented my voice to carry it across the crowd of my followers. There were twenty-two adults and twenty kids. With Coil's assistance, I'd brought in work gloves and black hazmat suits, but most people were wearing only the lower body of the suits. It was too warm for the full suits, and the masks were largely unnecessary. Everyone was dripping from the rain, but nobody was really complaining. I rather liked it; it was refreshing in the otherwise warm day. A generator stirred to life a short distance down the street, and there was something of a rush as people hurried to get away from the intimidating presence of the big bad supervillains and their mutant animals. That, and there was something of a fight to get the power tools. There were only so many circular saws and chainsaws to go around, and anyone who didn't have one was tasked with carrying the cut wood instead.

I created a barrier of bugs to stop one of the teenagers from reaching for a circular saw.
"If you're under eighteen, you don't get to use power tools," I called out. "Priority goes to the people who know how the tools are used. Able bodied adults get second dibs. Listen carefully to the guys who know what they're doing, and work somewhere dry if possible. We've had enough casualties, let's not have anything stupid happening with someone slipping or losing their grip in the rain. If someone's being an idiot, tell Sierra, and she'll inform me."
Sierra glanced at me and nodded.
I turned my attention to Bitch.
"You owe me," she said. The rain had plastered her short hair against her scalp. Her gang of four people stood by with dogs on leashes: Barker, Biter, a college-aged kid with the scars of four parallel claw marks running across his face, and a girl with her arm in a sling. They didn't look scared, like my people had, but they still didn't look fantastically thrilled to be in close vicinity to one of Bitch's dogs on full throttle.
Nevermind that you were the one that came here early. "Of course. We'll get you and your people some lunch."
She frowned. "Lunch?"
There was a bit of a pause. I waited patiently as she considered the idea.
"Fine," she decided.
"Come on," I told her. "We'll go to my place while we wait for the others."
While Bentley had been helping to tear down and dismantle the derelict building, I'd been contemplating how I'd leverage Bitch's early arrival to mend fences and rebuild some trust. I'd decided on something simple, as that seemed to work best with Bitch. I imagined that she hadn't paid a lot of attention to stuff like food as she took hold of her territory. Odds were good that she'd asked Coil for a lot of easy food she could stuff in her pockets and eat on the go. She probably wouldn't pay much attention to stuff like seasonings or variety in courses.

Great. This Arc is called Colony and in the first Chapter Skitter (because I suppose she's wearing her costume while she gives orders to her people to work) is re-building her Colony who was destroyed by Burnscar. Awesome. So this Colony from title either refers at Skitter's territory or Skitter's army that she's going to assemble in the near future in order to take Coil down. I mean, during Sierra Interlude, Taylor was decided to bring an end to Coil's machinations. She needs a VERY SUCCESSFUL plan, because Coil's power will protect him against almost anything Taylor is going to do against him. Well, as long as he knows what she's planning, of course. First, she must be very careful with so many Coil's moles around (she must not trust anyone except her fellow Undersiders/Sierra). Not even Travelers because they have no reason to want Coil dead especially since they NEED him. Any Traveler who'll find about Taylor's plans will betray her. Even Sundancer. Yes, as much as I like Sundancer, ultimately her friend is Noelle, not Taylor. Of course she'll want the best for her friend.

Rachel's soldiers and Lisa's soldiers are a big NO too, because they're Coil's soldiers first of all and in the end, they're loyal to him, not to Rachel or Lisa. Of course, if Rachel or Lisa will pay them better than Coil, their loyalty might change.

But nobody have Coil's endless fountain of money.
I like how Rachel's dogs, even in their monster forms, are still dogs and behave the same like any dogs. This is so cute, Rachel/dogs moments are ones of the best moments in this story.

I'd recently spent some time looking back on our past interactions. Her perspective toward me had zig-zagged between a kind of hesitant acceptance and hostility. We'd met, she'd attacked me. We'd gone to the bank robbery, and she'd been open and excited, only to do a one-eighty and start shouting at me after misinterpreting something I said. Two steps forward, one step back. Until I'd left the group and then been outed as an undercover operative a short while later. That had been a good solid one-hundred steps back.
Recovering from that breach of trust had proven far more difficult than anything that came before. Not quite impossible, though;
I'd apparently proved myself in the recent past, because Bitch was making an effort on her end. She was here earlier than I'd asked, for one thing, and she hadn't murdered me when I asked for a hand with some things I couldn't handle with my own power.
She glanced back at her group and whistled once, making a 'come hither' gesture. I couldn't tell if she was signaling her dogs and expecting the people to follow or if she was treating her own people like she did her dogs. She grabbed the chain at Bentley's neck and used it to lead him.
Barker and Biter looked pretty unimpressed, either way. Barker especially.
We didn't talk as we made our way to my headquarters, and I was okay with that. Every exchange between us was one more chance for me to inadvertently offend her, and the silence gave me a bit more time to consider how to tackle all of this. I was used to feeling like I had to approach every conversation with a strategy, planning out what I was going to say so I didn't sound like an idiot. That went double for Bitch, because a slip-up could set me back days or weeks in terms of our friendship.
Should friendship even be my goal? Maybe I was better off just trying to be a teammate.
If it was just for my sake, I could probably convince myself. As it stood, though, I was thinking of Bitch. I felt like I would be abandoning her to a pretty lonely existence if I didn't at least try.
I let them into my lair, after sweeping the area with my bugs to check for any observers, unlocking and opening the shutter. Charlotte had experienced a few sleepless nights since the scare three nights ago, so I'd given her permission to take it easy here, with the warning that I'd have guests and would want her assistance. She still looked a little wary as Bitch, Biter, and Barker entered.

"Hamburgers?" I asked Bitch. She nodded. When I looked at her minions, they signaled agreement. Good. Easy and simple.
"Charlotte, would you mind? Maybe fries, too, if you know how to make them on the stove?"
"I don't, but there's some in the freezer that I can do. They aren't bad," she replied.
"Good. When you have a second, some towels for the dogs, too."
"Okay."
I led the others into the sitting area on the ground floor. With the shutter up, some dim light filtered through the rain-streaked windows. Bitch was outside, tending to Bentley, who had yet to shrink to a more normal size.
I stepped outside to give her directions to where she could stow Bentley until he'd returned to a more normal size, pointing the way to the beach. She marched off with the one-ton monstrous dog, not offering a response.
Which left me to deal with her people in the meantime.
Barker and Biter gave me something of a George and Lennie vibe, with the smaller guy as the brains of the outfit, the larger one as the big oaf. While I didn't have any major clues to Barker's powers, Biter was clearly a physical powerhouse. He stood over six feet in height with a severe underbite exaggerated by a metal bear-trap style band of metal around his lower jaw. His teeth, I saw, were filed into points. His costume featured spiked knuckle-dusters and a number of leather straps and belts over his clothes. Each length of leather was studded with sharp spikes.

Maybe I'm going to learn about Bitch's lieutenants' powers because my wild guess for them is that Bitter is a Master with emotion control and Barker is another Master who can "communicate" with dogs through powered barks.

I don't have much imagination.

Poor Charlotte, she's still traumatized because of those ex-ABB fuckers who tried to hurt her.

I hope she'll get well with time. And I like the fact that Skitter reads Of Mice and Men- one of my favorite novellas of all time (my favorite characters there are George and Slim; people who know this story also know who I'm talking about) because she compared Barker and Biter with George and Lennie. Skitter likes quality literature.

Barker was an inch or two shorter than me, his hair and beard cut short enough that there was more skin than hair showing. His eyes seemed overly large for his face, with heavy lids and folds around them that made him look older than he probably was. His 'costume' consisted of a black sleeveless t-shirt, jeans and tattooing around his mouth. I'd seen him in something more conventional when Coil had introduced him to us, but now the only sign of his parahuman nature was the faint smoke that curled out of his mouth. Just going by his lack of bulk and short stature, I thought I might be able to take him in a no-powers fist fight.

I'd nearly forgotten about Bitch's henchpeople in the chaos of dealing with the Nine and all of the fallout that had ensued. I realized I knew very little about them.
To my surprise, it was Biter who did the talking. He had a low voice, and his words were muddled by some combination of the mouthgear and the underbite. "You get along."
I folded my arms.
He spread his hands, "How?"
"How do Bitch and I get along?" I asked.
He nodded.
"I'm not sure I'm comfortable talking behind her back."
The girl with her arm in a sling spoke up, "She acts like she's frustrated with us. And I think we're frustrated with her."
"I don't want to be rude, but that's really her business with you." They're her property, her territory. If I screwed around with her minions or started something, it would effectively be stepping on her toes.
"You can't offer us any tips?" she asked.
She looked so hopeful. Damn it.
"I can, but it's going to sound pretty damn basic. Be honest, be absolutely clear in what you're saying. Be obedient, but be assertive. Don't let her walk all over you or she will walk all over you. At the same time, if you think there's something worth arguing over, be prepared to fight tooth and nail for it, because you'll be in a weaker position if you fight over it and lose. Respect her space and her things, and remember that she's your boss above all else."
"She doesn't act like a boss," Barker said, and he made it sound almost insulting. Puffs of the dark smoke spilled from his mouth with each word, but they seemed to carry further than cigarette smoke would. It seemed to be tied to the stress or emphasis on the sounds that drove it forward. "She does her own thing and she leaves us to clean up shit."
"Adapt," I told him. "That's all I can say. If you've proven yourself reliable, showed that you're willing to clean up after the dogs and take care of them without complaining, she'll test you in other ways. That'll be your chance to prove you're useful."
He sneered, looking at the girl and the boy with the scars on his face. "She's cutting them more slack than she's cutting Biter and me. We shouldn't have to prove anything."
"What do you do? Your powers."
He looked up at me. "You want to see?"
I shrugged.
"Whore."
The puff of smoke that accompanied the word detonated like a small thunder-clap, mere inches from my face. I flinched, but it hadn't been intended to harm. Only to alarm.
He sniggered. I'd never met anyone who really sniggered before.
I could see how Coil thought Barker and Bitch would be a match. I could also see where there would be some friction between the two.

Biter looks more like he's coming straight out from Mad Max universe than like Lenny in my opinion. Skitter is teaching Bitch's lieutenants how to act around her, how to show her respect by being obedient but also how to make themselves listened by her by being assertive. Good advises, but they don't see very willing to listen. Barker also is pretty jerkass towards Skitter, despite Skitter meaning well. Barker, do you really want to not be able to sit on the chair for a couple of weeks? Because this is how BAD Skitter is going to kick your ass in the next seconds.

Its a bad time for him but a good time for me to see his power in action.

I sighed a little, watching as Barker looked to the others, then over at Charlotte, as if they'd be joining him in his amusement. None did. Biter earned a brownie point in my book by staying quiet and simply watching.
I caught my baton from behind my back and swung it underhand, still folded up, into Barker's chin. His teeth clacked shut with percussive force, and I stepped closer to push at his upper body while hooking at the chair leg with my foot to pull it in my direction. He toppled backwards, his head hitting the wall behind him.
I didn't have a full measure of his ability, but I did know his mouth was his weapon. It made me look weaker, but I stepped back so his legs and the chair seat gave me cover in the event that he decided to attack me.
For extra measure, I drew the bugs out of my costume and sent them straight for his nose and mouth.
He went bug-eyed as he sat up, coughing and sputtering in an attempt to clear the bugs from his airway. After one rolling cough,
he created another detonation in and around his mouth, obliterating a majority of the bugs I'd tried to gag him with.
I glanced at Biter. He was still seated. Good. I'd somehow thought that the guy would be stepping up to defend his partner, making this a two-versus-one fight.
Barker was climbing to his feet. I saw him falter, then start coughing again, gagging.
The capsaicin had kicked in.
"That's the sort of thing you have to watch out for," I told him, as he fell to the ground, writhing and coughing, tears welling in his eyes. I kept my voice level. "You're in my house, my territory, and you fuck with me? That's the sort of thing that would get you in your boss's bad books if you did it to her."
"He has," the boy with the scars on his face spoke.
Barker only gagged in response.
"Guess that's why he deserves shit duty," I commented. I leaned against the wall, folding my arms, my telescoped baton still in one hand.

Bitch had chosen that moment to return. She stared at the scene. Me standing idly by as Barker was curled up on the floor, wheezing and making pathetic noises, a few stray bugs crawling across his face.
She looked at me, glaring.
"He started it, I finished it," I told her.
She looked at Biter, who shrugged and nodded agreement with my statement. Bitch seemed to accept that as answer enough. She picked up his chair, moved it a few feet so it wouldn't be in Barker's way as he kicked and spasmed, and sat down.
"I'm surprised there's no objections about me attacking your partner," I told Biter.
"Your house, your rules, you said."
"What do you do? No demonstrations, please."
"I make parts of myself bigger." He pointed to his mouth, then to the fist with the spike-studded knuckle-duster. "Open wide, swing with bigger hands."
Nothing that would have been that great against the Nine. I couldn't blame Bitch for leaving them behind.
"Fair enough." I addressed the two unpowered individuals from Bitch's group. "And you two? Why were you picked for her team?"
"I was just starting my first year as a vet before everything went to hell," the girl said. "Needed money to pay my boyfriend's hospital bill, was offered more than enough. He got better a week ago, then broke up with me. Not even a thank you. Guess I'm still here because I don't have anywhere else to go, and I like taking care of the dogs."
I saw an opportunity. "Did you have a dog growing up?"

Biter's power seems pretty lame at first glance: he can make parts of his body (probably at his choice) bigger, but I think this power makes him an excellent fighter in hand to hand combat. Have bigger arms -punch your enemy better. Have bigger mouth- bite your enemy to death. Have bigger legs- compete with Skitter into wrecking as many dicks as humanly possible. I was right about Skitter kicking easily Barker's ass

It wasn't hard to imagine this result. Barker can release a gas through his mouth who allow him to detonate things around him, it looks like. Ok, this is a pretty useful power too. Not against Skitter's capsaicin, of course. No power is entirely weak or useless, unless you're called Leet or you're fighting against someone like Skitter.

I think Barker is more like Lennie and Biter is more like George than vice versa. Biter seems to me like an intelligent and fair man while Barker is just the opposite.

"Greyhounds. Eclaire and Blitzen."
"Blitzen? Like the reindeer?"
"No. Like German for lightning. And Eclaire is French."
I could see Bitch was tense. Something about this line of conversation?
I guessed what it might be and continued the questioning. "Why greyhounds? Don't they need a lot of exercise?"
She shook her head. "No. They're running dogs, but they only need about a half-hour of walking a day. They work really well living in an apartment, which we were."
"They howl," Bitch said.
"Only if they're unhappy," the girl protested. She glanced down as Barker thumped on the ground with one fist, then looked up at Bitch and smiled a little, "And ours were happy."
Bitch seemed to accept that.
"Do you have a dog now?" I asked.
She shook her head. "I don't have the money. Or I didn't have money, before Leviathan came. Student loans and living expenses kind of ate up whatever I made. I'm hoping to save up enough with the work I'm doing now."
"You buying the dog?" Bitch asked. She seemed interested, now, but there was still a tension, as if she was waiting for the other shoe to drop. One wrong answer, and this could turn ugly. I could only hope the girl had the right answers.
"I kind of want another greyhound, because it's what I grew up with… and you'll get greyhounds from an animal rescue ninety percent of the time. There's one I'm pretty fond of that's in one of your shelters, but he's yours, of course."
She'd taken my advice about respecting Bitch's ownership. Good.

"Greyhound? Chase or Ink?" Bitch asked.
"Ink."
Bitch frowned. I tensed, ready to jump in and distract with some mention of food.
Grudgingly, Bitch said, "Rather they have a proper home than stay with me."
I could see the girl's eyes widen in surprise. "I didn't- um. Thank you."
"If I see him in some cage in a shelter after you've taken him home, I'm going to track you down and dismember you," Bitch growled.
I could see from the expression on the girl's face that she believed Bitch. Still, I saw her steel herself as she replied, "If I fuck up, I deserve it."
There wasn't much more I could do to help that conversation. I had hope that this would set Bitch's underlings in the right direction.
While they continued talking, I stepped away to check on the hamburgers that Charlotte was cooking on the stove.
"Is he going to be okay?" she asked me.
It took me a second to realize who she meant. I looked back at Barker. "Yeah."
"I mean, is he going to attack us?"
"I dosed him with pepper spray, basically, as well as a few stings and bites to add to the hurt. That'll generally put someone down for half an hour, so I don't think he's a threat. I don't think he's stupid enough to attack with Bitch and I here."

The best way to Bitch's heart is through her dogs. That girl with an ASSHOLE of a boyfriend learned this lesson. She's going to take good care of the dog, Bitch, you don't have to worry.

Poor Charlotte is scared shirtless by men. First Merchants, then Sugita then Barker. I think something happened to her even before the whole Merchants traumatic incident. Something like a sexual abuse? I wonder if she acts like this around Grue and Regent too. Better to keep Regent away from her, he's not different from the men that Charlotte is afraid of. But Grue is the kind of boy that would NEVER hurt a girl in that way. Not only because he's shy with girls but also because he's not that kind of guy, he would rather make girls feel safe with him than run away from him. Skitter should get closer to Charlotte and try to offer her as much security and understanding as possible, because this girl needs some heart-to-heart discussion with another girl more than anything else.

She nodded, but she didn't look relieved. I would have asked what was up, tried to pry for more clarification on just why she hadn't slept well, or why she was so easily spooked, but I was interrupted by the vibration of my phone.
I stepped up into my lair to take the call.
"We're a few minutes away," Lisa told me, the second I picked up.
"Bitch is here already," I answered. "Come in the front door when you get here."
"Righty-o. Ta ta."
She hung up.
I took a second to compose myself, alone in the second floor of my lair. Dealing with people, the sensitive management of Bitch and her underlings, pretending confidence where I didn't necessarily have it, and thinking of all the little details that would help me convey the image of someone confident and powerful… it was draining. It meant standing straighter, having the answers, thinking two steps ahead and using intimidation and fear to prevent any argument or insubordination like Barker's little stunt. It meant retaliating in excess to any slight or disrespect.

Barker had pushed me, I'd left him mewling like a baby.
At the same time, I faced a dilemma on the opposite end of things. I wanted to help people, and I wanted to build friendships with the others. With the way Bitch sort of mandated that I go the extra mile, it was hard to be nice to her without seeming weak to others.
Well, what they didn't see didn't hurt them.
I stepped downstairs.
"Bitch?" I asked. "A word?"
She frowned, glancing at the food.
"We'll be done before the food is," I promised.
She followed me up the stairs.
"It's not complete," I admitted, walking over to where I had fabric draped over a workbench. I picked up one piece and flicked it out. "I just figured you'd want to see it and voice any complaints before the others got here, so your voice doesn't get drowned out."
She took it from my hands. It was a jacket, not dissimilar to the one she'd lent me once upon a time, but it was naturally lighter. There was a hood with a fluffy fur border at the edges, extending around in front of her shoulders. Besides the zippers and buttons, the fur was the only thing I hadn't made myself.
"I dyed it dark gray. I figured if you wanted it any color, you'd want it something dark, so I can tint it dark red, dark blue, dark green, or whatever you want."
She stared at it, her forehead creased.
"It's spider silk. Tensile strength like steel, but flexible enough to resist wear and tear that steel wire would experience. And it's lighter than the steel would be. Knives won't cut it. I figured you'd want a heavier feel, judging by the jacket you lent me before, so I put rectangular panels of armor in between the inner and outer layer to give it more substance. I originally meant for there to be an undershirt or something you can wear to protect your upper body for when you don't have it zipped up, but I kind of cannibalized it for my own costume, after I burned my legs. I'll have the shirt ready for you in a week or two. Here, there's leggings, too. They survived."
I picked up the leggings. Unlike the jacket, they were skin-tight.
"I don't wear tights," she said.
"I thought you could wear them under your pants if you were expecting a serious fight. I gave you an inner layer with a really fine weave for the inner thighs, for when you're riding, so there's less chafing."
"Uh huh."
"I went out of my way to give you lots of pockets like you had in the other jacket. I don't think it'll be too hot. There's zippers in the armpits so you can ventilate some cool air inside, and you can detach the hood if you want, but I liked how it looked with the fur. I'm planning an inside liner for when it's-"
"It's fine," she interrupted me. "Stop talking. It's good."
"Yeah? I didn't get a chance to get your measurements, so I went by memory, based on the jacket you lent me."
She pulled it on and adjusted the front. "Fits fine."
"Here," I said. I turned around and grabbed the next piece. I handed it to her.
She turned it around in her hands. I'd cheated and formed the base sculpt out of chicken wire, covering the remainder with layers of dragline silk and painting the end result. It was, as close as I'd been able to manage, a recreation of what her power did to her dogs in the form of a mask. Except I'd made it half human and half dog.
"Looks like Brutus," she said.
I didn't see it, but I didn't see fit to correct her either.
She pulled it on.
"It's just a little bit flexible, if you want to bend any bits that are rubbing in the wrong place, or shape it to fit your face better."
"It's fine," she said. She adjusted her jacket again.
"If you want me to change anything-"
"No."
Her refusal was so curt it gave me pause. I couldn't tell if she was upset or happy.
I forced myself to keep my mouth shut. I'd give her a few seconds to let me know either way. If she didn't, I was ready to escape by pointing out that lunch would be waiting for us.
"You made stuff for the others?"
"Yeah."
"But I didn't ask for it. I told you to fuck off when you asked me for my measurements, remember?"
"I made it anyways."
She adjusted her mask, turning it so it hung off one side of her head. She was glowering at me. "Why didn't you listen when I told
you to fuck off?"
Two ways I could interpret that question. "Don't worry about it. Look, the hamburgers will be ready soon…" I trailed off.
An awkward silence reigned. I turned to head downstairs.
"What do you want for this?"
I looked over my shoulder. "What? Nothing."
"You're trying to get some favor from me."
"No, I'm really not. It might feel like it, with the timing and what we're going to talk about with Lisa and the others, but it's really not. You're free to argue and disagree with me or the rest of us, just like usual. The costume's a gift."
"I don't get many gifts."
I shrugged. What was I supposed to say to that? I couldn't help but feel that if I were a little more socially adroit, I'd have had a snappy answer.

Skitter is giving Bitch her new costume and Bitch doesn't know what to say because she's not used to receive anything without people expecting something in return. But she didn't refused Skitter's gift which is a big step for Bitch. I'm enjoying this moment between them, Skitter is so patient and helpful with Bitch despite everything that happened between them.

The rest of the Undersiders are on their way, probably coming to receive from Skitter their new costumes Made in Hive. Then they'll probably talk about how to finish Coil off. Better be this because if I'll have to tolerate Coil's presence for few more Arc I'll seriously be pissed. :anger:

She kept talking. "All of the stuff I've gotten, it's been with strings attached. Used to get gifts from one of my foster dads," she paused. "And I get the money from Coil."
"Those aren't really presents. They're more like bribes or enticements. Really truly, this is no strings attached. You can act like you normally would, I won't expect any different."
Again, that glower.
I swallowed. "Wear it or don't wear it. It's okay either way. It's not a big deal."
"I'll wear it," she said.
When I turned to head downstairs, she followed.
I guess that means 'thank you'.
We were greeted by the others in the kitchen. There was just enough time to grab and prepare our burgers before the others arrived. Grue, Tattletale, Imp, Regent and Shatterbird. They turned down the offer of food, and together, we ventured back upstairs.
With everyone gathered in my headquarters, I handed out the costumes. Like Bitch's, the other costumes were in various stages of completion, primarily with minor details missing or askew. I ate while the others tried it all on.

Lisa's costume was virtually the same. The complicated aspect had been maintaining the crisp differences in color without any bleeding of black into lavender or vice versa. There'd also been the issue of getting the mask to fit her face well. I'd accomplished the former by making the black and lavender pieces separately and attaching them to a gossamer-thin sub-layer when I was done. We had the boys and Shatterbird turn away while Lisa and Aisha changed at one end of the room. The mask was a failure, it didn't sit right around the eyes, but I was left with an idea of what to do.
Grue's costume was not unlike his motorcycle leathers in terms of thickness and design, making him one of the most heavily armored of our groups in terms of the amount of material he was wearing. His headwear was the part I'd changed the most: I'd modeled the face-plate after a figurine he'd bought at the market. It was a step away from the visor he'd worn up to now, more demonic than skeletal. The only real trick there had been making it non-porous enough that his darkness wouldn't bleed through. A quick experiment proved that my efforts had turned out alright. In costume, the face-mask down, the darkness framed his mask but didn't cover it unless Grue forced it to. A demon's face in dark gray in a vaguely human-shaped twist of darkness.
For Regent and Imp, I'd settled on bodysuits and masks. Regent would wear his beneath his costume and Imp would wear hers as a simple black bodysuit, complete with a scarf and the horned mask Coil had provided.
There was more to do: belts, Imp's scarf, Tattletale's mask and Bitch's shirt, not to mention finishing my new mask, and my plans for different masks for our various minions.
When we'd been fighting the Slaughterhouse Nine, I'd lamented the fact that I hadn't better outfitted the team, and people had been hurt where the costumes would have otherwise protected them. In the days I'd had to wind down, focusing on getting people organized and working on cleaning up the area, I'd been in range to get a serious effort going on the costumes.
I was satisfied with this.
By all appearances, they were too.
"Safe to turn around," Tattletale told the boys.
They did. I gestured, and people found seats in the various chairs.
"Feels like we're different people than we were an hour ago," Imp said, looking around.
I considered her words. "I appreciate the sentiment, but I think it's more accurate to say we're different people than we were a week ago."
There were some nods. I glanced at the scar on Tattletale's cheek, at Shatterbird, who stood obediently behind Regent, and at Grue, who had transformed more than any of us.
And I couldn't forget the change I'd undergone, even if I didn't have the objectivity to nail down exactly what about me was different from a week ago. Sure, my costume was different, and I had the three hundred pound beetle that was resting on the roof.
"You wanted to touch base?" Brian asked, after he'd pulled off his mask.
"I had some words with Skitter," Lisa answered. "I think it's about time we all got on the same page."
"In terms of tactics?"
Lisa shrugged, "There's that. I think working independently is kind of throwing us off, and it leaves us weak against any coordinated attacks from the Chosen. We work best when we complement one another."
Alec shrugged. "Okay. That's easy enough to arrange. Not really a reason to throw a major group meeting."
"There's something else," I said. I swallowed, looking at Regent, Imp and Bitch. "I've already talked about this at length with Lisa, and I've discussed it some with Brian. This isn't an easy topic to broach, because it sort of fucks with the team's status quo."
That had their attention.

Exactly. Skitter called everyone at Hive to test their new costumes. I was going to question why R Shatterbird had to turn around when the girls were changing, because she's a girl/woman like them, after all, and everything they have she have too, but then I remembered that Regent can see through her eyes and....good thinking Skitter. Gosh, I trying to imagine what Regent would do with Imp's power. Better stop imagining...

A thing is sure, he'd be even worse than he's already. Grue, next time when you'll meet Amy again, borrow her power (because asking her is out of discussion) to heal Tattletale's scar. Speaking about Amy....I wonder where she's and what she's doing. Did she fixed Victoria yet or she still needs time?

"I guess the question is, how keen are you guys on continuing to work for Coil?"

"Are we talking quitting in the short-term or what?"
"I don't know exactly what we're talking about, because so much depends on how you guys respond and how things unfold in the next while," I said. "But this thing with Dinah, I'm not happy with it. I know Lisa and Brian have their issues with that, even if they don't share my perspective in how culpable we all are in that."
"I'm not responsible at all," Aisha pointed out.
"Aisha," Brian's tone was a warning.
"Just saying."
"You aren't responsible, I know," I told her. "I get the impression you'd side with Brian, Lisa and me if it came down to it. The people I'm really directing this question at are Alec and Rachel. I'm under the impression they're the least invested in helping Dinah out, and they're most interested in what Coil has to offer."
"Doesn't Brian have a stake in this?" Alec asked.
Brian shrugged. "Coil approached me a few days ago about increasing my pay. I think he knows I'm not that reliant on him anymore. I got into this because I wanted to get Aisha away from my mom. With the way things in the city have been turned upside-down, I know and Coil knows that I don't need help. The fact that I can say I've got money saved up, I can arrange to get a place and Aisha's safe and sound with me? That's almost enough to decide the court case as is."
"And mommy's on a bender," Aisha said. "Don't think it'll end anytime soon."
It was odd, but Brian looked more upset at hearing that than Aisha was about saying it aloud. Hadn't he grown up with his dad?
"So it's really down to you two," I addressed Alec and Rachel.
"If I were to say I wanted to stick around? That I like the status quo?" Alec asked.
"That's fine," Lisa said. "You'd be an asshole and a prick, but we'd work around you."
"That's vague," Alec commented.
"We can't exactly share our game plan with you if we're going to wind up on opposite sides," I pointed out.
"It's a hassle. Why make things complicated for all of us, because one member of our group has a moral quibble?"
"A preadolescent girl was kidnapped, with our help, and she's spent the last few months in a dungeon, drugged out of her mind, all so Coil can use her power," I said. "That's not a quibble."
Alec sighed dramatically. "I'm just pulling your legs. World's going to end in a couple of years. Won't kill me to help you make peace with yourself before it does."
There was a long pause where nobody spoke.
"Nice, Alec." Brian said.
Alec chuckled. "What? It's true. That Dinah kid said it was. Don't pretend it's not going to happen. Might as well live it up before everything goes to hell in a handbasket."
"There's a chance it won't," I replied, my voice quiet. "And with the sheer variety of powers out there, there's got to be an answer."
"That optimism's bound to be wearing thin by now," Alec commented.
"Enough," Brian said.
"Why are you guys freaking out? Because I'm calling you out on your willful blindness? The world's gonna end, and I'm okay with that. Therefore I'm saying I'll go along with your plan, whatever it is. Why argue with me?"
Brian sighed.
"Bitch?" I asked. "I know Coil's set up your dogs in those shelters, and we'd be asking you to potentially lose that, depending on how this plays out, but…"
"I've managed without money before," Bitch said. "Smarmy bastard conned me. Promised me I'd be left alone if I joined the group. That hasn't happened. If he thinks I'll forget that because of what he's given me, I'd like to see the look on his face when he finds out how wrong he is."
"Thank you," I said.
"So we're all in?" I asked.
"It was fun," Alec shrugged, "That's why we got into this, wasn't it? Easy money, fun, get to do what we wanted. No pressure, no responsibilities. It's become something else. So maybe we end that."
"I don't necessarily want to end it," I said. "I'm not talking about taking Coil head on, and I do want to preserve my territory, if I can help it. It's helping people."
"So what do you want?" he challenged me.
"For right now? I mainly wanted to know you're on my side. I really appreciate that you are," I said. I looked at Bitch and
repeated myself, "Really."
"And for the future?"
"We've got an awfully small window," Lisa said. "One and a half weeks, roughly, before Dinah's power is back online. Once that happens, Coil becomes a thousand times harder to take on. There's the mayoral elections, the question of whether the city gets condemned-"
"What?" I cut in.
"It's arguably more expensive to fix the problems here than it is to abandon the city entirely. Depends on what the consensus is from the President and all the other folks in charge."
"If that happens, what will Coil do?" Brian asked.
"Leave. Start over somewhere else, transporting any resources he can, leaving behind all liabilities. He might bring some of you with him, offering some hefty bribes. Somehow I don't think he'll bring Skitter. Even my own currency is running pretty thin," Lisa shrugged.
"He can't afford to lose you," Brian said. "You're too dangerous as an enemy."
"Oh, I think he's studied me enough to feel pretty confident he can off me if he wants to," Lisa said. "Trick is making it a sure enough kill that there's no chance of it backfiring on him."
"And me?" I asked, feeling a pang of alarm.
"He knows your weak points. The gaps in your power, your dad, your identity, your morals. You already know that."
I did, but hearing it said so clearly, it was one of those cases where having the details laid out in front of me didn't make me feel more confident.
"So this is going to be a different kind of fight," Brian mused. "It's about control and subterfuge. If he figures out what we're doing, if we clue him in, he's probably better equipped than any of our past opponents when it comes to knowing how to deal with us. If the city gets condemned, we're boned. And if Dinah gets her powers back, he'll be impossible to beat."
"That's the gist of it. Even I don't know what he has planned for his endgame, here. It's looking pretty ugly, to be honest." Lisa counted off the points on her fingers. "The Chosen will be gunning for us, Coil's got a small army of pretty excellent, well-equipped soldiers at his disposal, he's got some pretty fucking heavy hitters with the Travelers, the heroes are going to be going into overdrive to establish some sort of control and last but not least, he's Coil."
"Well," Alec said, chuckling a little, "At least we'll have something to help pass the time while we wait for the world to end."

Right now, I don't actually care if the world will end or not, the most important thing is for Dinah to be a free girl and if she'll die during the Apocalypse, at least she'll die in the company of her loving and caring family, not in the company of a sick, disgusting man. Skitter, only his death will free Dinah, why you don't want to understand this? I know that you're not very happy with the idea to kill someone, but you'll be even more unhappy if Coil will win and Dinah will remain his slave forever. So, better choose what make you less unhappy, my dear girl.

I'm glad that all of them agree to fuck Coil's days and nights but they should be very wary of Travelers because right now, they're more dangerous for them that are the headless Chosen. SUCCESS, my dear Undersiders, its going to be a tough fight against one of the members of the Triumvirate of Evil.

Btw, I remembered something about Charlotte. She said here something like this

"Like rape? Are you going to tell me there's a situation where rape is okay?" Charlotte asked.

when she was talking to Skitter in Plague 12.1.

Now I'm convinced without any doubt that this girl was sexually abused/raped during a moment of her life.

Good night and sleep well, my friends.

blackarrow · Jul 23, 2018

rafuki22 said:
Two things, first, you are too idealistic and second, your opinion of morality is very partial.
After all, I know how this story ends (I do not affirm or deny anything, maybe I'm trying to confuse you.)
...
...
...
NYEJEJEJEJEJEJE.

I'm idealistic and I'm proud of being like this. My opinion of morality is very partial and I'm proud of this. I'm proud of all my opinions and ideas. Every person should be like this (as long as they don't have extremist/racist ideas)

because we're feeling much better when we're proud of ourselves and our achievements, no mater how smart they're.

blackarrow · Jul 23, 2018

rafuki22 said:
I think I know how Jack got his powers, are you interested to know?
Also,about cauldron ... JAJAJAJAJAJAJAJAJAJA.

You can tell me if is not canon. My idea about how he got his power is something like this: he had a good friend who did something stupid like stealing from someone, then a crowd of people observed this friend doing what he did and attacked him like wild animals, killing him right under Jack's eyes. Jack was so affected by the whole happening that he got his power, lost his mind and started to hate the humanity, seeing every single human being as a monstrous animal ready to attack, subjugate and kill. This is how I imagine his trigger event.

How close I'm of reality?

blackarrow · Jul 23, 2018

squibble said:
So I know you're just really mad at Doctor Mother here, but I can't help but interpret this as Bitch being a licensed medical practitioner.

ALL HAIL VETERINARY DOCTOR, MAGNA CUM LAUDE, RACHEL LINDT, KNOWN AMONG FRIENDS AS BITCH AND AMONG ENEMIES AS HELLHOUND.

rafuki22 · Jul 23, 2018

blackarrow said:
Hello, sweethearts "hugs for everyone" A new week, a new day, a new Arc, a new Chapter. Last Interlude was truly awesome and heartbreaking. Battery's unfortunate death made me cry (I was still hoping that she survived Bonesaw's mechanical spiders), Doctor Mother was a cunning devil hidden not so well behind an angelic facade, Triumvirate of Heroes seriously disappointed me but I'm proud of Legend's final choice- to not believe Cauldron's "good" intentions and to find proof about their obviously amoral practices, and I still hope that Alexandria and Eidolon- despite knowing more than Legend knew and still being by Cauldron's side- will turn themselves against Doctor Mother and expose her/arrest her. Speaking about Doctor Mother, I still have no idea about her power but she's surrounded by some powerful parahumans. One who can open portals to other worlds, one who can bullshit super-calculate stuff and is very influential (I'm pretty curious to know more about this Number Man, he picked my interested in a couple of paragraphs ) and her personal bodyguard, a woman in suit with unknown powers. If Legend said that he's sure that she can fight by herself against Triumvirate if she have to protect Doctor Mother, then she must be hella powerful. Someone like...Siberian? Maybe she's not a real human but another projection, projected by Doctor Mother herself (its possible that this is Doctor Mother's power, to project the woman in suit. At least she's not PERVERT like Manton....) I still can't believe Manton is the perverted murderer behind Siberian. I never thought that it was him, maybe because his character appeared only in other people's conversation and never in reality (not even in a flashback) so I considered him more like a very, very minor character, not someone so freaking important to the story. My mistake. Maybe Doctor Mother and William Manton drank the vial with the same power- the one to project disturbingly dangerous women and of course they share the same power now. I wonder if Woman in Black (this is how I'm going to call her until I'll know her real name/codename/whatever Doctor Mother calls her, ok?) can make Doctor Mother immune to any attack, since Siberian can't do such thing with her perv master? Ok, enough with talking, let's start....Colony and see with what twisted ideas Wildbow have in story for me. I survived Mannequin (I still survive and I'll survive him), I survived Brian's grotesque torture, I survived Agnosia too. Wildbow, my man, bring something worse than everything I just mentioned. I challenge you. Colony 15.1

Great. This Arc is called Colony and in the first Chapter Skitter (because I suppose she's wearing her costume while she gives orders to her people to work) is re-building her Colony who was destroyed by Burnscar. Awesome. So this Colony from title either refers at Skitter's territory or Skitter's army that she's going to assemble in the near future in order to take Coil down. I mean, during Sierra Interlude, Taylor was decided to bring an end to Coil's machinations. She needs a VERY SUCCESSFUL plan, because Coil's power will protect him against almost anything Taylor is going to do against him. Well, as long as he knows what she's planning, of course. First, she must be very careful with so many Coil's moles around (she must not trust anyone except her fellow Undersiders/Sierra). Not even Travelers because they have no reason to want Coil dead especially since they NEED him. Any Traveler who'll find about Taylor's plans will betray her. Even Sundancer. Yes, as much as I like Sundancer, ultimately her friend is Noelle, not Taylor. Of course she'll want the best for her friend. Rachel's soldiers and Lisa's soldiers are a big NO too, because they're Coil's soldiers first of all and in the end, they're loyal to him, not to Rachel or Lisa. Of course, if Rachel or Lisa will pay them better than Coil, their loyalty might change. But nobody have Coil's endless fountain of money.
I like how Rachel's dogs, even in their monster forms, are still dogs and behave the same like any dogs. This is so cute, Rachel/dogs moments are ones of the best moments in this story.

Maybe I'm going to learn about Bitch's lieutenants' powers because my wild guess for them is that Bitter is a Master with emotion control and Barker is another Master who can "communicate" with dogs through powered barks. I don't have much imagination. Poor Charlotte, she's still traumatized because of those ex-ABB fuckers who tried to hurt her. I hope she'll get well with time. And I like the fact that Skitter reads Of Mice and Men- one of my favorite novellas of all time (my favorite characters there are George and Slim; people who know this story also know who I'm talking about) because she compared Barker and Biter with George and Lennie. Skitter likes quality literature.

Biter looks more like he's coming straight out from Mad Max universe than like Lenny in my opinion. Skitter is teaching Bitch's lieutenants how to act around her, how to show her respect by being obedient but also how to make themselves listened by her by being assertive. Good advises, but they don't see very willing to listen. Barker also is pretty jerkass towards Skitter, despite Skitter meaning well. Barker, do you really want to not be able to sit on the chair for a couple of weeks? Because this is how BAD Skitter is going to kick your ass in the next seconds. Its a bad time for him but a good time for me to see his power in action.

Biter's power seems pretty lame at first glance: he can make parts of his body (probably at his choice) bigger, but I think this power makes him an excellent fighter in hand to hand combat. Have bigger arms -punch your enemy better. Have bigger mouth- bite your enemy to death. Have bigger legs- compete with Skitter into wrecking as many dicks as humanly possible. I was right about Skitter kicking easily Barker's ass It wasn't hard to imagine this result. Barker can release a gas through his mouth who allow him to detonate things around him, it looks like. Ok, this is a pretty useful power too. Not against Skitter's capsaicin, of course. No power is entirely weak or useless, unless you're called Leet or you're fighting against someone like Skitter. I think Barker is more like Lennie and Biter is more like George than vice versa. Biter seems to me like an intelligent and fair man while Barker is just the opposite.

The best way to Bitch's heart is through her dogs. That girl with an ASSHOLE of a boyfriend learned this lesson. She's going to take good care of the dog, Bitch, you don't have to worry. Poor Charlotte is scared shirtless by men. First Merchants, then Sugita then Barker. I think something happened to her even before the whole Merchants traumatic incident. Something like a sexual abuse? I wonder if she acts like this around Grue and Regent too. Better to keep Regent away from her, he's not different from the men that Charlotte is afraid of. But Grue is the kind of boy that would NEVER hurt a girl in that way. Not only because he's shy with girls but also because he's not that kind of guy, he would rather make girls feel safe with him than run away from him. Skitter should get closer to Charlotte and try to offer her as much security and understanding as possible, because this girl needs some heart-to-heart discussion with another girl more than anything else.

Skitter is giving Bitch her new costume and Bitch doesn't know what to say because she's not used to receive anything without people expecting something in return. But she didn't refused Skitter's gift which is a big step for Bitch. I'm enjoying this moment between them, Skitter is so patient and helpful with Bitch despite everything that happened between them. The rest of the Undersiders are on their way, probably coming to receive from Skitter their new costumes Made in Hive. Then they'll probably talk about how to finish Coil off. Better be this because if I'll have to tolerate Coil's presence for few more Arc I'll seriously be pissed.

Exactly. Skitter called everyone at Hive to test their new costumes. I was going to question why R Shatterbird had to turn around when the girls were changing, because she's a girl/woman like them, after all, and everything they have she have too, but then I remembered that Regent can see through her eyes and....good thinking Skitter. Gosh, I trying to imagine what Regent would do with Imp's power. Better stop imagining... A thing is sure, he'd be even worse than he's already. Grue, next time when you'll meet Amy again, borrow her power (because asking her is out of discussion) to heal Tattletale's scar. Speaking about Amy....I wonder where she's and what she's doing. Did she fixed Victoria yet or she still needs time?

Right now, I don't actually care if the world will end or not, the most important thing is for Dinah to be a free girl and if she'll die during the Apocalypse, at least she'll die in the company of her loving and caring family, not in the company of a sick, disgusting man. Skitter, only his death will free Dinah, why you don't want to understand this? I know that you're not very happy with the idea to kill someone, but you'll be even more unhappy if Coil will win and Dinah will remain his slave forever. So, better choose what make you less unhappy, my dear girl. I'm glad that all of them agree to fuck Coil's days and nights but they should be very wary of Travelers because right now, they're more dangerous for them that are the headless Chosen. SUCCESS, my dear Undersiders, its going to be a tough fight against one of the members of the Triumvirate of Evil.

Btw, I remembered something about Charlotte. She said here something like this when she was talking to Skitter in Plague 12.1. Now I'm convinced without any doubt that this girl was sexually abused/raped during a moment of her life.

Good night and sleep well, my friends.

The power of leet, forgive me, is not useless, imagine, build anything, even if you can only build once, it would be incredible.
Also, people give too much hype to skitter, it's not that she does not deserve it, but they exaggerate their actions too much, taking them out of context.
Finally, coil ... I do not have to say anything.

rafuki22 · Jul 23, 2018

blackarrow said:
You can tell me if is not canon. My idea about how he got his power is something like this: he had a good friend who did something stupid like stealing from someone, then a crowd of people observed this friend doing what he did and attacked him like wild animals, killing him right under Jack's eyes. Jack was so affected by the whole happening that he got his power, lost his mind and started to hate the humanity, seeing every single human being as a monstrous animal ready to attack, subjugate and kill. This is how I imagine his trigger event. How close I'm of reality?

For all I know, it's canon, and not even close.

rafuki22 · Jul 23, 2018

blackarrow said:
I'm idealistic and I'm proud of being like this. My opinion of morality is very partial and I'm proud of this. I'm proud of all my opinions and ideas. Every person should be like this (as long as they don't have extremist/racist ideas) because we're feeling much better when we're proud of ourselves and our achievements, no mater how smart they're.

By the time you finish everything, your opinion will be very different, and when that happens ... I'll be there, waiting.
By the way, only certain people have the right to be optimistic? That does not sound good.

blackarrow · Jul 23, 2018

rafuki22 said:
The power of leet, forgive me, is not useless, imagine, build anything, even if you can only build once, it would be incredible.
Also, people give too much hype to skitter, it's not that she does not deserve it, but they exaggerate their actions too much, taking them out of context.
Finally, coil ... I do not have to say anything.

The power itself is not useless but the parahuman himself is stupid as a brick so he almost makes his power useless.

Skitter deserves to be recognized for what she did so far: taking some of the strongest parahumans by herself and making some awesome plans to win in a lot of unwinnable situations. This is Skitter's one of the best traits of character.
You don't have anything to say about Coil except for FUCK Coil. I'm right?

blackarrow · Jul 23, 2018

rafuki22 said:
By the time you finish everything, your opinion will be very different, and when that happens ... I'll be there, waiting.
By the way, only certain people have the right to be optimistic? That does not sound good.

I'm going to make a bet with you (of you want) that my opinion will not change even if the whole world will suddenly explode at the end. I'll still be optimistic that they'll populate other worlds and everything will be fine. Nothing, absolute NOTHING will crush my optimism.
No, I was saying that people who want the extermination of an entire race/nationality or to shoot all LGBT people or something similar should not be proud of their opinions because they're not good or healthy opinions.

Let's read Worm and its sequel Ward by Wildbow (One chapter/every day)

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rafuki22

Anti-nihilist(maybe).

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fabledFreeboota

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SPACE!

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