“If I’ve picked up on anything over the last few months of wearing a costume, it’s that humans are stronger than you’d expect,” I said.
Legend, with finger guns: “eyyy”
It was as much to myself as to Sundancer. “We can endure a hell of a lot of punishment before we break, and even after we’re broken, we tend to keep on going. Could be physical punishment: getting stabbed, getting scarred, broken bones. Could be mental: losing a loved one, being tortured, even the way I feel like breaking down and crying over the fact that just about every other member of my team is probably fucked, but I’m holding myself together? Humans can put up with a hell of a lot.”
Yeah, true. If there’s anything that sets humans apart from many other animals, it’s endurance, mental and physical. We just won’t stop.
Of course, we’ve got nothing on certain microbes, but still.
“I don’t think this is the right time for optimism,” Sundancer said, bitter.
“Optimism?” I shook my head. “No. It’s a double-edged sword. If we weren’t so resilient, so tenacious as a species, I don’t think we’d be having this much trouble with Jack.
…also true.
I don’t think Mannequin or Siberian would even exist like they do now. I’d almost call it pessimistic. Almost.”
They would qualify as broken people that kept on going. Down a dark path, but they kept on going.
She didn’t reply.
“Speaking of Jack and Siberian-” I started.
You should probably get going?
“Go.”
I left, taking off and heading for the spot I’d left Legend. Looking over my shoulder, I could see Sundancer creating her orb and bringing it down on top of herself. As it had done back during our fight with Lung, it didn’t burn the area directly around her.
Ohh, nice. It’s like a little bubble the power doesn’t affect.
And Tattletale and Trickster… were still standing in the midst of the miasma. They weren’t reacting or doing anything, but they weren’t signalling for me to come back, either, and they weren’t hopping on top of Bentley to rejoin the action.
Maybe that’s its basic effect. No zombie apocalypse, just… unmoving people. Just standing there, eerie in their unresponsiveness. Quite possibly awake and physically unable to do anything, even use their powers.
Something was up, I just had no idea what.
I consoled myself with the bittersweet idea that Bonesaw would want to draw this out. It wouldn’t be as simple as murdering my teammates.
And simply paralyzing them doesn’t sound like the full effect, as eerie as it’d be when applied to a whole city.
It wasn’t exactly reassuring, especially when I thought back to what had happened to Brian, but it gave me hope that this wasn’t the last time I’d see my teammates. My friends.
I appreciate that the word is actually brought in here, emphasized like this. It helps to drive the point home.
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