“Do it anyways,” Tattletale said.

Out of everyone here, you’re probably the least helpful one to be saying that. Unless you’ve been further changing Amy’s impression of you off-screen.

Victoria swung with her good hand, slamming it into the sidewalk.  Cracks spiderwebbed out from the impact site.  She coughed.  “No.”

Jeez.

Also that’s another physical power that’s still effective even as she’s severely physically incapacitated.

“If she hits me, she’ll kill me,” Amy said.

And it’s not farfetched that she would right now.

“Okay,” Tattletale said.  “If she doesn’t want help, you shouldn’t give it.”

Taylor: “Heal her.”
Victoria: “No.”
Brian: “You should accept help.”
Victoria: “No.”
Lisa: “Heal her anyway.”
Victoria: “No.”
Amy: “No.”
Lisa:

“I don’t know– what happened?”

“Crawler spit on her, then knocked out her forcefield.  Move!  Fix your sister!”

Taylor’s right, Amy. If you don’t do this, or don’t do this quickly, Victoria’s dead. If you do this, she’s alive but might be mad at you.

Which is worse?

Fuck, I actually suggested earlier that the former might indeed be less angsty for Amy.

It does matter that it’d be Amy’s fault, though.

She staggered forward and reached out toward Victoria.

“No,” Victoria mumbled.

Ah, there we go. She is here enough to understand this much. But does she understand that it’s this or death?

And Victoria actually voicing a denial of consent makes this even harder for Amy, even if that denial of consent comes from a position of not truly understanding what’s happening.

“You’re dying,” Grue spoke.

“No,” Victoria repeated herself.  “Not-”

She coughed sharply and mumbled in the same breath, and didn’t bother trying to correct herself.

I have no idea how this is going to ultimately play out but one thing’s for sure: It’s gonna suck for Amy either way.

“Come on, Atlas,” I urged him, “Faster.”

Taylor doesn’t need to use vocal commands. I’m 100% sure she only said this so she could reinforce to herself that his name is Atlas now. Make it official by actually saying the name. 🙂

Dumb to talk to him, when I knew for an absolute fact that he couldn’t understand me.  Maybe I was talking to myself. 

Totally.

We found my teammates still clearing a path through the edge of the area.  They were all walking, the dogs in a formation around them, Bitch holding up the distant rear with Bastard.

Better seek out Amy ASAP.

I landed.  Glory Girl didn’t have the strength to stand, and collapsed like a rag doll.

Y’know, when her organs are visible and being subjected to deadly acid, I find this very understandable. It’s a wonder she was even able to fly, though that’s a power. I don’t think we’ve ever seen powers entirely disabled by physical damage that didn’t specifically target the gemma, even physical ones. And flight can be either physical or mental/special depending on how it works. Though I’d lean towards physical by default.

(Shatterbird’s flight is purely mental because it’s not really independent flight, it’s telekinesis on her glass clothing.)

We moved as fast as my beetle was able.  I knew she could fly faster, would have compelled her to even push me and the beetle forward if I thought I could have handled the navigation.

I mean, she can fly faster when not being digested alive.

As a group, we passed over a red scaled wingless dragon that I took to be Genesis, wading through the flames on her way to the site of the battle.

Heya!

My beetle needed a name.  Had to have a better way of referring to it.  A hercules beetle, but bigger, a giant.

Oooh, naming time!

Hm. Like a hercules beetle but giant. So maybe a name of a large figure from Greek mythology? Like Atlas (though I don’t think Bailey’s strong enough for that name), Chronos (doesn’t fit very well either), etc., or the more general Titan. Or a name of an actual giant, which is a separate thing in Greek mythology from the also gigantic titans. I don’t actually know any names of giants, though.

I suppose if you get more specific and focus on Hercules, then maybe you could go bigger by naming the bug Zeus? Making him the father of Hercules beetles.

I thought about Hercules, about the myth; Hercules had borrowed the burden of the giant who carried the world.  Atlas.

Alright, sure! That was my first guess from “hercules beetle, but bigger, a giant”, even if I hadn’t connected Atlas to Hercules specifically.

I stand by my claim that the name Atlas has connotations of strength that don’t particularly fit him… actually, I suppose if it’s compared to other beetles, he’s incredibly strong. Fair enough!

(Also Atlas is a titan, not a giant. Though he is giant, the adjective.)

But his use of his power gave me another idea.  Glory Girl had powers too.

Yeah, but how would you use them to evacuate her?

“Can she fly!?”  I shouted.

It somehow managed to slip my mind that that’s one of them.

“What?”  Weld asked.  He glanced up at me, then turned his attention back to the fight.  His body was tensed and ready to act the second Crawler made a move for his teammates.

I don’t think this is quite what Taylor is going for, but I’m thinking that – like how I suggested that a side effect of Cache’s power might be being “hollow” – anyone with flight might, as a passive side effect, be lighter than they should be.

It seems Taylor is going for Glory Girl actively using her flight to help out the evacuation, even if she can’t fully lift off on her own.

“Ask her if she can fly!”

“She’s insensate!”

Insensate. Good word.

“Try!”

He turned back to the superheroine and said something I couldn’t make out.

“Uhh… can you fly?”

If she responded, I didn’t hear it.

Weld extended his arms into two long poles.  They extended ten feet, then fifteen, then thirty.  Reaching back, he caught Glory Girl with the ends, bending the tips to encircle her body.

Nice! Metal “tentacles”!

“Wait!” I said.

He glanced up at me, then over at Crawler.  The villain was spitting at Assault, who slid on the ground to evade the spray.  Crawler took advantage of the gap in the defensive wall to stampede toward Vista and Flechette.

Shit. Vista, do your thing!

Vista increased the distance, but not as fast as Crawler crossed it.

Well, at least she listened to me. That’s a change of pace. :p

Evac.  The last time I’d had a scale to check, months ago, I’d weighed a hundred and eighteen pounds.  With my gear, my costume, maybe that added up to one hundred and twenty.  I had my doubts the beetle could manage me if I was even ten pounds heavier.  How could I carry someone larger than me, in addition to myself?

Yeeah.

Even without Taylor, Bailey might not be able to carry the evacuees. Especially Cache.

Though maybe Cache is lighter than he seems because of his power. Even though the power doesn’t literally put people inside him, it might have a weird side effect of making him parahumanly “hollow”.

Maybe I didn’t have to.

Had to think out of the box.  If I could get her out of here, and if the beetle could manage her, I could remotely pilot it to Amy.

Yes! And if you’ve got time and range, you can do multiple trips.

I think time is the biggest concern there.

Those were two pretty huge ifs.  No, couldn’t pin my hopes on that.

I saw Cache using his power on himself.  He was barely able to crawl, but he surrounded himself in his dark geometry, disappearing as it condensed down to a point.  He’d taken himself out of this dimension.  I wasn’t sure if it was a journey of no return or a way to get some respite.

Probably the latter, I would imagine. Well, that means one less evacuee.

Though… if he can do this and open a portal back later, why didn’t he join the other heroes in his pocket dimension earlier, instead of being frozen? Can he not do this when there are others in there? Or maybe it was so that he’d know when it was safe for himself and everyone else to come back.