I nodded acknowledgement, but my focus was elsewhere.  As I judged that enough bugs had caught the foam on one pane of their individual pieces of glass, I directed them to carry the glass down to Dragon.  As I positioned the bugs, the glass stuck to lenses, vents of hot air, vents where air was rushing in, and the smaller joints near segmented areas.

Oh yeah, vents! Of course, blocking those off could cause some major trouble for Dragon.

Dragon didn’t seem to notice or care.

So far. Maybe when things start overheating.

“Can she see me?” Imp asked.

Who are you?

Tattletale started to speak, but stopped when one of the streams changed direction to spray closer to us, forcing us to retreat in a hurry.

Whoop.

Also, whether Dragon can see Imp is a very good question, because we don’t know whether her power affects sensors and we don’t know whether it affects people who are far away.

I’m somewhat coming around to the idea that Dragon might actually be inside there, but there’s no way in hell I’m trusting that yet.

I glanced at the gift shop.  Would it be a good idea to retreat in there?  The walls were glass, which was both good and bad in that both Dragon and our group could break through it.  The problem was that we risked being trapped if we headed in there.

Screw the risk, go get some souvenirs.

“She’s got a disadvantage,” Tattletale spoke, her voice low, “This suit is meant to fly to serious crises at a moment’s notice, deal with dangerous foes.  She’s packing too many lethal weapons.”

And it’s still not that serious a combat “suit”? I mean, the focus is still clearly on speed, but she’s certainly equipped the thing for battle.

“That’s a disadvantage?” Regent asked.

When you’re trying not to kill the opponent, sure. Too many lethal weapons, not enough space for a lot of nonlethal ones.

Oh jeez, can you imagine Dragon and Armsmaster cooperating on a mech…

“She’s not about to kill us.  Bad PR, especially for a notable hero traveling into another country to fight virtual unknowns like us.

Right, yeah, Toronto, Newfoundlander accent. Not sure how it never really occurred to me that being a Newfoundlander meant she was Canadian, even though I’m well aware that it was in Canada.

So we only have to worry about her nonlethal weaponry, and she doesn’t have many.”

Nice.

I didn’t use this grip to stick to the surface, but instead employed it to collectively lift and pick up the glass.  Six or seven bugs could lift a decent-sized piece of glass if they were on the ground, while anywhere from twelve to thirty could fly with one if I managed it right.

Niice.

I had a few hundred to employ, with more still arriving.

With this glass, I did my best to catch and block the outlying flecks and drips of spray as it flew through the air, at the periphery of the streams.

Ohhh, I see. I was close, but I forgot to tie it back to blocking the foam. And if we’re lucky, the added weight of the glass will cause it to fall down on Dragon rather than get blasted away like the bugs!

The spray knocked some pieces of glass from the air, and struck some bugs, causing the group to lose their collective grip and drop the glass.  That was to be expected.  Others, though, caught the foam on one of the flat panes of the glass.

Or that. Nice, this gives them much more control over not only getting the foam on Dragon, but where on Dragon.

The sensors and weaponry would both be good places.

As more bugs rose with the glass between them, I organized them into loose walls and barriers, to maximize the area they were catching and to overlap so that less bugs were exposed to incoming spray.

Smart.

I’d been drawing my bugs closer to the building since we arrived, and I brought them into the fray as Dragon continued to lock down the lobby with the spray.

Taylor just keeps ending up in fights against people with metal protecting their bodies, sheesh.

And in Dragon’s case I’m not

even

entirely sure there is a human body to protect, let alone that it’s around here.

So… what can the bugs really do in this situation? I suppose they might be able to sabotage Dragon’s weaponry or senses, or if they can somehow get in there, circuitry.

The first tactic I tried was blocking the spray with the bugs.  I didn’t intend to stop the spray, exactly, but I hoped that I could cause the bugs to catch it & drop down atop Dragon, sticking to her.  It didn’t work – the spray was too strong, and the bugs were blasted much too far away.

Only one or two landed on her, and even then, I doubted the positions were that ideal.

Nice try, anyway.

Instead, I adjusted my tactics.  The idea was the same, but I didn’t want to sacrifice bugs for the purpose of clogging her systems or blocking her guns if it would be that ineffective.

Hm… so how do you do this without sacrificing too many bugs?

I gathered some bugs on anything that looked like a sensor – glass panes or openings in the armored vehicle, and I set the rest to gathering on the shattered glass that littered the floor of the lobby.

Ah, the sensor-blocking tactic 🙂

The feet of the insects and arachnids had setae, or small hairs, which branched further into setules.  These fibers, in turn, harnessed Van der Waals forces to cling even to surfaces as slick as glass.

Interesting! So are you going to have the bugs try to pick up the glass and drop it back down on Dragon, or something like that? Sounds ineffective, though… I’m guessing Taylor has a smarter plan.

I’d been reading up.

Nice. That explanation did sound a bit more academic than we’re used to.

The four engines mounted on the shoulders of Dragon’s armor shifted position, each aiming at a different point within the lobby.  Tattletale was the first of us to turn and run, the rest of us moving to follow as Dragon opened fire.

Hm. This sounds a bit familiar… I wonder if Kid Win took some inspiration from Dragon like he was suggesting that Chariot could.

All in all, Dragon unloaded four streams of containment foam into the lobby, each of the shoulder mounted turrets gushing like firehoses.  Only flecks of the spray struck us, but they expanded into blobs of foam the size of golf balls and softballs.

Sheesh, as if this room wasn’t already messy enough with that foam.

Each blob was tacky, sticky, and any attempt to wipe it away just smeared it and exposed more surface area to the air, making it expand more. 

If we’d started running a fraction of a second later, we might have been screwed.

Yeeah.

Weld moved to block our retreat, but Shadow Stalker stepped up to fight him with one of the dogs, Bentley, joining her.

Oh right, some of the dogs did get back up.

It made for a pretty effective combination, as Weld couldn’t swing hard enough to hurt the dog without risking hurting his teammate.

Sweet!

The way Regent was having Shadow Stalker fight, there was no self preservation or defense, which worked out to being a more effective combat style than anything else, in its own way.  I was pretty sure Weld had never fought someone who was actively trying to get hit.

It’s the kind of tactic that depends a lot on the opponent’s relation with the attacker, and in this situation, it’s pretty good.