Dammit, Bonesaw…
Tag: chapter 14.6
Do you think Amy will be able to heal Victoria, given her mental state?
Whose mental state, Amy’s or Victoria’s? Not to mention, what do you mean by “able” and “heal”? Physically capable, mentally up for it, both? Physical healing, mental healing, both? There are at least eighteen ways to read this question.
I’m going to interpret this as whether Amy is physically and mentally able to heal Victoria physically and mentally given Amy’s own mental state.
I think Amy is absolutely physically capable of both forms of healing (Cherish would have an easier time than Amy with the latter, but fuck no), but she’s not going to have fun doing the mental healing. I’m not sure she’s up for actually doing it, making excuses for why she didn’t do it before leaving the Undertravelers. I think her head is filled with a complicated mess of emotions, and she was already reluctant to mess with brains before all of this.
“And in some cultures, people do eat insects.” And crustaceans, which are basically the insects of the sea. I’d guess you’ve eaten lobster and crab. If you ever end up in Louisiana, go to a crawdad boil.
I don’t think I have, actually? I’m not a big fan of seafood.
But yeah, good point! Those are also under Taylor’s control (though she hasn’t made use of that at all in the eleven-ish Arcs since that fact was introduced), so she could use her power to essentially go – very effectively – fishing for crabs if she wanted.
I rewatched the Incredibles 1 and when I saw Dash running through an insect swarm I immediately had to think about Taylor. How do you think the Incredibles would do up against either the Undersiders, the Wards, the Travelers, the Protectorate or the S9 in a fight?
Not incredibly.
By Worm standards, the Incredibles all have really basic powers, except for Jack-Jack, who is a baby and more often a liability than an asset despite his 17 or so different powers. I think Taylor alone could take most of them out without too much trouble. She might have some trouble with Dash, but it wouldn’t be her first time fighting a speedster.
In fact, apart from Jack-Jack, Helen is the only one with a main power Taylor hasn’t already been up against in some form. I suppose Violet also has her invisibility, but that’s nearly useless against Taylor if you’re not Mannequin.
Add to all this that three out of the five are quite inexperienced as fighters (and Bob tends towards pretty straightforward moves), and suddenly the Incredibles don’t seem all that incredible when pitted up against Worm capes.
Admittedly, Helen does show Worm-like creativity with her power from time to time, so there’s that. I definitely think she’s the biggest threat to any Wormverse opponents, though Jack-Jack’s wildcard behavior could also be a spanner in the works for the careful planning some of them are fond of.
“Atlas. I like that.” I shrugged. – Taylor should’ve made the bug shrug to keep the Ayn Rand reference more on point
Hehe, fair enough. Though that’d most likely require Taylor to be intentionally making the reference in-universe.
You’ve probably got a hundred messages about this already, but the TOC entry for 14.5 goes to 14.4.
Well, not anymore – I caught it while adding 14.6. Thanks anyway, though! I really do appreciate this kind of help even when I do happen to catch the error myself before I receive the heads-up. 🙂 I can’t catch all of them.
End of Prey 14.6
And with that, I’m pretty sure this part of the Arc comes to a close, surprisingly enough without anyone having to dodge Bakuda bombs.
This was very good. I liked the bits of the Protectorate+Wards vs Mannequin+Crawler battle we got, how Taylor contributed to it and the way Weld accepted without hesitation that she wanted to contribute, but the real star of the chapter was the tangent about eating bugs the whole scene with Amy healing Victoria and arguing with the Undersiders (especially Lisa, who seemed to care a lot about the mind-manipulation in play) about the best course of action forward. At least she intends to undo what she did, even if she’s prioritizing the bodily repairs and then plans to run off again and find a job as a rogue healer without working for the government.
Regent was really good in that part. More of that Regent, please.
One thing I didn’t realize until right at the end was how much the Travelers were backgrounded here. Apparently they were present (but perhaps out of earshot?) for the whole healing scene, but they were barely mentioned and none of them said a word. Neither did Rachel, for that matter, but I’m used to that.
Anyway, it seems we’ve found our next destination: An evacuation shelter. I hope it’s the same one Taylor visited during Extermination, though that might be a bad choice on the Nine’s part, since Leviathan fucked the place – and the door in particular – up.
In there we’ll quite likely find Jack, Bonesaw, however many of Bonesaw’s latest victims, and possibly even Siberian. Sounds like fun!
I don’t really have any other predictions for it right now, so… See you there!
I shook my head. “They disappeared. Literally. I’m not sure if they’re dead or if they found a hiding spot.”
Maybe it’s some bullshit Bonesaw did, like hiding them inside other people or something.
“That’s something we can work on,” Tattletale said. “Siberian was heading to a destination, right? Heading southeast?”
…did we know that?
I suppose maybe she didn’t know where exactly the others were when the Undertravelers said the rest of them were fighting them.
“Sure.”
“Did you see what direction Jack and Bonesaw were headed?”
I nodded. “Northeast from a point a few blocks that way.” I pointed.
So they might be getting back together somewhere to the east, then?
“Then I think I know where they went. It’s quite obvious when you think about it. A place they could have researched in advance, unoccupied by anyone of consequence, capable of withstanding hits from virtually anything, supplied with food and water…”
Oh! One of the Endbringer shelters?
Obvious? Maybe only to Tattletale. Still, with her hints, I could follow her line of thought to its conclusion.
“The emergency shelters for Endbringer attacks,” I finished for her.
Bingo.
I nodded. It was still better than nothing.
Sundancer was still clearing a path. I climbed on top of Atlas and rose above the ground, swaying a little in midair as I tried to control his flight enough to hover.
I wonder if Brian accidentally changed something that would affect the flight stability.
“Go,” Grue said.
“What?”
“Scout, search. Check on the fight. You’re restless.”
He knows her well. 🙂
“Don’t like how that thing with Panacea ended.”
Grue shook his head, “Me either, but we should focus on what we can do in the here and now.”
“And I’m restless because I’m frustrated. There’s nothing for me to do here. I can’t handle the fire, can’t do anything if I’m with you guys.”
Guess there’s nothing for it but to go home.
Hey, maybe you could go looking for Jack and Bonesaw? Just keep Atlas and yourself out of Jack’s line of knife.
“Search for Jack and Bonesaw so we can put them down,” Regent said.
*finger guns towards Regent*
“I could try,” Grue said, “I’ve seen her power, but I don’t get the full picture, I might kill it. Or fuck it up somehow.”
Hey, Brian, what were you using your power for earlier?
“Please,” I said.
He raised one hand and created a wave of darkness. It passed over the two girls.
Amy: “What the… Grue!!”
I brought Atlas to Grue, and he laid one hand on the shell. I could feel shifting in Atlas’ mandibles, head, thorax and abdomen.
I hope he can do this. I’m fine with the relay bugs being temporary, but Atlas is too cool to let go of.
The shifting stopped the same instant I saw Glory Girl spear straight out of the top of the cloud of darkness, flying high with Amy in her arms.
Damn it, she figured out what he was doing, didn’t she (does she know about Brian’s new power yet?). Or at least decided to get out of the dark.
“Did you finish?” I asked.
“Couldn’t say,” he sighed.
Guess we’ll have to find out by trying to feed a giant beetle.
What do you feed it, anyway?
I searched Atlas with my power, trying to get a feel for his physiology. As with all the other instances, everything about him was invisible if I wasn’t looking specifically for it, a black hole in the database of knowledge my power provided. He was created, and there was no genetic blueprint that my power could decrypt and analyze to figure out what part served a given function.
Ahh, that makes sense. Normally the power just tells her what it can glean from the DNA.
When I reached the area Grue had affected, I found it even darker, untouchable. The nervous system wasn’t something my power could interface with.
…maybe Regent can?
“I had to model it off of something, and I get the feeling I don’t have the same innate knowledge that Panacea does,” Grue told me. “The only thing I have any knowledge about is myself. I don’t know if it’s going to work, but he has a human digestive system. Or something close to it, that worked with his body. Near as I can figure, everything connects to what it’s supposed to.”
Better hope Grue knows his human biology.
I know I had trouble keeping my focus up when it came to the digestive system. It’s one of the reasons I didn’t take biology when the natural sciences class split up into more specific ones.
“Thank you,” I said. “Really.”
Tattletale was still watching Glory Girl and Amy disappear. She glanced down at Atlas, “You’ll have to figure out a diet that gives him every nutrient he needs, and pay a hell of a lot of attention to him. If you give him something his body can’t process, it could poison him like that.” She snapped her fingers.
Yeeah, makes sense. This isn’t going to be an easy pet to feed.
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