“413 times as much [land in Norway] as New York City” – Is this just a coincidence? I don’t imagine you’d fudge the numbers here but even so.
I wouldn’t do that, no.
I’m thinking that any instance of the number 413 that isn’t a direct result of Sburb filling in the blanks is a result of Andrew Hussie personally time traveling to set it up. Yes, I’m saying Andrew Hussie personally arranged for Norway to be 413 times as large as New York City. Maybe he carved away a bunch of the Norwegian coastline with a spoon.
It’d be easier to manipulate or replace the people involved in New York’s city planning, but do you really expect him to take the easy route?
His blades made that rasping sound as he sharpened them against one another, one edge of each blade, then the other. After doing it just long enough to lull me into a false sense of security, he lunged, blades spearing for my chest and throat.
This guy knows how to manipulate an enemy.
I struck out simultaneously with the piece of wood. It seemed to catch him off guard. I struck too soon to hit him, but he wasn’t my target.
Oooh! I think what Taylor has been setting up is about to break loose now, with this strike.
Y’know, like the bank robbery, which I’m sure will start next chapter. About time, really, after all these Arcs.
I clubbed at the uppermost blade, driving it down toward the floor. I tried to avoid the edge and strike the flat of the blade, but my strike wasn’t spot on. I didn’t see if I’d had any of the desired effect, because he collided with me, both blades striking the armor of my chest.
Honestly, it sounds like they’re about to form a very poor sport pile on the floor. Seriously, only two people, and it does stop from getting taller? That’s just inadequate.
Pain exploded in my collarbone and ribs, but I didn’t experience any of the telltale pain of impalement. My armor had saved me.
It keeps doing that today. She did good work with it. 🙂
This time, his attack was frenzied. If I didn’t know better, I’d have thought he was irritated. I hopped back out of reach of the first swing, then quickly backed up as he followed that up with a series of rapid rotations of his upper body, momentarily becoming a blender-whir of whirling blades.
Well, at least she got the “whirling” part in there.
I was so busy trying not to get hit by the blades that I missed it when he tilted.
Uh oh.
He balanced on one leg and kicked out wide with the other, letting the chain out so it could stretch the seven or eight feet to me. I was knocked back onto the wood pile a second time, landing on the edge and falling to the ground a second later.
She did. Mannequin reached out to extend a blade into the back of her leg, and she fell, but someone else hurried forward to help her.
Ooh! Some people in the crowd are actually carrying on the helping at their own risk now!
Mannequin’s left leg snaked around my throat in an impromptu headlock.
That sounds potentially more effective than slicing.
I tried to slip out, to force his leg apart. Even though I could move it, I couldn’t squeeze my head through the gap.
I think you must’ve misunderstood, Taylor. I said get him to tie himself up, not tie you up. :p
Not counting the time I’d spent lying on the ground, buying time, how long had I lasted? Less than thirty seconds?
To be fair, the only real advantages you had were the armor and a little bit of melee combat training.
Four blades sprung from the calf of his right leg. He extended it high above me, and they began to rotate, slowly at first, then faster, like the blades of a fan. Or a food processor.
It dawned on me as worked through each bedroom in each apartment: I doubted there were five other people in the world, cape or not, who could multi-task like I was.
Heh, yeah, Taylor can be pretty damn efficient that way. I suppose the massive extent to which she can do it at this point does point to it being a part of the power.
It had to be a side-benefit of my power. My consciousness divided a hundred ways, problem solving, performing complex tasks for a hundred different scenarios at once.
Almost like she’s a hivemind with the swarm, huh.
Once each person was awake, I had to warn them. But that wasn’t simple – apartments without power didn’t have light, either.
Ah, right.
Got any fireflies in there?
For many, I could put the bugs on the window and spell out words with their silhouettes, but there were people with blinds and curtains that would obscure that.
See, this is one of those cases where if I’d been reading my own comments as part of the audience, I’d be quoting this:
TC: can’t it be motherfuckin TC: BOTH THINGS.
It’s incredible how often this is applicable when following along with a liveblog, honestly.
I forced myself to use the bug’s sensory inputs, to seek out the biggest patches of light and warmth in each room where a person was being woken up, so the bugs could cluster in those spots and hopefully be seen.
Ooh, following up on that plot thread from 12.3 in a very constructive way, nice!
I felt Tattletale move. Her hand was fumbling at her belt. Was she going for the gun in the largest pouch? No. A pouch near there, just as long, but thinner.
Hmm…?
Removing something made of glass, maybe?
“Sundancer,” I hissed, “Help her.”
Sundancer did. There were pens in the pouch.
Right.
“Help her find the paper,” I said. Jack and his team had wrapped up and were walking away.
Ahh, I see, a message. I suppose she can’t exactly use her face to talk right now.
It was a notepad barely larger than a pad of post-its. Tattletale took the pen that Sundancer held for her, clasping it in a closed fist. She scrawled out one word. ‘Deal’.
…what? Deal… with it? Make a deal?
Then she looked up at me, her eyes wide.
“No,” I whispered. “We have to get you help, and I have to go warn-”
Oh, could she tell what dilemma Taylor was in?
Also that better not be “deal” as in “deal the finishing blow”. Probably better ways to write that, though.
She stabbed at me with the pen and clenched her teeth against the back of my hand, which must have caused her incredible pain. I wasn’t sure if it was her pain and mine, but Cherish turned and gestured for Jack, who was already walking way, to stop.
She might’ve also sensed the despair caused by the dilemma.
“A deal,” I called out, “I don’t-”
Sundancer had ripped off the first sheet, and Tattletale was writing the next message.
What do you have in mind here, Tattle? This better be good, you’re not exactly in prime condition to be doing this if you don’t think it’s important.
I swallowed, “She wants to know what happens if… if more than one person is left at the end.”
Oh yeah, that’s a question I asked a while back. Askers told me in that scenario, there’d probably been opened another slot during the tests, but that can’t always be the case.
“We pit them against one another,” Jack said.
Ah. Well, that makes sense. That was how I initially thought the whole thing was going to go.
The next word- I could barely make it out. ‘Game’.
Deal… game… what, are you challenging the reaper or something?
“This is not an exit. Kudos for the reference,” Tattletale said.
Pfft!
Sharks told me she was holding back some asks until I’d read one line of this chapter – I’m guessing they were about “This is not an exit” being a reference to something. Can’t say I recognize it, but I still appreciate this.
And hey, this line doubles as a little bit of self-congratulation and as lampshading. And perhaps a bit of character development for Jack, if the reference was intentional.
“I try,” Jack replied. He didn’t say anything more, looking us over. I felt a chill as his eyes stopped on me before moving on to Regent and the Travelers.
Apparently it was. I’m looking forward to seeing those asks and finding out what the refrance. 🙂
You know how I can be with references myself, so seeing this makes me like Jack a little bit more than I already did.
For the record, I do know how “puppy” is spelled. I just can’t help but misspell it on purpose when it’s preceded by “wolf”. This is what the refrance.
Coil went on, “If Jack Slash is killed, the event is likely to occur at some point in the more distant future instead.”
Though “more distant” may not be as distant as people would be likely to assume.
So years in the future, but not many.
“Dinah Alcott,” Weld spoke. All eyes turned to the metal-skinned boy.
Oh hey, Weld pieced it together! Nice work, buddy.
“Beg pardon?” Coil asked.
“Thursday, April fourteenth of this year, Dinah Alcott was kidnapped from her home and has not been seen since.
Oh nice, a canon date for the bank robbery. That was back when the exact amounts of time passing were fairly clear, so I’m pretty sure that can be extrapolated to give canon dates for everything that happened in Arcs 1-3. Maybe 4 too.
Dinah had missed several weeks of classes with crippling headaches in the months before her disappearance. Investigation found no clear medical causes. Police interviewed her friends. She had confided to them that she thought she could see the future, but doing so hurt her.”
That must’ve been a pretty cool thing to have a friend who could do at that age.
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