Leviathan had dispatched the three flying heroes and was dueling with Narwhal.

Poke him real good!

Although I guess you wouldn’t get very far in given how strong Leviathan’s tissues are. Might wanna stick to your usual forcefields.

That said, for all I know, Narwhal could have more powers.

Ballistic from the Travellers was providing supporting fire, sending trash, dumpsters, rubble and pieces of the street careening into Leviathan.

Ballistic sends stuff shooting off at high speeds… Damn the Manton effect, it would’ve been neat if he could do that to Leviathan himself.

Another try.

Durable layers to body, no conventional organs, irregular biology: Tissues mend from the inside out, layers expanding to fill wounds and integrating into surrounding structures.  Not human.

Of course he can regenerate too.

That last bit is very interesting. Does that mean he was never human, or has the power just subjectively decided that he’s changed enough to not really be human anymore?

I’m leaning towards the former, which raises the question: How did the Endbringers come to be if they are not extremely fucked up parahumans with incredible power?

Knew that much.

Not human: Never was human.

Well, that’s a confirmation on that.

That gave her pause.  But she could imagine Grue shouting at her, “Something we can use!” and that was nudge enough to get her to focus her efforts.  “Weak points.”

The power has been quite clear on Leviathan not having physical weak points, but maybe she can find behavioral or tactical ones?

Remotely controlled?  Tattletale raised an eyebrow.  She hunkered down to to watch the fight, mentally opening those doors that let more information flow.

Leviathan, nonstandard cardiac, nervous systems: irregular biology.

Ooh, time to learn a thing or two.

No standard organs or weak points.  No brain, heart or center of operations for rest of his body.

It kind of sounds like he’s just a mindless, violent sack of blood and meat, but we know he’s got some degree of intelligence.

Irregular biology, no vulnerable organs: body divided into layers, extending down to hyperdurable core body, each layer down is slightly more than twice as durable as previous.

Huh. I guess I spent my lollipop joke too early.

Exterior skin is hard as aluminum alloy, but flexible, lets him move.  3% deeper in toward core of arms, legs, claws, tail, or .5% in toward core of head, trunk, neck, tissues are hard as steel.  6% in toward core of extremities or 1% toward core of main body/head, tissues strong as tungsten.  9% toward core of extremities, 1.5% toward core of main body, head, tissues strong as boron.  12%-

Getting a little more detailed than necessary there.

She had to stop, start again.  Her power did that, if she didn’t focus, kept giving her a steady flow of information but not information she could use.

Much like me when I was younger.

Dragon ejected, skidded to a stop eighty feet away, a smaller suit of armor with thin arms and legs, each tapering down to points.

Nice, she has the sense to wear armor inside her mechs in case this kind of thing is to happen and she has to eject.

The suit Dragon had left behind glowed red, orange, white, then exploded violently around Leviathan, as though every crevice had been packed with high explosives.

Shame about the suit, but every bit of damage they can deal counts.

Leviathan reeled, lashed his tail, and then lunged back toward the gathered capes.  He was intercepted by three flying capes this time, who harried him with superstrength and the case of one hero, an oversized battle axe.

Sweet.

Dragon enters battle with suit packed with explosives, risky, current suit has insufficient room for arms and legs: Suit unmanned.

Ahh, nice. She’s not armored up in case she has to eject – the ejection is a decoy. She’s controlling things remotely!

I told you she wasn’t in the suit at the beach! ;D

The ‘face’ of her armored suit opened up and began discharging a blue-white flame into his face.  The ‘flames’ didn’t move like flames should, spilling off him and down into the water, where they pooled on the road and continued to burn – after a fashion – beneath the water.

Sounds like a sort of… liquid flame. Not a burning liquid, but flame in liquid form. I know that doesn’t make much sense.

Leviathan, for his part, began tearing into Dragon, clawing away layers of armor with each swipe of his claws, almost uncaring as to the liquid fire that was spilling over him..

Oh hey, I guess I was right to call it that.

Between the smoke from the missiles and the steam that arose where the liquid fire touched water, Tattletale was having trouble seeing the battle.

Uh oh. Censor steam, so we don’t have to actually see the deaths of one or more of these heroes?

Tattletale pressed the two buttons on her armband, “Give me a flier to get me to a better vantage point.  Moderate priority.”

Nice. It seems like being able to actually see something makes it easier for her to Know about it, so it’s vital for her to be able to see the action if she’s gonna help.

It took only ten seconds before one of the Silicon Valley capes arrived.  The man with the jetpack gripped her wrists and carried her up a dizzying height to the roof of the nearest building, five stories tall.

Tinker, probably. In fact, if Silicon Valley is a team rather than a descriptor for where this man comes from geographically (isn’t Silicon Valley in California or Arizona? bit of a trek, though I suppose taxiporters would help), then I’d venture to guess that the entire team is made of Tinkers.

She moved to the edge, being careful to stay out of the way of the other capes that were already set up, raining bullets, flames, lasers and other projectiles down on Leviathan at every opportunity.  The Endbringer was still battling Dragon, had dug deep enough through metal and armor to reach the center of her suit.

That is bad. That is very bad.

how many licks does it take to…

Let’s be real, though, one of the biggest takeaways from that was that Tattletale is essentially a supercharged Sherlock Holmes. Nice.

She glanced at the weapons the three hired guns had in hand.

“I’m listening.”

■

And so she became an employee of the mysterious Boss that wouldn’t be so mysterious to her in particular for that much longer.

Lisa accepted the phone and held it to one ear.

“‘Sup?” she injected playfulness and good humor she definitely didn’t feel into her voice, grinned for the benefit of the three adults with guns.

Hehe.

“I apologize for the manner of our meeting, I hope my soldiers were not too rough on you, Lisa Wilbourn,” the voice on the other end was smooth, calm, unruffled, “Or is it Sarah Livsey?”

“Either or,” she replied,  “Lisa these days.”

Hey, names! And yeah, this definitely sounds like Coil.

“As you wish.  I have been watching you for some time, Lisa Wilbourn, I have become aware that you are something special, and I would like to buy your services.”

Word choice, buy vs. hire: large amounts of money involved.
Word choice, buy vs. make an offer: not really a negotiation.

How would you like to become part of a team?