this is crazy

[from_scratch]

Cam is watching a new recording of Atriama, tail swishing in the gap in his couch, and doesn't stop to pause the show when he feels a summons go by.

Comments

[from_scratch]

"Sorry." Cam chases Crawler. "I've got facial recognition drones looking for the others, may find them at any time depending on how low they're lying, I can copy you that too."

[wormcan]

"Do. Here would be best for the monitor, it's the building with the force field. What is Crawler doing now?"

[from_scratch]

"Running away from me. I'm hoping he leads me straight to the others. Can you just get someone nearish -" Cam names the nearest intersection. "- so I can give them the thing and not miss the family reunion or fail to get between him and bystanders? I can also drop it out of the sky onto your forcefield if you like but landing things inside buildings I'm not looking at is tricky."

[wormcan]

"We've got people on the way.
If he does head to the others, the next fight isn't going to be any easier."

[from_scratch]

"Crawler and probably the Siberian are special cases, I see no obvious reason I can't just kill all the others."

[wormcan]

"They're slippery. Not that it'll matter if you can kill them as easily as look at them, but they're easy to underestimate."

Crawler, meanwhile, has continued finding an elsewhere to be.

[from_scratch]

Follow follow. "They must be, if the guy whose power is having knives has lived this long, but I managed one and that just doesn't seem like a full day's work."

[wormcan]

Crawler goes to ground. Literally, in fact; he's somewhere halfway between a cave and a hole. He's hiding, not lurking, but at least the annoying cape has no way of knowing where he is.

[from_scratch]

Cam decides that as long as Crawler is hiding in a way that doesn't involve killing anybody he doesn't know how to improve on this situation right now. "Crawler found a hole in the ground and doesn't seem to be going anywhere or meeting anybody. Where are your people?"

[wormcan]

"On their way. Look up."

Two capes fly down until they're level with Cam. "You're the one who found Crawler?"

[from_scratch]

"Yup." Cam hands them a thing. "Face recognition drones and Crawler's trackers and more immediately relevant trackers I make will report to this, you want spares?"

[wormcan]

"Definitely.

We're spread pretty thin, but there are more on the way.
When Crawler starts moving again, do you think you could hold him still for a clear shot?"

[from_scratch]

"I can immobilize him for a few seconds at a time, but I'm not sure your shots will do any better than mine. Do you have a reasonable testing ground for me to make a mindless copy of him to shoot at?"

[wormcan]

"Mindless copy? Um, probably. Be a bit awkward if it turns out to be hard to get rid of, though."

"I'll show you a space," the other one says. "And you can copy tinker tech, right?"

[from_scratch]

"Yes I can. And the mindless one I can launch into space if it's awkward to have around, it won't wiggle out of a ship."

[wormcan]

"Good. Tinkers always have things saved up for emergencies, like in our case I think Flambe had some kind of energy weapon that might hurt the big guy. But if you can make tinker tech, it might add up to something that actually works enough."

She starts leading the way toward a reasonable testing ground.

[from_scratch]

"I thought of something I didn't try while I was chasing him to his hole in the ground, but I'd rather not bother him with it if it won't help, hence the testing."

Flap flap.

[wormcan]

Flying, flying, landing. Several capes are nearby, ready to test.

"Here we go. Mind, even if this does work it might get vetoed. If the real Crawler probably can't be held still long enough, or something."

[from_scratch]

"Real Crawler can be held still for several seconds but mostly under layers of stuff." Cam makes a basement dweller Crawler.

[wormcan]

"But he can regenerate in less than that."

One of the capes, a Ward, points what looks like a staff topped with a crescent at the mindless lump of monster. There is a whoomph and the air shimmers as a wave radiates toward the Crawler. It eats through the armor and into the body, but over the next few seconds it becomes ineffective and the vaporized pieces grow back. "Grand. Not fast enough. Who's next?"

[from_scratch]

"Me."

Cam tries interpolating the basement dweller Crawler with water at as fine a resolution as he can manage without a microscope.

[wormcan]

Suddenly all the tissues in the Crawler copy are not quite adjacent to whatever they're meant to be connected to. The body sags downward, but then the regeneration kicks in.

[from_scratch]

"Damn."

[wormcan]

"No, that's good. It means he's not immune to whatever you did yet, and hopefully being hit with enough things can overwhelm the regeneration.

Remember I said a lot of tinkers have firepower stored away for emergencies? I talked to the Director, he talked to the other Directors, and now I've got a list."

[from_scratch]

"Cool, let's see it."