lung, meet rewind

[msrewind]

She gets the note just before lunch. She's in the PHQ in less than twenty minutes, then she knocks on Piggot's door politely.

Comments

[acanofworms]

"And don't provoke him," Armsmaster warns. "That could also set him off early. Transit, Lorica, ETA for arrival at the parents' location?"

It is farther away from Lung's, and in a different direction, closer to the docks.

[thinkering]

"I've only got a mediocre path for him, it could take a few tries."

[acanofworms]

"Stall him," Armsmaster instructs.

[msrewind]

"I will make you an offer. You work for me, they stay alive. You slip up, you tell the heroes, I suspect you of stealing a candy, they die."

"You seem awfully confident in your ability to keep them hidden from me."

Lung frowns.

"You could try to encourage me with something more than threats that will make me try to get creative to avoid?" she asks, and rubs her fingers together in the universal 'money' gesture.

[acanofworms]

"I said do not provoke him."

[msrewind]

"I have you outnumbered. I could set you on fire faster than you can use your power. I could make you hurt. I could kill you."

"If you trusted that you wouldn't be holding my parents hostage," she points out.

His frown deepens. "I would prefer having your cooperation."

"And threatening my parents is the best way you could find to have it?"

He remains silent.

"You ever hear of carrots and sticks? You're all sticks, no carrots, and you'll fall, Lung."

He looks at one of his thugs and says, "Kill the father."

"Wait, no-"

[mxglam]

As soon as Glam notices where this is going they conjure the designed protection around both parents-

-but the bullet is already in Rewind's father's brain.

[acanofworms]

"Fuck! Abandon covertness, converge now!"

[sundayfish]

Transit goes in.

[thinkering]

Bots swarm, golems break into a run -

[msrewind]

It'll still take a few more minutes for Transit and the real Rewind to arrive at the parents' location, but the moment Lung notices the diamond armor that sprouted around Rewind's parents he explodes, and then jumps at the copy, trying to burn it to a crisp.

[mxglam]

Except the copy grins and disappears, along with its feed. The other camera Glam conjured is quite enough for three Glam-copies to appear (now that the thugs are expecting such intervention it's just so much easier).

And the heroes start swarming into the warehouse.

[thinkering]

Lorica's bots are on the case for Transit's pathing; Lorica herself keeps an eye on everything and does strategic advice.

[acanofworms]

"Windflower, fill him with darts before he gets bigger!" Armsmaster says, arriving on his bike. "Glam, contain the unpowered, everyone else focus on Lung- does anyone have eyes on Oni Lee?"

He's nowhere to be seen.

[thinkering]

"He seemed to need line of sight, I'll have a little warning before he can land on anybody -"

[mxglam]

Glam's copies start dealing with unpowered thugs, there and where Rewind's parents are. "Silica, need a hand," they say, because they have a finite amount of attention and her golems are more effective versus unpowered people than versus Lung himself.

[acanofworms]

Glimmer slides and slams bodily onto Lung, who's still not large enough to shrug that off and is thrown onto a wall. "Windflower, now!"

[thinkering]

Windflower darts him.

Bots help; a cocktail of tranquilizers and poisons probably won't kill him but it's not going to do him any favors.

[acanofworms]

It is indeed not! But he's growing bigger, so it's unclear whether they're having any effect when he roars and generates enough fire to scorch the wall he's been thrown at, as he jumps to his feet and kicks the wall to throw himself forward.

"Continue trying to poison him when you can, use your strongest shots," Armsmaster says, and turns his halberd into a long, electrified morningstar which he hits Lung with. "Miss Militia!"

[msrewind]

"Are we there yet?"

[sundayfish]

"Just about."

It takes a couple false starts, but eventually he makes the last hop in.

[mxglam]

Glam has pretty thoroughly neutralized the few thugs in the place (a small apartment in a small, old, dingy apartment building somewhere), and when Rewind and Transit arrive, Glam dismisses the armor encasing Rewind's mother. They keep the one holding her father, though.

[msrewind]

And she proceeds to boop him back to life, which causes the armor to disappear and the bullet itself to return to where it'd been inside the thug's gun, from which position it falls onto the floor. She hugs him gingerly (still in her armor), and her mother hugs them both.

When they disentangle, Rewind says, "I'm going to make him pay for that."

[sundayfish]

"Get yourself back to the last hop point," Transit tells Rewind, "can't likely carry all three of you."

[msrewind]

"I'm gonna go kick Lung's ass is what I'll do," she growls. "My parents are safe, he won't be. I'll fly there."