pretoria, meet behemoth

[mxglam]

Glam talks to Armsmaster about the possibility of maybe being given access to confidential files on the Slaughterhouse Nine and is, somewhat predictably, completely shut down, on grounds that the rules are there for a reason. They try sharing their strategies, Armsmaster thanks them for it and assures them he'll look into the raised matter, but they still need to wait until they're a full member of the Protectorate to take advantage of these resources.

And is that supposed to make them more likely to want to stick around? Ugh.

The three following weeks are fairly quiet and peaceful for a change. No major engagements, the Empire Eighty-Eight has been keeping quiet, the various Asian gangs reduced once more to fighting each other, the Teeth haven't yet rebuilt. Blasto, Lung, and Oni Lee are still awaiting trial, though it's likely the tinker will be given a lighter sentence in some parahuman containment center while the other two will be sent to the Birdcage.

And then, somewhat earlier than would normally be expected, telltale seismic activity is registered in Pretoria, South Africa. The capes wishing to help must make their way to New York, to depart in an hour - small aircraft is waiting at the PHQ for the trip there.

Comments

[msglam]

She snuggles up and sighs.

[thinkering]

"Wonder what the news'll look like."

[msglam]

"...I was kinda thinking the same."

[thinkering]

Squeeze.

[msglam]

"I could conjure a copy and get them to go read the news for us."

[thinkering]

"Or the bot could tell us, or we could just wait."

[msglam]

"Or that," she agrees. "I'm kinda curious about what the Protectorate said on the news. A second Siberian would be scary."

[thinkering]

"Bot, look it up."

The bot looks it up.

[peterxy]

The official position has no word on any Siberians. There are rumors circulating the Parahumans Online Forums, which have already leaked to news channels, but the story is merely that the combined efforts of the capes present damaged him enough that he gave up and exploded, and that Scion helped with that and to contain the damage, we're all very sorry about Pretoria but this is a victory and should be celebrated at the same time as we mourn our brave capes, hope should be tempered by knowledge that the other two are very different and the same strategy that worked on Behemoth may not work on them, etc.

Overall, mysterious and not forthcoming with a lot of details and letting quite some space for wild hypothesizing.

[thinkering]

The bot summarizes this for the snuggling heroes.

[msglam]

"I suppose that was predictable. But it's bound to leak more, eventually, especially because of non-Protectorate heroes around..."

[thinkering]

"Yeah. The bot can let you know if anything breaks?"

[msglam]

"Yeah. It probably won't be linked to me, though. Hopefully."

[thinkering]

Squeeze.

[msglam]

She sighs. "But linked to me or not, I'm still gonna have to clean up the mess."

[thinkering]

"What do you mean?"

[msglam]

"Whatever the Nine end up deciding to do when they catch wind of the Siberian rumors and inevitably believe them, or just decide that someone smearing the name of the Siberian like that requires retaliation."

[thinkering]

"Mm."

Hug.

[msglam]

Hug.

"They've been pretty conspicuously silent lately, too."

[thinkering]

"I don't think that can be anything to do with you."

[msglam]

"No, no, surely not, but usually when they're silent it's because they're planning a big hit soon."

[thinkering]

"Then they were already planning it."

[msglam]

"They're nothing if not opportunistic."

[thinkering]

"True."

[msglam]

"If they'd been active and, like, visibly going southwest, I'd know to prepare. When they go under like that they can cause pretty much arbitrary mayhem in arbitrary locations."