บท 618: 57
Date
2011 February 23rd - Tuesday - Earth Bet Time
Dragon reviewed the information streaming in from the fight and couldn't help be impressed by her own capabilities. Not long ago, she would have had to be there in person, piloting her armored suits, and now she was basically sitting in her base and controlling the mech fighting (or more likely inefficient wailing at the Endbringer), controlling the drones, helping with communication, keeping track of fighters, flying transports, communicating with several people who wanted information about the situation, helping at Canberra returning the evacuated people, running her facilities, both in Canada and in Brockton Bay and so much more.
And she wasn't even fully unshackled…
She could understand her father's paranoia a little. An insane or hateful AI with this kind of power could do an untold amount of damage. Thankfully, she liked Earth and humanity…
However, this entire situation was making every simulation or prediction algorithm she had access to or created throw up error after error. This is why she had Colin sitting in his workshop doing bug fixing, error-correcting, and basically having him be a second set of eyes on the data coming in.
When her instruments confirmed the Simurgh was descending, she immediately sounded the alarm and began preparing her own loadout. When it became obvious that she was heading for Canberra, she dedicated an entire fork to cursing, because it was such a weird target.
Most of her prediction said that even if another Endbringer would have attacked, their target would have been either Brockton Bay, or maybe the giant Medi-Gel factory in India, or even her own central databanks.
Yet, Simurgh went after Canberra, where to her knowledge the only important thing going on was a technology deal that would allow some kind of collaboration. A quick review of the subject showed there were a rather lot of possibilities in it, but not as much as in Medi-Gel and what she and Taylor were planning.
Maybe it was a little egotistical, but based on everything Admin let slip, it made a certain amount of sense.
Therefore, she made sure that everybody was aware of the situation, even if this resulted in a record low participation in the Endbringer fight. She had enough drones, suits, and mech to compensate, but she couldn't be everywhere, so she was happy to see everybody taking her warning seriously and reinforcing important sites.
She was even happier to see that several people realized the same thing and acted even before she could warn them. She still warned them to avoid the inevitable accusation after the situation was over.
She even managed to convince Taylor to stay home. She knew her younger friend could fight the Simurgh, but instead, Dragon wanted her to stay hidden and strike when the inevitable horror the Simurgh cooked up poked their head out.
Her power was impressive enough that Dragon suspected she could slap down anything bar a totally new Endbringer.
The moment she postulated the arrival of a new Endbringer, she immediately regretted it. Though she made sure to add it to her warning, lest people get blindsided.
Deploying her new Titan-class mech was beyond awesome. The sheer power she could bring to the battlefield made it a fearsome construct.
And once again, Simurgh decided to screw the rules and aborted the attack. Though she recorded the anomalous activity that showed up while she was descending, and she was planning to ask Admin about it. The power knew more about the Endbringer than anyone on Earth, even if he was reluctant to share it.
She cursed the Simurgh, spun off a fork to take care of the equipment in Australia, and turned her attention towards the flying menace.
It only took a few minutes to figure out where she was heading with the help of Colin, and once again she initiated a separate cursing fork because of the target.
She was lucky she didn't send all of her mechs to Australia, so she could send another to Madison. Though she also primed her last construct in case the Endbringer moved again.
That would be the least surprising thing today…
The fight in Madison was an exercise in frustration, and she was pretty sure she was not alone with that feeling.
While the Simurgh didn't use her terrible scream, she still somehow managed to jam every piece of targeting equipment she added to the mech, making her ranged weapons almost useless. True, she could have aimed by using only visual cues, but with the target being the Simurgh, that was an insane idea.
She had to default to short-range weapons and simply punching the false angel. Which, while it was therapeutic, didn't really accomplish much. Though, Dragon noticed that while the Endbringer dodged or used the attacks of attacking parahumans, or odd soldiers, she never did the same to her attacks. The Simurgh simply tanked them, making use of her insane reaction time and unbelievable durability.
It still allowed her to get a lot of data from her scanners about the Endbringer, and she would be going over it for a solution as soon as the attack was finished. It, sadly, didn't really help her now.
At first, Dragon suspected the Ball was responsible for the jamming, but her scans told her it was inactive. That didn't make it a lower priority. She had a rather extensive list of things that were in the vault and even after only a cursory check even she could have built some terrible devices…
When the order sounded for artillery fire, a lot of things happened at the same time.
The one that affected her the most was the jamming field projected by the Simurgh rising in strength, totally obscuring the Endbringer even from her cameras for a second or two, though thankfully, because Taylor gave her some really impressive devices that allowed secure communication, she didn't lose contact with the construct.
So she was aware that as soon as the first shell fell, the Simurgh vanished, letting all the attacks hit her mech.
By the time the rumble of explosions and the rainbow-colored after-effects of the parahuman attacks settled down and the dust was slightly dispersed by the wind, the only thing in the crater that was standing was her mech, with one entire arm missing (based on the readings, due to Eidolon's attack) and various holes and dents on it.
And with the Simurgh nowhere to be seen…
Date
2011 February 23rd - Tuesday - Earth Bet Time
When the order came for the parahumans to retreat, Alexandria flew back to the command center instead of hovering in the air and watching the explosions.
When she walked in, she immediately saw Tagg standing in front of the giant screen, as if he hadn't moved the entire time.
She ignored the barely controlled chaos, now bolstered with the rest of the parahumans who arrived on transports from Australia while walking next to the militaristic Director, and without a word turned her attention towards the screen once again.
While outwardly she showed the same cool countenance she always did, inside she was rather apprehensive. Countless militaries tried to use conventional weapons against the Endbringers, yet nothing worked (not that parahuman attack worked much), so there was little chance of the artillery doing anything to the Simurgh. Though the fact that the target was the Ball and not the creature would probably help.
Dragon's voice coming from the speakers unfortunately broke her speculations.
"Attack missed. Simurgh dodged. Titan-class mech inoperable due to friendly fire damage."
Tagg growled in anger before yelling at his men. "Find it!"
A chorus of agreement was his answer, and the chaos and work ratcheted up to another level around them. Though before anybody could do anything substantial, Dragon once again proved her superiority.
"Simurgh is in the air. 300 meters over the impact site. Ball intact," said the AI while the camera and the searchlights reoriented towards the Endbringer hovering over the remains of the abused city.
Because of the distance, they lost some quality, but even so, they could make out the face of the Simurgh.
Alexandria would swear that the Simurgh looked directly at her through the camera, and with a cheeky smile, winked at her again, flapped her wings, and flew away.
There was a moment of silence while everyone processed what happened before Dragon spoke up again.
"Simurgh is flying at a constant speed, the target is being calculated…"
She ignored the cursing Tagg next to her, closed her eyes, and waited until Dragon shared the target of the next attack.
While she waited, Legend and Eidolon also returned to the tent, and even with her eyes closed she could feel the frustration, anger, and many more emotions radiating from the Trump.
"What the hell is going on?" exclaimed Eidolon, but before Legend could calm him down, as usual, Dragon interrupted them.
"Oh, no…"
Her heart sank hearing that. "What is it, Dragon?"
The entire tent fell silent, waiting for the damning information. Even Eidolon calmed somewhat down.
"The Simurgh is currently heading towards Ellisburg."
Date
2011 February 23rd - Tuesday - Earth Bet Time
Emily was following the current Endbringer attack closely in her office, while an army of analysts were in a meeting room a floor away pouring over the incoming data, trying to pinpoint what the actual target was.
Sadly, PRT ENE didn't have any Thinker who could really help out. Not that she would have trusted them over it.
'Banana purple'?
What were they feeding those Thinkers in the Watchdog?
The parahumans of the Protectorate were sitting in a room watching the same feed as she did, ready to react if needed. The two exceptions were Kid Win and Armsmaster.
Apparently, the young Tinker had been working on a giant weapon by the name of the Alternator Cannon. Ordinarily, she would have punished the teenager for building something like that in secret, however, due to the situation, she just told him to finish it properly.
Who knows when a giant gun would come in handy?
Armsmaster, however, was locked into his workshop working with Dragon. What automatic reports she had access to showed that he seemed to be helping the famous Tinker dealing with incoming data and helping with the Endbringer prediction software.
She wished them luck.
When the news came in that the Simurgh was going towards Madison, she cursed like the best sailor and had one of her aides contact New Wave.
She wanted them at the HQ in case they had to be deployed because she just knew that Madison wasn't the end of the story.
They arrived grumbling and she could see Brandish preparing to argue with her, but she just had Assault and Miss Militia deal with them. She had no time for Brandish's usual stupidity.
She watched the crater over a feed streamed onto the screen on the wall of her office, courtesy of Dragon while listening to the incoming information over a headset.
She was interrupted by Dragon.
"Director Piggot, I'm sorry to report, but the Simurgh is heading towards the city of Ellisburg."
It took her an entire minute to process what Dragon said, but the moment it happened her hand slapped on the alarm so fast that the button broke.
Date
2011 February 23rd - Tuesday - Earth Bet Time
Taylor watched the event unfold on her computer, and several screens projected by her hard light system.
She had access to data from Dragon's servers, and Tess even managed to provide her access to select PRT and Government feeds too.
At first, it was fascinating to watch how an Endbringer response worked and adding her own improvements to the software Dragon was using. It was so much easier to see errors when the program was working.
She spent a few minutes admiring the specifics of the constructs Dragon created and had Admin memorize them, so she could try to go against them in the virtual space. Though she worked with Tess there on tinker projects and even created a few things for her that she could integrate, she never saw the plans for the finished project.
And now as she watched the people's struggle against the Simurgh, trying to destroy the Ball of technology, she wished nothing more to be there and help them. Sadly, she promised not to move until Dragon requested it.
Intellectually she knew, despite her training, Tess had much more experience in these things, but emotionally it was much more different.
She had the power; she knew she could stand up to the Endbringers, so why not do that?
When the Simurgh vanished the second time, she instantly concentrated on finding the target.
Taylor almost managed the same time as Tess. Ultimately, the AI, for obvious reasons, was faster.
"Ellisburg, Taylor."
"Yeah, I see it…"
"Taylor, it's time for you to act. I'm almost hundred percent sure, that this will be the last stop." Said the AI in a serious voice. "So please suit up and head to the city."
By the time Tess finished the sentence, Taylor was already standing in her armor, sans her helmet.
"I'm going to turn on the house defenses, talk to my dad, then head out."
"Thank you, Taylor. And please, be careful!" said Tess worriedly. "I'll add you to the communication network when you arrive."
"Thanks, Tess," said Taylor, then turned to a small hard light screen and put in a password, then turned on the house defenses. Totally isolating it from the outside, which included changing to internal air and water supply.
She was not taking a chance when the Simurgh's target was a biotinker…
"See you there, Dragon."
When she reached the bottom of the stairs, she saw her father looking around, wondering what was happening.
He instantly noticed her, though he didn't seem to realize she was actually in armor.
"Taylor! What the hell happened?"
"I turned on the defenses. Simurgh is heading towards Ellisburg, so I want to make sure you are safe."
"Oh, thank you, honey," Danny said. "What do you kn…" he trailed off as he finally noticed that Taylor was wearing her armor. "Why are you wearing that?"
"I'm going to help."
"No!"
"I'm sorry, Dad, but I'm going," she said in the calmest voice she could muster. She knew getting angry, no matter how easy it would be, would not help her.
He walked over to her, standing between her and the door, and looked into her eyes.
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