Sentinel 9.3: Tick Talk

Source material: Worm, Sentinel 9.3

Originally blogged: December 30, 2017 – January 1, 2018

You know what? I’m kinda bored. Let’s slip in one last liveblog session before New Year’s!


Last night we saw Brockton Bay from the perspective of Flechette, as she tried to patrol with Sophia only to find out how comfortable the latter was with violence and revenge. Then she went and pursued cameraderie and love with the other needle gal, Parian, and it was sweet.

This chapter, we’re… following another hero. That’s honestly all I’m sure of. When the chapters start switching between different POV characters, it’s very difficult to predict anything solidly, as you’ve seen time and time again with the Interludes.

So right now, I think it’s best that I just let the chapter come to me, and we’ll see what happens!


Hm. It seems we’re at Arcadia High, today. But who’s today’s lucky student?


Hehe, nice.

Clockblocker looked around the room.

Ooh, Clocky’s up next. Excellent.


Makes sense that Weld and Flechette would end up sitting together. They’re both the “new kids in town”, and they already knew each other from before.


Huh, not exactly the two I’d generally picture together.


…they kind of have something to relate over now.






Because of course she does.



Only thirteen people present, altogether.

So there are usually more around?



I guess we didn’t really miss anything noteworthy while Clocky was considering who all were present.


101 and 102, I presume.


…yeah, I suppose that’s a fair assessment.

“For this class, I want you to think. Parahumans. People with powers. They’ve been around for nearly thirty years. Where did they come from? Where did they go? Where did they come from, Cotton Eyed Joe?”


Big questions that I’m curious about the answers to myself.

I feel like I should note that it’s entirely possible to write a story like this and not address this question at all. Basically saying, “powers started showing up one day, that’s all we know”, and leaving it at that. But here’s the thing: Worm hasn’t left it at that. It’s been made enough of a deal out of by the story itself that even if I weren’t spoiled on something called “shards” playing a role in this, I’d feel entirely justified in expecting some form of explanation, implicit or explicit, coming up over the course of the story.


That’s a good point. Pretty much everything, including powers, can be used as a weapon somehow, but it’s true that a lot of powers we’ve seen are pretty clearly weapons first and foremost. Miss Militia’s in particular is quite clear about that.


Speaking of Miss Militia, I feel like she might have a thing or two to say about this topic and Karahindiba.


Maybe because the talents in question tend to come with safety measures for their wielders?


Sounds like an excellent starting point.


Aha! So there is some theorizing around that in-universe. Niice.

Doesn’t necessarily mean there is a correlation, but it does mean there’s enough evidence that a significant portion of the scientists think there might be one.


Hm, makes sense. Psychological stress is what Taylor went through, and she’s a Master. And whatever happened to Labyrinth (a Shaker) was also very likely psychological in nature, and the power didn’t help on that front.

This also makes me more curious as to what happened to Tattletale.

Also: Which classification does Grue fall under? On one hand, his darkness does have an area effect that shakes up the battlefield, but it’s not really very similar to the “feel” of Labyrinth or Vista’s powers. With those two it’s more like they change reality itself.

I don’t think he fits into any of the other categories any better, though.


If this is accurate, then Tattletale probably went through something that hurt her mentally far more than physically. Meanwhile, Taylor was physically manhandled and forced into the locker, and ended up with the power to control the quite physical bugs.


One sibling to another is a curious one. It’s almost like the parents are carriers of a predisposition, but not necessarily predisposed in their own right.

Maybe everything started a generation earlier than everyone thinks, but the first people affected weren’t able to get powers themselves?

It’s entirely possible that people like Heartbreaker tailor their abuse of the potential parahumans in order to try to control what sort of power the latter might get to fit with what the former needs.

Relatedly, though, how does this all interact with the supposed tendency of second-generation parahumans to have easier trigger events? How does playing basketball fit into Garth and Rogers’ hypotheses?


It seems this class is going to be built primarily of Garth and Rogers.

Also, Pelham, huh? I have a feeling we’ll find out more about them at some point. Or is that the other half of New Wave?

*blog search*

Ah, yeah, Shielder’s civilian name was Eric Pelham.

Moving on, then.


We did see differences between the members in spite of significant similarities.

Similar trigger events and related individuals, similar powers.

Similar trigger events too, huh. That clouds it a tad, I suppose.


This is interesting stuff.


She’s probably used to it.

Not that I’m saying she isn’t asleep or despondent.


“There’s people going fucking crazy out there, and you’re talking trigger events.”


Yeah, I see where you’re coming from.


Yeah, that’s probably true.

On the other hand, it’s probably not healthy to be out patrolling all the time like it seems you want to. I totally get why you want to, but to save other people you also need to take care of yourself.

He shifted restlessly, annoyed, angry.


That last tidbit may be a result of more people experiencing trigger events in undeveloped countries.


…yikes. This is what happens when you don’t have an official PR organization, I suppose.



So in other words, people with lots of powers probably had lots of bad things happening on top of each other. Sheesh.

…what the hell happened to Eidolon?


She turned in her seat, “Sure.”

…that’s not really the impression I got last chapter, but I guess each of the ways she can make things defy physics might count separately?


“Not that I know of.”

Oh, okay, it seems I misunderstood.

So if several people get their powers together, each of them will likely have more powers. Which means that Endbringer attack is likely to create especially powerful parahumans.

Also, it’s not like that hypothetical organization trying to trigger more parahumans [here] needed any more incentive to target lots of people at a time.

(Incidentally, while looking for that post, I also came across Tattle telling us about third-world countries having more parahumans, so I guess that’s not news.)


Considering the whole secrecy thing, this is definitely possible.

Flechette frowned, “Yeah. A rather persistent villain.”

“Worth thinking about.”



He has a point.


But yeah, he could’ve put that a bit more nicely.

I stand by my understanding of Weld as a well-meaning kid who struggles with understanding other people’s emotions and social cues. Possibly autistic or something similar.


I like whoever asked that. Thank you.

I still wonder what sort of trigger event causes someone to develop such a fluid power.


Endbringers, except it seems like people didn’t know that they fell under “parahuman-related elements” rather than “parahumans” when this video was recorded.

Evidently, though, there must be more phenomena along these lines for the category to be a thing.


Ah yeah, I guess he deviates from the norm pretty damn heavily.




Hm, interesting. Nilbog was (were?) introduced in the same chapter as the Endbringers and the Slaughterhouse Nine, though Nilbog was more in line with the latter, among the really dangerous fuckers. Apparently they are debatably out of the ordinary somehow?

“Perhaps a subject for a course paper.

Very debatably, apparently.



Oh yeah, wasn’t Weld described as a case 53 in Interlude 7, before we knew what that meant and that he had a background fitting the usual narrative of Upsilon’s victims?


Yeah, unless Wildbow is deliberately misleading us.

I figure the only reason we don’t know of an Upsilon tattoo is that his skin is too metallic to put ink in.


But under that theory, where did his power come from? Is he an alien or something? He does have a highly alien vibe to him.

This, however, raises questions about where Scion came from.

Sometimes I should read one more sentence. 😛


Oh yeah, that’s that guy who got killed and showed the world that parahumans were flawed, wasn’t it?

*rereads a bit from Interlude 1*

Yep, Andrew Hawke, a.k.a. Vikare, clubbed down at a basketball riot in 1989. Also the last person on the boat to make physical contact with Scion during his debut in 1982.


Yeah, that’s kind of an issue with this theory. You could still make a case for it spreading further from other parahumans, I suppose. Hell, Taylor’s trigger event was directly caused by, among others, a fellow parahuman.

I don’t think I’m going to subscribe to this theory myself, but there are ways to make it work.


I suppose that covers the variant of the patient zero theory that I just talked about.


Hm, interesting.

There’s definitely something going on with regards to genetic relations, but apparently they’re sure that’s not the original cause, at least.


That’s a handy place to keep it.

Pun most certainly intended.

From: Mom


Uh oh.

Should’ve known something was up when he considered spending time with his family on par with being out on patrol, among things he’d rather be doing.


Least you could do is say you’ve got to go, but fair enough.

It was ringing as he closed the door behind him.



Not a bad name.

“How bad is it?”

“As bad as last weekend. Worse.”





Sounds like a good way to use the power.



Crack theory: This isn’t an infection. Clockblocker’s dad ran into a trigger event and gained a power that is changing his biology over time.

I don’t think that’s the case, but it crossed my mind, so I’m putting it down here.

“So he’s going to die.”

“I’m sorry.”

This is probably really hard to face for everyone involved.

“A few hours? Days? A week?”

“The doctor says it’ll be the next few days.”

He clenched his fist, relaxed it. Not fair.

As if Clockblocker didn’t have enough to worry about with the state of the city, it’s all on top of this? No wonder he’s not in the greatest of moods these days.


“Come by, Dennis. Before it’s too late.”

“I’ll try.”

“I love you.”

“Love you too.”


I’m sorry, Clocky.

He hung up, paused to compose himself.

Not fair.

Not at all.


Hm? What does he want to talk to Glory Girl about?

Loss of family members?



Sooo, why are you here exactly? Just wanting to get away from some things, but still be around people?

“Oh. Then why are you here?”


I see. They did lose a lot of manpower. Neither pun on that word intended, but both appreciated and endorsed.

I can’t blame them if some of the remaining members have decided to retire after the events of Extermination.

Hang on, I just realized something.

How the hell did I make it through an Arc called Extermination without making a single Dalek joke?

“Are you? Joining?”


Why? Because she’s been essentially a vigilante, due to the nature of New Wave?


…which portraits?


Ahhh. Memorials for some, painful reminders for others.


They sort of already do, what with the memorial on Captain’s Hill, though that’s more for everyone than for specifically the two Wards.




Ohhhh, now I get it. I’m a dumb. Of course he wanted to hear if Glory Girl could get Panacea to help out.


Nasty stuff.



Knowing Panacea, she’ll be willing to, but not necessarily to prioritize him over all the other people suffering after Leviathan’s antics.



And yeah, I didn’t really see any real reason for Glory Girl to say no, other than maybe her emotional state – though she does seem to have recovered somewhat.


Sounds good.

And yeah, like, Amy cares a lot about helping as many people as she can, but she’s also reluctant to value one life over another.

“Thank you,” he said, “Really.”


Heh, nice. Sounds like a good time.

“For sure.”


“Kind of having a moment here, guys!”

“Everything okay?” Weld asked.


Fair enough. The one who really doesn’t need another thing to worry about right now is you, but it does apply a lot to the others too.

“Things are okay,” Clockblocker spoke, carefully.

Some things are okay.

Not all of them, but some things.





I kind of figured they were on a time limit given that they didn’t flagrantly abuse the pause function to discuss, like with the comments about Flechette’s trigger event, without missing stuff.


Yeeah, probably gonna take a lot to get Clocky to like Weld at this point.


Between 9.1 and now, Vista seems like a rather perceptive girl, emotionally and socially speaking. A counter to Weld, in that sense.


…that’s a good point. In some ways, Weld is quite privileged.

He censored himself for his junior teammate.

I like that, even though we already know Vista has no apparent qualms with using the other F word herself. :p

The censoring says more about Clocky than about Vista.


Rumor has it he eats it sometimes too.


Aw. Yeah, try not to get too harsh.


To quote a certain pre-teen from two chapters ago: “Yeah, you fucked up.”


It’s not easy to win a race against someone who can make the goal come to them and move away from you.



Oh cod I forgot she was still there when he made that comment about Gallant

You fucked up, Clocky. You really fucked up.

Is Glory Girl angry enough to let it out on Clocky’s dad by not doing Clocky that favor she just said she’d do?



He nodded.


Hoo boy, hypocrisy on top of everything else wrong with what Clocky just said and did.


His team, maybe. He himself? I’m not sure about that.


She might be, but she’s kind of intimidating to begin with.


Okay, so when I first met Victoria and Amy, I liked them a lot. Over time, some of my hype for Victoria faded, though.

But this? She just stuck a jetpack on her back and rocketed back up even higher than before.

Wait, she doesn’t need a jetpack, she can fly.

“Okay. Right, okay.”


Hell yes.

He ran.

Definitely don’t get the sense I’m forgiven, there.

Yet Victoria focused on helping to set things right between Clocky and the other person he upset, no matter how much it hurt her.


Good to know Clocky has enough sense to check there, in spite of the awkwardness of entering.

(Which, by the way, is bullshit. Gendered bathrooms are bullshit. There’s literally no good reason to have them that I’m aware of.)


It’s gonna be hard to approach her if she doesn’t want to be approached.

“I’m sorry,” he spoke to her back.

“You’re a jerk.”

Good start, opening with that. If you didn’t, you’d risk suddenly being far away from her.

“I am. I’m the worst jerk.”

Heh. Yeah, sometimes it can be good to go along like this.


Both of the girls are concerned with how it affected the other, not just themselves. I like that.


I think it counts for a lot that Clocky actually mentions that he’s not sure how true that is and that he still intends to make it up to her, because I feel like if he didn’t, Vista would absolutely guess that it wasn’t okay and get even more annoyed/angry at Clocky for seemingly having taken it at face value.

She hung her head.



Seriously, Clocky literally couldn’t have picked a worse pair of people to speak ill of Gallant in front of. At least among the cast we’re familiar with.



Off and on.

Kind of like this song but without the finality, I suppose. (And yeah, I realize the finality is the most important part of that song.)


It’s probably for the best that Vista didn’t explicitly confess (though she didn’t exactly hide it either). Even if he were single, it’s not like he was in a position to accept without being a creep. Better to just let her enjoy his company one-sidedly.

I have a hard time believing he wasn’t fully aware of this. Especially considering his power involved emotion.

“He liked you. He was fond of you.”


Shame Vista never caught on to this, though.



Fair enough.


Hah, nice.

Vista smiled slightly.




Aw, Vista…


Ahaha, there he goes again.


Oh hey, either the info in Agitation was outdated or she’s had a birthday since then.

Also, that means Weld was wrong in 9.1, unless the birthday just happened. He got told by a Real Certified (Barely) Teen.



Basically, Clocky’s getting 8.3′d everywhere he goes. It’s nice that he’s opening up about it a bit, at least.



This seems like an important realization to have. Guess you’ve got one more person to apologize to, eh?





It doesn’t seem like her primary emotional reaction, but there might be some anger tucked away there too.


tfw the 13-year-old with a crush on one of the dead guys has it all more together than you

Seriously, though, I’m really liking Vista. Good kid.




People deal with bad stuff and pressure in many different ways. This isn’t the healthiest, but it is one of them.



Hehe, yeah. It kind of seems like you might be the toughest one here, sometimes, in some ways.


“Want to go back to class?” she asked.

“If you’re okay?”

She nodded.


I’m glad they got to work these things out a bit.


Um. Trouble? Or is it just patrol time?


Trouble it is.

Also, I like the word choice “informed them”, following a statement that should be especially obvious to them.

Alright, looks like we’re heading out to see the trouble for ourselves rather than have Weld explain it to us.

There’s plenty of chapter left, it’s 3 AM, and this seems like a fantastic breaking point, so I’m going to stop here for the year. See you in 2018 (or whenever you’re reading it, for you fancy future people) as we find out what sort of “trouble” is afoot!

Ooh, maybe it even involves Taylor’s plan? I’ll have to wait and see.

[End of session]



[link to this Reddit writing prompt]

The first time I killed a man, I swore I’d never do it again.

Keep reading

Early during my session tonight, my friend Loreweaver posted this short story. I personally thought it was brilliant, and it just so happens to be a superhero story with a tone much like Worm’s, so I think it will appeal to just about all of you as well. Go read it! 😀

(#lore has not yet read worm)

[If Tumblr dies, the story can also be found as a comment to the prompt, here.]


[For clarity going in: These next posts are asks, not session 2.]

The rating system isn’t so much a description of their powers but of their capabilities. It’s what the PRT uses to get a read on what to look for when fighting parahumans.

Fair point. Technicalities don’t matter that much unless they impact combat significantly.

I’m really glad you discussed the issue of “scale” in your last predictions post. Early on in your liveblog, I was dying a little bit because “Oh Krix, you have /no idea/ the size of the story and the elements that are coming!” (Remember when you thought it might just be a high school drama?!) But now you have a better idea and I’m just really glad to see your sense of scale expand appropriately. 🙂

Hah, yeah… this story and world have just been constantly expanding. It makes it hard to tell what’s important sometimes.

Wildbow has struck an odd balance between the benefits and drawbacks of not following the law of conservation of detail. On the plus side, plenty of dud information makes it harder to correctly deduce the plot despite the evidence being there, the world feels a lot more real, and there are lots of hooks for fanfiction authors to work off of. On the minus side, you get this effect, where it’s hard to tell not only which details matter, but which subplots matter in the grand scale.

And honestly? I’m inclined to say all of them matter, even though some are definitely on a higher scale.

You keep saying Interlude 4 when you mean Interlude 3. Interlude 3 was the post-bank-robbery Wards interlude, Interlude 4 was Brutus being a good dog. Also, RIP Aegis, Gallant, and Brutus.

Whoops! Yeah, I think that’s an error that’s fair to go back and fix. It’d be a different story if I’d been wrong about which Interlude something was in and actually meant the Brutus Interlude, but I was absolutely talking about the Wards Interlude.

I don’t know what the name for Parian/Flechette is, but I do know it’s a popular ship, so somewhere someone’s got to have a name for it.


There ARE loads of Lily/Sabah shippers but I don’t recall ever seeing a ship name, which is weird. I guess the Wildbow fandom just doesn’t really do ship names. :/


I think that Needlepoint is the ship name for Lily/Sabah


I don’t know of any ship names for Parian and Flechette, but how about Pins & Needles?


You caught on to the hints far quicker than the last live blogger that got to that part! As for ship names, Needle and Thread certainly fits.


Needlepoint! Is the ship name i prefer. There are probably others. These others are blatantly inferior. (Pun ship names are the best. Like the ship name for Taylor/Lisa: Smugbug.)

Nice! I like Needlepoint. Certainly a lot more elegant than “needle gal pals”.

YAY you finally reached Lily’s interlude! Her and Sabah are second only to Rosemary as my favorite ship from anything ever!!!

I really liked their interactions. I hope it works out for them! 😀

A fun little bit of Stealth World building many people miss: The full name of Uganda in our world is Republic of Uganda not People’s Republic of Uganda. Also for Parian/foil Shipping I prefer Needle and Thread.

Huh, that’s interesting. I guess things went a little redder for Uganda in the Wormverse, presumably for parahuman-related reasons.

Stalker could be cheating at track and field yeah but honestly with all the hero-ing she’s probs in good enough shape to be real good at track and field without needing to cheat

Yeah, that’s true. That’s what I was assuming before the bit that made me consider the possibility of cheating.

To my knowledge there is no WoG on Weld’s meme, but when the question was asked on the fan subreddit, the overwhelmingly upvoted suggestion was that it should be cheesy metal puns: “FIRST I FIGHT EM. THEN I BARIUM”; “PERP CARRYING DRUGS? BETTER CESIUM”; “THINK THEY CAN TAKE ME? I ZINC NOT”, and so on…

I love this so dium much. 😀

[Hopefully you don’t find my puns to be too boron.]

“Ironic, isn’t it. All of this trouble is caused by a kaiju bringing in too much water, and the one thing they find themselves lacking is water.”

“Water, water, every where, Nor any drop to drink” – Samuel Taylor Coleridge

A highly appropriate quote here. 🙂

I love surprises. Especially surprise liveblog sessions.


Oh, really? Maybe I should stop doing #next posts, then, and make every liveblog session a surprise… o:)

(#nah i’m kidding)

You might want to google “witch burnings Africa”. Or maybe you shouldn’t…. Let’s just say you don’t need superpowers for people to do horrible things.

Oh, yikes, the professor was talking about a real world event? From context it seemed reasonable to assume that it was brought up in Parahumans 101 because the “witches” in question were parahumans.

I suppose if this happened after 1982, then it’d be like the real African witch burnings except that some of the witches were parahumans.

Alright, so I googled it, and while it doesn’t mention Uganda specifically (it does mention other specific countries), the Wikipedia article on “Modern witch-hunts” does list sub-Saharan Africa as one of the hotspots for them.

Anyway, yeah, having superpowers or magic is not a requirement for people to do horrible things to you under the belief that you do. I guess if that tells me anything about the Wormverse, it’s that parahumans were likely only a small fraction of those killed in the Ugandan witch burnings.

Your probably going to get a few of these, but flechette states that she gets an intuitive understanding of angles, trajectories and timing from her secondary powers, in addition to the physics breaking touch

Flechette mentions her superpowered sense of timing in the last chapter; there may be something else she just didn’t mention or I forgot?

Ah, right, those count separately. That makes a bit more sense. 🙂

Weld does have the Upsilon tattoo. It’s just branded in his heel. Search your blog for heel, you’ll find the citation.

Oh, really?

…I was prepared to say “huh, there it is”, but blog search only found Shadow Stalker smacking a guy. Blog search is a bit unreliable at times, though, so that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s not there. Which chapter should I look for it in?

His heel, huh. He’s got a really tough body and a mark on his heel… It might not be a weak point, per se, but hi there, Achilles.

“And I guess Lung is a Blaster specifically because his pyrokinesis doesn’t belong in the Striker category, then.” Correct, Lung would be a Brute/Changer/Blaster with a low Mover rating (thanks to his wings).

I see how you came to that conclusion, but we actually know Lung’s classification from Interlude 6: “Brute 4-9*, Blaster 2-6*, fire and heat only.” [here]

The reason I brought it up in the first place was that when this was revealed, I was surprised to see Lung’s pyrokinesis described as “blast”ing after we’d seen it be far more versatile than a literal interpretation would imply. I wasn’t saying “I guess Lung is a Blaster” so much as “I guess this is why Lung is a Blaster”. 🙂

The needle gals by LinaLeeZ, submitted by mhplayer!

I love the designs! Especially Flechette’s costume, with the arrows and excellent colors. Lily’s civilian face (…maybe not the best way to put it, but I’m gonna stick with it) is great, too. She looks lovely.

Rachel Lindt by somnolentslumber, submitted by cedeelbe!

Damn, that build! It’s pretty obvious that she can kick your ass with or without her dogs. The colors are nice, too. 🙂

Tattletale by lisawilbourn (self portrait?), submitted by john-loves-broadway!

My favorite character in one of my favorite colors. What more could I ask for, really? I especially like the expression and the liney/sketchy way the hair is drawn. 🙂

[Session 2]
I haven’t liveblogged since last year, wow. Let’s finish up 9.3!


This city is such a mess right now.

Yet there’s no way of knowing whether or not this building was like this before.


…alright, sounds like that was an even newer development than I thought it might be.

“Yeah,” Weld spoke.


Huh. Someone destroying buildings… stealthily?






Sheesh. Someone’s got a flair for dramatic desecration.


Only thing missing is a cross.



What are you guys doing here? And why are the heroes talking like they aren’t?

Did the Travelers find the corpses and report them, despite the risk of their own arrest?


Right, that was the cape name of the pseudo-shifter.


Yeeah, this really isn’t something I’d expect from the Travelers.




Hehe. As if you aren’t still wanted villains.

“No. But if you come into custody-”


Sounds about right.

Weld frowned.


He does have a point, the Wards are probably better off focusing on the matter at hand, whatever the fuck that actually is.

My guess is on Fenrir’s Chosen. Hookwolf is among the characters I’d most expect to be willing to do something like this.

[Funny you should say that, part me, five Arcs before Hookwolf becomes part of the group that did this.]


Also fair.

“A shame,” Trickster bowed.


Hah, nice. But doesn’t this just put Weld over to the side?

I guess it might’ve been more about putting Genesis in a strategically important position than about sending Weld off.


Oh right, her gargoyle-like position is a bit of an issue for Weld, especially with the element of surprise.


Sounds like they’re focusing a lot on Weld so far. I’m not sure he’s the biggest threat to them here. That would probably be Clockblocker or Vista, both of whom can keep one or all of them in place.


It’s entirely possible for Trickster to swap the positions of one of the corpses with one of the Wards. He probably can’t adjust the pose they show up in, though, so they’d presumably just fall down from there like Weld just did from the window.


One thing’s for sure, Trickster’s power can be quite disorienting.




I suppose that’s why he was teleported in the first place – Trickster tricked him into turning around.


So far, Trickster’s being the MVP. I have a feeling this chapter is going to show us more from the others too, though. Weld vs Sundancer, for example… What happens when a man made of metal goes up against someone who can melt it?

Ballistic is also a threat to Weld if he somehow knows how Weld’s power interacts with metal.




Sending projectiles after Trickster didn’t work out so well for Kid Win.


Huh, interesting. The teleportation swaps positions, but not momentum. Don’t know why I expected it to do so, really.

Might have some interesting implications for a hypothetical interaction between Trickster’s power and quantum physics?

Really fucking annoying, Clockblocker revised his summation of the teleporter.

Ahaha 😛


I wonder how long that position’s going to last. Pretty helpful to have objects pass through you when you’re fighting Ballistic, at least.


And the other darts are off-limits.

“Red rover!” Vista shouted, “Go!”


Ooh, named combo tactics!

It’s a pretty good tactic – Clockblocker needs touch range, and Vista can arrange that for him.

Trickster swapped him with Vista, placing him several feet back.

Unfortunately Trickster has quick reactions.


Good luck!


Good thinking! Still, though, there are other people Trickster could swap him with, including three corpses that would drop him down 20 feet.



Reminds me of a scene in Homestuck where a character raises a hand to casually shrink a meteor with a soft smile.


Huh, nice! I guess metal beats fire if it hits fast enough.


Ah, maybe I spoke too soon.

At least we know he can melt parts of his body in the first place, and does so regularly to absorb metal that got stuck to him.


Ooh, good luck.


Dang it.

His hand touched the metal of Weld’s back.

Welp, guess we’ve got both molten and frozen metal at once.

He breathed a sigh of relief when Weld turned around.

Wait, really? Is he immune to Clocky’s power too? I know Weld was immune to most powers affected by the Manton effect, but as far as I’ve gathered, that’s not actually the case with Clockblocker’s.


Ah, okay.


Glory Girl’s power might actually be among the more useful ones here. Intimidating Trickster might be distracting enough for Clocky to get his hands on the guy.

I can’t keep track of this guy.

He’s rather… tricksy.


Welp. That’s probably something Trickster’s been deliberately arranging.





So does that mean he’s using the board as a shield…?


So wait, wasn’t Genesis’ ability a sort of illusion? In other words, is there even something real there to block?


Real enough to cause a reaction, I guess.


Hm, strange. Did Genesis get ahead of herself in stimulating reactions to match the visuals?

So, that’s what a changer nine brings to the table. Different forms, each with their own powers.

That’s a reasonable assumption.


Why? I mean, it’s a more effective shield against this one attack, but now it’s stuck in that one spot for a while.


Nice. Good to see that they can work together even if they have their differences. And hey, Clocky did admit he should go easier on Weld.


Okay I kinda think I should go back and reread Tattletale’s explanation of Genesis’ powers.

remotely controlled, solid projections [here]. Right. Genesis probably isn’t actually there.


Heavy hitters indeed.


Hm. Now what’s this? Gonna rip them up and freeze the shrapnel or something?


I see.


Ah, yeah…

This is what I’m here for.


End of Sentinel 9.3

This was a very nice look into Clockblocker’s, Vista’s and Glory Girl’s states in the wake of Leviathan’s attack. We got to learn about Clocky’s dying dad, followed by a heartwarming bonding between Clockblocker and Vista over the memory of Gallant.

Additionally, we learned about possible correlations between trigger events and powers, the fact that Glory Girl (and maybe Panacea – after Interlude 3, I have a hard time believing she would quit unless forced to, even if she doesn’t enjoy being a hero) might join the Wards, and the fact that someone (possibly Fenrir’s Chosen) is quite brutally murdering and desecrating people in broad daylight.

Why were the Travelers at one of the crime scenes? Maybe we won’t find out. Maybe they just happened to find it right before the Wards arrived? Maybe they were the ones to contact the Wards in the first place, and didn’t evacuate the premises quickly enough, though that seems unlikely. Especially since no one brought that up.

I don’t think we’ll get to see the end of the battle. I feel like the outcome wasn’t the point of it, so much as showing Weld and Clockblocker working together and addressing Clocky’s feeling of belonging in the battle. That said, we’ll probably find out who won… my money’s on the Travelers, just because I don’t think there’s much point in having them arrested right now and they did seem to have the upper hand in the fight.

Next chapter, we’re presumably continuing our trek through the Wards. I suppose the ones left are Kid Win, Vista and Shadow Stalker. Glory Girl might also count. These last two chapters have sort of covered Shadow Stalker, Vista and Glory Girl to some extent as well as their respective POV characters, so I’m not completely sure we’re getting chapters from their POVs at all. As such, my guess is that Kid Win is up next. Out of all the OG Brockton Bay Wards, he seems to be dealing with this the best, but appearances can be deceiving.

See you then! Which is to say… now!

2 thoughts on “Sentinel 9.3: Tick Talk

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