It has to be at least several hours as the alert was given that long ago and if he could build up in time then it would not be necessary for him to prepare beforehand.

Oh so I am in general but you brought it up so I simply followed the trail of thought especially since I tend to like the stories that use a single 'rule' break to make everything happen instead of just handwaving it. A lot more fun when you can predict things in advance.

 

Shadow Stalker no longer has the threat of Regent to keep her away from Skitter (I guess Skitter is a threat in her own right, but Regent's instant control was a bigger problem) if she ever escapes.

 

Because he didn't know when Behemoth would turn up.

 

Assuming that the current Alexandria is just Pretender using her body like a sock puppet...who's to say Cauldron won't snatch up Regent's body for the same use? He's got a pretty scary power.

 

Someone could you know... wake him up.

 

Mathematical guesswork and interpretation follows.

I think Phir See's charge-up is probably some kind of exponential approach, since it makes sense physically and would explain the behavior we've observed in the story so far. The mechanism of using time portals to clone photons would let the total energy grow at a rate proportional to how much energy there was. This unrestrained exponential growth can be modeled with differential equations as:

dy/dt = Ay
dy/y = Adt
ln(y)+C = At
y = Ce^(At)

However, whether due to interference from photons colliding with air molecules, or diffraction, or some other sort of restrictive factor, once the energy level gets too high it begins to bleed off until the loss rate of energy is the same as the gain rate. (Judging by the exposed nature of the portals and the level of energy that seems to be building up, I'm thinking most of this loss is probably due to some SuperScience factor aside from diffraction or air scattering.) If we guess that the true equation is sort of like:

dy/dt = Ay - By^2
dy/(Ay-By^2) = dt
ln(y/(A-By))/A + C = t
y/(A-By) = Ce^(At)
y = ACe^(At) - ByCe^(At)
y(1 + BCe^(At)) = ACe^(At)
y = ACe^(At)/(1+BCe^(At))

This is a logistic function, characterized by rapid growth initially, which slows as it approaches a maximum value. If various more complicated terms are used than By^2, the function could be skewed to no longer be as symmetrical. For example, in the case of Phir See's attack, the initial buildup could be quite fast (a half hour perhaps), but in order to get to the higher parts of the range, a day might be required. Practically, his second shot with an incomplete charge would likely be a little more than half as strong as his first.

This is why he stayed up for days maintaining a full charge: the difference between a hastily prepared 60% power shot and a long term maintained 95% power shot (just as an example of random numbers to pull out of my ass) could have been pivotal in the fight, especially since he didn't know if he would get to attack more than once.

Of course, there are probably much more broken things one can do with closed timelike curves than this. If Taylor had his power, she might've used her portals to make Dragon a CTC "Oracle" AI by now, and maybe would have a chance of out-scrying the Simurgh with brute force computing power.

 

Deductive reasoning states that because Phir Se gathered the power prior to Behemoth turning up, there must be a reason for it. The simple reason is that it takes more time than he would have had if he waited until it was in the city. The more complicated reason could be that the energy expenditure from the time bomb was what lured Behemoth to New Delhi in the first place.

Hell, it's not an absurd idea that Behemoth specifically goes for high energy targets, Leviathan hits places with S-Class immediate threats and the Simurgh attacks individuals or groups that will do the most damage over time. All with the same basic goal of causing as much damage as possible. The Endbringers have targeted a nuclear facility, Alan Gramme's big Tinker project, Japan, Canberra and a bunch of other places.

We've seen the effect of the Simurgh's attack on Alan Gramme's arcology (Mannequin), Madison (the Travelers), but not Canberra. Leviathan hit Newfoundland (turning Dragon loose), Japan (Lung) and Brockton Bay (Noelle). Going by this idea, Behemoth's first attack was where it was because of some nearby oil fields, he would have been the one to attack the nuclear facility, and we know his reason for being in New Delhi.

What's more interesting to me is why the Endbringers would pull their punches, and then why Behemoth would stick around even after Phir Se's first attack. Tattletale said that they don't take risks concerning their own health, so it seems to me that Behemoth has an ulterior motive in going on despite Phir Se's first strike. Either it's willing to risk its life to take down the threat Phir Se poses, or it's not in any real danger in the first place.

If it's the first, then we've found a way the Endbringers might be taken down. If it's the latter, I see something very bad happening the next time Phir Se lets loose.

 

While it's true that the energy seems to be what drew Behemoth to New Delhi, that was not Phir Se's intention. He said he was hoping to use it on either the Simurgh or Leviathan (or as he called them, the Third and the Second). Behemoth is the only one that he didn't want to use his weapon against. I think the simple reason is the correct one.

 

Occam's Razor suggests as much, though then we've got to ask, 'Why New Delhi?' Of all the places Behemoth could have attacked, why go for the one with a parahuman like Phir Se there? We know he had a target. We know that target is almost certainly Phir Se. So it's not too much of a stretch to suggest that the dynakinetic of the Endbringers would specifically target the cape wielding a gigantic energy weapon.

EDIT: Confirmed that Behemoth attacked the nuclear facility as well as the Birdcage.

 

?
I'm a little confused by your post. Maybe you misunderstood me.

I was saying that yes, Behemoth seems to be attacking Phir Se because of he has energy weapon and Behemoth is capable of manipulating energy- but Phir Se wasn't deliberately baiting Behemoth to come. He hoped it would be one of the others.

Basically, Behemoth is attacking New Delhi because Phir Se charged energy up for 3 days, but Phir Se didn't charge up energy for 3 days so that Behemoth would attack New Delhi. He just charged up so that he'd be ready for the next attack- he didn't know when or where it would be, just that it would be coming soon.

 

Ah, yeah. I misread your post.

 

Bad enough that Imp and Regent don't have a future, but the new update indicates Clockblocker/Skitter pairing has ended before it's even begun.

 

Ahoy the Weaver/Phir Sē’ ship!

 

He's not dead until we're sure there aren't any clones or body possessors! Plus, I won't accept anything less than a body or a sufficiently large explosion.

 

I enjoyed Skitter shutting down Tecton like that. He's a good guy but clearly the sort to have read every book on leadership in the self-help section of chapters.

Otherwise, good chapter. I'm not really surprised that Regent got axed. Skitter herself says that they didn't know each other especially well. It's slightly tragic that he was just kind of coming out of his shell with Imp. Which was probably the intent. I'm also glad the Wildbow is acknowledging that Leviathan's attack on BB had record low casualties. It was pretty nice that Skitter was able to notice that Pretender was involved. Little odd that the one mission she goes on with the Vegas Wards coincides with such a crucial asset - but still.

There was one other thing that caught my attention. Dinah predicted that Skitter going to the PRT would somehow help the world. Then during Behemoth's attack Skitter coordinates two different teams, the Undersiders and the Wards. If she had never gone over to the PRT she wouldn't have ended up in charge of that extra team with Tecton, Cuff, Annex, Grace, and Golem. Which means, to my thinking, that this decisive blow against Behemoth wouldn't necessarily have been struck or that they wouldn't have been able to construct such an effective, short-notice plan. She had a while to figure out the Wards' power and how they synargized. Then she combined them with the Undersiders ability to attack Behemoth in as great safety as possible. I mean, really, the Undersiders are an offensively minded team and the Wards under Skitter/ Tecton have pretty solid defense. Seems like a great mix to me.

Maybe Dinah wasn't trying to protect against the coming apocalypse. Maybe she was trying to stop a decisive loss against Behemoth in New Delhi.

If I'm right then my next question is; doesn't this make Dinah a huge target for the Endbringers? Specifically the Simurgh? Turning a precog that's able to do something as fucking ridiculous as this would be a godsend for that sort of master manipulator.

 

Precogs with actual future reading powers are able to cancel each other out, so if the Simurgh actively tried to seek out Dinah it would probably face the entirety of the PRT (or what's left of it) without the aid of its precognition. Given that it doesn't appear to be as tough as Leviathan or Behemoth it could be that doing so would constitute a greater risk than it would otherwise come up against.

 

There's something that's been bugging me about the Simurgh, and I went through the time to dig up the quotes to show it.

http://pastebin.com/8nDTNtr1

It looks really long, but most of it's passages from the story and if you remember reading those parts you can skip to the sections outlined with underscores and asterisks, which are my own words.

 

Yeah, that's a separate part of her power. The precognition allows her to see the future, and works similarly to a Thinker (albeit likely on a greater level, as with all Endbringer powers). Her psychic scream and mind screwing appears to be a separate facet of her power. It's because the two powers are combined in one being that causes the Simurgh to be so ridiculously powerful.

 

But her mind screwing power AND precognition is demonstrated in that interlude to extend over years, with 2 precog-interfering powers in the way, Coil and Dinah (who should alone be enough since she's the most powerful precog we've seen).
Which seemingly contradicts the idea that her precog power should be interfered with by the influence of other precogs. Unless Cody doing the killing was random and her mind screwing power alone made him do that, and she didn't explicitly plan for it.

 

Are you talking about Noelle? Because Cody never had any interaction with Coil and Dinah. He got handed over to Accord just before Coil talked to Trickster and offered to free the travelers of the Simurgh's influence.

Though I personally think that shouldn't matter, because surely some precogs had some influence/interaction with Cody over the years, even if it's something nebulous. But Dinah and Coil didn't ever talk to or interact with Cody directly.