| “ | Brockton Bay, this location, is a soft target. The city was originally founded at this location because of the proximity to the coastline for trade routes and an aquifier that provided the first settlers with access to fresh water. This aquifier, essentially an underground lake beneath the city, is our weak point. | ” |
—Legend to the rest of the defenders, Extermination 8.2 | ||
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The Battle against Leviathan marks the battle between the defenders of Brockton Bay and the Endbringer Leviathan. It took place about on May 15, approximately a month after the beginning of Worm.[1]
Prelude[]
Armsmaster's program was able to predict the arrival of an Endbringer to Brockton Bay, the gang wars and similar chaos that had occurred making it an ideal target for the Endbringers.[2] The prediction gave the city more warning than most, allowing them to evacuate people and bring in external forces in time.
Armsmaster separated the participants into groups based on their powers and abilities while others handed out armbands. These were designed to alert participants to Leviathan's and teammates' locations, call out casualties and tidal waves as they came, and direct people to the wounded. They suspected his end goal was to use the water in an underground aquifer to sink the city.[3]
Battle[]
The storm and initial tsunami hit the city and the building that the capes were gathered in. Forcing the defenders to teleport outside. Leviathan entered the city and sped towards the heroes once he saw them.
During the first half of the battle Leviathan slaughtered any heroes he got close to by pulverizing them with his sheer mass and after-echo or tearing down the buildings they were standing on. Throughout the battle he dodged most of the ranged attacks thrown at him and simply tanked the rest, including Legend's lasers which made his skin glow from the heat. Leviathan was barely damaged after a direct attack from Alexandria and didn't slow down even after one of Dragon's suits doused him in plasma and self-destructed on him. Eventually, Leviathan did get slightly damaged from the sustained attack, the worst wound being a deep gash across the neck. However every time the heroes even started to get the upper-hand he called in a tidal wave to regain the advantage, killing dozens of participants in the process.
Eventually he got pinned down enough that Miss Militia was able to use some of Bakuda's left over bombs on him. This included one that stuck him to the ground, one that crystallized part of his shoulder, and one that stopped time. Before he could be trapped for good he managed to break free and even threw some heroes into the time-field as he left. He injured Legend and Miss Militia to prevent further attacks before he attacked a group of clustered heroes and villains. Before he could finish them off Clockblocker managed to freeze him and give the heroes time to organize. Once the effect wore off, and with the PRT not wanting to risk Clockblocker again,[4] Leviathan continued his rampage.
After killing several villains he got into a one-on-one fight with Armsmaster. The hero appears to be winning as he has a program that predicted Leviathan's every movement while also having a nano-thorn Halberd that allowed the hero to cut chunks off. However, this weapon gets stuck partway through Leviathan's claw at the end of the duel as Armsmaster mistakenly assumed his weapon could cut through anything:[5][6] Leviathan defeats Armsmaster and escapes. He continued to slaughter heroes and villains alike before disappearing for a time. He later emerged at a damaged shelter and started to slaughter the helpless people inside.
Skitter however distracted him by stabbing him with the nano-blade and drew him back outside. He was further hampered by Bitch's dogs attacking him, but even with him being as damaged as he had ever been he still killed most of them. Finally Scion arrived and began fighting him with the help of Eidolon, forcing a severely injured Leviathan to flee the city.
Aftermath[]
A memorial to those that had died fighting Leviathan was constructed and placed on Captain's Hill five days after the attack.[7] In accordance with previous battles, it made no distinction between hero and villain, listing a cape identity then a civilian identity if permission was received from family members.
Bitch later carved the names of several of her dogs into the monument, as they would not otherwise have been given any recognition.
It is unknown what the long term weather effects were of the battle.[8]
References[]
- ↑ Comment by Wildbow on Sentinel 9.1
- ↑ Interlude 7
- ↑ Extermination 8.2
- ↑ Rediit Comment by Wildbow, 2017-09-26
- ↑ Legend talks about underestimating Leviathan... which is a complete aside and totally unrelated to me bringing up Armsmaster vs. Leviathan. I should explain (because I think it was unclear) - Armsmaster's computer didn't let him position the others so they would die, exactly. That was secondary. He put the villains in the way (particularly the giant bruisers and the wall-creating Kaiser) and set himself up so he would be able to fight Leviathan one on one. That let the simulation program be clean of interference and outside variables.
It wasn't that Armsmaster screwed up, but that a weapon that's supposed to cut through anything gets part of the way through Leviathan's claw and stops. - Comment by Wildbow on Reddit, archived on Spacebattles - ↑ Plendamonda: Reminder that Armsmaster's prediction software worked perfectly at predicting Leviathan
until it didn't
[...]
Wildbow: His combat analysis software did work
Xantho: The data it had was incomplete
Wildbow: Not that.
It let him land the blow just where he wanted it. But he was working on the assumption that his halberd cut through everything.
His software doesn't get into the nitty-gritty of powers or composition or figure out what can be cut through and what can't. It's about movement, attacks, counters, and tactics.
Watch how someone moves, get all the data from video footage and whatever else, gather data on mindset and habits, extrapolate.
Even if there's 50 possible moves (in a broad sense), it can still guide you to places where you're safe, and that reduce the opponent's future options for courses to take. - Conversation with Wildbow on Parahumans Discord - ↑ Extermination 8.8
- ↑ The wind was worse than the rain. I had to wonder how much of it was the aftermath of the Leviathan attack. The city had been flooded, and those same floodwaters had evaporated into the air, trapped within Brockton Bay by the surrounding trees and hills… how wide-reaching were the effects of that one incident? - Excerpt from Imago 21.6
[]
| Chapters | 8.1 • 8.2 • 8.y • 8.3 • 8.4 • 8.5 • 8.6 • 8.7 • 8.8 • 8.z |
|---|---|
| Battles and Events | Battle against Leviathan |