"Oh… My… God…"

"Please don't scre-"

"IT'S MOTHRA, LOOPHOLE!"

"Okay, but like legally, it can't be Mothra…" I said, pinching the bridge of my nose.

"DO YOU THINK THIS GAME CARES ABOUT LEGALITY!?"

"Seriously Codex, Loophole's right, you don't need to scream," Pinky said, backing me up as Jon practically overflowed with excitement.

"I'm sorry, am I the only one seeing this!? How are you guys not at least a little bit excited about this!?"

"Don't get it twisted Codex, as soon as we clear out these bugs, I'm going and beating that thing into a pulp and then I'll be bragging about this to Freak the rest of the night, I just don't think screaming was necessary," Pinky shot back.

"He's trying to convince me to reroute Duskbreaker just because nothing has happened in the city just yet," Jon said, though he did seem to calm down just a bit. My eyes were still focused on the massive moth as it spread its red and yellow wings out, blocking out the sun.

"Colony Mega Moth AKA Moth-Moth. Level 20 (Elite) Aerial Class. You know, as much as I want to agree with Codex, even Axio isn't about to try and mess around with Japanese copyright law, those guys are vicious. So while she does bear a striking resemblance, this right here is a legally distinct kaiju thank you very much."

"Actually, while we don't want to pull the trigger too soon, if droids or some kaiju don't show up in the city within the next 15 minutes, have Duskbreaker go pick up Freak, we're on a time limit and we might need that excitement of his," I said, turning and slamming my fist into an ant that got the courage to come near me. Two more strikes put the beast down before I bent down and scooped up the still unconscious Saint Mantid. "I'm going to drop her where we started, have BrainCraft get in contact with whatever police contacts he has, we need to get her picked up and off the board."

There was a piercing whistle that seemed to fill the air, Moth-Moth's wings shimmering at the edges as it flapped them for the very first time. There was an actual concentrated gust of wind that erupted outward, sending the smallest of the rocks still literring the ground rolling and more than a few of the smaller giant ants rolling outward along the ground. As soon as I felt the wind start to try and cause me to stumble, keeping my grip on Saint Mantid, I took to the air and was thankful my gravity based flight wasn't affected by the wind.

"There's something coming off of its wings. Talk about a fucking strong gust of wind…" Pinky said as I put on the speed. I could see out of the corner of my eye a cloud of dust with pink sparks erupting up into the air, several ant bodies getting tossed into the mix. "Barely able to keep my damn footing."

"I think it's… spores?" Swansong offered, though I couldn't see her, I could see her dot still on my minimap, thankfully not even swaying in the wind as another gust hit us with yet another flap of the moth's giant wings.

"Spores? There's no way that's a good thing. I know the mission says it's 2 hours until it gets to the nearest city but… we are literally in a small one, I have to imagine these spores are meant to create an issue in the town below it as we go," I said, dropping down onto the rooftop before I set Saint Mantid down behind the ledge, hoping it would keep her from getting thrown off the edge. "We've got maybe a few minutes before it gets over the town outside this theme park if we're lucky, I'd say we could test what happens with the spores so we know what we are dealing with, but that's a risk in itself…"

"Gonna use some time to test it?" Jon asked, a beep echoing in my head as he shifted into our private chat. I was relatively sure the beep hadn't been there before, but I instantly knew what it meant when it happened and pushed forward.

"Maybe, though like I said, that's a risk in itself," I said, bracing myself as I watched the moth's wings flap again. It was rising further into the air, oblivious to everything happening in the theme park underneath of it as it took to the sky. "At this level I can't imagine those things are instant kills, but if those spores paralyze or knock me out, then there's a chance I can't rewind things and then I'm also out of the fight."

"Hmmm," Jon said for a second before the comms beeped again and I noticed that an extra outline appeared around Swansong's icon in my peripheral. "Swansong, can you go fly right into one of the spores, we need to see what happens without incapacitating Loophole."

"Huh why would- ooooh… yeah I guess you can't ask Pinky since she doesn't know he can just back things up," Swansong said, the realization hitting her pretty much at the same time as me. I briefly cursed Jon under my breath, though I couldn't say he didn't have the right idea, it was only a stupid desire to keep her out of harm's way that made the feelings bubble up. While that was probably a rather natural feeling, I had to remind myself that even if we were starting to be more than friends, we both did have super powers and I did have a guaranteed way to make sure she'd be okay.

"I'll bring us right back to here once I know what happens, even if it's not that serious. My Time Bank just refilled so if I use a bit of time now, it's not that big of a deal. Though… Codex, start a timer, the moment we have our answer, give me the time so I can use as exact an amount as possible," I said, lifting back up into the air as yet another gust of wind passed by, this one weaker as the moth rose higher into the air.

"I… Okay, yeah I can do that," Swansong said. I managed to find her as I scanned the sky just before she started to fly toward the giant moth. Though I didn't want to get close enough to get hit myself, I still did take off toward her, wanting to make sure I could react the moment I knew we had our answer.

The backdraft continued to grow weaker as the moth started to fly toward the south. With each beat, large, fluffy spores started to float downward, drifting lazily back and forth as the sunlight caused the pastel red and yellow balls to glow.

"Red and yellow… they probably do different things," I said, more to myself than anything, my mind racing as I chased Swansong from a distance. "Codex, new timer now."

"What I-"

"Swan, hit the red one first," I ordered, cutting Jon off as I briefly got distracted by another cloud of dirt and pink sparks that erupted into the air.

"Hey don't chase it without me!" Pinky called out, practically offended that we were leaving her behind and I realized we hadn't looped her back into the conversation. There was an arc that followed her as she launched off the ground, barreling her way toward the escaping bug just as Swansong turned and slammed into one of the red spores.

The spore burst the moment she hit it, but almost more importantly several more of the red spores, though they were still drifting toward the ground, seemed to go swirling toward her. There were several bursts of red as her health bar dipped by just about 5%. I was almost relieved that it was so little when Swansong stopped in mid air.

"WHERE THE FUCK DO YOU THINK YOU'RE GOING!?" she screamed at the top of her lungs. It might have been the very first time I'd ever heard her raise her voice, let alone swear and it took me by surprise. She started to swivel around in mid-air, her head jerking from side-to-side until she finally found me. There was almost pure rage in her eyes as she opened her mouth and started singing.

"Holy shit what's wrong with Swan?" Pinky asked, her arc stopping midflight as she went crashing down to the ground with a heavy THUD.

My ears were burning as a song I'd never heard her sing came from her lips. Song of Disarray appeared in my status bar as I found my flight sporadically turning on and off, dropping a few inches each time it did so. I reached up for my ears, trying to block out the noise as I searched for a way to reorient myself. As my flight fully became disabled, I reached for the first thing I could think to do and activated Mute Button.

The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

The buff immediately disappeared and I caught myself before I could fall any further. Swansong was still singing but as she noticed I was no longer being affected, the glare she was giving me turned almost murderous. I finally noticed the Spore Enragement debuff sitting above her, with 25 seconds left on its countdown. There was another red spore that, while she held her position, clipped into her.

There was another burst of red around her as the debuff glowed and updated to 53 seconds just as it continued to tick down. This time she took damage equal to just about 10% of her health and I grit my teeth as she started barreling toward me, her fist pulled back as if she was planning on punching me.

"Codex, time?"

"Seven seconds since she hit the first spore," he reported and I took a deep breath. That seemed like just about enough information as I activated Timekeeper's Control and rewound things, backing up 15 seconds just to give us some wiggle room.

I was still chasing after Swansong, the spores drifting toward the ground rather lazily as she made her approach.

"Swan, hit a yellow one next. Red spores will make you enraged and turn on us. Codex, cancel the second timer, give me the original time when I ask next," I ordered, hoping she'd pick up the context clues so that I didn't have to explain.

"On it," she called back without hesitation.

"Hey don't chase it without me!" Pinky called out as she left a crater in her wake.

"We'd never think to, we're just doing some testing so we can come up with a plan," I called back just as Swansong turned and hit one of the yellow spores.

This one didn't come with an immediate effect like the red ones, though Swansong did suddenly seem to stumble in midair, coming to a stop as she started to look around. After just a moment she started flying to the side, spiraling around before coming to a stop and looking around again, just as confused.

"Where am I going?" she finally asked wistfully as she started to drift. I focused on her status bar, happy for a moment that she wasn't trying to attack me and verified she still had 27 seconds left on a debuff called Spore Confusion. "Ooo what are these red thingies."

A red spore floated down just as Swansong turned, reaching her hand up like she was trying to grab something off of the top shelf before the spore hit her. There was a large burst of orange color that erupted outward. Her body lurched as if she was hit in the jaw with a massive uppercut and she went falling down toward the ground. While she hadn't taken any damage this time, her health bar still pristine, she did now have a Spore KO debuff.

"Codex, original timer now," I said, instinctively lurching forward and rushing to catch her. Even if I could rewind it, there was no world in which I wanted to see her splat into the ground.

"23 seconds," he said and I immediately backed us up by half a minute.

It was a weird sensation going from hurtling forward to a full stop, especially since words were still actively coming out of my mouth.

"-Codex, start a- err… okay," I said, pulling myself up short and shaking my head and opening up the chat to everyone within range. "Okay folks listen up, yellow spores seem to cause a confusion state, you forget what you're doing and just wander. I'd be willing to bet if any of the other bugs are around, they'll happily capitalize. Red spores hit you hard with some damage and make you enraged unless you've already been hit by a yellow spore. If you're already confused, a red spore is an instant knock out."

"How-"

"You know how Pinky," I interrupted her. "Swan, do you have an ability called Song of Disarray?"

Swansong was already flying back toward me, the giant moth still beating its wings as it started to head toward the south behind her. It really was not moving fast and it was only barely putting distance between us as it started to move toward the edges of the dispersed ant hill.

"Huh? No, I don't… why?" she asked.

"Something that happened," I explained before opening a chat window.

<Loophole: During the rewind, when you got hit by the red spore you started singing it. It basically interrupted my abilities completely and almost made me hit the ground. If you can figure out a way to recreate that, an ability like that would be stupidly useful.>

"Ahhh, I think I can try to figure that out. I'll need to understand what emotion connects to it," she murmured instead of responding in the chat.

"Huh? What's that about now?" Pinky asked and I let out a sigh.

"Oh for fuck's sake," I pinched the bridge of my nose. While I understood where she was coming from and even knew why it was a good idea to keep my Hidden Power a secret, I wasn't cut out for this level of subterfuge, especially with people that I was actively trusting with my life. "My Hidden Power lets me rewind time. There you know, deal with it we got bigger fish to fry."

"You can- WHAT!?!" Pinky shouted and I flinched in response. "That's so fucking broken, what the hell!?!"

"How are the bugs looking?" I chose to push forward looking over the ledge and finding while I could see a couple of ants, it wasn't nearly the amount of the swarm that had scurried free from the ant hill.

"Oh come on we have two hours, you expect me to just skip over this?!"

"I could rewind things and stop myself from telling you if you'd prefer," I said and she let out a groan.

"Uggggh, okay fine but we are so coming back to this," she said, clearly displeased. "Those first few flaps sent a lot of them flying. I'm not sure where they're disappearing to, but I've got my area mostly cleared out. I'd bet they have tunnels to get back underground."

"I ran it past Brain and that seems to be his theory as well," Jon said. There was a cloud of dirt that was kicked up with pink sparks as Pinky came hurtling over toward me. It was a nearly perfect jump as she landed on the far side of the rooftop, turning on her heel with a sharp smile at me. "Seems like they are only here to build up the ant hills, best guess is the various other ones will be for the other attacks and Hive Queen is trying to maintain her workforce as much as possible."

"Not that I want to let them all get away, but them not being in our way might be for the best," I said looking back down at Saint Mantid. "Any word on pickup for her?"

"Brain got in contact with the folks in Red Bluff. Their infrastructure is down but they have some back channels they can run through for the NPCs embedded in the various police districts. Even then, it might be a bit before they can get there. KO lasts an hour, it might be enough time, unless one of her allies is nearby or Hive Queen notices she's out."

"Hmm," I said, unsure what I wanted to do. The moth was slowly moving away from us, a small cloud of spores getting left behind with each flap of its wings as I looked between Saint Mantid and the escaping insect. "Okay, new plan. Codex, have Duskbreaker make a detour. He can bring her to them before she's awake. It hasn't been long enough to make the call on Freak yet but by the time Dusk has made that trip we should know better."

There was a piercing screech that filled the air followed by a THUD that drew our attention back to the escaping moth. There was a small, at least relative to the moth, egg that had appeared beneath it. The moment it crashed into the ground, the shell around it burst and at least three dozen small, again relative to the giant moth, moths that came bursting out from it, scattering in all directions.

These moths weren't colored the same way as Moth-Moth, instead sporting purely black wings. They didn't seem to be moving with any actual purpose, all fluttering in circles before turning to follow after their mother.

"Um… so what happens if one of those spores hits the baby moths, Loophole?" Pinky asked aloud, looking over at me as Swansong floated off to the side.

"No clue, I've got exactly the same amount of information as you right now," I said and she let out a laugh.

"Well hey, at least I gave you the perfect spot to rewind to if you wanted to fill us in."

"I don't have an unlimited bank, I'm not gonna use it just to get us information a half a minute ahead of time unless it's dangerous to get," I said and she let out a groan.

"Well that at least makes it a little less broken," Pinky said, cracking her knuckles. "Should we start chasing them down?"

"Yeah, the big one is about to be over the town outside the park," I said, lifting up into the air. I expanded the ability to include Pinky in it, figuring it was probably a good idea to save her the effort when my stamina would refill enough to carry us both.

"That raises something I'm a bit more concerned about then what happens if the spores hit those other moths," Swansong said, following us up into the air. I looked over at her as we floated, about fifteen feet over the building.

"What's that?" Pinky asked. Swansong swallowed hard as she stared after the Moth-Moth and her freshly hatched brood.

"What happens if the spores hit the civilians in that town?"

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