With four golems, plus Smokey in the lead, carrying a ten-ton bus like it was nothing major was actually not that difficult. At first, the people inside panicked, screaming that they had been grabbed by the Simurgh, but Smokey was able to calm them down, shouting to the bus driver as they ran. It wasn't exactly a comfortable ride for the passengers, as the golems were forced to climb and jump over stopped vehicles at speed, but nobody was injured beyond a few bruises and minor abrasions.
Within a minute, they had carried the bus away from the twisted facsimile of an angel, its screaming fading as they ran towards the quarantine line, picking up several people along the way. When they finally arrived at a point clear enough for the bus to drive, they carefully placed it back down. With barely a thank you, the bus driver put the pedal to the metal, leaving Smokey and his golems behind.
As he turned, he could see two other guardian teams arriving as well, dropping off cars and people by the dozens, letting them run or drive the rest of the way. Two golems were even carrying a large rug with several people on it, many of which were children.
As quick as they could, they returned, running and jumping back into the heart of the city, helping people escape the radius of the scream, even as the Simurgh moved about not far from them. Over and over again, golems or guardians were forced to shield people with their bodies as the screeching Endbringer hurled chunks of concrete, chunks of vehicles, or even other people at them. They were able to save a few of the human projectiles that were still alive, but nobody wanted to think of how many of them had no one to catch them.
As they pulled people from half-collapsed buildings and carried more out of the danger zone, their armbands were counting down from twenty minutes, announcing thirty-second intervals. It stopped when they ran past the screams area of effect, but none of them were spending very long outside of it. On the way back into the city from their second trip, Smokey's armband reached seventeen minutes remaining. It also spat out another name, another fallen cape, though that was sadly nothing new. While the rate seemed to be slow, at least from what Smokey knew, Capes were still dying at an alarming rate, mostly crushed by swirling rubble.
Even his team hadn't escaped unscathed. Two golems had been damaged heavily, left to be recovered later, while a third had a steel beam the length of a semi-truck slammed into his chest. The somehow sharpened slab of building rubble had punched through his body like a spear, shattering his core in the process, its frame going rigid as the magic moving him failed. Only one guardian had been damaged, one of them losing an arm as they pulled someone out from under a collapsing building. The person was fine, but the guardian was forced to remove his arm as the slab of the building face that had pinned him was too unwieldy and heavy to move quickly.
It was at the fifteen-minute mark, after carrying a stranded van full of people back to the outskirts of the city, that Smokey took his first moments to inspect the situation since they had first started. From where he was, he could see the Simurgh as she floated between buildings, a swirling storm of crushed rubble and partially intact structures spinning around them. There were also smaller bits, which she floated closer to herself, spinning them in tight formation directly in front of herself as they tried to assemble something.
She appeared to be almost finished when a blast of green energy blew through it, sending chunks of material scattering out of her control. Something inside of the cluster of parts and materials must have been volatile, because just as the green energy faded, something inside it exploded, sending out whip-like tendrils of orange energy, like grasping coils. What little remained of the material the Simurgh had been manipulating closely was destroyed by the explosion, and several of the energy tendrils carved deep wounds along the Simurgh's body. It was a surprising amount of damage, and it rocked the fifteen-foot-tall Endbringer back.
And then there was her face.
Gone was the serene expression of grace that her face usually carried, replaced instead by shock. It wasn't an open mouth gasp of utter surprise, but just the fact that her expression changed, even slightly, was startling. That she could even be caught off guard, even if it was only slightly, was a revelation.
As if in payback, she gestured outward, and a whole section of her spinning orbit of debris and rubble hurtled away from her. Everything from chunks of fist-sized concrete to pieces of buildings the size of cement trucks were sent hurtling through the air. A litany of names were called out as capes flying in the air and running on the ground were crushed by the barrage of projectiles.
A large chunk of rubble, the concrete support of a bridge, still damp from its mooring, hurtled away from the telekinetic monster. It was massive, the size of a large truck, and its arc took directly toward a group of civilians being carried out by Smokey's group of golems.
The chunk slammed into the ground and tumbled, impacting close enough to the group that the shockwave knocked people to their knees. It was heading straight for the group, threatening to decimate them, only for Smokey to lunge forward. He dug his feet into the asphalt below as the concrete pillar slammed into him, driving him back in a spray of dust, chunks of road, and concrete. When the dust cleared, Smokey's legs were a whole foot into the ground, while his hands had made two massive divots in the concrete pillar. He carefully pulled himself free, dusting himself off and turning to continue his job of protecting people.
After finishing his sixth trip, his armband claiming that eight minutes had passed, he once again looked up, easily finding the Simurgh. She had gotten closer, her scream pushing slowly toward them, making their trips longer and more dangerous each time. Despite her slow progress forward, it did not appear as if the Simurgh was achieving her goal. Since she had first tried to build whatever horrible contraption she had in mind, she had attempted to build it or something new twice more. Each time it was destroyed by a final shot, something just barely scraped by, just poking through her defensive screeen. By then, her face was no longer showing just surprise or shock, but also confusion.
And maybe even a hint of nervousness.
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As he continued to run towards the abomination, Smokey continued to look up. After a few seconds, he realized something else was going on. When the assembled caped had first brought the fight to the Simurgh, only one in a hundred attacks got even close to hitting the fifteen-foot-tall angelic terror. There always seemed to be something in the way, a pane of glass to deflect a laser, a concrete chunk to absorb an explosion. Even physical attacks by the few brutes capable of reaching her were swatted to the side with steel beams and blasts of telekinetic force.
Since then, however, that had slowly changed as the fight progressed. It was subtle at first, with attacks that she attempted to block or dodge instead managing to just barely glance off her, only imparting partial damage. Then, over time, they began to fully get through, barely skirting by chunks of concrete or steel, hitting the endbringer head-on.
By the time Smokey's armband read twelve minutes remaining, the Simurgh was lashing out and missing, hurling chunks at places people had been, rather than would be. She was losing her edge, slowly becoming less and less effective.
Her precognition was failing her.
As if to hammer home what was happening, Eidolon dipped under an incoming city home, hurled at him as he got too close. The Simugh tried to recover, to block the opening with a chunk of a much larger building, but Eidolon shifted directions at the last second, cutting back around the barrier and firing a blast of pitch-black energy. The beam slammed into her chest and tore a deep, wide trench into her body, cutting up and around her shoulder as Eidolon flew up and over her. She swung her arm up at him, slapping him with enough force to send him hurtling across the sky, but not in time to keep the Triumvirate hero from amputating one of her many wings.
The world hung at the moment, the large feather facsimile falling to the ground, slamming into and partially collapsing a building. The Simurgh seemed to track its fall before spinning up and lashing out with a wide telekinetic blast, far more widespread than any she had done yet in this fight. A half dozen names were called out over the armbands, then again a second later, before Alexandria and Legend pushed forward, the latter leaving a trail of light behind him. The namesake of her power type slammed through obstacle after obstacle, deflecting them and keeping Legend clear, before he began firing a beam of deep purple, carving what appeared to be another deep wound along the false angel's torso.
Another blaster took a chunk out of her leg and another cut along her hip. Suddenly, everyone was firing everything they could, seeming to overwhelm the Endbringer. She lashed out again, but this time it wasn't to try and stop the attacks.
It was to cover her own retreat.
Every piece of debris under her control was launched away from her, and another list of names was called out, even as the injured and confused Endbringer turned and began to ascend, rising higher and higher into the air. The barrage of attacks cuts out instantly, no one wanting to attract her attention back to the city or to themselves.
After watching her continue to leave, getting smaller and smaller in the sky, Dragon's voice finally came through the armband, loud and clear.
"The Simurgh has retreated, repeat the Simurgh has retreated. Deactivating anti-mastering explosives… Switching to search and rescue."
Again, silence settled over the whole city. Then, faintly, the sounds of screaming echoed through, followed by a child crying and someone very nearby someone sobbing. Smokey immediately turned, directing his golems to start looking for the sobbing. With a now familiar metaphysical pull, the small golden "projection" of a Golden Retriever appeared, barking and looking around, whining when it noticed the destruction.
Smokey closed his eyes and, for a moment, took control of the summon directly. It had been slow work at first, but after a good chunk of practice and experimenting, he had learned how to sense through the mind of his canine companion. For his Doberman, that simply meant some enhanced senses and a different point of view. But for the Golden Retriever, it gave him access to his ability to sense the injured. And as he focused on the moment, the city was alight with red glares, flickering and sparking as they called out for help, suffering in pain.
He could see a nearby child as they wept, their leg pinned under an overturned car. On the second floor of a shop just down the road, there was a woman with a pipe stuck in her stomach. And down the street, an older man lay unmoving, the flickering red light he gave off growing dimmer by the second.
Smokey barked orders, directing his golems with confidence, even as he controlled his Golden Retriever to run down the street, jumping through a small fire to sit next to the heavily injured old man. Once in position, the dog began to glow, the older man's light stabilizing, though it was still weak.
Over the next minute or so, they brought as many injured people together as they could, all around the unmoving old man. Once everyone in the nearby area had been gathered, Smokey activated one of the sealed spells on his wrist. It was a mass healing spell that activated in a single moment, freed with a single word.
The familiar feeling of his creator's magic exploded from one of four spell containers on his wrist, spreading out at a rapid rate. The spell inside was one of Arcanum's more powerful creations, specifically designed to be raw, rampaging, unfocused healing in as wide an area as possible. The chant took around forty-five seconds to complete, and that was after cutting it down with his other skills, so as a spell, it was nearly useless. However, put it into a spell container and it was perfect for taking an injured crowd and getting them back on their feet, or rapidly healing someone who was bleeding out in your arms. They would likely need directed healing to finish off minor issues and make sure something hadn't been missed, but now they would get that chance.
When the spell was done, Smokey spent a few minutes calming the group down, assuring them that everything was okay. He advised them to stay calm, find somewhere safe to sit down and follow the directions of emergency personnel, who would likely be arriving soon. The Simurgh was gone, which meant aid would be pouring in to get the city back on its feet and save as many lives as possible.
Unsurprisingly, the now healed group seemed listless, unsure. They were happy to have survived, but what did they do now?
A golem carefully lifted up the heavily injured man, who was now doing better, but was still unconscious. Smokey gave the golem the simple order to bring him to the quarantined area, where doctors and trained emergency personnel were waiting.
With the people in his direct vicinity healed and slowly making their way to safer areas, Smokey finally reached into one of his pockets, pulling out his burner phone. A quick call to Arcanum revealed that they already knew that the Simurgh had been driven back.
Apparently, Piper had woken up not long before the Simurgh had retreated and had stopped to call their creator as well. Then, using both of her stored teleportation spells, Piper had brought Arcanum to the city, and now he was ferrying the rest of Brockton Bay's hero teams to Canberra.
Arcanum instructed him to gather the golem teams and head deeper into the city, where the destruction was the worst. He would be joining them shortly to provide healing and support in the field as best he could. If they could clear a place for him to work, somewhere central to the destruction, that would help as well.
Once they were done talking, Smokey made a few more short calls, gathering all of his comrades and golems together before finally leading them forward as instructed.
