| Volcanic Suicide | |||||
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| What: A volcano arises in the Suicide Slum | |||||
The Suicide Slum is the poorest portion of Metropolis, even the vice filled "Easy Street" is wealthy considered to this part of town. As such, it is a prefect place for those who prey upon the poor and for those hiding from the law. Still, there are many who live there, either in tenements or on the streets.
The first Earthquake was detected at 8:04 AM by the seismographs at Metropolis U. It was only a 4.5, but was notable for not being located on any known fault line. The second one was detected at 8:23 and was rated at 4.6.
Cir-El hears the ultra-low pitched vibrations of the Earthquake and heads to the area to investigate...
And...Zahra overheard somebody coming out of the science building discussing an earthquake that shouldn't happen. That was enough, as she didn't have class, to suit up and head out and investigate. If nothing else, New York buildings aren't really built to take being shaken, rattled and rolled like that. Airborne, the wind manipulator flies across the city, causing the wind to twist and bend and maybe the odd minor disturbance.
Suicide Slum might be the poorest section of Metropolis, but that also means that it needs more help. That's why an up and coming heroine like Charlie lives there. Or at least that's what she tells people. In reality, it also has to do with the fact that she has no money and it's the easiest part of the city to live in with that restriction. Plus, there aren't a ton of heroes taking care of it right now, so that's important too.
Of course, sometimes you're just in the right place at the right time. And when an entire city is the right place, it doesn't take a long time to respond. She's suited up in minutes and on the rooftops moments later. But then there's a problem. Just from looking around from the top of a tall building (with an entire city shaking), there isn't any clear source of the trouble. So she does her best to teleport around, helping anyone out on the streets out of harm's way, keeping an eye out for any indication of what's going on here.
Yeah, seismic stuff is -not- something that pings on Carol's senses. However, it is something that pings emergency services. It also happened that Carol was enjoying one of her favorite things in the world... a brat, from a food cart that operates only in the slums. She found the operator a couple years back, and has been a regular of his since then.
She also likes to spend some money and leave a good tip since.. she's not rich, but is definitely not poor, and she figures that the least she can do is help a guy out who's working so hard to support his family. But, he's proud, and won't take donations, so tips after buying food.. her favorite way of helping him out. She drops a twenty in his jar even as things start to shake. When the ground begins shaking, she narrows her eyes. "Harry, get your family and get moving. This could get a lot worse than it already is." she tells him as she simply stuffs the last bite of her brat in her mouth and lifts into the air.. a golden line of energy roaming up from her feet to her head, turning her street clothes into her red, blue, and gold costume. Her plan is... to get a bird's eye view so she can see where her help is most needed, rather than just... charging in somewhere and doing more harm than good.
These earthquakes are fairly mild, but the increasing intensity seems to indicate they may be fore-shocks of a larger quake. The Damage, thus far, is pretty minor, a fer of the cardboard constructions housing street people have collapsed and some things have fallen off shelves. There is a bit of panic though, among those who have not felt the earth move under their feet before.
Superlass drops from the skies only seconds after the earth stops shaking and starts helping out, mostly checking for injuries and helping stop panic by her presence.
Oh, good. She's not alone. Somebody on a rooftop, another flyer already landed, a third in the air...who looks vaguely familiar, but given how long Captain Marvel's been gone, the gold clad heroine can't quite place her. She calls down to Superlass. "What's the situation down there?" She's staying up a moment longer, looking to see if, oh, something's breaking through the ground or something else crazy. Also, not bringing her winds too close to cardboard shacks that are already about to fall down.
So long as the damage isn't /too/ bad, things look like they'll be alright. Of course, that's Charlie's assessment and she really doesn't know anything about architecture or engineering of any kind. Lots of questions to be asked. But people seem to be relatively unharmed. And that's a good thing. But the earthquakes don't seem to be stopping. So, maybe this is a supervillain thing? That'd be awesome, but then were are the quakes coming from? That shouldn't be too tough to find, should it? Teleporting quickly to a bunch of places in a bunch of paffs of pink smoke and trying to judge the intensity, she starts searching for the source.
Left hand coming up to her ear, Carol activates her SHIELD commpiece and calls it in. Then she hears a voice ... well lots of voices really. But.. she adjusts her position minutely to get a broad view. One of the most important rookie mistakes not to make is to just.. chaaarge. It is far more important to see what is happening and find the central location of it. So she closes her eyes for a long moment and then opens them again slowly, trying to summon that unreliable sense of hers to try to... kinda get an idea of the location of the source of this. But also, maybe... energy senses could pick up on -something-.. if there is a powered cause of it all. Then, pink smoke and such. Great... if she can only... get an idea of where the shockwaves are centered on, then she'll know where to go. She watches Superlass and all that. But when the shaking is done... there's nothing really to do but call back to SHIELD and ask, "I need a pinpoint of the siesmic disturbance. I need to know WHERE it was precisely, so I Can go find out what's up."
Sirocco senses that there is an abnormal flow of air from the sewers, this time of day the flow should be minimal. The Seismographs place the epicenter well below ground, but near the middle of the Suicide Slum. Carol senses unusual levels of heat below the ground. Cir-El detects a low but building rumble...
Cir-El warns, "Another quake is on the way, we need people out of the buildings, if they keep getting stronger we will be getting structural damage soon."
No visible hole, no visible sign of anything emerging. Sirocco calls down to the kid on the ground, "Got it." She starts flying between windows, yelling at people she sees to get out, and getting ready to rescue anyone who gets stuck on upper floors. She's happy to defer to the younger girl - as long as her ideas are good.
Okay, that last one was definitely closer and before long, Charlie is pretty sure she's in the right place. The quakes are definitely bigger around here and she's almost sure that something should be around here. This is usually the part with a giant Mole Monster appears from under the ground. Or an army of lava men maybe? But so far, nothing. She's been teleporting most of the way there, so she's a little surprised to see other people already on the scene. But it wouldn't be the first time she got to a disaster a little late. At least here, there aren't a lot of people who need rescuing, most people having fled to evacuate. So Charlie teleports into the middle of the street, stomping her foot as if testing for a weak point. "Does anybody know what's going on here yet?"
Okay... that's the best location Carol's going to get. She nods to herself and in her typical decisive mode, she locates the point at which she's been informed to search. She peels off and heads that way. It should be noted, she doesn't just.. turn in the air and change direction. She flies like she were an aircraft and does things like... rolls, peeling off, etc. The life of a pilot certainly colors the way she moves in the air. Anyhow, back to the matter at hand.
She comes to land on the street out front of the Ace o' Clubs, hopefully... directly above the center of the disturbance. If she can drain the heat out of any magma bubbling up, maybe she can settle this before millions of people are killed. So... Superman made it look so easy when he'd just spin and drill his way into the ground. She doesn't have that luxury, so she just searches quickly for a manhole cover, and if one is not immediately available, she'll try her luck with a photonic blast to make a hole. Either way, down she goes.
"Not sure -what- is causing it, but the thermal levels directly below here are rising... so I think as odd as it seems, there may be magma pooling down there." says Carol as she either uses an existing entrance, or makes her own. The Ace o' Clubs is owned by Bibbo Bibowski, a former boxer who found a winning lottery ticket blowing in the breeze an claimed the winnings. As well as owning the bar, he also helps bring food to local homeless people and other types of philanthropy in the area.
The earthquake begins to be noticeable, buildings start to sway, the ground starts to shake...and manholes start shooting into the air, pushed into the sky by heated steam from below!
Superlass uses her speed to clear people out of the buildings as fast as possible, but is still in the midst of it when the quake hits. She hears a concrete support breaking inside a tall building across from the Ace o' Clubs and rushes inside in a blue and red blur to hold the building up until it is evacuated...
Winds swirl outwards from Sirocco, her hands spreading as she tries to catch anyone who falls with them, to lower people...and some dangerous falling objects...to the ground. "Jump!" she calls to one woman. "I have you!" She sounds a lot more confident than she feels, and she's not sure how long she can keep this up, but it's working...for now. Magma pooling is bad. She knows that. "Once on the ground, *run*." Because this is going to be...yes. Bad.
Magma pooling? Charlie can definitely feel the heat from below and it's enough to get her to stop stomping her foot and testing the street. In fact, she teleports back towards the buildings, taking a few steps back when the manhole covers start popping off and the steam starts to vent. Recovering herself after a moment, she gets into her version of a fighting stance, getting ready for whatever could pop out of the ground any minute now.
Okay, there's a manhole that just launched itself. Carol says.. "It's gonna be hot down there. I'd love the backup if you can take the heat. If not... helping save people is -not- a bad option." That said.. she jumps down into the sewers, trying to move towards the most intense heat sources... her body absorbing up some of the heat as she gets closer. She might end up making a nice big hole in the street if and when she locates such a deposit of stuff, but... for the most part, she's just heading towards the hottest. Yes that's right... when it would be time for most to flee, she charges towards the source of this. Is she stupid? Well, yes but that's not the point. She's stubborn and determined to stop this is all.
Captain Marvel can tell which way the air is flowing from, the steam logically flows from the hottest point towards escape, if she heads directly into the heat, she should find the source.
Once the building is clear, Superlass runs outside. To starts to collapse and she catches the larger pieces so they do not hit too hard and shatter, scattering flying bricks and the like.
"I think I can. I'll pull back if I can't." Cir-El has rescuing the civs under control, and the windborne heroine drops to join Carol, although she's letting the older, more experienced hero go first. So far, the heat's not bothering her at all. What's a bit of heat to the desert wind? Sirocco follows, eyes narrowed. She knows this isn't natural...so she has to be a little bit careful.
Nodding at the younger heroines eagerness to help, and yet the sensibility of admitting that she will fall back should the need arise, Carol approves of Sirocco's response. She gives the girl a bit of a smile of approval before following her sense of the thermal energy. She's moving quickly, but not sprinting for fear of moving -too- fast and missing the right spot or detail in haste. An old military training adage. Slow is smooth. Smooth is fast. Usually that refers to firing bolt action rifles, but hey... cliche's work lots of times, right?
Either way, she moves forward... and the good thing about following in her wake is the fact that distorted air and waves of heat... aren't really making it past her. She's soaking up the thermal energy and her eyes will soon begin to glow, but.. it's not a ton of heat, and isn't really going to power her up much just yet. Diving in to swim in actual magma? That might be a whole different story. But.. keeping near her means.. she's sucking the heat away from her newfound companion. Well, some of it at least.
Okay. There's lava down there and they're planning on going underground instead of letting whatever it is come up? Isn't that... not a good idea? Then again, Charlie can't really teleport people to safety and she's not going to be a lot of help up here. Underground, if she keeps teleporting she can keep herself healthy. Probably. And it's a pretty badass thing to do, to go into the fight with the main villain surrounded by lava. "I'm coming too!", she calls out as she teleports up to the nearest manhole to the others.
Captain Marvel absorbs the heat in the steam easily enough, though she only absorbs what touches her the rest is cooled down by convection, and Sirocco can easily generate a breeze to keep the hotter air away from her. Misfit teleports in a bit late, but soon catches up to the others. Carol's heat sense tells her the source of heat is not too fat ahead, but the concrete walls are starting to get almost red hot, a problem for Misfit, who can not fly.
Above Ground, Superlass continues evacuating buildings, and has her hands full with fires started by gas lines breaking as buildings shift and being set off by flashpoint-heated steam. So far,no signs of the next quake she can hear...
Well, a little bit away from her. Really, Sirocco doesn't mind heat. And then she realizes Misfit is following and not flying. She glances at her. "Need a ride?" she offers. It's rather handy being able to move people around, she's found...she's aware Misfit's teleporting around, but...
Okay. This is way hotter than Charlie planned. One of the nice things about her teleportation is that it repairs everything. Costume included. Which is handy because the bottoms of her sneakers are starting to melt and while she doesn't want to go back up top, if she can't walk, she's going to be pretty useless. That's at least until Sirocco offers a ride and while she tries to look nonchalant about it behind the mask, she's very relieved. "Uhhh... sure. Thanks." Of course, she's also not totally sure how that works, bouncing a few more teleports before landing next to Sirocco.
Pausing, Carol goes into SpecForces mode. She lifts her left arm, hand balled into a fist and then gestures at the red hot concrete. She steps forward and places a hand against the concrete. She knows its stupid hot, but.. she is okay with that. She looks back and sees the teleporter there. She narrows her eyes a bit and takes a breath before she just shakes her head and turns back towards the wall. Hrm... oh hell with it. Sometimes the direct approach is called for. Concrete can be repaired. So she just.. gestures for the others to fall back just a bit. Then, she pulls back her fist and punches through the heated up stuff. She wants to see what's behind the wall. But she wants the others to fall back just in case magma comes pouring out.
As Carol rightly fears, breaking open the wall lets a flow of lava begin to pass into the sewer at the point where she pierced the wall. The wall threatens to start collapsing under the pressure. Carol could absorb the heat easily enough, where she touches, and it would solidify the lava and slowly spread. Stone may not conduct the heat well enough to freeze all the lava from a single point of contact. Sirocco could create a massive wind to force the lava backwards or to help cool it, though the latter would work better if she had a larger access to the lava.
Emergency crews are arriving at last, Paramedics are treating those scalded by the steam, firemen are helping with the fires, police are helping evacuate people. Superlass is in the middle of it all,helping everyone and nervously wondering how those who went below are doing, and when the next quake will arrive.
"Like this." Winds swirl around Misfit, lifting her off the hot ground. Then the more experienced person tells her to back off, so she does...tugging Misfit with her unless the teleporter, well, teleports. At least the kids seem to be listening. For right now, anyway.
Right, as she feared. Carol's body absorbs head out of the magma and... well, she starts glowing now. Magma.. has a lot of heat. It flows about her and she grimaces a bit. Absorbing a -lot- at once isn't exactly a comfy feeling. But.. she pushes forward, trying to get into the mass of the magma. "See if the wind can cool a firebreak here!" she yells back as she heads in. Her plan is... wade in, do what she can on a small scale, but... find the -source- of the lava. "Maybe the teleporter there can tell the fire department to start shooting water down here!" she adds before she gets out of sight. She's going to be trying to suck the heat out of the magma... at the point where it is coming -from-. Her theory is that should be a far more concentrated spot. But she's been wrong before.
Charlie doesn't have a lot of options on whether she can teleport right now. The good thing is that being in the middle of a wind gust, it's a lot safer. She doesn't need to touch the ground and there's less chance of her melting. "Thanks", she offers to Sirocco politely. The bad part? She really doesn't get to do anything. She was really expecting more action. Like a sprawling cavern or something with monsters running around. Maybe a huge place carved out of the sewers. This... it's not really something she can do anything about. So she hangs around in her little wind tunnel and waits for her moment.
Captain Marvel can absorb heat of this level all day probably, but until she finds the center, possibly a volcanic vent, she will not be able to stop the problem. She suggest to Misfit that sending quantities of water down might help cool things, it the teleporter would take that message up.
Cir-El is worried about the time, the last few earthquakes were almost the same interval apart, andthat time is fast approaching again.
"On it." She's directing her winds towards it...they're warm, but still quite a lot cooler than the magma. Wind that flows through...past and around the energy manipulator. Carol will definitely be aware of it, but it's just wind. Nothing more or less.
Wouldn't a bunch of water cause even more steam (which would still be extremely hot?) "I'll be back. Probably with some water", Charlie comments as she disappears in a puff of smoke, reappearing in the middle of the street and letting her eyes search around. She'd need a lot of water. Maybe a fire hydrant? Though she'd need a way to send it underground. Unless she just opens all of them around here. Water runs downhill. The first hydrant she goes to is as close as possible to where Carol and Sirocco were headed.
He would have arrived earlier, but a sensitive experiment back at Tesladyne, and the knowledge some supers were already in the area kept Atomic Robo busy, but now he's finally free to investigate the volcano. He arrives driving a van with the Tesladyne logo on its sides. He stops as close as he can from the chaos before having ot go on foot, but he does have, slung around his right shoulder, a heat-resistant rope so he can climb down the volcano. He looks inside at his team and speaks, "You all help with evacuation and then get some readings out here. I'm going to take a closer look at our Vesuvius-wanna-be." He says, before making his way toward the volcano while his team scatters to help with the evacuation efforts.
It's not exactly... a volcano erupted out onto the street. Carol is underground where she punched a hole in a red hot sewer wall and found magma roiling behind it. It was a manhole that was blown off by steam that she went in through. Visions of Tommy Lee Jones in an LA Volcano movie come to mind, but are dismissed as that movie kinda sucked. Anyway, she is virtually swimming in the magma as she tries to find the source of it. Maybe the right application of the right amount of force at the right spot would help but... she isn't exactly a scientist.
As such, she's hoping for an easy button, or at least something that she could fix with the right application of force. Her body begins to glow more brightly... not that it'd be noticeable with the magma glowing everywhere. The more heat she absorbs, the more her power levels rise, but... there's always the chance for overload when that happens. The wind coming around her makes her look back with narrowed eyes. "FIREBREAK!" She yells back, not even sure anyone can hear her. To be honest, the only way she can even navigate here, is by feeling for a source of thermal energy below... trying to pinpoint where it is entering this chamber. Once she finds it however.. she'll be trying to figure out just what the hell she intended to do when she got there since.. right now she's just going on instinct. But if there -are- any devices down there causing this, their electrical energy or whatever it is that powers them... should show up on her ping.
Atomic Robo soon realizes that the volcano is still blow the surface, though there appears to be plenty of heat in the sewers, judging by the steam coming out of them. Misfit arrives on the surface and realizes that the water pressure in the hydrants will not be enough, not with firetrucks everywhere using the water to put out fires. Carol, now that she is looking, does detect a large source of electrical energy in the area. It was rather hidden by the heat, so she had to look for it.
Superlass realized that she is hearing the low thrumm that presages another Earthquake, and starts shouting, "Another Earthquake on the way, ten second warning!"
And Sirocco, now Misfit is gone, can focus all of her attention on trying to contain the heat. "Ugh...we need to...take out whatever's causing this. I'm not going to be able to keep this up for all that long," the young heroine admits. She might need to be carried home after this one.
Well, the water isn't exactly going exactly where Charlie was hoping for it to go. But it's going down which is the right direction. Not into the manhole covers as much as it's going into the sewers. But down is good for the water. But it's clearly not enough. Maybe if there was a firetruck here or a water tower or something... but at this rate, she has a feeling that she's not doing enough. As the van pulls up and the guy with the armor steps out, she teleports over to him. "Hey, uhhh... you don't happen to have stuff in that van that can cool things down down there, do ya? There's a /lot/ of lava goin' on down there."
Atomic Robo's glowing optics blink as a girl teleport right in front of him, "Whoa. And.." he then looks over his shoulder, to his van, then back to the teleporting girl, "I wish. Our freezing guns were disassembled and re-purposed earlier, and in the hurry to get here, we did not have time to re-assemble them." He frowns, and looks at the manhole covers. Too small for his bulky frame. Figures. He then looks around, at the firefighters using the water from the hydrants to fight the burning buildings, "We can't use water. The magma's so hot that it'd cause so much pressure, like a pressure pan... Hmm.." he then looks at the manhole holes, "If it was just fire, we could just kill it by removing the oxygen..." He says as he walks toward one of the sewer holes to gaze downwards, "And I doubt the firefighters have enough... hmm...." he frowns, then he turns toward the teleporting girl. "Do your best to keep the damages to a minimum. I'll be back in a few minutes." he says, nodding, "I'll bring the reserve coolants for the Tesladyne building's reactor. Should be enough to at least stop the lava from spreading." He nods, then rushes to the van.
Electrical... Damn. That means Carol is going swimming in lava. All of a sudden, a thought jumps into her head unbidden. If she's going swimming, shouldn't she be in her old bathing suit style costume? A giggle does its best to escape her even as she takes a deep breath and dives into the Magma. Sure, she can't see down here, but she can still feel that electrical energy, and she's aiming right for it... flight power trying to push her along through the liquified earth. God, this is really weird.
When she gets out of here, she is really going to need to vent some steam of her own, pun intended.
Captain Marvel breaks the surface in a large chamber, at the edge of the lava field is that appears to be a geothemal generator. Standing beside it is a woman wearing strange armor of a dark blue-green with bronze trim. Energy shackles lead from the armor to what looks to be a child with legs replaced by a worm-like body.
Superlass drops in front of Atomic Robo, and says, "I heard what you said about coolants, I can get you there faster than your van." She knows they are more likely to release such things to their representative, so bringing him along is required. She can carry him there in seconds and then back.
Sirocco narrows her eyes a little bit. "Let the kid go." She only knows what she's seeing, but she's not liking what she's seeing at all. Is this a mystical thing or an alien or something else? Zahra...doesn't know.
Charlie considers the armored guy's comments for a few moments. He at least sounds like he knows what he's talking about. And so far, the water isn't really helping anything. And if she can convince them to help, she might be able to get the coolant they need from other fire departments in the city. "I'm gonna go check the nearest firehouses for stuff that might help. I'll be back." And with that, she's gone again in another puff of pink smoke to see what she can do about getting supplies from any firehouses that she can think of.
Atomic Robo stops dead in his tracks when Superlass drops in front of him. He frowns a bit, "Ok. But I hope you're very strong, because that coolant is HEAVY!" He says, and then taps his metal thumb against his chest, "And you'll need me to sign out that backup coolant. No time to waste, let's go." he says, nodding.
Narrowing her eyes, Carol would love to call for backup at this point but... that kid is being siphoned right now. Also... there's the chance that... she reaches up to her left ear. Oh good, her absorption powers have prevented her earpiece from turning into steam. She calls in... if the signal is strong enough (It's Stark tech, so it should be) "Danvers. I need you to call first responders in the area of the seismic disturbance. There were some metahumans on site... I didn't drag them into the magma with me." *pause* "Yes, I said magma. I'll explain later. I need you to get a message to them. There's some nutjob down here with power armor, draining some power out of a half boy, half worm. Yes, direct quote." *pause again* "Ping my GPS to give them coordinates if you can. I'm gonna engage and buy them time to get here." she remarks.
Then... you've heard of Sea Wolf? Well, this is Magma Wolf. She keeps a firm targeting location of that power source and submerges once more. She drifts forward and then pops up at the edge of the magma... "Care to shut this down yourself? Or are you going to make me kick your ass first?" she asks, magma dripping down off of her costume and body, arms folded over her chest.
The plant has about 80,000 liters of coolant that can be spared, which Superlass hauls on a set of rail cars along the rail tracks to the Suicide Slum as fast as she can (the train would break if she went supersonic). It is not a limit on her physique, but on what she has to work with that stops her, she could have carried the whole mass if there had been anything to carry it in, and if she would not have sunk into the ground or broken the bridges carrying it. At times like these, she wishes she could fly. She and Robo are back in about 2 minutes.
Carol challenges Harness, who says, "Right now, my son is the only thing keeping this volcano stable, with him in control, it will provide geothermal energy for the entire city . He controls the volcano, and I control him."
She can't actually let the magma touch her...she can't absorb it the way Captain Marvel can. Sirocco, thus, lifts above it. "Controls? You caused structural damage to half of Suicide Slum, injured people...that doesn't seem very controlled to me. I did better than that the day I got my powers." Of course, she also got a crash course, but she doesn't mention that.
Snorting, Carol shakes her head, the magma dribbling off her blond locks. "You call this -stable-?" she asks. "This is going to destroy the city and kill millions. I think you -caused- this Volcano, with your own cocky idea that you could control it, but... you can't. One thing about the world that everyone seems to forget. This world is far more powerful than any of us, and it will outlive us all."
And then.. Sirocco's already down here. She whips her head that way and was unaware of that. Amazing. The girl made it in. She grins a bit and looks back to Harness. "Now, if you have such control, then just... tell him to send the magma back where it came from. I could show you half a dozen good sites on a map where you could do this without risking millions of lives.. and I'm not even a Vulcanologist."
That said, she steps up onto the island where the generator is at. "Kid." she says to the boy as she moves his way, heedless of Harness. "If you can hear me, this is not controlled. You need to send this all back to the core, the mantle, or wherever the hell this magma came from."
Atomic Robo takes a bit longer to return than Super-lass, as the robot was left behind so the hero gal can focus solely on bringing as much coolant as she can. He returns driving a car and when he returns he is immediately accosted by a few of his employees, as they start explaining what readings they got. "Ok, so we have people down there working on what caused this? Ok, good. I'll speak with them after this, but, right now, we need to stop the lava from flowing, and we're working on that. Keep all the civilians away, while Super-Lass and I work with the coolant to get the magma frozen back into rock."
Superlass is only 15, and did not have a Kryptonian archive placed into her head, so despite her speed, she is no scientist. She will follow Robo's directions on how to use the coolant.
Harness seems hesitant, but decides, "Earthworm, send back the lava." The Child seems to be struggling, but the lava flow does not seem to be stopping.
"...okay." Lava, lava. What does she know about lava. "It's under pressure. We need to drop the pressure." It's not a supervillain she's dealing with, at least. It's some woman who thinks she's helping. Sirocco wonders if that might not be, well, worse.
Atomic Robo frowns after heading back, and after a quick study of the lava he looks at Super-Lass, "Get the coolant onto the lava, but start at the borders, and work your way toward the origin!" He says, pointing at where the lava comes from, "Form a circle around the lava to form a rock barrier to keep it from spreading!"
"Earthworm is it?" asks Carol. Her voice has softened. She really is good with kids, and she moves in his direction. "Can you maybe... instead of trying to send it back... maybe send it somewhere else?" She pauses, "Instead of fighting the pressure, redirect it?" Hey, she knows about redirecting force from martial arts, why not?! "Maybe out into the ocean?" she adds. That way... the magma would hit water from below, and just harden on the bottom and cause no real harm.
Earthworm seems to listen to Carol, while the lava here dies not so away, Carol can sense it has stopped spreating into the sewers. Wherever he is redirecting the vent is beyond her immediate sense range. Sirrocco is able to help cool the area with her winds, the lava seems to go from yellow hot down to a duller reddish orange.
Superlass distributes the coolant as directed, forming plugs of solid stone to prevent the lava from spreading. The coolant would be used up fairly quickly, but thanks to the efforts of Misfit more is being brought in. "That's better." Sirocco grins at Carol. "Good idea. I wouldn't have throught of that." She decides she likes this woman...she's a famous hero, and worth paying attention to, but she seems nice too.
Atomic Robo is seeing dollar signs flying away at mach speed at every ounce of coolant being used to cool the molten magma back into solid rock. Coolant of that quality and quantity is EXPENSIVE!! And Tesladyne was already struggling against being in the red as it was... now it's going to be hell. But he just couldn't do anything while the magma destroyed the city! "Alright, that's good. That should keep the lava from spreading around, now, but, um..." he pauses a bit, in awkwardness, "Couldyoupleasenotusetoomuchofit?" he asks with a small, barely audible voice.
"Good job Earthworm. You're doing great." says Carol as she drops to her knees before the kid. She knows children like to be spoken -to-, not spoken -down- to. She gives her best smile and then looks to Harness, her eyes narrowing. She reaches out to the kid, and looks back at him. Her intent is to wait for the magma situation to be dealt with, and then to tear those cuffs off of him and crush them before Harness's face. Sirocco, keep an eye on Mommy Dearest here." she mutters, "She so much as twitches wrong.. sandstorm'er, eh?" she asks, still smiling to Earthworm the whole time.
On the surface, at least, things seem to be under control. The lava is no longer spreading, the fires are being put out, and no more buildings are collapsing. With the pressure reduced, Earthworm closes the volcanic vent below the Suicide Slum...and the Harness teleports away with him leaving the heroes to clean up the remaining mess.
"Dang it..." Sirocco does relax a bit as the ambient heat lowers...even she was starting to feel that a little bit. "We're going to meet her again. I can smell it."
"Great job Earthworm. You did great. Thank you for saving the city." says Carol. And then... she starts to reach for the cuffs and... they, and the kid, vanish. That... trips her holycrapnowI'mpissed switch. She surges to her feet, energy pulsing about her fists.. (the sparklefist effect as some people call it) and she whips her head about left and right seeking them. "God DAMNIT!" she calls out, "I swear, I see her again, she's gonna eat photons." she mutters... gritting her teeth to contain the rage she feels now.
She glances over to Sirocco then, taking a deep breath, and then nods, "You did awesome by the way. Thanks for the backup." she intones, turning to stalk out while trying to make it look more leisurely. She really is pissed, but she's making the effort to not take it out on the eager kid who helped her.
Atomic Robo is, at the moment, carrying what was left of coolant (SOME was left! Hooray!) back into the van he arrived in the first place after the situation was contained. After he closes the van's back doors he pats it a few times to let his people know it's ready to go. They drive away with what was left of the coolant, leaving Robo behind to talk to the other heroes about the incident and learn more about why a 'makeshift volcano' was trying to erupt in the middle of a tectonic plaque.
Not being able to move the generator immediately (presumably Harness teleported it down here, though likely one piece at a time), Captain Marvel and Sirocco return to the surface to check on the progress topside. An official from the government stops by to tell Atomic Robo that his company will be reimbursed for expenses.