"Mm."

"Or, well, I suppose we could just pretend they're in fact Rewind's parents and try to rescue them anyway, and if they're not, well, we'll either save them or arrest them depending on just who they are."

"There's an idea." The bot fills in a side branch.

"So any strategies that apply to rescuing Rewind's parents apply to fake-parents. Except then we'd have the problem of rescuing her actual parents at some point, probably."

"Yeah. If Lung puts them somewhere findable."

"Okay, so... any other failure modes?"

"Alright. Is there any difference in strategy between if they're rigged with something and separated or if they're rigged with something and together? Other than my speedster?"

"No, I think that's the only difference."

"Then the bring-Rewind's-parents-in-person whole subtree's done, I guess?"

"Yeah." The bot wraps it up.

"Okay, next's remote transmission, which could be either a video feed or a phone call."

"Make sure," Lorica tells Rewind, "if it's either that you get to see or hear them react to something in real time."

"Yeah, if it's a recording it's pretty useless."

"But it could be a recording pretending to be a live feed, if you don't interact with it."

"I won't let him trick me."

"Okay, so, if it's a telephone conversation... I can't actually conjure anything through the phone that won't alert them."

"What do you mean, 'that won't alert them'?"

"Well, I can only conjure stuff if I can notice it's been conjured. Via video or in-person I can make a tiny locator somewhere they're not likely to be looking but which I can see, whereas via the phone it'd need to produce some noise loud enough for me to hear and then they'd hear it, too."

"Wait, really? I didn't know that."

"Eighty percent of power is appearances."

"Okay, but would it have to be a particularly implicating noise? Make it sound like somebody pressed the 6 button by accident or like the Rewind copy coughed."

"But... hmm... well, what could I conjure that's useful and would produce that kind of noise? Also there's the problem that I won't be seeing the other side, so whatever thugs that will be there might notice the thing I conjured wherever my power makes it appear."

"A bot," says Lorica. "A little, mini bot, which can make noises and see. A camo model."

"Where would I conjure it, that whoever's holding the phone wouldn't hear?"