Situation update for superintelligent AI!

The attackers were looking like perfectly ordinary Chicagoans; random people between the ages of twenty and forty-five walking down the street, wearing winter-appropriate clothes that included very large coats, that happened to conceal small but high-caliber rifles. Most of them look African, not as if they have some ancestors from Africa but as if they grew up there; three of them are Burmese, and more of them look Ecuadorian or Colombian; their average height is below that of the average American, and they're all men. All of them wear completely normal ski masks or hats with scarves that together conceal their faces to keep warm (most of them are also wearing winter coats to supplement that) and wearing gloves that block both snow and fingerprints.

(The two who were formerly police officers, on the other hand, look like much more typical Chicagoans, still wearing bulletproof vests and ordinary uniforms and firing with their department-issued weapons.)

The surprising thing is that they all moved together, drawing weapons almost simultaneously; they suddenly switched from walking like civilians to walking like people who can break your arm if you get it too close to them, and they did so without a single tell. Their aim is better than average for humans, and they might be missing because of gloves or unexpected weapon or because Musoka is flying very very fast and jinking as she does. Or they might be missing deliberately, that's also possible.

Other information:

- There are people alive in the police station. The SWAT team weren't the only ones there - and even they aren't dead, all of them, though one of the bombs did go off in the SWAT van - there were other people in the building and most of them are still alive, they're just concussed, trapped under rubble, and probably going to die of fire and/or smoke inhalation.

(There was more than one explosion. This is not immediately obvious to Musoka because they were literally simultaneous. It probably is to the Ring AI.)

- The fire against the police snipers was instant but not all lethal - there's two alive, but not dead yet, though they probably will be soon, from blood loss.

(The traitor-snipers did not miss, there; their shots were precise and rapid, swiftly changing directions to shoot down multiple of their enemies with fire that struck where the bulletproof vest did not cover, albeit they were firing against unmoving enemies.)

- A third of a second after the explosion, Octavian will change direction and start flying here directly at speeds people without lantern rings mostly can't match.

Fuckfuckfuckfuuuuck Okay, there's a lot going on, here, and if she doesn't redirect Musoka's attention very soon things are going to go really poorly.

...What course of action minimizes their exposure to things that are likely to terrify Musoka or get her killed or kidnapped, while leveraging her ability to help?

That's an easy call, actually. <Musoka, armor up and get to the police station! There's a lot of hurt people in there that we can help.>

(She forwards everything to Minerva, just in case it ends up mattering.)

aaaaaAAA so much is happening all at onc-

-Instructions! She can follow instructions! And help people! 

<Got it!>

Transparent blue armor springs up around her, and she jets into the police station at difficult-to-track speeds, disappearing into the entrance.

She knows how to put out fires rapidly; you smother the burning with an airtight construct, and then cool off any flammable material. She raises both hands and a solid wave of light pulses throughout the entire station, quashing the flames and venting the hot air upwards and outwards.

Flames are gone! There's hurt people there and there and there and there and rubble and people trapped under the rubble and a beam of light catches her while she's passing through the entrance, but it doesn't seem to have any effect -

You can't get good help these days.

Legate, if you want to try hitting someone flying at Mach 6 with a knockoff stunner beam, you can complain after you hit anyway and it doesn't do anything.

- And the gunfire falls silent for a moment and then there it is again - 

(One of the perfected soldiers falls as a stunner-beam from the shadows catches him; concentrated fire and a hand-grenade turn the hiding-place the shooter must have sat in to rubble, and there's no blood or body there)

- There's bullets coming down from the wreckage of the station, making the dust dance around Musoka - 

(Octavian is flying, and Octavian flies fast.)

-Ok, well now there's a massive shield stopping the gunfire from entering the police station.

She clears the rubble off people using large pincer and then starts doing emergency healing on everyone nearby. (it's slower than before; she's a lot less focused).

The bullets bounce off the shield, and the shooters pause to reload and to try to hunt down whoever's sniping them.

(He's has taken out two, now.)

Rubble is cleared - some of them are in bad shape, it's not just police in there, for that matter there's not just police and the cafeteria lady - there's ordinary people who happen to have been stopping in the station to report something and then the bomb went off and some of them don't have any legs -

Some of Livia's troops retrieve rather heavier-duty rifles than they were using previously from formerly uninteresting parked cars. How does Musoka's shield respond to anti-tank weapons?

She can stabilize people with no legs. It's a bit scary, but it's straightforward, so focusing on that instead of... everything else is what she's doing. 

Her construct shield shakes, but seems otherwise unbothered.

<Good work. ...Octavian should be here soon.>

Just checking: Her shields still work against grenades, tear gas, sharp objects, portable flamethrowers and people trying to just walk through?

Sure does! (A powerful concussive grenade might dent it inwards)

A blue laser would pass through it, if the mercenaries have one of those? 

Livia's army is equipped with military surplus from a thousand conflicts, mostly manufactured by the Soviet Union and sold to its satellites. Some of her troops on Novapest have Steelstorm Industries weapons, and Steelstorm Industries does indeed sell laser guns.

Not, however, any of her troops here.

Oh, hey, there's Minerva beckoning Blue Lantern to come to her from the door of the AAS headquarters building!

(Note to Ring AI: That is not Minerva. Minerva is not made of meat, imperfectly textured to resemble metal.)

Oh, that's weird.

<There's a doppelganger pretending to be Minerva, outside. Also some mercenaries with guns and other conventional weapons. Once you finish healing in here, they should be pretty straightforward to mop up.>

<Got it!>

The rest of the healing goes faster now; Musoka is more hopeful, more confident. She's shielding the police station just fine, the fires are all out, and everyone who was alive when she got here is going to be okay.

She wraps up and then turns back to her shieldwall to assess the situation. Are there mercenaries still nearby?

There are legionnaires around, yes. Nobody in melee range, but there are people ready to shoot her as soon as she comes out of her bubble or drops her armor.

Then they'll see a figure clad in transparent blue armor walk to the edge of the bubble shield (still connected to to her by a line of that same blue energy) and wave at them. When they don't respond, she tilts her head in apparent confusion.

Then she raises her hands with a dramatic flourish and her shield construct inverts, the back half of it dissipating as bands of force leap outwards and trapping the closest mercenaries in a rapidly-contracting net! 

That will work to trap some of them, assuming being shot in the back of the head with a stunner and in the leg with an anti-tank gun while the shield isn't protecting her have no more effect than they did previously!

The shot to the leg visibly pushes her back, but her construct-armor is unscathed! (The stunner doesn't do anything at all.)

This is going pretty well, all things considered. Oh, wait-

<-Octavian incoming!>