The double life, the lies, the constant suspense, that was the easy part. She still had everyone she loved. There was a part of Julie that realized it. That selfishly wanted the war to go on forever because there was no way for her to get to the end unscathed. But the fragile balance of her life was tipping. She had made the choice long ago and now she had to face the consequences.
The hardest part was watching her father go insane. She told him he was being paranoid and secretly knew he wasn't paranoid enough. When he still couldn't conquer Motorcity he had started cracking down on Deluxe. He began cutting off what little freedom there was there. He Imposed curfews, rationing, and drafts. He started diverting resources from infrastructure maintenance to build more drone factories. There came a point when she realized she could no longer wait for him to come to his senses—there might not be anything left by then.
The hardest part was realizing it had to be her. They couldn't just remove the man who had ruled the city for almost two decades unquestioned and expect the people to spontaneously hold elections. She could provide a sense of continuity and forestall the chaos. An outsider would be too disruptive; an inside would keep things too much the same. If she wanted a better Deluxe, a more humane one, she would have to build it herself.
The hardest part was telling her friends. It had to come out sooner or later. They were planning for the future and it would make everything simpler. Chuck had noticed the major flaw in the Burner's plan—just taking down Kane would not make his armies and bots disappear. This started an argument with Mike convinced most people in Deluxe were decent, Dutch taking a more pessimistic approach and Texas believing everything could solved by punching.
She took a deep breath. "I can take over KaneCo," she said softly. She might as well have shouted it. The argument immediately stopped and everyone stared at her.
Mike broke the silence. "Don't get me wrong that would be great but how is it even an option?"
"That's the thing—Kane's setting it up that I succeed him if anything happens," she replied. He nodded like this wasn't entirely unexpected.
Dutch was still skeptical. "Why would he do that?"
She fought to keep her voice steady. "Because I'm his daughter."
And they were back to shocked silence, a temporary calm before the inevitable storm.
The hardest part was listening to the last message her father left her. He warned her that the rebels had seized KaneCo and told her to lay low until he could take it back. He had loved her and underestimated her to the end. He had taken the time to try and contact her in the middle of a battle and she hadn't answered because she was too busy taking over his company.
They never found a body which wasn't unexpected given the extent of the explosion. He had been given the chance to surrender when his warpod was crippled. She was saddened but not surprised that he chose to crash instead. If her father had been more willing to compromise the history of the city would have been different.
At least she could put off the funeral. She wasn't ready to sort out her own complex feelings toward the man let alone take into consideration everyone else's. Maybe if they'd been able to put him trial the way Mike had always wanted to there would have been a cleaner break. As it was there were still many people who didn't think Abraham Kane had done anything wrong.
In the end she'd had a small plaque installed with just his name and the dates. No description. What could she say? Father? Visionary? Tyrant?
Author's note: this is a sequel to Things you aren't supposed to know. There will be four chapters. The next one should be up soon.