June 30th, 2007
Annette sat up in bed with a wince, the wound in her side pulling against the stitches. Suppressing the expression she wanted to put on, the brunette woman smiled at her husband and daughter as they entered the room and came over to the bed. Danny looked vastly relieved to see she was awake and more or less intact while Taylor's expression was, to her mother's eyes, a mix of happiness, worry, and sadness.
Holding out her arms, she smiled gently as Taylor dashed forward and held her. "The doctors told me what happened, dear," she said quietly into her daughter's neck, the girl holding her tightly. "Thank you."
"You're welcome, mom," Taylor replied, so quietly she was barely audible. Annette could feel she was shaking a little. Moments later it stopped, the girl reasserting the iron control she had over her emotions and outward signs of worry. Only part of that was the result of her training by the AI she thought of as a mentor and extremely close friend. The rest was all her.
Holding Taylor with one arm, Annette beckoned with the other, Danny coming over and sitting in the chair next to the bed, then taking her hand with both of his. "How are you feeling, love?"
"Like someone shot me," she joked. He almost smiled. "Better. Still hurts quite a lot, but not as much as I'd have thought it would." She looked down at where the bandages were under the covers, then back to him. "Considering it went all the way through. And I'm definitely feeling tired and weak. The doctor said that was normal after losing all that blood."
His grip tightened at her words. "Don't worry, they topped me up again," she added with a smile. "Four pints, apparently."
All three of them looked around when they heard someone clear his throat at the door, to see Doctor Anand, her physician. "Sorry to interrupt, Mrs Hebert, but we need to change your bandages again," he said in a calm and educated voice. "I'd like to check the state of your wound. Your family can stay if they want, it won't take too long."
"How soon can she come home?" Taylor asked the man, looking at him in an oddly evaluating manner.
"Well, young lady, your mother was very lucky in that the weapon was a small caliber one and it only barely nicked her kidney," the doctor replied, smiling at Taylor. "The damage was remarkably light, but no gunshot wound is ever trivial. We're going to want to keep her in for observation for at least three or four days to make sure there aren't any complications, such as infection, the wound reopening, that sort of thing, but if she's still doing well at that point we'll be in a position to consider letting her go home." He raised a finger as Taylor nodded thoughtfully. "But… She's going to need to be very careful for several weeks not to stress herself, put pressure on the wound, or anything that might cause more damage, so you're all going to have to look after her."
"We can do that," Taylor assured him gravely.
He smiled. "I'm sure you can, my girl. I understand you were the one who saved her life in the first place?"
"I did what I had to do," she quietly replied, looking slightly embarrassed.
"Out of curiosity, how did you know what to do?" he asked. "There aren't all that many people twice your age who would be able to cope with that sort of situation."
"I read a lot," Taylor told him with a sudden bright smile. "I've read several advanced first aid books, and a couple of military field medic training ones that Dad had lying around. It's interesting."
He nodded with a smile of his own. "I agree, medicine is very interesting indeed, although very complicated. Perhaps one day you'll consider it as a career, since you certainly seem to have picked up the basics very early." He looked approving. "Well done indeed. Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to examine your mother's wound."
Taylor released Annette and stepped back with a polite nod. Danny got up and moved out of the way as Doctor Anand motioned to someone outside the room, a nurse coming in moments later pushing a cart filled with medical supplies. Shortly Annette was lying on her undamaged side with her gown pulled up, while the nurse aided the doctor in carefully removing the bandages. "Ah… Yes, good, good. It all looks like the healing is starting nicely, Mrs Hebert," he said after closely examining both front and back wounds. Palpitating the area gently he paused as she hissed in pain. "Apologies. It will be tender for some time, I'm afraid."
He checked some more, nodded, and sat back. "Excellent. No signs of infection, only mild inflammation, and the sutures are holding nicely. Everything looks good. We'll monitor it over the next couple of days and check your kidney functions regularly. You'll have blood in your urine for some time, but it should diminish steadily. How does it feel?"
"A deep ache and a lot of itching at the surface," she reported. "And I'm tired and quite thirsty."
"All normal signs. Is the pain manageable or do you want a slightly higher dose of pain relief?"
"I wouldn't turn down some ibuprofen," she said with a small grin, making Danny chuckle.
"We can probably manage something a little more effective that that," the doctor smiled. "Hopefully it will hurt less quite quickly, although I'd expect you to be uncomfortable for a while. If it starts to be seriously painful, call the nurse immediately, please."
She nodded, watching as did Taylor and Danny as he and his companion quickly replaced the bandages. When she was lying on her back again, he made some notes on her record, then stood up. "Everything seems to be coming along well," he said as the nurse collected all the medical waste and put it into the biohazard container on the cart. "I'll come back this evening for another check."
"Thank you, Doctor," she said. He nodded to her, smiled at Taylor, did the same to Danny, and left.
When she was sure he was gone, Taylor leaned close to her. "Sorry, Mom, Kenny thinks that we need to be discreet right now, so we can't fix this properly until you get home," she whispered into Annette's ear, clearly not pleased about it but understanding why.
"That's OK, Taylor," Annette replied in a very low voice, smiling at her daughter. "I can handle it until then. It's not too painful."
"We need to do something to make sure this doesn't happen again," the girl sighed, still whispering. "That was too close. It's shouldn't have happened in the first place."
"Wait until I'm home and we can discuss it, dear," Annette smiled. More loudly, she asked, "Did anything interesting happen while I was being worked on?"
Danny looked at her, then turned his head to look at Taylor, who went completely blank. Annette sighed after a moment.
"Oh, dear."
She nodded to the door, Danny getting up and closing it, then coming back. As he did, Taylor looked around, to all outward signs apparently listening, before relaxing slightly. All three Heberts huddled close, Annette holding her daughter next to her. "Tell me what happened."
Taylor, after a long quiet sigh, began talking, while staring at the floor. This went on for some considerable time.
Hearing a soft knock on the door, Annette put the book Taylor had brought her down on the bed next to her and looked over, calling, "Come in!"
It opened to reveal several familiar faces. "Hello, girls," she smiled, beckoning. "Come on in. Hi, Carol."
Carol Dallon followed her daughters into the room and closed the door behind her. Amy and Vicky walked over to the bed, the former stopping to inspect her carefully from a distance, before she approached. Her blonde sister merely dashed over and plopped down into the chair Taylor had used earlier. "Hi, Mrs H. How are you feeling?" Vicky asked, looking concerned. "Has Taylor been in yet? Mr H called Mom this morning and told her what happened. Did they get the guy? I hope they got the guy. I'd like to get the guy..." She scowled fiercely, while Annette smiled more widely. The young woman was remarkably chatty even when she was worried.
"I'm not to bad, Vicky, thank you. You just missed Danny and Taylor, they left about fifteen minutes ago. And yes, the man who shot me has been dealt with. As was his partner." She didn't explain any further, but glanced at Carol who was standing on the other side of the bed with her other daughter. The woman nodded slightly.
"Good. I don't like people who go around shooting other people for no reason. Or criminals. Or criminals who go around shooting people for any reason," the girl said firmly.
Amy sighed very slightly. "Vicky, you're doing it again," she said quietly. Her sister looked slightly embarrassed for a moment, but it didn't last long. It seldom did, the girl was as irrepressible as Taylor in her own exuberant way. Amy was much less expressive and at times amazingly sarcastic in a very subtle manner, but was also capable of a high degree of empathy. Annette was very fond of both of them.
"Danny said that you were expected to make a complete recovery, Annette," Carol said, one hand on Amy's shoulder. "I'm very glad and relieved to hear that. How long will you be in hospital for?"
"The surgeon thinks that I'm healing well and that I can leave in a few days, but I'll have to take it very easy for some weeks," she replied with a shrug. "Danny has told the University and they're arranging a substitute lecturer if it turns out I can't make it back by the start of term. I probably can, but it's best to be prepared. Doctor Anand says that he'd prefer me to stay in bed for a couple of weeks, then do as little as possible to exert myself for the next month, but barring complications after that I can start getting back into normal life." She smiled again. "I was lucky. The gunman managed to poke a hole in me in such a way that it caused minimum damage. Half an inch lower and I might have bled out before the ambulance turned up, even with the first aid that I was given. They had to put quite a lot of blood back in."
The other woman nodded thoughtfully. "Excellent news, under the circumstances. I'm furious that it happened, but it could have been much worse."
"Indeed it could have. Luckily Taylor knew what to do and the gas station first aid kit was well stocked." Annette chuckled, then winced slightly as the wound ached as a result. "I knew her reading habits would come in handy sooner or later."
Vicky grinned. "Doctor Curlyhair knows many strange and wonderful things." This made Amy snicker, and both older women smiled.
"I brought you this, Mrs H," Amy said, lifting her hand and holding out a small box of very expensive chocolates. "I remembered they were your favorite."
"Oh, thank you very much, Amy!" Annette exclaimed, accepting the gift. "That's nice of you."
"You're welcome," the brunette replied, smiling back.
"Sit down, both of you, and help me eat these," Annette said, indicating the two remaining chairs against the wall. She looked around theatrically, then whispered, "I'm probably not supposed to have them, so we need to get rid of the evidence."
Vicky giggled while her sister smirked a little. Both girls eagerly picked out a chocolate each after she'd opened the box and held it out, Carol having brought the chairs over. The older Dallon woman also took one, popping it into her mouth and chewing with an expression of bliss.
"I have to say, Annette, that you have amazing taste in chocolate," she said after a moment's ecstasy. Annette nodded happily, eating one as well.
"My mother loved these," she confided. "It's always been a little treat for me when I needed a lift. Now is as good a time as any." She looked around at her visitors and added, "Thank you for visiting. How are the rest of your family?"
"Everyone's doing well, and asked me to pass on their best wishes," Carol replied, taking another chocolate. "Mark's latest treatment is working surprisingly well and he's been feeling a lot better recently now that they tweaked the dosages. He suggested a couple of days ago that we should invite you and your family over for dinner again, since we haven't done that for some time. Bearing in mind what happened, I think we'll have to postpone that for a while, but as soon as you're well enough, we'd love to have you over."
"We'd love to come, thank you," Annette laughed. "We all enjoy your dinners. I know Danny thinks that Sarah's beef stew is amazing and he'd probably crawl over broken glass for a plate of it."
Carol snickered. "Mark is the same, and so is Eric. It must be a man thing."
"Hey, I love it too and I'm no man," Vicky protested, making her sister giggle.
"Man and Vicky thing, then," Carol amended, amused. "In any case, we'll pencil that in for a few weeks. Is this going to impact on the holiday plans you had?"
"We'll have to talk to Alan and his family," Annette said. "We'd originally thought we'd go up to the lake for perhaps the third week in July. I might be mobile enough by then to be able to do it, but if we have to put it off a little, that's no great problem. I could certainly relax there and heal up. Are you still going?"
The other woman nodded. "It's become something of a tradition in the last couple of years and I have to admit that, despite my initial thoughts, some time away from work and the other things in life is very helpful."
"I told you that a vacation was a good idea, Mom," Vicky grinned. Amy nodded vigorously. "And we love the lake."
"You just want to see what crazy idea Taylor comes up with to confuse the locals this time," her mother pointed out, which made both girls nod again with wide smiles. "If you could not invade the summer camp and claim it in the name of Doctor Curlyhair's Empire of Doom this time, I expect that almost everyone would appreciate it quite a lot." The lawyer rolled her eyes as both girls produced eerie laughs, making Annette crack up.
"Oh, dear, she's gotten to them as well," she giggled. "Emma has been a lost cause for years, but now she's got more followers."
"Eric is besotted with your daughter, at least as far as thinking she's gloriously mad and enormous fun," Carol confided. "He's always up for the sort of experience that Taylor tends to produce when she gets creative. I still wonder if she's actually some sort of bizarre Tinker."
Annette shook her head with a smile. "I doubt it, to be honest. She's always been inventive and prone to doing things like that. And Emma is at least as bad when they put their heads together. The addition of your three only makes things even stranger." She looked fondly at Amy and Vicky, both of whom looked somewhat proud. "I believe it was actually Amy who came up with the trebuchet design last year."
"Taylor figured out how to actually make it, I just thought it would be fun," the shorter girl giggled. "I couldn't believe how far it threw things!"
"Neither could the people in the next cabin," Carol commented dryly. "Or the people in that fishing boat. Or, for that matter, that goose."
Vicky mimed something exploding in a cloud of feathers, before both she and her sister fell about laughing helplessly. Their mother exchanged a long-suffering look with Annette, who shrugged once more. "It was an unusual method of hunting but it seemed to work," the Hebert woman smiled. "Once it was cooked it was quite tasty."
"There is that, although I still don't believe that you can shoot down a goose with a coconut and I actually saw it happen..." Carol sighed.
"I'm just glad that Taylor and Emma became such good friends with your girls and Eric," Annette remarked. "Taylor particularly. She was always… not unsocial, but not the sort of person who made friends easily. I suspect because she couldn't find that many people who could keep up with her. Emma can, and these two can as well, but she never really had anyone other than Emma until she was ten."
"The girl is certainly mature beyond her years and frighteningly articulate," Carol nodded. "She's also a very nice person and I'm glad she and Emma became friends with my daughters too." She looked at the two girls who had finally stopped giggling, after Vicky mimed something plummeting from the air a couple of times. "Although at times the combination of them all can be… somewhat concerning."
"Don't worry, Mom," Amy grinned. "Kenny will stop anything too weird happening."
Annette tried not to burst out laughing while their mother gave them a look. "Yes, I expect the imaginary friend will be so effective at stopping five over-imaginative children from doing something excessive," Carol said with heavy sarcasm. "One only has to look at his past performance in that field."
Vicky smirked at her sister, both girls looking amused, but they didn't say anything else. Annette shook her head, also smiling. Carol glanced at her watch, then stood up. "We're going to have to go, I'm afraid, we have a number of other things to do today. But we'll stop by again tomorrow. Sarah said that when she was free she'd come and visit too, she was quite worried and very angry about what happened."
"It was lovely seeing you all," Annette told her honestly, holding her hands out and taking one each of the two girls, who leaned in and hugged her. "Thank you for the chocolates, Amy."
"It wasn't a problem, Mrs H," the girl replied. Annette offered the box around again, each of them taking one, then took the last one for herself.
"Could you get rid of this for me, Amy," she asked with a smile. "Just so no one knows I was a little naughty."
"Of course," the girl said, taking the box and looking pleased.
"Girls, go and call the elevator, will you? I just need to have a private word with Annette for a moment." Carol requested. Both her daughters waved to Annette then left the room. Carol closed the door gently and turned back to look at Annette.
"Is Taylor all right?" she asked quietly. "Danny told me what happened. Not much detail, but I know they were at the police station for a while before that insane Merchant attack last night. Is there going to be any fallout from that?"
The other woman sighed gently. "She… isn't happy. Not at all. But she's a strong girl, very strong, and she'll be fine. There aren't any charges to answer for, the police said it was a clear case of self defense and that she did the right thing all the way through. She saved several lives, including mine. I don't think we'll hear any more about it."
Carol nodded thoughtfully. "I see. That's good, although I'm very sad that the poor girl had the experience. It's not something someone that age should ever have to do. But I'm very relieved that she was able to stop them even so. I don't like to consider the alternative."
"I'm not too keen on thinking about what could have happened either," Annette admitted. "We had a long talk about it earlier. We're going to have to have a longer one when I get home, since the hospital isn't the best place for that sort of thing. I will say, though, as I did to Taylor, that I'm extremely proud of my daughter regardless of what she was forced to do."
"As am I," Carol said. "It was very brave." She looked at her watch again. "I really must run, I have someone I need to talk to, but I'm glad you're all right. If you need anything I can help with, just call. Sarah and the others said the same."
"Thank you all. Hopefully we'll be fine, and I'll be home in bed by the middle of the week." Annette motioned at the room. "This is nice enough for a hospital but it's not my bedroom."
Her visitor laughed. "I can understand that, certainly. Hospitals are never nice places to stay. They tend to be full of sick people which doesn't add to the ambiance at all."
Giggling, Annette waved as the other woman nodded to her and left, picking up her book when the door was closed again.
It was nice to have friends, and she was glad her daughter had finally discovered that too.
She was going to need them as the years passed, her mother suspected.
"...despite the lack of suitable training, equipment, and experience. The PRT regrets the loss of life on both sides, although there was obviously no practical method that the Brockton Bay Police Department could have avoided the situation once it began. It is unfortunate that..."
BBPD Commissioner John Blake dropped the paper he was holding on the table in front of him, glaring across it at the blonde woman on the other side. "It goes on like that at length, simultaneously saying how pleased the PRT is that so few of my people were killed while heavily implying it's their fault for the whole incident in the first place. Talk about damned with faint praise. Do you have an entire department dedicated to this sort of double-talk, Emily, or is it just a gift?" He snorted with anger, flicking the paper towards her. "Fuck it, that's going too far. It's disrespecting the memories of the good men and women who died in the line of duty, doing the job your people are supposed to be doing!"
The tallish white-haired man was clearly on the verge of adding something else, probably in a rather inflammatory manner, but visibly controlled himself. Breathing heavily for a few seconds as Director Piggot of the PRT ENE watched him warily, her face set, he finally opened his mouth again. "You may have gathered that I am not a happy man at the moment," he went on much more calmly but with a dangerous air. "I have lost eight good cops, have the largest station in the entire city shot to hell and unusable, and have just read the most pointless excuse for an official statement I've ever seen from your organization. And believe me, that's saying something."
He leaned forward again, pointing at the newspaper which was now lying half-way between them. "That right there is, I guarantee it, going to do more damage to the relationship between the BBPD and the PRT, and for that matter between the public and the PRT, than simply not saying anything at all would have done. You should see some of the things that are already being talked about on the internet. Gasoline on a fire is not the way you put it out." His voice was rising once again.
"Commissioner, perhaps we should pause and calm down before someone says something unfortunate," a voice cut in from the end of the table. Both Piggot and Blake looked in that direction. The man sitting there made a small motion suggesting calmness. "Feelings are understandably running high, but we're all on the same side here and need to present a united front. You're correct, Commissioner, the public is asking a lot of questions, but shouting about it won't help answer them."
"It helps me," Blake muttered under his breath, but nodded. "All right. I apologize for raising my voice, Director, but you must understand that I'm not happy, and neither are the rest of the BBPD. Nor are a lot of citizens of this city. What happened last night should have been avoidable and the repercussions of this could last for months."
He glanced at the third man. "I'm sorry, Councilor Christner. I know you're trying to mediate this, and I appreciate the effort."
"Just doing what I can to keep the city running while the Mayor is away on business," the younger man smiled. He looked around the table at the other people there, most of whom had wisely been keeping their mouths shut as their superiors growled at each other. "All of us here want to make sure that this sort of thing doesn't happen again, and we're here to see if we can work out the best method to ensure that."
After a moment's silence, he added, "If you've gotten that off your chest, Commissioner, perhaps we should let Director Piggot have a chance to respond."
The other man nodded with a grimace of irritation that he tried to cover by clearing his throat, before he leaned back in his chair again and folded his hands on the table in front of him. "Fine by me," he said, not looking happy but also not looking quite so combative now.
Director Piggot, a blonde woman in her mid thirties with a face that didn't look like it smiled very often and a body that betrayed a hell of a lot of hard exercise, despite the limp she walked with, cleared her throat. "I understand your anger, Commissioner. Believe me, I've lost people under my command too, and it's not something you ever get used to. Personally, I offer my condolences to you and the BBPD."
He nodded silently, but didn't reply.
"However, there is the issue that the BBPD took action on the Merchants, a gang with known parahuman members, despite it being policy of both the BBPD and the PRT that such things should only be done with PRT support because of the possibility of something like this happening. You should have liaised with us before your people moved in on the Merchants, which could have..."
Commissioner Blake raised a finger, causing her to stop. "Could I just interrupt you there, Ma'am?" She gave him a not particularly friendly look as he turned to one of the others on his side of the table. "Charlie, could you refresh my memory on what we did in the process of planning the raid on the Merchants? Say, in the 48 hours leading up to it?"
His voice was even and controlled, but betrayed a certain level of suppressed fury. The man addressed, who was wearing a very expensive suit, nodded with a totally blank expression and retrieved a folder from the briefcase next to him, put the case down again, then opened the folder.
"June 27, 2007, BBPD criminal intelligence receives plausible information that there is a large cache of drugs and weapons at a suspected Merchant facility," he began in a dry voice. "Undercover officers are tasked to gather further data on the facility, via known informants, a number of classified sources, and contacts in the PRT ENE parahuman street crime division." He looked over his thin-rimmed glasses at Director Piggot, who had gone completely still. "All the information so gathered corroborates the initial tip-off. PRT sources suggest that the facility is suspected to house more than seventy percent of the total resources of the Merchant gang. Parahuman involvement in the facility is suggested to be minimal over the next three days due to Skidmark and Squealer being otherwise engaged in setting up new smuggling routes after the recent Coast Guard seizures of three vessels bringing contraband up from Miami two months ago."
He turned the page. "BBPD SWAT officers in conjunction with Criminal Intelligence devise a plan of attack, using the information received to minimize the likelihood of parahuman contact. Plans are also drawn up to neutralize each of the known Merchant parahumans if such contact occurs. These plans are send to the PRT ENE liaison office at 18:38 on the 27th. No response is received."
Director Piggot opened her mouth, then closed it when the Commissioner held up his finger again. The other man went on, "June 28, 2007, plans are finalized for the operation against the Merchant facility, and personnel are assigned for each required role, drawing on officers from across all precincts of the city. City Hall is notified of the timing of the operation, as per protocol, and green lights it. Unofficial PRT contacts deliver extra background data, showing that the 29th is a suitable time for the raid as at least two of the three Merchant parahumans will definitely be elsewhere. The remaining one, Mush, is a possible combatant, and neutralization plans for him are updated. Timing of the raid, the expected routes of attack, and other relevant data are sent to the PRT liaison office at 15:29 on the 28th. A brief response is received at 17:43 noting that the PRT has filed the data. No further contact from the PRT is had on that date."
He turned the page again, while the room was silent, every person listening intently. Several of the PRT contingent were looking very uncomfortable.
"One hour before the commencement of the operation on the 29th, in an attempt to remedy the lack of communication, Lieutenant Hackett of BBPD SWAT attempts to double check via a personal contact at the PRT that the organization has no objections to the proposed actions. His contact reports that her immediate superior passed the request up the chain of command and returned with neither a positive go or a positive stop message, merely saying that it was in the hands of the BBPD. After discussing this response with Captain Rosenberg and the office of the Commissioner, it was decided that in the absence of further objection, the raid would proceed as planned. This duly occurred, resulting in complete success."
Charlie closed the folder and put it back into his briefcase. Blake nodded to him, then looked back at Director Piggot, whose expression suggested she'd just realized she'd stood on a landmine and there had been a tiny ominous 'click.'
"With all due respect, Director, my people did exactly what they were supposed to. Completely by the book on our end. Despite my own feelings about how things work, we gave the PRT ample opportunity to intervene if they wanted, and basically got ignored. Which isn't the first time by any means, but never over something this big. Now, if you can tell me more about this, go right ahead, but don't say we didn't follow protocol."
He sighed, rubbing the back of one hand with the fingers of the other, adding, "Jesus, I know you're under pressure and don't have nearly the resources you need, Emily, but this is a total cluster-fuck. And I have to say I don't think it's our cluster-fuck. I'm not blaming you, I know your history, and I'm damn sure this isn't something you knew about because you're much too professional to allow it to happen if you did. Since you took over eleven months ago, things have improved massively overall, although a lot of people, myself included, feel that there is a long way to go yet. But someone in your agency dropped the ball, with enough force that I'm more than a little suspicious it was deliberate, and press releases like that are only going to make things worse. And as the one at the top, your desk is where it stops. You know that as well as I do, and that there's no way something like this should have been missed by you unless someone is fucking with you."
There was a tired look on his face. "This damned city is one bad day away from a riot that will make the last one look like a carnival, we have a violent crime rate that wouldn't be out of place in a war zone, more parahumans per square mile than practically anywhere, and the people are seriously losing patience with all of us. Mostly you guys, actually, since your remit is to deal with the parahuman villains and that's not happening. I know you're outnumbered, outgunned, and probably have orders not to start a war, but people out there?" He waved a hand at the window looking out into the commercial district of the city. "They don't care. All they know is their businesses get destroyed, people are killed in various horrible ways on a regular basis, buildings get burned down, god knows what else. And now we have one gang that uses weapons that no one outside the army should have to shoot the fuck out of a police station and the PRT only turns up when it's all over."
Blake shook his head. "Not good optics, Director, no matter what the reason is. The public doesn't really care, all they see is what it looks like. And right now they mainly see that the BBPD did their job to take a lot of major criminals off the street, successfully, and paid a stiff price for it."
"I appreciate the lecture, Commissioner," Director Piggot finally said when he fell silent. "I'm sure that it felt good to get all that off your chest."
"Not really," he sighed. "It had to be said, but I don't enjoy saying it. I didn't enjoy saying something similar to your predecessor either, on the three… no, four, separate occasions we crossed horns. The difference now is that I hope I'm saying it to someone who will listen and do something about it. I'd rather work together with the PRT, not in spite of it."
The woman glared at him, then sagged a little. "Damn it. You're completely sure that your people informed mine?"
Commissioner Blake glanced at his aide, who nodded. "Yes," the man replied. "Definitely. I can forward you copies of everything we passed on to the liaison office, and the replies."
"Do that, please," she requested. Her left eyebrow twitched a couple of times. "I think I need to have a very long talk with certain people." The woman gave the impression that those people would be exceptionally lucky to walk away with their freedom, never mind jobs. "I've spend a lot more time getting rid of some of the dead wood that the former Director managed to accumulate than I care for, but clearly some slipped through the cracks," she added in a low growl.
Raising her eyes to meet his, she said, "I'm sorry, John. I honestly am. This shouldn't have happened, and when I find out how it did, who was responsible, and why…" She trailed off with a look of extreme annoyance. "In retrospect, you're right, that press release didn't help. Again, my apologies."
"It's too late now to do anything about it," Blake shrugged. "If you put out another one retracting anything in the first one, it'll be seen as a cover up and people will wonder what you're covering up. If we put out a statement taking issue with it, we're just adding to the controversy, which also makes it worse. Best to ignore it on both sides and pretend it didn't happen. Most people will forget about it in time. Politics is like that, and neither one of us can really win without making more problems for each other, which only makes the whole situation harder to deal with in the long run."
Director Piggot nodded reluctantly. "Unfortunately I think you're right." She glanced at Councilor Christner who had been listening quietly but with great attention. "What does the city administration think?"
"We mainly wish this hadn't happened," he replied immediately. "We have enough trouble keeping the place operating without firefights downtown, or local law enforcement getting into shouting matches with federal ones. But considering how things have worked out, I agree with Commissioner Blake that it's probably best to let it lie for now. If the public gets too worked up about it, our own public relations department will deal with it." He looked momentarily darkly amused. "Believe me, we got a lot of practice in that area with the previous Director. Thomas Calvert was… not well liked or respected."
"He was an asshole," Blake remarked with a frown. "Not surprising considering it was Tagg who put him up for the position and managed to force it through. Anyone James Tagg thinks is a good fit for a job like that is someone any sensible person would be wary of. Especially in Brockton Bay."
Director Piggot looked like she agreed, but didn't want to say anything. The councilman turned back to her. "We were quite relieved when we found out that you were in the top position to replace him after the entire Southside Mall incident, Director Piggot. You have a reputation for a level of competence that is desperately needed in our fair city." He looked amused as she snorted with disdain. "After all, you saved over three thousand people at Ellisburg with your quick thinking."
"And didn't save nearly two thousand others," she retorted, scowling.
"It would have been a lot worse if you hadn't taken the actions you did," he replied evenly. "I've read the reports. We like to know the people we work with around here. I happen to think you did the right thing no matter what your higher-ups might feel, by the way. While I suspect that your superiors are at least partially thinking of this as a punishment detail, and a way to keep you out of the way without officially censuring you for your actions, I personally think you're one of the few people that can genuinely help. Brockton Bay is a… complex… place. We don't need another Calvert, we need someone who will think things through, and consider problems from other points of view than their own. Having met the man more than once I rather felt he was mostly in it for himself."
Several people, including a couple of the PRT officers, nodded thoughtfully. Piggot regarded him for a moment a little suspiciously, like she suspected he was trying some sort of scam on her, but ultimately made a small gesture of acknowledgment.
"Thank you. I think," she replied.
"We just need to make certain that this sort of thing doesn't happen again," the councilor added meaningfully. "It's going to take a lot of discreet damage control to regain the trust of the public, and another similar incident could destroy in seconds any progress we make in the next few weeks. As the Commissioner accurately put it, the place is teetering on the edge of a complete catastrophe at the best of times, so we don't want to push it too hard."
She nodded slightly. "I don't want this repeated any more than you do, Councilor. Not only does it make my people look bad, innocent people lost their lives over something that shouldn't have happened in the first place. You have my word that there will be a reckoning over how this fiasco occurred. The commissioner is completely correct, there shouldn't have been any way for me to have been kept in the dark about this, unless someone was doing it deliberately or there was a series of frankly almost impossible coincidences. Or, I suppose, some form of parahuman interference, but considering the protocols we have in place for exactly that sort of thing, it shouldn't be possible."
She frowned thoughtfully as she spoke. "Perhaps those protocols need updating. I'll look into it. Regardless, something went badly wrong and I intend to make sure it doesn't occur again." The woman glanced at her own aide, a PRT lieutenant, who was making notes, then returned her attention to Blake.
"All right, I guess I can't ask for more than that," the man said after a second's study of her face. "Out of interest, why was the response time so long? I mean, this was less than a mile from the PRT building, and it was hellishly loud. Even without any warning I'd have expected you to have a squad on the way as soon as the first explosion happened, since there's no way you could have missed it."
Director Piggot scowled. "It was the middle of a shift change, we're short-staffed right now because of injuries from the last op against the E88 two days ago, and there were communication issues that caused a delay in reporting to the right people. A perfect storm of things going wrong, leaving aside whatever the hell happened with the liaison office. By the time all the confusion got sorted out and we had teams rolling it was all over. Bear in mind the main firefight only lasted about thirteen minutes, so even if we'd jumped the moment the first shot was fired, we'd still have missed most of the excitement."
Blake nodded slowly. "All right. I can understand that, mistakes happen to the best, and it was out of the blue. That's not to say I'm happy about it, but I can't argue with how effectively your guys got to work when they turned up."
"Unfortunately Armsmaster was on patrol on the other side of the district when the call came in and he had Miss Militia with him," the PRT lieutenant added, speaking a little carefully in case he managed to say the wrong thing. "The rest of the capes were on the Rig doing a detailed debrief of the E88 operation, which added quite a lot of time to their response availability."
"I suppose even he couldn't cover ten miles that fast," Councilman Christner commented with a smile. "I know his bike is impressive but to the best of my knowledge it doesn't fly. Yet."
Director Piggot sighed faintly. "Don't give him ideas, the man is bad enough as it is. If he decides he needs a flying bike, he'll build a flying bike, and the next thing you know he'll be locked in his lab for two weeks just like last time he had a good idea." She shook her head. "I need him available as much as possible. As irritating as he can be, he's actually exceptionally competent at his job."
"I'm surprised to hear you say that, Director," the councilor said with a small grin. "Aren't you supposed to keep your criticisms internal?"
She gave him a long-suffering look. "You have met the man, I assume?" He nodded, still grinning. "I am hardly saying anything that everyone else isn't also saying. Including his friends and coworkers."
"He has friends?"
Director Piggot actually snickered, but hastily pretended it was a cough. "Despite appearances, yes."
Her face went back to a professionally neutral expression moments later. "Since we seem to have reached agreement on the incident itself, and actions we need to take to solve the problems raised, I would like to move on to something else. Notably, exactly what happened after the incident began."
Commissioner Blake raised an eyebrow. "Considering the remarkable amount of paperwork I've read and signed off on in the last twenty four hours, I would think that's fairly well established, isn't it? A large number of highly trained BBPD officers used their skills and weapons, in conjunction with a certain amount of good fortune, to defend themselves against a large attacking force. Successfully for the most part, since the Merchant losses were much larger than we took."
"Yes, yes, I've read the reports myself, thank you," she said impatiently. "And all the ones my own staff have generated which make the BBPD ones look like a short novel." She sighed heavily as he looked slightly amused. "There are… some issues."
"Go on."
The blonde woman examined him closely, then glanced at Captain Rosenberg next to him on the other side from his aide, before looking momentarily at the councilor who was again listening with obvious interest. "OK, let's go through it. Skidmark is dead, a clean shot with a 7.62mm rifle bullet through the head. Mush is still in BBPD custody, sedated and heavily restrained. My own medical staff say he's undamaged and safe but unlikely to wake for some time. Squealer is… currently in an undetermined location." Looking narrowly at him, she added, "Which is something I am not happy about. We were lead to believe that she was being transported to Brockton General under BBPD guard, but they claim to have no record of her arriving."
Commissioner Blake put one hand over the other on the table and merely watched her. The man in the nice suit at the other end of the table from Councilor Christner, who hadn't said a word so far, was watching both of them with interest.
After a couple of seconds, Piggot continued, "So all three of the Merchant capes are either dead or in captivity. The BBPD has confiscated a remarkable amount of drugs, cash, and weapons, crippling the gang beyond saving even if they hadn't lost their capes. Not to mention shot dead more than a couple of dozen of the most gun-happy gangers."
"All true," he nodded when she stopped again. "Your point?"
"Oh, I have several," she assured him. "We'll get back to most of them. The thing that I am particularly curious about right now, though, is a rather… specific… thing that was brought to my attention by Armsmaster after his initial investigation of the crime scene."
"Which is?" The older man seemed politely curious. She examined him silently for a few seconds.
"He happened to notice a definite commonality between the kill shots that a number of the Merchants took. Exactly like Skidmark, as it turns out. One shot, directly between the eyes, through the brain. Instant kill, very efficient. Which impressed him. However, what really impressed him was the range involved in some of those shots."
She leaned forward slightly as she spoke. "Five bodies were found inside the station, three with 9mm holes in them from the front. The last two were shot from behind, rather remarkably managing the exact same shot in the other direction, which is almost impossible, with what was probably an AKM. The rounds haven't been found yet but I suspect that if they are, they would be a match for one of the Merchant weapons. The 9mm rounds all match the weapon belonging to one Detective Leroy Vanover. Who, while his range records show he is a damn good shot, is definitely not a trained sniper."
Blake nodded thoughtfully. "I've met Detective Vanover. Good man. I'm relieved he made it despite coming under attack with no warning. There may be a commendation required." He glanced at his aide. "Make a note, will you, Charlie?"
"Yes, sir," the other man said, doing as he was instructed.
Piggot watched this with an expression of annoyance. When the commissioner returned his attention to her, she went on, "There were another seven dead Merchants outside that had the same damn wound in the same damn place, almost to the millimeter. Based on the trajectories, six of those were shot from inside the police station, probably from the main office, at ranges up to one hundred and thirty meters. That's some exceptionally fine shooting considering it was dark, there was a lot of incoming fire, and it was done with an AKM which isn't the world's most accurate gun."
"We train our SWAT officers to the highest standard in the country," Blake remarked. "Many of them are ex-military as well. Half our people probably have more experience under fire than many of yours, for that matter. I'm not surprised they made their shots count." He seemed completely at ease as he spoke.
Director Piggot leaned back again, staring at him. Everyone else in the room was looking between them like they were at a tennis match. Eventually she said, "Armsmaster said that the probability of those particular shots all being the work of one person was somewhat in excess of ninety-eight percent. Which for him is the same as saying he was totally convinced it was the same shooter. I'm a damn good shot myself, as it happens, but I know for a fact that while I might be able to pull off the pistol shots at close range, there's no way I could duplicate the rifle ones. Not that accurately. They're the work of someone with one hell of a lot of very specific training in taking down people with one shot. It's a skill set you don't really see outside certain military agencies and as far as I can determine none of the BBPD personnel have that particular background."
She paused, then added, "Admittedly, they have almost every other military background I've ever heard of, but none of them appear to have been trained as counter-insurgency snipers or assassins."
There was silence in the room for a while. "So, going back to the thing that I'm most curious about… Who the hell pulled off those shots? Who helped you?"
Blake watched her expression without comment for another ten seconds. "I don't know," he finally said. She opened her mouth, but he cut her off. "Neither am I going to try to find out."
"What?!" she spluttered in shock.
"All I know is that an outside party came to the aid of my officers and risked their own life to save a lot of other ones," he said calmly. "Their identity is, under the circumstances, not something I intend to dig into. Call it a matter of mutual respect."
"You're protecting them, whoever it was," she noted with a modicum of mixed surprise and anger.
He shrugged. "Call it what you want. I'm not going to go out of my way to cause offense to someone who went out of their way to save dozens of lives. It's disrespectful if nothing else as far as I'm concerned."
After glaring at him, she turned her attention to Captain Rosenberg. "Captain, do you know who the shooter was?"
"I'm afraid I can't help you, Ma'am," he replied without seeming concerned. "My information is merely that an offer of aid was made and accepted. Since we were in a fight for our lives and eight of my colleagues had already died in under ten minutes by that point, I can't say that I regret the decision to accept aid. I might not be here to talk to you if we hadn't."
Emily Piggot sighed heavily, pinching the bridge of her nose. "And I assume that if I went and talked to any of the cops in that station, I'd get exactly the same answer?"
"I wouldn't be surprised, Ma'am," he replied politely. "We've lost a lot of good officers over the years. Someone who helps prevent it happening again is going to get a considerable amount of respect and trust. I'm sure you understand."
Closing her eyes, she leaned back and shook her head. "God, this city is fucked up," she muttered under her breath.
"It could do with some improvement, but that's what you're here for, correct, Director?" Councilor Christner commented brightly, making her open her eyes and give him an unfriendly look. It didn't do anything apparent other than amuse him.
"Why do I feel that I'm going to find you very annoying as time goes by?" she asked rhetorically, which provoked a certain amount of muffled snickers from several people.
Returning her gaze to the BBPD people opposite her, she tried again. "I'm concerned that the shooter may be a new parahuman," she said. "One who has already got a body count of at least twelve people so far. That shooting was inhumanly good even for an expert. Parahumans who use lethal weapons have a tendency to escalate over time which is not something I'd want to see, and I doubt you would either."
"No one saw anything that a correctly trained completely normal person couldn't have done," Captain Rosenberg replied after glancing at his superior, who didn't object. "And no suggestion was made at the time that parahuman abilities were involved. In the absence of any evidence to the contrary, I think it was just a very skilled shooter."
"And you'll keep saying things like that, won't you?" she asked with a frown. The man returned her look without comment. "For god's sake. Doesn't it worry you?"
"Not particularly," Commissioner Blake said. "When you think about the sort of people that are roaming this city killing with impunity, someone who stepped up to help on the side of the law is to be thanked, not persecuted. You're unlikely to find anyone from the BBPD who would think otherwise under the circumstances."
He scanned the faces of the PRT people. "The thing you have to remember is that last night a serious act of domestic terrorism took place, one that should not have happened. Before parahumans came on the scene, the sort of thing we tend to take for granted these days would have caused nation-wide condemnation and a response that would have involved every law enforcement agency in the country. These days, and particularly in Brockton Bay, it's basically Tuesday."
Turning to stare directly at Director Piggot, who was listening with an evaluating expression, he went on, "Somehow, over the years, we've grown to accept things that thirty years ago would have toppled the government. They get labeled the actions of a parahuman gang or villain and somehow that makes it something that's just… pushed to the side. It's insane. When I first became a cop, Berkowitz was terrorizing New York. He killed six people, caused panic across the city for months, made the papers around the world, and had every cop on the East Coast looking for him..."
The man lifted a hand in a gesture of incredulity. "Here and now, we have Hookwolf. He's killed at least fifteen people that we know of, and he's wandering around out there without anyone seriously doing anything about it. And when someone actually does manage to bring him in, his friends break him out again two days later and he's killed another person within a day. Kaiser's suspected of at least five murders. Kreig three. And so on. Skidmark was known to have directly killed a minimum of four people, but if you look at the Merchants as a whole, they're responsible for over five hundred deaths in the last two years that we know about. I wouldn't be surprised if it was actually twice that. And god only knows how many lives ruined in the process."
Stopping for a breath, he looked at each person facing him one at a time. Councilor Christner was listening with a somber expression, not moving, while the PRT people seemed almost fascinated. "Then he decides to go completely nuts and start a war with the BBPD. Compared to that, one citizen who is actually on our side, even if they did shoot a number of active shooters in the head, is someone I'm completely OK with. If more of these fuckers ended up tits up in a ditch we probably wouldn't have the problems we do now."
He looked at the captain next to him. "One of Rosenberg's detectives passed on something our friend said. 'Police rules of engagement are insufficient under the circumstances.' As much as I'd like to deny it, truer words can't be said. Last night proved that."
When he stopped talking there was a long uncomfortable silence. Eventually the PRT director opened her mouth. "Officially, I have to disagree at least in part. Policy is that escalating against supervillains is something left as a last resort since it can provoke them to escalate as well. Or first. Considering how dangerous even a fairly innocuous power can be with someone who thinks about it creatively, we don't really want to push a minor villain into becoming a major one by ramping things up too quickly."
"Which is one of the main reasons we're in the situation we have in this city," Blake retorted. "If they know they can get away with that sort of thing, oh, look, they keep doing it. What a surprise."
She sighed a little. "I can't entirely discount that, I admit. But I have to work within my own policy limits, as you do too. We can't simply shoot any villains we see."
"Of course not. But we can't just sit back and watch them do anything they want because we're scared that they might retaliate. If we do that we've already lost."
Once again they looked at each other, until Piggot shook her head. "I can see we could end up arguing about this from different points of view for hours. It's probably better to leave that for another time." He nodded. "All right. I'm obviously not going to get any more information on who the hell it was that took out Skidmark. I just hope you know what you're doing in that respect. If I have to deal with some firearms-based Parahuman who ends up on top of the Medhall building sniping everyone down town, I will take great pleasure in telling you 'I told you so.' I'm sort of vindictive like that."
Blake actually smiled at that comment. "If that happens, I will admit I was wrong. But I don't think I am."
"Be it on your head, then. Fine." She leaned forward. "Where is Squealer?"
"Safe."
"Safe, where?"
Blake glanced at the man in the suit at the end of the table. "In a medical facility outside the city."
"Which one?"
"I'm not at liberty to say."
Director Piggot growled under her breath. "You're being deliberately obtuse again." She pointed at him, then herself. "Your job is to arrest the gangers. My job is to deal with the parahumans. I would like you to turn over Mush and Squealer to me." After a moment, she added with carefully controlled politeness, "Please."
"You can have Mush," Blake replied. "Squealer is… currently unavailable."
"Oh for god's… Why is she unavailable?" The blonde woman looked angry again.
The up-to-now silent observer made a small motion which attracted her attention. "Squealer is unavailable due to a prior arrangement with another federal agency," he said.
She fixed him with a hard look. "I didn't get your name."
"Special Agent Pascoe, Boston FBI," he replied evenly, pulling out a wallet and flipping it open to show his ID. Director Piggot looked at it, then his face, before sighing heavily.
"Oh, hell. What are you doing here?" she asked with annoyance. "This is a matter between the PRT and the BBPD."
"Domestic terrorism is a federal offense," he said calmly. "There has been considerable talk in the Bureau for some time now that matches quite closely to the discussion you've just had with Commissioner Blake. We feel that the PRT isn't quite living up to it's mandate in certain areas. No disrespect to you personally, of course, as you're a recent appointee to your current position. It goes higher than that. The events last night drove home just how out of control the situation in Brockton Bay had become and it was felt that we needed to investigate things a little more closely than we have been doing up until now."
Piggot stared at him, then slowly turned her head to face Commissioner Blake. "You called him in."
"Agent Pascoe is an old friend and I asked for some advice on an untenable problem," the man replied, not looking intimidated. "He talked to his own superiors and they decided it would be a good idea to offer the city some help. Under the current circumstances I felt it was reasonable to accept the offer."
"Do you have any idea how much trouble this is likely to cause?" she sighed. "My own superiors aren't going to be pleased that the FBI is involved in a parahuman case."
"We do have a fair amount of parahuman experience of our own, Director," Agent Pascoe pointed out with a small smile. "We even employ a number of them ourselves despite the PRT's efforts to get complete jurisdiction over all parahuman matters and personnel. The young lady known as Squealer is someone we've been watching for a while and when the chance came up to have a talk with her, we took it. She's perfectly safe and is currently thinking whether a plea deal is a good idea. Between you and me, I have a feeling the answer will be yes." The smile got slightly wider. "Once the withdrawal symptoms stop and she's in a better frame of mind to consider the position she's in, of course."
"Jesus." Piggot looked at her aide, who was staring at the FBI man with a weird look. He glanced back at her, looked at his notebook, wrote a few things in it, and shook his head. "I can't work out whether I should be impressed or furious. I can guarantee that the Chief Director is likely to be both. You're opening a real can of worms with this."
The man shrugged. "We're aware of the ramifications. It will be interesting to see what happens. There are a couple of senators who are also quite interested in who gets upset and why."
She watched him for a moment longer, then closed her eyes and massaged her forehead with her fingers. "This job just gets better and better the longer I do it," she grumbled.
"I'm sure we'll work well together when we iron out all the little problems, Emily" Commissioner Blake chuckled. She opened her eyes and gave him an unfriendly look.
"There's also the matter of an 80mm recoilless rifle that somehow managed to get missed in an E88 armory raid," she said.
"Yes, that was very useful," he smiled. "BBPD SWAT is rather attached to it now, and it would be a shame to upset them after the hard work they've had to do recently. We've discussed it with the FBI and they talked to the ATF, who were oddly enough happy to let us keep it. They even found some more ammunition for the thing."
She started lightly banging her head on the table.
"Why did I accept this posting?" she mumbled between thumps.
Quite a while later Emily was sitting at her desk in the PRT building wishing she'd never heard of Brockton Bay while drafting a report for the Chief Director, a woman she didn't like at all and who felt much the same about her. They respected each other professionally but tended to avoid each other as much as possible. The last few hours had left her feeling that something fundamental had changed in the city and its relationship to the PRT, and she wasn't sure whether this was going to be a good or a bad thing. It was certainly going to be something that caused a hell of a lot of shouting in the higher echelons of power and she was desperately hoping she could stay out of that and just get on with her own job with as little interference as possible.
'At least the Merchants are out of the picture,' she mused as she typed. 'Pity the E88 will probably just expand into their territory, but we might get a few weeks of respite. Or, knowing this damn city, some other gang will turn up and try to claim it and make things even more complicated. Fucking villains. Blake might be right, a few more of the bastards with holes in would probably make things a lot simpler.'
Unfortunately, she knew full well it wasn't that easy. Never mind the ethics of it.
A tap on the door made her look up from the screen, rather thankfully. "Come!" she called, swiveling her chair to face forward. Armsmaster and Miss Militia entered, the latter closing the door, then walked over to her desk. "I've finished my report on the anomalous shootings, Director," the Tinker said, putting a printout on her desk. "The rifle shots definitely were carried out with a weapon belonging to the Merchants. We matched rounds embedded in the front of the precinct station with ones recovered from the crime scene having passed through the deceased attackers."
Director Piggot leafed through the comprehensive document, looking at the numerous graphs. "And you're certain it wasn't one of the Merchants who did it?"
"Extremely unlikely," he replied with a shake of his head. "The limited video available of the firefight clearly showed that the perpetrators were firing wildly with very poor tactical awareness or firearms skill. Whoever used the weapon to shoot them was exceptionally good in both regards. The accuracy of the shots was uncanny, at the top of what's even possible with the weapon in question, and there was only one wound on each of them. The shooter didn't appear to miss once."
"One shot, one kill," she remarked, stopping on one of the photos and examining it.
"Yes, Ma'am," he nodded. "My theory is that the shooter acquired Detective Vanover's weapon inside the station after he'd been shot, possibly without his knowledge, took out the Merchants who had infiltrated the building, looted their weapons and ammunition, and proceeded to utilize them in downing further assailants. Once they were outside, they apparently made use of confiscated grenades to confuse the attackers, allowing the remaining BBPD personnel to mount a counter attack, then killed Skidmark with their last shot. I determined that this shot was from the roof of the apartment building to the north of the police station, at a steep downward angle. Skidmark was apparently looking up at the time."
She inspected the graphic on the next page which illustrated this. "That's one hell of a good shot in the dark with no telescopic sight," she said.
Miss Militia nodded. "I'm not sure I could have done it myself with that weapon, especially on the first shot," the woman commented, looking both impressed and disturbed. "Whoever it was is highly trained. Something along the lines of Special Forces training on top of years of experience in the field and a lot of natural skill."
"So an ex-soldier, almost certainly, as we suspected."
"That's the most likely explanation. Possibly with powers aiding them, but I think it would also require a lot of experience and training even so. I'd guess someone who was in one of the middle eastern wars in the eighties, before we pulled out entirely. Maybe one of the BBPD staff, but we can't find a match so far."
"We'd be looking for someone about mid forties at the youngest in that case," Emily noted thoughtfully. "Someone with military training, probably overseas posting, at least one tour of duty in a hot combat zone… That narrows it down a little, but there are quite a few people who fit the description in the country. Even in this city. The Dock Worker's Association has nearly as many ex-military people as the BBPD does, for example. There are a few in the gangs too."
"It's possible that it was another gang that stepped in but I personally doubt it," the other woman said slowly. "I can't see it would benefit them. Admittedly with Skidmark dead and the Merchants disbanded the other gangs will be able to fill the gap left, but they'd probably have just sat back and let the police deal with the situation. Whatever happened they'd be able to make the most of it and it wouldn't cause them any risk, so why go to the aid of the BBPD?"
"It does seem unlikely, Director," Armsmaster added. "Kaiser is smart enough to take advantage of such an opportunity, assuming he felt it was in his best interest, but we know most of the E88 is currently lying low after the last operation, and they'd have been taken by surprise as much as anyone else was."
Emily nodded, thinking it over. They were both right. "So, based on the short response time, it's likely that this person was either already in the station, or lived nearby and managed to get inside pretty soon after it all kicked off. That should be enough together with the basic description to give us a short list of possibilities."
The two capes exchanged a look, then Miss Militia asked rather carefully, "Do we actually have any real reason to investigate their identity any further, Ma'am? I mean… The BBPD are clearly going to some effort to pretend they don't know who it is, and that may actually be true in any case. From what I've heard, the city council is also perfectly content to leave it alone. Even the FBI doesn't seem bothered by the whole thing, as weird as that is. We don't know it's a parahuman, either, so… Is it worth risking making quite a few different people annoyed even more than they are now over the whole thing just to find out who saved dozens of lives?"
The younger woman looked mildly embarrassed as she spoke. "Not that I'm saying that we should allow someone to break the law with impunity, of course, but it's not completely clear than any laws were broken when we look at what was happening at the time. I just wonder if we might end up causing more trouble than it's worth in this case."
Piggot leaned back in her chair and studied both of them. Armsmaster seemed not entirely in agreement with his colleague and friend, but he didn't look like he thought she was wrong either. Eventually she sighed slightly. "You make a number of good points, Hannah. Even so, I'd feel happier if I knew who it was, if only to be sure they weren't going to suddenly snap and use that remarkable shooting skill in the middle of the city one Friday afternoon because their coffee shop was shut or something. You said it yourself, this is someone with extensive combat training, who doesn't mind taking a life as a carefully calculated act. That's not the same thing that the gangs do for the most part and it makes me both less and more worried at the same time. I'd rest easier if we knew more about the shooter."
She glanced at her computer screen and frowned. "Not to mention that the Chief Director will almost certainly want to know. Which brings problems of it's own but those are mine to worry about." Turning back to them, she went on, "We seem to have a reasonable profile of our friend with the terrifying shooting skills. Indulge me and see if you can discreetly get an ID on him. But don't push it, and don't do anything if you do manage to track the guy down."
"And presumably don't upset the BBPD about it either," Miss Militia said with a quirk of a smile.
"That would probably be best," Emily agreed, frowning lightly. "Commissioner Blake isn't in a good mood right now for some understandable reasons and I'd prefer not to have to deal with an actively hostile police force. Our job is hard enough as it is."
Both of them nodded. "In that case, dismissed. I've got my own report to finish."
"Ma'am," Miss Militia said, then turned and headed for the door, Armsmaster following her looking thoughtful. Emily watched them go, then turned back to her computer and resumed typing, while wondering what was going to happen next.
Something would, she knew that much. It always did.
