A Waken 10.7
It was Calvert?
I told him my plan. Or rather, I told the PRT. I wanted to arrest the foot soldiers of the Empire and the ABB in one big go. Then the Undersiders raided Empire territory and the Empire withdrew. It wasn't bad luck.
Calvert sabotaged my plan.
"What's this about Tattletale?" Aisha asked again.
The Boardwalk. He sent me there. He paired me up with Kid Win and Valiant and asked us to go that way. Did he know about the Protest outside Parian's store? Did he know someone would throw a bottle at her head?
"He's the bad guy?" Lafter gawked. "How did we miss him, he was five feet in front of us!"
"Who's the bad guy?!" Aisha asked yet again. "Teacher?"
Oni Lee. Tattletale told me that wasn't her plan. Did she really mean it wasn't her idea? Did Calvert tell her to do that? To get me killed? If I died, my identity could leak and all the press would turn on the Wards for what Sophia did.
"We have never directly used precognition on the deputy director," Veda pointed out, "and I have never attempted to spy on PRT or Protectorate communications."
I met Murrue that night.
My hands gripped the arms of my chair.
"Uh oh. Dinah, chair!"
I told Murrue nearly everything.
Lafter pulled me back as I moved for the door.
The entire lawsuit plan was Murrue's idea.
"Lafter!"
"No running off and doing one of those things you do when you're freaking out!"
I struggled, but despite the running I wasn't exactly a body builder. Lafter was stronger than me, and when I tried to throw her with my hip, I found a loose bolt underfoot. A loose fucking bolt, standing on its side, that rolled as my weight fell on it.
"Fuck your power!" I snapped as I slipped backwards.
Lafter laughed as she dragged me.
"It is convenient like that!"
She hauled me across the workshop and forced me into the recliner.
Huh, this is comfy.
"I get it. It's a very comfy chair. We have—"
"Deep breaths, deep breaths!"
Green appeared on the right of me, sitting on the chair arm. On the left, Orange said the same thing. Dinah and Aisha stood off to the side behind Green, and Lafter opposite them. Kati watched from her seat with a confused stare.
"Sit," Lafter said. "Don't do…Whatever it was you were about to do."
What was I going to do?
I couldn't remember. I guess part of me just wanted to move. Calvert changed everything. It couldn't wait. We needed to deal with it…And I didn't know how to deal with it.
"Calm?" Lafter asked.
"She doesn't look calm," Aisha said. "Has this happened before?"
"You were here the last time it happened," Dinah replied.
"Does it happen often?"
"She's a hero of great passion."
"Someone tell me the problem," Kati begged. "The PRT Deputy Director is talking to Tattletale?"
I glanced at her, curious how she couldn't see the problem.
"You're sure it's Tattletale?"
"Yes," Veda answered
"Can you prove it in a court of law?"
"The means by which we have uncovered all this information are not strictly legal," Veda mentioned. "We would have to plead the fifth amendment…I am not certain the fifth amendment pertains to a machine intelligence."
"Ask the Supreme Court," Kati quipped.
"Hold on." I glanced at Aisha. "Tattletale is the one who told me about Teacher in the first place. She gave me a bunch of places and dates that pointed right at him."
"Calvert's the other one?" Lafter asked. "The one opposing Teacher?"
"No," I determined. "He can't be." Thinking back, I wasn't being totally paranoid. "Everything he's done lines up too well with Teacher's agenda." But he was talking to Tattletale. "So why would Tattletale turn around and tell me about him? I didn't even know he existed before that."
"Maybe Tattletale is unaware who she is working for," Veda suggested.
"The Undersiders have a boss," Aisha revealed. I glanced at her. "What? I'm all for beating Teacher the only way he deserves, but I don't want my brother in prison! This is covered by the unwritten rules, isn't it?"
Lafter, Veda, Dinah, and I all answered at once.
"No."
Aisha pouted. "Oh sue me."
"Just a boss?" I asked. "They don't know who he is?"
"Tattletale might. She always knows shit somehow."
Is she working for the other side? A double agent?
Teacher might know Aisha is working with me. If anyone could figure it out, it would be Tattletale. Unless Tattletale was some kind of double agent working against him. She might keep it secret. Loyalty to Grue might be a factor.
"What is the connection between Calvert and Teacher?" Kati asked.
"Calvert is the reason my plan to arrest most of the Empire failed," I surmised. "The Undersiders hit their territory and they withdrew…The same day, Kaiser attacked some Coil front."
I leaned back into the chair.
"That is too convenient. Immediately after that the Empire went underground. They started acting more like Coil to avoid me."
"The Undersiders, Coil, and the Empire?" Kati asked.
"Why the Empire? Aisha asked back. "They're Nazis. No one likes Nazis."
I didn't know. "I need a whiteboard."
"We don't have a whiteboard," Dinah replied.
"To the list," the Haros chirped. "The list!"
We'd get a whiteboard later. "Paper then."
The Haros brought me some and I started writing. I wrote down each event I knew Teacher to be involved in, and then did the same for Calvert. Then the Undersiders. Then the Empire. Veda had the Haros arrange them in rows and sorted by date, giving us four parallel time lines.
"The Empire went underground," I said. "Right after the fight outside, when the Undersiders attacked their territory and Kaiser hit Coil."
"And then a low level gang war followed," Veda continued.
Did it? "But a lot of those incidents were made up. Jenkins was lying…There was no gang war. They fabricated it to avoid being noticed."
"Some of the incidents did occur," Veda pointed out.
"They were in the news," Dinah added, "I saw them."
"There had to be a few real incidents or no one would believe it. It was all sta—" Staged. Like how I planned to do things going forward. But to what end? How did that advance Teacher's agenda? Or did Coil and Calvert have their own agendas, distinct from one another and from Teacher?
"That shell company that dug Coil's secret base was sold to Medhall," Veda recalled.
"I wrote that off as a scam," I admitted. "Maybe it wasn't. Coil and the Empire were working together. The Undersiders too."
"Hookwolf doesn't seem the working together type," Lafter said.
"He might not know."
"They can't know," Aisha said. "I'm black and Grue isn't adopted. No way Empire capes are going to work with a black cape."
She was right. "A secret alliance. Something only Kaiser, and maybe Krieg, knows about. And they probably don't know about Teacher at all."
Of course they didn't. I was just being paranoid again. There must be some kind of limit to how many people he can subvert, especially if he wanted to go unnoticed.
But Murrue fit into this so perfectly, and—Why does this keep happening to me?
"We caught Coil though," Lafter stated. "Didn't we?"
Did we? "Calvert knew Murrue and I were going to look through records relating to Coil." She went with me and helped. "He didn't have much time. Not enough to save Coil, but maybe enough to salvage everything else? Or maybe there's a rivalry in Teacher's group and Coil lost?"
Dauntless had the way of it. Too many maybes. I didn't know enough about anything to know exactly what was going on. That was the entire problem with Teacher from the start. Can't fight a battle when you don't even know what the battlefield looks like or who the combatants are.
Except I knew one now.
"Dinah, what is Calvert going to do tomorrow?"
Start broad. See what we find.
Dinah grabbed a piece of paper and started writing. She stopped early, saying, "Weird. I can't see a lot of possibilities. They're blocked.
"More blocking?" Why? "It's never happened this much before."
"We have never specifically asked about Calvert before," Veda reminded.
"It's weirder," Dinah mumbled. "I have seen him before. The visions I got just now were different though. His hair was cut differently and he dressed different. His office in some of them doesn't look like the PRT building."
I didn't know what to make of that. The sudden surge of blocks we'd gotten in asking questions was all around bizarre.
"If I were to guess, Calvert will want to sabotage Lung's prison transfer. That would be the best way to really hurt the PRT."
"Dinah," Veda asked, "What is the PRT going to do about Lung's prison transfer?"
I raised my head, but Dinah was already writing. "Veda?"
"It is curious. The sudden appearance of blocks in Dinah's visions, is it not? It may be the result of some restriction on her power we have been previously unaware of."
Restriction.
Administrator said it had restrictions and Lalah Sune said the powers weren't entirely free.
"Coil is a thinker," I said as Dinah wrote. "His power works anywhere…What if his being captured doesn't matter? Or was the entire point?"
Telepaths weren't supposed to exist, but I'd seen it. Lalah Sune and the kids talked without speaking and the powers seemed to do so too. Telepathy did exist. Maybe powers simply didn't grant that power to parahumans due to a restriction. But Teacher knew about powers. He might have different rules around his power.
"To control his pets like he does, there must be some kind of sensory feedback," I surmised. "Something. How else would he know when to make them do certain things? What if he can use Coil's power even if Coil is in a cell?"
His power was bullshit.
No way a power could split time or create a copy of the universe. The kind of energy needed to do either blew star systems out of the water. But Armsmaster would spot a lie. I reviewed the power testing documents, including video. I saw nothing to go off of, but something like parallel precognition or something would be more plausible. Probability manipulation maybe, with bizarre constraints.
Murrue gave me those documents.
"No blanks." Dinah set her pencil aside. "Nothing really interesting either. Just lots of talking and stuff. Guards. Armsmaster was there and Piggot too."
"But not Calvert?" Veda asked.
"I didn't see him."
Quickly Veda asked, "What is Thomas Calvert going to do about Lung's prison transport?"
Dinah started to shake but stopped before writing anything.
"Blank."
I lifted my head.
It couldn't be. It was too obvious. Surely the PRT would have noticed that.
"Amanda," I proposed. "Piggot's secretary."
Veda jumped in. "What is Amanda Devore going to do tomorrow?"
"Blank. Four questions."
"You're still getting a headache?" I asked.
"Yeah. Not as bad as usual though."
It was like her power was starting up, running into a problem, and then shutting down.
"Greta Watts. Sam Stanfield's driver."
"Blank."
I sat up in the recliner.
Shit. "Teacher can't be precogged."
"Kind of annoying," Dinah grumbled. "It's the only thing I do around here."
"No! He can't be precogged, and it extends to the pets!"
She blinked. "Oh."
"But she can see Calvert," Lafter pointed out. "Sometimes."
"Other possibilities," Veda suggested. "We know that Dinah's visions sometimes include other chains of events distinct from our own."
"Her power doesn't filter out other Earths," I clarified. "We usually try to ask specific questions to narrow things down…The other possibilities were obscuring ours."
Did Calvert do this shit in every reality?
Dinah nodded. "Otherwise we get the possibilities where Tattletale is Coil or Taylor is gay."
"I knew it," Lafter mumbled.
I groaned. She was going to give me shit for that.
Focusing, "Tattletale is Coil. Kind of weird, that they're connected in two different realities. Maybe some possibilities are more possible than others. That's why we see other versions of Calvert, but not for Amanda or Greta. Maybe those two don't even exist on other Earths."
"A question far enough removed does not return blanks," Veda noted.
"But they also might be wrong. We've been blindsided more than once by something Dinah never saw coming. Those might be possibilities that were hidden by the presence of a pet. Thinker powers can interfere with other thinker powers."
"Murrue Ramius," Veda said. "What would she do tomorrow if Newtype called her and warned her Thomas Calvert was in league with Coil?"
I flinched.
"It is on your mind," she added. "I can tell you do not want to ask the question."
I didn't. If Murrue was a pet, then I fucked myself by trusting her. I told Murrue almost everything. If Teacher knew what she knew then he knew I knew too much. He'd be a fool to ignore me. Maybe that's why Calvert changed tunes from supporting me for so long to trying to warn Piggot about giving me too much free reign.
I exhaled when Dinah started writing. Then I scowled.
Dead?
Dinah underlined that one. Something about warning Murrue caused her death?
"No blanks," Dinah declared, then counted up, "Six questions. Feels more like five though."
No blanks. Murrue wasn't a pet. She was just the right person for the job.
I felt a bit stupid.
Of course she wasn't a pet. They say children have a Ptolemaic view of the world. They think it revolves around them. Guess I'm still a child in that regard. Teacher wouldn't dedicate multiple pets to messing with me. I wasn't that important and he operated on a global scale. I was just a blip to him.
A single pawn on the board.
"Same question," I tried, "with Armsmaster and then with Piggot." Dinah nodded and started writing. "And then Tattletale, if you can."
Why did she tell me about Teacher?
Maybe she just wanted to mess with me or show off, or maybe she really meant it as an apology. It seemed too convenient though.
"We can identify pets if our hypothesis is accurate," Veda surmised. "This gives us an advantage."
"It does," I agreed. "But there's another problem. Calvert knows all about my plan to settle with the PRT and silence Blue Cosmos…I've assumed Blue Cosmos knows I'm Newtype, but with Calvert on their side they know about the deal."
"Then why carry on with the suit?" Kati asked.
"I don't know," I admitted. This means Teacher knows Taylor Hebert is Newtype.
If I tried to challenge him, he could use it against me. Threaten Dad. Not even that. It could be used to damage me at any time. Weaken me. So why not do it? I could think of reasons for other things that happened. Most of them anyway, but not the lawsuit.
Why is the lawsuit still happening, if they know I'm going to end it?
"No blanks."
"That's good, right?" Lafter asked. "Means Armsmaster and Piggot and Tattletale aren't pets. Is that last one good?"
"Good and bad," I offered. "As far as finding pets goes, this is really easy."
"The PRT surely uses thinkers to vet people as highly ranked as Deputy Director Calvert," Veda pointed out.
"And they didn't notice." Shit. "Teacher has to have corrupted the Think Tank. The precogs at least. Maybe not all of them. Surely Calvert's job would be easier as a director, but a director probably gets more scrutiny and attention than a deputy director."
I glanced at Dinah.
"If we let on that we're onto him, he might come after you."
"Or he already has." Dinah scowled. "That would suck."
"You'd have hidden this if he had," I assured her. "Lied. At this point you might be the only reliable precognitive left. If I were Teacher and I or my pets could be found simply by pointing a precog at them, I'd take out as many as I thought I could get away with."
But he couldn't take out all of them. It would be noticed. He'd have to be strategic to avoid giving up the game. And that went for everything. People like Tattletale and Murrue—Me—didn't realize we were being used. That kept Teacher hidden and able to work where no one could see him coming.
"Couldn't this mean Calvert is Teacher?" Aisha asked. "Why not just go beat him up?"
"Because if he's not it warns the real Teacher what we're doing." We couldn't do that.
"And while I enjoy a challenge," Kati said, "spinning 'we attacked a PRT deputy director' into a positive story is not something I'm eager to do."
I couldn't give up on Brockton Bay. Teacher couldn't keep winning, nor could he dictate the terms of what winning meant. The world needed to change and I needed to keep making that happen. Dragging me into the recliner might have been a bit harsh, but yeah. I did have a tendency of taking shocking news badly.
No more. I couldn't afford it. Calvert had to go.
But how to do it? If I did it the wrong way, it might tip Teacher off. If I let anyone even think I was spying on the PRT, there'd be hell to pay from other ends too. The Cape Illuminati were probably already watching me. It would be best to remain what I appeared to be and not let Teacher know I was coming for him.
I assumed it safe to just take for granted there were other things I didn't know and acting too soon or too openly could get everyone killed. Killed. Teacher didn't play with kid gloves.
And there's still the lawsuit.
"What is Calvert doing now?"
"He is going back and forth with Tattletale's and several other numbers," Veda answered. "I do not have names for them all, and some are not local to Brockton Bay."
"We need to set something up to completely intercept his calls. I want to know what he's talking about and with whom."
Just because I couldn't tell anyone about it doesn't mean I wouldn't learn things I need to know.
Schwartz Bruder maybe.
"I need to go home and figure out the lawsuit. There's something. A trap." I rose from the recliner. "Keep things running here, and watch Bakuda. We do not need her deciding Lung has to die right now and picking a fight with the Rig."
"So, not stupid running off or anything?" Lafter asked.
"No." Even admitting my reactionary reactions in the past, I wasn't that dramatic…
Lafter turned. "Dinah!"
"That would be a stupid waste of a question. I think I can do one or two more. The blanks don't seem to hurt that much."
"Save them. We might need them latter."
What is Blue Cosmos planning? Surely Calvert told them. Or maybe he kept it to himself and is working another angle?
I did look over Dinah's answers real quick. Armsmaster got arrested in three, fired in one. Calvert would have some way of protecting himself, even if revealed. Piggot died in one possibility, and in many others she simply 'died'. Her health maybe. Calvert could sabotage her medical care and make it look like an accident.
He'd have time.
Even if I told them about him, they'd want to investigate and verify.
I have to be careful in handling this.
And there was still the Empire.
"I'll be back," I promised.
Pink was making Mongolian barbecue for dinner. The spices bombarded me as I entered the house. Dad was in the living room, watching the news. Of course he was.
"You fought Lung," Dad said in a deadpan tone.
"It wasn't as much of a fight as it might seem," I told him. "Bakuda turned on him." I turned toward the kitchen. "Where are the papers for the lawsuit?"
"Taylor."
"I'm fine, Dad."
I wanted to talk to him about things tonight, not go running off into the next crisis. Fucking cape life. It's one disaster after another.
I didn't want Dad to know about Calvert. He needed to be distant. He'd be in enough danger now that Teacher could use him against me at any time. Maybe I should start arming the house with defenses. I'd been meaning to do it for a while.
For the moment, the best thing I could think of was playing it all off as nothing important. I fought Lung. It happened. It's over. Now I was doing something else. No big deal.
I found the papers stacked and pushed to the side. I started looking through them, but honestly the entire pile was confusing. There were so many pages and I didn't know how a lot of it was arranged.
"What are you looking for?" Dad inquired.
"I don't know," I admitted. "Something's bugging me."
They're not fools. There had to be something in place. Some way to turn things around when I pushed to settle. Charlotte? Could they have gotten to her somehow? We hadn't talked in a while, but it didn't seem right. Charlotte was on board with the idea and she was supportive of Newtype.
The Jane Does?
"Where are those witness statements? The ones we talked about before."
"Here." Dad started shifting through the pile. "Why?"
"Not sure."
I started looking them over.
I'd read them before, but I hadn't paid that much attention. Something about them set me off. Mildly, I mean. It irked me. I just couldn't put my finger on why.
Who are they?
Why hide their names from me? They were supporting my testimony with their own. Why were the names hidden? I didn't pay a lot of attention to all the testimony, but I did now. One story stuck out.
Pretended to be her friend.
Victoria? Not Dallon, the Victoria from Winslow. The one who pretended to be my friend for nearly three months. She turned around and started telling everyone the things I told her. It was like Emma all over again.
They talked to Victoria.
I started looking at other statements.
That's Julia. And that's Stacey…
I stared at one detailing how juice was spilled on my seat every morning.
Madison.
They talked to my bullies. They went to them and got them to admit what they did, but in abstract? Not once did any of them use the word 'I did it' in the descriptions of events. That was weird too. It didn't quite seem like a lie. They were statements of events with names redacted. Nowhere did they deny they took part, they just didn't confirm it.
They're going to use my bullies to prove I was bullied?
Everything was about the PRT. That was the end game, not me. I was just the means to the end. It couldn't be as simple as not wanting me to know the bullies who made my life hell were now on my side. Given what Blue Cosmos had to know, that wouldn't be enough to make me back out of the case.
"It's Madison," I realized. "Madison, and Juliet, and Victoria. Stacy. A few others. They've been talking to them. Getting testimony."
"Is that bad?" Dad looked at the pages in front of me. "Maybe they finally feel bad for what they did."
They were the least invested, less so than Emma. Sophia I think liked hurting people and I was available but—
Sophia.
The case was always about Sophia. About what she did. That's how Blue Cosmos could go after the PRT.
I got a sinking feeling.
Are they going to twist everything around and blame it all on Sophia? Sophia bullied the other bullies into it?
That was bullshit of course. I knew high school and no one needed to be compelled into bullying. The Trio went after people who tried to protect me, but from there anyone who joined in was just trying to be popular. Maybe they feared being on the receiving end if they didn't participate, but they still joined in on their own.
I gripped the page in my hands tightly, ripping into the paper with my fingertips.
"Taylor?"
"I need a lawyer," I snarled. I shifted the papers about till I found a contact list. "Or someone who is the next best thing."
I dialed the number.
"Hello?"
"Dean?" I shifted my tone of voice from confident to diminutive. "I had a question about the case."
"I'm not sure I'm the bes—"
"No. I'd rather talk to you than one of the lawyers. Please?"
Dean was a complication, someone who should be dead but wasn't. Unless Teacher could teleport about, he couldn't just go around using his power on every complication. I'd gamble on that.
"Okay," he said. "One sec. Actually, do you want me to just come over? It's kind of stuffy around here right now and I'd jump at a chance to be literally anywhere else."
Come over? To the house?
I glanced at Pink cooking in the kitchen. Green had arrived at some point and was watching Cops in the living room. Think some tinker stuff was scattered about upstairs.
"No. No, you don't have to do that. It's just a quick—"
"Please?" Dean insisted. "I could really use an excuse to leave right now. I won't be a bother. I can bounce over real quick so I'm not lying if anyone asks, and then I can just do whatever for the rest of the day."
This is so high school.
I looked around frantically and sighed.
"Okay?"
"Thanks Taylor, be there in a bit."
He hung up and I looked around.
"Green. Pink. Hide! I gotta go upstairs and hide the tools!"
I didn't have time to argue with Dean and if I resisted too much he might get curious. Fine. I just needed to hide some tools and two Haros. Easy.
There are a lot more tools in my room than I thought.
Pink was still out when I came back down from stuffing things under my bed and into my closet.
"Pink! Hide!"
"My meat!" Pink protested. "My meat!" Dad had her in his arms and was trying to wrestle a spatula from her hand.
"Your food will be fine!" I hissed. "You cannot be seen—" A knock sounded at the door. "Hide her!"
"I'm trying!" Dad replied.
I went to the door and opened it.
"Hi Taylor." Dean gave me warm smile. "Sorry about this. There's a private party back at the house and the atmosphere is really oppressive."
Probably because of all the bigots.
"It's fine. Sorry. I was just looking at things and had a question."
"Something cooking?" he asked as he stepped in. "It's pretty strong."
"Um, Mongolian Beef recipe…"
Dean stepped forward and turned. I tensed behind him, but he just smiled again. "Hello, Mr. Hebert."
"Mr. Stansfield." Dad sat on the couch, watching Cops. Green and Pink were nowhere to be seen. "Danny is fine."
"Dean is fine with me too." He turned to me. "Where are the papers?"
"This way."
I led him to the kitchen and we sat down.
He started looking at things. "What did you want to know?"
I sat down and asked him about the Jane Does and why their names weren't listed.
"Some witnesses early in a case don't want their names known," Dean explained. "If they were to testify, they'd have to identify themselves but this early it's sometimes easier to get people to talk by giving them some room."
Or hide them from another witness.
"There's also the legal issue," Dean added. "Some witnesses might be afraid of being charged."
Several. They'd deserve it too if anyone ever bothered to actually investigate back when it mattered.
"I haven't talked to any of them," he admitted. "It wouldn't really be right for me to violate their confidentiality and tell you their names. Your notes were pretty meticulous though. You can probably guess who they are."
I nodded.
Dean gave me a small smile. "Would that be hard for you?"
It would, but it shouldn't come to that. I was going to settle. Why were the names hidden?
"I've been thinking of settling." I took the chance. Blue Cosmos already knew that's what I wanted anyway. "I'm not sure I want to go through the whole trial thing."
"That might be easier," Dean offered. "The PRT would probably want to. Have you talked to Charlotte about this? I'm not saying you shouldn't settle if that's what you want. You should do what's best for you, but if you settle it might be harder for Charlotte to make a case. The best outcome for both of you might be settling together."
The case can go on, even if one of us settles.
I tried to hide my surprise.
The case can go on, even if two of us settle.
I picked up the papers again and read through everything in the Jane Does' testimonies. That was it, wasn't it? If Charlotte and I conspired to settle, just get another set of wronged girls. Have Madison and the rest play up their own victimhood as the big mean Ward pushed them to brutalize their peers.
Save their own asses by pointing all the blame at Sophia. Maybe get some money while they're at it.
My heart was racing in my ear and I felt hot.
The idea that any of them could claim to be victims infuriated me. I knew they had no shame, but really? The gall to claim themselves wronged after everything they did? Madison was the lowest of the trio. The pettiest.
This was low even for her, and I didn't even derive any catharsis from the irony of Emma and Sophia being betrayed by their 'friend'.
No, Sophia is dead. It doesn't matter to her anymore.
It was Emma who found herself alone now.
"Do you want to get that?"
I looked up. "Get what?"
Dean nodded to the stove.
"I think the food is starting to burn a bit."
"Oh. Right."
I got up and went to the stove. It didn't look like Pink had started putting the ingredients together. The meat was cut up and in one pan on a low heat. Vegetables in another. Sauce in the third.
Guess I just stir?
I caught movement in the corner of my eye as Pink rolled around the corner. A jolt shot up my spine and I tried to wave her back before Dean saw. He was currently looking at the papers in front of him, and not at me or in Pink's direction.
Pink flicked her little robotic wrist. No idea what that meant.
I mouthed 'hide' and as Dean started to look my way Green came barreling from the other direction and knocked Pink back around the corner with a thump.
"What was that?" He turned, looking toward the living room.
"Sorry," Dad called. "Knocked the table. Did I startle you?"
"No, sorry. Sounded like a bit of a crash."
"Just spilled something."
Good save, Dad.
"Need any help cleaning up?"
"It's nice of you to ask. I've got it."
I stirred the sauce and turned back to Dean. A thought had occurred to me.
"If I settle, is that evidence Charlotte could use?"
"No," Dean answered. "No judge in their right mind would allow that. The prejudicial value completely outweighs the probative. Um, settlements happen for a lot of reasons, but a jury might assume it to be an admission of fault. A judge wouldn't allow it as evidence."
I nodded. Then my settlement didn't make things easier. Or—
"What about Taylor's evidence?" Dad asked, stepping in from the living room. "Settlements usually include confidentiality agreements and a release of liability."
"They do." He looked my way. "It would be extremely odd for Taylor to be asked to testify if you choose to settle, but your evidence might be admissible. The notes are meticulously taken and detailed. They're pertinent facts speaking to a pattern of behavior and consistent failure to control Sophia Hess' behavior. Charlotte could still use them at trial if she wants to go forward. We'd have to make an argument to a judge but I don't think it would be hard."
The bullies are going to use my notes of what they did to me to prove their bullshit.
I gripped the spoon in my hand and kept turning. If I faced Dean he'd see my face. It was burning red, and I knew it.
Madison you bitch.
"Does that help?" Dean asked. "You're worried, aren't you? You want to settle but you don't want to leave Charlotte to face things alone."
"Yeah," I lied. "Sorry."
"Trials are hard," Dean said. "Joseph and some of the others will try to push you that way, but they're your lawyers. They have to represent your interests. If you want to settle say so, and stand firm. We can look out for Charlotte. Things don't get that much harder."
"Thanks."
"I'll make my escape then, unless you wanted to talk?"
"No, sorry for bothering you."
"It's no bother. I really needed the excuse to escape."
Dean left and I heard Dad ask him something as he did.
I didn't pay attention.
A pawn on the board. I was a pawn. Murrue too. Charlotte. Dean. I knew Teacher played games with people's lives but…He'd been playing me for so long without my even realizing it. So subtle, and calculated.
Even founding Celestial Being and trying to save Brockton Bay worked for him. It made the PRT look inept and the Protectorate look weak. He knew about the plan to settle with the PRT from the beginning and worked around it.
Asshole.
"My meat! My meat!"
Pink charged after the door closed and jumped onto the counter. She took the spoon from me and began attending the meal. I let her take over and stepped back, staring at my feet.
"Taylor," Dad asked. "What's going on?"
Losing fucking sucks.
And I had lost.
With Madison and the other girls, Blue Cosmos didn't need me anymore. I'd already given them the evidence they needed. I tried to think of some way to sabotage the case but…
"A villain knows who I am."
Dad stiffened behind me. I leaned back into him, hanging my head.
That's the real loss. If it was just Blue Cosmos with Teacher pulling the strings, they might suspect but so what? With Calvert in the picture, Teacher had to know. He could use it against me now and with little fear of being outed in turn.
Dad put an arm around me and held me.
"What are you going to do?"
I raised my head.
Pink and Green watched me, which meant Veda was watching me.
Good.
I wasn't some fragile little girl anymore, ready to be undone.
"Same thing I've always done."
Find a way to win.
I am not a pawn to be played.
I couldn't think of a way to stop it anymore. Teacher would get his lawsuit. But he didn't know, he couldn't know how much I caught onto. I was just an upstart cape in a pisshole of a city making the PRT look bad. That's the kind of piece Newtype was.
He didn't know I could find his pets. He didn't know I'd started looking into Operation British. Only Murrue and my immediate allies knew about that. Murrue was on guard and wouldn't just hand over information. If I used a few questions a day I might be able to clear the local PRT bit by bit and find help.
It's kind of funny.
Teacher can't see everything coming. If he could, why leave Dinah free to inevitably notice he can't be precogged? No. No he might assume an independent would notice that eventually, but Calvert was in the PRT. If I didn't know some of the exact things I knew—connections to Coil and Cranial—then I'd probably assume Calvert was with the other side. The side against Teacher.
I'd probably damage the PRT pursuing him, so why not leave me to do that?
Yes. Teacher was clever, but not infallible.
If he could be thrown off—even if it didn't ultimately lead to anything—then he had blind spots. If I laid low, kept doing what I was already doing, and waited my chance would come.
I needed to deal with Calvert first. Secure Brockton Bay and get a leg up. I needed to do it before my identity could be wielded as a weapon against me. Maybe I'd avoided being noticed for more than I seemed so far, but once I started making big moves that would stop.
Teacher would come after me hard and he'd do it by leaking my name, face, or address. Go indirect. Leak Dad, Dinah, or expose that Aisha was working with me.
I leaned back into my father and rested my head on his chest.
Or maybe…
If my identity was to be wielded as a weapon, one I couldn't counter, why not wield it myself? Take the sword pointed at my throat and shatter it entirely.
Would that work? I'd already eliminated the ABB. The Merchants fell apart. I had allies to fall back on and a way to ensure they weren't being subverted.
I did keep saying the unwritten rules were bullshit. Maybe the best way to fuck Teacher's net, was to pull the catch right out from under it. I could do that, at a price.
Teacher shouldn't get to keep winning.
"Dad, we should talk. About a few things."
Let Teacher think me a mere pawn. I could play the part. The distance is what? Seven spaces?
The pawn just needs to reach the other side of the board to become a queen.
