A Waken 12.2

It's amazing how some things can change and yet be exactly the same bullshit.

"She cheated!"

Such a nice day. The year could get cold fast in Brockton Bay. So far we'd had a temperate fall. Sun shined bright in the clouds. Gentle breeze on the air.

And there I stood. Glaring at some boy whose name I didn't know.

"She's not even sweating!"

I felt the eyes on me. Heard the whispers. Half the class ran up and down the track, too far away to see the spectacle. Some stopped as they approached or passed, then after noticing him and me started back to running.

Others remained to watch. I lapped most of the class, save two. There were two members of the track team who finished ahead of me.

They both looked at Bigot with disapproval. That's something.

I picked PE because I wanted the exercise. Seemed like a practical way to make being at school not a total waste of time. It's not like I needed an education or anything.

"Cheating," Bigot repeated.

Did Vicky deal with this shit?

"If running every day counts as cheating," Lafter called from the grass beside the track. She lay on the ground, chest rising and falling. "You know Hookwolf tried to kill her while she was jogging, right?"

A few on-watchers responded to that.

Some moved closer to Bigot and glared at Lafter. Others started to move to my flanks, because why not? Throw in that alien sense of people defending me on top of the familiar feeling of being under attack. Let's make it even weirder.

Bigot snarled and started to say something.

"That's enough!"

A shadow fell over those standing around the finish line.

'Coach' Zabi glared at Bigot. He was huge. Maybe the biggest man I'd ever seen and I'd seen Neil Pelham. The scars on his face only made him more intimidating.

"You could take a lesson," he said loudly. "Physical fitness is a commitment! You have to work for it! Have you looked at those abs!"

He pointed at me.

I flinched and glance down. Suppose there is a bright side to being flat chested. I could see my abs. The abs I worked for. Sort of. Mostly I just wanted to be fit. Looking fit came as an unintended bonus.

"That is a labor of love Mr. Ritter," Coach Zabi charged. "I know a runner when I see one and that is a runner!"

"That's what I just said," Lafter complained between breaths.

"And you still have a lap to go," the coach roared. Because fuck he's kind of scary. "Go! Go! The clock is ticking!"

Bigot got running and so did everyone else who hadn't finished.

And Coach Zabi quickly turned on Lafter.

"You too! If you have to walk, walk but you are finishing this run Ms. Frankland! Let's go!"

Lafter scrambled.

I did continually ask if she wanted to run with me.

Lafter lifted some weights, did push ups, and sit ups and such. But none of that really built up cardio. Though, she fought Merchants for hours over the summer with only a few breaks.

Pretty sure she could run a mile no problem if she really wanted to.

"Sorry about that, Ms. Hebert."

Beside me, Coach Zabi wrote something down on his clipboard.

"We've always had moments like that. Got a whole earful after Ms. Dallon triggered in the middle of a game and then there were all the meetings about whether she could compete anymore."

He shook his head.

"Well, you can't fly or run super fast"—he stopped and leaned toward me—"Can you?"

"I'm a tinker," I said.

"Right then. Seven minutes twenty-four seconds. Good time. Room for improvement too. You exercise in your free time?"

"Yes?"

"I'd ask you to join the track team or cross country but I'm guessing you don't have the time."

"Not really?"

"Here."

He handed me the clip board and a stop watch.

"Um, wha—"

"I'm going to go help some of the slower students. The first part of a good run is the motivation to keep moving at more than a walking pace. Clock the time of the others as they finish and write it down."

"Am I allowed to—"

He didn't wait, jogging off down the track to catch a few of the students who were slow walking rather than running or jogging.

I glanced at the clipboard and stop watch.

This is weird.

Familiar in a way. Bigot calling me out like that? Reminded me too much of the Trio and their bullshit. The teacher sticking up for me though…

That was a bizarre encounter and not just because it ran opposite to my previous experiences.

I watched the reactions as students passed the line and I wrote down the times. A few looked at me curiously, or even fearfully. Others looked at me with awe. I'd gotten lots of that as my name and face spread. Some looked angry. I'd gotten lots of that too.

The fuck was I thinking?

"She's cheating!"

I glared at 'Bigot 2', my hand still holding the marker to the board.

After PE, Lafter went to remedial classes. She didn't have the background for normal schoolwork. Fortunately, Arcadia had the resources to help her catch up.

Unfortunately, it also had a horde of assholes.

Bigot 2 sat toward the back of the room. The rest of the class glanced back and forth nervously and curiously. I stood my ground. Silently.

"Sit down," Mr. Sutherland directed with a small smile. "I don't tolerate disruptions in this class Charles." He glanced at me. "That's correct, Taylor. Take your seat."

I watched him from the corner of my eye.

We'd only been in classes for six days. He'd called me up to solve some equation thrice. I learned a lot about proof at Winslow. Mostly that the entire concept infuriated me when it came to these situations.

Sutherland reminded me too much of an 'evil' Gladly. Who by the way now had a job at Arcadia. I didn't fucking understand how. I only ever saw him in the halls, usually on the way to my locker. He scampered off every time he saw me.

I tried not to think about that.

Tried not thinking about a lot of things.

I only half listened to Sutherland's explanation of derivatives. I already understood derivatives and everything else about calculus. Easy college credit, right?

"That's not quite right Stacy," Sutherland said. "Think of it like th—"

"But—"

Sutherland ignored Stacy's protest and kept going, explaining, "think of it like a car going up a mountain. Watch the speedometer. Like this."

Yeah, I didn't get it either.

Seemed overly complicated.

I couldn't tell why Sutherland didn't just say 'a derivative is a slope'. Makes a lot more sense than 'the derivative of a function of a single variable at a chosen input value, when it exists, is the slope of the tangent line to the graph of the function at that point.' One of those definitions might be the more accurate, but to anyone who struggled with math the latter was word soup.

As someone who struggled with math once, I related to the bizarre and often counter-productive explanations in the text book.

"Taylor."

I raised my head, tearing my eyes away from something a hell of a lot more complicated than derivatives.

"Do pay attention," Sutherland said with a false smile. "We need to solve—"

"M equals change in y over change in x in all linear functions," I said with barely a glance at the board. "The answer can be checked afterward by solving y equals m times change in x."

"Don't interrupt, Taylor," Sutherland chided. I narrowed my gaze at him. "It's very rude."

One thing I could plainly say about Gladly?

He never purposefully set out to hurt me. He just didn't help me. That put him a full leg up on Sutherland and this petty schoolyard shit he was pulling.

It wasn't just me either.

Karen, one of the seniors, was president of the Civics Club. Apparently they thought pretty highly of capes. She wasn't good at math and Sutherland seemed to call on her for the hardest problems. Meanwhile, kids like Bigot 2 and Stacy—who gave me nasty looks when they thought I couldn't see—were given softballs and long explanations.

Sutherland played favorites and who the favorites were stood out plain as day.

Is this some way of recruiting?

Arcadia was divided. I saw that plainly in no time at all months ago. If that was how a high school functioned, what did it mean for offices? Colleges? Neighborhoods?

I beat the gangs.

I won the city.

And I painted a massive target on my back for the effort.

Without any criminal capes to point at, Blue Cosmos would soon target me. They had no other targets. Any misstep, any problem. All of it would be used against me.

The slightest family scandal.

I knew how far they'd go already.

They'd used Dad against me. Me against Dad. Our family against our neighbors.

I didn't want to hand Blue Cosmos any easy ammunition. A teenager running a business, testing straight out of high school at sixteen, college classes…The more I stood out the more of a target I became. I already stood out, so that was only one of the reasons I came back.

Felt like a stupid reason every time Sutherland made it clear that I'd be attacked for being a good student as much as if I wasn't a student at all.

When the bell rang I got up and left quickly. I didn't stay in any class longer than I needed to. It might help that I did enjoy my English class. Mr. McCrae was a good teacher.

Save for Sutherland, all my teachers were pretty good.

I felt the eyes again as I went down the hall.

Again, I ignored them.

At least no one pestered me for autographs anymore. Got all that out of the way in the first week. Ms. Badgiruel told everyone to stop disrupting a student's day just because they were famous.

At least I trusted she'd listen if I went to her with a problem…Sort of. I couldn't go running to the administration with every complaint. Not if I wanted to achieve my goal.

"Weld," I greeted.

"Taylor."

We opened our lockers together.

Our assigned lockers sat near the front of the school, in a hallway with lots of offices. The cafeteria sat at the far end on the right. Good public area. Hard for anyone to mess with our stuff and go unseen.

Little pleasures.

"Ready for English?" Weld wore a glove as he handled the metal. Guess it worked better than giving him a wooden locker.

"Yeah, but I've read Jane Eyre before though."

"Kind of dry.".

"A lot of the cultural subtleties don't make sense anymore," I explained. "The book revolves a lot around religious norms and gender roles from a hundred and sixty years ago."

"I like science fiction," Weld replied. "Space ships and stuff."

We walked to class together.

Solidarity. Weld and I weren't close. We took Katagiri's class together and interacted a little bit. But in Arcadia we had two things in common; the school was new to us, and neither of us could hide what we were.

I sat down beside him at the front of the room. I'd prefer to be in the back, but yeah. Solidarity. It felt steadying to have that again. A sense that I was just another person in the world. It was kind of nice having a friend too.

A shame the familiar memory of school as a rotten place always kept coming up, completely ruining the moment.

My stomach turned a little at that thought, but I fought the feeling down.

"Heard there was trouble in PE," Weld said.

"Just some BC jerk who thinks I'm a mover."

Weld smiled. "Your TA"—threat assessment—"does include mover six."

"The Gundams have a mover six rating." I knew that. "I don't."

And explaining 'Threat Assessments' sounded utterly pointless where BC was concerned. The fact the PRT had one for every cape, including their own heroes and Wards, just meant we were extra dangerous. If the PRT didn't trust us, why should anyone else?

Probably why the PRT worked hard to keep the entire system under wraps for years.

One had to wonder if there was an ulterior motive to leaking the system to the public but I'd never looked into that.

Probably never would.

There were too many things on my plate already.

I needed to let Faultline do her thing. I needed to let Aisha play pranks on small timers. Let Dinah and Veda handle the questions. Trevor the factory. Orga distribution of my models to fund my economic efforts.

There was too much to do now. I couldn't deal with it all myself. I still decided to come back to school, despite everything else in front of me.

As if I needed the experience to be any more emotionally conflicting.

"Taylor," Vicky greeted as she floated into the room and sat down. "Weld."

"Ms. Dallon," Weld replied.

"I'm not a miss," Vicky groaned. "Stop calling me that."

Maybe I should sit Biscuit and Weld down for a chat.

And there was that bizarre sensation of one part of my life suddenly intruding into another.

It's a weird thing about living a life of masks. You wear the one you need in the moment. You get used to living that way. It's how people lived double lives, even before capes existed.

Now that my masks were stripped of their veneers, I found wearing them confusing.

Newtype was strong, determined, driven. She didn't have patience for games and she didn't take shit.

Taylor Hebert?

I guess maybe that mask became the more nebulous of the two over time.

She was a daughter with a father who didn't know what to do and a dead mother. She didn't really have friends, or at least she didn't feel close to them. She could be compassionate and kind, but frustrated and misanthropic too.

"Weld."

I turned my head with him and we both looked up at Dean.

"Did someone give you trouble on your way in today?" he asked. "I thought I saw—"

"It was nothing." Weld smiled, but I knew him well enough to know it wasn't real. "Just a misunderstanding."

Dean frowned.

"You can—"

"He said it was nothing," Vicky interrupted. "Class is starting. Find a seat or something."

I raised my brow at that. A hostile reaction, but tame for how I'd seen them interact in the past. When did Vicky not lay into Dean as hard as she could?

Dean gave me a passing glance and nodded.

I pondered saying something. Dean wasn't like other BC members. If something was wrong, he would want to help.

Mr. McCrae started the class with an introduction to Victorian and Gothic literary trends. Jane Eyre. Wuthering Heights. Frankenstein. The good stuff. English was the only class I expected to work at and I didn't expect to find it bothersome.

I liked reading, and the books we were reading were books I enjoyed.

I continued working on my calculations, half listening to the lecture while my mind tinkered.

The divide was more obvious in a class with three capes in it. Less loud, oddly, but more starkly apparent in how people sat and looked around. You could feel the uneasiness like a mist, even at the front of the room.

Weld, Vicky, and I all sat near the windows on the left side. The people who watched Dean's every move sat closer to the door and shelf covered wall on the right.

"Bad day?" Vicky asked in a low voice.

"Pretty regular."

She didn't press, but I got the sense she wanted to say something.

Ask why I came back, maybe? Only a few people knew I didn't intend to come back to Arcadia. Of them, I only really talked about it with Dad, Lafter, Kati, and Veda.

Suppose I probably could have mentioned it to Trevor.

I saw him every day in anatomy.

"Hey, Trevor."

"Hey, Taylor."

I sat down.

How do you be friends with someone who has a crush on you?

The thought of any boy having interest in me was…Well, flattering. Old Taylor would be excited. Interested even.

Now?

I didn't have the time. Even if I did have the time, Trevor? Trevor meant well. I guess that was the disconnect. Trevor meant well, but lots of people meant well. It's just not very high praise.

And that sounded kind of mean but I didn't intend it to be. Trevor was a good friend and he helped me a lot at the factory. I didn't want to push him away or anything.

I Just didn't have time for that kind of thing and I didn't want him lingering around pining for it.

"Taylor. Trevor."

Trevor and I both turned. The lab was the same room I'd taken chemistry in for two weeks at the end of the last school year. Long tables intended for groups of three. Trevor sat on one end, I sat in the middle, and on the other side of me Chris sat down.

I didn't react, but I felt uneasy as he took the seat.

"Study guide?" Chris asked.

"Oh, right." Trevor reached for his bag and pulled out a small packet. "I finished my part of it last night."

He handed it to Chris. Also known as Kid Win. Also known as a cape with a secret identity still and someone who should probably be keeping his distance from a pair of outed capes.

Also known as the guy who didn't seem to care.

Chris flipped through the packet.

"You labeled all the bones?" Chris asked. "We only had to name the big ones."

Trevor shrugged. "I didn't?"

Chris turned the packet toward him, and incidentally toward me.

"You left your study guide where a Haro could reach it," I noted.

"I left the study guide where a Haro could reach it," he admitted.

One of them had labeled every single bone on the human skeleton. In fancy cursive. And added cat ears to the skull, of course.

"Well…If there's extra credit for naming extra bones, we'll get it."

Chris turned the guide back to himself.

It was his idea. I liked it, though I couldn't really help much He and Trevor took it on themselves to compile a basic guide to the human body to use for tests and quizzes and such later. He and Trevor took it on themselves to make it. Might be useful to the whole class when they shared it.

Anatomy was kind of halfway for me. It wasn't an AP course, so I expected something other than college credits from it.

My power didn't do biology well, but knowledge of the body would be useful. I'd do a little work, learn some useful information, and make use of it.

Again, not that much of a waste of my time.

And I keep justifying being here to myself.

Kind of weird how I'd always done that and only just now found a problem with it.

I avoided directly looking at Chris. I'd already let the Undersiders attack the Wards. I didn't want to out any of them.

I also didn't want to ponder my own hypocrisy.

All the hoops I expected others to jump through to earn my trust. What did I do to earn theirs? I could have stopped the Undersiders and I didn't. I chose to believe the Wards could do it themselves once Sovereign was taken out, and that the Undersiders would fail in their objective with a little sabotage.

I let them get attacked. By a master. Tattletale vanished to who knew where…

Not sure I'd ever felt a choice this heavily before.

Suppose I never had to look any of the casualties of my actions in the eye every weekday.

We used tablets in the class. No one was going to have high school students mess with cadavers two weeks in. Instead we used 'Operation' as Mr. Sinclair called it. It had a longer name but he liked to call it Operation.

3D interactive program. We could poke the liver. Explore the intestine. Look at how blood worked. Lots of 'ick'. Surprising how looking inside the body kind of made my stomach twist. I'd seen stuff.

Caused some of it.

A bone jutting out of an arm isn't pretty.

Mr. Sinclair walked the room, checking on each group as they went through the lab assignments. I actually had to learn something for once, but that feeling wasn't so bad. Arcadia was a better school than Winslow, bigots aside. A travesty that two schools could be so different despite being separated by a few meager miles.

I considered going back to Winslow for that reason.

Work at forcing the school to improve if need be. Make a difference. Fix something broken, again.

But fuck that.

I couldn't go back to Winslow. Bad enough Gladly found his way to Arcadia somehow.

"You okay?" Chris asked.

"Long week."

In a lower voice, he said, "You caught Phalanx. That's gotta feel good."

I glanced around the room nervously. People occasionally looked our way. They mostly looked at me and Trevor, not Chris. I doubted anyone heard him with how low he spoke.

"Not here," I suggsted.

"It's fine," he replied.

Why is it fine?

It shouldn't be fine.

I let you get stabbed in the back.

Fuck that was really getting to me, wasn't it?

It's not like I hadn't knowingly hurt others before. I knew when I set out that my actions would cause people pain. That people would die as a direct result of choices I made.

What made this so different?

"Still working on that study guide?" Mr. Sinclair stopped at our table. He reached for the packet. "How's it coming?"

"I left it where a Haro could get it," Trevor admitted remorsefully.

Mr. Sinclair raised his brow and flipped through the pages.

"Cat ears?"

"They like cats," I said.

He chuckled. "Well. I'm not expecting anyone to memorize all two-hundred six bones in the body, but maybe we can make some extra credit out of it for a test later in the semester."

He set the packet back down.

"Looks good so far. Email it to me when it's done. I'll proof it for errors and email it to the rest of the class."

"Yes, sir," Chris said.

"And there will be some extra credit for the effort," he added.

Chris smiled and nodded. I noticed the table behind Sinclair to our right glaring at him. Bigot 1 sat among them. So, BC assholes.

The exact reason I wanted Chris to keep his distance.

When the bell rang and we wrapped up the assignment to hand in, Chris turned to me and asked, "You sticking around for lunch today?"

I frowned. "Maybe."

My half day was over. The school district was willing to do it as recompense for my 'emotional trauma'. As long as my grades stayed high in core classes—and they would—no one would fuss. They'd count my hero work and business ventures as a massive dose of community service, which was an elective course at Arcadia.

"I need to go to my locker," Trevor said. "I'll see you later." He took the packet. "And I'll get rid of the cat ears."

"I don't know." Chris grinned. "They're kind of cute."

I let them go ahead before walking out of the room.

I didn't like Chris being so friendly with me, because school was never simple. Not for me. I knew the Wards well enough, and things were too complicated now with my being outed.

Funny how I was more or less just as isolated at Arcadia as I'd ever been at Winslow. No one really went out to be friendly with me save the capes who didn't have secret identities. I didn't reach out to them in turn because I didn't want to put anyone in danger.

Bad enough Chris kept being so friendly like there was no danger.

Deep breath, Taylor

I dropped my bag at my locker and pulled out my phone.

Badgiruel caught me with it in the halls, figured out I'd found a way to make it work despite the school's Faraday cage, and said she didn't want to see it.

No unauthorized phones out on campus during school hours.

I suspected the real reason was the PRT. They wanted to control communications in and out of Arcadia. If a Ward got unmasked, if gave them a buffer to clamp down. It prevented photos and text messages from going out. Made it hard for anyone to inadvertently notice which students fully disappeared at certain times.

Whatever.

I didn't need to babysit the workshop. Another task I could delegate and Veda seemed fine managing the daily tasks. I'd eat my lunch and then head off.

I could use some tinker time.

Arcadia hosted an outside patio next to the cafeteria overlooking the track and field. Nice enough space, and one where I could find a corner and sit by myself out of sight.

I unwrapped the sandwich Pink made for me and started eating with one hand. The other thumbed through my phone. We completed the fourth Gundam frame over the weekend. Veda was assembling the first of our simulator rooms in the new sub-basement.

Wind rustled my hair as I tapped in the latest equations and sent them to Veda to test.

I could start experiments soon. The simulations run in Veda's virtual space didn't come out right. I couldn't help the feeling something was missing. Slap two GN drives into one frame and see what happened. It seemed the most straightforward path.

"Hi, Taylor."

I sighed and glanced to Charlotte as she sat down.

"What is it with all of you?" I frowned. "I'm unmasked."

She set her tray in her lap and lifted the pizza slice to her mouth.

"And?"

"And?" I held out my hand. "I've got five Haros circling the school making sure no one tries to blow my head off with a sniper rifle and it's windy. Slightly bad aim—"

I stopped myself because fuck that was grim.

"That's kind of grim," Charlotte said, echoing my thoughts. "You'll be fine. Probably."

My brow twitched.

Had she been talking to Dinah?

"Besides," Charlotte mused. "You seemed kind of lonely."

"You could use more socializing," Veda noted from my phone. "You did state it as a primary reason to return to Arcadia."

"Exactly," Charlotte agreed, apparently completely unphased by the disembodied voice. She stopped mid chew. "Wait. Really? That's why you came back instead of testing out?"

I frowned. "It's complicated."

"Wanting friends isn't complicated. It's normal."

And that was part of the reasoning.

It was normal.

We ate in silence for a time. Charlotte didn't try to force any conversation. I appreciated that and felt like a jerk for it at the same time. Charlotte was as much my friend as anyone, an odd friendship it may be.

Though given my other friendships, they were all kind of odd.

Neither of us paid any mind to the watchers.

I picked an isolated spot to eat in. A stone bench on the other side of a dividing wall facing the field. It wasn't immediately visible from the cafeteria, so people coming and going didn't see me.

People sitting out in the courtyard did. Some gathered seemingly only to look at the cape. Others seemed to want to watch the cape. Of course, they'd all see Charlotte right there with me.

Blue Cosmos would leak our story soon, if they hadn't already.

She'd be tied to me forever. Shadow Stalker's victims. The one with powers and the one without. I didn't envy the moment the stories started slamming the news and Internet. Our lives dissected by ax-grinders.

Joy.

"You shouldn't keep doing this," I insisted. "We're signing the papers Thursday. They'll—"

"Maybe I shouldn't," she replied. "But I'm gonna."

"Why? If you get distance now you can go on with your life without being tied to me."

"I'm already tied to you."

"But—"

"My life. I've already briefly lived letting others control it. Not going down that road ever again."

I frowned.

Couldn't argue with that. Well, I could. I just didn't want to. I understood what she meant without it being explained.

It was nicer. Prettier. Better funded. The teachers took more responsibility. Yet, Arcadia was still high school and it was still crap. Being in the halls filled with lockers and the classrooms?

It brought all the old feelings back, but felt alien because the places and people weren't the same.

Maybe that's why I was having a hard time really finding my center over the six school days I'd had thus far. Was I Taylor Hebert the bullied girl, or Newtype the unmasked hero? How did I fit into this place and how did I best achieve my goals?

Charlotte followed me as I got up, breaking only to leave her tray in a rack over the trash bins.

"Half-days sound nice," she said.

"Charlotte—" I stopped abruptly and scowled.

My head snapped around at the sight of metal standing in the hall.

"You bumped into me."

Bigot 2's voice.

Did Arcadia have designated assholes or something?

"Sorry," Weld said. "I didn't see you." He started to bend over, reaching for some books scattered over the floor. "Let me—"

"Don't touch me!" Bigot 2 snapped. A small group was gathering behind him and glaring at Weld.

My stomach twisted.

I know this.

I knew it too well.

The way other students started shying away from the confrontation. The way a few stayed just to watch. Weld alone and surrounded by people who clearly wanted to start something.

"Taylor," Charlotte whispered.

I was already moving.

Kati would lecture me about making a scene later, probably. Tell me a better way to handle confrontation with high school bullies. I didn't care.

I coul—

"What's this?"

I stopped.

"Weld, Rick. Is something wrong?"

I stared as Gladly marched into the hall from a room to my left.

Bigot 2—Rick—looked surprised. Then he turned on Weld, saying, "He pushed me."

"I didn't see you," Weld reiterated. "And I said I was sorry."

I heard the strain in his voice. He handled the combined front of a half dozen assholes better than I ever did. He didn't shirk or shutter as they stared back at him. More than that, he kept calm and hid his uncertainty well.

Had things always been like this for him?

I continued forward through the crowd, watching Gladly suspiciously.

"An accident then." Gladly looked down and bent over. He grabbed one of the books Bigot 2 supposedly dropped. "No reason to start a scene."

"But—"

"I asked for Weld's locker to be right across from my office for a reason, Mr. Chance."

Gladly rose up quickly.

"I know what goes on here. I've talked extensively to Vicky and Amy about their experiences at this school. I know what the last student counselor let some of you get away with. You should use the education you're getting and apply it to the question of why she isn't here anymore."

He held the book out.

"Now, do you want help gathering your things or would you prefer to do it alone?"

The hall went silent.

The fuck?

Beside me, Charlotte looked equally shocked.

Weld crouched down and started gathering books before anyone did anything. Gladly got down and helped him. When they finished they pushed the large 'coincidental' stack into Bigot 2's arms.

The bell rang.

People started moving.

Bigot stomped off, apparently only noticing his little groupies had started falling back when he turned around.

"Thank you, Mr. Gladly," Weld said.

Gladly put his hands in his pocket.

"Mr. G will do. Go on to class Weld. Tell me if Charles gives you more trouble, or anyone else."

Weld nodded and turned to close his locker door. "Thank you."

Gladly turned and froze.

I stared at him.

He quickly bowed his head and shuffled off to the office he'd exited from.

Jacob Gladly, Student Body Adviser.

How the fuck had I not noticed his name directly across from my—

I asked for Weld's locker to be across from my office for a reason, he said.

I stepped up to the open door and looked inside.

Gladly was behind a desk, looking at a computer screen. He saw me and froze. Our eyes met again and I noticed the paper stuck to the door front. An introduction, with his name and how he liked to be 'Mr. G' and that his job was to help students if they had problems.

Bullying was at the top of the list.

"Can I help you, Taylor?" he asked, nervously.

I didn't answer.

I kept staring for a moment and then quickly walked away.

"Taylor?" Charlotte asked.

"How are we supposed to feel about that?" I asked, continuing down the hall.

Charlotte followed, though she should have been going to class.

"I don't know," she admitted. "That was…I don't know what that was."

"I'll see you tomorrow," I said as I pushed the front door open. "You should go to class."

"Are you okay?" She seemed surprised, but not shaken.

"Fine."

Dad's truck idled at the sidewalk in front of the school. I didn't want to come and go from Arcadia in a Gundam. That would call too much attention to the traits that set me apart from others. Counter-productive.

So Dad drove me.

Or he was supposed to.

I looked at him.

He looked back at me.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

I frowned.

Bitter was one feeling. Bitter because Gladly never stood up for me when I needed it. Petty too, because it seemed petty to be bitter over that. Weld needed help. It was good that Gladly stepped in and did his job, but what should I feel about that?

"Do you want to talk about it?" he asked.

Not really.

I guess he understood even if I didn't say it.

I watched Arcadia drift away as we pulled off.

Socializing.

My least favorite word of the week.

"Sure you don't want to talk about it?" Dad asked.

Arcadia disappeared around the corner.

Seemed stupid, but I found it easier to talk about when I couldn't see it.

"I don't get people," I admitted. "I don't know why they do what they do."

"I get that," Dad said. He quickly added, "That wasn't a joke."

Some I understood. Capes, mostly. Capes actually made lots of sense to me. Because I was one, I guess.

I understood Bakuda trying to blow up her school in a dark way. I'd had those thoughts and never acted on them. I understood Armsmaster's desire for achievement and recognition in a world that so casually cast people aside. I understood Cranial's madness even, knowing what I now knew.

I understood Leet's anger at Uber's death. Maybe that's the reason I couldn't hold it against him. I understood the loss of a friend and the anger that came with it.

But the rest…

Why was Dean such a better person than Charles or Rick? Why did Sutherland play obvious favorites while Coach Zabi and Mr. Sinclair didn't? Why did Charlotte want to stick by me even if it made her life more difficult? Why was Gladly now willing to stand up and do his fucking job? Why couldn't he have done it before?

Why did Emma betray me?

"Do you want to stop?" Dad asked.

Did I?

I had a whole list of reasons. Some practical, some idealistic, and some probably completely misguided. That sense of fear and ever-constant dread that pressed down on me in Winslow. I still felt it in Arcadia. Every situation produced a swirl of emotion and confusion. The familiar and the unfamiliar blended.

But I've changed.

So many things in my life I pushed to the side. I threw myself into being a hero and I achieved so much in such a short time. The easy part of the plan was over now. I fixed everything I understood how to fix.

That left me with the things I didn't know how to fix.

Dragon and Saint.

Teacher.

The PRT.

People.

I couldn't sit idle and wait.

Piggot was fucking right.

I found myself in a completely new place now. A place where I was the one waiting. A place without an immediate battle to fight, only wars to plan for.

I had time to dwell on my uncertainties.

Time to dwell on myself.

Enough time to admit that maybe I didn't know how to live without something to struggle against.

"No," I decided.

"If you aren't happy—"

"It's not about being happy." Everything else I refused to run from, how could I run from this. "It's about coming to terms."

I listed the crap and cut it out.

School would be easy, and when it wasn't it would be useful. True, but not the reason I went back.

I didn't want Blue Cosmos to use my life against me. They'd do that no matter what I did. Fuck them.

Arcadia wasn't Winslow. It wasn't that different.

I didn't understand people. That was the most bullshit reason of the lot, wasn't it?

I didn't want to keep doing the same thing over and over again. I couldn't keep detaching my emotions from my reasons. Self-justifying everything I did…It's not healthy.

Mrs. Knott told me once I'd always be a bullied girl. She was right. I'd always have that as part of me.

All the wars I was prepared to fight for others.

Time to fight a war for myself, even if it was stupid and bullshit.

Maybe I'd take the GED next summer. But I'd do it for my own reasons, not because I was afraid or bitter or uncomfortable. Not because I wanted to run away and leave the misery of my little corner of the world behind.

I wasn't one person living two lives anymore.

Newtype refused to be a bystander.

Now, Taylor Hebert had to live up to the example.