Would you look at that, I'm back in record time! I noticed a few mistakes I made on the last chapter, but, in my defense, I typed that chapter in the dark xD

Anyway, enjoy this chapter! I might (i.e. only a meteor would stop me) publish the 4th chapter tomorrow, I better get on with it before I have to go without an internet connection again.

Enjoy!

Tobias' POV

Johanna looked baffled. "What do you mean it's against the GP?" She's finding it hard to believe and, frankly, so am I.

Tris took a deep breath, but remained calm. "The mastermind's name is John Copperfield. His father was actually a pretty big deal in politics, but he went crazy and killed himself after his wife, John's mother, died. Councilman Powell was very close with the poor kid's father and took him in, adopted him and raised him as his own son. A few years later, Powell had a kid of his own, a girl who grew up to be insufferable." She chuckled a bit at that.

"Then, since you are Powell's protégée, you must be close with John."

She shrugged. "Not really. By the time I was taken under Powell's wing, Johnny was already a councilman of his own merit and was no longer living with Powell, so I didn't see him much. We saw each other at meetings and talked briefly about matters that concerned both him and Powell. That was pretty much it until I started suspecting him."

From Tris' words, it feels like it took her a while to start suspecting him, which, to me, seems unusual since her first impression of a person is usually right. The guy must be an amazing actor to be able to misguide her. I decided to intervene. "What made you suspect him?"

Tris pondered on an answer and then turned to me. "When I started working with Powell, I made it a point to befriend his daughter, a.k.a. John's pseudo sister. Nicole is basically an overgrown, obnoxious and spoiled brat, but putting up with her paid off when she commented with me on her brother's stranger behavior. Apparently, she had gone over to his place for lunch one Sunday and, while John was cooking their meal, Nicole noticed a loose tread on her shirt and started looking for scissors to get rid of it. She wandered into his office and was searching for the scissors on his desk when he came in. Nicole told me he looked angry and yelled at her to not go into his office while quickly putting away several documents. Then, he grabbed her by the arm, pulled her into the living room and then proceeded with what he was previously doing, as if nothing had happened." Having answered my question, she turned back to Johanna and continued. "I called my informants and told them to keep an eye out for John's movements. A few days later, I received reports of secret meetings between John and a wide number of people you wouldn't like to be associated with. I looked into his finances, his phone records, his council projects, everything. Then I-…"

Johanna put her hands up, interrupting Tris, who was looking slightly murderous. I guess she still doesn't like to be interrupted.

"Wait a minute, Tris." Johanna said. "How exactly did you get a hold of Copperfield's finances, phone records and council projects?"

Tris smirked. "It wasn't hard to get the council projects, I talked to the White House main desk clerk and asked nicely. As for the finances and phone records…I believe you'll find that I can be very resourceful when it suits my needs."

Caleb then pitched in on the conversation. "My guess is that she threatened people. Beatrice can be pretty scary." After that, he shivered.

'Beatrice' looked over at her brother and laughed. "I only threaten those who need threatening."

Johanna shushed their conversation. "So, you looked into him, what did you find?"

"Nothing. Absolutely nothing at all."

The look on Johanna's face was one of the most confused ones I've ever seen in my entire life. "Then, what…how…I-I'm afraid I don't fully comprehend the situation."

Tris leaned forward and reduced her voice to a near whisper, which caused all of us to lean forward as well. "On paper, he was squeaky clean. But I took the matter into my own hands and followed him every night for about a month. I compiled a list of the people he was meeting with and looked up all of the names. I threatened a few of them and sweet talked the rest. Eventually, I discovered what he needed from them – intel. At first, the bits and pieces of information seemed random, until I broke into his house and found the papers he hid from Nicole that day. I had to disable his security system, move a bookshelf and crack a safe to find them, but it was worth it."

"What did you find? What is he up to?"

"Well, I've already told you that it's against the GP, but let me go back to the start so you can understand what he's doing and why he's doing it." Tris leaned back again. "John's mother died when he was 5 years old. She was beaten and raped by a group of men and died in the hospital due to the injuries she sustained during the attack. The police gathered all the evidence they could find, but, nevertheless, the case went stale after a few weeks of investigation since they had no new evidence or clues. Although, naturally, it was a high profile case because the victim was the wife of one of the President's counselors, so they never really gave up on it. After about 2 months since the case was opened, they caught a break. The description of the assailants given to the police by a witness resulted in a sketch that was recognized by an old lady that lived in the outskirts of Washington. She was called in to give a statement and identified the perpetrators. Most of them we're just standard low life scumbags, but one of them was the son of a very rich and influent GP business man, the douche was GP himself. The men were arrested and placed under preventive custody until the trial. Since it was a high profile case, the judge was chosen the day before the trial at 11 pm, the trial itself started at 8 am the next day. The jury was placed under lockdown on a cheap motel right from the moment it was picked, to avoid influence of the media or tampering by the wealthy business man." She cleared her throat and took a sip of water. I didn't notice she was given water, but well. "The trial started and everything was well on its way until it was the GP douche's turn to testify. The judge immediately softened up and it got even worse when the douche's father was called to the stand as one of his son's character witnesses. A few days later, the judge dismissed the case based on the amount of time between the crime and the arrest of the defendants and said that there was lack of evidence. I don't really disagree with that, they only had the descriptions given by a senile old lady and the identification of said descriptions by another senile old lady, along with a handful of meaningless physical evidences. I'm not saying the scumbags didn't do it, I know they did, but the state's attorney took a gamble and lost, although I'm sure the judge wouldn't have dismissed the case if the GP douche wasn't one of the defendants. 3 days after the judge's ruling, John's father took his own life."

"That must have been hard on John."

"According to Powell, the kid barely ate and slept for months. He told me that on his 6th birthday, John came out of his room and never spoke of his parents again. He studied political science in college and, soon after his graduation, the President appointed him one of his councilors."

Johanna nodded in comprehension and then looked at me. "What do you make of the situation, Tobias?"

Both Tris and Caleb turned to face me. I reflected for a few seconds before speaking. "John's driven by a hate of GP people who think they can get away with anything and wishes to end the GP-GD prejudice. Since his mother lost her life because of said prejudice, to him the only fair thing is to have a GP life in exchange for his mother's. And to end of possibility of what happened with his mother's case ever happening again, he wants to end all GP lives."

Tris nodded similarly to Johanna and then spoke again. "The only problem to him is that he can't exactly line up every GP and shoot them all in the head. This his were the papers I found in his office come in. He needs to gather every GP in one place, a place that is big enough and can easily be closed off to the world outside and obliterated without many people noticing. What strikes you as a perfect place to do that?"

My eyes widen in shock. "Chicago. That's what you found on his desk. Maps of Chicago, plants of the fence. There's basically nothing around here, the people of the Fringe wouldn't exactly complain if Chicago disappeared. He's going to destroy the city along with every GP he can lure here. He's going to hit us. That's why you're here."

Tris nodded again. "Exactly."

I hope you enjoyed that! Review a let me know what you think!

See you next chapter!