AN: For the purposes of this story, Alan Barnes does not know that Sophia Hess is Shadow Stalker.

Chapter Thirteen: The Truth Will Out

March 10, 2011

It had been three days without hide or hair of Sophia, Emma, or Madison. Rumors had flown when Taylor came back to school on Tuesday and none of the other girls did, but no one had approached her. She was too close to the center of all the drama, which made her too much of an unknown. On Wednesday, the four girls who had been the trio's best back up were issued an in-school suspension. After that, everyone except Jason avoided Taylor like the plague, as though simply being around her would get them in trouble. Jason, by contrast, made it a point to eat lunch with her each day and when they saw each other in the passing periods he always gave her a huge grin and stopped to chat.

Fi had been missing since Tuesday, but Taylor didn't know what to think of that. Perhaps, after exposing Contract as a Winslow student, the PRT had decided to move her. Or perhaps Fi had gotten in trouble for whatever influence she had used to set things to right. Taylor had tried sending her a PHO message, but hadn't gotten a response yet. When she asked Jason if he'd seen Fi, he just shrugged and they drifted to other topics. It was nice to have a friend again, though they didn't have much in common.

This was now her third day in a row riding the bus home after seven full periods of class. It felt good. Taylor got off the bus two stops early and ran the rest of the way home. It was part of her new workout to run shorter distances more frequently to try to build her stamina up faster, in addition to her morning runs.

When Taylor got close to her house, she saw the Barnes' car parked out front and stopped dead in the middle of the road. Part of her wanted to run away, just turn around and not come home until it got dark. She didn't want to face Emma again. Miss Bird had insisted that there was nothing the girls could do to hurt her now that the school knew what was going on. She'd been encouraged to tell the councilor of any incidents, no matter how small they were so that the bullying could be stopped completely.

But Emma could still hurt her and both girls knew it. A single comment at the right time with the right smirk and Taylor would remember some shared moment now soured forever and feel betrayed all over again. It would seem totally innocuous, and Emma would sound apologetic if any action was taken, but Taylor and Emma would both know that she had been hurt. That was the power Emma had over her, and they both knew it.

Taylor had spent the entirety of Monday and Tuesday braced for impact, waiting for the other shoe that her life always seemed to have lurking around the corner. But staying that alert was exhausting, so she had woken up on Wednesday and decided to enjoy the calm while it lasted. When so many of her secondary tormentors had been punished, it had seemed like a sign that maybe things would actually get better.

Now she wondered how she'd ever been that naïve.

The only thing that kept Taylor from actually running was the feeling that if she did, she'd be abandoning her dad. There was no way to know what was actually going on in the house, but she knew that her father was alone in there with the Barnes, and she couldn't bring herself to surrender the last corner of her life to them without a fight. Her dad deserved at least that much. So, slowly, one step at a time, Taylor walked across the street, into the back yard, and climbed the unbroken steps into the house.

As soon as the back door opened, she could hear the rumble of Mr. Barnes' voice form the kitchen, until her father called out, "Taylor? Is that you?"

Reluctantly, but with increasing determination, Taylor walked around the corner into the kitchen. Surprisingly, Mr. Barnes was unaccompanied. He and her father were standing on opposite corners of the kitchen, but Emma was nowhere in sight.

"Hey Dad." Taylor said, walking past Mr. Barnes to stand next to her father. "What's going on?" It took control, but Taylor managed to sound wary, rather than scared.

"I was hoping you could tell me that," Mr. Barnes snapped, and Taylor saw her dads' fists clench in response. Whatever conversation they'd been having, it hadn't been friendly.

"I don't understand," Taylor said slowly, trying to understand why Mr. Barnes would be coming to her for answers. He was a lawyer, and Taylor hadn't heard anything about the case against Emma that wasn't unsubstantiated rumor. Mr. Barnes opened his mouth again, but her dad spoke over the top of whatever he had been intending to say.

"Taylor, Emma has been arrested. She's been charged with a number of crimes, many of them related to the incident back in January. They're holding her and several other girls without bail."

The information hit Taylor in two pieces. First, she felt a shock of terror that she would have to explain to her dad exactly what had been going on at school, and that it really hadn't gotten better and had in fact been spearheaded by her former best friend, who her dad believed was still Taylor's friend. She hadn't told him about what had happened on Monday, because she hadn't wanted to explain the circumstances. The second was the information that Emma was being held without bail. It seemed critical, though she wasn't sure why she'd keyed on it.

"No bail?" she asked.

"Don't act surprised!" Mr. Barnes shot back.

"You mean Emma did participate in that prank?" Danny Hebert was a lot of things, but never slow on the uptake. Taylor chose to address him first.

"Emma has participated in nearly every prank. She thought up several of them."

"You can't be sure of that!" Mr. Barnes cut in, and Taylor felt true, vitalizing anger for the first time in a long time. She turned on him.

"I can, actually. Emma used secrets I told her to hurt me in the worst possible ways. There is no way that Sophia or Madison or any of the other girls could have known how important my mom's flute was to me. Emma stole it out of my locker and destroyed it." After she finished, Taylor realized that she'd never told her dad what happened to the flute. She couldn't bring herself to elaborate now. Mr. Barnes spoke up and spared her from having to decide what to say next.

"That's hearsay. It won't stand up in court." Taylor shrugged in response. Mr. Barnes licked his lips. He seemed suddenly nervous. "You can't prove anything."

"I've got a written record of everything that happened this school year, since September. I don't have last year's stuff written anywhere, but I complained to the principle about the textbooks they ruined and the backpack they trashed."

"Emma has been a friend to you since first grade."

"And that ended two years ago. She betrayed me for Sophia and Madison. I don't know why, and I don't care anymore. She got herself into this mess."

"Emma didn't get the PRT involved." Barnes accused. Taylor felt like the last puzzle piece was falling into place as he continued. "Emma's not a parahuman, but the PRT has their hands all over this case. But I suppose you don't know anything about that, either."

The whole scene hadn't made much sense: why would Mr. Barnes be here instead of with the police or his co-workers? Maybe this was the piece she was missing. If the PRT was involved in the case, that meant there was a parahuman involved. Technically, Taylor was a parahuman, but she knew that she wasn't the cause.

It could be that Fi, Contract rather, was pushing for PRT oversight, but it was more likely that one of the criminals involved was parahuman. It would explain why all three were being held without bail, since Shadow Stalker couldn't be singled out from the other two and also couldn't be let out on bail since she was a flight risk. Emma wasn't the parahuman, or Mr. Barnes would know about it. Madison had the wrong body shape for any known parahuman in Brockton Bay except Rune, but it was hard to imagine that a member of the E88 capes would spend time as the third-place girl in a high school trio picking on a single white girl, and she was pretty sure that Rune was an adult.

That left Sophia, who was black, which eliminated E88 and ABB capes. Sophia ran track, so she wasn't doing drugs, which was strong evidence against the Merchants. The Wards… Taylor nearly skipped the hero group by reflex, but then she remembered that the Wards had added a new member in early October. Shadow Stalker was the right body shape, and she was black, and she was the right age. Sophia was Shadow Stalker, and it had taken the PRT six months to realize that she was assaulting another teenager. She'd already been a Ward in January.

Abruptly, Taylor made another leap. Fi was Contract, which meant that Shadow Stalker was technically her teammate. Had Fi known that Sophia was Shadow Stalker? Had she discovered it before or after she'd introduced herself to Taylor and heard about her troubles with Sophia? Had Fi faced push-back when she tried to accuse Sophia? Had that accounted for the week of agonizing torture while Taylor waited for results and endured abuse for being a rat? Taylor felt sick that Sophia had been such a celebrated part of the official system while she'd been abusing her power.

Luckily, Taylor's dad answered for her, because she wasn't sure that she'd be able to keep her voice steady in the face of everything that she had just learned. "What does the PRT have to do with Taylor?"

Mr. Barnes looked at her dad for a long moment, reading him, then turned to her. Taylor was pretty sure her face was still stuck on angry, so she didn't try to school her features. She just met Mr. Barnes' gaze and glared for all she was worth. After a long moment, he looked back towards her dad.

"The criminal case is weak at best. It rests on coerced testimony and an untested, unproven lie detection system. After Emma is cleared I am going to sue both of you for slander, unless Taylor testifies that Emma is innocent." For a moment, Taylor wasn't sure why Mr. Barnes was even asking. At this point, Emma was arrested and evidence was being collected, and Taylor changing her testimony wouldn't stop the wheels of bureaucracy. But one look at Mr. Barnes' eyes answered the question.

He was so desperate to help his daughter that he would do anything, no matter how illogical, to try to help her. Even confronting a suspected parahuman to try to accuse her of manipulating the system. Maybe, if Taylor had admitted to being parahuman, he'd even have been willing to threaten to expose her. He'd do anything for Emma. Unfortunately, he'd tried to help his daughter at Taylor's expense, and her dad wasn't going to allow that.

"Get out," Danny said, sounding like he was on the edge of losing control. Mr. Barnes frowned and tried again, ignoring the warning.

"Court cases are long and expensive. You know this, I've told you countless times that the deepest pockets will win." He glanced around the kitchen. "You can't afford to face me in court."

"Get out," her dad repeated. Taylor felt a swell of pride.

"Danny-"

"-Get. Out. Now. You are in my house, and if you don't leave, I will call the police and have you arrested for trespassing." Taylor was pretty sure that that wouldn't actually work with a lawyer like Mr. Barnes, but evidently he saw or heard something that made him decide to leave anyway. Her dad followed him out of the kitchen and to the front door.

Taylor heard the front door open, then she heard Mr. Barnes say, "Danny, I am just trying to protect my daughter. I will do everything I can for Emma."

"Do you think I'll do less for Taylor? I thought we were friends. I respected you. You know me. So look me in the eye and believe me when I tell you that if you come around this property again without an apology for my daughter, I will consider you a trespasser and I will lay you out cold."

The door snapped shut abruptly, before Mr. Barnes could answer. Taylor's dad came back to the kitchen and leaned against the door jam, looking less bewildered than usual while anger sharpened his gaze and made his height almost intimidating. If Taylor hadn't been sure that her dad loved her, and hadn't been pushing six feet herself, she might have felt afraid. Instead, she only felt grateful. For a long moment, the two just looked at each other.

"Want to come sit in the living room?" her dad finally offered. Taylor nodded and followed him into the living room to answer all the questions she'd dodged and ignored for the last year and half. After only a moment's hesitation, Taylor decided to sit beside him on the couch instead of across the room. It meant that he could wrap one arm around her shoulders, and she didn't have to always look at his face. For a single breath, they sat in silence together, both gathering strength. Then Taylor decided to lay out the bare bones of the situation, rather than force her father to drag it out of her.

"It started the summer before freshman year. I came back from camp and went over to Emma's house, and we talked and everything seemed fine. Then Sophia came over and Emma just… changed. She got mean. And she never stopped. Mostly it's little stuff. Name calling, emails, little vandalisms, taking advantage of the situation. A couple things have been clearly pre-planned. Like January."

"That bruise you had this weekend?" Her dad asked gently, and Taylor swallowed pure gratitude that he was controlling his temper. It made this so much easier.

"Sophia chased me down last Friday. She must have been pretty upset, because usually she avoids leaving actual bruises. She'll bump me in the hallways and she's even pushed me down the last couple stairs, but nothing like last Friday. I think she found out that I'd been talking to Fi about what happened, which didn't make any sense except…" Taylor hesitated to say that Sophia was Shadow Stalker and that was probably the reason that she'd known that Taylor and Fi were talking. She had no proof except for Barnes' comments, and while she thought that she was right, it was possible that the PRT was involved only because of Contract and that Sophia had nothing to do with it. But even without a shred of proof, it somehow felt like the right answer to a riddle she didn't know she'd been trying to solve.

Her dad didn't press for her to finish, instead he asked, "Who is Fi?"

"Oh, she's a new girl at school I've been eating with. She's really Contract, the cape that took out Behemoth." As soon as Taylor said it, it occurred to her that she probably shouldn't have. Fi had told her the truth in confidence, and even though Taylor trusted her dad implicitly, Fi didn't even know him. Contract had never come out and said that her secret identity was, well, secret, but maybe she hadn't thought she needed to. Taylor took a deep breath, then decided to plow ahead. She'd deal with the fall out of what she'd said later. For now, it felt good to just be honest with her dad, so she continued.

"She knew something was wrong right away, and she was determined to do something about it. She convinced me to send her my written record of everything that had happened this year. That was about two weeks ago, and she hasn't mentioned it since. In fact she sort of distanced herself last week, and then she hasn't been in school since Tuesday. I wasn't sure what she was doing with the information - if she was even doing anything - but I think the results speak for themselves."

"You think she's the reason that the PRT is involved?"

"Maybe." Taylor decided to take the plunge, since she'd already revealed Contract, who she actually liked. "I think Sophia might be Shadow Stalker."

"Should you be telling me about these secret identities?"

Taylor swallowed heavily. She probably shouldn't be. It might be alright for her to share her suspicions about Shadow Stalker, since they were suspicions and since she had found the information independently. But revealing what Fi, Contract, had told her in confidence was less grey. "Probably not." There was a moment of silence, then she elaborated guiltily. "But I trust you, and it's not like you'd tell anyone."

"You should still be more careful. I guess we'll just have to keep it as our little secret." The more she thought about it, the more she knew she'd screwed up, so Taylor forcefully focused herself on her next task.

She took a deep breath to brace herself. But since she'd exposed her friend, she really ought to be completely honest. "Can you keep one more secret?"

"Yes." Her dad looked wary, but didn't try to stop her.

Taylor almost didn't say it. Part of her really didn't want to tell him, but if she didn't do it now she probably never would, and the space between them would just grow which wasn't what she wanted either.

"I'm a cape too." It sounded too simple when she said it like that, so she hurried to explain. "I haven't gone out, I don't have a costume yet or even a name. I can control bugs. I've been weaving a costume, but it's long work."

"Breathe, honey. Start from the beginning. When did this happen?" Taylor felt herself flinch and her dad's look changed to regret instantly. "I'm so sorry. You were dealing with superpowers and bullying and I didn't even-"

"-no Dad, you did everything you could. I didn't give you the information you needed. I didn't even understand it at first. The bugs are sort of like… little stars that I can sense all around me. Spots of light and information. But I can't really use the audio or visual information and it took a while to figure out how to filter it out. I'm doing fine now. It's actually really helpful, because when I'm upset I can just focus on what the swarm is seeing and that helps distract me. Or I try to visualize fighting tactics or think up names."

"So you do intend to go out in costume eventually?"

"Yes."

"When will you join the Wards?"

"Never." Her dad didn't hide his displeasure at that answer, so she elaborated. "For one, Sophia is likely Shadow Stalker, which means that the Wards have had a serious bully on the team and nobody cared or noticed. I don't know which is worse. Second, the legal system failed me back in January, and I don't intend to put myself in their power any further. Finally, most importantly, I really don't need more teen drama. I don't need a new source of politics and heartache."

"You like Fi, and you know that she's Contract. I like the sound of having her watching your back. What's your other option? Going solo is dangerous in any city, and especially in Brockton Bay with so many teams."

"Sophia," she shot back in protest.

He nodded, acknowledging her protest but not backing down. "We clearly don't know the whole story there. It sounds like Contract brought the situation to the appropriate people and they reacted remarkably quickly. An arrest in less than two weeks based on the word of two teenagers is really very fast."

"I'll think about it," Taylor conceded, before he talked her into going down to the PRT tonight. She leaned further back into the couch, just relaxing, and felt her dad sigh beside her. It felt good to have a silence weighted with the things that they had said, instead of all the things they were both avoiding.