Plucking at threads - Chapter 1
Taylor Hebert – Sunday, January 16, 2011
Taylor stopped for a break from her jog, breathing heavily. 'I wonder if it's sad that I still prefer exhausting myself compared to what is coming tomorrow.' Scowling, she is annoyed at herself for reminding herself, once again, that she's back to Winslow. After almost getting murdered, and spending a week in the psychiatric ward due to her powers, she still has to go back to her own personal hell. At least she has powers, which isn't much of a consolation prize due to them being so useless for being a hero, but at least she can try. Her suit is still just in the planning stages, and she doesn't dare tell Dad to load more issues on his plate, but she has a goal to move towards now so effort is the one thing she has available.
Catching her breath, she looks around using her bugs without moving her head and confirms that nobody seems to be around. Sighing again at how her idea to start up jogging seems to constantly remind her that the Bay is dying, she is about to start off when she notices something small at the edge of her range falling down, and snaps her gaze towards what seems to be a black notebook falling from the sky.
'There's nothing around that could have fell from.' She looks around in the sky: The area she's in is all old residential, full of houses that were once solidly middle class but have been abandoned. Nothing tall enough so that the notebook should have been thrown off a roof to get where it came from, and she doesn't see any aircraft or flying parahumans around either. The notebook lands with a thump and she keeps a careful watch with indecision.
Slowly, as a few minutes pass with nobody seeming to show up, she walks closer to where the notebook fell. It just seems to be a normal looking black notebook, high quality cover even, but scrawled on the front in jagged white lettering are just the words 'Death Note'. She can't think of any Parahumans that use a notebook, but just in case has an ant poke it. Nothing seems to happen, so reaching down she picks it up. Turning it around, there doesn't seem to be anything on the back. 'It does seem to be a nice notebook, albeit with an edgy name.' She calms down, assuming that even if she doesn't know why it ended up in the street, she can still return it. 'It's what a hero would do.'
She opens it up to see if there's a name inside the front cover. Somewhat surprised, instead of a name or ownership details she finds an all-black page with further writing on it, in the same kind of jagged scrawling, almost artistic font. She begins to read it, curious. 'Death Note: How to use it. The human whose name is written in this note shall die.' She snorts at how edgy that is, but continues. 'This note will not take effect unless the writer has the person's face in their mind when writing his/her name. Therefore, people sharing the same name will not be affected.' Well, if this was real that's certainly a way to prevent issues. 'If the cause of death is written within the next 40 seconds of writing the person's name, it will happen.' 40 seconds is an odd time to choose. And you can choose how they die? Sure. Why not. 'If the cause of death is not specified, the person will simply die of a heart attack.' Guessing that still assumes the 40 second rule. 'After writing the cause of death, details of the death should be written in the next 6 minutes and 40 seconds.' Details, huh? Guess whoever came up with this wanted to really dial in things.
She flicks through the rest of the notebook. 'All completely blank pages, but nice feeling paper and well ruled. It has to be some kind of a prank notebook or something.' She looks up and notices clouds getting darker on the horizon. 'It was supposed to be fine today. Guess I'm cutting things short.' Looking at the notebook in her hands, she closes it. It's not like she's seen anything like this around, so maybe someone will have something about where it came from and she can return it. Leaving it on the street to get soaked with rain won't be helping, after all. She slides the notebook into her jacket and heads off.
Dad still wasn't home when she got back, so after taking off her shoes and jacket looks again at the notebook and heads to Mom's old study. Taking a deep breath to relax from the still painful memories, she turns on the old PC that Mom used to use. When it finally finishes booting up, she begins searching the internet for any information on this 'Death Note' but can't seem to find anything at all. Not even somewhere else to buy one, so it seems to be a one-off product, or maybe just sold in a specific store. 'I don't even know where else to start looking for who owns this.' She looks at it again. 'I suppose I can use a high quality notebook for my caping info no matter how edgy, at least.' She turns the computer back off after clearing search history, and heads to her room to put the notebook in her desk as she hears the door open and heads downstairs.
"Taylor, I'm home. Sorry I'm late." She hears her dad loudly say with the same dead tone as usual.
"Hi Dad, welcome home."
"How was your day?"
"Fine. I had to cut my jog short as I saw the rain coming in, despite the forecast. How was yours?"
"Same as always. I was able to keep a few more jobs afloat for a few more weeks."
"That's good. Any ideas on dinner?"
"Takeout?"
"Actually, are you ok with some Lasagna? I'll make it, and I think we have everything we need."
"Sure thing. I'll help chopping everything up after I get a shower."
"Thanks Dad."
'I'm glad he didn't seem to notice anything was off, but… I really want something to take my mind off things before tomorrow.' She starts pulling out ingredients and tries to think of happy memories with Mom as she starts preparing one of her mother's favorite recipes.
Taylor regretted making Lasagna. It turned out great, and was very tasty, but clearly just reminded herself and Dad of how Mom wasn't here anymore with every bite. It was very quiet, and Taylor didn't know why she suggested it. Sighing as she put the leftovers away, she head back up to her room and collapsed on her bed.
'They will absolutely start things up again tomorrow. They know they don't have any limits.' Her heart sinks, wondering what else they might do after what they did to her last. 'Maybe they'll just try to kill me this time.' She stops and remembers the Death Note. She gets up and goes to her desk, debating for a moment before pulling it out and looking at the first page. She glances at a pencil, and thinks of Sophia's scowling face as she wrote down Sophia Hess before closing it and putting in back in her desk. 'It isn't like it will work, but at this point I need something to keep giving me hope until I get strong enough.' She changes into her bedclothes and heads to bed, falling in to an uneasy sleep in minutes.
Shadow Stalker – Sunday, January 16, 2011 (A few minutes earlier)
Sophia smiled as she tracked the Empire gangsters through another alleyway as they chased an older black woman shouting jeers. She knew that this alley ended up as a dead end, and soon she would see if this was a survivor worth her time or not. She smirked looking at her freshly sharpened broadheads. She suspected she wouldn't need to be switching out for her tranquilizer bolts tonight.
"Please, anyone, help me!"
Sophia watched with detachment as the three Empire goons laughed as they began beating the woman to death. She didn't even try to put up a fight, just constantly begging them to stop and that she has a daughter. Disappointing, but expected. Nothing that she can do, but at least this group won't be doing it to anyone else when she was finished. When the cries stopped and the beating slowed down, she pulled up her crossbow, aimed, and fired. Sophia reloaded another bolt as the other two looked at their friend and realized what happened.
"Cape! It's Shadow Stalker! Call it in!"
Sophia fired again, killing the one who was just pulling out his phone before drifting down and pulling out a knife to finish them off.
"Fuck you! I'm not afraid of you!"
"You should be, scum." Sophia smirked behind her mask as she jumped forward, preparing to go into her shadow state to slide through the last gangster's baseball bat to stab him in the gut before finishing things.
"Arggh! Fuck! You won't get away with this, bitch!"
Sophia grinned maliciously behind her mask. "I think I will." She got ready to leap forward again to finish things before pain rocketed through her stomach.
Buh-dump
'My heart? I'm a survivor! I can't just…' Sophia's vision faded and she collapsed.
"The fuck? Did she just… No, call it in first before I bleed out."
The gangster called the empire hotline for medical and cape support.
"Well, what do we have here." Victor leaned down towards the dead Ward. "Shadow Stalker, out on her own, using lethal bolts? Killing two of our soldiers? Someone is in trouble."
"We should tear her body apart for what she's done!"
"Hold on Hookwolf, we shouldn't even touch her. Don't you see how this is an amazing opportunity for us? She doesn't have any wounds that were caused by us, but still died after killing two people with her signature weapon. I can't tell how, but it doesn't seem to be external and crucially, not something that can be attached to, or cause the PRT to come down on, the Empire."
"We still should do something for revenge. It's an insult not to."
"Oh, we will. I'll need to get approval for this, but I suspect this is a fantastic opportunity for the Empire, even with the losses we sustained."
Victor pulls out his phone and places a call. "It's Victor. Do you have a moment? Thank you sir. The cape situation that was called in was mostly resolved when we got here: They were already dead. No, we did lose two men, but the one who called it in should be arriving shortly for recovery after Othala helped him. Ah, that's where things are interesting: The cape was Shadow Stalker. Yes, the Ward was on one of her lethal side patrols. No, we didn't do anything: From what I can see, and what our man said, they didn't even touch her. I'm not sure what did it, but I suspect a sudden onset heart attack or blood clot as I don't see any causes visible. Well, that's why I'm calling: I want to know if you approve throwing quite a large egg on the PRT's faces. No, my idea is simple: We'll call it in to the PRT after we get a few pictures to our supporters. Well, that's true, but it has sometimes happened that a mask might fall off. Of course, they'll never see any signs of any Parahuman involvement. Excellent sir, thank you."
Grinning, Victor put on some gloves before reaching forward to pull the mask off of the dead cape.
"Figures that Stalker would be one of them. A violent weakling attacking from the shadows."
"We'll just need to get a few photos of things before we leave and call it in. For safety, of course. We wouldn't want the PRT to cover up such behavior from a hero." Pulling out his phone again, Victor begins to take pictures while using his skills to plan out how to get the most of this windfall for the cause.
"That's everything we should need. Let's head out."
"We leaving our guys like that? It's disrespectful."
"We are: We need to let the PRT investigate things to prove we had no direct input to Stalker's death. I don't think even you would want to get in a fight with Alexandria, would you?"
"Fuck no. Feels wrong, but I get it."
"We'll call it in to the PRT after we left the area and ensure no other Empire troops are nearby. I hope that the poor director doesn't have an accident herself when she finds out."
Climbing into the car, Victor and Hookwolf headed back to base after making sure they didn't have any tails. Once clear, Victor turned on a burner phone he had set up with voice modulation and called the PRT hotline to give them the bad news. After he listed the address and said what his power suggested he needed to for the right reaction, he hung up, pulled out the battery, cracked the phone in half, and threw the pieces into a trashcan as they left. Another win for the Empire.
Plucking at threads - Chapter 2
Taylor Hebert – Monday, January 17, 2011
Taylor was surprised to see that Winslow seemed to barely notice as Taylor headed in. Winslow was always filthy, so there were lots of bugs around that she could use without notice to keep track of people; even if she couldn't see very well at all through them and so couldn't tell exactly who everyone was. As soon as she saw anyone from the Trio she would tag them with gnats: She might not be able to see, but she could at least keep track of people using her swarm's other senses.
She sat down in homeroom, still cautious, before Greg came up to her. "Taylor, did you hear what happened last night? Shadow Stalker died!"
"What?" Shadow Stalker died? Did the villains really kill a Ward in cold blood? Did they WANT the Triumvirate to come down on them? Not that she really minded because she hated the gangs, but having a hero killed wasn't something that happened very often. Her train of thought was detailed as Greg continued.
"Yeah, the PRT isn't saying much, but apparently she was attacking some E88 gangsters and suddenly had a heart attack or something, right there in the alley!"
"Wait, how do you know it's a heart attack?"
"That's not even the part that's most related to us! See, the Empire got there after she died, and while they claim they didn't hurt her at all, even in self-defense, she did kill two people and got photos of it all! And the most important part is that they were unmasked!"
"Wait, hold on Greg, isn't it illegal to unmask a Ward? And what do you mean she supposedly killed two people? I hope you aren't actually believing what Nazis are saying."
"It is and I know, but here's the important part! Look at who it was!"
Taylor blinked as Greg shoved his phone in her face, and when she looked realized with a burning rage why he was telling her. Collections of bugs ripped each other apart under bushes in her anger. 'Fucking Sophia Hess was Shadow Stalker. She was a fucking HERO?' "What the FUCK?"
"Yeah! The whole school is going nuts! And she isn't here today either, and neither is Emma! It's crazy!"
"I need to visit the principal now, Greg."
"Are you sure? The PRT isn't here yet but..."
"Now, Greg." Seeing red, her mind was spinning as she stormed to the principal's office. 'Was this why nobody ever did anything? Why Blackwell and the teachers always ignored me? Mrs. Knotly at least always looked guilty, was it because they were all being pressured by the fucking PRT just to keep Sophia happy?'
She opened the door and tried to hold back her anger as she glared at the secretary. 'Was she in on it too?' "I need to see Principal Blackwell please."
"I'm sorry, but due to recent events she is unavoidably busy and is unable to…"
Taylor cut her off, knowing full well that Blackwell wasn't seeing anyone or on the phone right now through her bugs. "It's about Sophia Hess."
The secretary seemed shocked as she got up. "One moment."
Taylor watched as she seemed to almost skitter behind the desk to head to where Blackwell's office was, and kept watching with her bugs as she saw the two of them seem to freak out for a bit before the secretary came back.
"I'll bring you to see her now."
Taylor grunted and followed the secretary to Blackwell's office, watching with very minor amusement as she seemed to scatter to clear things away, and quickly sat down looking calm after the secretary knocked three times.
"Enter."
Taylor walked in with a calmness she in no way felt as she took a seat in front of Principal Blackwell.
"Miss Herbert. I understand that you likely wish to accuse Ms. Hess of…"
With considerable venom seeing that she was already in cover-your-ass mode before she even said a word, Taylor spit out her accusation while feeling bugs writhe in anger. "You know who she is, don't you. You knew it all along, didn't you."
She seemed taken aback. "Ms. Herbert, I have no idea what you might be insinuating but…"
Taylor cut her off again. "My last name is Hebert. Not Herbert. I know I've corrected you on this before. And to make things perfectly clear, I'm saying that you knew that Sophia Hess was Shadow Stalker all along. Was this why you always ignored my reports of bullying? Why you always believed everyone else's word over mine? This whole damn time?"
"Miss Herbert. You are to cease this tone and to stop accusing me of baseless rumors about the identity of a ward or bullying at once!"
"It's Hebert. And I hardly think they are baseless. You've never once investigated things, and from how you are reacting now? I already know that I'm right. I'm going home. Sophia apparently killed people, and because you've never once shown any resistance to anything they did, I'm just glad I didn't add to her body count and so I don't feel safe here."
She turned around and left, leaving the secretary shocked while Blackwell ranted on about baseless accusations and said that she would be contacting the PRT for attempting to unmask a Ward. Seething, she didn't care what she said, but did note that as soon as she wasn't visible, Blackwell pulled out her phone and frantically was calling someone. Knowing there weren't any bus routes home until far later, Taylor decided to walk home and started off. It would take a good hour or two of walking, but that's just what she needed. Her bugs were silent as she simmered.
Taylor finally arrived home, still simmering in rage, and threw off her coat and shoes to lie down on the couch, not even bothering to go up to her room. 'She was Shadow Stalker. The whole fucking time. Wait, no, not the whole time, she only joined the Wards a few months ago at the start of the year, but they let her in even with how she acted. Don't they have oversight for this? Checking up on her? I'm sure as hell not interested in joining the Wards now without a damn good reason.'
As she was about to work herself up again, her bugs notice something quickly coming for her house and she hears what she suspects is a motorcycle. 'I don't want anything else dumped on me today, world. It's enough, thanks.' The motorcycle pulls into her driveway despite her hopes, and she looks out the living room window to see who it is.
"Holy shit, that's Armsmaster." Then she remembers how angry she is at the PRT. 'Fucking Armsmaster. I bet Blackwell told him a pack of lies and he wants to arrest me knowing my luck.' She hears the knock on the door and Taylor opens it as she gets there.
"Hello. Can you confirm you are Taylor Hebert?"
"Are you here to arrest me for whatever lies Blackwell told you?"
He frowned. "Miss Hebert, I am simply here to confirm details: As this is sensitive, may I come inside to discuss this?"
Taylor scowled and moved aside, letting Armsmaster in to the kitchen before closing the door.
"Thank you. I was alerted that you were attempting to unmask a Ward, and then left the school. Was what I said true?"
"No, it damn well is not. I was shown information by a classmate when I got to homeroom strongly suggesting that Sophia Hess, who has been bullying me for nearly a year and a half with the seeming blessing of Winslow's staff, was Shadow Stalker and that she died last night. I went to confront Blackwell, who proceeded to cover her ass and insisted that everything I said was a lie. Like she always does. That convinced me that I was right, and I left."
"I see. And you knew nothing about what happened last night until this classmate showed you this information?"
"No. But from how Blackwell reacted, and how both Sophia and Emma were both missing, I'm guessing it's true. Hell, since Emma was also missing, was she also a Ward?"
"To confirm, you mean Emma Barnes?"
"Yes. Sophia Hess, Emma Barnes, and Madison Clements have been the three making my life hell since I started at Winslow. Madison was apparently in class today and I don't really think she's the type, but Sophia and Emma were both total bitches and if Sophia's a Ward I wouldn't be shocked if Emma somehow was as well, although I have no idea who she would be."
"I cannot confirm or deny any identities of Wards until the investigation on Shadow Stalker completes, but would you have any proof to support these bullying claims?"
"I do, but nothing that Blackwell ever accepted as proof. The entire school is against me, and since none of the cameras work, there's never been anything other than hearsay according to her."
"I see. Could you describe what you have?"
"I've got a journal I've been keeping of bullying since September of this year and all of my school emails are always full of harassing emails. I've been printing some of them off, but nothing that's been accepted as evidence and I stopped after getting told to stop wasting school supplies on it."
"Could I see them? I will not take them, but I might ask if copies could be provided to the PRT or BBPD if the school is ignoring such blatant bullying as you describe."
Snorting at how he's seemingly still refusing to admit anything, she heads to her room. "Sure. Wait here as I grab what I have and you can look through. Maybe you'll actually manage to get me out of Winslow."
She heads up and grabs her pile of bullying logs before returning and handing Armsmaster one of the notebooks. "Here's volume one." She began to see him grimace as he quickly flicked through the notebook, wondering if he was even reading it all, before passing it back.
"Thank you. Could I request that you and your father bring these to the BBPD or PRT office when possible so we could have copies made when possible?"
"I'll ask my Dad when he gets home. I'm assuming you aren't going to be arresting me or anything, but is there anything else?"
"Just one last question, Ms. Hebert. Do you happen to have any information on what could have caused Shadow Stalker's death?"
"No, I only found out she died this morning at school like I said earlier. I don't even know how she died other than a suspected heart attack."
"Thank you, Miss Hebert. I will head to Winslow to do some investigation: The information I was provided seems to clash considerably with what you have said and provided. The information about cameras being broken consistently is also something to look into as well as that is a state requirement for any educational facility."
She didn't even think about that being an issue somehow. "Is there any way the PRT can get me out of Winslow? I've attempted to request transfers to Arcadia and I did quality before I went to Winslow, but I don't think they've ever done anything with my requests besides shredding them once I left saying I didn't have the grades. Mostly because of said bullying, not that they've ever admitted to that."
"I will see what I can do. It will depend on an investigation into the school, so I cannot promise anything."
Taylor sighed. "At least it sounds like you'll actually try to do something. Winslow never made more than a token attempt at pretending they cared."
"I apologize for what seems to have happened. I hope you have a good day. Goodbye."
"Goodbye."
She stared at the door after she closed it and Armsmaster rode away. 'Well, he seems blunt, but maybe something good will happen.' She smirked a bit, reflecting how fast she seems to have calmed down. She started to head up to her room, hoping that things would actually go her way for once. She was still less than interested in the Wards if Sophia WAS Stalker, but she might give them a chance. Then she looked at her desk and suddenly remembered what was hidden inside and felt like the floor was falling out from under her.
"Oh, shit."
Armsmaster – Monday, January 17, 2011
Colin drove towards Winslow while specifically not considering it a school thinking about what he'd just learned. Despite how things were laid out by Ms. Blackwell, his software suggested that Ms. Hebert was entirely truthful in everything that she said and was rightfully enraged at what had happened. He would certainly be digging into things further, if only to confirm some of the easier to validate claims made. School cameras being first on the list, as the Ward contract required that those be in working order as a condition for Winslow getting funding from the PRT in addition to everything else that seems to have been not followed. Any reports of bullying, either towards or especially from a Ward, regardless of how trustworthy the report was, was supposed to be brought to the PRT for investigation. He made a note to have Shadow Stalker's handler questioned very carefully and a reminder to have a talk with all of the wards again, particularly if he started to get confirmations towards Ms. Hebert's claims of what was going on in Winslow in case it was happening elsewhere.
While thinking of questioning, he opened a call to Miss Militia using eye twitches.
"Miss Militia here. What did you need, Armsmaster?"
"Hello Miss Militia. I recently had a talk with Taylor Hebert following a report of a Ward's identity being breached without being told which Ward it was and was provided with some deeply concerning information about what Shadow Stalker seems to have been up to in civilian life. Are the Barnes's still in questioning?" He hadn't had a chance to directly interview them himself. The call came in to visit Winslow near the end of his patrol after they were brought in early this morning after some evidence was found that Shadow Stalker had indeed been killing people with the broadheads she was supposed to have turned over, and as her character witnesses they were now getting asked some very awkward questions about how closely they really knew the late Ms. Hess before giving the glowing reviews they had.
"They are, and the father is still stonewalling and refusing to answer questions while demanding to be let go. The daughter seemingly refuses to accept that Stalker is dead and is just shouting about her father suing us. What did you find on your end?"
"It seems that Ms. Hebert has been undergoing some particularly severe bullying at Winslow, specifically from a Sophia Hess, Emma Barnes, and Madison Clements. She also suggested that a number of things at Winslow are not as they should be, including a lack of working security cameras. I'm on the way to Winslow to investigate the cameras and speak with Ms. Clements, but wanted to ask if you might try and ask Ms. Barnes if she knows anything about bullying towards Ms. Hebert. Ms. Hebert actually has been keeping a bullying log, seemingly writing down and dating each instance of bullying since September of this year. If you can, would you be able to get a warrant to pull cell phone logs to see if we can corroborate the information? Ms. Hebert said she would talk with her father to get copies made at either the PRT or BBPD office of the logs she has. They are substantial. I'll send you what I saw in what she called 'Volume one'. She managed to fill an entire standard school notebook in just the first half of September, and from the size of the stack, things only escalated from there." A few twitches started the upload from his camera scanning software.
"I hope this isn't as bad as it looks, because it will make Piggot even angrier than she already is about this situation. I'll see what I can do here. Good luck on your side, Armsmaster."
"You as well, Miss Militia. Armsmaster out."
He pulled into the Winslow parking lot and prepared for what was likely going to be a VERY long day.
Plucking at threads - Chapter 3
Danny Hebert – Monday, January 17, 2011
Danny had a thought pop into his head while reviewing another contract. 'I should make sure that Taylor is OK, at least for her first day back.' The school assured that everything would be safe, but from how hard they were pushing to sign that joke of an agreement he felt like they were lying to cover their asses. He just wished he had been in the right headspace to contact the legal team here so they could take a look, but they were threatening to sue them if they didn't sign. In the end, he succumbed and regretted it when he realized how unfair it was.
Looking at the time and seeing that she would be soon getting out of class, he made his decision and called over to Lacey. "Hey, I'm going to head out early for once: I want to be home when Taylor gets there to make sure the school stuck to what they said."
"No problem Danny: I hope everything goes all right. I'll watch for anything urgent coming in. Tell Taylor to drop by sometime: We haven't seen her in a while."
"Will do, Lacey. See you tomorrow."
'It feels like it's been a long time that I've had to head home when there's still light out. I should be home more often.' He truly felt for her, and knew he wasn't doing as good a job as a parent as he should to his shame. It was just so hard when he just didn't have any energy after getting home late all the time, and his desire to be a good father pushed against his need to keep the men working at the union working and paid.
He wished he hadn't clammed up when Taylor made the Lasagna last night. She had at least tried, and they could have remembered the good times they had with Annette instead of silently eating in sadness. He stopped himself from thinking about it as he started up the car. He did not want Taylor to lose another parent from distracted driving. He just hoped that he could apologize properly when she got home.
Danny pulled in to the driveway, and turned off the car. 'I made it.' Ever since Annette passed, he seemed to always think of thanks for any trip, no matter how long or short. 'I wonder if things like that are keeping me in my funk, but I'm terrified that if I stop I won't be able to do it anymore.' Getting out of the car with more energy than usual, he realized that both he and Taylor should have seen a therapist at some point. 'I'll try to remember and check if the DWA has any resources for it tomorrow. And I need to stop working late all the time.' It was surprising how much clarity he lost from a few extra hours in the office.
Opening the door, he noticed that Taylor's shoes and coat were already there. "Taylor? Are you home?" He hoped that she hadn't just decided to skip without saying anything: It would make the school even more resistant if they had to do something.
"I'm here. I ended up having to leave early after I found something out." She sounded almost... haunted. 'They better not have started right back in on the first day without the staff stepping in.' Swallowing his anger with long experience, he finished taking off his coat and shoes to see Taylor lying listless on the couch staring at the ceiling.
"What's wrong Taylor? Did they start to bully you again? The school said that…"
"No Dad. Nobody bullied me today, but that's partly because I left before they could."
"Can you tell me what happened?"
"I went to school as usual, but nobody really noticed me there. Everyone was talking about something and I couldn't tell what, so I was able to get in to home room without being bothered at all. Then Greg, and he wasn't one of the ones who bullied me, just a nerd in my class, came over and started filling me in what everyone was talking about. It seems that Shadow Stalker, the Ward, died last night."
He waited for a bit. "That is terrible, but that can't be the end of the story. What else?"
Taylor took a deep breath. "He showed me a picture, because she died in front of some E88 goons who unmasked her after she died. She'd apparently killed two of them before just dropping dead, no signed that the gangsters actually touched her. The problem was that the person under the mask? Sophia Hess, one of my main bullies."
Rage flared before he once again swallowed things to confirm what happened. "Was she one of the people who threw you into your locker at the start of the year?"
"I can't confirm it since I didn't see, but it's likely."
"Do you think the school knew?" His rage simmered without letting anything out.
"I thought so as well, so I went to see Blackwell as soon as I saw it. I outright accused her of knowing who Sophia was, and ignoring the bullying for that reason. She refused to admit anything, and went straight into cover-your-ass mode, accusing me of making everything up like always." She turned to look him dead in the eyes. "She isn't as good at lying as she thinks, and very clearly was lying out her ass."
"That sounds like her from what I've heard. I assume this isn't the end of it?" The rage was building, but he kept things closed. It wouldn't hurt to know exactly who to unleash it at, but he knew it wasn't his daughter.
She turned back to the ceiling. "No. I was mad, said that I didn't feel safe there anymore since apparently Sophia had a fucking body count but still couldn't do anything wrong according to Winslow, so headed home. Blackwell proceeded to warn that she was going to have me arrested for attempting to unmask a Ward, but I just ignored her and walked home to cool off."
She sighed. "Shortly after I got back, Armsmaster showed up. That's where things get interesting and I'm not sure how to feel about it."
"Armsmaster came here? I hope he didn't come here just to arrest you based on what your useless principal said." It was getting harder to keep a calm face. 'Keep it capped, Danny.'
"No, but to be honest I was still mad when he got here and I did kind of accuse him of showing up to do just that." She had a shadow of a smirk going there; He was glad to see it, although it didn't last long. "He said he was just looking for confirmation, and apparently Blackwell just said that this troublemaker student named Taylor Hebert was shouting about the identity of a Ward before leaving school. Seems that she didn't bother to report who that Ward was, as during the conversation while he didn't admit to the truth he didn't seem to care about getting me to sign an NDA or anything. Probably because it's everywhere online. He did ask to come inside, and I let him in and told him what happened from my point of view. We ended up going on a bit of a tangent in the process."
He felt like she probably shouldn't have let a law enforcement officer in, but felt it was understandable considering the subject matter. From how Taylor was acting now, she was likely just as sarcastic and caustic as Annette was when she was angry. "What else did you tell him?"
Her tone went oddly detached as she continued. "Well, I explained that I didn't know anything until I was shown pictures of Shadow Stalker with her mask off by another student, that I accused the school of covering up the bullying because it was a Ward doing it, and explained how Winslow has been treating me. Along with naming the bullies."
He jumped in here. "Hang on, you knew names? Why didn't you tell me?"
"I didn't want you to get mad, and I knew you had enough on your plate." She kept that detached tone, and if anything it was getting stronger. "You wouldn't have been able to do anything anyways."
Wouldn't be able to… "Taylor, you can always tell me when you have problems, and while I know I haven't been very aware lately I could have helped. If you said something earlier, I'm sure that Alan would…"
"Emma is one of the ones bullying me. Sophia Hess, who was Shadow Stalker was the physical one, Emma Barnes used everything I ever told her when we were kids to hurt me, and Madison Clements was the cute innocent shadow who played pranks keeping me down." She looked at him again, with tears despite the detached tone which was starting to really worry him. "They stole and destroyed Mom's flute, Dad. Emma knew what it was and what it meant and she didn't care at all if it meant hurting me."
His anger had evolved into the kind of cool rage he hadn't felt since before Taylor was born. He might genuinely murder Emma for this, and Alan if he ever found out he knew or stood in the way. He breathed in and out to calm down for a moment to still himself. There was still more to find out. "What else did you tell Armsmaster?"
"He asked for proof, and I told him about how my school email was always full of harassment. I also showed him the bullying logs I started in September."
'Since September?' "How long was this going on Taylor? You never answered me in the hospital."
"Since I started at Winslow. When I got back from summer camp, I went to visit Emma. Sophia was also there. That's when she told me that she wasn't friends with me anymore and hated my guts. They've been bullying me the whole time. I still don't know why they started; They just keep saying that I'm a weak loser. The school always ignored my reports. It wasn't even always the PRT: Shadow Stalker didn't get picked up as a Ward until a few months ago, so the school just picked the popular kids and the track star over me from the start."
She snorted with derision. "Realized that when I got home, actually, but forgot it again until part way through the talk with Armsmaster, because the bullying logs more or less lined up when Sophia joined up. He looked through the first part quickly. Which reminds me, when we get a chance, he wanted us to head down to the PRT or BBPD building to give them a copy of everything. He didn't want to take the originals. He also said he would be heading over to Winslow to do his own investigation into things. He seemed very interested into reports of the cameras being always broken, in addition to the proof that Blackwell at least has been seemingly lying to them. Assuming that Sophia is Shadow Stalker, that is. I also asked if he could get me transferred out of there and into Arcadia because of how Winslow has messed up. He said he'd try."
Well, it seems like the PRT wasn't his target, but they might be an ally. That said, they wouldn't be fully trusted. "Is there anything else?"
"No, that's it."
"Thank you for telling me everything Taylor. I wish things didn't happen like this, but at least now we can move. Can you gather all of your logs? We'll head over to the DWA offices to get copies made and make sure the originals are safe."
She looked at him with curiosity. "Why?"
He smiled softly as his daughter. "Well, we'll be making sure that everyone knows exactly what is going on and dropping off copies to both the BBPD and PRT. We'll also want to look at getting a legal case going. The agreement that I was bullied into signing only covered the incident in January, after all."
"… I'll grab my things."
Taylor Hebert – Monday, January 17, 2011
'I'm still amazed at how fast things are going.' Taylor had gathered up the bullying journals into her backpack, and they head to the DWA building. She greeted Kurt and Lacey who she hadn't seen in years, before Danny explained that they needed to talk to Legal about what happened at Winslow outside of the legal agreement he was forced to sign. She actually felt some shame at how he sunk when he noticed for the first time how abused her backpack was, and worse when he realized how much there was to copy. The DWA lawyer, Michelle, was furious at seeing how much Taylor had endured as they ran page after page of abuse through the copy machine. All told, they ran off three copies for now. One for the BBPD, one for the PRT, and one for Taylor to keep at home. The originals were going into a safe in the office, which was alarmed.
Dropping things off at the BBPD was quick, and Taylor never realized how many people her Dad knew as they met with a sergeant in minutes rather than hours like she had assumed. While talking about what happened, it came up that Winslow apparently hadn't even bothered to report what happened in January to the police. Sergeant Hutchins assured them that an NDA does not prevent anyone from telling what happened to the police, and even if they had an NDA to not cover charges, the school should have had that kind of assault reported to the police anyway as required. She saw her Dad make a mental note of that as they headed to the PRT building.
After explaining things to the clerk, they were both ushered into a waiting room by a PRT officer and were met by Miss Militia to get the PRT's copy of the documents as Armsmaster was apparently still at Winslow. Her Dad mentioned that they had found out while dropping a copy off at the BBPD that Winslow hadn't reported the incident that happened in January, and wondered if the PRT was aware. They were not, and Miss Militia was shocked to discover what had happened when Taylor was locked in her locker. She seemed to almost hold back on asking something for a moment, but asked to wait for a moment before making a quiet call in the hallway. They were then escorted to a larger conference room for another meeting. She seemed a bit worried as there were only a few other people here, but the meeting started with introductions. She was now in a meeting with Miss Militia, Deputy Director Renick, and Director Piggot.
Piggot seemed to be in some pain and a bit pale as she started after introductions were completed. "Let's get started. Normally we would have insisted on an NDA, but as everyone in this room is aware that the civilian identity of the Ward known as Shadow Stalker is very publicly exposed online already, I won't bother. Mr. and Ms. Hebert, I would like to formally issue apologies on behalf of the PRT ENE for what Shadow Stalker has done while nominally under our purview. I know that it is a cold comfort, but it seems that Ms. Hess's case worker was working to keep Sophia's 'youthful indiscretions' under wraps as it as her first case and she wanted things to go well. It will also be her last case, as she will certainly not be working for any federal agency again assuming she is able to stay out of prison." Taylor was impressed with the level of withering sarcasm that Piggot was able to get across when saying youthful indiscretions if nothing else, but wasn't quite sure what would happen.
Her father stepped in. "Thank you for admitting what happened, but why exactly are we all here? We haven't really been told anything and we were initially just going to be dropping off a copy of Taylor's notes as she told Armsmaster she should have. Should we have brought a Lawyer?"
The Deputy Director spoke up this time. "That wouldn't have been a bad idea, but we aren't going to be requiring you to sign anything at this time. We want to try and prevent as much bad publicity from this event as we can, which is proving to be difficult from how poorly Stalker acted. We wanted to ask if you would be willing, after speaking with your legal representatives, to ensure that the PRT is kept out of your existing lawsuit against Winslow should you decide to continue it. Thanks to Taylor's information, Armsmaster was able to quickly confirm that Winslow was breaching the contracts they had signed with the PRT for hosting a Ward in various ways where we wouldn't have even known to look, and we are going to be opening up our own lawsuit against them. If Winslow had followed the agreement or even simply told the truth when asked, things would have been resolved far sooner and with less death both in the past and likely the future. This means we have multiple avenues not just for contract breach, but for direct damages with extensive proof of them. This, in addition to governmental legal resources, means that Winslow is not going to be getting out of this. If you agree to the terms we provide, we can include you on our case and will be able to apply additional support for expediting Taylor's transfer to Arcadia, much like we do for Wards transfers."
Taylor spoke up this time. "This will hit Winslow, but what about Emma and Madison? Sophia's dead, so I don't think we can do anything there and I don't think her family is responsible, but I don't want them getting out of this."
Director Piggot and Deputy Director Renick looked at each other for a moment, before looking back. Director Piggot spoke evenly before asking if they were willing to sign an NDA about other individuals before continuing. Taylor's heart sank. 'Emma really IS a ward. God.' The forms were passed over, read, signed, witnessed, and countersigned before Director Piggot started talking.
"Madison Clements isn't quite within our purview, but our investigations were able to acquire warrants for phone logs between Sophia, Emma, and Madison confirming at least what Armsmaster saw. Madison doesn't seem to have ever known about Shadow Stalker's identity from logs and testimony gathered by Armsmaster, but Alan Barnes and Emma Barnes were character witnesses for when Sophia Hess was inducted into the wards after being arrested for nearly killing a man. They are both already under arrest for fraud and perjury."
Author's note: Not really sure about how well that legal bit works: I'm kind of going under the idea that Piggot is already ripping pissed off about how Sophia screwed them over, and wants to make sure that Taylor (And her father) see the PRT doing everything it can to make things right. The whole "Drop your lawsuit or keep us out of it" bit is more or less a smokescreen so that it doesn't feel TOO suspicious. That's because Miss Militia suspects that Taylor might have triggered in the locker, but doesn't want to bring it up as something they know about. I was going to maybe do a short PRT side block from Miss Militia's POV, but... This is already over 3k words and it's 2:30 am. Considering earlier today I was writing up more notes for outline for later chapters and deciding plot points, I think I've done well. Funny thing is, this is pretty much all just from the first third of the outline notes that I've got already and all of it was stuff I came up with like a week ago: none of the new stuff I have. Hope I can do this kind of productivity tomorrow after work! (I almost certainly will not. I don't know how the hell I pulled today off.)
Plucking at threads - Chapter 4
Taylor Hebert – Monday, January 17, 2011
'I don't know why I didn't think that would take as long as it did.' Taylor thought through a yawn while taking off her coat. Despite how little time they spent waiting for meetings, it was still past 10 by the time they were able to get home. There was another meeting after the original one with Director Piggot as they were far too busy to sticking around the entire day just talking with them. Michelle had been willing to come to the PRT building while they had ate lunch at the cafeteria after that ended, and then Taylor had to sit through an incredibly boring and long meeting with the PRT's lawyers to just get everything resolved as soon as possible.
Once that was resolved, Dad and Michelle seemed happy with the general settlements involved that the PRT directly paid out for the part they were involved in even if it was only a few thousand due to the legal resources that would be arrayed against Winslow and the cut they would receive from that. Taylor was mostly happy that Arcadia was confirmed for her: She wasn't going to be told exactly when she would be starting, but was told it was likely the start of next week.
She blinked as she realized something she hadn't thought to ask at the meeting. "Dad, should I still even try to go to Winslow for the rest of the week, or stay home?"
Danny hummed while taking out the apple juice. "I would say no, and I would rather you spend as little time there as possible. I don't really like the idea of you spending all day alone, but I suspect you will be even more bored if you came in to work with me for the entire day. It might not even be that bad for the last week, if only because there will be officers and investigators crawling all over the place, and it sounds like a number of people have already been pulled in for interviews so they should get the hint about no pushing things. What do you want to do?"
Taylor thought on it for a bit before realizing how tired she already was. "I think I'll stay back for at least one day so I can think on things: it has been quite a long day."
Danny nodded. "I'll call Blackwell in the morning so she doesn't try to claim truancy, and warn her that if you do decide to come back to warn the teachers about a hard stop on bullying." He smiled slightly. "Assuming Blackwell is even there to pick up the phone and it isn't a replacement from the school district there to cover for her."
Taylor smiled faintly at that image. "Here's hoping." Turning to the stairs, she noticed her backpack. "Actually, I might pick out a new backpack and some new clothes as well: Can I have some money to head to the market?"
"No problem. I'll leave a few hundred dollars on the counter for you. I'm sorry again for not noticing everything." He stepped forward and gave her a brief hug. "If you do need anything, even if it's just a ride, you know the office number. Do you have any change for payphones?"
Taylor nodded. "I have enough for a few calls in my wallet just in case. Thanks again, Dad." Taylor yawned again. "On that note, I'm headed off to bed. Night, Dad."
"Good night, Taylor. I'll try to avoid waking you up tomorrow so you can sleep in a bit."
Trudging up the stairs to her room while dragging her backpack along, Taylor thought over things with a slight smile. 'I think that all things aside, today has been a good day. I'll try and actually spend some time with my powers tomorrow while I'm home, and probably do some studying. I'm almost looking forward to Winslow's changes on Wednesday, and if it hasn't? It deserves everything coming to it.' Taylor stopped after getting into her room. 'Speaking of things aside.'
She kept an eye on her desk after closing her door. She had apparently succeeded in her goal from earlier today of not thinking about what was in her desk by trying to shunt her mood into her bugs a bit, and totally forgot it with everything else that happened after. 'I almost don't trust myself to just forget again tomorrow morning somehow.' She sat down at the desk and pulled it open, confirming that the black notebook was still there. Just to be safe, she put it under some other notebooks before closing it. 'No, I'm too tired for this and Dad might come in to check on me. I'll look at it when I wake up.' To give herself a subtle reminder, she moved her backpack from its customary spot of by the door and put it on the chair next to the desk. Nodding somewhat grimly, Taylor got ready for bed and fell into a restless sleep.
Taylor Hebert – Tuesday, January 18, 2011
Taylor munched away at her cereal with a scowl while trying to read the paper with her bugs. 'It's even worse than reading the blackboard without my glasses. At least then everything is consistently blurry. This is like my eyes keep moving just a bit, even if all the bugs are staying still.' She almost wanted to see if other bugs would help, but she thought that flies and spiders had more than good enough vision to pick out the words for at least the headlines from the ceiling.
'Actually, why was I starting from there anyway? Let's move them right on top to see if I can get that working first.' The small swarm flew down and she arranged them around the start of the first article. She still couldn't really tell exactly what the first word said. Annoyed, she washed up her bowl and looked at the paper herself just to see what it actually was.
'I couldn't even pick out the word Winslow. After everything. God, this power is useless.' She was reminded of the old people who kept moving things back and forth but never really being able to pick things out anymore. 'Wait, maybe it's because the angles are too off and I'm getting confused that way?' She moved the bugs off of the paper on to one side of the table and grabbed some boxes from the pantry to prop the newspaper up so it was upright on the other side of the table away from the bugs. If she did get it right, she didn't want the first thing she read with her bugs to be about Winslow no matter what the article said. It isn't like it would be breaking the news of what happened yesterday.
'Let's see if this works…' Taylor started ordering the bugs to move slowly towards the paper, bit by bit, to see if she could get the words to resolve. 'Come on power, help me out here. Let me read a newspaper.' The words seemed to just constantly shift just out of being able to pick them out until for a moment they snapped into place before blurring away again.
"Oh, come on." She'd stopped her bugs immediately, but it still messed up. Groaning, she sat back down at the empty table and closed her own eyes to try and focus as much as she could and started slowly moving the bugs back and forth, sometimes all at once, sometimes just with some bugs. What felt like hours passed before the words snapped back into place, and seemed stable. 'Ok, now to see if I can keep things sighted in while I move them a bit.' Taylor started to very slowly move individual bugs back and forth and waiting for the vision to clear up each time. Eventually, she was able to move them around at a decent speed all over the table and keep things just clear enough to read, at least while the bugs were stopped and they weren't too far. She even was able to open her own eyes and just stare at the pantry door and still read.
'At least it means practice helps and it isn't just focus or something.' She looked up at the old analog clock above her. 'That didn't take nearly as long it felt. It's still only 10 am.' Taylor moved the paper so that it was lying flat, turned it to a fresh page while purposely not looking what was there, and started moving her spiders to the ceiling while having the flies buzz around in the air to get things to resolve again with a higher difficulty knowing that it was at least possible while heading back up to her room for the task she'd been putting off all morning.
Shutting her room's door despite knowing that nobody was in the house or even on the block, was about to pull out the Death Note before stopping and closing her curtains just in case. Out of excuses, she finally reluctantly pulled out the death note and looked over the rules listed before thinking.
'Ok, it says the human whose name is written here will die. Assuming that this isn't just a prank that has incredible timing for something unrelated, this is incredibly powerful. I don't want to kill anyone, but I just have to know if this is real.' Her vision downstairs finally snapped back into place and she smiled before realizing it was a story on Alabaster and some other thugs committing another hate crime. 'There's an idea. He always comes back when he dies, but I can probably try the death conditions on Alabaster. I don't think that many people besides Nazis have an issue with killing Nazis.'
She thought for a while on how best to try things: It wasn't like the notebook listed out how detailed the conditions could be. 'Not that this will actually work, but if it does, I should try something that absolutely confirms this as the cause. It also needs to be something that I would actually be able to confirm what happened without being seen as suspicious.' Making up her mind on something that would absolutely ever happen normally, she began to write while picturing the face that she knew was paste white in the newspaper article.
'Alabaster dies from his head exploding due to a lightning strike after loudly challenging God to strike him down for being a Nazi next to the Lord Street Market at 1:23 PM on January 18, 2011.' Taylor smirked. 'There's absolutely no way that would ever happen. I already told Dad that I was likely going to going shopping for clothes, so even if it somehow does happen, I'm likely not going to be hurt, and I'll have confirmation on a few things besides it working.'
Carefully closing the book, she was about to put the book back in her desk before realizing that she should probably hide it a bit better. Using more bugs, she started to look around the house for where she can hide the notebook while grabbing a large plastic bag from the kitchen to put it in. 'No sense in letting it get wet or dirty.' After dropping the notebook in and closing it up, she headed back upstairs. Her bugs revealed that the air vent in her room would likely work.
Using a ruler to unscrew the extremely loose screws holding the grate in place, she lifted it up out of the way and tucked in the bag with the notebook, and let her bugs work to pull the it deeper in to the vents. Once it was around the corner in a spot that couldn't be seen from any vents even with a camera dropped in, she used her bugs to make sure there weren't any dust trails before directing a few spiders to create loose cobwebs as cover while replacing the grate in her room.
Making sure that she had the money and change for a payphone in her wallet, she got her jacket and shoes on before heading out and locking the door while heading for the nearest bus stop. "A nice sunny day out, too. Things are looking up." Knowing nobody heard her speaking aloud, she smiled. 'I hope it will be eventful.'
Taylor Hebert – Tuesday, January 18, 2011
"Here you are." Taylor handed over $15 for a fairly cheap used backpack she found that was still in far better shape than the one she had at home.
"Thank you for your purchase: Have a nice day!"
She waved while putting the new backpack over her shoulder. It really was a nice day out, and she was glad even if nothing interesting happened that she decided to take the day off. Her mood was much improved and she was actually smiling without a specific reason already. The fact that the busy market provided lots of things to look at and she was improving with how well she could see with her bugs, even if the low numbers due to the cold meant it fairly slow going. She could almost pick out what some of the signs were saying on a few tables with only a spider and a few flies, even though it was upside down from the spider's perspective.
'Shopping here sure is easier if you can see roughly where everything is all at once.' Reading wasn't going so fast, but the clarity of overall observation was improving noticeably. She didn't just make a direct path to each place she wanted to take a closer look at. She did want to finish her shopping before it was time to see if what she wrote happened so she wouldn't have to wait around for any possible interviews from the PRT, but she didn't want to be clearly waiting around for an hour either.
She continued moving around the market, looking at different clothes and trying to dress a bit better than her usual wardrobe. Not a lot, she didn't want to stand out as much, but dressing on the upper side of average for once would be nice. She also suspected her ideas of what was average were not the average at Arcadia, and she might need to get new clothing again next week. She also didn't totally trust Winslow to not ruin this clothing either, so was trying to keep everything nice and cheap.
Once it hit 1 PM, she started keeping a much closer eye on anyone around the mall who might be part of the Empire, but didn't seem to spot anyone from any gangs at all. 'That's fine, it makes sense. Just keep watch.' Twenty minutes later, she still didn't see anyone that she might peg as Alabaster. She didn't want to be IN the market when it happened: She wanted to be close to an exit when he showed up (if he showed up) to make sure she could get away without being stopped. She really didn't really want to get questioned in case she was seen as suspicious.
'It's almost time, and he isn't here.' Without turning her head, she used her bugs to confirm that the time for all of the clock faces on the pedestal in the center of the market were the same. 'I wonder if it's off or something.' She was barely even looking at the clothes now. 'I'm getting worked up over nothing. I'll wait for 1:30, then just confirm the time with one of the stall owners using a phone or something before heading home.'
She seemed to get fidgety as the time slowly crawled on, before giving and looking at the clock herself where it showed 1:26. "Hey, do you know if the time there is correct?"
The stall owner looked mildly annoyed before pulling out his cellphone. "Looks to be mostly correct. It's 1:35 now. Anything else I can help you with?"
'Wait, 1:35? It was slow?' "Sorry about that, I was expecting a friend but I haven't seen them around. I guess they aren't going to show up."
They raised an eyebrow. "They also skipping? In case you forgot, this is supposed to be a school day."
"I've actually got permission from my Dad due to some things happening at school, and no, they weren't. Anyways, bye." She started making her way towards the bus stop next to the market.
It wasn't until she was on the bus home when she realized that she had used Sophia's civilian name the first time.
Kept getting interrupted while trying to write and review this, and I'm not super happy with it due to feeling like nothing's really happening, but it's a post. I'll probably do another look over later today, but editing jail is something I'm trying to avoid at all costs here.
Plucking at threads - Chapter 5
Taylor Hebert – Wednesday, January 19, 2011
Taylor still wasn't really sure why she was going to go back to Winslow for her last three days. She got confirmation that her Arcadia transfer was confirmed for Monday, which was a massive relief. Dad left the decision on whether to go to Winslow ever again up to her and he was clear he'd rather she not, she decided to do it anyway. At least to try one more day with her main torments removed. It wasn't like she had anything to grab in her locker or thought she'd get much schooling in three days. She just thought it would be useful training, not that she could tell him that.
'Well, it seems like Blackwell and some of the teachers are gone, and I still don't see Emma anywhere.' Taylor started to hesitantly feel relief as she got in range of the school. She wasn't sure if they would somehow be able to get out of custody so that Emma could try to torment her more against all odds. If what Director Piggot said was true, she had the both of them by the throats for whatever they said as character witnesses for Sophia but the worry remained. She also knew that Madison had an interview of some kind, but wasn't who gave it and when was said. She wouldn't be sure until something actually happened, and a small part of her was still whispering that everything would come down on her again no matter how much she tried to ignore it.
Nothing noteworthy happened while getting off the bus, and she was mostly just spending most of her attention on watching as much as she could with her bugs. How much she was getting was surprising to her, and she must have learned more at the market than she realized. She had far fewer issues understanding what her bugs saw on top of the seemingly larger range, and now that she wasn't focusing as hard on seeing through her bugs noticed that she could hear through them decently as well. It still wasn't enough to pick out every word, but unlike when she was practicing at home there were lots of conversations around to listen in on and she wasn't going to waste the chance to do… quite a lot at once, actually.
Sitting down in homeroom, she almost looked forward to classes starting so more people would open books. 'I never really noticed it when I was at the market or at home, but I feel like I'm reading entire pages at once since I don't have to track the words with my eyes. I wonder how many books I can turn the pages on at once for speed reading textbooks: I bet Arcadia's educational standards are far ahead of Winslow, and I'm behind here.' Hoping that nothing like Monday would happen again, she watched Greg walk up to her desk without turning her head.
"Hi Taylor! I heard that Blackwell suspended you and you left school before the PRT got here and started pulling everyone in to give interviews about Sophia! Then, a few hours after that Armsmaster showed up! I heard that after his talk with Blackwell the PRT actually arrested her, and a few other teachers got pulled in and arrested too!" Taylor was almost tempted to start tuning Greg out as he kept going, but couldn't see much of a reason to. It wasn't like she wasn't listening to many more conversations that had even less of a chance for any actual information. It was surprising now that she was paying attention how many people in the class were clearly listening to him go despite visibly trying not to seem like they were listening to him. At least until he started going on about how this all reminded him of a game and everyone who was listening in lost interest. At least Mrs. Knott was about to walk in, so that should put an end to that.
Greg thankfully noticed when Mrs. Knott walked in and mumbled about how they would talk later before heading to his desk. Mrs. Knott smiled at me on the way to her desk. She was one of the few teachers who Taylor liked and wasn't surprised that she was still here. She was surprised that Gladly wasn't gone, but he seemed to be a bit off. She hoped that meant he changed and wouldn't be acting like he had in the past. As Mrs. Knott turned on her computer, she noticed that her bugs had issues with reading the screen. Not the normal focusing issues either: It was really flickery. 'I hope that I'm able to figure something out there: if I can use a computer monitor to read books, it would be way easier than trying to turn pages for different books all the time.'
Taylor was lightly annoyed for once at how she was using one of the newer computers. It took a while to notice, but her bugs had far fewer issues with the older CRT monitors that some of the computers had. The newer LCD ones, like she had, were the only ones that had that annoying flickering effect via bugs. She wasn't sure why that was, but it meant it would be harder to set up a bunch of them from the size, power cost, and weight of the older monitors. At least she would be able to keep practicing even while she wasn't in class as long as someone was still here working.
The bell rang and Taylor started closing everything down and logging out when she heard Mrs. Knott speak up. "Taylor, can you stay back for a bit?"
She nodded while finishing up and grabbing her things, not sure what to expect. "Yes, Mrs. Knott?"
"I just wanted to let you know that I'm sorry that I wasn't able to do more about what was going on. I can't talk about details, but if you didn't hear, Principal Blackwell was removed yesterday as well as a few other teachers. All of us were told by the new acting principal that any and all bullying has to be stepped on hard, and the students were made aware that it won't be tolerated as well during an assembly. I know it doesn't mean much now with the news about your transfer I saw this morning, but I wanted to apologize for how Winslow treated you and hope you have a much better time at Arcadia."
Taylor was glad for the first time, besides the training, that she came to Winslow. "Thank you, Mrs. Knott. I don't know what will change at Winslow and I'm not sure if I'll actually keep coming for the rest of the week, but I am glad that I came in at least today so I could tell you that you were one of the few bright spots I had at Winslow. I'll miss you."
"I'm glad we were able to talk as well. You were always one of the brighter students, and it was terrible what we let happen to you. I should let you go to your next class, but in case anything happens to you I wanted to make sure that you knew you could go to the principal's office. They won't ignore you any more."
"I will, Mrs. Knott. Bye." Taylor actually smiled a bit while heading to her World Issues class with one of her least favorite remaining teachers. Gladly did seem to be acting much more professionally than usual, and she actually saw him step in once to stop some people from chatting in class. She hoped that would continue in case Madison tried something.
Sitting down in her desk which didn't seem to have anything spilled or drawn on it, she carefully kept a watch on Madison without looking at her. 'I don't know why, but watching her fidget reminds me of something that is just on the tip of my tongue. It's like she's…' A group of bugs visibly agitated for a moment outside. 'She's acting like a victim. A victim who is expecting to get attacked by her bully, which from how she's glancing at me suggests that I'm the bully in question.' Her bugs started very carefully watching her to see if she made a move, and she made sure there were multiple gnats on her and her clothing to keep track of any movement or muttering. Gladly, meanwhile, seemed content to keep a watch on the classroom in general, although he did seem to spend a bit more effort watching her.
'If she tries to say I'm the bully and he goes with it, I will be DONE with Winslow for good.' She wouldn't be putting up with any more shit from her bullies at this point, no matter how much she was learning. It wasn't like Arcadia wouldn't be an even better place to learn in all respects, after all.
Gladly started class promptly after the bell went off. It didn't seem like Madison was going to try anything at least, and Taylor made sure that she was attentive to class and clearly writing notes on today's topic of how tinkers and thinkers have affected the patent system. She actually felt a moment of mirth when she considered writing down the same notes that Gladly had on his desk, but decided against it as she wouldn't be able to explain how that happened if it was discovered.
Eventually, the lecture part of class finished up, and we were split into groups. I noticed that he made sure that the groups of people that would usually chat through class were split up, and if possible weren't next to each other. He also kept anyone who had bullied me at all in the past away from me. That meant that I was left with two of the other quiet kids in class and Greg to balance things out.
Greg had started out resuming talking about whatever game he was talking about in homeroom before Mr. Gladly actually asked him to focus on class. It looks like he really was deciding to act like a proper teacher now. It took a bit before anyone started to come up with ideas, and while I was quiet at first, I noticed that there was a noted topic on Mr. Gladly's sheet that nobody seemed to be using. "How about we talk about how thinker and tinker related changes have stopped most patent trolling on Earth Bet and have gotten a bunch of older patents invalidated?"
The class turned out pretty well. Nobody tried anything, and we got a good grade. It was… Nice.
By the time lunch rolled around, my ability to monitor things with my bugs was getting shockingly good. This led into likely why it seemed like everyone, even the gang affiliated kids, was keeping a tight lid on bullying. Rumors were (very quietly) flying around that the reason why the PRT was stamping down on Winslow after Sophia's death was that someone in the school had triggered and killed her, but they didn't know who it was or how. There were a few people that had suggested me, but the way I'd reacted when I found out kept that as an unlikely scenario. Turns out that I didn't realize how loud I had gotten when I was shouting at Blackwell and a few people had actually heard our little shouting match, even if they didn't hear exactly what was said. The fact that Blackwell apparently had tried to call the PRT to go after me and yet they came here after a few hours had apparently made people think that I had been arrested, but the fact that I showed up today was throwing that idea into question.
At least the rumors seemed to be enough that nobody wanted to sit next to me which was appreciated. 'I'm surprised that a few people have started to think I'm a new Ward to replace Shadow Stalker. I can see how that might work, but it doesn't really make sense that if I had killed Sophia that I'd be allowed back into school so soon.' Information about me transferring to Arcadia wasn't known yet, and she wondered if the assumptions would solidify when that came out. Surprisingly, nobody seemed to try and guess how I supposedly killed Sophia. I wasn't sure if that was already talked to death on Monday and Tuesday, or if against all odds people were trying to not think about it in case whoever it was took offense.
Why them happily gossiping about who it might be wouldn't cause offense if found out was likely down to Brockton Bay's well-known lack of critical thinking around capes. She never did get why so many people put themselves in harm's way to record things for PHO when it didn't seem to happen nearly as often elsewhere. It still happened, just not nearly as much.
She mulled over the idea while regretting to remember to bring a packed lunch. Winslow's lunches were still just as terrible as they always were, even if nobody harassed her so she could eat them. She debated just not eating at all, but she'd removed the not insubstantial insect population as soon as she got in range and while she wasn't running away from bullies, the amount of mental energy from watching everything built up a solid appetite.
'I wonder if it's down to Panacea being available for critical cases so it doesn't feel like they are in as much danger. Surely nobody is that dumb, right?'
Suddenly, her bugs picked up on some likely E88 kids seeming starting to discuss an initiation that was going to happen later this evening. She started to very carefully listen to them as well as ensuring they had multiple gnats to tag them, but they either didn't know any details or were, against all odds for nazis, smart enough to not talk about them at school. All she knew is that they would meet up around one of the bars in Empire territory.
The bell rang for the last few classes, and Taylor was debating if she really wanted to try and use her bugs to spy on an actual gang. Who knows, she might stumble upon something she could use to confirm if the Death Note actually worked.