ELF
My chair screeched across the linoleum as I stood up. My two tablemates, my Dad and Annabelle, both turned their attention from the paperwork strewn across the plastic surface. Miller started paying attention again from his post by the cafeteria doors. Even people without powers had a vague sense when someone was watching them, and a yearlong bullying campaign had particularly honed mine. I could feel when his eyes snapped to that spot on the back of my head like a tense rubber band.
"Everything okay?" Annabelle asked first. She had no idea what had happened during the short-lived meeting, aside from Director Piggot calling a break and locking herself in her office. No one was any closer to figuring out what to do with me, thanks to yours truly. My handler had taken one look at my face and that ended with us in the cafeteria with hot chocolate going over the standard employment pitch for the Wards.
Teenage government sponsored superheroes. The very group I might have just completely torpedoed my chance of getting into. With nuclear warheads.
Tinkertech antimatter warheads.
"Yes," I managed to say evenly. "Just need to go to the bathroom."
Dad bobbed his head over his steaming mug, his hand squeezing mine under the table before letting go. I knew he was concerned about what had happened, less about my abilities and more what they meant for me but he didn't bring it up. It sounded bad, but we've had a lot of experience in just
not talking about things we probably needed to. He didn't consciously make the decision, but he was going to stew silently in the implications to avoid worrying me.
My father and I were cut from the same cloth.
"Oh, right. I mean, right down the hall." Annabelle pointed, like she expected me to be able to see through walls. Maybe I could, but just hadn't found the switch yet. Who fucking knows at this point? "Should be able to follow the sign then."
"Thank you."
I walked out of the cafeteria with Miller behind me. I kept a tight hold of Dad's presence, for lack of a better word.
It would not be a good way to keep physical tabs on him. I realized that by the time I passed the vending machines and water fountain. The particulars were not the easiest thing to put into words. It was like trying to explain sight to someone blind from birth. How do you describe the color blue? Was this how every parahuman with a sensing power felt? Like English just didn't have the words?
My power, whatever it was exactly, it was subtle. My Dad made me notice it, but that didn't mean he was the only one I could feel once I knew what I looking for. Ripples, except they were also threads, flare guns and unorganized manila folders stuffed to bursting with papers all at once which really didn't make any sense at all, but that's how it felt.
Ugh, this is what I mean about not having the words.
To make what was probably a very poor art analogy, the world was a cardboard cutout painted white. Positive space. The sense I had was like trying to parse the negative space into a coherent picture. I don't think there even
was a coherent picture, but I was saying that after having only having maybe an hour of looking. As for why it took so long to realize I even had this power?
Replace the cardboard cutout with the sun. That was
me. Drowning everything else out. Dad was like the shadow of a shadow that never moved from where I 'spotted' him. Either my power didn't really work off physical distance, or distance didn't
mean much.
Far as I knew, Rebecca Costa-Brown's office in the main PRT HQ was clear across the country in California. For just a little while, back in the room? I could feel her just like I could feel Dad, like she was sitting right across from me. Wariness, a lot of it but tempered with something that rang like – like brittle iron? Tired and, ruthless? Not quite. Everything about her just screamed 'intent to deceive' at me. Not lying, exactly, just not true.
Blegh. Words. I don't have them.
The Restroom sign with the little green arrow beneath the letters pointing the way was by the elevators. There was no getting out that way. On this floor at least, you needed a keycard and the windows were a ticket to a nice twenty-foot drop. Even if I wanted to make a break for it, I'd be buried in agents before I reached the sidewalk.
I slipped into the bathroom without a backward glance at my shadow, Miller. Once again, I found myself standing before the mirror.
Bathrooms were kind of a safe place for me. Out of necessity, I found myself in a stall lunch period after lunch period just so I could eat in relative peace. At least with the lock on the door, and most kids out with their own friends I could avoid the bottom feeders, hanger ons and everyone else in the mood for kicking someone when they were down to make themselves feel better. It didn't work all the time, but it was better than being out in the open at the cafeteria where I would find all kinds of junk in my hair or down my shirt. Bathrooms were safer than the classrooms where my homework would be stolen, or destroyed. Juice in my seat. Safer than the hallways.
Safer than my locker, I guess.
Absently I closed the drain and turned on the cold water. I watched the ripples flow outwards, and then bounce back from the sides muddling what had initially been a clear pattern. I glanced up at my reflection.
"So I fucked up." I hated being lied to, and something so important like the purpose of the PRT and by extension, the Protectorate superheroes? From the mouth of Rebecca Costa-Brown herself? How could I let that go? I couldn't, but that didn't mean I went about it the right way either. How could I salvage this? They hadn't locked me up again, but how much should I read into that?
I stared into the water.
No matter what happened, I had to make sure Dad was safe. Brockton Bay was full of villains and criminals. Anyone interested in Taylor Hebert, the parahuman, my Dad would be a prime target for them. If I couldn't protect him myself, the PRT was my best bet for options. Getting a secret identity somehow, relocating or just watching the house when I wasn't there.
Next priority? I wanted to be a hero. I had powers. They
needed to be used making people safer. I owed that. I would not accept anything else.
If I had those, was anything else really important? My bullies were facing criminal charges. If I was in the Wards, I could go to Arcadia, a completely different school. Even if that didn't work out, Winslow couldn't be as bad as before. I could crush a laptop into the size and shape of a baseball with my mind. If the Chief Director had secrets, let her keep them. For now.
I'll work around her if I had to, when I had more control over my powers and more leverage than a few vague images.
Feeling a lot better about myself, I dragged a finger through the water and watched as my disruption create bigger ripples that almost drowned the others out. Then the inertia faded and it was like it had never happened. I unplugged the drain before the sink overflowed. The water drained quickly. I paused on turning the faucet off. Biting my lip, I took a step backwards until my back collided with a stall.
Ripples.
Descriptions, they were going to be a real pain in the ass, I could tell. I don't know how to describe my moment of insight, just that the comparison to water felt right. I lived in Brockton Bay on the Atlantic. The Boardwalk on the water was a raised platform for the seagulls as much as it was for the tourists. The concept of high tide, low tide was not unfamiliar.
Push and pull.
I had pulled on the Chief Director. As gently as I could, barely feeling like I was doing anything at all, I pushed at the space only I could feel.
The bathroom wall exploded.
I was left standing there with a broken pipe spewing cold water in my face, my finger raised like the pulled pin on a grenade as a man on the other side of the wall screamed from the urinal, yellow stream spiking, shattered glass and pieces of ceramic skittering across the floor. Miller burst through the door, pistol out.
I lowered my hand.
"I can explain everything."
____________
Director Emily Piggot was nearly a half foot shorter than me, and she still managed to make me feel like I was three feet tall. Dad was sitting on a couch, hiding behind a Sports Illustrated magazine but I
knew he was snickering at my expense, the traitor and so was Annabelle but she hid it marginally better. She got me new clothes, including underwear, and I changed out of my wet ones at
another bathroom on the other side of the building. Marginally. She handed me the shoes, Velocity sneakers, and told me not to break anything.
The man I scared the piss out of was in a Dauntless hoodie made to resemble hoplite armor and gratefully sipping at hot chocolate.
Piggot raised an imperious eyebrow. "I see you've met Deputy Director Renick."
Fuck.
Dad ripped a page turning it.
"Hello, sir." I said. He smiled awkwardly. Oh, right, getting caught in the men's bathroom by a teenage girl would be awkward, wouldn't it? And here I was feeling worse about almost hitting him with the sink while his pants were dow – don't think about it,
don't think about it!
I met Piggot's eyebrow with my own.
She pinched the bridge of her nose again. "I don't get paid enough for this."
I had the distinct feeling that it was a good thing I wasn't in the Wards yet.
"No unauthorized power testing." She jabbed a meaty finger in my face.
"Yes, ma'am."
She didn't say anything else on that topic. As far as I was concerned, she didn't need to. I, Taylor Hebert, can be a bit of a dumbass. This is known.
"After your
other stunt, the Chief Director was forced to observe opsec protocol however, for
reasons," she sneered. I could feel Piggot. Resentful, paranoid. "She wishes to speak with you. You'll be using the conference room this time."
I'll be using the conference room? Alone? "I'm…very sorry for – "
Piggot held up her hand, palm out. "Just. Go."
I went.
The conference room looked exactly as I would have expected. A gorgeous cherry wood donut table surrounded by plushy office chairs dominated the center of the room. Small terminals were imbedded in the table in front of each seat and a large see through computer screen was held in the center. Costa-Brown was on it with the camera zoomed out further than it had been during the other call. I could see her hands clasped on her desk in front of her this time, papers with handwriting and the edge of a window. She peered at me intently, calculating.
"Hello again, Taylor," she said without a trace of anger or fear. "Please, have a seat."
