I kind of hoped someone would break the silence while I took the time to consider, maybe even distract from me, but nobody did. Everyone patiently waited, putting me at the focus of all attention, a spot I hated being in, in or out of costume.
“The city,” I replied, being careful to be as genuine as possible, to avoid alerting Tattletale, “You want to control it. Fine. I want you to make it work. Fix up the Docks so they aren’t a shithole. Give people work. Clean up the drug trade, or the hard drugs at least. Straighten out the asinine bureaucracy of the government and schools and all that. That sort of thing.”
Coil shook his head, “Not something I can offer you in good conscience, dear Skitter.”
He raised his hand to stop me before I could open my mouth. Not that I was going to, but he did. “What you’re talking about, I already intended to do, in large part. To give it to you as a gift would be little different than offering you an amount in cash, when I already intend to give you as much money as you require.”
“So you’re going to improve Brockton Bay,” I said, carefully.
“Don’t get me wrong. I will not claim to be a good person – I assure you I am not. That said, you are likely to discover I am a proud man. I would consider it a catastrophic failure on my part if this city did not thrive under my rule, a tremendous blow to my ego.”
I nodded.
He continued, “Our desires on individual subjects may differ, however. I would argue there will always be crime, always be drugs.”
“I’m not saying there won’t. I’m just saying that there’s room for improvement. When I was in grade six, more of my classmates could explain what a K-hole was than name a dozen countries.”
“I am not promising quick fixes, Skitter. What I will tell you is that individuals like yourselves would control territories and be responsible for maintaining your own kind of order in those areas, with whatever means you saw fit. Over time, people would adjust to this, crime rates would decrease. I would simultaneously be controlling the flow of product into the city, reducing the distribution of the most problematic drugs, those that would lead to the most societal decay and crime, while making other, more benign product available in their place. Crime and drugs cannot be conquered, but they are animals I believe I can tame.”
“And the city itself?” I asked. I thought of my dad, “Fixing the ferry?”
“Yes. Rest assured, if you were to accept my offer, I would fully expect you to contact me and speak up at any time you felt I was not following through in any department. I might be a proud man, but I would rather you injure that pride, even provoke it intentionally, rather than let me be complacent.”
I nodded once, slowly.
“I have said my piece, then. I leave you to consider it, Undersiders. I recognize that this is not what you signed on for, in the beginning. I know it might not have the same appeal in the scope of costumed hijinks, and I’m prepared for the fact that that this might lead you to refuse this offer. All I hope is that if you do refuse me, if you decide you are more comfortable as simple uncommon criminals, that our prior arrangement will stand.”
“You’ve invested this much in us, and if we say no, we can just walk away?” Regent asked him.
Coil spread his hands a bit, “What would you see me do? Murder you? Threaten you? Orchestrate an arrest? There is no guarantee any attempt on my part would be wholly successful, whatever I chose, and you may count it as a compliment that I would not want any of you escaping the attempt and coming after me as a dedicated adversary.”
He knocked on the window behind him. Immediately, the limousine slowed down and pulled over. As I glanced outside, I saw we were in the Docks.
“Think on the subject. Discuss it and get back to me with your reply, the sooner the better, no later than a week from now. Tattletale, it should be obvious, but I formally free you from all stipulations in your contract requiring you to keep my identity as your sponsor private. You may give my contact information to your teammates.”
“Sure thing,” Tattletale replied.
“And before I forget, I arranged individual accounts for each of you with a supervillain banker by the name of The Number Man, as paying for tonight’s job in bills, naturally, was unfeasible. My men will provide you with your account information and the instructions for accessing these accounts as you retrieve your dogs.”
Grue extended a hand, “I’m not sure what we’ll do, whether we’ll take this deal, but it’s been good working with you thus far, and I hope to continue.”
Coil took Grue’s hand and shook it, firm, “Likewise, Grue, Undersiders.”
We departed the vehicle. We were on the West end of the Docks, judging by how far the water was, and how close we were to the mountains that surrounded the city. Parked behind the limousine were three vans, each with two of Coil’s soldiers standing by, alert.
As we walked by the end of the armored limousine, a soldier passed out envelopes to each of us.
We continued walking, and Bitch opened each door we passed, letting the dogs out. They were smaller, now. Judas, the tallest, only came up to my shoulder. Their external muscle, wet and wrinkled, hung off them like excess skin on a person who had lost a great deal of weight. The interiors of the vans were spattered with more excess flesh, blood and bone that had been shed. The final stage would be the dogs shucking off the last of the excess mass, revealing their normal shapes nested deep within, dry within a membrane, virtually untouched by the injuries they had sustained over the night.
As the last of the dogs, Angelica, was released and the vans and limousine pulled away, we headed back to the loft. Each of us too busy sorting through our own thoughts and dilemmas to be distracted with conversation, so it was remarkably quiet.
I have it. I’ve got what I need.
I just didn’t know how I felt about it.
6.09
Dear Miss Militia…
Was it wrong to start with Dear? Was that implying more friendship or intimacy than there was? Would it seem taunting?
Miss Militia, we met earlier tonight…
No. If I went that route, she might throw it aside alongside all the other fan mail she got.
Miss Militia, you know me as Skitter, but you don’t truly know me…
Better, but I didn’t like the tone. I’d leave it as is, move on, and come back to it later.
…You see, I’m not a villain, despite…
Despite what? Despite the fact that I’d terrorized and hurt a lot of innocent people? Despite the fact that I’d nearly killed Lung and later cut his eyes out? That I had nearly two hundred and eighty thousand dollars in illegitimate money to my name?
I shivered, pulled my hands from my pockets and did up my sweatshirt to cover my exposed stomach. After we’d arrived at the Loft, Brian had suggested that we were all too tired to discuss Coil’s proposal, so we tabled all discussion until the morning. I was glad for the excuse to avoid hearing or seeing anything that might make this any harder. Besides, I’d promised my dad I would be home tonight.
It was past nine, so the bus from the ferry was only arriving every ninety minutes. I’d figured it was better to walk home than wait. I could use the stretching, too, given the abuse my body had sustained while I was riding Judas.
Sticking my hands back in my pockets, I returned my thoughts to how I’d word my letter to Miss Militia. Scratch ‘despite’. Another approach, maybe?
…Believe it or not, my intentions all along have been good. I joined the Undersiders in the first place to assist you. To assist this city…
Was that entirely true? No. If I was being entirely honest with myself, part of the reason I’d joined and stayed with the Undersiders was because I had been lonely. What if I offered some honesty?
…It caught me off guard just how easy it was to like them. I was in a bad place, and they accepted me. So writing this email to you is difficult. But it is necessary. In the end, I decided to go this route because it serves the greater good…
>
That was what I had told myself, earlier today, before we left for the job. That sticking with those guys would pose the greatest risk to innocents, that it would eventually lead to someone getting caught in crossfire, or me getting arrested for something serious.
But now I had Coil’s agenda to consider. Was he really being honest about how he planned to help this city? I had no reason to believe he was lying, and Tattletale was vouching for him. But at the same time, Coil’s motif was a snake, and Tattletale had hedged the truth and misled me before.
Question was, was I taking this route because it served the greater good? No. Or at least, I wasn’t sure enough either way for it to be the reason I was doing this.
Why was I doing it, then?
It had been a hard question to answer hours ago, and it was doubly hard now. Enough that it spooked me. How had I gotten to this point?
I was put in mind of a time I’d sat in on one of my mom’s university classes. I couldn’t have been older than ten, my dad had been busy and my mom hadn’t been able to find a babysitter. So I’d been precocious, proud as hell to be sitting in that English lecture with the teenagers and twenty-somethings and understanding what my mom was saying. We’d even read the book together, over the prior few weeks, so I knew the material. Oranges are not the Only Fruit.
While I’d been sitting and listening, an older man had come in and sat next to me, in the back row. In a kind voice, he’d murmured a comment about how my mother was an excellent professor. Then, a few minutes later, when I got up the courage to raise my hand and answer one of her questions, he’d complimented me, got up and left. All my pride in myself and my mother aside, what had struck me about the encounter was the man’s hair. A ridiculous comb-over.
After the class was over and my mom had been taking me home, I mentioned the man, and she’d identified him as the head of her department, her boss. Then I brought up the comb-over and how bad it looked.
“Look at it from his perspective,” she’d explained. “Maybe, a long time ago, he started to lose a little hair, but he could brush it to one side in a way that made it not show so much. Every year that passed he brushed his hair over a bit more. It was gradual, something he slowly got used to, seeing it in the mirror every morning and every night. Lots of small steps.”
“Why doesn’t someone point it out?” I’d asked her.
“He doesn’t have anyone to point it out for him,” she had replied, “And anyone who knows him well enough doesn’t want to hurt his feelings, even if it might be better in the long run.”
“You could,” I’d told her.
So she had, later that week. Ripped off the band-aid for the old head of the English department. According to her, he’d gotten a haircut, then thanked her at a later date. That event and what my mom had done afterward always stuck in my memory.
I swallowed past a lump in my throat. It always caught me off guard, just how frigging much I missed her, when I thought about her. I’d give anything for a thirty minute conversation with her, right this moment. I didn’t have the slightest doubt in my mind that she could have made sense of everything, put things into terms so simple that working it out looked easy.
I had to stop, look up, blink back the tears in my eyes, and take a deep breath before I moved on.
Was my situation the same as the old man’s? Had I let myself gradually slip into a bad spot, because of my lack of perspective beyond what was going on inside my own head?
I hadn’t been thinking about this clearly. I was still confident enough I could send that email, make the call… but before I did that, I had to get my thoughts in order. Composing the letter in my head wouldn’t work, I needed the words on my computer screen in front of me, concrete words in black and white.
I walked around the back of my house and reached into my pocket for my keys. Before I could get them, my dad opened the door.
“Taylor. It’s good to see you safe and sound.” My dad looked tired, years older than the last time I saw him.
I gave him a brief hug, “Hi, Dad. You got my message, saying I’d be late?”
“I did.” He shut and locked the door behind me. “What happened?”
I shrugged as I pulled off my sweatshirt, made sure my pepper spray, phone and keys were all in the pockets, then hung it up by the door. “Nothing big. I was at Brian’s, helping him put furniture together, then his sister and his sister’s social services caseworker came without any warning. I couldn’t find a way to leave without it being kind of awkward.” Which did happen, pretty much, just at an earlier time.
“I see,” he murmured. “Were you two alone?”
“No,” I lied, to stop him from getting the wrong impression. “At least, not for long. Lisa left a few minutes before the caseworker dropped by.”
“And you have a new shirt, I see. It’s nice.”
“Lisa’s,” I fibbed, squirming a little under the scrutiny.
“Ah,” he nodded.
“I’m going to go to my room, if that’s alright? I’m kind of wiped.”
My dad shook his head, “I’d rather you stayed to talk.”
Not what I wanted to do. My mind was jammed with enough crap and internal debates that I didn’t want to worry about concocting more lies for my dad.
“Can we do it tomorrow morning?” I offered him, retreating toward the door to the front hall, pressing my hands together in a pleading gesture. “I really need to sit at my computer for a minute and organize my thoughts.”
I pushed on the door and it didn’t open. Strange. I tried the doorknob, and it didn’t help.
“Door’s jammed,” I said.
“Door’s locked, Taylor. So is the door to the living room.” My dad answered me. When I looked at him, he showed me the old fashioned key in his hand.
As I watched, he pulled out two chairs from beside the kitchen table, placed one in the middle of the room, then placed the second chair against the back door and sat down in it.
“Sit.”
“Dad, tonight’s not really-”
“Sit.“
My heart dropped out of my chest. Or at least, it felt like it. I felt an ugly sour feeling in my stomach.
“I talked to your school today,” he informed me, confirming that ugly feeling.
“I’m sorry.”
“You’ve missed nearly a month of classes, Taylor. Three weeks. You’ve missed major tests, project due dates, homework… they’re saying you might fail, if you haven’t already.”
“I- I’m sorry,” I repeated myself.
“I could maybe understand, I know what you’ve been dealing with, except you didn’t just leave me in the dark. You lied to me.”
I couldn’t form the words for another apology.
“I called the school to get an update on how you were doing, and they said you hadn’t been to class in some time, and I didn’t know what to do. I just- I felt completely lost. I called your Gram.”
I winced. Gram was my mom’s mother, an austere woman who’d never fully approved of my dad as a match for her daughter. It wouldn’t have been easy for him to make that call.
“She convinced me that maybe I’ve been too focused on being your ally, and not focused enough on being your parent. If she’d told me that a week ago, I would have hung up on her. But after talking to your school, realizing how badly I failed you-”
“You didn’t fail me,” I told him. I was caught off guard by how my voice broke a bit with emotion.
“I did. It’s clear that whatever we’ve been doing hasn’t been working, if you’re in this situation, if you can’t talk to me. No more secrets, no more half truths. So we’re going to stay here all night if need be. I’ll even call off work tomorrow if I have to, but we’re going to talk.”
I nodded and swallowed, hard. I still hadn’t sat down in the chair he’d left in the middle of the kitchen.
“I, um, need to use the washroom.”
“Okay,” he stood. “I’ll walk you there, and I’ll w
alk you back here to the kitchen afterward.”
“You’re treating me like I’m a prisoner?“
“You’re my daughter, Taylor. I love you, but I know there’s something going on, and it’s not just the bullying, or it’s something to do with the bullying that you haven’t mentioned yet. I’m scared for you, Taylor, because you’re avoiding me and staying silent even if it means failing.”
“So you force my hand by making me your prisoner,” I replied, letting anger and hurt creep into my voice, “Do you think this is even remotely cool, after all the times I’ve been cornered by those bitches from school? I’ve got to come home to this bullying power-abuse shit, too?”
My dad answered me with the utmost patience, “I hope you know that I’m doing this because I love you.”
I did. Thing was, that didn’t make it even slightly easier to handle.
“Do you need to go to the bathroom, Taylor?”
I shook my head. What I needed was to get out of this room. I saw him purse his lips, knew he was aware I’d just been looking for an escape.
“Talk to me, Taylor.”
“Don’t feel like talking.” I walked across the room to try the other doors, to the living room and basement. Locked.
“Why are you so insistent on escaping?” he asked. I could hear the pain in his voice, which didn’t make me feel any better. “Please, just relax, sit down.”
I felt the crackle of my power at the edges of my awareness, realized I was clenching my fists. Why was it that the people I was supposed to be able to rely on were the people who turned on me, cornered me, made me feel the worst? Emma, the school, Armsmaster, now my dad?
I kicked the chair, hard enough that it made a mark as it hit the fridge. My dad’s eyes went just a bit wider, but he didn’t move or speak. I could feel the tug of my power as bugs throughout my neighborhood began to move to my location. I had to willfully cancel out the order to make them back off and return to their normal behavior.
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