Speaking quickly, I explained to the others what was on the card and what I was thinking. Which, of course, meant telling Rubi about the Ministry. For the moment, I kept it a little more vague as far as who they all were. I just told her that the people in charge were my family and that I had found out about all this when I got my powers.
Needless to say, she had a lot of questions. not to mention thoughts about her brother and the girl who might as well have been her sister getting involved in this sort of thing. But she didn't seem angry at the rest of us. It took me a minute, but I belatedly realized she was more angry at the situation. She was angry with my parents and the rest of the Ministry, and wanted to give them a pretty firm and loud piece of her mind. Which just made me think I needed to reiterate how dangerous the whole thing was.
But, of course, now wasn't the time for that. Promising that we'd get into more details later, I held the card up once more. “So, all we have to do is call them.”
The older girl shook her head uncertainly. “Is that a good idea? Just…” She trailed off and held up both hands before sitting down on an old copy machine. “Let me think for a second. This is just… a lot. You're all saying that there is a massive criminal organization spread throughout every place of power and authority on both sides of the law through the entire city. This Ministry has people in the police, the mayor's office, the hospitals, probably all the utilities so if they can control the electricity, the phone companies, internet suppliers, and probably anything else they might need to handle any situation that comes up.”
She was clearly thinking out loud. “Some of those people must be important, but a lot of them are probably just regular old employees that are in the right place at the right time. Just a guy in an office somewhere with the right key or the right phone number. And they have influence over every Fell-Touched gang in the city on top of that?”
“Almost all of them,” Paige pointed out. “They don't have any control over the Scions. Which is the whole problem right now. They can't stop this their usual way. Especially not…” She paused and glanced over at me.
Right, this one was harder to navigate. And it hadn't exactly been easy so far. I took a breath, glancing over at Murphy and Roald. They were the ones who had made the choice to unmask themselves to her when she showed up. Even though my mask and helmet were still on, they could interpret my body language well enough by that point to understand. Both of them looked at one another, then turned back to me and nodded. They knew what it meant, what I was asking. And they confirmed that they trusted her.
And why wouldn't they? It was pretty clear by that point that Rubi had absolutely no connection to the Ministry. If she had, she would have gone to them directly with the information. Besides, she was an aspiring law student whose life had been completely torn off track by the incarceration of her parents, forcing her to put her entire life on hold to take care of her siblings. If she’d had any connection to the Ministry, they would've done something about that by now. If nothing else, they’d want to have her in their debt. Ironically, the very thing that made her life so hard made it absolutely clear that she was completely innocent when it came to this.
Absorbing all of that, I took a step that way. Even though I'd already made the decision on my end, I wasn't going to do so for her. “Rubi,” I started, “I need to ask you something very serious. Do you want to be involved in this? Because right now, with what you know, it's already dangerous. But if we keep going, you're going to know even more. You're going to learn secrets you can't ever unlearn. I mean, actually, you probably could unlearn them. The problem is, the only way to do so is for my parents to have their friend erase your memories. And if it's gotten that far, things are really bad.”
Rubi’s gaze met mine. She was quiet for a moment before simply replying, “Murphy and Roald are already involved in this, pretty heavily. Something tells me they know everything. I--” She stopped suddenly, eyes widening. “Wait, is this what happened to Tyson?” She was already standing up off the copy machine, eyes glancing toward Murphy while she brought up the girl’s deceased brother. “They said it was just a drug related drive-by, but if they--”
Murphy spoke up quickly. “They helped him get away. I mean, when we were chasing him. Um, at least at first.” She went on to give the quick rundown of what had happened and what we were able to piece together about the Ministry taking him out of town and simply executing him.
Rubi shook her head. “Is that supposed to make me feel better? Yeah, he was a piece of shit who deserved to rot in prison for what he did.” She glanced over at Murphy, biting her lip before pushing on. “But he didn't deserve extrajudicial execution. The law exists for a reason, and it's not for those people to decide who gets to live and who dies. He deserved to sit in a courtroom and be judged properly. That's how our entire society is supposed to work.”
Yeah, I could definitely tell this was a girl who wanted to be a lawyer. Giving a little nod, I spoke up. “Believe me, we know. But like I said, if you get more involved than you already are, it's not really something you can just walk away from. Right now, we're just trying to help as many people as we can without being part of the Ministry. We're not ready to do anything about them, not directly. They're too strong, they've got too many people in too many places. We just have to take it one day at a time. And right now, all our days are taken up with this plague. And now, with the whole Scion thing.” I gave a heavy sigh. “We really need about twice as many hours in the day.”
Rubi was watching me for a moment before she realized, “Hold on, you want to tell me who they are. Your parents, I mean. That’s what all this is about, why you’re trying to make sure I get how serious it is. Wait, Murphy said the Ministry couldn't handle this their usual way, especially not now. Why would it be especially not now? It's because something changed, something’s different.” She went silent for another couple seconds, then spun on her heel to take a few agitated steps off one way, before spinning again to come back. “The people in charge of the Ministry would have to be very powerful and important. And the only real reason for Murphy to say that things are different now would be if they weren't in control anymore, at least not the way they have been. You've been trying to solve this plague thing so much you left town completely in the middle of all this. I don't really know all the details, but you left for days to get this machine over here. You had to be pretty desperate to fix the people who were affected by that attack. Because your parents, the ones in charge of the Ministry, are two of those people. They're able to do all the stuff you're talking about because they're two of the richest people in the country. Your parents are Sterling and Elena Evans. You're Cassidy Evans, their daughter!” She made that last announcement dramatically, spinning suddenly on her heel to stare at me.
Okay, uh, wow. If I ever got into legal trouble, I was kind of hoping she would have her law license by then, because I totally wanted to hire her. She'd sniff out the truth in seconds. Taking that in, I managed a somewhat weak, “You think pretty fast.”
Rubi, in turn, blushed and shook her head. “Oh, not that fast. I had to use my power.”
That made me double-take. A lot had been going on in a short time, but this was news to me. Everything we'd been saying had been information coming from our side. “Wait, power?”
“Oh, right, the others were--you guys didn’t hear about that yet.” So, she quickly explained what had happened to her fully. Which led to her explaining how she knew what would hurt Pencil. I'd been so stuck in figuring out who we could send the information to that I'd briefly forgotten to find out what that information actually was. Which was a little embarrassing, but in my defense, there was a lot going on.
Still, hearing about what had actually happened and what the girl was capable of made me reel backwards a bit. “Okay, hold on, hold on. You freeze time and then repeat things over and over again with a bunch of different versions of yourself, and then all that is multiplied together when you unfreeze time and you get the benefit of all the actions taken by every incarnation of yourself while time was frozen? So you did that with Pencil and actually hurt him just by punching him.”
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Her head bobbed up and down quickly. “Exactly, I don't know the details, but I'm pretty sure he's not completely immune to everything all the time. He's got a limited number of immunities or something. I don't know if it's separate immunities that have their own charges or if it's a single shield or something but either way you just have to keep attacking. All I know is that he can just be hurt if you hit him enough times.”
My mind was spinning out. Was it really that simple? That was impossible, wasn't it? Surely he had been hit a bunch of times while carrying out his schemes. But on the other hand, if it took dozens or even hundreds of hits to actually break through his power, maybe that really was his weakness? It had always seemed unfair that he ended up with what appeared to be complete and total immunity to any and all damage whatsoever. But maybe he hadn't. Maybe there really was this secret to it and he had been able to hide that for this long. But if he had, and then this nobody girl had managed to knock his tooth out? He would realize that she could either figure out his secret, or that her power simply trumped his. And that meant…
“He'll be after you. They all will. They’ll rip the whole city apart looking for you. The only reason they haven't already is because he's obsessed with helping his sister. They've probably got some of their people looking for you anyway. You can't go home.”
Rubi blinked at that. “They don't know who I am. It's not like I shouted my address at him.”
“It's still not worth the risk,” Paige agreed with me. “If he managed to get pictures of you from a security camera, or described you well enough and someone happened to figure out who you are, they could be waiting for you. At the very least, we should make absolutely certain they don't know anything, and we can't do that right now. Not with everything else going on.”
Reaching up, I took my helmet and mask off. It was the least I could do in that moment. “Look, you're right. You're right about everything you guessed so far. But you're saying you used your power just to think?”
Staring at me as though surprised by my appearance even though she'd already guessed it, Rubi swallowed visibly. “Um, yeah, I just froze time and sat there thinking for a few minutes. It gave me time to work through all of it in my head.”
Boy did I wish I had that sort of power. It would've been nice to make everything completely stop at any point so I could think. Still, I was glad someone like her had ended up with this power if it had to be anyone. Especially considering the information she had just dropped into our laps.
While I was still thinking about that with my helmet tucked under my arm, Sierra spoke up. “Well, I guess I can take this off." She tugged her own mask up, making Rubi do a double-take.
“Wait a second, what are you, her stunt double?”
That made me scoff, offended. “Hey, if anything, I'd be her stunt double.”
“No yeah, she's right.” Sierra was nodding casually. “She's even more insane than I am when it comes to wild shit.”
She and Paige gave a quick rundown about who and what they were. And yeah, this was definitely a lot. We were throwing way too much at this poor girl already, and now we were adding in the whole Biolem explanation? I wouldn't have blamed the girl if her head had exploded. Or if she had just thrown up her hands and walked away.
Of all people, it was Qwerty who spoke to her next while she was trying to digest all that. The little squirrel-parrot bounded over to sit right at her feet before speaking up. “It's a lot to take in, huh? I only figured out how to think a few weeks ago, and this is a lot of thinking.”
Rubi looked down before kneeling to put her hands out for the little guy to clamber onto. Then she rose and asked, “Could you guys give us a second?” With that, she turned and walked to the opposite side of the room so the two of them could talk in private.
Which left the rest of us looking at one another. We had our own little conversation about what was going on and what we still needed to do. Eventually, the other two came back. Rubi seemed a little calmer. “Right, so you guys have been dealing with a lot, that's for sure. And I get why you would have complicated feelings.” She was looking at me. “Whatever else your parents are responsible for, they're still your parents. And right now they're sick. We need to do something about that. We need to help them. And the best way to do that is this plan you've got. I mean, maybe it's not really the best plan, but I don't exactly have anything better. Every instinct I have is saying to take it to the authorities, but I'm not that naïve. I mean, I like the law, but I know it can be compromised in the best of situations, let alone something like this. So yeah, I understand why you'd have mixed emotions, and why we can’t just tell the authorities.
“So, that's a lot to get into. But if you think this Ministry is the best choice for how to get this information to the right people, then I guess I trust your judgment. You're right, they’ve gotta want things to go back to normal so they can keep making money. This is bad business for them. Not to mention it's a distraction from helping their leaders. But… do you really think they’ll be able to do anything if your parents are out of commission?”
“They’ll have capable people to take over for them,” I replied, trying to keep the hitch out of my voice at the thought of what would happen if that was a permanent take-over. “They'll know how to tell everyone and spread the news to the right people in a way that will actually help.”
Everyone else agreed, so I made the call. But I didn't just tell the person who answered the phone everything. I told him, some unknown guy, who I was (the Paintball part, not the Cassidy part) and that Robert Parson had given me the number. I told him I had vital information about Pencil that they needed to know, but that I needed to give it to someone in person. He, in turn, promised to get back to me with a place to meet, before disconnecting.
So, we were waiting for that. In the meantime, we had to get this machine back to the shop so Wren could look it over thoroughly and make sure it was ready to grab Pittman. Then we could worry about getting the cure out of him, one way or another.
It really was nice to be back in the city, no matter what the circumstances were. Especially since Rubi’s whole situation had been at least somewhat addressed, and Qwerty had gotten over his initial nervousness. The little guy kept bouncing from one person's head or shoulder to another, asking questions and pointing out everything he saw even as we loaded the machine into the van that Fred had brought. To say nothing of how many questions he had on the drive back to the shop. It was the middle of the night and dark, but he still pointed out dozens of things and places he wanted to check out. It was kind of adorable. And I was right about him fitting in. He even managed to distract Peyton a little bit from worrying about her mother. And, I was pretty sure, distracted Rubi as well.
Yeah, if so much hadn’t already been going on, I still would’ve been reeling from that whole thing. She knew who I was, she came with her own power and the secret to actually hurting Pencil, and… yeah. It was a lot. Somehow, the fact that it came on top of everything else actually made it easier for me to just roll with it. This was just another thing to add onto the pile. I would figure out how to deal with it later. And, I was pretty sure she wasn’t done asking questions either. We were all just trying to roll with this as best as we could.
Finally, we made it back to the building and began packing the machine up into Wren’s workspace. Once it was all in place and she was going over it with a fine-toothed comb, I found myself up on the roof, pointing out various parts of the neighborhood to Qwerty as our new little friend sat on top of my head. Peyton was up here too, while Murphy and Roald had a little private time with Rubi, and Paige and Sierra worked with Wren to see how long it would take to get things ready.
“This place is even bigger than you said!” Qwerty enthused, bouncing about a bit on my head. “I wanna see all of it!”
“You will,” I promised. “We’ll take you to see everything, anywhere you want to go, as soon as we get a chance. First we just have to get through this.”
As I said that, my gaze moved to Peyton. She was standing by the edge of the roof, arms folded as she stared off into the darkness. She seemed to sense me looking, and turned her gaze to meet mine. After a moment, she spoke, voice soft. “We have to save them, Cass. My mom… your parents… all those people. We can’t let them--we can’t lose them. I… I can’t lose her.”
Qwerty jumped off my shoulder and went to stand on the edge of the roof himself while I stepped that way, taking the girl’s hand. “We’ll save them, Peyton. We’ll get the cure out of Pittman and make sure the Scions don’t kill anyone else. We know how to hurt Pencil now, and we’ll make sure the right people know too. They’re all gonna be okay.” I managed to say all of that without letting my voice crack or my own fear show. Now if only I felt as confident as I sounded. There were so many people in danger right now. Bobby, my parents, Peyton’s mom, Paige’s (and sort of Sierra’s) adopted sister, not to mention all those innocent people. Even Rubi, Murphy, and Roald were in danger if the Scions identified the girl who had hurt their leader. Was it even remotely possible that we could get through all of this and not lose any of them?
The truth was, there were so many ways this could end badly. It was like we were walking on a tightrope between two skyscrapers, with potential tragedy looming right below our feet.
And the wind was picking up.