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Rating:
Mature
Archive Warnings:
Graphic Depictions Of ViolenceMajor Character Death
Category:
Multi
Fandoms:
Parahumans Series - Wildbow呪術廻戦 | Jujutsu Kaisen (Manga)
Characters:
Gojo SatoruTaylor Hebert | Skitter | WeaverVictoria Dallon | Glory Girl | AntaresAmy Dallon | Panacea | Red QueenBrockton Bay WardsHannah | Hana | Miss MilitiaColin Wallis | Armsmaster | DefiantEmily PiggotSukuna | Ryoumen SukunaEmma Barnes (Parahumans)Kenjaku | Fake Getou Suguru
Additional Tags:
CrossoverCrossovers & Fandom FusionsFix-ItAlternate Universe - Canon DivergenceReincarnationSoul BondAlt-Power Taylor HebertWard Taylor Hebert | Skitter | WeaverHero Taylor Hebert | Skitter | WeaverGojo Satoru is a Little ShitGojo Satoru Being Gojo SatoruSmug Gojo SatoruSix Eyes (Jujutsu Kaisen)Overpowered Taylor Hebert | Skitter | WeaverGojo and Taylor are OneSlow Burn
Language:
English
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Published:2025-12-06Updated:2026-05-30Words:60,746Chapters:5/?Comments:715Kudos:1,617Bookmarks:672Hits:48,422
The Strongest
TheSmilingFox
Chapter 5: Money & Twilight Blues
Chapter Text
1/The Strongest, Again
Money & Twilight Blues
The Director's office… I was largely expecting the obvious before entering. Something gilded, maybe, with portraits of stern men shaking hands with slightly less stern men, or perhaps a globe that opened to reveal a secret whiskey decanter.
Reality was more sobering.
The Director's desk was the same soulless, ergonomic crap you'd find in a salaryman's cubicle. The walls were the color of a depressed cloud and utterly lacking in vanity. At the far end of the room, there was a battalion of steel cabinets humping against each other, drawers swollen and filled to bursting with what I assumed were documents. My Eyes inventoried a grand total of twelve thousand, seven hundred and seventy-seven individual sheets of paper.
On another side of the room, there was a pair of bookshelves, which was a surprise, honestly. I'd pegged these guys as the type to burn books for warmth. There was common law, geography, psychology. A few names of the usual dead white guys, too… Cicero, Freud, Nietzsche, the works. Then, my Eyes snagged on the local curiosities, the titles that my other half did not recognize.
'Parahuman Physiology: Deviations from Baseline Human Function'. 'Vectors of Expression, or Why Powers Manifest the Way They Do'. 'The Economics of Endbringer Recovery'.
I licked the pudding off the corner of my spoon before it could drip as I skimmed through the books. An instant later, I focused on the woman sitting across from me.
Director Piggot was eyeing me like I was a stain on her floor. Her hands were clasped on top of her desk, back ramrod straight. Her lips were a thin, bloodless line. And her eyes, the exact same shade of institutional silver as the rest of the room, were set on me with something between disgust and caution.
The Six Eyes glanced downwards.
I caught the topography of scar tissue on her body, pale seams tucked beneath the tailored fabric. I noted the empty space where two healthy kidneys should've been filtering blood. Her left leg took more weight than the right, compensating for muscle that wasn't there anymore. And above it all, I heard the faint hitch in her breathing, virtually hidden for anyone who wasn't paying attention.
I blinked and slouched deeper into my chair, the bag of pudding cups crinkling in my lap like a plastic symphony. I scooped another glob and ate, loudly, mouth open. Gross, wet sounds echoed in the silence.
Piggot's eyebrow twitched.
I fought the urge to smile, swallowed, and returned her stare from behind my sunglasses.
"Miss Hebert," she began, her voice flat. "My name is Emily Piggot. I'm Director of the PRT, East-North-East branch. I oversee all parahuman matters in the city, including those regarding law enforcement, social unrest, and the Wards."
Silence.
She kept staring at me. I stared back, then stabbed my spoon into my pudding cup like I was planting a flag on the moon. I gave her a lazy, two-fingered salute.
"Wazzzuuuuuuup…" I drawled. "...Emmy."
Another twitch on her face. Magnitude two-point-zero on the Piggot Scale.
"...Normally, I'd say I'm pleased to meet you," she continued. "Truthfully, I'm rarely, if ever, pleased to meet your kind. Today I don't feel particularly motivated to pretend."
I sorted, nearly inhaling the pudding.
"Your kind," I echoed. "Oh, boy, here we GO, haha! The 'You People' speech! Get the bingo cards out, ladies and gents! Wait, wait, I've always wanted to say this… what d'you mean, you people?"
Director Piggot lifted her chin a fraction. It was the closest thing to a smile she could probably manage without her face cracking.
"Several tens of thousands of dollars in damages," she commented. "On your first day no less. You're not even a Ward yet, and the average recruit waits at least a month before deciding state property should bear the brunt of their traumas. You're ahead of schedule, Miss Hebert."
I scooped another bite as I listened, nodding slowly.
"Under normal circumstances, I'd have Battery face severe sanctions for failing to reign in an underage parahuman," the director explained. "But all testimonies agree: she warned you not to lose control. So, I can only assume two things. Either you didn't have as much control as your flippancy suggested…"
A faint, labored hiss emerged in the pause between a word and another. The worn-out piston in her chest hitched a second.
"...Or you chose not to exercise control," she finished. "Only one of those options ends with paperwork."
She leaned back on her chair, curiosity replacing some of the cold. I smiled wider, letting the pudding sit on my tongue for a moment before speaking.
"I prefer the electric chair," I said. "I want funky hairs for my funeral, and also an open casket. Gotta make a statement here."
For the briefest, most terrifying moment, a sound escaped her. It might have been a death rattle. It might have been a chuckle. She coughed into her fist and shook her head.
"That would be exaggerated," she replied. "But let's not get ahead of ourselves."
She bent down and retrieved a manila envelope. My envelope. The one I'd lovingly crafted. She opened it, pulled out the sheets, and gave them a long look.
"I see you've procured new eyewear," Piggot noted, not looking up. "Were things 'too shiny' for you, Miss Hebert?"
I smirked, adjusting the dark lenses on my nose. "See, there's this old British band I dig, and there was this dude named John, and he was just rocking them sunglasses, so I figured…"
"Don't answer then."
She read my papers for about a minute. Then she sighed.
"Your paperwork is odd, Miss Hebert," she commented.
"Odd how, boss ma'am, sir?"
Her steel-silver eyes flickered up. "Sorry. Did I say odd? I meant disastrous."
I gasped and put a hand on my chest.
"What in tarnation!" I said. "That ain't possible! I spent hours on those! What did I mess up?"
Her eye twitched yet again, a full tremor now.
"Everything," Piggot said, fixing her hair with a stiff hand. "Every single field. Every single line. There is not a corner of these forms untouched by your utter contempt for the process. If you were a PRT agent, I would fire you, rehire you, and then fire you again for good measure."
"I think you're being unfair, boss ma'am…" I said in my best mock-whimper.
"You used crayons to fill out government forms."
I pursed my lips, trying my hardest not to smile. Seeing that I was immune to shame, she pressed on.
"Aside from that, the first disaster I noticed… is your name."
She gave me a look that could freeze nitrogen.
"You wrote your name," she intoned flatly, "in Japanese."
I giggled and scratched my cheek like a flustered schoolgirl.
"Tte ka, bairingaru da shi, chotto doyatte mitakatta dake na n da yo ne~" I mean, I'm bilingual and I just wanted to show off a little, y'know?
"Watakushi mo Nihongo o hanashimasu ga," she replied. "Kore wa shinjirarenai hodo oroka da to kangaemasu." I also speak Japanese. I find this unbelievably stupid.
I choked. Pudding went down the wrong pipe.
"Director!" I coughed out, grinning. "You like anime? You secretly love Japan? DO YOU HAVE A BODY PILLOW OF ALEXANDRIA?!"
"I do enjoy anime," she went on, utterly unbothered. "That is not why I learned. Some believe knowing the language of an enemy makes it easier to understand them. I also happen to know German, but it has not helped me flush out the neo-Nazis in my city. And speaking English isn't helping me comprehend what is currently misfiring inside that skull of yours."
Her eyes roved over the next page.
"Age… forty-four," she said with a sigh. "A forty-four year old Ward. Obviously."
I giggled. "Stress is terrible for ya. Don't you see my white hairs?"
Another page.
"Place of birth. You wrote 'opitl'."
"That's, heh, French."
"In blood type, you wrote 'Z'," she said, almost accusing.
"Cool Kidz blood type," I replied, giving her a thumbs up. "It's universal donor for vibes."
"And in the section where you were supposed to write an approximate description of your power, for reference…"
Her eyes lifted to me. She turned the paper around, holding it up like a piece of evidence.
"...You drew a cake with infinity-shaped birthday candles."
I shrugged, smiling at her.
"It's very self-explanatory, ma'am," I said. "It's the Infinity Cake! I have the power to make an infinite number of cakes appear. I kill my enemies by giving them type two diabetes. I mean, yeah, they gotta eat it first. I'm still kinking out the details on this one. But you can't deny it's a pretty sweet power~"
Her eyes narrowed to slits. She set the papers down. Her fingers laced together on the desk again, knuckles whitening just enough to notice.
"Let's cut the crap," she said. "I'm of the opinion you're mentally unwell. You're also lucid enough to know exactly what you're doing. That combination makes you significantly more unpredictable, and thus more of a liability, than your average teenage meltdown. I think stricter measures are in order."
Director Piggot pointed a finger at me.
"You're looking at a trip to a parahuman containment center."
I tilted my head, spoon hovering. A smile tugged at my lips. It was a good bluff, I would give her that, but there was no way anyone would buy this. At least not anyone who wasn't fifteen years old and cracked under pressure easily.
Two could play this game.
"Now, now," I said, letting the pudding wobble on the spoon. "Isn't that like sending a girl to Guantanamo for breaking a few windows? Bit... excessive, dontcha think?"
"Not at all." The Director closed her eyes. "It would not take much convincing for a judge to order your detention. As a civil servant, I don't have to wait for you to turn your powers on the public. Besides…" She gestured at me vaguely. "...This is the second time you've caused panic unprovoked."
I hummed, nodding along as I slid the spoon inside my mouth.
"It'sh kinda curioush," I replied before swallowing. "So, lemme see if I understand… you're telling me a judge can order the arrest of a girl who, by the way, just woke up from a bullying-induced coma… but he ain't gonna take my word when I say Sophia Hess needs to be put in a straitjacket? Paperwork just seems to fly when it's me!"
I chuckled.
"Some lame justice system we've got going on in this country. Hey. Psst." I leaned forward conspiratorially. "I'm the v-i-c-t-i-m. So far you've all been treating me like I'm the antichrist or some such. Where's the presumption of innocence? I know my rights, officer!"
I slapped the desk for effect. Piggot only tilted her head.
"Sophia Hess hasn't left a trail of distress and destruction wherever she's gone."
Her pulse jumped, just a momentary spike. I kept smiling at her.
"You, on the other hand," she continued, "have consistently played adults for fools and then used abilities when specifically told not to. This isn't about justice. This is about making sure you don't cause a catastrophe."
I let the silence go on for longer. The Six Eyes glanced at her, almost on their own, like searching for the exact organ in Piggot's body that gave her the capacity to talk so much dumb crap with a straight face. They just found a slight, very slight sheen of sweat on her palms and some micro-tension in her jaw.
"...You do know this bad-cop blabber doesn't work on me, right?" I said.
"It's not blabber. It's security."
"And you're willing to put a girl in freakin' jail for the sake of your nebulous security," I pressed on. "That's just how it is, yeah?"
Piggot gave a single, cutting bob of her chin. "That's how it is."
I let another beat of silence stretch. Ate more pudding. The sound of my chewing filled the room like a wet, defiant metronome.
"Are we sure this has nothing to do with the fact Sophia's a Ward and you don't wanna rat her out?"
Her heartbeat kicked again, faster this time, before she wrestled it steady.
"That's a ridiculous accusation," she replied smoothly. "And I suspect the next step in your journey of delusions."
I laughed and pointed my plastic spoon at her like a tiny, pudding-smeared sword.
"Man, you're just a mean woman, Director!" I giggled. "Helloooooo~! I can see through walls! I could see beneath Shadow Stalker's mask the second she walked in! And if you want further proof..."
I gestured at her with my chin.
"I can also see you're two kidneys short. And I know M&M and Armsie gave you the juicy dossier on my funky Eyes. I know you know I know. So let's, as you put it... cut the crap. This is getting real boring."
I kicked both feet up onto Piggot's pristine desk, crossed them at the ankle, and scooped up another spoonful.
"Get your feet off my desk, Miss Hebert."
"One thing's bugging me," I continued, utterly ignoring her. "The timing. Did you plan for Sophia to waltz in right when I arrived? Give me a nice nervous breakdown so you'd have cause to cuff me? Real chess master move, if that were the case. Very Machiavelli. It'd have worked if I weren't, y'know… awesome."
Director Piggot stared at me for a good ten seconds. A weary sigh escaped her mouth.
"Shadow Stalker's arrival was an unfortunate combination of events," she admitted. "I made a mistake in giving you free rein to come in whenever you wanted, and she decided to respond to my summons on schedule for the first time in her life. I'd like to say this occurred due to an alignment of planets, or maybe because Mercury was in retrograde, but it simply was an oversight on my part."
I snorted. "I figured. What's up, Director? Not getting enough sleep? Didn't peg you for the sloppy type."
She looked away, toward the steel cabinets stuffed with twelve thousand sheets of bad news. "The neo-Nazi bit I mentioned was not for laughs. Empire Eighty-Eight has been a thorn in my side lately. On top of their usual gang warfare, they've stirred up the human side of the city with recent... incidents. It's not easy to coordinate crackdowns when I also have to manage public outrage when I also have to manage teenage drama."
"Incidents?" Anything I can help with?" I lifted my open hand. Above my palm, a faint distortion shimmered into being. Blue let out a low, hungry hum, pulling at the edges of the air like a gentle vacuum. "I'm good at… making problems disappear."
Piggot's gaze locked onto the distortion. Her pulse spiked. Thump-thump-thump-thump. She was looking at Blue like it was a live grenade with the pin half-pulled.
"You are not to use your powers in my office ever again," she ordered. "And no. You cannot help. Not with that childish attitude of yours."
She gestured sharply at Blue.
"That right there is the reason you are more trouble than you're worth, Miss Hebert. You seem to think this is all a game you can win by brandishing primary colors at people. A person, a child like that can't be expected to solve anything."
My eyebrows went up. Primary colors.
She… could see my jujutsu?
I let the Six Eyes pierce through her at full throttle. I tried to find that, whatever allowed her to see my cursed technique directly. Even if the spatial distortion affected the real world, nobody who was not a sorcerer could see jujutsu just like that, with their eyes, let alone a person with no cursed energy. Blue's color should've remained hidden. Apparently, it wasn't.
Had the others seen, too? Piggot didn't seem to have powers. Was it something the people in this world had in common? Or had my Limitless become fully visible at some point?
…I found no cursed energy in her body, still. I checked once, twice, and by the tenth time it was clear I would not find anything strange. I shelved the thought somewhere in my mind and went on.
"But it's Blue!" I beamed. "It's the color of the skyyyyyy~"
"...I rest my case," she responded.
Piggot sighed again. She gave me an expression that was caught somewhere between a smile and a grimace.
"Never mind Shadow Stalker's identity," she went on. "Your unseriousness is an even bigger issue. If it becomes necessary and you refuse to cooperate, I will have you detained."
"On the contrary, Miss P." I swiped my hand, snuffing Blue out of existence like a soap bubble. "Sophia's very relevant to our discussion."
I smiled at her, stretching my legs on her desk.
"I'm sure a jury would just eat up my sob story, y'know?" I explained. "Bullied for a year, shoved into a war crime of a locker, systematically left to fend for myself… and there comes the big bad PRT, protecting my bully, because she's one of their own Wards. Some may ostensibly call this an appalling lack of accountability, but I like to call it 'being a huge sack of shit'."
I pushed up my sunglasses so that they covered my Eyes better. Piggot was a slightly less bright, slightly more damaged collection of atomic signatures in my vision. I tried to focus on her expression.
"We don't even have to wait for the trial, though! I can go to the press and sell 'em my tragedy. How many more headaches do you think you can handle when the city's up in arms already? The public loves a good drama. They love protecting the little guy. Now, I'm neither a guy nor little… but I can cry on command and, in a courtroom, that's one hell of an advantage."
Across from me, Piggot didn't even flinch. She adjusted herself in her seat. Whether it was respect or caution flickering behind those steel-grey irises, I couldn't say. Her heartbeat stayed mostly steady, a low, stubborn thud that spoke of old discipline rather than calm.
"Cute," she said at last. "Annoying, but cute. Life, unfortunately for you, isn't a TV show, Miss Hebert."
I tipped my head. I twirled my plastic spoon between my fingers.
"Tell that to Truman."
I licked my lips as I angled my body towards her.
"C'mon. Do you honestly expect me to believe journos ain't ten times more irritating than me? Do you really wanna make this an even bigger problem?"
"You can stop now." Piggot's voice went a bit flatter. "This is… pathetic."
I glanced at her over the rim of my shades, savoring the last artificial-vanilla note of my pudding lingering on my tongue. My Eyes narrowed at her.
"You seem to be under the impression I care only about reputation," she said, settling deeper in her chair. "I do not. I can't, in good conscience, allow an element such as yourself to roam unchecked in my city after what you've done, after seeing what you could do. And beyond that…" Her eyes narrowed back at me. "...The identities of every parahuman hero are in jeopardy, thanks to your sensory abilities. I have reason to fear a widespread breach of personal information. That's much more severe. That's grounds for containment, never mind your theoretical victimhood."
More bureaucratic cotton-candy. I was curious whether she'd trot out the usual speech about the greater good, the duty, the delicate ecosystem of rules and obedience. I was prepared for those. I'd grown tired of listening to those. Instead…
"You clearly have no interest in cooperating," Piggot concluded. "This leaves me with limited options. Although I suspect your father will prove far more understanding, once I've explained the gravity of his daughter's mental stability and the danger of her pow—"
"Shut up."
The words cut the air before I even knew they were mine. I actually glanced around the room, senses flaring, scanning for a hidden speaker, someone who'd finally lost patience with Piggot's slow-roasted bullshit. The Six Eyes gave me nothing but cold fact: a dozen agents in the hall, a few heroes on standby, Armsmaster and Miss Militia among them, and the omnipresent hum of the lights.
No hidden third party. Just her. Just me. Us.
I felt my jaw lock, the muscles along my temples twitching. My hand had balled into a fist on my thigh, knuckles rhythmically clenching and unclenching with just a whisper of cursed energy, enough to crunch my chair into nothing if I fed Limitless with it. I forced it still.
Of course.
This was… another principal's office. Another adult with pursed lips, telling me to be reasonable. Explaining that my pain wasn't as important as their convenience. And in the end, when it was clear I would not budge and they would not take me seriously, only then they'd pull out their ace.
'We'll call your father. He'll understand. He'll be more mature.'
As if handing him my pain would make it hurt less.
I'd been here before, in a different time, with different people.
The curse attached to Yuta Okkotsu is far too dangerous. Already it is clear that its cursed energy dwarves yours, Satoru. If that curse were to get out of control, if that boy ever learns jujutsu… who is to say he will not use it to destroy society and you along with it? You should have done away with him immediately.
Sukuna's vessel must be destroyed, Satoru. The King of Curses won't be as cooperative as the boy if he ever finds a way out. There has not been a greater danger than this in a thousand years. For once in your foolish life, see the wisdom of the past, see the pain of those who have had to die to prop you up where you stand… and purge this evil from the face of the earth.
Eliminate this. Remove that. Preempt the disaster.
Shut up about the bullying. Stop complaining about some silly pranks. Grow the fuck up, Taylor.
Behave, because one's suffering clunks the system. Exorcise, because that's what you're made for.
I breathed through my nose. The office snapped back into focus. I set my Eyes on Piggot, slowly.
"...You government types," I started, "have a really irritating habit of invoking my dad's name whenever you want something from me. This's the third time now. You're like a broken record."
I set my spoon into the empty pudding cup with a final, decisive click. Placed the cup on her desk. I turned towards her fully.
"I'll make it real simple for ya. So listen well."
I pinched the temples of my sunglasses between two fingers, slid them off, and set them on her desk beside the pudding cup. When I looked at her again, it was with my bare Eyes.
"If you do anything to my dad, or plan to do anything to my dad just to get to me…" I held her gaze. "...You're dead."
Piggot's eyes widened a fraction of a millimeter. Her pulse ticked up, not racing, but no longer steady. She opened her mouth.
"An imaginative threat, coming from a—"
A terrible shriek of metal cut off Piggot's words. Her head immediately turned to the source of the sound, and she saw several of her cabinets quickly collapse into themselves like crumpling paper. I unclenched my hand, releasing Blue in the process, and rested my cheek on my palm. The deformed cabinets—what remained of them—bumped against the wall.
"I wasn't finished."
Her eyes returned to me. She raised an eyebrow.
"My dad isn't leverage," I said. "He's not a soft underbelly you can poke at and expect me to flinch. He's the line."
I leaned forward a little.
"You get any funny ideas, and you're dead," I explained. "And trust me, I will know if you get any funny ideas. I see everything, remember? Every little twitch. Every weird little blink. Every lie you tell yourself before you dress it up in policy and sell it to me as justice. For example…"
I leaned back a bit. I quickly raised a hand at Piggot, smiling, then slid that hand just beneath the edge of her desk at my side. My index and thumb caught something. I pulled it out and up.
It looked like a black marble of sorts. I wagged it at her with a knowing smile and she grimaced. Then, I massaged my throat, brought the marble closer to my mouth, and…
"SUPERCALIFRAGILISTICEXPIALIDOCIOUS!"
Armsmaster doubled over outside Piggot's office as his helmet fed him what I imagined was unbearable static along with my voice. I waited until he recovered to speak into the small gadget.
"Kick back and relax, Tin Can. The adults are talking," I whispered before throwing the marble onto the desk. I pointed at Piggot. "Now you can speak."
Piggot leaned back, slowly unlinking her hands. They disappeared beneath the desk, resting on her thighs.
"Forgive me if I don't react to your… gravitas appropriately," she said evenly. "I've had my fair share of teens threaten my life already. It gets old fast."
I stared at her, unblinking, for a good ten seconds.
"Director."
"What?"
I raised my hand and waved it at her.
"I'll fold you, your cute little building and every hero inside into something you could hold in your hands," I explained. "All of it. And then, I'll dunk this proverbial object you could hold in your hands into the Mariana Trench, deep enough no one ever finds it. I'd still make it home before dinner, and there isn't a single damn thing you can do about it."
I let my hand fall onto her desk. I tapped it with my fingers in a rhythm.
"That ain't no threat," I added. "That's a schedule. You've seen what happens when I don't try… so let's not pretend this is just hypothetical."
I retracted my hand and shook it so that my black sleeve covered it better. Then I crossed my legs, one over the other.
"Poke my mind aaaalllllll you like. Touch my heart, though…" I smiled. "...You don't get to live and tell."
I tracked Piggot's weight shifting in her chair, the quiet gulp that bobbed the tight muscles of her throat. Her pulse had settled into something approximating steady, but the sweat on her palms told a different story.
"A disproportionate reaction, I'd say. I simply asked for cooperation and explained the risks," she replied. "Put yourself in my shoes for a second, Miss Hebert. Would you—"
"Hands off the panic button."
Her hand froze beneath the desk, an inch shy of the small, discreet switch nestled against the underside. I watched her retract it slowly.
"Ya were sayin'?" I propped my chin on my fist.
Piggot exhaled a short, irritated puff. "Would you allow someone like yourself to do whatever she wants? It's my responsibility to ensure safety. Even if that means making decisions you dislike."
I rolled my Eyes, picked up my spoon again, and pointed it at her.
"See, that argument would be fine 'n' all if you weren't lying to my face and plotting behind my back," I rebutted. "You knew Sophia was a Ward. Why didn't you tell me from the jump? I wouldn't have gotten mad, then. No, you dickheads set the board, moved the pieces, and waited for me to trip. Doesn't paint a good image of y'all, does it? Have you tried, I dunno, listening to me for a change? Fulfilling my demands? Negotiation, wild concept!"
She blinked.
"...The government is not providing you with a yacht," Piggot declared flatly.
I snorted. "Hah! Guess I'll kill you, then… just kidding! I don't care about the yacht. Or the vacation trips. I want the money. The amount I asked, obviously."
She shook her head. "Ten thousand dollars is far too much for a government parahuman, especially a child. Only the Triumvirate gets that much individually."
"I don't care what you or the government thinks is too much." I took my sunglasses from her desk and slid them back on, the world dimming to a comfortable, muted shade. I retrieved a fresh pudding cup and cracked it open with a pop. "You want me to follow the rules? Pay up. You do that, and I'll be a good girl."
Piggot opened her arms wide, a bewildered expression on her face.
"And… that's it." She arched an eyebrow again. "I pay you this sum and you magically stop defying authority. It's just that easy."
"Yeppity-yes." I scooped up a generous wobble of pudding and shoved it past my lips, letting the silence hang for a beat. Then I swallowed and tilted my head. "The dockworkers are doomed, y'know?"
Confusion flickered across her face, a brief, unguarded twitch before the mask reasserted itself. She said nothing, so I pressed on.
"No one's hiring them. Not unless a hurricane drops by and wrecks the skyline. Everything's outsourced and automated and imported. Now, this might not be an issue if you PRT fucks did your jobs and stopped villains from scaring off investors. No investors, no construction projects, no jobs. The Docks stay a Yakuza-infested shithole. The city remains a neo-Nazi sanctuary. Normal people stay jobless and scared."
I licked my spoon clean, setting my Eyes on her.
"My dad's fighting for those dockworkers," I continued. "His cortisol levels have been through the roof. His body's pumping adrenaline and norepinephrine like a lighthouse on drugs just to get him through the day. Glutamate chews through his neurotransmitters every time he looks at unpaid bills. Then there's the strained cardiovascular system, the overactivation of the amygdala, the reduced efficiency of the prefrontal cortex, the shot immune system, the headaches, the insomnia, the broken appetite…"
I let the clinical litany hang, took a breath. My voice dropped a degree.
"...I'm watching my dad die in slow-mo, in granular detail, because someone, whose name I ain't gonna mention… cough the PRT cough… sucks ass at fighting crime."
The accusation settled between us for a moment. I smiled at the director, tilting my head to the side.
"I want Dad to smile. You want the good people of BB to be safe," I said. "Pay my dad's bills… and I'll give you a city worth living in. I'm kinda strong."
Piggot's eyes closed. Her fingers linked and unlinked in a slow, contemplative rhythm, before she cupped her chin, thinking. She set both hands flat on her desk after another minute.
"Five thousand dollars per month," she offered. "That's five times the allowance of any other Ward in the United States."
I smirked. "...I ain't gotta take a subpar offer."
"And I can't have some precocious little shit extorting taxpayer money off of me," she shot back swiftly. "Five thousand. It should be more than enough to cover family expenses. I'll even set up an official bank account in your name so everything is transparent. All Wards have one."
"Suuuuure," I drawled. "Definitely not because you wanna track how my money moves."
"Call it whatever you want, Miss Hebert." She extended her hand across the desk, palm open. "Do we have a deal?"
I stared at her hand. The Six Eyes catalogued the faint tremor of her pulse in the radial artery, the calluses on her palm that pointed to years of gun training. I reached out and shook it firmly, pale fingers wrapping around her fair skin. I looked at her through the dark lenses.
"Yeah, why not?" I said. "I also want Sophia out. I'll play ball and pretend she doesn't make me gag, but I want her out and outed. That's the deal-breaker. And get her a therapist, for heaven's sake. Girl's got some issues."
Piggot held my hand. "The machine takes its time. However, I'll find a way to remove her. I'll also instruct her not to bother you while she remains with the Wards. She's proven far more troublesome than you, somehow."
"Sweet!" I chirped. "And I also wanna go to Arcadia."
"...Do you want a diamond too? Perhaps an apartment in Dubai?" Piggot responded with a frown. "Or would Snow White feel satisfied with a humble little Lamborghini?"
"Heh. Sarcasm fits ya well, Director." I shrugged. "Winslow's too toxic for me. Gets me all twitchy."
The handshake lasted for a few more seconds. Piggot's fingers clenched slightly around my palm.
"Fine. Arcadia it is," she complied. "But. You will go through regular medical checkups and meet with a therapist twice per week."
I groaned. "Lameeeeeeee."
"No sass," Piggot ordered. "Prove to me you're not a conniving sociopath mutant and I'll let you do backflips in the mayor's backyard. And for the love of God, stop using your goddamn powers in public. If you need help, call 911, call the adult heroes. That's what they're there for. And do not, under any circumstance, engage villains alone. Until you get a costume and a green light from the experts, I don't want you anywhere near parahuman incidents. Are. We. Clear?"
I weighed her terms for about a second before I nodded.
"Okay, okay. Will do," I lied. "Hey… you're actually pretty cool when you're not being a total bitch!"
"Duly noted, Miss Hebert."
Our hands unclasped. I pursed my lips, curiosity prickling.
"Sooo… what changed your mind?" I asked.
This time, it took her longer to answer. The corner of her mouth curved almost painfully.
"You're too dangerous to fight and too sharp to scare at the moment," she replied. "And I suppose… I can understand the angle of a daughter who just wants her father to be okay. It's certainly more reasonable than a yacht."
I plopped back into my seat, pudding cup in hand, a satisfied smile curling my lips. I glanced down at it, then up at her.
"Heeeey, Director…" I waggled the cup. "Want some pudding? I've got plenty for two. It's artificial-vanilla-flavored chemical goop, but it's the good goop."
"I don't eat sugar."
I giggled and scooped another bite, letting it vanish between my lips with an exaggerated mmmm. "Sucks to be you, I guess~"
Piggot rested her elbow on the desk. Then her cheek sank onto her palm, her grey eyes sliding over to me with an expression I couldn't quite categorize. The Six Eyes noted the steady insulin baseline, the slight wistful drop in her serotonergic activity.
"Yes," she said quietly. "Yes it sucks."
January 11, 2011
"It's unlocked!" I said, pitching my voice just loud enough from my bed to intercept the knock before it happened.
A beat of silence. I tracked Dad's form hesitating through the walls. The hinge-creak came a half-second later, along with his small, awkward chuckling.
"What's up, you?" Dad said, leaning past the threshold, already dressed for work. "You, hmm… you're a little underdressed, Taylor. It's really cold outside."
My Eyes glanced at him. I noted the molecular composition of caffeine in his breath, the slightly uneven rise of his collar, and faint iridescent ghost-fractals across the lenses of his glasses where he'd cleaned them without committing to it. Oily whorls at the periphery, a sharper smear dead center.
I blinked and shrugged, bare shoulders dragging against the mattress. I felt a minute roar of sensation before it dissipated.
"Clothes feel like sandpaper, Dad. I told ya." A pause. "Don't worry. I ain't cold. At least I'm still using underwear, yeah?"
Dad exhaled slowly. Nodded.
"Of course. I was just… never mind." He shifted his weight. "I got mail a couple minutes ago. It was an envelope addressed to you from those PRT folks. It looked shifty so I opened it to check. There was a card inside, so I called the PRT, and they said it was yours. They also said it's fully… operational, was the word. It's got funds, too, apparently."
I smiled.
"Damn, they move fast," I muttered. Then, louder, lighter, "Yeah, that's probably my exclusive Ward card or something. Can you believe them? Didn't even ask for my consent before giving me money. That's non-consensual money-giving, hehehe."
"They didn't?" he said, voice sharpening. "Well, I can always call them back and—"
"Joke, Dad. 'Tis a joke." I turned my head enough to catch his eye and winked. "I gave them a headache 'bout it yesterday. Gotta fight for your salary, eh? I learned that from you~"
I took in a breath through my nose.
"I'll pay you back for the chocolate and the sunglasses in a bit. Need to find an ATM first, though…"
He shook his head. "No. That's your money, so you keep it."
"Dad, let's not—"
"Yes, let's not," he cut in, smiling, but firmer now. "I don't want it. It's yours. As long as you don't use it for drugs, I won't say a thing."
I huffed and grinned. "Maybe the tooth fairy will leave a couple hundred bucks under your pillow tonight. Maybe she really likes yer teeth, old man. She wants to see you smile~"
He raised an eyebrow.
"Maybe I'll give that special money to my special daughter," he rebutted. "I personally like her teeth much more."
We laughed together at that. He shifted on his feet again and adjusted his shirt.
"I'm heading out," he added. "Need anything? I won't be back till late. I left money underneath Betsy, but I wanted to check."
Betsy, the cactus in the living room. She was poorly positioned for sunlight, and the Six Eyes had informed me she'd been overwatered last week. I hummed.
"Nah, I'm good. I think I'll manage," I replied. "Go do the adulting thing. I've got enough chocolate to survive a couple more hours."
He lingered for about four seconds before smiling, nodding one last time. The door closed gently, the click echoing in my room along with his voice.
"I love you," he whispered.
"Love ya too, Dad," I whispered back.
His footsteps receded. Front door, hinges, engine… silence.
I rolled onto my back, then over again, aligning myself with the nightstand. My Eyes locked onto the digital clock.
8:15 AM.
Grey light seeped into my room through the window, diffused into something dull and noncommittal. It was the exact luminance I expected from an overcast January morning.
I let my Eyes scan the house one last time before letting my body sink deeper into the mattress. The tension in my body bled out in increments.
My mind worked.
"I wonder if the kids beat Sukuna…" I mumbled.
A smile tugged at my mouth.
"...Bah. 'Course they did. I left that asshole at one HP."
It was the logical conclusion. Even with his oceanic amounts of cursed energy and his Shrine, there was no way he could win with so much accumulated damage. He didn't have a domain anymore. The idea was for me to win outright, but if the kids jumped him all at once, not even the King of Curses would survive. The mental image was pretty funny, though: the big scary demon king, brain-damaged and getting pulped by a bunch of teenagers.
"I do wonder who got the killing blow."
Yuta was the strongest sorcerer after me so he had the highest chances. But Yuji was familiar with Sukuna in a way nobody else was, not to mention a pretty sturdy bastard. Him winning was a low possibility… but not zero.
Or maybe it was a team effort. We had the lawyer guy, the lightning guy. If strategy didn't work then overkill surely would. Domain spam the motherfucker until there was nothing left to hit. In the chaos, someone would eventually land the coup-de-grace.
Still, I wondered… had any of them died?
Did they manage to save Megumi?
…I cut that line of thought. I had no way of knowing, and inventing a scenario wouldn't make me feel better. Whatever the case, whatever happened, the outcome would always be the same. I trained them all for that moment.
"They won," I said softly. "That's all that matters."
"Taylor! I'm home!"
My Eyes snapped open.
"...That was pretty fast." I sat up slowly, the mattress creaking slightly. "Hey, Dad! Did ya forget something or…"
My gaze landed on the window.
Darkness. The sky was a deep bruise, no grey remainder. My breath stopped for a quarter of a second before I craned my neck to look at the digital clock.
7:47 PM.
Twelve hours, unaccounted for.
I bit my lip.
"...Goddammit."
January 12, 2011
"Are you sure you're not cold, baby?"
I bit into my buttered toast and looked up at Dad.
Dad stared at me from over his mug. Steam carried a bitter-coffee particulate cloud I could map by density. His grip on the ceramic was asymmetrical, but steady.
I smiled, chewed and swallowed.
"Itsh good," I said. "Really. If the cold actually bothered me, I'd put something on."
I rolled one shoulder, letting the air hit my skin again. It felt cool, yet distant. Background noise for now.
Dad nodded slowly. His fingers tapped the table, one-two-three, one-two, a rhythm that matched the opening bars of a song he used to hum when I was small.
"You didn't seem too bothered when we went out, the day before yesterday."
"External stimulus saturation," I blurted out before clamping my mouth shut. I paused, searching for an analogy that wouldn't sound clinical. "I-I mean… It's like stubbing your toe. Hurts like hell, but something else grabs your attention and it fades. Then you step wrong and, boom, it's back. I'm micromanaging this thing."
I took a sip of my sweet, ultra-sugary coffee. Dad nodded yet again as he listened. A second later, his eyes narrowed at me, before leaning forward to stare at me.
He bent down under the table. When he straightened back up, his expression had shifted.
"You're shaking," he said.
"It's the sugar." I grinned wide. "Give it a second."
I counted. One-Mississippi, two-Mississippi. The tremors plateaued at second three, then decayed exponentially. Dad only stared as the shaking resolved itself.
"Does that always happen when you eat sugar now?" he asked. "It's not… bad, is it?"
"Nah," I said. "My body's just happy about glucose. This is how it says 'thank you'."
The real explanation was that increased processing throughput demanded proportional energy availability and my caloric overhead would also bankrupt a normal human pancreas. The Six Eyes couldn't drain me, but they scaled me, and more than a gram of sugar a day kept the machine oiled. He didn't need to know this, though.
"Relax~" I said instead, lifting my mug. "I'm just… revving. Like a bike. Means I'm working smoothly."
He nodded, the tension in his shoulders dropping by a measurable degree. Then he checked his watch—8:19 AM, I noted—and stood.
"…I think I get it. More or less," he said softly as he picked up his mug and left it by the sink. "Gotta go to work. Don't wash that. I'll take care of it once I get back."
I swallowed the last of my toast, then licked butter off my fingers. I offered him a buttery smile and winked.
"No promises. I may just get bored and do it anyway~"
He chuckled, leaned down to kiss the top of my head, and left. His pace was faster than usual. I focused on him as he started the car. There was the crunch of tires, the fading rumble… in a moment they were replaced by the hum of the refrigerator, the heartbeat of the spider in the wall.
I stayed at the table, swirling my coffee with gentle wrist-flicks, watching the liquid's spiral.
8:19 AM.
I tapped my fingers against the table. Established a rhythm.
Remember the lessons.
The thought surfaced uninvited, but not unwelcome.
I laid down the mug on the table.
'You are not the forest; the forest makes way for you.'
The first deviation of the Six Eyes. The one Satoru Gojo had to learn before he was old enough to tie his shoes. I'd inherited the pitfall and the solution along with everything else, but applying the second wasn't as easy as recognizing the first.
The Six Eyes were not just enhanced perception, or simple sensory organs in any biological sense. They were hyper-rare jujutsu that evolved in lockstep with the brain itself. A recursive, self-expanding interface grafted onto cognition itself. I struggled to function with them until I was around five in my past life.
This body had hosted them for less than a week. The integration was… incomplete. Buggy.
I hated relying on advice from people I would've gladly buried. Their lessons came wrapped in mysticism and condescension, the smug certainties of old men who'd never felt the universe press in from all sides. However, I couldn't afford to have my own Eyes mutiny. Utility outranked pride right now.
Besides, it was the perfect occasion to go back to the basics.
I closed my Eyes.
'You are not the river of kalpas; the river only ripples where you breathe.'
The second deviation of the Six Eyes - the loss of the sense of time.
This one had always been the easiest to master. Much less abstract than the first. It was the lesson that let me sit in the Prison Realm without my mind unspooling.
It involved a simple trick: give the Six Eyes a reference point they couldn't ignore. In this case, breath, the most primitive rhythm. Each had to be a distinct event. Each was proof that now was not then. If everything else collapsed into simultaneity, then I had to invent a sequence. And even if I couldn't tell one thing apart from the other thousand… I could still tell a breath apart from the next.
I breathed. In through the nose, out through the mouth… just like Dad had taught me.
"Hhh… hahhh… Hhh… Hahhh…"
See? I told the Six Eyes. Time is happening. Keep up with it.
"Hhh… Hahhh…"
I continued. Again and again, until the pattern became enmeshed.
Another breath, for good luck. Another, just because I could.
I opened my Eyes.
The world snapped back, crisp and immediate. I turned on my seat to look at the nearest window, already assembling an estimate of the hour from the angle of the shadows.
Darkness.
The sky was a deep indigo, streetlights casting yellow pools on the asphalt.
I threw my arms up.
"Oh, come on!"
January 13, 2011
"Going out today, Dad."
Dad looked up from his newspaper, mug hovering near his lips. His pulse hitched as I pulled on a white t-shirt and tightened the belt on my jeans. I left my sunglasses case on the table.
"That's… that's pretty good!" he said, his smile arriving a fraction late. "I mean, it's good you want to go out. I'm not against you being a couch potato though, hahaha."
I smiled back as I crouched to loop my shoelaces.
"...Where would you be going? Not trying to be nosy," he amended quickly. "Just to have an idea of where you are, in case of an emergency."
"Dunno. Thought I'd walk downtown. Maybe hit the Boardwalk, clear my head." I tightened the knot, tested it. "After so much sugar, I feel like saltwater's basically medicinal, heh."
I stood up, swiped the leather case from the table, and took out my sunglasses. The moment I slid them on, a lance of pain jagged across both temples, like ice picks dragging over my skin, phantom and fleeting. I shivered as the sensation subsided. Then, I strapped the case to a belt loop with a cord hanging from its side. Easy to carry, in case I needed to take the glasses off.
"Downtown. Boardwalk," he echoed. "Anywhere else?"
"Wherever the wind takes me, I guess." I grinned, patting the pocket where my wallet sat. "I'm kinda hungry and I wanna break in the new debit card. Maybe… I'll get some sauerkraut. Or maybe I'll indulge in tamagoyaki. Depends on which side of the axis I'm on today."
"Axis?" His eyebrow arched.
"History joke," I let the grin stretch. "Relaaaaax. It's a stroll. What's the worst a white girl with her debit card can do?"
Dad laughed, shoulder loosening. He stood, left his mug by the sink, and walked over. His hands settled on my shoulders.
"Not much, I suppose," he said. "Okay. I'll stop being a pain. You can go."
I pressed a quick kiss to the inside of his wrist. The skin was warm, faintly salty.
"Yer not a pain, Dad. Yer just Dad."
He hugged me tightly, gave me a ruffle of hair that I tolerated because it was him, and pulled back. He headed for the door.
"Try to be home before it gets too late," he said on his way out. "Love you, Taylor."
"Love ya too, Dad!"
I waited. The door closed. I felt his footsteps on the porch, then the car door, then the engine. I gave it an extra forty-five seconds of performance to sell the illusion I was still preparing. Once I was truly alone, I stepped outside, locked the door behind me, and lifted my head to the grey sky.
The sun hung veiled behind clouds, a fuzzy glow that the wind kept teasing apart. A few rays knifed through, cold and sharp. The air temperature hovered at a point where I should have felt chilly but didn't. The Six Eyes offered me a meteorological report: barometric pressure steady, humidity low, precipitation probability under five percent. Even if it rained, I wouldn't need a jacket. I had Infinity to keep myself dry.
I turned my head in a slow pan, scanning not the street but the weave of the neighborhood itself. The sightlines, the parked cars, the windows with curtains slightly askew…
…And there it was.
A van. It was parked on the far side of the street, half-tucked behind Miss Sherwood's overgrown hedge. On its side, 'Mendel & Sons Cleaning Service', written in a font too clean, the paint too new.
I raised an eyebrow and looked through it.
There were two men and one woman inside. Their coffee cups were going cold on a fold-out table. I saw banks of monitors, radio receivers, and a directional microphone aimed at our front door. Cables snaked to tiny lenses hidden in the grass, in the crook of a tree, in a knot of ivy near the porch light. I watched one of the men shift as his posture snapped from bored to alert in a second.
His lips moved. The vibration travelled through the van's frame, and I parsed the words from the gentle shifts in the air: "Snow White is singing at the well."
I smiled, put my hands inside my pockets, and exhaled.
PRT agents. And I guessed 'Snow White' was Piggot's new pet name for me. I did threaten her in her turf and I did also wreck her precious testing room, so getting tagged with a fairy-tale codename wasn't exactly the worst she could do. The dwarves were probably the strike team on standby.
I started walking, no particular direction at first, letting my feet carry me while my mind chewed on a harder problem.
I didn't mind them spying on me. The problem was that I hadn't noticed them until now.
So, one of two options: either they'd set up today, or they'd been tailing me ever since I left the PRT HQ and I completely missed them.
I sighed.
The Six Eyes were poorly documented, paradoxically enough. After taking headship of my clan, I'd riffled through the Gojo archives, and they contained plenty on how to handle the Eyes, but almost nothing on understanding them. They'd treated them like a divine lottery, something to breed for and bow to. My own parents weren't even in the direct line of the succession, so it was obvious the Eyes didn't just follow recessive patterns. That should have been a clue that they didn't know what the hell they were talking about.