Eventually, he decided to get out of the warmth radiating off Nadine’s body. As soon as he was up, he brought life to the dolls, Casper giving him shit almost immediately. “You think you can just deanimate us whenever you want, don’t you?”
“Not now,” he told the tiny doll.
“Not now? We need to talk about this,” she said, huffing hard enough that a strand of hair blew off her forehead. “I know you are under some stress…”
“I said, not now,” he told Casper with a growl, the tiny doll jumping back and smacking into Coma’s breast.
“What are our plans for today?” Coma asked as she moved Casper to the bench.
She stood, Celia standing as well, both smoothing their hands over their outfits. Roman’s second doll was in the superhero uniform she had originally come in, no mask on her head this time, visually at odds with Coma’s Gothic Loli dress.
“I don’t really know yet,” Roman told her. “I’m supposed to train with Ava later, but I don’t know. I don’t know if I can do anything, to be honest.”
He sat on the bench, Casper crawling up his arm. “You need to get out and get some fresh air,” she said once she was secure in his shirt pocket. “You definitely don’t want to stay in this dingy place, even if there’s a hot spy in here for you to sleep with.”
“Casper…”
“Let’s go out—let’s take them shopping, how’s that?”
“We don’t need to go shopping,” Celia said, sitting next to Roman, bringing her hand in his arm.
“You two always wear the same clothes,” Casper said. “It’s lame.”
“So do you,” Celia reminded her.
“Who is going to custom make something for a girl my size?” Casper asked.
“We have other clothing too,” Coma informed the tiny doll.
“Did someone say something about shopping?” Nadine asked, rising from the bed.
As strange as Roman probably looked with the dolls surrounding him, the smallest one jutting out of his pocket, Nadine didn’t say anything about it as she simply moved over to the dresser, slipping into a loose long-sleeve shirt.
“They want new clothing,” Roman said.
“No, Casper wants us to get new clothing,” Celia reminded him.
“I’ll figure this out in a minute,” Roman said, preparing a mental message for Ava. “Let me see if I can get out of my training first.”
Ava completely matched her superpower, the fiery Type II responding to his message almost immediately, informing Roman in her spunky way that not only was he required to attend training, now she wanted to have lunch with him too.
“Well, she definitely knows.” He stood, pinching the bridge of his nose for a moment. “Shit.”
“You mean your teacher?” Nadine asked. “What does she know?”
“She knows I quit my job. Why else would she invite me to lunch?”
“We did have a lunch break, you know, back at the office.”
“You’re so self-obsessed,” Casper said from his pocket. “It’s not all about you. Maybe she’s just hungry.”
“There was something about her tone…”
Nadine nodded, both of them familiar with a mental message having a tone to it.
“So what you going to tell her, then?” Celia asked, concern moving across her flawless face.
“I’m going to tell her the truth.”
“What part of the truth?” Nadine asked.
“All of it, from the fact that I quit my job to our little trip to the East—all of it. I’m going to tell her everything,” he said, ignoring Casper’s cruel laughter.
“No, no you’re not,” Nadine said. “I can’t have you blowing my cover.”
“I won’t tell her who you are; I’ll just tell her that…”
“You really haven’t thought this through, have you?” Nadine asked. “You’ve done things that are illegal, and Ava practically works for the Centralian government. She could theoretically turn you in, and maybe even have your power stripped from you.”
“If she wanted to have my power stripped from me, she would have done it by now,” said Roman. “Trust me. Ava is on my side, she likes me, and I like her. I don’t think she would betray me in that way.”
“He loves his teacher,” Casper assured Nadine.
“How much do you know about Ava?” Nadine asked, cocking her head to the left as she looked from Casper to Roman. “Aside from the fact that she’s your trainer, what else do you actually know about her?”
“I know her name is Ava Montague, that she is a Type II Class C, and that she has a dog named Bonbon. She’s a fan of wine, and she can do some pretty crazy things with her flame powers.”
“Give me a minute…” Nadine sat on a chair near the dresser, going for her brush. She began combing her dirty-blond hair, her eyes flickering every now and then as she fired off mental messages.
“Okay. Ava Montague, codename: Plume. She is a member of Mister Fist’s exemplar team alongside William Bottorf and a telepath named MindLenz. Her sister is on the Lottery Council, and she has received several awards recognizing her service to the Centralian government and its people. She is single, she lives in southern Centralia in a townhouse on 16th street, and she has done several tours of the Western Province.”
“Did you hear that?” Casper asked. “She’s single…”
Quiet,” Roman told her. “Wait, she’s on an exemplar team?”
“Yes—Plume, that’s her name. Ring a bell to you?”
“No, but those others do, Mister Fist and William Bottorf. I fought Mister Fist once; he’s a strongman with the power to turn into a mist. William is a duplicator whose primary weapon is the baton. Never met the telepath. Ava never said she was on a team….”
“And you still think it’s a good idea to tell an exemplar, who is part of an actual exemplar team that likely works directly with the Centralian government, all the illegal shit you’ve been doing?”
Roman sighed. “The fact that the hooded woman who has my goddamn wife attacked Prison South and was actually able to break someone out of there—the most protected prison in this country—only goes to show how powerful she is. Unless you got a better option, it is at least worth a shot. I’m going to need help, and I need to tell someone with some power what’s going on here. I can trickle information to Ava, giving her just a little bit at a time and seeing how she reacts. I don’t need to just jump in and tell her all the crazy shit I’ve done.”
“Yeah, I would save treason for your next lunch date, or the fact that we killed Centralian soldiers.”
“You guys killed Centralian soldiers? Was I there for that?”
“Maybe?” Roman told Casper.
“Or how about the fact that my government now has a sample of your blood based on the agreement you made to free me,” Nadine said, “and how they may be able to uncover how Centralia is able to grant superpowers. And that’s another thing about this. I am assuming animating inanimate objects isn’t your dormant power.”
“No, it isn’t. I believe my dormant power had to do with strength, possibly agility.”
“Exactly, so the Lottery Council didn’t unlock your dormant power; they actually gave you a brand-new power. And now my government has the ability to find out how they did that, thanks to you,” she said, her voice growing quiet. “Oh, let’s not forget the fact that you fought someone in government offices. I mean, that’s not so controversial compared to some of the other things you’ve done.”
“I did what I had to do,” Roman said, looking to Celia for support. And of course the doll nodded, giving him the support he so desired.
But Nadine wasn’t so kind.
She laughed out loud for a moment as she pulled some of the loose hairs from her brush to deposit them in the trash can. “Roman, you are seriously delusional. I like you, and I think you are a great guy, and I can never repay you for saving my life, but if you think this is going to go over well…”
“What oth
er options do I have?” Roman asked. “It’s not like you are going to be able to put together a team of exemplars to help me destroy this woman.”
“The East does have resources you don’t know about, and I’m not just talking about technology,” Nadine said sharply. “We have exemplars as well, powerful ones.”
“Who are spies in Centralia?”
She raised an eyebrow at him. “Not as many as I’d like. Oddly enough, there are less Eastern Province exemplars here than there should be. It’s part of a government policy we have, using our strongest for other…”
“Other what?”
“Other means,” Nadine said firmly. “But my point remains: you’ve already done illegal things Ava may not like to hear about. You aren’t even supposed to be using your powers, so there’s that as well. And money? I’m assuming you’ve been counterfeiting money too, considering you can falsify passport documentation.”
“You know about that?” Roman asked.
“I do now,” Nadine said, not knowing if she should laugh or feel sorry for Roman.
“Look, all of this, every part of it, has been because I do things my way, the way I see fit. And that’s crazy, I know, but I think Ava really could help. We have a connection.”
“You have a connection with a lot of people, and dolls,” Nadine reminded him. “Actually, I don’t know how many people you have connections with. Roman, I’m getting off track here; it’s a bad idea.”
“Just trust me, Nadine. I’ll tell her what’s going on as carefully as possible. I won’t immediately volunteer everything I know, and depending on how she reacts, I’ll tell her more. I’m not going to reveal who you are, and they won’t be able to get it out of me. I will kill her before I go to jail.”
“You mean that?” Nadine asked.
“No,” Roman said, not able to really put force behind what he’d just said. “But I will at least disable her so I can get to a safe place. That’s one thing I can definitely do. If I really want to do damage,” Roman said, thinking of how he had killed Hazrat, “I can do so rather rapidly.”
“It’s your life,” Nadine finally said. “Just give me fair warning.”
Chapter Twelve: Confession Compression
“You know I can tell when you’re hiding something from me, right?” Ava asked, pointing her drink at Roman. They were at a restaurant of her choosing, a low-key place that reminded him of a diner trying to look fancy.
As she’d done before, Ava had ordered for him, telling Roman they had great Northern Alliance salads here. She had also ordered his drink, which was a minty water concoction with a bit of lemon.
Strange, but good.
Coma was seated to his left, Celia to his right, and Casper deactivated in his pocket. Ava hadn’t batted an eye at Roman showing up with his dolls.
“It was a long night,” Coma said for Roman.
“They’re answering for you now?” Ava asked with a laugh. “If there is something you want to discuss, let’s discuss it now. It’s better not to keep secrets from your teacher, especially when your teacher has the strength of the Centralian government’s espionage abilities on her side. Joking, I try not to spy on you too often.”
“That’s, um, reassuring,” Roman said as a waiter brought a tray of fried pieces of bread to the table.
“For example, I know that you quit your job, which is one thing we have to talk about. I’ve explicitly told you not to go and do something like that…”
“I couldn’t take it anymore,” said Roman. “And look, I know there are worse jobs out there in Centralia, and in our world as a whole. I know there are slaves, people who work grueling hours around the clock for little pay or benefits, and I feel for those people. Truly, I do. And they are stronger than me, I will admit that. But me, personally, the Roman Martin who sits in front of you, I just couldn’t take it anymore. I never really liked that job, I never really liked having a job, and I don’t know how much longer I have to live.”
She stifled a laugh. “Are you dying or something?”
Roman tilted his head at her for a moment, wondering how he should respond to this question.
“My point is, I only have so much longer left to be alive, and whether that time span is fifty years or fifty hours, I want to do a favor for my future self.”
“You do know this complicates things,” she said, the smile on her face starting to fade.
“If it complicates things, what I’m about to tell you next should really complicate things.”
“I’m all ears,” she said, going for a piece of bread.
“First of all, I know who you are. I know you are Plume, and I know you are on an exemplar team with Mister Fist, William Bottorf and a telepath named MindLenz. So let’s just put that out there, so we’re on the same page before I tell you more.”
“You’re not supposed to know that type of information,” she said, a fire igniting behind her eyes.
“Well, I do.”
“And how did you find this out?”
“I’m getting to that.”
Rather than beat around the bush, Roman went straight for it, telling his teacher about Paris, and then about Nadine, whom he simply referred to as “an Eastern spy.”
He explained everything as best he could, how Paris had tried to kill him, and how he had fought back.
It was at this point that Ava stopped him. “You do realize the things you’re telling me give me the right to strip you of your power, right?” Ava asked.
“I was hoping it wouldn’t come to that.” Roman bit his lip. The waiter came and placed their salads down, but neither touched them. “I did what I had to do for a reason.”
“When it comes to governments, the average citizen doesn’t decide if a reason is good or bad—they do,” Ava reminded him.
“There’s more to the story, and I’m only telling you because I trust you and I need your help.”
Ava shook her head. “You’ve just gone from telling me all the illegal shit you’ve done to asking for my help?”
“Just let me finish before you pass judgment.”
“Roman, I knew taking you on was going to be a challenge. No, you know what? I’ll tell you whose fault this is. This is my fault. I should have just passed up the opportunity. You’ve told me all this stuff, and now I have to figure out a way to respond. Do you know how fucked this is for me?”
“Just let me finish,” Roman assured her.
He explained how his wife had disappeared, how the Eastern spy had sent someone to help get to the bottom of Celia’s disappearance, and that they had discovered a woman had taken his wife, a woman with the same power as Roman.
And before Ava could interrupt him, he explained what had happened yesterday, going to Harper’s home, being attacked by the criminal named Hazrat, spying on his own home to find that this woman had taken up shop there with his wife’s corpse and his newest doll.
It was a complicated story, and there were a few points where Ava told him to stop and backtrack a bit, to better understand the role certain individuals played.
“And that is why I am telling you all this,” Roman said, ignoring the burning glare Ava was giving him. “Through my sources, I believe that the woman in my home is the same person who attacked Prison South, the one who broke out the shadow user I killed yesterday. That means she’s just as big of a threat to the Centralian government as she is to me. And she’s holed up in my fucking home with my wife’s dead body,” he said, a little too loud.
Luckily, they were sitting far enough away to not be heard by anyone.
“Roman, Roman…” Ava stared down at her salad for a moment. She lifted the fork and began moving things around without eating any of it. “Twice.”
“Twice?”
“The woman you’re talking about has attacked Prison South twice.”
Roman took a sip from his drink. “She attacked again?”
“A couple days back. There was another prison break, this time a group of rogue exemplar
s breaking out a healer.”
“Centralia has one healer, correct?” Roman asked. “According to my sources, Centralia has one healer. This is the one you are talking about, correct?”
“That’s correct,” Ava finally said after a long, uncomfortable pause. “And this woman with the same power as yours fought this team of rogue exemplars in the courtyard who were there to bust this healer out, all of them inevitably escaping.”
“Do you know anything about the team?”
“From eyewitnesses, we know there was a cat girl, a male telepath, a woman who was a power amplifier, and a fat guy with a nullification ring.”
“A cat girl? Fuck. You know, there’s another person I haven’t told you about,” Roman said, starting to pick at his salad.
He felt tension in that moment, but he knew playing it cool would serve him in the end.
If Ava tried to do anything, or if she was mentally ordering law enforcement to arrest him, he would respond accordingly. He didn’t want to, but now that he had connections in Centralia’s spy-heavy underbelly, he wasn’t as worried as he should be.
“There’s another person in the story?”
“His name is Kevin Blackbook. He’s my former coworker, the one whose power I currently possess.”
“Kevin, the guy in the cubicle next to you, right?” Ava asked.
“Yes. How did you know?”
“You mentioned him once.”
“I did?”
“Yes.”
“Okay, then,” Roman said as he tried to use his fork to stab an almond in his salad. “Kevin was the person who attacked me back at the immigration office, the same attack you helped cover up. I only found this out later. Did you know it was him?”
“To be honest with you, I didn’t look too deeply into it,” Ava said with a shrug. “I assumed it was just an angry immigrant exemplar. My main focus was covering up what had transpired, just to be sure HR didn’t know it was you.”
The pieces suddenly came together for Roman. “You said cat girl, right? At the prison.”
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