Taylor Hebert, Medhall Intern Pt 18 (Patreon)

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[A/N: This chapter commissioned by @GW_Yoda and beta-read by Lady Columbine of Mystal.]

12:17 Wednesday Morning

Taylor

The dream was horrible. I hated it. Tracey was stuck in the car and I was climbing down to save her, but the more I climbed, the farther away the car got. And the worst part was, Tracey was calling out for help, and I couldn't reach her.

Over and over, the dream restarted, and Tracey called out to me every time. I'm so sorry, I desperately shouted at her in the dream. I'm trying. In befuddled dream logic, I kind of knew that I was failing her, but the whys and wherefores escaped me at the moment.

Just when I was about to figure it out, I fell off the cliff.

Waking up involved me landing on my bedside rug. It was a hell of a shock for me; still tangled in my sheets, I had no idea which way was up, or where Tracey had gone, or anything. Reality seeped into my head as I struggled and cried out, but I only really figured out what was going on when the bedroom light came on.

"Taylor!" Dad said, kneeling down beside me. "Are you okay? What happened?"

I rubbed my eyes and shook my head to dispel the last of the nightmare. "Had a bad dream," I mumbled. "About Tracey."

"Oh, Taylor." He helped me unwind the sheets from myself, then hugged me. "I'm so sorry. Did you want to stay home tomorrow? Uh, today?"

Sure, I wanted to. But there was too much I had to do. And it would be my last day at Winslow with Greg, and I didn't want to do that to him.

I got up and headed into the bathroom to splash water on my face. Feeling a little refreshed, I went back to bed, rearranged the covers so they were on the bed again, and tried to settle back down. I did get to sleep, in the end, but it took a while.

<><>

Winslow

Greg

When Taylor's bus pulled to a stop and everyone started getting off, he straightened up from where he'd been leaning against the wall and took a few steps forward. He liked meeting her before class and catching up on the gossip, and it pained him that this would be the last time they'd do it.

They would remain a couple—she'd been extremely clear about that—but their time together would necessarily be limited to Medhall and weekends. Friday afternoons would be all theirs, of course, because they'd meet up at work and go from there.

He knew he was going to miss hanging out like this before class, and that was the least of it. Heading to the cafeteria with her for lunch had become the highlight of his day, especially with her snarky commentary on Gladly's class and discussion of whatever book or movie caught their fancy.

He'd read more books (as opposed to graphic novels) since they'd become friends than ever before in his life.

Finally, he spotted her in the crowd and went over to her. She looked great, as always, but there were bags under her eyes and a hollowness to her cheeks that didn't look good. "Hey, you," he said, then lowered his voice. "Everything okay?"

"Yeah, mostly." She put her arm through his and leaned against him. "Can we just go someplace quiet, please?"

He nodded, pleased he could help. "I know just the place."

<><>

Taylor

Greg did indeed know just the place, for which I was grateful.

At this time in the morning, there wasn't anyone smoking on the roof. How he'd known that would be the case, I didn't exactly worry about. I hadn't made a habit of going up there myself; I'd snuck up to eat my lunch in peace a couple of times, but the smell of cheap cigarette smoke and the way conversation had fallen silent had put me off.

Nobody had been so blatant as to bring up actual chairs to sit on, but there was a board laid over a couple of cinderblocks, and I was happy enough to sit on that. Greg sat beside me, his gaze silently concerned. I sighed and leaned against him, balancing my backpack on my knees. The last thing I wanted to do was accidentally carry a couple of the sad and sorry cigarette butts littering the area down into the school on the bottom of my pack, and be accused of smoking literally on my last day.

"Bad dreams," I said, in response to his unasked question. "About Tracey."

"Ah," he said, in tones of comprehension. And I knew damn well that he did actually understand. "You knew her better than I did. She was nice, wasn't she?"

Tears welled in my eyes, but I refused to cry. If I went into class with swollen eyes and a runny nose, the rumour mill would be churning out the most godawful theories before second period. Besides, I needed to talk it out.

"Yeah, she was." I accepted his silent offer of a handkerchief, wiped my eyes, and blew my nose. "She took me under her wing, gave me work, then trusted me to do it. When Emma tried to pull that shit pretending to be me, as soon as I called, she understood and believed what I was saying. And she even got me more of those clothes from Beautiful Me when Emma and her asshole friends stole the first lot."

"I totally get that." He put his arm around me and gave me a comforting hug. "She sounds like a great boss."

"She was the best." Leaning over, I blew my nose on his handkerchief again, then put my head on his shoulder. "I can't believe she's gone."

He squeezed me gently. "So, you think you can find out what's going on with this whole fake car accident thing?"

The question made me straighten up, anger replacing grief. "Yeah. However she ended up in that car, whoever put here there, the trail starts in Medhall. And if anyone knows how to sniff around inside Medhall's systems, it's me." I was totally going to find who killed Tracey, and then I was going to sic Max Anders and the entire white-hot fury of Medhall on them.

"And there's the Taylor I know and love," he said; even without looking, I could tell there was a grin on his face. "You know I've got your back in all this, right?"

"I know." I gave him his handkerchief back; I didn't need it anymore. "And thanks. I needed that reminder."

"Anytime." Just then, the home-room bell went off and he bounced to his feet. "Whoop! Don't want to be late for your last day at this glorious institute of mediocre education."

"This 'glorious institute' can die in a fire," I growled. Far too many of my troubles could be laid at the theoretical feet of Winslow High School, and the actual feet of the teachers and students that infested it.

But I had met Greg there, so that was a bonus.

He grinned again as I got up. "Not arguing."

<><>

Just After Midday

Greg

He wasn't sure about the expression on Taylor's face as the bus pulled away from the stop. She didn't look relieved so much as contemplative.

"What's on your mind?" he asked. This was one of the many good things about having Taylor as a girlfriend. Asking her a straight question got a straight answer.

"I was just thinking … I'm never going to see that place again, at least not as a student." She leaned back against the seat, looking up at the ceiling of the bus. "There's not much I'm going to miss about it, apart from World Affairs and lunchtime with you, but it's weird to think I'll never do any of that again. Computers with Mrs Knott. Math with Mr Quinlan. It's something that's been a huge part of my life for nearly two years, and now it's just … gone."

Greg nodded. He'd never really been in that kind of situation himself, but he could kind of imagine it. "I guess it would be like if we suddenly stopped working at Medhall tomorrow, except in a good way."

"Yeah, exactly that." Taylor sat up and booped him on the nose with her forefinger. "It's like I'm having this huge chunk of me just … excised, and I'm left wondering why I'm twenty pounds lighter."

"What, like cancer?" he jibed.

She snorted. "Exactly."

"You'll still have Arcadia to deal with," he reminded her. "Though I hear it's pretty good. They say the ABB doesn't even recruit there."

Taylor snorted. "I'll be happy with no gang fights behind the school."

He frowned thoughtfully. "I doubt that happens either. PHO rumour is that the Wards go to school there. I can't see them letting shit like that slide."

"Unless they didn't want to out themselves?" Taylor shrugged. "It might become an issue if Arcadia suddenly started showing a one-minute Wards response time whenever anything bad happened." She rolled her eyes. "And besides, they had a Ward at Winslow. That didn't do shit to keep the gangs in check."

"In fairness, Shadow Stalker was kind of a Ward-in-name-only," Greg mused. "I honestly think she was in it more for the 'being allowed to hurt people and get praised for it' aspect than the actual 'helping people and doing good' part. Just my impression."

"Ward-in-name-only? W-I-N-O?" Taylor smirked. "Would a superhero in name only be a SINO or a SHINO?"

Greg chuckled. "At the risk of sounding crude, if she'd graduated to the Protectorate, she'd be a PINO." He pronounced it 'peeno', causing her to roll her eyes.

Then her smirk morphed into a grin. "Well, she definitely was a bit of a dick. Anyway, I'd call her a hero-especially-in-name-only, ultra-skeevy, because she was pretty heinous."

It took him a second to get it, then he groaned. "And I thought your dad's jokes were terrible."

She preened. "I learned from the best."

<><>

Medhall Building

Taylor

The banter and silly jokes with Greg were a welcome distraction on the bus ride, otherwise I would probably have gone back to brooding about Tracey. It wasn't fair! First she lost Justin, and then someone abducted and killed her as well!

I honestly would've suspected Sophia for that one too, except Dad had made some phone calls and established that she was still firmly under lock and key, with visual checks every hour. I gathered that following the Medhall debacle, the PRT wasn't taking any chances with her getting away. Their public image had already been tarnished enough; they didn't want it to drop any further into the toilet.

Which meant, with Sophia out of the frame, I only had one other person to pin it on.

Ed Ferguson.

Whatever bushes Tracey had shaken to get his attention, and rate her abduction and murder, I was also going to have to ferret through. I had no idea how he'd grabbed her, unless it was as she was leaving the building to catch the bus. He could likely try that with me as well … unless I asked Bradley or Brian to walk out with me and Greg. And if I found rock-solid proof that he'd done it, I'd take that straight to Max Anders, and Ed Ferguson would soon have a lot more to worry about than one teenaged intern.

We got off the bus and headed up the stairs to the front doors. By mutual silent agreement, we'd brought along the black armbands we'd worn in Justin's memory. It gutted me that we were having to use them again so soon, but I felt Tracey would be pleased that we were using the same ones.

Brian was on the front desk, looking as impressively muscular as ever. He nodded pleasantly to two people coming through in front of us, then smiled when he saw us. "Taylor," he said warmly. "Greg. Good to see you." He paused, his eyes flicking to our armbands. "Uh … am I missing something?"

Greg gave me the sidelong glance that meant 'go ahead, I got this', then headed over to the desk as I went through the security arch. It didn't buzz for me, of course, and I caught fragments of what Greg was saying. Brian nodded, looking suddenly solemn, and I found myself unaccountably irritated that his higher-ups hadn't clued him in that someone from the company had been murdered overnight.

"If there's anything I can do to help, just let me know," he said, and I knew he meant it. I could tell just from looking at him that he was one of the good guys.

If he'd been at Winslow when I was being bullied, he wouldn't have been one of the people looking the other way and pretending they didn't see it happening. That just wasn't Brian. From what I'd seen of him, he would've been in there kicking ass, especially when Peter Ferguson and the Hitler Youth came after us.

I nodded. "Thanks." It was nice to know that someone had my back, even if I didn't need the help right then. I'd gone so long without anyone being in my corner, and now I had everyone backing me up.

Greg and I stepped into the lift together, and I hit the buttons for each of our floors. We didn't talk much on the way up, each of us involved in our own thoughts as we were, but our silence was companionable rather than awkward. I got out on my floor and headed by habit to Tracey's office, but once I got there, I had no idea what to do.

I'd been making these grand plans in my head, but in the cold hard light of reality, I knew I couldn't just go ahead with them. I was on Medhall's dime now, and they would surely expect me to actually do some work instead of investigate a murder. The best I could do, I supposed, was find out what they wanted of me then see if I could work my other stuff in around that.

With a nod to myself, I turned to go toward Ms Harcourt's office, then paused in thought. Tracey's boss valued initiative, and this wasn't my first unsupervised day in this building. Heading into the kitchenette, I set up a cup of coffee the way Ms Harcourt liked it—I'd jotted a note to myself to that effect and left it on the fridge—and spent the time until it was ready making sure I was presentable.

With coffee in hand, I went back down the corridor to Ms Harcourt's office. She was clearly a busy woman and, although I had no illusions about being able to fill Tracey's shoes, I figured I could take some of that load off her shoulders. After all, they were actually paying me a full salary now, so it was only fair that I do something to earn it.

Pausing before the dreaded portal, I knocked twice.

"Enter." Her voice wasn't any more forbidding than normal, as far as I could tell. Hopefully I hadn't come at a bad time. Well, a worse time than normal.

I turned the handle and opened the door. Ms Harcourt looked me over as I entered. "Miss Hebert. I expected you three minutes ago."

"Yes, ma'am. I made coffee, ma'am." She didn't already have a cup on her desk, so I'd guessed correctly.

"Ah." She didn't say any more than that, but she allowed me to place the cup on her desk. "Thank you. Until a replacement can be found for Ms Grimshaw, you will be working in her workspace. Is that going to be a problem?" The subtext, as far as I could tell, was that if it was a problem, she'd find some other place for me that was unlikely to be as comfortable, such as an unused utility closet.

I stiffened my spine. "No problem, ma'am." Or rather, while it was all too probable that I'd find the memories of Tracey in her workspace to be unpleasantly sharp from time to time, there was unlikely to be anyone there to supervise me, and I wasn't sure if I was up to adapting to a new boss right that very second.

"Good." There was a large Manila envelope on her desk; placing two fingers on it, she slid it across to me. "A continuation of the audit process. If anything appears to be unusual, make a note of it and bring it to me at the end of your work day. However, if you find something that seems likely to affect Medhall directly, contact me immediately. Is that understood?"

"Totally, ma'am." I took up the envelope, and felt an oblong lump that I guessed was a flash drive in there as well. "Am I expected to complete these today?"

Her expression was almost unreadable, but I thought I detected a hint of approval. "You are expected to complete them when you complete them. When you are finished, return the results to me."

"Thank you, ma'am. I'll, uh, I'll get to work, shall I?" I absolutely, desperately, did not want to turn my back on her and walk out when she still had stuff to tell me. Nor did I want to stand there like a stuffed dummy, waiting to be dismissed.

"Yes. I will call through when I need anything from you. I hope you've been working on your telephone presentation." Translation: 'get it right this time'.

"Yes, ma'am. Thank you, ma'am." I turned and walked steadily from the office, carefully closing the door behind me. Well, she didn't yell at me for stopping to make coffee, so I'll count that as a win.

Clutching the envelope like a lifeline, I headed back to where Tracey and I had spent so much time chatting and working. The first thing I did was start another cup of coffee brewing. While the machine was still burbling, I sat down at the desk and opened the envelope.

I'd been right; along with the paper files was a flash drive, no doubt containing extraneous information about the people named in the files. I restrained myself from gulping nervously. Here I was, a teenager, and they were trusting me to vet actual adults who had been with them far longer than I had.

It was one hell of a responsibility.

I leafed through the files, getting first impressions while keeping half an ear out for the coffee maker. Nothing seemed to jump out at me, though I knew how deceptive that could be. I hadn't spotted those moles the first time until I compared their social security numbers. Aside from that, they'd looked perfectly mundane.

Once the coffee machine had worked its magic, I went and poured myself a cup, then came back to the desk and started work in earnest.

About five minutes in, I ran into an unexpected snag. There were a few things about the first guy I wasn't sure about, so I was going a little deeper into his employment history when one of my queries hit a wall. Instead of popping up a new window in response to hitting the Enter key, it instead generated a text box. ENTER USERNAME AND PARAMETERS OF SEARCH QUERY.

Well, that was something new. I remembered, on Monday, skating straight past that particular set of search screens while looking into Ed Ferguson. And now I had to ask permission to go deeper?

This was potentially problematic, but I didn't give up my plans immediately. There were ways and means around that sort of thing, not least because humans were fallible … and nobody seemed to have touched Tracey's desk yet.

Dutifully, I entered my username then typed in the basic description of what I was looking for. Either someone was really on the ball, or they'd automated it and were checking to see who went past a certain level, because the authorisation popped up almost immediately. A moment later, I figured it out, and wanted to facepalm: Ed Ferguson, or whoever had found out Tracey was looking into him, had evidently been in the system, so they were working to trace whoever was going where they shouldn't.

Well, it was good to see they were doing something, though I intended to see things through from my end anyway. Ed Ferguson was a clear and present danger to Medhall, and I wasn't going to let that stand. This was now a matter of pride; Medhall security might be on the case, but I was going to get there first.

The check on the guy's previous employers showed nothing of any particular interest, but I was only just getting warmed up. Once I'd given his file a thorough check, I started on the next one, keeping notes on minor things that might line up. Once again, when I got to a certain level of query, I hit the same request for authorisation to continue. I complied again, of course.

One by one, I worked through each of them. Nothing of a dramatic nature had showed up by the time the phone at my elbow rang. Mindful of Ms Harcourt's warning, I carefully answered. "Good afternoon, Taylor Hebert speaking. How may I help you?"

Ms Harcourt spoke crisply and firmly. "Very good, Ms Hebert. Bring me a cup of coffee, then I will be requiring you to hand-deliver an envelope for me."

"Yes, ma'am," I replied. "I'll be there soon."

Never one for extraneous verbiage, she ended the call on that note, and I put the phone down myself. After jotting down a reminder for myself so I'd know where I'd been up to, I got up and made the cup of coffee for Ms Harcourt.

Again, I trod the length of the corridor to her office and knocked. Her "Enter!" was as curt as ever, but she nodded approvingly when I bore the coffee into the room.

"Thank you," she said. "Take this envelope up to Max Anders' office." Not even by a gesture or a quirk of her expression did she ask if I knew where it was. If I didn't know that by now, I would not have been the girl she'd hired on.

"Yes, ma'am." I took the envelope. It held a stack of papers, and was held shut with one of those cool string fasteners. "Was there anything else, ma'am?"

She looked at me for a moment. "You haven't called me about anything dangerous to the company, but have you located anything problematic at all?"

I thought back to the little I had discovered. "It'll be in my report, ma'am, but all I've found so far is that three of them lied about some of their employment before entering Medhall, and one may be concealing a minor drug habit, if I'm interpreting his absences correctly."

Her eyebrows rose fractionally. "I shall be interested in looking at your conclusions." There was a minor pause. "Well, don't let me keep you." The dismissal was clear.

I nodded. "Yes, ma'am."

Heading for the elevator, I kept a firm grip on the envelope. Whatever Ms Harcourt wanted to convey to Mr Anders, it had to be too important and too sensitive for the inter-building mail service to courier from one office to another, or even to put in an email. Was I curious? Sure. But was I even tempted to open it and see what it was all about? Hell no.

To my surprise, when I stepped into the lift, Greg was there, wearing his Medhall maintenance gear and carrying an impressively large flashlight. Given that I had a screenshot of him wearing that same gear while knocking Sophia ass over teakettle with a fire extinguisher, I thought he looked very cool indeed wearing it.

"Oh, hi," he said with a blink of surprise. "What's happening, Tay?"

"Nothing much." I gave him a grin as I punched the button for the top floor. "Just the normal high-flying business life of a Medhall intern. Where are you headed?"

"Hey, I'm a Medhall intern too, I'll have you know," he retorted, then returned my grin. "Someone up on the seventeenth floor is complaining that the HVAC isn't working right, so I get to go and see if we can fix it or if we need to pull in an actual qualified repair guy. Whee."

"He also serves who fixes the air ducting," I reminded him. "Looking forward to next Saturday?"

"You know it." There was a lot we weren't saying, but we didn't need to say it out loud. I hadn't seen any cameras in the elevator, but if the doors opened at the wrong time and someone caught the two interns saying or doing something inappropriate, I was absolutely sure that Something Would Be Said. As my dad had once said, the best way not to get caught doing something wrong was to not do it.

"I liked Theo. He's shy, but a nice guy underneath all that," I mused. So as not to speak ill of the absent, I didn't speak the next bit out loud, but Greg and I knew each other well by now. He nodded as he heard what went unsaid: Tammi, not so much.

The elevator dinged and the doors opened. Greg glanced away from my face to look at the lit-up floor indicator. "Whups, this is my floor. See you around, Tay."

"See you, Greg." I waved as the doors closed, then rode the rest of the way up to the top floor.

As I approached Mr Anders' office, his secretary nodded to me. "Miss Hebert? Go right in, he's expecting you."

"Thank you." I nodded to her, still a little weirded out by how accepted I was in Medhall, even by the boss's secretary, whom I was almost certain I'd never met before. Stepping past her desk, I knocked once then opened the door. "Mr Anders? It's Taylor Hebert."

"Ah, Taylor." Max Anders, immaculate in a three-piece suit that would've cost more than our car—maybe more than Alan Barnes' car—rose from behind his desk and came around it to meet me. "You made good time. It's good to see you again, although it always seems to be under less-than-ideal circumstances. How are you holding up?" His expression was the epitome of concern.

"I've been better, but I'll be okay, I guess. Thank you for asking." I held the packet out to him. "This is from Ms Harcourt."

"Ah, yes." He nodded as he accepted it from me. "Formidable lady. I honestly don't know what Medhall would do without her."

I didn't know how to answer that, or even if it had been addressed as a question rather than a comment. "Was there anything else, sir?"

"No, no, you're fine." He waved his hang negligently. "Back to work, Miss Hebert."

"Thank you, sir." I turned and left, closing the door carefully behind me. I had more work ahead of me before I could start on my own project.

<><>

Kaiser

Seating himself behind his desk again, Max idly tossed the envelope to one side—it contained reports, but nothing of substance—and tapped a button on his laptop. "So, what do you think?"

Victor's face appeared on the screen. "I still think having Veder in the elevator at the same time was trying too hard. She's very sharp; I doubt she'd do anything stupid in an elevator, even one without visible cameras."

Max shrugged. "Teenagers do stupid things all the time. They're known for it." His lips tightened as he thought about Theo's transgressions. "Especially if they want to impress their boyfriend or girlfriend."

"Not Hebert." Victor chuckled. "I'll give you one guess as to who wears the pants in that relationship, and it isn't him. She doesn't need to do jack to impress him. That's already been achieved."

"I do see your point." Max picked up the envelope and examined the string with which it was held closed. "How about outside the elevator? When she was alone in the corridor? Did she try to sneak a peek?"

"Not even a little bit," Victor admitted. "In the footage we've got, all her body language is focused on one thing. Getting that envelope to you. And pride that she was given the responsibility to do so."

"So, she's not the one working with Grimshaw against us, then." Max wasn't sure if he should be relieved or disappointed. The Hebert girl had been an absolute godsend when it came to finding those moles—he still got the shudders when he thought about how close they might have come to uncovering Medhall's connection to the Empire Eighty-Eight—but if it wasn't her, who the hell was it?

Grimshaw had uncovered that connection when following on from Hebert's initial investigation—which had been deeper and more thorough than he'd anticipated (that was on him, and he'd own it)—and had sent off a message to someone. Whoever that someone was, would know what Grimshaw knew. Hebert was good at many things, but she wore her heart on her sleeve; deception at a level that would fool Victor just wasn't part of her skillset.

If she was aware of Medhall's true nature, there was no way she'd be able to hide it. And from the face-to-face encounter he'd just had with her, she'd been up front, frank and slightly giddy at meeting with the boss … and that was it. Nothing else.

Victor shook his head in agreement with Max's assessment. "Not a hope in hell. She's just as loyal to Medhall as she ever was, if not more so. There's no way she's secretly working to bring us down. Bullshit of that level isn't in her wheelhouse."

"And you've got no idea of who it could be." Max hoped he was wrong.

"Not yet." Victor's expression of determination became razor-edged. "But now we know it's not Hebert, we can look past her and find the real culprit. No sneaky email blackmail demands yet?"

"No." That also was a disappointment of sorts. It would've given them something to work with. "I'll let you know if anything does come up."

"You do that. I'll keep working from my end. Later."

Max ended the call and leaned back in his chair with his fingers steepled, thinking hard. Okay, who do we focus on next?

It was a dilemma without an immediate solution.

<><>

Taylor

Some little time afterward, armed with a fresh cup of coffee, I finished my last cross-check and looked over my notes. I'd found one more inconsistency, which I'd tracked down to a potential link with ABB sympathisers. There was no evidence that the actual employee shared those sympathies, and it wasn't as though he could've chosen who his brother-in-law was, but I noted it down anyway. Medhall could investigate more deeply, or not, as it saw fit.

With all that squared away, I could now work on my other project: proving that Ed Ferguson had found out Tracey was looking into him and had her killed.

The trouble was that as far as I could tell, Medhall security was trying to do the same thing I was, but in doing so, it was seriously getting in my way. The requirement to send in a request to dig past a certain level was an indication that they were trying to honey-trap the bad guys into revealing themselves, but I doubted it was going to work. And if I tried looking for whatever Tracey had found, the automated system might lock me out or it might raise an alarm with an actual human being. I had no desire to get a talking-to from Bradley about staying safe in the workplace.

However, I didn't necessarily have to use my login.

Standing up from my desk, I went over to Tracey's. I'd been holding off from doing this for more than one reason, but I knew I had to. Getting in trouble was a very real scenario, but with any luck I'd find my proof first, so I'd be able to offer up Ed Ferguson's head on a plate.

However, over and above the spectre of potential trouble, I now had to face the loss of Tracey. When I wasn't focusing on her desk (and the fact she wasn't sitting at it) I could pretend in the back of my mind that she'd just stepped out for a moment and would be right back. Looking right at it, at the chair that was turned at just the right angle for her to get up and walk away from her desk, my eyes filled with tears at the thought that she'd never be back. She'd never sit down opposite me again, pass a little banter, then get on with her day.

I used a tissue to wipe my eyes, then moved so I was standing behind her desk, alongside her chair. Careful not to move the chair—the surest sign anyone had been at her desk—I gently edged open the right-hand top desk drawer. "Sorry, Tracey," I murmured. "But I have to do this. You understand."

Tracey was a nice person and an awesome boss, but she seemed to have problems remembering her password. I wouldn't even have known this, but a few times while I'd been taking a break between tasks, she'd gone to the bathroom, shutting her terminal down while she was away (as per the rules) and then had to log on again when she came back. Each time, she'd opened her right-hand drawer before typing the password into the computer.

There was only one reason she would be doing this: she'd left a reminder for her password in that drawer somewhere.

It wasn't immediately obvious, but then again, I hadn't expected there to be a giant Post-It note with THIS IS MY PASSWORD written on it. Acutely aware of the passage of time, I shuffled through the contents of the drawer—a couple of staplers, about fifty pens, several pencils, a packet of rubber bands, an actual Post-It pad (no password on it)—and other assorted stationery. Nothing popped out at me to indicate why she always opened the drawer.

I didn't want to empty the drawer onto the desk; it would take too long, and if someone came along I would be very hard-pressed to come up with a good reason. 'Better to beg forgiveness than ask permission' only worked if something had been achieved with the unauthorised action. So, I looked harder.

I saw the transparent sticky-tape on the upper edge of the inner opening of the drawer and dismissed it four or five times before my attention was drawn back to it. Why would Tracey put tape there? Although I couldn't get down low enough, I ran my fingers over that area … and found what I was looking for.

There was a small, laminated card, taped in place so that normally it was held up out of sight by the tape. I found that if I hooked my finger around it, I could pull it down far enough to read the password printed on it. After reading it through several times, I let it flip back up into place and nudged the drawer shut again. Then I went back to my desk.

What I was about to do next was the riskiest part of all. If they had already cancelled Tracey's login, it would simply come up with an error; however, if the system was watching for someone logging in as Tracey, it would certainly raise an alarm. My only hope was that, via institutional inertia, they'd neglected to do either one. After all, who would log in using a password that only she knew?

Dad had told me horror stories about logins not being cancelled after someone left the Dockworkers, and other people getting into the system using the still-extant password. Fortunately, the intruders hadn't done much damage, but password security was now something they took extremely seriously there. In Medhall, I'd been told, they did security updates over the weekend; with any luck, cancelling out Tracey's login privileges wouldn't be done until then.

With an excuse already brewing in the back of my mind—oh, uh, I had a brain fart and forgot my login so I used the one Tracey showed me once, I'll never do it again—I logged out of my terminal, then logged back as Tracey. One character at a time, I entered the password.

My finger hovered over the Enter key for the longest time. Then I jabbed it down.

The computer screen didn't ignore my request, and it didn't flash any kind of alert that I'd logged in with someone else's password. I didn't hear running footsteps in the corridor. The terminal considered my offering, then popped up a new screen.

I was in.

As of right then, I was on the clock and I knew it, but I had one last thing to check. If Tracey's login was also affected by the query restrictions, I would be back to square one. Also, I would be in so much trouble it wouldn't be funny. They might not fire me—I had saved them millions—but Ms Harcourt would probably bust me down to janitor for a few weeks to show me why I didn't pull crap like that on her watch.

Fingers flying over the keys, I retraced my earlier steps with Ed Ferguson. Only a few screens separated me from where the query was likely to happen. I blazed my way down the trail, barely reading the prompts. This was it, the make-or-break. If I got through, I was golden. Otherwise … I was probably going to have to get used to scrubbing toilets alongside Greg.

(Actually, either way this was likely to happen. But I was okay with that, so long as I found out what I needed to first.)

I reached the point where I'd been roadblocked so many times before. The query went in, and I clicked the mouse button.

Without any hesitation at all … it gave me the information.

I wanted to shout, to cheer, to jump up and down and whoop, but I didn't. The clock was ticking down, both literally and figuratively, and I needed to find out what I was looking for. There was exactly zero chance, as I saw it, for this intrusion to go unnoticed until Friday. Medhall security might have been slow-moving, but they weren't that lax.

However, now I had to follow Tracey's breadcrumb trail. For a moment, the word 'breadcrumb' reminded me of how Greg had been texted the word 'Mice' by Tracey. This now had more chilling connotations. I wasn't sure exactly what it meant, but I intended to find out.

With a burst of inspiration, I clicked the mouse on 'Previous queries' … and there it was. My roadmap. All the links Tracey had followed, the last time she was in here. Pulling my notepad closer and turning to a fresh page, I started following the links, going on from where I'd left off. It was getting very close to three, but I was hot on the trail.

She went in some directions that didn't seem to make sense, but I followed them anyway, jotting down fragments of data. Max Anders showed up, as did his ex-wife Kayden. The rabbit-hole became deeper and deeper, with no end in sight. Why isn't she looking more into Ed Ferguson? What did she do that triggered him to grab and murder her?

Tracey had looked into the money and where it had been disappearing to. She'd found a lot more cash, not being laundered by Medhall for Ferguson's subsidiary like I'd thought. Someone within Medhall itself had been using some very creative accounting to make it look like it was actually going somewhere and not just vanishing … and that someone had been personally appointed by Max Anders.

Why would Max Anders want to conceal the disappearance of his own money? Surely he could spend it how he pleased.

Unless he was bankrolling something extremely illegal. The thought wouldn't go away.

There was a series of searches into personnel files: Bradley, Melody, Justin, Mr Grayson, Diane, and photos of Mr Anders' ex-wife. I wasn't sure why; the money didn't seem to be going to them.

She'd done an outside search, and called up pictures of villains. Hookwolf, Cricket, Crusader, Victor, Othala, and Purity. I stared at the side-by-side image matches. No. Oh, God. No.

Hookwolf had tattoos. I'd never seen Bradley shirtless.

Cricket rarely spoke. Melody didn't either.

It can't be.

But the information was there.

Max Anders hadn't told Ed Ferguson to back off. Kaiser had given an order to an underling.

Even the racist jokes Greg had complained about when he first started working with Maintenance … it all made sense now.

The jigsaw puzzle was vast, almost too big to comprehend, and the pieces I had were few and far between. But when I looked at them with the certain knowledge that they'd led to Tracey's death, they took on far more sinister connotations.

This could all have been a horrifying coincidence … but I didn't believe in coincidence. Nor, it seemed, had Tracey.

Using that as a springboard, she'd looked deeper. Cash influxes into the company, well-concealed, but matching dates with heists and robberies by the Empire capes. Once upon a time, Hookwolf had been captured and was due to go into the Birdcage. Bradley had not attended work for that whole time … until Hookwolf was broken out of the transport.

I could only imagine the look on Tracey's face when she'd finally connected all the dots. At a guess, it would have matched mine.

This was huge. It was terrifying. I didn't want to believe it. It made all the sense in the world.

Have I been working for the Empire Eighty-Eight, for Kaiser, all this time?

I wanted to throw up, but I didn't have the time.

Grabbing my notepad, I tore the top pages off and folded them before tucking them into my bra. Then I made one last foray into what I could only imagine as a deep and dark jungle waiting to tear me asunder. With Tracey's clearance, she could log into the security camera system; not the current running system, but the recordings.

The clock was ticking down the last minute or so before three. I selected the camera that had a view of Tracey's desk, and flicked through the thumbnails until I saw one where she wasn't at it. Going back to the previous one, I started it running.

There was no sound, but I saw her working at her desk, looking more and more flustered as she no doubt found out what I just had. She spent a little time collating her work, looking as though she wanted to tear it all up. I knew how she felt. I wanted to shred it myself, but it was too late for me.

I knew what I knew, and as soon as someone checked the login records and the security logs, they'd know what I knew too. It was unbelievable, inconceivable … but Tracey had died for it.

If I kept denying it, I'd die too. I knew that, without a shadow of a doubt.

On the screen, she got up and headed out of sight up the corridor.

I flicked to the next recording in that direction; she'd gone to Ms Harcourt's office.

Inside the office, she laid out what she had. Even with no sound, it was easy to see what she was talking about. Ms Harcourt heard her out, then came around the desk.

I'd known something must have happened, but I didn't expect Ms Harcourt to punch Tracey in the stomach, hard enough to drop her the floor. On the screen, she dragged Tracey to a small closet on the far side of the room and shoved her into it, before hooking a chair under the handle. Then she went to her phone.

That was it. I knew exactly how bad it was now. Danger surrounded me on all sides.

I have to get out of here.

Hastily, I began to shut the terminal down. I'd been logged in for far too long already, but now I had to treat every second as vital. Snatching up the phone, I dialled a number that I'd long since memorised.

"Greg here. Who is this, and how can I help you?"

"Greg!" I hissed. "Can't talk! I need a secret passage out of the building! Life or death!"

"What—?"

At that moment, I saw Ms Harcourt coming along the corridor, so I put the phone down. In front of me, mercifully enough, the computer had finished shutting off. Anyone with any computer knowhow, of course, could retrace where I'd been and figure out what I knew.

And if I was still in the building then, I would be dead.

Literally, not figuratively.

Even worse, they'd probably assume Greg knew what I did, and murder him too.

Fuuuuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck.

"Is everything well with you, Miss Hebert?" Ms Harcourt looked me over. "You seem flustered."

"Sorry, no, I was just rushing to get this last bit done," I said entirely truthfully but misleadingly. Picking up the report I'd already written, I handed it to her. "Three cases of being less than truthful about prior employment—and I think that one there may have done prison time and not told us—one potential low-key drug user, and a possible link to ABB sympathisers that we weren't told about."

Thankfully, she was distracted by that, and looked down over the report. "This is exceptional work, Ms Hebert. We will have to check your conclusions, of course, but I foresee no problems arising with that."

"Thank you, ma'am," I said. "Uh … I know I'm running late to leave, and I'm seriously not trying to score overtime, but would it be possible to use the restroom before I go?" I tilted my head at the phone. "I was just telling Greg that I wouldn't be long."

"Of course." She afforded me a measured nod. "Alert the security people in the lobby when you leave so we are aware when you have vacated the premises."

"Sure, I can do that." I tried to look like someone who was doing their best not to cross their legs in front of their boss. "Uh, the restroom …?"

"Go." She stepped aside, looking over the report again.

I ducked past her in the direction of the nearest ladies' restroom. A glance over my shoulder told me that she was heading off back toward her own office.

Hurry up, Greg.

Please.

Part 19