He’d already tried this. I answered, “It was a decision made by people who have access to all of the evidence. All of it, including paperwork she didn’t have access to. I’m sorry, but no. You can’t smile and say it’s fine that she’s protecting her identity one minute, then use it as a point against her the next. And it’s a special sort of unkind to pretend there’s something wrong with protecting identities when I just told you what the consequences are, less than ten minutes ago. I’ve lost a family member.”

“That’s not what I was saying.”

“You’re attacking us on the grounds that we’re too unreliable, too dangerous,” I said. “But you’re taking allegations as fact and then running away with it. Lookout, once we realized what was going on, was removed from the unhealthy dynamic. Her parents are in custody and she’s safe in the hands of the City. The court cases I’m aware of are in progress, but yeah, sometimes when you’re dealing with monsters, lives are lost. The courts will arbitrate.”

“If they have untainted information,” Gary Nieves said.

“You wanted to be mayor,” Swansong said. “Yet you can’t trust your own city’s information? What would you have done if you won? Would you have second-guessed every one of their decisions, until you were ousted, retired, or resigned?”

“Let’s not be hostile,” Lynn said.

“I would have second-guessed the ones involving parahumans who can distort reality or records.”

“They do good work,” Tristan said. “Police, Patrol block, courts, fire, medical, they’re doing the best they can, given the circumstance. Admirable, considering circumstances. And I’ll tell you this—we’re going to give our all to do our own share. That’s what gets us through the colder months.”

“That’s a heavy topic of its own,” John said.

“It’s imminent,” Tristan said. “A month or two. You want to focus on a twelve-year-old girl?”

Nieves leaned forward. “If traffic is limited, doors are closed, and this girl has the ability to get inside homes, steal or kill, and get away, hiding her evidence trail, yes. So long as the monsters are among us, yes.”

Hamza was nodding along. The other two weren’t disagreeing.

“I’m not going to say it’s all perfect,” I told them. “But I’m going to try to spell out how I see this. It’s going to involve sharing some stuff that others haven’t talked about. About powers. And about Gold Morning.”

I could see the audience shift at that. My heart beat faster.

“We could just walk away,” Swansong said. “If they want to condemn us, let them. But we don’t owe them this, and some of it is going to come down on our heads.”

I shook my head.

“Okay,” she said.