“Let me help then,” Colt said, and when she stared into my visor there was a clarity that hadn’t been there before, like she had focused on me for the first time. Kind of like Rain had explained Love Lost doing, but without a year of being ignored or seen as a monster as lead-up.

Seeing someone as a monster. I made note of that stray thought. It was easier to relate to him if I put things in those terms.

“Information is the only help you can give.”

“Can I fight? Because I don’t know anything. I can—can I do volunteer service? Join the heroes?”

“The Navigators were chopped up by people you helped and supported,” I said. “They flew under the radar as a hero group before, but when we all heard what happened and realized there wasn’t a single bad thing we could say about the Navigators, that they’d only ever done good, that made it that much worse. People are resentful.”

“I could join you? You could give me a chance.”

I didn’t move. I waited, while Rain remained very still.

Rain shook his head a small fraction, but he didn’t say anything.

“No,” I said, so he didn’t have to. He had to see her every night, and if he was the one to refuse her, then her anger might find root and fester over nightly recurrences.

“But Damsel of Distress likes me, and I know you guys have committed crimes.”

“It’s Swansong, not Damsel,” Swansong said.

“Punishments pending,” Rain said.

“Pend mine! I don’t know how to… I don’t know, build a house with a pile of wooden slats, or cook, or hunt or fish. I’ll die.”

“We’re more resilient than you think,” Swansong said.

“What if—I can talk to the doctors I talked to earlier? They asked questions about my health, and questions about depression and anxiety, and… what if I give different answers? They couldn’t send me away then.”

“I don’t think that’s going to work,” I said. “You can’t change the answers you already gave.”

“But—”

There was clarity in her fear, because somehow things were finally setting in. Her responses were a little bit quicker, more like she was actually listening to what others said.

“The judge gave sentencing guidelines,” I said. “Three and a half years. There’s a very real chance we don’t take the extreme measures, but it’s up to the capes to decide, because it’s the capes that are dealing with parahuman containment right now. If we don’t send you out to this other world for three and a half years, we put you in juvenile prison for three and a half years, and you wear a kit like you’re wearing right now to keep you from turning breaker.”

“I don’t want to go to prison either.”