“Couldn’t tell you,” Tattletale said, her voice level, almost bored. “Do what you were going to do, I guess. You white-hats go sit in your cube, get transported in there, try to get your hands on the controls of this fucked up system we’re all hooked up into. Do it before Teacher gets set up and starts tampering with the shardspace again. Do it before things start breaking down on the city-wide scale. Just, you know, dodge or distract that thing while you’re in there. Use the fact it probably doesn’t want you or your clustermates dead, shield your guests, give them the opportunity to go for the goal.”

“Knowing it might tear me to shreds, physically or mentally,” Rain said. “Snaggletooth ended up brain dead.”

“The alternative is that it’s just you and it might do that anyway,” Tattletale told him.

“With that alternative, at least I don’t put my team at risk.”

“You would be putting them at risk if you went the Ash Beast route,” Tattletale said.

I saw Rain clench all four fists, and not because he was ready to swing at Tattletale. Stress, strain.

I spoke up, “What’s your goal here, Tattletale? Because this feels a bit more like you’re rubbing it in than if you were giving it to us straight.”

“I’m here on pure goodwill,” she said. “And while I’m here, enjoying the chance to get a deeper look behind the veil. Bonus is, I’m guilt-free this time, and I get to be a bit smug that my kid didn’t make this mess.”

She motioned toward Kenzie and Chicken Little.

“Oh fuck off, Tattletale,” I said. “This isn’t a competition and we really don’t need to be dwelling on this stuff when there’s a deadline.”

“Not dwelling,” she said. “Briefly commenting.”

“Um,” Chicken Little said. He raised his hand like he was in class. All heads turned his way. “Didn’t you kind of mentor Skitter? Wasn’t she your ‘kid’, kind of like this?”

“No,” Tattletale said.

“She kind of was,” I folded my arms. “By just about every objective account we have.”

“Including stuff you’ve told me,” Chicken Little said, to Tattletale.

“No,” Tattletale said. “You’re way off base, bud. Skitter was her own woman.”

“But Imp said you taught Skitter about the cops and robbers game, and we all know how that went.”

“Alright,” Tattletale said. “I might have to put a new rule in place, where you’re grounded every time you bring her up.”

“Why? That’s not fair!” Chicken protested.

“It’s not fair,” Darlene echoed, in a tone reminiscent of the ‘don’t hurt the Chicken’ chant from earlier.

“It’s an opsec thing,” Tattletale said.

“I don’t even know what that means,” Chicken Little protested.