“I’m sorry it happened like this,” he said. “It wasn’t supposed to be anything like this. I thought it’d get a bit nasty with the civilian protesters but I didn’t think it’d be anything like this. Not the capes, not the gunshot at the end.”

I hadn’t either.

“Jasper said you guessed why I sent those students with you.”

“Yeah,” I said. I climbed to my feet.

“I’m especially sorry for that,” he said. “If it was up to me, I wouldn’t have ever tested you like that. It wasn’t wholly up to me.”

“Who?” I asked.

“Everyone,” he said. “No-one. It’s complicated. Wardens and the hero teams are being pressured to be mindful of who is out there, touching base, and they reached out to some of the other Patrol groups with concerns. They wanted to coordinate, so teenagers wouldn’t be out interviewing or exposing themselves to anyone dangerous. School got to talking, and they got into CYA mode.”

“Cover your ass,” I said.

“They wanted to be able to say that they’d made a reasonable effort to check that the parahumans the students were exposed to were reasonable and safe, in case anything happened down the line. I could have kept quiet about you, but…”

He trailed off.

“I wouldn’t have asked you to,” I said.

“…I didn’t get the impression you wanted me to, either. You weren’t being secretive. I don’t want to operate that way, either.”

“No. I wouldn’t want you to,” I said.

“You know I can’t keep you on the staff,” he said.

I nodded.

There it was.

Fuck.

I hadn’t been super attached to the job, but… fuck.

“Using power on kids, the contention about possible conflict of interest, undue influence, danger. I think things will stay at that, I don’t think it’ll follow you.”

I nodded.

“There’s a dim chance of a student claiming emotional distress because of your aura and pursuing things in court, I’ve already talked to one officer to get them on board and we’ll get something in writing. I’ll vouch for you and for the events as Jasper described them, one hundred percent, if you end up needing someone to stand for you. None of this was you.”

“Courts are a million years behind as it stands, and getting further behind every day we don’t have an established system of government,” I said. “By the time things get that far it’ll be forgotten.”

“That is a factor,” Gilpatrick said.

I wasn’t worried about that side of things. I was hurt, but I wasn’t worried.

“Do you need a hand getting things cleared out of the office?” he asked.

I shook my head. I didn’t want to think about that.