Mac let me sleep late the next day before impatiently barging into my bedroom without knocking, Janet in tow.

  “Morning, Mac,” I greeted him sluggishly. I was still exhausted, and so not ready for his company. “Hey, Janet,” I greeted her more warmly.

  “It’s afternoon, Natalia. And I need you to give an official statement now. We really cannot put this off any longer. The sentencing is in a couple of days, and the Judge will need it. It’s protocol,” Mac insisted. I hated protocol.

  “And you didn’t think that bribing me with breakfast might get me to talk faster?” I said sarcastically.

  “I shouldn’t have to bribe you. It is your duty as a TOXIC Operative to give a report when you are involved in an incident. Under the circumstances, I have let it go for longer than normal, but it cannot wait any longer.” Mac was definitely short on patience this morning, and I didn’t blame him. The whole ordeal had been a nightmare for both of us. He’d been making daily visits to Tramblewood to question Penny, but always made sure to return at a decent hour so that he could see me while I was awake. I was sure that he wanted the incident behind him almost as much as I did.

  “Fine. Where do you want me to start?” I replied shortly.

  “At the beginning, please. Mr. Kelley was interrogated before he flew back to Headquarters, but I would like to hear your version of how you breached protocol and forced a Crypto to access classified information instead of asking me.” Mac’s tone was pure disapproval.

  “Erik’s not in trouble, is he?” I demanded. I felt horrible; if he were, it would be my fault. Sanctions usually accompanied breaches of protocol. Crap, I really hated protocol.

  “No. Under the circumstances, I have excused Mr. Kelley’s behavior. He’s promised to exercise better judgment in the future.”

  “Thanks, Mac,” I sighed. “I really appreciate it.”

  “You can thank me by abiding by the rules set in place.” Mac rolled his eyes in a rare show of normalcy. He never did something so human. The gesture told me that he knew the chances of getting me to follow TOXIC protocol in the future were slim. While I hated that people begrudged me his special treatment, I rarely let that stop me from taking advantage of it.

  “Why don’t you start with how you discovered that Ms. Latimore may have cheated on her Placement Exams?” Janet suggested gently, getting us back on track.

  So, I started at the beginning. Mac already had the tapes of my interrogation sessions with Cal and Jennifer, so I only reiterated the finer points. I glossed over what I’d learned from Grace and Rider. I explained how after questioning the four other Cryptos, I’d become convinced that Penny also must have known that there was something wrong with the encryption; I just hadn’t been able to figure out why she didn’t tell me.

  All of the others had given assorted reasons for the omission, but none were applicable to Penny, particularly since it was my mission. I considered that maybe she hadn’t really known, but I didn’t see how that could be true . . . unless she wasn’t an Elite-level Higher Reasoning Talent.

  I recounted Erik’s explanation of how the Placement Exams essentially worked. I told Mac and Janet that I hadn’t realized that the Manipulator on my panel was actually a Mimic. I recounted how I hadn’t known what Erik’s Talent was because I’d never met someone like him, or at least I thought I hadn’t.

  Mac actually smiled at that. He’d hand selected Erik for my trials as a true test of my fighting abilities since he had known that I wouldn’t be able to control him the way that I had the others. At the time, I’d thought it was a dirty trick, but now I was glad that he had; it was my fight against Erik that had guaranteed my spot with the Hunters. Plus without it, I might never have met Erik.

  Next, I explained how, if I’d been unaware that Erik and the panel member were Mimics, it might be possible that I had encountered others as well. At that point, I still hadn’t made the leap to Penny being one, but I was suspicious enough to want a look at her Placement Exam results. I wanted to look at the others’ records, too, just in case.

  Initially, I’d thought that I was wrong when I looked at Penny’s results; everything seemed on the level. Both her written exam and her physical demonstration indicated that she was exactly what she purported to be—an Elite-level Higher Reasoning Talent. Despite that, the whole Mimic thing still nagged at me. I went back further and reviewed all the suspects’ intake evaluations. That was where I finally found the missing piece.

  When TOXIC first found Penny, she was at Mrs. Gubbard’s Home for Orphaned Children, and she wasn’t the only Talented child there. Two other kids were collected at the same time—an eight-year old Light Manipulator boy, and a ten-year old Higher Reasoning girl. The Operatives who had collected Penny wrote down on her intake form that she was a Light Manipulator, but once Penny arrived at school and was formally tested, she was declared a Higher Reasoning Talent. At first, I dismissed the original evaluation as a clerical error. Then I remembered when we’d been in the city for Festivis someone had made Ursula’s chair disappear. I’d thought that it was Cadence, but that didn’t really make sense since she was the only one there besides Erik who was really friends with the girl. I’d dismissed it, thinking that maybe Cadence had a devious side, but the fact that Penny had originally been classified as a Light Manipulator made me wonder if it hadn’t been her. I didn’t understand how Penny could be a Light Manipulator . . . unless she were a dual Talent. That theory didn’t feel right either, though, because there was no reason for her to hide being a dual Talent.

  This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  I explained that Erik’s imitation of my abilities and the whole Light Manipulator mistake on Penny’s intake form made me review all of the interactions I’d had with her since we’d met. I described how I always felt safe around her and had told her things that I wouldn’t otherwise talk about; how I’d never read her mind because every time I considered doing so something stopped me; how Erik told me that he had used my Talents on me and I didn’t know it. I thought maybe that was what Penny had been doing to keep me from reading her mind. And if that were the case, it left only one option: Penny was a Mimic.

  I shifted my position in the bed and took a deep breath before launching into an abridged version of how Erik frequently mimics my gifts and uses them on me. Mac and Janet exchanged knowing glances.

  “He doesn’t do it to get me to talk about, like . . . confidential things,” I said defensively. The last thing I wanted was for Erik to come under investigation.

  “I think we all know exactly what Mr. Kelley uses your manipulation for,” Mac assured me dryly. Janet gave me a sympathetic smile.

  “Right,” I stammered as heat rushed my cheeks.

  The way he said it left me no doubt that he’d been privy to my personal conversation with Erik. I obviously knew that he would be; I just didn’t think he’d be so bold as to mention it. I should’ve known better.

  I hurriedly started recounting how I’d realized that the chair incident at Festivis wasn’t the only time that Penny had mimicked someone else’s Talents in front of me. I told them about the water glass she’d caught at Captain Alvarez’s dinner, and how she’d saved me from a broken leg when I’d tripped over the baton. These incidents further solidified my belief that she was a Mimic.

  “When I confronted her in the Crypto Bank, she admitted that she was the reason that Crane knew I was coming,” I finished.

  “Did she say anything else?” Janet asked. “We weren’t able to salvage any of the security footage.”

  I looked guiltily at Mac. He’d said that I wasn’t in trouble for breaching protocol, but he hadn’t mentioned the destruction of property . . . millions of dollars’ worth of property.

  “It’s been taken care of,” he assured me, answering my unspoken question.

  I relaxed.

  “No, Janet. She just kept saying that TOXIC was bad, that’s all,” I lied easily.

  Mac looked unconvinced, but he didn’t press the issue.

  “I still don’t understand exactly how the low-level encryption plays into everything,” I said. “Did she plant it?”

  “Not exactly. The intel did originate from the Coalition, but the encoding was purposely crude so we’d be sure to decipher it. As far as I can glean, she arranged to have the communication sent when she would be working, so that her team would handle all of the intel for the mission. She knew that you still hadn’t been assigned your solo Hunt and banked on my sending you because of your specific Talents,” Mac explained.

  “But how did she know that the others wouldn’t say anything about the encryption?”

  “She could not have known for sure. I am assuming after spending so much time with Mr. Simmons, she knew how ambitious he was. Likewise she knew how weak Ms. Eisenhower was. As for the verification team, I can only assume that she got lucky. Of course, she was in classes with Ms. Howard, and as a Mimic, she might have realized how low level the girl’s abilities really are.” Mac gave me a pointed look. Apparently he’d figured that detail out on his own; so much for my promise to aid true love.

  “There is nothing to indicate that she knew Ms. Howard and Mr. Trindel would be working that evening, but she may have. It would not have been hard to know ahead of time which Crypto units would be on duty at School. Honestly though, Natalia, I may have done a few things differently, but I still would’ve sent you for him. The intel would have been scrutinized more closely and I would have sent an entire team, but TOXIC had not had an opportunity to go after Ian Crane like that in years. I would not have let the opportunity pass.”

  “I see,” I said. “What’s going to happen to her?”

  Erik had already told me, but Mac’s confirmation would make it real.

  “She will be executed,” Mac said bluntly.

  Apparently, he didn’t share Erik’s affinity for sparing my feelings. Then again, Mac probably didn’t think that I should care about her impending demise; he probably thought that I should be advocating performing the deed myself.

  “Right, of course. I figured,” I replied quietly. I bit my lip to keep the tears at bay. I didn’t want them to see me cry for Penny. Neither of them would understand.

  “You will need to be at the sentencing. Technically, you are her accuser, and it is protocol for the accuser to be present,” he continued.

  Man, I really, really hated protocol.

  “What about Erik? Are you going to let him be there as well?” I asked, practically begging Mac to do so.

  Mac studied me for several long moments before answering. “No, Natalia, I’m not. You may see him once all this unpleasant business is behind us.”

  I nodded, the urge to cry becoming harder to suppress. How was I going to face her without him by my side?

  “However, you may continue to speak with him on my communicator. And I do intend to grant his leave request so that he may come and stay here with you. There is one condition for that, though.” Mac paused, and I held my breath. I could usually handle conditions, and I’d do just about anything he asked if it meant that I could see Erik.

  “Sure. Anything.” I smiled tightly.

  “While the Cryptos might appreciate hearing about your and Mr. Kelley’s private affairs, I do not. In the future, it would be much appreciated if you kept your conversations less ...explicit.”

  The color returned to my face, the fire under my skin so intense that I thought spontaneous combustion a real possibility. Thankfully, Mac didn’t wait for my reply. He turned and motioned to Janet, and they left me alone with my humiliation.