The Academy by Zachary Rawlins

to get her to violate the Agreement somehow, and thereby embarrass the Auditors.”
    Mitsuru could only look at the floor, her cheeks burning.
    “Don’t get so down, Mitzi,” Alistair said encouragingly. “If they chose you as a weak link to expose us, then they chose poorly. Unless I’m missing something important, we come out of this looking pretty good.”
    “He’s right, Mitsuru,” Rebecca said slowly. “So Audits looks good, and whoever put this together, assuming we’ve read this whole thing right, comes off pretty badly. For something that must have taken tremendous effort to orchestrate, it sure didn’t pay.”
    “Yeah. I’ve got to admit, I’m skeptical that’s the case.” Alistair leaned back in his chair, and put his sneakers up on one corner of the desk. “I think Gaul’s got it wrong. I think we have to assume that whatever happened, it all happened because the responsible party wanted it that way. I’m not seeing this whole thing as an operation gone wrong.”
    Rebecca looked at him doubtfully, but didn’t say anything.
    “Until I hear otherwise, I’m assuming that the same person was responsible for the whole thing. Mitsuru being ordered there, the Weir, the probability tampering, the kid deciding to take a walk in the park.” Alistair smiled thinly. “At this point, I’d be tempted to lay the JFK assassination at their doorstep, too.”
    “You don’t know that,” Rebecca objected, “this whole thing could have been the result of competing factions, pursuing different agendas…”
    “I don’t think that’s the case,” Alistair said, frowning and studying the chart. “I don’t see any sign of struggle or opposition, the manipulation looks blunt to me. The structure is haphazard, but it’s congruous – I think this is the work of a single party. Even if it is clumsy work.”
    “Of the major cartels, who has the resources for this kind of probability manipulation?”
    “The Black Sun,” Alistair said definitively, “Meier-Stoldt. Thule. North. Lao Xhin. I can’t think of anyone else, but there might be one or two others.”
    “Which one of them,” Rebecca asked, plowing onward while glaring at Alistair, “is it that you think is this clumsy? Which cartel has this kind of power, but uses it with all the grace of an untrained child?”
    “None,” Alistair admitted. “I don’t get it either, Becca, but it’s the only conclusion that makes any sense to me…”
    Rebecca pulled another cigarette from the pack on the desk, and lit up, apparently oblivious to Alistair’s disapproval. She drew on it with obvious satisfaction, and then blew smoke at the ceiling.
    “Maybe we’re coming at this from the wrong direction.” Rebecca said, turning to face them again, suddenly animated. “Why do you think it was that they wanted Mitsuru? What’s so special about her?”
    Mitsuru’s throat tightened, as if she’d done something to be ashamed of. It took an effort to make certain her response didn’t sound defensive.
    “What? What do you mean?”
    Alistair looked legitimately confused.
    “Well, look at the whole setup,” Rebecca said, leaning over the chart to point with her cigarette. “I see two clear points of intention – make sure the kid needs a rescue, and make sure you’re the one who does the rescuing. I heard about the catalyst thing.”
    Mitsuru looked at the bandages on her hand speculatively.
    “It was weird,” she said softly, “I’ve never felt anything like it. I don’t even know where I got the idea do to all those things, much less how I knew I could do them.”
    “Remind me to try it sometime,” Rebecca said dryly. “Anyway, we know why the kid is important, or at least we’ve got an idea why he’d be important to someone. But why was it so important that you be the one to save him, Mitsuru?”
    “Maybe his power as catalyst is limited,” Alistair speculated. “Maybe it had to be someone like Mitsuru…”
    “What?” Rebecca crowed.