“Get it, Regent?” I asked him, “The bank robbery was a distraction for the local capes, so Coil could be sure to get away with taking the kid.  We played a part in that. We made that happen.”

Hoo boy.

The Protectorate proper out of town, the Wards fighting the Undersiders… not much resistance left against Coil. That’s why he needed them to do a job at such a precise time, too, without caring all that much what that job would entail.

Hell, maybe that’s why there were so many Wards there compared to what they were expecting – in an effort to distract as many of them as possible, Coil himself reported the ongoing robbery and played up the threat?

Damn, I’m not sure they should stay with Coil anymore.

I hugged my arms tighter against my body, “He’s keeping her strung out so she’ll cooperate, give him his numbers.”

“I don’t think-”

“Shut up,” I cut Regent off.  “Just shut up.  I- I can’t argue with you on this.  Please.”

Yeah, if Taylor’s right, this is extremely shitty.

He stopped.  I looked at the others.  Grue had his arms folded, and was standing very still.  Bitch just had her usual angry look.  Tattletale looked pale, even for the single lightbulb’s worth of light we had in the stairwell.  She wouldn’t meet my eyes.

Is that why she went pale? Because she suddenly Knew how the girl was being treated?

“You’d know if you watched the news,” I told Regent, “If you read the paper.  I hate that I have to explain this, when I don’t even want to think about it.  She’s the missing kid.  Remember our bank robbery?  How we were weren’t even front page news because an amber alert took priority?  That was her.  Dinah Alcott.”

Damn.

Well… at least we got a name, eh?

The revulsion and anger that was welling up in my chest and throat made me want to throw up, hit something, right there.  Some of that emotion, a lot of it, was directed at myself.  I looked to Tattletale, “Tell me I’m wrong.  Please?”

I… don’t think she can. Without lying, anyway.

She broke eye contact, which was answer enough.

Yeah.

“Coil?” Tattletale spoke.  She looked a little pale.

“Tattletale, do you know why the numbers would change?  Does your power tell you anything?”

She shook her head, started to speak, but was interrupted.

…?

“Then go,” he ordered her, ordered us.  “I will contact you later, and we will finish this conversation then.”

“I-”

Oh yeah, cutting off the person who knows stuff like this always turns out well. Sure.

“Please,” he stressed the word, “See yourselves out.  This situation, whatever it is, demands my attention.”

Good jorb, Coil.

By the way, I’m hoping we’re going to get a name for this girl. I’m getting sick of just calling her “the girl”, and bringing her up later would be awkward.

“The numbers are wrong, pet.”

She shook her head, raised her voice in a surprisingly sudden fit of anger, “No!  They’re right!  You just don’t want to give me any candy!”

Hehe.

Coil put a hand on her shoulder.  She pulled away, but he held her firm.  He had to raise her voice to be heard over her squeals, and he shook her just a little to be sure she was listening, “Last question, then you’ll get your candy, I promise.”

Better make it count, Coil – not sure that little accident with the last two questions is gonna make the Undersiders much more confident in your abilities.

She began to settle, and Coil was calmer when he spoke again, more like his usual, reasonable self, “Just give me the number, again, if I sent the Undersiders out to fight Kaiser, without giving them my help.  What percentage, that they come back intact?”

“Twelve point three one three three percent-”

Yep, there we go. This time he kept the terms the same as for the last two questions, and she answered accordingly.

Coil stood, swiftly.  He turned to the soldier that stood nearby, “Give her what she wants.”

The soldier guided the girl back through the door.

Coil muttered to himself, “There’s some anomaly at work, here.  The numbers can’t skew that much, that fast.  More than a thirty percent drop…”

It’s a simple case of having to be careful about exactly what you ask for.

I hugged my arms close to my body.  When I glanced at the girl, I caught her looking at me.  I looked away.

“Candy, now?”  She started to bite at her thumbnail.  Looking at her other hand, I saw her nails were bitten to the quick.

Hrm.

He moved her hand away from her mouth, “Four more questions, pet, then candy.  Tell me the numbers for the same situation, but if I sent the Travelers instead.”

“pet”? …not sure how to feel about that.

“Sixty point two one zero zero nine percent chance they all come back.  Forty-four point one seven four three percent chance but someone gets hurt or killed.”

So in other words, the Travelers would be better suited for this job. Makes sense, really. Sundancer’s power, for instance, would be a thousand times better against Kaiser himself than Skitter’s.

“Good girl,” he turned to look at us, “The Travelers are powerful, so it stands to reason their chances are higher.  But I’ve found that your group benefits more from a use of my power.

Interesting. So that means it’s not a constant +x p.p. boost to an outcome’s probability, but it can be represented in such a way, just with varying efficiency. Which also tells me that he can’t simply decide the outcome entirely – there is still room for failure.

As for why the Undersiders benefit more than the Travellers, maybe it’s that the Undersiders rely more on luck?

Pet, tell me the numbers for the same scenario, for both the Travelers and the Undersiders, but let’s say I was helping them in my usual manner.”

“That’s two questions.  Two teams, two questions.  No cheating.  I get really bad headaches when I try to get too many numbers.”

Yeah, I agree with the girl, this is two.

“Okay.  Answer those two, then there’s one more before you get your candy.  I just need to know the chances that the teams will come back intact.”

The girl nodded, a little too quickly and eagerly, “Those people there have a thirty-two point zero zero five eight three percent chance to come back with nobody dead or seriously hurt if you help them.  The Travelers have a forty-one point-”

Wait, did the numbers go down? Maybe it’s because she didn’t specify “nobody seriously hurt” in the last batches.

Which kind of messes up what Coil was trying to do here.

“No, stop,” Coil stopped her, “That doesn’t make any sense.  You gave me different numbers before.  Those numbers are lower than the ones they’d have if I didn’t help.”

“It’s the numbers in my head.”

When adjusting one variable to demonstrate the effect of that adjustment, you need to make sure the terms of the experiment and all other variables are the same. Coil’s mistake, as far as I can tell, was the word “intact”.