"Lorica's reports indicate that you have nonlethal options. Why were you using lethal ones?"

"It was an accident. I was—planning on going after Mincemeat, and was prepping for it, and used the wrong thing, and it was reckless and silly and thoughtless and stupid and—" They shut themself up, but can't quite bring themself to look at the Director. They killed someone, even if it was an accident they did, they did, it's another person in their conscience and they really need to stop thinking about it or they'll start hyperventilating and none of it is enough, it'll never be enough, they're dead, they're both dead—

"What motivated you to take up vigilante work to begin with?" asks Piggot, frowning.

A question to focus on, yes, good, that they can deal with. They look at her. "A desire to use my powers to help people."

"And yet you didn't join the Wards until after your lack of discipline claimed a life."

Sigh. "I was thinking about it. Thinking about my options, pondering what I wanted to do. I—I was between New Wave and Wards, before this happened."

"New Wave is a family organization."

"That's not part of their stated mission."

"Beside the point," says Piggot, shaking her head. "I hope this is the only wake-up call you need to get your head on straight, Glam. I consider you a probationary member. I advise you to be rehabilitated. Am I making myself understood?"

"...not really? I'm not sure what-all that entails. I mean, wake up call, yes, obviously, and probationary, sure, makes sense, but what are the actual practical consequences of this and what does rehabilitation look like, day-to-day?"

"I'm so glad you asked," says Piggot. "It means that you do not contravene the authority of your captain, the sworn-in adult heroes, me, or any of the other staff who are here to make you an effective hero and not a well-entertained vigilante. It means you will not indulge your smart mouth nor will you threaten standard humans with power use as you so unwisely did with Ms Yates. You will not, to summarize, insert your judgment, which is demonstrated to be inadequate, where you are not absolutely obliged to make a call on your own. You are here to learn and to make up for some part of what you did, not to play around or get your way all the time."

"Ms. Yates felt threatened, and her description of the conversation is very different from yours, and whatever you think of her conduct is thoroughly irrelevant unless she crosses an actual line. She has many skills which make her an unusually good instance of a Branding employee, she has continued to work here despite repeated ill treatment by heroes who think they're hot stuff, and she deserves your respect, not casual attempts to make everything about what you want and how you want conversations to go. As for your gender, you can have whatever gender you want. Claim to be a sexless robot if you like. That is unrelated to whether you are entitled to inconvenience not only your teammates, who might if you're charismatic enough indulge you, but also people who are not here to be your friends at all. You are not so entitled."

"I want you to offer a written apology to Ms. Yates," says Piggot. "Why the concept of respect for authority figures is tripping you up so badly I would dearly like to know. Do you act any differently with your teachers? With whoever's been taking care of you since your parents' deaths?"

"I will gladly write the written apology to Ms. Yates, though I would like guidance on what I'd need to apologize for. Like I said, I do not have any recollections of having been disrespectful, and an example of a specific way in which I was would go a long way toward ensuring incidents like this do not happen again. My teachers tend to like me, and no one other than myself has been taking care of me for a while."

"You will be apologizing for speaking carelessly and selfishly and for not regarding her as an authority in her subject," says Piggot.

"Okay, I can do that, though that doesn't actually let me make any changes to my behavior. Am I supposed to be—more deferential? To not express preferences? To accept every idea and not question them or try to understand them?"

"You aren't negotiating from a position of strength. Deferring to others would be a smart move. If you want your costume to be a certain color, Ms. Yates can probably accommodate that. Before you'd met her she complimented you on your choice of cape name, for that matter. But you don't get to unilaterally decide that certain things are your way or the highway. And if your idea of understanding can only come in the form of impertinent questions, and you can't think of any better ways to go about it... postpone it."

Pause. "Okay. Um. So I can't have anything I won't budge on a priori, even if in the end it turns out that I didn't have to budge?"

"There are of course what I would normally call common-sense rules about conduct and the abuse of power, and if any of the authorities in your life oversteps those bounds you can go to any of the others to have that addressed."

"And... gender isn't one of those? She could present a boy cape as a girl cape, for example?"

"Ordinary genders are well within the normal range of cape prerogative on costumery and presentation. This thing you are doing is not. Ms. Yates is entirely correct to insist on an apolitical stance. You wouldn't be the first with some personal identity frippery that has to be dispensed with for the public eye. Do you think there are no gay superheroes, none who feel strongly about religion, none who could if invited argue for hours about hot-button issues that would have half the country up in arms over whether their favorite agreed with them too? You aren't special. I don't care which you pick, but if you don't pick, you're staying inside or Ms. Yates will pick for you."

Piggot smiles thinly. "Can you be seen in two places at once?"