The right buttons

“Well,” I said. “Being a thinker isn't all bad. As long as they can keep her from stabbing me, I might be able to make her a project.”

“A project?”

“Just how much can you change a person without them knowing just by pushing the right buttons.”

He stared at me.

“You can do that?”

“I'm not sure,” I said. “But I've got a pretty good ability to read people now, at least if I'm paying attention. A thinker with a similar power might be able to spoof that, but normal people should be pretty easy to deal with.”

***

Planner

***

“Is it?” I asked. “I could make you my friend if I thought you were worth the effort. Just telling you this would make it that much harder, but I could still do it.”

She stumbled back.

“Social thinkers are basically just slow Masters,” I said. “Heartbreaker can have you in a moment, and it might take me months if you were really stubborn, but I could do it, maybe just to fuck with Emma. Yanking away the only real friend that she has left...wouldn't that be a fitting revenge?”

“That's...”

“Something Emma would do? Yeah,” I said. “But the weird thing is that my power pretty much forces me to act like Emma sometimes. You've gotta break people down before you can build them back up after all. There was a time when I would have looked at all of this and told myself that I was better than all of this.”

***

She grabbed her shirt and stalked out of the locker room.

The really sad thing was that she respected me more for not being as strong as I'd wanted to be. I'd told her exactly what I was capable of doing, and in her mind I was full of crap. There was no way I'd be able to change her mind about anything, much less make her a better person, or at least a person who was better for me.

Challenge accepted.

***

Challenge

***

Sophia was going to be a long term project.

I was like a sore tooth, she simply couldn't help but keep poking at me, not just because I didn't fit into her twisted world view, but because she wanted to prove to herself that she was immune to my bullshit thinker powers. As far as she was concerned they were just smoke and mirrors, and she wanted to prove to herself that she was the one who was strong enough to fight.

I'd noticed the flinch when I'd talked about her mother protecting her sister. I suspected that these days it was probably true, but less so when Sophia was smaller. She'd likely be wondering why she hadn't been protected when her sister was. What was less worthwhile about her? It was possible that some of her obsession with dominance was a bit of little dog syndrome. Little dogs barked the loudest, because if they could convince the other dogs they were bigger than they were, it effectively became true. They were aggressive because they were always afraid.

Or maybe I was just buying into the old stereotype that bullies all had bad homes. Emma certainly hadn't, even if her parents had been overly permissive.

All I had to do was let her come to me, and I'd chip away at her. It'd give her time to think about the things I said, and give her time to stew over them. She had to believe that she was making her own conclusions or nothing I did was going to stick.

***

Helplessness

***

She didn't say anything, but I caught the look of interest in her eye. She was seriously considering running, and that wouldn't fit my plans at all. Ultimately, turning her would be an excellent, if petty revenge against Emma. She'd dropped me for a new friend. Having her new friend drop her for me would be ironic and it would be the kind of punishment that she deserved.

F ck Emma.

She wasn't really worth putting too much effort into, but I didn't want to let her off the hook either.

Also, I didn't want to move too quickly with Shadow Stalker, because that meant that I'd have to spend time with Shadow Stalker, and I had better things to do. It was a long term plan, but the fact that she hadn't tried to hit me was a good first step. She was already treating the others better too; everyone had noticed her change in attitude. It was all enlightened self interest, but I never would have called Sophia enlightened about anything, so it was actually an improvement.

***

Choose