Just a Phase [Worm]

The Unicorn · Oct 31, 2023

SlickRCBD said:
That said, it also wouldn't surprise me if the money for the clothes Taylor purchased along with the spending money she has comes out of her paychecks, along with any money she spends in the cafeteria.

"like" doesn't fit this sort of statement, but I do appreciate your post.

KingCrimson1081 said:
That isn't the case in this story since it was stated somewhere in the first few chapters that the PRT does provide funds for Wards they are the guardians of.

The point is, the PRT, acting as her guardians, can and in many cases are required to, act in ways which severely limit Taylor's ability to oppose them. If they want to keep control of her they could easily twist those to make that 100 times worse.

Since you know they are their legal guardians and are thus required to pay for things like food, clothes, and other essentials so them taking those funds from Taylor's paychecks would be very immoral and probably illegal since they would be doing it without informing Taylor.

The whole point of the guardianship is that Taylor is not competent to handle things herself and thus they are not required to inform her of any financial dealings they do in her name.
They are required to provide the basics, but they are also allowed to use Taylor's money to help support her. How much of that they're allowed to use and for what sort of function is the sort of thing that varies a lot not just between jurisdictions but also according to the details of the guardianship agreement made with the court and various other factors. In most cases it comes down to what the guardians can convince a judge is reasonable.

When, as in this case, the guardian(s) and the judge have significant ties outside the case, that can lead to the judge accepting some pretty ridiculous claims as reasonable.

KingCrimson1081 · Oct 31, 2023

The Unicorn said:
The point is, the PRT, acting as her guardians, can and in many cases are required to, act in ways which severely limit Taylor's ability to oppose them. If they want to keep control of her they could easily twist those to make that 100 times worse.

At which point Taylor decides to just fuck off because the trust fund is quite literally the only thing keeping her in the building, and if the PRT messes with it she is out of there and they can't stop her.

The Unicorn said:
The whole point of the guardianship is that Taylor is not competent to handle things herself and thus they are not required to inform her of any financial dealings they do in her name.
They are required to provide the basics, but they are also allowed to use Taylor's money to help support her. How much of that they're allowed to use and for what sort of function is the sort of thing that varies a lot not just between jurisdictions but also according to the details of the guardianship agreement made with the court and various other factors. In most cases it comes down to what the guardians can convince a judge is reasonable.

I wasn't talking about Taylor's trust I was talking about what she makes as Ward doing Ward things like the PR tours, and if she was a full Ward, patrols. Which is separate from the trust fund since it is the equivalent of a part time job, and from what I remember a parent or guardian can't just take their ward's paycheck. Plus if that was the case regarding Taylor's trust fund I imagine it would literally cause the Youth Guard to riot since it would be in their eyes the PRT attempting to prevent Taylor from having a life outside of their control by leaving her with far less money then she should have to support herself after her time as a Ward, forcing her to join up with the Protectorate instead of say pursuing a higher education with that money.

Nikas_Zekeval · Oct 31, 2023

The Unicorn said:
No, they have a responsibility as her legal guardians to take care of her, this includes many things including ensuring she doesn't waste her money, regardless of where she got it from.

Only if they take the nuclear option of unmasking "Ghost" as Taylor Hebert. I'm sure unmasking someone for cashing in a bounty will not have any negative repercussions what so ever.

Without that connection? Then the money isn't paid to Taylor, it's paid to Ghost. And legally they don't know Taylor has it. Thus no way to tie it up in a trust to say, keep her from using money "donated" by Ghost to hire a lawyer.

RogueInquisitor · Oct 31, 2023

Given Taylor's unique situation, what counts as "Ward duties" that they have to pay her for may be very different. I could see her argue that she is engaged in "Ward duties" 24/7, because she wouldn't be in Boston but for being required to by the Wards program. Literally anything she does in Boston, or at least in the PRT building, could be plausibly argued to count as time they have to pay her for, in her specific case.

Honestly, she might want to get more extravagant with her spending. She's already denying them any ability to profit from her (they can't advertise her, they can't make or sell any merch of her, etc.,) which means they can't recoup any money they spend on her. Even if they're willing to keep eating those costs, Taylor can keep racking them up out of pure spite.

The Unicorn · Oct 31, 2023

KingCrimson1081 said:
At which point Taylor decides to just fuck off because the trust fund is quite literally the only thing keeping her in the building, and if the PRT messes with it she is out of there and they can't stop her.

The money isn't what's holding her, she can runaway just fine without it, she just chooses not to.

Nikas_Zekeval said:
Only if they take the nuclear option of unmasking "Ghost" as Taylor Hebert.

I'm not following the logic here. We're talking about a scenerio where Taylor presents herself as having killed the S9, not any other identity. How does outing some other identity the PRT may or may not even know is connected to her relate to that?

libertinlary · Oct 31, 2023

The Unicorn said:
I'm not following the logic here. We're talking about a scenerio where Taylor presents herself as having killed the S9, not any other identity. How does outing some other identity the PRT may or may not even know is connected to her relate to that?

I was under the impression that she presented the killing of the S9 under her ghost identity

Psiidmon · Oct 31, 2023

Showing up as Taylor for cape matters such as gaining a S9 bounty would be ludicrous, break the 'only capes can fight capes' social engineering/staple of canon, and pointlessly give them ammo to use against her (playing fuck-fuck games with her payout)

The Unicorn · Oct 31, 2023

libertinlary said:
I was under the impression that she presented the killing of the S9 under her ghost identity

No, the whole point of that scene was she presented it as Taylor, that's where the whole trust-fund came from in the omake in the first place. If Ghost did it the entire discussion goes away - Ghost wouldn't be presenting the evidence to Armstrong, she'd probably get her money and leave before the director even heard about it.

Psiidmon said:
Showing up as Taylor for cape matters such as gaining a S9 bounty would be ludicrous

Which is why it only happened in an Omake.

FirstSelector · Nov 1, 2023

KingCrimson1081 said:
Taylor's pay situation

Being a Ward means she has a college fund independent of her hours worked, as well as a company card for certain essentials. Her by-the-hour Wards pay gets split -- some into the aforementioned trust fund, some into an account she can access.

There was a kerfuffle years ago about a Ward of the state who used his funds to buy a motorcycle, and so there is much more in the way of oversight for Wards' money than their well-being.

Ashley9469 · Nov 3, 2023

If you've legit saved it up then why not?

KingCrimson1081 · Nov 3, 2023

Ashley9469 said:
If you've legit saved it up then why not?

I think the issue was that the Ward used the company card to buy the motorcycle instesd of their own funds.

Ashley9469 · Nov 3, 2023

That is something that really should be specified in universe.

Easy enough edit at least.

KingCrimson1081 · Nov 3, 2023

Ashley9469 said:
That is something that really should be specified in universe.

Easy enough edit at least.

I imagine Taylor stumbled across the regulation and the reason behind it during her research into the rules surrounding the Wards, she did find the history behind the power testing rule after all. Plus I imagine Taylor could do something malicious compliance related with the regulation like say spending the maximum amount on the company card each quarter. The budget hates her but they can't stop her because she is still technically spending within her limits.

Prince Charon · Nov 4, 2023

KingCrimson1081 said:
I imagine Taylor stumbled across the regulation and the reason behind it during her research into the rules surrounding the Wards, she did find the history behind the power testing rule after all. Plus I imagine Taylor could do something malicious compliance related with the regulation like say spending the maximum amount on the company card each quarter. The budget hates her but they can't stop her because she is still technically spending within her limits.

To be safe (and also deeply frustrating for the other side), I think she'd go for something like 'one dollar below the maximum,' or 'one cent below,' but it's a good idea either way.

KingCrimson1081 · Nov 8, 2023

FirstSelector said:
Attempted murder, negligent school officials, failures of parenting… and an extremely dangerous Trump.

So I was looking through the latest interlude again and spotted this comment from Lisa about Taylor's situation. This is the first time someone other than Taylor referred to the locker as attempted murder, even Jim didn't outright state that Emma and Sophia's actions were a murder attempt. But what makes this so important is the fact that Lisa is an outsider looking in on the situation which is very telling about what the PRT is covering up, and while she may have an anti-PRT bias due to being a villainously leaning rogue it isn't any worse than the pro-PRT bias everyone else has. Probably only a minor bit of information I am looking too much into but it is interesting nonetheless.

SlickRCBD · Nov 9, 2023

KingCrimson1081 said:
So I was looking through the latest interlude again and spotted this comment from Lisa about Taylor's situation. This is the first time someone other than Taylor referred to the locker as attempted murder, even Jim didn't outright state that Emma and Sophia's actions were a murder attempt. But what makes this so important is the fact that Lisa is an outsider looking in on the situation which is very telling about what the PRT is covering up, and while she may have an anti-PRT bias due to being a villainously leaning rogue it isn't any worse than the pro-PRT bias everyone else has. Probably only a minor bit of information I am looking too much into but it is interesting nonetheless.

That's because any prosecutor would have a hard time getting an attempted murder charge to stick. The Trio weren't trying to kill her, they wanted Taylor to suffer and everyone knows it. They went a bit too far and didn't realize how dangerous what they did was, but it was not technically attempted murder.
They would be nailed for false imprisonment and assault, and mishandling/misuse of biohazardous materials, whatever the charges would be called.

Praetrunco · Nov 9, 2023

SlickRCBD said:
That's because any prosecutor would have a hard time getting an attempted murder charge to stick. The Trio weren't trying to kill her, they wanted Taylor to suffer and everyone knows it. They went a bit too far and didn't realize how dangerous what they did was, but it was not technically attempted murder.
They would be nailed for false imprisonment and assault, and mishandling/misuse of biohazardous materials, whatever the charges would be called.

Any reasonable person should understand that shoving someone into a thin metal box with toxic waste might carry the risk of killing them, considering the same can be said of pushing someone down when on concrete or asphalt. Ergo, attempted murder can actually apply.

KingCrimson1081 · Nov 9, 2023

SlickRCBD said:
That's because any prosecutor would have a hard time getting an attempted murder charge to stick. The Trio weren't trying to kill her, they wanted Taylor to suffer and everyone knows it. They went a bit too far and didn't realize how dangerous what they did was, but it was not technically attempted murder.

Well how would they know that they didn't intend to murder Taylor beyond their own statements? From Taylor's perspective she was jumped out of the blue by people who had been tormenting her for months, including acts of physical violence against her, and shoved into a very unsafe environment. For all Taylor knew at that moment they were planning on killing her and if the the court is taking the trio's statements then her own statements should have equal weight.

Plus it is as Praetrunco said their actions did potentially risk killing Taylor so attempted murder could still be argued.

MovingTarget · Nov 9, 2023

SlickRCBD said:
That's because any prosecutor would have a hard time getting an attempted murder charge to stick. The Trio weren't trying to kill her, they wanted Taylor to suffer and everyone knows it. They went a bit too far and didn't realize how dangerous what they did was, but it was not technically attempted murder.
They would be nailed for false imprisonment and assault, and mishandling/misuse of biohazardous materials, whatever the charges would be called.

They are both law enforcement so i assume they got "how to not kill someone when restraining them" training

The Unicorn · Nov 9, 2023

Praetrunco said:
Any reasonable person should understand that shoving someone into a thin metal box with toxic waste might carry the risk of killing them, considering the same can be said of pushing someone down when on concrete or asphalt. Ergo, attempted murder can actually apply.

First, no that does not make the act attempted murder. Possibly criminal negligence, or some other variation of negligence, but not attempted murder. That requires there be an actual attempt at murder.
Second, most people won't realize that "shoving someone into a thin metal box with toxic waste might carry the risk of killing them", partially that's because people are generally stupid and don't think things through, but mostly it's because the fandom greatly exaggerates the risk of death from the locker, as well as the toxicity of the waste Taylor's locker was stuffed with.

KingCrimson1081 · Nov 9, 2023

MovingTarget said:
They are both law enforcement so i assume they got "how to not kill someone when restraining them" training

Do you think Sophia would be the kind of person who would pay attention to that kind of training? Plus restraining someone in a space like the locker is definitely not something they would cover in that kind of training outside of capes with specific powers.

MovingTarget · Nov 9, 2023

KingCrimson1081 said:
Do you think Sophia would be the kind of person who would pay attention to that kind of training? Plus restraining someone in a space like the locker is definitely not something they would cover in that kind of training outside of capes with specific powers.

I assume they would cover positional asphyxiation and while i expect Sophia to not pay attention i expect the prosecutor not to care much.

KingCrimson1081 · Nov 9, 2023

MovingTarget said:
I assume they would cover positional asphyxiation and while i expect Sophia to not pay attention i expect the prosecutor not to care much.

Still though they didn't take any steps to ensure that Taylor didn't die in the locker so that could be thrown against them regardless.

Also minor nitpick the persecutor would be on Taylor's side in this scenario since she would be the one pressing charges.

The Unicorn said:
because the fandom greatly exaggerates the risk of death from the locker, as well as the toxicity of the waste Taylor's locker was stuffed with.

I think that mostly comes from the fact that they took things from the waste disposal in the girl's restrooms and considering how Winslow is usally discribed most people assume there must have been used needles in the locker when they shoved Taylor in which could have caused all sorts of problems.

Zernoc56 · Nov 9, 2023

FULL DISCLAIMER: I AM NOT A LAWYER, IM JUST A GUY WITH AN INTEREST IN LEGAL EAGLE VIDEOS AND SOME SKILL WITH GOOGLE!

While attempted murder might not stick well enough for a prosecutor to go for, they might swing for "reckless endangerment". If Taylor had actually died, upgrade to whatever charge would fall under "depraved-indifference murder" where an individual acts with a "depraved indifference" to human life and where such act results in a death, despite that individual not explicitly intending to kill. Whether it be charged under "wanton murder", second-degree murder, varying degrees of manslaughter, or third-degree murder, depends on the state. A prosecutor could definitely prove there was "malice aforethought" when Taylor was shoved into a locker full of medical waste and left there for hours. Honestly that level of preparation would probably qualify as premeditated, which may up the charges. Also taking into account that it's somewhat vague (at least to my mind) if Wards count as federal employees, depending on that answer may drag the US attorney for the jurisdiction into the fray, with accompanying federal charges and a national media circus to match. Full charges might include: False Imprisonment, multiple counts of Reckless Endangerment (as other students and faculty other than the victim were in danger), (possibly)attempted murder in the 2nd degree, something to the effect of 'assault with biomedical waste materials' (I couldn't google well enough to find a specific charge), Harassment, Violation of Probation, Conspiracy to commit a Violent Crime, and if they attempted to erase messages and be otherwise difficult in hindering the investigation- Obstruction of Justice.

All this theorizing on the legal clusterfuck Taylor's trigger would realistically be if anyone had shown any competence in their jobs, goes a long way to explaining why it was swept up under the rug *so damn hard*. It would be a landmark case at the state level for sure, and quite possibly at the federal level. Which would draw eyes from across the country to the absolute shithole that is Brockton Bay, where the local government barely has nominal control of a third of the city.

The Unicorn · Nov 10, 2023

MovingTarget said:
I assume they would cover positional asphyxiation and while i expect Sophia to not pay attention i expect the prosecutor not to care much.

First, I would not expect them to cover that both because Wards should never be in position where knowing about it is important, and because the Wards training under Piggot is very much sub-par.
Second, I doubt the sort of training a cop (or PRT trooper) would get on handling prisoners would cover anything about shoving people into a locker and weather or not there'd be a risk of asphyxiation there. Rather it would focus on the dangers or hobble or hogtie positions and how to securely handcuff someone in the field without risking them.
Third, I don't see why you think Taylor would be in danger of positional asphixiation when shoved in the locker. While I can see that being a possible risk if the locker was shorter than her and she needed to be forced to fold up to fit, that isn't the image I get from how quickly and easily she was shoved in the locker (not to mention lockers that you can fit a person into are mostly all higher than any person).

KingCrimson1081 said:
most people assume there must have been used needles in the locker when they shoved Taylor in which could have caused all sorts of problems.

This is the first I've heard that assumption, and I agree if there were used needles there Taylor would be at significant risk, but not as much risk as the trio dumping the stuff there in the first place.

KingCrimson1081 · Nov 10, 2023

The Unicorn said:
This is the first I've heard that assumption, and I agree if there were used needles there Taylor would be at significant risk, but not as much risk as the trio dumping the stuff there in the first place.

It's Winslow every discription we hear about it in canon and the fanon describes it as a gang infested shit hole so it really wouldn't surprise me if people just tossed their old needles in the bathroom trash.

SlickRCBD · Nov 10, 2023

Praetrunco said:
Any reasonable person should understand that shoving someone into a thin metal box with toxic waste might carry the risk of killing them, considering the same can be said of pushing someone down when on concrete or asphalt. Ergo, attempted murder can actually apply.

Special Ed teachers and aids (and most school staff) in NSSEO are trained (or were a decade ago) in "Crisis Prevention Intervention" aka CPI on how to restrain out of control kids and teens.
Part of that training is to literally push the kid down even if on concrete or asphalt. It is preferred to get the kid onto the grass, but if the kid is lashing out and trying to hurt somebody, taking them down so nobody else gets hurt is more important. The kid will probably get some scrapes, especially if it is summer and they are wearing short sleeves, shorts, or a skirt above ankle length (and possibly even ankle length), but that's all.
So, no, pushing somebody down on concrete or asphalt isn't necessarily attempted murder, it can actually be the opposite.

The Unicorn said:
First, I would not expect them to cover that both because Wards should never be in position where knowing about it is important, and because the Wards training under Piggot is very much sub-par.
Second, I doubt the sort of training a cop (or PRT trooper) would get on handling prisoners would cover anything about shoving people into a locker and weather or not there'd be a risk of asphyxiation there. Rather it would focus on the dangers or hobble or hogtie positions and how to securely handcuff someone in the field without risking them.
Third, I don't see why you think Taylor would be in danger of positional asphixiation when shoved in the locker. While I can see that being a possible risk if the locker was shorter than her and she needed to be forced to fold up to fit, that isn't the image I get from how quickly and easily she was shoved in the locker (not to mention lockers that you can fit a person into are mostly all higher than any person).

This is the first I've heard that assumption, and I agree if there were used needles there Taylor would be at significant risk, but not as much risk as the trio dumping the stuff there in the first place.

You forgot that they collected and set up that stuff before winter break, which is 2-4 weeks long depending on the district. So that crap had been festering and any bacteria or viruses had plenty of time to breed based on the blood.
Don't underestimate the danger of blood-born pathogens.
I a bit of training material before taking a temp job to upgrade/replace the workstation computers in a couple of hospitals, and it talked about the danger of blood born pathogens and the importance of using the bio-hazard disposal bin.
Taking used tampons, which are generally bloody out of the disposal bins and letting them fester would put Taylor at risk of many STDs if she got any in her mouth, eyes, or any of that crap soaked through her clothes and got to her vaginal region. What kind of STDs? Whatever the girls using those feminine hygiene products had.
I don't know what would survive and what would not after a couple weeks, but it would not be good or safe unless the trio took the effort to sterilize them first.

So, no, they aren't overestimating how dangerous it was, Taylor was probably put on a regimen of antibiotics and was lucky she didn't get AIDS or some other incurable STD from that incident.

Maybe it was scare tactics on the video about safety for working at the hospital, the way they exaggerate the risks of STDs, smoking, drinking, and some illegal drugs in high school to discourage risky behavior, but I do recall a video cautioning about blood and body fluid I had to watch and pass a quiz on before I could start replacing desktops with micro form-factor computers all over the hospital. Heck, some places I had to put on a "bunny suit" (NOT the Playboy kind. This is QQ so I thought I had to specify that) and many more I had gloves.

KingCrimson1081 · Nov 10, 2023

SlickRCBD said:
So, no, they aren't overestimating how dangerous it was, Taylor was probably put on a regimen of antibiotics and was lucky she didn't get AIDS or some other incurable STD from that incident.

That sounds like an idea for an omake actually since we don't know much about Taylor's hospital stay only that she was there when Miss Militia showed up to give the recruitment pitch. That and there wasn't much time between that and Taylor's first meeting with the ENE team so probably not long enough to get a blood test back and there was no mention of Panacea being called in to check. So it would be interesting if Armstrong and Gauss get word from the hospital about how Taylor contracted X STD and they now have to break it to her as if she didn't have enough reasons to hate the PRT.

The Unicorn · Nov 10, 2023

KingCrimson1081 said:
It's Winslow every discription we hear about it in canon and the fanon describes it as a gang infested shit hole so it really wouldn't surprise me if people just tossed their old needles in the bathroom trash.

Nope, in canon it is a very well maintained school, although one with a piss poor anti-bullying program.
All the depictions of Winslow as so terrible are fanon.

SlickRCBD said:
You forgot that they collected and set up that stuff before winter break, which is 2-4 weeks long depending on the district.

No, I didn't forget, in fact that's why I said the trio would have been in more danger than Taylor from any needles.
While BB is described as having mild winters, it will get well below freezing at night in an unheated building in late December/early January. That means that pretty much all blood borne pathogens would be dead before Taylor was exposed to the stuff. Her risk would be from getting the decomposition products and/or microbes in her, but given they'd progress fairly slowly at low temperatures the risk of that wouldn't be very high either.

KingCrimson1081 said:
So it would be interesting if Armstrong and Gauss get word from the hospital about how Taylor contracted X STD and they now have to break it to her as if she didn't have enough reasons to hate the PRT.

There are many medical issues tAylor could get because of the locker (although as noted the chances of them are much lower than fanon often depicts it as), but STDs are not among them. Even just a few hours at room temperature would kill most STD in a sample. The reason STD are called that is that they can't survive outside a human body for long.

Praetrunco · Nov 10, 2023

SlickRCBD said:
Special Ed teachers and aids (and most school staff) in NSSEO are trained (or were a decade ago) in "Crisis Prevention Intervention" aka CPI on how to restrain out of control kids and teens.
Part of that training is to literally push the kid down even if on concrete or asphalt. It is preferred to get the kid onto the grass, but if the kid is lashing out and trying to hurt somebody, taking them down so nobody else gets hurt is more important. The kid will probably get some scrapes, especially if it is summer and they are wearing short sleeves, shorts, or a skirt above ankle length (and possibly even ankle length), but that's all.
So, no, pushing somebody down on concrete or asphalt isn't necessarily attempted murder, it can actually be the opposite.

I guess that would be why there's that whole notion of self-defense, defense of a third party, lawful use of force by law enforcement or the military, et cetera.

Because measures to deal with difficult or enemy combatants isn't remotely the same as wanton violence.

Why, that could be why people training in combat styles aren't automatically charged and prosecuted for assault and battery.

Because basic logic.

The Unicorn said:
First, no that does not make the act attempted murder. Possibly criminal negligence, or some other variation of negligence, but not attempted murder. That requires there be an actual attempt at murder.
Second, most people won't realize that "shoving someone into a thin metal box with toxic waste might carry the risk of killing them", partially that's because people are generally stupid and don't think things through, but mostly it's because the fandom greatly exaggerates the risk of death from the locker, as well as the toxicity of the waste Taylor's locker was stuffed with.

That's funny, because I looked up what constitutes attempted murder (and sure, it might vary by state), but the few I looked at all stated that one such route by which the jury could judge one guilty of attempted murder was if the act they committed on someone was something a reasonable person could consider would carry a risk of killing the individual. Like I fucking said, verbatim.

Whether or not people think things through is irrelevant. Otherwise, picking up a loaded firearm and pointing it in someone's direction wouldn't ever qualify as attempted murder when their finger winds up pulling the trigger, because golly gee, they're stupid and how potentially lethal something is doesn't matter because they didn't think about it.

Given the rise of charging people with murder, and not those lesser offenses you listed when driving someone to suicide through bullying, even cyberbullying, one could contend your 'logic' is absolutely bereft of such on the whole, by nature of the fact that the suffering they intended is not a singular act.

The Unicorn said:
No, I didn't forget, in fact that's why I said the trio would have been in more danger than Taylor from any needles.

Yes, because they carried the bags of used products to her locker by hopping into them.

Your stance is categorically false and scientifically ignorant, for reasons I've already covered prior numerous times.

Just a Phase [Worm]

Well worn.

Experienced.

Know what you're doing yet?

Know what you're doing yet?

Well worn.

Making the rounds.

Versed in the lewd.

Well worn.

something else entirely

Getting sticky.

Experienced.

Getting sticky.

Experienced.

Just zis guy, you know?

Experienced.

none

Getting sticky.

Experienced.

Not too sore, are you?

Well worn.

Experienced.

Not too sore, are you?

Experienced.

Know what you're doing yet?

Well worn.

Experienced.

none

Experienced.

Well worn.

Getting sticky.

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