NOVA FOLLOWED THE OTHERS into the elevator, still edgy over the whole experience before the Council. She was proud of herself for staying so calm during the proceedings, when every time she looked into their faces she thought of little Evie, she heard gunshots, she remembered all over again that these were the people who had promised to protect her family, and had failed.
“Well,” Oscar said brightly as the elevator doors shut behind them, “that could have been worse. They say probation—I hear vacation.”
“No kidding,” said Ruby, slumping against the wall. “I was worried they’d take us off street duty forever and force us to do, I don’t know, admin tasks or something.” She grimaced at Nova. “Sorry about that assignment, by the way. It sounds awful.”
Nova shrugged. “Boredom is my ultimate enemy. I like having something to keep busy with.”
Truthfully, she couldn’t imagine a better assignment. Entry into their arms database and computer systems? Irresistible. Anything that could speed up the process of uncovering new, useful information would be gratefully welcomed at this point.
Anything to get Leroy, Honey, and even on occasion Phobia out of “her” house. It hadn’t even been a day yet and already she was rife with anxiety, sure that some Renegade would decide to check up on their new recruit, only to find her home overrun with Anarchists.
Besides, they couldn’t avoid the tunnels forever, no matter how much they were enjoying daylight and plant life on their very own patch of land. Even if that patch of land was smaller than a sleeping bag and that plant life was nothing but nettles and dandelions.
Dandelions, she had heard Honey say that morning, were severely underrated.
The elevator plummeted back down to the ground floor and they spilled out into the lobby.
“Lunch, anyone?” said Oscar. “It’s taco day in the cafeteria.”
“I’m going to visit Max,” said Adrian, glancing up toward the sky bridge. “I’m sure he’s been watching news stories about the library all night.”
Nova’s pulse jumped. Though her focus had been caught up in the Sentinel lately, she remained intensely curious about Max. The Bandit. She still knew so little about him, his abilities, or why he was stuck in that quarantine. “Can I come too?”
Adrian looked at her, surprised—but, pleasantly, she thought. “Sure, if you want.”
When they arrived outside the quarantine, Max was smashing a hammer into the rooftop of the Cloven Cross Library. Pieces of glass were scattering around his knees but if he was worried about cutting himself, it wasn’t apparent. He was, at least, wearing protective goggles as he decimated the model.
Adrian knocked at the window.
When Max showed no sign of having heard him, he knocked louder.
Max startled and looked over his shoulder, pushing the goggles up on top of his moppy hair. He grinned, and there was something so bizarre about seeing that bright smile, coupled with the goggles, the hammer, and a demolished library that Nova couldn’t keep back a laugh.
“That’s looking really good,” said Adrian, twirling one finger in the direction of the library. “But more destruction on the east side. That wall is pretty much gone.”
“I wasn’t done yet,” said Max, a bit stubbornly. Standing, he crossed his arms and surveyed the city around him. “I was thinking, now that the Detonator’s active again, I’m probably going to be doing a lot of restructuring in the next few weeks.”
“Hopefully not,” said Adrian, frowning. “We’re aiming for less overall destruction, not more.”
“Speaking of restructuring,” said Nova, walking a few feet along the glass wall to get a better view of the Merchant district, “would you mind if I offered a few suggestions? You seem very concerned about accuracy.”
Max straightened, almost giddily. “Yeah, anything.”
She pressed her finger against the glass. “See that row of town houses you have on Mission Street? It’s actually one block up, on Stockton.”
Max stepped over a few blocks and pointed. “These ones?”
“Yep.”
Adrian cocked his head. “Are you sure?”
“Positive. I’ve spent a lot of hours just … walking. I know the city pretty well.”
“But then what goes on Mission?” asked Max.
“Two-story commercial buildings. There are stores on the ground floor, maybe offices on the second, although I guess some of them could be apartments. There used to be a boarded-up real estate office on the corner, and when I was a kid there was a pharmacy, but I don’t know if it’s still there.”
“Hold on,” said Max. “I’m going to get something to write this down.”
He disappeared into his back rooms and Nova realized after a moment that Adrian was watching her.
“You used to live around there?” he asked.
“When I was really little. My family had an apartment a few blocks away. Why?”
He looked away, shrugging. “My mom used to patrol that area a lot. It was kind of her … route, I guess.”
Nova started. “Your mom?”
Adrian gave her a look, at first surprised, then amused. Leaning toward her, he fake-whispered, “I’m not actually related to the Captain and the Dread Warden, you know.”
She rolled her eyes. “Obviously. I know who Lady—”
“Okay, say that again,” said Max, skipping past the marina. “Two-stories, real estate office, pharmacy questionable. Now, is that on this corner?”
Nova shook her jumbled thoughts away. “Um. Yeah. Wait—no, that one, across the street. Yeah, that one. If it’s still there.”
“Could you find out for me?” Max said.
His gaze was so hopeful that Nova had no choice but to shrug. “Sure?”
“Nova’s really busy,” Adrian interjected. “She was just given a new assignment from the armory.”
Max scowled at him. “Then maybe you can find out. What are you doing today that’s so important?”
Adrian glared back.
“We’ll find out,” said Nova. “Just give us a few days. Also, our trip to Council Hall this morning gave me an idea.” She jutted her chin toward the model of Renegades Headquarters, its surreal tower rising above the rest of the skyline. “How would you like to have functioning elevators on the headquarters tower?”
Max went still. “What do you mean?”
“It’s simple. I made one for my dollhouse when I was a kid. I mean, this will require some more materials, but the principle is the same.” She ticked off on her fingers. “We’ll need some syringes and a long tube, and Adrian will have to redraw the elevators in a way I can connect them to the new hydraulic lift. I’ll sketch up a plan to show you what I mean.”
Max turned his excited attention toward Adrian. “You’ll do it?”
“Sure, of course,” said Adrian with a surprised laugh, and the smile he gave Nova—a little intrigued, a little grateful—brought unexpected warmth to her cheeks. “Am I drawing up the syringes and tubing, too, Miss Engineer?”
“Absolutely not,” said Nova, feigning disgust. “The whole point of this experiment is to show how normal, everyday objects can, through the power of physics, be turned into something really cool. That point gets missed when you just”—she waved toward Adrian’s hands—“conjure whatever you need.”
He nodded seriously, though his eyes were still shining behind the thick frames of his glasses. “Right. Because I could, in theory, just redraw the elevators to make them functional. You know … by magic.”
Nova pointed a finger toward his nose. “My science trumps your magic. You’ll see.”
“I can’t wait,” said Adrian.
“The technicians have syringes.”
She glanced toward Max, who had made his way over so he was standing just on the other side of the glass.
“Lots of them,” he added, and Nova couldn’t keep her eyes from darting to the bruises on the inside of his arms.
“Right,” she said. “That’ll work. I bet they have rolls of tubing lying around somewhere too. Maybe Adrian and I can go in and … talk to them? See if they’ll let us borrow some stuff?” And look around while we’re there …
But Adrian shook his head. “Even I don’t have clearance to go inside those labs. But I bet if Max made them a list, they’d bring it to him.”
Nova’s shoulders sank, but only briefly as she saw another opening. Her brow furrowed as she turned back to Max. “They try really hard to keep you happy in here, don’t they?”
Just like that, she saw his enthusiasm deflate, and Nova had the distinct impression that he tried to forget that he was trapped in there as much as possible.
“Sorry,” she said. “It’s just … what are they doing to you? What are all the blood samples for?”
Max looked down at the needle wounds in his arm, stretching the skin to inspect them, as if this was the first time he’d paid them much attention. “Blood samples, tissue samples, bone-marrow samples…”
“Exactly,” said Nova.
But when Max looked up, it wasn’t at her, but at Adrian, his expression slightly pleading. For his part, Adrian’s smile had disappeared, overshadowed by a furrowed brow and tight lips.
“Oh, right,” said Nova. “I don’t have the clearance for that information.”
“It’s really important, what they’re doing,” said Max, and Nova wondered if he was trying to convince her, or himself. “They think they’re on the verge of a breakthrough, even. It’s going to change prodigy relations forever.”
“Prodigy relations?”
Max flushed. “That’s what they keep saying.”
“What does that mean?”
Adrian cleared his throat.
Nova glared at him. “Top secret?”
He opened his palms apologetically. “We don’t make the rules.”
No, she thought wryly. Your family does.
But she tried to smile as if she understood. “Am I allowed to ask where your parents are?”
“They’re dead,” said Max, without a beat of hesitation or an ounce of sorrow.
“Oh,” stammered Nova. “I’m … I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be,” said Max. “They threw me off Sentry Bridge when I was two weeks old.”
Nova’s heart jolted and she stared, speechless, as Max casually stooped and shuffled around a few of the glass boats tied to the docks at his feet.
“They were afraid of prodigies?” she breathed, thinking of what Adrian had said about the prodigy children who were so often abandoned by their superstitious parents.
But Max shook his head. “They were prodigies. Villains. Members of the Roaches.”
The Roaches. The same gang that had ordered the death of her family.
“But then … why?”
Max glanced up at Adrian and again she could see the hesitation as the conversation crept too close to confidential territory. She followed the look and saw that Adrian’s shoulders were tense, his jaw clenched, his anger toward two villains who would so heartlessly murder their own child quickly surfacing.
“I was dangerous to them,” said Max, speaking slowly. “And the rest of the gang too. They knew they’d be better off without me.”
“How did you survive?”
“Captain Chromium and the Dread Warden saw it happen. The Captain dived in and rescued me, while the Dread Warden went after them. They got away, but … I figure they probably died in the Battle for Gatlon.”
Nova’s fists clenched. “They would have been dead before then.”
Max looked up, surprised, and she felt Adrian’s head swivel toward her, too, and immediately her brain started scouring for truths and lies and she found herself picking through her words as tentatively as Max had been. Perhaps, she thought, it was unfair to begrudge him his secrets when she was constantly tiptoeing around her own.
“All the Roaches were killed a few months before the battle. The whole gang was slaughtered.” She glanced at Adrian. “Didn’t the Renegades know that?”
He frowned, shaking his head.
“Oh. Well … they say Ace…” She cleared her throat. “Ace Anarchy himself did it. Supposedly, there was a … a dispute of some sort. Between the two gangs.”
A dispute. Like the Roaches murdering Ace’s brother and his family.
“Huh,” said Adrian, scratching behind his ear. “That explains why the Roaches were so quiet those last few months.”
Nova glanced from Max to Adrian and back. “So, the Captain rescued you and, what, did they adopt you too? Are you two, like, brothers?”
Adrian’s smile started to return, and the sight of it made something unwind in Nova’s chest. “Something like that.”
“I always had to be kept separate from the others, though,” said Max. “Captain Chromium is the only one who’s immune to me. When they started construction on headquarters, here, they designed these rooms for me, specifically. They wanted me to feel like I was still a part of the Renegades, still in the middle of everything, even if … you know. I’m not really.”
“Captain Chromium,” Nova mused, trying to keep the scorn from her tone. Always with the invincible Captain. “And the suits they have to wear to get close to you?” she said, nodding toward the chamber outside the quarantine.
“They were decontamination suits,” said Adrian, “but they’ve been retrofitted with chromium in the lining and around the edges. It allows people to get close for a little while, but his power will still affect them eventually.”
Nova’s lip curled. It seemed that whatever Max could do wasn’t fatal, otherwise his parents couldn’t have transported him all the way to the bridge. But then, what was everyone so afraid of? “I really wish you could just tell me what it is you do.”
“Someday,” said Adrian. “It’s not personal. Most people here don’t know. Not that we don’t think we can trust our own Renegades or anything, but the Council is afraid that if too many people knew, it could leak out, and … there are a lot of people who would want to kidnap Max.”
“Or kill me,” Max added, calmly as giving a weather report.
“Okay,” said Nova, “I won’t pry anymore.”
She only sort of meant it. They had given her more information than they probably realized—at least enough to start formulating some theories, and she hoped that once she had access to the Renegade databases she would be able to learn a lot more. “So now I know what became of your parents…” She glanced at Adrian. “What about your mom? Did Lady Indomitable die in the battle?”
He shook his head. “Before. They received a tip that one of the villains was planning a retaliation murder, because some guy had been selling out their secrets. Mom volunteered to go stop it. But the next day, she was found in an alley…” His jaw twitched. “She’d fallen from the rooftop. Or, maybe she was pushed. The thing is, falling off a building shouldn’t have killed her, because…”
“She could fly,” said Nova, thinking of those photographs she’d seen of the original six. Lady Indomitable had been beautiful and strong, twists of black hair framing her face and that smile like a constant toothpaste advertisement. She and the Dread Warden were the only members of the vigilante group to wear capes, and in every picture of her she seemed to be levitating a few feet off the ground while the golden material flapped behind her.
“No one saw it happen,” said Adrian, “and no one knows which villain was responsible for killing her, or how they did it. How they could have disabled her long enough to…” He trailed off, and he didn’t have to finish.
How does a prodigy who can fly fall off a building?
“What about your dad?” she said. “I mean, your biological dad. Don’t tell me he was a superhero too.”
He chuckled. “I don’t think so. She told me he was some guy she rescued when a shoe factory collapsed. She flew him to safety, they were both pumped up on adrenaline, one thing led to another … honestly, at that point I told her to skip to the end of the story, ’cause I was five, and ew.” He shuddered and Nova couldn’t help but laugh. “Anyway, they tried going on a few dates after that but he couldn’t handle the pressure of dating a superhero, so it ended before she even realized she was pregnant.”
Nova leaned her shoulder against the glass wall. Inside the quarantine, Max had seemingly grown bored of the conversation and was rearranging the buildings she’d pointed out to him earlier.
“Do you think you’ll ever try to find him?”
“Naw. If he couldn’t handle a superhero girlfriend, I doubt he could handle a superhero son. Besides, it was big news when my mom had me. I’m sure he would have heard about it, and later when the adoption happened. If he’d had any interest in being a parent, he had plenty of opportunities to introduce himself.” He was frowning sardonically as he said it, but the look was short-lived as he turned his attention back to her. “What did your uncle think when you got home last night?”
The hair prickled on the back of her neck.
“My uncle?” she squeaked.
He nodded. “We get a lot of pushback from family members, especially during a recruit’s first few weeks in the field, once they start to realize what a dangerous job it is. And yesterday was even more dangerous than usual.” He seemed to be looking right into her and Nova felt all her old paranoia rearing back to the surface of her thoughts. “But we have a really great outreach team that’s always happy to get involved, if you need their help. Someone could give your uncle a call, or he’s welcome to come into headquarters and get a better sense of what we do. Sometimes that goes a long way in helping them feel more secure.”
“An outreach team,” said Nova. “To talk to my uncle.”
“Only if you want them to.” That little wrinkle formed over his nose again. “Did he say anything to you? Try to talk you out of coming back? We hear that a lot.”
He seemed truly, legitimately concerned, and Nova felt a laugh burble up and catch in her throat. That hysterical, disbelieving guffaw soon turned to actual choking.
Nova turned away, coughing and pressing a hand to her chest, squeezing her eyes shut as they started to water. She felt a hand on her back, placed gently between her shoulder blades, and she shivered so hard at the touch that Adrian pulled his hand away. Even as she cleared her throat and tried to bring her breaths back to normal, she felt the sting of disappointment that the touch, concerned and innocent as it might have been, hadn’t lasted just a little bit longer.
Swallowing around her scratchy throat, she looked back at Adrian, still smiling with faint amusement.
“Um, no,” she finally said. “My uncle really isn’t that worried about me. But again…” She gestured vaguely at herself. “I’ve been training for this my whole life, so I think he knows there’s no talking me out of it.”
Adrian nodded in understanding. “Well, if he does start to have concerns, just let me know. We don’t ever want anyone to feel like they’re torn between the Renegades and their family.”
Her lips stretched out again, and she knew he must think she was crazy, but she couldn’t disguise how hilarious she found this entire conversation. “No,” she said. “That would be awful.”
“Hey, Sketch.”
They turned and the sight of Magpie, the young thief from the parade, was fast to douse Nova’s grin. The girl was stomping across the sky bridge, a deep scowl on her face making her look far older than she probably was. Or at least like a kid who wanted people to think she was older, but couldn’t quite pull it off.
“Magpie!” said Adrian, and Nova could tell he was intentionally effusing his voice with joy and brightness, perhaps in an effort to balance out the cloud of pessimism that hung over the girl. “Been making good choices lately?”
She ignored the question, coming to a stop a few feet away and holding an official-looking manila folder out to him. “Council’s got me on messenger duty this week,” she said, sounding like this was an unspeakable punishment.
“Oh, good,” said Adrian. “That’ll keep you out of trouble for a while.” He held up the envelope. “Excellent delivery. I’ll be sure to let them know you are surpassing all expectations. Keep up the good work.”
She let out a dismayed groan, shot one bitter glance at Nova, then turned and stalked back toward the elevators. Nova couldn’t help checking the security of her bracelet as she walked away.
“She’d make a decent villain,” she murmured.
“Let’s not mention it,” said Adrian, ripping into the envelope. “Just in case it hasn’t occurred to her yet, I don’t want to be the one to put the idea in her head.”
Nova watched his hands as he tugged out a single sheet of white paper. At the top was printed a large R in red foil. “Does the Council not believe in sending messages through the communicator bands like the normal folk?”
Adrian shook his head, eyes scanning the letter. “Everything that goes over the system is subject to review and inspection. Evidently”—the corner of his mouth lifted as he met her gaze—“they don’t want the whole organization to know they’ve approved our request to talk to the Puppeteer.”