Ivan looks alarmed and impressed at the same time.
“Okay, ballerina with rage issues,” Jax says. “Respect.”
“My turn?” Ivan asks, a little too eager.
“Obviously,” Jax says, leaning against the cart like he’s settling in for a good story.
Ivan clears his throat. “I… broke into the science lab.”
Jax perks up. “Nice. Why? Explosions? Secret formula? Mutant frogs?”
“No!” Ivan sputters. “I needed a chemical.”
“A chemical,” I repeat, already losing interest.
He pushes his glasses up. “Silver nitrate.”
We both stare at him.
“It reacts to light,” Ivan rushes on. “Leaves black marks if you’re careless. It’s used in photography and chemical pattern detection.”
“So… dangerous stuff?” Jax says, actually interested now.
“It’s science.”
“And why did you need it?” I ask, not really caring but feeling like I should contribute.
Ivan hesitates, then mumbles, “I’m testing a hypothesis. Silver nitrate shows what isn’t normally visible.”
He lifts his hand and I see that his fingertips are faintly stained black.
“It wasn’t supposed to get on my skin,” he confesses. “Mrs. Hagen said I wasn’t allowed to use it unsupervised, and she locked it up. So I, um… may have let myself in after hours.”
“You broke in because you couldn’t wait till morning for a school project?” Jax asks, like this is the best thing he’s heard all day.
“The reaction window was optimal,” Ivan retorts.
Jax bursts out laughing. “Nerd crime.”
Ivan glares. “It’s not a crime. It’s time-sensitive chemistry.”
Jax snorts. “Your fingers are literally black. That’s villain origin story stuff.”
“It fades,” Ivan mutters, though he doesn’t sound convinced.
I stare at his fingertips.
“And you?” I ask Jax. “Fighting?”
He shrugs one shoulder. “Technically, but it wasn’t my fault.”
“It never is,” I say.
“That guy threw the first punch,” Jax says. “I just threw the last three.”
“Three?” Ivan asks, swallowing hard.
Jax glances at me, then back at the shelf. “He said something he shouldn’t have.”
