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Max tightens his grip on my arm. Crimson appears at my other side. Heavy breathing comes from behind me and I look back to see Hugo Havoc making his way around the dead villains. “You will not take her,” he says. “And you will release President Might immediately.” Aurora’s jaw tightens. Hugo makes his way in front of me, stopping beside Max as they form a protective barrier around me. “You are outnumbered, Aurora. This is over.”
“Right about one thing, Havoc.” Aurora tosses something shaped like a metal poker chip into the air and catches it in her palm. “I am outnumbered. But this isn’t over.” Her thumb presses into the device and it emits a high-pitched whistle that, like a dog whistle, I only hear for a second before its frequency rises beyond my capability of hearing.
I expect something equally abhorrent to happen—like Hugo’s head to suddenly burst into flames or something, but his head remains exactly where it is … and so does every other part of his body. Max’s grip on my hand turns ice cold and his fingers stay in the same gripped position even after I pull and twist my arm trying to break free. Crimson doesn’t move either. In fact, no one moves.
A pained grunt escapes Hugo’s parted lips.
Aurora clacks across the fishbowl, stopping in front of Hugo. She rests her hands on the ledge and leans over to look at him. “Hugo Havoc. You worked thirty years in Pathology, yes?”
Another grunt.
“You have incredible resources in the pathology lab—DNA of every Hero. I believe it’s used for tracking Retrievals,” she says, glancing at me as if this explains everything. “Can you believe it?” I don’t answer and she turns back to Hugo. “So much information and yet it is so poorly secured. It’s as if anyone with a valid MOD can gain access.” She shakes her head, giving him a reproachful look. “Oh wait. That’s exactly how it is. And that’s what I did.”
She holds up the poker chip device. “Felix made me this handy tool. Just a press of a button and it inhibits the
movement of every Super programmed into it.”
“You used their DNA to freeze them?” I ask, trying to make sense of this new information.
“Oh stop your whining. They’re fine. They’re just a little—stuck—at the moment.” A small part in my mind warns me to fear her, but I’ve got a better plan. My wrist breaks when I pull it out of Max’s grip, but it heals as I step around my frozen bodyguards and face Aurora, woman to villain. “If you have the ability to paralyze everyone then why bother bringing an army of villains to fight them? Heroes died, you bitch.”
“You don’t think I needed that army, do you? I don’t need to employ Supers to fight your precious Hero Brigade. They wanted to come. They begged to come. I’m not the only one with an unresolved vendetta here.”
I motion to the gore surrounding me. “But you killed them.”
She rolls her eyes. “Of course I did. You can’t trust a villain!”
“You will pay for this,” I say. “But feel free to tell me what your freaking vendetta is before I kill you.”
“Uh uh uh,” she tuts with a wave of her finger. “Before I tell you, we are going to play a game.” She flourishes her hand in the air as if presenting Miss America. “A Hero Examination retake, if you will.”
Déjà vu sweeps over me. Again I wonder if this is all just an elaborate trick; a sick game where I am both the winner and the loser.
“Many members of the community are accusing you of being evil.” She frowns and touches a hand to her heart. “And you don’t believe you are evil, isn’t that right?”
I nod slowly. “I am not evil.”
“Oh but sweetheart, how can you know? How can you be really sure you aren’t evil when your twin is dead?” She smiles with her head tilted to the side, her silky silver hair swaying gently behind her. I find myself thinking, although this is the absolute worst time to be thinking at all, that she is strikingly beautiful when she smiles. Old age suits her. Too bad she’s an evil psycho.
I start to reply but she cuts me off. “You can’t know. No one knows. Not since the beginning of the Super race has anyone known which twin will be the evil one. But we do know one thing, don’t we?”
“What?”
She moves the controls on the fishbowl and it lowers to the ground. My heart races as she steps out of the bowl and onto the floor—the same floor that I’m standing on not ten feet away. Now is my chance to attack her.
But I can’t. I want to hear what she has to say. She’s found a way to freeze me like the others by using her words instead of a fancy DNA device. She laces her fingers together and in front of her body, leaving her completely vulnerable to an attack. She knows I won’t attack her. That really pisses me off.
“The only thing we know is that one twin will always turn evil. Every. Single. Time.”
“I’m not evil,” I repeat.
“Look at that dark hair. Look at the ruthless anger in your eyes, how quickly you lose control when something pisses you off. You killed a droid, am I right? And yet, why are you not depowered? What makes you so special that you get to live until the age of sixteen when you have a fifty percent chance and a whole hell of a lot of evidence pointing to you being evil?”
She puts her hand in the air and makes a come here motion behind her. “Why, Maci? Maci Might?” She bites off my last name as if it’s a curse word. Her head lowers, her voice going from bold to condescending with each word, “Because your daddy is president, that’s why.”
“Or because I’m not evil,” I snap, knowing all too well that my argument doesn’t hold water.
“Why don’t we ask the man himself?” The squeaking of wheels in dire need of grease signals the arrival of another villain, dressed in all black, her small feminine features cloaked in what looks like the hood of Death himself. She pulls a hospital gurney behind her. Metal ropes hold my father onto the rusty frame.
