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I need a plan. I take a deep breath. I need a plan, I suck as a Hero and I need a plan.
Tell me where you are and we’ll think of a plan.
It’s as if Evan is standing right next to me. I squeeze my fingers into a fist, reaching out to the only lifeline I have available. I’m in the Atrium. Aurora has my dad on the depowering machine. All the Heroes are frozen. My sister is alive. Where are you? Hurry ohgodwhatdoidoevan?
“You told me they left me for dead,” my twin says, her power somehow growing weaker as she talks. “You said you took me and raised me because they didn’t want me. Why won’t you look at me?”
Your sister is alive? That explains the dual life forces in your blood.
Enough with the nerd shit, my dad is about to be depowered. Where are you?
“I’m right here.” This time his voice really is over my shoulder. Like the twins that we are, my sister and I twist in unison to find Evan standing between us. He’s looking at me, but he hooks a thumb in her direction. “What the hell is that?”
My twin dawns a look of bitchface, which I think looks absolutely fitting on her. “I’m Nova,” she hisses. Without so much as a glance backward, she sprints across the room, leaving waves of power in her wake. My jaw hits the floor as she slams into Aurora—fist first, knocking her against the side of the machine but most importantly, removing her fingers off the command plate. “I can’t believe—” she grunts, pulling back her fist and punching her again. “—you were going to—” Punch, kick. “—let me die!”
Evan grabs my arm. “You need to save your dad. Quick, while she’s distracted.” The seriousness in his eyes startles me.
Three things happen at the same time. But my brain processes them in this order:
Evan kisses me. Full lip-on-lip, his hands in my hair, three-second smooch.
Aurora releases her power, sending Nova rocketing off her feet and crashing into the wall with a fatal-sounding crack.
The depowering machine groans to life as Dad’s body lurches feet first into the bright circle, Aurora smiling as she pants for breath with her hand pressed firmly to the command plate.
“Dad!” is what I think, but my screams drown out any form of discernible language coming from my mouth. Aurora’s laughter fills the air, followed by my father’s blood-curdling scream. His legs lift off the gurney, convulsing as blood splatters out from his toes, to the arches of his feet, up his ankles, and continues to climb up his legs as the machine moves. Strands of silver pull out of his body, sucking up into the machine at speeds barely noticeable even with my Super vision.
I’m stunned into a paralyzed stupor, but Evan springs into action. He holds up his hands, aiming at Aurora. The old hag flies into the wall exactly as I had when Evan used his juice on me. With a flick of his wrists, he zaps her again and again and again until she is just a bouncing blur in my peripheral vision as my feet finally move. I race to my father.
Dad’s face is frozen in an open-mouthed portrait of agony; there is no point in continuing to yell because his pain is far from over. Blood pours from his calves as his flesh rips open, allowing silvery veins to rip out and suck into the machine.
Jake’s words come back to me as I survey the machine, looking for some kind of button to shut off the power. Once the machine starts, you can’t stop it until a depowered body comes out the other end.
I throw myself onto his chest, digging my heels into the base of the machine. My arms hook under Dad’s shoulders and I pull him toward me. Powerful magnets and Super technology are no match for my muscles and lack of proper nutrition. His two-hundred-pound body would be no trouble to move under normal circumstances. But now, my teeth grind together as I throw all of my strength into trying to release him from the magnetic pull of the bright white circle that’s now encompassing his knees. My ankles lose circulation from how hard I push against the machine. Red fills my vision as capillary vessels in my eyes burst but I blink them away and pull harder.
It doesn’t work. He only moves closer into the machine, losing more of his powered veins as each torturous second unfolds. His eyes are closed, his mouth stretched open but with no sound coming out. With no strength left, I sag onto Dad’s chest as I gasp for breath.
“I’m sorry, Dad,” I cry as I try once more to pull on him, but my arms are limp. I’m all pulled out.
As I lay on Dad’s chest, his bloodshot eyes look right at me as tears streak down his cheeks and shudders of pain zap into him like mosquitoes hitting a bug zapper. His chin lowers onto my head in a comforting gesture that I know isn’t an involuntary jerk. My heart shatters into a thousand pieces. Even though my dad is being depowered, he’s trying to comfort me.
Blinking away tears mixed with blood, I see Evan take the poker-chip device from Aurora’s fingers, probably breaking them in the process. He presses a button without hesitating. Either he’s an electronic supe
r genius, or he had a hand in building this device. I’ll choose to believe the first one for now. A crackle of energy shoots through the room and the frozen Heroes return to life once more.
The chaos turns into louder chaos as everyone springs into action. At the same moment, a line of Retrievers enter from the double doors, hooks at the ready, faces in war mode. God, these guys are good. They don’t let their feelings get in the way; they don’t break down and cry like I do.
The weight of my faults hits me as I realize that all the things I did when pretending to be a Hero were only what I thought Heroes should do. Being a Hero is much more than kicking ass and taking names. It’s being strong when everyone else is weak. It’s knowing when to act and when to remain still. It’s being the kind of person that will instantly remove all fear from the civilians in the room, just by showing up.
That kind of relief falls over me now. The Heroes are here, the Retrievers are ready—Aurora will not make it out of this the victor. Everything is going to be just fine.
The machine reaches Dad’s thighs. Well, almost everything. His power veins are twice the size now, leaving gaping wounds an inch thick as they rip from his body. My stomach churns at either the sight of it or the overwhelming smell of iron and blood. I can’t stay here much longer. I will have to let him go. I’ll have to meet him on the other side, when he is a human.
My left hand pulls Dad’s head toward me as I hover over him. “Dad, look at me. Don’t focus on the pain, focus on me.” My words are intense and all strung together and tinged with panic, but he appears to understand them anyhow. Our eyes meet and I keep talking, hoping that even a second of distraction will take away some of his pain. “I love you, Dad. I’m sorry I screwed things up, I’m sorry I foiled the undercover plan and I’m sorry I didn’t listen to you and just go home when you told me to. I never meant for anything bad to happen—I, I truly thought I had things under control. I’m sorry, Dad. I’m sorry. Don’t look down! Don’t look! Just don’t think about it.”
My voice cracks as I talk faster, trying to stop him from lifting his head to look at the machine’s progress. He’s almost violent as he jerks his head harder toward the machine, as if he wants me to look at it too. “Stop looking at it!” I yell, pushing his head back down. “Close your eyes! Think of something else, Dad, please!”
His eyes look from me to the machine, from me to the machine. Panic and pain must have consumed him, despite how calm he stayed for the first part of the depowering. My sobs are uncontrollable now. Dad’s face, twisted in agony, relentlessly staring at the machine, will forever burn into my memory. You can’t unsee something so disturbing.
