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“What’s going on?” Dad’s voice booms through the room, making all of us jump. Screw his off day. Right now he looks and sounds exactly like the man I remember. “Since when can you determine if power is good or evil?”
Evan’s eyes go wide and I grab his arm to calm him. “I don’t know if it’s one hundred percent conclusive,” he begins, looking at his hands. “Well, no. It is. Max is right. I figured it out.”
Dad looks at me. “When?”
Evan hesitates and I squeeze his arm. “You can tell him. He’s my dad.” He gives me this look that says it’s your funeral. “A few days ago, Hugo Havoc and some of the other elders assigned me the task of determining if Super blood has evil or good coding in it. Only...well I was already secretly researching it myself. I tested it on Maci when she was on lockdown at my lab.”
Dad’s mouth opens and then closes. Maybe it’s the lack of power, or the jeans and t-shirt instead of his Hero suit, but right now my father looks like a little kid. “Don’t look so scared, Dad,” I say. “Yeah, I’m evil. But we already knew that. It doesn’t mean anything.”
Dad swallows. “That’s not what’s worrying me right now.” He stares at his arm, flexing and twisting his depowered limbs.
“What is it?” Max asks.
“Villains are selling Super power as a drug to humans. Power doesn’t grow like pot leaves and it’s not created in a lab. They’re selling power which means they’re getting it from somewhere. And Evan just said it didn’t all come from a villain.”
The gears in Max’s head turn. “Well there’s not exactly mobile blood bank vans that go around asking Supers to donate power.”
Nova raises her hand. We all turn to look at her. “The depowering machine?”
It takes everything in me not to repeat her words all high-pitched while shaking my head, sticking out my tongue and blowing a raspberry at the end. Of course she would think of the depowering machine first. Of course she would.
“It did take your power and some of mine,” I say to Dad, ignoring my know-it-all of a sister. “That would explain why the power is mostly good. What happens to the power after it’s taken?”
“It’s incinerated.” Dad’s eyebrows knit together. “Of course, that usually happens in the machine’s room down in the medical ward. It’s connected to piping that incinerates everything it takes out. But Aurora uprooted the machine and put it in the Atrium for her little stunt.”
I get chills at how casually he speaks of losing his power.
“So the bitch rigged the machine to keep the power and now they’re selling it.”
“Don’t--” Dad begins before waving his hand toward Max. “Never mind. You’re old enough to curse.” He lets out a snort of laughter. “I can’t believe I still think of you as kids.”
Nova smiles and wraps her arms around Dad’s shoulders. He hugs her back, patting her arm in that fatherly way. As if she were always a part of this family and not a newcomer who doesn’t quite fit in yet.
Of course I might be the only person who hasn’t accepted her completely into the family. And I don’t even care how ironic it is that I’m the one who brought her here.
“We need to find who’s currently in charge of the depowering machine and where they put it after they cleaned out the Atrium. Max and I can pull all the security footage and see who handled the machine. Somewhere along the way, someone stole the power from it. We’ll find out who.”
I grind my fist into my palm. “And we’ll make them pay.”
Max shakes his head. “You should let me handle this, Mace. It’s a villain matter and I don’t want you to violate your probation.”
“What? No! I have to do this.” My lungs are tight as I struggle to breathe. “The power they got came from my arm, too. That’s my power they’re selling to humans. I’m responsible for their deaths. Dad, back me up.”
Dad sighs. He’s been doing that a lot lately. He runs his hand over his face. “Central has always been a transparent government. We don’t operate like the humans do, keeping secrets from our citizens and stretching the truth. But everything I’ve stood for has gone to hell in just a few weeks. I’m harboring a wanted villain who is the daughter I had thought was dead, my other daughter has evil DNA and we haven’t told anyone, I’m willingly allowing Evan to lie about his research.” His hands fly up in the air in a gesture of defeat. “I don’t know, guys. I just don’t know.”
“I’ve got this, Dad.” Max stands to his full height which fills the room with his immense presence. Even Evan seems to shrink back under my brother’s sheer intimidation. “I’ll investigate the depowering machine and find a list of all people who have access to it. And I promise you, Maci, I’ll report everything I find back to you. Don’t give me that look!”
I fold my arms over my chest, clenching my teeth together as I glare at my brother to the fullest intensity.
“I’m coming with you,” I say.
“No.”
Dad speaks up. “I trust Maci to handle this herself but I also trust the examiners to uphold their contract. It isn’t worth it, Maci. You will let Max handle this situation.”
I know he’s right but that doesn’t stop my guttural groan of disappointment. At least this time I don’t punch anything.
In the three days that follow, I am called to stop sixteen drug-induced human fights. Eight humans were already dead by the time I arrived on the scene and two more died at local hospitals. The humans have done a decent job of keeping these incidents out of the media but the popularity of these fights haven’t diminished in the slightest.
