“Dangerous,” said Ruby, at the same time Oscar supplied, “Valuable.”
Nova cocked her head in confusion, but before anyone could elaborate, she heard a large clunk and hiss from the door into Max’s quarantine. It opened to reveal another enclosed chamber beyond it. A woman entered the circular room wearing a cumbersome suit, complete with a full-face shield and self-contained breathing apparatus. Though most of the suit was pristine and white, it was embellished with metallic cuffs around the wrists, ankles, and throat. It looked like the sort of uniform one would wear to scour a nuclear wasteland.
The woman carried a white medical box.
Beyond the skyline, Max stood up, looking mildly annoyed at the interruption.
The woman didn’t have to say anything for Max to set down the Insomnia and Gargoyle figurines and start picking his way toward her.
“What’s going on?” said Nova.
“They have to take regular samples from him,” said Adrian. “Blood, saliva…” He shrugged. “I’m honestly not sure what they’re doing with most of it.”
“Trying to cure him?” she said, thinking it should have been obvious.
But Adrian shook his head. “I don’t think so. It’s not really like that. They’re working on something down in research and development, I think.” Adrian sighed and turned his back. “Come on, let’s give the kid some privacy.”
Nova followed the group across the sky bridge, glancing back once to see Max rolling up his sleeve as the woman in the suit prepared a syringe.
“You still haven’t told me what’s wrong with him,” she said. “Or why he’s dangerous, or valuable, or all of the above.”
The others exchanged glances, and Nova bristled.
“It’s sort of classified,” said Adrian, looking apologetic.
That word sent a shiver along Nova’s spine. Classified.
Classified was exactly what she was there for.
“But I’m one of you now, aren’t I?” she pressed. “Why can’t I know too?”
Adrian shrugged. “We’re not even supposed to know. It’s just … I have the luxury of getting to hear a lot of things that I’m not technically supposed to hear.”
“So you overheard classified information and you told them,” she said, gesturing at Ruby and Oscar.
“It’s your first day, Nova,” said Ruby. “We’re not trying to exclude you, it’s just … it’s your first day. And what’s going on with Max doesn’t have anything to do with us.”
“Besides,” said Oscar, “we have more pressing things to deal with right now, don’t we?”
Nova frowned, recognizing the change in topic. She couldn’t help but feel irked. Though to be fair, she knew she wouldn’t have trusted herself with classified information, either, no matter how well she’d done at the trials.
She filed away a mental note for later—Find out what’s up with the Bandit and the quarantine, and what are they doing with his blood samples?
“—with this.”
Nova gave herself a shake and looked down. Adrian was holding a narrow strip of thin plastic, about the length of a ruler, but she hadn’t heard what he’d been saying about it.
“What is it?” she asked, taking it between her fingers and holding it up to eye level, peering at Adrian on the other side.
“Renegade communicator,” he said.
“Pretty much a fancy phone,” said Ruby.
“And a hip accessory,” added Oscar. He rolled back the sleeve of his uniform, revealing a similar strip of glass wound around his wrist. “High-end designers are already trying to copy it. They’ll be all the rage this time next year.”
“Fashion aside, R and D is very proud of these. Here.” Adrian took Nova’s left forearm, but hesitated when he saw the delicate bracelet. He took the other arm instead. Taking the device back from her, he started to bend it, curving it until it fit snugly around her wrist, an elegant spiral against her skin. It was so light she could barely feel it—or perhaps she was simply too in tune with the warmth coming off Adrian’s fingers to pay much attention to the communicator.
“This part will light up and sound an alarm when there’s an emergency,” he said, pointing to one end of the device. “If the call center has already designated a location for us to report to, a city map will show up along the middle here, indicating where to go. Down here,” he tapped the other end of the strip, resting near Nova’s thumb, “is how you communicate with one of us. Just press your finger here and say the name of the person you want to contact.”
“Or you can hold it up in front of your face,” said Oscar, mimicking the action, “and it will automatically start to record a video message. Very nifty.”
Nova turned her wrist from side to side, feeling the start of a grin. New tech, a new gadget. Finally, they were speaking her language.
But then a thought occurred to her that smothered that first twinge of excitement. Technology like that had to include a tracking device. Which meant, so long as she wore it, the Renegades would know just where to find her.
She had no idea whether or not they would bother to use it that way, but regardless, it made her feel like they’d just wrapped a venomous snake around her wrist.
“Thanks,” she said, trying to look appreciative. “It still hardly feels real. You know … being a Renegade.” She made mild jazz hands beside her face.
“You get used to it,” said Adrian, with an understanding smile.
“Do you?” chirped Ruby, beaming. “I haven’t yet. It’s still pretty much the most awesome thing ever.”
“Try to keep the communicator on you at all times,” said Adrian. “You probably already have a message on there with our instructions for tomorrow night.”
“Tomorrow night?”
“Our first assignment.” Adrian’s expression brightened. “We’re running surveillance on Cloven Cross Library.”
Nova stilled.
“It’s run by a guy named Gene Cronin,” he continued. “He used to be a member of a villain gang called the Vandal Cartel, and we have reason to believe he might still be dealing in illegal weaponry, including, perhaps, the gun that Nightmare used to try to assassinate Captain Chromium at the parade.”
Nova stared at him, her body tense as she waited for Adrian’s composed act to drop away, for him, to say that he knew her secret identity after all and this had all been a ruse to trap her here inside their headquarters.
Instead, he gestured at the elevator bank. “We’ll take you back up to the lounge so you can get your things. You have the rest of the day off to rest. Or … whatever it is you do.” His lips quirked, but Nova hadn’t been ready for a joke and any humor was lost among her scattered thoughts. “Anyway,” said Adrian, his smile fading. “We’ll meet you outside the library, tomorrow night at eleven. You can wear street clothes. We’ll probably want to stay incognito.”
“Wait,” said Nova, following him blindly into the elevator. “That’s it? Surveillance? We’re not … I don’t know, tracking down a mass murderer or something?”
“Huge letdown, right?” said Oscar.
Adrian shot him an ireful look. “We like to ease recruits into the mass murderer hunts. But this mission is really important. If we can find evidence that Cronin is still trading on the black market, it could open a lot of doors into criminal rings throughout the city. Crime rates have been going up for the last four years, and if Cronin is out there supplying criminals with weapons, stopping him could be a huge victory for us.”
Nova tried to listen, nodding when it seemed appropriate, though her mind was spinning. She knew full well that Gene Cronin, who she knew mostly as the Librarian, was very much selling on the black market and had very much supplied the gun that she’d tried to use against the Council.
“But before we can do anything else,” Adrian continued, ignorant to how this conversation had unnerved her, striking far too close to her own secrets, “the Council requires evidence that Cronin is breaking the law. They won’t a
llow a raid or even a permit to search the library until we have something concrete.”
“Seriously?” said Nova, unable to keep the disbelief from her tone. “The Council won’t allow an unsanctioned raid?”
They’d allowed plenty on the subway tunnels.…
Adrian’s face turned mildly annoyed, though she could tell it wasn’t at her. “The Council is really strict when it comes to following the new codes. You know, back during the Age of Anarchy, they would do anything they had to do to try to clean up all the violence and theft that was going on. But now they’re trying to reestablish a justice system, like we used to have. I think they’re afraid that if we start bending the rules, other people will get the impression that it’s okay for them to do it too.”
“You mean people don’t like to see hypocrisy in their leadership? Shocking.”
“I know,” said Adrian, casting his eyes toward the ceiling, his quick smile making a return. “Their reasons make sense. But it does mean our hands are tied in situations like this. But who knows? Maybe we’ll find something tonight that will provide enough evidence to really start investigating Cronin.”
“During our surveillance,” clarified Nova. “On a public library.”
“Right.” Adrian nodded. The elevator doors opened and he led her back to the bank of lockers where she’d stashed her clothes. “Lucky for us, we have the Renegade who doesn’t need to sleep.”
“Yeah, lucky you,” she said, grabbing the bag that Adrian had sketched that morning and slinging it over her shoulder.
His expression fell a little. “I know it’s not exciting, and your skills obviously lend you to much more hands-on missions—”
Nova laughed. “It’s okay. I’m not disappointed. If anything, I’m a little relieved.”
And it was true, though she’d let him assume his own reasons for it.
This was a mission she could work with. She could easily play the role of dutiful Renegade, while not doing or saying anything to incriminate Cronin, who had always been an ally of the Anarchists. If anything, she might even be able to find a way to lead the Renegades off his trail … and hers.
“Good,” Adrian said. “Then we’ll see you tomorrow.”
She pressed her lips together and nodded. “Great. Right. I’ll … uh, see you then.” She turned and started back for the elevator. “Thanks for the tour.”
She had just stepped inside when she heard her name.
“Nova?”
She glanced back.
“How’s the bracelet holding up?”
She held Adrian’s gaze, feeling once again the way he’d gripped her hand, the gentle trace of the marker’s tip on her skin, the flutter of her pulse beneath it.
She shook her wrist slightly, feeling the brush of metal against her skin, right at the edge of the uniform’s sleeve. “Hasn’t broken again.”
He nudged up his glasses and for just a moment, he looked almost shy. “Just let me know if you ever need anything, um, drawn. Okay?”
The elevator doors closed before Nova could think how to respond to this. As the car started to sink, she held up her arm, inspecting the bracelet’s clasp for what must have been the hundredth time. The mirroring details, the subtle difference in color. When he had drawn it, he had made the clasp functional, so that it could be unclasped and taken off if she wanted to, though she never did.
She spun the bracelet around and peered at the socket where a gem would have been placed if her father had finished it, but she wasn’t really seeing the bracelet or the chain or the empty prongs.
Her mind raced over the past few hours, struggling to sort through everything she’d learned, trying to discern how much of it was valuable and what she would need to gather more information on in the coming weeks. The elevator reached the ground floor. As she crossed the lobby of Renegade Headquarters and headed back onto the streets of Gatlon, she traced over her memories of the day.
She saw an underground training room full of powerful enemies.
She saw a woman in some sort of specialty hazard suit coming to collect samples from a boy they called dangerous and valuable.
She saw two Council members making their way through the lobby, laughing as if they hadn’t a care in the world.
She saw Adrian and that subtle shift of confidence, that hint of awkwardness as he watched the elevator doors close.
As she put more distance between herself and the headquarters, she began to feel the pressure of eyes following her. It was rare enough to spot a Renegade in the city that people stopped to gawk at her as she passed, and a few tourists even snapped her photo. Then there were the opposite reactions—the prodigy haters who sneered, or the ones who wouldn’t make eye contact out of fear or disgust.
Either way, admired or loathed, Nova became more eager with every step she took to get home and get out of her uniform as fast as possible.
She wasn’t a Renegade.
She was Nightmare.
And she did not like to be seen.
CHAPTER TWENTY
EAST NINETY-FOURTH AND WALLOWRIDGE was an even crummier neighborhood than Nova had envisioned. It wasn’t that she was too proud, exactly, to have the Renegades thinking she lived there. It was just—if she was going to be given a fake home, couldn’t Millie have picked something a bit nicer? Maybe one of those abandoned mansions in the suburbs or a condo with a water view or, at the very least, a place that didn’t look borderline condemned?
The home that Nova McLain apparently shared with her uncle was a row house with a brick facade sandwiched between more row houses, each with peeling paint on their window trim and tiny yards overgrown with grasses and weeds. There was trash in the street gutters, empty beer bottles on her front step, and an old tire leaning against the wall. One of the upstairs windows appeared to have a bullet hole through it, and a couple of their neighbors had their doors and windows completely boarded up.
Standing on the sidewalk, she let her gaze travel up and down the street, taking in the graffiti on the walls, the cars on blocks. It was so still and quiet that she couldn’t be sure if anyone lived there at all. If they did, they were awful caretakers.
At least they live somewhere with daylight, a voice whispered in the back of her thoughts.
Nova frowned at her brain’s intrusion into her critique of the neighborhood, but then she thought about it, and her face softened.
Actually, sunlight was a definite plus.
And at night, there would be stars.
She climbed the short stairs and stepped over the beer bottles. A brass mail slot in the door had long ago been engraved with the single word: MCLAIN.
It was the first indication Nova had seen that her fake identity might actually be tethered to someone in the real world, contrary to what Millie had told them. It made her wonder what had become of the real McLains.
Nova tested the doorknob and found it unlocked. She shoved the door open, revealing a narrow sitting room and a collection of cobwebs. She was surprised to see furniture—two dated armchairs and an entertainment console, though whatever TV or radio had been there before was long gone, replaced with a thick layer of dust. The room had once been done up in a garish paisley wallpaper, though strips of it were starting to peel.
What gave her the most pause, though, were recent footprints left across the dusty hardwood floors, making a series of back-and-forth paths between the front door and the staircase that lay straight ahead.
Settling a hand on her belt, which still held the instruments she had brought with her to Renegade HQ that morning, she stepped inside. She passed a collection of framed photographs on the wall—the McLain family, perhaps—but did not bother to inspect their faces as she headed up the staircase. The wood groaned beneath her, shattering the still silence of the house. She froze and listened. When only the sound of her own breath could be heard, she turned the corner and proceeded up the rest of the staircase. On the second floor, there was a door to her left, barely cracked open, and an open li
ving area to her right, with a bedroom beyond it.
Nova reached out her hand and nudged open the first door the rest of the way. Inside was a bed frame with no mattress and yellowed curtain panels hung over two tall windows, one of which was fluttering around the bullet hole.
Turning, she made her way to the second bedroom—the master, judging by the small tiled bathroom attached to the closet. There was no furniture in this room, though. Only a backpack, a paper grocery bag, and a green sleeping bag in the corner with a large form curled up inside it.
Nova paused in the doorway, staring at the form and hoping it wasn’t dead. A stranger’s dead body wasn’t exactly the sort of housewarming gift she’d been hoping for. After watching for a moment, she detected a subtle rising and falling of breath.
Sighing, Nova crossed the room. She spotted a handgun lying not far from the figure and, pressing her foot onto it, dragged it back out of reach. Then she cleared her throat.
The figure didn’t move.
“Hey.”
A quiet snuffle.
Scowling, Nova crouched down and nudged the figure through the sleeping bag. The figure yelped and rolled over, then shot upward. The man had a beard of thick whiskers and ears that stuck out too far from his head. Despite the gray sprouting in his hair and the wrinkles cut through his brow, Nova had the impression he was younger than he looked, but had been aged prematurely by too many unkind years. His hand went for the spot where the gun had been, but when it landed on only the floorboards, he glanced down and spotted it tucked behind Nova.
His bewilderment turned to a sneer. “Who’re you?” he barked.
“The new tenant,” she said. “Sorry, but you’re going to have to find somewhere else to crash.”
His eyes swooped over her Renegade uniform and she could see indecision warring behind his groggy eyes. It was clear he wanted to tell her to get lost and let him go back to sleep, but most people these days opted to treat any Renegade with respect, regardless of whether or not they actually supported their rule over the city.
“What?” he said. “You people claiming this block for another one of your social projects or something?”