I shrug as I roll up my sleeve.
Getting immunity shots is routine. Mom doesn’t even use a syringe anymore. She has this futuristic injection gun that does all the hard work. She just pops in a vial, holds it up to my arm, and pulls the trigger.
But when she opens her bottom desk drawer and pulls out a vial from the box she keeps hidden in the back, she curses.
“What’s wrong?” I ask.
“It’s clouded.” She flings herself back in her chair. “And I haven’t started a new batch. I was going to do that tomorrow.”
I don’t know much about the immunity serum besides what it does, but I do know that when it goes cloudy, the chemical bonds have broken and it’s on its way to becoming toxic.
“It’s no big deal,” I tell her, even though I know she thinks it is. “A couple of days won’t make much of a difference.”
She turns her scientist glare on me. I can already hear the speech in my head. The dose is carefully calculated to match your metabolism. Immunity only lasts a week at full strength. After that, it gradually wears off.
Sometimes I wonder if she even notices me—Kenna—anymore, or if all she really sees is the powerless girl she’s desperate to protect.
I throw up my hands. “Hey, I’m not responsible for it going bad.”
“I know.” She tugs me into her lap for a hug. “I’m just shaken up after the break-in. When I first heard…”
I give her a tight squeeze before pushing back to my feet. On the one hand it’s annoying how overprotective she can be. On the other…I totally understand. I already lost my dad, and now I’d do anything to keep her safe.
“What time is it?” I ask.
Mom checks the clock on her computer. “Almost two in the morning.”
“No wonder I’m so beat,” I say, stifling a yawn.
I’m usually good for another couple hours of my own work, but I guess the villain situation took a toll on me. Besides, it’s not like I can get anything done in the lab now.
“You go on home and get some rest.” She squeezes my shoulder.
“Sure you don’t want to come with me?”
She shakes her head. “I need to make sure those idiots don’t mess with any of my research while they’re cleaning up.”
“And you need to start the new batch of immunity serum.”
“And that,” she says with a smile.
“You’re sure you don’t want me to help?”
I’m always offering, but she always refuses. I’m not even allowed to observe the process.
“I just need a little catnap. I’ll be good as new.”
I give her a quick kiss on the cheek before heading back to the lab. I want to grab my things and then go straight home to bed. As I walk down the hall, I have a flashback to when Draven appeared around the corner. All I had seen was a gorgeous guy, tall and dark and way too hot to be hanging out at a lab.
I wasn’t wrong. He is too hot to work in a lab. He’s also too dark, too dangerous, and too twisted.
A villain.
Draven is a villain, and I can’t afford to forget that. He didn’t kill me this time, but that’s no guarantee he won’t if we ever run into each other again. Forgetting that, even for a second, is like signing my own death warrant.
With that thought in mind, I round the corner into a world of chaos. At least a dozen heroes—most of whom I don’t even recognize—are working to restore the lab.
The Cleaners. Definitely the Cleaners.
A woman with frizzy blond hair—who looks more like an escapee from a hippie commune than a hero—waves her hand over the shards of glass littering the hallway, sending them swirling through the air toward the empty window frame. Another swish of her hand and the shards coalesce like the most complicated jigsaw puzzle ever, filling the space with a cracked version of the pre-Nitro window. A tall, skinny guy with white-blond hair and a nose like a rat flicks his fingers at the glass, and in one melty swirl, the cracks disappear. The window looks good as new.
Bet Nitro would be pissed to know how easily we fixed his handiwork.
Inside the lab proper, heroes clear scorch marks off the walls and ceilings, air-sweep spilled chemicals into a containment bin, and repair the half-melted tabletops closest to where Nitro had been standing. A telekinetic hero swoops up a stack of papers and folders from the floor, floating them into growing piles on one of the unmelted tables.
Must be nice. Seeing all these different powers at work could make a girl crazy if she was the type to dwell on what she doesn’t have. Which I so totally am not.
Except…I cast another look over my shoulder. That melty-glass power is pretty cool. I’ve never seen that one before. Vending machines wouldn’t stand a chance against that.
A team of lab assistants goes from cabinet to cabinet, making a list of all the supplies that need to be replaced. When they head back toward my station, I’m jolted out of stunned observation.