When he reached the medical wing, he spotted Tamaya Rae—Thunderbird—through the windows of the first room. She was sitting on the edge of a bed while a healer tended to one of her black-feathered wings. She looked enraged, though all he caught were the words Puppeteer and balloon and pathetic fishing net!
He found Danna in the third room, lying on her side, unconscious. Much of her uniform had been cut away, revealing extensive burns along her left arm and torso. A mask was over her nose and mouth, probably filling her lungs with an elixir that would keep her body from transforming while she was unconscious, as sometimes happened when her brain went into fight-or-flight mode. She once told him that it happened to her a lot when she’d had nightmares growing up.
Nightmares.
Oh, the irony.
Adrian’s gut sank. He hadn’t had time to stop and see how bad her burns were during the fight, and now he was struck with the full weight of guilt from what he’d done.
Oscar and Ruby were there, too, sitting on a bench in the corner. Ruby’s head was resting on Oscar’s shoulder, and for a moment Adrian thought she might be asleep, but then her eyes peeled dazedly open. She spotted Adrian and sat up. The briefest flash of disappointment crossed Oscar’s face, but it was gone so fast Adrian thought he might have imagined it.
“Oh, now he shows up,” said Oscar, standing. “Dude, where were you?”
“I’m sorry,” said Adrian, feeling the apology down to his core. “I got your message about Nightmare and I was making my way to you guys when the Puppeteer showed up and I was stuck trying to get this group of kids to safety. There must have been a hundred of them there on a field trip. It was chaos.” He lightly scratched his wounded shoulder through his shirt, surprised by how easily the lie had come. “But I still should have been there with you. I’m so sorry. Is Danna…?”
Oscar blew out a frustrated sigh. “She got burned really bad in the fight.”
On the bed, Danna inhaled a shuddering breath. A machine on the wall beeped faster for a second, then fell again into a steady rhythm. Adrian walked closer, forcing himself to lift one of the cold compresses that had been draped over her burn wounds. Forcing himself to take in the damage he had done.
How much pain had she been in? Or had her body immediately gone into shock? Setting the compress back over her burns, he rubbed the flame tattoo through his sleeve. Though it had been healed for weeks now, he imagined for a moment that he could feel it, like the flame was alive, like it was burning his skin.
He turned back to Oscar and Ruby. “Have the healers been to see her yet?”
Oscar nodded. “Yeah. They say she’s going to be okay, but it’ll take some time. It’s really bad.”
“Danna is our eyes when we’re on patrol,” said Adrian, scratching the back of his neck. “We’ll be at a huge disadvantage without her.”
“The really weird thing,” said Ruby, “is that wasn’t even Nightmare’s doing. That”—she pointed at Danna, then drew quotes in the air—“was ‘the Sentinel.’”
Adrian flinched at the venom in her tone. The small part of him that wanted to tell his team that he was, in fact, on the roof with them that day, quickly evaporated. “Who?”
“Some guy who showed up mid-combat,” said Oscar. “Faced off against Nightmare. He had an R on his suit, but…” He shrugged. “None of us have ever seen him before.”
Adrian kept his brow tight with confusion. “The Sentinel?”
“That’s what Monarch said, before they put her under. He was a fire elemental, I think.” Oscar frowned. “But it definitely wasn’t Wildfire.”
Wildfire was the only fire elemental they currently had on the Renegades, at least in the Gatlon City branch. Adrian had gotten most of his ideas for how to handle fire manipulation from watching him in the training halls.
Ruby yawned. “I don’t think it was that Islander prodigy, either. The one who trained here last year. Magma, was it? This Sentinel guy was fully covered, head to toe. Someone caught a photo of him from street level so they’re starting to circulate it, to see if anyone knows anything.”
“He also had superior jumping,” said Oscar, “and this suit, like something straight out of a comic book. Honestly, I think he might be from research and development—like maybe some sort of new super-soldier they’ve been working on down there, and it’s too classified for them to admit it yet.”
Ruby gasped and leaned forward excitedly, like she’d just uncovered a clue. “Or he could be a villain, masquerading as a Renegade. Maybe he’s trying to hurt our reputation. Maybe it’s all part of some complicated scheme that will lead to our ultimate downfall!”
Adrian and Oscar stared at her.
Ruby shrugged. “Maybe?”
“Maybe,” Oscar agreed.
Collapsing back onto the bench, Ruby threw an arm over her eyes, as if this outburst had sapped her last bits of energy. The bloodstone on her wrist reflected the room’s light, turning her cheek a rosy red. “That’s my theory and I’m sticking to it.”
“But he was fighting Nightmare at first,” said Oscar, “before he attacked Monarch. Or maybe that was a mistake. Who knows?”
“Was anyone else hurt?” asked Adrian.
“Nope,” said Ruby, with a hint of defensiveness. “We’re grand. Positively stellar.”
“Nightmare got to her,” explained Oscar. “Put her to sleep.” He reached down and pet Ruby on the head. It was one of the most awkward gestures Adrian could recall him ever making, and Oscar could be a pretty awkward guy at times.
“Tattletale,” Ruby grumbled, swatting him away. “In case anyone’s wondering, I currently feel like someone’s filled my head with concrete.”
Adrian bit back the impulse to say he knew exactly how she felt. “That makes the fourth time this year a Renegade team has come in contact with Nightmare. She can’t be working alone.”
“She escaped on the Puppeteer’s balloon,” said Oscar. “Could be a new Anarchist.”
“But,” said Ruby, thrusting a finger into the air, “she threw the Puppeteer overboard. That’s not exactly a friendly greeting.”