Powerless (20 page)

“You better make a decision,” she taunts. “My power is feeling a little unsteady, and I just don’t know how long I can hold it…”

“Darn it, Rebel!”

“Where’s the bunker, Riley?”

“There’s no way I’m telling a bunch of villains—”

“Whoops!”

The plate crashes to the floor and Riley whimpers. He actually whimpers.

Rebel doesn’t give him a chance to say anything else before a three-foot-tall statue of Aquaman and a miniature Iron Man suit go crashing to the ground.

Riley watches in shock, but it’s not until she actually grabs his pièce de résistance—original cells from one of the first Superman comic books—that he starts talking.

“Stop! Stop! Just stop. Please, Reb. Just stop.”

She narrows her eyes at him, poised to tear the page in half. “Where’s the bunker?” she asks again.

“In the mountains.” Riley sinks against the wall. He looks sad, defeated. Maybe I should feel sorry for him—he did just rat out his father and everything he believes in. But it’s hard for me to be sympathetic when Riley cares more for a bunch of collectibles than he does for the suffering of real, live people.

“Where in the mountains?” Draven demands. “The Rockies are pretty damn big.”

“I’ve got it!” Jeremy crows from the doorway, Riley’s laptop in hand. “My rootkit found the coordinates for the bunker.”

“Thank God!” Nitro says, and before anyone can say or do anything else, he lets loose a fireball straight at what’s left of Riley’s extensive—and expensive—collection of comic book memorabilia. It whizzes past me, burns my arm, and then crashes straight into the display case.

Nitro laughs at the horrified look on Riley’s face as the whole thing goes up in flames.

For long seconds, we all stare at the burning display case in shock. Then several things happen at once. Riley starts screaming, Rebel dives for the bathroom and comes back with a fire extinguisher, and my shirtsleeve catches fire.

Draven runs for me. He knocks me to the floor and smothers me with blankets.

By the time he lets me up—after patting at every inch of me to make sure there’s no latent spark anywhere—Rebel and Dante have the fire under control. Nitro surveys his work, seemingly pleased by the whole proceedings.

Jeremy ducks back into the other room just as Draven finally starts to breathe again.

“Are you all right?” he demands. He drags me into the bathroom and probes at the second-degree burn decorating the bottom of my bicep.

“I’m okay,” I tell him. “I mean, it hurts, but I’m a lot better than Riley’s comic collection.”

Draven’s eyes darken at my words. He presses a palm over my burned skin. “This is going to sting.”

He’s right. My arm erupts in pinpricks, like I can feel the burn on every nerve ending. It takes a little while, but eventually the pain fades. What was a bubbling, red second-degree burn moments ago is now nothing more than a patch of red and a couple of blisters.

Draven releases my arm, his head hung low. “I can’t heal it all the way,” he says quietly, “or they’ll know.”

I don’t have to ask what he means. He already told me that his second power and his mixed parentage are a secret from everyone except Dante. “It’s fine,” I say, yanking down the remains of my sleeve. “It feels a lot better.”

“Why was it so bad this time?” he asks. “When he hit you before, it wasn’t like this.”

I shrug. “The serum must be almost out of my system by now.”

He moves closer, traces a fingertip over the back of my palm. “So your immunity is gone?”

Considering how much I’ve always resented those damn shots, I’m surprisingly emotional at the thought that my immunity—the one thing that made me more than ordinary—is gone.

“I guess so.”

“When was your last shot?”

I shake my head and look up at the ceiling. “I don’t know. Early last week sometime.”

He storms out of the bathroom and stalks up to Nitro. He wraps his hand around his friend’s throat and lifts him several inches off the ground.

Nitro claws frantically at Draven’s fingers.

“Let him go,” I say. “We’ve got more important things to worry about right now.”

Draven’s grip loosens enough for his friend to breathe. “What the hell were you thinking, Nitro? It’s like you didn’t even try to miss her.”

“She has immunity. Even if I winged her it wouldn’t matter,” Nitro gasps.

“She doesn’t,” Draven snaps. “Not anymore.”

Riley looks up from his quest to rescue his prized possessions from the charred and foam-covered mess that was his once proud display case. “Kenna’s immune?”

“Not anymore, idiot.” Rebel smacks him on the back of the head.

“How was I supposed to know?” Nitro complains, hands in the air as if surrendering.

I’m not happy either—believe me, getting set on fire wasn’t in the top one hundred things I wanted to do today—but there’s nothing to get angry over. I mean, until we find my mom, there’s nothing any of us can do about my immunity, or lack thereof.

“Don’t worry. I’ll be okay,” I say.

“Don’t worry?” Draven stares at me incredulously. “How the hell am I supposed to protect you if you can get hurt as easily as any other ordinary?”

“I didn’t realize you
had
to protect me,” I tell him. “I thought we were all supposed to protect each other.”

“You have to admit, you need more protection than the rest of us. So you need to stop getting so offended every time I try to help you. I don’t care that you’re powerless. I swear, Kenna. But you don’t seem to trust me. You want me to trust you, but this is a two-way street. If we’re going to get through this, you’re going to have to change that. Otherwise, we don’t have a chance.”

Maybe he’s right. Maybe he’s not. I don’t know. But right now I don’t have time to figure it out.

“Seriously,” Riley says, oblivious to, oh, apparently everything else that’s been said, “Kenna is immune to powers?”

I glare at him.

Rebel answers for me. “No. Her mom cooked up an immunity serum to protect her. It’s a huge secret, but now everyone here knows. So she’s never gone without the serum before, never tested to see how long it takes to get out of her system.”

“That’s against League regulations,” Riley complains, and starts citing policies and procedures. “All research is supposed to be recorded and approved by the—”

“Yeah, well, torture is against regulations, too, Riley,” I retort, “and it seems like no one cares about that. As long as the public doesn’t know that villains are suffering and dying on your father’s watch, those who do know don’t give a damn. Including you.”

He glares at me. “You keep calling it torture, but it’s not. Of course we interrogate villains who have been caught breaking the laws, but torture? We’re the good guys. We don’t torture anyone.”

Before anyone can react to that ridiculousness, Jeremy calls from the living room, “Sorry to interrupt, but can you guys get out here? I want to show you what I’ve found. And pick your brain for a minute.”

The last of Draven’s temper mellows at the prospect of good news—or any news. He starts for the door. I grab him by the back of the shirt and tug him back.

“We can’t leave Riley alone,” I hiss at him. “He’ll call Mr. Malone and ruin everything.”

“We’ve got this,” Rebel answers.

Sure enough, Dante and Nitro have Riley cornered, and my best friend is armed with a roll of duct tape.

Guess he won’t be much of a problem after all. At least not for a while.

In the main room, Jeremy sits in Riley’s breakfast nook. He’s got Riley’s desktop and laptop set up side by side, and there are blueprints on both of them. His phone also displays some kind of schematic I don’t recognize. Whatever it is, they all seem to be linked because the pictures change as he works on his tablet.

“What’s going on?” I ask, leaning over his shoulder to get a better look. “What did you find?”

“Give me a second,” he says, not even glancing up from what he’s doing. “Check out the blueprints over there.” He gestures vaguely at Riley’s laptop. “Breaking into the bunker is going to be ten million times harder than the lab.”

That’s not exactly a surprise.

“So, any ideas?” I ask.

“Maybe. Take a look at this entrance.” He points. “It’s the weakest spot. I think I can hack through the security there, and if I can—”

Suddenly, all four of the screens go wonky, blur, and disappear completely.

“What the hell?” Jeremy exclaims, jumping to his feet.

I back away, trying to give him room to work as Draven paces impatiently behind me. Within seconds, the screens are back to normal, the schematics once again prominently displayed.

Jeremy settles back down without another word. As I watch, the graphics on the screen start to move, like the layers are being peeled away.

He points at another spot on the screen. “If I have enough time, I can hack the external system, but they’ve got all kinds of closed-circuit security that can only be accessed from inside the bunker
and
they have half an army of hero backups. Security guards, check-in stations, locks that actually require keys to get in.” He sounds scandalized at the old-school tech. “The good news is they aren’t running at full capacity yet. We forced them to move earlier than they planned, so the complete protocol hasn’t been implemented yet.”

I lean down once more to get a better look, and the screens go nuts. Again. This time the whole array turns to static and the laptop actually shuts down.

“What the hell did you do?” Jeremy snaps at me impatiently.

“Me? I didn’t touch anything!” I turn so he can see my hands clasped behind my back, a testament to my innocence.

“Then what is going on?” He goes to restart Riley’s desktop, but nothing happens. It doesn’t so much as let out a start-up whir.

“I don’t know! Why would you think it’s my fault?”

“Because everything was working fine until you got close.” He sounds completely exasperated. “Unless…” He turns to Draven. “You don’t have any tech-based powers, do you?”

“Definitely not.” Draven lifts his own hands. “Dante’s got wind and Nitro—”

“Trust me,” Jeremy interrupts. “We’ve all seen Nitro’s power. What about Riley?”

“He’s a flyer,” I answer.

Draven lifts his brows in reluctant amusement. “You mean those Superman pajamas actually have some basis in reality?”

“I know. It’s ridiculous.”

Jeremy checks his plugs and cords. “Then I don’t know what the hell is going on.”

“Figure it out,” I tell him. “We’ve got to find a way into the bunker, and those blueprints are the only way!”

I’m so frustrated that I start pacing too. I walk from the kitchen into the living room. When I’m on the other side of the room, the computers spring to life again.

“What the hell!” Jeremy yelps. “This isn’t normal.”

But Draven is looking back and forth between me and the computers, a studious expression on his face. “Come here, Kenna,” he says, holding out a hand to me.

I do as he says, and the second I get close to the breakfast nook, the computers freak out again.

“It’s you!” Jeremy howls. “You’re doing this!”

“How is that possible?” I demand. “I’ve never had problems with computers before. It must be something with how you linked everything together.” I gesture vaguely at the web of cables.

“What? You think I made the mistake?” I’ve never in my life heard Jeremy sound so insulted.

“I’m not saying that. I’m just saying something is wrong and it can’t be me—”

“Let me see your phone,” Draven interrupts.

“My phone? It’s on the fritz. Why?”

“Just let me see it.”

By now, Dante, Rebel and Nitro have joined us and are staring at me like I’ve grown another head. So, under duress, I pull out my phone and hand it to Draven. He presses a button to turn it on. When he does, the screen goes static-y.

“Told you.”

He walks away a few steps, tries again. This time, when he holds up the phone, the display works. Then he takes a few steps back toward me and the whole thing fritzes out again.

“What is going on?” I whine, totally frustrated.

I’ve worked with some of the world’s most sensitive technology in my mom’s lab, and nothing like this has ever happened.

“How long have you been taking those immunity shots?” Draven asks me as he hands back my now utterly useless phone.

“Since I was little. Why?”

“And this is the first dose you’ve missed? Ever?”

“Her mom is obsessive about those shots,” Rebel tells him. “What does that have to do with this?”

“I don’t know. Maybe nothing. But it’s hard to imagine that the same day the immunity wears off, you start making computers go nuts. That’s quite a coincidence.”

“You think I emit some kind of electromagnetic field and the shots blocked it?”

He shakes his head. “I think the shots blocked some kind of
power
that you have.”

“That’s not funny, Draven,” I snap. “I’m powerless.”

“Are you?” he asks. “Or did the immunity shots block your powers the same way they blocked everyone else’s?”

His words hit me like a freight train and my knees go weak. I reach out to steady myself and Draven—seeing me falter—starts toward me.

Just in time, it seems, because a second later, a bullet slams through the window and into the wall right where Draven had been standing.

For a second, nobody moves. Then all hell breaks loose.

Draven dives for me. Dante dives for Rebel. Nitro—God bless him—runs into the bedroom after Riley. And Jeremy…well, Jeremy dives on top of his electronics. No surprise there.

Another window shatters as a canister of some sort comes hurtling through it. Followed by another. And another. Within seconds, noxious smoke fills the apartment.

“Tear gas,” Draven mutters bitterly in my ear. “We’ve got to get out of here.”

“But that’s what they want! They’re waiting out there.”

“Yeah, well, they’ll wait a couple minutes for the tear gas to do its work and then storm in here. We’ll be totally screwed. We have to go. Now.”

He’s right. That’s exactly what’s going to happen. But that doesn’t make it any easier for me to do what needs to be done. Not when my heart is pounding like a metronome on high and I can’t catch my breath. Not when I know what the heroes are capable of, what the trouble outside might bring us.

I can see it so clearly: Draven, captured by the heroes, bloodied, beaten, destroyed. I want to grab on to him, to beg him to stay here where I might be able protect him.

But it would be a lie. There is no safety here. No safety anywhere, really. Not when Rex Malone is determined to bring us down.

My eyes water as hell rains all around us. It’s an impossible situation. Stay until they come in, or run out into their trap. Through the pain I try to wrap my head around what I can do to save Draven and Rebel. Jeremy, Dante, Nitro. And myself. I’d really prefer to make it out of this alive, but there are no guarantees.

“Let’s go,” Draven yells, pulling me up into a crouch as a spray of bullets comes through the already-broken windows.

Dante uses his wind power to clear the air around us as much as he can, but there’s a lot of tear gas in the apartment now and I can barely see.

“Where are we going?” I demand as Rebel and Dante fall in behind us. “How are we supposed to get out of here? Mr. Malone isn’t stupid. He’ll have people in the hallway as well as on the street. We’re trapped.”

“The roof?” Jeremy suggests hoarsely between coughing fits. He’s crawling along behind us, his and Riley’s laptops tucked into the backpack slung over his shoulder.

If we were smart, we’d surrender. Or at least barter Rebel and Riley for our own escape. Except that’s not how this team works. Corny as it sounds, we’re not leaving anyone behind, not even Riley. Once we’re on the street, he can go his own way. But for now, we’re all in this together.

“Not the roof,” Draven says, his voice just as rough as Jeremy’s. “They’ll be waiting.”

“Well, then, what the hell are we supposed to do?” Dante asks. He’s got his hands up, creating a light wind tunnel around us in an effort to keep the tear gas at bay. It’s helping a little bit, but the sound of boot steps in the hall tells us we’re out of time.

“We’ve got to get the hell out of this apartment,” Nitro says as he starts building a fireball.

I can see where this is going—he’s going to end up accidentally burning down the whole damn building in his efforts to save us. It’s late; people are sleeping. No way am I going to let Nitro set the place on fire and kill everyone who lives here.

“Draven, our only chance is the hallway!” I shout.

“You just said there will be guards out there!” Rebel gasps between coughs.

“There will be,” I reply. “But it’s our best shot. We’ve got this.”

“How?” Jeremy demands.

“Rebel can move them with her mind. Dante can use his wind. I’ll apparently make their electronics go nuts so hopefully they can’t radio our position to anyone.”

I’ll do my best, anyway. Whatever it takes.

“They’re hero SWAT, Kenna,” Jeremy tells me. “They’ve got special suits that neutralize powers coming at them.”

“How do you know that?” I demand.

“How do you not?” Jeremy replies. “I mean, come on. Your mom helped design them!”

“So what are we going to do then?” Rebel asks.

“I don’t know.” I’m out of ideas.

There’s a loud crash in the hallway, and seconds later, something heavy slams against Riley’s reinforced door.
Battering
ram.

“Screw this,” Nitro says, walking over to the common wall between Riley’s condo and his neighbor’s. The slamming against the door gets worse. Nitro lets loose a fireball that blows a hole straight through the drywall.

“Come on!” he yells, stepping through. We all follow, though I grab the extinguisher and put out the smoldering fire on our way through.

The people who live in this apartment start screaming, but Draven gets them under control, fast, erasing their memories and sending them back to the safety of their locked bedrooms as I put out the last spark. I can’t imagine what they’re going to think when they wake up to disaster in the morning.

The battering ram pounds against the door while Nitro rips a hole in the far wall of this apartment and we follow him into the next. I do the fire-extinguisher thing; Draven does the mind-erase thing. Nitro gears up for one more hole—to the corner apartment—but just then, the pounding stops as Riley’s door gives with a tremendous screech of hinges.

“Move!” Draven yells, and Nitro lets loose his fireball. This time, neither Draven nor I pause to mitigate the damage. Instead, we hightail it through the apartment.

We’re aiming for the fire escape, when Riley says, “Corner apartments have attics. We can get up there—”

We don’t have time to be shocked by his helpfulness.

Draven’s already pulling at the cord hanging from the ceiling. And then we’re climbing up the rickety ladder, Dante all but carrying Rebel up the stairs and Riley doing the same for Nitro in their haste to get ahead of our pursuers.

I can hear the SWAT team storming after us as I start to climb. Draven pretty much throws me up the ladder and into Dante’s waiting hands, and then he’s there beside me, yanking up the ladder and wedging something against the door to keep it from being opened.

“We need to move,” he barks. “They could start shooting at the ceiling—”

He breaks off as gunfire sounds below us, bullets slamming into the floor where we’d been standing only seconds before.

“Bugger it!” Nitro yells. “We’re trapped!”

“We’re not!” Jeremy says, pointing to a small skylight in the middle of the attic. “That leads to the roof.”

“What if they’re on the roof?” Rebel demands.

More bullets come plowing through the floor. “You really want to debate what-ifs right now?” Jeremy says.

“Not even a little bit.” Dante reaches out and slams his wind into the small skylight. It shatters on the first blow.

“Give me a boost!” I shout.

God only knows what’s on that roof, and I want to be the first one through the window. It’s the most vulnerable position, the one most likely to get hurt, and I feel like it’s my responsibility. I’m the one who convinced Draven that coming here was a good idea, which means it’s my job to figure out how to get us out of it alive.

Draven doesn’t agree. “
I’m
going up first,” he tells me.

“No way. I am.”

“Don’t fight me on this, Kenna. You’re not equipped to go up there on your own.”

“Not equipped?” This isn’t the time, but my blood begins to boil.

“Yes. You’re—” He stops.

“I’m what? Powerless? Didn’t we just decide I’m not?”

“An electromagnetic power will do you no good in this situation!” he whisper-shouts, his voice echoing in the narrow chute. “You don’t even know how it works yet!”

“Seriously?” Jeremy says. “We’re fighting about this? Now?”

“No,” Draven, sounding dangerous. “We’re not going to fight about this. Kenna, you have no immunity. You can’t control your power yet. You need to just go with me on this. You need to let me protect you.”

I know what Draven says makes perfect sense. Yet the idea of sending him out there like a sacrificial lamb… It makes me sick.

“You know it’s the only way this is going to work,” Rebel tells me softly.

I turn to look at her, and Draven takes advantage of my momentary distraction to climb through the skylight.

I brace myself for the sound of gunfire. It doesn’t come. At least not from up above. From down below, it’s still going strong and getting closer.

“Come on,” Draven snaps a second later, reaching back through the skylight to help me up. “They’re positioned at the stairwell, expecting us to come up that way. If we move, we can be gone before they learn otherwise.”

Taking a deep breath, I jump and grab his hands. He pulls me up. Then Riley flies through the hole dragging Nitro behind him, with the others on their heels. Rebel wavers a bit, tapped out from using her powers so much. Until she gets some rest, she won’t be able to reach full strength for a while.

We huddle behind some kind of large, rooftop air conditioner. It’s the only reason the guards on the other side of the roof haven’t seen us yet.

But as their radios start to crackle, I know it’s only a matter of time before they figure out that they’re watching the wrong spot.

“We need to split up,” I whisper. “There’s no way they’re going to let seven of us waltz across the roof.”

“You guys need to make your way over there,” Draven says pointing to the edge of the roof where a fire escape ladder peeks up over the top. “Dante and I will distract them.”

“I can fly someone down,” Riley volunteers. “I can only carry one person at a time, but—”

“Like we’re going to trust you,” Dante sneers.

“Do you have a choice?” Riley counters. “They firebombed my apartment. They shot at us even though we’re unarmed. It’s like the heroes have gone crazy!”

Talk about an understatement, but this isn’t the time for an I-told-you-so.

I turn to Draven. “You’re not going to sacrifice yourselves for us.”

“Damn right we’re not,” he agrees. “But we are going to give you guys a chance to get away.”

“No—”

He places a hand on either side of my face. “Jeremy is Deacon’s only chance.” His mouth kicks up in that cocky half-grin. “We’ve got this. We’ll rendezvous at the pedestrian bridge in Fine Park. You know where that is?”

His lips brush against mine, and then he’s darting across the roof, Dante hot on his heels.

“Shit,” Jeremy gawks. “Who ever heard of villains with a hero complex?”

“You have to go,” Nitro says, shoving me and Rebel toward the fire escape. “You too,” he tells Jeremy.

“What about you?” I demand.

“I’m going to cover your boys. Make sure they get out of here with that fearless skin of theirs intact. Besides, Riley’s got my back, don’t you, mate?”

“Yeah, I do.”

Jeremy chokes a little. “Now I’m terrified for everyone.”

“As you should be,” Riley says, totally serious.

“Go!” Nitro says again. “And keep nerd boy safe at all costs. He’s got the only way into that bunker!”

That’s what finally gets us moving. Well, that and the gunfire. As we slither toward the edge, I turn to look over my shoulder as Nitro lobs fireballs at three attacking SHPD officers. Across the roof, Dante is using his power to kick up all kinds of debris in an effort to give Draven and him some cover.

I fight the instinct to turn back and help, but Nitro’s words are playing in my head. Deacon and my mom are counting on us. Jeremy’s the only one who has a chance of saving them, and Draven is trusting me to make sure he can.

A flash of superhero lightning whizzes over my head and crashes into a pole a few feet away from us. It’s the catalyst we need. We dash to the roof’s edge, heading for the fire escape.

“Let’s go!” I jump over the edge and onto the top platform, then scramble down as fast as I can as a spray of bullets showers the parapet above me.

Seconds later, the whole thing shakes as Jeremy starts down after me. Rebel brings up the rear. We’re moving fast, and then suddenly the fire escape ends a few feet from the ground. I climb onto the ladder at the end, which slides down under my weight and finally hits the ground hard enough that my teeth snap together. Then wait for Jeremy and Rebel to follow.

Another spray of bullets hits the side of the building right below Rebel’s position.

“Go, Kenna, get moving!” she shouts.

But I’m not going without them. “Hurry, hurry, hurry,” I chant.

The heroes are closing in.

As soon as my friends hit the ground, we start to run down the alley. But we don’t get very far before we’re swarmed by SHPD officers with guns and riot shields and weapons I can’t even begin to recognize. We’re surrounded.

“Shit!” Jeremy turns in a circle, looking for an opening.

Energy tingles under my skin as my fear and rage grow. Even without ever having felt it before, I know this is my power. Almost like it’s itching to get out.

I let it.

I draw in a deep breath and then release the invisible hold. Almost immediately, the helmet of the officer closest to me crackles and starts to smoke. He drops his shield and yanks the helmet off his head, quickly melting back into the sea of officers.

I did that.
I
did that. For the first time, I know what power really feels like. And it feels amazing. I feel like I can take on the world. Like I can take on this whole SHPD squad.

Jeremy gapes. “Whoa.”

“Get him out of here!” I shout to Rebel. “Use your telekinesis and get as far away as you can.” I know she’s tapped out, and asking her to move even one person is a lot right now, but she has to try. It’s Jeremy’s only chance.

“No. Not without you, Kenna!” he shouts, grabbing my arm. “I think I can use your power to get into the bunker.”

Jeremy and Rebel exchange a look. His gaze is desperate. Hers is determined.

“Stay alive,” she says, holding out her hands. She gives a telekinetic push, and then Jeremy and I are flying through the air on the last of her power.

“Rebel, no!”

I grab for her, but it’s too late. We soar down the alley, high above the reach of the heroes, the pull of Rebel’s power jerky and uncontrolled—like the last sputters of a car running out of gas. I’m screaming, crying, desperate to get back to Rebel, but I can’t break her hold on me.