“No.” Dad takes the tube, holding it like it might hurt him. “We don’t know what this drug is. It’s killing humans so it could be toxic to us. We need to get it analyzed. Maci, call Evan.”
Max’s power trickles with disbelief. I feel it from Nova as well. If I paid any attention to my own power, it would feel the same way. Max says what my sister and I are also thinking.
“Why should we get it tested? It’s obviously power.”
A thick blanket of rain drops splatter across my bedroom window. When the rain splashes onto my floor-to-ceiling window, I’ll usually pick a raindrop to watch as it makes its way zigging and zagging around other drops, absorbing and splitting again until it disappears out of sight. But the rain comes in a downpour tonight; even with Super vision I am unable to single out a solitary drop.
I roll away from facing the window, letting my body decompress on top of my ultra-fluffy cloud-like mattress. Max was right when they ordered this mattress for me a couple years ago. Nothing beats lying on one of these beds after a long day of working as a Hero. If only they made memory foam mattresses that worked inside your head. A place to lie your thoughts at night so all the stress and anxiety that’s been balled up in your mind all day can decompress.
Nova lies next to me, propped up on her elbows on top of the comforter. Sometimes she sleeps in here and sometimes she’ll slip into the safe room in Dad’s office. We haven’t talked about it, and I don’t ask. She’s holding a wallet-sized laminated photo of our mother, staring at it like she does every night. Her eyes trace the lines along Mom’s golden shoulder-length hair, her tight smile and big blue eyes. It’s an official photograph that Mom kept in her wallet next to her work badge. In it, she’s dressed in a royal purple Retriever suit, one of the old fashioned styles from before we were born.
My sister’s hair has faded almost entirely back to blonde now. I guess that’s why human hair dye companies have never asked a Super to endorse their products. It doesn’t last in our hair very long. I reach out, touching a strand of her hair. Some of the dye rubs off at my touch, revealing shiny wisps of Nova’s real hair. “I should buy some more boxes of that hair dye. We might need it again to keep you hidden.”
“I wonder if I would have been a Hero too,” Nova says, sliding her finger down the front of the glossy photograph.
“What do you mean?”
She shrugs. “If I wasn’t taken by Aurora and if I just grew up normally with you. Do you think I would have wanted to be a Hero?”
“Hell, no.”
Her face crumples up as if my words just slapped her. I roll my eyes at her stupidity. “You wouldn’t be a Hero, Nova. You’d be a depowered invalid. Both of us. We’d probably live on the street somewhere wishing we were dead.”
“That’s a little harsh,” she mutters, turning Mom’s picture over in her hand.
“It isn’t harsh. It’s the truth. Don’t you know what happens to Super twins?” I lower my voice so it isn’t so condescending. Maybe she doesn’t know. She wasn’t educated like I was on the history of the Super race. Nova swallows and her power level flattens out into a neutral state.
“Yeah, I know. The laws say that we would have been depowered.”
“So why bother reminiscing about some stupid make believe past that would never happen?”
She shrugs. I feel like she has something more to say but I don’t bother asking. I’d rather just go to sleep.
Evan stands awkwardly in our foyer, like he’s a guest in our home now that my dad is back from the medical ward. You’d never know by his rigid posture and the business-like expression on his face that he spent a few weeks crashing on my bed while wearing Max’s pajamas. It took him an entire two days to analyze the drug after we shipped it to him in full bio hazard protective casing. Dad’s having an off day, or at least that’s what Nurse Martha called it when we spoke with her earlier this morning, so we decided to have Evan come to us instead of risking bringing Dad on the long KAPOW ride to South Africa.
“Is that all you brought?” Dad asks from his place on a barstool in t
he kitchen. He’s been drinking water all day so he hasn’t left that spot.
Evan holds out the vial of the drug which is now half empty. “Yes, sir.”
I motion for him to follow me into the kitchen and he finally uproots his feet from the foyer and joins us next to Dad. He places the vial on the countertop. Dad gives it a curious glance and then flattens his hands on the granite. “Well? What did you discover? What is it?”
“Is it power?” Max interjects.
“Yeah.” Evan chews on his bottom lip. “It’s power.”
Dad lets out a disappointed sigh.
I can’t help but think that Evan looks super freaking cute when he’s nervous about being around my dad. But that’s not the point right now. Max curses under his breath and takes a big bite off the protein bar in his hand. “What else is in it? Cocaine? Speed? Heroin?”
Evan shakes his head. “No, just power. Good power actually.”
“What does that mean?” Dad asks.
“Well it’s not evil. It was a mixture of mostly good and a little evil.”
Max chokes on his food. “Wait, what? You figured that out already?”