The nurse cocked her head. “I wonder who that was,” she mused. “Must be a new intern.”
“That sounded really important,” said Adrian, as out of the corner of his eye he saw the microphone replace itself on the intercom. “I’d better let you go. We can discuss this later.”
“Oh, that alert only applies to prodigy hea—”
“Keep up the good work!” Adrian clapped her on the arm, then walked past her, past the desk. “See?” he whispered, hoping Max was beside him as he swung into the next corridor. “No healers, no prodigies, no worries. Come on, this way.” He headed toward the southern elevator bank.
“Okay, this is sort of fun,” Max whispered. “I feel like a spy in one of those old action flicks.”
Amusement twitched at Adrian’s cheeks, and he wondered if it was cooler to be a spy or a superhero. Maybe they were a little bit of both.
“You would make a pretty awesome spy.”
“I know. No one ever suspects the kid.”
Adrian chuckled. “That and the whole invisibility thing.”
“That goes without saying.”
Adrian started at the sound of footsteps barreling toward them. He stepped closer to the wall, holding out his arm to tuck Max behind him—which probably looked like an odd thing to do—but neither of the men in blue scrubs was paying him any attention.
But when they were twenty steps away, the shorter of the two men stumbled unexpectedly, nearly collapsing on top of a cart stacked with near-empty cafeteria trays and paper cups.
His companion froze. “You okay?”
“Yeah. Just feel … weird, all of a sudden,” said the doctor, pressing a hand over his chest. “Not like a … heart attack, exactly, but…”
“Shit, shit, shit,” Max whispered. “It’s me. He’s a prodigy. I’m—”
Adrian reached for the air and found Max’s upper arm. He dragged Max forward, though the boy struggled weakly, trying to pull Adrian the other direction, away from the doctors. Adrian held firm. Realizing it was useless, Max stopped objecting and they hurried down the hall.
The doctors ignored Adrian, as the taller of the two tried to help his friend to a chair in a small computer alcove.
Before they turned the next corner, Adrian glanced back. The prodigy healer was sitting a bit taller already, nodding at something his peer was telling him.
“All the healers will head straight for the first floor!” cried Max, flickering into visibility, presumably so Adrian could see his death glare. “That’s what you told me. A three-two-one alert will make sure there are no prodigies—”
“Okay, okay,” said Adrian, holding up his hands. “So that one was taking his time.”
“This is exactly why I shouldn’t have let you talk me into this. That guy has lives to save! Patients! Responsibilities! And now—”
“He’s fine,” said Adrian, heading for the elevator. Max followed after him, still carrying Turbo’s cage in both hands. “You were hardly in his vicinity. I’m sure you only got a tiny bit of his power.”
“But what if that tiny bit is the difference between a successful heart surgery and a nicked aorta?”
Adrian feigned a confused look. “What’s an aorta?”
“It’s the big artery that—” Max paused. “You’re avoiding the question.”
Turbo shrieked angrily.
With a laugh, Adrian jammed his thumb into the up button. “He’s fine. And so are you. We shouldn’t pass any more prodigy healers.”
Max scoffed. “What about prodigy patients? Nurses? Visiting family members? And also—why are we going up? I thought the idea was to leave the hospital.”
“I have a plan. And look, I know you’ve been surrounded by prodigies your whole life, but they aren’t all that common outside of headquarters. The chances of us running into any more is really low. Trust me, okay?”
Max scowled, but didn’t argue as the elevator arrived and the doors parted.
A nurse started to step out, and Max froze, standing straighter.
“Mr. Everhart? What are you doing here? What’s—” She noticed the cage in Max’s hands, but Turbo had fallen asleep again and maybe she assumed it was one of those plastic dinosaurs from the machine. Without waiting for an answer, she narrowed her eyes and reached forward, taking Max by the elbow and steering him back toward the hall. “I know you’re probably getting restless lying in that bed all day, but we can’t just have you wandering around the halls without supervision. You understand that, right?” She cast a disapproving frown at Adrian. “I’m sure your friend will understand. Now, come on, I’ll walk you … both…”
Her voice slurred. Her attention was still on Adrian as her eyelids began to droop. Her foot skidded forward another half of a step, and then she started to fall face-first toward the linoleum.
Adrian narrowly caught her, scooping her beneath the armpits as her forehead crashed into his chest.
He gaped at Max, then down at the kid’s skinny, pale arms, the insides of his elbows mottled with bruises new and old.
He knew immediately what had happened. Judging from Max’s expression, they both did.
“I didn’t think you got any power from Nightmare.”
“I didn’t, either,” said Max. “I panicked just now. I didn’t really think about it—it just happened. But … but Nightmare didn’t seem affected by me at all when she…” He trailed off, eyes widening. “Oh.”
“Oh?”
“The quarantine. I must have gotten it when Nova came into the quarantine.”
Adrian swallowed hard. Right. Of course. The night that Nightmare stole the helmet wasn’t the first time she’d crossed paths with Max.
It was just one more piece of evidence against her, and though one more reminder of who and what she was shouldn’t have hurt, it still did.
He thought again of the tattoo he was planning and imagined putting another stone on the wall around his heart.
“Anyway, good job,” said Adrian.
The elevator door started to close and Adrian stopped it with his foot. It opened again with a chime. Spotting an empty gurney against a wall, Adrian lifted the nurse onto it. “I doubt you got much of Nightmare’s power, so she probably won’t be out for long. Come on.”
They got in the elevator just as an obnoxious buzzing started to come from the doors, alerting them that the doors were closing this time, whether they liked it or not.
“I’d go invisible again if I were you.”
Max winked out of view as Adrian hit the button for the top floor.
Seconds later, they stepped out into a serene waiting room, the smell of talcum powder wafting toward them and the sounds of a crying baby drifting from a nearby hallway.
“No,” Max said emphatically, tugging on Adrian’s sleeve. “The maternity ward? Are you nuts? I don’t care what you say, there could definitely be a prodigy mom here—or what if there’s a baby! I can’t—”
“Would you relax?” Adrian whispered back at him, earning an odd look from the nurse sitting behind a reception desk. He smiled and surreptitiously took hold of Max’s hospital gown, dragging him forward. “Hi there,” he said, leaning his free elbow on the counter beside a visitor check-in sheet. “Is there a way to get up to the roof from this floor?”
Her already-suspicious countenance darkened more. “The roof isn’t open to the public,” she said, as if this should have gone without saying.
“Oh, I know,” he said with a mild chuckle. “I’m Adrian Everhart. My dads are Hugh Everhart and Simon Westwood?”
He was met with instant recognition. Her mouth formed a surprised O.
“Right,” he continued. “And, as I’m sure you know, my brother, Max, is a patient here and, well, the other Council members are going to be stopping by periodically to check on how things are going. We’re all pretty much one big happy superhero family down there at headquarters, and everyone’s really worried about the kid.”
A snort came in the direction Max was standing.
“So,” Adrian persisted, “Tamaya—er, Thunderbird—is going to be stopping by anytime now so I can give her a full report on Max’s condition, and you know Thunderbird, always flying around the rooftops. Never uses the main entrance. It’s kind of a superhero thing. I mean, if I had wings—”
Max jabbed Adrian hard in the side and Adrian stifled a grunt. “Which is to say … how do we get to the roof from here?”
The nurse led them to a plain door and punched a code into a keypad while Adrian assured her that a Captain Chromium autograph would be no problem. He made a mental note to actually follow through on that promise as he and Max bolted up the steps and pushed their way out onto the hospital roof.
Wind buffeted them from the east. From way up here, Adrian could see the Sentry Bridge, Merchant Tower … even the parking garage where he and Nova had staked out surveillance on the hospital when they’d been trying to stop Hawthorn and her gang.
He passed over the helicopter landing pad on the center of the roof, heading for the north wall.
Max, visible now, came to stand beside him, scanning the city rooftops—the water towers, the fire escapes, the windows glinting in the late-afternoon sun. “Did you order a helicopter for us?”
Adrian chuckled wryly. “Nothing that glamorous.”
“Then what are we doing on the roof?”
“You wanted to avoid being near prodigies as much as possible, right? Well, like you said, on the streets, you never know who you might pass. But up here, the sky is ours.”
Max took a step back, hands held up. “Oooh, no. I realize that you had to carry me like a sack of potatoes when you brought me here, and that’s embarrassing enough. You are not becoming my general mode of transportation. Thanks, but no thanks.”