Page 119 of Renegades

Max turned his excited attention toward Adrian. “You’ll do it?”

“Sure, of course,” said Adrian with a surprised laugh, and the smile he gave Nova—a little intrigued, a little grateful—brought unexpected warmth to her cheeks. “Am I drawing up the syringes and tubing, too, Miss Engineer?”

“Absolutely not,” said Nova, feigning disgust. “The whole point of this experiment is to show how normal, everyday objects can, through the power of physics, be turned into something really cool. That point gets missed when you just”—she waved toward Adrian’s hands—“conjurewhatever you need.”

He nodded seriously, though his eyes were still shining behind the thick frames of his glasses. “Right. Because I could, in theory, just redraw the elevators to make them functional. You know… by magic.”

Nova pointed a finger toward his nose. “My science trumps your magic. You’ll see.”

“I can’t wait,” said Adrian.

“The technicians have syringes.”

She glanced toward Max, who had made his way over so he was standing just on the other side of the glass.

“Lots of them,” he added, and Nova couldn’t keep her eyes from darting to the bruises on the inside of his arms.

“Right,” she said. “That’ll work. I bet they have rolls of tubing lying around somewhere too. Maybe Adrian and I can go in and… talk to them? See if they’ll let us borrow some stuff?”And look around while we’re there…

But Adrian shook his head. “Even I don’t have clearance to go inside those labs. But I bet if Max made them a list, they’d bring it to him.”

Nova’s shoulders sank, but only briefly as she saw another opening. Her brow furrowed as she turned back to Max. “They try really hard to keep you happy in here, don’t they?”

Just like that, she saw his enthusiasm deflate, and Nova had the distinct impression that he tried to forget that he was trapped in there as much as possible.

“Sorry,” she said. “It’s just… what are they doing to you? What are all the blood samples for?”

Max looked down at the needle wounds in his arm, stretching the skin to inspect them, as if this was the first time he’d paid them much attention. “Blood samples, tissue samples, bone-marrow samples…”

“Exactly,” said Nova.

But when Max looked up, it wasn’t at her, but at Adrian, his expression slightly pleading. For his part, Adrian’s smile had disappeared, overshadowed by a furrowed brow and tight lips.

“Oh, right,” said Nova. “I don’t have the clearance for that information.”

“It’s really important, what they’re doing,” said Max, and Novawondered if he was trying to convince her, or himself. “They think they’re on the verge of a breakthrough, even. It’s going to change prodigy relations forever.”

“Prodigy relations?”

Max flushed. “That’s what they keep saying.”

“What does that mean?”

Adrian cleared his throat.

Nova glared at him. “Top secret?”

He opened his palms apologetically. “We don’t make the rules.”

No, she thought wryly.Your family does.

But she tried to smile as if she understood. “Am I allowed to ask where your parents are?”

“They’re dead,” said Max, without a beat of hesitation or an ounce of sorrow.

“Oh,” stammered Nova. “I’m… I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be,” said Max. “They threw me off Sentry Bridge when I was two weeks old.”

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