Page 165 of Supernova

Nova exhaled. She felt like she was releasing a breath she’d been holding on to for ten years. She covered the dead star with her hand and watched as the last remnants of its light faded away into the ocean beyond the city’s ports. There were a few more sporadic flashes of color, of brightness beneath the water’s surface, and then all fell still.

For a moment, it was peaceful on the cathedral’s roof. The whole world felt quiet. Waiting to see what would happen next.

Max groaned and slumped forward. Adrian barely managed to catch him before his head struck the stone banister.

“Max!” they shouted simultaneously, crouching at his sides. Adrian pulled him into his chest, pushing back his mop of sweat-drenched hair.

“Is he breathing?” asked Nova, checking for a pulse. The golden veins were gone, and his skin was now pale as parchment.

But yes, he was breathing. Yes, his heart was beating.

“Max!” Adrian yelled. “Come on, kid, stay with me.”

Max’s eyes started to open, fluttering warily, and Nova could feel her relief mirrored in Adrian. Not just to see his eyes open, but to see them returned to normal, if a bit bleary and unfocused.

“Were we heroic?” he croaked.

Adrian laughed and crushed the kid against his chest. “I think you just redefinedheroic,” he said through an onslaught of tears.

“Max! Adrian!”

Nova propped herself against the wall, feeling like it would be weeks before she could stand without her muscles wobbling, and turned to see Hugh Everhart and Simon Westwood racing across the roofline, though Simon hesitated when he was halfway to them, his expression torn.

“What was that?” said Hugh, falling to his knees and wrapping both of his sons in his broad arms. “We were coming up the stairs when we felt it and now—” He pulled back, bewildered. “What did you do?”

It took a moment for Nova to understand. She’d been so overwhelmed by the surge of inexplicable power that was inside of her, even for such a short time, she had failed to notice the change thatstill lingered inside of her. Swallowing, she flexed and straightened her fingers. They tingled encouragingly.

A laugh tumbled from her mouth. Her power. It was back.

She could tell that Adrian was having the same realization. They were prodigies again. Elation rushed through her, and the first thought that crossed her mind was that Adrian would be able to fix her bracelet.

But that was a request for another time. Beaming at him, she slipped the bracelet into her pocket.

The star had returned their gifts.

And yet. Adrian still had his arm around his little brother, and nothing was happening. Nova felt no weakness in his presence.

Could it be that Max was no longer the Bandit?

Simon continued to approach them, cautious, and seemed bolstered by every step in which Max’s power had no effect on him. Then he was laughing, too—they all were, as their family crowded in together, embracing amid the broken stonework and shattered shards of glass.

Feeling like she was intruding on an important moment, Nova heaved herself onto her feet and stumbled across the roof. She stooped to pick up Ace’s helmet. She peered into the opening where her uncle’s eyes had once looked on her, doting and proud.

But his pride, she could see now, was never for who she was. It was only for what she could do. What she might be able to do for him. She doubted if he had ever truly loved her.

“It was indestructible when I took it the first time.”

Nova spun around. Captain Chromium had extracted himself from his family and was standing warily a few feet away. Was he worried that Nova still despised him? Now that he knew the truth about who she was, she supposed it was impossible for him not to think of how she had tried to kill him in front of thousands of adoring citizens.

“I doubt we’ll have any luck destroying it now,” he added.

Nova angled the helmet one way and the other. She could feel the weight of the dead star in her pocket, and wondered whether it could have been used to destroy the helmet. But it was too late now. Whatever power that star had held, it was gone, spread out across the world.

“We can put it down in the catacombs,” she suggested. “We’ll bury it down there, and hope no one will find it.”

“In a chromium coffin?” Hugh suggested, and though his eyes twinkled as if it were a joke, Nova actually liked the idea.

“With Ace,” she said.

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