Grunge grabbed hold of his bronze belt buckle. Instantly, his hand began to change, taking on the gleaming brownish-yellow appearance and texture of the buckle itself. The effect spread up his arm, across his shoulders, and down his chest and back, until his entire body completed the change. He looked more like a living statue than a human being—a living statue that was mad.
“Say your prayers! ’Cause there’s a half ton of mad metal in your face, and I got more important things than you to take care of!”
With a roar, Grunge leaped to the attack. Slash matched his charge. Slash thrusted and whirled, employing his blades with such grace that the fierce offensive almost resembled a dance. The air hummed with each pass of the blades, and each contact resounded with the sound of metal on metal. Grunge parried and blocked the blows with single-minded determination, using his arms and shoulders to protect his face. It was a defense that would have left a normal man dismembered, but thanks to Grunge’s bronze form, each blow did little more than shave off ribbons of metal in a small shower of sparks.
It was a mark of Grunge’s concern for Roxy that he wasn’t even bothering to indulge his usual non-stop stream of patter. Wordlessly, Grunge moved in closer, wading through the hail of blows. He raised his fist to deliver the finale ...
. .. and froze.
It wasn’t just Grunge’s arm, either. His whole body was paralyzed. He tried to move his legs, but they wouldn’t respond. Nor would his hands or neck or anything else. Grunge couldn’t even move his tongue and lips to speak, or his eyes to see what was going on. He had become the bronze statue he resembled.
It was a bizarre sensation. As Grunge tried to will his body to move, he didn’t feel any strain or resistance, as though something was holding him back. Instead, he simply felt... nothing. It was as though his body had become disconnected from his brain. As though his body had simply stopped working.
Slash just watched him, passively, without so much as a sneer of triumph. Grunge didn’t get it. How was Slash doing this?
Then he realized Slash wasn’t. Out of the comer of his eye, Grunge spotted one of the girls facing him. She was standing motionless despite the battle raging throughout the room, her eyes closed.
What’d that blonde chick call her? Grunge thought. “Overdrive?”
Then it came to him. He would have slapped himself in the forehead for overlooking the obvious if he could. No, he thought. “Override. ”
Just then, Grunge started to move again.
You’d think he would have been happy about it. After all, that was precisely what he’d been trying to do, just a moment ago, with no success.
But he wasn’t happy about it. Because he wasn’t doing
it.
Grunge watched helplessly as he put one foot in front of the other and slowly started to walk. It was like being a passenger in his own body. He tried to stop himself, but he had as little luck preventing the action as he’d had when he was the one trying to initiate it.
Grunge’s heavy bronze arms raised themselves high over his head. His hands clasped together in a double fist.
Grunge’s mind recoiled in horror as he suddenly realized what his body was about to do. He was about to bring his hands down in a devastating blow that would smash the target at his feet to pulp.
And the target at his feet was Roxy.
Rainmaker didn’t know how the kid had done it, but whatever it was, she’d hit the far wall of the living room hard. The pain in her side was terrible, and it hurt more whenever she moved. Rainmaker suspected that the impact had at least cracked, if not broken, a rib or two.
She couldn’t afford the luxury of taking time to recover, though. Despite the pain, she forced herself to her feet and prepared to use her own powers to retaliate.
Before she could, though, the world went mad.
The last coherent thing Rainmaker could remember was Rave’s eyes narrowing. Then Rainmaker’s senses erupted. Her head starting spinning violently. Everything around her dissolved into a swirling mass of light and color with no distinguishable shape or form. Her ears were filled with howling, surging waves of sound, as though someone had recorded a random symphony of noise—and then played it backward. Her tongue tasted loud, and the world felt purple. Rainmaker had no idea which way was up. She couldn’t tell where her body ended and everything else began. The cacophony of disjointed sensation filled her head to bursting. She was afraid even to move for fear of falling over ... assuming that she hadn’t already.
Rainmaker thought she screamed. But she couldn’t be sure.
The strategy was perfect, serving simultaneously as both attack and defense. Calling it overwhelming would have been the understatement of the century. And at the same time, there was no way to launch a counterattack, or even defend herself. She couldn’t possibly risk using her own powers. As it was, she could barely manage linear thought. If she tried to command the weather with her senses running amok, there was as much chance of doing damage to one of her friends as one of her foes. She might even wind up striking herself.
Then, without warning, it stopped.
Rainmaker staggered and sagged, her body so thoroughly exhausted from the ordeal that a massive hangover would have been a step up. She grabbed onto the nearby window moulding to keep from falling. But while every neuron in her body felt like it had been stretched past its limits and twisted in knots, she was grateful. At least, she could see and hear again. Of course, it meant that the searing pain in her side had returned, too, but at this point, she had to be grateful for small favors.
Rainmaker’s mind was racing. She just didn’t get it. Admittedly, she was still having trouble thinking straight, but Rave’s strategy didn’t make any sense. Why would Rave stop now? Why not finish Sarah off first?
Rainmaker squinted through her disheveled hair to see Sidestep watching her. A small patch of air in front of Sidestep was shimmering. Rainmaker stared, curious, as Sidestep reached her arm out in Rainmaker’s direction. But as Sidestep’s hand and forearm met the shimmering patch, they disappeared into nothingness.
Suddenly, Rainmaker’s entire body was wracked with a evel of agony that dwarfed the pain she felt in her side.
She went pale. She couldn’t breathe. A terrible pressure engulfed her heart.
Rainmaker sank to the floor. Her head smacked against the metal of the sputtering baseboard heater. But she didn’t even notice the pain of impact or the heat.
Oh, God! she thought. I’m—I’m having a heart attack! It’s like someone’s hand squeezing my heart!
Slowly—
Like someone’s ... hand .. .
—the light—
. . . squeezing . ..
—started to dawn—
... my heart. . .
—and Rainmaker realized the truth.
... My. . . God. ..
Her hand’s .. . inside me ...
That was it.
That was why Rave had released her.
They didn’t just want to kill her.
They wanted her to feel it, too.
CHAPTER 9
D umout knew he had to act fast. The pressure inside his D mouth was mounting. He had only seconds left before Growing Boy’s size would increase enough to tear off Burnout’s jaw and rip his head apart.
But what could he do? He was still soaking wet from Riptide’s attack. It didn’t stop him from using his powers, but it hampered them a whole lot.
Growing Boy was getting bigger. As he started to fill Burnout’s mouth and throat, Burnout felt himself gag. He had to fight not to throw up.
No! he thought. That’s it!
Burnout was soaking wet...
... but only on the outside.
Burnout let the heat build within his stomach. He was still gagging, but now he welcomed the feeling. Because it was going to save his life.
Growing Boy felt the heat, too. The rising temperature took a moment to catch his attention, but once it did, he quickly realized what it meant.
<
br /> Growing Boy was too big now to escape Burnout’s mouth. Quickly, he started to shiink back down.
Burnout’s stomach convulsed. A ball of fiery plasma coursed up his throat and out his mouth. Growing Bov leaped from Burnout’s mouth less than a second ahead of the flames. If they had caught him full-on, he would have been burned to a crisp. He avoided that fate by a hairs-breadth, but he was still too close to the wave of fire to come out of it unscathed.
As the minuscule assassin put as much distance as he could between his intended victim and himself, Burnout bent over the arm of the sofa, retching up bits of flame that smoldered on the carpet. Panting and sweating, he extinguished the tiny fires with his foot, and looked up ... ... to see Grunge about to smash Freefall.
Unable to fly, Burnout ran as fast as his weakened condition would allow, and flung himself at his best friend. Grunge was so heavy in his bronze form that a standard flying tackle aimed at his waist would have had no effect. But Burnout wasn’t aiming for Grunge’s waist.
Reared back for the blow, with his arms held high over his head, Grunge was already off-balance. Burnout grabbed onto Grunge’s hands, and with the full force of his weight, tipped his metallic teammate backwards. The floor shook as Grunge landed on his back with a crash.
Still unable to speak, Grunge silently cheered his friend
on.
Burnout scrambled to his feet, searching to see if Sarah needed help, too. But he wouldn’t get the chance.
Because when he looked around, Burnout saw a twelve-year-old girl grabbing Grunge by the ankles and hoisting him off the floor. Knockout spun around, swinging Grange at Burnout like a giant, five-foot metal club.
Grange managed to start the change back to flesh and bone before he connected. But he still couldn’t move and still couldn’t stop the impact. There was a sickening thud as the semi-bronze hero connected with his friend. Burnout was knocked clear off his feet.
Knockout casually tossed Grunge off to the side. He landed on—or, more accurately, through—a coffee table that shattered beneath his weight. With no visible show of emotion, she moved in toward Burnout to finish him off.
Rainmaker gritted her teeth against the pain. She had to do something. She couldn’t just give up and die.
But what could she do? The white-hot agony that filled her body prevented her from so much as standing up. She could try to use her powers against Sidestep from a distance, but with her hand inside Rainmaker’s chest, the chances were good that she’d just wind up killing herself. If she hit Sidestep with a bolt of lightning, it was the same as blasting it straight into her own heart.
There was no point to counting on any help from her teammates, either. Fighting against her own reflexes, Rainmaker forced her eyes open long enough to see that they weren’t doing any better against Gen14 than she was. If something, or someone, didn’t turn the tables quickly, they were all dead.
Where were Lynch and Kat? It was bad enough that Gen13 was so badly outpowered. But in the face of a well-organized enemy, they were leaderless, too.
Rainmaker could see only one answer. And she was the only one who could execute it.
The only option Rainmaker could see was to push her control of the elements further than ever before. She could sweep the room with the combined force of a blizzard, a hailstorm, and a full-blown hurricane. No one could survive all of that for long. It was a last-ditch solution, one that was likely to cost her life... and the lives of her friends as well.
But the odds were that it would kill Gen14, too.
We 're dead anyway, she told herself through the pain. These kids are too dangerous. They’re inhuman. They could slaughter millions—and they will.
Unless it ends here.
Rainmaker said a silent prayer. She bid goodbye to her friends. She prepared herself to do what she had to do.
It’s funny the sorts of things that go through your mind at a time like that. Despite the pain, despite the roar of battle all around her, all Rainmaker could hear was the sputtering of the heater beside her ear.
Suddenly, Rainmaker’s eyes opened wide. The heater!
Rainmaker gave a quick mental command. Out of nowhere, a massive bolt of lightning shot down from the sky to blast the wall near the heater. The plaster shattered. The pipes within the wall burst, releasing powerful, billowing jets of scalding hot steam.
Sidestep jumped back to avoid it, and the pressure in Rainmaker’s chest was gone. Rainmaker could see her own blood on Sidestep’s hand.
But only for a moment.
Within seconds, the clouds of steam filled the room, making it impossible to see anything. Rainmaker was still trembling, and battling to stave off shock and unconsciousness. Yet, she realized her makeshift smoke screen wouldn’t hold off their opponents forever. She had bought herself only a small margin, and she needed to make the most of it.
Ironically, Rainmaker’s greatest advantage was that her team was already down on the floor, where the steam wasn’t quite as thick. All she had to do was summon up a mild breeze to clear a small zone of visibility around her, while the Gen14 kids groped around blindly.
Highwire’s commanding voice cut through the mist. “Where’d they go?” she called. “Sweep the room! Sing out when you find one of them!”
Mustering up her remaining strength, Rainmaker crawled quickly beneath the steam. Every movement brought new agony to her broken rib. But still, she pushed on until she reached the spot where Grunge was already stirring. He shook his head to clear it, his long hair flying.
“Tssst!” Rainmaker hissed.
Grunge brushed the hair from his face, a determined look in his eyes. “Where’s Rox?” he whispered back.
Rainmaker increased the breeze slightly but kept it near the floor. As more of the area cleared, Freefall came into view. She was still curled up in a ball, her eyes tightly closed.
Rainmaker cupped her hands to Grunge’s ear to minimize the odds of their being overheard. “We’ve got to get out of here,” Rainmaker whispered. “You grab Roxy and get her to safety. I’ll go after Bobby.”
“Right.”
“And stay low. Take the fire stairs. If we get separated, I’ll meet you out back in the alley.”
With a quick nod, Grunge headed off.
Even as she made her own way toward Burnout, Rainmaker had to marvel. She’d never seen Grunge with so little to say before.
He really does love her, she thought.
Moving forward, Rainmaker was surprised to see Burnout already crawling toward her in a clear zone of his own. Apparently, they’d had the same idea, though she didn’t know how he’d managed it. Then, as he came closer, she felt the wave of heat and figured it out. He was using the same trick that he’d used yesterday in the snow, raising his body heat enough to disperse the steam around him.
Burnout’s way was riskier, though. Because if one of the Gen14 kids felt the sudden rise in temperature as he passed, they’d be able to pinpoint his location.
Rainmaker drew a finger across her throat, signalling him to cut the heat. Burnout nodded. She pointed toward the door, then set off toward it. Burnout followed close behind.
The door seemed miles away. But they covered the distance swiftly.
As they headed out into the hall, Sarah looked back at the remains of their beautiful apartment.
This isn ’t over, she thought grimly.
It took several minutes for Knockout to follow the sound of hissing steam back to its source and feel her way to the broken pipes. Then, after she crushed the pipes to slow the billowing steam to a trickle, it still took several more for the air to clear.
By that time, no one was surprised to see that Gen13 was gone.
Highwire looked around with a clinical eye. She nodded at the empty apartment without disappointment, as though acknowledging exactly what she had expected to find.
“Mission abort,” she said. “Someone is bound to have heard the noise and called the authorities. We cannot risk public exposu
re at this time,
“Sidestep, withdraw to base.”
Sidestep responded with a nod. She began to create the teleportational portal they’d need.
“What about Fairchild?” asked Reverb. “Intel indicated a fifth member of Gen13.”
“The other targets are likely to alert her,” Highwire answered. “In all probability, they know where she is. We do not.”
While Highwire had been talking, Riptide had been surveying the area around him. Mostly, it was just the shattered remains of objects that had been broken in the fight. However, his interest was piqued by a sheet of paper lying on the bar next to him. The thing that caught his eye was Caitlin Fairchild’s name, printed in bold letters across the top of the page. He scanned the sheet, which was limp from the steam, but still perfectly legible. Gingerly, he peeled the wilted resume off the bar and turned it over. The back was covered with a list of times, names, and telephone numbers.
“Perhaps we do know where she is,” Riptide said.
It’s worth it, Kat thought. All of it.
Everything that Kat had put up with all day long faded into the background. In the half-hour since she’d arrived at the converted loft that housed the company, it was as though everything that Kat had endured in her other interviews had ceased to exist.
.. So I was reading the American Association of University Women report,” the woman was saying, “and it just sort of clicked in my head. Here you’ve got thousands and thousands of teenage young women dropping out of science and technology, right? So what struck me all a sudden is that, after a while, it starts to turn into
a self-fulfilling prophecy. The technology doesn’t attract women because it isn’t designed to appeal to women.” “Because it’s been built by men.”
“Exactly! Most of the girls drop out before they grow up to design stuff themselves, so they’re not around to build the next generation technology. So when the next set of girls comes down the pike, what do they find?” “More of the same.”
“And that’s not going to draw them in any more than it did the last time around. To really engage them, you need stuff that’s been designed with them in mind. It can’t be macho shoot-’em-up games where you think with your testosterone. It needs to feel different, it needs to look different, it needs to be relational instead of coldly logical. It needs to ‘think’ like they think.”
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