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Nothing happens.

I venture closer toward the center of the tunnel web, walking this time so I can take in my surroundings. Dad said four villains had infiltrated Central. The last thing I need is one of them sneaking up on me.

I consider going home but the Atrium seems like a better choice. Everything worthwhile happens in the Atrium. Maybe that is where I’ll find my imposter.

I know I’ve made the right choice when I reach the Atrium. The unmistakable sounds of fighting leak through the impenetrable steel doors in front of me. It sounds like an all-out war behind those doors and my body itches to join them. I stand before the tall steel doors in the same place I stood on the day of my Hero exam. I was nervous then, but I’m ready now. This time it’s not a test.

As expected, the doors do not swing open when I press my palms to them. But they jiggle, and that’s not at all expected. I push harder. Soundless, the door gives away beneath the weight of my push. The system is disabled.

In my wildest imagination, I never imagined this. A mass of bodies tangled in a fight, blurring and yelling and filling the air with the tingle of power. I recognize several Heroes—probably the entire Hero Brigade, each one locked in a one-on-one fight with a masked villain dressed in solid black. I glance around the room—any one of the villains could be my imposter.

The Atrium, a vast and elaborately designed common area, is now a circus of chaos. The white granite floor peppers with drops of blood as Heroes and villains blur together in a chaotic struggle of good versus evil. Commotion fills the room, making it impossible for me to recognize anyone in the crowd. The decorative archways that line the room and dip into the floor, form columns that block people locked in battle the moment I try to focus on them. I look up at the massive domed ceiling that’s incased at the top with a skylight about fifty-feet wide. The sun was out when I left Research. Now the darkening sky casts a purple-orange glow onto the Atrium below.

This all takes a matter of seconds but I feel it in slow motion. A sickening thought occurs to me as I stand in the opening of the doorway with no freaking idea what I should do first. On the day of my Hero exam, I stepped through these same doors not knowing what to expect. What if this is all some elaborate scheme the examiners have contrived? Some kind of a second chance Hero exam?

A Hero in a bright blue suit is face down near the door. I rush over to him, kneeling beside him and scanning the area to ensure I haven’t been seen. “Hey,” I whisper as I shake him. “Get up. I’ll take you to safety.”

He’s an older Hero, one on the verge of retirement but still in the Hero Brigade. I don’t know his name but I recognize the retro-style suit he’s wearing. He’s been around longer than my dad has been alive. It doesn’t register right away when my hands shake him and don’t feel a surge of power beneath his skin. It isn’t until I roll him onto his back and see his crystal blue lifeless eyes staring straight ahead, forever frozen in a look of horror, that I realize he’s dead.

This isn’t Hero Exam Take Two.

I allow my anger to fuel me. I do not let it control me.

I take a few steps backward to gain momentum and then I catapult myself into the fray, arms and legs moving so fast they swoosh through the air. A guttural scream bursts out of my throat as I grab the nearest villain by the neck and slam him into a concrete archway, leaving the Hero he was fighting gaping in surprise.

“Who are you?” The surprised Hero wears his mask, but I’d recognize him anywhere. His name is Griz, and he’s one of Dad’s poker buddies. Thick waves of power emanate off him and, as he approaches me, his lips twitch like he’s planning to attack. Guess that’s to be expected; I am dressed primarily in black after all.

Since a picture is worth a thousand words, I don’t tell him who I am. I rip off my eye mask and toss it to the floor. “Maci,” he breathes. “Are you on our side?”

A solid black figure appears from the nearest archway and advances toward us. Griz and I lunge at the same time but it’s me who kicks the villain’s kneecap, hearing it crack as he collapses to the ground in agony, his knee bent the wrong way. I turn to Griz. “Of course I am.”

He looks as though he’s not entirely convinced, but a villain pounces on him and takes his attention away from me. This may be arrogant, but I’m immediately annoyed when no one seems to notice that I’ve arrived.

Hello,
I think as I punch a villain in his kidney and slam my knee into his back.
I’m here! Why doesn’t anyone care?

Justification comes in the form of a familiar male voice. “Maci!” My brother’s voice has me swirling around so quickly, my black hair obscures my view. A sharp pain slams across the back of my head. I let out a silent scream as my vision blurs. Another kick to my ankle sends me toppling forward, but not before I reach up and grab my attacker’s fist. I twist it as I fall, using my weight to pull him down with me.

“Die,” the masked villain hisses. That’s when I realize she’s a woman. I roll on top of her and crush her skull into the floor.

“Not before you,” I hiss back as a pool of blood drips from her ear.

A silver suit catches my eye as Nyx makes his way through the chaos, eyes focused on me. I break into a smile and give him a slight wave as I deliver a swift kick to the villain on the ground who’s trying to bite my ankles. Nyx lifts his hand too, only instead of waving he points at me. “There’s Maci,” his thin lips say the words loud enough to catch the attention of most people in the room. My smile wavers. I pull myself to my feet. Nyx breaks into a run. “Get her!”

Oh no.

A large body practically falls out of thin air and crashes into the column I’m attempting to use as a shield. Dust and concrete bits fly everywhere. It’s Max. My brother is only a few feet away! I run toward him but he steps in front of my path, pressing one hand to my chest and holding the other one in front of him. “Touch my sister and I’ll kill you.”

Nyx stops dead in his tracks. The power bouncing between Max and his best friend grows strong enough to repel anyone who tries to step in front of them.

“She’s a murderer,” Nyx says. His thin frame is just as tall as Max, but with only half the width. I wouldn’t bet on him in a fight between the two. “Turn her in.”

With Max’s fingertips still pressed to my chest, I feel his response in his power before he says anything. “We do not negotiate with villains. Your job is to detain these assholes. Leave my sister to me.”

It’s not an ideal reply, but I’ll take it. Nyx slinks away, knocking two villains to the ground as easily as if they were mannequins. Max gives me a guarded look over.

“I didn’t murder anyone—I’ve been set up.”

“Then where have you been?” Our conversation is rushed; all the things we want to say to each other bury under the vital questions we have time for amidst the war going on around us.

“With Evan at Research.”

He cocks an eyebrow as if this is the last answer he’d expect from me. “I looked everywhere for you,” he says. “I thought you had switched sides. I thought she was hiding you.”

I shrug. “You didn’t look there.”

Someone calls for Max from across the room. He pushes me into a crevice in the wall between two massive decorative columns. “Stay here,” he orders, before jumping back into the fray, disappearing inside a tumbleweed of fighters.

I stay put for exactly half of a second and then I give into my natural instincts and join the fight.

Like a hoard of zombies in a Halloween horror film, the villains keep coming. I punch and kick and slash my way through them, keeping the wall at my back so there are no surprise attacks. Desperation to find my brother again overwhelms me, but I can’t take my eyes off my attackers for even a second to look for him, or I’d be overtaken.

My breathing grows ragged, almost to the point of panting, by the time the Heroes outnumber the villains. I have a clear view of Max, Nyx, Hugo Havoc, and a few others now. They form a circle around the open center of the Atrium, engaged in a battle with only one villain per Hero. Their numbers are down. Ours remain strong.

Unlike on the Xbox, my enemies’ bodies don’t blink a few times and then disappear when I knock them unconscious. Six crumbled villains lay motionless at my feet, a pile of black Kevlar bent in unnatural positions.

I allow myself to catch a breath. Not two seconds pass before I hear the clicking of a Retriever hook coming from above. I look up to see yet another villain hiding in the ceiling arches. The clicking hook releases from her hand and slams into my chest. I gasp, expecting pain, but the hook bounces off my new breastplate, hits the floor with a zap, and falls over on its side. The villain gawks at me and I give her a smirk. Nice job, idiot.

She hits the floor a second later, her black suit fitting unflatteringly tight around her pudgy form. Blue eyes peer at me from behind her facemask. The discarded Retriever hook lies between us. We both get the same idea at the same time.

But I’m faster.

I swoop up the hook in the second it takes her to bend toward it, arms outstretched as if trying to find something in the dark. Her coordination and speed are so inefficient she doesn’t deserve to call herself a villain. I wrap my hand around her neck. On the plus side, at least she won’t miss her power once it’s ripped from her body. It’s not as if she used it well in the first place.

My right hand pulls back, hook positioned with the pointy ends facing her, and I give her a sardonic smile as I prepare to ram the hook straight into her flabby abdomen.

Two things happen before I get the chance to hook her.

A supersonic boom fills the air, ear-shattering in its low bass volume, vibrating the floor, the walls, and my own skin as if I were encased inside a large speaker. Everything goes black. My heart beats three times. The woman’s body sags beneath my grip on her neck.

The booming sound happens again and the lights appear as quickly as they had extinguished. I’m eye to eye with a now-unconscious villain in my grip. The woman’s eyes roll to the back of her head. The retriever hook falls from my hand as I watch in horror as blood gushes out from her eye sockets, spilling over her eye mask. I release her neck and she slumps to the floor. Dead.

A horrified shriek fills the air and I turn to see Crimson, her hands cupped over her mouth as she stands over a dead villain lying in a pool of blood. All the villains have suffered this fate, leaving only a dozen Heroes and myself to witness their sudden demise.

The raspy voice of a hundred-year-old chain smoker comes out of the silence. “Come on child, you don’t need to scream.” The examiner’s glass podium descends from the ceiling, stopping just higher than I would be able to jump if I had a good running start. I suck in a deep breath and turn to face Pepper’s murderer.

“Aurora.” I grit my teeth and look at the woman who has made everyone’s life hell. She laughs and it echoes off the walls, a cackle that chills me to the core. Max’s scent surprises me. It’s the same fresh body wash smell as always; fighting has no effect on him. He takes my side and grabs my arm protectively.

“What do you want with her?” he asks. “And where is my father?”

Aurora brushes her hands over her skintight leather dress, smoothing out the wrinkles. “You’re an inquisitive giant. Look at all those muscles,” she coos. “What are they feeding Heroes these days?”

Max starts to reply and she holds up a finger. “You know what, I don’t care. That’s enough talking from all of you. I’m only here for one person.”

I step forward. She’s right. She’s only here for me and I would like very much to find out why and without hurting anyone else I care about. “There she is,” Aurora says with a smile. “Maci, dear. Come stand with me.”

Max tightens his grip on my arm. Crimson appears at my other side. Heavy breathing comes from behind me and I look back to see Hugo Havoc making his way around the dead villains. “You will not take her,” he says. “And you will release President Might immediately.” Aurora’s jaw tightens. Hugo makes his way in front of me, stopping beside Max as they form a protective barrier around me. “You are outnumbered, Aurora. This is over.”

“Right about one thing, Havoc.” Aurora tosses something shaped like a metal poker chip into the air and catches it in her palm. “I am outnumbered. But this isn’t over.” Her thumb presses into the device and it emits a high-pitched whistle that, like a dog whistle, I only hear for a second before its frequency rises beyond my capability of hearing.

I expect something equally abhorrent to happen—like Hugo’s head to suddenly burst into flames or something, but his head remains exactly where it is … and so does every other part of his body. Max’s grip on my hand turns ice cold and his fingers stay in the same gripped position even after I pull and twist my arm trying to break free. Crimson doesn’t move either. In fact, no one moves.

A pained grunt escapes Hugo’s parted lips.

Aurora clacks across the fishbowl, stopping in front of Hugo. She rests her hands on the ledge and leans over to look at him. “Hugo Havoc. You worked thirty years in Pathology, yes?”

Another grunt.

“You have incredible resources in the pathology lab—DNA of every Hero. I believe it’s used for tracking Retrievals,” she says, glancing at me as if this explains everything. “Can you believe it?” I don’t answer and she turns back to Hugo. “So much information and yet it is so poorly secured. It’s as if anyone with a valid MOD can gain access.” She shakes her head, giving him a reproachful look. “Oh wait. That’s exactly how it is. And that’s what I did.”

She holds up the poker chip device. “Felix made me this handy tool. Just a press of a button and it inhibits the movement of every Super programmed into it.”

“You used their DNA to
freeze
them?” I ask, trying to make sense of this new information.

“Oh stop your whining. They’re fine. They’re just a little—stuck—at the moment.” A small part in my mind warns me to fear her, but I’ve got a better plan. My wrist breaks when I pull it out of Max’s grip, but it heals as I step around my frozen bodyguards and face Aurora, woman to villain. “If you have the ability to paralyze everyone then why bother bringing an army of villains to fight them? Heroes died, you bitch.”