by Tess Sharpe
“That’s right. I had a pair when I crashed. Did—”
“I have the bag with your clothes and gear from the ship,” Carol assured her. “We can go through it, get the gloves.”
“I bet I can whip up some duplicates for us as soon as I get a better idea of the tech we’re dealing with,” Scott said.
“You’ll have some help on that front,” Carol said, pulling out her phone that had just started buzzing. “I thought it’d be a good idea to add another member to our little quartet.”
“Am I not enough brains for you, Carol?” Scott joked.
“You can never have too many extra brains on hand,” she deadpanned, making him chuckle around a mouthful of waffle. “And the person I’ve asked isn’t just a mega-mind. He’s all brawn, too—literally.”
10
SMASH.
Amadeus jerked backward just seconds before the robot’s arm sank into the wall by his head. Concrete went flying, a small piece striking his cheek.
“Okay, maybe not precisely calibrated,” he muttered, tapping a new coding sequence into his tablet as the tall silver monstrosity he’d spent the summer creating in his free time tugged its arm free of four feet of reinforced concrete wall and rounded on him, the flat discs at the end of its arms flipping sideways and starting to spin with deadly speed. He’d run enough tests with pumpkins to know that if the robot flung them, Frisbee-style, he’d be bound for Sleepy Hollow.
Exactly why had he given the robot deadly Frisbee arms again? It seemed like a good idea at the time. Now he was having second thoughts.
There was an inquisitive rumble in the back of his head—the big guy was stirring, awakened by his elevated heart rate, but he’d skew his test results by Hulking out right now. This was about outsmarting the robot, not overpowering it.
Each step the bot took toward him shook the floor, but Amadeus stood stock still, waiting until it was only inches away. Then, just as it let one of its death-Frisbees loose, he hit ACTIVATE on his tablet and raised his tablet-free arm. The disc struck the personal force field he’d just engaged; green light rippled around him, but it held. The disc twirled through the air across the lab, ricocheted off a column, and rolled down the floor, stopping at the feet of a group of people.
Oh, right. He’d forgotten he had visitors coming.
Unfortunately, the robot, which he’d built to be much too smart, took that moment of distraction to its advantage.
“Oh, God, not again,” he heard Carol say, just as the bot began sending discs of death spinning in all directions.
“Sorrrrrry!” he shouted, but it came out garbled as he began to transform.
Each time, transforming had the same contradictory effects: a confusing mess of opposites when he spun into his new body, not knowing which way was up. His body was his, but it wasn’t. He occupied a space alongside Brawn, but he was Brawn, all at once. A lot more existential than he preferred, being a man of science, but Brawn? Brawn was the side of him that was all emotion, strength and power.
His muscles rippled, bones growing longer and stronger, skin stretching and greening as he grew, up, up, up, until the lab equipment looked like toys and the spinning discs were crushed by his massive hands as he swiped them away from their human targets. So tiny… so puny—the discs and the humans.
He grabbed the top of the robot’s head and twisted it, a pleased smile spreading across his face when he heard the grind and twist of the gears and wires, and then pop! goes the robot.
Brawn tossed the head to the ground, and its body drooped like a mechanical flower, creaking as the circuits lost their juice. Only then did he turn his attention back to the humans.
“Hey, Brawn.”
He squinted, bending down so he could see her better. The captain. Not Captain America. No, the other captain. The one with the star. Last time Brawn had seen her—it felt like forever ago—he had been angry with her.
“Not that it’s not great to see you, but I’m wondering if Amadeus can come out and play?” Captain Marvel asked him. “We had an appointment,” she continued. “It’s a little urgent.”
Brawn sighed, blowing a raspberry so she knew he was doing her a favor even though Amadeus had control. She grinned.
“Thanks, big guy.”
Amadeus blinked, slowly getting to his feet and staring down at his now-demolished robot. “I worked so hard on that. You couldn’t have helped stop it from getting destroyed?” he asked, looking over his shoulder at Carol.
“I mean, I could have,” Carol said. “But I heard about the last metal man someone tried to save from Brawn.”
“Tony was fine,” Amadeus muttered, cheeks turning pink.
“Stark is always fine,” Carol said, with very little heat. “Anyway,” she straightened her shoulders, all business. “Everyone, this is Amadeus Cho, also known as Brawn.”
“Hey.” Amadeus stepped over the robot, wiping his greasy hands on his jeans. “Scott, it’s nice to see you again, and nice to meet you, Mantis. And you must be Rhi.”
“Yes,” the girl replied. She couldn’t manage much else, still shocked at his sudden transformation from man to Brawn and back again.
“That landing you made was a tricky one,” he said. “I watched it live online. I’m glad you’re okay. I’ve got so many questions about the ship—and the Damarians and their technology. Carol sent me the report last night when she floated the idea of me joining the team, but it just made me have more questions.”
They’d been spinning in his head all morning, and now that he had the chance of getting some answers, they just spilled forth. “If the society’s purely pyrotechnic in abilities, how and why did they have a weapon with the ability to suppress a larger variation of powers? When you crashed on Damaria, your powers were already affected by their technology before the shock bracelets, or even later, the implants, right? If so, we must surmise that they have some sort of power suppressor that’s being broadcast somehow. Did they just miniaturize that in the form of an implant? You said the implant was connected to brainwave patterns, right? Do you have the one you took out? If I can figure out how they programmed them, I should be able to find a way to reverse-engineer it. And if it’s similar to the larger suppression weapon, maybe I can crack that through learning about the implant.”
“Umm…” Rhi licked her lips, her fingers clenching and unclenching under the barrage.
“Maybe not so many questions right now,” Mantis said firmly, stepping forward.
“Also, your robot’s on fire,” Scott said, pointing to the smoking carcass.
“Dear God, it’s like herding cats,” Carol muttered, hurrying over before Amadeus could even move, grabbing the fire extinguisher and hitting the robot with a few good squirts.
“Just wait until we’re all in zero G,” Scott said cheerfully, walking over to help her. “Think of the trouble we’ll get up to then.”
Amadeus seemed to be the only one who noticed how Rhi had stepped back quickly from the fire, her gaze fixed on the flames as if she were afraid they were eyes spying on her.
“Hey, you want to come over here, out of the way?” he suggested, and she followed him to the corner of the lab, where he had a big steel desk covered with stacks of books and piles of papers that would never be organized.
“I didn’t scare you, did I?” he asked, even though he had an inkling that the fire frightened her more than his transformation. “People on Earth are used to me greening up, but I know it can be kind of overwhelming.”
“I’ve seen Inhumans who can transform,” Rhi answered, reassured by his friendliness. “Not like that, exactly. But similar.”
“One of your friends we’re going to rescue?” he asked.
Her dark eyes swept down, focusing on the spread of books on the desktop. “No. She’s gone now. Not all of us survived those first few years. And not all of us survived our Keepers.”
His throat clicked painfully as he swallowed. He’d accidentally stepped in it, and he was afraid he’d be doing that a
lot here. He needed to be more aware of her background and the emotional minefields that came with it. Maybe Mantis could give him some tips.
“I’m sorry,” he said, feeling awkward, but then she flashed him a quick, reassuring smile, and the awkwardness dissipated a bit.
When he’d gotten the call last night, the last thing he’d expected was Captain Marvel asking him to join a high-stakes rescue op. He never dreamed he’d be even the last name on her list of possible allies to go after the Keepers of Damaria. But life had a way of surprising you… Carol had a way of surprising you. And in Amadeus’s life, Carol’s surprises had been pretty catastrophic. Much of the time, the two of them didn’t see eye to eye. Losing Bruce Banner had crushed so many people, and he and Carol had clashed—to put it mildly—a lot during that time.
But when she told him about Damaria, he knew he couldn’t say no to her, even if he wanted to be petty—which he didn’t. Maybe even more than muscle like Brawn, they’d need a tech expert to navigate this world undetected. And with a mother-to-be and a bunch of other lives on the line, the decision was an easy one—he was in.
Like Rhi and her brother Zeke, Amadeus knew what it was like to lose your parents, and he understood her determination to save the only family she had left. If anything happened to his twin sister Maddy, he’d tear an entire galaxy apart to get her back. So yes, he was all in.
“Is this room all yours?” Rhi asked, as Carol and Scott finished dealing with the fire and Mantis watched the two of them over her shoulder.
“Alpha Flight strongly encouraged me to do some of my more volatile experiments here at the Triskelion instead of my home lab. Something about national security and that one time I accidentally turned my neighbor’s cat into a twenty-foot treat-seeking fluff monster. Brawn was really happy to have a decent-sized pet for a few hours, though.”
“I would have liked to have seen that,” she said, running her finger over the spines of his stack of physics texts.
“See any you like?” Amadeus asked.
Rhi jerked her hand back. “Sorry.”
“It’s fine,” Amadeus said. “Books are meant to be shared and read, right?”
“I—we… weren’t allowed them,” Rhi said. “The only books we had were Damarian histories, and they were kept locked up most of the time.”
There he went, stepping in it again.
“Well, that’s completely screwed up,” Amadeus said, because it was the truth, and he didn’t know what else to say. It startled a laugh out of her, one that she clapped her hand to her mouth to stifle, like she was afraid someone would scold her. Which… hell, she was probably afraid of more than that.
His stomach churned. He had enough trouble with most people his age, but he’d need to walk on extra-fine eggshells here. And at least, it seemed, they had books in common. He could work with that.
“You can read, though?”
She nodded.
“Then take whatever you want,” he said. “Most of this is science, but I’ve got fiction on this.” He reached over and grabbed his e-reader, tapping it on.
“Fiction? Like mysteries?” she asked. When he nodded, her face lit up like the Aurora Borealis. “I remember mysteries. From before we crashed.”
“Check it out,” he encouraged her, handing over the e-reader. “Everything from Agatha Christie to Harlan Coben. I’ve also got the classics and a bunch of new releases, plus all those Inhuman romance novels by Koli Kane on there. My sister downloaded those,” he added quickly.
“Oh, your sister downloaded those?” Mantis asked, grinning over her shoulder as she caught the last bit of their conversation.
“Absolutely,” Amadeus said, trying to keep a straight face.
“Such a mystery why everyone denies reading those books, yet they’re always topping the bestseller lists.”
“Why would you deny reading a book if it’s allowed?” Rhi asked.
“It’s because it’s a romance novel,” Mantis explained, walking over to them. “People think they’re not as smart as other books, because they’re read mostly by women and they’re about love. We may not be Damaria, but we still have some major problems with how we treat women here too. And one of those problems involves putting down the things that women like.”
“Okay, guilty,” Amadeus admitted. “Maddy downloaded the first book, but I got hooked on the series. And now all I want is to find out when Joax will discover she’s heir to the Crystal Throne. I’m still torn if the prince really deserves her affection, though.”
“So many books,” Rhi murmured, paging through a text on robotics. “You really don’t mind?”
“We’re gonna need something to read on the journey,” Amadeus said. “Speaking of that, I should get down to the hangar deck. Will you walk me through how the ship works? It’ll be easier with someone who’s familiar with the tech. You can bring that with you,” he added, when her grip on the tablet tightened.
“All right,” she said. “Carol said she had my heat gloves, but they’re out of juice. That’s one of the reasons I crashed. I can’t keep the systems on without the gloves working.”
“It’s kind of a terrible system to have in place,” Amadeus commented. “Especially because not all the Damarian men have pyrotechnic abilities, right? So the ones who don’t have the flame need to wear these gloves all the time to get anywhere?”
“Only about forty percent of the men hold the Flame,” Rhi said.
“So the other sixty percent and all the women can’t even open a damn door or operate a vehicle without the gloves?” Amadeus shook his head. “That’s massively ineffective.”
“That’s the point, Amadeus,” Mantis said gently. “If you can’t even leave your house or take a bus without a pair of gloves that I assume only the government issues?” Rhi nodded in confirmation. “Then you’re going to be really invested in following all the rules required to get—and keep—access to those gloves.”
“Pyrotechnic fascism,” Amadeus said. “Well, let’s go smash it with some science. Give me a few hours, and I’ll find a way to keep your gloves energized all the time, Rhi. We’re going down to the hangar deck,” he called over his shoulder to Carol and Scott, who were standing over the smoking corpse of his robot. “You two ready?”
Carol kicked the robot one last time for good measure. “I think it’s been beat.”
11
“DO YOU really think he can fix it?” Rhi asked, staring down at the hangar deck, where Amadeus was working on the ship’s central command module.
“Amadeus is very skilled,” Mantis said.
“And super smart,” Carol added. “Don’t tell him I said that, though.”
Before he and Scott started in on the job, Amadeus had spent the morning scurrying around assembling parts and asking Rhi endless questions. But once he got going, things started moving fast, especially with Scott’s help. By the time lunch had rolled around, he’d broken through the heat gloves’ security sequencing and rerouted the energy pathways to work in a continuous loop while Scott set to work duplicating the internal heat sensors that warmed the gloves so everyone onboard would have a set and access to all the ship’s controls. It would make it a lot easier to infiltrate Damarian buildings this way, as well. Rhi had watched Carol try to use her own powers on the sensors earlier, but that had melted the tech down to a smoking glob within seconds. She couldn’t help but wonder how the Damarians would react to a woman who held more power and heat in her body than any of them combined.
Once they figured out how to repair the circuitry and restart the power module, Amadeus became a whirlwind, chatting nonstop, his old-school welding torch sending sparks flying as he soldered the split control-panel screen back together. Rhi retreated to the deck overlooking the hangar bay, far from the sparks. Amadeus noticed, and seemed to understand that she didn’t want to be near the fire. He suggested gently that she might like to join Carol and Mantis up on the deck, where they were hammering out battle plans.
S
he smiled and turned to go, hiding her surprise. Over the years, she had become unused to anyone offering her options or speaking to her without a patronizing tone, as if her brain was too small to understand the question, much less give the answer.
You’re smart and strong. Those were the words each girl would whisper to Mazz every night before they fell asleep. A tradition that Rhi had started, her mother’s words fresh in her mind back then. Mazz had been so young when they crashed. They’d all been scared that she’d forget what it was like to be more than what the Keepers told them they were. So, as she’d told Carol and the others, the girls had made sure Mazz knew who she was and where she came from. And they’d explained what freedom meant, so that even if she couldn’t remember what it felt like, she was taught in secret to reach for it.
That’s what she knew Ansel wanted: girls who didn’t know better. Girls he could exploit from the cradle. Girls he could train from their first breath to believe they weren’t enough, that they were dangerous, that they were too weak to bear the power that was their birthright. But that was going to end—soon.
“If Amadeus keeps up at this rate, we’ll be able to leave tomorrow,” Mantis said, handing Carol a neat list she’d torn from a notebook. Carol glanced down at it, then up at the empath.
“Do we really need two cases of flash grenades?” she asked.
“We will be infiltrating the Maiden House, which sounds like the equivalent of a prison,” Mantis pointed out. “And not all of us have…” She flicked her fingers. “You know.”
“Laser arms?” Carol rolled her eyes. “You have a good point, though. Rhi, how big is the Maiden House?”
“Ours is the smallest because we were considered the most dangerous,” Rhi said. “The building is three stories tall, surrounded by desert and sand dunes—nothing green for miles. There’s an electrified fence circling the grounds, and a force field beyond the fence that sets anyone who touches it on fire.”
“They really like their fire,” Mantis muttered.
“I can take care of the force field,” Carol said. “Amadeus can disable the fence. Are the girls kept on one floor?”
