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  “How are you...” I tried to finish the sentence, but I couldn’t get the words out. I was struggling too hard.

  “You were the second person to become a Super, yet you’re still so naïve,” Atlas said, as calm as he could be. “You’ll pay for this. The end will begin the same way the beginning did, with Macy Westling falling from the rooftop.”

  Atlas took his foot off me and dashed to Macy, grabbed her, and disappeared outside the building.

  I jumped up and ran outside as fast as I could. I looked up and saw Atlas standing at the edge of the Ebon High gymnasium roof, holding Macy over the edge by her throat.

  He let her go.

  I jumped up to catch her, exactly as I had all those months ago, moving so fast she fell in slow motion. But Atlas didn’t.

  Atlas slammed into me, knocking me away from Macy. I wasn’t going to let him stop me. Before he could pin me to the ground, I flew out from beneath his feet. Macy inched to the ground, all in painfully slow motion. I reached out for her, felt her red hair between my fingers.

  Atlas tackled me, sending the two of us flying through the gymnasium. We exited out the back wall and I got out of his grip. I flew over the rooftop and saw Macy as she reached the halfway point.

  I flew down, but Atlas got hold of me again. He grabbed me and threw me straight down to the ground, right through the roof of the gymnasium. I caught myself before I hit the ground and redirected my flight path.

  I flew out through the wall, bricks freezing in the air as the wall exploded around me. I stood right beneath Macy. I could almost reach up to grab her.

  Atlas came at me one last time. He grabbed me and began to fly along the wall of the gym, holding me out in front of him the whole way. My body slammed into the wall nonstop. The pain was immense, but I ignored it. I had to save Macy.

  Atlas was angry, and that meant he was sloppy. His grip wasn’t tight enough on me and he was leaning a little too far forward. I placed my foot on his chest and using his momentum, threw him off me, far into the air.

  I flew to Macy just in time. I wrapped my arms around her, slowing her descent. Time sped up back to normal as I slowed down. I shielded Macy with my body as the gymnasium fell to the ground behind us, unable to stand after the beating Atlas and I had put on it in a matter of seconds.

  After the dust and debris had settled, I stood, helping Macy up. “You okay?” I asked.

  She wrapped her arms around me. “I don’t know what to say. Thank you.”

  I smiled as we let go. “No problem. All part of my job.”

  Macy smiled and was about to say something else, but four gunshots rang out.

  Four bullet holes appeared in Macy’s chest.

  I caught her before she fell to the ground, but she was dead before I even laid a finger on her.

  “I was trying to be poetic, but I guess I’ll stick to just getting the job done from now on.” Atlas threw aside the pistol he’d used to kill Macy. “See you soon, Kane,” he said, then launched himself into the air.

  I didn’t follow. I couldn’t. I was numb. I let out a bloodcurdling scream that shattered the windows of all the cars around me.

  I didn’t want it to be true. It couldn’t be. But as I looked down at her lifeless body, I couldn’t deny it.

  Macy was dead, and there was nothing I could do to save her.

  Clouded Judgment

  It was cold on the night Macy died as I waited on a rooftop in Dallas for Holocene.

  I still couldn’t believe she was dead, and it was all because of me. Because they’d found out who Tempest was. This was exactly what I’d worked so hard to avoid. I didn’t even know how they’d been able to figure out who I was, but that didn’t matter anymore. All that mattered now was that I stopped Atlas. I needed to keep my mind off everything. I didn’t want to think. I didn’t want to process. I just wanted to fight.

  Holocene landed on the rooftop five minutes after we were supposed to meet.

  “You’re late,” I said.

  “Sorry about that,” she said, brushing her brown hair behind her ear. “I was a little busy. I’m sorry about your friend. Well, everything, really. I should’ve been there.”

  Yeah, you should’ve, I thought. I didn’t want to think about the fact that Samantha had told me to wait. That maybe if I’d listened and waited for Holocene, Macy would still be alive. Atlas wouldn’t have gotten away. Maybe—there I went. Thinking about it. “What do you know about Atlas and the Legion? Samantha said you were out last night chasing some leads.”

  Holocene hesitated and crossed her arms. “Are you sure you want to do this? You don’t want to talk or anything?”

  “No, Holocene, I don’t,” I snapped.

  “Tempest, you’re upset right now. You need some time. We all understand that. You’ve been through a lot,” she said, taking a step forward.

  I shrank back. “I don’t want time. Time is the last thing I have to waste. I spent six months in a coma on the moon, for chrissakes. ‘Taking time’ is the last thing I want to do!” I yelled.

  “Okay, Tempest, you need to quiet down,” Holocene said, raising her hands to calm me. She took a couple more steps forward. It was like she was approaching a cornered feral animal.

  “I am calm! I’m very calm!” I yelled. “I just want to understand why, when I’m trying to stop Atlas and the army he’s building, you’re telling me to calm down! To take some time off! I don’t need. Any. Time. I just want to find Atlas!”

  “Tempest, it’s okay to admit that you’re in pain. It’s okay to admit that you failed. I-uh—” Holocene said, quickly trying to recover.

  It was too late. The words had already come out.

  You failed.

  “Oh, so you think I’m just a screw-up now, don’t you?” I snapped, taking a step forward. “You just want me to stay out of your way so you can take out Atlas by yourself, don’t you? You think you’re just going to swoop in and finish what I started? You think you’re better than me, and you think I’ll just slow you down, don’t you?”

  “Of course not!” Holocene shouted back. “We’re a team, Tempest! We’re going to take down Atlas. You, me, Samantha, Doug, the people I recruited while you were captured. All of us together!”

  Anger and frustration grew within me. I felt waves of anger slamming against the shores of my brain. I couldn’t think clearly. All I wanted to do was take it out on Atlas. “If you won’t tell me where they’re at, I’ll fly up and down the entire country until I find him myself!”

  I launched myself into the air with such force that a small crater formed in the ground beneath me and flew toward the East Coast. I planned on flying up and down, working my way west until I saw Atlas or he saw me.

  Just outside of Dallas, Holocene flew in front of me and stopped. I came to a halt a foot or two away. “Get out of my way!”

  “Tempest, don’t do this. You can’t take him alone.”

  “I don’t want to, but you aren’t helping me!”

  “You need time! Take just a day to process.”

  I flew past her. I didn’t need her to tell me what to do.

  Holocene grabbed my arm as I flew by and threw me to the ground. I slammed down through some trees and landed on the floor of the woods. Holocene stood over me, pinning me down.

  I pushed my feet up against her chest and threw her off me. She slammed into some trees, knocking them to the ground. I dodged out of their way and jumped up into the air.

  The trunk of a tree slammed into me, sending me flying through the woods, slicing through trees as I flew. I slowed and came to a stop, falling to the ground.

  Holocene flew toward me, her hand in a fist. I rolled out of the way and she punched the ground, sending a geyser of dirt into the air. “Tempest, stop it!” she yelled. “I don’t want to fight you!”

  I swung at her, my punch sloppy. She easily dodged it. I wasn’t sure why I wanted to fight her so bad, but I had to take all my emotions out on somebody.

  Ho
locene slammed her fist into the lower part of my back and I fell to my knees. She got behind me and put me in a headlock. “Stop fighting, Tempest. Just stop this.”

  I struggled against her grasp, but it was half-hearted. Even though she had me in a headlock, feeling someone put their arms around me struck a certain chord within me. I realized that Holocene was fighting me because she cared about me. She didn’t want me to go out there and do something I’d regret. If anybody could kill me, Atlas could. None of us knew for sure, but we didn’t want to find out.

  Holocene just wanted me to get better.

  I relaxed. I stopped fighting and collapsed into Holocene’s grasp. The moonlight filtered through the treetops as she held me on the forest floor. “I failed. Macy died because I failed. I should’ve waited for you. I should’ve waited,” I said, crying.

  “Shh, it’s okay. It’ll be okay. Atlas will pay for what he did. I promise you. He’ll pay.”

  I nodded reluctantly. “We’ll do it together, Holocene.”

  “Selena,” she said.

  I looked up at her, confused.

  She pulled off her mask, revealing her entire face. “My name is Selena.”

  “It’s nice to meet you, Selena. My name is Kane,” I said.

  I began to laugh and soon Selena did as well. My tears turned to laughter as my emotions poured out of me.

  The Siege Begins

  Two days later, I was sitting in my favorite chair in the storage unit as Selena explained what she knew about Atlas and the Legion. Samantha and Doug were there, as was a super with flight and strength called Nep. He was the dark-skinned guy who had come with Selena to rescue me from the STF. He wasn’t wearing any sort of mask or costume. I wasn’t sure where the girl who had been with them was. Hank and Drew were both there, though. It felt especially nice having Drew there.

  Basically, it was really cramped and really hot in there.

  “I think Atlas himself is in Washington D.C., as that’s where some of the more evil Supers have been congregating. Even reports of that teleporter Kane and I took down have popped up.”

  “Ugh, Sven,” I groaned.

  “That guy’s the worst,” Hank said.

  “Anyway, that’s the most logical place for him to be,” Selena said.

  “I don’t like the idea of Atlas and his Legion hiding out in the nation’s capital,” Drew said.

  I nodded in agreement. “Whatever he’s planning, it can’t be good.”

  “I think he’s planning something in more than just those cities, though,” Selena said. She turned to Nep, who stood up straight.

  “I was patrolling New York City and ran into some guys who were flying around the R those bastards engraved into the Statue of Liberty. They fled when I got close, but I caught one of them. They kept saying the word ‘mark’ over and over again, like some sort of crazy person. I thought it was a name—”

  “—but he meant a mark as in a target?” Samantha said, interrupting him.

  Nep nodded. “Exactly. All the R’s are marking their territory—territory they’re going to want to take soon.”

  “Where are the R’s all at?” Hank asked.

  “New York City, Dallas, Chicago, Los Angeles, and D.C.,” Selena replied.

  I sighed and slumped back into my seat. That was a lot of cities, and there weren’t a lot of us. From what I gathered from the word legion in the Legion of Richter, Atlas had a lot of people on his side. People and Supers, from what it seemed. And plenty of Eximus guns from the raid on the STF complex. This was going to be very difficult.

  “Okay, so I’ll keep watch on Dallas, of course,” Selena said. “Nep’s got New York. Drew and Hank, no offense, but you won’t be able to watch a whole city on your own.”

  “None taken,” Drew said.

  “I’m not that stretchy,” Hank agreed.

  “Hank, I think you should go with Nep. Drew, you’re with Kane. You guys will watch L.A.”

  Drew and I made eye contact, giving each other a nod and a smile. I was really excited to work with him. He was my best friend, and we were superheroes together. It didn’t get much better than that.

  “What about us?” Doug asked.

  “We’ll stay here and keep an eye on all news reports, police scanners, everything we can get our hands on,” Samantha said. “I’ll report it to everyone out in the field. We’ll also keep an extra close eye on the cities we don’t have anyone in, like Chicago and D.C., so if anything goes wrong we’ll be able to direct whoever’s not busy there.”

  “Are you sure there’s not something that needs to be hacked? Because if there is, I can hack it,” Doug said.

  I chuckled. “Yes Doug, we know. We aren’t fighting robots, though.”

  “Never say never,” Doug said under his breath.

  I rolled my eyes.

  “I have a few more things I want to go over before we get going,” Selena began.

  “Yeah, you might want to save that,” Samantha said. She pointed at something on her screen. “Local news stations here in L.A. are reporting that Supers just tore down the statue of Kane at the USC campus.”

  Thank god.

  “I got reports of some Supers destroying some construction sites in New York,” Doug said, tapping on his keyboard.

  I stood up from my chair and flipped up the hood on my Tempest uniform. “Everybody get to your cities. It’s beginning.”

  I DROPPED HANK AND Drew off in the middle of the USC campus. The Supers there didn’t have powers that were too crazy, so I figured they’d be able to take them out easily. Then I turned north up to Koreatown, where one of the more powerful Supers was wreaking havoc.

  Before I got there I could see a car fly high into the air and had déjà vu back to the times of Richter. I landed on the street a few hundred feet from the Super.

  My heart was pumping and my adrenaline rushed. I was ready.

  The Super loomed about seven or eight feet tall. He was huge, his muscles bulging all over. He looked more monster than man as he tossed a car at a crowd of pedestrians who were trying to run away.

  I caught the car right before it got to them. I swung it around and launched it right back at the Super. The car slammed into him and he stumbled backwards. He was thrown off by my attack, and let out a roar in anger.

  “Are you seeing this, Samantha?” I asked.

  “Yeah, he’s all over the news. What is it?” she asked.

  I grabbed another car he threw my way, tossing it back at him like a Super version of catch. “I don’t know! He’s strong, though. He looks like some sort of experiment gone wrong.”

  “I’ll see what I can find later. Gotta help Selena. Two of the Supers at Ebon High are playing hide and seek with her in downtown Dallas,” Samantha said before leaving my mind.

  Things really were beginning to kick off.

  A fire truck slammed into me, sending me flying into the building behind me. I hadn’t seen that one coming. I crashed through the glass walls of the building and slid through a row of empty cubicles, sure that the fire truck would destroy everything after me.

  We slid to a halt and I placed my feet on the grill of the truck. I gave it a hard push and sent it shooting back out the building. I flew after it, making sure it had the right trajectory.

  It did, and it slammed into the back of the Super, smashing him to the ground. The Super let out a guttural roar as he pushed the fire engine off him, sending it high into the air before it landed on the top of a nearby building.

  I rushed the Super, pounding my fist into its chest. The Super flew backward a foot or two, but not nearly as far as another Super or human would’ve flown.

  I hadn’t been expecting this, so when the monster Super quickly recovered and hammered his large fist into my side, I went shooting down the street. Pain filled my body as I tried to slow myself down. I was aided by the three-hundred-thousand-dollar sports car I careened into, destroying it.

  I climbed out of the wreckage. The Super charged dow
n the street at me on all fours. “Where the hell did this thing come from?” I asked myself. He looked like a monster you’d see on some late night TV show, but was clearly human, based on his human face and form.

  I jumped over his head as he got close and he skidded across the ground, stumbling over himself to try to bring himself to a stop. He began to turn himself around to come back for a second pass, but I was right in his face before he could do so.

  I delivered a Super-punch to his right cheek, causing his body to fly up and twist in the air. Then I brought my fist down into his chest, sending his hulking body into the ground hard, creating a crater in the road. The Super was dazed, but tried to get up. I slipped my hands beneath his body and lifted him into the air.

  I flew up fast and high. The Super struggled, trying to get free, but I kept a tight grip on him. Once I was high above the city, I turned around and threw him at the ground.

  The creature-like Super rocketed toward the ground, wailing in the air trying to grab hold of something. I flew down toward it, my fist extended, ready to seal the deal and smash him into the ground.

  A blur came out of nowhere to the left. This new Super swooped in and grabbed the creature, flying off into the distance with him.

  I slowed myself and came to a halt a few feet from the ground. I took in the destroyed street. Destroyed cars burned all around, filling the air with the smell of burning gasoline. The fire engine’s sirens wailed a warped tune, while people peeked out the windows of the damaged building, checking to see if the Super was gone.

  That thing had really done a number on this area, and there’d been no reason for him to do so. He’d been destroying stuff just for the sake of destroying it.

  I waited a few more moments, making sure that that creature-Super wasn’t going to come back. He seemed to be gone for good, taken away by whoever that other Super was who had caught him. I didn’t like what the existence of that thing implied. I had a feeling we had no idea what we were actually up against.

  I left the street and flew back to the USC campus. I landed just in time to see Hank trip a guy who was charging at Drew. Drew punched the falling Super with his arms, which were surging with Eximus energy, and the Super crumpled to the ground in a seizing heap.