Sami’s heart sunk into his stomach and he suddenly backed slightly into his chair. An Antiserum was interesting enough, but there was something a little too obsessive in Apex’s tone. Sinister, even. Was Apex some doom-ridden quitter like Lightcrown who wanted to escape his own powers with an Antiserum? Or worse, did Apex want to wipe powers off the face of the planet, himself included?

  Swallowing, Sami tried to make his question sound casual. “Why do you want the ability to get rid of powers?”

  “A scary question, eh?” Apex winked, but Sami wasn’t assuaged in the slightest. “The number of people Awakening keeps going up, but membership for organizations like HUE and EUE are slow going. It means there are plenty of people out there with nefarious purposes and destructive potential. If we stop a criminal like that, our only option right now would be to kill them.”

  Sami frowned. “Kill them? What about jail?”

  “There’s no jail cell that could hold me. Nor half those people in the ambush on our headquarters. They’d be out as soon as they regained consciousness. But… If we could get rid of their powers entirely, then jail would be a viable option once more. Until then…” Apex gripped the seathead so tightly it bent under his fingers.

  Sami eased slightly in his chair. The concept of an “un-Awakening” serum was too fresh for him to have an opinion that aligned with Apex’s but at least he didn’t sound crazy. The idea made sense. And Sami also worried about how to handle taking down a villain in public. Could he leave them to the police?

  “Don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone about your plans. I can see how some people might freak out,” Sami assured him with a thumbs up from his Shadow Hand.

  Apex eased up on the chair, relaxing at Sami’s words.

  “Good. I knew I could trust you. Naomi had such high praise.”

  “Really?”

  “Sure. Why do you think you were deployed so early?”

  “I didn’t think about that…”

  “In fact we want to send you back out today if you’re comfortable with it.”

  “Yeah! Yes! Of course!” Sami said, leaning forward in his chair while his Shadow Hand quivered in excitement.

  “Easy, Sami.” Apex chuckled. “This is routine. Nothing fancy. We volunteered to control traffic at a broken intersection. You would go with a more experienced HUE member, Rudy. He’s a good rank, but neither of you will be doing anything intense.”

  “Yeah, that’s fine! I’ll go and not use my power at all! I thought I was gonna be let go for messing with the HUE image!”

  “Excellent. Except, please do use your power while you’re out there. Be flashy. Or continue to work out with it like I’ve seen you doing. Or, just be yourself. Smiling is important. We want to make sure the image of HUE is a good one, even if it’s something mundane. And right now, people want to see more of you.”

  “Great! Except for the part that people want to see more of me,” Sami said, smiling.

  “Is that an issue for you?”

  “Not an issue. I just don’t really want to do anything for fame. I’m cool just helping.”

  Apex chuckled again, leaning his head to suggest they leave. Sami stood with him.

  “We have that in common, Sami. I’m glad you decided to join up with HUE,” Apex said, leading the way out.

  “Me too.”

  “Rudy will meet you at reception. He’s a stickler when it comes to time, so try not to waste his,” Apex said, turning the opposite direction down the hall.

  “Got it. Thanks Apex, I’ll see you around.” Sami waved with his Shadow Hand.

  “The name’s Alex,” Apex said, waving.

  Sami grinned widely as he headed to reception, feeling amazed that Apex was forthcoming with his name when he still couldn’t get a hint out of Lightcrown. Rushing through the hall, he entered the large warehouse and sped through the open area. Claire waved to him, and he pointed to the exit area with a hand. Claire then waved with both arms, looking uncharacteristically urgent. Scrunching his face slightly, Sami flicked his eyes between the exit and Claire.

  “Get over here!” Claire said, waving with one arm and pointing to an embarrassed Gutshot next to her.

  “Deployment!” Sami replied, continuing toward the exit.

  “You should go,” Gutshot said immediately.

  “Don’t you dare!” Claire snapped.

  Feeling cornered, even across the room, Sami rushed over to see what was so serious. When he arrived, Claire gave a pointed stare to Gutshot.

  “Either admit you were kidding, or tell him what you told me,” Claire said, sounding like a mother scolding her child after eating cookies before finishing his dinner.

  “Why are you being so weird about this?” Gutshot asked.

  “Sami. Who is Gutshot’s dad?” Claire asked.

  Sami’s smile flickered.

  “We can drop this, Claire. It’s okay,” Sami said, giving her a look. He thought they were on the same page about the topic by now.

  “No, this is extra weird. Who is your dad, Gutshot?”

  Rolling his eyes, he raised a hand and pointed toward Sami. Narrowing his eyes slightly, Sami looked behind him only to see empty warehouse.

  “You’re serious?” Sami asked, looking at Gutshot earnestly.

  “What do you mean, Dad? Is this some prank you made with Claire?” Gutshot asked, sounding concerningly sincere.

  “Sami, how old did you say you were?” Claire asked pointedly.

  “I’m seventeen,” Sami said, watching Gutshot closely.

  “And Gutshot?” Claire turned her whole body his way.

  “Eighteen, why?”

  An awkward moment sat silently between them as both Claire and Sami stared at Gutshot. The moment stretched into a long silence, during which Gutshot looked at Sami with a sort of glance that Sami shrunk away from. Like a son looking to his dad for how to feel.

  “Do you think maybe there’s something a little odd about your respective ages?” Claire prodded.

  “Is this like a trick question? I dunno, what do you think, Dad?” Gutshot looked to Sami.

  “Gutshot, you know I’m not your dad, right?” Sami asked, glancing above him.

  “What?” Gutshot placed a hand on his stomach, looking genuinely offended. “Why would you say that?”

  “Is this your other Power? An Anomaly that makes you think people are your dad?” Sami asked, looking at the red and green bubbles above Gutshot with Power Sense.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “That explains it!” Claire exclaimed, looking vindicated. “I knew there was something wrong about it. It wasn’t some weird joke, it’s something messing with his view of the world!”

  “Dad, what is she talking about?”

  “Can we talk about this later?” Sami asked. “I’m being deployed right now.”

  “Yeah, I can deal with it now that I understand it.” Claire nodded.

  “We can talk about it at home, right Dad?” Gutshot said earnestly.

  Sami stared at him with a cringe-induced smile. “Sure thing… Champ?”

  Gutshot grinned, giving Sami a thumbs up. With a salute with his Shadow Hand, Sami rushed away, escaping the sensation of a son’s gaze on his back. Sami was already convinced that it was an Anomaly, but he wanted to know what triggered it. And even more importantly, Sami was insanely curious to know about Gutshot’s real father.

  Upon reaching reception, Sami unexpectedly found Rudy waiting. A clean-shaven man wearing a gray dress shirt with a tie, pressed pants, and glasses. On his hip, attached to a key zip chord was his key card to HUE and a round plastic plate that said “2A.” He looked very old, maybe thirty-five years old. Rudy checked his watch and looked up at Sami.

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  “Sami, I presume? You’re a little late.”

  “Sorry, I was a little caught up with something on the way out,” Sami pointed a shadow thumb over his shoulder.

  “No sweat off my back. I just don’t work after hours. We’re good on time, still got at least two hours. Let’s roll.” Rudy walked out immediately.

  Sami rushed to remain close behind his fast pace. Despite this being a traffic job, Sami appreciated how quick Rudy moved. A man with a purpose.

  Glancing both ways up the street, Sami watched for Steve to roll up in his truck, but Rudy continued leading the way until he hopped into a luxury sedan. Sami blinked as Rudy quickly waved him in.

  “Burning daylight, Sami. Come on!”

  “Sorry.” Sami ran to the car. In his rush, he accidentally closed the door on his Shadow Hand, but he was pleased to see it maintain its form and bounce the door off it. More severe circumstances were required to make it dissipate. Maybe training was already showing signs of improvement.

  “This is a nice ride. I was expecting a truck. Or something less sleek.”

  “You like it?” Rudy asked, hitting the gas and gunning down the road. “I got it before joining HUE. No way I could afford this on their salary. But benefits are nice, so I don’t complain. Plus, they understand how much I hate overtime.”

  “Overtime?”

  “Yeah, you know we’re hourly right? And they don’t pay overtime, so I don’t work overtime,” Rudy explained.

  “Oh. I see.” Sami did not see.

  Never having had a job before, it was difficult to understand the concept. Rudy checked his watch as he turned down another road, glancing at his GPS on the dashboard.

  “That Shadow Hand looks pretty nifty. Got any other powers?”

  “Power Sense. I can see how many powers people have if they’re Awakened,” Sami said.

  “That’s incredible! You can look at someone and know whether they’re Awakened?”

  “Yeah, I didn’t think it was that impressive.”

  “It sounds like the most important reconnaissance power there is!” Rudy said, slapping the top of his steering wheel. “You get to know how dangerous someone is as soon as you see them! Imagine someone tries to bluff you and you already know they have nothing up their sleeve. Really good stuff. I’m glad you’re on our side.”

  Sami grinned, remembering how one member of the ambush tried to bluff him and Dawson about how many powers he had. Using his Shadow Hand to cover his head from the sun rather than using the car’s visor, he turned to Rudy and looked at the plastic plate with his Rank on it.

  “What about your powers?” Sami asked.

  “You can’t tell me what they are with Power Sense?”

  “No, just the number. I see them as cloudy, misty bubbles floating above people,” Sami explained.

  “And all the bubbles look the same?”

  “No, they have different sizes and colors.”

  “And what do the colors mean?” Rudy pumped the gas to speed through an intersection with a yellow light.

  “I dunno. Should they mean something?”

  “You tell me! You’re really dexterous with that Shadow Hand, you probably had to work on that. How much have you worked on Power Sense?”

  Sami raised an eyebrow to himself, not having considered the idea of working out Power Sense. He looked at Rudy with a new appreciation, feeling like he was a pupil to a mentor.

  “It’s more like an on and off switch. I see the powers or I don’t. And I don’t keep it running all the time. It takes energy to use.”

  “Well, use it longer. Stretch that limit. You might find out more about the bubbles. What do my bubbles tell you?” Rudy asked, Sami’s head bobbing slightly as he pulled a sharp right.

  “You have a red and a blue bubble,” Sami said, scrutinizing them for any further information.

  “Makes sense that they’re not the same color. My powers aren’t similar at all. What do you know about red bubbles?”

  “Not much. I know bubbles glow when you use powers, so you’re not using yours,” Sami said.

  “Hey, good stuff! Well, one of my powers is… How do I put this… I can calculate risks. And the other is portals,” Rudy said, slamming his brakes as though the next red light snuck up on him.

  “Portals?” Sami asked excitedly, picking his head up from an inch away from the dashboard.

  “Easier to show than tell.”

  “How is it a power to calculate risk? Isn’t that just a desk job?”

  Rudy put some thought into it, glancing at Sami sidelong with some amusement. “You mean an actuary? It has a surprising number of use cases beyond that.”

  “Like knowing what side a coin will land on?”

  “Well, no. That’s always 50 percent. And my power tells me it’s fifty percent. It’s more like knowing if I can eat food that’s been in the fridge for a while,” Rudy explained quickly.

  “You’ve eaten rotting food?” Sami asked, wondering if Rudy had more resolve than Gutshot.

  “Sure! But nothing crazy… I ate an old pistachio. And sure, it was healthy, but it was gross,” Rudy said, poking his stomach with a hand. There was something off about the way Rudy explained himself enough for Sami to be certain he was holding back information.

  “Huh. I guess that could be useful,” Sami said, wondering about more applications of risk assessment.

  Could he work out and always reach failure by calculating the risk of self injury? Could he even know how far he was from hitting a personal record? What if he hit the gas as fast as he could? Would he be able to assess the risk to a crash and base his speed on that? Sami suddenly slid his hand to hold on to the grab handle, considering that Rudy’s reckless driving could be because he didn’t fear for a crash.

  “Did that help with the Power Sense? Get any new feel for my powers, or any aspect of it?” Rudy asked.

  “Not really.”

  “That’s fine. How much have you been tracking people out in the field?” Rudy rolled right into the next question like the first stopped mattering.

  “I… Don’t know what that means.”

  “Analyzing someone to get an understanding of them. Their clothes, their looks, their mannerisms.”

  Sami thought back to the robbery he stopped. “I guess so. There was a guy pretending to have fire power that I used Power Sense on to see he was lying. He had a flamethrower up his sleeve.”

  “Great!” Rudy nodded to someone waiting for the traffic light at the pedestrian crossing. “Now give me an analysis on that guy! Full analysis, don’t leave out details.”

  Sami squinted, scanning him up and down.

  “There’s a guy standing on the sidewalk waiting to cross the street, and a few vehicles ahead of us. Three to be exact.”

  “A guy?” Rudy asked, amused. “That’s a poor field report. Give me more on the guy.”

  Sami sat up straighter.

  “Umm… He’s of average height and build. Looks like he has lighter skin and black hair. If I had to guess, I’d say Southeast Asian. Wearing a blue shirt and jeans. And a hat that’s tilted up so you can see his face clearly. Oh, and he wears glasses,” Sami read each attribute as they jumped out to him.

  “Okay, okay.” Rudy drummed on his steering wheel with his fingers, sounding slightly unimpressed. “That was a great two-second glance at the guy. Give me something useful?”

  “I feel like that was plenty of information to pick him up in a photo or lineup,” Sami suggested.

  “Tell me something about him,” Rudy demanded.

  “How am I supposed to know anything other than what I described?”

  “Look at him! His hat is discolored. Is it because he’s lazy and doesn’t clean it? No, his glasses are also a bit crooked. Two points are enough to establish a pattern. He’s not a wealthy guy. How else could you have determined that fact?” he asked.

  Sami leaned forward, peering at the man and trying to figure it out. Looking at the streetlight impatiently, the man wiped the sweat off his brow and smeared his hand on his shirt.

  “His clothes aren’t looking very new?” Sami attempted.

  “No, not necessarily. Plenty of well-off people don’t constantly restock clothes. It’s a lot simpler than that. It’s boiling out. Anyone who can avoid it would not be walking around in direct sunlight right now. And he’s headed the same direction we are. I think people would avoid a place where a light post was hit over if they could afford it.”

  “Or he has business with that broken post.”

  “Now you’re analyzing.” Rudy winked.

  Sami scratched his head, surprised that he didn’t pick up on things before Rudy pointed them out. His quick scan of the man felt right, like there was a story to be told about anyone on the street. Sami turned back to Rudy, impressed.

  “Is that what you do while you’re driving? Take in everything like that?” Sami asked.

  Rudy shrugged, moving the moment the light went green.

  Turning again, Rudy pulled up to an intersection surrounded by cones. A fallen traffic light lay in the intersection’s center, encircled by detour signs.

  “This is us,” Rudy said, turning off and hopping out of the car in the same motion.

  “Any idea what happened here?” Sami said, looking at the fallen signal. Upon closer inspection, the traffic light housings appeared significantly larger than he expected. It looked almost as tall as him, each bulb about a foot across in diameter.

  “Some Awakened kidnapping business at a pizza parlor, or something,” Rudy said, walking toward the center of the intersection where someone stood wearing a high-visibility vest and yellow construction cap. Sami followed slowly, surveying the area to try and put together a story. There were a few pieces of sliced pineapple with cheese spotting the floor. Pineapple pizza? Gross.

  “You with HUE?” the man in the vest asked, reaching a hand out to shake. Rudy took it firmly.

  “That’s us. I thought this was a traffic control job. You didn’t clear out the traffic pole, yet?” Rudy asked.

  “It wasn’t my idea. Mr. Steele wanted you for traffic, but he only sent me to clear this pole out! What is this, like a ton? No way one man moves this without heavy machinery. Either of you have enhanced strength?”

  “I know that name. Which one is Steele? The mayor?” Rudy asked, looking around at the sidewalks with intent.

  “No, the current mayor is Bernard Sugar,” Sami said, putting his Shadow Hand under the traffic light to see if he could budge it an inch. Nothing.

  “Steele has a campaign set for the next cycle,” the workman said.

  “Ah, so he and HUE are both trying to win some free press,” Rudy said, clapping his hands and rubbing them together. He walked to a nearby sidewalk and slapped his palm onto it and then walked back to the traffic light and slapped the cracked asphalt beneath it.

  A thin purple line stretched out under the length of the fallen pole. It opened up and swallowed the traffic pole, spitting it out where Rudy had slapped the sidewalk.

  “Portals?” Sami asked, smiling.

  “Portals.” Rudy grinned. “Saves a lot of time.”

  “You’re telling me,” the workman said, scratching his head under his construction cap. “You guys want to spare me any of that Awakening powder?”

  “Powder?” Sami asked, watching the portal close into the asphalt.

  “Whatever you got that juices you up. HUE gives it to you when you join, right?”

  “There’s no juice. One day you randomly wake up with power and then you can apply for HUE.”

  “Random? You mean any schmuck can get a power?” the workman asked, sounding more concerned than enthused.

  Flipping on his Power Sense routinely, Sami blinked in witness of a green ball of hazy mist floating above the service worker.

  “Yup, any schmuck,” Sami replied.

  Sami decided not to inform him he was already Awakened, suddenly self aware that he may somehow be saying things that would do poorly in the media. The workman folded his arms and Sami's tongue caught in his throat, realizing that the man could already have known he was Awakened and he just insulted him. Rudy caught his gaze and was quick on his feet to switch subjects.

  “Clear out the cones and signs and we’ll be good to go. And if you want, I can put that traffic light elsewhere if you point out where you want it,” he said. “I’m gone in a little over an hour, so be quick.”

  “You got it. Thanks,” the workman said, running to gather the cones and open up the intersection to traffic.

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