Adrian lifted the bowl to his mouth, slurping at the pink-tinged milk.
“Yes,” said one of the women, “but how many injuries could have been prevented if they’d just stopped him?”
The man shrugged. “And what if one of those civilians they took to safety had ended up dead? We’ll never know.”
“What we do know,” said the first woman, “is that—casualties aside—Winston Pratt probably would not have been captured today at all if it wasn’t for that would-be assassin tossing him out of his own balloon. Can we please talk about the elephant in the room here?” She spread her arms wide, her face contorted in disbelief. “Nightmare! Who is she? Where did she come from? We don’t know the first thing about her, except she almost assassinated Captain Chromium today, she took down Thunderbird, and she eluded a Renegade patrol unit in a one-on-three fight. Isn’t anyone concerned about this?”
“I am,” said the man beside her. “But what concerns me even more than this solo attack—if it was a solo attack—is that, for all we know, this could be a sign that more prodigies are going to start coming out of the woodwork, bent on destruction and mayhem all over again. It shows that the Renegades may not have the city under control like they want us to think they do. That new, villainous prodigies are still going under the radar. And if that’s the case, I’d like to hear from the Council about what they plan on doing about these threats.”
“Hopefully,” said the woman beside him, “they have a better plan going forward than they had today!”
Scowling, Adrian grabbed the remote and turned off the TV. He leaned back into the sofa cushions and took another bite of cereal. In the sudden silence, the crunching became absurdly loud, the demolition of small artificially flavored rice puffs filling the entire living room.
It was uncanny how much the news anchor’s questions mirrored those that had been revolving through his head all day.
Nightmare. The great mystery. And they didn’t even know the greatest mystery of all, those words that he could not quiet.
One cannot be brave who has no fear.
Swinging his feet down to the carpet, Adrian set the bowl on the coffee table and grabbed his sketchbook.
The wooden floorboards of the house creaked beneath him as he padded into the main foyer and up the oak staircase to the second floor. It was an old, stately home. Had, in fact, been the mayor’s mansion, back when Gatlon City had a mayor. The mayor and his family and even some of the staff had been murdered in this very home in the early days of the Age of Anarchy. When he was younger, Adrian had been convinced their ghosts still haunted the upper floors, which was why he begged to be able to convert the basement into his bedroom. Though he no longer believed the spirits of the dead were still hanging around, he often felt a chill of apprehension when he went up to the second floor, where the master suite and a series of guest rooms branched off a central hallway. He rarely had cause to come up here, though. The basement, the kitchen, the living room—those were his domains.
But what he needed to see now was up here, in his dads’ shared home office.
Reaching the landing, he flicked on the hallway light, illuminating the dark wooden doors, the intricate crown moldings, the faded oriental carpets that ran the length of the narrow corridor.
The house had been in terrible shape when his dads decided to move in. It had been a prime target for looters during the Age of Anarchy, but Simon felt it had too much history to be allowed to succumb to eternal abandonment. It was a symbol of a different time—a peaceful, civilized time, when society had order and rules and leadership.
So they’d all moved in and had been restoring it ever since. Adrian could hardly remember how bad it had been back in those early days, when he’d been mortified at the thought of actually living there, with its piles of trash and cigarette butts, stripped wires left dangling from punctured holes in the walls, thick cobwebs and scrawled graffiti on every surface. But before long, his dads’ dream became his, too, and by now he’d done almost as much to restore the place as they had. At least his skills lent themselves easily to the project. When a shutter was broken or a balustrade destroyed, it was easier for Adrian to simply draw them a new one rather than track down an artisan who could mimic the work. The result was that Adrian felt as much pride in the house as he could imagine any of them did, even if he still found himself avoiding the rooms where the murders had taken place.
With his sketchbook tucked beneath one arm, he placed his fingers against the door to the home office and nudged it open. The hinges creaked. The hall light cut through the thick shadows. Reaching into the room, Adrian pressed the top button of the vintage press-button light switch, one of the few that was still original to the home. The chandelier brightened, five small amber lampshades making the room glow in subtle shades of gold.