It’s … what? Why are you looking at me like that?”
Nick shook his head slowly. “Uh. Nothing. Never mind. Déjà vu, I guess.”
“That’s the strangest feeling, isn’t it? Like you’ve been here before. Or it’s precognition. I think my father has a pill for that too, to be honest. Maybe that’s the one you’d like to take?”
Nick blanched. “That’s … I can’t—”
“Let’s go.”
Nick followed.
Owen led them toward the other side of the room, ignoring the walls of glass on either side of them. Inside, large machines sat silent. There were microscopes and computers and what Nick thought was an oversized centrifuge, though he couldn’t see inside it.
They stopped in front of a sheet of glass.
“There,” Owen said. “There it is.”
Nick stepped forward.
There were seven different tubes on the inside.
In each of the tubes, hung suspended in midair, was a pill.
Green.
Yellow
Violet.
Blue.
Orange.
Black.
White.
“That’s it?” Nick whispered.
“That’s it,” Owen said somewhere near Nick’s ear. “Tiny things, aren’t they? Though they’ll surely pack a wallop.”
“What … what do they do?”
“Green is super strength, capable of turning you into a human wrecking ball. Yellow is the power of flight. Violet is the ability to summon storms. Blue can make you become a conductor of electricity. Orange is fire. Black is smoke. Or maybe shadow. I’d stay away from that one if I were you. I’m told it’s … intense. I wouldn’t want that for you. Perhaps the blue. Or the green.”
Shadow. “And the white?”
Owen shook his head regretfully. “The white one is off-limits. Even for you, Nicky. It’s the most unstable. It’s telekinesis. The power to move things with your mind. We can’t touch that one. According to my father’s tests, the last person who was given the white pill lost their mind. It’s not quite there yet. One day. This isn’t even all of them, just the ones currently being tested.”
Everything felt too big, too wild. Unreal. “Oh,” he said dumbly.
Owen put a hand on his shoulder. “So. Which one will it be?”
“I don’t know,” Nick admitted. “It’s … a lot.” A choice, finally, here at last, if Owen was to be believed, and Nick didn’t know why he’d lie. Not about this. Owen could be an asshole, but Nick didn’t think he’d try and pull something over on Nick, not when he was hurting. “You said I’d have to keep taking them in order to stay an Extraordinary?”
Owen nodded gravely. “Yes, but let’s not worry about that yet. Choose one, Nick, and see how it goes. If you don’t like it, you can try another. And another. I’ll make sure of it. One pill to make everything go away, to protect all those you love the most. My father thinks … well. In addition to the military applications, he thinks these things should only be for the people who can afford them. The elite, willing to part with their riches in order to have the upper hand on those beneath them. It’s ridiculous, isn’t it? They should be for everyone. Anyone who wants to fight back against those who would take from them.” He sighed, a long whispery sound that crawled along Nick’s skin, leaving gooseflesh prickling in its wake. “Someone like you wouldn’t even be given a chance. And how is that fair? After all, it’s your father who suffered.”
It’s easier to stand together than it is to struggle apart. Dad had taught him that. It’d been close, hadn’t it? Dad had been so close to dying, and where would Nick be then?
Alone. He’d be alone.
Still, he hesitated. “Are they addictive?” They had to be. If they gave the power Owen claimed, then why would anyone want to stop?
Owen laughed, but there was a harder edge to it. “Addictive isn’t quite the right word for it. I don’t mean to rush you, but we’re running out of time. You need to decide, Nicky.”
Nick pressed a hand against the glass encasing the tubes, staring at the pills. “Aren’t you going to do this too?”
“This is for you,” Owen said. “Don’t worry about me.”
He thought of the way the machines beeped around his father, his skin mottled with bruises. He thought of his mother smiling near a lighthouse, forever frozen in a moment in time. Anything. He would do anything to keep his people safe.
Including this, even if it was temporary. Being a temporary hero was better than being nothing at all.
“I think … I think I’ll—”
“That’s enough,” another voice said from behind them.