inches behind his heels, and drew instead on the thigh of his jeans.
He had learned, over the years of being Sketch, the Renegade who could turn any drawing into reality, that complex, detailed drawings might be impressive, but it was the simple ones that tended to work the best. He could have drawn some sort of high-tech hearing aid with a radio antenna and background-noise dulling capabilities, but why muck around with all that? Instead, he drew an old-fashioned ear trumpet, pointed at one end and open wide at the other to take in sound waves and funnel them toward his ear canal. It was something the elderly might have used hundreds of years ago, and it didn’t exactly make him feel too sexy to pull the drawing from the denim fabric and hold it up to his ear.
But it worked. Suddenly, his father’s voice was coming through as if he were standing right beside him.
“—a great debt,” Hugh was saying, in a calmer tone than when he’d first entered the room, “which is putting us in a hell of a position. You’re sure he would have died if the Sentinel hadn’t gotten him here so fast?”
“Nothing is certain,” said another male voice—Dr. Sutner, Adrian recognized. The civilian doctor who had taken on Max’s care when none of their on-staff prodigy healers could get close to him. “He might have pulled through on his own, especially with the ice stanching the bleeding. But…” He didn’t finish his sentence. He didn’t have to.
Adrian felt a tinge of warmth in his chest to know that he had done something right, at least. He had been tempted that night—so very tempted—to go after Nightmare when she had run. But he had chosen Max instead. He had chosen to try to save his little brother rather than exact vengeance on his attacker.
Vengeance could wait.
“Well … if I ever meet him, he’ll have my gratitude,” said Hugh, though there was a heaviness in his words. “Even if he does need to be stopped.”
“Stopped, Captain?” said the doctor. “But … isn’t he working for you?”
“Of course not. He’s a vigilante—he hasn’t followed our code from day one.”
“Right. Yes. The media says that. I’d just assumed…” Dr. Sutner trailed off.
“He’s not a Renegade. He’s not one of us.” Hugh’s voice took on an edge of resentment. “Maybe he’s done some good for us, but … it’s hard not to criticize his methods. He should have joined the organization, rather than going off on his own. It’s given people a lot of ideas about heroics and crime fighting, and that’s dangerous when it isn’t left in the hands of the professionals. People have been getting hurt, and it’s going to get worse.”
Adrian wished he could break out his mirror so he’d be able to see his dad’s expression, but he couldn’t use both the mirror and the ear trumpet. Still, he had a feeling he could tell what his dad was thinking. There had been a lot of talk about the Sentinel’s capture of the world’s most revered villain. It felt a little unjust, as Oscar, Ruby, and Danna had all helped him do it and should have gotten part of the credit. But after finding out that Adrian was the Sentinel, it had been Ruby’s idea to leave the Renegades a note for when they came to get Ace Anarchy. It had read,
CONSIDER THIS A
PEACE OFFERING.
—THE SENTINEL
That way, as Ruby explained, they would know that the Sentinel was on their side. That he wasn’t a villain. That they needed to stop hunting him.
Despite her good intentions, though, the note only seemed to have irritated the Council more. People thought that maybe the Sentinel was mocking them by tracking down their worst enemy, an enemy the Renegades had long believed dead. On top of that, the rise in vigilantism had skyrocketed these past months, as news of the Sentinel’s victories over criminals had spread. People were beginning to feel like the Renegades and their code weren’t enough. There needed to be more drastic measures taken if they were ever going to stop the spread of crime in their city.
It would have been flattering, except not everyone was made to be a superhero, and plenty of good intentions had led to civilians being severely wounded. One ambitious man had nearly been killed while trying to stop a carjacking, and an innocent woman had been shot in the arm when an enthusiastic vigilante had wrongly assumed that she was trying