* * *

“And no one knows,” Aiden says, his startling eyes fixed on me, taking it all in.

“Just Jamie, he heard Ethan and I talking, and let’s face it, Kitty will find out because she’ll force me to tell her, but that’s it.” I help him stand.

“We keep it secret.”

I nod, holding his spare shirt open for him. He winces, negotiating the sleeves, but we get him in and I tie the sling at his shoulder.

“Am I allowed to let Ethan know that I know?”

“Of course.”

He turns to face me, hesitating. “I guess that was a fairly intense situation for him too, just now.”

I nod again.

“I thought he seemed, you know, invested … for a stranger.”

I release a small gust of air, not quite a chuckle.

“The dad, huh?” He lifts his eyebrows. “What’s he like?”

My shoulders winch up. “I don’t know. Okay, I guess. He’s pretty serious. Doesn’t talk much. Kind of a big deal at the office. He loves Miriam.”

He opens his good hand. “Which is something.”

“Except they can’t be together.”

“Because?”

“Of the rules.”

“Right. I don’t get that.” He drops his hand and thinks some more. “So, he’s … intense.”

“German.”

We both grin a little and he asks, “What’s Miriam?”

“Irish – mainly.”

He snorts and waves his hand over my general vicinity. “That explains all this.”

I screw my nose up and try to pat my hair tufts down. “Have you looked in the mirror?”

“I guess we take after her, then.”

His use of “we” ignites a burst of happy in the pit of my stomach. “I can be intense.”

“No kidding.”

I punch him gently in the good arm and he makes a show of wincing and protecting his injured shoulder. I go to the door, take hold of the handle. “You sure you want to go out there?”

He smirks. “No.”

We make our way into the hall, the attic stairs folded up again. I feel like I’m holding my breath and glance at him. He looks like he’s holding his breath too.

“Hey,” he nudges me with his elbow and whispers, “don’t tell Kitty what I said, about kissing her. I don’t want it to creep her out.”

I snort. “Trust me, Wolfman. It wouldn’t creep her out.”

He looks at me. “Really?” Then his grin splits wide and seeing it lights me up.

PARALYSIS

It’s the cool, papery slip of her fingers sliding beneath mine that I feel first. The fine birdlike bones of the Proxy’s hand and then the clamping in the base of my skull and the harrowing pause before fire.

She must have been waiting for me by the opening to the hallway. I didn’t notice her, my focus on Kitty and Jamie at the entrance to the kitchen, watching their faces as we come into the living room. Kitty, her thigh tightly bandaged, leans on Jamie’s arm, her face open and expectant the moment she sees us. Jamie cautious, his frown restrained. I can’t see Ethan. I don’t register Davis still sitting against the wall, or Benjamin still lying on the ground. I have no idea where Felicity is but here is the Proxy beside me, her hand tightening around mine, taking me out of my stride. I feel only briefly the jangling sense of discord in my stomach before I feel nothing, her system overriding mine. No fight, just numb paralysis.

Aiden walks on; he doesn’t see the Proxy either, watching Kitty as she steps away from her brother. She limps towards him, her smile curving out and up.

Cataclysm comes all at once.

Precognition, lightning reflexes, speed, strength and the plastic toys of a Shield’s arsenal don’t stand a chance because she has all the power. The Proxy has all the power and it hums and crackles through me.

I watch as Aiden and Jamie explode into action. It’s that sudden. From relative ease to full alarm though I can’t see at first what the danger is. My view is Aiden’s back, Kitty’s face and shoulders and beyond her, Jamie’s head. Kitty doesn’t see the danger either and her expression is one of perplexed surprise, not even reaching fear before Aiden has grabbed her and thrust her aside.

A hair’s-breadth. Is that the measurement? Something microscopic. Something breathtaking in its closeness that changes everything. Though she falls, Kitty is saved. Her pain will be bruising all down her side and face because she won’t be able to break her fall.

In the hair’s-breadth, Aiden catches the bullet with his temple. It opens a tiny hole just beside his left eyebrow and a slightly bigger hole out the top of his head. His blood splatters the side of my face, a warm wet spray, but I can’t even blink. As he falls, I finally see the danger. Benjamin, his arm outstretched, gun raised from the floor, and with seeing, I feel the Proxy’s will for him to act humming through me. Jamie arrested mid-kick, too late to dislodge the weapon from Benjamin’s hand. It’s not because Jamie’s slow. It’s simply that he’s lost the use of his limbs and like Kitty he won’t be able to break his fall.

The Proxy tries hard to break my fall, though she’s tiny and I’m a dead weight. We make a crumpled heap against the corner where the wall meets the hallway. The sharp edge digs into my shoulderblade. She sits back on her heels, panting, her fingers still tangled in mine. Her eyes are bloodshot, bright red capillaries pattern the tender skin beneath and blood seeps from her nose in the aftermath of strain. She shifts beside me, her arm bumping mine. We sit like kids, legs splayed, fingers twined, Aiden’s blood only inches from our feet, a glistening ruby halo in the light, his eyes blank.

“I’m sorry,” she says, breathlessly. “But this is going to hurt.”

It begins with skull-splitting static. Fire erupts in my spine. Vice-like clamping at my temples and in the back of my neck. Bolts of electric energy, cramping my muscles, seizing my joints. It goes on and on, the roaring static, a synaptic scourging erasing me from time and space. Then it stops and I’m released from the grip of the monster’s hand. I slump, aching, my eyes stinging at the light, the taste of blood in my mouth and completely unable to move.

The Proxy spasms next to me. A long low moan. She shakes herself and draws a steadying breath. She lifts my hand and presses it to her clammy face, wetting it with hot tears. “I’m sorry. I couldn’t keep a hold of them all without you. It was hard enough managing Benjamin all day, by myself, but I could never have tapped multiple signals without your help.” She rocks her head back and forth, bouncing her forehead softly on the back of my hand. “You have such a pure signal, Evie. Even with Jamie’s layering you’re like a rainbow. I wish you could see it. It’s beautiful in the bandwidth, like music in colour.”

Her body quakes and she hums a single minor note. She tips her head, resting it on my shoulder, her white-blonde hair spilling over our linked hands. “I knew the moment I saw you. I knew you’d help me. You’re my knight, Evie. You’re the hero, the dragon slayer. You saved Kitty. You saved your brother and now you’re saving me.”

She tilts her chin up and kisses my lips, once, twice. “Thank you.” She sniffs to clear her running nose and untangles her fingers from mine. Shuffling away from me, she says, “Look. It holds. Even when I’m not touching you. Isn’t it wonderful? They sent me to boost your signal but they didn’t understand that it goes both ways. You give me strength. I mean it. I could never have done this without you.” She shifts to kneel in front of me and touches her fingers to my forehead. “It will be different for you now. Clearer. Your senses, your reach, your control. I’ve unlocked you, Evie. Matured your signal. I’m sorry that means you’ll never deactivate, but that was unlikely anyway. At least now you won’t faint any more. I hope that’s okay, but I wanted to give you something. To thank you for this because you deserve good things. You do. You deserve to be happy.”