Chương 16: All the time you need

That day, I finally told Nadia everything. It began like any other normal day, actually. Save for the fact that we woke up beside each other, and that her smile was more radiant than the sun itself. Save for the fact that it made my morning ten times better before she even said, "Good morning." Save for the fact that, when she did, I already knew what I was going to do. We had breakfast sitting next to each other, sharing little touches.

Nadia must have noticed my hand going to the key beneath my shirt, and my attention drifting to a place she couldn't fathom. Perhaps she thought I was pensive, and in a way I was, with my attention going to the fully digested power inside me. She noticed but said nothing. Only when I got up and led her to the cellar door did she look at me with puzzlement, wonder, and a bit of surprise. She studied the key when I fished it out. Gothic wings of black filigree, a red gemstone, and the plain end I slid into the lock.

She followed every movement as I unlocked the cellar door, then the trapdoor beneath it. I went down the ladder first, my phone's light cutting into the darkness. Only then did I realize I was holding my breath. Nadia descended the last few steps into Gus's hidden lab, looking around in confusion and awe. I expected her to approach the steel table. The spent, empty vials. The injector and scattered notes. Instead, she looked at me, and her expression melted into soft, genuine affection.

"Thank you for sharing this secret with me," she said, taking my hand. Then curiosity tugged at her cheeks and filled her eyes with energy.

"What is this place?"

"My grandpa's true legacy," I said.

"Here." I handed her one of the notes from the table." To gift powers to those the lottery deemed as unfair losers," she read. Her gaze moved to the half-open suitcase and the six empty vials inside it.

"Nanomachines?" I nodded.

"Gus. The old man on the hill. The technology." She exhaled through her nose.

"I knew they connected. Not this, exactly, I could never have imagined. But something. It all fit too neatly."

"You never asked. Why?"

"It was not my place to ask." She put the note down carefully.

"I told myself you would bring it to me, or you wouldn't. I wasn't going to search your house, pry it out of you, or ask twice." It should have surprised me but it didn't.

"It is mine to say now," I told her.

"I trust you completely, Nadia. More than I know what to do with. More than I thought possible." Her fingers tightened around mine. So I told her. I told her more about my grandfather, his rants and his worldview. How I used to think none of it applied to me because what did he know? I was going to awaken, and it was going to be epic. Then he died, and I awakened to a joke of a power.

"I had already found this place by then," I said.

"I got angry. Frustrated. Fucking desperate. So I came down here and injected all six vials." Nadia stared at the empty glass.

"All six."

"Jabbed the injector into my arm six times and emptied every one into my bloodstream. He had planned a grand reveal. Then I come along and use the entire untested batch in one go and collapse over the table for a few hours. Well," I added bitterly.

"Not that he was around to see me, at least there's that." Concern tightened her face even though she knew I had survived. It was adorable. I tried to wave it away.

"When I woke up, I had a second hint."

"A second hint," she echoed. The concern sharpened into something else. Older and more methodical.

"A second awakening?"

"Yeah. Consume, deconstruct, integrate, grow and bestow." Her composure finally cracked, just a little.

"That is not possible."

"Tell that to whatever lives inside me."

"The nanomachines?"

"Maybe. Gus put nanomachines in the vials, but I don't know if they're still physically there. Maybe they became the power. Maybe they caused it and vanished. I call it the swarm because that's what it feels like." You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story. And I wasn't going to let someone dissect me to find out if I bled silver. Which I didn't, but it was just a manner of speech. The six empty vials caught my eye again.

So did the scattered notes, the injector, and the draft of the speech. His face flashed through my mind. My neck felt tight and painful as memories I did not want dragged me under. Almost dragged me under. Not now. A soft hand grounded me.

"Hey," Nadia said.

"Let's go back upstairs, alright?" She dragged me up the ladder, pushing me ahead of her and following close behind. At the trapdoor, she stopped.

"Lock it." I did. She waited until we reached the cellar door.

"This one too." I locked that behind us as well. Only when we were back in the warmth of the house did some of the melancholia begin to fade. Nadia brought me a little snack, her hand lingering on mine with the hint of a smile.

"Thank you," I told her, and I meant it. She was amazing. Fuck, I told her that too, because I wasn't going to keep secrets from her anymore, even if the truth made me sound cheesy and made her blush. We ended up on the sofa, Nadia partly in my lap and partly spilled over the cushions, stroking my face. She noticed my hands twitching and placed them on her butt with a teasing smile.

"Right," she said.

"You injected six vials of unknown nanomachines, collapsed, and woke up with a second awakening."

"That's the short version."

"Your version of short needs work." She kissed the corner of my mouth.

"Start with consume. What does it actually do?" There was nothing random in the way she asked. This was Nadia in the field, cutting through every stupid possibility before it could get us killed.

"Touch triggers it. It strips every power from the person permanently. I can't choose one part of a power and leave another, and I can't put it back the way I took it." Her thumb stopped against my cheek.

"You've only used it on yourself and me?"

"Yes."

"Then deconstruct starts by itself."

"Immediately. Everything after that waits for me. Integrate is where I choose what stays, what gets removed, and how the parts fit together. Grow lets me push those parts further. Bestow gives the finished power to someone."

"That's how your time slow became a stop." I nodded.

"I consumed it from myself. Deconstruction pulled it apart. At integrate, I dropped the random trigger and the part that would have frozen my body with everything else. Grow pushed the slow until it became a full standstill, then I bestowed it back onto myself."

"My prince with two powers," she murmured, licking her lips.

"I knew you were special." Something in me stiffened. Well, two somethings, and with diametrically opposite meanings.

"Silly." Her laugh was softer this time, vulnerable beneath the tease.

"It's not your powers that make you special. Although I ought to thank them for forcing us into a situation where I could see you for who you are. I would have pushed you away like everyone else otherwise." She let that weight sit for a moment before the other look returned.

"Could you do it again?" she asked.

"Consume someone else's power, rebuild it, then bestow it onto yourself?"

"I don't know."

"But it might be possible."

"Maybe. I bestowed my own power back onto myself, but it was already mine. I've never tried giving myself someone else's."

"If it worked, you could keep adding powers."

"One at a time, at best." I felt the weight inside me.

"The engine only has one processing slot. Your power is in it now. I can't consume another foreign power while I'm holding yours, and anything big leaves the swarm dormant afterward while it recharges." Nadia went quiet. Thinking. Then her eyes found mine again.

"You said my power is in that slot now." There it was.

"The deconstruction ended weeks ago," I said.

"Digestion kept going after I understood the pieces. It finished last night, while you were sleeping in my arms."

"Really?"

"Really." Her expression remained steady, but her fingers gripped my shirt.

"I still have your power inside me," I continued.

"But it isn't just sitting there anymore. I understand it now. I can change it. Repair it. Improve it. Then I can give it back to you." She said nothing.

"Nadia, please. Don't just look at me like that." She blinked. A single tear escaped her left eye. She touched it, almost incredulous that she was crying, before smiling at me.

"You'd do that?" she asked.

"You'd do all of that for me?"

"Yes."

"You don't have to." She cocked her head as if she didn't understand me.

"You could take it. Keep it. You don't owe me anything, Adrian." My mind went back to the other night, when I had told her exactly that. What had she said in response?

"I want to." Her smile became a grin. Then she kissed me fiercely until we were both out of breath.

"Alright," she panted.

"Tell me what you know." I laid it all down for her. The core of her power was life. That part was intact. The curse was something added onto it, the aura inverted into a drain and the off-switch broken. I could surgically alter the inversion without damaging the core, fix the switch, and grow the power into controlled giving and taking.

"And the way I looked?" she asked quietly. Of course. Her mutation.

"Separate. You'd think it was tied to the rest but, it's like it was added there as an afterthought. Perhaps your awakening had more juice to offer and it went there? Whateve the case, the life power, the corruption, and your appearance are different parts. I can give the repaired ability back without forcing the appearance onto you. I don't have to destroy the appearance either." Her hand rose to her ordinary ear.

"It's not my power to play with," I said.

"It's yours. Nothing happens until you tell me what you want. Then I'll do it."

"You're sure you can?"

"Yes. I don't know all the limits of this thing, but I know this. I can remove the lethal part, repair the control, grow the life power, and bestow it safely. It's ready whenever you are."

"And nothing has started?"

"Nothing. We've only talked." Nadia watched me for a long moment.

"I know you will," she said.

"That's why I..." She caught herself, a hint of pink touching her cheeks.

"That's why I like you so much." I smiled and let her have the retreat. She almost, just about said another word altogether.

"Can I think about it?" she asked.

"Not just the mutation. Everything. Give me some time, Adrian? I know it's a lot to ask, and I can't imagine how it feels to have a power ready to bestow just lying there, but..."

"But nothing. All the time you need. It's yours." She searched my face.

"I would wait for you forever," I said. That did not refer only to the bestow, of course. She saw through me. Her eyes shone with tears and emotion, and her hug became a kiss, then a hiccuping cry as she held me so tight.