Steelheart (The Reckoners #1)(77)

“What real y saved this place,”

Tia continued, “was the Great Transfersion, when Steelheart turned everything in the city to steel. If he hadn’t done that, dirt would have

lled this room

completely. Beyond that, the





settling of the ground probably would have caved in the ceiling.

However, the transfersion turned the remaining things in the room to steel, as well as the earth around it.

In e ect he locked the room into place, preserving it, like a bubble in the middle of a frozen pond.”

I continued forward until I could see the sterile little mortgage cubicle I’d hidden in. Its windows were now opaque, but I could see in through the open front. I walked in and ran my ngers along the desk. The cubicle felt smaller than I remembered.

“The insurance records were inconclusive,” Tia continued. “But there was a claim submitted on the building itself, an earthquake claim. I wonder if the bank owners really thought the insurance company would pay out on that.

Seems ridiculous—but of course, there was still a lot of uncertainty surrounding Epics in those days.

Anyway, that made me investigate records surrounding the bank’s destruction.”

“And that led you here?” Cody asked, his voice coming from the darkness as he poked around the perimeter of the room.

“No, actually. It led me to nd something curious. A cover-up. The reason I couldn’t nd anything in the insurance reports, and why I couldn’t nd any lists of what was in the vault, was because some of Steelheart’s people had already gathered

and

hidden

the

information. I realized that since he had made a dedicated attempt to cover this up, I would never discover anything of use in the records. Our only chance would be to come to the bank, which Steelheart had assumed was buried beyond reach.”

“It’s a good assumption,” Cody said, sounding thoughtful. “Without the tensors—or some kind of Epic power like the Diggers had— getting here would have been near impossible. Burrowing through fty feet of solid steel?” The Diggers had started out as normal humans and had been granted their strange powers by an Epic known as Digzone, who was a gifter like Con ux. It … hadn’t gone well for them. Not all Epic powers were meant to be used by mortal hands, it appeared.

I was still standing in the cubicle.

The mortgage man’s bones were there, scattered on the oor around the desk, peeking out from some rubble. All of it was metal now.

I didn’t want to look, but I had to. I had to.

I turned around. For a moment I couldn’t tell the past from the present. My father stood there, determined, gun raised to defend a monster. Explosions, shouts, dust, screams, fire.

Fear.

I blinked, trembling, hand to the cold steel of the cubicle wall. The room smelled of dust and age, but I thought I could smell blood. I thought I could smell terror.

I stepped out of the cubicle and walked to where Steelheart had stood, holding a simple pistol, arm extended toward my father. Bang.

One shot. I could remember hearing it, though I didn’t know if my mind had constructed that. I’d been deafened by the explosions by then.

I knelt beside the pillar. A mound of

silvery

rubble

covered

everything in front of me, but I had my tensor. The others continued talking, but I stopped paying attention, and their words became nothing more than a low hum in the background. I put on my tensor, then reached forward and— very carefully—began vaporizing bits of rubble.

It didn’t take long; the bulk of it was made of one large piece of ceiling panel. I destroyed it, then froze.

There he was.

My father lay slumped against the pillar, head to the side. The bullet wound was frozen in the steel folds of his shirt. His eyes were still open. He looked like a statue, cast with incredible detail— even the pores of the skin were clear.

I stared, unable to move, unable to even lower my arm. After ten years, the familiar face was almost crushing to me. I didn’t have any pictures of him or my mother; I hadn’t dared go home after surviving,

though

Steelheart

couldn’t have known who I was. I’d been paranoid and traumatized.

Seeing his face brought that all back

to

me.

He

looked

so … normal. Normal in a way that hadn’t existed for years; normal in a way that the world didn’t deserve any longer.

I wrapped my arms around myself, but I kept looking at my father’s face. I couldn’t turn away.

“David?” Prof’s voice. He knelt down beside me.

“My father …,” I whispered. “He died ghting back, but he also died protecting Steelheart. And now here I am, trying to kill the thing he rescued. It’s funny, eh?”

Prof didn’t respond.

“In a way,” I said, “this is all his fault. Deathpoint was going to kill Steelheart from behind.”

“It wouldn’t have worked,” Prof said. “Deathpoint didn’t know how powerful Steelheart was. Nobody knew back then.”

“I guess that’s true. But my father was a fool. He couldn’t believe that Steelheart was evil.”

“Your father believed the best about people,” Prof said. “You could call that foolish, but I’d never call it a fault. He was a hero, son.