Reckoners 01 - Steelheart

though. She didn’t agree that Steelheart should be killed, but she didn’t abandon the Reckoners, or even ask for a transfer to another Reckoner cell. I didn’t know how many of those there were—apparently only Tia and Prof knew—but there was at least one other.
    Either way, Megan stayed on board and didn’t let her feelings distract her from her job. She might not agree that Steelheart needed to die, but from what I’d pried from her, she believed in fighting the Epics. She was like a soldier who believed a certain battle wasn’t tactically sound, yet supported the generals enough to fight it anyway.
    I respected her for that. Sparks, I was liking her more and more. And though she hadn’t been particularly affectionate toward me lately, she wasn’t openly hostile and cold any longer. That left me room to work some seductive magic. I wished I knew some.
    She got the crate in place, and I waited for Abraham to call up that I should start pulling again. Instead he appeared at the mouth of the tunnel and started to unhook the pulley system. His shoulderhad been healed from the gunshot using the harmsway, the Reckoner device that helped flesh heal extraordinarily fast.
    I didn’t know much about it, though I’d spoken to Cody—he’d called it the “last of the three.” Three bits of incredible technology brought to the Reckoners from Prof’s days as a scientist. The tensors, the jackets, the harmsway. From what Abraham told me, Prof had developed each technology and then stolen them from the lab he’d worked in, intent on starting his own war against the Epics.
    Abraham got the last parts of the pulley down.
    “Are we done?” I asked.
    “Indeed.”
    “I counted more crates than that.”
    “The others are too big to fit through the tunnel,” Abraham said. “Cody’s going to drive them over to the hangar.”
    That was what they called the place where they kept their vehicles. I’d been there; it was a large chamber with a few cars and a van inside. It wasn’t nearly as secure as this hideout was—the hangar had to have access to the upper city and couldn’t be part of the understreets.
    Abraham walked over to the stack of a dozen crates we’d heaved into the hideout. He rubbed his chin, inspecting them. “We might as well unload these,” he said. “I’ve got another hour to spare.”
    “Before what?” I asked, joining him at the crates.
    He didn’t reply.
    “You’ve been gone a lot these last few days,” I noted.
    Again, he didn’t reply.
    “He’s not going to tell you where he’s been, Knees,” Megan said from her lounging position at the desk. “And get used to it. Prof sends him out on secret errands a lot.”
    “But …,” I said, feeling hurt. I’d thought I’d earned my place on the team.
    “Do not be saddened, David,” Abraham said, grabbing a crowbarto crack open one of the crates. “It is not a matter of trust. We must keep some things secret, even within the team, should one of us be taken captive. Steelheart has his way of getting to what one hides—nobody except Prof should know everything we are doing.”
    It was a good rationale, and it was probably why I couldn’t know about other Reckoner cells either, but it was still annoying. As Abraham cracked open another crate, I reached to the pouch at my side and slipped out my tensor. With that, I vaporized the wooden lids off a few crates.
    Abraham raised an eyebrow at me.
    “What?” I said. “Cody told me to keep practicing.”
    “You are growing quite good,” Abraham said. Then he reached into one of the crates I’d opened and fished out an apple, which was now covered in sawdust. It made something of a mess getting it out. “Quite good,” he continued. “But sometimes, the crowbar is more effective, eh? Besides, we may wish to reuse these crates.”
    I sighed, but nodded. It was just … well, hard. The sense of strength I’d felt during the power station infiltration was difficult to forget. Opening the holes in the walls and creating those handholds, I’d been able to bend matter to my will. The more I used the tensor, the more excited I grew about the possibilities it offered.
    “It is also important,” Abraham said, “to avoid leaving traces of what we can do. Imagine if everyone knew about these things, eh? It would be a different world, more difficult for us.”
    I nodded, reluctantly putting the tensor away. “Too bad we had to leave that hole for Diamond to see.”
    Abraham