Nine and Lexa left, and Max leaned against the pillows. He stared at the glass. It moved a quarter of an inch. He lifted his hand and slapped it with the other hand.
“Did you just high-five yourself?” Nemo asked from the doorway.
“No,” Max said, embarrassed. “Okay, yeah.”
Nemo laughed. “You’re something else,” she said, walking over to the bed and sitting where Nine had been a moment before. “How are you feeling?”
“Good,” Max said. “How about you?”
“Better,” Nemo said. “I actually slept a couple of hours. It was nice to be in a real bed. But then I woke up and started thinking about everybody.”
“Six and Sam?”
“Them,” Nemo said. “But also Ghost and Lava and Bats. We don’t know what happened to them. Or Seamus.”
“Forget that guy,” Max said angrily. “After everything he’s done?”
“Yeah, I know,” Nemo said. “Still. I saw his dad this morning. He looked upset.”
Max grunted. He wasn’t going to waste any time worrying about Seamus. But he was worried about the others. He’d been relieved to be out of the bunker, but he wondered if some of them were still trapped in there.
“They know where Six is,” he told Nemo.
“I heard,” Nemo said. “I ran into Nine and Lexa on my way up here. That’s great. I also heard you’ve got magic blood.”
“I’m a miracle of science,” Max said.
“I’m really happy to not be carrying that thing around anymore,” Nemo said. “I can’t even imagine having one of those crawling around inside my head, eating pieces of my brain or sucking up my Legacies or whatever it is they do.” She stopped talking and looked at Max, her eyes wide. “Sorry, I forgot you have one—”
“It’s okay,” Max said. “Anyway, I think it’s dead, or at least it’s not doing what it was doing anymore. I’m getting my telekinesis back. Watch.”
He tried once again to move the glass. This time he succeeded in pushing it to the edge. He was concentrating on shoving it off and onto the floor, when a nurse appeared.
“Can I interrupt you for some blood?” he asked Max.
“More?” Max said. “How much do you need?”
“Only another gallon,” the nurse said. “Maybe two.”
Max groaned and held out his arm. “Just bleed me dry, leech man.”
As the nurse tied the rubber tubing around Max’s arm and started looking for a vein he said, “Tell you what. After this, how’d you like to come down and see what we’re doing with all this blood?”
Max shut his eyes and grimaced slightly as the nurse slid a needle into his arm. “Deal,” he said.
Once the blood was drawn, Max got out of bed and he and Nemo followed the nurse out of the room, into the hall and into the elevator. This took them down to the level where the labs were. There they walked into an office filled with equipment. A woman was seated at one of the desks, looking at something through a microscope.
“Dr. Fenris,” the nurse said. “This is Max and his friend Nemo.”
The woman looked up. “What a pleasure,” she said, standing and holding her hand out to Max. “I was just looking at your remarkable blood.” She then shook Nemo’s hand. “And thanks to you, we have a specimen of the parasite we’re dealing with.”
“Does Max’s blood really kill it?” Nemo asked.
“Well, the antibodies his body produces in response to the parasite neutralize its effects,” Dr. Fenris explained. “That in turn keeps it from feeding effectively on its host. So, yes, it will die. The important thing as far as we’re concerned right now is that we think the antiserum we’re working on will do the same to the parasite in another infected person.” She looked at Max. “I understand some of your telekinesis has already returned.”
Max nodded. “It’s getting stronger and stronger,” he said.
“That’s excellent news,” the doctor said.
“So, if we can get your antiserum to Six and Sam, they’ll be back to normal?” Nemo asked.
“Hopefully,” said Dr. Fenris. “Assuming the parasite hasn’t developed too much.”
“What do you mean?” Max asked her.
“The specimen Nemo brought back is a mature one,” the doctor said. “The end-stage form. The one that was injected into you was microscopic. You didn’t even know it was there. But once it gets as large as the one you retrieved from the bunker, it’s likely too late to reverse the effects.”
“How long does it take to get that big?” said Nemo.
“We don’t know,” the doctor admitted. “My guess is quite some time. Six and Sam have been infected for less than a week at this point, so I’m hopeful that the damage isn’t irreversible. If we get the antidote into them soon.”
“How soon?” asked Max.
“As soon as possible,” said the doctor, without elaborating. But the expression on her face worried Max.
“Where did this thing come from, anyway?” Nemo asked. “Like, is it just out there in the world? Could it infect anyone with a Legacy?”
“I don’t think so, no,” said Dr. Fenris. “My guess is that it was created by the Mogs you had a run-in with. It’s unlike any parasite I’ve ever seen before. Here. Take a look.”
She beckoned them over to the microscope. Max leaned down, peering through the eyepiece. He saw something that looked like three big purple blobs. “What are those?”
“Those are the toxins created by the parasite,” Dr. Fenris said. “Now watch what happens next.”
She placed the tip of a thin pipette on the surface of the glass slide in the microscope. Max saw a thin stream of tiny red bubbles come out.
“What’s that?” Max asked.
“Those are the antibodies from your blood,” the doctor explained.
As if they sensed the antibodies, the toxins moved towards them, like monsters hunting their prey. Max felt his heartbeat quicken. For some reason, watching the toxins attack his blood terrified him. But then something interesting happened. The antibodies attacked, throwing themselves against the walls of the toxins until they broke through. Then they rushed in, filling up the purple blobs with red and consuming them.
“That’s awesome,” Max said, stepping aside so that Nemo could have a turn watching.
“That’s science,” Dr. Fenris said.
“So if Max’s body can do this, why can’t Six’s and Sam’s?” Nemo asked.
“Every body is different,” Dr. Fenris said. “In medicine, we like to say that immune systems are built, not born. That means that your body develops defenses based on what it’s exposed to over the course of your life. For some reason, Max’s body has developed a way to fight the parasite. It could be because he was exposed to something similar in the past. Or his specific Legacy might have something to do with it, since his ability changes his brain function. Or his body could just be better at fighting invaders.”
“In other words, you don’t really know,” said Nemo.