And now I was trying to brush my hair, you know, when I thought about it, and looking at myself in mirrors, wondering if I was pretty. Pretty! A year ago, when my hair got in my eyes, I hacked it off with a knife. The only thing important about my clothes was whether they were too stiff with whatever to move fast in battle. And Fang had been my best friend and an excellent fighter.

Now everything was upside down.

“You are really pretty, Max,” said a small voice next to me.

I pressed my face into my pillow and squelched some extracolorful words. Way to go, ace — have embarrassing personal thoughts while you’re two feet from a mind reader.

Yes. Along with the wings and the raptor eyesight and the weird bones, the insane scientists who’d created us had given us the potential to suddenly develop other skills. Iggy can feel colors. Nudge can draw metal stuff toward her and hack any computer. Fang can pretty much disappear into whatever background he’s near. Gazzy can imitate any voice, any sound, with 100 percent accuracy. His other skill is unmentionable. I can fly faster than the others, and I have a Voice in my head. I don’t want to talk about that right now.

But it was Angel who’d hit the genetic jackpot. She can breathe under water, communicate with fish, and read people’s minds. We’re talking about a six-year-old. And, you know, six-year-olds are famous for having excellent judgment and decision-making skills.

“You have nice hair and really pretty eyes,” Angel went on earnestly.

I rolled over a bit. “Yeah. Brown and brown.” Have I mentioned how much Fang loves red hair? I believe I have.

“No, your hair has little sun streaks in it,” Angel informed me. “And your eyes are like — you know those chocolates we had in France? With the gooey stuff in the middle, with the alcohol in ’em except we didn’t know, and Gazzy ate a million and then barfed all night? Those chocolates?”

As much as I had tried to suppress all memory of that incident, it rushed back to me in vivid Technicolor. “The color of my eyes is like barfed-up chocolate?” Despair settled over me. There was no hope.

“No, the chocolates before they were barfed,” Angel clarified.

So there you have it, the extent of my charms: brown hair and eyes like unbarfed chocolate. I’m a lucky girl.

“Max,” said Angel. “You know Fang is the best guy ever. And he loves you. ’Cause you’re the best girl ever.”

With anyone else, I could ask them how they know that and then discredit them. Not Angel. She knew because she’d seen it, in his mind.

“We all love each other, Ange,” I said impatiently, hating this whole conversation.

“No, not like this,” she went on relentlessly. “Fang loves you.”