Juliana had trouble getting to sleep on a good day, and this was certainly not a good day. She rolled over on her tiny cot in the corner of Max's office for what felt like the hundredth time in the past hour, a flurry of thoughts racing through her head. 

Her progress in Maddie's lab was undeniable. She'd managed to design new laser shooters for her gloves - ones that could actually cut through Thornton Tech's carcopters and drones in a reasonable amount of time - and her ability to disable androids was only improving with practice. Yet, some part of her wondered if any of it mattered at all. Max had been limiting her news exposure in an effort to control her stress levels, but from what she'd managed to gather, no one had seen Project PROB since their altercation at the last Order meeting and Nelson was only continuing to assemble his forces. He obviously hadn't taken over Arcana to be a jolly old king... he was planning something bloody, and Juliana was genuinely questioning her ability to stop him. 

A loud crash followed by a blaring car alarm shook Juliana out of her thoughts. She sighed in annoyance and pulled her pillow over her head. There goes all hope of getting any sleep at all tonight. Max had as many enemies as he had admirers, and this certainly wouldn't be the first time someone threw a rock through his car window. 

What really surprised her was when the alarm stopped. The sudden silence was pierced by the groan of metal as it was crushed by an impossibly strong force. Juliana leaped to her feet and ran to the nearest window, getting down on her knees so she could look through it without being seen by anyone outside. 

A shadowy figure rose from behind the remnants of a car - now little more than a pile of scrap metal - and let out a deep, guttural roar, raising his much smaller female opponent in the air before slamming her to the ground with force that should've killed her on impact. Yet, she rolled over to break her fall and sprang back up to her feet, hissing angrily. Juliana's breath caught in her throat. Even at night, under the dim illumination of street lamps, she could recognize that voice anywhere. Ravenna. 

"I will ask you again. Where. Is. Maddie?" the man growled. Judging from his and Ravenna's relative proportions, Juliana figured he had to be at least 7 feet tall. He could've just been an NBA player, but there was something grating and metallic about his voice - something not quite human. 

"What's it to you, robot boy?" Ravenna scoffed, hurling her claws at him and watching as he ducked to avoid them. The claws arced back into their sheaths on her fingertips with a characteristic shirr and she lunged forward, hooking them in his calf and sending him tumbling to the ground. 

"It's everything to me," the man answered between heavy breaths, stomping angrily as he rose to his feet. They were lucky to be in a mostly industrial area - the commotion they made would've easily woken anyone who lived on the street. 

"Well, if you want to know so badly, you'll tell me where to find my sister," Ravenna taunted, still undaunted by her much larger opponent. 

Juliana retreated from the window, running her fingers over her bracelet. Ravenna had no idea how close she was... or did she?

"Still hung up on that, are you, terrorist?" the man seethed. "You give cyborgs a bad name. You're the reason my country was so quick to turn on me!" 

"Well, I'm sorry," Ravenna replied sarcastically. "I was designed by someone who loved me and wanted to make me better, not as a piece of corporate propaganda." 

"You have no idea what you're talking about!" The man flew into a rage, swinging at Ravenna with a powerful hook, but she blocked his fist with her palm, the metal fibers in her skin easily absorbing the impact. 

Before Ravenna could answer, their conversation was cut short by the sound of approaching police sirens. The man instinctively reached forward and grabbed Ravenna by the throat. "Tell me where she is right now, or I'll turn you in." 

"They'll take you too, you know." 

"My life means nothing to me without Maddie." 

By the time two police cars were visible at the end of the street, Ravenna must've realized that the man was being serious. 

"Okay, fine, she's in Alan Nelson's basement. At least, that's where she was when I left Arcana. Go do whatever you want - I don't work with that liar anymore." 

Almost as soon as the words left her mouth, the man loosened his grip on her neck and she scurried away into the darkness with catlike grace. Facing the approaching police cars, the man began scanning his surroundings for possible escape routes. 

There weren't many people who could take on Ravenna in a fight. Having one around might prove to be useful... if Juliana didn't act now, her chances of encountering him again were very slim. Thinking quickly, she pulled the window open and stuck her head out. 

"Adam!" she whispered loudly. "Up here!" The man whipped around, confirming her theory about his identity. He ducked out of the police cars' way and began to effortlessly climb up the side of the Thornton Tech building, his metallic fingers grasping the grooves between the bricks and pulling his body upward. Juliana moved to the side as he approached, making room for him to tumble over the windowsill headfirst, somersaulting in the air and landing quietly on his feet. 

As soon as he was safely in the room, he pulled the window closed to avoid the beams of the police officers' flashlights. They stood in the street with a man who was presumably the owner of the destroyed car, searching the area for the perpetrator of the damage. 

Feeling her way to the front of the room, Juliana turned on the light to get a better look at her unexpected guest. He sat with his back to the window, his enormous legs pulled up to his chest. 

"I'm pleasantly surprised that you decided to trust me, Your Majesty," Adam commented. Juliana marveled at the way the tiny metal plates that made up his face moved to form human lip movements and facial expressions. 

"... that is what I'm supposed to call you, right?" Adam added when he saw her staring blankly at him instead of offering a reply. "I'm sorry, I've never talked to a queen before." 

"Just Juliana is fine," Juliana chuckled, the ridiculousness of his question catching her off-guard. She was talking to a full-replacement cyborg who was supposed to be dead, and he thought it was his lack of decorum that shocked her. 

"To answer your question, Max told me your story. Maddie obviously means a lot to you. It would've been a perfectly rational choice for you to sell me out to Ravenna in exchange for her, but you didn't do that. That's enough to get me to at least give you a chance," she added, sitting down on her cot across from Adam. 

"And how could you be so sure that I knew where you were?" 

"Because Ravenna thought that you did," Juliana said simply crossing her arms over her silk night shirt. "My sister is a lot of things, but she is rarely outright wrong." 

"Well, you were right. I did know where you were," Adam mused, tugging uncomfortably at his sweatshirt. "But that's not because of anything that has to do with you or your Order. You see, since I 'died,' I've been watching Thornton Tech like a hawk, keeping track of everything and everyone that passes through those doors. Including you." 

"But why?" Juliana questioned. "And why fake your death?" 

"Oh, I didn't fake my death on purpose," Adam laughed. "I very nearly was dead. The army sent out their golden girl - Winterbird - to go after me. She froze all my mechanics and dumped me off a bridge to die a slow death. I put myself in power save mode - the cyborg equivalent of a medically induced coma - to conserve energy. I fully expected to never come back, but I guess the currents were my friend that day, because I woke up on the side of the river in a completely different part of town. Next thing I knew, Thornton Tech put out a press release saying I was dead, and I just decided not to correct them. Makes my job easier, being off the grid." 

"And what is that job?" 

He remained silent, breaking eye contact with Juliana and gazing off into the distance. 

"Adam, what's the job?" Juliana repeated, this time more firmly. 

"Isn't it obvious?" Adam chuckled. "Destroying that entitled leech Max Thornton and everything he stands for." 

"Adam! Do you not realize where we are?" 

"Oh," Adam looked around, the corners of his mouth sinking. "This is the dirtbag's office, isn't it?" 

"Yes," Juliana nodded. "His office... where he has security cameras." 

"He keeps those on after hours?" Adam gasped, jumping to his feet. "You knew that, and you invited me up here? Do you realize what's gonna happen when he finds out I'm alive?" 

"I do," Juliana skirted around Adam, standing between him and the window. "Listen. I have a plan... one that could possibly save my country and Maddie. But it involves both you and Max, so I'm going to need you boys to stop bickering and start working to fix this before it's too late." 

"I'm never working with Thornton again," Adam scoffed. "I'm a real man, unlike that spineless fool who keeps bowing down to Nelson without doing a thing to help his wife. Now that I know where Maddie is, I'm going to get her." 

"Wait a second." Juliana held her arm out in front of her to stop Adam. "Maddie is Nelson's only leverage over his biggest arms supplier. Do you really think you're just going to waltz into his house, grab her, and be on your way?" 

"Well..." Adam stepped backward, looking mildly embarrassed. "Do you have a better idea?"

"Actually, I do," Juliana nodded. "But you're going to crash here for the night, and I'll explain that idea to both you and Max in the morning?" 

"What if I leave right now?" Adam scrunched his face up in disgust. 

"Max has the security footage," Juliana shrugged calmly. "He'll figure out that you're still alive, send the police and the military after you, and you'll be a hunted man for the rest of your days. Unless, of course, you stay to tell your side of the story." 

"Damn," Adam scratched his head, sulkily making his way over to the opposite side of the office as he watched Juliana straighten her back, a small victorious smile playing on her lips. "They don't call you Queen for nothing, huh?"