What goes on inside Ari's head

I watched the bird kids while the whitecoats go ready to take blood samples from them. The smallest of them, a girl even younger than me called Angel, was first. She cried when she saw the whitecoat, and tried to hide in her dog crate. Then it was her brother's turn. They called him Gasman for some reason. He tried to be brave, but he started crying just like Angel even before they made him get out of his cage. After taking a blood sample from him, it was Nudge's turn, who was black and three years older than the Gasman. Just as the other two she cried a little, but not too much. Then, they decided it was the blind kid's turn. The flock called him Iggy, I think. He didn't cry, but looked as scared as the other three. I admired them so much for having each other, even if they did experiments and tests on them. After they had taken blood form the blind guy, they looked at Fang, getting the needle ready. He was always quite, and rarely spoke. But he never showed fear, actually, he never showed any emotions, like he didn't have a soul. Then, they turned to Max. Max, the most incredible of them all. She was never afraid of them, she was so brave and strong, probably that's why the whitecoats couldn't stop making tests on her, maybe wondering how she could be so perfect.

I admired her as no one else did, I wanted to be just like her. But when I followed or tried to speak to her, she just ignored me. She only talked to the other bird kids and loved them so much. No matter how hard I tried to be nice, she still ignored me. All she cared about was the flock. And that was all my father, Jeb Batchelder cared about too. He was obsessed with them, especially Max. Every time he looked at her, I saw pride in his eyes, his gaze softening. But when he looked at me, I saw nothing. He ignored me too, just like Max. It was like all the people I loved and cared about (which weren't many) hated me.

Sometimes, I would imagine telling the Erasers (the guards of the School) to kill the rest of the flock, so that Max would be mine and she would have no other option but to love me. Some other times, I dreamed about becoming one of them. Then I would join the flock and my father would admire me as he admires them.

But all this would be too good, and obviously, my life had to get worse. One day, my father decided to leave with the flock while everyone was sleeping. I heard voices, got up and saw my father whispering something. He was leaving, so I ran up to him.

'Where are you going?' I asked a bit scared. He looked at me coldly, showing no emotion in his eyes or his words 'go back to bed, Ari. I have to leave now.'

'Will you be back soon?' I asked sounding worried and like the useless child that I was. I thought I saw tears in his eyes, but it must have been my imagination. 'I'm not coming back in a long time, son. But in time, I will explain. You've got a big part to play in this, but you are not ready yet'.

'I want to come with you' I said, I mean, who would look after me? The whitecoats? Anyone could see that if he wasn't there, they would start playing with my DNA, just like they did to all the other mutant freaks. 'Where are you going?'

'Sorry Ari, no time to explain' he said, 'now go back to bed'.

Saying that, he turned around and went over to the flock. There was something wrong, they weren't in their cages! They seemed excited and happier than normal. What was going on?

'We are leaving, we are finally leaving!' I heard Max say. 'School's out forever! 'cause we are never coming back! We don't know how to thank you Jeb, you are our hero!'

And then, just as I started to realize what was happening, they were gone, and probably never coming back. I felt anger, resentment and hate exploding inside me. All the love and admiration that I had once felt for Max disappeared. I hated her now, hated her so much that all I wanted to do was kill her, right here, right now. She had always ignored me, thinking that I wasn't as good as her flock, hated me for no reason. But just now, she had stolen my father, who didn't love me anymore because of her. Maybe if she was dead, he would love me again. But if he didn't, I'd strangle him, making him feel all the pain that he made me feel.

The next day, I heard some whitecoats talking about my dad and the flock. They seemed angry, like they wanted to kill him. Maybe, I could help them do that.

'He betrayed us!' one of them exclaimed, 'the six experiments are gone, gone! How much money did we spend on them? They were the only successful hybrids apart from the Erasers!'

'Calm down. I have an idea, a great idea. Batchelder was stupid enough to leave his son here' they turned to me, and smiled. 'I imagine what would happen if we try to Erasify him at the age of three. Would the life span of Erasers be changed? What would we get?'

'Come here, boy' they said with evil expressions. 'Do you want to be stronger? Come here, we'll turn you into a superhuman.'

They were a bit scary, but I wasn't afraid. Nothing could be worse than wanting to kill someone so badly and knowing that you can't. If they turned me into a superhuman, I would be able to kill Max, starting with her flock. Those mutant freaks were an experiment gone wrong and had to disappear, that would be my job. I will kill them, and I will be stronger than them I thought at the time, not knowing how painful the tests that were later on done on me would be. But I could resist physical pain, it didn't hurt as badly as my heart.