The End
I swung round to glance at Gasman. Erasers were overrunning him. There were sixty of them. There were ten for each of us. This is the end. The school had recaptured us. Our flight feathers torn out. Thrown into the enclosure for one last battle with the erasers. They'd done all the tests they'd wanted. We were finished. About to be retired.
But not without a fight. I smashed an Eraser in the jaw and kicked another in the gut. I broke free of their ring. Angel had made an Eraser on her side. It was trying to take out the others. Total was fighting, ripping at the Eraser's with his teeth.
Nudge, Iggy and Fang had gotten together, guarding each other's backs.
Gazzy fell.
I screamed out in anguish. I yelled his name; it was the last gift I could give him.
I couldn't watch as they tore him open. The Gasman. My baby, my soldier, my little trooper. Yet I couldn't turn away. Time seemed to pause and all my most painful memories of him flashed through in my head.
A blonde haired baby being dumped in a cage with the other baby. The little dark coloured one. He had wings too. I looked at the dark-eyed one and he looked at me desperately. I knew what he was thinking. Not another one to live a life of pain, only to die.
Two year-old Gazzy, being pressed into my arms with a bottle. He was screaming. They had just run toxicity tests.
Gazzy at three, screaming when Iggy ignored him. Iggy crying desperately. I could only just understand. They had taken his sight.
Him swooping around, only a few metres off the ground, just after we escaped. When we were learning to fly.
Him playing hide n' seek in the field at our house in Colorado with Nudge and Angel. He went missing for a few days soon afterwards.
Asking if I was okay when they kidnapped Angel. It should have been me asking him if he was okay.
Flying with the hawks as they stormed the school, eyes lit up with pleasure.
Swooping down at the restaurant to grab an éclair.
His brown and white wings blurring as he flew away from a bomb.
The laughter in his eyes as he dive-bombed Nudge at control-freak Anne's house.
The look in his eyes when he set off the stink bomb.
Him imitating ter Bortch. Saying he was going to eat the snickers bars.
The sadness in his face when the flock split up.
His joy at being together again.
His laughter at the gas cloud he had made.
The way he had outsmarted us all by seeing the wire in the pizza box.
I snapped out of it. Had to stop them, had to stop them. I roared and threw myself into the group of Eraser's. They split, laughing. I was too late. I looked at Gazzy in horror. I couldn't bring myself to look at his waist. It had been ripped up. I looked into his face,
saw for the last time his bright blue eyes, fluffy blonde hair, brown-white wings, out in defiance. No, not Gazzy. He can't have been gone, not Gazzy. Not the Gasman. It couldn't be happening. They were killing my flock. I stared down at Gazzy's lifeless face. It couldn't be happening. He was only nine.
A sound that tore into my heart and clutched it in its cold fist was what drew me out of my trance. Angel screaming. I heard her voice in my head 'Max, I'm going to die. Max, I'm sorry. I tried so hard.'
I screamed in fury, leaping towards the Erasers. But it was too late; she too had fallen.
"ANGEL!" I screamed, fighting forward.
No, not Angel, not my baby. It couldn't happen. Not after Gazzy. Tears streaming down my cheeks I got to her.
The baby being put in the same crate as me. Blonde hair, and blue eyes. She looked exactly like the blonde-haired toddler that had came along two years ago. Fang, we had named him the year before, gave me the same look as before.
Angel, her guileless blue eyes locking into mine, as she downed four hotdogs when she was two.
Teaching her how to tie her shoes.
Doing up her buttons.
Her telling me she loved me like no one else after I thought about her being my baby.
Her screaming as she was kidnapped.
Asking to make strawberry shortcakes.
Pushing her fingers through the crate side, so we could almost touch.
Getting Celeste from the toy store.
Asking for Total and Fang giving in.
Drinking coffee for breakfast on her first day of school.
Floating in the air without wings when she was playing at being a swan.
Eating a cookie when she was pretending to be a traitor.
The helplessness in her eyes when we split up.
The scary look as she controlled other people.
Being trapped down the Crevasse.
Talking to the fish and breathing under water.
Saying Total was boring even though he could talk.
I had to stop those memories, the rest of my flock needed me. But I had to see her one last time.
Like with Gazzy, the Eraser's had sliced her stomach over. I didn't look at that. I looked at her still face, her blue eyes, her cornrows. Her small hand clutching Celeste. Her small white wings, with blood showing red where they'd been splattered. No she couldn't be gone. Not Angel. The Gasman had been bad enough. But Angel…
Angel, my baby, the youngest. She'd only been seven. Seven. It wasn't fair. How could life be like this? Some people had everything. We were experiments. We were only kids. And we were dying. I couldn't stand this. I couldn't just sit and watch as they killed my flock. I leapt at the nearest Eraser, knocked him down. They sensed my anger, and half of them started fighting me. I heard Fang screaming my name, saw him try and break through. The Eraser's turned around and started attacking him. It was about forty verse two.
"Max, we're going to die." Said Fang.
"Not before I take them with me." I snarled.
He did a roundhouse kick, keeping off the Erasers for a second. Then he leant in, and kissed me.