A/N: Inspired by a Tumblr post (oh yeah, I have a MR blog now automaticthree-sixty). And if you're here because you were hoping I'd updated WGA, fret not! Because the next chapter is almost done, and I hope to post it soon!
Jeb watched as Max scrutinized the dingy hotel room. Sure, it wasn't the cleanest, but that was not what she was looking for. Wings tense behind her, she checked the ceiling and walls for cameras. Finding none, she pulled the curtains back from the window and it looked like she was trying to decide how much force would be needed to break it if necessary.
"Is it bullet-proof?" she whispered, not looking away from the view of the parking lot below.
Jeb frowned and made a point to speak in normal volume. "No, but if something happens we can use the door."
Max shook her head. "Not if they come through the door." Whispering again. She shifted her attention to the group huddled behind Jeb, just inside the closed door to the hotel room. "Fang?"
The silent one flared his wings a bit, giving Jeb a look that clearly said he didn't completely trust him, before joining Max at the window. Without words exchanged with her, he inspected it a moment, tapping it with a crooked and scrawny index finger.
"Think you could break it?" Max asked in a hushed tone.
He tilted his head to the side, considering. Then nodded.
Max beamed. "Great." Then, turning to the rest of the kids standing behind Jeb, she set her hands on her hips and declared, "It's good."
Jeb expected cheers, or at least some sense of relief from the Flock–he had heard Max call them that once–but stiff-shouldered birdkids pushed past him and slumped to the floor, exhaustion etched into their posture and drooping eyelids. Max carefully relieved the blind boy–Iggy, Jeb had to remind himself–of his sleeping toddler charge so he could use his hands to feel for an empty space and join the younger kids on the floor.
Jeb made a mental note that his hands were shaking. So were Max's, when she rocked Angel and hummed under her breath the way she must have seen the researchers do before. Fang didn't sit at all, but moved to where he was between Jeb and the Flock and leaned against the wall there. A heavy silence followed, during which the young girl with dark skin, Nudge, blinked at him with large brown eyes.
He noticed Iggy stiffen first, as though he had been shocked by something. Max abruptly stopped her rocking, and Fang straightened to standing, putting his weight in the balls of his feet. The younger ones–Nudge and the Gasman–scrambled backward until their backs hit the back wall of the room.
It took a few more seconds for Jeb to hear it: the soft hum of a cart being pushed down the hallway outside, followed by the steps of a heavy man. Jeb watched as the Flock in front of him held their breath, their wings silently spreading, as the cart crept closer. He didn't understand why they would be so afraid of a cart–oh. Researchers at the School frequently used carts to transport experiments in their cages to labs.
He sighed, and the sudden noise made Iggy flinch. "It's okay, they're probably just moving into a room." Despite his reassurance, Max only spared him a glance–Fang didn't move at all, still as a shadow–and returned her fierce gaze to the door, waiting for Jeb to be proven wrong.
The cart stilled in front of their door. Jeb's heart fluttered, and he wondered if somebody could have followed him here. This wasn't protocol–
The door for the room across from them opened, more rolling, then it closed.
The whole room relaxed, and its occupants return to their normal setting of exhausted-beyond-all-getout. Jeb cleared his throat before he lost his nerve, and instantly four pairs of eyes fixed on him. "You're probably hungry. What do you want to eat?"
They all looked toward Max, who had begun rocking Angel again without thought. "It's not feeding time though."
"That's okay. You can–you should eat when you're hungry."
The Gasman reached out and grabbed Nudge's hand. He whispered, "I don't want to do any experiments. I'm too tired."
Jeb's brow furrowed. The comment seemed to indicate some of the researchers had bribed the children into cooperation with food. Or worse, blackmailed them. "You don't have to." He loosened his tie; the room was suddenly stifling. "As long as I'm around, you won't have to ever again."
It didn't seem like any of them knew how to respond, so he sighed and said, "I'm going to pick up some food from the pizza place across the street. Don't go anywhere; I'll be back in just a few minutes." Turning specifically to Max and Fang, he continued, "You should be able to watch me from the window. If anything happens, use the phone on the nightstand to call me."
Fang raised an eyebrow. He knew as well as Jeb that if something happened they wouldn't have time to call anybody, and there was hardly anything Jeb could do anyway. But after exchanging glances with Max, they both nodded. Better if the younger kids thought it was safer.
Jeb opened the door and repeated "Right back," before shutting it behind him.
He returned after fifteen minutes with six pizzas after mentally calculating the approximate amount of calories a mutant would consume according to their previous diets at the School. For the sake of time, they were all plain cheese, but he didn't think the Flock would mind.
He wasn't surprised to shoulder the door open and find them awake and pretty much in the same positions they had been in when he left, although it looked as though the Gasman and Nudge had been dozing before his noisy return. He set the boxes down on the desk in the corner of the room.
Iggy cocked his head to the side. "What is that smell?"
Jeb smiled. "Pizza."
Max's mouth was set in a thin line as she said, "Food."
After a period of no other reaction, Jeb realized they were waiting for him to eat some. Prove it wasn't poisoned or something. So, he opened the top box and picked one of the smaller slices to take a bite from. Chewed, swallowed. It wasn't the best quality, but for the price and time it took it at least had flavor.
Iggy stood up and stretched his back. "I'm hungry, and that smells too good. If it kills me to eat it, at least I'll die happy." The Gasman jumped up behind him, and helped him get a slice. The kid helped himself to one, too.
It seemed to be all the prompting the Flock needed, because soon pizza was passed around, and Max gently woke Angel so she could eat as well. Jeb noted that the older kids made sure the younger ones had their fill before getting some for themselves. It was becoming increasingly clear they were protective of them; he may be able to use that.
They ate in silence, and Jeb knew for a fact it was because of his presence. Security cameras in the research facility picked up plenty of conversations they had had before while they thought nobody was listening. But, he reminded himself, they would grow more comfortable with him in time, when he had them convinced they were safe. That he was safe–he didn't miss how Fang shifted to keep Jeb in his peripheral vision whenever he moved around the room.
And not one of them verbalized how they felt about the new flavor. Their wings gave away their excitement and happiness, but their faces remained blank.
"You can eat at the table, if you want," he said, when he realized they all intended to continue eating on the floor.
Max cocked her head to the side. "Why would we?"
And Jeb realized they had never eaten together before. He mentally scrambled for an explanation. "So you can see each other. And the chairs are more comfortable and better for digestion."
Iggy huffed, blowing his overly long bangs to the side in a habit Jeb recognized from before he was blind. Exasperation. "And," Jeb added, "it's how civilized people eat. Come on."
It wasn't the right thing to say, apparently. All of them froze, at various stages of pizza-consuming.
Nudge cleared her throat. "Uh, no thanks."
Jeb raised an eyebrow. Suddenly it was very important that they sit at the table together. "I take it back. You have to. Sit and eat like a normal family."
The Flock just blinked at him. Jeb pulled out a chair and gestured to it. "Angel, do you want to sit?"
Angel's shoulders tensed after being singled out, and she turned her big blue eyes toward Max. "Max," she whispered, "can I?"
Max's gaze softened, "Sweetie," but Fang's jaw clenched, and Max saw and changed her mind. Instead of answering verbally, she only shook her head.
Jeb studied the Flock, suddenly even more withdrawn than they had been when they arrived at the hotel. Their eyes were downcast, pizza forgotten in their still hands. "What's wrong?" he asked.
Iggy snorted. "We won't ever be normal." His empty gaze was landing eerily near Jeb's own. "Will we?"
"Iggy," Max said, and it almost sounded like she was pleading. As though they had had this conversation before, in hushed tones amongst cages of sleeping mutants destined to die. Jeb thought for a moment that she had nothing else to say, but then she continued, "We are family. Nothing will change that."
"But we're too different. We aren't–"
"Igaramus Pencilworth… ington," Max started, earning a giggle from the younger hybrids, "If you believe for one second that being two percent chicken makes me love you any less, have I got news for you."
Fang had the faintest smirk ghosting across his features at Max's tone. Jeb stepped back and observed her in her natural position as leader.
"You know that's not what I mean," Iggy snapped back. "We aren't even human, Max. How are we supposed to survive?"
Max crossed her arms. "Jeb will show us." She shot him a look that said 'you'd better not make me a liar.' Fang huffed in amusement.
Max stomped over next to Jeb. "You said normal families eat at a table?" He nodded, amused by her determination. "He nodded, Iggy. You heard it, guys. Let's eat." And she pulled out a chair and plopped down in it.
The Flock only hesitated a second before following. Not even Fang was immune to her leadership skills. Or the lure of more pizza.
Halfway through the last box, the Gasman poked Jeb in the arm. "Dr. Jeb?"
"You can just call me Jeb, Gasman."
"Okay, then you call me Gazzy. What is that?" He pointed at the other end of the room.
"What, the black thing? That's a–"
"TV for laparoscopic surgeries. But what are the big things?"
"What do you mean?"
"The soft counters," Nudge piped in. "I was wondering too. What are they for?"
"Oh," Jeb's eyebrows rose. "Do you mean the beds?"
There was a chorus of ohs and oohs. And a particularly loud "That's not a bed. Where's the bracelets?" from Angel, who had only recently graduated from her lab-issued crib (complete with restraints) to a cage like the older children.
"But there are two," Max said, nibbling on a pizza crust. "Why?"
"I figured I would sleep on the couch. The six of you can divide the two beds amongst yourselves. It will be tight, but–"
Nudge squealed. "We get to sleep on one? That's so exciting! How does it work?"
It took him longer than he would have thought to get them calmed down enough to fall asleep in the beds, considering their states. He convinced the older three kids to sleep only after promising to wake them at the first sign of trouble. It was no big deal; he wasn't expecting the School to send trouble before the researchers arrived in the morning and found the empty cages, and he had to plan for the upcoming weeks on the run.
And maybe he found himself looking forward to teaching the Flock about being human.