Forward, Beauteous Light

By Krrimarte

Part I: Deadly Secrets

"An Oasis With The Familiar Faces"

We were in a strange land. It was a place of hot sand, strong erratic winds and very little to put my mind at ease. We vaguely knew that we were somewhere over India.

There are a few problems that occur whenever we go near the natives. The first is that we're white, a dead giveaway that we're not exactly natives. Which isn't too bad until one of us, usually Nudge, opens our mouth and they know we're Americans. We get that a lot when flying abroad.

The second problem is our most obvious one. We have wings, and in a land where the people have a billion gods, we spend a lot of time making the pious twitch.

It is for these reasons that we'd been avoiding people in general, which isn't hard to do when you're surrounded by a hundred miles of sand in every direction. A word to the wise, when in India, if you can't interact with the people, at least raid their wells. Trust me, dehydration is not your friend. Fortunately, we were able to find an oasis. A real, sparkling mini lagoon smack dam in the middle of a seamless sandy wasteland.

"Max, I think my sneakers are melting..." Iggy said quizzically as he bounced from foot to foot.

I rolled my eyes and turned to Fang. "Why are we here again?" I asked him. After the 'Great Divide' I'd dubbed Fang "Ye Great Directional Decision Making Dude", So now he was in charge of figuring out where to go. Needless to say, I often don't like his choice of scenery.

"Hiding out, laying low. They aren't going to come looking for us here." He said matter-of -factly.

Okay, I have to ask. Why is it that they will hunt us down in Antarctica, but not in the vast deserts of India? Oh yeah, because people with self-preservation instincts don't come through here without at least 30 camels and a guide. Both of which, I think we'd notice pretty quickly.

So I'm a little cranky, it's the heat, or the dehydration, or the constant sand in my eye... You take your pick. We're part bird so dehydration is a serious problem. Unfortunately, lack of water wasn't our only concern.

"How's the food situation?" I asked.

Silence. Great, just great.

"Okay guys, we rest for the night and tomorrow we hunt lizards or something." I decreed.

Nudge and Angel let out a collective "Eww, Max!"

"Lizards?" Fang mouthed quizzically.

I shot him a look. "Rats?" He rolled his eyes and started assembling our pup tent.

We learned out first night out in the desert that our tent was definitely not designed for the sand storms that plagued this area. We'd had to do some improvising. Our ten was first constructed and pushed over on it's side, so the door was basically our ceiling. The doorway was then covered with a tarp to prevent sand from slipping through the zipper.

This was not a great way to sleep, because the six of us were basically heaped onto the 6 foot- by- 6 foot area of the side of our tent. Not exactly roomy, and when you're sharing any space with Gazzy you just have to pray that there weren't beans on the menu that night.

Come morning, Fang, Iggy and I would carefully unzip the flap and push about a hundred pounds of sand off of the tarp. It was a pain in the rear, but it was a necessary evil.

"Fang, where are we going after this?" I asked him wearily as I filled my canteen the water's edge, probably getting equal portions sand and water.

"Depends. How do you feel about the possibility of getting shot down by anti aircraft missiles?" He asked. I could tell what he was thinking. Now way, being in the Middle East really sucked. I gave him a dirty look. "We could head towards Russia." He said and took a sip of water.

"Sounds like an improvement." I said and looked at the troupe of dirty, gritty kids. "Okay everybody, fill up your water bottles and clean up!" I said. The kids trudged forward and started filling bottles.

I waited for them all to finish before I waded out into the water with a sigh. After all of the flying and sand and sweat, a dip in very cold water feels incredible.

I took a deep breath before dunking my head under water and scrubbing at my face. Something sharp grazed my cheek, I could feel the blood running down it. I opened my eyes and looked at my hands.

"No, no, no,no- This can't be happening." I said softly to myself. I thrashed around frantically for a minute until I heard the familiar shuffling of sand.

"Are you okay, Max?" Fang asked. I turned towards Fang with a wicked snarl on my face. His eyes widened in terror and surprise. "M-Max?"

I gazed into the now still water surrounding me. My muzzle and razor sharp fangs were back. Slowly I turned towards Fang again.

"Why, hello little birdie." I taunted. He took a few steps back his hand finding it's way to his pocket.

"Max, snap out of it." He said pleadingly.

I pushed up with my wings powerfully and forced my way out of the water with a 'whoosh!' A large shower of droplets fell between me and Fang. I stared down at him, not as my friend, not as my flock, but as my prey. Fang stared up at me, "Max, don't. Please, don't."

I laughed viciously and charged down at him with my jaws open and craving the taste of his blood. I could feel the flesh of his neck between my fangs. Then in a split second I heard the muted. 'Shink!' I stepped backwards a little and looked down in shock that where Fang had the stiletto blade firmly lodged between my ribs. At first it didn't register, then I started coughing up my own blood.

Fang looked down at me sorrowfully. "Max, I promised..."

My scream woke everybody up, and Fang being Johny- on- the- spot was barking order for them to go back to sleep as he crawled his way over to me.

"Max, shh, it's just a dream." He whispered in my ear.

I wanted to believe him, but something kept nagging at me. The knife, I didn't allow the kids to carry weapons, why would I dream about that? "So, when did you get the knife?" I asked.

He became very still and I heard him stop breathing for a second. "How did you know about that?" He asked softly.

I started shaking uncontrollably. Fang wrapped an arm around my shoulder and gently rocked me until I calmed down a bit. "Max, it's okay. It's okay, Max."

"So you believed me?" I asked him softly.

Fang rested his hand against my shoulder. "Max, that night, I knew there had to be more to it then just a nightmare. It had you really upset, so I knew something was up. I never thought that I'd ever use it on you. I figured that there was probably an eraser clone that I'd have to deal with and it was better to be... " He trailed off. I know what he was going to say next, "Prepared, just in case."

I brought my hand up to his forehead and gently scratched his scalp. "I know. Thank you." I whispered.

"What was the nightmare about, anyway?" He asked.

I thought about how much stress I was under, and how tired he was. There was no point in telling him about something that may only be a nightmare anyway. "You know... I honestly can't remember."

Fang started to pull away but I gripped his arm, probably too forcefully. "No. Stay." I said. Wow, a whole two word statement. Single syllable sentence, even. With such mad articulation skills I'd be Magna Cum Something -or- another in the class of 1500 B.C.

Either way, he looked at my black blur of a face and settled down beside me. "Okay, Max. I'm not going anywhere." He said.

I know what you're thinking, but it's not what you think. I didn't feel safe in his arms, nor did I have the childish notion that his presence was going to keep the nightmares at bay. No, I need him there to be between me and the flock... Just in case.

"I'd look ridiculous in short-shorts."

Morning eventually came, not that you could tell for how dark it was. Fang and I were still laying on the floor, waiting for the rest of the flock to wake up. There was definitely a tension in the air. He had questions he was hesitating to ask, and I was unwilling to just provide the answers. The result was a silence that could have made Helen Keller uneasy.

"Fang?" I asked

"Mm-mm?" He responded.

"Remember that idea you had, the one about the island?" I asked him.

He paused. "Yeah, but it was stupid. I know that." He said.

I took a deep breath. "It wasn't stupid, just impractical at the time." I insisted.

"So, what are you trying to say, that you want us to be the new cast for Gilligan's Island?" He asked me sarcastically.

"I'd imagine that Iggy would make a heck of a Professor." I said with a small laugh.

"Gazzy is Gilligan" Fang said. I could feel him smirk against my shoulder.

"Nudge would have to be Ginger." I replied.

"Oh yeah." He said agreeing with me. "So, are you Skipper or Mary-Ann?" He asked jokingly.

I rolled my eyes. "Neither. I'd look ridiculous in short-shorts and I'm not nearly chummy enough to be the skipper." I replied.

"Ditto." He responded. I laughed at the thought of him saying things such as "Hey, little buddy!"

"So... I was thinking... How about the Amazon Rain Forest?" I asked.

"Wait... That isn't even an Island. I think you need to be isolated by a large mass of water to be on an island. At least the last time I checked." He said stoically.

"No, it's not an island, but we could still live there." I replied. "Maybe build a gianormous tree-house or something?"

Fang shifted and pulled be over to look at me. "You're serious about this, aren't you?"

"I mean, we could at least set up a home base there. Save the rain forest and have a place to land at the same time."

It's funny, but we never use the term "Kill two birds with one stone." It's just bad taste.

"We'll have to talk about this again when I can see your face." He said.

I smiled in the dark. "Sounds fair enough.

Ten minutes later, Nudge was singing her usual morning song: "Maaaxxxx, I'm hungry!"

I rolled my eyes. "Ready for the day?" I asked Fang, who of course shrugged.

After nearly collapsing the tent with us still occupying it, we managed to crawl out to face the relentless sand.

"Max, what's for breakfast?" Nudge asked.

"I told you, lizards." I replied. Obviously she didn't quite get I that wasn't kidding.

Nudge looked at me with a combination of disgust and disbelief. "Fang!" She yelled and ran over to where he was collapsing the tent. Oh yeah, go whine to the guy who introduced us to the culinary deviancy that is the roasted rat on a stick.

To make a long story short, we didn't eat lizard that day. However, I think I may have preferred it to the very dry, spicy ride that we procured in the next village over. Water was never more a friend to me then at that moment.

By the way that Iggy was wolfing it down, you would think that he'd lost his sense of taste and not his sight. Did the guy have a death-wish? No matter, him and Gazzy were sleeping outside tonight.

After ingesting just enough to make me functional, I came to a sad conclusion. I didn't have any cash. One bad thing about being in the middle of a desert, there aren't any ATM's. Crap.

Angel went to work on convincing them to allow us to pay for our meal through work. They were an elderly couple and didn't seem too interested in turning away 6 young sets of hands.

The work really wasn't that bad. Iggy and Gazzy had to make several trips to collect water from the village well, and Angel and Nudge were set to herding sheep. Meanwhile, me and Fang were up to our elbows in cooking rice. The couple must have appreciated our work, because they made us a significantly less spicy meal to take with us.

Once airborne, Angel poked her way into my head. Max, where are we going?

I don't know yet, baby.

We can't just fly around, you know. She sounded cranky, poor thing.

I know, Fang's just weighing out our options. I replied

...Okay, but you guys need to decide soon. She said testily.

Then she left my head space. I sighed and held back until I was wing- to- wing with Fang. "So... Where are we going?"

Fang looked at me for a second. "Were you serious back there?" He asked.

I nodded. He looked ahead for a while, obviously debating something in his head.

"I guess we head back to the U.S." He replied. I gave him a strange look and he raised a brow defiantly. "I am not catching some weird jungle infection because we're playing Tarzan. There's a bunch of stuff we're going to need to stay healthy." He said.

I smiled brightly. "Back to Mom's?" I asked. He nodded. "And chocolate- chip cookies had nothing to do with it?" I asked.

He only smirked and tilted his wings a bit to adjust his course.

Arizona, USA, here we come.