Chapter 2 Boys Are Sooooooooooooo Annoying
Guess what? You never will. Those guys actually followed us, total failure. That's not bad, if I ever get a pet I am naming it Total. Anyway those slantheaded tanks or whatever they call themselves decided to come with us and then decided to have a name calling contest. Since I am benevolent I will spare you the agony of listening to it, but the way I fixed the problem is too clever to leave out.
I slowed down so I was walking between them.
"No fighting, Max rules," I told them.
The fighting continued.
"If you don't stop by the time I count to three," I said calmly.
They didn't stop, so I used my mutant birdkid technique for separating Gazzy and Angel: I unfurled my wings sending them sprawling on the ground. Angel giggled, probably glad that for once I was using this trick on someone else. I beat my wings a couple of times to get the icky boy germs off of them and pulled them through the slits in my long sleeve T settling them in the depressions on either side of my spine. I started hiking again like nothing happened. Angel skipped up next to me.
"Max, I didn't just like it because it's the first time I've seen you do it to someone 'sides Gazzy and me-"
"I," I corrected thoughtlessly.
"Whatever, I liked it because I learned some new words!" Angel skipped off in a self-satisfied manner leaving me with my mouth hanging open. How in the world do you stop a little girl that can read minds from picking up naughty words? I have no idea.
Angel came back soon enough however.
"Max, I'm really hungry," she said pitifully fixing me with a pair of adorable blue eyes.
I facepalmed. I'd been so worried and caught up in finding the others, I'd forgotten about the ones I had. I know, I know my parenting is horrible.
"We'll find something baby," I cooed comfortingly while I tried to control my thoughts.
"It's okay Max, I don't want the other to die because we didn't find them fast enough either, especially Gazzy, or Nudge, or both."
Angel swiped a grubby little hand across her face to wipe the tears before I saw them, but she wasn't fast enough. I thought like I hadn't seen though.
"Hey yo, stupid and ugly."
The boys glared at me and Angel smiled.
"Not more words?" I asked.
Angel nodded.
As soon as Thomas and Minho stopped dragging their feet and caught up with the rest of us I grabbed them by the backs of their necks and dragged them behind a large tree.
"No more bad words, you teaching them to the little one," I started.
Thomas and Minho looked at me like I was insane.
"We never said anything," Minho said defensively.
"Yeah, well, she can read minds."
Thomas and Minho nearly jumped out of their skins and I had a feeling Angel had learned more than just naughty words. Grrrr idiot non-flock boys.
"We need some food, any ideas?"
"I second that!" Minho said.
Thomas shrugged.
I facepalmed, non-flock boys are exceptionally stupid. Meeting adjourned.
I was weighing the pros and cons of leaving Angel with two people who had previously tried to kill her when a bush started moving. I am Maximum Ride, I go big or I go home, this wasn't your little rabbit behind the bush moving, this was your black bear behind the bush moving! Just as I was about to yell for Angel to get up a tree-
"I'm on it Max!" She said bravely, although her voice was trembling.
"Scared ducklings?" a charismatic voice asked.
The Eraser was probably splitting his skull trying not to laugh at our three identical deer-in-the-headlights expression.
"What's that?" Thomas whispered carefully.
"Eraser," I answered.
The Eraser looked momentarily confused since none of us appeared to have wings, they are so stupid. It recovered.
"Get ready for some fun chicklets."
I leaped forward slamming him into a large tree. He hit his head hard and groaned. I socked him in the jaw before he swiped a clawed hand across my shoulder. I hissed in pain as hot blood oozed down my shoulder. He grinned toothily. I slammed him in the gut with my knee and added a roundhouse kick in the chest for good measure. He slumped to the ground, victory is sweet.
"Let's get this grub," I said turning to face Minho and Thomas. Their horrified expressions and Angel's "Max behind you!" told me it wasn't over yet.
"Just get down and stay down," I snarled kicking him in the chin.
His head snapped back and he growled. Then he leaped forward knocking me over with his huge heavy bulk.
"Remember the rules buffalo wing, when you die your friends are that much closer to victory, the ones that are left anyway," He cackled evilly pinning me to the ground with his weight.
"Oh please, whenever we're split up you tell us you killed the others and you need some new comebacks, or whatever those are, they're so stupid I can't tell."
I braced my feet against his chest and heaved he flipped backwards…over a cliff. Score! I knelt down and used my jacket to soak up some of the blood that was seeping out of my shoulder. Thank goodness they missed the wing!
"Are you okay?" Thomas asked.
The boys knelt down beside me and Angel joined me.
"Nice backup," I said sarcastically. "Not you baby girl, you were perfect." I added seeing Angel's hurt expression, which turned into a smug smile as soon as I said that.
"Now let's go find some food baby,' I cooed stroking her blond hair.
She snuggled up to me which made my arm bleed more, but what the heck it's for the children. The boys stood around awkwardly while Angel and I had a moment then I got up, pulled her up after me, and started thinking of meal plans. At least I don't have to juggle around Nudge's new vegetarian thing. Nudge must be starving! Poor motormouth Nudge with no one to talk to, and Gazzy my kiddo. Small kids can't cope on their own well.
"Don't worry so much Max. Even if Jeb was a mean cruel backstabbing old man, he did teach us. They'll be okay until you find them." Angel said.
I tried to refrain from thinking it would have been great if I'd found one of the flock that couldn't read my every worry.
"I found some berries over hear guys," Thomas yelled.
We all ran to where he was standing in a clearing full of berry bushes. My mouth watered and my stomach clenched, no doubt about it I was hungry. I could tell from the hungry look in the other's eyes that they were too. Something felt wrong here though like-
"Thomas spit those out!" I yelled as Thomas tossed a handful of berries into his mouth.
Thomas spit out the berries and wiped his tongue on his sleeve for good measure.
"Wa ith wong ow?" Thomas mumbled with his tongue hanging out of his mouth.
Angel smiled and answered understanding his thoughts perfectly, "There poisonous, although Max can't remember what kind they are, if you eat them you'll die."
"Aths ust purpect." Even though I didn't know what he was saying the sarcasm was there plain as day.
"You might want to wash your mouth out," I advised.
Thomas nodded and crashed through the forest to the bigish stream that ran through it.
"Well I guess that's off the menu," Minho said.
"Ya think?" I asked sarcastically.
Thomas crashed back through the woods.
"Oh my gosh! What happened to you?" I asked pointing at the large green bruise on Thomas' cheek.
Thomas touched it lightly and winced. "I fell off of a rock…onto a rock."
This is just great, how are we going to win a fight to the death when a few innocent berries and a rock can leave us gasping in defeat.
Minho smirked. Angel crept across the clearing to Thomas. When she reached him she stood on her tiptoes and kissed the bruise and rubbed it in. I felt so proud because that's exactly what I do whenever they got hurt at home. Angel dashed back across the clearing and jumped into my arms. Major ouchy with that arm injury, but I held her anyway. Being a parent is sooo rewarding sometimes. Angel snuggled into me, she knows she's my perfect one. I looked over her skinny shoulder and saw Minho and Thomas making faces and stuff.
"Let's go get some food Angel, okay?"
"Finally," she grumbled resting her head on my shoulder.
I can't really blame her it's a least 3 o'clock in the afternoon and us bird kids tend to get hungry quite fast. Suddenly a rabbit flashed across our path. I threw Angel into Thomas and Minho (either they'll catch her or she'll fly) and sped after it with all my mutant speed. Just as it was about to get away I put on a burst of speed and dived grabbing it by the legs. After killing it, in hopefully a painless fashion I picked it up and retraced my steps through the part of the woods that looked like a cyclone, or bird mutant hit. When I reached the clearing Angel took one look at the rabbit and turned green, she'll probably go vegetarian like Nudge. Thomas and Minho began immediately discussing ways to cook it.
Interesting factoid: none of us can cook, zip, zero, nada. We didn't have anything to get the skin of with so we just held the rabbit over the clumsy fire the boys built, green smoky twigs compliments of Angel, and burned it off. This left the rabbit, none to good looking, but most likely edible. Although looking at it I had almost an overwhelming desire to wash it. Angel looked like she had the overwhelming desire to puke. I put the fire out with a flap of my wings because you never know who looks for stuff like that in a killer takes all type of games and besides that smoke was really starting to make my eyes smart. I wiped the tears out of my eyes and ripped the rabbit it to four fairly equal pieces.
"Maybe we should go down to the river so we have a fresh water supply," Thomas suggested.
Bad cooking and nothing to wash it down with? We went to the stream. We all sat down and waited for someone else to take the first bite. It looks like I'm still the valiant leader, so I took the first bite, a queen must lead her people. As soon as the warm meat hit my tongue I forgot everything but how hungry I was and dug in until I'd finished the last scrap. When I finally looked up Minho and Thomas were nearly done with their shares while Angel had only picked at hers. I crawled across the clearing and sat down next to her.
"I thought you were hungry."
Angel nodded turning the meat in her hands.
"Then why aren't you eating?"
Angel shrugged.
"Angel I'm going to treat you like an equal member of the team, which is why I'm telling you this. We might be here for a very long time, and until we find Iggy this is just what the foods gonna taste like. So buck up and eat it, it's actually not that bad, it sure beats the waffles I made."
Angel giggled, "I guess I can try some….."
"Won't like it till you try it," I said.
Angel tentatively took a small bite, which lead to a feeding frenzy that was dainty, unlike mine. When she was finished we got a drink and I wiped the grease off of her face.
"Do you really think we could be here for a while?" Angel asked giving me some bambi eyes.
"It-"
"A fight to the death, I forgot, but we'll never kill Iggy, or Nudge, or Gazzy, or Fang. Will we?"
"Absolutely not!" I assured her. "We may be mutants, but we're also a family, and family means no one gets left behind, or killed."
The sun had started to set behind the trees casting long shadows in front of us. We were almost to the base of the mountain. After we'd had food, my stomach hadn't stopped growling, which is one of the minuses of having an increased metabolism, you need more food than a normal person. I really hoped Nudge, Fang, Iggy, and Gazzy were getting enough to eat, 'cause we sure weren't.
"We should probably stop and set up camp soon, Max. We can always make the last stretch to the mountain tomorrow and besides it's time to get more food." Thomas said.
I nodded, it was true. Angel was practically asleep on her feet.
"I'll try to catch some fish," Minho volunteered. He'd been sharpening a stick with a rock as we'd hiked.
"Okay, I'll see what else there is. Thomas, watch Angel." I strode of into the woods pushing my wings out of my jacket in case I need to take flight quickly, but keeping them close to my body so they wouldn't create wind resistance or noise. The woods were quiet I couldn't hear a thing. I suddenly realized that it had become steadily cloudy through the afternoon and now I couldn't even see the sun anymore, well that and it was behind the trees.
Boom! Flash of lightning lit up the sky and it was followed by a piercing scream. Oh my-NUDGE! Then it was like the time Iggy dropped a bomb down the drain. Water pounded down everywhere, I pulled my wings over my head to shield me from some of the pelting wetness. Another crack of thunder went off followed by flashes of lighting. Please don't let me die by lighting.
"Nudge!" I yelled through the torrent. "Nudge! Nudge! It's me Max!"
"Max?!" Nudge shrieked. "Is that really you? If it's not you, oh my gosh I will die. I'm starving and stuff and I just had berries all day! So now I have a stomach ache! Max I'm really wet and it's cold out here!"
"I'm coming Nudge," I hollered speeding up.
I burst into a clearing full of berry bushes which were full of berries, all plump, ripe, and juicy. In the middle Nudge was curled on the ground shielding herself with her speckled wings. She was peeking out and when she saw me she leaped up splashing water everywhere and threw herself at me covering me in mud and water. I didn't care, I squeezed her tightly and then the questions came.
"Are the others with you? How's Iggy doing? How's Fang? And Angel? And the Gasman? I was soooo lonely without you guys! I'm so glad I don't have to sleep outside by myself tonight, I thought I would and I was so scared and now I'm so glad that I don't. Did you guys get any food today? All I had was berries and they were okay at first, but then I ate a lot of them and I got sick and you know…..I'll never eat another berry as long as I live! But then maybe I'll have to or I might have to give up being vegetarian and I don't want to do that!"
"Great to see you too Nudge."
Nudge may be a talker, and that may be annoying, but she's still a great kid and I love her. Besides who else is going to make me look good, Angel sure doesn't.
"Nudge we're getting really wet, let's go back to the others, okay?"
"They rest of the flock is with you?" Nudge asked eyes shining.
"Angel is, but I haven't found the others yet."
Nudge's face fell. She was disappointed and I didn't know what to tell her. It's hard to raise a family of bird kids when a whole school wants to rip you apart. I put my arm around Nudge's shoulder and started walking back to where I'd left Angel and Thomas. I sheltered us with my wings trying to keep us dry and healthy even though we were soaking wet and caked with mud. When we got the clearing Thomas had this shocked expression, I could tell he wasn't too happy to see another bird kid, I know we're a lot to take in, and Angel was ecstatic.
"Nudgey!" she squealed wrapping her arms around Nudge's neck. "I'm so glad you're here! But ew, you're a little messy." Angel daintily swiped some mud off of Nudge.
Nudge flapped her wings flinging mud on everything and everyone.
"Nudge!" I exclaimed putting shielding my face with my arms.
"It feels really good, you should try it some time," Nudge said.
"Yeah, maybe some time when I won't annoy everyone in flinging distance," I said flicking mud off of my arms and face.
Angel copied Nudge flinging everyone in more water and mud. Minho and Thomas looked less then delighted to have more bird kids. We created a very imaginative human umbrella and I think the boys were impressed, or just glad not to be wet