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Part Three

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The rest of the flight was uneventful. They reached the sea with time to spare, so Nudge, Gazzy and Angel went swimming. Iggy sat on the beach, which was deserted, and listened to them over the crackle of the flames. Nudge and Gazzy had a water fight, and Total barked frantically from the beach. Angel wasn't to be heard sometimes, searching beneath the waves for pretty shells or pieces of water-smoothed glass.

Occasionally, Iggy tossed a new piece of wood on the fire, just to break up the routine. Max and Fang disappeared off somewhere inland, Max speeding off and Fang straining to follow. No-one was wondering where, or what they were doing. None of them were going to go looking either. They'd been caught in the act a few times before, and Iggy wasn't keen to repeat the experience. At all.

It would've been at least polite to have some kind of warning, Iggy has said then, the rest of the flock would have respected any boundaries. It wasn't as if they weren't going to find out – it was a flock of six and there was a telepath in that number. He'd asked why they wanted to keep it a secret. He hadn't got an answer then, he still hadn't. Maybe Max did know about his feelings, maybe she was trying to protect him. He didn't know.

As it started to get dark, Angel walked back up the beach, with what smelled like fish. He offered her a towel, and she put whatever she was carrying down on a rock with a squishing sound followed by a clinking of what he could guess were the fruits of her 'treasure hunt'. Nudge and Gazzy followed a short while later, Nudge complaining about something. Again.

"What's that smell?" he asked, wrinkling his nose.

Gazzy snickered ,"Angel put her fish talking talents to good use for once and got the fish to come up to her. Then she made them die. So we've got fish for dinner." He explained.

Iggy frowned at Angel's latest use of power, it was one thing to use it on Erasers, but…

"It's okay, Iggy." She told him. He wasn't sure whether to believe her, but he nodded. At least she wasn't making him think it was okay. He didn't think she'd do that, but maybe…Iggy's head started to hurt.

"We'll have fish for dinner then, but only if you gut and skin them, and cut off the heads and the tails first." He said, taking charge, as oldest. "Nudge and Gazzy can do that. Take them away down the beach first though, otherwise they'll smell up the place. Angel, have we got some foil left?" He handed Nudge his sharpest knife, and Gazzy took out his own.

They walked down the beach arguing about which X-man had the coolest power. So far Nudge was winning with Rogue, but Gazzy was adamant that Cyclops would kick ass. Iggy just hoped none of them developed eye-laserbeams. He listened until they were out of earshot, smiling. They'd argue about anything. Angel started searching around in the packs. He decided he might as well contribute and started building up the fire to a cooking heat with some of the stuff collected from the forest off the beach earlier. Driftwood didn't burn well, and Gazzy had told him that if it did burn then the flames were green.

"There's not much foil left," Angel chirped disappointedly, after a few moments of rummaging. "What're we gonna cook the fish in now? I'd feel really bad if we just wasted them!"

Iggy put a hand on her shoulder to comfort the girl, and hummed in thought. "Is there any roofing iron on the beach anywhere?" he asked her, unable to see himself. "A small piece?"

The sand shuffled around her feet as she turned around to scan along the beach. "Yeah," she exclaimed, "There's a smallish piece down there."

"How rusty is it? If it's not too rusty we can use it to cook on." Angel clapped her hands in delight, and grabbed his hand to pull him down the beach. She was right, the piece was a little on the big side, but it would do okay for cooking, and it wasn't too rusty.

He'd dragged it up the beach with Angel's 'help' and covered the top in the remaining foil when Gazzy and Nudge returned with the now de-scaled, beheaded and gutted fish. They helped set up the iron on sticks, and Iggy told them to go and get washed off while he cooked. Because they really did smell. Angel needed no prompting to head off with them into the water again. Iggy sat down next to the fire and waited as the fish began to sizzle.

The terrible twosome showed up just after the fish had finished cooking, smelling like each other and sounding satisfied. Iggy said nothing, and it didn't sound like either of them intended to say much either. Angel muttered something about now being one of those times where she wished she wasn't a mind reader, because she really didn't want to know what was on their minds. Iggy grinned because they did deserve it, Max ignored them both.

They ate their fish in silence, Max and Fang snuggling up one side of the fire and the rest of them on the other. The divisions were becoming all the clearer now that he knew where to look.

They'd finished and cleaned up, well, he and Nudge had cleaned up, and while it was still a little light they decided to go for a quick fly, just for the fun of it. Well, Max and Fang decided and the others decided to follow because no one turned down flying-for-the-fun of it. They had precious little time to do what they wanted, and besides, flying cross-country was a boring necessity. This was fun.

The flock took off and flew south a way to the nearest of cliffs that dotted the coast, ones that Nudge had spotted as they'd circled in to land at the beach.

Divebombing.

Awesome.

Iggy sped down the side of the cliff, wings half out and tilted so his feathers whistled uselessly, falling. He began to feel cold, salty sea spray on his face, and he pulled up at the last second to stop from plowing into the rough water. From the height he'd fallen, it would hurt like hitting concrete.

The danger, the fear that something would go wrong, that he wouldn't pull up in time - You couldn't do this without letting out a whoop, the adrenaline burning through your veins, wings on fire, every feather tingling with the force of drag.

He loved this – he'd come up with in a way, literally walking off one of the drops that surrounded the mountain top home in the Sangre de Cristos. To be fair, Iggy hadn't seen it, and no one else had been looking out for him, making sure he didn't do just that. He hadn't got the hang of walking around their home yet.

Then Fang, being Fang, just had to copy. Max and Jeb had gone ballistic. Nudge had nearly fainted the first time she saw it happen. Gazzy couldn't wait to join in. Iggy had blushed every time it was referred to. Nearly-three-year-old Angel had blinked at the noise and the thoughts and emotions and had gone back to chewing on the liquorice she'd been given.

All in all, it hadn't been a fun few weeks until Fang had pushed him off when he wasn't expecting it. That had been when he realised that this was pretty good when you weren't convinced that you were going to die at any second. It had become a competition, how far would you fall. They'd gotten better and better over the years, so now he could fall so far his feet nearly brushed the ground when he pulled up. He swooped back up to the top of the cliff listening out for Nudge's turn to fall.

Instead the older boy had another kick in the guts. "Max," Fang yelled, "Erasers!"

Max swung around frantically, eyes scanning the area as she told them to U and A. They all sped into the air like bullets, off the cliff in formation that at any other time would've made Max proud.

The reached a good fighting altitude for the flying Erasers, a height were their ground-bound cousins wouldn't be able to reach with most of their standard range weapons.

Ten seconds, twenty… Iggy got a strange, slightly elated, mostly guilty feeling in the pit of his stomach

Still nothing.

"Some joke, Fang!" Max shrieked. "Next time you get the urge to have a sense of humour, why don't you take a leaf out of Gazzy's book and let off a smoke bomb or ten!"

Fang looked furious that Max thought he was joking, "I saw Erasers!"

"Then where," and Max spun around midair, probably gesturing all around them at the bare cliff and the sky, both absent of murderous wolfmen toting submachine guns, "Are they?"

Fang, stubborn until the last, "I saw Ari." Iggy felt that feeling in his stomach swing all the way to guilt, then back to guilty elation.

Max took several deep breaths, calming herself down at the mention of her nemesis, and then she mumbled something. Probably to her Voice, though Iggy wouldn't know. It sounded a bit like she was swearing. "Fine. Whatever. This has ruined the evening anyway. Head back to camp!" she ordered, anger obvious in her voice.

She sped away, half using her super speed to keep just a bit to fast for them to follow easily. It was annoying to not be able to fly as he wanted to, and he couldn't ask Max to slow down. She wouldn't do so, maybe she'd even speed up.

The flock gathered in the air above the beach, Max impatiently doing the winged equivalent of tapping her feet on the floor. "Guys," she said sweetly. "Why don't you land while Fang and I have a little chat." Her tone of voice implied that it wasn't a suggestion. "Don't bother staying up for us, we might be a while. Get all nice and tucked up in bed. Iggy can be on watch."

Iggy bit his lip to keep from yelling in anger. Three nights on watch. Three.

"Goodnight." Came Max's dismissal. Noiselessly the flock dropped from the sky, landing quietly, ears straining to catch what Max would say to Fang. No luck, as soon as they landed, Max sped off seaward. Fang following reluctantly.

"Do you think," Gazzy said, breaking the silence, "Do you think Fang really did see Ari?"

Iggy flinched and hoped that the other three hadn't seen it in the flickering firelight.

"I don't know Gazzy, I didn't see whatever Fang was looking at, but what if it was Ari?" Nudge started, "What if Ari's watching us right now, with a whole pile of Erasers looking down on us with guns and Max and Fang not being here, and we'd have to fight and…" Someone clamped a hand over Nudge's mouth.

"I don't hear any Erasers," said Angel, ending that discussion. "There's no one else around."

Iggy got out the blankets, and sat down on the nearest log. "You might want to get to sleep before they return, else Max might get angry." Three sighs met his words.

"Okay," Gazzy said half-heartedly. The younger boy came and picked up a blanket, passing two out to the girls, who thanked him. Iggy dropped the other two, Max's and Fang's, on the sand. He had a thought then. Tentatively, Iggy extended one fist. Gazzy reached out and put his on top of Iggy's, and was quickly joined by Nudge's and Angel's.

"Goodnight, guys."

"Night Iggy!"

"Goodnight."

"'mm. 'Night."

It wasn't long until he heard Gazzy's snores and Nudge's sleep talking, they were tired and it had been a long day. "Do you think we should tell Max?" Angel asked.

"Was it Ari?"

Angel nodded, "Yep."

"I don't know." He told her honestly; after all, she was a mind reader. "I'll think about whether I want to. If you think you should, then…"

"Okay." Angel said, yawning. "I think I'm going to tell Max, it's not fair that she's mad at..."

"Tell Max what?" Max asked, stepping into the camp so quietly Iggy wasn't surprised he hadn't heard. "Angel? Iggy?" she demanded loudly. "Tell me what!"

"Wha's goin' on?" Nudge asked sleepily.

"Angel and Iggy have something to tell me!" Max said furiously.