Chapter 7
Chaos
I couldn't believe I didn't realize who those people were earlier! I knew I should've trusted my senses and I felt horrible for getting in a fight with Lucy over it but this meant I only had a few hours to decided what we were going to do before those damned erasers were on us!
Erasers are not the pink things you use to erase mistakes on your paper, trust me. They were big hair wolf beasts that looked like something you'd get out of a horror movie! Erasers had huge bodies; they were probably around eight feet tall!
I remember when there beady, blood red eyes would pierce into my soul, they were definitely the devils spawn. They had no tails, which was intriguing enough and claws that could rip through flesh like a knife going through hot butter.
"What? What did you figure out?" Lucy demanded. I snapped my attention back towards her and realized while I was in lala land my whole family had gathered around the dinner table to see what was going on.
"We're leaving in two days," I said simply and stood up to walk away. I walked through the light colored house and drug myself up the wooden stairs. The move was going to make a hard impact on our lives. Lucy, Jackson and I are going to have to find and get new jobs, a new house, and a new address. New everything!
"Rea?" Jackie said and walked into to our room.
I gave him a vacant stare and responded with a hint of anger in my voice, "Yes?"
"Is there more to the moving thing? Or I guess do you want to talk to me about it?"
He was such a worry wart like me but I appreciated that sometimes. With a sigh of defeat I beckoned him over to sit next to me in my hammock. "The erasers aren't going to stop hunting until they find us… I just don't know what to do. I think I'm scared," I said and leaned on his shoulder.
"That's a first, well maybe we can get far enough away and hide ourselves so well they won't be able to find us ever again," He said even though he knew that would never work, he was just trying to cheer me up.
I looked at him with tired eyes and laid my head into my hands, "Can you please just go make sure everyone is packing and watch over Percy please. We're heading out in less than 48 hours. I want to be prepared."
"In a moment," He answered and wrapped his arm gently around me. He was my best friend and I knew he'd be here for me no matter what. I also knew that it meant he would never listen to me unless I snapped at him, "I know you've been waking up on and off in the middle of the night, and that you have nightmares. I've been using my telekinesis to keep your hammock from flipping over at night when you struggle in it," Jackson said and rubbed my arm comfortingly.
"Thanks," I said curtly and stared at the ground, "We're going to have to give up so much and I don't know how to hide the evidence that we were here. The erasers are going to have so many ways to track us unless I can think of something," I whimpered in annoyance.
"But you'll figure it out, Lucy and I can help you too you know. You don't have to take care of all these matters alone and we're never doing anything so we might as well worry with you," He soothed.
"HA, no I would never want to put this kind of stress on you guys, it can drive ME up a wall so you'd probably go crazy before you could even pay the first bill," I sighed back.
"Rea, are you alright?" Someone asked. I looked up to see Percy standing in the door way holding Hazels hand and a few bags.
I immediately wiped the worry off my face and sat up straighter, "I'm fine bud, why don't you go help Lucy and Angel pack. I'm sure they'd appreciate it," I said and gave them a hopeful smile.
"Sis, are the erasers going to get us?" asked a suspiciously quiet Hazel.
"No sweetie, sissy won't let them lay one finger on you," I said with a reassuring look and Jackie rubbed my back for support.
"Rea, I'm scared," Percy piped up. I slipped out of Jacksons embrace and took both of my siblings into my arms.
"Don't be scared guys, we'll be ok. I promise, and we get to move to a new house. Maybe you'll meet some other kids your age where we go next and you can play with them. Does that sound good?" I encouraged as they hugged me back.
"I'm gonna go check on Lucy and Angel," Jackson said after awkwardly clearing his throat.
"Thanks, that'd be great," I responded and moved the kids aside to let him out.
"What's going to happen to us?" Percy asked. I could sense his worry and Hazels fear as I continued.
"I don't know," I started, "We're going to fly as far away from here as we can and settle down somewhere safe, from then on out we're going to be in fates hands. But don't worry chickadee's fate happens to favor us so I'm sure we'll all be fine, alright, now stop worrying and go down stairs. Dinner's in an hour."
They both nodded and walked away in a slightly better mood, "Hey, Jackie can you start dinner. We're having tacos tonight, so please start cooking the meat!" I called down the hall. The crimson carpet under my feet was starting to get uncomfortable when Jackson didn't answer so I shifted my gaze towards the girl's rooms.
"Jackie, I'm talking to you!" I snapped and knocked on the door before opening it to see Jackson doing the same thing to his siblings as I was doing to mine. All three of them looked up and Jackson had a glum look on his face, "Never mind, I'll get it started." I said with an understanding look on my face.
I shut the door lightly behind myself and heard more comforting words passing Jackson's lips. Angel was crying, the poor baby, and Lucy was silent…
After a long pep talk with myself about being more supportive I marched down the stairs and straight to the fridge. After prying it open I grabbed the raw hamburger and threw it on a frying pan, it sounded like a glass rock scraping up against a side walk and it made my skin tingle.
I turned the burner to our gas stove on and tied my hair back in a ponytail. The smell of sizzling meat tickled my nose and I wrinkled it like a bunny would, this was a normal schedule but soon enough I was going to have to go shower and pay some bills. I'd put Jackson in charge of dinner and Lucy in charge of cleaning up and then I'd be getting everyone off to bed.
I turned the burner down when the meat turned a healthy brown and grease started spitting itself at my ivory face. I walked over to the cabinets in my baggy grey sweat pants and Scooby doo slippers, after a quick flip through the storage space for hard taco shells I called out for Jackie to run to the store and get some.
"Lucy, can you please set the table? Dinner will be in five minutes," I said gently as she solemnly walked down the stairs. She nodded at me and smoothed back her ginger frizzy puff ball she called hair, "Thank you," I said with a smile, she smiled back to my relief and we worked around each other as I got cheese, cabbage, sour cream and some beans out for the accessories to my famous tacos. She pulled some plates from the far left cabinet and quietly set the plates and silverware down at each seat.
"What's for dinner?" Percy asked peaking his curious blue eyes around the kitchen doors to catch a glimpse of my delicious creations.
"Tacos and some potato chips. Sound good to you?" I asked sweetly. He gave me a cute toothy smile and trotted over to the cabinets to pick his favorite potato chips out. They were of course the barbecue type; he never ceased to amaze me at how he could eat so much junk and not be living in the restroom.
"What type of chips are you going to have lulu?" I asked trying to make conversation with her.
"Regular Doritos I believe," She said back with a gentle smile.
"Sounds good to me, Percy will you please get the Doritos out too babe?" I instructed and he did as I asked. I heard Hazel and Angel playing out in the living room and some cute laughter come from Angel. I was surprised Jackson didn't spend more time with his siblings; they were such good kids, a little arguemeantive but good kids either way.
"I'm back," Jackson shouted through the door way and all the children rushed out to greet him.
"Come on in everybody, din din's ready!" I called through the door way and was suddenly trampled by a heard of children trying to get to the dinner table first. They all put there napkins in their laps formally as they took their seats and eyed the food with hungry gazes.
"Rea, may I have some milk?" Angel asked.
"Of course sweetie, Jackson, milk please,"
"What! But she asked you!" He argued and I shot him a glare.
"But you'll do it anyway, RIGHT?"
"Yeah yeah yeah, ok." He complained and opened the fridge up. I was hit with a rush of cold air as he shut the door and walked over with the carton of milk to each and every kid already knowing they'd all want some too.
"Thanks, Jackson," All of them said. I smiled at Jackie and he stuck his tongue out at me childishly, "Are you eating with us tonight?" Angel asked and looked straight into my eyes.
"Yes," I responded and now everyone's eyes were on me. You can probably guess I don't have very many family dinners…
I passed everyone there plate and sat down feeling relaxed for once. I never knew how soothing a family like this could be when they weren't arguing or complaining with me. I smiled happily and dug into my two tacos. Pure bliss and I'm guessing the others enjoyed them too because they were all smiling and eating every last crumb of the tacos and to my surprise they were being quiet.
'Maybe I'll get one peaceful night after all.' I thought happily and continued eating my master pieces.
A/N: Now to those of you who have kept with us through this, probably know that i like to be witty and sarcastic in my authors notes, even if Lucy isn't to sarcastic. But now i'm going to swollow my pride a bit and admit something. Well, actually 2 things. One is, remember at the beginning of this chapter, Rea described the Erasers. Well, that was because Lucy was supposed to do that, like, 3 chapters ago, but i spaced and we couldn't find a good spot to put it in. So invadercari, my hero, made it seem like nothing went wrong, but i just cant lie to you guys. and second, now as i'm thinking about it (and i just read another chapter of maximum ride) i realize that we forgot to say where their school was. well, now that they're in the conflict, i need to call my partner in crime and confer about where they were tortured. So, we'll get back to you on that.
ok, now after that totally embarassing A/N, the arrows below will direct you to chapter 8!
