Everything was quiet.
Maybe a little too quiet.
After all, if it hadn't been so peaceful, maybe the flock wouldn't have slept quite as deeply.
If it hadn't been so peaceful, maybe Iggy wouldn't have dozed off on watch on the roof.
If it hadn't been so peaceful, maybe the universe wouldn't have felt the need to break the calm and hail flying Erasers down upon the sleeping flock.
"What the- AHHH!" Iggy's scream woke the other six mutants in the hay loft, five of whom sprang instantly into fighting position while the last howled with fear and dove into Angel's open backpack.
The Eraser that had thrown Iggy off the roof tore open the ceiling hatch and hurtled Iggy's backpack down at whoever was coming up first: Max. All the air left her lungs as she lurched backward from the force of the backpack slamming unexpectedly into her.
"Max!" Nudge cried, rushing toward her leader. She threw up an arm and blocked the punch that was coming down at Max while she recovered, then straightened fully to continue fighting the Eraser. Nudge slammed her fist into the side of its head, and jammed her knee into its face to knock it out as it recoiled downward. "Come on guys, get outside!" she yelled, grabbing her backpack out of the hay where she had been sleeping thirty seconds ago.
Gazzy and Angel helped Max to her feet while Fang covered the roof hatch, where several more Erasers had tried to storm the loft. The evidence lay in the furry bodies piled around Fang's feet like giant, grotesque stuffed animals. "Fang, U and A!" Max coughed, still working on fully regaining her breath. She clutched Iggy's backpack in one hand, her own slung across her back. "Go find Iggy!"
Fang glanced back at her and nodded briefly, taking down one last Eraser with a hard kick to the ribs before springing forcefully upward through the hatch. "Clear!" he called down to them. "But only for a second! Go!"
"You heard him," Max said with fake cheer. "Up and at 'em!" She gave Gazzy and Angel a boost so they could launch themselves properly into the air with the limited space available. "Let's go, Nudge," she sighed. Nudge complied, tucking her wings in tight and springing through the hatch. Max followed, fists at the ready and prepared for anything.
Well, almost anything.
She definitely was not prepared for the hundred-odd Erasers swarming all around the barn. Each of the flock was already locked in combat with three or more, and Max was starting to regret leaving the shelter of the hayloft.
That's when the first Eraser attacked her, and she stopped considering logistics and started fighting.
Iggy had not enjoyed his tumble from the roof at all. Not only was he woken from a pleasant doze under starlight (not that he could see it, but it sounded poetic enough to be a shame that it was ruined) by a seemingly endless stream of Erasers, but he had been picked up and thrown off of a barn roof. About two-thirds of the way down he stopped screaming and snapped out his wings, only to almost crash directly into the wall of the barn and start falling all over again. Then, before he had time to think, he had somehow managed to right himself in the air and was fighting four Erasers at once.
Iggy swore under his breath, snapping out punches and kicks as fast as he could. How could he have fallen asleep?
He blamed Gazzy for making the stars sound so nice, added to the warm night air and crickets everywhere.
"How many?" he shouted into the night, not directing it to anyone in particular but hoping that a flock member would answer.
"Too many!" Angel yelled back. Then in a much different tone of voice, she continued, "You five are going to beat up those other five for me."
"Plan?" Fang shouted, slamming his knee into an Eraser's nose as they tried to grab him.
"Working on it!" Max replied, gritting her teeth as she yanked her arm out of an Eraser's grasp and elbowed him in the gut. It grunted, but grabbed her around the middle and threw her hard into the roof. Max grunted right back, Iggy's backpack falling to the tips of her fingers as she lay on her back and tried to breathe again.
"Still working on it?" the Eraser asked snidely, leaning over her and watching her struggle for air. He placed his furry arm over her throat and pushed down hard, making her choke more. Max's fingers scrabbled for anything to make him stop, and when her punches and kicks weren't doing anything, her mind offered up one last idea. With red and purple stars exploding in her vision, she reached into Iggy's backpack, fingers desperate to find a box. Or more specifically, the cooking knife he kept inside it.
The Eraser pushed harder though, and as Max struggled uselessly for air, her fingers closed around the only thing it could find. She yanked it out of the bag and slammed it as hard as she could into the Eraser's side, hoping it was sharp.
Max felt a sharp pain race through her body, but almost instantly the Eraser immediately fell backward, flailing and stiff, and the pain left with it. Max looked down at the abnormally warm object in her hand, confused at what had caused his reaction.
It was one of the pens Gazzy had bought the other day.
Max stared at it for a moment, then groaned as realization dawned on her. "Shock pens!" she yelled. "Supercharged shock pens? Are you kidding me, guys?"
"I think she opened your backpack, Iggy," Gazzy called out after a short pause. He gave a sharp cry a moment later, recoiling awkwardly as an Eraser kicked him in the thigh.
Max looked between the shock pen in her hand and the slightly sizzling Eraser at her feet before making up her mind. She dropped to the roof and dug through the backpack, pulling out four more pens before an Eraser tried to jump on her. Turning swiftly, Max jammed a pen clicker end first into the center of its forehead. The Eraser jolted backward, then fell spasming to the roof. "I'll punish them later," Max mumbled to herself, resigned to fight this battle with weapons that she herself had declared contraband in the flock.
Max fought her way over to Fang first, slamming pen clickers left and right into attacking Erasers. "Fang!" she yelled, punching an Eraser out of the way. "Take this and don't click it," she instructed, shoving a pen into his hand as he blocked a punch. "Hit them with the clicker."
Fang looked a little uncomprehending, but he trusted Max enough to shove the pen hard into the side of an Eraser attempting to get near enough to tackle him out of the air. When the furry beast's wings stopped flapping and it dropped from the air like a twitching stone, Fang was convinced he had a good, if perhaps unorthodox, weapon in his hand.
Now that he had an advantage, Max left him to keep fighting. She beelined straight for Nudge, who was struggling to fight off five Erasers and stay aloft. A sixth one snuck in from behind her, and Max turned up the speed to jam a pen into its neck before it could grab Nudge unawares. "Nudge, take this. Don't-"
"Don't click it, I know," Nudge finished. "I heard them when they were making these. Thanks Max!" She grabbed a pen out of Max's hand and seamlessly moved into slamming it into an Eraser's windpipe. The beast jolted and dropped out of the air. Two of the other four flew back a little in alarm, but the other two rushed forward in fury, only for one to get chopped in the gut by a kick as Nudge clicked the pen against the other's chest. The air soon was pervaded with the crackling charge of electricity and thick scent of burning flesh and fur.
The shock pens were proving to be very effective in dispersing Erasers, much more so than good old fashioned hand-to-hand combat had been. Gazzy had noticed Max's use of the pens, and within a minute managed to extract a couple from him backpack to arm himself. Max gripped a pen in each hand, wielding them dangerously as she made her way over to Angel to assist her.
"Hi Max!" Angel greeted her, sweat glistening on her forehead in the moonlight as she forced two Erasers into beating each other to pulp. "The people who live here called the police, by the way."
"Good to know," Max replied shortly, taking out an Eraser with each hand. "You want a pen?"
"Nah, you got it," Angel said. She turned to another pair of Erasers. "Can you two smash your heads together? Like, really really hard? Thank you." The sweetness of her voice toned down as she turned back to Max. "I can't really get close enough to hit them with it without getting punched," she explained.
"True," Max agreed. "I'll stay with you for now. It looks like the crowd is thinning."
And it was. The effectiveness of four avian hybrids with supercharged shock pens was astounding on a flock of winged Erasers. The hundred-plus swarm of them was slowly receding, whether they were collapsed in piles on the roof or in the surrounding farmland, or simply fleeing from the fight.
"Max?"
"Yeah Ange?"
"A lady with a pitchfork and a rifle is headed in this direction. I think we should leave."
Max turned for a second to look at Angel. The younger girl just raised her eyebrows and made a face. "Just saying the facts," she offered.
Max sighed, then scanned the area quickly. There were less than thirty Erasers left in all. "Flock, U and A!" she yelled, pumping her wings viciously to get out of the reach of any of the Erasers left around her.
The flock obeyed instantly, pulling quickly out of their individual fights and flying as high as they could. Max could make out a tiny figure with a rifle and a pitchfork stomping toward the barn in the darkness of pre-dawn. No one spoke as they ascended, breathing hard and favoring their new injuries as they flew away from the farm as quickly as they could manage.
"That might have been an even worse farm to land in than Anne's," Gazzy muttered at last, his voice barely carrying through the whistling night wind.
That was enough to make Max snap. She had been woken out of a sound sleep only to spring up and get a backpack thrown into her with enough force to knock her on her back. Then she had almost been choked to death by an overgrown mongrel with wings. This was barely even topped by finding out that two of her flock had supercharged multiple shock pens with enough force to stun, if not kill, Erasers! Not to mention that this was completely against her specific orders that any prank materials like that were strictly contraband and certainly not to be modified to damaging and possibly lethal levels! And where the hell had Iggy been when they had been ambushed?!
It was only after a moment of tense, awkward silence that Max realized that instead of mentally fuming, she had been yelling all of this at the top of her lungs.
"I dozed," Iggy said shortly. "The ambush was completely my fault, and I realize that. I'm sorry."
"You're sorry?" Max screeched.
"Max!" Fang said sharply, cutting her out of her adrenaline-powered rage.
She shook her head back and forth, trying to calm herself down from the rush of the ambush and sudden rush of emotion from all that had ensued. "Is everyone alright?" she asked instead, in a much quieter, controlled voice.
A chorus of yes's in various states of monotone and holding-back-pain-and-exhaustion rang out among the flock. Total had abandoned Angel's backpack during the escape, not arguing at all about his primary feathers as he flew alongside the tired girl. It was clear she could barely keep herself in the air, let alone his weight too.
"I'm sorry I snapped at you, Iggy," Max said in a careful voice. "I was still pumped up from the fight and didn't react well."
"It's fine," Iggy muttered, his face colored with shame in the pale light of the moon. "I'm well aware I screwed up and deserved that reaction."
"Well, your shock pens saved our butts from your screw up," Nudge offered. "So that kinda evens out."
"You know why you aren't allowed to have shock pens anymore," Max gritted out in a dangerous voice. "I'm sure you haven't forgotten the Electric Bathroom Incident of '09?"
The whole flock tried not to shudder.
"Sure, we blew up a couple things and almost electrocuted Fang while he was showering, but that's in the past!" Gazzy argued. "We made sure to fully insulate these pens with our own special sealant and everything this time!"
"A couple things?" Nudge shrieked. "Do you have any idea how long I had saved up for that hair dryer? And you completely shorted it out! And what about Angel's special strawberry shampoo that exploded all over the room? And Max's-"
"Well would you mind telling me what the hell is in the battery chamber?" Max demanded, cutting in before the fury of the Electric Bathroom Incident resurfaced in her mind. She was trying her best to be as patient as she could manage, and they weren't making it easier on her.
Gazzy and Iggy were quiet.
"Should we tell her?" Iggy asked, sounding more than a little reluctant to do so.
"Tell her," Fang suggested, looking sideways at the very stiff and angry girl leading the flock to who knew where.
"First, remember that if it weren't for these pens we would all be screwed and Max would be lying in a hayloft, dead via Eraser chokehold," Gazzy quickly blurted out, his words tripping over each other.
"Gazzy," Max said warningly.
"Fine, fine. I'll stop stalling," he sighed. "It was…"
They waited.
"Gazzy!"
"It was Plan 42, ok?"
Everyone turned to look at Nudge, who looked unperturbed by the information she had just offered. "What?" she demanded. "Gazzy was being a drama queen about it."
"You used Plan 42 again?" Max thundered. She was so furious she almost forgot to keep flying. "Does strictly forbidden mean anything to you two anymore?"
"I'm pretty sure it might be synonymous with 'cool idea' in their heads," Fang commented quietly. "Max, remember that it's not worth it to kill them after you've spent so much time saving their butts."
"Plan 42," was all she muttered in reply. "Fnicking Plan 42."
Gazzy and Iggy were silent, afraid to say anything that might set her off.
"Wait," Max snarled, glaring at the two very wary boys. "Don't you need denim to make that? And as I recall, you used myjeans last time! You better not have taken mine agai-"
"Don't be silly, Max. We aren't wasteful," Iggy cut in. "We still had shreds of yours from the last time we made it."
Max hesitated, unsure for a moment whether that should appease her or simply make her angrier. Gazzy seized that vital moment to add in, "And don't worry, we didn't even blow anything up this time!" He held one of his pens up triumphantly. "And look how great these worked out as weapons! Man, we should've known it would work to just jam the clicker against the attacker."
"You mean that wasn't your intention for how to use them?" Max demanded incredulously.
Gazzy immediately shut up. Iggy groaned, and Nudge giggled a little in the background.
"Great. Just great," Max muttered. "You created super powerful weapons without any idea of how to use them without killing yourselves."
"And we thank you very much for testing them out for us," Iggy replied, smiling his most winning smile. "Come on Max, you saw how effective they were! Cut us some slack!"
Max was silent for a moment. Iggy and Gazzy crossed their fingers that they were about to get assigned clean up duty for the next century. Nudge, Angel, Fang and Total waited patiently for the verdict, mostly just for the amusement of watching the drama play out.
"Fine, I admit that the stupid pens just saved our lives," she sighed at last.
Gazzy and Iggy erupted in shouts of joy, ecstatic that they had managed to cover their butts.
"BUT!" Max yelled, shutting them up almost instantly. "I'm still pissed, so you better not try to pull anymore stunts like this without approval any time in the near future. And I'm keeping the pens that I got out of Iggy's backpack, plus the one you already gave me."
"Done," Iggy and Gazzy said together, their jubilant smiles reappearing like magic.
"I'm so proud of how well those things worked," Gazzy sighed happily. "It was like a dream come true!"
Iggy nodded, his smile widening. "They worked perfectly! And we didn't even blow anything u-"
A thundering boom in the distance cut off his victorious spiel. The flock skidded to a stop and wheeled around, gliding slowly to try to fix their raptor vision on what had just exploded.
After a moment, they were able to discern that the roof of the barn they had just been occupying had been blown to smithereens.
Everyone was dead silent, before slowly locking their gaze on Iggy and Gazzy. Gazzy was staring at Iggy with as much accusation in his eyes as everyone else was giving him. "Iggy," Gazzy said slowly. "What did you do with the Plan 42 that was left in the bowl?"
"I left it in the bowl!" Iggy insisted, looking as confused as anyone else. "And the bowl is in my backpack! Max has my backpack, right?"
Max looked startled, then smiled guiltily. "Uhh…" she started, not meeting anyone's eyes.
"Max?" Iggy asked, his eyebrows furrowing.
"So… you know how the Eraser threw Iggy's backpack at me?" Max said carefully. "I kind of… maybe… left it on the roof by accident when we U and A'd."
The entire flock was silent for two whole seconds. Then everyone except Iggy burst into uncontrollable laughter.
"You left my backpack on the roof?" Iggy screeched over the din, looking aghast. "My backpack!? My priceless possessions!?"
"Calm down, Drama Queen," Max gasped over her laughter. She wheezed slightly, clutching her stomach as she spiraled lower and lower in the air, barely able to stay aloft. "I'll get you a new bag."
"That cooking bowl was irreplaceable!" he shrieked. "And my clothes! And my chemicals! And my Rubix Cube! Do you have any idea how close I was to finishing that? You just undid all my work!"
"You're blind, what use do you even have for a Rubix Cube?" Fang choked out over his laughter. Even he couldn't stop to breathe.
"I can still feel colors!" Iggy said indignantly. This only served to make the flock break out in new peals of laughter, sinking lower and lower in the air as they lost control. Iggy ignored them, still righteously angry. "My spatula! My Twix bar! My iPod!"
"You stole that!" Nudge wheezed out in between giggles.
"And now Max has stolen it from me!" Iggy retorted. "Shame on you! Shame!"
"Stop, Iggy!" Total shrieked, his little body fighting in vain to stay in the air as he shook with laughter. "I can't breathe! I can't!"
And so at 3 a.m. one summer night, the flock left one more lightly smoldering building behind them, Iggy howling at the injustice of his lost possessions all the way. While the flock laughed themselves to pieces over his misfortune, he began plotting for revenge upon them all. Oh, they thought Plan 42 was destructive.
Just wait until they saw Plan 43.
Wow, I so did not plan this ending at all. Then again, I rarely decide how these kind of stories will end when I start them. It's spanned almost four entire years, but I finished it! And I like it (:
-round of weak applause cuz no one really cares about this story-
-TMI cries-
haha no but seriously, I get it that no one cares that I finished the story. That's ok! I love you all anyway. I know most people reading this are probably just waiting impatiently for the next chapter of School Days that is allegedly in the works... (;
Lemme know what you think? I feel satisfied, how bout you?
~TMI~