Okay, so you'll all be happy to know that I finally managed to get that weird gnome to leave me alone. Also, incase your interested, I have a new story going on Bree, the vampire killed at the end of New Moon, so if you want to check it out and review, that would make my day a little more fun and/or exciting.
Disclaimer: my wish list is rights to twilight and Maximum ride. Needless to say, I haven't gotten either.
Chapter 7
Cruelty
Jasper's POV
Starting tomorrow was thanksgiving break. I was happy. That means Alice doesn't have to go to school for a week, and I can stop sitting around the house all day waiting for her to come home. Right now, it was exactly noon.
Words cannot express how bored I was without Alice.
Soon she would be home, and so would the Rides. I had to admit, the Rides were growing on me. The other day, Jeff wired a bomb all by himself! Not even I knew how to do that. Yet it seemed that every new thing we learned about them, the shadier their background became. I mean, how many 18 year olds would every have the need to make a bomb, outside of personal entertainment. Not to mention the time I walked in on Crystal on our computer, ordering all sorts of explosives. When I asked her about it, she assured me that she had done so much work on it, that it was impossible to trace it anywhere and that should anyone try, they would come up to the FBI's homepage. To me, it looked like Max was the leader, Nick was the protector, Jeff was the bomb technician, and Crystal was the hacker.
They weren't bad, though, even if they had done bad things. I could see now, they weren't bad. Max had saved Bella from being hit by a van at her own expense. When I asked her about it, she shrugged it off like it was nothing. Everyone in the house could smell blood on her.
Sighing I looked at the clock. It read 12:01. Great. I can't wait until Alice gets home.
Later that night
Max's POV
Finally! After months of school, we get a vacation! The sun was setting and the flock and I were flying in the cloudless (for once) sky. It felt so perfect. Looking at my flock, they all looked happy and clean. I was glad, this was what they deserved. I glanced at Fang, who was glancing at me. We both smiled. The flaky shale below us was a red color in the sunset. We were flying above some mountains, a ways from Forks. The air was nice and cool at 200 feet. We didn't want to risk any people seeing us. It was so peaceful.
"Max!" angel called nervously. "I'm picking up what seems to be erasers about three miles to the west!" Damn it! I didn't even say it this time!
"What do you guys want to do?" I asked.
"I'm with you, Max. What you say goes," Fang said. The rest of the flock nodded in agreement.
"Okay, I'm tired of running away," I said. "Angel, how many are there?"
"About thirty flying this way with something else that I can't exactly pick up." She answered. We could do that. Thirty was easy with our powers. It would be even easier in the growing dark. It was the something else that bothered me. We had seen a lot of things, and for Angel to not recognize something was a big deal.
"Alright! Get in formation!" I yelled. "If I say retreat, retreat. If we get split up, meet at the Middle School parking lot. That will lead them away from our house."
"Don't worry, Max," Nudge said from under me. "Thirty is child's play!" that's Nudge, trying to put a good face on things. We could beat them; we just had to fight hard. I could faintly feel painful emotion running over Nudge's skin and floating in the air around her. Gasman smiled before shaking foot long spikes of flames out from his fists. Fang's shape blurred next to me as he prepared to turn invisible. Angel had her eyes closed in preparation for mind control. Iggy had his head motionless, facing west. I started feeling the air currents around me.
We were ready.
I almost felt bad for the sorry erasers who had to face us; they would be outmatched in seconds now that we were battle ready. Almost.
The erasers were close enough that we could see them. The weird thing was they were flying in a formation. It turns out about half the erasers had escaped the school and had joined some of the groups who were still trying to kill us, but never before had I seen them fly in formation. That along with the fact that Angel didn't recognize the mind of one of them, made me grow a little nervous.
"Let's go," I said coldly. We immediately fell into formation with me at the point. Using the air currents, I created a cone around us. We met the erasers with a bang. I allowed the air to carry me through to the center of the erasers. To my surprise, the erasers had only formed a circular shell with a hollow center. In that center, with ice blue wings to match his eye, hovered Omega.
Fang's POV
Max forced herself through to the center of the mass of erasers. I made myself invisible and followed after her. Around me, the others were crashing through the erasers, too. All powers where unsheathed. Once I broke through the thin layer of erasers, what I saw made my blood run cold. Max was squaring off against a boy who looked about our age, wings and all. The erasers were hovering around like fans in an arena, just watching. Nudge and Angel gasped.
"That's Omega!" Nudge snarled. Omega. He had much to answer for. He was smiling at us.
"Hello, everyone. You know who I am and I know who you are, so I'll just get to the point," Omega said sneering. "I survived when you destroyed Itex. You shouldn't have, but I'll let that slide. Now, all I need is to kill you, Max, in one on one combat, like I should have four years ago. I don't care what the rest of you do, but you must not interfere with me as I kill Max."
"Fat chance," Gasman snarled, the fire on his fists flaring out. "You can't kill Max, and we defiantly won't sit here and watch if you can."
"I was expecting that," he said with a cruel smile. All at once, the erasers started attacking and Omega flew at Max.
I became invisible and started throwing punches. Good thing I'd kept in shape. The others were fighting hard. These erasers where stronger then normal. We were forced to fly above them due to their overwhelming numbers. Numbers we could take with Max fighting next to us.
Above us, Max and Omega were fighting like titans. Max had the upper hand. On the ground, she was formidable and might be an even match for Omega. In the air, she was in her element. She was deadly. She had pushed him under her so his wings were exposed to her kicks and jabs. I was yanked out of starring at her by and eraser's claws against my jaw. The cut was shallow, but bleeding. Damn. Now that I was bleeding, the erasers could see me. Well technically, they could only see the cut, but I didn't want them aiming at my face. I dived into the mass of erasers and fought hard for a few minutes before flying back up for a break. Then everything slowed down.
Max was a little cut up, but Omega was worse. An eraser grabbed Nudge's arm with it's teeth. Nudge cried out, and Max saw what was happening. She dived past Omega, pulled the eraser off Nudge, and punched him in the mouth. As she was pulling back to punch the eraser again, Omega landed on her back, pinning her wings and arms to her body. He tucked his own wings into a nose dive. Max was trying to break his grip, but not succeeding. Omega got ten feet above the ground, snapped his wings open, and pushed Max down onto the rock and shale.
That's when time went from slow to stopped.
No.
"Max!" I don't know who screamed it, it could have been anyone. It could have been me. I saw her try to push herself up before falling back to the ground, unconscious.
The rock around her was bloody red again, but the sun was long gone.
I had to get down there. I tried furiously to break through the wall of erasers. They just smiled their cruel smiles and laughed their cruel laughs. Omega laughed to the sky.
"See, I have beat the great Maximum Ride!" he yelled. "Just as it was meant to be!" with that, he flew off, the erasers following him.
All five of us nearly fell from the sky to get to Max. I reached her first and flipped her onto her back. Her entire left side was torn up. Iggy landed next of me, put a hand on her heart and groaned.
"Fang, we got to get her to a hospital. Her heart beat is weaker already. She's losing so much blood, and I wouldn't be surprised if some bones are broken." Iggy said, worry written all over his face.
"Let's take her to the Cullen's," Nudge said. "Mr. Cullen is a doctor, and they already know a little about us. Max would want this to get out to as few people as possible."
I nodded, picking up Max and pressing her cut side against me to try and slow blood loss. Everyone got in formation and we took off towards the Cullen's mansion. Looking around, I saw no one else was in great shape. Nudges arm hung limp at her side, Iggy had cuts and bruises all over his body, Gasman had various burns and claw marks, and Angel had a long cut across her shoulder. This was very bad. I just hoped we could make it to the Cullen's in time.
Edward's POV
We were all sitting around the living room, talking about how this would be the first time we had ever made a thanksgiving dinner. Bella was staying here over the vacation because Charlie was going on an extended fishing trip. She was currently sitting next to me, blushing at Emmet's plan to "cook all the turkeys on the Olympic peninsula" for our main course. Suddenly I felt six fuzzy minds at the edge of my range. It had to be the Rides, but they were coming toward the house at a weird angle, traveling very fast.
"Hey guys," I said, "the Rides are coming."
"Oh, that reminds me! We should invite them over for Thanksgiving dinner!" Esme exclaimed.
"We'll need more turkeys, though," Emmet said. Just then, jasper gasped. In his mind, I saw what the Cullen's were feeling.
Horror, fear, guilt, pain, despair.
"Everyone, get ready," Jasper said. "They're really shaken up. Something is very wrong. They could attack."We all tensed and waited for them to arrive. I stood in front of Bella; ready to run her away should fighting break out. Finally, they were at the front door. One of them started banging on it.
"Help! Please, Mr. Cullen! Max is going to die! Help!" It was Nick's voice, punctuated with the steady pounding against the door. Carlisle's eyes widened before he yanked the door open. In the door stood Nick, holding Max in his arms. Behind him were Jeff, Crystal, and two smaller children both with blond hair and blue eyes who I assumed were Ariel and Zephyr. Max's wings were limp.
Wait. Wings?
Sure enough, there were two, large, beautiful wings lying limp, attached to her back.
They were angels.
Then I saw the blood. It was all over all of them, even little Ariel. But the worst was Max. Her entire side was cut open. Her blood was staining Nick's shirt. It was even flowing down her wings. Nick's cheek was sliced open, Crystal's arm and shoulder looked like they had been bitten by an animal. The others were bleeding, too. But instead of looking like they were in pain, they looked terrified. What sort of monster would do something that would cause this much pain to angels?
Demons, like us; vampires I thought miserably. What else could it be?
Ariel's eyes snapped up to my face, and she jumped in front of Max and Nick.
"Fang! Get her out of here!" she screamed. "They're vampires!"
