Sorry this took forever! I really thought I posted Chapter Ten but I didn't! I'm so sorry!
I don't own Maximum Ride…
Iggy's POV
Whatever Jim injected into me knocked me out long enough for them to move me somewhere besides that comfortable couch.
When I woke up, I was laying in what felt like grass.
I immediately tried to stand. It was hard, because I was still kind of under the effects of the drug, but I shook it off.
There were voices coming from…about 30 feet away from me. They sounded distinctly Whitecoat-ish…
"He's awake…"
"I see that."
"Oh…Okay…Sorry…"
"Can I get him now?"
"Not yet…"
"Why not?"
"Just wait…"
There was a very Eraser-ish growl.
"Experiment Number 06-01." one of the human voices shouted.
It was Jim.
I turned to the sound. "I guess that's me…" I mumbled. I vaguely wondered why I was "01"…
"You are the subject of an experiment, as you know, to perfectly combine human and avian DNA."
Really? I thought sarcastically. That's news to me…
"We haven't run any tests on you in a while, and you've clearly grown, so we are going to test your growth since those last tests. If you cooperate, the Eraser we have here will not attack you."
Oh, man…What did I say about hating it if he was my enemy?
Now that he mentioned it, I felt a few of those sticky monitors on my skin, which brought back memories from the original School. They had taken off my shirt, and the monitors were on my chest, back, arms, and neck.
"And if I refuse to cooperate?"
"Then he attacks. And he really wants to attack."
I chuckled. "And what's to keep me from just flying away?" I flexed my wings to make my point.
"The fact that we've implanted a tracking chip into you. And we could follow you wherever you go. Back to the other experiments, for example."
The rest of the Flock…He had a good point…
What was more reasonable? Try to beat the Eraser? I probably wouldn't have a chance…Try to escape with the tracker in my arm and hope they don't follow me? They would definitely follow me, and I wouldn't be able to fool the tracker and lead them to the wrong place. Cooperate with them? Stupid…but probably wouldn't get me killed…
I made one of the snap decisions that Max was so famous for, then forced her away before thoughts of her could seep into my mind and distract me.
I sighed. "What would these experiments entail exactly?" I asked.
There was a dark chuckle. "These experiments would entail defeating the Eraser."
I should've figured…
The Eraser growled, clearly happy, and I heard him jump. He was big, I could tell, just by how much the air moved when he did.
He was on me in another second.
I was screwed. He was about twenty times my size, as far as I could tell, and ran into me with the force of a huge bus.
Max's POV
I was almost ready to give up on finding Iggy. I never give up, but that just shows how the search had gone…But I heard familiar shouts from the woods about half a mile away.
Familiar…As in…Iggy…
I immediately turned that way, pouring on the speed, making my wings beat even faster than they had in a long time…
Only to find Iggy being attacked by a giant Eraser, with two Whitecoats watching.
Damn…I leave him alone for a little while and he gets himself into trouble…
I sighed at his stupidity, wondering how he'd gotten himself into this mess, then dived downward at the steep angle, straight towards Iggy and the Eraser.
There was blood, and I'm pretty sure Iggy couldn't have caused that much damage to an Eraser that size when he was pinned down like he was.
He was hurting Iggy. He was hurting my brother.
So I had to do something.
So I dived down at the Eraser, gathering up all of my anger so I could just go into a blind rage and beat the shit out of him…Easy to do…
He didn't see me until the Whitecoeats shouted out at him to look up and he did. But he looked up right as my foot ran into his jaw and he was knocked off his feet. I was pretty sure I felt a crack.
The Eraser was thrown out of the way, but he would recover fast, so I had to grab Iggy and get the hell out of here…
He looked terrible. He was on the ground, in a little ball, shirtless, curled up to protect his chest and stomach. Smart. I leaned down and put my arm around his.
"Iggy!" I yelled in his ear. "Get up! We're going!"
He recognized my voice instantly and got up with me. We both spread our wings and jumped to take off just as the Eraser got up and jumped at us.
We were already almost ten feet in the air, after less than a second after taking off, but he jumped and got us.
To be specific, his claws raked at my leg.
I screamed for a second, then got it together and pushed my wings downward again. But the Eraser had latched on to my leg.
"You're not getting away that easy, you little…" he growled.
Iggy had let go of me, so we wouldn't be so close we'd hit each other's wings. He'd heard me scream and had come back for me.
I reached out to him as the Eraser started pulling me down. He somehow found and grabbed my hands and flapped his wings, trying to pull me back.
The Eraser tightened his grip on me and I tried not to scream. I gripped Iggy's hands tighter. He felt it.
"Max, brace your legs!" Iggy yelled at me.
I instantly knew what he was going to do and listened, holding my arms straight too.
Instead of pulling, Iggy pushed my arms, pushing me so that my feet jammed right into the Erasers face. I was pretty sure I felt bones break.
It let go of my leg as it clutched it's bleeding muzzle in pain. Yeah, it had broken.
Iggy held my hands tightly, still not letting go, backpedaling to get us out of the Eraser's reach if he jumped again. I was a little bit woozy from the pain of the gash in my leg, but I could pretty much fly in a straight line.
"You won't be able to hide, Experiment 6-1!" One of the Whitecoats yelled up at us. "We'll find you!"
I think he yelled more, but before I knew it, Iggy had dragged me far above them, into the sky. I looked down and figured they couldn't see us anymore.
"Ig," I said, "I think we can slow down now."
He nodded. The beat of his wings got a bit slower until we weren't in escape mode and were just flying like we had a purpose, which we didn't.
I studied him. He must've been in pain. I could practically sense that he flinched every time he moved his wings. He was bleeding from scars on his chest, stomach, and back. He was pretending it didn't bother him.
Of course, I wasn't in very good shape either.
"Iggy?"
"Yeah?"
"There's a cave down there. 11 o'clock. About half a mile away. Land."
He nodded and we started our descent.
Again, I'm sorry I left the last chapter at a cliffhanger and then took forever to update! I promise, I'll work on the next chapter immediately. And I might be closing my poll on this story soon…so if you have an opinion, I want to hear it! Please review!
--Fire wolf12