Chapter 14

Fang blinked. Which is, as you may recall, his version of complete astonishment. "What?"

"You were dead," I repeated, my voice still wobbly. We were sitting on the slab of rock that we had somehow ended up on after the collapse of the arch, me no longer crying and Fang his normal self. Like so many other times recently, I had no idea how long I had cried. At one point Fang had carefully sat up, pulling me with him and holding me close with a protective arm. 'Cause, you know, the guy who had just been dead was in so much better shape than me. That makes perfect sense. When I had finally sort of gotten a hold of myself, Fang had asked the inevitable questions: why the heck I was crying and where the hell we were. So I had told him. Which I guess pretty much brings you up to speed.

He shook his head. "That's not possible."

"What, you think I don't know how to tell when someone's dead? You were - " I shuddered inwardly, not wanting to describe it. I looked into his dark eyes, trying to convey my meaning without the use of words. Suddenly I had a huge urge, one of those things where you feel like you'll go kablooey if you don't act on it - so I did. I threw my arms around Fang's neck, pulling him close and just kissing him, kissing him, letting the pure bliss drown out all the other feelings that were clamoring in my head. He tensed up at first, surprised, but then I felt his strong hands on the back of my head and neck and his lips moving against mine. Then I felt his tongue run lightly over my lips and I opened them, letting him enter in. Though I had begun this, Fang was now the leader, the director, the…aggressor really, because as I believe I have said before his kisses are just so incredibly desperate.

Several dizzy moments - possibly minutes, I wouldn't really know - later, I rolled off of Fang, panting for breath. Somehow we had ended up lying on the ground with me on top. I figured Fang had pulled us down, but I didn't actually remember it happening.

After a pause, Fang said, "Man…Okay, I think I believe you now."

I turned my head towards him. He was stretched out on the slab of rock in the darkness-that-wasn't-from-clouds-or-night, his reaching up over his head, his chest moving up and down slightly faster than usual under his dark shirt. Dang, he is so ho-

"Max?"

"Oh God, I missed you," I said, which was probably kind of dumb since he'd never actually been gone. I scooted a little closer to him.

"I know," he whispered. He slid his arm under my head and around my shoulders, pulling me right up next to him. I put my hand on his chest, feeling his very-much-alive heartbeat. And we just stayed there like that for a while. It could have been so perfect. Too bad nothing works out like that for us.

You know how some people have recurring nightmares where they keep dreaming about the same horrible thing over and over again? Well, that was kind of like what happened next. Except without the dreaming part.

All of a sudden several huge shadows loomed over us, blotting out what little light there was.

"What a cute couple," Ari said, his voice full of menace. 'Cause yeah, one of those shadows was him. Apparently death means nada these days. That had turned out well once, but definitely not this time.

There was no time to react. The Erasers were already fully morphed, their fangs dripping with not-very-hygienic-looking saliva. Ari growled something about me being his and lunged forward, ripping me away from Fang and putting several parallel gashes in Fang's arm and chest all in the same movement. I was screaming and yelling, clawing and biting, but it had no effect on Ari. The rest of the Erasers were on Fang in the blink of an eye, punching him in the stomach and kicking his head. He fought back but it was only a matter of seconds before he went limp. The Erasers had found us in way too vulnerable a position, and anything we might have done standing up or flying had been impossible.

"It's time to sleep now, Max," Ari said, and I swear he almost said it lovingly. Sick. He clamped a furry, wolf-like hand across my throat, pushing down on the hollow at its base. My eyes widened as my air supply was cut off and I panicked. I tried to pry his hand away but he was too strong, not giving way at all. Little black dots started crawling into my vision, and then everything went dark.

-

The other mutants gasped as they saw what was on the other side of the door. Nudge gasped with them.

The room itself was so weirdly…ordinary that it was hard to comprehend. It was probably about eight feet in depth and thirteen or fourteen in width, with a ceiling much lower than that of the huge room outside it but still more than tall enough for someone to stand in. The floor was covered in off-white carpet that needed a good vacuuming and the walls were painted light purple, with white trim around the edges. The only piece of furniture was a metal bunk bed the same color as the walls. Both of its bunks were made up with sheets and blankets. That was what Nudge noticed at first glance, anyway. She then realized that what had appeared to be a window was actually just a painting of one. And that there were two dirty, disheveled kids handcuffed to the bed. They had stopped yelling now but were staring wide-eyed at the mutants, quietly pleading for help.

"Come on guys, we have to help them get out of there!" Nudge said. She was now standing next to Angel, having pushed her way through the crowd. No one moved, not even Angel. Okay… Nudge stepped forward, placing a foot on the carpet in the other room. She jumped back with a start as, out of nowhere, a big, bubble-like wall of energy appeared between her and the two kids. It crackled slightly, then was silent.

"Okay, does anyone here know what this is? 'Cause it's really freaky. This whole thing is freaky. Don't you guys think so?" Nudge looked around at all the unfamiliar faces, hoping someone would say something.

"I-I think I've seen this before," said a small boy who looked a little older than Gazzy. He seemed to have some weird scaly shell-like thing covering most of his body. Human-armadillo? That's an…interesting one…

"Yeah, okay, well what do we do about it?" Nudge asked.

The armadillo boy hesitated, absently chewing on a fingernail. "Umm…well I think…uh…if you put enough force on it, it'll go away. I think." He frowned. "Or it might vaporize you. I'm not sure."

"Okay, uh, thanks," Nudge said, not exactly happy with the odds. "Maybe we should try sticking something in it to see. Does anyone have something we could use?" She saw the rude cat girl who had tripped Angel earlier exchange glances with a boy who had deer antlers growing out of his head. He shook his head vehemently at first but after another look from the cat girl walked over to a mat a few feet away and came back with a blanket.

"This was my friend's," he said blankly. "He doesn't really need it anymore." He motioned for Nudge to move aside and lightly tossed the blanket at the bubble of energy. It slid off without a sound, neither affecting nor being affected by the wall. "Well, I guess the vaporization thing was wrong, Scute," he said, directing his words at the armadillo boy.

"Okay, let's just say…Scute's…theory about putting force on it was right," Nudge said. "I'm gonna need a few people to help me to start off with. Uhh…Angel, and Scute, and…umm…you, what's your name? And your friend, the one with the whiskers."

"The name's Stag," said the boy with antlers. "And she's Whisker." He pointed his thumb back at the cat girl, who was now walking towards them.

"I'm Nudge," Nudge said. She, Scute, Stag, and Whisker braced themselves against the energy bubble, which surprisingly didn't give way at all despite its flimsy appearance. "Angel?" Nudge asked. The six-year-old was staring into space, moving her mouth as if she was speaking. "Earth to An-gel! Hello-o?" There was no reply. Nudge sighed. Okay, apparently Angel wasn't going to be helping. She counted to three and the four of them pushed as hard as they could. Nothing happened.

Whisker motioned a few other people over and they tried again, but still with no result. Nudge was starting to think Scute had been wrong.

Just then, Stag stood up. "Watch out, guys."

Nudge saw the others quickly move away and followed suit. Stag shut his eyes, and before Nudge knew it the brown-haired boy had transformed fully into a deer. He's like an Eraser, only not bloodthirsty. And not mean. And not half wolf. Oh, whatever. Stag reared up, preparing to slam his front hooves into the energy bubble.

"Wait!" Angel yelled completely out of the blue. Nudge turned to her in surprise as Stag put his hooves back on the ground, head turned to the side in confusion.

"It's not real. None of this is real," Angel insisted. "Remember Itex, Nudge?"

"Right. None of this is real yet we can touch and feel all of it. Sure," scoffed Whisker.

Nudge saw Angel glancing at the area around the door as if she was looking for something.

The six-year-old finally pointed at a slightly flickering red light encased in some kind of clear plastic which was mounted on the wall just to the left of the door. "Try smashing that thing. I dunno if it will do anything, though."

Whisker rolled her eyes and Stag, having morphed back to human-with-antlers form, looked incredibly skeptical, but Scute's eyes brightened with curiosity. "What do you think it's gonna do?"

Angel was looking straight at Stag. "Turn into a deer again and smash that thing," she said in a normal voice. Of course, Nudge wasn't at all surprised when Stag did exactly what he was told after looking confused for a moment. Stag's powerful hooves crashed down on the light's casing, shattering it and the light. Nudge quickly turned to the small room. Her mouth dropped open: the carpet, the bed, the painting, the kids, the energy bubble - everything was gone, leaving only an empty concrete room.

-

Iggy pinched the bridge of his nose, trying to stem off a headache. "Okay, okay. So we're randomly on top of a building in New York City, the rest of our flock is God knows where, I can see again, and I just almost blew you to smithereens. And you have wings."

Tess nodded gravely. "I'm just as confused as you are."

Gazzy poked a finger distractedly into a small indent in the concrete. "I think we get that now, can we please try to do something about it? I miss Max and Angel and everyone else."

Iggy felt his heart jolt at the mention of Max. Maybe, just maybe when she found out that he could see again she would realize that he was at least as good as Fang. If he ever saw her or anyone else in the flock again. This is so freaking screwed up! Then he glanced up and saw Tess looking at him with her bright brown eyes and felt once again like he had been hit by a truck. Damn it! Make that doubly screwed up. This wasn't supposed to be happening. Max wasn't supposed to like Fang better than him. He and Gazzy weren't supposed to be here, separated from the rest of the flock. Tess wasn't supposed to be here either. And he definitely, definitely was not supposed to be feeling this way about two girls at once. "Working on it, Gaz," he said, resisting the urge to groan in frustration.

"Nah-uh," Gazzy replied.

Iggy was about to respond angrily when Tess stopped him with a light hand on his arm.

"How about we go to the library? Maybe we can…I don't know, figure something out once we're there."

Iggy nodded. "Yeah, sounds good. There has to be something there."

-

A few minutes later they were standing outside the New York Public Library of Humanities and Social Sciences, the very same library that the flock had unsuccessfully used to try to find the Institute. Once they had figured out what part of the city they were in, it had been a simple matter to fly to the library and drop down inconspicuously into a nearby alley. Now they were next to a statue of a lion figuring out what to do next. There were people all around, and Iggy was going insane trying to listen for Erasers. Though his other senses didn't seem to have been dimmed now that he could see, he had forgotten how many distractions sight could add to the world. He didn't trust his eyes to pick out Erasers at this point in time because it had been such an incredibly long time since he'd actually seen one - and according to the rest of the flock, they were getting harder to identify anyway. He would use his eyes, yes, but he wouldn't rely on them for this kind of thing. Not yet, anyway.

"Let's go use a computer like last time we were here," Gazzy suggested.

Iggy nodded and they walked into the stone building, getting into one of the dreaded elevators. Iggy felt sweat beading on his forehead as he began to panic in the confined space. Gazzy seemed to be having a similar reaction. He glanced at Tess. She seemed more composed, but her face was slightly flushed. Had she lived most of her life in a cage too?

They sprang out of the elevator the second the doors opened on the fourth floor. Okay, we're out of there now. Get it together. Iggy remembered that Max had had to sign in at a desk in order to use a computer, so he headed towards it and picked up the pen. But what to write? He had his alias, Jeff, but what about a last name? If any Erasers were looking for him, they would pick up on "Ride," "Batchelder," or "Walker." He noticed that Tess was hovering near his shoulder and whispered, "Are they after you, too?"

"Who? The whitecoats? Yeah, if that's what you mean. Ever since their dumb wolf boys sniffed me out that day at school," she answered, just barely audible to anyone who didn't have Iggy's hearing.

Iggy nodded, deciding to save questions for later since the guy behind the counter was giving them a look. He wrote J-E-F-F B-A-U-E-R, borrowing the surname of a television character. They headed over to one of the computers.

"Maybe it would help to find a map of where you guys were or something," Tess suggested, crossing her legs as she sat down in a chair next to Iggy.

"Yeah. Okay." He hadn't really used a computer in this manner before since he hadn't been able to see it, but it wasn't very hard to find the Internet, which luckily opened up to a search engine. He looked down at the keyboard, trying to make sense of the order in which the letters had been arranged, and slowly typed out "Caribbean map." He was a little embarrassed at his lack of typing skills, but what could he do?

He pulled up a picture that showed a bunch of Caribbean islands. So…there's Florida…we flew about this much southeast…then kind of north to get Max…east and a little south… He traced the route with his finger.

"This isn't anywhere near exact, but I think we were about here," he said, pointing to the east side of an island. "Look about right, Gaz?"

The Gasman moved closer to the monitor and frowned as he studied it. After a few moments he said, "Yeah. Hey, what's that dotted triangle thing?"

Iggy looked at the outline of a triangle that was dotted around part of the map. "I think it must be the Bermuda Triangle. Supposedly a ton of really weird stuff happens there. Disappearances, plane crashes." He exchanged glances with Tess, then mentally swore at himself as he felt his cheeks heat up slightly. Damn it, you like Max! You can't go around falling for another girl!

"Do you think the Triangle has anything to do with this?" Tess asked.

Iggy shrugged. "It's supposed to be something about the magnetic forces down there. I don't see how that could get us here. Hey…why are you here?"

Tess bit her lip. "After the Erasers came to school I had to get out of there. I just started wandering around, I guess, and…somehow ended up here."

Iggy thought he heard something in her voice but didn't push it. He glanced out the window at the sky, reveling in the sensation of sight. "Woah. When did it get so dark?" he asked with a start. The sun was sinking to the horizon, its last rays turning the sparse clouds pink and purple in the few places they could be seen between all the buildings of the city. He glanced down at his watch and did a double take as he saw its face. "Uh guys…take a look at this."

Author's note: Ok, a just a few things here. One, I'm so sorry it took so long to get this up. I wrote it in three parts so it took a while. Plus there's always the fact that I have tons of homework. But never mind about that. As I said there were three parts to this chapter for the different sets of characters. I'd really like some feedback on the new characters in Angel and Nudge's storyline. Be honest 'cause if you guys like them they might just stick around a while, but if you don't they won't. Also, I really don't like how the Iggy/Gazzy/Tess part of this chapter turned out so please let me know if you think it was OOC or if it's just me. And also just a note which is not very important but I'd like you to know, Iggy's emotional storyline at this point is taken completely from personal experience.

Hope you enjoyed and please REVIEW! I'll try to get chapter 15 up faster than it took for 14.