Chapter Twenty-One

Nick's POV

"Robin, see if you can get Riley to settle down." I suggested, hoping the seventeen year old would be able to handle her mentally unstable twenty-four year old brother. The blondes were both in the sky in an instant.

Watching the two of them together was something special. Though Riley wasn't all there, Robin never treated him like that. They were perfect siblings in every way. While Riley continued to fly in random, not thought out circles close to the trees, Robin flew right beside him and kept pace with his incoherent flight path. Her blue tipped robin wings were graceful while his bulky sandy wings weren't, but they managed to match the same movements.

"I'm hungry." Nine year old Genevieve complained, reminding me of another little girl that I knew in the School as nothing other than Nudge. Both had the same dark skin, but Jenny's was due to being part penguin. Her tiny stomach was perfectly white and gave her the tuxido look. The brown eyes and black hair help her look too.

"I know." I said, fishing in my bag for what was left of our food. I had stolen some extra cash from the Cullen house before I left since I knew I would be gone much longer than the six months I promised my brother. Fang would forgive me though, just as I knew that Carlisle and Esme would for taking the money.

But now the cash was out and so was the food.

I found a cereal bar and tossed it to the youngest of our Troopers. Jenny smiled widely as she scarfed down her food, somehow mangaging to swallow it whole like only a penguin can do.

"Was that the last of it?" Leo asked, coming from the forest and shaking his white hair to hide his cat like ears.

His grey eyes met mine and I knew that he knew the answer to his question. He was a smart guy for a snow leapord. Most animal hybrids tended to be on the dumb side, but Leo had age on his side. Thirty-five and still kicking. It was amazing for a School experiment.

I nodded nonetheless and Raymond sighed as he took a seat by his father. I didn't even notice him joining us, but that was the problem with a fifteen year old who was part leapord, part cheetah. He talked almost as fast as Nudge and runs faster than Edward and Leah combined. He was definitely unique, especially with his pale skin and eyes like his father and orange-ish hair color like I assume his mom had.

The only one who looked even closely like him that I had ever met was Antonia. Toni has a small striped tail and ears that she can cover as well as the leapords hide theirs. She has tan skin, orange hair with black looking highlights though I know they are real due to her tiger DNA, and coal black eyes.

If she had been younger, she and Ray would have made a good couple, but she's four years older and thinks of him as a little kid. Me, however, she finds adorable despite our six year age difference. Help me.

"But I'm hungry too. Why do we never have enough food? I just want to eat enough for once and not have to be hungry again. That would be great, huh? To not be hungry? Have you ever not been hungry, Nick? Was there ever a time in your life when you were completely fed?" Ray said in one breath, giving Nudge a run for her money. "I bet you have. You lived with those vampires for years. I bet they fed you. Did one of them ever try to eat you? That'd be scary, I think. But you're not afraid of anything, right? That's why you took down our Institute all by yourself! Just like Max did with the other Schools. But she had a Flock, you're by yourself..."

"Slow down there, son." Leo said with a laugh. "We'll eat soon enough."

"When are we gonna be in Forks?" Toni asked, coming to sit next to me on the log. She scooted closer to me to keep warm, but I knew it was an act. The girl was smitten, but I had been trying not to give her the wrong impression since we picked her up from the Institute she was at. I had someone hopefully waiting for me back home. If not, I had a girl that I was in love with.

"We're about three miles out." I said, pretending to need to look at the map as I got up from the log and away from Toni.

"Great! Let's go then!" Jenny said excitedly. She waddled over towards me and handed me her empty wrapper that had been licked clean.

I looked up at the late afternoon sky and frowned when I saw that Riley was still flapping around like crazy and Robin was nowhere near closer to settling him down.

"I think we should spend the night here." I advised. "I still haven't called them to let them know we're coming and, besides, I don't think Riley is ready yet."

"He'll be ready if we have to go." Robin yelled, obviously having heard me with her advanced bird hearing.

"You sure?" I called back, not wanting to risk Riley having another episode. My Troopers were all that mattered to me right now. Until I saw her face again, then it was just going to be her.

"Yeah, he can handle it, I swear." Robin said and sure enough, in ten minutes, he was calmed down enough to fly straight and like that we were off. I carried Jenny while the others ran underneath so we made great time. The sun was just starting to set when we stopped in the Cullen's forest.

This was what we, mainly I, had been waiting for.