Happy Valentine's Day! Unless your single like me and it's just another Sunday, except with more chocolate (I like that part! ;3) So in honor of this minor but lovable, eatable holiday, here is the next chapter. Maybe Charlie and Liela will even fit thinking about love in on their busy, death defying schedules...

After Armageddon

Chapter Twenty-Four: Five Minutes

Charlie

Much to my surprise I wasn't dead.

Even more surprising I wasn't burned or maimed either.

I found I was barely hurt as I tossed the chair and the empty set of shelves that had pinned me to the ground away. From their burnt condition I guessed they had taken the brunt of the explosion. I had a few scratches and bruises and I ached something fierce, but other then that I was whole. The shelves hadn't faired so well. All that was left was the back board and it snapped into pieces when I threw it.

Another groan let me know at least one of the others was alive as well. I threw the chair that had been lying on me in the general direction of the groan and tripped out the door. A yelp let me know that I had hit the mark.

I ran down the hall, trying to remember where I was in the building and how to get down to the freaky wall where Liela and Rebecca should be. I turned in what I hoped was the right direction and finally noticed that I was seeing red and there was a ringing in my ears. I shook my head to clear it and ended up running into a wall. I hadn't thought that the explosion had hit me this hard.

Then sound leaked back into my ears and I realized that the ringing was fire alarms and the red was the lights that were swinging around with the sirens.

"There he is!" An angry voice called out behind me. "After him!"

I ran faster, nearly falling over when I took the next corner. A loud grumbling of voices followed me. I think a couple of them actually snarled, like large, furry animals. Before me was only a long thin hallway with no windows and few doors.

"Ah great." I thought to myself. I couldn't go the right way once in my life could I?

"Hurry up, we've got him now." The same voice yelled excitedly.

Crud. That was not what I needed to hear right now. 'Hey where'd he go?' or 'Drat he's disappeared.' would have been much better.

But instead I pushed myself faster and tried to think of some way to lose the angry mob behind me.

And then suddenly the mob was in front of me.

I slid to a stop, very confused. Maybe it was because I had blown myself up but I thought that I had somehow gotten turned around and I was now headed toward the mob that wanted to de-feather me, then tar me, and then feather me again.

Then I turned around and saw that the original angry mob was still behind me.

Oh good. It's nice to know I'm not crazy. I'm just trapped.

I took the next hallway I could find and ducked into the next open doorway before they could see what I did. I had hoped for another hallway or at least a big room with lots of junk, but like everything else today I was sadly disappointed. Instead of a big space to hide in I found myself in a cubicle.

For those of you who don't know what a cubicle is, it is a small box not much bigger then what big screen TV's come in. You know the kind you play in as children when you can still fit inside them.

I thought quickly, or quite possibly not at all, before diving behind the biggest pile of stuff I could find. I ended up pressed inside a small black cabinet that was missing two of its feet. I couldn't close the door all the way either, but I hoped that since I was still dressed all in black (the Director hadn't made us change into those nasty hospital gowns yet) I would blend in with the shadowy cabinet.

The mob followed me around the corner soon enough. "Spread out." I heard Pardus's rough voice order. "He can't have gotten very far. You two check the far rooms. The rest of you circle around so he can't escape." There was a smattering of assents before the general shuffle of large groups of people moving.

Pardus however didn't leave. Through the crack in the door I could see his booted feet come into the room. He moved slowly enough that I couldn't hear his boots hit the floor. If I hadn't been able to see him I wouldn't have known he was there at all, but then again I suppose that was the point of his sneakiness.

I heard him sniff the air; following the trail I couldn't help but leave behind. Hey it's not my fault I only see modern plumbing ever two to six months. And before you start wrinkling your noses at me I do bath more often then that.

He took a step towards my cabinet, then two. I held my breath. I decided that after another step or two, I would burst out of the cabinet and jump him. Hopefully he would be too surprised to claw me to shreds.

He took another step.

"Whatcha looking for Pardus?"

The new voice took us both by surprise. I couldn't really jump, crammed into this box as I was, but Pardus nearly jumped out of his skin. I muffled a laugh as I saw his boots clear a nearby table as he whirled around to see who was standing in the doorway.

"Dr. Akins," He greeted the crazy doctor sourly. "What are you doing here?"

Akins's shoes stepped into my limited field of view. "I heard you managed to lose my favorite canary. I thought I would help you search for him. After all this time I'd like to think that I know how he thinks."

I shuddered.

But if the two of them noticed the slight shake of the cabinet, they gave no sign. "I don't need your help old man." Pardus spat with a slightly feline hiss. I could just picture his fur standing on end. I would have shaken my head if there had been room. Bad move. He had been polite to McCauley for a reason. Apparently he forgot that reason now. "If I remember right you weren't that good at catching them before anyway."

I couldn't see exactly what happened (I wouldn't see anything interesting unless they decided to kick at each other) but there was a loud slam and a rattle as Pardus's back hit the wall. I saw with amazement that the bad cat's feet had left the floor. Who could've guessed that Elmer Fudd was strong enough to lift up a leopard?

"Listen putty tat," Akins's voice was soft and dangerous. I remembered how he had snapped into crazy mode before I had gone to meet the Director. I shivered again at the memory of his wild face and burning eyes. "These canaries are mine understand? You can tell your friend," I can only assume he meant McCauley, "to back off. He's already had his chance and he bungled it. He knows it as well as I do. Even the Director knows it. Does he really think she'll give him a second chance so easily?" Pardus didn't answer. "Now here is what you're going to do. You are going to go tell McCauley that Charlie and his girlfriend are mine. I get to decide what to do with them and he is going to stay out of my way. Got it?"

I could imagine Pardus's frantic nod so clearly that I smiled at his uneasy face whether it was really there or not.

Wait a minute. Girlfriend?

"Good. Now get out." Atkins snapped as I tried to fathom why he thought Liela was my girlfriend. Yeah I know we could finish each other's sentences half the time, but that's just because we've been stuck together for so long. Plus she doesn't even look at me like that. At least, not that I've noticed.

Pardus slid back to the ground and left the room as quickly as he dared. It was quiet for a long moment. Atkins adjusted his coat, smoothed down his shirt and muttered something about it being hard to create good help these days. I breathed as quietly as I could, praying for him to leave so I could find that magic storeroom and Liela.

Now don't go getting funny ideas. We had to get out of this place is all. You don't honestly expect me to just leave her here? Sheesh, what kind of readers are you?

Then finally, much to my relief, Atkins made his way toward the door. "I won't have you ruining my experiments bird brat. You have until the time I come back to get your feathered self out of here. If I find you again I'll make you part of the experiment." He said harshly. Then he left.

I didn't move as I tried to think of how he knew I was here. He hadn't seen me. He would have had to bend down to do that and I would have noticed if he did. So how had he known I was there? What in the world was he playing at?

I heard the mob report to Atkins that they hadn't found me. He ordered them to expand there search in a lazy tone of voice. Briefly I wondered if he had just been letting his crazy show again. But then I shook my head. Atkins may be insane and down right scary half the time, but I never claimed he was stupid. Somehow he had figured out I was there.

I waited another moment as the mob trooped away to follow orders. When no one returned, I slunk out of the cabinet, taking only a moment to stretch out my legs (they had gone all tingly) before I snuck to the door and peered outside. All clear.

I was hesitant to just run out the door and down the hall. I was pretty sure of where the magic room was now, but there was no cover between here and there. I pulled my head back into the room trying to think of if there was any other way to the exit. There were always the vents, but the sirens were still going outside so there was a good chance that they had been locked down as well. Hollywood had ruined any chance of anymore villains forgetting that escape. I could try the other door, but I had caught a glimpse of yet another sterile, white room when I had been trying to find a place to hide earlier. Most likely it was a working room, where the doctor could inspect his patients or papers or some other such thing. I thought harder. I needed to get out of here quick.

I checked out the hall again, this time looking up at the ceiling. Pipes ran along side simple, bright lights that swung erratically over head, illuminating everything below them in a stark, unforgiving white light. However now that I noticed, there was a dark little crawlspace above the lights. If I could make it up there, then I could crawl along the water pipes. The contrast between the white hall and the dark ceiling was so great that even if they looked up, my pursuers wouldn't see me unless they knew I was there.

I made sure that no one was there to see me before I left the safety of the doorway. With a little help from my wings, I jumped up and grabbing the bottom most pipe, swung up onto the thicker ones above it. There was one in particular that ran the length of the hall and T-ed at the corner that was about as thick as a young pine tree. It was more then enough to hold my weight. With some balancing difficulty, I started crawling off down the pipe towards the end of the corridor.

Just out of curiosity, do you think Dorothy ever worried about falling off the yellow brick road? Yeah, I suppose not. Never mind.

I froze when I turned the corner. The mob had thinned, but there were still maybe six to eight cattle prod toting, security guys wandering systematically along the hallway. Two were always out in the hall, searching for me. I should've felt flattered I know, but somehow the emotion was completely squashed by the realization that they would use those cattle prods on me if I slipped up. Of course, if I literally slipped up, then I would fall down, and then I'm sure my inner ear would be too confused to let me run in a straight line, much less away from them.

In light of that, I carefully placed each hand in front of me before I put my weight on it. I was maybe a little more then halfway along the pipe when my knee slipped out from under me.

"CONG!" Went the pipes as my chin hit it with enough force to rattle the metal.

I don't know if it was just because the sound mainly reverberated up into my empty head, but only one of the guards looked up. I pressed myself flat against the quivering metal, hoping to make it stop its shivering from giving me away. I watched from the corner of my eye as the guard peered intently into the gloom above the swinging lamps.

"Did you hear that?" He asked his partner a few doors down.

The other man looked up at him in a bored way. "Hear what?" He asked.

"That noise, like something hitting the water main. I think something might be up there."

The bored guard rolled his eyes. "Yeah, like you thought that little old lab rat was the escaped sewer monster? I don't think so. You're just hearing things." He said dismissively.

"I dunno..." The first one started.

"Well I do." Said lazy guard sounding a little more perturbed. "It means you have got to stop staying up all night playing Halo. You're too tired to do your job right. Besides, I whoop you every time." He sounded smug.

Now the first guard rolled his eyes. "Shut up. You cheated."

"Nuh uh cry baby. I beat you fair and square."

I rubbed my chin as the continued to bicker. "Thank you addictive, gory, video games for sleep depravation." I thought with a smile.

I crawled over a few more security infested hallways before finally coming to an out of the way corridor with only two doors, one on each side. After making sure that the rooms were empty, I hopped down, landing in a crouch on the ground. Still no one appeared. I snuck quickly into the storeroom and rushed at the back wall. I closed my eyes at the end, not wanting to see the seemingly opaque wall fill my vision.

I ran smack into the thing.

Holding my aching head, I got up off the floor, hoping no one had seen that. I reached out a hand and touched the wall. It was as solid as Grandma's house.

Wrong room.

With a promise never to tell this to Liela ever, I stumbled into the other room. This time I checked before running at the wall. My hand went right through the concrete. With another groan, (Why couldn't I have checked the first time?) I leapt through the fake wall and landed six inches in sewer muck.

"Charlie!" Liela tackled me wit a hug and my head hit the sticky sewer pipe wall behind me.

I groaned again. "Liela that is my head!" I told her reaching up to feel if I had anything more then a bruise. With my luck my concussion record had just ended.

She took a step back and propped her hands up on her hips. "Well excuse me for worrying about you. What took you so long?" She demanded.

"I had to blow up half the building to get away from Pardus and McCauley. It turns out he's even crazier then Atkins." I told her, finally catching sight of the group of kids standing behind her staring at us. A small girl with white hair stood near the front staring at me unbelievingly. "Who're your friends?" I asked.

"They were in the same cage room as Rebecca. I couldn't just leave them there." She said. I nodded, agreeing with her. That would be cruel.

"It's Mouse."

Liela and I turned around took look at the young girl that had spoken. It was Rebecca.

"Huh?" I asked sounding stupid.

She licked her lips nervously and hoisted the little girl she was carrying higher on her hip. "My name," she explained, "it's Mouse."

Liela and I looked at each other confused. She was Aaron's sister wasn't she? "Okay," I finally said. "But we were looking for our friend's sister. He said her name was Rebecca."

A hesitant smile began to stretch across her face. "Is your friend's name Aaron?"

I nodded.

The smile bloomed like a rose. "That's my brother." She said excitedly. "Where is he? Is he here?"

Liela shot me a sorrowful look. Tears were already beginning to form in the corners of her eyes. I shook my head at Rebe-Mouse. "No, I'm afraid he's not coming." I said, that awful knowledge that Aaron was dead weighing down on my chest, making it difficult to breathe.

Mouse's face fell. "Where is he?" She asked again.

I swallowed hard and stiffened my spine. Whether I liked it or not I had to tell her. She deserved to know the truth. "He's dead. Dr. Atkins killed him about a month ago." I told her as gently as I could.

She staggered as if the words had hit her like a physical blow. Only the dark haired boy next to her kept her standing. "Oh," She said weakly. "I-I see."

Liela stepped forward, tears running down her face now. She wrapped Mouse in a hug as she started crying too. They stood there for a moment, forgetting where we were in the presence of their grief.

"How do we know you're telling the truth?" The dark haired boy next to Mouse demanded. With a start I realized he had cat ears and a spotted tail. I distrusted him immediately.

"Aaron was my friend." I told him as if that should clear everything up. "I've known him sense he was six years old. I wish I was lying, but I'm not."

He still glared at me. "That still doesn't me we should just automatically trust you. Give me one good reason why I should even listen to you." He dared me.

I opened my mouth to tell cat man off, but then a muffled sound of a dog's bay drifted through the magic wall. We all cringed. The dogs would find our scent and lead the doctors to the wall. It wouldn't take them very long to find out where we went with our scent still fresh in the room above.

"That's why." I said in a hard tone pointing up at the space where we had come from. "Because I know the way out and the last place you want to be is here."

Kitty glowered at me a moment more before stepping aside. "Fine wise guy. Which way is out?"

I looked around, getting my bearings. "This way." I said pointing behind me. "The pipes will intersect there, we want to go right. That should lead us outside. Come on." I said when none of them moved.

Kitty was the first to follow. I didn't take it to mean that he suddenly trusted me, but rather that he wanted to stick close to me so he could pounce if he needed to.

"I can take her." I heard Liela offer Mouse. Their eyes were red and watery, but they had cried themselves out for the moment. Mouse nodded and handed Liela the little brown haired girl she was carrying. The little girl must have been amazingly easy going. She smiled up at Liela as she put her arms around her neck and started chatting at her in the way only very small children have. Liela smiled back at her and nodded at the right places, encouraging the little girl to talk.

It was weird, but right then, despite the face that bloodhounds were tracking us, that there were at least two crazy men that wanted to take an exclusive look at our brains in a jar, and that an even crazier woman just wanted to kill us, I found myself wanting to smile at Liela.

She looked up and I realized how goofy I must look. "You take point." She said. "I'll make sure we have everybody."

I nodded and made my way through the crowd of kids to the front. "This way." I told them.

I had just caught a glimpse of sunlight when there was a loud crash of breaking metal and sloshing water behind us.

The kids froze like a group of scared deer that have just heard the click of the hunter's gun. To his credit, cat boy had his claws out, ready to fight rather then just let them take him and the smaller ones behind him. Like my mom used to say, it's always smarter to fight.

Unless it's smarter to run.

"Go!" I yelled, shoving the kids closest to me toward the patch of daylight. Once one started running they all followed. I fell back to where Liela and Mouse were. Liela was alright even holding the little girl, but Mouse was already breathing hard. I began to worry when I she started to wheeze too.

Not bothering to stop, I picked her up. She yelped, surprised, but didn't struggle like I thought she would.

A bullet zinged past my head, making a loud noise as it hit the side of the pipe.

"Don't kill them you nitwits!" A woman's screechy voice echoed down the metal tube. "The Director wants them alive. Use the tranquilizers."

"Great," I thought, "that's reassuring."

I noticed clouds of dust as I got closer to the exit. Then I backpedaled fiercely. The pipe ended as abruptly as the land around it. Outside, a cliff had appeared; the drop almost straight to the ground. However the cliff slanted just enough that there was a chance that if you jumped, you might survive the slide down the earth. The puffs of dirt were from the kids that had decided they would take the chance and jump rather then let the Director's goons recapture them.

I agreed with them whole heartedly as I jumped off the edge of the sewer pipe. Mouse gave a short screech and covered her eyes when she saw I wasn't jumping down the side of the cliff like the others. Instead I had launched myself into the air and snapped out my wings to catch the strong wind blowing around me. Liela jumped not two seconds later and together we soared up into the sky.

Needles suddenly struck me as something heavy hurled itself onto my back. I yelled and dropped a good twenty feet before regaining control. I looked back, afraid to feel the unnatural relaxation of tranquilizers making their way through my bloodstream.

Instead I saw a cat's small, whiskery, face peering over my shoulder.

"Ricky!" Mouse cried seeing my newest passenger. She held out her arms to him and he clawed his away up my back and into her hold.

"Remind me to skin you when we land." I yelled at him over the roar of the wind. He hissed at me.

I looked over my shoulder again to make sure Liela wasn't far behind me. She wasn't. I also saw that she had the little boy Ricky had been holding as well as the little girl. He must have given him to her before she jumped.

She smiled at as we climbed higher into the sky. Relief crashed into me as I realized we would be okay and I smiled back at her, wanting to laugh out loud.

Then a brightly feathered speck pecked her right shoulder and I saw her look of surprise and alarm.

The tranquilizer worked quickly and she began to fall.

"Liela!" I yelled even as I turned and dived after her. I saw her eyes begin to close as the little girl clung to her neck and began to scream. The little boy's grip wasn't as good and he began to drift away from Liela's still half conscious form.

I reached out and grabbed him, but Liela was falling too fast. "LIELA!" I yelled again.

Her wings opened feebly, but there wasn't enough time for her to pull up before she plummeted through the growing twilight into the tree tops below us.

"LIELA!"