It went up in flames. Cheetah-hybrids, riding on the giant lizard, launched themselves at the scientists screaming in the galleries. A certain mutant, with mottled gold-brown hair and slanted, catlike eyes leapt on a hysterical red haired woman, spitting curses.
"You killed my brother! You killed him!" she screamed. Beside her, a girl with lank, damp aquamarine hair and gleaming scales pummelled a Japanese scientists. A boy with bat's wings and tiger stripes growled, flinging an assistant over the balcony rail. Mutants swarmed over the white floor. A lobster-minx cross dug its pincers into the floor, tearing up the round metal projection-plates up with a hideous screech.
A hideous, shaggy and almost inhuman buffalo-cephalopod hybrid curled its four different pairs of arms around the throats of four different scientists at once. A frog-cat-human dug its claws into the chest of one of the shrieking Itex technicians, green skin oozing reddish slime. Nearby, a porcupine cross drove his spikes in the body of a scientist again and again. A violet-eyed hummingbird-gecko-boy sated himself on the blood of one of the assistants, blood streaming down his chin. Shiloh shrieked, shrill and deafeningly loud through the microphone. A grey and white streak veered away from its collision course with her, diving and coming to an abrupt halt on the white floor-plate as the blue suspension fields flickered and died.
The seven flock members came to an ungraceful halt as they hit the floor. Eila groaned, rubbing her side. Griffin yelped and dodged the cloven hoof of a half-goat boy as it fought alongside an Eraser. Kichiro lay still and pale as Mist crawled over to check that Bobby was okay. Fleur embraced them both, staring at Whisper, eyes widened. Rhaksha had already picked herself up, and Griffin and Eila hauled Kichiro up. Her eyes fixed on the white-clad figure as it wiped blood from its split lip. It couldn't be. Her eyes were deceiving her; this was just another cruel ploy of Itex's or the School's.
A half-bull boy helped Griffin and Eila as they struggled with Kichiro's weight. He was still out of it, completely unconscious. Griffin turned and did a 360, and nearly choked on his own yell when he saw him. Mist screamed, half in shock and half in joy. They didn't move for a second. Then they all rushed at him at once, shouting over one another and trying to grab hold of him, not believing that he was real.
"Whisper!"
Rhaksha's incredulous murmur carried over the roar of the angered mutants and the shrieks of the falling whitecoats. Her green eyes filled glimmered, filling with tears as her lips trembled and her expressionless facade began to crack, little by little.
The towering, muscle-bound boy helping Griffin and Eila grunted, and began to clear a path through the raging mutant mass when the M-Geeks poured in. Their green eyes gleamed, and their metallic expressions did not changed. In a single monotone voice, they called out, surging forward.
The mutants in the room stopped dead.
"Resistance is futile. Surrender immediately."
There was incredulous silence. Then a voice cried out, the voice of a red-haired, fox-tailed fourteen-year-old.
"Would you just shut the bloody hell up!"
Then the mutants turned on the robots and began to summarily keel-haul them. The angered mutants chopped and smashed and dismantled, sectioning the robots' heads like metallic oranges. The red-haired fox boy dragged Mist forward, out of the blasted doors and Fleur, Griffin and Bobby struggled to keep up. Whisper, Rhaksha and the boy carrying Kichiro had already fought their way through as mutants watched their backs and held off the tide of robots. Somewhere, a siren began to sound, and the tide of mutants seemed to make a simultaneous decision. They disengaged from their battles and streamed out of the exits, like a many-armed monster. Blocking one exit was Tred, and his small yet grim cohort of loyal Erasers. The ones in the escaping monster pounced on their former comrades, howling like banshees. Tred lifted his a gun, sighting a mutant as it leapt toward him. Whisper shouted, and a belt of flame fell over the Head Eraser.
The stench of burnt fur and blood filled the chamber as battling mutants smashed robots against the walls. There was smoke, and fire. Then, there was smoke, fire and screaming electronics. Griffin screwed up his face in concentration as undestroyed computers leapt from their perches on half-smashed desks and podiums. Transmission cables and fibre-optics leapt free of their housings as half of the 'bots turned and started to contribute to the destruction of the enemy. Their green-laser eyes flickered as sparks raced across their metallic hides. Griffin gasped, blood dripping from his nose as he fought to keep control of the robots. The microphone shrieked and the big screens above roared with blurring colours. Cabling and electronic parts ripped free of the walls, wrapping around and over each other to form a metal monster. The monster tore great swathes out of the robot opposition. Griffin whimpered as blood trickled steadily over his chin. He gasped, and clutched his head as his control evaporated.
Mist roared and the ceiling was smashed through like a sheet of paper. Lightning struck again, and the building shook. Powdery dust fell from above, and the mutants focused on getting out of there. The flock, followed by the muscular boy and the red-haired fox boy, darted through the corridors, with Mist and the other fox-hybrid in the lead. They scented the air, searching for even the tiniest traces of the outside world. It would be easy to smell. The white halls were full of the stench of antiseptics and spilled blood. The clean smell of air would be a welcome relief.
They ran head-on into a crowd of robots trooping silently down the hall, metal arms swinging by their sides. Their laser eyes fixed on the flock, eerily wide and unmoving.
"Bugger," the fox-boy muttered. The robots ran forward, arms pumping. Fleur leapt forward, leg outstretched. Her kick blew the head off the first of the robots. It landed four feet away, sparking and twitching. Eila swept low with her leg, kicking the robots' delicate ankles. They broke. Rhaksha landed a two-handed chop to the lower back of one of the M-Geeks. Its back broke, and the fox-boy leapt, hammering the robot's head with his fists. He leapt from the metal corpse and landed on the chest of another. It flailed backward, and took several others down with it.
Without warning, the robots flew together, as if attracted by an insurmountable magnetic force.
Nudge stood at the end of the corridor, hand outstretched. Her hair tumbled loose, and her face was smeared with coolant fluid and blood. Iggy came behind her dragging Max and leading Gazzy and Angel. Nudge closed her fist, and the robots crumpled inward; crushed metal parts skittered over the floor.
"Let's get out of here," Nudge said, sounding harder, colder and older than she had ever sounded before.
That started them into action. Bare feet pounded against the ground, as the flocks pushed their wings out through the gaps in the backs of their hospital gowns.
"We're close!" Mist shouted as the fox-boy dropped to all fours, sprinting forward. They rounded the corner, skidding against the linoleum as a set of double doors loomed ahead of them. They could see the light pouring under the door, pooling like white smoke.
Mist leapt, reaching for the door.
And then she hit the wall with a shriek. Shiloh, dishevelled and wild in her ripped blue suit, strode forward, hand outstretched and more than half-crazed. Energy crackled in a faint blue aura around her. She planted herself in front of the doors, looking determined. Rhaksha leapt at her; she ended up on the floor, groaning. Mist hauled her backwards as the red-haired boy slunk back to them.
"Shiloh," Whisper said softly. Her mouth pressed into a tight line.
"Shiloh," he repeated, "please."
Griffin stepped forward and lowered her outstretched arm as she looked at him in shock. Her momentary decisiveness seemed to have fled her.
"We're going now," he said firmly. Shiloh, bewildered, nodded dumbly as she sank to her knees, stockinged legs splayed out.
Griffin pushed open the door, and the bite of cold mountain air greeted them. Identical black helicopters were lined up outside. Griffin stared, and made up his mind.
"Everyone get in," he shouted, urging them into the helicopters. The muzzles of door guns protruded from the opened entry hatches. Griffin pushed Eila into one of helicopters' cockpits, and Fleur into the other.
"Don't worry. I'll control it from the back," he shouted as the helicopter blades began to turn, whipping into a frenzy.
"Mist! Rhaksha! Door guns!" he yelled, half-drowned out by the roaring down-draft. The girls scrambled to grab hold of the door guns as other mutants, lead by Beatrix Webber from Pennsylvania, poured out of the doors. The flightless mutants hopped into the helicopters, and others spread their wings before plunging off the precipice at the edge of the helipad. Robots tumbled through the doors, darting at the departing mutants.
Bobby shrieked and swivelled Mist's door gun at a robot just feet away. He flicked the safety off and pulled the trigger, riddling it with bullet holes. The helicopter rotors picked up and the vehicles rose off the helipad. Griffin jumped into the back of one of the helicopters as mutants turned the wrath of the door guns on the robots flooding the launch pad. The helicopters with the flocks and their rescuers veered off as one, angling away from the crumbling White Castle. Mist whooped as a bolt of electricity struck from the roiling clouds above. A tower collapsed, and through the windows they could see glimpses of flame.
The swarm of black helicopters disappeared around the surrounding mountain peaks as the flocks soared over snowy crags of grey stone. The air was cold and fresh in their faces as they stuck their heads out of the doors.
They were out again.
Whisper couldn't hold himself back any more. Since they'd gotten out, there hadn't been a moment in between flying as far away as they could. When they had been able to land, it had been a rough and unpleasant one. Griffin, pale and swaying, had collapsed of sheer exhaustion. He'd only been up for a few minutes, for water and roasted raccoon in the large sandstone cave they occupied. Then he'd curled up again and fallen asleep, head resting in Fleur's lap as she stroked his hair.
There had been the frantic checking over of Kichiro. Eila was nearly beside herself with worry, but really, all he needed was rest to recover from his cell graft; Iggy and Nudge had suggested Max's mother's place as Angel coaxed the fitful Max into sleep. The half-bull boy who had helped them, Orion, had searched for his own food, and the fox-boy, Blaze, had been getting acquainted with Mist. Iggy and Nudge had snuggled close together while Eila had thrown her arm protectively over Kichiro. Gazzy and Bobby sat together, and Angel soon joined them.
Rhaksha, well, she had stared over the flames, face unreadable. Her green eyes seemed shadowed, and whenever he tried to catch her gaze, she would look at him disbelievingly.
The fire had been banked and the rest of the flock crashed before he could speak to her. The moon was high in the air, a pock-marked bluish-white sphere hanging heavy in the sky. Whisper swallowed painfully. He opened his mouth and tried to speak, but his mouth was as dry as paper and no sound emerged. Whisper tried again.
"Rhaksha," he murmured, voice rough. She turned slowly, silver light spilling over her features. Her soft lips parted slightly. He cautiously approached, and she reached out. Her hands cupped his face, and her fingers traced the lines of his face. His fingers tangled in her hair. She was covered in grime, blood and dirt; there was no denying it. Her hair wasn't lustrous, but tangled and matted and sticky with whatever. He leaned forward as she seemed frozen still. Under the cover of coppery blood and the smell of metal, he could barely sense the warm, spicy, clean Rhaksha smell.
"You're... r-real. You're n-not d-dead," she stammered. Whisper nodded slowly, holding her eyes. They were beautiful at night, he realised. Wetness glimmered at the corners of her eyes, sliding down her face and cutting a path through the dirt on her cheeks. She ran her hands over his shoulders, tangling in his hair; her expression grew more and more frantic as tears tracked down her face more quickly. Her narrow shoulders shook.
"You're real," she whispered, and flung her arms around him. Whisper held her, arms encircling her frame as it quaked with shudders. He buried his face in her hair, repeating over and over and over.
"I'm here. I'm here."