10
Angel ran at the door, nearly knocking me over, and grabbed Celeste from Ari's outstretched arm.
"Angel, where did you leave Celeste?" I asked, tugging Angel softly away from the door.
"She was in Fang's bag with Total, so Ari saved her." Angel smiled briefly, then trotted off and sat down with Fang, playing with Celeste and letting Total gently out of the backpack. Well, I don't know if I would have worded it that way, but whatever. So Ari saved Celeste and Total, big deal?
"I found something, Max," Ari said in his rough Eraser voice. But there was something different in his tone. He almost sounded afraid, an emotion I never thought I would hear from him.
"What are you talking about?" I was really curious at this point. If something actually made Ari turn this serious, it must be important.
Ari's face was solemn as he pressed another button…and the cage door opened. Wow, this was a serious turn around. Or was he just trying to get into the cage and attack us? Be careful, the Voice said. Prepare to attack if he strikes first.
Taking the Voice's warning, I braced myself for the worst. But as it turned out, the worst was Ari stepping aside and motioning for me to come out of the cage. "What the heck are you doing?" I asked, still braced for any surprises he may have for me.
"I know this sounds crazy, but I need you to trust me if you and your flock want to live." Ari was dead serious; I didn't even have to be able to read minds like Angel to figure that one out. "But I can only bring you out for now, the rest can come later."
"Never." And that was my final response. There was no way I was leaving the flock alone, especially in a cage. And if Ari was going to try and bring me by force, he had another thing coming.
But again he surprised me by simply standing there, staring at me with a certain longing in his eyes. He wasn't going to try and force me. But I could tell he still needed my help for…something.
Angel's soft voice came from behind me, where she was now standing, cradling Total and Celeste in her arms. "He's not lying, Max. It's really important, and only you can go with him."
"Angel…" That was all I could manage. I looked from Angel to Fang, who gave a confused look and shrugged. Then I looked at the flock and a knot caught in my stomach, thinking of what might happen if I never came back to them.
She said he's not lying. The Voice was stating what I already knew again. You should trust HER if you trust anybody.
I almost laughed at that. So now I'm going to put my trust in the same girl who had manipulated the president not too long ago? Sure, that's safe. But I knew it was true; if I wasn't going to trust Ari, I might as well trust Angel about what his thoughts said.
I sighed and slowly stepped towards the door, still keeping alert in my mind.
"Want me to wake up everyone else?" Fang asked.
I turned around again and shook my head. "No, let them sleep. I won't be gone long." Well, I hoped I wouldn't be gone long at least.
Once I had reached the door, tension filling every muscle in my body, Ari slowly closed it behind me and proceeded down a long, dark hall.
We didn't speak that whole time, even though there was a whole load of things I wanted to question him about. Let him show you what he needs to show you. Yeah, thanks Voice, just take his side.
"Don't scream, don't make any noise when we get in here, or we'll both probably be killed," Ari said as he opened a door when we had finally reached the end of the hall. Okay, easy enough. Don't scream, don't die.
But the "don't scream" part turned out to be harder than I thought. When Ari opened the door, we entered an enormous testing lab filled with cages and computers, testing tubes and capsules. And there were Erasers crawling wall to wall, Erasers prowling the ground, Erasers with guns.
"Ari…are we…" I lost my voice as I nearly began to panic, realization flooding my senses, sending me into a whirlwind of horrible and painful memories.
"I'm sorry Max," Ari said, turning to me and staring with sincerity in his eyes and voice. We were at the School. Again.