Chapter Five: Blood, Sweat, and Screams

We crept silently to surround the barn entrances. I was with Fang, Keez, Soda, and Tonks. We were going to give the signal. Tonks was going to yell, I was willing to bet money. She had told me that what she'd woken us up with was from a book, and was a war cry. The way she'd screamed it, I wasn't about to doubt it.

Again, she counted down on her fingers, a hard glint in her eyes and a smile on her face. Three…Two…One.

"EULALIIIAAA!" She and I kicked open the barn doors, as two on the sides and the one in the back opened in the same instant. Fifteen flyboy heads whipped to different doors, and horses whinnied and reared. Sam saw all of us and started kicking at the nearest flyboys, his hands tied to a post and useless. Lissa looked like she was going to wet herself until she saw Fang. She grinned then, and waited for rescue. The perfect little damsel in distress.

Max, lean left.

Finally, the voice had something useful to tell me! I leaned left, and the flyboy's fist whizzed past my head. I grabbed it and hurled him over my shoulder, then gave his arm a jerky twist. It popped off, and the flyboy's mechanical eyes died.

"Eulaliiaaa!" Tonks kicked a flyboy, flipping off of it and onto the back of one behind her. She clubbed it on the head with her mace, and he crashed to the ground beside its companion. Flyboys were falling everywhere, and I saw Lissa free, backed against the barn wall, biting her lip as she watched Fang take two flyboys on. Sam was beside him, popping one's shoulder out in seconds. Huh, the boy could actually fight!

With thirteen flyboys down, the other two flew off awkwardly, Total leaping and biting at them.

"Fang!" Lissa squealed and ran to him. I looked away, disgusted. I wasn't interested in seeing the following goo.

"So, you guys came back." Sam grinned next to me.

I nodded, taking stock of the Ghosts and my flock. Everyone was okay, which was great. I thought at least one of the Ghosts was gonna get it good, but they were better than I thought they were.

"Still can't trust anyone, or can I be an acceptation?" The idiot tried to grab my hand.

"No, Sam. You can't be. If I was sorry, I'd say I was, but we don't have anything. Besides, I have wings and I'm a mutant and I have to keep traveling. No, you can't be the acceptation. A friend, yes, but nothing more."

"Oh." Sam sulked. "A friend then." He held his hand out to me with a solemn smile.

"Friend. I'll call on you if I need an flyboy's butt kicked in this area." I shook hands with him.

"Deal."

"What?" Lissa's voice had risen both in pitch and volume quite suddenly.

"I told you. There's someone else, and there is no us." I could hear Fang's solid reply. Oh, someone else? He had someone else? Some L.A. bunny, probably.

"Who could be better than me?!" That girl was going to break the sound barrier whining one of these days.

"A lot of people, and no one can be better than her."

I tuned them out, walking to the entrance of the barn, farthest from the two. I heard Lissa burst into sobs and she ran away. Good riddance.

I looked up into the pure sky…and gasped.

"Guy's, we've got about two dozen reinforcement flyboys!"

"Crap!" Keez said.

The flyboys swarmed, taking us by surprise. I saw Sam take a punch to the head an fall. Tonks was thrown into a wall, and Soda was trying to protect himself from three flyboys. He was fading fast, his strength nearly gone. None of these seemed important, however, when my eyes found Fang. He was slumped over the arm of a flyboy who was extending his wings and preparing to spring. The flyboy gave a whistle, and the remaining flyboys increased the attack.

"Fang! FANG!" My shouts echoed into nothing.

"Max, we need help here!" Keez yelled, protecting Tonks' unconscious form with all his strength.

"Everybody duck and cover!" Iggy screamed, throwing himself into an empty horse stall. Everyone did as he asked, and the horses, now absolutely panicked, backed up in their stalls.

An explosion scattered flyboys everywhere, dwindling their numbers by nearly a dozen. Ghosts were everywhere, and my flock fought hard. The flyboys gave up again; flying off, with many badly damaged ones falling to the ground.

I looked up to where Fang had disappeared with the flyboy.

"FANG!!!"