Chapter Thirteen

The next morning, everyone seemed to be cautious around me. It had been a long time since any sort of physically-hindering attack happened to me, so I wasn't really surprised to see my flock on full alert, ready to take action. I tried my best to smile and keep everyone moving around. Being the leader is kind of a big deal.

We drudged through the day slowly, especially after I told them we would be taking off after nightfall. None of them were excited about it. But we were out of options. If we stayed in one place for too long, the Erasers would find us that much quicker. It didn't take us long to pack up our possessions. Each of us had two full outfits and a little food we kept for emergencies. Granted, most of our clothes were stained and torn up, but hey. What can a group of flying bird kids do?

Mom and Ella left for a little bit after we ate lunch, saying they had to run a few errands before we left. It made me anxious to let them go by themselves, but I couldn't risk leaving the flock, either. My mother reassured me several times that she and my sister would be perfectly fine on their own, but I never really believed those words out of anyone's mouth.

I was putting our clothes in the dryer (Mom taught me basic laundry care. I kind of knew it from our days at the Colorado house, but I didn't learn about the wonders of fabric softener until she showed me.) when Angel practically floated into the room. She was humming happily, which was never a good sign. It was an evil-incarnate sign. I raised an eyebrow at her as I turned the dial on the dryer and checked the lint trap.

"So we're leaving tonight for sure?" she asked nonchalantly.

"That's the plan," I answered, trying to hide the edge of suspicion out of my voice. "It's easier for us to not be noticed at night."

"I know. Because we can see and the Erasers can't. Well, they used to not be able to. I guess I don't know about the new ones."

"Yeah, who knows? They're some kind of souped-up version. I plan on having Nudge try to dig up some stuff on them from the laptop. Maybe we can figure out who's making the new and improved Eraser hordes."

Angel nodded. "What are you gonna do after we find out who's behind it?"

I forced my thoughts down as I shrugged. "I'll figure that part out after we find out. One step at a time."

"Where are we headed to, then?"

"Washington."

"DC or the state?"

"The state."

"What for?"

"For coffee."

My little girl wrinkled her nose then broke into a shining smile. "We're not allowed caffeine, boss's orders."

"Well, at least not Nudge. That motormouth is thirty-fold when she's had any kind of caffeine . . . or sugar . . . or food . . ."

"Or air."

That made me crack up. "Good point. Ah well, she's a teenager. She should be able to gossip."

"You're a teenager, too, ya know. You should act like one once in a while."

"How do you propose I do that, Angel? Take our falcon friends to the mall for a shopping trip? Bring a hair dryer to use while we're flying? Ooh, I could ask an Eraser out on a date. That's what teenagers do, right?"

She rolled her eyes. "Typical Max sarcasm."

I shook my head as we walked out of the laundry room and up the stairs to the kitchen. "Besides, I'm too busy taking care of you guys to be able to act like a teenager. You take up enough of my time."

"Is she complaining about being 'responsible' for us again?" Gasman sighed from the table. He was focusing on creating a house of cards and was currently up to card number 74. The house took up the entire table.

"I don't complain about it," I snapped. "I'm just telling the truth."

"We talked about this, like, nine thousand times now. We're old enough to take care of ourselves, Max."

"Says the kid that still finds ways to blow up buildings with a firecracker and a toothpick."

He giggled maniacally while he placed another card. "Hey, it was an abandoned factory building. No harm, no foul."

I shook my head with a smile. The Gasman is the MacGuyver of explosives . . . and Iggy is his faithful sidekick. So I guess it would be more of Iggy is MacGuyver and Gasman is MacGuyver, Jr. Like the two of them claim, no one is on the same playing field as MacGuyver, so it'd be hard to branch him with anyone else. Wow, I must like to say "MacGuyver" a lot.

Not in much of a mood for arguing, I walked out of the room to go to Ella's bedroom. Angel continued to follow me. Nudge was sitting on the floor of Ella's room, flipping through a magazine my mom bought her. She looked up and smiled at me and Angel before going back to her reading. Angel hopped on to Ella's bed while I started to make mine.

"So we're leaving tonight for Washington?" she asked.

I sighed. "For the eighth time, yes, Angel. We're leaving after it gets dark to head for Washington."

"Okay."

"Why do you keep making me repeat myself?"

She shrugged innocently. "I don't know. Just making sure you have everything straight."

"Well, thanks for the concern. Nudge, I have a favor to ask."

"What's up?" she asked.

"I'm not exactly sure what's going on, but we're gonna have to do some research. Do you mind helping me out with the laptop later?"

"Sure, we can do it now, if you want."

"I'm not exactly sure what I want to look into yet, but I'll let you know."

"All right."

I nodded thankfully then looked to see Angel still looking at me with a small smile on her face. The "I'm just bidding my time until I need to ask you an Earth-shattering question" smile.

"What?" I said. "What is it already?"