A Few Days Later, When the Flock Has Almost Arrived at Their Destination…
"Ma-ax…" Nudge began. Oh dear, here comes the Nudge Channel, as dubbed by Max herself, "I'm hungry. When are we going to get there? Do you think your Mom'll have food for us?"
"I don't know, Nudge."
"But I'm hungry!"
"…So you've said…"
Then Gazzy piped up, "I'm hungry too!"
"And me!"
Angel has joined the bandwagon. To avoid the incoming babble traffic, I angled my wings downward, away from the now annoyed Max.
Peering into the distance, I could see a city on the horizon. Miami.
"Miami ahoy!" I yelled, leading the way very enthusiastically. I was hungry too, but I don't think having a bitten-off head would help me so... no telling Max…
"YES! Finally!" Max shouted. I think she was relieved to keep the younger kids from harassing her anymore.
Everyone picked up the pace, energy somewhat renewed at the sight of their destination.
As if he read my mind, Gazzy imitated a GPS. His power is one of the stranger ones of the flock, even compared to Iggy feeling colors. "Go straight for 50 miles. Then go down at the building." He paused. "Ma-ax…"
"WHAT?!"
"Uh, do you know where exactly we're supposed to be meeting your mom?"
Well, this threw a wrench into the plan. "Well, we can always wing it!" I called cheerfully.
Iggy laughed, then replied, "Yes, wandering around the streets in Miami is going to help our cause how exactly?"
"Uh…"
"Course, we've always had such good times in Miami."
What in the world was he talking about?
Soon, we arrived at our destination, as Gazzy proclaimed in his GPS voice. Unfortunately, we still had no idea of where to go.
"Max? You don't happen to have a cell phone to call your mom with, do you?" Angel asked.
"Hold on, lemme check…" Max rummaged through her backpack, before coming up with her hand full of… thin air.
"There goes that plan," Fang remarked.
"Like I said earlier, we could wing it!" I suggested again.
They ignored me.
"Angel? Do you think you can help?" Max asked.
"Oh! I can read people's minds and see if they saw Dr. Martinez, and where she was going."
"Yep."
Awww… No fun of wandering around aimlessly?
We were, actually, wandering around aimlessly, except for Angel, who probed every passing person's mind for sightings of Dr. Martinez. I happily bounced around, cheerful as usual, or at least away from high amounts of tension.
As I walked amongst the flock and crowd, I realized that this might be one of my favorite places. The sun beat down warm, and it was cloudless in the sky. Perfect weather for a nap.
I longed to leap into the great blue sky, to spread my wings and let them shine gold in the sun! That would be a sight to see.
My thoughts of playing with the sunlight were interrupted by Angel. Her brow furrowed, then she said, "I found them! They're over there!" She pointed to a tall building, a boring tan color, with lots of palm trees around it.
"I don't see them."
Angel whacked me, "She's inside the 'boring tan building'. Of course you can't see them!"
"Then why did you say that?"
"Because-"
Max intervened, saying, "Guys, calm down. It's not worth it. Seriously."
Eventually we made our way over to the building. We pushed aside the doors, and saw a lady with brown hair typing something at the front desk. Aside from the occasional other person, the building was empty.
Max made her way towards the lady, all leaderly like, with Fang following. The rest of the flock fell into step on the side and behind her. It reminded me of a wolf pack. Max was the Alpha, Fang was obviously the Beta, then the rest of the kids as normal pack members. Wait, where did this put me?
"Hey. We're here to see Dr. Martinez," Max said. When the lady gave her a questioning look she replied, "I'm her daughter. Maximum Ride. Maybe you've heard of me?"
Aaaand there goes her nice, subtleness. Max was getting cranky. I think she was hungry too.
The lady looked puzzled for a moment, then her face cleared up. "Oh. Okay, take a seat, I'll phone up to her conference. It'll be a minute."
So we all went to a couch on the side of the room. And waited. And waited. And waited some more.
"It's been a minute," I hissed, irritated. The lady was still talking on the phone! How long did it take to phone a conference room and tell 'em we're coming!?
"Relax, Spark," Fang replied, not bothering to move from his position.
"Miss Impatient…" Gazzy muttered.
We waited. AGAIN. Suddenly Max looked up, straight at me. "Keep your ears and tail hidden, okay? Like you have them now. Other than Mom, they haven't seen you yet, or even heard of you."
She paused, then continued, "And no shape-shifting. They'd freak out more than necessary. Even my mom's not seen it."
Then, thank goodness, I heard the lady say "Okay, thanks," and hang up the phone. She looked at our group and called, "Okay, they told me to send you on up. They're in Conference Room 7. It's on Floor 8. You can take the elevator."
Max led the flock over to a pair of metal doors that had a few buttons on it. (AN; Now remember, Spark has lived most of her life in a cage. Then she spent nine and a half months in the wild. She is not familiar with a few things such as elevators.) I watched in fascination as Max pressed one and it glowed. The doors slid open with a soft ding.
She stepped inside, and the rest of the flock followed suit. Even me.
Inside, it was very small. It had a rough carpeted floor, light cream walls, and on the same wall as the doors, a large panel. Filled with buttons!
Max pressed a button that said '8' on it. The doors slid closed with another ding. Then we began to rise.
Whoa. I turned to Max. "So… This is an elevator?"
She gave me a very strange look. "…Yes…"
"It's slow."
"I know."
"Why don't we just fly up?"
"The other people will get freaked out."
"But it's faster!"
"…" Max dropped her head into her hands with exasperation. The rest of the flock was trying to suppress giggles.
Suddenly, the floor jolted to a stop. I nearly lost my balance, cause I wasn't expecting it. The doors slid open with yet another ding, and it revealed a hallway. We all stepped out, and Max set off purposefully towards a door labeled 'Conference Room 7'.
She pushed the door open, and made her way inside, a couple of greetings announcing her arrival. The rest of the flock followed again. I went through the doorway and came face-to-face with a large room, again painted with cream, with a giant, ebony colored wooden table in the center. Many chairs were pushed around it, all the spinny kind, I noted with pleasure.
Most of the chairs had people in them. All adults, except for Ella who sat in a dark chair next to her mom.
A man stood up from his place at the head of the table and came to greet us. "Max, how nice to see you again."
He looked at the rest of the flock, smiling, until he came to me.
Uh-oh.
Confusion spread across his face. "Uh, Max? Who is this?"
Max gestured towards me. "This is our newest flock member," she said, "This is Spark."