Chapter 6: The Holidays Are Over

Max POV

About a week and a half had passed since we left School. We were in a forest about a mile west of a town called Montgomery. The School was only a 30 minute flight from here. I didn't feel safe being so close, but I knew we would have to go back sooner or later for Emily. I had promised Will, we would soon.

He had asked me first thing, each morning, for the last 5 days when we were going back. Each time my reply was "Not yet." I had been spending a fair amount of time with Will, learning more about him. He told me about when he had hit Ari, the power surging through him, the anger, how he had never felt anything like it. I guessed it was some sort of power. I told him how the rest of us had some sort of power. How Gazzy could mimic almost anyone's voice perfectly, how Nudge could find anything on a computer in an instant, how Iggy could recognise almost anything by touch or sound, how Angel could read and control minds as well as breathe underwater and how I could fly at almost supersonic speeds. He asked about Fang, what powers he had. I told him Fang didn't have any extra powers yet, or at least he hadn't told us about it if he had one.

I liked talking to Will. I very rarely got a break from being leader these days. He didn't see himself as part of the flock, and although he respected my authority over the group. I think he was only staying because he knew he needed us to get Emily back and get home. He was his own leader. It was nice I had one less person to worry about.

Will was spending a lot of time with Iggy. I asked what they were doing, but they always changed the subject whenever I asked them.

I was sitting by the campfire, with Angel and Nudge. It was dark and Gazzy and Fang were asleep and Will and Iggy were off somewhere again. I had thought about following them, but whatever they were doing was between them. I didn't want to intrude.

Nudge and Angel were talking. "You know what I want to be when I'm older?" Nudge asked Angel.

"What?" Angel replied, yawning.

"An actress!" She exclaimed happily. "It would be so cool to have people know who you were, noticing you as you passed, and not because I had wings, because I was in films and they respected and admired me for it. The good kind of noticing." Typical Nudge. Everyday it was something different. A doctor, a mechanic, a teacher. It never stopped. Nudge continued to talk on, not noticing that Angel had fallen asleep.

I heard a rustling to my left. I looked over and saw Iggy and Will walking out of the forest. I got up and walked over to them. "I know it's pointless my asking, but what are you two doing out there?" I moaned.

Will just ignored me and said sternfully. "When are we going back for Emily?"

"I told you when we are ready. Most of us don't want to leave yet. I know we made a promise, but the flocks well being comes first. You can't go on your own. You can't even fly! You'll never get in!" I said. I was too tired for this conversation.

"Well maybe you're not ready but I am. Iggy has been teaching me to fly and I know which direction it is. I can go with or without you." He looked at me forcefully.

"And when he goes I'm going to go with him." said Iggy. I looked at him, surprised. "He can't go alone. Someone has to go with him, besides, it was my fault, I have to help him get her back, and anyway I can."

"And me!" piped in Nudge, who seemed to have been listening in. "Someone will need to be on lookout and there might be a computer or two I can hack. Dig up some stuff. Beside's you did promise him. You can't keep delaying it." All 3 of them were looking at me, even Iggy. They were going whether I liked it or not. I had to give in.

"Fine," I sighed. "But only the four of us, well leave a note or get Angel to tell them in the before we leave. We'll go in the morning."

Will smiled at me and said "Thanks."

"Right then, bed!" I ordered. "Looks like we are going to have a long day ahead of us!"

Fang POV

I was cold. Extremely cold. There was ice, everywhere. Darkness and ice. There was a rock on the floor. I picked it up and it froze in my hands. It dropped it and it shattered into a million pieces. It was so cold. I heard wing beats. Someone was flying.

I opened my eyes to see the fire, now just a few smouldering ashes. I looked up and saw 4 of the flock taking off. Make that 3. Will was one of them taking off. I got up and ran over to them. "Max!" I called after them, careful not to wake Angel and Gazzy, who were still sleeping. "Where are you going?"

She had already taken off, but flew back, hovering 5 feet in front of me. "We're going back to the school. We're going to try to find Emily." She said calmly.

"Oh, ok hold up, I'll get my shoes on and come with" I said.

"No." She said quickly. "Just us four. We want to get in and out without being seen. 5 would be too many." I began to protest when she dealt the final blow. "And besides, someone has to stay behind with Angel and Gazzy." I was about to suggest that Iggy stay behind but she had already started to fly after them. "We'll be back in a few hours hopefully!" She called back.

"Ok then." I sighed. I walked back over to the fire. Angel and Gazzy had woken up. They had been watching me talking to Max.

"Have they gone back for Emily?" Gazzy asked. I just nodded, and continued to walk past them.

"Well what do we do then?" called Angel.

"Get firewood, start a fire. I'm going to find us some breakfast." I called back as I walked through the tree line. We had the camp set up in a small clearing in the middle of the woods. There was a small stream that Angel had found whilst exploring, not far off, and a small town about a mile away. The leaves of the trees were blossoming already, a lot earlier than usual. I suspected it was something The School had done to the local area.

I couldn't figure out why would Max leave us alone? What if the Erasers came for us when we were gone? I was being picky though, I knew they wouldn't. We hadn't seen them in over a week. Something was up. Why were they not coming after us? Why leave us alone? We escaped, killed a fair few of their men, and they were just leaving us alone? Something didn't add up.

I was returning to camp triumphant. I had caught 3 rabbits. It may have taken a few hours longer than planned, but cooking your own meals was always more satisfying than the canned food we had bought from the shop in town. I was wondering if Angel and Gazzy were alright. I hadn't heard anything and I never stayed out of shouting distance from the clearing. I'm sure they would be.

I was coming up to the campsite. I could see the flickers of a fire through the trunks of the trees. As I got closer I saw that there were more than two people there. It seemed that Max and the others had arrived back. I was too far away to hear what they were talking about, but I saw Will get up and walk off. He looked angry. I didn't want to alert them to my presence but I wanted to hear what they were saying, so, with the rabbits still in my hand, I crept closer.

Will POV

We had arrived at the school with relatively no trouble. We flew in over the clouds, and onto the roof. Max had said to expect Erasers but there were none. There were only two human guards who didn't even see us, before we crept up behind them and knocked them out. We took some rope out the packs we had bought with us, and bound and gagged them. We also took their walkie talkies, and got Nudge to change the frequency, making sure so that they wouldn't be picked up by anyone inside.

We went down through a vent on the roof and, making sure there was no-one there, dropped down into a corridor. We walked down the corridor, being quiet to make sure no-one was alerted to our presence. Once again there was no-one at all around. Not even any whitecoats. This was weird.

We were walking around for about 20 minutes when we came across a familiar site. The walls were charred and black; there were blood stains on the walls and floors, large cracks in the walls around us. The same as we had left it, except for the bodies, which had thankfully been removed. This was where Gazzy had set off the bomb.

"Right, we know where we are," Said Max. "Now we just need to figure out where we are going."

"I think I remember seeing a records room when we were running." said Nudge. "Perhaps we should try there?"

"Lead the way." Max said to Nudge, smiling. Max had an amazing smile, so full of hope, reassurance and, beauty. We walked down the corridors for about 5 minutes, when Nudge stopped at an intersection of corridors. One leading left, the other right. She looked lost. "You do know which way to go don't you Nudge?" asked Max, frowning.

"I know after this it will be the 1st left, second right, second left, and it will be somewhere down that corridor, but I'm not sure which way now." She said, looking worried. "Should we split up?" she asked, looking round at Max.

"I suppose we'll have to." Max said sighing. "You and Iggy take the left," she said looking at me. "Nudge and I will take the right. Remember, 1st left, second right, second left."

"Righto." I said. She started to go down the corridor when, without thinking I said, "Be careful Max." She looked at me and frowned and smiled at the same time.

"I will" she sounded slightly confused. "Why? Are you worried about me?"

"So what if I am." I said back, smiling. It was like my brain had gone blank and my mouth was on auto-pilot. Why did I say that? Iggy and I walked off, with Max and Nudge going the other way.

Once we were out of earshot of them Iggy said, laughing lightly "What was that?"

"I don't know. What was what?" I said confused.

"That!" said Iggy, pointing back down the corridor. "Back there! Do you like Max or something?"

"Maybe. I don't know." I pondered to myself. "Right now, all I can worry about is Emily." "Well either way, if you do, it's fine by me, and probably Angel, Nudge and Gazzy too, but you'll have a tough time with Fang. He doesn't trust you." remarked Iggy.

"Look, at the moment, all I want to do is find Emily, Ok? I can't think about anything else." I exclaimed. I wondered whether I was trying to convince him or myself.

We were silent after that. I quite liked Iggy. Over the last week, he had helped me a lot with my flying. We'd become friends. It was interesting how he still managed to do everyday things, even though he was blind, sometimes better than people who could see.

Everyday, he managed to cook amazing meals, spike his scarlet red hair in the exact same way each day, managed to shave the stubble off his chin without once cutting himself. If it wasn't for his white, glazed over eyes, you wouldn't have thought he was blind. He was the best 'lookout' out of all of us, as he could hear what was coming ages before we could see it. A cockroach couldn't get within 50 meters of him without him knowing when he was concentrating.

We were arriving at the last left when Max's voice came through on the walkie talkie. "Hey guys, we found it."

Iggy held up the walkie talkie to his mouth and whispered "Ok, we're on our way." We turned round and started to jog back.

"Well that was a pointless little trek we just did there." I laughed.

We had one corner left to turn when Iggy put his hand in front of me. "Wha-" I began but he cut me off with a shush and put his finger to his lips. He pointed round the corner and put his finger to his ear. "What, can you hear someone?" I whispered as quietly as I could. He nodded.

I poked my head round the corner and saw a large hairy figure up against the wall, slowly creeping down the corridor; coming up for a room which I could see said Records.

"Ari." I whispered to Iggy. I looked around for a weapon, and, seeing a fire extinguisher on the wall opposite, picked it up. "Stay here." I said as quietly as I could to him. I crept round the corner and started to slide along the wall. Ari had reached the door and now, he kicked it open violently. "Well, what do we have here?" he began. "Looks like some birds have been-" but before he had time to finish the sentence, I had crept up behind him and held the fire extinguisher behind my head. "Not today Wolfy", I thought to myself and then pulled the extinguisher over my head and let go.

It hit him with a crack, and he fell to the floor. I looked down at him and then through the door to see Nudge and Max looking at me shocked.

"Looks like we came just in time!" I laughed.