Summary: What if Max and the Flock had never gotten "the talk"? What is the outcome of an adolescence without an adult and knowledge of societal norms?
Chapter Six: Relaxation
I ducked down two feet and reached over, tapping Gazzy on his shoulder. When he turned around, I quickly flew past him on his opposite side. He looked around confusedly for about two minutes, while I snickered loudly far off in the distance.
After the morning showers, the weather seemed absolutely beautiful—just cloudy enough for me to officially allow the flock to fly past the cliffs.
The feeling was incredible. Definitely, flying was incredible. I relished in the feeling of my wingspan stretching and flexing, I could feel my trained muscles taut and tight against the soft downy feathers on the tips of my wings. I savored the feeling of wind flying out onto my face as I cut through it like a knife on butter. .
Sometimes, just sometimes, it feels like living in a cage for the first 10 years of life is an easy trade for being able to experience an incredible feeling like this.
I closed my eyes and lifted my arms out to my sides, slowing down a bit to revel in all of the world's glory. (No wonder the flocks' got such superiority complexes in comparison to normal people..).
A quiet whisp sounded above me, to my right. I looked up, squinting against the sunlight, and saw a figure clad in black coasting about.
Fang flew around me in a tilted circle, with an irregular axis—first he swooped down a few hundred feet below me, and then he charged up, coasting over me, and then swooped back down again, coming back up to the same spot he was in relation to me.
I felt good. Flying in beautiful weather always made me feel good. Thats probably why I started laughing and smiling drunkenly. I flew a similar irregular circle around him, however, my axis was superlatively more oblong—like I said, I was definitely not the technical flyer of the flock.
"What is that, a trapazoid, or a plane crash?" Fang called out to me, smirking, as I came back up to my original disposition.
I would've normally gotten uptight about that comment, but I just stuck my tongue out at him. See, that's not so bad. It's not insanely embarrassing. Its just the whole wiggling-it-at-him business I regret. But secretly, that grin made my heart flutter a bit on the inside. I resented the dumb feeling in the pit of my gut, but I couldn't help blushing madly. Dumb things like these cause me to do dumb things like wiggle my tongue at him.
Fang made a face.. like he was trying devastatingly hard not to burst out laughing. I gave him a snide ugly grin, and then went up 400 feet or so. He followed me. We were above a whole new layer of clouds. He was flying to my right, at the same pace, about 2 feet behind me probably. He was, of course, a lot more quieter and suave than myself though. It would usually have irritated me, but I was in too much of a good mood this afternoon. We soared through the sky, and at some point Nudge and Angel had found us, and we took the flight together, high above the Colorodo Mountains and town.
Angel was talking about puppies, or something, with Nudge, and Nudge was talking about those little clothes they have for puppies. I never got the point of that. Dogs had fur for a reason.. and if they couldn't make clothes for themselves with their own hands, they obviously were not meant to have them. Fang was being... Fang. I looked over at him. His eyes were closed, his face looking more relaxed than I'd seen it.. ever. Ever since I've known him, since our cages were placed next to eachothers' at The School, where we were engineered, he'd always had a serious look on his face, always tense, alert. It was when we flew, for enjoyment.., that was when he looked truly.. happy.
He opened his eyes suddenly and stared at me staring at him. I blushed profusely and quickly snapped my head back. In fact, I may have snapped it back too quickly. Ouch.
"I'm Hungry," Nudge said. Like I haven't heard that before.. Maybe the 600th time this week? Naw, 601st, to be accurate. I sighed. It was a nice flight, but all good things must come to an end. Its a part of life.
"Okay honey. Let's go down to the picnic baskets then. Letsee what Iggy packed for us," I said to her, smiling genuinely. Man, I sure seemed to be in a really good mood today..
"Yay!!" Nudge exclaimed, wooting. "He made tuna sandwiches and egg salad and french toast and bread and cranberry jam and raspberries, you know, I don't get why blueberries aren't even like blue, cause they're like totally purple, but its okay cause purple is so much prettier anyway.." she began ranting.
"Yeah, it's really yummy, we helped pack all of it!" Angel cut in.
"Sounds good," Fang said to them with a tiny, microscopic, minuscule smile planted on his face. But it was definitely there, and we all knew it. But then again, who couldn't help but smile at those two adorable little girls?
The four of us, in V-formation, turned in a graceful semi-circle and began to head back.
Nudge and Angel landed in a rush, I watched Angel wobble a tiny bit on the ground. They raced up the grassy lawn to the blanket Iggy had lain out, their childish laughter filling the air. Fang and I landed shortly after they did, watching them from behind, walking the uphill slope in slow and steady pace.
"This is nice." I said suddenly, stretching my arms high above my head. Fang was walking just behind me—I could feel his presence looming over me, just behind my right ear.
"Yeah.. it really is," he said.
"They're so happy like this," I commented.
"This is what we were meant to do Max.. We were meant to fly." he said confidently. It almost made me feel guilty for not letting the flock fly past the cliffs normally. Almost.
"We can't risk getting sighted, Fang," I said seriously. "You know as well as I do how much I love seeing them like this.. But they're not old enough.. not careful enough."
"I was Nudge's age when I first went to the supermarket, Max." he responded.
I spun around and sat down on the grass where I had been standing. My back was to the flock, meters away. I rubbed my forehead, leaning my head on my hand. For some strange reason the sunlight I had been relishing in previously, seemed to be charging down onto me relentlessly now, giving me a throbbing headache.
"That's different Fang.. Do you think I would let you to go into town if I didn't need to? You first went down into town cause Jeb was training you, Fang. That was just once when you were her age. Now we know that everything matches up, we know that he was planning on leaving us." I said to him, massaging my forehead. Why was he trying to pick a fight?
"They have a right to know what its like out there, Max.." he said to me seriously. "Why don't you come with me next time? Theres so much out there Max, its unbelievable.. it's incredible. We can't live our whole lives cooped up in a house, isolated from the world that we live in, Max. There's too much we're missing." He sat down next to me, leaning in towards my side and speaking close to my ear in a low, gruff voice. I shivered in the warm weather.
I'd been past the cliffs countless times, but into town maybe just once. It was Fang who always did the shopping and groceries for supplies.
"Okay.. I'll think about it," I whispered. He was close enough to hear me.. speaking in a normal voice would've burst his eardrums.
"Then thats good," he whispered back into my ear. He got up from the grass and turned around, walking back to the picnic blanket. I sat there for a moment longer, and then followed him.
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"AHA I WIN!!" Gazzy shouted excitedly. His voice reverberated out over the hill.
"Down, Nudgie" he said to her cackling, an evil grin spread out onto his face.
She squealed, her face crumpling up in fear. She had lost their half-hour game of gruesome thumb wrestling. Squeezing her eyes shut tightly, she squatted down. Bending down behind her, Gazzy swung his arm back 180 degrees, and then swung it forward, hard, onto Nudge's behind. She squeaked loudly, falling forward into the cool grass with a soft "thump". She sat forward, crossing her legs and rubbing her posterior sadly. I'd imagine it to be red.
"I'll get you Gazzy!" she growled. She stood up and started chasing him around the vast green lawn in circles. Angel rolled her eyes, her facial expression frighteningly reminiscent of one of my own.
I leaned back on my arms propped up behind me. The cool shade of the tree I was lounging under on the picnic blanket was easing my headache away like a breath of fresh air. I sighed relaxedly, closing my eyes peacefully.
A thought just struck me. I immediately opened my eyes, searching the neat lawn with my expert-raptor vision. Where was Iggy? I started panicking, turning my head around frantically to search.
"He's by the creek, looking for a rock for a project he's planning." Angel interjected smoothly. It was like every sentence she said, she sung out. I would've lectured her for reading minds without permission for the third time today, but the day was too nice to pester her over such a seemingly small matter. At ease, I leaned back again, reveling in the short warm wind that blew my hair back past my face. I threw my head back, feeling very, very good. Angel was observing me, and then mimicked my actions, throwing her own head back. It felt like Jeb didn't even matter. We really, truly didn't need him. I felt so high, like I was on top of the world, even though I was still on the ground.
We watched Gazzy and Nudge come running back to the tree our blanket was under, Gazzy screaming "WHOO-HOO!" as he ran as fast as his wiry legs could take him, Nudge hot on his trail. He collapsed on the edges outside of the blanket, spreading his arms and legs wide on the cool green grass, staring up into the blue sky, breathing hard and laughing equally as hard in between his deep breaths. Nudge landed on her knees on the blanket two seconds later, her arms falling into my lap, her face flushed, the apples of her tanned cheeks stained a luscious shade of red. She was breathing hard too, but her anger that had been focused on Gazzy seemed to have dissipated, as the two of them joined together in breathless laughter, the remnants of their fierce adrenaline rush.
I couldn't help but laugh with them, but my laughter was more out of delight. It was good to see them like this.. to see them be the kids that they were underneath those wings. I felt a tear squeeze out of my right eye.. I didn't know why. I kept on laughing with them.. this was my flock, my beautiful, smart flock. And they were happy.
"But Max, you're a kid too. You're only thirteen," Angel said to me in my mind. I blinked soundly at her statement, and then chose to disregard it. I wasn't thirteen in my mind. In my mind, I was the leader of the flock. Age did not define who I was to be, I was not in a luxurious enough position to. We were not normal kids. But it was not their job to worry about us, it was mine. I blocked Angel out of my mind.
For the first time in a long time, I felt like a good leader. We didn't need Jeb. He could be rotting in heck right now. We didn't need him. We were fine. We were happy.
I heard a rustle up in the tree above us. I looked up to see a dark figure in the blue sky. It was Fang. Smiling up at him, I got up to join him. Gazzy got up too. With a running start, Gazzy lifted himself up into the air, his wings flapping solidly, supporting his weight. Looking up, I propelled myself forward and up, perfecting the formation—Fang on my right, the Gasman on my left. We flew together, up and over the clouds.. in Gazzy's unfortunate case, clumsily through them. He emerged wet and soggy, much to my amusement. Just when he'd begin to dry out in the sunlight, he'd smack right into another one. Adorable thing he is, really.
I looked behind me, checking on Fang—he had a relaxed expression on his face, his eyebrows furrowed—and Gazzy, who was looking down and squeezing the water out of shirt. Fang and I exchanged glances, and I had caught another one of his brief, heart-stopping smiles. My heart pounded for the next two minutes; I determinedly faced forward to hide my splotched red face.
Somewhere behind me, I suddenly heard a soft grunt. I looked to my right, and saw Fang wavering. His arms, usually strictly at his sides, was rubbing his neck instead and he was looking down instead of forward. He dropped in elevation to about 30 feet below us. My brows furrowed in confusion. I watched him expertly make a perfect angle and turn around, flying back. He was just probably heading back to the picnic blanket, I thought. I was enjoying the flight too much to be bothered to follow him.
The Gasman and I continued our flight for another 5 minutes, and then decided to head back to picnic blanket to eat berries. We both landed gracefully near the site, our faces flushed happily after a great flight.
We sat down and joined Angel and Nudge and Iggy, who had returned from the creek. I inspected Iggy carefully.. he was the most suspicious member of the flock.. And at the moment, he was definitely hiding something from me. I looked him up and down several times critically, but couldn't find anything wrong. He looked at me with a sheepish smile plastered on his face.
"Always suspect the blind guy, huh? This is subjugation man, SUBJUGATION, I want a lawyer!" he said to me with a loopy grin. To my own surprise, I suddenly burst out laughing and punched his arm playfully. The nice weather was definitely making me loopy.
Too bad I had overlooked the substantially large sedimentary rock ostentatiously jutting out of his back pocket..
I picked up a few raspberries from a bowl on the blanket that Angel, Gazzy and Nudge were sitting around, popping them into my mouth. I took off my shoes before I stepped onto the blanket, and sat down, stretching my legs. I watched my toes wiggle and smiled. My back was leaning against Iggy's, he was busy making a few more PB&J sandwiches. Whatever would we do without Iggy? A saint—a diabolical bomb-creating mess of a saint, but a food-making saint nonetheless, I thought.
I leaned my head back so that it rested flat on top of his shoulder, he was about 4 inches taller than me now, at 5'8. I turned my head on his shoulder to observe his pale jaw. His cheeks were spotted with light brown freckles, and his beautiful sightless blue eyes, unfocused. They were as unfocused as they were the day the whitecoats brought him back to his cage with stained gauze wrapped around his eyes when we were seven. The freckles sat on high cheekbones. His face was long and thin, much like his body, I thought worriedly. He should be eating more. I felt guilty—it was my own duty to make sure my flock members were healthy. Those growth spurts were hitting both him and Fang hard. For about four months, Iggy couldn't get through a sentence without having his voice break at least seven times. His voice was deeper now, about 4 pitches deeper than it had been a year ago. Still, it wasn't as deep as Fang's. I shivered at the recollection of his gruff voice in my ear this afternoon. If Fang's voice had ever been cracking, he sure as heck didn't speak enough during that time period for any of us to notice.
"Fang should've gotten back before Gazzy and I. Where is he now?" I asked Ig absentmindedly. My eyes were closed and I felt myself falling into a lull of sleep. Leaning against his back, my head resting on his shoulder, I was feeling quite comfortable.. in the mood for a nap, actually.. I thought drowsily. Gazzy and Angel were already napping peacefully on the blanket. Angel was curled up, neatly laying on her side, while Gazzy was on his back with his arms and legs widely splayed out. Nudge was sitting in front of Iggy with her legs crossed, eating the PB&J sandwich he had made and watching him make another one quietly. The only time she was ever quiet was when food was in her mouth. I sighed contentedly, enjoying the lulling silence.
"Hmm? Oh, he didn't come back. I thought I heard him fly past us," Iggy replied. That woke me up. I jolted up off of him and stood up immediately, causing Iggy to fall back onto the blanket unexpectedly. He called out in pain, rubbing a bump on his head. He had slammed into a rock that had been on the grass underneath the blanket. "OWW!! MAX," he said to me irritatedly.
"What direction did he go?" I demanded of him. His body was laid out flat on the ground and he was still rubbing a spot on his head. His head was between my feet and I was frowning intensely at him. It would've been a lot more significant if he could see it though. Fang hadn't come back to the picnic area? Where the heck did he go? It was more trouble than you'd understand, to be leader of this flock. Keeping track of Fang was one of the harder tasks in the job description.
Iggy was still grumbling, irritatingly neglecting to answer my question.
"I think I saw him flying that-a-way," Nudge said helpfully. She looked up and pointed Northeast out in the clear blue sky.
I rubbed my forehead again. I could feel that headache coming back on.
I sighed. "You guys stay here. I'll go find Fang. Don't wake up Angel or Gazzy, let them take a good rest, cause they're probably pooped. I'll be right back," I instructed them. "Iggy's in charge," I added in an afterthought before I walked away to take off. Northeast was the direction our house was in. Maybe Fang went back there, but why the hell would he do that?
As I lifted myself up and propelled myself forward, flying towards the direction of our house, I wondered if it had actually been a good idea to put Iggy in charge.. I was wondering whether or not I'd find the beautiful green lawn burnt to a crisp by the time I got back. I shook my head sadly at the thought, reaching up to rub my forehead again.
Thanks alot for the reviews guys! Though, I've gotten superlatively more alert subscriptions and favorited alot more than the amount of reviews I'm getting.. I wish more people would review, because then I can try and improve this stuff!
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