Thunder: Back Through the Rain – Chapter 21
By MyNameIsCAL
---Max's POV---
There was no hiding that the bullet had done a lot of damage to me. But it was healing, of course better than the doctors thought, but not fast enough for me or the flock. We couldn't spend another day in here. Fang was here the most, Iggy always visited with Ella now after school, Gazzy would come by himself most of the time after dinner, and whenever Mom came, Angel and Nudge tagged along. They made it bearable to be there along with the news and seeing how Itex was being brought down.
Today started like any other day. Fang was already there waiting for me to wake up, looking tired and exhausted, but always giving me a smile as I woke. And then, the door burst open.
"We need to talk to you." It was that FBI agent again along with the one that had showed up at the house.
Fang stood, gripping his crutches. "Hey, she just woke up."
"Yeah, well we need to talk to you too." And the FBI agent from yesterday dragged Fang out of the room.
"You're going to hurt him!" I protested.
Fang had lost grip of both of his crutches, his bad leg was dragged as he struggled to keep up with the agent. And then Fang's other leg slipped, sending his bad leg twisting beneath him. He let out a scream of pain.
And that's when the other agent spoke up. "Hey, Jesus, John, what the hell are you doing?"
The other agent stopped and let go of Fang. He slouched to the floor, breathing heavily.
"I don't know, Jimmy, I was just doing what you told me to do," John muttered.
Jimmy rolled his eyes. "Don't screw this up for me. This is gonna make our careers."
I cleared my throat. "Whatever you have to ask, you can ask both of us."
Jimmy straightened up. "I'm sorry, I really am."
"Yeah, you're just doing your job," I muttered.
He looked ashamed and pulled out his questions, asking all of them calmly and waiting patiently for Fang and me to tell our story.
---Fang's POV---
We found out from the agents that they caught sight of Marian Janssen, but she fled, killing five of their agents. She was dangerous and armed by some genetically altered body guards. The agents left without asking me if I needed help getting up. It made me angry, but I wasn't going to waste time over it.
After they left, I dragged myself to the chair next to Max's bed, using my crutches to get up, I sat down, sweating and out of breath.
"Are you ok?" Max sounded worried.
"I'm fine," I insisted.
She knew I was lying. "You better have Mom check that out."
"Of course," I said, trying to smile.
"Fang, maybe you should call Mom," she said, reaching for my head.
"Nah, I'm fine, really." But the pain felt like it was building now that I was sitting.
She squeezed my hand. "Fang, look down."
I'd never seen my leg twisted like that before. I almost passed out.
---Iggy's POV---
Fang asked me to stay with Max as Mom whisked him off to her office again to get his leg checked out. Mom may not have been a people doctor, but she knew enough to keep us out of the hospital. If only she knew how to treat severe bullet wounds.
"Fang gave Mom the business card the agent gave to you the other day," I informed Max. "She's going to call him up. Fang isn't too happy either. Actually, he's pretty pissed off by the way he sounds."
"I bet," she said, turning the TV off as a food commercial came on.
"You still can't eat, huh," I said.
She sighed. "Nope. Not until everything is all done healing. Besides, as much as I want to eat food, I'm sure it would only hurt."
"I guess so," I agreed.
"So how are things at home?" Max was trying to fill our awkwardness.
"They're ok," I told her. "Ella is busy with school, Gazzy has been watching a lot of TV, Nudge and Angel fight over the computer, Mom seems to be handling everything very well, and Fang spends a lot of time arguing with Mom about his leg."
"Arguing?"
"Well, she didn't want him to put any weight on it. But that would prevent him from seeing you often," I explained.
"And how are you?" Max asked after a while of thinking.
"I'm good." She waited for me to continue, so I started to talk again. "And when I'm not here, you would probably guess that I'm with Ella and you'd be right. Everyone would really just like to have you home."
Max laughed. "Really?"
"Yes, really," I responded. "Especially Fang."
---Max's POV---
I woke up to see Fang waiting, as always. He smiled, immediately, looking more tired than ever. To my surprise, he's not in a wheelchair. I was almost positive Mom would force him to use it after yesterday.
"Good morning," he whispered, brushing the hair out of my face.
"Hey," I smiled back. "How's your leg?"
He shrugged. "Well, it sorta got dislocated. I mean Mom got everything back into place and it's bandaged and we got a brace for it. I'm not really supposed to be here. In fact, I'm supposed to be using the wheelchair, but Mom went to work, so I came anyway."
I winced as I sat up a little. "You're going to hurt yourself."
"Well," Fang began, taking my hand. "I didn't think you'd want to wake up alone."
Thanks for reading!