Iggy's POV

"Fang, shut up! I hear something!" and sure enough I did. The cry sounded just like Arseny's. So unless they'd already cloned him, he was near. I wasn't so sure about Sage, but I knew exactly where my son was.

"We gotta go down now. I think I hear Arseny crying down there. Is there a window were could fly through?" I asked.

"Yea, but what if he's a clone? What if he's crying cause…?" Fang's voice broke on the last sentence. But didn't he know I'd already thought of that? I knew that there was a big chance that he wouldn't be the real Arseny, or that he was already dead, but I had to try. I'd be letting down Sage if I didn't try.

"Fang, I thought of that, okay? Just trust me on this one."

With that, we landed and Fang managed to open a window. The noise was overwhelming. Screeches, screams, howls, shrieks, and wails filled my sensitive ears. There was one sound above all though, Arseny crying. I let myself drop from the window, hoping the fall wasn't that long. Good thing it was only six feet or so, because the floor was linoleum. I heard Fang fall a couple seconds after myself.

Making my way over to the cage by using only sound, I found them.

"Iggy? Is that you? Please tell me it's you and not some psycho clone! Oh my God you came I knew you would!" said Sage. She was crying, her voice was cracked a bit and she sounded exhausted. I worked fast, picking the lock on her cage. We needed to get out, and fast before the white coats made it here. I knew there was a security camera somewhere in the room, and if there wasn't then I was dreaming.

"Can you fly?" I asked when I'd managed to open her cage.

"Um, I guess. They didn't do anything to me. At least nothing I know about."

"Okay, well I hate to break this up, but we need to get out of here, like, now! There are probably Erasers and everyone else after us by now!" said Fang.

I heard Fang take a running start, and then he was in the air. I let Sage go next, and then I grabbed Arseny out of his cage and we went last. It felt great to be out of there. Whether I was in a cage or not, I felt weird in that place. Once in the air, Arseny stopped crying. I held him and his complete twenty pounds tight, careful not to drop him. We flew home in silence. No words could ever express what I felt, Arseny couldn't talk, Sage probably wasn't up for show and tell, and we all know Fang isn't a big talker.

Sage's POV

After flying home, I collapsed on the bed. Arseny was sleeping and I wouldn't even bother to wake him for food or anything. He had a treacherous day. His face was scratched and his shirt was bloodstained and ripped. There were bruises all over him, and a few feathers on his wings were missing.

"Iggy, why is life like this? I made a promise to him that when he was born that nothing would ever happen. No white coats, no Schools or Itex or Institutes." I was crying again. Few things made me cry. Guess I just had a rough day, with all the kidnapping and such. I just needed to rest. I laid down on my stomach, and Iggy was stroking my hair.

"We can't help it. It's just something that we're gonna have to deal with. I'm sorry this happened to you," he said trying to console me.

"Oh, hey Max," he said apprehensively.

Uh oh. The way he said that meant that he either set off another bomb, or something was wrong.

Arseny stirred on the bed and opened his tiny blue eyes, yawning. He went to stretch his arms out, but winced when he did. He probably had a pulled muscle or something. I picked him up and walked out of our room where Max and Iggy were talking. Their conversation could possibly be about me and the little School kidnapping incident. I decided to take Arseny to the bathroom because one, I wanted to see what they did to him, and two, he needed a bath. I opened the bathroom door, and sat him on the counter.

"Let's inspect the damage," I said while taking off his ripped, bloody clothes and tossing them into the trash.

His whole torso was bruised in various places and he had a massive cut that extended diagonally from his shoulder to just under his bellybutton. It wasn't deep, but it'd need medical attention. He watched me as I walked over to the medicine cabinet and pulled out a bottle of peroxide, bandages, and a tube of Neosporin. He flinched when I dabbed a cotton ball saturated with peroxide on his wounds, and cried when I accidently touched a bruise.

"I'm sorry hun, I know it hurts but soon it'll be all over," I told him.

Leaving him on the counter, I went over to the tub and ran some warm water. I added bubble bath so that Arseny would be more willing to get in. for the weirdest reason, he would almost never get in without a fight. There was a knock at the door.

"Can I come in?" it was Max.

"Sure," I answered.

She came in and watched me struggle to put Arseny into the tub. He was screaming, kicking, and scratching. He was in after a couple minutes of this, but I was soaking wet. Max was giggling behind me. How about she tries doing this? Arseny was no problem in the water, because he had a rubber duck and other stuff. I picked up the shampoo and put a quarter sized amount on the top of his head.

"You know, what just happened with Arseny not wanting to be in the tub? Well, when Jeb rescued us Fang was the same way. He and Jeb would be in there, fighting. It was kind of funny. And then when Jeb left he stopped taking showers because he said there was no one to make him. Until I made him."

We both laughed at that last sentence. I finished washing Arseny's hair and it was time to move onto his body. This would be hard; I didn't wanna hurt him or something. To make him less nervous, I picked up his favorite clown fish wash cloth and started with his face. You should've seen how dirty he was. Fortunately I got him completely washed and he didn't cry. Max saw how he was all bruised and stuff, so she held his hand when I did his torso.

"So, I know what happened," she said after I had put another diaper on Arseny and was working on his SpongeBob Squarepants footie pajamas.