Journal NOT a Diary!
Max's Journal
October 16, 2010
I've been calling and calling on the iPhone Mom gave me until the full battery went dead (Apparently, that doesn't take many), with no answer. Or even a voice mail. Either Mom or Ella lost their phones, or something happened to them. I kept hoping it was the first one.
"No use?" Fang asked, looking up at me. He was sitting under a tree, iPod earphones plugging his ears. (I bet that iPod was about to go dead, too. Wow, Apple needs to invent a way to preserve battery.) He seemed a lot more chilled then me, considering all our loved ones were probably dead.
I sighed and tossed the phone in his backpack. "Nope. Mom and Ella never let their phones die, but I didn't even get a 'This person has not set a voicemail' in that stupid flat female's voice." Suddenly a thought hit me. "Fang, you said that we were going to leave and Mom was going to die. You didn't see why, did you?"
"I saw parts of it. But when we left, all the flock was watching us go." He paused, frowning. "They didn't look tired or beat up. My visions always come true."
"There's a first time for everything. And hopefully this is it." I sat beside him against the tree trunk.
He sighed and pulled out the earphones. "All we can do is look for them. Either we'll find them, or they'll find us."
"You know, no one is probably at that hospital except a clean-up crew." His head turned and he met my eyes. I knew we were both thinking the same thing: If they died, they would be in the hospital. Unless their bodies were moved, and then they would be trying to figure out who it was. They wouldn't mind us checking.
Not twenty minutes later, we were back in the air, flying the hospital. I was secretly wishing I could turn around and fly the other way.
Yeah, I might be this big, tough girl, but when it comes to my flock, I'm a wimpy ballet dancer.
Cop cars surrounded the building with yellow DO NOT CROSS tape around the perimeter of the building. Ambulances sat outside for anyone lucky enough to survive the shooting, even if they had critical wounds. Family members and friends stood around, talking to medics and police, or watching the building through tears. Airlift helicopters flew around the top of the building, ready to touch down at a seconds notice. There were already bodies being pulled from the building.
We touched down in the woods and walked into the parking lot, pushing threw crowds of people. I stopped in front of an officer.
"We, um, escaped," I told him. We had changed out of those horrid hospital gowns as soon as we could. "I think some of our family was in the hospital during the shooting."
He frowned, but nodded. He pulled out a clip board and took out a pen. "Were they patients?"
"No, they were visiting us. I don't know if they got out or not, we weren't going to stick around to check."
He nodded and flipped the paper on the clipboard. It was covered in names. "What are their names, and what were they wearing?"
"Um, my mom is Dr. Martinez," I waited as he scribbled on his clipboard. "She had on a blue V-neck T-shirt and blue jeans. She has brown hair and brown eyes." He scribbled my words on his notes. "Angel was wearing a pink John Deere shirt and green capri pants. She has curly blond hair and pretty eyes, age seven."
"Is that all?"
"No," Fang said. "We don't know what the others were wearing. Iggy probably has -"
I drowned out his voice. I was focusing on a girl that was being pulled into an ambulance on a stretcher. She had mocha skin and frizzy brown hair. Her necklace had been pulled to the side of her neck, the silver covered in red blood, that was a silver chain with a N between two flowers...
I knew the necklace. Nudge had begged for it last time we were in WalMart, and lets just say I... got a discount price.
My feet were moving while I was thinking, and I was beside the ambulance before I even finished my flashback. "I think I know her," I whispered to the paramedic, stopping the door from closing and pushing past him. He didn't object when I jumped into the back of the ambulance.
"Max," she whispered when I came into view. Her long, slender, blood-covered fingers reached for me. I grabbed her hand and squeezed it as I keeled beside her.
"Nudge, I'll be here," I said, sitting in the floor. I wasn't planning to move anytime soon. I would ride in the ambulance as she rode from one hospital to another. Her grip didn't loosen. "Do you know what happened to the others?"
"Angel escaped," she said. "He shot me before I could follow her. Dr. M and Ella are with her. I don't know what happened to Iggy and Gazzy... Is Fang with you?"
I nodded, praying that Angel, Mom, and Ella got away. I thought about finding Celeste in the middle of the road. She couldn't have been flying in Mom and Ella were with her, she wouldn't have been strong enough to lift both of them. Ha, she's not even strong enough to fly with Ella.
"Max?" Fang stepped on the back of the ambulance and pulled himself up. "The police is looking for the others. You found Nudge..."
Her eyes lifted to meet his. "Don't leave, Fang!"
"I won't," he said. He looked at me. "The police chief will call us if they think they found the flock."
The doors banged to a shut behind us and a paramedic stepped up and started fiddling with equipment. How do they know what all that stuff does?
Two hours later we got to a hospital across town. Nudge was taken to the emergency section as Fang and I waited for the chief's call. My heart pumped as I thought about Mom and Ella. They always answered their phones, but they didn't today...
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