Chapter: 2
'It's just a warm up.'
Marian Janssen's words kept playing on her mind as she saw the erasers running towards her.
If this is a warm up, she thought bitterly as she started to struggle with the metal bands, then what the hell is the real test?
Max don't waste your time with the locks. The Voice informed his presence in her head.
Yeah? Then what do you want me to do? Die and be the erasers breakfast? She snapped.
Break the rod. He commanded.
Max thought about it. The locks were actually unbreakable, but the rod wasn't. So to her total dismay, she listened to him and started to give pressure on the rod. She saw the erasers coming closer, and the first one lunged at her. She turned her back to it and threw a round house kick which hit it perfectly on its jaw. The first one fell. And as the next two came, the rod broke and she started to circle it in her hands.
Well, bring it on…...
"Impressive." The Director said flatly as the three of them stood inside the glass cabinet watching Max fight with the erasers.
"It's unbelievable!" The scientist standing beside her chirped. "She is incredibly strong!"
"Hmm." The Director felt annoyed. The scientist was young, and chirpy. But she was very talented, the only reason why Marian had kept her in this experiment.
"Together" The Scientist continued. "They're going to make an amazing thing!"
"Don't rise up your hopes." She said coldly.
"Are you sure about this?" Omega asked, confusion poured out from his voice. He tried not to cringe when he saw an eraser's claw slashing Max's shoulder.
"Omega." Director soothed. "Obviously I'm sure about this." She put her hands on his shoulder and turned him towards her. "Think about it. If we can do this right, if she can do this right, an amazing thing is going to happen. An amazing chance is going to be born. And we won't get another chance like this." She stopped for a moment, her eyes piercing his. "Don't you understand this?"
Omega stared at her, and then he stopped himself from sighing. "I understand. I'm sorry that I was confused before."
The Director smiled, and then she pushed a button. "Let's stop them before she's hurt too bad."
After a few minutes, when all the erasers and all the bloody bodies were almost cleaned out, and when two erasers were shoving Max to walk, she looked at the place where Omega was now standing alone. Their eyes met through the glass wall. Her eyes would've shown hatred, but she was surprised when she saw that there wasn't any hatred in Omega's eyes. Instead, there was something else. Something that was not meant to be there.
But unfortunately, Max never found out what it was.
They brought her back to the Flock and locked her in the same crate. It was shady in the room then, all the kids were asleep. Except Fang. His eyes widened a bit but went back to their normal state before anyone could've noticed.
"Hey." She said as she sat on her previous place and rested her head on the bars.
"What happened?" Fang asked.
"Well, the Director decided to put me with a bunch of erasers and then she sat with popcorns and watched the international match of 'Max VS Dogs'.
"Wow." He sat there silently for a few moments, watching her. "How bad is it?"
"Hm." She closed her eyes and tried to fall asleep. "Nothing serious, just a few scratches and bruises."
"What about the blood?"
"It's my shoulder and it's not bleeding anymore." She smirked. "Don't worry their worse then I am."
There was silence for a few moments. Max tried to sleep. She was tired, her whole body was stiff, and her shoulder hurt like hell. But unfortunately, sleep never came. So after a few moments, they started to talk again.
"Hey, are you awake?" She asked softly.
"Yeah." He breathed heavily and answered her unspoken question. "Total isn't back yet."
They took Total before any of them were conscious. And they weren't sure if he was taken or if he had flown away. So they never talked about it loudly. They only communicated through Angel.
Max looked at her surroundings. Gazzy, Angel and Nudge were asleep. The only exception was Iggy. He was staring in front blankly. And Max couldn't help but thought how he could live with this. Somehow, Iggy knew she was staring at him; he looked just at the direction she was sitting.
"Hey." He whispered.
"Hey." Max whispered back. His head went back to its previous position.
Sometimes it amazed her. How he lived through that. Not ever knowing, not ever seeing one single thing, one single ray of light; the only thing he could ever see was the darkness. And no difference between day and night; not knowing where you're going, not seeing any colors, not seeing the sky, not seeing the first flake of snow, not seeing to rain, not ever seeing the beauties of life. And knowing that you won't ever see them again.
Max woke up by the sound of door. And saw the two erasers from last night coming in. One of them unlocked her crate door while the other stood with its gun pointing at her. It gestured her to come out as she groaned.
"What now you dog?" She muttered, but she knew that it was of no use. For some reason, those erasers never talked. Did they sew up the new ones mouths? She thought bitterly.
Like before, they locked her hands and wings and shoved her to walk. Before she walked out from the room, she glanced at the others. They were fine, as fine as you could be without any food and water, and were asleep. Angel stirred silently, and just when they were about to close the door, she opened her eyes and shot up. Her eyes full with shock and terror. And Max managed to give her a wary smile before the door was fully closed. And that was it.
The last time she was seeing her family normally.
Max didn't see Marian Janssen the whole day, not that she wished to, but it was creepy. She ran through some tests. Well, more like so many tests. But unfortunately none of them were about fighting with a bunch of erasers or running in a maze or that kind of stuff. It was like; they were done testing her strength, her skills. This time they ran blood, and went on with that kind of stuff.
After 3 or 4 hours later, they put her in a white room, strapped her on a bed, stripped her clothes off, put a white sheet over her body which covered her from her chest to thighs, and left the room. She stared at the ceiling and wondered about what the hell. Then the door opened and someone walked in. She looked at the person.
It was Omega.
And for some reason she had a stupid feeling in her stomach, but she managed to put it aside and smirk.
"Hey Omega. Still hanging around huh?"
Omega frowned at her smirk and stared at her with his silvery blue eyes.
"Hello Max." Mechanical voices filled the room, Max searched for the speakers which were carrying the Director's words and found nothing. "So" The voice continued. "Here's the news. Did I tell you about the new experiment? Well, as far as I remember, I've mentioned but didn't give you any specifics. So, here's the deal…." She stopped for a moment for Max's response, and Max was feeling bad in her pit, but she didn't respond. And so Marian continued. "The thing is, we are interested about your second generations Maximum. Not the lab created one, but the biologically enhanced one."
This time, Max did respond. "What?"
"Yes. And so, we're settling an experiment. To see if you can bear a fetus naturally. Well, obviously you can with your own kind, but we want to see if you can do it with someone different, someone more powerful than you are, someone like Omega…."
And the words rang in her ears. She couldn't get what the director was saying, and she didn't want to. But the words slip through her…
"No." She whispered as she saw Omega coming towards her slowly.
One, two, three….
The Director was still babbling about the experiment, how it was going to be incredible if Max could do this one thing in her life correctly. She was happy. She didn't care if Max could actually conceive, but she was happy to see the fear in Max's eyes through the cameras. She was happy to see Maximum Ride freaked out lastly.
"No."
…..And as Omega stood in front of her bed, he muttered, mostly to convince himself then saying to Max. He chanted and chanted, until his head was blanked out from the thoughts.
It's just a test, and it would be great if we can do this right this time. We have to do this right this time.