It had hurt a lot to fly to Dallas.
Even Brium admitted that to himself.
It had hurt a lot.
But he had done so anyway, carrying the shotgun with him for the entire flight.
In his weakened state, Brium knew he'd need all the protection he could get his hands on, and the shotgun had proved useful thus far. Why not keep it a bit longer?
Brium had also had the cover of darkness to fly under, which had indeed been his plan. It was a nice, length night flight. It was almost distracting enough to make Brium completely forget the amount of physical pain he was in.
Almost.
He went at a relaxed pace the whole way; no one could see him, so there was no rush, and despite the pain, the flight proved quite enjoyable.
He decided to not listen to the radio, favoring his own thoughts for this particular flight; he had so many of them after the bout of Questions and Answers he had played with Jeb.
Brium had more of his questions answered in those few minutes than at any other point in his life.
They had indeed killed Dr. Ruby Foster as punishment for what she did to help him.
Brium would take certainly take vengeance for that.
That and the other murder. The one of someone far more important to him.
In fact, Brium was already seriously debating whether or not to proceed with the war he had been thinking up for months.
A full-scale war with the School, and all of the men and woman who worked for it.
The entire corporation or group or whatever it was that they belonged to.
War.
Complete and total war.
A war Brium didn't start, but would fight; perhaps even end.
All that was left was the final decision.
Once Brium got started, nothing could stop him.
Brium decided to wait a little longer.
He coasted with ease into Dallas airspace, and dropped several thousand feel of altitude. He maneuvered to the outskirts of the massive city (which was absolutely beautiful that night) and began looking for a good place to land.
He found it in a darkened park, and zipped quickly to the ground, landing without a sound.
He hid the shotgun, emptying all of the shells; he would come back for it later.
It took Brium about twenty minutes of walking around admiring the Dallas nightlife before he found what he was looking for: an ATM machine.
He withdrew five hundred dollars (the most the machine would give him) from his bank account (listed another a different false name entirely) and proceeded to phase two of his Dallas excursion.
Brium walked for nearly a half hour longer searching for the perfect run down motel to stay in.
He found one.
The man behind the counter asked for Brium's ID. Brium informed him that he had lost it. He wasn't going to use that ID anymore.
The man raised an eyebrow at Brium's tattered appearance, and seemed on the brink of turning him down, when Brium put one of the hundred dollar bills on the counter.
"And if I get through the duration of my stay, which I can assure you will only be a few days, without any… problems, you'll get two more of these upon my departure."
And the man had asked which room he wanted.
The room (53) was on the far side of the building, facing the least amount of anything; nice and quiet. The way Brium liked it.
He took a shower, checking all of his major wounds; noting how well they were healing. He estimated that in two weeks he'd be good as new.
Brium had then hopped into the room's bed, and fell asleep almost instantly.
He slept deep, or as deep as Brium ever sleeps, waking every two or three hours to check everything over once again.
It was the epitome of Brium's lifestyle.
He did this for nearly fifteen hours, leaving the motel the next day for lunch, which was to be some fast food joint. He ate quite a bit; far more than normal, relishing every single bite.
It was all needed energy; he was healing after all, so it let the massive consumption slide this time. After lunch, Brium had gone to a small thrift store, buying enough food to snack on for the duration of his stay; he didn't need much. The lunch would get him through quite a bit.
And then it was back to the motel room to sleep some more until darkness fell.
Brium had noted the few bemused looks he had received for the patch of duct tape over one eye, and the slightly bloody shorts (he was grateful once again that his sweatshirt had soaked up most of the blood) and had responded with amused expressions of his own.
It had been an interesting day.
And now back in bed, Brium reflected for perhaps the thousandth time on what he had learned the previous day.
Almost everything he had needed to know.
In one sitting.
Amazing.
When it became late enough that night, Brium had quested to the park where he had landed, and had retrieved the shotgun; he had walked there and had flown back. It would have been hard to explain why he was walking around town with a shotgun, even if this was Texas.
And then more sleeping, until about four o'clock the next morning.
That's when the searching would begin, and it was the part that Brium had been dreading.
It had been a few days since the flock's football game ineptitude, and they may had flown the coop, so to speak, by now.
This whole trip to Dallas may very well have been for naught, but it was the only lead that Brium had, so he had and would continue to follow it.
At first light, Brium was already on the outskirts of Dallas beginning his search. He would get a few thousand feet up, and just fly.
If they were still here, they wouldn't go too far from the city, and would probably be staying in a canyon or near water, if there was any of it in quantities around here, so both those places became prime places to search.
Brium scanned the earth, concentrating on every single detail. He could concentrate for a long time without rest, and was putting it to good use; he would be out here a long time.
Unless he was very, very lucky.
Brium wondered if he shouldn't have waited two days before searching, but quickly dismissed the though.
In the state he had been in when he had arrived, he had needed both days to heal sufficiently just in case he got in a tight spot.
It was standard procedure, and Brium was glad he hadn't gone against common sense.
And anyway, if the flock had moved on and Brium had missed them he would just continue searching. It wasn't like he did much else with his life. He could devote all of his time to tracking them down.
And then what?
Brium didn't know.
Maybe that war.
Brium smiled to himself as he searched.
What did his life amount to? What had he really done to make a difference?
Not much.
Yet.
He had an eight year oath to uphold, and he would do so.
Maybe finding the flock would provide the answers to these questions.
Maybe.
The eleventh hour of Brium's search, and Brium noted that in a few hours it would begin to get dark, making the search a little more difficult; Brium would continue anyway.
He was right in the middle of deciding how much longer he would continue the search, when, out of the corner of his eye, he spotted a canyon in the bleak Texan landscape, and made a sharp turn to investigate.
A quick glance in the other direction, and Brium could see Dallas off in the distance.
As Brium flew over the canyon, he spotted something out of the ordinary instantly. He quickly angled himself down, landing soundlessly and straightened up, alert immediately.
Something wasn't right here.
It was what was let of a campsite, Brium guessed. There was the remains of a fire a few feet off, and it looked as if people had been here recently.
But that wasn't what had drawn Brium's attention.
Brium thought he had been seeing things, but as he walked to the object, it quickly became apparent that he wasn't just seeing things and something was awfully amiss.
He crouched down, and carefully picked up the object.
It was an arm; a dull silver arm with wires sticking out of where it should've been attached to an elbow. It's hand looked more like a claw, but that mattered very little with the overall description of it.
Brium was holding a robotic arm.
And it took him all of two seconds to piece it all together.
The School had evolved. They were making robots now.
And that meant that said robots had been here, and had been damaged.
By the flock.
They had been here!
Brium stood up, and let the arm fall to the ground.
There had been a fight, and it appeared as though the flock had lost.
Brium breathed deep, and looked to the sky, planning what to do next.
He decided it best to look around for any more pieces of these robots, and found only a scrap of metal here or a wire there.
The ground wasn't as disturbed as it could have been, which implied a good portion of the fight may have taken place in the air.
Brium spent nearly fifteen minutes examining everything he could about the area, searching for any answers with what exactly had happened here.
Soon enough the tracking would begin.
This had happened within the past several days, Brium concluded, which meant tonight he would be leaving Dallas.
In a direction that he did not know yet.
And, what was more concerning, was if it was robots he was now up against, how good were they?
Brium made himself ready for the worst.
He was just about to take off to try to pick up any clues about what direction the flock may have been taken, when he heard something.
It sounded like…
Wings.
The only sound that Brium had ever heard that sounded similar enough to what Brium was hearing now, was the sound that Brium's wings made when he was in flight.
Brium took cover behind a rock about ten feet away, pulling the pistol from his pocket as he did so.
He looked once again to the sky, and for maybe the second or third time in his life, Brium was transfixed by something.
Two kids with wings were landing in the middle of the ransacked campsite.
Two kids just like him.
He recognized one instantly, and with the information supplied by Jeb, recognizing the other wasn't difficult.
It was Fang and Max.
Brium pocketed the pistol, and sat for a few moments.
So this was it.
The pair turned away, and Brium casually stood up and moved a few silent steps from the rock, and stopped.
And simply stared.
Max turned slowly, spotted him and froze instantly.
Which was fine. Brium was used to having that effect on people.
So they just stared at each other for a few moments until Fang spun around and became similarly frozen
Brium wondered is Fang would recognize him.
For another few seconds the standoff continued, so Brium decided that he'd better do something.
So, without breaking his eye contact with Max, he walked silent towards her stopping a few paces away.
He gave a small smile, hopefully with the implication that he meant her no harm.
Quite the opposite, actually.
If what he had seen here was true, then the rest of the flock, Iggy, Nudge, Gasman and Angel were now once again in the clutches of the School.
They would need to move fast if rescue was to be an option.
Brium once again had to make the first move.
He continued smiling.
"Hello, Max," he said.
Author's Note:
I hope this is driving you all insane.
Stuff'll happen next chapter, I promise!