SOAR - More Like Us

CHAPTER 12

                                                      AARON

I AWOKE AND RECOGNIZED that voice. That soothing, beautiful- Who the hell, am I fooling? That ragged, rough, and raw voice called out to me.
"Aaron?" She repeated. I rose up and postured myself against the wall. "You're here!" She lowered down to my level and gave me a rib-crushing hug. She picked me up, with her hands on my shoulders. She pressed her face against mine and I fell into her. We kissed each other to our hearts content, but we have the pack to deal with. To be fair, that was the first time we'd ever kissed, which is kind of great, because we were in the dark and I couldn't see anything. I wouldn't see anything in the light either, but that doesn't matter. The door opened, and I was able to tell that there was light from behind the opened door. Patrick was thrown into the room and Snow helped him back up to his feet. After maybe, thirty minutes, John was put in the room. This time, I nudged Snow away from him and hugged him myself. I held him close to me, his lanky body awkwardly pressing against mine.
"John!" I smiled, realizing I couldn't see his face. But, there's a chance he might not see mine either. My expression fell, "John,"  I felt him angle his head up a little.
"Don't worry, I'm fine." He said, and my heart flooded with relief.
"Stop." Said snow, coming up from behind me, "Don't lie to him." I turned my head around, facing Snow, shaking my head vigorously,
"No, no, no." I said, my hands firmly grasping my hair, "No, what do you mean?" I felt the presence of John shift uncomfortably, hearing him shush Snow,
"Tell. Him." She said steely. She repeated her sentence,
"Fine!" He yelled, "Aaron, I-" he trailed off, "I-- or they, took off my right arm and leg." I winced, gaping at him,
"How?! I didn't feel it gone, when I hugged you!"
"They replaced it with wood!" He snapped, "They replaced my arm and leg to see if they could test the hybrid endurance..." I backed away from him, weeping softly.

                                                           MAX
THREE HOURS AGO
"WHAT'RE YOU WAITING FOR, max?" Gazzy snickered, as he launched off, with me taking off after him, the school shrinking as we rose to the sky. We flew all the way to Vegas. I began thinking back to the time when me and Fang came here and won the lottery. Again and again. Until Dr. Hans Gunther Hagen tracked us and nicked Fang with a bullet. Then it made me think about Angel and how she pointed the gun at me. Then Jeb, then kissing Dylan, then making out with Dylan. I held my hand to my temple and groaned a little. We met at the rendezvous point and waited for this fake, sewn-on-wings, girl called Snow. We waited for about twenty minutes before gazzy spotted something below. "Max?" He looked at me, worried, "What is that?" There were a bunch of sketchy black, SUVS, pulling into the empty abandoned, parking lot. I mean who knows? Could be for someone else. It's not,
"Fight or flight?" Nudge asked,
"I don't think they're gonna let us fly away," I said, pointing down to what looked like, a net thrower. We lowered ourselves down, as they packed out of the vans,
"So fight." Nudge shrugged, forming into something of a decent fighting stance in the air. I nodded. They began shooting, missing every shot, like a bunch of dumb-asses. We darted down like arrows, landing roughly, sweeping dust off the ground with our wings. When we landed, it immediately escalated,
"Iggy!" I shouted. He was thrown to the ground by an electric net. He laid there on the ground, screaming like a maniac. The men hauled him to his feet. I tried going after him but my distraction was also my demise. I slept towards him but felt a bright sting, wrap around my body. The net fell against me. I was taken into the van, along with Nudge, Dylan, Gazzy, and Iggy. Somehow, all of us were taken. All of us had lost the fight. And we didn't even fight! We were just immediately captured and kidnapped. I was humiliated by letting my flock down, my family, my friends. The whole world faded to grey. The last thing I saw was the ill-faced birdkids of my family. Gone.