Air Born | Generation Icarus #1

Hawk - Arizona

Kess and I continued swapping stories until we forgot about the others and laughed too loud. Marcus grunted in his sleep and we fell silent, sharing conspiratorial looks.

I thought about how much I enjoyed Kestrel's company. She wasn't just a pretty girl. I felt — hoped — that we were developing a genuine friendship, something that had once seemed impossible after puberty kicked in. I continued stealing glances at her, and was encouraged to see the faint smile remaining on her face as she absentmindedly played with the ends of her feathers poking out from under her jacket.

After a while, Kestrel insisted that I let her drive. Falcon stopped the pickup behind us and followed our example. Gratefully, I climbed into the seat behind Kestrel, Raven giving me a brief smile as she scooted over. Marcus moved into the front passenger seat as it was too cramped in the back for two tall guys to rest comfortably. With Kestrel and Tui behind the wheels, our convoy returned to the road.

Soon I was dozing. Some hours later, I was vaguely aware of the car stopping again for the next changeover, but I nodded off before I could take in any details.

Soft voices woke me from a restless dream. As I stirred, the muted discussion stopped. I peered through heavy eyelids and saw Marcus was driving again, with Raven in the front passenger seat.

I tried to shift position, but there was a warm weight holding me in place. Blinking, I found Kestrel had put a folded sweater on my lap as a pillow. She had one hand under her head, and the other trailed on the floor by my feet. The wing-lump under the back of her jacket was pressed into the back of the seat, and my hand was resting on her shoulder.

Confused, I glanced forward, and noticed Marcus watching me in the rear-view mirror. Just as that was starting to feel really weird, his pale grey eyes flicked back to the road and he made no further acknowledgement. It felt so surreal, I wondered if I was still dreaming.

Hesitantly, I brushed some of Kestrel's long blonde hair off her face. She smiled in her sleep and I quickly looked out the window. Okay, before this gets any more awkward, I'd like to wake up, please.

Instead, Kestrel jerked awake as Marcus turned off the highway and the car bumped across extremely rough ground. She scrubbed at her eyes. Suddenly remembering where she was, she struggled upright and gave me a sheepish grin. I smiled back uncertainly.

The sedan jolted over the rocky, scrub-scattered ground, revealed in sharp splashes of colour and shadow by the headlights. The sky was barely beginning to lighten in what I assumed was the east, almost directly ahead of us.

"This car is not built for off-roading," Kestrel said.

"Where are we?" I asked between jolts.

Marcus didn't look up. "Arizona."

When nothing else was offered, I guessed it didn't really matter. We could always check later on the satphone if we needed to.

After a bruising half hour or so, during which time we couldn't have gone more than a few miles, the lightening sky revealed a range of rugged hills rising out of the desert scrub ahead, the tallest one in the middle barely qualifying for the title of 'mountain'. By the time the sun was squinting over the top, the car had bounced into the mouth of one of the countless canyon-like valleys slashing into the foothills.

I was looking ahead in some dismay at the rising ground and increasing piles of broken rock, when the sedan jerked around a particularly jagged outcrop and crunched to a halt. The pickup followed and parked next to the steep stone wall.

Everyone emerged, stumbling as they stretched, and the first hunger rumbles seemed to echo off the rocks.

Laughing and commiserating about our endless new appetites, we worked together to make our first proper meal as a group. The packets of food we'd consumed on the drive already made a significant pile of trash in the back of the pickup, but there was something more meaningful about cooking and eating together.

As we got to work, we peeled off our jackets and stretched out our wings. Black, gold, multiple shades of brown. Feathers much richer in colour, pattern and texture than I had been able to see before. And everyone's wings matched their natural hair colour. I felt a slight thrill of satisfaction as the evidence for my keratin theory stacked up.

Sitting on a rock next to me, Kestrel extended her golden wings as far back and as straight as they could go, the tips of her feathers reaching about eight feet behind her. I had to consciously turn my eyes away so she wouldn't see me staring, and I caught Miguel looking at her too. A surge of rivalry rose in my chest, but I stamped on it quickly. I might have only known Miguel for a few days, but somehow I knew I already had a stronger connection with him than any of the other guys I'd known, even Nico. Maybe, I mused, because our situation stripped away all the petty problems that dominated high school friendships. Out here, our priorities were aligned through necessity, and now there were seven of us learning to hang out and work together. I wasn't going to let my attraction to a girl ruin that.

Not yet, anyway.