Animals

Chapter 6: Max's POV

"Get out of the dang bed." I hear a deep voice say to me. "Either get up, or I force you up, and trust me. You don't want that."

I open my eyes a little and see the biggest guy I've ever seen my whole life. Not skin big, but muscle big. It's as if all he was was muscle.

"Five more minutes!" I complain. I'm going to try and test his patients, and see if he runs out of it quick.

The next thing I know is I'm getting held by the neck by the guy, and he's whispering in my ear.

"Listen, boy." He starts. "Do not test me because I will end your life without a moments hesitation."

I'm starting to feel dizzy because he's holding me so tight. I force myself to nod my head even though it hurts trying to struggle against his massive hands.

Finally he lets me go while saying, "Good. Now, I'm Frank. You are?"

"Max." I say while rubbing my neck. "Now am I going to work, or did you just wake me up for no reason?"

He turns around and walks away without saying a word. I have no idea what to do, so I just decide to follow him.

***

"Okay, so both of you understand what to do now, right?" Frank says to me and Mark while handing us the paint bucket.

"That's it?" I say trying to hide the anger in my voice. "We're going to paint the houses? Isn't there some more important stuff to do, such as, I don't know. Get food!"

Frank gives me the can and then starts walking away. So I guess that's how he solves his problems. I'm about to go after him, but Mark stops me.

"Let him go." He tells me. "Honestly, I wouldn't trust us to do anything important either. They don't even know us."

I push his hand off of me and I begin to paint. I just want to know if my mom and the twins are okay. When I asked Mark he didn't say anything, and he just ignored me.

"They're fine." Mark says as if he knew what I was about to say. "I just didn't want to tell you while The Incredible Hulk was right there."

"Why couldn't you tell me while he was there?" I ask, confused.

"Your mother's right outside of here. I got caught on purpose to get you out. We need to hurry up and leave before that guy comes back."

It doesn't take long to think about my answer. "No." I say. "I'm not going anywhere."

The look on his face is a mixture of confusion and frustration. "What?" He asks me.

"You need to ring them here. My mom and the twins. We can all live here. In beds. All we need to do is paint freaking houses."

"We can't trust these people, Max. Not while they can't trust us."

I keep painting. "Then go by yourself. I'm not going anywhere."

I don't even have to look to know that he just walked away. I know him by now. Just like Frank, the only thing he can do is walk away from his problems.

***

I'm about to walk back inside of Taylor's house when I hear her talking.

"I just don't know what to do, Jeremy." She tells him. "It's so hard without him."

"I know. I know." Jeremy tells her. "You can get through this. I know you can."

I walk inside the door and I see Taylor sitting down on the couch with the Gate Opener, which I guess is named Jeremy.

"Oh, hi, Max." Taylor says to me, but still looking at Jeremy.

"Well, I better get going." Jeremy says while getting up. "I'll talk to you later, Taylor." He stops at the door. "Don't forgot. You have to do this. Arnold would want it this way." He looks from Taylor then to me. Then he leaves.

"How was your day?" Taylor asks me too happily.

"Alright. Just tiring." I say while sitting next to her on the couch.

"Well, you should go to bed and get ready for tomorrow." She tells me.

"I just got here."

"I know, but you'll be working a lot tomorrow." She says nervously

"What's wrong, Taylor?" I ask her started to get nervous my self.

She puts her hands in her pockets

"This could have happened so fast." Then she takes out a knife and tackles me.

"Taylor!" I scream while on the ground. Her knife is right next to my neck.

"For Arnold!" She shouts. It gets closer to my neck no matter how hard I try to push her off. The knife is about to reach me a piercing scream stops her.

"AHHHHH!" The female voice shouts. "Fire!"

While Taylor's distracted, I throw her off of me. Then I tackle her and take her knife and put it at her neck.

"Why, Taylor? I trusted you."

She doesn't answer. She just stares at the knife. I think for a second to kill her. That's when I remember that lady screaming about the fire, and I know I have to leave. I get up and dust myself off. I wouldn't have been able to kill her anyways.

I sprint to the door and leave her there. She doesn't even try to go after me. She lays there when I leave the door.

Right when I run out I bump into Jessica. Right away I get ready to slap my knife when a voice interrupts me.

"Don't!" Mark shouts to me. "She's helping us!"

I look at Mark with confusion then Jessica with disgust.

"We don't have time! We need to go!" Mark says to me while pointing to the city.

I just notice it. All of the woods houses in this city is on fire. How did I not hear all of this before? How did it happen?

"Help!" I hear a voice shout. I realize that it's the mayor soon after. I start to run but Mark stops me from going.

"No time." He says. "We need to go."

"I'm not leaving him!" I shout back angrily. That's when Taylor's house start to go in flames.

"Shoot!" Mark shouts.

"Fine." Jessica says annoyed. "I'll get him. Just go!"

Mark and I head towards the exit while Jessica heads to the Mayor's house.

When we finally reach it I see my mom waiting for us at the entrance.

"Mom!" I shout while we embrace.

"You started the fire. Good." She says to Mark.

That makes me stop hugging her.

"What?!" I ask Mark.

He sighs. "I had to. I asked you to escape, but you wouldn't go! Your mother and I agreed to do this and we got help from that girl, Jessica to do it."

I want to hit him, but they get to him first. Mark gets hit in the back of the head by the butt of the gun. Then two bears pick the unconscious body up.

My mom tries to run for him, but I stop her. There's no way we're going to be able to fight two bears. I grab her and force her to run away with me. She screams his name while running, with tears coming out of her face.

I'm upset too. I'm not entirely sad because Mark is probably going to die. That's not all of it. The animals know humans are alive now. They're going to try and find us. Then they're going to kill me and my family.