Angel (Maximum Ride 7)

Which, come on, didn’t Golden Boy here know me at all?

He was pointing at the sky and mumbling something about how they couldn’t see. I glared at him. Yeah, Dylan, we’ve established that.

“Over their heads,” he shouted. “I don’t think they can sense anything directly over them!”

I looked at Angel, who was hovering over a confused-looking ninja kid. He was spinning around but couldn’t seem to get a read on her.

Oh. Got it!

Dylan and I joined Angel in zipping from kid to kid, moving as quickly as possible, so that the ones we weren’t directly over couldn’t get a good shot. It wasn’t long before the kids were spinning in place, trying to focus.

If it hadn’t been so screwed up, and we weren’t actually, you know, dancing over the heads of kids trying to kill us, it might’ve been kind of fun. But somehow I didn’t think that this strategy was going to end our little skirmish.

Just as I was about to call for a plan C, the ninja kid below me dropped to the ground. And so did the one spinning underneath Dylan. Say wha…? They seemed to be short-circuiting or something. After the third one fell, we snapped cord ties around their wrists.

When it was over, I sat back, panting, watching the bodies warily to make sure they stayed down as Dylan double-checked that all guns were accounted for.

Angel leaned over and yanked off one ninja kid’s black hood.

It was awful.

He looked just like a regular kid, but he had a small slit above his nose—a slit that ran around the circumference of his head, like a ring. And in that slit, I saw… many eyes. Tiny, dark orbs, angrily zipping back and forth. He wasn’t blind at all. He had 360-degree vision. They were virtually impossible to sneak up on, except from above, apparently.

“And I thought we were paranoid,” Angel said quietly.

“Yeah,” I said. “These guys are paranoia incarnate.”

Dylan was shocked and silent. I’d thought genetic mistakes were the height of horribleness. I hadn’t realized that genetic “successes” like these ’noids might be even worse.

28

“WHO MADE YOU this way?” I whispered, horrified. “And why?”

They were just kids. Kids like us who had been cut open and experimented on, kids who had been programmed to kill us, but still.

The ’noid we’d been looking at wriggled onto his side, his slit of eyes racing. He didn’t look older than nine or ten.

“We’ve been created to have an advantage—over the humans who have mucked up the planet, and over you and all earlier generations of improvements. The world is going to end, and when the time comes, we’ll… take over.”

I rolled my eyes. Serious brainwashing here.

“Look, Spider Eyes, we know the world isn’t in good shape. That’s why we’re trying to take steps to fix things. Which would be a whole lot easier if people like you weren’t shooting at us all the freaking time.”

“I don’t think you guys understand what’s been done to you,” Angel cut in. “Max is a really good leader. What she means is that if you come with us, you can help us stop the people who did this, who experiment on kids. We’re going to save the world. Maybe we can work together.”

He cackled, and a shiver went down my spine. Why are evil kids way creepier than anything else?

“You don’t get it, do you? You’re forgetting about natural selection,” he said. “Trust me—you won’t be able to do a thing, when the time comes.”

I bristled. “Listen, kid, we can do plenty. If you don’t want our help, fine. But don’t tell me what I can do.” As much as I’d never wanted the whole save-the-world gig, I was irritated that this kid assumed I was totally powerless.

“You’re so… Gen 54,” he sneered. “You and your birdkid pals and your doctor pals and the Coalition to Stop the Madness are all trying to save the world.” His many little eyes darted back and forth constantly. “But what you don’t get is that maybe the world doesn’t need to be saved. It can’t be.”

“I think one person can make a difference,” I said. But suddenly I didn’t sound so convincing.

“Yeah, and you believe in unicorns and pots of gold at the end of the rainbow,” he said. “I’m just telling you how it really is.”

“And how do you know ‘how it really is’?” Dylan asked, stepping closer to me.