Hawk - James Patterson Page 0,55

I could ask for—he wanted my wings unharmed? Great! That made these things better than a bulletproof vest.

No more bullets came at me, though below I heard shouting and feet running. It sounded like the big prison riot was pretty much over; watching me get shot off the cage was better entertainment.

One thing about feathers—you can’t see through ’em. Very slowly I edged them away from my face and immediately a bullet came so close to me that it singed some of my hair. Shit.

“You’re trapped!” McCallum yelled from his vidscreen. “You might as well come down! We’d rather take your wings off you alive than dead—but either is fine with me!”

That asshole.

What to do… what to do… Peeping out again, I saw the skinny sad-sack doctor shouting orders to the guards, staring up at me with fury. I bet he wished he hadn’t helped me, before. He probably wished he’d just let me bleed out from the shiv in my side. He’d said he was just an old Ope, but I bet his version of flying wasn’t half as good as mine.

Hey, here’s a thought…

With no warning, I dropped off the ceiling cage, plummeting toward the ground. Prisoners started applauding—they probably thought I was going to kill myself. You are shit out of luck, guys, I thought, letting my wings stream out behind me. Right as I was about to splat against the stained concrete, I grabbed the doctor and whooshed upward! People gasped as I reached the ceiling bars almost instantly, holding the doctor with one arm around his skinny middle.

“What are you doing?” His voice sounded tense and squeaky—guess he wasn’t used to looking down from forty feet up.

“Max.” McCallum’s voice now sounded calm and patient. “Max, come back down with the good doctor. Even with him, you’re still trapped. Really, what can you do?” He was all reason and logic.

Blinding strobe lights spattered against me, holding me in sharp focus against the bars. Guards were raising long ladders against the walls. What was their plan? Were they going to climb the cage to get me? Or maybe they were angling for a better shot?

“You can’t win this, you know,” the doctor said. He was trembling and his voice was weak. His hands gripped the arm holding him, as if afraid I’d let him go. To be honest, I had totally considered it. I mean, I could hold him for hours. But not forever.

“I don’t need to win, hack,” I said. “I only need to come out even.”

With that I let go of the bars and swept downward, zigzagging to avoid the bullets ripping through the air around me. The doctor squealed and then suddenly screamed. I reached the bars way on the other end of the courtyard and held on.

“I’m hit!” the doctor yelled, trying to hold his leg where he could see it, assess his own damage. “I got shot!”

“Gosh, I bet that hurts, huh?” I asked. “Whoa, you’re dripping blood on everyone below you!”

“Eff you, you goddamn freak!” the doctor shouted, squirming in my hold.

“Hold still!” I said. “Unless you want me to drop you right now!”

The doctor stopped, his body rigid with pain.

“I’ve been shot before. It hurts like a mother,” I said sympathetically. “Almost as bad as getting a shiv in the side and having some hack staple it shut.”

More bullets hissed through the air around us. The doctor looked down and screamed, “Quit shooting, you idiots! I’ve already caught one bullet!”

A slight sound made me look to my right. Hm. I squinted against the bright lights to see that guards were climbing up the outside of the cage. It would be super hard for a person to climb up the inside of the cage, but much easier to climb up the outside. In a few minutes I’d have bullets coming at me from front and back.

Looks like it was a bad plan, after all.

CHAPTER 53

Hawk

Clete was horrified by me saying I’d leave without the gang. But—I knew the Flock was anxious to leave, to go get this Max. And I could hardly ask them to crawl around in air ducts when the kids could be anywhere. They wanted to save my mother… my supposed mother. What a laugh. Well, I didn’t need them anyway.

I kept crawling down the duct, which was mostly pitch-black except for the air vents from each room, shining a bit of light. There weren’t too many left before I’d have to stop, tell Clete I was abandoning