“What?” asked Nudge.
“We have fourteen hours to go,” I said. “And I doubt we’re getting meal service or in-flight entertainment.”
63
OKAY, SO THEY KIDNAPPED us from Antarctica. Let’s review: extremely freezing, much ice, snow, wind, et cetera. Very little fresh fruit. No swimsuit season. No cable TV. No coffee shops.
Where did they bring usto?
Miami.
You’d think it would work the other way- snatchedaway from Miami, sentto Antarctica, which is like Siberia but with more penguins.
But no.
Just another example of the whimsy of the fantastically wealthy, powerful, and deluded. For us, it was like, Oh, please don’t snatch us away from Antarctica and send us to the playground of the rich and famous! Not that briar patch!
On the other hand: In Antarctica we were relatively free and doing actual meaningful work that we felt good about. In Miami we were prisoners. It was an ironic situation all around, no doubt about it.
I won’t bore you with the usual duct-taped hands and feet, bound wings, stuck into black body bags,yadayadayada, that we always go through in these ho-hum random abductions. It was like, same old, same old, and I could hardly work up the energy to fight hard enough to get more than a black eye and a sprained wrist out of it.
I guess I’m just getting jaded.
When they unzipped our bags and started ripping off the tape (tip: Don’t try that at home), we found we were high up in a tall, tall building. There were tons of other tall buildings around us. Below us was one of Florida’s white-sugar beaches, edged by water that I was dying to sink into. Or at least I’d want to after it stopped pouring. The sky was full of dark gray clouds. It was raining so hard I could hear the drops pelting the window glass likeBBs.
I was amazed they had let us loose in a room with windows, given our annoying habit of leaping through them, but oleGozen answered that question.
“These windows have been rated for hurricane-force winds of up to one hundred twenty miles per hour,” he intoned. “They do not open from the inside.” He stepped closer, then heaved himself sideways, shoulder first, into one of the big plate glass windows. We all winced, expecting him to go bye-bye with a huge crash, but instead he practically bounced off, the glass not even cracking, and I thought,Holy crap. Or, actually, much worse than holy crap, but let’s just say I thought holy crap.
“The auction will begin in one hour,”Gozen said. “Food will be provided.”
“You know, he’s really a people person,” I said when he’d left.
“What auction was he talking about?”Gazzy asked, and I shrugged.
“No clue,” I answered, starting to walk around. The double doors to the room were metal, windowless, and had several locking bolts. Our captors definitely thought we were hot stuff, and I felt kind of proud of our bad reputation. Proud but really trapped.
“Now what?” Angel was still wan and pale, with dark circles under her eyes. There were chairs around a table, and I helped her sit in one.
“Iggy?” I said. He came closer, and with his incredibly delicate touch, he skimmed his fingers over her arm. “Is there anything you can do?”
“It’s really swollen,” he said, and I used every bit of my self-control to not say, “No duh!”
“It feels like a clean break,”Iggy went on. “Let me see… So to speak.” Very tenderly, he manipulated her broken arm.
Though Angel’s face got a little green around the edges, she made hardly a sound. I held her shoulders and sent her comforting thoughts, and then we all heard a tiny scrape and a clicking sound, and Angel relaxed a bit.
“Oh, that feels better,” she said. “Still really bad, but less bad. Thanks,Iggy.”
Iggysmiled, proud that he could contribute to the flock this way. I ripped up the lining of my jacket- wouldn’t be needing that here!- and made a stiff bandage to hold her arm in place.
“Now what?”Gazzy repeated Angel’s question.
“Fan out, check the perimeter,” I ordered.
Which took less than five minutes.
Everyone reported that the room seemed rock solid. The vents were too small for a house cat, there was only the one set of doors, and we had all seen the window demonstration.
“Maybe I can…” Nudge murmured, and she crouched next to one of the doors. She moved her fingers close to the locks and closed her eyes. “If I could make the bolts all line up…”
“Oh, so smart, Nudge,” I breathed, coming to crouch next to her. “Can you feel them?”
“I think so,” she said. “If my magnetism could-ow!”
There was a harsh crackle, and Nudge was jolted backward almost a foot. The residual electricity practically made my hair stand on end. Nudge was on her back, rubbing her hands.
“The locks are booby-trapped,” she announced glumly, in case we hadn’t picked up on it. “So much for my new skill.”
“My new skill was no help either,” said Angel.
“And since we’re not surrounded by snow, I’m still blind.”Iggy sounded bitter, but then he perked up. “On the other hand, this carpet is a tasteful ecru, with a thin cinnamon stripe close to the wall.”
I glanced at Fang, who was totally visible against the walnut paneling of the room. He shrugged.
“So now I guess we wait,” I said. Which, you know, I’mso good at.
64
BEING IN THIS TALL BUILDING was interesting for us, because we were up high but not flying. Outside, it was really storming- huge crashes of thunder and lightning that I remembered from the last time we were here in the wishfully named Sunshine State. Gusts of wind buffeted the building, and it was so tall it actually swayed.
“Good thing this building’s rated for hurricane-force winds,” Nudge said, looking out the window nervously. “It’s really blowing out there.”
They fed us. I was hoping they’d send in actual humans with our food, because they’re easy to jump and pretty fragile. No problem getting past them, unless they have guns.
Instead we got Transformer-bots with trays, underGozen’s watchful laser eyes.
They gave us a variety of food, apparently never having fed mutant bird kids before. We had oatmeal, sandwiches, fruit, bread, a bowl of dog kibble, which Total pushed towardAkila, and…
“Oh, my God!” Nudge squealed, removing the cover on a tray. “Oh, my God!”
“What? What?” I hurried over, hoping for chocolate.
Instead I was confronted with a large bowl of… well, birdseed.
“It’s just seeds!” Nudge said. “Not even like a granola bar. It’sbirdseed! ”
For a couple seconds we all just stared at one another, and then we cracked up, really howling with laughter.
“Oh, God, no!” I said, holding my bruised ribs. “Don’t make me laugh!”
“Nummy!”Gazzy said, poking the seeds with his finger. “Could I get some worms with this?”
“Stop! Stop!” I begged.
Even Fang, who as you know is Mr. Personality, was actually laughing out loud, bent over, his hands on his knees.
“What? Seeds?”Iggy asked, feeling the contents of the bowl. “Is this really birdseed? ’Cause we’rebirds? ”
I nodded, tears running down my cheeks. I gasped for air, saying “Ouch” with each breath. “I’m nodding,Ig.”
“This is too much,” Fang wheezed. “Too much! Birdseed! Oh, God.”
“What’s for dessert?Caterpillars? ” I said, barely intelligibly. This set off a new round of shrieking laughter.
“This sandwich isn’t half bad,” Total said, his paws up on the table.
“Did they bring us a bunch of nesting material?”Gazzy asked. “’Cause I’m beat.”
More laughter. Angel almost fell onto her hurt arm.