HAT SMALL PART of my mind that was still functioning finally made me look up and catch sight of the flock rushing in just as the lab security team flooded the room from another doorway.

The unfriendly familiar face of our old nemesis, Mr. Chu, shocked me out of my daze for a moment.

“Take ’em out!” I screeched. “Show no mercy!”

“On it!” Iggy shouted. Even though they knew I couldn’t leave Fang’s side, I’d never seen the flock look so confident and determined. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that we were in a lab, and we knew our way around labs.

But then again, so did these guys.

Iggy immediately flew across the room, swiping glass jars and tubes off shelves and tables and then knocking over as many freestanding shelves as he could.

The instant hurricane of thunderous chaos gave the flock an advantage. By the time the men had chosen their targets, the kids had spread to all corners of the room. Grown-ups just think too much.

“Skateboard!” Iggy called to Gazzy. The Gasman used his wings to propel himself toward the high ceiling and grabbed the pipes running across the length of the room. Swinging off like a trapeze artist, he landed on a gurney and went zooming across the lab, knocking over two guards as he went.

Then, an encore performance: Gazzy gurney-boarded back the other way, over the two dazed guards. But this time, the gurney flipped as it caught one of the guards’ heads.

Gazzy went flying as though he’d been launched from a cannon, but it was a good shot. He knocked another guard down before he hit the floor.

Nudge had grabbed a metal IV stand and was spinning around with it like a wild whirling dervish. It smashed into a guard’s face and he went down, but not a second later, Nudge took a hard punch to the side of her face from another man, her skin splitting under the impact.

The flock’s never been shy about using crotch blows, and with a roar, Nudge nailed her assailant, who dropped like a sack of dog food.

“Sorry,” Nudge said, kicking him in the head to knock him out. Then she and Iggy wasted no time rolling him and the other man into nearby empty extralarge lab animal crates.

“Justice!” Nudge cried, slamming a door shut.

There were five guards down, but several to go. Mr. Chu and Dr. Hans were still on the loose as well. It could have easily been a lost battle without the secret weapon. Dylan.

The youngest but most powerful bird kid held nothing back as he took out one attacker after another. He was coldly furious and determined — almost scary. Everything about his quiet, easygoing demeanor had disappeared. Now his fists slammed into faces, he spun into kicks that had taken us years to master. His blows knocked grown men off their feet; his roundhouse kick shot a guard eight feet back, into a wall.

Total had been right: He was a fighting machine.

Meanwhile, Dr. Hans was watching everything from a safe corner, a scientist unemotionally observing his lab animals. But no one had noticed that Angel was missing from the fray. She now dashed out of the supply room clutching six or seven different-sized containers.

“Gazzy! What’s good here?” It was flock shorthand for: Is there anything you can make blow up here?

Gazzy had just recovered from his cannon-fire episode. He ran over and scanned faster than a computer. “No explosives, but there’s some pretty acidic stuff,” he determined, pulling three canisters aside. “Some of this is gonna hurt super bad.”

“Not so fast, children.” The impeccably dressed Mr. Chu — who’d been cowering under a lab table to avoid the fight, or to avoid ruining his suit — now appeared at their side.

“Chu!” Gazzy gasped.

“You know a lot about toxic chemicals, if I remember, sir,” Angel said, stalling. “Maybe you can help us.”

At that moment, with a perfect swan dive from the suspended pipes, Iggy crashed into Mr. Chu, knocking him onto the floor. The breath left Mr. Chu’s body in a sharp oof! Iggy got his hands around Mr. Chu’s neck and started twisting.

“Oh, my God!” Gazzy shouted a few seconds later. Angel’s mouth was open in horror.

Mr. Chu’s face had come off in Iggy’s hands, and Iggy was now holding it like a huge, disgusting face glove.

“What happened?” Iggy cried.

Nudge hurried to his side. There, on the ground, with Mr. Chu’s body, was the head of a … freak? His boyish, round face was flat, green, and scaly, and he had a kid’s wide eyes.

“Jeezum pete,” Nudge breathed.

“Don’t kill me,” pleaded the freak.

“Let Robert up,” ordered Dr. Death from the corner.

“Robert?” Iggy almost shrieked. “He’s green!”

“Watch it, guys!” Dylan warned. Some of the men who’d been down earlier were back up and staggering toward them. They moved just slowly enough to allow Angel, Nudge, and Gazzy to pry open the containers and start dousing the men with chemical agents that kids should never have access to.

“Incapacitate them,” Dylan ordered, catching his breath. “I’ve got to get the doctor.”