The Angry Birds Movie 2

by Heather Nuhfer

  “How about that it’s able to withstand the pull of forty thousand more pounds than any other string—”

  RIIIING.

  The class bell cut her off.

  “—known to bird kind. Or pig kind for that matter!”

  Silver sighed as the students cleared out of the room. Just then, a familiar yellow wing tapped her on the shoulder.

  “’Sup, sis?!”

  Silver spun around to see her brother, Chuck.

  “Chuck!”

  “Silver!”

  After a big hug, they both started talking at the exact same time. “I’m so happy to—!” They both tried again, but the same thing happened! “It’s really—” They were still speaking in unison, “Great to—” They both reached out at the same time and tapped each other at the same time while calling out, “Jinx!” Since they did everything at the same time, neither was actually jinxed. They both tried again, but this time Silver dodged Chuck’s tap, managing to tap him right on the chest.

  “Jinx! One, two, three—I win!” Silver said triumphantly. “You can’t speak until someone says your name!”

  Just then Red, Leonard, and Bomb walked into the room, looking for Chuck.

  “Hello? You in here?” Red asked as he scanned the room. Red was surprised when he spotted Silver with Chuck; she was the nosy bird from speed dating! Red did a double take—she was Chuck’s sister?!

  “You?” Red said.

  “You?” Silver replied before turning to Chuck. “You know him?”

  Chuck pointed to his sealed beak, reminding his sister of the jinx she put on him.

  “Okay, Chuck! I un-jinx you!”

  “Yeah, this is one of my best buddies Red, and these are the guys! Guys, this is Silver. The greatest kid sister in the world!”

  “Well, I’m not exactly a kid anymore, Chuck.”

  Chuck pulled Silver in for a noogie. “Well, you’ll always be my kid sister!”

  “Okay. Okay, Chuck,” she implored. “Hey, everyone!”

  “You know, I just don’t think this is going to work. It’s just that I’m not sure you’re going to be compatible with the team,” Red said snidely. “Boom! How’s that feel?”

  Silver, unimpressed, slow-blinked at Red before walking right past him and straight to Leonard.

  “Oh, wow. It is such a pleasure to meet—” Silver started saying to Leonard, but turned to Red and interjected, “not you,” before turning back to Leonard and finishing with “but you. I’ve never met a pig before. Your technological achievements are amazing! May I shake your hoof?”

  “Why thank you! I like her,” Leonard declared, smiling proudly at the compliments.

  “And this has to be Bomb,” Silver said to the large bird.

  “Yeah! How’d you know?” Bomb asked.

  “’Cause you have a fuse coming out of your head. So cool! Kaboooom!”

  “So I hear you’re some kind of engineering wizard or whatever,” Red said unenthusiastically.

  “Heh. I mean, I don’t like to brag, but—” Silver said as she held up an award that read: “Dean’s Distinguished Achievement Award.” Silver pointed to a photo of her that was on it. “Wait, who’s that?” she said coyly before revealing dozens of other awards. “And why is she all over these achievement awards?!”

  Silver’s role on the team? The brainiac.

  “The kid’s amazing, right?” Chuck bragged.

  “I’m not a kid anymore, Chuck,” Silver reminded him. Again.

  Chuck wasn’t listening. “Toot toot! Tickle train arriving at sister station!”

  “Chuck! No! I’m a serious academic!” Silver protested, but it was too late. Chuck attacked his little sister with tickles until she gave in, and they began roughhousing and tickling each other. It went on long enough that the rest of the team started to get uncomfortable.

  “Oh, look at this . . . two grown birds tickling each other,” Red observed.

  Far out at sea, the hatchlings Zoe, Vivi, and Sam-Sam were still trying to catch up with the eggs they had accidentally sent into the ocean. While paddling their raft toward the eggs, which were just a few feet away, the trio sang a sea shanty to help encourage themselves.

  WE’RE SAILING IN THE OCEAN WE MUST . . .

  ROW! ROW!

  THE EGGS ARE IN OUR SIGHTS SO WE MUST . . .

  GO! GO!

  WE’LL GET ’EM BACK BEFORE OUR PARENTS . . .

  KNOW! KNOW!

  AND SAVE THE DAY LIKE RED! A REAL . . .

  HERO! HERO!

  Vivi and Sam-Sam reached out and grabbed the eggs from the water!

  “Woo-hoo! We did it!” Zoe cheered. “That was so easy!”

  “Yeah! A little too easy actually,” Vivi agreed. “Normally when things are this easy, some dramatically unexpected setback occurs.”

  “I don’t get it.”

  “Well, it’s kinda hard to explain. But it’s sorta like when . . .”

  But Vivi didn’t get to finish her explanation. Something started rising up out of the water from underneath their raft and lifted them into the air! A PUFT! from a blowhole sent the eggs soaring high into the sky. Beneath the raft the hatchlings could now see a whale was below them!

  “Like that,” Vivi said.

  The three hatchlings looked up to the eggs in dismay as they shot up far into the sky.

  “Are you freaking kidding me?!” Zoe gruffed.

  Back at Mighty Eagle’s cave the newly formed heist crew of Red, Chuck, Bomb, Silver, Mighty Eagle, Leonard, and Courtney had gathered to hear the plan. The power struggle between Red and Leonard wasn’t showing any signs of going away, either.

  “Each of you has been selected because you are the best in your field . . . ,” said Leonard, before adding, “that we could find.”

  The group scoffed at Leonard’s rude remark, but he continued without hesitation. “Your skills will be put to the test, facing this—” Using a pointer, Leonard dramatically revealed a picture of the third island. “As you can clearly see, this is a—”

  “Volcano!” Red interrupted him. “A volcano is what my assistant was going to say.” Red tried to grab the pointer from Leonard, but Leonard did not want to give it up.

  “Assistant? You’re the assistant. I’ll take that!” Leonard said as he struggled to get the pointer back.

  Red held on to it as tightly as he could. “No, no, no, nope. I’m the leader.”

  Silver cleared her throat, which caused Red and Leonard to stop fighting over the pointer.

  “Actually, it’s a composite volcano, you can tell by the height and the clearly apparent vent clusters.”

  “Vent clusters. I was gonna say that,” Leonard said defensively.

  “Okay, forget I said volcano. This is . . . It’s a superweapon!” Red declared.

  “Yup, and here’s the scary part: this is their psychotic leader,” Leonard said as he pointed to the new image on the screen without looking at it. He didn’t know the image was an embarrassing selfie he had taken. Noticing the odd looks from the group, Leonard looked at the image.

  “Whoops! How did that get in there?! Next! Courtney!”

  “You took them,” Courtney reminded him.

  Red stepped in, taking over the slideshow. “Ahem. This is their psychotic leader.”

  The screen clicked to a photo of the majestic, evil eagle Zeta.

  “Ahh!” Mighty Eagle screamed, which caused stares from his teammates.

  “Whoa. Hey, buddy, do you know her?” Red asked.

  “What me?” Mighty Eagle fumbled. “No! Definitely not. Absolutely not. I’ve never seen her before in my life. Who’s that? I don’t know!”

  No one knew what to say because it was so obvious that Mighty Eagle was lying.

  Finally, Red spoke up. “Not terribly convincing, but moving on. Okay, folks, so no need to panic . . . nothing here I haven’t dealt with before. I saved the island once, I can do it again.”

  “Great! What’s the plan?” Silver asked him.

/>   “The plan,” Red pondered. “So, um . . . Three steps. Step one: We’re gonna travel undetected to Eagle Island. That’s step one.”

  Red racked his brain, as he tried to come up with a plan on the fly. Silver was listening intently and taking notes.

  “Step two,” Red continued hesitantly, “we are gonna break into the superweapon. We’ll just shimmy on in there.”

  Silver looked at her notes and circled the words “no plan” repeatedly.

  “No plan,” she said to herself.

  Red was still talking. “Step three: We are going to deactivate that superweapon and escape, hopefully before both our islands are destroyed and we all die. So, uh, that’s it!”

  “Right,” Silver said, “so, I just have a few questions.”

  “What? Why?! I just explained everything. It’s a foolproof plan.” Red was dumbfounded by Silver’s boldness. She was the newbie! He was the pro!

  “How do we sneak onto the island? What exactly is the superweapon? How do we deactivate it? And when you say ‘escape,’ how do you plan to do that exactly?” Silver asked with rapid-fire delivery. “’Cause I feel like this is a pretty crucial thing to figure out.”

  “I agree. Why isn’t she in charge?” Leonard asked. He was trying to wind Red up even more.

  “Hey, guys, hold on a second. Please,” Red said, trying to keep attention on him. It wasn’t working, though. Everyone was more interested in what Silver had to say.

  “Mighty Eagle, do you want to weigh in on this?” she asked. “You’re an eagle. Any chance you might have a map?”

  Mighty Eagle quickly walked over to a wall and struck a dramatic pose. It was obvious he was trying to hide something behind his body.

  “What? No, nooo! There’s no map,” Mighty Eagle told them, but then he accidentally bumped into the wall he was trying to keep covered, causing a map to unroll for all of them to see. The map read, ‘This Is a Map of Eagle Island.’ But Mighty Eagle’s failed trickery was quickly overshadowed by an ominous whistling noise from outside. It sounded like it was coming closer and closer.

  “Wait a minute . . . You guys hear that?” Red asked.

  The team listened as Silver followed the sound to the doorway and looked out at the sky. Suddenly, her eyes went wide with fear, and she gasped. “Hey, guys . . .”

  They all looked out the doorway, only to see a giant ice ball flying right toward them!

  “It’s headed straight for us! Run!” Leonard screamed, as they tried to escape before the giant chunk of ice hit. The team ran through the dark cave screaming. Red remembered to snatch Mighty Eagle’s map of Eagle Island just before the ice ball made contact with Mighty Eagle’s home. In a panic, Mighty Eagle screamed and threw the birds and pigs onto his back before jumping from the cave and flying through the air and out of danger in the nick of time. Behind them they saw the giant ice ball fully collide with the top of Eagle Mountain. It broke off a large piece of the summit, which crashed into the ocean. The team couldn’t believe what had just happened.

  Over on Eagle Island, however, there was someone who could very much believe it.

  “Rewind it! Rewind it! Play it again!” Zeta demanded gleefully. She, along with her assistant, Debbie, and a few eagle engineers, were watching the action replay of the ice ball destroying Mighty Eagle’s mountain on Bird Island. They all cheered as Glenn replayed the footage on the monitor.

  “Yes, baby! You knocked that top right off it! Well, that should send ’em running!” Zeta declared.

  “Wait, ‘him’? Send who running?” Debbie asked.

  “Them. I said ‘them.’ Stop asking me stupid questions,” Zeta insisted.

  Riding through the night on Mighty Eagle’s back, the team was still in shock.

  “Wow, that was crazy! We could have all died,” Red said.

  Mighty Eagle tried to comfort them. “Well, you can always count on me to—”

  CRASH!

  But he was interrupted when he crashed into a cliff, sending all his riders falling through the sky. Everyone screamed in terror, except Red, who got a steely look of determination in his eyes. It was hero time! Red unfurled the map into the wind.

  “Everyone, grab the map!” he instructed them.

  The map was so large that once everyone had a hold of it, it worked like a parachute, slowing their fall and saving their lives!

  Red breathed a sigh of relief—until—

  RIP!

  “Bomb, please tell me that was sound of your pants ripping!” Chuck begged.

  “I don’t wear pants.”

  In terror, they all watched as the small rip in the map became a huge rip! Their makeshift parachute failed, sending them all plummeting toward the ground screaming, “None of us wear pants!”

  Silver had to do something. Like all self-respecting Angry Birds, she had a special state of being that she could call upon in times of need. It was Silver Vision! Suddenly she could see all the calculations needed for their safe landing. Everything from trajectory, angle, and speed appeared right before her eyes! She used all of them to quickly formulate a plan. In an instant, Silver floated up to the big rip in the map and masterfully used her hair tie to cinch up the hole.

  FWOOP! The parachute was reborn! It softened their fall just enough that they slammed into the ground but didn’t die.

  TWHOMP! Silver landed on top of Red. They were belly to belly, which was very awkward.

  “Oh, erm,” Silver mumbled.

  “Haha, um . . . ,” Red stammered.

  Their eyes met, and they both felt something they hadn’t felt before.

  “Hey! What is this?” Chuck interrupted.

  Red and Silver instantly separated, acting like nothing had happened.

  “Oh, well, I um— She was just thanking me for saving everyone,” Red fibbed.

  “I’m sorry, ‘saving everyone’?” Silver objected.

  “Yeah, you know the map was my idea.”

  “It ripped—”

  “Yeah,” Red said, getting very annoyed. “Well, maybe that’s because there’s one too many birds on the team!”

  “I—”

  But Silver’s rage was interrupted by a very sad Mighty Eagle. “Oh, my mountain,” he mourned.

  At the same time, Red and Silver called out, “We gotta save that mountain!”

  “Jinx!” Silver added gleefully, causing Red to groan and roll his eyes.

  Back at the superweapon, Zeta was still watching the monitor with Glenn.

  “Wait. Why isn’t anyone leaving?” she scowled.

  “It appears that—” Glenn started to say that the birds had escaped, but Zeta stopped him by letting out a long growl. She then violently ripped the monitor in half before letting a smile reappear on her beak.

  “Okay here’s what we’re gonna do . . . I want you to take all of those ice balls . . . and fill them with molten lava!”

  Glenn gulped. It sounded like the most insane plan ever.

  “Uh . . . I’m pretty sure that’s not possible.”

  Zeta wasn’t one to take no for an answer, though.

  “Excuse me?” she said, letting out another terrible growl.

  Glenn nodded. He would find a way to make it work.

  On Bird Island’s Main Street, the birds were very nervous after the ice-ball attack. The sun was setting, but they could still see Eagle Mountain smoldering in the distance.

  “What’s gonna happen to our island? Red, are we gonna be okay?” one of the villagers asked.

  “All right, guys! Don’t worry! We got this! Red, here, has got your back! . . . And your front . . . and your sides!” Red reassured them as he led the heist team through the crowd.

  The villagers were relieved that Red was there to take care of them.

  “Thank you so much for coming out. It means a lot . . . to each of us,” Red thanked the villagers as the crew followed him down to the dock. “Okay, Leonard, where’s your ride?”

  As if on cue, a tiny submarine popped out of
the water, like a bubble.

  “Aww, it’s so cute!” Bomb gushed.

  “Okay, that’s it, huh?” Red criticized Leonard. “How are we all supposed to fit in—”

  “Oh, I think we’ll manage,” Leonard said smugly as he clicked his remote control.

  A gigantic submarine emerged from the water, pushing the tiny sub aside. It was so large that it blocked out the last rays of the sun. The sheer size of it impressed all the birds on the dock. The heist team boarded the sub, and Red took a final look at all the birds—and pigs—who were depending on him. One bird held a sign that read, IT’S ALL UP TO YOU, RED!, while the pigs held a less supporting sign: IF WE ALL DIE, IT’S KINDA YOUR FAULT.

  Red took a moment to think about what was about to happen. Suddenly, he wasn’t feeling so confident.

  “I got this,” he told himself nervously as the hatch closed on the sub and they submerged into the water and off into the sunset.

  “Yes! Oh yeah! Oh yeah! Ha ha! It’s glorious! I’m a genius!” Zeta trilled as she spun around inside a production room that was filling ice balls with colorful lava.

  Debbie and Glenn looked bemused as Zeta continued her self-adulation.

  “I am so smart! Yes! So, are we ready to go then? We ready to drop some lava balls on some islands?” Zeta was giddy. Against all expectations, Glenn had somehow managed to achieve the impossible—much to the relief of him and his team. Well—almost.

  Glenn took a deep breath and said, “Well, actually, we’ve had a few complications.”

  Zeta’s mood instantly changed. “Hold up. So you’re telling me right now that my superweapon still doesn’t work?”

  “Oh, no! No! We’ve actually made a lot of progress.” Glenn gestured to an ice ball that was being filled with lava.

  “Ha ha! Yes! I love it!” Zeta’s happiness returned for nothing more than an instant, as she watched the ice ball melt from the lava’s heat. “You suck, Glenn. I thought the ball was supposed to hold the lava.”

  “It will. We are very close. We just need two more weeks.”

  “Two weeks? Two weeks?! TWO WEEKS . . .” Zeta looked like she was about to blow a fuse.

  “It’s quite an undertaking,” Glenn tried to explain.