Prologue: the end of days.
Today was one of those days, thought Max wistfully, where everything around you seems to glow with an unreal radiance. Which Max didn't think much of the time because this was something that she rarely felt. Constantly, there's a crisis at hand. Someone's life is always in peril or some new baddie wanted to shave the world down to the nubs and start again. Now, that's all over. She could finally relax. She could revel in this moment with one of her favorite people. Fang. She was happy just to get out of the house and have some time to goof around and date… a normal teenager would.
But you're not a normal teenager. You've got a job to do. It's not over. The Voice interjected, putting a damper on her happiness as per usual. Just because she's supposed to save the world doesn't mean that she shouldn't be able to have fun, right? Itex is disbanded and dead; the flock made sure of that by storming the last known branch.
Max, it's never over. Max tries as hard as she can to drown him out and focus on Fang flipping his dark bangs from out of his eyes. She sighs; she really loves those small idiosyncrasies of his.
How long do you intend for this vacation to last? There isn't time for… for whatever this is. You need to get back out there and nip Itex at the bud before the regroup and it becomes too late. The Voice scolds her. Shaking her head, she nuzzles closer into Fang's arm, willingly letting his nonsense fade from her thoughts.
Once she's knocked down the leader of Itex they'd all went falling down like dominoes. Even after that, she knocked down those who she was sure would try to vie to be the next leader. Every single possibility had been exhausted. There's nothing left, each leader either dead or rotting in prison. So why should she let the Voice suck all of the fun of her day to day life? She's worked hard and long for years. Who's to say she doesn't deserve a break?
The fact that Fang was here with her didn't make things any worse. It makes them better, making her feel like they were finally becoming a real couple. Fang tapped her shoulder, "You okay? You were kind of zoning out there."
She shrugged. "It was just the Voice, nothing really."
"No, what did it say?"
"Itex's not gone, yada yada yada… you know we already took care of that." Max tries to convince him that everything was fine, because it was. Though Fang doesn't seem to be taking the message the same way Max is. He seemed a little too shaken by it, like he knew something she didn't.
"We should head back home, Max." Fang shakes her off his shoulder and takes her hand.
"No." Max tugs away from him, though following him as he heads back to her mother's house. "What's got you so spooked all of a sudden?"
Fang sighs heavily. "Have you ever thought that no matter what we do, no matter where we go, there will always be people out there who want to hurt us? You know… hunt us down?"
"Of course. But there's nothing we can do about that."
"That's exactly my point. There's nothing we can do. So understand that we'll never stop the world from ending. The humans with their thirst for mad science and dangerous splices, blowing themselves up and shit… Maybe we can't save the world because it's doomed to fail. Inevitable." Fang spoke quickly, as if these pessimistic thoughts have been hovering on the backburner of his throat for the longest time.
"That's no reason to stop living our lives and striving for normal lives— "
"Isn't it?"
"Fang, I—I don't understand. All of this, where is it coming from? Did something happen when I wasn't around?"
"Sort of, but it's just… Max I've been thinking. Maybe instead of trying to steer clear of all the craziness, we should lean into it to shape it to our liking. It has to be better than constantly living panicked and dirty lives in damp caves."
He's right, you know.
No, he isn't. Max stopped in place on the sidewalk of the residential street, suppressing the urge to shout. Arguing with yourself that she doesn't believe her own opinion. What was she coming to? She turns to Fang. "Are you about to let some voice scare you after all of the things that we've been through? It's wrong all the time; I know that better than anyone else. What's different this time."
His eyes hardened, seemingly holding something back from her. As Max moved to ask him about it, the negativity drains from his face as quickly as it had appeared. He tries to smile for her nonetheless. "Fine. Let's go see that movie."
She smiles brightly back up at him, letting the issue sink of the back of her mind. Today was their date. If there was something up, it's have to wait for tomorrow.
And soon enough they are sitting in the back of a small movie theatre with two large tubs of buttery, heart-attack inducing popcorn and two Dr. Peppers they'd sneaked in under Fang's hoodie. We sat in the back of a superhero action-flick. Fang's arm wraps around her shoulders. She sighs and relaxes into it. Fang speaks. "You're right. It is great to feel normal for once."
"Yeah, it was so nice of Dr. Martinez to hold down the fort so that we could have some fun."
"I just hope Iggy doesn't burn it down before we get back," he says, chuckling softly.
"Enough about them, Fang. We're here to focus on us for once."
Fang scoffs. "Maxi, look at these trailers. Those guys have nothing on us. I mean who dresses up in spandex to fight bad guys? It's ridiculous. I think combat boots are the only thing I've ever needed."
He begins to play with a bit of her hair absentmindedly. Max looks up at him in the dark. Fang eyes are still glued to the screen, although Max believes she can make out a faint flush on his cheeks in the dark. She smirks. "I was thinking it was alright, but what's better than the real thing? Except more appreciation from the general public."
"Maybe, but they aren't as pretty as you."
Max smiles as she pokes him in the rib. "I don't know about you but that Captain Am— "
She's cut off when Fang leans down kisses her on the lips. It isn't a deep one, but a simple one, a soft peck that makes her heart flutter prettily. Fang pulls away and stands up. "This movie sucks. Wanna get ice cream?"
She looks around; the tubs of popcorn are nearly empty. Max replies, hoping she doesn't sound too ditzy. "Sure."
They walk home in a comfortable silence, Max contented by his arm slung lazily around her waist. On the way they stop for ice cream cones. Max orders mint chocolate chip, while Fang settles for a simple vanilla cone. Max asks, amused, and almost hoping they never arrive home. "So you feeling another superhero flic next time or what?"
"Maybe not, but it just got me thinking about how our lives would be if we didn't have wings. We'd be a bunch of orphans. "Fang asks between licks on his cone.
"What, with less noticeable scales in place of wings?" Max wonders aloud, already finishing her ice cream. She stands up to walk again. Fang wordlessly follows her. "Though I'm not sure if I'd take that change because I happen to think having wings is pretty freaking awesome."
"Good point, even if it does make us underdogs."
Max pauses for a moment than before laughing. "Wait – you think you're an underdog. You think you're the underdog?"
He laughed. "Why not?"
"Because—because you're not." Max says. "It's not who you are. Think about it like this: In movies the underdog is the one person who after times and times of trying and trying, they finally get the one thing no one ever though they would get. You get what you want, because you're driven."
"I never thought I would get you," he replies quietly.
"Same," she says. "I thought I would never be free of labs."
"I never thought I would live a life past the age of twelve."
"I never thought I would have a family as great as ours."
"I never thought I… would love someone as great as you, or have such a great family." Fang replies, a light twinkle recognizable in his usually unreadable eyes. "So maybe we're all underdogs in a way. The only silver lining of our situation."
"Definitely." They share a hug, and as they turn the corner to Dr. Martinez's house, Max realizes that she had something she had to say as well.
"I never thought I would love— "Max tries to reply, but before she could Fang's face drops. His steps falter until he comes to a complete stop. He intakes a sharp breath.
"Fang, what's wrong?"
Fang leans against their neighbor's fence, breathing heavily. His labored breathing grows scarce before he collapses. As he loses consciousness, Fang makes a final grasp at his neck. Filled with horror, she holds him up. His head falls limp against her shoulder; his hair falls out of the way revealing a date. Today's date. Then suddenly their day started to make a lot more sense, all of his defeatist behavior. Wouldn't he want everyone to know, or at least help him stop it if there were any way possible? Or to make his last days that much more lovely?
She could feel tears falling of their own volition. No amount of words could describe how man, no, sad, no furious she was. Max couldn't understand why he wouldn't tell her, why he'd want to die alone, without anyone knowing until his last breath.
She sat with his body cradled to her chest, just trying to fathom how to explain this, trying to stop her silent tears from falling. She needed to collect herself and be strong. Fang wasn't dying today, unless she had anything to do about it…
Max stormed through the doorway, ignoring all the crazed glances, bee-lining for her mother. She finds her in her bedroom, hunched over a book reading by lamp. She bursts through the door, snapping Valencia out of her novel. Looking up, she sees Fang lying limp in her arms. As if by instinct, she leaps into action, rushing them to her clinic. On the way, Max tells her the entire story… what she hoped wasn't an expiration date on his neck.
Valencia was worried. With all her heart, she wanted to save Fang, but knew she couldn't; she didn't have the heart to tell Max that. How could you fight a programmed expiration date? The odds weren't in her favor. How could she fight against what his body wanted?
She did, however, hook him up to the machines. She gave him sedatives, wiped the sweat from his forehead, and watched his heart rate drop… Out of the corner of Valencia's eye, she could see Max weeping softly in the corner. It was near eleven-thirty and she couldn't bear to see it anymore. She had to save him, for her daughter.
Valencia was taken by surprise when Fang's eyelids fluttered for a moment, and hope glittered in her heart. She did her best to try to keep Fang awake, but it seemed like he just wanted to close his eyes… and sleep. By now, Max was watching him; she saw when his eyes started to roll back. Dr. Martinez could only imagine how scared Max was. She had to keep tapping his face to stop it, but soon this problem became more frequent, and she was afraid that she was going to lose him. There was nothing she could do.
Just minutes later, the flock rushes into her clinic with Iggy in their arms. He was unconscious and his face was paling by the second. She took him from them and set him next to Fang, whose eyes were now open and fighting to stay that way. In a snap decision, she decided to pull out a vial of adrenaline and put it into a shot, injecting it directly into his heart. She hoped it could save him if she couldn't.
He inhaled sharply, his knuckles turning white as he grasped the edges of the table. Only moments later did his body slow down, did the drugs start to wear off. He slowly lay back down, his dark eyes closing. "I'll… be… okay."
Max screams and runs towards her. Angel catches her just in time to hold her back, calm her down.
"I trusted you!" She screams, sweating rage and fury. "I trusted you, and you, you killed him!"
Valencia was taken aback by what she said, because as harsh as it was, it was true. She had trusted me to help him, and I had let her down. She'd killed him. The reality of the situation made her a little woozy. She staggered back against the wall, her breaths uneven. She had dealt with tons of animals before, and none of it even compared to this. She had killed a person. She killed someone that her daughter cared about in volumes.
What broke her out of her trance was her daughter falling to the ground, right out of Angel's grasp. The look on the young girl's face was pure horror; Valencia couldn't bear to look any longer. Turning away, she pulled more examination tables into the room (if worse came to worse) and placed Max on one next to Fang. She was so peaceful when she was asleep; a tear streamed down her cheek. She had always had a soft spot for her daughter, whether she was ninety-eight percent human, or not. She wasn't like the cold-hearted scientists. She couldn't let her die, not like this. She calmed down, and prepared to get back to work now that she was thinking clearly again. She grabbed some cloth from the table and headed to Iggy's bedside, when Angel tugged on her lab coat. "Dr. Martinez?
Tiny beads of sweat formed on her forehead. She couldn't imagine answering this child's questions. The whole situation was out of control; this couldn't be the end for them! They were the flock, the ones who would save the world… "Yes, sweetie?"
"I can't hear… your thoughts," she said tiredly. Valencia stared in awe at her; how could she not hear my thoughts? I didn't understand. It would make sense that Max, Fang, and Iggy would go down together, because they're all fifteen (even they should be months apart), but now it seemed that they were all being taken down at once. If this were a real expiration date, then Angel would have eight years left, Nudge would have three, and so on, but the fact that this was simultaneous was beyond coincidence. Someone was taking the flock down, and she could only imagine why.
Angel falls into Valencia's arms. Gasping, she holds her. He skin was growing cold and her eyes were already rolling back into her head. When she glanced around she saw that Nudge and Gazzy were already unconscious and on the ground. Trying to keep from going mad with pressure, she laid them on examination tables, one by one, and set to work. She took a set of tools out a cabinet, and opened Iggy's mouth. She was trying to check all parts of his body, to find out what was wrong. Even if this were the end, she would fight for them all until the last breath. Only Valencia was stopped, because she fell to the ground too, but this wasn't caused by an expiration date; it was by a few familiar faces.
Dr. Chu had injected Valencia with sedatives, which would knock her out long enough for them to do what they needed to do. Shoving her to the side, they started with Fang. According to his pulse he looked dead, but the drug Dr. Martinez gave her had only reacted with the drug they had set off in him, resulting in a false illusion of death. They quickly took out a small machine that would fix their problems once and for all. The machine was a small rectangle, with many medical capabilities. They eventually hooked this machine to every flock member, and got to work. With these machines, they could alter their DNA in anyway they'd like. They could cure illnesses or even inflict one; they could plot out the rest of their lives in the form of genetic code. In the hands of an ordinary person this would be useless, but in the hands of a scientist like themselves, the device was more precious than gold.
They made sure to tweak them in such a way that would work to their liking. These capabilities so to speak would lead to the making of a new world, a jumpstart in what would normally be a process that'd span lifetimes. A few temporary sicknesses were added to some of them, took away some powers here, added some there, and for good measure, they added genes commonly seen in the intelligent. For this plan to work, they needed some things to be removed temporarily, even if it was for a few weeks or for a lifetime, but other things needed to be removed completely, because of the weakness they inflicted on the California Group.
After they finished "fixing" the flock's genes they unhooked the machine from the last of their creations and knocked them all out. They then, left to the house, where Ella, Dylan, Total, and Akila were and took Dylan, who was now collapsed on the floor with Ella crying over him. They sedated Ella and the dogs, while taking Dylan with them. His purpose was over; he had failed his mission and will be terminated immediately. He would have done it now, but he didn't want any interruptions. He didn't bother fixing him either, because as far as they were concerned, he was nothing more than a failed experiment.
So that night, everyone in the house was asleep. It was quiet, too quiet for a house usually filled with so much people, so much laughter. All is silent. As the kids sleep, there is a change taking place, one bigger than all of them. Over the course of the next few weeks, there will be turmoil. Hearts will break, love will grow, minds will expand and people will grow. Just remember this: all change isn't bad; some change can actually be beneficial to us despite the wicked form it may take.