Expressing Emotions
Chapter 1
Let's jump right in, shall we? My name is Maximum Ride; I'm a 16 year old girl who lives with the eight people I love most in the world and who helped me save the world. You can thank me later.
Right now though, the Flock, Fang's Gang, and I were living back in the good ol' mountains of Colorado. It was great to just be able to kick back and relax after having two years of adventure, romance, near-death experiences, and heartbreak.
As I'm sitting here, telling you all this, everyone was swimming in a lake near our new home. For those of you who don't know everyone who is in our story now, I'll go over it for you: There are six of us who are 16; Fang, Iggy, Ratchet, Star, Kate, and yours truly. Then there are two of us who are 13; Holden and Nudge, then Gazzy, who's 10, Angel, who's 8, Maya, a clone of me who's 2 (though she's cloned from a 14 year old me, so she's not as old as she looks), and finally, there is Dylan, a clone of a clone of a clone of a genetically modified boy, and my other Ex.
For those of you not properly informed, after we (the Flock) had started the CSM (Coalition to Stop the Madness), Fang and I had sorted through some rather, romantic feelings we had for each other. The result of which was Fang and I falling head over heels in love. The romance didn't last long, as it was brought to a screaming halt after Fang had been medically dead for at least five minutes and I had barely been able to bring him back to life with a shot of adrenaline directly into his heart. Shortly after words, we attended Total (our talking and flying black Scottish terrier) and Akila's (she was a dog we had met while in Antarctica. Long story) wedding. When the after-party was over, the Flock and I, minus Fang because he went back early, though he didn't tell us why, flew home where we discovered a letter Fang left for us, but mostly for me.
In the letter Fang had poured out a lifetime's worth of love to me, and it made me realize that only Fang could hurt me so emotionally. After Fang was gone, Dylan, who had shown up before Fang left, who was supposed to be my other half (Dylan, not Fang), made his move and swept me off my feet. We had been dating, I guess that's the word, when the Flock, Fang's Gang, and three platoons of Marines and one squad of Navy S.E.A.L.s saved the world by means of an all out assault against a radical group called The Doomsday Group. At first, they were just a bump in the road before we saved the world, then it turned out, to save the world, we had to stop them.
By the time we fought them, they had amassed an army of followers in the millions, including several companies of the Chinese Army, and they had their headquarters in a secure fortress on an artificial island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. The Navy S.E.A.L.s were barely about to make it past the artificial beach to clear a landing for the Marines and us mutants. Finally though, we had reached the central control center in the fortress. Unfortunately, it was three miles below the water and after we tried to capture their high and mighty leader, who ended up killing himself, the whole structure was collapsing and we had to high tall it out of there.
As we were escaping, Maya was grabbed by and aquatic version of an Eraser, that proceeded to escape. At first Fang tried to chase him, but Dylan was able to catch the Eraser before Maya drowned. We didn't see if either one had gotten out since we were still getting pushed by the rapidly flowing water, but wouldn't you know it, another aquatic experiment was lurking, but this one grabbed me. Since Fang was closest, he responded first. Most of the escape I don't remember though, since I passed out while the creature was swimming away, but I did wake up to someone giving me the breath of life.
After I was able to breathe, I grabbed person who performed CPR, figuring it was Dylan, and kissed them. When I opened my eyes, I don't think I ever blushed heavier then I did right then; Fang gave me the breath of life when he had brought me out of the water. I immediately began asking where Dylan was, but no one had seen him or Maya. So Fang and I set out searching what was left of the island, and we were both shocked to see Maya and Dylan kissing. I hadn't really spoken to Dylan about it other than to tell him we were over. Turns out he had been planning to say that when we met after the island.
Since then, I've been avoiding both Dylan and Fang, though for different reasons however.