AN: Thanks to Demon Child Of Night 14, it has come to my attention that my story is awfully similar to theirs. I honestly did not realize this until she posted an AN about it, so I am changing my story some so that it doesn't resemble hers. I'm sorry for that, but in no way did I mean for our stories to be so similar, which is why I'm changing it. And, again, I'm sorry Demon Child Of Night 14. I promise that this story wasn't supposed to be so like yours, and I'm totally willing to change it. I feel horrible about it. I hope you guys enjoy my new version of the story!

(Fang's POV)

"Guys, relax." I told the Martinez family. They were adopting a new family member today. The family consisted of Ella, Nudge, Angel, and Gazzy, as well as Dr. M. My brother, Iggy, and I were here to greet the new member. We lived a couple streets over, but all of us are like family.

"Yeah, so the new girl is a little rough and sarcastic. She'll warm up to you guys." Iggy said. "We've just got to give her some time."

"But her last foster home kept her for three years, and they were abusive! She's likely not to trust us for months at least!" Ella said worriedly. She looked like she was ready to bash her head against a wall. All of them did. It made sense that they were so stressed out.

The new girl, Maximum Ride, has only been to four foster homes in the eleven years she's been an orphan. But all of these were abusive, and they each kept her for at least a year. She was rough, distrustful, and sarcastic. It would take a lot of work for us to get through to her.

The doorbell rang and Dr. M rushed off to get it, almost crashing into a wall when she tripped over her own feet. I could hear her talking with someone else at the door, before she came back, leading Maximum into the room. Maximum was wearing blue jeans and a simple black T-shirt. Her hair was dirty blonde, her eyes the color of melted chocolate. They would've been beautiful if they weren't so hard and cold. They were the eyes of a girl that had seen things we could only see in our nightmares. "Everyone, this is Max. Max, this is Ella, Nudge, Angel, and Gazzy, your new siblings. And these are our friends, Fang and Iggy."

"Hey, Max. It's good to finally meet you." Iggy said with a smile, standing up and extending his hand for her to shake. She just glared at him until he put his hand back down. "Well, um…" Iggy tried to think of something else to say, but failed. Epically.

"I'm so glad you're finally here! Now we can go shopping, and to the movies, and the mall! I'm going to buy you the cutest looking outfits!" Nudge squealed. "This is going to be so exciting! I–" It was at this point that Iggy clamped his hand over her mouth.

"Sorry about that. Nudge is a chatterbox." he said, giving Max a grin. She didn't return it.

"Where's my room?" she asked.

"Um, right up here." Dr. M replied. She led Max up to her room. It was pretty cool. It was painted a dark green color, and there was a balcony. There were also some instruments in there, which Max seemed kind of surprised about. "The people at the orphanage told us that you were really into music." Dr. M said. "I hope this is okay with you."

Max gave Dr. M a confused and wary look. My guess was that she was trying hard to find some kind of evil in Dr. M's kind gestures. Even so, Max walked over to an acoustic guitar and picked it up, checking the strings and such. Her hands ran delicately over the guitar before she put it back down. It was at that moment that Total, Angel's little black Scottie, decided to run in, scaring Max so bad that she actually jumped, like, a foot in the air.

"Geez!" she yelled. When she saw it was Total, she rolled her eyes. Total stopped when he saw her, they stared at each other for a minute, and then he went into a barking frenzy.

"Total, no! Max is our new family member now! Stop it!" Angel demanded, grabbing hold of her dog and attempting to calm him down.

Max rolled her eyes again and walked up to them. "No." she said, calmly and firmly. Total stopped barking and cocked his head. He barked again. "No." she repeated, her tone becoming slightly harsher. Total was dead quiet. It was the weirdest thing I'd ever seen.

"How did you do that?" I asked, the first words to come out of my mouth so far.

Max shrugged. "A friend of mine once told me that you had to be calm and firm with a dog if you wanted them to listen to you." she replied stiffly.

"Well, um…are you hungry?" Iggy asked. "I make some pretty mean meals, if I do say so myself."

"Yeah, he's almost as good as Mom." Gazzy agreed.

Max just shrugged and followed us down to the kitchen. It turns out, she eats a lot. Of course, I didn't tell her that. You don't tell any girl that, but she had two servings of food, while the rest of us only had one. But it didn't seem to bother her though. Like she was used to it.

After lunch, she went back upstairs to her room, and locked herself in there for the rest of the day. But, whenever we walked by, we could hear her on the guitar or keyboard. And, if we listened closely, we could hear her singing. Let's just put it this way, she has an amazing voice.

(Max's POV)

This family was different from the others. They actually acted somewhat civilized. I couldn't let my guard down though. I've been tricked by the nice guy act once and never fell for it again. I'm not starting now.

Dr. M opened my bedroom door. "Max?" she called. I looked up from the song I was writing and raised an eyebrow at her, not even bothering to hide my annoyance. "I was wondering if you'd like to go to the mall with us tomorrow." she said.

I grimaced. "I'm not a big fan of the mall." Or crowds, I silently added to myself.

"Well, Nudge and Angel won't like that, but I was actually asking because we need to go clothes shopping for you."

I sighed. "Whatever." I mumbled, going back to my song. I heard Dr. M close the door. Why do I feel bad doing this to her? It's how I treated all the others, and I never felt bad about it. Stupid heart. This is why I hate emotions. They're just too complicated.

Suddenly, my right wing cramped up. My back arched and I hissed. I got up and locked the door, then carefully extended my wings. I shook them out to work out the kinks. That's right, I have wings. My "father", Jeb Batchedler, was a scientist. He gave me the wings when I was still in the womb. My mom was just as bad. I remember the experiments that they used to perform on me. Horrible, torturous, unspeakable experiments that still haunt me to this day. Then, our dysfunctional family fell apart. Jeb got arrested and sentenced to death row. He was executed by the electric chair last year. They actually had the gall to invite me to see his execution. Mom's gone. And I went to an orphanage. Which would've been a relief if it wasn't for the fact that I was sent to abusive families. At least it's better than what would've happened if I hadn't hid my wings all these years. I probably would've been sent to work in some zoo or circus.

I looked at the balcony longingly. I wish I could just jump off of it and spread my wings as far as I could. Nothing compares to the feeling of soaring through the air. Someone knocked on my door and I jumped. I folded my wings in and quickly grabbed my jacket, which I'd thrown on the bed when I came back in from lunch, to cover them.

I yanked open the door and went to glare at whoever was behind it only to find no one there. I looked down and saw Angel standing in the hall. I blinked a couple times in surprise, then frowned. "What?" I asked flatly. Again, I felt bad when she flinched at my tone.

"Um…we were going to the movies. Mom said she wanted you to go. She doesn't want to leave you home alone, just in case something happens." she said.

I sighed in frustration. I don't like crowds. And movie theaters were almost always crowded. "Fine." I mumbled, slipping my tennis shoes back on and following Angel downstairs. I found that the others were already ready to go and I followed Dr. M and her family to their van. I got in the back, next to Iggy, and stared out the window. My claustrophobia, unfortunately, included cars. But, hey, you'd be claustrophobic too if the first five years of your life were spent in a cage.

We got to the movie theaters and bought tickets for Ironman 2. As we sat down, I could already feel my skin tingling and my breathing quicken. Nothing that the others would be able to notice. My eyes darted to the exits, and warily watched anyone who walked by me. Like I suspected, every seat in the freaking theater was filled.

The lights shut off and my breathing spiked up again. I closed my eyes and flashes of old memories danced behind my eyes. I remembered being locked in my cage in a dark room. The screen lit up, but I kept my eyes closed. I screamed as the Whitecoats experimented on me, the single bright light shining right in my eyes. The loud music started, killing my ears, which were much better than a humans. I screamed as an explosion went off just a meager twenty feet from me, flying through the air and crashing into the ground, pain shooting up through my entire body.

"Max, are you alright?" a voice asked beside me. I pried my eyes open to find Fang staring at me worriedly. I stood up. "I'll be right back." I murmured, walking quickly out of the theater. There was a bench right outside, so I didn't have to go out and have to worry about showing the idiots that worked here my ticket again. I sat down and put my head in between my legs, my hands on the back of my head, and I took deep breaths. Just like Officer Wayne taught me when I had a panic attack like that.

"Max!" I heard someone exclaim next to me. I jumped and looked up to see Fang. He'd just been coming out the door when he saw me, so he was half in, half out. He moved towards me, reaching out to touch me, then thinking better of it and pulling back. Good move on his part. He sat down next to me instead. "What happened back there?" he asked.

I just shrugged. I didn't let people know my weaknesses. It just gave them an advantage over me. "Do you want to go back inside?" he asked, surprisingly gentle. I was careful to keep my face blank as I shook my head. I could see much better than any human could in the dark. Most humans know that the others are there, but they can't see them clearly because of how dark it is. I can, so I know I'm constantly surrounded by people.

"Do you want to go outside?" he asked. I looked down the hall, which so happened to be in front of us. There was a huge crowd of people waiting for their movies to get started. I shuddered slightly and shook my head. Recognition dawned in his eyes.

"You're claustrophobic, aren't you?" he asked. I glared at him, which seemed to be enough of an answer. "Why didn't you tell anybody?"

I shrugged, looking at the ground so that my hair curtained my face. "When you've lived like I have, you learn not to let people know your weaknesses. Especially people you don't trust." I replied.

He stared at me for a couple seconds before saying. "I'm really curious about what's happened to you."

"Why? Because I'm a distrusting freak?" I asked, rolling my eyes at him.

"No. Because I'm wondering what could make someone so strong break so badly." he replied.

I felt my eyes widen slightly before I looked away, glaring at the floor. How is it that this complete stranger could read me so well? Why does he know more about me than my own parents did? And why does it seem like I can read him better than anyone else can?

I tried to figure this out. I had to force Fang to go back inside and watch the rest of the movie. I sat out for the rest of the movie. IT was a couple hours before we finally went back home.

AN: Alright guys, that's the new story. Demon Child Of Night 14, if you still think this is to similar to your story, please tell me what part is, so I can change it. I really have a different plot line from you story, and different ideas, but I still don't want you to think that I'm trying to steal anything from you. I'm very willing to change anything you think is too much like your story, or anything you think belongs to you. I really am sorry about all this, and I really didn't realize how close both of our stories were until you posted that AN. I didn't mean to copy your work, and I really want you to continue your story for two reasons. 1: You are an amazing author. 2: It is a great story and you've had me hooked on it from the first paragraph I read. So I'm totally willing to work with you, you just have to tell me what's wrong. Just send me a message on anything you think I should change. Thank you very much, and I'm sooooo sorry.

Wolflover777