Prologue / author's note, updated 21 March 2014:
Due to renewed interest in this fic, I've revised the introduction. If for some reason you wanna see the original, PM me.
I wrote "The Art of Treachery" in March 2008, after prompting from mergirl007 and mride-for-life. At the time I was deeply closeted about being both homosexual and transsexual. For the record - yes, I'm a transsexual man.
Looking back now, I handled the theme of Omega's gender identity with more sensitivity than I'd have expected of myself at 15 - I think this is the only Max Ride romance fic to feature transsexuality.
This fic was written before the release of The Final Warning, and I took a liberal hand with canon to fit it to my plot.
Below is a new piece written specially for this introduction. I didn't feel fair just putting in a new author's note without any story content.
Iggy shook her awake before dawn that morning. A pale light stained the rocks around them, and far below the pines that ringed the base of the cliff shone faintly green.
"What?" Max yawned, rubbing her eyes. "I thought Fang was on watch."
"He's gone," Iggy said. "I heard a noise and when I got up, he wasn't there. I don't hear him anywhere either."
"Maybe he went into town." She unknotted her short braid with her fingers, combing the dirty hair by touch. They'd used the showers at a campground three days ago, and washed off in the lake the day before, but she was starting to feel downright disgusting.
Iggy shook his head. "I don't think so." He found one of her hands, pressed four or five metallic objects from his hand to hers. "I found footprints leading away from where he was sleeping. They ended in what looked like a fight happened. I found these."
She squinted at them in the low, bluish light. Fang had always had better night vision than she did. The objects were small, a golden brassy color, and slightly hollow. "What do you think they are?"
"Max, they're bullet casings." He looked straight at her, and the illusion would've been eerie if he wasn't her brother and she didn't know he was pointing his face in the direction her voice had come from. His eyes, the irises a blurry, milky fog-color, even seemed to search her face for a reaction.
"They could be old. From hunters or something." She yawned again. "We would have heard gunshots."
"Not if they used silencers. It would've been quiet enough we might not have woken up." Iggy looked worried, his hair sticking up in crazy corkscrews. There were faint red lines on his face from using the sleeve of his windbreaker as a pillow. "I found darts too. Since when do hunters use tranq darts?"
Max rubbed her forehead. Thank God, the Voice hadn't rung in yet. "What, do you think it's Itex? We got rid of them. They're done-zo. I'm telling you, he probably just flew into town to get tacos."
Iggy folded his arms. "Then why did he leave his backpack?"
"OK." The lassitude of interrupted sleep was finally starting to leave her head, and her stomach felt acidic with fear. If someone had taken Fang... why not the rest of them, too? "Fair point. Did you find any trace of where they might've gone?"
He shook his head. "I'm blind, not a magician. But his tracks stopped after the scuff marks. It was like they just vanished."
"What are we gonna do?" They'd been headed noplace in particular, but with a flock member missing and no leads, what could they do now?
"Look for him?" Iggy scratched an itch on his left wing, fingers rustling through the oily feathers. "It might've been the School."
"It could've been anybody," Max said.
Iggy sighed. "True that. Just when I thought we were gonna get a break."
"Yup."
The sun rose above the horizon.