Hello ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the reboot of Maximum Hearts. For my returning readers, I know that some of you may have wanted me to continue the original. I do apologize to it, but personally after rereading my own work, I feel like this is necessary. I promise this won't be an exact recreation of the original. There will be different scenarios and, the most exciting thing, different worlds. OOOooohhh~ Anyways, I hope you enjoy.

Chapter 1: End of the World

Keep running. I have to keep running. I can't stop or I'm dead. Ignore the people's screams Max. Ignore all of the people crying for help. Jump over the destroyed cars that are on fire. Run past the people ahead of you. Before I might have gone out of my way and helped them, but not anymore. After what happened to my family, I can't be bothered. I probably can't save anyone anymore.

I just have to keep running, at least until I can find some kind of shelter. Though that's going to be kind of hard with everything either destroyed or on fire. The sky is a mixture of orange and black. I'm trying hard not to breathe in all the smoke that's coming my way. It's still hard to believe that just a few hours ago the sky was blue. I wasn't running for my life. Where all I had to worry about was my hair being a complete mess. After years of running, after years of fighting, I thought I finally found peace. Guess the guy upstairs had a change of heart. Want me to go through some more hardship.

Ahead of me, I see something crawling on the floor. Little humanoid creatures, all in black with antennas on their circular head. Their yellow eyes look around in every direction. Crap. They're here too. No matter what I do, I just can't escape from these monsters. These creatures that are hunting everything that moves. In a matter of just a few minutes, they destroyed an entire city. I close my hand, clenching it into fist. Should I fight? Should I turn around turn around and continue to run? It's only the little weak ones. I can handle them easily, but they have a tendency to gang up on you easily. I shake my head. It's not worth the risk.I should just turn around and start running in that specific direction.

I'm about to do just that, but something made my feet stop. Sniffling. Whimpering. Crying. A child crying.

No Max! You can't! You can't go and help them! If you can't manage to save your own family, you can't save a child!

"Help! Someone help!" The child screams, clearly scared to death. I glance back to see a little girl crawling on her back towards a totaled car as one of those monster squirms to her.

Max! Don't go! You just keep moving forward. Don't turn around and try to save her. They don't you. You know that you can't. You know damn well that you can't save anyone! So just keep running and don't look back.

Before I get the chance run, I take one one last glance behind me. The little blonde girl's back is against the car door as the creature crawled towards her. Tears running down her face. I want to yell "Run you dumb kid!" But I notice the red streak going down her right leg. Crap! She can't run.

Don't bother Max! Even if you save her, she'll be dead weight. A burden. Don't bother! Just go and run!

My mind is right. I should just look out for myself. Protect me and only me. I've survived plenty in my life. This girl probably doesn't know the first thing about protecting herself. She's just going to be dead weight and is only going to get us both killed. I should just run and not look back. Yeah. That's exactly what I should do. So why am I charging towards the monster?

Defying my brain, I run to the creature and give it a good sucker punch to its face (at least I think it's a face.) The mouthless, yellow-eyed creature turns into a puff of black smoke once my fist connects. I watch it drift away into the burning city.

I turn to the girl, her eyes red from the tears, shaking against the busted car door. I kneel down and look for injuries. "Are you okay? Where does it hurt?" I ask in a quick pace.

Why am I doing this? No matter how I see it, saving this girl is only going to hold me back. Either she's going to die both of us will. I should've just kept running. I've done that to so many other people. Why can't I do it with this little girl? I ask myself that, but I already know the answer. Besides the brown eyes, she looks exactly like her. Like Angel.

"My leg hurts." The girl's voice brings me back to reality. I check her blood soaked leg. There's a deep cut right below her knee. Yeah, she's not going to walk anytime soon.

Just leave her! You're not her guardian! Leave her and save yourself!

I shut my brain up and try to think of something useful. I start ripping the bottom of my pajama top, remembering how just a couple hours ago, I was eating pancakes with my family. That alone feels like it was years ago. I tie the ripped cloth around the girl's wound. As I finish up, I hear the girl scream "Look out!"

I notice that her hand was pointing behind me. I instantly turn around one-eighty degrees, only to get a face full of claws. I back away from both the girl and what hit me, touch the stinging area. My hand quickly turns red with my blood. In front of the girl now are three of the same looking creatures only taller and more slender, like the creature I turned to dust's older brothers. And they do not look happy...I think. Without any eyebrows and mouths, you can't really get a read on them.

With even more of a reason to run away, I charge ahead towards the monsters. Punching one of them right in between its eyes, turning it into dust, just like it's little brother. Now there are two of them in front of me. I try to kick the one on my left, but it melts to the ground, with the other one quickly following suit. I try to follow them, but they go in separate directions. Managing to follow the one closest to me, I stomp my foot on the little pool of darkness, but I watch as it forms a hole around my foot. In seconds, the puddle starts to crawl it's way up my leg.

I grab onto it and begin to pull. "Get off of me!" I scream as I start feeling weak in my leg. This is really not good. I use most of my strength and pull it off of me. I squeeze what's on my hand so hard that it joins its dusty brethren. As I catch my breath, I look for the one that disappeared. Where did it go? I look towards the little girl. She's safe, shaking, but safe. But the fact that she's safe means that the monster can be any-

I let out a scream as something sharp stabs through my right arm and the pain slides downwards. I grab hold of the source and squeeze its neck. As the creature turns into, say it with me, dust, I look at my arm. Yup. That's a lot of blood. Have to take care of that later. First things first is the little girl.

I kneel in front of her. "Can you stand up?" I ask a question with an obvious answer. She shakes her head as I pick her up in a cradle position. Pain shoots through my injured arm as blood trickle down. The girl looks at me with a worried look. I force out my best smile, hoping it will calm her down. "Don't worry. I got this." I start running in a random direction, hoping nothing else will go wrong.

And of course my prayers go unanswered.

Five minutes after I began running, more and more of these shadow monsters keep popping up. I hold on the little girl as best as I can, avoiding the creatures. But it's getting harder because the further in I go, more and more of them appears. Normally in these apocalyptic scenarios in movies, you would see bodies lining up all over the place, but there isn't a single corpse in the streets. Once these monsters manage to get you, your body disappears. It's like they never existed in the first place. I've seen it happen before and there's no way I'm letting that happen to this little girl.

I hear the girl let out a scared squeak, breaking me from my trance to realize I'm heading towards a hoard of those creatures. "Crap." I whisper under my breath. This way is no good. I turn around. Before I can get anywhere, a long line of monsters are running our way. "You have got to be kidding me!" I let out a sigh. It's like the big guy upstairs doesn't want us to escape with our lives. Well. Too bad for him that I have something up my sleeve. Or should I say on my back.

"Hey." I whisper. "Hold onto me tightly, and don't let go." I feel the kid's arm squeeze me. I ignore the pain that's screaming throughout my body. I straighten my back, take a deep breath, and force all of my energy to my "special gift." I can hear the little girl gasp when I feel something on my back expanding.

"Wings!" The little girl probably can't hold back her shock.

Yes. I have wings on my back. I'm officially 98% human and 2% avian. I'll explain everything later. If there's ever a chance to ever to explain. I jump up into the air and start flapping my wings. I take off into the sky, leaving all of the monsters down below.

Once I'm in the air, I quickly remember why I didn't pull them out earlier. I can feel blood oozing out from my wound that I got on my first attempt at flying. I can't keep this up for long. I have to find a safe place to land.

I start to scan everything below me to find anywhere I can rest. But all I can see is destruction. I hold the child's head to my chest so she won't see anything. Cars crashed into buildings. Windows shattered in every building. Chunks of walls on the fiery ground below. And the only thing moving are those monsters. Nowhere is safe, but I'm slowly losing altitude. Losing blood very quickly. Starting to get dizzy.

I see an empty roof of an abandoned apartment complex. Windows barred by planks of wood. The insides probably haven't been touched in years. I thank every deity known to mankind as I make a beeline to the roof. When my feet touch the ground, I swiftly close my wings, closing the wound under them. I put the little girl down to the floor before my body gives out and crumbles down.

"Are you alright?" The small child kneels next to me. Without the threat of those creatures, I can finally get a better look at her. Blonde hair dirtied by dust. Her brown eyes shaking as they stare right at me. Her face smudged with dust and dirt. From afar she really almost look like Angel…

I use most of my strength to sit up. "Yeah. I'll be okay." I answer. I look to her leg. The pajama piece is already soaked with her blood. "We need to change that soon. How does it feel?"

She tries to stand up quickly, but quickly winces and kneels back down. She's clearly trying to hold back a scream of pain. Brave kid. She sits next to me, staring down at the destruction. Probably a few hours ago she lived a happy life with her family. Now they're most likely gone. Just like everyone else.

I shake my head, pushing this morning away from my memory. Now is not the time. Right now I have to think of what to do next. I look at the destruction below. Not a safe place for probably miles. My safest bet is probably to go out into the wild. But there are a lot of holes in that plan. First of all, how far have these monsters gone. Are they only attacking only the city? Or is this worldwide? Then there's the kid. I highly doubt she can fight, let alone survive in the wild. Guess I'll have to take care of that later. I smirk a bit realizing that this situation reminds me just of just earlier this year. Flying with the flock, hunting for food, fighting creatures of our own. Just surviving.

"Hey, come to think of it, I don't even know your name, little one." I speak up, breaking the silence. "My name is Max. What's yours?"

The kid looks right and then left and right, seeming like she's waiting for permission. I nudge my head a bit, signaling that it's okay. "Katherine." She answers. "With a K."

I chuckle a bit. She really wants me to know that little fact. Maybe one too many misspelled it or just never bother to learn it. "Okay, Ms. Katherine with a K." I use the energy I manage to gather to stand up and look out into the distance. I can barely see a dense looking forest over the horizon. Don't know how far it stretches, but anything that's not wide and in the open is perfectly fine by me. If we can rest here for another twenty minutes or so, I can manage to fly out there, even with damaged wings.

Before I can even congratulate myself for the smart idea, Katherine lets out a high pitch scream. I take my gaze away from the forest downward to where she is to find her pointing to something behind me.I instantly do a one-eighty to see those creatures materialize out of nothing. How the hell did they find us? I was sure there was nothing on this rooftop when I landed.

I feel Katherine hide behind me. I try to pull my wings out again, only to flinch in pain. There's no way I can run away now. All I can I can do is fight and hope they'll just go away.

I focus on the monsters. There's four little ones and three big slender ones. All together there's seven, the most I've faced at once. "Katherine." I speak in a low tone, trying to keep my cool. "Whatever you do, just stay behind me. Away from those things." I can hear my voice crack, signalling some weakness. Don't know if she noticed it, but I see her nod in the corner of my eye, and that's all I need.

My feet instantly move forward at great speed. I push a fist forward, connecting it with one of the tiny ones and completely pulverize it. One of the creatures charge towards me. I backstep, trying to avoid it. I feel my feet slip and I land on my back. Really? Now of all times? Two tiny ones try jumping on me. I manage to grab them both and smash them together, dispersing them. That takes care of three small ones, now where are the rest?

The sound of a little girl screaming brought me to my feet. I look to see Katherine running away from the remaining monsters. Damn! They distracted me to get to her! Bastards! I'm not going to let anyone else die on my watch!

I scream at the top of my lungs, dashing to the tall monsters. I punch through one of the monster's chest. With my arm inside, I swing my arm, flinging it off and it turns to dust. I pick up one one of the tiny ones and throw it at the other tall one, making them both disappear, leaving only one tall one left. Problem is Katherine is in between it and the edge of the building, and it's closing in. No! Nonononono! I'm not going to lose her! I'm not going to let her die. I charge towards the creature. Going as fast as I can. I have to reach her.

But I wasn't fast enough.

I can only watch as the creature raised its hand. Swings it downwards on Katherine's chest. I can only watch as blood spills out from the wounds. I watch as she begins falling off the building. I don't even bother with the monster as I jump off the roof. I try to make myself fall faster, reaching Katherine. I wrap my arms around her. I force my wings open. But the pain is too much. I can't use my wings. I can't do anything! The ground is getting closer every millisecond. I hold on to Katherine tightly to my chest. I can feel her blood soak my clothes. I close my eyes. I wait for what's about to happen.

Hey! Are you okay?

To be continued...