A/N: Ola!! Okay… so this story was seriously screwed up so I have decided to revamp it in the hopes that all this effort will spur me into actually putting up some more and hopefully finishing it at long last. I had almost written this story off as a white elephant but I'd feel pretty much awful if I did that so I'm pulling it up out of the darkness of its near-indefinite hold. This version will be more chapters in a less huffed-up, patchwork, squished-Frankenstein's-monster and more structured and orderly sort of way.

Disclaimer: yes, some dude actually flew by on his golden-winged piggy and gave me the rights to Maximum Ride... uh huh… and then Alice and I had tea in the queen of hearts' garden with the man from the moon who brought some of it's cheese to have on toast.

XxX

MN: righteo! Chapter one here we come.

Ata::grins:: yip. it feels good to rebuild this story with some semblance of a structure.

Merla: yeah… but this chapter's like nine pages… I don't think we've ever had a chapter that long…

Ata: hmmm this is indeed true

MN: Long ass chapter for us. ::smirks::

Ata::shakes head:: well, without further ado!

XxXxXxX

Carpe' Noctem

Chapter one

Tori watched the sun rise above the horizon as she walked up the driveway to the main house. It wasn't the first time that she had only come home at dawn, but she felt tense as she climbed the steps and unlocked the large oak door. The house was already filled with the sounds and smells of cooking and cleaning.

/Strange,/ Tori thought as she slipped to the main staircase and began to climb up to her room. The sun filtered in through the tall windows on either side of the door and filled the entrance hall with golden light. The maids never got up this early unless…

/Oh no/ she thought with a silent groan. /Father's home./ It could only be him, her mother was in Paris for a month with her aunt.

"Toriana Jacobs!" a cross voice hissed from behind her in the corridor. She spun around to see her personal maid, Liz , coming towards her. "is this any time to come home?"

A small smile crossed her lips, she knew Liz wasn't really cross with her, but she smothered it quickly. When Liz, who was 5'8" of almost pure muscle(she had grown up with eight older brothers) chose to act cross, you chose to be sorry.

"I'm sorry Liz, but I told you I'd be late." She paused, "I take it Father's home?" Liz nodded.

"He got here about an hour ago. I've been under stress ever since." She admitted. Tori knew that she was the cause of the anxiety. If she hadn't gotten here before her father woke up, Liz would've been in big trouble. Although Liz was her maid, they had developed a good friendship and she hated getting her in trouble.

"Sorry Liz." She said again.

Liz tutted affectionately and rolled her eyes. "C'mon we'd better get you ready." She said, ushering Tori into her room.

"Ready?" Tori asked in horror, this didn't sound good.

"Yes, ready. Your Father is having a Breakfast meeting and I expect he wants you to join him and his guests for the meal." She glanced back at Tori, who had stopped just inside the door, her face a mixture of horror and fury, and chuckled.

"No." Tori said firmly.

"You have to. You know that as well as I do." Tori glared at her.

"I hate you."

"That's fine," she said in a placating tone, "but you still have to go."

Tori gave a growl of frustration, walked to the bed, and flung off her bag and jacket before sitting heavily on the edge. Liz crossed the room and closed the door before going to stand at the foot of the bed.

"Sorry." Tori muttered, she knew she was just being stubborn, but she hated going to her Father's stupid parties and functions. "It's not you I hate, it's him. He goes away for weeks at a time, and still expects our lives to revolve around him." Liz sighed.

"He's a busy man Tori, you know that."

"I know. And I know that I should be glad for him, after all he's the head director of a huge research corporation, but it's hard to love a man that's never around. And it's easy to hate a man that makes you go to all these annoying functions that make you feel like nothing more than a stupid trophy in a glass case."

"I know you don't like going to these things, but it is your duty as the future lady of the manor." Tori snorted back a laugh. Lady of the manor indeed. If her mates in the club heard that, they'd laugh themselves silly. She worked hard to keep her two worlds separate. Posh Princess that goes to a private school, always looks neat, never speaks out of turn, by day, and well, everything her parents hate, by night. She hangs around the darker side of town, clubbing, drinking and dancing. Her height and money gave her an advantage that most girls didn't have, and she established a reputation for herself. None of the bouncers ever asked her for ID, but she had a fake one anyway, just in case.

The shower being turned on brought her back to the situation at hand. She sighed and began to take her wig off. She always wore it when she went out at night. It stopped any of her friends from recognising her. She unclipped her long, brown hair and let it fall in waves down her back and over her arms that glinted gold in the morning sunlight. She went to her dressing table and took off her makeup then went into the bathroom got undressed, and climbed into the shower. When she got out ten minutes later, Liz had put out a dress for her and was standing waiting for her with her discarded clothes in her hands.

"I won't ask why your top is ripped and your clothes have blood on them, but I do hope that you know what you are doing."

/How did she know about the blood? I washed those clothes at the hotel/

"I'll throw these away. I suppose you don't want me to tell your father?"

Tori nodded. She couldn't think of anything to say.

"Right then," Liz said, opening the door "breakfast starts in three hours."

Tori nodded again as she closed the door, then turned to get her robe, her thoughts back to the night before, and the guy of her dreams.

XxXxX

Two hours and forty-five minutes later, Tori walked into the dining room. One of the maids that saw her was slightly startled at her silent appearance. Her father was sitting at the head of the table already, reading a newspaper and he looked up at the maid's sharp intake of breath. He stood up as she approached and gave her a light kiss on the cheek.

"Toriana, my dear, you look lovely. Did you sleep well?" Tori could tell from the instant he opened his mouth that something was wrong, but she knew better than to ask, so she ignored it instead.

"Yes, thank you father." She saw a look cross his face, but it was gone before she could read it.

"I see you are wearing the new dress your mother sent you, it suits you." Was that a compliment? She had to work very hard to keep her eyes from widening in shock, and then from narrowing in suspicion. She looked down at her dress. It was plain black silk with thin straps and a curved 'v' neckline, and a flaring skirt. She had clipped her hair back so that the top half flowed over the clip and the bottom half hung freely down her back, and she wore very little makeup, just a little around her eyes, and some lip gloss.

"Thank you." She barely managed to say it without stuttering. Then the doorbell rang. The first of the guests had arrived, and as her father went to greet them, she could've sworn she'd heard him say "and so it begins." under his breath. /And so what begins?/ she thought as she went to join him.

Breakfast was almost as boring as usual. The same pleasantries, followed by the same questions. How is school? Has she decided what she's going to study after school. Biology? Following in her father's footsteps? God, she hoped not. She did love biology, both human and animal, but she hadn't decided which she wanted to study when she left school. The only thing different today, was that there was a strong undercurrent of tension running through the room and she was very interested in what it was. Tori had found out just after her thirteenth birthday that she was telepathic and had learnt very quickly how to put up mental barriers to block out other people's thoughts. /It was either that or go insane./ she thought irritably. She hadn't told anyone, not even her parents, worried that they'd think she was weird, and she had found out just after that that she was stronger and faster than her other friends, and that she could heal herself.

Liz knew that she could heal herself. She had found out one day when she had looked out a window to see Tori falling out of one of the oak trees in the back yard. Tori was an excellent climber because of her other abilities, but she couldn't escape gravity and the rotten branch didn't help much either. Liz had rushed out to find Tori sitting on the grass healing a long cut on her knee, and she had nearly passed out from the shock. Tori felt someone watching her and looked up to see a young man staring at her as if it were her on the menu instead of breakfast. She stared defiantly into his eyes and suppressed a shiver at the coldness that she saw there.

His lips parted in a predatory smile to reveal a set of very white teeth. Sharp teeth. With fangs. Very sharp fangs. She didn't know why she did it, but she reached out toward him with her mind, and not for the first time in twenty-four hours, her heart seemed to be pumping ice instead of blood. He was one of them. This angelic looking guy was one of those things that had been chasing her last night. She looked at him closer and saw that he had a faint bruise on the side of his head, just next to his eye. He was the one she had hit. If she'd thought that trying to keep a straight face earlier was hard, then trying not to completely freak out now was almost impossible.

She wondered why this…thing…was here, in her house, calmly having breakfast at her dining room table, eating calmly like a well-mannered, polite young man. She strained to keep her face calm and looked away from him, down to her plate. She had lost any appetite that she had had earlier, and now could only manage to push her food around her plate, thinking about how he could be associated with her father. If her father didn't know, which was very unlikely, she decided, then he couldn't know about what had happened last night. But then why did he react so strangely when she'd said she'd slept well. He had to know, she decided reluctantly, and if he knew about the guy, then he knew about last night, and that meant that he was part of it.

She looked up at the man she had thought she'd known her whole life, and it was as if a veil had suddenly lifted. She knew now the reason his eyes never seemed to smile, why he always looked like he was preoccupied with something. His life was as much a lie as hers was, maybe even more so. Their eyes met as he looked around and he smiled slightly at her. Her whole world shattered in that single gesture because it told her now for certain what she had suspected.

/He's known all along/ she thought as she smiled back. /He knows I'm not normal. He's always known./ she reached out to his mind for the first time in her life and read the thoughts there. /…must be something else. She's sixteen already and the only things to show up are strength and speed. These can't be the only results…/ Tori wanted to scream. Results of what? But at that moment one of the guests spoke to her father and his thoughts shifted to the conversation.

Eventually they finished eating and she was told that she could go if she wanted. She knew that there wasn't really any question. She was being dismissed. Tori waited until she had closed the door behind her before breaking into a run. She ran into her room and threw herself down on the bed, sobbing. After a few minutes, when she had calmed down enough to be able to string two thoughts together without it hurting her brain, she began to asses the situation.

She couldn't stay here, that much was certain, and she began to formulate a plan. She packed a small bag with the basics, Jeans, t-shirts, the usual. Then she padded into her parents' room. She'd known the code to their safe for years, but had never used it, or needed to, until now. She opened it now and took out what must have been over a thousand dollars of neatly stacked bills. She glanced at the gun and thought of taking it for a moment before deciding against it. The money she could handle, but not the gun. She closed the safe again and padded back to her room, but as she got to the door she heard her father's voice float up from the study. /they must have moved there after I left/ she thought.

"WHAT??? It's been two weeks and we still haven't located him???" he sounded furious. She waited for a second to hear more, but one of the others seemed to be talking now. She wondered who'd gone missing, but shrugged it off. She had bigger things to worry about. She opened her door to find Liz pacing at the foot of the bed.

"Why?" she asked. Tori didn't even try to play dumb. Liz knew that she was going.

"Because I have to." She said truthfully.

"Because of your father?"

"What do you mean?"

"I'm not dumb Tori, I know he's hiding something, I've always known. And as of the last two weeks he's been very tense. Ever since you turned sixteen, actually. And then this morning he suddenly arrives home when it's still dark, telling us there's going to be a breakfast meeting, and then you arrive at dawn with torn clothes and covered in blood. I'd be a fool not to notice something's amiss. So I decided to do a little snooping. I came up with this." For the first time, Tori noticed that she was holding a file in her hand, which she now handed to Tori. Inside was a picture of Him. The guy from her dreams. "Apparently," Liz continued, "he escaped from some place called The School a couple of days after your birthday." That was who they had been talking about earlier. That meant that he was still safe. For now. She looked up at Liz and found her staring uncomfortably at the floor.

"What Liz?"

"This seemed much easier earlier." she muttered, "turn the page" so she did. And gasped in shock as she looked into her own eyes.

"What is this?" she asked Liz.

"I'm not sure Tori, but I think that you and that guy are somehow mixed up in this together, and whatever this is… your father is at the centre of it." Tori looked back down at the page. Her whole history was written there, along with a footnote scribbled in what she recognised as her father's writing that said: 'experiment is a possible failure.'

She looked back at Liz, her violet eyes flaring.

"I have to get out of here. Now."

"I'll help you in any way I can."

XxXxX

"I seriously need to find some food or I'm not going to be able to do anything!" Stefan muttered to himself for the tenth time in the last five minutes. He really was starving. He hadn't eaten anything since he had started looking for Tori last night and his stomach was getting louder and louder by the minute. He was almost sure that that would give him away before anything else did. He had landed around dawn, and had found himself in the alley that he remembered as the one from the dream about fifteen minutes ago, now he was slinking around, trying to figure out what to do next.

He couldn't just walk around without food forever, which was exactly what he was going to end up doing if he didn't come up with some sort of plan. Maybe he could steal some food or something? There weren't exactly a whole lot of animals that he could catch and cook, which was pretty much what he'd been doing when he was in the woods, running from the School. He looked around to see where he was, and he was back outside the same building, again.

This was the fifth time that he'd been around the block in a circle. He didn't mean to, it was just that he felt…almost drawn to the place. It was almost noon, he guessed, and there didn't seem to be too many people around… at that moment he felt shivers run down his spine and he swung round to see someone heading straight toward him. At first he had a fleeting sense that it was Tori, but then common sense took over and he saw that it couldn't possibly be her, this woman had thick, curly blond hair that looked very dry when he focused on her.

Stefan panicked slightly and looked around for someplace to hide. The only place that he could see was up, so that's the way he went. Taking a big jump and landing awkwardly on the roof. He ducked down as low as he could and watched the woman approach. She kept her head down and stared at the pavement. When he looked closer it looked like her top was wet. Was she crying? Why? Stefan began to study her as she walked toward the building. She was wearing all black. Sneakers, jeans and a t-shirt. Her nails were even painted black. Her hair really looked bad, he noticed, it looked more like plastic and it was really dull.

She stopped outside the building and rang a bell. She was carrying a large backpack on her back which looked really full. Suddenly someone opened the door, and the woman looked up, but he still couldn't see her face because of all that frizzy hair. Stefan heard a gasp and then a man's voice spoke in a very surprised tone.

"Terri? What are you doing here? Is something wrong, you look like you've been crying. A lot."

"Dyllan, I'm sorry to just show up like this, I know I must have woken you, but I really need your help." In an instant, Stefan realised that this was not a woman at all, but what sounded like a young girl desperately trying to keep calm, but she was obviously terrified about something.

XxXxX

Tori looked anxiously up at Dyllan, she saw worry in his eyes as they searched hers for some sort of answer. At length he took a step back to let her into the club. She sighed softly in relief. As she moved towards the door, a movement on the roof caught her eye, but when she looked up there was nothing there. /I'm getting paranoid./ she thought harshly and shook herself mentally for being so stupid before following Dyllan inside. She was slightly taken aback by how different the club looked during the day as she followed him silently to the bar.

"You look like you could use a drink." Dyllan commented, handing her a Bacardi after studying her for a second, "on the house." She smiled weakly back at him before taking a long sip from the bottle.

"Thanks. I think I could."

"No problem. So, what brings you down to my club at this time of the day?"

This was one of the things she liked about him, he was always straight down to business. And, unless you were a cop he was always honest with you. If you wanted something, he'd do his best to get it for you, provided that it didn't go outside his principles, which ruled out drugs and any other highly illegal stuff, including arms, except on rare occasions. He also dealt in ID's and passports, which was how they'd met. Which brought her back to why she was here.

"I need two sets of documents. The works." She said much more confidently than she felt. She saw his eyebrows raise slightly. He was definitely curious, but wouldn't ask too many questions.

"Who for?"

"Myself- yes I know, I think my other set may have been found, so I need another." She said quickly as he opened his mouth to comment. He closed it again and let her continue. "The other set is for a friend. I've got his picture with me so he doesn't have to be here. I've also got a copy of his prints." she said, opening the folder and taking out the information he needed. This definitely got him interested.

"Planning to elope or something?" he joked to hide his interest. Tori looked at the picture for the millionth time that day.

"Yeah," she joked back, "something like that."

"Alright then, we'd better get started, I take it you need these ASAP?" he was already making his way to the basement door with the info in his hands. She nodded and he turned to go down. "Help yourself to whatever, just leave some stuff for the customers. I don't want to have to stay closed tonight."

"Aye Aye, mon capitan!" she shouted after him and a grin played on her lips as his laugh floated up the stairs. She smiled to herself. He really was a good friend. /He was once more than just a good friend./ some part of her chided. She squashed the thought. Yes, they had dated, but with her constantly leading a double life, they had both known that it wouldn't really have worked out. She sighed, remembering their time together. He was older than her, but not by too much. A person would think that he were much older than he was, considering that he owned a nightclub, but he was only about twenty-four.

He was a brilliant hacker and had a good business sense. And it didn't do any harm that he was over 6' and had a very well-muscled body. /Wait a minute, hacker?/ a sudden thought hit her, maybe… she thought about it for a moment. He definitely was good. She remembered getting him to hack into her house's camera's once. And into her bank account. She crossed the room to the window and looked out, then turned away/Maybe he could hack into this place, this School that the files mentioned./

She felt the hairs on her neck prickle and turned back to the window. There was a man walking past the club, and as he walked past he looked up and she recognised the face. /ohmygod../ she ran to the door and flung it open, jumping down the four stairs and almost falling on her face, but her momentum carried her forward slightly and she collided with him, pulling him to the ground with her.

Stefan let out a yelp of surprise and then pain as his shoulder connected with the sidewalk.

"Oh, sorry." Tori gasped, getting up quickly, pulling a still dazed Stefan to his feet and pulling him back into the club so quickly that he didn't even realise that he was moving until he had stopped and heard the door close behind him. He turned in panic to the blond girl to ask just what she thought she was doing, only to be rendered speechless by a very familiar pair of violet eyes.

"Hello Stefan." She said with amusement at the stunned recognition in his eyes.

His eyes, if possible, went even wider and his jaw dropped. He tried to reply but his brain was suddenly numb and seemed to be incapable of speech.

"uh," was pretty much all he could manage.

"Boy, and I thought I was bad." She commented with a grin. "Come on, let's get you a drink." She said, leading Stefan to the bar. It always seemed to work for her.

"Well, um," Tori said, sitting opposite Stefan after getting them each a Jack Daniels with crushed ice. She'd had to put soda in his, remarking that he evidently didn't get out much, after he'd choked on the first sip. Tori found that she couldn't think of a good way to start the conversation, so she fell silent again and it was Stefan who broke the silence.

"Erm. Who are you?" the question startled Tori so much that she actually answered without thinking.

"Toriana Jacobs."

"Oh. Um," he said looking more confused than he had. "I'm just Stefan. I don't have a last name. Um," /This seemed so much easier last night/ he thought, frustrated.

"Hmph, you're lucky. I hate my last name. It always makes me think of coffee. There is actually a brand of coffee named Jacobs, did you know that? I used to get teased about it at school until-"Tori realised that she was babbling and closed her mouth firmly, looking down at her lap. When she looked back at Stefan he was frowning at her. But with mild surprise she noticed that his eyes were unfocused.

"Stefan…" she said tentatively touching his arm. He didn't even blink. For a second she wondered what to do, he was obviously deep in thought and she didn't want to disturb him, so she decided to just let him think, and did the same. Her thoughts turned to home and her mother. Did she know? Was she part of this? She didn't think so, her mom was so different to her father. Kind, loving, never cold like him. She couldn't possibly know, could she?

His thoughts were on the school. Hearing the words 'Jacobs' and 'School' in the same sentence had triggered something. He remembered the whitecoats talking about someone named Jacobs coming to inspect the facility the day he'd escaped. He'd used the chaos just before the visit to slip through the security. He wondered if…

"Jacobs…" he murmured, then turned his attention to Tori. He knew so little about her. Actually, he knew nothing about her except her name and the fact that he felt connected to her, like he could trust her. "Tori." Her head snapped up when he said her name, "Do you know a Dr. Jacobs?" Her eyes widened a fraction at the question, and he knew the answer was yes.

"Yes, I knew him" she said it calmly but her voice was tinged with bitterness "Why? Did you?"

"No, not really." She seemed relieved at his answer. "But he was supposed to be visiting the School the day…" he trailed off realising that she didn't know about the School, or that he'd escaped, or what he was for that matter. Then he noticed that she didn't seem surprised at the mention of the School. And the question she did ask was definitely not one he had expected.

"Why?" she asked it almost thoughtfully.

"Why what?"

"Why was Dr Jacobs supposed to be at the School the day you escaped?" Stefan was flabbergasted. He just stared at her until she repeated the question.

"H-He came to oversee something. Wha- How do you know I escaped? And how do you know about the School?"

"I heard them, well him really, yelling about you. Well, I didn't know it was you at the time, but I found out later." He looked at her, horrified. She knew. She knew about Them, she knew about the School. /What if she's one of them?/ he thought in panic.

"Don't be daft. Of course I'm not one of them, I wouldn't be running from them if I were." It took them both a second to realise that Stefan hadn't actually said anything at all. When they did they just looked at each other in utter shock.

/What the hell just happened?/ she thought with wide eyes, her father momentarily forgotten. Stefan's eyes grew wider. /Wait, you can hear me?/ he nodded. /Well, say something./

/Erm, hello?/

"Oh my gosh." She breathed.

"I could hear you, your thoughts. How's that possible?" suddenly Tori knew who to blame and a wave of fury swept over her.

"I don't know," she said with a bitterness that made Stefan flinch, "but I know who does. And if I see him or one of his rabid little mongrels, I'll tear them apart." She focused her eyes on Stefan again and said, in a tone as cold as ice. "Dr Jacobs, the Head of the School, my Father."

XxXxXxX

MN; XD I like that… rabid little mongrels…

Ata::gasp:: I can't believe that he would experiment on his own child!

Merla: and then to Still send his hell-spawned mutts after her!!

MN: so the dude needs therapy… that's nothing new.

Ata::rolls eyes:: midnite, jus coz you're a little batty-

Merla::chuckles:: excuse the pun.

Ata::glowers:: …doesn't mean everyone else is.

MN: XD whatever bookworm. Anywayz! Please R+R people!!