A/N: Well, here's chapter two… I felt like being nice and posting two on the same day.

And please review, folks—you know you want to.

Disclaimer: I don't own Maximum Ride or any affiliated characters.

Chapter 2

I tried not to pale at that little plot twist the Voice gave me. And failed. Miserably.

"You okay?" Crap, Fang. Ironically, Mighty Emotionless was great at reading my expressions. Annoyingly good at it.

I swallowed, concentrating on flying and not screaming. Calm, Max, calm. Breathe. Nonetheless, I did a 360, just in case they decided to send a bunch of Erasers after us.

"Stupid Voice is trying to scare me," I said with forced lightness, looking down. It was almost dark out; we needed to land now, even if it wasn't at our first choice of locations. I noticed a field and small forest—a park?

It would have to do. "Land there, guys, and we'll eat dinner."

"YAY!" they all chorused (minus Fang) and shot past me, racing each other to the ground, pushing and shoving playfully. I smiled sadly.

Fang wasn't so easily fooled; he continued to fly in tandem with me, waiting. How such an impassive expression could carry so much weight, I had no idea.

His wingtips—so dark they glinted with a purple iridescence—brushed mine on the down stroke.

"Alright, I'll admit that Voice is doing a good job of it," I grumbled, locking my wings and gliding into a descent. He matched me perfectly.

"How?"

"Threatening me." I tried to sound nonchalant.

He just watched, the weight of his gaze wringing out every drop of information in me.

"They're going to hurt the Flock if I don't save the world," I blurted, voice rising involuntarily. "And then, to top it off, it says 'they've already started'."

There was a pause where Fang mulled it over, and I struggled not to hyperventilate. I banked, making a loose circle around the lightly forested park. A buffet of wind hit the side of my head—Fang was backpedaling, tilting his wings up to create more resistance and fly behind me.

"Could be a bluff," he pointed out, always practical.

"But they've already tried to do you guys in once."

Actually, they had tried to scare my Flock to death. Literally. But I'd screwed up Itex's hologram machinery in time. Which meant they'd already tried to make the threat real…

"Oh," I breathed, "that's what the Voice meant by 'already started'."

I couldn't hide the relief in my voice. I'd dealt with the first attack, so I had some time before they launched Round Two.

Maybe five minutes, if I was lucky.

I stalled my wings and landed right on the edge of the forest. Fang touched down a couple seconds later, as I was folding up. It was dark now, stars flickering on above, heavy shadows marking trees and shapes.

He put a hand on my shoulder, eyes searching my face—his version of concern.

"I'm okay," I assured him, then sighed, contradicting myself.

"It'll work out," he said stoically. "They've always been out to get us."

I smiled wryly. "Good point." Woah, that'd been, like, a full-length speech for Fang. I mean, he'd actually spoken in complete sentences. Would miracles never cease?

I heard the Flock's voices coming from the trees, but I couldn't make out individual words. The sounds overlapped and ricocheted confusingly over the distance.

"Arguing over dinner," Fang told me, turning to join them.

"Really?"

He gave me a funny look over his shoulder. "They're shouting."

I shrugged. "I can't hear the words—just noise."

He sighed a long-suffering sigh. "Great, now you're deaf."

"And you're dumb; we should be a team," I joked.

I darted past and managed to reach the sanctuary of younger kids before he killed me.

Dragonology's Dictionary: "There are sadistic scientists who hurry to hunt down errors instead of establishing the truth." –Marie Curie

Another A/N: Hint—Guess who the sadists are… Guess who the errors are...