Note: Update! Yay! So anyways. Here I'm gonna introduce an OC, who probably will never show up ever again. Don't mind it. Of course, if you want to hear about her, review/message me and I'll try my best. Hope you don't mind another Wicked chappie. My first reviewer brought a good point to my attention...if you don't know how the song in the story goes, I always read the story first, then find the song on Youtube, and listen to it as I read, pausing when there's big blocks of text. Hope that helps all you readers. :D

Oh! More plot changes here. So Max does not escape and go live with Jeb. She just goes and takes the flock with her.

Disclaimer: Don't own.

Oh! One more thing. Thanks very very much to Silentsky93 for being my first reviewer! Huggles! :D and yes, you're right. it is very hard to incorporate music into writing and still make it interesting ("B flat major, C minor, and F chords were struck in rapid procession..." xP)

Chapter 2: Defying Gravity

Starring: Max and Phoenix (OC)

Phoenix POV

I floated through the air, winging through the blue sky away from the School. The air was scented of pine trees and flowers. I did a loop in the air and smiled...then suddenly someone was poking me! I jumped up, scooting away from the hand and snarling. "Whitecoat, go home! Leave me alone." The hand was snatched back, accompanied by a whisper of, "Phoenix! Calm down, I'm not a whitecoat. I'm Max." Oh... it was just Max, my sweet little friend in the cage to the left of me.

I relaxed, leaning against the wire wall of the CanineCamper. "Max!" I said, relieved. "You scared the crap out of me. I thought you were a whitecoat and were gonna have more tests on me." I smiled at the little brown-haired girl, who was maybe twelve years old, as opposed to my fifteen. Fifteen years in this hellhole. I couldn't believe it. Fifteen years with wings, fifteen years of tests, fifteen years of dog crates and needles and mean whitecoats. I was surprised that I wasn't totally wankers.

Max looked around, shoving her face against the wire cage's mesh. "Speaking of, where are all the whitecoats?" I followed suit, peering around the plain white room, filled with fancy lab equipment and stuff. "I don't know. That's a really good question, Max." It was so quiet. No guttural gasping of failing experiments. No hum of computers. No one screaming. I was so glad about that last one. I had a little brother and sister here, an avian-hybrid and a dolphin-hybrid respectively, and was glad that my siblings weren't out on the test tables, shrieking. I also had a boyfriend- a leopard-hybrid named Logan. We never got to spend any time together, but their crates were back-to-back so we could talk during the rare times we were both in our crates, awake. Since he wasn't out there, I was OK. Oh, how I wished I could hug my sister Sabrina or play with my brother, Zephyr. Or curl up in Logan's arms. Meh, wishful thinking. Sure, that could totally happen. And the whitecoats would dance the polka in barracuda-print underpants and pink fedoras.

Then the door burst open and we shrank back against the back wall of the dog crates. I was praying that the whitecoat wasn't looking for an experiment to use in some test. But there was nothing. Then Jeb came and, working fast, popped Max's crate open. "Max," he said. "Time for you to get out of here. Get Fang, Iggy, Angel, Gazzy, and Nudge."

Max jumped out of her crate, flaring open her wings to stretch. Then she realized what was happening. "Why? You're a whitecoat. Why should I trust you?"

Jeb shook his head. "I need you to trust me. You can be free. Go!" Max undid my cage first. "You're coming with me," she said. I jumped out and unfurled my fiery orange wings, stretching them. Jeb continued. "You need to get outside in ten minutes, through that door and through the third window on the left. Fly to the ground and follow the perimeter to the left until you see the cliff. Then I need you to jump and fly to these coordinates. I'll meet you there." Jeb handed Max a piece of paper.

Max stuffed it into her pocket. "Phoenix," Max said, "Get your siblings and Logan. Clock's ticking." Just as I was about to turn, I saw Max deck Jeb. Hard. He fell to the ground, out cold. "Max!" I shouted. "What are you doing?"

"We can't trust him. He's a whitecoat!" Max said.

I didn't think so. If he was helping us get out, he must have been OK. So I put my hands on my hips and shouted at Max. "Max! Why couldn't you have stayed calm for once, instead of flying off the handle! I hope you're happy." Why would you be happy if you'd just decked a friend? "I hope you're happy now! I hope you're happy how you've hurt your cause forever- I hope you think you're clever!" I sang. How could Max uphold her anti-hurting-people policy if she'd just knocked someone out?
Max stared at me with rage in her brown eyes. She replied in indignant song. "I hope you're happy! I hope you're happy too. I hope you're proud how you would trust this stupid gator, although he's obviously traitor!" Then we sang in unison. "So though I can't imagine how...I hope you're happy right now!"
I sighed. Then I turned back to Max. "Max. Listen to me! Just...say you're sorry." Then I sang again. "You can still escape the School, What you've worked and waited for- You can have all you ever wanted!" I gave her a pleading look.
"Don't give me That Look, Phoenix." Max said. "Cuz I don't want it- no. I can't want it anymore..." Max held that last note and continued. "Something has changed within me, something is not the same. I'm through with playing by the rules of someone else's game!" How many times had we felt like mere toys for the whitecoats? We were all tired of it. "Too late for second-guessing, too late to go back to sleep- It's time to trust my instincts, close my eyes and leap..." She snapped out her wings and thrust herself into the air.

What was Max talking about? She must have been crazy. She couldn't just leave like this, by herself, with no place to go.
Max continued to sing. "It's time to try defying gravity- I think I'll try defying gravity- And you can't pull me down!" She ran down and started to open her friends' cages.

I couldn't believe she was doing this. "Can't I make you understand," I sang, "You're having delusions of grandeur!"
As she unlocked the cage of the blind guy, Iggy, Max turned and sang back to me. "I'm through accepting limits, 'cuz someone says they're so! Some things I cannot change, but 'till I try, I'll never know." Maybe she could change the world and destroy the School... "Too long I've been afraid of losing love - I guess I have lost! Well, if that's love- it comes at much too high a cost! I'd sooner buy defying gravity- kiss me goodbye, I'm defying gravity! And you can't pull me down..." Then Max alit on the ground, surrounded by her friends- Fang, the dark guy; Iggy, the blind one; Nudge, the talky African-American one; Gazzy, the, well, gassy one; and Angel, the cute toddler. She looked imploringly into my eyes and said, "Phoenix. Come with me! Think of what we could do...together." She sang again. "Unlimited- Together we're unlimited! Together we'll be the greatest team there's ever been, Phoenix! Dreams the way we planned 'em-"

I smiled. Oh...what a wonderful concept! Freedom, with Max and her friends for support. I continued her line. "If we work in tandem-"

Then we sang in unison once more. "There's no fight we cannot win... Just you and I, defying gravity! With you and I, defying gravity..." The beautiful harmony rang through the room.
Max finished. "They'll never bring us down. Quick, Phoenix. Go get Sabrina and Zephyr and Logan. Let's go!" I smiled and ran down the line of cages, adrenalin and ecstasy (the emotion, not the drug) coursing through my veins. I stopped by the first cage I would have reached, Zephyr's. I popped the latch open, ready to drag him out...but the CanineCamper was empty. My jaw dropped. Running down to what would have been Sabrina's cage, I peered inside.

Sabrina and Zephyr were gone.

I ran down to Logan's cage...he was gone too. Suddenly I understood why Jeb had just named Fang, Iggy, Nudge, Gazzy, and Angel. They were the only ones there. Max thrust a piece of paper in my hand. "I found it in Jeb's pocket." It was a testing schedule. I looked at the clock on the wall and checked the schedule. The schedule announced that this room would be empty, and all the whitecoats would be testing someone at this time. Except for us.

"Phoenix! Earth to Phoenix!" Max called. "We've got to go. Now!" I followed her. Maybe I could find Logan, Sabrina, and Zephyr on the way.

We coursed through the halls, seven winged kids running towards a new fate. We dashed through the door Jeb had mentioned, kicking out the window and crawling through. I ushered Fang, Iggy, and Max through first, then giving nine-year-old Nudge and six-year-old Gazzy a boost. I passed little Angel through last, then crawled through myself. Then we jumped down to the ground and ran to the cliff. Then I realized that my previous thoughts were ludicrous. My siblings were not there. Logan was not there. It was just us.

I couldn't leave. Not without my family and my boyfriend.

MAX POV

We reached the cliff and I saw Phoenix freeze. "What's wrong?" I asked her.

Tears welled in her eyes. "I can't. I can't go with you."

I couldn't believe this. "Why not? Are you nuts?" She shook her head and replied, "You can't ask me to leave Zeph and Sabrina and Logan. I can't come. I need to look after the little ones and I need to keep Logan going. Besides, they'd weigh us down, since only me and Zephyr can fly."

No. I was not hearing this. I needed Phoenix! Talking quickly, I argued. "We can carry them! Let's go get them. We have to! We need you." I could feel my throat closing, my eyes watering. "I need you, Phoenix."

Phoenix hugged me, one last time. "I'm so sorry, Max. But I can't come. Max, look at me." She took hold of my shoulders and pulled me to eye level.

"What?"

"If I get out of here, I'll let you know. Somehow. I promise I'll try. Got that? Stop crying."

Yeah, right. She was never going to get out. But there was no choice. "I guess."

She shook her head and sang. "I hope you're happy, now that you're choosing this."

I sighed and sang with her. "I hope it brings you bliss-"

And together one last time- "I really hope you get it, and you don't live to regret it! I hope you're happy in the end...I hope you're happy, my friend!"

Then the door behind us burst open. Oh, no...we had to go! Ten Taser-toting whitecoats streamed out, with five Erasers in their wake. The Erasers and whitecoats dove for Phoenix, who was closer. I couldn't stand them attacking my friend. "It's not her. She has nothing to do with it! I'm the one you want- it's me!" I yelled, throwing myself into the air. I snapped out my wings and pumped them hard, motioning for the others to follow. Iggy scooped up Angel, and Fang grabbed Gazzy's arm and helped him into the air. I saw one of the Erasers slash his claws across Phoenix's face, then over her wings and back. As crimson blood spilled over my best friend's face, suddenly I couldn't stand it anymore. I divebombed the Eraser, kicking at his head, and propelled myself back up with a scream. "It's meeeeeeeeeeeee!" The Eraser fell back, out cold. As I flapped my wings and rose higher and higher into the air, I felt as if this was where I belonged. So I continued to sing. "So if you care to find me, look to the western sky! As someone told me lately, everyone deserves a chance to fly!" Who said that? Phoenix. "And if I'm flying solo, at least I'm flying free! To those who ground me," I glared at the whitecoats, "take a message back from me! Tell them how I am defying gravity. I'm flying high, defying gravity! And soon I'll match you in renown..." I saw Phoenix crawl away from the shocked whitecoats and Erasers. Geezum, I'll never forget their expression. They were so shocked they couldn't move. Phoenix got shakily to her feet, holding onto a tree for support. I so wanted to fly back down, grab her and take her with me, bandage her up and then kill that Eraser.

But I knew I couldn't, and that all my best friend wanted was for me to go be free. I'd come back for her. I would! "And now, now that I'm flying free, no whitecoat that there'll ever be, is ever gonna bring me down!"
Looking down, I saw Phoenix wave to me, though she looked horribly weak and she was coated in blood. "I hope you're happy!"
More whitecoats streamed out of the building. They joined into the song, shouting, "Look at her, she's mutant! GET HER!"
They'd never get me. "Bring me down!" I belted, just as I saw three whitecoats and two Erasers grab Phoenix as she fell to her knees, and drag her away. I could hardly sing as my throat closed and my eyes teared up for my friend.
The whitecoats continued to scream, though they could do nothing more to get me. "No one mourns the mutants! So we've got to bring her... "
I screamed, pouring all my hatred for these whitecoats and the Erasers, all my love for my friend, all my joy at being free, and all my fear of the future into the sound. "AAAAAAAAHHH!"

The whitecoats finished their phrase as I saw a weakly thrashing Phoenix being dragged through a door. "Down!"

I turned tail, and with a hand signal, my little flock and I flew towards the setting sun. I looked back at the grass on the cliff, spattered with my friend's blood, and promised myself that I'd destroy Itex, even if it killed me. I never saw Phoenix, or her siblings, or Logan again. But I knew she'd be glad that I was free, and I would get revenge on Itex for everything that they'd done to me and my friends. Thank you, Phoenix, I thought. For everything.

Note: Awh...sad. . So review! I don't think it was my best chappie, but it's OK for me. Oh, if you want to hear from Phoenix again in some other story, let me know. She's fun to write. REVIEW!