A/N: First of all, I want to say thank you to BunniesOfDoom for being the first to subscribe for story alert!
I'm going to try and put this story on a regular update schedule. School is getting crazy with review for exams and I am starting my new job in the next week or so. But I am going to try to update at least once a week.
I do not own Maximum Ride. If I did, the first movie would be out already and the books would not have been so upsetting.
Chapter 2: Change of Plans(Fang's POV)
Yes, I left. And I hate myself for it. But I had to keep the flock and my Max safe. Their safety is more important. Yes I love h…them. And I would do anything for them, hense why I left. I couldn't risk people from The School coming for me while I was around the flock.
Anyways, you are probably wondering where I am. Well I'm not going to tell you that. I don't need stalkers and I don't exactly find it appealing having people that want to kill me knowing where I am. That doesn't exactly make me comfortable.
I'm not the type to be all wrapped up in my emotions and inner feelings, as you all know. So I have a plan. I am making my own flock. I don't just want to sit around, so I am going to help the flock from a distance. So far I have recruited Holden, Star, Kate, Ratchet and Max, er Maya. They all have their own special abilities.
Holden can heal really fast. Like faster than even I can. And he can breathe under water like Angel. Oh, and he can regenerate limbs. It's kind of scary, but awesome. Don't ask him to demonstrate, because he will.
Star, oh Star. She has the ability to run extremely fast. She can even beat me while I'm flying. She's super skinny like The Flock, and she eats like a truckload of food. I swear she's always eating, it's like Me, Iggy and Max all in one person. My Max…
On to Kate. She's cool, but she is defiantly a different duck. She is super strong. Way stronger than me, on a good day. But she's a pacifist, and a vegan. So she doesn't like to fight which is a downfall in my lifestyle, and all she eats is this tofu stuff. I'd live off desert rats before that crap.
You already know what Maya can do since you know what Max can do. But Maya added a magenta colored streak to her hair, I guess so she'd look different from Max. So last but not least is Ratchet. He was my first recruit. Ratch has really sensitive hearing and sight. He always wears awesome sunglasses and sound cancelling headphones so that his senses dull a little bit. He doesn't appreciate it when Star gets mad and yells.
So the back-round stories on my new flock I'm not 100% on. Ratch was in a street gang, Kate and Star went to the same school and are friends, Maya is from The School, and Holden just kind of left his family behind. But whatever, we have a mission, and as long as they don't all try to kill each other I think we'll be okay.
"Hey Kate, so you want to go for a spin when things settle? I think I could hot-wire a nice car for ya." There goes Ratchet, always trying to hit on Kate.
"In your dreams lover boy. We are here for a reason. And that reason is not for you to try and get me to go out with you." Kate hates it when Ratch hits on her, she's usually pretty sarcastic with her remarks. I knew I should have stuck with all guys. There's much less drama.
"If we are going to be living in such close quarters, I think we should muzzle Ratchet. I can't take his rambling." Star and Ratchet can never get along. They have some things in common, and can be nice to each other, but it's rare.
"We can get him some neon pink duct tape!" Holden usually sticks up for Star. I think he's secretly got a thing for her. Like a said, with just guys there is way less drama.
"Don't start with me starfish! I will chop off your hand or something." Ratchet thought it was clever when we gave Holden the nickname 'starfish' since he can re-grow limbs. So that's what we call him now.
"My hand will just grow back if you chop it off, so go ahead." Starfish liked to demonstrate his little ability; he tries to show it off, often.
Time to be a leader, I hated this stuff. I have to talk so much. I still don't know how Max does it, especially with the younger ones. "Let's not go through that again. You may heal fast Starfish but you still bled and I am not explaining that to another maid." I'm going to go out on a limb here and be like Max, and make up my plan as I go along. It's not as easy as she used to make it seem. Man, I wish she were here right now.
"I think we need to start looking at Itex branches that are close by, or bigger targets." I don't really like the feeling of being trapped in a car, or plane, or train, surrounded by complete strangers that may or may not be trying to kill me. I prefer to fly.
"You are so paranoid Fang, and unless you're planning on stopping at every McDonald's and Burger King we see, I'm not running wherever we are going." Star likes to run everywhere when it's short distances or there are a lot of food breaks.
"You guys should really stop eating that stuff. It's so terrible for you!" There goes Kate, she hates how we eat meat and fast food.
"Well, at least it tastes and looks a whole hell of a lot better than your tofu patties!" Star didn't like being anywhere near Kate when she was eating. I don't blame her, the stuff Kate eats just looks and smells gross.
"Guys we are getting completely off task. We need to look up branches of Itex and take action! We are getting behind! We can't just sit here and argue over who is eating what and when and why! If we don't stop Itex, they'll get to us, then all of the world saving will be left to Max-the-Wonderful and The Super Flock." Maya gets mad easily, especially when we just try to relax. But I still don't think her little 'nicknames' for The Flock were necessary.
"She's right guys. I'll get the laptop and you guys can just chill until I find something. And try not to get us kicked out again, Star, Ratch. We need a place to stay and we don't have time to find a new cheap motel. So just lay low until we find something." The last little motel we were in, Star and Ratch got into a big fight over something and she threw a lamp at him in the lobby. Needless to say we were asked to leave and never, ever come back.
"I can help you look stuff up on the laptop. It's easier to spot stuff with two people, and one of us might miss something." Maya always offered to help me, with everything. I think it's because she isn't too fond of the rest or my little gang. Oh well, she can get over it.
"Sounds good." Let the fun begin.
I was on the computer for four hours looking through sites that turned out to have nothing to do with The School. And when Maya pointed one out, it just happened to be in Colorado. And I was so not going there, I have all I can do now not to fly back to the flock, I don't think I could resist if I was that close. But I'll have to do something about it, I can't knowingly have Max and The Flock in danger.
"Hey look at this!" Maya pointed to a link on the screen that showed an Institute for Genetic Recombination. The description said that the place was trying to do research for cancer to see what clues were in people's genes, but I wasn't buying it. They even got all their science gear from Itex, so we were defiantly going there.
"The Institute is in France, Fang. I'd say just the two of us go but there is no way we could fly the Atlantic." Maya had a point. We may be able to fly long distances, but not an entire ocean. I guess we will have to take a plane, no other choice. Great.
I shut off the TV that everyone was watching, resulting in a pillow being thrown at my face by no other than Ratchet. Gotta love being the leader.
"What the hell, Fang? The movie was just getting good!" The only thing that Ratch had been doing lately was watching movies and pathetically trying to get Kate to go out with him.
"I'm sure it'll be on again, the movie channels always repeat what they have on. Anyway, I…" Maya shot me a dirty look. Jeez, girls these days. "Maya and I found an Itex branch that we think is worth checking out. The only problem is that it's in France. And not all of us have wings, and we wouldn't be able to fly that far anyway. So I think if we get a nice flight, sooner rather than later, and a French-English translations book we'll be fine. What do you guys think?" I was hoping that there would be some opposition. I really didn't want to go on a plane.
"I've always wanted to go to France! Let's go!" "Mmmm, French boys." "I heard French girls are really hot, so I think it's worth it." "Kate wants to go to France, so Ratchet wants to go to France!" "I think we need to take the opportunity while we have it Fang. We need to take Itex down!"
So much for my opposition. "Okay guys, as long as you're all going to behave on the flight and not try to see who can annoy the people around you the most before they complain, Ratchet, Star. I'll look up a flight and try to get us out of here in the next few days." I didn't want to go right away, I liked having some down time.
"Wait! Isn't there a Disney Land in France? We should totally go!" Of course Kate is the one to bring up Disney while we are going on a trip to take down a bunch of crazy, evil scientists.
"Disney Land sucks compared to Disney World. We should wait and go to Florida." Holden had gone to Disney when he was younger and Kate loved to hear stories about it. Her parents didn't believe in wasting money on 'over-advertised theme parks.'
"Guys we are not going to France on a social trip. It's strictly business! We are trying to take down the leading company in Genetic Recombination and Mutations in the world! There is no time for social events!" Maya never wanted to just take time to sit back and relax. You think she would, considering how she grew up.
'Okay guys I'll make you a deal. Once we find out everything we need to know about the Institute in France, we can take a trip to Florida." Maybe if I make them a compromise they will focus more on the task ahead of us instead of which Disney Park is better than the other.
Did you know that finding cheap round-trip airline tickets for six teenagers is really hard? The cheapest deal I've found so far is $400, per person. There is no way we were going to be able to do this. I'd have to leave people behind. They could hold up fort and do more research while we are gone. Of course that didn't go over well, at all.
"Why do I have to stay behind with Starfish? It's so not fair! Just because we don't have the money, that's totally BS Fang!" Kate was extremely pissed off that I said that at least two people were going to have to stay behind, and said that one of them would probably be her.
"For the last time Kate, I need to bring Ratchet. He is the best look-out I could ever get! And you being there will only distract him. You get to him enough when we are just hanging out in a motel room somewhere. I need him 150% when we are at the Institute!" I actually started to raise my voice at Kate. But this was getting out of hand. I need to do what is best for everyone and if she can't take it, well then she'll have to get over it or move on.
"Kate, we have an important job staying behind too. It's not like we'll just be sitting around doing nothing while they are off in France." Holden shot me a dirty look but smiled. He had offered to stay back because he understood why and I trusted him to scope things out around here. "We need to keep tabs on everything around here, and look around for other places to stay because we won't be able to stay here much longer. And while everyone else is on this mission, we'll be here planning the next one and making sure we have a job in it. So just chill out!" Man, I am glad to have someone here that understands me for once!
"Fine! But I am soooo going on the next trip wither you like it or not!" Well at least she agreed to stay behind.
"So it's settled then. We will leave in two days. So start thinking about what you want and need to get for the trip, and start packing." Hopefully that will calm everyone down and give me time to check my blog.
Looks like everything on the blog is the same as usually. People complaining about how I left The Flock, random questions they seem to always have, girls trying to find out where I am and how they can find me. It's a tough life, being a famous bird-kid. But someone has to do it.
I was about to sign off when I got a new message. Some girl named Kelly, claiming to be a bird-kid and wanting to join my new flock. I've gotten hundreds of these messages, all fakes. But this one had a picture. I opened it, and it was a picture of a girl that matched the description that Kelly gave me. The girl in the picture was really skinny, not like anorexic but like a flock member, she had long, blonde curly hair, almost like Angel's. The girl in Kelly's picture was also really tall like a flock member and she had these really light blue eyes. They almost seemed familiar. And of course, there were her wings. They were a light sandy brown color, and looked to be about the size of Max's. At the bottom of her message, Kelly said that she would be in Florida for the next week or so, just checking out the area, and she wanted me to meet up with her. She also said that she had some abilities, and that she had some new information on the School.
Well this was different. I know you're probably all thinking, 'Hey, it's just a photo-shop picture!' But it's not, I would know. Her wings were just like ours in the Flock, and her body shape was the same as Max's and Nudge's. And she might even have an ability that would come in handy on our new mission. Besides, you can always use another bird-kid, especially one that has information on The School.
"Whatcha looking at Fang?" I hadn't noticed that Maya was looking over my shoulder the whole time. "Who is that? You aren't thinking what I think you're thinking are you?" Maya had a pissed off expression on her face. Another thing her and Max didn't have in common. My Max never liked to show when she was mad at me over little things. She'd save it all for when we were alone the let it all out. "Fang don't do this! You don't even know who she is!" I'd say she had a point, but I hadn't known any of the others when I met up with them either.
"Hey guys! Change of plans! I just got a message from this girl Kelly. She's in Florida and will be there for the next week or so. Looks like she's another bird-kid, and I think it's worth checking out. We could always use new people in the gang, and she may be of some use to us. So the whole France trip is on hold for now, and everyone is going to Florida!" I made sure that I looked at Kate when I said this so that she knew that she wasn't going to be left behind.
"Lemme look at this picture she sent." Of course Holden would want to see. Ratch came over to look too. "Wow, I think it's defiantly worth a shot!" Starfish was so wrapped up in pretty faces. At least I didn't have to explain them to him like I did to Iggy.
"She's pretty, but I want to know what abilities she has. Maybe she can read minds or something! We should totally go!" "Yeah, it's worth the shot." "Maybe Ratchet will get caught up in her instead of me, I say let's go!" "You already know that I want to go."
"Well it looks like we are going to Florida! And we don't have to take a plan which is great, we can just take the bus a little ways the go on foot and I can fly over to scope things out. Once we get close I'll go back on the blog to ask where Kelly wants to meet us. I just sent her a message saying that will we be there in a day or so. So let's get moving!" Now when I want everyone to be all for it, I get one person totally against it, Maya. She's kindda acting like Max in the way that she doesn't want another pretty face around. But that is so not the reason I'm going. I'm hoping to get a new gang member out of this and someone with a School back-round.
Look out Florida, here we come!
A/N: Hope you all liked this chapter! Fang is going to get some major surprises in his mission to take down the Institute in Paris and meet up with Kelly. Hope you all stick around for the ride!
See you next chapter!
Oh yeah, R&R please and thank you:)