Hey, guys, I'd like to thank you all for your great reviews this past week! Big shout outs to Lacking Stealth, Bandgeekclarinet14, The Wolf Who Walks Alone, and The Other Fetus. Thank you all to those who either prayed or were thinking about me yesterday and today, even though I didn't find my hearing aid, but I'm optimistic, because I believe God can do great things, and even if He doesn't choose the outcome I want, I know He's doing it for my own good, no matter how much I don't want to believe it.

Since you guys were all great yesterday and today with encouraging reviews, I'm updating a day early. I was going to make you wait, but now I love you all too much...

And just so you all know, The Wolf Who Walks Alone is probably one of my absolute favorite fanfic writers, and has kind of been an inspiration to me, so you should freaking read her stuff. This girl deserves all the publicity she can get, because she will go places.

Anyway, these reviews have been really encouraging, and I've been much more excited to write more for you all. This has been amazing, mostly because I had the shittiest week in the history of shitty weeks. The nice reviews every couple of days have really helped me through with my major self-esteem issues and stuff, and helped me realize that I'm not the complete flaming idiot that I've somehow convinced myself I am. However, I did lose a hearing aid because I stuck it in my hoodie pocket, while thinking that it might fall out and not bothering to put it into my zippable coat pocket instead. That and not tearing back outside to look for it the second I realized that it was gone, because I was worried I'd be late for class. I'm a moron. A very tiny yet exceptionally large blonde American idiotic moron.

Fortunately, I think I might be able to get my warranty on it, and receive my one-time device replacement get-out-of-jail-free card. From now on, I'm going to carry around the stupid, cumbersome case that I'd resisted because it made me feel like a retard, and I am going to put my hearing aids in there when I'm not using them.

Finally, here's your chapter :)

"Hey, Maxio?" a voice called from the other side of the small house.

The day was still new, and the three of the small group who had not grown up in a semi-normal situation had already been awake for a few hours occupying themselves with what they had seen fit. They all had their own ideas on how to sort of homeschool themselves now that Lou was gone, and Max had, in a way which could only be described as Maxism, dictated that they all were to read thirty pages of something logical at the beginning of the morning.

"You are not all turning into potato brains!" she had yelled one day about a month after the doctor had passed and she'd caught Iggy simply laying on the floor eating Nutella with a spoon right from the jar. "And you should be ashamed of yourself!" she'd added as he glopped another gooey wad of chocolate crack into his mouth. "You're becoming a stupid, fat, feathered lard-face!"

"Um, no, you're mistaken! I'm binge eating! Leave me alone!" he'd shouted back. "It comforts me!"

By the end of the hour, Iggy had then without a doubt concluded that Max was right, and always right, mostly due to the fact that the spread was all over his favorite shirt, and he had a spoon stuck to his face with Gorilla Glue for the next week and a half.

And that was the day Max had assumed her dominance over their so-called "flock". And it was also the day they instituted a strictly-enforced homeschool law – the penalty always having something to with something both incriminating and painful. For everyone.

Fang normally buried himself in the works of some brilliant philosopher from Greece, or somewhere else which tended to yield those who were smart. Max's theory was that these people were the source of the random pearls of wisdom Fang chose to depart on the other three when they were overwhelmed with some form of emotional peril, or in the middle of an illogical rant. Personally, Max preferred classics, text books, and history novels which had been stashed all over the study by the Lou. It was incredible the amount of writing he had managed to stow away in this cabin, and it could easily be perceived that he had been preparing for a situation such as this. Louis had wanted to best for his "adopted" children, and wanted to see that they would turn into educated people if he ever had to leave them. And so, in a way, it was like Lou was still looking out for them, even if it was only to ensure the well-being of their minds.

Max was reclined on the ancient sofa in the small living room with a book written about one of her favorite historical topics, World War II. She didn't particularly enjoy reading about the terrors and horror of the battles of Nazi Germany, but they reminded her so much of her childhood that it was abnormally fascinating. She loved evaluating the accounts of the surviving Jews, and stories of how the Americans eventually came to rescue those who'd remained in the death camps until the very end from certain death. The United States Army, in her mind, was so much like the doctor who had done not only the same thing for her and her best friend, but also for the others she had come to know and love as her own family. She had absolutely idolized Lou.

At that moment, Fang looked up at her expectantly, knowing that she hadn't even heard what Iggy had called her. This was probably a good thing, too, since she strongly refused to tolerate anyone who dared to call her anything but Max. Except for when he called her Maximum on occasion, but she only let Fang do that because it reminded her of the doctor. Anyhow, he lightly grunted at her and nodded in Ig's general direction.

She looked up at him from her book with a raised eyebrow. "Oh, so what, you're giving up talking altogether before nine in the morning?"

"No," he corrected her, shaking his head and leaning toward her slightly as if to further prove his point, and closing the copy of Collections of John Locke that he hadn't quite finished reading yet. He left a finger in as a bookmarker. "Iggy-dear called you."

It came again, slightly louder and more annoying than the first time, "MOM!"

She leaned her head against the couch which had its back to the blind boy hopelessly searching the kitchen cubbards with his pale, spindly hands.

"Child!" she yelled back sarcastically, giving Fang, who was sitting under her calves, which were outstretched across the length of the sofa, a dimpled smile, to which he returned.

There was a crash as something fell out of one of the cabinets and fell with a plastic crowr-raur-owroror on the hardwood floorboards. Iggy unnecessarily covered his head with his arms and complained, "Ella murdered the house elf!"

"Excuse me?"

"Mother, there's no food."

"Stop referring to me with maternal titles! I am not a parental figure!"

Beside her, Fang licked a finger and turned the page of his book, mumbling nonsensically, "Dobby was getting a tad overbearing."

Max punched him in the shoulder, but not hard enough to leave a bruise. "Don't encourage him."

Being no gentleman, he punched her right back so hard that it would. "Well, I'm sorry – Oliver Twist wants some 'ore."

There was a slam of door a little ways down the hall, and the tell-tale, quite little murmurings of the final flock member. From this, Max was able to assume that it was now about nine-o-clock.

"Hm-ara-wha...hm…" El was rubbing her brown eyes and shuffling across the rough floor in black plaid pajama pants, which were really far too long for her skinny legs. "You guys are making so much noise…" she groaned, then threw a lethargic index finger in the general direction of the kitchen. "Iggy, make me coffee."

He crossed his arms stubbornly."No, you killed Dobby."

"What?"

She slumped down into the pale blue armchair across from Fang and Max's red couch. It squeaked a bit in protest as it sagged under her weight. She exhaled softly and put her face in her hands, her black nail polish chipped and in need of some maintenance. "Frrrm, I slept on my left wing weir' and now ist all knotted up'."

Max hummed in sympathy and put her legs down to pat the seat next to her. "Fang, move, I'm gonna rub El's back for her," she commanded. "C'mere, babe."

Giving an annoyed look, Fang wordlessly got up from his spot on the couch and switched places with the girl, who clumsily scooted across the distance between the two places on her butt to lay down next to Max. The eldest girl lifted her shirt gently revealing the twisted forms of two scrawny, feathery frames. The right one was a bit bigger than the left, but the second of the two was less completely covered in fluffy, brown plumage. The sparsely feathered wing was mostly the color of Ella's naturally tanned skin, but a little darker where a birth mark spanned a large area of the joint.

Ella's arm twisted around so she could directly gesture to Max the part of the right which was hurting her near the part where the wing met the shoulder. "Riiight here…"

Max began to kneed and loosen the muscle which had cramped over the night, and the four fell into a slightly uncomfortable silence, because it wasn't very often that El bared the deformed wings attached to her back to the others. Though she'd never outright admitted it, it had become obvious over the years that she was bitterly ashamed of them.

One time, she had told them about when a kid at her school would make fun of her for being a hunchback, even though she knew very well that she wasn't. They used to throw rocks at her and call her names. Thus, from a very early age, El had known that she was different – and in a bad way. This probably gave birth to the close friendship she had developed with Iggy, who was also limited in a very serious way.

"Have I ever told you that I love the color of your wings?" Max cooed, breaking the stillness with her clear voice.

El said nothing, but had closed her eyes and hummed every once in a while in approval as her muscles unwound.

"Well, not that this isn't fun," Iggy said impatiently, "But I'm about as hungry as a baby beluga whale…so…if someone could please go get food..."

"Belugas eat krill," Fang said shortly and received an approving smirk from his leader.

"And catch food using only their mouth," Max joined in.

Ella had sat up and drawn her over-large shirt back down. "And I think they eat through a toothbrush, too. Here, I'll go get you one…"

"…And you can find something nice in the lake," Max added.

Fang jumped up from the sofa and shoved the book he had been reading onto the bookshelf. "I'll find your swim trunks."

The blind kid stayed cemented in place between the island and the cubbards with his arms crossed over his chest. "I passionately hate you all."

"Do you think Ella would eat kidney beans?" Max was asking Fang as they walked both side-by-side and hand-in-hand through Aisle 12 of a King Soopers grocery store. When just the two of them were out in the real world, they both dressed in dark clothes and pretended to be a married couple, in an effort to dissuade suspicious shoppers. Especially if the Erasers were around looking for flock, the two of them wanted to look very different. They were certainly tall enough, had the build of adult humans, and Fang even used temporary one-day blonde hair dye in order to give him kind of a Mexican hipster Backstreet Boy look. This, Max always had to convince him, did not look stupid, but in reality, it he looked really cute. Max's hair had been colored a much lighter shade of brown today and she was wearing a dark green sweatshirt with the hood up.

Fang adjusted his fake, modern black glasses and frowned at her as he dumped several cans of tomato sauce into the pale gray cart. Around his midsection, he sported a baby Snuggly with a very realistic-looking newborn doll. It had little socks over the hands and a hat covering its almost-real, olive-toned face. Fang had named it something very normal, Will, because he had come up with the idea and built the thing. But Iggy, for whatever reason, had continually insisted on calling it Pilot Inspektor.

However, Max had to admit she and Fang really looked like a perfect little family…and she kind of liked it. Though, she never would have admitted it out loud. She could only imagine the embarrassment.

"I don't think anyone eats kidney beans," he remarked. "Here, could you hand me eight cans of Campbell's soup, babe?"

She scowled at him, but made her way over nonetheless and picked up what he had commanded. "Would you be in the mood for stroganoff tonight? I could get our cook to make it for us."

"That would be lovely, dear," he smiled. When they were out, she insisted he smiled all the time. This, also, would turn undercover whitecoats off because Fang never grinned.

And she liked it when he smiled.

The cart at this point was positively filled with all sorts of foods, right up to the rim. They had to be careful to always get things which didn't have to be refrigerated, however. Milk and other items like iced cream were very obviously out of the question, except for in the winter when they could be placed out in the snow. Since it was summer, none of them had had a good glass of milk with cookies…in months. This bugged Max the most.

"Then we'll have to get, like, twenty bags of noodles to go with them. Plus, I mean, we need all the carbs we can get," she pointed out, reaching out between her and her companion to lovingly stroke the baby.

"So…true…honey, you're such a genius," he cooed, and added seriously, "I can't tell you how much it turns me on."

"Aw, baby, you're so full of shit, I love you."

It was convincing, and the people around them didn't notice anything. However, the look in Fang's eyes said all that he didn't say out loud, and he was visibly struggling to keep up his serious façade. He grinned again. "C'mere and give me a kiss, Maxine."

"Um, not if you want to have any more children, Nicholas," Max answered sweetly.

To this, he gave one hushed, but explosive laugh and reached across dear William to gather about thirty high-calorie protein bars as they walked down the next aisle, the cart squeaking over the dirty linoleum floors.

"Oh, hey, on a more serious note, how many more boxes of Raisin Bran do you think we'll need for the next month or so? And Cheerios…I mean, Will could probably go through about one box a day."

"Nick, he's three weeks old. Let's get twelve of the Bran and…six O's?" she went at the display like a bear, then noticing that they may be in need of another pushcart "Do you want to leave with all of this and go back home, or risk the exposure and get another cart?"

Fang checked his wristwatch and frowned. "Well, if we've been out for an hour and a half already, we should probably head back so the kids don't get apprehensive."

"All nine of them."

"Yes, all glorious nine."

"And the triplets on the way."

"We've decided on Roy, Charles, and Shaniqua for sure, am I right?"

They strolled lazily down to the check-out, which didn't have a line, thanks to their uncommonly good luck. A small Asian girl with a light blue apron looked up at them from behind her very thick glasses. She asked in a politely high voice, "All set to go?"

Fang smiled politely in very good character. "Yeah, I think so! The baby's starting to get a little fussy, so this'll be it for now."

They all looked at Will, who did absolutely nothing.

Max cleared her throat in order to distract the very apprehensive-looking cashier and started loading jugs of orange juice onto the moving rubber belt. The girl had very certainly noticed the large amount of food they were checking out and conversationally asked Fang, "Is…is this your first?"

Stifling a grin, Fang swung an arm around his fake wife, gave her a squeeze and quick kiss on the lips. Max's eyes got very big. "Oh, no, we've got seven at home with a sitter. Maxine and I here just can't stay off each other, can we, love?"

Max gave him a tight-lipped false smirk, clearly exceedingly annoyed. "Honey, kindly shut your face," she said very politely, giving the girl a nice smile and purposely not looking at her partner.

Pulling the counterfeit dollar bills and food stamps which Ella had so flawlessly made, Fang informed the girl knowingly behind his hand, "Sorry, she's a little pissy from pregnancy hormones. Got another one on the way already."

Max elbowed him very hard in the ribs.

The girl seemed obviously very confused, and to admit, a little flustered, so it was no surprise that she did not check the fake money, bagged the merchandise, and just let the two leave with their extremely hefty amount of food.

After high-fiving and finding the large blue duffel bag they'd hidden behind the store, Max told Fang as she unbuckled the Snuggly from behind, "Okay, next time I'm carrying the baby, and you are not allowed to talk to anyone!"

"Oh, go die, it was a believable story!" he gestured largely to his entire body after taking off the glasses, "I mean, who wouldn't want this? You, my dear, are a very lucky hypothetical wife."

"You do not kiss me! We've been over this several times! What is your freaking–"

"I'm sorry if I was staying in character! She looked skeptical!"

"What part of her looked skeptical? You kissed me! Now forgive me if I reserve the right to not talk to you for the next week, you giant oaf!"

"Oh, stand back, she's resorting to British, Tolkien-like insults."

Fang just had a silly look on his face like he'd just pulled the prank of the month and completed an Iron Man race in record time. Wife. Max took the baby and roughly shoved him into the duffle, then all fifty pounds of it at Fang.

Meanwhile, back in the mountains, it was about noon, and Iggy was narrating everything he did right as he did it. Ella was curled up on the couch reading her favorite Jane Austen book, Pride and Prejudice for about the fifth time in a row. She'd been doing her best for the last three hours to ignore him, but as he started again and walked past her with a new slur of commentary, she began to reach her breaking point.

"The handsome hero walks down the hall. The hero puts his socks on. What color are they? He knows not. The hero maaaakes his waaaay into the kitchen and prepaaaares for himself a cheese sandwhich! The knife is cold and light in his strong, capable hands. What stealth! Such dexterity! Inpecible–"

"IGGY I SWEAR TO YOU THAT IF YOU DO NOT STOP DESCRIBING EVERYTHING YOU DO THIS INSTANT I WILL MURDER YOUR STUPID, BLIND WHITE ASS AND DESPOSE OF YOUR DEAD BODY IN THE LAKE. AND I WILL NOT FEEL BAD ABOUT IT!"

That was it.

The book dropped to the floor with a satisfying and very loud whap! and Ella leapt to her feet, storming the short distance between the blue armchair and her bedroom and she shut the door as hard as she could.

There was a pause.

"…The hero begins to speak to himself in hushed tones…"

At that exact same moment, the front door opened after a series of knocks, clearly indicating that it was Max and Fang, and not the blood-thirsty Erasers they were so paranoid about.

"Hey!" Max breathed tiredly, because she'd ended up carrying the bag halfway because Fang's bad back almost gave out. "We bear goods."

Iggy, who'd been sulking ever the slightest, perked up a bit, looking now skeptically at his measly little sandwich. "Any chance you would have bought, like, some provolone or mozzarella? Oh! Or pepper jack…it's the best."

Max made a face, because it was a known fact that she despised cheese with everything that was within her. "Ew, but yeah…but ew."

There was a whump as the seven pound baby was carelessly flung onto the table by its unsympathetic creator in an effort to reach the other light-weight food articles from the now-heavy duffel.

At the noise, Ella quickly burst out of her room, completely fueled by the drive of hunger. "Bread? You have bread? I asked for bread, do you have bread?"

Someone threw one of the fresh-baked loaves at her, and she nimbly caught it.

"Fang, is that a black eye?" She noticed Fang's now rather dark optical orb and gave a pointed look at the kid she had to share the house with all day, tearing into the bread with her bare hands.

"Hey, Max? Iggy's pissing me off. Punish him, too."

I have nothing else to ask you except to review! The more reviews I get, the more motivated I get, and the less I get depressed (depression, buh), which means the more lengthy the chapters :) I can't tell you how much I love you readers. You're the reason I write!

~Steph