(A/N/ Disclaimer: I don't own. I am perfectly aware that the timings of this story and the book do not coincide. I really couldn't care less. This is the fifth book and while it is not one of my favorites it is the one I like to play with the most. You got a problem with that?)
At this point I would like to admit that I was a bit freaked out. Not only was I possibly walking into a trap set up my one of the many groups of people that wanted to kill me, but that I was going to have to interact with people my own age. That was what really scared me.
We had been discussed what we wanted to do for abut a week before we really decided what the deal was going to be. We would arrive a day late so that if this thing was a trap, they wouldn't be expecting it. We were also going to get there early morning. I didn't like the fact that things could go socially wrong but I had to think about the overall safety of the flock.
When we had decided to leave the Room of Satan (i.e. the flower room) we started flying. I had assumed the school was in London because I thought that big prestigious schools were always in big cities so we charted a course to go there.
I am not sure if you are aware of this but England is very small. I don't think you understand. We flew for only twenty minutes at a leisurely pace before we stopped. Of course we were flying at night because with all the chaos of a city it is always better to fly at night. We were getting ready to land, when something hit me, heard, right at the back of my head. I blacked out.
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\
It wasn't long before I woke up. I felt myself flying and instantly knew that Fang was holding me. He was the only one who ever held me. (I had asked and apparently he didn't let anyone else carry me in those few instances when I passed out. I wasn't getting my hopes up though.)
I snuggled into his chest, not really knowing what I was doing when I heard him speak.
"Max as much as I would like to carry you around when you could easily fly yourself, you have to get up now."
I groaned. "I don't wanna get up, my head hurts."
There are people you have never met before staring at you."
That sure as hell got me up!
I practically kicked Fang's face flying up. I looked down to see a group of people flying in circles, staring at me. There was one boy in the middle who looked about my age and he didn't look any happier about his situation then we did.
I looked over at Fang and he shrugged, motioning for me to follow the group.
They all suddenly nose dived to stand on the streets of London. We were in, what I thought was, a dump of a neighbor hood. And this from a girl who used to sleep in subway tunnels! What have I become?
Oddly enough, a piece of paper was handed to the black haired angry boy. (Have I mentioned how pissed this kid looked?) He then handed it to Fang who handed it to the rest of the flock then me. I looked at it and saw that it said "Number 12 Grimmauld Place".
"Excuse me? What are we supposed to…?" I started asking, but was rudely interrupted by a growling voice.
"Shut up girl! Just think about where the paper said and don't say it aloud!"
I will admit I was a little taken aback. Of course growing up in a cage, you are used to people not using manners all the time but usually I got back at them. I was just about to do this in fact when I saw Fang shaking his head and giving me his "Don't-do-it-we-have-more-important-things-to-do" look.
I sighed, almost growling and did what the rude man said. Before I knew what was happening a building appeared in between two of the other buildings! This was surreal on a whole new level of surreal.
I looked to discuss this with my Flock but they were already walking inside. I ran to catch up to them and was the last one inside. The place looked dumpier than most but, again, subway tunnels here, who am I to complain about where people live?
A red headed woman ran over to us looking more then a little frazzled.
"Harry dear, it's so good to see you again and…oh…who are they?" she said. I looked her up and down trying to see if she was a threat to us or not. She was plump, messy and very…motherly! I hadn't seen my own mother in a very long time thanks to the flock never wanting to stay in one place very long. We always took pictures on our travels and often bought souvenirs thanks to Nudge and Angel's shopping habits. That meant we frequently went back to our apartment in New York to drop stuff off and recuperate from travels. The only problem with that was we were busy a lot of the time and I didn't see my blood family. Long story short, I liked this woman already and that is a rare feat for me.
"I'm Max and this is my Flock." I announced to the woman.
She looked at me and obviously wanted to say something, but she was interrupted by a messy disheveled man.
"Molly these are the new students Dumbledore said we may run into. Tonks hit Max here while flying."
"It was an accident!" exclaimed a younger looking girl who had bubble gum pink hair. She looked at me with an apologetic look.
"We will all get a chance to get acquainted but right now we have to go to the meeting!" rude guy from before said, rudely might I add.
"Oh, yes of course. Harry, Ron and Hermione are upstairs. You can take the others up if you wish." Molly said.
Harry nodded and went up the stairs with only one backward glance.
I looked over at the flock now desperately wanting an explanation or something, but Fang shook his head again and started up the stairs. I let all the kids past so I could take up the rear in case anything attacked.
We reached a door in a hallway that looked so broken it wouldn't even open. The kid, Harry had barely opened it when a flash of bushy hair attacked him. The hair started talking and then some red headed kid came over and started talking. I really wasn't paying attention as I was a bit preoccupied with shooting death glares at my flock. Fang turned towards me after several minutes of trying to stay interested. I vaguely heard the sounds of a simmering argument but I was a little lost in trying to find the truth in Fang's eyes. No I was not staring! Why would you think that? I was trying to figure out what he was keeping from me.
"Harry, not to change the subject but, who are those kids standing in the doorway?" I heard the bushy hair girl whisper. She had meant for us not to hear but with our enhanced hearing, we could hear her loud and clear.
"I'm Max. This is my Flock." I said for the second time in like ten minutes.
"Flock? What do you mean Flock?" The red headed kid said. I noticed with astonishment that he looked just like the motherly woman who had greeted us. This made me be a little bit nicer, just a little.
"And what about you? Who are you people?"
"Oh, well, I'm Hermione Granger, this is Ron Weasely and I guess you know Harry." The bushy haired girl explained. She was obviously not entirely used to people being so rude or blunt. Well right now I was majorly pissed that I had no clue what was going on and I didn't feel like caring.
"Yeah I guess I know Harry, but I wanna know the whole story here! For example, where the hell am I?!" Yes I did swear but like I said before I was pissed.
The bushy hair girl hesitated and looked at Harry and Ron. Ron nodded while Harry actually spoke. "I think I'd like to hear this too." At that Hermione sighed and began her explanation.
Apparently we were at the headquarters of a magical organization called the Order of the Phoenix. It was set up to fight an evil wizard named Lord Voldemort. He was this horrible dark wizard who had killed many people including Harry's parents. Harry had defeated him when he was just a baby and was now big on the wizard circuit. Now Voldemort had come back and it was up to the Order to stop him. We also found out that Hogwarts was a huge school with a lot of rules and that Harry Ron and Hermione went there.
"Wow. That is a lot to think about." I said, more then a little bit stunned. Just as the word came out of my mouth, however, there was a loud crack and two red headed boys (again with the red) appeared in the room.
When I had heard the crack, I freaked out and covered my head with my arms and crouched on the floor. When I didn't feel an explosion, I looked up to see the boys staring at me with surprised smirks on their faces. They looked a little bit older the Fang Iggy and I but they seemed nice.
Looking around, I saw that the rest of my Flock had gone down into protective positions. Living with Gazzy and Iggy can do that to you.
"Max these are my brothers, Fred and George." Ron said a small smile, similar but not as bright as his brothers', had crossed his face.
"Pleased to meet you, Max!" One of the twins said with a comical bow. I couldn't help but grin. They seemed so free and so happy! It was nice to be around people like that after all we had been through. I nodded my head at them.
Ron jumped in, "Well you know our story, what's yours?"
I looked at him. Even though Itex was gone I couldn't help but be weary of what we told people, but apparently these kids had just confessed that they were magical so I guessed it was ok.
"Well, like I said, I'm Max, this is Fang, Iggy, Nudge, Gazzy and Angel and we're 98 human and 2 bird."
Silence met my astonishing announcement. Even though these people had grown up in a world of magic, this seemed different to them, so I went on.
I told them how we had grown up in steel cages with scientists doing horrible tests on us. How we had escaped with the help of a scientist named Jeb and that after a few years of happiness, Jeb disappeared only to reappear when the School took Angel from us. I told them how we had saved the world and were now traveling around. When I was done there was even more silence.
It was broken by Hermione saying, "Oh, that…that's so horrible! You're ok now though, aren't you?"
I nodded and said we were fine. Scarred for life, sure, but fine.
Just then Mrs. Weasely poked her head in the door and announced that the meeting was over. We followed her downstairs to see people in the hallway talking in whispers. This struck me as a little weird but not terribly. I thought they just wanted to be polite. We walked into the kitchen, people staring at us the whole way, and sat down.
"I'll work on dinner, you kids just relax. We sat down and looked at all the people. I decided this was a good time to have a whispered conversation with Fang.
"What the hell is going on with you? Why wouldn't you tell me all this?" I hissed at him making sure no one heard.
"That one guy who looked really creepy, the rude one, he asked me what we were doing flying around up here. I figured that since they were on broomsticks they would know about that school so I told them about Hogwarts. They said they were wizards and witches and that they had heard about us and to come down to their headquarters. One of the people actually tried to curse me." He uttered the longest speech I had ever heard from him.
All of a sudden I heard screaming. As fast as I could I ducked under the table. My life is very scaring if you hadn't noticed.
When the screaming stopped (Or at least when the terrified screaming stopped since Mrs. Weasely was still yelling at the twins) we emerged from under the table. A lot of the people were laughing so I knew it was all an accident. We sat down and for the first time in a long time, I had a nice dinner with people who knew, accepted and cared about me.
(A/N There you go. Nobody is reviewing. Is that because the story is bad? Tell me if it is I really don't care! Just…don't complain that I stole ideas. If I am butchering the idea then I have a right to know so please just tell me.)
