Way Back When

Chapter Three: The Beginning

A/N: Oh my gosh you guys have officially reduced me to a gibbering, bouncing, mess. Thank-you to my amazing readers and reviewers! A humongo thank-you to BookMusicGeek and "lover of books" for requesting the next chapter. You make me feel so wanted, it's kinda insane.

Disclaimer: *sigh* I wish I could write like JP. SOOO badly.

And now, true to form, my next chappie for you all.

So, Oh Omnipotent Fortune Cookie, I snarled. Let's get a move on, I've got several young flock members crying next to my still body and two stoic older ones flipping over the fact that one is now the leader and the other's in the passenger seat.

Maximum, your sense of humor never fails to amuse me. The Voice said drily.

Humor? You call this humor? Just wait till I have a few drinks in me. I countered. Hop to it! God, Fang is going to kill me when I wake up. Then I will actually be dead. How long have I been unconscious?

Your playful banter has cost you thirty minutes.

Thirty minutes! I mimed zipping my lips and throwing away the key. Cuz, you know, I couldn't actually move my hand.

Are you ready to start your training?

Ready and—well, not willing, but you get the idea. What's a better word? Ready and, ready and, ready and-

Desperate? The Voice supplied.

That works.

There was silence for a moment. I stared into the black nothingness of my mind. Man, it was dark in there. I began to feel claustrophobic. My heart rate sped up, the walls seemed to be closing in, I was moving, lights were flashing before my eyes…

Hey, wait. I WAS moving. And lights WERE flashing before my eyes.

Uh, Voice? Where exactly am I going? Seeing as I'm in my MIND?

We're going back. Way back. Back to the beginning.

The Lion King opening song began playing in my head. I gritted my teeth.

Only having some fun, Maximum.

Fun.

How far back are we going? The creation of the universe? When bugs first walked the earth? When hairy monkeys decided to stand up and call themselves men? When-

Back to the School.

My heart stopped. Was that even possible? The heart stopping. I wasn't in control of my body at the moment.

Back to where? My inner voice came out shaky.

The School. Where you were created. We are going back to when you were young. There, you will be as you were at around age four, I believe, but you will not be a bystander. You will be Maximum, with your fourteen-year-old mind in a four-year-old's body. And from there you will do the impossible.

The impossible, huh? I've done that before. This'll be a snap.

You will create the Flock. You will break out of Itex all over again. And you will start your life.

….wait. What?

All will be made clear. The Voice was fading. It was leaving me? Alone?

No! Come back! I yelled.

Good luck, Maximum. You're on your own. And with that the Voice faded away entirely, leaving me and my speeding backwards mind quite alone.

Well crap.

The images in my mind were memories. That much I understood. But I couldn't for the life of me figure out what they were, so I gave up. Instead I mulled over what the Voice had told me. I was going back…There…to relive my life as a kid. I shuddered, but plowed on through my bottomless well of knowledge. The Voice said I would have the mind of my current self in my kid self. Well that would be interesting. But why did the Voice want me to go back? What had I done wrong then? I suddenly felt hope rise up in me. Could I fix the Flock's lives so that we wouldn't have the life we had now? Maybe we'd end up on a beach in Havana! But…what if it wasn't what I had done…wrong way back then?

What if it was what I had done…right?

My bottomless well of knowledge had suddenly dried up.

The flashing white light of my memories was slowing. I felt like I was on a train coming into the station.

Reeeeeeeeeeeeally slooooowly.

Then, the memories stopped flashing. One white light remained constant ahead of me. As I stared at it, the light grew brighter, expanding to fill the entire view of my mind. I began to hear faint noises. Quiet at first, then getting louder. The white light got brighter and brighter and I smelled something harsh and metallic and medicinal all at the same time. I winced as the light grew blinding and I raised my hands to cover my eyes, curling up in a ball on the floor.

My small hands. Covering my swollen eyes.

My tiny, little kid's body scrunched into a ball on a metal floor.

Of a titanium cage.

I was at the School.

Welcome home.

A/N: Hi, everyone I'm sorry it's so short! I hope you're still there and I'm sorry you had to wait so long! I have to go shower though, my mom wants me in bed by 11. Talk about ridiculous. And I may not be able to post tomorrow because I have school. We had to use a day not allotted for snow days and so lost a day of break. And that makes sense how? I'm sorry again that this was so short! Please don't hesitate to review! I promise the story picks up from here and everything falls into place. In the long run. Night, now!