The Champion #3

Author's note

Hey, i'm really sorry about updating, like, a week late when I really have no bissness doing so. The fact that I have chapters up to chapter 11 completely done (they are seriously almost all fillers) and I can't remember when to update is just pathetic and I am sorry. I am going to try updating every week and see if that's easier to remember. if it is then I'll just do that. Two more things before I let you read. One- HAPPY SUMMER EVERYONE! Two- unless I suddenly turned into two middle aged men, I am not Rick or James. Therefore, I DO NOT OWN IT! understand that and we'll all get along just fine.

Max's POV:
Once we were in the air Ember and I started talking. We were just in the middle of me telling her how Brook and I found each other and then how we found her when I realized that Brook had been leading our formation like she knew where to go, yet she had a confused face on.

"That's it!" she yelled smiling, confused face gone.

"What is?" Ember asked.

"Well I was wondering how I knew where to go to get you and how I know where to find Zane and so I was wondering and wondering and I got it. I got a new power! I can track people! That's awesome right?"

Ok, so the power thing is new. I'm not sure how I feel about an 11 year old being able to track me when crazy smart but evil middle aged men couldn't find a way to make a device to track me.

I just realized that she's a lot like Nudge with the fast talking. But unlike Nudge she knows how to stop. For once I'm lucky. People like me are never lucky. I feel like that line has been used before. I don't know where though.

Wait a sec. Who's Zane?

Ember seemed to notice my confused face. "Zane is another member of our flock. He was always threatening to leave to the mountains whenever we fought, he's a year younger than you and me. And I'm guessing we are on our way to find him."

"Ok. Who are the other members of your flock?" I asked. I want to know how many people we are going to be picking up. The sooner this mission is over the sooner I can go back to the flock and rip Angel's head off and become leader again. We could multiply in numbers with the new flock that I'm helping find, too.

"Well there is Zane, Night Owl, Lamar, and Asher. Zane is somewhere in the Colorado Mountains, as is Night Owl, and Lamar is with Asher because Asher was too young to be on his own when we split up, and they are in some part of the East Coast. Man! I love this power!" Brook answered.

Ok, so two down, four to go. And two of them are in the same place! This shouldn't take long.

Why did the Voice tell me to go to the Colorado Mountains when I had to go all over?

'You had to go in that direction in order to meet Brook. And she is the one who can lead you to the others.' Voice said. Wow, for once it was actually helpful. Well, it's been happening more often now so I guess I should get used to it.

Okay, so to the Colorado Mountains it is to get this Zane dude and 'Night Owl'

"Hey, Max, we have told you about our family, now it's your turn. What's your family like?" Ember asked me.

My anger at Angel spiked for a quick second then left, leaving me with the craving to punch someone. Hard.

"My family was awesome. Every one of them. There was my right-wing man Fang and our blind pyro Iggy. The chatter mouth was Nudge and the second pyro, Gazzy, could practically kill someone with what comes out his rear end. But Gazzy's sister, Angel, was difficult. Don't be fooled by the name, she's Satan's spawn. She was the one with the power of mind control and mind reading and she kept thinking that she is the most powerful and that she should be leader. So not long ago she controlled the minds of the rest of my flock and she made them kick me out. She's most likely going to give them false memories of me being a traitor to them so that they are happy that I'm gone. And one day I'm going to get her back. I'm going to murder Celeste that little stuffed angel bear of hers. It will kill her and revenge will be mine! MINE!" Then I did a sort of creepy evil laugh.

Through a corner of my eye I saw Brook and Ember share a look then look at me as if I was crazy.

"So for revenge the great, invincible Maximum Ride is going to kill a stuffed bear? Girl, I think you've lost your touch." Ember said sympathetically.

Then I did a normal laugh and the other two joined in soon after me.

Once we realized that we were all tired and hungry we found a forest close to a town. We landed there and walked to the nearest restaurant which happened to be BJ's Brewhouse.

"You sure that you've got enough money for the three of us to eat until we're full? BJ's is pretty expensive." Ember said worriedly as we sat down.

"Don't worry about it. I got this mysterious credit card that somehow never runs out of money, so basically I'm rich." I told her reassuringly. She and Brook shared a look before looking back at me.

"Okay? Well, in that case I'll have five of their best steaks!" she proclaimed. Hey, that sounds pretty good. I wonder what else they have. Ooohhh, deep dish pizzas. Ok, from the looks of this, one large and one personal deep dish pizza could fill me enough to be satisfied, but then I'll need to rely on dessert to fill the rest of me up. Oh, I wonder what a pazookie is? It sounds good. I'll try two of them.

Brook looked like she had just figured out what she was going to eat too. With only three people eating, this meal was going be be pretty cheap. For a flock of mutant bird kids who eat like pigs anyway.

Just then a female waitress with brown hair and eyes walked up to our table and asked what we wanted.

I gave her my order, then Ember ordered her 5 steaks, and Brook ordered 3 huge burgers.

I thought that she would be all shocked and have the manager come out, but all she did was say, "Okay, anything else?" very calmly.

For once it was us who were shocked instead of the waitress.

"How come you aren't all like, 'you can't order that much food!'" Brook asked.

"Well, you guys look like you could use a big meal and lots of people here order a lot of food so they can take it home and eat it later. Some people order some for other family members too, so this is really nothing new to me. But you will have to pay upfront for the food." She explained. I think BJ's is my new favorite restaurant.

So she left and came back after a few minutes and gave us a check.

"Because of the large quantity of food you ordered it may take a while before it comes out." She said while rolling her eyes. She must be annoyed at how much she has to say it.

We all nodded and she left. Then we all seemed to be thinking the same thing because we all said, "I love BJ'S." at the same time. Then we did what girls always do, we laughed.

We talked to each other for like thirty minutes until four different people came over with all of our plates of food in their hands. They put the food down on the table and left, one of them saying, "Enjoy!"

Then we picked up our knives and forks daintily and straightened our backs. We then started eating with our mouths closed and feet crossed while making small talk for around 2 hours.

Yeah, no.

What we really did was forget the silverware, and dug in like the sloppiest pigs you could find on a farm. So after maybe 20 minutes of nonstop eating we were done and happy and full. Beat meal EVER!

But what really surprised me is that a poozkie is a warm handmade cookie with ice cream on top. Well that didn't surprise me but what did was that the cookie was a 9.3 on the Maxness Scale of Cookies. Not as good as Mom's but a very close second.

After we left BJ'S we promised that we'd go back as soon as possible.

Then we left the cute warm little town and headed into the forest and then took off.

Brook was leading us again knowing exactly where to go. She told us later on the flight that the closer she gets to a person the better she can track them. I find this just a little creepy.

After pointless talk and a few flight tips from one Avian-American to another for a couple of hours, Brook informed us that we were about a 15 minute flight away from this Zane guy. I hope he doesn't turn out to be a jerk like Angel. No, bad Max. That was a bad thought. Angel is just being arrogant because she's going through a phase. You'll be back, and she knows that.

So we talked a little bit more and then we could see him. He was starting a fire with what looked like a dead desert rat, next to him. He was by the entrance of a cave and had either really dark brown hair or black hair. I couldn't make out a lot of details from so far away. His back was to us.

All three of us landed as softly as possible, but being a bird kid it didn't matter much to him. He turned around to us, taking a battle stance. I folded my wings in before shape shifting so my wings grew smaller and smaller until they were gone. I always do that after a long flight. It keeps them from getting sore.

"Zane!" Ember and Brook said at the same time, and ran toward him. They hugged him while he still had a confused face, but at least he wasn't ready to fight anymore. I was still by the entrance watching their reunion. It made me think of all the times that I shared with the flock. Our bedtime stack, and our group hugs. It made me a little sad, but I remembered I have a mission, and it needs to be accomplished without distraction.

Now that I was closer I could tell he had dark brown hair, black eyes, and a light tan. He looked my age and still had a look of confusion, but remembrance, too. He then smiled and hugged them back. After maybe 5 minutes they broke apart, and he looked at me.

"What, did you pick up a stray?" He asked them, smiling.

"Haha, very funny. But because that is coming from another Avian-American it kinda hurts." I told him. His smile decided to take a walk and leave the room.

"Do I know you?" He asked. I started walking forward to them.

"Well, you should, I'm pretty popular where you came from."

"I'm pretty sure I don't."

"Well let me introduce myself so that your life can finally have real meaning." I said arrogantly.

"I'll have to remember you. I like your style." He replied while chuckling. I kind of liked his style too, not many people go along with me.

"I make it kinda hard for people to forget me." I smiled at him.

He smiled back but still looked a bit confused. "Anyway you are...?"

"You sure you don't want to take a shot at guessing who I am? You'll just feel stupid once I tell you." I smirked. But if Brooke knew who I was he should too.

"Are you Lady Gaga?" I laughed at that one.

"No, she's like 60. Think of all the Whitecoats complaining about me and my flock for all the 13 years that you were in the School." Now he was shocked.

"You were there?"

"Yeah." I rolled my eyes.

"But you're human looking-and ALIVE!" He shouted, gesturing to my slightly rugged by not horrible appearance.

"Did you just notice?"

"Wait, are you Maximum Ride?" Ahh! He finally gets it.

I said, "No, I'm Taylor Swift, of course I'm Maximum Ride. But you can call me Max."

"But you don't have wings." Is he serious?

"That hurt more than the stray comment. I have powers, you know. I actually have several, one of them being shape shifting. I can make myself into different shapes ... or objects." I told him.

I held up my hand and turned my index finger into a knife. I then turned the rest of my fingers into knives. I joked, "You might have met my uncle, Wolverine, he and I go way back."

He laughed kind of nervously and Brook and Ember looked like they were about 5 seconds away from bursting into laughter and rolling on the dirty cave floor.

He seemed to remember something. "Wait, Ember, Brook how did you find each other? And how did you find Max? And how did you find me? And why are you here?" By the end he was talking very fast, like he needed to get the answers as soon as possible.

"Well, I was at a diner and I heard a waitress complement Max, saying that she liked her name. So I was all like, 'could that really be Maximum Ride?' So I went over to her table, confirmed that she really was Max, told her to meet me on the roof and when she did I showed her my wings, then we talked about it in a forest, then we spent the night together in a cave, and we talked about each others flocks and she convinced me to get the flock back together. So the next day we went to find Ember and I had a feeling that she was West so we followed my feelings and found her. Then we went to find you I had another feeling that you were somewhere West, and I realized that I have a new power! I can track people! And now we're here." Brook said. One breath. She might have just beaten Nudge's record.

Zane looked kind of relieved to hear the story.

"Then let's go get Lamar and Asher. They should be in the same place so we only got one stop. Do you know where they are Brook?" He asked.

"On the East Coast. I'll get a more precise location once we're closer." She answered

"Then let's go!" Ember said. And we were off. We gave Zane some time to pack up his stuff when I noticed something. Because the sun was setting, the sun was facing the entrance of the cave and it made something shine in the back of the cave.

"Hey, guys, what's that?" They all stopped and turned to look at what I was talking about. I was the first to walk closer to it, battle-ready. Once I got a close look at it, I immediately knew what it was. For once I'll thank you Iggy and Gazzy.

"Everybody out! The place is rigged!" I shouted, starting to grow my wings again. Everybody ran out of the cave and spread out their wings. I got a little stuck at the edge waiting for my wings to fully grow. When I finally grew my wings completely, I jumped out of the cave, the others far away, and starting to notice that I wasn't with them. When I did my first downstroke I heard the rapid beeping.

'Too late.' I thought. Then there was one last long beep, and then a large boom. I remember the pain of my wings burning and my body flipping and falling in the air and getting hit by debris from the cave. I only felt that for a second though, before I passed out.

Author's note
Haha! My first cliff hanger! Will Max die? Heck NO, but how will she live? Review and tell me what you're theory is and get extra cookies! SMILEY FACE! :D see you guys in two weeks.