I shrugged. "We do what she told us not to. Look for information and see if she really knows something, or is just insane."
In all honesty, I wasn't sure exactly how I intended to come across this information. I knew her first name, and if she was anything like us, she wouldn't come up if we typed in into Google. But something about what she'd said stuck with me. Something that made me think she knew what she was talking about. And if that was true, I wanted to know about whatever it was before it happened to Fang.
I'd asked Fang again if he'd ever met her, but he denied ever even seeing her before. The possibility of him lying flashed through my mind, but I quickly squashed the idea. Fang wouldn't lie. Not to me.
"Max, we should put them to bed." Fang commented lightly as he appeared behind me, wrapping his arms around my waist. I looked up, finally realizing that the sun had long left the sky.
"You're right." I agreed. Then in a louder voice; "Alright, time for bed, we'll head out in the morning." I told everyone.
"Max," Nudge whined. "Why can't we just stay here for a little while?"
"Because I said we're not." I answered, I wasn't really in the mood to argue with her. Not when I had Fang to worry about.
"Please?" She asked.
"No." The word came out slightly harsher than I intended, and it made Nudge back off. We stacked our fists the way we usually do, and everyone went off to bed, except me because I'd graciously decided to take first watch tonight.
You really shouldn't be getting into this Max. She was serious when she said not to try and look for anything. The Voice rang clearly in my head.
I gritted my teeth. Of course I had to look for it, it was important.
What's important is that you and flock keep out of her business.
Was the voice insane? Did it really think I was just going to back off? I couldn't back off, I couldn't stop thinking about it.
I could've sworn I heard the Voice sigh in defeat.
If you really insist Max, there's an abandoned Itex building about 20 miles east of here. It finally told me. I smiled. For once, the Voice came through for me.
The next morning was quiet. If you excluded Nudge's ranting. We easily found the Itex building the Voice had told me to go to, and found it empty.
"Alright Nudge." I smiled encouragingly to her as she approached the keypad on the outside door. She ran her fingers over it, closing her eyes briefly. Then, without missing a beat, her eyes opened and she punched in the correct code.
"Why is the security up if it's abandoned?" Gazzy asked. We all shrugged.
"Probably because they don't want random people looking into their research." Fang answered. I nodded in agreement.
Though we knew it was empty, we still walked cautiously through the halls. The place gave us all the chills, it brought back to many memories.
When we found a decent computer, Nudge quickly hacked it and we had access to everything.
"Alright, what am I looking up?" She asked.
"Er, try 'Kyra'." I suggested. She did. And the word wasn't found in the records.
"Maybe she made it all up." Angel offered, though no one believed her.
"Well, what else can we try?" I asked the Flock. They gave me blank looks. I was getting frustrated. I'd found a place to look her up, broke in, hacked in, and now I was missing the key word. Why me? I wondered not for the first time.
"Oh oh!" Nudge cut into my thoughts. "What did that Whitecoat call her back with Mr. Shu? You know, when we walked in and you were all mad, and we were all scared, and she was in the room thingy and it was right before she did the whole ice thingy and-"
"The Tsunami Project." Fang cut her off.
"That's it! I remember thinking that that's such a weird name for anything. I mean, would you want to be called 'The Tsunami Project'? That doesn't even sound like a human!"
"Nudge!" We cut her off.
"Oh, right." She muttered before turning back to the computer and typing in the name. We all turned to the screen as the page came up.
The picture was most definitely of Kyra and her arms and wings were spread. Her expression was emotionless, but if you looked in her eyes you could see a hint of pain.
"Well?" Iggy asked impatiently. "What's it say."
Fang read aloud: "The Tsunami Project, mutated to have control over water and excelled greatly at it. Project is the brains of the experiment, with the ability to think through every possibly and be ten steps ahead of the opponent.
"Tsunami, as the leader of the four Elemental Projects, was the first to disappear. The building was tricked, and the girl escaped. Search is still progressing, but no word has been found of her whereabouts." Fang finished the summary. "The rest is just details about her water and strategies." He said.
"Ok….what does this have to do with Fang then?" Iggy asked.
"Why am I not surprised?" We whipped around at the voice.
"Kyra." I said, half in relief, half in shock.
"Did you know this is the Itex building I escaped from? I was really hoping I'd never have to come back." She looked annoyed and angry. Mostly angry. "I suppose you being the infamous Maximum Ride, I should've made sure you couldn't do this, but I didn't really have time."
"Why is it so important? You really didn't want us to know what Itex made you for?" The Gasman asked curiously.
"I couldn't care less about you knowing. It's him you should worry about." She pointed to Fang.
"Why!?" I finally snapped. "Just what do you know about Fang that even he doesn't know!? Huh!? Tell us!" I yelled.
She sighed and walked to the computer, paying no attention to Nudge and she moved my girl out of her way. I looked over her shoulder as she typed in 'The Volcanic Project'. A page popped up without a picture. Kyra read the words aloud angrily, as if the words themselves were fowl. "The Volcanic Project, the most unstable. The project proved far too unstable to remain as was. It burned down first Itex building, and memory was erased deep enough that abilities of fire did not resurface. Subject never showed signs of remembering, though that in part is due to having nothing that could resurface memories." The bitterness in her voice was strong. "Fang, you are fire." She finished.
He stared. And stared. And then stared some more. "I'm….the project……with the fire……and……"He looked confused.
"Listen to me. Everything you've seen me do? That's kids stuff. But you already knew that, didn't you Hotthead?" Kyra said to Fang just as bitterly. "Didn't you always want to be the strongest of us? Didn't you challenge Twister? Wake up Hotthead!" He gasped at that, clutching his head in a death grip as he fell to his knees.
"Fang!" I yelled as ran up to him, placing a hand on his shoulder. I quickly removed it though and looked down at my now burnt hand.
"Hmm.." Kyra mused. "A bit more of a reaction than I expected."
"What did you do to Fang!?" I demanded, clutching the front of her shirt.
She made a face and pried my fingers off of her as she spoke. "You think I did this? You were the one snooping when I told you not too!"
"You're the one who wouldn't stop speaking gibberish." I reminded.
"Whatever, what's done is done." Was her voice as grave as I thought it was?
"Ice princess?" Was the first thing out of Fangs mouth when he finally stopped screaming. He was staring at Kyra intently.
Her eyes narrowed. "Does that really have to be the first thing you remember about me?"
He chuckled. "Yup. That, and I haven't seen you in years." Wow. Long sentence from Fang.