Fourth Chapter of the series. Really, I don' know where the story is going. At all. I just write it and read it and post it, hoping that people like it. Reviews help :) and thank you to anybody who is keeping tabs on this story :)

Disclaimer: James Patterson owns. Sad, but true.


Max got back to the cafe about half an hour later. Her hair was blown around by the wind and she stifled a shiver as she walked in the door. Adam and Alex were sitting on barstools by the counter and Amanda was nowhere in sight. Neither of them turned to look at her as she entered; she guessed they hadn't noticed.

Max went around them to the back. Here was the kitchen, and a pot of oatmeal sat there, waiting for Max. Amanda came around the corner and smiled at Max, her eyes twinkling. "What is it?" Max asked, her eyebrows crinkling together. Her head cocked to the side as she gazed at the young woman.

"Alex and Adam. Adam is showing Alex pictures of our family," she paused to open the fridge, scanning it for food. Max turned the burner off and took the oatmeal to a small table, eating it with the wooden stirring spoon. "Alex... He's been very distant for the time he's been here, and this is the first time he's actually pushed forward and been the first to say something." Max listened quietly as Amanda spoke, washing her hands and patting them dry with a towel over the sink, looking out the window.

"It's been hard for a while, but it's getting better," Amanda murmured. She put her hands on the edge of the sink and pushed down, leaning forward a little. "Whatever you did last night, though, it helped. A lot. Thank you for that."

Max looked up, her eyes sharp, unconfused or cloudy for the first time in weeks. Her voice held the same sharpness, loud and clear, letting Amanda know instantly what she was saying, so she didn't get asked twice about it.

"I didn't do anything. None of us, the flock, have. The past few years were just survival, and it was just dumb luck that so many people heard about us and that so many people were ready to fight to help us, to help the lives Itex screwed up so badly," she said, her voice strong straight to the end. Amanda turned to eye her with one wise eye, the other thrown into shadow by the sunlight. Max felt as if she were being judged.

"None of us wanted to be in newspapers or on television. We didn't want people saying our names, and we used to be completely anonymous. Now? Now, we can hardly walk down the street without getting dog-piled. We're not celebrities and we never will be. Don't thank me, because all we've done has gotten us free, but trapped. We will never be able to disappear now," Max said, her voice almost cracking. She wanted to voice that deep want in her, the ache to become invisible again.

Amanda opened her mouth and was about to say something that seemed important, but Adam called her name. "Yeah?" Amanda called back.

"Time to open up," he announced. Amanda put down the towel and tossed an apron Max's way, telling her she had to pull her own weight around here. Max wouldn't have thought any less.

The work kept Max busy, her thoughts in the back of her mind, only slightly nagging. She was thoroughly distracted as she learned how to work the machines and cranked out the caffeine for the sleepy customers and the chatty people that strolled through the door. She wiped off the counters and washed cups and at the end of the day, when there was an hour of open time left, she sat in the nearly empty cafe, on one of the couches off in the corner, and let her thoughts take over.

Max closed her eyes and leaned her head back, letting the tears fall sliding over the curve of her cheek in the still silence of the cafe, about to close. Amanda almost entered the room, but caught a glimpse of Max and quietly backpedaled. She may not have had many years on her back but she knew when somebody needed to be alone.

Soon, Max fell asleep and New York was so quiet that nobody entered the cafe, and Amanda chose not to bother her. Max awoke when a light blanket was tossed over her and was carefully adjusted. She opened her eyes a crack to see Alex walking away, his stride awkward. His wings dangled almost limply from the gashes he had cut into his shirt, and he stopped by the fire. In a soft rustle, he unfurled them completely. Dark, they almost blended in to the dim lighting. His wings might have been wide, but they were bent in so many places Max couldn't have counted them all. Quietly, and moving slowly, he bandaged his wings, being gentle with the feathers.

It seemed Max hadn't been as quiet as she'd hoped. "Do I look freakish enough for you?" Alex said, his voice sarcastic. He didn't turn to look at her, continuing with the bandages. "Seen enough yet?"

Max didn't say anything. Neither did Alex, for a time.

"I'm sorry," he muttered. "I was being rude, and I had no right to." Max felt her eyebrows crinkle in confusion, but she just stretched, yawning. She tossed the blanket off and stood, wobbling sleepily over to the fire.

"It's.... okay," Max murmured, looking at Alex through the corner of her eye. "I'd probably be rude too, if I were... in your position." Alex didn't seem to register the fact that Max had so widely avoided the subject. He tied off the bandage and stared deep into the fire.

Max rubbed her hands together, warming them.

"I'm close to blind," Alex said abruptly. Max tilted her head toward him, eyebrow raised slightly. "The bones in my legs are light steel, my real ones were replaced with them. I... I can touch a surface and know who else has touched it, what they were thinking. My wings don't work very well, probably never will. Because of an experimental drug they tested on me, my immune system recognizes only human cells, and it works hard to kill off everything avian. I used to be able to see better than you probably could, and now..." He gestured to his eyes and fell silent. Max shifted. Alex's head rose and he turned to look at her. Max wouldn't have been able to tell he was blind except for the cloudy white pupil of his eyes.

Max nodded, knowing that it must have been hard for him to say this, and knowing, also, that he expected something from her in return.

"Itex... I didn't spend many years in there. But every night, I hear the screams of pain. I see all the gruesome things they did, those heartless scientists. Playing with life. Playing with something they should have never touched in the beginning. Without them, I would be a normal human, unafraid. I wouldn't look over my shoulder every second for danger, and I wouldn't sleep so lightly, ready to spring at any moment. Without them, I wouldn't have wings, but without them, I wouldn't have my family, my flock. It's hard to admit that I am grateful to a point because I cannot imagine life as a human. Powerless. Bound to the ground." Max stopped abruptly as her and Alex both snapped their heads up, rotating them. There was somebody on the stairs. She heard Alex breath in faintly, then saw him relax.

"Adam..." he breathed out. Max saw Adam peek out from behind the wall.

"I wasn't trying to interrupt," he said. His gaze rested on Max for a few seconds before he stepped into the room. He strode to the fireplace and clustered there with Max and Alex. He sat on one of the chairs and Max turned to look at him. He patted the seat next to him, his usually bright green eyes dark and dull. Max sat down obediently, while Alex sat down a few chairs away. He was close, but not too close.

"Itex was a horrible corporation. I may not have suffered much, but I still have nightmares, and I hate every single person there. Absolutely hate them," he muttered, his voice slow, sounding weak. Max turned to Adam, confusion in her eyes. He shook his head slightly.

"I'm not an avian-human hybrid, like you guys," he said to Max, looking up at her. She was startled by how intense his gaze was, and had to remind herself that he was only a year or two older than her. His eyes, the way he moved, the way he talked, he sounded like he was forty years older.

"There was a mess-up, and instead of avian DNA they injected the embryo that was me with feline DNA. My mother had been prepared to give birth to a kid with wings, not a kid with furry ears. She was shocked. So shocked, in fact, that she committed suicide." Max found herself staring at him. The way he said it, point-blank, like it was just another fact. He continued his story.

"I... didn't spend much time in cages. After the customary tests, they explored my limits farther, and they came up with this bright idea that I would grow up in the lab, live in the lab, know the lab. I became something of a junior scientist, and so it was their fault that I was able to escape. They had let me learn, they'd let me explore, and they pretty much opened the door so I could walk out. Right from under their noses."

"How old were you?" Max asked softly. Adam bent to toss a few pieces of wood into the dying fire before answering. "I was eight when I escaped." Max nodded.

They both stared into the fire, Max searching for some kind of an answer, Adam barely registering the flicker of colors. A soft snoring sound entered Max's ears, and she turned to look at where Alex was sleeping softly. Adam found the blanket Max had tossed off earlier and draped it over his older brother, careful not to wake him.

Adam laid down close to the fire, stretching out in front of it. He curled one arm under his head, the other laying on empty space. Without thinking about it, Max laid down, nestled into him. Her face turned toward the warm fire and his hand coming up to rest around her.

If she was in a right state of mind, awake at all, Max would have been shocked at herself. As it was, she was frightened, and needed comfort. She was searching for something she wasn't sure she'd find, and all she wanted was to feel right. To feel like Max, not this scared girl who could barely do anything. She wanted to be strong again.

They slept next to each other, Max curled up and Adam curled around her. No hanky-panky, but it was all the same. Nothing would change that.