The Inevitable Truth

Readers, I will take my time and get this story right. If I don't write for a few months, don't panic. I have a busy life as well. Please enjoy the ride.

~Margaret Lavorne~


Max POV:

Time moves swiftly, even when you feel as though the world has stopped. I was in that horrible place, that cell, for a long time. Longer than I would have wished. During that time, for a while, I lost myself. I let go of reality and let insanity take over. Fang wasn't coming. He couldn't save me. The scientists there found a way to mess with my memories. They twisted the fragile images, made me see things different. Some of my happiest memories, all the times I'd been near Fang, my flock, my friends, times when I'd held Angel as a baby, they took those beautiful times, and twisted them into horrible nightmares. That was why I let myself slip into darkness. Those images that were my lifeline faded away. And during the time that I lost myself, I forgot everything, even about my past, and my friends. All of that knowledge was replaced by the twisted thoughts those scientists put in my head with a newly found chemical that was for healing, but could do horrible damage. Damage to someone like me. No one could beat me physically, but when people started messing with my thoughts, that was when it became dangerous.

And eventually, the only thing I remembered was Fang's face, only his face. His deep, beautiful, chocolate eyes were the only thing that remained. And so, gradually, I remembered all I had forgotten. It came back to me in pieces, not in a steady rhythm.

Now, months later, I finally remembered everything. And I was mad. I burned with a rage so fiery that if you dared look into my eyes, you'd have sank to your knees in fear. I ran against the walls, battering myself into them, bruising myself with no outcome. When I finally calmed down enough to realize I was only hurting myself, I punched holes in the walls, all the way around the room. With my knuckles raw and bleeding (and hurting like heck, though I wouldn't admit it), I tore down the walls, rage fueling my adrenaline. I was blazing mad. I found the metal door, and ripped it open, to find myself in an empty hallway, the red alarm lights flashing like crazy, and an alarm screaming so loud you'd go deaf from listening so long. I raced down the corridor, looking for an exit, barely realizing I was wearing clothes so tattered they looked more like rags, barely covering my skinny body. It was no wonder, considering they'd barely fed me anything while I'd been here. I looked down, and could see my skin stretched tightly over the definite edges if every rib. That was when I realized I was hungry. Man, I gotta get out of here, I thought. I ran recklessly down the hallways until I came to a metal door. I pushed on it. Locked. It wouldn't budge.

I screamed in frustration. Come on, there's got to be another way, I thought. I looked around, and spotted a fire extinguisher in a glass case on the wall. I punched through the glass, shards of wire-imbedded glass imbedding into my skin. I grabbed the fire extinguisher, and headed to the door. That was when the guard arrived.

"You! Put that down or I'll shoot!" a guard with a handgun shouted at me. Okay, let me give you a heads up on how mad I was by then: I was so mad I was ready to kill this guy. Oh wait. That's normal.

"Listen buddy," I stated slowly, "Put the gun down, or I'll kill you." He shook his head. So I ran at him. As fast as I could.

I watched his eyes as he pulled the trigger, and I ducked and slid on the floor towards his feet, causing him to land on the floor like a ton of freaking bricks. On. Top. Of. Me. I pushed him off me, and hit him in the head with the fire extinguisher. He was out cold. That was when I felt a stinging in my arm. I looked down, and on top of having raw, bleeding knuckles, glass imbedded in my hand, and a body so bruised and scarred I thought I was eventually going to fall apart, I now had a path of flesh carved out of my arm by a bullet, all the way from my elbow up to my shoulder. I can't believe it! He actually hit me! You think I would have learned my lesson concerning idiots and guns, but hey, you never know, I thought. It started burning.

I grabbed the fire extinguisher from the ground and started running towards the door. I hit the spot where the lock should have been. Ow! I thought. Ow! Ow! Ow! Ow! OUCH!! That hurt so badly. That didn't work. The only thing I ended up doing was jarring my bones and probably breaking some in my hand.

Okay, by now, I was so mad that I was seeing red. I punched through the door, completely disfiguring my hand. I grabbed the lock from the other side and wrenched it off, screaming from the pain.

I gingerly edged my tattered hand back through the jagged hole, that's all my hand was, tatters, shreds of flesh and bone. I was screaming inside, and my vision started to flicker. No, no, NO! I thought. I have to get out!

I shoved the door open with my shoulder and gasped. I was on the roof of a twenty-story high building. I gasped in the harsh sunlight. I hadn't flown for months, maybe a year, and now I had to escape. So, instead of thinking rationally, which you know is NOT my style, I ran, leapt off the building, and snapped my wings out…


Time passes swiftly, and even for Fang, even for Max, three years have gone by without them barely even noticing their lives going on.


Narrator POV

Fang sat crouched in a tree looking over a building in a remote area of Tennessee. The building was well concealed, hidden in a valley, and surrounded by impassible barrier of trees. Fang knew the plan. Go in. Get the innocent out. Set up the bomb. Get out alive. That was all it came down to. Besides, he'd done this many times before. He was responsible for all of the bombings on the company Voltex. Fang had found and destroyed many laboratories of theirs over the past few months.

He always knew the flock was safe, back at their home, a house built into one of the Blue Ridge Mountains. The house was totally concealed, and invisible to anyone on the ground. It had probably belonged to a lone miner or hunter. He knew they were safe because he'd checked on them this morning when he'd left. He kissed Angel good morning while she slept, and peeked in on Gazzy and Iggy. Nudge still had the "Do Not Disturb" sign on her door, because she like to sleep late, so he'd left her alone. Fang become more of a father to the flock, now that he was seventeen. That means Max would be seventeen too, he thought. No Fang, don't go there.

Fang could barely go an hour without thinking about her. He hadn't seen her for almost three and a half years. It'll be three and a half years in May, a voice in the back of his mind said. He pushed the thought away with all the others. He focused on the mission. Only the mission. He took off.

Stealthfully and swiftly he raced through the trees, not even a broken branch marking his passing.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Twenty minutes later there was a huge fireball erupting into the sky, people stumbling out of the ruins, and prisoners headed for the nearest towns. And above it all hovered Fang, the one who'd started it all.

He flapped into a steep climb and went above the clouds. On the winds above the clouds, Fang soared towards his family.


Nudge POV

I woke up this morning to the smell of pancakes and sausage. I ran through the halls practically singing with joy. The food fairies had come again. (Meaning Fang had gone to the store). I walked into the kitchen. Iggy was cooking breakfast. Iggy. I smiled. I'd been feeling unusually shy around Iggy lately. I think I was falling for with him. After all, I am almost fourteen. And he's almost seventeen. You have no chance. I thought, but I pushed it away, not wanting to ruin the moment.

Right then, Angel walked in, wiggling her eyebrows at me, no doubt just having read my thoughts. I held my finger to my lips. She shrugged. That was when I really thought about it. Angel was nine already, and the Gasman was already eleven. Speaking of him, Gazzy walked into the kitchen sleepy-eyed.

I walked up to Iggy and wrapped my arms around his shoulders casually and rested my head on one. "Hey Ig," I said.

"Hey Nudge," he continued cooking. "Hey Gazzy, hey Angel."

"Morning," they answered in unison.

I walked over, sat down at the table, and asked, "Where's Fang?"

"Gone again," Iggy answered. It was the same answer as always. "Hey guys, we have to chop wood today."

"Okay," we answered We chopped firewood for a general store in a town about and hours flight from our house, and they gave us store credit there. The old couple that ran the store took pity on us, so sometimes they gave us a little more than our wood was worth, which was okay by me.

So after breakfast we got dressed and headed out into the warm spring air.


Flock POV

Fang got home an hour later, covered in soot and drywall dust. He took a shower, making sure to get all the grime off. He got out, decently clean, went into his basically black room, put on one of his basic black ensembles, and headed out the door. He grabbed his ax and took a running takeoff. He flew west for a while, until he reached the spot they usually felled trees. He heard the sounds of chopping and so he landed carefully and walked towards his flock, the golden morning light glinting off his wet, dark brown hair.

"Hey Fang," they all greeted him. They didn't ask where he'd been. They stopped asking the first time, when he'd decided not to answer. The only one who knew where'd he'd been had been Iggy, whom Fang always asked to make him the bombs. He had even learned to hide his thoughts from Angel. Fang couldn't have destroyed all those different laboratories without Iggy. Iggy was the only one who knew what Fang was looking for. He was the only one who knew that Fang was destroying all those labs looking for Max…


Thank you all for reading this, though this is not the end, and I regret not updating for such a long time. I must admit I am proud of this particular chapter, because it is uncharacteristically longer that most of my others. Thank you all for reading again! Please review to your heart's content. Yours mysteriously,

~Margaret Lavorne~