The long awaited next chapter of Dancing with Fire!!!!!

Now now, you can stop applauding. I know I'm awesome and all, but seriously, yall can stop now. ENJOY!

And now, ON WITH THE STORY!!!!

"We're finally HERE!!" I yelled, channeling Hope and Jinx as we soared down into the alleyways of Chicago. I was ecstatic that we had finally made it, and just as nighttime was coming, too. Plus, we had made it before Demon's birthday, which was the even more important thing. It was March 16th, thank gosh. His birthday was tomorrow.

Everyone landed softly behind me, looking at me as though I were crazy. Which, if they hadn't figured that out by now, then they didn't really know me at all.

"Umm… that's great, Val…" Skye said, eying me out of the corner of her eye. We all walked out of the alley attempting to camouflage with the rest of the people that were walking through the streets. And that was a lot of people.

Instinctively, Skye grabbed onto me, and I took Mira's hand that wasn't occupied by Shawn's hand, all of us eventually forming one long, spaghetti-like structure of Avian American. Mmm... Spaghetti...

I was hungry! Don't look at me like that!

We were able to twist and turn ourselves, and keep everybody together all at once until we found a hotel. I bounded up to the receptionist, smiling my "HI! Please give me a room before I drop kick you into next week!" smile at him.

"How can I help you?" He smiled, looking a bit constipated if you asked me. Angel snickered quietly behind me.

"I need four rooms, preferably next to each other, please?" I said, putting my wonderful acting skills to use. Because I'm always this pleasant to random strangers. How could you possibly think otherwise?

"Ah, long day?" Mr. Receptionist Man asked as he typed the information into the computer. We had apparently interrupted him in the middle of a game of Solitaire. Whoops.

"You don't know the half of it." I said, adjusting myself so that I was leaning on the desk to "keep my feet from giving out".

"Where you going?"

I stopped short, and lied, my trust issues with strange men in uniforms and paranoia kicking in. "We're going on a road trip across the states, trying to make it to the California coast." I made my smile seem more genuine and tired at the same time, not like I was dying to get out of this lobby and very suspicious of this man.

"Just you and some friends?" Why in the name of freeze dried calamari are you so interested?!

"Yup." I said, giving Senor Suspicious my credit card to pay for the rooms. He swiped it quickly, and gave it back to me. I slid it into my pocket, and turned my attention back to the receptionist, who had that phony/ constipated smile still on his face.

His eyes left my face for a few seconds, and I looked into his head. He was pretty lonely and bored, just wondering when his shift would be over. Nothing suspicious. Just... extremely creepy.

And then he threw me a question that bowled me over. "Hey, where's your boyfriend?"

Everyone's minds perked right up at this, I realized. Well, the girls were all curious. The boys, Iggy and Demon especially, wanted to make this guy their personal punching bag.

Down, boys. I sent in all directions to all the guys' heads. Out of my peripheral vision, I saw that it didn't do much.

"Excuse me? Sorry, I spaced." I said, keeping the act of "totally normal teenager" up.

"Where is your boyfriend? I see all your other friends have paired up. You're the only one alone." Senor Nosy, have I mentioned how much you are annoying me right now?

Without warning, Demon came up behind me, wrapping his arms around my waist. "What's wrong here?" he said, placing his head on top of mine.

Because I couldn't just push him off and yell, "WHAT THE HEDGEHOG ARE YOU DOING?!?!" (at least, not here and at this moment,) I took a different approach to the situation, and leaned back into his chest.

"Mmm, talk to nice man. Me tired." I mumbled, and closing my eyes, making it seem like I was half asleep.

Demon chuckled and slung me over his back, wrapping his arms around my legs which were around his waist and helping the very "sleepy" me --In all honesty, I wanted to smack the crap out of him. Just where did he think he got off, pretending to be my boyfriend?!?!? Angel, what I could see of her from my new position, was smothering her giggles in Max's side.—put my arms around his neck. Turning my head so I was somewhat comfortable, I settled into the position of "sleeping Val, spazzing panther". This is not one of your old yoga positions.

In this "yoga position" that I was currently in, it looked like I was sleeping peacefully while in a piggy back position, when in all reality, I was freaking out on the inside and plotting my best friend/ pseudo-boyfriend's demise. Angel was nearly on the floor, dying of laughter.

I mentally told Demon, You. Will. Die. A. Very. Painful. Death.

He concealed a chuckle that I felt vibrate through his body. Damn evil…demon.

Angel had tears streaking down her face. And I had a feeling that she was sending everyone else my thoughts of the situation now as well, because Fang had a rather noticeable smirk on his face; Max was laughing nearly as hard as Angel was; Nudge was smothering her cackles in Iggy's shirt; Iggy was smiling like a hyena; Gazzy had run over to the couch and was attempting to get air into his lungs… and return his facial color back to normal; Skye was vibrating next to Blaze, who had a hand over his mouth; Mira and Shawn were falling all over each other, trying to stay upright; Hope and Jinx were already on the floor, each of their faces tinged slightly purple.

And notice no one was even trying to smack Demon for me. All the girls had content looks on their faces, and the boys didn't look murderous anymore. They were all just laughing at my misery. Damn evil hell spawn bird children!

Everyone was still laughing at my expense.

Senor Nosey finally stopped asking questions once he saw Demon lift me up and put me on his back. I was ready to light some stuff on fire—including my dear best friend. And everyone was still laughing at me and Demon's little situation, even after we had walked out of the lobby and into the elevator. As soon as the doors closed, I jumped off of Demon's back, and smacked him upside the head. "What the fudge did you do that for?!?" I whisper yelled at him.

"He was looking at you funny!" Demon whisper yelled back at me, rubbing his head as we walked out of the elevator to stand in front of our hotel room. The others in my flock simply passed us after taking their keys and went into their rooms.

"You-! He-! Tha-! UUGGGH!!! Just UUGGGHH!!" I yelled at him, stealing the key and stomping into my—our room. Then I turned back and hugged him. "Thank you, though. Shows how much you care."

He must be so confused. Serves him right.

Just a filler. I'm getting to the real action in the next chapter. And that is where everything in the plot starts coming together. Pay attention.

Peace, love, and electrically charged bunnies,

Skittles