A/N- We've gotten the first winter blast here, which is nice, because already the buses were cancelled which means no one goes to school except for the insane people (that's me). Thus the halls are empty and the classes pointless, which is always fun.

And before you ask: Phoenix is the capital of Arizona. I didn't just name the largest city in Arizona after me. :D


Ever notice how you wish life was exciting when you're bored, and vice versa?

Those were exactly my thoughts. The first fourteen years of my life –fifteen, next week- were all about survival. Live through the tests at the School. Don't make the whitecoats mad. Learn to fight Erasers. Teach Flock to survive. Try not to blow too many things up.

I was actually starting to miss it all.

No, no, don't get me wrong. I don't miss the whole 'do it right or die' scenario or 'make one mistake and the world explodes' case. It was just the action of doing, knowing that you were making a difference. If you succeeded in your tasks, lives could be saved. But at Mom's house, the most important thing for me to do was to make sure we didn't run out of chocolate chips for the never-ending stream of cookies.

Camping out in the woods, macaroni in a can for breakfast- how could I miss those?

But a small part of me did, I hated to admit. It was cool. It was different. I had spent my whole life being a freak, and being shoved into a normal life started getting on my nerves.

My average day:

12 noon. Get up

12:30 p.m. Actually get up

1:00 p.m. Eat whatever's on the counter that smells good

1:30 p.m. Do something with Flock- eat more?

3:00 p.m. Sit around.

5:00 p.m. Watch that new TV show on Fox, the one about the birds

6:00 p.m. Eat

9:00 p.m. Laze more

1:00 a.m. Go to bed

So you're probably thinking, Hey, Max, that would be the best day ever! But notice how you said day, not days. There's only so long you can eat, laze and sleep. It started to get repetitive, redundant. The only two exciting things were the whole shower and St. Patrick's things, which was two days ago. The whole "She's mine" thing was still fresh in my mind, but Fang said nothing about it.

I wanted more excitement.

God, was I going to get it.

I could tell just by the way Ella ran into the house during my watching-TV section of the day. She was nearly bouncing to the roof with excitement. Her hair was poofed out and she was breathing heavily, as if she had sprinted a few miles.

"Guess what?" She yelled at the top of her lungs, which brought the rest of the Flock and Mom emerge from their respective rooms, slightly perturbed at being interrupted.

"What's so awesome?" I asked, powering off the TV.

"I just scored major tickets to the Justin Timberlake concert- tonight!"

I had always pictured her a Bon Jovi person, but hey, I wasn't too into the music scene.

"Woah, wait a minute," Mom said, holding her hands up. "There's a concert? Tonight? No way, Ella!"

"But Mom," she wined. I could tell already that Mom was weakening. "This is Justin we're talking about! Only the hottest guy on the planet!"

Not exactly, I thought, glancing at Fang.

I did not just think that. No, no, no.

"The concert's in Phoenix!" she continued, not stopping for air. "And I got eight tickets- enough for all of us!"

Mom saw straight through that. "And how might you have come across these tickets to a world-famous musician on the day of the concert, and eight of them at that?"

Ella paused, slightly put-off, then answered a bit more slowly. "About that."

Crossing her arms, Mom made a fierce person to cross. But Ella wouldn't back down. "Look, I was walking home from school today, right? And then this girl in my class caught up to me and told me that the Ticket Center had a surplus of tickets to the concert because Justin added Phoenix to his tour stop only yesterday and it hadn't been publicly announced, just quietly spread out. So I ran there and they had exactly eight tickets left!"

She left the sentence hanging, as if she wanted to add on, but didn't. Instead, Fang said, "No way."

"Why?" Angel asked, with a slightly hurt voice.

"Angel, first of all, you can't go to a Justin Timberlake concert! There's some…interesting things there. And it's so convenient that there were exactly eight tickets- am I the only one thinking this could be set up?"

Ella rounded on him. "How could it be set up? It's a concert. Itez or whatever that company was is gone! No way can something bad happen! We go to Phoenix, we see the concert and have a blast, then come home. We'll all be sitting next to each other, Mom." She had switched to whom she was talking to mid-way.

"No," Mom said in a final voice. Tears welled up in Ella eyes. "But…"

"No buts. Return the tickets and get a refund, and we can go to the movies or something, 'kay?"

"It's Max's birthday next week! This can be her present!"

That surprised me for a couple of reasons. First of all, she remembered my birthday, which was cool. Then she was sacrificing all of my presents for a concert that I didn't care about?

"Max doesn't want to go, honey," Mom said, saving me the guilt of telling Ella that. Her face fell, realizing she was right. Guilt started gnawing at me. I couldn't just let my sister not have a great evening just because of me!

"I want to go," I spat out. Everyone turned and said "Really?" at the same time.

"Really. It would be neat seeing the..." I searched for a good term, "different styles of music out there."

"Please, Mom?" Ella pleaded. "I promise on my heart and soul that I'll be good for the rest of my life."

"I want to go, too!" Angel called, with the rest of the Flock nodding, but backed down quickly when Mom went over to them.

"How could you go?" she asked in a weird tone of voice. It made you feel like she was being nice to you, but also trying to get you to admit you're wrong. "Angel, you're six. Gazzy, eight. Iggy, no offense, but you're blind. You're going to be short-circuited at the concert."

There was no way Nudge would go this long without talking, so sure enough, she piped up, "Oh, oh, I have an idea! Maybe just Dr. Martinez, Ella, me and Max and Fang could go! And Iggy and Angel and Gazzy could just hit the movies like you said!"

"But I want to go to the concert," Gazzy frowned, while Angel was dangerously close to a meltdown.

"It's okay, Gazzy, Angel," Iggy softly said, patting the Gasman's shoulder. "You can pick the movie."

That cheered the two of them up, who promptly forgot about the concert and started debating on which movie to see.

Mom wasn't all too happy with this turn of events, but realized she was losing an uphill battle. "Ella…"

The Flock and Ella all turned their Bambi eyes towards Mom. "Oh, fine."

Cheers erupted, and Ella rushed to hug Mom, who had her mouth quirked up. "But there's a few rules." Before anyone could interrupt, she went on, "First of all, Iggy, make sure that Gazzy and Angel are with you every minute you're at the movie theatre. Gazzy, Angel, don't let Iggy wander and play with explosives, all right?"

Iggy grinned, and the Gazzy and Angel nodded with smiles plastered on their faces. It was such a Kodak moment.

"And you four" –she pointed to me, Ella, Fang and Nudge- "are to be in my sight no matter where you go. No going for souvenirs or popcorn or whatever unless I'm with you. If you see anybody staring at you for too long, just tell me. There are too many bad people out there wanting the Flock for us to let our guard down for more than a second."

Something was wrong, I noticed. Mom had said, "There are too many bad people out there wanting the Flock." As far as I knew no one was after us at all.

There was most definitely something going on that I didn't know about.

Mom kept ranting about the rules – wings must be firmly hidden with no chance of being seen, no running up to Justin and telling him he was sexy, always must be within two inches of someone you knew- and by 5:30, we were all ready to go our separate ways. Mom handed Iggy a wad of cash, and with Gazzy and Angel skipping behind, they went to the bus station for downtown. (It was too light out to fly.)

Fang, Nudge, Ella, Mom and me all filed into Mom's minivan, and away we went to an event that would most certainly have outcomes I hadn't dared to dream of.


We stopped at a Wendy's along the way, where we all stuffed our faces so we wouldn't be tempted to buy the food at the Dodge Theatre, where we were seeing the concert. From there we drove an hour and a half, and eventually arrived in Phoenix. It wasn't much compared to New York, but Downtown was still impressive. We passed the Science Center, the Burton Barr Central Library, the Dodge Theatre...

"That's it!" Ella yelled, pointing to the funky-looking building with lights flashing around it and a billboard of Justin Timberlake outside. Mom drove into a parking lot and turned around, and we searched for a safe place to park. We eventually found our way into a parking garage. Every time we stepped or did something loud the sound bounced off the walls and echoed back to us.

Others were getting out of their cars, too, and most looked about Ella's age with 'We love you Justin!' T-shirts. I reminded myself that this was all for Ella and that this wasn't supposed to be torture. Supposed to be.

We got into the elevator, and we were dropped back down the ground level. By now the sun had almost set, twilight biting at the edges of the city. We ran across the street, and found our way into the Dodge Theatre's main entrance.

It was sweet. I mean, I'd never been inside a theatre like this before. We first had to fight our way through the ticket lines –where they just made sure you had one- before we actually got inside, where we faced a large bronze wall with famous quotes engraved on it.

We were then forced to walk through metal detectors, which made Mom more at ease. No weapons would be able to be sneaked in.

To our left was swanky-looking, with red carpeting and attendants swooning over whoever went over to them. It looked as if those were the thousand-dollar ticket holders who had the balcony to themselves. The Dodge Theatre held five thousand five hundred people, and all of them seemed to be here at once, milling around, wondering where to go.

Ella seemed to be at a loss for words. She was shaking and admiring the large crowd, eyeing the souvenirs. Nudge, too, had a look of astonishment on her. Mom just looked uncomfortable, and I realized why: it would be a cinch to get lost in here, or to have someone stab you in the back.

Nasty, but in my life, altogether too true.

"Watch it, girlie!" a man snarled as he bumped into me. He was headed to the balcony section.

"Excuse me?" I said, annoyed. He was short, slightly overweight, and had two bags of popcorn and a tub of cotton candy in his arms. "I didn't touch you."

"Shut it," he said and continued walking past, but Fang grabbed his shoulder and turned him back. The crowd gave him uneasy looks but continued onwards.

"Apologize," Fang growled. "Now."

The man tried to rip his arm out of Fang's grasp without luck. "Tell your girlfriend that if she watched where she was going then you wouldn't have to protect her. And if I were you, I'd get a prettier one."

Well.

That's about the equivalent of saying "I want you to kill me."

Fang was about to spontaneously combust, but I grabbed him back before he could resort to blows. "We'll be on our way," I said coldly, and pivoted away from him, the crowd growing larger.

"You didn't let me rip him from limb to limb," Fang said, faking sadness, but fists still clenched.

"No. Too much blood," I said, and we pushed out way through the crowd to the main vending area.

Popcorn, pops, candies, fries, hot dogs, souvenirs, everything was set under our noses, and it took serious willpower not to spend all my money. It looked as if the Dodge Theatre was meant for classical concerts, not a pop star, just from the way everything was carved and set up. However, with the amount of people, you could've fooled me.

There were these alarm thingies all around the walls, which looked like the sirens on top of police cars. When they started flashing and making this loud noise I nearly jumped into Fang's arms.

"What does that mean?" Mom asked quickly, grabbing us all close.

"Relax, Mom, it means the concert's starting in ten," Ella informed us all. She looked ready to die happy at that exact moment.

The crowd started surging towards the left, where there were several double doors with numbers on them. "Where are we?" Nudge asked as I looked at my ticket.

"Main floor…section 6…seat 244," I said. We managed to get to the doors with the '6' above it, where another ticket person checked to make sure we weren't sneaking in. When we got through I wasn't sure why anyone would.

The seats were okay, but could've been better. We were near the stage, but at an angle. The stage itself faced towards sections 2, 3, 4 and 5, with us on the outskirts. However, we were only in the third row up, so if we turned ourselves correctly we had a pretty decent view.

People were charging in the doors at record rate, trying not to spill their food and whatnot. I saw the Nudge and Ella had both acquired popcorn when I hadn't been paying attention. The lights dances around the building in different patterns and colors, which was almost asking to send some into a seizure. The ground was already littered with garbage and candies, which annoyed the heck out of me.

Security guards roamed around in dark clothing and sunglasses. They looked like they were straight out of Mission Impossible, with their walkie-talkie things in their ears.

Finally, with a grudging excitement growing in me, the lights dimmed, and the crowd screamed with all their might.

"I'm hungry," Fang said to my right.

"Me too," I said, watching a girl in front of take a massive bite of her hot dog.

Fang narrowed his eyes just as someone stepped onto the stage. "What are you talking about? I didn't say anything."

I thought he was just joking, but I could tell by his eyes that he was telling the truth. "You said you were hungry."

"No, I didn't," he responded automatically. Before I could say anything the crowd overtook my voice.

"Hey everybody!" yelled the guy onstage. "Is this what Phoenix is all about?"

The crowd exploded into noise, Ella included.

Then, the classic, "I can't hear you!" which provoked more sound. If I weren't deaf by the end of this thing it'd be a miracle.

It turned out that guy wasn't Justin Timberlake, just the leader of the band that played before him to get the audience even more hyped up. The songs were all loud with the same lyrics about sex, drugs and life on the streets. Not too impressive.

Finally, after three songs the band took their instruments offstage and the noise dimmed. Just seconds later the lights, sounds, beams and everything focused on one figure who seemed to come out of the floor: Justin.

Ella nearly jumped the rail, but Mom held onto her shirt tightly as the back-up scantily-clad singers came out onstage and they into their first number.

I've seen bikinis with more material then the stuff those girls had on, which made lingerie look like a winter coat. It was all supposed to be 'sexy', but to me it looked stupid. Justin, meanwhile, was just in jeans and a tight T-shirt.

I couldn't hear myself think with everything going on, even with Fang silent like a rock beside me. Ella's yelling from two seats away took out my eardrums alone.

Then I felt it.

I knew it was going to happen.

Weapons weren't able to get in because of the metal detectors, right?

Wrong.

The weapons were already inside the building.

It was the security guards. I saw the closest one, near the foot of the stage, take a handgun out from inside his coat pocket. My raptor vision saw that every other nearby guard was doing the same, and they were all drawing towards us. One met my eyes, smiled, and motioned to his gun.

Remembering St. Patrick's, I thought to Fang, Look at the security guards.

Fang, who looked half asleep, (how that was possible I would never know) jerked his head up and watched the guards. He immediately leaned over to Mom and Ella, while I told Nudge to my left.

"What are we going to do?" she asked, lights dancing off of her eyes. I could only understand her from reading her mouth, but I could also see that she was disappointed. Once again we were interuppted from having fun.

I plan started in my mind, and when I met eyes with Mom, she was thinking the same thing.

"Run," I yelled, then turned to Mom. "We'll meet back at the house!"

Mom and Ella stayed behind, knowing they only wanted us. At least, that's what we were gambling on.

Nudge, Fang and I wheedled through the third row, and then sprinted up the carpet back up to the main area. From the corner of my eye I could see the guards congregating to us.

We burst out of the door and into the now-empty vending area, scaring the door attendant out of his wits. The three of us ran straight down towards the ticket area to get outside, when three security guys jumped from the above balcony to right in front of us.

I took the biggest of them, and first kicked the gun out of his hands. He looked shocked at that, and I took his hesitation time to break his fingers as he howled in pain. Nudge and Fang ganged up on the last one, as Fang had finished his off his quickly, who was now whimpering in pain on the floor.

After the third was properly dealt with, we continued to the ticket area. Before we could jump the revolving things, at least ten of the guards jumped out from the other side.

"Woah," I backed up. "Why the tough love? What'd we do?"

"Just wanting a survey," one of them smiled. He was missing a front tooth.

"You know," I continued, my back hitting the bronze wall, "That's all fine and good, but your people skills need work."

The guards were closing in, so I played my last card.

"In five," I said, Nudge and Fang nodding, "four, three, two-"

We flew open our wings, and normally anyone would have been freaked out. But these guards looked as if this was normal itself.

"Fly!" I yelled, and I took off down towards the only door in sight that didn't lead to the washrooms or the concert hall. I paused long enough to throw open the door, and prayed there was an exit down the hall.

It was an empty, brightly-lit hallway of offices. People yelped and ran out of the way as the three of us flew down it, not stopping to turn.

There, at the end of the hall: an exit sign. I flew even faster and came to a screeching halt in front of the doors, Nudge and Fang seconds behind. I jimmied the door- it wouldn't budge.

"Let me try!" Fang yelled. He slammed his body against the door, making me wince, but it just wouldn't open.

I turned and faced the guards, whose ranks had grown to about twenty, sprinting towards us and cutting off all chances of escape.

For the first time in my life I was trapped, and there was absolutely no way out.


A/N- As you know I'm in Canada, not Arizona (but I have been there- it's awesome) so the description about the inside of the Dodge Theatre -which is real- is completely incorrect. The description is from the one concert I went to and the theatre I dance at. I did, however, research it and Phoenix (the city) as well as I could. I just don't want to be yelled at by people living in Arizona.

–whoops-

I chose Justin Timberlake because he's just about the only musician I know of because of Sexyback, the song people wouldn't stop singing last year, and because Ella had a poster of him in a previous chapter.

Reviews are wickedly sweet!