It's update day! And also the 4th of July, so Happy Independence Day! I think I'll celebrate by eating an entire half-gallon of Blue Bell ice cream. That sounds sufficient to me :)

I'm going to dedicate this chapter especially to The Wolf Who Walks Alone, and Pancakes-For-You. You guys give the best reviews, so thank you so much! I enjoyed all my reviews, so here's for all of you - a long chapter. Enjoy!

Max stayed awake for the next several hours while a couple of different nurses filtered in and out of her hospital room to check and see how she was doing. There were only two, and Fang had said it was because the hospital was trying to keep the five of them as invisible to the world as possible. Who knows what would have happened if word had gotten out that five teenagers with wings had checked into the hospital and, oh, one had a miscarriage and another was part wolf. The New York Times probably would have wet itself with excitement. They would have been all over the front page overnight. "FREAKS FOUND GUSHING FOUNTAINS OF BLOOD – ALL IS SURPRISINGLY WELL. BTW, WEREWOLVES EXIST."

It wouldn't be a pretty picture. She shook her head.

Fang hadn't left her side hardly at all, and the only times he did were to use the bathroom on occasion. On the few trips that he made, however, he made sure someone else was in the room with her, and that he had custody of their right shoe. Normally, Max would have thought this was completely unnecessary, but now that she was feeling like she had not only shitted a puffer fish, but had also been stabbed several times over in the side by Edward Scissorhands, she had a change of heart.

"Can I get you anything?" one of the nurses, the one she liked named Jamie, asked as she appeared in the doorway, her red hair pulled up in a messy bun. A syringe dangled dangerously from her scrubs, and a flashback of Dr. ter Borcht nearly blinded her to the point that she couldn't even respirate.

Her breathing increased, and the heart monitor that was attached to a device on her finger started to beep a little faster. Fang had finally passed out on the chair next to her, but as soon as he sensed a change in the room's energy, his dark eyes snapped open and locked on the woman who had caused the discomfort.

Jamie.

She was the one who drew blood from him just hours before. His stare made the her wring her hands uncomfortably and look about the room like she suddenly realized she possessed eyes and had the motor capabilities to move them.

"I can take it from here," he said dryly.

Through her momentary delirium, Max had the capacity to wonder if it was simply his façade, or the fact that this nurse knew he could easily snap the IV drip in half that made her leave so briskly. It was like he'd shot her with a rubber band or something. But, after all, he was wearing a tank top that nicely showed off his toned muscles

His gently, yet firm hand settled on her knee, and she felt herself relax at his touch. This was Fang – she knew him. She trusted him. She knew she could trust him. It was going to be alright.

"I'm right here," he said. "I'm not leaving you."

Max's eyes locked on his and she said tersely through her heavy breathing, "We need to get out of here."

He nodded. "I know, the smells of antiseptic are making me climb the walls."

"Literally?"

For her, Fang pulled a rare smile.

Though her wound was healing rapidly, the hospital still wouldn't let her out of their sight – or their custody. It was almost like she had become their property, and the last thing she wanted was to be the property of something. She'd had enough of that her whole life. They'd said it was something about taking every measure to make sure she was safe, which she thought was stupid. It was completely unnecessary, of course, because she had Fang. And Fang was such a badass that he could actually eat the cafeteria's tofu, which was saying something. The security guards at the end of the hallway probably couldn't do that.

Still being characteristically bossy, had painstakingly managed to El and Iggy to move a couch from the lobby into her room and convinced Fang to get some rest. Every time he'd realized he dozed off in the chair he'd spent the last week in, he'd snap up and shake his head like a wet dog. Sometimes, he'd crack his neck, too, and she was so sick of that that she could have probably snapped his neck if he'd but sat a little closer.

The other two had disappeared, as they did, to go and visit the Eraser that Max had managed to get them all to drag along without even saying a word just a few nights ago, and Fang took this as an opportunity to ask her about something that'd been eating him up since the second they'd reunited. What had happened to her at the Institute, and why wouldn't she say anything? Goddamn him for nodding off when he did, because now he didn't know if she'd ever really tell him.

"I saw some of it, you know," he said, adjusting his balled–up hoodie to use as a pillow and watching her with his eyes half shut. If he didn't have a stronger sense of self-control, he might have passed out the second he'd lay down. "I'd have dreams," he continued.

Max pulled her blanket closer to her.

He sat up and watched her for a second, gentle concern written all over his normally impassive face. He couldn't close himself off to her now – she needed him more than she'd ever had before. His eyes said it all, and he didn't have to speak again as their eyes held one another's. What did they do to you?

Sinking down in her bed, she closed her eyes and tried to think of anything but the needles, the tests, the hunger, thirst, the abuse…and the rape. Fang set his jaw, understanding that he shouldn't press for more, and lowered himself down on the couch again, trying to envision the lake and the serenity of the dark forest he'd never see again.

But sleep again was interrupted as Iggy came tearing down the hall and swung himself into the room using the metal doorframe as an anchor.

There was a broad smile on his face."They have bacon in the dining hall."

Ella ran into him from behind because she for some reason had the same picture in her mind as he did as to how one should go about entering a hospital room with complete and utter respect for the patients trying so painstakingly to recover therein. Fang almost put his face in his palms, but didn't have the energy to do more than lift his head from the cushion of the scratchy-fabricked sofa.

"Oh, God!" she exclaimed in surprise, grabbing onto Iggy's broad shoulders to steady herself. This, of course, backfired and the two fell backwards onto the linoleum floor.

"Excuse you," Iggy said, brushing his hands off.

"Sorry!" she leapt to her feet. She was jittery – probably had taken advantage of the espresso machine which was located at the end of the hallway. "Hey," she said, "we're moving rooms in, like, two minutes. I convinced one of the nurses with a handful of bacon," she nodded at the blind boy, who had pulled a bundle of napkins out of his pocket and had begun crunching on what smelled like Nirvana on steroids, "I thought we should be a little closer to Ari…and there was bribing material."

Ella had had this glow about her the last few days; she'd finally sort of become a leader in their small flock. She was the only one that was comfortable around normal humans, and she had been the one who'd gone to the FBI and the police to report everything her friends had lived through so that Itex could be taken down. She and all of the others had asked relentlessly to tell them what exactly went down the other day when they said they took down Itex, but nobody was talking. They said it was all private information they didn't have the authorization to know about.

Itex hadn't needed authorization to create us, Max thought angrily.

"I'll bet they didn't even do it," Fang said gruffly later when they were in their larger suite gathered around the two remaining hospital beds. The place was still white for the most part, but the walls were a nice beige color, and there were several more windows with a nice view of the cliffs several miles away. Light trickled in through the shades, kissing Max's face with warmth she hadn't felt for quite some time. The sun. She'd missed it.

"I mean, they're the government," he continued. "Don't they always lie?"

"Not always," Ella was quick to defend between bites of her poppy seed muffin. Iggy was sucking on a juice box. "But, admittedly," she said, "they do hide a lot from the public. There's a lot of stuff that mobs with pitchforks and silver bullets wouldn't be that great at handling, you know?"

Iggy laughed sarcastically. "Yeah, like how there's an underground lab creating all kinds of unsafe hybrid children. Keep it on the DL – wouldn't want the American people to know what evil is!"

Fang smiles almost undetectably. "'Mr. President, sir, can you explain how Google Maps didn't pick this up?'"

" 'Oh my God, is that a flying dog?'"

El and Max exchanged looks of annoyance.

Max noticed how Ella's eyes quickly went from her flock leader to the still unconscious wolf-boy lying motionlessly on the color-neutral hospital bed. He looked normal now, like a real human being. A surgeon had come in and offered to fix both his scoliosis and crooked legs once he woke up, but Max hadn't been too sure about it. They'd better ask him how he felt about it when he came to. Ella had certainly felt like it was a good idea.

"It would improve his quality of life," was all she had said on the matter.

While the boys continued making jokes about the police and whatnot, Max watched the face of the girl she'd grown to respect so much more in the last week that she'd ever had when they had still lived in the cabin. She was so grown up.

The girl bit her lip and shook her head sadly. Max had explained the drugs to them just awhile ago, and all but Fang seemed to feel considerably more open to the idea of keeping him their flock. She'd kept the part about the assult and the baby to herself, though. That was something she didn't think El and Iggy should know.

"I feel so bad for him," Ella said quietly. "He doesn't deserve any of this. He's just a little kid."

Max nodded, wishing she could just rip all of the tubes and needles and probes binding her to the metal bars of the bed she sat on so she could reach over and gather the girl who was so much like a younger sister to her in her arms. She wanted to hold Ari's spindly, human hand in hers like she could transfer her wellness to him simply by touch.

"That's right," she murmured, confirming what El had just said, and her eyes grazing the sleeping features of the boy she knew so little about. "It's not his fault."

With his eyes closed and him lying on his back, Marius Odil actually almost looked like he could have been normal. His brown hair with those hints of grey and black was still a little messy from when the nurses had to gently work out the dried blood that had clumped with a sponge. It looked so soft now that it was clean, and Max almost wished she could run her hand through it, just to see if it was. She had a shred of belief that that was how Ari was on the inside. Soft as wool, sensitive like an open heart, and capable of love like a little child. Wasn't that how all children were, really?

By this time, Iggy had picked up on the girl's conversation, and his face was trained in the general direction of the Eraser's head. Unlike the others, he couldn't see the normal appearance of the boy enough to know for sure that he was harmless now. He had been keeping his distance.

"When do you think he'll wake up?" he asked, but neither of the girls wanted to put a number on the days or hours until he would come about.

Fang, however, was still bitter. "Never," he said gruffly, perhaps without really meaning to. But it was unknown to Max why he would say such a thing, because she had no idea how her best friend really felt about her. Had she known, her reaction may have been a bit different.

And so her mouth dropped open. "What is with you?" she quipped. "Why do you keep talking about him like that? He's just as good as you are."

"No, he is not! He kidnapped you!" Fang retorted. "He raped you, and he almost killed me! Forgive me if I find those things hard to forget!"

In that moment of complete stupidity, Fang had forgotten that El and Iggy didn't know about anything that he did, so neither of them said anything while Max stared at Fang with eyes that he never thought would ever pardon those words.

"What did you say he did?" Iggy asked slowly, all humorous tones in his voice completely flushed and his head cocked slightly. He leant forward like he thought he might have heard wrong.

Sadly, there are few words that sound like the one Fang had just related.

"They weren't supposed to know–" Max started.

"I…I–"

"You're such a bitch, Fang," El said, sympathizing in what appeared to be denial. Iggy prepared to throw his shoe at the revelator.

This was all right as Anne Walker came into the room. She had knocked twice, but came in anyway, knowing that the four conscious kids could really do nothing to prevent her doing so. She was the FBI.

Iggy received a weird look.

"Would it be alright if I spoke with Max in private?" Anne sensed the tension in the room, which was so thick she could have cut it with a spork. Accordingly, she spoke slowly, like she was trying to make sure they didn't, like, lunge at her with concealed weapons they had somehow managed to smuggle inside undetected. "Is that okay with everyone?"

Max nodded dismissively at the others, but Fang stubbornly stayed put, for reasons that she knew were completely rational. However, she was so embarrassed in that moment that she wasn't exactly thinking rationally. She didn't look at him while Anne murmured a quiet thank you to the younger kids. But Fang came up to the bed anyhow and rested his palms on the metallic guard rails that Max couldn't seem to find a use for.

"I'm not leaving," he said, eyes trained on Anne in what was supposed to be a threatening manner. She didn't ask him again and continued while he set his jaw.

"Max, is it?"

The girl in the bed nodded. "Yeah."

"Okay, Max, my name is Anne Walker and I'm with the FBI."

"And that means you're supposed to be on my side?"

"You could say that."

"Am I supposed to feel safe now?"

She had a clipboard in her hands, but she didn't seem like she was consoling with it too much, and Fang had to wonder if she had only brought it as a prop to give her something to do with her hands. To him, Anne seemed like the type that always had to be busy. He had observed her hair hadn't been washed in the past few days, and her nails looked like she may have been biting them, perhaps because of stress. The bags under her eyes certainly confirmed sleeplessness.

Maybe she'd be easy to crack and maneuver.

Anne hadn't answered the question, and instead changed the subject. "Have you been informed as to what will be happening to you five once you are discharged from the hospital?"

Her blue eyes seemed genuinely kind, but Max had been wrong before.

"Not really," Max cast an annoyed glance at Fang. "He doesn't seem to have been giving people the right information for quite some time."

That hurt, and Anne saw that right away. Gently, she continued on, "I've offered to have the five of you come and stay with me while you and Ari recover from your injuries."

"We don't need any help," Max tersely responded.

"Well, the last six days, you have," Anne laughed once. "Don't you think it would be good for all of you to, I don't know, have a shot at a normal life? Go to school, make friends, attend college? You can't just live on your own your whole life."

This was playing with Max's head, Fang knew. She was asking all of the right questions that would trip her up and make the mothering side of her think twice about how she could provide for everyone.

"That would be nice," Max answered, "but I don't think that kind of life is possible for us. For one thing, we've never been to a school, and Fang has a history of beating people up. It can get out of hand."

He shrugged apologetically.

"Well, unfortunately, Max," Anne started, "as a member of the FBI and an employee of the government, I could be fired from my job if I let you and the others walk out that door unsupervised. You know, it is the law to go to school, and it's the law that you five be cared for."

"Anne," Max looked up at her with a stubborn look on her beautiful, flawless face. "Do we look like a gang that would really be in line with the law?"

The woman ignored her like she was a child making ridiculous excuses, which, however subtle, belittled Max into a fury. "I'm afraid it's either you come with me, or the five of you will be distributed out into the foster system and you may never see one another again."

Fang looked at Max, and she caught his eye, disregarding what he had disclosed earlier, and momentarily forgetting the anger she was holding against him. He could tell by her expression she was thinking about how she didn't want to lose him, that she didn't want to be taken away from the others. Fang had to respect that, and they both understood that this time, they couldn't run from their problems. This time, they really had no choice.

Max crossed her arms, her lips set in that manner she had which meant she was thinking hard about something. "How soon do I get out of here?" she asked absently, her eyes looking out the window towards the cliffs on the wall next to her. If they tore out of here now, they could probably find a nice cave to crash in.

Anne smiled a little. "I think, given your regeneration speed, you could even be out of here within the next few days. Maybe even tomorrow. I don't live far from here."

The girl in the bed nodded towards Ari, still out cold with the monitor beeping repetitively. "And him?"

Of course it comes down to him, Fang thought bitterly.

The agent let out a huff of air. "He may need to stay here a bit longer. He's in more critical condition than any of your were. They're not sure he's going to wake up at all."

Fang almost laughed. "He will," he said, looking down at Max. "He's one of them. He'll pull through."

She nodded, like she was agreeing to disagree with Fang on all matters concerning Marius. But she couldn't deny that one piece of information: Erasers were very hard to kill.

"Fang's right," she told Anne, "He'll wake up. But I think we should all wait here until that happens. I don't know what he'd do if he woke up somewhere strange like this."

"What would he do?" she asked.

"Maul your face off?" Fang offered, dodging a backhanded slap from Max. "Eat one of the male nurses?"

He was playing with Max like he would do whenever she was pissed off about something. It was like he had to make fun of her, and there was nothing he could do about it. But she didn't think it was funny.

"Fang, can you please leave?" she asked.

Pain flickered in his expression, mostly because his plan to soften her with humor didn't work this time, and partially because she had never dismissed him like that. Like he was just a member of the flock. As soon as he was gone, he heard nothing more about the matter for several minutes before Anne left again, and he was allowed to return.

Taking a long look at the creature in the bed next to the girl he loved, his eyes finally rested upon her while he laid his dignity out before the both of them.

"I'm sorry," Fang said, keeping his eyes low. "I won't say anything more, just…could you understand for me?"

Her eyes had again filled with tears, which pulled at his heart in ways he couldn't explain. Going back to the Institute had done something to her – 'cause she never cried in front of anyone. She was nodding, eyes shining, not looking at him. He thought he saw her chin tremble.

So he did what he felt was best. He touched her cheek with his hand and kissed her forehead. "We'll figure this all out," he promised quietly. "Don't worry. What did Anne say?"

Max swallowed with difficulty and composed herself, the way that she was always able to in nearly any circumstance. Lou had taught them to drown their feelings with rational thinking and deep breaths. Emotions didn't help anyone, he said sometimes, in most situations – something Fang had taken to heart quite literally. Sometimes, it was like he didn't feel anything at all, and she wondered where his soul had escaped to.

He had taken a seat next to her in a red cushioned chair, his elbows rested on his knobby knees and his hands supporting his chin. Someone had given them clothes to wear that weren't completely covered in dried blood, so he had on a grey jacket that said "AE" on the front in white letters, and zipped down the middle. The pants were a little baggy because he was so stick skinny, which allowed his boxers to show slightly whenever he stood up. They were new ones too, she couldn't help but notice.

The gown she was wearing wasn't much better than the one she'd been required to adorn at the lab, but it was made of noticeably softer and was covered with little yellow and pale pink flowers. She breathed a sigh and decided to answer his question after a few seconds of trying to reach a glass of water that had been set on the bedside table. Fang smiled a little and the corners of his eyes crinkled while he picked it up for her, bringing it up to her lips so she could get a sip without the hindrance of the numerous wires attached to her.

"Well," she began when he set it back down, "We're leaving. Tomorrow."

"So you agreed to it?"

"I didn't really have a choice, did I?"

He smirked. "We could go find an island somewhere. Drop off the radar. Live like the Swiss Family Robinson."

"Do you want to live in a tree?"

"It's better than going to school."

She leaned back into her bed and put her hands over her eyes and groaned. "Don't remind me."

In the hallway, there was more confusion in addition to that which the two leaders were dealing with. For example, Iggy had been missing for a total of twenty minutes when he said he was just going to the bathroom. Ella deduced that could mean one of two things: either he had been kidnapped, or he was doing something really, really stupid.

If he was doing something really stupid, he would get in trouble.

If he got in trouble, Max would hear of it.

And if Max heard of it, she would get her ass kicked for not kicking his ass before he could accomplish such a unintelligent achievement.

He was probably in someone's room dancing around with rubber gloves on his feet and three popsicle sticks hanging out of his mouth. The mental picture caused her to panic just that little bit more, and she seriously considered getting Fang to help her when she heard a loud metallic crash around the corner and down the stairs followed with a string of colorful swear words.

El crept to a hidden place where she could check it out and saw something she would have never been able to expect in a million years, even if she had spent the rest of her life conjoined to the hip with the red-headed blind boy. Iggy was sprawled on the stairwell with a bedpan on his head, a couple of mis-matched brooms, a tin foil ball, and one of those rubber devices one uses to suck the mucus out of baby's nostrils with.

"What the hell are you doing?" she whisper/yelled. "Are you trying to get us kicked out?"

Iggy scowled in her general direction and picked himself up. "No," he defended like a three year old. "Quidditch. We're playing Quidditch."

He bent over and picked up the two semi-round objects, holding them up for emphasis, and she had to restrain herself from bursting out laughing by clapping her hand over her mouth. She giggled.

"What?" he demanded, "I'm getting antsy! I've always had this problem."

She looked at him like he was absolutely crazy, and Iggy composed himself, throwing her a janitor's broom. For a split second, she worried they might get in trouble with the hospital staff, and subsequently be thrown out onto the streets...and then she decided she didn't care.

"Oh, what the crap," she said, shrugging. "I'm in."

"Awesome," he winked, putting the broom between his legs. He dashed up the stairs like he was making off on an imaginary horse, and Ella followed behind him, not really knowing what he planned on doing.

He whooped, not a care in the world.

"Harrahpattah!"

Fin! I made it longer to make up for the sadness of the last chapter, and there was some nice Iggy/Ella fluff, which was nice :) Sorry if you're not into Harry Potter, because that last part wouldn't make very much sense if you aren't, haha. To those of you who are: HARRAHPATTAHHARRAHPATTAH.

Anyone notice the cool cover artwork? I sort of had a creative explosion the other night and made some for each of my stories. It was intense, let me tell you.

Please review! Make my long hours writing worthwhile :) I'm grateful for each and every one, and I can't thank you all enough for all the support. I honestly don't know what I'd do without you all :)

HAPPY 4TH! God Bless America!

~Steph