A/N: Sorry about the long wait! I was in the world of no internet access. Well, they have internet, but I was without my computer. I was in Hawaii! And I was rereading MAX 'cause I'm doing a book report on it and I had to pay attention to literary crud and it was funny reading about how she saw Pearl Harbor as I passed Pearl Harbor. I dunno. Anyway…chapter 20! And thanks for all the reviews!!!- foreverandalwaysyours

It's not very often that I feel completely out of it. But when I woke up, I freaked. I was sure I remembered settling down in a nice, safe tree and sleeping- Fang keeping first watch. But that's sooo not where I woke up.

For one, I was in a bed, not a tree. Second, I was in a room with tan walls, a dresser, side table, closet and squishy white carpeting. Lastly I had a really, really sharp pain in my right side near my hip. I sat up, too fast, and felt my head spin (not literally, my dear readers- I may be part bird but I don't think its owl…maybe hawk or eagle…). I groaned. Where the heck was I?

"Max?"

Still too dizzy to move my head again, I replied with another groan. I felt the right side of my bed sink as someone sat next to me. A hand traced up my back and to my neck. I felt fingers gently entwining with my hair. I slowly turned my head to see who was next to me, almost cursing for my vulnerability of the moment.

"What's going on?" I asked Fang. My voice was oddly sore and hoarse to my surprise and it startled me. I also realized that my mouth was extremely dry and I felt drained and extremely hungry. But the thought of food just didn't agree with my stomach at the moment. What was wrong with me?

Fang's voice was soft and comforting. Just like it was when he'd talk Angel to sleep and rock her back and forth. Speaking of which, where was everyone else? My heart quickened to a state of panic as I scanned the room again. We were the only ones in here. I stood up and felt the squishy carpet between my toes. But what I also felt was a quick and unforgiving pain in my hip. I sat down again.

"We're at Dr. Lyons's house in San Francisco. Remember the chocolate festival? We were there last week."

I quickly searched my brain for the moment. Yeah…the chocolate soda (gross by the way- I don't suggest it). Then we fought off some Erasers. A week ago? Why couldn't I remember the past week? And what was with the Erasers? Weren't they retired? Ari was the last one and he died a while ago. Is the reason why my hip hurt because I was injured in battle?

"Fang?" I asked, rubbing my temples. His eyes met mine. "When we saw the Erasers…did I, like, get hurt?"

Fang pressed his lips together and shook his head. Now I was really confused. "You kind of…passed out in the air," he mentioned. I looked at him like he was crazy. It wasn't that crazy because I know I've done that before. But that was way back when, when I first started hearing the Voice and we had just left Colorado. "You didn't just pass out, though. You kind of…died…"

I sank a little in my seat and Fang scooted closer. "Okay," I said, trying to figure this whole thing out. "We went to San Francisco and fought off Erasers, I remember that. But…why did I pass out? It was the chocolate, wasn't it? Too much sugar? Overload? Did I like, OD on it? I needed protein? I probably just got too tired. But I didn't die. If I did then I'd be in bird kid heaven and there'd be, like, ice cream and an all you can eat buffet and pretty lights and…God? You don't look like God."

Fang chuckled. Then his face got all serious and gloomy. Kind of like the look he had on his face when we found that little girl passed out in the van. "Do you remember anything before that?"

I nodded. "Yeah…I remember getting mad at you, and getting mad at you again…and again… and that lady in the van and meeting Dr. Lyons and your mom-."

"Do you remember this?" Fang cut me off and pulled something out from his pocket. It was a little bottle with cream in it. The front said "Vanishing Cream". Ohhhhhhh…

"What's the date?" I asked, this close to almost understanding this mess.

"May 26th." The date on the back of my neck had been May 18th. It was my expiration date. I'd passed out that same day in San Francisco due to my expiration date. But how was I still here? I should be buried in a deep, dark hole with flowers and "I Love Max" cards and tears just like my half brother, Ari (minus the cards, of course). Why wasn't I?

Fang read my face like a book and went on to explain. "After you passed out we raced here and brought you to Dr. Lyons. He said that he'd been working on something to help reverse or stop the expiration date but he hadn't quite come up with too much yet. So he said it would be a good opportunity to see if what he thought up really worked. It didn't…kind of."

There was a knock on the door and it opened slightly, exposing a head belonging to the one and only Dr. Lyons. A.K.A.: the dude who saved my life. My mom followed in after him with a bright smile and a tray full of chocolate chip cookies. I was in heaven. Then Jeb entered the room. A girl can only dream…

My mom sat on the other side of me and Fang and I each took a cookie and wolfed them down and started on the rest of the tray. Meanwhile, Dr. Lyons started talking about what Fang had left out.

"I see you're up," he began. "You've been a heavy sleeper. I think it was from all of the Oxicodone and Valium-."

I almost gagged on my cookie. "Valium?!" Fang grinned and stretched his hands apart a little. If I had the energy, he'd be on the ground with a bloody nose and possibly one or more broken ribs. Boyfriend or not I still don't wanna remember that day. "Why was I heavily medicated?"

"You had surgery. When Fang and the others brought you up here, you weren't exactly in the best condition. I opened up your right side to find a place where there was quite a bit of blood flow and tissue, ignoring your heart because of how fragile it is. I worked on taking out blood and tissue samples and injecting a chemical into them to work as an antibiotic then injecting it back into your blood stream. You see, your expiration dates are nothing more than a disease that the scientists at Itex whipped up and evolved into your DNA to give you a certain life span. They created it when Angel was given to them because that's when they started to categorize you as 'failed experiments'. I also scraped off a part of your hip bone to use as a part of the next formula I'm working on."

"What's wrong with the antibiotic you injected in me all ready?"

My mom sighed and Dr. Lyons stiffened up a little. "It failed. It's only temporary. You're life span at this very moment is only about a month. I have until then to figure out how to create an antibiotic to clear up this disease. At the moment, what you have is deadlier than any disease known to man. And unlike some incurable diseases like AIDS or Multiple Sclerosis, there isn't really much any medicines can do to help make the disease dormant for a long period of time. So I have to work very quickly. That's why I have Jeb and your mother here and that's what I wanted to talk to you about. I was hoping you'd get here before the 18th but that didn't work as planned."

I shook my head. I only had a month? A lousy month? That's it? And if my guessing was dead on, Fang and Iggy didn't have too much longer either. Who knows how long? I didn't even know how these wackos determined the death date. This story was getting worse and worse as it went along. "So what triggers this disease to just suddenly kill you? What's with the dates? How does it know?"

Jeb stepped in. "I'm not exactly sure how they made it possible, which is a reason why it's so hard to cure. But we do know that the disease was designed to terminate you, human-avian-hybrids, on your 15th birthday."

Terminate? That's a pleasant word to use, way to be Jeb. "You know, most kids get, like, their driving permit or fancy jewelry or a nice dinner and concert tickets for their fifteenth birthday. What do I get? A lovely new tattoo on my neck and hip and a field trip to the Pearly Gates to have a picnic with my good friend St. Peter. Life's great, isn't it?"

Everyone in the room looked at me for a moment before turning back to whatever they were doing. My mom set the now empty tray of cookies on the bed and straightened out her apron, Dr. Lyons checked his PDA, Jeb was probably thinking up ways he could cheer me up (he will fail- I don't care what it is), and Fang was just sitting there being Fang and…blending in with the room…

I nudged him a little and he sat up. "Max?" I looked up. I saw someone poke their head into the room. It was Angel. I smiled at her and opened my arms a little. Her little curls bounced as she ran over and hugged me. I winced a little from impact on my hip but shrugged it off. Behind her came Iggy, Nudge, Ella and Gazzy.

"So when will this new treatment thingy be ready?" I asked. Everyone's gazes went up and met the face of the only one who could possibly save the six of us.

"It'll be ready in a week or so," he said. "Then it'll be ready to be tested."

I stood up and walked up to the doctor, ignoring the weird pain from having a part of my hip removed. "I'll be ready."

Dr. Lyons shook his head. "No, Max. You're still going to be too weak." I heard a cough come from someone in the room. I locked my eyes with the doctor's. "I was thinking about testing someone else."

I raised an eyebrow. "This vaccine…it could possibly kill or make one of us really sick…couldn't it?" Dr. Lyons nodded. "Then you're testing it on me."

"I was going to test it on Angel. She's young, strong and very, very powerful. She could recover quicker than any of you if she got-."

"No," I interrupted. I could hear Angel trying to send me thoughts. All I could make out was "I'm scared. I don't know. Don't make the decision now." Just bits and pieces of things. But when I heard "I'm scared", that made my mind up for me. "You're not touching her!" I shouted. "She's too little and too young and she's probably been through more crap than any of us here. You're not testing on her. You're testing on me."

"Max-."

"I said no," I replied, cutting off my mom. "I'm not going to risk the lives of anyone in my flock on an attempt to save our lives. I have the least amount of time to live out of anyone here and I'm the leader so I'm taking the vaccine."

"That's exactly why you shouldn't." I looked up, shocked to hear Fang's voice arguing against mine. Well, that wasn't that much of a surprise but I was irritated to hear him going against my will…again. I turned my body and faced him.

"What do you mean? I'm gonna die anyway so-."

"Max, you're not going to die. And besides, you're the one out of all of us who needs to live the most. You're the one who's supposed to save the world, remember? I'll take the vaccine."

Of course, now he's on board with the saving the world ship. I actually liked the deserted island routine he brought up better. Who switched us?

"You die when they die," I said, remembering what he told me not too long ago. I was supposed to die when they died but that didn't look possible from any angle so I wasn't risking anyone else's life.

"One of us has to take it," he said.

Fang and I were now face to face in an argument on who was going to die first. Jeez. "I'm taking it and that's final! None of you are going to die for this!" My outburst sent the room into a silence. My mom looked to the floor and everyone else looked towards me. Fang stared into my eyes and let out a breath. I felt warm air on my face and it made me shiver.

"Okay," he said, barely audible. "If that's really what you want…then I think that's what's best. You are the leader."

I was about to turn around and try to take a flight out of here when Fang grabbed my arm and leaned over, kissing me. I felt my breath leave me, just like any other time we'd kissed but this time I felt something else. I felt a drop of water fall onto my cheek and roll down my face. But I wasn't the one crying. Fang was.

After another brief moment, I stepped back and broke the kiss. I could feel stares of everyone else in the room fall on me and Fang and after our little scene, I don't blame them.

"Okay," I said, turning towards Dr. Lyons and Jeb. "I'm your victim."

A/N: I know the quote from book…was it 2?...wasn't exact but yeah. "You die when we die" "You die when they die"- it all works, right?