For the record, not entirely my fault that this was late. My editor took forever to edit this chapter, I sent it to her over a week ago. So don't get all mad at me.

Changing the tone, this chapter is pretty long… so yup. Enjoy!

Chapter 20: Good Times Don't Last Forever

The 7 of us were defiantly an odd sight; 4 clumsy birds wearing shoes and clothes, and an even bigger misshapen bird (Max and I), and a mini flaming meteorite whizzing past the weird crowd and doing loop-de-loops.

"Show-off," Max muttered in my arms.

"Tell me about it." I muttered. No offense to Max, but she was starting to get heavy, and my wings had to work twice as hard to keep us in the air. We were almost to the lake, and I slowly started ascending. It's always hard to land when you're carrying someone, and was extremely easy to do an impressive looking face plant, and land on your passenger.

Max and I were first to land. I came down as slow as possible, and once my feet touched the ground I began running as fast as I could. This was another good use to my fast speed. I managed to stop without tripping or landing on Max; so I guess it was a success. I set Max down gently, and she took a step back. "And you thought I wouldn't be able to carry you that whole way." I mocked.

"Yeah, yeah. Good job, I'm very impressed muscle man." Max said sarcastically. Me and Max sat down near the edge of the lake in the sun, leaning up against a rock. Gazzy dropped his shirt from 10 feet off the ground, and swooped back up, making a 20 foot cannon ball into the water, cackling like a maniac.

I gave him a thumbs-up when he resurfaced, still laughing insanely, coughing up water, trying not to drown. "Close your mouth next time, genius." I called out to him. The flock wasn't in the water yet; Iggy was pulling off his shirt, and making his way slowly towards the water, trying not to trip over something. Quite frankly, Iggy was a stick with abs, and he really hadn't changed much since he was 14.

Finally the entire flock was in their swim suits, the girls both wearing bikinis which frankly looked uncomfortably tight for their wing's sake. I'll never understand why girls put themselves through agony just to look "hot" or whatever. Sure, us guys worked out until we practically threw up, but there's a difference. On a random note: If Angel and Nudge are in bikinis, then Max must be…

"Stop drooling muscle man." Max laughed. "Aren't they a little young for you?"

I scowled at her, and again noticed that the strap around her neck must be one to a bikini (not that I would know); Max must have not been too pleased about that one.

"Are you wearing a bikini??" I asked her.

"Yes…" She answered slowly. "Why?"

I shook my head, and looked back out to the water and the kids playing. Iggy and Gazzy were fighting each other in the air; Iggy appeared to be winning. But I wasn't really paying attention to the boys fighting, all I could really think about was Max in that bikini.

"I swear, I don't think either of them are going to grow up." Max sighed, and leaned up against the rock.

"Huh… oh, yeah; I highly doubt it." I said, playing along with whatever she was saying. I was just too tired today; last night had been another 8 sleepless hours without Max. Tomorrow night she finally was allowed to sleep in a normal bed, so I guess tomorrow would be a good night's sleep.

Xxx

Max's POV

It was nice how I was finally outside again after the whole incident; to see the sun shining, allowing it to warm my face. The kids laughed and splashed in the background, fooling around like old times.

Max!

What? Is this Jeb or the mysterious voice? Must you bother me today? I finally have a day outside.

It's Jeb, and why are you outside?! I told you to stay inside!!

You said today I could!

I said no such thing!

Sure you did! Remember the 'Yes, the Itex spies are hundreds of miles away from you. You're safe for today.' Thing!?

I didn't say that!

Yes you did, I remember very clearly!

When??

I don't know, maybe an hour ago?

That wasn't me. But that is beside the point, Itex Erasers are coming! Get you and your flock out of there!

What?? But you said…

Get out of there Max!

"Flock!" I yelled just loudly enough for them all to hear me. "Get out, NOW!"

"Max, what's going-"

"No time to explain, everyone out! We've got company." Angel, Nudge, and Iggy waded out of the water as fast as they could. Gazzy, who was in the air, flew over to me, and landed. Scorch came out from under the shade from the other side of the lake. They all gathered around, looking to me for instruction, even Fang. I had trained them to follow me no matter what, and it's times like this were their obedience came in handy.

"Into the trees." I commanded, we all ran as fast as we could into the shelter of the forest. We were all designed to be fast, so we made it there in a matter of seconds. I started whispering now, the erasers were too close for us to be noisy. "Flock, run to the safe house. We need to be quiet and ready."

Without waiting for any longer the flock took off running through the trees. Me and Fang were in the back, making sure to keep everyone in our sight. We ran near the river, knowing it would eventually take us to the safe house. I looked up and through the canopy of the trees, and what I saw horrified me. Erasers… at least 50 of them, flying over the mountains like some demon cloud, and gaining on us fast. I didn't know if they knew were we were, but I wasn't prepared to find out.

Max! Turn around. There is a bunch of erasers by the entrance of the safe house!

AGGGH!! Where are we supposed to go?!

Hide! Anywhere the flying erasers can't see you. You can out fly the erasers, so eventually you will need to get in the air.

AGGGH!!

"Flock, stop!" I hissed. Everyone stopped abruptly, almost smashing into each other. "Turn around, erasers by house." We all spun on our heel, and headed west, deeper into the forest.

We kept on running, and running, and running, to the point were we were starting to huff and puff. We ran past huge oak trees, stumbling over roots, past long grass and rocks. Eventually we reached a clearing, and when we looked up there were no erasers within view. That just made me more nervous.

We stopped for a quick second, deciding what to do. It was either up, and risking us getting seen too close to the crowd; or it was stay here, and getting attacked where we were vulnerable. I hated to leave the safe house, but it was time to go; we would come back sometime. I commanded the flock upwards, whispering to stay low. They nodded and Angel took off then Gazzy, Nudge, and Iggy. Scorch was just going to attract attention; it's hard to miss a flying fireball. Scorch nodded, and miraculously knew what I was thinking.

"Fly east until you hit a small town, I'll contact you guys." He hissed. With that, he ran back towards the safe house, closer to the erasers. He was going to distract them, he could defiantly out fly them. If one so stupidly touched him, they would draw a shocking conclusion that fire might not be something you want to touch, especially in midair.

Fang made a motion as if to pick me up, but I stepped away. This was an emergency, if I opened up my wound, so be it. I'll get over it. Fang sighed and pushed me forwards. "Go," He said. I obeyed, and took off with a running start, just clearing the top of the tall oak tree.

I turned back my head back, and saw no erasers in the air. They had just disappeared; I looked forwards and saw all 4 flock members flying safely away. Suddenly, my body just jolted for a second. I whipped my head forwards, looking for whatever happened; but I saw nothing. Slowly my wings became heavy, until I just couldn't move them. Crap…

I started spiraling towards the earth, I must have been 40 feet off the ground; a deadly drop. I vaguely heard Fang call out my name weakly, before he started falling too. I just couldn't comprehend all of the colors and noises, everything seemed so slow. Something furry smacked into me, catching me from the death spiral. I heard a cruel laugh, and everything just went dark.

Xxxxx

Something uncomfortable was jabbing at my hip. I realized it was my hand, so I moved to a more comfortable position on my side. I shivered and felt for my warm bedcovers; I found none by touch, so I opened my eyes, and a horrifying scene appeared. I was in a cage, a concrete one with a medium sized cot in one corner. I wasn't alone though, Fang was in with me, still out, but moving slightly. I stood up shakily, and peered out of the bars in a northern direction. In front there was nothing but brick wall, but I sensed there were cages next to us, their occupants silent.

I went over to Fang and shook him awake. "Wha?" he mumbled, his eyes opened slowly. He blinked, and looked around; again and again he blinked rapidly.

"What are you doing?" I asked.

"I… I can't see. Everything's all blurry." He said groggily.

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"I mean I can barely tell that you're standing in front of me. Everything is all misty and disoriented." He said, feeling around with his hands as if he were blind. "Don't worry Max, I'm sure it's just so I won't be able to escape with my shadow ability."

I felt bad for him; he couldn't even see where he was. I quietly described the room and as much surroundings as I could see. "By the way, how do they always know who you are and what your ability is?" Fang pulled up his shirt, and showed me a painful looking tattoo on his upper right leg; you know, were your bone connects with your hips. I had never seen it because it was just below his pants line. Fang always seemed to be against wearing shorts in public if he could help it; probably something about not wanting to look gay.

"Owe… Does it hurt?" I asked. I looked closer at it, it was a sort of cross between a pointy sort of star, and two circles, below it was written 'special' and Fang's experiment number.

"Not anymore," He said emotionless.

"I'm guessing we are back in the school or something?" he sounded bored.

"Yeah."

"I knew I would get caught sooner or later, it was only a matter of time." Fang said, leaning up against the wall. "And it'll only be a matter of time until we escape."

I had a very high doubt that we were going to escape soon. Something about this just felt different; maybe it was because I hadn't been in the school for over 9 years. I just settled with a single nod, and sat down on the cot. The weirdest thing about looking at Fang right now was that his eyes were unfocussed. They always seemed to be focused and alert on something. At the moment his eyes were of no use to him, so why should he focus on anything?

A door whooshed open somewhere out of my field of vision. I heard several echoing footsteps making their way towards us, muttering as they walked. There were several disgruntled noises coming from the cages next to us at the noise. Me and Fang exchanged glances, waiting to see where they would stop; or in Fang's case, listening. It was no surprise that they stopped in front of our cage, an eraser opening taking out a set of keys.

The whitecoats looked at us in interest, mumbling about 'the original Angel Experiment'. They examined us like zoo exhibits, (to them, we were) the erasers stepped into the cage, and made a grab towards me. Fang stepped in front, snarling at them. One of the erasers sniggered and cuffed him hard on the shoulder, and three of them grabbed him. "What's wrong birdie? You don't want me touching your girl?" The one that hit him sneered.

"Hey! Don't damage it." The leader whitecoat snapped.

Fang insteped on one eraser's foot, a look of satisfaction. This angered the eraser, and it punched him hard on the back, temporarily knocking the wind out of him. The eraser looked satisfied at Fang's gasping breath. "What, your man can't take a hit?" The eraser snidely asked me. I took a step forwards, but one eraser held me back, thrusting my arms behind me.

"Cut it out." The whitecoat snapped again. "Get the girl." One more eraser grabbed onto me, which frankly offended me.

"Oh, so because I'm a girl I only need two erasers to hold me back?" I asked snidely. The eraser cuffed my back half-heartedly. The whitecoat motioned for the erasers to bring us forward, so they shoved me in front of them, trudging along after the retreating whitecoats. Fang went in front of me, stumbling because:

1.) He couldn't see worth crap at the moment.

2.) The erasers were pushing him purposefully hard at random moments.

The erasers laughed each time Fang tripped, and broke into hysterics when he almost fell down, not able to pick himself up with his hands. Saying stuff like 'what's wrong birdie, can't see?" and 'having difficulty walking?' They roughly pulled him back up, practically dragging him. I didn't do anything to object, I knew it would just embarrass him.

"Stop fooling around with the bird, the more it's damaged the less it's worth." The head honcho finally demanded. We walked through empty white hallways, the acidic smells bringing back painful childhood memories.

My captors shoved me into a white room after the whitecoats, Fang was behind me. There was a mirror on one side of the room, and a few chairs and desks on the other. The whitecoats took their seats, 3 behind one desk. They pulled out some paper, and looked intently at the head whitecoat to begin. My captors shoved me in front of the mirror, and stood in front of the door, locking it. They pulled out a gun and made sure I saw it. Fang was pushed roughly towards me, and almost fell down; his erasers joined the others in front of the only exit. He straitened his shirt, sniggered at the erasers (the brown blobs) just to tick them off, and smiled creepily at the whitecoats (The white blobs.).

The whitecoats looked unsettled at Fang's expression, shifting in their seats uncomfortably; which is exactly what Fang wanted. The head whitecoat cleared his throat, and pulled out some notes. He stood on the podium about 5 yards away from us, and pulled out a little remote. On the side opposite to the entrance, there was a white screen, and a sort of projector that started up.

"You prepared a slide show?" I sniggered. The whitecoats just ignored me.

It showed pictures of us flying. And by pictures of us, I mean of me and Fang. They showed different angles, and zoomed in on our wings, capturing exactly how we flew and our wing movements.

"This is experiment 003456, also known as Max." The video started focusing on me and my fawn colored wings. It showed me unconscious in the school lying on the hospital bed. (By the way, wasn't creepy at all…) (Sarcasm. Note the sarcasm.) "She is roughly 24, actual birth date unknown." The tapes continued, showing me falling out of the sky. A black blur that was Fang came swooping down to catch me. "Wingspan: roughly 15 feet, we're doing actual measurement today." I sniggered at that, he would have a fun time trying to get me and Fang to cooperate with that one. "Height: unimportant." Lastly he showed me going into hyperdrive, until I was out of sight.

"This is experiment 003507, also known as…" The whitecoat peered closer to the paper, making sure what he was seeing was correct. "Fang." He showed pictures and videos of Fang catching me from the sky; rapid pictures of him sinking into the shadows. "Wingspan: roughly 15 feet." They showed Fang flying, his wings glinting purple from the sun, his hair whipping in the breeze; catching a glimpse at me, and quickly setting his gaze in front of him. They showed a picture of him flying away, a building blazing behind him. I was guessing it was the Itex building.

"Both experiments somewhat successful, except 003507 seems to be going corrupt." Fang smiled weirdly at the whitecoats again. They took a look at him, and exchanged glances with the head, looking uneasy again. "Too successful on 003507's part. Destroying 14 Itex plants single-handedly is not how powerful we aimed for it to be. However; we believe these mutants are mutating themselves. They have been getting powers that were never planned; we never even thought they were possible." He looked around at the crowd seriously, and the whitecoats looked at us, somehow differently then before.

"Today we're going to do a few measurements, and have a meeting afterwards." He shuffled through his notes, and looked over to us. "Nothing funny; 003507; we don't want to hurt you, but if we have to, we will." He warned Fang. Fang scowled at him, just daring for him to get closer. The erasers edged closer, ready to grab Fang if he decided to attack.

A whitecoat separated himself from the crowd, and said calmly "All we need is for you to put out your wings. No harm will be done to either of you if you cooperate; we have no intention to hurt either of you." That was a load of crap, why would they suddenly decide not to harm us? They never kept their promises. And to have them come up behind us, in our blind spot, 'measure' our relatively fragile wings, and have them do no harm to us; it seemed completely impossible. We weren't idiots.

And yet, I found myself slowly extending my right wing, focusing harshly on everyone's movements. Fang looked at me in shock, trying to find a way to put my wing back in without damaging it. (Harder then you think, our wings are not flexible; bend it a certain way and it breaks pretty easily.) The crowd of whitecoats came forward cautiously, making sure their hands were within our view. They motioned for the erasers to back off, and they did, staying a couple yards away.

Fang made a movement as if to step in front of me. Instead, he hesitated, staying close to me, and glaring at all of the whitecoats with a piercing gaze. He too extended his wing slowly, keeping his eyes on the erasers in back of them.

One whitecoat slowly pulled out a measuring tape, and made his way towards me. Fang's eyes focused sharply on him, watching his every move. I wasn't worried about the whitecoats; they couldn't do any damage to us. What I was worried about was the erasers, still too close for comfort. The whitecoat deliberately made slow movements while measuring my wings. "7 feet, 2 inches; wingspan of 14 feet, 4 inches," He said. He walked to my side, and I saw him admiring my wings.

I gave him a look, and he stopped, sheepishly backing away. I tucked my wing back into a comfortable position. It was now Fang's turn; he looked more paranoid than I did. A different whitecoat came up and measured his wing, "7 feet, 7 inches; wingspan of 15 feet, 2 inches." The whitecoats scribbled that down on their papers, and gawked at the size of Fang's wing. Fang scowled at them, and quickly drew his wing in, making the whitecoats jump.

"That's all we needed of them today; erasers, take them to room 4," The head whitecoat said, not looking up from his recently taken notes. Two erasers brought my hands behind my back, and started marching me towards the door. Three erasers grabbed onto Fang, wrenched his arms behind his back, and shoved him towards the door. I don't know why they hated Fang so much, it was almost like they were being nice to me, and making everything miserable for Fang.

They brought Fang and I down a long hallway and past a series of doors. They finally stopped in front of one, scanning a card in something that beeped. The door clicked open, and they led us down a shorter hallway with sets of other doors. They marched us up to a door that had a little black 4 above it. The erasers took a set of keys, and unlocked the deadbolt, punched in a quick code, then scanned another card. Finally the door opened, and the erasers pushed us in a dark room, shutting the door with a slam, We heard all of the locks click automatically, trapping us inside; leaving us in the pitch dark room.

After failed attempts to crash open the door, we gave up, and turned around. I felt around for a light switch, and flicked it on. I held back a gasp at what I saw. The room had a sort of white carpet (cheap carpet; but still!) and light blue walls. There was a table with two chairs, a couch in okay shape, a smallish TV on top of a bookshelf, and a desk with a swivel chair. "What the h-" Fang trailed off.

"Well, this is… new." I managed.

There were two other doors leading from this room. Fang walked past our little 'sitting room' and opened the door cautiously, as if it would explode in his face.

"It's… a bathroom… I think." Fang said, the slightest hint of puzzlement.

"Seriously?" I asked, going to check for myself. It was true, it was a bathroom. It was pretty nice, complete with a shower and shampoo.

Fang opened the other door. "bedroom." He muttered. I went over and saw what he was talking about. It had a simple king bed with blue sheets, and a bedside table. The room was spacious and by far the nicest out of all the rooms; not because it was fancy, but because it was warm and comforting. The walls were the same color as the ones in my room in the E shaped house; our heaven after the hell of the school. I looked over to Fang and saw him in thought too.

I snapped him out of his trance. "What is all this for?" I referred to the luxury of what should have been a cage.

"Either they're plain crazy, or they're sucking up. Bet you it's the second."

"Why would they want to suck up to us?" I asked.

"They want us to have them on our good side, so maybe we'll cooperate. I'm sure they're tired of trying to fight us." Fang explained.

He walked out of the room, and sat down on the couch. I joined him, sighing. All we could do now is wait. There was no windows and the walls were rock solid. They obviously had stopped underestimating us, and had gotten serious. Faintly I heard someone walk down the hallway outside.

Our deadbolt unlocked, and a tall whitecoat stepped in. He was clean-shaven, had black hair, and looked surprisingly muscular under the white coat. "Hello Max and Fang," he said in a cool smooth voice, which strangely made me feel overpowered. He closed the door, and took a few steps closer to us. Fang stiffened at my side, sizing him up. "I'm Doctor Charlie Batchelder. We're going to get to know each other very well in the next couple months."

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