Chapter Twenty-Eight: Blabber Mouth

I was standing directly in the morning sunlight, so that's probably why he got confused, but as soon as I felt my feet hit the ground, I heard a startled voice call out, "Max..."

My voice got lost in my throat like a Twix bar when you just need a moment, only I needed about ten Twix bars because I had no idea what to say. Apparently, neither did my father. We stood in awkward silence for a minute or two before he cleared his throat; I guess he had just eaten a Twix too.

"Oh, sorry, Lexi..." Fang said nervously at long last, running his hand through his dark black hair and refusing to meet my eyes, "I...I thought you were someone else."

"Tell me about her." I said desperately, not even remembering telling my brain to say the words out loud. But they were out there now and I had to know now. "Tell me about Max."

He flinched when I said her name, as if it were a curse word or like lime squirted on a wound that hadn't been healed. He looked away, a far off look in his eyes, and I almost thought that he was ignoring my request but when he looked back at me, he seemed to have made up his mind. He gestured towards the ground for us to sit on.

"This is a long story," he explained as I took the seat next to him. "It's not one that I've ever told, though Maggie knows bits and pieces...but there's just something about you that reminds me of Max..." He drifted off, leaving the sentence hung in the air like that.

I wanted to blurt out that I was his daughter and Max was my mom, but I knew that now wasn't the time. If I wanted to find out exactly what happened between them, I had to be patient.

"Anyways," he said, shaking off a memory in his head, "don't say I didn't warn you. This story doesn't have a happy beginning or a happy end, so brace yourself."

I nodded, not sure that I really wanted to know anymore, but dying of curiousity anyways.

"Maximum Ride, that's her name, by the way," Fang said, a small smile twitching his lips, "was created at the same School as I was. Not just us though, there were four others that made up our Flock, the original Flock. We were tested on, beaten, starved, and sometimes forced to kill other experiments for our survival-though you probably had similar experiences at your own School."

I didn't correct him, but he didn't seem to be talking to me anymore anyways. His thoughts were a million miles away as he continued the story.

"Max was the leader of our Flock, and she loved every minute of it. We destroyed our School when she and I were fourteen, and that was when I fell in love with her." Another small smile. "She wanted them to pay for what they'd done to us, her family, and she was just so beautiful doing it that I couldn't help but notice the change that had been occuring within her."

I would have thrown in a "eww, gross" because he was talking about my mom like that, but it was such a sweet story that his teenage boy memories couldn't ruin it.

"She didn't feel the same until we were fifteen, though I knew that I would wait for her forever so it didn't really matter that a year had passed." Fang said, "Our love was strong, though apparently not enough. She had a world to save and I was just along for the ride. She took off one day without a word to anyone and naturally I went off in search of her...only I got captured."

"By whom?" I asked, panic in my voice though he was clearly fine right now so nothing completely horrible could have happened.

"Itex, another form of the School. There are hundreds of branches of both around the world...but that's not really important." Fang said, sighing as he tried to get back on track. "Anyways, they erased my memory and trained me as one of their guards. Since I couldn't remember anything other than that life, I stayed and obeyed; but at night, I would dream of her..."

"Awww." I said before I had a chance to stop the reflex.

Fang looked embarrassed, though his olive skin didn't darken but slightly. "The problem was, I couldn't remember her. I couldn't remember Max."

"But you do now...?" I asked, though it was redundant since he was telling a story about their lives.

"I do, but only because of Maggie." Fang said, trying not to glare off into space as he thought about her. "I guess I should mention that Maggie's name when I first met her was Max II."

I raised an eyebrow, not following where this was going.

"Maggie is Maximum Ride's clone." He stated and suddenly it all made sense. She looked so much like the images I got from Brain about my mother, but I knew when I first met her that she wasn't Max. "She informed me that it had been fourteen years since I was abducted. Ben was eight at the time and a little uncontrollable due to his Eraser genes, but Maggie couldn't abandon him..."

"Did you go looking for her, Max I mean?" I asked, not willing to believe that my father would ever give up looking for my mother.

"I did." He said, an angry/sad expression on his face. "But her sister said she had passed away, along with one of my other Flock members. I didn't believe that it could be true until I saw the two graves in the yard...so Maggie and I struck out on our own, with Ben of course. That was two years ago. Kayla joined us seven months ago and we've been a group ever since."

I couldn't believe it. Ella had lied to my father? Why would she do that...unless she was protecting Max? I felt like I was going to get sick.

"She lied." I whispered, once again not being able to stop the words. "Ella lied, Max isn't dead." I whispered when Fang stared at me strangely.

"How did you know her name was Ella?" He asked, emotions strong on his face. "Maggie was right-you are here to destroy us." He grabbed me by the shoulders forcefully. "Who sent you?" He asked angrily and I tried not to break down.

"No one, Fang." I said, but that was the wrong word choice again.

"I told you my name was Alex." He said angrily, his dark eyes darkening the angrier he got. "I haven't been called Fang in a long time. I'm only going to ask one more time: Who sent you?"

"I did." I finally admitted, knowing that Angel was going to kill me.

"Why? You obviously know my past, so why did you come if not to spy on us?" He asked, still angry but less tense now.

I took a deep breath, knowing I would probably need it, and said my next words as nonchalant as I could. "I figured that my dad might like to meet me since he didn't even know I existed until now..."


AN: Sorry for another cliffhanger, but the next chapter needs to start here so Lexi can tell her story now that Fang's told his.