First stop: the Twilight Inn. I checked it out carefully, but it seemed clear. The Echo was still in the parking lot. No one was in the room, however, though all of our stuff was still there. Was the flock out looking for me?
I wolfed down some food, then packed all of our stuff as fast as I could. I grabbed everything and took off, running twenty feet in the parking lot and leaping into the air, wings wide and gathering wind.
I kept up a constant surveillance, watching for flying Erasers, but saw nothing. The backpacks weighed me down too much - I needed to ditch them and have my hands free.
I hid our stuff at the top of a pine tree. Next stop: back to where I'd just busted out from. The more I felt like myself, the more myself felt like a murderous, enraged maniac. I tore through the night sky, rage rolling off me like steam. My whole life, the whitecoats had done countless heinous, inhuman, unforgivable things to me, to all of us. They had kidnapped Angel. But now they'd really crossed the line.
They had put me in a freaking tank!
I was amazed I was still coherent at all, could fly at all. I stayed out of sight, under the tree canopy, zipping through and among and between the pine trees.
When I shot out of the woods, I did a fast, fast circle around the whole compound, seven huge buildings. I backtracked my path, looking for a telltale broken window. And I found it. I'd just needed the confirmation that I'd really been held here, that this company was behind it. That Jeb was associated with Itex.
Now to find the flock.
Racing back to the woods, I screamed to a halt at the dark edge of the trees. I dropped lightly to the ground, shaking out my wings. I felt okay. Like I'd had the flu but was better now. My hands clenched and unclenched at my sides. I was eager for Erasers to show up. I was ready to rip something apart.
I pulled in my wings and sneaked through the shadows toward the main building.
I kept low to the ground, my eyes on the lighted windows of the building. Something hanging brushed my head, and I swiped at it absently. My hand touched something smooth and cool - and alive.
Stifling a gasp, I yanked my hand back, only to feel the something drop down on me with a thud. A snake!
I almost shrieked, but let out a horrified squeak instead.
Then there were snakes everywhere. Six- and seven-foot black snakes were dropping down on me, climbing my legs, winding around me, flicking me with their tongues. I was flinging them off me, doing a freaked-out dance, whirling, trying to shake them off. But they just kept coming.
I was about to completely lose it. If there was one thing I hated worse than small dark spaces, it was lousy snakes! "Oh God, oh God, oh God," I panted, ripping snakes off me. I felt hysteria rising and knew I was gonna blow.
Hunching down, I gathered my muscles and sprang straight up into the air. I whooshed my wings out as hard as I could, shaking and shuddering as I felt snakes slithering all over them. Oh God, help, help, help! In the air I shifted gears and went into hypersonic mode. The snakes began to peel away from me, dropping off and falling into the darkness below. I was trembling so hard I could barely fly, and I finally kicked off the last of them.
Snakes! Horrible snakes! Where had they come from? I hated, hated, hated snakes.
You 're afraid of them, said my Voice, as cool and unruffled as always.
No freaking duh! I screamed inside my head.
Fear is your weakness. You must conquer all your weaknesses.
I was so horrified and furious that I thought I was gonna barf. Had that been another test? Had it all been in my imagination? My stomach was roiling, and adrenaline sang in my blood. My head was going to explode.
The flock. Have to get the flock.
Good, Max. Keep your eyes on the prize.
"Screw you, Voice." I put my shoulders back, set my jaw, and did a 180, back to Itex.
Excellent, Max. Sometimes you amaze me.
(Max II)
How did this blind guy Iggy know someone was coming? He was like a bat! Maybe he had some bat DNA -
Crash!
Ari burst through the computer room doors.
"Scatter!" Fang yelled, launching himself at canine boy. What's this bonehead doing here? I thought. I'd been expecting Itex's expert termination team, not any of those half-assed wolves. Where were they? I looked at the clock, then decided to watch the two male mutants tear each other up on the floor.
That is, until I heard Gasman shriek, "Spiders!" An enormous swarm of spiders poured under the doors, a black carpet of crawly legs moving toward him like lava.
Ari suddenly broke free from Fang to explore other mealtime options. "Here!" I said. I grabbed Angel's skinny arms and held her. She tried to push me toward the exit, but I braced my feet.
Grinning, Ari sprang forward and ripped a bite out of Angel's forearm. She gave an earsplitting scream, and I winced.
"Nooo!" Fang bellowed across the room, but a cage dropped down out of nowhere and covered him.
"Rats! Rats!" Nudge wailed, scrambling onto a counter. She jumped from counter to counter, heading toward the door, but wherever she went, a river of squeaking pink-tailed rats scurried after her. Several ran up her jeans, and finally she just stood there shrieking, covering her face with her hands.
By now all of them were screaming at the top of their lungs. It was total craziness. Each person here, except me, was living out his worst nightmare, facing his biggest fear - even the dog. It was under a counter, staring horror-stricken at a bowl of generic dog food.
Crater was punching back and forth with Ari. Neither of them going down at all. Let out your claws! You can kill him and you know it!
I was still holding Angel, who was struggling much harder than I thought she would. She kicked at both me and Ari, even though the huge gouge on her arm was running blood over my hands.
Crater tackled Ari away and an ear splitting roar came out of her as a huge furry face came out. There it is!
I couldn't help smiling, I looked over at Angel - she was a tough little mutant-Out of the corner of my eye I saw Fang staring at me in disbelief, hurling himself against the bars of his cage. "Guys, guys!" Fang shouted. His deeper voice cut through the high-pitched wailing. "This can't be real! It isn't real!"
You wish, freak, I thought.
(Max)
Get this: I could follow their scent. I didn't know if this was a newly enhanced skill or if they were just riper than usual, but I could actually follow where the flock had gone.
They'd gotten in through the air vents, and I tracked them, even reversing course a couple times, as they must have done. Finally I knew that they were near, and by concentrating, I picked up on whispered conversation. I found a ceiling vent that looked down into a computer room in the basement, kind of similar to the computer room at the Institute. As if there were an interior decorator who specialized in working with mad scientists.
I saw Fang! He was standing guard at the door. Angel was keeping Total quiet. I changed my angle and looked farther into the room. Nudge was at a computer, reading something. Her cheeks were streaked with tears, which made my heart tighten. Then - I saw her.
The other me.
"Max, Max, look at this," Nudge said, turning to her, and my blood ran cold.
I mean, she looked exactly like me, and as I watched, she flipped her hair back impatiently, the way I always did.
Fresh rage ignited in my chest, making it hard for me to breathe. They had actually made a backup Max and substituted her for me.
This was, like, a seventeen on a diabolical scale of one to ten.
I was going to kill the other Max. And what about my flock? How could they not know? How could she be that perfect a copy? But I swear, it was like watching a hologram of me, a video of me, interacting with Nudge.
I glanced around again - and saw Angel looking directly at me through the vent.
I pulled back immediately, not wanting her to give me away. Then I had a horrible thought: What if Angel thought I was the impostor? What if the fake Max had them snowed?
Oh God, I had to stop this now.
Grimly I started to undo the clips that held the ceiling vent in place. Then, below me, I spotted my favorite combat partner barreling toward the computer room. Ari. I would have to take care of him for good this time.
At the same time, I would have to take care of my ultimate enemy: me.
(Max II)
In the middle of the chaos and screaming, a crashing sound made our heads whip around. Unbelievably, the old Max, Maximum Ride, dropped through the ceiling vent into the room. Where had she come from? She was supposed to have been taken care of!
But here she was, and she looked sooo mad.
"My invite must have gotten lost in the mail," she said venomously. "But I don't mind crashing this party."
Crater smirked and broke Ari's nose. "'Bout time you got here, thought you were gonna miss all the fun."
In that instant, the rats, the spiders, and the cage disappeared. While everyone else blinked, looking around - giving new meaning to the word dumb - I cursed under my breath. A fine time for the big guys' latest super-top-secret holographic virtual-reality system to crash. This - along with the untimely arrival of my charming predecessor - was going to make my job a little more difficult.
"Max? " Ari asked, staring at the other Max.
"Max!" Nudge shouted.
"Yes," we both answered.
The other Max looked at me, and her eyes narrowed. "They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery," she said snidely. "So I guess you're really sucking up."
"Who are you?" I gasped, my eyes wide. "You're an impostor!"
"No, she isn't." The little creepy one, Angel, turned to look at me. Her arm was still bleeding where Ari had bitten it. "You are."
Crater nodded and she and Ari stopped passing blows. "Yep, sure is. Max don't smell like you do." Old Max gave here a look and Crater shrugged.
I swallowed my anger. Who did she think she was, her and her stupid dog? I gave a concerned smile. "But Angel," I said, sincerity dripping from my voice, "how can you say that? You know who I am."
"I think I'm Angel," she said. "And my dog isn't stupid. You're the stupid one, to think that you could fool us. I can read minds, you idiot."
My stomach dropped faster than a falling elevator. No one had told me that.
"Yeah, you idiot," said the dog.
I gaped at him. Had he just talked? Was this a trick?
Maximum Ride was checking out the mutants, one by one. They hugged her, and I glared at her. I couldn't believe she had shown up, ruining everything.
"Okay, let's solve your personality crisis," the other Max growled, turning to me. Her face was white, and her hands were clenched in fists.
"I was about to say the same thing," I growled back, getting ready to fight. "Keep your hands off my flock!"
"Oh good, you two have met each other."
We both whirled to see several scientists in white lab coats standing inside the doorway.
"Max, are you all right?" Jeb Batchelder asked.
I started to say yeah, but then saw he wasn't looking at me. It was the other Max he was concerned about, the other one he cared about. I was expendable.
Fury rose in me. I was exactly like Max, I was Max, I was better than she was in every way. But to everybody here, I was chopped liver. Nothing. Nobody.
But then I heard one of the other scientists step forward and say in a deep voice, "Take out the old version. She's no good. She's got an expiration date." He was looking at me to do the honors.
Without thinking, I launched myself at the other Max, right over a countertop, headfirst.
The other Max was braced, but I had insane jealousy and rage on my side. I managed to slam into her, knocking her against a wall. Instantly she regained her balance and squared off against me.
"You don't want to do this," she said in a low voice. "You don't want a piece of me."
"Wrong!" I said snidely.
"Uh, Max?" said Gasman. 'There's something you should-"
"Shut up!" I snapped at him, and threw myself at Maximum Ride again. The scientists and Jeb eased out of the way as we got deadlocks on each other and rolled across the counters. She managed to pull a fist back and punch me in the head, making me cry out.
I kneed her in the stomach and heard a satisfying oof!
We were evenly matched - too evenly matched. We attacked in a flurry, with fists flying and roundhouse kicks and bruising connections. But then we retreated, circling each other warily.
"There can be only one Max," Jeb said softly.
"Yeah, the real one," I heard Ari say.
The scientist with a deep voice folded his arms across his chest. "Let's see if what you say about her is true, Batchelder."
I yelled and lunged for Max again, knocking her down. She held me by my hair and head-butted me so hard I saw stars, but I didn't let go. I whaled into her side with my fist, once, twice, three times. The third time, I swore I heard a rib crack. It felt sooo good.
"Which one survives is up to you," Jeb said. "May the strongest Max win."
"Shut up, jerk!" Maximum Ride barked at him, just as I was about to say the exact same thing. She and I jumped up, looked at each other. It was like looking in a mirror. So weird.
But she had to go. There was one Max too many. With another roar I sprang forward, snapping out a side kick that sent her to the ground again. I dropped down onto her, sitting on her stomach, and punched her right in the nose. She winced, her head whipped to the side, and then blood spurted out her nose.
"You think you're so great," I hissed. She struggled underneath me, but I clamped her arms at her sides with my knees and reached for her throat.
This was going to end only one way: with me on top. I was built to survive. This was my destiny - to be able to outdo anything weaker that came before me. That was all I cared about. Max was weak because she cared about everything else - her stupid flock, their stupid parents, the way Jeb had betrayed her, everything other than what she should care about.
I chuckled aloud, thinking how pathetic she was. I was ready to squash her.
But suddenly she arched her back, snarling, throwing me off hard. On her feet again, she kicked my chin, cracking my head back with so much force I almost blacked out. Then she was straddling me, like I had done to her a moment ago. She grabbed my throat with both hands and started squeezing. With blood running from her nose, she looked murderous, unstoppable. One of her eyes was swollen shut, but she still had a choke hold on me. I grabbed her arms, trying to pull them away, but couldn't budge her.
"Max?" I heard Gasman say again. We both ignored him. "Kind of important…"
Oh, my God, I thought, struggling, vaguely surprised. She's going to win. It had never, ever occurred to me that she could. In every scenario I'd ever run through, every training exercise, I had always won. But amazingly, I was getting tunnel vision, and my world was going dark. I tried to buck her off with all my strength, but she was stronger than I was.
"There can be only one Max," I dimly heard Jeb say. It came from a distance, floating over my head.
This . . . is. . . it, I thought hazily. This . . . is. . . the . . . end.
Suddenly the pressure around my neck released.
With a huge, sucking rush, air poured into my lungs. Light filled my eyes, and I was gasping, wheezing, gulping in air.
The old Max got off me. I coughed, my hand to my throat. I was struggling just to sit up.
"I'm stronger," she yelled to the scientists. "Stronger than you. Because I'm not going to kill this girl for you. I won't sink to your pathetic level."
"Max," said Jeb, sounding surprised. "There can't be two Maxes."
(Max)
I looked down at the fake Max, who was sucking in air like a fish on the ground. I'd seen her pupils go to pinpoints, knew just how close I'd come to finishing her. But this rat was leaping out of the maze right now.
"Then you shouldn't have made two of us," I said coldly. "Now it's your problem."
"You don't understand," one of the scientists said. "Only one of you can fulfill your mission, your destiny."
He sounded idiotic and pompous. Keeping my eyes on the fake Max, I circled back to where the flock was gathered, getting ready for fight or flight.
"You know," I told the whitecoat, "it sounds like you guys didn't really think this all the way through. You plugged us into an equation and predicted outcomes. Well, I got news for you, nimrod." I looked up at the group of scientists, at Jeb, at Ari. I was still totally hyped up on adrenaline, my nose was still bleeding, and I felt like kicking more butt. "In this equation of yours, we're variables. We're going to vary." I was practically spitting my words at them. "What you sick jerks don't seem to get is that I'm an actual person." I pointed to the other Max, who was on her hands and knees, trying to get up. "She's real too. She's a person. All of us are! And I'm done jumping through your hoops. You can tell yourselves that you're doing all this to save the world, but really you're just a bunch of psycho puppet-masters who probably didn't date enough in high school."
I stalked around, really worked up. Sweat ran down my forehead and stung my cheek where it was split-Out of nowhere, an alarm sounded. Next we heard shouting, and thundering footsteps.
Jeb and the other whitecoats looked at one another. I couldn't piece everything together right now. Were they part of Itex or not?
"Max?" said the Gasman again.
"We've got to get out of here," I said urgently, looking for a possible escape route. Then I remembered: We were underground. Oh, jeez. Now things were going to get sticky.
Jeb and the other whitecoats edged closer to the Erasers. The fake Max looked lost, uncertain whose side to be on. I almost felt sorry for her.
"Max, really -"
"What?" I snapped, wheeling to look at Gazzy. "We're up the creek, if you haven't noticed! What's so important?"
His big blue eyes, so like Angel's, looked at me earnestly. "Duck."
Within a millisecond, I had dropped to the floor. I rolled under a counter and covered my head with my hands. When some eight-year-olds said "duck," you might be facing a stream from a water pistol. When Gazzy said "duck," you prepared for all hell to break loose, and really freaking fast, man.
BOOM!
My eardrums practically ruptured from the force of the blast. Instantly my mouth was covered with dust, carpet fibers, and something wet 1 didn't want to identify. I got knocked about four feet, still curled in a ball, and then something collapsed on me, knocking my breath out. Aftershocks and a much smaller boom made me curl tighter, but as soon as the explosions seemed to be over I straightened my back, grunting with the effort of pushing away debris.
"Report!" I yelled, inhaling dust and coughing hysterically. Big chunks of desk or ceiling fell off me. If I didn't have some broken bones, it would be a miracle. I felt like I'd been hit by a tractor trailer, maybe a couple of them.
Clumsily, still coughing, I scrambled to my feet. "Report!" I yelled again frantically.
The room was full of billowing dust and fibers wafting everywhere. Red emergency lights were on, casting the whole scene in a horrible, bloody glare.
No one had answered me yet. I yelled even louder: "Report!"
I began to pick my way through the rubble. A sweeping glance told me that several whitecoats had been standing in the wrong place at the wrong time - they were lying crumpled and unconscious on the floor. I couldn't see Ari anywhere, but I did see a couple pairs of feet sticking out from beneath piles of debris. No feet I recognized.
Across the room Jeb was slowly getting up - gray with dust, blood running down his chin.
"Here!" said Angel, and I felt the first spark of relief.
"Here," croaked Nudge, and started coughing. I saw her crawl out from beneath a shattered desk.
"Here." Total's voice came from behind an overturned chair. I kicked it out of the way and saw that Total had turned completely gray, except for his eyes. "And I'm not happy about it, let me tell you," he added grumpily.
"Here," came Fang's quiet, calm voice, as he picked himself out of a Fang-shaped hole in the opposite wall. Ooh, I bet that hurt.
"That was so awesome!" Gazzy yelled, leaping to his feet. Bits of broken countertop and wall fell off him.
"I give it a solid ten," said Iggy, rolling out from under what used to be a desk. "Just for sonic blast alone." I smile and the freeze up, I looked over at Fang and we realized the same thing. Crater didn't answer.
"Crater!" I called out but there was no answer, Fang started to move debris around quickly shouting her name. The other started to do the same until we stayed quiet.
It had been eerily quiet for a minute, but now voices started up in the hallway outside. Again we began hearing shouted orders, the clanking of weapons, running feet. Though the feet sounded less steady. I heard groaning from beneath rubble. I rushed to it thinking it was Crater but I realized it wasn't her voice. Nudge gasped and put her hand over her mouth when we realized what might have happened to our favorite Eraser.
A quick survey showed me my flock as missing a piece and silent but ready to move. It also showed …
… a huge hole in the basement wall, big enough to drive a truck through, leading right outside into the night.
"Oh," was all Nudge said.
I was starting to feel close to tears. I was happy my flock came through but we were missing someone very important. Our lives were one gnarly sitch after another. Again and again they tried to defeat us, and again and again we showed them what we were made of. I was so proud, and so mad, and suddenly so tired, and now that I thought about it, really sore all over.
"You got that right," I said, already hurrying toward the hole and get out of here. When I was next to Gazzy, I held up my hand. "Way to be," I said, slapping him a high five. Gazzy gave me a small smile but he didn't look so happy about it anymore.
"Max?" Angel said. She looked like she'd been dipped in gray flour.
"Yeah, sweetie?"
"Are we leaving now?"
"Oh, yeah," I said. "We're gonna -"
"Blow this joint!" the flock yelled with me with all their might a few tears escaped them and a small sob did too.
"Total!" I clapped and held out my arms. The small dog ran and leaped into them. He stuck out his tongue to lick me happily, saw my face, and thought better of it.
Then the seven of us raced for the hole and did an up-and-away that looked like poetry. I looked behind me to see Fang was keeping his head low and his face aimed away. We flew quickly but...there was just something that felt so wrong about leaving and not staying.
EPILOGUE
Needless to say, there was dead silence when we grabbed our stuff with an extra bag one of us had to carry. Fang and I reached for it but I let Fang take it. She was his cousin. We shared stories about what happed, hurts examined, and gotten mad all over again with more tears.
We flew south until sunrise. Then we dropped down into the Everglades and found a patch of dryish land to sleep on. We felt exhausted and wrung out and there was an ache everyone was feeling but wasn't saying. We won but at a cost.
Iggy, the younger kids, and Total crashed immediately. They curled up together like puppies, filthy and ragged, and I was so happy to have them all in one piece that tears leaked out of my eyes and ran down my bruised cheeks as I thought about Crater. There was like this huge gaping hole in me I couldn't explain.
Fang sat next to me, and we split one of our last warm Cokes.
"Breakfast of champions," he said, raising the can in the air, making a silent toast.
"Did you see what happened to the other Max?" I asked him, trying to change the subject and the looming loss.
"No, actually I didn't," he said. "But maybe she escaped."
I drank the warm soda, feeling it run down my parched throat. Never would be too soon to see the other Max again. But I couldn't make myself destroy her. Killing the fake Max would be like killing the Eraser Max who looked back at me from the mirror sometimes. Besides - it would just be wrong.
I was exhausted, beyond exhausted, but the last time I'd gone to sleep, I'd woken up with my mouth duct-taped shut and then gotten put in an isolation tank. So I didn't want to close my eyes anytime soon.
The tank. I shuddered just thinking about it.
"Was it bad?" Fang asked quietly, not looking at me.
"Yep," I said, not looking at him, and took another swig of Coke.
The sun was higher, the air heavy and warm and growing warmer. It was December. We'd been on the run for what felt like forever. I didn't know how much longer I could do it. I was ragged out, and between the tank and the Voice, and losing Crater, I felt like I was losing my mind. I still wasn't sure how the Erasers were tracking us. I remembered Angel campaigning to be leader and didn't know what to think.
"Did you know that wasn't me, the other Max?" I asked.
"Yeah."
"When?"
"Right away."
"How?" I persisted. "We look identical. She even had identical scars and scratches. She was wearing my clothes. How could you tell us apart?"
He turned to me and grinned, making my world brighter. "She offered to cook breakfast."
A second later we were laughing so hard it brought tears to my eyes all over again. Fang and I leaned against each other and laughed and laughed, unable to speak, for the longest time. I started to feel the ache again and I pulled away from Fang when I heard the thumping of feet behind us. I jumped up along with Fang, the others just starting to wake up. We turned around and I ran forward. Crater let out a winded 'oof' as I held her.
Crater chuckled and I didn't realize how much I missed her voice.
"Heya everyone, what was so funny?" She asked in a tired and raspy voice.
"Crater!" Nudge yelled and soon we were dog pilling on her. She laughed and pushed us off to breathe. I looked her up and down to make sure she was alright and she winked at me.
"Like my new look? I call it Debris a la Gazzy." She said gesturing to herself. Fang chuckled and we noticed two things right away. Her left wing looked off and her arm was in a sling she made out of her sweater.
"What happened?" I said before I could think.
"Well turns out takin' on armed men with a bad arm aint the smartest of ideas."