Author's Note: Howdy y'all! Here I am with my very first Maximum Ride fic! ...and i don't think that it's really gonna be much of a tragedy...more along the lines of Fang's thoughts throughout the story...i'm not really sure how long it'll b...but i love the books! ...oh, and i started this at max's first brain attack...there really wasn't much to go on before that. And plus...i think that the story really starts right there.

--grabs Fang from closet--

Lovie: You know you want to...

Fang: ...no...

Lovie: but you owe me!

Fang: for what?

Lovie: why, saving you from those awful whitecoats back there!

Fang: ...back where?

Lovie: --sighs-- never mind, I'll read it! --Ahem-- Loviegurlie (me) does not own any of the Maximum Ride characters. James Patterson does. Nor does she even really own what's going on...again, that's James Patterson's. If I did...well, the books wouldn't have been as good, but man, there'd be pairings out that wah-zoo! But alas, the only things I do own are my razor, my books (all 100+ of them!) and Fang's thoughts in this story (you know, the parts that you don't recognize!)

Fang: ...? save me...I beg of you.

Random Quote #1:

If men can control the world, why can't they stop wearing neckties? I mean, how good is it that they start the day by tying little nooses around their necks?

-Linda Ellerbee

Chapter one: The Brain Attacks

Fang's POV: (will be entire story! ...bare with me, i'm a girl writing in the form of a boy...i have no idea wtf runs thru the mind of a fourteen year old bird-boy.)

"Max!" Nudge yelled, causing me to look back sharply, and what I saw terrified me. My jaw dropped as Max plummeted, her head in her hands. Without thinking, I dove after her, catching her with minor difficulties-Ididn'twant tohurt her wings. She groaned, and I think that her grip on her head tightened as tears streamed freely down her cheeks. I continued to fly, worried about Max but not wanting to land quite yet and have to answer the flocks many questions that I had no answers for. Thoughts flew around my head. I mean, what if something was wrong with her DNA? What if it were unraveling? How much longer for the rest of us? I'm two months younger than she is...did that mean that, in a couple of months that I'd be facing the same fate? What about six months from now? What would happen to the flock? I was really hoping that Max didn't notice the pounding of my heart-what would we do without Max? ...what would I do?

I banished these thoughts as I noticed Max moving a bit more. She looked up at me, her eyes red, and I held back a sigh of relief. She was okay...well, for now anyway.

"Man, you weigh a freaking ton," I said, trying to ease myself into relaxing some. "What have you been eating, rocks?"

"Why, is your head missing some?" she croaked, and I only almost managed a weak smile. God, Max had scared me. Nudge flew over, and asked how she was okay.

"Uh-huh," she seemed to have barely managed to say that, but I kept my mouth shut. "Find a place to land. Please." Max said, her voice steadier, but I knew she wasn't herself completely. She'd said 'please.'

That night, after the flock had laid down to sleep, I sat up with Max, desperately wanting to know if she knew what had happened earlier...besides falling out of the sky and almost becoming a Max-pancake. But, instead, I began talking about our parents-or her lack of and my sad excuse of a mother. Max seemed better-she wasn't in a ball, moaning anymore. I don't remember much of our conversation, but I do remember getting upset over something dealing with my mother.

I laid down by Gazzy, but remained awake for awhile, thinking of Max's head pain. Was it her DNA unraveling? Were we all facing the same fate? How long did we have before we expired? I shook those thoughts from my head, and glanced at the flock for paranoia's sake. Max was sound asleep with an arm around Angel and a foot near Nudge. This was one of the very few times that I had ever seen Max so relaxed...and you know what? It was rather nice. I laid back down and drifted off to sleep, my back against Gazzy's and my head near Iggy's.

I was awoken the next morning by Max's boot connecting with my shin and the sound of popcorn popping over an open fire. Max was back to her normal self (thank God) and was telling us of what she planned on doing. We were off to New York City-a big city. Absolutely wonderful. But, I kept my mouth shut and we were off twenty minutes later. I was off the ground first, followed by Iggy, Nudge, Gazzy, and then Angel. I hovered a little bit, letting Nudge and Iggy take the lead while I kept my eye on Max. Her take off was fine, and I turned to head off. When Max hit the ten-foot marker, she clutched her head, and fell like a rock. She hit the ground with a resounding thud, and I was next to her in a matter of seconds, terrified that this could be the end of my best friend.

"Max?" I brushed my fingers across her shoulder and applauded myself because I didn't sound as scared and shaken as I felt. "Is it like before?"

Max didn't move, but the tears rolled down her cheeks and she made some sort of high pitched noise of pain. God, I felt so helpless, watching her lay in a crying ball of pain. I was vaguely aware of the rest of the flock nearby, watching her and me. Almost as if they weremaking sure thatI wouldn't just leave her and take over. Slowly, Max released her head...then crawled to the bushes and threw up before crumpling to the ground again, this time exhausted. All I wanted to do was hold her tightly, and reassure myself that Max was okay...for now. But that would be way too un-Fang-ish, and probably scare them even more. (and by them, I mean the flock)

A little while later (or was it a long while? I don't remember) Max finally opened her eyes to find us staring at her, all very concerned.

"Max, what is wrong with you?" Angel asked, sounding terrified.

"Think you should see a doctor?" I asked her, trying to sound calm and rational, my eyes scrutinizing her as I made sure that she was physically fine, as she blinked.

"Oh, yes, that's a good idea," she replied, sounding drained. "we need to let more people in authority know about us."

"Look," I started to say, but Max cut me off.

"I'm okay now." she said, but I knew she was lying. Her eyes proved it. "Maybe it's a stomach bug or something." Max said, and I bit back a remark. What in the world has she eaten that the rest of us haven't? ...and when did her stomach affect her head?

"Let's just go to New York." she continued, but I watched her more carefully this time as I made her take off before me. These crazy head pains of hers were starting to scare me, and I don't scare that easily...except when it came to the School and Max's safety. Angel suddenly looked back at me with a strange expression on her face, but I kept my eyes on Max as she flew off ahead of me. Nudge began to talk to our 'leader' about her parents, and I relaxed just a little bit as another attack didn't seem evident quite yet.

Everything seemed fine for a little while after that-if being chased by eight Erasers is considered 'fine.' But Max had no massive head pains for an entire day. Well, she was nauseous at the zoo, and there was that one time when she stopped dead on the street; I thought that I was going to have to carry her off to the nearest alley...but it was only cookies. I couldn't stop the sigh of relief that escaped my lips as she disappeared into the shop with Angel in tow. The library was okay too. No attacks, no strange people; all in all, kinda nice. Except we didn't find anything on our Institute. I kept as close to Max as possible without freaking her out...or letting her know what I was doing. But being as close to Max as I was, was...actually kinda nice. Not that anybody would ever hear me say that out loud. After our fruitless search at the library, then our quick escape, we wound up in the subway, which made me tense, nervous, and kind of twitchy. But Max and Iggy were too, so I didn't feel as paranoid. Especially after waiting for ten minutes with no train. Eventually, Iggy led us to an underground city of the homeless, the perfect spot for six homeless kids. We were led to an empty stretch of ledge after Nudge willingly gave up her knish, and everyone-save Max and myself-went straight to sleep. Max and I leaned up against the wall, our knees drawn to our chests, and she began to rub her temples. I couldn't help but start to worry about her again. Gah! I hated worrying like this...it was so...not me.

"You okay?" I asked her softly.

"Yeah," Max muttered. "I'll be better tomorrow."

"Go to sleep," I said, wanting her to get as much sleep as possible...wanting her to get better sooner. "I'll take first watch." I offered, and she smiled at me gratefully. She then lay down and fell asleep at once. I leaned back on the wall, keeping my eyes on both the flock and those nearby. Max was laying still, her breathing even. The people around us ignored the flock entirely. They had their own problems, so why worry about a bunch of ragged looking, tall kids? An hour or so later, Max's breathing changed from it's deep, gentle, methodic rhythm of sleep to sharp hisses of pain as she shot up into a sitting position-her head tight in her hands. I crept up by her side, worried for her safety again.

"Max?" I asked in a low voice, not wanting to wake the rest of the flock. She didn't answer, and I put a hand on her shoulder, wishing I could take her pain away-that it was me with this horrid head pain instead of her. She whimpered as her jaw clenched, and I saw some blood trickle down her chin...meaning she'd bitten her lip, cheek, or tounge. I gripped her shoulder tighter as a strange kid in army fatigues came over to us.

"Who's screwing with my Mac?" the guy demanded angrily. I glanced at the guy, and back at Max, who was slowly starting to relax some.

"Who are you? What are you doing? You've crashed my whole system, worthless dipstick!" the kid yelled at us again. I was surprised that Iggy hadn't so much as budged.

"What are you talking about?" I asked as I tried to keep myself from grabbing Max and flying the heck out of there. After the flock had left, of course.

"My system crashed. I've tracked the interference, and it's coming from you. So I'm tellin' you to knock it off-or else!" the kid fumed. I almost laughed at the 'or else' part...andI probably would have had I not been so worried about Max. She took in a deep, shaky sounding breath, and the guy with the Mac looked at her. "And what's wrong with her? She trippin'?"

"She's fine." I snapped, wanting this guy to go away soI could be absolutely sure that she was fine, and then maybe get some sleep. "We don't know anything about your computer. If you're not brain-dead, you'll get out of here."

"I'm not going nowhere till you quit messing with my Mac. Why don't you get your girlfriend to a hospital?" he asked flatly. Girlfriend! He thought that Max was my...? But before I could reply to that, Max sat up and squinted in the direction of the Mac kid.

"Who the hell are you?" she asked, sounding weak.

"None of your beeswax!" the kid shot back. "Just quit screwing up my motherboard." Max looked at him confused.

"What are you talking about?"

"This!" the kid turned his machine around so that we could see the screen, and Max gasped-something I had very rarely ever heard from her.

"Who are you?" she asked again, still sounding shaky. I was examining the things on the screen as he answered. They were quite interesting actually.

"The kid who's gonna kick your butt if you don't quit messing with my system!"

I almost laughed again. I'd love to see him try to kick Max's butt...in her present condition too. Then, the computer screen went blank, leaving a dark green screen...and the words 'Hello Max' came up. Now, I'm a fourteen year old bird kid, who spent the first ten years of his life in a cage, being experimented upon, the last four years in a cabin in the mountains, and always with five other bird kids. I am constantly chased by half-wolf-half-people things...and a computer saying hello to my Max creeped me out. My head whipped around towards Max so fast, I swear it popped three or four times. Whoever sent this message was watching us right now...and that could be very bad. She looked at me, I automatically focused my eyes on hers, and we turned back to the computer screen at the same time. More words replaced the two that that were there first. 'Welcome to New York.'

"Can you hear that?" Max whispered to me. "Did you hear it?"

"Hear what?" I asked, confused.

"That voice?" she said. Then, she rubbed her temples and looked at the Mac again.

"What's the deal?" the kid asked, sounding like he couldn't believe what was going on. Hell, I couldn't believe what was going on! "Who's Max? How are you doing this?"

"We're not doing anything." I replied. I saw Max wince out of the corner of my eye, and became slightly worried again...the part that had gone away came flying right back. Was it another attack already? But she continued to rub her temples and stared at the screen as four words popped up. She looked my way, and I gave a slight nod. The name of our Institute: The Institute for Higher Living.

The kid returned to his machine, muttering stuff and glancing at us apprehensively. I'm pretty sure that the drying blood on Max's chin was freaking him out. Which was good in my book...and I know, I have a pretty twisted book. He started to say some stuff, but I only caught the last part of it, having been lost in my thoughts...deep thoughts too.

"We don't have any gear. Spooky, isn't it?"

"You guys on the run? You in trouble?"

"Why would you think that?" ...Note to self, pat self on back for sounding calm even though you want to shove him in a dark hole...

"...because you're a bunch of kids sleeping in a subway tunnel. Kinda clues me in, you know?" he replied. And wouldn't you know it, I didn't have a reply to that.

"What about you?" Max asked, sounding more and more like her normal self. That one must've been pretty bad if she had bitten herself. How much longer until she...NO! I scolded myself for even thinking of a portion of that question. No way was I going to ask that, either in my mind or out loud. For some odd reason, I just couldn't seem to come to terms with the fact that Max might be...damn...I can't even write it down now. But I wanted to know how much time we had. I mean, the Erasers lasted six or seven years, and we had easily doubled that lifespan. So was this it? Were we finally finding our limit on life? A whole fourteen, crappy years?

With these thoughts still bouncing around in my brain, I refocused on the Mac-kid, who was talking about 'spun out.' ...whatever that meant.

"What's spun out?" I asked, faking curiosity to make them think that I had actually been paying attention...which I hadn't been, but nobody needed to know that then. And then my thoughts shot off again...this time in the direction of Max. Well, more along the lines of what Max had asked me not too long ago. About hearing a voice...maybe it had to do with the computer...? Or the pain? I wanted to get my questions answered, but I knew that the only way would be to go back to the School and talk to Jeb. Yeah...like I'd return there willingly. Maybe after they pried my cold and lifeless corpse from the bottom of the ocean...and only maybe then.

"So, what's up with your computer?" I asked, curiously. Hey, asking this guy was worth a shot, right? The kid shrugged. "It's my bread and butter. I can hack into anything. Sometimes people pay me. I do jobs when I need money." ...and then he snapped his jaw shut. "Why? Who want to know?"

"Chill out, dude." I said with a frown. I couldn't lose him to his schizo ways yet! I didn't have my answers! "We're just having a chat."

The kid backed up, his eyes roving the place around us, and he was looking rather angry. "Who sent you? Who are you? You just leave me alone! You just stay away!" he yelled. I gave him the 'calm down' gesture that I usually give to Max when she's too stressed, but he took off running...and he left me with just as many questions as before. Crazy schizo.

"It's always refreshing to meet someone crazier than us." Max said, sounding more like herself than she had in two days...which relieved me. "We seem so normal afterward." she said with a grin.

"We?" I asked, an eyebrow raised.

"Wha's up?" Iggy asked, sleepily. Great, the guy sleeps through everything important, and wakes up now. Isn't he supposed to be the one with the best hearing out of the entire flock...? Yeah, he kind of scares me sometimes too. But, Max and I told Iggy everything and we vowed not to tell the younger ones...yet. Well, okay, so 'vowed' is a strong word here...maybe 'decided.' Yeah, that one works better. Max said something about a voice in her head. I asked if she thought it had anything to do with the School or Institute...but she said something about maybe being born with it. I think she was being sarcastic...but you know, she is sarcastic so often, it's hard to know when she's being serious or being sarcastic. You just never seem to know with that girl.

A/N: So...there's chapter one! I have at least up through two or three written out...but I didn't separate them, so I end when I want to end. ...uhm, is that a go me? Or is it a throw-rotten-veggies-at-the-author sorta thing? Meh...dunno. Now excuse me as I go and find out where Fang has flown off to. --grabs butterfly net and dresses in khaki jungle outfit-- FANG! COME BACK TO MEEEEE!

Please review, cuz reviews make me happy! --holds out a dish that says 'reviews'...you see it is empty and the girl is sad...-- u don't wanna make me sad, do you? Just think, in the short amount of time it will take to tell me what you think, you would have made my day, and completely ignored this section of my author's note!