DISCLAIMER: I don't own Maximum Ride. But I'm looking to buy the second book soon.

To some of the reviewers:

Master Chief – Uh… was that a compliment? Thanks anyway… I think…

Paintedblue47 – Thanks for your review. I can't wait for SOF – people say it's better than TAE.

Ime247 – No offence, but your review had nothing to do with my story. I don't want flames, but I don't want things irrelevant to my writing; however, thanks anyway – I hope to get the second book soon.

Wings of Hope

Chapter Two: Never Test the Depth of Water With Both Feet

Ok, so I blacked out from winging myself slap bang into a building after laughing off the fact that I was practically blind and flying, stupidly, close to the ground (point taken, Fang, point taken). I didn't even black out for that long; just long enough for me to fall several feet onto the next rooftop down and severely bruise my butt. And this is the point where I ask 'Why me, why me?'

Or it could be the point where Fang hovers next to me, telling me 'I told you so' but I'm blocking that out on account for my aching butt and head. Well, for me, there's really no difference. Sigh.

"Max?" Angel called out my name from somewhere above, and I could hear she was trying not to giggle. "Are you ok?"

"Fine…" Must get up without falling on ass again, must get up without falling on ass again, must get up –

"Max, you hit that building hard," Iggy commented with a witty snigger. Hahaha… NOT.

"Really? I hadn't noticed!" I said, finally standing up, though swaying dangerously on the spot. I reached out and grasped the closest thing to me, clutching on tight so that I my face didn't introduce itself to brickwork for the second time in one night. Come on, I gotta spare myself some brain cells, right? I mean, they are getting rather scarce up there.

"Max…?" Gazzy's voice percolated into my thoughts. "Why are you hugging my foot?"

I groaned and immediately released his sneakers. God knows where they've been. "Eurgh. My bad." Wiping my hands thoroughly on my already soiled pants, I shook the nausea off and ruffled my feathers to shake the dirt off them. I honestly felt like I had just taken a roll in dog crap; I even smelt of dog-crap… or wait, that could've been the stuff on my hands. I brought my palms blindly up to my face and grimaced. Note to self: remind Gazzy to watch what he steps in.

"I think I've found out what that stink was," I announced after shakily jumping into the air (and colliding painfully with little Angel – gosh, she's so big now), "And it's not Total… or it could be, I'd rather not know."

Fang snorted, as if he'd known all along. "We need to go," he said as soon as I'd gained an even wing-stroke pattern. "Iggy, can you still hear shouting?"

"Yeah; sounds like a riot's going on, or something."

"Then we've got to get further away."

I thought for a while – which was hard because my butt whinging sorely, adding to the cacophony of whining pains in my mind. "Ok, let's fly a bit higher this time and try to find a bit of a less-densely populated area to land in." I stopped to let my bird-senses pick up on a good direction to take. "Let's just go in the direction we were going in before I – um – had my accident."

Endless hours (several minutes) of strenuous flying later, Iggy called for us to halt and told us that it was getting a lot quieter the more we flew. Below, I could pick out various little lights flickering as the wind tossed them about. The people had turned to their ancestor's artificial light source – fire. Too bad we didn't have such ancestors per se, but I could hardly see a bird holding out a flaming torch to see in the night when there was no sun. A bird on a flaming torch, maybe; barbequed chicken – yummy.

Anyway, the city below was lit by these tiny little bundles of fire. I could just about make out the figures of humans milling about in confusion, probably wondering what had happened to all the electricity. Though there was still not enough light to see the buildings around us, I swooped down lower once more, trying to gauge where would be the best place to land without attracting too much attention. A really black patch of land caught my interest. Most likely, there were either no people around there or – the more likely, since I seem to draw bad luck to myself like a magnet – some sort of snake pit, filled with venomous, scaly, non-legged creatures... Yikes.

"There," I pointed, indicating to the blank stretch of land below, "Head for that black area."

"Where?" Nudge flapped about somewhere above me. "There are black areas all over the place."

"Just – just – over there," I flailed my arms around in an empty gesture since she couldn't see me so clearly. Flying back up, I gave as-accurate-as-possible directions to where I wanted the flock to go – something along the lines of 'that kind of really dark black bit over there… can't you see it, you know, through the darkness and all?'

Soon, I was herding an exhausted flock towards the black spot. I didn't really care where it was – as long as it was black and preferably not a lake or body of water. I suppose that's why Fang made me go first. At least, if I ended up drowning, the rest of the flock would know not to follow.

"Don't follow me all the way down," I ordered them, three-quarters of the way through our descent, "Let me scout around first."

So I descended. The darkness enveloped me once more and I felt as though I was flying willingly into the belly of some God-forsaken demon. The smell of dampness and rotting snatched at my nostrils and I struggled to hold it a sneeze. The occasional plink plink of water droplets would cause me to snap my head around to detect the sudden source of sound, only to relax hesitantly again. All too soon, I felt solid material beneath my shoes and allowed my wings to fold themselves tentatively into my back. Cautiously, I strained my ears and nose to help me perceive my surroundings a bit better, building a mental map out of sounds and smells in absence of my sight. Reaching out a hand, I felt forward to add touch to that list of senses. I felt coarseness rubbing against my fingertips. I frowned and carried on tiptoeing round, letting the unknown engulf me.

Fang circled the spot where Max had gone down just minutes before. Or was it hours? He had no idea – only that he was left with the flock and she had gone down into who-knew-what without a reasonable back-up or safety plan. He should have objected or gone with her…

"Fang!"

The dark-haired boy's heart pummelled the insides of his chest and he forced it to calm down before he spoke. And when he did, he made sure it was in his usual carefully measured tone of calm. "What is it, Nudge?"

"Look! Look! Look!"

Fang's eyes darted across the blacked-out scenery below, taking in as much as possible with the limited light. His eyes narrowed further when he caught sight of Nudge's distress. Little pinpricks of light flared to light, slowly assembling to form a circle, surrounding something. The flickering sparks of red and yellow danced against a severely blackened background; the formation started to tighten around the apparent subject of attention. Immediately, Fang was straightening his body and wings, sweeping gracefully into a steep drop toward the ground.

"What? What is it?" Iggy was asking as the rest of the flock followed.

"Max is in trouble," Angel answered, sounding strangely direct and authorative.

Fang's heart constricted at the word 'trouble.' Of course, he thought, as he cut through the misty air, this could all be nothing to be worrying about. They could be swooping in onto something trivial and revealing themselves to befuddled humans for no apparent reason…

An angry screech from below tore furiously into his thoughts. Fang pushed the doubt out of his mind, squared his jaw and prepared for a crash landing.

Literally.

A.N. I've never fully appreciated how difficult it is to conduct a story in the dark. For those of you who don't know, or haven't tried – it's HARD!

Thank you for reading; hope you enjoyed and please review (no flames).

Daygoner