Disclaimer: May cause severe allergic reaction in nasty lawyers who want to sue me. Please don't.

Nudge watched Max's eyes pop open with a familiar sense of discomfort, a sense that this was something she wasn't supposed to see. It was weakness again. Max wasn't invincible, she was panicking in her sleep, thrashing and muttering under her breath.

"What?" Max said, her wide eyes darting frantically, absorbing their surroundings. Her face was pale and clammy and her breaths came in short, uneven gasps. No one said anything; they just stared at her. A sick feeling of dread crept into Nudge's stomach. They needed Max. She was the only person who could hold them all together. Fang had tried to be a leader once, four years ago, but they never spoke of it and Nudge knew it hadn't gone well. And Nudge couldn't handle the pressure, as she'd so recently experienced. Maybe Max couldn't take it either; maybe this was the breaking point.

But then Max took a deep breath and wiped her forehead. "Sorry, guys," she said, freeing herself from Fang's grasp and standing up on her own, albeit rather shakily. "I was just…" Nudge could practically see her mind straining as she searched for an acceptable excuse. "I was tired, you know."

Nudge looked around at the other members of the flock. Gazzy looked a bit skeptical, but Nudge knew that he wanted to believe it, so he would. The younger kids always heard what they needed to hear. Nudge saw that now that she was no longer a part of that group. Angel was sitting up in the same spot where Nudge had set her down when they landed. Her eyes were open and her face had molded into a worried yet concentrated expression, so Nudge knew she was reading someone's mind. Maybe Max's.

Fang, who was obviously not convinced, pulled Max away from the group and whispered to her under the shade of one of the larger trees. Nudge wasn't very good at reading his emotions, but his face looked angry, almost scared. Now Max was saying something back, and it wasn't hard to see the fury in her face. Or was it panic? Nudge sighed and sat down next to Angel, dropping her face into her hands.

If Max was falling apart, the flock was falling apart. It was that simple.

I was still shaking when Fang pulled me away from the younger kids. I felt kind of dizzy and I kept seeing moving shades of color out of the corner of my eye, but when I turned to look the scenery was stationary. Fang had a tight grip on my arm and I couldn't summon the strength to pull away. We stopped a good distance away from the flock, where they wouldn't be able to hear us.

"Max…" Fang said softly, laying his hand on my shoulder. I brushed it off and glared at him.

"I'm fine," I spat, taking deep breaths as the world spun in front of my eyes. I could see shades of green glittering, almost teasing me.

"You're obviously not. And denial isn't going to get you anywhere." His voice was harsher than before. I closed my eyes and tried to control my breathing.

"No, Fang," I gasped. "I don't want-"

"What do you want?" he said quietly.

"I…" I wanted these freaking colors to go away. They weren't even real, I knew that. But I was seeing them anyway. And the dreams… I wanted those to go away too. I didn't need to relive the cause of my guilt every time I closed my eyes.

"Look, it's not like I don't know where you're coming from," said Fang. "I'm the one who neglected the mention my shredded ribs that one time, remember?"

"I try not to. And this is different." I struggled to hold myself together. The flock was watching. Breathe.

" It's close enough."

I looked down, leaning against the tree in an attempt to combat my dizziness. My shoes and the edges of my jeans were still coated with black dust. "I really think," I said slowly, "that it's just from stress. At least the dreams are."

I could hear the frown in Fang's voice when he spoke. "Okay. But we're going to deal with this later. And you're going to tell me if it gets worse."

I nodded, still looking at the ground. Everything here was green and brown, lightening as the sun rose, but I was still the color of death. I wondered if there was even a point in running away from it, or trying to wash it off. Maybe it was like a plague, and the people in whatever town we stayed in would catch it from us, the black dust creeping up their bodies until it smothered them.

Fang was watching me. I hated this. I hated being vulnerable and needing help and leaning against a tree because I was too dizzy to stand. I sank down into a sitting position and laid my head on my knees, closing my eyes.

"Stress, huh?" Fang said sarcastically.

"Shut up." I mumbled, but the dizziness was going away now, and I lifted my head cautiously. "I assume we're close to some sort of town."

He nodded. "The ones closer to the city were evacuated, I think."

"Let's just… Wait a while."

We didn't say anything after that; I don't know exactly how long the silence lasted. I put my head back down to recover further, and I could hear Nudge and Gazzy walking over. They must have carried Angel, because I heard them putting her down next to me. The air was tense, and I knew I was worrying them by acting like this. But then again, it would probably worry them more if I collapsed walking into town. I only needed a few more minutes to clear my head, and then we could go.

In the town, a man was laying in a dark alley, looking up at the sky. He'd been up all night, receiving shipments from the nearby deserted towns, but it was still hard for him to fall asleep. There was always a nagging paranoia in the back of his mind. Despite the protection the group had offered him, there was always the possibility of an attack. Violence was prominent in times like these, especially in these lower parts of town. There was always the chance that he wasn't earning enough profit to please the people in charge, and that would be enough for them to turn on him.

After the bomb, there'd been another one, far away, and then another, and then another. The man wasn't sure if the whole world had fallen into a panic, but this area certainly had. The big cities had all been emptied, as had the smaller towns surrounding them. The people had been terrified and left immediately, bringing with them only what they could hold.

In the aftermath of a tragedy, there were always the people who used the outcome to their advantage. These were the people the man worked for. They employed those who had lost everything, sending them into the empty towns and cities to take whatever resources were left and paying them for their findings. They paid next to nothing, hoarding the profit for themselves when they marketed the items to general public, but the salary was better than nothing at all. And there was the promise of protection- not that it was always kept.

So the man just stared at the sky waiting for the sun to come up, waiting for sleep to take him. He had to rest sometimes, no matter the risk. He was just starting to feel himself drift off when something streaked across the sky. He was sitting upright in a second; he needed fast reflexes to survive on the streets.

He could actually see several figures against the backdrop of the sun rising. He counted three. They were too large to be birds, but he could clearly decipher that each of the creatures had wings: powerful, sweeping wings that propelled them effortlessly across the sky.

Aside from the wings, of course, he thought they had a distinctly human shape.

Author's Note: So here's the deal. This is important. I need characters. Now that the flock is quickly approaching civilization, there is a need for minor characters to interact with them. I mostly need names, but if you want to give me a description too, that's also helpful. You can make up a character or describe yourself, but please keep in mind that I might twist their personalities a bit so they can fulfill the role I need. So don't be insulted if you describe yourself to me and I make you evil. Well, maybe not evil, but not a very nice person. Another thing: I need an equal distribution of girls and guys. And seeing as 90 of FF members are female… Some of you are going to have to make up guys. Sorry.

Thanks to everyone who reviewed last time: Me, disneydork, Someone aka Me, FindTheStrengthWithinYourself, senoritasophia13, fangsangel, therealme1123, Kyo-Fang (x2), 14rosestar15, FangsBestFriend, Jayde3, RippedIntoPieces, and FallingisFun (x13). This was a good week in terms of reviews, so please keep it up, and thanks so much for reading!

Oh yes- one more thing. (This is getting rather long.) If you know me in real life, and you are reading this and not reviewing, then please review anonymously. Please? Telling me in person that you liked it doesn't count…