The night was dark, the dark blur of the trees beneath him whispering amid the tapestry of murmuring shadows that painted the night. Iggy could barely hear his own wing-beats over the whistle of the wind and the rustle of the leaves on the branches; just coordinating his own direction was a challenge, relying on echolocation.

Relying…

He gritted his teeth, feeling his cheeks balloon against the incoming rush of air – he would have laughed, but laughing seemed a world away, distant as the glint of a silver coin at the bottom of a deep well – and swooped downwards, forcing his wings into the bird-like motion. He felt the trees rush up to meet him, the leaves scraping his toes, the wind tugging at his wings before he angled them and fluttered upwards.

Stunts. That's all they were, just silly stunts. What did he think it would prove?

What did he want to prove?

It wasn't like Iggy hadn't grown accustomed to the mask – the deception, the lies that still somehow managed to seductively pluck his heartstrings with guilt, despite all the baloney he blathered to Jeb about not feeling anything.

What did he have to prove? His true self? But no…

His thoughts were a meaningless whirlwind, and flying was their trigger. It almost made him give up the night flights altogether… but night-time was the only time when everything just seemed to click, the only time when he wasn't wandering around with eyes half-lidded to protect them against the blinding light…

Iggy loved the night. No… the bat-hybrid loved the night, Iggy loved…

The groan that slipped past his lips was snatched away by the wind and cast off into the night. He would end up with a psychosis if he started referring to himself as two people – assuming he didn't have one already, but Jeb would have probably told him if he did by now.

Iggy didn't want to think about it anymore. The reason he had come out – flying at night twice in a row, very conspicuous, he cringed at the thought of the consequences should the flock check on him and find his bed empty, but he had taken precautions – was to abandon the insecurity, the feeling of teetering on the edge of a cliff made of eggshells, if only for a few hours. Normal time periods didn't seem to affect Iggy, what with his sleeping patterns wacked up as they were. If the flock did find out he'd been going out and asked him about it, he hoped they wouldn't notice the lack of bags under his eyes when he told them the truth.

Hah! It was hard to snort in the face of the rushing wind, but he managed it. Truth? What truth? Even if the flock did notice he was gone, he would probably only tell them a warped, garbled version of the true story, the big picture: he'd been sneaking out into the town, clubbing, running errands for Jeb… but that would probably put Jeb in an awkward situation, not that Iggy was inclined to feel any sympathy towards him. The way he had glared at Iggy that morning…

He scowled, mentally slapping himself. He had promised he wouldn't think about it anymore! He had told himself…

Was he lying to himself, now?

Iggy swooped down into the rushing, whispering dark, wings flaring as the dark enveloped him like a gaping, endless nightmare.

###

It wasn't often the Gasman woke up at night, but tonight was different. Not only were recurring nightmares about flying pizza plaguing every minute of his dreaming hours, the atmosphere felt… weird. The Gasman had been lying awake, staring up at the cracks in the ceiling he had caused from one of his more unwieldy explosions, when an odd feeling had overcome him. In that single instant, the Martinez residence had seemed a bit… off. He couldn't put his finger on it, but something about the silent, dark house had radiated dissonance, prompting him to get out of bed and walk out of his room.

Had something happened? Has some noise registered itself in his dreaming mind, and he only just realized it when he woke up? Was one of the others in danger?

… no, he didn't think any of the others were in danger. If they were, Max would have woken everybody up, and Gazzy could tell for certain nobody was up patrolling this part of the corridor, where most of the flock's room were. It's probably nothing, the eight-year-old assured himself as he reached the end of the corridor. I just can't sleep. I'll get a glass of milk and then…

He was halfway past Iggy's door when he stopped.

The feeling hit him again, stronger than ever.

The door was ajar; the slender rivulet of pale light ebbing out into the grey-tinged darkness of the corridor. The Gasman frowned. That wasn't like Iggy; even when back at the E-shaped house, Iggy had always liked sleeping with his door firmly closed. Not that it had made any difference to the Gasman; he just kicked it in. So why was Iggy's door open now?

"Iggy?" he called, reaching out one hand for the doorknob. "Iggy? Are you awake?" he couldn't think of any other possible explanation why Iggy's door would be open at this hour… was he in the kitchen? Had he too felt like a midnight snack?

"Ig?"

He pushed open the door.

Iggy's room was large and spacious; it had once been the attic, which Dr. Martinez had easily given up so that Iggy could use it (he had joked he wanted to be a true "bat in the belfry", whatever that meant). A window took up most of the far wall; the bed's ornate iron headboard silhouetted against the open drapes. A few of Iggy's things were scattered across the floor; clothes, books, a video game console. But the thing that first registered in the Gasman's attention was this:

The bed was empty. It looked rumpled enough; sheets creased, second pillow scattered halfway down the bed, but there was something about it…

That feeling again.

Gazzy spun on his heel and walked out the door, closing the door behind him. It banged against the doorframe with more of a noise than Gazzy would have liked, but by then he was halfway down the corridor, calling in a fierce whisper.

"Iggy?" he peered into Jeb's study as he passed. Nobody was there.

"Iggy?" nobody was in the bathroom either. The kitchen, then?

"Iiiiiiiiiggggyyyyyyy!" he hissed, reaching the top of the stairs that led down into the kitchen. From his vantage point, he could see the island was empty; there was nothing there except for a faint light ebbing out from underneath the door leading into the guest bedroom where Jeb slept.

Nothing there… except for a tall figure sitting hunched at the table.

"Iggy!" the Gasman strode down the stairs, laughing. "Where were you? I was looking everywhere for you…"

The groan that met him wasn't Iggy's. "Gazzy, what are you doing up so late?"

"Max?" Gazzy ground to a halt, blinking in astonishment for a few seconds. "What are you doing here?"

Max massaged her forehead with her thumbs and let out another groan. "Voice." She slid a few aspirin tablets into her mouth and took a slug from the glass beside her. "Giving me a headache."

"O…Oh." The Gasman faltered. "Do you know where Iggy is?"

Max peered at him from under her tangled brown hair. "Why? Isn't he in his room?"

Gazzy shook his head. "No… I checked everywhere, I thought he was getting a drink or something…"

"He's not." Jeb's voice suddenly resounded from one corner and, startled, Gazzy whirled around. He saw Max tense in his peripheral vision.

"What do you want, Jeb?" her voice was acid.

Gazzy blinked rapidly, studying the scientist. Jeb's eyes were like shards of ice, his mouth a tense, grim line. Something about his attitude underlined his new, flinty composure; his clenching and unclenching fists belying the cool ease in which he spoke.

Even as the Gasman watched in startled silence, the ex-geneticist flicked his gaze over to Max, as if he had only just noticed she was there. "Can you gather the flock, please?"

###

Iggy landed and skidded a few meters, battered sneakers catching on the rough wood floorboards of the porch. He folded his wings and paced the deck once rapidly, breathing through his nose to help calm the buzz of his thoughts.

Okay. Time to put the mask back on.

He knew something was wrong before he even looked up. Maybe it was the light; breaching the barriers of his echolocation like frenzied, darting silver lights, or maybe it was the ambience – cold, hostile. Iggy's heart clenched as he walked forward, barely registering the impact of his hand against the wooden doorframe before he was walking into the house, striding as if nothing had happened. His throat felt constricted, like someone had squeezed an iron fist around it, and suddenly dry.

He couldn't have… Tell me he couldn't have!

He could. He knew that before he even met the various gazes of the flock; Max and Fang's dubiousness, Gazzy's fear, Nudge's mute shock, Angel's calmness.

"Do the words." Max's voice was both ice and acid, tempered by shards of flint and sandstone. "Bat kid mean anything to you?"

He was scared and uneasy and trapped.