Made some adjustments to the format… hopefully the story will flow a little better now. Think of the italicized parts at the beginning as sort of like, 'previously, on insertTVshownamehere…' kind of thing.

REVIEWS MAKE THE WORLD GO 'ROUND!

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MAX
Naruto
Sunagakure

He looked at me for a while, brain apparently whirring. "Unfortunately, since you don't seem to be willing to respond to me, I am going to have to confine you."

"Confine me?" that got my attention. "What, like jail?"

His expression said yes.

I made a snap decision. This guy didn't look like he was healthy enough to be going anywhere fast, so I took a flying leap over his bed and out the window, and then a flying fly from there. My wings snapped open and caught the faint breeze like a kite. One flap sent me several meters upwards. With my sharp avian hearing I could hear shuffling back in that room, no doubt guards getting ready to chase me. But my hyperdrive kicked in and I was two miles away in about fifteen seconds. I flew around a couple times, backtracked, and got myself thoroughly lost, and then touched down, pulling my wings in. It would be a good idea to gather information before I split for good.

I was stifling hot in my all-longs outfit, so I peeled off my sweatshirt and windbreaker. Even in the short sleeved shirt underneath it was really hot. From my aerial view I had determined that this was some sort of desert town. All the buildings where white, made out of, like, mud or something, and outside the walls was sand as far as the eye could see.

No wonder everyone's dressed like sluts, I thought, looking around at all the girls in mini- and micro-skirts and alarmingly low-cut tank tops. Most of the guys were the exact opposite, clad in white robes that covered most of their bodies, but some of them wore weird capri-like sweats and variations of tops. A recurring accessory seemed to be something like a headband with an hourglass engraved into it. I wondered what it was for.

In the crowded confusion of the square I was walking around in, I hadn't noticed a guy sneaking up behind me. He grabbed my wrist and I immediately spun around and punched at his face. He grabbed my fist and twisted it aside. I wrenched my limbs from his grip.

"Wow," he said. "What was that for?"

It was another familiar face from that cave. It was the blonde with the whisker-cheeks.

"Who are you and what do you want?" I asked coldly.

"I just recognized you – you're the girl Akatsuki kidnapped, right? Are you okay?" he said. So far, seemed safe enough. I narrowed my eyes.

"Just dandy," truthfully, I felt almost completely recovered. It's amazing what leaving a hospital can do for ya.

"What are you doing out of the hospital?" He looked so innocent when he said that it made me want to knock his teeth out.

"I hate hospitals," I said. "I split."

"Oh. Did you talk to Gaara?" he asked. "Gaara said he wanted to talk to you when you woke up… annoying, he wouldn't even talk to me."

"Who are you?" I asked.

"Oh, right. I'm Naruto. What's up?" he said.

"Can you tell me what this Akatsuki thing is?" I continued, ignoring his question.

"Oh, they're like, this group of people who are trying to capture all the jinchuuriki - "

"The demon containers," I confirmed. He nodded.

"Yeah, the jinchuuriki. Who knows why, but they're definitely evil."

Evil group of people with evil intentions yet unknown? Sounds familiar.

"Look, I'm really bad at explaining things. I'm not really a words person," he said. "We should go back to the Kazekage tower. Kakashi is there, he's much better at this kind of thing."

Who's Kakashi? I wondered, and filed that away into my brain as one of the zillion questions I should probably get answered at some point.

"Thanks, but no thanks," I prepped to do a lickity-split U and A when someone addressed me from behind.

"Just humor him. He's been going on about asking Gaara what it's like to be dead all day," I turned around. It was the pink haired girl from the cave, rolling her almost turquoise eyes. Then she held out her for me to shake. "I'm Haruno Sakura, by the way."

I glanced down at it, but didn't shake. I don't shake hands. "Haruno? Funny name."

I wasn't sure why, but I instantly had a serious dislike for this chick. Maybe it was because her hair was pink and pink is a shade of red and – well, you know me.

She drew back. "Haruno is a perfectly normal family name!"

"That's your last name? Then why'd you say it first?" I shot back. So her name was Sakura, then?

"That's how you do it! Family name, and then… well, name name!"

"Not on my planet."

"Well, apparently you aren't from this planet," she snapped. "What's your name, anyways?"

"Max," I said.

"Well, at least I have two names," she said tartly.

"I have two names!" I told her. "Max Ride. Maximum Ride. That's my name."

"That's a stupid name," Sakura retorted. "They're both words."

"Better than 'sakura', that's a flower," I rolled my eyes.

"Woah, woah, woah!" Naruto jumped between the two of us. "Chill out. Let's just say you both have weird names and leave at that!"

Sakura punched him in the head (wicked hard, I mean supernaturally hard) while I pointed out icily that his name was weird, too.

"Ow, Sakura!" he whined. "Can we please go back to the Kazekage tower? Please?"

FANG
Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Buffy's House

There was a thud and the sound of an opening door above them. Fang was immediately even more on-edge then he had been before. His fists clenched around the granola bar and he slid his left foot back in a discreet fighting stance.

But he didn't have to. A girl came bouncing down the stairs in pajama shorts and a tank top. She had long brown hair and looked maybe fourteen or fifteen. When she caught sight of him, color rose to her cheeks.

"Who's that?" she spat at Buffy, crossing her arms in an attempt to cover her lack of proper dress.

"Dawnie! This is Fang. Fang, this is Dawn, Buffy's sister," Willow introduced them. "Dawn, Fang is a… well, do you mind if I say mutant?"

"Whatever," Fang shrugged.

"Mutant?" Dawn's eyebrows shot up. "Huh. You don't look mutant to me."

He allowed his wings to slip from under his shirt a bit again.

"Cool," Dawn grinned. Fang was completely freaked out (he didn't show it, of course) – not because Willow and Tara were apparently witches and Buffy was apparently a vampire slayer and vampires and demons apparently existed, but because they seemed so unconcerned about his extra body parts.

"Wait, what are you doing up?" Buffy looked up at her sister. "It's eleven o' clock! Go to bed!"

Dawn rolled her eyes. "Oh, no, eleven. So late."

"Buffy's right. We should all go to sleep soon. School tomorrow," said Willow.

"There's a guest bed in the basement, or you could sleep on the couch," Buffy told Fang. "Just until tomorrow, when we hand you over to Giles."

Fang didn't like the sound of that, but he gave her the benefit of the doubt and just assumed she was saying it like that as a joke.

"I'd prefer somewhere aboveground," he said. "But I don't really care."

He was barely aware of the fact that he'd just agreed to stay in a complete stranger's house. But hey, he could handle himself. Don't look a gift horse in the mouth and all that.

"Couch it is," said Tara. "We've got extra blankets in our closet, right Willow?"

"Yeah, let's go get them."

The two young women walked up the stairs, taking Dawn with them, and disappeared into the hall above, leaving Fang and Buffy in the kitchen together, alone. They stood there awkwardly for a second.

"Let's get the scratchy pillows off the couch," Buffy decided finally. They went into the living room and Buffy plucked off a few pillows, some beaded or embroidered funnily or otherwise uncomfortable-looking and set them on a chair.

"So, tomorrow you will meet Xander, Anya, and Giles. Giles will know what to do with you and your whole gallivanting around in a nerdy movie thing."

"Great," said Fang. They were saved from another awkward silence by Willow and Tara trouping down the stairs, laden down with blankets.

That night, Fang fell asleep thinking of the Flock, but mainly one particular member. He had to get his mind off all this crazy occult crap.

IGGY AND ANGEL
Avatar: The Last Airbender
Somewhere in the Earth Kingdom

"What?" Katara – the girl – snorted. "Why don't we introduce you to the rest of the group? By the way, I'm Katara, and this is my brother Sokka."

"I'm Jeff, this is Angie," Iggy introduced them, being sure to use nice, fake names. He heard Angel pout next to him. No doubt she wanted to pick her own name, something Nudge-inspired, like… Angelina Glitterpants Barbieface McWonderpets or whatever.

"Those are weird names, too," Sokka commented. "Where are you from?"

"All over," Iggy said.

"Quit being so rude," Katara told her brother. "Here, the others are this way."

She led them about one fifty meters or so through the trees and underbrush until they reached a nice little clearing. Iggy immediately located two more people and some sort of animal lounging about.

"Jeff, Angie, this is Toph and Aang, and that's Momo," Katara introduced. Her arm bumped against Iggy's as she lifted it to point at Toph and Aang and Momo respectively and Iggy memorized their… well, their general feel. He would be able to locate them again. "Momo's a flying lemur. Toph, Aang, this is Jeff and Angie. We found them in the woods. They're headed for Ba Sing Se, too."

"Great, more fun traveling companions!" Toph exclaimed sarcastically.

"Hi!" Aang jumped up. "Wow, your hair is great! It looks like… like gold! Or hay!"

"See, it is abnormally colored!" Sokka spat.

"My hair's fine!" Angel said defensively. Iggy patted her on the head.

"Your hair's great, Ange," he assured her.

"Hey… wait, hold on a second," scuffing of feet and body. Toph probably gotten into a crouching position. "You… you're not normal."

Iggy froze. How did she know?

"Your heart rate just went up," Toph observed. She stood up and began walking towards them. "But… it was already super high to begin with. Abnormally high. You're super tall, but super light. And you've got stuff sticking out of your back… hold on, are those wings?"

"You have wings?" Sokka cried in disbelief. "No way! That is so cool!"

"Wait!" although he tried to squash it, panic was rising in Iggy's voice. "How could you tell? How did you know without looking?"

"I don't really do much looking, thank you very much," the girl said tartly. Something about that statement felt so familiar to him. Like it was something he would say.

"Hold on," he said, realization dawning. "That was a blind joke!"

"No friggin' duh," she retorted.

"Oooh!" Angel squealed. She grabbed the two of them and shoved them together. "You two should get married!"

"You are acting awfully Nudge-like today, Angie," Iggy pushed her away.

"Wait… married?" Aang jumped forward – really, really far forward. That kid really knew how to get from point A to point B in a single bound with no obvious effort. "How come?"

"They have so much in common!" Angel said. "They're both blind… and… and… well…"

"Yeah, that about covers it," Iggy said coolly.

"Wait, you're blind?" Toph asked in disbelief.

"Have been for kind of a while now."

There was a pause. Then, "cool," she slurred, and slugged him on the shoulder.

"Ow," Iggy said, with some surprise. "That actually kind of hurt…"

NUDGE AND THE GASMAN
Harry Potter
Somewhere in Britain

"Ronald!" Hermione emerged from the woods and nearly dropped her bundle of firewood.

"Bloody hell, it was the kid! It wasn't me!"

"You can't be so loud, we'll be discovered, and then we'll –we'll –well, die!"

"Don't be so melodramatic, Hermione - "

"I'm not being melodramatic!"

"Hey!" Harry poked his head out from the tent. "Some of us are trying to sleep in here."

"Sorry," said all four of them at once.

Nudge was surprised when after weeks of jumping from place to place in search of more horcruxes in the pouring rain, she and Gazzy still hadn't been kicked out. Ron had certainly tried, at first, but Hermione had taken a liking to Nudge. She probably enjoyed the change of pace from being surrounded by angsty, hormonal teenage boys.

Harry, however, didn't seem to care one way or another. He mostly just locked himself in whatever room was available to 'think'. This set the rest of the group increasingly more on edge every day. Hermione seemed to be, shall we say, extremely pissed off at this, and Ron was obviously sucking up to her. All in all, nobody got anything much done. Ron brainstormed, Hermione pored over her books, Harry daydreamed. Ron tried to get the radio to work, Hermione searched for other safe places to camp, Harry daydreamed.

One day, however, they managed to pull Harry out of his little hole when Ron fixed the radio. Or rather, he gained access to a certain station, something he'd been attempting for days

"I've got it, I've got it! Password's 'Albus'! Get in here, Harry!" he announced, successfully pulling to boy with the lightning scar out of his stupor. All five of them knelt over the radio as sound issued from the speaker.

"…apologize for our temporary absence from the airwaves, which was due to a number of house calls in our area by those charming Death Eaters."

"But that's Lee Jordan!" Hermione said.

"Who?"

"A friend… from Hogwarts…"

"I know!" Ron grinned. "Cool, eh?"

Other voices that Ron introduced them to included 'Royal', or Kingsley Shacklebolt, an Auror (basically a wizard cop), 'Romulus', or Remus Lupin, a werewolf friend, 'Rodent' – actually, 'Rapier' – probably Fred but possibly George, and one of Ron's numerous brothers. As the station reported deaths of wizards and Muggles, Harry, Ron, and Hermione's faces became drawn, pale and distressed. Someone called Xenophilius Lovegood had been arrested. Someone named Hagrid who apparently had a sixteen-foot-tall half-brother was on the run after having hosted a 'Support Harry Potter' party. Romulus – or, Remus – had a segment where he announced firmly that he believed Harry was still alive, and that he believed in him, after which Ron informed them that Remus had moved back in with Tonks (his wife, apparently) who was massively pregnant. Fred reported that Voldemort was hiding out to keep suspicion and confusion reigning.

"Wicked," Gazzy grinned crazily. He had been picking up British terms.

"Good, eh?" said Ron brightly, once the broadcast was over.

"Brilliant," Harry agreed.

"It's so brave of them," said Hermione. "If they were found…"

"Well, they keep on the move, don't they?" Ron shrugged. "Like us."

"But didn't you hear what Fred said?" Harry said excitedly. Ron, Hermione, and Nudge exchanged a look. They all knew what was coming. "He's abroad! He's still looking for the Wand, I knew it!"

"Harry - "

"Come on, Hermione, why are you so determined not to admit it? Vol - "

"HARRY, NO!" Ron lunged forward.

" – demort's after the Elder Wand!"

"The name's Taboo!" Ron bellowed, leaping to his feet as a loud crack sounded outside the tent. Nudge grabbed Gazzy's wrist and they both jumped into combat stances, snapping their wings out. "I told you, Harry, I told you, we can't say it anymore – we've got to put the protection back around us – quickly - it's how they find - "

Ron cut himself off and Nudge held her breath. She could hear her heart pounding in her ears. She pulled Gazzy close. Voices were coming nearer and nearer. A stick snapped loudly. Ron pulled something out of his pocket and clicked it. The lights in the tent all went out.

There was a moment of silence and Nudge squeezed her eyes shut. She opened them again when a raspy voice slithered through the darkness.

"Come out of there with your hands up!" it ordered. "We knew you're in there! You've got half a dozen wands pointing at you and we don't care who we curse!"