Max POV

Recap

We started to move towards the gap but as we did I heard an automated speaker start:

10.....9.....8.....

The countdown to detonation had begun.

My pulse seemed to roar in my ears. It was literally all I could hear. I glanced at Fang and saw that he had heard too. Our efforts to get out became faster and more inaccurate. We were throwing punches in any direction and just hoping that they made contact or made the gap bigger.

....7.....6....

I frantically looked towards the gap and almost groaned in despair. There were flyboys covering the gap. We wouldn't get there in time, before either the bomb detonated or the gap closed. We were going to be killed.

I felt something snap inside me. No! I wasn't going to go this way. Maximum Ride wasn't going to die trapped like a rat in a maze, escape routes covered.

Inspiration came swiftly. I grabbed Fang by the wrist and pulled him close to me. His eyes went wide, the Fang version of complete and utter shock. I avoided his gaze and just focused on the ever shrinking gap in the wall of flyboys.

I felt the burst of fire in my wings that I had felt when we went on the rescue mission to get angel back. Using the adrenaline rush that that gave me I pushed forward towards the gap.

....5.....4....

Flyboys tried to stop me in vain. I just ploughed right through them. I vaguely felt the pain searing in my arms, but I pushed it in to my mental answering machine. I saw the gap looming in front of me and threw new energy in to our escape.

.....3......

We were through the gap, clean, flyboy free air surrounding us, but we weren't out of dangers way. There bombs were still going to go off and the debris would be catapulted for miles not the mention the initial sound wave and aftershock. My energy was giving out; I couldn't keep up my super speed. I felt us slowing down.

....2......1...

I used the last of my energy to propel both of us forward as much as I could and hugged Fang close. I wasn't going to let him go. I one final effort to protect him I made sure that my body was between him and the flyboys and their bombs, wrapping my wings around his body, trying to make sure that nothing was on show.

...0.....KAAAABOOOOOM!!!!!

The shockwave threw us both forward, tumbling over and over in the air. I had no sense of direction, there was no up or down, left or right. There was just me and Fang, flying through the sky. I couldn't hear a thing; it was like someone had pressed the mute button on my world.

I could see bits of flyboy whizzing past us and made sure that my wings were still covering Fang. Not an easy feat when you have your eyes squeezed tightly shut and it sounds (and feels) like your ear drums have just exploded. But wrapping him in my wings meant that I couldn't flap them to keep flying, so we dropped like a rock.

I felt something hit the back of my head hard, but I felt like I was floating, in the sun. And I knew that this must be death, because I could hear everyone that I loved, calling my name, calling me back to the pain and horror I had just left. I wanted to scream back, but something else hit me in the lower back and I fell in to darkness.