Max POV

I awoke to find I was staring up at the stars. They have always amazed me, stars have. They only appear at night yet they're there all of the time. Little balls of gas made to light up the sky along with the silvery sliver of moon also visible. They are so beautiful yet so far way and if you were to go close enough to touch it, you would already be dead. Deadly beautiful. Kind of like Fang. How he beat Luke was scary, the violent red his eyes had turned to was like staring into someone else entirely yet it made my body shiver with the intense allure he created. It wasn't normal, and if this was a new power, it was dangerous.

I began to sit up but a wave of pain rolled over me, alerting me that my ribs were definitely not in a very good shape. I gasped a little as the pain hit and this notified the rest of the flock of my conscious presence.

"Max!!" shouted Angel and Nudge in unison. At that moment, Angel started sobbing.

"I thought......I thought you'd never come back," she whimpered and as she finished, a new wave of tears welled up from her crystal blue eyes.

"It's ok sweetie," I soothed, "I'm here now, I won't leave you again, I promise." As I said this, she shuffled up next to be and folded into my arms. My ribs were screaming at me mercilessly to let her go but I couldn't deal with her being like this so I held onto her until her sobbing subsided.

As I glanced up at Fang over Angels bobbing curls, it felt like his eyes were boring into my head. His expression was of sadness and at first I didn't understand why. But then it hit me. The argument.

I needed to talk to him, and soon.

"Ok Angel sweetie, I need to be able to breathe thanks," I said softly, and Angel rose from her curled up position in my arms.

"Fang, I need to talk to you. Alone." I stated simply.

"Oh great," said Gazzy, "the last time you guys talked alone, you ended up knocking someone out and Max being hurt. I can't take this. I can't take not knowing whether Max will be here in the next hour or whether Fang will be happy enough to actually communicate with anyone and when our next meal will be. I don't want all of this to happen again. I hate it. I HATE IT," Gazzy screamed, echoing off the cave walls. All of us were taken by surprise at this outburst. Gazzy always seemed to be the fighting type, and never showed any pain. After he finished, his head dropped and he fell silent but not before muttering one last thing, "I want out."

"What?" Asked Nudge, wondering whether she had heard him right.

"I said, I want out," said Gazzy, in a louder voice, "I'm sick of this. I'm sick of being on the run. Without you there Max, we had nothing to worry about. Nothing attacked us and we were happy. And then you come along and send our lives tumbling back down in a vicious spiral. It was better without you Max and I don't want you back. I'm leaving." And with that, he got up and walked to the edge of the cave that looked out over a high cliff face.

"Gazzy, wait.." I started but he interrupted me.

"I WILL NOT WAIT MAX. NOT FOR YOU, AND NOT FOR ANYONE ELSE. I AM GOING NOW AND I DON'T WANT YOU TO FOLLOW. YOU CAN'T STOP ME." He took a running start, spread his wings and flew over the edge of the cliff into the darkness of the night.

The rest of the flock looked at me, as if to say, what do we do, but I had no answer. He knew that was the one thing that could have hurt me the most. More than physical pain and more than even the pain of having one of the flock taken away by force. One of the flock leaving by their own will. It shattered my heart and tore up my insides. My head seemed to be unwilling to accept what had just happened and all I could do was stare into the darkness, willing him to see his mistake and return. But I was fairly sure that wasn't going to happen, because the conviction behind those words was too strong and it hurt me to even think it, but Gazzy may be gone forever.

Iggy and Nudge were huddled around Angel, who was, for the second time this night, sobbing, but this time for the loss of her brother. Someone who had cared for her no matter what was going on, and now he was gone. I was finding that hard to believe myself.

Guilt and sadness seemed to overcome me and Fang noticed too. He pulled me into his arms and cradled me there. I felt water on my cheeks, and it was then I realised I was crying. At any other time, Fang's closeness would be comforting, but now it seemed that nothing could help. It was singlehandedly my fault that Gazzy left and nothing could fix that. Fang was breathing into my hair and eventually tiredness overcame me. That night I cried myself to sleep in Fangs arms.

Gazzy POV

That was the only way I could do it. The only way I could leave them. The least harsh. I could not tell them about the mission and although it killed me to do it, I had to leave. Luke had failed and I had to take his place. Knowing I was a traitor to the flock. My family. Was making me crazy with resentment towards myself but I had no choice. If I didn't, they would kill Angel with the poison capsules they implanted into her, just over a year ago when she was captured. I couldn't let that happen to my baby sister. I couldn't. It was nearly morning when I caught a glimpse of the new testing facility, just outside of Forks, Washington.