Ooooooohhhhh-kaaaaaaaayyyy….yeaaaaah…..how long has it been? FOREVER? And EVER? …oops. :D forgive me?

Disclaimer: despite my attempts at world domination, I have yet to obtain the legal rights to Maximum Ride. Dang it.

Max POV

"Max? …..Maaaaaaax?"

Cracking my eyes open, I glimpsed a wisp of blonde hair and mischievous blue eyes.

"What do you want Gazzy?" I mumbled, half awake. Normally, I could wake up and be alert in just a few seconds. Today, not so much. Without Mirage to get seriously angry at, my life had been reduced to a series of boring flights and tedious night watches. Fun.

"I'm hungry and we don't have any food," he complained. "Iggy was gonna tell you, but he fell asleep. Anyway, we need to find somewhere to eat."

Sitting up groggily, I looked around our cheery little camp. Iggy, like Gazzy had said, was passed out in a nearby tree, and Angel and Nudge were talking quietly to each other. "Where's Fang?"

"Right here," said a quiet voice an inch from my ear. I whipped around, my heart pounding. Why didn't that kid ever make any noise? I was planning on yelling at him, but he was right there. And by right there, I mean our noses were almost touching. I felt my insides begin to turn to Jell-O and mentally kicked myself. Get it together, Max! "There's a Burger King about 13 miles west, in case you were wondering," Fang said quietly, his breath hot on my cheek.

I swallowed hard, managed a nod, and turned away before I hyperventilated. "Alright, guys, up and at 'em!" I yelled, waking Iggy and drawing Skye out of…..wherever she slept. Nobody knew, except maybe Angel, where that place was.

The first night, when we noticed Skye missing, we all panicked, thinking she had run away. We looked and looked until she came out of the forest, rubbing her eyes and asking groggily what we were doing. Turns out she just enjoys sleeping where nobody can find her. Shocker.

Anyway, in a matter of minutes, we had packed up our meager supplies and headed off to Burger King.

Fang flew up beside me. "What are you going to do about Skye?" he asked, making sure the small girl was out of ear-shot.

To tell you the truth, I had hoped to ignore her, but she hadn't said a word since Mirage left and wasn't eating as much I know a bird-kid her size should. "You could get Angel to talk to her," I suggested lamely.

"Or you could talk to her."

I stared dumbly at Fang. He did not just suggest that. "M-me?" I stammered, frantically trying to come up with a good excuse. "Angel knows what's going on in her head. Besides, aren't they friends or something?"

Fang sighed. "If Gazzy was dumped into another flock, who would you want him to talk to? A creepy mind-reading six year old or someone who's been dealing with little kids for their entire life?"

I opened my mouth to protest, but nothing came out. Fang was right. Curse his logic.

"Fine," I huffed, crossing my arms as we descended into an alley near the restaurant. "But only after we eat. I'm starving."

We decided not to eat in the restaurant; it was too public. Instead, we took it back into the safety of the wilderness.

Right in the middle of our little picnic, Nudge gasped, gave out an excited squeal, then said something like, "Olookieisachimunk!"

We all stared at her.

"Ummm, gazuntite?" Iggy said, breaking the silence.

"Nooooooo guys. It's a chipmunk!" Nudge pointed to a nearby tree, where a little rat-thing was sitting in one of the lower branches. "Isn't it cute? Here little chipmunk! I have some yummy lettuce for you!" She then proceeded to walk towards the rodent, lettuce in hand. I continued to eat my sandwich.

Not a second later, Nudge let out a shriek of surprise. "It bit me!" she yelled, sucking on her wounded finger, which had begun to spurt blood.

"Chipmunks," said Gazzy in a matter-of-fact tone, "are still wild animals and should be treated as such."

"Where'd you get that Gasman?," Iggy teased, "the nature channel?"

Gazzy shifted uncomfortably on the ground where he was scarfing down his fourth burger. "It's a cool channel…" Iggy snickered.

"Come on guys," I said, putting on my best leader voice. "Finish up. We have to get going."

"How much farther?" Skye asked absently, catching me by surprise. I'd completely forgotten about her.

"Well," I started, trying to think of a good answer. How was I supposed to know exactly where we were, not to mention what kind of things we might run into on the way to Kentucky? And then it hit me: Mirage would have known. "We'll get there when we get there," I said firmly.

"But-" Skye looked up, clearly confused, then her shoulders sagged as she realized that she was stuck with a whole bunch of wanabes (a.k.a. us) that she didn't know. Yeah. I wouldn't be too happy either.

"Talk to her," Fang whispered in my ear, sending shivers down my spine. He smirked at my reaction. That little twit. I jumped into the air, and the Flock followed suit. Soon we were all soaring above the clouds, and I couldn't help but let out a little sigh.

I spotted Skye flying above the rest of us, looking disinterested and sad, and flew up to meet her. She glanced at me warily, but didn't move. There was an awkward pause.

"You need to eat more," I said, getting to the point in my usual Max fashion. "We don't want you to starve."

Skye squirmed, but said nothing.

"And you can talk to us. We don't bite." I tried my best to sound positive and reassuring, but I'm not sure it did any good.

"I'm fine," Skye said quietly. "It's just different, that's all."

"What's different?" I asked, genuinely curious. I hadn't ever stopped to consider that there might be other bird-kids, much less that they might have a completely different living style than us.

"You guys talk a lot," she said in a matter-of-fact tone. "Usually, we just use Jack. And also-"

"Wait," I blurted, cutting her off. "Use Jack for what? Talking?"

Skye hesitated, obviously deliberating over whether or not to tell me what was so special about Jack. "Well," she started. I nodded encouragingly. "Jack can read minds…and it goes both ways."

I almost laughed out loud. "We have Angel and we still talk." I was still holding in chortling when I looked over to see her staring at me disapprovingly. "What?"

"It's not like Angel's power." Skye said seriously, shredding any humorous thoughts I might have been harboring on the subject. "When Jack uses his power, he makes all the minds mush together. It's not like you're talking to each other," she visibly struggled for words, "it's more like you're thinking together like one person. Except you're actually two people with two minds," Skye made a face, like she'd tasted something sour. "You look confused."

Confused? I was way beyond confused. "You lost me at 'mush together.'"

Skye let out another big sigh. "You'll see when Mirage gets back. Like I was saying, you have more people, too. It's just really different. I'll get used to it," she promised, smiling shyly at me.

"Okay. Just don't starve." With that, I dived down to join the rest of the Flock, Skye's words still buzzing in my head.

Yaaaaaay! I, personally, thought that was a pretty awesome, if not uneventful, chapter. At least you learned something! And there will be FAX! eventually…

Read and Review! well...actually, you've already read soooo... REVIEW! Please.