~16 Years Later~

Max's P.O.V. (Because its not Maximum Ride without Max narrating)

Ugh, Friday mornings. Typically one of the better mornings, behind Saturday and Sunday morning, but not for me. Fridays usually meant that Jack would be home late from his shift at work...and...

Wait..I'm getting ahead of myself.

Let's start off with my name, isn't Maximum Ride, at least, not to the public. I'm thirty-three now and my son Jack is sixteen and he's looking more like Fang everyday.

He's got slightly darker skin than Fang did, but his hair is shorter. His wings, also as black as Fang's, had grown to be at least thirteen and a half feet wide. He generally dressed plain Jane (or would it be plain John? Dunno, don't care), his outfit being a gray short sleeve t-shirt over a white long sleeve shirt, blue jeans, and black sneakers. He's responsible and sarcastic (not as much as I am, but still) and a big brother character. But he's still clumsy and can blend in too much with the background, that made for plenty of games of "Hide-n-Seek" when he was younger.

I'd changed too though, I was now 5'9.5" and my wingspan was fifteen feet. I had straighter hair I'd kept dyed black, and blue eyes, colored contacts of course. It's better that I look like Jack's looks came from me, so I don't have to talk about the Flock, or Fang. I'd had years of nightmares after their deaths, and telling Jack when he'd asked brought a month worth of nightmares.

Beep Beep Beep Beep

Ugh, there's the devil of the morning. Of all the things I hate about normal life, alarm clocks are in the top five, right below keeping my wings in, and my job.

Yeah, about my job, it's hell. I don't even know why, when I got that fake ID almost sixteen years ago, they'd decided to put the girl who grew up tortured in a cage with a fear of anything medical related, in a hospital, as a nurse.

I'm surprised I haven't had a mental breakdown yet, but I've been going strong with it for sixteen years, so there's no backing out.

I groaned and pushed myself up out of my bed (yeah, a bed, I know right?), rolling my shoulders and wings to keep the joints loose. I walked over to my dresser and pulled out a set of teal medical scrubs and pulled a yellow cardigan off the desk chair. I walked with my clothes to the shower and scrubbed myself down, making sure to get in the nooks and crannies of my wings. Stuff gets trapped there so easily and it's really hard to get all that crud out.

After my shower I got dressed, pulling my wings in tight and wrapping them in a thin layer of compression tape, enough to make them less noticeable, but not enough that I'd have trouble breathing. After brushing my hair and teeth, I walked into the kitchen, pulling out the cereal boxes. Even after sixteen years I still couldn't cook for crap, unless tofu counted.

I heard Jack beginning to wake up in his room down the hall. Namely, I heard him grunt and fall face first off the bed, dragging the sheets down with him. Within minutes my son walked into the room, still half asleep. His hair stuck up in all directions, like a tornado had gone through. He didn't have a shirt on, since he didn't like the feeling of the fabric between his wings when he slept, but he had his favorite pair of black pajama pants on.

"Morning Mom," He murmured, still half asleep. He rubbed his eyes, and walked straight into the fridge. "Ow."

"A ballerina dancer you are not," I teased. He rolled his eyes and poured himself a bowl. As he ate, he readjusted his wings and realigning the feathers. "Going with the others today?"

"As always," Jack replied, "Just a day in the life."

I saw the look in his eyes, his face, the war was stepping up, and Jack knew it would mean getting ignored.

"No," I said. Jack looked up from his cereal. I knew what was happening, he was feeling like he didn't matter again. And I refused to let that happen.

"What?"

"You're not going today," I undid the compression tape with a quick twist and I unfurled my wings. "Just me and you today. Spending the day like we're supposed to, where we're supposed to."

I pointed to the sky, burning a bright orange and red with the dawn. Jack's eyes lit up.

"Really?" Jack asked. "What about Arcee?"

Of course, how could I have forgotten about her? The transforming motorcycle/alien warrior would certainly overreact, not about the wings (we agreed not to tell then), but because I was being "helicopter mom" again. What can I say? I'm a mother bear if Jack's in danger.

"Tell her you're helping me at the hospital," I said. "I'll tell my boss you're sick and that I'm taking care of you."

Jack seemed to think it was a pretty good lie and smiled. He ran around to hug me.

"Thanks Mom," He said.

"No prob kiddo," I said. "Go get dressed and explain the situation to Arcee, I'll make the call."

Jack ran off to his room, wings whapping his shins as he went. I strutted to my room and changed into a brown tank top under a cream long sleeve shirt. I pulled on some pants and combat boots. I yanked on a leather jacket and took out my colored contacts. I walked into the bathroom and began washing out the hair dye, revealing my brown-blonde streaked hair. Finally, I was me again, just Max.

After I'd dried my hair and put it in a medium ponytail, I walked out to where the house phone sat in the kitchen. I dialed my boss's number and "explained" that Jack was sick and that I'd be staying home to take care of him. My boss believed it and gave me the day off.

Jack wandered in from the garage and I heard Arcee drive off.

"She bought it," He said. "Still hate lying to her though."

"Well, you can hate it later," I said. I jingled my keys. "C'mon, let's head out."

Yeah, I bet you're wondering why were not just propelling ourselves out of the nearest window. Well, on a small town where people talk and you've got a nosy gossip on one side of your house and a senile old man on the other, it's not a good idea.

We hopped into my Crown Victoria and left the street to its early morning silence. Jack shifted in his clothes.

Rather than wear his usual clothes he wore black combat boots, dark ripped jeans, tight dark gray t-shirt, and a black pullover hoodie. He hadn't bothered to comb his hair, so it still stuck out in all directions.

We drove for a good hour until I found our spot. It was a section of desert with half of it being rocky and good for working on dodging, while the other was wide open, perfect for doing what ever we liked. I killed the engine and we got out. After camouflaging the car, we climbed up one of the big cliffs.

"Remember to keep a steady beat," I reminded him. "Last time you fell ten feet before you regained any air."

"Yeah, yeah," Jack replied. He lifted himself up over the edge and rolled into a crouched position. "Why'd we climb up a fifty foot cliff again?"

I pulled myself up and stood next to Jack, who stood up too. "So we can fall off and get great air."

With that I pushed him off and threw myself over the side. Jack cheered and hollered as we descended in a wild freefall. We both snapped out our wings last second and pushed down hard, and we sped off at a decent 100 miles an hour. Today is gonna be a good day.

So how'd you like it? Review if you liked it, review if you didn't. Bye, and thanks for the support.