LaughingLlama: Hey! Yeah, I have NOT disappeared off the face of the Earth, and have NOT been abducted by aliens(though that would be sooo awesome!). Sorry it's taken so long to update, I've been busy. My schedule and school keep me on my toes. I won't be able to type very much, so I'll try to update as much as possible. Anyway, here's chapter 3!

Disclaimer: I do not own Maximum Ride or any of its characters. Having read the books a million times, I know that nobody really controls Max. You just try, and she'll give you a piece of her mind. Once again, I own nothing MR. I just help keep Max's temper in check (it doesn't always work, though).

Iggy's POV

Albino. That's what she calls herself. That's what she calls her whiteness. I can see-sense-her. After the whitecoats tried to improve my already-hightened eyesight, I have never been able to see anything. I can sense colors, but it's not the same. Skie is the only person I have ever met that I could almost see. The only completely white person. Not Caucasian; white. I liked it.

I do wonder if she knows I'm blind, and, if she does, if she thinks I'm even more of a freak than I already am. Or does she accept it?

"Hey, Iggy," I hear Ella say. "Do you want to help Mom and me bake cookies?"

"Sure." As I follow her into the kitchen, I have a sudden thought. Does Skie like chocolate-chip cookies, too?

Skie's POV

I wake up and the antiseptic smell that hits me makes my head throb even more and twists my stomach into knots. White; that's all I see. White walls, white floors, white sheets. I start to panic-Was that whole thing just a simulation? Am I still at the lab?-before I remember that I am not at the lab, but a hospital. It doesn't help with the nausea, though.

I am the only one in the room; there are no bustling nurses, Dr. Martinez, or mutants like me. Like me. Finally, someone like me. But we weren't exactly alike. They must have been those "special" experiments the scientists cared so much about. Well, as much as an evil, psychotic scientist can care. I had never seen any other avian-humans; it had been just me and some dying fish-people.

What makes them so special, anyway? What makes them any different than me? I think bitterly.

A faint knock on the door snaps me out of my reverie; "You have some visitors, Skye," a nurse says. The blind boy from before, and a Hispanic girl that I hadn't seen before, entered; the girl held a plate wrapped in aluminum foil.

"We brought you cookies," she said. "Iggy thought you might like some. I'm Ella, by the way." Cookies? Ella lifted the foil, and the smell of warm, baked goodness wafted to into my nose. Cookies! I immediately grabbed one and gobbled it down. They were chocolate chip; they were fresh, with the chips still melting. Ella laughed, and a ghost of a smile flickered on Iggy's lips.

The taste alone brought back childhood memories. Well, the few good ones before I became a freak of nature to my parents and was sold as a guinea pig.

Mommy holds me tight, rocking back and forth, back and forth. I am crying. "There, there, sweetie. Everything will be alright," she whispers. "But M-Mommy, they were so mean!" I wail. "Skie, they were just jealous. Your hair's so pretty." She blows lightly on my forehead, whishing my white bangs up; I giggle. "Don't pay attention to what those mean people say, no matter what." Wiping my tears, she hands me a cookie. Chocolate chip; my favorite! I greedily eat it, hearing Mommy chuckle in delight.

I sighed; that seemed so long ago, and it was.

"You okay?" Ella sounds worried.

"Yeah, I'm fine. Just wish I didn't have to stay in this place," I responded. It was true; I hated how the clean smell of medicine brought back the bad memories. The ones of prodding needles, tingling flesh, harsh treatment. I shudder. "It's just….well, you'll probably think it's stupid….it's the smell that bothers me."

"I know how you feel. I hate it, too," Iggy agreed.

"Maybe when you're a bit better, Mom can arrange for you to stay at our house instead," Ella suggested.

"Anything's better than this place; it's too….white. Enough to make a person go crazy!" I said. Iggy sat down on the bed next to me.

"I've been in a place whiter than this: Antarctica," he says. I raise an eyebrow.

"Really? What was it like?"

"I felt so happy because I could finally see something! And it was freezing cold and the one place uninhabited by humans. As for what it was like, it was desolate except for the scientists we were helping, the bad guys chasing after us, and the occasional flock of penguins."

I laughed at the last part, but on the inside I felt sad.

You can't see?" I ask. His smile drooped.

"No, I'm blind," he said shortly.

"Oh." My voice is no more than a whisper.

"You should sleep now. Dr. Martinez said you're badly injured and need rest," he says. I start to protest, then realize he's right. I am dead tired. I close my eyes. Even though he's blind, I can still sense that Iggy's piercing blue eyes are watching me.

LaughingLlama: Hoped you liked it! R&R please, and no flames! Also, I have some great ideas for when Skie is allowed to leave the hospital, and begins to live with Dr. Martinez and the Flock. There will be one chapter inbetween that one and this one, but I need a filler idea! PM me any ideas, I will gratefully accept them! Thanks:)