Chapter 11, yay! Sorry if I confused some of you guys… Anyway, updates are getting later and later! (Oh nooooooooooooooo) Because exams are overrrrr, all the after-school activities have started again. Yeap. And I need the write inspiration! Geddit? Like, write and right. Ah well. Go corny.

Anyway, I'm not really good at writing fighting scenes, so sorry. And sorry if you don't get the lemonade and chocolate thing.

Disclaimer: I do not own Maximum Ride or any characters associated with the story.

Chapter 11: Truths, Lies and Pervs

"Pedophile?" Ari momentarily paused. A look of surprise flickered across his face.

"I saw you with that kid! It got me scarred me for life!" I yelled.

"Oh, what do I care about what you call me?" he growled and got into a fighting stance.

"Get away from her!" Fang shouted as he ran towards us.

Then Ari made his first mistake.

He turned around.

I'm not sure how it was possible for me to send Ari a flying kick from my position, but I still did it. Ari dropped onto the ground with a loud thud just as Fang caught up, barely even panting. He immediately leaped on Ari and rained punches onto his stomach. I edged away from the edge of the cliff so that there won't be a chance of Ari pushing me off again.

I stood by and watched, waiting to get into action. Fang was holding off well on his own, and I didn't want to get into his way. Ari yelped as Fang managed to get him in the collarbone. He snarled and before I knew it, he managed to clap his hand around Fang's ears.

"Shit," I muttered and launched myself at Ari. I copied his move and cupped my palms around his ears. But I did it Max style, 'cause I'm funny that way.

Ari shrieked and dropped onto the ground like a rock, writhing in agony. His eardrums had most probably popped.

Ouch.

I looked at him, wiping the blood away from my nose.

So you must be wondering, who the heck is Ari?

Remember what I said about Jeb? And about me and my… disturbing past that I didn't want to talk about? Well, here goes.

You see, Jeb Batchelder works at this… lab. I don't know what they do there, but I have a pretty vague idea. Something to do with genetics, I guess. I don't want to talk about it. Anyway, I met Ari from there. Obviously, Fang knew about Ari since he was my best friend after all. He knew everything about me.

Nah, he's not a stalker or anything. Fang's my best friend!

I blinked rapidly as a flashback ran through my mind.

Jeb had brought me to the lab one day.

"Max, you can do whatever you want here. Just don't get lost, 'kay?" he said to me kindly. I nodded and my hair flew into my face. I blew it out.

I had been wandering around the hallway, peeping into rooms. When I turned a corner, I had the first shock of my life.

I saw Ari pinning a younger kid against the wall. His body was pressed against the kid's and he was whispering something into her ear. The little girl looked frightened out of her wits.

"What are you doing?" I asked.

Ari and the girl turned to look at me. The girl sent me a "help me!" look and I immediately knew what Ari had in mind.

"You pervert!" I screamed and ran back to Jeb, still screaming.

After a private session with Ari, Jeb told me that Ari had simply been bullying the girl. He had nothing indecent in mind.

But it had scarred me all the while.

"This won't be the last you hear from me," Ari hissed and picked himself up clumsily before running off into the darkness like a drunkard.

Way to break my train of thoughts.

I felt Fang's arms, ropy and hard, wrap around me.

"You okay?" he asked quietly.

"Mhm," I muttered. "Thanks. You okay?"

"Yeah."

"Your ears are alright, right?" I asked worriedly.

"Yeah."

I sighed. Fang remained silent. As usual. However, he didn't let go of me.

I liked it like that.

After a moment, a thought occurred to me.

"What are we going to tell the others? I mean like, Carmen was there and all!" Crap.

An unholy grin played with Fang's mouth. Did he learn that from Iggy or something? I mean like, yeah, it's not everyday Fang smiles like that.

In fact, that was the first time I saw him smile like that. Iggy's evil grin.

This was going to be really bad.

"He was going to WHAT?!"

"OMG!"

"R…ra… I don't even want to say that word!"

Hah. Fang and his brilliant idea. Now everyone thinks that Ari was a pedophile who preyed on helpless, little girls like moi. Amazingly, Fang had managed to explain that in so few words I didn't think it was possible.

"Yep," he said.

"And then Fang must have saved Max!" Angeline shouted.

"Yeah…" Iggy said thoughtfully. "The handsome prince saving the damsel in distress. What could this lead to?"

Fang started to look uncomfortable. Hooray for backfiring plans!

"But I don't understand! I mean like, that Ari person even knew Max and Fang's names!"

I snapped my head up and looked at her. This could get out of hand. They musn't know.

"Stupid stalker," Fang muttered loudly and stalked up to the room.

Everyone laughed.

Fang and his brilliant ideas.

"What are you doing here?" I scowled at Fang. He shot me a look.

"What do you think I'm doing here?" he replied.

This was the morning of the third day of the whole chalet, and we were at the Botanical Gardens. I know! How boring can this get? Time flies. It seemed like yesterday when we arrived at the chalet.

"To sell lemonade," Alvin said in a serious tone.

"Nah, it's chocolate." Fang's face was dead set and Alvin's face scrunched up.

"You need to poo?" he asked, eyebrows raised.

"You have not smelled those ribs," Fang shot me a deadly look. I felt heat creep up my face and I looked away pointedly.

"Why are there so many people in the toilet?" Zoe questioned as Carmen, Angeline, Michelle, and herself piled into the public toilet.

Firstly, no, the boys weren't in the girls' toilet and neither were the girls in the boys' toilet. Unfortunately, there was only one toilet near where we were in the botanical gardens and anyone could use it. Hence the large queue outside.

"I don't know!" Carmen said.

"Uhh…" Brandon muttered.

Just then, Iggy emerged from the restroom with a pair of scissors in his hand and his hair looking… weird.

"Your hair looks, uhm, different?" Zoe said hesitantly.

"Well, it was getting kind of long, so I decided to cut off a bit of the fringe and halfway through, I sneezed."

I snickered as the others burst into laughter at the idiocy of it all. Carmen entered the unoccupied bathroom, giggling like a maniac.

"Why are you even cutting your hair in the freaking botanical gardens, dude?!" Alvin said incredulously.

"Iggy… you're blind. How can you cut your own hair? What if you like, poke yourself in the eyes with the scissors or something?!" Zoe said, alarmed.

"Do you actually think I'm that stupid?" He scowled, crossed.

"Yep," we said in unison.

"Oh thanks a lot!"

I heard a faint burst of giggles coming from the toilet.

"Stop… making… me… laugh!" Carmen's small and high-pitched voice squealed. "Calm down, breathe in, breathe out," we heard her say to herself.

Fang raised an eyebrow.

She flushed and came out of the toilet giggling.

"Oh my god trust me on this, NEVER LAUGH WHILE YOU PEE. Or never pee while you laugh. Because it'll be like super hard! Yeah!" She jumped up and down.

"Why?" I asked, curious.

"Come on! Look! It's the squatting toilet. We can't even aim properly! And when you're like laughing, it goes all – "

"No need the gory info, thank you very much," Alvin said, looking grossed out.

"Well, at least we men can aim properly after years of practice," Iggy said, with a hint of pride in his voice.

"Would you like the honor of teaching us the ole' arts of aiming, master?" Michelle asked.

"OMG major ewwness!" Carmen squealed. I was speechless.

"I read about some thingamajig that can help people aim!" Angeline suddenly piped up after being miraculously silent for so long.

"People?" Fang said doubfully, as Alvin went into the toilet for his turn.

"Girls. Yeap."

I flinched at the horrible images going through my mind right now.

"Unnecessary info!" I shouted and covered my ears with my hands.

"Totally," Michelle said.

"Perv!" Zoe exclaimed.

Angeline smiled and shot us her classic perverted look.

This is the kind of people I've been around with.

I know, it's sad.