Hello good people of the world! How are you? Are you ready for another update? Good, 'cause that's exactly what you're getting. I hoped you enjoyed my last chapter. We went back to Elisabeth and Iggy. They'd had a month without Melody and weren't doing so great. Well, in this chapter we go to Melody. She's had an entire month at the School. Before we see what's been going on with her, I do have a couple of things to say. First, I won't be updating for awhile 'cause I'm leaving for the beach on Friday. Wish I had a laptop, but my dad's too cheap to get one. Second thing, big thanks to my ONLYreviewer, as of now, Selene Darkmoon. This one's for you Selene! Okay, read and review 'NeoFlock' and 'Deadline' by Talon666 and 'My Life to the Max' by angelicreader6. Three terrific stories by two terrific people. You will love them, please trust me on this one. They are my two of my biggest supporters, even though they are currently MIA, and I'm trying to help them out. Okay then, I suppose I better get on with the chapter for those of you kind enough to read this. I know I have tons of readers, but I have very little reviewers. As I said before, currently Selene Darkmoon's my only reviewer. I would love it if some of you readers became reviewers. It would make me very happy. You can criticize the story all you want. In fact, I'd love that. I would love to know what people think of my writing. I would loveto know what I need to improve on and what you guys like. I mean, I enjoy getting good reviews that tell me how awesome this story is, but you can still tell me my story is excellent and tell me what you think I need to work on. I promise I won't get mad. Not even if you say I have a bunch of mistakes or that you just don't like the story very much at all. You can even tell me you hate it, just review. Okay, well I'm done with this really long note. On with the chapter! Enjoy!

The whole School was sitting outside in the blazing hot sun, watching Tanner, Willow, and Flint fly around, showing off for buyers and investors. We all had to watch which, in my opinion, was completely stupid and utterly pointless.

Once a month, scientists and other people from other countries came to the School to buy experiments. That's why we had to train all the time. This time we lost five experiments, including Stella, a three year old girl I had met a week earlier in testing and had taken a liking to. Afterwards, Tanner, Willow, and Flint put on a show. The Director thought it would be a showcase of what the other experiments could do after they were properly trained.

Everyone started clapping, so I looked down onto the field. They had just finished and were bowing. Everyone started filing out of the stands and I felt Jewel tap me on the arm. I stood up, stretched, and looked at her.

"We can go back to our rooms now." she said simply. I supposed she didn't feel up to much talking which was sort of unusual. I followed her and Skye out of the stands, ready to escape the crowd and the intense heat.

The second we stepped inside, I was met with a blast of refreshing, cold air. (The School had to have air conditioning.) I put my hand to my face and noticed that it was sweaty, sticky, and grimy.

I turned to Jewel. "I'm gonna go to the bathroom. I feel like crap and I think I have a sunburn on the back of my neck." I said, feeling my neck.

Definitely sunburned. I thought, wincing.

"Okay." Jewel said, sounding rather glum. "See you back in the room."

I had just turned around when Jewel shouted. "Oh, Mel don't forget. We have to be in the training room in about a half hour."

I nodded. "Right. See you later." I swung a left and headed for the nearest bathroom. It didn't take a long time to find one. It was just three doors down on the right.

I walked into the bathroom, a much cooler breeze hit my sweaty face. The door slammed shut and I walked over to the sink and looked in the cracked mirror. I looked awful. My face was red, sweaty, and dirty (presumably from the occasional warm wind blowing around dust outside).

I turned on the faucet and splashed the cold water on my face. It felt so much better. I turned off the faucet, grabbed a handful of the cheap paper towels the School used, and wiped my face clean.

I took another look in the mirror. My face was still red, but I could fix that. I closed my eyes and concentrated hard on my sunburned face and neck. Several seconds later, I opened my eyes and the sunburns were gone.

"Much better." I muttered to myself. I then noticed that my throat was dry so I turned the faucet back on and cupped my hands. I brought the water up to my face and took a drink. The water trickled down my dry throat and I was relieved.

I turned the water back off and wiped my wet hands on my very dirty jeans. I couldn't wait until we escaped and I'd get to go home. Back to sunscreen, hot baths, my dad's delicious cooking, my comfortable bed, and clean clothes. I never realized how good a clean shirt made you feel until I came to the School.

Had it really only been a month? It seemed longer. It felt like an eternity since I'd had a good meal or a warm shower. At the School, all we ever got to eat were sandwiches and we had to take freezing cold, fifteen minute showers once a week.

I looked over my shoulder at the mirror one last time. I wondered if my mom had looked this bad when she was at the School.

No. I decided. She was strapped to a cold metal table day in and day out, only being let up to go to the bathroom and for testing. She didn't get the crud beat out of her on a daily basis.

With that thought in mind, I opened the door and started to make my way down the hall for training. I figured I had been in the bathroom for at least fifteen minutes. I needed to get down there so I would be on time.

I walked into the elevator at the end of the hall. I pushed the button that would take me to the basement. Just as the doors were closing, Tanner came into view. He got there just before the doors had fully closed and wrenched them apart, stepping in.

I rolled my eyes and thought, Great, just what I needed.

Tanner smiled at me and said, "Oh, hello Melody. Fancy meeting you here."

"Oh yeah." I said, as sarcastically as possible. "It's a real pleasure. A nice treat."

"Oh Melody. Don't be like that." he said, putting his hand on my shoulder.

I looked at the buttons on the elevator. Tanner had stopped it. Perfect. I was stuck in there until he was finished with me.

"What do you want?" I asked, throwing his arm off me.

He put his face close to mine. "I just want to know why you're wasting your time with Jewel and Skye. They're nothing but trouble."

I moved away from him. "I like them. They're my friends."

He came closer to me. "Really? Would real friends let you get hurt to protect them?" he asked, pulling the sleeve of my shirt up, revealing a pretty nasty burn I'd gotten from that electric cattle prod the other week. I tried to heal it, but it was useless.

I threw his arm off of me again, ignoring him.

"Would real friends hate you?" he whispered in my ear.

I backed away from him. "Jewel doesn't hate me." I answered back, truthfully, defiantly.

"Maybe she doesn't," he said, so close that I could feel his breath on the back of my neck, "but what about Skye? If he's your friend, then why does he hate you so much? Why do you want to be friends with someone like that?"

I didn't say anything. What could I say? It was true that Skye probably hated me. But I wasn't telling Tanner the reasons that I put up with Skye were because he cared about Jewel and because I thought he was cute.

"See?" he asked, still breathing on the back of my neck. "If I was you, I'd ditch them for people who would like me."

"Like who?" I asked, though I already knew his answer.

"Well, like me." he answered as I knew he would. "I like you…Mel." he said, using my nickname for the first time.

I couldn't tell if he was telling the truth or not, but either way, there was no way I was helping the Director.

Noticing my silence he said, "You can talk Jewel into it if you want. I know you really do like her. We'd be more than happy to let her join too." He wrapped his arms around my waist for added effect.

I couldn't believe what he was doing. He was trying to seduce me. What he didn't know was that he was failing miserably.

"C'mon Mel." he whispered in my ear. "Whadda ya say? I can show you things. Amazing things. Things you never dreamed of doing."

I'd had enough. I threw his arms off me and turned the elevator back on. "I say that there is no way I'm ever going to join you." I stared into his eyes, filled with anger. "And keep your hands off me." I added, just as the elevator came to a stop and the doors slid open.

I walked out and heard him shout, "You're on the losing side Melody! You just wait, you'll come crawling to me one of these days!"

I kept walking, not turning around. Part of me wanted to burst into tears. I was really afraid of Tanner now. I'd never been afraid of anything in my life, but I was terrified of him. But another stronger part of me knew that if I showed fear around Tanner, he'd make everything much worse.

I threw open the doors to the training room to find Skye doing one armed pushups and Jewel hitting a punching bag.

I stormed over to Jewel, grabbing the punching bag next to her. I began beating it as hard as I could, pretending it was Tanner.

Jewel stopped what she was doing and looked at me. "Mel, is something wrong? I've never seen you act like this."

I gave the punching back a good hard smack. "I ran into Tanner on the elevator."

At this piece of news, Skye stopped what he was doing so he could listen too.

"Know what happened?" I asked Jewel, who just shook her head. "He tried to get me to join the stupid Director again."

"How?" Jewel asked, looking nervous at my rage.

I took a deep breath, trying to remain perfectly calm. "He started saying bad stuff about the two of you. He said if he was me he'd hang out with people who actually like me."

Jewel stared open mouthed. "But I like you."

"I know Jewel. But Tanner knows how Skye sort of hates me." I noticed Skye's eyes avert down to the floor. He began his pushups again.

"But Skye doesn't hate you either." Jewel said, giving him a 'Look'.

I didn't say anything about that comment. "Anyway, then Tanner told me he liked me. I couldn't tell if he was lying or not."

Jewel had a thoughtful look on her face. "I suppose he could be telling the truth. You are really pretty. Right Skye?" she asked, giving him a 'Look' again.

Skye said nothing but kept going with his pushups. "Eighty-two." I thought I heard him mutter.

"Okay." I said, not sure how to take the weird way Jewel was acting. "So, he started calling me 'Mel' which freaked me out. He kept touching me and coming close to me and whispering in my ear." I shuddered just thinking about it.

"That is freaky." Jewel said, going back to her punching bag.

I gave mine another good, hard punch. "I've decided we're going tonight." I told them.

"We're escaping tonight?" Skye asked, saying the first words I'd heard him utter all day.

"Yeah." I answered. "The plan's really simple. I'll explain it in our room later. Max's plans weren't complicated either. Straightforward." I punched the punching bag harder.

"Sounds good to me." Jewel said. "I didn't figure it would be too complicated. Security's not very tight late at night."

"Right." I said. "Now, we better not talk about this until we're in our room. I know the security cameras don't have audio, but they can still read lips. We'll discuss it away from cameras, in our room."

Jewel and Skye nodded and we went back to training silently.

I could almost taste the sweet, sweet freedom. I had decided to stay with Jewel and Skye for one night to show them what they needed to know for survival. Then I'd be off, on my way home.

Home. I thought, smiling to myself. Back to my wonderfully crazy family. Back to explosions in the garage and Max beating up Fang and my dad for being idiots. Back to Angel reading everyone's minds and causing chaos. I couldn't wait to get home.

So, will that tide you all over until I get back from the beach? I hope so. I also hope that I'll have tons of reviews when I get back. Anyway, read and review this story and check out 'NeoFlock' and 'Deadline' by Talon666 and 'My Life to the Max' by angelicreader6. Hope you all are having an excellent summer. Oh, later on I'm thinking about putting up a Twilight story and a Harry Potter one. The Twilight one will be a story for Seth Clearwater and the Harry Potter one will be for the Weasley twins, leaning on a particular twin later in the story. Anyway, I'll see you all later. Fly on!