Harlow's PoV

Something was wrong. I couldn't put my finger on what it was, exactly, but something was up-not right. I scanned the beach, propping myself up on my elbows, and my eyes wandered to Andrew. He was playing about thirty yards away, near the water, building a sandcastle. The rest of the bird kids were walking towards me, all with different expressions. Savannah looked angry, but also something in her eyes looked contrary then her normal air. Instead of the usual mix of authority, concern, and snarky humor, she looked almost slightly dazed, happy.

Happy in not a normal way, per say, but in a way that implied she'd just been, for example, kissing Chase. Chase looked almost the same way, but he also was frustrated, and a little embarrassed. From what, I'd have to ask him later. Felix and Ash both had their heads down, and I noticed they were avoiding each other. I broke the silence. "So...what happened?" Chase looked at Savannah, who glared down at Felix and Ash. "Nothing." She said pointedly. "We'll talk about it later."

Ash sat down. "Sorry, Chase, Savannah." She muttered. Chase draped an arm around her shoulder. "It's okay, just don't do it again." I narrowed my eyes. "Don't do what again?"

"We won't, we promise." Felix added, and his face was red. "What are you talking about?" I asked again, a little louder. "Good." Savannah said, but she smiled a bit. I leaped up. "Someone tell me what's going on!" I yelled. The flock's heads all turned towards me. "What's wrong?" Chase asked. I crossed my arms, wanting to cry. "I'm sick of you guys ignoring me and making me feel like I'm not important. I'm sick of you all acting like I'm not here, and none of you want to talk to me anymore. I'm sick of being Andrew's mom. I love him to death, but I'm doing everything! Can't you guys be responsible?" I shrieked, then jumped up into the air, flinging out my wings, and flying away from them.

When I was about ten thousand feet high and about thirty miles safely away, I let tears fall where none of the flock could see me. I hated feeling this way; but sometimes I couldn't help it. When you needed to cry, sometimes it was better to cry rather to store up all that emotion, I found. So I cried. The wind whipped in my eyes, freeze-drying my tears to my face. It stung, but almost in a good way. After flying for fifteen or so more minutes, I didn't want to fly anymore, just curl up somewhere and scream. Or cry. Or both.

I swooped downward in a large arc, scanning the ground for a place to land. I spotted a field amongst the abundantly rolling hills, and gladly landing there. The air was cooler in this slightly higher altitude than the beach, but still warm. It was quiet, very quiet. The only sounds I heard here were few birds chirping, the faint sound of a stream nearby, and the rustling of grass. I sat, tucking in my wings. I was subconsciously being quiet, as if being loud would disturb this part of the hushed earth. (A/N-oh, so poetic, right? xD)

I ran my fingers across my face, brushing away stray tears. I closed my eyes and fell forwards, laying on my stomach and feeling the sun warming my neck. I sighed, wishing I could stay here for awhile.

After many minutes, a thought crossed my mind that had entered before. What if I left the flock? No, this wasn't some spontaneous thing, it'd occurred to me many times.

I didn't feel needed. I don't know if I am a hindrance to Chase and Savannah, now that I think about it. I'm older than they are, therefore resulting in me being expired first, most likely. I'm quiet, and certainly not as well as a fighter as them. A shiver coursed through me, and I felt scared. Trying to remember all my past years with the flock, I closed my eyes shut tightly, rubbing my temples. None of the times I'd been the hero. I'd never personally saved anyone, or make quick, amazing escapes or had any brilliant plans.

I clenched my jaw so tightly it ached, to stop the tears that fell. They. Didn't. Need. Me. The only reason they'd probably kept me with them is because I took care of Andrew, I was his "mom."

Even thinking about this broke my heart.

Suddenly, I felt a thin, bony hand touch my back, right on my wings. Mostly running on instinct, I leaped up, snapped my wings open and hands gripping into fists. What I saw made me feel terrified and full of complete, utter wonder: it was a wrinkled, old, smiling man who looked around 70. He was wearing a white loose, dirty shirt and black pants and shoes. He had a little white hair, and a long white beard. Twinkling blue eyes that also smiled, and a few teeth missing. But what surprised me most was the fact that he had wings. Pure and white wings that were so pure and white I almost had to squint while looking at them when the light hit.

They nearly sparkled; they were so bright and beautiful. "W-who are you?" I couldn't help saying in surprise. The old man grinned so widely his eyes were slits. "I'm Horace! Who are you, child?"

His voice was old-sounding (A/N if that makes sense hahaha) and very, very friendly. "Uh...Harlow." I replied. This man seemed harmless, so I didn't see any point to lying. And even if he was evil, he looked to frail to really do much damage. Looks could be deceiving, though, so I decided to be careful. "Well, aren't you a young, pretty thing!" He exclaimed, slapping his knee with a hysterical laugh. I didn't understand what was so funny-did he have something wrong with his mind? "Thank you." I replied, forcing a smile on my face.

He nodded, placing his hands on his hips. "Now, what's a bird-child like you doing without a flock?" My mouth dropped. "I-um...have a flock." I muttered. "Why aren't you with them? One should never travel alone, you know. Facing enemies are hard enough when with a flock." He told me. I nodded. "I know, but I-" I took a deep breath and raised my chin confidently. "I'm quitting my flock. They don't need me."

The man, Horace, looked disappointed. "Now that's just wrong, child. Every person in every flock needs each other." I shook my head, trusting this man, for reasons I didn't understand. "Mine doesn't need me. I'm not the best fighter, I never have good plans, all I do is take care of the four year old." My eyes stung.

Horace pursed his lips. "You know, taking care of the young child is one of the most important things can do in a flock." I blinked. "How so?" I asked. "Most avian-humans can fight, because of powers they have or natural abilities. They are created to fight, created to be better than the rest. Very few have the ability to be a mother, since most of the recombinant life forms don't have mothers, so little have the touch. Do you have the "touch", child? " He asked with a small smile.

I looked down, never thinking about it that way before. "I suppose...that I do. It feels very natural being a mom of sorts, anyway." Horace nodded. "See? Let me guess-you are the oldest in your flock, but not the leader."

I looked up with a frown. "Yes, how did you know?" I asked carefully. Horace waved his hand. "Educated guess. It makes sense-a leader is not quiet or shy, like you are." I was a little surprised that he judged me that quickly, but it was true. "And about your age, well, the Institute started a new generation of recombinant avian-humans seventeen years ago, and you seem about fifteen or sixteen. So, scientifically speaking, you must be the oldest in your flock."

I blinked. "Well, yes. I am. There are two leaders in my flock, a boy and a girl who are both fourteen." I said. Horace smiled again. "So why exactly are you here?" I frowned. "I got fed up with my flock. They were ignoring me and stuff and I just kind of snapped."

"You should go back." Horace said seriously. I shook my head. "I-can't. They don't want me. I'm the weakest link." "Why don't you just ask them? If they don't want you, I mean." My eyebrows rose at his statement. "I can't just ask them, they wouldn't tell the truth, obviously." I pointed out. Horace nodded slowly, "That may be true, but I doubt it. Think about it, child, if they didn't want you, your flock would have kicked you out long ago, or at least made you stay behind during missions."

I'd never thought about that before, either. This man was giving me some kind of hope that I hadn't thought about before. "I under-" Before I could finish the sentence, a tall, slim, Caucasian girl had practically materialized at the edge of the meadow-she came so quietly I hadn't heard her. She wore a frown, a knife was in her hand, and she was looking at me menacingly.

Apparently, Horace saw me staring and also turned around. "Indianna!" He called, motioning her over. "You came back quicker than I expected!" The girl walked towards us with sharp, precise steps that made me think of a military commander. "Who are you." She asked, or rather- demanded an answer-with a scowl. "Uh-Harlow." I stammered. Horace shook his head. "Pardon Indy. She is rather-harsh." Then turning to Indy, he shook his finger at her. "Please be nicer to our guest. And please remove that scowl, too."

Indy opened her mouth like she wanted to protest, but then closed it, rolling her eyes. "Whatever." She said. I offered a slight smile. "Hi." Indy thought for a second, then returned a slightly-sarcastic smile. "Hi. What are you doing here."

I was a little surprised at her abruptness. "I was just being here." I tried to explain. "Then Mr-um-Horace-came." Indy raised her eyebrows. "Gotcha." She pushed her long, hazelnut hair over her shoulder. "You're a bird kid?"

I shook out my wings just a little to show her I was. "Abandoned my flock." I joked a little. Indy didn't think that was funny. "Why'd you leave?" "They didn't want me." I said shortly. "Ahh, that's where the question is!" Horace said, raising a finger. "We don't know that for sure."

"So...what are you planning to do? Stay with us?" Indy said in a biting tone. "That, in fact, is a rather fine idea!" Horace said happily, clapping his hands together. "At least for a few days, so you can get your feelings sorted out about your flock!" I glanced at Indy out of the corner of my eye. "Would...you mind?" I asked hesitantly.

"Of course not!" Horace said, at the same time Indy said "duh we'd mind!" They both looked at each other, and I could see them debating each other with their expressions. Finally Indy turned to me and sighed. "I guess a few days won't hurt, will it?"

Felix's PoV

"I can't believe Harlow is GONE!" Ash wailed, throwing her head dramatically into her hands. Savannah patted her head a bit. "She'll be back, she just probably went to cool off. I didn't get what was wrong with her, though, did anyone else get it?" We looked at each other. "Uh, we were kind of ignoring her." I offered.

Chase frowned. "Yeah. Maybe she felt like she was left out." Ash looked up. "I don't think she wants drama, do you?" Savannah shook her head. "Nope. We were kind of leaving her out, right?" Our conversation trailed off, seeing as though none of us had an answer for that.

Chase stood up, brushing sand off his cargo shorts he'd gotten. "So, we ready to take off?" He looked at the sky. "It's probably around two o'clock." "Can we go laser tagging?" I asked. Ash's mouth dropped. "YES YES YES, pleeeeeeease can we?" She begged with me. Chase grinned. "Our day of fun couldn't be complete with out it, don't you agree, Savannah?" She frowned. "I guess we can..." "YAY!" Screamed Ash, and I cheered too.

We headed down the beach, grabbed a protesting Andrew, and jumped into the air, flying away from the beach. I decided that I didn't want to go back there, because of the whole incident with Ash. I didn't like the beach much, anyway. "So where might we find a laser tagging place?" Savannah asked. Chase grinned. "I think I've said this three times before, but this is California! We'll find it somewhere."

Turns out, we didn't find it until about twenty minutes of searching. Actually, we went to a kiosk thing on a main road to find out. But when we got there, all that searching seemed totally worth it. When we walked in, it was all dark but had neon flashing lights. There was a bored, female employee draped at a counter and a group of teenage boys who looked around seventeen or so across the room. We walked over to the counter. "Hi." The employee said lazily, not bothering to smile. "Hi. Us four want to play." Chase motioned to us, and Andrew was already gazing longingly at a playroom with toys for little kids, I assumed. (A/N-i doubt these exist, but...sorry, no laser tagging for four year olds xD)

The girl nodded. "You guys wanna play alone or with those guys?" She nodded her head towards the teenagers. "With the teenagers." Savannah said, with a slightly evil grin. "Yo, Andre!" The girl yelled at the teens, and one of 'em sauntered over. "What up." He said, bored voice matching the girl's. "These kids wanna play you and your gang." She looked back at us. "Y'all are gettin' your butts kicked." She added.

I almost could laugh, 'cuz I knew she was wrong. If we could easily destroy swarms of Erasers and Flyboys and M-geeks, we knew some gymnastic and ninja moves, then shooting a few guys with plastic guns would be easy. "We'll see about that." Ash said sweetly, batting her eyelashes at the worker in a very innocent, little girl way.

She never did that to me.

The teenage boy, Andre, leaned over and put his face near Chase's. "Easy win." He snarled with an evilish grin. Chase raised his eyebrows in a super cool confident way. "Hope you like losing." He retorted.

Savannah's PoV

I couldn't help but laughing as the teen guy backed away from Chase a bit, surprised at his confidence. I stepped next to Chase and glared daggers into the guy's back, while his friends watched. He spoke to them for a moment, then all the guys laughed at us, I assumed. The employee, who had a name tag that read Azure, looked slightly interrested now as she walked us over through a black door into an equally dark room. It had weird, dimmed lights, and the whole thing kind of reminded me of a kids play land, except much bigger, and more intense. I grinned as we suited up in this bulky chest pad thing, and Azure handed us guns. Ash had insisted on the pink one.

"Savannah?" Felix touched my arm softly. "What about Harlow?" He whispered. I looked down at him and all his nine-year-old-ness. His chestnut hair was messy but clean from the ocean, and his hazel eyes looked so concerned even in the dark. I suddenly felt really bad for yelling at him earlier, after all, he was just a kid! I resisted the urge to gather him into my arms for a hug, because we were in front of a bunch of obnoxious teenagers. "She needed her time to be by herself, I think." I replied quietly. "She wouldn't want to do this."

Felix nodded, still looking troubled. "You ready to kick some teenage butt?" I asked him with a wicked smile, distracting him. Felix grinned. "Yeah." He said, semi-enthusiastically. "They're going DOWN!" I patted his shoulder. "That's the Felix I know."

"Okay, guys, I think we all know the rules." Azure said, looking bored again. "No running, climbing, physical contact. Be careful. Have fun." Then she left the room. "Bye." We looked at the teenage boys, automatically assembling some sort of cool Flock pose. "No wings." I muttered to them. "No showing, no drawing them out. Got it?" They all nodded. "This is gonna be SO much fun." Ash giggled.

I stepped forward. "You guys ready?" I (ahem) graciously asked the boys. One of them, not Andre, (A/N-AHHAHA i just realized how much "Andre" sounds like "Andrew"...whoops!) stepped forward. "Oh, we're more than ready. What'dya say we make bet on this, huh?" He smirked. My eyes flickered over to Chase, who nodded. "Remember, we're bird-kids." Chase whispered so only we could hear, "we can beat anyone." Then louder he said, "go ahead, Savannah, raise the stakes high." Then lower again, only to me, "freak 'em out." I grinned. "If we win, each of you guys give us twenty bucks." There were seven teenagers.

The guys laughed. "Easy win! And if we-pardon me-WHEN we win-" the main guy turned to the rest of his gang, talking to them in hushed tones. Then he turned back to me. "You guys buy my gang pizza, while the oldest girl-" he nodded towards me, "goes on a date with me."

Immediately, I felt Chase stiffen. "Deal." I said without hesitation. "Deal!" said Andre. We shook hands, and I used my super bird-kid strength to all but crush his hand. I saw his face whiten in pain, but he didn't make a sound. He ripped his hand away. "You've got three minutes to plan." He said, voice wobbling a little.

I walked away with my flock to the opposite side of the room, and Chase took both of my wrists and faced me. "Savannah, what are you doing!" He muttered urgently. I flipped my wrist so my hands were in his. "It's okay, Chase," I said calmly, "you said it yourself, we can win." He leaned his forehead against mine. "I know, I just don't like it...what if they cheat or something, and they win?" I shrugged. "I don't know, but it won't happen. We'll find some way to do this."

Slowly, Chase pressed his lips on mine. I let the kiss linger only a second, because Ash and Felix were standing right there. Thankfully, they were not paying attention to us, but instead Felix was showing Ash how to work the laser gun. I broke our lips apart. "Why are you doing this." I whispered. Even in the dark, Chase's white teeth gleamed. "Just in case." He said teasingly. Ahh, Chase. Always the humor. I loved him.

I stepped away from him, lips warm and tingling. "Alright, flock. You ready to do this?" Felix raised his hand. "Hey, I've got the best idea ever. We can soooooo beat them."

We huddled like football players, arms around each other's waists as Felix told us his-can you say brilliant?-plan. "Felix, have you done this before?" I asked, knowing he hadn't but he seemed so experienced that he could have. "Nope, but I've always wanted too." Felix laughed, and just then, the lights dimmed even more till we were almost in pitch black, which was absolutely no problem for us bird-kids, and our handy-dandy raptor vision.

"Three." A robotic, playback message filled the room, beginning our countdown. I tensed, suddenly getting a crazy-awful flashback about the School, and it's experiments.

"Two." A cold, icy chill swept down my back as I pushed memories away, reminding myself this was ONLY a game, and we had to win this.

"One." By now I was in full-out battle mode, and so was the rest of my flock, holding their guns.

"Begin!"

Ooooh, cliffy! Sort of... not really.

So, there you have it. Don't think it was as long as the last one, but it has some pretty important stuff that happened. So...yes. REVIEW! 3