Ash's PoV

I'm pretty sure it's a bad habit, but I always somehow end up listening to conversations I'm not supposed to hear, getting into other people's business and sometimes I end up in the wrong situations. For example; right now. One of the worst possible things that I could imagine happened now. Well, not the worst ever, like if someone died or broke both their wings or got horribly sick or something, but to me, it was pretty awful.

We had been flying towards Georgia for about four hours, which was a major haul for Andrew, but then we were above Tennessee and we'd stopped for a break on top of this small mountain chain we'd found. It was the Smokys, and from way up there it was an amazing view. Indy had stood up, folding in her shaky wings and slowly walking away about ten yards from us, leaning against a tree for support. I looked at Chase, who glanced concernedly at her. He followed after her, and motioned for her to follow him into the woods. Nobody else was really paying attention, but I was curious to know what was happening, so I jumped up and crept after them.

"Indy, you have a fear of flying, right?" Chase was asking gently. Indy's head was bent as if she almost looked defeated, which was totally surprising. Then she looked up, and very slowly, she nodded. "I just wanted to let you know that it's okay. You don't need to try to be tough all the time and disguise your weaknesses, because we all have them. It's part of life; no one is invincible." He said, very sweetly.

Indy had looked like she didn't know what to say. Then, to my total amazement, I saw Indy's eyes starting to well with tears. My mouth dropped...Indy? Cry? I watched closer as she blinked back tears, but her hard, stony look didn't come back. Instead she frowned a little. "Sometimes you have to be." She whispered. Chase touched her shoulder. "Why's that?"

I was starting to get alarmed at how physically close they were getting. "I know all us bird-kids have gone through a lot at the Schools we escaped from, but some have gone through more than others." Indy said softly. Chase waited for her to continue. "They treated her....me so cruel, Chase, I don't even want to talk about it. I get nightmares just thinking about it, and getting this close to the School; it's bringing back so much stuff that I perfected in forgetting." Indy kept her eyes lowered the whole time when she was talking, and at the end her eyes met Chase's.

They both didn't move, didn't speak, for the longest time until Chase's hand slipped from Indy's shoulder to her waist, and drew her into a hug. Indy hesitated for second, but she wrapped her arms around his neck and turned her face into his shoulder, so I couldn't see her face anymore. My insides grew cold. This didn't mean anything, right? Chase hugged all of us! But that little voice in the back of my mind reminded me that Indy wasn't part of this flock and Chase didn't hug people for that long. Maybe he was starting to like her? But wasn't that cheating on Savannah? No, they weren't together anymore...Still!

I didn't like this, at all. That's when the really bad thing happened: they broke apart, Indy was smiling a little; and Chase was too. He turned to go back to the rest of the flock, but before he'd taken a step, Indy grabbed his arm, whirled him around, and kissed him.

There was a split second where Chase didn't move, as if he was deciding whether or not to kiss her back. Indy kissed him again encouragingly, but then Chase tore his lips away. "Indy!" He cried, shaking his head. He sounded sad and super disappointed. "What are you doing!"

Relief flooded me. He must still love Savannah after all! Indy looked mad. "Chase!" She said, aggravated and upset and frustrated. But apparently she couldn't say anything else because she walked right past Chase without another word. I slipped away too, but broke out into a run to get there before Indy. I arrived right on time, skidding down next to Felix while trying to wipe any suspicious look of my face.

Now we were flying again, almost out of Tennessee, and I couldn't help but look at Chase and Indy. They were acting pretty normal, still sort-of interacting with each other and Chase kept talking to everyone else. It was as if nothing had ever happened.

Chase's PoV

It'd been nearly an hour, but my lips still burned from Indy's kiss. I was still horrified that she'd done that...didn't just yesterday we talked about how I was still in love with Savannah? I could feel my face grow red every time I looked at Indy and felt bad. I hoped I wasn't too harsh, because I liked Indy a lot, but kissing me was way out of line. I was still surprised she'd done that at all, it wasn't like her to show emotions like that. I glanced over at her, and caught her staring at me. When I met her gaze, she looked apologetic.

Still, I cringed at the pleasure I felt while holding Indy; near the same way I felt when I held Savannah. I didn't get why I felt that way, wished I didn't feel that way, but it was apparently not in my control.

Maybe it was just me, but it felt like this flight was taking four times longer than it should. We had too many people, maybe we were getting slowed down. I made a promise to myself that as soon as we found Savannah; we would have Horace and Indy leave. The smaller the flock, the less likely we are to die. Surely, they'd understand that. I hoped, that when this whole thing would be over, that there would be less tension and drama between us all, especially me and Savannah.

Savannah. Though my lips were still warm and my heart was still trying to steady itself after Indy, I wouldn't let her go. I loved her too much to ever let her go; even for another girl. What if she were dead? My mind brought up the thought I'd been pushing back for hours now. She's not dead, she could never die. I told myself firmly.

"Chase!" A voice interrupted my tangled up thoughts, and I looked over to see Harlow gliding over next to me. "We're about to cross over the Tennessee-Georgia border. Do you remember which library we have to go to?" She asked. It wasn't to hard to remember, because we've probably gone to a total of two libraries in our lives. "Yeah. It was the Lay Park Resource Center in Athens." I remembered. "Athens is not that far from Atlanta."

Harlow solemnly nodded. "Think we'll get there by tonight?" I rubbed my forehead, resisting the urge to point out that if we didn't have these two extra people, we'd be getting there a lot quicker. But then I remembered I was the one who let them stay. "Maybe. Depends. Tonight, or if we sleep, early tomorrow morning." Harlow glanced ahead at Andrew, who was starting to goof off a little. "I'm going to fly with Andrew for a bit."

She was about to fly ahead again when she stopped and looked at me seriously. "Chase, try to smile, okay? We all miss you." Then she was gone.

~

About an hour later, it was ten o'clock and we'd reached Athens, Georgia. All totally worn out from our long flight, we found a large, open prairie and crashed. None of us bothered to take watch, partly because we didn't think there were many threats right now, but mostly because we were too tired. I tried to think of a plan before we slept, anything to keep myself distracted, but my heavy eyelids fell shut and I couldn't open them again, giving in to the pull of sleep.

When I awoke, the sun was shining brightly on us, warming my shoulders and neck. I sat up, squinting, and looked around at my flock... And Horace and Indy. Everyone else was asleep, and I decided to let them for a few more minutes. It'd give me time to think, to plan, to...I found myself looking at each member of my flock, one at a time, smiling to myself at their varied faces. Harlow, as usual, looked serene and peaceful, as did Andrew. Ash's lips were pulled down in the slightest of frowns, and Felix's face was buried in Harlow's wing, who surrounded him and Andrew.

Today; the library. After that? No clue. All I could do was hope or pray that we found any bit of information from Andrew's book that would point us in some direction. This whole thing, it didn't make sense. What would a children's book we read weeks ago have anything to do with a kidnapping that occurred just now? It was crazy, the more I thought of it, so I tried not to think about it.

Finally I stood, very gently unfolding my sore, stiff wings and stretched them out, rubbing my arms to keep warmer in the October air. At least it was warmer down South...I wondered what we'd do in winter. Just as I was about to clap my hands loudly and announce for the flock to wait, a hand on my shoulder stopped me.

I whirled around, snapping out my fist and ready to punch whatever enemy had come to attack us, but before I could stop myself, realized it was Horace. He easily deflected my blow, grinning at me. "Good reflexes, child. Ahh, I remember, back in my day, when I was a strapping lad like you!"

I couldn't help but smiling back. Horace was so easy to like and be around. "Um, thanks. Sorry for almost...hurting you." He waved his hand, brushing away my comment. "No matter. I wanted to talk to you anyway, son."

This could either be a good or bad thing. "Yeah? What about?" I asked, as respectively as I could. Manners were, in fact, something I tried to pay attention to. "First of all," Horace began, sitting heavily down on a conveniently-placed rock. "I'd like to thank you for being such a good friend to my Indianna. You know, I noticed she's friendlier now, mainly because of you."

I looked down, a little uncomfortable. If only he knew how much friendlier she was getting... "No problem. She's pretty cool, once you get to know her." I admitted honestly. Horace nodded. "Poor thing. Had a hard life, especially since the death of her sister." He said sadly. "The death of...her sister?" I repeated dumbly. Indy had a sister?

Horace sighed. "The story, just awful, it was so awful. I'm not going into details, because I swore to Indy I wouldn't tell a soul. Son, you may want to ask her yourself." He looked at me pointedly, expectantly. Slowly I nodded. "Yeah, I may do..." I trailed off, already getting haunting images planted in my brain, of what, I wasn't sure. I turned away, not wanting the man to see my face. I felt as though he could practically read through my expressions and know what I was thinking. Kind of like how Savannah could, but that was because she knew me so well. With Horace it was just creepy; his normally-cheerful light blue eyes were staring right through me.

At that moment, thankfully, I heard the sounds of my flock starting to get up, and turned around. "Let's go, guys, we got a busy day today!" I called, helping Harlow to her feet, smoothing Ash's messed up hair, and clapping Felix on the back. "Are we going to find Savannah today?" Ash asked. "And my wings are all stiff." She pulled out her wings and shook them a little. "It's just because of the long flight, but we made it; we're in Georgia now." I explained. "You guys all ready to go?"

Andrew was uncharacteristically quiet, and Indy was very characteristically silent. Harlow nodded, worry lining her face, and Ash and Felix mumbled "Yes" with not much enthusiasm. Horace just kind of watched over us, as usual. He usually didn't say a whole lot anyway. I decided, as a leader, to give a pep talk. I was pretty good at those. "Guys, listen up." I announced, putting on my most eager smile but only half meaning it. "I know we're pretty discouraged because we have nothing to go by except a book, but for all we know, it could be the biggest clue pointing to where Savannah is that we have. Now, I don't expect you guys to be overflowing with cheerfulness or whatever, but I want you to have good, positive attitudes. I know I probably haven't been the best example, but from now on, we're going to smile. It's what we need, what we all need to see right now. I hate seeing you guys all sad, and I'm sure Savannah would too." I thought that was pretty good; I'd give it a 7 on a scale of encouraging speeches.

"What if she's dead?" Felix whispered, looking at his shoes. That had occurred to me more than once; many more times than once. I reached out and tilted up Felix's chin with my hand, so he was forced to look me in the eye. "She wouldn't die." I said, with a touch of my old humor back. "We wouldn't let her."

Indy's PoV

(Yep, so this is another special point of view that you won't see that often, but as I said; it's special!)

There we were, back in the air. It seemed all we ever did was fly now; and I was just sort of getting used to it; getting slowly over my fear of heights. What Chase said yesterday made me think; what he said about me trying to stop being invincible.

Really; if only he knew.

There were a lot of things he didn't understand about my past, about myself, but there was a part of me that told me he was right. I was cold, I was unfriendly. Could I help that? Showing emotion was wrong, so wrong. That's what they taught us at the Institute, what they drilled into our heads and punished us if we tried to have an opinion of our own, or even try to speak up at all. They called us accidents, mistakes, and even though she told me again and again not to believe them, I couldn't help but start to.

That whole thing with Chase; that was probably one of the biggest mistakes I've ever made, but it was also the best thing I'd done in my life. Conflicting emotions rose up in me, tired of being pushed back, and for the first time in a long time I felt like crying. In fact, when Chase had his arms around me and was holding me really close, I almost had cried. Just because that was the biggest show of emotion, the sweetest thing anybody has ever done for me. Somebody cared. And I was caught up in the moment, I guess, because when I kissed Chase, I felt normal. Completed.

I'd never kissed a boy or been kissed before, never have wanted to. But when Chase's mouth was inches from my own, smiling so gently at me that I was pretty sure he could melt my heart, I couldn't help it. It was the best sensation my body has ever felt. His lips were warm and sweet on mine, and it was so perfect, everything was so perfect until... He didn't kiss me back. His lips were frozen against mine. I didn't want this to end, and I didn't want him to pull back.

Now that I think about it, Chase's friend Savannah never occurred to me. Never once did I think about her, that she was probably lying in a cell half dead, remembering Chase and waiting for him to rescue her, kiss her. Was it horribly selfish to not care? No; it's the way I was brought up.

But it was true. Even if I did think of her, I wouldn't have cared. All I could think was kiss me, kiss me, kiss me over and over again. But he didn't. He didn't kiss me back. He was probably thinking of Savannah, remembering her kissing him, and again, his mouth didn't move. In one more desperate attempt, I moved my mouth against his and kissed him one more time, but it was no use. Chase had torn our lips apart and was looking at me with total sadness and disappointment. It was all I could do not to scream and cry, but I kept everything together and had simply walked past him, beyond caring.

Now, flying thousands of feet in the cool morning air, my head was slowly clearing and I felt...dare I say it? Better than I have in awhile. I saw Chase glide over to me, brownish-gray wings gleaming beautifully in the sun, flecks of lighter gray and white prominent. I tried tearing my eyes away, but with his dark green eyes gazing into mine, it was a little hard. A lot hard, actually.

"Indianna," he said, pronouncing my full name in a way that made my heart do that weird thing again. "We need to talk."

I was pretty sure those were about the worst four words in history. "What about?" I asked calmly, even slipping an impatient note into my voice. Perfect. Hide your emotions, Indy. No emotions. "I wanted to apologize." Chase said, running a hand through his dark hair. My heart threatened to pound. No emotions. No emotions. "Why?" It was more a statement then a question. Chase was unfazed, as usual.

"Listen, Indy, it was my fault for provoking you to kiss me. Honestly it was, and I am sorry. I like you a lot, but..." His face looked troubled, and I held up a hand. "Right. You're in love with her, I get it." I said coldly. Now I was actually mad: mad enough to cry. "Just leave me alone, Chase. I don't want to deal with you right now." Or ever.

Chase looked distressed. "I want us to be friends!" He insisted. Something inside of me snapped. "Friends? Are you freaking serious?" I screamed above the wind. "Chase, you do not know me! You don't know where I came from or what happened to me! Just leave me alone!" In my mind I added You don't even know how much you hurt me.

"What happened to your sister?" He yelled back, and it was as if time froze. My. Sister. How on earth did he know about... My heart constricted painfully as tears of sadness and fury blinded my vision. It took me about ten seconds to fully realize my wings had stopped moving and I was dropping fast. I couldn't move them. They wouldn't work! I couldn't feel anything, I think I stopped breathing, because when I did, a choking sob escaped my throat and it burned. My. Sister.

It was as if time stopped, everything else slowed way down. All sounds were blurred, my vision was totally gone, the only thing I could feel was wind rushing up at me, way too fast. Suddenly, just as I was positive I'd hit the ground and die (something I now welcomed), two strong arms wrapped around me and I felt myself rising. (A/N..is it me, or does this sound way to much like Max's first headache? Sorry...don't mean for it to be like that...)

"Indy?" The voice said, but it sounded very faint and far away. I tried to answer, but all memories of my sister came flooding back to me, very fast and very painful. Sage, with her arms around me, screaming, trying to block me from the lab men, who were coming towards us with outstretched hands, looking evil and cruel. They ripped Sage away from me, anger on their faces, and threw her across the room. She lay, limp and head bleeding on the floor, eyes closed, and I remember shrieking for her. I was only six years old; she was eight. It seemed like an eternity till her eyes opened and, when the lab men's backs were turned, she crawled across back to me, and we both shrank in the corner, terrified. The lab men turned back for me and saw Sage with me again. One picked up Sage by her neck, shaking her until she was limp, and screaming at her. I cried pitifully, wanting to do something, anything to save her, but couldn't.

"Indy!" The voice said again, growing louder. I felt the sensation of being shaken, hard. "Indy!" It commanded again, until my vision cleared enough to see that the ground was way to close, and Chase was struggling to keep me aloft, because his wings were being crushed against mine. "I...I..." Was all I could get out, partially not knowing what to say at all. It was then I realized I was crying, really, truly crying. And it felt so good. As if all the pain and agony bottled up inside me was being let out, and relief was, for some reason, taking it's place. In fact, I didn't even mind that everyone was around me, watching with sympathy, or that I was showing more emotion than I have in my life, because it was okay. Everything felt at that moment that it was going to be okay.

"Indy, try to move your wings. Fly." Chase said, "I'm going to let go now." Then he dropped me. I felt the beautiful sensation of the ground rushing up at me, the wind whipping through my long hair, then stopped myself by moving my wings. It worked! I rose, high in the air, back to the rest of the kids. "What just happened there? That was like...totally scary." Ash said in a worried tone. "Yeah." Felix agreed. "He mentioned your sister and you freaked out. I thought you were dead or something!"

I was still crying, still looking kind of stupid, and I swiped at the tears with the back of my hand. Horace flew close to me, smiling gently, the way he usually did. "It's alright, Indianna." He said simply. "Guys, sorry, but look!" Harlow said, pointing down. "Athen's town center. The library's there!"

We all angled downwards, shooting downwards a little ways away from the people so we could land without being spotted, and I thought our little emotional moment was over, right? Wrong. The second we touched down, Andrew, of all people, flung his arms around my knees. "Harlow says that when people is crying you should hug them." He said. "So I am hugging you."

Then both the boy and girl who talk to much joined in, hugging me kind of awkwardly, but it was okay at the same time. Like earlier, the fact that somebody really cared touched me in way that was special.

That sounded really lame, but it's true. We all had this ridiculous group hug thing, then went to go to the library to find Andrew's book. Chase walked us to the front desk, smiling sweetly at the librarian. "Hello, ma'am, I'm looking for a certain book." He said.

The librarian smiled. "And which might that be?" She asked pleasantly. Chase blushed a little. "It's a book called I Like Red Trucks." The lady's eyebrows shot up. "It's for my...little brother..." Chase stammered, motioning toward Andrew. All the rest of us nodded like bobble head dolls, but the librarian still looked at us funny.

"Well, um, let me check if it's still here." She said, clearing her throat and starting to type something in on her computer. After a moment she frowned. "Sorry, kids, but that book has been checked out. And that's our only copy."

UGH! Well sorry I haven't updated in a week, I was in Tennessee. However, I WILL get back to my normal updating, meaning you'll get another chapter every few days now. REVIEW! Thanks! :)