If you think you know what empty is, think again.

Seriously, when the only thing around you in any direction is just space, so much so that you can't even see anything on the horizon, that's empty.

What's cool about that kind of empty is that you can do practically anything you can think of in it.

Trust me, it's even better with wings.

We'd needed this for a long time, so it felt great to just spread our wings and just soar aimlessly. After being couped up underground (FYI, worst place to build a secret base ever!) for twenty-four hours, then stuck inside a thirty foot long metal tube, with the GASMAN, flying just felt so right.

"Good call, Max," Fang called from my right, "I think we all needed this."

I nodded back at him and did a double loop-d-loop. Sort of a backhanded way of saying I agreed.

"This ocean must go on for miles," Gazzy said, "it's like you can see over the curve of the Earth."

"Yeah, except we're not on Earth anymore, doofbag," Iggy said.

As Gazzy and Iggy argued about whether the term "earth" applied to the planet we were on, Fang pulled me aside.

"What is it?"

"How do you like it here so far?" he asked.

"You mean how do I like the whole island thing." I corrected.

He shrugged.

"I guess."

"Well, there's a lot more people here then I thought there was going to be, but I'm starting to miss my mom and Ella. You know, the rest of my family."

"Even Jeb?" Fang asked, eyebrow raised.

"Yeah, even him." Fang shot me an incredulous look. "Hey," I said, flashing a goofy smile, "I need something to take out all my built up stress on."

I'm not sure, but I think he smirked just then.

"Hey Max!" Total barked.

I groaned, fearing he would go into another one of his rant against discrimination of canines or a ridiculous five-star critique of the food we had to eat here.

"Yes?" I exasperated.

"You know how Captain Falcone said that there was mainland way out there? Well, I was wondering, that is..."

"Total wants to know if there are any dogs there," Angel said, finishing Total's thought.

"Exactly."

"And we could go to the beach!" Nudge squeed. "Oh beaches are soooooo fun! The sand, and the water, and the seashells..." For once, Nudge drifted off into silence.

Call the media.

"Nudge is right, beaches are fun," Gazzy concurred.

"Why not?" Fang shrugged. "It's not like we're going anywhere soon."

"PLEEEEEEEASE!?!" Iggy said, doing his best to comply Nudge's patented whiny plea and Angel's pattened Bambi eyes.

His milky, grey pupils somewhat dulled the effect. That, and the fact that he was trying to copy Nudge's voice.

"Nice try, Ig," I said, "but no cigar."

"PLEEEEEEEASE, MAX!?!" The Gasman echoed, doing a perfect imitation of Nudge's voice.

As if one "Nudge Channel" wasn't bad enough.

"Wow, that was pretty good!" Iggy congratulated. Gazzy beamed.

"Thanks," Gazzy said, still using Nudge's voice, "I've, like, been practicing. You know?"

God, there were so many things I wanted to do to that boy right now; he was being so annoying. And not the way Nudge does (most of the time she doesn't realize she's doing it), but on purpose. Now, which option to choose. Killing? Nah, way to unoriginal. Poisoning? No, Gazzy's already 35% toxic, so that was out. Making out with Fang in front of him?

Oh yeah, I liked that one alot.

Before I could implement my brilliant plan, I heard a voice calling our names. Only it sounded kind of static-y, and it sounded like it was coming from Iggy.

"Iggy..." I warned, flying closer to him.

"Yeah, uh," he stammered, "I kind of, 'borrowed' one of their radios."

"Really?" I asked incredulously, motioning for him to 'give it'. "I thought we were past all this." He reached into his pocket and pulled out a walkie-talkie with some wire wrapped around it.

"You put that in your ear," he said, pointing to something small and black at one end of the wire. "It's voice activated."

Convenient, I thought as I unwound the wire and slipped the earpiece on my ear.

"Hello?"

"Max?" Captain Nate's voice sounded in my ear. "Where did you guys go? You completely vanished from the sensors, we had to send out a Jumper just to get you guys back in sight." I looked around, but couldn't see anything that looked like the ship we came in. I did notice that the city was now just a tiny spot in the distance. Wow, we really had gone far, hadn't we?

"Oh, sorry, forgot I turned the cloak on. Hang on a second."

Cloak?

"Max," Iggy suddenly said, "look behind you!"

I turned around to see what Iggy was talking about, then suddenly felt very sheepish.

Way to go, Max. You fell for the old "Blind kid calling wolf" trick. I glared at said blind kid.

"Max," Angel said before I could yell at the blind prankster, "you're gonna miss it."

"Miss what!?" I yelled, turning around again. When I did I...

Well, let's just say I should really keep my foot away from my mouth.

There was a shimmering distortion about twenty meters away that quickly faded into a visible image.

It was the flying sewer pipe, with the intrepid Captain Nate at the helm. He wave/saluted us and began to turn the Jumper around.

"If you guys'll come in through the back hatch..."

"There's nothing...combustible in there, right?" I asked.

"Don't worry, this one's empty," Captain Nate reasured me. "But just to be on the safe side I'll leave the door open, OK?"

Boy, this guys knew us better than we knew ourselves.

We all clambered into the sewer pipe and plopped down on the seats, letting out a sigh of relief. You would to if you were hovering in place for a while, right?

As soon as the shock of seeing a big, metal pipe materialize out of thin air, we all turned to Iggy.

"How did you do that?" I asked, amazed.

"Do what?"

"Know where the ship was," Gazzy clarified. "That was so cool, how'd you do it?"

"I just saw it. I mean, it looked like a camera negative, but it was as plain as day."

"Iggy has a new power, Iggy has a new power!" Nudge sang.

"Sweet," Gazzy said as he gave Iggy a high-five.

"Seems like it would be useful," Total said.

"Does it work on Fang?" Angel asked.

"Yeah, go invisible," Nudge chimed in.

Fang shrugged, and a second later he had disappeared.

"Whenever you're ready, Dark One," Iggy said impatiently.

"Dude, I already am."

"It's true, Ig," I said, "All of our eyes work normal, but we can't see him."

"I guess you can't see everything invisible," Fang said as he reapeared.

"But, then, how could he see the ship?" Nudge asked, confused.

Some theories were bounced around as to exactly how Iggy's new power worked, all ranging from plausible sounding to just plain absurd. I won't bore you with the details, but let's just say we still weren't any closer to understanding it.

And thankfully, Gazzy had yet to have one of his "unfortunate incidents".

...

What?

When we got back to the city we all headed to our rooms to get some shut eye. Seriously, we've been up for almost twenty-four hours, so we really needed the rest. Besides, it was getting dark anyways.

As I walked around my room I began to scrutinize it, looking for every possible exit route. Just in case.

I was interrupted from my analysis by the muted ding-dong of the doorbell (cool, huh?). I slid my hand over the door control (seriously, Gazzy and Iggy will have a feild day with this place) and found Fang standing there, leaning on the door frame.

"Mind if I come in?" he said.

"Of course I mind," I said, smiling coyly, "but you may come in anyways."

"Thanks." As he stepped into the room his eyes went over every square inch of it. "Kinda homey."

"I guess it is, in a 'nice hotel' kind of way. Did you want something?

"Yeah," he said, "I did." Oh god, did his eyes have to be so dreamy?

They made me feel like doing anything.

"What exactly?"

"Well," he started, "I've been thinking..."

"Did it hurt?" Doh! I didn't want to do that. Bad Max, bad!

Fortunately, Fang just smiled and shrugged it off.

Phew!

"I've been thinking about us," he continued, "about our relationship."

Uh oh, this might be messy.

"I've been thinking about marriage."

Whoa, I did not see that coming.

For a moment I just stood there, too stunned to say or do anything. Marriage? Was he serious? I mean, I'd always secretly fantasized about it ever since he and I became an item (If you tell anyone about that, I'll kill you), and Angel even told me that she thought we were good together on numerous occasions, but I'd never thought it would actually be an option. And especially not this soon. So, I did the only practical, logical thing I could think of.

I totally cracked up. Tears and everything.

I mean, marriage? Fang couldn't be serious. My suspisions were at least partially confirmed when I looked over and saw him doubled over.

"OK, I'm sorry, I probably should have said it like that," he apologized.

"Ya think?" I said, taking in a lungful of air.

He grunted his agreement.

"I actually wanted to know if you wanted to hang out for a while. You know, since we haven't really had much time for each other the past month."

"Do you even have to ask?" I said excitedly. Then a thought occured to me, "But what if someone needed to find us? We are sneaking out, I assume?"

"We are," he said reasuringly, "and I took the liberty of borrowing one of their radios. Captain Nate said it would save them the trouble of tracking us down again if he just gave us one right off."

And this, ladies and gentlemen, is why Fang is my right wing.

EXTRA!

Captain Nate; Hi there Fang, what's up?

Fang; I was on my way to Max's room.

CN; Why? *scrutinizing*

Fang; We're dating now; I'm gonna spend some time together.

CN; Sounds nice, just be sure to keep it under K+.

Fang; Huh? *question marls*

CN; Never mind. Here, have a radio.

Fang; You're giving me military hardware?

CN; Yeah, I figure it's easier than running around everywhere looking for you guys.

Fang; Hmm, makes sense.

CN; Just keep it clean!

Fang; ????

Layman here, apologizing for taking so long with this next chapter. (Sorry!) I've just been really inspired for another story I was working on, but I've since brought that one to close. Unfortunately, because of the holidays approaching, This story will be put on an indefinite Hiatus. You'll still see stuff published under the Layman name. but you'll have to wait untill after New Years at least to hear more about the Flocks' adventures abroad.

I will still check my account regularly, so feel free to ask me questions or offer helpful criticism. (PS, if my spelling or grammar seems to miss the bar, I KNOW! I'm working on it.) Just click the little green rectangle below the text here. Seriously, you can't miss it, it's right there. Click it already, will you!