Okay...I know...everyone wants to stab me in the face...but here is your new chapter so maybe that will suffice as an apology for taking so freakin long. I dedicate this chapter to Meepisms because I got this idea from her! Enjoy!

Disclaimer: I do not own Maximum Ride or anything else...too bad...I'd love to own Fang...lol ;)

Chapter 4...(I think)

I pushed my wings up and down as hard as I could. My muscles were burning from a lack of oxygen, even mutant-bird-kid-freaks ran out of oxygen eventually. I wasn't really sure where I was going or what I was running from but I did know the feelings that coursed through my body, sang in my bones and danced in my blood, fear, desperation. There was no mistaking the fact that I was running from something, what it was I didn't know. I began to wonder where the rest of the flock was, how they were, whether they were safe or not. I felt a rush of wind and my genetically enhanced eyes saw the bullet as it crashed into a tree ahead of me, it had just missed the side of my head and my right wing. I pushed my muscles to the max and gasped at the pain that ripped through my body. I couldn't hold out much longer. The edges of my vision were going black and everything was going blurry, I relied purely on my bird sense of direction and my enhanced reflexes to keep me from slamming into a tree, but I was fading fast. Another bullet whizzed by and now I could hear shouts, I could feel myself slowing down and then the ground rushed up to meet me and I blacked out, my face in the dirt, my wings outstretched, awkwardly.

I shot straight up and my head slammed painfully into something above me. I groaned and held my head in my hands.

“Ow.” I blinked my eyes several times and then sat back up slowly. I realized that I was in Angel's bed, the bottom bunk in her and Nudge's room. Strange, I thought, I don't remember falling asleep in the girls' room. I looked down as Angel moved against my side, she was curled up around Celeste with Total twitching against her back, his paws in the air. I couldn't help but smile as she sighed and pulled Celeste closer. Nudge grumbled something in her sleep about another hot dog, and I recalled coming into their room to read Angel a story, I must have fallen asleep reading her the story.

The door creaked open slowly and out of reflex I jumped up, careful not to hit my head again, and took up a ready stance. Iggy's head popped around the door and his sightless eyes locked immediately with my own wild eyes. (ha! And you thought it would be an eraser or Fang! I'm sneaky!)

“Oh! You're already up. Fang needs help in the kitchen.” Iggy said in a bored tone. I stood there and listened to him pad down the hall to wake up Gazzy. I turned back to Nudge and Angel, biting my lip.

Naw, I thought, I'll let them sleep a bit longer. The wooden floor was cold beneath my feet and a shiver ran up my spine, I slid my hand down the banister on the stairs. At the moment I felt like royalty coming down the stairs to meet my public...well ok...royalty with a royal-sized headache. A small cloud of flour flew out of the kitchen doorway.

Hmmm...Iggy said Fang needed my help in the kitchen. I wonder what he's doing. There was a bang and then a bunch of smoke and then a soot-covered Fang stumbled out of the kitchen coughing. I froze on the bottom stair, trying not to laugh. Fang tensed and raised his head to look at me. His face was smudged all over with soot, his hair had turned black and you could only barely see his highlights. His chocolate eyes stood out from under his shaggy hair though, and they took in my disheveled morning look.

“Guess I look kinda funny huh?” He said. I hadn't noticed before how his voice seemed to resonate inside me. It was as if he was talking from inside me. This feeling his voice had was similar to the feeling of a beat of a bass drum in your heart when you go to see the marching band in a parade. (I had to mention a marching band...since I LOVE marching band!)

“Here, we should match.” I was a bit confused about this comment from Fang until he walked to me and ran his right hand across my cheek, leaving five black streaks on my face. I reached up and touched my face, my fingers came back black.

“Fang!”I yelled, “Just because you are covered in soot and ash doesn't mean that you have to put it on me!” I looked around for something to wipe my hand on and settled on my jeans, and used my sleeve to wipe the marks off of my face. Fang chuckled and headed back into the kitchen.

“What were you doing anyway?” I asked, curious. I followed him into the kitchen, it wasn't near as bad as it had looked at first. There were a couple black spots on the linoleum floor and the counters, but other than that most of the mess was from Fang attempting to cook something.

“Iggy and I figured it would be a good idea if someone else in the flock could cook also.” He replied. I suppose that fit, Nudge was too scatterbrained to learn how to cook, Gazzy and Angel were both still a bit too young, and I wasn't allowed anywhere near food since I could burn cereal without using the stove, so Fang was the logical choice. Whether he could actually cook or not was yet to be seen. “I need you to be the taster.” Fang said slyly. I stared at him and blinked a couple of times, then I erupted into side-splitting laughter, Fang just crossed his arms and legs and leaned against the counter watching me with raised eyebrows as I collapsed onto the floor in uncontrollable laughter.

“You...you want...m-me...to...to ta-...taste something...you c-...c-c-coo-...cooked?” I managed to stammer between gasps of breath and laughter. I was answered by a roll of the eyes, an annoyed noise, and a short clipped answer.

“Yes.”

“No way”I countered, now in control of my laughter

“Why not?” He asked, clearly pretending to be insulted

“Umm...maybe because I would like to live past today?” Fang grimaced.

“Who was it that ate the food you first cooked without complaint?” Hmmm...he had me there, he did voluntarily taste all of the food I made at first, even though one of my tacos made him sick to his stomach for a whole two weeks. Even after that he still firmly believed that I could cook something edible and continued to taste the food. Bummer. I was hoping he wouldn't remember that, guess I have to be the taster now.

“Ok, fine, but no tacos.”I consented.

“Thank you Max.” Fang turned and got a plate out of the cabinet and I sat down at the table and shoved all of the technological-looking stuff to the other side of the table. Except for they never made it to the other side of the table, as soon as my fingertips connected with the metal, it was like my brain shorted out or something. There was a flash of bright light behind my eyes and I gasped in pain as my head seemed to explode. I could hear a faint buzzing in my ears, and there was a myriad of pictures, words, songs, buildings, people, flowers, mountains, tables, scientific equipment, needles, cages, black. All I could see was black, I panicked.

Am I blind? Is this what Iggy sees all of the time? How can I lead the flock if I'm blind? What happened to me? Where is Fang? My head hurts, I need some pain killers. Speaking of killers, I want to kill some Erasers right now. Erasers, that reminds me of pencils and pencils remind me of school. School reminds me of Anne and Anne reminds me of Thanksgiving and what I was thankful for that day, and the way Fang looked at me quickly and then looked away, he thought I didn't see him. Fang. He kissed the RHW. He kissed me too. Wow, my mind is pulling a Nudge. It hurts to think.

You may not think that's a lot to think, but let me inform you that I thought all of this in between painful spurts of light and pictures, mixed up sounds and all in about 30 seconds, before I was interrupted by a familiar presence.

MAX, I'M SORRY IT HURTS SWEETHEART, I WISH THERE WAS A WAY TO MAKE THE PAIN GO AWAY, BUT YOUR BRAIN IS TRYING TO GET USED TO SHARING SPACE IN YOUR HEAD. I screamed, it was the voice, it was Jeb. No. It can't be, he was in the building when we destroyed it. This is impossible. I made absolute sure that I wouldn't have to deal with this anymore!

Get the hell out of my head! I shrieked internally. The black was fading and the pictures and all were less frequent. I could feel the hot tears leaking out of my eyes and down my face now. The floor came to life underneath me, I was curled up on the floor. No, that's not the floor, that's somebody. Fang, I can hear his voice, nope there it goes again.

CONCENTRATE ON WHAT YOU KNOW IS TRUE. What the...? Never mind, I'm not even going to bother asking. I won't even gratify the...the...growl there isn't a word bad enough to describe him, well either way I'm not gratifying him with a response.

I could hear my sobs and feel myself shaking in Fang's arms. I concentrated on his voice and let it call me back to reality.

“Max! Max breathe please, breathe.” His voice was strained, worried as if it were vitally important to his survival that I breathe. Wait...I wasn't breathing? That might explain the light-headed feeling. I sucked in a shaky breath and Fang relaxed.

Wait...was that his...lips...no, not Fang. For a second there I could have sworn that Fang had kissed the top of my head, but then again I'm delusional and in pain so I wouldn't put too much faith in that. Needless to say I don't like it when I feel weak so I'm not going to go into detail about the rest of the day, all I did was lay in bed, my eyes closed, letting the throbbing in my head slowly subside and drift away.

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The warm water cascaded down onto my skin, snaked through my hair, and loosened my muscles. I spent the longest time in the shower the next morning just relaxing my tired body.

GOOD MORNING MAX. That familiar no-gender, no-age, not computer, not human, voice broke through my calm thoughts and sent them into a hate-filled frenzy.

I told you to get the hell out of my head. I snarled. The buzzing sound came back into my ears. That was new, last time the voice didn't have a buzzing sound with it. Maybe something was wrong.

MAX, YOU MUST STAY INSIDE THE HOUSE, IF YOU GO OUTSIDE I CAN'T COMMUNICATE WITH YOU. Hmmm...dumb Jeb, you don't give a rebellious teenager a way to get away from you. I snickered to myself as I dried off. Guess what Maximum Ride was fixing to do. Let's hit the air currents!

Clothes on, wet hair hanging limply, barefooted, I jumped out of the bathroom window and took off into the morning sky. The air felt so good in my feathers, and swirling around me. The rays of the sun danced across my skin leaving is tingling in the soft wind. It was exhilarating to feel my powerful muscles controlling my wings. Up. Down. Up. Down. Over and over, a constant, soothing rhythm. I saw a break in the trees up ahead and headed for it.

The clearing wasn't absolutely breathtaking, but it was pretty. There were flowers of all different colors, the grass was a deep, satisfying green, and it was soft and inviting as I laid down on my back.

XXXXMEANWHILEXXXX

Fang stepped out of the shower, water droplets sliding down his chest and tickling his abs. He shook his hair like a dog and it fell in place in front of his face. He wrapped a black towel around his hips before heading back into his room. (I'm sorry...I had to...poor Fang's fan girls...I made you suffer...muahahahahahaha...ok back to the story.)

Fang had just fastened his belt when Iggy came crashing into his room. Fang jumped back in surprise.

“What the...don't you know how to kno-...Oh, it's you...what's wrong?” Fang knew Iggy wouldn't be crashing around the house for no reason.

“Max is gone.” Was all that Fang heard before he was jumping out of his own window, his dark wings unfurling with a snap. Max was fast, but when desperate, Fang could be just as fast or faster. Fang took off into the sky in search of Max, he had almost lost her once when he split up the flock over Ari, and he wasn't going to lose her again. Never again.

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I lay, my eyes closed, letting the sun soak into my skin and warm my blood. I was getting dirt and grass in my just-washed hair, but I didn't care. A wave of cool air came over me as something flew overhead, but it was soon gone and the warmth came back.

“I wish I had brought Nudge and Angel with me, they would have loved this.” I spoke to no one in particular, but decided to go get Nudge and Angel, since Fang would probably rather someone be out here with me.

I stood up and shook out my wings to get the grass out of them, something flew overhead again, but this time it hovered, not moving. Annoyed that this bird had blocked my sunlight I moved to the side. It was a good thing I did, because as soon as I moved the shadow grew, and then Fang landed right where I had been a second ago. I yelped and jumped back, my back landing against the tree.

In my lifetime I have seen some pretty scary Fang moments, but never was he as murderous-looking as he was now. I couldn't help but wonder what Gazzy had done to his i-pod this time.

“Never do that again.” Fang ground out between clenched teeth.

“Do what?” I asked, confused. Fang took a step toward me, bringing his face an inch away from mine and causing me to press back into the tree.

“Iggy came into my room and told me you were gone, I didn't know where you had gone, whether you had gone willingly. Max, I lost you once I...” He trailed off, probably thinking he had said too much for Fang. I found myself wanting to hear him scream at me, I had hurt him, scared him. I wanted him to lash out, I couldn't stand the way he just stood there looking at me with a blank look on his face. I knew from the subtle swirl in his eyes and the way his jaw was set that he was mad, scared, worried, relieved, happy, and something else I didn't recognize all at once.

“I was afraid something had happened to you.” He whispered. I opened my mouth to speak, but found that my words were lost as he covered my lips with his. Only this kiss wasn't like the others, there was no soft pressure, this kiss was all passion and it scared me. I didn't know Fang was capable of this kind of passion. His arms slid around my waist and my hands tangled in his wet hair. We completely lost ourselves in the kiss and only when my nails raked his bare shoulders did we part. Fang hissed in pain.

“Sorry.” I mumbled, winded. Fang grunted, and that's when I noticed he wasn't wearing a shirt. I'm sure my face looked like a clown's nose, because I turned the brightest shade of red possible. Fang just looked at me confused for a minute then noticed that he was holding me close to his chest, which was not currently covered by any form of cloth whatsoever. He threw his head back and laughed, and I couldn't help smiling. I had never seen him laugh like that, and his smile was brighter and warmer than the sun could ever be. I laid my head on his shoulder and his arms tightened around me. For the first time in my life, I felt completely safe, as if nothing could touch me. I felt six feet tall and bulletproof. I felt more alive than I had ever felt before. I closed my eyes and reveled in the feeling, knowing that he too was feeling the same way, we were one.

A.N. Hokay...so there is your chapter, it is dedicated to Meepisms as I have said before...and now I'm going to bed...I want you all to know that I stayed up just so I could finish this chapter for you people. If you give me reviews then I will convince Fang to do a strip tease for you...lol.

Fang: I'm going to do what?

Bkleanne: A strip tease for all of the people that review!

Max: Can I watch?

Bkleanne: Of course!

Fang: blushes the deepest shade of red possible

Max: Alright! You people better review!!!!!

Bkleanne: Now slam your little mousy onto the little purple button because it will make Max and I happy!