"U and A. On the count of three." My voice is barely audible. I catch Fang's eyes and flick my own to the window high above the warehouse floor. He nods almost imperceptibly. "One."

Six bird kids simultaneously whip out their wings and jump into flight. Fang covers his head and barrels through the window, sending shards of shattered glass flying at the mob of Erasers below. Nudge, Iggy, and Angel are hot on his heels, er, wings. I begin to follow Gazzy out the window when I see the flash of a gun.

"Gaz!" He stops flapping and drops a few feet. The bullet buries itself in the wall a foot away from his head. I give Gazzy a boost out of reach of the Erasers while the gun is being reloaded, but before he can get out the window another bullet whizzes past. A quick scan of the ground below reveals three more muzzles, sights set on moi.

Looks like I'll have to do this the hard way.

I free fall towards an Eraser, picking up speed as I plummet, and kick out my feet at the last second. They land squarely in the Eraser's chest, knocking him and me to the ground and sending his gun skittering across the floor.

I manage to whack an Eraser in the face as I spread my wings for lift off. Something catches on my shirt, and next thing I know, glass bites into my back as I hit the floor. I manage to get a few feet off the ground on my second attempt at being airborne when a different Eraser jumps and grabs one of my legs; my ankle pops painfully as my wings take me up and his body starts to drag me down. Lucky for me, he fails to notice my other leg before it stomps decisively on his noggin. He crumples into another Eraser, but my feet have already made contact with the floor.

With the Erasers closing in, there's not enough room to spread my wings. My ankle throbs as I sprint for the only other exit: the door. An Eraser tries to grab me but only manages to rake its claw up my arm. I admit it, I cringe. A gun is fired. The bullet bounces off the floor next to my feet.

Suddenly, there seem to be another three Erasers between me and my exit. I backpedal to keep myself from running into them and turn right. More Erasers. I manage to kick up my speed a few notches. With a leap made half of faith and half of mutant bird kid, my feet clear the Erasers' heads. I almost smile to myself when my wings catch the air.

That's when everything takes a turn for the worse. On the third down stroke of my wings and already fifteen feet off the ground, two bullets pass me. A third passes through my side.

I fall.

It takes only two minutes for them to push me down to my knees with my arms pinned behind me. A new record.

I hear a laugh. "Well, well, well. What do we have here? The great Maximum Ride, in all her glory, graces us with her presence." An Eraser bearing a gun and shiny boots steps out from the crowd surrounding me. "What do you think we should do with this birdie, boys? Maybe we should cook it up and eat it for breakfast this morning—"

I can't help but break his monologue. "I'm sure I'm too tough for your taste. You prefer the easy meals, right?" I earn a hard slap to the face.

But he doesn't seem to get the whole monologue-is-such-a-waste-of-time thing. He continues, with a venomous glare towards me. I match his gaze. "Perhaps we could put it in a cage and make it sing for us—"

I almost laugh. "There are two things wrong with that theory, the first being that you definitely don't want to hear me sing, and the second being that you could never, under any circumstances, make me."

The Eraser grins crookedly and walks towards me. He takes one of my closed wings with an unnaturally strong hold and painfully stretches it out, up, and behind me so I can't see what he's doing. I can feel his grimy paws gliding over my feathers. Suddenly, he takes a handful and yanks them out. My wing flinches back so hard I almost pull a muscle. I taste blood and realize I've bitten-still biting-my lip. The Eraser struts in front of me and dangles the feathers in my face. Tiny beads of blood drip onto the floor. At least feathers don't bleed much.

"You're going to have to try harder than that, dog breath." My voice sounds more stable than I feel. The Eraser restraining my arms clenches his hands, making my fingers go numb. I try unsuccessfully to shimmy my way out of his grasp. He holds tighter and starts digging his claws into my skin. I hiss when a nail sinks into the slashes down my arm.

That's when it occurs to me: they haven't tried to put me under yet. No mysterious syringes or bulky, bottle-shaped pocket bulges. Heck, I haven't even caught sight of a chloroform-soaked rag yet.

This is bad.

The head honcho gestures to the door. "At this very moment, your precious Flock is restrained and at gunpoint outside. One wrong move and they all disappear. You didn't really think we'd be stupid enough to leave the perimeter unprotected?"

"You've proved yourself pretty dumb before." The Eraser sneers and kicks me in the stomach. My breath leaves me in a whoosh, and leaning forward puts a strain on my already aching arms.

Through my grit teeth, I spit, "Kicking the bird kid when she's already down? What a gentleman." I stop wriggling for a second, eyeing the sizable fists of the hybrid. "Why don't you even the playing field a little bit? Tell your goon to let go of me, and we'll fight fair, one-on-one."

The Eraser laughs and leans into me. When he speaks, I can feel his hot breath on my face. "I don't do fair." He cups his hands and claps my ears. I can't help but scream as my ear drums burst. The Eraser's sick grin forms words I can't hear.

A door opens behind the Erasers. My heart leaps when Nudge, Gazzy, and Angel enter; it sinks lower than ever when I see the guns pointed at the base of their skulls. Tears stream down their bruised, bleeding faces. Iggy is dragged in behind them, unconscious, with blood seeping from a wound in his head and shoulder. Lastly, Fang. An Eraser holds each limb, literally carrying him through the door. His dark wings drag on the floor, leaving a trail of feathers.

The Erasers move aside to give me the best view possible. I feel the vibrations of laughter through the floor. Or maybe I'm shaking. They line the Flock up against the wall and force them to their knees. My stomach lurches with understanding.

They're going to execute my family.

I can't hear my own desperate cries. I shake hard enough to make the Eraser holding my arms let go. Instead, he wraps his arm around my neck in a choke hold, too tight, cutting off my air supply. I can't scream anymore. My breath comes in gasps.

I take one last look at my Flock. Angel, watery-eyed, shaking from head to toe. Gazzy, trying and failing to put on a brave face. Nudge, frozen like a deer in the headlights. Iggy, awake enough now to hold himself upright, silently searching his pockets for a bomb, not finding any.

Everything stops. The lead Eraser raises his hand. I meet Fang's eyes. Dark. Deep.

The back of my head registers the signal from the spawn of Hell.

Fang mouths one word. Next thing I know, everything else comes into painfully sharp focus as I watch my Flock die. Five bullets, each landing squarely in the chest of its victim. A silent scream rips its way up my throat. The Eraser holding my neck tightens its grip. My vision blurs with tears and a lack of oxygen.

The last thing my brain processes before I black out is a single word. The last thing Fang ever said.

Max.

It echoes in my head.

Max.

Max. Wake up.

Wake up, Max. It's just a nightmare.

It's just a nightmare.

Nightmare…

Nightmare…

When my fumbling fingers are met with another's hand, my eyes shoot open. The first thing to register is my Flock's worried faces. The second is that my clothes are sticking to me with sweat. The third is that I am lying under the tree I fell asleep in last night.

I fell out of a tree.

Again.

A silent signal cues Iggy, Nudge, Gazzy, and Angel to disperse towards their respective branches. Fang helps me sit up, but doesn't let go of my hand. We sit in comfortable silence.

When the Flock is asleep, Fang asks me, "Nightmares?" I reply with a nod. They have plagued me for almost a fortnight now, and, besides the obvious psychological impact of helplessly watching your family die in various painful ways every night, I have gotten about four hours of sleep in the past week. Now, I know the tough Maximum Ride can "go three days without sleep, food, water, or even oxygen to breathe," but something about this is different. A constant paranoia boils my stomach. My fight-or-flight instinct keeps the Flock at a standstill for three days, and then we book it across a state in the next twelve hours. Somebody is always watching me, or at least it feels like it. And not to mention that I haven't been able to sleep in a tree without falling out of it for the past four-make that five-days.

All in all, I am pretty sure the Flock thinks I've bonked my head a few times too many.

Fang and I stay up the rest of the night to keep watch. I tried to get him to catch some shut-eye, but he refused, claiming that he wouldn't be able to fall asleep again anyways. I'm thankful for his lie.

I start to silently muse, as is typical when intently staring at an unchanging horizon. Normal kids, at this time of year and this time of night, would be shooting off fireworks and catching fireflies, or staying up late to watch bad horror movies and shove their faces full of popcorn. Perhaps there're even some people with their eyes glued to a good ole' game of Solitaire on their computer. And although I'm happy to be free of school or work or whatever kids my age are doing these days, I can't help but feel—jealous?—of the normal people. "Normal" people do "normal" things; mutant freaks stay up all night hoping their throats won't be ripped out in their sleep. Sometimes I think about how different life would be if the Flock wasn't raised in cages. Simpler. Kinder. Better.

I shake my head. As much as I hate how I got them, my wings make me who I am. Life wouldn't be better; in fact, I bet it would be worse. Like, who would eat the chocolate? And who would save wayward rabbits from the jaws of hungry wolves? Without me, Colorado's entire food chain would be irrevocably destroyed!

Yeah. Definitely.

At some point during the night, when the moon is long gone and the sun only two hours away, a beam of light steaks across the sky. Fang doesn't notice, and I don't say anything.

I had heard somewhere that if you wish on a shooting star, then your wish will come true. Maybe it's just wishful thinking, or maybe it's my lack of sleep again, and I know the probability of anything happening is, if any, point-zero-zero-zero-zero-one percent, but…

I cross my fingers, shut my eyes, and will with my whole heart.

"I wish the School never existed."

So ends chapter one. Comments? Questions? Ideas? Awesome quotes that need to be told to the world? Feel free to review!

IMPORTANT: Sorry guys, I have found that I am not a very good updater. The second chapter is already under way, so I'm definitely trying really hard to update regularly-ish this time, but...yeah. We'll see.