I do not own Red vs Blue. Red vs Blue is property of Rooster Teeth.
I do not own Maximum Ride. Maximum Ride is property of James Patterson.

I hadn't seen anyone for days. I finally got over the mountains a few days ago as far as I could tell. I had made the critical choice of moving on instead of hiding out there. I knew that as long as I was in the air, they couldn't get me.

Stopping meant I made tracks.

Stopping meant I could be seen.

Stopping meant death.

Besides, I was built for the air -literally. I made another push downward with my pair of aquamarine wings. They were fourteen feet across. Yet, they were almost at their limit. I had been flying for almost a day solid. The sun peaked across the horizon -horribly timed. I couldn't rest now! Especially during the day when every normal person was awake. I just had to push on.

The breeze was still cool, but slightly warmer here. Another reason to move away from the mountains. There I couldn't fly as high, and the air was like inhaling icicles. Here, I could stay well out of sight from the regular human population.

My wings were burning now. I couldn't keep this up. Not for much longer. I could have told myself that I was making excellent progress that I'd done good enough for today, and I deserved a break. But I didn't. That's what happens when you are the product of the most disgusting and horrible experiment known to man. I escaped a week ago and that meant I had a week of freedom. My wings burning, my back aching, the sun glaring right into my eyes was nothing compared to what they would do to me if I was captured again. If they would take me back to the laboratory called the Mother of Invention where I was tortured under the organization, Project Freelancer.

My legs started to hang limp and my altitude began to fall. I hadn't eaten in three days. Even my superhuman body was beginning to fail me. My eyes started to droop until I saw a speck of blue in the distance. At first, I thought it was just another lake, but as I kept looking I realized it must have been the biggest lake in the world. I couldn't see the end of it. My heart started to beat faster as I tried to figure out if I was just imagining it. But the mirage stayed consistent. My heart leapt with joy!

"I made it!" I giggled like a child.

I made it to the ocean! The ocean! That meant I had made it to the borders of this country! The boundaries of the Project's cruel grasp! I just had to get on a boat, and I was free! I slowly made the descent. Picking a landing spot that looked field-ish, I ungracefully crashed to the dirt. My wings were steaming in the cold morning. I folded them to my back where they finally rested. I wrapped my torn up jacked around me. It was the only thing I brought with me. It hid my wings. I pulled myself to standing, and finally made my legs do some of the burden of travel. I made it to the coast.

I had never seen the ocean before. The ground was almost powdery and coarse nearest the water. A nice golden tan. I walked into the ocean. Watched my toes disappear into the ground as the cold water washed over them. I scooped up some of the water, but almost puked as it tasted horrid. What happened to it? Why was it so salty? Why didn't it taste the same as the water I had drank everywhere else? I moved on. I followed the water's edge looking for some sort of boat to hitch a ride on. I didn't care where it was going. All I needed was a way out of this place, this country. Not to mention I had to eat too. The weird water left a horrible taste in my mouth, and my stomach threatened to eat itself from the lack of nutrients offered to it.

As I continued and the sun started to rise, more people started appearing. They stood by the water and molded the golden ground into piles or splashed around practically naked in the water. I didn't like this. There were too many people. Too many pretty people too. I freaked out as I envisioned how every one of them could possibly be one of the Project's minions, Erasers. They looked like gorgeous humans one minute then they turned into wolf-people the next and tried to rip your face off. I escaped and wasn't going to take any chances. I was paranoid, and I wasn't going to let them take me by surprise. Everyone was a suspect. Everyone could be a potential threat. Even this far from the Mother of Invention. I hurried my pace along. Most of them ignored me. I kinda felt out of place with my ripped clothes and my extremely pale skin. Even my red hair seemed too dry and ratted for me to be just here for the water.

Eventually, I saw a dock with some boats tied off to it. This would be my least favorite part because it meant I had to talk to people, I had to get close to people, I had to get out in the open, I had to be seen -which meant people could remember me and people could report me. I wasn't a very trusting person. But for good reason.

I didn't have any money. But, that wasn't exactly going to cause a problem. I could try feminine charm although that wasn't exactly going to work when I smelled like I hadn't showered in years, which I hadn't, and that I didn't exactly have much practice. All I really needed was to know if they were leaving the country and when. I could stow aboard easily. I could even follow them for a while then drop down onto their ship from the air. They really couldn't stop me. I just needed the information.

There were few boats that looked like they could actually make it across the ocean. They were practically all small boats that looked like they were for fishing, not for travel.

"Ugh!"

I kicked a soda can into the water off the edge of the dock as I finished my observation of the wimpy, tiny boats. I hated being on the ground for any longer than necessary. This was a risky stop that could have meant big trouble. Thankfully, it didn't seem many attractive potential-Erasers liked to captain boats. I groaned as I realized I couldn't just fly off to the port. It was the middle of the day! The sun was up to its full height, and the world was wide awake here! I was completely and utterly exposed. Crap.

That's when my luck did a complete 180. In the distance, I saw an enormous boat. It looked six times the size of these pathetic rust buckets that sat at this dock. I could see with my improved vision that there were many coloured crates on top of the huge ship. The side of the boat had foreign writing on it. That boat must travel somewhere outside the US.

"Where is that ship going?" I asked to a nearby shiphand who had been watching me as he smoked on the deck of his miserable boat.

"Pro'bly Charleston. It's the biggest port in the Carolinas," he reported as he tossed his stubby cigarette into the water.

I started briskly for the beach again. If there was one ship like that there, there had to be others. The anticipation was killing me. I wanted to burst into the sky right then, but I might as well have flown back to the Mother of Invention myself if I did that. So I walked. Trying to act as normal as possible. I had the goal in my sights. I had a mission. I was focused beyond belief.

I got back to the beach. It was my only option. It's not like I could have simply got in my car and drove there. Roads went everywhere. The beach was my best option. Ships had to be in water therefore the port did as well. If I just followed the beach I would have to run into it eventually.

The beach dwellers still scared me. The ground burnt my feet if I stood on the sand behind all of them so I had to walk near the water parading in front of them. My feet hurt from stepping on so many weirdly shaped rocks.

My attention was so divided between scanning the crowd for Erasers and watching where I stepped, it wasn't until about an hour into my trek I noticed the people following me. They were muscled, but not tanned. They were freaking hot, but not sandy. They were perfect, but not in swim shorts. And they were heading right for me.

At first, I tried to play cool. They were still a little bit behind me. Maybe they weren't here for me. Maybe they just thought I was pretty. Yeah. And maybe this was all a bad dream, and I would wake up with a family in nice house with a picket fence. I took another glance behind me. They were getting closer. My muscles coiled as adrenaline pumped through my veins.

"Screw it!"

I threw off my coat as I broke into a sprint. As soon as I gained enough speed, I snapped my wings out and thrust them down hard. Sand flew up into the air and choked some people in mid gasp of seeing a mutant bird kid right in front of them. I got a few other wing beats in before I felt my legs constricting and a stomach lurching weight start to pull me down.

"NO! Get off me you, _! NO! NOO!" I screamed, as I panicked and tried to shake the Eraser free.

I was no match for a 250 pound wolf-person. I almost ripped my wings off trying to stay aloft, but it was no use. I crashed to the ground, and turned on the attack. I flipped myself over, spitting the sand out of my mouth, and beat the Eraser still holding my legs as hard as I could. I was ripping his wolfy hair off his arms and throwing sand in his eyes and punching mercilessly at his huge muzzle. My fingernails were covered in blood, but he opened his mouth and bit my leg. I fell back at the sheer pain that lanced through me. I screamed bloody murder.

The beach patrons had all fled by now. It was just me and the Erasers. I tried to pry his jaw off, but it wouldn't budge. Tears streamed down my face as expletives poured out my mouth. If anything, I would let the Eraser know exactly what I thought of him and of the Project and of their experiments and of his mother! Yeah, the Erasers were products of the Project's experiments too, but they weren't tortured like the rest of us! They were their mindless workers. I beat the sand and made ungodly noises nothing would make the Eraser let up.

One of the other Erasers knelt down next to me smiling maliciously. I swung at him, but he caught my arms and twisted them to the verge of breaking them.

"You're a little far from home, aren't you?"

I spat at him. He chuckled as he licked it off his face with his huge Eraser tongue.

"The Director was getting worried. He was missing his precious number one. He was even bringing in agents all the way from the East Coast, the Institute division, to look for you," he cooed with a hypnotizing smoothness.

I struggled some more, but he tightened his grip.

"Because there were so many of us looking for you, we ended up finding several other bird kids who escaped too. All because of you. Isn't that great?"

I could only glare at him.

"Well, we'd better hurry and get you to the truck. You'll be back in time for supper!"

"Why don't you save yourself the gas money and just kill me."

The Eraser laughed.

"Trust me, I'd love to kill you, but I have orders to bring you back-" "Did you not hear me? I said I'd rather die!"

"Now, now. Let's not do anything rash, deary."

With that I pushed my arms that he still held back at his face, slamming him in the nose. He squealed and growled as he recoiled then brought his fist down on my head. The world blacked out.

Well, this is certainly an interesting concept, no? Anyway, this is completely AU for obvious reasons. I'm not going to include any of the Maximum Ride characters, only the concept of the bird kids and such so if you know RvB, you should be able to follow this. I don't know if I'll include any of the Blood Gulchers, but I will include the Freelancers for sure. This first one is Carolina, but we will meet the other Lancers along the way.
Basically, the School is the Mother of Invention and Itex is Project Freelancer. The Director is the Director. It's pretty simple.

Looking forward to it.