MangaFlock by St. Fang of Boredom

So, the flock escapes an army of Flyboys to end up at a….anime convention?? They find out about J.P.'s new manga about them, get mistaken for cosplayers, and why does everyone keep calling Fang "Dark"?

Ok, I'm planning on this being a short fanfic. Like, 4 or 5 chapters. Let's see if I stick to that.

Ye Olde Disclaimer: I own NOTHING!! Not Maximum Ride, Lost, or any other famous movie, TV show, book, etc. mentioned in this story. So please don't sue. I'm trying to go to college here, I need my money. If anyone's suing around here, it's me.

You know what I hate most about Flyboys? Their complete lack of a sense of humor.

"Back off, you overgrown, flying toasters!"

"We are one of many"

That had basically been our conversation for the past 5 minutes. I'd throw out a random insult, and they'd reply with their, "We are one of many" crap. Sooo frustrating.

Yes, only a few days after our takeoff from Dr. Martinez and our government-issued school, we're being chased by Flyboys. Make that a whole freaking lot of Flyboys. If they'd had the capacity for it, I'd say they were getting revenge for chaos that went down in Germany. The thing was, we had no real clue what they were chasing us for. Great. More random acts of evil from some unknown attacker.

"I think we should find a place to land. Somewhere to hide." I said to my silent second-in command. Fang just nodded. He was paying more attention to making sure one of those robo-werewolves didn't grab one of the younger kids.

Ok, so now you're all thinking, "Why is the flock running-excuse me, flying away? Where's the usual Flyboy-Flock fight scene?" Well, did I mention there was a whole freaking lot of them? Look, I like the sweet mid-air fight scenes as much as the next bird-kid, but I don't have a death wish here. After all, they are "One of Many". Sheesh.

I looked down, looking for a place to land. All I saw was a big city, and a pretty busy one at that. Below us, people were milling around a large building that looked to be a couple stories high. I thought we were screwed 'till I saw a door on the roof of the building. Bingo.

"Guys! For the roof of that building! Now!"

In unison the whole flock made a beeline for that roof, practically dive-bombing the place. As soon as we landed I ran toward the door. "Please don't be locked. Please don't be locked." Obviously, the Patron Saint of Recombinant DNA Bird Children was listening; the door did have a lock, but was open. I raced inside and held the door for the rest of the flock. Fang was last, and helped me by finding a chair to pin against the door while I locked it. Not that we thought a measly chair and lock were going to hold 2 gazillion robots at bay, but it was better than nothing.

"Report." I said turning to my worn out flock.

"I'm in one piece." Iggy said. "Are they gone?"

"I hope so." said Nudge. "There was, like, a bazillion of them out there! Hey Max, where do you think they came from? Do you think the Director sent them? I thought they locked her up, though. Maybe she escaped like in that movie, "The Fugitive". Except the guy in that movie was actually a good guy. Did you see that movie? I saw it with Ella. It's all about this guy who-"

"Thanks, Gazzy" I said.

The Gasman gave me a thumbs-up with the hand that wasn't over an annoyed-looking Nudge's mouth.

"I'm ok, and so are Total, Akila, and Celeste." Angel said. Total nodded, and went back to trying to comfort a whining Akila.

Fang put his hand on my shoulder, almost making me jump out of my skin. He'd pulled his little "disappearing act" again and I'd almost forgotten he was there.

"Hey" he whispered, "You hear that?"

I listened, but I wasn't getting it. "Hear what?"

"Nothing. There's no sound coming from outside. Shouldn't the Flyboys be trying to take down the door by now?"

"Maybe they're gone?" said Gazzy, hopefully.

"Well," I started, "It's kinda doubtful that they just gave up and decided to go home and watch the new episode of Lost. We should probably-"

"Oh my Gosh! Do you guys smell that?!" said Nudge, breaking Gazzy's grip on her mouth, "It smells like cheeseburgers!"

"And fries." Added Gazzy. "There's something else, too. Not sure what, but it smells good!"

I sighed. As usual, being on the run from bloodthirsty, wolf-shaped toaster ovens had made my Flock absolutely starving. As much as I wanted to get out of here before those Flyboys came back, all of us, especially the kids, needed food.

"Alright guys." I said, reluctantly, "Let's go find some chow."

The younger members of the Flock began to cheer, but I quickly shushed them.

"Guys! Quiet! You want someone to-"

Then, the door flew open.

This is my first shot a fanfiction, so I'd love some reviews. Please try to make your criticism constructive.

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Chapter 2:

At first, the light from outside our little room blinded us. As soon as my eyes began to adjust, though, I was in fight-or-flight mode. I realized that our wings were still out, so whoever it was who opened the door could probably see them. Great. I was about to give the Flock the order to burst out of there and make a run (or flight) for it, when I got a good look at the two people at the door.

One, a guy, was dressed in some kind of dark red samurai outfit and was holding a fake sword. (At least, I hope it was fake.) The other, a girl, was dressed up as a cat, whiskers and all. I almost thought we had landed at some kind of Halloween party, till I realized it was the middle of freaking August. The the guy spoke.

"Whoa, dudes, what ya doin' in there? Ya having some kind of secret meeting or something? Oh, hey! Nice costumes! You cosplayers, too? How'd you make those wings, dudes?"

We all looked at each other, confused. What the hell is this guy talking about?

"Oh my gosh, Kevin." Catgirl said, finally getting a chance to speak. That guy almost talked as fast as Nudge. "Look at their faces! I bet you and your talking totally freaked them out." She rolled her eyes. "I don't blame them for hiding in here. They probably heard you coming and took cover."

"Oh shut up, Christie!" He turned back to us. "But really, how did you guys make those sweet wings? They look so real! Hey, can I-"

"Oh, leave them alone, Kev. Besides, we need to go. We're gonna be late for the writer's board. Sayonara!" She grabbed Samurai Kevin and dragged him off.

Ok….

After sitting it silent shock for a couple seconds, Nudge finally got brave and peeked out. She motioned to us to follow, and we slowly climbed out.

We soon found we didn't have to hide our wings. They fit right in. We had somehow landed on the roof of the biggest costume party in the country. There were more kids dressed in strange outfits like Samurai Kevin's and Catgirl's. We saw more samurais, some pirates, werewolves(had to double check that they weren't Erasers), some "Men in Black" type guys, a whole pride of cat people, a mermaid, vampires, witchs, wizards, etc. I even saw some other kids dressed in wings, which made us look a whole lot less conspicuous.

"Oh my gosh!" exclaimed Nudge. "Please tell me that's not a guy in a schoolgirl uniform!"

I looked over, and quickly turned away. Why the heck did I look? "I hate to tell you, Nudge, but I think that's exactly what it is."

"Oh, ew! At least he could have shaved his legs or something"

"For once, I'm glad to be blind." Said Iggy.

"Ok," I said, trying to change the subject. "Well, this place may be a bit strange, but at least we blend." It was kind of more like, 'At least we're not the freakiest people here', but that's not the point. "We're here to get food, right? So let's find the food, chow down, and get out of here before either the Flyboys come back, or we find that these people's breed of insanity is contagious. Clear?"

The Flock nodded. Looks like we might actually follow my orders and stay on track this time.

"Hey!" Said Nudge, "Look! That table over there is selling that same cat hat that the girl with the Samurai was wearing! It's so cute!

"And they've got cat stuffed animals!" Added Angel.

Before I could say, 'Wait', the two girls were racing of toward the cat table. So much for staying on track.

"Why the heck do they want to look at cats for?" Asked Total. I gave him the 'Shut up. You're just a dog, remember?' look, before running off after Angel and Nudge. As I ran by, I saw a banner hanging above us that read 'Hatten Place Annual Anime Convention'.

An Anime Convention?

Got the idea for the dude in the skirt from 'Dramacon'.

Reviews welcome! Constructive criticism, please.

I'm so happy! I already have reviews! I love you people! Cookies for all!

-gives out cookies-

Ok, first of all, if anyone wants updates on how the story is going, I usually give updates on it under "Fanfiction Updates" on my Profile/Bio thingy. You know what I'm talking about.

Keep up the reviews and enjoy the story!

So, half an hour later, we're down 10 bucks, Nudge and Angel have matching kitty hats, Total's grumbling about "useless feline junk", and nobody can decide on what we should eat.

"I want to get tacos." Said the Gasman.

"Yeah, Gazzy, because that's exactly what your system needs." Said Iggy. "Your dangerous as it is, please, spare us."

"Besides," I added, "I don't think the have Mexican here." Thank God. "It looks like either burgers and fries or noodles."

"Noodles?" asked Iggy.

"Yeah, they've got a noodle stand thing over there." I said, pointing. Then remembering Iggy had no idea that I even was pointing, I added, "To your left, Ig."

"Max," Angel asked, "what's pocky?"

"Pocky? No idea."

"Well, they're selling it over there, and people are eating it." She said, pointing.

I looked over and saw a bunch of people eating what looked like little stick things. They must have been pretty popular, since some of the people seemed to be buying a year's supply and guarding them with their lives. They looked almost rabid.

"Can I get one Max?" asked Angel.

I looked over at the hostile-looking crowd of pocky people and shook my head. "Maybe we'll come back later when that crowd calms down, ok Sweetie?" The last thing we needed was to be trampled by Mad, Stick-Eating Anime People. "Besides, I think we should get something a bit more filling than sticks."

Suddenly, Fang, once again, felt the uncontrollable urge to scare the living heck outta me by grabbing my shoulder from behind.

I swung around, ready to strangle whatever it was that was behind me, and saw Fang. "God, Fang, you gotta stop doing that, I was about ready to punch your lights out!"

He raised his eyebrows, as if to say, 'You? Punch my lights out? Very funny.' and motioned for me to follow him. "I think you're going to want to see this, Max."

What now? I motioned to the Flock to come and followed Fang over to a section of the auditorium with a banner over it reading "New Manga". I thought for a millisecond that maybe Fang had developed a sudden fetish for Japanese comics, when I saw he was pointing up at something. I looked towards where he was pointing and almost had to grab him to steady myself.

On a poster that went from the floor almost to the ceiling and was the width of my wingspan read the words: 'Maximum Ride'. And below it was a picture of a 'mangafied' me. And below the poster was a very excited crowd of teens, some of them dressed up with wings, grabbing flyers of a table with a sign reading 'Maximum Ride: The Angel Experiment, by James Patterson. Illustrated by Narae Lee.

I looked at Fang. "What the…?"

"We really gotta start keeping tabs on this Patterson guy, huh?" Fang said.

"Hey!" Iggy exclaimed, "Someone want to tell me what the heck we're looking at here?!"

While Fang went to describe the scene to a pissed-off Iggy, I took another look towards the table. I saw that one of the flyers had pictures of the rest of the Flock in manga form. I was going to have to grab one of those.

"So Max, impressed?" said the Voice.

I will try to explain in the next chapter how they somehow know who J.P. is, but have no idea about the manga. Somehow. It'll either all make sense or make no sense. We'll see how it plays out.

Ok, so, Ch. 4. Where I try to make this story make sense. Alright, I'll get on with it.

When we had arrived at Mom's (Dr. Martinez to all the clueless people. Haven't you been paying attention?) house, after our showdown in Germany, about twenty zillion people wanted to turn our story into a book, movie, news article, etc. We had flatly refused all except one of them. James Patterson. J.P. or J. Patt. to us. See, he had been one of mom's friends from college or something and mom asked us to do him the favor of letting him write our story. So, we grudgingly agreed and gave him an interview from which the book you know as 'The Angel Experiment' was born. And now I here he's working on a couple more books, a movie, and now this. Busy little bee, isn't he? Well we, being busy saving the world and such, hadn't really been paying attention to what old J. Patt. was up to, so finding out we'd been turned into a Japanese comic was kind of a shock.

"Well, Max?"

Oh, and now my Voice was speaking to me again. Oh joyous happiness of contentment.

"Well, what?" I thought/said to the Voice. "We're a comic now. I guess we're famous. Hey, do you think we get a cut in the profits from this, 'cuz I could really use a new pair of combat boots."

"Yes, Max," said the Voice, "you're famous. Kids all over the world are reading about you, know about you. What do you think of that?"

"Well, so much for the 'lie-low' plan, huh? Though I don't think they have any real idea of what we look like. My hair's a bit shorter now, and Fang's? Nothing like that picture."

"You have a captive audience, Max. People are listening to you. Your story's out, you can't hide anymore. What are you going to do with this situation, Max?"

This questioning was starting to tic me off. "Well, let's see. Get a cut in the profits, buy new shoes, order a life supply of chocolate chip cookies, and hire a private investigator to find out who you are so I can kick your questioning ass. Anything else you'd like to know?"

Silence. How typical.

Nudge ran up to me with a handful of papers. "Max! I grabbed a bunch of those papers from that table. Hey, o you think that picture looks like me? I'm not sure. I mean, the skin color's right, but my hair's more-"

"I'm sure it's fine, Nudge." I said, cutting her off before she got on a roll. "How 'bout we put them in Fang's backpack, and we can look at them when we've finally found some food?"

"Ok." Agreed Nudge. "But, uh, Max? Where is Fang?

We all looked around (well, except Iggy. He kind of listened around.), but didn't spot him. I could feel panic rising in me. Where was he?

"This better not be some kind of sick joke of his." I thought "'Cuz I'm not laughing."

"I think I see him." Angel said. I breathed a sigh of relief. "But I think he might need saving." She pointed behind me.

I turned around, and suddenly didn't know whether to get pissed off or laugh.

Fang was absolutely surrounded by an excited horde of fangirls. They were all trying to either hug him, or just fawn over him, oohing, ahhing and giggling. I heard some of them saying 'Dark' over and over. What? Did they have a thing for emo bird-kids or something? But the best part was Fang; he was standing right in the middle of the rabid fangirl crowd, looking like he was at a total loss as to how to get free from them. He saw me watching and kind of gave me a 'help me out here' look; a look I had seen so infrequently on him, I burst out laughing, which changed his face into the 'I'm gonna kill you as soon as I figure out how to free myself from Fangirl Hell' look. This, of course, brought on more laughing from me, and now the rest of the Flock as well. Oh, man.

We must have been there for five minutes watching fangirls freak Fang out, until one of them practically jumped him and tried to, of all things, kiss him! She didn't even know him? Who does that?! Suddenly, my laughter ceased.

I dove into the crowd and extracted Fang from his Fangirl Hell. "Ok, miss, uh, Vampire/Mermaid Thing" I said, taking a look at her crazy outfit. What's with these people and their costumes? "I think my friend here has enough excitement for one day. You can go swim off and find some merman to go bite or whatever now." I gave her the 'back off' look, which I think she and her little friends must have understood. They started to leave.

One of them turned around. "Until we meet again Phantom Thief!" She gave Fang a little wave, and ran off with her friends, giggling.

"I'm really starting to hate giggling." Said Fang.

I looked at him, ready to nod and agree, took one look at his rumpled clothes and red face, and burst out laughing all over again.

Well, I hope J.P. doesn't mind me making up his history. Oh well.

Poor Fang. He'll probably have nightmares of getting glomped by Eccentric Fangirls for months. Hee hee.

Finally! Ch. 5 is up! Hope it was worth the wait. Well, here goes nothing…

Well, we finally got around to getting something to eat. Actually, it was more like, as soon as Fang composed himself, he said, "Wow, I'm hungry. Hey, let's eat over there!" Then, he practically dragged me over to the nearest food court-type place. Now, we were sitting at a corner table and Fang was doing his best to try and hide behind us so his fan club wouldn't see him, hide behind his hamburger so we wouldn't see him, and act like nothing at all was bothering him, all at once. To say the least, he was failing miserably at the last two, but we had decided while in line for food to let it go for now. I could always hack onto his blog and post about it later if I felt cruel enough.

Nudge had pulled out the stuff from the MangaMax booth and was going over it.

"Awww! Angel, you look adorable! I think they could have done a little better with me, though. And Fang's hair! Oh my gosh! They didn't get your hair quite right either, Max, though it's better than Fang's. Iggy and Gazzy look ok. Maybe we could right to this Narae Lee person and tell her what we really look like. Maybe we could even model for her or something! I always thought it'd be cool to be a model. Hey, maybe-"

"Maybe we could talk her into making a picture of me, too." Grumbled Total. He was a bit upset to find that there was no picture of him. "Akila doesn't have a picture, either. What are we, chopped liver?!" He turned to Akila, who was completely ignoring his entire rant, chowing down on her cheeseburger. "That's right, Akila!" He exclaimed. "Ignore these silly little things. Ignore them like they ignore us. Why should we care what this ignorant illustrator thinks? Someday, we shall prove our worth, and then she will be begging to draw our pictures! This is only small potatoes compared to the trials ahead that we will face. And when we save the world, then they will be the foolish, the ignored!" He bit into his own burger angrily, probably imagining that it was the illustrator's head.

I rolled my eyes. "Alright, Total. First of all, you're only a small character in J.P.'s first book, so you wouldn't have a picture. Second, Akila isn't even in the first book, so she doesn't get a picture. Third, I think I'm the one chosen to save the world here, remember? Unless you're hearing little voices now. And fourth, do you even know if this Narae Lee person is a girl or guy? Does anybody?" I looked around, but the Flock just shrugged. Total continued attacking his cheeseburger, probably ignoring me as well.

"Hey, Max?"

I turned to Gazzy. "Yeah, bud?"

"Can I go get some more French fries?" He had already downed 3 burgers, 4 things of fries, 3 milkshakes, and 2 things of onion rings. What can I say, he's a growing birdboy.

"Sure, Gaz." I handed him the money and he started to get up and leave. "Hey, and not the fries with the cheese and stuff on them, alright? We're not here to have you take out half the convention."

Iggy began making gagging noises. Gazzy stuck his tongue out at him. "I'm sticking my tongue out, Ig!" He added, remembering.

He started off toward the food line, only to be stopped only about two feet away by a couple of girls dressed in weird Japanese-style clothes. Oh, great, more fangirls. Fang began to sink lower in his seat.

"Hey!" One of them said to Gazzy. "Are you Naruto?"

Gazzy raised his eyebrows. "Uhhh…no."

"You look just like him! All you'd need would be a headband and fox whiskers on your face!" They giggled. I rolled my eyes.

"Oh, and that kid you're sitting with, the one with the black hair, he could totally be Sasuke!"

"Nah," Said the other fangirl, "He looks more like Dark, you know, from D.N.Angel?

By now, I had grabbed Fang before he ended up under the table.

"Uh oh, Carl wanted us to take over our table at 5:00, and it's 4:45 now. We'd better get going. See you around, Naruto." They giggled. Then, waving to a thoroughly embarrassed Fang, they walked off, still giggling.

Gazzy quickly bought his fries and came back. "Anyone have any idea who Naruto is?"

We all shook our heads. "Guess you have an anime twin out there." I joked.

"Well, at least I'm not the only one." Gazzy said, looking at Fang.

"Yeah, Fnick's an anime triplet!" Iggy said.

"Shut up Figgy." Fang responded, sinking dangerously close to the floor again.

We all started laughing, which intensified as soon as Fang finally ended up where I was afraid he would, under the table.

So much for dropping it.

It's like an attack of the fangirls!

Fang's going to need therapy before this is over…

Ch. 6 people!! Let's get on with it, shall we? This, by the way, may be the second-to-last chapter. Maybe. I'm just kind of going with the flow here. I may have more great ideas, or I may run out and end it. We shall see.

Well, after practically lifting Fang off the floor (he was kind of reluctant to come out), we finished our food and began making plans for our next great endeavor.

"Hey, can we, like, go shopping?" Nudge started. "I want to buy some of those cool costumes like all those girls have been wearing." Fang flinched. "They're sooo pretty! Hey, do you think we could get some of those stuffed animals, too? And what about-"

"Hey, I wanted to try that pocky stuff!" Angel cut in. "Can we go see if the crowd is gone?"

"Well, hun," I started to say. "I think we'd better be-"

"I want to find out who this "Naruto" guy is." Gazzy interrupted. "He's an imposter! He must be stopped! Right, Ig?"

Iggy nodded. "I want to find out more about our little comic. Make sure the Japanese got the facts straight. Could've messed up with translation and all that. Want to make sure they didn't leave out any important info, like, oh say, me and Gazzy's super-cool Eraser bombing!" He and Gazzy high-fived.

I rolled my eyes. "I'm sure they won't forget you. Now, as I was say-"

"Oh, and those cute pictures!" Nudge cut in. "Did you see those? I guess that guy draws them himself. We should buy one! Maybe he'll become famous someday and we can-"

"Akila and I would like to launch a silent protest against this Lee person." Total jumped in. "We need to stand up for our rights as important characters. We need to-"

"I really wanted some of that pocky, though." Angel said, talking over Total's rant. "It looks really yummy. And I wanted to get one of the stuffed kitties."

"Oh, and those headbands!" Nudge started in again. "Everyone has them. I totally-"

"As Martin Luther King once said," Total had begun speaking louder, trying to make his speech heard. "I have a Dream! And so do we. A Dream to be acknowledged, a Dream to be accepted as equals, a Dream-"

"Who does this Naruto guy think he is, anyway?" Gazzy jumped in. "There's only room for one of me around here. I'll show him-"

"Gazzy, I really think that-"I started again.

"Hey, did they make me look ok in the manga thing?" Iggy said. "I don't want to look like a dork or anything."

"Iggy, since when do you care about appearances? Look, we really need to-"

I was cut off again by Total. "We are man's best friend! We have stood by these humans for generations! Do we not deserve our right to be heard? Do we not-"

"Max." Said Fang. "Just to let you know, I'm all ready for the 'bust outta here and get moving' plan."

"Good to know I've got someone on board." I sighed. By now, everyone was talking at once, arguing about where to go, trying to get my attention, and, in Total's case, preaching the importance of dog rights. The only ones who were quiet were Fang and Akila, who was busy licking her plate clean. I was, for once, thankful for the noise other people were causing around us 'cause, if we had been in a normal restaurant, people would have been staring minutes ago.

I was getting sick of this. "Hey, guys?"

They kept talking.

"Uh, guys?" Fang tried.

Still talking.

"Woof?" asked Akila, looking about from her plate.

Still talking!

"Guys? We're speaking to you here!"

Guess what? Still talking.

"Hello?! Listen up here!"

Still. Freaking. Talking.

"SHUT UP A MINUTE!"

They shut up.

"Nudge, I do not have the money to buy a whole bunch of junk we won't even be able to carry anyway, Angel, we already had something to eat, we don't need pocky, Gazzy, Naruto is most likely a fictional character, so there's no chance of you finding him here, Iggy, you look fine, girls will love you, now shut up before I slap you, and Total, if you want to preach animal rights, join P.E.T.A.!"

Shocked silence. Beautiful.

"Now, as I've been trying to say, I think it's about time we blew this joint."

Most everyone groaned and began to protest. I heard Fang go "Yes!"

I gave everyone the 'shut up or else' look. Silence.

"We've been here long enough. I doubt those Flyboys who chased us in here in the first place have forgotten about us, their bound to be back looking for us. We need to be one step ahead of their game. So guys, say goodbye to AnimeLand, 'cause we're outta here."

My Flock had been ready to protest again until I reminded them of the Flyboys. Guess they'd forgotten the reason we were here in the first place. We agreed to be U&A as soon as we found a door out of this place. Fang was the happiest I'd ever seen him. He actually almost smiled. Almost.

We got up, checked to make sure we had everything, threatened Total with a muzzle and generic dog food if he didn't shut up, and headed towards a large map Gazzy had spotted in the corner. It turned out to be sooo helpful.

The map read:

'Don't know where you are? Well, neither do we! Good Luck!'

I rolled my eyes. "Just my luck. I get the map with a sense of humor."

"Hey, Max?"

"Just a minute, Nudge." I began looking for a 'You Are Here' star, a 'food court' label, anything to help me figure out the damn map.

"M-Max?"

"Hold on, Nudge!"

"MAX!"

I flipped around. "What?!"

Then, I found out what.

The Flyboys had found us.

Dun dun dun! The Flyboys have finally come! I guess Lost is over. Ha ha.

Oh, by the way, got the idea for what the map said from 'Dramacon'.

So, where were we? Oh, yes. Flyboys. Right?

The Flyboys had found us.

There were less of them this time, only about six, but that was probably because they couldn't fit a freaking ton of them into this already-packed joint. They began coming towards us, slowly. The Flock tensed. We were in our literal fight-or-flight mode, and in these close quarters, it was gonna be a fight.

"We are one of many." The front Flyboy droned out in an almost too-robotic tone. Whatever. I was sick of hearing it.

"I'll show you 'One of Many'! In case you haven't noticed, there's six of you and eight of us." Ok, so I was counting the practically useless-in-battle Total and Akila, but what did the robot know, anyway? Could these things even count? "So guess what, robo-jerks? Fair fight this time!" I got ready to aim a roundhouse kick at the nearest one when a couple of the Flyboys did something very unexpected. They started to laugh. Ok…

"Oh my Gosh, Jake and Eddy, you're ruining the dramatic fight scene!" The front one yelled in a girl's voice.

I looked at the Flock and we all rolled our eyes. More of these costume freaks. I had to let out a sigh of relief, though. At least they weren't the real thing.

"But come on, Gina!" The 'Flyboy', Jake replied. "Does she, or does she not sound just like the real Max? Hey!" He said, turning to me. "Damn good act. You should, like, try out to be in the movie or something. You sound like the real Maximum Ride!"

"Well, duh." I wanted to say, but held my tongue. I settled for a simple, "Uhhh, thanks?"

"You're Welcome." Jake said, taking off his Flyboy headgear to reveal a red-headed, freckly teenager.

"Hey, how long are you guys here?" Piped in another 'Flyboy'. "If you're gonna be here around eight, we could do a skit or something."

I jumped in before any of my wannabe actor Flock got any ideas. "Actually, we were just looking for the exit. We've gotta get home before our parents freak. Can't stay out too late, they're missionaries and all." Yes, always use the 'missionary parent' excuse. 'Cause its worked sooo well in the past. At least it worked on these guys.

"Oh, ok. Well maybe the next convention, huh? You guys going to the one in NYC?"

"Uhhh, maybe." I said, hoping it would prevent them from asking for names and numbers and such. "Hey, do you think you could point us toward the nearest exit?"

"Oh, sure!" Said the 'FlyGirl'. "Just keep heading that way." She pointed to the left. "You're bound to run into it."

"Thanks." I said, motioning to the Flock. We waved goodbye and got the heck outta there. I don't care if those things are just costumes, they freak me out.

We kept heading to the left, and finally saw a large, glass door that headed out. Finally.

"Ok, guys." I said to the Flock. "As soon as we're out of here, we head for the nearest empty spot and we're U&A. Got it?"

My Flock nodded. Fang actually looked tense. Probably excited to get out of here, I had thought. Then, he got up beside me.

"We're being followed." He whispered to me.

"By who?" I asked, scanning the crowd.

He grimaced. "One of my fan club."

That's when I saw her. Miss Bold & Bizarre, dressed in her mermaid/vampire costume, stalking us. Tagging along was a goth-kitty girl who looked insanely bored. I decided to take care of her once and for all.

I stopped the Flock and turned around to face the Weirdo Duo. They kept walking and stopped in front of me. The mer-vamp was practically bouncing off the walls, like she was on a caffeine binge. The other just crossed her arms and glared. I got the feeling that was a usual pose for her.

"Alright, Dracula's Bride of the Deep." I started. "What is it that you want so bad that you feel the need to stalk us on our way out?"

She completely ignored me, pointing to Fang. "See, Amanda? He looks just like either Dark or that Maximum Ride character, Fang!" Fang flinched. "I mean, is this just the coolest or what?! We should go get Cody and tell him. I bet he'd totally agree! Do you think they'll-"

She was cut off by Goth-Kitty's hand covering her mouth. She turned to me. "I'm sorry about my excitable little friend here." She said. "Becky here had one too many of Dunkin' Donuts finest brews and enough pocky to feed an elephant. As for the reason we're stalking you, I'm just here to keep motor-mouth out of trouble, and she's here for a favor. Becky, you ready to ask like a calm human being now?"

Becky nodded.

Goth-Kitty let her go. "Ok, ask away."

"Is it ok, I mean, if it's not too much trouble, I mean-" Amanda gave her a look that said, 'Get on with it'. Becky nodded. "Uhhh, yeah. Could I get a picture with him? Please?" She pointed to Fang, bouncing. "Please please please please please??"

Wow, she was almost as bad as Nudge. I turned to Fang. "What do you think?"

He turned to hyper-girl. "Will you leave me alone?"

She nodded so much, so fast, Amanda had to grab her head to make her stop.

"Fine." Fang answered. He didn't look to comfortable with the whole thing, but I'm sure he doubted as much as I did that the girl would go away if we even tried to say 'no'.

"Yes! Sweet! Thank you, thank you sooo much! Squee!" Did she actually say 'squee'? "Amanda, will you take the picture? Please?"

Amanda rolled her eyes. "Yes, because I'd just love to take a wacky picture of you and some cosplaying bird-boy with your dysfunctional camera." She took the camera anyway, though, saying, "Next time Cody gets the bright idea to come to a freaking Anime Convention dressed in a schoolgirl outfit and invites me, I'm gonna pass." Did she say 'schoolgirl outfit'? It couldn't be… Oh, forget it.

Amanda held up the camera, ready to take the shot. Fang stood there, looking ready to jump out of his own skin, while Becky hugged him, sticking to him like glue, and smiled. I think I saw Fang twitch.

"Ready, Amanda!" Becky said excitedly.

"Ok, say 'I'm-a-complete-and-total-coplaying-weirdo-with-no-life-or-future!'

Becky made a pouty face. "Amanda, come on!"

"Ok, say 'Amanda-is-the-queen-of-all-Hell-and-that's-where-I'm-going-because-I'm-a-godless-infidel!"

Becky glared.

"Alright, how about, 'I-wish-this-freak-would-let-go-of-me-so-I-can-get-the-hell-out-of-here-and-go-be-an-emo-dork-somewhere!'"

"Amanda!"

"Face it, it's what he's thinking." She said, pointing to Fang.

Becky glared again.

"Alright, say whatever the hell you want, I don't give a crap. How about you just shut up and smile?" She looked at Fang. "Or scowl. Whatever works for you, birdboy."

She finally took the picture. Becky was ecstatic.

"Thank you so much!" She hugged fang again, poor guy. "Hey, do you have a MySpace or something? E-mail? What about a-" Amanda grabbed her, pulling her away.

"Yeah, thanks for humoring my insane friend here. Have a happy life. Hope to never see you again and what not." She dragged the squirming Becky off, wrinkling her mermaid tail. "We're going to be good and leave the poor guy alone now." I heard her saying to Becky. "He looks traumatized enough. You should have to pay for his therapy."

We watched them leave. Fang let out a sigh of relief.

"Well, at least that's over." He said, turning to us.

Then we all burst out laughing. Fang just couldn't get a break today.

Poor Fang! It's just never gonna end, is it?

And in case she reads this, yes, Amanda, you got to be in my story. I hoped I portrayed your Queenliness well enough. I expect a cookie for this. 

Chapter 8! Is this….the end?

So, after watching Fang be completely embarrassed for the 3rd time today, we finally made our way out the double doors and into the parking lot, which was almost, if not more of a zoo than the actual convention hall.

"I want to learn how to do that dance! It looks so cool!" Nudge said, watching a group of girls (in freaky outfits, of course) doing some weird dance.

"I think it's called Hare Hare Yukai." Angel said, obviously pulling her little mind-reading trick.

"Cool." Answered Nudge, like she had any idea what the name of that dance meant. "Max, I want to learn how to do it!"

"Ok, you can look it up on YouTube later." I answered. "We're outta here, remember?"

"Yeah, we need to get out of here before Fnick the Anime Twin Wonder gets ambushed again." Iggy said.

Fang glared daggers at him.

"Yeah, Iggy, Fang's glaring at you." Gazzy added.

"Forget something, Fnick?" Iggy asked.

Fang rolled his eyes. "Yeah, yeah, I forgot you're freaking blind. Sue me. I'm rolling my eyes, by the way."

"C'mon, guys, stop messing around. Let's go." I was itching to get out of this place. Way too many crowds of freakishly-dressed people for me.

"Oh, look, Angel! They're doing another dance!" Nudge said, pointing to the dancers again.

"That one's Caramelldansen." Angel said, mind-reading again.

"Yes, and it's all on YouTube." I said, grabbing the two girls. "Now, let's roll."

Unfortunately, we weren't able to roll very quickly.

We were stopped by at least fourteen people selling random anime-related junk, about twenty people who wanted to know who we were cosplaying as, and fifteen of those people insisted on knowing how we made our wings look so real. We also were forced to stop at a booth selling pocky so Angel could finally try some. And if all this wasn't bad enough, we kept running into members of Fang's fan club.

"Oh. My. Gosh, Vanessa! I swear that kid looks just like Dark!" I heard some girl saying to her friend. Fang looked miserable.

"Don't worry, I think we've almost reached the end of the parking lot. Then maybe we can make a run for it." I whispered to him, smiling.

"At least no one else has asked for pictures." He answered. We heard some more giggling from behind, followed by the word 'Dark!'. "I wish this jacket had a freaking hood." He added, trying to pull the jacket a bit higher to cover his face.

"Yeah, though, with your track record today, someone would probably follow you around saying you were the grim reaper. I laughed.

I caught a glimpse of one of his rare smiles, and then it was gone in a flash. "Probably."

I opened my mouth to say something else, then felt that something was behind me. I turned around and came face-to-face with a Flyboy.

"We are one of many."

I rolled my eyes. "Yeah, yeah, one of many freaky cosplayers who creeps up on people and tries to freak them out. Very funny. Now, I and my friends are trying to leave-"

"M-Max?" I heard Angel say behind me.

"Yeah, Angel?" I did not like the sound of her voice. Oh, Patron Saint of Recombinant DNA Bird Children, please don't let her say...

"That's not a cosplayer."

Crap.

I looked behind the Flyboy in front of me. He had back-up. Lots of back-up.

"U&A! Now!"

The three younger kids shot into the air first, Nudge carrying Total. Total was freaking out.

"Get Akila! Get Akila!"

Fang and I both grabbed Akila and were ready to take off when I saw Iggy tangled up with one of the Flyboys.

"Iggy!" I yelled.

"Just get the hell out of here!" He yelled back. That's when I saw him stick something on the Flyboy.

Fang and I didn't ask questions. We took Akila and were up in the air in a matter of seconds. We had known Iggy long enough to know when all hell was about to break loose.

It wasn't too long until Iggy was right behind us, going as fast as he could.

"Can't you guys fly any faster?" He asked.

"Not carrying a freaking huge dog, no." I answered.

I looked behind us and saw the Flyboy army following. Fang saw them as well.

He looked at me. "You know what? I think I've just been inspired to go faster."

I nodded, and we sped up. I was beginning to wonder how long we'd be able to keep up this speed with Akila in our arms when…

"BOOM."

We slowed down, turning to look behind us.

The Flyboys were exploding in a series of explosions. One would explode and take out around ten others when it did, spraying Eraser skin and shrapnel all over. Akila barked her approval.

"Iggy, my man, that was sweet!" Fang yelled to Iggy. Ig just gave him a thumbs-up.

"Nice work, Ig!" I yelled back. I decided I talk to him about hiding explosives on her person another time. Right now, I was kind of glad he did, though I also decided it might be smart to keep clear of him from now on. It seemed like his bombs were getting more powerful, and if he's carrying them all on his body and one of us accidentally bumps him…BOOM!

"Come on, Max." Fang said. "Let's get going. I've had enough of planet weird for one day.

"But Fang!" I said with mock astonishment. "You look just like that Dark guy!" I threw in some fake giggling.

He glared, but finally smiled.

"Alright, Maximum, let's get out of here."

Meanwhile, back at the convention, people were trying to make sense of what had happened. Most dismissed it as some kind of show or crazy publicity stunt. But there was one group of kids that had another opinion.

"Well, that explains why she sounded just like the real Maximum Ride." Jake, the Flyboy cosplayers said to his shocked friends.

"Wish I'd gotten an autograph." Gina the FlyGirl added.

"And to think we thought Gazzy looked like Naruto!" A cosplayer said to her friend, a couple feet away.

"Yeah, we're such idiots!" Her friend agreed.

But the biggest commotion was going on right outside the double doors where a mermaid/vampire cosplayer was loudly bragging to anyone who would listen.

"I got a picture with the real Fang! You hear that, people? THE REAL FANG! I have a picture with-"

She was cut off by her friend pulling her away from the crowd and back inside.

"Yeah, Becky, I think they've got it. Actually, I'm sure even China knows by now."

"That's pretty awesome, though." Added their friend, the schoolgirl cosplayer, Cody.

"Yeah, so awesome. We can sell the prints on eBay." Amanda said.

"No! It's mine! Mine! My picture! My precious!" Said Becky, clutching her camera.

"Let's go, quick. I think she's starting her Lord of the Rings Gollum impersonation again." Amanda said.

Cody just shrugged and helped his friend drag off the eccentric girl.

"This has been the weirdest day of my life." Commented Amanda.

Cody just smiled. "Welcome to an Anime Convention, babe."

A quick note:

Hare Hare Yukai and Caramelldansen are two awesome dances that you can find on YouTube. Look 'em up!

So, this is the end. R&R is greatly appreciated. I would like to take a moment to thank all my reviewers…

THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU!! YOU ALL ROCK!! COOKIES FOR ALL! -gives all cookies- YOU ALL ROCK!!

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