Angel: A Maximum Ride Novel

think of all of this?” I admit it. I was waiting for Angel to step up and volunteer to be Queen of the World. It was what she’d been wanting. She wanted to run the flock. She wanted to take over my job. She wanted to have power. “Are you interested in meeting this little gaggle of Gen 77 kids?”

But Angel remained uncharacteristically quiet. Calculating her next move maybe.

“You can’t just pretend this isn’t happening, that you aren’t destined for this,” Jeb said. I detected a note of frustration in his voice. Good. “The Gen 77 kids need you, whether you acknowledge them or not. Don’t you think it makes sense for you to see them? To know them?”

Angel stood up. Here we go, I thought. “Max doesn’t want to go, Jeb,” she said. “So we’re not going.”

Did she—did she say we’re not going? I glanced at her, and she gave me a sweet smile, just like the old days.

“Yeah,” said Dylan, coming to stand behind me. “Max leads the flock. If she doesn’t want to go, then we don’t go.”

It would have been churlish to remind Dylan just then that he wasn’t part of my flock.

Jeb and Dr. G-H looked like they wanted to tear their hair out.

“Well, you know, I wouldn’t mind seeing the Gen 77 kids.” I looked up as my mom stepped forward. Come again? “Just see them.” She smiled at me apologetically. “I know how you feel, Max,” she went on, noticing the shock twisting my face, “and I don’t blame you. But as a scientist, I have an insatiable curiosity. And I think we need to see some of this new generation, whether you lead them or not. We need to know what’s going on out there. It’s for our own good.”

I sighed, beaten. Oh, like I’m gonna tell my mom no?

11

THERE’S SOMETHING ABOUT flying that helps clear the cobwebs from my mind, puts everything into perspective, and makes me feel strong and powerful. And often I can leave annoying people behind on the ground. Always satisfying.

This day, I had left the annoying people in Jeb’s airplane, trapped inside a little tin can, while I flew free, chilly air filling my lungs, about two hundred feet away from them. The plane was small, a fancy corporate jet, and everyone—the flock, my mom, Dr. Gub-Hub, the blond DNA donor, and of course Jeb—had opted to travel the easy way.

One odd thing about flying today: the cobwebs weren’t clearing out of my head. Instead, my mind was clouded with misgivings as we flew low over the Arizona mountains. I had not promised to lead the Gen 77 kids. This was a look-see only. I mean, who am I? Joan of Flock? I had my hands full with my own family, my own romantic disasters complications. I couldn’t help wondering if this had all been a setup—if Jeb and the Hanster had cooked up this plan to get us interested, to get us on their side. I can’t help it—it’s just my suspicious nature. That, and the fact that they’re both lying, manipulative weasels.

Oh, I see something, Angel thought at me. (She’s the only one of us who can project thoughts into other minds at will.) At two o’clock.

I looked, and when I squinted, I could see buildings with camouflage netting, in shades of tan and green and brown, over them. Which made them almost impossible to detect from the air. Unless you had super birdkid raptor vision.

Yeah, got it, I thought. Well, let’s go down and see what we can find out. But way deep inside, I was thinking that maybe I would just hang back, be on my guard, not get sucked into a trap.

Then I remembered that Angel could read minds and that I couldn’t actually keep some thoughts deeper inside my head than others.

Crap.

I sped up, leaving the plane behind, and concentrated on the ground, scanning the area a good distance out. I saw no vehicles, no—

I don’t know what made me look up at that moment, but I did, and suddenly, not fifty feet in front of my face, was a huge, clear—jellyfish? I was going almost three hundred miles an hour, and I plowed right into that sucker.

12

IT WAS LIKE hitting a squishy balloon. Going as fast as I was, I sank deep into it, as if I’d hit a bouncy castle face-first and vertically. My head was pressed against a thick, smooth film, and for several horrible moments I had the feeling of being smothered, my wings bent painfully back. Then, boing! I bounced out of it, arms and legs flailing wildly, my stalled wings causing me to drop quickly before I could catch myself.

What the heck?!

It had literally bounced me back about sixty feet, and from this distance I could see that it was a huge, clear, weird thing. It was practically invisible, and I realized with shock that there were hundreds of these balloon-type things,