A/N: Welcome to chapter 7! Comment, vote, yadda yadda yadda. This chapter is relatively uneventful, but we do figure out some of the characters' Tragic Backstories™, which someone should be happy about. Also, some bad decisions may be made this chapter by parties who shall remain unnamed, so go easy on them... Enjoy the chapter!

"Cab driver," Lucy shouted out.

Luke shook his head and put his hands on his head again in a point.

"Unicorn," Seb tried.

Luke shook his head again. He flapped his hands behind his ears.

"Gills!" Ivy said excitedly. This was clearly her first time playing any kind of game, and she was very much enjoying herself.

The timer went off, and Luke collapsed frustratedly to the ground as though he'd been stabbed. "Guys, it's a dolphin, obviously."

"What part of that was obvious?" Carter asked. "The part where you rode a unicycle, or the part where you had gills?"

"Dolphins have gills," Luke jokingly protested.

"Boooooo," Seb yelled, with her finger and her thumb in the shape of an 'L' on her forehead.

Madison laughed with the rest of them. She was happy here with the whole flock, just having fun and not worrying about school or other dangers. Well... almost the whole flock.

Sawyer was outside on the deck, standing in silence and looking out at the trees. He'd left after the first few rounds of charades, and had been out there for a few minutes now.

As Alvira drew the next card, Madison got up off the couch and started walking towards the door to talk to him. Sabine grabbed her arm.

"Hey, where are you going?" she asked.

"Just to get some space," Mads replied. Seb nodded and let go of her.

She stepped out into the warm summer air and breathed it in deeply. Then she turned to Sawyer. "What's wrong with you?"

"Can I talk to you?" he asked in a serious voice.

Madison looked at him suspiciously. "You already are, but sure... what's up?"

"I thought I saw someone today. A man named Cole Morrison."

"Okay... what's weird about that? Do you know him? Is he famous or something?"

"No... he's a VOID agent."

Madison's heart stopped dead. They'd all been told stories of the terrifying VOID, an agency that hunted and experimented on Aviads. VOID had never found them in the small town of theirs that probably wasn't even on the map, and they'd never worried about it either. They knew they lived somewhere secluded and they were careful where they pulled out their wings. How could VOID find us?

"Don't freak out yet, I'm not sure if it was really him... it's been five years since last we saw each other," Sawyer told her.

"By the way you say his name, he doesn't sound like the kind of guy you'd forget," Madison replied. "How do you know him?"

Sawyer was silent.

"You can talk to me," Madison said. "If you need time, though, that's fine."

"He killed my girlfriend," Sawyer blurted out.

"What? What happened?" Mads hissed. "Only if you want to share, though. I know it's probably hard."

Sawyer took a deep breath and began his story. "It was a long time ago. I was only fifteen when I discovered I was an Aviad. I was found by a woman named Cristina Perez-Sanchez. She was like a goddess, honestly, so fearless and strong. She introduced me to her flock, and that's where I met Cora. She was so sweet, so caring, and so understanding. I felt like I could talk to her about everything and nothing. It wasn't long before we became a couple." He huffed a humorless laugh. "She used to call me Soy Bean. Anyways, at the time, we all lived in Washington DC. That's a big city, and at the time it was a hotbed for VOID. They discovered our flock, and so Cristina told us that she was disbanding us. She told us we would be safer if we all moved away from the city to another town, or better yet, another state. Then she left us. She and most of the flock moved to Maryland, but a few days before Cora was supposed to go to Michigan to live with her grandparents and I was supposed to move here, VOID ambushed the two of us. We were saying goodbye to each other behind an off-limits factory where we thought no one would find us, but Morrison did. He tried to catch the both of us, and like a coward, I tried to fly away. Cora tried to protect me in the way she tries to protect everyone. They managed to get a wire around her ankle, but she fought them anyway. In the chaos, Morrison accidentally threw her against an electric fence. She died that day." Sawyer squeezed his eyes shut, obviously trying to hold back tears. "I never saw Morrison again, until today."

"Wow." Madison blinked, letting his words sink in. "I'm so sorry."

"It wasn't your fault," Sawyer told her. "Can I ask you a favor? Don't tell the others. The new guys don't even know about VOID, and I think they have enough to worry about. I'm not even sure if I really saw him anyways."

"Are you sure? I trust you, but do you think that's really the right call?"

"I don't know. I just want to keep everyone safe. Right now, I think it's important that they get settled first before we give them life threats to worry about."

"Okay." Madison bit her lip. "And thank you for telling me, I know you don't like to talk about your past."

"Says you, Miss Human-Trafficking." Sawyer responded. Then his eyes widened, his face showing that he immediately regretted his choice of words, but it was too late.

Madison flashed back to her brief kidnapping, back when she lived in Concord. She had only been ten at the time, playing frisbee in the park with her younger siblings Jack and Lily after dark. Jack had hurled the frisbee into the woods, so Madison went to go get it. Three men snuck up on her, put a drugged cloth over her mouth, and took her to a van before driving her away.

She'd awoken in a small room with a few other young girls. They'd told her that the men who took them were selling them to bad people, and that every now and then they would come in and take another girl. Madison had spent the night praying, even though she had no religion. She was just so scared, and she had no one to ask for help. The next morning, men dressed in black had come into the dark room and tried to take her away. She'd kicked and screamed, but to no avail. They tied her hands behind her and forced her to wear a horrible dark sack over her head. They sat her down in the middle of a room, but she heard gunshots and screaming and she'd been terrified but it was over so quickly. The police had arrived, and they killed or arrested all the kidnappers. They brought her back to her mother and siblings, and she was safe. After that, though, she never went anywhere dark alone and got trained in boxing, so she wouldn't have to be scared anymore. The whole experience was behind her now, and she wasn't as traumatized as some of the other girls must have been who had been there longer. But it was still a touchy subject. And suffice to say she was not happy when Sawyer brought it up.

"What the hell do you know about it?" Madison snapped at him. "Nothing. That's what you know. You're just some stupid rich guy who thinks he's so great because he lets kids stay over at his house."

"You don't mean that," Sawyer said, his lip trembling. "I know you get angry like this when you try to hide your feelings-"

"Shut up!" Madison screamed. "You don't know anything about me!"

She turned on her heel and slammed the door behind her. Through the window she could see Sawyer pressing his sleeve up to his eyes, but she really wasn't in the mood for dealing with other people's emotions right now.

She stormed back to the couch and slouched back into her usual seat.

"Are you okay?" Alvira said when she saw Madison's face.

"I'm fine," Mads barked. "Whose turn is it now?"