Maximum Ride: Schools Out Forever

by James Patterson

After the events of Maximum Ride: The Angel Experiment, the prior book, the Flock is headed toward Washington, D.C., where they hope to find the answers to their origins. However, after Fang is gravely injured by a flying Eraser and taken to a hospital, the Flock is housed by an FBI agent named Anne on the agreement that she is allowed to examine them "at a distance." The Flock enjoys a rare period of peace, even attending a private school, which is later discovered to have been an insane asylum. Life is good to them for now, as Max sees it, but they happen to be seeing Erasers often and their relationships in the Flock with each other are starting emotions that sometimes spill over and cause fights. Suddenly, though, Iggy finds his long lost parents (he later said, "They were the real thing and the real thing wanted to make money off me"). An ordeal at their school in which teachers pull out tasers and chase Max, causing the Flock to leave. Angel then suggests that they go to Florida, and for lack of a better plan, Max agrees. Later on, while in Florida, the Flock learns that a multi-national corporation named Itex is plotting to destroy the world, based on what Angel "overheard" some teachers thinking about being one of the company's able to destroy the world, and is also tracking the Flock's movements. Earlier, Anne hadrevealed herself as a member of the lab that created the Flock, and seeks to recapture them. Afterward, Max faces a clone of herself created by Itex, and she is destined to either destroy it or have it kill her. However, when she discovers that Itex created the clone to kill the original Max, she decides not to destroy the clone after a long battle to the death in the Itex Headquarters. The clone is referred to simply as "fake Max" or "the other Max".