Maximum Ride 9
James Patterson
PROLOGUE
A note from Mac about this book being the new history. She gives a brief overview of what he past books. In the end of the last book, the apocalypse came.
BOOK ONE: APOCOLYPSE
1. The world is in chaos with disaster everywhere. Max grabs the backpacks and tries to take off. A smoldering boulder knocks them from her hands. Lava runs over the place that had been their home for the past few months. She races to meet the rest of the flock.
2. Max stops herself from falling into a river of lava by spreading out her wings. She meets the others and Gazzy tells them they have to get to higher ground. They have limited supplies. Dylan goes to save the jugs of water before the lava reaches the lake and destroys it. He tells her the others need her to lead. They take to the air with Fang carrying Total’s love, Akita. A smoking rock hits Max in the head and Max starts to fall. Fang grabs her hand and pulls her up. The start running, but Max asks where Dylan is.
3. Max looks around for Dylan. Their entire paradise created for mutant kids is destroyed. She hopes her mom and half sister have survived in the caves below. They find a high up cave. It is safe from lava and mudslides, but the wind is hurricane strong. Mac is worried about Dylan, but Angel tells her she can’t go out. Angel tells Fang to stop her. He tells her to calm down. Gazzy warns her that the air isn’t safe to fly through. Fang tells her they will look in the morning and she eventually agrees it is the only thing they can do.
4. In the morning they set off to find Dylan from the ground. They find their water supply still in tact which means he hadn’t made it that far. Angel cannot sense him. Fang finds one of Dylan’s sneakers.
5. Max finally accepts Dylan’s death. Usually flying is calming for Max, but seeing all the destruction doesn’t help. She drops his sneaker into the ocean below. Max wants to go back, but it is a wasteland and they are already too far. Iggy points out the direction of land. They see the opera house in the empty Sydney, Australia.
6. They fly through ocean spray and falling ash to a skyscraper rooftop. Nudge uses her ability to unlock the door. Angel curls up under a desk to sleep. Max goes to find food, but Angel sends her a warning to get out of there. A pack of huge dogs start snarling at them.
7. They have no idea if they are wild dogs or genetically engineered creatures thee to kill them. One attacks Max and she fights back. Nudge offers to come help, but Max tells her to stay back. Max finds a hose and starts to praise them. Akilla goes after them. Fang finds a knife to fight them off. Nudge is attacked and Max goes to help her. Gazzy blows out the wall to daze the dogs. They run and get themselves into a conference room with a huge window. Max dives through the window and into the air.
8. Max counts her flock and they are all safe. Nudge is hurt, but Max is able to get her to smile with a joke. They fly over a sea of dead bodies in the streets. Only their bones are left. They brainstorm about what could have killed them. Total is upset because Akila hadn’t made it through the fight. Iggy set down her body. Total cries and they all are all cried out when he finishes.
9. The flock finds a clear spot to bury Akila so they can all say goodbye. Fang goes into the cottage to find a headstone, but instead finds a laptop. He tells them they are all going to want to see it.
10. The cottage doesn’t have power and the tablet is dead. Nudge finds a solar power machine and she is able to manipulate it to charge the tablet. It turns on.
11. They start looking for any information they can find. All of the news sites are down. An Instagram-like site is still up and they can see photos of all the apocalyptic destruction people have posted. Fang checks his blog and sees there are posts they haven’t seen yet.
12. A lot of the posts are from before the destruction. There are a few after from anonymous posters telling them where they are leaving supplies for them. Some are asking about updates about what has been going on. London has been incinerated. There is a virus going around killing people. The last post is from only a few minutes ago. They get a response and says they are in Western PA. They ask them about Erasers, but the poster isn’t sure what they are talking about. The tablet dies.
13. A servant leads a boy, A1013, into a lab. The man tells the boy he created him and that many call him The Remedy. They are underground and The Remedy is trying to get the world’s evolution back on track. He tests A1013’s knowledge of the flock. He tells the boy they need to be exterminated. The doctor says A1013 is the first horseman of their apocalypse. A1013 is confident he will complete his mission.
14. A1013 ventures out on his mission. He goes down the tunnels to where the doctor told him to go. A relaxation scenario is started for him. He sees a girl and almost screams when she reaches out to touch him. He introduces himself as Horseman. The girl tells him she loves him and they are made for each other. He realizes this is his gift from The Remedy. He realizes he can’t love her. He leaves her to go about his mission and promises to try to fix her situation when he returns.
15. Horseman feels too much and thinks it might be like a glitch like the flock. He spreads his wings and takes off through the heating vents into the Russian skies. He enjoys flying and wonders about it. He notes that these are not things he should be thinking about.
16. As they go through the cottage for supplies, they discuss where they should be going. Angel says they need to go to Russia because that is where the answers are but refuses to tell them why. Budge suggests they stay where they are. Max says they need to take some time to figure out what they need to do instead of rushing off to the unknown. Gazzy and Iggy are frustrated with Max for not accepting the death of her mom, half-sister, and Dylan. Angel declares they will take off in the morning and leave Max and Nudge behind. Fang declares he is staying with Max.
17. Angel tells Fang he can’t stay with Max, but he refuses to believe her. She says she will have to show him. His eyes roll back and his nose bleeds. Max yells at Angel to stop.
18. Max finds Fang banging a tree branch against a tree repeatedly in anger. She asks him what Angel showed her, but he won’t tell. He says he has to leave and do as much as he can with the time he has left. They have sex and fall asleep in the leaves.
19. Dang wakes up from the vision Angel showed him on a repeated loop. He is careful not to wake Max and spreads his wings to take off. He finds it odd that they will fail him one day. He decides to go with his instincts and head for California.
20. Fang sees a pack of cryena heading for the flock’s cottage. He decides tot take them out as a parting gift to the flock. He does well at first, but eventually they take him down. He rips off the skin of one and sees a blinking light. He realizes they are robots and someone is tracking the flock.
21. He tears the cryenas apart finding machine and lab grown body parts. One has a constant howl so he smashes it head until it is silent. He goes to leave and Total barks his farewell. Fang signals his goodbye and takes off.
22. Max makes her way back to the cottage looking for Fang. Iggy and Gazzy are preparing to leave. Max tries to convince them to stick together, but they want answers they can’t find there. Nudge and Total say goodbye to the others. Total tells Max he saw Fang leave around Dawn. She realizes Fang is gone forever.
23. Max blames Angel for breaking up the entire flock. She says she has to go too. Max hugs her. Angel says max will understand some day. She days she’ll see her in Russia and take off.
24. Max has a tantrum and says she cannot trust anyone because they all left. Nudge points out that she and Total are still there. She thinks Max is upset that she won’t be getting attention from boys fighting over her. Max tells her her priority has always been the flock. They hug for a long time.
25. Max, Nudge and Total make their way back to the island. They are about to find someplace to land and rest when Max sees a person on the ground. She calls out to them, but then they fire something at the flock.
26. The flock is brought to the ground with nets. The group is mutants and have gills and says they are defending their island. Nudge recognizes some of them from when they first arrived on the island.
27. They are kept bound. Eventually they are fed. The group doesn’t have a ruler, but rule themselves. They are going to allow the flock to join their group in the tunnels, but once they enter, they won’t be allowed back out. They have struck punishments for rule breakers. Max asks what happened to the others. They say most of the people without gills drown, including her mom and half-sister.
28. A boy named Johnny tells him his theories about what happened. Dr. Martinez said something about Russia betraying them. He talks about different disasters hitting different parts of the world and it seems like the whole thing was orchestrated. He has been trying to talk Rizal into planning for weapons because someone isn’t going to be happy about bunch of mutants survived. Rizal thinks they have everything they need in the caves and he t will be better for them to be disconnected from the rest of the world.
29. Johnny has oxygen tanks for them, but Max assures him they have gills just like him. He asks her to carry the oxygen takes back for him anyway and they agree.
30. While under the murky water, freakishly large eels start to swim around them. Nudge screams. Max uses the air in her tank to scare them off. She sees one patch onto Johnny and then several more attack and kill him. Max tries to use her tank to help him, but it is empty. When they surface in the tunnel, they can see the blood from the aquatics they lost. No one seems bothered that they lost more than half of those that were on the trip.
31. She confronts Rizal about it and he just shrugs saying they lose a few kids everyday. Max has trouble dealing with the idea of being okay with that. She flies to the ceiling and is already feeling claustrophobic. She sees why the rest of the flock hadn’t wanted to come back with her.
32. Max goes to get Nudge and Total, but they don’t want to leave. Max says she needs answers, but Nudge says she doesn’t. They say goodbye and Nudge gives her a sweatshirt as a goodbye present.
33. Max for es as far as she can before swimming the rest of the way. She takes off as soon as she can. She starts towards Russia and hits a storm. The temperatures continue to drop. She makes it to land and finds the entire animal population dead. She sees someone picking over the corpses. Max coughs to get her attention. The woman is surprised she is not burned. She tells Max to come with them.
34. Azizi and his sister Nuru are albinos and have to keep their skin covered to keep it from burning. Azizi tell Max she is in East Africa and explains there was a bright flash of light and then heat all around. The animals all just laid down and died. They haven’t seen anyone that wasn’t burnt until her. They can’t go back to the city because their culture considers albinos lucky and some people already took Azizi’s hand. They give her a cup to drink out of and tell her it’s the last of their food. Max offers to help them find food since she can fly further around.
35. That night, Nuru comes at Max in the night. Azizi explains Nuru wanted to eat Max’s wings. Max leaves them behind.
36. Max sits down to mope and end up on a termite mound. She strips down to her sports bra and underwear and sees the bugs covering her clothes. She remembers that a lot of animals eats termites and so she starts to eat them.
37. Having are her fill, Max moves on. She comes to a demolished Tanzania that looks like it has been attacked by a nuclear bomb. A man comes to tell her the large cities had to pay for their crimes against nature. He tells him it is part of The Remedy’s plan. Max goes to take off, but the man pulls her down and she fights him. She stabs him with a steak knife and gouges out his eyes with a piece of tile. She uses a piece of rebar to threaten him. She asks who the Remedy is. The man tells her the Horsemen will keep coming for her before he jumps off a cliff
38. Nudge swims in the eel free lake. Hands come after her and block off the air through her gills. She wonders if she really was happy not knowing. Everything goes black.
39. Horseman checks in with the doctor and tells him the flock has split up. He is tracking them one by one. He reports Nudge is dead. He offered to kill Total as well.
BOOK TWO: EVOLUTION GONE WRONG
40. Max decides she is going to New York and finds it completely underwater. She goes to the New Jersey airports. The planes are full of corpses. She breaks into the control room and turns the dials until she hears voices. Someone says the Remedy has demanded they kill anything that moves. Max lays on the floor and weeps over everything they have lost.
41. Fang has trouble finding any sign of survivors in California. He sees bees moving in strange patterns. When the seagulls start to attack him, he does his best to fly away from them. He shoots himself higher into the air at 200 miles per hour.
42. Max reaches the Mississippi River, but it has dried up. She realizes Angel was right about something bigger coming. She knows she has to find Fang.
43. Fang ate some plants that smelled like mint and hallucinated for three days. He hears voices talking about assassinating mutants. They find him and think he is one of the Horsemen. They say the Remedy promises to turn anyone that kills 50 survivors into Horsemen. Fang tells them intelligence is more important and promises them lessons.
44. He starts by telling them genocide isn’t evolution. He warns them there is always someone stronger than them. He kicks one gun away, but the other kid grabs his. Fang somersaults to the side as the kid tries to shoot him and misses. Star arrives in a blur beats up the boys and asks Fang if he can handle them from there before she takes off. Fang leads them to a cliff and tosses their guns over the side. He leaves them there and flies off to find Star.
45. Fang finds her and thanks her. She says they are even and he is upset about the comment. He gives her his meal in exchange for information. The Remedy tried to give her an upgrade in so she declined and ran away from Russia as quickly as possible. He asks her to go with him and she declines.
46. Max is in the Mojave desert. She sees a bird kid shadow fly above her. She sees five of them and knows they are not her flock. She approaches cautiously. When they land, she finds they are more bird than kid. And she lets them groom her.
47. One of the boys nestles her. She stays with them. That night, the boy brings her a rattle snake. Max makes a fire. She prepares the snake and eats it with the boy eating the skin and guts. The boy hands her a magazine that features her and the flock. She introduces himself and he tries to say his own name. She figures it is close enough to Harry.
48. Iggy and Gazzy have found Appalachia mostly intact. Iggy was able to cook a turkey over their fire. They start reminiscing. Gazzy added something to the fire that makes it smell. A group of teenage girls arrive and tell them to freeze.
49. Gazzy and Iggy say the are looking for a friend from the internet. They say there aren’t any boys around and they owe them for the turkey they ate. They don’t have anything to exchange and Gazzy offers to do manly things.
50. Gazzy and Iggy clean the sewage pit. Iggy is contemplating rejoining the flock when he realizes someone is down there with them.
51. Horseman is there with him. Gazzy tells Iggy to go and he’ll be right behind him. Horseman tries to take off up the silo ladder with a hurt hand and burning eyes. He reports that Gazzy blew himself off and he is in pursuit of Iggy.
52. Horseman gains on Iggy. He tries to pretend to be willing to team up with Iggy. Iggy keeps losing him. He knows he can’t risk loosing him or else the next Horseman will be sent after him.
53. Horseman blindfolds himself and continues his chase after Iggy. He lets his instincts guide him.
54. Max wakes up and sees the rest of the flock is gone. She tries to help Harry find his flock, but she feels something that makes her turn and they start heading up the coast.
55. Max lands in what is left of Seattle. They go inside the demolished Space Needle and Max finds a phone that has a charge and signal. She checks the posts on Fang’s blog. He hasn’t posted anything, but there are rumors of the flock being picked off one by one. They say there is an army waiting for Fang in Alaska. Someone, ImMargaretA, says she is on the inside of the Remedy’s plans and Max is next.
56. Max is having trouble dealing with the legitimacy of what has been posted about her flock. Harry tries to get Max’s attention. She thinks he wants to leave, but he is warning her that someone is there. A girl is there and Max offers to help her. The girl says that Max has her phone. Green gas comes from her palm and Max passes out as the girl says “One Light.”
57. Max wakes up in a cage. There are a group of cult members watching the Remedy speak. Max calls out that he is actually the problem. She asks about if he even had to look at her friends he had murdered. She threatens him, but he points out there isn’t much she can do from a cave.
58. Max realizes the guy in front of them conned a few clean up crews he was The Remedy as he talks about history. She starts questioning actions and motives. The man comes up to the bar and Max grabs his jacket and he squirms out of it. He says he doesn’t need much to keep the others believing him.
59. The cult members spend their time poking and prodding Max. She does what they can to fight them off, but there are too many. Harry opens his wings and starts beating them outside the cage. Max extends her own and helps.
60. He smashes the cage against the ceiling until the cage door opens and they fly away and letting the cage drip to the ground. They fly far away before they stop for food. Max tells Harry about her family. He kisses her, but she tells him he must not ever do it again.
61. Rather than going to Russia right away, Angel has been gathering survivors. She finds two brothers, Mathew and Lucas, who were told they were only working with the Remedy because they thought they were helping. She tells them they have another chance. She shows them the vision and tells them what she has been telling everyone: go to Russia, find Himmel, bring weapons.
62. Fang eats salmon right from the gulf of Alaska. He is hoping the rest of the Flock is also heading to Russia to take on the Remedy who he believes is Jeb. As he nears the mountains, a blizzard closes in. He comes out of a whiteout to see Erasers on the mountain top. Fang sees his death scene, but it is Dylan that the Erasers are fighting.
63. Dylan tells Fang to get out of there, but he decides to face his fate head on and goes to help Dylan. As they fight, they seem to be able to anticipate Fang’s moves. Dylan tells him they are Horseman and enhanced. He starts to loose and sees Dylan on the ground. A man approaches and tells him to give up.
64. Fang recognizes Jeb, who tells him he can’t beat them. The Horsemen continue to attack Fang. He thinks the Horsemen are near perfect. Fang realizes they used his DNA to create these enhancements. The fight continues and one of the creatures rips Fang’s wing off. He realizes what it means and he hears Angel’s voice telling him to just let go.
65. Angel hides in a tree trying to sort through the visions they keep coming from her. She hears the voice of someone she knows near her. A figure comes toward her and she knows this is the moment she has been waiting for. She tells him she has been waiting for him.
66. She knew Horseman would come to her. She jumps down from the tree. She asks if it is done and he confirms that Fang is dead.
BOOK THREE: WITNESS
67. Max has a falling nightmare. She tries to sleep and moves closer to Harry for warmth. Suddenly, Harry jumps up in alert. Dylan arrives and Max is happy to see him, but a bit disappointed he wan’t Fang. Angel joins them and says her name. Max asks what is wrong.
68. Angel runs to Max. Max asks if they are all dead. Dylan tells her the deaths were faked. He did it to convince the Remedy he had killed them to prevent the other Horsemen from being released. When he went for the jugs, he got disoriented and someone knocked him out. He woke up in a lab and they had upgraded him. He was different than the others because the programming hadn’t taken him. He woke up with a note with One True Way. he realizes it was an address. Dr. Gunther-Hagen is the Remedy.
69. Max is shocked. She was upset he didn’t kill him when he had a chance. He points out that the doctor’s guards would have killed him if he had attempted to attack him. He was able to pretend to complete his mission and get intel for Angel’s plan. Max realizes he is right and hugs him in thanks. Dylan and Angel are still somber and Max asks what is wrong.
70. Angel tells her not everyone is okay -‘d Dylan tells her Fang is dead. Mac has trouble understanding and her heart breaks. She yells at Dylan to tell her it isn’t true. She drops to the ground.
71. She runs out to the woods to grieve. After she is cried out, she starts thinking that it wasn’t possible for Fang to be dead. She misses their family, but cannot face them and the sympathy. She convinces herself Fang isn’t dead.
72. Max knows she can’t trust Angel. She tells everyone to take Harry with them. Max has to go back to Alaska to see it for herself. Angel is angry. Dylan says he saw it.
73. Dylan says he was there and saw the Horsemen tear into him. He watch him fall. He says he sent the video of it from the chip and screen in his arm. Max demands to see it. The video becomes clearer when Dylan passes out. Max asks what Jeb is doing there. She watches the Horsemen attack Fang. They tumble off screen and then back in. He takes three horsemen off screen again. Fang’s detached wing comes on screen and Max says she has seen enough. Dylan hands her one of Fang’s feathers.
74. They fly over western Canada, Alaska, and into Russia. She hears Fangs voice to telling her to go on. She decides she will kill the Remedy. When they get into his territory, it is clear. They go to the camp first to see the kids that have come to help them. The rest of the flock is there.
75. Max greets the fang with hugs. They are all grateful to Dylan for saving them. Max asks why all the kids are there.
76. Angel tells them they are there to fight a war. They look around and see members of Fang’s gang all around. Kate is there to make up for her betrayal. They ask where Fang is and the news hits them hard. Max can’t go into that grief again with them and walks away.
77. The kids are restless and wondering what they are working on. Ratchet tells her Angel, Kate, and Dylan are whispering secrets. Angel tells her Dylan and Kate have been working on strategy. Max wants a face to punch.
78. Angel addresses the crowd. She speaks in their mind. She knows they want answers. She shows them her vision. A meteor heading for Earth where it smashed and the effects of it. She tells them about what else the Remedy has done with viruses, bombs, and everything else to try to wipe humans off the planet. She tells them they have gathered to stop him. She promises they will win if they fight him. The kneel in front of her.
79. Max has more questions. She asks Angel how she knows it is true. Angel tells her she just knows and Max realizes she isn’t a psychic, but a prophet. When they altered her eyes, she thought she was blind, but then she kept seeing the images. She thought the Russians had attacked. She had no idea about the Remedy. They get ready to fight.
80. Angel looks down on the underground city of Himmil (German for “heaven”). They start to attack. She hears the enemy army; there are thousands of them. Angel tells them to hold because she hadn’t expected them. She tells them to charge. The Remedy’s soldiers are bottlenecked so only a few can get out at a time. Kate hesitates when she sees the enemies are kids. The flock is already used to these types. Robotic soldiers come out of the vents and Dylan shouts a warning to Angel.
81. Max is fighting a few kids when the new robot soldiers, M-geeks, appear. Mac takes to the sky and Ratchet keeps her from getting shot. All the old familiar enemies are around them. Dylan saves Harry and Gazzy. Max takes on a giant, but Kate takes it out first. There is a sound that makes everyone stop. The brainwashed kids are freed. An eraser comes for Max, but Dylan takes it off. He tells her she can’t fight right then. He points out the entrance is clear and this is her chance to take on the Remedy.
82. Dylan says everything looks different than it had before. They split up. Max sees opens a door to find an exact replica of the lab they grew up in. Jeb is there. He says he now sees the flaws of the mutants is the humanity that leaves them immortal. He made the horsemen by splicing Fang’s genes. He wants them to thrive and says it is possible because of Fang’s DNA. Max starts to go after him. Jeb tases her with intentions to inject her with something. Star and Kate arrive and tells him she is fine the way she is.
83. Max ends up with the syringe and stabs Jeb in the leg. Kate snaps his neck. Star and Kate apologize and Max knows Fang would have forgiven them, so Max does.
84. As she moves on, one of the cult boys with the deadly virus comes up to her saying “One Light.” She keeps going and Dylan finds her in the dark. Max tells him what happened, but the Russian guards start to shoot at them. Dylan puts his hand to a door to open it. They get into an elevator and Dylan asks Max not to judge him.
85. They arrive in a pink room. A beautiful girl greets Dylan and is says she is happy he came back. Dylan explains the Remedy made her as his new perfect match. She says she has been reading and chose her name from the Handmaiden’s Tale: Margaret A. When Dylan says he loves someone else and can’t be with her, she freaks out. Max realizes she was trying to help them. She promises Margaret they won’t hurt her. She asks where the Remedy is and Margaret tells them he keeps moving down.
86. There is a narrow staircase and Dylan insists on going first. He finds a door and finds the Remedy sitting in his chair alone. He greets A1013, but Dylan tells him what his name is. Dylan says he is the last one. The Remedy says he injected himself as well. Max joins them. Remedy says it is convenient the rest of the world’s survivors are all in one place. Angel warns them there is a bomb. Remedy shows them he is the bomb. If he dies, the bomb will explode.
87. Max starts to drag the Remedy up to the battlefield. She holds him and takes him up to the skies. She takes him out over the ocean. He agrees to answer any questions. He says he learned most of what he needed from Dr. Martinez. She wanted to send missiles to destroy the meteor, but he had other ideas.
88. The Remedy says the virus wasn’t his doing, but it did help his plan along. He reminds her he created the vaccine. It gave him a name. When the meteor hit, they looked to him for another solution. He says Dylan and Margaret are his legacy. He plays the video of Fang dying saying they aren’t the future. Max tells him she is pregnant.
89. He uses the screen on his are to engage reactor, but nothing happened. Max realizes her flock has probably helped her again. He tries to attack Max’s stomach with a pen, but she drops him.
90. Clean up and exploration of the tunnels begins. Max comes to terms with the fact that she is pregnant now that she has said it out loud. She hands out food. Angel tells her nuclear winter is coming and they will have to live in the tunnels. Angel already knows about the baby. Max says she isn’t ready to be a mom, but Angel says she has been mothering the flock for years. Dylan says he has something to show Max.
91. Max follows Dylan into the tunnels and takes her to the lab. He cleaned it up. He says he is continuing his father’s work. Max grabs a scapel. He brings out a bed with Fang’s body on it. Max faints.
92. Max scolds him for making a clone. Dylan tells her he loves her, but he knows she will always love Fang. He waited until everyone was gone to go down into the canyon. Dylan took him to a lab. He died. He was put into stasis. The body has mostly healed itself. Dylan says he can bring him back to life if she wants him to.
93. Dylan knows she doesn’t like the alterations, but it would be Fang still. She says she wants fang and feels Dylan she is pregnant with Fang’s baby. Dylan says he wants her to forgive him. He grabs wires as he flips the switch. Electricity goes from Dylan to Fang. Dylan dies for her.
EPILOGUE: HER STORY
1. Fang is alive. Dylan left her a note saying he knew she would chose Fang. He becomes himself after a few days. He is able to fly. On their last flight before nuclear winter, she tells Fang about the baby. He is thrilled. They have to move to the caves shortly after. Max feels guilty about Dylan’s death for a long time. Max gave birth to a baby girl. Angel lets them know when they are able to leave the caves. Those that could fly, head south while the others wait until they can travel south by land. The meteor left a crater that went down almost a mile. They live around where Peru had been. Max tries to record the past with a feather pen.
2. Fang is a father and teaches her everything he remembers from the books he read. Her feathers are in, and Phoenix is ready for her first flying lesson. Max will let her choose her own name when she is ready.
3. The flock joins in Phoenix’s flying lesson. She takes in everyone’s advice. Max tells her to do what feels right and Fang says they won’t ever let her fall.