#max 2

A strange little red headed girl strolled up to the masked warlock and plopped a two headed beast onto his lap. “Mama said you like Max’s” she said with a toothy grin, looking up at him waiting for a response.

“Why do you have thi-” Percival began to ask before the bicephalic elemental canine was dropped into his lap. Immediately he picked it up and held it at arms length, trying to decipher why on Azeroth he was being given this gift in the first place.

“What am I supposed to do with this creature?” he finally asked. Though as soon as the words left his lips, he began to conjure up ways he could make the beast more powerful and... greener.

That was, until, the small pup pooped out a tiny, stinky lava nugget right between the warlocks feet.

“Disgusting...”

How can Cupid.

So we all remember how Maya tried to replace Max at the end of book two, and how she was immediately found out because she acted like the exact opposite of Max. She offers to cook, she does Nudges hair, and then Angel gets to deliver the zipper of “I can read minds, you idiot.” 

But lets take a closer look at this little operation from the Itex side. We already know Jeb and Ari are working with Maya. However, because of Maya’s comment about how boring it is to watch Erasers play poker all day, we can assume Jeb is the only whitecoat on this particular initiative. This is important, because Jeb knows the Flock. He knows Max doesn’t cook, he knows Max doesn’t do hair, and he most definitely knows Angel can read minds. With him on the team, there’s no way these things should have been an issue, right? 

BUT earlier in the book, there’s a little throwaway comment by Ari about Jeb “hating the new Max”. Based on this line and the above, it is my belief that Jeb intentionally sabotaged the “new Max” plan. He intentionally neglected to tell Maya about key parts of Max’s personality he knew would trip her up, and he intentionally didn’t tell her about Angels abilities so that it would be practically guaranteed she would fail.