Bittersweet

DISCLAIMER: All "Dark Angel" characters belong to James Cameron and Charles Eglee (Cameron Eglee Productions) and "Dark Angel" itself belongs to FOX.

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Photo courtesy of Jensen Ackles World

Bittersweet
By Valjean

This is a stand-alone story following the events of Max Allan Collins' DARK ANGEL novels SKIN GAME and AFTER THE DARK, and incorporating information revealed in D.A. Stern's THE EYES ONLY DOSSIER. -- author's note

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Photo courtesy of Jensen Ackles World

She came to the gates of Terminal City at dusk one hot summer evening looking for an X5 named Simon.

Approximately 20 years old, pretty, with wavy shoulder-length dark hair and big brown eyes, the girl nevertheless had a pale look about her that spoke of recent illness, her expensive blue pant suit hanging loosely on a too thin frame.

When the guard radioed in her request to the control room, Dix and Luke simply looked at one another, befuddled. They didn't know who she could be talking about. There was no one named "Simon" in TC -- X series, transhuman, or nomalie.

Max watched their visitor on one of the security monitors, a slight frown marring her features. There was something very familiar about the girl, but she couldn't quite place her.

"Alec?" she said, turning and looking behind her, intending to ask the male X5 if he recognized the young woman. But before she got the question out of her mouth, the answer clicked into place in her mind. "Oh my God," Max whispered, her fingers covering her lips. "It can't be."

"Can't be what?" Alec asked, strolling up to the bank of monitors, hands in the pockets of his leather jacket and a typical cocky smirk on his face. Then he saw her -- on the screen -- and all the color drained from his face.

"It's a trick," he said through clenched teeth, his voice low and dangerous as hazel-green eyes narrowed with suspicion. He looked to Max. "It's gotta be a trick, doesn't it?"

"I don't know," Max breathed.

"She's dead," Alec said firmly. "Rachel's dead and buried."

"But we never saw the body," Max said quietly. "What if--?"

"Old Roger Berrisford, clever dad that he is, faked her death?" Alec supplied. "Wouldn't put it past him." The X5 looked up at the ceiling and took a deep calming breath. Then he gave a desperate little laugh -- the kind of sound one makes when everything's FUBAR -- and shook his head. "It would be one way to insure her safety," he continued, a faintly hysterical tone creeping into his voice as he gestured at the screen with his hands. "And a stunt like that sure as hell would make certain Simon Lehane never snooped around his daughter again."

Photo courtesy of Jensen Ackles World

"Simon Lehane?" Max questioned, not understanding.

"My cover name for the mission," Alec explained offhandedly as he studied the girl on the monitor. "It's the only name Rachel ever knew me by."

"Alec," Max said, putting a hand on his arm. "You've got to talk to her. Tell her your side of the story. Tell her about Manticore and what they made you do. You owe it to yourself if not just to her."

Alec was still staring at what to him was a ghost, finding this nearly impossible to believe. Almost three years had passed since he'd sobbed at the bedside of the dying young woman he'd loved ... three years since he'd paid his one and only visit to her grave. How could this be? And more importantly, if it really was Rachel, why was she here looking for him? Surely she must hate him -- the man who'd tried to murder her father and ruined her life.

Only one way to find out.

*****

"Simon!" Rachel Berrisford called out joyfully when Alec came around the corner and approached TC's gate. "It's me! I know you thought I was dead. My father tricked you. But--"

"Rachel!" Alec said, the name coming out more sharply than he'd intended. He nodded at the X3 guarding the gate, and it opened. Slipping through, he grabbed her hands in his. And then -- he found he could do nothing but stand there looking at her, the dead come back to life, his long lost love returned to him, a bizarre fairy tale unfolding with what appeared be a happy ending.

His heart was beating way too fast.

"You're shaking," Rachel breathed. And then she raised his hand to her mouth and kissed his palm. "Oh God, Simon, I never thought we'd be together again. But now I've found you, and everything's going to be all right. We can start all over again." Her dark eyes were sparkling with happiness and sweet dreams. "I forgive you. I forgive you everything. I didn't understand before, but now I do."

Alec's gut clenched as he swallowed the tears rising in his throat. The smile on her face was killing him. He didn't deserve her forgiveness -- not after what he'd done. "Over there," he said huskily, indicating the Terminal City Artworks malll with its first floor diner.

"But I want to go to your place, Simon," Rachel protested as he led her by the hand across the street. "I want to be with you. We belong together. Show me where you live ... who you really are. I want to know everything about you ... the truth."

"You can't go in there," Alec said, indicating with his head the bio-contaminated Terminal City. "You can't go where I live."

"Why not?" she pleaded.

He stopped outside the front entrance of the mall and spun the lithe girl around in his arms. "Because you're an ordinary," he said simply.

"I don't understand," Rachel implored.

"How did you find me?" Alec asked as he led her into Gem's diner and found an empty booth in the back corner where he could watch the door. "How are you alive?" He took hold of her hands across the table

This is a dream. This can't be happening. Not really. How am I supposed to act? Hell, how am I supposed to feel?

"I remember the accident," Rachel began.

"It wasn't an accident," Alec interrupted brutally. "You were hurt when the bomb I planted to kill your father went off."

Her eyes, which had eagerly been searching his face, suddenly fell, long lashes shadowing ivory cheeks. "I know," she whispered. "Daddy told me what you did ... and why. He said you were an assassin."

"I was."

"But you tried to warn me ... tried to save both me and Daddy at the last minute. I remember you on the stairs ..."

"You slapped me," Alec said. "Remember that? And you had reason to. I'd lied to you ... seduced you ... betrayed you ... tried to murder your father ..." His voice trailed off. Then, again, "How did you find me?"

"The news," Rachel said. She took a deep breath, as if gathering courage. "I saw news coverage about Seattle's Terminal City on SNN, how the transgenics had elected a representative to city council. They showed your picture ..."

Alec closed his eyes. Of course.

"But they called you 'Alec'," she said. "Why did they call you Alec?"

"Because that's my name. Simon was just a cover."

"Your name's really Alec?"

"Alec McDowell -- or at least that's what I've chosen to call myself in the ordinary world. At Manticore I was X5-494." He turned his head to one side and lifted the long strands of hair covering his bar code. "Ever see one of these?"

"Your transgenic designation," Rachel said. "You were made in a lab and trained from birth to be a soldier. I know all about that. I studied everything I could about transgenics before I came here to find you." And then, surprisingly, she smiled again. "But none of that matters. All that counts is that we can be together now. Daddy's dead, Simon ... I mean Alec. Of natural causes. A heart attack. He loved me very much, and was trying to protect me, but we don't have to worry about that any more. I inherited his estate. I'm rich and free to do as I please, and I want you to come home with me."

Alec closed his eyes again. He'd seen this coming. What he hadn't been prepared for were his own feelings. There was a time he would have sacrified everything to have Rachel back. But that was then ... this was now.

Things change. Feelings change.

Gem brought them two steaming cups of coffee. Alec glanced up at his sister X5 and gave her a lopsided smile. "Thanks," he said softly.

"I'll put it on your tab," Gem replied with a little smile of her own for one of her favorite customers, then slipped discreetly away.

"Alec, what's wrong?" Rachel still stumbled over the name.

"Rachel, you know what I am."

"I already told you I knew. You're a transgenic. You have animal DNA."

"I'm not human," Alec said bluntly. "At least not completely."

"I don't care. I love you." Her eyes were trying to hold onto him.

"Rachel, I'm glad you're alive and all right," he tried. "I'm glad you have your life back. And most of all, I'm glad I'm didn't kill you."

"I'm glad you didn't kill me, too," she said with a puzzled little laugh.

Alec realized he was still clasping her hands. He let go and looked deeply into those liquid brown eyes. "Rachel, we can't be together. We couldn't back then, and we can't now. Not ever."

"I don't care what you are, Alec!" she protested, beating one small fist on the formica table top. "I don't care if you're not human! I want to be with you. I love you and you love me!"

"No," he said softly as tears once more welled in his throat. "I loved you. I loved you more than life itself and when I thought I'd killed you I wanted to die. Manticore tried to make me forget you Rachel, but I never really did. And then when I found out you'd survived the explosion, but were in a coma--" He swallowed hard. "I felt so guilty I wanted your father to kill me. I figured I deserved to die ... to be punished."

"But you didn't die," Rachel said gently. "Daddy didn't kill you, I didn't die either -- not really, and now we're together again."

"I said I loved you."

Suddenly, Rachel Berrisford realized the meaning of his words. "Oh my God," she said, her eyes widening with the revelation. "There's someone else! You're in love with someone else! Somehow I thought-- I never considered--" Now it was her turn to take a deep breath. "Who is she?," she asked, her gaze hardening slightly. "Can you tell me that much?"

Alec nodded toward the front door of the diner where Max had been standing all along.

"Her?"

"Her," he said softly, the corners of his mouth turning up in a gentle smile as he regarded TC's mayor. "Max!" he called, and motioned for her to join them.

"Everything all right here boys and girls?" Max asked glibly as she slid into the booth next to Alec.

Alec leaned over and kissed her lips, then gently put a hand on his lady's very pregnant stomach and smiled again. "Baby's due in September," he said to Rachel. "Even though Max already looks like she's about to pop her spandex."

Max hit his shoulder hard.

"Ow!" He rubbed good naturedly at the bruise."Doc says it's a healthy X5."

The beautiful young girl was staring at the transgenic couple, tears streaming down her face, the fantasy she'd nurtured for so long vanishing in the light of emotional reality. She was too late. Her prince -- her transgenic knight in shining armor -- had moved on. Simon ... Alec ... belonged to another.

"I'm sorry," Max whispered as her fingers tightened in Alec's. "I'm sorry you got your hopes up and came all this way to find out your dream can't come true." She turned then and gazed into Alec's eyes as her voice dropped even lower. "Believe me. I know what it's like to lose your first love ... to find out the hard way that ordinarys and transgenics just don't belong together." And then she brushed long strands of hair out of her eyes and looked directly at Rachel Berrisford once again. "But thank you for setting him free ... for taking away his guilt."

Alec was nodding, his keen, dark hazel-green eyes infinitely sad, but resigned.

"Consider it a present for the baby," Rachel said quietly as she gathered the remaining wisps of her dignity and hurriedly got to her feet. "I hope you two ... you three ... have a good life."

"Rachel!" Alec called out to her as she fled for the door. Max got out of his way and he sprinted after the girl. "Rachel," he said, taking hold of her arm. "I'm sorry. For everything. But--"

"I'm sorry too," she said quietly, regaining her composure even as she dabbed at her eyes with a tissue. She looked up at him for the very last time. "But I'm not sorry I knew and loved Simon Lehane."

And then Rachel turned her back and was gone from Alec's life -- again.

But this time, there was no emptiness left behind in his heart. How could there be when Max's warm arms were around him, and her sweet breath mingling with his in a passionate, posessive kiss? How could there be lonliness when he felt his child kicking in the womb as his hand caressed her belly. How could there be bad dreams when the real love of his life ... the right love ... loved him back?

Rachel had come looking for her fairy tale ending, and hadn't found it. But for Alec, Max was the "happily ever after" he'd never in a million years imagined could be his.

"Come on," he whispered softly in Max's ear. "Let's go home and get you out of those tight spandex pants."

Max's smile beamed up at him, and together, hand-in-hand, the two transgenics walked back into Terminal City, both leaving their bittersweet memories behind.

THE END

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