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Alec hit the woods running, and never looked back. Loping at a ground covering pace, his newly healed heart pumping steadily, and his breathing easy, he headed straight for US10 that connected to I-94, the main east/west highway. Of course that would be the first place Lydecker would order blocked to intercept him, but it was still his best chance for getting quick transportation out of the area. All he needed was to hitch a ride on a big rig and they'd never be able to catch him.

However, every minute counted now. Lane and Devon would be back at base and have reported. A search helicopter could be in the air at any time. The trees gave him cover for the moment, but Alec knew that once he emerged onto the highway he'd be visible and vulnerable. He also doubted Manticore would be trying to take him alive -- even Lydecker's patience for his precious kids had to have its limits, and 494 had been a very bad little X5-Unit today.

Up ahead he thought he heard the sound of a car engine. The highway? Slowing to a walk, Alec cautiously approached what looked to be the edge of the woods. Batting annoying gnats away from his sweat slick face, he peered out through the trees, and saw the pot-hole filled road that used to be a main thoroughfare. There wouldn't be much traffic way out here, but hopefully there'd be some kind of vehicle he could either thumb a ride with, or, if worse came to worse, car jack. However, at the moment, there was just dead silence again.

Snugging himself back down in the underbrush, Alec waited several precious minutes, uncertain what to do. Mind racing, trembling slightly, every one of his enhanced senses on alert, he counted his options. There weren't many. Lydecker wasn't just going to let him waltz out of here. There had to be some kind of pursuit in progress. But the sky and road were clear, no sign of a helicopter or military vehicles.

Damn, he hated being hunted like an animal.

Crouching lower behind a honeysuckle bush, Alec willed his heartbeat and breathing to slow so he could hear better. Birds ... buzzing insects ... a trickle of water from a small nearby brook ... In an odd way, the X5 felt as if he was suspended in time, waiting for the next step in his destiny.

God, Max, I hope I can make it home to you ... I'm trying ... I'm really trying ...

Then suddenly there was ... something. Alec's preternatural abilities told him so. He wasn't alone out here. But he still didn't hear or see anything. A sniper maybe? Was he about to die with a bullet in his brain? Which way should he run?

And then he knew. Fuck, he knew!

They were almost on top of the young transgenic when he shot out of the underbrush onto the road, blurring again, running as fast as he could pump his legs and forcing his muscles.

X7s -- half a dozen of them, sneaking up so stealthily only Alec's sixth sense had registered their approach, and then only at the very last second. One of the little bastards leaped forward through the air, and he felt fingers grasping his t-shirt. Terrified beyond reason, a deep ingrained loathing of the human-bat creatures instilled in him from his original days at the Old Manticore, Alec kicked viciously and broke free. But he could tell they were on both sides of him now, a glimpse, a crackle in the underbrush along the road, betraying their positions. Out in the open, cut off, he had nowhere to run except straight down the asphalt.

Faster, stronger, and with hive minds, the X7s had been designed by Manticore specifically to keep X5s in their place -- a superior physical being that could hunt down and terminate their too independent-minded, feline DNA-enhanced predecessors. Even though he was a full grown X5 male with all the bells and whistles that entailed, Alec knew he was no match for even one of the X7s if it came to one-on-one combat. And a pack of them? He was as good as dead already.

However, just when Alec was truly running out of breath and expecting to be pulled down at any second like prey viciously run to ground, he heard the sound of a car up ahead.

He skidded to a halt, swiped sweat soaked strands of hair out of his eyes, and zoomed his vision in on a black SUV that had pulled sideways across the road a hundred feet ahead. The rear door of the car popped open.

Lydecker -- seated in the back.

"Get in!" the colonel shouted at him, gesturing wildly. "Get in now!"

Alec's mind flashed back to nearly four years earlier -- a car exploding, a dark SUV with his Manticore handlers inside, an order to "Get in!" ... They'd forced him into the vehicle that time, and dragged him back for torture and reindoctrination -- his punishment for a failed mission.

No way. Not again.

Flipping a finger at Lydecker, Alec shied into the woods, knowing he'd probably run into an X7 who'd make short work of his life but not really caring. He wasn't going to go down without a fight -- not this time.

And then he saw them -- two male X7s barring his way ahead. At first glance they seemed like adolescents, just kids dressed in khakis and gray t's like his own clothes, maybe 13 or 14 years old. But that was before looking into their emotionless black eyes ...

One of the X7s, the taller one, was actually smiling as he "transmitted" information to his Unit mates, informing them that they'd overtaken their quarry.

Instinctively, Alec froze, as if confronted by a poisonous snake coiled to strike. There were rumors about the X7s ... about why no one ever saw them eat food ... rumors that the source of their DNA was from vampire bats, and that their main nourishment was human (transgenic?) blood.

Alec had never really believed that -- until now. There was something about the way those two X7s were looking at him, a hunger on their faces that terrified him even more than the guns they held in their hands.

"Don't move, son," Lydecker said from behind him. "Or they'll tear you to pieces. And I do mean that literally."

Alec rolled his eyes to the right and saw the colonel in his peripheral vision. Surprisingly, the man wasn't holding a weapon.

"You don't have to die today, 494."

Alec swallowed hard. You're right. I don't.

And with a superhuman bound, 494 leaped as high as he could over the heads of the X7s, to land on the other side at a dead run again.

"Kill him!" Lydecker screamed.

Alec burst out of the trees and once more skidded to a halt, this time just short of a steep embankment that ended with a 400 foot drop down into a canyon. Below was the sound of rapidly moving water; to his right an abandoned train trestle with most of the ties missing, but some semblance of structure still reaching across the gorge. Without hesitation, Alec scrambled up the low rise to the tracks and ran out onto the rickety timbers, his genetically enhanced sense of balance allowing him to tightrope walk the beams. If he could make the other side and knock down the trestle behind himself, he might have a chance. There probably wasn't another crossing within 5 miles.

The X7s had come out of the tree line, six of them, all with guns pointed at their target. Lydecker, gasping, wasn't far behind. Catching his breath, the Manticore colonel straightened up and took in the situation.

Alec spared a glance back over his shoulder, and nearly lost his balance, arms windmilling as he fought to stay on the beam. Below was a tumultuous mountain river pellmelling its way down a narrow ravine, its icy waters fed by glaciers melting high in the mountains. Lydecker looked like he was about to shout something ... perhaps try to give his kid one last chance Alec figured. But that wasn't it at all.

With a sad shake of his head, the colonel took out his sidearm, raised the gun, and aimed. "I'm sorry, son!" he called out as he pulled the trigger.

But Donald Lydecker wasn't genetically enhanced when it came to marksmanship. The head shot was meant to be either a quick kill or a clean miss -- and it was a clean miss, whizzing by Alec's ear as he ducked. Throwing caution to the wind, and knowing he had to move before the X7s began shooting, the X5 leaped forward along the fragile beams, determined to make the other side.

He almost made it -- almost. He was within 50 feet of freedom when his luck ran out. With a sharp crack that sounded like another bullet, the trestle wood split beneath his booted feet, and with a scream of pure primal terror that had nothing to do with Manticore, X5-494 helplessly plunged into the gorge.

*****

Max swung by Jam Pony on her way back home from another fruitless meeting with Detective Ramone Clemente. The Seattle Police weren't budging in their opinion of the mutants in TC. Too many mistakes had been made. The Freaks were now considered an outlaw gang, and no amount of talking and promises on her part seemed able to change that.

It had been several days since Max had seen O.C., and she badly needed someone to talk to. Zack, although she loved him dearly as a brother, wasn't exactly great company -- not like Alec had been. X5-599's idea of a conversation often consisted of more grunts and piercing looks than words, and anything outside the realm of military business issues eventually led to uncomfortable silence between them.

Joshua, of course, was always there for her, but she imagined the gentle dog man had to be tired of her habit of emotionally dumping on him at the end of the day, especially when both of them were afraid to mention what (or rather who) was really on their minds -- the one who was missing from their lives.

She knew the big fella still whimpered with loneliness at night, and that he'd insisted on keeping all of Alec's things in the quarters they'd shared -- right where the X5 had left them. Max also knew that someday she'd have to sit down and do a reality check with Joshua. But not right now. Not when she, herself, couldn't bear to let anyone else use Alec's motorcycle that she kept parked beside her Ninja in TC's main garage -- not even Zack who'd asked for it.

When she entered Jam Pony, Max spotted Normal talking to O.C. over by the break room, and memories of a day three months earlier suddenly overwhelmed her -- the day she'd had to tell Reagan Ronald his Golden Boy was dead.

*****

"How's Alec doing? I haven't seen him lately," Normal had said. "But then I guess a man of his raw animal charisma has better things to do than hang around a former place of employment."

"Normal ... There's something I have to tell you."

"About Alec?"

"Yeah, about Alec. A few days ago there was a drive-by shooting at the TC Mall. Steelheads looking to expand their turf. Alec caught a bullet."

"But he's okay, right? Alec's always okay. Heck, that boy's pretty much indestructible."

"Normal, I'm sorry. He was hit in the chest ... his heart. He didn't make it."

God, how she'd hated quenching that look of hope in Normal's eyes.

"Alec's dead?"

Unable to speak, Max had simply nodded, her eyes flooding with tears. And then Normal's arms had gone around her, wrapping her in an unexpectedly comforting big hug.

"I'm sorry, Max. He deserved better than that." Her former boss had then wiped away a tear of his own, and asked huskily, "Was there a funeral?"

Max shook her head no. "The hospital where he died didn't return the body."

"A memorial service then? I wish someone had told me. I'd have come. Geez, I'm going to miss him. Alec was pretty magnificent you know. A shining example of manhood, or rather transgenichood, so to speak. Why, I remember when ..."

Max had just looked up at Normal, listening as he reminisced about his Golden Boy. The thought of having a memorial service for Alec had been more than she could bear at the time. And now ... now it was too late. Most of Terminal City had already moved on, chosen a new leader, Zack, and forgotten the old.

*****

Most had moved on -- but not all, Max thought to herself as she remembered Joshua's devotion to his X5 brother. The dog man would never forget Alec, and neither would she. Not ever.

"Hey, Boo!" O.C. shouted across the crowded Jam Pony floor. "What's shakin?"

Pulling herself out of her morbid nostalgic thoughts, Max plastered on a big smile and went to meet her best friend.