DISCLAIMER: All DARK ANGEL characters belong to James Cameron and Charles Eglee (Cameron Eglee Productions) and DARK ANGEL itself belongs to FOX.

ARCHIVE: No

Artwork courtesy of Valjean & JensenAckles.org

He held her for a long moment, breathing in the scent of her hair as she shook in his arms.

"Max," he said softly at last. "What are we gonna do? More importantly, what are you gonna do?"

She looked up at him, brown eyes full of despair. "I don't know," she said. "I want you so badly, but I also love Lo--"

He cut the word off with another kiss, not wanting to hear the name of his rival. "I will win you, you know," he said softly in her ear. (A warning?) "You've started somethin' here, Max, that's only gonna end one way. You know our kind don't ever give up."

This time the look in her eyes was one of alarm as she pulled back. Perhaps she was remembering Zack, and how in his damaged mind his love for her had led him to try and kill Logan. But Alec wasn't brain damaged, nor was he obsessed ... at least he didn't think he was.

"Alec, I--"

But the X5 wasn't looking at her now. Instead, his eyes were riveted on something on the floor in the corner -- a hatch or manhole cover? "We'll arrange the duel later," he said, setting her aside. Walking over, he crouched beside the metal plate, then glanced back at her and grinned, a twinkle in his eyes. "Bingo."

Lifting the lid, the two transgenics set it aside and dropped lightly into the gloom below. They didn't have a flashlight -- an oversight on their part -- but there was enough light coming from somewhere overhead that their cat eyes could make out most of the details of their surroundings. It was a sewer tunnel all right -- long unused and in huge disrepair, the brick walls crumbling and pipes leaking water like rain around them.

"This the lair?" Max asked, following Alec as he prowled in the lead, cautiously heading down the tunnel.

"No," he said. "It's just part of the sewers, not the underground city." Which is when he saw something up ahead.

"Max," he said. "Look. Is that a door?"

Larger than a hatch, a metal panel secured by a bar loomed in the darkness. With a shrug, Alec lifted the lock and swung the door open on creaky hinges that probably hadn't been used in over a century. On the other side was a familiar sight -- a high-ceilinged cavernous room filled with Manticore ration boxes, bedding, and lavender light.

"Home sweet home," Alec said quietly as he stepped through then turned around to offer Max his hand. "Watch it. The floor's slippery." In the distance he could hear water lapping -- the tunnel he'd swum through.

"Anybody here?" he said more loudly. "Hey guys! It's me. Alec!" He turned to Max. "Nobody home. They may have cleared out after I was here figurin' they'd been compromised."

But Max was moving along the north wall -- the one behind the half-burned ruins of a 19th century building. "There should be a way from here into the rest of the underground city," she said. Then, "Look! Alec come here!"

When he came up behind her he saw she was peering through an archway that led to a long corridor.

"That wasn't here before," he said, suspicion in his voice. "I'm sure of it. "A door must have been opened." But they didn't see one, just the beckoning hallway.

"Should we get Logan?" Max wondered.

"Max, this could be a trap."

"For who?" she said scathingly.

"Duh ... how 'bout us?" Alec snapped.

"As if anyone knew we'd be coming back here," she said. "Or that you'd even been down here in the first place."

Well, Alec thought. There was that. "Okay," he conceded. "We'll check it out, but then we go back for re-enforcements, okay?"

"Agreed," Max said. She turned around. "I'll go secure the hatch we came through."

"And I'll--" He'd only taken two steps through the archway, but apparently that was all it took. There was a deafening sound above his head, and Alec looked up in horror to see a huge gate falling straight for him. Instinct kicking in, he jumped to avoid being impaled -- unfortunately the wrong way.

"Alec!" Max shouted, reaching the iron bars that now separated them just as the X5 was getting to his feet. In the distance behind him there was an alarm clamoring.

Frantically, Max searched for some way to life the heavy grate.

"It's not use, Max," Alec said, glancing over his shoulder as he heard shouting and voices that were rapidly getting louder. "Get out of here! Now!"

"I can't just leave you!"

"You have to! Get help! Get Mole and the guys!"

"What if they--?"

"Just go before they see you!" Alec hollered before turning to face what sounded like an approaching small army.