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Artwork courtesy of Valjean |
Five Years
By Valjean
(Rated R & NC17)
A DARK ANGEL story set in 2027, five years after the events of the final official novel "After the Dark." -- author's note
*************************************
Max Guevera ... X5-452 ... knew she’d made a mistake. A bad one. However, not being the kind of person to readily admit her own flaws, it had taken her a very long time (over a year in fact) for her to own up to that mistake, and another four years for her to begin seeking a way to rectify it.
Now, in the year 2027, with the transgenic conclave of Terminal City barely hanging onto existence and her world, not to mention her Manticore family, in eminent danger of being destroyed by its enemies, she was regretting that mistake more than ever.
I never should have let him leave. I should have stopped him ... talked to him ... convinced him that he didn’t have to go just because--
And here Max always reached a stumbling block, because she honestly couldn’t say for certain why X5-494 had left five years ago. He’d claimed he was simply bored, and wanted to see the world -- reasons she could sympathize with since, after all, he’d been a Manticore captive for almost all of his life.
But she’d always found it a bit strange that her X5 second-in-command and partner-in-crime had chosen that particular time to declare he was moving on -- the day after she and Logan Cale had announced their engagement.
Not that she’d even had a chance to convince Alec to stay. He’d vanished in the middle of the night, leaving a only couple of brief notes: one for Joshua, and one for her. Hers had simply said:
Max. I’m sorry, but I need a change of scenery. I’m leaving. Don’t look for me. Take care of yourself and the others. It’s been fun. Be careful. Alec.
Joshua’s note had been even briefer, although perhaps a bit more personal:
Josh. I’ve got to go for awhile, but we’ll always be buddies. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do, and take care of Max. Alec.
She’d never heard from him again -- and five years was a very long time for an X5 to be on his own in an extremely dangerous, hostile world. Most humans hated the Manticore survivors with a passion, and those few who didn’t wanted to own them, or at least dissect them, their genetics worth millions ... maybe even billions since the technology to create transgenics had essentially been pretty much lost.
Chances were X5-494 had been killed or caged long ago, which would certainly account for why she’d never received so much as a Christmas card from the big jerk since he’d left.
But now -- she needed him. For weeks Max had been trying to convince herself otherwise -- that X5-494 wasn’t the one person she most wanted to see ... talk to ... even argue with. Alec had always been good at that ... standing up to her when no one else would, never afraid or intimidated by her at all, telling her in no uncertain terms when he thought she was wrong ...
None of the others in Terminal City had that kind of courage -- to tell their leader when they thought she was making a mistake, except maybe Joshua who was usually so circumspect with his criticism Max half the time didn’t even realize he was disagreeing with her.
Fondly, Max recalled how there’d been nothing circumspect about X5-494. When Alec was mad at her, he let her know, and when he approved of her actions he’d ... well, usually he’d just smirk, maybe wink or tilt that handsome head of his a fraction in a brief nod, but he’d get his feelings across.
She missed that ... Alec’s crooked egotistical smile and those fuck-authority hazel-green eyes.
But deep down in her heart, Max had a horrible feeling that 494 was dead, and probably had been for quite awhile. Still--
“Dix,” Max said as she entered Terminal City’s run-down-yet-still-functional control room.
The small bald monocled mutant turned around in his computer chair.
“Hey, Max,” Luke, Dix’s companion and helper, said. “How are things going?”
“Not too good,” she said truthfully. “Lydecker says the Breeding Cult hit some of our people up in Canada yesterday. Casualties were bad. Marina’s group is having a fit about it. They want revenge, and you know they’re not too careful about who they take down along the way.”
“Yeah,” Luke said, shaking his head sadly. “Marina’s given all of us a pretty bad name since she went pro and got the military to back her bunch.”
“Well, I can’t really blame Quantico for going with the group of transgenics willing to do their dirtiest work for them,” Max said dryly. “And I also can’t blame our guys from here who joined up with her. The pay is supposedly pretty good, not to mention free room, board, and a part of the spoils when they take out a Familiar stronghold or do a mercenary job for Uncle Sam.”
Dix shrugged. “Hey,” he said. “Not all of us want to play soldier, Max. I’m just glad we’ve got our own place here in Terminal City where we can make an honest living and not have to kill people.”
“Me, too,” Max said truthfully, although the fact that almost half of TC’s population had deserted over the past few years to join the other group of transgenics galled. Now there were fewer than 150 of them left in Seattle, and the U.S. military was constantly on their asses, strongly urging them to consolidate with X5-592’s bunch who were located at the old Manticore facility in Gillette, Wyoming. The attrition rate among the X5s and X6s had been especially bad since they were the most desired, and as such the best compensated. As for transhumans ... they were tolerated out in Gillette ... made use of ... but pretty much treated as second class citizens. Still, at least they were safe there from being murdered by mobs of mutant haters like those who occasionally attacked Terminal City, the local tolerance for Manticore children greatly lowered after the Seattle mayor had been assassinated by an insane X4 two years ago.
And then there was the Breeding Cult whose members -- millions worldwide -- had pledged to a man to eliminate the “animals” who’d murdered their leader in December, 2021, even though their anticipated genocidal plague that was supposed to make them rulers of the human world had never come to pass.
Max sighed one more time at the complexity of her fucked up life, and then she asked the question she’d really come down here for.
“Dix,” she said, “Do you have any idea how to find Alec?”
*****
Alec McDowell ... X5-494 ... was tired of speaking Spanish. He was also tired of speaking Russian, Thai, and that catch-all Islamic dialect Manticore had taught him that pretty much sufficed throughout the Middle East. And his French had never been all that great -- not quite having mastered the accent -- so after making an idiot of himself in Paris via a little misunderstanding with the local gendarmes, he was avoiding that country as well.
And here he’d thought being an international cat burglar would be a piece of cake ...
Oh, there had been heists, and a few pretty big scores, as well as adventure, good liquor, leggy blondes with big tits, and scams and hustles enough to satisfy even his player’s heart.
However, there had also been times he’d run out of tryptophan and spent days fighting seizures until he’d figure out how to score more, usually breaking into a doctor’s office or small medical center somewhere. And there’d been the times his bar code had been spotted and he’d gone on the run for his life, as well as a few incidents when he’d actually been captured and jailed -- not for being a transgenic, but because one of those scams or hustles had gone sideways.
Of course he’d always managed to escape. It was nearly impossible for an ordinary jail to hold a supersoldier. But Alec had always been uncomfortably aware that, even though cats had nine lives, he quite likely had used up more than one of them during the years he’d been rogue.
And somehow -- even when he’d gotten his hands on a substantial quantity -- the money had always run out or disappeared, either used up by simple living expenses or, as happened twice, stolen at gunpoint by persons he strongly suspected were Breeding Cult members (as witnessed by the broken arm he’d gotten in one of those scuffles and the broken ribs he’d gotten in another, both times having barely gotten away with his life).
Now, Alec was back in the U.S. -- had been for the past six months in fact -- and as he sat enjoying a breakfast of bacon, eggs, and ham in an IHOP in DeLand, Florida, X5-494 read through the morning paper, just like he did every day, looking for news about the family he’d run away from ... the family he was beginning to think more and more about trying to rejoin.
Because, the simple truth was, X5-494 was lonely. His travels had led to wine, women, and quickly spent wealth, but he hadn’t found what he thought he’d been looking for. He hadn’t found where he belonged ... his place in the world ... his purpose.
In fact, the longer Alec was gone from Terminal City, the more he began to realize that he’d left behind the very thing he was seeking: friends, family, a meaningful job, people who needed and (for the most part) appreciated him.
He fingered the amulet that he wore on a cord tied around his neck -- a gift from Joshua, given brother to brother -- a Celtic arrowhead designed and forged by one of the TC artisans that the Big Fella swore up and down would protect him from harm. Alec had just smiled at the time as Josh put the talisman around his neck, thinking he’d humor his superstitious friend.
But he’d never taken it off, and the memories it invoked when he held it in his hand now were all good.
Nor had he ever removed the two simple leather bracelets on his right wrist he’d donned the night he left Terminal City -- an oath to himself to remember his true friends -- transgenic and human.
Max, however, had given him nothing but a rueful shake of her head and a sneer of a smile, letting him know how disappointed she was that her “Smart Alec” was deserting her once again.
Now, though, Alec could see that he’d been right to leave at the time because five years away from her had also allowed him to see that part of his life clearly. He’d been falling in love with Max, a woman who was deeply in love with another man ... a woman who would never dream of so much of looking at him that way. It was something it had taken him a very long time to recognize ... to admit ... But he could do that now because it was in the past, a mere memory.
No, Alec thought. Five years away from X5-452 had cooled off that part of his brain (and body). It really was best that he’d left before jealousy over her impending nuptials to Logan Cale turned him into something he’d rather not become, no matter how much he’d told himself back then he only loved Max as a “brother.”
Five years was long enough to forget ... and forgive. Five years of sleeping with pretty much as many women as he wanted to (which really weren’t as many as he might have once imagined), and to stop staring a bit too long at girls with long dark hair and olive complexions he spotted in the distance or in dimly bars in the vague hopes it might be Max and then berating himself for wanting “the one he could never have” and getting as drunk as his transgenic metabolism would let him on Scotch afterwards.
Because Max is Mrs. Logan Cale now, and probably hardly even remembers me.
Or so Alec told himself whenever old feelings began to surface.
He glanced out the window of the IHOP to where his midnight blue Ninja motorcycle was parked -- the same make and model as Max’s black one (although at the time he’d bought the machine he’d told himself that was a mere coincidence) -- the saddle bags slung over its rear seat holding pretty much everything he currently owned in the world. Yes, it was good living in the U.S.A. again, but -- as usual -- he was getting close to broke and would need to score a few bucks soon. He spotted a pool hall across the highway from the restaurant and his eyebrows rose, even as the pretty red-haired waitress refilled his coffee cup.
“You live around here?” she asked, her interest in the handsome customer obvious.
“No,” Alec said truthfully. “Just passin’ through.”
She gave him the once over, taking in the black t-shirt layered with a blue flannel one, weathered grey leather jacket, jeans with holes in the knees, and motorcycle boots. No matter what the tourist brochures said, it was cold in Florida in January, and riding a bike in 40 degree weather could make even a hot-blooded transgenic shiver.
“You lookin’ for a place to stay?” she asked, her blue eyes hopeful.
“Not really,” Alec said with a polite smile. He honestly wasn’t interested in this girl. She just wasn’t his type. In fact, none of the women he’d dated and slept with over the past few years had been “his type.” But then how could they be? They were human, and he wasn’t.
And they also weren’t Max, an annoying little voice whispered in the back of Alec’s mind.
“Here,” Alec said, digging a twenty dollar bill out of his jeans pocket and putting it on the table. “Keep the change.”
“Thanks,” the waitress said coolly, not taking his rebuff very well and probably thinking he was gay, Alec figured.
He took the newspaper with him, and finished reading the National News page while straddling the Ninja, adjusting dark glasses to offset the sharp glare of the rising Florida sun as a big tractor trailer pulled into the parking lot behind him, its diesel engine annoyingly loud to his sensitive hearing. There was nothing at all about Seattle in the column, but there was a small item detailing a military-style scuffle that had happened in Denver where several people had been killed during a bar room brawl with X-series supersoldiers being blamed.
Alec narrowed his eyes as he read that. He’d never learned all the details, but he knew a second group of transgenics apart from the Terminal City gang had taken up residence in the old Gillette, Wyoming base -- his former “home sweet home.” Oh, nothing had been announced publicly, but it hadn’t taken much for his sharp mind to see a pattern in the news over the past few years that pointed to transgenics -- X5s and X6s most likely -- playing mercenary for the U.S. military. He’d also read that the Gillette base had been taken out of mothballs as part of a beefing up of Homeland Security, verifying the other info he’d gotten.
Alec knew damn well Max would never have been a part of the transgenics going back under military command -- not if she could help it. Therefore, there had to be a second group of “transies” somewhere ... a group more bloodthirsty than the TC gang and obviously willing to fight for either duty or pay, or both. Which is what had also led to Alec finally going back on the promise he’d made to himself when he’d left Seattle.
He couldn’t stand not knowing for certain that she was all right. The contact had been brief, a short phone call to Dix three years ago who’d given him the Cliff Notes version of Marina’s rise to power in the second transgenic conclave out in Gillette. But Max hadn’t been involved, and -- more importantly -- had been all right.
Since then Alec had made a habit of once-in-a-while checking in with the little transhuman, sometimes talking to Luke as well ... keeping briefly abreast of what was going on in TC but making them swear to not tell Max he’d called.
His last contact had been two months ago, and Alec wondered if maybe it wasn’t time for another check-in given the news about that bar room brawl. He was guessing it was Marina’s boys who’d done the damage, but -- as was often the case -- it was his TC brethren who would probably take the punishment because they were far more vulnerable.
Speaking of which, Alec made sure the collar of his motorcycle jacket was turned up even as he glanced around the parking lot -- old habits of being both hunter and hunted coming into play. He hadn’t been able to get his bar code lasered off lately, and his near-military short haircut did nothing to hide the damning tattoo. Usually he simply owned up to who and what he was if someone remarked on it -- after all, being transgenic wasn’t illegal any more, just vastly unpopular. Sometimes chicks were even into it. But today he didn’t feel like being taunted or getting into a fight or even getting laid.
He checked his watch. It was a little past eight, which would make it 5 a.m. in Seattle. Luke should be on duty.
*****
Dix maintained his usual stoic face, his white bald brow merely crinkling slightly at Max’s question. However, Luke -- as usual -- was an open book.
“Tell me,” Max said sternly. “I asked you if you knew how to find Alec and the two of you look about as guilty as I should probably feel.”
Dix glanced at her sharply when she said that, the wheels of his keen mind turning as his single eye sized up his leader.
Max knew she might be their commander, but that didn’t mean she had absolute power, and Dix and Luke’s loyalties to Alec ran deep.
“Please,” she said quietly. “I need to find him, that is if he’s still alive.” This last was said with a tightness in her voice. “You’d at least tell me if he was dead, wouldn’t you?”
“He’s not dead,” Dix said gently. “At least he wasn’t dead this morning.”
“This morning?” Max exclaimed. “You talked to him this morning?”
“Alec checks in with us once in awhile,” Luke elaborated, crossing the command center bridge to stand beside Dix’s chair, one hand on his buddy’s shoulder as if ready to defend their actions.
But Max wasn’t mad. She was relieved.
“He called in before dawn this morning,” Dix said. “Wanted to be sure we weren’t under fire for Mirana’s last stunt -- that big fight out in Denver yesterday where those Ordinaries got killed.”
“Alec knows about Marina’s bunch?” Max said, blinking at that bit of news.
Luke shrugged. “Alec knows lots of stuff, but then that’s just Alec. I guess you could say he keeps abreast of things, especially when they concern his family.”
“That’s really why he checks in every few months,” Dix added. “He wants to make sure we’re okay.”
Max was still reeling. She’d honestly had no idea that 494 had kept in contact with his TC brothers. The fact that he hadn’t kept in touch with her, though, made her wonder if she should really follow through on this.
She paced the platform a moment, hands tangled in her long dark hair. Then she stopped and looked hard at Dix. “Tell me,” she ordered. “Tell me where he is.”
“I don’t know, Max,” Dix said. “He never talks about himself, only asks about TC and the gang.”
“You said you talked to him this morning,” Max said, her voice rising in spite of herself. “Could you trace the call?”
Dix looked at Luke who shrugged, his attitude resigned because he probably knew that if they didn’t tell her, she’d find out some other way. “DeLand, Florida,” Luke said. “That’s what the caller I.D. said. It was from a pay phone.”
Florida, Max thought wildly. And he might not be there for long.
Without another word, she headed for the door, her decision made. It would take every penny she had saved, and probably some from TC’s treasury as well, but there were direct flights out of Seattle International Airport if one had the wealth to buy the ticket. With luck, she could be in Florida by nightfall.
*****
“Girl,” O.C. said as Max packed a duffel bag. “You sure ‘bout this? Spendin’ all of your hard stolen money chasin’ after some worthless man who deserted your ass years ago and hasn’t bothered so much as givin’ you a single jingle since?”
“I’m sure,” Max said in that quiet determined way most people who knew her knew better than to argue with.
However, O.C. wasn’t “most people.”
“Give me one good reason why you even want to talk to that boy?” the dark skinned girl persisted. Having moved up to being Normal’s assistant at Jam Pony, Original Cindy now made better money than she had before and could afford an apartment on her own, which is where Max actually spent a great deal of time. However, her friend had risked TC’s contamination to come and talk to Max in person when the call had come that 452 was going to be “out of town” indefinitely.
Max shoved a pair of black blue jeans into the duffel followed by some warm socks. Then she went into the bathroom and began gathering up her toiletries -- hair brush, tooth brush, a little make-up ... She had no idea how long she was going to be gone, but she also knew that she had to travel light. Alec would be moving fast and DeLand was probably just a brief stop on his way to God knew where. If she didn’t catch him today or tomorrow, she might not get another chance for months.
However, Max also knew she owed O.C. more of an explanation than she’d given. She stopped packing and stood with a tube of toothpaste in her hand. “I miss him,” she said simply -- the truth. “Ever since Alec left I haven’t had anyone I could really trust to help me out in TC ... not someone with leadership qualities, which is what the place needs.”
O.C. snorted a laugh. “Trust? Sugar, you never trusted that man any farther than you could throw him. You were always goin’ on and on about what a liar he was, how he was so unpredictable, how he was only out for himself ...”
“I know,” Max said, her voice low. “I know Alec has a lot of flaws, but he never betrayed me -- at least not after that once -- and in the long run he always stood firm and fought for his family. I also don’t think he really left for the reason he said.”
“That he was bored?” O.C. said. She was nodding in agreement. “Boo, that boy left ‘cause he couldn’t stand to see you marry Logan.”
Max had never wanted to admit that -- that Alec’s feelings for her had ever been more than platonic -- but it had always seemed a bit too coincidental that his exit from Seattle had been timed perfectly with the announcement of her engagement to Logan. As for her own feelings regarding Alec--
Max knew that absence made the heart grow fonder, and that she might be exaggerating how important Alec had once been to her ... how much she’d valued him. As for the romance part -- 494 had never, ever indicated he wanted to be more than friends with her aside from the occasional crude comment/compliment about her body or her sex life. And that had been just fun ... jesting between close friends -- or so Max had always thought. Now, looking back on the year and a half Alec had been in her life, she had to wonder a little bit about that. If Logan hadn’t been the love of my life, would Alec have taken a piece of my heart?
“Max,” O.C. said. “If you wanna make a flight out today you’d better book to the airport. I’ll give you a ride so you won’t have to pay long term parking for your bike.” One of the perks of being a Jam Pony assistant manager had been the use of a company car -- if one could call a used Volkswagen Beetle a real car -- the service having fallen on better financial times recently.
“Thanks,” Max said, slinging the duffel bag over her shoulder. Then she smiled at her friend. “And thanks also for not lecturing me too much about this. Bottom line is, O.C. -- I just have this terrible gut feeling that I need to get Alec back, if not in my life than at least to Terminal City. This mess with Marina’s bunch is getting worse every day, and the Breeding Cult is picking us off one-by-one. Alec might be an egotistical jerk, but he’s also one of the best warrior’s Manticore ever created.” She held up her hand. “And I know I’d have laughed myself silly five years ago if anyone had told me I’d be saying that about Alec. But it’s true. He and I made a good team when we were together, and I want ... need that back.”
“What if he’s already got a lady?” O.C. asked bluntly as Max’s hand was on the door knob.
452 looked at the other girl for a long moment. It was a thought that had already occurred to her. “This has nothing to do with Alec’s love life,” she lied. “If he’s found someone, then I’m glad for him, and I know he might turn me down for that reason. But if I don’t go, I’ll never know.”
O.C.’s dark brown eyes glittered as she tried not to smile. “You just keep tellin’ yourself that, Boo,” she said as she followed Max out into the hallway. “All the way to Florida you just keep tellin’ yourself that if that boy has some fine blonde-haired beauty on his arm it don’t matter to you.”
*****
Max’s direct flight to Sanford, Florida cost her almost $3000 one way -- every penny from her own pocket and another $500 from TC’s cash. She felt guilty about it, but told herself she was really on a recruiting mission, acquiring a new resource for Terminal City’s defense.
DeLand was 15 miles north of Sanford, and it didn’t take much effort for Max to catch a ride along I-4 in the back of a beat-up old pickup truck full of seasonal workers heading for the growing fields. They left her off just south of the small, shabby town at a gas station where a polite inquiry and a once-over of her body by the dark-skinned skanky manager who’s toothy grin made obvious what he was thinking got her the information she needed -- where to start looking.
If Alec had been in DeLand at dawn this morning, he might have already moved on. However, there was probably a better than even chance he’d stuck around to make a little bit of traveling money. Dix had said Alec indicated he’d just arrived here the day before, and that he was looking to “score.” And since Max didn’t see a single thing worth stealing in the essentially trailer trash ‘berg, that meant Alec was probably working a scam somewhere.
And what better place to pull a scam than in a pool hall -- of which there was only one that she could see along the town’s run down Main Street, a neon-lit beer joint that apparently doubled as the local gaming hangout.
She checked the time -- a little after nine in the evening. And to think just 12 hours ago she’d been in Seattle. Shivering slightly in the chilly Florida air, Max pulled her black leather jacket tighter, looked around the parking lot to make sure nothing set off an alarm in her mind, and mounted the wooden steps of “Arnie’s Pool Hall.”
The dim smokey light of the place didn’t hinder her cat-vision at all, but she didn’t see her man -- not at the bar, and not playing pool at the big table that anchored the east corner of the seedy joint. Her man? Max thought. And just when had Alec ever been “her man?”
However, before she could get into a silent argument with herself, she noticed there was a back room to the place that held a second pool table, perhaps where the higher stakes games were played. She moved to the beaded curtain that covered the adjoining door and, standing half concealed, checked out the action. There were two guys playing and two more watching while the proverbial mini-skirted, big cleavage blonde waitress hovered balancing a tray holding beers. The two men observing were probably locals, both with bald patches on the backs of their heads, big bellies overlapping their belts, and still-slender legs that spoke of thirty-somethings who’d left their better years behind and were fast on that downslide of declining testosterone.
Her attention shifted to the players, although Max’s heart was already beating faster because she’d noticed something. One of the men was wearing a cowboy hat, his long thin face set in concentration as he watched while his opponent sized up an impossible shot -- and made it. The other ...
The low chuckle was as familiar to Max as her own voice, and -- even though his face was in shadow -- she knew it was her X5 simply by the way he moved as he prowled around the table with the grace of the cat he part was.
She continued watching while her former partner ran the game, finishing in less than five minutes flat and collecting a nice wad of cash from both his opponent and the two onlookers. Studying Alec as he moved more into the light, Max was amazed at how little he’d physically changed, yet at how much he’d matured. When 494 had left Terminal City he’d been in his early twenties ... just out of his teens more-or-less, his body adult but not at its peak potential yet.
Now ... Max licked her lips. She wasn’t a prude, and had never been shy about appreciating a fine looking man when she saw one -- and X5-494 all grown up was a fine specimen indeed, proof positive that the Manticore lab boys had known what they were doing when they’d mixed up this guy’s DNA cocktail in their test tubes. Alec was little heavier than before maybe, but in all the right ways ... his jaw line a tad stronger ... his brow a shade more defined ... his shoulders still broad. For some reason he looked taller, too, maybe an inch or so? And muscles ... she could see the outline of hard abs and pecs beneath that thin grey t-shirt. Once again, she licked her lips, like a kitty about to taste cream.
While he counted his cash, Max continued studying her objective and realized also that Alec’s hair was shorter than when he’d left ... a military cut really, buzzed on the sides and only an inch long or so on top -- practical, masculine, and actually incredibly sexy once she got past the fact that the style didn’t cover his bar code.
So, he’s still an idiot about that, Max thought, somewhat relieved that 494 seemed to be the same old careless “Alec” in that respect.
He was also dressed just like she remembered, his style parked halfway between biker and beach bum if perhaps a bit more casual than before ... layered t-shirt and flannel with jeans, boots, and a faded grey leather jacket, the amulet Joshua had given him as a parting gift still swinging on a cord around his neck (a sentimentality that surprised Max to no end). However, the holes in the knees and thigh of 494’s jeans rather threw her. Alec had always been a bit fastidious about his appearance -- a carry-over from his military discipline -- and she honestly wondered if the worn jeans were a fashion statement or a sign of financial lack.
Then again, that wasn’t a shadow on his face, but rather two day’s growth of beard -- another new twist on Alec’s grooming. But damn, stubble looked good on the guy.
All-in-all, 494 looked fine ... healthy ... and he was laughing ... the old sparkle she remembered still there in his eyes. (Although there were tiny lines at their corners now.) It was fairly obvious to her that no one had hurt him, abused him, or -- for that matter -- broken his heart, at least not recently.
And Max was glad to see Alec hustling pool for one other very big reason besides it being proof he was alive and relatively well. If X5-494 was relying on his skills with the cue to make money, it probably meant he wasn’t doing other, far less innocent things such as mercenary work or assassinations. It meant he -- like her -- hadn’t wanted to revert to Manticore ways.
The game was finished. Alec handed the hovering waitress a few bills, winked at her flirtatious look, then scooped a mug of beer off the tray that he held onto as he walked back into the main saloon, headed for the bar. Max ducked back into the shadows as he passed, not all that surprised when she saw him hesitate just a fraction as he came opposite her, his head cocking to one side as if listening. Alec had the preternatural senses of a jungle cat and perhaps a touch of sixth sense as well. It was part of his breeding.
He looked in her direction, eyes narrowing slightly as he focused in the darkness, and Max -- not quite emotionally ready for this -- quickly turned her back, pretending to be engrossed in a video game machine. She could feel his eyes on her for a long moment, but then -- as she sneaked a peek -- the waitress breezed by, deliberately brushing up against him, and Alec shook his head as if feeling slightly dazed. Then he moved on to the bar where he sat down and helped himself to some of the free peanuts sitting in a bowl, his attention now on the football game on the overhead TV.
It was now or never.
Max took a deep breath, straightened her jacket, and walked across the room, black boots clicking on the wooden floor, ignoring the stares and remarks of several male patrons who probably thought she was cruising for a hook-up, her sites set on her objective, that pair of broad leather-clad shoulders that belonged to her “brother.”
“Buy a girl a drink?” she said coyly, sliding onto the bar stool next to Alec.
He turned to look at her, that flirtatious smirk automatically in place, one corner of his lips curling up as he started to say something that he would undoubtedly think was witty.
And then it registered on X5-494 who it was.
Max later thought how she’d almost have been willing to pay money to see that expression on Alec’s face as recognition dawned, his jaw dropping open and those green-gold eyes widening.
“Max,” he breathed. “What the hell are you doin’ here?”
She started to say something, but -- as usual -- Alec wasn’t going to just leave it there. He had to go on the defensive. “Or should I ask what the hell do you want?”
Not a good start. Not a good start at all ...
*****
Alec owned very little in the world: his clothes, his bike, his warrior training, his DNA, and his hard-won freedom. That about covered it. But now he suddenly realized he just might own one more thing as well ... something he’d never dared hoped for.
494’s world had pretty much just tilted -- but, true to his species, he was quick to recover. His first thought at seeing Max appearing like magic beside him at the bar was that he’d never been so glad to see someone in his life. However, that was immediately followed by a second, darker realization. If Max was here, she wanted something from him -- and he was right.
“What I want is for you to come home,” she said quietly with none of the belligerence or arrogance he’d always associated with his former partner-in-crime.
“Why?” he said. “What’s wrong?”
“Because I need you,” she said -- the words nearly flooring Alec for the second time in as as many minutes. “And don’t look so surprised. It’s not like I can’t be polite.”
“Polite when you want something badly enough,” Alec said snidely, reminding himself how this woman with her beauty and wit could manipulate most men as if they were made of clay. But then he’d never been one to bow down to “her highness” in the past, and he wasn’t going to start now.
“You’re right,” she said. “I already told you I want something. I want you to come back to Seattle and help me with our family. Things are bad back there, Alec.”
“Not according to Dix,” he countered.
“Dix doesn’t know the truth.”
“Then enlighten me. According to our little monocled friend the Art Mall is making enough money to keep you in Skittles and beer, and the city has pretty much accepted your little enclave as one of their suburbs.” His lips twitched up in a lopsided sarcastic smile. “‘Freak Nation’ has come of age.”
“Not exactly,” Max said levelly. “What’s really happening is that most of Seattle hates us, we lose at least one or two people a month to mob violence, the Breeding Cult is breathing down our neck at every turn, the Art Mall is failing, food and medicine is running short, and Marina’s bunch out in Gillette is leaning on us big time to consolidate so we can better fight the Familiars.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Alec said lightly. “That whole consolidation thing.”
Max shook her head, her dark brown locks falling forward, hiding her face. The bar tender came up, waiting for her order.
“Another beer for the lady,” Alec said almost automatically, putting a few bills down on the wet, peanut-shell-covered bar. “And a Scotch for me. So,” he said, taking a long sip of his drink when it came a minute later, fortifying himself as the liquid burned its way comfortingly down his throat. “Lemme guess. You and Marina don’t see eye-to-eye.”
“That’s putting it mildly,” Max said, raising her head and taking a sip of her own beer. “Alec, she’s killed as many of our people as the Breeding Cult has. She doesn’t tolerate transhumans unless they can be made -- as she puts it -- ‘useful.’ And her men have masacred way too many Ordinaries in the name of Homeland Security.”
“I read about that bar fight,” Alec admitted. “And the thought’s crossed my mind that you and she were probably at odds. How’s she getting away with it?”
“How do you think?” Max said bitterly. “Military backing. Her X5s and X6s are extremely useful to Uncle Sam. And a lot of our own people have deserted, joining her group. The rewards are pretty good if you don’t have an aversion to killing innocents.”
Alec pressed his lips together and looked up at the television screen hanging above the bar where the Falcons were defeating the Dolphins handily in one of the playoff games. “How does me goin’ back fix anything?”
“Because I can’t do this alone,” she said, her brown eyes as sincere as Alec had ever seen them. “And I can’t trust anyone else.”
“You’ve managed on your own just fine so far,” Alec pointed out.
“If you call losing almost half of our population in TC since you left ‘fine’,” Max returned hotly. “They’re either dead or with Marina’s crowd, and I’m afraid every day that a military contingency is going to roll right into TC and simply take the rest of us prisoner.” She leaned forward, her beer forgotten. “I’m scared, Alec. I’m scared and in this pretty much alone. If Marina takes TC away from he she’ll kill a lot of our friends ... Joshua for one. It’s not like the Gillette base has use for an artist.”
Alec sat back at that one -- an angle he hadn’t really considered. Joshua meant something to him ... a lot really. And so did many of the other transhumans in TC, Mole for one -- although, an outfit like Marina’s would probably have a “use” for a trained DAC.
“They tried to kidnap Eve,” Max continued, her tone falling to a softness that was a rarity for 452. “They want to breed more X5s and raise the children just like we were raised back at Manticore. Only, they’ve lost the genetic base so their only recourse is to mate X5 with X5 and X6 with X6 and take the offspring.” She looked toward the bar door, almost as if afraid a contingency of Manticore soldiers might burst in at any moment. “Gem was killed, protecting her daughter,” Max whispered, her voice filling with tears. “I wasn’t there. I was at a fucking City Council meeting.”
Alec closed his eyes, his jaw clenching. That had once been his gig -- alderman. Of course Max would have taken his place as TC’s representative, and she’d been off the base when the attack had come. He could feel her pain because it was his right now as well.
“I can’t do this alone any more,” Max repeated. “Please. I’ll beg if you want, but I need you to come back with me -- now.”
Alec was almost ready to give in ... to say yes ... but there was one thing he had to know first. “What about Logan?” he said, his voice dropping an octave. “Why isn’t he helping more? I mean, the two of you are husband and wife, right?”
Now it was Max’s turn to look absolutely dumb struck. “You mean Dix never told you?”
“Told me what?”
“Logan and I broke up for good four years ago. He’s not even living in Seattle any more.”
And all of a sudden Alec realized that this changed everything. It shouldn’t -- but it did.
Max was free, and she needed him. It could be a dangerous trap for his heart ... would most likely lead to his death in fact. Alec realized this. But--
The woman I thought I could never have ... the one I can’t forget ... the one who haunts my dreams is sitting here begging me to help her. And damn it, she still makes my brain drop right to my crotch.
“Okay, Max,” Alec said as he took another slug of his Scotch to fortify himself. “I know I’m gonna regret it, but I’m in. Oh, and the whole black leather look you’re workin’?” He winked. “Still nice.”
*****
Alec didn’t know what was the most disconcerting -- that Max had wanted to find him ... or that she’d succeeded after he’d been so careful to cover his tracks all these years. But then of course it was really his own damn fault ...
Still, she had no place to stay, and no money. What else could he do but offer to share the hotel room he’d already rented for the night at the Days Inn across the highway from the pool hall? Tomorrow they’d head back to Seattle, double riding on his motorcycle, but he really did want a few hours rest before heading out. Transgenic metabolism or not, he was pretty tired, especially faced with a 3000 mile/5-day cross-country bike trip in the middle of the friggin’ winter.
Cheap hotel rooms all smelled the same, and Max turned her nose up in what he figured was disdain as soon as he opened the door.
“You don’t like it, you can find your own digs,” Alec commented as he took the key out of the old fashioned lock and shut the door behind them. He dropped her duffel bag that he’d carried for her into the room’s only chair and stripped off his jacket, tossing it over the back.
“No,” Max said, shedding her own coat. “It’ll be okay. Thanks for sharing.” However, she was eyeing the only bed in the room with its standard-sized double mattress.
Alec sighed heavily, and decided to be a gentleman. “Max,” he said, “you take the--”
“Logan and I didn’t break up because of you,” she suddenly said. “Not really. So don’t give yourself the credit.”
Alec blinked at that. “Why would you and Logan break up over me?” he asked, genuinely puzzled.
“Just so long as we’re clear this has nothing to do with that,” Max said rather primly.
Alec was still confused, and scratched his head to prove it. “Max, what are you talkin’ about?”
“I ... I just don’t want you to think I came after you because I’d broken up with Logan and was lonely or something. That was years ago, and I’ve been doing just fine on my own.”
Confusion growing ...
“Max ...” Alec leaned back against the frame of the bathroom doorway, one foot lifted and braced flat against the wood and arms crossed in front of his chest defensively. “You already told me why you tracked me down. You need my help with runnin’ TC. Period.”
“Right,” she said, still standing in the middle of the room and looking extremely like she wanted to say more.
He waited, not knowing what to expect. But then this was Max.
“Alec.”
“What?”
“Logan and I broke up because he wanted me to be Ordinary ... a regular girl.”
“I always thought that’s what you wanted too,” Alec said, his disgust at the notion -- that a fine X5 sister would ever want to be “ordinary” -- still showing after all these years in the tone of his voice.
“So did I,” Max said softly. “But I was wrong. And when I realized it and told Logan, he and I had a big fight.”
“And broke up,” Alec said, thinking that was the end of the story.
“He accused me of some things,” Max continued.
“What things?”
“Of ... wanting someone like me. Of wanting you.”
“Which wasn’t true, and I guess you told him so. Right, Max?”
She didn’t answer, only looked away toward the window that overlooked the parking lot.
“Max, tell me you didn’t drag me into your break up with Logan. I mean, you just said it wasn’t about me, right?” And then Alec realized that she’d lied, and he honestly didn’t know whether to feel guilty, angry, or elated.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “But don’t go thinking you’re God’s gift to women, Alec. You were only a very small part of it. But basically, Logan was right. I needed to be with my own kind in a lot of ways, including that one. He used you as an example because of that whole jealousy thing we had going on back in ‘21. Remember?”
“You mean when you lied and told Logan you and I were together just to get him to break up with you?” Alec drawled. “No, Max. I’d totally forgotten that dirty little trick you pulled. Why are you telling me all this anyway?” He uncrossed his arms and leaned harder into the door frame.
“Because I want you and me to have a clean start, Alec. I don’t want you to always wonder why I left Logan. It’s the truth. We broke up partly because of the way I felt ... feel about you. There. Now gloat, and say ‘I told you so’.”
“I’m not going to do that,” Alec said, his brain trying to spin off in a direction he didn’t want it going in. It almost sounded like Max wanted him in that way. But he couldn’t believe she’d ever back down from her long held stance that he was a total jerk and unworthy of her attentions. “Max,” he said, his voice as gentle as he could make it because he really was tired and wanted to stop the talking and go to bed. “What do you want from me? Really?”
“Really?” she said.
“Really.”
“I want to get this out of the way.” And with those rather astounding words she began peeling off her tight fitting t-shirt.
Alec didn’t usually play dumb around his ladies, but on this point he needed to be absolutely clear. “Get what out of the way?” he said, knowing he sounded like a moron. “Max, where do you think you are?”
Max stood with her shirt in her hand wearing nothing on top now except a very low cut black bra that showed off her ample cleavage to the fullest. “Right where I want to be,” she said bluntly. “Sex. You. Me. In the bed right now. We do it and then it’s over with. No more wondering.”
It was almost a command.
Alec started to say he wasn’t wondering, and opened his mouth to inform her of that. Which is when Max closed the distance between them and stood on tiptoe to press her lips against his.
He almost fell backwards into the bathroom, but regained his balance by catching hold of Max’s waist -- and suddenly realized he never wanted to let go.
*****
WARNING: NC17
Graphic and explicit sex. Do not read if this kind of material offends you!
He had her bra off in seconds, his own t-shirt as well. She started to unzip his jeans, but then they realized it was taking too long and broke apart to strip. Ten seconds later Max was in his arms again, and this time there was absolutely nothing between them -- not Logan ... not TC ... not clothes ...
Alec was hard enough to drill concrete even before Max pushed him back on the bed and mounted. He didn’t mind being dominated. In fact, he liked that in a woman ... one bold enough to take him on. However, things were moving awfully fast.
“Easy,” Alec chided Max, his voice low and husky as she slid moistly over his dark swollen dick. “Don’t spoil the party.”
With an impish grin, she reached back and not-so-gently tugged his tight balls, massaging them away from his body -- a skilled sexual move that would prolong his pleasure, and one the X5 was actually a bit astounded that Max knew.
Alec hissed sharply at the feeling, arching his hips and pushing her upwards. She bent forward with the move, her dangling breasts too tempting to resist. Taking a nipple into his mouth he was rewarded by Max’s rich, low moan of pleasure. But then the tip of his wet cock was at her opening and he once again had to close his eyes and swallow hard to keep from losing it right then and there.
Slowly ... slowly ... she eased herself down on his shaft, stretching around him ... taking him all in until her ass rested on his balls. And then Max leaned forward again, pinned his wrists against the sheets with both of her hands, and began to pleasure herself on him.
Alec felt like he was going to die from it ... the tightness ... the heat ... And then her mouth was ravishing his again ... teeth nipping painfully at his lower lip only to soothe it with her tongue that then tangled with his own, almost as if she was seeking something deep inside of his body ... tasting him ...
Part of Alec’s mind recognized full well that he was being seduced ... but surprisingly, he didn’t care. Max could manipulate him all night long if she wanted to, just so long as she kept squeezing his dick with her cunt that way.
However, eventually enough was enough. Even an X5 has his limits. Breaking her hold on his wrist forcefully, 494 grabbed the back of Max’s head and pressed her face down against his, at the same time raising hips to pump so hard the springs of the bed protested. He felt her trembling inside a fraction of a second before her legs began to shake, and then he wasn’t feeling anything at all except the hot cum rising in his shaft and his seed spilling into the body of the woman he’d fantasized about so often but never dreamed he’d really ever have as her mouth muffled his moans.
*****
Afterwards, they lay quietly together, his arm around her waist from behind, one hand cupping her naked breast, their legs tangled, his warmth in the chill room surprisingly comforting.
Max hadn’t said a word except for uttering his name one time as she climaxed, and Alec hadn’t said anything either ... just enveloped her in that big hug afterwards, his chin resting on top of her head and his hard muscular body at her back.
The red numerals on the night stand clock were flashing 1:07 a.m. She felt him swallow. “It’s all right,” she said softly.
“Satisfied?” his deep voice murmured in her ear.
“Very,” Max said truthfully. She turned over part way so she could see his eyes in the dark, placing fingers against his hard abs and letting her other hand trail over his thigh and through wiry pubic curls until she touched him intimately. “But don’t get cocky. I’ve had better.”
“Liar.”
“You wanna call me a bitch, too?”
“Can I?”
Max thought about that a moment, even as she felt him hardening once again in her hand. “Yes,” she said, turning over on her stomach and raising her hips. “Yes.”
This time was slower ... more personal ... calmer yet also more intense. His strokes were hard and deep and stimulating as he took her from behind like a stud takes a mare, his face visible in the light from the parking lot, rocking on his knees, bedsprings creaking again, his features set as he concentrated, brow furrowed ... eyes closed ... jaw clenched as Max rested her head on a pillow, simply enjoying their copulation and letting her partner do all the work this time.
The clock read 1:27 when he began to shake and her own insides began to coil.
And this time it was Alec who cried her name out loud.
They finally slept, still entwined, until the faint flush of morning replaced the sulfur yellow of the street lights outside. When she opened her eyes, she was alone in bed, and for a moment Max almost panicked. What if she’d made a mistake? What if Alec had gotten what he wanted and now was gone?
But then she heard the toilet flush in the bathroom and there he was standing unabashedly naked in the doorway rubbing sleep out of his eyes somehow managing to look both boyish and deliciously manly at the same time. “You may be able to function on just two hours sleep a night, sister,” Alec said with a big yawn. “But I need four or I feel like shit.”
Max rolled over and looked at the clock. It was a little bit past 6 a.m. “You got your four and more, pretty boy,” she said, her smile softening the sarcasm. “Up and at ’em. We need to get back to Seattle as fast as we can.”
“Seems to me I’m the one who’s already up,” Alec said as he began picking up his clothes from off the floor, totally at ease being naked in front of her. Max, deciding she wasn’t going to be put to shame, slid out from under the sheets and walked nonchalantly toward the bathroom. “Is there enough hot water for us both to shower?” she asked.
Alec smirked. “There will be if we do it together.”
She realized he was being bold for a reason. He wanted to see just how far she was going to take things ... whether last night had been a one-time roll in the hay or not.
Max thought about that a moment -- whether she wanted to keep the big jerk or not, and knew her answer almost before the question. Of course she did. After all, she’d just flown 3000 miles to find him, and last night had pretty much sealed the deal.
“It might not last, Alec,” she said, wanting him to know the score. “But if you’re in. I’m in.”
His smile was real this time, and she’d swear she saw a look of relief in his eyes. It was the answer he’d wanted to hear. “So,” he drawled. “You wanna join me in the shower?” He cocked his head to one side. “And that’s somethin’ I never in a million years thought I’d be sayin’ to X5-452.”
“Yes, I’ll join you in the shower,” Max said with a laugh. “And that’s something I never in a million years thought I’d be saying to X5-494.”
*****
Alec was honestly surprised that she hadn’t kicked him out of bed -- and her life -- the morning after. In his experience, Max seemed to often have sort of a “buyer’s remorse” kind of thing going on with her relationships, quick to jump in and equally quick to jump back out.
However, instead of her being all up tight about the night before, the two of them had shared a very enjoyable shower together that had led to an incredible amount of deep passionate kissing and yet another coupling with Max’s legs wrapped around his waist, her ass cupped in his hands, and the hot water running out as her back pounded the mildew-stained grout of the tile wall in rhythm to his urgent thrusts. Afterwards, they’d dried off, dressed, checked out, and gone across the street to a little pancake house for breakfast.
Max got all the way to pouring maple syrup on her stack of pancakes (his treat) before eyeing him in that speculative way she had that made the hair on the back of Alec’s neck prickle (right about where his bar code was).
“What?” he said, beating her to the punch, watching her closely as he chewed.
“I was just wondering something.”
He waited.
“Are you really the lone wolf you always made yourself out to be, Alec? I mean, my little seduction routine last night isn’t making you leave someone else behind is it?”
It took a second for Alec to understand what Max meant, but when he did he made a wry face and hesitated answering just long enough to make her nervous (because she deserved it). “There’ve been a couple,” he said honestly.
“Ordinaries?”
“Yeah.”
“I thought you always said we were a danger to them?”
“We are. Which is the main reason nothin’ ever worked out for me. A date or two is one thing -- a one-night stand even better -- but gettin’ too involved ...” He shook his head.
“Did they know who you really were?” Max asked. “What you were?”
“One did,” Alec said. “She kind of understood ... was fascinated in a way.” He grinned and leaned back in his chair, stretching a kink out of his back. “She digged datin’ a genuine supersoldier, right up until the part where some of our Breeding Cult buddies took a shot at me in an alley in back of a bar in Madrid one night. I told her to beat it after that and got my ass outta Spain.”
“I’m sorry,” Max said, sounding genuine about it.
Alec shrugged. “Nothin’ for you to be sorry about. You’ve had your share of lost loves too. Love ‘em and leave ‘em’s.”
“Yeah,” Max quietly agreed, reaching out to cover his hand with hers when he reached for the salt for his scrambled eggs. “But I’m going to do my best to not lose -- or leave -- you. It’s been too long Alec. I’m tired. I’m scared. And I’m lonely. I really, really need you, so please, don’t let me down. If you want out -- go now.”
Alec didn’t know why he did it, but he raised her fingers to his lips then and kissed the back of her hand -- a sentimental gesture he half thought Max might laugh at (but she didn’t) -- his hazel-green eyes locking with hers and making a silent promise. “I’m tired and scared and lonely too, Max,” he said.
Their waitress, a plump motherly type carrying a tray of waffles, saw and smiled at the handsome young man with his pretty girlfriend, little knowing that what she was really looking at were two of the most dangerous bioweapons systems ever created by man falling in love.
*****
Alec badly wanted to keep his bike, even though Max told him his green Suzuki was still safe and sound in TC’s motor pool, used only on occasion by Mole and a few of the remaining X5s.
494 was adamant, though. He shook his head. “Steal a car if you want to, Max, and I’ll meet you there, but this baby cost me too much money to just ditch and I’d never get a good price for it here in Louisiana.” They were taking the southern route home -- both agreeing that driving a Ninja through the Colorado Rockies in January would be too cold, even for a transgenic.
“Fine,” Max snapped as they prepared to mount the bike again having stopped for food, drink, and a bathroom break at the state line. She eyed him speculatively. “How’d you come up with the cash anyway?”
“Poker game,” Alec said simply.
“Did you cheat?”
He smirked. “What do you think?”
She gave him a look, hands now on hips, her disapproval evident.
“Hey,” Alec said. “You wanted me back. What? Did you forget who I was?”
She had the decency to look away at that.
“Relax, Max,” Alec assured her. “The only way I cheated was ‘cause I can memorize the cards. You do the same thing yourself. Remember that trip to Las Vegas when we needed to raise cash fast for a new generator to run the TC power plant? I didn’t see you playin’ dumb at the blackjack table.”
He had a point, and he knew it. “Anyway, I keep the bike. But get a car if you want. I know ridin’ double isn’t the most comfortable thing in the world.”
Actually, though, Alec kind of liked the feeling of Max’s arms locked around his waist, not to mention her warm breasts pressing against his spine as they drove. But he wasn’t going to tell her that.
“Can I drive?” she finally said.
He thought about that moment, and decided the compromise was worth it. With another little smirk, he tossed her the keys.
“Watch your hands,” Max said as he climbed on behind her and wrapped his arms around her body.
“Well, where do you want me to put ‘em?”
“Lower.”
He gripped her stomach, but his hands were big.
“Not that low!”
Alec just smiled, remembering now that they’d had this conversation before. She was yanking his chain. In response, he moved his hands upwards again, cupping her breasts. “How’s this?” he asked, his voice husky in her ear.
Max turned her head to look back at him, her expression mean, but her eyes sparkling. “Just remember,” she said primly. “I’m gonna have my payback time tonight.”
“Promises, promises,” Alec sighed as the Ninja roared out of the parking lot and back onto the highway.
*****
They found a cheap motel in Texas and grabbed a few hours sleep, once again sharing a bed (and their bodies).
It was almost like they’d always been like this, Alec thought as he sat on the edge of the bed at dawn, pulling on a pair of black boxer briefs, his back still stinging slightly from the scratches Max had etched there with her nails as they made love the night before.
She was awake too, and raised one finger to trace a red welt. “Sorry about that,” she said apologetically.
Alec shrugged. “Battle scars earned honorably,” he quipped. “They’ll heal.” He glanced back at her, the cocky grin still in place. “Should I make a comment about always knowing you’d be a real wildcat in bed? Or that I’ve been waiting five ... no, make that six years for this?”
“Only if I get to comment that I always knew you’d be the kind of guy who’d beg like a baby during a blow job.”
“Touché,” Alec said, closing his eyes as he shook his head. Damn, he’d missed this over the years -- someone his equal to spar verbally with, not to mention someone he could really let go with in the sack, someone he didn’t have to hide his true nature from.
Max reached past him for the map on the night stand, her naked breast brushing his muscular biceps as she leaned. He couldn’t help it. He reached up and touched her lightly ... possessively ... Untangling her legs from the covers, she then sat next to him on the edge of the bed and unfolded the map. “Do you think we can make southern California by midnight?” she asked.
It was still fairly dark in the room, dawn barely beginning, and the irises of Alec’s eyes widened like a cat’s as he looked over the route. All was still quiet in TC -- or at least it had been last night when Max had given Dix a quick call. There was always the worry about lines and cells being tapped, so she hadn’t gone into details with the monocled mutant, merely affirming there hadn’t been any violence around the compound due to the Colorado killings and that her “mission” had been successful.
Alec wondered what flavor icing the cake Luke would undoubtedly be baking for his welcome home party would have.
They showered fast -- for once not playing -- and left 15 minutes later, figuring they’d grab breakfast later in the morning from one of the numerous fast food restaurants dotting the interstate.
Sixteen hours later they made California, Alec driving the bike for the last nine of them with Max all but asleep lying along his back. At least the weather was warming up now, he thought as he pulled into yet another roadside hotel. It was almost midnight, and he badly needed to rest. As the Ninja coasted into a parking spot a sound overhead made him look up. There was a helicopter circling, using a searchlight, apparently trying to find something or someone on the ground.
“Look at that,” Alec said, nudging Max awake. She blinked bleary eyes then squinted up at the light. Old habits died hard. The sight of a dark chopper in the sky brought back bad memories for both of them. They’d been chased too often ... run too often .... hurt too often for their hearts to not beat faster at the sight of what might be a black ops squad.
Max looked toward the motel with its inviting “vacancy” sign blinking. “Go,” she said quietly.
Alec agreed. Starting the bike up again, he lifted booted feet from the ground and glided out of the parking lot, and when he hit the highway he opened it up, quickly making at least 60 mph on the relatively empty road.
“No one could know where we were!” Max shouted at him above the whistle of the wind as it whipped by. “We’re probably being paranoid!”
“I’d rather be paranoid than dead!” Alec yelled back, and nudged the machine another five mph faster.
They ended up driving all night, making San Diego by dawn, and Alec felt like he was going to die he was so stiff and sore. But this time when they pulled into a run-down little roadside inn there weren’t any helicopters circling in the sky and the thought of a bed -- any bed -- was just too tempting.
“A few hours, Max,” Alec said as he climbed stiffly off the Ninja. “You might be bred for night fighting, but I’m not. I need to sleep.”
Max, although not looking as tired as he was, did look pretty sore and merely nodded her agreement, tucking long strands of her dark hair back into its ponytail as they walked toward check-in.
Alec didn’t have a lot of money, but he’d had enough to buy gas and food for the trip they were making with a bit left over. The price of a room was $75 though -- pretty steep -- and he started to haggle, telling the manager they only needed the room for a few hours. The way the guy leered at Max inferred he knew exactly what this couple were going to be doing during those “few hours” and therefore the price wasn’t going to come down.
“Tell your skank to lower her price,” the pudgy little bald Ordinary said. “That way you can afford it.”
Normally Alec would have let it go, but he was tired, sore, and incredibly cranky this morning. The hand he shot out moved in a blur as he grabbed the sleazy clerk by the front of his shirt and half pulled him over the desk. “My girlfriend isn’t a skank,” Alec said through slightly bared teeth. “Now apologize to her. And we’ll pay fifty for the room.”
“Alec,” Max said quietly, laying a hand on his arm. “It’s all right.”
“You sure?” Alec said, releasing the guy.
“Yeah,” she said. “I can defend my own honor.” And with that she turned around and slugged the hotel manager hard in the face, sending him reeling backwards with blood gushing from his broken nose.
“Nice,” Alec commented as he yanked the phone cord out of the wall so the cops couldn’t be called too easily. Then he sighed. “Guess we’re not gonna be stayin’ here either.”
Max shrugged apologetically and they headed back out to the bike.
*****
By the time they hit the outskirts of Los Angeles -- Max’s old stomping grounds, Max knew Alec’s eyesight was starting to dim, even though she was driving by then. Coffee was the only thing that had kept him going, though she was pretty sure he’d dozed while resting his head against her back.
And Max, herself, was shaking with fatigue. She was trembling as she pulled the Ninja off the highway at a camping grounds. They’d been looking for a hotel for the past hundred miles, but everything had been full, too fancy for their very limited budget or -- as was the case at one place -- had a parking lot filled with cop cars.
“We stop here,” Alec said, his voice gruff with exhaustion. “I’ll sleep on the ground if I have to.” He took off his sunglasses and squinted up at the grey sky. “Of course with my luck it’s gonna rain.”
“At least it’s fairly warm,” Max said as they walked from the parking lot down a dirt trail toward the woods. They picked a spot where they couldn’t be seen by any of the other campers and spread their jackets on the grass. Alec was out like a light almost as soon as he stretched his lanky body out.
Max could sympathize. And, even thought her military mind told her it wouldn’t be good for them both to sleep out in the open like this, she lay down beside him, arm outstretched and pillowing her head. Sleep eluded her for awhile, and she found herself studying Alec’s face, once again marveling at both how little -- and how much -- he’d changed over the years. He was still the cocky, egotistical, “smart alec” kid she’d named so long ago, but at the same time he’d evolved into a confident, dependable, caring man who seemed to have finally found out what he really wanted in the world: his family and maybe ... just maybe ... her.
As she dozed off the last thought in Max’s mind was to wonder just when during all the time she’d known him X5-494 had stopped being a complete jerk and turned into a guy she could picture in her future for a long time to come.
I took awhile for the sound to penetrate her dreams ... the chatter and roar that she at first thought was a train taking the transgenics to someplace safe at last where they could live a peaceful, fulfilling life. However, the train was getting louder and suddenly Max opened her eyes and realized what she was hearing: another helicopter ... close ... landing ...
“Alec!”
He was already awake, propped up on an elbow, shielding his eyes against the glare of the setting sun and looking up through the trees. “They can’t be after us,” he said, shaking his head. But his voice was uncertain. “Can they? I mean, how could they know where we were? And who the hell would ‘they’ be anyway?” He thought about that moment and made a wry face. “But then people have always been after our asses, so I guess the who doesn’t really matter.”
“Maybe it’s just coincidence,” Max said loudly to be heard over the chopper as it descended toward the parking lot.
“Or maybe it’s the Reds, Lydecker, Marina’s people, or the whole fucking U.S. Marines corps,” Alec shot back. “Whatever, I don’t feel like sitting here and waiting for the Welcome Wagon.”
Max agreed. They rose together and she let him take her hand. The chopper was almost on the ground, landing not 50 yards from where the bike was parked. Alec made a face. “Damn,” he said. “Damn, damn, damn!” But there was no getting around it. His Ninja was a lost cause.
“At least we’ve got our stuff,” Max said, indicating the saddlebags and duffel they’d brought with them.
Alec was looking down through the trees toward a second parking lot where there were maybe twenty assorted cars, campers, and trucks. Then he looked back toward his bike. “Maybe they’re not really after us?” he said hopefully.
“You really wanna find out?” Max hissed. The chopper was on the ground now with black clad commandos pouring out, at least eight of them. And then Max saw something ... or rather “someone” ... that made her heart momentarily stand still.
“Marina,” she said. “It’s Marina.”
“X5-592?” Alec said, looking along Max’s line of sight. “That’s her?”
“In the flesh,” Max said, staring at the slightly older X5 women who currently commanded an army of supersoldiers. Brown hair whipping in the wind, her black uniform showing off her voluptuous figure to the fullest, Marina ... X5-592 ... was shouting commands to her men.
“She wants me,” Max said. “That’s why she’s here. She’s tried ordering me into her Unit several times, but Lydecker’s always intervened.” Max looked up at Alec, brown eyes wide and fearful. “It’s a kidnapping mission ... “conscription’ she calls it ...and they won’t hesitate to take you too.”
They were crouched down now, half hidden behind some bushes as they watched the small army of men (and women) assemble for orders by the chopper. In a moment they’d fan out, and both Max and Alec knew they’d better be gone by then. Alec, however, was studying Marina, assessing the new enemy.
“She’s pretty,” he remarked in a way that made Max’s hackles rise.
“Of course she is,” Max snapped. “She’s X5 ... form Zack’s generation ... ‘98. You wanna ask her out on a date?”
“Why?,” Alec said with an impish grin. “Would it bother you?” But then he sobered. “We need to move.” He bit down on his lower lip and looked toward the adjacent parking lot, already picking out a vehicle. “The Jeep,” he said. “The black one.”
Max agreed. Together, crouching low and carrying their gear, they made their way down the short slope to the other lot. It only took Alec a minute to get into the black Jeep Cherokee they’d chosen and hotwire the engine. Fatigue held at bay by pure X5 stamina, driving slowly ... carefully ... not attracting attention ... he pulled out onto the highway and started north.
This time they didn’t stop until they reached Seattle -- home.
*****
Alec almost felt as if he’d never left. Everything in TC’s command center looked and sounded just the same ... the banks of cobbled together computers ... the damp cement floor ... the dirty windows of the converted warehouse ... the salvaged chairs and couches with their butt-sprung seats and threadbare cloth ... the whir of the machines with the background noise of a generator ...
However, he also quickly noted that, even though the setting was the same, the people had vastly changed -- all except Dix and Luke, the two mutants still manning their stations when he and Max came wearily straggling in at half past dead in the morning. For one thing, instead of a half a dozen of their people operating the center there were only three -- Dix, Luke, and an X6 who’s name he didn’t know.
“Marina’s taken most of our key personnel,” Max said quietly, apparently reading his mind as he stood in the doorway surveying his “once and future kingdom.”
Luke looked up, saw who’d arrived, and a wide grin split his face. “Alec!” he cried out, leaping out of his chair and scurrying across the command center where he pretty much flung himself into the X5’s arms, giving him a huge hug. Then Luke looked at Max and back to Alec, the question obvious in his eyes.
Alec winked and gave a thumb’s up, indicating his status with their fearless lady leader. He didn’t think the little mutant’s smile could get any broader -- but it did.
Dix, too, was smiling, but he was still at his station, reading data on the computer screen. Max walked up behind him. “We were jumped just south of Los Angeles -- Marina and her people. Why now, and how the hell did they track me?”
“I can answer that,” a new voice said from the doorway behind them.
Colonel Donald Lydecker, one-time commander of Manticore and full time pain in the transgenic’s butt, stepped into the command center, back ramrod straight, blue eyes grim, and hands in the pockets of his leather flight jacket. The man looked older to Alec ... the hair now far more grey than blond ... a few more creases on that weathered face ... he’d put on a pound or two as well ... but the expression was just the same -- fierce and commanding.
Max had told Alec how Lydecker occasionally helped out the Seattle transgenics, especially when they needed a liason with the military or local government, and even once-in-a-while with Marina’s people. Although no longer in charge of a military group, Lydecker’s word still held weight as an expert consultant on the Manticore survivors.
Alec’s mouth twitched as he realized what he’d just done ... thought of his people as “survivors.” That alone told just how bad the attrition rate had been.
“She tracks you through that Red’s implant in your neck,” Lydecker said gruffly. “She recently acquired the technology.”
Max’s back straightened at that bit of information, and Alec glanced at her. “You can’t get it out?” he asked softly.
“No,” Max said simply. “Not without killing me.”
Alec made a face but didn’t pursue the subject.
“Why does she want me so bad all of a sudden?” Max asked the colonel.
Lydecker shrugged. “Does she need a reason. You’re a valuable resource to her, Max. You know Marina’s hell bent on collecting all viable X5s and X6s for her group. Those who don’t come willingly are ‘reconditioned’ to at least serve some sort of purpose, and the few who can’t be bent to her will are still good for body parts or breeding stock.”
His cool eyes went to Alec and a grim smile touched his chapped lips. “She won’t let you keep him for long.”
“She’s not taking him,” Max said. “Or me.”
“You, might be safe here for awhile,” Lydecker said, walking on into the room and looking around at the computers with mild interest. “Marina’s not ready for an all-out war with you yet. Not with the Breeding Cult becoming so much more aggressive. She’ll pick her battles.” Once again he sized up Alec. “But when she finds out you’ve got 494 here, she’ll have an order issued to take him. She won’t let a healthy fertile male X5 stay here. She’d consider that a wasted resource.”
“I’d like to see her try and make me join her little army,” Alec commented lightly as he straightened his shoulders and tugged his leather jacket down. Dangerously exhausted or not, he wasn’t about to show weakness in front of the colonel.
“If nothing else she’ll lock you up and use you in her breeding program,” Lydecker warned.
Max looked up at Alec, her brow furrowed with worry. “He’s right,” she said. “They’ve taken other X5s. Left us really only the ones who have permanent injuries or genetic problems that she doesn’t want to waste time fixing.” She glanced around the room. “Hammond, for example. He lost part of his leg in a Breeding Cult attack last year. Marina doesn’t want him, so he’s still working with Mole. But someday she might run out of ... parts ... Or the government might get tired of supplying our X5s with tryptophan.”
Alec fingered the bottle of tryptophan he always kept in his pocket -- his one big genetic weakness ... one that could kill him if he wasn’t careful. But tryptophan, although hard to come by, was still manufactured in several places in the world. It shouldn’t be a problem, even if the official supply the government had been giving their people here in Seattle were to be cut off. It was just one of many things he’d discovered in his worldwide journeys over the past few years ... a potential way to help his people, even though, at the time, the knowledge was only for himself.
“She wants a meeting,” Lydecker said. “With you, Max.”
“Marina?” Max clarified.
He nodded.
“What about?”
“Consolidation,” Lydecker replied, sighing heavily as he stopped to look over Dix’s shoulder at a stream of data going across the screen -- weather reports from around the nation Alec thought as his pupils widened and his cat sight focused briefly on the data.
“No,” Max said firmly. “And there’s no use talking. You know as well as I do that if we put our groups together, most of our transhumans will be killed.”
Alec’s head came up at that. “Where’s Joshua?” he asked.
“With O.C.,” Dix answered. “Two of our guys were attacked in the Art Mall yesterday ... retaliation for those killings in Colorado. We thought it best if Joshua lay low for awhile out of TC. O.C. said something about taking him out of town even.”
Max looked like she didn’t like that either -- O.C. and dog boy Joshua out in the open somewhere -- but Alec figured she really had too many other things to worry about right now to spend much time on that one.
“I’ll find them,” he offered. “You’ve got your hands full here.”
“No,” Max said, taking hold of the sleeve of his jacket. “I need you to stay here.” She looked back to Lydecker. “When and where is this meeting?”
“This afternoon. My office,” Lydecker said. He kept a small office across the street from Terminal City in the building that Logan Cale used to own.
“I’m coming too,” Alec said.
“Not a good idea,” Max quickly argued. “Marina might not know about you yet, and I don’t want her getting ideas about acquisition.”
“Hey, Max,” Alec quipped. “When did I ever run away from a pretty woman who wanted me?”
She had to smile at that, and her fingers threaded with his.
Lydecker saw, and his eyebrows rose a fraction. “Max,” he cautioned, his voice harsh. “You want to keep him? Then don’t let her see him.”
“Too late,” an authoritative woman’s voice said over the intercom system.
Alec looked up and around, astonished and at the same time pissed as hell that TC’s security was apparently so lax.
“I’m here early for the meeting,” Marina said through the speakers set in the corners of the ceiling. “And don’t bother trying to hide the fact that X5-494 is on the premises. 494!” she commanded. “You’re to accompany 452 to the meeting. I want to get a good look at you prior to your reassignment to my command.”
*****
Alec felt very much like a piece of meat as X5-592 raked her eyes over him as he stood “at ease” behind Max in Lydecker’s office, she and Marina having taken the only two chairs.
Marina -- a hard edged woman in her late twenties with straight shoulder length brown hair, her curves covered by a drab khaki soldier’s uniform, and steely eyes that made Lydecker’s habitually cold gaze look positively loving -- essentially ignored him while the business end of the conversation took place. It was a summary of Breeding Cult activities that Alec found useful, ending with X5-592’s order that the Seattle and Gillette bases unite once and for all in order to hit the Familiars hard and strong before they mounted an attack on the transgenics, the Manticore supersoldiers -- as planned by Sandeman -- really being the only line of defense humankind had against them. (Marina felt quite strongly about that ... maintaining Sandeman’s “vision” as she called it.)
“You want my people to move into the Gillette base,” Max said coolly.
“The logical thing to do,” Marina said, crossing khaki clad legs very much like Max had just crossed hers.
One could tell they were somewhat “sisters” just by looking at them, Alec thought. Even though Max had the more exotic looks, Marina had a similarly shaped face and body, and that same hellion spark in her eyes. The two were well matched, he decided.
Which meant trouble. Max wasn’t going to give up her command easily, and Marina would accept nothing less than full capitulation. There could only be one “leader” here today.
Lydecker, acting as an intermediary, sat behind his desk, fingers steepled. “592’s correct,” he said to Max. “It only makes sense to consolidate our forces now.”
“What about my people?” Max asked tightly. “My transhumans.” She shot Marina a dirty look. “Word is you don’t treat anyone who’s not an X5 or X6 very well.”
“You want to keep your pets, do so,” Marina said blithely. “They can stay in Terminal City for all I care. But I get the DACs and all of your X series soldiers that are physically fit.”
“You’ve already got most of my X5s and 6s,” Max said.
Marina looked meaningfully at Alec.
“I said most,” Max added tightly. “Alec’s just come home, and no matter what you say he’s--”
“Your lover,” Marina interrupted. “I get it. But that’s totally beside the point. He’s my property now, correct Colonel?”
Lydecker, too, was studying him, and Alec felt like he was supposed to say something. What that “something” was, he hadn’t a clue. However, just as he opened his mouth, Max jumped back in.
“All right,” she said. “You can have him. “I’m done with him anyway.”
That wasn’t what Alec had expected, and his mouth remained open.
Max shrugged. “He’s only adequate as a breeding partner anyway. Maybe you’ll get some enjoyment from him, but don’t get your expectations too high.”
“Hey!” Alec finally got out.
“Shut up!” Max commanded. “And that’s an order, soldier. You do what I say and you go where I say. Understand?”
“Yeah,” Alec drawled scathingly, gritting his teeth and wondering what kind of game she was playing -- or if it was even a game. Maybe he’d misjudged things ... her ...
“That’s ‘yes,’ solider,” Max snapped.
“Yes,” he complied, humoring her.
“Yes, what?”
“Yes, sir,” Alec hissed, reluctantly acknowledging Max’s command status.
Marina was smiling like a cat that had just gotten the cream. “Very well,” she said to him. “Gather your gear and meet me at my chopper in twenty minutes.” Then to Max, “My men will inspect the rest of your personnel and make travel arrangements for the ones we want.”
“And the ones you don’t want?” Max asked levelly.
Marina shrugged. “They’re free to do as they please, be it stay here or leave before the Breeding Cult strikes, as they undoubtedly will.”
“And me?” Max said. “You wanted me badly enough yesterday to send a goon squad after me. But oh yeah, that was before you got me to agree to turn all of my people over to you willingly.”
“Are you pregnant?” Marina asked bluntly, glancing over at Alec then back to Max, what she was inferring obvious.
“No.”
It was plain to Alec that Marina was trying to decide if she wanted Max within her own compound where she could watch her, or outside where Max could make less trouble.
“Stay here, 452,” Marina finally said. “Unless you want to totally accept me as your commander, in which case I can find a use for you in Gillette and perhaps rectify that non-pregnancy situation.”
“That’s a death sentence if the Breeding Cult attacks,” Alec said quickly. “If you take all of her key personnel.”
“Silence,” Marina ordered. “Your opinion hasn’t been asked.”
Alec tensed. Max might not want him any more -- although he found that hard to believe -- but that didn’t mean he wasn’t still concerned about her safety.
“Give me a few minutes with 494,” Max said quietly to Marina, “before you take him. I’ll make certain he understands where he belongs, and that it’s not with me.”
Alec followed Max outside into a nearby alley as Marina headed toward her men where they were standing just inside Terminal City’s main gates.
“I gather you want me inside the hornet’s nest for some reason,” Alec said as soon as they were alone. “Or do you really want rid of me already?”
“Not likely,” Max said, her voice low and full of desire as she stood on tiptoe, put her arms around his neck, and drew his head down for a private kiss.
“What’s the plan?” Alec murmured against her mouth, more relieved than he wanted to admit.
“You inside, where you can see what’s really going on,” Max said. She drew back. “Gain Marina’s confidence.”
“And report back to you,” Alec said, nodding at the logic. Marina would never have trusted Max if she’d been the one to surrender, but she probably didn’t know jack about X5-494 beyond his official Manticore record.
Max kissed him again, long and deep, until his crotch was so tight he wasn’t sure he could walk straight. “Max,” he said huskily. “I don’t wanna leave you like this.”
“And I don’t want to lose you to her,” Max said, tears making her brown eyes sparkle.
“Max, we ... you and me ... we’re just starting. Don’t worry about that. I’ll be all right, and so will you. Someday this’ll be over and then--”
“And then what?”
He didn’t really have an answer other than, “Then we’ll maybe really give this ‘us’ thing a try. Okay?”
She smiled a little bit at that, but as he turned to leave, she grabbed his arm. “Alec,” she said. “Sleep with her if you have to ... or if you want to. Whatever it takes.”
Alec knew what that cost Max, and he wanted to put her fears at ease. However, he also knew that he had to be prepared to do literally anything if he wanted to be effective as a double agent. He simply nodded, then turned around and headed out of the alley, not looking back ... and not saying what he really wanted to say.
*****
“You’re healthy,” Marina declared, eyeing her new X5 acquisition coolly as Alec sat on the Gillette med lab’s examining table, naked except for the amulet around his neck and the leather bracelets he always wore on his right wrist. She glanced down at the chart the doctor had just handed her. “No sign of genetic breakdown or drift in your DNA coding. No sign of progeria or metabolic problems other than the serotonin deficiency which we can supplement.” She regarded him a long moment then. “On your feet, soldier.”
Alec jumped down from the table and stood at attention, the linoleum cold on his bare feet, his skin goose-bumping slightly in the frigid air of the Wyoming lab as he carefully looked straight ahead at the wall, telling himself he wasn’t embarrassed. After all, usually he liked it when a pretty woman admired his body.
However, Marina wasn’t just any pretty woman. She was his commanding officer. She also, quite literally, held his life in her hands -- at least for now. He could tell she was judging him ... staring too long ... and he felt a flush begin to creep up his neck. “See anything you like?” he asked, his voice low and seductive, figuring now was as good a time as any to find out if this was what she really wanted from him.
“As a matter of fact, yes,” she replied levelly. “But watch your tongue, soldier. Or have you forgotten that Manticore protocol is to speak only when spoken to?”
“Yes, sir,” Alec said quietly ... obediently ...
“You’re fertile,” she said, again consulting the chart.
Alec glanced at her and didn’t really like the way her eyes were lighting up at that little fact.
“Ever sired any children?” she asked. “Either within Manticore or on an Ordinary?”
“Not to my knowledge, sir.”
“Well, we’ll certainly correct that in the near future,” Marina said. “Very few of our X5s are capable of siring offspring. You’ll be a great asset to New Manticore in that capacity.”
“I thought I was going to be put on active duty,” Alec ventured.
“Oh, you will be,” Marina replied. “That doesn’t mean you won’t be making regular donations to our sperm bank.” She looked at him a moment, her thin lips twitching in a little smile. “I hope you didn’t think you’d actually be assigned a breeding partner or some such nonsense,” she said. “Renfro’s ways were a failure and I’m not one to repeat mistakes.” She consulted his file again, the smile still in place. “Although, I see here where you were once assigned to breed with X5-452.” Her gaze flickered over his genitals. “What happened, 494? Weren’t you man enough for Her Highness?”
“Max wasn’t into it,” Alec said truthfully. “She was in love with another guy, and I didn’t force the issue.”
“You mean you disobeyed orders?”
“I didn’t rape her, if that’s what you mean,” Alec said tightly.
“You disobeyed orders,” Marina clarified, her smile turning into a frown. “Your file indicates you have a weakness that way ... for women. It also says you’re capable of falling in love ... that whole Berrisford incident ... a bad flaw for an assassin.” She narrowed her eyes, still studying him. “I’m wondering if another stint in psy-ops isn’t called for. Perhaps we need to strip some of that ‘humanity’ out of your mind.”
Alec shivered slightly, and this time it wasn’t with cold. He knew he had to say the right thing here or he could be in a hell of a lot of trouble before his real mission even began. “That was a long time ago, sir. I’ve learned a lot since then ... where I belong and what I was created to do.”
“And that would be?”
“I was created to kill,” Alec said blithely. “And I now know that a weapon can never be human. I belong with my own kind, doing what I was bred and trained to do.”
“And 452?” Marina said. “I saw how the two of you were looking at one another.”
Alec shrugged slightly. “She’s a good fuck.”
“And you’re not ‘in love’ with her?”
“No, sir. Not at all. Although, she probably thinks I am.”
The cold smile was back on Marina’s face. “You were designed to be a stealth unit,” she reiterated the information in the file in her hand. “Light combat ... infiltration ... empath enough to ingratiate yourself with almost any one in almost any situation ... a consummate liar, ladies’ man, and as unpredictable as hell. Does that about sum it up, 494?”
“I suppose so, sir.” Alec remained carefully still, studying the white cement wall behind 592’s head.
“So, why should I believe anything you’re telling me now?”
“Maybe you shouldn’t ... sir.”
Marina seemed to think this over for a moment. Then she called his bluff. “Guards,” she said to the four X5s who’d accompanied her to the lab and were waiting lined up against the wall behind her. “Take this worthless piece of lying shit to a holding cell.”
Alec’s eyes widened. Later, he’d have plenty of time to wonder what had happened ... where he’d tripped up ... but right now his instinct was to defend himself, even though he knew it would just make things worse.
However, it was four against one ... and there were TASERs. He’d forgotten how much that fucking electricity hurt ...
*****
When he woke up, the first thought in Alec’s mind was how he felt like he ought to be dead -- his body hurt that much, especially his pounding head. The second coherent thing he managed to think was that, pain aside, he couldn’t move his arms and legs. Opening his eyes carefully, squinting in the harsh overhead light, the X5 quickly saw that the reason for his immobility: nylon tethers tightly locked around his wrists, ankles, and waist. That was the bad news. The good was that someone, somewhere along the way, had at least taken pity on his coldness, if not his modesty, and provided a set of scrubs to cover his nakedness. Looking around, craning his neck, he saw that the room he was in had stark white walls, floor, and ceiling, no furnishings whatsoever.
494 recognized an interrogation chamber when he saw one. However, what he wasn’t sure of was just what Marina thought she was going to get out of him. It wasn’t like he was privy to any of Max’s big secrets any more.
Alec was still pondering his current unfortunate situation when the white door of the room opened and an elderly man wearing thick-lensed spectacles and a white lab coat entered. He was carrying the ubiquitous file folder of course, and the X5 had a feeling he knew what was coming.
“Lemme guess,” Alec said, going on the offensive even though his head was pounding and he felt like he was going to be sick. “Her Worshipfulness doesn’t think my dick’s big enough to satisfy her needs.”
The elderly man’s expression didn’t change one bit, not so much as a flicker of emotion in those cold blue eyes at the X5’s crude remark.
A chill ran down Alec’s spine. He wasn’t going to be able to talk himself out of this one.
“You’ve been unconscious for three days,” the man said quietly.
“Which explains why I’m so thirsty,” Alec replied, not mentioning hunger because he really did feel like he was about to puke.
“Food and water aren’t your primary concern,” the scientist said. “You’ve been almost 90 hours without a serotonin supplement. That’s why your head hurts so much. Soon, you’ll have a seizure. Then you’ll have another and another and another. The pain, I’m told, can get quite bad. Eventually you’ll lapse into a coma and die.”
Alec shrugged. “Tell me something new,” he said levelly. “Been there, done that. I gather Marina wants me dead then? Although why she doesn’t just get it over with beats me. They can preserve my body parts just as easily if I die from a bullet in my brain as they can if I die from a metabolic disorder.”
“My commanding officer doesn’t really want you dead, 494. She wants you under control.”
“So, this is the first stage in another round of reindoctrination?” Alec guessed, straining slightly against the shackles on his wrists and finding them unforgiving. “Weaken me with my own personal flaw before starting the brainwashing?”
The man walked around the examining table and the X5 turned his head to the right to keep him in his line of sight. The air in the room was quite cold. In fact, Alec could see his breath steaming slightly as he exhaled. But the clothes helped. He wasn’t shivering. In fact, he thought he might be a bit feverish, which went along with the serotonin drop in his bloodstream.
“Marina knows X5-452 sent you here as a spy,” he said. “She expected as much. However, you’re a valuable Unit. One she would very much like to add to her stable of soldiers. However, as long as you’re in love with 452 she knows you won’t be reliable ... that you’ll be serving Max Guevera, not New Manticore.”
“And killing me will change that how?” Alec asked dryly.
“We’re not going to let you die,” the man said in a tone that made Alec afraid in a whole new way -- sounding far too much as if he enjoyed what he was about to say. “We’re going to let you suffer, for a very long time if we have to. We’re going to let you convulse and experience agonizing muscle cramps and a headache that will make you want to stab your eyes out.”
“Until?” Alec said quietly.
“Until you beg for mercy and offer to do absolutely anything we want in return for a dose of serotonin. You’re as hooked as a heroin junkie, 494, and just as weak.”
“Marina knows regular reindoctrination won’t work on me, doesn’t she?” Alec said. “This is her back-up plan. Well, it won’t work either. Like I said, you might as well shoot me now and save all of us a lot of trouble.” Alec wasn’t really angling for suicide, but he did want someone to take the restraints off of him. It would at least give him a chance ... however slight. Unless, of course, they simply shot him in the head where he lay, or put him down with a lethal injection.
The old man looked down at some papers in the folder he was holding, eyebrows slightly raising. “Considering Manticore psy-ops methods have already failed twice on you already, I can’t blame Marina for wanting to try other options,” he said carefully. He glanced at the time on his watch. “Another two ... maybe three hours ... and we’ll talk again.”
“Wait!” Alec called out as the scientist turned to leave. “Can I have some water?” It wouldn’t hurt to ask.
“No,” was the simply, and expected, reply. And then Alec was alone again in the room with nothing except his own fearful thoughts and his pain for company.
*****
“Max, it’s only been three days,” Joshua comforted her. “You know Alec. He does things Alec’s way ... on Alec’s time ...”
“He was supposed to check in after twenty-four hours,” Max replied quietly, glaring at the cell phone in her hand. She turned to look at Dix. “Marina wouldn’t try anything too harsh with an already established soldier, would she? One that joined her willingly?”
Dix could only shrug. But it was Mole who put her fears into words. The DAC had been listening shrewdly from the far side of TC’s control center, cigar stub between his lips and a scowl on his lizard-face. “Marina’s not stupid,” he said. “I knew her back in the old days. She’s a cold hearted bastard of a bitch too. She’s got to wonder why you’d give up an X5 warrior so easily, especially one she knows was probably at least a fuck, if not more to you.”
“Marina doesn’t know anything about Alec except what’s in his Manticore file,” Max said stiffly, twirling a strand of her long dark hair nervously between her fingers as she began to pace. “And that’s all old news ... outdated.”
“She knows you thought highly enough of him to bring him back here,” Mole said, raising his chin and pointing the smoldering cigar right at her. “I wouldn’t put it past 592 to want her new stud reprogrammed before adding him to her stable.”
“I should never have sent him there,” Max said under her breath. “I wanted him back so badly and now ...” Her words trailed off.
“Hindsight,” Mole commented flatly. “Too late, Max. She’s got our boy and Marina’s not gonna let him just stroll back home.”
“I never meant this to turn into a rescue mission,” Max said bitterly. “I didn’t retaliate for Gem, and I didn’t go after any of the other X5s and X6s Marina’s group has conscripted.” She turned pleading eyes to Joshua. “How can I justify going after Alec just because I--”
“Because you love him,” Joshua replied quietly, his large brow crinkling with concern -- the words a statement, not a question.
Max knew she could argue with herself all she wanted ... the pros and cons of risking her people in what might very well be a failure scenario mission.
“Max,” Mole said. “Give him another few days. “Alec might just not be able to call yet. You know how he can turn on the charm, and Marina is female.”
“But what if he’s in trouble?” she said, not just to Mole, but to all of her people in the control room. However, she also knew there might be one option left.
“Who are you calling?” Dix asked as Max took out her cell phone again and dialed a number.
“’Deck,” she said as she held the phone to her ear. “If anyone knows about Alec and can tell us, it’s the Colonel.”
*****
They weren’t going to let him die ... not easily. They wanted to prolong things, hence the I.V. of fluids an orderly had just wheeled into the interrogation room.
Alec watched warily as the young soldier -- an X6 from the looks of him -- set up the stand and fussed with the tubes to the right side of the table he was strapped to. It was getting difficult to focus through the pain throbbing in his head, and his limbs were starting to tremble, but the X5 thought he still had strength enough to at least try. Now, all he needed was an opportunity.
Which he got. Somewhere the gods were listening ...
The X6 couldn’t get the I.V. line started, probably because he was inexperienced because the vein was there. He fumbled ... stabbed Alec half a dozen times with the needle, then scowled furiously. “I’m going to untether your wrist,” he said, trying to sound authoritative. “Don’t try anything.”
Or what? Alec was tempted to say to the green kid. But he kept his mouth shut, feigning weakness, letting his eyelids flutter as if he were only half conscious.
The boy took out a key and unlocked the strap on his patient’s right wrist as Alec watched through half-open lids. He waited until the X6 bent closer, examining the veins ...
X6s really should know better, Alec thought as his hand blurred and his fingers sank into the younger transgenic’s soft throat. The boy thrashed, and 494 felt the stab of the needle as it sank into his shoulder, the kid using the only weapon he had. He pressed harder, not really wanting to crush the X6’s trachea, but willing to if that was what it took to save his own life. However, his old tricks served Alec in good stead. His thumb and forefingers found the carotid and jugular, squeezing off blood supply to his opponent’s brain. It was only a matter of seconds before the X6 quit fighting and began to sag. Softly, Alec counted to himself, “one, two, three, four, five ...” He knew if he reached 10 the X6 would be dead. He stopped at eight, having recognized the boy as a former TC refugee named “Doug,” letting the body slump to the floor as he held onto the tubing of the I.V. line. Then his eyes went to the video camera set high in the corner of the room. He’d only have seconds now himself ...
Using the needle as a pick, Alec quickly sprang the lock on his left wrist, then used what strength he had left to tear loose the straps holding his ankles shackled. Hopping off the table, staggering a moment as his head reeled, he looked around, saw nothing to really use as a weapon, then headed for the partially open door. Careless of Doug to not have locked it behind himself ...
He made it into the hallway. Looking up and down the corridor, Alec saw it was empty, although in the distance he heard an alarm begin to clamor. It wouldn’t be long now. However, he recognized this part of the Gillette base. He’d been here before when in psy-ops. He was about four floors underground. He could see elevators and stairwells to his left about a hundred yards away. Clenching his jaw against the pounding throb in his head, he turned and ran, bare feet slapping on the cold linoleum floor. But as he came to the bank of elevators, one of the doors slid open revealing a lividly angry Marina with a wicked looking TASER in her hand.
Alec’s feet skidded on the slick tiles as he fell, braking, and he frantically looked back the way he’d come only to see his old friend, the elderly scientist slowly walking toward him holding a hypodermic. Behind him were at least half a dozen X5s and a DAC that looked too much like Mole.
His choice was obvious. Getting his feet back under himself, Alec made a spectacular catlike leap directly toward X5-592.
She hadn’t been expecting an attack, not from a prisoner who was supposedly in such a weakened condition -- and she’d also forgotten just who, or rather what, X5-494 really was. The TASER prongs whined as they flew through the air, one of them grazing Alec’s arm and emitting enough electricity to elicit a yelp of pain. However, the tine fell away, the brunt of the near-lethal voltage expending itself uselessly into the floor before it could cripple.
And then 494’s big hands were around Marina’s neck. One twist ... one sharp crack ... and it was over, the New Manticore CO’s body falling lifelessly to the elevator floor, her spine broken by what was, after all, an expert X5 assassin.
Alec jerked his head up just in time to see the squadron of X5s running toward the elevator. Slapping his palm against the “close” button, the doors shut, too slowly for his liking but fast enough to keep the guards at bay. Then he hit the one for ground level. Of course they’d head him off ... but he had to try.
Checking Marina’s body as the elevator rose, he found no weapons, and cursed silently under his breath, knowing he wasn’t going to get far on his looks alone ... not after killing his commanding officer. It would be shoot on sight.
The elevator stopped, and Alec backed up against the wall of the car, the steel hand bar pressing coldly into his back, bracing himself and wishing he wasn’t shaking so badly, knowing he was trapped.
The doors opened on -- another empty hallway. Poking his head cautiously outside, Alec looked up and down the long corridors. In front of him, about a hundred yards away, he could see daylight through the entrance doors. But he knew that meant nothing. Even if he got outside there would be acres of open grass and a 15-foot high concertina wire-topped fence he doubted he had the strength to jump. An alarm was blaring from overhead speakers, making it impossible for him to hear if any soldiers were approaching. Like an animal in a safe burrow, he cowered back for a moment, trying to get up the courage to emerge from the elevator ... to make one last run for it.
Unfortunately, Alec hesitated too long. Three X5s came barreling around a corner to his right, machine guns raised and pointed directly at him. Licking dry lips, Alec forced himself to step away from the back wall of the elevator, chin up, uncomfortably aware that Marina’s dead body was lying practically on top of his bare feet. If he had to die, at least it would be with the dignity of not showing fear. However, he couldn’t quite stop the deep swallow he took as he saw those gun barrels aiming at his aching head. But of course, there might still be one option.
“Hey, guys,” Alec said, raising his hands slowly. “I surrender. You got me. No need for violence here.” The words sounded ridiculous, even to himself, all things considered. Of course there would be no surrender ...
“Sir?” one of the soldiers said, speaking to the senior officer.
“Put him down,” grated the biggest X5 of the group.
Fingers tightened on triggers, and Alec couldn’t help it. He closed his eyes and conjured a vision of Max, bracing for the impact of bullets. But it wasn’t bullets that shot through his body. Like a bolt of lightening the grand mal seizure hit the young X5, an electrical storm overwhelming his brain’s synapses with a swiftness rivaling a TASER hit. One second Alec was thinking about the woman he loved and preparing for death, and the next -- nothing.
His twitching body landed on top of Marina’s corpse when he fell.
*****
“I don’t suppose it’s possible for you to save my ass just once without gloating,” Alec mumbled.
Max scowled, but contradicted the sour expression by reaching up to gently stroke a hand through his hair, her fingers then lingering on his beard stubbled cheek as she checked for fever. “Be quiet,” scolded. “And stay still.” Her eyes went to the I.V. drip lines feeding into both of his arms. “It’s going to take awhile to get your nervous system back to normal.”
“Am I shot?” Alec asked, ignoring her admonition to shut up.
“No,” Max said roughly. Then her voice softened. “But you had a really bad spell of seizures.” She licked her lips and glanced away at the wall. “Your heart stopped twice. If you hadn’t already been at Manticore--” She didn’t complete the sentence, but she didn’t need to. “Ordinary” doctors in “Ordinary” hospitals wouldn’t have known how to treat his serotonin deficiency, or at least they wouldn’t have figured it out in time.
Alec felt like he’d been drawn and quartered and quite possibly kicked in the chest by a mule as well, hence his first thought that he’d been shot. However, as his head began to clear as the precious amino acid fed the starved synapses of his brain, he began to remember more.
“Why am I even alive?” he asked, his voice rough with thirst. “And how the hell did you get here?” He glanced around the room that was obviously still at the Gillette base, only this time he was in the hospital section, not psy-ops, and he was in a real bed, not strapped to a torture table.
Max glanced up at the ever-present security camera hanging in one corner of the room’s ceiling, then shrugged tiredly -- obviously not caring who was listening. Her hand continued stroking his close-cropped hair lightly as she spoke, almost as if assuring herself that he was still real. “Lydecker received word you were in trouble here. We came as fast as we could. But by the time we got here everything was finished. Marina was dead, and you were lying seizing and unconscious in a cell. If we’d been half an hour later you’d have been dead too, which I think was what Marina’s soldiers intended. They didn’t really want a prisoner. They wanted a corpse. Cheaper that way ... no fuss, no muss, no trial ...”
“I’m surprised they didn’t just shoot me,” Alec said, a memory of all those machine guns pointing at him surfacing.
“So am I,” Max said simply. Then she shrugged. “I guess they knew they had to at least go through the motions of following protocol.”
Alec started to ask something else, but began coughing instead. Max brought a glass of water to his lips and he drank thirstily for a moment before finally looking up at her and saying, “Am I under arrest?”
“Looks like,” she said, her eyes darting to the video camera.
“For murder?”
“There’s camera footage, Alec,” Max said firmly. “It was self defense. You’ll be cleared.”
“I was an escaping prisoner.”
“You should never have been a prisoner in the first place. What Marina was doing to you is called slavery.” Max took a deep breath and leaned down to kiss him lightly on the forehead. “Don’t worry she breathed against his face. (Alec sensed that if it hadn’t been for that camera she would have been doing more with her lips.) ‘Deck’s in charge for now and he’s trying to work something out for you.”
“Something that will get the military to turn the other cheek about the fact I broke my commanding officer’s neck?” Alec quipped, his own lips lightly brushing hers before she drew back -- a memory of their recent times together firing up his synapses far better than the serotonin drip.
“Don’t underestimate me, Pretty Boy,” Max chided him gently as she stood up, her words glib but her eyes sparkling with what Alec thought just might be affection, if not something more. “I’ve gotten your fine ass out of worse situations than this before.”
494 -- who really did feel like he’d been run over by a truck (he’d never been so sore in his life) -- managed a slightly wicked smile. “So now you finally admit my ass is fine?”
He was expecting a sarcastic comeback, but Max simply looked at him instead, her expression inscrutable. “Just ... don’t speak to anyone until I get back, all right?” she finally said as she opened the room door. Alec saw several white-coated technicians breeze by in the hallway outside as well as the muzzle of the machine gun held by the X5 guarding the door. “Oh, and Alec--”
“What?”
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry I got you into this mess.”
One more thing X5-494 never thought he’d hear X5-452 say to him ...
*****
He felt better now that he was dressed even if it was only jeans, a military-issue t-shirt layered with flannel, and a flight jacket Max had scrounged up from somewhere. The boots fit though, which Alec figured counted for something as he wriggled his toes in the leather. Tilting the office chair back, he put hands behind his head and extended his long legs, stretching still-sore muscles as he waited for Colonel Donald Lydecker to declare his fate -- because that’s what Alec knew this little meeting was really all about. He was about to find out if he was going to be allowed to continue breathing, or if the military was going to execute him for murder, trial not withstanding since the verdict would be a foregone conclusion.
Lydecker, seated behind his desk with fingers steepled and head bowed almost as if prayer, cleared his throat. Alec glanced briefly over at Max who’d declined the offer of a chair and was typically pacing the room. “Relax,” the X5 chided her softly. “It’s not you they wanna shoot this time.”
“And you think I feel any better knowing it’s you instead?” Max snapped.
Alec held up one hand, a “hey” look in his eyes that warned her to calm down.
Lydecker cleared his throat again and reached over and took a sip of the coffee that had been growing cold at his elbow, then those cool-as-death blue eyes were pinning 494 in a way that took Alec right back to his youth at Manticore. Not even realizing he was doing it, Alec straightened in the chair, meeting that gaze unflinchingly but his shoulders at attention. Old habits died hard ...
“You’re in one hell of a mess, soldier,” that gravely voice finally said, the words followed by a huge sigh. “The charge will be murder if it’s brought to trial, the verdict guilty, and the punishment a bullet in the head.”
“She was killing him!” Max exclaimed.
“Silence, 452!” the Colonel roared. “If you want me to help 494 you’ll hold your tongue.”
“Help me how?” Alec ventured. “Aren’t I already under arrest?”
“Technically, yes,” Lydecker said, making a sour face. “However, I’ve been put in charge of New Manticore -- at least temporarily -- and as your commanding officer I do have some leeway in how I deal with internal disciplinary matters.”
“Meaning you could let me go if you want to?” Alec said levelly, no longer avoiding those cool eyes as the muscles of his own jaw twitched.
“My real decision isn’t whether to let you live or die,” the Colonel continued, “but whether you’re of more use to Manticore breathing or cut up for your body parts.”
“I’ve heard that threat before,” Alec sneered. “It’s gettin’ old.” He held out his hands. “Just cuff me and get it over with.”
“Alec!” Max said sharply. “Shut. Up!”
For the first time a flicker of emotion other than pure coldness touched the Colonel’s chiseled features as his lips twitched in the ghost of a smile. “Looks, brains, and attitude,” he said softly, shaking his head. “The blessing and the curse of my X5s.”
Alec’s eyebrows rose, not certain if that was a compliment or if he was being mocked.
“I wouldn’t put much stock in the ‘brains’,” Max said quietly.
Alec had had enough. He turned to her. “Max, I’m sittin’ right here.”
“And about to be hauled off and killed!”
“Maybe not,” Lydecker interjected before a retort came out of Alec’s mouth. The X5’s head swiveled toward the colonel.
“As I said, I have some leeway here, and at the moment ...” His eyes went to Max. “I’m inclined to be lenient.”
“Lenient in as you’ll kill me quick rather than prolong the process,” Alec snarked.
“Lenient in that I can free you if I want to,” Lydecker said quietly, for once not taking exception with his X5’s “attitude.”
“Why would you do that?” Alec pressed. Never one to believe in something that seemed to good to be true, he was highly suspicious of this new development, as was Max who was watching the Colonel through narrowed eyes.
“452,” Lydecker said without looking at her. “You’re welcome to stay here if you want to. The other residents of Terminal City will be arriving tomorrow. They were loaded onto buses yesterday.”
“What?” Max exclaimed.
“Martial law has been declared with regards to transgenics,” the Colonel continued. Off of Alec’s wide eyes he added, “What? You didn’t think your little stunt of killing your CO wouldn’t be noticed
