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Artwork courtesy of Valjean & |
By Valjean
ARCHIVE: No
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Artwork courtesy of Valjean & |
*****
“Don’t look so hopeful,” Sam said, twiddling his thumbs as he sat cross-legged on the bunk. “He hasn’t missed a call yet.”
Lydecker glanced at his watch and made a slight face, having to agree. Then he pursed his lips critically. “Love,” he spat. “It always has been 494’s greatest weakness.”
“Or strength,” Sam said cheerfully. “If it wasn’t for Dean’s love ... his devotion to me and our family ... I’d be dead right now. He’s saved my ass more than once. And a lot of other people too along the way.”
“Family?” the Colonel scoffed. “Which family? You and your father, or his Freak one?”
“Both,” Sam said levelly. “As far as I’m concerned, Max is my sister and Brac’s my nephew.”
“Your brother’s life is going to end badly someday,” Lydecker said. “You know that, don’t you? There are too many people in the world who want him dead.”
“And not just ‘people,’” Sam had to add. “Believe it or not, Dean and I really do have a lot more to worry about than you and your frickin’ New Manticore. We’ve got a mission in life, Lydecker -- a lot higher one than anything the government could mandate.”
“You mean ghost hunting?” the Colonel snorted.
Sam shrugged. “Let’s just say that for all your genetic manipulation abilities and so-called ‘wetware’ creations you and your scientists have no idea what real power is lurking out there in the universe.”
Lydecker looked at his watch again, just as his cell phone rang. He listened to the receiver a moment. “So, everything’s on schedule?” he said. “Good work, 494. I’ll be waiting for your next report.” He glanced at Sam as he snapped the cell phone shut. “Lucky for you, your brother is for once doing as he’s told. He’s found out the target’s location and is on his way to proceed with the elimination.”
“Dean will never kill an innocent person,” Sam said quietly, for the first time truly beginning to worry but not wanting the Colonel to know.
“Dean might not,” Lydecker said easily. “But X5-494 will pull the trigger. After all, long before he was your ghost hunting partner he was one of my kids.”
*****
“You were right,” Luke said.
“Right about what?’ Dean asked absently, his main concentration on the warehouse across the street from where he, Max, and a dozen other Terminal City warriors were crouched, waiting for the signal to attack.
“Your Impala. It was bugged.”
Dean looked sharply at the little grey mutant. Grinning -- glad to be able to help his old pal -- Luke reached into his pocket and fished out a small handful of components.
Dean’s brow drew down in a scowl.
“In fact,” Luke added triumphantly, “your car had not one, but two of the little buggers on it.”
“Two?” Dean grunted, not liking the implication of that as he jiggled the bits of electronics in his hand. His eyes met Luke’s. “But you’re sure it’s clean now?”
“As a whistle.”
Dean nodded his appreciation then dropped the pieces to the concrete where -- just for good measure -- he ground them into even tinier pieces under his boot.
“You ready?” Max asked, scooting up beside him but still keeping low behind the barrier that was concealing them from the eyes of the guards across the street.
“More’n ready,” Dean said.
“Remember,” Max commanded her men as they gathered closer -- an odd assortment of X6, X4, and transhumans, “our primary objective is to get Sam out unharmed. Our secondary objective is to cause as little collateral damage as possible. In other words, shoulders and kneecaps. We don’t need to give the military any more reason than they already have to think of us as the enemy.”
“In other words, don’t kill anyone’s ass,” Dean clarified. “Unless you absolutely have to. We don’t wanna burn our bridges.”
“And if baby brother’s dead?” Mole said, chomping fiercely on his cold cigar stub -- as always not mincing words.
“Then I’ll take care of the killin’,” Dean replied quietly, his eyes narrowing dangerously as they locked with Max’s.
For once, she didn’t argue.
*****
The sound of gunfire from the other end of the compound was loud and urgent.
“Sounds like you’ve got company,” Sam said mildly, even as Lydecker looked to his sergeant in alarm.
“Watch him,” the Colonel barked, pointing a finger at the prisoner. “If he so much as gets up off that bunk -- shoot him in the head.”
The Manticore soldier nodded in understanding and saluted. Well used to dealing with X5s and worse, the young man would follow his leader’s orders to the letter if necessary -- of that Sam had no doubt.
“What if I have to go to the bathroom?” Sam complained as the Colonel slammed shut the cell block door, hurrying on his way toward what sounded like an all-out assault on his stronghold.
*****
“You know,” Dean shouted at Max as he ducked back behind a cement hallway corner just in time to avoid a hail of bullets. “It’s a hell of a lot easier bein’ one of the bad guys. I’m beginnin’ to rethink this whole ‘no killin’’ shit.”
“They’d hunt us down like animals,” Max said tersely as she took cover behind his broad shoulders. “At least if we don’t leave a bunch of dead soldiers behind the military might not throw everything they have at tracking us down when we run and scatter.”
Dean’s reply was to pop back around the corner where he lay down a barrage of cover fire with two automatic pistols so Mole and his “men” could make another advance down the long corridor. X5-452 might still have a phobia with regards to using guns herself, but she had no compunction whatsoever about helping 494 use his. As the empty clips dropped to the floor, Max already had two more in her hand. Snapping them expertly into place in her partner’s weapons, she then once again took up a stance where she could watch his back. Just like old times ...
Lydecker was fast running out of men. His headquarters weren’t designed to withstand an all-out assault, especially one led by supersoldiers. After all, he was supposed to be protecting and managing the transgenics in Terminal City, not barricading himself against them. Fewer than a dozen Marines manned the warehouse -- none of them X5s except the Colonel’s two personal guards. The humans he commanded had always maintained a healthy fear of their charges, and the site of all those mutant faces did as much to make them run scared as did the heavy weaponry the Freaks were carrying. Terminal City had, indeed -- thanks to Max’s early planning and 494’s contacts -- been highly armed for years.
“’Deck will have Sam in a holding cell,” Dean panted just before sprinting to join Mole and his crew where they’d taken yet another hallway. Return fire was dying down, and so far they hadn’t come across any bodies -- just a couple of out-of-ammo young soldiers with leg wounds who looked up at them fearfully as their attackers dashed past.
“Logan’s blueprints show they’d probably be using the old food locker section in the center of the warehouse to house prisoners,” Max replied.
“Logan’s?” Dean couldn’t help saying.
Max shot him a reprimanding look. “You can thank him later,” she said dryly. “And he does feel a bit responsible for your trouble. After all, he’s the one who’s got the data base that’s put him in Lydecker’s sites.”
“I’m still not so sure about that,” Dean grunted as he pushed off from the wall and let loose with another round of bullets. Slowly but surely they were gaining headway, taking hallway after hallway, room after room, making their way on all sides to the heart of New Manticore’s headquarters where presumably Lydecker was holding Sam. Suddenly a Marine -- a more seasoned soldier than most of those they’d encountered -- leaped out of an alcove, knife raised. Caught by surprise, the blade grazed 494’s shoulder before he could jump out of the way. Spitting a curse at the pain -- and his own carelessness -- Dean was about to put out the guy’s lights with a vicious punch when Max’s spinning crescent kick did the job for him.
“No killing,” she admonished him, obviously knowing by the fierce look in his eyes that 494’s blow could all too easily have been deadly.
Dean scowled as he looked down at the unconscious guard, then touched his bleeding left shoulder and winced.
“Quit being a big baby,” Max chided. “It’s just a scratch.” She nodded down the hallway where the gunfire had ceased. “Besides, we’ve got business to finish. Sounds like Mole’s gotten there.”
His wound forgotten, Dean followed her gaze to the door at the end of the hallway where he knew Lydecker was most likely holed up with a hopefully still alive Sam. (After all, a dead hostage wouldn’t do the Colonel much good, he tried to reassure himself.) However, now was also where things would get tricky.
*****
Sam knew a couple of martial arts techniques that might have worked, but getting free from a guy holding a knife to his throat was never easy. Room for mistakes were literally none. (Translation: once one’s jugular vein was sliced it was all over except the dying.) And so he waited, letting Lydecker have the upper hand for now, doing nothing to antagonize the agitated Colonel.
“You know,” Sam finally said as the silence outside the door grew unbearable. “You could just let me go and we’ll all head home. No hard feelings.”
Out of bullets for his gun, Lydecker’s only reply was to press the blade more tightly against the taut skin of his prisoner’s neck.
“You say you care about my brother,” Sam tried again. “And in his own way Dean respects you. Let me go and he won’t hurt you. Kill me, and you’re dead too.”
“Ask me if I care,” Lydecker grated. “Everything is ruined now. With this act of rebellion the government will order New Manticore totally shut down -- like it almost did after the assassination. My kids will never be trusted now, thanks to your rogue brother.” The last word was spat like an epithet.
“Dean didn’t do this,” Sam said quietly. “You did. You took me hostage and pissed him off. Didn’t you know better than to back him into a corner?”
“Shut up.”
The door knob was turning. “We’re coming in,” a familiar female voice called. “’Deck. It’s me, Max. We don’t want to hurt anyone. We just want Sam.”
The panel opened, revealing only two people -- Max and Dean. The others, presumably, were mopping up throughout the building and securing their position. The relief in Dean’s eyes when he saw his baby brother still alive was almost palpable -- and incredibly heartwarming. In that brief instant, Sam realized just how much his brother truly did love him. But they weren’t home free yet. There was still a knife at his throat.
“Let him go, ‘Deck,” Dean said calmly, his voice deep and authoritative. “Then you can go too. No one has to die here today.”
“You destroy my world and you really expect me to not make you pay?” Lydecker said.
“We didn’t destroy it,” Max said. “You did that all by yourself when you tried to force us to do things your way instead of just asking nicely. You used to say we were a team ...”
“Cale can’t be allowed to sell that data base,” Lydecker replied. “And I’m not talking about the government forbidding it. Those are my kids in that data. No foreign nation is gonna have ‘em ... you ...”
“I’m not peachy keen on that either,” Dean agreed. “But we’ll worry about the data base and Logan later.”
Max shot him a look.
“Killin’ Sam and forcin’ me to kill you isn’t gonna solve anything. Let him go, ‘Deck. Let us all go.”
“No,” the Colonel said simply, the tendons in his arm tensing as he prepared to slit Sam’s throat. Which is when the younger Winchester brother did what he’d planned to do all along. Grabbing hold of Lydecker’s forearm with both of his hands, he ducked low to one side, and heaved the Colonel over his back, throwing him across the room -- a simple martial arts maneuver taught to him by his father and brother that worked beautifully.
Hitting the wall hard, Lydecker didn’t even have time to scramble to his feet before Dean’s hand was around his throat, drawing him upright and pinning him hard against the wall. “Listen, and listen good, ‘Deck,” the X5 said, his voice as hard as the look in his eyes. “Max made me swear to not kill you if Sam was okay. But if you ever come at me and mine again I’ll--”
“What?” Lydecker gurgled, the word coming out as a laugh. “Kill me? Torture me? Hurt my loved ones? What loved ones? Go ahead, 494. Do your worst because there’s absolutely nothing in this world you can threaten me with.”
Dean’s eyes darkened, and a wicked little smile tugged at the corners of his lips. “Oh, what I do to you won’t be in this world.” And with that enigmatic threat, he let the Colonel go. “Get this piece of shit out of here,” he ordered Mole who’d poked his head in the door to check and see that everyone was all right.
“Any blood in here?” the lizard man asked.
Dean looked down at his blood soaked shoulder. “Just mine,” the X5 said with a sigh. “As usual.”
“Hmpff,” Mole snorted. “That’s ‘cause you’re always careless.”
Sam moved to his brother’s side. “You okay?” he asked.
“Bleedin’ like a stuck pig but other than that peachy keen. You?”
Sam gingerly felt his neck, his fingers coming away smeared with a little bit of blood of his own. “Your timing could have been better,” he remarked. “But yeah, thanks for the rescue.”
“Your welcome,” Max replied. “Now, we all need to get our asses out of here before reinforcements arrive.”
“What about him?” Sam asked, eyeing Lydecker who was watching the trio warily.
Dean looked at Max who shrugged. “What about him?” she repeated offhandedly. “He’s nothin’ to us now. Mole will take care of it. Let’s blaze.”
Which is what they did, the Impala that Mole and Dix had driven speeding away from the site as sirens rose in the distance.
*****
Dean studied the map, his freshly bandaged shoulder aching a bit but not really bothering him too much. Luke’s “Florence Nightingale” technique and motherhenning hadn’t changed much since their early Terminal City days -- the little mutant had done a good job of patching up his favorite X5.
“Keep it,” Max said, referring to the map. “Those back roads on the border are a bitch to remember, and I want you to know where Brac and I are ... to always be able to find us.”
He handed it back to her. “I got it,” he said, pointing to his temple. “Just don’t let Lydecker know your location. Mole let him go and he’s disappeared for now, but knowin’ that bastard he’s liable to pop out of the woodwork again at the most inconvenient time.”
One dark eyebrow rose at the implication.
However, Dean had to ask something. “Logan ... does he know where you are?”
“Yes,” Max said without flinching. “Alec,” she stepped closer, touched the amulet hanging around his neck, glanced at Sam who was standing nearby trying to not overhear, and lowered her voice. “I told you. Logan’s a big part of my life. I’m not trying to sneak around on you. I’m gonna be with him again.” Her eyes met his. “But I’m gonna be with you again, too.”
Bitch!, Dean wanted to yell. She was doing just what he’d sworn he’d never let a woman do. Talk about pussywhipped ... Maybe he and Logan had more in common than he’d ever realized.
The thought was nauseating.
“Dean,” Sam said with quiet urgency, breaking the momentary awkward silence as well as Dean’s rather rabid train of thought. “We need to go. The whole town’s up in arms about the racket you guys made taking down Lydecker’s complex. Newscasters are saying that there’s gonna be a manhunt ... or rather mutanthunt ... to eradicate all remaining Manticore survivors not currently under military control. No more amnesty.”
“Will Mole and the others be safe?” Dean asked.
“Like I said,” Max replied, “we’ve had plans in place for a long time now. Everyone in TC knows where to go and how to stay in touch with one another. On the surface it’ll seem we’ve just disappeared, but in reality we’ve just become the transgenic underground.”
He looked down to where her fingers were still curled around the amulet and he started to take it off over his head. “You’ll need the protection,” he said. “From whatever it is that doesn’t like the Winchester men bein’ in love.”
A tiny smile as her hand stayed his. “So, you do still love me? Even though I’m not leaving Logan?”
Dean looked away and sighed heavily. “Do I have a choice?”
“I don’t need your necklace.”
“But I gave the pentagram to O.C. for Brac. You need somethin’ to ward off the evil. You know. You saw it. It could come after you ‘cause of me and how I feel.”
“And I believe you,” Max replied. She touched the insect icon he was wearing one more time. “But you need the protection more than me. When I get to the cabin I’ll put the pentagram back on.”
“Promise?”
“Promise.”
Their goodbye kiss was quite chaste, considering their passion of just the night before. However, there was an audience this time, as well as pangs of regret. Dean was careful not to look back in the mirror as he drove away. That would be bad luck ...
Later -- in the car when they had a few miles under the tires -- Sam tried to lighten the mood. “Max really is a beautiful woman,” he said.
Dean scowled. “Don’t even think about it.”
“Think about what?” Sam asked innocently.
“She’s practically your sister ... family. Kate was somethin’ else. Neutral territory ...”
“I never said anything about Kate,” Sam replied sweetly.
Dean’s lip quirked in a wry smile. “’Sides,” he drawled, “Max would eat you alive, and I don’t mean that in the enjoyable sense.”
“Okay,” Sam said with a smile of his own as the Impala sped down the highway back toward their awaiting ghost dog. “Sister it is.”
*****
In a house in faraway Appleton, Washington, Eyes Only sat in front of his computer banks talking on the cell phone. “Max, you’re sure you’re all right?”
I’m fine. We’re all fine. You know where to reach me.
“And Alec?”
What about him?
“He’s not with you?”
No. Alec’s got his own life to lead right now, and there’s no place in it for me.
“Or Brac?”
A long moment of silence. Or Brac. It’s too dangerous.
“Where is he ... Alec?”
I told you. Alec’s got his own business to take care of. He and Sam are on the road. Why? You wanna challenge him to a dual or something?
Logan laughed lightly at the very thought of a one-on-one fight with the handsome young supersoldier. “Nothing so dramatic,” he said into the receiver. “I just like to know where all the pieces are on the board.”
Well that piece has his ass halfway to Nebraska right now. Logan ... are you still going to sell the data base?
“Of course not,” Logan replied, his voice at its most reassuring as he studied the disc in his hand. “You’ve convinced me. It’s obvious now that would only hurt you and your people, and I’d never want to do that -- not even for all the money it could bring to the cause.”
Thank you.
You’re welcome. And I’ll see you soon.
I’m counting on it. Love you.
Love you, too, Max.
Logan then snapped the cell phone shut and -- eyes glowing with a strange yellow light that almost looked like flames -- turned to his computer screen where he typed an e-mail: Manticore data base obtained and ready for exchange. Money can be wired at your convenience to the account specified.
THE END
