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~~! Max and Alec's Apartment - TC - Two Weeks Later !~~
Alec stepped out of the shower, drying off with one of his blue towels before tossing it over the side of the shower and moving, completely naked, into the bedroom where Max was waiting.
"Feeling better?" She asked from where she lay on the bed in a pair of shorts and one of his T-shirts.
Alec nodded, grabbing a pair of boxers from his top dresser drawer. He slipped into them and lay down beside Max. "Yeah. I'm just glad to be home and not in the Med Center."
"I must say I think it's nice to have you home too." Max replied, kissing him gently before settling herself against his side and turning her attention back to the TV.
"It's my first night back and all you're interested in is the Real World, Season 37?" He whined, tickling her side with one hand and dipping his head to kiss her neck.
"Baby, you're on restricted activity. All we can do is watch the Real World." Max turned to look up at him, a pout forming on her lips.
"Damn truck," Alec muttered. "Just had to be coming down the highway at the exact same moment that I was standing in the road. What are the odds of that?"
"Apparently quite high." Max replied, flipping the TV off and sitting up. "Did you take your meds?"
Alec rolled his eyes. "I'm not five years old. I can remember to..." He trailed off for a moment before ducking his head and looking sheepish. "No."
"Alec!" Max chided, hopping out of bed and leaving the room. She returned a minute later carrying a glass of water and his medications.
"Thanks," he smiled at her, downing the pills and half the glass of water.
"Are you okay?" She asked, seeing him grimace as he shifted on the bed, apparently trying to get comfortable.
"Stiff and sore." He shrugged. "Drawbacks of rescuing your pretty little ass."
"I told you..."
"I know, I know. You could have rescued yourself. But you didn't. I helped. So let's just drop it for now, okay? I'm tired." He yawned and snuggled into his pillow to illustrate how much he wanted to go to sleep.
Max gave one of her long dramatic sighs before tentatively curling up against his side. The truck that had hit Alec had done quite a lot of damage to the young transgenic. Both his legs as well as several ribs had been broken and the cuts and abrasions had initially been all too plentiful. However, two weeks after the accident, he was almost fully healed. His only residual trouble was a recurring weakness in his legs. Sandi had kept him in the Medical Center for the two weeks, wanting to make sure that everything would be okay before releasing him.
"I'm okay, Max. You won't hurt me." He said softly, wrapping his arms around her and pulling her closer.
"Okay," she replied, putting her arms around him hesitantly.
"So," Alec broke the silence a few minutes later, "are we any closer to finding out who White's traitor is?"
Alec thought he heard her groan, but he couldn't he sure. "I thought you were going to sleep," she replied, deftly avoiding that topic of conversation.
Shrugging, he responded, "Too wired from the trip home I guess."
"You walked two blocks from the Med Center to here."
"And up the stairs. Don't forget about the stairs."
Max rolled her eyes and gently smacked his chest with her hand. "Nitpicker."
"Meanie."
"Ass."
"Lover."
"Mmmm," Max moaned as Alec sucked on her neck. "Alec..."
"Don't change the subject, Maxie." He said, pulling away, letting her know that his sensual teasing was really retaliation since Sandi had banned him from physical activities for a while longer. "Do you know who the traitor is?"
She sighed, rolled her eyes, and propped her head up on her hand. "No. I've been too worried about you. The others haven't found out anything either."
"What about the runes? Have you had any more appear?"
"No. They've stopped showing up. Dix is still trying to translate the last ones though." She paused before speaking again. "You never did tell me about that mission, where you talked to Sandeman."
Alec's breath left him suddenly. He was caught off-guard by her statement. "Uh, no, I didn't."
"Want to fill me in now?" She tried not to sound too hopeful. She didn't want him to catch on to how important knowing what Sandeman had told him was to her.
"Not really," he replied honestly. "I still need to think about it. There's been so much going on that I kinda forgot."
"We're running out of time on this, Alec. So, think faster, okay?" She said with a sigh.
"I always think fast."
"Except when there's a truck barreling toward you." She retorted with a roll of her eyes.
"Hey! That's not fair!" He protested weakly.
"I know. I'm sorry. Let's just get some sleep okay?"
"Sure. Night, Maxie."
"Night, Alec."
~~! TC Command Center - The Next Evening !~~
"Grab a seat," Mole said, his voice characteristically gruff so it wouldn't give away his concern. He'd seen the way that Alec's legs were shaking and the white-knuckled grip his friend had on the back of Dix's computer chair.
"Nah," Alec replied, determined not to show weakness. "I'm all right."
Mole raised a scaly eyebrow and kicked a chair across the room toward Alec. "It wasn't a suggestion."
Alec rolled his eyes and made a show of turning the chair around and sitting down on it. "Happy now?"
"As a clam," Mole chuckled and started puffing on his cigar as if nothing had happened.
"So," Alec said, scowling at Mole before turning his attention back to Dix. "The runes? What do they say?"
"The hunters will become the hunted. In the darkness of night, beware. Two for the price of one. One for the price of life." Dix read from his computer screen.
"Is that it? All those symbols for that?" Alec rolled his eyes.
"Uh, a few of them didn't translate and it repeated the hunter part quite a lot." Dix shrugged his shoulders.
"So something's going to happen to us," Alec waved his hands to encompass all of TC. "At night, and apparently, someone is going to be a sacrifice or something."
"Max?" Mole ventured hesitantly.
Alec's gaze shot to the transhuman and he shook his head emphatically. "No. The runes do not say that. They just say one."
"It could be Max, Alec." Mole said. "She's the one with the old-timey tattoos."
"It could be me or you or Sandi for all we know too."
Mole raised his hands in a gesture of surrender and shrugged his shoulders. "What about this ‘two for the price of one' stuff? Any ideas on what that could mean?"
"There's the obvious twin idea." Dix said, turning to look at the others. "Twins are essentially two people made from one egg and sperm. Sometimes anyway."
"Max and I both have twins. Or had, in my case." Alec offered, biting the skin around his thumbnail as he stared at the opposite wall.
"Any other things it could mean?" Mole asked, not making a connection on the twin level.
Dix and Alec both shrugged.
"You two are a lot of help," Mole muttered, blowing a smoke ring out of the corner of his mouth.
Alec chose to change the subject instead of commenting. "What about the traitor? Have any ideas on that?"
"You wouldn't like them, Pretty Boy," Mole replied, looking away from his friend.
"Mole," Alec's tone held a very clear warning.
Mole shrugged. "Sean hasn't been around much lately. I know you trust the guy, but he does control the guard shifts, if you know what I'm saying. And that throw-down with Sandi a couple weeks ago. You seriously think the medic would resort to violence? She keeps removing the tap on her office phone too."
"Mole..."
"Also, your girl has been making a lot of phone calls on a cell that we didn't provide her with. Therefore, we can't listen in, just like with Sandi. And who the hell knows what Sean's up to. They all sound pretty fishy to me."
"Maybe Sean's been busy with guard duty and maybe they just don't want you to listen in," Alec said, waving his own illegally obtained, un-tapped cell phone in Mole's face.
"Whatever you say," Mole grunted, obviously not caring to take the conversation any further.
"Are we done here gentlemen?" Alec asked, standing up.
Mole and Dix both nodded and Alec left them, walking slowly down the stairs and out the door. Mole waited until he was gone before moving to take his chair and whisper to Dix.
"You tapped his cell while he was in the infirmary last time, right?"
"Pfft," Dix rolled his eyes. "I did that months ago, after the sewer caved in on him. Or was it after he was stabbed? Hmmmm. His trips to Med Center are so hard to keep straight."
Mole laughed, a deep throaty sound that caused the smaller transhuman to jump. "I knew I liked you for a reason."
~~! Unknown Location !~~
A shadowed figure sat in the corner of a dilapidated room. Holding a phone to her ear, the person listened to the voice on the other end.
"We're moving on this tonight. Has everything been prepared?"
"Yes. No one suspects a thing." The shadowed person replied in hushed tones.
"Good. This has to happen after nightfall so as to arouse the least amount of attention. Is there any reason to believe that there will be interference?" White was unmistakably the person on the other end of the phone conversation.
"No. It should go off without a hitch."
"Good. That's just the kind of thing I like to hear. Fenos'tol."
"Bye."
~~! Terminal City !~~
Alec wandered down Oak Street, lost in thought. Not only had Mole and Dix given him something to think about, his conversation with Sandeman from so many years ago was tickling the back of his mind.
He remembered the discussion in bits and pieces, like confetti fluttering to the floor. His memories, having been suppressed by Manticore, were disjointed and unclear.
"Four-nine-four," Sandeman's voice had been strong with the authority that the older man had obviously felt.
Alec had ignored him then, wanting his job to be finished. He'd brought his Glock to bear, aiming for Sandeman's forehead, above the silver nosebridge of his large eyeglasses.
Something had happened then, drawing Alec's attention away from his mission. He didn't know what it was, but he was pretty sure that the mechanics didn't matter. What did matter were the words that followed.
"You must be careful, 494. Mind those close to you at all times. Remember that caring is a luxury you might not have... Don't let your guard down."
Alec had panicked for a moment then, wondering what the old man was talking about. However, he was nothing if not a calm, cool, collected soldier. He quickly composed himself, and released the safety on his gun. In moments it was over and he was on his way back to Manticore with another successful mission under his belt.
Thinking back on those words now, he wondered if Sandeman knew what was going to happen in his life, or Max's life, for that matter. He'd given the air of being omniscient, but Alec couldn't quite wrap his mind around someone knowing things about himself that he didn't even know.
The words were rolling over and over in his mind though. There was something there, something important.
"Alec?" Sandi's voice broke through his musing. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah," he nodded and shrugged off his bad mood to give her a dazzling, yet fake smile. "What's up?"
"Oh, no. I've known you far too long for that. What's going on?" She refused to let him charm her. If he kept anything else bottled up inside, he would implode.
"Dix finished translating Max's runes. Obscure and cryptic messages from within. Sounds like something straight out of one of those old pre-Pulse sci-fi shows." Alec replied with a deep sigh.
"Speaking of Max," Sandi said, more focused on the rune-bearer than the runes themselves. "I think we need to talk about her, Alec."
"What do you mean?" Alec asked innocently. Sandi hated to be the one to bring this up.
"She's been sneaking off at night a lot lately. Sean told me that his guards have seen her leave several times in the past two weeks." She spoke carefully, choosing her words before she said them.
"Impossible," Alec shook his head. "She's been with me."
Sandi nodded and then shrugged. "Sure, when you go to sleep and when you wake up. What about while you're asleep?"
Alec sighed. "I know what you're thinking and it's not like that. Max wouldn't do that."
"You're not looking at this objectively." Sandi replied, shaking her head at him.
"I've known Max for a long time now, Sandi. I've been intimate with her for a while. She wouldn't do something like this. She wouldn't turn her back on the transgenics or me."
"Hey, guys," Max said cheerfully as she stepped out of an alleyway a few feet ahead of them. "What's up?"
"We were just talking about you," Alec said, moving over to her and wrapping his arms around her. "Everyone's a conspiracy theorist lately," he muttered into her ear.
"With good reason," she replied quietly, pulling away abruptly and sweeping her leg down low to catch Alec behind the knees. He fell with a cry of surprise. Max raised her fist for the killing strike to his exposed throat.
Sandi charged at Max. However, the younger X5 was prepared and she stepped aside at the last instant, but not without giving Sandi a shove in the direction of a nearby brick wall. Sandi's momentum was too much for her to overcome. She slammed into the wall and then fell to the ground unconscious.
Alec had not stayed still long enough to watch. He knew that he was still weak, so he flipped himself to his feet and searched for a weapon to use against the enemy. His mind had stopped thinking of her as Max the minute that she had betrayed him, and now he only saw her as the enemy. She was someone that threatened his life and the lives of his friends and she had to be stopped. If he let himself think of her as Max, he wouldn't be able to do what he needed to do to protect the others.
"Don't you want to know why I'm doing this?" Max asked, trying to delay the inevitable. She didn't want to have to fight Alec, but she didn't see any other way.
"Would it make a difference?" Alec shot back, maintaining his disconnection with the situation.
"To you, maybe." Max shrugged, sliding into a defensive stance.
Alec ignored Max's words as his mind frantically tried to work out a plan of action.
"You're going to die, Alec." Max's voice was strangely calm as she laid out his fate. "The Familiar virus is going to come and kill you all. Only those of us with immunity will survive."
"We all have immunity," Alec replied as they began to circle one another. "Remember? Sandeman made us immune."
"He was a fool!" Max shouted, throwing a punch that Alec easily blocked. "He didn't know what he was doing. Even I wasn't totally immune, Alec. White helped me. He made me stronger."
"What?" Alec asked in shock, taking several steps back. Memories of when he had broken Max out of White's compound filled his head. "I don't understand. What did White do to you?"
"He gave me full immunity," she said calmly, lowering her fists and attempting to persuade him with just words. "All of you will die unless you come with me and let him help you. The Familiars are my people now, Alec. They're the ones who will live when this is all over with. Please, come with me and let him help you."
Alec narrowed his eyes while she spoke. "What happened to you?" He asked softly.
Max sighed and brought her fists to bear again. "Fine. It's going to be like that, huh?"
Alec took her by surprise when he closed the distance between them with a single leap. Instead of kicking at her with his weakened legs, he lashed out with his fists, hitting her several times before she was able to go on the defensive.
The fight was a blur of fists and grunts and the sounds of flesh striking flesh. They were both tiring. They needed to end it, and soon. Max saw her opportunity as Alec stumbled back from a blow to the head. She lashed out with her foot, putting all her transgenic strength behind the kick. Alec flew backwards into the wall behind him. His hand lifted to his chest and he gasped for air.
"Bitch," Sandi snarled from behind her. She had regained consciousness a few minutes before and had been waiting for the opportunity to jump into the fight.
Max whirled in time to duck Sandi's foot, which was aimed at her head. She seemed to have gained a second wind. Blows were exchanged and blocked and parried. Both women were now bruised and bloodied. Eventually, Max gained the upper hand, sending Sandi to the ground and pinning her there.
"You never were much of a fighter," Max spat.
"Better than you," Sandi ground out, snaking one of her hands out of Max's grasp to grip the smaller woman's neck. A little pressure and a quick wrist flick and the fight was over.
Sandi, breathing hard, pushed Max's lifeless body to the side and turned over to see if Alec was okay. He was laying on the ground a few feet away. Mole was kneeling beside him, pressing two scaly fingers to the X5's neck. He moved his fingers slightly and it dawned on Sandi that he couldn't find a pulse. She pushed herself to her feet and half-stumbled, half-ran to Alec's side.
"He was kicked in the chest, wasn't he?" She asked, gasping for breath as she dropped to her knees. "Dix, run to the Med Center and get Gila and a large hypodermic needle. Hurry!"
"Mole, do chest compressions," Sandi ordered, still trying to catch her breath. She wasn't used to fighting. She was a medic, for crying out loud.
Mole ripped Alec's shirt open, knowing that he needed to find the proper landmarks in order to begin CPR. Sandi pressed her fingers to Alec's neck as she tried to catch her breath.
"I'm not getting anything," she reported a minute later. "Shit!" Her worst fear was all but confirmed now. If Dix didn't hurry, Alec wasn't going to make it.
"What's wrong with our boy now?" Gila asked as she and Dix ran over to them.
"He's dead," Sandi replied, grabbing the needle from Gila's hand and pulling the protective cap off with her teeth. She carefully started to insert the needle into Alec's body.
"What are you doing?" Dix asked, not able to stand the silence.
"Shhh!" Sandi sharply quieted him. She blinked sweat out of her eyes and concentrated fully on what she was doing. A moment later, she started to gently pull back on the plunger and blood began to fill the hypodermic needle. The kick to Alec's chest had caused blood to begin pooling in the pericardial sac around his heart. As the blood gathered there, pressure was put on the heart until it could no longer beat. The only way to get it beating again was to drain the blood off. Alec's healing factors should have kicked in by now to clot the bleeding, so at least he probably wouldn't need surgery after this. Sandi hoped not anyway.
When she was no longer drawing blood, she removed the needle and handed it to Gila. Then she pressed her fingers back to Alec's neck and waited for a pulse.
"Dammit! BEAT!" Sandi balled her hand into a fist and thumped Alec's chest once.
"Isn't that how we got here in the first place?" Mole inquired as he fished a cigar out of his pocket.
"He's got a pulse!" Sandi announced and monitored the now steady thumps against her fingertips for a few moments. "Let's get him to the Med Center."
~~! Unknown Location !~~
"Fuck!" White shouted as he kicked a chair across the room. He'd just gotten word that 452 had been eliminated and his plans would not go through tonight.
"Sir," a Familiar asked from the doorway, "what would you like us to do?"
"Nothing," White growled. "Nothing can be done now. We must wait for another opportunity."
"Yes, Sir." The Familiar turned and left the room.
White heaved a sigh and punched the wall. "I had such great plans for us, 452," he whispered into the emptiness of the room.
~~! Med Center - Room 494 !~~
Alec gently drifted into consciousness and realized somewhat groggily that he was back in his room at the infirmary. Vaguely he considered moving in, but dismissed the thought from his mind when he turned his head and saw Sandi sitting beside the bed. At first he wondered why she was in Max's chair, but the events of the last night rushed back to him and his whole body tensed with anger.
"Calm down," Sandi said softly.
"What," his voice broke and Sandi offered him a glass of cool water with a straw so that he didn't have to sit up. He took a few sips and cleared his throat. "What happened to her?"
"I think you know," Sandi replied, averting her gaze for a moment.
Alec gave a curt nod and, pressing a hand to his chest, slowly rolled over onto his side with his back to Sandi.
"Alec..."
"Leave me alone," he replied, his voice soft, but his meaning firm. He needed to be alone and Sandi would honor that.
Alec waited until he heard Sandi's footsteps leave his room and retreat down the hall. Then he curled up as much as he could and pressed his palms to his eyes as tears were leaked out of closed lids.
~~! Sandi's Office !~~
Sandi had left Alec and gone to her office to be alone as well. She had an apartment, but she felt more at home in her office. Perhaps because she spent a lot more time there than she did at her home. She had a lot to think about, including her feelings for Alec. She wouldn't tell him, of course. Not now, and probably not ever, but she did have feelings for him. Always had, in fact. Now she had to deal not only with his damaged body and broken heart, but also with the knowledge that she'd been the one to kill Max.
A knock on the door drew her out of her musings and when she called out for the person to enter, she found that her office filling to capacity as Alec's closest friends filed in. Mole, Dix, Joshua, and Gila took seats on the couch or in a chair and looked at Sandi expectantly.
"He'll be fine, physically."
"Must be more human than cat then, since that was his ninth life, at least," Mole muttered under his breath.
Sandi gave Mole a harsh glare and continued. "Emotionally though," she shrugged, "I'm not sure."
"What about you?" Gila asked. Trust the female of the group to sense Sandi's own tumultuous feelings.
"I'm fine," Sandi replied, echoing Alec's oft-used words.
Everyone nodded and smiled condescendingly.
"Don't give me that," Sandi muttered. "I'm sorry about what happened, but I'm not sorry that it did. Max was the traitor and she deserved to die."
"We know," Dix replied gently.
"If you hadn't done it, I would have," Mole added.
"Good to know," she responded, nodding to Mole. "It doesn't matter anymore anyway. It's in the past. The only thing we have to do now is help him get through this."
The others nodded and shared their ideas of how to help Alec. After a few minutes of suggestions, Sandi couldn't take it anymore. She stood and ushered them from her office before heading back to Alec's office. She needed to talk to him and she hoped that he'd want to talk to her too.
As she entered the room, Alec quickly rolled over so that his back was once again to her. Sandi's heart dropped, but she continued over to sit in the chair beside his bed.
"Alec?" She spoke softly, not wanting to cause him any more pain in any way.
"I asked you to leave me alone," he replied, voice breaking slightly.
"I'm sorry," she blurted out quickly before she had time to hesitate.
"What?" He asked, wiping his eyes quickly before turning onto his back and looking over at her.
She winced a little at his reddened eyes and turned her gaze to the floor. "I'm sorry for killing Max."
"Sandi..." he interrupted her ramblings, but she held up a hand.
"Please let me finish. You don't have to forgive me or anything. I know that it's not right for me to ask for forgiveness, but I had to tell you that I was sorry."
"Are you finished?" Alec asked gently after a minute's silence.
Sandi nodded and wiped away the tears that were now on her cheeks.
"I don't blame you for killing Max, Sandi. Hell, I was trying to do it too." His hand found a stray thread in his blanket and he picked at it so he wouldn't have to look at his friend. "I don't want you to think that I'm a fool for believing in her. I never thought that Max would do something like this. She never gave any indication."
"It's okay," Sandi said, reaching out to take his hand and pull it away from the stray thread. "I don't think you're a fool."
"Really?" His eyes found hers and Sandi's heart broke when she saw past his walls for the first time. His eyes held sadness and fear and something that she couldn't quite pinpoint.
She nodded and smiled softly. "Don't ever think that you're a fool, Alec. It's not true now, nor has it ever been true."
"I've never been good with love, though," he whispered as he continued to stare into her eyes. "It's never been good with me either. Rachel's dead. Max is dead. I'm scared that it will happen again."
"Don't be," Sandi assured him. "You'll find someone, Alec. Someone who won't hurt you or betray you. And then you'll truly know what love is. But, never think of yourself as a fool. You're someone who's searching for someone special."
"Thank you," he said, twisting their hands so that his fingers intertwined hers.
"No," she shook her head and squeezed his hand, "thank you."
In the end, it was the friendship of Alec's inner circle that saw him through the long days and sleepless nights. Soon, he was back to setting up missions and acquiring the supplies they needed. He unwillingly became Terminal City's representative, but he was better at the job than anyone thought he would be.
Slowly, he and Sandi began to expand their friendship. Only time would tell just how close they'd become.
The End