Author's Note : in November 2010, the Raising Hell fiction archive launched a massive challenge - to celebrate Dark Angel's feisty brunette with art or fiction prompted by twelve personality characteristics. I chose to answer the prompts as chapters of a continuing storyline. This is the first one of those chapters.

Due to Real Life obligations, I have chosen to post the chapters that are essential to the understanding of the plot (at this moment), and fully intend to fill the gaps at a later date. (just don't hold your breath - it may take me a while!)

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Guilty - part 1 of MaxFest

Just another day in Terminal City.

With a sigh, Max stepped away from the window she'd been gazing out of, and shot a glance at her desk - the contents hadn't changed; the paperwork was still sitting there casting its accusatory aura into the atmosphere. She was about to sigh again, when her door banged into the wall with Alec's entrance. He caught sight of her face and held back a grin.

"Maxie, Maxie, Maxie," he chided. "Are you moping, again?"

She opened her mouth to deny it and settled for a glare, as Alec dropped into one of the uncomfortable plastic chairs she kept for visitors. He winced.

"What do you want?" she growled. "And don't call me Maxie..."

"We missed you at the planning meeting,"

"Oh my God," Max clapped a hand over her mouth, "I completely forgot!"

Alec shook his head, "What were you thinking about to forget a meeting you demanded we have!"

"Safety issues aren't something to ignore, Alec." Max hoped her needling would get him to change the subject, even if he wouldn't forget it with his Transgenic memory.

"Whatever," he dismissed her snapping with a languid hand wave, his face morphing in subtle ways that signified a change in tone. He was serious and all business when he said "We need more tryptophan and food. We always need food, but the meds are way more important - people are starting to get the shakes." He pinned her with his gaze. "I know you're one of them, Max."

She startled so badly, only feline grace kept her butt on the chair. But she recovered well,

"Does that really matter, right now? People need it," she shot him a withering look, "Regardless of who they are... But we've got an army on our doorstep." her lips tilted in a wry smile. "And on all our clever hidden exits too..."

"Ah but we have a plan!" Alec's grin was so infectious Max had to forgive him for it being so smug too. And she settled back in her chair to listen to the details and argue - it was how they worked best.

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Max stared out of her window - what had possessed her to claim quarters so close to the boundary? She got a face full of National Guard every time she pulled her curtains.

A dark coloured sedan idled a short distance away from the Military blockade.

Max knew that car; knew who was sitting behind the wheel, in his dark suit with his dark mood and hot temper.

The guilt Max always felt, at all the wrong choices she'd made in her life spiked suddenly when she remembered a long forgotten thing - today was Ray's birthday.