Author: mari6s.

Fandom: Dark Angel.

Character: Max.

Number of words: 300.

Disclaimer: I do not own Max, Dark Angel, Seattle, the Space Needle, or the Eiffel Tower, for that matter.

Her hair was flying in the wind, dripping wet with rain. Not safe to be up here with that kind of weather – but then again, it never was… A car can run you over every time you cross the street, anyway. Start thinking about it and you might as well stop living. And if she checked the weather forecast, she'd never climb to her favorite haunt. Whenever doesn't it rain in Seattle…?

She looks down to the city. Can't say it's beautiful – shady and tumbledown is what it is. But for some reason, this sight calms her. Helps her put things in perspective. And god knows she needs that…

She finds herself so irritating, sometimes. She's one of the lucky ones and she knows it. She got away from Manticore. She has a life, a good life considering everything, and even though she always has to be on her guard, she has people who care about her. Yeah, she knows that. True, but…

But what, Max? But sometimes she feels like she brought a part of Manticore along with her. A tiny little voice, or maybe not so tiny, that keeps bugging her. Reminding her to keep both eyes open, her bags packed under the bed and one foot out the door.

And hard though she tries not to listen, the voice never remains silent. She's been well conditioned.

Contemplating the city from what once had been the symbol of its technological progress, wreckage of a civilization convinced that nothing could ever go wrong, Max finds herself hoping that maybe, someday, she'll be able to forget that voice altogether. Yeah, someday. And even though she sure as hell doesn't believe in omens, good or bad, she feels a bit warmer and stronger when she sees Seattle crowned by a rainbow.