Rating: PG for some isolated swearing, angst, and lots of (vague) references to the sex act

Pairing: Alec and half of Seattle

Spoilers: Berrisford Agenda and Borrowed Time. Beyond that, there's no real timeline.

Rule 1: Never let them meet.
Cat fights

Alec strode into Jam Pony, marveling at the shit that was his life. Everything in this part of Seattle was filthy: the people, the buildings, the street...He'd only been two places in Seattle where the dirt was kept at bay: Rachel's and Logan's. He'd left them both broken, the places and the people. The dirt followed him, or maybe he led it. The distinction didn't really matter, only the result.

There was commotion in the women's locker room, and several female employees rushed out in various states dress. Alec let his eyes pass over them, sliding fluidly from one to another, judging what he saw. Wendy might be worth taking a pass at one of these days.

"What's the deal in there?" Alec nodded toward the locker room.

"Marina and Little Suki are in some sort of massive cat fight," Chaz replied casually. "I'm debating spending my entire paycheck on jello. Those two are so fine, know what I'm saying?"

Alec grinned. He knew. He knew quite well. And quite recently...oh. Shit. He turned away from the noise, then, planning his escape. He knew once Marina and Little Suki were done being mad at each other, they'd realize that Alec was the deserving object of their wrath. It was time for Escape and Evade. Old habits died hard, especially ones drilled in by years of military training, and most especially ones that involved self-preservation. He casually drifted away from the scene. He thought he remembered Wendy heading this way.

Rule 2: Women are consumers.
How to be a bargain boy

Alec sat at the bar and considered his options. It really wasn't fair, he decided, for transgenics and humans to interact. Manticore may have been right about locking them away. He had been surveying a pretty little target for approximately ten minutes, and he already knew what he needed to do to have her.

Too much make-up, cheap sparkly jewelry, an outfit that tried too hard. If Alec were more romantic, he would admit that she would be prettier if she stopped putting up a front and went for a natural look. Instead he focused on the engagement ring on her left hand she couldn't stop playing with, the one expensive piece on her body.

His eyes slid over her again, not missing a curve. She had a nice body. Soft. Years in the barracks had taught him the value of soft.

He made contact with his target, ordered her a drink, smiled broadly, twinkled his eyes. Like other women who thought too much instead of acting on their instincts, she was reserved at first. Alec kept the rounds coming, paying for every one himself, and he never took his eyes from her when he shot the alcohol. Women had been conditioned from an early age to invest themselves wisely, but all they really wanted was to be taken care of.

Alec made sure to take care of them, if only for one night. If someone spilled a beer on her right now, it would be the perfect opportunity to prove what a gentleman he was by bashing the guy's face in. But he didn't need a big display like that. He sent out his patented Alex Vibe.

Whether or not this target was married, Alec just had to remind her of how much of a bargain he was, like a free manicure, or something else cheap that women went crazy over. She didn't have to care about him, do things for him. She didn't even have to remember him. She just had to drink her fruity alcohol and let him do what he did best.

He wouldn't be there in the morning.

She wouldn't care.

Neither would he.

Rule 3: Promise nothing.
How to walk the line

"We're living on borrowed time," he concluded with an air of finality. This target considered herself an intellectual, which was fine with Alec. There was something decidedly alluring about seducing a girl's mind that got him in the mood. It was more of a challenge, and the sex was always better.

"Are you always this cynical?"

Alec considered her smile with a gulp of his whiskey. "I'm a realist," he said evenly. "I call 'em as I see 'em."

"Your life sounds sad."

"Not really." He held her eyes with his own. "There's not as much unnecessary shit."

Her eyes measured him. He knew she couldn't read him--Manticore had made sure of that--but he could see her brain working. She was an interesting one. Like all the other targets, she saw what she wanted to see in Alec: a man whose jaded attitude could be changed if only someone would love him. A man with green, green eyes who could be changed if only...

If only...

He could see her make up her mind, even if she didn't realize it yet. She raised her vodka and tonic and put on her most ironic smile.

"Here's to borrowed time," she said.

He never once asked her to try to save him. He never promised to change. She just wanted him to have asked, and probably told herself that Alex had asked with his unreadable eyes. When he left in the morning, it wouldn't hurt her as much as her realization that she had failed to save him, and had perhaps lost herself along the way.

Rule 4: Never pick one up you can't leave.
No attachments

Asha reminded Alec of Her. The One he could not leave. Or at least, Asha reminded him of what She would have become if She had survived the blast. She would have become jaded, closed, and bitter. Would She ever have forgiven him, had she lived? The One he could not leave...

Maybe it was Asha's big teeth. She had lots of teeth when She smiled. Maybe it was the way Asha carried herself; She was amazingly self-assured for a teenager who sucked at playing the piano and tried to seduce her piano tutor anyway. She could walk into a room and own it, own everything in it. Even in a coma he could feel Her presence. Even buried, six feet under the ground, lifeless, he could feel Her radiate out of the tombstone. The One he could not leave.

The One who still owned him.

She had destroyed him, spoiled him, damaged him. He recognized in himself the very thing he loathed in Max and Logan: the pathetic way they died a little inside for each other's peace of mind. And yet, as he stood in a graveyard with the cold Seattle rain falling, he was positive his heart was breaking. He put a hand to his chest, straining to feel the two halves pulling away from each other.

Asha had to go because if she turned out not to be a one-night stand, she could kill him with her love.

Rule 5: Work the pickup line.
You are a beautiful and unique creature, unlike any other.

"You are a beautiful and unique creature," Alec told a pretty young woman, gracing her with a smile. He played with one of her long, silky curls and bumped her drink closer to her with his arm.

They were, too. Every single one of them was blessedly different: short, tall, blondes, brunettes, three red heads, and one girl with hair so black it shone blue under the lights at Crash. Oh, goth chicks were wicked in bed! Alec had all shapes and sizes of women...well, no fatties. They just couldn't keep up like the athletic ones he preferred, and even the ones who were "in shape" wore out too fast. But in all these beautiful women, there had never been two who looked the same.

Except the twins, but by the end of the night, he could tell them apart, too.

The diversity of women in the real world was a smacking difference to the face he saw in the mirror everyday. He sometimes stared at his own reflection, unrecognizing. Was he Ben? Was he still crazy, and Alec was a personality Ben had constructed? Or was he yet another nameless X5 clone with the same exact DNA sequences down to the individual nucleotide and maternal organelles as Ben?

He felt a hand on his thigh, making its way North, and he brought himself back to the present, sitting in a bar with the prettiest girl he could find that night. He turned on his sincere eyes and leaned in to whisper in her ear.

"Unlike any other."