DISCLAIMER: Dark Angel does not belong to me. Any resemblance in name or description of original character to any real world figure is entirely unintentional. The plot is cobbled together with some of my own original plots but is heavily based on the season 2 DVD commentary where the writers reveal how they were looking at progressing the show, and on story lines which were developed by Dark Angel's regular writers and may have made up season 3 if the show hadn't been cancelled.
Chapter 2 - Agent 86
Doc drew back the syringe plunger, filling the barrel with blood. "That's it," she said, pulling the hypodermic needle free and recapping it. The transgenic set the syringe on the bench behind her. A second syringe had already been filled. "I'll see you again in a week."
Max rolled her sleeve back over her elbow. "Whatever you need, Doc."
"Yes. Well." Doc's voice was brusque. She had learnt her bedside manner at Manticore, where there was little emphasis on any type of doctor-patient relationship and where her patient's psychological care was more appropriately considered the domain of psy-ops. Max appreciated the no bullshit manner, especially given the subject matter. "I'll do what I can, of course, but I'm not promising results. The scientist who developed your retrovirus was a prodigy. The replication he managed to achieve in such little time was… well. The most I can say is that I'll try."
"All I can ask. Thanks, Doc."
Doc pulled her gloves off with twin snaps, already engrossed with the syringes and her medical instruments. "Stop in on X5-701, would you?" she said when Max reached the door. "Tell her she's free to go."
"Sure thing," Max said, privately appreciative of the doctor's choice of words, because being under the caustic doctor's care would pretty much feel like a life sentence.
"Thank god," Syl said when Max relayed the news of her liberation. Syl threw off her blankets and swung her feet around to the side of the bed with a swiftness that belied any need for further convalescence. "This place is shut down like Fort Knox. I can't decide whether I'm being mothered to death or slowly put out of my misery."
"I don't think Doc makes that kind of distinction."
"Do me a favour. Next time I'm getting shot at, remind me not to duck." Syl scooped up her clothing, freshly laundered and folded perfectly, and began pulling on her pants under the gown Doc had managed to dress her in while she'd been asleep. When the denim reached the bandage on her thigh, she winced despite her obvious care. "Reed dropped in earlier and said they've started the apartment conversion on the old Barnes building." She hopped a little, pulling on each pant leg. "I'm headed over to Trove to give him a hand. We could use an extra pair if you're not too busy?"
Max's lips twisted unhappily. After having a gill of blood drawn by Doc she was feeling off, and she was certain she wouldn't be able to hide it from the other transgenic. Syl had already intuited that there was something going on between her and Logan the last time she'd come to Seattle. Once Syl got over her annoyance at Doc, Max was sure she'd pick up on her mood and wheedle out the whole sad story of the virus and why she and Logan couldn't be together. That was a conversation she could do without. "I'd love to," she said, which was the truth, "Right after I tick off the thousand things on today's to do list."
Syl paused in pulling her shirt on. "Alright," her head popped out the top and she tugged at the shirt-hem, "I'm picking up the back off vibes you're putting down, but you came in looking like you need a shoulder. If you wanna talk… about anything-"
"'Bout what?" Max interrupted. "You're the one who got shot. I got nothing to complain about."
Syl balled the hospital gown and tossed it into the corner. "That's not what I meant."
Max shrugged - what're you gonna do?
Syl sent Max a dirty look but still grabbed her boots from the bedside, more than happy to exit the building sans shoes if it meant avoiding any more time spent with Doc. Before she could make her escape, however, Dalton entered the room.
"There's someone at the fence," Dalton announced, impatient. "They said to come get you."
Syl fell back on the infirmary bed with a frustrated grunt and boots still in-hand.
"Who?" Max asked.
"Ace. He's on the southern perimeter."
"Yeah, I figured. Who's at the fence, kid?"
Dalton lifted a shoulder. "I dunno. Someone from the National Guard?"
"Guess I'll see for myself," Max said. "Go find Alec and Mole and tell them to meet me back at HQ."
Dalton pivoted to comply, but not without an eye roll.
Max leant out the doorway a moment later, to make sure he was headed in the right direction. To Syl, she said, "I'd better go check it out. Don't wanna keep my mystery date waiting."
"Godspeed," Syl said disinterestedly, her focus restored in getting her shoes on and getting the hell out of there.
Max took the opposite end of the hall to Dalton, taking the stairs down to ground level and turning toward the southern fence.
She exited the building to the smell of wet pavement. It had stormed that morning, a flash in the pan type storm that had raged for no longer than twenty minutes before it died over Lake Washington. The effects of the storm were still evident even this late in the afternoon, forcing her to skirt puddles and muddy bogs.
She cut through an alley that bypassed TC's Square completely, neatly avoiding the loiterers in the Square and the inevitable twenty-questions her presence seemed to invite. She hit a good run before the transhuman, Hamilton, crossed the mouth of the alley in front of her. He reappeared a moment later, backtracking slowly.
Max bit back a sigh. "Walk and talk," she said, when she pulled even with the transhuman.
Hamilton's forked tongue flicked out in a hiss as he hurried after her. "The X-8 hatchlings are out of control. One could be sitting down, minding their own businesss-" the sibilant word was hissed angrily "-before one of them pops up -" another hiss "- and scares the bejesus out of you." His cheeks puffed rapidly. The right hand of his dismembered limb, held in his left hand, flapped uselessly as he hefted it into what was presumably a more comfortable position. "This is the second appendage they've scared off today. I don't have the balance or the hands to stop them. Something mussst be done."
Sure enough, the transhuman's tail, which usually protruded from the seat of his pants, was now a pink stump. He would clearly have a difficult time catching any transgenics, let alone the nimble and hyperactive X-8's. "I'll see what I can do."
"I would appreciate if that happened sooner rather than later. It's inconvenient to ssshed an arm, especially when it's the dominant one -"
"- I'm so not going there -"
" - and the hatchlings need a diversion to keep them out of ssstrife." Hamilton tilted his head like a lizard angling for the sun, watching as Max swung up onto the fire escape that lead to Ace. "Should they not be in school?"
"School's been out since Renfro burnt it to the ground, but I'll put it on the list."
This prompted another angry hiss. "I leave it in your capable hands," Hamilton said, then turned and retraced his steps, right hand still flapping over his shoulder.
Max shook her head, climbing the ladder hand over hand. She had enough to worry about without writing up unruly children on her to do list. Still, she mentally bumped the X-8's up, preferring that something get done about it before Hamilton's arm grew back and he took matters into his own hands.
Max cleared the roof of the building, and took another few strides that brought her to the foot-wide gap between the fire escape that clung to the wall of the next. From there she stepped across the gap to the metal grate platform, climbed through the nearest window and landed on the second storey.
A fine puff of dust expanded from under her boots as her eyes adjusted to the dim room.
Sol, the rodent-faced transhuman, crooked his finger from deep in the shadows cast by heavy tarp-like material that covered many of the building's windows. Both he and Ace were stood against the wall on the far side of the room. Max crossed to them and slid in beside them. "What've we got?"
"Visitors," said Ace, nodding out the window to Max's left. "Take a look."
The window afforded a view of the southernmost perimeter of TC. Mid-way down Max's field of view was the skeleton of a building, abandoned in the middle of construction. Piles of steel beams overgrown with weeds were stacked neatly on the edge of a sprawling, more haphazard field of beams that had dropped from the old crane that steadily rusted above it.
More steelwork had been moved against TC's fence to strengthen it before the National Guard had moved in. Where the steel bulwark ended a few sheets of corrugated iron had been halfheartedly leant against the chainlink fence. There the weight had caused the fence to sag outward from its heavy frame. The Colonel was stood within 5 feet of the fence, framed by two big sheets of corrugated metal and flanked by two soldiers on either side.
"He's just been standing there," said Ace, his eyes never having left the Colonel. The transgenic's tone suggested that this had somehow offended him. "Do you think he's here to roll out the welcome wagon or the welcome tanks?"
Max shrugged. "Beats me. I'll signal a thumbs up for the welcome wagon; running and waving my arms if it's tanks." Sol gave her a sidelong look. "Keep an eye on his friends for me," Max continued, gesturing back toward the window. "I'm heading down."
Ace tapped his new earpiece, 'tactically acquired' from the National Guard. "Trust me, we've got your back."
Max matched his smirk with one of her own, rested a hand briefly on Sol's shoulder, and made her way back to the fire escape.
The ground level windows of the building, like all buildings on the outer edges of TC, had been boarded up or blocked. Max could've exited from the second floor windows, but she had no intention of burning Ace and Sol's position, and would prefer not to demonstrate any more abilities in front of the Colonel then she had to.
From the fire escape, Max swung down to the ground, turned back to where she'd left Hamilton in the alley and followed the corridor to its end. A bunch of tyres, an upended dumpster, and other heavy debris formed a mound that blocked the alley's exit. She used the dumpster as a platform to jump over to the shipping container on the other side, then lowered herself to the ground.
Vinzet, directly in front of where she'd landed, hailed Max with a nod. "Mornin'," he said, southern drawl in full force.
Behind the Colonel, three soldiers stood rigidly with hands on weapons. All the safeties were off. A fourth soldier with an unmarked package stood immediately to Vinzet's right.
Max kept her eyes on Vinzet as she closed the distance, bringing up a hand to give herself some relief from the afternoon sun. Behind the National Guardsmen was a military cordon, set up 200 yards further back. A single sector cop was behind the cordon, leaning against his motorbike with folded arms - but no reporters. The Colonel must've done some fancy footwork to avoid the malingering press who thought the situation in TC was about the best thing to happen since the Pulse. "Morning, Colonel," she said, stopping a few feet away. "What brings you to our neck of the woods? Business or pleasure?"
"Well…" Vinzet raised his arms in a generous gesture. "I usually find the two can be combined, purely by sittin' down and conducting business over whiskey and a cigar."
"Business, then," said Max, "unless that soldier next to you is carrying a case of whiskey."
Vinzet turned to the soldier to his right, who did his best to pretend he hadn't been staring, fixated at the sight of the first transgenic he'd ever seen in his life. "I regret to say, he is not."
"Maybe next time."
"Maybe." He turned again to his right. "Now hoik that over the fence, soldier."
To his credit, the soldier kept his face perfectly impassive. "Say again, sir?"
"You weren't picked for this excursion just to make me repeat myself, son. An overarm should get the job done."
The soldier looked on the verge of questioning the Colonel again, but instead crooked back his arm and propelled the package over the top of the fence. Max tracked it and took two steps backward.
"Payment to close our deal, in full," said Vinzet, as the package sailed into Max's hands.
"Thanks." Max shook it, hearing something large clunk around inside. She paused with the package held up to her ear. "This isn't gonna blow up in my face, is it?"
Vinzet gave a half smile. "That's a matter of perspective, darlin'."
Max gave a snort. "Everyone's a fortune teller, huh? You don't earn an extra buck writing prophecies by any chance, do you?"
Vinzet stiffened; his soldiers tightened their grips on weapons, one pointing their weapon at Max's shoulder.
Immediately Max turned sideways, presenting a smaller target. "Easy there, boys," she said, blurring out of the soldiers line of sight. "Don't start something I'm gonna have to finish." When the soldiers' crosshairs stayed fixed at the point she'd vacated, she turned to see what the fuss was all about. She scowled immediately, seeing the transgenic jogging toward her. "Colonel - mind giving the order for your people to stand down?"
"Stand down," said Vinzet, peeved, as Yams effortlessly cleared one of the fallen steel beams with his wide, white smile.
The big transgenic was built sturdier than the majority of his peers; as he continued his forward jog, hands raised in the universal gesture for peace, his grin made him look closer to a daydreaming quarterback than a sleek human weapon.
"It seems this meeting's going to be cut short," Vinzet said dryly.
"Yep," Max said, forcibly slowing her breathing to suppress the adrenaline the encounter had sent snapping through her limbs. "Seems so."
Yams came right up to her side and stopped. He looked between Max, still scowling, and Vinzet and his soldiers, who were eyeing him with nothing less than mistrust. "Hey," he said by way of preamble, lifting his chin at the Colonel, who raised a salt-and-pepper brow. To Max, he said, "Hate to interrupt, but you're needed, boss."
Max gestured with the box Vinzet had given her. "Kinda busy. Can't it wait?"
"Not unless you want a bigger situation on your hands."
"Guess not, then." Max turned to Vinzet. "Sorry, Colonel. Gotta blaze." She shrugged. "You know how it is."
"Duty calls," the Colonel replied, managing to sound both sympathetic and amused.
"One of these days I'm gonna tell it to lose my number." She pivoted and went after Yams, who had already walked a few impatient steps away. Holding the package aloft, she said, "Thanks for the goods."
They entered HQ through the roof and crept down the snakes-and-ladder maze of catwalks that lead to the floor.
Yams filled her in on the way. Word got around TC quickly, and when the news of her meeting with the Colonel had reached Dash it had been received about as well as a handful of grenades. TC's inhabitants smelled blood in the water, and a group had made their way to HQ in Dash's wake to voice their opinion or just to watch the show. Alec was doing his best to fend them off, responding in his mostly facetious way that some people found inexplicably endearing but that happened to rub Dash the wrong way. By the saccharine sarcasm Alec was directing toward Dash, she doubted very much that Alec was unaware of this effect. Mole was stood beside Alec on the tech deck with arms crossed in a way that might've been construed as a show of solidarity if he weren't nodding whenever Dash spoke.
Max paused, high on a catwalks as the noise from below grew particularly loud.
"Ay!" Alec was saying below, gesturing for quiet. "Ay!" he repeated, louder and with more insistence. It was clear he didn't hope for any assistance from Dash, who fronted the group at the base of the tech deck.
"Good news, folks," Alec said, when the residual mutterings died down. "We can all lighten up, 'cause the situation in Monster Burg today is peachy." Alec raised his voice over the increase in noise from the floor. "No secret meetings, no conspiracies-"
Someone yelled from the crowd "Yeah - where's Max, then?"
Max's fingers tightened around the rails.
"- No one betraying their command." Alec directed this to Wynn, who had accused Max of doing just that and caused the uproar in the first place. "We're even getting you hooked up to satellite tv. What more could you want?"
Suggestions such as "Hot water!" and "Fix the provision shortage, dumbass!" flew from the crowd.
Alec jabbed a finger at the source of the last suggestion. "Alright, that's enough from the peanut gallery. And for the record, it ain't easy keeping all the X's in beans and bullets. Not to mention all the other stuff we've gotta stockpile for the rest of you weirdos. Tuna for Kat, kibble for Josh." He turned to Mole. "You know what? I don't even know what you eat."
Mole's fingers removed the ever-present cigar. "Cupcakes and salad."
Dash slowly unclasped his hands, the only point of calm amongst the hostile crowd. "It's not difficult to see why we have a provision shortage when some of us treat the subject like a joke," he said, quieting the crowd more effectively than anything Alec had attempted.
The cigar twitched in Mole's mouth.
"While you digress," Dash continued, "a cache of hostages, weapons and supplies sit right outside our gates. Yet, the 09'er seeks to treat these ordinaries as allies."
A soft touch to her elbow by Yams, and Max realised she'd stopped moving entirely. She knew Alec had called her back to put a stop to Dash passing out the kool-aid, but instead she found herself saying, "No, I wanna hear it."
Yams shrugged and leant his weight on the rail next to her. "Your funeral."
Even at 200 yards below, Alec had a visibly stubborn set to his mouth as Dash began again.
"An armour battalion of the Heavy Brigade Combat Team has had us surrounded for the last four days, and still they sit idle. Do you think this is because they fear to attack us?" Dash looked at the transgenics around him. "They've actively hunted us since we broke out. They wanted us dead at the siege. If they wanted us dead now, Terminal City would be nothing but a hole in the ground. Instead, we're still breathing." The talk in Dash sounded mostly in agreement. "Someone wants us alive. If we were to use our heads and take advantage of this fortuitous situation -"
Alec's response was lost to the rush of blood in Max's ears. She loosened her grip from the catwalk handrail and clenched her fists a few times to get the blood circulating back into her knuckles and fingers. She stepped around Yams, who looked after her questioningly. "Hey!" she said, coming down the catwalk stairs. She pitched her voice to carry and saw most of the people on the floor crane their necks around to the source of the interruption. "I thought I made the speeches around here."
"And Dash here thinks he's the voice of all reason," said Alec, watching her procession down the stairs from across the old factory floor. He made a disappointed tsk tsk as he looked between Max and the other transgenic. "Looks like there's a lot of delusion going around."
The blond X-5 set a hand on the edge of the tech deck, below where Alec and Mole were standing. "452," he said easily, one of the formal greetings the X-Series' used when a name was too familiar. Dash made it sound like an insult. "I see you're done treating with the ordinary."
"Yep," Max said, just as easily. "He gave us a present too." She tossed the box the Colonel had handed her. It soared over the heads of the crowd to Dash, who caught it with both hands.
Dash did much the same she did - shake the box and hear something clunk around inside. He gazed back at her, now faintly disapproving. "We don't need help from ordinaries." He held the box in both hands for a moment, set it on the deck behind him. "What we need is some initiative -" Dash paused, making it clear by his quick once-over that he considered Max sadly lacking in the next department "- and some balls."
"Hooah," said Nero. Quick as a shot, Suki threw back, "What we don't need are hotheads like you starting a fight with the National Guard!" Within moments the noise of opposing opinions built into the lusty disarray Alec had been wrangling with before Max's arrival.
Alec leant over the rail of the deck and attempted to shush them with another, "Ay!" When that failed, he lifted his head and shook it with a vaguely helpless look. Wynn climbed through the rail onto the stairs of the tech deck, ready to add his voice to the cacophony.
Done with the whole debacle, Max squeezed the shoulder of the nearest transhuman, Fi. "Shut 'em up, will ya?" she asked.
Obligingly, Fi brought her fingers to her mouth and let loose an earsplitting whistle that would've cut through the roar of a superbowl touchdown.
Wynn paused then finished the action of drawing his leg through the stair rails. By the time the X-6 and transhuman who'd been arguing in front of Max stepped aside, the room was quiet.
"Newsflash, ladies and gents," Max said, filling the silence. "There ain't a whole lot of people lining up to help us, so if we're gonna get through this, we're gonna need all the help we can get." Her eyes went to Dash. "And it seems to me like we might've forgotten something important so I'll consider it my duty to remind you." The crowd parted before her. "Manticore's gone. No one's forcing you into the quad at 0500 for combat training and it's no longer acceptable to kill to get what you want. Three square meals a day and a narrow bunk doesn't exist anymore. Welcome to the real world. If you want a place in it you're gonna have to start thinking about what you can do get yourself accepted into it. If that means we have to make an arrangement with the Colonel, so be it."
She finished in front of Dash, feeling the crowd at her back and her sides, some supportive and some not.
Dash moved his head from side to side in polite disagreement. "You want us to ally with this ordinary? A Colonel in the National Guard?" Mole, above Dash on the tech deck, was nodding again. "There's only two ways that ends: he sells us up the creek or wipes us off the map. Either way, he's gonna screw us over."
"Yeah, he probably will," Max said, unconcerned. "But I'm counting on the ones with the super speed and mental enhancements taking the prize."
Dash let his hand drop from the tech deck and gave her a pitying look. "I hope you're right, because the consequences if you're wrong will affect us all." He stepped away from the deck and came closer, said, "Those consequences will be on you."
Under her breath, Max said, "Don't I know it." She watched Dash step away from the deck and the crowd flowed around her, dispersing in Dash's wake and leaving only a few behind. Cade climbed the stairs to the tech deck and shoulder-checked Wynn on the way up.
When the majority of the crowd had melted away, the transhuman, Sol, placed a hand on her arm. "Don't worry about that one," he said, whiskers twitching. "Nobody with a lick of common sense listens to him, anyway."
"I wish that were true," she nocturnal transhuman swiped blearily at his eyes; no doubt this mess had cost him his precious sleep. "Get some rest, Sol," she urged wearily.
"Aye aye, cap."
As Sol wandered away, Luke immediately took up his place before her, clipboard in hand and an even more determined glint in his eye than when he'd corralled her earlier in the morning. "Since you're here," he said blithely, flipping a page on his clipboard, "now seems as good a time as any to talk about those provisions. Cook said we're down -"
"Not now, Luke. Give me a minute."
"Sure," Luke said as Max turned away. "I guess I'll just... come find you?" When Max continued on her way, he flipped the clipboard page back. "... For the fourth time."
Max slumped into the metal folding chair in front of the computer they used for external comms and swung her legs onto the desk by the keyboard.
Although she seemed to be amassing no small amount of concerned looks and furtive glances, her glower ensured none of her friends were game to follow her. Before any of them got any ideas, she jiggled the mouse to wipe the screensaver and pretended to look busy. In the corner of the monitor, an incoming video-mail icon blinked green.
"Job's never done," she muttered, then clicked the blinking envelope.
A dark room appeared on the screen, empty and obscured by image static. A familiar voice muttered a 'shit,' then a hand appeared across the monitor and the static eased. Logan and swivel chair rolled onto screen, twisting something else off screen that caused the rest of the white noise to disappear.
"Hey, Logan."
"Hey, Max." Logan studied her for a moment. "Did I catch you at a bad time?"
Max forced her face into a more sociable visage. She crossed her ankle over the other and leant back further, tipping the chair onto its two back legs. "Timing's perfect. What's up?"
"Just… checking in," he said cautiously, not at all losing the concerned expression he'd had since seeing her on screen. Still, he was used to her sweeping things under the rug and ignored it like a pro. "And I've, ah, got a favour to ask you. Some time soon, if you think you can swing it. I know you've got a lot going on over there, but -"
Max lifted her legs off the desk and straightened. "I'll be there as soon as I can."
Alec caught her when she was no more than two minutes out of TC and almost copped a fist to the face for his trouble.
Max wrenched her fist from where Alec had caught it inches from his nose.
"Geez, Max," he said, shaking out his hand and making a show of wincing. "You gotta stop pulling your punches."
"And you gotta stop sneaking up on people. What are you even doing here, Alec?"
He stepped away from her, raised a brow. "Same question."
"You're the one following me."
Alec eyed her crossed arms. He knew a brick wall when he was looking at one and caved in less than a second. "Fine. I saw you cut out and figured, hey, I'm not gonna be the sucker left doing all the work; that sucker's gonna be Mole. So I followed you down," a shrug, "Bob's your uncle."
He grinned and Max considered punching him for real. If they'd been above ground Max would try to shake him, but there was little opportunity to lose a tail in the sewers. Besides, she suspected the harder she tried to dissuade Alec the harder he'd try to tag along. "Whatever, Alec. Just keep up."
Alec fell into step beside her. They journeyed all of ten steps before Alec said, "So… what're we doing? Gotta be something big for you to break the Colonel's curfew. Breaking someone outta jail? Blowing something up? Man, tell me it's blowing something up."
She was quick to stomp his enthusiasm. "We are doing a favour for Logan."
"Oh for the love of - for real, Max? You skipped out on us to do some dumb errand for your old boyfriend?"
"Still keen?"
"Definitely feeling less keen..." he grumbled "...and yet, more keen than I am to inventory cans of creamed corn with Mole."
The rest of the journey passed in silence. When they reached the exit nearest Logan's house, Max climbed the ladder first, hefted the grate up and set it down with as little sound as she could manage. She waited for Alec to climb out after her, then bent to manhandle the grate back over the hole they'd crawled out of.
Alec exhaled noisily. "Wait, wait." He bent and lifted the other end and they placed it back over the concrete hollow.
"Thanks," Max said. She strode up the street to Sandeman and Joshua's former house.
Alec looked down at his hands, grimaced, and wiped them on his pants. He hurried after her.
Max put a hand on his shoulder when he joined her and pointed to the side of the house, where a man-shaped silhouette was hunched close to the weatherboards. They shared a look and bent into a running crouch, crossing the concrete path.
As they got closer, Max slowed and rounded the corner silently.
Logan held a flashlight in his mouth, illuminating the fuse box. An open book was held against the side of the house with his hip. He held two pieces of wire in his hands, both stripped at the ends to expose the copper wiring inside. A toolbox was at his feet. As Max neared him, she could see the book was a manual, full of diagrams and tiny print.
They stopped behind Logan, watched as he muttered something, then brought the two wires closer together.
Max leant forward, almost putting her chin against Logan's jacketed back. "You don't wanna do that."
The wires dropped. Logan jerked. The flashlight fell out of his mouth.
"Hey, man," said Alec. His impassive expression hid what was probably a smirk.
Logan reached up and adjusted his glasses. "Hey… guys."
Max picked up the flashlight. She stepped around him and shone some light into the fuse box. "Uh - what are you doing?"
"Well…" He gave a self-disparaging 'ah', pushed at the nose of his glasses again. "The circuit breaker didn't trip during the storm this morning. It damaged a lot of the equipment I had plugged in, which brings me to the favour."
Max twisted one of the wires closed. "Yeah, shoot."
Logan watched her poke the wire back. He shook his head slightly. "I need to replace what was damaged or find the parts to fix it. Usually I'd put in an order, but -"
"- But you're not exactly living in the penthouse."
"Exactly."
Max flipped a switch and closed the fuse box cover. The yard lightened and a window gleamed to life from one of the rooms at the back of the house. Max turned and shrugged. "I can hook you up no problem. Just tell me who I need to unhook it from and you'll be back to hacking and fighting crime in no time."
"Thanks, Max."
"No sweat."
Logan didn't break the gaze, doing that thing he always did where he was trying to figure out her thoughts. He swallowed. "Listen… Max -"
Max bent to pick up the tool box, blocking out the same contemplative look he'd given her at the flag raising, when she'd untangled her fingers from his. She knew she and Logan were due for a heart-to-heart, but until she left here, she intended to stick to Alec like glue to avoid it. When she straightened, she said, "You know if you want me to keep doing you favours, you're gonna have to put me on retainer."
Logan paused, then gave a short laugh. "Duly noted. In the meantime, I owe you one."
"Good. Lucky for you, I've already got something in mind."
Logan quirked a brow. "Oh?"
Alec cleared his throat loudly, drawing the attention of them both. "I might be missing some subtext here," he said, looking between the two, "but it's starting to sound kinda dirty, so, sorry Logan, but if there's favours being handed out, I'm gonna have to cash in with Max."
Max snorted and folded her arms. "Alec, you've got a one-track mind. If it sounds dirty, it's not subtext. It's you."
Alec waved this away. "We don't have time for epiphanies, Max. I'm seeing larceny on the horizon, and, statistically speaking, whenever you try to steal stuff something always goes wrong. You should start cooking up a plan. I'm gonna go find a book or something in case I get trapped in a closet within you again."
"Good idea," Max said solicitously, bending and then offering Alec the electrical manual Logan had dropped earlier. "Here's one. No subtext and heaps of pictures."
"Yeah…" Alec didn't make a move to grab the manual and crossed his arms disdainfully. "...Thanks, but no thanks. If I want my reading material illustrated, I'll grab a skin mag."
Max opened her fingers and let the manual fall to the ground as if it were soiled goods. "I'm so glad you tagged along."
They killed time at Logan's until it was fully dark, then took Logan's battered car to the farthest edge of the sector, parked, locked up, and continued on foot. Alec made a point of checking the car was locked - Sector Eight hadn't been that great even before the Pulse, and now it was full of apartments lived in by multiple families and 'burbs ruled by gangs and loan sharks. Where they were headed was just as crooked but the lawns were manicured and the streets mostly clean - almost like it used to be before '09.
They scaled the sector fence with no fuss, then slipped into the side streets and stuck to the shadows.
Their target was a building in the heart of Sector Ten, part of a group of buildings in the Tern's media compound that housed three of Seattle's television studios and the city's daily newspaper, the Herald.
The compound was roughly rectangular and took up the whole block. Buildings of varying heights and a few trees were visible above the compound's brick wall. Max sent Alec to do a walk around while she watched the gate.
A camera, anchored onto the top of the wall, pointed toward the boom-gate. Max crouched behind a car parked across the road and out of the camera's view. She ducked lower, watching as a car from inside the compound coasted toward the boom-gate, then stopped. An arm appeared through the heavily tinted windows, swiped a card against the metal box attached to the boom, then drove off when the red-and-white striped pole lifted into a vertical position. The boom arm stayed vertical for seven seconds before it lowered automatically.
No more vehicles exited or entered the compound while Max waited for Alec to return. Absently, she scratched at the fresh batch of runic tattoos that had cropped up on her neck. A slow trickle of traffic passed her by, headlights illuminating the area in passing. All were nice cars, pre-pulse and detailed like their owners had better stuff to worry about than unemployment and the cost of living. The country club procession was relieved finally by the appearance of a beat-up van from 'Benny's Laundromat', which slowly rolled into the street.
The van didn't speed up from its turn, however, and continued its slow roll down the right hand lane toward her. Max narrowed her eyes. When the handbrake squeaked and the van jerked to a stop, Max stood up.
Alec wound down the van's window. One hand gripped the steering wheel; the other jiggled a white swipe card. "Need a lift?"
Max eyed the creepy-looking van dubiously. "Aren't you supposed to offer me candy as well?"
"Only if you're good."
Max took the few steps to jerk the sliding van door open. A laundry bag fell to its side, revealing two sets of wide eyes amongst the laundry-padded back of the van. Max stared for a second, then climbed in beside the gagged laundry workers and tugged the door closed. "Seriously? We're taking hostages now?"
Alec adjusted the rear view mirror until he could see Max's eyes, then put the van into gear and pulled out. "Just making hay. I saw 'em swipe out of the compound and then head right toward me. A cover story basically rolled up to me on a silver platter."
Max raised a shoulder. "Can't argue with that."
The van turned up the road that lead into the compound. It stopped with another squeak. "Speaking of rolling and silver platters..." Alec touched the swipe card above the keypad on the metal unit and waited for the beep. "What was the deal with you and Logan back there?"
The boom-gate rose along with one of Max's brows. "Beats me. Dunno what you're talking about."
"Au contraire, le Max." Benny's van whined past the boom, which lowered behind them. "I mean what's the deal with the 'Logan's eyes boring into your soul and you blowing him off' thing."
"I didn't blow him off."
"Yeah, you did."
"If I did, it's none of your business."
Alec tried to catch her eye in the rear view mirror. Max was suddenly engaged in upending one of the laundry bags onto the floor of the van.
"It kinda is, Max," he said. "Since you made me into your pretend boyfriend, I have a pretend right to know whether I need to pretend back off." The undercurrent of resentment was enough to startle Max into a quick glance at the mirror, but Alec was studiously steering further into the compound. His reflection in the windscreen, ghostly highlighted by the indicators in the dashboard, was too insubstantial to get a read on. "Look…" he started, more evenly. "I saw you two at the flag raising. I'm not trying to stick my nose where it's got no business going, but if I'm supposed to keep acting as your hetero-beard so you can avoid giving the man the truth - and what would probably be a super awkward conversation - I need a heads up, you know?"
Max frowned and whipped one of the empty laundry bags flat with a thwack. The entire building of Seattle Channel 41 went by before she said, "If what you're asking is whether me and Logan are back together, we're not." Another thwack. "Not while the virus is still kicking."
Alec's response came back with a tone of finality. "Okay." He steered the van around a corner in silence.
They reached the middle of the block and Alec slowed the van to a crawl. He slung an arm around the back of the passenger seat and leant closer to the window, clearing his throat. "Well, here it is."
They both craned their necks to look up at the building.
The lobby was brightly-lit, showing a vacant console where a security guard would be stationed during normal business hours. The whole second floor was dark, but here and there on the top third floor were offices and rooms still lit, even at this late hour.
"Keep going," Max said.
Alec circled to the back of the building and parked in a car park, concealed by well-kempt bushes and a Japanese Pagoda Tree. Max exited the car and arranged the full laundry bags back around the two hostages. When she leant clear of the van, Alec pulled the sliding door closed with a reassuring, "Hang tight, guys. We'll be right back."
They kept to the tree line then crossed to the Herald newspaper's emergency exit door. Max handed the empty laundry bags to Alec and picked the lock with the tools Alec tossed her. "Magnetic sensor," Max said, noting the recessed device at the top of the door jamb. "Soon as I open this door, we're on the clock."
"Yeah, yeah. Get on with it, already."
Max jammed the lockpick into the recessed sensor as Alec swung the door outward. The alarm was silent, which was a good indicator that the compound had on-site security. That gave them five minutes, tops, until someone showed up to investigate. Max stabbed the lockpick into the sensor again, palmed it, and grabbed a laundry bag from Alec. They closed the door behind them and began walking calmly, passing framed prints of newspaper front pages and following the glowing 'exit' signs to lead them further into the building.
They took the stairs to the second level then split up, sweeping rooms and offices for the tech on Logan's wish list and stuffing it into the laundry bags like they were santa sacks. When they hit the more populated third floor, Max walked straight past a guy at a photocopier, who didn't even give her a second glance, before spying some video-conferencing equipment in a meeting room. She stuffed it all in the bag, waited until photocopier guy walked back down the hall shuffling his papers, then popped her head out, looking both ways down the hall.
Alec was at the opposite end of the hall with a full bag tossed over his shoulder. He signalled her to wrap it up, but she shook her head and pointed down the hall where photocopier guy had disappeared.
Alec shook his head and jabbed a finger at the stairs. He whisper-yelled an angry "Max!" when she turned and followed the hall in the opposite direction. She didn't stop, so he threw up his hands and followed her.
The hall ended in rows of cubicles. A sole female was working with her desk lamp on. The blonde shifted in her chair at their arrival and watched Max and Alec walk her by, her face flickering over their unfamiliar faces, the laundry bags, and ending with an odd enquiring look. Max kept walking and lifted the laundry bag, which she thought pretty much explained itself. Alec sent the woman a generous smile.
The cubicles were walled on both sides by frosted-glass offices and an occupied boardroom. Max kept on until she reached the darkened office with door plaque engraved 'Editor in Chief'.
"Jackpot," she said, eyes going immediately to the most expensive computer in the building. She went straight for the computer and started disconnecting cables.
Alec slipped in and partially closed the door, leaving it open only a finger-breadth. He kept his eye to the gap. "That better be the Taj Mahal of computers," he said, "'cause this B and E is about to get gatecrashed by security."
"How long?"
"Uh…" Two security guards approached the blonde woman in her cubicle. They shared some words with the woman, then she pointed in their direction. One of the guard's hands went to his sidearm. "Thirty seconds." Alec pulled the door until only a sliver of a gap remained.
The sound of the energetic photocopier and the low speech from the occupied meeting room was suddenly very loud.
Max opened the laundry bag wider and packed the bulky computer in while Alec alternated between watching what the security guards were doing and making hurrying up, 'shooing' gestures. Max drew the drawstring on the laundry bag tight, moved the executive desk forward and stepped onto the desk. She pushed one of the ceiling tiles up. It was a suspended ceiling, with a five foot gap between the ceiling tiles and the concrete roof, full of wiring and ductwork that wound around the ceiling for the airconditioning. Max lowered the ceiling tile and yanked the covering diffuser off the duct. "Up here. Let's go."
Alec pulled the door shut with a soft click, stepped on the desk too and gave Max a boost up to the duct. He lifted her laundry bag up and Max pulled it in after her, then Alec's too. Alec gripped the duct and hauled himself in. He flattened himself along the duct and held the diffuser over the entrance of the duct with his fingertips just as the office door opened.
Flashlight beams swung around the room.
One of the security guards moved further in, shined his light under the desk, along the edges of the bookshelves, the windows and blinds.
"This one's clear," the guard said.
Both security guards exited the office, closing the door behind them.
Alec waited a moment then clicked the diffuser in.
"I knew I should've brought a book," he muttered.
Joshua stood under the sewer grate, put both palms on the underside and pushed. His strength lifted the grate a full foot before he tipped it and shoved it to the side. He jumped and pressed his way out of the sewer, looked both ways - there was no one on the deserted street - and loped across the road to father's house.
When he reached the porch, he straightened and walked to the front door. He eased his fist forward, stopped, pulled it back and frantically brushed his lanky hair away from his face. The fist eased forward again and knocked three times.
Joshua waited a bit, then put his ear to the wood of the door, listening as a chair scraped and a pair of footsteps grew louder.
"Who is it?" a voice enquired.
"Josh-" he started, then cleared his throat. "Joshua," he said, more firmly.
"Joshua?" The voice within sounded perplexed.
"Joshua," Joshua said, now perplexed as well. His head cocked further against the door. "Joshua who used to live here. Max's friend. Alec's friend. Mole's friend. Kat's friend -"
The door opened, and Logan stood in the doorway, still perplexed.
"We had little hotdogs."
"I remember," Logan said. "What are you doing here?"
Joshua drew up to his full height. "Here to see…" He deflated a little. "Someone."
Logan pointed at himself, if at all possible now looking more confused. "Me?"
Joshua's shoulders slumped and he averted his gaze. A pained whine came from the back of his throat. "Annie."
"Oh." Logan stood motionless, then shook his head slightly. "Oh. Right. Come in."
Josh turned to the side and sidled through the door, muttering a 'thanks'. He straightened again, looking around the room he'd once painted in, which now looked like a fourteen-year old computer gamer's haven, excepting that the majority of the equipment was blown. Of the technology that was piled around Sandeman's old wooden desk, a few red and green lights blinked stubbornly.
"I cleaned up a bit," Logan said, watching Joshua walk slowly around the room. "All your, ah, painting stuff, is down in the basement. I'll show you." He stepped around Joshua and opened the door that lead to the basement, gesturing Joshua through.
Joshua walked through with another 'thanks', and shuffled down the basement stairs.
Logan flicked the light switch on and accompanied the transhuman. He brushed a strand of cobweb off his shoulder just as his leg cramped, and he crumbled against the banister with a "Goddammit!"
Josh was at his side in a second, pulling him up by his arm.
"No - I'm alright," Logan said, wrenching his arm from the transhuman. Josh let go and he ended up against the banister again, propped up only by his arms and Joshua clutching the collar of his shirt. "Goddammit - No, I'm sorry, I'm fine," Logan said. He set his leg gingerly on the step below, then tested his weight on it. "You can let go."
His shirt sprung back down. Logan kept a hand on the banister while he tugged his shirt into place.
Joshua backed down the stairs until he was directly below Logan, both hands outstretched like he was watching a priceless artifact about to topple from overhead. "Okay now?"
Logan drew in a shaky breath. "Your father sure didn't buy this house for its easy access." He tried his leg again, but it trembled like a stump of jelly. "Soon I'll have to... get a ramp installed for the porch, then I'll use all the money I don't have to get an elevator installed just so I can get to the basement."
Joshua's head cocked to where both of the other man's knees were now bending unsteadily. "Your legs."
"Yes," he bit out. "Dr Shankar dosed me up with your blood to save me and it gave me back my legs. But the effects of transgenic blood - your blood - are unfortunately only temporary."
Joshua began rolling up his shirt sleeve. "You need more blood."
"No!"
The vehemence stopped Joshua abruptly. "Why?" he asked, then pulled at his sleeve again. "I can help. I want to help."
"There's no point." His leg finally seemed to work and Logan placed it cautiously on the step, then the other, and ducked around the transhuman. He descended the stairs again. "It gets better for a while, then it starts to deteriorate. You can't imagine -" he broke off and stalked across the floor of the basement. "I can't go through that again."
Joshua descended as well and wound through the junk in the basement. His easel, covered by a dust throw, was in the far corner he had cleared for painting when he'd lived there. His paintings of Annie were arranged around it, some sideways and some leaning backward against the wall.
Logan pulled the dust cover off the easel, revealing Joshua's last, unfinished painting of the blind woman. Logan studied the painting for a second, then balled up the dust cover. All the force was gone from his voice. "I think you probably understand about not wanting to get hurt again." He set the dust cover on top of the piano. "I'll, ah, leave you to it."
Logan withdrew.
Joshua started lifting his paintings, turning and rotating them, setting them the right side up.
"So, here's something to think about." They'd stayed completely still for what seemed to Alec like an age, listening as the guards came back and searched the office again. Then he'd had to turn around in the duct, which involved a lot of shuffling and painful body contortion. Now he followed Max on his hands and knees, increasingly regretting the length of time his wrists and knees had been pressed to the base of the metal duct by his body weight. The throbbing in his mistreated joints grew with each shuffle as he pushed the bag in front of him in a desultory fashion. "We're in an air conditioning duct on the third floor of a building, with no way of knowing whether this opens to the outside, other than shuffling around like Ray Charles and Stevie Wonder without their canes. What's the plan?"
It was close to pitch black in the duct, but Max's impatience was evident. "Keep going 'til we see something."
"Wow." The word was drawn out. "Great plan, Max. Take you long to think that up?"
"Nope."
"Well that's reassuring."
Max stopped and whipped her head around. "You got a better plan?" The duct was silent. "Thought so. You know what they say 'bout the best laid plans." She started up again, pushed the laundry bag ahead. "Keep it simple, stupid."
The duct made a slight popping, metal noise as Alec's drag and crawl began behind Max. Under his breath, Alec said, "You know that doesn't mean you put the emphasis on the stupid, right?"
Max's head jerked around again. There was a more ominous pop, a metal yawn, and Max disappeared from the duct in a wash of bright light. A crash followed and a scream.
Alec only had time to fold his arms around the laundry bag as the duct tilted and jerked and he slid down the metal duct like a bag of grain on a conveyor belt. He landed with a crash as well. He rolled and found himself crouched and clutching the laundry bag, on a boardroom table around which five professionally dressed men and women had been seated. They were now at various stages of pushing away from the desk or bolting for the door, all with identical looks of shock and confusion. It was clear that this had not been on their agenda.
One of the suited women had her hand still clenched at the plaster-covered lapel of her suit jacket, whispering a "What..." that ended in a squeak.
"Forgot my pencil," Alec said.
The woman's face blanked and she lurched drunkenly out of the room like she'd been hit with percussive grenades instead of gyprock dust.
Max glared at him from the head of the table.
"What? Haven't you seen The Breakfast Club?"
"New plan," she said, moving for the door. "Shut up and run."
"Roger that."
Their reappearance outside the boardroom caused a fresh round of panic they had to barrel through. They darted down the stairs, hit the long corridor on the second level and reversed suddenly at the sight of two security guards coming up the stairs.
Evidently the hard angles of the equipment in the laundry bags rendered their laundry worker disguises ineffective, because one of the security guards drew his sidearm immediately, followed by the other. "Stop right there!" overlapped with "Stop or I'll shoot!"
No way in hell they were stopping right there. Max, at the top of the stairs, paused only long enough to say, "Take your best shot," then pulled Alec to the right and sprinted back up the hallway.
Footsteps shuddered up the staircase.
"Are you freakin' kidding me, Max!" Alec raced up the corridor beside her. "Taunting the guys with guns? Not the best plan!" He looked completely vindicated when they had to start dodging bullets, and shot her a look that said do you see this shit?
"Trust me!" Max risked a backward glance - the guards were running behind them, intermittently taking running shots. Ahead, the bullets had plunged through the quickly advancing windows, spidering the glass. "Just keep running."
"I'm being chased by frigging bullets! Not a problem!"
Max set her shoulder and hit the window. The weakened glass shattered. Max curled protectively around the tech in her laundry bag and felt a blast of cold air hit her bodily. She landed in a roll and came out running. She heard the impact of Alec landing behind her and following.
There was a momentary silence then more shots flew around them, but blurring transgenics were hard to hit, especially with handguns.
They blurred down the slope at the back of the building and into the line of bushes that concealed Benny's van. Now invisible behind the tree-line, they lowered their profiles and waited until the shots broke off. The two guards reversed and quickly disappeared.
They were stock-still, waiting to make sure the guards wouldn't reappear, then Alec's voice came from beside her. "What did I tell you?" he said. "Something always goes wrong."
Max turned with a ready retort, which died unspoken when she saw the ends of his lips kicked up in an exhilarated grin.
She pushed at his side, nearly overbalancing him. "Weirdo. Come on. Let's get outta here."
Max climbed in beside the hostages and Alec drove Benny's van like a madman until he reached the boom-gate. He brought the van to a stop with a great squealing of tyres and breaks that left the van rocking and the hostages' eyes wide. Alec calmly reached out to swipe the card, then spun the tyres under the boom-gate and out of the media compound. He slowed a few blocks away and drove normally to the Sector perimeter. There they trundled around, looking for a deserted spot, then parked in the relative dark between two streetlights.
Max wiped a knife free of prints - an over precaution as she'd been wearing gloves - and cut the gag from the gentleman hostage's mouth.
Alec yanked the side door open just to catch the man yell, "Qù chī dà biàn!" Go eat shit! He then spat on the van's floor and glared angrily between Max and Alec.
"Woah," Alec said, for once taken aback. He lifted his foot off the van's sidestep. "Easy there, Benny. We're lettin' you go. Max here is an environmentalist - she's all into catch and release."
Max cut the gag from the female hostage, who joined her voice to the chorus of chinese obscenity. Max tossed both laundry bags full of Logan's tech to Alec, then ducked out of the van. She bent and cut the bonds from Benny's feet. Benny immediately began kicking, bucking like he was performing the worm in the middle of a dance floor, and getting closer to the open door of the van.
Max set the knife inside the van and slammed the door shut, muffling the noise, but the van continued to shudder with the force of Benny's agitation. "I'm getting the sense Benny's angry," she said.
"Yep."
They were over the fence and safely in Logan's car before Benny had the van door open.
It took them less than twenty minutes to navigate the streets back to Logan's house. Pulling up at the front, they slammed the car doors and went into the house with their loot.
They found Logan in the basement, sitting on the piano stool and staring at Joshua's easel where a painting of Annie rested.
"Getting in touch with your inner Picasso?" Max asked, noticing the smell of wet paint and turpentine.
The transgenic's voice seemed to pull Logan from his enthrallment. He turned and blinked at the two as if they'd been suddenly beamed into his basement. "No," he said.
Max looked at the palette and brushes resting in a wet bucket and shrugged. "Whatever. We got your stuff." She lifted the laundry bag, which was impressively full, and lowered it to the floor. "Want us to help you hook it up?"
"I'll do it later," Logan said, with a shake of his head. He looked from Alec, then to Max. "Thanks, guys. I mean it."
"Yeah, well remember you owe me one," Max said, "and I mean to collect as soon as you fire up your new computer."
Logan put both hands beside him on the piano stool, then lifted himself to standing. "Then I'd better get to it."
They followed Logan back up to the living room and Max set the bag on his desk. Alec dropped his next to it, ignoring the censorious look from Logan, then flopped into the armchair in front of the TV. Max dragged the other armchair over to the desk and sat on the arm.
Logan brought each piece of equipment out of the bag carefully, turning it around in his hands and placing it on the desk and floor. When he picked up a monitor with a bullet hole in it she just shrugged.
The computer Max had stolen from the Herald's Editor in Chief took pride of place on the centre of the desk. Logan plugged it into an overloaded powerboard, attached it to a monitor he brought out from another room, and turned the computer on. He inserted a thumb drive and they waited for the computer to boot while Alec flicked channels rapidly and Max shot him dirty looks.
"So. What are we doing?"
Max lifted her head from her chin and looked at Logan, who was looking back at her earnestly. "Huh?" she asked stupidly.
"You and me." When Max just continued to stare at him, he clarified, "With the computer. A favour, right?"
"Right." She straightened against the back of the chair and breathed a relieved sigh, glad because for a moment she'd thought he was about to bring up the subject of 'us'. He probably deserved a final answer on that, right as soon as she figured out the answer herself. She rested both hands behind her neck, and asked, "How do you feel about hacking?"
Logan put on a serious face. "Conflicted," he said. "I know it's illegal, but it's so darn easy."
Max sent him a grin.
It was well into the early morning when Max and Alec resurfaced in TC. Dix, snoring on the threadbare couch in HQ, stirred at their reentrance and rubbed at his eye. "How'd it go?"
"'Bout as well as expected," Alec put in. He hooked a thumb over his shoulder at Max. "Maxwell Smart here got us stuck in an air conditioning vent."
Dix flicked his eyes between the two, not quite sure whether Alec was being serious. Kat, draped across the top of Dix's couch, gave a soft huff of laughter.
Max ignored them. She was headed for Luke. Before Luke could flip a page on his clipboard to the list of never ending shit she had to get done, she dropped a print-out on top of the clipboard. "Got you covered," she said.
"And this is a requisition for..." Luke squinted, cocked his head. "This looks official."
"Because it is," she replied. "Courtesy of Logan. Change an address, and voila. Delivery of rations for three-hundred hungry National Guardsmen, arriving at our gate at 0600."
Luke blinked once. "Guess that solves the rations -" Max was already turning to leave "- problem." The clipboard dropped to Luke's side. "And I'm talking to myself again."
"You." Max pointed at Alec, who'd just sunk into a comfy-looking chair. "Since you've been in such a helpful mood, wanna help me tie up a loose end?"
Before Alec could decline rather ungracefully, the door at the far end of HQ crashed in. Mole, with all the righteous anger of one abandoned to the task of inventorying beans and preserves for hours - alone - zeroed in on Alec and started to advance. His target sprang up from the warmth of the couch. The cigar-butt falling from Mole's mouth - he'd bitten clear through it - had Alec at Max's side in a heartbeat, a hand on her shoulder as he steered her in the opposite direction. "All yours, Max," he said. "Lead the way."
By silent agreement, they exited HQ moving faster than Mole could follow. A few blocks away Max slowed and they came upon the tyre-dealership that mostly everyone tried to avoid.
At the sight of the building, Alec moved with visibly less enthusiasm. "Mind if I ask what loose end we're tying up here?" he asked.
"Next thing on the to-do list."
Max ducked under the roller-door at half-mast, and heard Alec grunt and straighten behind her. What could only be described as a tyre-fort filled the dealership, complete with two sturdy storm doors, a turret, and roof made of ply and a good portion of the camo-netting that, two days ago, Mole had complained was missing from inventory. A single table lamp perched above the nearest storm door, illuminating the novelty door mat situated below which read, in obnoxious lettering, 'come back with a warrant'.
"Jesus," Alec muttered. "They've gone full-on Lord of the Flies."
"Come on," she said, opening the nearest storm door and leaving it open wide. "Time to bring the little savages back to civilisation."
Max followed the narrow corridor of tyres roofed with ply, branching off into darker and narrower corridors to both her left and right, and which finally opened up to a sizeable space covered with the stolen camo netting. A mess of blanket, pillows and potato chip packets were stockpiled in the far right corner. Max walked into the centre of the space, the noise of her footfalls absorbed by the tyres, and looked around at the otherwise seemingly abandoned fort.
A hushed giggle from her left was her only warning of a tyre nut that catapulted toward her from the gloom. Max blurred forward and grabbed an X-8 by the scruff of his neck, who objected with a loud 'oi!'.
"All right," Max said, kicking the dropped slingshot away from the kid's scrabbling leg. "Listen up. Holiday's officially over. School starts tomorrow."
There was a collective groan as Alec emerged from a corridor to her right with a squirming kid slung over his shoulder. An X-8 in grease-covered overalls traipsed in from another corridor, followed by another X-8, and another, until a dozen pouting kids stood around her and Alec.
"Seriously?" The kid in her arms asked, every inch the petulant child.
"Yeah, seriously," she said, matching his attitude. " And I expect that netting to miraculously reappear in the storeroom by morning."
The kid's head fell back against her arm and he groaned even louder.
Max smiled and finally felt like she was getting somewhere, not knowing that at that moment, Logan was seated on the piano bench in his basement at the adverse end of his own dilemma.
There, Logan stared at the cooler Joshua had left next to his painting paraphernalia, pretty sure it was filled with the transgenic's blood.
