Neither of them slept. They lay on their flat cots, paced the cell, leaned against the bars, laid back down on the cots. They even closed their eyes, pretending. Hunger wasn't an issue, yet. But she was getting thirsty. She regretted having helped the dehydration with beer – was it two days ago?

Still, they did not sleep.

She was tired of lying down. She was not built for hours upon hours of inaction. She would have given anything for something else to do. She'd even considered trying to muster the courage to talk to Alec, but he still hadn't looked at her – at least that she could tell in the darkness. She had climbed the hard bars a couple of times, partly to see if there were any breaks in the metal, and partly for exercise. It was useless, though. Exercise would dehydrate her faster. She couldn't think of a way out. She couldn't invent a way out.

Alec lay with his back to her, feigning sleep. She knew he wasn't dozing. If he was, his breathing would change, but he kept inhaling and exhaling steadily.

Max had felt the urge to pee. For hours, she felt the pressure building on her bladder. There was no facility, no toilet, nothing in this room. Finally, she couldn't take it anymore. She had to break the silence, even if it was just to tell him not to turn around.

"Alec, if you're awake," she began, even though she knew he was, "don't turn around please. I have to use the restroom."

Alec mustered "M'kay."

Max dug a hole the farthest from their cots she could figure and fingered the waist of her pants. Am I really going to do this? She thought. Undress in front of Alec? She may have thought about it before – a fleeting thought. She wouldn't have given Manticore the satisfaction of knowing they had paired her right when Alec walked into her cell that day.

I guess I have no choice, she thought. Max pulled her clothing down and squatted over the hole. As the liquid drained, she felt relief, but it was quickly thrown back into context by her surroundings. What more than a free bladder could she feel relieved by? She was still going to be stuck here for the rest of her genetically-engineered life, which itself wouldn't be much longer. She felt sure of that, and desperate about it.

Pulling her pants up and kicking the dirt into the hole, she was struck by the idea that her remaining time on this earth, or in this earth as it were, was almost half over if what Alec said was right.

She'd done seven days before – in the cell at Manticore after her heart replacement. She had been hungry, thirsty, her muscles ached from the close quarters, and her eyes ached from trying too hard to see through the darkness. Even if she did see anything, there wasn't anyone to keep her company. She had steeled herself against the loneliness by reminding herself constantly that she wasn't going to die in there – not as a fucking number. She would always remember her name. The name her unit had given her. Max wasn't sure how many more days she could do, but she had done seven days before. Before re-indoctrination.

She shuddered at the thought. She had spent a month having most of what Alec had said about Psy-Ops done to her, repeatedly, without stop for several days at a time. Why did he think it would be any different after her recapture? Ass, she thought, walking to her cot and sitting down.

She had been in the infirmary, just starting to get her wits about her, the brain stem cells coursing through her veins, repairing her with ridiculous speed while she began planning her eventual escape, when Renfro had appeared with a couple of orderlies and a doctor, all followed by two guards. She hadn't said a thing, only nodded in 452's direction, and the orderlies had needled her with a deep sedative, laced with a pretty strong muscle relaxant. They had carried her into that room. The one with the chair.

She had been lax in the chair for the first day, but they had still strapped her in, eyes propped open like a subject out of some awful propaganda-driven book. 1984 came to mind. But the thought didn't stay there. There wouldn't have been enough room for her own thoughts when the stimuli started – the harsh sounds, the brazen images, the constant flashing, their words droning on, trying to turn her back into the questionless soldier she once was, the child soldier she had been before The Blue Lady and the puppet shows and the red balloon.

When she had started to struggle against the straps, they hooked her up to an IV of the sedative solution, and another with water and nutrients. They were going to make sure she survived this testing and make sure she was in peak condition to return to soldiering on.

While she had stared into the laser, they had given her the worst physical. They pricked her with needles, tested her blood and cells, injected her with multiple viral agents to see if she still had the immunity they had spliced into her DNA way back in her embryonic stage, tested her body temperature with relation to multiple physical levels of stress; they had cut her to see how fast she could heal. They had dislocated her shoulders and legs, then days later, pushed them back into their sockets. Were they testing how much pain she could take before she passed out? Was that it?

Then the shock therapy had begun. It was probably a week, but she had lost her sense of time while in the chair, relentless information jamming into her brain, demanding to be organized and understood and accepted without hesitation. Each time a jolt of electricity ran through her body, she thought it would jumpstart a seizure, but she could never be sure, since she had gone in and out of consciousness if the shock was too high.

The worst part had been their fertility testing. Max felt her heartbeat quicken just remembering it. With her head strapped to the board, she could only try to stretch her vision down to the merciless doctors between her legs, sticking every medical instrument they could find up into her. Who knows what they were doing? Exploring her ovaries? Removing eggs? Injecting specimen? Their sedative wasn't an anesthetic, and she could feel their scraping and prodding and rough, jagged movements inside her. She hadn't cried until that day.

Max shook herself out of the memory. She couldn't burden anyone with that information. It was hers and hers alone. She had survived that, and she had broken out. Again.

She had survived almost ten years of childhood military training in the worst conditions. She had broken out in mid-winter in deep snow, fallen through the ice into a subzero liquid atmosphere wearing only a nightgown of sorts, and still made it out alive and without hypothermia or pneumonia. She had spent ten years hiding who she used to be, making friends, getting a job, even dating – all without any serious problems.

But she had lost her brothers and sisters in the shuffle. Brin. Jace. Tinga. Zack. And Ben. She had lost Ben. Because of her, because of her unwillingness to have Ben return to Manticore and suffer at Lydecker's or Renfro's hands, she had been agonizingly merciful. She thought about him almost every day, replaying those moments in the woods when she had a decision to make.

She had compromised the safety of her friends, the identity of Eyes Only, and her own identity in the process. She had even been shot. Twice. And in all this, Alec was right. She had spent too much time trying for that normal life – the billionaire cyber-journalist boyfriend, caring friends, and normal job, when she just wasn't meant to be like them, with them.

Now, what did she have to show for it all?

Max thought about the Blue Lady. Though it defied sense and logic, she looked up through the darkness to the ceiling, trying to imagine the sky, the place the Blue Lady must be, and begged.

Blue Lady, if you're there, if you're real… Please help me find a way out of here. I'm not ready to die. I don't know if there's anything else I was meant to do, but if you give me a sign, I'll do it. I don't want my life to mean nothing.

Max felt tears stinging her dry eyes. She tried to control her thoughts so she wouldn't dehydrate any further. She wanted to retain as much water as possible. But the weight of everything came crashing down on her already-slumped shoulders and she continued crying, wondering if this was karmic retribution for everything Alec had said; just the idea compounded on her, making the weight of the burden even heavier.

Alec, still turned on his side, heard her. She was trying to hide her sobs, but he was a transgenic, too, and that came with certain peculiar perks, such as adjustable vision and enhanced hearing. He already felt horrible for what he'd said, and for making her cry.

This is what happens when I open my mouth, he chided himself. I'm supposed to protect her from this. There's no way she would have known about what would happen when her unit escaped, and it really isn't her fault that she discovered what it means to be free. She won't stop crying. I made her start and now she won't stop. Asshole.

Alec turned over and focused his vision on her. She had heard him rustle and stopped crying.

"Max," he started, wanting to have the words ready to apologize, wanting to sit up and go to her and wrap his arms around her and say how sorry he was for unloading on her. Tell her how he felt like shit for making her cry and that he didn't mean it and that they'd be okay. Tell her that lie but have it turn out to be true.

He thought about it before – maybe more than once – that they had been drawn together for a reason other than Manticore's breeding assignment. He had thought about kissing her. Just once. At least once. Before he died down here, he wanted to know what her lips felt like against his, because he was sure they were hard and punishing and soft and forgiving at the same time. Or at least to convey this urge he had to really show her how to be kissed. But that was probably the farthest thing from her mind.

They both held their breath.

Suddenly, a quick, loud buzzing sounded, rumbling the structure. A fast loud beep followed. Max immediately sobered and looked toward Alec as a bright light filled the underground bunker, lighting up Alec's face and Max's determined eyes. The light source seemed to be just outside their reach, outside the bars but inside the bunker. Just as quick as it had come on, the light blinked out.

"Guess the show's started," Max said.

Alec opened his mouth to say something, but before he could, the buzz came again, longer than the previous one, but a little softer. The bright light returned like one quick strobe, the beeping noise overlapping its departure. Then both noises stopped.

"Max! Close –" Alec began, but because the beeping returned before he could continue, she heard 'Max! Clothes,' which made no sense to her. The light was not back on yet and she couldn't see his lips forming words.

The noise was like enhanced hearing overload. It seemed like the level of volume varied per beep or buzz. Maybe the X5 brain had to work harder to adjust the volume received. Max wasn't sure if that was what was happening. Either her brain was trying to adjust the levels, or the levels were already too varied and her brain had nothing to do with it.

She raised her fingers to plug her ears and hummed to prove to herself she could still hear.

The beep stopped and she removed her fingers as the bright light came on. She looked to Alec. He must have been blinking – he sat very still except for his hand, which reached into his pocket to pull something out. The light died out and the loud buzz returned. It was so loud Max felt like her eardrums would explode at any moment.

Again, Alec tried to speak. "Cover –," but the loud buzzing prevented his words. The light came back on and she looked to Alec, who looked to be climbing off the cot and… is he chewing? She wasn't sure because the light flickered quickly like a strobe and the beep played over the buzz.

Something didn't feel right. Alec looked like he was moving toward her in short bursts, but she knew it was the effect of the light creating the illusion. She felt dizzy and looked up at his figure approaching. His eyes were still closed and she watched as he took the item out of his mouth, split it into two and shoved the pieces into his ears. He walked toward her, eyes shut, with his arms outstretched, trying to make sure he didn't bump into her.

Max's eyelids became limp as she saw Alec chewing another piece of gum as fast as any transgenic could. Her arms fell to her sides, deadweight, and she began shaking. He must have said 'Close your eyes'. She felt weak and allowed her dull muscles relief as she lowered herself to the floor. Alec's strong arms found her on the way down, clutching her elbows and guiding her gently to the ground as the trembling continued.

She couldn't speak. Whatever light and noise combination this created, it must have short-circuited her brain, the language control portion. She couldn't muster any words. Alec laid her head against his chest, her shoulder against his torso, as they settled on the ground.

The noise was too loud, but she felt him humming. The reverberation was calming to her haywire body. Alec wrapped one arm around her head, covering her eyes with his hand. With the other hand, he popped her mouth open and pulled her tongue out a little bit. A moment later, she felt him shove a gummy material in her exposed ear. He embraced her shaking body firmly, his hand shielding her from the light, and hummed.

Gotta keep humming, he thought. She's got something to hope for as long as I keep humming.

Alec thought about his twin's "Blue Lady." A couple years after the '09 escape, Alec had taken a course on modern religion. He wasn't sure if he believed in it, but he knew it offered relief and hope. He wondered if there was a god, and if there was, what was God's plan for him and his fellow Manticore alum? Were they doomed to this kind of life? Or this kind of death?

If you're real, please help her through this.

He continued humming, reverberating for her. He couldn't let her feel alone. It was probably the most devastating feeling he could think of – being alone. Max's tremors continued.

He had been humming for two hours, her body shuddering against him uncontrollably. The 'show' had induced her seizure. It didn't make sense. The seizures were caused by a chemical deficiency, he thought. Right? But if they aren't, then what is it? Did some other sucker soldier change the engineering of this program so that just the right combination of sounds and lights will induce one? Is it targeted to the 09ers? Alec could hear the beeping and buzzing slow down, muffled by the gum in his ears.

He chanced opening his eyes. When he did, there was a dim light playing off the metal bars. Maybe a malfunction in the lighting. Either way, it was not dependable. But at least the show had stopped. Max's quivers slowed to a stop and she fell against him. He waited for her intake of breath.

Breathe, Max, he willed. Please.

As if answering his silent prayer, she breathed. She had fallen unconscious, or maybe to sleep. He wasn't sure which.

Carefully, he removed his hand from her eyes to find them closed. She looked like a sleeping angel. He untangled himself from her and stood up, stretching his legs a little, then lifted her onto her cot. He used the tips of his fingers to push her tongue back in – it was pretty dry and could use a little moisture. He swept the hair from her face and pinched the gum out of her ears, then his own. He mashed the pieces together and threw them out of the iron bars into the bunker.

Alec returned to his own cot and lay down on his back, facing the iron bar, then concrete ceiling. He sighed, thinking only two words as he closed his eyes, thankful to the Blue Lady for her efforts.

She's okay. She's okay.