He looked up at the sight before him, grinning appreciatively. 'Now that's a fine lookin ass if ever I saw one!' Smirking, he considered the damage Max'd inflict if she knew what he was doing and thanked the fact that she was currently busy scaling the building they were about to infiltrate and help themselves to the financial services located therein. They were running low on cash. He'd saved quite a large amount from his pool sharking days and she, well, she'd had her benevolent benefactor Logan. He couldn't really remember how or when Logan had become such an irritating presence in his life. It seemed like he'd always rubbed him up the wrong way. But anyway, regardless of where their small fortune had been amassed, it was exactly that – small and dwindling fast. So they'd taken it upon themselves to relieve this thriving company, of its monetary burden.

'damn that cat suit is hot!' the voice in his head said bringing his mind back to earlier thoughts 'I know, its like its sprayed on' he commented back.

He had grown to accept that both he and the annoying voice residing in his head were physically attracted to Max and he'd taken to having such observational conversations with it from time to time, but he insisted it was purely because he hadn't gotten any action in over 3 months. The voice begged to differ but he figured they would just have to agree to disagree on that point.

Having reached the window they had picked out to enter from, Max signalled she would go in and scope the area and indicate when he should join her. He nodded and watched as she slid her body into the small opening much like a cat. Moments later, she appeared at the window and motioned for him to join her. When he stepped into the room, he made a cursory scan of the area before he padded over to where Max was. She had already located the safe and was walking around it, looking for any external security features. There was a silent tripwire attached to the base so they would have to input the correct 6 digit security code to get access, unless they would rather have security and sector cops on their asses…err…nope, guess it was gonna be a case of in and out without raisin so much as an eyebrow. Alec pulled a small electronic device he and Dix had put together during their two day rendezvous and attached it to the safe. It bypassed the safe's own built in computer mechanism, overriding its security and eventually it would display the security code for Alec.

As it was doing its thang, Alec couldn't help but smile a little as he recalled showing this baby to Mole and Max. They had both looked at it with admiration. Ok so maybe it more of a glimmer where Mole was concerned. But what made him smile was how Mole had looked back at them and said: "what can I say, you're a regular 007 and this guy fancies himself as Q" that one comment had lead to a long debate as to how easy he could have been a real life Bond, if not even better than all the Bonds put together. Alec had also tried to convince Maxie to be his Bond girl telling her she'd finally get a chance to be with a bona fide handsome, suave, charismatic bachelor. She had turned him down though, of course, saying she'd rather be M and boss him about! 'Maxie Maxie Maxie' Alec mentally shook his head in amused frustration.

A throat quietly cleared causing him to glance at Max and he caught her questioning look. 'What?!' he thought and he almost frowned back in confusion before he followed her eyes down and realised that while his gizmo had called up the code, he'd been standing around with his head in the clouds instead of putting it in. Giving her a small embarrassed smile, he hurriedly entered the code, which broke into a more confident grin as the safe beeped its acceptance. Rolling her eyes she stepped in front of him, shoving him away playfully and began emptying out the safe. As she did so, she couldn't help but reflect at how great it felt to do this and not feel the terrible guilt and self loathing she would have felt eating away at her had she been in Seattle still, with Logan.

A while later, back in the confines of their room, and dressed in their comfier bed clothes they were counting their loot. Alec was sitting up against the headboard, whilst Max was sprawled out on her stomach beside him.

"Whew Maxie, I think we rinsed 'em out! We've got enough to last us a good while"

"And in style!" she quipped happily.

Stuffing the money into their holdalls and lining their wallets and their jeans, in case of emergency, they settled back down to watch TV. Max had rotated on her stomach so that her head, resting in her hands, was at the foot of the bed and her feet were crossed at the ankles and rocked in the air, disturbing Alec's view of the screen. He batted her feet away causing her to look back at him over her shoulder with a rebellious gleam in her eye. Turning back around, she continued kicking and waving her legs as though she had no idea she was disturbing him, until Alec grabbed a foot by the ankle and stroked a finger down the curve of her foot. She couldn't help but try and jerk her foot from his grasp in reaction. Grinning vengefully, he began tickling her foot mercilessly, grabbing it with either hand whenever she kicked it free and swapping to the other foot when she was successful in writhing it away. Both were laughing uncontrollably by now.

"Oh god! Alec stop!" she laughed and then let out a small shriek which made Alec grin even more. He was almost positive no one had ever seen Maxie like this, ever! He let go of her foot, pounced on her, spinning her around in her momentary surprise and within seconds he was tickling her sides instead, making her squeal even louder with laughter and beg harder for him to stop. He didn't relent even after he'd had her telling him how sorry she was and promising not to do it again but suddenly she went stiff and he looked up at her curiously. She ignored him to tilt her head and stare at the TV and he followed her eyes. He felt something smoulder within his chest as he watched the blue and white stripes float across the screen, realising what had caught her attention so easily as he listened to Logan's frustratingly condescending voice filter from around those stupid 'eyes'. He lifted himself away off her and saw her wriggle back to a comfy position, her eyes not leaving the screen once. Sitting himself back at the head of the bed, he looked away from the scene dejectedly.

'Why the heck am I unhappy for? What's new there anyway? She's always been like this over the guy' he glared at Max's back, for a moment disliking her before he shook that thought away. 'It's not her, it's them. They're so wrong for each other; they only make one another miserable'

'So why do you care so much if it does?' the voice in his head asked. It was getting to be such a pain at questioning him that he was thinking of calling it Biggs coz Biggs had been a wise guy like that. 'Coz she deserves better than…this' his eyes flickered back to her. She was lying on her stomach; her head held up in her hands, propped up on her elbows, head tilted. 'Smitten with a guy on TV… ' he thought disgustedly 'a guy she can't touch anyway and even if they could, he'd still sap the life out of her and make her so…so repressed! He fumed. He was getting angrier with himself too for getting so worked up over it. Try as he might he couldn't fight the feelings that had surged through him when 'Eyes Only' had rocked up.

'Hmm, y'know your eyes are lookin greener than usual today, jealous are we Alec?' Biggs asked.

'No, like I said, she deserves better'

'Someone like you maybe?' Biggs observed innocently

'Yeah. Wait, no, no…I don't mean me, I mean I would be a step up sure but we wouldn't, we don't work like that'

'So why get your knickers in such a twist? Face it bud, you're the one who's smitten' Biggs taunted. Alec refused to answer back to this observation though he felt something inside him stir as some of what had been said hit home. 'Maybe I, I dunno' he wondered to himself. The only woman he'd ever loved was Rachel, none of the women he'd been around since had held any affection in his heart, until Max. 'But I loved Rachel right? Yet that felt nothing like this, this is just….' His eyes drifted back over Max 'something else!' and with that he fled to go to the bathroom.

Listening to Logan drone on and on Max found herself lost in her own thoughts. At first, she'd been so shocked to hear his voice again she'd been eager to listen to it. She'd automatically turned to it for the familiar feelings of comfort and guidance she usually found there. But as he'd begun his caped crusader speech she realised that she had now become disillusioned by Logan. She no longer felt comforted or guided by him. In fact as she sat there, she realised that before Logan, she'd never felt guilty for being transgenic, she'd never felt despair at her own kind. Logan came along and made her believe he could guide her to the path of righteousness and that not only would he find her family, by following his example she would be more fulfilled. And she had followed him, with all her heart and soul, but all she'd found was self deprecation over and over again. For stealing to get by, oh no, that was bad unless it was for the cause, for being made in a test tube, for getting caught and letting him think she was dead, for the virus, for having friends she could touch and would rather hang out with, for having killed in her past, something that she had been made to do, for her heat…..all of it and many, many more. He had made her feel so bad about everything it was a wonder she even missed her old life. Looking back, comparing how she felt now and how she'd felt then, she knew for certain Logan had never made her as happy as her time on the run with Alec had made her. 'How could I have loved this man? Was I ever really in love with him? How the hell do you even know if you're in love?'

She wasn't being selfish, she realised how much Logan had done for her and her kind but it was always done with an expectation of something in return, he'd find her family in return of her services, he'd saved her life, to be able to say that he'd done it and not Alec, he'd helped her hide Zack but only if she chose to stay with him over her brother, he'd helped bring down Manticore, not because he cared about them, he'd never even met them, how was he even sure they wanted saving? No he'd done it because he wanted to be the hero.

Max sighed as she heard Logan's voice being replaced by the show they had been watching. Sitting up, Max glanced around for Alec.

Alec had stayed in the bathroom until he had heard the end of the bulletin and then, after a quick glance in the mirror to smooth over his features, he walked back into the room. He saw that Max was waiting for him and one look at her face and he just knew she'd want to talk about Logan and how much she missed him blah blah. So he forced himself to appear to be indifferent as he approached the bed. She switched the TV off and climbed into bed beside him, signalling the end of that activity. Turning to face one another he patiently watched her bite her lower lip and glance downwards as she thought of the words to begin with.

"Alec?"

"Yeah?"

"ummm, can I ask you a personal question?"

"Yeah"

"Well, how do you know that you loved Rachel?" she asked

Alec was floored by that comment. He hadn't anticipated that. Max looked up at him through her lashes, trying to see his reaction. She knew it was a sensitive topic, but she had been wondering whether or not she had ever loved Logan at all and was hoping that Alec, having definitely been in love before, would be able to tell her what it felt like.

"I… I just do" he replied weakly.

Truth was, whilst in the bathroom he'd been wondering the same thing. Had he loved Rachel? He thought he had but now, with Max, he was feeling things he'd never felt with Rachel. They hadn't been together long and he didn't really know her as well as he knew Max. The whole thing confused him and left him feeling guilty too. Had Rachel died because of a man that didn't even love her? Had they really loved each other or was it just an infatuation with one another? He didn't want to believe that because it meant he'd never been loved before. But he knew that she hadn't even known him for who he really was…she'd been attracted to a part of him, the side he'd allowed for her to see but would she have loved him if she knew who and what he was?

To say Max was disappointed by his answer was an understatement. So she tried to pry it out of him

"How do you know she loved you then? What did she do?" she asked innocently. Unbeknownst to her, Alec was slowly growing increasingly defensive, 'Why the heck is she asking me all this? Has she always known what I'm still tryina figure out and wants to have gloating rights that her love life is more real than mine?'

"What do you mean what did she do?" he said evasively

"I…I'm just trying to find out how you knew you loved her and that she loved you back.." she trailed off as she detected something behind his eyes that belied the calmness they displayed. There was something wrong with him.

"Well, why don't you go first and enlighten me, Maxie? Tell me how you know that you and Logan love one another?" he snapped back as his frustrations got the better of him and he put up his defences.

She had no answer to that. Those were her own doubts thrown back to her! Why was he being so damn cagey, he never kept things from her before, not since they'd stopped hiding from one another. Dammit, he was supposed to make things clearer for her and help her figure things out, not…..just…not be like this! Max felt her irritation consume her and she decided to change tactics and tried to antagonise him into telling her.

"What, can't think of anything to say so you're throwing this at me? What are you so afraid of Alec? That I might find out…" but before she could continue he flung himself from their bed and was shoving his clothes on.

"Find out what Max?" he demanded. She sat up, staring at him with regret and confusion. She didn't know what she'd done to piss him off so bad. After all, in the past she'd said much worse.

"That I'm incapable of falling in love? Unlike you?" he growled as he tugged on his boots.

"Or maybe, that I'm incapable of falling in love with? Is that it, that what you wanna hear huh?" he pulled on his polo neck jumper and grabbed his jacket.

"No! Alec, wait! Wold you just listen? I didn't mean it to sound like that! I wasn't even.." she scrambled out of bed. Too late, she now realised that Alec wasn't all that sure about himself when it came to love. Pretty much like her then. But now he was walking away angry at her coz he'd misunderstood her. Ok, so she had made a wrong move aggravating him too. She tried to come clean to him about what had made her question him but he cut her off.

"Save it Max! I'm goin out. I'll be back later!" and with that he slammed the door and left. She stood speechless, staring at the door. How had the night gone oh so horribly wrong? She hurried to look for her clothes and began getting dressed. She had to go after him, explain herself and apologise!

A/N I am almost halfway through the next chap. I wrote a load and have had to split it into two chaps instead, so expect an update v.soon!!