Chapter Nine

Max had barely made it out the door before she heard a voice calling out her name, pulling her up short and cutting off her escape.

"Max!"

Original Cindy was crossing the parking lot in front of her, heading right for her. She wanted to keep walking, wanted to get as far away from the clinic as she could. She needed to go somewhere she could deal with everything going on in her head by herself – she wanted to get to the Space Needle, where she knew the height and silence would help clear her thoughts – but there was no way she could run away from Cindy. She'd tried that before, and it had never turned out well.

So she stopped where she was and waited for O.C. to reach her side.

"What's wrong, Boo?" Cindy asked. "Is it Alec? Is he...?"

Max shook her head. "He's awake. He's..."

"Oh, thank God!" Cindy said. "Girl, made me think something bad happened, the look on your face. He's awake, though? So he's gonna be okay?"

Max shrugged and looked at the ground, unable to make herself look her friend in the face. "I don't know. I... I left. Before the doctor got there."

"Why'd ya do that?"

Cindy was confused, and Max didn't blame her. She'd been calling her every few hours, keeping her updated on Alec's condition, so Cindy knew that Max had been sitting in his room all night. It didn't make any sense that she'd leave before hearing what Sam Carr had to say about Alec's chances for recovery now that he was awake.

But she'd stayed long enough to hear what Alec had to say about things, and that was more than enough.

"He didn't..." She was having a hard time putting it into words, just exactly how the things Alec had said were affecting her. "He doesn't think I'm real," she finally forced out. "Alec doesn't. He thinks... God, Cindy, he thinks I left him there. He thought I wouldn't come for him."

Cindy tilted her head a bit, and Max knew she was considering how to react to that. She wondered if Cindy was asking herself the same questions Max was – what had she done, how badly had she treated him, that he really expected her to just leave him where he was and forget about him? Did he really think she hated him that much?

Cindy's final reaction was a shrug and a huff. "So what?"

Max finally lifted her head and looked at Cindy's face. That wasn't even close to what she'd been expecting her to say.

"What?"

"Why does it matter what he thought when he woke up? Boy's head was messed up, you said. Drugs and fevers and torture make people say things that don't make much sense, right?"

"Yeah, but Cin..."

"Besides, this ain't about you." Cindy's words stung, but that was one of the things Max loved about her the most. She didn't hold back on telling anyone what she thought, especially not the people she really cared about. "You got a place to be, Max, and it ain't out here in the parking lot hiding because Alec, half-dead and out of his head, said something that hurt your feelings."

Max nodded her head wordlessly.

"Okay, this is ridiculous. I come to see Alec, and I ain't spending all my time standing around outside with you. Now, where do I need to go?"

Max sighed deeply. "Yeah. Yeah, you're right. Follow me."

Max turned and headed back into the clinic, with Cindy right behind her.

"'S gonna be okay, Boo. We just got bigger things to worry about right now. Let's get him fixed up, and then we can worry about the little stuff, 'k?"

"Yeah," Max answered. "Yeah, okay."

Sam Carr was standing in the hallway with Logan when Max and Cindy walked up. Logan looked at them and smiled, nodded his head at Cindy in greeting, then returned all of his attention to what the doctor was saying. Max and Cindy joined them silently.

"The fever's not down far enough yet," Sam was saying. "But it's starting to drop. His heart rate and blood pressure are still too low, but they look like they're on the way up."

"So he's okay, then?" Cindy asked. "He's gonna be good?"

"I can't answer that yet," Sam said. "I need to see what his blood is doing, if the stem cells really have replicated enough to start fighting this. And I really need to get that incision checked and rebandaged. There's enough blood on it now that I'm worried he managed to hurt himself when he was thrashing around in there."

"So do it," Max said, confused. "You don't need our permission to do that."

"No, but I do need his," Sam said. "Or rather, I need his cooperation, and he's not giving that at all right now. He won't let me touch him, and every time I try, he starts fighting again. I'd sedate him, but until I can get a look at his bloodwork and see what drugs he's still got in his system..."

"So you need him to lay still," Cindy said. "Need somebody to talk him into behaving himself?"

"Yes," Sam said. "I'm really glad you came back, Max, because I was thinking you..."

Max was already shaking her head, trying to figure out how she could explain to Sam that Alec wouldn't let her touch him either, since he thought she was an hallucination. Cindy saved her the trouble.

"I got that," she said. "Let O.C. work her magic. I'll have him eatin' outta the palm of my beautiful hand."

Cindy smiled quickly at all three of them before walking into Alec's room. Sam followed her to the door to watch her through the window, and Max and Logan walked behind them slowly.

"What happened, Max?" Logan asked quietly. "Why'd you run out? What did he say?"

Max took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "He doesn't think I'm real," she answered. "Because he doesn't think I looked for him."

Logan tipped his chin in confusion. "So, he didn't expect you to find him? Why did that...?"

"No," she interrupted. "It's not that he didn't expect me to find him. It's that he expected me not to. He thought I wouldn't even try."

"Oh." Logan's voice was full of understanding. "Give him time, Max," he said. "Let him get his head back on straight. We have no idea what they said to him while they were torturing him, but with all those drugs and how much pain..." He stopped long enough to clear his throat. "The point is, it wouldn't have been hard for them to convince him of anything. If they told him that you weren't coming, to keep him feeling isolated, it might take a while to overcome that."

Max nodded again. "I know that. It's just hard, ya know? Knowing that he thought it. Wondering if he still thinks it. Hearing him say it."

"We just have to give him the time and space he needs to get better. Completely better, not just physically. He's bruised and broken in places we can't see. And for now, we start with the most immediate concern, and we concentrate on the physical. Because without that, none of the rest matters."

Max glanced through the window and saw Cindy standing at Alec's side, holding his hand and running her fingers through his hair.

"It still feels wrong," she muttered. "That should be me in there."

"Cindy's good at this," Logan said. "If anyone can get him calmed down enough to..."

Whatever Logan had been about to say was forgotten when Alec started screaming again.

When Cindy walked through the door, she thought that what Alec needed most was normality. He needed people to treat him the way they always had. He needed to feel like nothing had changed. He needed to not be coddled or babied. The last thing he needed was people acting like he was broken or that he needed someone to fix him.

She managed to hold onto those thoughts until she saw his face for the first time. After that, all she really wanted to do was wrap him up in her arms and hold him until it all went away.

"Alec?" she said quietly.

He didn't answer her, didn't turn toward her or acknowledge her presence at all. He didn't even move. He just stared straight ahead, with his head turned slightly on the pillow, like he was looking out the window. But the glazed, faraway look in his eyes made her think he wasn't seeing much of anything.

"Alec, baby?"

That got a reaction, though not the one she'd been hoping for. He turned his head slowly and blinked a few times when he saw her standing there. Then his eyes narrowed in what she thought looked like suspicion.

"Cindy?"

She could barely hear his voice, and if he hadn't been right in front of her, she wouldn't have recognized it as his. It was small, hesitant, uncertain and weak, and none of those were words that she would have ever associated with Alec.

"Yeah," she said, forcing a smile as she crossed the room to his side slowly. "Yeah, Original Cindy's here. Hear you been givin' your doc a hard time."

Alec shook his head slowly, but didn't speak again. He was still looking at her, though, watching her warily as she approached his bed.

"No? 'S not what he says." If Alec wasn't going to talk, then she'd just fill the silence in the room by herself. She was good at that. "Says you won't let him get a good look at ya."

She was close enough now to see the blood-soaked bandage that had the doctor so worried, and she had to agree that it looked bad.

"You're bleedin', honey," she said, pointing at his side without touching it. "Ya gotta let him fix that."

He didn't take his eyes away from her face when he shook his head again, and the expression he wore was starting to bother her. She couldn't figure out which one of them had more doubt about what he was really seeing.

"Hurt you pretty bad, didn't they?" she asked before she could stop herself. She saw him flinch and mentally kicked herself for her tactlessness. "I'm sorry."

Everything she'd thought about not treating him any differently than she ever had was completely forgotten. She couldn't stop herself from reaching down to take his hand in hers, and even when she felt him tense up, she couldn't make herself let go.

"It's okay, Boo," she whispered to him. "You know Original Cindy ain't gonna hurt you."

His breathing was speeding up, and his body was still tense, and she knew that he needed to calm down. She ran her free hand through his hair gently.

"I got you, baby," she said. "Ain't gonna let nobody hurt you. Not while O.C.'s around."

Alec closed his eyes as he nodded his head, and she could feel him starting to relax. When he leaned his head into her hand, and whispered, "Cindy," she couldn't help but smile down at him.

"That's it," she said. "Gonna be okay now." She knew she could claim it as a victory, but it was one she'd give anything to not have needed to win. And her job wasn't finished yet. "Can I get the doc? You won't fight him this time?"

Alec nodded slowly. "You stay."

"Won't go nowhere," she answered. "Be right here the whole time. Doc'll get that hole in your side fixed right up, and you can stop worryin' your pretty little head about it."

She felt the change immediately. His body went stiff again, he pulled away from her hand, and he stared up at her.

"Wha... what?"

Cindy looked down at him in confusion.

"No," he gasped. "Get off."

"Alec," she said as she tightened her grip on his hand and pressed the palm of her hand against his face. "Calm down, baby. Cindy's..."

"Don't!" It would have been a shout if he'd had the strength for it, and she knew that. As it was, it sounded more like he was begging. He was fighting her, pushing himself as far into the bed as he could go and trying to pull his arm free. "Get away from... don't touch me!"

She didn't know what to do, didn't know what had happened, didn't know what she'd done wrong... but it was becoming clear pretty quickly that she'd managed to send him somewhere in his mind, somewhere he didn't want to be, somewhere that wasn't where he actually was, but he couldn't tell the difference. She'd managed to trigger something, somehow, and she knew for a fact that he wasn't seeing her anymore.

When Alec closed his eyes again, threw his head back and screamed, Cindy's heart slammed into her throat. And suddenly, Max didn't seem quite so selfish for having run away from him.

Max caught Cindy by the arms when she tried to leave the room.

"He needs us," she said urgently, reminding Cindy of her own words in the parking lot. "We can't keep running. None of us."

"Max, this is... how do you..."

Max took a deep, shaking breath. "It's not really him, remember? He's too sick, doesn't know what he's saying. He doesn't understand what's going on."

"He's so scared," Cindy whispered. She glanced back at him across her shoulder. "The poor baby."

"He's not a baby," Max said. She was watching past Cindy's shoulder, too, watching Logan and Sam trying to bring Alec back from the edge one more time. "He's hurt and he's sick, but that's it. And he's gonna be fine."

Logan was standing at Alec's left side again, the same place he'd been earlier, and he was doing the same things Max had seen him do then – holding Alec's hand in one of his own and rubbing his other hand up and down Alec's arm. Max envied Logan the ability to get that close even as she wondered when he'd gotten it.

Since when did Alec accept comfort and support from anyone? And when exactly had he started accepting it from Logan?

Logan was talking to him, his voice calm and gentle, soothing and reassuring. "It's okay, Alec. You're safe here. You know that. Calm down and breathe. It's all okay."

Max and Cindy stood against the wall, near the door, watching in awe as Logan succeeded at the one thing that neither of them had been able to do – bringing Alec back out of the nightmare he kept getting trapped in.

Alec grabbed at Logan frantically with his right hand, and Logan responded by letting go his hold on Alec's hand and wrapping his fingers around the fist that was suddenly tangled in his shirt.

"Calm down, Alec," he said.

"She's here," Max heard Alec gasp out.

"No," Logan said with a shake of his head. "No, Alec, she's not. That was Cindy. You're at Sam Carr's clinic, remember? There's no one here who doesn't belong. You're safe."

Logan glanced across at Max just long enough for her to see the understanding in his eyes. Both she and Logan knew exactly who Alec thought Cindy was, but neither one of them was going to tell her that.

"No, it... she... she said... called me..."

"Alec, look at me," Logan answered. But Alec didn't look at him, didn't stop talking to himself, so Logan put his right hand on the side of his face and made him. "Look at me. You're sick. You're hurt. I know you're confused and you're scared, but no one here is going to hurt you." Max saw him searching Alec's eyes for recognition, and she could tell that he wasn't happy with what he saw.

"Alec!"

Alec stopped mumbling and focused all of his attention on the man who'd called his name, and Max saw his entire face change. There was no more fear, or anger, or confusion. In Alec's eyes, looking up at Logan, there was nothing but trust.

"Logan," he said.

"Yeah." Logan smiled down at him. "You back with me?"

Alec nodded his head quickly, but didn't let go the hold he had on Logan's shirt.

"Dr. Carr's going to take a look at you now, and you're going to let him. All right?" Alec nodded again, but he looked doubtful. "He just wants to make sure you're getting better. That's all. So he's going to take a little blood and change that bandage on your side."

It only took a couple of minutes for Sam to do what he needed to do, and through it all, Alec kept his eyes on Logan's face and his hand wrapped tightly in Logan's shirt. And Logan was talking to him, his voice steady, explaining everything Sam was doing. Sam looked up and nodded, indicating that he was done.

"Okay, Alec. All done," Logan said. He gently pulled Alec's hand away from his shirt and placed it across his chest. "That's it. That wasn't so bad, now was it?"

Alec shook his head.

"You can go back to sleep now, all right? I have a feeling that you're going to feel a lot better the next time you wake up."

"Logan..."

"We'll talk later, Alec. Right now, you need to sleep, and I need to go with Dr. Carr..."

"No!"

"Shhh," Logan soothed. "I'll be right outside, watching through the window, and I'll be back in no time. Me and Max and Cindy, we're not going anywhere."

"Max..." Alec's voice was weakening as his eyes slid closed. "Need Max..."

Max's heart pounded in her chest and she swallowed hard against the lump in her throat. She felt Cindy's hand on her arm and took a deep breath.

"She's here," Logan said. "And she'll still be here when you wake up."

"Came... for me..."

"Yes, she did. We did."

"Real?"

"We're real, Alec," Logan said. "This is real."

Alec's whole body relaxed, and he stopped fighting the exhaustion that was pulling him under. In only seconds, he'd fallen into a deep, and Max hoped nightmareless, sleep.

Logan straightened up and followed Sam to the door, then held it open and motioned for Cindy and Max to walk out ahead of him. Max saw him take one last look at Alec before he moved out into the hallway.

"I'll go check this," Sam said, holding up the vial of blood he'd finally managed to draw. "I was right about that incision, too. He did rip it open a little, but it's starting to heal on its own. Right now, I think we're all going to be happy with what these results show."

"Thanks, Sam," Logan said.

"No, Logan, thank you. If you hadn't... I don't know how you did it, but I couldn't have done it without you."

Neither Max nor Cindy spoke until after Sam had left.

"How'd you do that?" Cindy finally asked.

Logan shrugged. "I don't know. He did it the first time, too, after you left, Max." He looked over at her, and she smiled at him shyly. "He just listens to me, and acts like he wants me there. I don't know why."

Max nodded her head in sudden understanding. "He thinks he's hallucinating me, and he thinks Cindy is someone else," she said. "You're the only one he trusts right now."

Logan looked through the window and back into the room, watching Alec sleep, looking out for him like he'd said he would. "I know that," he said. "What I don't understand is why it's me he's latched on to."

"Because you're the only one he knows is real," Max answered.

Logan turned toward her, surprised.

"You couldn't be nobody else," Cindy added. "There's only one Logan Cale."