Now it was Logan's turn to blink back tears. Where is Max? Now that's a good question, Logan thought. I guess they would have taken her body back to Manticore. Out of the corner of his eye, Logan saw Hope cock her head to the side like she was listening to something and then narrow her eyes.

"What?!" Hope demanded. "What is it? Tell me!" Logan couldn't meet her eyes. How do you tell someone their sister is dead? he asked himself. Caught up in his thoughts, Logan didn't hear the low growl that emitted from Hope's throat. He was so caught up in his thoughts that he didn't notice when Hope finally jumped from her chair and stalked toward him. He was forced to turn his attention back to her when he found himself thrown against the wall with Hope's hand at his throat. When he jerked his eyes to meet hers, he was amazed to see that her eyes had turned from a forest green to a deep yellow.

He could tell the very instant she focused on him. Logan couldn't tear his eyes away from hers. His body went slack. "Tell me," Hope said again.

"She and Zach tried to take down Manticore. They failed. Max is KIA, and Zach is MIA." Logan heard a voice answer, and wondered were it was coming from before he realized it was his own.

Hope snatched her hand back from his throat as though it had burned her. Logan slumped to the floor and held his head in his hands. He wasn't sure what had just happened. He remembered yellow eyes and growls, and Hope''s eyes staring into his, probing, searching. Logan jerked his head up. Hope. Hope had done something to him. Logan met her eyes quickly, but they were just a forest green, without a trace of yellow. Hope met his glaze solemnly. Logan tore his eyes away and quickly ran them over her, studying her more closely than he had before.

She was small. Even smaller then Max. 5"1, maybe 5"2. Her clothes were three sizes too big for her. Her hair was red, no, orange, like carrots. It was thick and curly and reached her hips. Her eyes looked to big for her face, and her skin was almost white. She looked like a little girl more then a solder of twenty.

A flicker of movement drew Logan's attention back to her face. Hope's eyes were moving swiftly behind her closed eyelids. It was like she was searching for something inside herself. Logan watched her for a few more seconds before she let out a satisfied sigh and opened her eyes.

"What was that all about? What did you do to me?" Logan said sharply. "How did you--" He was interrupted by a very impatient Hope.

"Max isn't dead."

Logan froze. Of corse Max was dead. She died in his arms. But Hope sounded so sure--so forceful.

"How...I mean...what...umm, are you sure?" Logan finely managed. Hope gave him a dismissive glance.

"Of course I'm sure. I would know. I'm her sister remember?" she said.

Logan shook his head. "Nope, sorry, that just doesn't do it for me. You're going to have to come up with a better reason than that to convince me."

Hope looked at him thoughtfully. Ok, she thought, here goes nothing.

"Okay, Logan. I'm going to tell you something. Something I've never told anyone." Hope took a deep breath. Logan had a feeling that whatever she was about to tell him was big--very big. And suddenly, he wasn't so sure he wanted to know. But it was too late to stop, Hope had already began talking, and whatever he was about to hear he had brought upon himself.

"There are things about me, Logan..." Hope paused. "Things about me that Manticore can't even explain. They labeled me an X5, but I was never really one of them. I can do all the things they can do. Run, jump, swim, track, evade, hunt..." She paused again. "Kill." Hope watched as Logan flinched on the last one. "I can do all the things they can do, but I do it better."

Hope watched as Logan narrowed his eyes. "What do you mean better?" he asked.

"It's really hard to explain..." Hope paused, trying to find the words, trying to put into words what had never been said. At least not out loud, Hope thought. "You know that Zach was the best of us right? I mean that's why he was our CO. As fast as we ran, he always ran faster. As long as we could hold our breath, he could always hold his longer. Do you see were I'm going with this?" When Logan nodded she continued. "At least that's what they wanted the rest of them to think. I mean you can't have a simple solider running faster and holding her breath longer then the CO. The CO's the best. That's just the way it is."

Hope paused. Logan could tell there was more to this then just being better than Zach. He also knew it wasn't about the thing she could do with computers. He had seen the plug.

Hope drew in a breath and started talking again. "I don't think Manticore is even sure how they did it. They were never able to again achieve what I can do. The closest they got was the X7s. The only thing I can think of is that I must have gotten it from my mother. They told us that our mothers were sluts and two dollar whores. Maybe some of them were, but not mine. Mine was special. I don't know how, I just know she was. She had a gift, a gift that was passed on to me."

Hope glanced at Logan. He was busy staring at her wrist. She resisted the urge to snort. Here she was trying to open up to this guy and all he could think about was her hardware. "I can see your interest lies else were. Fine, I'll tell you about this," Hope gestured to her wrist. "First." Hope smirked when Logan flushed slightly.

"Sorry, it's just that I've never seen anything like that, ever, anywhere, at all..." he trailed off quickly.

Hope just waved away his excuses. "Every series is supposed to have one soldier that could deal with the technical stuff. It was a good idea really, I mean we were coming into a technical age--doing things we'd never even thought possible. That is at least before the Pulse. So you can see why it looked like a good idea at the time. But I'm actually the only one from all the series that survived." When Logan gave her a questioning look she said, "It's a very um." Hope paused. "Painful thing to be chosen for. All the others that were picked couldn't take it. The only reason I survived is because of one of my mother's gifts."

Logan perked up upon hearing her last sentence. "Because of one of them? You mean like there's more than one?" When she nodded he went on. "What, like two?" With a negative shake of her head, she said, "More than two." "How many more?" he asked. "Lots," was the only answer she would give him. Frustrated he said, "Fine, but which one kept you alive when all the others died?" "This one," she answered simply, she jerked a knife out of her boot, and without even a moments hesitation about what she was about to do, used it to slit her throat.