Black winged night
By Jondy octavia_hermione@hotmail.com 20.7.01
Summary: Brin and Max finally free themselves from the clutches of Manticore.
Disclaimer: I own noth-ing. Noth-ing. Just like that guy says nothing in Hogan's Heroes (he he he)
Author's Notes: This is the sequel to Saving Brin and The Message, and probably the last story I will write in this series. It can be a triple story bonanza. (I knew I would be able to incorporate the word 'bonanza' into one of my stories). But I reckon I probably will write tons more Dark Angel stuff. I am, after all, an insomniac, so I have tons of free time in the middle of the night. But also this year I am doing School Cert (a big big exam that has the potential to ruin my life if I fail it...aahhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!! ) and I am in FULL PANIC MODE HELP HELP HELP cos I have exams......panic panic panic....we're my prozac......calm calm blue ocean.
Please review!!!!!!! Puh-lease peeeze pweeaziiieah? You're the bestest ppls eva. Thanks from Jondy
********
Though Max never slept, normally, except when she forced herself to, she found she couldn't now. Whenever she shut her eyes, she saw the reprogramming propaganda. Traitors. Escapees. Cowards. X-5656. X-5599. X-5452. X-5734. X-5338. X-5712. X-5466. X-5219. X-5377. X-5882. X-5542. X-5915. Your duty is to Manticore. Duty. Obedience. Courage. And the pictures - the slides of her and her siblings who had escaped, their nine year old faces looking expressionlessly at the camera.
Sometimes when Max opened her eyes the pictures were still there.
********
Brin woke suddenly in the middle of the night. Ever since she'd been returned to Manticore she had slept on edge, awakened by small noises, or mumblings, or echoes of things people had once told her.
Next to her, her sister stared at the ceiling, her eyes dark and blank. Someone had once told Brin 'the eyes are the windows to the soul', but after all, everything was turned upside-down at Manticore. After the botched reprogramming of Max, which she managed to resist, and then fool everyone into believing sahe was still loyal to Manticore, Max's eyes hard been sore, puffy, bloodshot and red and filmy. After a while her blank, unemotional, guarded, perfect-soldier posture, manner and expression had spread to her eyes, blocking out the person Brin knew was still in there.
Though there were no mirrors in Manticore, Brin knew she probably looked the same. She often felt like she was Brin inside, while X-5734 controlled her actions and words. But what was happening now? Did the reprogramming fail? It certainly had with Zack and Max, perhaps it was wearing off. Certainly lately X-5734 had been put aside in favour of Brin, though nobody except Max knew.
********
slowburn
all the while you learn
slowburn
all the lies you learn
slowburn
believe me when I say
it's a hard pill to take
my second skin is wearing thin my polished visage aches
it's not the fact I'm a part of that
it's the thought I'm part of this
behave like someone else and I'm doing it naturally
one way is not enough but I keep it to myself
there for no-one else
I keep it to myself
I keep it to myself
slowburn
********
Krit had refused to stay in Seattle.
"I'll just be making more trouble for you," he had said, when Logan tried to insist. Syl watched him go without a word, and told Logan
"He just need to be alone for a while. He ws the same after Brin..." she didn't need to finish the sentence, Logan understood.
Syl stayed on Logan's couch, contacting the other X-5s, making him eat once in a while and watching Logan convince himself that Max was still alive silently, her blue eyes hooded. It was possible, Syl supposed, when Loagan tried to convince her. Manticore was probably one of the most technologically advanced facilities in North America. Perhaps they could have given Max an artificial heart or lung, or maybe they gave her a blood transfusion and fixed it with surgery...Syl shook her head to get rid of those unhelpful thoughts. While it was possible, she had a sinking feeling about Max, and Zack stuck in Manticore.
********
Logan prepared himself to knock on Original Cindy's door, looking to the two women with him for support. I have to tell her about Max sometime or another, he told himself sternly. While he appreciated Syl's support, when Jondy, another of Max's sisters arrived it had been a bit unexpected. Jondy didn't look like either Max or Syl, and while Syl was identifably caucasian and Max and Krit looked Latino, she looked different. Her eyes were green, but she looked almost Polynesian.
Syl had told him of the conversation she'd had with Jondy after telling her of Max and Tinga's deaths and Zeck's capture.
"I'm coming to Seattle," Jondy had said immediately.
"No, it's too much of a risk..." Syl had started to mimic Zack unintentionally.
"Syl, I don't know about you, but I just lost three of my family. I'm coming," Jondy had said confidently, and arrived a week later. Logan offered her his spare bedroom, but she said she'd stay in a motel. Logan didn't know if she actually had, or if she'd stayed awake the entire week she'd been with them.
Syl gave Logan a small, sad smile now, and Jondy joggled his elbow. Logan knocked, and Original Cindy opened the door. She looked at Syl and Jondy suspiciously, and then looked disbelievingly at Logan.
"We're you in a wheelchair?" she then thought a second, and changed her mind. "Original Cindy ain't even gonna ask. What can I do for you fellas." She glared at Jondy and Syl. Syl looked serene, but Jondy frowned.
"You already replaced my Maxie?" Original asked cuttingly. Jondy's frown became more pronounced, and Syl sighed.
"No way," Syl said. "We're Max's sisters."
"We would never do that to Max!" Jondy said angrily. Syl glared at her and she shut up, pouting a bit.
"How do I know you're telling the truth?" said Original sardonically. "You for sure don't look like Max."
Jondy sighed exasperatedly, gathered up her hair, and twisted around to show Original Cindy her barcode.
Original Cindy stood there for a minute, before saying "Come on in..."
********
Strike, block, kick, roll. Strike, block, kick, roll. The mind-numbing training routine repeated and repeated, echoing in Max's mind. Now that Lydecker was no longer at Manticore, there was no-one to train the Manticore-bred soldiers, so Max usually trained with Brin. She would have chosen a more varied and interesting training routine, but Brin had already choosen this one long before Max had started training, so she went along with it.
Max had just rolled under Brin's kick, but suddenly Brin had stopped moving. She looked up at her sister, standing above her, and was just about to ask a question when Brin gave her a hand to help her up and flitted her eyes over Max's right shoulder.
Max turned, and there was Renfro walking towards them, her cocky smile still plastered on her lips. Max fought down the wave of hate she felt for the woman, and reluctantly stood at attention next to Brin.
"I thought I'd find you here," said Renfro to Brin, smirking. "You are dismissed, X-5452" she said offhandedly to Max, who nodded and walked away, but then made a face at Renfro's back. Brin looked as if she might laugh at the expression, but she forced it down.
********
"What did the bitch want?" Max hissed to Brin in the corridor, quiet enough so that no listening devices could hear. They were always very careful about that.
"She was saying that I'm going to be put out on assignment soon," Brin said, trying to ignore the despairing look that appeared in Max's eyes when she said this.
"Doing what?"
"I don't know, but I found something out," Brin said, looking more excited than Max had ever seen her in the last few months.
"What?" Max asked, wishing Brin could just tell her, for crying out loud.
"They're going to take the fire-prevention systems off line in the East wing."
Max's eyes widened, and her mouth opened slightly as she contemplated what this could mean.
"And next week then X-7s will be on assignment..." Max continued softly. She looked amazed that such an opportunity had presented itself. Logan could crash the Manticore computers, infect them with a virus, anything. Syl and Krit were nearby, and Lydecker had all the information...it was almost too good to be true.
"Why did she tell you?" Max wondered.
"She trusts me to not tell the others, and keep them in line," said Brin with a wry smile. Max giggled, and they continued their walk to the mess hall.
********
Logan threw his car keys onto the kitchen table, and Jondy started to take off her jacket. While she bent to look in the fridge, Logan retreated to his study. A few minutes later though, a shout from him had brought both her and Syl running.
"She's alive!" Logan said, beaming.
"How?" Jondy said, a smile breaking out on her face, but Syl tried not to get her hopes up.
"How do you know?" Syl asked. Logan pointed to his computer screen happily, where a small message blinked.
"Are you sure it's from her?" Jondy asked, looking at the small message wonderingly.
"D'you reckon Brin is an ally? Maybe Max's has..." Syl hesitated to say it "been turned."
Jondy looked shocked. "Max would never be turned!"
"We thought Brin wouldn't be, but..."
"Zack wasn't. Brin and Max aren't the same. Max is stronger than any of us, she's got inner strength," Jondy said, while Logan nodded feverently. She looked so sure of it that Jondy had to believe her.
********
Jondy and Syl spent the next three days looking at plans of Manticore, planning how to get in and out and calling other X-5s to help in trying to get Max out of Manticore. The news of the death of Zack had shaken them as much as the false news of Max's had. Now they were without the protector they'd had all their lives.
Logan spent days hacking into Manticore's computer system, where he monitored the security cameras, and saw Max and Brin, talking and walking, looking very much normal, not some mindless Manticore reprogrammed soldier.
Jondy and Syl saw them too, and began to get their hopes up more.
About three days after that first message, Logan received another one, which cemented their view that Max was alive and well and normal.
Brin 2 go on assignment soon. Fire prevention systems taken off whole of next week eastern half of complex. Set fire 2 manticore and logan infect virus 2 computer system and make crash. Day sent this mssge will arrive. Get lydecker 2 help. X-7s on assignment next 4 days. Bring explosives, guns, sentrys still at manticore
Max
"Where will we find Lydecker?" Jondy asked. Syl's lips twisted breifly.
"I think I know."
********
Donald Lydecker's life as he once knew it was no more. He had lost two of his kids - the two most brilliant of his kids -, he had no job, he was wanted for murder. All of these seemed very good reasons for having a couple of drinks. Or maybe it was more than a couple - he really couldn't remember.
"Hi, dad," said a sarcastic voice behind him. He spun around jerkily to see two young women - or girls maybe - looking at him distainfully. They looked familiar - Lydecker squinted through the alcohol induced fog that seemed to surround everything.
The blond one - Syl. Oh, god, Syl. Why were they here? And the other one - Tehan? Eva? No, Eva was dead, he'd killed her himself.
Jondy. That was her name. She was talking now, and Lydecker forced himself to concentrate.
"Emotion is weakness, don't you remember, 'Deck'?" she said, laughing humourlessly at him trying to stay upright on his stool.
"What do you want?" he croaked, looking up at the too-impossibly beautiful girls.
"You're coming with us," said Syl, and they pulled him out of the bar and the smoke and the smell.
********
By Jondy octavia_hermione@hotmail.com 20.7.01
Summary: Brin and Max finally free themselves from the clutches of Manticore.
Disclaimer: I own noth-ing. Noth-ing. Just like that guy says nothing in Hogan's Heroes (he he he)
Author's Notes: This is the sequel to Saving Brin and The Message, and probably the last story I will write in this series. It can be a triple story bonanza. (I knew I would be able to incorporate the word 'bonanza' into one of my stories). But I reckon I probably will write tons more Dark Angel stuff. I am, after all, an insomniac, so I have tons of free time in the middle of the night. But also this year I am doing School Cert (a big big exam that has the potential to ruin my life if I fail it...aahhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!! ) and I am in FULL PANIC MODE HELP HELP HELP cos I have exams......panic panic panic....we're my prozac......calm calm blue ocean.
Please review!!!!!!! Puh-lease peeeze pweeaziiieah? You're the bestest ppls eva. Thanks from Jondy
********
Though Max never slept, normally, except when she forced herself to, she found she couldn't now. Whenever she shut her eyes, she saw the reprogramming propaganda. Traitors. Escapees. Cowards. X-5656. X-5599. X-5452. X-5734. X-5338. X-5712. X-5466. X-5219. X-5377. X-5882. X-5542. X-5915. Your duty is to Manticore. Duty. Obedience. Courage. And the pictures - the slides of her and her siblings who had escaped, their nine year old faces looking expressionlessly at the camera.
Sometimes when Max opened her eyes the pictures were still there.
********
Brin woke suddenly in the middle of the night. Ever since she'd been returned to Manticore she had slept on edge, awakened by small noises, or mumblings, or echoes of things people had once told her.
Next to her, her sister stared at the ceiling, her eyes dark and blank. Someone had once told Brin 'the eyes are the windows to the soul', but after all, everything was turned upside-down at Manticore. After the botched reprogramming of Max, which she managed to resist, and then fool everyone into believing sahe was still loyal to Manticore, Max's eyes hard been sore, puffy, bloodshot and red and filmy. After a while her blank, unemotional, guarded, perfect-soldier posture, manner and expression had spread to her eyes, blocking out the person Brin knew was still in there.
Though there were no mirrors in Manticore, Brin knew she probably looked the same. She often felt like she was Brin inside, while X-5734 controlled her actions and words. But what was happening now? Did the reprogramming fail? It certainly had with Zack and Max, perhaps it was wearing off. Certainly lately X-5734 had been put aside in favour of Brin, though nobody except Max knew.
********
slowburn
all the while you learn
slowburn
all the lies you learn
slowburn
believe me when I say
it's a hard pill to take
my second skin is wearing thin my polished visage aches
it's not the fact I'm a part of that
it's the thought I'm part of this
behave like someone else and I'm doing it naturally
one way is not enough but I keep it to myself
there for no-one else
I keep it to myself
I keep it to myself
slowburn
********
Krit had refused to stay in Seattle.
"I'll just be making more trouble for you," he had said, when Logan tried to insist. Syl watched him go without a word, and told Logan
"He just need to be alone for a while. He ws the same after Brin..." she didn't need to finish the sentence, Logan understood.
Syl stayed on Logan's couch, contacting the other X-5s, making him eat once in a while and watching Logan convince himself that Max was still alive silently, her blue eyes hooded. It was possible, Syl supposed, when Loagan tried to convince her. Manticore was probably one of the most technologically advanced facilities in North America. Perhaps they could have given Max an artificial heart or lung, or maybe they gave her a blood transfusion and fixed it with surgery...Syl shook her head to get rid of those unhelpful thoughts. While it was possible, she had a sinking feeling about Max, and Zack stuck in Manticore.
********
Logan prepared himself to knock on Original Cindy's door, looking to the two women with him for support. I have to tell her about Max sometime or another, he told himself sternly. While he appreciated Syl's support, when Jondy, another of Max's sisters arrived it had been a bit unexpected. Jondy didn't look like either Max or Syl, and while Syl was identifably caucasian and Max and Krit looked Latino, she looked different. Her eyes were green, but she looked almost Polynesian.
Syl had told him of the conversation she'd had with Jondy after telling her of Max and Tinga's deaths and Zeck's capture.
"I'm coming to Seattle," Jondy had said immediately.
"No, it's too much of a risk..." Syl had started to mimic Zack unintentionally.
"Syl, I don't know about you, but I just lost three of my family. I'm coming," Jondy had said confidently, and arrived a week later. Logan offered her his spare bedroom, but she said she'd stay in a motel. Logan didn't know if she actually had, or if she'd stayed awake the entire week she'd been with them.
Syl gave Logan a small, sad smile now, and Jondy joggled his elbow. Logan knocked, and Original Cindy opened the door. She looked at Syl and Jondy suspiciously, and then looked disbelievingly at Logan.
"We're you in a wheelchair?" she then thought a second, and changed her mind. "Original Cindy ain't even gonna ask. What can I do for you fellas." She glared at Jondy and Syl. Syl looked serene, but Jondy frowned.
"You already replaced my Maxie?" Original asked cuttingly. Jondy's frown became more pronounced, and Syl sighed.
"No way," Syl said. "We're Max's sisters."
"We would never do that to Max!" Jondy said angrily. Syl glared at her and she shut up, pouting a bit.
"How do I know you're telling the truth?" said Original sardonically. "You for sure don't look like Max."
Jondy sighed exasperatedly, gathered up her hair, and twisted around to show Original Cindy her barcode.
Original Cindy stood there for a minute, before saying "Come on in..."
********
Strike, block, kick, roll. Strike, block, kick, roll. The mind-numbing training routine repeated and repeated, echoing in Max's mind. Now that Lydecker was no longer at Manticore, there was no-one to train the Manticore-bred soldiers, so Max usually trained with Brin. She would have chosen a more varied and interesting training routine, but Brin had already choosen this one long before Max had started training, so she went along with it.
Max had just rolled under Brin's kick, but suddenly Brin had stopped moving. She looked up at her sister, standing above her, and was just about to ask a question when Brin gave her a hand to help her up and flitted her eyes over Max's right shoulder.
Max turned, and there was Renfro walking towards them, her cocky smile still plastered on her lips. Max fought down the wave of hate she felt for the woman, and reluctantly stood at attention next to Brin.
"I thought I'd find you here," said Renfro to Brin, smirking. "You are dismissed, X-5452" she said offhandedly to Max, who nodded and walked away, but then made a face at Renfro's back. Brin looked as if she might laugh at the expression, but she forced it down.
********
"What did the bitch want?" Max hissed to Brin in the corridor, quiet enough so that no listening devices could hear. They were always very careful about that.
"She was saying that I'm going to be put out on assignment soon," Brin said, trying to ignore the despairing look that appeared in Max's eyes when she said this.
"Doing what?"
"I don't know, but I found something out," Brin said, looking more excited than Max had ever seen her in the last few months.
"What?" Max asked, wishing Brin could just tell her, for crying out loud.
"They're going to take the fire-prevention systems off line in the East wing."
Max's eyes widened, and her mouth opened slightly as she contemplated what this could mean.
"And next week then X-7s will be on assignment..." Max continued softly. She looked amazed that such an opportunity had presented itself. Logan could crash the Manticore computers, infect them with a virus, anything. Syl and Krit were nearby, and Lydecker had all the information...it was almost too good to be true.
"Why did she tell you?" Max wondered.
"She trusts me to not tell the others, and keep them in line," said Brin with a wry smile. Max giggled, and they continued their walk to the mess hall.
********
Logan threw his car keys onto the kitchen table, and Jondy started to take off her jacket. While she bent to look in the fridge, Logan retreated to his study. A few minutes later though, a shout from him had brought both her and Syl running.
"She's alive!" Logan said, beaming.
"How?" Jondy said, a smile breaking out on her face, but Syl tried not to get her hopes up.
"How do you know?" Syl asked. Logan pointed to his computer screen happily, where a small message blinked.
"Are you sure it's from her?" Jondy asked, looking at the small message wonderingly.
"D'you reckon Brin is an ally? Maybe Max's has..." Syl hesitated to say it "been turned."
Jondy looked shocked. "Max would never be turned!"
"We thought Brin wouldn't be, but..."
"Zack wasn't. Brin and Max aren't the same. Max is stronger than any of us, she's got inner strength," Jondy said, while Logan nodded feverently. She looked so sure of it that Jondy had to believe her.
********
Jondy and Syl spent the next three days looking at plans of Manticore, planning how to get in and out and calling other X-5s to help in trying to get Max out of Manticore. The news of the death of Zack had shaken them as much as the false news of Max's had. Now they were without the protector they'd had all their lives.
Logan spent days hacking into Manticore's computer system, where he monitored the security cameras, and saw Max and Brin, talking and walking, looking very much normal, not some mindless Manticore reprogrammed soldier.
Jondy and Syl saw them too, and began to get their hopes up more.
About three days after that first message, Logan received another one, which cemented their view that Max was alive and well and normal.
Brin 2 go on assignment soon. Fire prevention systems taken off whole of next week eastern half of complex. Set fire 2 manticore and logan infect virus 2 computer system and make crash. Day sent this mssge will arrive. Get lydecker 2 help. X-7s on assignment next 4 days. Bring explosives, guns, sentrys still at manticore
Max
"Where will we find Lydecker?" Jondy asked. Syl's lips twisted breifly.
"I think I know."
********
Donald Lydecker's life as he once knew it was no more. He had lost two of his kids - the two most brilliant of his kids -, he had no job, he was wanted for murder. All of these seemed very good reasons for having a couple of drinks. Or maybe it was more than a couple - he really couldn't remember.
"Hi, dad," said a sarcastic voice behind him. He spun around jerkily to see two young women - or girls maybe - looking at him distainfully. They looked familiar - Lydecker squinted through the alcohol induced fog that seemed to surround everything.
The blond one - Syl. Oh, god, Syl. Why were they here? And the other one - Tehan? Eva? No, Eva was dead, he'd killed her himself.
Jondy. That was her name. She was talking now, and Lydecker forced himself to concentrate.
"Emotion is weakness, don't you remember, 'Deck'?" she said, laughing humourlessly at him trying to stay upright on his stool.
"What do you want?" he croaked, looking up at the too-impossibly beautiful girls.
"You're coming with us," said Syl, and they pulled him out of the bar and the smoke and the smell.
********