Black Winged Night
Chapter 2 by Jondy
The songs used in this story are (in order) Slowburn, by stellar*, Turn off the light by Nelly Furtado, Liquid skies by DLT, What you do by stellar* and Every girl by stellar* (I do really like stellar*, in case you couldn't tell)
Please review,
luv Jondy.
****
I want to believe
That I can do it on my own without my heart on my sleeve
I'm running, I'm running, catch up with me life
Where is the love that I'm looking to find
It's all in me, can't you see, I can see, why can't you see it's all in me
****
Everything was going according to plan, but Max was still worried. She and Brin had sent a third message, confirming the day of when they would set fire to the compound, crash and infect the computer systems, kill Renfro and hopefully escape Manticore once and for all.
She hoped that nothing would go wrong. The last time they had broken into Manticore Max had been captured and Zack, the X-5 who had seemed the most invincible, had died. She didn't want anything like that to happen again.
She pulled nervously at her regulation jacket, trying to get the collar to cover her barcode. Brin helped her tie back her hair every morning, but it wasn't long enough to cover her barcode when it was tied up. Brin nudged her, looking around to see if anyone had noticed that behaviour, strange for a soldier loyal to Manticore. Max dropped her hand from her collar with a small sigh, and thought of Logan and the outside world.
****
Brin nudged Max disapprovingly, and sighed with relief when Max stopped unconsciously trying to cover her barcode. Sometimes Brin had to fight the urge to do that as well, so she normally would have sympathised, but Renfro was only a few metres away. She was having an inspection of the troops, something she did about once a month. Lydecker had done it at least every week. In some ways it was good having such an inattentive director. But in other ways it almost gave the game away. Brin would build up so much more anger each month so that when the inspection finally came around, she had to work extremely hard to conceal her hatred of Renfro, and she had to work even harder to stop Max breaking Renfro's neck whenever she came near.
Though when Brin had been under the hold of Manticore, after her reprogramming, she had never really thought about the outside, now she thought about it every day. Suddenly everything at Manticore seemed cold and grey, and Brin dreamed of the colours on the outside. Red fires blazing, blue skies, greenish haze caused by pollution around cities. A group of kids around an oil puddle, watching the colours change from purple to blue to silver to yellow.
****
Free your lies
Never to compromise
Deaf to the cries of distant skies
And I hear neon lights and electric cries under the liquid skies
And I see burning clouds
And fallen stars
Under the liquid skies
****
"He doesn't seem to be as strong and tough and manly anymore, does he, Syl?" Jondy asked, a thick layer of sarcasm heaped on the words 'strong', 'tough' and 'manly'.
"Not really," said Syl is a fake innocent sort of voice, shaking her head in pretend disbelief at the man sitting at the kitchen table of Logan's apartment.
Lydecker sat, shielding his eyes against the light, that his former 'children' would just get on with it and explain why they had dragged him here before his head exploded with all the hammering that was going on inside it. Jondy and Syl really seemed to be enjoying torturing the extremely hung-over man.
"What are you doing?" Krit's voice said from behind them, making Lydecker jump. The others took it in stride, turning around smoothly to look at Krit.
"When did you get back?" Syl asked. Krit shrugged, which she supposed meant just now, and gave Jondy a hug.
"Hey little sister," he said, giving her a squeeze. "Hey Syl," he said over Jondy's shoulder. Jondy seemed to notice, and when Krit wasn't looking, winked at Syl. Syl blushed slightly and wished everyone wasn't quite so taken with the fact that her and Krit were together. Krit noticed the blush and gave her a quizzical look, but she just shrugged and turned to Lydecker.
"You're gonna help us break into Manticore again. But this time you aren't gonna play us or anything, you gimp-"
"Why didn't you warn us about the X-7s?" Krit chimed in, moving to stand beside Syl. Jondy looked disbelievingly at normally calm and contained Syl getting so worked up.
"I…I didn't know they would be a problem…" croaked Lydecker, wondering if after he helped them brake in they would tear him to shreds. He wouldn't put it past him.
"You better not screw us over this time, Lydecker," warned Syl. "Max isn't here, so…"
"There'll be no-one who'll be upset by us using a gun," said Jondy, smiling slightly.
"To blow off your head," finished Krit, leaning in with a steely, uncaring glint in his eye that Zack used to have.
Lydecker look over the possibilities - continue protecting Manticore and have his head blown off, or help destroy it and live a free life, with no-one chasing him for murder. The latter definitely sounded good.
"Give me a map and I'll show you," he said, his voice cracking slightly, sitting up a bit straighter.
****
I'm not a stone, I bleed just like you do
I'm flesh and bone, I feel just like you do
no part of me can be immune
would like to be but still I bruise
haven't got a lot to lose
don't be afraid take it like a man
please behave the same way if you can
no bitter tongue will get to me
and if it did I won't let you see
show the bastards what you mean
so close I can taste it
I'm ready to please
too close now to fake it
pretending is sweet
I'm down on my knees
I'm dying to
show the bastards what you do
****
The frost crunched under Syl's boots, the cold seeping into her toes, her legs, her body. She ducked behind a tree for a minute to check that her communications link to Logan was still working.
"Logan," she hissed into the device on her shoulder.
"Yeah?" he said. Syl sighed in relief.
"Nothing, just checking the link is still working."
"Oh, okay," Logan sounded a bit confused, but she didn't care. The worst thing about Manticore was the silence, Syl had always thought. Being here made her feel like she was still 9, and she might get caught for being out of barracks - the Colonel would hear about it, and maybe put her away with the nomalies… Syl said something to break the oppressive silence.
"Lydecker shot through yet?" She asked, half hoping the answer would be yes so she would have something to take out all her anger on, built up over years of Manticore training and hiding and now, most recently, losing her brothers and sisters.
"No," said Logan, and she could hear a smile in his voice "he's here, looking nervous." And Logan actually laughed, which Syl had come to think of as a very rare occurrence. Perhaps when he was with Max he was different.
"Good," said Syl, feeling bizarrely pleased. "You better get started on transferring the virus. Are you already into their computer systems?"
"Yeah. Good luck. Logan out."
And there was the silence again. Syl craned her neck to try to see Krit or Jondy, but they were most likely well on their way to their destinations already. They'd split up at the perimeter fence. Syl thought of the last thing Jondy had said to her and Krit - "I gotcha back. We're gonna get Max and Brin and destroy this thing that's been plaguing us our whole life. Right?"
"Right," Krit and Syl had answered, and, thinking of that, Syl set off for the Communications Centre in the East Wing, her first stop.
****
Brin and Max were the only ones in the barracks again. Once in a while other X-5s would stay at Manticore for a night or so, but lots stayed on the outside, staying in other Manticore- owned institutions and receiving orders from there. Brin stood at the window in her regulation grey night uniform, looking like she had when they were kids, except now she had long dark hair.
"Can you see anything?" Max asked, moving to stand beside her.
"Not yet-" but Brin had seen a flash of black and green racing across the frost that had settled after about midnight. The moon had a reddish tinge, as if it already knew what would happen tonight, and how much blood would be spilt.
"There." Max had noticed it too. Brin nodded, and they put on the boots they'd hidden in the barracks quickly and quietly, and Brin kicked down the locked door.
****
It was working perfectly - Krit would have picked off most of the guards protecting the outside by now, Syl would have already set explosives in the Communications Centre and Main indoor training area, and from that fires would spread to other areas. Jondy had spread gas through the ground floor of the East Wing, and was now moving up to the third floor to try to find Brin and Max. Hopefully they had already left there barracks, and were on their way to the perimeter fence, but no-one had seen them and Jondy wasn't sure - so here she was now, trying to dodge guards and not always succeeding. Already she'd been forced to render about eleven unconscious.
Jondy listened carefully, and turned the corner, her gun at the ready, only to have it kicked out of her hand. She only saw dimly a shape slightly taller than herself before, twisting, kicking and hearing the thud of her attacker. She stood up and looked at him - obviously a Manticore-bred soldier, but not one she knew. He definitely wasn't one of her siblings, and he seemed weaker and older than any of the X-5s…perhaps X-4? X-3? Jondy knew that the first two lots of X-soldiers had been total failures, but she'd never heard anything about the ones that came between the insane, flesh-eating X-2s and her generation.
Jondy was just pondering this, reaching for her gun, when she was grabbed from behind, her mouth covered and her head yanked to the side.
****
Max and Brin ran as fast as they could through the corridors, sirens going off around them. They'd heard a soldier shouting something into his COM about an explosion in the Communications Centre, before knocking him unconscious. They turned onto the third floor, clattering down the steps, and stopped short when they saw Jondy, Manticore soldiers pressing a gun to her temple.
****
Krit was starting to get worried. Syl had completed her lot, and so had he, but Jondy hadn't checked in for a while, and Manticore was still ver fire-free in the Eastern half, the most susceptible half.
"Krit," Syl's voice came through to him, sounding worried and almost scared, though no-one apart from him would've detected it.
"I know," Krit said, knowing that Syl probably saw through his fake-brave voice. "We need to complete the mission even if Jondy is gone."
"You sound like Lydecker," Syl said, sounding faintly hurt and very disgusted.
"Alright," Krit gave in, knowing Syl could out-stubborn anyone except Max and Jondy any day. "You get Jondy, I'll start the fires and set the rest of the explosives."
"I'm gonna see you soon," said Syl, sounding grateful, trying to convince herself that she would.
"See ya, pumpkin," Krit said, using the name she hated.
"You're the pumpkin," she muttered, and cut the connection. Krit tried to muffle his laughter in the empty corridor.
****
"Just give her to me," Max said, trying to come closer to Jondy. The second soldier, the one who wasn't holding her sister, pointed his gun at her.
"No." And he smirked, just like Renfro.
"That's an order, soldier!" said Brin in her most authoritive voice. He seemed to waver a bit, but shook it off and kept smiling.
"Not a chance. You're all traitors." Manticore loyalty at its most horrendous.
Max lunged for him, but before he could shoot, he fell forward, bleeding from a wound in his back, cold and dead. Behind him, Syl stood, soot on her face and hands. Brin looked incredibly grateful, but Max had already turned her attention to the soldier who was holding Jondy.
There was really no need to. Two punches and a kick from Jondy and he was down. Jondy smirked at Max, who nodded approvingly.
"Impressive," drawled Max, sounding normal, though looking tattered and haunted.
"I thought so, little sister," Jondy drawled back, and pulled Max and Brin along down the corridor.
"We've got to hurry," yelled Syl, running full out. "We haven't got much time before we're trapped in here - Brin, what the…"
Brin had stopped running where two corridors met, looking at something down one of them. "Renfro," she muttered, starting towards the Director, who was standing, trying hopelessly to access one of the computer panels attached to the wall.
"Brin," Syl was tugging at her sleeve, trying to get her to keep running. Max and Jondy stood a little further away, pleading looks on their faces.
"No, I have to do something…" Brin wrenched her arm out of Syl's grasp. Her sisters didn't move, so she looked at Max, pleading. Max nodded, sadly, understandingly.
"Go on," Brin told them. "I'll meet you at the perimeter fence."
Max nodded again, and backed away, pulling Jondy with her. Syl looked at Brin again, but Brin nodded her on encouragingly, and her sister finally followed Max and Jondy. When Brin was sure they had started to run again, she turned to Renfro.
****
Krit waited at the perimeter fence, looking for any sign of Syl or his sisters. Where the hell were they?
****
Renfro looked up, her face looking relieved to see Brin. Brin kept on walking towards her slowly, hating her more and more with each step.
"Oh, good, it's you. What's a safe way out?" Renfro demanded, running a hand through her perfectly styled hair.
"I'm not going to help you," Brin said quietly, her face hard and angry, her eyes obsidian chips.
"What?" Renfro almost screeched, but lowered her voice slightly.
"You killed Tinga," accused Brin, wanting to cry. Renfro straightened her jacket fussily, shrugging.
"She was just an experiment. She was born that way, and that's how she d-"
Brin hurled herself at Renfro, hating her, hating the way she used the past tense, how she talked of her sister's death so off-handedly.
When Brin stopped, Renfro was on the ground, dead or unconscious, she didn't want to know. If she wasn't dead, the smoke inhalation will probably kill her, Brin though morbidly.
And Brin ran.
****
Max looked at Brin with relief as she pulled the door of Logan's car shut behind her. Jondy looked over at her and grinned, saying "Lets go."
Syl wrapped her arms around Brin, and they both watched Manticore go up in flames.
****
the side effect for every girl
I'm letting moonlight have wicked way tonight
educate me, compensate me for living life amongst the shadows
****
Max sat contentedly beside Logan up at her own high place, free at last from the spectre that had haunted her her whole life. Manticore was destroyed, the complex, the computer systems, the people who worked for it, and the decades of research that had gone into making soldiers like Max. Imperfect soldiers. That thought was a comfort now.
They watched the black-winged night getting chased across the sky by golden-cloaked day.
****
THE END! I can't believe I actually finished it! And it didn't take me forever! Yay! Please tell me what you think of it, and thanks to all the luvly ppl who reviewed all my other Dark Angel stories. Thanks from Jondy.