Disclaimer: These characters are not mine, blah,blah,blah
Rating: R
Max slipped the small black device back into her shirt sleeve. |No turning
back now. But why the hell would I want to turn back? I'm just doing my duty to
Manticore, my duty as a soldier. I'm doing what's best for my family. I'm sending them
home, where they belong, back to the place and people we were stupid enough to abandon
back in '09.| She mentally cursed herself out for even questioning for one short moment
the rightness in her actions. |I'm a soldier, I don't question, I do what I'm told. Besides,
they'll thank me for this, I know they will.| "There you are! What are you doing running
off like that? Aren't you going to talk with us?" Logan was standing behind her with a
somewhat bemused look. She turned her head and smiled. "Sure." She followed him back
into the living room where her family was waiting. Zane stared at her. "You know, you
gave us all a fucking hell of a scare for a while. You really shouldn't go around letting
people think your dead." "Yeah." Jondy said. "I really don't know what I'd do if I lost you
to those bastards." Max smiled . "Glad to know someone cares. And for a while I thought
I'd wind up like Brin. Thanks for bailing me out." |Too bad they don't know I already am
at that point. Hope they can come to their senses too.| "No problem, Maxie. You'd do the
same for me."
The emerald green lights of her eyes lit up as she smiled her delight. A smile
Max had once seen on a young girl of 9, a smile that would drive the pain and misery from
her consciousness after a hard day of drills and endless lessons on tactics, a smile that
would calm her and make things better whenever she had another seizure or she was afraid
for someone close to them. All a sudden she wondered how that smile would hold up
when it's wearer was back in the cold, black-blue, lifeless walls of their childhood home,
with that familiar air of oppression and entrapment--|No! Stop it, Damn you! You're
doing the right thing! She might be resistant at first, but--| Her train of thought was
mercifully interrupted when the she heard a noise similar to that of the door being blown
off it's hinges.
Krit burst into the room with two bottles of champagne in one hand and
several 6-packs in the other. The earsplitting sound of him slamming the door was the only
thing that alerted the room's occupants to his presence. "OKAY, WHO WANTS SOME
HARD LIQUOR!" Syl stared at him in shock along with the rest of the group. "Jesus,
Krit, what are you trying to do, give us all a freakin heart attack?" Krit grew slightly
irritated. "Sheesh, you're welcome. He held up the the bottles of champagne. Don't you
have any idea how hard it is to get your hands on some of this stuff in a economically
depressed country? The least you could do is say thank you." "Thanks" she replied,
helping herself to a bottle of Heineken. The others all rushed to fetch themselves some
quality booze. Logan first grabbed a beer bottle, then headed over to the front door to
inspect it for damage. |Not even so much as chipped paint.| He thought. |Thank god.|
Meanwhile, Jondy uncapped the champagne and began to enthusiastically spray it into the
faces of Krit, Syl, and Zane. |Christ, I hope that stuff washes off the carpet. Hope they
don't have too much and end up wrecking the furniture. Remind me to be more careful the
next time Max's family decides to pay a visit.|
His thoughts turned to Max. |surely she must be happy now that she's back
with her family again.| But he spied her sitting quietly on the sofa, unmoving, her mind off
in space. She hadn't touched the alcohol, and he knew Max wasn't the type to refuse a
drink. She seemed to be upset about something, her eyes refusing to meet his, as if she had
some big dark secret tearing her apart from the inside out. He walked next to her, noting
the eerie way she didn't acknowledge his presence even as he stood in front of her. He
opened his mouth to speak. "Max is something wrong? Max? Max!" "What's with her?"
Krit asked, his mood suddenly serious and questioning. All 8 pairs of eyes came to rest on
their baby sister. |What did those bastards do to her?| Logan wondered. He opened his
mouth to speak. Suddenly, without warning, the front door of the apartment exploded
inward in a flash of blinding yellow-red light and flame. Logan could feel the heat of the
blast rushing towards him like a speeding train. The hot, burning tendrils of flame
threatened to reach out and devour him like some kind of hideous monster. He opened his
mouth to yell, to scream. But he couldn't. He couldn't even breathe as time itself seemed
to almost stop at that one terrifying moment, and the force of the explosion propelled his
body backwards into the room like a flimsy paper mache doll before it subsided into a
cloud of smoke and translucent shadows. And then there were the sound of voices
shouting and dark, wraithlike demon figures descending upon them as if they had risen
from the very pits of hell.
Brin could hardly see through the smoke caused by the explosive charge
they had laid on the door and the large mass of black clad troops that constituted TAC
team Alpha 1. Eva stood beside her, peering through the gray smoke and shredded bits of
wood and furniture, trying to use her enhanced vision to pick out their targets. Team
Alpha 2 brushed their way past the two X5's and joined the first group. The two women
watched as the 2 teams frantically yet systematically and efficiently moved to secure the
objective, guns and tazers out, bodies rushing about like hungry wolves drawn to the scent
of frightened prey. One of the team leaders peered into a corner of the room and saw a
30ish man with glasses lying dazed on the floor. "Over here! I found---" his words were
cut short when Zane suddenly lashed out of the murky smoke and wrapped his arms
around the man's throat and pulled him back into it's depths. About a quarter of a second
later there was the sound of a neck breaking. Others in the immediate vicinity trained their
weapons at the sound of the noise and opened fire, submachine gun rounds shattering a
table and leaving pock marks along one wall. "Cease fire, dammit! We want them alive!"
Brin called out to the two teams. Her eyes darted across the room to a multilimbed figure
rapidly making it's way to the nearest window. Before anyone else could react, she had
fired a tazer dart deep into the back of Zane who was carrying a barely conscious Logan.
Zane cried out and stumbled for a moment before the tazer darts of 3 others found their
way into his back and legs, sending him crumbling to the ground, limbs failing like one
having an epilectic seizure.
"NO!" Jondy leapt from her position in the kitchen and laid down a
withering rain of fire, driving back the black clad goons while flying towards the crumbled
form of Logan and Zane. One soldiers stepped into her path and raised his tazer gun to
fire. Blindingly fast, she launched one kick the sent the device flying from his grip, and
then with her other leg, a hurricane kick that crushed his checkbones and sent him flying
into the wall, blood spurting from the side of his face and mouth as the impact cracked the
wall hard with his skull. He slumped to the ground as she gathered the two men up, only
to have Eva dash like a bullet across the room and land a blow to her chin that cracked the
bone and sent her sprawling across the floor. Before she could recover, Eva had produced
her tazer and shot her in the chest with it, followed by the tazer darts of several guards.
Pain streaking through every cavity of her body, Jondy slumped into unconsciousness on
the wooden floor.
"Come on! Lets go!" Syl yelled at Krit who had paused to look at the
horrific scene behind them. "We can't just leave them!" he yelled back at her. "It's too
late! If we don't move now they'll get us too!" she shouted while smashing the window
with a nearby stool. She leapt out of the newly formed hole and dropped down onto a
lower floor balcony. Krit moved to follow her when suddenly a leg connected with his
ankle and knocked him to the ground. He fought off the sudden pain and struggled to rise
when Max flew on top of him and delivered a swift punch to his forehead. Stunned, he
tried to throw a punch at her, only to have it caught and his arm twisted around, flipping
him on his belly and causing severe pain as she twisted and dislocated his shoulder.
"Aghhh! What the hell are you---" He was unable to finish the sentence as she brought her
hand down on his neck in a powerful chop and everything faded to black.
X5-452 looked out the window to find that the last target was rapidly
making her way down the series of balconies and fire escapes. X5-868 moved to her side.
"Call in Bravo 2. They should be ready for her when she hits the ground." Eva nodded and
spoke the orders into the transmitter. She was quickly done and they both turned their
attention to Logan, who was now being held up by two soldiers and looking at Max with a
mixture of downright horror and shock. "Max? Max! What the hell are you doing? What
the hell is going---" He stopped talking when one of the soldiers slugged him in the back
with a rifle butt. The exoskeleton creaked a bit as he sagged towards the ground, only to
be jerked upright by the two men that held his arms. He raised his head to look once more
into Max's face. And he saw nothing. The beautiful face before him was cold, blank,
devoid of any emotion, unyielding of any answers. It merely stared at him without the
merest hint of the love and affectionate yearning he had seen on the same face mere
moments ago. |Max?| "My god." He had reached the realization that he should have
suspected this to happen all along. |But this is Max we're talking about, it can't be, she
would never go back to them, she would never be one of their sol--| But the truth was
there, staring at him directly in the face, unblinking and harsh beyond words. In the end he
could only mutter weakly..."They've turned you haven't they?" The stranger in front of
him spoke with an icy calm in her voice. "They made me see who I am." "Listen to me
Max, you don't have to do what they say, you don't have to be their slave, try to
remember who you really---" He was cut off by another blow to the back. And he caught
his breath to stare into those soulless brown eyes once more. Max was dead, and the
monster from his dream had taken her place...
Sweat beginning to pour down her brow, Syl made it to the lowest balcony
of the building. |just one more leap, then I'm home free.| She looked up to find no sign of
Krit behind her. |Shit!!! No time to worry about that now, got to keep--| The sound of
wheels skidding to a stop to the right of her made her made her freeze. She instinctively
turned to her left only to find herself facing the barrel of a tazer gun held by a soldier not
10 feet from her position. Her eyes flashed past him to find 4 more all pointing their
weapons at her. She turned to her right to find that yet 5 more soldiers had climbed out of
a humvhee and were pointing weapons at her. |What the fucking hell.| Legs pushing with
all her might, she took a flying leap over the railing of the balcony as the electrical darts
streaked towards the place where she was standing and flew in a arc towards her as she
soared through the air. The last one embedded itself into her foot but somehow failed to
penetrate her shoes. She hit the ground hands first and bent her head down to land neatly
into a foward roll. The closest soldier on her right attempted to get a shot off as she
crouched there for half a second, but the gun refused to fire, as if by some divine act of
god. The soldier cursed and struggled to unjam his weapon as his buddies lifted theirs.
Wasting no time and moving with a speed and energy she had never known, even on the
night of the escape, she dashed straight at one of the guards to her left and grabbed the
arm of the surprised man who flailed uselessly against her steel grip as she pulled the arm
over his shoulder while getting behind him. The darts fired by his comrades were meant
for her but instead embedded themselves into her hapless human shield. While team Bravo
2 stared in horror as one of their own screamed in pain from the thousands of volts of
electricity that coursed through him, Syl blazed across the street, leaping across the hoods
of cars, and disappeared as a large truck obscured her from their sights.
"So. This is the ever elusive Eyes Only." Renfro gave Logan her best
sinister grin as she entered the apartment and fixed her eyes on him. "So wonderful to
finally meet you." Logan grinned, his face somewhat distorted due to the pain of the
beating the soldiers gave him for trying to resist. "I believe the pleasure is all mine." Max
continued to stare at him from the corner of the room. Her expression still seemed empty..
|Or was it?| There was something in her eyes that sparked a small flame of hope within his
chest. For about an instant she looked at him like the woman he knew long before he had
lost her in the forest that fateful night, before she became the monster who had led them
all into a trap. She seemed to stare at him with a detectable hint of concern and some of
the love he saw in her the night she kissed him for the second time on the living room
floor... And then she turned away. |Maybe it's too much to hope for.| Renfro continued to
speak. "I must admit, you've caused both us and many others considerable amounts of
trouble with those broadcasts of yours. I'll be honest, Mr. Cale. You've been a real pain in
the ass to well, pretty much everyone." "Glad to know I'm so popular." Her smile faded a
bit as she changed her expression to a chilling look of deadly malice that actually made
Logan feel a shiver crawling all over his skin. "Too bad things end here for you. I wonder
how much your enemies would pay me to hand your ass over on a silver platter? You
think we should start the bidding at 15 million?" Logan gave a grim smile. "You crazy?
That would be an insult." Renfro laughed out loud, her cruel features taunting him as he
stood there helplessly before his impending doom. "But I think I have a much better idea."
Logan's heart froze. "And what could that be?" he asked nervously. The
blond bitch gestured towards max. "X5-452. I believe you have, or should I say had, a
very close personal relationship with this particular specimen of ours correct?" "HER
NAME IS MAX! GODDAMN YOU!" "Whatever. Well, who better then to carry out
your execution?" She turned to Max. "X5-452, shoot this man." Brin handed Max a side
arm which she proceeded to cock and point directly at Logan's chest. He stared deep into
those beautiful almond eyes. "Max, I know you don't want to do this. You don't have to
do this. Don't you remember me? Don't you remember what we had together? Please.
Don't listen to this bitch." "Do it, X5-452. Do it for Manticore. Do it for your family."
"NO MAX, DON'T! REMEMBER WHEN WE FIRST MET? REMEMBER ALL
THOSE DAYS AND NIGHTS WE SPENT PLAYING CHESS AND HAVING
DINNER? REMEMBER HOW YOU HELPED ME WHEN I COULDN'T WALK?"
"DO IT, SOLDIER! FAILURE TO OBEY IS TO BETRAY MANTICORE! DON'T
MAKE THE SAME MISTAKE AGAIN!" Logan could see her indecision, the conflicting
voices battling it out inside her for dominance and control. Her finger tightened on the
trigger.
"REMEMBER HOW YOU SAID YOU'D RATHER DIE THAN GO
BACK THERE? YOU REMEMBER WHAT THOSE BASTARDS DID TO YOU? YOU
DON'T TO BE THEIR PUPPET, DAMMIT! FIGHT THEM! FOR ME, FOR YOUR
FAMILY! FOR ZACK!" The mention of the name stirred something inside of her. His
hope grew as he saw more and more of the Max he knew breaking through the scales of
the monster they trapped her under. The soul of the woman he knew started to come back
into those almond colored eyes. "Shoot the bastard soldier. That is a direct order."
Looking deep into the brown eyes one last time, Logan spoke calmly, a soothing ocean in
his words. "I love you Max. I've always loved you. And no matter what happens, I always
will. Then, for one blissful, glorious moment, the eyes of X5-452 became those of Max
Guevera once more. Logan could have screamed for joy. | SHE'S STILL IN THERE!
MAX IS STILL IN THERE! I KNEW THEY COULD'NT BREAK---"|
And then the features of that angelic face folded back into those of the
demonic creature from his dream, and he heard a loud bang as a hot metal object slammed
into his chest.
Note: I worked extremely hard on this chapter, so please give me some feedback.