The next time Bree got a chance to talk with Max in private was as they were leaving work.

The next time Bree got a chance to talk with Max in private was as they were leaving work. A jumble of questions still in her minds, she didn't wait long to let loose.

"Cindy doesn't know that Logan is Eyes Only?"

Max lost pace for a moment, then looked at Bree, "No, Logan isn't-"

"You said earlier, you fumbled." Bree spoke, staring right at Max who stared somewhat confused but like a deer caught in the headlights of an oncoming car. "If you think X5's have a memory, you should check out the X6 capacity." Bree said, shrugging it off.

"Huh," Max grunted for a second, "No, Original Cindy don't know 'bout Logan, I only tell the girl so much." she finished, leaving the rest unspoken.

She's afraid of letting too many people in on it, afraid that it'll be found out and they'll be used as bait. She knew the feeling, thinking back to a month or so after escaping, when she'd been hanging it with some girls. They 'd all gotten to be really close, and Bree would have told them anything, except about her past. There was only so much the mind could handle before breaking down. Most people didn't want to know anyways, thinking it impossible, or looking at you as if you were a freak.

She knew that look so well. She thought back to a rave party her friends and her had crashed. How she'd finally met a guy, whom she'd immediately clicked with. Just like that, Bree could have planned their whole future. A happy future, where she could live happily ever after. A fairy tale.

She hadn't been planning on getting so drunk that night. It took a lot to shake up a Manticore-Engineered brain, but what she'd drank on an empty stomach had done it to her.

Bree could clearly remember hanging in the back alley with Nic. Hanging, maybe not quite the word for it. It was more like Bree hurli ng the contents of her stomach two days over in to the trash can out back. The rancid smell burning her nose. Nic holding her long blonde hair back, kissing her neck. Until, as if a shiver passed between them, Bree had stopped, as ha Nic.

"What's this?" his voice echoed in the soft night.

Her drunken mind didn't even bother to make it up. "From when I grew up." she held her head over the can.

"They put barcodes on you where you grew up?"

"I grew up in a compound." she'd whispered, feeling him moving the hair aside to get a better look.

"A compound.."

"Manticore, where I was born and brought up to be a soldier, genetically enhanced." Bree had found that as soon as she'd started about her past, she couldn't shut up. She'd kept babbling, barely aware of a nything else around her, until his hand had moved away from her neck. She sensed he'd moved back a step, and the cold air moved between them. She'd shivered, looking up.

"What's wrong?" she asked.

And the look he'd given her. The look that broke her heart in half, and made her pledge she would never, ever, tell another living soul.

"Bree?"

The sharp voice snapped her from another day dream. She shook her head slightly.

"You okay?" Max asked, concerned.

"I.." her voice cracked for a second, "I'm okay, just thinking." she offered a half smile. Max took it in, but looked back with a knowing look filling her eyes.

"You'll be safe, after this meeting. Logan can set you up to be away from here, so they don't find you and take you back."

Back. She shivered in the warm air. Max didn't seem to notice, or didn't show it anyway.

"We're here." she finally stated, looking up at the building.

Bree looked up at the tall building. A posh looking place for these days. Something only the rich could afford. She looke d up at the windows, lights dotting the occasional one, then stepped in to the building, the noisy outside, replaced with a quiet atmosphere as soon as the doors closed behind them.

"Logan!" Max called as soon as they were inside the door of his apartment after Bling had let them in. Bree stepped in first, guided by Max's hand on the small of her back, as if to prevent her from running.

Bree could feel her muscles tense, and running sounded quite good right now. Although, she knew that in her heart, she didn't want to run. At all.

Max stepped past her, and Bree followed, watching Max strip off her jacket. Bree kept hers on. In another room, her eyes settled on a young guy in a wheelchair, sitting at a computer. Screens surrounded the desk, and haphazard stacks of paper were all around, as if in no specific order. However, the guy, Logan she assumed, moved with ease, knowing where everything he needed was. As if the piles were as good as any filing cabinet.

"Logan, this is Bree." Max said, "Bree, Logan."

Bree nodded her head to Logan's casual 'hey'. He shared a meaningful look with Max, and Max nodded, at the same time speaking up.

"It's okay Logan, she came here on agreement, she ain't gonna run, are ya sis?"

Bree swallowed, met both their gazes and smiled, "I'm tired of running."

The phrase sounded familiar to Max. The same thought had coursed through her mind several times. Part of the reason Max had stayed in Seattle. The other two parts were her friends, and the guy sitting in front of her at this very moment.

"Okay, let's get on with business then, shall we?" Logan asked, turning to stare back at the computer screen. Articles jumped all over the one in front of him, then came up on a separate monitor to the sides. Bree watched this with amazement, watched Logan's fingers fly over the keys, gather the information, then turn back to them.

"There." he said, gesturing towards the articles on his screen, "Are confidential documents concerning you, Bree. Max may have told you that there are three gove rnments looking for you. Two of which are the same that are after Max."

"Lydecker." Max almost spat the word out. She glanced at Bree, who stood at her side, slightly behind a step or so. The girl was focused on the monitors, her irises enlarged, and reading the articles.

"Right. What's special about you, Bree, is that Lydecker seems to have taken every possibly action to find you without arranging a house-to-house search. How you managed to make it this long, I don't know. Any ideas on why he 's so focused on you?" Logan asked, looking at her directly.

Bree thought for a moment, back to her days at Manticore. With a perfect memory she could remember comments here and there, snitches of conversations with other officials. She was his prized one. As if she were his very own daughter he were bragging about. Instead of mentioning these few things, she shook her head no.

Max could hear Bree take a short intake of breath. Could almost feel the suddenness of it. Then she'd shaken her head no. Max couldn't quite get past some of the girl's poker faces yet, but she was almost certain there'd been a flash of recognizance in her eyes. Which meant she knew something she didn't want to share at the moment.

"Okay." Logan continued, "The other thing is the third government, or party rather. Anything I've found on them is very vague, and I can't seem to get any profile out of any of the characters. The leader's name is John MacKenzie. He used to work with a scientist, Dr. Tanaka, until they split off their separate ways."

"Tanaka," Max muttered. Logan watched as her face lit with recognition.

"The doctor that-" Max began.

"Held the conference on gene re-sequencing." Logan finished off.

"Why would he want Bree?"

"I don't know, that's the mystery. I was hoping to find some more information, but I've been getting occasional brownouts that keep interrupting my research."

As if a reply to the word 'brownouts', the lights suddenly were off. The monitors flickered the last bit of life out of them before they went black as well, throwing the room in to a complete blackness.

Bree couldn't help but let out a laugh, Max joined, but Logan sat quietly.

"In case you've forgotten, I am the only one here without enhanced vision..." he began.

"Yeah Logan, where are the candles?" Max asked, stopping her giggling. But even through the dark Bree could see a smile still playing on her lips, as one was on her own.

"Second drawer down on the left hand side of the kitchen counter." he replied, waiting.

Both girls moved towards the kitchen, retrieving the candles, and lighting them with matches that were found with them. Soon the room was thrown in to a somewhat freakish glow of light, forming shadows on everyone's face.

"So, what are we supposed to do about this Logan?" Max asked, now seated beside Bree on the couch across from him.

"Well, I suggest that we get some stuff together, and get Bree out of Seattle as soon as possible. It's not safe here anymore, they've tracked her to Seattle. All they need to do is implement a full search, and she's been found."

"Well, fortunately that hasn't begun yet," Max replied, looking at Bree from the corner of her eye. The girl's face was fighting some heavy emotion, like she was struggling to make a decision.

She spoke, suddenly and loudly, her voice filling the room. "I'm tired of running." she stated, looking back at Logan in the eyes, for only the second time that night.

"I'm afraid there's no real choice, Bree. They're close already. If you don't leave, you could end up back in Manticore."

"Not if I fight them." Bree suggested.

"That's crazy, one girl can't fight an army, or three at that, on her own. They'd have you in a minute."

Max struggled to decide, a fight churning deep within her soul. Help out her sister, her family. She never let them down. Never would, not until it killed her.

"Not if I help." she suggested.

Bree stood in the semi-darkness. "No." she replied, looking at Max, who stood slowly.

"No?" Max questioned.

"I can't do that, I can't get you involved. They could get you hurt. This is my fight."

"You're my family, this is my fight too." Max pointed out.

"It's not like that-" Bree began.

"Hey!" Logan suddenly yelled, interrupting the two girls. They both turned to stare at him.

Waiting for a moment before he continued, he met both gazes, both defiant and stubborn. "First of all, Bree, you can't change Max's mind once it's made, Second of all Max, I don't like the idea, just for the record. Third of all, there's no way in hell that you two can fight three different governments."

Defeat filled through Bree, dread filled Max. Max didn't want her sister to run, but didn't want her to be brought back to Manticore either.

Bree didn't want to run, and didn't want to be brought back to Manticore. What they needed was an army to fight an army. Her mind spun in a world of impossible ideas.

She couldn't picture Original Cindy haulin'ass to kick some, or Sketchy. They needed a strong army. This wasn't supposed to be a suicide mission.

Max could almost feel the ideas taking place in her head, and before she even spoke, Logan spoke up.

"Max, you know he won't do it, there's not even a way of contacting him."

"But all we have to do is contact him, he can contact the others. It's an army against an army. Logan, we could win it, we could take down these people finally, and then I could relax - we could all relax - for a little while. We wouldn't have to constantly keep running."

"There's no way of contacting him. It's suicide. Any way to get his attention, would also attract the attention of Lydecker and his men, as well as the others."

"Then we have to figure out a way to get his attention, and only his." Max put in.

"It's suicide Max, and you know that."

The two bickered, stubbornly, as Bree stood there lost in the conversation. Not understanding what they were talking about, she drifted in to her own thoughts.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~