I sit perched on the Space Needle with a huge grin on my face and a light heart

Okay, here it is, due to request, the first chapter of the sequel to Assasin. Please R&R!

Dedication: To anyone who gave reviews for Assasin. THANKYOU!

Disclaimer: I don't own anybody, and I'm not making any profit.

I sit perched on the Space Needle with a huge grin on my face and a light heart. Life has never been more perfect. I have the best roommate you could ask for, great friends, a wonderful boyfriend, who's letting me take things slow, and a job that, when you really come down to it, isn't half-bad. True, Normal can be an ass sometimes, well, all the time, but all in all it's not that bad. And he doesn't yell at me, doesn't hit me, doesn't order me around. I really don't know how I ever stood 20 years of Manticore, and still maintained my sanity. Of coarse, I must've been crazy, acting the complete robotic soldier, letting everyone at Manticore rule my life for so long. I shudder a little. The scary thing is that if I hadn't come here two months ago; if I hadn't met Logan, I'd still be like the rest of my family; a mindless drone that doesn't even know that it's a slave. Logan. Just thinking about him makes my smile widen. He's…wonderful. And he's also making me dinner tonight, so I'd better get going.

I pick the lock to Logan's apartment, and am instantly greeted by wafts of tantalizing aromas.My mouth starts to water in anticipation of Logan's cooking. Not only is he a fantastic boyfriend, but, at least in my book, he's the world's greatest chef too. I walk to the doorframe and grin fondly at Logan's back as he adds some finishing touches to whatever he's made, so preoccupied that he doesn't even notice me standing there. He almost never does. I knock lightly on the doorframe.

"Knock knock." I tease in a sing-song voice. He turns to me, a smile on his face, his eyes filled with warmth. My chest flutters a little.

"Hey." He gives me a quick kiss.

"Hey. So what's the latest Cale Creation?" He grins pleasedly, his eyes dancing with amusement. He still thinks my obsession with food is funny.

"Roast turkey with sage stuffing. I follow him to the dining room, plop into a chair, and immediately dig into the food with relish. He watches me for a moment from across the table.

"What have you been doing, not eating all day so you can come here and eat all of my food?" I stop look at him sharply to see if he meant anything nasty, but his eyes are teasing so I relax.

"What can I say? Your food is worth waiting for. And I have eaten, just not since lunch." When he starts to laugh I continue with as much dignity as I can muster. "Manticore metabolisms are fast." A thought occurs to me. "Did you get anything more on Manticore?" He shakes his head, his laughter dying. I shake off a niggling sense of disappointment. Over the last month I'd told him everything I knew about Manticore, so now he had enough information to shut it down, but not the proof to back it up. I couldn't be named as a witness without exposing myself, and he hadn't been able to hack into any more of Manticore's computers to get documents because Manticore had upgraded it's system even more to protect itself from him just after I'd 'failed' my mission. Without solid proof, he couldn't broadcast anything, and no one was going to try to take out a bunch of genetically engineered soldiers on the little bit of proof that he did have. No one without a death wish anyway. So Logan had been dilegently trying to hack into Manticore's mainframe for weeks, with more precautions to make it untraceable, but hadn't had any success yet. Even though I've been taught that there's no such thing as luck, I really hope his turns soon. The sooner Manticore is brought down, the sooner they won't be looking for me anymore, and the safer I'll be.

Trying to lighten the mood, I shrug in a show of indifference.

"You'll break in sooner or later." Taking on a teasing tone, I add. "No one escapes Eyes Only's justice forever, right?" He smiles in thanks.

"Right." The rest of the night passes in companionable chatter, both of us careful not to dip into dangerous subjects. He walks me to the door and reaches up to stroke my hair.

"See you again in 2 days? Around 7 o'clock?" I nod.

"Sounds great." He studies me for a second. I always feel like he's reading my mind when he does that.

"Night Max." He leans down and gives me a long, sweet kiss. When we finally break away I'm grinning like a dope, and I don't care.

"Night." Still grinning, I turn away and head down the hallway. I hop back on my baby and ride through the night, back to my apartment. It's funny, it's still the same dreary, run-down apartment that it was when I first moved in, but now it seems almost…homey. I've grown kind of attached to it. I park my bike and head into my apartment, still feeling light-headedly happy. I kick the door shut and turn towards OC's and my living room. My heart stops dead. A figure dressed all in black has OC around the throat, and a gun trained on me.

There you go, hope you liked it.

\