Author: Tiger_lily

Notes: Well this is my first Max/Zack fic, inspired by a song and a fanart I made.

Suppose to before AJBAC I'll do a post SAR later . Go to Tigerlily.8m.net/images/finito.jpg to see the fanart. sorry if its not that good.. it was my first one.. : )

Only when I Sleep

_______________________________________________________________

You're only just a dreamboat

Sailing in my head

You swim my secret oceans

Of coral blue and red

Your smell is incense burning

Your touch is silken yet

It reaches through my skin

And moving from within..

* * *

Things look so different here. So much smaller, in perspective. And me? I feel like there is something bigger than just running away from the past, from Manticore. It makes me feel like maybe one day the world I watch, silently, so high above their sleeping heads, will have more to offer me than fear and insecurity. So I come up here some nights, just thinking, wishing, hoping that one day I'll belong down there with the rest of them.

The air up here seems to clear my head.

It helps that I don't need any sleep. Correction, I don't like to sleep. Sure the bad-ass shark DNA that me and Jondy got means we don't need sleep to survive. But wouldn't hurt me to just. close my eyes, just for a second.wash some of my memories away. Right?

Wrong.

The memories never stop. They haunt my dreams, like the past I never left behind. Sure, I surround myself with friends, people I trust, people I respect, people I might even. love. But it doesn't change the fact that I'm different. I never had the happy careless childhood they sometimes tell of. or a typical hate-love relationship with my family. And the love I have for my family transcends our genes.

Zack once said that love was a sentimental lie. Phony sentimentality. Isn't it ironic that he was the one who taught me, who taught all of us how to love? At Manticore, he always looked after us, making sure we weren't hurt, sometimes even disobeying orders if he thought it was best for us. There was something in his eyes, something that I put down as pride, but now that I look back, I think it was love. He guided us through those years. He bought our freedom by coming up with the escape. And he has sacrificed so much for us. for me.

Some people would peg his guidance and leadership of us as following an order. He was trained to be a leader, so he was just doing his job. And we just happened to be a series that had very independent mothers. Some might say Zack didn't love us at all.

But why do you think he continued to look out for us after the escape? He would call it his duty. I call it love.

I feel sorry for the X-7s. I remember looking at my clone, it was like staring into a mirror. She was me so many years ago. I thought I needed to give her chance, since nobody at Manticore had ever given her a choice. But then looking into her eyes as that gun fired, they were steel- gray. No light, no hope, no love. She is me except for one difference; she never had a caring, protective big brother to teach her there was more to live than following orders. Zack taught me that. Manticore can never duplicate that.

For someone who doesn't believe in love, he has a lot of it to give. Zack's so intense, his emotions (when he reveals them) are amplified a thousand times. I've never seen someone so strong and yet so vulnerable. Zack doesn't wear his heart on his sleeve. Sometimes looking at his chiseled face, his expression is impossible to read. He's grown good at guarding his emotions. But at least he's direct. If he wants something, he lets it be known how he feels. He might not say it. But you know. You can feel it in his presence, his stride. and those baby blue eyes that are as clear as a mirror to his soul.

Zack might not the caring sensitive new age guy girls want these days. He might not ask you, ' how are you feeling?' or 'are you okay'? Zack's observant. He doesn't base things on feelings. He watches what you do. Then he does the maths and figures it out for himself. But he understands me without needing to ask. He can tell when I'm angry or sad. It's just a deeper understanding that comes from what we've gone through together. Sometimes I see girls mourning over some hot high school stud who ditched her. I see women prostituting themselves on the street. I see babies with no mothers because they didn't have enough strength to live alone. I see women who let their husbands bash them up just so because they believe it's better than nothing. I wonder what they could possibly have seen in men who hurt them so. And that's when I'm grateful for what I have. Zack doesn't like to be disobeyed. But he'll let me make my own choices.

Zack says I'm living a lie, but better a lie than nothing. He doesn't understand though that I'm trying to replace the emptiness that I feel without him. I remember just after the escape, Hiding in Hannah's car, then later at the cabin. I had never been separated from my brothers and sisters before. Never been away from Zack. I was always his right hand. But then he made us split up. I didn't know where he was or even if he escaped. And there was just this awful emptiness inside me. Like there was nothing to live for. This deep darkness that despaired me so much I wanted to give way to my soldier training and just shut out everyone altogether. So I ran away that night, thinking I could never trust anyone.

Then I came here. Seattle. Home of the brave and free. And I met Cindy, who taught me how to laugh freely, Sketchy who reminded me to live life for today, Herbal who taught me to release my anger and hurt. Even Normal with his 'bip, bip, bip' reminded me that I was living my life the way I wanted to. Manticore kiss my genetically engineered ass. I'm not going to give up living because I had a bad childhood and people want to kill me. Heck, I admire normal human beings who deal with these problems and still turned out to be beautiful people.

So I felt somewhat at home here. I filled that empty hole in my heart with laughter and friends, a job and some righteous butt-kicking courtesy of Mr Cale. But it was like that jigsaw piece that didn't quite fit properly. The hole was filled, but never the right fit.

Then Zack found me, and I'm reminded that I can't entirely ditch my past. There were good things there too. Ben making butterfly shadows on that plain grey wall. Zack holding a red balloon with 'Happy birthday' on it. We'd never heard of birthdays before, let alone balloons for celebration. All the language that was thrown around us were project commencement dates and termination dates. That didn't seem like something to celebrate. But seeing Zack again. god how he'd grown. changed from the image I'd memorized so many years ago.

*

And when I wake from slumber

Your shadows disappear

Your breath is just sea mist

Surrounding my body

I'm workin' through the daytime

But when it's time to rest

I'm lying in my bed

Listening to my breath

Falling form the edge.

* * *

If I close my eyes, his image comes into view. Locks of gold surrounding that hard face, the prominent jaw, those baby blue eyes. His scent and presence surrounds me and I'm falling. Falling in love with him again. No matter how many times I forget. or involve myself with normal guys, thinking if I can't make my mind forget, I'll distract my body, he haunts my sleep, my dreams, my sub-consciousness. Me.

The first time I fell in love with him was as a soldier at Manticore. He was so noble and so brave. I had one of those cute little kiddie crushes on him. He was my hero, and he was my safety. The second time was after I discovered Sam was Zack. Like for all my siblings I'd imagined lives for him. Lives where he was happy, a normal life for him. I'd imagined what how he would look and how he'd smile. But seeing him again destroyed the perception I'd held in my head. He was cold, still a soldier. I thought all these years on the outside, surrounded by laughing happy people would have worn him down a little. But he was still hard as granite. It kind of ripped me apart to see what he'd become. So bitter, so hateful. I wanted to scream, ' Zack you can't feel this way. This is exactly the way Manticore would have wanted. For you to throw your life away. You're letting them win.' But like a good little soldier, I did what I was told and I kept my mouth shut. But secretly I hated him for it.

But when I went to save him after his escape from Manticore, which was because of ME, he was a completely different person. So unnaturally scared. so weak. He cried in front of me and it seemed like he was only a shadow of the man he was. I hated him for that too. Like he'd shattered the idea I'd developed as a kid that he was invincible. It's the kind of disappointment that you feel when you realize your hero is not as strong as he looks. But how could I hate him after he'd open up to me? I feel in love with him again, right then, after I realized he'd given me a glimpse of a side of him I'd never seen before. I'd seen that there was so much more to him that just that cold veneer he put up. If you just scratch the surface a little.

What we share transcends the consciousness. I don't need to think to know he'll protect me, like he always has. Forever the big brother, the CO. forever thinking I'm not capable of protecting myself. But now I know that he has fears, doubts and even dreams too, like me. Now I've seen him smile, an hesitant curve of the mouth, a flash of teeth, reminding me the worth of something rare. Like watching a baby takes its first steps. He's gradually succumbing to me. Letting me teach him a another way of living to the one he'd been taught. And now I can protect him back.

*

it's only when I sleep

See you in my dreams

You got me spinning round and round

Turning upside-down

But I only hear you breathe

Somewhere in my sleep.

*

Maybe he's right. Maybe I can't protect myself. I can't seem to protect myself from him. From my dreams. From my feelings.

So instead of sleeping, instead of losing myself into his baby blues while I sleep, I ride my motorcycle, I kick some ass, I scale buildings and come up here. Continually running. Hiding. Denying.

I'm trying to escape more than just Manticore. I'm trying to evade my dreams. Trying to leave myself behind.

My feelings for Zack is the weakness I won't surrender to ..

But its no big dealio.

These dreams only come when I sleep. So as long as I'm up here, feeling the wind against my face, watching the world sleep around me, I'm safe. As long as I keep my eyes open, he is a million miles away.

Right?

So how come I feel like I'm just living with my eyes closed?

*

Up to the sky

Where angels fly

I'll never die

In bed I lie

No need to cry

My sleeping cry

Hawaiian High

But it's only when I sleep...