Extra Ordinary I
Chapter 16
"Where the hell is Max?" Zack's tone of toughness was lost because he was saying this around a mouth full of chicken lo mien. Krit had announces in as little words as humanly possible that he'd cracked Phillip Costello's hard drive about a half hour before, but they had still been waiting for the Chinese food delivery to get there, and they did have their priorities.
"She's on the front porch." Jhondie answered digging through the brown paper bag. "Who took my egg roll?"
"What's she doing on the front porch?" Zack questioned.
"This and that." Syl supplied evasively. Before Zack could question Max's leisure habits further, she slid into a chair next to Krit who was quickly and quietly hammering away at his computer. "Now can we stop worry about her, please, and lets get down to work? She'll get in here to help when she full well wants to." Syl didn't mean to be quiet so rude about it, but she was the one who went on the front porch to pay the delivery guy, and she didn't think Max would mind overly much.
"Well, before we get started, where's Cale? We can't exactly have him walking in on the middle of this." He'd been hanging around so much lately; it was almost unnoticeable by now.
"He's on the front porch, too." Zane answered with a knowing grin. Syl smacked him, hard, on the back of his head, making him spill rice all over the table. "What?" He asked innocently holding up his hands.
"Shut up." She said fiercely under her breath.
Zack stared at them coolly. "What am I missing?" Syl glared at Zane, who merely smiled at her. Krit covered a barely suppressed laugh with a mouth full of egg roll. Jhondie probably would have laughed too, but she saw Krit eating *her* egg roll, and was contemplating what way she was going to hurt him for it.
"Logan and Max having been hanging out an awful lot lately." There was a loud thump and Zane slid back from the table, grabbing his leg. "Ouch, damn it, Syl!"
"What is that supposed to mean?" Zack's fork was halfway between the plate and his mouth. He hadn't been home the last week, dealing with a situation in Southern California had kept him busy, but it seemed like a lot had happened since he was gone. Of course, any one of the people sitting around the table could tell him that it had been going on for about another week before hijackers had required Zack's 'special touch'.
"Oh, nothing much." Zane answered quickly when Syl stared threatening at him.
"No, what aren't you saying?" Zack asked, quickly rising from his chair, staring suspiciously at the people sitting around the table. No one said a word; in fact, they wouldn't even make eye contact, unless you counted Krit's smirk into the computer screen.
Zack scowled and stormed out of the room. "Good job, Zane." Syl snapped.
"What?" Zane asked, grinning. "Its not like he wouldn't have found out anyway."
"So, Zack's going to walk out there and find out what is going on when he catches Logan with his tongue down Max's throat." Jhondie supplied to her often-dense brother.
Zane's face fell. "Oh. Poor Logan."
Krit perked up. "I think the real question now should be, who wants to watch?"
Everyone in the family could agree that though Krit's words were few and far between, when he did chose speak, it was more often than not brilliant. Everyone scrambled away from the table in record speed.
The scene was hilarious. Or, at least it was if your name wasn't Max, Logan, or Zack and you were watching from the living room window. When Zack pulled open the door, he was…well…distressed to find the man who was about to expose Manticore to the world with his tongue down his sister's throat. Manticore wasn't the only thing he was about to expose, seeing as several buttons on Max's shirt had *somehow* come undone. Zack 'politely' cleared his throat, while silently plotting the best way to break Logan's legs.
The only way Logan could think to describe Max's expression was 'Oh shit, Run." But he could be wrong, seeing as he only saw Max's face for that split second before she was on the ground. She'd pulled back so fast, added with the fact that she was about to get her ass kicked by her brother, even her super-balance couldn't keep her from landing on the ground with a loud thump. Logan dared to glance over in Zack's direction long enough to realize that he'd be better looking at the ground far, far away.
"Max, can I see you inside." Zack's eyes were narrowed. It was a look that was meant to cause fear in the masses. It was working quite well. The door shut with a quiet click. You had to admire his control. He really wanted to slam that door, but he didn't. It was probably because he was waiting to slam Logan's head against a wall.
Soon as the door was shut, Max was on her feet. "Shit." She said as she quickly re-buttoned her shirt. "Shit shit shit shit shit."
"Max…" Logan didn't know what to say. Brothers were stereotypically overprotective of their younger sisters. That, he could deal with. But most brothers weren't multimillion-dollar military science projects that could be termed as weapons in themselves. They were screwed. It was as simple as that. They could run now, and get a head start, but either way; he was probably getting dismembered by the end of the day.
"Okay." Max took a deep, steadying breath. "Okay. Uh…stay here. Don't move. I'll handle this." That was, unless Zack decided guns were necessary. God forbid he find out that she was considering sleeping with him. Before Zack's ever-so-kind interruption, she'd been thinking about making it sooner, rather than later. Hell, if he'd been five minuets later they would have probably forgotten they were outside in broad daylight. If that had been the case, Zack would have shot first, asked questions later.
Max was so distracted by her upcoming date with death that she didn't notice the small group of people huddled in the living room. "Twenty bucks Logan runs." Syl whispered.
"No, twenty bucks Zack breaks a bone." Jhondie shot back.
Syl narrowed her eyes and watched Logan glance nervously around the front porch. "You're on."
Max walked into the kitchen where she knew she could find Zack. The kitchen was a good place to be. They didn't have a whole lot of other weapons in there, at least that she knew of. Zack was leaning against the counter, his arms crossed, his chin angled out. 'Ouch.' Max thought. 'Standing right next to the knives. Not good.'
"What the hell was that, solider?" Zack snapped as soon as she was completely in the room.
When Zack was pissed there were very few ways of dealing with it. In fact, there was no way to deal with it rationally. "Well, Zack if you don't know what making out is, you're worse off than I thought."
"Don't fuck around, Max. I'm serious."
"So am I. Should I draw you a map, or how about a nice picture book? Would any of that help?" Max sat down at the table, ripping open a container of rice, the complete image of relaxation. It spoke nothing of the quaking fear that Zack could put in her when he was like this.
"What the hell are you thinking? Of all the people in the world, he is the last person you should be getting involved with." Zack remained still, completely still, which was another sign of how pissed he really was.
"Which makes it all the more appealing, doesn't it?" Max shot back.
"What do you think Lydecker is going to say when he finds out about this?" That was a wrong move on Zack's part.
Max eyes flashed. "I can do what I want when I want to with whoever I want to do it with. Not you, Lydecker, or anyone else for that matter is going to say any differently."
"Stop being stupid! This is insane! He's out to expose us and he's using you to do it! I can't believe you don't see it!"
Max slowly put down the container of rice. Temper was a vicious punch in the stomach and she had to fight to keep a grip on herself. "Is that what you think?" Her voice had lost the sarcasm and had picked up an icy edge.
Zack knew he had treaded onto boggy ground. "I'm just looking out for you, Maxie." He said quietly.
"You're not looking out for me at all. You're just pissed that I managed to find some small thread of happiness outside of assassinations and blowing things up, unlike you."
Zack didn't show any reaction to Max's words. They'd been trained better than that. But they were cold enough to sting. "You call risking months and months of work happiness?"
"What, you think I'm going to let case details slip in the throws of passion?" Max's head dropped forward as she mirthlessly laughed.
"It's possible." Zack shot back defensively.
Max was silent a moment. "You really think that little of me, Zack? Do you really think that small of me?" It hurt; it really hurt to know that he did.
Zack ran a hand over his face, frustrated. "Relationships are messy, Max. You know that as well as I do, and that is why none of us have them. We don't know how to handle them, and when you get all tangled up in them, it's dangerous to them and you."
Max clapped her hands three times, a mocking applause. "That was good. Did you practice that one?"
"You are going to get hurt, I know you are." Zack said wearily. "I can't stand here and watch him hurt you."
"Who says I'm not going to hurt him first?" When Zack remained silent, Max sighed. He was trying; he was really trying not to be an ass about this. He was failing miserably, but she had to give him credit for trying. "Look, Zack, for the moment, I'm happy. That doesn't happen very often. Can't you just let that alone, for now."
"I've got a really bad feeling about this. You get serious with him, its going to come back and bite us in the ass. I know it will."
"Who said anything about serious?" Max asked. She had the sudden urge to fidget. "We're messing around, that's it." Zack just narrowed his eyes further, if it was even possible. Max didn't mess around with anything. She was determined with everything she did, whether it is kicking Zane's ass for looking at her car wrong, or defusing a bomb in ten seconds or less. When she wanted to do something, she did it as soon as possible, and as fast as possible. Messing around simply wasn't her style. The fact that she had tripped this far into a relationship with him said a lot on its own. Along with that single-minded determination to be the best was her stubbornness. This meant that he wasn't going to get anywhere fighting with her, no matter how much he wanted to give her a nice, swift kick in the ass sometimes. The only place fighting with her would be frost burn. Max was just as good as freezing people out, as she was raging at them. The cold spells always lasted a hell of a lot longer than the temper tantrums.
"Max, promise me you'll be careful." Zack amended after a long silence. "If you get hurt, I'll be honor bound to hurt him severely. He's a well-known guy, I think they'll know if he doesn't come back one day."
It had the desired effect when Max smiled. "If he hurts me, I'll help with the cover up."
They were utterly still, each in their own world, contemplating the next move. "Maxie, forgot to tell you." Zack said, suddenly brightening. "Krit cracked the financial records."
You could almost see her ears perk; a testament to her cat DNA. "Really?" Her words were a delighted purr.
"Yeah, we were waiting for you, that's why we didn't get started." That was a lie, of course, but they all served a purpose.
"Well, where the hell are the rest of them? I want to see where Costello blows his money."
"I'll go get rid of Cale and then we'll get back to business." Zack answered, a little to brightly. Max was busy peeking at the laptop to notice.
After briefly bitching at the rest of his siblings for spying on Max and Logan, pointing out their total lack of maturity, then giving up when a twenty changed hands, Zack found himself on the front porch with the newest addition to his personal hit list.
To Logan's credit, he looked liked he wanted to run, but remained in the chair. In his mind, chances were he was going to die in the same chair. The same chair that he's been partaking in more enjoyable activities fifteen minutes ago.
The exchange of words was one sided, but it was quick and to the point. "You hurt my sister, I will use the jumper cables that are in the trunk of my car on very delicate parts of your anatomy. In fact, I think I might anyway." Zack turned and walked towards the door. "Max's got work to do. Go home." The door slammed this time.
Logan decided that going home was a very good idea
Chapter 16
"Where the hell is Max?" Zack's tone of toughness was lost because he was saying this around a mouth full of chicken lo mien. Krit had announces in as little words as humanly possible that he'd cracked Phillip Costello's hard drive about a half hour before, but they had still been waiting for the Chinese food delivery to get there, and they did have their priorities.
"She's on the front porch." Jhondie answered digging through the brown paper bag. "Who took my egg roll?"
"What's she doing on the front porch?" Zack questioned.
"This and that." Syl supplied evasively. Before Zack could question Max's leisure habits further, she slid into a chair next to Krit who was quickly and quietly hammering away at his computer. "Now can we stop worry about her, please, and lets get down to work? She'll get in here to help when she full well wants to." Syl didn't mean to be quiet so rude about it, but she was the one who went on the front porch to pay the delivery guy, and she didn't think Max would mind overly much.
"Well, before we get started, where's Cale? We can't exactly have him walking in on the middle of this." He'd been hanging around so much lately; it was almost unnoticeable by now.
"He's on the front porch, too." Zane answered with a knowing grin. Syl smacked him, hard, on the back of his head, making him spill rice all over the table. "What?" He asked innocently holding up his hands.
"Shut up." She said fiercely under her breath.
Zack stared at them coolly. "What am I missing?" Syl glared at Zane, who merely smiled at her. Krit covered a barely suppressed laugh with a mouth full of egg roll. Jhondie probably would have laughed too, but she saw Krit eating *her* egg roll, and was contemplating what way she was going to hurt him for it.
"Logan and Max having been hanging out an awful lot lately." There was a loud thump and Zane slid back from the table, grabbing his leg. "Ouch, damn it, Syl!"
"What is that supposed to mean?" Zack's fork was halfway between the plate and his mouth. He hadn't been home the last week, dealing with a situation in Southern California had kept him busy, but it seemed like a lot had happened since he was gone. Of course, any one of the people sitting around the table could tell him that it had been going on for about another week before hijackers had required Zack's 'special touch'.
"Oh, nothing much." Zane answered quickly when Syl stared threatening at him.
"No, what aren't you saying?" Zack asked, quickly rising from his chair, staring suspiciously at the people sitting around the table. No one said a word; in fact, they wouldn't even make eye contact, unless you counted Krit's smirk into the computer screen.
Zack scowled and stormed out of the room. "Good job, Zane." Syl snapped.
"What?" Zane asked, grinning. "Its not like he wouldn't have found out anyway."
"So, Zack's going to walk out there and find out what is going on when he catches Logan with his tongue down Max's throat." Jhondie supplied to her often-dense brother.
Zane's face fell. "Oh. Poor Logan."
Krit perked up. "I think the real question now should be, who wants to watch?"
Everyone in the family could agree that though Krit's words were few and far between, when he did chose speak, it was more often than not brilliant. Everyone scrambled away from the table in record speed.
The scene was hilarious. Or, at least it was if your name wasn't Max, Logan, or Zack and you were watching from the living room window. When Zack pulled open the door, he was…well…distressed to find the man who was about to expose Manticore to the world with his tongue down his sister's throat. Manticore wasn't the only thing he was about to expose, seeing as several buttons on Max's shirt had *somehow* come undone. Zack 'politely' cleared his throat, while silently plotting the best way to break Logan's legs.
The only way Logan could think to describe Max's expression was 'Oh shit, Run." But he could be wrong, seeing as he only saw Max's face for that split second before she was on the ground. She'd pulled back so fast, added with the fact that she was about to get her ass kicked by her brother, even her super-balance couldn't keep her from landing on the ground with a loud thump. Logan dared to glance over in Zack's direction long enough to realize that he'd be better looking at the ground far, far away.
"Max, can I see you inside." Zack's eyes were narrowed. It was a look that was meant to cause fear in the masses. It was working quite well. The door shut with a quiet click. You had to admire his control. He really wanted to slam that door, but he didn't. It was probably because he was waiting to slam Logan's head against a wall.
Soon as the door was shut, Max was on her feet. "Shit." She said as she quickly re-buttoned her shirt. "Shit shit shit shit shit."
"Max…" Logan didn't know what to say. Brothers were stereotypically overprotective of their younger sisters. That, he could deal with. But most brothers weren't multimillion-dollar military science projects that could be termed as weapons in themselves. They were screwed. It was as simple as that. They could run now, and get a head start, but either way; he was probably getting dismembered by the end of the day.
"Okay." Max took a deep, steadying breath. "Okay. Uh…stay here. Don't move. I'll handle this." That was, unless Zack decided guns were necessary. God forbid he find out that she was considering sleeping with him. Before Zack's ever-so-kind interruption, she'd been thinking about making it sooner, rather than later. Hell, if he'd been five minuets later they would have probably forgotten they were outside in broad daylight. If that had been the case, Zack would have shot first, asked questions later.
Max was so distracted by her upcoming date with death that she didn't notice the small group of people huddled in the living room. "Twenty bucks Logan runs." Syl whispered.
"No, twenty bucks Zack breaks a bone." Jhondie shot back.
Syl narrowed her eyes and watched Logan glance nervously around the front porch. "You're on."
Max walked into the kitchen where she knew she could find Zack. The kitchen was a good place to be. They didn't have a whole lot of other weapons in there, at least that she knew of. Zack was leaning against the counter, his arms crossed, his chin angled out. 'Ouch.' Max thought. 'Standing right next to the knives. Not good.'
"What the hell was that, solider?" Zack snapped as soon as she was completely in the room.
When Zack was pissed there were very few ways of dealing with it. In fact, there was no way to deal with it rationally. "Well, Zack if you don't know what making out is, you're worse off than I thought."
"Don't fuck around, Max. I'm serious."
"So am I. Should I draw you a map, or how about a nice picture book? Would any of that help?" Max sat down at the table, ripping open a container of rice, the complete image of relaxation. It spoke nothing of the quaking fear that Zack could put in her when he was like this.
"What the hell are you thinking? Of all the people in the world, he is the last person you should be getting involved with." Zack remained still, completely still, which was another sign of how pissed he really was.
"Which makes it all the more appealing, doesn't it?" Max shot back.
"What do you think Lydecker is going to say when he finds out about this?" That was a wrong move on Zack's part.
Max eyes flashed. "I can do what I want when I want to with whoever I want to do it with. Not you, Lydecker, or anyone else for that matter is going to say any differently."
"Stop being stupid! This is insane! He's out to expose us and he's using you to do it! I can't believe you don't see it!"
Max slowly put down the container of rice. Temper was a vicious punch in the stomach and she had to fight to keep a grip on herself. "Is that what you think?" Her voice had lost the sarcasm and had picked up an icy edge.
Zack knew he had treaded onto boggy ground. "I'm just looking out for you, Maxie." He said quietly.
"You're not looking out for me at all. You're just pissed that I managed to find some small thread of happiness outside of assassinations and blowing things up, unlike you."
Zack didn't show any reaction to Max's words. They'd been trained better than that. But they were cold enough to sting. "You call risking months and months of work happiness?"
"What, you think I'm going to let case details slip in the throws of passion?" Max's head dropped forward as she mirthlessly laughed.
"It's possible." Zack shot back defensively.
Max was silent a moment. "You really think that little of me, Zack? Do you really think that small of me?" It hurt; it really hurt to know that he did.
Zack ran a hand over his face, frustrated. "Relationships are messy, Max. You know that as well as I do, and that is why none of us have them. We don't know how to handle them, and when you get all tangled up in them, it's dangerous to them and you."
Max clapped her hands three times, a mocking applause. "That was good. Did you practice that one?"
"You are going to get hurt, I know you are." Zack said wearily. "I can't stand here and watch him hurt you."
"Who says I'm not going to hurt him first?" When Zack remained silent, Max sighed. He was trying; he was really trying not to be an ass about this. He was failing miserably, but she had to give him credit for trying. "Look, Zack, for the moment, I'm happy. That doesn't happen very often. Can't you just let that alone, for now."
"I've got a really bad feeling about this. You get serious with him, its going to come back and bite us in the ass. I know it will."
"Who said anything about serious?" Max asked. She had the sudden urge to fidget. "We're messing around, that's it." Zack just narrowed his eyes further, if it was even possible. Max didn't mess around with anything. She was determined with everything she did, whether it is kicking Zane's ass for looking at her car wrong, or defusing a bomb in ten seconds or less. When she wanted to do something, she did it as soon as possible, and as fast as possible. Messing around simply wasn't her style. The fact that she had tripped this far into a relationship with him said a lot on its own. Along with that single-minded determination to be the best was her stubbornness. This meant that he wasn't going to get anywhere fighting with her, no matter how much he wanted to give her a nice, swift kick in the ass sometimes. The only place fighting with her would be frost burn. Max was just as good as freezing people out, as she was raging at them. The cold spells always lasted a hell of a lot longer than the temper tantrums.
"Max, promise me you'll be careful." Zack amended after a long silence. "If you get hurt, I'll be honor bound to hurt him severely. He's a well-known guy, I think they'll know if he doesn't come back one day."
It had the desired effect when Max smiled. "If he hurts me, I'll help with the cover up."
They were utterly still, each in their own world, contemplating the next move. "Maxie, forgot to tell you." Zack said, suddenly brightening. "Krit cracked the financial records."
You could almost see her ears perk; a testament to her cat DNA. "Really?" Her words were a delighted purr.
"Yeah, we were waiting for you, that's why we didn't get started." That was a lie, of course, but they all served a purpose.
"Well, where the hell are the rest of them? I want to see where Costello blows his money."
"I'll go get rid of Cale and then we'll get back to business." Zack answered, a little to brightly. Max was busy peeking at the laptop to notice.
After briefly bitching at the rest of his siblings for spying on Max and Logan, pointing out their total lack of maturity, then giving up when a twenty changed hands, Zack found himself on the front porch with the newest addition to his personal hit list.
To Logan's credit, he looked liked he wanted to run, but remained in the chair. In his mind, chances were he was going to die in the same chair. The same chair that he's been partaking in more enjoyable activities fifteen minutes ago.
The exchange of words was one sided, but it was quick and to the point. "You hurt my sister, I will use the jumper cables that are in the trunk of my car on very delicate parts of your anatomy. In fact, I think I might anyway." Zack turned and walked towards the door. "Max's got work to do. Go home." The door slammed this time.
Logan decided that going home was a very good idea
