Chapter 1: Baked Goods
by: Mochaije
Disclaimer: I do not own Dark Angel or its characters. Other than that, the story and characters are mine.
Summary: Virus bitch goin' down! After "Medium is the Message".
Rating: PG 13
A/N: My third story! I decided to poke a new option in the whole Max/Logan virus crap... I don't think anyone's explored this one yet.
Max snuggled up to the couch under the gigantic duvet. It had been so nice of Logan to let her stay, even though her touch was poison, even though they loved each other and could do nothing about it. They didn't even talk about where their relationship was; just long, uncomfortable silences and the occaisonal Eyes Only mission. Any hope of figuring out their relationship was lost in babble about White and his goons.
She fingered the edge of the duvet, unable to sleep. She'd stayed at Joshua's for a night about two weeks ago, and had woken up next to a beautiful painting, made with Max's person in mind. Not her body, but what made her Max. It struck her that it's the insides that make you love someone--looks help, but not much. Joshua could see inside her and what surrounded her, but Logan seemed to think "all or nothing"--he wanted the inbetween, as well. She just wished she didn't end up killing everyone she got close to, that everything would get back to normal around there.
The sun began coming up and she threw the duvet off, standing up and folding it, watching the sun rise into a strangely clear sky. It reflected off of Sector Five's skyscrapers; this sector was the high-rise capitol of Seattle, after all. Max smoothed the folds in the blanket and tucked it back behind the small couch, where she'd found it. The sunrise warmed her skin and she smiled wistfully, remembering her first night out of Manticore, watching the sun rise and feeling free. Max folded her arms across her red t-shirt-covered chest, whirling when she heard the definitive whirring of Logan's exoskeleton.
"Sleep well?" She asked, noticing contently that he was shirtless when he nodded at her. Someone's been workin' out since my hair went straight...
"Uh, yeah... Seen my blue shirt?" It took Max a second to realize which one he was talking about.
"The light blue one? Nope," she mumbled, checking out his now nicely-toned upper body.
"Meh... I'll grab a different one then. Got those disks from last night?"
"Yeah," Max pulled them from her jacket that was sitting on the arm of the couch. "Want me to load them up?"
"If you want to." Logan dissappeared into his room and Max's eyes followed him, wondering what his problem was this morning. She sat down at the computer and popped the disks into the A:\ drive with a sigh, logging into Logan's network identity. The phone rang, and she checked the caller ID before picking it up.
"Hello," she said blandly, looking at her nails and picking a bit of lint out of one while the disks booted. It sounded like a loud diner on the other end of the conversation.
"Logan Cale or Max Guevara?" It was the stuttering doctor who she'd paid five large a few weeks ago.
"That depends. I'm guessing this is the screwball that I gave a few handfuls of money to, right?"
"Y-yeah... I've got some good news for you on that virus thing." Max straightened up, glow back in her face. "It's got an expiry date. Don't know when it is. I'm helping out at a blood donor clinic tomorrow, how 'bout I give the address and I get another virus sample and get that expiry date.. Or... Or you could give me the rest of the papers and I could find it in there." Max's heart sank when she remembered Alec handing her the paint-covered papers.
"I'd better just go to the blood clinic. Do you have the address?"
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Max laid down pensively as a friendly-looking nurse rubbed her inner elbow with some alchohol, reassuring her that it wouldn't hurt. She barely noticed the needle going in, not feeling pain from it, just knowing it was in there. The awkward-looking, balding, stuttering lab tech stared down at her and patted the nurse on the shoulder.
"I'll take over here. She's an HIV patient of mine, don't know why she had the nerve to come here and donate blood." The nurse said something like "yes, doctor" and left, Max giving the tech a dirty look.
"Doctor? Bullshit. I'm not gonna owe you money for this, am I?" She kept her voice down, almost inaudible against the loud hum of the school gymnasium the Red Cross was using that day.
"Hey, all I did last time was get you some paper. Like that got you anywhere." He replaced the vial with an empty one, filling it as well.
"Got an estimate on the expiry date of this virus bitch? And any idea on why it even has one?"
"The whole idea isn't new," he told her, picking up a full vial and holding it up the small desk lamp. "If the virus doesn't have anything to do, it starts attacking whoever it's living in, as long as it's been activated before. So they gave it an expiry date... Six months or so. But it ain't a good idea to play guessing games with shit like that."
"So that's why you called me," Max spoke in a softer tone. "I'm either a ticking time bomb or overdue baked goods."
"Funny you should say baked goods," he muttered. "It's lingo for female fugitive."
"I lived in Manticore for ten years. I know what baked goods are."
"Keep your voice down," he warned. "I'm not the only tech in this joint right now." He pulled the entire needle out of her then and she gasped slightly.
"Wanna be a bit more gentle there, doc?" Max asked, hopeful. She got up and pulled her leather jacket back on. "Now where's my muffin and juice?"
