Chapter Three:

Eerily Familiar Eyes

This was definitely one of the nicer buildings in Seattle before the Pulse. She wished for a moment that she could have seen it in those first months of freedom after the escape, those few months before all of the computers got fried, but she'd never ventured into this part of town back then. They stepped into the elevator and her companion pushed the "penthouse" button. "Sorry, Milly," she muttered as the elevator moved upward, knowing that the cat was probably not enjoying the ride. Original Cindy glanced sideways at her, but said nothing. She imagined that most people wouldn't be likely to ask a genetically engineered killing machine why they were talking to themselves. She smiled inwardly at the thought.

A rather harried looking man in a wheelchair, who for some reason looked extremely familiar, answered the door within seconds of the knock. "I feel really bad about this," he began, but stopped when his eyes fell on the stranger.

"Newest member of the family," Original Cindy said by way of explanation. "Where's my boo?"

He eyed the newcomer suspiciously for a moment. "Over on the sofa." He turned and led the way into his living room.

"Are either of you, perchance, allergic to cats?" They gave her a strange look.

"No . . . " they answered in unison, taken off guard by the unexpected question.

"Okay, all I wanted to know."

And then there she was, lying on the sofa, her body shaking violently. A glass of milk sat on the floor beside of her, but it was clear that she was shaking too hard to hold the glass to her lips. Her dark hair was damp at the scalp, where she'd been sweating. She was curled into a fetal position, and for a moment the memory returned of a much younger Max, head shaved into a military-style buzz cut, lying on her bunk in nothing but a thin gown, shaking, much like she was now, tears streaming down her face because she was afraid that they would give her to the Nomalies. She shook the memory off.

She plopped her backpack on the floor, remembering at the last moment that Milly wouldn't enjoy being dropped. "Sorry, baby." She opened the zipper of one pouch, lifted out the cat, and set her down on the floor. She opened another pouch and pulled out a brown prescription bottle. As Milly stretched and began to nose her way about the room, she moved towards the sofa and wished for a moment that this reunion could have been under happier circumstances. Lifting the glass out of the way, she sat down on the sofa and rested her sister's head in her lap. "Hey, baby sister."

Max looked up at her, a slightly confused look coming into her eyes. "Jondy? Great, now I'm hallucinating, too. Just what I need," she mumbled though clenched teeth. Jondy smiled. She poured a few pills out into her hand, then put the bottle aside to grab the glass of milk.

"Happy to see you, too." Max tried to pluck the pills from her hand but her hands shook so that she couldn't get a firm grip. "Just open up." Max did as she was told, and Jondy plopped them into her mouth. She maneuvered the glass of milk to Max's lips, and, after several attempts she somehow managed to drink it all down. Smoothing the hair out of her sister's face, she reached over and took Max's hand and watched her struggle against the seizures for several more moments. Someone reached down to take the glass from Jondy's hand. It was only then that she remembered her two companions. Original Cindy, worry etched into her face, took the glass and wandered off, presumably to the kitchen for a refill. The man sat across the room with a strange expression on his face. Worry, certainly was there, and love, that shone through as clear as day, but there was something else there as well. Regret? Guilt? She couldn't quite make it out.

She glanced back down in time to see her sister's eyes flutter open. Her tremors had nearly subsided by the time Original Cindy returned to the room with more milk. "Always the mother," she murmured as Jondy held up the glass for her to drink. "You and Eva," and then a shadow crossed her face. Eva, but Max didn't need to think of that now.

"Close your eyes and get some rest."

Max's eyes fluttered shut. "I'm sorry," she murmured before drifting off to sleep.

Jondy smoothed the hair across her forehead, propped a pillow under her head, and let her sleep.

It was already closer to dawn than to dusk, but there was no way that Logan was going to sleep, not after what had nearly happened tonight. He pushed himself away from the computer screen, let out a deep breath, and raked a hand through his hair. Catching a movement out of the corner of his eye, he turned to see Jondy, arms crossed in front of her, leaning against the doorjamb.

"Logan Cale." Original Cindy had just told her his name, and it had rung a bell or two. How extremely ironic, she thought.

"And you would be Max's sister, Jondy." Sister. She wondered for a moment how many people knew the truth about Max, but then again, probably not so many as knew the truth about her.

"Yeah." She paused. "Just so you know, you don't have to worry about my cat. She's toilet-trained. I mean, I can't exactly carry a litter box around in my backpack all of the time, you know. She's already figured out where the bathroom is, so she shouldn't be any trouble."

She took a deep breath. No reason to beat around the bush, she thought, nagged once again by the thought that there was something oddly familiar about him. "Have they always been this bad?"

"Only since she got back from Manticore." He turned to face her. "They had a different treatment back there, one that isn't available out here. The tryptophan will work okay, once she gets readjusted to it, but for another week or so things might not be so great. I suspected as much right after she came back and the seizures started up again. I got in touch with your sister Jace, and she confirmed my suspicions."

"Jace?" Jace is out of Manticore? she thought. But she stayed behind . . .

"She went AWOL last February," he explained, reading the confusion in her expression. "She was more interested in being a mother to the baby she was carrying than she was in being a soldier."

Jace? AWOL because she was pregnant? "Yeah, well, when we signed our contracts back in '07, I noticed that they didn't offer us a very good deal on maternity leave, and I don't think childbirth was covered under the group policy. 'Course we didn't have dental, either." Logan smiled lightly. Sarcasm seemed to run in the family . . .

"Why didn't she take anything before?" she asked quietly, stepping into the room and dropping her hands to her sides. "She had pills in her pocket."

"She did, they just weren't enough. She needed more, but by then she was too shaky to take them herself." He paused. "And it's not as if I could give them to her, and Asha's out of town . . . doing something for me. I had to call somebody . . ."

"Huh?"

"Asha is a . . . friend of mine. She knows about Max." Interesting, Jondy thought to herself. Very interesting. She gave him a stern look. That hadn't been the information she'd been hoping for. Logan removed his glasses, and rubbed his fingers over his aching eyes. He glanced briefly in her direction before he slipped them back on, and in that second, it clicked. Bingo. So that's why you look so familiar.

"I can't touch her," he began. "Manticore, they . . . did something to her when she was there. It only affects me, but now, if I touch her, or she touches me, I die. Period." He turned the chair back around to face the computer screen, propped his elbows on the desk and, rested his forehead in his hands. "Do you know how hard it was tonight?" he continued. "Sitting there, watching her, wishing I could do something? I couldn't even hold her hand and help her through it. I wanted to just forget it all and give her the damned pills. I almost did, but she yelled at me. Said she'd kick my ass if I touched her." Jondy almost chuckled. It sounded like her baby sister, all right.

"You should get some sleep," she said softly. "Max is asleep on your sofa, and Original Cindy's zonked out in a chair. Hell, even my cat is asleep somewhere."

He shook his head. "I don't think I can sleep."

"At least lie down for a bit and try to get some rest."

He conceded with a nod. In his experience, there was no point in arguing with an X5. He didn't imagine that this one would be any different. "I'll try."

Jondy walked back into the living room, but turned as she passed the doorway. "By the way, thanks."

"Thanks for what?" His brows knit in confusion.

"That hack last February. You quite possibly saved my life, mine and several others."

"You're welcome," he said after a moment. He turned and headed toward his bedroom. "You are quite welcome."