ARCHIVE: With permission
By Valjean
Tryptophan
She loved to watch him sleep. He lay beside her in their bed, one hand curled beneath his cheek, the other resting possessively on her naked breast. With those predatory green-gold eyes closed he looked so deceptively innocent, like a little boy. And the long dark blond strands of hair that fell in waves across his forehead and covered his ears only added to the illusion of youth, making him look more like a teenager than the adult warrior he really was.
He sighed and murmured, probably dreaming, and Max resisted the temptation to stroke that long mane of hair that covered the bar code on the back of his neck, tangle her fingers in it. All it would take was a touch and he'd be instantly awake, the primitive part of his hind brain that never really slept alerting him in an instant. No, she didn't want to deprive him of his rest. After all, Alec had been sitting with her nearly night and day ever since they'd returned from New York, worried sick about her wound, until Dr. Makari had finally pronounced her "out of the woods." Now it was his turn to sleep -- while the depleting chemicals in his brain still let him.
"Serotonin." Max whispered the word aloud. An organic compound, C10H12N2O, formed from tryptophan and found in animal and human tissue, especially the brain, blood serum, and gastric mucous membranes, and active as a neurotransmitter and in vasoconstriction, stimulation of the smooth muscles, and regulation of cyclic body processes, or; a neurotransmitter involved in e.g. sleep and depression and memory.
"Tryptophan." An essential amino acid, C11H12N2O2, formed from proteins during digestion by the action of proteolytic enzymes, necessary for normal growth and development and is the precursor of several substances, including serotonin and niacin, or; an amino acid that is essential for growth and normal metabolism; a precursor of niacin.
Max had memorized the definitions years ago, when she'd been trying to find a way to combat her own seizures. Manticore had designed its X series soldiers with that one deliberate flaw, an inability for their bodies to manufacture serotonin. Afterall, the U.S. government couldn't very well have their revved up soldiers capable of living independent lives on their own, reproducing even. These were flesh and blood killing machines. Of course they'd required a built-in fail safe.
The earlier X series, the X2's, 3's, and 4's, were worse off than the 5's, 6's, 7's, and 8's. They'd been the experimental models. Deemed essentially worthless and locked away in Manticore's basement, they'd never received any treatment at all for the condition, and they'd deteriorated the fastest in spite of taking tryptophan -- a grim preview of what was to come for the rest.
Most of the graves on Chimera were theirs. Most ... There was also a small tomb stone for Maddie, an X7 girl who'd died three weeks ago from massive seizures. Some of the younger ones here had more problems with serotonin levels than others -- meaning some would die sooner. Although he'd tried to hide his emotions, Max knew Alec had taken Maddie's death hard. She'd been a constant companion of Dalton's, the kid who'd become almost like a little brother to the older X5.
Only the transhumans were safe -- Joshua, Mole, Dix, Luke, and their like ... Considered to be freaks rather than a potential threat to the human race, Manticore hadn't cursed them with the failsafe in their brains.
Max had known from the time she escaped in '09 that her lack of the brain chemical would probably kill her someday. But right now it wasn't herself she was worried about. Manticore had bought her more time. She'd received gene therapy two years ago after her heart transplant, and most likely had a number of years left before the chemical imbalance returned. No, it was Alec and the other X's on Chimera who were in deadly danger now -- the ones who'd been treated at Manticore 10 years earlier and supposedly cured of a deficiency that was far more crippling than their makers intended.
Supposedly cured ...
She could still hear Dr. Makari's words as he'd delivered what was essentially a death sentence to nearly a hundred of her people, Alec and their son included.
*****
"The gene therapy Manticore used on its X series ten years ago is breaking down," the doctor said. "The cloned cells that were injected into the soldiers to manufacture serotonin are being systematically destroyed by your incredibly advanced immune systems." He shook his head sadly. "This is truly a case of science outsmarting itself. The very thing that allows you to heal so rapidly, the stem cells in your blood stream, your vastly superior antibodies, are all more or less conspiring to kick out what they see as a foreign invader -- the cloned serotonin-producing cells in your brains."
"But we can still take the tryptophan and be okay, right?" Alec said. "All of us. Either that or just put some more of those cloned cells in us."
"I lived ten years without any gene therapy," Max pointed out. "Just took the tryptophan."
"Tryptophan is a very imperfect temporary fix," Makari said. "Some will get relief from the seizures, some won't. Some will live for years on the tablets, some will die within weeks of their own serotonin depletion, the tryptophan making no difference."
"Then do like Alec suggested," Max said. "Put more of those cells back in us."
"Wouldn't work even if I had the equipment and knowledge to manufacture them," Makari said. "You're producing antibodies now that would destroy any newly introduced cloned cells. It would take scientists a decade or more to create another type of DNA marker that could do the same job."
"Better stock up on tryptophan then," Max said. "Looks like it's going to be number one on our lists of supplies. And in the meantime, we keep looking for a permanent cure."
*****
But the whole world was falling into chaos and tryptophan wasn't high on the list of priorities of drug manufacturers -- not with thousands dying every day from the Familiars' pathogen. Sandeman's people were making and distributing vaccine as fast as they could, but it was an uphill battle that would undoubtedly take years to win. In the meantime, according to the Prophecies, the transgenics were supposed to be breeding an army to fight against the Familiars when they finally made their move for world domination -- kind of hard to do when your race was dying around you due to a brain chemical depletion.
Max knew that she, herself, hadn't had any problems since Brac was born, and only a few tremors during the pregnancy. But then the genetic "fix" in her brain had only been inserted two years ago. Alec and the others, however, were at the end of the line. The new serum they'd purchased with the King Tut necklace had turned out to be of little use. Supposedly it would allow a better uptake of tryptophan, so their bodies could use it more efficiently and need less, but so far Dr. Makari couldn't make it work.
And now they were running out of tryptophan altogether on Chimera, with almost no place to get any more.
Unable to resist, taking a chance, Max reached out and lightly stroked Alec's hair while he slept, hoping she wouldn't disturb him. He'd started having tremors a little over a year ago, at first ignoring them, but finally being convinced by Dr. Shankar back in Seattle to begin the tryptophan supplements when blood tests showed his serotonin levels dropping dangerously low.
For awhile the pills worked, just like they'd worked for her all those years. But there was something different about Alec's chemistry, maybe because of the failed gene therapy. Now he was having to take more and more of the supplement to remain functional.
Alec stirred and Max tensed. Sometimes he had seizures in his sleep. All she could do then was to lie helplessly beside him, holding him in her arms while his muscles spasmed. In the morning he never remembered, the only evidence of the episode broken blood vessels in the whites of his eyes, sore muscles, and sometimes a bitten tongue.
He didn't like to talk about that when it happened. She knew how helpless he must feel. Bad enough to suffer tremors when you're awake and know what's happening. Terrifying to suffer through when you're essentially unconscious, your sleep cycle becoming a conduit for a vicious brain storm that might someday prove fatal.
Luckily, it didn't happen often to Alec -- the night seizures -- maybe once every month or two. But she'd seen his hands shaking more often lately, and he'd been downing the capsules every day.
I'm going to lose him. Not in battle, not to a bullet, but to Manticore's damn sabotage.
Her heart thudded in her chest. She could lose Brac too, although the baby's serotonin levels weren't critically low yet.
She wished she could get out of bed and check on their son, but her leg was immobilized in a halo cast, and Dr. Makari had cautioned her sternly to not put any weight on it for at least two weeks. If it hadn't been for her transgenic healing abilities ... if it hadn't been for Zeb's emergency medical skills ... if it hadn't been for Alec getting her out of the museum, flying the plane, getting her to help ...
But she would heal, and she would live -- most likely longer than both her mate and her son.
And that thought was enough to make Max wrap her arms around Alec's warm strong body and cry.
There is one upcoming chapter in this story that might not be acceptable for fanfiction.net's new guidelines. Anyone who wants to read "The Best Laid Plans 2: Death and Life" in its entirety as I write the story is invited to my website: http://www.michaeleaston.com/DA/DAfanfic.html. I also have a number of other DARK ANGEL M/A fanfiction stories there that I've not made available on ff.net as of yet. I even keep an email list of interested readers whom I notify when I post new work on the site.
Also, I'd like to encourage all M/A DARK ANGEL fans to read Max Collins' official prequel novel BEFORE THE DAWN. True, Alec isn't in the story (yet), but there's lots of canon background material in the book that would be pertinent to Alec later on. Plus, Mr. Collins says that Alec and Joshua will be "centerstage" in the DARK ANGEL sequel novel SKIN GAME coming out next February. -- author's note