Where are my reviews people?! I'm getting really sad at the lack of reviews. If you think this story is even halfway descent, review it!
And one other thing, for some reason, everything that's supposed to be italicized won't stay that way. So I've supplemented italics with *stars*. Anything surrounded by stars is supposed to be italicized.
Alec walked through the streets of Terminal City and got the distinct impression that something was wrong. Oh right. Maybe it had something to do with the single black, in some cases white, rune that adorned the middle of every passing transgenic's forehead. And Alec also got the feeling, probably from the glares and resentful looks of other transgenics, that he really wasn't wanted there. Needless to say, he picked up the pace a little.
Upon entering their base of operations, chaos bombarded Alec. Transgenics ran every which way talking and yelling about who knew what. As soon as a transgenic laid eyes on Alec, they'd stop whatever they were doing to stare at him and not out of love.
Alec scurried up to Max and Logan hunched over Logan's computer. "Max, Logan. What the hell is going on?"
Startled, they both looked up at him, though Max was a little more disapproving than normal. "Every transgenic that wasn't involved with the prophecy before, is knee deep in ancient cryptic predictions now," Logan informed him. Logan pointed to various trangenics. "They all have numbers."
"But I don't," Alec said. "Is that one everyone's looking at me like they'd be more than happy to introduce my face to my ass?"
Logan and Max shared a glance. "That would be a much better explanation than what we're going to give you," Max said. "Logan was looking over the prophecy when Joshua came by," Max explained, then let Logan continue from there.
*"Logan," Joshua said coming up behind the human.*
*Logan jumped but soon relaxed and smiled at the dog-man. "Hey, Joshua. How are you?"*
*Joshua scratched the rune on his head. "It's all good," he responded in his rough voice. "Figure out rune bitch yet?"*
*Logan smiled. "Not yet." He turned to his computer screen. "I know that Alec's The Destroyer, Wil's The Lover and Max is The One. But I have no clue what the numbers are."*
*"Didn't prophecy say something about order?"*
*Logan glanced back at Joshua. "Yes, it did."*
*"Trangenics in order," Joshua stated simply.*
*Logan's brow creased. "Transgenics in order?" He scrolled up on his screen. "Order of death of all the impurities," Logan mumbled. "Laying waste to the impure." It clicked. "The numbers are putting all the transgenics in an order." His voice softened. "And the transgenics are the impure." He looked to Joshua who only seem to understand what Logan was about to say. "Alec's supposed to kill all the trangenics by the order of the numbers on their foreheads-"*
"-that's insane!" Alec practically shouted. "Do you know how insane that sounds?!" He ran a hand over his face. "I'm supposed to kill everyone."
"In a certain order," Logan added.
Alec glared at Logan, then his eyes shifted to the transgenics surrounding them going about their business. "They know, don't they?"
Max nodded. "They're not too happy."
Alec snapped to her. "Do I look happy about it? You know, Max, as much as you'd like to blame this all on me, I didn't ask for this. I didn't ask Sandeman to put some weird freaky shit in my DNA that told me I have to kill they only family I've ever known." Off Max's surprised look, he elaborated. "Yes, Max. I know you don't think it would ever be possible, but everyone here is my family," he gestured around to all of them. "Even you," he pointed at Max.
"Alec," Logan said bringing the young transgenics attention to him. "The numbers were to appear after the merging of you and Wil. What did you two do?"
"Not that it's any of your business," Alec fumed, "but we kissed."
Before Max could make some snide comment, Alec held up a halting hand. "Forget it. I don't want to hear it." He turned and walked away, but not before calling out, "Don't even think about following me."
Both Max and Logan watched Alec storm away.
"Well," Logan spoke, "I think he took it rather well, don't you?"
Max rolled her eyes and sighed. "Let's just hope he doesn't start his killing spree."
"I'm going to print out a bunch of lists with the Minoan numbers and pass them around," Logan told Max.
"What, so people can know when they're number's up?"
He shrugged. "They might want to."
After walking around in the drenching rain for an hour, Alec decided he should probably head in. When he entered his apartment, he saw a lone figure standing in front of the window watching the rain.
"Hey, Wil," he quietly tossing his sopping jacket on a nearby table. He frowned at her appearance. "Were you out in the rain too? You're completely soaked."
She didn't answer, only continued her watchful vigil on the beads of water falling from the sky.
"Wil?"
Finally, her voice found her. "I heard about the meaning of the numbers."
Alec's shoulders slumped. Boy, news traveled fast. "Yeah?"
"You do realize you're supposed to kill Max first, right?"
Alec groaned. He had forgotten that Max had 'one' on her forehead. "I had forgotten about that." A thought hit him and so did his hand at the realization. "Joshua's supposed to be the third one I..." he trailed off. Like he really wanted to finish that statement.
Lighting cracked outside and the thunder rumbled through his small apartment. Alec had to quell the urge to shiver.
"You know what scares me more than Max being the first and Joshua being the third?" Wil faced Alec and he gasped. Smack in the center of her forehead rested a single rune taunted him. "I'm the second," she finished.
Speechless, Alec's eyes couldn't focus anywhere but on that lone black number labeling this woman who meant so much to him as the second to die. The second he was supposed to kill. Everything inside of him screamed at Sandeman for doing this. But outside, he didn't move.
She smiled dispiritedly. She opened her mouth ready to say something, but changed her mind. Taking a different approach, she went to him. The tension in his muscles jumped out at her like a leaping monkey. She knew that he was restraining his anger and frustration. Manticore taught them that showing emotions was bad, weak anything along those lines. No one could completely rid themselves of that brainwashing.
"Come on, Alec. Let it out. I know you're pissed," she said to him.
He looked away from her. "I'm fine," he said tersely.
"Are you scared?" she asked harshly. "What the hell kind of soldier are you? You're not even man enough to face up to this dumb prophecy." He glared at her, anger and hurt flashing behind his stormy eyes. "You're so emotional and weak. I can't believe I ever loved you." She crossed her arms. "Pathetic," her voice dripped with disdain.
Alec lost it. He threw one punch aimed for her face but she easily blocked it. And in that instant they were fighting. Alec throwing a punch or a kick, but Wil blocked it without a problem.
"Really, Alec," she said between punches. "This is getting boring. Weren't you supposed to be te best?" That's when it got rough. Instead of using the simple moves, he pulled out all of his advanced training and Wil struggled to keep up with him.
During the course of there sparring match, Alec realized what Wil was doing. She knew that Alec wouldn't admit when something was bugging him. Being the one who was supposed to kill all the transgenics made Alec angry. But the fact that everyone believed he would do it made his blood boil. And Wil fought him so he could have an outlet for his anger.
"Tell me, Alec." Fresh sweat and rain mixed on Wil's skin. Alec was the best and she could barely equal him enough to make sure she didn't get hurt. "Tell me!" she screamed.
"You wanna know?" he asked while kicking for her head. A kick she barely missed as his foot crazed her hair. "I hate that everyone thinks I could kill them." Alec threw two punches at Wil which she almost couldn't throw off. It had stopped being a sparring match and had become strictly about Alec letting out his feelings, and Wil trying desperately to block his attacks.
"I hate that Max blames everything on me." His attacks weren't letting up. "And I hate these fucking runes!" Alec went to swipe Wil's feet from underneath her but she grabbed onto his shirt throwing him off balance. They fell to the ground in a tangle of limbs with Alec landing on top of Wil.
Maybe it was the fact that the fighting had made him face his emotions. Maybe it was the fact that he was frustrated and pissed as hell. Or maybe it was the fact that her skin glistened beautifully and the fitting tank top she wore was soaked with rain and sweat and clung to her like a second skin. Whatever the reason, Alec brought his lips down to hers in a passionate kiss.
He pulled back to search her eyes. Her normally light brown eyes were dark with desire. Alec could feel her warm breaths coming fast and her heart beating even faster.
He wanted her. But with what had happened to her, he'd have to be gentle and caring. In his head, he smiled. Caring ... that would be a nice change of pace.
Bringing a hand to gently stroke her face, he memorized every curve of her face, her lips, memorized every emotion displayed in her open eyes.
"I want to show you," he said breathily, "how I feel about you." His eyes searched hers hopefully. "Can I do that, Wil? Can I show you how I love you?" he whispered.
Smiling, she closed her eyes and nodded. When she opened her eyes, a stray tear slipped out. "Please show me," she pleaded with him.
So he did, slowly and lovingly. Paying attention to exactly how she reacted, Alec happily explored her, but always returned to her face with a kiss and to whisper a short but genuine 'I love you'. Wil eagerly returned the favor.
"I see him. There," Max pointed.
Rift nodded. "I'm going to go around on the other side." And he was gone, curtesy of Manticore training.
Stealthily, Max snuck up on the individual who had decided it would be fun to break into Terminal City. At the moment, he struggled with the make shift barrier getting his jacket caught on something.
While he tried to untangle himself, Max took the opportunity to come to him and tap him on the shoulder. "Whatcha doin'?"
He whirled around to her. Snagged coat quickly forgotten, he ran tearing his coat in the process. Unfortunately for the poor bastard, he didn't get more than ten feet before a fist swung out and connected with his jaw.
Rift smiled at the dazed man and grabbed him. "Trying to break into Terminal City? That's just asking for an ass kicking."
Max cam up to the pair. She grabbed hold of his hair and forced his face towards her. The man had a rune decorating his forehead. "Well, fancy that. He's got a number but for some reason, I don't think he's one of us."
She smiled pleasantly as Rift. "How about we take him to the control room and tie him up? Then we could have a fun game of interrogating the intruder."
Rift smiled back. "I'd be delighted." With that, they headed back to the heart of Terminal City.
And one other thing, for some reason, everything that's supposed to be italicized won't stay that way. So I've supplemented italics with *stars*. Anything surrounded by stars is supposed to be italicized.
Alec walked through the streets of Terminal City and got the distinct impression that something was wrong. Oh right. Maybe it had something to do with the single black, in some cases white, rune that adorned the middle of every passing transgenic's forehead. And Alec also got the feeling, probably from the glares and resentful looks of other transgenics, that he really wasn't wanted there. Needless to say, he picked up the pace a little.
Upon entering their base of operations, chaos bombarded Alec. Transgenics ran every which way talking and yelling about who knew what. As soon as a transgenic laid eyes on Alec, they'd stop whatever they were doing to stare at him and not out of love.
Alec scurried up to Max and Logan hunched over Logan's computer. "Max, Logan. What the hell is going on?"
Startled, they both looked up at him, though Max was a little more disapproving than normal. "Every transgenic that wasn't involved with the prophecy before, is knee deep in ancient cryptic predictions now," Logan informed him. Logan pointed to various trangenics. "They all have numbers."
"But I don't," Alec said. "Is that one everyone's looking at me like they'd be more than happy to introduce my face to my ass?"
Logan and Max shared a glance. "That would be a much better explanation than what we're going to give you," Max said. "Logan was looking over the prophecy when Joshua came by," Max explained, then let Logan continue from there.
*"Logan," Joshua said coming up behind the human.*
*Logan jumped but soon relaxed and smiled at the dog-man. "Hey, Joshua. How are you?"*
*Joshua scratched the rune on his head. "It's all good," he responded in his rough voice. "Figure out rune bitch yet?"*
*Logan smiled. "Not yet." He turned to his computer screen. "I know that Alec's The Destroyer, Wil's The Lover and Max is The One. But I have no clue what the numbers are."*
*"Didn't prophecy say something about order?"*
*Logan glanced back at Joshua. "Yes, it did."*
*"Trangenics in order," Joshua stated simply.*
*Logan's brow creased. "Transgenics in order?" He scrolled up on his screen. "Order of death of all the impurities," Logan mumbled. "Laying waste to the impure." It clicked. "The numbers are putting all the transgenics in an order." His voice softened. "And the transgenics are the impure." He looked to Joshua who only seem to understand what Logan was about to say. "Alec's supposed to kill all the trangenics by the order of the numbers on their foreheads-"*
"-that's insane!" Alec practically shouted. "Do you know how insane that sounds?!" He ran a hand over his face. "I'm supposed to kill everyone."
"In a certain order," Logan added.
Alec glared at Logan, then his eyes shifted to the transgenics surrounding them going about their business. "They know, don't they?"
Max nodded. "They're not too happy."
Alec snapped to her. "Do I look happy about it? You know, Max, as much as you'd like to blame this all on me, I didn't ask for this. I didn't ask Sandeman to put some weird freaky shit in my DNA that told me I have to kill they only family I've ever known." Off Max's surprised look, he elaborated. "Yes, Max. I know you don't think it would ever be possible, but everyone here is my family," he gestured around to all of them. "Even you," he pointed at Max.
"Alec," Logan said bringing the young transgenics attention to him. "The numbers were to appear after the merging of you and Wil. What did you two do?"
"Not that it's any of your business," Alec fumed, "but we kissed."
Before Max could make some snide comment, Alec held up a halting hand. "Forget it. I don't want to hear it." He turned and walked away, but not before calling out, "Don't even think about following me."
Both Max and Logan watched Alec storm away.
"Well," Logan spoke, "I think he took it rather well, don't you?"
Max rolled her eyes and sighed. "Let's just hope he doesn't start his killing spree."
"I'm going to print out a bunch of lists with the Minoan numbers and pass them around," Logan told Max.
"What, so people can know when they're number's up?"
He shrugged. "They might want to."
After walking around in the drenching rain for an hour, Alec decided he should probably head in. When he entered his apartment, he saw a lone figure standing in front of the window watching the rain.
"Hey, Wil," he quietly tossing his sopping jacket on a nearby table. He frowned at her appearance. "Were you out in the rain too? You're completely soaked."
She didn't answer, only continued her watchful vigil on the beads of water falling from the sky.
"Wil?"
Finally, her voice found her. "I heard about the meaning of the numbers."
Alec's shoulders slumped. Boy, news traveled fast. "Yeah?"
"You do realize you're supposed to kill Max first, right?"
Alec groaned. He had forgotten that Max had 'one' on her forehead. "I had forgotten about that." A thought hit him and so did his hand at the realization. "Joshua's supposed to be the third one I..." he trailed off. Like he really wanted to finish that statement.
Lighting cracked outside and the thunder rumbled through his small apartment. Alec had to quell the urge to shiver.
"You know what scares me more than Max being the first and Joshua being the third?" Wil faced Alec and he gasped. Smack in the center of her forehead rested a single rune taunted him. "I'm the second," she finished.
Speechless, Alec's eyes couldn't focus anywhere but on that lone black number labeling this woman who meant so much to him as the second to die. The second he was supposed to kill. Everything inside of him screamed at Sandeman for doing this. But outside, he didn't move.
She smiled dispiritedly. She opened her mouth ready to say something, but changed her mind. Taking a different approach, she went to him. The tension in his muscles jumped out at her like a leaping monkey. She knew that he was restraining his anger and frustration. Manticore taught them that showing emotions was bad, weak anything along those lines. No one could completely rid themselves of that brainwashing.
"Come on, Alec. Let it out. I know you're pissed," she said to him.
He looked away from her. "I'm fine," he said tersely.
"Are you scared?" she asked harshly. "What the hell kind of soldier are you? You're not even man enough to face up to this dumb prophecy." He glared at her, anger and hurt flashing behind his stormy eyes. "You're so emotional and weak. I can't believe I ever loved you." She crossed her arms. "Pathetic," her voice dripped with disdain.
Alec lost it. He threw one punch aimed for her face but she easily blocked it. And in that instant they were fighting. Alec throwing a punch or a kick, but Wil blocked it without a problem.
"Really, Alec," she said between punches. "This is getting boring. Weren't you supposed to be te best?" That's when it got rough. Instead of using the simple moves, he pulled out all of his advanced training and Wil struggled to keep up with him.
During the course of there sparring match, Alec realized what Wil was doing. She knew that Alec wouldn't admit when something was bugging him. Being the one who was supposed to kill all the transgenics made Alec angry. But the fact that everyone believed he would do it made his blood boil. And Wil fought him so he could have an outlet for his anger.
"Tell me, Alec." Fresh sweat and rain mixed on Wil's skin. Alec was the best and she could barely equal him enough to make sure she didn't get hurt. "Tell me!" she screamed.
"You wanna know?" he asked while kicking for her head. A kick she barely missed as his foot crazed her hair. "I hate that everyone thinks I could kill them." Alec threw two punches at Wil which she almost couldn't throw off. It had stopped being a sparring match and had become strictly about Alec letting out his feelings, and Wil trying desperately to block his attacks.
"I hate that Max blames everything on me." His attacks weren't letting up. "And I hate these fucking runes!" Alec went to swipe Wil's feet from underneath her but she grabbed onto his shirt throwing him off balance. They fell to the ground in a tangle of limbs with Alec landing on top of Wil.
Maybe it was the fact that the fighting had made him face his emotions. Maybe it was the fact that he was frustrated and pissed as hell. Or maybe it was the fact that her skin glistened beautifully and the fitting tank top she wore was soaked with rain and sweat and clung to her like a second skin. Whatever the reason, Alec brought his lips down to hers in a passionate kiss.
He pulled back to search her eyes. Her normally light brown eyes were dark with desire. Alec could feel her warm breaths coming fast and her heart beating even faster.
He wanted her. But with what had happened to her, he'd have to be gentle and caring. In his head, he smiled. Caring ... that would be a nice change of pace.
Bringing a hand to gently stroke her face, he memorized every curve of her face, her lips, memorized every emotion displayed in her open eyes.
"I want to show you," he said breathily, "how I feel about you." His eyes searched hers hopefully. "Can I do that, Wil? Can I show you how I love you?" he whispered.
Smiling, she closed her eyes and nodded. When she opened her eyes, a stray tear slipped out. "Please show me," she pleaded with him.
So he did, slowly and lovingly. Paying attention to exactly how she reacted, Alec happily explored her, but always returned to her face with a kiss and to whisper a short but genuine 'I love you'. Wil eagerly returned the favor.
"I see him. There," Max pointed.
Rift nodded. "I'm going to go around on the other side." And he was gone, curtesy of Manticore training.
Stealthily, Max snuck up on the individual who had decided it would be fun to break into Terminal City. At the moment, he struggled with the make shift barrier getting his jacket caught on something.
While he tried to untangle himself, Max took the opportunity to come to him and tap him on the shoulder. "Whatcha doin'?"
He whirled around to her. Snagged coat quickly forgotten, he ran tearing his coat in the process. Unfortunately for the poor bastard, he didn't get more than ten feet before a fist swung out and connected with his jaw.
Rift smiled at the dazed man and grabbed him. "Trying to break into Terminal City? That's just asking for an ass kicking."
Max cam up to the pair. She grabbed hold of his hair and forced his face towards her. The man had a rune decorating his forehead. "Well, fancy that. He's got a number but for some reason, I don't think he's one of us."
She smiled pleasantly as Rift. "How about we take him to the control room and tie him up? Then we could have a fun game of interrogating the intruder."
Rift smiled back. "I'd be delighted." With that, they headed back to the heart of Terminal City.