SPOILER NOTE: This story is a therapeutic release of much frustrations of certain lame ass After The Dawn plotlines. In regards to White in particular, and also that damn ending... grr... If you don't want to know spoilers, than hopefully you won't know what's part of the AtD storyline and what's just my own details thrown in as I twist the story out of the path MAC set down for it. Waay out of MAC's path...
Anyway, thanks so much to Astra for sharing her info
of ATD at The Broken World!! It's really great of her to go to the trouble
and I'm sure that us spoiler addicts who've been hanging off her tidbits of
information, are realy damn grateful for the time she's spent writing it all out
for us. And thanks also Enigma who is surely by now getting sick to death
of forever being thanked. Tough bananas. Thanks Mel for helping me seek
retribution! (Now, help me seek therapy?)
Disclaimer: Don't own Max Allan Collins or his book After the Dark, or Dark Angel itself. Bummer about the latter though.
There, now if you really hate spoilers of any sort, I've given you ample time to escape this story before your eyes fall upon anything you don't want to see. Now, on with the fic!
by Sorrow
White stared at the body of his son, limp in the arms of his enemy, 452. For a moment he stood frozen, barely comprehending what his eyes were trying to tell him.
"What have you done?"
His words came out strangled and heavy, as if the effort to speak was almost unbearable.
The realism was yet to truly sink in. His body was still numb and unresponsive. The shock so overwhelming, that the desire to step forward and snatch his son out of 452's arms before disembowelling her, had not yet entered his head.
Max had known she'd need to speak fast, to make White understand who Ray's real murderer was. But now that she stood before him and saw the wretched expressions cross his face, she found herself unable to formulate the words. And with every second she hesitated, he grew closer to snapping.
"It wasn't me -"
And then White found the world closing in on him, suffocating him, filling him with pain. As he stood in the middle of the room, the daze finally lifted and he woke up from his waking nightmare to discover it was all too real...
No words spilled from his lips, they would never begin to capture the depth of his rage and pain. Instead he lunged forward with a guttural roar, ripping his son from her arms so that he could wrap his fingers around 452's throat and squeeze the life from her.
Max's gurgled protests were cut off as he threw her down onto the concrete floor and leapt upon her. But as White began to pound his fists into her face and tear at her flesh, he found himself being lifted into the air by someone whose strength was more powerful than even his own. In the next instant, he was flying through the air... his body slamming into the wall before crumpling upon the ground in a heap.
Heavily winded, White struggled to regain his footing but looked up to find the dog-like transgenic reaching down to him again. Suddenly his head was wrenched backwards, so close to snapping, he actually felt the sharp pain searing through his skull. Instantly he was taken back to the day in Jam Pony when this beast had nearly snapped his spine. But he had no chance to comprehend the pain, or the voice that cried out in the background. He only knew that he was feeling an agony that was so much more intense than anything physical the transhuman could ever deal out to him. And that he was going to die without gaining retribution for his son's death.
And then the pressure on White's neck ceased and he found himself falling to the floor once more.
The pain slowly ebbed. At least, physically. Above him, an argument ensued but he paid no attention to the words. Blurs of noise, without meaning. But finally they forced their way into his mind, forming coherent syllables along the way.
"No, we need him alive!"
"He tried to kill you Max!"
"His son is dead, how would you react?"
White ignored the compassion that tinted 452's voice, he didn't need pity from animals. She had taken his son from him and brought back his carcass. And now she tried to show him compassion?
Fr months he had suffered not knowing Ray's fate and now, so close to believing he could be reunited with him at last, he had lost him forever.
Just a short time ago he had confidently told 452 he wished to spend Christmas with his son in a new world. He was willing to put the ugly past he'd shared with the transgenics behind him, if only he could have Ray with him once again.
Now, he had nothing.
White angrily shoved Max away and stumbled to his feet. Falling to his knees beside his son, uncaring of who saw him in his grief. He clutched the cold body to his chest, squeezing tight until Ray's bones began to crunch beneath the pressure.
Seconds flew, the room was drowned in the unearthly sounds of Ames White's rage as the agony of his loss crashed fully upon him. Not a man to show emotion, he suddenly found the stoical rug of cold, calculated apathy wrenched out from beneath his feet. The one thing he had ever cared for had been taken away and he could never, ever bring him back. Physical pain he could deny, but this... it tore through him.
Voices cut into his grief, at first a distant murmur, but as his own anguished roars subsided, he looked up from the neck of his son he had buried his face in, to see the wide startled eyes of 452 staring at him as she attempted to explain why she had brought him this lifeless body.
"...they got there before us. There was nothing we could do to save Ray, or his Aunt. Joshua took out one of them, but the other got away. No doubt to return to the Conclave. They're the ones who betrayed you White, it wasn't us..."
The voice was hesitant, cautious. White looked away and briefly bowed his head, his eyes squeezed shut as he tried to regain some sense of self-control. How could familiars have done this to his son? His own kind?
"You're lying."
"No I'm not. Why would I bother? Why would I stop Joshua from ripping off your head as he was no doubt about to do?"
He turned her words over in his mind, searching for an argument, not wanting to believe any one could be responsible for his son's death except for her. 452.
"It's your fault. You took my son away from me!"
Having seemingly forgotten how close he had just come to death, White lashed out at Max once more, for the second time he tightened his fingers around her throat, wishing nothing more at that moment than to crush her windpipe and see the life blink out from her eyes.
Joshua stepped forward, at the same time Alec and Mole both withdrew their guns. But White pulled Max towards him, holding her back against his chest as he slowly regained his feet and stepped back, dragging the transgenic with him.
"Stay back!"
His fingers dug into Max's throat and Joshua stepped back, the canine's eyes were fearful though filled with anger.
"Drop the damn guns!"
With no choice but to co-operate, Alec and Mole exchanged glances and with a nod, cautiously lowered their weapons to the floor, kicking them so that they slid across the ground, far out of reach.
Terror gripped Joshua as he was forced to watched the face of his closest friend turn crimson, her eyes nearly bulging from the pressure of strangulation. And there was nothing he could do.
"No White! We're not like you - we don't kill innocents!"
The panic filled words tumbled from Joshua's mouth, but they only increased White's rage.
For a moment.
And then somehow, he saw the honesty in the words of his enemy. Just a small glimmer of truth. Enough to make him loosen the pressure on Max's throat ever so slightly so that she could draw in a ragged gasp.
Withdrawing his own gun from the inside of his jacket, White held it to Max's head as he released her completely. Showing the transgenics that he was still unwilling to place any kind of trust in them.
He glanced to the body of his son, his expression tightening for a moment, before he stated in a voice that was void of emotion, "tell me again."
Max was unable to answer, instead she could only laboriously draw air into her lungs, her throat burned as if on fire, the pain was almost too much to bear without sobbing out loud.
Clearing his throat, Alec slowly stepped forward, his hands raised to show he meant no threat. At least, not immediately.
"We found the address of Ray's Aunt. It took some time, only Logan had ever known of her whereabouts." He paused, watching the irony sink into White's mind. All this time, the familiar had hunted Max for answers, and Logan was the only one who'd held them.
"We arrived moments too late. Two familiars murdered your son, White. In cold blood. We didn't know this was going to happen."
Still holding the gun to Max's head, White stared in silence at the transgenics before him, weighing up their words. Finally his eyes drifted to the body which the reptilian had dropped unceremoniously to the concrete floor.
"You can check him out, we won't harm you."
White stared at the X5 and grunted in arrogance - he couldn't help himself. He still held contempt for the transgenics, despite the fact he was largely outnumbered and without Max as a hostage to hold before him, his life would basically be in their hands. Although, there was still the other card he held back from them still, Logan Cale. He'd almost forgotten him.
An eye for an eye...
452 had taken away the one person he cared about, perhaps he should show her how it felt to lose something you hold so close? Hatred and anger seethed within him once more, his eyes darkened as pupils dilated, so thick was the black emotion within him. He wanted nothing more than revenge. It was all he had left.
"Now you know how it feels."
White looked to the dog-boy, not comprehending what he was meaning. How would a piece of transgenic filth such as this abomination before him, have any idea of what he was going through, and of how much he desired to tear out the throats of those involved?
And then he realised the truth in the accusing glares that greeted him. The girl in the sewers... Annie... This trannie must have actually befriended the poor blind sap. The mutt did understand what he was going through after all. And he no doubt felt the bitter longing for retaliation... Ames White was in no way a compassionate man, but he understood. He had given pain and suffering to the transgenics, now it was his turn. But whether or not they had murdered his son as revenge, well, he planned to find that out.
His eyes flickered to the body of the man the lizard had carried in, and back to the transgenics. He knew they would take the smallest excuse to rip him limb from limb. He was in company as dangerous as his own, and he couldn't afford to lose his head until he was willing to part with it.
"Time to show each other some trust huh?" White's voice was listless, his face weary. Grief having, for now at least, snuffed out his strength and arrogance.
"Trust you! You've got to be kidding us!"
"Hey! Pipe down!" It was Max who called for Alec to be silent. After all, White still held a gun to her head.
"White is right, we need some trust. There's no doubt we've got our differences but, for the moment it seems we share the same enemy."
"Max, the enemy is standing right behind you, ready to blow off your damn head!"
Max shot Alec a look of warning once more. "Yeah, and I'm going to trust him not to."
She turned her head to meet White's eyes. He nodded slightly and released her, stepping back with the gun still aimed in her direction, until he was out of immediate reach.
Eyeing the transgenics warily, White walked over to the man who lay face down on the ground. Turning him over with his boot, he recognised the face instantly, though the name was not immediately so easy to place. Fox...no... James. That was it.
"Son of a bitch!"
Giving the body a violent kick, he fought to calm himself from the adrenalin that suddenly flushed through his system. Save it for the one who got away. And the one who sent them after my son...
Unable to resist kicking the body again, and then again, White at last looked up to the transgenics who watched silently. His eyes felt hot with burning fury as he clenched the fist which wasn't resting on the trigger of his gun.
"There was another one?"
Max nodded. "Joshua and I attacked him, but he got away."
Nodding, White knew immediately who it would have been. He uttered the name, half to himself. "Mac. Familiars without honour."
Alec sniggered, unable to stop himself. "What, you guys know the word? Since when?"
"You shut your fucking mouth!" White strode towards the X5 but found his nemesis stepping in his path, halting him with a hand to his chest.
"You don't have the upper hand here White!" He paused and looked down at her, then glanced to the fingers still poised on his chest.
Following his gaze, Max stepped back, still keeping her body between the two. Unsure if she was protecting Alec from White, or White from her companions who were itching to seek payback for every transgenic he'd ever slaughtered.
She understood how they felt, she was hardly fond of White herself. But she'd spoken to him only hours before, and knew at last that no matter what lies he told, he was genuine about his love for Ray. And she knew also that she would never shake off the guilt of the boy's death.
Max recalled what she had said to White so many months ago, before finding out that he was more than a mere transgenic serial killer. You deserve whatever pain life can give you, but your wife and son don't. They shouldn't have to suffer for what you've done.
Perhaps White had been right. Perhaps she should never have interfered? Either way, she couldn't change the past now, but she could try and make amendments. He was Ray's father after all.
"Look." Max lowered her head and took a deep breath before looking into the cold eyes of the man before her. Cold eyes, but awash in a kind of pain he would never admit to, and only vent in a rage that would no doubt, eventually get him killed. But perhaps not today - not by the hands of the transgenics at least.
"There's no doubt that we're enemies. But didn't you once say to me, 'My enemy's enemy is my friend?'"
White opened his mouth to speak, a smirk hovered lightly on his lips, though it was not quite as contemptuous as perhaps it should have been.
Max cut him off with the raise of a finger and rephrased the words White had spoken as he tracked her through the top floor of Harbor Lights hospital, so long ago. "Well, it seems the breeding cult you were so fond of, are in fact your enemies. They're my enemies too, so that makes me your friend."
"You don't really believe I had any intention on keeping to the 'lets be chumps' bullshit do you?"
White's words held none of the fire that one would have expected from him. Another pang of guilt stabbed at Max, but she ignored it and pushed on.
"No, of course not White. But being that you lacked scruples then, perhaps you could show us that you do have honour now?"
Tripped up in his own words at last, White had no choice but to grant Max a tired smile, and a nod of affirmation. Striking a truce with the very creatures he had sworn to hate.
He glanced to his son again. The Conclave had given up on him, but White knew Ray hadn't been as weak as they thought. That he had survived the initiation only to die by the hands of his own people...
The agenda of Ames White had drastically changed. For so long he had hunted the transgenics. Driven by his need to fulfil the commands of the Conclave, and later, his desire to see his son returned to him. Now, he had his son, or rather, his son's corpse, and his role as transgenic pest control was a defunct one. Instead, he vowed to hunt down those who killed his son.
His own people.