A.N. I had already written this chapter when my computer turned off and I
lost the whole thing. I was indecently annoyed so I'm sorry if it took me
so long to post this chapter but.you know how it is after you poured all
your heart and soul into a chapter then it just disappears before your
eyes. It sucked. Anyway, here it is, I was trying to remember all of what I
had in the first one so I hope you like it. Oh and if anyone has the time,
please read and review my other two fics which are finished. Apathy and New
World, they are pretty good, except for the hard to read format that I will
be fixing up A.S.A.P.
Chapter 4 - Wake Up Call
Alec strode purposefully through the dormitory section of Terminal City and came to a halt at one of the doors. He rapped briskly on the door then leant against the doorjamb waiting for someone to open it. The door opened after a few sounds of scuffling to reveal Raven who rubbed her eyes tiredly and gaped at Alec as though he were a raving lunatic. Ever since her and her sisters had arrived a week ago they had been assigned on assassination missions, their main mission was getting rid of annoying cult cronies in positions of power without bringing attention to themselves and, while the fact Raven had been fighting for a good cause pleased her, all Raven wanted to do right now was curl up in her bed and snore the night away.
"Alec, its 3am in the morning, can't whatever it is you are going to annoy me with wait until later?" she asked annoyed as she moved further out of the door pulling the door behind her back, not quite shut, as she didn't want to wake her four sisters who were sleeping in the room. Actually there were only three sisters in the room, Dove had disappeared for the night and Raven had a sneaking suspicion Dog-man Joshua had something to do with her sister's disappearing act, which didn't really bother Raven, as long as Falcon didn't find out those two could get married and have half babies for all she cared. Falcon was always protecting the five of them especially against guys and on top of all that, she was allergic to dogs, something that came from her birth mother. Alec didn't seem at all apologetic for waking her up; in fact, her even had the audacity to grin at her.
"Max needs us to do a mission for her, Logan found these two microchips that he needs, they were foraged from Manticore so Max and Logan think they could have something to do with the virus, anyway, they found out a few minutes ago that one is being transferred to England tonight so we have to go wait at the warehouse and steal it before it gets shipped out of the country or Max said and I quote "You better get it or I swear I will kick your ass to London to go get it," end quote, so I'm thinking we better get it while Max is going off to get the other one," Alec informed her and Raven nodded knowing she would help Max but then a thought passed through her mind. This didn't exactly seem like a two man job.
"Why me?" Raven asked suspiciously and Alec grinned sheepishly.
"Well actually it was only meant to be me but I wanted company," Alec said putting on a mournful face and turning to Raven who rolled her eyes placing her palm flat across his face and pushing him away.
"And again I ask why me? Of all the girls you could have picked, why me?" Raven wanted to know and Alec grinned cheekily knowing exactly how to push Raven's wrong buttons.
"Because your fun," he said simply and Raven's outrage hit the roof.
"You woke me up because you wanted company? I'm gonna kill you," Raven's voice got louder and she raised a hand to smack him one in the head for being an inconsiderate jerk when someone kicked the door shut from inside the room and the force of the door on her back flung Raven into Alec throwing him off balance and they both toppled to the floor, Raven landing on top of Alec who smacked his head on the ground.
"Take it outside losers," came Falcon's grumpy voice from inside the room and Raven looked down at Alec in horror as he blinked rapidly staring about him dazedly wondering why Raven was on top of him.
"I'm sorry Alec, I seriously didn't meant to knock you over," Raven apologised her voice full of remorse as she leant forward checking to see if he was bleeding and as much as Alec enjoyed her sitting on him he couldn't actually breathe very easily with her weight all over his ribcage.
"That would sound a lot more believable if you made an attempt to get off me," Alec made a joke of it and, embarrassed, Raven jumped off of him and didn't even offer to help him up and Alec sat up and smiled charmingly at her as he added, "You just couldn't wait to touch me could you?"
"Don't flatter yourself pretty boy," Raven fumed, furious that Alec had managed to fluster her. No man made her feel uncomfortable. Raven was always the girl in control, and she hated the fact that Alec kept trying to take the control away from her. It was unnerving and exciting all at the same time to have someone question her authority. With her sisters they had already picked her as leader and none questioned what she said but Alec just pushed all her wrong buttons, and the scary thing was Raven enjoyed it.
"So you in?" Alec asked getting to his feet and Raven sighed deeply knowing he wouldn't leave her alone unless she did go with him. Last time she tried to refuse going on a mission with him he had sat at her door and kept asking her to go along with him in a monotone voice that annoyed her sisters so much that they practically threw her out of the room just to get him to shut up.
"Well now I'm awake I guess I can go along," Raven sighed resignedly and when Alec smiled she glowered at him walking back in her room adding, "I'll meet you at the front gate, but you owe me Alec, big time."
Alec smirked to himself as she shut the door behind her. The score was one Alec for getting his own way and zero Raven because she couldn't resist him. Alec turned to go tell Max he would be ready to go, a self satisfied grin on his face as he walked off to get the equipment they would be needing.
In a warehouse near the harbour, Alec and Raven sat up in the rafters in silence. They had been there for two hours now and both were getting really bored. Raven pulled out a switchblade and proceeded to carve her name into the rafters and Alec's gaze wondered to the tattoo that said 'freedom' on her left forearm. She told him once before she and her sisters each got it when they began their new lives far away from Seattle, and Alec recalled she never actually told him of her life after Manticore.
"What did you do when you left Manticore?" Alec asked breaking the silence and Raven paused her carving to shrug.
"I had my sisters with me, we went to Australia after getting fake passports and lived there for a year or so, but after our visa's expired we had to come back to Seattle, when we found out what was going on with the Familiars we figured we needed to take some of them out," Raven grinned as she said this winking and Alec who smiled and Raven returned his question, "What did you do?"
"My life after Manticore had no purpose until Max helped me out, got me a job and enlisted my assistance in this little war of ours, I don't know what I'd do without her," Alec said humility, respect and admiration for her in his voice. She was the one who was brave enough to give all the transgenics what they had been longing for since birth, freedom.
"You love her," Raven stated more than asked wondering why she felt a little disappointed as the realisation struck her and Alec looked disgusted and horrified by the thought.
"No! No way, Max is my sister, yes she is hot, but she is my sister, I love her as my family," Alec hurried to put things right uncomfortable with the idea of anyone thinking he and Max.Yes Alec knew she was hot but Max was family.
"You know what?" Raven said staring off into a distance and Alec looked at her alarmed never having seen her so serious, her face showing no emotion.
"What?" Alec asked softly not wanting to disturb or annoy her when she seemed to at peace.
"Sometimes I wish I was back at Manticore, life wasn't so hard in there," Raven said wistfully and Alec broke into a smile thinking she was joking but the look on her face told him she wasn't and he looked away from her.
"If you can call being in Manticore living," he said bitterly remembering all he had been put through, the training, the punishments, his back still ached at the thought of the whip he had received for being a smart ass to one of the guards. No, he didn't want to ever go back there.
"And what we are experiencing now you call living? This is living, being holed up in some radioactive waste dump?" Raven asked mockingly referring to Terminal City and Alec nodded indicating he understood what she was saying.
"Its freedom Raven, the only thing not free in this world is freedom," Alec said softly and Raven fell into deep thought as did Alec as he remembered all that Manticore had forced him to do. Immediately his thoughts went to Rachel, that poor innocent girl who had been caught up in something bigger than the both of them. If only things had been different.
"I hated every moment with Manticore, what they made me do," Alec said firmly breaking the silence again and at the pure hate she heard in Alec's voice she turned to him raising her eyebrows questioningly already knowing what he was going to say. But she knew if she could make him say it, he would feel better.
"What did they make you do?" she asked softly not wanting to scare him into hiding it and Alec let out a sigh not wanting to really think about Manticore and Rachel and the fact she was dead because of him. But he needed to get it off his chest.
"I was assigned to kill a sponsor who had gotten too nosy and had to infiltrate his family as the piano teacher to his daughter, her name was Rachel, she was a really beautiful girl, so innocent, not like any of the other girls around nowadays," Alec described Rachel so softly that Raven felt herself caught up and swept away by his voice, it was so soft and melodic.
"Let me guess, you fell in love with her," Raven said somewhat sarcastically and Alec looked over at her seriously considering the question.
"I guess it was love but I'm not really sure what it was; I couldn't bring myself to finish my job and kill her father because I didn't want to hurt her, I cared too much about her but in the end it was Rachel and not her father who ended up dying," Alec said his voice choked with emotion and Raven gave a harsh laugh hating Manticore for what they had done.
"The sad sob story of every Manticore product," Raven told him bitterly and Alec looked over at her not expecting her to say that of all things after he had told her his story.
"What do you mean?" Alec asked and Raven looked at him
"Every time any agent from Manticore was sent out they ended up falling in love with someone on the outside, why do you think Manticore started those breeding programs all of a sudden? They were trying to encourage us to find our own kind more attractive, unfortunately it kind of backfired, most of the transgenic resented being forced to copulate with someone they barely knew," Raven told him and understanding dawned on Alec. He had always wondered why they started the breeding partners, and now he knew and it made him hate Manticore even more.
"Did you ever have to kill someone?" Alec asked wanting Raven to shed more light on her mysterious past and Raven looked off into the distance again lost in her own thoughts.
"Yes I was assigned to kill someone but I didn't know it, they assigned me a job where my mission was to fall in love with my target, I did and he died, pretty simple when you think about it," Raven said quickly not wanting to dwell on it while Alec stared at her incredulously.
"That was it? You were assigned to fall in love?" he asked in disbelief and Raven smiled wryly.
"Yup, falling in love with me is the most dangerous thing in the world, that's why I can never allow myself to fall in love with anyone, because sooner or later, they are gonna die," she said somewhat proudly and Alec felt like it was something of a warning to him as well although Raven was still smiling.
"How can you be sure?" Alec asked testing her and Raven rolled her eyes at his persistence.
"Trust me I know," she assured him and Alec stared at her. A challenge. He hadn't had one of those in a while. There was something about Raven that made Alec want her so badly, maybe it was because she kept blowing him off at every turn, or didn't respond to him the way the other females did, but he wanted her.
"Come out with me," Alec begged out of the blue and Raven stared at him like he was nuts before she reached over and knocked on his head.
"Didn't I just tell you I would never fall in love?" Raven reminded him and Alec shrugged not caring about that. He didn't need her love, all he needed was her.
"I'm not asking you to fall in love with me I'm asking you to come out with me tomorrow night," Alec now smiled winningly and Raven found it hard to harden herself against it. She felt all her objections melt away and she pursed her lips.
"All right then, but you have to promise not to fall in love with me," she gave in and Alec grinned like a schoolboy.
"Don't worry that won't be a problem," he assured her and he and Raven smiled widely at each other in complete understanding.
The doors to the warehouse flew open and two security guards came in with a small metal container that housed the chip.
"Let's get this bitch so I can go home and sleep," Raven whispered and Alec grinned at her as they went to work.
Chapter 4 - Wake Up Call
Alec strode purposefully through the dormitory section of Terminal City and came to a halt at one of the doors. He rapped briskly on the door then leant against the doorjamb waiting for someone to open it. The door opened after a few sounds of scuffling to reveal Raven who rubbed her eyes tiredly and gaped at Alec as though he were a raving lunatic. Ever since her and her sisters had arrived a week ago they had been assigned on assassination missions, their main mission was getting rid of annoying cult cronies in positions of power without bringing attention to themselves and, while the fact Raven had been fighting for a good cause pleased her, all Raven wanted to do right now was curl up in her bed and snore the night away.
"Alec, its 3am in the morning, can't whatever it is you are going to annoy me with wait until later?" she asked annoyed as she moved further out of the door pulling the door behind her back, not quite shut, as she didn't want to wake her four sisters who were sleeping in the room. Actually there were only three sisters in the room, Dove had disappeared for the night and Raven had a sneaking suspicion Dog-man Joshua had something to do with her sister's disappearing act, which didn't really bother Raven, as long as Falcon didn't find out those two could get married and have half babies for all she cared. Falcon was always protecting the five of them especially against guys and on top of all that, she was allergic to dogs, something that came from her birth mother. Alec didn't seem at all apologetic for waking her up; in fact, her even had the audacity to grin at her.
"Max needs us to do a mission for her, Logan found these two microchips that he needs, they were foraged from Manticore so Max and Logan think they could have something to do with the virus, anyway, they found out a few minutes ago that one is being transferred to England tonight so we have to go wait at the warehouse and steal it before it gets shipped out of the country or Max said and I quote "You better get it or I swear I will kick your ass to London to go get it," end quote, so I'm thinking we better get it while Max is going off to get the other one," Alec informed her and Raven nodded knowing she would help Max but then a thought passed through her mind. This didn't exactly seem like a two man job.
"Why me?" Raven asked suspiciously and Alec grinned sheepishly.
"Well actually it was only meant to be me but I wanted company," Alec said putting on a mournful face and turning to Raven who rolled her eyes placing her palm flat across his face and pushing him away.
"And again I ask why me? Of all the girls you could have picked, why me?" Raven wanted to know and Alec grinned cheekily knowing exactly how to push Raven's wrong buttons.
"Because your fun," he said simply and Raven's outrage hit the roof.
"You woke me up because you wanted company? I'm gonna kill you," Raven's voice got louder and she raised a hand to smack him one in the head for being an inconsiderate jerk when someone kicked the door shut from inside the room and the force of the door on her back flung Raven into Alec throwing him off balance and they both toppled to the floor, Raven landing on top of Alec who smacked his head on the ground.
"Take it outside losers," came Falcon's grumpy voice from inside the room and Raven looked down at Alec in horror as he blinked rapidly staring about him dazedly wondering why Raven was on top of him.
"I'm sorry Alec, I seriously didn't meant to knock you over," Raven apologised her voice full of remorse as she leant forward checking to see if he was bleeding and as much as Alec enjoyed her sitting on him he couldn't actually breathe very easily with her weight all over his ribcage.
"That would sound a lot more believable if you made an attempt to get off me," Alec made a joke of it and, embarrassed, Raven jumped off of him and didn't even offer to help him up and Alec sat up and smiled charmingly at her as he added, "You just couldn't wait to touch me could you?"
"Don't flatter yourself pretty boy," Raven fumed, furious that Alec had managed to fluster her. No man made her feel uncomfortable. Raven was always the girl in control, and she hated the fact that Alec kept trying to take the control away from her. It was unnerving and exciting all at the same time to have someone question her authority. With her sisters they had already picked her as leader and none questioned what she said but Alec just pushed all her wrong buttons, and the scary thing was Raven enjoyed it.
"So you in?" Alec asked getting to his feet and Raven sighed deeply knowing he wouldn't leave her alone unless she did go with him. Last time she tried to refuse going on a mission with him he had sat at her door and kept asking her to go along with him in a monotone voice that annoyed her sisters so much that they practically threw her out of the room just to get him to shut up.
"Well now I'm awake I guess I can go along," Raven sighed resignedly and when Alec smiled she glowered at him walking back in her room adding, "I'll meet you at the front gate, but you owe me Alec, big time."
Alec smirked to himself as she shut the door behind her. The score was one Alec for getting his own way and zero Raven because she couldn't resist him. Alec turned to go tell Max he would be ready to go, a self satisfied grin on his face as he walked off to get the equipment they would be needing.
In a warehouse near the harbour, Alec and Raven sat up in the rafters in silence. They had been there for two hours now and both were getting really bored. Raven pulled out a switchblade and proceeded to carve her name into the rafters and Alec's gaze wondered to the tattoo that said 'freedom' on her left forearm. She told him once before she and her sisters each got it when they began their new lives far away from Seattle, and Alec recalled she never actually told him of her life after Manticore.
"What did you do when you left Manticore?" Alec asked breaking the silence and Raven paused her carving to shrug.
"I had my sisters with me, we went to Australia after getting fake passports and lived there for a year or so, but after our visa's expired we had to come back to Seattle, when we found out what was going on with the Familiars we figured we needed to take some of them out," Raven grinned as she said this winking and Alec who smiled and Raven returned his question, "What did you do?"
"My life after Manticore had no purpose until Max helped me out, got me a job and enlisted my assistance in this little war of ours, I don't know what I'd do without her," Alec said humility, respect and admiration for her in his voice. She was the one who was brave enough to give all the transgenics what they had been longing for since birth, freedom.
"You love her," Raven stated more than asked wondering why she felt a little disappointed as the realisation struck her and Alec looked disgusted and horrified by the thought.
"No! No way, Max is my sister, yes she is hot, but she is my sister, I love her as my family," Alec hurried to put things right uncomfortable with the idea of anyone thinking he and Max.Yes Alec knew she was hot but Max was family.
"You know what?" Raven said staring off into a distance and Alec looked at her alarmed never having seen her so serious, her face showing no emotion.
"What?" Alec asked softly not wanting to disturb or annoy her when she seemed to at peace.
"Sometimes I wish I was back at Manticore, life wasn't so hard in there," Raven said wistfully and Alec broke into a smile thinking she was joking but the look on her face told him she wasn't and he looked away from her.
"If you can call being in Manticore living," he said bitterly remembering all he had been put through, the training, the punishments, his back still ached at the thought of the whip he had received for being a smart ass to one of the guards. No, he didn't want to ever go back there.
"And what we are experiencing now you call living? This is living, being holed up in some radioactive waste dump?" Raven asked mockingly referring to Terminal City and Alec nodded indicating he understood what she was saying.
"Its freedom Raven, the only thing not free in this world is freedom," Alec said softly and Raven fell into deep thought as did Alec as he remembered all that Manticore had forced him to do. Immediately his thoughts went to Rachel, that poor innocent girl who had been caught up in something bigger than the both of them. If only things had been different.
"I hated every moment with Manticore, what they made me do," Alec said firmly breaking the silence again and at the pure hate she heard in Alec's voice she turned to him raising her eyebrows questioningly already knowing what he was going to say. But she knew if she could make him say it, he would feel better.
"What did they make you do?" she asked softly not wanting to scare him into hiding it and Alec let out a sigh not wanting to really think about Manticore and Rachel and the fact she was dead because of him. But he needed to get it off his chest.
"I was assigned to kill a sponsor who had gotten too nosy and had to infiltrate his family as the piano teacher to his daughter, her name was Rachel, she was a really beautiful girl, so innocent, not like any of the other girls around nowadays," Alec described Rachel so softly that Raven felt herself caught up and swept away by his voice, it was so soft and melodic.
"Let me guess, you fell in love with her," Raven said somewhat sarcastically and Alec looked over at her seriously considering the question.
"I guess it was love but I'm not really sure what it was; I couldn't bring myself to finish my job and kill her father because I didn't want to hurt her, I cared too much about her but in the end it was Rachel and not her father who ended up dying," Alec said his voice choked with emotion and Raven gave a harsh laugh hating Manticore for what they had done.
"The sad sob story of every Manticore product," Raven told him bitterly and Alec looked over at her not expecting her to say that of all things after he had told her his story.
"What do you mean?" Alec asked and Raven looked at him
"Every time any agent from Manticore was sent out they ended up falling in love with someone on the outside, why do you think Manticore started those breeding programs all of a sudden? They were trying to encourage us to find our own kind more attractive, unfortunately it kind of backfired, most of the transgenic resented being forced to copulate with someone they barely knew," Raven told him and understanding dawned on Alec. He had always wondered why they started the breeding partners, and now he knew and it made him hate Manticore even more.
"Did you ever have to kill someone?" Alec asked wanting Raven to shed more light on her mysterious past and Raven looked off into the distance again lost in her own thoughts.
"Yes I was assigned to kill someone but I didn't know it, they assigned me a job where my mission was to fall in love with my target, I did and he died, pretty simple when you think about it," Raven said quickly not wanting to dwell on it while Alec stared at her incredulously.
"That was it? You were assigned to fall in love?" he asked in disbelief and Raven smiled wryly.
"Yup, falling in love with me is the most dangerous thing in the world, that's why I can never allow myself to fall in love with anyone, because sooner or later, they are gonna die," she said somewhat proudly and Alec felt like it was something of a warning to him as well although Raven was still smiling.
"How can you be sure?" Alec asked testing her and Raven rolled her eyes at his persistence.
"Trust me I know," she assured him and Alec stared at her. A challenge. He hadn't had one of those in a while. There was something about Raven that made Alec want her so badly, maybe it was because she kept blowing him off at every turn, or didn't respond to him the way the other females did, but he wanted her.
"Come out with me," Alec begged out of the blue and Raven stared at him like he was nuts before she reached over and knocked on his head.
"Didn't I just tell you I would never fall in love?" Raven reminded him and Alec shrugged not caring about that. He didn't need her love, all he needed was her.
"I'm not asking you to fall in love with me I'm asking you to come out with me tomorrow night," Alec now smiled winningly and Raven found it hard to harden herself against it. She felt all her objections melt away and she pursed her lips.
"All right then, but you have to promise not to fall in love with me," she gave in and Alec grinned like a schoolboy.
"Don't worry that won't be a problem," he assured her and he and Raven smiled widely at each other in complete understanding.
The doors to the warehouse flew open and two security guards came in with a small metal container that housed the chip.
"Let's get this bitch so I can go home and sleep," Raven whispered and Alec grinned at her as they went to work.