Glory Days by Star24
Disclaimer: Dark Angel and its characters are property and copyright Twentieth Century Fox and James Cameron and Charles Eglee. This original story is copyright 2003 Star24.
AN: Since so many people seem to be enjoying this series I'm keeping it going. This is part 4 of Alternate Season Two. The first three parts Smoke & Mirrors, Breakdown and The Puppetmasters are complete and can be found here or on my website http: // star24.freeservers.com/
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Prologue
Fogle Towers
"Ouch." Logan dropped the pair of needle nose pliers he was holding and sucked on his finger. "Damn it."
"Sounds like someone hurt themselves. Need Mommy to kiss it all better?"
Logan looked up to see Max standing in his doorway, hand on hip, head cocked to the side. He grinned at her and held out his finger. "Sure."
Max sauntered over, took his hand in hers, and examined it. "What? That little tiny pinch mark? You're kidding me right?"
"If you don't want to…" Logan started to pull his hand away.
"I didn't say that." Max brought his hand up and dropped a light kiss on the injured finger. "All better now?" she teased.
"It'll do." Logan smiled back at her, giving her hand a light squeeze before he released it. Their eyes met and held for a moment, but then Max looked over to see what Logan had been working on.
"The exo giving you trouble again?" she asked when she saw it lying on his workout table with various tools scattered around.
"Not exactly. But it is temperamental. I find that if I don't adjust it pretty regularly, it tends to get kind of wonky on me when I least expect it to." Logan sighed. "But it's better than the alternative." He indicated his wheelchair.
"Guess so." Max said. "You do know it doesn't matter to me which you use. Right?"
"Yeah, I know, but it's easier to get around with the exo. I kind of got back into the habit of meeting with my informants while you were away. I hate to give that up. The chair sticks out, and informants don't exactly like that when they're having a secret meeting, don't cha know."
"Whatever." Max shrugged and held out a handful of envelopes to Logan. "Almost forgot, the doorman gave me your mail to bring up."
Logan reached for the mail. As Max handed it over, an envelope fell to the floor. She bent and picked it up, looking at it curiously before she gave it to Logan. It was thick and square and cream colored. Logan's name and address were etched on the front in an elegant calligraphy.
"What's this? Some kind of fancy invite?"
Logan took the envelope from Max and turned it over. "Dunno."
"So open it."
Logan took a screwdriver and used it as a letter opener to rip open the envelope. He pulled out a card. "Oh. It's nothing." He was about to toss the whole thing away, but Max reached out and snagged it from midair over the trash can.
"Max that's my mail." Logan protested as she looked at the card.
"You were throwing it away." She was already reading it. "Why aren't you going?"
"Because my High School reunion is the last place I want to be right now. Believe me Max, it'll be completely boring. All the scions of Seattle's upper crust will be there, out to impress each other with their trophy spouses and expensive cars. Blah blah, woof woof in the words of someone I know."
Max looked at him. "Sounds like a hoot, Logan."
Logan looked at her. "I really don't have time."
"No, saving the world takes priority, right?"
"Max, are you saying you think I should go to this thing?" Logan looked at her askance.
"Well we did say we were going to try to do some normal kind of things together once in a while. You know, something that doesn't involve comm units, burglary tools and cat suits."
"What's wrong with cat suits? I kind of like them." Logan grinned.
Max just rolled her eyes at him, "That's 'cause you're not the one wearing one."
"You really want to do this?" Logan pressed her. "They're a bunch of snobs."
"That's what you said about your cousin's wedding too, and it wasn't so bad. Except that I never did get my cake." She gave him a look and a smile, "Come on, Logan. We can go together and you can show off your trophy girlfriend."
"And my trophy exo-skeleton?" he asked, feeling a rush that Max had called herself his girlfriend.
"Bet you're the only one with one of those. You might start a new trend." Max teased.
Logan tried one last time. "You seriously want to go to this thing?"
Max smiled at him. "Yep."
He thought for a moment. "You do realize that you'll have to get a dress, and no, you are not 'borrowing' it this time. If you insist on going, I insist on buying the dress."
"Aw, where's the fun in that?"
"Max."
"Do I have to?"
"Do you want me to take you to this?"
"Killjoy."
"So am I buying you the dress or not?"
"Guess I have no choice."
"Nope."
"Okay then." Max gave in. "I'll take OC shopping with me for it, she gets a kick out of goin' to those uptown stores. She needs some cheering up anyway, after the whole Lina thing."
Logan was silent a moment, "Yeah I bet. She doesn't manage to catch a break does she?"
"Maybe we can find a hot society chick at your do to hook her up with. Never know." Max winked at him. Then in a sudden change of mood she walked over to look at the exo. "So tell me about this thing. Maybe I can help with the adjustments…"
"…since you excelled in electronics as a child." Logan smiled. "If you look here, this is the control chip that…"
End of Prologue