She lies still as death on the dais. Her skin, blanched to alabaster, a stunning contrast to the blood red of her dress, and the dark ebony of her hair. Only the dark eyes, burning in the still pallor of her face, show signs of life. They burn with incandescent fury. The animal inside of her rages at inactivity, at imprisonment. I could empathize, after a year in psy-ops the feelings of an animal in captivity were second skin to me.
Normally I love women in all of their forms, but the blond that steps out of the doorway across the room just frightens me. Her brilliant blue eyes scream bitch, and she walks with her shoulders flung back at a perfect ninety degree angle to her body as if to say that she'd just as soon spit on you as look at you. Every fiber of my being strains forward as she circles in like a vulture on my lover, but I hold the primal instinct in check. As the woman slashes out at Max, my hands convulse with such strength that my nails rake bloody tracks across my palm. A few more minutes and then I can fight back.
Four of the familiars step forward holding the ceremonial bowls and each of their brothers and sisters drink from them. In two minutes the brew will take effect, putting the strongest of the familiars in a deep trance and incapacitating them. The thought didn't trouble my conscience in the least. If my short career as an assassin had taught me anything, it was that those who played fair never won. Thirty seconds, I needed a good distraction. Seeing as how you could probably hear a pin drop in this tomb it shouldn't be too hard. Torchlight glinted temptingly off of a set of decorative of silver bowls ranged across the back wall behind me. Quelling the urge to steal them and fence them for a few bucks, I placate myself with a spot of petty destruction.
I flashed back to a time five or so years ago, back at Manticore, back before the whole Berrisford incident. Biggs and I had been on a mission in Texas, retrieving some sensitive computer files from a politician who'd developed a conscience. One day we'd been out doing recon and we'd seen a dozen young boys out playing baseball in the late summer heat. We'd looked like normal fourteen year old boys and the other guys had called us over to join them. One of the boys had said that I ought to pitch for the Rangers. Gripping the metal projectile now, I wondered how my pitching arm had faired over the years.
Instead of aiming for the fleshy head of one of the familiars I opted to go for maximum noise impact, and flung the bowl at one of the stone columns on the other side of the room. It hits its target with a satisfying bang, and all eyes turn in my direction. Get up and go time.
Giving free reign to the primal forces held so long in check I let out a gutted scream of rage and begin to blur. My left hand snaps out in an uppercut catching the nearest familiar under the chain and breaking his neck with an echoing snap. Using the force of the impact I swing my upper body to the floor, and rock back onto my hands leaving both of my feet free to kick the two men in front of me. My left foot caught one in the nose, while my right smashed into the other man's sternum shattering it. A woman off to my left side catches my right foot before I can right myself again. Using the full force of my weight I jerk sharply backwards rolling off my hands and dropping completely to the floor, sending the sister flying over my head and crashing into a wall.
Taking this opportunity to scan the room I search out the form of my lover. She still lays bound and unguarded on the stone platform in the center of the room. Behind me somewhere Biggs, CeCe, Kate, and a dozen other x-5's held the familiar's forces at bay. Another hundred assorted transgenics waited in the passages beyond the chamber to cut off escape and to reinforce us if our line fell. I was free to focus on my mission.
Swinging to my feet I push two familiars out of the way, run halfway up the side of one of the pillars, and twisting in midair propel myself from its surface into the air. Newton would have died for an opportunity to study our kind, when an object applies a force on a second object, the second object applies an opposite and equal force on the first. Looking at it that way, the pillar sent me flying a good 6 meters through the air, landing me in a dog pile on top of another four black robed familiars. 1.4 meters to my object. Using the momentum from my landing I spring into the air again and land squarely in the center of the stone circle, careful not to land on my lover of course. Somehow Maxie didn't strike me as the type to treat a guy with kid gloves, even after sex.
All of the upper ranking familiars, surrounding the alter had the glazed expression of someone stoned off their asses. I reached over the other woman, the one who had tortured me before, and yanked one of the ceremonial daggers off the nearest brother. Swinging it high over my head I bring it down hard on the chains binding my beloved to the dais. Flinging the dagger into the chest of the man whom I'd taken it from, I drop to my knees and take her head in my hands. During the fight her eyes had dropped shut, and now she lie with the absolute still of death. A thin thready pulse fluttered beneath my finger tips, and the smooth skin of her face and neck felt feverishly warm in the circle of my hands. She must have been exposed to the snake toxin somehow.
Oblivious to the war going on around me, I reach into my back pocket and pull out a syringe. Yanking the cover off with my teeth, I mutter a silent apology and plunge the needle into the ashen skin of her forearm. "Maxie? Come on angel, I know you're in there somewhere. There's a full scale battle going on here, and if you don't wake up soon there's an excellent chance that I'm going to screw things up as per my usual. Maxie? Please baby open your eyes up, glare at me, tell me to go to hell, tell me off for jabbing you with this needle, anything."
"That hurt like hell you bastard did you learn how to give injections in psy-ops? You also smell like you haven't bathed in a week. Now get me off of this god damned table, the stone hurts like hell on my bruises. Oh and Alec?" My heart hammers in my throat.
"Yeah Maxie?"
"Kiss me, right now, preferably long and hard." My lips crush down on hers, her head still cradled between my hands. My fingers slide back to twine themselves through her hair as our tongues wrestle together desperately. Her skin burns like a mark of life against my skin, branding her scent and touch into my skinf. In this life, we have no certainties but pain and running, and watching the road at our shoulders.
"I have to get you out of here Maxie." She nibbles lightly on the corners of my lips.
"We're staying to help fight." Her voice is hard and determined. Running my hands the length of her silk clad body, I grab her hips and hoist her up in my arms raising us both to our feet in one smooth movement.
"Look Max, if we fail, and the familiars succeed, both of us need to be alive. As long as we're alive then more of the cure can always be made." Her lips compress so tightly that a small swell of blood trickles down her chin. Staring hard at the floor she slowly nods her head in permission, and I jump off of the platform carrying us both back to the floor.
"Now brothers and sisters!" The voice, deep and commanding, comes from directly behind us, as does the ugly snicking of a pistol's hammer being cocked back.
