PART FOURTEEN : " Enceinte "

Ames started the car, which he'd found down the street a half block. He wasn't sure how Max had arranged that so fast, but it beat walking. He'd have to run it for bugs later. Driving off, he was through most of the checkpoints and halfway out of Seattle when he stopped the car. Looking at Ray, who was now asleep, he considered his short range plans.

He knew the security patterns of the Conclave but that didn't make them any easier to get through, in fact; he might be incapable of doing so. He ran through several scenarios before coming to the ultimate conclusion; there was only one accessible group who had successfully blocked his moves time after time; the transgenics. Hiding wouldn't buy time, the Conclave would find him. The problem would be getting the mutants to accept him; that would never happen. But for Ray's sake...

He began driving; a plan forming in his selectively bred mind.

* * * * *

Max pulled into the clearing at the Bradford place, and noticed one of the Terminal City vans parked there. She slid to a stop and Alec got off the bike.

"Ever consider a career in missile piloting?" he chastised.

Max got off the bike, slowly. "A motorcycle is meant to go fast. I could have let you walk."

Alec uncharacteristically let it slide as he observed her walk balanced but unsteadily towards the porch. He also noticed she was watching the ground instead of around her. Deciding she might need help, he started to walk towards her but stopped as he noticed that Logan had stepped out onto the porch. Better to let him handle her.

When she got to the porch she looked up into Logan's face, seeing his concern. "I'm ok, but a little dizzy. We need to talk."

Logan helped her inside, and upstairs where Beck was waiting. She had set up the extra equipment Logan had brought and had already determined that Sharon Bradford would be sore but should heal fine. Logan set Max down on the bed and Beck started hooking her up to "Cyclops", a portable X-ray machine they had salvaged from the R&D shop a few months back. The machine looked like a bunk bed, with a monitor that looked like a basketball-size eyeball.

She ran the scan over Max and watched the monitoring screen. Frowning, she asked; "Logan, did anyone mess with this before you brought it?"

Logan looked over at her. "No... it was right where you said it would be in the Med Lab. It's not broken, is it?"

"No." she replied. "Come look at this."

He squeezed Max's hand, and walked over to Beck at the machine's monitoring screen. She pointed to her shoulder.

"The X-rays we took before with the old unit showed spiderweb cracks throughout her clavicle. Not severe enough to cause us anything but major discomfort but still..." She looked dubiously fascinated at the screen. "This is showing the bone completely healed."

Beck pointed at the screen. "See these lines? Those are where the cracks originally were. Don't get me wrong, we were made to heal fast. But nothing I've ever seen in a transgenic has ever healed this fast, not with the type of injury that she had. Not even with her junk-proof DNA."

Max, listening to this, asked "Then I'm 'fit for duty'?"

Beck sighed. "I'd like to find out how this happened. This didn't occur when you were shot in Seattle, or back when you were 'killed' back at Manticore. You seem to be healed, but there might be alternative problems. I'd like to run a couple of tests to make sure you're going to stay that way."

Max's exasperatedly exhausted look was not lost on them. "How long will it take?"

Logan stepped in between them; he knew her long enough to recognize the end of her patience. "Max, why don't I go downstairs and make sure everyone has something to do. When she's done with you she'll send you down and you can tell me everything that happened. OK?" He and Beck shared a conspiratory look, which was not lost on Max.

She looked at Beck, who nodded. Satisfied, Max mumbled something that sounded confirming to Logan. He smiled, bent over and kissed her forehead, then walked out of the room.

He started to head downstairs, but thought better of it and walked over to Mrs. Bradford's room. Her son was leaning against the window and a girl that looked slightly younger than the boy was in a chair next to the bed talking to Sharon Bradford. He knocked on the open door, "Mrs. Bradford, how are you feeling?"

"Mr. Cale. Come in!" Sharon called out. "The doctor said I could get out of bed in a couple of days if I took it easy, but didn't say anything about not having visitors. Is Max back yet?"

"She made it back with Alex just a few minutes ago. She's being given a once over right now. Can I talk to you alone for a few?" Logan asked.

She looked at him oddly, then nodded. "Kids, why don't you check and make sure everyone has been fed. I'm sure with all these people someone must be hungry."

After slight grumbling, they agreed and left the room. "They're great kids. Full of questions and very protective of you, from what I've been told." he commented.

"They're the joy in my life. I can't even imagine my day without them." she smiled.

Logan smiled back, then became serious. "I have something to tell you. When the medic went over your blood she found some anomalies. I was with her at the time she discovered this; which is why I'm talking to you instead of her."

Sharon looked concerned. "What kind of anomalies?"

Logan walked over to the window and looked out onto the property. "Genetic anomalies." He turned around. "The kind that I've been told apparently only takes place when a woman has had a certain type of pregnancy."

She suddenly looked uneasy. "What type of pregnancy, Mr. Logan?"

He walked over to her bed. "When a typical female is a host-mother to a transgenic, Mrs. Bradford."

Visibly sweating now, she looked straight at him. "You can't bring me into this. That was two decades ago. I don't even know who the baby was."

He sighed. "We're all in this. But I believe you when you say you don't know. However, the anomalies are so differed between mothers that an identifying match is possible even years later if the child's DNA pattern is on record. We have a number of those DNA markers on record now, thanks to the large number of transgenics that have come to Terminal City."

Eye to eye, he quietly stated the fact. "You're Max's mother."