The Moon is Not Enough by ThePekingNoodle
Chapter Eighteen: Memories
In which Jondy brings back bitter memories for our heroine…
Logan managed to locate a sedative in the cabin's medical supplies. He slipped a dose into a bowl of the stew. Jondy was hungry when she awoke, and she ate the meal greedily. Shortly after, she was fast asleep once again.
"Do you think that will really keep her out all night?" Max asked.
"I hope. It's not like I'm any kind of medical expert, and we are dealing with an X5 here." Logan said.
"Not to worry. You know I don't need much sleep. It should at least keep her down for a few hours, and then I'll check on her." Max said as she curled against Logan on the couch in front of the fireplace.
The night was cool, and the fire that Logan had built, crackled and sparked merrily in front of them. For a while they both stared into it, lost in their own thoughts. Max rested her head on Logan's shoulder and he draped an arm casually over her shoulders and played idly with a piece of her hair.
"What was it like?" he asked abruptly. "Manticore, I mean."
Max was silent for a moment. "It was like nothing you could ever imagine. The thing I remember most is the cold. Stupid huh? Years of torture and being treated like lab rats, and I remember the cold." She shivered and Logan pulled her closer to him.
"I'm sorry." He looked down at her. "I shouldn't have asked." His blue eyes were full of love and compassion.
"It's okay. Maybe I need to talk about it, get it out. I never told anyone, not even my parents. Even though I think my father knew some of it from his investigations." She fell silent and then she began.
"I remember always being cold. We wore military style fatigues no matter what the season was. No coats, no gloves or hats, nothing but our fatigues and boots. And at night we wore hospital smocks to sleep in. We all had buzz cuts, no hair allowed to grow. Like patients in some insane asylum." She paused and stared into space.
"We were designed to withstand temperature extremes, so I guess they figured we didn't need warm clothing. We had one blanket apiece for our cots. Those thin woolen ones that scratch like crazy. But at least they were blankets. Not that they helped much in the winter. I guess they didn't want to waste money on heating our barracks. So they didn't. On winter mornings there would be ice on the windows. Even in the warmer months it was always cold and damp. Probably because the walls were three-foot thick stone, and the only windows faced north. They didn't bother to wash them, and they were so dirty that not much sun came in to warm things up.
"Every day was pretty much the same. Roll call at six AM, followed by classes for the entire group for two hours. After that we did drills and training on the parade ground for a couple more hours, and then it was lunch in the mess hall. Afternoons…" Max trailed off.
"Afternoons?" Logan asked gently.
Max shuddered once again. "Afternoons were for individual training. They were for one on one correction of whatever mistakes we made in the morning classes or drills. If the mistakes were too bad, they were for discipline. We learned young not to make mistakes if we could help it. Or they were for…" she stopped again.
"Max, you don't have to talk about this." Logan reiterated. He was sorry he had brought up the subject.
Max ignored him; "They were for experimentation. If they decided that you were going to be one of the experimental subjects, they'd bring you into one of the medical labs. Then they'd break a few bones, or try some new experimental biological or chemical warfare agent on you. You either survived it or you didn't. They were testing the tolerances and abilities of their perfect soldiers. Trying to see what kind of immunity and recovery responses we had. So they'd know for the battlefield later on." Her voice was cold and emotionless as she spoke, and Logan felt chilled to the bone at her matter of fact recital.
"But that was okay. I figured out early on that I could just …go away. I'd let my mind drift and forget what was happening to my body. The thing is, you weren't chosen too many times for that, and it was of relatively short duration. Once it was over it was over. But the cold never went away. It was always there. It seeped into your bones and your blood. It was there in their eyes when they looked at you. That coldness. We weren't human to them. We were subjects in a grand experiment. Things. There only for what we could teach them. So they could take what they learned from us and use it to make better things. More perfect things."
Max finally stopped. Tears were running down her cheeks. Logan reached out a finger and gently wiped them away. He pulled her close and hugged her to him, as he murmured soft words to her, and stroked her back gently.
"You know, I think that was what made me fall in love with you the very first time I saw you." Max said softly. "When I was sixteen years old."
"What?" Logan was confused.
"The way you looked at me. You made me feel warm all the way through, for the first time in my entire life. My parents loved me, but there was always that coldness inside of me that even they couldn't make go away. But you did. I knew that if I was with you, I'd never feel that awful cold again."
"Max…" Logan felt a surge of love wash through him at her words. "I don't know what to say." For the first time in his life he felt at a complete loss. He felt humbled by Max's simple words.
"You don't have to say anything. All you have to do is look at me the way you do." Max smiled up at him. "Like you're looking at me now."
Logan lowered his head slowly to her, and their lips met in a soft kiss. The passion was there as always, underlying it, but it mostly a declaration of their love for each other. When they finally broke apart, Max rested her head against Logan's chest, listening to the strong, steady beat of his heart. His chin was on her head and he closed his eyes as he held her close to him.
"Don't ever leave me, Logan." Max said softly. "I don't want to be cold again."
"I'm not going anywhere. I promise." He answered without hesitation. He gently put her from him and rose. "Come with me to bed? Let me keep you warm tonight. Let me help you forget the cold."
Max looked at him with her heart in her eyes. "Yes." She rose to join him.
They glanced into the extra bedroom as they passed it, but Jondy appeared to be fast asleep. She stirred and murmured, but when Logan looked at Max questioningly she shook her head.
"She's out. For now." She took his hand and pulled him along with her to the master bedroom.
End of Chapter Eighteen…TBC…