Disclaimer: Not mine.
CHAPTER 4
"Pouting isn't pretty," a young voice cried across the breeze.
Alec, who'd been happily occupied planning several methods of the demise of everyone's favorite X5, glanced down from his secluded perch on top of his "Shoddy Shack", as he so lovingly called it, towards the guileless cherub face that was Ray. His child-sized blue eyes sparkled with tongue-in-cheek chiding and a whisper of insight. Fingers wrapped securely around the slimy fire escape ladder, he let his tiny nymph body dangle back and forth lazily, seemingly innocent of the laws of gravity and the cement a few hundred feet below him.
Alec was tempted to warn the kid about the many negative aspects of becoming a pancake against the unforgiving pavement. But even as the words formed on the tip of his tongue he swallowed them. It was too much a Max-like thing to do, and he took every satisfaction of spiting her, with or without her knowledge. But it seemed any warning would be redundant, for Ray hopped up on the roof within moments. He idly crossed the distance between them then hopped and turned slightly in mid-air, coming down on the roof ledge with an enthusiastic little grunt. Minus some excess body hair and a garbled foreign tongue, Ray for all the world reminded Alec of one of those little teddy bear eewogs he'd once seen in one of those "Star Wars" movies. And like Princess Leia, Alec too found himself charmed against his will. The tiny thigh that slid against his was oddly warming.
Ray though, seemed unaffected by the close contact. Unlike Alec, he'd grown up underneath the loving caresses of his mother, his aunt, and now Max. A tiny nip of envy sank its teeth into Alec, as a bittersweet smile came to his face. Nothing to make one feel so jaded as sitting next to a child's innocence. His thoughts though, were destined to be interrupted again.
"Pouting isn't pretty."
Tearing his eyes away from the freefalling sun, Alec spared a glance at the other audience member, but his couldn't really see Ray's eyes behind all of the purple sunspots. "I'm not pouting," he said.
"Yes you are."
"No I'm not."
"Yes you are," Ray sang. Alec shrugged his shoulders. His expertise was assassination, not inane squabbling. Ray was just a kid, he could probably go at it for hours.
Now that the sunspots were fading, he could see the slight challenge in the child's eyes. The boy leaned forward slightly and whispered conspiratorially, "Whether you give up arguing with me or not, it still isn't pretty." The X5 felt himself smile back and leaned forward also, their noses scant inches apart. "Let's pretend I am pouting," he shot back in the same hushed tone. "What makes you say pouting isn't pretty?"
"Aunt Max told me so. She tells me that a lot." Ray nodded wisely, like a child that just learned an important fact of life, and was now teaching it to a friend.
Pulling back from the undeclared staring contest, Alec scoffed. "Well if that isn't the pot calling the kettle black," he whispered to himself.
"What?"
"Nothing. It's just a saying," he said, waving his fingers through the air as if illustrating. "It means that 'Aunt Max' has no room to tell you not to pout when she does so all the time."
Ray seemed perturbed, slightly miffed even. He defensively shot back, "She doesn't do it anymore, not really. She did when we first met, but she'd just lost her sister. She only does it around you anymore."
The last words slapped Alec out of his engrossment with the setting sun, which had just dipped beneath the horizon as twilight settled in, coloring the world in a secretive, conniving flush. He turned on Ray, a question in his eye. But Ray was already standing and dusting the light coat of dirt off of his clothes, making his way toward the ladder and heading back down for the real world. "That's impossible," Alec shouted after him in defiance. The rise to his feet was almost comical in its rush to follow Ray and the distinct unsteadiness accompanying a sudden revelation. He clambered down the ladder after the boy, continuing the conversation. "Today was the first time we'd talked to each other since...since you guys came back."
Ray let himself drop the last few feet down and landed on the first platform with a metallic slap, the impact jarring his tiny legs. Shrugging at the X5's non-question/question, he began to head down the next level when he felt himself jerked back. Alec grabbed him by the back of the shirt and lightly flipped the boy around in mid-air before settling him firmly on the rail of the fire escape. Ray, partly filled with glee and terror at being lobbed through the air a couple hundred feet above ground, merely gazed up at the man leaning over him in wide-eyed wonder. "Today was the first time we talked to each other," he continued, sounding unconvinced. "Right?"
"Yes," the kid said, sliding off the railing and away from the danger of testing the Familiars' ability to fly. "But Aunt Max has seen you before. Lots of times."
Now Alec was beyond confused. Besides a couple of gatherings of the entire population of Terminal City, the Mole incident, and then the disaster at the Command Center today, he hadn't gotten more than a couple glimpses of the ghost formerly known as Max since her return from vacation. "What do you mean, 'lots of times'?"
By now the child's patience was running thin. "Lots of times!" he shouted, punctuating the words with his hands flying through the air. "But every time we see you, she makes us go around the long way."
"You mean she's been avoiding me?" Alec felt a self-righteous irritation crawl across his barcode. How dare she...?
Being an apt pupil of Max's dramatic tutelage, Ray smacked his palm against his forehead, before racking his fist through his blond locks. For being so genetically superior to ordinaries, these X5's sure were dumb. "Yes! She's been avoiding you! Can I go now?"
Alec tightly gripped the slime-covered metal rail with both hands, momentarily lost in his own thoughts. His knuckles whitened under the pressure, a stark contrast the purple sheen of twilight and the brown metal of the rail. Ray's eyes widened. Perhaps he'd been a little to nasty at Alec's obvious turn of stupidity. But before the kid could work up a decent fear of the man before him, the X5 returned to his normal self. Almost. The grin he threw towards the boy didn't quite reach his eyes. For a moment, Ray was quite ashamed. Somehow, something he had said had hurt his friend Alec. Needing to make amends, he slipped his little hand over Alec's, who glanced down with a rueful smile.
The X5 cleared his throat gruffly. One hand already holding the child's, he let the other hand ruffle his hair. Ray shrieked in response. Giggling, he vainly tried to tidy the messed locks. "Yeah, squirt," Alec said. "Let's go back." The rest of the trip back to the troop was silent; content in one's minded, troubled in the other.
*****
"I will sell you my soul for a cigar." Max flopped down on the crates exhaustedly, kneading her neck. With vague interest, she perused the game table. Luke, Dix, Mole, Joshua, and an X5 named Joe playing poker. So far it seemed the X5 was cleaning house; his abstract bounty of candy, cigars, and tube socks bulged in comparison to his competitors'.
"I didn't realized you smoked, Max," Mole mused, peering disdainfully down at his hand. "I fold."
"I don't," she said. She popped open the first few buttons on her shirt and fanned her chest against the heat. A competitive silence fell over the players. Joe, distracted by Max's dismal attempts to ward off the heat, lost the next three hands. But he lost them rather cheerfully. Realizing he had duty that night to guard the perimeter, he left the table - more reluctantly than usual - sneaking several peeks back in Max's general direction. Max claimed his place in the game.
"I don't have anything to gamble with," she confessed.
Dix scoffed, "And you think we do? How do you think we worked our way down to tube socks?"
"It's practical," Max defended. "How about if I strip?" she joked.
Mole chuckled, puffing out small clouds of tobacco induced smoke. "Then Joe would really be kicking himself for leaving. You should come around more often when we play Max. Joe seems to have a splash of Vegas in his gene pool and you seem to even the playing field."
"Right," Max drawled. "With so many fine looking ladies around here, I highly doubt a washed up X5 runner is enough to catch his fancy."
"It works for some," Joshua said cryptically. Max practically fell out of her chair. Since her return to T.C., the dog man had snubbed her. He was dead in Alec's corner, following his lead on how to treat the deserter. Max fairly beamed in appreciation at any words from her one time friend, but Joshua tactfully ignored the smile, completely absorbed in his cards.
The next few rounds passed in an almost friendly silence. She won a couple hands, followed by Dix. The game was interrupted, however, with the entrance of Max's - and now Alec's - charge. Ray, completely oblivious to the sudden tension between his two best "big" friends, leapt into his "aunt's" arms, chatting animatedly about all the adventures of the day. Only once did she summon the courage to lift her eyes from Ray to his recent babysitter, who looked almost comically both stern and bemused.
She turned back to Ray, who was describing the stop sign he and a couple of X6's found in a sewer. When Alec's attention shifted away from her she could physically feel it, relieved by the loss of strain on her nerves, but filled by an strange void.
*****
When Ray awoke the next day with a scratchy throat and his less than normally chipper mood, Max wrote it off. Kids get sick, it was a fact of life. The hacking cough that began to rack his body over the next week not only cost Max precious sleep - even sharks slept - but gave her a few gray hairs as well. But it wasn't until Max had spent the greater part of a Saturday morning pushing the hair back from Ray's head while he emptied the contents of his not-quite-full stomach and crooning small comforts in his ear that she let herself truly worry. Now pacing back and forth across the dingy hallway of Terminal City's make-shift sickbay, Max cursed herself for not bringing him to the medics sooner. Her self-inflicted abuse followed her light steps, echoing across the empty hall. Later, when Max's own erratic footsteps were harmonized by a calmer, heavier beat, she looked up.
"Max."
"Alec."
"Well, I'm glad we haven't forgotten each other's names," he tried to joke, but it fell flat. Silently Max returned to her pacing. Thankfully a third party joined them before more could be said, which would have eventually lead to bleeding - him bleeding. Evita, a somber, lithe transgen majoring in the medicinal arts, left the room holding Ray hostage - in Max's opinion - and strode up to the pair, making final glances over the notes on her clipboard.
"It's really simple," the medic explained, turning a slightly accusatory glance towards Max. Ever since Evita had joined the rogue race at T.C., Ray seemed to be the only one to charm her. He had quickly weaseled his way through her moody exterior with his curious questions and frank observations. Ray had become a favorite of hers, and she apparently held Max responsible for his present illness. But before Max could even defend her care-taking abilities, the medic said, "He's sick of you. Literally."
Max's fist tightened at her side, ready to throttle the little pipsqueak for having the nerve to accuse her of any neglect. But once again, the medic took the wind out of her sails. "Ray's still suffering from the ceremonial inoculation. Between this and the transfusions of your blood, it has wiped out his little system."
Max's eyebrows skyrocketed in surprise and confusion, while Alec silently soaked in her response. "But I thought the blood transfusions would help him," she said.
Evita nodded. "Yes. They do help, but they also hurt. Although they keep him from becoming a puddle of genetic slime, that retrovirus isn't taking too well to his system. You see, it is specifically targeted to Logan's system, but the mix of the retrovirus plus the inoculation plus a strained system equals a very sick Ray."
Max chewed on her thumbnail. "Is there anything that can be done?"
"Obviously this has been building up for months, with your constant contact with his skin. But the transfusions are what have cut down his immunities exponentially. He will be perfectly fine in a few days, but it would be best if you avoided any sort physical contact with Ray for a few weeks. You'll also need a new volunteer to transfuse blood."
"I can do it," Alec offered almost before Evita got the words out and both females jerked their heads in his direction in surprise.
"Can I see him?" Max asked. Evita shook her head with a rather unsympathetic "No."
"Why not?"
"He's very vulnerable right now. It would be best if you avoided any contact with him for a few days as he rides out the worst part."
"But..."
"No buts, Max. Unless of course you want his condition to get worsen," she dropped accusingly. Off of Max's forlorn but determined look, Evita nodded. "Then stay away a few days." With an insincere smile in Max's direction and one not-so-insincere in Alec's, the woman bounced down the hall.
"That little bi..." Giving up on all pretenses of self-will, Max started after her with every intention of a beat down. A forgotten Alec clamped his hand down around her wrist, causing Max to stumble back and bounce of his chest. Overlooking Evita, Max turned on him instead. "Where do you get off...?"
"I hear Vancouver's nice this time of year," Alec lazily replied. Max's jaw clenched in response. "You know," Alec began easily. "If those nostrils of yours flare a little bit further, I bet you could fit at least a Brussels sprout or two up in there."
"Shut up, Alec!"
Deciding to change his tune, Alec calmly latched his other hand on her empty wrist. "Easy there, tiger. Don't freak out on me. Ray is going to be fine in a coupla days." Consoled a bit, Max's angry mask sank into her real emotion...worry. Alec's fingers subconsciously rubbed her wrist. He didn't feel the gesture but Max did. For one moment, Max was tempted to see Alec in a new light. Her eyes gripped his and found a new softness there that she had never seen before.
Then he opened his mouth. A mischievous grin crossed his face and his eyes began to dance again. "You know, I have it on very good - though very tiny - authority that 'pouting isn't pretty.' I was just wondering if you had gotten that memo."
Max growled and didn't even resist her most primitive urge. Whaap! Her hand cut across his shoulder. She stalked down the hall muttering something about "bastards in gentlemen's clothing." Alec was left in her angry wake holding his shoulder. His fingers tested the flesh lightly and he hissed. Yup, there would be some definite bruising. In fact, if Max would have angled her shot a little better she could have had the honor of dislocating his shoulder. Obviously Anger Management 101 wasn't on the itinerary during her little cruise. Pretty soon Alec would return to being the constant brunt of her ire.
So why was it he could not stop that idiotic grin from spreading across his face?
A/N: I know it was shorter than I had intended. I had the story stuck at this same place for a couple of weeks and I couldn't decide how to work around it. Although I wanted to add more on, severe writer's block has had me well...blocked. I've had a very tiny epiphany but I'm not sure how that'll work in yet. Any patience is much appreciated.
A/N 2: It's official: any intelligence I might have had at one time is now falling to teenage hormones. I picked up the DA DVD...the first day it was out...and watched "Pollo Loco" first. Someone stop the insanity.
CHAPTER 4
"Pouting isn't pretty," a young voice cried across the breeze.
Alec, who'd been happily occupied planning several methods of the demise of everyone's favorite X5, glanced down from his secluded perch on top of his "Shoddy Shack", as he so lovingly called it, towards the guileless cherub face that was Ray. His child-sized blue eyes sparkled with tongue-in-cheek chiding and a whisper of insight. Fingers wrapped securely around the slimy fire escape ladder, he let his tiny nymph body dangle back and forth lazily, seemingly innocent of the laws of gravity and the cement a few hundred feet below him.
Alec was tempted to warn the kid about the many negative aspects of becoming a pancake against the unforgiving pavement. But even as the words formed on the tip of his tongue he swallowed them. It was too much a Max-like thing to do, and he took every satisfaction of spiting her, with or without her knowledge. But it seemed any warning would be redundant, for Ray hopped up on the roof within moments. He idly crossed the distance between them then hopped and turned slightly in mid-air, coming down on the roof ledge with an enthusiastic little grunt. Minus some excess body hair and a garbled foreign tongue, Ray for all the world reminded Alec of one of those little teddy bear eewogs he'd once seen in one of those "Star Wars" movies. And like Princess Leia, Alec too found himself charmed against his will. The tiny thigh that slid against his was oddly warming.
Ray though, seemed unaffected by the close contact. Unlike Alec, he'd grown up underneath the loving caresses of his mother, his aunt, and now Max. A tiny nip of envy sank its teeth into Alec, as a bittersweet smile came to his face. Nothing to make one feel so jaded as sitting next to a child's innocence. His thoughts though, were destined to be interrupted again.
"Pouting isn't pretty."
Tearing his eyes away from the freefalling sun, Alec spared a glance at the other audience member, but his couldn't really see Ray's eyes behind all of the purple sunspots. "I'm not pouting," he said.
"Yes you are."
"No I'm not."
"Yes you are," Ray sang. Alec shrugged his shoulders. His expertise was assassination, not inane squabbling. Ray was just a kid, he could probably go at it for hours.
Now that the sunspots were fading, he could see the slight challenge in the child's eyes. The boy leaned forward slightly and whispered conspiratorially, "Whether you give up arguing with me or not, it still isn't pretty." The X5 felt himself smile back and leaned forward also, their noses scant inches apart. "Let's pretend I am pouting," he shot back in the same hushed tone. "What makes you say pouting isn't pretty?"
"Aunt Max told me so. She tells me that a lot." Ray nodded wisely, like a child that just learned an important fact of life, and was now teaching it to a friend.
Pulling back from the undeclared staring contest, Alec scoffed. "Well if that isn't the pot calling the kettle black," he whispered to himself.
"What?"
"Nothing. It's just a saying," he said, waving his fingers through the air as if illustrating. "It means that 'Aunt Max' has no room to tell you not to pout when she does so all the time."
Ray seemed perturbed, slightly miffed even. He defensively shot back, "She doesn't do it anymore, not really. She did when we first met, but she'd just lost her sister. She only does it around you anymore."
The last words slapped Alec out of his engrossment with the setting sun, which had just dipped beneath the horizon as twilight settled in, coloring the world in a secretive, conniving flush. He turned on Ray, a question in his eye. But Ray was already standing and dusting the light coat of dirt off of his clothes, making his way toward the ladder and heading back down for the real world. "That's impossible," Alec shouted after him in defiance. The rise to his feet was almost comical in its rush to follow Ray and the distinct unsteadiness accompanying a sudden revelation. He clambered down the ladder after the boy, continuing the conversation. "Today was the first time we'd talked to each other since...since you guys came back."
Ray let himself drop the last few feet down and landed on the first platform with a metallic slap, the impact jarring his tiny legs. Shrugging at the X5's non-question/question, he began to head down the next level when he felt himself jerked back. Alec grabbed him by the back of the shirt and lightly flipped the boy around in mid-air before settling him firmly on the rail of the fire escape. Ray, partly filled with glee and terror at being lobbed through the air a couple hundred feet above ground, merely gazed up at the man leaning over him in wide-eyed wonder. "Today was the first time we talked to each other," he continued, sounding unconvinced. "Right?"
"Yes," the kid said, sliding off the railing and away from the danger of testing the Familiars' ability to fly. "But Aunt Max has seen you before. Lots of times."
Now Alec was beyond confused. Besides a couple of gatherings of the entire population of Terminal City, the Mole incident, and then the disaster at the Command Center today, he hadn't gotten more than a couple glimpses of the ghost formerly known as Max since her return from vacation. "What do you mean, 'lots of times'?"
By now the child's patience was running thin. "Lots of times!" he shouted, punctuating the words with his hands flying through the air. "But every time we see you, she makes us go around the long way."
"You mean she's been avoiding me?" Alec felt a self-righteous irritation crawl across his barcode. How dare she...?
Being an apt pupil of Max's dramatic tutelage, Ray smacked his palm against his forehead, before racking his fist through his blond locks. For being so genetically superior to ordinaries, these X5's sure were dumb. "Yes! She's been avoiding you! Can I go now?"
Alec tightly gripped the slime-covered metal rail with both hands, momentarily lost in his own thoughts. His knuckles whitened under the pressure, a stark contrast the purple sheen of twilight and the brown metal of the rail. Ray's eyes widened. Perhaps he'd been a little to nasty at Alec's obvious turn of stupidity. But before the kid could work up a decent fear of the man before him, the X5 returned to his normal self. Almost. The grin he threw towards the boy didn't quite reach his eyes. For a moment, Ray was quite ashamed. Somehow, something he had said had hurt his friend Alec. Needing to make amends, he slipped his little hand over Alec's, who glanced down with a rueful smile.
The X5 cleared his throat gruffly. One hand already holding the child's, he let the other hand ruffle his hair. Ray shrieked in response. Giggling, he vainly tried to tidy the messed locks. "Yeah, squirt," Alec said. "Let's go back." The rest of the trip back to the troop was silent; content in one's minded, troubled in the other.
*****
"I will sell you my soul for a cigar." Max flopped down on the crates exhaustedly, kneading her neck. With vague interest, she perused the game table. Luke, Dix, Mole, Joshua, and an X5 named Joe playing poker. So far it seemed the X5 was cleaning house; his abstract bounty of candy, cigars, and tube socks bulged in comparison to his competitors'.
"I didn't realized you smoked, Max," Mole mused, peering disdainfully down at his hand. "I fold."
"I don't," she said. She popped open the first few buttons on her shirt and fanned her chest against the heat. A competitive silence fell over the players. Joe, distracted by Max's dismal attempts to ward off the heat, lost the next three hands. But he lost them rather cheerfully. Realizing he had duty that night to guard the perimeter, he left the table - more reluctantly than usual - sneaking several peeks back in Max's general direction. Max claimed his place in the game.
"I don't have anything to gamble with," she confessed.
Dix scoffed, "And you think we do? How do you think we worked our way down to tube socks?"
"It's practical," Max defended. "How about if I strip?" she joked.
Mole chuckled, puffing out small clouds of tobacco induced smoke. "Then Joe would really be kicking himself for leaving. You should come around more often when we play Max. Joe seems to have a splash of Vegas in his gene pool and you seem to even the playing field."
"Right," Max drawled. "With so many fine looking ladies around here, I highly doubt a washed up X5 runner is enough to catch his fancy."
"It works for some," Joshua said cryptically. Max practically fell out of her chair. Since her return to T.C., the dog man had snubbed her. He was dead in Alec's corner, following his lead on how to treat the deserter. Max fairly beamed in appreciation at any words from her one time friend, but Joshua tactfully ignored the smile, completely absorbed in his cards.
The next few rounds passed in an almost friendly silence. She won a couple hands, followed by Dix. The game was interrupted, however, with the entrance of Max's - and now Alec's - charge. Ray, completely oblivious to the sudden tension between his two best "big" friends, leapt into his "aunt's" arms, chatting animatedly about all the adventures of the day. Only once did she summon the courage to lift her eyes from Ray to his recent babysitter, who looked almost comically both stern and bemused.
She turned back to Ray, who was describing the stop sign he and a couple of X6's found in a sewer. When Alec's attention shifted away from her she could physically feel it, relieved by the loss of strain on her nerves, but filled by an strange void.
*****
When Ray awoke the next day with a scratchy throat and his less than normally chipper mood, Max wrote it off. Kids get sick, it was a fact of life. The hacking cough that began to rack his body over the next week not only cost Max precious sleep - even sharks slept - but gave her a few gray hairs as well. But it wasn't until Max had spent the greater part of a Saturday morning pushing the hair back from Ray's head while he emptied the contents of his not-quite-full stomach and crooning small comforts in his ear that she let herself truly worry. Now pacing back and forth across the dingy hallway of Terminal City's make-shift sickbay, Max cursed herself for not bringing him to the medics sooner. Her self-inflicted abuse followed her light steps, echoing across the empty hall. Later, when Max's own erratic footsteps were harmonized by a calmer, heavier beat, she looked up.
"Max."
"Alec."
"Well, I'm glad we haven't forgotten each other's names," he tried to joke, but it fell flat. Silently Max returned to her pacing. Thankfully a third party joined them before more could be said, which would have eventually lead to bleeding - him bleeding. Evita, a somber, lithe transgen majoring in the medicinal arts, left the room holding Ray hostage - in Max's opinion - and strode up to the pair, making final glances over the notes on her clipboard.
"It's really simple," the medic explained, turning a slightly accusatory glance towards Max. Ever since Evita had joined the rogue race at T.C., Ray seemed to be the only one to charm her. He had quickly weaseled his way through her moody exterior with his curious questions and frank observations. Ray had become a favorite of hers, and she apparently held Max responsible for his present illness. But before Max could even defend her care-taking abilities, the medic said, "He's sick of you. Literally."
Max's fist tightened at her side, ready to throttle the little pipsqueak for having the nerve to accuse her of any neglect. But once again, the medic took the wind out of her sails. "Ray's still suffering from the ceremonial inoculation. Between this and the transfusions of your blood, it has wiped out his little system."
Max's eyebrows skyrocketed in surprise and confusion, while Alec silently soaked in her response. "But I thought the blood transfusions would help him," she said.
Evita nodded. "Yes. They do help, but they also hurt. Although they keep him from becoming a puddle of genetic slime, that retrovirus isn't taking too well to his system. You see, it is specifically targeted to Logan's system, but the mix of the retrovirus plus the inoculation plus a strained system equals a very sick Ray."
Max chewed on her thumbnail. "Is there anything that can be done?"
"Obviously this has been building up for months, with your constant contact with his skin. But the transfusions are what have cut down his immunities exponentially. He will be perfectly fine in a few days, but it would be best if you avoided any sort physical contact with Ray for a few weeks. You'll also need a new volunteer to transfuse blood."
"I can do it," Alec offered almost before Evita got the words out and both females jerked their heads in his direction in surprise.
"Can I see him?" Max asked. Evita shook her head with a rather unsympathetic "No."
"Why not?"
"He's very vulnerable right now. It would be best if you avoided any contact with him for a few days as he rides out the worst part."
"But..."
"No buts, Max. Unless of course you want his condition to get worsen," she dropped accusingly. Off of Max's forlorn but determined look, Evita nodded. "Then stay away a few days." With an insincere smile in Max's direction and one not-so-insincere in Alec's, the woman bounced down the hall.
"That little bi..." Giving up on all pretenses of self-will, Max started after her with every intention of a beat down. A forgotten Alec clamped his hand down around her wrist, causing Max to stumble back and bounce of his chest. Overlooking Evita, Max turned on him instead. "Where do you get off...?"
"I hear Vancouver's nice this time of year," Alec lazily replied. Max's jaw clenched in response. "You know," Alec began easily. "If those nostrils of yours flare a little bit further, I bet you could fit at least a Brussels sprout or two up in there."
"Shut up, Alec!"
Deciding to change his tune, Alec calmly latched his other hand on her empty wrist. "Easy there, tiger. Don't freak out on me. Ray is going to be fine in a coupla days." Consoled a bit, Max's angry mask sank into her real emotion...worry. Alec's fingers subconsciously rubbed her wrist. He didn't feel the gesture but Max did. For one moment, Max was tempted to see Alec in a new light. Her eyes gripped his and found a new softness there that she had never seen before.
Then he opened his mouth. A mischievous grin crossed his face and his eyes began to dance again. "You know, I have it on very good - though very tiny - authority that 'pouting isn't pretty.' I was just wondering if you had gotten that memo."
Max growled and didn't even resist her most primitive urge. Whaap! Her hand cut across his shoulder. She stalked down the hall muttering something about "bastards in gentlemen's clothing." Alec was left in her angry wake holding his shoulder. His fingers tested the flesh lightly and he hissed. Yup, there would be some definite bruising. In fact, if Max would have angled her shot a little better she could have had the honor of dislocating his shoulder. Obviously Anger Management 101 wasn't on the itinerary during her little cruise. Pretty soon Alec would return to being the constant brunt of her ire.
So why was it he could not stop that idiotic grin from spreading across his face?
A/N: I know it was shorter than I had intended. I had the story stuck at this same place for a couple of weeks and I couldn't decide how to work around it. Although I wanted to add more on, severe writer's block has had me well...blocked. I've had a very tiny epiphany but I'm not sure how that'll work in yet. Any patience is much appreciated.
A/N 2: It's official: any intelligence I might have had at one time is now falling to teenage hormones. I picked up the DA DVD...the first day it was out...and watched "Pollo Loco" first. Someone stop the insanity.