Chapter 3: Just Can't Fight It
"Okay," Jondy said, "Take a deep breath and try again." Max pulled against the restraint with every ounce of her genetically enhanced strength. It didn't budge, she couldn't get out—she was effectively trapped.
"Alright," Jondy said, "Think you can get your feet out?" Max tried every muscle in her legs and every twisted contortionist combination she could think of. The leg restraints didn't give either.
"Nope," Max said, breathing a sigh of relief, "It's all good."
"You sure you want me to sedate you now," Jondy asked. "I could stay and read to you or something until you start going batty."
"Now would probably be better than later," Max answered, shaking her head a little. "I go through this in between phase where I think I might not be in heat yet, sometimes. I like to be unconscious before that starts."
"It's your party," Jondy agreed, pushing the hypodermic needle into her sister's forearm. "How long before this bitch kicks in?" she asked.
"Ten minutes, maybe fifteen, and it will keep me out for the whole time, hopefully, so you don't need to check on me," Max said. "Maybe you could pop by once in about thirty six hours just to make sure I'm still out, but other than that, your job ends once I go beddy bye."
"You do know you're one of about twelve females who actually go to this extreme, right?" Jondy asked, making sure her sister knew how silly she was being.
"I know," she said, yawning slightly, "But I'm one of the only transgenics who would definitely kill someone if they got out."
"You're talking about Logan?" her sister assumed.
"It's the glasses. They make him all, sexy and intellectual," Max agreed, yawning again. "And the fact that I'm seriously considering jumping his bones right now, virus or no, would be the best sign that we're not a minute too early with that sedative."
Jondy would have said something more, but it was pointless, because her sister was asleep before the words left her tongue. It was a weird experience for Jondy to watch Max sleep—and not one she particularly enjoyed. Jondy had a lot of practice watching people sleep; boys, siblings, friends and roommates all nodded off at least once in her presence during their acquaintance, but Max was different. With Max, staying awake was a shared interest. Putting Max to sleep felt wrong on deeper levels than the ones Manticore had drilled in about being alert at all times. Jondy left the room in a hurry. She'd check back in thirty six hours, but not before.
When Max opened her eyes she knew immediately that something was wrong. She was on a comfortable bed with sunlight shining across her face, and she was no longer in restraints. She sat up, instantly alert and in a defensible position. Lila was standing in the doorway of a room Max didn't recognize, completely relaxed. Max let her guard fall.
"What happened? What am I doing here?" the mayor of Terminal City demanded.
"Remember about a week ago when we established that part of you wanted to help our cause, but couldn't?" the activist asked calmly. Max got a very bad feeling and her guard snapped back into place.
"It hasn't been anything like thirty six hours, has it?" she asked quietly.
"Very good," Lila agreed. "A friend in the hospital replaced your sedative with something milder when Doc wasn't looking. Who would want to hurt you, though? So of course no one checked it." Max was getting a very bad feeling. "You've been out for a little more than an hour if you care."
The bad feeling was all over the place, now, coupled with that itch she felt when she was just going into heat. "So what," Max asked, "You're just going to dump me into the middle of Operations and watch the fire works?"
"Of course not," Lila said, trying for placating. "It's your choice whether you want to help us or not. You're free to stay in here. Shalala is just out getting you something to eat in case you're hungry. If, however, you decide you want to help our cause, we certainly won't be stopping you."
Max felt her stomach drop out. "You really will just let me roam, won't you? That's the purpose of this little endeavor. Christ, don't you have a heart?"
"It isn't the dramatic spectacle you're making it out to be," Lila argued with a soft smile, as though Max was the child.
Max strode menacingly toward the other transgenic, who had the grace to back down slightly. "You don't know anything," she growled. "This is how I met Rafer and Darren and Eric and Leo and…. God, everything romantically wrong with my life since the escape is the fault of either heat or the virus and you want me to wander out where I can either meet some random X or run into Logan and kill him. Are you people fucking insane?"
Lila was cowering slightly, but she still had that patronizing smile, like she knew something Max did not. "We're trying to help you understand, Max," she said softly. "We wouldn't do this if we thought you would get hurt."
"I really want to kick your ass right now," Max grumbled.
"It wouldn't change the situation," Lila pointed out.
"It would make me feel better," Max shot back.
Luckily for Lila, Shalala chose that moment to interrupt with a tray. "How are you feeling, Max?" she asked, pointedly ignoring the 'patient's' aggressive posture.
Max grabbed the sandwich from the tray, ignoring the banana next to it. Could the girl be any more obvious, it was like she wasn't even trying to be secretive. And hot chocolate? It was a well known fact that chocolate was an aphrodisiac… Max wasn't going to touch it. She also wasn't going to look out of the window at that beautiful boy walking past. Six foot two easily with very nice arms. The sort of arms that… Max screamed, scaring the two females who were watching her.
She threw the sandwich at Lila. "I won't let you win. Ever. Now get out!" The soldiers knew when to retreat.
An hour later Max was climbing the walls. She'd never been cooped up this way during heat… except that one time she'd locked herself in the closet, but the door hadn't lasted this long, not once she was fully into it. Hanging out with OC was different, she'd spent the whole day outside. Max hadn't even seen a male since this bitch hit, and somehow that made it worse. Max was going through her mental library of every masculine anything she had ever seen naked. She was picturing practically every man she'd ever met in extremely compromising positions. In a moment of clarity, she shook it off and went back to her old stand bye of doing push ups.
Somewhere around two thousand five hundred and sixty nine push ups, Max had to start comforting herself with the idea that someone was bound to check on her and notice she wasn't there. That would lead to a search party. Alec was smart, and he would probably figure on the Naturalists having a part in this because it was during her heat, although that was slightly irrational. That didn't matter, someone would find her soon, and all she had to do was hang tough.
All Max had to do was keep it together until Alec kicked the door in to rescue her. Alec still owed her a rescue or two. Maybe it would be a shirtless rescue. Max was pretty sure there was a plausible reason or two out there for Alec to kick the door in shirtless. Max spent the next twenty minutes and twelve hundred push ups thinking about the naughty, naughty things she could do with a shirtless Alec.
When Max caught herself she spent another ten minutes and six hundred stomach crunches thinking about the possibilities of Logan rescuing her. When she finally caught what was wrong with that plan, she was firmly against the prospect of being rescued by anyone. Staying here, sedative or no, was her only real option. She left the room to look for a shower, but Lila regretfully informed her that their water was off, no hot or cold shower to be had.
"Where's your phone?" the prisoner inquired. "I'll have Luke over here to fix it in a jiffy."
"Nice try," Shalala smirked, "There is definitely no phone on the premises."
Lila and Shalala sat down in the living room. "Would you like to watch television?" Lila offered to her guest.
"No thank you," Max grunted. Shalala shrugged and picked up a magazine with a pretty boy actor on the cover. That might not have been on purpose, and the television comment was innocuous enough, so Max didn't really have enough evidence to justify killing them just yet.
"Can I get you anything?" Lila offered.
"Yeah," Max answered, "My sister Jondy." If she'd known there was no shower available, she never would have worked herself up with all of those push ups. Max was sure it increased her pheromone output, not to mention any increased blood flow was just plain bad.
"That was a lot less slick," Shalala commented. "The phone bit was much better."
"How about a game of cards?" asked Lila, who was still trying to be polite.
"I don't want to play cards," Max groaned, starting to pace the living room carpet.
"What do you want?" she asked again, "We are fully at your disposal."
Now if they were two male X5s fully at her disposal, Max would have quite a few ideas of what she wanted. "I need some air," Max grunted, moving to the front door. Shalala looked like she'd just discovered it was her birthday.
"Are you sure about that, Max?" Lila asked, her voice cutting into the little angry cloud Max had wrapped around herself. Max looked sharply at the other woman.
"No, I'm not," Max answered. "And I'm not leaving, you're right. The question is; why would you stop me?"
Lila glanced up at the wall clock. It was shortly after eleven a.m. "You've been here for about four hours and you have about thirty eight left until you're done with heat. When you choose to leave, it will be your own choice."
Max blinked. "One thing I'll say for you," She murmured, sitting down, "you're honest."
"So," Shalala offered, "Poker anyone?"
Three hours later, Max was throwing herself at the walls again. Cards had lasted for a little while, but she couldn't concentrate. She had to go back to push ups, but even that wasn't enough movement. She couldn't stand being this still, this cooped up. Max had a feeling that she was driving Lila and Shalala crazy, but they deserved every second of it. She couldn't think of a way to end this. She couldn't call anyone, she couldn't be sedated, and her old standbys: a shower and a motorcycle were unavailable. Actually, Lila might be willing to hand deliver her baby, but that would just send her zooming through TC spreading pheromones.
Max was pretty sure she was insane. She'd always suspected there would be something that was too much to take. Max hated being locked up—always had, but being trapped in a four and a half by two and a half foot box for a week without food and water when Manticore first recaptured her hadn't done much for that. This was worse than that, though. Now she was trapped without locks. Leaving might very well kill someone and staying was completely intolerable. Max needed air. She couldn't think of anything other than her need to move; that she happiest when she was going very, very fast on her motorcycle.
And if room to move just happened to contain a male or two, Max wouldn't object. She needed action. She was sick and tired of waiting. She hadn't been with anybody since Rafer and that was getting boring. She'd kissed Logan what? Once? Twice in that time span? Held his hand a few times with a latex virus shield firmly in place? A human being could not survive without touch. There were those studies with the babies that weren't held and how they all turned into brain dead sociopaths. Max remembered reading about it and thinking that she had to make up for all the lack of hugs back at Manticore or she might just kill someone.
Max might just kill someone if she didn't find a mate. All Max really wanted was a mate, somewhere in the back of her head she knew that. She'd always known that. Max wanted two shoes on the floor next to hers every morning. She wanted someone who would always have her back because it was just an extension of their own. For a few minutes, she almost had that with Logan. He wasn't her mate, but he could have been, his feelings for her were strong enough. He did things that only a mate would do, like lie down for days waiting to die because Max was dead and nothing was worth it if he thought Max was really dead. He cried for her and reached out to her and wanted her to be happy, only he didn't anymore. Max didn't owe him anything: he wasn't her mate and he never had been. That didn't change the fact that she wanted one.
In a city full of male transgenics—the perfect possible mates—Max had never been one to sit idly bye. She'd already unlocked the deadbolt when Lila asked her where she was going.
"To find a mate," Max stated, opening the door wide.
"Have fun," Shalala called after her. Max grinned. She intended to.
Max jumped down the two flights of stairs to the lobby of the apartment building and opened the door. It was a beautiful, sunny Terminal City afternoon. There were a few people around, Xs and trans-humans laughing and talking in small groups just outside of buildings or walking together on their way somewhere else.
It hit Max like a south paw: what was at stake. That step outside was completely selfish. Already the male Xs were looking up, turning toward her, trying to figure out what it was they smelled. She couldn't do this, couldn't take the risk, but the Naturalists' apartment couldn't take the assault it would get if Max tried to barricade herself there now.
Max ran. She needed a defensible position and she needed one fast. An old bank vault would be nice, maybe a meat locker. She needed to get out of sight, hopefully somewhere she couldn't get out of on her own, and she needed to do it five minutes ago. Like a nightmare, the male Xs were running after her and she wanted nothing more than to stop and meet them head on—to select the best for her mate.
Willpower or pigheadedness drove her onward. She couldn't think about hurting someone right now. She couldn't think about the deaths that came when males fought over females. Max couldn't even think about Terminal City—the dream that occupied her entire mind these days. Max could only think about stopping and choosing her mate, but her legs kept running. Maybe they would have continued to run forever, obeying the wish that their conscious could no longer stand to think, but the Park was her downfall.
Reaching the smattering of half grown trees, Max stopped automatically. The males slowed and approached her warily, circling one another. She knew most of their names, and a little bit about the ones she could name, but that truly did not matter to her. What mattered was the strongest. She grinned when one—Quail—closed in enough to reach out and touch her, only to be pulled away brutally to fight with another.
The part of her mind that was squelched under her dancing eyes and appreciation for violence knew this was unusual. Not that there would be a fight, but that so many males would be drawn to one female. Some at least should be discouraged by the sheer odds of competition, but none were. Max knew this was why she had been chosen for the experiment, but she couldn't bring herself to care. She was Alpha and she was waiting for her mate to be proven.
The fighting around her quickly grew to encompass the entire group in deadly one on one matches. More males were drawn into the park to battle, but no one managed to get within arm's reach of Max before some other contestant noticed and dropped their fight to go for him that dared. Max was well pleased with everything she saw, and some repressed portion of her mind was pleased too that so far no one had been killed. Those that fell either got back up to fight or skulked away to lick more serious wounds.
At the edge of the park, she saw him; his back rigid, his eyes wide. He took a controlled step backward, inching away from her. Their eyes locked. Max made her choice. She called to him by name, and some of the fighting stopped. One or two saw her choice for what it really was and moved away. Most ignored her voice completely. Alec let go and strode purposefully into the park.
The two nearest him went down immediately, one with a broken leg and the other a broken nose. The next pair standing between 494 and the potential mate was ready. The first went down with a solid punch to his throat, not quite hard enough to kill him, but enough to keep him down for a while. The second got off a strong kick that caught Alec right in the solar plexus. 494 grunted and knocked his opponent to the ground with a roundhouse to his left ear. The opponent did not get up. More were backing down now, falling to the fringes of the battlefield to see what happened next. Two who had been doing well remained, standing between Alec and Max.
Max knew their names, but they were not Alec and so their names did not matter. The one on the right—with dark brown hair—rushed in high, trading a rapid fire series of punches with Alec before the latter swept the legs from beneath his opponent and pressing a thumb against his jugular. Alec hesitated just long enough for the X5 to concede.
The blonde did not waste time watching their fight, he moved immediately for Max, using his counterpart to distract Alec. Max dodged his advances nimbly. Alec would finish soon and win her, of that she had no doubt, and she would take no lesser mate. She was right to wait, and she purred watching Alec punish the blonde for his impudence by not putting him down immediately.
When there was no one who dared to challenge left standing, Alec approached Max. Wild green eyes locked with feral brown orbs as the distance between the two transgenics closed like a cheetah on the back of an injured gazelle. Alec's arm roped around Max, crushing her to him. Instinct was the only thing left in him as his mouth dropped low to the place where her neck met her shoulder and he bit down, hard.
He bit her shoulder and marked her where every one could see. He flaunted his indisputable claim to the pack leader as he flaunted his new status as champion, but the simple truth was: he was the best, and he wanted it the most. Lila glanced down at her watch. Twenty minutes after Max breezed out of the apartment the losers were shaking their heads and slinking away in small groups. Terminal city would never able to forget this, and that felt really good.