Title: M.I.A
Author: Lexie Jayne
Rating: PG
Characters: Jondy/Zane; Max/Alec; Syl/Krit; Logan, Zack.
Summary: Jondy vanishes, risking the lives of her loved ones, Max is faced with a new future and Terminal City faces it's biggest challenge yet the return of old enemies and allies. WIP. JZ, SK, MA
Feedback: Would be lovely if you feel inclined.
Notes: Apologies that this is taking awhile to write – I have so many fics, I tend to fall behind.
Warnings: Language
Disclaimer: All recognizable characters belong to James Cameron. I make no profit from this fan based venture.
Ames White looked through the glass window that lead to the room, almost institutional like it was so sterile, and gazed at the X5. Two-one-zero.
She'd been found in Chicago, living with a partner but unmarried. Further investigation had found that she also had a daughter and worked nights in a bar. It hadn't been hard to follow her and recapture her for termination.
The X5 lay still on the gurney, her brown hair matted to her skull and her skin paper white. Bruises were up and down both her arms and on her face. Dark circles were under both eyes. Her hands were chained to the wall, and a tube was attached to her neck, slowly dripping the drugs that had kept her quiet for the last fourteen days into her veins.
The drugs in question were ones that had been used in Psy-Ops, at Manticore.
Contrary to popular opinion, Psy Ops was not the latest technology. It was second rate and very experimental. The methods that went throught Psy-Ops had been ones that were being road tested for public use. Ninety percent of all drugs that were tested in Manticore Psy Ops were eventually labelled unfit for human consumption. More than seventy percent of all long-term Psy Ops patients at Manticore ended up dead or with permanent brain damage. The survivors of Psy Ops were so rare, that they were experimented on to see why they survived the treatment and ended up dead.
Dead for surviving death.
The drug running through 210's veins had done more harm than good during it's time at Manticore. Now on the White House's list of dangerous drug warfare, it hadn't done any visible damage to 210 as of yet.
But then, X5-210 wouldn't last long enough for the detrimental effect to become obvious.
White turned to the guards who stood behind him. "Get her on a second-grade sedative. Keep her chained up. She mentions a word about the boyfriend or the child, I want to know. Eight X5s are still unaccounted for."
"Yes sir!" The guards saluted and moved into Jondy's cell.
Jondy felt like she was dying. Her head pounded so hard, it was an effort not to scream in pain. Her eyes burned and her vision swum. Her stomach twisted and lurched, her limbs cramping. She felt like her heart would explode. Sweat dripped off her face and she tried so hard not to move, not to aggravate her body, but every breath brought tears to her eyes.
Jondy knew the drugs well. They were what they had put Syl on when Syl shot Dem. Syl had been sick for a long time afterwards and now got headaches and loss of vision that could last for days. And nightmares.
Jondy had never understood why Syl was so terrified of Psy Ops, why Syl still had nightmares about those weeks she'd spent in Psy Ops, but lying on the gurney, a guard injecting her with something bright blue, she knew the terror. She tried to scream for Zane, but a tube was pushed past her lips, down her throat and in her mind's eye, Jondy could almost see the black-silver liquid sliding down her throat like mercury.
She
attempted to struggle, to scream for Zane, to scream to be shot but
before any noise could pass her lips, she was unconscious again,
falling back down somewhere dark.
---
Jondy could see things in her mind. It was like she couldn't remember herself being apart of any of it, flashes and snapshots from a life that she didn't remember being hers. Just memories she could not longer relate to.
Watching Max fall into the ice.
Spending a night in a snow drift, crying her eyes out for Max or Zack.
Eating some pizza out of the garbage because she was so hungry.
Running, terrified, from Ben and straight into Zane.
Zane's mouth on hers, hands up her skirt.
Being seven months pregnant in some sort of refuge and having seizures.
Tanner sleeping in Zane's arms, as he cried happy tears.
The seizures.
Krit and Syl kissing under the mistletoe while Tawny teased them mercilessly.
Micah and Tawny having an argument over a pretty Psy Ops trained X5 named Mia.
In her unconscious mind, all Jondy could feel was the uncertainty, the terror, the pain, the sadness… nothing good…
Her hand reached for a gun only her mind could see.
Jondy's eyes opened and she breathed heavily, wheezing and coughing suddenly, from the lack of tubes down her mouth. She had been unchained and unhooked from the tubes that kept the sedatives flowing. Rubbing her wrists, Jondy sat up, bringing her knees to her chest, her eyes resting on the man standing before her, flanked by two guards with stun-guns. And a sedative or nine.
"X5-210," White smiled, as Jondy huddled on the gurney, glowering at him like some deranged 1960s mental patient.
"Random Asshole," Jondy croaked back at him. Her mouth felt like sandpaper and her head swum a bit.
"Before you continue with the witty banter that your late sister 452 was so memorable for, I'd like you to congratulate you," White smiled. "Lasted the longest of all the X5s. Last one to break."
White stared at 210 in front of him without flinching. She'd been too easy to capture and he was going to tell her because of her laziness at protecting her family, they were dead. Because of her. Somehow, telling this Manticore freaks that they screwed up was satisfying. Ames liked reminding them that they weren't more perfect than humans. They stuffed up. These freaks were less than human.
Jondy's eyes narrowed but she did not flinch. 'He's lying. Maxie's fine. She's fine.'
"Who else was here?" she demanded, her gaze not leaving White, her voice croaking and wavering.
"452, 599, 205, 701... Every escaped X5 was here. I believe 205's body was incinerated four hundred and sixty seven minutes ago, 210," White smiled, as he listed all the X5s from the 2009 report. "All I had to do was show him you and he went crazy. And according to a declaration made by Washington Officials, that gave us the right to shoot him on sight."
Jondy felt the blood run out of her face. "You're lying." Not Zane. No, no, not Zane. He was with Tanner. A pause. "Washington?" Washington. Maxie's in Seattle. That's near Washington, right?
White's smile faltered a fraction. 'Gotcha,' Jondy thought, trying to keep her head in the game.
"205 screamed for you for seven days straight, 210, but finally he gave in."
Jondy felt her vision spin. "You're lying."
"No, I'm not," White took a step closer. "You've been in here for fourteen days now 210. Every single member of your family is dead." White turned to the guards. "Full blood tests. I want to know if 210 has the same DNA strand found in 452, 471, 656 and 205. No sedatives until 0600 hours and we'll move her with the rest."
Jondy slipped off the bed. White turned around, his gun trained on Jondy's heart.
"Take the risk, 210 and your child will be killed," White reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a photo that made Jondy sick to her stomach. Tanner.
"Touch her and I'll rip you a new…!" Jondy yelled, throwing herself at White. The stun guns hit her mid air and she collapsed onto the lino, shaking. 'Tan, Tan, be okay. Please be okay.'
"Blood tests," White ordered, turning on his heal. "Chain her up."
And Jondy felt herself go limp as the guards dragged her back to the gurney.
As unconsciousness claimed Jondy, her thoughts were with her daughter and Zane…
'They'll be okay… They'll be okay…'
Ames White watched 210's unconscious form on the gurney. "I want exact locations of 205 and the child," White ordered the guards. "The chance that child is of any use to us is slim but I want full DNA work ups of the entire family."
