The sight of tall decaying buildings covered in graffiti and obviously created pre-pulse when there was still an economy to support such structures depressed most people. Which was why former popular cities like Seattle were not the favorite thing for most people to see after a long days drive.
However at this moment, Alec was sure he had never seen anything nicer than the sector checks and perpetual grayness that was Seattle. Because Seattle meant home and home meant his bed and… "Hey, Max," he had to yell over the motorcycle.
Giving him a nasty glare for both swerving in front of her and having interrupted the calm that the roar of her bike always lulled her into, Max steered closer to Alec reluctantly. "What? This couldn't wait until after we stop?"
Motioning to the side of the road, Alec pulled his bike off and stopped, knowing that the busses were far enough behind them to give a couple minutes rest at least. He waited patiently while Max cursed and doubled back to park next to him. "Please, hold the insults. What are we going to do going across the sector checks, and then, assuming we make it, how the hell are we supposed to fit these women anywhere. Because, personally, I've lost enough money on this trip."
She actually did hold her insults, but only because he was making sense and she had been thinking the same thing. Bribing an old lady was one thing, paying for motel rooms in the city was another, much more expensive, thing. "I'm still working on how to get through the sector police. But as soon as we do, I figured we'd go hit Logan up for space, he's got the room, and put the rest up at our apartments."
With that one sentence all the wonderful fantasies that had kept Alec one happy person during the day, despite having slept on the floor the night before, went away with a poof. There goes the sleeping in my own bed idea. "Well, seeing as you were nice enough to think of half the plan, I've got the other half."
"Let me guess, run like hell," Max sarcastically supplied with a raised eyebrow before sparing a quick check behind her to see if the busses had caught up. They hadn't, so she turned back to Alec, who didn't look nearly as pissed as he should have at her insult.
As a matter of fact, Alec was grinning at her, and not the good grin, the grin that said he was so about to do something illegal and dangerous and most likely stupid. "Ahh, Maxie, when will you learn? The plan is always 'run like hell,' we're just going for 'drive like hell' because of the constraints of vehicles and people minus our speed. We run the check, the busses are high enough that nobody will be recognized and they're unmarked."
Despite her better judgment, Max actually took a moment to consider this plan. It was true that the busses were high enough and couldn't be traced to them or any of the women on board directly, and as for her and Alec, well, they ran through on motorcycles all the time. "I know I'm going to kick myself later, but, why not."
Alec flashed her his favorite 'I'm God' grin and turned to flag the busses down which were just cresting the hill so that they could explain the plan. As he caught Max pretend bashing her head against her steering wheel, he sighed punched her playfully on the arm, "Hey, it'll be fun, Maxie. It's not like we'll be seeing our beds any time soon so we might as well have fun on our bikes."
Max smacked him back, fairly lightly, just because she wasn't sure whether he had meant that to sound so dirty, but by the raise of his eyebrow and tilt of his head, she was pretty damn sure he had. Plus, she reasoned, even if I am wrong, he did hit me first. "Good luck convincing our happy snail-paced drivers."
"Why, Maxie," he stumbled off his bike, hand over his heart in a fake wounded way, "you underestimate my charms severely. Haven't you learned yet?" Giving her a little bow to finish his overly dramatic performance, Alec swaggered towards the now parked busses.
A small chuckle escaped Max's lips before she could stop it. Damn it, she lamented to herself, I've been spending way too much time with Alec if that attitude of his isn't making me want to kill him. But whatever the reason, she did find his little mock-bow-salute and swagger cute, funny, and still fairly infuriating. "Ahh," this time she did bang her head on the steering wheel, lightly, "I'm being Alecanized!" Louder, so that he could hear her, she said, "Hurry up, would you? I would like to see my apartment sometime fairly soon."
Alec simply waved her off, having heard every word she said and glad that she couldn't see his face because he was having a hard time not laughing. He hadn't seen his fellow transgenic act carefree like that very often, but he decided he liked it, a lot. Max was definitely more fun when she was not threatening him with death. Reaching the step of the first bus, Alec called out, "Ladies, ladies, listen up, we've got a new game plan."