Facing Death
By: lfbrox
Story: Set in early second season. Logan can walk (just because I like him to). And lots of transgenics are on the run and the other X-series are all out too. Lydecker, Renfro and White are the enemies – as a team this time.
Rating: R
AN: Here we go again. When I send this chapter to my beta, I told her that the readers won't like it. And she agreed. It seems like I know what you want but I don't give it to you. I don't do it because I'm mean. I do it because the fluffy, sappy and smutty M/L scene that you all crave won't fit in anywhere. I can't just build up something for 10 chapters and then solve everything in one chapter and add a love scene to it. Let me just solve up this Manticore thing and then you'll get the love. Promise.
Thanks for all the e-mails and the few reviews. I don't expect many reviews for that chapter either. But it would still be nice of you J Thanks Sammi for being a great beta.
And thanks to you all for still reading.
Chapter 13: Awake and escape
"Logan. No." Max said, freeing herself of the grip the soldiers had on her and running over in between Logan and Ben trying to protect Logan.
"Maaax." Logan yelled when he saw Max flying towards him to push him away from the tazer strings. Instinctively he held his hands out to catch her fall and, just as the tazer hit him, Max crushed into him knocking him to the floor.
With a loud thud Logan landed on the floor and Max followed suit, landing on top of him.
"Fuck." Max yelled and quickly rolled off of Logan. She hadn't intended to jump at him. All she had wanted to do was get him away from being tazered. She had never intended to touch him, let alone land flat on top of him. Yet that is what she had done. She knew that guns and tazers were pointed at her. But that couldn't stop her from turning towards Logan instead of Ben and his army.
Logan lay unconscious on the floor. / Oh my god. Did I do that or did the tazers hit him/ Max asked herself, slowly starting to panic. How she would have liked to shake him to see if he was alive. But in case she had infected him with the virus, she didn't want to make it worse by touching him again. But what was she supposed to do? She was alone against an army without being able to focus.
Slowly she turned from facing Logan towards Ben. She found him grinning down on her.
"Oh. Did Maxie kill her precious one? Or did I?" Ben snarled, pointing a tazer at her.
"You will pay for this." Max replied, slowly getting to her feet.
"Oh. Let's not fight Maxie." Ben said, voice laced with honey after seeing her get into her fighting stance.
"No. Let's." (I didn't steal that from any major motion picture. Did I?) Max countered and leapt up to attack Ben, not caring that there were other soldiers present.
"No. Let's not." Ben said, pointing his tazer at Max and shooting. Five other soldiers joined in at the attack and within 30 seconds Max was laying unconscious on the floor.
"Okay people. Let's get them all to the rendezvous point." Ben said and walked out of the penthouse with a satisfied grin on his face, letting the other soldiers do the dirty work – he was an X5 after all.
Manticore, Seattle HQ:
"X5-452, 599, 494 and Eyes Only captured and secured. Ready for transport to rendezvous point, Sir." The leading soldier informed Lydecker at the observation lab.
"Good Harris. Make sure they can't escape. They are not to be underestimated. Get them there as fast as you can." Lydecker ordered, feeling a wave of superiority. Finally he had managed to capture 452. Finally.
"Team Delta has just confirmed the successful completion of their mission. Let's make sure the other three teams can say the same." Lydecker said to the soldiers at the observation lab by way of explanation. "Report."
"Sir. Commander Fest and his team have arrived in Portland and located X5-656 at her home. Her husband and son left the apartment 3 minutes ago and are on their way to school. Ready to strike sir whenever you say." The first officer in charge reported.
"Make sure she's alone. Then capture her." Lydecker ordered and turned to the next team officer. "Report."
"Sir. X5-734 and her team have arrived in L.A. and have located X5-701. She has just left the restaurant she works at and is heading towards home. Ready to strike sir whenever you say." The second officer in charge reported.
"Move in. Make sure not to draw any attention to yourself. Back her into a dark ally. Shouldn't be hard to find in L.A." Lydecker commanded then turned his attention to the last team officer. "Report."
"Sir. Commander Sedwick and his team have arrived in Tacoma. X5-471 hasn't arrived at work yet. He wasn't at his apartment but he is scheduled to work in 20 minutes. They're waiting for him at the back door of the hardware store. Ready to strike sir whenever you say." The officer finished awaiting Lydeckers orders.
"Capture him as soon as he shows up. Make sure the area is secluded." Lydecker ordered, turned and, without saying another word, left the observation lab to go and report to Renfro.
Renfro's office:
"Are you absolutely certain that the regrouping coordinates work?" Renfro questioned for the second time in the past five minutes.
"Elizabeth. We have checked the coordinates over and over again. They work. Dozens of transgenics are on their way there right now, thinking we are regrouping. And as you know there are only entrances and no exits. Once they have arrived they cannot leave. Not that they want to – in a natural way that is. So don't worry. The whole place is under surveillance and the kids will be storming in shortly." White explained, pretty pleased with himself.
"I hope for you that this is true. X5-452 and company will be delivered there shortly. As soon as everybody is conscious again we can start the experiment. I'll get over there right now so I can be there once they arrive. Do not contact me from now on. I'll contact you. We have to keep our communications to a minimum so Lydecker won't get suspicious. If we get what we want we don't have to worry about him anymore anyway. If Lydecker's kids live up to expectations we won't have to wait too long. Stay put Ames. I have got to go." Renfro said and ended the phonecall quickly after hearing the knock on her door.
"Come in." Renfro barked.
"Elizabeth. Good news." Lydecker announced, closing the door behind him and sitting down on the chair in front of Renfro's desk.
"Really? What is it?" Renfro asked, all too familiar with what Lydecker called a success.
"We have 452, 599, 494 and Eyes Only. Within the next 30 minutes we will have three other X5's captured. They are being delivered to the rendezvous point as we speak. Have you activated the regrouping signal?" Lydecker requested.
"The signal has been send out twenty minutes ago. You stay and coordinate the active teams. I'll go to the rendezvous point and welcome our 'guests'." Renfro ordered, getting up from her chair and quickly leaving her office, leaving Lydecker sitting there without any recognition of his success.
Undisclosed location:
Max slowly drifted back into consciousness. She didn't dare open her eyes. Her head was throbbing, she felt weak, she felt sick. She had no idea what had happened but somehow knew that she wasn't just waking up with a bad hangover. Knew that the ache in her body wasn't caused from a long night at Crash. Yet her memory wouldn't kick in. And she was just too tired to open her eyes. Just too sick of knowing that she won't like what she would see. Know that her fucked up genetics had something to do with it.
So she kept her eyes closed. Willing herself to go back to sleep, to go back to unconsciousness. Anything that would get her away from where she was. But she knew that it wouldn't work. Knew that she had to face reality eventually. So she took a deep breath and tried to remember what had happened while still keeping her eyes closed.
/Manticore…..Zack…..Alec… Tazers…..fighting….Oh my god….Ben!... Did Maxie kill her precious one? …….Oh my god…..Or did I?...Noooo……Loooooogan…I touched him…Noooo….Oh my god…..Logan….Oh my god./
It all came back to her now. The fight. Ben. Logan. Everything. She bolted upright, like she was just waking from an awful nightmare. Sweat had formed on her forehead. She was breathing heavily. Her hand was clutching the floor, which seemed to be made of dirt and sand. She opened her eyes for the first time and looked around her surroundings. It was dark. It was humid. It was dirty. And most of all it seemed deserted. She was alone. Unharmed, as a quick check of her body unveiled. But still alone.
She still felt weak from the tazers and would have loved to sleep it out. But she was alone. She was scared. She needed to know what happened to Logan. Did the tazer render him unconscious or did her touch kill her? Was he dead already or was he just unconscious? And where the hell was he?
She struggled to get to her feet. She needed to find out where she was. She needed to find Logan. If he was infected she needed to find him a blood donor. If he was dead she had to kill herself. There was so much to do.
Undisclosed location: Observation point:
"She's awake ma'am." Officer Cook informed Renfro after seeing Max bolt up from her slumber.
"Good. I was hoping that she'd be the first one to wake up. She'll be looking for the others. Once she's out of her cell and has walked towards the center, lock it up. We don't want her back there again. The same goes for the rest of them. Inform me when the rest of them rise or when we get visitors from the outside." Renfro ordered and stepped to her room, where she could observe each one of them more closely.
"Yeah. You go look for your allies. Show me what you got. Show me the leader you can be." Renfro commented, watching Max stumble towards the center where the light was coming from.
Inside:
"Fuck." Max cursed as she stumbled into yet another obstacle. She was still too weak to coordinate her body functions in the dark, despite her night vision. She wasn't too aware of her surroundings but she figured that she must be in a cave. She felt stone walls where her fingertips craze the walls. It smelled musky. It was sandy. And she could see a faint light in front of her. That's where she was heading right now trying not to panic. Trying not to think about how she touched Logan. Tried not to think about how good he smelled and felt when she should think about the fact that she may have killed him.
She tried to focus on beating the shit out of everybody who happened to appear in the light in front of her. And if she died while doing that – so what. She had touched Logan and he was dead. It was their fault, it was her fault, it was his fault, it was nobody's fault. If she died now it wouldn't bother her too much. The only reason she ever wanted to be alive was to show Manticore that she was better off without them and that she had managed to survive. That wasn't important anymore right now. If they had killed Logan, if she had killed Logan – well in that case she had nothing left to prove.
"Fuck!" Max cursed again as she stumbled over something on the floor and fell to the ground hard, not having the strength to support her own weight.
"Max. That you?" A voice rasped behind her.
"Alec?" Max asked, having realized that she had just stumbled over him.
"What the fuck is going on. One second I'm shooting the breeze with my bar-buddies. Next thing I know I run into Zack who says something about Manticore and now I have you trip over me in god-knows-where-the-fuck-we-are-land." Alec said and sat up to rub his head where Max had tripped.
"Yeah I'm alright. Thank you. I don't know where the hell we are either. But as Manticore is behind this I don't suppose anything real pleasant. Let's go and see what is over there." Max suggested, motioning towards the light.
"I bet that's what they want." Alec said but still got up and followed Max towards the light.
"If we don't go there we'll never find out what is going on here." Max defended her decision.
"So it has nothing to do with your boyfriend?" Alec asked, sensing how worried Max was about Logan.
"Of course it does. You, Logan, Zack and I were captured in Logan's penthouse by our own brother. And right now there's just you and I. So yes. I wonder where Logan is. But we also have to find Zack. It's just that…oh forget it. Let's just go to where that light is." Max finished too frustrated to keep on explaining.
"It's just what Max? Come on. It's me. Alec. You could have been stuck with worse. Like Zack. So tell me. It's just what?" Alec asked, picking up on Max's tenseness.
"I don't know why you would care." Max spat and kept on moving forward, slowly regaining her strength.
"That's right. Why would I care? I have no interest in it whatsoever. So you might as well tell me, cause whatever it is I'm still the bigger screw-up than you could ever be." Alec joked.
"Don't be so sure of that. I touched Logan. The last time I saw him was me sprawled on top of him. Then I lost it, attacked Ben and woke up here. I have no idea where we are, let alone where Logan is – that is if I haven't killed him. Now who's the biggest screw-up here?" Max explained, getting closer to the light.
"Well, don't make yourself too crazy. You don't know if he's dead or not. Let's break out of this joint and see for ourselves." Alec said, failing in making her feeling any better.
"I guess we have bigger things to worry about than if Logan is alive." Zack's voice echoed from in front of them.
"Zack?" Max asked.
"Yes. We need to figure out how to get out of here." Zack said, approaching them in the darkness.
"That's the plan. Let's move over there." Alec said, pointing towards the light.
"Okay. Let's go there. Where there is light there is an exit." Zack replied and hurried on leading the way.
Observation point:
"All X5's are awake right now ma'am. They are moving towards the center. Colonel Lydecker has just confirmed the capture of 3 X5's, who will arrive shortly. A group of X7's and X8's have arrived and are on their way towards the center. Another group of X6's is expected plus an additional 4 teams of X7's, they are on their way to the regrouping point. Ma'am." Harris reported.
"Good. 452 will arrive just in time to take over her position." Renfro mused.
"Not the way she worries about Cale." Lydecker added, surprising her with his presence.
"Deck? I'm assuming your work at the base is done?" Renfro asked, making clear that she didn't like his surprise visit.
"Yes. Everything is under control. They are on their way home. I thought I could help you out here." Lydecker answered.
"And how do you think you could help me?" Renfro asked with humor in her voice, doubting that Lydecker could come up with something couldn't.
"You want 452 to show what kind of leader she is. Right? Well she won't be able to do that if she worries about Cale." Lydecker explained.
"Cale is just an ordinary. He's dispensable. 452 knows better than that. She has her priorities. And that is her mission. We'll give her a mission. She's a soldier. Her mission will be her priority." Renfro replied with conviction. That was the base of her project. 452 being a soldier. 452 being genetically engineered. Altered. Altered to fight. Altered to focus. Designed to finish a mission.
"She's been out of Manticore for quite some time. She's developed human feelings. Attachments. And unfortunately she has some feelings and attachments to Cale. I doubt that she will cooperate without him." Lydecker explained.
"They are not supposed to develop feelings. They are not meant to be attached to anybody. That's not how they were designed Deck. You should know that. After all – they are "your kids", now aren't they?" Renfro replied, clearly not pleased with what Lydecker was getting at.
"We trained them to be soldiers. We didn't train them to not be human beings. So if 452 needs Cale to function as you want her to then I think we should give her Cale." Lydecker argued.
"I don't think she will be showing 100 of herself if Cale is there." Renfro argued back.
"And I don't think that she can give 100 if Cale isn't there." Lydecker replied, knowing it would piss Renfro off.
"We did not create them to be like that Deck. You know that. We created them to be superior to ordinary human beings. It shouldn't take much to get out of her system what the outside made her believe is normal. Once she connects with her inner soldier again it will all come back to her and she will realize how foolish she has been." Renfro stated, without a hint of a doubt about her assumptions.
"Maybe. But as I mentioned. She has been away from Manticore for over ten years. She lived longer outside than inside Manticore. It takes more than just triggering her inner soldier to make her forget her past." Lydecker explained, having experienced first hand how much of a soldier 452 was, and also how much she was using that ability against Manticore.
"She is held captive by her past all the time – her memories create the conditioning that literally runs her life. And her memories are of Manticore. Memories where she learned who she is and what she is meant to do. She struggles against this. But most people struggle against their own will. And so does she. But she knows who she is and what she is. She is denying her destiny. Denying her true self. Lets help her overcome that denial and half the battle is won." Renfro argued back, convinced that given the right stimulus 452 would stop struggling against it and let the soldier come forth again.
"She won't have enough willpower left to do anything – side with us or against us – if Cale isn't around. But the emotion of love always contains its opposite. The strongest love you feel masks a hatred equally strong. The only difference is that the love is in blossom while the hatred is still a seed." Lydecker reasoned with her.
"What's your point Deck?" Renfro asked with annoyance.
"I say we give her Cale – a reason to go on. Then we trigger her inner soldier. Putting her in charge. Giving her responsibility. Giving her power. The blossoming love will soon make room for the blossoming hatred once she realizes that he is the reason she hasn't found her true calling earlier. She will realize that her greatest problem with her desire for him was the attachment – holding on to something, to him, when the flow of life wants her to let go." Lydecker finished, hoping he had gotten his point across.
"I see your point Deck. No need to go all spiritual with me. I don't buy into that crap." Renfro replied but thought about what he had just said for a second. Love and hate. People always used this example to express something completely opposite. But they came from the same place. Had the same roots. You could love someone with passion or hate someone with passion. There is nothing in between. In fact it is the easiest opposition to reverse. She didn't believe in love. She didn't consider the ability to love a great strength of character. It was a weakness. You cannot go through life filled with love. But you can go through life when you're filled with hatred. It gives you drive. It motivates. It gives you strength. Love could never do that. Yet it has the same roots. Maybe Lydecker was right. Reverse her love for him to hatred. Heal her of her attachments.
"Okay. Let's give it a try." She said to Deck. "Cook." She yelled and three seconds later the officer in charge of observation stepped in the room.
"Yes ma'am." He said awaiting his order.
"Bring Cale over and dump him in the center before 452 arrives there." Renfro ordered and made a dismissive gesture with her head.
"Yes ma'am." Cook replied and left the room hurriedly, knowing that 452 was almost there.
Undisclosed location:
"We're almost there." Zack informed Max and Alec who followed him. "The light is coming closer."
"Damn. This place is big." Alec complained. They had been walking for over five minutes now and the light still seemed far away. "What is it anyway? A cave or something?" He asked.
"Yeah. Looks like it. And I don't think there's something great awaiting us once we've reached the light." Max said, moving forward with a fast stride.
"Well we know it's Manticore. So why are we moving towards the light when we know that we are probably the target for a sharp-shooter exercise? It's like we're moving towards the light now and the next thing you know is that you are literally moving towards the light." Alec said, keeping up with Max.
"I'm a curious person. I wanna know what is there. If you don't want to come then don't." Max snarled back, annoyed with his attitude.
"So on we worked and waited for the light." Alec replied and walked past Max to follow Zack.
"What the fuck does that mean?" Max asked staring after Alec.
"Edwin Arlington Robinson." Alec replied without looking back.
"What?" Max said finally moving to catch up with them.
"Read it in a book Max." Alec answered.
"I didn't know you read books." Max said waking next to Alec now. "But what did you mean by saying it?" She asked annoyed at his antics.
"Instead of getting the hell out of here – like normal people would do – we go and do what we were born to do. Work our way towards the target to do whatever the hell is appropriate in the situation found. But always towards the light." Alec explained, pointing towards the light they were heading for.
"Doesn't really make a lot of sense anyway." Max said and moved faster to walk next to Zack.
"Not really you know." Zack said, speaking for the first time in the last few minutes.
"Not really what?" Max asked, wondering why she was surrounded by cryptic guys all of a sudden.
"We do what we were made for Max. We might not have a mission but we still do what soldiers do. We investigate, we will find out the truth and we will find a solution to this situation. We're in our element. This is what we were trained to do and this is what we are best at." Zack said matter of factly.
"This isn't my element Zack." Max said, glaring at him. "All I'm trying to do is get us out of here."
"And save Logan." Alec quipped from the back.
"Let's hope there is something left of him to save." Max muttered and overtook Zack to take the lead.
Center:
"Hurry. Drop him and then get out of there. They're gonna be here soon." Cook urged his subordinates from the observation point.
"Yes sir." The soldiers replied and carried the still unconscious Logan to the center. They had no idea if he was alive or dead. But they didn't care enough to check. So they dropped him unceremoniously close to a wall and left the center as fast as they could, already hearing someone coming closer.
"Are you positive that these are the right coordinates?" A young X7 asked his teammate upon entering the place.
"Positive." The oldest X7 replied, moving further into the center.
"It's empty." One of the other X7's remarked.
"They wouldn't send us here without a reason. Let's wait." The older X7 stated and the others took it as an order and grouped up in a corner of the center.
"There's someone." An X7 alarmed the others after standing in formation for 5 minutes.
"It's coming from over there." Another X7 pointed towards the sound.
"Get ready." The oldest X7 ordered and they all jumped into fighting stances. They slowly moved towards the sound they had heard, ready to either fight an enemy or salute in front of a superior officer.
"Give it up." Came the shout from the tunnel across from the center.
"Show yourself." The oldest X7 replied moving closer to the tunnel with the other 9 X7's close behind him.
Carefully stepping closer to the opening of the tunnel the oldest X7 was for the first time in his young military career speechless at what he saw.
Himself.
At the age of 10.
Staring back at him.
"You're an X8." The oldest X7 said still in his fighting stance.
"Yes. What is your designation?" The young X8 asked relaxing slightly in his stance upon seeing other Manticorians.
"We're X7's." The X7 answered and gestured the group of 15 X8's into the center while also signaling his team that there was no threat.
You followed the regrouping coordinates?" The oldest X7 asked his younger X8 version as they moved back to the middle of the center.
"Positive. Are any commanding officers present?" The X8 asked.
"Not yet. But I'm sure they'll be here shortly." The X7 answered his younger twin.
"There is someone over there." One of the X8's shouted, pointing over to the unconscious Logan.
"Is he one of us?" One of the X7's asked eying the body on the floor from a distance.
"Lets find out." The oldest X7 answered and carefully moved closer to Logan's body. He kicked him in the leg lightly to see whether he was just asleep. After receiving no reaction the X7 moved closer, reached for Logan's shoulder and turned him on his back to get a closer look.
"I don't think he's one of us." He reported after roughly guessing Logan's age. Even the X1's were still in their late twenties – if they were alive at all. And he didn't look like a nomalie either. To be sure he bent down to check Logan's neck. "No barcode."
"Is he alive?" One of the young X8's asked from the back.
The X7 checked his pulse and other vital signs with a doctor's efficiency and then turned to the group of X7's and X8's. "He's alive."
"What are we gonna do with him?" One of the X7's asked, not liking the idea that an ordinary human was at their regrouping place – unconscious as it is. This could only mean trouble.
"Let's kill him before he wakes up and causes problems." The oldest X7 answered and stepped closer to Logan's body.
"You do that and you will never get out of here." Max shouted from the background.
All the X7's and 8's turned in surprise. Their sensitive hearing hadn't picked up on anyone approaching. Intruders meant bad news. They adapted their fighting stances and eyed the three approaching strangers with watchful eyes, ready to attack when the need would arise.
"And why would we want to get out of here?" The oldest X7 replied, keeping his eyes fixed with Max's.
"Because I'm telling you so. I'm X5-452. Now let go of that man." Max ordered trying to sound and act authoritative while her insides screamed to check on Logan.
"Yes ma'am." The oldest X7 replied, stepping away from Logan and looking at Max in awe. He had heard the stories about the escaped X5's back in '09. And even though they were taught that those escaped X5's were traitors, they still had an aura of heroism about them. It was an urban legend among his team. They were officers. They were leaders. And now that one of them was standing in front of them the myth was proved to be true.
"Step aside and secure the exits." Max ordered, her eyes now finally on Logan.
"Yes ma'am." The X7's and 8's replied and moved towards the tunnels to secure them.
"Alec, Zack. Make sure they are not trying anything funny." Max instructed them, her eyes still fixed on Logan.
"K Max. Go check on sleeping beauty over there." Alec said and stepped closer to the young Manticorians to keep an eye on them while Max moved slowly towards Logan.
TBC
AN: Okay. How was that? Not too bad, or was it? Don't be too mad at me for not bringing in the fluff here. And be gentle with me. Cause a sad writer is an uninspired writer. Thanks for reading and please drop a review if you can.
Lfbrox