A/N: Sorry to keep you all waiting so long; this wasn't according to plan - computer issues and those waiting for the update at NWP will have to wait even longer because a different set of computer issues have yet to be solved. In the mean time, here's the next chapter. Feedback welcome but not essential. Thanks for your patience.

Chapter 4

"Max?" Logan repeated, but she still hadn't heard him. He waved a hand in front of her.

"Sorry, what?" she said, blinking suddenly.

"You okay?"

Max frowned, still a little lost in her thoughts.

"Yeah, fine. Sorry, got a little distracted," she laughed off but stopped almost as quickly. Logan was one of the few people around whom the mask could be slipped off for a break, albeit a brief one. The people of TC expected their leader to do just that and she could not afford to let them see anything but the officer that, as an X5, she was born to be.

She couldn't blame them for forgetting that while her DNA said otherwise on any number of strands, some percentage of her cocktail was human. And having spent as long on the outside as she had, despite her best efforts Max had succumbed in part to those very traits which defined her as such.

The consequential magnitude of setting off Operation Pale Face had hit her not long after, when the number of suspicious incidents involving Manticore's escaped operatives had amounted to a figure even she couldn't ignore. The day had yet to come when she regretted it but whenever she came close to thinking along such lines, it was always Logan who assured her she had done the right thing.

His justice seeking self wouldn't allow his feelings for her to cloud his judgement. Even though he thought she was different from them, that she could easily lead the life of an Ordinary without the burden of their leadership, Logan couldn't deny them their right to her. Or her obligation to them.

While what Manticore did was wrong and condemned on every level in his eyes, Max had still made a conscious decision, not as thoroughly thought out as he would have liked, but a conscious decision nonetheless when she had completed the Eyes Only streaming video which had exposed the facility. To that end, she was responsible for removing them from the cruel and unimaginably punishing system. Responsible for their freedom.

But she was also responsible for removing them from the only routine they had known their whole lives. From the only discipline and thinking that governed their very existence. From the easy, if morally reprehensible, life of following orders, into a world of chaos and corruption. A world which knew no rules after the Pulse. Any state outside the thousand mile radius of the hit area might have seen the chances of societal integration increased somewhat. But that wasn't the terms of this game.

Love her as he might, Logan Cale was first a righteous man. Which was probably why he and Alec got on so well. Or not as the case may be.

"Max," he said expectantly.

Max looked at him as if searching for answers to all the questions silently floating around in her head, unwilling to give them voice.

"Let's go for a ride," she suggested suddenly. It threw him a little if he was honest. That was probably the last thing he had expected her to say. He frowned in question.

Max wrinkled her nose as she tossed the napkin onto the table.

"Come on," she said, not offering any sort of explanation.

"I gotta work on those papers you guys brought back earlier," Logan replied, hoping it would nudge her towards some sort of explanation, be it for exactly what had happened earlier or for her odd behaviour tonight.

He heard her sigh.

"Talk to me," he encouraged gently, leaning back in his chair.

Again a sigh, this time one of frustration.

"About what? I could either be here all night or out the door in fifteen seconds. There's no summary or any short cuts. Just like this whole saga. Sometimes, I wonder if I would have done what I did if I'da known it was going to go so global," Max replied sharply.

"You would have," Logan assured her, not needing a second to consider his words.

Max gave him an inquisitive look. Logan held her gaze before getting to his feet to clear the plates away.

"I know you," was his simply explanation.

She frowned. Like that made everything clear to her.

"And?"

Logan looked up at her from the island counter in his kitchen.

"The guys in Terminal City don't follow your orders and take your word as final because they see as a superior officer. Mole doesn't back down because he always thinks you're right. And we both know Alec doesn't honestly buy your threats of physical damage."

Max crossed her arms, waiting.

"They all do what they do because they look at you and see that you care. They know you won't take second best for them. Because even though you made a life for yourself and could just as easily pretend you aren't one of them, they know you know you are."

"So?" she threw back defiantly.

"So?" Logan repeated, coming round to face her.

"So you care too much to regret your actions. To go back in time and change history even if you had the chance. Admit it, you wouldn't even trade back Alec if you could," he added with a grin, attempting to diffuse the mood slightly.

Max allowed a small smile to tug at the corners of her mouth.

"He has his uses in his own pain in the ass ways," she acknowledged with a shrug.

"Face it, you're just too stubborn to not give a damn," Logan told her.

Her eyes met his in earnest.

"Thanks. You're a good friend," Max remarked with sincerity. Logan paused.

"Max –"

But she had already seen it. The glimmer of hope in his eyes.

"Logan," she reprimanded briefly.

"Just –"

Max took a step back.

"Just because there was never actually anything between me and Alec doesn't mean the reason behind my lie goes away."

"We'll figure something out for this virus –"

"Is that all you think it's about?"

Logan looked at her. It had been such an obvious issue for such a while now that he had honestly never considered any other possibilities.

"You said Alec had been selfish to let Rachel be dragged into the collateral on the Berrisford assignment. That she didn't know better and he should have. But you do. Did you ever think that the selfish one here isn't me for running away at the first sign of trouble? That maybe the one who's selfish is you?"

"What?"

"You remember how you felt when you thought I'd died, even though you didn't believe it? Add guilt to that for it being your fault. Only it wasn't. So you can only imagine. But I got blood on my hands Logan. And I carry the guilt of every single person I've killed. How am I supposed to figure out this big Breeding Cult plan and be the person I need to be for that, if I have to live with your death on me as well?"

"I'm not going anywhere," Logan replied determinedly.

Max shook her head. Either he was being stupid or he was refusing to admit what she had a long time ago.

"I don't want to lose you as a friend but if I have to, I will pretend I never knew you. If that's what it takes to keep you safe. Because obviously you're too selfish to look after yourself."

"I may not be a highly trained genetically engineered super soldier but I'm also not a child. I can sort myself out. And you call me selfish? Max, you're the one shutting me out so you don't have to worry about a guilt trip," he shot back, knowing the last part was a low blow.

He wasn't selfish. He could see exactly where she was coming from. And he knew, in her shoes, he would do exactly the same thing. But if he didn't at least try, he would be just like her. Unable to forgive himself.

Max refused to justify his last comment with a response so she stood in silence. Walking out would have been the best option but now that the tin had been opened, it might as well be dealt with in one go.

"To be honest, I don't see how being friends and being together makes any difference. Do you care less?" he wondered.

"I won't let you be a target. As a friend, I only have to worry about you the same as everyone else." It was just that simple. Just that superficial.

The finality in her tone of voice told him this conversation was over. He knew there was nothing else he could say to convince her he didn't care. Because that was her point. He would be selfish if he didn't care how she felt in the likely event, given the circumstances, of him dying and the blame lying at her feet.

And he should have known her well enough by now to know that, even if it couldn't have been any further from her fault if it had tried, Max would find some way to put it on her conscience. Logan smiled to himself at that. At the end of the day, it wasn't the virus or him being human that defeated them. It was her overwhelming sense of duty.

So even though it cut his very being to say so, he said what he knew she desperately wanted to hear from him.

"Friends?"

The smile alone was worth the pieces of his heart.

"Friends," she agreed, going to his arms, painfully cautious to put their clothing between them.

"I'm always here," he whispered, careful not to lean into her hair no matter how right it would feel. She heard the dozens of meanings behind those words.

"Thanks," Max smiled, pulling back, before letting herself out.