The Surprise

Chapter 14: Calm Before the Storm.

A/N: New chapters people!!! Are you excited? I am! Well not really it means I am going to have to become regular with my updating, something I'm not particularly good at. But anyway here you go!

"Excuse me?" said Jondy, who appeared to be as surprised at this news as everyone else was. "You heard me," said Max as confident as ever. Surely, after all of this she wasn't going to deny it was she?

"Sure ok, so Maxie, when did you start on the drugs?" she asked certain that Max had gone completely mad.

"So you are going to deny it now?"

"Nothing to deny."

"Then what were you talking about just now, what everyone was talking about?"

"Alec, would you like to clear things up for Little Miss Fruit loop?" asked Jondy looking round at Alec who hadn't said anything. She was disturbed by what she saw when he looked up, his eyes were so full of anger and it scared Jondy.

He walked over to Max and placed the ring box in her hand before walking out of the hall. Confused Max looked down at it, 'no, it couldn't be, could it?' she thought staring down at the little black box she was now holding in her hand. She opened it slowly and cautiously almost hoping that she was wrong and that she hadn't made a huge mistake.

She had. She couldn't believe it, he was going to propose to her, 'that's why he had been sneaking around all day and why . . .' Max closed her eyes unable to believe what an idiot she had been as everything worked itself out in her head, and it all made logical sense.

"Shit!"

She looked up to see everyone staring at like her, they never thought that she could have made such an error in judgement. She realised then just how good of an impression Alec had made on them all in a reasonably short period of time. "Well what are you waiting for?" asked Jace. "Go after him!"

Not waiting for anything else to be said she ran silently out of the hall, hopefully in the direction he went and like in all good dramatic moments, the heavens opened and the rain started to pelt down.

She spent over an hour running around TC in the pouring rain before she realised there was only one place that he could be. Rubbing the rain out of her eyes, she headed towards the Space Needle.

Alec sat on top of the Space Needle, staring out over the city. He sat letting the heavy drops of rain drip down his face hoping that they could wash away Max's accusations with them. Unfortunately, they couldn't so he was left to deal with it by himself. After all the trouble he had went to, to make sure Max was happy she still didn't trust him.

"Go away Max," he said as her heard her behind him.

"Alec, let me explain," she said almost pleadingly, not even bothering to ask how he knew it was her, he always did, it was like a sixth sense for him which currently was only making her feel worse.

"I said go away," he repeated more forcefully, not wanting to have to deal with Max right now. With the state of mind he was currently in the chances that he would say something that he would live to regret were high.

"Look Alec, I'm sorry, I just thought that . . ."

Alec rolled his eyes and as she didn't appear to be picking up on his subtle signals he decided to give her a piece of his mind hoping that she would get the hint and leave.

"Thought what Max? That Alec the screw up was just doing what he does best? Why must you always assume the worst of me and never think otherwise Max? You always do it, then you apologise but there are only so many apologies a person can accept before they stop sounding like you mean it. I mean at this point you begin to realise that if you really were sorry you would have simply stopped putting yourself in situations where you need to apologise! Or did that thought never occur to you? To actually trust me? God forbid, Max trust Alec? Never, I mean if you did the stars would probably collide and we'd be seeing four strange looking figures riding through the sky on fiery horses about now," ranted Alec, spitting the words out of his mouth passionately, bitterness, anger and hurt evident in every word.

Max felt more tears running down her cheeks, mixing with the raindrops that were falling so heavily and she couldn't think of what do say. He was right, from day one, she had never given him a chance and she had just never seemed to get out of the habit of assuming that he was going to mess her life up.

"So were you really going to do it?" she asked quietly.

"You know I was, well from about an hour ago anyway. I mean really how could you think I was cheating on you? With Jondy of all people. Ok so I can just about see why you thought I was doing something because let's be honest it's me and in your eyes I'm always doing the wrong thing, but why would you not trust Jondy, always got the impression she was your favourite sister?"

"It wasn't about Jondy that much it was just." Max paused looking up at the sky desperately.

"What? It was just me you couldn't trust?" interrupted Alec who was only getting madder. He looked over at her quickly and then went back to staring straight ahead, looking at her hurt. "Look Max," he said calmer than before. "I just need to work things out by myself, you know, think things through. Just leave me alone and for the love of God stop digging yourself in deeper; you're only making things worse."

"Are you . . ."

"Just go," he said in a finalising tone of voice, which made Max realise that she wouldn't get anything else out of him for the moment. As she left the Space Needle silently, searching her brain for another time when Alec had been mad at her. There were very few moments and those she could think of were short and brief and solved quickly. 'Great, that means I have really hurt him,' she thought realising just how much of a mess everything was all because her mind was warped and twisted.

She found herself wandering along the streets of Seattle until she came across a familiar building, and then a familiar corridor, followed by a familiar door and a familiar face.

When Alec finally returned to Terminal City, it was five in the morning so he headed to HQ to avoid running into Max back at the apartment. When he opened the door into his office, he was faced with Jondy, Jace, Kat, Krit and Zane. "So did Max find you? Have you two sorted things out yet?" quizzed Jace.

"Yes she found me but things are not 'sorted'" said Alec using air quotes. "Has she not came back yet?" he asked, failing in his attempt to hide his concern.

"No, Cindy phoned a while a go to say Max was staying with her tonight," said Krit. "So where's. . ."

"Syl is looking after Jen back at yours," filled in Kat.

"Thanks, look I think I'm just going to crash, I'm kind tired and well . . ."

"Not so fast, you're not getting away that easy, what happened?" asked Zane.

Alec sighed knowing he would have to tell them what had happened though he had hoped Max had already done that. "Look, she found me and we talked a bit but then I asked her to leave and finally she did. It is just one of those things I'll have to work through on my own, there is nothing she can say or do to fix it. By going on at me she is only making things worse."

"Don't," he said when Jondy went to talk. "You don't have to defend her, I just, I just, I just can't believe her, I mean relationships are supposed to be based on trust so if she doesn't trust me . . ."

He looked round at the horrified faces he was now faced with when his words had sunk in. "Nothing for definite or anything," he said raising his hands defensively, "But this isn't the first time she has showed that she doesn't trust me one hundred percent, it would be different if I gave her reason not to but I don't! You saw how she acted when we were trying to get TC up and running, she treated me as though I was going to mess everything up and it didn't even occur to her that knew what I was doing! I just, I just need time."

When he looked at them, he saw a definite pause in their eyes that meant that on some level they agreed with him, seizing the opportunity he left before they could snap out of it and make him talk things through.

"Max, doesn't always, um, damn it! He's right guys," said Jace. "Max never gives him a chance."

"Yeah but we can't just do nothing, they love each other," said Jondy.

"But unfortunately that's not the problem, Alec knows Max loves him, she just doesn't trust him."

Max had been crying for an hour straight and Original Cindy hadn't got a word out of her and therefore didn't have a clue what had happened. Her one piece of knowledge was that she at least knew whom it had to do with.

Alec.

He was the only person who could have gotten her this upset but the reason was what OC couldn't come up with. The only thing she could think of was that Max had been right and had cheated on her but she found that very unlikely. Finally, when Max calmed down a bit and regained regular breathing patterns they began to talk.

"He was going to propose!" she said as she gratefully accepted the cup of coffee OC had just handed her before sitting next to her on the couch.

That had definitely not been what Original Cindy had been expecting. "Ok slow down there, cause unless you are trying to tell me that those were tears of joy, which I doubt, Original Cindy is well and truly lost."

"But to do it he had been sneaking around a lot with Jondy to make sure it was a surprise which is what lead to my suspicions but I didn't realise this until after I had accused him of cheating in front of everybody! Then he got really angry and stormed out placing the ring in my hand then I couldn't find him and spent hours looking for him in the rain. Then when I finally found him we had this fight and he asked me to leave and now I don't know what to do!"

"Damn you transgenics talk fast," said OC trying to take it all in. "But I don't get it, why is he so angry, no harm no foul like."

"It's because this proves I don't trust him, that I never did. It's just that I find it so hard to open up to people and . . ."

"I know, I know Boo, he'll come round eventually," said OC reassuringly.

"I don't know OC, I really hurt him this time," said Max, who despite OC's reassuring words couldn't bring herself to be optimistic about the situation. 'Hell even transgenics have to have some limits to what they can put up with,' she thought miserably.

For the first time in her entire life, Max was faced with a problem that she didn't know how to handle, and she was really scared.