Chapter 14: Unfold

The following weeks went by slowly as I settled down and found myself a job at Harbor Lights Hospital. I worked as an assistant to an in-vitro specialist. The papers Logan provided me verified the credentials I had lost during the fire at Manticore while a contact from Manticore introduced me to the right people to get the job. Harbor Lights had a rather small number of patients requesting in-vitro operations, so I wasn't too busy. It gave me time to do some research I had been working on while at Manticore. Fortunately for me, I had backed up my files before Manticore collapsed, but I still lost my most recent work, so there were a few things I had to "rediscover". I was working on gene therapy and re-seqeuncing DNA strands.

My boss was rather impressed at the research I had been doing, claiming it was "cutting-edge" and he had never heard of such advanced work in the field of genetics. I shrugged it off; this was nothing new to me, having been at Manticore for so long. Of course, a lot of Manticore technology had been kept private for use within government projects only, so there was no way for the public to know of such breakthroughs discovered in technology. Then again, perhaps my boss was just not well informed.

My work began because Lydecker had come back from a conference about such work. There was a doctor in the outside world who supposedly began working on a baby born prematurely. The mother was addicted to crack, and at birth, the baby was quite deformed and suffered from the same addiction. It was bound to die, but the doctor rescued the boy, using gene therapy to fix him up and nurture him back to health. It was quite impressive work, and Manticore could have learned a lot from him, but the doctor was killed during the hostage crisis at the conference led by the May 22 Movement. All Manticore had left were his papers, and so we worked off of his publications. We experimented first with the anomalies in the basement, attempting to re-sequence their genes to fix the flaws of those classes. Most attempts ended in failure, but there were several successes, which led to less aggressive subjects, a desired effect for those in the basement of Manticore.

Shortly after the first few successes, we moved on to the X5 series. Several of the X5s had already passed away from a late-stage progeria, and it had become a priority to find a cure for this illness before it took too many lives. Against our recommendations concerning the treatment's readiness, Lydecker insisted we used it on recaptured X5-734. If all went well, the progeria would regress and 734 would return to normal. If anything went wrong at all, she faced the risk of immediate death from even further acceleration of aging. Perhaps Lydecker was right to place his faith on us; the treatment worked quite nicely, without error. Our calculations and theories had been right from the start. 734 later went through re-indoctrination and once again belonged to Manticore. It was a perfect success, by Manticore standards and earned us bonuses.

The weeks passed and my research continued. It was fairly uneventful - no threats from Manticore or Ames White; I couldn't complain. Of course, all that changed when Harbor Lights went under lock down. One of their patients had a virus strain and the CDC swooped in to quarantine the area. I was kicked out of the building without any time to even finish my research; we left before the CDC arrived, however, so I took the shortest path out, which just happened to cross by the patient's room. I was surprised to see Max lying in bed, unconscious and restrained. This wouldn't be good, especially if they found out what they really had in their hands. I hung around as one of the curious onlookers outside. I saw Logan in the crowd and new it was indeed Max. Shortly after the CDC arrived, I saw another familiar face – Ames White. This would soon become a dangerous affair. It struck me as odd, however, that they would consider Max "contagious". The X-Series were supposed to be immune to nearly all biological agents, and none of them were supposed to carry biological agents, as far as I was aware.

I had a colleague of mine sneak me some photos they had taken of the blood sample with the viral agent. I had never seen anything like it before in any of the X Series. Not only that, but Max was not born with any known viral agents; it must have occurred during her return to Manticore. Of course, it was impossible for any ordinary being to be a carrier of such a deadly virus and not contract any symptoms. I was also right next to Max and didn't contract the virus. The photo clearly indicated the strain was mutated, so I concluded Manticore must have done this, but for what reasons, I did not know. Of course, if Manticore did this, then they wouldn't have made it contagious; that would serve no purpose, as they could just as easily create bioweapons with the same effect. They wanted Max to infect someone for them; that had to be the only reason. But...who?

I gave Logan a call to warn him.

"Logan, it's me, Kat."

"Kat, oh hey. I can't talk right now, I'm kind of in the middle of something, can I call you back later?" he hung up before I even had a chance to say anything. With a sigh, I called him back.

"Logan, it's important. I know where you are and I know why you're there. Max isn't contagious, but I just saw White outside Harbor Lights. She needs to get out of there."

"Thanks, Kat, but I already know this. I'll call you back later." He hung up the phone.

Well, I tried. I hung around to see how everything would turn out, but night fell and the police turned everyone away, so I went home and kept up with the events on the news.

As I watched the news, it then occurred to me that Logan insisted he knew what was going on with Max. So...he knew about the virus? He has some explaining to do.

Eventually, an announcement for hospital personnel informed us that the CDC had the situation under control and the patient would be taken into CDC custody for treatment. The patient was never contagious and the hospital was scheduled to reopen the next morning. Great, back to work for me, I thought. I was still waiting on Logan's call, wondering if he planned on calling me back. In the end, I ended up calling him. I had to warn him of CDC's plans.

"Logan, it's Kat. I just heard the CDC is planning on taking Max into their custody."

"How'd you hear that?"

"I work at Harbor Lights, but I wasn't aware of Max's situation until it was too late. We're supposed to be back at work tomorrow; the hospital is reopening, which I guess means that Max is scheduled to leave with the CDC tonight."

"Thanks Kat, but I'm really really concerned about the CDC right now. White's quite intent on making sure she does not fall into the wrong hands, and if he has his way, he's going to eliminate her before giving her to them. I'll have to call you back, as I'm trying to help her out right now."

"Right, sorry to bother you. Good luck, Logan."

I couldn't think of anything else to say, and it seemed I was only getting in the way. Logan certainly seemed to know what he was doing, and he also seemed to know a lot about Manticore. Would Max really tell him so much? My chain of thought led me to realize that there was certainly more to the couple than the eye could see. I could tell they cared about each other, maybe even loved each other. Yet, it just seemed that I was missing something.

I went about making dinner that day and went to work the next day. I was working with a patient, for once, when I received a call. It was Logan, calling back as he promised. He asked me to go over to his place later; he had a few questions for me concerning Max. I agreed, uncertain of where this would lead to, but it would give me to the chance to ask him some questions of my own.

I arrived at Logan's place later that day.

"Kat, I'm glad you could make it on such short notice."

"Well, you know scientists – work and more work, and I'm still trying to lay low for a while, so I haven't been going out much."

"You said Max wasn't contagious. I was hoping you might know more about this virus Manticore put into Max."

"How did you know about the virus? I don't suppose Max would tell an ordinary if it doesn't concern them."

Logan sighed and hesitated before replying. "I...found out because it infected me. We both found out at that time."

I looked up in surprise. "Manticore sent Max to kill...you? Why?"

"I knew too much," he said dismissively.

But I sensed something more. "And Max told you all about Manticore?" I guessed.

"Here and there," he answered vaguely.

"They could have just sent another X5. I doubt Max would have willingly agreed to kill you, no matter how much psy-ops they put her through."

"That's why she didn't know about the virus, which made it hurt so much more when she realized what she had done. Can you blame her for feeling the way she does about Manticore? She escaped Manticore, and we touched..." Logan said reminiscingly. From the look in his eyes, it was more than a touch, a kiss perhaps. Now it was clear why they hadn't shown much affection to each other. Despite how much they loved each other, her touch was lethal. "I contracted the virus. She was informed that she would have to turn herself in if she wanted me to live. It's just like Manticore to play a sick game like that. Look, I was just wondering if you could help us out – find a cure."

Logan clearly didn't want to go into too many details, but I wanted to get to the bottom of this. "The time she escaped...you mean a few months ago, right before Manticore burned to the ground. I remember those days. Renfro was furious, but there was no team sent out to find her. A short while after, an Eyes Only broadcast gave her all the reason to destroy Manitcore. I nearly died myself from that fire."

Seeing I wasn't going to give up on the topic, Logan gave a little more. "She found out Manticore was destroyed and went back to unlock the buildings, which went into lock down. You should be thanking her for saving you and your friends from burning alive."

And yet, something didn't seem right. "Logan, when are you going to stop lying to me?"

"What makes you think I'm lying?"

"How exactly would she know that Manticore would be destroyed from an Eyes Only broadcast? How could she possibly care about Manticore while you were dying in her arms? You're not telling me something, and if you want my help, I would prefer to know the whole story, not just the half truths." Suddenly it occurred to me that Max may have been responsible for the destruction of Manticore, but I wasn't sure how yet. But it was the only way she would have known about the destruction of Manticore while outside of Manticore.

"I'll find someone else then," Logan said annoyed. "I'm sorry I wasted your time."

"I'll help, Logan. I have some contacts who may be able to fix problem." My mind kept wandering though, even as I said that.

I said my thoughts aloud, allowing Logan to understand my thinking. "So Max knew Manticore was destroyed from an Eyes Only broadcast, which must have meant that she knew the threat Eyes Only posed on Manticore. She would have only known this if Manticore revealed this to her, since there was no way for her to find out that Eyes Only was attempting to bring Manticore down while she was in Manticore. If Manticore revealed this to her, then they must have believed she would be able to assist in stopping Eyes Only." I smiled as I looked at Logan, finally understanding everything.

I continued, "And the only way that would have happened was if she met Eyes Only on the outside. Why would Eyes Only broadcast Manticore's location, attempting to destroy it? Eyes Only must have known someone from Manticore, perhaps someone he cared for and recently lost," I ventured.

I could tell from the look on Logan's face that I was right. "They didn't send another X5 because they didn't know who Eyes Only was, and Max wasn't going to tell them. They sent Max because they knew she would find you, Logan. But that wasn't the end of it. They knew if Max cared enough for you, she would turn herself in, with that small ounce of hope that there was a cure and you would survive. They would not only get Max back, but have Eyes Only as well. It was a win-win situation. Of course, whether or not they really would have stuck to their promise of curing you, this is Manticore we're talking about..."

Logan sighed. I knew then that I was right. "So what am I missing?"

"You got all of that just from a few half truths?" Logan asked, slightly surprised.

I shrugged. "I'm good at deducing things."

"Noticeably..."

"So you going to tell me what happened or do I have to guess some more?"

Logan sighed. "Fine," he muttered. "Eyes Only was about to do another hack, revealing Manticore's location. Everything was ready, and then, she arrived. I couldn't believe my eyes after first; it was like I was dreaming. I thought she had died during the Manticore raid we did a few months ago, but I still clung to the hope that Manticore somehow saved her, knowing their ways with technology. And they did. We kissed...and she insisted I leave, that Manticore had found me. Shortly after, the virus hit, and Alec made his appearance, telling Max what happened and her choices. She was furious and ran my hack, revealing Manticore's location. Then she went back to Manticore to look for the antidote. By the time she got there, Manticore was already in flames. She went in...unlocked the cell doors, all the while looking for Renfro to obtain the antidote. Asha was around to administer the antidote when she got back. We've been careful to avoid touching since. Satisfied?" Logan asked, annoyed.

"Sounds like Max alright. So...about that virus, how much do you know about it?"

Logan forced a smile. "It's a genetically targeted retrovirus, activating on my DNA. Not long before the incident at Harbor Lights, Max managed to find a temporary solution by trapping the virus, but the virus mutated, so the solution lasted only a few hours. I can get you the research behind that, if it will be of any assistance."

"Anything at all will be useful."

"Alright, I'll call you when I have it. As far as money goes, I'll –"

"Don't worry about it. You've helped my friends and I so much. It's time I returned the favor. My lab at Harbor Lights will give me the equipment I need to do some preliminary research, and I have a few contacts who owe me, so I'm sure something can be managed."

Logan smiled now. "Thanks, and...could you...not tell Max? I don't want to get her hopes up for anything...not that I don't believe in you, but...I just thought it'd be a nice surprise for her."

I returned the smile. "Your secret's safe with me."

I left Logan's that day, satisfied to hear the truth behind Manticore's downfall and given a chance to help out, especially after all the pain Manticore had caused them. It was a nice feeling.