Today 'They' Won the Battle

by Rhasa

Part 21

Another day

It was quiet, and still – a little too quiet and a little too still for Max's liking. Looking up, past through the chintz curtains that adorned the window, to the sky outside, she noticed the sun shining cheerfully and almost scorned it for doing so. It was going to be another beautiful clear day – at least weather wise.

As per her usual morning routine, she stood next to the bed piling folded clean laundry into her duffle bag. She should really place them in the nearby dresser – after all, as Logan had said on more than one occasion, it had been over three months now; time to finally stop living out of a suitcase. Max stopped just before she was about to pack a pair of black hipsters into the bag; glanced at the drawers to her left for a moment, then returned to defiantly shove them as hard as she could into the very bottom of the bag. If she had shoved them any harder she could have well put her hand right through the canvas bottom. Despite all that had happened in the last few months there were some things that she just wasn't ready to face – wasn't ready to concede, the chest of drawers was just one of those things.

She was closing the bag, tugging a little too hard on the zipper, when she heard the tires on the gravel. Looking up she saw Logan's beloved and seemingly indestrucatble car ambling up the uneven driveway. Max sighed. She had hoped that she would have a little more time to herself this morning. But like clockwork, he had returned when he had told her he would. She didn't like to give too much thought to the fact that he was never away for too long and what that might mean. She didn't like to give too much thought to anything much these days – over thinking things just brought her more heartache and pain.

Quashing her frustration and the ever-present anger that seemed to bubble just below the surface, she came out to meet him, just as she normally did, expecting as usual to lend a hand unloading the supplies. She was surprised when he reached into the boot of the car to retrieve a huge bouquet of flowers. Their colour and perfume were completely overwhelming and assaulted her senses. Completely stunned for a moment, she couldn't help but smile – the act so … out of character … When he returned the smile, she secretly hated him and then herself for it. She knew he was just trying to be sweet.

"What's the occasion?" she asked, as she handled the bundle awkwardly.

"Do I need one?" he asked her.

She shrugged.

He sensed her unease, and reached to take back the bouquet. "I thought we'd have a special dinner tonight."

"Special?" she asked as she crossed her arms defensively over her chest, her body language not lost on the older man before her.

"Okay, well not really all that special, but at least not the canned stuff we've been living on the last few weeks. I got lucky in town," he said a little proudly. "Fresh produce, vegetables, baked bread and salted moose meat. I thought I might whip up one of my culinary miracles since we haven't had one of those in a while."

Max nodded slightly, secretly thinking that it would be nice to have fresh food, but something inside of her was determined to not let him know this.

Logan watched her closely for a moment or two. Max felt uncomfortable under his persistent gaze and she sensed that her reaction wasn't exactly what he had hoped for. "Even managed to score a bottle of pre-pulse Sparkling Burgundy," he added. "Might make it seem like old times," he told her sadly.

Old times. She shuffled her feet, and chewed on her lip nervously. The last thing she wanted to do was to think about old times. The phrase rang over in her head, making her stomach churn.

Sensing her mannerisms were an indication that she wasn't yet ready to go there, and not to push, Logan sighed once again, bowed his head and nodded towards the flowers. "Well, I better go put these in water."

"I'll bring the rest of the things in," she told him quickly as she turned towards the boot of the car.

He continued to track her every movement as she piled the load into her arms and moved towards the house. Adjusting the weight of the packages, she stopped abruptly a few inches away from him catching herself just as she was about to brush past.

Logan looked up. "Max, there's no need-" he began to explain for what must have been the hundredth time that she didn't need fear touching him now that the virus was cured, but she cut him off tersely.

"I know," she spat, then seeing the sad frustration in his eyes, added a soft, "I'm sorry," before returning to the house, with tears in her eyes.

The day seemed to drag on forever. Both time as well as Max's movements seemed to have slowed down. She didn't quite know what was wrong with her– well other than the usual. She hadn't really been expecting the depression that seemed to have settle over her the first few days on arriving in Canada with Logan to last as long as it had. Today was a particularly hard day. It had been such an effort to get out of bed in the morning. In fact, it was such an effort just to put one foot in front of the other. Max was so keen for this day to be over that she asked Logan to prepare for an exceptionally early dinner. Surprised that she had taken an interest in what he was trying to do for her, Logan happily agreed, and they found themselves sitting down at sunset to enjoy his cooking.

"Can't remember the last time I had iceberg lettuce. Can you?" Logan asked as he tucked into a small side salad he had prepared.

Max shook her head slightly.

"Mm. These tomatoes are great. I mean, I know I paid a lot for them, but they're definitely worth it. Don't you think?"

Max attempted to take a bite of the food before her, but found 'special' dinner aside, she just wasn't that hungry. She dropped her fork back down to her plate with a clunk.

Logan sighed heavily. Max felt that he was inevitably going to ask what was wrong, just like he had on numerous other occasions when the conversation waned between them. She felt guilty for a moment. She knew he was trying – trying to reach out to her – just as he had been doing ever since they had arrived at his safe haven in Canada. The first few days he talked incessantly about the area in which they were staying, about his efforts to fix up their new home, a bit about the local community and a lot about his plans for their future. He looked so happy during that time – perhaps the happiest she had ever seen him. He wanted her to share in that happiness too, but the harder he tried to get her to be enthusiastic about their new life together, the more she shut him out. He had never seen her so quiet. She had hardly said a word to him in the first two days, so he over compensated for the uncomfortable silence by talking about everything and anything that wasn't Manticore, Terminal City or transgenic related. He took her silence for worry and concern, and maybe as a sign that it had been so long since she had allowed anyone to truly take care of her that she had forgotten how to let someone else in.

"It will get easier, Max," he had promised early on. "I will do everything I can to make it easier on you."

She had wondered exactly 'which' part Logan thought would get easier. The missing her true 'family' part? The worrying about her family part? The getting used to her new 'domestic' life part? The hiding from the world part? The picking up where she and Logan had left off part? Or the losing Alec -- no, she wasn't going to think about that part.

Max had to admit that Logan had tried to make 'things' easy on her. Accutely aware that she was still recovering from near fatal injuries she had sustained in the attack on the tunnels, and that she probably still had psychological and emotional scars that had to heal as well, he did everything humanely possible to make her comfortable in her new home. He let her sleep when she was tired, covered her with a blanket when she was cold, he brought her breakfast and drew baths and did all the necessary domestic chores and house work, all under the pretense that she needed time and space and didn't need to be worrying about the littlestuff.

But Max also found his 'doting' and constant acts of affection annoying. She knew he meant well, but the last thing she needed was time to think about her new life … or time to reflect on her old life … and everything … and everyone … she had left behind. Consciously she had pushed him away at every opportunity to the point where they rarely sat down to a meal together, let alone have a full and complete conversation. She couldn't deny that instead of growing closer with time they were growing increasingly apart – she knew it was all her fault and she didn't care. Now she woke each day with a feeling of dread inside of her – wondering just how long their current situation was going to go on. She rose each morning feeling sick to her stomach, caught between her increasing apathy for this older man who was doing so much to make her happy and her disgust at her own indifference to it all.

"Sparkling burgundy cost a pretty penny too," Logan's words broke into Max's internal musings, triggering a thought.

"Did you manage to get the spare comms link you needed?" she asked with eagerness in her voice. The chance to restore full communications with Terminal City was the only thing that had truly excited her in the past few weeks.

Logan stopped eating, wiped his mouth on a napkin, rose, and went into the kitchen for a moment. "Ah no," he said simply on his return.

Max couldn't help the scowl that flashed across her face. "What happened? I thought you said it was all arranged?"

"My contact sold it," Logan told her as he casually poured himself another glass of wine.

"Sold it?" she pressed.

"To a higher bidder."

Max couldn't believe what she was hearing. She had been pushing for the comms link to be restored for weeks. He had known how important it was to her. And he had lead her to believe that he would come back with the part. "We got out bid? By how much, Logan?"

Logan coughed a bit after taking a deep sip of wine. "Two thousand."

"Only two thousand?" she asked, clearly disappointed.

Placing his glass firmly on the table, Logan got ready for the argument that would surely follow, as it always had before when the subject of communications with Terminal City had come up. "We need money, Max. We need something to live on up here. You made me give half of what we had to Terminal City for supplies-" he stopped himself, knowing that he sounded like a petulant child for the sacrifice that she well suggested but that he also agreed to. "I couldn't justify going any higher on the comms link; not at this time anyway."

"You couldn't justify going higher on bidding for the new comms link, but you have no trouble blowing money on flowers, wine and fresh vegetables?" She mocked his efforts.

"That was different."

"No. Not really, Logan. We need that comms link so we can sort out the interface with the TCs mainframe and establish reliable communications with the command centre," she said in anger.

"Communications with the command centre are working just fine," he said with conviction.

"We get brief reports from our supply runners at best, once a week, if we're lucky. And even then we don't know if what they're reporting is accurate because they're civilians. That's not 'fine' Logan."

"And I guess there's no need for me to bring up, yet again, how much of a bad idea I think establishing a permanent link with base is? After all, you're supposed to be in hiding, Max."

"We've had this argument a thousand times before. There are ways around the link being traced. Or have you forgotten all the skills you learnt as Eyes Only?"

"I haven't forgotten," he replied quietly.

Max's eyes narrowed. "Do you know who the other bidder was?"

"No," he told her, then fixing her with a glare he asked,"Why?"

She shrugged. "I thought I could lift it off of him."

"Why are you pushing so hard to establish links with the command centre?" Logan asked.

"Why are you trying so hard not to?" she asked him in return.

"I'm no trying to prevent you from establishing the comms link. It's just … I'm just trying to protect you, Max. That was my reason for bringing you back up here. To make sure you are safe."

Max slumped a little in her chair, their brief confrontation seemingly taking an awlful lot out of her leaving her limbs leadened somewhat.. "I know," she said sadly.

He could tell by the tone of her voice that that was the end of the argument about the comms link – at least for now.

After a few moments of silence, in an attempt to steer things back to normal, he signalled to her glass. "You haven't touched your wine."

"I'm not really in the mood," she said softly.

Logan eyed her with genuine concern. "You okay?"

She shrugged. "To be honest, I'm not feeling too well."

Logan was out of his seat like a shot. He came to her side and put a hand to her forehead. "What's wrong?" he asked tenderly.

Annoyed by his touch but deciding she didn't have the strength to shirk away from him at least for the time being, Max replied, "Just feeling a little whacked, that's all."

"You don't seem to have a fever," he said in a strange voice.

"You sound so disappointed," she accused him.

Logan removed his hand and stood up, preparing to return to his seat. "No. Not at all."

Before he turned away, Max grabbed his arm."What Logan? What did you think was wrong with me?"

"Nothing."

"Tell me," she asked him.

"It's nothing," he told her in an attempt to brush her off.

"No. It's not nothing. I can tell by the look on your face."

Logan sighed and momentarily debated whether or not to go on. "I was just wondering, the other day … oh god …" he began clearly, uncomfortable.

"What?"

"I was just wondering about … your heat cycle."

"What?" Max screeched.

"Max, we've been here for three coming up four months and you haven't had a heat cycle. I was just thinking-"

Max shook her head in disbelief. "You were just thinking that since the virus was cured you might get-"

"No! Nothing like that!" Logan cried. "God, Max, you still can't bring yourself to touch me. I was just thinking … I just wanted to be prepared. I've never lived with a transgenic before."

"Is that why you're keeping me here Logan?"

"What? I'm not keeping you here."

"You won't let me come to town. I haven't left this place for eight weeks-"

Logan faced her straight on. "You know we have to keep a low profile. White-"

Max couldn't help the hysteria that was rising in her voice. "You're keeping me, like some prized pet, waiting for me to go into heat, with no other men around-"

Logan vehemently shook his head. "What? Max, you've got it all wrong."

"What is it exactly that you want from me, Logan?" she asked him tearfully.

"I …" he faltered.

"Give me the truth. Be honest. If we are ever going to work this thing out, then I need to know. What is it that you want?"

"Max, I don't—"

"Spare me," she interrupted. "Tell me. What do you want?"

"I want …" he swallowed hard. Taking his time, knowing that he had to get this just right. "I won't lie to you. I want us. The way we used to be. I love you, Max. I always have and always will."

"Logan-" she started as what she secretly feared was realised, and the tears began.

"I know it's been hard," he told her. "I didn't expect everything to be exactly the same as it was before straight away. I know it will take time. But Max, we did have something once, something so very special between us, and we can have that again in time. I'm willing to give you all the time you need. It's been three months since we've been here and we're yet to touch – at least on purpose. I know you're probably afraid that the cure might not be real, that you might hurt me, but don't be. It's okay. It's going to be okay. We can have what we once had."

Max lowered her head to avoid his gaze, suddenly so tired that speech was almost beyond her. "Things change, Logan," she said softly.

"They don't have to, Max."

She looked up at him. "No you don't understand," she whispered. "Things have already changed. My life without you, when you left for Canada the first time when I ran Terminal City without you, I had to go on, Logan-"

"It doesn't matter-" he told her.

"No," she insisted he listen. "I have to tell you, just what happened in those months, that year-"

He knelt before her and placed both hands on the sides of her face. "Max, I don't need to know."

"Logan, please-" she pleaded.

"Max. I don't need to know. I don't want to know. That year, we were apart? It doesn't change anything."

Oh god, how could he say that to her? Of all the things he could have said, why that? For a moment she wondered if he was punishing her, but then she remembered. There was no way that he could know … he couldn't know that she had uttered that very phrase to Alec the morning of her departure from Terminal City …

Flashback

She had waited for over an hour for him to wake, resisting a strong desire to leave the bed they were sharing before it was too late … before she had no choice but to face him. She spent long minutes composing what she did not want, but needed to say. When she began to feel him stirring her heart began to race once more – except this time it wasn't from excitement or passion, but fear and dread. She would have liked to have called their night together a mistake, but knew that after what they had shared, after the love he had shown, there was no way she could lie to him like that. So she decided on a different tactic – perhaps one a little less cruel, but cruel nonetheless.

"Just so you know," she began as right after he had let out a huge yawn signalling his consciousness. "Just so we're clear …. about last night….. it doesn't change anything," she said.

Alec was dumbfounded. She surprised him – not by what she said, but by the fact that she was there to say something to him at all. He had expected her to run – he had expected that come morning, she wouldn't be there. Last night had been incredible – the most amazing experience of his life. He had finally made love – not had sex – but made love to the women he had been in love with for literally years. It was both everything and nothing like he had imagined. And if he was honest, it was the singularly most frightening emotional time in his life; he could not quite believe how desperate he was to be with her; to be inside of her. Never before had he experienced what it was like to literally want to devour and be devoured, mind body and soul by another person. And despite what Max had just said to him, Alec knew, even before it had ended, that last night had changed everything – at least for him.

She continued to stare directly in front of her up to the water stained ceiling determined not to look in the eye of her lover. "I mean it, Alec. This doesn't change a thing."

"Not exactly the good morning I was looking for," Alec admitted while swallowing a lump that had suddenly formed in his throat. Perhaps humour wasn't the best defence right now.

"Last night was last night, Alec. This is the cold reality of a brand new day. I know what you were going to say. You probably thought that just because I slept with you I might have changed my mind about leaving-"

"That's not why I slept with you," he told her, his tone just as angry as hers had been. He raised himself up on one elbow and looked directly down at her. "Us being together wasn't some trick, Max."

"I know. But it can't change things, Alec. I still have to leave."

He brought a hand up to her face, turned it with as much gentleness as he could allow, and made her face him for the first time since he woke. "So it didn't mean as much to you as it did for me?"

Her eyes moistened. "It did. It does mean a lot to me. More than you will ever realise."

"But you're leaving anyway."

"Don't you see that I have to? Now more than ever. I have to protect you, Alec."

"From what exactly, Max? What is your leaving going to protect me from? From being hurt? You're leaving me so I won't get hurt, is that right?" How can you say that, if when you leave me, I'll be nothing but hurt? he thought to himself.

"You'll get over it," she said coldly.

And there it was. Max's decision. She was dismissing him – just like that.

"I see. Well then, I guess you had better go," he told her bitterly, as he leant over the side of the bed, retrieved the shirt she has tossed there the night before and threw it at her.

"Alec-"

"No. I'm done, Max. I don't know what you want from me. Do you want me to beg? Something tells me that if sleeping with you didn't work then begging wouldn't either."

Seemingly satiisfied, Max nodded "Well, as long as we understand each other then," she said as she rose, grabbed her duffle and ran from the room with tears in her eyes.

End Flashback

"It doesn't change anything," Logan whispered again, as his face moved closer to hers, his intent clear.

Her head was spinning, a thousand rambling thoughts flashing through her mind – of Alec … of Logan … of truths …. of possibilities … of pain …. of regret … . of loss … of forgiveness … Her head was spinning making her sick once more. She didn't know what was happening, only that it was clear Logan was going to kiss her and that she had been wrong to ever think that she could have made a life for herself with this man.

Oh god help me, she thought as she found herself immobilised against Logan's breathe as it brushed across her cheek.

"I love you, Max," Logan whispered softly against her skin.

Max whimpered as her attempts to move away from him failed.

"Nothing can come between us now," he told her as he closed his eyes and began to crush his lips to hers, only to be interrupted by a piercing scream from a few rooms away.

Max's breathe hitched. "Jed," she whispered.

To be continued………

Author's Note:

Apologies for the delay posting this chapter. I re-wrote it three times and I know there are some errors in the post but I just had to post it before it drove me insane. I ended up combining three chapters into one and apologise if the flow is a little confusing. I also wanted to see if I could throw a few of you off this way (some of you know exactly where I am going with this story) and then bring you back.

I don't know whether I hate Logan here for not letting Max off the hook or admire his love for her….. I didn't really want him to come out as all creepy here, but his voice just got into my head and I didn't have any control over what he said – he just said it. I think I've told you before that I have no control over my characters.

Some of you may have picked up on the following where Logan says "the fact of the matter is I love her and like I told you, right before I left Terminal City the last time, I am never, ever going to give up on her or us…"

That little reference is to another story I wrote called Storm Brewing It sooo fits into this story that I was tempted to put part 1 in here word for word – except I think that would breech rules about mutliple postings of the one story so I didn't. But hey you can clink on the author link and go read it if you like. nudge nudge, wink wink

Please review such little payment for so much effort. My goal is to reach 200 reviews for this story. Hence reviews keep me writing.

Til next time Sarah