Numbers
Author: sereace
Pairing: Max/Alec, or at least the implication of it. For now.
Warnings: First, the pairing. If you don't like that, the big, bright, X button is right there for you to click on. Next, everything is kinda metaphorical or figurative when I write. So um, sorry? sheepish grin But I think I'm pretty literal on this one, so. I don't update very often – mostly, I write only when the mood strikes me, or when the muse is running around unchained.
Summary: They are more than what their names are.
Author Notes: First foray in this fandom. I think I have everything straight, but if you notice inconsistencies with the fic from the show, please leave feedback. I need a beta! Help! Don't I repeat, don't, flame me, because everything that's in this you've already been warned of. But, constructive criticism is always welcome (so please, uh, help me!). Along with tricks and treats:D Plus, if you haven't read And Still Hope by alethia over at Raising Hell, please, please do so. It is thebest Dark Angel fic ever to be written in the face of the planet. And for the record, we're not even friends, and I'm promoting her fic. It is that good. I promise.
Zero
Questionable morale and favoritism aside, the boy was a sight to behold. There's really nothing like watching one of your children become who they are meant to be – Manticore's golden boy, his finest, if he does say so himself – on the prowl.
Hunting.
Winning.
"X5-494," he mouthed, silently, because he knew the repercussions should this particular one catch wind of him. Lydecker wasn't a superstitious man, but he wasn't stupid either. He's not about to risk his cover just because he was proud of one of his creations.
Never mind that he's in another building, a block over from Foggle Towers, only seeing what he's seeing thru the help of a little bit of luck, and a lot of technology. It isn't helping that Sandeman is a paranoid nut that Lydecker is believing a little bit more everyday. But still, nothing like a practically 10,000 year old selective breeding cult to get over your wonder at being able to splice DNA of different species and put it all together and have your instant perfect little soldiers.
So he watched as 452 stood, looking lost in the middle of the room, telling the…Ordinary that he should go, that they should escape, unaware that the most powerful of Manticore's elite was waiting just outside the door, ruthless, dedicated, set.
Binoculars and 'security' cameras: it was a very good thing they survived the Pulse.
Ah, 452. "Max," And this one came out audibly, and Lydecker saw Sandeman smirk.
"You do know that if he kills her, we'll be short of the cure."
Lydecker allowed a small chuckle escape. "It's your fault. You sent Renfro in, had me usurped, had her send 494 to follow Max, who, for all the information you coded in her genes, did not even suspect 494 of the trap he was cornering her in."
A grunt, before the man retorted, "The Conclave was moving in. I had to do something to counter them."
"Right," Lydecker paused, seeing Max and Logan Cale kiss.
"He's supposed to be assassinated and they kiss," Sandeman stated, and Lydecker cannot say whether he's amused, or frustrated. Or just being sarcastic. "And what is 494 doing?"
Lydecker watched, as Logan Cale practically melt through the floor, and 494 snark his way in. "We should really have used the ones with audio."
In the other building, two of his best faced off. With 494 barely putting up resistance.
There was a thoughtful pause of the man beside him, and Lydecker held his breath as 494 practically waiving the battle to Max. He cleared his throat, "Sandeman," he started, uncertain how he could explain the performance of the boy that's surpassed his own records. What Lydecker didn't expect was the expression of amusement so clearly seen on the face of a man he rarely even seen but frown.
Sandeman smirked, a light in his eyes that hasn't been there for a very long time, and said, "Well, at least we know the cure is still probable."
Lydecker allowed his mouth to curve a little upwards, "I'll be sure to relay them the message next time I meet them for lunch. 494, 452: Your copulation is imperative to the survival of humankind. The blood of your unborn child will provide the cure against a virus that will send the world spiraling into second darkness." He turned to Sandeman, and saw the other man chuckle. Lydecker shrugged himself, as he saw 452 run back to Manticore. "It's worth a shot."
Sandeman turned from the window and headed for the kitchen, shaking his head in amusement. "I still can't believe you actually believed that one."
One
Their first meeting was a boot on his chest, in a cell with a bunk that had soft, used sheets and smelled like her. Since then, he never closed his eyes before sleep without that particular organoleptic detail pushing its way on the forefront of his mind.
Their second meeting was the thrill of the chase. Deception.
Their third meeting was the floor, another man, a fight. Duty, mission, discipline. Death.Questions.
Their fourth meeting was a kid in her arms, blood, a lighter and a knife, and the smell of burning flesh he never thought he would be able to associate with her. She is, after all, an 09-er. A deserter. A traitor. She brought chaos in his ordered world.
But, with it, freedom.
Two
She had always been alone. In Manticore, during drills and training exercises, she would always excel.
When they escaped, she was alone.
There was always no one inside, no one who understood. She set up barricades and checkpoints and base camps all around her and no one ever dared cross the line from where she stopped them, because no one did get that she drew the line.
When he came, he didn't only understand – he spoke her language. Better than her, sometimes. He didn't only have barricades and checkpoints and base camps – he had sentries, he had hounds, he had land mines, and elaborate traps everywhere in between. He was bigger, better, sharper. Darker. And she didn't know how to handle that, because she had never been the lesser one. She had always been the one with the bigger secrets, the better at evasion, the sharper tongue. But for the first time, in the damp, dark of Seattle outside the clutches of Manticore, she wasn't alone in the abyss.
Three
She used to look at him.
It was the first he noticed that she wasn't doing anymore, aside from the touching, because it wasn't like they touched all the time before the virus. So it was the looking, because that, they did all the time. Well, at least he did all the time, because it's not like he's a genetically enhanced supersoldier who can tell when other genetically enhanced supersoldiers are looking at him.
He snorted to himself, 'Heh. Bitter much?' And damn, but it was annoying how that inner voice is even beginning to sound like the cause of his…frustrations.
So, looking. He looked, she looked, and then he looked some more. It was pathetic, how he followed, follows, her like a dog on a leash, practically begging for the scraps she would throw his way. He doesn't blame her, really, he doesn't, because he knew he brought that upon himself, because he couldn't help it. Idly, the cyberjournalist wondered if this was what the average Sector Police feels, being addicted to authority, to the money, to the power. She had that effect, like the drugs that so proliferated the streets of Seattle these days, and boy does he feel old when he can remember what Pre-Pulse Seattle was like, a powerful, intoxicating drug that brings beautiful promises, and you know, know that everything was just, is, a hallucination. A figment of the imagination. Funny also, how she doesn't seem to know the effect she has. Logan used to think that she knows and just doesn't use it, because like every person with actual, raw power, she didn't want it. She complained about her…transgenicism, all the time that Logan felt justified about his theory, until he came, sauntering in his room with a gun deceptively casually in hand speaking like someone who wasn't Manticore. When he wasn't lying on his floor, dying due to a retrovirus targeted specifically to his DNA sequence, he saw what it was to actually have power and try to confine it.
And then it started. Alec looked at Max, and Logan never knew what to call it, because it was too intense a stare to be observant, less concentrated to be cataloging. But Logan knew he's seen that stare, all the time, every time he was with Max and they entered a new place. What was it she used, ah, casing. So Alec cased Max, stripped her down layer by layer, studied every angle, considered every single detail about Max that no one should ever be able to do. Well, no one human at least. He was sure that for their kind, that was S.O.P. And Max had no defense against that, because no one looked deeper. No oneused to be deeper before, and now that there was, deeper, darker, more complicated, well. Curiosity killed the cat, and so the saying goes.
So Max started looking back at Alec. Logan didn't notice it at first, but he's human. Or an Ordinary, as the transgenics he's associated with has started calling him. What he had first realized was that Max wasn't looking back at him anymore. He didn't become Eyes Only just because he had the money and the brains to execute a hack, so he watched, and every so often, followed her gaze. It was like watching a train wreck, like going to the kitchen to get the spoon which you would use to gouge your eyes out. Because, Max had never met anyone who needed more than a passing glance to categorize, someone who was. More. Alec was everything more. More Manticore. More secrets. More lies. More than Logan Cale.
His mobius strip went on with the premise of Logan stares at Max staring at Alec staring at Max sometimes and less and less glancing at Logan. He doesn't need Einstein in his cocktail to know who the variable was in that equation.
TBC