A/N: This is AU for SPN, a pre-series fic. Sam and John will make an appearance later, because family is important to Dean. And if Dean can't forget his little brother, then how can I? I'm not a huge fan of stories without both brothers, but this story wouldn't work unless they were separated at the start of it, so just try to satisfy yourself with Dean & Alec interactions until I can get Sam in here!
They had brought flashlights for back up, in case the dark plunged too deep for their eyes to see. But shafts of moonlight filtered in through the building's barred windows, stretching outward along the floor just enough to paint the concrete with the wriggling drops of rain on the glass.
Their own shadows slid into the mix, the two transgenics highlighted by the silver glow. They exchanged a glance, and Alec nodded his head down the sparse hall. His hands came up, flashing fast in the dim light. Outside, thunder rumbled the building, hiding the disjointed sounds that came from the inside—low growls and louder keens. It reminded Max too much of the basement at Manticore.
Alec's hands finally stilled, the message conveyed. Scanning one room at a time, staying together. She nodded. It wouldn't do either of them any good to split up and get caught. It would take them longer, but they would be better equipped to deal with any threats that came along.
She might have been imagining it, but she thought she saw relief flash in Alec's eyes. This place must have been getting to him, too.
Logan had caught wind of a major discrepancy in a supply company's records, and he tracked down the case because it sounded a lot like human trafficking. And, nowadays, that meant a potential that some transgenics had run afoul luck. The S1W had gone in, scanned the place. But the group was already gone. And it didn't look like they had left in a mad rush. But still, they had left just enough behind. Cages. Equipment. Silver chains and collars. And what looked an awful lot like heavy structural damage made by something inhumanly strong.
It had taken Logan weeks to track down their new location, by hacking his way through suppliers and finding out where their deliveries were going to.
Which left Max and Alec there. Infiltration and retrieval two days later. They would have waited, scoped the place out more. But Logan had told them that the people were getting antsy again. Ready to run. Which didn't leave them with much of an option but to rush the job.
Thankfully it was a small operation. At least, this particular branch of it was. No more than twenty people at a time shipping in and out. No more than fifteen men running the place at one time. And most of them had already left for the night. Apparently they were confident enough that their cargo can't make it out during the night. They had only left one guard.
Not that they knew the schedule—that was haphazard at best. People showing up and leaving without a discernable pattern, which meant they didn't have time to spare.
Alec's hand on her shoulder stopped her from going down the hall. She turned to face him, but he wasn't looking at her. In the dim light his head cocked to the side, and she could see the distant look in his eyes. He circled his hand in one movement, signing listen.
Max turned, to face front. She tilted her head, letting her senses widen. She was out of practice with the maneuver, so used to containing her sensitive abilities to protect them in the cacophony that was Seattle.
As soon as she reached out, she heard it. Muffled howls. It almost reminded her of mewling, some of the chorus longing and calling, others growling and snapping. All of it drifted to them in faint snippets. It reminded Max all too vividly of walking down the hallway in the basement with Joshua, listening to the cries of the 'anomalies.' Mistakes. She remembers Joshua talking about them like they were his brothers.
"I feed them. When I can." She knew it wasn't often.
If only Ben had met Joshua. Maybe the dog-man could have helped.
But right then, she had others to help. Live transgenics.
She looked at Alec, breaking from military signing long enough to snap out a message with her hands: It sounds like a lot more than I thought. Those aren't humans.
Apparently he felt safe enough to break routine, because instead of signing, he breathed low, in a voice that only she could hear: "Animals, Max. Logan said they trade in exotic animals too, remember?" He pointed down a side corridor, in the direction of the noise. The message was clear. Act now, talk later. Ironic, coming from Alec.
Max followed, trusting Alec to lead the way while she kept scanning for approaching threats. In daily life, she might not trust Alec far enough to throw him. But when it came to a job, whether a heist or a robbery, she had to admit that there was no one better. Ten years of extra training on top of Alec being promoted as a CO of his own unit showed in every movement. It was hard to recognize elsewhere, when they were at Crash or when Alec was toppling off his bike because he stopped too fast. His laid-back demeanor concealed it even further. Hiding the dangerous behind the snarky. She suspected it was intentional. But it showed now, in lithe movements as he glided down the hall. Every step he rolled his feet, body shifted to the side as his eyes scanned the hallway for movements. Every part of his body moving in sync, no movement wasted.
It was almost… pleasant. Working with Alec when they were in a job that required him to keep his mouth shut.
The howling was getting louder. Alec held up a fist, and Max halted, watching as the X5 tilted his head. She caught his profile, outlined by the silvery glow from the windows. His lips were parted in focus, eyes zoned out as he focuses entirely on what he can hear.
She casts her gaze back, checking the hallway. It is still clear.
Alec jerked his hand down, follow me. He strode forward, two more doors, before halting in front one that was steel-coated. A deadbolt latching it closed. Again he paused, tilting his head to listen while Max watched the corridor.
She wished he would hurry. She didn't know exactly when the shift change of the guard will come, but it was already close to midnight. They agreed this operation had to be in and out. The quicker the better, considering they don't even know how many prisoners they would have to bust out. She wasn't just going to leave the humans there because they weren't a part of them. Which means they could be busting out as much as twenty people. This place didn't have security cameras—she suspects the men who run the place are depending on the isolated location of the building and thorough screening of the people they hire. They seemed to move often, too.
Alec eased back the bolt on the door, his gloved hands bracing the metal to keep it from making any noise. The hinges were well-oiled despite the rundown building. Well enough that with a little lift Alec was able to slide the door open without making a sound audible to the human ear— revealing a wooden staircase that plunged down into darkness.
Max followed Alec down, the two of them moving in sync as they ease themselves down the stairs. There were still people in the building, and if they hadn't run into them yet, that meant they were locked down there with the prisoners.
They barely had to worry about making the steps creak. The howling was all but shrieking now—she wondered if the transgenics scented their approach.
A voice broke above the cacophony, followed by the sharp thwack of wood on metal. "Quiet!"
Alec rushed forward without any warning, downing the rest of the stairs and disappearing into the shadows. Max followed behind him, but by the time she reached solid ground again, Alec already had the guard in a headlock, the denim-wearing man choking and grappling at Alec's forearm. He sunk under, and Alec slid him to the floor.
"Max, try to find the light," Alec said, raising his voice to be heard over the hoots and yells. They were all around them now.
She backtracked, feeling along the wall from the stairs until her hands encountered a switch board. She flicked on one after the other, lighting up four naked bulbs set along the ceiling.
"God." She almost missed the word. Alec's soft voice was lost in the noise. And now she knew why.
The concrete floor was covered with coagulated blood. She could feel the slight sucking stick under her boots, and now she could smell it. Copper and urine tainted the air, assaulting her nostrils. But that wasn't the worst part.
Cages. Coming up to no higher than Max's waist. No more space than a square yard. Twenty of them, lined up in rows. All of them were filled, with women and men alike. Bare human arms reached out between the bars towards them, their flesh littered with burns and bruises. They didn't look human anymore, eyes glazed over as if with a fever and screaming bloody murder.
"They're rabid," Alec said after he came even with her, his voice eerily calm. Two months ago, that would have pissed her off. But now she knew it was just his way of trying to stay in control of the situation.
Max set her mouth in a firm line, her eyes flitting over the cages. Something inside her twisted. At least in Manticore they gave them cells. This… this was inhuman. She swallowed. "We can't just leave them here."
"Where are we gonna take them, Max? We have to get out of this place, and they're not gonna stop making noise. There's no place for them to go out there."
She looked up at him, about to snap out a retort when she saw the expression on his face, the pinched skin around his eyes. Damn it, this was worse than she thought. She was expecting trauma survivors—not animals.
"But the other Anomalies—"
"These aren't Anomalies, Max." He stared at her. "Where are their barcodes?"
She looked again. Past the burns, the crazed faces. She tried her best to ignore the fact that there wasn't a stitch of cloth on any of them as she stepped closer to one of the cages. A woman, in her late thirties. Or she used to be. Now she just lay hunched in on herself on the ground of her cage, muttering to herself in a crazed pitch, muscles twitching. But her hair was cut short, short enough that she could see her neck. Bare. The cage next to her—no barcode. And the next. And the next.
"But the structural damage—"
"That doesn't matter, Max," Alec said. She turned to him just in time to see him throw his arms out in surrender. "We can't help them. We have to get out of here, Max. White's still looking for us, and we have no idea who these people are connected to."
She opened her mouth to protest, but she knew he was right. "We'll get out of here. Call the police, leave an anonymous tip."
Alec stared at her, eyes softening. She knew what he meant—it was a piss poor hope. Even if the police in the city weren't corrupt or in on the deal, it would take them far too much time to assemble a force to make a raid. And even if they dispose of the guard, by the next shift change they'll know something is wrong, and they'll book it.
She felt her eyes begin to burn, her own memories of being locked inside of small cages, held in the dark, surfacing in her mind. There was no telling how long these people had been here, but Alec was right. There was no way they would stop making noise.
Alec reached under his jacket. Pulled out his .45. God, she hated guns. She looked up at his face, seeing the hardened expression as he steeled himself. But she managed to catch his gaze, and her protests fell away. There was pain in his eyes, despite their hard frame. The green orbs betraying the painful memories held behind them.
He shrugged, a smile twisting his features. It didn't reach his eyes. Hell, it barely reached his mouth. "It's what I would want."
As much as she wanted to say no, that it wasn't right, she looked at the cages around them. Heard the growls and screeches of humans—humans—and knew she couldn't say anything.
Alec had ten more years of being locked in a cage than she did. He was a thief, a burglar, and worked jobs for Logan on the regular. But he didn't kill innocents. She had seen him give a bastard of an Ordinary a beat-down, but he never crossed that final line. He didn't even kill Familiars. So, somehow, she couldn't work up the nerve to tell him it wasn't necessary.
But she didn't watch. Part of her wondered if that made her selfish—letting Alec be the one to go down the line, align the sights. Pull the trigger. The first shot made her flinch, closing her eyes. The people were so far gone they didn't even realize what Alec was about to do when he stepped in front of their cages. No change in the howling pitch, no begging. But, slowly, the cries died away. Every explosion from the gun silenced another voice, like an orchestra's instruments dropping away one by one.
Her sensitive ears picked up Alec's shaky exhale when he replaced the clip on his gun. But he picked up again, no hesitation. One after another. Until there was only one voice left.
And it was laughing. Max turned, the maniac sound making her eyes grow wide as Alec raise his gun. The man's eyes were clouded over, turned gray. Jagged, yellow teeth revealed themselves when his bloody lips peeled back in a grin.
One last bullet, the flash of the muzzle, and the man dropped dead, a hole through his forehead. The room fell into a silence so thick Max could hear Alec's heavy breathing. He still hadn't lowered the gun.
"Alec?" Her voice sounded thunderous in the still room. She stepped closer. His eyes were phased out, still focusing on the spot the man was before he dropped. "You with me?"
Her proximity must have snapped him out of it, because he blinked, shaking himself, and lowered the gun. She could see the mask reassembling before her eyes.
"Yeah." He stuffed the gun into the back of his jeans, not even bothering to check if the barrel was heated. "Come on, we better get out of here. Isolated or not, we don't know who might've heard those shots. I'd rather not be here when whoever Frankensteined these people shows up."
Max watched him head towards the stairs, back straight, movements still cautious but reverting back to a more relaxed position. Not too long ago she would have called him cold hearted for that switch he had, the ability to flip between emotional to controlled in a few seconds. Now, she knew better.
She made herself take one last glance at the bare corpses—if she was part of what got them dead, she couldn't just walk away from it—before starting towards the stairs.
"H-help."
Both of them froze. If Alec didn't look over his shoulder, she might have thought she imagined the small voice.
"Max?" Alec asked—wanting confirmation that she had heard it too. She nodded.
She turned back to the room, scanning over it. Beside her, she felt Alec doing the same. There were the rows of cages that Alec had gone through—four rows of five. But all of those people were dead. Head shots. And the voice… God help them, it sounded childish.
"H… hel—me," It came again, choking over the simple words. "Pl—please!"
Alec strode forward. Max followed his lead, trusting him to have found a direction. He didn't stop until he reached the far corner, that was draped in shadow. A crusted iron door rested there—no one had bothered oiling these hinges. It looked almost like a grotesque attempt at mimicking a hospital, with a folder shelf set into the metal, filled with papers.
A moan, tapering off into an anguished cry, sounded from behind the door, and Max knew they had found the kid.
Alec jerked back the bolt on the door and pushed it open before Max could move. She rushed in behind him, coming up short in the dark room. Light came from the main chamber of the basement, spilling in from the doorway and around their silhouettes to give dim illumination to the room. It was more than enough.
Shackles were set into one wall, another corner being taken up by an operating table, cabinets and rolling tables full of supplies surrounding it. Blood was everywhere, the stains ranging from weeks old to mere hours. But more than the smell of blood came the smell of burnt flesh.
One last cage was set in the corner, far enough away from the walls for a man to circle the small thing. And it was small, barely big enough for a child to curl up in.
And there was one. God, there was one.
"Alec," Max snapped, the rest of the message unnecessary as she rushed the space to the cage, Alec skidding to a stop beside her.
He couldn't have been older than twelve. Half his face was covered, tied off with a strip of cloth so filthy she knew it wasn't for medical purposes. At least she hoped to holy hell it wasn't. But that was the only part of him that had any protection from the cold.
The smell of burnt flesh was overpowering right next to the cage, and even in the dim light she could see the strips of burns all over his young form—aligning with the bars of the cage to perfection.
The kid's head was hunched over his knees, and he had no room to lift it. But she could see the shuddering in his muscles, and knew he was aware of them.
The kid reached out, his filthy hands trembling as they fumbled along the bars, trying to reach them. She smelled the fresh charred skin—the cage was burning him. What was visible of boy's face contorted into a rictus of agony, busted lips twisting.
"Please," he whispered, his voice like gravel. "Kill me too… please."
Max tugged off her glove. She reached out, her fingers brushing against the icy skin of the boy's. He flinched, but didn't move it.
"We're gonna do more than that, kiddo," she whispered, rubbing her fingers along his knuckles. Her skin brushed the bars, but all she felt was cool metal. It didn't hurt her. She filed that away for later. "We're gonna get you out of here."
He didn't give any sign that he heard her. Didn't react when Alec started picking the lock. Didn't move other than the tremors running throughout his body. If he shifted a millimeter fresh skin would brush the bars, leaving more burns.
How long had he been in there? She didn't want to know.
"Got it." Alec dropped the picks; jerked the door open.
The boy seemed frozen, drawing in one rasped breath after another while emaciated limbs trembled. They looked on the verge of snapping from the muscle movement alone.
He flinched when Alec touched his shoulder, turning his head like he could see Alec through the bandage wrapped around his eyes.
"Come on," Alec rubbed slow circles on the boy's tricep. "Let's get you out of there, yeah?"
The kid drew in a shuddering breath through his nose. It came out a sob, as he went lip, crumbling into Alec's arms.
The transgenic stared at her from over the boy's shaking form, his green eyes wide with shock at the blatant show of trust. As for her, Max could only stare back at the tuft of filthy brown hair against Alec's shoulder. She recovered quicker, sending a glare Alec's way, the message clear: You'd better not fuck this up.
Alec cleared his throat, the sound like an alarm in the still space. He looked away from Max, down to the exposed boy in his arms. "Okay…" he muttered. He let the boy lean curled up against his chest while he worked his arms out of his leather jacket. The boy didn't seem to notice, curling up even further into the male transgenic. His arms tucked close in protection of his ribs.
Max's heart constricted as she watched Alec drape his jacket around those filthy shoulders. It made the kid look even younger, the jacket falling to the kid's mid-thigh and the sleeves looking gargantuan on the tiny body. But it beat the hell out of the kid being laid bare for all to see.
Bastards.
It wasn't as if Manticore ever had a sense of modesty. Up until the heats started, every unit bunked together. Boys and girls. Of course, none of them knew any better at the time. She could still remember the confusion, and later shame, that she felt when she found out that children weren't supposed to strip on command.
But it also wasn't as if that made her immune to seeing it happen to somebody else.
Kids in burning cages.
"Max!"
Alec's voice snapped her out of her reverie. He was staring at her, his face pinched with what looked like… fear?
"We've gotta get him out of here, Max. I don't like the sound of his breathing."
She nodded, the fear in his expression pushing her to her feet. "Can you carry him?"
He gave her a look, a, 'what the hell do you think?'
"What the hell do you think?"
She gritted her teeth—she would not get into an argument with him when they had more important things to worry about. For instance, a heavily injured little boy.
"I'm taking point."
A/N: This chapter is a teaser. Next chapters will be posted when story is finished, or at least when I have made enough progress to be confident in posting a chapter.
I wanted to make this a WIP because in this type of story (found family with a lot of character interaction) there are a lot of ways to go and a lot of moments to be had. I love sharing the story ideas that pop into my head, but for me the richest part of stories is interacting with people over them. So if you have a spare minute and a stray request for a moment you want to see, I'm all ears!