"Pick up pick up pick up…" Max muttered into her phone's receiver, listening as the dial tone hummed, dropping off a note. Then hummed again. "Come on…"

She glanced in the rearview mirror again, and the same sight greeted her as when she looked back ten seconds ago. The boy rasping in breaths, arms that had been shoving weakly against Alec now limp, the tips of his fingers a faint blue tinge. Alec's gaze kept switching from the kid in his arms to glaring at the road, as if he could make it move by faster by throwing out silent threats through his eyes.

"Come on…"

"This is Dr. Samuel Carr. I'm otherwise occupied at the moment, but if you leave a messa—"

"Damnit!" She hung up, and dialed again.

"Max?" Alec.

"He's not answering!"

The dial tone rang again. Once. Twice. Three times. Finally clicking over as the signal connected.

"Hello?" a groggy voice drifted over the line.

"Sam!" Max barked, glancing back at Alec again. He perked up, neck straightening and head tilting as he no doubt listened in to both sides of the conversation. Trint was in a similar position, though his eyes were latched on the road. "Sam, we've got an emergency and we really need this kept on the down-low."

"What?" His voice came over, alertness seeping into his tone. Something rustled in the background, then what sounded like creaking bedsprings came over the speaker. "Max, is that you?"

"Yes. Look, Sam we don't have time for twenty questions. I got an injured kid in the back seat that needs professional medical attention asap and no one can know about it. You in or out?"

One thing Max had always liked about Sam Carr—the doctor was a civilian, but he had military-like response in tense situations. She suspected it was from years working in an ER before coming to the calmer hospital environment.

Either way, it only took him one blown out breath to collect himself. "Okay. Where are you? What do you need?"

"Max!" Alec caught her attention from the backseat. She looked over to him, his hand reaching out for the phone. Knowing it would take too long to ask questions, she handed it over. "We're about two hours out from the edge of Seattle. We can't take this kid through the sewers and we can't make it through the sector guards. We need an ambulance waiting on the backroad that leads out of sector eight. We need equipment and supplies for oxygen deprivation, burns, dehydration, malnourishment, and possible head trauma."

"Give me a run down. Triage, stat," Sam's voice came from the other end of the line. She could hear movement, what sounded like the jangling of keys, and knew the doctor was on the move.

She might have imagined it, but she thought Alec's spine straightened a little bit at the direct order.

"Two shattered ribs. One lung partially collapsed. Contusions on the torso, arms, legs…" Alec swallowed, the mask of a soldier slipping for a millisecond, "his whole fuckin' body. Swollen trachea, internal bleeding—probably caused by blunt force trauma to the abdomen. Full body first to third degree burns. Abrasions on his back. Severe dehydration. Disoriented and falling in and out of consciousness. He's not getting enough oxygen."

Max gripped the door handle with white knuckles as the van ran over another pothole. The mewling keen that came from the boy was so weak it made her heart clench.

"Alright… keep his airways open, keep him as stationary as possible. Keep him warm. I'll be there as soon as I can."

Alec snapped the phone shut, flicking it onto the center console between the front seats. He was breathing heavily, but his touch was gentle as he adjusted the boy to make him more comfortable against him. Cradling his cheek with a filthy hand, their faces inches apart.

The sight twisted something in her, as she realized how hard Alec would take it if the kid didn't survive. He had come a long way from flippantly wanting to leave a transgenic in White's clutches.

Then again, they both had.

Max slipped out of her jacket. She folded herself over in the seat, holding the leather coat out to Alec. The transgenic looked at her, green eyes wide and strangely… innocent.

She flapped the jacket. "We don't have any blankets. Just take the damn thing."

He blinked, but obeyed, clearing his throat as he spread it over the kid's bare legs. He adjusted his own jacket, folding the collar up around the kid's neck and ensconcing the boy's arms close to his chest with gentle tugs to the leather.

"You're gonna be okay, kid. Just keep breathing."

It seemed like the mantra was more for Alec's comfort than the boy's.

The only way Max knew an hour hadn't passed was because they hadn't met the ambulance yet. She found her heart pounding, adrenaline refusing to fade even as time stretched and they still bounced along the old asphalt. They were going sixty. Any sane person would be driving twenty on this death trap of road. But even dismissing their sanity—an easy thing to do—it felt like the van would fall apart with every dip in the road.

She had an asinine image pop into her head, from helping out Logan with his niece and the archaic cartoons he had scrounged up on the computer for her. That they would finally hit a pothole too big for the ancient car to handle and the pieces would start to fall off. First the bumpers, then the doors, then the framing and the top, until eventually only the seats would be left. Floating in midair for several seconds too long to adhere to the laws of physics, before dropping. Leaving them stranded.

They ran over a bruiser, the whole van bucking and vibrating. The choked off cry from the back caught on Max's last frayed nerve.

"You trying to hit all of them?" she snapped, her frustration lashing out to the nearest target—Trint. She was self-aware enough to know that Alec was her usual go to, but she didn't have the heart, or lack thereof, to attack the man who's breathing seemed just as unsteady as his self-appointed charge.

But she also had enough of a heart to feel guilty for the stricken expression on the X5's face. "Sorry ma'am."

Max sighed. She was starting to consider apologizing when the phone rang. It was years of training that kept her jump entirely internal at the shrill note.

She snapped the phone open without looking at the caller ID, grateful for a distraction.

A fuckin' jeep would be out of place on this damn terrain.

"Yeah?" she barely kept most of the snap out of her voice.

"Max?" Logan. She sighed.

"Yeah."

"You guys okay?"

"Yeah."

"Max."

"Maxie," Alec's voice was softer, the tone strangely soothing despite the hated nickname. "You might want to fill him in. This kid can't stay in the hospital if we want to keep those fuckers from finding him again."

She closed her eyes, forcing some calm back into herself despite the bouncing ride. It was bad enough that they couldn't give the kid proper medical attention, now they had to keep him at Sandeman's old house.

At least it was close to Terminal City.

"Yeah," her voice was smoother this time, calmer. "Look, Logan we got ourselves in a bit of a situation. The extraction didn't go as planned and we're trying to keep a kid off those fuckers' radar." She didn't notice how similar her words were to Alec's. "We've gotta set up shop at Sandeman's old house, so get ready for company. We're gonna be bringing him there as soon as Carr hijacks an ambulance."

"Ambulance? Max, what happened?" his voice was laced with concern. It was mildly comforting, if entirely unhelpful. She felt that all-too-familiar awkwardness start to creep in on their conversation.

"No time, Logan. We're fine. Hopefully the kid will be too. I'll call you in a few hours with an update."

She hung up before he could answer.

Quiet ruled in the car; the bouncing seemed to still long enough for the silence to stretch. The kid's raspy breathing permeated, setting an underlying tone of tension in what had to be the most macabre white noise Max had ever heard.

That was, until Alec broke it. His voice failing when it tried to hold on to his usual flippant tone.

"Awkward."

The joke fell flat.

It was disorienting, going from a blur of movement to a silence tense enough to snap lead then back to another blur. Alec had been trained for these situations his entire life, run countless drills to teach him the art of detachment. Hovering just out of the mind's eye in order to stay in control. Above the situation. Aware of his own movement.

And he tried. He tried to detach himself, to pull the emotional part of his brain back, to be ruled by logic, to make his muscles relax and his damn heartbeat slow.

But he was holding a terrified kid in his arms, and that sort of detachment seemed cruel. It felt too much like the guards at manticore. Like Lydecker. Or, God forbid, the doctors in Psy-Ops.

So he stayed present, stayed aware, keeping up his litany of, 'keep breathing' and 'you're gonna be okay' and 'stay with me, kid' until the words sounded like a grating buzz within his own skull. He hoped they were giving the kid comfort, though.

He felt the kid come back to himself, the little jolt that ran through his frame, when they pulled the van over behind a red and white emergency vehicle about an hour outside the city. Carr was already out, opening the ambulance doors. And Alec couldn't help but think, despite the inappropriate timing, that he was expecting the man to have a little more… hair. Or at least wear a white coat.

Then again, they did call him out of bed on a Saturday night.

"Get him ready," Max said. The doors of the van squealed when they opened, and the kid gasped, his arms jerking under the jacket like he wanted to cover his ears. "We'll bring the gurney around."

She shot the boy one last glance before jumping out of the car. Cold air leaked in from the outside, filling in the car with a stiff breeze. Alec hunched over the kid, pulling him close enough that he was dwarfed by Alec's broad frame.

The kid had gotten worse over the rest of the drive. It was hard to tell past the bruises, but he was sure his lips were blue. The discoloration in his fingertips were more clearly defined, reaching down almost to the first knuckle. What had been rasping breaths before were now so shallow they wouldn't darken asphalt.

The hands twitched under the jacket, peeking out past the zipper to brush the fabric of Alec's shirt. Alec took the hand with a light touch, the small fingers like ice between his own.

"Hey," he whispered. He glanced up at the sound of the gurney's rattle, and saw Carr and Trint wheeling it around to the side door—Max running ahead of him. He tensed in preparation to edge over the bench seat.

The boy's fingers curled around his own, making Alec's gaze snap back to the limp figure in his arms. The kid's head was hanging off of Alec's bicep, and his movements were so lethargic Alec could see the amount of thought he had to put into every one.

The boy drew in a breath, this one deeper than the others. His body tensed with the pain, but he seemed determined to ride it out.

"O'ay," he breathed. Alec furrowed his brow. His mind jumped to the first thing he thought the kid might mean.

"Yeah, you're okay."

The boy grunted, his fingers wrapping tighter around Alec's. "I's o'ay."

The transgenic stared, green eyes wide as he looked down at this boy, beaten beyond recognition—comforting him.

He didn't realize he had stopped breathing until the door opened with a squealing groan, letting in more stinging winter air. The kid didn't flinch this time. His breath slowed, as he dropped back into oblivion.

He didn't wake up when they got him out of the car, his weight held between four people working to settle him on a gurney. He didn't stir at Carr's voice, working at ninety miles per hour as he rapped off instructions. He didn't move when he was laid on the abrasions on his back, or when they got into the ambulance, his head lolling limply with the jarring.

Trint climbed up in the driver's seat of the ambulance without being told.

It only took a look passing between them for Max to jump into the passenger seat. He didn't miss when she opened up the partition window between the front and back.

There was a moment… Alec standing next to the ambulance with red and blue lights flitting across the canvas of fair skin and rain-soaked hair. He stared at the door that Max slammed shut, swallowing down the heavy fog lodged in his chest. It only settled further.

A flash of surprise crossed Carr's face when Alec was the one to climb in the back with the kid, but it was gone just as fast.

"Where's Max?"

He shut the doors behind him, unable to keep the edge out of his voice as he caught his first good view of the kid—lit under the LED lights of the van with two leather jackets acting as meager protection. He tore his eyes away, looking up at Carr as Trint started the ambulance rolling forward. Alec grabbed one of the rails along the ceiling for balance. "Max's riding shotgun. I passed field med and I'm good with my hands. Where do you want me?"

Carr accepted him after that. Alec hooked him up to oxygen and started setting up a warm saline drip and another of precious O- while Carr pulled back the jackets to assess the damage.

"Sweet Jesus," Carr breathed.

The kid was a mess. Alec knew it, had felt the abrasions and seen the bruises while in shadow. He had felt the shattered ribs shifting underneath the paper-thin layer of skin that stretched over them, painfully tight and unpadded.

It was completely different seeing it under light.

Seared flesh, furious red and smeared with black grime, spread in blotches and slashes over the kid's entire form. The worst of the burns stretched up to the kid's ribs, intercepting the ruptured knot of swelling over the shattered bones. Raised lines of brackish crimson slithered out from the wound, snaking their way over the pectoral muscles and down to the sharp jut of the kid's hipbone, covering the entirety of the purple-black bruising over the kid's abdomen.

Alec had seen damage. Far more than his share. He had seen a man's rib ripped out of his own body and embedded in his aorta. Bright red. Gushing. Air leaving lungs in a scream and throat in a choked gurgle.

But when he saw the swollen, discolored flesh on the kid's shaft… it felt like something snapped.

They locked eyes over the limp figure on the gurney, and if Alec didn't know from the kid's appearance, he certainly gathered it from the doctor's eyes.

There wasn't much of any chance.

Alec sent back a message of his own, a clenched jaw and a steady glare. "What're you waiting for?"

"This kid—he needs a hospital." Alec wasn't sure who told him that they were going to Joshua's old house, but dismissed it as unimportant. Max had plenty of chance to tell him when they were setting up the gurney. "The internal bleeding alone… we can't monitor it outside of CT scans. We'd be going off of guesses. Add the collapsed lung and the tracheal swelling—I brought what could fit in the ambulance, but he needs equipment I don't have. If we don't get him to a hospital chances are he's going to die."

"Yeah, and if you don't start working on him he's definitely going to die."

"I'm trying to help—"

"That kind of help will get this kid killed. Or worse, back with the bastards that got him here. You have an ambulance full of supplies and three universal donors with enhanced blood. So close your mouth and do what you can."

It might not have been fair. Or right. The kid had slim chances as it was, and they were spreading them thinner. But Max and Alec's faces were too well known with law enforcement, and if that didn't trip them up then whatever connections the underground ring had definitely would. They couldn't leave any trace of the kid.

If he died, at least he wouldn't have to go back.

The morbid thought only solidified his decision.

Carr didn't mention a hospital again.

It passed in a blur. As soon as Carr confirmed the internal bleeding with the abdominal rigidity and deep bruising, they had the kid hooked up to two different IV's and Alec was working on setting up IV's for a direct transfusion. Carr didn't protest.

Alec's nerves were already stretched to their breaking point, and when he looked over to find Carr starting to work on inserting a catheter in the kid's swollen cock, Alec couldn't help it.

He looked away.

It felt wrong, like an itch he couldn't scratch as he wrapped his hand around the boy's limp, blue-tinged fingers. Doing his best to focus all of his attention on hooking up the kid's end of the IV line. It wasn't until the rivulet of crimson started flowing from Alec's forearm into the boy's elbow that the movement at the corner of his peripheral finally stopped.

Alec covered the kid with his jacket. Carr didn't say a word.

"Alright," Sam sighed, coming up from his medical bag with a pair of round-edged surgical scissors. The ambulance hit another pothole, sending the gurney rattling against the straps holding it to the floor. "Let's see if there's any other hidden damage."

The transgenic found himself rubbing the kid's arm below the needle as Sam started to cut away the bandage over the kid's face. That was another thing that looked worse under the LED lights—the bandages yellowed, aged, curling at the edges, and caked with almost as much dirt as was in the boy's hair. If it was hiding any damage, it was probably also hiding an infection just as bad as the one in his side.

Carr finished cutting through the cloth, setting the scissors aside with a clatter. He began to peel the damp cloth away.

That was when the kid started choking.