Miserable Max on the Space Needle
For a moment she thought Ben was back, calling her name from somewhere behind her back. The worried voice was that of the sweetly caring brother of her childhood, free of the insane obsession characterizing their last encounters. Seeing him sight of him standing there, his tall, handsome appearance triggering surreal memories of Ben’s boyishly smirking younger self, Max could feel herself starting to smile.
Then her seizure-fogged brain kicked in, connecting the familiar face with the annoying character of her supposed breeding partner. He was listed way up in the list of people Max didn’t want to see right now.
Completely lacking the willingness to hide her aversion, she spat out an angry “Go away,” her harshness breaking out with the intention of forcing him to leave. Her words, however, didn’t seem to have any impact on Alec’s usual smugness and the only reason Max knew that they’d affected him was her own familiarity with the game of putting off people.
And so, aware that soon she might need more than that emergency dose of tryptophan from her jacket pocket, she resigned herself to his presence, telling herself that she should be thankful that he’d found her and that treating him with minimum politeness wouldn’t kill her after all.
But all Max had wanted were some quiet moments alone with her misery after the craziness of the last several weeks. It had been one thing after the other, never leaving her a break to look back and catch up…. her escape, the shock and helplessness of seeing Logan almost die right before her eyes, learning about the virus, rescuing the kids, Manticore’s new villain with the crazy idea that her DNA was even wackier than that of the others…
And even in those rare hours when she just ignored her new responsibilities to plunge into the familiar world of Crash and Jam Pony, she couldn’t simply be Max the bike messenger. The incredulous excitement about her sudden rise from the dead followed her around like her own shadow, excited whispers buzzing around her as the news spread. Everywhere she went, Max was confronted with people hugging her, wanting to know what had happened, where she had been, how she could possibly be back... It was an overwhelming thrill to know that so many people had missed her - and yet, as she repeated the story of her heart transplant over and over, the old weariness and strain of her double life that kept her from really enjoying all the excitement.
Before, she just would have visited Logan, knowing that with him she could just forget everything for a few, precious hours of food and smiles …. but now she didn’t even have this comfort anymore. So Max had turned to her old sanctuary, the first signs of the shakes creeping up on her as she made her way up the stairs of the Space Needle.
But at least she had been alone, finding some peace in the calming sight of the wide, open sky over the city that was so liberating after Manticore’s stifling cells and narrow corridors… until, after having stuck around lately like a blurred figure in the background of a photo, Alec had shown up, breaching the last remainder of her privacy here in the one place she could find it.
Max knew it was neither fair nor true to make him the scapegoat for all that had gone wrong with her life in the last few months, but right now she just didn’t care. Right now, there was only her seizure, transforming her otherwise so efficient body into an aching mess, only made worse by the fact that she couldn’t go over to Logan and let his cool hands soothe her, carefully stroking her hair as he’d done before.
Right now, in a state in which reasonable knowledge didn’t matter, she despised Alec, simply because he was alive and Ben wasn’t, because he was going through life with such a nonchalant ease that was the very opposite of the dark, pondering seriousness that made things so hard for Ben. Alec had fooled her into trusting him, had tried to kill Logan, had known of the virus and hadn’t warned her: he had….
“Forgot your tryptophan?” Alec’s voice, coolly pretending to not really care, interrupted her self-absorbed misery.
As she gave him a snorted attempt at laughter, Max admitted to herself that his cynical egotism wasn’t that far from her own attitude. Maybe she was so easily irritated with his selfish, immature behavior because she might have become just like that that herself, had she not escaped from Manticore. But still, right here and now, she simply didn’t want to acknowledge any of those insights, still refusing to treat him like the reluctantly caring person he’d turned out to be in the woods the week before. “Thing is, when people think you’re dead they throw away your meds.”
Her smart remark had meant to brush him off… but he saw right through her, his quietly pondering smirk suddenly making him much more likeable.
And even though only seconds ago it had seemed like such a good idea to blame him for every evil in the universe, now Max was tired of it. She’d made it so easy for him to walk away, trying to run him off with more hostility than even he deserved… and still Alec had stayed, reluctant and awkward, his fidgeting nervousness badly covered with cool, military detachment. His wordless refusal to leave told Max more about his character than any of his attempts at playing the tough guy: a true Manticore soldier would have obeyed its perverted philosophy of leaving behind the sick and injured long before now.
It was because she’d allowed herself to relax and soften up towards him for a second that his question hit her so hard.
“Nobody else who could have a bottle?”
Logan…
She just wanted to be with him, in the Penthouse’s comfort, warm and fed and happy and back in her old life that now seemed so wonderfully uncomplicated. She had tried so hard to stay optimistic in the last weeks, to believe in a better future, despite Manticore and the virus, Ben’s and Tinga’s death, despite her fears for Zack’s life after leaving him behind with the people for whom he was only an assembly of spare parts. But underneath her thoroughly upbeat smile it had all been there…. the hopelessness and insecurity, the anger about everything they had taken, the helpless fear at the mere impossibility of finding a cure now that every sensible scientist was on the run...
Behind her Max could hear Alec’s breath catch for an instant, as if he wanted to say something but didn’t know how to deal with her alarmingly unfiltered emotionality. And so again she made it easy for him, toughening up her features to that of the blank-faced soldier so deeply engrained into them all.
Then, after another moment of silence, she heard him retreat quietly… and even though she just wanted to be alone, even though he had every right to turn away in annoyed frustration, Max almost missed his company.
----------- to be continued -----------
Title: High above
Author: Geeky_Apple
Ratings: PG
Pairings/Characters: Max/Logan, Alec-friendly
Timeline: In between ‘Bag’em’ and ‘Proof of Purchase
Disclaimer: I don’t own Dark Angel
Many thanks to
fauxcynic for suggestions, interesting language-bits, mistake-finding and answering my confused questions.