I thought we were past this...

[im_always_okay]

Who: Alec
Where: Med Lab (can be occupied or no).
When: His arrival.
What: Not going down without a fight, this time.

Comments

Because Martha needs still more drama in her life...

[notrosesshadow]

Martha was on her way to the medical lab to check up on the patients. She had quite calling them hers because Dean took care of them as much as she did. She had made a few more makeshift button ups when her original showed up whole and complete again. Today's was blue. Like the one Handy had made for her, it opened off center and closed with safety pins. She was looking forward to the day the ribs felt OK enough for her to lift her arms.

On her way she passed Dean. Or at least someone who looked very much like Dean. "Hello Dean, how's your jaw feeling?" she asked. Martha was trying to be polite to the hunter, trying to show him she wasn't crazy. This was too small a place to have people think you were crazy when you weren't.

She did a double take. "Dean?" she asked, "Where did you get those other bruises?" And was it her imagination or was he younger? "Come on, I can patch you up in the medbay."

Of course!

[im_always_okay]

Dean? Alec grimaced at being called by the name. His mind raked through the various mission parameters he'd been given over the years. No Dean. Was it a new assignment?

Didn't matter. He was done killing for them.

"Who the hell are you, lady?" He demanded, brandishing the scalpel. "I'm not going to any lab. You PsyOps butchers can go fuck with someone else's brain for a change."

Re: Of course!

[notrosesshadow]

"Dean!" she cried out. "What the hell are you doing with a scalpel?" Her eyes darted left and right looking for someone else, but no one was around. "And who the hell are the PsyOps. Look, this is the Hotel talking. Perhaps it gave you whatever drug it gave the Doctor." This was stupid. She was in no condition to fight or run. And what was wrong with Dean anyway.

[im_always_okay]

"Hotel? What the hell kind of military action are you running out of a hotel? And since when does a hotel have a lab?" He was not buying Martha's crazy. He was all full up on his own! "I'm leaving. You get in my way, I kill you. That's the deal. Comprende?"

[notrosesshadow]

Martha put her hands up in a surrender gesture. "There are no military actions here except you. And you're not even real military. Just some demon hunter who is really good a stitching up wounds." She hadn't moved yet though. She wasn't strictly in his way... "You saved me last time I was in trouble... why the sudden killing?"

[raised_fromhell]

The lift dinged open and Dean stepped out, brandishing an armload of clothes stolen from Julian's room. The doctor had requested a change of more comfortable clothing, and the hunter could not exactly disagree that being laid up was usually better when your ass wasn't hanging out the back of a hospital gown

[im_always_okay]

"Lady, I've never seen you before in my life." Unless they'd already been messing around in his head. His scowl deepened. Max told him this would happen if he fought again. Damn them.

The second voice didn't startle him, but it complicated things. This one sounded like a voice of authority. Unfortunate. Those were harder to kill. "You're going to have to kill me, because I'm not going back to any lab."

He turned slowly, taking stock of the situation as he was trained. He was not trained for the sight of his dead brother holding a gun on him. "Ben? Max killed you..."

[notrosesshadow]

Martha's eyes widened when Dean's doppleganger stepped around the corner. Except the doppleganger was holding clothing and had a bruised jaw. Her brows knitted together and then the lightbulb turned on. "Dean!" And then she realized just how perilous this whole situation was. Normally a quick thinker, she wasn't exactly ready for something of this caliber. So she just stood there, trying to decide if she had enough of an advantage to trip the guy maybe.

[raised_fromhell]

The kid looked like he had seen a ghost. But Dean couldn't help but stare himself for a second. It was like his freaking reflection walked off the mirror, only it was twelve years younger and not nearly as abused

[im_always_okay]

Tactical analysis suggested that this was what happened when Manticore caught and 'rehabilitated' its missing X5s. Alec was in no hurry to get himself reprogrammed. Then again, Max swore Ben was dead when she left him. How had they done this to his twin? Problem: Unnecessary to resolve at the current moment.

Further analysis indicated that a pair of matched X5s in a battle would favor the one with the gun slightly, although his twin looked to be in worse shape than he was. Additionally, no Manticore guard would allow an X5 to walk away, armed or no. Problem: Immediate. Most likely a trap.

"I haven't harmed anyone, yet. I also don't do the prisoner thing anymore, sorry, brother." He watched the other man carefully. "I've been through reprogramming twice. I won't do it again. You're going to have to kill me, because I'm done being Manticore's weapon."

[notrosesshadow]

Martha tried to catch Dean's eye to see if there was anything she could do. "Dean's right. You're in the Hotel. It kidnaps people from all over. None of us know what Manticore is." She took one tiny and, she hoped, non-threatening step forward. "No one here is trying to reprogram you. We wouldn't know how even if we wanted to." She had made the easy leap that something like that happened in whatever universe this man was from.

[raised_fromhell]

Dean saw her take a step and he really hoped she was trying to creep close enough to the infirmary doors to get in and lock it behind her. They could not afford to have another doctor wounded more than they already were. And if things went south here, he hoped there would still be one able to save his sorry ass and this moron.

This kid called him brother. Did he think he was his brother? Yeah. Right. And reprogramming. That was new.

"Kid, I'm not your brother. I have a brother. He doesn't look like you. You're too short. And not old enough." Dean stared at him for a second more before lowering his gun just a hair. "I don't have a fucking clue what 'Manticore' is. But its a pretty lame name for a evil cooperation."

He started to relax his hand. "Look...I've been in one fight enough alright. I don't want another. Just put the damn knife down and you can go. Try running across the damn desert and see how far you can get before you come right back. You're not leaving with a piece of medical equipment we need for the wounded."

[im_always_okay]

"No, I guess we weren't ever really brothers. We never met." He looked between the man and woman. Neither of them were dressed like his usual Manticore handlers. The man was clearly in need of medical attention and not healing like a X5 should. Then again, his brother had turned into a mass murdering psycho, so who knew what else was actually wrong with him?

He lowered the scalpel slowly, watching the gun. As far as weapons go, it was woefully inadequate anyway, so losing it would be no big sacrifice. "Fine." He tossed the scalpel harmlessly to the side. "Satisfied?"

[notrosesshadow]

Martha breathed a sigh of relief when the scalpel landed on the carpet relatively close to her feet. She gingerly crouched down and picked it up, wincing at the pain. Then she backed up a few paces gaining precious feet towards the infirmary doors. "Do you have a name? It'll be easier than calling you Not Dean," she said, not meaning to crack a joke. She was positioned so she could run to the infirmary if need be.

[raised_fromhell]

Dean lowered the gun to his side and blew out a breath, trying not to grimace too much to show how he visibly hurt. The muscles in his neck and shoulders just ached from having been wound tight with tension.

"Thank you." He dropped the commanding tone of his voice. He sounded weary now, just a guy aching for a ice pack and a cold beer.

The hunter gestured down the hallway in one direction. "Main Lobby is that way. If you see the manager, feel free to punch him the face for me." He supplied, lifting the edge of his shirt to holster his weapon once more. "Don't go threatening anyone else. Especially if you're walking around looking like my twin. I don't want to be dragged into your crap."

[im_always_okay]

If this was a trap, it was the most bizarre trap Manticore ever sprung on him. Where were all the soldiers? He glanced between them again, then down the way Dean indicated. Was it possible this wasn't actually his worst nightmare come true...?

He looked back to Martha, weighing his options. Either they really were Manticore... in which case, they already knew who he was anyway. Or they were telling the truth and had never heard of Manticore... in which case, it wouldn't matter what he told them. "My primary designation is X5-494."

Alec turned his telescopic vision on Dean, getting a close-up look at the obvious injuries. He definitely wasn't 493. "Why do you look like me? What's your barcode designation?"