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

[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.

He'd have to see if he could weasel out of Jack the location of his room to do the same for the other man. He heard Martha's voice and really paid it no mind until he heard the words "Sudden Killing".

Dean's head snapped up from the pile his hands to the hallway. He was starting at the back of some kid's head and Martha, hands up in surrender and obviously scared and confused.

He registered the posture of the man in between them and the glint of a weapon in his hand. A scalpel. Dean froze, his mind racing in a hundred directions at once. Had this kid just walked into the infirmary and killed Jack and Julian? Was he making similar threats at Martha?

His hand had already lifted his gun from where it was tucked into the waist band of his jeans and held it ready, pointed at the kid's head. He raised his voice, which hurt like a mother to clench his teeth and sound all official. His voice grated like gravel from not having been used much the last two days. "You don't put that knife down, I kill you."

[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.

A shifter? Maybe. No. Not in the hotel. Himself? From the past? Possibly. But the kid had called him Ben. He wasn't a Ben. Who the fuck was Ben?

His mind quickly flashed back to some strange night when a woman mistook Jo's picture for someone she knew. Ah. That seemed a bit more logical...

All the while Dean had been processing that thought, he had kept his weapon trained on the younger man's head. "I don't know who the hell Ben is." He said, managing through the pain of his aching jaw. "Or Max." His eyes narrowed a little.

"I'm going out on a limb and guess you're new here." Dean observed. "I'm Dean Winchester, I'm a demon hunter. That's Doctor Martha Jones. This is the Hotel California. Welcome to your cozy new home. We're all prisoners here. Put the scalpel down and you can walk away from this without an extra hole to breath out of." He remained ready with his weapon. "Unless you did something to Jack and Julian in there." He added, in indication of the infirmary and its two patients. "Then I don't make any promises."

[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?"

[notrosesshadow]

"Well it does roll off the tongue nicely," Martha said without missing a beat.

She was starting to feel superfluous now. The strange man with a barcode was more interested in Dean anyway, and his weapon was now in her hands.

"Since no one is bleeding or dying, I'm going to go see how our patients in the infirmary are doing. Unless you need me out here."

It was more that her legs had started visibly shaking as the adrenaline had left, and it was probably time for more painkillers. And she really didn't want to show weakness in front of either man.

[raised_fromhell]

Dean stared at the man, his eyes narrowing a little in confusion but he sighed and showed simple resignation in his features. "I don't have a barcode, Terminator. And I'm not John Conner either." He started an approach, neither threatened by the young man or caring much for that matter.

"And I don't know why we look like each other. I'm Dean. I'm from 2010, South Dakota. Just how old are you, kid?" He demanded, stopping on his way towards the infirmary after Martha with his armful of clothing. He was now three feet from the doppelganger, looking him in the eye. They even had the same eye color.

[im_always_okay]

"Doesn't it just?" Alec replied easily as he watched Martha. She didn't appear to be a threat, but he'd been fooled before. He'd noticed the two men in the lab as he made his way out. For their sake, he hoped Martha wasn't actually Manticore. 'Checking on the patients' was more often than not code for 'dissecting the failed experiments'. "What's wrong with your patients?"

He looked back to Dean when he approached. He didn't move, watching carefully. The other man didn't appear to be threatening any longer. Something very strange was happening here.

"I'm nineteen," he answered, not bothering to insist he wasn't a 'kid'. No need to be picky about semantics. He took a breath when Dean stood in front of him, enhanced senses picking up gun oil, gun smoke, blood, metal, and sweat... all the markers of a soldier without the barcode. Very strange. "Give or take a few months of viability testing. How old are you?"

[notrosesshadow]

She leaned against a wall as nonchalantly as possible to answer his question. "One almost died from a gun wound, the other almost died from internal bleeding." She almost answered his question about age, but he was talking to Dean.

"Please excuse me," she murmured as she turned and made her way to the infirmary, using the wall for support.

[raised_fromhell]

"Thirty-one." Dean replied. "What year is it where you're from?"

This guy looked uncanny to what he was when he was younger, even with ridged posture of a trained solider. It was scary to think just how dangerous he might have been with a knife if he had even half the skill the hunter possessed at that age with blades.

"You got something better than a license plate number for a name?