Dark Angel Fanfic: A Flash (5/17)
Title: A Flash
Author: poestheblackcat
Rating: PG-13
Characters/Pairings: Alec/Max, Alec/Rachel (memories of), Logan, Berrisford, Sarah (OFC)
Warning/Spoilers: Major spoilers for the episode “The Berrisford Agenda.”
Summary: A flash is all it takes for Alec to notice the young girl with the locket. Enter Alec’s sweet-yet-spunky daughter with Rachel, Sarah. Of course, she gets in trouble-like father like daughter. Takes place in 2028. Not as bad as it sounds.
Disclaimer: All recognizable characters not mine, yadda-yadda.
AN: Ooh. A Max and Alec chapter. Max is pissed off as usual and Alec is…well, you’ll see.
A Flash
Chapter 5
Max ground her teeth in frustration. Stubborn, pigheaded, stupid jerk. Idiot. Ass. She wanted to smack his dummy head so hard it would fly off all the way to Canada for making her worry about him like this. No. Make that China. Or even better, Mars. That’s where all men are from anyway, right?
For three weeks, he had been acting weird, all quiet and ‘Heathcliff-like,’ as her sista Original Cindy had put it once. Three long weeks with hardly a smart-ass comment or cocky comeback. Trust him to be able to annoy her by not being annoying!
Glaring at her SIC working diligently across the room, she wondered what had caused this relapse and blamed it on whatever had occurred on that day she had nixed following him. He had come back even more sullen than when he’d left and wouldn’t even tell Joshua or Dalton what was up. Whenever he was in his apartment, he’d play that damn piano for hours on end instead of sleeping or watching his ‘boob tube,’ which were normal Alec activities. Everyone in Terminal City had noticed the abrupt change in Alec and there were worried murmurs about his behavior.
Of course, while in the public spotlight, he appeared to be still the same ‘people person’ that he used to be, but it was just an act. When back home at TC, he seemed to be lost deep in thought at times, and was quite somber at others. Don’t get the wrong idea; he still laughed and smiled sometimes, but they just fell flat, as if there was no real emotion behind them.
The only time he really cheered up was when he answered his cell phone, which had begun to ring more often. He had begun taking some of his calls to where no one could hear the conversation. Max wondered if this was some weird kind of depression or maybe madness and wracked her brain for what she needed to do to get him out of this funk, for her own sanity’s sake. Seriously, what was the big secret?
“Stop it, Max,” Alec said quietly, putting an abrupt brake on her train of thought. “I can’t work with you staring at me and growling like that.”
Max slammed her pen down. “Then stop and tell me what the hell is going on with you!” she demanded.
Alec blinked at her slowly. His voice steady and serious, he replied, “I told you. Nothing is going on with me. We’ve just been really busy with the-”
“Alec. Don’t try to sell me that ‘I’m always alright’ crap,” Max interrupted, exasperated. “You’ve been moping for almost a month and I think it’s about time we talked,” she said, standing and walking over to his desk. “Now start.”
Alec rubbed his hand tiredly over his face. “What do you want me to say, Max? You wanna talk about my feelings? What I’m thinking? Huh? You wanna have a whole touchy-feely buffet?” He turned his face up to look Max in the eye.
Max crossed her arms across her chest and nailed him with some attitude. “Yeah. Feelings and thoughts. We can start there.”
Alec leant back in his chair and mimicked her move. “Fine. I’m thinking that no matter what we do, people out there are always going to hate us, see our kind as inferior, as animals, or worse, and that for our children, our children’s children-it’s just going to be the same hell for them as it was for us. What we want-real freedom-it’s never gonna happen. It’s hopeless.”
Max stared back at him, jaw hanging open. She gave an unbelieving laugh before speaking. “You really think that? You think that what we’re doing right now is useless? You didn’t used to think that. I remember you used to be pretty optimistic about all of this.”
Alec stood, towering over Max’s petite frame. “Well, I’m not anymore,” he said coldly. “We’ve been working our asses off for this for seven years and what do we have to show for it? Almost nothing. All we’ve got is a pretty shaky reassurance that they won’t bomb us first thing tomorrow morning. And I’m being pessimistic about this?! I can’t even-” He stopped before he could say what he couldn’t do.
“You can’t even what, Alec?” Max said forcefully. She put her hand on her friend’s arm, urging him to look at her, to trust her. She wanted to see his eyes, which sometimes were the only portals to what Alec was really feeling inside. “You can tell me,” she said softly, gently.
Alec averted his gaze and sat back down, chest heaving from his outburst. “There’s nothing to tell,” he said, his voice rough.
Right. Max could be stubborn, too, but nagging at Alec was like head-butting a brick wall repeatedly. She knew from experience. Reluctantly, she huffed back to her desk, intending to keep a close eye on him, even if he wouldn’t talk to her.
After a beat, Alec spoke again. “Sorry if I haven’t been Mr. Sunshine lately. Just give me some time, Max. I’ll work it out.” He leveled a look at Max, giving a faint twitch of his lips in lieu of a smile.
“That’s just it, Alec. You don’t have to do it on your own. I thought you knew that.” Max smiled at him sadly.
“Thanks, Max.” Alec nodded. “But I-” He was cut off by the ringing of Max’s phone. “You better get that.”
Max eyed him with a look that said ‘We’re not finished’ before answering her phone. “Go for Max.”
“Hey. It’s Logan.” Right, Logan. He was a great guy but he always called at the most inconvenient times. Like now, for instance.
“Hey, Logan. What’s up?” She kept her eyes on Alec, who seemed to have gone back to his work after rolling his eyes at hearing who the caller was, but was actually listening to her side of the conversation.
Logan gave a brief pause before speaking. That meant he needed to ask her for a favor. “Remember my cousin Bitsy’s daughter Brittany?” The hell? Random.
“Ummm. Yeah. I helped you babysit her when we had that whole mermaid dealio with White way back when. What about her?” Alec had tensed up slightly when she’d said that. ‘Babysit’ was a trigger word. Hmm. Interesting.
“Turn on the TV,” Logan instructed.
Max did so, and Alec gave up all pretenses of trying to appear to be busy with paperwork. The newswoman was reporting on a group kidnapping from a local school. “…snatched each child when he or she was standing apart from the other children on the playground, as can be seen from this footage.”
The image was shaky and pixilated, but three figures could be seen pulling at a much smaller figure who struggled briefly before falling limply into their arms. She, for the smaller figure was obviously a girl, was slung over one of the men’s shoulders, long blonde hair trailing down, and carried to a van with no license plates. The footage was taken from above, most likely from a hoverdome, hence the grainy picture.
“The video playing right now is of the abduction of twelve-year-old Brittany Morland from Mariners Elementary School this morning. The three other missing children are Lindsey Harrison, aged 10; Jacob Wright, also aged 10, and Sarah Berrisford, aged 8. For those of you joining us right now…”
“Max?” came from the phone, Logan’s voice tinny over the line.
But Max was busy staring at Alec’s reaction. He had paled visibly at the mention of that last name, hands clenching at papers long forgotten. Berrisford, as in that Berrisford? “Yeah. I’m here. So Brittany’s been kidnapped and you need my help?”
“Yeah, that’s it. Can you?” Logan and Max still had that give-and-take deal going on; Logan would help out with TC with Eyes Only broadcasts and contacts and the like, and Max and Alec would help him out with jobs whenever they could.
“Tell him we’ll help,” Alec said in a low voice, eyes still glued to the television screen.
Max frowned as she answered. “We’ll be there in twenty.” She snapped the phone shut before she could hear Logan’s “Thanks, Max.”
She turned to Alec, who had stood up from his desk by now and was headed to the door, the dazed look replaced by grim determination and…anger? “What is all this about?” she asked, hands on her hips. “Are you doing this to help Logan out or that girl, something Berrisford? You still feeling guilty about what happened back then? Like you have to repay Berrisford?”
Alec stopped, hand on the door handle, looking as if he was contemplating something. Apparently he had made up his mind because what he said next was a bombshell that left Max with a shell-shocked expression on her face.
It was uttered quietly and calmly, belying the rigid set to his shoulders. “I’m doing it because Sarah’s my daughter.”
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AN: Let the adventure begin! What do you think?
Chapter 6