Title: The Cure

Author: Lusmeitli

Rating: PG-13 (but with some warning for language)

Show: DA

Disclaimer: Not mine, no money involved, just for fun, so don’t sue, thank you.

Genre: Experimental – again

Type: Standalone

Pairing: Well, I bet it’ll be a really big surprise

Summary: This is another take on ‘the cure’ situation, but with an additional twist.

 

A/N: This is purely experimental. I just wanted to change the odds a little and see what might happen. It starts out rather dark. You know me. J Enjoy.

 

 

 

Wild honey. That was the word. The liquor had the rich, dark, golden colour of wild honey. It had to be the most beautiful colour he had ever seen.

 

No other bottle had ever looked so nice, so tempting, so wonderfully promising like this one. Smooth glass, the golden liquor inside, the black and white tag on the bottle assuring him it was the good kind of booze. The one before the Pulse, when people still knew how to make a good drink.

 

His fingers slowly slid up the neck of the bottle. Wonderful. Bottled numbness. Yes, it would numb him alright. No need for a second or a third one. This time, this one – and only just this one – would do the trick. He opened the cap, the cracking of the safety closure made him swallow, hard. Then he pulled the bottle closer. Carefully.

 

He closed his eyes and breathed in the rich scent and it made tears sting his eyes. Heaven. All these other times, he had been cheated on. Only ever got the taste, but never the effect. He had fooled himself, each time, hoping against better knowledge – but not today.

 

He poured himself a glass, a generous double shot, and he leaned back on his couch. If this would be any other place than Seattle, the sun might be playing with the golden liquor in his glass right now. But this was Seattle and if the heavy clouds outside his window were any indication at all, it would be pouring down again in under an hour.

 

He brought the glass to his lips, taking a sip. Savouring the malty taste, heavy, leaving a small, bitter taste in his mouth. And he enjoyed it. Like never before. Enjoyed the burning down his throat and he could feel it all the way down, into his stomach. Never had it tasted so good. And he had had the good kind of booze before. But this, this was different. This time, he would walk the whole nine yards.

 

The stinging pain in his left side reminded him of just how much trouble he had gone through to get the cure. And he had actually had to wait for two entire days until he could get out of TC’s infirmary, without Joshua fussing over him. Two whole days. 48 hours of  “Alec made little fella and Logan happy, very happy”, crushing hugs and countless pats on his shoulder from the enthusiastic dogman. Much less, but seemingly much longer, were the two hours of Max staring at him with tears in her eyes, a scowl on her face – got to keep up appearances – asking him the same questions over and over again. How. Where. Why.

 

And he couldn’t really answer them. But he had somehow imagined it to be different, this scenario, to be quite honest. No great declarations of gratitude. Something more Max. Something more along the lines of, “thanks, you jerk, now get out of my face”. Instead, a scowl, tears and a silence that nearly killed him. He had expected to feel better. That his guilt would finally die down. It didn’t, however. In fact, seeing Max’ face made it all worse. And he didn’t get why. The couple could finally touch and compensate their long pent-up love. Hell, if they had any sense, they’d be shagging like bunnies right now!

 

But no. All he got was a scowling Max, glaring at him and he wondered how he had managed to fuck up coming riding in and saving the day. He had looked at it from all perspectives, really. Alright, so maybe he should have said something a little more sensitive than, “it’s the cure, Max, now go horizontal with Logan”. But he had been tired and he had had a bullet in his side that was just being taken out. Not exactly the best moment to be sensitive.

 

But Max knew him, and he was quite sure that his choice of words hadn’t resulted in her non-stop scowl. Or the tears. Heck, he had called her names after she had called him names (and hers were a lot meaner than his) and she had never cried before. The usual reaction would have been a smack to his head, or a side kick to his jaw, depending on how much distance there was between their bodies and whether it was one of Max’ good or bad days.

 

So he really didn’t know how he had managed to fuck up this time. He had paid his dues. They were even now. After he had found out about that lab freak who could work something out, he had paid extra attention as to how often Max had saved his ass and how many times he had saved hers. When he had brought in Joshua’s painting with the notes of the scientist on it, and the freak had hung over it for hours, trying to make out the writing and such, he had sat there and made a list. Photographic memory was a damn good thing if you were getting up to date with your peccadillo list.

 

The list showed him that Max was eleven saves ahead of him. So he was very careful on the next missions. Which had the side effect that Max got very suspicious and even broodier than usual. That and she hit him more often, but he could see past that, with his greater aim in focus. He would not let her irritate him into making another mistake where she would haul his ass out of a tight spot.

 

He kept the list to himself and each time he saved her ass, he ticked it off the list. Actually, he had saved her four times more than she did him, but he thought of it as some kind of an added bonus.

 

The freak really was a freak. Alec had spent a lot of time (and money) on that guy. But he seemed to be making progress. Alec had managed to get all the requirements for him. A sample of Max’ blood was the easiest of it all. Trust Max to get into a tight situation with White within the week. Alec got her out of there. Not the Alec way, but being extra super careful. He had been downright glad that she had been out cold and didn’t notice how he took the rag, he had been trying to stop her bleeding with, with him.

 

Getting Logan’s blood had been a little more difficult. But Alec could trust Logan to inflict some injury on himself just trying to survive day to day. It had happened while chopping up some mushrooms. And the older man had been weeping like a child. A cut in the finger, really big deal. So what, the fingertip was looking a little bit detached. But the doctor sewed it on again alright. Alec had seen far worse, had had far worse, and there had always been considerably more blood involved and he had never been such a sissy about it.

 

Of course whining was what Max called “sensitivity”. And apparently chicks had the hots for sensitive men. Just like cooking pasta and drinking wine seemed to be sensitive. Alec couldn’t quite understand Max. All this “wooing” and “courting”. It was such a big effort. To him, it seemed like a waste of time. If he wanted to scratch his itch, he went to a bar and asked a girl to come home with him. None had said no until now, so it seemed to work just fine. He didn’t need to buy her dinner, let alone cook for her or show off his injuries or boast with some wine from before the Pulse. So he was quite sure Logan wouldn’t really miss the bottle of Jack Daniels he had borrowed from him.

 

He refilled his glass and drank slowly. He wanted to enjoy this for as long as he could. And he already started to feel the effects after his third double shot. It was a warm, comfortable buzz in his tummy.

 

Nice. Just like the freak had promised. Alec had threatened him a little, so he could be sure the cure really would be the cure and not just some placebo or something that didn’t work. He couldn’t afford to let another cure slip away. So he decided to temporarily move in with the freak to be able to control what was going on. Sometimes, the guy needed a little incentive to go on. Usually it didn’t take much more than a few subtle threats or no pizza for a day. So he had had to cut him a little, when he was getting really unmotivated after three months of unsuccessful experimenting. That had delivered the boost he had hoped for. The cure had been delivered within the week. And suddenly it worked. But Alec was no fool. He had it double checked in three labs all over the town with the blood samples of Max and the Logster.

 

Of course the special cure for Alec was an added bonus. It was, if you will, an experiment gone wrong. The freak had been really upset, because he had thought he had found the cure and Alec had inquired in no uncertain terms whether his girlfriend was as pretty in reality as she was on that picture. And the geek had babbled that he had created a wrong kind of cure. But as he explained, Alec had smiled. It would be his kind of cure. The geek hadn’t noticed how Alec had taken it with him, that little vial with the pink fluid in it. Enough for a long evening, an entire night of being able – finally – to get drunk.

 

He had harboured that vial like his life essence. Well, actually better, seeing as he was getting quite sloppy with it and tended to bleed all over places. He had watched this pink fluid in wonder and amazement. It would render him, for one evening and one evening only, normal. His revved up body would still be revved up, just not his immune system. It would be out of order, on holidays, whilst he could get really, really smashed. Really numb.

 

This thought helped him through a lot. It pulled him through when things started to go wrong for a while. Getting even wasn’t really easy to do. And it cost him another hole in his body. Unfortunately, White had come into the equation and things had gotten a little messy. The freak had been able to escape, with his help, so that explained the bullet in his side. But he was sure White’s shoulder hurt equally bad, where he had placed his bullet. Not that he hadn’t aimed for the face. But White being White, he hadn’t come alone and had brought company. Party-pooper. And that company was quite disturbingly insistent in wanting to join the game. So that kick to Alec’s hand just when he was pulling the trigger had saved White’s face, quite literally.

 

So now here he was, starting to feel delightfully light-headed and he was in an altogether rather good mood. Hadn’t he wanted to feel numb? He shrugged. Oh well, he’d take this, too. As long as he didn’t whine like the Log (god, that man was pathetic), he’d be perfectly alright. In fact, it might make Alec even more of a man to face his misery with a smile on his face. It was, after all, his second best feature of his body. The first being his ass. Max was obsessed with his butt. Really, she couldn’t seem to get over it at times. Looking for all kinds of excuses to touch it, even if she said it was actually kicking and not touching as such. He knew better though. Yes, his butt was nice. And Max couldn’t make it any less nice, no matter how hard she glared.

 

When he reached for the bottle, he had to squint quite a bit to make things stable and stay in focus. What a beautiful, beautiful bottle. He hugged it to him after he poured himself another shot. Damn, that buzz felt nice. He chuckled.

Max never chuckled. She hardly ever smiled and when she did, it never, ever was directed at him. He couldn’t understand why he thought she was hot and why he did all those things for her. There was very little about her that was female. Kicking his ass? Very unladylike. Such bad language? Her mother would have had her wash her mouth with soap. Alec smiled. Max’ mother must have been one hell of a woman. They certainly hadn’t messed with her attitude genes, or otherwise she wouldn’t be such a bitch. He had known lots of female transgenics, some quite intimately, but not one had been as bitchy as Max. It was totally not sexy.

 

And damn, it was attractive.

 

He had never known he was into S/M until he had met Max. He craved being hurt by her. Or so it seemed. He did everything he could to be close to her. Heck, he did things for her he wouldn’t even do for money!

 

Like baby-sit Gem’s little brat. One look in Max’ eyes and he had given in. Alec winced at the memory of that. He could still hear the howling in his ears. What had been worst was when he had stared at her howling in the crib, Max had suggested he take her out. So he did. And that little thing had not stopped. Max had smacked him in the head, asking what he had done wrong, Gem had told her the baby would stop crying as soon as she was lifted up and she still was crying at the top of her tiny lungs. So he had pulled the baby closer, very carefully, to his chest, gently rubbing her back. She had quieted down for exactly one moment and Max had given him a very weird look. If he hadn’t known better, he would have said it was something akin to amazement or adoration. And then that brat threw up all over him and actually smiled – SMILED! – at Max. Max had instantly been wooed by that trick, but he was the one with the sticky, stinky t-shirt on and that spawn of hell on his arm. And then it had smiled at him and he caught himself smiling back! Humiliated by a mini-transgenic. Alec sighed. The things he did for Max.

 

“Alec.”

 

He looked up and wasn’t really surprised to see her suddenly stand in front of him. Of course Max could do that, escape from his head and personify right there, in his living room. She was Max, after all. Scary, glaring, sex-oozing, adorable Max.

 

She scowled at him, arms crossed in front of her chest.

 

He beamed at her, highly delighted to see her, lifting his glass. “Max!”

 

He tried to get up from the couch – a gentleman does that, right? – but found it very difficult, since it didn’t seem to let him go. After some struggling, he won. The room was moving with him, which he found amusingly surreal. But he focused on Max standing in front of him and hugged her, bottle in his left, glass in his right.

 

“Max! I wass jus’ thinkin’ ‘bout you!”

 

He found himself sitting again before long and Max’ hands on his arms to steady him.

 

“Alec, what did you do?”

 

He smiled at her. “I cured your luv bug, I’m curin’ me now. Wanna drink?” He held out the bottle to her. It was a very generous offer, he thought, since this was the really, really good stuff and he wasn’t usually one to share. But with Max it was something different. He’d share even this one with her. The expensive kind of booze, the numbing kind of booze. The kind that made him happy. And Max frown.

 

“You can’t get drunk Alec, we can’t. What did you take?”

 

He patted her cheek patiently. “No worries, ‘s all good. The geek that got me your cure made me a lil extra so I can get wasted. Ain’t that swell?”

 

“Swell?” Her frown deepened.

 

“Swell. Such a lovely word. Saw it on a show the other day, no wait, some old film, used it all the time. It’s a swell word, swell, dontcha think?”

 

She made a move to grab his arms and get him standing. “Alright, come on, we have to get you to sober up.”

 

“No, thank you,” Alec said, letting himself falling back down on the couch, splattering some liquor on himself and the couch in the process. “I like me like this. ‘S real good stuff, this…,” he concentrated to read the label, but the letters were dancing out of line and he chuckled, “really good stuff. Even has dancin’ letters. Look!”

 

And with that he thrust the bottle in front of her face. She, however, was entirely disinterested at the cool dancing letters. A fact, he couldn’t understand. Much like her sighing now.

 

“What am I gonna do with you?”

 

He felt slightly worried that Max would spoil his getting-plastered-evening. “No ass kickin’ tonight, ‘k? I fuckin’ gave you the cure, so no ass kickin’.” He considered this. “And no punchin’. No smackin’. In fact, no violence at all.” He patted her cheek. “Smile, Maxie. For a girl who’s just shagged her brains out you look awfully unhappy.”

 

The moment it was out of his mouth, he realised he might have been a little too blunt. But she didn’t smack him, nor hit him. No violence. Perhaps the glare then? But when she looked up at him again, she didn’t glare at him. In fact, she was looking at him in a very odd way. One that sent a really hot shiver down his spine. God, that booze was pulling off nice tricks.

 

“Alec,” she said softly, her voice sounding somewhat chocked, “stupid Alec.”

 

“It didn’t work?” Alec was in a frenzy in a second. But that was impossible, he had it double checked three times, it had worked there! Something must have gone wrong during the—

 

“It worked alright.”

 

Oh. “Oh.” But then… “So what’s got me stupid again?”

 

“Alec…” She sighed and sat on the coffee table in front of him, taking away the bottle from his one hand, the glass from the other and he let it happen. He let her take away his wonderful bottle of gorgeous booze! Because she was Max and Max could just do that. He felt really dizzy when she clasped his hands in hers.

 

He was waiting for her to explain and that had better be a damn good explanation for he might be rather tipsy by now, but he still knew this peccadillo list. He had it all covered, they were even and why the fuck wasn’t she shagging Logan? Or kissing him? Or just with him? Why was she here? All of a sudden, realisation dawned on Alec.

 

“Oh… Logan, he… he’s not quite the man, eh?” He couldn’t make out her expression, but he decided to take it for embarrassment and squeezed her hands reassuringly. “He got too excited, eh? Well don’t worry, you’ll get ‘round to it. You have time now, no need to rush. Logan’s not in bloom anymore, but you’ll get there, you two.”

 

Again, she gave him a weird look. He was nearly certain she would hit him any second now, so he carefully slipped his hands out of hers and put them up in front of him. Better be prepared for the worst.

 

But what she did next had to be a side-effect of the booze no one had ever told him about.

 

“I don’t want Logan. I want you.”

 

And then she leant forward and kissed him flush on the mouth.

 

Long. Hard.

 

Whoa.

 

Her hands came up into his hair, she sat in his lap (when that had happened completely escaped him) and his hands and lips were doing all the kinds of wrong things. Like pulling her closer and kissing her back. He even opened his mouth and he could swear he heard her moan at the first contact of their tongues.

 

He felt very dizzy. His thoughts were running in all sorts of directions and there were too many voices in his head, shouting different things at him, encouraging him to go on, ordering him to stop, remarking it was one hell of a booze, urging the room to stop spinning, getting his beautiful bottle back.

 

Alec pulled away from Max and opened his eyes. Maybe the dizziness would stop. God, even his stomach was doing flip-flops. Maybe Max would get back into her head as fast as she had gotten out of it. But no such luck.

 

The room was still spinning and Max was still there. She smiled at him. God, she was so beautiful.

 

“That confession requires some sort of an answer,” she nudged him, and he could swear her eyes were actually looking at him in a rather happy and kind way. Okay, now he believed even the tale that there was some booze that made you blind when you drank it. This was much better than getting numb.

 

Would have been, if it weren’t for his head. It was buzzing in confusion, the room was spinning and he was certain he had just seen the floor lapping in waves at his feet. And he didn’t quite feel as well as he thought he would after a kiss from Max. He looked up into her expectant face. He was...

 

“I’m gonna be sick.”

 

* * *

 

She sat there with him, on the cold tiles of the bathroom floor. That was when he realised she was for real and that the booze wasn’t actually as good as he had thought. For it all wanted to get out again. And you only have to puke from the cheap stuff, right? He felt betrayed by the booze and that no one had told him that getting drunk would stop being fun whenever the stomach decided to and that he then would feel utterly miserable. So alright, maybe Manticore had done at least something good. Damn, how he wished the drug would stop working.

 

Max held his head when he emptied his entire stomach into the toilet. She stayed and rubbed his back soothingly, even when he begged her to leave him to die. (And damn, he had sounded as whiny as Logan had, only that Alec had a real reason to whine, for surely no one else had ever experienced such pain before.) He hated her for not leaving him. She had brought him a cup of water to rinse his mouth and kissed him on his lips afterwards. Again. He didn’t understand why she did it. But the throbbing ache in his head and more retching made thinking a very painful process, so he just accepted the fact that Max was here with him, instead of with Logan, wiping his face off with a cold cloth, instead of having wild, hot sex with Logan.

 

And what he hated the most was that she wasn’t offended by his reply to her confession. That she sat with him until the early morning hours, when the retching finally had stopped and the cure wore off and his fucked up DNA saw to working out the alcohol of his system quickly.

 

It took him completely by surprise when she repeated everything she had said to him before. And then she smacked him in the arm (for his head was still hurting like hell) for taking the cure. She smacked him for getting her the cure. She smacked him for getting shot for her. She smacked him for not noticing how she felt about him. She smacked him for asking how she felt about him. And he acknowledged thankfully that she only swatted at him.

 

Then she kissed him again and he loved her for it. Even though he didn’t understand it. He wasn’t sensitive and he found it utterly disgusting to kiss someone who had just spent hours throwing up. Besides, she had told him so many times how he had fucked up. But perhaps Max wasn’t like the other girls and she did like the bad boy for keepers. The bad boy with the devilishly handsome looks and the very sexy ass, of course. And charms that could kill. And then he stopped thinking and started just feeling.