Author: Restive Nature (aka Bavite)
Disclaimer: The characters and fictional placings of either of these shows do not belong to me. They belong to Cameron/ Eglee (Dark Angel), Joss Whedon (BtVS) and Whedon/ Greenwalt (AtS). Only the story belongs to me.
Rating: 13 (for now)
Genre: Crossover of DA/ BtVS
Type: WiP
Timeline/ Spoilers: Post Season 5 for Buffy. Up to LAtR for DA. Story set in DA time.
Summary: BtVS/ DA crossover. Life brings about so many changes. Especially when one has just risen from the dead.
A/N- Not all of the events that took place in Dark Angel will be present in this fiction. And there may be more time passing between events than it appeared on the show. So I guess that makes this AU.
A/N2- I could find no indication of where Joyce Summer’s grave was located, so I used the name of one of the more common cemetery’s from the show. If anyone knows differently, please let me know.
Chapter Six
May 15th, 2021
"I’m serious Max," Alec announced again as Max sat in the backseat of Logan’s Aztec, looking just a little stunned. He didn’t know why he felt so strongly about this, just that he did. While Max may not have seen the obvious implications, or may not have wanted to, it certainly went a long way in Alec’s mind to explain why Logan was the man he was today. And why he admired Max so much.
"You think that Logan likes me because I remind him of his cousin?" she finally gasped. She tried to control the shudder that went through her. She’d had people believe that they knew her, or that she was familiar to them. But never had she been a substitute for a long dead cousin. And the fact that Logan thought of her in a manner that was less familial and more in a certain sexual way, well that just weirded her out. Alec was obviously not playing with a full deck on this round.
"He said it himself Max," Alec shrugged. "He idolized her. Those were his exact words."
"But I’m nothing like her," she protested. "For one, I’m alive."
"And that’s another good point," he mused. "One I didn’t even think of."
Max’s eyes widened; slightly horrified that Alec was actually thinking things like this through. "I don’t want to hear it Alec. This is just plain sick."
Alec studied her for a moment, wondering why she was taking such offense at his words. In fact, if she thought about it, it should have been very flattering, for her. But then he realized what she was getting so huffy about. Obviously she realized that he was substituting her in as the person Logan admired most. And because Logan was sexually attracted to her, the most likely conclusion was that Logan had been sexually attracted to his cousin. Which Alec didn’t discount at all. Now if he could just get Max to see it. "No it’s not," he replied seriously. "Max, sexuality starts at a lot younger age than puberty." He had to hide his grin as she averted her face to hide the sudden blush.
"Whatever Alec," she mumbled, slightly mortified that she was having a sex talk, with Alec of all people and he was trying to instruct her!
"Not whatever," he said calmly. "Kids learn how to be a man or a woman by the examples they have around them. Little boys learn the expectation of how to be a man by how their mothers react to various men. They learn what’s acceptable for men to do and what not to do. If Logan’s mom’s demeanor said it was acceptable for men to behave like gentleman, then that’s what he’d pick up on. That’s how he’d behave, because his mother expects it."
"And how does that relate to his cousin?" Max demanded. She was stunned that Alec had any insight to this at all, considering how they’d grown up.
"Like I said before," Alec continued, keeping an eye out for Logan’s return. This was something he was sure neither one wanted to discuss in front of the older man. "Logan idolized his cousin. And he said that she was never mean to him, no matter how nerdy he might have been. Even though you’d think that they had nothing in common besides being related." He pinned Max with his penetrating gaze. "Have you ever belittled Logan because of his computer skills or disabilities?"
"No!" she protested. "Logan not being able to walk on his own has never been a problem to me. It’s just another part of who he is."
"Right," Alec nodded. "And probably in his youth, Logan didn’t always like who he was. He said, Buffy was everything he wanted to be when he was young. At least personality-wise, I’m hoping."
"Alec!"
"The point there is, that she never treated him like there was something wrong with him," Alec pointed out. "And with his mother being proud of his scholastic abilities, he learned that it was okay to be… well, geeky."
Max tried to hide her smile. Logan did exude that quality a lot of the time, to others. But she saw it more as dedication. He didn’t talk computers for computers sake. They were just a means to an end for him. "And I reinforced that ideal because I accepted who he was and what he did as normal?"
‘Got it."
"Okay, I’ll give you that much," Max sighed. "But as to the rest…"
"I do have more, Max," Alec frowned. Her expression clearly said, ‘like what?’. "Okay, Buffy setting fire to her high school gym was pretty extreme." She nodded at that. There was no argument there. "But as a child, I don’t think Logan understood all the implications behind it. He said himself that he didn’t figure it out until he was older. So as a kid, he probably thought that what she did was really cool. Isn’t it every kid’s dream to get rid of the institution that traps him or her for so long in their life? And blowing up her other high school. He obviously believes that she did that."
Max’s mind was rapidly processing this. "Oh my God. I did the exact same thing in his mind."
"Exactly," Alec’s smile was so completely smug that Max felt like smacking him just on general principle.
"But he thinks she was…" she shrugged and then for lack of better word, announced, "crazy. But he doesn’t think that of me."
"No," Alec agreed. "But you had a logical reasoning behind what you did to Manticore, both times. And Logan knew it. That made what you did acceptable, while he couldn’t understand Buffy’s reasoning." He glanced up then, realizing that Logan had exited the building and was heading back to the car. Instead of heading to the driver’s side, he moved around to the back and opened up the hatch.
"Good news," he announced through the opening as he pulled his bag from the pile in the back. "They had two rooms available. So I took them both. There’s a single and a double. We can sort it out inside." He left the back door open so that the transgenics could retrieve their items. With a significant look of wonder, Max then clambered out of her seat. Alec sighed and followed behind. If he left the rest of this unsaid, Max would end up turning it over in her mind until she justified that she was right and he didn’t know what the hell he was talking about. He didn’t know why it was so important, but in a way it was.
The pair retrieved their bags and Alec shut the hatch. They followed after Logan, who had the keys for their rooms. When he came to a halt outside one door, they just waited. "So how do we want to do this?" Logan asked quietly. "The single room also has a small sofa. But the double doesn’t."
"I don’t care where I sleep," Alec shrugged.
"And I don’t really need to," Max sighed. Therefore, the two rooms should have been split between the men. But she couldn’t stay in Logan’s room just because she lacked anywhere better to go. And she didn’t want to stay with Alec, because he’d insist on continuing their previous conversation.
"You may not need to, but occasionally you do," Logan pointed out, referring to her sleeping habits. "How about this? Max takes the double room. That way you can sleep if you want. Alec and I can share the other room." He turned to the younger male. "We can decide who gets-!"
"I’ll just take the sofa," Alec decided swiftly. Even though he usually slept longer than Max, he was used to rougher conditions. "Is there a TV?"
"Might be?" Logan smiled. He’d inquired about the amenities because he knew Alec would ask. He’d been informed that some rooms did, but he couldn’t recall if the receptionist had confirmed a set in the single room or not. He held out the keycard for the double room to Max and she took it gingerly, careful not to touch him and glanced behind her. The corresponding number of her card was on the door behind her. Logan turned back to the door he’d stopped by and easily swiped their card through.
The door opened and Logan turned back with a polite smile. "Good night Max."
She returned the smile. "Good night Logan, Alec." Alec said nothing, as Logan stepped into the room and turned on the light switch. Max sighed and turned to open her own room door. But as she was about to slip in, Alec’s hand caught her arm. She glanced back, a frown upon her lips. ‘I’ll talk to you later’, he mouthed. She sighed in irritation, but nodded. Knowing Alec, there was no way she could avoid it. He followed Logan into their room and shut the door behind himself. Max followed suit with her own, hoping that maybe there was some hot water and she could scrub away these mildly disturbing sensations crawling all over her skin.
*****
True to his word, a few hours later, Alec was knocking quietly at her door. Max, who’d been reclining on the spacious double bed, reading the Gideon stamped Bible in the bedside table, set the book aside and rose to answer. She opened the door and stepped back to let him in. He did and looked so delighted that she puzzled over it, until she followed his gaze and it landed on the television set. He made a beeline straight to it. Max rolled her eyes and shut the door he’d left open.
"Come on in Alec," she muttered sarcastically. "Make yourself at home. Sure, watch TV when I thought we were gonna talk." Alec just threw her a sarcastic glance as he turned the set on, lowering the volume so that it produced a little noise.
"The set in the other room doesn’t work," Alec supplied. "Plus it’s a good excuse if Logan wonders why I’m over here."
"I don’t think he will," Max replied as she took a seat on her bed again. "He was pretty tired. Did he go right to sleep?" Alec nodded. Max took a deep breath. She’d thought quite a bit about this as she’d had her bath. "You know, I’m willing to give that there might be some similarities between Logan’s cousin and I, but they are purely superficial."
"Maybe," Alec shrugged and took a seat near her, on the floor, leaning back against the bed. "Look Max, I didn’t mean anything bad or perverted, no matter what you might think."
"Bad no," she smiled. "Perverted, yeah. That’s just the way your sick mind works. You always have sex on your mind Alec."
"So, I’m male," he stuck his tongue out at her. "That’s completely acceptable."
"Not this time," she warned. But Alec was shaking his head.
"Max, there’s nothing perverted in what I suggested. Look at it this way, little girls learn to flirt with their fathers. Everyone thinks it’s so cute and adorable, so she keeps it up. That doesn’t mean that she wants to have sex with her father. It’s a learning process. Guys go through the same thing. At least in the normal world they do," he added with a touch of sarcasm. Max’s eyebrows were almost arching off her forehead. "And even just two hundred years ago, it was acceptable for people to marry distant cousins. Probably still is in some cultures. But it isn’t acceptable to people in these days. So Logan had an admiration for his cousin, but anything beyond that was taboo. Marrying his cousin would have been a cultural and societal wrong. When you came back from Manticore with the virus, that would kill him, there was probably a transference of his feelings, making him put you on an even higher pedestal because he was equating the situation to the one with Buffy."
"Where the hell did you learn this crap?" she demanded, aghast.
"Basic psych was mandatory," he retorted quickly. "We had to know how to manipulate people in certain situations. Understanding familial connections was a useful tool," his voice slowed and was soft and slightly hesitant, "especially if you needed leverage over your target. Family was the quickest way to achieve the objective."
Max watched him, realizing just how much lately she’d been confiding in him. There hadn’t been a lot of turnaround, though she knew about Rachel and what had happened there, in the resulting death and guilt Alec still carried about it. She wasn’t the only one with skeletons in her closet. But a new thought occurred to her. "You said basic psych?" implying that what they were discussing was hardly basic.
"Sex is a tool," Alec recited in a monotone voice, obviously recalling the manner of instruction they’d been given. "Sex is also a weapon. Like any weapon, you must understand it to fully utilize it." He glanced up with a suddenly cheeky grin.
"That’s scary," Max giggled.
"What?"
"I know we were taught that our bodies were weapons, but…" she dissolved into helpless giggles. Alec smiled as well and when she’d calmed down, spoke again.
"But can you ever tell me that you haven’t used your sex appeal as a weapon?" he demanded. And she glanced away. "Don’t worry Maxie. Even the norms do it. You see it all the time."
She wanted to get away from this topic, so she brought up the only other thing she thought that Alec would latch onto, though it was still as distasteful. But maybe less so than before. "So what other things do you think I have in common with Buffy?"
"Oh couple of things," Alec shrugged. "There’s the obvious abandonment issues that Logan feels he shares with you."
"What!" she screeched. "I wasn’t abandoned. And neither was Logan."
"Weren’t you Max?" he smirked. "Didn’t you feel like Zack abandoned you when he made you split up when you escaped?" She couldn’t refute that, since she’d said so herself to Alec before, when they’d discussed Ben. "And Logan probably felt abandoned when his cousin killed herself. And before you argue, that’s a common feeling in situations like that for the survivors."
"Okay, okay," she gave in. That was probably an easy one. "Anything else?"
"I don’t know Max," Alec sighed, frustrated. "It’s just a whole bunch of things all put together, not any one thing. I mean, you even technically died on what was really a suicide mission."
Okay, fine," Max rolled her eyes. "There are some similarities. But it’s coincidence. And there’s one thing you didn’t take into consideration."
"What’s that?"
"Most of that stuff happened after Logan and I met, so it doesn’t apply to me," she stated triumphantly. "Logan didn’t meet me and go, ‘hey, she’s just like my dead cousin’."
"That’s very true," Alec conceded and let her have a moment of seeming victory. "And I’m not saying that Logan even realizes himself why he likes you so much. But you keep saying that you guys weren’t "like that" for so long. And when you finally did get there, it was only after you’d known each other for a long time."
"Yeah, so?"
"I think that the more that Logan got to know you, the more of Buffy he saw in you," Alec stated firmly, but quietly. "But like I said, I don’t think he’s thinking about this stuff. It’s things that he’s learned from his past and things in his subconscious that he hasn’t bothered to analyze."
"So you think that Logan doesn’t like me for me at all? To him I’m just the grown up version of his cousin?"
Alec wanted to deny that, he really did. But it was what he was thinking. Not to a certain and total extent, as Max was making it out to be. Because Max had her own charm. And without knowing Buffy himself and being able to make the parallel between the two, he could only go on his supposition and gut instinct. "I think it’s just a part of the larger picture. Because face it, you and Logan have nothing in common. At all. Your childhood’s, the class you’re accustomed to hanging with. Your ideals, your hobbies. Nothing."
"That’s harsh Alec," Max whispered. She went slack, her shoulders hunching over as the veracity of his statement hit her. He really believed what he was saying.
"Not harsh Max," he corrected. "Real. You need to find someone who can care about you for who you are. Everything that’s good and bad about you. You’ve already broken it off with Logan. I told him and I’ll tell you too. If you can’t be friends with him and nothing more, then you should remove yourself from his life."
"I-!"
"Can you do that Max?" he questioned softly. Max glanced up at him and was held by the sincerity in his gaze.
"I really don’t know," she answered honestly, exhaling sharply. She hadn’t thought of Logan as a mere friend for a long while. But she also knew that Alec was right. "I’ll just have to learn to do that, to be just his friend again."
"Yeah, you will," Alec nodded, then hefted himself to his feet. "I’m going to bed. Night Max."
"Night Alec."
*****
May 21st, 2021
Just inside the Californian border
"Damn it!" Max swore loudly as Alec leaned over the Aztec. "It’d be quicker if we just stole another car."
"Well, I’m sorry," Alec snapped back, his words slightly muffled by the opened hood over his head, "that Manticore decided that diagnostics and repair wasn’t my specialty." He grunted and Max heard metal clanging on metal. "Try it again Logan!" he called out a little louder. Max turned to see Logan straighten up in his seat with a sigh and tried to turn the engine over. It didn’t even crank up a little. Logan reclined in his seat again, already having admitted that he had nothing to contribute on the subject of engine repair. So he felt it better to stay out of the way and away from the bickering transgenics. Especially as he was readily susceptible to migraines from their arguments.
"Did you check the carburetor?" she demanded. Alec glanced sharply at her.
"Yes Max I did, the first time you asked that?" he grunted.
"Alec, you just looked at it," she protested. "You need to take stuff apart and look inside. You know, you don’t have X-ray vision."
He pulled back out and straightened quickly, brandishing the wrench he was wielding at her. "You wanna do this?" he snarled. Max arched an eyebrow and snatched the wrench away. She made straight for the carburetor and within half an hour, she’d found the problem, and it wasn’t good. Even telling Alec ‘I told you so’ didn’t make her feel better.
*****
Of course it was just their luck that the first town they came to did not have a parts store that was open. Or a junkyard. So they were forced to take a motel room for the night. And in the morning, Max headed over to the parts store and hoped that they had a fuel intake valve that would fit Logan’s car. They didn’t. But they did give her directions to a guy back in the direction they’d come from, who might have the part she needed. So Max had hightailed it out to the farm road they’d passed by in the dark.
Luck found her there as the old guy had a valve that would fit her needs. And since she was already out so far, she decided to keep going. Alec and Logan were starting to worry when she pulled up to the motel parking lot, with the Aztec running once again with a comfortable purr. Max was just relieved they weren’t delayed more. With all the freaky things that had been happening lately... Well, she didn’t believe in bad luck so much, but she just didn’t want to chance anything.
*****
May 22nd, 2021
"Man, Logan," Alec whistled in a low tone as he looked around the grayed buildings and decrepit streets. "You really weren’t kidding when you said this was a ghost town."
Max stared out the window, a chill shuddering through her, despite the warmth of the car and outside. The feeling had been getting stronger ever since they pulled into the outer city limits. Everything was just so gray. And for someone who’d lived the last couple years in Seattle, home of the rainy gray, that was saying a lot. "What happened here?" she whispered, as if raising her voice would raise the dead. "Was it the Pulse?"
Logan shook his head sadly, as the car idled at a lonely stop sign. There was no reason for him to have stopped, except for them to take a moment and absorb the desolation of the place before they forced their way through the streets. "No, it was well before that. Another one of those weird things that happened. A few months after Buffy died, people began abandoning the city. But some stayed. And then, after Hank came and got Dawn, I heard on the news that there was an earthquake of horrific proportions."
"Then why doesn’t it look like it?" Alec demanded, perplexed. Because while there was some damage to the buildings, roads and sidewalks, there was nothing that could indicate a natural disaster like that.
"Strangely enough, it was centered completely around the old high school," Logan mused thoughtfully. "There were theories about how it was a minor fault line that caused the gas main to crack and then years later, erupted itself. But with the amount of rubble already present, sealed itself after about twenty minutes. If I remember correctly."
"Well," Alec sighed, "at least there’s one good thing about getting here."
"What’s that?" Logan glanced at him.
"We beat the full moon," he smirked. He turned his head to check Max’s reaction, but she was leaning against the glass, staring out the window still. She made no sound and her brows were furrowed with whatever thought was occupying her mind.
"Yeah, we did," Logan confirmed, not unaware of the lassitude of his friend. "So that means we have a whole night and day to check things out."
"So what’s our plan?" Alec questioned. "Max?"
"Huh? What?" came the unsteady response from the back seat.
"Um," Logan began before Alec could repeat his question. "If you guys don’t mind, I’d like to go see… the graves."
"Of course Logan," Max sighed with relief. Something about this town had her so on edge that even as much as her curiosity about the glyphs was piqued, she’d turn around right now. If only she hadn’t made such a big deal about taking this trip.
"Yeah," Alec consented. "That’s fine with me."
It took a little bit for Logan to figure out where they were going, having to reference an old phone book they finally found at a corner stand to find the address of the cemetery they were looking for. Restfield Cemetery. Admittedly, all the graveyards had nice sounding names like that. But there was no disguising what it was when they pulled up to the gated wall surrounding the consecrated earth. Once they entered the park-like area, but for the headstones and tombs, the transgenics allowed Logan a little distance to deal with this attempt at closure.
Logan walked up and down the rows, looking. He’d just been a boy when he’d been here last. And time and other momentous events had dimmed a memory that he thought was burned in his mind. But at last, he located his mother’s cousin’s grave. He crouched at the headstone and traced his fingers over the name, wincing as pieces of stone crumbled away under his fingertips. Alec and Max stood at the foot of the grave, looking on uncomfortably. Finally the older man stood up fully and began to walk away.
"Aren’t you gonna…" Alec wasn’t sure what the right terminology was for this kind of procedure. Say goodbye? Surely Logan had done that. Commune with the dead? Not quite right either. "Your cousin’s grave?" he finally muttered, hoping Logan would get the gist.
"Oh," Logan chewed at his lower lip. "Buffy’s not buried here. Dawn told me when I saw her last."
"Ah," Alec nodded. "I just figured, you know, family. Probably buried together."
Logan shrugged. He certainly hadn’t been privy to the family’s strategy when it came to grave planning. "Well, Buffy’s buried in a place called Breaker’s Woods, just outside Sunnydale. You can stay here and start looking around if you want," he offered. Without waiting to hear their answer, he began the return trek to the vehicle.
"So do we stay or go Max?" Alec asked, watching as Max shivered again and wrapped her arms around her middle. She began walking after Logan and Alec followed quickly. Her quietness was starting to worry him.
"We stick together," she decided assertively, though her words were quiet. As they passed through the gate, she chanced a glance up at the not quite full moon. Was it her imagination, or was there a slight tinge of red around it? She shook her head and pointedly refused to look again. But she couldn’t help the shudder passing through her. "We need to stick together." Because she really didn’t have a good feeling about this now.
Chapter Seven
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