ONCE AGAIN, my thanks for your words and thoughts. This is such a hoot, coming out from under my rock! So nice to find you all hanging around; you've stoked the fires & helped me whip these up over the past few nights.

THIS IS A STAB at a longer, multi-part story. I'm weak at developing a good, solid, complex plot with a strong start, middle and end–which is why all the recent hit & run vignettes. But it's something I want to try, and with a couple like Max & Logan, it might come a little more easily.

THE TIME IS again early S1, probably somewhere between "411 on the DL" and "Prodigy" for what I foresee–but if anyone sees it playing out at a different point in the time line, I'm flexible...

AND AS ALWAYS...characters borrowed and gently used. All belong to the good folks who own DA.

PROLOGUE: Three weeks earlier:

This was a good day...

"His Crankiness" had been positively chipper all morning. Not only did he have a good hack in the can, but he'd decided recently that he needed to refresh his cover, so had written an "above-ground" three part piece for a regional journal. Not only was it published quickly, but he had just gotten word that morning that it was on the nomination list for a not-too-shabby award. Logan was almost feeling like a real live journalist again.

The feeling was made even better by the news he had for Max: a list of 18 names, all young women between the ages of 17 and 24 who had suddenly been added to a new patient list in a private clinic near Gillette, Wyoming over the course of 3 or 4 years–all apparently surrogate mothers who underwent fertilization on site, paid a stipend throughout, given room and board and state of the art medical attention during their stay, and released nine months later. There was no record of the offspring.

...and Logan showed Max the six names connected with the two year period that had to embrace her own birth date...

They made their way through the market, more crowded than usual due to Saturday shoppers, and Max followed Logan as he pushed from stall to stall, sniffing vegetables and squeezing fruit and rubbing herbs between his fingers...

She watched, amused, as he considered the peach he held up to his nose. "You know, I'd think this was all for show if I hadn't actually tasted some of your creations." Max muttered good-naturedly. Not only was the market crowded with people, but the food seemed to be endless today. Indeed, a very good day...

"It's all about the ingredients" he announced, "but I have to confess that it does take a certain genius to make each one a masterpiece when half the things you need are suddenly unavailable," He glanced up at her with a smug grin as he reached across a bin of tomatoes, stretching to grab one with just a little more color than the others, and curling up his nose in disappointment before putting it back. Looking around, Logan saw yet another rack of goods catch his eye and he called, "hey Max–can you grab...?" He watched her catch up to him and he turned back to the bin that stood high, a bit taller than Max, tipping away from them. "The lettuce, there–it looks pretty good." He watched, directing her to just the right bundle of greens, as Max leaned in and up to find the leaves he wanted. After the appropriate scrutiny, he added them to the basket in his lap.

"You're enjoying this, aren't you?" Max laughed, standing in a familiar pose, fist on her hip, finding the whole thing a bit over-involved, but pleased that, for whatever weird reason, he seemed to be having fun.

"You're not?" He looked up in mock surprise, "Of all people, you should be passionate about food stalls. The dinner potential here boggles the mind. "

"What else do you need?" she laughed, as he turned to push back out into the aisle leading from one seller to the next. Max followed, musing. Who'd've thought that a simple trip to the market could be so... companionable? And who'd've thought that someone who knew about her unusual upbringing would accept her so easily and let her feel like a normal girl...

But it never lasted, did it? And Max looked over at Logan just in time to see a subtle shift in his features, the delight there moments ago fading. With a glance ahead to see what changed his mood, she saw what–and who--caught his eye, and felt a wave of sadness for him, understanding his reaction now.

Coming toward them along the aisle was a man of maybe thirty or so, pushing a cumbersome, "medical" wheelchair, bringing a frail looking woman nearly eye to eye with Logan. His strong back and shoulders, his easy, independent mobility in his low-friction, lightweight chair made a glaring contrast to the translucent skin and shaky limbs of the middle-aged woman, clearly quite ill. It didn't matter, though, how fit and mobile he was, Max knew; at that moment, Logan saw only her chair, and his, and had visions of being that invalid, pale and dependent. She wondered fleetingly what he saw every day when he looked in the mirror...

But his earlier buoyant mood had been a strong force and, to her surprise and relief, in a moment, Logan appeared to shake off the melancholy that threatened to return, and looked back to Max a bit sheepishly. Going back to her question, he offered a shrug, "Well, you'll want dessert, won't you?"

"Won't you? she challenged. His chuckle let her relax.

"Either way, I can use some of those apples." He tipped his chin toward another bin. "Want to get me about a dozen?"

"Okay" She leaned over to grab a bag, and bent to inspect the fruit as Logan moved off in search of flour and sugar. As she turned to the next bin, Max heard a gasping sound behind her, and saw that the ailing woman in the chair had gasped for breath and now sat rocking gently, looking shaken and ill. As the man behind her came around to offer assistance, Max filled her bag quickly and moved off to find Logan, awkward with the woman's suffering.

So she didn't hear the man asking his mother what had happened, if she was alright...and had no idea that what had caused the woman's gasp was not the illness now wracking her body, but the glimpse of a bar code on Max's neck as she leaned over the apple bin.

"...452..." the woman wheezed to her son, voice barely audible even in his ear, in the noisy marketplace...

TBC...