SECOND CHANCE

CHAPTER 3

Molly came to her room an hour later and told her they had left. "He seemed to be quite shaken. He, ah, left his card." Molly said quietly and held it out to her.

Alista looked at it like she was trying to hand her a diamondback rattlesnake. Molly pulled it back. "So, he's the one?" She asked gently. She hadn't seen her friend look so destroyed since she had told Molly the story of how she had come to be here working for them. Even though Molly could understand that many people feared the mutated humans she couldn't understand how you could love someone the way Rodney had supposedly loved Alista and react the way he had. She hadn't changed. It wasn't as if she suddenly had abilities. He had lived with her, slept with her for months. Known her for more than a year and she had never done anything to harm him or any one else.

"Yes," Alista said, swallowing hard and trying to compose herself and failing miserably. She swiped the back of her hand across her cheeks and pressed the palms into her eyes trying to relief the pain and stop the tears. She shuddered as more white hot pain lanced through her heart.

"How can it….still hurt…so much?" She sobbed brokenly as Molly wrapped her in a tight embrace. She let herself slump into the safe haven as heart wrenching sobs wracked her body.

Molly, Paul, Gavin - these were her dearest friends, forged over the years on the mountain. They had learned of her abilities quite by accident and had accepted her into their family anyway.

A cougar had surprised her and Molly early one morning and it was either phase them both or let Molly get savaged by the cat.

After Alista had shot the cat and un-phased them, Molly had just stared at her, shaken. "What just happened and how did you do it?" She had whispered, her eyes wide and her face white with shock.

"I phased us." Alista had said sadly thinking she'd have to move on now that Molly knew what she was. She took a deep breath and uttered the death sentence to her peaceful haven. "I'm a mutant."

"Mutant?" Molly asked, slackjawed.

"Yes." Alista affirmed with a wince.

"Mutant." Molly muttered.

Alista had waited, braced, for the fear and disgust, but it hadn't come. She waited to be told to get away, to leave, to not come back. Molly had raised a shaky hand to her hair and stared at the ground for a long moment. "Anything else we should know about because that," she asked after a long moment as she waved her hand vaguely, "was very useful."

"Useful? You…you don't want me to leave?" Alista had asked incredulously. Hope flickering to life in her wounded soul.

"Eight years ago maybe. Maybe even if you'd said when you arrived, but now - no. You've been here three years. I know you are not trying to take over the world or any of that crap." Molly had grinned self-consciously at her. "That phasing stuff, that won't harm me will it?"

Alista smiled back cautiously. She blinked away tears. She shook her head. "No."

"Paul and Gavin are going to be so upset they missed this!" Molly gave her a megawatt grin. "Come on and tell me what else you can do."

As they made their way back to camp Alista told her about her ability to heal herself.

"Can you heal others?" Molly asked, glancing at her friend as they picked there way carefully over the rugged terrain.

Alista frowned slightly. "Yes, I've done it once or twice when I could get away before being noticed. It takes a whole lot out of me though. It's the hardest thing for me to do so don't go and get careless."

Sure enough, after getting over the surprise and shock, Paul and Gavin had been more upset that they missed it than about her being able to do it. Alista stared at them in as much shock about being accepted as they were about her being a mutant.

"What's it look like?" Gavin asked.

"Look like? What's it feel like?" Paul had retorted.

"I'll answer both questions at once." Alista had said with more bravado than she felt and reached out and grabbed Paul's wrist and phased.

"Oh, wow, cool! Can you hear me?" Gavin asked excitedly.

"Yes," Alista responded.

"You two look like a shimmering blur and you sound like you're underwater." Gavin cautiously poked Paul through the arm. "Can you feel that?"

Paul had yelped when Gavin's finger slid through him then he glared. "You couldn't ask first if that was okay to do? Moron! Do you eat unidentified plants as well?"

"Did. You. Feel. It?"

"No." Paul huffed.

Alista let go of Paul. "It's effortless for me to do myself, but to do other's takes it out of me. Leaves me tired, especially healing so don't go getting carelessly hurt."

"Cautious as ever." They promised her.

#

"You lied to him." Gavin said softly after the orientation was over and Paul and Molly had taken their two groups off to get gear for tomorrow morning's departure.

Alista shrugged and picked at her sweatpants. "He wouldn't have given up otherwise."

Gavin gave her a very serious look. "Sounds as though they really needed you, Lista."

"Where was he when I needed him?" Alista asked bleakly and left him.

She sat up most of the night aching and angry; crying and raging; wanting to go to him and beg him to love her again then her emotions would flip and she wanted to run as far away as possible. Funny, the very thing that had ran him off now had him seeking her out in the wilds of West Virginia asking her to help him. She finally curled up around her pillow in the middle of her bed and gave way to an exhausted sleep.

She wished as she had wished many, many times over the years that she could hate him or at least not feel anything at all, but once again her wish wasn't granted and the ragged pieces of her heart throbbed with pain. Each memory a sharp, jagged piece that ripped and stabbed.

For two weeks she rode the emotional rollercoaster. She ghosted around the lodge pale and listless, eyes dark with pain. She snapped and snarled at the least provocation until she was banned from even being in the same room as paying customers. She would spend days weeping in her room until her eyes were swollen and her voice was raspy and her throat burned. She raged at him and fate and ignorant people and stupid emotions and her dumb heart. She packed. She unpacked. She was slowly falling to pieces.

Molly finally stalked into her room one day after Alista had wrecked it in a fit of rage before collapsing to weep on the floor and snapped, "For Pete's sake! You're driving us crazy. How long are you going to make him wait?"

"What?" Alista looked at her, puffy eyes wide with surprise.

"Its obvious you're going to say yes to the man!" Molly huffed, hands on her hip.

"It is not!" Alista yelped.

"Oh, honey, yes it is or you'd already have let it go and moved on." Molly shook her head sadly at her denseness and laid Rodney's card on the table before leaving her alone with her thoughts.

She sat in the window seat and stared at the white card on the table all night until dawn was breaking then she gingerly picked it up.

Dr. Rodney McKay, PhD, PhD

Chief Scientist

She grinned ruefully in spite of her inner turmoil - just like him to list both of his highest degrees - then she frowned at the phone number.

She picked up her cell phone and slowly dialed the number with fingers that shook.

"The person you're trying to reach is out of the network area."

She tossed the card back on the table. Of all the...! He wasn't even in the country apparently. She jerked to her feet and paced around the room. She carded her fingers through her hair over and over again as she silently fussed and fumed. Finally, she was drawn back to the table and that little white card. She stared at the card thoughtfully. That wasn't like the Rodney McKay she remembered. If he wanted her to call, he would give her a number that was guaranteed to go through. She flipped the card over on a hunch.

'If at first you don't succeed…..' "Try a different approach." She finished the quote softly. Had she forgotten anything about the man? She was mortified to think that the answer was no. She remember every little quirk and nuance of Rodney McKay. He had written in a second phone number.

The second number got her a bored sounding operator. "Base operator. May I help you?"

"Dr. Rodney McKay, please." Alista said quickly before she could change her mind.

"One moment."

She paced from one end of her room to the other, flipping the card over and over in her hand.

"I'm sorry he isn't on the base at the moment."

Huh? She rubbed her fingers over her forehead. "Then he must of left notice of someone to take his calls."

"There is a short list of people to patch through to a secondary. May I have your name please?"

She took a deep breath and said in a rush. "Alista Steward."

"Ms. Steward? Please hold; transferring," said the suddenly not bored sounding operator.

The difference in her voice almost made Alista hang up, but she gripped the phone tightly and whispered, "Not afraid of anyone, not afraid."

"General O'Neil."

Oh, crap! Alista hung up quickly.

She stared at the phone in her hand like it might attack her. Rodney had a freaking general listed to take his call from her if he wasn't available! What was going on? Why did they want her so badly?

She was pacing and chewing her thumbnail and fretting over whether she was safe or if she should pack and run when the phone rang. She jumped and dropped her phone then scrambled to pick it up.

Not afraid; not afraid. They can't hurt me. "Hello?"

"Ms. Steward. I didn't mean to scare you."

Too bad. You did. She stood frozen at the sound of the general's voice.

"Hello? Ms. Steward?"

"You didn't." She meant it to come out strong and firm, but instead it was almost a squeak.

"Good." He replied obviously not buying her bravado. "Look, I know you were expecting some flunky to be taking McKay's messages and usually that's what would happen, but we really need you to come in and talk to us."

"Will Rodney be there?" Alista asked suddenly very, very afraid. The military made mutants disappear. They locked them up and experimented on them.

"He isn't in the, ah, country right now."

Of course, they couldn't lock her up. She could phase through anything. "Then when he is call this number back." Alista said.

"This really can't wait." The general sounded annoyed now instead of like he was calming a skittish animal.

"I know him. I don't know you. I'll," she took a deep breath. Idiot! Idiot! "I'll come talk, but only if he's there." Alista hung up.

The phone rang back. She turned it off and collapsed into a chair. She rested her head in her hands. What had she done? Mutants don't advertise their whereabouts to the U.S. Military! They definitely didn't voluntarily walk into a secure base. She was in so much trouble!

Thank you, Rodney McKay!