A/N Some people were sort of confused, so I thought I'd straighten some things out. Nothing from Season 3 has happened (yet). This means Max and Tess's son is NOT called Zan. He is James. Characters on Antar are:
ZAN (Max)
AVA (Tess)
VILONDRA (Isabel)
SERENA
MICHAEL (yep, he's still Michael!)
Hope that cleared some stuff up, and just ask if you are still confused. Well hopefully you're confused about some stuff, but hopefully you'll know if you shouldn't be confused. God, am I making any sense? I don't think so!
This'll be my last chapter for a couple of weeks as I'm off to Italy (wahoo!). I'll update as soon as possible.
Thank you so much to everyone who reviewed. I love you all big hugs.
Please keep up the good work, and here's the next chapter...lets see how Liz is...
Chapter 3
"Most people change kind of slowly- they're who they are, and then, after a while, they're someone else. But some people know the exact moment when their lives change- they saw the person they were going to marry, or the look in their baby's eyes the first time they saw them. For some people it's not the good things in life that make them change, it's something they've gone through that makes everything they look at from that moment on very different from how it had always been." Dakota Fanning, 'Allie' in Taken
Liz
29th April 2006
The tray squeaked as she pushed it down the white sterile hall. Her light brown hair and grey eyes meant she blended in. No one gave her a second glance and that was how she meant to keep it.
For a long time she had been unable to come to hospitals. It had been a combination of the look in her grandmother's eyes as she lay there weak and helpless on the crisp sheets, and the horrible feeling of oppression that came from being surrounded by white walls, white floors, white ceilings. She guessed she knew who to blame that one on.
She had conquered that fear though, four years ago when she had woken in the middle of the night. Her heart had been racing, and her eyes had been itchy. She had looked at the clock. It read midnight.
She had known what she had to do.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
She had gone to the graveyard today. She had stood at the edge and looked over to where his grave was. She could never forget that. Maria had been there, blond hair tied back and flowers hanging limply from her hand. She hadn't changed a bit.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
The room was deserted. She had watched the nurses leave, heard them whisper how it was a shame, so young, but there was nothing that could be done. A car accident they had said, the road was wet, he braked too late, hit a tree. He was sixteen.
He was in a coma.
He would die.
No.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
For a minute she had felt the urge to go over there. To hug Maria, pretend nothing had happened. What had happened?
She felt Alex urging her to go, just a few steps he was saying, there is nothing I want more than for my two best friends no longer to be alone.
Too late. She had turned away.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
A wave over the window meant anyone passing would only see what they wanted. The doctor would be round in five minutes. She had to be quick. No mind-warp, just molecular structure. There would never be a mind-warp.
She made her way over to the bed. Brian Goode read the sheet in the clipboard. There were no visible signs of injury, just a cut on his head and his unnatural stillness proving there was anything wrong.
She placed her hands over him. In less than ten seconds she was in.
A golden retriever. A blond haired little girl. Jessica. A man shouting. A history textbook. A drunken kiss at a party. Buildings. Grass. Life.
He was fighting, she could tell, but he was losing the battle. She would not let him go.
Robert Facely, Nadim Parvi, Scott O'Realy, Antony Frost.
She hadn't let any of them go.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
It was hard, avoiding Maria and Kyle. She had returned for her weekly visit to Roswell. She always forgot how small it was, how different from London. She stayed at the Crashdown of course, but whenever she felt Maria or Kyle come near she would retire upstairs. Her parents had soon got the hint and sent them away. She hadn't talked to either of them for over four years.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
Her breathing was hard but it was done. He would be okay. She stood up shakily and exited the room. Her hair was blonder now, her eyes hazel. Two different people. No- one would think anything of it. It had been five years and she was an expert at escaping notice. God knows she had had the practice.
Leaving was the hardest part. She could not attract any attention, even though her powers were drained and she needed to sleep. She had to keep moving, make it to the car, drive home. Only then could she relax.
It had become easier, the healing. It scared her that she thought she had more power than Max ever had. That was wrong. That should not have happened. She did not know how she knew that, but it was an undeniable fact. Just like her power was the wrong colour. She tried to avoid thinking about it.
Nothing good came from thinking about it.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
London was different. The climate was different, the people were different, the atmosphere was different. She loved it. She loved the sense of anonymity walking down Oxford Street gave you. She loved the crowds, where you could lose yourself and pretend to be someone completely different. She loved the old buildings, the churches, the sense of history that pervaded every pore. She loved the rain, the feeling of being washed clean. Renewed.
The rain washed away her sins.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
She got a taxi home. First she walked to the park, two blocks away from the hospital- that way the taxi driver wouldn't remember picking her up by the site where a miraculous healing had just taken place. Between the hospital and the park she had become herself again. She was never sure whether she liked or hated returning. One the one hand she loved to sink back into familiarity, and she liked the way she looked, dark hair, dark eyes. She didn't want to change that. But still, being someone new gave you so much opportunity. You could be pretty, you could be punk, you could be a bitch to the people you hated most, and they would never know it was you. Still, for the moment, being herself was comforting, and she always needed comfort when she was here.
It was late and her parents had already gone to bed. She climbed up the fire escape and made her way shakily into her room. She flung off her shoes and lay down on the bed. Within seconds she was asleep.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
They swayed slightly as they walked down the street together. The lamps kept moving and she had the strangest suspicion that she was drunk. A half empty vodka bottle hung from Maria's hand and she was singing in a far away voice that made it seem as if she wasn't quite there.
"I can feel it coming in the air tonight..."
She suddenly felt as if she was surrounded. The shadows seemed to grow larger and Maria's off-key music, so funny a moment ago now appeared sinister and she wanted her to stop.
"And I've been waiting for this moment for all of my life..."
The world was spinning around her and she could feel something happening. She didn't know what but it scared her and she knew something was terribly wrong.
"Can you feel it coming in the air tonight?"
There was a blazing pain in her head. It spread throughout her body and it felt like every cell was on fire. She screamed- a long terrible scream full of pain. What was happening to her?
Maria who was a few paces ahead turned round. She looked at her and began laughing. "See Liz...we...we're going to be surrounded by them for the rest of our lives. Just when we thought we were free." She giggled. "You're glowing Liz."
She squinted down at her arms. The pain was receding now and she realised the swaying lamps had stopped and the fuzziness in her head had cleared. She was sober...and glowing. It was a turquoise light, a wonderful mixture of green and blue. She felt full of energy and life but at the same time a great worry. Somehow she knew this was not meant to happen.
The glowing began to fade away, and Maria was still staring at her with an unreadable expression. Liz felt the sudden urge to run away, to run where nobody had any idea who she was, what she had been through, that now she glowed.
She couldn't leave Maria and Kyle though. They had been through so much together. She owed it to them not to leave now. That would be weak, and she prized herself on being strong.
A strange guttering sound drew her attention back to Maria. The laughter in her eyes had gone and now she was beginning to scare Liz. She looked empty, and angry. So very angry. It was a surprise then, that her voice was so soft when she spoke. "We had fourteen years didn't we? That's what you said. Fourteen years when we were happy and we had each other and Alex was still there." At the mention of Alex Maria's eyes filled with tears. Her voice rose up an octave and she stepped forward shakily. "Why did you change it? Why did you get the chance to change it?"
Liz was walking backwards now, away from Maria. She wanted to cover her ears and pretend she couldn't hear. She wanted to remember that Maria was drunk, that she didn't know what she was saying, but she couldn't. Maria's slurred ramblings echoed what she had hidden in her heart; and that scared her more than she could possibly imagine.
"It was always you wasn't it Liz. You who found the soul mate, you who got healed, you who was visited from the future. News flash Liz. Max slept with Tess. He got her pregnant. She killed Alex. I lost Michael ten minutes after my virginity. We lost everything to her, and you could have stopped it all; you could have stopped it all."
Maria was sobbing now, huge heaving sobs that seemed to burst out of her. Liz stepped forward and embraced her and they sunk to the ground, arms round each other as they cried for what had been lost. But Maria was drunk and Liz was sober, and all too aware of what her best friend thought deep inside.
Maria awoke with a raging headache and a large feeling of guilt; Liz was gone.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
The bus had smelt. That was her main recollection. She could remember thinking she had finally lost it. On a bus to God knows where, with no money and no plan. The kid in front of her had a portable TV; money wasn't a problem for him obviously. She craned her neck to see what he was watching. She sat back in her seat when she realised it was just a Friends repeat. She had more pressing issues to deal with.
What was she going to do? It began to sink in. She had left everything, her parents, her friends, the only life she had ever known. Where was she even going to go?
"London baby!"
The episode carried on, but she was stuck on that one line, and she relaxed for the first time since April as she realised one problem was solved. She'd call her parents, try and explain. She'd get the money, make a plan.
She was going to London.
TBC...