Blue Skies

by Fluorine

Dead girls don't come back to life, and good girls don't screw around with time. The Partners in Time and Crime break both of these rules as they try to bring an end to Arcadia Bay's worst storm in decades, using nothing but their wits, powers, and oh-so abundant people skills. Ready for the mosh pit?

10. Chapter 10 - The Lighthouse

A/N: Over 2 months later and I have finally finished the finale of Blue Skies. Longest chapter (18k) and a bittersweet end to my first LiS fic. Thank you to all who have kept up with this story! It's been immensely fun to research for and write this story. Though this is the final chapter, I know that I'll continue to have the Life is Strange soundtrack on constant repeat whenever I need to work or study. Without further ado, here's the final chapter of Blue Skies. Enjoy!

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Chapter 10 - The Lighthouse

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Max squeezed her eyes closed at the boom of the two gunshots, ears ringing and body braced for impact. She braced herself so much so, that she barely noticed the cry of pain from behind her. Unwilling to open her eyes, she stayed tense and still, until she was tackled to the ground from her side.

Fearing for her life, she fought back, pushing and clawing against the unseen force. The figure on top of her easily overpowered her, pinning her arms to her sides. Beads of moisture flicked onto her face, like someone raking fingernails down her cheek.

"Max! Jesus, it's me! Stay down!" came the voice that finally sliced through the fog in her mind. Max peeked open her eyes to see Chloe bent over her, strands of wet blue hair tickling her face. Max's eyes were wide with fear as her gaze darted around. She looked over on her side and to her horror saw Tamara face-down in the gravel, arm outstretched futilely for a pistol that was permanently out of grasp. Chloe quickly grabbed the sides of her face and forced Max to respond to her.

"Hey! Snap out of it! We're under attack!"

Max was about to scramble to her feet but Chloe kept a firm grasp on her shoulder, forcing her down.

"No, no, no. You need to stay down," she shushed as she got into a kneeling position. She then grabbed Max under her arms and began to drag her to cover behind a pile of junk. Max broke out of her daze and sat crouched next to Chloe, who was checking the bullets in her revolver.

"Shit! I'm almost out. What do we do?" she whispered to herself as she surveyed her surroundings. Eyeing Tamara's pistol on the floor, she took a peek from behind cover. An idea began to form in her mind.

"Alright Max, here's the plan. We're low on firepower but we're high on girlpower. You take Tamara's pistol and stay here. When I break cover for those trees on the right, take him out."

"And if I miss?" Max asked feebly.

Chloe snorted. "Then we're both fucked."

Max fought to keep her anxiety under control as she felt her racing heart send blood coursing through her veins. She grabbed Tamara's pistol and was slightly overwhelmed by its relative complexity compared to Chloe's simple revolver. There was a switch on top of the grip with a red color marking. Was the red supposed to be showing? Hidden? Do I have to pull back on the gun like I've seen in the movies?

She had little time to ponder the weapon's usage when Chloe began a mad dash to the tree line she had pointed at earlier. Gunshots ensued, and Chloe fired back recklessly with a single hand pointed backwards. She was yelling at Max to start shooting but was drowned out by rain and the gunshots. Max still understood though, and broke cover to begin shooting at the gunman.

The pistol in her hand clicked and didn't fire. For the next most terrifying moments of her life, she could see the gunman's face as he looked down the barrel of his gun and continued firing at the retreating Chloe. She was sure that he would see her and begin shooting at her, but his gaze was still fixed on Chloe. She squeezed the trigger again but only came up with another click.

Crouching from behind cover, Chloe wailed over the storm, "Come on! What are you waiting for?"

Instantly the gunman knew he had been flanked and turned around to face doe-eyed Max. With the copious amounts of adrenaline pumping throughout her body, everything moved in slow motion. Her fingers, already frozen by the icy rain, felt like they were dipped in molasses as she fumbled to disengage the safety on the left side of the gun. She lifted the weapon of seemingly infinite weight and pulled back on the trigger. Her finger moved the trigger back further and further but to no end. Finally it stopped moving and clicked. A single bullet expelled out of the gun and went straight for the gunman's chest.

He collapsed instantly.

A searing pain in her side caused her to cry out in agony and drop to her knees. Chloe was at her side in an instant, having witnessed the whole exchange of gunfire.

"Max! Are you okay?"

Max looked down at her side and was easily able to point out the source of her pain. A splotch of dark red had seeped through her shirt spreading out from a shallow wound that was its epicenter. She lifted up her shirt but couldn't see what the injury was caused by. A bullet? was her first thought. But the injury seemed too small to be caused by a bullet fired from a large handgun. Shrapnel, then?

"Can you walk?" Chloe asked as she pulled Max to her feet. Max nodded, but grimaced in pain. She kept her hand over her side, hoping that the bleeding would eventually stop itself. Without the gunfire and the shouting, the night was eerily still save for the howl of the wind. But in the darkness, even the wind seemed to be muffled. The rain poured around them and rinsed her hands of her own blood.

"Max…" came a weak whisper.

Max spun around, realizing it was Tamara. In all the commotion, she had managed to prop herself up against a scrapped car, holding a hand to her chest. Blood poured out from between her fingers, leaving her skin pale and her expression grim. Dirt streaked her face as tendrils of hair clung to her face as if they knew their life would soon be sucked out from them. Max went to her.

Gulping down air and summoning her strength, Tamara managed to hiss the name, "Randall…Stephens…"

"Randall Stephens?" Chloe repeated.

She looked at Max. "They didn't come for you…they came for…me," Tamara said between fits of coughing. "I'm sorry."

"Why?" Max asked.

Tamara shook her head. "Sean knows…he knows. Randall Stephens can take him down," she mumbled in a daze.

"Who is he?" Max pressed.

"Not a person," she corrected. Her mouth moved to In a softer voice, she added, "You're so brave, Max. I think I…admire that about you."

Her eyes closed and her head slumped to her chest. Chloe sank to her knees in front of her as her gun clattered out of her hand. Her lifeless expression mimicked Tamara's.

"I killed her," she stated simply. "I killed her," she repeated. She looked down at her right hand, now devoid of the gun but still imbued with her own powers. Her fingers were shaking but she stretched out her hand in front of her.

"Chloe…" Max warned.

Chloe cut her off with a pained glance. "Max, please. For me. You have to do it."

"No, I…I can't!" Max cried as she backed away slowly.

"Please!" Chloe begged, "You have to rewind this."

Max walked away with her hands on her head. "If I rewind, it could trigger the storm!"

Chloe stretched her arms out to the sky. "Look around you! The storm is already here. And if you're going to save both me and the town, there's a good chance your powers aren't responsible for the storm. Please, Max, I can't…I can't become a murderer."

Max looked upon Tamara's lifeless body and Chloe's kneeling figure. Her eyes were steeped in remorse as they pleaded with Max on their own accord. Rain poured and thunder boomed around them. Chloe was right: the storm was already here.

Max raised her hand and dug deep inside herself, imagining the howling wind to be still and reverse its flow. Slowly but surely, the world around her spun about in a blur, bringing herself back to the point where Tamara and Chloe were holding each other at gunpoint. Max's head swam and she stopped her Rewind before she passed out completely. She shuddered as she tried to shake the fog from her mind.

"Drop the fucking gun!" Chloe roared next to Max.

"Wait!" Max said with her hands up. She stepped in front of Chloe's gun and placed a hand over the barrel. Chloe was alarmed and lowered the gun.

"What the hell-"

"I used my rewind!" Max blurted out. This shocked Chloe, who stammered in response.

"W-why?"

Without answering her, Max faced Tamara. "I know you brought the two hitmen here. You're not trying to kill me, you're trying to use them as leverage against Sean Prescott."

"How do you know that?"

"I don't have time to explain! But you have to tell me everything right now, or they're going to come and they're going to kill us."

"I…just follow me."

With a great deal of effort she pocketed her gun, glancing back at Chloe to see if she would do the same. When Chloe still held her weapon out in front of her, Tamara ignored her. Max followed her back to the car, surprised when Tamara gave her the keys.

"They're not after you, they're after me. When they come for me, hit the highbeams and start honking the horn. Anything that distracts them. I'll take over from there."

"Just like that?" Max asked as Tamara opened the door.

"Well if everything goes just like that, I expect you to tell me what she's doing here," Tamara said as she pointed at Chloe. "Now get in the car. And keep your heads down."

Chloe looked back at Max with suspicion, but grudgingly followed when Max got in the car. Chloe took a seat in the back so that she could hide behind the front seat, while Max sat behind the wheel, ready to turn the headlights on. Throughout this whole time, Tamara remained inordinately cool and collected. She went to the front of the car and had her hands in the pockets of her dark long overcoat.

"Max!" Chloe hissed from the back, "You've gotta tell me what's going on. Why did you use your Rewind?"

Max held a finger to her lips, silencing her. Chloe rolled her eyes and grunted.

Out of the darkness came two figures, this time without all guns blazing. Now that she could see their faces more clearly, Max's suspicions were confirmed when she saw that they were the same ones who had attacked her after her visit to the county prison. They approached Tamara slowly, careful to keep their distance. Max could see their mouths moving in conversation but was unable to discern what they were saying. By the hitmen's body posture, she could tell that one of them wasn't paying as much attention to the actual conversation, rather he was staying back and keeping watch. The one talking to Tamara was becoming increasingly aggressive, swaying forward and taking closer steps to Tamara, who was smartly but slowly backing towards the car, making sure her backside was faced at the headlights. She still kept her hands in her pockets and her head up high, even with the hitman approaching her.

Max's moment came finally when Tamara suddenly shielded her face and shouted "Go!" to no one in particular. Max flipped on the highbeams and began hammering the horn, causing the hitman to cover his eyes and back away in shock. Tamara jumped up and held him in a headlock, pressing a small box to his neck. Electric blue arcs emanated from the device and Max realized it was a taser. He spazzed out for a few moments before going limp. The second hitman had his gun out on Tamara but she kept her grip steady on the first hitman, using him as a human shield while drawing another taser gun from her belt. The second hitman convulsed from the 50,000 volts delivered from the gun, dropping his weapon as his arms flailed about. He landed face-down in the dirt.

As Max and Chloe got out of the car, Tamara dropped the hitman in her headlock and rolled him onto his front, securing his wrists behind his back with zip ties. She did this with the other one as well, looking expectantly at the pair standing by the car.

"A little help?"

Chloe spoke up first. "What do you want us to do?"

Tamara's eyebrows raised. "The dead girl speaks." Chloe rolled her eyes yet again, but Tamara dragged the second hitman by the shirt towards the car. "Throw him in the trunk."

As Max and Chloe hoisted the heavy body into the trunk, Chloe mouthed the question, "Rewind?" to which Max shook her head. Tamara moved around the back of the car and closed the trunk, standing in between the two girls. Her gaze bore into Chloe as if staring at the formerly deceased girl would cause her to vanish in a puff of smoke. When she didn't, Tamara began to get in the car.

"Max, you're with me. I want to talk to you, alone. Chloe, follow my car."

Instead of going to the passenger's side, Max went around to where Tamara was seated and held the door open. "Whoa, hold on. Anything you have to say to me you can say to both of us."

"And you trust her?" Tamara asked with suspicion.

"Trust her?" Max balked. "Of course I trust her! Why the hell wouldn't I?"

"I don't know, maybe because she's supposed to be dead?" she returned matter-of-factly.

Chloe laughed cynically, drawing the attention of both Tamara and Max. "God, you have trust issues!" she burst out. "You bug Max's dorm, you send assassins after her, you drag us into a firefight with more assassins, and you think that I'm the one who isn't trustworthy? Give me a break, for fuck's sake."

"I'm not going anywhere without her," Max said resolutely.

Tamara ground her teeth as she relented. Her voice was tense and strained. "You get in Chloe's car, you follow me to the location, and I'll tell you everything. But I want answers."

Max nodded as Tamara turned the ignition and slammed the door. The two got into Chloe's truck and followed Tamara into the night.

After a short silence wherein Chloe repeatedly made glances at Max expecting her to say something, Chloe spoke up. "You used your Rewind. Why?"

Max wouldn't say anything. She continued her gaze out towards the window watching the rain trace lazy paths down the glass. The thunder outside mixed with the bumps in the road, but to Max, all noise was thunder.

"Max!" Chloe repeated.

Max afforded Chloe a response by returning her stare with a somber one. Chloe was taken aback and her expression softened. "There was a firefight. Tamara was shooting at one of the hitmen who was behind me, but you thought she was shooting at me. So you…" she trailed off, knowing Chloe would put together the rest.

Chloe did. She leaned back in her seat and ran a hand over her face with a heavy sigh. "Was I the one who asked you to Rewind?"

Max nodded, earning another sigh and muttered expletive from Chloe. "What about the storm?" Chloe continued.

"This is the storm," Max gestured around them. "And you had a point. You said that if I was going to save both you and Arcadia Bay, it's possible that my powers don't actually cause the storm."

"So what does, then?" Chloe asked.

The question went unanswered as it hung between them. Neither of them had the knowledge or the confidence to suggest anything.

…

The truck pulled up into the parking lot Tamara had instructed them to go to, and Max already felt uneasy. A large dilapidated warehouse sprang up in front of them, and it looked like no one had done so much as look at it for years. Paint peeled off the walls and the rust on every visible metal surface reared its weathered head. Maybe it was just because of the night and the way the headlights cast shadows that stretched across its surface, but Max wouldn't be surprised if it was haunted in some way. The building looked so dead, it looked like it was used to manufacture tombstones or coffins. Max just hoped that there wasn't one inside with her name already on it.

Chloe put the truck in park but Max grabbed her arm as she reached for the door.

"Randall Stephens," she said.

"What?" Chloe replied confused.

"Before I rewound, Tamara gave us a name. She said that 'Randall Stephens can take him down'. And she said it's not a person."

"So what is he? Or it?" Chloe corrected.

"I don't know. A company? A location? The name to some protected Swiss bank account? It could be anything. But listen, if anything happens to me, find Randall Stephens. I have a feeling that Tamara won't tell us everything there is to know about her plan."

Chloe scoffed. "If anything happens to you, it'll happen to me first. I'm with you in this till the end," Chloe said with a hand on Max's shoulder.

The two got out of the car after noticing Tamara's car already parked out front. Max went up to the car and saw it was empty, but found an interesting trail in the dirt that lead all the way from the trunk of the car to the front door. She assumed that Tamara had moved the assassins inside but was wary of any plan she might be waiting to spring.

Max's thoughts were interrupted by the awful sound of a rusted door squeaking in protest. In the doorway stood Tamara, who beckoned them in wordlessly. Max turned to glance at Chloe as she entered, noticing with some sense of security that Chloe had one hand in her pocket, probably tracing the outline of her gun with her finger. There was palpable tension between the three as they followed Tamara deeper into the warehouse, past poorly lit corridors and weathered access doors.

Max finally broke the silence with a question. "Where are we?"

Tamara glanced back before proceeding. "Safe."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Chloe called from the back.

Max could have sworn she heard a snort as Tamara replied, "It means we're safe."

She could almost feel Chloe rolling her eyes behind her and threw a warning glance backward to dissuade any rash behavior from the typically rash girl. Chloe huffed audibly but managed to keep her cool.

"Where'd you take the assassins?" Max asked with rousing suspicion.

"I'm letting the twins sweat it out in an interrogation room."

"Twins?" Max repeated.

"Yes, twins. It's convenient to have twins, especially when you're trying to call them out in a lineup. We'll keep them there for a couple hours or so. Time in the dark does wonders."

"I'm sure you'd know," Chloe muttered under her breath.

Tamara pretended not to hear her as she pulled the door open to the next room. But instead of another dark and musty corridor, it opened to an unusually well-kept room that appeared to be a lounge. It was surprisingly well lit. Along the wall sat a coffee maker next to a rack of ceramic mugs, and in the center of the room was a large round conference table with a few chairs around it. Along the opposite wall lay a long futon that looked used but comfortable. Despite all of the amenities, the room was still cold from the rain. Tamara addressed this by going to the space heater in the corner of the room and cranking it to the max. She pulled off her soaking overcoat and hung it next to the heater, then sank into the futon with a contented sigh.

"Make yourselves at home. We're going to be here a while," she said from the comfort of her seat.

"What is this place?" Max asked as she continued looking around the room.

"It's an abandoned warehouse. It's got everything you'd need, from interrogation rooms, to a small first aid center, and this nice little break room. The futon even pulls out into a bed."

"And what do you mean we're going to be here a while?" Chloe asked.

"That storm out there is the worst I've seen in years. It's 9 o'clock and you can't see two feet in front of you. We're not going to drive through that," Tamara stated firmly. From the moment she sat down, Max noticed how she couldn't remove her gaze from Chloe. Tamara seemed permanently interested with the subject, as if analyzing every movement from her body and every word from her mouth. Chloe noticed this leering gaze at once and grinned to herself at Tamara's obvious discomfort. Finally Tamara broke her stare and addressed Max.

"I think some discussion is in order," she ventured.

"You first," Max returned with no effort to conceal her displeasure.

Tamara shook her head with humorless laughter. "My side just got decidedly less interesting as soon as you brought her into the picture. How'd you do it? Fake her death? Switch the bodies?"

"We didn't fake anything. Chloe Price was shot and killed by Nathan Prescott on October 7. The body was hers and the funeral was real."

"Then explain this," Tamara said, gesturing to Chloe like she wasn't there to witness her astonishment.

"You're not going to believe me."

"Whatever you say is going to be more believable than accepting that she came from nowhere."

"Time travel," Max paused and waited with bated breath, trying to gauge Tamara's reaction to this strange revelation. Tamara glanced back and forth between the two girls, waiting for one of them to lose their seriousness and burst out in laughter, admitting that this was all a huge practical joke. When neither girl did so and she saw the seriousness written on both of their faces, she prompted either of them to speak.

"Well, go on! Don't stop there," she prompted.

"She traveled back through time from an alternate universe where I died instead. It brought her back but it's also causing that storm outside."

"Is that how you knew about the twins in the junkyard?"

"I foresaw the shootout and your explanation." Glancing at Chloe, Max added, "And you said you needed information from the twins. So I had to Rewind to save them." Max hoped that Tamara's skepticism at her time travel abilities would distract her from Max's impromptu fib. Chloe relaxed a bit as she realized how Max covered for her.

"I see," Tamara said slowly.

"So do you believe me?"

"Believe? Sure. But accepting time travel itself? I have to admit, I'm still thinking about that one."

"Well save your thinking for later. Right now you're going to give us everything you know. And that includes whatever the hell you're doing with the Prescott's."

"It's a long story. Could take a while."

"Time isn't something I really worry about anymore," Max returned boldly.

Tamara's eyebrows went straight up. "Right then. But you both had better save your snarky comments for the end. And that means you, Miss Price."

Chloe scoffed. "Whatever you say, but just say it."

Tamara took a deep breath as she began. "I worked for the Prescott Foundation for a few years. In the beginning it was mostly legitimate work and it paid well. Then there was this company I was supposed to check out. Small time fishery, didn't look too glitzy. We were getting tips that it was actually a front whose main venture was shipping drugs up and down the West Coast. I lead the investigation, wrote up the papers, and shut them down, thinking about the good we did in busting the baddies."

"But it wasn't a front, was it? It was all real."

"I didn't learn that until later. Turns out we were the baddies and we just shut down a family business and took jobs from a few dozen hardworking people. By the time I realized all this, it was too late for me to get out. I was the one behind everything, and the Foundation would eat me alive if I snitched. It was all downhill from there. I started working for the state while behind my back I was working for the Foundation. But if there's a scale held up by the big hand in the sky, it's not pointing to the good I did. I was stuck with the Foundation, for better or for worse."

"Why now? What changed your mind?"

"Actually, for better or for worse is what changed my mind. I…bugged Alex's office. And I'm not proud of it. But I overheard him talking to my sister about ring sizes and flying my parents out here to Oregon. As a matter of fact, that dinner I was at tonight was supposed to be our 2-year anniversary," she added with disappointment.

Max tried to conceal the surprise in her voice as she concluded, "He was going to propose to you."

"He may not play by the rules all the time, but he does it for the sake of his clients. Me? I'm just plain dirty. I knew I couldn't face him with everything I did if we were going to spend the rest of our lives together. But I also knew this isn't just something I could walk away from. I was in too deep. And that," she paused to point at Chloe, "that is when I read about your murder."

"What's that got to do with anything?" Chloe asked.

"I saw my way out. I knew that if I directed all the blame onto Nathan, Sean would have to silence anyone who went after him."

"That's why you sent me to get Nathan's testimony? To lure out the hitmen?"

"I didn't want to. He was already starting to get suspicious of Jefferson's disappearance and I had to do something to get on his good side, so yes, I bugged your dorm room for him and sent you after Nathan. It was the only way to force his hand."

Max held up a hand. "Hang on, Jefferson's disappearance? I thought he ordered Jefferson's death. Why would he be suspicious of something he ordered? Unless..."

Chloe finished her thought. "Unless he didn't order his death. That means that..."

"You killed him," Max ended in turn.

Tamara's mouth was slightly open as her usually stern expression wavered for a split second. Her eyes flickered between the two girls, and Max was able to guess that her assessment was close, but not exact. What, then? Tamara killing Jefferson in order to force the blame onto Nathan, which in turn forces Sean's hand, made sense.

"But you said disappearance, not death," Max ventured slowly. Color drained from Max's face as she followed her own train of logic. "He's not dead," she whispered in apprehension.

Max watched Chloe's expression with bated breath as she saw her friend's face slowly twist and contort with rage at the revelation that Mark Jefferson was still alive. Her jaw visibly clenched and her nostrils flared slightly as she sucked in angry breaths, struggling to keep steady. She leaned forward off the table suddenly, and Max followed suit, hoping she wouldn't have to hold Chloe back, but being prepared all the same. She supposed she could understand. But she had never seen Chloe this upset before. Tamara tensed in turn, her body language obviously reflecting how threatened she felt by Chloe's increasing rage.

Tamara had her hands out in front of her as a sign of peace. "Hey look, I'm sorry."

"Chloe…" Max warned as Chloe began to approach Tamara.

"You lied," Chloe spat, not halting her approach.

Tamara was backing against the wall now. Chloe continued to corner her, despite Max who was now tugging at her arm.

"Chloe! Come on!" Max pleaded.

"Where is he?" Chloe hissed.

Tamara gulped but didn't respond. Chloe pounded the countertop next to her, rattling several dishes and making Max jump. "Where?" she demanded angrily.

In a low voice Tamara muttered "Here."

No sooner than she said that, Chloe disappeared. Tamara blinked hard and looked around the room, absolutely stunned by what she saw. Chloe Price had simply vanished into the air without a trace. Max too was in shock until the door swung shut and she realized what had happened.

"Where did-?" Tamara began.

"I'll explain later," Max said hurriedly walking toward the door. "Where's Jefferson?"

"You don't think-"

"Where?" Max repeated much more forcefully.

"Follow me," Tamara said as the two left the room.

They passed through winding hallways and rusted doors, both still trying to process what had just happened. Max had an inkling of what Chloe was up to, but she just hoped she was wrong. Finally after opening one door, faint cries of pain could be heard. Not female luckily, but male. It was Jefferson.

"Is she-?" Tamara started.

"Open the door!" Max commanded Tamara.

Tamara turned the handle to the room, but the door wouldn't budge.

"Shit!" she cursed as she continued to rattle the door.

Max went up to the door and began pounding on it with her fists.

"Chloe! Open up!"

There was no response, except for the rhythmic sound of bone meeting flesh, punctuated by grunts and cries of pain. Max could picture the scene through the door; Chloe menacing over Jefferson, swinging her fists through his face with all her might. Though she couldn't blame how Chloe felt at all, she knew it wasn't right, and this was definitely not a healthy expression of her hurt.

"Chloe! Please open the door!" Max cried.

Finally the blows seemed to pause. There were still the muffled groans that reminded her that Jefferson was inside, but at least Chloe had stopped swinging.

"Why did you keep him alive?" shouted Chloe from inside.

Max looked expectantly at Tamara, who was standing there with her arms crossed, as if she had nothing to do with the situation. She took her cue however, and answered.

"I made him a deal," Tamara said in a low voice. "It was the only way I could get him to talk."

"You were gonna let this piece of shit walk free? After everything he's done?" came Chloe's strained voice.

"Chloe, there's a lot of things you don't understand."

"Maybe you're right, but at least I understand that this bastard deserves to rot in prison."

"Look, it's complicated!" Tamara exclaimed, exasperated.

"Then I'll uncomplicate it for you. You take back your offer or I put a bullet in his good for nothing skull."

"Chloe, wait!" Tamara cried out.

"Take back the offer!" Max urged Tamara.

"What? I can't! I already put everything in place to put him in witness protection. It's legally binding!"

"One..." came the count.

"I don't care what it is! Right now if you don't take it back, Chloe is going to kill him."

"It's not that simple..."

"Two..."

"Chloe, I'm sorry, but I can't!"

"Wrong answer."

Max's face lit up. "Wait! The voice! Remember the voice? It told me to get true justice for Jefferson. Killing him isn't true justice. Let him live to face the consequences of his actions. Let him rot in prison, just like you said. Killing him is mercy. Don't let him have any."

There was a painfully long silence where Max was tensed, waiting for the clap of the gunshot that would mean the end of Jefferson. Part of her longed for that sound, painfully even, to punctuate the end of Jefferson's twisted machinations, but she knew it couldn't happen. For whatever reason, the voice in her head demanded that Jefferson receive true justice instead of his life being cut short. Now she understood. Somehow the voice had known Jefferson wasn't really dead, rather having received a deal that traded his sentence for information. She had to right this wrong, for the sake of the voice. She only hoped that Chloe would reach the same conclusion.

After an eternity of waiting, the door swung open to reveal an engaged Chloe struggling to keep her emotions in check. For a lingering moment she glanced back at the lone occupant of the room, as if to claim ownership of her handiwork. Said handiwork consisted of a severely bloodied and bruised Mark Jefferson carelessly propped up against the side wall of the cell. His chest rose and fell slowly, signaling he was still alive but had definitely seen better days.

Continuing, she forcefully pushed past the shoulders of Tamara and Max, who had both taken note of her darkened marred fists. Tamara without looking, grabbed Chloe by the elbow. She spun back around in her tracks, ready to face down whoever dared interfere with her. Tamara stared back, her cold steely gaze matching Chloe's.

"Go cool off," Tamara commanded softly but sternly.

Chloe glanced at Max, expecting the other girl to back her up or at least give a shrug of sympathy, but received neither. She looked disappointed and hurt, which made Max reevaluate who she had just chosen to back here. She wrested her arm out of Tamara's grasp and straightened her jacket before walking away. Once she was out of earshot, Tamara let out a heavy sigh as she rubbed the bridge of her nose.

Max glared at the woman she had chosen to back. "Now you really need to start talking."

"No. Not right now. I'll patch up Jefferson. Let's hope he hasn't suffered any permanent brain damage," she added sarcastically. "Go back to the lounge and we can talk once I'm done."

"But Chloe-"

"She's volatile. Anything I say in there is just going to go in one ear and out the other. I just saved the man who killed her best friend. She needs to be alone right now."

"She needs to hear you out."

"What she needs is to cool off. Now go," Tamara pointed.

Max knew grumbling against Tamara's will wouldn't do her any good, even if it made her feel better to argue. As much as she wanted Chloe to be there to hear everything, Tamara was right. She was far too volatile right now and everything Tamara said would be met with a cynical ear and sarcastic retort. Max grudgingly left for the lounge.

…

About fifteen minutes later Tamara walked through the lounge doorway. All the questions Max had built up and scripted in her head seemed to run about each and every way, losing their places from the logical order Max had originally imagined. She didn't know how to start. Tamara could sense the girl's confusion from a mile away. Concealing a sheepish smirk, she took the carafe from the coffee maker and filled it at the nearby sink. She went back to the coffee maker and poured the water into the reservoir with a hollow splashing sound. Under the counter there was a small pull-out drawer where she retrieved the grounds and filter. Filter into machine, grounds into filter. Press the button and voila.

Though Max knew she was only making coffee, watching her was increasingly irritating. The way Tamara moved about and meticulously measured the water and doled out the grounds was just so vexingly casual. It was as if the whole thing was a facade to prove to Max that she was an ordinary lawyer who liked her coffee with two sugar, no cream. Surely she must be stalling for time, trying her hardest to avoid the difficult conversation about to take place. If not stalling, maybe she was putting Max at ease so that she could pull a tranquilizer gun from the coffee drawer and knock out Max while Chloe was gone.

While waiting for the pot to fill, Tamara went to the cupboard and retrieved two plain white mugs. Max's eyebrows raised as she realized the second one was for her. The ceramic mugs clinked on the counter as Tamara turned off the coffee maker. Max could hear the liquid slosh around in the mugs and the mixing spoon scrape along the sides. The rich earthy smell of the coffee was deliciously enticing, especially when the damp and cold had seeped into Max's bones.

"How do you take your coffee?" Tamara asked without looking up from stirring her cup.

The simple question caught Max off guard, as she was still in her 'interrogation' mode. Hoping to not sound too abrasive, she replied, "Cream and sugar."

Tamara approached Max's table casually, holding out two cups of coffee. Max reached out her hands gratefully and took the steaming mug between her cold fingers. Tamara settled in opposite the table from her, blowing into her mug before taking a sip. Max was about to follow suit, but paused.

"This isn't poisoned, is it?" she asked cynically, but half serious.

Tamara's expression didn't change a bit. "Of course it is. Now be a dear and deliver that to Mark Jefferson so that we can kill the psycho motherfucker."

Max smirked and took a sip of the hot liquid, wincing as it burned down her throat and warned her insides. She relished the sensation of warmth and was glad to see movement return to her previously frozen fingers. Across from her, Tamara placed her mug back onto the table and sighed with folded hands in front of her. Max followed and returned her mug to the table.

"Look Max, I just want to get something out of the way really fast, 'kay? I don't want you to think that my decision to keep Jefferson alive in any way means that I sympathize with him. I don't. I think that he's a demented son of a bitch who deserves no less than to be strung up by his balls and left in the desert for the vultures to pick his eyes out. And if he was the only bad person I knew, I would be the one stringing him up. But he's not the only bad person I know."

"You're saying that Sean is so much worse than Jefferson that Jefferson should get to go free," Max concluded with narrowed eyes.

Tamara shot a glare at Max. "You know that's not what I meant. And he's not going free. The deal was 5 years in a private prison with the possibility of parole in 3."

"Three years? He'll be on the streets before I'm even done with college, is that what you're telling me?"

"There's a lot you don't understand!"

"Then explain it to me!"

"Sean Prescott is the king of Arcadia Bay. No one can touch him, not the police, not the state, no one. He will throw money at anything and everything that either helps the family name, or expands his empire. Mobs, hitmen, corrupt accounting firms, you name it. He knew about Jefferson and his manipulation of Nathan, but instead of risking family defamation he built a Dark Room and told the principal to keep quiet. I mean, do you know what kind of person you have to be to do that? His son is off somewhere drugging girls and taking creepy pictures, but instead of stopping him he says, 'Hey, son, here's a state-of-the-art bomb shelter so you won't get caught.' Can you imagine the things he'll do when the stakes are that much higher? What's worse? Jefferson, or the one covering up a dozen Jefferson's?"

"That's a long way of saying you compromised."

"I didn't want to but yes, you can say that I compromised."

Max clicked her tongue. "Hell of a compromise. If you had Jefferson, what did you need me for?"

"Isolating Nathan to take the fall was just the setup. You were the catalyst that was supposed to force Sean's hand."

"Are you saying I was bait?"

Tamara couldn't hold eye contact out of pure shame. Her head sank low as she stared into her now empty mug. She looked up somberly and nodded her head.

"Jesus..." Max muttered as she leaned back with a hand in her hair. "So when you sent me to interrogate Nathan..."

"You don't know what kind of person he is or how much power he has. If I didn't send you to Nathan, he was going to kill you anyway. I thought it would at least look better for the press if you died a martyr for justice."

"For the press? I don't give a shit about the press or how it would look against Sean and his stupid Foundation. You might as well have killed me yourself."

"But you didn't die! As much as it disgusts me to think that your life was in his hands, he let you live. He could've killed you any time in the week you were in the hospital. So yes, I sent you to die, but I regretted it every second afterward. That's why I kicked you off the case when you came back to me."

"And yet the assassins were still after me! Why?"

"They're not after you, they were in the junkyard for me. Now if Chloe hadn't shown up and scared the bejesus out of me, I would have had the situation under control. I never intended for you to be caught in the crossfire like that. If all had gone according to plan, you would've found me in the junkyard with both of them already in custody."

Max shook her head in disgust. "So you used me to lure out the assassins, and when that didn't work, you used yourself. Both instances were to get the twins. Why do you need them?"

"The twins have access to the shell account that processes all of the Foundation's illegal dealings. I can use them to get to the account and expose Sean."

The account.

"It's Shawshank!" Max gasped in realization.

Tamara's eyebrows furrowed in confusion. "What?"

"The Shawshank Redemption! Andy Dufresne processes the laundered money for the Warden through an account belonging to the made up person, Randall Stephens. That's the account you're looking for. It's Randall Stephens."

Tamara's face suddenly darkened. Her eyes narrowed in on Max and her grip on her mug got a little tighter. "How the hell do you know that name?"

"W-what?" Max stammered in confusion.

"I said, how did you find out about the account?"

"I didn't! You told me before I used my time travel powers."

"Under what circumstances?" Tamara pressed.

"You were dying! You got hit in the firefight. That's why I rewound, okay? To save your life."

Tamara's mouth opened slightly as she searched for words, but came up with nothing. Max continued, "Your last words to me were 'Randall Stephens can take him down.' Were you lying?"

Tamara stammered, "I...no, I wasn't lying. But I can't just turn in the account. The account has connections to me and everything I did for the Foundation. I'm trying to go clean here, not go down with the ship. I have to use the twins to get access to the account and make sure I don't show up on the ledger."

After hearing everything Tamara said, a humorless grin spread across Max's face. It was the kind of grin that a person has when they know they've fucked up, usually royally. She laughed to herself, much to Tamara's surprise. "I'm such an idiot. This whole plan is so complicated and full of bullshit, but when you step back, it's so simple. You'll do anything to go free."

"I've sacrificed-"

Max stood aghast. "You've sacrificed? Sacrificed what, exactly? No, all you do is push blame. You blame your corruption on your circumstances. You cut a psychopath a deal and call it compromise. You're nothing but a goddamn coward!"

Max got up abruptly and stormed to the door. Tamara didn't attempt to follow. Max's ringtone halted her in her tracks and she groaned in annoyance. She was leaving the room to make a point to Tamara, not to be interrupted by some phone call. She went to take the call in the hallway.

Her mood shifted immediately as she saw it was Chloe who was calling her. She answered.

"Chloe?"

There was a gentle rumble in the background, like Chloe was near some heavy machinery. "Max, you have to promise me something," she began abruptly.

Max frowned. "Uh, tell me what it is first," she said, taken aback.

"Promise me you won't try to stop me," Chloe said. There was a tension in her voice that bothered Max.

Max asked worriedly, "Stop you from doing what? And where are you?"

"I'm going after Sean on my own."

"You're what?!" Max replied in horror.

"I can't just sit here while Tamara is busy covering her own ass. I have to do something."

"Chloe, wait-"

And then the line clicked. Max ran to the front of the warehouse and pushed open the heavy door with some effort and stepped outside. Chloe's truck was gone.

Max raced back into the lounge where Tamara sat with her coffee, her position unchanged. She looked up at Max, puzzled.

"Chloe. She's gone," Max blurted out.

"What?" she asked after taking a moment to think.

"She just called me. She's going after Sean on her own."

"Dammit…" Tamara hissed as she rose from her seat. "If Chloe kills him or does something stupid that gets him off the hook, we'll have both lost everything. I'm not willing to let that happen. Come on, we have to stop her."

---

In true grandiose fashion, the Prescott house sat at the top of a large hill protected by a gate. The driveway twisted and turned through the hill, leading up to the house that was more of a mansion than a house. Faced with its enormity, Chloe couldn't help but think that she was here to confront the house itself, instead of Sean Prescott. She parked at the base of the hill but didn't leave the truck.

Her heart pounded out of her chest as she sucked in air to calm herself. She leaned her head back and ran her palms over her face, exhaling.

"The fuck are you doing here, Chloe?" she muttered to herself.

She looked at her company in the passenger's seat: David's loaded Smith and Wesson .357 revolver that was pretty much on permanent loan, a flashlight she had dug up from a toolbox in the garage, her set of lock picks that were on permanent loan from Frank, and a black strip of cloth she tied into a mask. She took the gun in her hand and popped out the cylinder, checking to see that the chambers were all filled. With a flick of her palm it spun into place, clicking a few times before it stopped. The weapon was stuffed into her jeans and covered with her shirt as she jumped out of the car to cross to the other side. The lock picks went into her back pocket while she tied the mask around the lower half of her face. The flashlight she kept in her hand as she shut the door, the only loud sound on the whole block.

The gate at the front wasn't manned, but it no doubt had security cameras looking over it. She had to find another way in. A tree with a low hanging branch that extended over the fence presented itself a little further down the street. She managed to climb up its branches and step onto the fence. She looked down from her precarious balance, slowly lowering herself to jump down from the fence. She braced herself and absorbed as much of the impact as she could, surprised by the height from which she jumped. It was dark, and the lack of lighting was messing with her depth perception. As she looked up from the inside of the fence, she realized she wouldn't be able to jump out this way. She would have to find another way out. But she would have to cross that bridge when she got to it. The main objective was inside, not getting out.

There was no cover across the vast green, and only darkness would help her. Every step she took closer to the house was filled with anxiety. Each one could have been her last if she was caught by anyone who happened to be looking toward the lawn by the front gate. As she got to one of the side doors, she looked around to make sure there weren't any security cameras. Satisfied that there were none, she went to work on the door.

After a few minutes she had successfully picked the lock. Now came the tricky part. She knew that as soon as she stepped inside the alarm would go off. Luckily for her, she was no ordinary burglar. She knew she could just run inside and rewind to before the alarm went off. The problem was whether or not she could rewind, or even should. Max had just rewound in the junkyard to save Tamara, and she had frozen time in her fit of rage against Jefferson. But at what cost? The storm had raged on for about 4 hours now without any sign of stopping. Winds had picked up and the streetlights were already swaying dangerously above the roads. Had the use of their powers accelerated the storm that wasn't supposed to come until Saturday?

Doubt crept into her mind as she considered the consequences of her actions. Max had told her that whatever she was going to do was going to be the right decision, but how could she know for sure? She wished Max could be here with her right now, telling her what to do. As the first one with powers, she always seemed to know what to do. Willpower and moral boundaries separated them from each other. Chloe was doing what had to be done while Max only wanted to do what should be done. They had always balanced each other out nicely, but now she was on her own. They both were.

Chloe kicked in the door and the alarm went off shrilly as expected. She stretched out her hand and rewound time, feeling woozy as she did so. She could see a silhouette of the door shut and she released her powers. The smell of iron filled her nostrils as blood trickled down to her lip. She wiped it away casually and headed through the house.

Approaching the bedroom, she was cautious to avoid the center of the hallway, where floorboards could creak. Instead, she stayed close to the wall, minimizing the sound she made. Finally at the doorway to the bedroom, she took a deep breath and kicked the door in. Stepping inside she quickly rewound time to where the door was still in place, having effectively walked through the wall.

Sean Prescott lay there in bed next to his wife. He looked strangely peaceful, not menacing as Chloe expected, nor was his face smug and proud in its resting state. The scene almost made her remember he was human. But the gun in her hand reminded her what she was here to do.

She pressed the gun to his cheek but kept a hand on his mouth to quiet any unsuppressed screams. He groaned awake slowly but his eyes shot open frantically as he realized what was happening to him. Chloe shushed him by putting the gun to her lips and pointing at Sean's wife right next to him. Sean shook his head slowly and quieted down, understanding the threat. Chloe left a note on his bedside table and froze time long enough for her to disappear, just for effect. What Sean should have seen was a girl threatening him with a gun and then promptly disappearing. She hoped it would have been enough to prevent him from crying out.

As she heard the rustling of bedsheets from standing outside the bedroom, she heard Sean's wife groggily get up as well. She held the gun out and her hand as well, ready to rewind.

"I'm just getting water," came Sean's voice to his wife.

Chloe quickly headed downstairs toward the kitchen, which she had indicated on the note. Her gun was still raised and pointed at the base of the stairs, ready for Sean. A few footsteps later, and he appeared.

Sean had his hands up as he slowly approached Chloe. "If you want money, my wallet is on my bedroom dresser-"

He was quickly cut off when she brought the handle of her gun across his face with a sharp smack. He grunted as he reeled from the blow, stumbling face first into the wall. Chloe pressed the gun into the small of his back, throwing an arm bar into his neck to keep him there. He stopped struggling but she drove her elbow between his shoulder blades just to spite him. Through gritted teeth she hissed inches from behind his ear, "I don't want money."

Sean's breaths came in gasps as his facade of strength began to fall. "Then what do you want from me?" he asked through strained breaths.

Chloe took the gun and shoved it at an upward angle into his side, twisting as Sean pushed back against her. With her other hand she grabbed a fistful of hair and slammed his head into the wall until a small but steady trickle of blood poured from his nose and down his chin. She returned her arm bar to his neck and forced his face deeper into the wall, almost grinning at the sight of the dark red smudges that appeared on the stark white wall.

"The Dark Room. Your son Nathan. Mark Jefferson. How much did you know?"

"Who are you and why do you care?" he returned defiantly.

"Wrong answer."

She grabbed him by the shoulder and spun him around to face her. He received no rest however, as Chloe repeatedly punched him in the face, causing blood to come out of both nostrils and a busted lip to form. Holding the barrel of the gun to his neck, she pulled down her mask. Immediately a wave of recognition swept over Sean's face and was reflected by the rest of his body language as he tensed even more. His bloody mouth opened as if to say something but no words formed.

Chloe sneered. "You know who I am, don't you? Go on, tell me."

"You're... you..."

Chloe twisted the gun into Sean's neck, causing him to shrink into himself even more. "Say my name," she hissed venomously.

"Chloe Price."

"Attaboy," she said with an evil grin.

"But you... you're dead..." he mumbled in a terrified whisper.

"Really?" Chloe asked in mock surprise. She drew back and threw a vicious swing to his ribs, causing him to double over and cry out. She lifted him up by his jaw and pressed the gun into his neck. "I feel pretty alive to me. You on the other hand... you look like you're the dead one."

Feigning confidence, Sean countered, "If that's the case, why don't you just get on with it and kill me?"

Chloe shook her head and frowned. "You know why you can say stuff like that? It's because you think I'm scared of getting caught. But take a look from where I'm standing. I'm a fucking ghost. My body is buried 6 feet under in Arcadia Bay Cemetery. Hell, I could bash your skull open on my own fucking tombstone if I really wanted to. I could beat you within an inch of your life and walk away with nothing but bruises on my hands. You can't pin a murder on a dead person. Now, if you're still willing to bet I won't kill you after everything I said, then ask me to kill you, and it will be my genuine pleasure to call your bluff."

Sean's gaze bored into Chloe's soul and found nothing but hate and sheer will. This girl was truly ready to kill him, and she likely wasn't kidding when she said she could get away with it. She was right after all; she was a real life bona fide ghost, and the police would be chasing their tails for years if they discovered the fingerprints of a dead girl on the murder weapon.

In a low and grumbling drawl, he asked, "What do you want to know?"

"How much did you know about Nathan and Mark Jefferson's business together?"

"Enough."

"How much is enough?"

"My son is a screw up. And that creep Jefferson did nothing to fix that."

"His name is Nathan Prescott, not Nathan Jefferson. He's your son. If there was anyone who was going to get him help, it was you."

"I helped him as much as I could have."

"Bullshit! I talked to Dr. Collins and he told me how you forced him into writing a prescription that he knew wasn't going to do anything. Raymond Wells already gave you up. He showed us your correspondence with him and how you tried to cover up Nathan's sickness with more medication."

"What do you think you have on me? A handful of bad decisions and an unfortunately possessed son? It's by no means grounds for an arrest, and hardly reason to kill me, don't you think?"

"You built the Dark Room. You gave Nathan access. You let Jefferson corrupt him and take advantage of his resources. Their whole operation was funded by you. What do I have on you? I have the ruined lives of 17 innocent girls, all who have faced unspeakable terrors from the Dark Room that you built."

"I only built this so-called 'Dark Room' because of the terrible storms we faced 5 years ago. It was never my intention to allow Nathan to use it for his twisted fantasies."

"Then why was the lock on the bunker door brand new? Why was the equipment in there brand new? Am I supposed to believe that Nathan had the means to order the construction of a state-of-the-art blast door and move all of that equipment in there himself? No, I don't buy your 'hands-off' story. You knew what Nathan was doing, and instead of getting him help, you buried him underneath the family barn and called it a day. You may not have held the camera, but your fingerprints are all over their pictures."

"I buried all of this because I wasn't about to let this psychopath destroy years of my work that was all for his own future!"

"That psychopath is your son!"

"Not after murdering that girl, he isn't!"

Sean clenched his teeth as he realized his mistake. Chloe saw the defiant look on his face melt into anger, and she knew she had won. She smirked. Sean sighed as he shook his head.

"You really were about to kill me, weren't you?"

"Gun's loaded and I'm bad at poker. I'm too straightforward."

"You've got some resolve, Price. It's honestly impressive for someone your age. But were you ready to kill two people?"

As soon as he said that, Chloe heard the click of a gun from her left side. Instinctively she glanced over, but the split second distraction was enough for Sean to butt his head against hers, sending her reeling and dizzy. She lifted the gun at the noise on her left, but before she could fire a shot there was an immense pain in her left shoulder. She cried aloud as she clutched her arm but quickly lifted her right to freeze time. Her head was swimming and her ears were ringing from the sudden blood loss as she stumbled out of the house. A second shot rang out from behind her and searing pain embedded itself into her right shoulder blade. She stumbled and fell on the wet concrete but scrambled to her feet to keep running.

What the hell? I froze time! She glanced behind her and saw a woman, presumably Mrs. Prescott, holding a gun at her, though moving in slow motion. Perhaps in her weakened state, Chloe was unable to completely freeze time, and had given Mrs. Prescott the chance for another shot. The rain around her had also not completely stopped, but also fell in slow motion. She ran as fast as she could toward the gate.

At the front entrance the gate was still locked, so she fired a few shots at the kiosk window. Clearing the glass around the window pane, she slammed her hand on whatever buttons were available. Finally, the gate creaked open, and she dashed through to her car.

Running down the street, her head began to ache incredibly. Both of her shoulders were bleeding badly. She couldn't tell if her vision was getting cloudy from blood loss or from the heavy downpour of rain in her eyes. Though there were no more shots being fired, her ears were still ringing from the shock, and suddenly she couldn't feel her limbs. The rain was cold, and her blood loss did nothing to help that. To her surprise, she made it all the way to her truck. She was about to open the door when her foot slipped on a fallen tree branch and she fell against the side of her truck. Her head throbbed and everything was cold. Her arms lay limply at her sides as blood ran down her arms. The rain washed the blood from her hands, where it collected in little pools at the ground beneath her fingertips.

She reached into her pocket and pulled out the tiny microphone and pressed the stop button. She smiled to herself. The cold gusts of wind against her face were hypnotic, and her eyes opened and closed with the rhythm.

Her vision clouded over and the rhythm stopped.

---

"There she is!" Tamara cried out.

"Oh my God, she's not moving," Max said with her hand covering her mouth. Tamara immediately slowed down, but Max jumped out before the car came to a complete stop.

"Shit…" Tamara cursed as she parked the car in the middle of the road. Max was already crouched over Chloe, pressing her fingers against her neck to find a pulse. She beckoned over to Tamara who came running.

"Unconscious, but she's alive. She's alive," she whispered to herself and Tamara.

"We need to get her out of here."

"We should call an ambulance," Max said hurriedly.

"No!" Tamara said above the din of the rain. "If they find out she's alive, our case falls apart. I can treat her at the warehouse."

"Tamara-"

"She just broke into Sean Prescott's house! If we give her to a hospital we lose her to the cops. Let me save her."

"Fuck…" Max breathed out.

"Just keep putting pressure on the wounds. I'll move the car closer. We put her in the back."

Tamara quickly jumped back into her car and pulled up right next to Chloe's truck where she lay. Tamara took her legs while Max held her under the arms. They slid her into the backseat where her head rested in Max's lap. Tamara threw a handful of towels at Max before she jumped into the driver's seat and pointed back. "Tilt her head to the side and elevate her feet."

"Tilt her head?" Max asked hesitantly.

"In case she throws up. Just do as I say."

Max complied and tilted her head to the side. She grasped Chloe's hand in hers and was appalled by how cold she was. Nervously she stroked her fingers through her hair repeatedly, hoping that somehow it would miraculously wake her up.

"Dammit Chloe, wake up!" she muttered to herself.

"Max, put your fingers on her neck and start counting beats. I'll tell you when to stop."

"I…okay," she stammered. She placed her fingers on Chloe's neck but couldn't tell if it was her own shaky fingers or a weak pulse.

"I can't tell! I…it's hard to feel anything."

"Under her neck, right there!" Tamara instructed as she reached back to press her fingers into Chloe's neck herself. Max nodded emphatically and did as told, counting the beats. Her pulse was rapid but it felt weak. From the front seat, Tamara was counting silently to herself.

"Time," she finally said.

"Uh…I counted a lot but they were weak."

"I need a number," Tamara pressed.

"I couldn't keep count! But it was way more than one beat per second."

"Shit…"

"I thought it was good her heart was beating," Max said confused.

"Beating, yes. Beating too fast, no. She's going into hypovolemic shock which is causing her tachycardia. Let's just hope it's mild…"

"W-what does that mean?" asked a bewildered Max.

"She needs the bleeding to stop and she needs oxygen. Where is she bleeding from?"

"Her left shoulder and her right shoulder blade, I think."

"Do you have anything to use as rope? Like a belt?"

"I have shoelaces, but no belt."

"It'll have to do. Bundle up a piece of cloth and tie it to her shoulder with your shoelaces, as tight as possible. You want to keep the attention on her shoulder blade. We don't know if she's bleeding internally."

Max fumbled with her shoelaces but was able to yank them out. She held the cloth with one hand and wrapped the lace around Chloe's arm with the other. She bit down on one end of the shoelace and pulled apart, tightening it. She grabbed both ends and retied it, pulling as hard as she could. Then she took the other bundle of cloth and pressed it against Chloe's shoulder.

"I'm putting pressure on it," Max reported.

"Good. Keep at it until we get inside."

They couldn't have gotten to the warehouse fast enough. In an instant, Tamara was out of the car and helping Max pull Chloe's body into the warehouse. She was barely conscious enough to push off with her legs and help the two attempting to carry her, but only barely. Her feet dragged recklessly through the gravel as an awkward combination of half steps and missed footing.

Eventually they placed her down on the futon in the lounge. Max balled up her sweatshirt and placed it under Chloe's head while Tamara used an empty trash can to prop up her feet. Tamara dashed out of the room, leaving Max to run her fingers through Chloe's messy hair, assuring her everything would be alright. Moments later Tamara returned with gloves, a large first aid kit, and a small bundled blanket. She rolled open the blanket on the table and fingered over the various tools. She returned to Max's side with a pair of cutting shears.

"Okay Max, we need to cut her shirt off. You're going to roll her onto her side and keep her steady."

"Cut her shirt off?" Max asked worriedly.

"This isn't going to go well if you question me every step of the way. Just do as I say."

Max gave in as she assisted Tamara in rolling Chloe onto her side away from the two of them. Chloe groaned as she did so but held onto Max to stay steady. Max was just relieved she was still conscious. Meanwhile Tamara had taken the shears to the back of Chloe's shirt and carefully cut straight down the center, leaving two bloodstained flaps of clothing on either side. She then cut through the sleeves and pulled away the fabric. Max gasped as Chloe's bloodied back and shoulders were exposed, revealing the full extent of her injuries. Her skin looked cold and clammy with a sickly pale pallor underlying the darkness of the blood. Tamara went back to the table and exchanged her shears for a flashlight. The light clicked on, illuminating the bullet wounds further. Max could barely stand to look as the new light showed exactly how deep and wide the cavities were. Tamara had her attention firstly on the bullet hole in her back, trying to determine if the bullet was still inside, and if so, how deep it was lodged. As she directed her attention to Chloe's left shoulder, she cursed to herself.

"Can't see a damn thing on her left side. Lay her back down and pull out the futon from the wall."

Max nodded as she slowly set Chloe down. They pulled the bulky furniture from the wall so that Tamara could examine Chloe's left shoulder. As soon as Tamara began examining her, she cursed again.

"Shit! She's bleeding bad on this side. Max, I need you to keep pressure on this while I grab a few more things."

And with that, Tamara left once more. Max looked down at Chloe, who lay on the futon dazed and confused. Her eyelids were heavy and her blinks were becoming more prolonged, bordering on closing completely. Max squeezed her hand and was relieved to feel a squeeze back. She was still here, thank God.

She wanted to say something or ask if she was okay, but she knew it would be best for Chloe to save every bit of her strength during this critical moment.

Tamara returned with a large glass bottle that looked like liquor.

"What's that?" Max asked.

"High proof liquor. Disinfectant," Tamara replied quickly.

Tamara wasted little time as she unstopped the large glass bottle and poured it over Chloe's wound. She groaned and tensed in pain, her hand squeezing Max's painfully. Tamara ripped open a gauze pad and placed it over the wound using athletic tape to secure it.

"Roll her over to the other side," Tamara commanded.

Max rolled Chloe over and held her around her front. Max could hear Chloe's raspy breathing quicken as she anticipated the pain that would come from cleaning the second wound. Tamara held the bottle over the wound and nodded to Max, who took Chloe's hand again. Max nodded back.

Tamara poured the alcohol over the wound and immediately Chloe cried out in pain. Tamara repeated the process with the gauze pad and the athletic tape. After a few moments, the blood began to soak through the gauze pad, but slowed eventually. The wound was finally clotting, allowing Chloe's blood pressure to normalize. Chloe's death grip on Max's hand relaxed a bit and her breathing returned to normal. Her eyes were still closed but she was only resting. Tamara stood up and wiped the sweat off her brow with the back of her forearm. She let out an exhausted sigh as she sat down. Her bloodied gloves hung off her hands, which she stripped and threw lazily into the garbage. Pouring out a small amount of the liquor for herself, she nodded to Max.

"It's 2 in the morning. Take a nap. Don't worry about Chloe, I'll keep watch," she ordered.

Max looked down at her shaking hands and felt her racing heart. "I don't think I can sleep," she said, though she felt exhausted.

"That's the adrenaline. Once it wears off, you're going to crash hard. It's better you try to sleep now. Besides, we've still got work to do. Rest up, and I'll wake you when it's time."

Max hesitated but followed. As she tried to find a comfortable spot on the futon, she couldn't help but feel awkward with Tamara sitting there. Of course she had slept with Chloe and was quite used to it by now, but to have Tamara sitting there keeping watch just made everything…weird. She settled for lying flat on her back behind Chloe. Her heart, finally slowing after the initial adrenaline rush, allowed her to drift into sleep.

…

Light everywhere. No furniture. No horizon. Max quickly realized she was in a dream. But the realization didn't do much good, as she couldn't tell where she was.

The light began to dim, and she found herself standing at the edge of a cliff. It was dark and she could barely see the outlines of her surroundings. The horizon was completely dark. A blazing beam of light passed her from above and she looked up to see the Arcadia Bay lighthouse.

I'm at the lighthouse again. Am I going to see the storm?

The dark horizon suddenly was illuminated with the sweeping gaze of the lighthouse. The light sliced through the darkness the same way a present is revealed beneath the torn wrapping. But this storm was no gift, and the darkness was no cheery Christmas wrapping.

In the distance Max could see the twister. It was the same as it had been in every dream, except this time it was frozen. Not frozen as in ice cold or frosty, but frozen in time. It hung suspended on the water, a terrifying column of seething waters and churning foam that shot up in a spiral.

Suddenly the winds began to pick up again. They howled and swirled around her, pushing her closer to the edge of the cliff. They brought her to the edge and knocked her off when she awoke.

…

Chloe stirred and pressed against Max, who had just woken from her dream. She realized that Chloe had been the force that had shaken her out of her dream, and she rubbed her eyes, thankful to be awake. Chloe was muttering and groaning incomprehensibly but Max was immediately relieved. She sat up and leaned into her.

"Chloe! Can you hear me?"

"Cold…" was all the reply she could muster.

"Take her temperature," Tamara commanded from her seat at the table. Max looked up and saw that Tamara, true to her word, had kept watch by sitting at that table. She wondered how many more cups of coffee she had consumed in this time. Tamara gave her a funny look for staring at her for so long, prompting Max to move. She dug through the first aid kit and found a thermometer, running it over her forehead.

"It's cold…" Chloe murmured again.

"96.2," Max said to Tamara. "You've lost a lot of blood," she explained to Chloe.

"Where am I?" she asked weakly.

"You're safe. We had to bring you back to the warehouse to patch you up. You're going to be okay," Max answered while stroking her hair. Tamara went to a nearby table and leaned against it for rest.

"What the hell were you doing?" Tamara questioned.

"Let her rest! She's still in bad shape," Max chided angrily, her voice groggy.

"I talked to Sean Prescott," Chloe whispered, "And he confessed. He said he knew about the Dark Room, that he built it, and that Nathan murdered Rachel. It's all in a recording."

"That…that's badass!" Max stammered in wonderment. "You did it! That's awesome! That's…it's great, right?" Max slowed down as she saw Tamara shaking her head.

"It's not enough," Tamara said from the table she was leaned against.

Max narrowed her eyes at Tamara. "What do you mean it's not enough? You haven't even listened to it-"

Tamara sliced through the air with her hand as a way of cutting Max off. "It's not enough!" she repeated, irate. "When I wanted to take down Sean Prescott and his Foundation, this is not what I meant. I mean, what do we have here? An illegal recording of a legally dead girl breaking and entering and forcing a flimsy confession of a crime he didn't even commit? This doesn't help our case at all! If anything, it hurts it!"

"Hey!" Max clipped. "At least she fucking did something! You're content to just sit around and wait for the perfect storm that will magically bring you everything you need to take down Sean and get off scot-free. Well guess what? The only storm you're getting is that Armageddon shitstorm outside that's going to tear apart the town if I can't stop the Foundation!"

"What in the hell are you talking about?" Tamara asked in utter confusion.

"These powers aren't just party tricks. They came to me when I used them to save Chloe from getting shot by Nathan. After that we solved the mystery of Rachel Amber's disappearance, but realized that my powers were attached to the storm. I had to undo my first action that was to save Chloe to prevent the town from being destroyed. That storm outside is the exact same storm that will tear this town apart if I don't solve the case."

"And what does this case have to do with some supernatural storm?"

"I don't know. But whoever gave me these powers is in my head, and he said that I had to find true justice for this mystery to save the town. Believe me or don't, but this shit is for real."

Tamara's eyes were wide and it was obvious she didn't believe Max. "Well while you're going off to...save the world, I'm going to have a talk with the twins next door."

"No," came a raspy voice.

The voice left both Max and Tamara astonished as they saw Chloe already upright in a sitting position. Her head was heavy as it bobbed to her chest, and she leaned forward with her elbows on her knees. Water dripped off the shredded remains of her shirt, pooling between her feet. Her eyes followed the slow spread of the pool.

"Chloe-" Tamara started.

"You're not going to talk to them," Chloe uttered in a low voice. "All you've done is compromise and all your compromise makes everything worse. You double-cross Max, you double-cross the hitmen, you double-cross Sean, I mean just thinking about all of the convoluted shit you've done gives me a fucking headache," she spat darkly. She turned her gaze to Tamara, who met her icy stare. "Everything you did was supposed to help you but it all ended up backfiring spectacularly. So you're going to go in there and what, ask really nicely for them to give you the account? Or are you going to make another deal? Torture them? Anything you do to them you'll have to answer for in court, if you want to get out of this scot-free, anyway. Do you see what I'm getting on with here? You can't keep covering up bullshit with cleaner bullshit and expecting the pile not to stink! You're just making a bigger pile of bullshit!"

"That's enough!" Tamara bellowed. "What would you have me do?"

With unpredicted strength rising in her voice, Chloe proclaimed, "Turn yourself in! Or I will."

Tamara's breath hitched as Chloe's outburst caught her off guard. Chloe's long-winded tirade left her breathless. Max was as astonished as Tamara was, the obvious reason being the thought never occurred to either of them. In this whole debacle of covering up the past, Max had mistaken Tamara's drive for self-preservation as a desire for justice.

Chloe rose to her feet with strained effort. She glanced at Max, who was still frozen in place. "Come on, Max. I'm going home." Max stood there unmoving and Tamara remained leaned against the wall, her arms crossed and her gaze pointed at her feet. As Chloe got to the door, she turned back to Max, who sighed.

"Five minutes," Max said quietly. Chloe paused before she nodded and left.

The door closed, leaving only Max and Tamara. Max took a seat at the table, leaning on it while thinking of something to say that would break this tense silence between them. Tamara was as still as a statue against the wall as she pondered the same. Both waited for the other to say something, yet both wished that nothing would be said. It was easier this way when no one said anything.

The burden fell to Max. "I'm not going to act like I don't agree with Chloe," she began. Tamara smirked ruefully as she nodded. "But," Max resumed with a sigh, "I can't ignore how you've tried to do right."

Tamara looked up at Max's acknowledgment. Max continued, "When I first discovered my powers I told myself I was doing things to help others. I stopped a girl from being hit by a football, I talked to loners who felt like they didn't have friends. I related to geeks who couldn't relate to anyone, and I connected with people I'd never connect with. And you know what I realized? I didn't need my powers in most of those situations. It doesn't take a time traveler to be a friend and reach out to someone new. I just happened to have powers that allowed me to do what I didn't do the first time around."

"What are you saying, Max?"

"I'm saying that I understand what it's like to try and cover up your mistake, to try and right a wrong. My greatest regret is not being there for Chloe when her father died. That was five years ago, and I've been fighting through hell to make up for it. If I stuck by her side, none of this would have happened."

"I see…" Tamara mused.

"But Tamara, I…I can't follow you any further. I can't help you cover yourself up if it compromises what I've fought for. I hope you understand."

Tamara's expression remained thoughtful and unchanged, but Max could see a flicker of regret flash across her face and in that moment, she knew Tamara understood. Tamara slowly went over to Max and held out her hand.

"Then this is goodbye, Max."

Max stood and shook her hand for what she knew would be the last time.

"Goodbye, Tamara."

Max moved to the door but Tamara called out once more. "Thank you. For everything."

"Good luck," returned Max genuinely. The door closed behind her as she headed to the parking lot.

In the main area of the warehouse Max looked up at the ceiling. The old rusted sheet metal bore several gaps in its placement on the roof, allowing the pouring rain to fall through. Lightning flashed through dirty windows, followed by thunder that shook the building to its core. She rushed to the front entrance, hoping futilely that the storm would somehow die down.

Suddenly there was a loud crack coming from outside the warehouse. It wasn't thunder, but its impact felt enormous. There was the whoosh of wind and a great rustling of leaves when one side of the warehouse cleaved in two, its sheet metal wall tearing down the middle like a zipper. Sitting at the base of the tear and welcoming in the wind was a massive tree, completely uprooted. It had fallen over from next to the warehouse and the winds had collapsed it on top of Tamara's small hideout. It shook the whole warehouse worse than any thunder could have shaken it, and Tamara quickly came running to the main area.

"Max!" she cried, running to her.

"I'm okay, I'm okay!" Max repeated, still astonished by the magnitude of the storm.

Chloe was next, having come in from the parking lot and was now standing in the doorway. "The storm's picking up like hell! Max, we've gotta stop it!"

Max ran towards Chloe but Tamara grabbed onto her arm.

"Hold on!" she halted. Tamara had noticed Max in only a thin sweatshirt that wasn't designed for nearly this much rain. She took off her own dark overcoat and threw it around Max's shoulders. "You can't save the world if you catch pneumonia." Max faltered at Tamara's acknowledgment of her quest. The moment was short-lived however, as Tamara ushered her on, "Now go." Max nodded and ran off to Chloe, who was motioning for her to hurry up.

"Good luck!" she shouted after her. The two jumped into Chloe's truck and sped off, racing to beat the storm.

…

Max's heart was racing out of control as she struggled to keep the truck within her control. Around fallen branches and rubble she swerved, eyes scanning the road back and forth, looking out for any obstacles that might tumble into their path. To her right sat Chloe, visibly uncomfortable, both from the speed and her injuries. She was scooted far up in her seat, bracing herself by pressing an arm against the door. She looked out her window fearfully.

"I can't believe this is finally happening," she whispered somberly.

"We're going to stop it. I know we can," said Max with forced confidence.

A break in the hills revealed the Arcadia Bay lighthouse standing tall and watchful of the night. Its beam shone out onto the waters of the bay, calling any unfortunate ships caught out in the storm back home. Little did it know that home was to be a death trap, the lone target of the angry twister headed for land. As Max and Chloe got out of the car at the base of the hill, they could see the twister in all of its terrifying might. Small arcs of lightning shot out from the twister, threatening to spark a fire in any of the many dust trails caught up in its wake. Entire trees were uprooted by its indiscriminate ferocity, and Max counted herself lucky that the collapsed tree had only fallen down and was not thrown.

Wind beat upon them as the ocean beat upon the rocks. Its near constant flow was interrupted only by the stinging rain that poured down from the heavens. Storm clouds swirled above, almost blocking out all view of the moon. The rain made the ground slippery, and combined with the wind and suffocating darkness, their journey to the top of the hill became that much more treacherous.

Max led Chloe by the hand. Chloe trailed behind her, cold and shivering both from the storm and from her injuries. Max did her best to lead her footsteps, but many times it looked like Chloe was about to fall.

"We're almost at the top," Max encouraged gently.

In earlier years, Max and Chloe would race up and down the lighthouse steps or come simply to hang out. From this point on, they would look to the lighthouse as a headstone for their youth.

Finally at the top of the hill, unprotected from the wild winds, they paused to marvel at the enormity of the storm. The wind and rains howled around them madly, a torrent of blind chaos and destruction. This storm was like only one other she had faced before: there was a tangible presence possessed by this storm, a near-sentience that demanded it be engaged.

Something in the storm pulled her, though not with its winds. It called out to her like an angry child demanding attention from a parent. It was then that she realized what she must do.

Max slowly began to reach out her hand. Chloe quickly grabbed onto her, asking "Max! What are you doing?"

"Just trust me!" she replied.

Max grabbed onto Chloe's wrist and pulled her close. She held out her hand in the same way she used her rewind powers and closed her eyes. She took a deep breath and focused on creating a still moment, ignoring the sting of the rain on her cheek or the force of the wind that threatened to topple her.

She was at the top of the hill. Chloe was by her side. The storm was approaching. She was destined to stop it.

When she opened her eyes, the twister had frozen in place. Branches and other debris hung suspended in rings around the center of the storm. Chloe was looking around her in wonderment, mouth slightly opened.

"You…you froze the storm. But-"

Chloe was cut short by a light that began to radiate from Max, who looked down at herself in surprise. The light pulsed gently with a heartbeat of its own, eventually swelling to completely envelop her vision. At once it died down, condensing into the ghostly image of a girl who stood in front of them. Her face was covered by the glare of the intense light, yet she almost seemed to smile at the two.

But not even the girl's ephemeral appearance nor her partially obscured face could have prevented Chloe from instantly recognizing her lost friend and greatest tragedy, Rachel Amber.

"Rachel…" Chloe whispered.

The girl's smile grew even wider as Chloe recognized her. "Hey, Chloe."

"I…I can't believe it!" Chloe cried as she ran forward to embrace Rachel. But to her disappointment her hands passed straight through Rachel's figure, unable to make contact. Her heart sank as she realized Rachel's lack of a physical form.

"I'm sorry," Rachel lamented. "I'm here, but not…here, physically at least."

"No, Rachel. I'm the one who's sorry. I shouldn't have gotten upset at you that day or blown you off that night. If I had stuck with you, maybe you'd-"

Rachel hastily interrupted. "Don't you dare say it, Chloe. I'm the one who pushed you away. Besides, I didn't bring you here to throw myself a pity party. I came here to deal with that," she said as she pointed a finger at the frozen twister.

"You can stop it?" Max asked, hopeful.

"In a weird way, I am the storm," Rachel corrected. "Actually, in a lot of ways I was the cause of most of your adventure. It also means I was the cause of much of your pain. I'm sorry," she added grimly.

Max's face lit up in realization. "You were the voice in my head."

Rachel nodded. "I couldn't let you know who I was until the very end. That was the only way this was going to work."

"The end?"

"Of your journey. I…I never told you this before, Chloe, but I had powers like Max does. Nothing as powerful as rewinding time itself, but similar. I could see glimpses of a person's future and do things to affect it. But when I looked into your future, I saw…death. I tried to change things but I still couldn't shake the image of you and Nathan in that bathroom. It's all I saw, over and over again."

"You…you knew it would be Nathan?" Chloe asked. Her voice trembled.

"I…tried to get close to him so that I might be able to help him, you know? I thought that I could stop him from going bad. But then he turned on me. I didn't see it coming…"

"Oh, Rach…" Chloe sighed.

"When I died, I saw a river made of streams of light. Each of those streams was its own timeline and I desperately looked for one where you would survive. Finally I found it, but it was nearly impossible to achieve, a literal one in a billion chance. A very specific chain of events had to happen. For one, I would have to give Max my powers, which would tear apart my soul."

"Part of your soul lived in me, and the other part was the storm," Max concluded.

Rachel nodded. "The part of my soul in you gave you powers. The part in the world causes problems. Only when your task is complete will I be able to pass from this world in peace."

"But why didn't you stop the storm the first time around?"

"Simply put, because your task wasn't complete. Tamara Nelson gave Jefferson a get-out-of-jail-free card, Nathan wasn't getting any help, and you still had a lot to learn."

Max hesitated. "When you stop the storm…is that it? Are you going from this world?"

Rachel nodded somberly.

Chloe asked, "Where?"

Rachel glanced out at the twister before replying. "On," she stated simply. Chloe gave her a funny look. "But trust me, I can't explain it in any way you'd understand. The supernatural is supernatural for a reason," she added to show she wasn't completely aloof by speaking in cryptic mystical ways.

Max began to feel woozy as blood trickled from her nose. Even Rachel noticed.

"I...I don't know how much longer I can hold this," Max warned.

Rachel looked longingly at Chloe and Chloe returned her gaze. "Rachel, I…God, I just miss you so much."

"Me too."

She turned her gaze to Max and smiled warmly. "Take care of Chloe for me, alright Max?"

Max returned a faint smile. "I will," she said softly.

It was then that Rachel turned around to face the frozen twister. Her arm reached out in the same way Max and Chloe did. A light in the center of the twister began to glow, and time looked like it was unfreezing. The wind slowly picked up and the rain resumed its course. The very space around Rachel's figure began to warp and pull into her center, like a vacuum pulling in dust. Max watched in astonishment as the winds that made up the twister were sucked in by Rachel. The light at the center of the twister moved closer and closer to the trio, until Rachel reached out and grabbed it, causing a blinding light to explode all around them.

Max and Chloe both shut their eyes and braced themselves against the strange explosion. They stayed this way until a gentle breeze pushed its way past Max's hair. She opened her eyes hesitantly, realizing that the storm was gone. The twister on the water was nowhere to be found, and even the clouds that blocked out the moon were gone.

"She did it. She's gone…" Chloe murmured as she wrapped her arms around Max and buried her face in her shoulder. Max felt tears roll down Chloe's cheek and she hugged Chloe back tighter.

Max's ringtone broke the silence caused by the absence of the storm. The scene she had just witnessed was so surreal it took her a few moments to settle back down into reality. Letting go of Chloe's hand she dug in her pocket to read the untimely message. Chloe intrigued, looked over her shoulder.

Her phone read One new voicemail. It was from Tamara.

Quickly she played the message and held the phone to her ear. After a few moments of listening to Tamara's words, she covered her mouth in shock and began to drag Chloe to the car.

…

"Max. I know things haven't always been easy between us, and that's been my fault. I guess this is kinda an apology and a thanks.

I'm leaving you this voicemail because it won't be safe for us to be seen together in person anymore. I've taken away Jefferson's deal, I'm giving over the twins and the account, and I'm turning myself in. It's something I should've done a long time ago but never had the guts to do, not until I saw you fearlessly diving into your friend's murder. The police will take me in as an informant and I'll stand before a judge to testify. Everything I give will be more than enough to put Sean away for good, though my chances at getting a good plea deal, despite being an attorney myself, are slim.

I don't know what the future holds for me, but perhaps that's better left to people like you. I don't know how your powers work, and frankly I don't really want to know. But to whatever part of you that's still a regular human, I'd like to apologize.

I'm so sorry for everything I've done to you. I've lied to you and manipulated you from the start, and however good my intentions were, nothing could've justified what I put you through.

When I sent you to talk to Nathan, I regretted it immediately. I thought I was really sending you to die, and to see your hardened expression as you still took my orders in blind faith…well I just felt like ending everything right there. But you kept coming back, even after being knocked out for a week. Foolishly, I forgot the regret I felt and convinced myself that this could still work. The definition of insanity is trying the same thing over and over again but expecting different results. I followed that definition to a tee.

I have you to thank for singlehandedly bringing down the corrupt Foundation. If I'm being honest, I didn't do much of anything except cover for myself. Sometimes I still can't believe you did all of this by yourself, and all because you didn't care what it cost you. I have to admit that it's something I admired about you. You were right, when you called me a coward earlier. I was afraid then, and I'm still afraid now. I'm afraid to see what would happen if I let my past catch up with me. But I'm more afraid now of who I had to become to outrun it.

I've spent so many years running in the wrong that I've forgotten what it's like to fight for right. I kept imagining myself as the hero of my own story and thought that this was just a dark portion of my narrative. It took you, a true hero, to show me just how far into the wrong I was.

Wherever you go next, I know that you'll do great things. I hope that one day you can look back on this and count my changed heart as one of your greatest accomplishments. Take care, Max."

As they continued driving down the pitch black road, flashes of blue and red began to gradually illuminate the streets. They approached the driveway to the abandoned warehouse but were greeted by half a dozen police cars staking out the building. Max didn't slow down, for fear of looking suspicious in front of the cops. Wide eyed, Chloe turned around in her seat trying to catch a glimpse of the driveway. She couldn't see anything.

"What are the cops doing there?" Chloe whispered as if they could hear her.

"Tamara... she... she turned herself in."

"You're shitting me," Chloe said flatly.

Max shook her head as she put the voicemail on speaker.

"Oh my God," was all that Chloe could mutter. "I…I didn't think she would do it."

"You gave a hell of an argument. But I can't help but feel bad for her. We all make bad decisions in life. I just had the powers to fix them."

"Your powers weren't without consequence, though. We both faced our demons tonight. Tamara's demons just happen to be physical. Do you think she'll be okay?"

"I hope so."

As they pulled into the hospital and walked up to the front desk, Chloe couldn't help but feel a mixture of apprehension and starry eyed hope when the receptionist asked for her name and she confidently replied, "Chloe Price."

---

A few days later

News of Tamara Nelson, State Attorney's confession in helping the Prescott Foundation conduct illegal activities spread like wildfire up and down the coast of Oregon. Arcadia Bay's population quickly turned into 50% media and press overnight. Though businesses in town boomed with the sudden surge of foot traffic, there was an shared tension amongst those who ran Arcadia Bay's prominent businesses. They knew they would all rather keep the town calm and quiet, despite the financial benefits that came with a sudden increase in traffic. A double-murder by the son of the town's most powerful benefactor was already enough news for a decade.

Managing to keep their involvement in the case a secret, Max and Warren had managed to go through their classes at Blackwell without being bombarded by the media, though Nathan's association to both his father and the school did not go unnoticed by the press. Principal Wells took the brunt of the interviews and press time, as expected. Max often wondered how he explained his connection to Sean Prescott, or if the press was even privy to that information. When the Principal announced the creation of Blackwell's Rachel Amber scholarship, she supposed she could forgive him for his past mistakes.

The matter of bringing Chloe back to life, legally, was handled rather smoothly. Tamara had managed to convince the police that she forced Chloe to fake her death in order to pass blame onto Nathan, which they accepted in a heartbeat. Though not the cleanest solution to bringing Chloe back to life, it was the easiest to explain. Even Tamara still didn't know if she believed in time travel quite yet. Chloe's resurrection provided another shock to an already volatile situation and as a result her house was constantly bombarded by the press. Luckily the press didn't notice when Chloe sneaked out of her window and drove off with an overnight bag. She spent the next few days living in Max's dorm, somewhere the press weren't allowed into.

The day of Tamara's trial was a long-awaited one. This was when all of their work would come to fruition, where the Foundation would be exposed and Tamara, hopefully, vindicated. Max and Chloe had managed to find seats in the courthouse; a miraculous feat, considering it was packed with all of the reporters and other press who had previously taken over Arcadia Bay. Tamara gave her statement with all the eloquence of a lawyer and a fierceness that spoke to her resolve to change herself. Though neither Max nor Chloe were on trial themselves, they were nervous throughout. Only when it came to an end did they finally relax, having seen the court's reaction to Tamara's abundance of evidence.

They followed the bustling crowd out onto the courthouse steps, trailing behind the reporters and the police who were trying to push them back. They could see Tamara, closer to the base of the steps, where more of the police were. The crowd pushed further and further down, leaving Max and Chloe near the top of the steps to look over everyone. Above the clamor Max could hear Tamara silencing the crowd to talk to the reporters. A hush fell over the crowd and only the shutters of cameramen could be heard.

"My only regret in this matter is not coming forward with this information sooner. The outcome of my own sentence I now consider to be irrelevant; my only hope being the swift and just sentence for Sean Prescott and his Foundation that will put an end to their corrupt dealings. Thank you."

With that, the police held back the rest of the crowd as Tamara was escorted to her car. Shutters continued to fire rapidly as did their blinding flashes. Her car began to pull away and drive off to some undisclosed location away from the press. Satisfied, the crowd slowly returned to their own business.

A loud bang drew everyone's attention back to the car just in time for them to witness a massive fireball erupt from the vehicle. An intense wave of heat followed, causing some closer to the vehicle to shield their faces. Thick plumes of black smoke filled the air, rising up like a cloud around the car and the surrounding area. Police were all over the scene immediately, and those who weren't rushing to the burning car were pushing the wailing crowd back for their own safety. Screams began to arise from the shocked group of reporters, photographers, and simple bystanders as they realized what had just happened. The photographers continued to snap as many pictures as they could, as though their careers depended on it.

"Oh my God..." Max breathed with a hand over her mouth.

Chloe couldn't even speak. She had one hand over her own mouth and the other clutching Max's arm. She glanced at Max, whose gaze was fixed on the scene.

"Tamara…" Chloe gasped. She raised her arm as if to rewind time, but nothing happened. Max noticed what she was doing and shook her head sadly.

"I don't think we have our powers anymore," she realized.

"We can't just…we have to do something! Say something!" Chloe cried frantically.

"We can't!" Max stopped her. "There's nothing more we can do. The court has her evidence, more than enough to put Sean away. Tamara…she knew what she was getting herself into. She knew this could happen," she murmured, recalling the voicemail.

Chloe settled down but sank down to sit on the courthouse steps. With her arms resting on top of her drawn up knees, she sighed. "She was cold and calculating and manipulative. But a total badass at the same time," she added with a smirk. "I'll miss her."

"She made a mistake and she wanted to cover up for it. I know what that's like," Max mused. "I'll miss her too."

...

The afternoon sun beat down upon the dock, shimmering spectacularly off the waters. Two girls were seated along the pier, watching the waves crash back and forth without so much as a care of their own. The first girl's loose tank top hung casually off her thin frame, very much reflective of her own personality. The blue in her hair matched the blue of the sea, which was also matched by an identically colored streak in the second girl's hair. Unlike the first girl's, her knees were drawn together as her feet kicked back and forth carelessly to the rhythm of the waves. Though still more conservative in posture, she gazed out toward the sea with an unmistakable air of belonging and purpose.

"How's the shoulder?" the second girl asked thoughtfully.

"Twinges a bit every now and then. But it hurts less," the first replied. "You?"

"My shoulder is fine," she returned with some confusion.

"No, Max. Silly," the first laughed. "Not your shoulder. You," she emphasized.

"Oh," Max responded, a tad embarrassed. "I'm sleeping better. I don't stress about random shit as much. Probably has something to do with the fact that we just saved the world so everything else, like school, seems meaningless," she added with a chuckle.

"I'm sure that nihilism will wear off eventually and good-ol' Super Max will be back at it again, finding joy in the little things like taking analog pictures. Meanwhile, I'll be chilling my ass off as a live person again, because let's face it: school is really fucking dumb."

"Don't you want to use your second chance at life to do something good?" Max prodded.

Chloe smirked. "Of course. Good doesn't have to mean school. But that really got me thinking. What are we going to do now?"

Max shrugged. "Go on with life? Keep doing what we used to do before life got strange?"

"With you, Max, I would do anything at all."

Max beamed as she rested her head on Chloe's shoulder. Chloe glanced down at her and gave a small smile, perfectly content to remain like this until the sun went down. The two had moved heaven and earth to be together, and now finally without their powers did heaven and earth slow to a halt to grant them this moment.

---

Fin.