Disclaimer: Roswell, and its characters do not belong to me. Melinda Metz, Jason Katims and 20th Century Fox have that particular pleasure. If I was lucky enough to own them, you just know the show would still be on the air, and you'd be watching that instead of reading this.
Rating: PG-13 to R for inappropriate language and some violence.
Chapter Twenty-One – Setbacks
"Damn it," said Max. "We should have expected something like this. Do you suppose there's any chance his clone is defective, like his Vilondra clone?"
"Judging by the way things are organized, I'd go with no," Isabel said, bleakly.
"Isabel, we need you to think," Max said. "Was there anything, anything at all that you could see that we could use against the Gadori?"
"Max, he said they didn't have any weaknesses. I don't think he was lying."
"Cal, can you think of anything, anything at all that we can use against these guys?" Max asked.
"Pretty much, you're screwed," said Cal. "When they change into something, they take on all the characteristics of that species, including DNA."
"So blood tests won't work," said Liz. "Now what?"
"I vote for eating," said Michael. He passed his hand over his plate and heated his food back up and resumed eating, while everyone stared at him.
"What?" he said. "I'm hungry, and starving myself is not going to give us an answer. We can plan and eat at the same time. At least I can. I don't know if Kyle's mastered that skill yet."
"I can't eat anything," said Isabel, looking at the food-laden table with disgust.
"Michael's right, Isabel," said Liz. "If nothing else, we need to keep up our strength, and to do that, we need to eat." She stood up and walked over to the table and sat down, and toyed with her food.
"Nice try Liz," said Michael. "But for it to work, you actually have to put the food in your mouth. All of you, sit down, and eat. Pacing is not going to solve this problem."
"He scares me when he's reasonable," Max said to Isabel. His comment caused her to smile slightly, and move to the table. He winked at Michael behind Isabel's back. He didn't buy reasonable Michael for a second. He knew it was just an act to get Isabel to stop focusing on her dream walk of the Gadori. There was a bond between Michael and Isabel that even he, as her brother couldn't break.
"You might as well sit down and eat, Cal," Max said.
"Such a gracious welcome," said Cal, sitting in the seat vacated by faux Eddie. "Is that what I think it is?" he asked pointing to a dish containing a noodle like substance.
"Only if you think it's bodrodnya," said Michael, reaching for the platter. "Max brought some back on his last trip to Antar."
Cal sighed with delight at the thought of the spicy sweet dish. He took the platter that Michael held out to him and slid some of the noodles on his dish. He offered the platter to Liz who wrinkled her nose in disgust.
"Thank you, no," she said. "One thing I don't miss about Antar is the food. No offense to your culture and all, but the food is horrible."
"I'll say," said Kyle. "I don't know how we would have survived up there without those pills that Liz made, and the care packages from our folks."
Cal shoveled the bodrodnya into his mouth, and watched as the five friends bantered back and fourth, amazed at their ability to regroup and roll with the punches. It saddened him too that they developed this ability out of sheer necessity. If he had done a better job of protecting them, they wouldn't have needed to be so adaptable.
"Don't," Kyle, suddenly.
"Don't what?" asked Max. "Have more chicken? Why not, there's plenty."
"Not you, Max, him," Kyle said, nodding at Cal. "He's busy beating himself up over the lousy job he did of protecting you."
"Well he did," said Michael, baldly.
"Yeah, but if he hadn't, you probably never would have ended up with Maria, and Liz would probably be dead, and I never would have found Ava," Kyle said. "Did you ever think of that?"
"That power of yours is really developed, isn't it?" asked Cal. "You got all of that off of me in a matter of seconds. It's too bad the rest of you don't have that ability, or anything similar to it."
"The Granolith!" Liz cried, excited. Do you think that we could use the Granolith to accelerate our abilities?" She looked around the table, waiting for the others to share her excitement, but all she saw were blank stares.
"Don't you get it? My powers started because Max healed me, right?" The others nodded their agreement. "And Alex and Kyle's started to develop because Tess mind warped them to hell and back. But Maria didn't have any powers, even after Ava tried to nudge her brain."
"We were there, Liz," said Michael, not unkindly. "We don't really need the recap right now."
"Yeah, you do, because none of you are remembering how the Granolith activated and fixed Alex and Kyle, and gave Maria powers. Maybe we can use it to amplify that power in us."
"Liz might be right, Max," Isabel said thoughtfully, lifting a fork full of food to her mouth in an unconscious gesture. "It helped us so much remember, why can't we try and activate it to do this too?"
"Mostly because we don't know how, that's why?" said Max. "We don't know how to activate it."
"Maybe you should just take it on faith, Max," Cal said. "That's one lesson you're father and I never learned. Neither one of us ever really believed in the power of the Granolith. Don't make the same mistakes we did. Just take it on faith."
"Then let's go now," said Max.
"What do we do about him?" asked Liz, looking at the Gadori, still tied to the chair.
Without a word, Cal jumped out of his chair, knocking it to the ground. He crossed the room in three large strides, pressed his hand to he Gadori's chest and fired a concentrated bolt of energy into his chest. The Gadori glowed red for a moment and then imploded in a pile of dust.
"Someone's going to have to clean that up," said Kyle.