Liz couldn't sleep. For hours that night she had been able only to lie in
bed staring at the ceiling. Staring up at nothing, burdened by her thoughts.
She'd almost died that night….again. And again Max had brought her back from
the brink; snatched her again from the jaws of death. Liz could feel his
handprint burning silver on her chest, healing her still. For the second time,
Liz owed Max Evans her life. And how had she repaid him? By letting him know
the one thing he should never have had to know.
From the moment Max had healed her in the Crashdown almost two years ago,
Liz's life had been drastically changed. First there had been the shock of not
dying from the fatal gun shot that would have killed her. Then there was the
knowledge that Max and Isabel and Michael weren't even of this planet. And then
there was the bond between Liz and Max…undeniable, even when they had resigned
themselves to only being friends. Every time he looked at her she felt….more
alive. Every time he touched her, trails of fire followed his fingertips across
her skin. And when they kissed….flash….they could see into each other's
soul. Liz had never felt closer to – or more in love with – anyone than she did
Max. But all that changed last year. It all changed when Tess came to Roswell.
Turned out, there were four aliens, and that Max was destined to be with
Tess...not Liz. Max had had to admit the attraction he felt toward Tess…it had
practically been programmed into him by his race. See the thing was, Max and
the others weren't exactly who they thought they were. In truth, they had lived
out their lives on their own planet. Max as King, Tess as Max's wife, Michael
as Max's second-in-command, and married to Isabel. Liz still thought that that
pairing was rather ludicrous. She wasn't exactly sure what had happened, but
somewhere along the line Isabel – except that her name was Vilandra in that
other life – had betrayed her brother and husband, and there was a war. In the
fighting, the 'royal four' were killed. To save some sort of hope for the
future, genetically engineered clones of the four were designed, and sent to
Earth for safekeeping. Two sets of each person. One set ended up in New York,
and had just recently suffered the loss of Zan, Max's duplicate…killed by
Isabel and Michael's duplicates, Lonnie and Rath. The other set grew up in
Roswell, New Mexico…knowing almost nothing about who they were or why they were
there. When Tess had arrived, they began finding answers to their many
questions: Including the fact that they all had a much higher purpose than
going to high school and falling in love with humans. For indeed, that was what
they had done. Maria had fallen for Michael…who returned her feelings, much to
his own chagrin. Liz's friend Alex had likewise come to truly care for Isabel,
though he'd had even less luck connecting to her than Maria had had to Michael.
Isabel wanted and craved a real relationship with the people around her, but
was just as afraid to let anyone in as the rest of the aliens. Max and Liz,
however, had discovered a deep bond between them….starting the day he had saved
her life, and growing into a meaningful love that seemed to transcend
everything else. But then everything had fallen apart. Tess had come, and Max
was unable to fight the genetics that had been engineered into all four of them
to bring them together . He very quickly shunned the idea of a destiny that was
not his own to decide, however, and refused to be with Tess. He still loved
Liz.
This is where everything went hopelessly wrong.
What might be the one possible thing that could convince you to stay away
from the person you love? How about that person coming back from 14 years in
the future to tell you that everyone you know will die….life as you know it
will cease to exist, if you stay with him? Using the granilith, Max had been
able to come back to try to change his past. In the original timeline, he'd
said, he and Liz had gotten married at nineteen, and remained inseparable from
that moment on. But Tess had felt there was no longer a place for her with her
fellows because of this, and had eventually left. Her loss had a devastating
effect. Without her, the remaining three were not as strong as they could have
been, and were unable to stop the havoc that befell the earth in that future.
Future Max's goal was clear…..make his younger self fall out of love with Liz
before it was too late. Unfortunately, changing young Max's feelings proved to
be a difficult thing, and Liz was able to succeed only by leading him to
believe that she and Kyle had slept together. Whether it truly made him stop
loving her or not, it did alter the original course of events, so that
the Max from the future never was. And that's where it had lain…Liz doomed to
carry the secret that they were right for each other, but could still
never be.
Until tonight, that is. Tonight, when she'd walked out of the Crashdown and
seen that car speeding toward Max. She hadn't had time to think of the
consequences of her actions….she only saw that he was about to be hit. By
healing her again, Max had reawakened the bond between them….saw what she
saw…knew what she knew. Now he knew the truth, and shared her burden.
Liz felt horrible….the one really important charge Max had left her with,
and she'd betrayed his trust. The pain went even deeper, however. It had been
hard enough to know she couldn't be with him before, but at least then she'd
had a small degree of comfort in knowing that she was doing the right
thing….saving lives, and protecting Max. Now, they still couldn't be together,
but on top of it she had failed to protect him from the knowledge of a future
that they would have lived side by side in. Worst of all was the hope that had
blossomed in her heart again. Despite knowing what would happen if they ended
up together, Liz still hoped somewhere in her heart that now that Max knew the
truth, there might be hope for them. She felt relieved at not having to lie
anymore, and that Max knew now that she wouldn't have ever hurt him if she'd
had any choice whatsoever, and thought that this was perhaps the deepest
betrayal of all.
Liz sighed deeply, looking at her clock. It would be time to get up soon,
and go to school. Just as Liz resigned herself to another hour or so of
restless wakefulness, she heard a sound on her balcony. Her heart leapt into
her throat, "Max?" she called out hopefully.
More scrabbling from the balcony, and a pale face peered in her window. A familiar
pale face…pierced and framed by chin-length purple hair. "It's Ava," said
Tess's duplicate. "I'm in trouble; I need your help."
~*~*~*~*~
The sun shone brightly in through the windows of the science room, and
Michael started to shut the blinds as Max closed the door behind them. The
reason Liz had called this emergency meeting was clear…..Ava sat flightily on
the edge of a desk, fidgeting. She watched the others warily, and with sidelong
glances…looking as if she might bolt at any moment. The others, Tess, Isabel,
and Max, stood across from her. Finishing with the blinds, Michael joined them,
glancing over at Maria and Liz, who stood apart, seeming to be trying to
separate themselves from the aliens. Michael's glance lingered on Maria for a
moment before he pursed his lips and returned his attention to Ava.
"So what's going on?" Max asked after several moments of silence. Ava
fidgeted some more, then seemed to gather herself and looked up to meet Max's
gaze head on. "We're all in danger," she said.
From Max's left, Isabel spoke up. "What do you mean?"
Ava rolled her eyes, sighing hugely. "I already went over all this with
Liz."
"And now you can go over it with us," Max said.
After a moment spent gathering her wits, Ava started. "A couple weeks ago I
overheard Lonnie and Rath talking about the granilith. About how they knew you
had it, and how stupid you were not to give it up at the summit. I didn't think
too much of it….the summit was over, the deal was done, ya know? End of story.
Except it wasn't. Three days ago Rath tried to kill me. He'd been going on
about how it was all my fault they were stuck here. He said that Lonnie had
remembered about the granilith….that there was a way she could use it to get
them home."
The amazement on the faces of everyone in the room was not lost on Ava, and
she continued before anyone could speak. "I don't know how," she said flatly.
"Just that it would take four of us….no more, and definitely no less. It has to
be four, and at least two of the four have to be from Roswell."
"Why?" Tess asked.
"I don't know," Ava said honestly. "Maybe something to do with the
equalization of powers, or safeguards in the granilith itself….I don't know. I do
know that Max has to be one of the two." She looked directly at Max, who was
startled. "You're the key. So she won't be trying to kill you." Ava looked at
Tess next. "You either, I guess. They want me dead, so I guess that means you
have to live."
Michael cut in harshly. "So Isabel and me are out too, right? Is that how it
works?"
Ava nodded. "One of each person, yeah. That's how it has to be." She spoke
again to Max. "They plan on using you to get home, and killing everyone else.
Lonnie thought that it was poetic justice, or something. Betraying you just
like Vilandra did. Letting everyone you care about die. I…I managed to get away
from Rath, and stole a car. But they followed me. They were right behind me
when I burned through town last night."
Tess immediately made the connection and spoke without even thinking it
through first. "That was you?! You hit Liz….you almost killed Max!"
Startled, Ava turned to Liz, her voice faltering. "That was you? I'm
sorry….but how….how did you…?"
Liz studied the floor before her…very obviously not looking at Max,
and everyone heard Ava's unspoken word – "survive" - as they saw the truth on his
face.
Suddenly, what Liz had just heard occurred to her, and she looked up at
Tess. "Wait, how did you know? You weren't there." Tess didn't even glance at
Liz, but continued to stare at Ava. "How do we know you're telling the truth?"
she demanded of her double. "How do we know you weren't trying to kill Max last
night?"
"Why would I try to kill him?" Ava shot back in Tess's own voice. "Why would
I do that when I just told you he's necessary to make the granilith
work?"
"We don't know how true that is, either!" Tess said acidly. The two
women stared each other down, their eyes flashing identical anger. They had
even both adopted the same aggressive stance. If it weren't for Ava's
outlandish hair and piercings, it would have been impossible to tell them
apart.
"Look," Ava said, backing down, "I don't wanna kill anybody. I came here to warn
you. To keep people from dying."
Maria spoke for the first time, "Yeah, you're a real bleeding heart. It must
have taken lots of courage to make your way here to warn them….and then leave a
wounded person lying in the road bleeding after you ran her over."
"I didn't mean to!" Ava started again, but was interrupted when Max cut in.
"It doesn't matter. Whether this is the truth or not, whether Lonnie and
Rath are here or not, we've gotta take steps."
Suddenly the bell rang, and everyone became aware of the voices and sounds
of slamming lockers out in the hallway. "We've got to get to class," Max said.
"Act as if everything's normal. We'll meet again after school. Until then, keep
your eyes peeled."
With that, everyone started filing out of the room…Max and Liz being the
last two to exit. As they approached the door together, Max lost his breath
when she looked up at him. As he'd neared her he had willed her to not look at
him. Because he'd known that he'd become locked in her gaze. Would drown in the
luminous brown eyes that looked up at him now. Looked into him. If
anything, he loved her more now than he ever had….though he'd never thought it
possible that his feelings could grow stronger. All of the emotions that he had
tried so hard to will away had come flooding back the instant he'd touched her
last night. Hell, who was he kidding…they'd never really gone away. He'd been
hurt…but he hadn't loved her any less. But the cost of learning the truth of her
loyalty to him was bittersweet. Because now he knew just how much they really couldn't
be together. Max wasn't sure what was worse…thinking that he had lost Liz's
love to Kyle, or knowing that he could never have her despite the love
he now knew she still felt for him.
How will I ever get through this? he thought. He tried to keep his
voice even as he spoke her name in inquiry. "Liz?"
Liz took a deep breath and strove for calm when she spoke. "The granilith,
Max." she said. "You know what I know, now. What you…he told me. It's
important; it's powerful, and dangerous. And we can't let them have it."
"I know," Max said, trying to reassure her. "Don't worry; we'll stop them."
They gazed at each other a moment longer, both of them wanting to say so much
more, but knowing they couldn't. Finally Liz started to back away slowly,
making as if to turn and walk out of the room. She stumbled a bit, and Max
reached out a hand to steady her…touching her arm.
~FLASH~
…and they were assaulted with images and sounds…almost too fast to
comprehend. Flashing lights, music, Max, Liz, kissing…on their wedding
day…happy and laughing….
….Michael, screaming…dying. An explosion of glass and debris...Isabel
holding a gun, crying and full of rage as her finger trembled above the trigger….
…Maria, hurt….Max and Liz in bed, holding each other before morning with
agonizing tenderness…
~FLASH~
This time it was Liz who broke away in shock. Eyes wide, her mouth
worked, but nothing came out. She looked at Max.
He looked back at her, his face ashen. "I saw it too."