CHAPTER 50
Michael leaned against the wall of the pod cave and rested his forearms on his bent knees. With a heartfelt sigh, he tilted his head back and closed his eyes, weary to the bone.
Two days. He'd been here two days, and he hadn't accomplished anything. He'd just wasted his time.
Well, that and attempted to demolish the cave wall.
He'd spent most of Sunday night raging against his situation, his helplessness, his stupid human weakness. Letting his fury consume him. But the only result had been a pair of bruised and bloody fists, torn from hours of pounding against the wall of the cave.
At least in his rage he'd found the presence of mind to avoid the pods, not wanting to disturb one of their few tangible souvenirs of their former lives.
He'd finally fallen asleep, too exhausted to fight any more, only to wake several hours later and repeat the cycle. Less violently this time, because his hands were beginning to swell, although he didn't think he'd broken anything.
Now he sat there, battered and totally devoid of energy. And for the first time in a very long time, he felt a sense of clarity. He was able to look without bias at himself and his situation. And he didn't particularly like what he saw.
He had spent the last six months reacting blindly to things. Not thinking, just raging away at the perceived unfairness of his life. He'd thrust everyone away, fighting with Max, withdrawing from Isabel, closing himself off from the few humans who'd actually, surprisingly, become his friends.
And why? Because he couldn't--or didn't want to--deal with what he'd done. Sure, he'd pretended to push it aside, and maybe that worked for a little while, but he couldn't hide from it any longer.
He'd killed a man. He'd taken a life out of fear and hate and anger. He'd lost control--if he'd ever had it--and Pierce was dead.
He could never take that back. He could never go back and change it.
He could never make up for it, either.
But he couldn't allow it to burden his soul any more.
He could never undo his actions, but one moment didn't have to define the rest of his life, either. He could still do something of value. Something meaningful. Be a part of something bigger than himself.
And he could help Max and Isabel by doing it.
So no matter what he felt or wished or regretted or wanted, he had to let go of his guilt. It was a luxury he couldn't afford.
Somehow he had to forgive himself.
Once again a sudden noise woke Max from a deep sleep. This time it wasn't a pounding on the window, though. It was the shrill ringing of the phone.
Managing to reach a hand out and grab the receiver before the noise could wake his parents, Max blearily eyed his clock radio. It was 2:43. "What is it, Michael? Some of us have school in the morning, you know," he said in a grumpy tone.
The voice that spoke gave him shivers, so much that for a moment he didn't take in what it was saying. It was very familiar--and it wasn't Michael. It took him back to his captivity and torture in the white room.
Pierce.
No, not Pierce. Michael had killed him and effectively rid Max of that particular nightmare. Well, the living one anyway. No one could do anything about the bad dreams he still occasionally got. Michael wasn't the only one with trouble sleeping.
But Pierce was gone, and the shapeshifter Nasedo had taken the agent's place as head of the FBI Special Unit. Max hadn't heard one word from him since he'd left for Washington. "Nasedo?" he said sharply.
The shapeshifter's oh-so-cheerful voice belied the seriousness of his question. "Where's Michael?" he repeated.
"Away. Why?" asked Max, sitting up.
Nasedo didn't answer, merely barking out, "Do you have any idea what he's been up to?"
"Well, yes, pretty much," Max replied, asking again, "Why?"
"He's drawing too much attention to you all. I can't protect you from this distance. You need to keep a better rein on him."
Max bristled. "I'm his friend, not his keeper. Michael can take care of himself, make his own decisions."
"You're the leader. He's your second. You command, he obeys." Nasedo's statement was implacable.
Max got a sudden mental image of his headstrong friend meekly obeying his every order. It was ludicrous. "You obviously don't know Michael. Or me, for that matter," he said with a grin.
"Regardless, the attention he's calling to himself is dangerous."
Max frowned. "How do you know what's going on, anyway?" he asked suspiciously. "I thought you were in D.C. taking care of the Special Unit."
Nasedo sounded amused, in a cold, uncaring sort of way. "And it's part of my job to keep tabs on areas of suspected alien activity. I've kept up Pierce's subscription to the Roswell Journal. And when your hotheaded second got into the paper, and Tess verified--"
"Tess?" Max interrupted.
"Tess verified the incident, and said he's been the talk of the school. Not exactly a low profile. Do I need to remind you that attention can be dangerous?"
"No, you don't need to remind me. And believe me, Michael doesn't like the attention any more than you do. He's been going through some things, that's all."
There was a tense silence on the other end of the line. "What things?"
There was no way Max was going to sit there and tell Nasedo everything that was going on in Michael's life. His friend had been definite that he didn't trust the shapeshifter, and didn't want him involved. Max would respect that wish. So he merely said, "It doesn't matter. We've got it under control."
Nasedo's voice was insistent. "Power problems? Strange dreams?" He paused for a few minutes. "Has he been acting unlike himself?" He seemed to take Max's silence for confirmation. "You have no idea what you're dealing with," he said, his tone sharp. "Listen to me, Max. It's imperative you keep him under control. Do not under any circumstances allow him to use his powers, not even the tiniest little bit."
"What's going on?" demanded Max.
"I can't just take off without compromising my position with the Special Unit," the shapeshifter continued ruthlessly. "But I'll get some things cleared up and be there within a couple of weeks. Until then, keep a rein on your second, or the consequences could be catastrophic." The warning was quite clear. "And don't tell him about this conversation. The less he knows, the better."
And then all Max heard was a dial tone on the other end of the line. He stared at the receiver in his hand. What was going on?
With a frustrated grunt, Michael relaxed his right hand, feeling the pull on his swollen knuckles lessen. In the light of the Coleman lantern Max had dug out from the recesses of the Evanses' garage, he stared down at the small pebble he'd been clutching. It was just a rock. A tiny thing. Nothing to it. Izzy could change one of them when she was eight. Hell, he could do it back then, at least occasionally. So why couldn't he now?
Dropping the small stone, he ran both hands over his tired face. If he was going to be of any use to Max, he had to get better at this power stuff. He had never had great control over it, but he'd been able to do some things. He'd changed his fingerprints, like Nasedo had shown him, during their rescue of Max, hadn't he? And then the visions; and just a couple of weeks ago he'd connected with Maria even if he hadn't been able to control what she'd seen. At the very least, he'd always been able to blow things up, even if he didn't mean to. So why couldn't he change one stupid little rock?
The chilly air surrounded him, wrapping him in its cold embrace. He idly considered going outside to look for something with which to make a fire, but a total bone-weary reluctance to move kept him from it. Instead, he reached out for the sleeping bag that was laid out next to him. Unzipping it, he wrapped it around his shoulders like a blanket. He shook his head at his own stupidity. It figured he'd decide he needed to hang out in a cave in the middle of November. He couldn't hole up someplace comfortable, not him. And desert or no desert, it was cold.
Holding the sleeping bag closed around him, he reached the other hand out and groped along the cave floor for another rock. Finding one, he picked it up and studied it in the dim light. It might've been the one from before. Maybe not. It was just a rock, after all.
Idly rolling it in his hand, he let his mind wander.
Cold or not, he actually felt more comfortable in this place than anywhere else he could remember. Whether it was due to the alien pods hanging nearby or to its seclusion, he didn't know. But it was a place in which he didn't have to hide what he was from anyone. He could be alien and it didn't matter. After all, the only people who'd ever seen it were aliens, too. They wouldn't care that he was.
No, wait. Liz Parker had seen it. She'd been there when they got the so-called message from home, that horrible day last spring where everything had gone all wrong. Well, wronger. Was that even a word?
He could still remember Liz's face after she'd heard about the aliens' destiny--not to couple together, but to save their home planet. She'd left so that Max could do what he needed to in order to save an entire race. Never mind that it broke her heart to do it, and Max's too. Michael wasn't blind, even though he liked to pretend to himself he was. It was easier to keep separate. But he could see what Max and Liz meant to each other. Liz had left. It was maybe the bravest thing he'd ever seen.
A small voice deep inside wasn't going to let this go so easily. Liz had given up Max, even though she loved him. So how was that different from Michael giving up Maria, even though he'd loved her?
Because he had loved her. He wasn't sure how anyone could have become so important to him. Especially an overactive, hyper pixie of a blonde girl who somehow was able to make him feel things he didn't want to feel. Things he hadn't even known he was capable of feeling.
He shook his head. It was different for him, though. Max and Liz--they deserved each other. Barring Max's extra-terrestrial origins, they maybe even were meant for each other. True love, soul mates, whatever, if you wanted to get all sappy about things. They were both such glaringly good people, in an upstanding, honorable, heroic kind of way. Liz had let Max go because it was the right thing to do.
Michael had shoved Maria away because he was scared.
Scared of hurting her, scared of himself, scared of the things she made him feel, scared that he didn't know how to or couldn't handle those things...All of that and more. Their whole 'relationship', if you could call it that, was a bizarre dance, with him being pulled to her, then running away, then being dragged back to her in spite of his fears and intentions.
Because no matter what, he couldn't escape her, not entirely. She always seemed to be stuck somewhere in the back recesses of his thoughts, ready to leap out the instant he wasn't paying attention. He wouldn't mind if it didn't make it that much harder to stay away from her. Which he had to do, and not just because her mother wanted him to, although that was part of it. He'd never paid that much heed to grownups before, though, except to try and avoid Hank's drunken rages, so why get all hung up on what one grownup thought? Was it just because she was Maria's mother? Mrs. DeLuca was important to Maria, a vital part of her existence. They weren't well off, but they had each other. They were family.
And Michael was starting to understand just what that really meant. He'd always wanted a real home, a real family, without really knowing what it was. He'd been envious of Max and Isabel for their life with the Evanses--who wouldn't when compared to the squalor of life with Hank?--but he'd never really believed in it. Now, the two DeLucas--he could almost see the bond between them. Even when Mrs. DeLuca had been furious with the both of them, he could see how much she loved her daughter.
It was a far cry from the easy acceptance Mr. & Mrs. Evans gave to Max and Izzy. Everything was a little too perfect in that particular household. Well, other than the two teenagers being aliens. And even if Isabel thought otherwise, Michael couldn't help believing that things would be different if the Evanses knew the truth about their children. No matter how jealous Michael might have been of his two fellow aliens' situation--and he had to admit he was, if only to himself--it had never seemed quite real. It was too dreamlike, too good to be true.
But Maria's small family--now that was real. Real, and vibrant, and vital. Maybe even more so because the two were all each other had. Even with the hard things he knew they had gone through, they still went on, fighting and struggling and needing each other.
Not that different from how he felt about Maria. Well, he knew he didn't feel the exact same way about her as her mother did, that was for sure. But he needed her just as much as Mrs. DeLuca did. He just didn't have the luxury of acting on it any more.
It was funny--the weird kind of funny--how quickly she'd set roots in him. They'd gone to school together for years. He supposed they'd probably had classes together, and she'd probably waited on him some of the many times Max had dragged him into the Crashdown, but he'd never really noticed her. He wasn't even sure now if he'd known her name. She was just one in a sea of faces, too dangerous to know much about. He was too busy hiding from the world to stop and see her as anything other than that.
And then came the day when Liz had been shot, and the world had taken a sudden left turn onto a whole new road. He'd found friends that accepted him, regardless of what he was or how he acted, and he'd discovered that he was far more human than he'd ever imagined.
And through it all, Maria was there beating on his stupid self-made stone wall and tearing it apart piece by piece. He'd tried to mend it, sure, but it was never the same, like she was some sort of acid that ate away at its underlying structure, exposing the parts of him he'd kept hidden even from himself.
Stupid analogy, Guerin. But still, she had worn him down, and he was weak. If it weren't for Mrs. DeLuca, he wasn't sure his resolve would be able to hold out any longer. He'd probably go running again, but towards her this time.
As much as he wanted to do the right thing, he was weak. And the tiny part of him, buried down deep, that had almost accepted the human part of himself was threatening to overwhelm the supposedly much more established alien side.
Part of him wouldn't even mind.
He could give in to his feelings and try to act human. Allow himself to feel for Maria again--not that he'd really ever stopped--and try to make something of his life here on this planet. He could be with her, hold her, kiss her, listen to her babble about nothing in particular, watch her breathe in one of those stupid oils she always carried around...He could lose himself in her, and feel like he actually belonged. Forget his origins, his search for home, never try to use his powers, whatever.
Except then instead of being an outcast who nonetheless had a purpose, a part to play in something bigger than himself, he'd just be a loser with nothing. No reason that he'd ever existed in the first place.
And he was terrified of that too.
His eyes closed, he continued to roll the pebble in his hand, his fingers running over its smooth surface, trying to block out his fear.
Wait a minute.
Smooth?
It was a rough pebble, oddly shaped by nature. Or it had been. Now it felt round, and smooth, and familiar. Kind of like...the metal walls in the room he'd imprisoned himself inside in his own head.
His eyes flew open and he stared down at the thing in his hand. It didn't look like metal, but it didn't look like a rock, either. It was clear, with a slight bluish tint to it. Color aside, it kind of reminded him of the alien balance stones River Dog had given them.
He'd changed it. But how?
Reaching out, Michael carefully set the blue crystalline sphere on the floor in front of him and searched until his hand found another small desert rock. Holding it loosely in his hand, he closed his eyes, willing it to change.
Nothing.
What was going on? One minute, he had some sort of rudimentary control over his powers and the next, it was gone? How had he managed to change one when he couldn't repeat it? He grimaced, his mind churning with the need to make some sense out of this. What was different the time it had worked? He'd just been sitting there, with the sleeping bag around him--could temperature affect his powers? He'd let his thoughts drift, and...
He froze with a sudden realization. The other difference between his failed attempts and his successful one was Maria. Thoughts of Maria invading his head, and suddenly he could tap into whatever it was that allowed him to use his powers instead of struggling with them. It had been so easy, he hadn't even realized he'd done it.
Looking back, this wasn't the first time, either. Way back last year on their trip to Marathon, he hadn't been able to get a vision from the key until she'd stood next to him and told him to try again. And when he did, it had worked. More recently, he'd been able to heal Pierce's body, and Maria was nearby. Sure, it was only in a dream, but it had to mean something, didn't it? She could feel when he was around, and he'd dragged her into his mental prison and then, the other night, into his dream...Was it possible for a person to be the missing key to controlling his powers?
When you looked on the surface of things, it seemed stupid. An extra-terrestrial needing a human to be able to use his powers? And out of the billions of people on the planet, the human he needed just happened to be the girl he...well, happened to be Maria? He shook his head. He was too much of a skeptic to buy into that. The coincidence was too strong. Max and Liz fated to meet each other--sure, okay. But Michael Guerin fated to meet Maria DeLuca? No, it had to be blind luck that she was the one who could help him focus.
Except that usually his luck tended to be of the more negative kind.
Well, one way to put paid to this whole idea. He'd just think about Maria, and when nothing happened to the stone in his hand, he'd know he was just being stupid.
So he closed his eyes again and summoned up an image of her in his mind. The one he chose was a recent memory, with her standing, laughing, on the West Roswell High stage in some filmy white thing, looking joyous and alive and real. He'd wanted to be up there with her, to allow some of her happiness to reflect onto him. He could picture her so clearly, she could almost have been in the pod chamber, standing right there in front of him.
Except of course she couldn't. He was avoiding her. Running away in fear--big surprise there. Maybe thinking about Maria wasn't such a good idea after all. It just tore him up inside, and since it couldn't really have any effect on his powers...
He opened his eyes and stared down at the smooth blue sphere in his hand. Oops. Maybe it could.
TBC...