Liz's knees buckled underneath her and she slid down the wall.
"We become inseparable. And nothing comes between us ever again. Until—"
"The end of the world?"
"That's right."
The words swirled in her head until she wanted to press her hands against her ears and shout for them to stop. Future Max had told her that if she didn't stop loving Max it could lead to the end of the world. He had told her that it would drive Tess away and without her it would make Max, Michael and Isabel weaker. And Tess had gone about as far away as she could imagine. Because of her.
"Liz? Are you alright?"
Liz shook her head miserably.
"You said I was going to bring about the end of the world," she whispered because her throat had gone dry. "You were right. You were right all along."
* * * * * *
Max's head was still throbbing when he finally woke up. His eyes felt like they were going to fall out of his head but he forced them open anyway. What he saw made him wish that he hadn't. He, the vampire and his friends and another guy in glasses were chained to a wall. But while all of the others were strung up with their hands above their heads Max's were pulled behind him. And in front of him, Agent Topolski was getting a neck rub from the guy she had been with earlier.
"You have wonderful hands," she said.
"You have no idea," the guy with her whispered in her ear. She smiled, but pulled away from him.
"I think I'll take a nap."
"Yes, my love," he said. "You'll need all your energy for tonight."
She smiled and sauntered off seductively.
"She's going to eat you alive," the man next to Max said. "Literally, if there is a God in heaven."
Max gave a start. He hadn't realized that the other man was conscious. Max looked at him and thought that he looked as bad as Max felt. But he was staring at the other man through his glasses with angry intensity.
"Ripper!" The other man said with delight. "You're not giving me advice on women are you?" He walked toward them. "After all, your track record isn't exactly glorious, is it? There's Olivia, who just stopped coming to visit after she realized all the stories of demons and vampires weren't just things you said to get her into your bed. But she was the lucky one, wasn't she? She walked away before she met the same fate as Joyce Summers and Jenny Calendar."
The guy next to Max, "Ripper", lunged at him despite the chains latching him to the wall. He was within reach for a split second before his restraints pulled him back. The other guy just laughed as Ripper cried out in frustration.
"How did you get away from the Initiative, Ethan?" He demanded to know.
"Oh well, after the Adam debacle there was a shift in power. The Initiative was disbanded and I was placed in a position that was beneficial to some of the new regime."
"You bribed your way out."
"If you want to be crass, Ripper."
"How did you end up with Darla? Last I heard, she left LA when she couldn't get Angel to succumb to the dark side."
"Well, you see, that's the really interesting part. While I was in the custody of the Initiative, I met a woman who had an amazing resemblance to my beautiful Darla. I told her about it and she "arranged" to have me look for her. I didn't tell her that, at the time, I believed Darla was dead. Imagine my surprise when it turned out someone had resurrected her just when I needed her. It was like divine intervention."
He smiled and paced slowly in front of Ripper.
"When I found her, Darla told me that she bore a child back in her days as a courtesan."
"Agent Topolski," Max whispered.
Ethan's eyes turned toward Max.
"Yes, you knew her great, great, great granddaughter, didn't you? It was very painful for her to find out that you were responsible for the death of her only living relative."
* * * * * *
"Liz, what are you talking about?" Buffy asked.
Liz was pacing the room frantically.
"He traveled through time to warn me but I didn't listen did I? I wasn't strong enough to walk away from him. And now---"
Buffy grabbed her by the shoulders and gave her a shake.
"You are not making any sense. Explain to me what you're talking about."
"Max, Future Max. He traveled back from fourteen years in the future to tell me that if I didn't break up with the Max in this time it would lead to the end of the world."
Spike snickered.
"You're telling me that because you didn't send your boyfriend packing the world is going to end?"
Liz glared at him. "Yes."
Buffy looked incredulous as well but she wanted to understand.
"Why? What is so important about you that would make this happen?"
"It's not me, it's Max." Liz said desperately. "Max has enemies. Enemies that can destroy this planet. And he was—" she fumbled to explain it without using the word alien. "He was suppose to marry Tess but Max was in love with me. Future Max told me that our being together eventually drove Tess away and because of that it made Max and his—family—weaker. They couldn't defend themselves or this planet as well without her and they lost."
Liz started pacing again.
"I did what he told me. I broke up with Max; I did everything I could think of to get him to stop loving me. I even made him think that I slept with my ex-boyfriend. We were apart for a long time but a part of me always wanted him back; a part of me wanted to tell him why I pretended. Then I almost lost him for real. My friend Alex was murdered and I was so intent on finding out who did it, I hurt him. I blamed him, I isolated him, I pushed him away--"
"And he went to Tess," Buffy said quietly.
Liz covered her mouth with her hand and she nodded. It took her a moment to find her voice again.
"They were—together, just like they were suppose to be."
"So what's the problem?" Spike asked. He sat on the bed and stared at her like he'd just gotten caught up in a really good soap opera.
"I found out Tess is the one that killed Alex."
"This is better then Passions!" Spike exclaimed.
"Shut up, Spike," Buffy said and then said quietly to Liz: "What happened after that?"
"Tess left. Max wanted to kill her but he couldn't because she was pregnant."
"Oh God."
"But it doesn't matter because she's gone. Max and I are back together and she's gone and it's going to happen anyway."
"The end of the world," Spike and Buffy said together.
* * * * * *
"I don't know what you're talking about," Max said. "Miss Topolski was a guidance counselor at my high school until she disappeared."
"Oh, you do that quite well," Ethan cooed. "You've really perfected the whole normal, innocent teenager act."
"I am a normal teenager," Max insisted.
"Then why have you referred to her as agent Topolski up until now?"
Max fell silent and Ethan grinned.
"You knew she was a Federal agent. And when she couldn't bring you to her superiors, they killed her." Ethan shook his head. "Darla was devastated. I had to do what I could to comfort her."
"By feeding her revenge scenario," Ripper said.
"She really has an incredibly creative mind. It's very titillating." Ethan said. "The plan was to get you to kill each other. I planted a few false clues about the Parker girl in one of your books," he said to Giles, "and your Slayer was suppose to kill her. Then Max here was going to go after you. The survivors, if there were any, would figure out that the carnage was a tragic mistake and wallow in their own self-pity for years to come. No on would escape unscathed."
He just about beamed with delight.
"Darla and I concocted the perfect plan. Until the avenging angel showed up." He glared at Angel's unmoving form. "But every good plan has a fall back."
"Which is?" Ripper asked.
"Kill everyone involved."
* * * * * *
"This doesn't make sense," Buffy said, starting to pace. "You said this Tess person killed your friend Alex?"
Liz nodded.
"Why?"
Liz tried to find words to explain. She had already told her too much. She hadn't said the word alien but Buffy now knew that Max was different. Liz had been sworn to secrecy about Max, Isabel, and Michael's alien origins but she was the one that had spilled the information to Maria and Alex. She had known that she could trust them but she knew nothing about Buffy.
"Tess had forced Alex to do something and she was afraid that he would tell Max about it so she killed him. It turned out that Tess was working with Max's enemies."
"So if Tess is a traitor then what makes you think she wasn't the one that caused the end of the world in the future?" Spike asked.
"What?"
"It makes sense," he said with a shrug. "You and Max and your whole lovefest shaked her off so she went away, contacted his enemies, fed them the information they needed to know about Max and his weaknesses and strengths and pop goes the world. Your Future Max didn't know she was a traitor, or I assume he wouldn't have wanted you to force them to be together, so he assumed the reason they failed was because she defected."
Spike grinned.
"This Tess chick sounds like my kind of girl."
Buffy glared at him.
"Or she would have been, back in my big bad days, this is…."
Liz let the words sink in. What he said made sense. Tess was a traitor and that never changed. If she was set to betray Max now, then she may have done so in the future that Future Max had described. More so if she was angry with him for rejecting her. As it became more real to her, the lighter the weight crushing her began to feel.
"I think it's safe to say that you won't be bringing about the destruction of the planet any time soon." Buffy said.
Liz looked at her, puzzled.
"Why did you just do that?"
"What?"
"Help me. You're the one that convinced me that I might be the person that you came here to kill."
"Well, for one thing, Giles' book said that you were going to bring about the end of the world but it also specified that you were a demon with silver glowing skin and you can't be hurt by modern weapons like bullets. We researched you and there were reports that---"
"I had a silver hand print and survived a shooting," Liz finished for her. It was comforting to know that Buffy had done some research and had not just hunted her down based on one source of information. It was also disturbing. "But how could that information get into your book?"
"Someone is setting you up," Buffy said decisively. "Someone wanted me to kill you."
"I vote on the fem fatale." Spike said, raising his hand. But Liz shook her head.
"Angel thought so too but when Tess left she went—well she went really far away."
"Back to the home planet?" Buffy asked. Liz's head shot up.
"I never said alien."
"Well duh." Spike said.
"Listen," Buffy said, ignoring him. "I understand that this is probably a secret that you've had to live with for some time. I know what it's like. But whoever set this is motion is playing all of us and the only way we're going to get to the bottom of it is to trust each other."
Liz took a deep breath. She knew Isabel and Michael had been angry with her for letting Alex and Maria in on their secret identities but she knew in her heart that she could trust them with the secret. The same voice was now telling her the same about Buffy.
"OK," Liz said and she held out her hand. Buffy shook it. "Now we have to find Max."
"And Angel."
