Sacrifice
A Sequel to Quietly into the Night
Conventional Couples
Rating: PG-13

Chapter Twenty-One

Antar – Outside Capitol City


Franchet guided the transport to a stop in a deserted section of the city. He and Malik jumped out and went to the back of the vehicle to help Isabelle and Lexie out. The carried a still unconscious Liz out and led them into an empty warehouse. Isabelle and Lexie followed the men as they went down several flights of stairs into a basement. Malik shifted all of Liz's weight into Franchet's arms and moved to the back of the basement. He opened a hidden panel in the wall, pressed several buttons, and the wall slid back to reveal a small room with several beds in it. Franchet stepped into the room and carefully laid Liz on one of the beds and motioned for Isabelle and Lexie to follow him. Once they were all in the small room, the panel slid close, hiding them from view.

"Where are we?" questioned Isabelle.
"In yet another of the many tunnels that were established by the resistance movement," answered Franchet. "You will be safe here until we can find out what is going on."
"You have to get word to Jereon and Saranara, they must be frantic by now," said Isabelle.
"I like Jeremy and Serena," piped in Lexie. "They're my friends."
"That's right sweetie, they are our friends, and we need to let them know that we're ok," agreed Isabelle. Turning to Franchet she continued, "Can you get word to them soon?"
"Yes Princess, it will be done as soon as possible," Franchet assured her. "Now, let me show you where the supplies are before Malik and I leave."

The two men showed Isabelle where the supplies where kept, and how to work the door, but urged her to remain hidden until they returned.
"We should be back in several quarchaks," said Malik. Isabelle remembered that quarchaks were the Antarian equivalent of Earth hours. "However Princess, if we do not, you will know that something has happened, and you must take the Queen and her child and run."
Isabelle nodded to show she understood and said goodbye to the two men. After they left, she went over to check Liz who was still unconscious. Lexie sat on the bed next to Liz, staring at her.
"That's my mommy," she said matter of factly. "How come she's still sleeping? She takes bigger naps than me."
"I'm not really sure," said Isabelle. "But look see, she has a big ump on her head. Maybe that's why she's sleeping."
"I forgot she had a boo boo," said Lexie, her lower lip trembling. "I'm sorry auntie."
Isabelle sat down next to the child and quickly reassured her that she hadn't done anything wrong.

Lexie slid off the cot she was sitting on and moved closer to Liz. She kissed Liz's cheek and then placed her hands over the large bump on Liz's forehead. Isabelle could see the small child shaking with concentration as she tried to heal her mother. After several minutes, Lexie broke the connection, her forehead wet with perspiration.
"She's got lots of boo boo's Auntie," said the little girl. "But I made her all better," she added proudly.
"That's great muffin," answered Isabelle as she stroked Lexie's hair. "Why don't you eat this little snack and take a quick nap."
"Ok," said Lexie as she took to proffered snack from her aunt. "It don't taste good Auntie Isabelle," cried the little girl. "It makes my tongue tingly."
Isabelle took a bite of the bar that Lexie was munching and almost squealed in delight. One thing they had found on their last visit to Antar was that the food was seasoned with a combination of spicy and sweet, just the way she, Max and Michael liked it. Apparently, that was one gene Lexie didn't inherit.
"I know it doesn't taste very good sweetie, but try and eat up. It will make your tummy feel better."

Lexie nodded off while she was eating, so Isabelle covered the child with a blanket and began a systematic search of the area. A soft moan caught her attention and she rushed over to the cot that held Liz. As she approached, Liz sat up slowly, holding her head.
"Oh, God, that hurts," she said. "What's going on, where am I?" she questioned. She saw Isabelle and looked shocked. "Aren't you Isabelle Evans?"
"What?" Isabelle asked in shock. "I mean, yes, I am, but you know that Liz."
"Well yeah, I mean everybody in school knows you Isabelle, but I had no idea you knew who I was," said Liz. "Where are we, and who is that?" she asked pointing to Lexie.
Oh my God," Isabelle thought to herself. She has amnesia or something. I may have done the whole medical school thing, but I don't think I can cope with this.
"Liz, what's the very last thing you remember happening?" asked Isabelle.

Liz thought for a while, a frown on her face. "I don't know, I think I had a date with Kyle last night, and Maria and I were working at the CrashDown this morning. Oh yeah, and there were these two really geeky alien hunters in town for the Crash Festival. I tried scamming them with this picture I have of a doll that melted out in the sun. I told them it was an alien baby," she laughed. "And there were these two guys at one of Maria's tables. The were really loud, they were having some kind of argument or something, and one of them pulled out a gun. That's the last thing I can remember."
"Wow," said Isabelle, half to herself. "How am I going to explain this?"
"What, explain what, and who is that little girl? Isabelle, what's going on here?"
"Look Liz, this is going to take a while to explain, but for now, can you just trust me?" said Isabelle
Trust no one, a voice in Liz's head said. She backed away from Isabelle shaking her head. "Stay away from me," she said scrambling off the cot and moving across the room. "I want to get out of here!"
"Liz, relax, it's just me, Isabelle, nobody here is going to hurt you," said Isabelle in a soothing voice as she walked towards Liz.
"I said stay away from me," said Liz raising her hand in an unconscious gesture.

Isabelle stopped, unsure if Liz realized that she could kill her with her upraised hand. "Ok Liz, I'm stopping right here, but you don't have to be afraid. I'm your friend."
"You're not my friend Isabelle Evans. People like Maria, Alex and I aren't in your so- called social class. You walk past us in the halls and look down on us like we were bugs!"
Isabelle faltered at the mention of Alex, and at the reminder of how shallow she used to be. She stepped back from Liz and went to go sit on one of the cots.
"Ok listen," she said. "I'm going to try and explain some things to you, and it's going to sound really strange, but I want you to promise me that you'll listen and keep an open mind."
Liz looked warily at Isabelle and finally nodded her assent.

"That fight in the CrashDown that you remembered, well, the gun went off, and well, you were shot Liz, and you almost died. You would have died, but Max saved you."
"What? I was shot, where, and how did Max save me?"
"The bullet hit you in the stomach area," said Isabelle. She watched as Liz lifted up her shirt to examine the area.
"It can't be true, there's no scar or anything. You're insane. I was never shot."
"You were, and you almost died, I guess I shouldn't say Max saved you as much as he healed you."
"Now I know you're insane," said Liz. "I've heard enough, I want to leave, now!"
"Look, you promised to hear me out, now will you do that. I always heard that when you gave your word you stuck to it, now was that true, or a lie?"
"Fine," said Liz. "I'll listen, but I still think you're insane. But please continue. Max healed me how?"

"He's an alien Liz, and so am I, and so is Michael Guerin."
"Aliens? Right," snorted Liz. "You and Max aliens. Michael, now maybe I could see that. Maria always said he was a strange person but an alien?" her voice trailed off as she watched Isabelle pass her hand over her hair and change it to long and red, then short and black.
"H-how did you do that?" she asked.
"I told you, I'm an alien. We can manipulate molecular structure as well as other things. One of the things Max can do is heal people. He healed you, but when he did, he exposed our secret, and put us in danger. We were all set to run, but you came up with a plan to through Jim off our tracks."
"Jim?" questioned Liz.
"Sheriff Valenti. Look Liz, this story is going to get very confusing from here on out, so maybe you better just listen, and try and remember."

Isabelle went on to explain how first Maria, and then Alex became intertwined in their secret. She told Liz about her relationship with Max and how they tried to fight their attraction, but couldn't, and about the arrival of Tess. Isabelle found it interesting to note that at the mention of the name Tess, Liz's face took on a troubled look.
"What, are you remembering something?" she asked.
"I don't know," Liz said. "Keep going."
Isabelle explained about Nescedo, and the Destiny book, and the holographic message that they received from their mother explaining that Tess was Max's destiny.
"And so I just walked away from him?" said Liz incredulously. "I gave him up?"
"Pretty much, but no matter how hard you tried to fight it, you two were always drawn together."

Isabelle continued the story, telling Liz about the skins, the harvest, and the Max from the future.
"And then you convinced Max that you slept with Kyle, and he turned to Tess. I still can't believe you did that Liz; you turned your back on the person you love more than anything to save us. You really are an incredible person."
"I'm not feeling to incredible right now. Unless incredibly stupid counts."
"What do you mean?" asked Isabelle.
"That Tess sounds like a real manipulative bitch, and I just let her walk all over me."
"There's more Liz, you need to hear all of it," said Isabelle. She proceeded to tell Liz about the duplicate podsters, and how Ava confirmed that when Max healed her, he changed her. She told Liz about the prom, trying to avoid any mention of the kiss between Tess and Max.

"Look Isabelle, if you're going to tell me this, tell me everything. You can't censor out the things that you think will hurt me," said Liz.
Isabelle began to cry. "Oh Liz, it was so awful. She killed him. She killed Alex!"
"What? Alex? He can't be dead!" cried Liz.
"He is, she mind warped him until his brain just couldn't handle it anymore, she destroyed him," whispered Isabelle through her tears. "And then she mind warped Kyle into helping her make it look like Alex killed himself. And everyone believed it Liz, everyone except you. You kept pushing and pushing for answers and you figured it out."
"What happened next, I hope someone killed that vicious bitch," said Liz bitterly.
"Well, no, see the thing is, wile you and Max were broken up, he slept with Tess and got pregnant. She told him that the baby was dying on Earth, and we decided to go back to Antar. We were getting ready to climb into the granolith, when Michael decided that he had already found a home, on Earth, with Maria. He left the pod chamber to find you, Kyle and Maria outside trying to get in to tell us what Tess did."

Isabelle got up to move over beside Liz. "Max let her leave for Antar, to protect his child," she said. "But the second he did, he knew he made a mistake. He became obsessed with finding his child, and you did everything you could to help him."
"God, did anything good happen to us?" asked Liz.
"Well, I got married, and you and Maria were my bridal attendants. His name was Jesse, and he was wonderful."
"Was?" asked Liz in a faint voice.
"Yeah, was, but we'll get to that," said Isabelle with a sad smile. "You started developing your powers Liz, and you left for a while, and went to school in Vermont. You just couldn't be around Max anymore, but it didn't last long, and you and Max were back and together, and happy."
"I'm guessing it didn't last very long," said Liz.
"Tess came back, with the baby. Kivar didn't want him because he was human, so she stole a ship and came back here. The military was back on our tail. Tess did try, she gave the baby to Max, and she had you drive her to the air force base, and she, well, she destroyed herself to give us a chance at freedom, but it didn't work. You started getting visions, and you had horrid one of us being killed, you, me, Max and Michael."
"But we didn't right? I mean, we're here, did the others get away ok as well?"
"Yeah, we decided to wait until after graduation because you and Max, Maria and Kyle were all graduating. Michael left right before graduation, but at the ceremony, we found out that we were going to be killed that night. Max stood up and walked to the podium, and he used his powers to kill the lights, giving us a chance to escape. At the last minute, Michael showed up and got Max out. After that, we decided to run."

"What do you mean, we decided to run. We shouldn't have done that, we should have stood up and fought back!" said Liz.
Isabelle laughed at her vehemence. "Well, in the end, we did. We left Roswell as a group, and you and Max got married, but the FBI kept tailing us. We had to split up, we figured we were safer, but then we all started being tailed. I thought it was Jesse. Kyle and I were living in the same city as him, and I found proof that he was an FBI agent."
"You and Kyle? Didn't your husband come with us?"
"No, I told him he still had a chance to live a normal life, so I left, he stayed."
"But you ended up in the same city?"
"Yeah, one of my more stupid plans," admitted Isabelle. "Anyhow, we all got back together, and you convinced us that we should go home to Roswell and take back our lives."
"And did we?" asked Liz.
"Yeah, it turned out that the FBI was never tracking us, it was Kivar and his stupid minions all the time."

"This is all so unbelievable," said Liz. "There is no way all this happened. I don't have any powers. I can't raise my hand and blow up that table over there."
"Oh really," said Isabelle. "Have you tried?"
"Ok, fine. I'll try," said Liz pointing her hand at the table. A burst of energy emanated from her hand and the table exploded.
"Shall I continue the story?" asked Isabelle.
"Yeah," said Liz faintly, looking at her hand in awe. "Go ahead."
"Well, it turned out that Jesse wasn't an FBI agent, Kivar had mind warped him, but he resisted it and was able to feed Kivar misinformation about our powers. There was a battle outside of town, and we, well Maria actually, killed Kivar."
"Maria killed Kivar? Maria the pacifist killed somebody?"
"We thought so at the time. Anyhow, you were pregnant, and we all came to Antar to learn about our heritage and make sure your baby was ok. But something went wrong."

Trust no one,the voice in Liz's head whispered. "No!" she shouted.
"No what?" asked a puzzled Isabelle
Trust no one," the voice whispered again.
"No! No! No! No! No! Shut up. I have to trust, I have to I have to!" shouted Liz. She stood up and ran over to a corner of the room and huddled down. "I have to! I have to protect my babies. I have to save them!" she burst into tears. "I have to protect them. I can't let anything happen to my babies."
"Oh Liz," whispered Isabelle moving over to the sobbing girl. "You remember, don't you?" She knelt down on the ground beside her friend and wrapped her arms around her. Liz sobbed in her arms.
"Liz, listen to me, you did save them you did! Kyle got Kam out, they're safe, they are! You have to believe me, your babies are safe."
Slowly Isabelle's words penetrated the anguish that filled her mind. "They're safe?" she whimpered.
"Yes, Kyle and Kam are with Max and Michael right now. They're ok, they are."
"And Alexandra? Is she ok? Is she with Maria?"
"Mommy?" said Lexie as she walked across the room. "Mommy, are you ok?"

Liz looked at the little girl, and then to Isabelle who nodded slightly.
"Lexie, Lexie sweetie. Oh my baby. I love you so much," cried Liz as she held her small daughter in her arms. "Mommy loves you so very much!"