Part 2

"It's Alex, I know it is," Isabel said pacing the room. That's all she did the previous night. The last report was that the car pieces were similar to the color of Alex's car.

She didn't sleep, she didn't eat, she only blamed herself for Alex's disappearance. She thought of all the ways she could have prevented this. She didn't listen to Max's comforting words, she only heard her scornful thoughts in her head.

Liz tried calling Alex's house, but to no avail no one picked up. Mr. Whitman was out of town, working on something and surely if something were wrong, he would be the first to know and of course Mr. Whitman would phone them. He knew they were best friends. Nothing is wrong, nothing is wrong was Liz's mantra.

"Isabel, please, don't worry, Alex is fine," Max said, embracing his sister. He gave Liz a worried glance, but she turned her head. She was worried about Alex, she didn't care about herself, she was really worried. As soon as she turned her head, she immediately regretted it. She knew Max didn't mean any harm, he just wanted to comfort her, but Isabel should be his first priority. Right?

"Michael, you don't think it's him do you?" Maria asked him.

"No, he's a big boy he can handle things himself, I'm sure if he was in trouble he would have called by now," he said. He knew it wasn't the best or right thing to say. He was never good at saying those types of things to her.

Maria was going to say something about his insensitively but decided not to, she didn't want to get herself worked up even more.

"Kyle, has your dad called and said anything?" Max asked.

"No, he hasn't. He doesn't really know what's going on either. Hanson has been keeping him out of the loop," he said. Kyle had been one of the outsiders recently. He knew Max didn't trust him after what happened in October. The only person he trusted was Tess. She was always the quiet one. She would console you when no one was looking.

Tess felt like an outsider too most of the time. They seemed to gravitate towards until that was until the Prom.

"Well, there has to be something we can do. We can't just sit here," Isabel said.

"You're stressing out, like all of us," Tess said, "you should get some sleep, we all should. After Maria called us late at night, it will all do some good."

"I think she's right," Max said.

Tess was a little surprised that Max agreed with her. Usually he only agreed with Liz, but after Prom, she knew she made her mark.

Liz wanted to leave. She was dying to leave. All possible of the impossible theories were racing throughout her scientific mind. She wanted to go to the Whitman's and see what was going on. She was the first one to get up. Everyone looked at her with surprise. She felt Max's gaze on her and at first she welcomed it, but followed was Tess's eyes. She remembered what happened after Prom, when she saw Max kiss Tess.

"I'm just going to go home and shower, it's been a long night," she fudged. She didn't know why she lied. Why it was the first thing that came to her mind. She didn't want to stress anyone out. Everyone deserved some sleep, she knew that. But she had to find out what was going on. Liz felt like something else was going on, she felt like there was a cover up, but she couldn't put her finger on it.

She left Maria's house in the mind set that she would find out the truth. No matter what. She walked to Alex's house. It wasn't too far away.

She rang the doorbell. No one answered. She rang it again. When no one answered, she went towards the back of the house to see if any lights were on.

She knew Alex and Mr. Whitman always left a key underneath the flower pot by the back door. She reached for it and it easily slid into the key hole.

"Alex? Mr. Whitman?" Liz said slipping into the Whitman residence. When no one answered, she knew the coast was clear. She went towards Alex's room, she was scared when she heard no noises. It was too quiet. There was no music playing, Mr. Whitman wasn't watching 'Jeopardy.' Her heart raced as she had never done something like this, not in her best friend's house.

When she entered his room, it was a mess. Clothes were scattered, papers thrown around. She lowered herself to pick up the papers, but then realized that it could be a crime scene. She scolded herself when she had that thought. She went over to Alex's desk. Gingerly touching the counter top, she stopped, when she noticed Alex's favorite book of poetry was out. She opened to the book marked page and there lied 2 tickets to Beth Orton. The concert was for tonight. Something was definitely wrong. He wouldn't have just left if he had bought tickets for Isabel and himself. She looked around some more, and saw his lap top on his bed. She opened it and turned it on, maybe something would be on the hard drive that could tell her something. When the computer booted, she clicked on 'Alex's Stuff' and noticed that files were password protected.

"What is the password?" she thought to herself.

"Right, I the Stud," she remembered. Alex had let her a couple of times use his email account and his passwords were all the same. She typed in the password and the files that appeared seemed like gibberish.

She thought about printing the files, but then decided it would be more useful to take the computer. She didn't think his father would mind. Mind you she didn't think. She went on her first instincts.

She left the room, but first she had to take one quick last look around. She realized that all the clothes and papers, were just Alex being Alex. There was no crime, nothing out of the ordinary.

"God, Alex, where are you?" Liz said with a sigh of fear and of worry, before she left the room.

~
Hours later Alex reached his destination. This time he was awake when the bus pulled up. It was getting dark, by the time he arrived and as soon as he got off the bus, his stomach grumbled.

He got on line for the information desk and when it was his turn he asked for the nearest diner.

"Sir, the best place would be the Talon," the clerk said.

"Sir, I'm a sir," he said quietly to himself as he nodded his head in confirmation and hailed a taxi.

As soon as he arrived in front the Talon, he groaned in pain. He sat on the fire extinguisher as he let the vibrations in his head continue. When he closed his eyes, he saw something. A building, bright lights, a round object. Everything was happening so fast. By the time the images past, he was on his feet. It was all a blur, just looking at the Talon made him have a feeling of warmness.

Alex reached into his hoodie pocket and took out the piece of paper where he was writing all of his theories. He wrote: 'Talon, restaurant connection? Round object. What's the connection?'

He thought about it for a couple of moments, but when nothing came to him, he grabbed his bags and stepped into the café.

The aroma of coffee welcomed him. There were so many people, unlike the few on the bus.

"Hey, take a seat, I'll be right with you," a small brunette told him.

Alex nodded, not really sure what to do, he saw the nearest table, next to a blonde girl.

He gave her a weak smile, before sitting down.

He took out his paper again, maybe something else would come to him.

He began tapping on the paper without his knowing it, it felt like he was in his own little world, when a thought was coming to him, it was interrupted by the brunette again.

"Sorry, about that, it's a little busier than normal. Can I get you something?"

"Um, yeah, coffee, and an apple turn over," he said, giving the girl his attention. Something about her gave him the impression that she seemed familiar.

"Are you new here?" she inquired, taking down his order.

"Is it that obvious?" he answered blushing a little.

The brunette giggled lightly, "Um, sorta, you seem kinda out of place, but don't worry about it. I'm Lana."

"Well, OK, Lana, nice to meet you," Alex said. He didn't really feel comfortable using his alias.

"Well, welcome to Smallville, I'll be right back with your coffee," Lana said, going to the counter to place his order.

"Don't forget his apple turn over!" Alex heard from the side of him.

He turned towards the voice.

"Oh, those are the best here," the blond next to him side, "I'm Chloe by the way."

"Nice to meet you," Alex replied shaking her hand, "would you like to join me?"

"Sure, wow, so where are you from?" Chloe asked.

"Down south," Alex replied remembering the list he wrote. He figured he came from that vicinity, but he wasn't so sure.

"Oh, well, Smallville is kinda Smallville. Well, unless you're one of those crash fanatics," she replied.

"Crash?" Alex inquired. "Why did that sound so familiar? Right, the pamphlet," he reminded himself.

"Oh, well there are these weird things that happen here and we well, I think they're all related to the meteor showers from '89," Chloe said. She was really getting into the subject. Alex didn't want to interrupt her because of her enthusiasm.

"Oh Chloe are you already filling in our visitor about the weird things?" Lana asked with a look, placing the coffee and the turn over on the table.

Alex smirked.

"Well, enjoy!" she said.

"Thanks, so what is there to do here?" he said taking a bite of the turn over. This was the one thing he was positively sure that he liked.

"Um, well there's here, the Talon, and I think that's it," she said smiling, "so you're really enjoying those turn overs huh?"

Alex laughed because she was so right, "Yeah, you got me."

"Well, those would be the spawns of the Kents," she said, "speaking of the Kents, here comes Clark."

As Clark was approaching them he gave her one of those "who's he?" looks. You could see a pang of jealousy, but Chloe was used to the feeling already.

"This is my friend Clark, Clark this is, oh I'm sorry what's your name, I didn't catch it?"

Alex fidgeted for a moment, "Mario."

"So, he's new here," Chloe said introducing Clark to Alex.

"Hi, so are you going to Smallville High?" Clark asked.

"Uh, yeah," Alex said, "um, actually I have to get going, you know the worrying parents. I'll catch you at school."

He shoved his hands in his pockets grabbed some bills and threw them on the table, "Nice meeting you guys, later."

And with that Mario Parker left the Talon. He felt suffocated. He felt like the world was spinning around him. He freaked inside, there were so many new people. He had the feeling he knew them all, or they had some kind of connection to him. The weight of the world was on his shoulders and he was still hungry for apple turn overs.

~

It was the early morning of the following day and Liz Parker still hadn't slept. She had been on Alex's computer trying to decode the files. She couldn't figure the code of it. It wasn't like it was in another language, it was in jumbled computer symbols.

Liz felt so lost. She officially lost Max. She had only used Sean. Maria was no where to be seen. Alex, God Alex, she missed him so much.

The official report was that Alex was in the car. His driver's license and credit cards were all found at the site. The school memorial was being held that Monday. She didn't know how to react. She still hadn't allowed herself to cry for him. She wouldn't until the truth was out. She couldn't accept it. She wouldn't let her friend die. She owed it to him. God, she couldn't let it go and grieve. Was she wasting her time? Should she be with Maria and Isabel. She thought that maybe it was an accident. But no car could spontaneously combust without some kind of tampering. The photos she had seen on web pages from the Roswell ledger showed no way it could have crashed. It was too perfect. There were no poles, no rocks to crash into. He didn't smash his car. Something was wrong with this picture. She was a scientist, everything had answers. In science there are always answers, it just takes time to hypothesize and reach a conclusion.

She was frustrated with her tenuous attempt to decrypt the files. She got up from her seat and stretched. When she did she got a look of herself in a body length mirror. She was still fully dressed from the night before, makeup smeared and sticky from her tears of frustration. She needed some air.

She climbed out of her room, using the window. She didn't feel like being consoled by her parents. She wanted to be alone. She didn't want the "it's OK, everything will be all right's because she knew everything was not going to be OK. Alex was gone. The trio of her, Alex, and Maria had been destroyed. Gone, zapped, disconnected. Whatever it was, it would not be OK. She couldn't even think anymore. She didn't know how she felt. She couldn't sort out her feelings. She just felt numb. She couldn't write in her journal. Everything felt bottled up and there wasn't a way to open the bottle. She felt empty, a part of herself which she had given to Max and to Alex was gone. Part of herself was missing and she wasn't sure how to get it back.

So Liz started walking. She didn't go anywhere in particular. Didn't care in what direction. If the street signal said walk she would, if not she would turn the corner. She just starred out, not paying attention to anything. She realized she was a block away from Kyle's house.

She sighed and walked towards his house.