CHAPTER 8 (Blood samples, human)
Max and Alex walked into the Crashdown and headed towards a booth. Liz saw them and walked over. "Hey guys, where's Maria?"
Alex shrugged "We don't know, she kind of took off last night and we haven't seen her since."
Liz gasped. "She's gone?"
Max stood and rubbed her arms comfortingly. "Don't worry, she's not gone gone, just gone."
Alex rolled his eyes. "Great explanation Max, I'm sure she understood perfectly."
Max glared at him while Liz tried to stifle a chuckle. "What I mean is that, well when ever she gets mad or something she goes to a place where she likes to chill and think. She'll be back soon."
Liz nodded and sighed in relief. If Maria weren't coming back then Max would leave.
"Um hey Liz, you wanna take a drive somewhere?" Max asked
Liz smiled "Where?"
"Just a drive I want to show you something" Liz nodded then they headed out the door just as Isabel came in.
"Hey Alex" she greeted as she sat opposite him.
"Hey Iz, ah thanks again for last night, you didn't have to do that" Alex told her
"Yeah but I wanted to, I mean it all means so much to you, I just wanted to help." She smiled shyly. Alex nodded and was about to say something when Michael interrupted.
"Hey, where's Maria?"
Alex and Isabel shared a smile and Michael glared at them. "Don't know but she'll be back soon, why?" Alex asked
"Oh I just want to ask her something" Michael replied then sat next to Isabel.
Michael looked between the two and noticed that something was different. He eyed them suspiciously. "So what happened last night to make you guys late?"
Isabel blushed a deep red while Alex looked away shyly.
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FLASHBACK
"Well at least we know something," Alex said as they walked back to the car.
"Yeah, did you know that there was another?" Isabel asked him. Alex shook his head.
"No, Maria will be happy though"
Isabel smiled and continued walking. "So home's up there somewhere huh?" Isabel said as he looked up at the night sky.
Alex too looked up. "Yeah, somewhere." He then looked at Isabel's profile. He had to admit that she was beautiful, and whenever she was around he started to feel things, things he shouldn't.
Isabel sighed and turned to see Alex staring at her. "What?"
"Your beautiful" he whispered. 'Shit' he thought. He hadn't mean tot say that but it was what he was thinking at the time. Isabel smiled.
"Thankyou" she whispered back. The next thing she knew was that their faces were inching closer. 'This is it' Isabel thought. 'He's going to kiss me'.
Alex inched in taking in her eyes then her mouth when suddenly a cough was heard from behind them. Both jumped away from each other. Isabel cursed whoever had interrupted them while Alex silently thanked them. He couldn't get involved. He had to stop the feelings.
Alex turned and saw a smiling Eddie. He walked over. "I think the lady dropped this." He said handing over a silver bracelet. Isabel thanked him and hopped into the car. Eddie winked at Alex before he too joined Isabel for the journey home, neither one saying anything about there almost kiss.
END FLASHBACK
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Alex coughed. "Ah Isabel dropped her bracelet so we were looking for it." It wasn't a total lie.
Michael nodded unconvinced. "Right."
An hour later Alex's cell rang. "Hello. What? Oh god, are they ok? They what? We're on our way"
Alex hung up his phone and headed out of the booth with Michael and Isabel following. "Max and Liz were in an accident, Liz is fine but Max was taken in to hospital in critical condition, they want to take a blood sample"
"Oh god, they can't take his blood" Isabel yelled in shock
Alex nodded. "I know, Michael try Maria's cell." Michael nodded and tried but received no answer. "Damn it, she'll go ape shit when she finds out"
They reached the hospital and ran up to the ER where they saw Kyle and Liz. "They just took him for a blood sample now, what are you going to do?"
Alex looked at Kyle then Michael, "I'll need one of you to give me blood, they can't test Max's it's not the same."
"I'll do it" Michael volunteered. Kyle sighed in relief, even the though of blood made him sick. "Ok, Liz go get a syringe or whatever and get ready, Kyle keep a lookout"
Kyle nodded then went to the door. Alex took out his wallet. "I'll go try Maria again"
Liz came back and took a sample and added it to a tube. "Maria's on her way, and she doesn't sound too good" Alex said as he changed the name on the sample. "Kyle go and switch this" Alex handed him the tube.
"Ok." Kyle said as he left.
"You ok?" Isabel asked her brother. Michael nodded but closed his eyes. He was a little drained. Just then Maria burst through the doors.
"Where's Max?" she asked frantically. Alex walked over to her.
"Maria calm down he's---" Maria cut him off.
"DO NOT TELL ME TO CALM DOWN" she yelled. "My brother is in a hospital, possibly dying and your telling me to calm down?" Alex went to grab her arms when a nurse wheeled in Max. Maria ran over to him. "Oh my god Max, are you ok?"
Max nodded slightly, his head still hurt a little. "Yeah don't worry sis I'm still here" Max smiled but then went limp.
Maria shook him, "Max, Max oh my god Max wake up, don't leave me, you can't leave me, you promised" she yelled as a tear fell from her eye.
The nurse walked over to Max and checked him. "He's just knocked out from the drugs we gave him, He'll be fine, and we took a blood sample so that probably drained him a little as well."
Maria nodded still unsure. Her brother was unconscious and not looking very healthy, what is she supposed to think? Maria snapped her head towards Alex. "Blood?" she whispered.
Alex walked over to her and leant down. "Don't worry, we took care of it, we switched his with a sample we got from Michael"
Maria nodded in relief and looked towards Michael. She mouthed 'Thankyou' then turned towards Max holding his hand. "God why was he driving?" she asked quietly. "Why weren't you with him?" she looked at Alex.
"He dropped me off at the Crashdown then took Liz somewhere to show her something" Alex said but after seeing her brows crease instantly regretted it.
"Liz? He was taking Liz somewhere, my brother was driving to show Liz something?" she asked slowly raising her voice. Alex nodded and Maria looked up at Liz then glared at her. "You go anywhere near my brother again and I will kill you," she said seriously.
Liz's eyes went wide. "What? How can you blame this on me? I wasn't driving, why is it that you can't like me?"
"Because it's all your fault, everything, this" she motioned to Max "Is your fault. If you would have just left us and Max alone then he wouldn't have wanted to drive you somewhere and crashed. If you hadn't of opened your big mouth and distract him from looking at the road he wouldn't be here right now. God I don't even know why he couldn't just have left you in the Crashdown that day"
Alex gasped in shock. "Maria"
"No Alex, she has done nothing but screw up our lives. Max trusted her with our secret and what does she do? She tells everyone. Then she makes us stay because what? You're afraid that Max will leave you? Well get this into your head Parker, you and Max can never be anything all right. You will never be his girlfriend and one day we will eventually leave and never come back. If you hadn't of stopped us from leaving than this wouldn't have happened. If you had left us alone from the beginning like I told you then he wouldn't be here right now. So ask me again Liz, how I can blame this on you. Go on, do it."
Liz just looked at her not being able to say anything. Maria continued in a calmer voice.
"I don't like you cause you have hurt my brother and you betrayed his trust. How he could still like someone like you is beyond me. You only care about yourself no one else because if you did, if you really loved Max the way you think you do, then you would have left us alone, You would have left Max alone instead of egging him on into thinking that you honestly care for him and then have it all come to this. What you have Liz, isn't love, trust or loyalty to us, It's selfishness, pure selfishness, that is the reason I don't like you"
Liz stood there shocked at the words Maria had just said. She looked towards Isabel, her best friend for some sort of defence but saw nothing. Isabel just turned her eyes away and stood by Alex. Isabel thought Maria was right. Liz was acting on nothing but selfishness when she made then stay, but then again her and Michael were no better. But still, Liz should have listened to Maria; maybe all of this could have been avoided.
The doctor walked through the door but slowed his pace as he neared his patient. The tension in the room could be cut with a knife. "Well how is our patient?" he walked over to where Max lay.
Max started to move and then slowly opened his eyes. "Mmmm, what's going on?"
Maria rushed over to him and looked at the doctor. The doctor looked at his eyes then his charts. "Well Mr Evans, your vitals are good but we would like to keep you in overnight for observation then do an MIT in the morning."
Maria looked at Max worryingly. Max grabbed her hand reassuringly. "Look doctor besides feeling drowsy I'm fine, I don't need a scan or to stay here, I mean I have a lot of school work and I'd only be wasting bed space for other patients."
The doctor smiled. "Well I guess it would be ok. But what I'll do is give you some antibiotics to take and make sure you get plenty of bed rest." Max nodded and the doctor left.
Maria hoped off the bed. "Well lets go, I don't want to be in here any longer than I have to and you need to get into bed" she told Max.
Max rolled his eyes. "Yes mommy Maria" he laughed. As they were walking down the corridor Isabel stopped.
"Oh I left my purse on the table in Max's room." Alex looked at her in exasperation. "What? We were in the middle of a crisis I wasn't thinking." She said defensively.
Alex shook his head. "Fine I'll get it, you guys go get in the car." As he walked into the room he noticed two men going through Max's room, he remembered one of them from earlier that day when he was on the phone to Maria, they guy was just staring at him. The two men looked at him. "She forgot her purse," he said as he left the room.
Later that night at the Apartment
"They are following us I know it, they were going through your room Max, we have to do something" Alex told him as he relayed the details from that day.
"I can't believe it, I knew we'd be found out, we have to run" Maria said pacing the room.
"No we don't, look I have a plan" Alex said getting Maria's attention. "Ok, we firstly let the guy follow Max tomorrow then Max can lose him, you and I will follow in a car and see where this guy goes after he loses Max, hopefully to a motel or something, then when he leaves we search the room and hopefully find something out about him."
Maria thought about it. "That could actually work, but we can't take the Jeep, we need another car."
Alex nodded "Yeah I thought about that already"
The next day
"So we just follow this guy after Max and Liz lose him?" Michael asked from behind the wheel of the Jetta. Maria just sat mutely beside him in anger. Out of all the people they knew Alex had thought of using Michael's car. Alex was going to die.
Alex nodded from the back. He knew Maria was pissed but they needed a car. "Yeah that's pretty much it. Oh look there he is, Max must have gotten rid of him. Go."
Michael started the car and drove behind him. After 20 mins of driving they pulled into a cheap motel. "So what do we do now?" Michael asked.
Alex sat back in his seat. "Now we wait."
After ½ an hour Michael was bored. "He's never gonna leave that room"
As he finished the guy opened the door and got into his car and drove off. Maria turned and smirked at Michael. "Never?"
Alex shook his head from the back. He just sat there for ½ an hour listening to them two flirt and was getting quite sick of it. "Look, I'm going to keep look out around the building, you go and search the room" he told Maria. Maria nodded then pulled Michael along with her.
"What am I doing?" he asked.
"Being my lookout" she lied. That's what Alex was doing, she just wanted to be around him more, she just couldn't let him know that.
"Isn't that what Alex is doing?" he whined. A thought then struck him. "You don't trust me do you? You pulled me here so I wouldn't—"
Maria cut him off by pulling him into the room. "Shut up your going to get us caught, look just watch out the window ok" she said as she walked to the closet. "Ok, no luggage tags, Michael check the garbage for any notes or something" Michael nodded then went over to the bed.
"You know, this is the second time we have been in some cheap motel together," he said with a smile.
Maria rolled her eyes. "Well don't get used to it"
Michael laughed and went through the garbage. He pulled out various papers and came across a name. "I think his name is Moss, and look here's a number." Maria took the number and started to dial on the phone. "What are you doing?" Michael asked
"Finding out who's on the other line." Maria pulled the phone to her ear but Michael twisted it so that he could hear as well.
Some one picked up the phone. "Topolsky" they answered. Maria hung up the phone.
"That was Ms Topolsky, as in school counsellor Topolsky" Maria said in shock.
Michael nodded. "We need to get back to the others. Obviously she's not who she says she is."
At the Crashdown
"Topolsky? Are you sure?" Max asked. Michael and Maria both nodded.
"Definitely, I knew she couldn't be trusted" Maria said angrily. "We have to do something, get her to confess or something, if she knew that we knew about her then she'd probably leave, it's either her or us"
"You guys can't leave, it'll be to suspicious" Isabel spoke up.
Alex nodded. "Yeah she's right, we need a plan. Ok Kyle, she's been hounding you about Max right?" Kyle nodded. "Ok, well this is what we do…"
The next day at school Kyle walked into Ms Topolsky's office. "What is it Kyle?"
"Look, I'm only doing because I'm worried about my friends alright. If Max and his mates are into drugs or whatever then I don't—"
Topolsky cut him off. "Drugs?" she asked
Kyle nodded. "Yeah, that's what there involved in right?" Topolsky shook her head then grabbed a clipboard.
"Just write down everything you know and we'll take it from there." Kyle nodded then sat down. There was a knock at the door and Topolsky answered it. "Liz, what is it?"
"Can I talk to you for a minute" Topolsky nodded then followed Liz out into the corridor. Kyle quickly shut the door then went to the window and let Alex in. Alex walked over to the computer.
"So what are you looking for?" Kyle asked. This was the plan, for Kyle to get in then let Alex go through her files to get any evidence, Liz was outside trying to tell her that Kyle was having problems with jealousy. Kyle didn't like that part of the plan, why would he be jealous of Max?
"Anything that links her to FBI or something." Alex continued typing then said bingo.
"What?" Kyle said from the door.
Alex turned the computer towards him just as Topolsky re entered the room. "What are you doing here?" she asked Alex. She then looked down at her computer; Alex had hacked into her files.
"What is the FBI doing in West Roswell?"
Topolsky walked over to her desk and shut down the computer and gathered her stuff. "Don't think that because you know who I am it's going to end. I was on your side, I could have helped you." With that she left.
Kyle looked at Alex. "We're all going to have to watch what we do and say, there's bound to be more like her around."
