First
Wave: "The Lost Prophesies"
Chapter Six – Training Day
Summary: The five friends return to Roswell where they discover the true reason for their presence on earth.
Disclaimer: See Chapter One
"You can't say that civilization don't advance, however, for in every war they kill you in a new way."
Will Rogers
Isabel looked around the airport terminal until she saw her dad frantically waving his arms in an attempt to get her attention, she went sailing into his arms dropping her luggage in the process and leaving a grumbling Alex to pick it up. Alex looked up at Michael hoping for some assistance.
"Do I look like a baggage handler?" He asked before he walked off leaving a very annoyed Alex with the luggage.
Isabel pulled out of her fathers arms to indicate Maria who was standing behind her nervously clutching her luggage to her chest "Dad, I want you to meet my sister – Maria."
Phillip Evans didn't hesitate; he pulled the skittish girl into a hug "any sister of Isabel's is like a daughter of mine" he paused "which under normal circumstances would be a really strange statement to make."
He laughed at his own joke. "Welcome to our family Maria...and you are family."
Maria smiled and thanked him; Phillip then pulled Liz and an uncomfortable Michael into another hug. Alex chose that moment to join them looking very haggard and trying to balance large amounts of bags in his arms, he threw an angry look at Michael who shrugged and looked away.
Phillip noticed the new addition to the group "you must be Maria's brother; Alex, pleased to meet you son."
"Thanks, you too Mr. Evans."
"Please, we're practically family, call me Phil, here let me help you with your luggage" he said whilst reaching for some of the bags, that a grateful Alex handed over.
Mr Evans then led the group of five young adults out of the terminal to his car.
Isabel opened the door to the house she'd grown up in and hadn't seen in over a year. It was strange walking into the home that held so many good childhood memories and yet so many sad teenage ones.
Her last couple of years in this house had been full of pain and turmoil. Her stomach clenched as the memories assailed her.
With her mind thus distracted, it took her a full thirty seconds to register the presence of two people in her living room.
When eventually she did, her feet stopped dead in its tracks, her mouth instantly running dry as fear overcame her.
Isabel's mind screamed that this could not be happening. Not now, not when they were so close to finding Max.
Before her sat the Sheriff.
Michael grunted in surprise as he walked into the stationary Isabel.
Expecting a scathing comment from his lack of attention, he immediately began planning his own retort when he noticed the stiff posture of her back.
Her fear was easily readable, and the tension in the room so thick you could almost see it.
Peering around his long-time friend, his eyes narrowed in anger as he too saw the object of her fear.
"What the friggin' hell are you doing here?" he ground out. The muscles in his jaw contracting as he bit back the more colourful expletive's in his vocabulary.
Phillip Evans stepped into the house in time to hear Michael's question.
Cursing himself for not mentioning the welcoming party that would be waiting for them back at the house, Phillip stepped beside Michael "he's here to help."
He led Isabel to a sofa and sat down beside her, Maria and Alex who were unaware of what was going on followed them in, Liz brought up the rear, sending Michael a fearful glance as she walked in. Michael chose to stay near the door, far away from the Sheriff whom he did not trust.
Phillip introduced Cade to the children and Jim to the newcomers in the group before allowing Cade to take the floor.
Cade turned to Isabel "your father didn't indicate how much of your destiny you are aware of, so I'm not sure where to begin…"
Isabel said nothing, instead, returning Cade's look with one of distrust.
Cade shifted uncomfortably in his seat "I guess I'll just tell you everything I know."
Everyone remained quiet.
"If you were wondering – I'm not an alien. I'm human, but like you I have a destiny. One that I may not want or care for, but one that I have none-the-less."
He gave each of them a look before continuing, "Like you, there are other aliens on earth, but unlike you their intentions are not good. Each of you has lived previously – as royalty on a planet called Antar."
Cade pulled out a folded piece of paper from his pocket, on it was printed picture of the constellations "this is where you are from" he indicated a particular constellation that was shaped as a V.
This time the three aliens showed a sign of listening as all three leant forward to get their first ever look of their home.
Before anyone could comment, Cade continued with his story "Your planet was at war for many years until it eventually fell, and it only fell after you were killed. What you need to understand is that your planet could never, would never fall whilst you all lived, for this reason you were targeted and killed."
Cade wasn't sure if he was giving them too much information in too short a period of time. But time was a luxury they did not have, and these people needed to know the truth.
"For centuries your people had been aware of the imminent war, and they prepared extensively for it. That was how you arrived on earth. Your essence, soul, ka, whatever you prefer to call it, was preserved and sent to earth in human bodies. Your planet brought you back to life so that you could have a second chance at destroying your enemies, the very enemies that have followed you here and who are determined to wipe you out once again so that they can finish this planet off as they did with yours. They only reason Earth is still safe is because your very essences are protecting it and it is for that very reason that you are in danger – they cannot allow you to live."
Cade paused to allow them to digest the information.
Isabel sat wide eyed next to her father, across from her sat Maria clutching painfully to her brother and at the entrance to the living room stood Michael, scowling.
"The Gua – your enemies, targeted me years ago in the hopes that they could put an end to my destiny before it even started. They were aware that someone on earth would help the Royal Four discover their destinies, they call me the Twice Blessed Man…the funny thing is…I never would have known about you had they not targeted me. Their attack put my own destiny and by connection your destiny in motion. It was then that I discovered the prophesies, the warnings, the exact dates times and locations of certain experiments that the Gua would exact on people. Through years of studying the prophesies, I eventually came across the one depicting the Royal Four, Nostradamus describes you as humanities last stand against the end of days."
Cade watched as Isabel and Michael shared a look.
"The prophesies describe you as the Royal Four. The King, protector of his planet, his essence is what kept Antar safe for so long and is what keeps Earth safe for the moment. The King's sister, the Visioner. Her visions and the visions of her predecessors were what ultimately warned them of the danger; it gave them the extra time they needed to prepare the essences for removal from Antar. The Chosen One, also sister to the King. Born with the duty of protecting the King and his essence. The last Royal, Second in Command, also a Chosen One, he too was born with the duty to protect above all else the King and his Essence."
Cade steeled himself for the finale "The Gua will destroy this planet in three waves, we're in the first one now, and if we don't find Max, we might find ourselves with a front row seat to the end of the world."
Silence engulfed the room as Cade finished.
It was a huge amount of information for each of them to take in, Cade had as good as told them that they were in effect dead aliens walking. They were being hunted by both humans and aliens.
Michael shifted uneasily. As much information as this was for him to digest, now was not the time, because they had bigger problems, like the fact that the Sheriff had been given everything he needed to pursue his obsession with them.
"Questions?" asked Cade.
Michael interrupted "Yeah, what I want to know is, what the hell has he got to do with any of this?" He glared pointedly at the Sheriff.
All eyes fell nervously on the Sheriff who answered the question "Mr. Foster came to me first with all this information."
Michael was not happy "which leads me to another question, why did he go to you, and why aren't you squealing to the feds?"
"Because if what Mr. Foster says is true, I can't very well condemn the very…uh…people responsible for the safety of this planet."
Cade looked at the Sheriff in confusion "I don't understand, I thought you already knew, I would never have come to you otherwise."
"Well I suspected, but I was never in their confidence as you thought" admitted Valenti.
Cade did not look happy about this revelation but he realized that he had no choice now but to trust the Sheriff. The question was, could he trust the Sheriff?
"I realize you're all still taking all of this in, and I understand that some if not all of it will have come as a shock. But at the risk of sounding insensitive, we don't have time for you to digest this. We've got work to do and in order to do it, I need to know who is who in the whole Royal Four Scheme of things?"
The five teens looked at each other. When no one spoke, Liz took the lead "Obviously Max is the King. You mentioned that the King has two sisters, so that has to be Max right?"
"You mean you don't know?" Questioned Cade. He knew from the quatrains that he was needed to lead them towards discovering their destinies, what he hadn't realized was how little of themselves they new. He'd assumed that they must have had some knowledge, at the very least a basic idea of their mission.
Isabel shook her head. "You know more about us than we do."
Alex spoke up, hoping to move the attention away from how little they knew to something more constructive like figuring out who they were. "So then by simple deduction, Michael is a Chosen One."
"That leaves Isabel and Maria. Do you guys have any idea which one of you is the Visioner and which one is the Chosen One?" Asked Phillip.
Both girls shook their heads.
It felt like a dead-end, until Liz broke the silence "wait! Isabel! You've had visions. You knew Max had been kidnapped, and you knew where to find Maria!"
"So that answers that then" Said Phillip.
Michael disagreed "what about my vision about the pod chamber?"
"No Michael, I think what you had was a memory surfacing in your dreams" replied Liz, confident in her reasoning. "What you saw was a place from your past!"
Isabel agreed "and besides I'm guessing we each have the ability to do everything each other can do, but in the end, we're each strongest on one particular thing. Like Max and healing, yet both you and I are capable of healing small cuts, minor headaches, that sort of thing."
"Besides" continued Maria "unless you're a girl, you can't be the Visioner".
Michael gave Maria a look of irritation "I wasn't suggesting that I was, I was just trying to make a point about this whole specified power crap!"
"And you point is?"
"It's stupid" he gave her a look that dared her to pursue this topic of conversation.
Maria chose not to take the bait, Michael was obviously spoiling for a fight, and as much as she'd like to take him down a peg or two, they had more pressing issues to deal with.
"Okay, so what now?" Liz prompted, eager to begin their search for Max.
Michael gave her the answer she was looking for "we find Max."
Cade shook his head in objection "no, you three need to work together first, advance your powers otherwise all you will be doing is putting yourself in danger. You need to reach your highest capabilities, when you do, then we get Max."
It was frightening how little these young adults knew about themselves, and there was no way he would let them loose against experienced Gua and Government Agents until they were more equipped to handle themselves.
"Hey, I don't recall nominating you leader of our group."
"Michael, I'm not trying to usurp anyone here, but the fact remains that I know more about you and the people you will be fighting than any of you do. If Max is that important to you, then at least give yourself time to prepare because you're only going to get one shot at this."
"So what do the rest of us do in the meantime?" Asked Alex.
"We find out where they're holding Max, so that as soon as Michael, Isabel and Maria are ready we can go and get him" said Liz firmly, determined to be a part of the search and rescue.
"So then we all agree?" Questioned Isabel.
With some reluctance on Michael's part because of the delay, they all eventually agreed.
Isabel opened her eyes and looked around her room, it brought back so many memories, memories she didn't want to remember, memories of Max.
Everything in her room remained the same as it had one year ago when she'd first left to begin her search for her sister.
On the wall hung her posters from pop groups and movie stars, on the dresser mirror were photo's from happier times.
"Morning"
Isabel looked over at the cot next to her bed where Maria was currently snuggled. "Morning, how did you sleep?"
"Like a log." Came the sleepy reply.
After a moment of silence Maria hesitantly asked "Isabel, you've never mentioned your mom, and I didn't see her yesterday?"
Isabel turned in her bed to face her sister "That's because she's not here. About a year and a half ago she was diagnosed with cancer, at first it seemed like she was getting better, then about six months ago she had a relapse and had to be admitted to ICU. My mom's sister is a nurse at a Cancer Facility outside of Miami, it specialises in my mothers type of cancer and they've been having fantastic results. Almost all of their patients have gone into full remission. So my Aunt managed to get my mother admitted, she's been there for the past couple of months and is doing really well, they even discharged her into my Aunt's care, this way she's still monitored and can return to the clinic on a weekly basis for treatment. My dad and I try and visit every month, depending on finances, but hopefully that won't be for much longer because she might be coming home soon." Isabel smiled, allowing herself to hope that maybe her mother was on the mend.
Maria listened attentively during the explanation, she could hear the pain in Isabel's voice as she spoke about her mother, but she had also noticed the hope she had for the progress her mother was making. "Does she know about you being an alien?" Asked Maria, hoping her questions were not too personal.
"No, when I finally told my dad about a year ago, we agreed she was in no condition to deal with information of that magnitude. We're hoping that she'll be home soon and when the time is right we'll tell her."
"How did your dad take it?"
"Actually, surprisingly well. As it was he was already suspicious about the disappearance and all the discrepancies of the official reports so he was already doing investigations of his own. It turned out he had some home videos of us doing a few 'remarkable' stuff as kids, so he was already on track to figuring it out himself."
Maria nodded in understanding. It sounded as if her sister had dealt with quite of few harsh blows in the past three years. First discovering that she had a sister that was missing, then the disappearance of her brother and then her mother's cancer.
Maria's heart went out to Isabel as she desperately sought for a change in conversation topic, anything to draw her mind away from the terrible fate life had dealt her.
There were a few minutes of silence as Maria formed a plan, with her resolve set, she broke the silence with a giggle, already imagining the face of her brother who would be her guinea pig in her plan to cheer up her sister.
Sister…it felt strange referring to Isabel as her sister, yet at the same time, it felt right.
"What's so funny?" Asked Isabel in surprise.
"I was just picturing Alex's face when we shock him awake by jumping all over him. He's not a morning person and will probably die of hysterics, especially with his over-active-imagination and all of our recent discoveries about the existence of aliens."
Isabel felt herself enjoying the idea of shocking Alex awake "well let's go and put your little fantasy into reality shall we?"
Both girls jumped out of their beds giggling.
Alex let out a decidedly female shriek when he awoke to find two mischievous imps jumping on him.
"What the hell...Ria? Isabel? His shocked gaze fell on both girls as his sleep befuddled mind tried to figure out what was happening. "Why you..you..."
Both girls flopped down on to the bed all the while smiling innocently at Alex. It seemed that Maria's plan had worked remarkable well because Alex continued to lie flat on his back taking in deep gulps of air, his eyes as big as saucers as his mind began to wake up.
Maria looked around the room, on the bedside table were two photo's, one of Isabel and her parents and another one of Liz, she idly fingered the bedspread imagining her brother whom she'd never met sleeping here, doing his homework over at the desk, even daydreaming about his girlfriend Elizabeth Parker.
Alex glared at both woman in mock anger and demanded, "well after that rude awakening I think I deserve breakfast in bed!" His voice was petulant as he sat himself up in bed, completely awake.
"Considering how you squealed when we woke you I'd suggest you go and cook us breakfast, unless that is, you want us to divulge that embarrassing information?" Blackmailed Isabel, an impish grin lighting up her face.
Alex's face contracted in shock, not sure if Isabel was being serious or not "you wouldn't?...Would you?"
He could just imagine the field day Michael would have with this type of information.
Isabel burst out laughing at the horrified expression on Alex's face, "c'mon screechy, I'm sure there's already a table full of food in the kitchen.
Michael opened his eyes and tried stretching, until his feet hit a barrier and he realized he wasn't in his bed but on the Parkers living room sofa instead. He got up and walked through to the kitchen hoping to find something to feed his growling stomach. Liz and her mother were already there drinking coffee.
Liz looked up at his entrance and smiled "morning sleepyhead."
"Morning."
Liz watched as he continued standing self consciously, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.
"Sleep well?" Questioned Mrs Parker.
"Uh yeah, thanks."
"Care for some breakfast?"
Michael brightened at the mention of food. Mrs. Parker went to the oven and got the already made up plate of eggs and bacon and handed it to Michael, who by now had already seated himself at the table.
Mrs Parker sat herself down next to Liz "I can't tell you what a pleasant surprise it was to see you arrive on our doorstep last night. Although I have to tell you, we were a little concerned because NYU doesn't break up for another few weeks."
Michael looked up from his food and arched his eyebrows in a questioning manner at Liz. Ignoring his gaze she prepared herself to tell her mother another lie, something that had become all too common over the past couple of years.
"I received a research grant through my professor, so I've taken a couple of months off as I collect specimens from the desert for our studies. It's a good opportunity and will count towards my graduation."
Mrs Parker looked both relieved and pleased "Liz that's wonderful, your professor must have so much faith in you to nominate you for something so prestigious. I'm so proud of you honey!"
Liz could feel the guilt eating away at her as her mother got up from her seat to give her a congratulatory hug.
Her parents had no idea that she had dropped out of university when it had gotten in her way of finding Max, and there was no way that she would ever be able to explain it to them, so she had led them to believe that she was still in school.
Mrs Parker was still confused as to the reason that Michael had returned with her daughter, she was impatient to find out the reason but knew that she would have to wait for a moment alone with Liz before she could question her on it.
She hoped that it was a sign that her daughter was over the infatuation she had for the Evans boy.
She had no doubt that Max had meant a lot to her daughter, but the boy had been gone for three years, it was long since time for Liz to move on and begin living her life.
She'd spent many a night rocking her inconsolable daughter to sleep, cursing the young man for running away from his loved ones and causing so much pain, he didn't deserve his daughter's love.
Liz claimed to love him more than anything, something Nancy found very disturbing because Liz was too young to know what love was, and yet she still remained adamant that she loved Max and was waiting for his return.
Many a time she'd considered getting professional help for her distraught daughter, but now she hoped that Elizabeth had finally come to her senses and realized that it had been a crush, one that had, had disastrous results on her life, it was a part of her life that needed to be put behind her so that she could begin her life anew. And maybe that was finally happening.
LATER THAT DAY AT THE EVANS RESIDENCE
Everyone was seated in the Evans living room listening as Cade worked out their plan for the next couple of weeks.
"Right, so we're going to split into two groups, the first group will be the Field Team; the second will be the Research team. Now Mr. Evans will lead up the research team with the help of Liz and Alex. I'm the only one here with experience with fighting the law and the Gua so if it's all right with everyone I will lead up the field team, which will include Jim Valenti, Isabel, Michael and Maria."
Michael remained silent, he was still unsure about the Sheriff's and Cade's participation, especially as both seemed intent on trying to take over leadership of their little investigative group.
Michael didn't believe that they were needed; after all, they'd managed okay on their own for many years.
The only thing that kept him from throwing either of them out of the house was because he didn't want to take the chance that they would be of some assistance in finding Max.
Once everyone had agreed, Cade led the field team out the door to begin their training in the desert - that being the only secluded spot in the area. The research team were going to head up their operations at the Evans house.
RESEARCH TEAM
Alex immediately went about setting up his laptop, once that was done he started making sure that his connection to the World Wide Web would be untraceable. While he was doing this Mr. Evans and Liz started researching all the possible places Max could be.
"You guy's mentioned before that you thought Max was being held at a place called the Eagle Rock Military Base?" Asked Alex as he continued to set up the equipment he'd brought with, along with the equipment that Mr Evans had.
Liz nodded in agreement "Yeah, that place is still top of my list...why?"
"Well if our very own SWAT team go there they can't very well go in guns blazing, figuratively speaking of course…"
Liz grinned "of course."
"Anyway they're gonna need a layout of the place as well as an idea of the security and stuff."
"Good thinking." Acknowledged Liz.
"See if you can also get an idea of where in the building they could possibly be holding Max" added Phillip.
Alex grinned "no problem!"
"Meanwhile, Liz and I can investigate all other avenues, we definitely don't want to be breaking into the wrong base."
Liz sat down at the dinning-room table and pulled out all her papers on possible places Max could be from her briefcase.
"This is all we have, everything that's not on this list are places that we've already eliminated, and everything else is still a possibility. But, as I mentioned before, Eagle Rock is the most probable place, it makes sense in terms of location, secrecy and reports done by UFO Investigators."
Sitting down beside her, Phillip began paging through the documents, letting his legal mind take over as he settled down to research.
FIELD TEAM
The five stood facing each other in a circle
Cade addressed the group "First, we need to get an idea of what you are each capable of, Isabel you first."
"My strongest power is dreamwalking, other than that, I can change the molecular structure of stuff. I can move things with my mind, unlock doors, alarm systems, that sort of thing."
"Michael?"
"I can do most of what Isabel said, just not very well and I can't dreamwalk, mostly I can move stuff like Izzy, the thing I do the best though is shooting off bolts of power...like intense bursts of energy…I'm not sure how to explain it, or exactly how much damage it's capable of, I just know that if my emotions are intense, so is the power."
Cade nodded "That's because your powers are fuelled by your emotions. It's both your strength and your weakness, and it's important that you are all aware of it, so that you can control it. What about you Maria?"
"I..uh, well I don't really know I've never really tried, but I've done the door-unlocking thing and uh what did you call it..changing the molecular structure of things? I can do that too and I can also move things with my mind. Or more correctly – I have done all of those things, when I was a kid…nothing since."
Cade pulled out a slip of paper from his pocket "Okay, most of what you've described is what the quatrains say about you, although you've left out a few of the major powers, like Mindwarping, Mindscanning, teleportation…"
The three aliens eyed Cade in confusion.
"So you can't do any of those things?"
"We don't even know what any of those things are," answered Isabel.
Cade scratched his head in thought as he took in the new turn of events, he had believed that they at least possessed a limited ability of everything mentioned in the quatrains and that all that was required was progressing that ability.
"From what we've made out, the Visioner's main strength is the mind, hence Isabel's ability to dreamwalk and receive visions, included in this is the ability to Mindwarp, which is similar to dreamwalking – in the dream plane Isabel has the ability to influence the dreamers thoughts and dreams, she can even change the whole dreamscape, a Mindwarp works the same, but on people who are awake, for instance, she could make us believe that we were seeing Goddzilla skipping through the desert and it would be so real that we would not doubt it."
Everyone looked at Isabel in awe.
"That's a nifty trick Izzy" remarked Maria.
"But I can't….I mean I've never even influenced peoples dreams, how am I going to do it whilst they're awake?"
Cade smiled "Practice" before continuing "the Warriors, on the other hand, find their strength in protection, this is why Michaels strongest power is the energy blast, he would use this to protect his King. In addition to this, the Warriors are able to teleport, it's a means of getting to the King quickly to protect him, it assists them when fighting their enemies, can you imagine the advantage of disappearing when a bullet is headed towards you only to appear behind the enemy and take him out? It makes sense that this would be one of your powers, especially as it is a form of molecular manipulation, which also means that the rest of you may be able to develop this power to a small degree."
Cade paused as they all took in the information "The King has the job of protecting his people and his planet, that's why Max has been engineered with an essence the prevents the planet that he is inhabiting from being destroyed, it's almost like the ability to put up a shield around the planet – basically a larger version of the shield he can hold up around himself. This is also why Max is the healer, because he is responsible for all of you, keeping all of this in mind, it explains why he has the ability to Mindscan, in other words weed out the bad seed from the good seed. He has the ability to get into people's minds and see their thoughts, know their intentions and use the information to protect his people."
Cade watched the groups reactions to his explanation, he noted that they were both nervous and excited by the prospect of these powers.
Clapping
his hands together to get their attention, he said, "Okay then lets
get to work; we've got lots of it to do. Michael I want you and Maria
to work closely together, it stands to reason that your powers will
be somewhat similar, so I want you two to work on advancing Maria's
powers in the next two hours. Jim and I will work with
Isabel."
--
Maria stood nervously with Michael a few feet from the others, she wasn't sure she liked working alone with him. He made her nervous and jumpy, which in turn got her irritated and grumpy. There was no way they would be able to work together if emotions really were the trigger to their powers. Because when Michael was around it felt like her emotions fluctuated like a bouncing ball.
Then there was the fact that she was still getting used to being an alien princess no less…with warrior like powers.
It was too unreal.
Michael broke her out of her thoughts "lets do the easy stuff first."
He found it ironic that he was teaching someone else to advance their powers, when in the past it has always been him that needed the help.
He changed his shirt color from white to black "now you change it back."
Maria concentrated and waved her hand over Michaels shirt, successfully changing it back to the original color "that was easy." She grinned, pleased with the accomplishment.
"You'll probably find that most of this will be easy 'cos you already have the ability, you just need to learn how to do it properly." Now he was sounding suspiciously like Cade, which was freaking him out to no end.
"Lets try something else" she clapped her hands in excitement, causing Michael to show a hint of a smile at her enthusiasm. Which in Michael terms meant he was also enjoying the moment.
"Okay then, try shooting a burst of energy at that tree" he pointed in the distance at a tree that was obviously dead, probably from a lightning bolt during a recent storm.
Maria looked dubiously at the tree, she wasn't sure if this was something she could do, and she wasn't sure it was something that she ever wanted to do because it meant that she would have to hurt someone and it was not a situation she ever wanted to be in "I don't know Michael."
"There's no harm in at least trying."
Maria squinted at the tree and held her palm out, her brows furrowed in concentration. At first it felt like nothing was happening, but before she could say anything she felt her senses begin to tingle, it was like a crackling energy felt during electrical storms, Maria closed her eyes as she felt the energy build up to a crescendo.
Michael and Maria were both thrown to the ground by the force of her energy blast.
"Ahh…" moaned Michael as he rolled on to his back feeling the pain from his hard landing.
In the distance, Isabel, Jim and Cade all threw themselves to the desert floor when the tree exploded.
"What the hell was that?" screamed Isabel in a panic, unsure of what was happening. She kept her head down as she hugged the desert floor.
Cade remained on the ground, but looked around for any sign of danger, with very little movement he was able to unclip his weapon from it's concealed holster. Gripping it firmly in the palm of his hand he continued to scan the surrounding areas, noting with a sense of satisfaction that Maria and Michael had also thrown themselves to the ground when the explosion went off.
Sheriff Valenti climbed to his feet, his weapon drawn, the safety off and a bullet already in the chamber, he was leaving nothing to chance.
Cade crept over to Isabel and told her to stay down, his eyes then fell on Michael and Maria in the distance picking themselves off the ground "STAY DOWN!" he shouted, wondering if they were extremely brave or extremely stupid.
Michael stood up and stared at the spectacle going on around him, at first he found himself confused at the scene, wandering why everyone was crawling around on the ground with the Sheriff pointing his gun all over the place.
Michael continued to stare in bewilderment until he realised the cause of the strange behavior, shaking his head at their antics he called out "relax, it was just us!"
Isabel stood up, dusting sand off herself and seething in anger with Michael for causing the false alarm that had sent her sprawling to the dirty ground. It was bad enough that she had just endured the humiliation of literally eating dirt, but to find out it was because of Michael's stupidity was just beyond her capabilities of thinking rationally. Michael had to pay!
The Sheriff holstered his weapon the whole while eyeing Cade as he returned his own weapon to it's concealed place, Valenti made a point to himself to keep an eye on Foster, after all, how much did any of them know about this stranger who claimed to have all the answers for the alien hybrids.
Valenti had come to realise over the past couple of days that these kids were just that, kids. Admittedly they were alien royal kids, but they were kids all the same. Struggling to fit in and lead a normal life.
They had, had to face many terrible situations in their short life span and he'd found himself looking upon them as people he had to protect, because they had very little protection in this world and he did not want to be one of the many things that just added to the terrible burden they all already carried.
He'd found his purpose; it was to look after them, which meant he had to watch out for Cade Foster and his fantastical stories.
Jim briefly wondered at his radical change of view, it was surprising how quickly he'd come to look on them as innocents who had been thrown into a difficult position. They were not to be feared, as he had previously thought, and they were not the reason for his father's actions and eventual insanity.
Isabel's eyes bored into Michael's as she placed her hands on her hips "Michael you idiot! What were you thinking?"
Michael glared at Isabel, then turned around and glared at Maria who was behind him and still somewhat dazed.
"You can't go around blasting everything into oblivion and putting the rest of us in danger…"
"Hey, don't get angry with me cause you got yourself a little dirty."
"Are you insane? You could've missed your target and blasted one of us."
"Not possible!"
"What? You have perfect aim?"
"No, actually, I was aiming for you" he smirked.
Isabel could feel the anger rising at his quips and deliberate attempt to avoid apologising for his stupidity.
Maria chose to speak up during the brief break in the argument before it got completely out of hand "Uh actually Isabel, I'm going to have to take responsibility for that" she raised her hand, a sheepish grin on her face.
Isabel who looked suitably shocked said nothing.
"Either of you care to explain what just happened here?" Demanded Valenti, also feeling irritated now that he knew they were in no immediate danger.
"It was nothing, Maria was just testing her powers, so now that the show is over lets get back to work shall we?"
His look dared the Sheriff to say something, but to his disappointment the Sheriff kept his thoughts to himself.
Michael sat on the rocky earth deciding it was safer, less further to fall and all. Maria sat down next to him.
"Okay, lets try some other stuff" he suggested.
