Author: Katydidit aka PolarEmeralds aka Kat

Email:

Rating: PG-13 now, for a bit of language, violence and I think…what the ratings people call adult situations. thinks

Genre: Drama/Angst

Category: AU. Pre-shooting. Now becoming full-blown Polar.

Disclaimer: They're mine! All mine! demented laughter Ooor not. They're Jason Katims and Co.'s. Evil demons. They should be vanquished. blissful grin Ahhh, if only.. cough Move along, folks. No evil plotting to see here. g And there's a line in here somewhere, about a third eye or ear, that's from the show, which isn't mine. I just thought it was hilarious, so I turned it polar and stuck it in here.

Summary: A not-so-short AU fic. Thirteen-year-old Michael is out one night, trying to escape Hank's fury for a while, when he stumbles across someone he hadn't expected to see and realizes that things aren't always what they seem.

Spoilers: Guys, the show's over. If you haven't seen an ep, you're not gonna. Lol. I don't think there's any, though.

Things Aren't Always What They Seem

Chapter 16

Michael didn't move from his seat on the floor—just sat there for hours after Liz had quietly left the trailer, formulating a plan. What if he could convince Maxwell to let him tell her? Normally, Michael wouldn't feel the need to get Max's permission for anything, but this was big. Max had gone against everything they'd agreed upon when he'd healed Maria that night in the park.

One night, about three years after Liz had left (it was funny how Michael had begun to measure time by how long Liz had been gone), he'd been sitting under the tree in the park, just looking at the sky and thinking. Suddenly, two shots rang out nearby and, for some reason, Michael had leapt to his feet and ran towards the noise. He saw Max kneeling over a still figure half-hidden in the trees, and as he got closer, he heard him pleading with the figure to open her eyes. It was Maria. Michael sank to his knees next to Max when he saw the hole in her abdomen, but had yanked Max's hand away from her.

"What are you doing?" he'd hissed.

"What the hell does it look like I'm doing?" Max had demanded, tears in his voice. "I'm healing her."

"You can't!" Michael had exclaimed. "Maxwell, we agreed—"

"I don't care what we agreed! She's dying, Michael. I have to save her." He'd paused, looking at the quickly-paling blonde next to them. "You lost Liz, Michael. Don't let me lose Maria."

Michael had sighed in disgust and rocked back onto his feet, watching but not approving. When Maria had come to, she'd been (of course) full of questions, and Michael had half-listened as Max explained their origins. At first Maria had been freaked, and run off, but she hadn't told anyone, and after a few days, Michael had seen the two of them embracing. They'd been together ever since.

Michael had been pissed at Max for telling a human their secret, and he would feel like a hypocrite if he did it without letting the other two know. So he'd talk to them tomorrow.

The next thing Michael knew, it was mid-afternoon, and his body was aching from sleeping on the floor. He groaned and slowly stretched out, flexing his muscles, then stood, heading over to the Evanses' without even thinking about breakfast.

Michael ran up the steps and knocked on the door. Behind it, he heard Max's old video game system play the music it always did when someone lost, then heard Max protesting.

"I'm never playing you again!" he yelled as he opened the door, then turned to look at who it was. "Oh. Hey, Michael. Liz is in here."

"Hey," Michael said, trying to look into the living room. "No, I need to talk to you."

"Oh. Okay." Max held open the door for him, and Michael stepped inside. Liz got up from the chair she'd been sitting in and pushed past him. "Where you going?" Max asked, grabbing her elbow. She shrugged him off—she never liked being caught like that.

"Just going for a walk," she said, not looking at Michael. "I'll be back later."

"O…kay," Max drawled, looking after her strangely, then kicked the power button on the television, plunging them into silence. "So. What'd you want to talk about?" he asked, getting comfortable in the chair Liz had just vacated. Michael perched on the couch.

"Me and Liz…kissed last night."

"Finally!" Max muttered, shaking his head. "Guess that means Maria wins our bet."

"Excuse you?" Michael demanded.

"I said that you'd take longer than a week, but Maria insisted that it'd be sooner." He leaned forward, grinning. "Five bucks for me if you made the first move, though."

"Wha…ah… Yeah." Michael rubbed his eyebrow. "You were betting on us?"

Max shrugged. "It was just a little joke, man. Nothing big. Okay, so you kissed last night, and…?"

"And…I saw some things." He looked down. "Like, memories. Feelings. Stuff like that. Do you ever get that with Maria?"

"Yeah. All the time. What'd you see?"

Michael shrugged. Liz wouldn't want Max to know. "Just stuff," he said nonchalantly. "But…Hank was being…Hank last night when we went inside, and he pissed me off. I…blew up a lamp."

"Did you hurt Liz?" Max asked. Michael shook his head vigorously.

"Of course not. But then later, I blew out my window." He sighed. "She knows something's up."

Max nodded, finally understanding. "And now she's mad at you, and you want to tell her what we are."

"Yeah."

"So why don't you?"

Michael shrugged. "She'll want proof," he said, thinking quickly. "And I'll end up just blowing something up. So I need your help."

"Alright. You wanna tell her now?" Max stood, and Michael followed.

"As soon as possible," he said decisively, and they left, heading for the park.

After about half an hour of searching, they found Liz wandering down a trail that wound in and out of the trees, and approached her carefully. Liz looked up when she heard them, and stopped, crossing her arms in front of herself.

"Hey, could you come with us?" Max asked quietly. "We need to tell you something."

"Can't you tell me here?" She asked, looking around the trees.

"No," Max said, also looking around, as though he expected someone to leap out from behind a tree and cart them off. "In private."

"Uhm…okay," She said, looking nervous. "Where, then?"

Max looked around once more, and this time his eyes landed on the bathroom building. "Over there," he said, pointing towards it. Liz scoffed, but didn't disagree, and Max led the two of them into the men's room. Michael checked to make sure that all of the stalls were empty, while Max used his powers to seal the door. Liz leaned on the sink, still looking nervous. Max returned to them and nodded at Michael, telling him to get on with it.

"Liz…" Michael began, his heart beating wildly. What if she became afraid of him when she heard what he was? Or what if she was disgusted? Michael didn't know which would be worse. What if she ran away and he never saw her again? He cleared his throat and went on. "You remember…how you asked me last night, what I am?"

She nodded, not taking her eyes off of him.

"Well…I'm not human."

"Then what are you?" she asked in a trembling voice, then smiled a little. "Martian?" When Michael didn't say anything, the smile faded, and she tilted her head to the side.

"Sort of…" Michael said, stepping away from her. "I'm…we're not from here. You know the '47 crash?"

"The weather balloon?"

"Yeah…that wasn't a weather balloon. It was a ship."

"That's crazy," Liz said, shaking her head.

"No. It's true. That was a ship. …Our ship."

"Our ship?" Liz asked, glancing at Max, who nodded. "No. You're—this is a joke. Ha, ha. Very funny, guys." She edged towards the door, and the two of them watched quietly as she tugged on it, to no avail. She looked back up at them in confusion and fear.

"Liz…" Max said quietly. "It's true." He put his hand to the wall, and the tiles changed from the dirty gray color to a sparkling blue. Liz jumped backwards, squeezing her eyes shut for a minute. Apparently, when she opened them and saw that the tiles were still blue, she realized that they were telling the truth. She reached out a tentative finger to touch the wall, then pulled it back with a soft gasp, looking at the two of them with dawning belief.

"Okay…" she said slowly, piecing it all together in her mind. "But the crash was, like, fifty-some years ago. So you…"

"We were in these pods," Max explained. "Somehow, they survived the crash, and we stayed in them until we…came out, and we looked like we were five or six years old."

Liz nodded quietly, looking at the floor. Max changed the color from blue back to the dirty gray. She looked back up. "So what do you really look like? I mean, the image of three-foot-tall little men with huge eyes in silver spacesuits…that's bull, isn't it?"

Max laughed. "I don't know. This is what we looked like when we were born. Human."

"Yeah, except for the third eye," Michael added, kneeling to tie his shoe. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Liz studying the back of his head. He stood back up. "Kidding."

She laughed and rolled her eyes, blushing. "Jerk."

Michael and Max exchanged glances, and Michael stepped forward. Encouraged when she didn't step away, he put his arm around her shoulder. Michael unsealed the door and pushed it open. He stepped away from her but took her hand, and they continued walking, having forgotten all about Max.