Michael gently rubbed Sierra's back. After a while, she pulled away and wiped at her eyes.
"Sorry." She said softly.
"It's okay." Michael said. "You want to talk about it?" He asked.
"Remember that girl I told you about? She was my best friend, her name was Annie."
"Yeah." Michael said, vaguely remembering her mention something about her. Sierra sighed.
"I was just thinking about her……….About how she died." She said softly. "She died in my arms."
"How….How did she die?" Michael asked. Sierra sighed and looked at him. She told him the story of that day-how she disobeyed orders in order to protect him, how Annie was shot right before their eyes, how she held Annie, begging her to stay as she slowly died. Michael watched her as she told the story. Her eyes remained downcast and her chin quivered every so often as she tried to hold in her sobs.
"After that, I was given a dishonorable discharge." Sierra said, ending her story. "Failure to obey orders resulting in death of fellow soldier."
"But you didn't know she was going to get killed. You were worried about me."
"Somehow they didn't seem to care. I mean, a commanding officer, not to mention my father, was in trouble how was I supposed to just stay at my post?" Sierra sighed. "But that's not the issue. I mean, I remember Annie's parents being there at my hearing……..I felt terrible." Sierra looked down. Michael looked at her for a second.
"Sierra, how did everyone die?" He finally asked. Sierra looked at him.
"What?" She asked.
"How did we die?" He repeated. Sierra gave him a hard look and quickly stood up, walking to the edge of the porch.
"How can you even ask me that?" She demanded. "Why would you want to know?"
"Because it happened." Michael replied. Sierra shook her head.
"No, not if I can help it. I'm not going to let my future repeat itself. I just need to stop it. I just need to stop Travis…"
"But how? Present Travis is alive, on Antar; probably listening to all of mommy dearest's little lies."
"Well if you guys stopped trying to dwell on the past-sorry, my past-maybe I could think of something." Sierra muttered. Michael sighed and sat back. The two were silent for a while. "Kyle's wife." She finally said.
"What?" Michael asked.
"Kyle's wife was the first one to die, after Annie, that is." Sierra said. "Some…..certain individuals from her past teamed up with Tess and the Skins to get revenge on her. So they killed her." Sierra stared off to the distance as she remembered.
There was a knock on the door.
"Sierra, get the door." Sierra heard her father call out from his room. It had been two weeks since Annie died and Michael was on bed rest, recovering. Sierra's mom had begrudenly taken on the role of the doting wife but Sierra knew that deep down, as much as she hated bringing him his meals in bed and fluffing his pillow, she was glad he was home and not on the battlefield.
"All right." Sierra responded. Sierra shuffled to the front door as the knocking continued, getting urgent. "I'm coming!" Sierra called out, annoyed. She opened the door. "What do you-" She stopped as she saw who was at the door. Kyle, drenched from the pouring rain, with HER in his arms. Sierra's eyes widened. "Kyle, what-" He didn't let her finish as he stepped past her. Sierra ran to her parents' room where her mother was sitting beside him in bed.
"Who was it, honey?" Her mother asked.
"It's Kyle, I……….Something happened……She….." Sierra stammered, feeling flustered. Her mother dawned a confused expression. Before anyone could say a word, Michael climbed out of bed and went to the living room with his wife and daughter on his heels. The adults stopped sort at what was before them. Kyle had laid her on the couch, he was kneeling beside her.
"Kyle.." Sierra's mother gasped, going to his side. Michael looked at Sierra.
"Call the others." He said. Sierra nodded and went to the phone. A short while later, everyone was gathered in the living room as Max held his hand over her body. Kyle sat not to far off, watching him and chewing on his thumb nervously. Max panted and strained as he tried to heal her, but nothing seemed to be working.
"Why isn't it working?" Kyle asked. Max looked up at him.
"I'm sorry, she's-" Kyle stood up from his perch, shaking his head.
"No, no. You have to fix her." Kyle growled. Max tried to get up but he was weak from trying to heal her.
"I can't, I-"
"She's my wife! You can't let her die!"
"Kyle," Liz said, going over to him. She tried to put a comforting hand on his shoulder but he slapped it away.
"THEY did this. You know that, don't you? Don't for a second think this was some sort of caught in the crossfire bullshit accident. And I'm going to make sure they don't live long enough to regret touching her."
"Kyle, you can't-" Jesse began. Kyle turned to him.
"Don't tell me you wouldn't to the same if it was Isabel lying there." Kyle snapped. His eyes slid to Isabel, who was standing by her husband, then spanned over Max and Michael. "If it was your wives…..But it wasn't. It was my wife. And they are going to be sorry."
"After that, Kyle ran out of the house." Sierra said. "His body was found just in time for her funeral. They were buried together." Sierra blinked back her tears. "Then it was you and mom. Travis snuck into your room one night and killed you both in your sleep. A few days later, he killed Alex. After your, mom's and Alex's funeral service, Isabel, Jesse and Liz drove home together while Max stayed with me at the cemetery." Sierra paused. "Apparently the skins had gone to more primitive tactics and resorted to bombing stuff. They put a bomb in Jesse's car. Isabel and Jesse were DOA, but Liz survived. She lost the baby though, and she was in a coma for almost a week."
"Baby?" Michael asked.
"Yeah, she was pregnant with Max's child. There first one. After being together for so long they were going to have a baby. After you and mom died, I was living with Max and Liz. One day………" Sierra blinked.
"Liz?" Sierra asked through the bathroom door. "Liz?" She repeated. There was no reply. Sierra knocked on the door and it creaked open gently. Sierra's eyes grew as she saw Liz lying in the tub.
"She gave up." Sierra said. "Took a razor blade and gave up."
"No. Liz wouldn't do that." Michael said.
"Why not? Her baby was dead; most of those she cared about were dead."
"But she still had Max."
"Who, like the rest of us, had become jaded and hollow because of everything that happened. " Sierra said. "After Liz died, it all came crashing down on Max. He started saying stuff about having to fix the past to protect the future and talked about the granolith and everything. He was supposed to come back to before Tess left for Antar or something and tell someone……..I'm not quite sure of the details. We were on our way to the granolith when we ran into Tess. She killed him, I killed her." She sated mater of factly. "After I buried Max with the rest of you guys, I set off to finish what Max started."
"So, what are you going to do?" Michael asked. "How do you want to finish this?" Sierra turned to face him.
"I don't know." She replied honestly. She sighed and sat down beside him again. She became very pensive for a moment, and then sat up straight, as if she just remembered something. "When The Skins started using the granolith as sort of the commuter bus between here and there, our side went in and destroyed the granolith. It didn't stop the hordes of them already here, but it kept more from coming in."
"How'd you get in?" Michael asked. "I mean, they had the granolith, so how in the world did we get on Antar?" A slow smile crept to Sierra's face as she jumped to her feet and ran inside the house. "Sierra?" Michael asked, he got up and followed. Sierra walked into the living room where the others were sitting. Michael went and sat beside Maria on the couch.
"I've got something." Sierra announced. The others looked at her blankly.
"I sure hope it isn't contagious." Kyle muttered. Sierra gave him a smirk and then looked back at the others.
"I might have an idea to help out the situation."
"Mind sharing?" Max asked.
"I don't want to say anything in case it jinxes everything. All I can say is, anyone up for a little road trip?" Sierra asked.
Later that night, the others left, agreeing to meet up the next morning to leave. Maria said she'd stay with Michael, everyone pretty much knew why, Max stayed with Liz at her house, The Valenti's in their on place, and Sierra went home with Isabel. When they got there, Isabel was surprised to see Jesse sitting on the couch. He looked up and smiled.
"Jesse." Isabel said, still a little surprised. "What are you…." Jesse cut her off as he got up and gave her a quick kiss on the lips. Isabel gave him a smile. "I thought you had to be away for a few more days." She said.
"We were able to get the business wrapped up last night, so I hoped on a plane and came home to my beautiful wife as soon as I could, which was this afternoon, unfortunately." Jesse said. He put his arms around his wife and went to kiss her passionately when he realized they weren't alone. Sierra stood back and gave him a smile. "Oh, sorry." Jesse said. He stepped back away from Isabel.
"Oh, uh, Jesse, this is uh……..Michael's…" Isabel stammered trying to think of an explanation.
"Cousin." Sierra cut in. Isabel sent her a secretive thankful look. She stepped in and shook Jesse's hand. "I'm Michael's cousin, Sierra."
"Oh, it's nice to meet you." Jesse said. "You know, Michael's never mentioned having a cousin, or any family for that matter." Jesse said.
"Well, honey, you know how Michael is, he doesn't exactly divulge personal information." Isabel said. Sierra gave a soft smile.
"It's all right Isabel." She said. She turned to Jesse. "Isabel's sparing me the tedious job of explaining what's going on." She said. Isabel gave her a look as if to say 'what are you doing'? "See," Sierra said, giving a chuckle. "It sounds like some sob story from some pathetic talk show." She said. "We're long lost cousins." Sierra said. Isabel almost sighed with relief. "Michael's been looking for some family and he found me and my parents all the way in Tucson and we were just so beyond happy that he contacted us we were just about ready to hop on the next bus to Roswell. Unfortunately, a few days before we decided to come up here, dad had a bit of an accident at the construction site he works on. Hurt his leg real bad. Mom decided she'd stay and make sure he was all right and said I could go find my cousin in New Mexico. So," she said, extending her arms to the side as if putting herself on display. "Here I am." She said.
"Wow, that's quite a story." Jesse said.
"Yeah, it is." Isabel muttered. She blinked and looked at Jesse. "Well, you know, since Michael has that little apartment and he has Max there, I suggested Sierra stay with us. If that's all right with you, of course." Isabel said.
"Of course it's all right." Jesse said with a smile. "Michael's family. And any family of his is welcomed here." He said.
"How nice of you." Sierra said. "Of course, kind and generous is the Jesse Ramirez I know." She said without thinking. Jesse gave her an odd look. Sierra blanched for a second before grabbing Isabel by the arm. "Well, this woman has talked about you so much, it's might as well be that I do know you." She said, giving a wide smile. "Every other word out of her mouth was some praise or tidbit of information about her dashing lawyer husband." She said. Jesse looked at Isabel.
"Dashing?" He asked. Isabel smiled and nodded quickly. Jesse grinned. "Well, I mean, maybe a little." He said. Isabel and Sierra could practically see his ego growing a little bit. "Well, I should be off to bed." He said, looking at Isabel. "You're dashing lawyer husband has a meeting with your father and some of the others at the office tomorrow morning." He said, as he went to his and Isabel's room.
"By the way," Sierra said, "I hope this isn't adding on to the imposition I'm placing by staying here, but well, mom and dad so wanted to see Michael, and I figured, going along with your logic, that Isabel, Max and the others are like Michael's family so I'm sure they'd want to meet Michael's second family as well. So, I suggested that we all sort of take a bit of a road trip tomorrow to Tucson."
"Oh." Jesse said. Isabel looked at him.
"Michael might need us." She said. "I mean, meeting his real family after all these years-" Jesse held up a hand.
"Say no more. I understand. I only wish I could come along." He said. He gave her a kiss on the cheek. "I'll be in bed." He said, as he left. Isabel waited a few minutes after she saw the light in the room go off from the creak of the door. She turned to Sierra.
"Long lost cousin from Tucson?" Isabel asked. Sierra laughed.
"I figure the believability is all in the details. If you overload on the details people have no choice but to believe you."
"Uh huh." Isabel said. "Max, Michael and I have had to do our own fair share of lying in our lives, but I've got to say, that was masterful." Sierra laughed.