After sundown but before last light, Nicholas walked on foot along U.S. Route 385, heading north toward the intersection where he knew the government setup one of their checkpoints. They blocked all traffic from heading east into Rita Blanca National Grasslands and in the direction of Kivar's ship.
Nicholas convinced someone in El Quarterlejo to drive him about 10 miles north on 385 to a small farm warehouse where he said his father worked. He made up a sob story about how they fought over a hunting trip Nicholas said he didn't get to go on and that he made his father so angry that he left Nicholas alone in El Quarterlejo while proceeding to the farm. Nicholas pretended this freaked him out and that he feared his father wouldn't come back for him, accounting for why he needed the ride.
Of course none of that was remotely true. Once there, Nicholas discreetly lurked about the property until he followed a farmer from his pickup into a restroom. Nicholas used his powers to lock the door of the restroom, providing Nicholas plenty of time to steal the man's pickup. He then proceeded north another 13 miles, pulling off to the side of the road about a mile from the military checkpoint, so he could approach on foot undetected.
With such little natural light, no one noticed as Nicholas neared the checkpoint. At this time of day, anyone approaching typically traveled in a vehicle with the headlights on. Nicholas saw a group of four men essentially guarding the east road. Three wore military camo and one a black suit, white dress shirt and a black tie, a telltale sign of his affiliation with the Special Unit. Nicholas knew of the Special Unit but managed to cleverly avoid ever getting on their radar. An olive green Humvee was parked near the officers, and a large cargo truck was parked at an angle along the north bound lane just before the intersection, effectively barricading any vehicle on 385 from reaching the intersection.
Nicholas used his powers to switch the truck from park to neutral. It started to roll backward down the slope running away from the road to the east in the opposite direction of the intersection. The three officers scrambled after the truck as it plowed through a makeshift fence of u-shaped steel posts with bands of thin metal wire running between the posts. It would soon stop as the terrain flattened. This left the Special Unit agent near the Humvee alone to watch his comrades chasing off after the runaway truck.
Nicholas used his powers to temporarily slow the blood flow all throughout the Special Unit man's body. As soon as he collapsed, Nicholas released his influence which would allow the agent to fully recover. He could've easily killed him, but he saw no need to do that. He viewed the military's presence there as a nuisance instead an actual threat to him or Kivar.
An advanced cloaking technology hid Kivar's ship and made it invisible to the naked eye. However, Nicholas sensed the ship's presence and pulled up a few feet short. He shifted the Humvee to neutral and upon exiting the vehicle waved his hand to use his powers to fling it back toward the intersection. It would be found abandoned somewhere between the site of Kivar's ship and the military checkpoint.
Nicholas approached the ship's location on foot until he gently bumped into a transparent energy field that the ship emitted facing the road.
It was there to prevent humans from getting too close or firing some kind of weapon at the cloaked ship, which could disable the fragile cloaking technology. Kivar dumped spare parts all over the area before settling on a landing spot. Kivar was brilliant that way. The move caused the military to barricade a large area surrounding the ship from the public while the military ran a search for a large craft they'd never actually manage to see.
The barrier couldn't and didn't need to keep Nicholas out and he used his powers to temporarily wedge a hole into the barrier. He stepped through it and approached the hidden ship. Nicholas used his powers again to send a friendly signal, which resulted in someone from the ship opening a hatch and extending a ramp for him to board. While no one was around, to the outside world it looked a floating doorway opened several feet off the ground, supported by nothing.
Nicholas walked up the ramp into the ship. Once inside, he knew exactly where to go. He headed toward Kivar's chambers where he knew Kivar waited to see him. As Nicholas walked down the corridors of the familiar ship layout, he noticed how wide and especially tall the corridors appeared. Not so much because he forgot, but most of his memories on ships were from his original alien body, not his relatively short husk of a teenage boy.
Inside Kivar's dimly lit chambers, Kivar sat perched above the rest of the room in the center. Not exactly in a spotlight, but the light shining down and around Kivar showcased his presence in the room. Kivar wore the form of a black human male, very tall and very muscular. An intimidating form to be sure, but Nicholas didn't need a human form to be intimidated by Kivar.
While Nicholas remained in overall good favor for his loyalty to Kivar and the only remaining ally on Earth, his failure to kill the Royal Four and secure the Granolith stained his reputation and standing. In fact, after the Summit in New York, Nicholas maintained infrequent contact with Kivar, who didn't plan to return to Earth after Tess fled Antar with baby Zan.
After Nicholas learned of the Royal Four's permanent departure from Roswell, he found ways to stay on the move himself, needing to carefully arrange for foster parents or charitable families to support him. His teenage husk prevented him from passing himself off as an independent self-sustaining adult.
Nicholas knew Max and Liz traveled around saving people, but he only learned of a handful of heroic saves after the fact and never managed to pick up their trail. Nicholas considered it fortuitous that his discovery of Zan and Ava in El Quartelejo coincided so closely with learning of Kivar's in-person visit to Earth to retrieve the Granolith once and for all.
At first, they didn't know where to find any of the Royal Four. They knew Ava came from the backup Royal Four left in New York, making her of little value because she never knew the Granolith's location. Kivar felt that Zan held the key to his plans. Kivar wanted Nicholas to earn Zan's trust. By bringing Zan to him, Kivar believed he could draw out the hidden Royal Four and leverage Zan to get his hands on the Granolith. Either by manipulating Zan to learn the location of the Granolith and confide that in Nicholas, or by threatening Zan's safety to get Max or one of the others to surrender the Granolith's location in exchange for Zan's safe return. The plan was that in exchange for his help with Zan, Kivar would reward Nicholas with the opportunity to return home. If he could get back to Antar, he could finally safely exit his teenage human husk and return to his adult persona.
Kivar quickly took notice of Nicholas' entrance and approach to him.
"Nicholas, you disappoint me yet again," Kivar boomed with a hint of anger in his voice. "All I asked you to do was bring the boy to me."
"I know, Your Majesty," Nicholas said, "and I was so close. But Max Evans and Ava swooped in and threw me back. They took Zan away."
Since Kivar never achieved a universal acceptance of his legitimate position at the head of the Antar throne, Nicholas knew that formally referring to him as "Your Majesty" always sat well with Kivar. It usually curried enough good will to assure Kivar treated Nicholas as well as he ever would since it served as a reminder of Nicholas' loyalty.
"And you couldn't defeat them?" Kivar asked, somewhat rhetorically, as he expected Nicholas to be capable of the task.
"They had the element of surprise, and I wanted to exercise some caution in how violent I acted in front of the boy, especially when I'd be attacking his parents like that," Nicholas explained.
Nicholas found it easier to accept Zan and Max for the names they went by. However, Kivar rejected the hybrid's human personas. Kivar always referred to Max as Zan or sometimes "the once and mighty Zan," and he always referred to Max's son as simply "the boy." Nicholas generally mirrored this whenever talking to Kivar, but he sometimes used Max Evans in place of Zan. After all, it could be confusing that Max doesn't go by Zan, but his son, "the boy," does go by Zan.
"I see," Kivar noted.
Nicholas knew Kivar couldn't fault his reasoning for exercising that degree of caution. But he also recognized that Kivar was still unhappy he couldn't get Zan to the ship and that Kivar didn't want to give him the satisfaction or credit for handling the situation properly.
While Nicholas benefitted by a rise in stature and significance from his loyalty to Kivar's revolution, he sometimes wondered where he might stand if he were never selected for the mission to Earth. Nicholas pursued his own political aspirations and started networking with some of the right players when they learned the Royal Four and the Granolith were sent to Earth. At the time, Nicholas didn't have the influence to defy Kivar's wishes. However, he hoped the mission to Earth would play out relatively quickly and that leading the mission would help elevate him even more upon returning to Antar. He never anticipated how long it would take for the Royal Four to hatch from their pods, how hard it would be to find out where they were on Earth or that Tess would develop the power to annihilate his fellow husk-clad soldiers. Nicholas was the only one who came to Earth with a backup husk that didn't age or degenerate while in stasis. Nicholas intended to harvest a new husk with his fellow soldiers and maintain his backup. When Tess killed all The Skins, Nicholas' consciousness downloaded into the backup husk, giving him another 50 years with the clock beginning November 2000.
"Fortunately for you," Kivar continued, "I still have an idea that involves putting your talents to use."
"It's my honor to serve you, Your Majesty," Nicholas said humbly.
Kivar cracked a very subtle smile, which quickly faded as he uttered his next chilling statement.
"Indeed," Kivar said, "but if you fail me again, then I will see to it that you remain exiled on this planet until your husk dies, killing you along with it. For now, you may go. You will be called upon when needed."
Nicholas bowed before his king and left Kivar's chambers. He knew this meant he would be permitted to stay on the ship until his next mission. Nicholas welcomed this, as he would be treated not as a teenage boy but as a high ranking member of Kivar's royalty. His time on the ship would either become a rewarding preview of a return to his life on Antar or a devastating tease of all that he was losing by not fulfilling Kivar's orders.
The unexpected opportunity to return home came about quickly. For a time, Nicholas lost hope because Kivar reportedly moved beyond his agenda to hunt down and kill the Royal Four on Earth. Staying on Earth so long, he struggled to some degree to visualize a return home to Antar. Since his life became more about surviving with no clear purpose, Nicholas found he slipped into old habits of trying to please Kivar. Even though he didn't know exactly what a return to Antar would mean, Nicholas figured pursuing that goal made sense and that returning home would beat waiting for his backup husk to eventually die in exile on Earth. Securing the means to return home would mark the first significant accomplishment for Nicholas in decades, and he became determined to take advantage of the next opportunity Kivar would soon present to him.