Chapter 15 Us

Chloe

April 19th, 2014

8:37 PM

Arcadia Bay, Oregon

Price Residence

It was around eight-thirty-ish when we arrived home to my house. Back with my partner in time. It had been over week since Max had ever set foot in my home. The home of our childhood. The home we had always known since the beginning. Max and I walk upstairs to my bedroom to make herself at home again. The place she's always welcome in.

"Home sweet home," I say entering my bedroom. "Feels great to be back, doesn't it?"

"Don't have to tell me twice," said Max. "You bet a Delorean's ass it feel so great to be home at last."

I take off my jean jacket and sit on my bed next to Max. After a long day of winning Max's trial, picking her up from Portland, celebrating her freedom at Two Whales, being invited up to Rachel's lodge for our victory, and now resting in my lovely bedroom. What have I got to lose now. We're not sure what to say to ourselves for what to do now. Other than to sit on my bed and relax with my lover. Taking a breath from all the dangerous work I've done for her that exceedingly paid off.

"So," I say.

"So," she says back.

"So," I say again.

"So what do we do tomorrow?" asked Max.

"Tomorrow, we start over and never look back at our insulting profanity of a quantum crisis Arcadia Bay has periled for the past week since you've been gone," I reply. "From this day forward, this will be another week to remember. Just like that other week."

"You are correct, Chloe. This has become another week to remember. As memorable as our reunion week. That'll be the story of our lives."

The two of us lye down together on my bed. Max takes her sweater off as we do. We fold our hands together lying down facing the ceiling on my bed set. The two of us keeping calm and carrying on.

"You don't know what it means to me to have you back, Max," I said. "We're a family again. At least you won't be going down in history a the girl who set the world on fire just to keep her lover alive."

"Yeah, you don't know what it means to actually resolve that revelation, Chloe," said Max. "I've been waiting six months for that revelation. And now, the answer is a bunch of twisted terrorist wanting to destroy Arcadia Bay just to fuck with my head. Why couldn't I come to that revelation six months ago? I would have no reason to chose my bae over the bay. Let alone the bay over my bae."

"It matters not anymore, Max," I said. "You saved me. That's all that matters."

"Speaking of which, there was something I wanted to talk to you about earlier in the truck on the way back to town."

"What was it? Was it about that choice?"

"It was."

Max sighs.

"Chloe...I don't know how else to say this but - but if I had chosen to back to that first day, letting you die would be very highly unlikely."

"What do you mean?"

"Instead of letting you get shot in that bathroom...I'd let myself get shot in that bathroom instead."

"What?"

"I'm not shitting you, Chloe. Out of all the times I've seen you die, that bathroom would be that last place I'd let you."

"You'd actually give your life away for mine? Why?"

"Why? I don't abide answering questions people know the answer to. Consider that question rhetorical."

"I'm serious, Max. Why would you be the one to take the bullet instead?"

"One, I was done letting you take so many bullets for yourself, I'd rather see you dodge one that time. Two, your the best thing that's ever occurred to me. You know that."

I blush at what Max brings up. Her? Getting shot by Nathan instead of me? I can't even imagine watching the girl I love die in my arms that day. I would have nobody left. I almost want cry. But I won't endure anymore sadness this time. Not this time. This time I hold the tears.

"I'd have nightmares about me actually dying for you that day," she said. "I just lay there bleeding on the bathroom floor holding me in your arms. Watching a girl you haven't seen in five years take a bullet from a kid with an opulent family. It felt like reality. As if I was witnessing a possible reality that I would've made for myself that never happened. It felt so real."

"Max, that's enough, okay?" I say stopping her. "Let's not let nightmares outsmart you into making you the right person in the wrong place. Whatever it is that troubles you, don't let it overcome you. As long as I live and breath, there will be nothing to dwell about. Comprende?"

"Comprende," she answers with a sigh. "I'm so glad that wasn't my storm. What were we thinking on that cliff, Chloe? Prescott and his Neo-Chrysalis cunts really had us going. Why couldn't we stop them for making that storm happen? We were more fixated on Rachel then we were about my imaginings of a tornado."

"It wasn't your fault, Max. There wasn't anything we wouldn't done before you know. Not without Rachel. Right now, this is the only way forward."

"There was...another thing I also wanted to tell you. Though it isn't related to that choice, it's pretty dark also. It's probably not worth mentioning anyways."

I sigh.

"Try me."

"Back the Chrysalis headquarters in Portland, where they ran test on me, they put me in a simulator to test my powers. During the simulation, somehow you were part of it. You were being simulated as someone being held hostage at gunpoint by what I think to be some mercenary that belonged to Neo-Chrysalis. You were scared. I was scared. It was just another reminder of how sick I am watching you die."

Max drips a tear from her eye. I cup my hand in her dark brown hair and comfort her before she fully breaks down.

"Max, that's enough, okay? You have no reason to be afraid of losing me now. We're back together now. The way it always should've been. Nothing can stop us now."

Walls - Anadel

Max gets over herself as we embrace our redemption. Lying down next to each other face to face. Looking at each other in the eye and smile. Infusing ourselves with hope. I stare at her pretty face with dark hair and blue eyes. She stares at my pretty face with blue hair and bluer eyes. Our moment of romance was imminent. And it was time for ourselves to undergo it.

"I love you, Max."

"I love you, too, Chloe."

Without thinking twice, I move my head towards Max's and smother her lips against mine. I loved her so much. It felt so good to have a moment like this with her again. It really did.

I take off my beanie and tank-top having my bra exposed. Max does the same taking her shirt off exposing her skin and breast holder. Then we take our shoes and socks off. Then we sit up on the bed on our knees having our way with each other. Shipping Pricefield. Our couple name. The two of us lovers keep kissing and hovering over one another on the bed. I make sure the lights are off when we do. I touch Max's hip with my hands whiling kissing as she does the same. We were part of each other. We were one.

Back at the lodge, Rachel had invited Frank over for some warm coffee earlier at the diner when we left and he came just in time for her to finish what they've started. Frank lays down on Rachel's bed shitless. Rachel herself exposes her breast holder and it was time for them to get laid.

Rachel climbs onto the bad hover over Frank and they start having their way with each other as well. Pressing their lips against one another and rolling around on the bed. Proving themselves they still had feelings for one another and Frank being the man Rachel still loved even after all these months being away. Frank no longer had a reason to waste himself drinking in his mobile home. Rachel no longer had to risk her life for Max's. They were now a thing again.

My mother laid down in her bed asleep in my parents' bedroom. While my step-father had just arrived home from the Arcadia Precinct. Seeing his wife had already fallen asleep. David was a brave father to me. Braver than William ever was to me. Even if David had always been the paranoid retard he always was, he loved my mom and I very much. I'm glad I managed to make some changes in my life for him. Calling him step-this and step-that especially. So I would no longer be the selfish brat I always was in front of him and my mother. We are family. It was time we acted like one.

Kate Marsh laid down on her bed in her dorm room. Saying her prayers before she slept. Praying the time of reckoning for Arcadia Bay and her best friend Max had reached it's closure and will never have to confront another in her lifetime again. Warren was fast asleep in his dorm without having to worry about a thing. Before Victoria had slept in her dorm, she laid down on her bed staring at a photo of her and Nathan. She still missed her boyfriend, but she was still a good leader to Blackwell and the most dedicated person to the Vortex Club and the rest of the Blackwell community. Once a queen bee, always a queen bee.

Chrysalis soldiers were now leaving Arcadia Bay. Packing up their guns and departing town via trucks and carriers as well as choppers. Now that martial had been lifted on Crosby's authority, and Sean Prescott had been sentenced to death row over at Quantum Prospekt, it was time for Chrysalis's private army to leave the bay. Crosby, Captain Cage, and Senator O'Donohue overlooked the departing military down at city hall. Watching them leave in their trucks and allowing peace be with Arcadia Bay at last. A new era had begun. The quantum conflict in this city was over.

Sean Prescott was now rotting in his prison cell on death row in Quantum Prospekt. Detained under maximum security. He sat their in his cell awaiting his execution that would be in months or years to come. A prison walked across his cellblock to turn the lights out. Leaving the inside of this cell as dark as a dungeon.

He sat there staring at the dirty floor of his cell. Thinking about how horribly he handled his family. Lamenting the sins of the father. The sins that killed his son and left his wife and daughter without a father to helm the family legacy. A legacy he had forsaken upon himself. He now declared himself a sorry leader of a once proud family. That he had.

Back at the Prescott Estate, the wife of Sean Prescott, Caroline Prescott, had sat there on a leather chair in one of the lounges crying with her butler to comfort her. Knowing she had lost both her husband and son to this family. At least her daughter Kristine was their for her mother. Kris had walked in the lounge her mother was mourning and stood by the doorstep with a frown seeing her sob. Even Kris herself couldn't believe they both had to live through her father's crimes. It had become an insult and a disgrace to the family's legacy. Kris was the only family Caroline had left in Arcadia Bay. Which meant she was the only heir left to prolong the Prescott legacy. It was time for her take responsibility.

Karen and Burke, Max's prosecutors, were at their motel room they stayed in until the case was closed down. Karen stood their in the bathroom of the room they stayed in. Needing some time alone from her partner. She had stared at the picture of her and her daughter Sarah. Her only daughter that had been mistakenly murdered by Max's hoaxed actions. When in reality, the actions of her former client Sean Prescott was what murdered her child who died so young.

Karen had felt betrayed by what Prescott made her believe. Loosing a case by the scandal of Sean Prescott. She stood there crying in contempt of what she was made to believe. Karen had torn the papers of Max's criminal evidence she had in court. Disgraced by Prescott's betrayal. Her partner Burke had laid there on the bed of their room overhearing his partner's breakdown. He felt bad for Karen and cared for her a lot. Since her daughter died during the storm, Burke was always there for her when she needed him the most. And he has there for her at that moment of sorrow. So he was.

Ryan and Vanessa were now leaving town back to Seattle. They had driven twenty miles away from the bay and heading for the Washington border. While Ryan was driving, his wife Vanessa fell asleep in the car. He turned over to his wife who was passed out on the front seat next to him. Then turn his head back on the road. Going home after a long day of celebrating his daughter's victory of her case. Driving into the night with the headlights on and the power lines bond. It was a long week for the Caulfield couple awaiting Max's verdict. And now they had left town with all the closure they deserved. That they did.

Max and I were now passed out on my bed. Sleeping next to one another after another romantic moment to ourselves. We were now at peace after another long week of struggle. Just like that week six months prior. We slept beautifully in our nice warm bed. There was no partner in crime without time. No hella without a wowser. No Price without Caulfield. No questions asked. We were together now. That way it always has been. Nothing would untie our bond together. Nothing.

As we slept peacefully in my cozy bedroom, a mystical creature had been watching us from outside the house fifteen feet away. It was Max's spirit doe. Overlooking our happiness from the other side. And with it, my spirit butterfly watching us with the doe. For our moment of truth. Our moment of happiness. Our moment of triumph. For us.

Note: And that's the end of the second act folks. A peaceful way to end it, isn't it? Now don't go anywhere just yet. This episode is far from over. That's right. I wasn't lying when I said this was going to be my longest episode yet. No I wasn't. I am a man of my word. But don't worry now. Expect shit to get realer in the next couple of chapters from now. And expect another flashback with Rachel in you know where next chapter as I promised.

By the way, I forgot to mention. This may sound obvious to you, but the part where Rachel was blowing off steam with Chloe and Max as well as the part they swam in the lake was a nice little callback to episode one and three of season one where Chloe danced with Max in her room and the midnight swim in the Blackwell pool. You probably figured that out. How those parts mimicked a little bit of season one. I'm sure you have. No question.

Until next time, stay golden!