"Max!"

Chloe looked up at the sound of an excited woman's voice cutting above the din of voices in the area. Coming down through the rows of tables that had been set up to feed the displaced residents of Arcadia Bay was Vaenssa Caulfield. The woman's long brown hair was pulled into a sloppy bun, and her normally colorful but well cared for clothing was wrinkled, giving her a harried look. But she didn't seem to mind, just moving quickly towards her daughter.

"Mom," Max exclaimed, jumping up from the table and going to envelop her mother in a large hug.

Just behind Vanessa, moving a bit slower, and even more exhausted looking, was Ryan Caulfield. He looked much like Chloe remembered. Tall, reasonably well muscled for a man his age, and with a well kept thick bear and mustache. And as soon as Max had finished hugging her mom, she slid into her dad's arms for an embrace as well.

Chloe quickly dropped the spoon she had been using to push her empty stew bowl around the table and tried to clean her appearance up slightly. Taking her last cigarette from behind her ear, she slipped it into her pocket and straightened out her clothes some.

Normally, Chloe didn't give a shit what people thought about her punk look and her smoking. It was an expression of who she was. And it had done a good job of driving Joyce and David go crazy at first. But seeing the Caulfields again suddenly made her self-conscious.

These were two people who had practically been a second set of parents to her growing up. The two of them almost felt like the last link she had to when her own family had William in it. And the thought of seeing any sort of disappointment in their gaze made her stomach start to twist.

Still, better to get it over with then to wait for the executioner to come to her. Getting up, she made her way over to the group. "Hi, Mr. and Mrs. Caulfield," Chloe said, putting her hand up to greet them.

Vanessa Caulfield looked up from where she had been inspecting Max for any injuries, and her eyes widened in surprise before a large smile came over her face. "Chloe! Darling, its been forever. And look at you! You're all grown up and so hip looking."

She stepped over, holding her arms open for a hug. It took Chloe back for a moment, and she looked into the woman's face to see if she was just hiding her disappointment, but if she was, Chloe couldn't see it on her. Smiling, she stepped in and relaxed into one of Max's mom's tight warm hugs.

Pulling back, Vanessa gave her a once over, "How are you? No injuries?"

Chloe shook her head, smirking a bit "Takes more than a little rain and wind to keep me down."

"Good," Vanessa said, visibly relaxing a bit. "We were so worried about you and everyone else once we heard about the storm. How is your mother?"

"She's fine. Her and David decided to go digging through the old place and see what they could salvage. You missed them by like half an hour, but they should be back soon."

"I can't imagine how hard that must be for them," Ryan Caulfield said, stepping over to the pair. "Now, where is my hug?" The man smiled broadly and opened his arms, and Chloe stepped in to give him a hug as well. She squeezed him tightly, glad that both of them were treating her normally enough.

"Let us know when they get back. We'd love to see Joyce and see if there is anything we can do to help."

"Will do, Mr. Caulfield."

He raised an eyebrow at Chloe. " 'Mr. and 'Mrs. Caulfield'? It has, will always be, Ryan and Vanessa for you. Besides, you'll make me feel old. Max and her mother do a good enough job of that already."

Chloe laughed, "I mean, you are getting a bit gray there."

Ryan gave an exaggerated sigh. "No respect." He then shifted into one of those characteristically large toothy smiles she remembered growing up. "Its great to see you Chloe. And thanks for taking care of Max."

He looked over at Max, who was being inspected by Vanessa closely in between more hugs a few feet away. He started speaking again, this time being a bit quieter so only she could hear him. "She used to really work herself into knots over you. Max had some trouble with bullying in high school, nothing too bad, but the typical teenage drama that can mess with your head. I think she let it convince her that you had lost interest in her. So I hope you don't hold her radio silence against her too harshly."

"The past week has honestly been the best of my life. Even with all the other shit attached to it. And its all thanks to her. I've missed my best friend, and I'm not going to let the drama from her moving get in the way of that." Chloe said, looking Ryan square in the eyes as she did so and not feeling at all embarrassed by the words.

"I see," he said, looking at her for a moment before going over to free Max from the clutches of Vanessa. "All right, lets give Max some room to breath."

Vanessa turned to face Chloe. "I was just telling Max that Ryan lucked out just a few minutes before we got here. He found a hotel with two rooms available about thirty minutes outside of town that we reserved for the next few nights. If you and Max are willing to share the smaller room, we'd be willing to share ours with your parents. I'm sure they could use somewhere comfortable to sleep while they sort their business out."

"Wow," Chloe began, "thanks. You really don't have to do that, though, I'm sure..."

Max cut her off, coming to stand next to Chloe and facing her mom. "They'd love it Mom." The brunette raised an eyebrow at Chloe. "Who knew the trick to getting the new devil may care Chloe Price to be polite was my parents."

She felt herself blushing a bit as the Caulfields chuckled at her sake. "Shut up you, you brat," she grumbled.

Max placed a hand on Chloe's shoulder blade, moving to stand next to her facing her parents more squarely. "We'll go find Joyce and David and bring them back here. It shouldn't take too long if the roads are cleared, but why don't you two get some food. You must have drove here non-stop to get in so quickly."

'That would explain them looking so tired,' Chloe thought, 'not that I'm surprised they rushed here, given the circumstances.'

Ryan shrugged, "We weren't about to let our daughter deal with this all alone. Now go on, why don't you two find Joyce and her husband so we can get you every back to the hotel to wash up and turn in for the night. We can finish catching up tomorrow and talk a bit."

Vanessa looked between the two girls, looking a bit torn at the idea of Max leaving. Now that Chloe was taking a closer look, she could see the slight puffy red skin around her eyes. 'Must have been crying,' Chloe thought, feeling bad for her. Still, she nodded along with Ryan. "I think that's a good idea. You father could use some time to relax before we hit the road again. And we're both a bit hungry."

Max stepped up to her, giving her one more hug before stepping back to Chloe's side. She could just see some tears at the corner of her friend's eyes. "Love you, mom, dad. Thanks for coming."

"Love you too, honey," Vanessa and Ryan replied. Chloe gave the pair a final wave as they headed towards the area where food was being served, and Chloe began to make her way to the nearby residential street she had parked her truck at earlier in the day. She had kidnapped Max to help her retrieve it from near the base of the lighthouse, hoping it could be useful in helping with whatever clean up was about to take place in town. While some trees had fallen along the road between the town and the cliff side, it hadn't been too difficult for the two girls to move them just enough get the truck by. And it had given them a good chance to be active and just absorb their own thoughts about what had happened during the storm.

As they got to the truck, Max began to chuckle next to her. Looking over at her friend, she looked at Chloe before bursting into more laughter, her hand coming up to cover her mouth.

"Hi, Mr. and Mrs. Caulfield," she mimicked in an impression of Chloe's voice.

"Oh shut up," Chloe said, her cheeks reddening a bit. "I was surprised to see them, that's all."

She hoped in the cabin of the truck and leaned over to open the passenger door for Max. Max took her tote bag and threw it on the bench of the truck before climbing in. "Yeah. They used to ask after you a lot. I think they were trying to get me over my anxiety about talking to you. The situation is lame, but I bet they're glad to see you and Joyce."

Chloe smiled, glad that the Caulfields had been thinking of her, even if part of it had been to help Max with her self-confidence as Ryan had hinted at earlier. She twisted in her seat to look out the back window and reverse the truck as she began to respond to Max...

"Its getting dark. Just wait or something," Chloe said, her arm propped on the table holding her chin up as she waited for the food to be prepared. "The house will still be there in the morning, and its not like you haven't been busy all day already."

"I know, Chloe. Our neighbor just told me they cleared the street going in, though, and I would feel better checking on a few things tonight. The rest can can wait for tomorrow." Joyce said, passing down a few plates along the table to the other towns folks present. As she turned to look down the table, her mother frowned. "Max. When did you get over there? Are you okay hun? You look as pale as a ghost."

Chloe turned to see Max staring at them, skin pale and with a hint of panic to her eyes. And just out of the corner of her nose, Chloe could see just a small drop of blood building up.

Max threw her messenger bag into the cabin of the truck before climbing in to join Chloe. She was physically and mentally exhausted after the past week of activity and the trek to go retrieve Chloe's truck earlier in the day. Seeing the destruction the hurricane had left in its wake had been pretty hard on both of them, casting a slightly awkward cast to their dinner with Joyce and David.

That seemed to have changed slightly though, as the blue-haired girl next to her hummed a happy little song while getting herself settled in behind the wheel. The girl seemed to be in high spirits after seeing her parents, which made Max smile. Chloe had been doing her best to shrug off the excitement of the past week, but even being five years out of practice, it was pretty obvious that her friend was feeling overwhelmed.

Her folks had been the perfect distraction from the fallout of the storm, though. Chloe had always been pretty close with her folks when they were younger, so her reaction was no surprise. And despite trying to prove she could be an adult and handle things on her own, Max couldn't help but feel slightly more at ease with them nearby.

She wished they could have avoided heading to Chloe's house, though. On the list of things that could break the building good cheer in Chloe, going to see her house in ruins was definitely one of them. The other girl had obviously been dying to get out of Arcadia Bay forever, but it was another thing to see her home and her things become a pile of rubble.

"Yeah. They used to ask after you a lot. I think they were trying to get me over my anxiety about talking to you. The situation is lame, but I bet they're glad to see you and Joyce."

As Chloe began to back the truck out from the other cars being kept here, Max leaned her head against the wall of the cab and closed her eyes. 'That hotel shower and bed sounds so amazing right now. I am ready to sleep for the next week.'

As Max was fantasizing about the rest of the evening, she noticed the truck wasn't moving. Opening her eyes, she saw that Chloe was frozen next to her. Her body twisted to look out the back of the vehicle, but she wasn't moving, blinking, or even breathing. She was just frozen in a moment in time. Feeling her heart begin to pound, Max quickly began looking around outside the truck. All around them all signs of movement and life had come to a complete still.

'This isn't me...I don't think?'

Max reached out to touch Chloe, but the girl just remained still as a statue. "Chloe...Chloe!" Max yelled, trying to shake her arm, but the arm remained stuck in place.

Knowing she was freaking out a bit, she took a moment to take a deep breath and collect her thoughts. She was pretty confident this wasn't her fault. Usually she had to focus to control time. The only time it had been different was when she had been unconscious, but her gut told her that she had only been that way because of how much focus it had taken to do what she did. 'So what does that mean for this?'

Grabbing her bag, Max forced open the door to the truck. Luckily the object gave her less trouble than Chloe's arm had. Looking around the truck, she could see in the distance other frozen individuals. She stepped over towards a few coast guard who were pulling debris out from a nearby building, hesitating a moment before touching one of them on the arm. The man didn't respond, staying in mid lift of a small crossbeam.

'It looks like just touching someone won't bring them in like it did with Chloe or Warren.'

Max tried to focus on rewinding time for a moment as well, seeing if she could exert any control over what was happening, and after a moment of nothing happened she let out a deep sigh. If nothing else, it helped to confirm her suspicion that it wasn't her fault this time. As she tried to think about what she could do next, she heard a snapcome from some nearby bushes, causing her to nearly jump and shout in surprise. Not sure what else to do, she quickly squeezed past the two coast guard nearby and into the house they had been clearing. As she whirled about to place her back against the mostly intact wall near the doorway, she could just see the hint of a creature poking through the bushes.

Trying to remain in the shadow of the wall, she leaned forward just enough to catch a glimpse of the creature. It was clearly a canine of some sort, with gray and reddish fur. And while it looked vaguely wolf like, the slightly lean body and narrower ears made Max think that this must be what a coyote looked like. The most striking feature that made it look unique from any sort of wolf or coyote she could imagine though was its sheer size. It had to be close to four feet at the shoulder.

It was also scanning the area, as if looking for something. Its head swinging back and forth and its nose twitching, the sound of its huffing breath audible in the muffled silence of these frozen moments in time. Not wanting to be seen by the creature, Max pushed back into the wall, trying to hide fully in the shadows. She did her best to calm her breathing, but each shaky breath and heart beat sounded far too loud to her own panicked ears. Something about this creature just radiated viciousness and ill will. Before now, only the doe and the butterfly had appeared when she dealt with these strange time powers of hers. And those had been strangely comforting. This one was just deeply terrifying.

She could hear the creature move out of the bushes nearby, its paws padding lightly on the concrete nearby. It drew slowly in the direction of where she was hiding, and for a brief moment she debated trying to shift deeper into the house and risk moving, but just as she was about to reach the breaking point to try it, she could hear the creature begin to move away. Even so, she waited a few more minutes before she allowed herself to take a deep shuddering breath, and a few more minutes yet before she dared poke her head out of the doorway to see what was taking place outside. The creature was no longer visible, but Max stayed in the house, letting her back slide down the wall as she sat down and pulled her knees up to her chest.

'Calm down, Max.' Her pulse was pounding in her ears. 'Calm down and think. You need to figure out what is going on.'

It was clear there was still a lot neither she nor Chloe understood about these time traveling abilities. She had originally thought that her powers had been connected to Rachel Amber. The girl's death had hung over everything. And the aesthetic of the doe and the butterfly had fit into her need to find a narrative to explain what was happening. But she wasn't really sure that was the case anymore.

Rachel Amber's death had definitely been tied into the weird happenings of Arcadia Bay. And it had motivated Chloe to get involved in things that set off the chain of events that caused Max to save her friend from being shot. But other than that, her story had ended in that graveyard weeks ago. And while a supernatural explanation involving ghosts or gifts from ghosts didn't really blow the lid on the insanity that was the last week, it pushed the limit on how many odd things that they had to invoke to get an explanation.

"Occam's Razor," Max said to herself. It had been something Warren had told her about, and it seemed to fit the bill here. Until they had more to go on, she couldn't buy the explanation that a girl had died, become a ghost, then granted her control over time.

So the question remained, was what else could it be.

Obviously the animals seemed to have something to do with it. And judging by the coyote out there, weird animals caught in or around her time abilities seemed to be a thing now. They clearly were acting with some knowledge of what was going on too.

'It would be real helpful if those animals would learn to use their words,' Max thought, laughing to herself in a dry humorless way.

Sighing, she decided she had to accept it wasn't a lot to work on yet. But Chloe and her and agreed to give it some thought in a few days, once everything had calmed down and they had some time to decompress. Hopefully they could stick to that plan, but if things like this were going to keep happening they would have to be ready for it. Especially now that something dangerous seemed to be stalking the town in these moments. 'Two somethings, technically. If you count that man Chloe saw.'

That man was the only other clue they had to work with. Honestly, she wasn't sure what to think about that. Chloe didn't seem to take shit from anyone, so whoever that man was must have given her a really bad vibe. She wasn't sure how she would have reacted in that scenario, but Chloe was definitely a lot braver than her by default. So if she thought the guy was bad news, then she believed her friend.

The problem was, the most likely explanation was that he had something to do with this current pause in time. That made finding out more about him important.

Regardless, none of this solved her current problem. She was still stuck in this bubble in time and she wasn't sure what to do next but wait for things to move again.

It took a few minutes, but eventually she noticed the coast guard moving just outside the door, and she jumped up to run outside. She could see people moving again, only this time they were moving slowly in reverse, picking up speed quickly. Chloe had just finished exiting the truck and was moving backwards back towards the dining area, her movements speeding up into a strange nauseating blur and she ran in reverse. Realizing the confusion that could happen if she suddenly disappeared from Chloe's perspective, she dashed after the girl, but was unable to keep up with the speed of the rewind, especially as she had to make sure to dodge people moving into her path suddenly.

She quickly lost sight of the girl, but could see the dining area just around the corner of a home. Putting on a burst of speed, she could see her parents getting back into their car and driving away just as she got into the dining area. And she had just gotten within a few feet of the table they had eaten at as Chloe was looking at Joyce and David. Whoever had rewound time had done so going back far longer than anything Max was capable of, but it looked like time was slowing again, and with a sudden shift, everything came back into focus.

Max felt herself grow instantly nauseous at the sudden shift in her perspective, which was unlike any other rewind attempt she had made before. She could feel the blood growing at the corner of her nose as her body fought to settle in this new timeline.

"Max. When did you get over there? Are you okay hun? You look as pale as a ghost."

Sorry for the delay. Life conspired to get in the way of getting this piece of mind candy onto paper. Hope you all enjoy.

Like and reply. It feeds my desire to write. :)

Clear Skies,

Rylkan