Part 3b

In the van Max was staring at the truck in front of him, focusing on maintaining an exact distance between the vehicles. He felt like he was going to lose his mind and he didn't know how to even begin dealing with losing Michael. He refused to let Maria's misguided beliefs get his hopes up because he had no misconceptions about the powers that the Granolith possessed.

He had felt the emptiness in Michael's body when he had tried to connect with him, the lack of essence that had made him alive. It was as if his very soul was gone and nothing remained but his cold, dead body. He hadn't been able to save his best friend, his brother, the only other male hybrid like him. The letters on the license plate in front of him suddenly became blurry and he reached up to rub his eyes, brushing away the tears that wouldn't stop falling.

Michael's intense presence had been a constant in his life for as long as he could remember, and now that he had been ripped away from them Max felt like he had lost the ability to breathe. What about Maria? his conscience prodded. What would happen to her once she was forced to accept that Michael was gone? He knew, after the summer they had spent hanging out a couple of years earlier, that when Maria DeLuca let herself love someone the way she loved Michael, it was intense and it was for the rest of her life. There was no halfway when she fell in love. She went into it just like she did anything else - with her whole heart and without holding anything back. She would never get over losing Michael, he thought. Never. Would she go on living or would she just give up?

What about Liz? he wondered. What would happen to her if she lost Maria? She was one of the strongest women he had ever known, but she had barely survived losing Alex; what would happen if she lost Maria too? No one was that strong. If anything happened to Maria, Liz would lose it. Their friendship, their bond, was too strong, and Liz just wouldn't be the same without Maria around.

He glanced in the rearview mirror, reaching up to readjust it so he could check on his wife. He could barely make out their shadows in the darkness, relying on what little light was provided by the headlights reflecting off of the truck in front of them.

Liz rubbed Maria's back, wishing she knew what to say in this situation. Her best friend was convinced that the Granolith was going to make things right again, fix it so that Michael wasn't dead, but Liz wasn't convinced that it was the answer. She was worried about how Maria was going to handle it if her plan backfired and the trip was for nothing. She watched the other woman as she carefully cradled Michael's head in her lap, rocking him gently as she spoke to him in such a soft voice.

Maria loved the surly, ill-mannered alien and if the Granolith couldn't save Michael, it was going to destroy her. She knew what it would do to her to if the unthinkable happened and she ever lost Max. She had felt him die when she was in Vermont, but a miracle had happened and she had gotten him back. Now Maria was going through a similar tragedy, but Liz had her doubts that such a miracle could happen twice, even with the hybrids and the mystery surrounding their existences.

"Maria…"

The blond slowly raised her head to look at her friend in the near-darkness. Her fingers continued to comb through his spiked hair, the contact necessary to her sanity. "He loves me, y'know." It was a statement, not a question. "I know most people don't understand him, they don't know what I see in him, but he loves me."

Her gaze dropped back down to him and her fingers traced over his features, ignoring the fact that his flesh was so cold. "Even when he was…" she swallowed with difficulty, "leaving, when he thought he was leaving me for good, he promised that he would never leave me." Tears spilled over and tracked down her cheeks. "He struggled to keep breathing long enough to tell me that… he promised."

She folded her body over him, her forehead pressed against his as she fought against the wave of desolation that she could feel trying to take hold of her. "It'll be okay, Michael, the Granolith will fix everything," she whispered.

Liz realized that she fell into that category of people Maria had been describing as she watched them; she had never understood Michael, and she had never known what it was that Maria saw in him. After months of being on the run with them, living in cramped quarters, and listening to their constant bickering, she had been ready to dump him on Maria's behalf. He was unbearable, rude, sarcastic, and she had never once seen him do a single thing to deserve his girlfriend's love and respect.

Their relationship had been strange, it had been filled with intensity, and it had certainly lacked the fairy tale quality, but now that it was too late Liz could see that she had never recognized what was right in front of her eyes. In his own way, nonverbal, gruff, and abrasive, Michael had loved Maria with a depth that defied explanation; mere words had never been enough to convey his feelings and he had known that. His last words… his last breath, had been for Maria, to reassure her that she wouldn't be alone.

Liz glanced up when she felt the van slowing and then turning. She could tell that they had left the highway, the bumpy ride indicating that they were traveling off-road now. She made her way up to the front, resting on her knees beside her husband. His knuckles were white from gripping the steering wheel so tightly. She could see the tears silently tracking down his cheeks and his pain was so close to the surface that she could feel it as if it were her own.

"Hey," she said softly, "how're you holding up?"

Max shook his head and used his shoulder to dry the right side of his face. "Do you think this is gonna work?" he asked, his voice rough.

"No. I think she doesn't know how to deal with this and she's desperate to come up with any possible solution that will put off the inevitable." She rubbed his shoulder. "I'm sorry, Max."

He nodded but kept his gaze glued to the truck in front of him as it bounced through the desert. He couldn't look at her; if he did he was going to lose his tenuous grasp on his control and he would fall apart. He took his right hand off of the steering wheel long enough to point out the outcropping of rocks looming up ahead. The cave where the Granolith was hidden was located within the towering boulders that were now just minutes away.

"I'll let Maria know."

Kyle parked in front of the mountainous rock formation and stared at it in silence for several minutes. He pushed the button on the side of his watch to illuminate the face so he could read the time. 3:37am. Next to him, Isabel had opened the door and was staring out into the night. She had fallen silent after arguing with him for the first couple of hours, but she had managed to hold herself together so far. He climbed out of the truck and stretched; his body was stiff from sitting in one position for so many hours and he could feel his spine popping into place.

Once Max pulled up beside them he went to help them carry Michael's body up the path that led to the secret entrance. Near the entrance Max waved his hand over the place where the sensor was hidden and after a moment a handprint became visible and a slab of the rock moved inward and slid back to allow them to enter. Inside the cave they gently placed his body on the ground and they all stood back as Maria slowly approached the mysterious object that was the Granolith. She walked around it several times, watching it for any indication that it was aware of their presence.

"How do you turn it on?" she asked, the question not aimed at any one specific person.

"It was only active once when the key was inserted."

Maria glanced at Max when he spoke, and forced her own voice to remain level in response to his ragged tone; she couldn't afford to fall apart now. "And we don't have that key?" He shook his head and she turned back to the machine, staring at it as she considered her next action. "I don't know how you work or how you communicate, but I need you to speak to me." The only sound in the chamber was the hum that emanated from the general vicinity of the Granolith. She walked up to it and placed her hand against it, barely controlling the urge to just curl up in a fetal position on the ground and let go. "You have to help him," she whispered, leaning forward and placing her forehead against the smooth surface. It wasn't cool as she had expected, instead it was warm to the touch and she could feel the vibrations that pulsed through it.

"Maria, it isn't gonna speak to you," Isabel said. "I've talked to it before, remember? It didn't respond to me either." She kept her gaze focused on the Granolith, irrationally hating it for everything that it represented and blaming it for everything that she had lost. "It's just a stupid alien device or something; it's not a sentient being with a conscience or the ability to - "

"The ability to interact with lesser beings is indeed within my capabilities," a mechanical voice rumbled. It seemed to come from all around them and not just from the device at the center of the chamber that was now glowing brightly. "Why have you come here?"

Maria took a couple of steps back and stared at it in awe. It could understand her and answer her. To her knowledge, and according to Isabel's own statement, it had never done that in the past. Why? Oh, right, because everything had to be so complicated where the aliens were concerned! But maybe it knew what they were there for, why they had come to seek it out. Maybe it knew somehow that it had to save Michael… or Rath, as the Granolith probably knew him. It was a question of life or death, so maybe that was why it had started to speak. "Granolith, you have to help us," she said insistently. "There was an accident and Michael… he was… he…" Oh, God, she couldn't say it! If she said it, it would be true! "He was hurt, badly, and - "

"You have brought him to me for what reason?"

Maria couldn't believe the Granolith's controlled responses. She hadn't expected it to be all warm and fuzzy or anything, but it was unemotional to the point of being cold. "I want you to fix it, to… to fix him. You're capable of many things and it's your job to watch over the hybrids."

"You have come with a request that cannot be granted." The response was dispassionate. "Once the hybrid ceases to exist there is no possibility of generating new life within it."

"Okay, fine, I'm not asking you to do that. But, you're capable of time travel."

"It is within my abilities."

"Then tell me how to do that, how to go back in time to prevent this from happening."

"Your request cannot be granted."

Maria's patience was quickly coming to an end. "Why not? If you possess the ability, why would you refuse to help him? He is - "

"Altering the events of the past in order to preserve a single being is not allowed. For many years the sacred laws have existed to prevent those who would change the past, present, or future for their own gain."

"You're refusing to help him? I seem to remember an occasion where you allowed time travel, so why are you refusing it now?" she demanded, shocked. She wasn't going to let the Granolith get away with this answer. She had heard all about time travel from Liz.

"The creators must be obeyed. Your request cannot and will not be granted."

"What? No! Come back here, we're not finished! You've got to - " Maria stopped when Liz put her hand on her shoulder, silently holding her and trying to make her realize that the Granolith had stopped interacting with her. The light that had been glowing so brightly while the Granolith was speaking dimmed suddenly, leaving only the dull green glow behind. Maria stared at the device, shell-shocked, unable to comprehend what it meant and unwilling to accept what it had said. She reached blindly for Liz's hand, desperately seeking strength in her best friend as she stood there, sightlessly staring at the powerful alien device, carefully hidden in a small cave near Roswell, New Mexico.

"Why doesn't it want to use time travel to save Michael?" she questioned in a lost voice. "It helped you and Max in the other timeline, remember? So, why is it refusing to help Michael? After everything he's been through… Hank, his miserable existence with that abusive animal, how can the Granolith do this? It can't just leave things this way… it can't just let Michael stay dead! It's not fair, Liz, it's not FAIR!"

Liz held Maria closer, trying her best not to break down and cry. She had an idea why the Granolith had refused to use its power to allow time travel. As it had said, it was against the rules, but in that first timeline Future Max had mentioned that she and Serena had modified the Granolith for time travel. Maybe they hadn't modified it only for that purpose, but they had bent the rules to use it for time travel. But the truth was she had no idea where to begin to alter the device. She hadn't been able to do it on her own in the first timeline, and Serena didn't exist in this one. Or she hadn't met her. Either way, she had no idea who or where she was.

Kyle looked around at his friends, his family, and knew that he was going to have to be the one to bring up the difficult, but necessary task that needed to be completed. It wasn't going to get any easier the longer they put it off, but he needed to do it in a way that would keep Maria from losing it. They had to be far away from Roswell, well on their way back to their new homes before that could be allowed to happen.

"Maria." He moved closer to her but refrained from taking her in his arms and offering comfort. "Maria, it'll be daylight in less than two hours, and you know we can't risk bein' seen around here. Maybe this…" he waved at the Granolith, "thing, whatever it is, has the answers, maybe it holds the key to getting Michael back, but it's not givin' it up right now." He crouched down a little to meet her gaze, easily reading the denial in her green eyes. "It's already admitted that it's capable of time travel, right? Well, we can come back when we have more time, convince it to do what needs to be done, but we've got to…" He felt it like a punch to the gut when recognition settled into her expression.

"You want to bury him. Here? In the desert? He'll be alone here, Kyle! You want me to just leave him here? I won't even be able to - "

Kyle looked at her with pity in his eyes. She was talking about Michael as if he were in a coma, not dead. Maybe that was why she hadn't totally lost it yet; it's what was holding her together. "Maria, we can always come back and try to convince this damn thing to cooperate, but we're runnin' outta time here. You know it's not safe here, and Michael would be havin' a fit if he knew everyone was here, risking discovery and capture just to bring him back."

Maria turned her head to look at Michael's body, swallowing with difficulty as she nodded. "You're right; that would piss him off. I just… I need a few minutes, Kyle."

He nodded in understanding. "We'll wait outside." He glanced at Liz, seeing that she had been listening to the entire conversation. Max and Isabel both looked shell-shocked and neither of them said a word as she gently herded them out of the chamber.

"Kyle?"

He turned back to Maria, his body halfway through the entrance. "Yeah?"

"You know that spot on the other side of the rocks? The shady spot by those scraggly little bushy things?" She cleared her throat when he nodded. "Michael liked that spot."

"I'll take care of it." He was gone then, leaving her alone with Michael's body.

"You never could make things easy, could you?" she murmured, dropping down beside Michael. Her fingers tangled in his soft hair and her heart thudded painfully in her chest as her other hand trailed down the side of his face and she registered just how icy his skin felt. "We've beat the odds before, Michael, and we'll beat them this time too. We've never been the type of people to just sit back and let life happen." She chuckled tearfully. "I'd like to think I was a little more diplomatic than you, but we made things happen, didn't we?" She pressed a lingering kiss to his lips. "We're not finished, Spaceboy, and no matter what it takes, I promise you I'll find a way to fix this."

"Maria?"

She wiped the stray tears from her eyes and turned her head to look at Kyle.

"We're ready."

"So are we." She kissed Michael one more time before standing up.

Half an hour later she watched as the last of the sand was smoothed out over the unmarked grave. She forced her emotions further down, terrified of what would happen if she released them. She had to hold it together; she had made Michael a promise and she had every intention of keeping it. This was only temporary, she reminded herself.

Her head snapped up when she heard a choking sound and tears suddenly clouded her vision when she saw Max drop the shovel in his hand and fall to his knees. Liz hurried to his side, kneeling in front of him and taking him in her arms. She cradled his shaking body, her hands rubbing his back in a soothing gesture while she whispered words of comfort through her own tears.

Not far away Isabel was watching her brother and Kyle was watching her as she began to shut down and close herself off.

Maria took it all in and felt her emotions building up into an uncontrollable mass and she knew she had to get away or she wasn't going to be able to keep it in any longer. Her gaze turned up towards the rocks that jutted out against the sky that was beginning to lighten, hinting at the pending sunrise.

Her emotions began to mutate from sadness, loss, hurt, and emptiness, to anger that was burning a hole in her chest and without conscious thought she began walking back to the cave.

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Michael stared at his reflection in the mirror over the sink, annoyed that he couldn't recall the nightmare that had interrupted his sleep. Nightmares weren't a normal occurrence for him and having one that had created the unfamiliar feeling of fear while the images remained elusive pissed him off. He didn't like experiencing things that he couldn't remember later, and the fact that fear had been involved bothered him more than he cared to admit.

After the night he'd had he should've been able to come back to his hotel room and sleep straight through what was left of the night. They had gone back to her house for a very long night and he was incredibly pleased with his performance. She… what was her name anyway? He frowned at his reflection for a moment before shrugging. He didn't give a rats' ass what her name was. Whatever her name was, she had been even more aggressive in bed than she had been at the jail and he'd had his hands full with her.

Generally, sex of that nature left him pleasantly worn out and once he'd ditched whatever lucky bitch had benefited from his sexual prowess, and he was back in his own bed he enjoyed the sex-induced coma that inevitably came afterwards.

But that luxury had been denied him this time and even his morning run hadn't taken the edge off. Knowing he was no closer to an answer he pushed away from the mirror and packed his things back into his saddlebags, left the key on the nightstand, and walked outside to his motorcycle.

He looked up at the pre-dawn sky before checking his watch. He could be in Santa Fe by noon and in some sweet little thing's panties soon after. He threw his leg over the seat and settled into it before turning the key and revving the engine several times. An old man sitting on the porch reading his newspaper by porch light looked at him in disapproval and Michael flipped him off and revved the engine once more for good measure.

He had spent the entire night fucking a beautiful woman and he was irritable and ready to pick a fight with someone. Maybe when he got to Santa Fe he'd find some idiot in need of a good ass-kicking and get that out of his system before looking for some hot bitch in need of fucking. He rolled his shoulders back and took a deep breath before pulling out into the quiet street.