Unbreakable - A Beautiful Lie (AU M/L ADULT) COMPLETE 5/5/17 + A/N 5/5/19

[begonia9508]

Hey congratulations for your Engagement... and I understand really well your Problems; summer is too short to stay home and write, right?

So don't worry if we have to wait for a new part, as long as it doesn't end into 'dead and buried'! Have a nice time... EVE

[Twilighteyes]

Congratulations!!!!! I'm very happy for you and understand that it's summer and all. Just please finish the story when you can. Because it's incredibly amazing!!!!!!

[Natalie36]

life can be very busy. a lot of good and positive things heading your way. this story is to awesome so i know I will stick around for more when you can

[mela3]

Congratulations!! I'm am so happy for you.

[max and liz believer]

Hi!

Thank you so much for your patience and for your congratulations You're the best!!

Ashley (Morning Dreamgirl)

You know how to make a girl happy in the middle of the night.



Not like that! I meant when you're woken up and then get a notification you updated 13 minutes previously...

Okay, gonna read this amazing chapter again because, yeah, my brain isn't coming up with the right words right now.

You're amazing!

Thank you


Eve (begonia9508) - Thank you so much for the feedback, Eve I'm proud of you for being able to read even though some parts gross you out a bit...

Hey congratulations for your Engagement

Thank you <3

So don't worry if we have to wait for a new part, as long as it doesn't end into 'dead and buried'!

It'll never end up there. I promise


Helen (roswelllostcause)

This was so not the part to read while eating breakfast! Lol! Good thing I have a strong stomach!

*ahum* sorry... Glad you made it through though. Thank you so much for the feedback!!


Carolyn (keepsmiling7)

AMAZING.....disturbing......and heart warming!

Thank you

Alex, always Alex thinking of others first.

He's a good man that one

Thank you so much for the feedback!


Twilighteyes - Thank you so so so much!

Congratulations!!!!!

Thank you <3


Natalie36

life can be very busy. a lot of good and positive things heading your way. this story is to awesome so i know I will stick around for more when you can

Thank you <3 That really means a lot


mela3

Congratulations!! I'm am so happy for you.

Thank you <3


Before we dive straight back into it, I'm gonna do a quick recap since you might be a bit fussy on the details right about now...

Previously on "Unbreakable - A Beautiful Lie"...

Following the attempt to plead their right to be together, Max and Liz are held captive by the alien "government". Liz is tortured - both mentally and physically - with the intention of weakening her to a point where either Sean Carter or his father (the Sergeant) will be able to break the bond between Max and Liz. Thus binding Sean (or Steven Carter) to Liz and use her magnifying powers as a gaea.

They are not very successful at this. Consequently, Command decides to move Liz and unite her with Max. Shortly after their relieved reunion (within captivity), Sean decides to take his vengeance on both Liz and Max and shots Max. Liz, directed by or controlled by the connection, kills Sean and Steven. With Max bleeding to death on the floor, Liz finds a phone and contacts Philip Evans. He arrives just as Max's hold on life is fading.

Plagued by what has happened and the injuries they have sustained, Max and Liz are both held unconscious for a couple of days following the rescue. When they wake up, they are more dependent on each other than ever before, but both have been traumatized by their experiences in captivity.

Max gives the impression of being strong while Liz spends a lot of hours locked up in a bathroom.

They are now at an abandoned hostel, spending their days with Isabel, Alex, Mr. and Mrs. Evans, Jeff and occasionally Michael. During their stay, both Max and Liz are trying to heal. Isabel is sneaking in exercises (yoga) to sharpen Liz's concentration and give her tools to combat her anxiety. Max works on building both him and Liz up through their connection, even though they suffer some setbacks with the connection towards the end of their stay, with Max suspecting that the connection is raping them of their own free will.

They do learn that Liz is able to tap into Max's powers. They learn that Max might be a parim. That Liz might be too. A person of pure goodness. The reader get a peek at Max's grandfather.

Max has just been "betrayed" by the connection, having taken his frustrations out on the desert landscape outside, when Michael arrives with a screaming and resisting Maria. According to Michael, Maria was in danger. He was trying to protect her.

Maria first attempts to get Liz to run away with her, feeling that Liz must be a captive as well. At this point, Max lays it all out (in widely summarized terms) to Maria, something that Maria doesn't know how to react to. But instantly makes her pull away from everyone, Liz included. They are interrupted by an attack on the hostel. Maria is rendered unconscious. Liz, Max, Alex and Michael (carrying Maria) flee into underground tunnels.

Shortly after meeting up with Dresden - the head of the rebellion - they are attacked. Liz is safe inside another tunnel, protecting the unconscious Maria. But she is alone and terrified with the sounds of battle echoing off the dirt walls of the tunnels.

Then the connection goes dead.

And Max is being dragged into the tunnel by Michael, with a large hole in his abdomen. Somehow, under the guidance of Alex and Dresden, Liz manages to heal the wound and bring Max back to consciousness. Along with a stronger connection.

Together, Max and Liz heals Alex who has been seriously injured in the battle.

And that brings us up to speed...


From NINETY-FOUR:

”I knew that you were something of a brainiac, Parker,” Alex said lightly, ”But I never realized the amount of thinking you do.”

I frowned, shifting my gaze back to Max in confusion.

He was grinning now too, matching Alex’s amusement.

Before Max could say anything, Alex chimed in, ”My hat off to you, Evans. That’s a lot of thoughts to have in your head.”

I narrowed my eyes in disapproval as I looked back at Alex, catching on to what he was referring to. That I was thinking too much. That I was overwhelming Max with my thinking.

”I love your thoughts,” Max said softly and closed the distance between our bodies.

I let go of Alex’s arm, realizing that Max had already done so when he put both his arms around my waist and hugged me close.

He was warm again. His body heat seeping into me when I pressed my cheek against his chest (his bare chest, his sweater having been torn in the attack, now hanging off his shoulders like an open vest).

His lips brushed against the top of my hair while I temporarily allowed myself to relax against him. When I let my body relax, I was surprised to feel no pain. I had assumed it to be Alex’s pain that had been removed previously, but it had also been mine. My feet felt light and like before. No heaviness or pain.

The connection already gave me the answer, through Max. Our bonding with Alex to heal him had healed me as well. And had probably also healed any residual injury that Max might have had.

”Alright,” Dresden said behind me. ”We need to get moving.” I reluctantly pulled back from Max and looked at Dresden at the same time as he added, ”The others are waiting.”

____________________________________

NINETY-FIVE

I was the first one she saw when she woke up. It had been arranged that way. It was the choice of the lesser evil. Not even I was very high on her ’People I trust’-list right now.

Michael had carried her into the room and put her on the thin mattress with flowery print which gave an abandoned impression on the floor. Max had kissed my forehead and brushed my cheek with the back of his knuckles as he had held my eyes for a long second before leaving the room.

Now it was only Maria and I.

Now it was only her green eyes looking into mine. First blinking with drowsiness and confusion before the blinking increased in both number and speed, the increasing discomfort of her movements further accentuated by the hasty flicking of her gaze from side to side.

Then the blinking stopped, her eyes widening as terror seeped into her dilating pupils, her memories rushing back to her.

Her mouth slowly opened with the intention of making sounds as her eyes zoned in on mine. Her mouth was widening along with her eyes, and it was the expectations that her scream would very soon cripple my eardrums, which had me speak quickly to interrupt her intentions, ”Don’t be afraid.”

I didn’t dare touch her. I didn’t want to make her feel trapped. But it took a tremendous effort to keep my hands clasped in my lap while she laid frozen like a threatened animal, her mouth clamping closed.

She stared at me for the longest of seconds, her gaze both challenging and frightened, her blond thick hair unruly and wild around her head, before she lifted her upper body off the mattress, scooted back off the mattress in a seated shuffling motion, moving her bottom against the dirty wooden floor rapidly until her back slammed up against a wall.

Putting about 15 feet between us.

Maybe I should have let her scream and let her get it out of her system.

Instead we sat watching each other, neither of us knowing what to do. Like strangers. Not like two people who had braided each other’s hair and eaten ice cream from the same bowl.

I wondered what she was saw when she looked at me. I wondered if she was seeing a traitor or a victim. I wondered how much she remembered from Max’s rapid summary of what was going on, before Michael had knocked her out (again).

”Where am I?” she croaked, her question so sharp in the silent empty room that I startled.

I watched her purposefully swallow, as if her speaking had made it known to her that her throat was in desperate need of water.

I looked towards one of the long ends of the room, where Max had placed a glass of water just to the side of the closed door, in case Maria would like something to drink.

I found that Maria had followed the trail of my gaze as I looked back at her. It was an effort to attempt normalcy as I discreetly cleared my throat, my own throat longing for that glass of water, and asked, ”Do you want some water?”

With a stubborn expression, she pressed her lips together, and I knew her well enough to read the internal battle. She didn’t want to ask anything of me - she was too proud - but the longing in her eyes as they flittered to the glass exposed her desperate thirst.

I decided to let her out of her misery, unfolded my legs and got to my feet. Her eyes were burning on my neck as I walked up to the glass. But when I wrapped my fingers around the cool solid surface of the drink and turned around, she pointedly turned her head away.

She would rather look at a concrete wall than at me.

I approached her slowly, making the decision to stop a couple of feet from her and put the glass on the floor, before walking backwards towards the mattress, my backward retreat enabling me to keep my eyes on my former best friend.

She was looking over at the glass slowly, her face tipped forward to hide the majority of her facial expressions. But I could still see the suspicion in her eyes. And the vulnerability.

”It’s just water,” I told her, my heart aching.

Did she really think that I would put something in her drink that might hurt her?

She narrowed her eyes in deep mistrust as she looked up at me through the veil of her long dark eyelashes. Even with the coldness she was emitting, with the dark circles under her eyes, the dirtied clothes and the wild hair, she was beautiful. Amy - her mother - had had a brief encounter with an Venezuelan man 16 years ago. Two months later, she had realized she was pregnant with Maria. The girl that was going to grow into this long legged blonde woman with green eyes and dark long eyelashes. With the temperament of a pit bull and an unparalleled capacity to love.

It was a humbling experience to be a friend of Maria’s. It was a frightening experience to be her enemy. Something I never personally had to experience until right now.

Maria had the power to pull you in. Most of the students at Roswell High probably thought she was an airhead. A bit too goofy. A bit new-agey. A bit too much. But they never got to see the real Maria.

The real Maria, the one behind all the layers of fascinating oddity, was amazing.

I missed the real Maria. I really really really did.

The pressure in my chest grew heavier as I watched her reach for the water, grasp the glass and bring it to her lips. She wouldn’t let me go with her eyes for a second, barely blinking as she looked at me over the rim while she gulped the water down.

In that time, I said nothing. Partly, I had no idea what to say. Mostly, the look in her eyes held me back.

The glass made a sharp determined sound against the concrete floor as she put it down.

The dilation of her pupils made her eyes look black as she repeated, ”Where am I?”

”Underground,” I replied.

She was controlled. Calm. ”Under what? Roswell?”

I held her gaze, adopting her calmness. Answered her controlled question with an equally controlled reply. Even though I didn’t exactly have many answers to give. ”I don’t know. We only arrived twenty minutes ago.”

Her face revealed nothing. ”How did I get here? Was I carried? Or was I awake and you have somehow messed with my brain to make me forget?”

”You were unconscious,” I answered, feeling guilty even though I’d had nothing to do with putting her in that state.

”Who knocked me out?” Before I could answer, her eyes narrowed, her control breaking as she suggested with dark irritation, ”Michael?”

I nodded, watching her closely.

She dropped her eyes and grumbled under her breath, ”Of course.”

Slowly looking back up at me, her stoney expression was back and her question cut through me painfully, ”How could you let him do that to me?”

I swallowed back the tears at the unfairness of what she was accusing me of. ”I didn’t know he would do that. If I had, I wouldn’t have let him. But…” I hesitated, fearing that she might explode when I said what I needed to say, ”But in retrospect, I think it was the best thing to do.”

Anger reddened her cheeks, but before she could protest I hurriedly explained, ”It kept you safe.”

Shaking my head slowly, my stoic pretense wavering, I was speaking more to myself than her as I mumbled, ”I’ve seen many things in those underground tunnels that I would give a lot to have unseen.”

Her silence made me look up, to find the coldness of her mask breaking. There was a hint of the Maria I knew when she whispered warily, ”What happened?”

Worrying my bottom lip between my teeth, I hesitated to tell her. Would it make it worse or better if she knew? Would it make her hate the situation more or would it make her accept my (and her) place in this?

”We had been moving through these dark murky tunnels for like forever. I didn’t have time to put shoes on before we left, so my feet were all bloody and it was extremely painful to walk let alone run.”

I paused to review how she was handling it, carefully scanning her facial expressions. But the lines of her face were softer now and she seemed to be really listening.

Encouraged by this, I cleared my throat and continued, ”We had just met up with one of the main people of the rebellion - you’ll meet him later - and were about to go through this small connecting tunnel to another tunnel, when we were attacked.”

”Attacked?” she whispered, looking nauseous.

I nodded slowly, considering stopping. But she looked like a child listening to a ghost story. Like she didn’t want to hear any more because she was afraid that she would be frightened, but at the same time needing to know how it would end.

”I was already inside the small tunnel - you had to crawl through it, it was that small - when Max was separated from me. He was just behind me when I heard the screams and the…fighting.” How else would I explain the sounds energy blasts made? The horrific sounds of aliens fighting using their (gruesome) powers?

”Is he okay?” Maria asked and my heart broke again.

Because there she was. I could see her more clearly now. I could see the compassionate friend I had known for 90% of my life. Who probably didn’t consciously realize that she was currently concerned about the life of an alien. The life of an alien that she had just disapproved strongly of before she was knocked out by (yet another alien) Michael.

Right now she was concerned about a fellow classmate. The infamous Max Evans of Roswell High. The boy who had fascinated the majority of a school - her included - and had let me believe that he was a vampire.

My voice shook a bit when I answered, the memory of Max’s injuries having yet to fade, ”He is now.”

”But he was badly hurt?”

”He…” I swallowed, shifting uncomfortably. ”He had a hole in his stomach. He almost died.”

”Oh my G…” Maria took a deep breath, looking down at the emptied glass of water, her eyes unseeing. ”But how did he…? How is he…? How do you survive that?”

”I…” I paused, wondering how to answer it with anything but the truth.

The reply ’I healed him’ was on the tip of my tongue when my control abruptly shattered. Maybe it was because she was finally listening and letting me explain, or maybe it was because she was showing concern. Or maybe it was just everything catching up to me in the silent calm space of that minimally furnished room.

Whatever it was, it came so suddenly that I didn’t know I was going to bend over in loud wrecking hollow sobs until I did. The emotions were so overwhelming that I didn’t have a chance to see how Maria reacted before I pressed my hands against my wet eyes, in attempt to silence the broken sobs with my palms.

I couldn’t stop. Even when I was lost in the memories from what had happened in the past 24 hours and pain was laced with relief, grief was intermingled with love, fear was tainted with protection, I was aware of how my uncontrollable crying impacted brutally with the naked concrete walls, magnifying the sounds, hollowing them out before sending them back to me.

There, a couple of feet from that thin, abandoned mattress, with my legs crossed, my back curved forward as I folded in on myself, I felt more alone than ever before. Even with Max’s comfortable presence in my soul, with his concern for my collapse moving through me strongly, I was aware of Maria’s silent presence in this room. And the fact that she wasn’t doing anything. The fact that I had managed to alienate her to a degree that would make her sit idly by as I cried the broken pieces of my heart out through the thick warm salty tears landing on my thighs had the power to destroy me.

It made me cry harder. The suspicion that she might not even take my tears as honest, but possibly a charade to win her sympathies, burned through my being, creating loud desolated sounds to be ripped out of my chest and brought past my lips to echo in the room.

It had been so long since I had been able to seek comfort in Maria’s arms. Not since the death of my mother. And even then, I couldn’t tell her the whole truth. For weeks, I’d been forced to push her away; to protect her and keep Max’s secret safe. For weeks, I hadn’t been able to ask for her comfort, for her listening ear.

Ironic how when I finally did, Maria wasn’t ready to comfort.

I don’t know what finally changed her mind. What had her sit down next to me, making me jump in surprise as her arms wrapping around my upper body alerted me to her closeness.

The strength of her long thin arms, circling me so easily, as if nothing ever had come between us, pierced straight into my aching heart and fueled my crying even more. But the sobs that had just been violent and harsh now turned softer, and the sound of my sniffling was joined by Maria’s quiet sobs as she tightened her arms around me further and scooted her body closer.

My body absorbed her tremors and her crying and it wouldn’t surprise me if she did the same with mine. Just like two friends did in comfort. Took on the other person’s pain. Made it their own. To ease their burden. To share the weight.

Maria’s tight hold on me almost restricted my own ability to return her embrace, my upper arms restrained against the sides of my upper body, making it only possible for me to use my hands to grab onto the soft edges of her shirt and fist the material desperately in my hands.

I’m not sure how long we sat like that or how many tears were shed. But my fingers were aching from the desperate clutching of her shirt in my fists, a headache was creeping along my hairline from the rough crying and my body felt completely worn out.

But I didn’t think about that. All I could feel was tentative relief. A small hope that things might be okay. That I had managed to get a hold of Maria again.

Which meant that I was deathly frightened when Maria eventually loosened her grip on me and started to pull back. I was deathly afraid of what I would see on her face.

Would she be reverting back to the stranger she had just been or would she be the best friend that I had missed?

Her eyes were glistening with redness, her face appeared drawn and tired. But there was a softness to her features, which gave me hope of her forgiveness.

My taut body sagged with relief and a couple of silent slow tears escaped the corners of my eyes and slowly slid down my cheeks.

Her gaze was firmly on my face as she whispered with a voice wet from her crying, ”I’m not gonna pretend that I understand at all what is going on and what’s happened to you.” She shook her head slowly, as if in disbelief. ”I don’t even know how to feel about all of this, because I don’t understand it.”

Her long fingers, cool to the touch, encircled my hand. ”I want to be angry with you for not including me in this from the start. I want to hate you for lying to me. I want to feel betrayed and hurt because you didn’t trust me enough to tell me the truth.” She frowned. ”Because that would make more sense than what I’m actually feeling.”

I tried to swallow past the dry lump in my throat. ”What are you actually feeling?”


She blinked, looking down at the hand she had joined with mine, before slowly looking up at me, the green of her eyes piercing through my heart with honesty. ”That I want my friend back. That I want to be happy that you are okay. That I want to hear everything that’s happened to you and… and…” she paused, her voice having thickened with emotion, and a tear hanging sadly from her bottom eyelashes, ”I want to hear everything about you and Max.”

A shudder of something powerful rocked me and I pressed my eyes closed against the onslaught of those emotions.

She squeezed my hand, but in my attempt to keep my tears in I couldn’t get myself to open my eyes at her gentle prompt.

”Because even though it doesn’t look like it, I noticed straight away that you two have something…big. I knew there was something between you and Max already before you disappeared on me. But you were… You didn’t want to tell me.”

She couldn’t hide the hurt that crept into her voice at that last statement. She was hurt. She was feeling betrayed.

But she was willing to push it to the side in an effort to understand what I was going through. To grasp what had happened.

I tried to swallow again, but it didn’t help in strengthening my voice. ”I don’t know what to say…”

She looked at me silently for a long moment, before she wrapped her arms around my neck and pulled me into another hug. This time I was able to return her squeeze. This time I was able to hold her tight.

”I love you,” she whispered into my ear, making my heart fold in on itself, and my hold on her tighten. ”I’ll always love you.” A sob escaped her before she added, ”You’re like my sister, Lizzie. Nothing can ever come between us.”

I wanted to thank her. I wanted to shower her in gratitude for accepting me. But all I could manage was, ”I love you too.”

The hug was long and warm. But eventually she pulled back again, wiped her eyes with the pads of her fingers and licked her lips while the hardness of determination inched into the lines of her face. ”I need to know something.”

I nodded. ”Anything.”

There was a beat before she firmly asked, ”What happens now?”

I searched out Max in my head. Max, who had been ever-present but had managed to let me handle this on my own. Who had been itching to intervene, to protect me from any hurt - even from Maria - but who had managed to restrain himself and had trusted in my strength.

Nevertheless, even without the information in Max’s mind, I knew what the future held. I knew the answer to Maria’s question.

Darkly, I replied, ”We’re going to war.”


TBC...

[Roswelllostcause]

Nice to see that Maria is nearly back to normal. But I just things are going to get even more dangerous now.



Helen

[keepsmiling7]

The underground and so many things were a mystery to Maria.
She wanted to be mad at Liz, but they had too much history together.
LOL......everyone at school thought Max was a vampire.........
Oh dear.........that's not what Maria wanted to hear, "going to war"
Great part,
Carolyn

[Twilighteyes]

amazing! Simply amazing!11111 Thank you so so much! I love this story!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[begonia9508]

That was such a moving part that I found myself crying! ... and like a baby even... but it was good, especially for Liz, that Maria finally understood all of what she learned and finally maybe accepted, even if not all because she was too frightened by the situation Liz was in and couldn't have stood back, at this!

EVE

[Natalie36]

wow maria stepped up i always loved then