The Rebel *Sequel* (CC ALL, YTEEN) Ch. 40 - pg. 23 - 4 / 18 / 25

[Misha]

xmag, I think 2005... I remember thinking 2011 was so far in the future to be placing the "present" of the story there, but yeah

Well, here we go! From now on, all chapters will be in the present.



Part 27: Point of Reunion
November 2nd, 2011 - New York


1 : Dave

The first servers finally came back online after a tense hour of multiple intents and remote calls, though Dave was far from getting his network back. By his side, Daniel smirked as he wrote one last line of code.

“Told ya’ we could do it.”

“We’re barely starting…” Dave said, his mind looking for the pieces he needed to put the puzzle together: Where was the Unit, where was Van, where was Max.

The Network Keepers in Europe and South Asia were already connected and working together to get things back, but it would take days if not weeks or months to get everything up and running. Bringing his Network down was a small price to pay for Earth’s safety, though. It was slow work from Antar’s hidden headquarters, but at least the internet was secured, and the computer was decent enough.

“Oh, this is interesting,” Daniel said as he stared at a secondary monitor. Security footage from the outside showed up. The first thing Daniel always did was hack the security systems so he couldn’t be surprised the same way Dave had surprised him years ago. “It looks like Michael is here. With Ray in tow, rah-rah…”

Dave looked at the monitor, “And Luke is also in tow, rah-rah…” Van’s second in command was hostile on a good day, and this was most definitely not a good day.

He went back to his own monitor and keyboard and resumed what he’d been doing for the past twenty minutes.

“What are you looking for?” Daniel asked, frowning.

“We were tracked through the Network. I have to make sure we’re not being targeted anymore.”

“Uh…” Daniel said, frowning deeper. “Your people don’t know they have to get rid of their phones at the first sign of trouble?”

“Hmm…” was all Dave responded. Ordinary people? Sure. Max and his merry band? Not exactly. Dave wouldn’t risk losing contact with Max, especially not when Van was coming to speak with him. They hadn’t been instructed to lose them, so chances were they hadn’t.

But if McKay tracked them down, I can track them down as well, Dave thought, looking for a way to verify if they were trackable or not.

A knock barely sounded on the door before Ray came in.

“You’re the first bit of good news I’ve had in the last couple of hours,” Ray said as Dave looked up. Then Ray looked at Daniel and his face went from confused, to suspicious, to downright anger. “You! It was you in the middle of this whole mess!”

“Ray—” Dave warned, aware that one of the shifters was watching them by the door. He couldn’t afford the Rebellion executing Daniel here, at least not yet.

“Don’t protect him! Stop falling for his antics!”

“Ray. Not now.”

“Then when?”

“Whoa, there, I’m just trying to help here. I even rescued Dave earlier today!” Daniel innocently said, and then was utterly silenced by both Dave’s and Ray’s glares.

“Later,” Dave answered with a pointed look at Ray. “We need to find Zan and Van, and Daniel can help to speed that up by tenfold. So, later.”

Ray sighed for patience but nodded twice. “We were being tracked by the phones. Luke told us you had left a backdoor so they could trace Max. It was only a matter of finding the right hacker for the Unit to find their way in, so things clicked in place. We got rid of our phones then. I don’t know about the others.”

“I’m trying to see if there’s any tracking I can do on my own. Daniel is trying to see if the Unit has captured anyone today besides me. He’s been leaving backdoors of his own on their software.”

Daniel studiously continued typing. It was finally dawning on him that the trouble he’d made—that the consequences to his actions—were about to catch up with him.

“What is this thing I’m hearing about Isabel being arrested?” Ray asked.

“Antar politics transcend lifetimes, apparently,” Dave said. On the second monitor, Daniel changed the outside cameras to the inner cameras. Michael was talking with Isabel while Jesse paced. They couldn’t hear them, but it wasn’t looking promising.

“Tell me about it. Luke was explaining to Michael—I mean, the General—about what happened on Antar in the last seventy years, with an emphasis on the last eleven. What are we even doing here?” Ray rhetorically asked.

“We’re helping the Rebellion gaining their rightful leader—and in the process we’re hoping they leave Earth alone.”

“You’re selling Max out?” Ray asked, looking incredulous.

“I’m bringing Max to the table. Whatever he decides it’s up to him,” Dave said, his coding forgotten. He couldn’t look at Ray, though.

“Since when are you working with them?” Ray whispered, aghast.

“Since the beginning, Ray. You teaching them was a big reason why the Rebellion let me keep them under my wing.”

“You—” used me? Ray tried to say, the words clearly written on his face if not spoken out loud.

“Van wanted to wipe out the entire human race for crimes against the crown. What was I supposed to do?” Dave whispered back, angry now. Jake had been so mad at him when he’d found out what the offer had really been about, and now Ray was too, as if Dave had taken all these decisions lightly. As if the fate of the Earth was some random game he’d picked years ago on a whim.

“And you didn’t tell anyone, did you?” Ray said, now looking hurt if resigned.

“I couldn’t. It was part of the deal.”

“What else are you hiding from them?”

Years of calls with Langley and logistics with the Antarian shapeshifters flashed in Dave’s mind. A lot was not really what Ray needed to hear right now.

“Listen, I will explain, I will, but we have bigger problems now. I need your help or we won’t make it out alive, do you understand? This day was supposed to go smoothly yet suddenly it all went to hell—” they both glanced at Daniel and then kept talking, “—so we need to get everyone to safety once more.”

“Oh…” Daniel said from his quiet corner, “looks like they heard you.”

Frowning, both Dave and Ray turned to look at the main monitor as Daniel switched the image once more to the outside: Liz, Maria, and Kyle were visibly walking towards the front door.

“Is that Max?” Daniel asked, hopeful.

“That’s not His Majesty,” the shapeshifter who had guided Ray here said, making all three of them jump. “That’s Jade, the Queen’s guard. He must have taken Zan’s form for a good reason.”

“Or maybe he’s actually Max,” Daniel insisted.

“He would never walk so detached from his wife,” Finn pointed out. The Max on the screen walked a bit faster and reached the warehouse door first. He opened it for the others and looked around, clearly looking for hidden trouble. He didn’t look at Liz once.

“You’re good,” Ray said with approval.

On Daniel’s corner, a warning beeped on the smaller monitor. The hacker cursed. “We have a beacon.”

“What are you talking about?” Dave asked, now looking at whatever warning was on Daniel’s computer.

“Someone’s tracking us here.”

“Impossible,” Finn said.

“They used the phones, didn’t they?” Daniel asked, turning to look at Dave as he started typing, looking for the tracking source.

“Michael destroyed ours,” Ray said, “maybe Liz, Kyle, and Maria still have theirs?”

Dave’s fingers flew over the keys as he searched for the beacon in the hopes of redirecting it somewhere, anywhere else but there. For how long have they known we’re here?

“Wait,” Dave said, stopping on his mental tracks, “What did you do with Isabel’s and Jesse’s phones?” he asked the shifter. The four of them looked at each other for a second, and then the shifter ran out of the room.

“We found the beacon…” Daniel muttered as he and Dave went back to their keyboards and codes. They had to redirect that beacon—or it would be only a matter of time before the Unit landed on them.



2 : Maria

The corridors of this place were amazingly long, she decided, as she took another turn left. She knew where exactly Michael was, to the point their escort was visibly rattled.

“How do you know the way?” Lance asked as Maria waited for him to open yet another closed door.

“The same way you feel a train coming: the vibration is impossible to ignore.”

“The General vibrates?”

Both Kyle and Liz swallowed their laughter as Maria threw daggers at the shifter. “You have no idea. Can you just hurry up? It feels as if—”

“—I’m going to explode something,” Michael finished for her as the doors opened, and he was right there, in front of her.

“Micha—”

She didn’t get to finish. He swooped her up and crash-kissed her as if his life depended on it. The lights flickered as she grabbed his jacket to be as close to him as humanly possible while still clothed. They came for air for a second, and she kissed him back as fiercely after that.

The light closest to them burst out in a spectacular shower of sparks, but they didn’t care. Although there were no real words exchanged through their connection, he kept asking her if she was all right, and she kept asking him if he was really there.

“What are we up against?” Maria finally asked, breathless and worried and ready to do something. He was still holding her head in his hands, almost touching their foreheads.

“One hell of a mess,” he answered, equally breathless. He looked past her to Liz. “Max is getting closer.”

“Yeah, but he’s not…right.” Liz said, biting her lip.

“Van’s still missing. And Isabel is jailed,” Michael added, kissing Maria one more time before separating.

“So, what do we do first?” Maria asked, glancing at the burnt light in the ceiling with mild interest.

“We regroup—and then we get some answers. Dave’s here, and the Rebels are here. It’s time we learn what the hell is going on.”



3 : Max

He’d been dreaming about Antar again. About loud sounds and screams. About adrenaline running through icy veins as he realized the Palace had been breached.

They were coming for him.

“Are you all right?” Violet asked from the front seat, worried eyes searching his face for signs of something she could fix.

Max blinked, trying to reacquaint himself to his present life on his present planet. His head felt heavy for a moment. “How long was I out?”

“Um…about fifteen minutes, tops?” she said, unsure. They were parked somewhere dark on the outskirts of New York City. He could see the lights of the bridge they had crossed while he was having a blast from the past.

“Where’s Ash?” he asked. Shade would be invisibly watching over him, never leaving his side.

“We’re close to headquarters. He’s just making sure the coast is clear.” She looked outside, tense. “This day has been so full of surprises; we’re not leaving anything to chance.”

For a moment, something tingled on his chest—and then jolted his heart. Max literally bounced against the seat, clutching his chest.

“Max!” Violet shouted, while Shade shifted right beside him, ready to defend.

“I’m—I’m okay,” Max said through clutched teeth. “Liz is really close,” he said, apologetic. “We’ve just…reconnected, I guess.”

The two shifters looked at him for a moment, and then let a long sigh out. When the door suddenly opened a moment later, they were ready to jump Ash.

“We’re good to go—what?”

Three pairs of jittery eyes met him in contempt.

“I just need this day to end,” Violet muttered, turning the car on. She only drove for a couple of minutes until an abandoned warehouse came by. All shifters vanished as Max opened the door, making sure the perimeter was secured.

Out of habit, Max counted his resources at hand: he had about three hundred dollars, and he could be back in New York in about an hour. He had no phone, no way to contact back-up, and was walking into unknown territory. On the bright side, everyone he cared about was—down?—there. He bet there was a basement somewhere.

Liz was the easiest to find, but both Michael and Isabel were there, too. If everything had worked out, then their entire group would be here.

Violet and Ash reformed, both bowing. “Welcome to Antarian soil, Your Majesty,” Violet said with a small smile, as if this were an embassy of sorts.

Max hesitated. He was entering what little Antarians could claim here not as Max Evans, but as Zan, their king. For all the memories he had, for all the lessons he’d learned, once he stepped into that warehouse, there was no going back.

[xmag]

Oh, ouah, an update! I'm so going to reread the last part once it's complete. I remember more the first part, and a bit less the second but the third story is so action packed that it's hard to remember after all those years.

Still, I remember what matters. Van. Daniel. The guards. Isabel's arrest.

So... Dave was working with Van who wanted to eradicate humanity. I guess he didn't have a choice, then. Now our roswellians are regrouping. It's the final countdown. It's about time.

Great MM reunion. Next is probably Max and Liz? And there's still the Isabel problem.

[Meka]

YAY!!!!!!!

I'm soooo excited, I'm gonna start over from the first story. I really love this series and I'm very happy you can continue it.

I dont mind only getting the "present" chapters, I just want to know how it ends.

You just made my day

[Misha]

Well, I told you I had two chapters ready to go, so here's the next one. I'll be writing the ending for Nanowrimo so I might take a few more days to post the next chapters. I have scattered scenes for the next four chapters or so that need to be put in order and edited, but the story is moving along!

If you want to catch up with all the details, you can probably re-read only book 3 and be good with that

xmag, it's always so awesome to have your candy validation on my M&M scenes And yes, it's time for Max and Liz to finally find each other



Part 28: Magnets
November 2nd, 2011 - New York


1 : Jake

“Why Dave?” Jake asked Van as they were finally leaving Manhattan. Both Langley and Jet kept searching for tails, signs that the Unit was following them somehow. The last thing any of them needed was to guide them to their headquarters.

“He came highly recommended by Zan’s Guard,” Van said, though there was a subtle tone there that spoke of lingering doubts.

“How did you even meet Dave?” Jake asked, now looking at the rearview mirror. The only Zan Guard who was still standing was Langley himself.

“He found out about me and decided to corner me on a flight to Japan,” Langley answered with a raised eyebrow.

“Charming,” Jake said with sarcasm.

“Ill-advised,” Langley said, nodding. “Yet I was impressed. I’ve been dodging bullets, Antarian threats, and FBI Units for decades—and I didn’t see him coming. Not a whisper, not the slightest of inklings. It doesn’t hurt he has many resources, and I’m not just talking about finances here.”

“You do not surprise a Royal Guard every day,” Van said, now more resigned. “Langley said Dave had the means to keep Zan safe. Then Dave proposed to have you help them improve their skills, and Ray to help them develop strategic thinking. And in all this time, I haven’t been disappointed.”

“He kept you informed,” Jake said, finally understanding Dave’s obsession with their reports. Accurate, short, always on time. It wasn’t like Dave to need so much information in such a scheduled way, but Langley and Van? Yes. A thousand times yes.

It was all making sense now. The secrecy, the planning. Dave’s need to keep the kids inside his innermost circle. But it also made sense that Van was here, now, hoping for a future that might never be. Dave had made sure to keep those flames alive.

“Those reports, though…” Van said, thinking something through, “they lacked perspective. You didn’t know what the end goal was, no one besides Dave and Langley did. So, I sent my own eyes and ears.”

“You were spying on Max?”

“Guarding him,” Jet said from the front seat as a matter of fact. “Wherever the King goes, so does his Royal Guard.”

“Since the moment they stepped out of the compound, everywhere he went, I knew about it,” Van said, looking rather pleased with that.

“And yet you don’t know what Max will choose,” Jake stated. No matter how this Royal Guard thing worked, they hadn’t been privy to Max and Jake’s talks about his memories.

“We will all get our answers soon,” Langley interrupted, speeding up. “We’re not ten minutes away from headquarters. With a little luck, this day can still be salvaged.”


2 : Liz

Max’s presence was suddenly there. It was a force that started right in the center of her being and zigzagged like wildfire through her chest, her arms, and straight to the tips of her fingers. Green electric sparks shone for a moment in her hands as she stopped in her tracks and almost lost her balance. Kyle held a hand to help steady her.

“You okay?” he asked.

“Max—” Liz whispered, as Michael also stopped ahead of her.

“—he’s here,” he said, nodding.

She turned to walk towards Max’s direction, just to see a shapeshifter running towards them.

“General! There’s been a breach!”

She moved past him. If hell was going to break loose in the next five minutes, then she had to hurry and find that elusive husband of hers. Michael and the shifters would cover this, she knew, but a thorn in her stomach was rapidly growing around her soul. What if she was not fast enough and she missed Max yet again?

Leaving Michael, Maria, and Kyle behind to deal with their newest problem, she walked and then ran, and it was just a matter of seconds before she was faced with a security door she had no way to open on her own. Exasperated, she turned to scream for someone to open it, and was met right there by a man she didn’t know. She stepped back, afraid of who this new person—shifter?—was. Her face gave her confusion away as the twenty-something guy smiled.

“I can no longer be His Majesty,” he said, his blue eyes and black hair adorning a boyish smile. He passed his hand over a point in the wall, and the door slid open.

“Jade?” she asked, already starting to walk down the hall, still frowning at him.

“Yes, my Queen. This way.”

He ran in front of her, easily navigating the maze of halls as she felt Max the way two magnets sensed each other. Closer and closer, until Jade opened the last door ahead of her, and at the end of the hall, Max was running straight to her, too.

Jade vanished as she crossed the door, the same way her anxiety and fear vanished at seeing Max, so alive and, as she collided into his arms, so real.


3 : Max

Everything with the world—with the whole universe—was right again.

He held Liz as close as he could, his chin on her head, the touch of her arms around his body, her breath warming the chill in his soul. She listened to his heart, beating so fiercely he thought everybody around them could hear it.

His hands moved from her back to her neck and her shoulders, and he moved one step backwards to see her eyes, to connect with her in the unique way they shared. His soul sang at the stars he saw in those expressive eyes of hers, and they were kissing before he even registered they had moved towards each other.

The connection formed instantly. Liz at the lab, looking through a microscope. Liz, walking through a forest in the middle of winter, hugging her coat as she turned to smile at him. Liz running through the New York metro, a man who looked like him holding her wrist.

Liz laughing, Liz thinking, Liz worried about him.

They came for air, both with their eyes still closed. He had no idea what she had seen from his side, but he knew her worries were not fading away.

“Someone said there was a breach…” she panted, her forehead touching his.

“I’m sure Khivar has found a loophole to execute me…” he panted back.

She smiled, both finally opening their eyes. “Nothing can be easy when you’re a dark-haired, mysterious man from an exotic location, uh?”

He smiled back, “Why, Ms. Parker, would you like it any other way?”

“A vacation without incident once in a while would be nice,” she said, wrinkling her nose. They were both stalling for the inevitable, and neither of them cared.

He winced, embracing her once more, his chin comfortably resting over her head. “I thought—I thought that they would never let me see you again,” he confessed in a whisper, knowing Liz had seen some of that just now.

“I had little hope of finding you again so soon as well,” she answered, her hands clasped behind his lower back.

Behind her, at the end of the hall, Max saw his Invisible Guard reformed, waiting for him. As much as he wanted to remain here, in this little piece of heaven, more pressing matters needed their attention. He had managed to get here, now he had to manage to get them out. With one last breath of her essence, he finally let her go.

Time’s up.


4 : Michael

The problem with being in this place was that Michael had no real intel on how it worked, how extensive it was, or how to defend it. Having Max here was a short-lived relief as the General in him started to make a list of all the things he needed to know—and all the things that could go wrong.

“Right now, we don’t know how deep the breach goes,” Luke said, updating Michael on whatever Dave had said. He hadn’t seen the man himself, too busy trying to convince Isabel to stop blaming herself, while they both knew they had roles to play to keep Max alive.

Yet Max was here now, so the show didn’t have to last long.

Maybe.

“Get everyone who’s gathering information in one room, and we’ll decide on strategy then,” Michael said to Luke, turning to look at Max as he met them in the middle of the hallway.

On his end, Max was talking to his own Guard. “We need confirmation that this is, in fact, Khivar’s doing. You have the means to contact home, right?” They all nodded. “Good. We’ll deal with this once we know it’s real.”

All shifters vanished then, Max’s Guards, Liz’s Guard, even Luke himself. It was way beyond unnerving to know most of them had been watching their every move for years without them knowing about it.

“Max,” Michael said, embracing him for a moment. “Are you okay?” he asked, looking him down as if expecting to find a bleeding wound somewhere.

“Not exactly,” Max answered, freezing Michael. “I’m fine right now, but I won’t be for much longer.”

“What?” both Liz and Michael said at the same time.

“It’s a rather odd theory that I’d rather tell just once. Where’s everyone else? Where’s Isabel?” Max asked, rather puzzled at feeling her close by but not seeing her here.

“Jailed,” Michael said with a raised eyebrow. “Looks like Vilandra is finally getting the punishment she deserves, one lifetime too late.”

“This again?”

“Oh, you have no idea how serious they are about this, including Isabel herself,” Michael said, now guiding him down the hall. “They want blood and the only one around good enough for that is Vilandra. I wouldn’t advice pulling the King card on this just yet, though.”

“Pulling the King card is the only good thing about playing Zan,” Max said in a hushed tone.

“I know, I’m having so much fun playing the General as well,” Michael said with mocked enthusiasm. “But they’re nervous about Van, and everyone is waiting for your answer, Your Majesty,” he added as they reached a set of doors. Michael waved his hand, and it opened with a hiss. “Maria and Kyle stayed with her, trying to come up with a way to get her out. Jesse is there, too.”

“Van isn’t here, yet?” Max asked. “He was shot last I saw him.”

“You’re the last of us to come,” Liz said.

“Dave, Ray, and some other geek are here, too,” Michael elaborated. “We’re still missing Van, Jake, and one of your Guards.”

“Jet. My Guards informed me he stayed behind with Van after we got separated. I had no idea Jake was involved in this, but I thought they would be here by now.”

“Not yet. Dave is trying to figure out where Van was taken. Needless to say, everyone wants him back far more than any of us.”

Max chuckled at that. They might want their long-lost royalty, but it was Van who they knew. It was Van who they followed.

“So,” Liz said as they walked down the hall, “do you guys actually remember Antar? Like…who you were?”

The question was loaded with a million other questions. Are you Zan? How much do you remember? Do you want to go back? Why did you hide it all this time? He hadn’t let Maria ask him yet, but the truth was, Max and Michael had to come clean now. At least Isabel had been able to do so while locked down with Jesse.

“No one is getting me away from you,” Max said, pulling her closer. “I—I’ve been meaning to tell you some things, it just never seemed to be the right time to do so.”

She nodded, absently biting her lip. Maria was not going to be so passive about this, Michael knew. She was buzzing through their connection, barely containing her need to blurt out her own questions.

On they went through the halls, getting closer to Isabel while Michael detailed his side of things. About finding Ray, about getting rid of the phones, and most importantly, about Van’s second in command, Luke. It was all a blur of short answers and no time before they finally arrived at Isabel’s and Jesse’s makeshift jail, where Maria and Kyle were already waiting.

“Glad to see you’re in one piece, girlfriend,” Maria said as she briefly hugged Max, while Jesse looked like a caged panther ready to pound. Michael had thought about offering Jesse to be out of the cell, but he was afraid Jesse would think he could take on shapeshifts and win.

He mentally sighed in relief to have everyone who mattered to him here, regardless of Isabel and Jesse being jailed. Maria gave him a warning glare that he was not out of the hook of questioning, and Liz was glued to Max’s side. Kyle took a few steps back, probably attempting to hear their thoughts less.

It gotta suck to be a telepath.

From his corner, Kyle nodded.

“Please tell me you have the authority to release her,” Jesse said to Max, while Isabel’s eyes filled with tears of shame as she saw him. Max’s heart went out to her, and so did Michael’s.

“Lonnie,” Max said, and in that moment, he was speaking as Zan and she was listening as Vilandra. “No matter what he said, or what you believed, you are my sister, and I forgive you. I forgave you a long time ago. Now it’s time for you to forgive yourself for the wrongs of others. You did what you did because you thought it would lead to better outcomes, to a better future. And there’s nothing I admired the most than those stubborn ideas of yours about making things better.”

“But I betrayed you…” she whispered. “I believed your ways were wrong, that you wouldn’t listen to reason no matter what I said. I wanted change; I wanted you to change. How is that something you can forgive when it all led to our downfall?”

“Because that downfall led to them,” Max said, stepping aside so she could see Jesse and the whole gang. “We cannot change what happened. We all paid a high price then. We don’t need to keep paying it now.”

“Why are you so intent in being Vilandra?” Jesse asked from his side of the hall.

“Yeah, I’d like to know that, too,” Maria said, turning to look at Michael. “Everyone’s calling you ‘the General’ and I don’t see you making any corrections.”

“Look,” Kyle said, still from his corner, “we all have seen it. The three of you clearly have some big conflicts in your heads I don’t want to keep hearing about, but beyond that... Liz, Maria, Jesse, and I know sometimes there’s—I don’t know? A tone in the way you speak?”

“A change in your eyes when you look at things,” Maria clarified.

“Or the way you walk into a room,” Liz said.

“Definitely the way you phrase your thoughts,” Jesse added.

“Yeah, those things,” Kyle said with a dismissive hand. “So, since we’re all here without an audience, who are you, really?”

Michael opened his mouth and faltered, looking at Max and Isabel. This was something they had talked about for so long that it was comically frustrating they were still stuck on how to say this. Max moved forward, facing their questions.

“We know who they were. Each of us, Michael, Isabel, and I have—seen their lives. Like a movie.”

“You remember…” Liz whispered, afraid.

“Yes…and no,” Max said, looking back at Isabel and then at Michael. “We don’t think of ourselves as Zan, Rath, and Vilandra. But we do know what they thought, how they lived. We have a pretty good idea how they died, too, though we’ve never really remembered that part. Sometimes, though, sometimes we wish we could go back and change their lives. Soothe their fears. We know them so intimately that we feel sorry for how things ended. And sometimes we need reassurances that everything is going to be okay now,” he said, looking back at Isabel.

“And sometimes,” Michael said, looking at Maria, “sometimes their personality traits sneak on us. Things that mattered to them, or thoughts about similar things—that’s what you sense. It’s not like they’re taking over us or something like that.”

“So you are Michael,” Maria said, looking at him with narrowing eyes. “You are always Michael, right?”

He nodded.

“Just with a dash of Rath,” Maria said. “I mean, you can’t go through something like this and not be…changed somehow.”

“It’s still us, though,” Max said. “With a wider perspective and some hard life lessons gleamed from them.”

“They don’t seem to think that’s a problem,” Liz said, hugging herself. “Jade said… he said that they want to take you back. They want to use—they want to use the people you used to be so they can win.”

“We might have to act as the rulers of Antar today, maybe a few days after that. But know that we are who you know we are—with a dash of our previous selves,” he said with a ghost of a smile as he looked at Maria. “Once this whole Antar rebellion is past us, we’ll answer all your questions. For now, though, you’ll have to have a little faith in us—and play along.”


5 : Dave

It took him a few minutes and some creative programming to trace back Danny’s backdoor. And there, in black and white, Dave’s worst nightmare came true: McKay was tracking him down to this exact location.

He was six years old looking up at his imposing silhouetted shape. He was seven years old, escaping to his own mind to avoid thinking about McKay. He was nine, he was ten, he was desperate to leave that place, yet so afraid of what that man would do. Jake had always known they would escape, but Dave had not been so sure.

And once they were out, it was McKay’s shadow that had always threatened their lives.

Now McKay was almost at their doorstep. Worse, Max was already here, the man who’d died in another world and stood to bring the wrath of an entire solar system if he didn’t accept to be called Zan.

How can everything be converging right here, right now?

“I bet McKay’s not coming alone,” Daniel said beside him, following the communications between the Unit. “Oh, this is interesting,” he said suddenly, snapping Dave out of his paralyzing fear.

“What?”

“Jake’s on his way, too.”

Time slowed down to a crawl. He heard himself asking once more, what? but his mind had stretched in ten different directions, all running away from McKay yet now stuck on how to save Jake.

“They have just crossed the perimeter. Tell me that’s not Jake on the window.”

On Daniel’s screen, a still shot of a car could be seen. Langley was driving, and Jake was, indeed, the one on the window. Langley wouldn’t be driving Jake here without Van. Not a chance in hell for that.

“How far is McKay?”

“McKay himself? About twenty minutes. But his tactical team? I can guarantee they’re just about to shoot that car.”

“No,” Dave said, getting up to run to stop them, to help them, to do something, when the door he’d been about to reach opened. Ray was coming back with Luke in tow. Van’s second in command narrowed his eyes at the tension in Dave’s face. If worst came to worst, Dave could afford to lose Max, but never Van.

“What?” Luke asked.

“Van is about to get shot outside the warehouse.”

Luke didn’t ask for more.

[xmag]

Oh, ouah, things are going so fast now! I remember McKay (althought I keep picturing the McKay from Stargate Atlantis, lol), the guy who tortured Dave when he was a kid.

Okay, we have a group of aliens with powers and a special unit. The aliens have also been trained as soldiers. Logically, they should win. I say logically because some bad stuff can always happen.

I don't remember, is Mckay and co allied with Khivar or is he one these fanatic anti-aliens, who doesn't even pay attention to the kind of aliens he faces?

[Misha]

Just a quick update! I have the next twelve chapters in draft form and I'm only one epilogue away from The End. So yes, this story is getting closure! I will probably start posting by December, since the drafts are pretty drafty

xmag and Meka, thank you for your latest comments! You guys and everyone who PM'ed me over the years totally make my day!

See ya soon!

Misha.

[Misha]

Welcome back!


xmag, McKay is the head of the Special Unit but he doesn't know a thing about Antar and their conflict. All aliens are bad aliens in his book. Why both Khivar and McKay acted on the same day will be explained in the upcoming chapters. Is not a coincidence, more like a chain of events




Part 29: Shields
November 2nd, 2011 - New York


1 : Van

Something changed. It wasn’t the silence that had settled amongst them as they grew closer to their destination, nor was it the abrupt change in terrain, from asphalt to uneven ground. Yet, as Van moved his head from one side to the other, trying to listen, he realized that the change he was perceiving was in his sight.

“I think—I think my sight might be coming back,” he whispered, too afraid of imagining things and making himself look like a fool.

Something moved on his left, and he reacted by moving back.

“You’re seeing shadows?” Jake asked, getting closer to his face. Van could sense his presence, but he could not really see him at all.

“I think so. Dark shadows on a darker background,” he clarified. In front, another movement startled him.

“But you are seeing something,” Jet said from the passenger seat, sounding too happy for the amount of hardly anything that this something was. “We’re almost at headquarters. I’m sure Rose will find a way to speed your recovery up!”

He had never heard Jet being so optimistic and cheerful at once, that for one moment Van wondered if Jet had traded places with Jade without him knowing.

The car slowed down until it stopped. Silence wrapped itself over them again as Jet vanished to do his recognizance. Van never walked into a room without at least one shapeshifter checking it first, so this was normal procedure for him. For all the fact that Van didn’t feel superior to any of them, he was aware of what he represented, and that he couldn’t be careless with himself.

He’d seen once a private recording of Zan with his Invisible Guard, a backstage to some grand event that had meant all four of them had been by his side. They had been smiling while Zan was telling a pretty bad joke. One of those so bad everyone just laughed at it. They had been friends.

He didn’t know if Langley had been one of those Guards—changes to the Guard were infrequent, but they did happen—but Van didn’t need to know that. Langley had left his own home world to come here for the one-in-a-million shot that his Ward could be cloned, brought back to life, and picked up from where they had left. And when their plans had spectacularly failed, when the other shapeshifters had died or become enemies, Langley had stayed. Zan had meant that much to him.

Langley’s fingers impatiently drummed on the steering wheel. Jet was thorough with his inspections, but Van knew he was taking longer than he usually did.

More movement caught his attention, the shadows becoming defined silhouettes.

“It’s getting clearer,” he exhaled, raising his hand and finally seeing its contour.

“How are you feeling? Any headaches, drowsiness?” Jake asked.

Pure, unadulterated joy were not exactly the words he wanted Jake and Langley to hear.

“I’m fine,” he said instead, his voice sounding in awe even to his own ears. His sight was coming back, disaster had been averted. The future of Antar was still possible, at least the future as he had envisioned for so long.

Jet reformed in the front seat, and although it lacked any definition or color, Van could distinctively tell where Jet started and the seat ended.

“Something isn’t right,” the shapeshifter said. “We better hurry inside. The path is clear for several feet in all directions, but I can tell we’re being watched.”

“How far are we from the main entrance?” Jake asked.

“We still have a couple of minutes to drive,” Langley answered, looking straight ahead. “The shifters guarding the warehouse must know we’re coming, though we have no idea if anybody else has already come or what they’re prepared for. You should give them the heads up and have them helping us out,” Langley told Jet.

“Van cannot be left unguarded,” Jet answered, deadly serious. “If I go, you cannot leave his side.”

Langley smirked. “I think I know how this thing works.”

“You may leave my side,” Van said as he felt more than saw Jet’s indecision.

“Once inside the warehouse, we’ll be safer than in any other place on Earth,” Langley said, though his voice had an edge on it that Van didn’t miss. “Once you’re back, you’ll go first, help Van get inside. Jake will follow, and I’ll close the guard.”

Jet nodded and then turned to look at Van. “How much can you actually see?”

“It’s getting clearer by the second. I can see your shape, but not details. I’m pretty sure I can walk on my own with minimal guidance.”

“I’ll be right back,” Jet said, and disappeared from Van’s mostly unseeing eyes.

Tension grew inside the car as Langley started driving forward, so slowly Van could almost feel every pebble the tires stepped on.

When he looked out of the window, he could make the shape of the warehouse against the black sky. They were not ten feet from the door that signaled where Earth ended and Antar began, and for the briefest of moments, all he could think about was home.

The car abruptly stopped as Langley melted in his seat, followed a second later by the unmistakable sound of glass shattering as a bullet hole suddenly appeared on the windshield, missing the shifter. Van’s already tense nerves switched to his flight or fight instinct, honed by years of living in constant danger, and ducked at the same time Langley reformed to cover him.

A second bullet impacted the windshield, and then a third took out one of the headlights.

“Snipers,” Langley muttered, extending his hand to mentally push the accelerator down. They were close but not close enough to the entrance.

“We’ll exit on your door. Jake, follow him closely,” Langley instructed as the car once again stopped, a fourth shot aiming at taking the other headlight failing. Another shot took care of the right tire and another one the side-view mirror.

Langley took his attention from the accelerator and towards the warehouse door, which groaned as it was forcibly opened by the shifter’s power.

“On three,” Langley whispered as more shots shattered a side window and another tire. “One. Two. Three!”

The sound of Van’s door opening felt too loud, and the ground looked like a massive gray flat mass that he wasn’t sure he wanted to step on. A cold rush of air also filtered through the open car door, playing with his hair at his back. He half jumped out of the car, almost losing his balance at the odd angle he came out, the entrance not three feet from his position. A bullet buried an inch from his foot as he moved, his hand touching the ground as he fought to maintain some sense of balance.

In a terrible moment of clarity, Van knew he was not going to make it.

And there, appearing out of the shadowy warehouse entrance, Zan was running out to his rescue, one of his hands extended as if he were reaching for some invisible foe. In Van’s black-and-white vision, the whole world was suddenly engulfed by a shimmering green energy. Everything became green, the floor, the air, Zan himself, creating a bubble where bullets ricocheted harmlessly away from them.

Van had no context for what was happening in that instant, he only had one crystal clear thought that Zan was—and would always be—Antar’s savior.


2 : Jake

Max’s projected shield covered Van, Jake, Langley, and the entire car. It was easily triple the size they had practiced in Jake’s lab for years, not only extending in front of them but creating a spherical barrier that ensured no bullet was going to reach them.

Van seemed to be transfixed for a precious second before Jake took him by the shoulder to help him get inside. Jake had no idea how good or bad his sight actually was, but Jake knew Max could not sustain such a display of energy beyond a few seconds, tops.

Rushing behind Max, Michael was also extending his hand and Jake’s instinct told him to duck. Langley, though, pushed him further into the warehouse alongside Van, as Michael’s firepower blew out the car in a spectacular ball of fire that didn’t penetrate Max’s rapidly reducing shield.

“Get inside!” Max shouted, even if they were already inside the rusty, old warehouse that felt more like a trap than a haven.

People appeared out of nowhere to guide them to an opening in the middle of the floor, the real entrance to the Antarian headquarters. Shifters, Jake realized, as Van went down the ladder first, giving Jake a moment to turn to look at Max and Michael.

Max faltered for a moment as he retracted his shield and then repositioned it with his hand extended upward to give them cover over the underground entrance, sweat transpiring on his forehead. Bullets started flying through the already broken windows of the warehouse while Michael walked beside Max, never taking his eyes from the open door. He was ready to blast any Unit men who dared to enter right now.

“You have to go first,” Max said to Michael as Jake entered the narrow entrance. “Michael, I can’t give you cover if I go first!” he heard him arguing.

Jake reached the underground floor a moment later, finding himself inside a long, white hall. Van’s anxious eyes met his as they both knew it wasn’t safe for either Michael or Max to remain there. Van turned his eyes up to the entrance as steps started descending.

“They’re well trained,” Jake reassured him, also looking up.

“They’re not bulletproof,” Van said with a sobering thought.

“Max’s shield certainly is. Believe me, we tested it against a million different things.”

Judging by Van’s paling cheeks and narrowing eyes, that was probably not the right thing to say, but Michael came down at that moment, his eyes hawkishly looking up for his friend. Finally, Max made it downstairs, closing the lid above him, effectively sealing them in.

The strangers who had guided Jake were suddenly there, Jet amongst them, all looking on edge. The Invisible Guard is really invisible, Jake fleetingly thought, amused. He was still panting.

“It seems Langley has gone on a mission of his own,” Max said, wiping a slight sheen of sweat on his face with his sleeve. Such a human way of doing things when he could just wave his hand over it.

“Are we missing anybody else?” Michael asked. All Guards shook their heads. “Good. Let’s see what the real situation is before we go and make any rushed decisions. Maybe Langley will end our problem before it becomes a nightmare.”

Outside, something exploded.


3 : Dave

You’re okay, you’re alive, Dave thought as he embraced Jake. They had not been on speaking terms for a week—well, Jake hadn’t been, Dave had certainly wanted to. And in the last twenty-four hours, Jake had been left out of the Network, had barely escaped the Unit at the airport, just to be re-ambushed later at a Starbucks. And while Dave was executing his daring escape, Jake had been taken into custody to the exact same location. They had missed each other by minutes.

That McKay had led Jake back to the same prison Dave had escaped did not make sense. Certainly, if Dave had been able to escape it, so could Jake. They didn’t share the same IQ just for kicks. Still, McKay was just arrogant enough to believe one prison could hold two geniuses plus aliens of all things. The fact that Van had not left Jake behind—nor Langley or Jet—spoke volumes of how resourceful Jake could be in any situation.

“Are you okay?” Dave finally asked.

“Me? I heard all about your escape before I got out myself. I bet McKay has a lovely purple color on his face right now. I just wished we hadn’t led him here.”

“They used Isabel’s phone to track this place. You weren’t being followed,” Dave reassured him. “Ray is tracking down their movements through Daniel’s backdoor. We might be able to redirect them or somehow give us room to leave.”

“Daniel? Danny?!”

“It’s a long story,” Dave said, as he guided Jake back to the room where they were working.

“Van was blinded for a while there,” Jake said as they waited for the first door of three to be opened remotely. Dave couldn’t conveniently wave his hand and have it done.

“He what?”

“He was shot with a sedative. It temporarily blinded him, though it’s mostly back. He says he can’t see colors for the most part yet. I need to check him again.”

“Don’t. Don’t get near him ever again. He has people here to look after him. Trust me, Jake, you don’t want to cross his people. Don’t make them doubt your intentions, not even for a moment. They’re the type to execute first, ask questions later.”

“Interesting company you’ve been keeping all these years.”

“More like interesting company who’s been giving me ulcers all these years,” Dave muttered as they stopped at the second door. “So, you helped Van escape?”

“It was a team effort. Quite creative, if I say so myself,” he added with a smile. “Yet Van has too many hopes about Max. Hopes I’ve no doubt you’ve fanned over the years,” he added, reprehensively.

“Not now, Jake. Not here,” he said pointing out their general space. It was ill-advised to talk about these things in enemy territory.

“Then when? When Van is actually shot dead? When Max refuses to play along? When the Unit and McKay luck out and get their hands on both of them? This is exactly why you shouldn’t have kept this a secret, Dave. And you pretending that we can just walk away from here now that you’ve delivered Max to their hands is not doing any of us any favors, least of all Max—or Van.”

Dave chuckled, in that tired, resigned way people who are at the end of their rope do. “You always care about people—even the ones you’ve just met.”

“Dave!” Jake said exasperated. “This is why you didn’t tell me, isn’t it? You’ve always known how wrong this is. This gamble on everyone’s future—”

“It’s not a gamble,” Dave said, far too fierce for Jake’s liking, he knew. If he was going to be judged, at least they could judge him with the right facts. “Everything I’ve done for the past eight years has been with one goal in mind: to save the Earth from Antar’s wrath. And I have delivered what I promised: the chance for Van and his Rebellion to sit down with Max and see if there are any traces left of their leader in there. That’s all I did.”

“I doubt very much Max and the others would agree with you,” Jake said, both of them standing in front of the second door, which lay open while they argued.

“That was never a factor in this. Do you honestly believe they didn’t know this was coming? Take me out of the equation for a moment here. The Unit would have caught up with them a long time ago. And even if they hadn’t, Antar would certainly have. You’ve met Van. Do you think he would have settled for ‘we can’t find them’ or ‘it looks like the humans killed them’ and do nothing about it? I’m everything that stands between the Unit and Antar, and both would have hunted them down for one reason or another. That much Max and the others know, Jake. I bought them time to grow up and taught them how to navigate the worst of their enemies. If they choose Antar or not, if the Unit is dissolved just to be reformed again, that’s not in my hands anymore.”

“It’s far more than just that, and you know it,” Jake said as Dave walked down the hall. Though Jake was taller, he still had to speed-walk to reach Dave’s furious pace.

“Why is it that you see the good in everyone but me?” Dave argued back.

“Because you would have told me otherwise. You would have told Ray. We would have found a way to make this work with them. Instead, you lied to everyone around you, everyone, knowing full well the implications of what you’ve done could blow up in your face.”

“I didn’t tell you because Van didn’t let me,” Dave said as they stopped at the third and final door.

“Please, since when any kind of authority has stopped you.”

Dave’s shoulders slumped as the door hissed open.

“What would you have done differently if I had told you?” he asked, part of him eager to know and part of him daring Jake to come up with a better plan on the spot.

Jake stood there, beside him, weighing something in his mind, something heavy. “Max knows Zan. He remembers much of his life. He knows what it felt to be him, he remembers what transpired in the palace. He sometimes just acts like Zan out of some sort of second nature, something you would have noticed if you had spent any amount of time around them.”

“What are you saying? That he is Zan?”

“Not at all, just that he remembers who Zan was. He’s still Max, though. Yet Zan knows how to play this game while Max knows what he wants has nothing to do with his alien self.”

“It doesn’t mean he’ll get it,” Dave said, finally walking to the door that led to his makeshift Network control room.

“Well, Van is quite sure Max will choose Zan one way or another,” Jake pointed out, “if not out of his memories, then out of duty. And we both know Van is a dangerous man. He’ll do what’s best for his vision of what Antar should be.”

“Well, it doesn’t mean he’ll get it, either. Van’s idealized idea of who Zan was is as far from reality as Max is human. Langley knows this, so we’ve been preparing for a few scenarios here.”

Dave opened the door at the same time Danny was about to open it himself. And there they were, Danny, Dave, and Jake, with Dave playing the middle of the sandwich here.

“What are you doing here?” Jake asked. In their long friendship, there had never been a contentious point like Danny was. Nobody liked Danny but Dave, a fact that both Danny and himself knew.

“Saving your boss’s ass, if you must know,” Danny said, with the same smart-ass tone that infuriated everyone—including Dave.

“He’s also the reason why I had to bring the Network down, I was captured, and you were found. Don’t forget that,” Dave pointed out as he forcibly entered. Danny moved aside as if he’d been burned.

“You’re the reason everything fell apart today,” Jake said, following the general idea if not the details. It wasn’t even a question.

“That was—that was an unforeseen consequence of what I wanted to do. In any case, Max is here,” he told Dave. “You want me out of your sight, just arrange for His Majesty to meet me for two minutes and I’ll be out.”

“How do you even know about Max being royalty?” Jake asked, now wanting the details.

“Max has bigger things to worry about now, in case you haven’t noticed,” Dave said to Daniel, finding it hard to keep his cool in the face of the one person who’d brought everything down without even trying. Everyone had warned him about Daniel: Jake, certainly Ray, even Susseth, his lovely assistant who knew how to keep quiet yet make her point.

“What do you even want Max for?” Jake asked, still stuck in the details.

“None of your business,” Daniel said, glaring at Jake. Jake frowned, finally entering the room.

“It’s going to become everybody’s business in about two minutes,” Dave said. “Van is here, and I won’t keep your involvement secret. If Van buys your sob story about needing Max to heal you, that’s anybody’s guess.”

“You know what? I don’t even need you to make the introductions,” Daniel said and stormed out of the room, complete with slamming the door. Dave winced. Jake turned to look at him with a what the hell? look.

“If Van doesn’t shred him to pieces, Max’s bodyguards will,” Dave said, shrugging as he was done with his protégé.

“What exactly happened to you today, Dave? I think I’m drawing more than a dozen blanks here.”

“Sit down, then. It’s been quite the long day.”

[xmag]

Yeah, the problem is, for Van, especially after that display of power, Zan is the savior. If Max chooses to stay on Earth, or to come back to Earth only to give up on power and install democracy, I doubt Van will be pleased to see his life mission desintegrated under his eyes.

[Misha]

xmag, yeah, Max has an uphill battle convincing Van that he's not everybody's savior, he's just not helping his case right now...

Also, one would think that after twenty-five years of fandom, I would know how to write Czechoslovakians at the first try...





Part 30: Bad News
November 2nd, 2011 - New York


1 : McKay

Monsters walked the Earth.

The Head of the Special Unit looked at the footage on their makeshift headquarter outside New York City, his inner thoughts revolving around how to enter enemy territory that was defended by unknown special capabilities.

He refused to call them powers. It made them sound invincible, even if technically he’d just watched video of some sort of shield that had made them bullet proof, followed by a car exploding not ten feet from the door.

Yet Max Evans had already been captured and brought to his knees once. One of his own had been blinded and captured not four hours ago. Not to mention that Nasedo had spent three years in captivity back in the forties.

No, these human-shaped monsters were not invincible, not by a long shot, yet McKay was neither stupid nor impatient. He just needed enough information before going in.

“It can’t be an abandoned warehouse,” Andrews, one of his technicians said as they inspected the inner space with a miniature drone. “We know there are at least five hostiles inside.”

“No, wait, get back,” another agent said, pointing at the bottom of the screen. “Something is at ground level.”

“It looks—it looks like something was burnt there,” Andrews said, slowing the drone down and pointing it directly at the out of place mark.

“They’re underground,” McKay said. “Bring me something to see how far that rat nest goes.”

“Yes, sir,” Andrews said. He liked this guy, tech savvy and disciplined to a fault. He wished more of his team were like that, but it was hard enough to recruit for a clandestine unit that most of the time was chasing false leads. Even McKay had to admit that if he hadn’t found that little snitch that used to work for David, he might still be chasing ghosts down in Roswell, New Mexico.

Danny boy was the star of his own show, and McKay had flamed every vendetta the kid had against David and stroked every corner of that hacker’s ego. Plant an idea here, push for an update there, and little by little, Daniel had given them all the little crumbs they needed to find their way right into the heart of the alien group. Including the fact that they were going to be all together today.

Pity I have no more use for him, McKay thought as he got out of the van to make a few calls. Either that rat nest had no more exits, or it had enough that they would need to keep hunting for them. Both scenarios required far more manpower than McKay currently possessed. It was time to call for the cavalry.

He would show these alien monsters what the combined powers of the FBI and NYPD’s finest could achieve.


2 : Max

He’d barely saved Van by a couple of seconds. As Max splashed water over his face on a bathroom somewhere, he replayed the scene again in his mind, his stomach feeling like a rock at the prospect of seeing that man dying in front of him. Van was the key to solving this puzzle. Granted, Max barely knew him, but having the leader of the rebellion dead at his feet was not a good outcome no matter how the Zan side of his brain tried to spin it.

At least one of us knows how to spin things, he thought as he looked at the mirror with a slight smile. Gone were the days Max had dreaded looking at his reflection in case it was Zan who would look back.

Zan had had a dry sense of humor, something Max appreciated. Some sort of kinship between them, however flimsy it was, but he would take it. He needed to be Zan for the foreseeable future, after all.

A polite knock on the door told him his time alone was already gone.

He opened the door expecting to find Liz, but instead it was Violet’s intense eyes that looked straight at him.

“It’s been confirmed, Your Majesty. Khivar has been actively using the mind-link technology for the past hours. It matches your fainting spells. We just don’t—I mean, we knew he was planning an attack on you today, but we thought—we were certain the threat would be here, on Earth. Van is being informed as we speak, as well.”

It felt as if the floor had moved beneath him. To suspect and to know where two vastly different things. Khivar was going to kill him, sooner rather than later, and there was nothing he could do to stop him.

Not so fast, a tiny voice said at the back of his mind, one that sounded suspiciously like Ray’s.

“If you can confirm it, can you also disconnect it?”

“The Rebellion is not sitting idle, Your Majesty, but we didn’t disclose it was you he was targeting. Chaos would erupt if anyone even thought for a moment that Khivar can control you—and through you, us as well.”

“No, that’s—that’s good thinking. Yet the Rebellion needs to buy me time, at least enough to settle things with Van. If this is inevitable and Khivar succeeds, Van will need the Seal.”

“Max…” Violet whispered, her eyes going round at the prospect of his imminent death. The implications were far reaching, far more than Max could even really think about right this moment. For Violet and all shifters though, that Seal was the literal symbol of their slaved lives. That it had to be handled with care was an understatement.

“Best case scenario, they destroy the machine and I’m not dead in the next five minutes,” he said, trying to reassure her as much as reassuring himself. “But contingencies need to be placed. Once we target the machine, Khivar will know it’s working.”

“We will—will transmit your orders, Your Majesty,” she said, blinking fast.

“At the 2000 summit, all representatives came here taking over some random people. They all have that puppet machine, don’t they?”

“Yes, most likely, sir.”

“We need to disconnect them all. Even if it legitimizes Khivar’s plan, I cannot have him winning, not again. Never again.”

“I’ll transmit the orders right away, sir,” Violet said, wasting no time and walking away.

“Ash?” Max called, and in walked his other Guard. It was nice to know that at least no one had followed him into the bathroom.

“Your Majesty?”

“Call everyone into the same room. I need to deliver the news.”

“The General is already assembled at the War Room, assessing our position with the Special Unit.”

“Good, let’s go there, then.”

“Your Majesty…are you sure we cannot just go out and execute McKay and his men?” Ash asked as they walked down the hall. Liz was nearby, hopefully having a nice early supper.

“McKay managed to ambush all of us not four hours ago, Ash,” Max pointed out. “He captured Van, Jake, and Dave within the same hour. I’m not blindly sending you, any of you, into that man’s territory. We need to be smart about him. If anything, McKay has proven to be a worthy challenge to us all.”

Ash wasn’t happy with that answer—most likely Jet and Shade weren’t either. “Tell you what,” Max said as they passed the first security door, “if he’s on your sight, you have my permission to execute him for crimes committed against the crown.”

Ash nodded once, though Max didn’t miss the fleeting approval in his eyes. With a little luck, they would all be long gone before McKay set foot on the compound.


3 : Van

“Colors are starting to become brighter,” Van said as Rose shone a light on his pupil. It was the third time in the last ten minutes, while they both waited for his sight to be completely restored. Sitting on a bed in their small medical wing, Van looked around, waiting for colors to meet his eyes. “Everything seems grayed out for the most part. Green is the only vivid color I see.”

“We’re lucky this was nothing but a scare,” Rose said, finally placing the penlight in her pocket. She was dressed in a white coat, looking grim. “Maybe we should ask His Majesty to take a look at you. Heal anything we might be missing.”

“He doesn’t heal,” Van said with the same certainty his shifters had told him over the years. “Besides, I’m as alien to him as humans are to us. I don’t think my biology would click in his mind as easily as earthlings’ do.”

“It wouldn’t hurt for him to at least check,” Rose pointed out.

“You should’ve seen it, Rose,” Van said above a whisper, “He was suddenly there. For all we hate the idea of what this human body has done to his mind, the fact that he could project that energy shield to protect himself—I was so relieved. They do have the means to survive, no matter the challenge. Those who designed his every cell knew what they were doing.”

“We always knew he would be different,” she said, softening her stance. “He heard you were in danger, and he just took off—as if he’d always known you and fought for you. Even his own Guards were left to scramble after him, including the General.”

Van smiled at that.

“Yet they’re alien in nature, Van. Don’t let this fool you.”

“You’ve never believed they survived, Rose, yet here you are, in this alien world, keeping tabs with all of them. You volunteered if I remember correctly.”

“Making sure the Rebellion is not running on a fool’s hope. You know how I promised the Queen mother I’d watch over you, Van. That means making sure you’re not—”

A double knock on the door announcing Luke coming cut her words short.

“Come in,” Van said, blinking a bit harder to will his sight to come back faster.

“Van, I bring troubling news. It looks like His Majesty was right. Khivar has been using the mind-link technology today.”

“He could be just reaching for any human to control and carry on his assassination attempt,” Van said, standing up. “There’s absolutely no way Khivar would be able to take over Zan’s mind.”

“We knew he would attempt to kill him today. That’s why we came. That’s why we took the chance to move our planned date. We cannot take this as anything less but Khivar succ—”

“He has not succeeded,” Van fiercely said, which was punctuated by the color red suddenly becoming vivid in his eyes. “He has to be stopped. Here, in Antar, anywhere he’s trying to pull the trigger—” Van looked Luke straight in the eye. “We cannot lose him, Luke. Not this close.”

Outside the room, one of the shifters who resided in the compound cleared his throat. “His Majesty has requested your presence in the War Room, sir,” Finn said.

“I just left the General there,” Luke explained as all of them left the room. “The Unit has surrounded us, though Langley has yet to come inside.”

“We’ll have to assume he won’t be coming inside,” Van answered, following their resident host. That any human could ambush or kill Langley was as unlikely as Van losing his sight, so he was not going to gamble on the safe side of that equation.

“His Majesty has ordered that the Rebellion prevents Khivar from using that machine by any means necessary,” Finn elaborated, “same with any machine in the sister planets. Violet is about to send His Majesty’s orders through our comms console—unless you object. I didn’t give her the codes.”

The fact that any of them could even suggest disobeying Zan’s direct order unnerved Van. Violet and the other Guards would never question his word, but the rest of them? He wasn’t so sure.

“My word pales against Zan’s word,” he answered. “Get the order through.”

“Yes, sir.” Finn took a left, while Rose took the lead to the War Room.

If his own shifters were doubting Zan’s claim to the throne over Van’s, he would have an uphill battle with the Rebellion at large.

First things first, we have to get out of this place alive.


4 : Maria

It was one thing to feel useless in a superpowered situation, but it was a whole new level to feel useless in the middle of alien conspiracies and Special Unit men shooting at them.

“This day sucks,” she said as she took some instant ramen out of the microwave. Jade had shown them the kitchen-slash-dinner room, and here she was with Liz. “We were supposed to be having lobster or something fancy tonight. Gosh, I had the entire night planned, you know? Like, I’ve been planning this whole week for months and months on end, but noooooo… Michael had to bring his past life baggage and—”

She sat down without finishing that sentence. Liz was barely listening, and she had no idea where Kyle was. She was just hungry and angry and blaming Michael for things beyond his control was suddenly not fun at all.

“This day sucks,” she repeated, before settling to blow over her yellow, salty food.

“I can’t sense any difference,” Liz said, blinking fast as she came back to the here and now. “Like I thought—I don’t know, that maybe he would feel less Max and more…Zan?” In front of her, her own ramen cup laid open, the vapor slowly stirring up. Liz hadn’t started eating yet.

“Well, I for once am happy Space Boy is not about to explode something. He feels…he feels calm,” she said, narrowing her eyes. “Collected. Like he has no time to worry like a headless chicken now that I’m here. I mean, he’s worried, just being smart about it.”

“How far we’ve come,” Liz said with a teasing smile as she started stirring her own cup of ramen.

“Indeed. This day is changing everything, though.”

“Because we finally know the truth?” Liz asked, testing if her steamy food was ready for consumption.

“Well, there’s that, but that’s just a tiny fraction of it. Let’s say for the sake of argument we’re not all dead tomorrow—”

“Maria!”

“—just being pragmatic here. So, not dead or captured,” she said, ignoring Liz’s horrified eyes. “This is it. This is Dave’s endgame. Once we’re out of here—heck, even since the moment we stepped foot in this place, the deal is over. We’re no longer his ‘wards’ or however he thought of it. He’s delivered us—them—to the Antarians.”

“We don’t know for sure…” Liz said, but there was no conviction behind her words.

“Max and Michael and Isabel need to deal with this whole Antar problem,” Maria continued, ignoring Liz’s non-doubt and stabbing her ramen instead, “And since Max is playing king, Michael is playing general, and Isabel is playing victim, I don’t see this ending in our favor.”

“I don’t see a future where Michael chooses to go,” Liz said with a smile.

“No, but it doesn’t mean they won’t drag them out to their world. These people have not spent all this time here to politely take ‘no’ for an answer.”

“Even if they’re dragged there,” Liz said rolling her eyes. “They would come back. I don’t know, maybe the answer is that we go with them,” Liz said, shrugging.

“You are being way too casual about that prospect right now,” Maria said, her food forgotten for a moment. She was a woman of this world. She knew how to deal with this world. She was not going to suddenly become the alien by living in that world.

“I guess it just hasn’t sunken in. I’m still rattled about what Jade said. That he would take Max away from me to make sure Antar is free. Like maybe the answer is that we go with them.”

“It would be like changing Dave for a Palace… And we don’t even know what kind of life they would have. The Rebellion is far from over at this point. What kind of world is Antar, anyway?”

“I feel kind of guilty, actually,” Liz said, wincing slightly at her food. “We’ve never really even thought about Antar. And it’s not like we thought their mother’s message was an echo of the far past. Nikolas was here. Khivar was here. We even knew Courtney—”

Maria gagged at that name. “I’m eating…” she muttered.

“The point is, we’ve known all these years that Antar’s political problems are alive. People are losing their lives every day, waiting for Zan to come back.”

“Yeah, but that’s on them,” Maria pointed out, blowing her ramen once more. “It’s up to them how they’re ruled. They should pick Van and move on. Leave Space Boy alone. Let Zan’s memory rest in peace at last.”

“Maybe. It doesn’t change that the reason Max, Michael, and Isabel are here is because their Rebellion bioengineered them to be reborn and go back. We’re the extras in this life, Maria. They were always meant to go back.”

“And it doesn’t change the fact that we’re stuck with them…” Maria said, biting her food. That she couldn’t do a darn thing to change things in this chess game made her skin crawl. She was not a damsel-in-distress, and she was not going to become a nameless “General’s wife.” She had her own set of skills. She had her own life to shine in.

Maybe things are moving too fast… maybe I just need a moment to think, here. There’s no way in hell Michael would allow me to go if he thinks it’s too risky, for starters.

“I still would rather stay,” Liz said as an afterthought. “It’s like you said, everything is changing today.”

“You know what else has already changed?” Maria asked, her food forgotten for a second again. “It also means we’re free. Free of Dave’s contract. We’re finally free to move out in the world. We have the resources to tuck ourselves on a paradise island and not work a day in our lives. As long as we don’t call the government’s attention, of course.”

“How ironic that the day we’re free of Dave we’re just stuck with Antar and the Unit at our doorstep,” Liz said, sighing.

“Well, you know it can never be easy with the Czechoslovakians…”

“I just need this day to be over—” Liz said when Jade knocked on the door.

“Your Majesty?” the shifter said. “His Majesty has requested everyone to meet at the War Room.”

Maria was up and out of the room before the man had finished the sentence. She was needed at the table, and she was not going to sit and passively watch while others made life-altering decisions for her. Now she only had to figure out what exactly she was bringing to fix this mess.

[xmag]

Danny boy was the star of his own show, and McKay had flamed every vendetta the kid had against David and stroked every corner of that hacker’s ego. Plant an idea here, push for an update there, and little by little, Daniel had given them all the little crumbs they needed to find their way right into the heart of the alien group. Including the fact that they were going to be all together today.

Pity I have no more use for him, McKay thought

Danny is a traitor? I remember that he used to hate Dave but I thought he had changed but it looks like... well, there was a line where he was thinking about how his actions had consequences and they were about to catch up with him.

He led the bad guys to our roswellians. That's bad.