Hedging Her Bets (CC,M/L,TEEN) Part 12 12/20/04 [WIP]

[blackknight1864]

Part 11:

Los Angeles - Langley’s House

The sun was rising so different from his home world and yet so similar. Accept that today there would be no bombs dropping around him, no armies to assault him, and no dead friends to mourn. Today all there would be were questions. The questions that had haunted him for a long time, who am I? And what’s the point? My name is Garen and I know nothing of who I am. A warrior for longer then most of the people on Antar had lived; I have been forced to do things both honorable and repulsive. Still these questions plague me, eternal doubts as I fought for a King growing in an incubation pod on a world half a galaxy away.

Since the instant Khivar’s plans were confirmed, every action, every breath of my life, became horrifyingly clear. He holds every advantage in supplies, troops, and position. There is an old tradition on both Antar and Earth that old warriors reaching their final battle could sense when the war would claim their lives. In hours, the final battle for Antar and Earth would be joined bringing about a petulant dictator’s final hours, or the last gasp of freedom for two worlds. But even with all my experience I can not figure what course the future would take.

I know I can survive if I just took off and ran, but I have no desire to do that. Survival had long ago become a secondary thought to me. All that was left for me was honor and death. Death was the final, ultimate peace, and subject to the whims of those who have never seen friends die. Death was the only peace that would ever truly last. Off to the side as the rising sun began fading into the clear blue of the morning sky I could feel a person watching me. I don’t need to ask who, Langley stepped next to me before I would need to ask.

“Your habits never change.”

I turn to look at Cal as I speak to him. My doubts about myself are nothing compared to my doubts of him. “What do you want?”

“To annoy you,” Langley said as his eyes glared at me.

“So I guess that means you haven’t change ether.”

“I’ve changed more than you can imagine, more than I ever wanted to, and I want you to remember that.”

“Why should I? You think you can scare me little brother? While you have been here sitting on your ass. I have been out there in battle. I have watched good people die because of Khivar. So tell me Cal, sitting here on Earth in relative safety could possibly make you upset?”

“You still don’t get it. You don’t get what every human in this country understands since the age of eight! That you do not get freedom by taking it away! You fight for freedom, but treat your soldiers like cogs in a machine. You took away the only freedom that means a damn to a soldier. The freedom of choice! If I had been asked do you think I would have turned down the mission? That I wouldn’t have agreed to go?”

“I didn’t know, and I couldn’t take that chance. But either way I expected you to do your duty as I would expect any soldier to do their duty.”

“And what about your duty to your soldiers to not treat them like things? You treat soldiers like they're nothing more than items to be used, and you are no better than Khivar!”

I felt my fist spring forth like a sledge hammer against Langley’s face again.

“I would watch your tongue, or the king might find out you had an unfortunate accident.”

------

Max watched Liz’s chest rise and fall as she slept. Here Liz’s face was relaxed, and without the concerns that during the day there was so much that weighed them down. He wished she could have more moments like this, and in his heart he made a promise to give them to her. She had given everything to him, and he would not make her regret that choice.

Just then her eyes fluttered, and opened. “Max?” she asked in the early morning haze.

“I was just watching the most beautiful woman in the world.”

“How much longer till we have to go downstairs?”

“We have a few more hours. Go back to sleep.”

Just then a mischievous smile appeared on Liz’s face. “Actually I have other ideas.” A few seconds later the only thought Max could have was, I love this woman.

------

Maria sighs as an all too familiar sound began echoing down from the upstairs. 'Jesus Christ do they ever sleep?' Maria stopped that thought right there. Max and Liz had been through so much that she should allow them to do…well. 'Okay stop this Maria. You know what you’re really avoiding thinking about right now.' Before she’d gone to sleep last night, she had listened to Michael and Garen, and she’d never seen Michael so relaxed. Not even around Max was Michael so unguarded.

He was possibly the closest to Michael’s real father that she would ever get, and she was afraid that after all she and Michael had gone through that if he gave her a negative review Michael might leave her. So she was trying to be on her best behavior, and not let her mouth lead her into trouble. Unfortunately, she didn’t have anyone who could help her since Liz was upstairs and otherwise engaged. Isabelle was avoiding all contact with anything alive as she grieved for her husband. And Alex had been taken away from her by the blonde haired bitch.

Kyle had disappeared, and wasn’t talking to anyone right now. So now her melodramatic imagination was working overdrive. Just then Garen came into the kitchen from outside. He seemed to be just about ready to explode when he saw her with a spoonful of cereal half way to her mouth. Had it been anyone else the scene would have been incredibly funny. “So, you’re Maria.”

“Yeah, look I just want to…” before she could finish Garen interrupted.

“Quiet till I’m done speaking,” Maria flinched at his harsh attitude.

“I don’t like, I don’t dislike you. I really at this moment do not have time to care either way. And I have no desire to expend the effort to get to know you. That is of course unless you want to watch Khivar kill every last one of your race?”

Maria looked at Garen in the eyes her temper in full swing at his crass manner. “You arrogant obnoxious jackass,” she said just before slapping Garen in the face with her left palm and walking straight into Michael.

“I do apologize for setting your girlfriend off, but I’m not going to be here much longer. I just want to make sure she’s worthy of you. Actually from what I’ve seen Michael, you are not worthy of her.”

------

Isabelle didn’t do anything to make her presence know, it just was. Her grief surrounded her more then any veil or black dress. Her walk, her posture, her eyes all gave her away. She would receive no comfort, no outreached hand, no love. She would share her pain with no one. Not Kyle, Michael, Maria, Liz, or even Max. Alex had been Liz and Maria’s friend not just her boyfriend. They were her last links to him, and so she had let them be close, well as close she would let anyone who wasn’t Alex.

But Jesse had been different. He had been hers’ alone. With him she had been able to have more then shared grief, and had found love again. Jesse had rebuilt her heart without removing Alex from it. Yet, she had kept him distant from the rest. Afraid that he would be taken like Alex had. She had even distanced herself from Max and Michael. It hadn’t been enough. She had lost him as she had lost Alex, but this time there was no comfort with friends. No shared grief. She would not allow it. Even now Jesse would still be hers and hers alone.

------

Kyle could not sleep. His dreams were a strange mix of nightmares and a conversation between Alex, Jesse, and him. He was not sure which caused him more pain, the images of Alex and Jesse telling him to go to Isabelle, or the more horrific images that plagued him. Images of a world that could not have been Earth and fields filled with dead bodies.

He felt less in control of himself then when Tess had mind warped him. He found himself outside the room Liz had been placed in when she was unconscious. No one, not Liz, not Michael, and not even Max had dared to enter this room. The imposing figure of Isabelle Ramirez now seemed more like a broken Barbie doll. She had cried herself to sleep, desperately clinging to the picture of Jesse.

Again almost as if he were watching himself from somewhere else Kyle picked Isabelle up and placed her down on the bed. He gently brushed the side of her face moving a few stray strands of hair away from her face. So beautiful even now, Kyle thought. Suddenly at that moment his arm began to crackle in green energy, and then just before the green energy touched her skin Isabelle woke up.

“Kyle?”

------

The sound of hard passionate sex going on made both Michael and Maria groan.

“God do they ever stop? I mean they go on and on for an entire night. Don’t you think they should sleep?” Maria shouted.

Michael just sighed. “Don’t look at me like that Maria.”

“What does that mean?”

“Oh, for the love of god! I know you. You want to go up there. I, on the other hand, have no desire to Max and Liz doing whatever it is they do.”

“Fuck you Michael.”

“Ahhh, young love,” Garen laughed.

“Funny Garen,” Maria said as she shot him a menacing glare as she left the kitched and head up towards the sounds.

“You have a passionate woman there Rat…Michael. But then again you always did love a challenge.”

“A challenge? Boy is that the understatement of the millennium,” Michael said as he dropped his head and followed Maria.

----

Maria began pounding on the door to Liz’s room. “Oh, for the love of god! Liz! Come on take a break!”

“Maria, what are you screaming about?”

Maria started talking before turning to face Liz. “You and Max going all…Wait, what are you doing over there?”

“Isabelle was in there, remember?”

“Well if you’re in there? Then whose in…”

[blackknight1864]

*All the characters from Roswell are owned by the creators of Roswell, all original characters are owned by me and the people in my head.*

Part 12

Los Angeles - Langley’s House

Isabelle wasn’t sure what was happening. It was as if her mind had retreated inward, and she was just feeling her body’s reactions without knowing where they were coming from.
But despite what she might want, what she was feeling was separating her from her grief. Isabelle felt it, inside. As if someone was putting her soul back together, and for some reason that angered her, but she wasn’t sure why. How dare she feel those things when Jesse had just died? How much more could she betray the man?

Slowly however the room was slowly coming into focus, but she felt her bodies need for sleep overwhelm her. At that moment her mind wasn’t capable of thinking about what was going on, or why? All that was clear was for the moment she felt safe, protected, and that whoever had done this for her would not hurt her. She could feel that person’s arms around her as Isabelle passed into sleep.


At that moment the door to the room opened, and Maria looked in on the two sleeping lovers. Maria had enough good sense left to be quiet, and close the door.

Roswell - Crashdown Café

Amy Deluca began screaming. “JIM! JIM! You answer me! Don’t you leave me you bastard!”

Jeff Parker and Phillip Evans grabbed at her pulling her off of Jim Valenti’s unmoving form. Her tears pouring down her face. “He’ll be okay? Amy, don’t worry Jim will be fine,” Phillip Evan’s said.

“Don’t lie to me,” Amy answered.

Less then a second later Rath entered. “You know it is really hard to eat when some stupid bitch can’t keep her mouth shut.”

Jeff nearly had to tackle Amy to keep her from leaping at Rath. “Oh, temper, temper, you wouldn’t want to end up like those Agents downstairs now would you?” Rath replied mockingly.

Diane reached around and slapped her hand across Amy’s mouth. “Amy, please, this isn’t helping.”

Phillip turned to look at Rath. “Jim Valenti needs help. He’s become unconscious. He needs to see a doctor.”

Rath sneered at Phillip then pushed him aside to look at Jim Valenti lying on the floor against Liz’s bed. “Yeah, but I don’t fix ugly, so he’s your problem.”

“He might die!” Amy yelled in desperation.

“And you want me to what kill him quicker? Cause really you keep flapping your mouth like your no good slut of a daughter, and that’s all you’re going to get. Of course maybe you’d like that, you need a real lover, want to see why your daughter kept inviting that idiot Guerrin back into her bed?” This time both Jeff and Phillip had to step in to stop the enraged mother from going after Rath. Turning his back on the struggling woman Rath turned to look at the unconscious Valenti. “You, I believe I told your bitch I didn’t want to hear her voice, or I’d do something she’d regret. I just wish I could see your(her?) face when I kill you (her?).”

Los Angeles - Langley’s House

Maria finished closing the door, and turned to look at the rest of the group. Everyone looked at Maria for the answers only she could give them.

“I just see Isabelle and Kyle doing…well you know?”

“Maria do you have some problem with the word sex? Cause you didn’t seem to last night?”

“Shut up Michael.” Michael laughed, okay he didn’t laugh or make any expressions, but amusement flashed briefly in his eyes.

Although the tension eased with the usual Michael, Maria banter it was not gone. “This can’t be good.”

Max seemed to decide this was the moment to speak, “Alright, everyone lets leave them alone for now. Garen, I want you to get your men ready.”

“Yes, your majesty,” Garen said as he saluted, turned, and walked down the stairs.

Michael was the next to speak. “And what do you want us to do about those two?”

“Nothing,” Liz answered, “Right now we have to get ready to stop Khivar.”

Michael just nodded and left. Maria was going to stay and answer, but the look Liz had on her face convinced her not to.

Roswell - Crashdown Café

Rath laughed, raised his hand then spun up, and blasted Jeff Parker backward before he could hit him. “Do you think I’m an idiot? You small town hicks, you think everyone’s as stupid as you. Did you really think you get me with such an obvious trap?”

“I thought you had orders not to kill us,” Diane asked.

“Oh, I do, but do you realize just how much I can do to you before you die. You might be old, but I haven’t had any in awhile and I got three quick human females to fu…” Rath never finished that sentence as he went flying into the wall. Rath’s body slammed into the wall with a sickening thud.

Holding his sparkling green hand up, Jim Valenti spoke, “Not so stupid a trap was it you Son of a bitch.”

Los Angeles - Langley’s House

For the first time in what seemed like days, Kyle felt like he was really looking out of his own eyes and in control of his own body. The bed that he realized quickly was not his own, almost causing him to fall out of the bed. Kyle felt his mind racing as it only had when it was the fourth quarter of a football game. His body pumped with adrenaline, but instead of the harsh turf of the football fields, Kyle now found himself naked with another naked body pressed against him.

Kyle’s mind stopped working at that point; too much was happening to him right then for his mind to make any coherent thoughts about what he was seeing. They weren’t so much pressed together as he was holding her protectively. Of course at that point the only thing that Kyle realized was that a pair of beautiful brown eyes was looking right into his now terrified eyes. At that moment the memories of the night before came rushing back.

Isabelle shot up like a rocket. She had that deer in the headlights look that made Kyle’s heart break in half. For second Kyle forgot that he was naked and tried to reach out to here, but she just back away. “Isabelle…I didn’t…I don’t know what happened, but I didn’t…”

"Kyle just leave me alone.”

Kyle just nodded. He grabbed his scattered clothes slipped them on quickly and left the room.


Isabelle just retreated into the wall, and wanted to cry but somehow couldn’t. “God what did I do? I’ve betrayed both Alex and Jesse… and Kyle?”