Rebuilding Lives(CC,I/A,L/M,K/T,ADULT) Complete 6/16/06

[Chrisken]

Title: Rebuilding lives
Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to Roswell.
Couples: All the usual CC ones. In order of priority, more or less, Isabel/Alex, Kyle/Tess, Max/Liz, Michael/Maria
Category: Pure and honey-sweet fluff, hehe. Maybe a tiny smidge of drama, but (I hope) nothing angsty.
Rating: ADULT.
Summary: After winning the war on Antar (and getting a special delivery,) the pod squad are back on Earth and keen to renew old ties of the heart.
Author's note: This is a sequel to mt gazer's "What passes for normal", originally written by her for our Enigma challenge team, Individual Complexities. I'm continuing the plot with her permission, and adjusting the timeline slightly for my own reasons. It's only a little more than two years after the hybrids left, September of '03, about fifteen months after Liz/Maria/Alex/Kyle graduated high school. That means that little Lex is about a year and a half old, or a little more.


"So, umm... what are you going to do now that you're back?" Alex asked. Isabel had passed baby Lex over to his Gramma Di, so that they could get better acquainted while the two of them shared a proper reunion hug and kiss, which took a little while. "I... I mean, I understand that you only just landed, and being back here in Roswell has got to be disorienting, but..."

"No, I understand you being curious," she assured him, squeezing his hand, "and it's something that we have to face up to. For the short term... Max and I were hoping that our old rooms were still available--"

"Absolutely!!" Mrs Evans's voice came in from the dining room, where she was playing peek-a-boo with the baby. Isabel hadn't realized that she'd been talking loud enough to be heard that far away. "We've moved a few things... as little as we could, essentially, but your father would get in a mood sometimes when he'd practically turn the house upside down, trying to find some clue to why you left so suddenly."

Isabel's face fell a bit, but she caught it before letting it become a frown. All of the pain that she had caused the people she loved, inadvertently or because she felt she had no other choice, was over, as of today, and if she had to try until the day she died, she would make it up to them. "I'm a high school dropout, but pretty smart and there are ways of avoiding going back to West Roswell Secondary, I think. Study for my GED maybe, or put together an applications package for college as a mature student."

"You kind of have to be living on your own for that," Liz pointed out... not snarkily, just pointing out a requirement that Isabel should be aware of.

"Well, whatever. There are ways," Alex assured her. "You'll find one that's right for you, somehow I believe that completely now. If you could cross stars to make sure that our son would be born safely, win a war, go through... through developing a new treatment for him to make sure that he could survive on earth, come back and find us, I don't think there's anything in the universe that would stop you when you set your mind to something."

"You'd better believe it," she muttered under her breath. "But... you, Alex, what's happened in your life since we met?? Aside from writing angsty songs."

"I..." Alex shook his head; somehow it honestly hadn't occured to him that Isabel wouldn't know that stuff. "I've been in Los Angeles for a year now, studying database engineering. The UCLA campus is so incredible, you'd love it." He grabbed Isabel's hand, impulsively. "You have to see it. Soon."

She smiled. "I'd like that, though there's probably a lot that has to be worked out here in Roswell."

Alex nodded, accepting that, and just sat back on the couch, seeming to accept that everything would be sorted into its proper spot in due time. Isabel snuggled close to him, and they each tried to sort out the other conversations that were going on in the room. Maria was trying to stop Michael from rambling on about incredible battles on a distant planet and get him to think about where he was going to live, now that he was back in Roswell. Max was listening with rapt attention as Liz gushed over about Massachusetts.

After a minute or so, Mrs Evans brought Lex back into the living room, smiling at the little boy's parents as they relaxed next to each other. Alex spread his arms wide, opening up room on his lap for the little guy, and Diane passed him carefully over. Alex had just got Lex settled on his left thigh, staring as if to memorize every detail of his son's face... his SON!! The son he hadn't realized he had... or that Isabel had maybe... even if Lex was his son, it wasn't like Alex really *had* him when he was so unimaginably far away...

Lex started to bawl and yowl his head off. Alex's grin collapsed, and he brought the little boy closer to him, trying nervously and ineffectively to make comforting noises. "I... I didn't mean to upset--"

"It's okay, sweetie," Isabel assured him. "He doesn't really understand that you're his daddy yet, and he's not used to your face. That's going to change soon." She took the child into her own arms, and almost immediately he quieted down. "Baby's had a long day, full of excitement that he didn't really follow, and come to think of it, his dinner's really overdue."

"Oh, whoops," Alex said, his face full of regret again.

"No, that's okay, there's no way you could have known. I should have..."

"It's *my* fault," Michael insisted suddenly, stepping almost literally out of his conversation with Maria. "I should have realized that you wouldn't be able to think of anything else once Alex walked in the door... we could all have waited a little bit for you guys to get yourselves sorted out. But I have to admit, I could hardly wait to see the reunion myself."

"Well, if no-one else is going to claim responsibility for the oversight, I'm going to go feed my son," Isabel said. "See you in a bit."

"Does... does it have to be just the two of you, alone?" Alex asked. "I-- I mean, well, since he's so big I wouldn't imagine you're still brr- breastfeeding him, and... well, the best way Lex is going to get used to me is if I'm around all the time, right?? Plus, I don't exactly think I could bear to take my eyes off both of you at the moment."

Isabel smiled. "Well, I kind of want him to calm down a little while he eats, and having you around might keep him excited and everything... but since it means so much to you, we can try it out." She carried Lex into the front hall, bent over just enough to scoop up the little bag that she'd taken from the ship after it landed. Tonight was not the night to start getting him used to human food... that could come later, after he was adjusted to the gravity change and the air and all of these new people. "We'll be in my room, okay mom?"

"Of course, dear," she replied, and the newly rejoined little family quickly disappeared up the stairs.

"Oh, by the way Alex??"

"Yeah?"

"I do still breastfeed him... sometimes. It's full of stuff that's good for developing immune systems, and there aren't social preconceptions against it like a lot of people on earth have. Just so that you're not surprised... not that they're anything YOU haven't seen before."

Diane turned away - looked at her long-lost son, at Michael, who had been almost like another son to her, and at the beautiful young ladies who loved them. "Now, Michael, I've gathered that you're not quite sure where you'll be staying immediately."

"Umm, yes'm," he replied, suddenly shy and uncommunicative in front of the older woman. "My apartment's probably been long ago rented out to someone else, hel-- I mean, um, heck, maybe the building's even been condemned. I suppose I could go back and sleep in the ship, but it's kind of a long way out of town, and we should be trying to keep trips back and forth to a minimum, just in case anyone gets curious and follows me one time..."

"Well, you probably wouldn't have noticed, but Philip and I have had some work done on the place, since last we saw the three of you," Max's mother replied. "One way of keeping ourselves busy I suppose, and holding out hope that there would be enough family to fill our house again, one day. There's a small one-bedroom apartment above the garage, and... actually, come to think of it, Isabel should probably have first option on that place, since she has the baby to think about, and if she wants it, you can move into her old room. If she doesn't want the apartment, then you're welcome to it. Either way, there's a place for you here, if you want it, Michael."

"Thank, thank you very much, Missus..."

"Don't call me Missus Evans," she interrupted him with a warm smile. "Not now, it sounds impossibly formal and stuffy. How about just 'Diane'?"

"Umm... Diane," he repeated, trying it out. "Yeah, I think I can handle that."

"Now, are the two of you planning on taking off for college way off in the northeast, too, as soon as it can be arranged??" Diane sat back down in the armchair and smiled broadly at Michael and Max.

"Umm... well, we haven't really had a lot of time to work it out, but I have to admit the idea has its appeal, Mom," Max admitted. "Not sure if an Ivy League school would be impressed with a GED, no matter how high I can get my SAT scores, but there are lots of good colleges in the Boston area. I've kinduv always wanted to go somewhere that it really snows, like all winter, and see the... um, all the historic sites and that stuff. And... well, I have to admit that Massachusetts has other draws working in its favor." He shot a long, tender look over at Liz.

Several pairs of eyes turned to stare at Michael. "Umm... well, hey, I've got nothing against New York City," he said with overdone casualness. "Just as soon as I check and make sure that there aren't any killer clones still living in the sewers."

"Don't think you have to worry about Lonnie and your evil twin any more," Liz told him. "It's a really long story though."

"Ummm..." Max blinked in surprise at the way she had phrased that. "Alright." He sighed in contentment. "I wonder how Tess is making out at the Valenti's place."

"Tess came too?" Maria asked. "Yeah, I guess you'd take her. Did she mellow while you guys were gone?"

"Yes, actually," Michael told her. "It surprised her how much she missed Earth as soon as she was gone... maybe more than any of us." He stretched a little. "I didn't see Kyle at the festival, but I didn't really look long before I found the three of you and decided to cut and run. Would he have been there, or home with his father??"

Maria and Liz shared a long look. "As far as we know, he'd be home," Liz said. "All three of us tried to convince him to come to the Crash, but it was like trying to drag a mountain out of the desert sand. He was feeling *incredibly* bummed and, last I heard, vowed that he would stay in his room all night, listening to nothing but old Horsemen of the Wastelands records."

"Somehow, I think he may be just as happy that he didn't come out," Maria said, hiding a smile.

"Umm... what do you mean?" Max asked.

* * * * * * * * * *

"You're... you're what?" Tess repeated, her knees wobbling. like they were made out of the Jello-water from Lake Zrxggrhavkis. Kyle helpfully put his hands gently on Tess' shoulders, supporting her and moving her until she was next to his bed, and then gently encouraging her down into a sitting position. He sat himself on the storage trunk full of his police academy gear and old movies, which was just about the same level as the bed. Took one hand and looked deeply into her eyes.

"Tess, I'm in love with you," he repeated. "I think I have been since, well, since a few weeks after you first moved in here, though I was a complete jackass and never even admitted it to myself until you were gone."

WHAM!! Tess' arm moved like lightning, and for no prissy, open-handed slap either. Her hand had been clenched into a fist and it landed directly on the left side of Kyle's nose. Kyle howled in pain. "HEIIY! What... what was that for!?" he spluttered, scrambling up and groaning. He'd gone flying backwards with the force of Tess' punch, and banged the top of his head against the corner of the old dresser, to add injury to insult and injury.

Some current of sympathy and remorse tugged at Tess' face, but she didn't let it out yet. "For saying that I was like a sister to you while you were 'in love with me the whole time'. I don't care how mixed up you are, for that I get a little payback. Because that's about how much it hurt me to hear those words, I reckon."

The door flew open at that moment and Jim nearly charged in, and caught himself about halfway over the threshold. "Everything... is anything the matter in here?"

Kyle faced him down, the side of his nose now bright red and swollen where Tess had hit him. "Dad, this is between us, alright?? I'll live."

"Umm... um, okay," his father muttered, flustered. "Once you guys are done, go into the kitchen and put some ice on that. You'll thank me tomorrow morning."

"Fine. Bye, Dad!!" Kyle nearly screamed in confusion and embarassment. Jim took the hint and dashed away, managing to close the door on his way.

Kyle oriented once again on Tess, most of whose righteous fury had drained away during the course of the intrusion, and she seemed torn between an odd amusement and pity on Kyle's much-abused head. "I... I hurt you??" Kyle repeated. "But... but you, well, you practically said you felt the same way. I mean, you didn't say it, but the tone in your voice when you said you were disappointed..."

"Huh, I guess I didn't realize I did that good a job of covering it up," Tess admitted. "Well, imagine if the situation were reversed, and some girl who you were crazy about, who had asked you to the prom... (or maybe you asked her and she said yes, if that suits your ego better,) told *you* that you were like a brother to her? Would you pour your heart out and say how much you felt for her, after that??"

"Umm, no, I guess not," Kyle admitted slowly. "So... when did you know? That you... I mean, that you felt that way..."

"When I heard about your supposed one-night stand with Liz," she told him.

"Oh, about that..."

"Don't worry about it, sweetie," she muttered. "It hit me that I was jealous of her, because she had been with you. Even though Max saw the two of you together, and he came to me that night, that didn't matter as much to me. The one I cared about wasn't him -- it was you. That's when I knew. And I started wishing that Liz hadn't interrupted us that night... you know the time I meant? When you said whatever it was about trimming the lamp of wisdom..."

"Oh, right," Kyle muttered, blushing a little. "That."

"Yeah," Tess agreed. "And by the way, I've heard that the actual sex didn't so much happen with Liz. She confessed it to him just before we left. Um... so when did you admit it to yourself? After I was gone??"

"Something like that," he agreed, a little sadly. "Maybe once you told me that you were going." He took a deep breath. "No... I guess it WAS once you were gone... there was no denying that I didn't miss you the same way I would have missed a sister. I was missing the incredible girl who could have been the love of my life." He smiled slightly. "And now you're back here, for good? What was the whole thing about, anyway?"

"Not really my story to tell," she demurred. "You'll have to go see Isabel... and meet somebody new."

"Isabel has someone new??" Kyle replied?? "Oh, god, that's just going to kill Whitman."

"Umm, not quite like that," Tess said, a teasing smile on her face. "You'll understand when you see him... but I hope Alex will be just fine with the news. Now, enough about them. I figure that we've been waiting something like three years, Valenti. Kiss me, and you'd better make it good."

"Okay," Kyle took a deep breath. "Just one word of warning - I'm not sure which way you usually lean your face during a kiss, but this time you'll kinda have to go to your left, my right. Otherwise..." he gestured again to the sore left side of his nose. "There could be badness."

Tess smirked a little. "I really am sorry for that. Want me to try and make it better? I'm still not a healer like Max is, but I got a lot of training on fixing little things during the war."

"Later. This comes first," Kyle said, and gathered her into his arms for a passionate kiss. Tess leaned to her left.

It was perfect.

* * * * * * * * * *

"Wow." Isabel realized that there were people behind her on the stairs, curious to get a look themselves, and stepped forward from the doorway, cradling Lex on her shoulder, and looked around the room. It felt spacious, furnished in more or less the bachelor apartment style... living room, kitchen/dining room, bedroom and study each confined to seperate quadrants. A small space was sealed off with walls... probably a small bathroom. "It's gorgeous mom, and thanks. I'd love it." She turned round, saw Michael watching her, and made a 'so sorry' expression with her face.

Michael shrugged good-naturedly and smiled. Living here would have been cool, no doubt, but it kind of did make more sense for Isabel and Lex, and he wouldn't mind being in the Evans house proper. It was kind of cliche, at any rate, for the good family friend to be living above the garage. "So, umm, I guess that there's a lot of my stuff in the room that you'd kinda like moved out tonight," Isabel continued.

"Umm... no big hurry, but yeah, I think I'd appreciate it," he agreed, as Maria came up beside him and Michael absently circled an arm around her shoulders.

"No sense in putting it off," Isabel decided. "I know that I've got a lot of energy to burn off, so we might as well see how much we can get moved tonight. Umm... I think I'd appreciate anybody's help who's willing to offer it, but no pressure."

There were sounds of vague agreement coming from most of the others, and they headed back down the stairs and towards the main house. "Spealing of stuff left behind," Maria whispered to Michael, blushing, "there's something I have to tell you."

After a moment of silence, Michael prompted her. "Yeah? Umm, go ahead."

"Well, when you left so suddenly and without any warning, the landlord was pretty mad and he was going to throw all of your stuff out before renting the apartmrent out again."

"Pretty much what I expected to happen," Michael replied.

Maria seemed to get even more embarrassed. "Well, I didn't want that to happen, okay? So... So there's about six big boxes full of your junk down in my mom's basement. You can come over sometime and see if you still want any of it."

Michael blinked. "You kept my stuff?"

"Yeah, and I'm feeling a little stupid about it just at the moment, so if you make one smart remark, Spaceboy, I may just torch the whole lot to make myself feel better."

"Why would I make fun of you for this??" Michael asked, gently caressing Maria's chin, persuading her head upwards to meet his. "Why do you feel stupid about it? It's an incredibly thoughtful and sweet thing to have done, especially under the circumstances. *Thank you.*"

Maria stood there in the Evans' back yard for a moment, then reached up on her toes and kissed him lovingly. "Going through your boxes might not be the only thing we do in the basement tomorrow." Then, it struck her that the phrase 'going through your boxes' sounded like it might stretch for a dirty euphemism, and surrendered to nervous giggles.

* * * * * * * * * *

"Oooh, there's a message waiting," Mrs Evans said immediately upon entering the dining room, pointing out the cordless phone, which she hadn't thought to take with her, and a red light on it was blinking.

"Let me take a wild guess," Isabel replied, picking up the phone, tapping out part of a phone number and getting stuck. "Umm... little help? Max, Liz??"

"Oh, umm... seven two three five," Liz replied after a moment, guessing what she was after. "Oh, and you need to use the five oh five prefix for local calls now, since last January."

Isabel sighed and started dialing all over again. "Yeah, Hi Kyle, did you or Tess by any chance just... yeah, we didn't listen to the message, we just got back in and thought we'd try you straight off... Okay. Well, why don't you come over here. We've got a little fetching and carrying to do, many arms make short work, and then if anybody's up to it you can go from here... Alright, see you in a few." She hung up. "Yeah, Tess and Kyle will be here soon. They were wondering if anybody wanted to go grab a bite to eat at the Crashdown or something."

When Tess and Kyle finally made it through the Evans' front door, they were practically both glowing. Kyle took the opportunity to steal a quick kiss from her as he helped Tess off with her coat... just about the moment that Alex and Maria came in sight, and they ooohed and ahhhed incessantly, trying to embarass the two newfound lovebirds... without much luck.

"Guess I don't have to ask how your little reunion we--" Maria broke off as Kyle turned to face her, revealing the still bright red spot on the side of his face. "O- or maybe I do, just a little bit."

"I'm fine," Kyle repeated. "It hardly hurts at all anymore, though the color will probably take a few more hours to go down."

"Alright, then... let's get moving," Alex joked. "Literally. Up this way." He pointed them over to the stairs, which Michael and Max were just descending, each carrying an armload of Isabel-ania.

It really didn't take too long to get everything shifted over... the heavy furniture was neither dear to Isabel or troublesome to Michael's manly sensitivities, and almost all of it had counterparts already inside the garage apartment, and clothes, books, cds, jewelry, and makeup all moved easily enough. Soon the original eight of them, plus one very new individual, were back in the Evans' living room to make plans.

"Well, umm... I think I'm going to call it an early night, settle into my new pad," Isabel admitted. "All of the excitement's started to catch up to me too. Alex, you wanna stay over for a little while?"

He got a big grin on his face. "Oh, very very definitely."

"I'm not ready for tonight to end," Max said. "Crashdown... ehh, I'd like to see the place, but somehow it doesn't seem like a Crashdown night." He thought about that a bit longer. "How about maybe we just take a big walk around, catching up more, figuring things out, talking and talking??" He was aiming that mostly at Liz.

"Hey, sure, I'm in," she admitted. "Anyone else??"

Michael, Maria, Kyle, and Tess all signalled their approval. "By the way, Tess," Isabel said as they were all getting ready to leave. "The three of us were kinduv thinking of starting a college prep study group. GED, SATs, the whole thing. You interested?"

Tess shot a sidelong look at Kyle and blushed. "I... I don't think I'm going to be worrying about college for a little while. Was thinking of finding a job nearby and concentrating on that... and maybe a few other things, for the time being. Umm, is it okay if I tell them, honey?"

Kyle smiled slightly. "Let me. I've informally run by Tess the idea of the two of us moving in together sometime quite soon. The response was very favorable."

"Oh, congratulations," Isabel said, rushing over to hug her friend. "Wow, didn't waste any time on that one, did you Kyle??"

He shrugged, as Max offered his hand for Kyle to shake. "Well, what can I say, when you realize that the right moment is just sitting there in front of you and waiting, what else is there to do but take it?"

"Oh, by the way, I had to ask you guys this before we split up," Michael said to Alex, Liz, and Maria once the congratulations were finished. "Just because you're fancy university sophomores, you don't dress up for the Crash festival anymore??"

Max and Isabel jumped a little in surprise and turned to look at their human friends. In all the excitement, that particular oddity hadn't occured to them. Dressing up in outlandish alien-themed costumes was a rigorous Crash Festival tradition, but the three of them were in quintessentially plain casuals... Maria in cutoffs and a brown T-shirt, Liz in jeans and a black tank top, Alex in a white t-shirt and cargo shorts. Something about the clothes seemed oddly familiar to Max, but he couldn't place it.

"We couldn't think of anything really cool do to this year," Liz admitted. "In the end, Alex came up with the idea to go as three of the hapless victims of 'The deadly spawn of Jupiter.' Really lame I know, but... well -- there you have it."

"Ahh." Max nodded, yes, that was it. He'd actually seen that movie with Liz once... and made out through most of it. "Well, it might not win any prizes, but I have to say I like your outfit," he muttered to her. Liz grinned slightly.

"I won't make the obvious comment on YOUR clothes," Maria said to Michael. The four of them had come out of the ship in the only earth clothes they had... the same ones they'd been wearing when they left. Isabel's black sweater and white pants, Max's blue t-shirt and jeans, Michael's white striped collar shirt and black stonewashes, and Tess' green v-neck shirt and blue denim skirt were all impressed on their memory of that day when the Granilith had taken the hybrids home.

"Yeah, well, we could have tried to come up with something else that wouldn't look out of place, but it didn't really seem worth the effort," Isabel put in. "Not like we've been wearing these the whole time, and they were cleaned just before we landed."

"Okay, we'd better be going," Kyle said, trying to head off the next side discussion. "Probably see you tomorrow, Alex... Isabel." The six of them going on the 'big walk' had almost got ready when Diane Evans came through the front door.

"I manged to find one," she panted, slightly out of breath. "Max, Michael, Alex, could you run over to Mrs Thomas' house... she's across the street and four houses to the left, with the front porch painted white and the house number in green?? I know that Isabel will probably want to have it ready for tonight."

* * * * * * * * * *

"Okay, umm..." Michael said once they had taken care of that last little errand and were starting on the walk, down the Evans' street towards the main road, four in a loose row across the sidewalk, and two bringing up the rear. "Well, Maria, I probably should have asked you this, but when do you have to go back to school??"

"Too soon." Maria's face fell. "I signed up to be a peer advisor this term, and frosh - orientation for the new students - has already begun. I had to borrow some favors to take off for just a few days, but my flight leaves at noon, the day after tomorrow, and I *have* to be on it."

Michael's face fell a little bit. "Well, we'll just have to enjoy that time as much as we can, and maybe I'll find some way to get up to the coast pretty soon and meet up with you." She smiled at that.

"And what about you, Miss Parker?" Max asked in his turn.

"Umm... I guess I'm lucky." Liz had a charming half-smile on her face. "No particular reason to be back in New England until classes start, and that isn't for nearly a week and a half." Max smiled at that.

"So, I kind of gathered that you've already been offered Isabel's old room, Michael?" Tess asked.

"Ummm... uh, yeah, why?? Isn't Jim Valenti letting you crash at the old place?"

"Well, maybe a night or two, but he's not happy about it," Tess replied, her face falling. "Not when he realized that I wouldn't be there as his foster daughter so much as Kyle's new girlfriend."

"Couldn't you be both?" Max quipped.

"Not in his family, apparently," Kyle sighed. "I can't say I'm really surprised, which is why I brought up the idea of us getting an apartment of our own. But that'll take time... I don't suppose either of you girls might be persuaded to take in a stray for a few weeks?" Tess reached up and pinched his ear. "A... a, uh, a good friend, I mean? Oww, quit it Tess, c'mon!!" He nudged with an elbow towards her sensitive ribs, and Tess let him go.

"Uhh... well, I'd like to, I really would, but we've never really had an excess of space," Liz said. "And my parents have kind of expanded their stuff since I've been in Cambridge all year, so..."

"It's okay, it's okay," Tess assured her. "Might have been a little weird, um, rooming with you anyway. Maria?"

"Errr... could work, I'll ask my mom," she promised. "Or maybe the Whitmans... I know that they've been keeping in touch with Max and Isabel's parents, hoping that you'd be all coming back. They have plenty of space, because of Alex's two older brothers, and I don't think they'd get hung up about having a girl around, given that both you and Alex are involved with other people."

"Okay, I'll make sure to ask him," Tess said. "Thanks."

"No problem. Do you want me to call my mom now?" Maria already had her cell out.

"Umm... yes, please, if you wouldn't mind!! That would be great, I'd kind of like to get this settled so I don't need to worry about breaking into somebody's car to have somewhere to sleep." Tess laughed, and Maria kissed Michael on the cheek and dropped behind the rest of them to make the call.

"So, umm... you mentioned something about winning the war, and that everything back home is peachy," Liz said to Max after a moment. "I... I have a hard time believing that it was that easy, somehow."

"It wasn't," Max confirmed, nodding slightly. "I'll tell you more about it later, but... well, we just kind of happened to come to the right place at the right time, for one thing. People were looking for the right moment to turn on Kivar... even his own people. And we showed up, with the Granilith... everything started before we were even ready for it. Never really fun being through a war, but..." he sighed. "Later, 'kay?"

"Oh, sure," Liz said. "I guess I was just looking for a little reassurance that..."

"It's over," Michael assured her. "Kivar is dead, a lot of his hardliners too. A great-nephew of Zan and Vilandra has been crowned king, and he's working to transfer power peaceably to an elected assembly and council, yadda yadda yadda. Good enough?"

Liz smiled sheepishly. "For tonight, yeah."

"Okay, the word is in," Maria said, stepping back up to join the others. "Tess, the hide-a-bed in our rec room will be available for at least a week if you want it."

Tess smiled. "Thanks."

"No problem."

"Okay, I've gotta ask," Max said. "Just what is this long story about Lonnie and Rath?"

"Well, it wasn't something that happened to us," Liz admitted. "We've pieced together parts of it from the news reports, and so on. Basically, they tried to rob a Fort Knox truck, and the FBI got on their ass and just wouldn't give up. Rath was in their car when it got blown up, and Lonnie was shot nine times in front of witnesses... the conspiracy theorists had a field day trying to explain how her body disintegrated into dust, but I don't think anybody actually said that she was an alien hybrid... or even an alien."

"Umm... well, I guess that's something of a relief," Tess agreed. There was a long moment of just walking. "Okay, I have to say that I'm hungry. Anywhere good to eat within a few minutes on foot?"

* * * * * * * * * *

"Whatcha think, Lex?" Isabel asked, bending down a little and looking at her son. "You like that?? Hmmm... ooh, are you trying to climb out? Nah, you're just exploring... yeah, I think you like it here, huh?" She smiled, and looked over at Alex, who also had eyes only for little Lex, who had his little hands around the sides of the crib that Diane had gotten from Mrs Thomas.

"Yeah, I think he does," Alex agreed with a smile. "I think you like it here too."

"For the moment... as long as you're here with me," Isabel ageed, taking his hand. After a moment they crept back to the couch, still both watching the baby as he continued to examine the new bed. "I don't think I'll be happy anywhere unless I'm near you... and it looks like that means the City of Angels sometime soon, huh?"

"I... I guess so," Alex admitted, stroking the side of her face. "Frankly... everything has changed, and I'm not sure if I want to stay at school. I mean, when I left the house today, I was just some twenty-year old kid going out for a bit of fun with his friends before classes started. And now... well, I'm a young father! That kind of says it all, about how my priorities are in the process of shifting... do you understand that?"

"Well, yeah, of course I do," she told him. "But... but I think staying in LA is the right thing for you to do. I can hear it in your voice where you talk about it... you're having a blast and learning so much. I promise you... you can be a father and go to university at the same time... we'll work it all out." She smiled. "I want to go to college and be a mother at the same time too, though I realize it's not going to be easy."

"No, maybe it's not," Alex admitted, "but I believe you that you'll find some way to make it work." And he leaned over and kissed her, which went on for a little while, as Lex peered over at his mommy curiously.

"So, umm..." Isabel brushed her hair back. "I guess it's past time that I asked the big question: How long can you stay in Roswell before having to go back to California?"

"Umm, let's see. almost a week," Alex told her with a smile. "I think. Haven't actually locked in my plane ticket yet, but assuming I can get a seat for something leaving Thursday morning, I should be fine."

"Almost a week," Isabel repeated, grateful that it was that long. "Okay. Well... tomorrow we should visit with *your* parents I guess... they're Lex's grandparents as well, after all. They deserve to meet him,"

"Uhh, yeah, of course," he agreed. "Boy, I feel a little silly that I didn't think of that."

"It's okay," she assured him. "Well, there's a lot that I want to do together in that almost-week, and probably a few things that we'll have to take care of seperately." She yawned. "And it's getting late, so here's another big question. Do you want to stay here with me tonight??"

Alex blinked, and looked over at the bed on the other side of the room. It had been freshly made with clean sheets while Isabel's stuff was being moved into the bachelorette apartment, (as it were,) and was double-sized. Plenty of room for the two of them, especially since they knew they liked each other's company. "Umm... stay here, to sleep, or stay here..."

"Entirely up to you," Isabel admitted. "I'm not feeling any particularly great urge to jump your bones at the moment, but I suspect that if we started to fool around it wouldn't take long to get to that point. I know, on the other hand..." she sighed a little, "that I do want to go to sleep pretty soon, and I think that I'd sleep better with your arm around me."

Alex smiled. "That's a really good answer, you know. Umm... okay, yeah, let's take it slow. I'd love to sleep with you tonight. But... I should probably call my parents and let them know I'll be out all night, so they won't worry. I don't think they'll insist on getting any details just at the moment. Let's see, umm..." He had got up and walked over to one of the chairs at the kitchen table, on which he had hung his jacket. From inside the jacket pocket he pulled a cell phone... which immediately started to ring! Startled, he looked at the display - 'Liz calling...' and answered it. "Hey, Parker, what's up??"

"Umm, hi, this is Tess actually," another voice replied. "Liz just let me borrow her phone. Umm... I was just wondering... there are kind of personal issues with me staying with Jim and Kyle Valenti at this point, and Maria mentioned that your parents have some space for a... err -- I realize this is a huge imposition, but..."

"Tess," Alex replied. "I'd be glad to ask my parents if you can stay with us, but it might be a little awkward for tonight, because... because I'm not planning on going home tonight."

"Ohh... gotit," she replied quickly. "I think I understand. No problem, guess it's the DeLuca hideacouch then. Thanks anyway... I'll call you again tomorrow maybe?"

"Sure, Tess, no problem," he told her.

"Thank you. Bye."

"Bye." She hung up on the call.

"That was Tess?" Isabel called out to him. "She wanted to stay at... hmm." She fell silent, apparently starting to realize the potential problems. Alex put his fingers to his lips in a request for the quiet to continue and phoned his house, quickly let his mother know that he'd be staying overnight at a friends' house and not to worry, and that he'd have a lot of news to tell them about the next day. As he talked, he quietly wandered back to the couch and joined the girl he loved again.

"So, umm... sleeping things?" he asked softly.

Isabel laughed. "I have all kinds of girly pajamas... two years old, but if they don't fit me I can make some quick adjustments. For you..." She shrugged. "Umm, whatever you're comfortable in I guess. One of us can go in to borrow something quickly from Max if you want... I'm not going to be embarassed about having you here, but..." She shrugged.

Alex smiled. "I guess I can leave my shirt on, and undershorts. Nothing fancy, but it'll do."

"Perfection." And they kissed again, long and sweet. When she pulled back, Alex realized his fingers were tangled in Isabel's hair, or what was left of her hair.

"By the way... not to make a judgement or anything," he whispered, his fingers brushing through the many three-inch long blonde strands. "but I was wondering if there was a reason for the short haircuts." None of the foursome had returned to earth with particularly long hair.

"Ehh," Isabel shrugged, and stood up. "War and space travel -- there's a lot of wearing helmets necessary. Short hair is just more convenient. So, umm... do you want me to change, err, seperately, or..."

"No, I don't think we need to be modest with each other about that," Alex admitted, getting up himself and unfastening his shorts. "That is, if you don't mind."

She pulled off her sweater. "Works for me."

TO BE CONTINUED...

[Chrisken]

Part Two

"Okay, let's see," Michael mumbled, turning his mind to the problem. "Max and I don't really need to go in either car, since we're just going to have to end up right back here anyway. So... um, Kyle, you can take Maria and Tess over to the DeLuca's before going home, and Liz, I guess you can go straight back to the Crash."

Liz smiled and grabbed Max's hand. "Yeah, I can... but not just yet. Dibs on the back yard!" Max just smiled as she led him down the narrow path between the Evans house and its southern neighbor.

"Umm, yeah," Maria agreed. "I'd like a moment for private goodnight too, umm..." After looking around, back and forth, she gestured up the street, and Michael nodded. "You guys can find some way to keep yourselves busy, I'm sure," Maria teased Kyle and Tess.

"So, um... I'll call you after breakfast tomorrow?" Michael asked Maria, stroking her arm softly, once they'd moved off far enough to have some sense of privacy.

"Nah," Maria shook her head, and laughed a little at Michael's expression. She kissed him, putting all the impatient feeling she sensed inside her into it. "No, we don't have time for breakfast apart and phone games. I will be back here, dear spaceboy, very early tomorrow morning. We can go to breakfast together, and then to look through those things of yours, or whatever else. But I don't mean to let you get far out of my sight all day."

Michael grinned at that. "Sounds good, yeah." He looked around, and his smile kind of faded into a neutral expression, which Maria noticed.

"You're thinking about something... something you don't want to ask me about," she guessed.

"Um... actually yeah, or pretty much. Wondering about saying it anyway," he said.

"Okay then, out with it."

"Um, well... all of this seems to be playing out almost too smoothly. We came back looking for you guys, but... well, considering how we left, I didn't really expect that any of us would have been sitting around waiting for the grand return of the Pod squad. And... well, I don't know if you were or not. But you don't seem to have made any other arrangements, or..."

Maria finally lost control of a spurt of laughter. "Michael, honey, are you trying to ask me if I'm dating somebody else??"

"Umm... was doing everything I could to avoid putting it in those terms," Michael explained, "but that's the meat of it, yeah." He hung his head a little, mightily humiliated.

"Okay, well then here's my answer," Maria replied, evenly and looking straight at him. "No, no boyfriend. One blind date, and a handful of strangers I've firted with since you've been gone, but I guess deep down I knew that my heart was spoken for. And though the exact details aren't mine to tell, Liz, Kyle and Alex weren't dating anybody either... until you showed up. Does that help put your mind at ease?"

"A little," he admitted. "Though I have to admit, I'm wondering how many sticks you needed to use to beat the guys of New York City away, looking as good as you do... and now I'm done wondering. Would rather just focus on you and me, not spare any thought for anybody else in the whole galaxy."

"Good," Maria replied with a smile, and it was only about a second before Michael swept her off her feet into a passionate kiss.

* * * * * * * * * *

"So, is it okay if I call as soon as I get up tomorrow morning?" Liz whispered, her lips moving only a hair's breadth away from Max's own. "I know that sounds like a bit much, but I've spent too long without hearing your voice, and I don't want to have to wait again."

Max smiled bittersweetly as he let his lips trace and tease over the curve of Liz's cute little chin. "As much as I'd like to say yes to such an entreaty, maybe it's better not. I've crossed seven hundred light years in the past five days, and even though we had the ship on a twenty-four hour cycle, we couldn't tell what time it would be in Roswell when we landed, and anyway I couldn't sleep once we were less than a day's flight away, so, umm..."

"You're going to have the mother of all cases of space lag," Liz finished, "and if you're going to be pleasant company at all over the next week, it might be better for you to sleep yourself out."

"Umm..." Max made 'apologetic face.' "Yeah, I kind of think so. You're not too disappointed?"

"Umm... I don't think so, no," Liz agreed, and kissed him to prove it. "Do what you have to do, and call *me* once you're awake and feel like you can stay that way." She grinned and made a kissing motion again, without actually bringing her lips in contact with him.

"I will," Max agreed, and sighed in contentment. "It's a little funny, isn't it? I mean, we weren't really together when I left, and we didn't have a big and dramatic scene with baring our feelings like I gather Tess and Kyle did. It's almost like we settled everything between us with an unspoken understanding... at least for tonight."

Liz thought about that... of how she had felt so confused and bereft after seeing Max and Tess kiss at the dance... how sure she'd been that they would fall in love again after they got home. "Yeah, I guess you're right. But then, that's happened to us before."

Max let confusion take over his face. "It has??"

She shook her head at him. "March the second, two thousand. Remember yet?"

For a few seconds, Max allowed it to be obvious that he wasn't placing the reference. Then... "that night I kissed you in the Crashdown back room, after you spilled the strawberries?"

Liz nodded. "We'd been apart since before christmas, but that night just sort of happened and with a poof, we were back together. Never settled any of the issues or arguments with words... at least, not until much later."

Max smiled at the thought. "I was just glas that you weren't slamming doors in my face or anything."

Liz nodded, still half lost in memory. "Well, there is one thing I do have to tell you, this time, but it'll have to wait for tommorow." She put her lips to Max's for one last kiss, which went on much longer than she had expected and got more intense and inventive as it went. When the two dreamers finally seperated again, Liz's hair was wildly mussed and each of their clothes were a little askew around the edges.

"Yeah," Max answered the expression on Liz's face. "We'd better call it a night now or neither of us will get much sleep." Liz smiled at the way Max put that, touched her hand to his for a moment, and walked back out to the front of the house. Max shrugged and followed her.

When they got back around front, Michael and Maria could as yet be seen nowhere. Kyle and Tess were locked together in a passionate embrace, she leaning her bottom against the side of Kyle's car and apparently licking his earlobe. Kyle very definitely had one hand up under Tess' shirt.

Giggling, Liz whispered to Max, "now, why didn't WE think of that?!"

Taking a moment to reply, Max admitted, "well, *I* did." Liz turned to stare at him, and Max felt obliged to elaborate. "I thought it was still too soon and you'd slap me if I tried."

Liz rolled her eyes. "There's such a thing as asking."

"Yeah, but..." Max's face screwed up a little. "I've never figured out the way of asking something like that without sounding like a total dork."

Liz took a long moment to react, and then smiled, patting his arm. "Don't worry... I'll teach you."

Soon after that, Tess and Kyle finished the floor show, and Michael and Maria emerged from the shadows of the street lights. A few last goodbyes were said, out loud, and Kyle, Tess, and Maria started to pack themselves into Kyle's car. Liz sighed, waved 'til tomorrow' to Max, and got behind the wheel of her own mid-sedan. Feeling very lonely, she followed Kyle as long as he was heading into the center of town.

* * * * * * * * * *

Alex drifted back to the waking world carrying vague memories of a truly bizarre dream, in which he was helping Bert & Ernie search his Granpa Madigan's old basement, (the one from the house in Oakland that he and Grandma had moved out of when Alex was fifteen,) for a cassette tape with important information about a James Bond mission on it. Until Commander Data and Lieutenant Worf had shown up, that was, and things had gotten REALLY weird.

He didn't think of anything particularly for several minutes, just getting used to consciousness again. He was lying behind Isabel, his right arm still draped over her midsection like she said she wanted it when they went to bed, and the other arm lying a little awkwardly on the bed between their bodies. His face was so close to her head that his cheek was pressing against the back and side of her neck, and Isabel's soft and tempting bottom was so close to his lap that eery so often he could feel the fabric of her pajamas brush against his undershorts, but nothing more.

As the seconds ticked by, it occured to Alex that he was... er, excited. Why wouldn't he be? Isabel's return had been enough to turn his world around. They had a son together now, and Iz had made it clear that she wanted to be with him again. Not for the sake of Lex... she'd shown that she was quite capable of taking care of him herself. Oh, of course, she wanted father and son to be a part of each others' lives, knowing how much it would enrish each of them. But somehow Alex knew for sure, fundamentally Isaebl had returned to him for her own sake. He'd read that much in her eyes.

She still loved him. She'd wanted to be by his side every day that they'd been seperated... just as much as Alex himself had wished it, thinking that it would never happen. And right now, Alex was feeling -- affectionate, in more than just a simple, passive way. But Isabel was still sound asleep.

For a long moment he tried to convince himself to just let this girl he loved so much sleep herself out... who could tell how much she needed her rest, especially with little Lex still depending on her above anyone else. But Alex just couldn't resist the temptation. Crawling up a little, he ran his fingers again through her short blonde hair, and kissed the smooth, creamy skin just below her right ear, where the extreme corner of her jaw met the neck.

Isabel let out a low, soft sound like a cross between a moan and a sigh, and the smile on her peaceful face got a little bit more pronounced, but there was no real sign that she was waking up. Grinning to himself, Alex decided to take his plan a little further at least.

After considering for a moment, he smoothed down the collor of Isabel's PJs, folding the fabric back so that it would stay out of his way. Then, as tenderly and softly as possible, he moved in towards Isabel's neck, plying the soft, sensitive flesh with sweet kisses, delicate fingertip caresses, and a few small, playful licking motions.

Izzie groaned again, a louder sound with a slightly plaintive whine at the end... because Alex had broken off his teasing as soon as the sound emerged from her, watching her face intently He leaned over her to kiss her cheek, her forehead, his fingers playing at a particular spot on her exposed ear that he hadn't even known about before Isabel had left, more was the pity.

That did it. Isabel's eyes popped open all of a sudden, and she twisted her upper body around on the bed to get a better look at his face. "Well... I have to say, that's a mighty delightful way to be woken up. Any chance I could get alarm clock service like this on a regular basis?" The smile she shot him was merry and carefree.

Alex laughed, enjoying the joke. "Maybe might be better to leave it for, umm, special occasions."

She nodded and stayed silent for a moment, reading quite a bit off his eyes and his face. Then all of a sudden, she was in action, wrapping her arms around the middle of his chest, pulling him gently but surely downwards, meeting him somewhere in the middle for a lusty french kiss, and twisting them both around so that Alex ended up lying on his back over by his side of the bed, his head a little askew on the pillow.

But neither of them cared, because Isabel was right on top of him, practically all of her body pushing itself into his desperately as they continued to hungrily suck the passion out of each other's mouths, back and forth. Alex ran his fingers through her hair delightedly for about a moment and a half, and then tried to get his fingers down to the neck of Isabel's pajama top and start undoing those tiny little buttons, knowing that she would welcome the effort.

He managed to undo two of the little fasteners before their erratic motion, and the fast that the next button was into territory that Isabel was still practically grinding against him, defeated his efforts. A few excited seconds later, though, Isabel got the message, considered alternatives quickly, and broke off the kiss with one parting sweep of her tongue along the lower side of Alex's upper lip. She spun back off him, landing on her own back, and quickly sat up, her fingers going to the open neck of the pajama top and continuing where Alex left off.

"You do you," she said with a teasing smile. "A little less fun that way I know, but quicker, and somehow I think we're both in a hurry."

"Ummm..." Alex took a moment to take her meaning, (and stop staring at the impressive cleavage that Isabel was revealing more and more of,) but then he caught the point, shucked the T-shirt he was wearing off in about two seconds, and scrambled his butt off of the bed, trying to yank his boxer shorts off without doing any damage to tender bits. Isabel laughed softly to herself as she watched him stick his legs right up into the air, all of his weight on the upper part of his back.

Isabel had gotten rid of her own clothes just as quickly, if not quite as frantically. She hadn't been wearing underthings under the silky pajamas, and Alex was staring with a kind of hunger at every inch of skin that was revealed down her legs, until she had finally pulled the sleeping pants off of her feet. For a moment, she seemed nervous, and Alex grinned and leapt at the chance to initiate things for once, scrambling forward, kissing Isabel back equal measure in return for earlier, letting his fingers and hands get reacquainted with her naked body, not hitting any of the quintessential tender zones, but stroking his lovers' shoulder, her back, the side of her waist, and the back of her upper arm. Isabel grinned back at him through their clinched lips and pushed the envelope, (just like always,) letting one hand slip down the lean muscles of his back and pinch lovingly at Alex's rear end.

He yelped a bit with surprise at that, (having realized that she was making a move for the butt, but somehow expecting that she'd try a gentler caress first,) and the exclamation effectively disintegrated the kiss that both of them had been sharing. "So, how do you want to do this??" she asked him teasingly. It was obvious that goosing him hadn't done anything to flag Alex's excitement about the proceedings.

"Umm... not sure I care, do you have any ideas?" he replied honestly. "I, I just... there were times when I thought I'd dreamed it, actually," he blurted out suddenly. "That I'd never seen you... seen you literally without your defenses up, like this. That we'd never... never made love. Because... well, because it was so amazing for me, and I guess I couldn't accept that you could feel that and still... and still leave. And I didn't want to think that you HADN'T felt what I felt."

Isabel shook her head a little. It seemed on some level like an odd moment for Alex to be telling her this, but she understood why he'd felt the need. "I... I think I did," she whispered. "You... you understand the why a bit better now, right??"

"Yeah, of course," he admitted. "I didn't mean to imply that, just... it's funny, I guess. How my heart could confuse me to the point of doubting something like that, which I definitely have vivid memories of." He shrugged. "Well, umm..."

Isabel smiled. "Time to refresh the memories." And she leaned closer, (struck by the thought that her long hair, if she still had it, would have been just brushing Alex's shoulder in that pose,) and her hands made their way to the stiff rod at his crotch, teasing and stroking it...

And little Lex chose that moment to wake up and make his presence known with an energetic little scream. Isabel's eyes met Alex's, and there was disappointment, resignation, love, and tenderness in both of their faces.

"He gets priority," Alex pointed out. "We can pick this up later."

"But the moment will get lost," she said, and sighed, and got up off the bed anyway. Lex didn't seem to notice that his mommy wasn't wearing anything, and he quieted down as soon as he could see her face. She picked him up and checked the diaper.

"Did he sleep through the night?" Alex asked idly, lying back and stretching out a hand to retrieve his boxers.

"No, I got up around two thirty. He wasn't hungry, so I just carried him around for a little bit, and sang to him in the bathroom. You probably slept through it."

"Actually, now that you mention it, it does sound familiar, though only fuzzily," Alex admitted. "Sorry I didn't wake up more myself."

"Why, at least this way one of us got a full night's sleep," Isabel shot back. She had started to organize a changing operation on the table. "Of course, I won't object to you taking some of the 2 am checks and feedings and whatnot, but since you just met Lex yesterday I think you have a bit of a grace period for that."

Alex smiled. "Actually, a part of me feels like I can't wait," he told her, "And yes, there's a much smaller part of me that kinda wants to run screaming, but he hasn't yet, so I think that counts for something."

"As long as all of you doesn't run, then I'm in heaven," Isabel assured him. "And, speaking of... want to pick up a few angel points??"

"Umm..." it took Alex a few moments to parse out that this was a cute way of testing the waters before asking a favor. "Pretty sure I'm up for it, yeah."

"Get dressed, go into the house, and start scrounging up breakfast?? We forgot to do anything about stocking the fridge or kitchen shelves in here last night, and I am *starving.* Lex and I will be along in ten or fifteen, but I'd just love for there to be waffles and eggs all ready when I get there."

Alex smiled, shrugged back into his shirt, and headed over to where his shorts from yesterday had been folded on top of Isabel's dresser. (She'd done the folding with a smile on her face.) Before leaving, he went over to Isabel, kissed her on the cheek again, and waved bye-bye to Lex with three fingers.

"Wave bye to Daddy?" Isabel prompted, grinning. "You'll see him again in a few minutes, but wave bye-bye anyway." Lex made a swinging gesture with one of his arms that looked like it just might count. Alex's smile was still glowing as he trotted down the apartment stairs.

Breakfast was already a going endeavour when Alex got into the Evans kitchen, with Max and his mother sharing the cooking duties. Michael had apparently already been dragged off by Maria for the only full day that they could spend together before she got back to New York. Eggs were already frying and pancake batter mixed, so Alex occupied himself getting the waffle iron out of its box and starting to heat its cooking plates up.

Not too long after the first waffles were cooling on a big serving platter and Alex had poured the second batch of batter into the iron, he heard footsteps outside and a door opening. He turned toward the back kitchen entrance, but something about that wasn't quite right and it took him a moment to figure out why. Then he realized that the sound was actually coming from the other side of the house, the front door and by now the vestibule. Did that make sense?? Maybe Isabel had wanted to show Lex Gramma Di's front yard, since he probably hadn't had a chance to see it by daylight the day before.

Alex checked that the waffle iron would be okay for a few minutes and dashed off towards the living room. "Sweetheart, you're right on time... the eggs and waffles are waiting for you..."

He broke off at that point, because there was no sign of Isabel or Lex, and Max and Liz were sharing a good morning hug in the doorway between the vestibule and the living room. "Not to needlessly state the obvious, but I believe that she's *my* sweetheart. Unless, err, the two of you have something that you need to tell me?" He was grinning, obviously not serious about that last bit.

"No, Alex, I'm not Isabel," Liz said even more superfluously. "But eggs sound great... and did anyone think to make pancakes and bacon??"

"Like I'd forget," Max shot back. "The first batch of bacon has a minute or to before it's ready, and the pancakes are hot off the griddle. Oh, also, it seems that my mom has a loaf of that fresh homestyle bread that you like to make thick slices of toast out of.

The headed towards the kitchen, all three of them chatting and joking with each other. Isabel and Lex showed up just around when the rest of them started to eat, (though nobody really stayed sitting down to eat, everyone was running around thinking of delicious new things to prepare, and quite a lot was actually consumed from plates carried by people who were standing up.)

To Alex, it seemed almost as if the past two years plus, and all of their pain and frustration, had never happened. But moreso, because something like this breakfast with the five of them, had never happened even things had been doing well between him and Isabel. (At least, something like it had never happened to *him*, and that was a bit of a sore point, but he was more than happy to let it go now. Deep in his heart Alex knew that he'd never be left out of the good times again.)

Isabel grinned as she sat, finished the very last bite of her fifth waffle, (topped with freshly whipped cream and tabasco,) and stretched a little. "Umm... this may sound a little sudden, but could you watch Lex for me for a little while, Max?? He kind of woke up at the wrong time and... interrupted something that I'd like to get back to." She shot a meaningful look over at Alex.

Neither the glance nor the likely meaning of it escaped Max, but he didn't say so out loud. "Sure, of course." Max adored his little nephew, of course -- he had nearly from the beginning, definitely since before the little guy had been born. For the first few weeks or so after the four of them arrived back on Antar, he had resented the baby a little for pulling him away from so much that he loved on Earth, but after connecting to Isabel for the second or third time to check on the baby's progress breathing native, untainted air his affection had grown beyond any such possible checks on it, and he cherished Lex as much, or maybe more, than he would a baby child of his own.

"Thanks," Isabel made as if to get up, and then realized that Alex was still hurrying to finish his plateful of sausages and scrambled eggs on toast. **Don't rush so much darling, you might choke yourself.** It was just a stray thought, not something that she felt comfortable saying out loud in front of her mom and Liz. Maybe she wouldn't have said it out loud to him even if they'd been alone, for fear of sounding like a bit of a nag.

But Alex shook himself, stopping literally in mid-chew, and looked straight at her, blinking two times. He carefully swallowed a bit of the food in his mouth, and got a look of odd concentration on his face. After a moment of that he shrugged, started to chew again, more slowly.

What had that all been about? Had Alex been able to tell that she was... to overhear her thought?? If so, how?? It was certainly nothing that had ever happened to them... to any of them before. And why about something so trivial? If Isabel was right that Alex had heard her mental words, then that almost certainly meant that he had been trying to concentrate and send a mental reply to her, but if so that hadn't worked. She hadn't heard anything.

Max and the others, meanwhile, had been oblivious to this level of byplay, and he turned to Liz with a smile. "Keep me company for nephew-sitting?"

Liz grinned back. "Thought you'd never ask, uncle Maxxie."

Breakfast was wrapping up at this point, and Isabel crossed over to Alex and linked her arm into his proprietarily. Mrs Evans insisted that no-one was to help her clear away the dishes, and Max took Lex and Liz into the living room. Alex and Isabel were back up next to her bed above the garage in what felt like an instant.

"Okay, I have to admit that you're right, that particular moment we were in the middle of has fled quite away," Alex said, kissing her softly on the lips, "but I want you as much as ever, and I think I know what I want to do about it now. Trust me?"

"Always and forever," she shot back, and Alex stepped closer to her. After only a moment, he brought both of his hands to the hem hanging about an inch away from her waist. All of a sudden something occurred to him about the clothes she was wearing... yes, she had all of her old wardrobe to draw from, and apparently alien tailoring capabilities. But Alex could NEVER remember seeing Isabel wearing clothes like these in all the years he'd known her or known of her... a simple summery T-shirt in a light peachy-pink color, and blue-jean cutoffs that stretched about a third of the way down her tanned and lovely thighs. Isabel Evans had always maintained a bit of style and flair before, as opposed to these plain and homey clothes... (not that Alex was complaining at all, he wasn't much for fancy dressing himself, and thought that she looked just great with a simple look like this.) Had she made more radical changes to her old clothes than he'd been expecting?? The cutoffs could have been made from longer jeans, but the shirt... had she completely changed the style and color of something else, maybe something cotton if she'd had it?

"Umm, are you going to take it off or just stand there with your eyes almost closed??" she teased him.

Alex laughed back. "Yeah, sorry. Just kinda got lost in a weird train of thought." Without wasting any time, he pulled off the shirt, revealing a simple black bra holding Isabel's amazing breasts in just the most alluring position possible, and playfully he rubbed one of the cups just where a tiny point was trying to press through. Isabel groaned and her body shook a little.

Moving on, Alex continued to unsnap the cutoffs and persuade them downwards, (taking an opportunity to quickly cup, stroke, and caress her ass and hips through the denim material. Then he bent down and completely unlaced the well-worn sneakers she had put on, before getting back up and staring into her eyes.

"I appreciate the thought," she told him, "but either get on with it or let me do you!"

"Alright then, undress me," he replied. Isabel's eyebrows shot up at the imperative phrasing, but she wasted no time at all in ridding him of his t-shirt, shorts, and boxers, indulging in only a few teases and rubs of his flesh along the way. (Alex hadn't worn any shoes or socks into the house and back, a detail he didn't think had been lost on Isabel's mom or on Max... but he didn't really care. Like Isabel, he didn't want to hide the fact that they had spent the night together, though exactly what had or hadn't happened in the night wasn't anyone else's business.)

Alex took the lead again at this point, opening the front clasp of Izzie's bra and starting to tease and caress her sensitive spots. **Oh yeah, you know I like that,** her voice came into his head as Alex started to lick at the textured brown flesh surrounding one of her noble and impressive peaks.

Okay, that was twice now. How was she doing it? Alex moved downward, kissing Isabel's sleek midriff, and his hands stroking and softly tickling around her behind and thighs. **Lie down on the bed and beg me for it -- out loud.** He hadn't meant to send that thought... it was just something that happened to come out.

There was a tensing in her body, and when Alex craned his head back up he could see Isabel looking down at him as he squatted. Without a word she stepped back and let her body fall down onto the mattress, scrambling up a ways after a second so that her feet and lower calves weren't hanging over the edge. Alex stood up and came a step closer himself, wondering what, if anything, she would say.

"Please, lover, stop teasing me like this," she whispered, so quietly at first that Alex could barely make it out. "I'm hot and I think you're ready, so we don't really need any more foreplay. And I can't help but notice that there's one piece of my clothing that you haven't even made a move to take away, and it's kinduv the most important one of all. You're not trying to keep my pussy all wrapped up and out of sight, are you Alex?? I don't think so, at least not for long... you like her too much. I remember that well."

"My pussy hasn't had much attention for too long, Alex, and she misses your johnson, and your clever lips and your talented fingers. I don't care how you want to do me, but please, just do me now, stud! Do I have to beg you even more??"

Alex shook his head. "No, I think that'll be enough." He sat on the bed next to her, and she shifted to the side a little... not trying to get away but making room for her. Alex stretched out a little more, running one hand through her hair, across her cheek, over her full, proud breasts, and down the curve of her provocative right hip.

"Now, let's see," he teased her, grinning. "How do I want you??"

* * * * * * * * * *

Liz smiled as Max watched Lex crawl slowly across the living room rug. "So, how're you feeling? Any sign of space lag yet?"

"Actually, not so much," he admitted. "Sleeping in my old bed was very restorative. Also, well, I've picked up a few energy regeneration tricks lately, and they can help us get by on a lot less sleep." He paused a moment. "I hope you're not upset that I didn't let you call me this morning."

"Oh, no," she assured him. "You probably got me moving more quickly than I would have done myself, to tell the truth." She paused a moment. "I let my parents know that you're back in town, by the way... not too sure that my dad is happy that I'm getting back involved with a teenage runaway but, well, he's just going to have to learn to live with it. My mom's happy that I found you again I think... she still remembers how emotionally wrecked I was when you left."

Max smiled faintly. "Ohh... there was that thing that you said last night you still had to tell me. Is this an okay time?"

Liz jumped a little and looked around... Lex was happily exploring the legs of the Evans' coffee table, and Mrs Evans was singing as she worked in the kitchen, probably washing dishes. "Umm... not quite what I was expecting, but I guess so. Umm, okay so -- the year before you left. Kyle incident. I know that I told you we never really slept together, but before you left I still couldn't explain why... why I was trying to make you think that I had."

Max paused a moment. "No, you didn't. I kind of gathered that it didn't need to be said. You thought that Tess was my destiny, that being with her was what was best for me even though I didn't think so myself, and you loved me enough to let you go. I don't blame you for that... it was an incredibly noble gesture to make, even though things have turned out a little differently."

"Okay, that's part of the truth pretty much," Liz admitted. "But certainly not all of it. Did it never strike you that something must have changed, for me to suddenly get so... so proactive about you and Tess, that week? For weeks after I got back from my Florida summer, I hadn't been letting you in, yeah, but I hadn't been butting my nose into your life either. It might even be argued that I was visibly weakening before your persuasions." Max nodded, a half smile on his face.

"And then, all in a row... I set Tess up to meet you by moonlight, apparently by chance, armed with a low-cut black top, a book of Steinbeck and a little dangerous knowledge about the problems we'd been having. I very insistently refused your ticket for Gomez. I come to your room and scream at you that I didn't want to die for your sake, convienently forgetting to mention how you'd nearly died because you saved my life."

"And then... the whole Kyle thing itself. Given that I'd faked the whole thing... did you wonder how I knew that you'd come to visit me at exactly the right time to make that work?? If you didn't see us, the whole thing would be for nothing, and if Kyle and I were lying there with nothing on for more than an hour or so, we'd probably get found by my parents first, which was counterproductive."

Suddenly realizing how much she'd talked without a response from Max, (and how loud and excited she'd been getting,) Liz suddenly clamped her mouth shut and shot a slightly mortified look silently over at him. Max counted to three in his head, and opened his mouth. "Yeah, I, uhh... at least a few of those points occured to me, actually. Didn't come up with an answer for any of them."

"Alright, then," Liz replied again, her mental volume knob turned back down. "The answer starts with the fact that, well, you came back to me. Not 'you' you, but a future you... a Max Evans who had gotten married to Liz Parker, and... and been caught up in the middle of a disaster in the future. Someone... someone he knew had figured out how to use the Granilith for time travel, and he came back to 'fix the past.'"

Max shook his head, stunned by the enormity of the concept. "A future me? Umm... go on. How did you know that he was for real?"

"Because he predicted something that you did, moments before you did it. Because he remembered... you know that night when you sang mariachi from beneath my balcony, and threw the white roses up for me to catch??"

"Umm... yeah, actually. He... he told you that I'd do that?" Max was blushing at the memory

Liz nodded. "That was what convinced me. He told me that... that in his timeline, I'd said no to Gomez, but you came to my room that night and we... we made love. A little while later, Tess found out that we were back together, and ran away from Roswell, never to be seen again. I could see that it was breaking Future Max's heart to even say it, but he argued that Tess had been necessary, crucial in a way that nobody and nothing else could replace, and that he needed her to stay part of the group to stave off this always-vague invasion. That the only way to keep Tess around was to get you to fall out of love with me."

"That..." Max tried to swallow, and had to repeat the motion nearly six times before the ugly lumpy feeling at the back of his mouth went away. "That makes a certain kind of strange sense, considering what's happened to us since then. But... oh my god, it must have been so horrible for you. He said that we'd gotten married?"

"Yeah," Liz agreed. "We ran away and went to an Elvis chapel in Vegas when we were nineteen. Met up with all of our friends for a party halfway back home... somewhere near Phoenix he said, and danced all night. 'I shall believe' became our... I mean, became their song I guess."

Max nodded and stayed silent for nearly a minute more, though there was something in the look on her face that kept Liz from blurting something else out to keep the silence from stretchng on. She could tell that Max needed the silence to think in.

"Well, umm, now I guess I realize why you seemed to be nothing but a big tangled mess of mixed signals all that year," he said slowly. "You felt that it was your bounden duty to keep me at arms length, or otherwise this disaster would come about, kill any or all of us, possibly more."

"Or even the whole world," Liz agreed in a broken whisper.

"Wow, but... yeah. On the other hand, you'd been told all of these romantic stories about how our life together had been, how it could have been... should have been maybe. The more you tried to push me away, probably the more you dwelt on those might-have-beens, elaborating on the parts that Future Max didn't tell you much about. With each day, you loved me more, and you got a little bit more obsessed with these things you thought you had to give up forever, yes??"

"Now when did you get to be quite so perceptive, Max Evans??" she teased him.

"Umm... if I haven't been this way all along, then you can probably blame Antarian politics," he joked, and quickly got up and closed the distance between them on the couch, sitting next to Liz and wrapping an arm around her shoulder like it was the most natural thing in the world. "You realize that you don't need to be afraid of this any more, right?? No one is going to come and attack earth because of us."

"How can you be sure?" Liz said, tears forming in her eyes. "Okay, sure, Kivar is dead and his flunkies are mostly in prison camps or whatever. But he never said exactly who it was... well, just that it was 'their enemies.' What if it's some other race entirely? Or what if some of Kivar's guys manage to break out and come looking for a little payback?"

"Okay, I'm not completely sure," Max admitted. "Though I think Future Max would have left you some clue if it wasn't the usual suspect, and I think the new Antarian government is going to keep any of Kivar's league from escaping, stealing transport that can take them here to earth and press home an effective attack." He smiled a little. "But we've taken care of the usual suspect, and Tess isn't going anywhere. She's realized that she doesn't love me in this life... she's made up with Kyle and they sound like they're staying put. So even if there's another attack, we'll beat them."

"As long as they don't manage to pick you off one by one because you're scattered across the country," Liz muttered. "But okay, yeah, I believe you of course. Just be careful, and I think it'll be okay."

"I'm always careful," Max laughed. "So, umm, well, I'm not quite sure exactly how long Alex and Izzie will be busy, but do you have anything else you want to do today?"

"Umm... not much... go to the Crashdown a bit and hang out with you," Liz admitted. "Show you some digital photos of all the fabulous and incredibly interesting stuff you missed. Go to the park and just lie down in the grass, not doing much of anything."

"All sound like good ideas," Max admitted. "I think I have a few more, but... emm... not ones I feel comfortable saying in front of Lex, whether or not he can understand me."

"Ahh, yes, that kinda stuff," Liz shot back, her eyes twinkling. "I think you'll probably find me interested, if we can find a locale with sufficient privacy."

"Can't wait," Max chuckled, and started trying to think of somewhere he could be alone with Liz without parents barging in. **I wonder if Iz would let us borrow the apartment??**


TO BE CONTINUED...

[Chrisken]

Part Three

When Kyle woke up that morning, he got about as far as three feet away from the bathroom door before suddenly having the events of the previous evening occurring to him, and immediately he turned around and went straight back to his room, lying back on the unmade bed and reaching for the phone handset on his alarm clock table. Picking it up, he was suddenly oddly glad that his father had put in speed dial 9 because Kyle sometimes left his phone around where it was the nearest one available.

The signal sounded once, twice, thrice, and... "Good morning?"

It suddenly occured to Kyle that Mrs DeLuca might have seen the caller ID and opened with something considerably more embarassing. "Um, hello, er, Amy. It's Kyle."

"Ohh, right. Can I assume that you're calling for my unexpected overnight guest?"

"Umm, yeah, I guess you could. Is Tess up yet?"

"Erm, I think so, just a sec." After a moment of silence, Kyle realized that she must have put the phone down. Not knowing quite how long this would take, he picked a 'Buffy' comic up off the dresser and started flipping through it idly.

"Hey there, studly." Tess' laughter rang over the open line. "How're you doing this morning?"

"Couldn't be better, unless I was actually looking at your face," Kyle said, knowing that he was getting a little bit gushy and not even caring. "I just realized that neither of us said anything last night about who was going to call whom or when and where we were going to meet."

"Umm, no, I guess not," Tess agreed, and made a little satisfied sigh... (Kyle wondered where she was and in what position,) "but you've called me, and that seems to have worked well. D'you want to pick me up to go out for breakfast, say in half an hour??"

"Well..." Kyle mentally added up his minimum time to new-girlfriend-presentability in terms of bathroom and dressing, and added in the driving time to the DeLuca house. "Make it forty? I like, *just* woke up."

"Of course, babe." Tess laughed again. "So, umm, should we leave it at that?"

"I love you," Kyle blurted out. "Okay, now I'm good."

"Luv ya too," Tess replied. "See you in forty minutes."

Kyle waited until the phone line had clicked off, then rushed back over to the bathroom. The door was locked. "Dad??!" he called out. "C'mon, I gotta be ready like five minutes ago."

"Umm... then you should have been in here," Mister Valenti called back. "Tell you what, though, I can be out of here in, erm, two minutes and let you take a cut before I'm done."

"Thanks," Kyle told him, and rushed back into his room to start looking for something that he could put on to wear once he was clean and shaven.

* * * * * * * * * *

"Okay, how about this," Alex whispered low and throatily, as he let his fingertips tickle along the skin of Isabel's arm. "Do you want me to give it to ya hard, baby??"

"Hmmm... sounds - attractive," Isabel purred back. "As hard as you can!!"

"Alright, then." He nodded at her. "Get up on your hands and knees, facing, err, that-a-way." He pointed diagonally across the laptop, so that there would be as much room as possible.

Isabel's eyes widened as she realized what he was getting at. "You wanna fuck me like a bitch in heat, sweet baby?"

"Pretty much, yeah." Alex chuckled as his head nodded. "Up for it?"

"You forget, I'm not the one who has to get it up," she wisecracked. "But it looks like you have that part taken care of and yeah, I'll give it a try." She scrambled up and assumed the all-fours position more or less just as Alex had pictured it, her torso pointing in at an angle toward the corner of the headboard. "Just like this?" She did her best to look over her shoulder and grin at him.

"Exactly right," he confirmed, moving up behind her. Before getting too close, he reached out, (his hands trembling just a little,) and pulled down her white, lacy underwear, off of that flawlessly figured behind, down her thighs, and Isabel helped him get the little scrap of fabric entirely past her feet and away. Then Alex nudged a little closer... Isabel had spread her calves wide apart once the panties were clear, so he kept his knees together and shuffled forward.

"Ummm... what about, err, protection?" He asked. "Umm, I think I might have something in my shorts, actually, but..."

Isabel turned back a little again and tapped a spot on her upper arm meaningfully. "I had a four-year implant put in... well, around three years and ten months by our time... there isn't anybody on Antar who counts time in earth years, of course. But it'll work just well for now at least. Specially tailored for my unique hybrid hormones and cell structure."

"Ummm... okay, yeah, that should work." Alex seemed to be considering something else for a moment, then chuckled slowly. "Then I'm, uhh, coming in as I am."

"I'm waiting," Isabel teased back. "But come on darling, give me a little more lovin' first maybe?? I've cooled down just a bit while you've been dallying, ya know?"

Alex smiled and crouched down, leaning on one hand and reaching around underneath Iz's body with the other, fondling her voluptuous bust and lightly stroking the stiff points now hanging down from them. Isabel moaned softly, and continued to whine as Alex changed hands and began to stroke and carress one of her thighs, moving from the front, along the outside of her leg, and to the sensitive flesh of the back of her thigh, so close to his own.

Sensing that it was enough foreplay, he oriented his throbbing manhood and pushed into Isabel's dripping crevice. She moaned with the sensation, shoved herself backwards and more deeply onto him, and reached a hand back, where it made contact against the side of Alex's torso. He thrust again, letting his fingers indulge themselves on her goddess-like tits, and a moment of altered consciousness hit him.

He was looking out, from a sort of gray conical crystal, as it was launched from a deep rocky crevice and into the brilliant night, whose blackness even a fiery yellow star-disc could not conquer. Alex realized that he was seeing the Granilith launch, as Isabel remembered it. Her memories probably associated the experience with sadness, but Alex was insulated from those connections, and he could not help but be transported by the glory and intrinsic beauty of the moment.

He had several other flashes during the course of their congress, visions of the child being born, of some sort of minor battle, an important conference... and of the moment they had first met, before the prom. Finally, their passion reached its natural climax and fulfillment, and Alex and Isabel broke apart, panting with the exertion of it, and crawling, weakly, into each other's arms.

"W-wow," Isabel muttered. "Was it me, or was it never quite like that before? On a more or less physical level, I mean?"

"Umm... it's a little hard for me to judge," Alex admitted. "Seems a bit more intense than what I remember, yeah. And emotionally... I felt so connected to you. That was incredible."

"Hmmm," Isabel whispered, an odd tone in her voice. "That's weird, now that you mention it. It was almost like there was something that was keeping me from seeing you, I mean, seeing inside you. I got a few images, but that's it." She shrugged a little, clearly not overly concerned with the realization.

"Errm, yeah, that's -- funny," Alex replied. "Well, we'd probably better get cleaned up a bit. As much as I'd like to spend all day and all night alone in here with you, making love as often as we can recover from it, Max isn't going to be wild about looking after the baby that long I think, and there are a few things we should probably be doing out there."

"Hmm, yeah," Isabel agreed. "Can we go out to that spot in Frazier woods? Bring a picnic dinner or something like that? I wanna do a little stargazing from there again. And you could bring a guitar and serenade me, or us."

Alex smiled. "Yeah, that can probably be arranged. I was thinking, though, more of things like taking Lex to see my parents. They deserve to meet their grandson too, even if we can't really explain, um, everything to them."

"Okay, yeah," Isabel agreed, sitting up. Alex released his hold around her waist and she crawled temptingly over to the foot of the bed, gathering up some clothes and starting to shrug back into them.

All of a sudden she turned back to Alex. "There's something I have to ask you, and I hope that you won't be offended that I said it. But there's a lot of little things... that barrier that I can't see through when we're together, the way you act and behave when the question of sex comes up. You seem so much more confident and self-posessed than when I left, and even full of slightly kinky ideas... was there -- were you with someone else, while I was gone, Alex? Physically??"

He took a deep breath. "Umm, yeah. And yes, I realize that it would have been good to find a way to tell you about that *before* we made love -- I just couldn't seem to find the words to bring it up, and we both wanted it so much."

Isabel's face fell, and she got up off the bed and sat down on a chair. "Well, full disclosure would have been appreciated, yes." She let out a long sigh. "More than that, though... I know that I couldn't expect you to wait forever, considering how I left. But I know how much you loved me, and it was only two years. I guess I thought that you wouldn't have gotten over me in that time, and I didn't think you were the type to get involved in sex without love."

"I didn't think so either," Alex admitted. "But life can be funny that way." He sighed. "Do you want me to explain how it happened... what I was thinking? At the times when it's fair to say that I *was* thinking, that is??"

"Umm... yeah, maybe that'd be best."

Alex sat up straighter, propped against the pillows, and tried to think of how to start the story. "It was when I first went out to UCLA... as you might have guessed. You'd been gone for over a year, and though I still loved you -- I guess I was starting to lose hope that you would ever be back. Between that and homesickness from finding myself in a completely new and unfamiliar place, I was very blackly depressed; something which was not lost on some of my neighbors in the dorm. They were good guys in spirit, considerably more psyched about being out on their own for the first time, about all of the parties and pretty girls that made up the orientation festivities, and it was explained several times in remarkable detail how much of a 'bring-down' I was being." Isabel chuckled softly, though no smile managed to take over her face.

"Around the end of frosh, just before classes started, I agreed to go with them to a wild and happening bar that didn't check students' IDs, and once we were there I was just blue enough to start drinking quite a lot more rum mixers than I should have. And one of the neighbor guys, Jason, arranged not-too-subtly for me to encounter a girl."

"'The girl'", Isabel repeated. "Just tell me a little about her, don't go on and on."

"Alright." Alex considered. "Anna was pretty... not as beautiful as you, but pretty -- and outgoing and a junior, and she decided that she liked me right off. We talked, and danced a little, and played some pinball. I still remember pretty much all of that night, though there's a certain... disconnectedness about the decisions I made. We went back to campus together, she invited me into her room, and we had bottled water - and sex."

"When the morning came, I was hung-over and more than a little upset with myself about what had happened, but I took it out on her. She argued back a little, saying that she'd been buzzed and not quite thinking clearly too, but didn't see what the big deal was. I realized that it wasn't really her fault and made an exit just about as quickly as I could... focused as hard as I could on classes and so on, but the memory of that night kept coming back to me when I least expected it. There was something tempting about the thought of being in her arms."

"After a week and a half, I went and found Anna's number and called her. She acted as if nothing had been wrong, told me that she'd been hoping I'd get in touch, and the second time we talked I asked her out to dinner. We had dinner, and went out to a movie, and I kissed her goodnight and made a second date."

"But having made contact again, it was somehow inevitable that we'd end up back in bed. That was what I'd been looking for -- being with Anna, it made missing you hurt less, it made the fact that I was still in love with a girl who was light-years away from planet Earth less confusing. Anna made no secret of the fact that she liked sex and she started to teach me about it."

"It was about halfway through October that I started to realize that what was happening wasn't good, or right. No matter how much pain loving you had caused me, I still did love you very deeply, and there was a little voice telling me that sleeping with another girl wasn't right. Not 'right' in the sense of immoral, though maybe that's relevant too. But... not fitting, not appropriate, not rational. I ended things with Anna, trying to make it as im-personal and nonconfrontational as I could, but I ended it. And that was that. I knew, from then on, that my heart belonged to you, at least until I fell out of love with you, and that didn't have enough time to happen."

"I'm not exactly proud of what I did, but I do count the fact that I'm more experienced, and more confident, as a good thing now that you're back. We have a lot of time to make up for, and I want to do everything with you, in every way. I want you and need you that much, Isabel. And I hope that I didn't just throw a wrench into the works any of several different ways."

Isabel laughed softly. "Well, I'm disappointed to hear it, but I kind of understand. It's going to take some time to get over the hurt feeling of thinking of you with another girl, though a whole lot of very moving serenades will probably help." She smiled at him teasingly. "But for now, we really had better get ourselves sorted out and see how Max is doing with Lex."

Alex got up and grinned. "Sounds like a plan."

* * * * * * * * * *

"Okay, what's in here?" Michael muttered, sitting on an old and dusty chair in the DeLuca basement and opening up yet another scuffed box. "Hooo!! My CD's!" Grinning, he took out a few of the flat, full-width plastic cases, shuffled through them, and ran a finger along the scores of other titles, each one stacked vertically so as to be easily identified. "You saved my entire collection??"

"Umm, well, it's not like we really had much lack of space here," Maria commented. "A few of them I've 'borrowed,' and you can take them back when you come to New York to visit me. Ohh, and also, there are a few bands that have come out while you were gone that I thought you might be interested in checking out... I never did entirely get your taste in music, so I may have missed a few, but..."

"I can't wait to hear them," Michael said, and got up and kissed her. "There's some stuff that I'll want to collect and bring over to the Evanses tonight, but for right now, I kinda feel like I want to get out of here." With an embarrassed look on his face, Michael started stroking Maria's forearms softly. "I've been away from Earth for years, and there have to be better parts of it to spend time with you in than this basement. I'm not sure where, but..." An inspiration struck him. "I want you to show me somewhere new, somewhere that we haven't been, or somewhere that's changed. If you can think of one, that is."

Maria smiled. "I think I have an idea, yes. Come on." She stepped away and held out a hand in invitation, her head nodding towards the stairs that led back up to the first main floor of her mother's house.

They didn't actually leave for Maria's 'somewhere new' right away once they left the basement. Maria decided that she wanted to pack lunches for both of them, Michael helped her out a little with the preparations, and Mrs DeLuca showed up and started making with small talk with him about how it felt to be back home after such a long time, and if he had any plans organized already about what to do next. Michael answered as frankly and honestly as he could, not wanting to make a bad second impression on Maria's only real parent, mentioning how the Evanses had offered him Isabel's old room for the time being, and how he was going to try to study for his GED and at least attempt the college boards.

Finally Maria had packed what seemed like a more than generous amount of food, beverages, and utensils, confirmed with her mother that she could borrow the Jetta for the afternoon, and the two young people made their way through the usual pleasantries of farewell and headed out into the front yard. It took only a moment for them to load the food into the back seat and then take their own seats.

Maria refused to say what their destination was, but Michael could tell that she was headed for the east side of town, not too far from where his old apartment had been. About eight blocks north of that neighborhood, she found a parking spot on a quiet side street and started to lead the way on foot, a sack of sandwhiches and juice (among other things,) on her back, while Michael took the other load. When he first caught sight of their final destination, Michael stopped still for a long moment, his eyes wide and mouth hanging open.

He remembered there being a park here, of a sort... a small and dingy playground for single mothers to take their little ones and for older latchkey kids to play ball together and generally run around chasing each other and screaming at the top of their lungs. But the venue had completely transformed itself since then.

For one thing, the open space was definitely larger than Michael had remembered it. He looked back and away to the nearest cross-streets, using them as landmarks, and trying to cudgel his memory into giving up the details. Yes, there had been a large, run-down house right over *there* -- it must have been torn down entirely, and the foundations filled in with new soil.

Because the park had been turned into an incredible public flower garden.

Maria was hurrying him forward, and he came, a big grin spreading on his face. Michael Guerin wasn't the kind of guy to get terribly sappy about flowers -- or, at least, he'd never have thought so. But there'd been a small underground yard at the hidden refuge on Antar where the hybrid foursome had spent a lot of the past years, (at the insistence of security officers who seemed paranoid about the possibility of a 'decapitation attack' coming from the Kivar-ians,) and it had usually been the best place to take off and spend some time by one's self.

Michael had spent quite a lot of time in that yard, and slowly began to appreciate the fragile beauty and delicacy of the Antarian blooms that grew there, dependent on reflected sunlight funnelled through a mirror-tube from the surface above. This garden, though, was much more more impressive, and Michael felt as if his aesthetics had been sharpened sufficiently to appreciate the carefully cultivated beauty that would have passed him by entirely, if he had seen this place before leaving.

The flowers grew in plots of different shapes - some geometric, others clearly based on real-world items, and yet others confusingly absract. Similarly, some plots were patches of solid color, all the same time of flower or two that were almost identical in shade. Others were chaotically multi-hued, or containing only sparse blooms against a background of dull brown soil. The effect was breathtaking... clearly every little bit had been planned and planted just so, and yet the entire scene also managed to convey the vigor and enthusiasm of even the simplest growing thing, that could never be perfectly predicted or constrained.

Walkways were laid out between different flower plots, and benches here and there, even two small picnic tables. There were a few other people walking around and enjoying the flowers -- Michael would have expected to see more, but then maybe most native Roswellians had grown so used to this garden that they didn't really see its beauty any more. For that matter, maybe a lot of them never had seen it, any more than Michael himself would have a few years ago... or at most thought of it as 'oh, that's kinduv pretty... but I've got to get to the theater and see a movie' or whatever.

Michael and Maria toured the field of flowers with hardly a word for a long time, and it wasn't until they had taken one of the benches for a brief rest that Michael felt comfortable asking her about it. "When did they do all this? Did the city pay for it all? What happened to the old house that used to be over there??"

Maria smiled. "I'm not sure of all the details, actually, I wasn't really paying attention until I came back from school for thanksgiving last year and it was nearly finished. I think that some reclusive millionaire backed the idea, and paid for a lot of it, including the continuing care to keep the flowers tended. The city kicked in some too, though there was some resistance to using tax money for it -- and the had the Bateman house condemned so that there would be enough room. No one had been living there for five years or so anyway."

"It's... it's amazing!" Michael breathed, and Maria smiled. He saw something in her eyes... appreciation of the fact that Michael's horizons had been broadened since she saw him last, that he appreciated the garden so much. She was also more than a little pleased with herself for having thought of it, Michael decided, and that was more than deserved.

"You wanna start lunch?" he asked about a minute later. "We don't really need to take one of the picnic tables for just the two of us, do we?"

"No, I guess not," Maria agreed. "Just be careful to keep all of your garbage and keep it from blowing into the flowers or anything. There are waste bins at some of the walkway intersections." She was already looking through her bag, and tentatively handed him a wrapped sandwhich. "Salmon, blackberry jelly, and tabasco?"

Michael laughed. "Sure, I'll give that a try."

* * * * * * * * * *

"Isabel?" Diane Evans' voice echoed through the rooms on the first floor of her house. "Max, are either of you around?"

"I'm here mom, and Liz and Alex," Max replied, trying to orient on the indistinct sound and follow it to its source. "Isabel's going to be busy with Lex for a little while -- he was hungry." Somewhat frustrated, he led the way off uncertainly into another room, his two human friends following.

"Oh." Diane seemed a little disappointed. "I was wondering if you wanted to see your father, but he has to leave in a few minutes."

"Dad??" Max repeated, confused. As far as he knew, his adopted father was still out on the East coast for another day or so, providing expert advice on some 'contracts and considerations' case in Conneticut.

Once he got to the doorway of the rec room, though, it became clear what the situation was, at least in part. Max had noticed some of the unfamiliar computer equipment set up on and around a light brown table there, the night before. A tall, shiny gray destop processing tower sitting on the floor, simple keyboard and mouse interface, a quite large flat-panel monitor and fancy color printer. During the confusion of their homecoming, he hadn't thought to inquire further.

Now, the tower was humming with life, and the face of Philip Evans was staring out of the bright LCD screen. As Max stepped further into the room, his father waved hello, and Max realized that there must be a web-camera somewhere in the setup. He smiled back, looked at his mother, who was sitting back on the couch, and pulled up a chair to the computer. A curved white rod standing up on the table and attached to the tower with a gray wire now suddenly seemed as if it might have a sensible function. Max picked it up and cleared his throat. "Um, hello, Dad, can you hear me?"

He laughed and spoke into a different but roughly equivalent mike, on his end. "Yeah, Max, you're coming through loud and clear! Where's Izzie?"

Apparently he hadn't been able to hear what Max had been saying before he came in the room. "Busy with the baby."

"Ahhh... yeah, guess I shouldn't be surprised at that."

"Umm, where are you Dad??" Max asked in his turn, peering at the background behind his father, which seemed to also be a charmingly decorated family room or airy den. "Don't tell me you've been keeping another family hidden on the East coast all this time!"

"Umm, what??" Them he looked around himself and laughed slightly. "No, this is the house of, well, of one of the senior associates for Broodwin, Gage, and McNeil... who happens to have a compatible webChat system to ours and let me borrow it."

"Oh, cool I guess. Thank him for me too."

"I'll make sure to mention it to her, yes," Phillip corrected mildly. "And I see young Mister Whitman and Miss Parker hovering back there, almost literally -- aren't there more chairs that the two of you could pull up? When you're standing right there, half of your faces are cut off by the cam."

Alex squatted down instinctively, and almost lost his balance, and in a few moments a few more chairs were produced so that the three young people were sitting in a row before the screen - Liz on Max's left and Alex on his right. "So, Alex," Mister Evans prompted, and Max quickly handed him the mike. "I was talking with Isabel last night, and she mentioned that, um..."

"That I'm Lex's father?" Alex guessed. "Yeah."

"And also that you had no more idea than we did when she left, that there was a baby." Alex nodded agreement. "Well, we did spend some time together while Max and Isabel were gone, but I suppose this sort of thing redefines our relationship. We're all family now, in a way."

Alex jumped in surprise. "Umm, well, with all due respect sir, even with Lex in the picture, Isabel and I haven't had time to talk about engagement or... well, or anything really, and --"

"Relax, Alex," Mrs. Evans put in. "I don't think he's talking about marriage between the two of you as such. But, well, you're Lex's father, and that's definitely family. We're his grandparents... at least in spirit, if not in strict genetics, I think..."

"Of course you are, mom, dad," Max put in. "You may not be technically our birth parents, but then again we didn't really have any in the traditional sense, or a real 'birth' if it comes to that. You raised us, and you will always be my mother, my father. I know that Isabel feels the same way."

"Alright then," Alex said, taking a deep breath. "So yeah, I guess we are family, in a way, and I know that Lex couldn't have a finer set of grandparents than you guys, and my folks." It was true that he'd gotten closer to the Evanses after Max and Isabel left... even though there had been the secret still between them, the information about exactly WHERE the pod squad had gone that he couldn't reveal, the sense of common loss had apparently been great enough to bridge that gulf. Mister Evans' letters of reccomendation for Alex had been invaluable, in securing acceptance for one of the most sought-after courses of study on campus, and even getting picked for a small scholarship that helped pay off the bills, even though Alex and his family would probably have been able to swing the state school tuition without that.

"Well, thanks. That's quite a compliment," Phillip replied. "We have a lot to talk about, but I think it can wait until I get back into town. And Elizabeth?"

"Just Liz, please, Mister Evans," Liz replied as she took the mike handed over to her. "I keep telling you guys -- it's not short for anything, just my actual name. Liz." She was smiling, and Max could definitely believe that this was something that they'd been bantering over for quite a while.

"Ahh, right," his dad replied, a bit of mischief in his eyes. "Now it's coming back to me. Just Liz Parker. No middle name, or anything like that?"

"Would be for me to know, and you to find out, sir," Liz replied coyly.

"Now, I may just have to take you up on that if you tell me to enough times. Well *Liz,* I know that there isn't such a bond between you and Max yet, to make you part of our family -- just yet. At least if there is, I haven't heard about it."

"No, no," Liz managed to choke out through a swallowed splutter and some nervous giggles. "No bond that tight so far -- you can take my word for it."

"Right. But do I guess correctly, that we'll be seeing a fair bit of you from now on, now that Max is around again? And that maybe he'll be spending even more time with you, once you head back to the chills of New England?"

Liz looked down, blushed, and shot a glance over at Max. He was smiling back at her. "Yes, yes mister. I won't be too far away."

"I'm glad to hear it," he announced with a chuckle. "The two of you are good for each other, I think. And it seems to me that there's a few things about your history together that Diane and I are going to want to hear about, reasonably soon."

Liz and Max shared another look. "Umm, yeah, that seems fair I guess," Max replied. "Depending on exactly what details you're thinking about, of course. We can talk about it when you're here, right?"

"Talk about *what* when who's here??" another voice announced from the hallway. All of them turned around to see Isabel enter, carrying Lex cradled in her arms, once again wearing the pink shirt and blue shorts. "Ohhh -- Daddy, hi!! You didn't say that you'd be webvideoing us, or whatever the proper term is."

"Ummm... Isabel, honey, I couldn't hear that," Mister Evans replied regretfully. "You have to be a lot closer to one of the mikes. As the rest of them reorganizes so that Isabel could have a seat, Alex repeated the remark.

"Oh, right. I wasn't sure last night that I'd be able to borrow the right kind of of setup." Phillip peered into the screen on his end, which wasn't quite where the camera was, so the effect was slightly disconcerting. "Oh, honey, he's such a beautiful little boy!"

"Yeah, I kinda think so too," Isabel replied, managing to balance both Lex and the mike in her limited number of arms and hands. "So, what did I miss?"

"Umm... your friends can tell you all about it," he said. "They told me that you were busy feeding him."

"I was, and I don't think he's quite finished with his lunch," Isabel admitted. "But somehow I think Lexxy could tell that something exciting was going on. He started to get all fussy and wouldn't calm down until I'd left the room, and then, gone downstairs, and towards the back of the house. He may be young, but my little guy does already seem to have a talent for knowing where the action is."

"You may be right, all things considered," he agreed.

They chatted briefly about the case that Mister Evans was helping with, about the weather in Conneticut and Roswell, about the plans that Isabel, Max, and Michael had made so far to make up for the time they'd lost when it came to school, and quite a lot about Lex. Far too soon, though, Phillip was explaining how he had an appointment to get to, and promising that he'd be greeting them all, in person, in less than two days' time. Each of his kids insisted on taking the time to tell him how much they loved him and couldn't wait to see him before he finally terminated the channel.

"Okay, so what's next now?" Diane put in.

"Well, Lex has got some pineapple to finish I think, and then Alex and I were talking about taking him to meet his other grandparents for the first time," Isabel said. "Can I borrow your car for the afternoon, Mom?"

"Umm, sure," she said after a moment. "I drove your father to the airport, so his car is still here in case I really need to go anywhere. Say hi to John and Gloria for the two of us, if you remember. Max? Liz??"

It took Max a second to realize that his mother was still asking for answers about plans for the day. "Well, Liz had a few ideas, starting with lunch back at the Crashdown."

"Alright. Will either of you be here for dinner?"

Liz looked from Max to Diane and back for a moment, and he nodded encouragingly. "Yeah, I think we'd both love that, if you don't mind."

"Not at all. I haven't had a proper family dinner in too long, and the more the better. You're always welcome here, Liz."

"We'll be here with bells on," Isabel blurted out. "Umm, right, Alex?"

"Yeah, I think so," Alex agreed with a smile.

"Alright. Would you mind if I, umm, invited the others?" Diane continued. "After all, Michael has been your best friend just about forever, and Tess... well, erm,"

"Sounds great, if you manage to catch either of them," Isabel said.

"Maria and Kyle have cell phones after all," Liz put in. "Do you have the numbers, Mi-- umm, Diane?" She tested out the name cautiously, and the older woman smiled.

"Yeah, if I can just get the computerized address book that Phillip bought to work without it throwing a tantrum," she replied. "Just a second."

The cell phone numbers were looked up and confirmed, and Liz and Max headed out to her car and away.

"What about the two, excuse me, the three of you?" Diane asked Isabel. "Not heading off quite yet?"

"Umm, well, my parents are probably just starting their lunch right now," Alex said. "And it'd probably be best to wait until they've had some time to digest it before bringing home a previously unsuspected grandson and runaway girlfriend for them to meet. Ehh, that was kinduv a joke," he clarified uncomfortably. "Don't expect them to have a problem with Lex OR with Isabel, but still... no sense in asking for trouble with the timing, right??"

"I suppose not," Mrs Evans agreed. "Well, then, you two had probably better eat lunch for yourselves, here?"

Isabel smiled. "Alright, this time leave the kitchen to me. I've got an idea for something that the two of you will really like. And don't worry - no, it won't be too spicy."

"Alright," Alex agreed. "Where's the rest of the food for Lex? I think he might not put up too much of a fuss this time, if I come bearing gifts of a sort."

* * * * * * * * * *

"I love you," Liz whispered as she and Max finished yet another hot and tender kiss in the cafe parking lot.

"I love you too, soulmate," Max vowed intently. "Somehow two weeks doesn't seem like nearly enough."

"Well, you said that you'd be following me up to new england as soon as you could, right?" she teased him. "You can study and take the GED and SATs up there as easily as in Roswell, well almost."

"Yeah, I know," Max said. "Though I'm not sure I'd do so well without Isabel to push me." He kissed Liz softly on the cheek near her ear. "But don't worry baby. We'll work it out somehow. We've come through too much not to, now."

They made their way into the dining room -- all the booths were full, but there were some free tables, including three of the small ones that fit best for two people. "Hey, can we get some service here?" Liz called out, a wide grin on her face, about ten seconds after they had settled in.

Soon enough, a man with an apron and an order pad had hurried over towards their table, and nearly tripped himself when he recognized the pair. "Max." It was Liz's father, Jeff Parker.

"Umm, hello sir," Max said carefully and politely. "How are you doing today?"

"Not too bad," was the even reply, "aside from the part where my darling, impulsive daughter told me that the guy who ran away from town and broke her heart is back in town, and that the two of them are getting seriously involved again right away. How are you doing today, Max?"

"Err... not quite as well as when I walked in here," Max admitted.

"Come on, stop it Dad," Liz insisted. "Max has told me why he had to leave, and the reasons are quite sufficient under the circumstances, and not anything that you need to worry about. I'm not jumping off of any kind of a cliff with him - and who I date hasn't been something that you have a vote in for quite a while now. Right now, both of us are paying customers here, and so I think Max deserves a little more respect and a less snarky attitude than that."

When Liz's rebuke drew to a close, Mister Parker had a slightly sheepish look on his face. "Umm, sorry I guess. Do you guys need to look at menus or anything??"

They didn't get any menus -- Liz just ordered for herself and for Max.

TO BE CONTINUED...

[Chrisken]

Part Four


"Don't worry honey," Tess said as she sat in the awkward little chair, filling out the blanks provided. "I'll be finished with this in a minute." Social security number... the one that Ed had gotten for her several months BEFORE she came out of the pod was fresh in her mind, since she'd entered it on several other applications already today. (The first time she'd been terrified that it was lost completely, but she was still carrying the little micro-pocketbook that she'd taken with her on the Granilith out of habit and for sentimental reasons, and there was a tiny little card in one of the pockets with her number on it.)

"I'm not worrying," Kyle told her with a small chuckle, "and don't rush yourself. Take as much time as you need."

Employment history... none. "Well, maybe you're not worried, but I know you're getting impatient," Tess informed him. "You always breathe that way when you're running out of patience."

"Then this is a good opportunity for me to come to terms with my own impatience and deal with it," he replied smoothly. "Take all the time you need."

Tess smiled up at him briefly and went back to the application, not rushing -- but aware that there was really only so much that she could enter. Not even a date of graduation from high school, errgh. After getting to the end, she scanned it over very thoroughly for any mistakes or details she might have missed and got up to hand it to the teenaged girl behind the desk. On their way out of the megastore, she picked up a few useful supplies -- a little pad of her usual foundation makeup, dental floss and moisturizing body lotion, and lined up at the checkout with them. The same checkout that if she was lucky, she might be working the other side of soon.

Once they were out into the September sunshine, Kyle cleared his throat awkwardly. "How're you feeling? Up for any more of this?? Because I can think of a few other places, but..."

"No, I don't think I have the inner strength for it," Tess agreed, wrapping one arm around Kyle's shoulders and kissing him on the side of his neck. In addition to all of the job applications that had actually been filled out and handed back in, there was a small collection of them in Kyle's car that she had taken to put on a waiting list, either because she didn't think that they were worth her immediate effort, or there hadn't been a good place to spend the time filling them out, or no obvious person to give them to or place to put them. She'd look at those ones later, and probably fill most of them out and come back to figure out how to get them into consideration. "Not quite sure what I want to do now instead, except that whatever it is I want to do it with you."

"Hmmm..." Kyle considered that. "I think that you might be in need of a little treat to keep your spirits up. You've been pushing yourself out there all day, practically."

"A little treat, like as in sweet tidbits?" Tess said. "Well, there's a part of me that likes the idea, but, come on, we just had lunch an hour and a half ago. WITH desert. You'd better be careful, buddy, or I'm gonna swell up like a balloon here, and then where ya gonna be?"

Kyle grinned at her. "Now, did I say that I meant a little treat as in something edible??"

"No, but call it an intuition??"

"Umm... okay, feminine intuition on target I guess." They got into the car. "Secondly, you know that I'd love you and wouldn't be able to keep my hands off you even if you were a... a blimp, right??" She made a noncommittal sound. "Thirdly, I don't think that's going to happen, because there's probably something in your hybrid DNA that makes certain you'll always stay beautiful and never weigh more than... than one twenty-five or something. Huh?"

"Actually, I, I really hope that's not true," Tess muttered under her breath.

"Umm... huh??" He still hadn't started the car.

Tess turned to him. "Well, in case we... or I, well, want to -- you know." She couldn't quite get the words out.

Kyle's face settled into thoughtful confusion for a long moment, and then maybe he got it. "You mean... when you want to have a baby, like Isabel?? Or, well, you know what I mean I think."

She nodded. "Yeah. That'll be a long time off, because the problems that she had will probably affect me the same way, and I want to stay here on Earth for several years before worrying about that kind of stuff. But... well, I know that sort of thing can be difficult for skinny girls. If they don't pack on extra pounds while they've got a bun in the oven, it can be dangerous... for the baby or the mother, or both."

"Oh god, I definitely didn't mean that honey," Kyle said, his skin burning with regret.

"And, well, even aside from that... we don't really know what my DNA means about my future," she told him seriously. "The human side comes entirely from my human donor, who was picked because she had the flaw that made her cells vulnerable to infection by the Gandarium."

"Right, those freaky little blue critters," Kyle replied, with a long sigh.

"We found out a little more about our other human donors just before we left earth," Tess added. "Did you know about that? Michael and Max managed to find them from abductee records in Brody Davis' UFO database." She sighed. "The only donor they could find for me, that was compatible with Ava's DNA sample, was a little girl - Jamie Stafford. The aliens running the project didn't even know what she'd look like when she grew up, beyond a few sketchy projections. They were looking for donors who were healthy, and, yes, attractive by human standards as much as possible - but I don't think that Jamie stayed a raving beauty as she got older. And the fact that I have completely foreign, alien genes too -- there's no telling how that'll affect my body as I grow older..."

"Tess, you're babbling," Kyle said gently, taking one of her hands in his own. "Bottom line is -- I love YOU, not what your body looks like. I love every cell and chromosome inside of you, I love your heart, and your mind and your personality and your spirit. My love for you is never going to change." He let that last sentence ring in the silence as much as possible.

"How can you be so sure??"

"I guess I can't be completely certain," he admitted after a moment, frowning. "But I tell you so today, and I mean to tell you so tomorrow, and the day after, and the day after that. I don't intend to stop telling you that, and I don't expect to start lying to you. That's as much as I can promise you maybe, but I can see my love for you, going on and on into infinity."

She laughed a little at that. "Well, I guess we'll see." She sighed. "You know that it's kind of hard for me to trust people."

"Yeah, I know." There was a short silence. "Maybe that'll change." After a moment, Kyle thought of something else. "What about, erm, Max and Isabel's donors? Are they, like, brother and sister on the human side too, or what?"

A snort of laughter escaped Tess as well, and she brushed a few stray tears away from her face. "Okay, don't let on that you know, because it's kinduv weird. They were related, but not siblings. Isabel's donor was actually the mother of Max's donor." Kyle's mouth dropped open. "Well, they were working with what they had, and I guess the mother passed on the genetic flaw to her son."

"Kinda like Grampa Dupree passed it on to Laurie's father, who passed it on to Laurie??"

"Yeah. Okay, ummm..." There was a kind of awkward silence. "You were saying something about an edible treat??"

And so he drove her over to Kaleidoscoops and Tess got a jumbo sundae with three scoops of chocolate ice cream, marshmallows, chocolate and hot caramel sauce, whipped cream, two marashino cherries, and a little tabasco on top. Kyle took a cone with one scoop of black cherry yogurt. Just as they were finishing up, Kyle's cell phone rang.

"Highway patrol, Valenti the third speaking... oh, hi Missus Evans, how're you?? ... good... alright, yeah she's here, I'll ask her." He covered the mouthpiece lightly. "It's Max and Isabel's mom. Wants to know if we'd like to come over tonight for quote, a big family dinner, unquote."

Tess smiled again, digging a little leftover caramel out of her dish. "Yeah, I think that'd be great. You don't mind do you?"

"Not at all." He went back to the phone. "Yes, Missus Evans, we'd be delighted to come... Alright, seven o'clock, we'll see you then... yes, you have a nice day too. Bye!"

Tess checked her watch. "Well, it's only a little past two now. Whatever shall we do with all of that time??" And she grinned teasingly at him.

Kyle laughed and reached forward without thinking about it, rubbing her shoulder and upper arm slightly. "Well, maybe we can go off somewhere like passion peak and have a little fun together in the car. And then maybe your spirit will be recharged enough to hit a few more places for possible mcjobs??"

"Hmm... maybe." Tess sighed. "Maybe there's a matinee movie that we could hit or something?? I'd like to spend a little time doing something very ordinary and human like that... and getting a chance to make out with you in the dark theater is a bonus."

Kyle thought. "Yeah, the cinema Four has some afternoon showings I think. Probably still have X-men 2 and matrix reloading showing, come to think of that." He thought about that. "Just to warn you... I know you kinda liked the original matrix, but everybody agrees the long-awaited sequel was a big letdown."

Tess smiled. "I don't really care what we see, honey."

* * * * * * * * * *

Michael knocked on the front door of the Evans house, Maria snuggling herself into the side of his body as he stood there. There was no immediate answer, and he tentatively tried the door... after all, he lived here now, didn't he? "Hello??"

"Max? No... Michael??"

"Umm, yeah, it's me Diane." They went in and soon met Mrs Evans in the kitchen.

"Everybody else is off somewhere," she said. "Hi again Maria. Were you guys looking for Max or Isabel, or just..."

"Umm, actually, I kind of just wanted somewhere that we could sit down and relax together," Michael told her. "We've had a pretty busy day so far."

"I can imagine," Diane agreed. "Well, I was just about to call Maria's cell phone... we're going to be having a big family dinner here tonight, and I'd love for both of you to be there."

"Umm... thanks Mrs Evans," Maria said after a moment, blinking. "That's so nice of you."

"Yeah, we'll come and eat," Michael assured her.

"Okay, well then I'd better get the piece de resistance started," she replied with a smile. "You two just make yourselves at home wherever you like... well, within reason under the circumstances, you know??"

"Yeah, yeah, I think we get the idea," Maria replied, towing Michael back to the sofa in the living room.

They sat together, and got some cool drinks from Mrs Evans' fridge, and told each other more stories about the time that they'd been apart, and shared memories from the times that they'd been together and before they'd met. In one casual, relaxed break from the chatter, Michael's ears perked up. A car drove up the street and pulled quickly into the Evans driveway... brakes squealing loudly to bring the wheels to a stop. A door opening softly, then slamming loudly, and footsteps cutting straight across the front lawn and hurrying up to the door. A bell rang out... (a bell that, presumably, Michael himself had missed when he got to that door.)

Maria beat him up off the couch and towards the door. Michael was only just getting his balance when he heard... "Laur-- you didn't tell me that you were c..."

What the heck. "Laurie??" Michael dashed off towards the door himself before he was quite ready, and managed to trip over his own feet and sprawl somewhat awkwardly in the front hall. "Laurie!?" Sure enough, there in the doorway was a familiar pretty face, with something still seeming slightly off-center around the cheeks or whatever. Long blonde hair reached down, longer than he remembered, down past mid-torso.

"Michael?? Are you okay??"

He sat up, grinning about as widely as he could. "I'm doing amazingly well, tumbles notwithstanding. Why are you even..." He started to crawl up onto his knees. "Did Maria let you know that I was back??" In retrospect, he was kicking himself for not having thought of giving Laurie a call before this.

"Yes, of course I did," Maria replied. "Laurie was about as heartbroke as the rest of us when I called her to let her know that you'd gone, Michael, so I wasn't going to give up the chance to be the one to pass along some happier news."

"I... I just couldn't wait to see you," Laurie added, hurring into the hallway to help Michael up to his feet. "I hadn't been planning on coming so soon, just found myself on the phone with the airline asking about last-minute ticket prices."

"And the car??"

"Rental, of course."

"Must be nice to be rich," he teased her with a smile. "Okay, umm... well, I'm glad that you're here, Laur. Umm... someone had probably better go ask Missus Evans if she can set one more plate for dinner tonight."

* * * * * * * * * *

Isabel balanced Lex and a small bag on her shoulders as she stood, looking at the brown wooden front door. Alex looked over at her and rubbed one hand against her lower back warmly. **Don't worry sweetie, it'll be all right.**

**I know.** Alex smiled, and Isabel realized that if he'd 'heard' her, then this was the first time that they'd managed to have an actual mental conversation both ways. The thought made her smile as well, and she reached out and knocked loudly on the door.

For a long moment there was no sign of a reply. Then she could faintly hear footsteps approaching, and then it was very clear that both of Alex's parents had reached the door at the same time... Mrs Whitman from the second floor stairs and the landing, his dad from the hall running the length of the main level. They smiled at each other slightly, saw some of who was waiting outside the door, and opened up.

"Ummm." After John Whitman's first sound, there was an awkward silence. "H-hello Isabel, it's been a while. And, erm, well, and who is this little person??"

"Errr..." Okay, well, since they'd asked, she might as well tell them the answer that she'd rehearsed. "Hi mister Whitman. This is my son. *Our* son." And she took Alex's hand to make the point. "Lex."

Mrs Whitman blinked slightly. "Well, I guess you'd better come inside then, and we can all sit down."

They took seats in the Whitman living room, Lex swinging his legs as they dangled down from the couch. He seemed in a very energetic and hyper mood, but Isabel wasn't sure that it would be helpful to let him run around at the moment. "I realize that this must come as a shock to you... it was quite a surprise to me," Alex started off.

"Probably not quite as surprising to you as to us, since you presumably knew at least one fact that would help put the news in context," Mrs Whitman told him a bit frostily.

"Okay, yeah mom, point made," he replied. "No, I never told you guys that Isabel and I had... had made love. And..." He apparently wasn't able to come up with another sentence to follow that one with.

"It's really neither here nor there at the moment," Mister Whitman said softly. "He looks like a very precious little boy."

"Yes, he is." Isabel turned to look at her beautiful baby... Lex's round baby face just starting to show a tiny little bit of an oval stretch to it... dark green eyes like his father's, straight golden blond hair like her own, a little disorganized and messy. She had measured and weighed him in the upstairs bathroom after feeding him last night... two feet seven inches tall, twenty-three pounds. His ears even seemed to be sticking out just a little already, like his father's.

"How old is he??" Gloria Whitman asked, her voice soft and light.

"Umm... Nineteen months today. He was born February the second, two thousand and two." That much was true, at least as nearly as Isabel had been able to work out the time. There hadn't been any noticeable time distortion in travelling back and forth through space, but Antar hadn't been keeping a regular earth calendar of course.

"He seems a little... small for nineteen months. Not trying to sounds suspicious or anything, but..." Gloria shrugged awkwardly.

Trying to fight down the impulse to answer defensively. "Yeah, he is small for his age. Has been for a while." She reached out and pulled Lex close to her. Memories of long weeks after the procedure that prepared Lex to breathe Earth air were flashing before her eyes. The carefully engineered cellular alteration had been a shock to his young system... he had lost a lot of weight, and caught an infection just to make matters worse...

But she didn't want to talk about that with Alex's parents, lest she say something that might arouse their suspicions. Lex was okay now, though still a little short and light for his age, and he'd been a little slow to start walking.

"Come on, mom." Alex put his hand over Isabel's again. "We didn't come here to be attacked. Lex is my son, your grandson. There's no doubt about that, no chance that the father was someone else, after she already left Roswell..."

"Now, I didn't say that, and I didn't mean to imply it," Mrs Whitman insisted. "I'm sorry, I was completely taken off guard here, and I'm aware that I'm not reacting perfectly." She took a deep breath. "He does look like a fine little boy, Isabel."

Isabel smiled. "Would you like a, umm, a closer look at him, Nana Whitman? Maybe hold him if he doesn't kick up a fuss??"

"Yes, I'd love that."

* * * * * * * * * *

"Oh hey, there you are!" Max took a second to reorient when his mother's voice rang out at him. He and Liz had just been coming through the back door. "I was just about to try Liz's cell once I finished dishing this out."

"Are we late?" Liz asked.

"I'm really sorry," Max blurted out at nearly the same time. "I kinduv got caught up in looking at the tens of *thousands* of photographs on Liz's computer, and..."

"We both lost track of time," Liz chimed in, not letting Max have a chance to take all the blame for their tardiness.

"Well, I'm running behind on the cooking too, so no harm done," Diane told them with a smile. "Everybody else is here by now, including one that I hadn't planned on, but..."

Max blinked and tried to think of who, besides the eight of them, his mother would welcome to the big family dinner. "Did Dad make it back already? Or mister Valenti drop i--"

"No, you're off on the wrong track entirely," the hostess said with a secretive smile.

"Is it Laurie Dupree?" Liz guessed, and Mrs Evans nodded. "Right, Maria must have called and told her that Michael was back."

"What, like he wouldn't have thought to get in touch with his own sister?" Max protested. Liz shot him a look. "Okay, you might have a point... it's been a crazy twenty-four hours for all of us."

"Go wash up," Mrs Evans suggested. "I'll be serving everything onto the table in about a minute."

Max let Liz take her turn first in the downstairs bathroom, (He didn't think it was the right time for them to try washing each other,) and said hello to Laurie, made a little small talk with Tess and Kyle. Then he took his own turn to clean up, and by the time he was done, everyone else was crammed in around the Evans dining room table. Even with the extender leaves up, it had never been intended to seat ten, but they manged to make do. Lex was sitting in an old high chair a few feet from the table corner, near his mummy -- he'd already had his dinner, but this was the easiest way to keep an eye on him.

Mrs Evans had prepared a delicious meal, centering around a main course of meatballs, (sweet and spicy of course,) and tender pasta noodles. As the young people served themselves out from the various bowls and platters and dug in, stories were exchanged about the day... Alex telling about bringing the baby to introduce him to his own parents, Michael going on and on about this flower garden place in considerable detail, Tess giving a condensed play-by-play of her job search so far, and Laurie describing her sudden plane trip to New Mexico. Max told his friends about how Liz had told her father off for giving him 'attitude' at lunch, and described some of his favorites out of the photographs she'd shown him, (some of which the Roswell human teens were familiar with.) Thinking of something else that fit the definition of 'important news,' Max caught Liz's hand briefly in his own as the second helpings were being polished away and gave her a meaningful look. Liz smiled quickly and nodded, leaving Max uncertain about if she'd understood the signal he had tried to send, but he decided to go ahead regardless.

"There's something that Liz told me about this morning," Max mentioned, and she turned to look at him, her throat moving in a very obvious 'gulp' of silent nervousness. But she nodded once more, tremblingly, and Max continued. "She hasn't told most of the rest of you I think, but the time for secrecy is past us. Nobody here deserves to be kept in the dark. Umm, Liz."

"Okay, well, uh -- where do I start?" As Liz once again retold the story of her strange visitor from the future, an awed silence settled on the rest of the dining room. The long-standing club members who hadn't heard this before were soon staring intently at Liz, amazement and concern written on their faces. Diane Evans was shaking her head and grimacing as if hoping that the entire tale was some kind of strange joke, and Laurie seemed uncertain of what to make of it. After describing how Future Max had vanished in mid-dance, Liz briefly related how she had told Maria the story while Max and Tess had been in New York. "I told Max that I hadn't really slept with Kyle before he left two years ago, but no more of the backstory until today. Umm, and so..."

"And you never knew any more about it than the part you played, sweetie?" Tess asked Kyle. "Liz just asked you to play along, and you agreed?"

"Ummm... uh, yeah, pretty much," Kyle agreed, still awed by the story that Liz had told. "I certainly never got a real look at Future Max myself, though I suspect that he was hiding in the bathroom -- am I right, Liz??"

"Uh, yeah, actually... how did you know?"

"Just something about your, erm, your body language from that night that never really made sense... until now."

"Okay." Max made a move to get the conversation firmly away from the prurient details. "Now, I think that whatever disaster prompted all of this, there's a pretty good chance that we've already headed it off. The four of us have lived very different lives than Liz's 'Future Max' briefly described to her. We've defeated several enemies already and put people who wish us well in positions of power back home. Tess--" He broke off for a few seconds and smiled at Tess, a smile filled with affection that was simple and uncomplicated by all of the old 'love triangle angst' that had existed between them back in 2000. "Tess is part of our family, and is NOT going to freak out and run away because she's found out that Liz and I are together, right Tess?" She laughed and grabbed Kyle's arm posessively. "So all of that is a good sign, or several good signs. Still--"

"No sense in letting our guards slip too far down," Michael filled in. "Much as I hoped all of the tension and suspense was behind us, looks like we'll have to stay prepared."

"But not too much, right?" Maria interjected quickly. "I mean, this is a small, theoretical possibility of danger in more than ten years' time, or at worst, somewhere in that timeframe. We don't exactly need to sound even a yellow alert over that. Maybe condition chartreuse?"

"Chartreuse?" Kyle repeated blankly.

"It's a color," Isabel explained. "Kinduv a light yellowy-green." Kyle did a half-shrug, half-nod gesture.

"That sounds oddly phrased, but about right," Liz put in. "Alien attack is a possible danger, but not I think anything to panic over until we see some more warning signs. Just like the theoretical possibility that government alien hunters might target you guys again." There was an awkward silence. "Emmm, I guess I shouldn't have mentioned that, should I?"

"No, it's okay Liz," Isabel assured her softly. "Something we need to keep in mind, just a little." She let out a tired sigh. "On the other hand -- I could really do with some dessert right now."

That suggestion was received by muted cheers of approval all the way round the table, and Mrs Evans asked Maria to help her bring in the sponge cake and the kiwi jellies.

* * * * * * * * * *

"Umm, hey Maria, I, uhh... I wanted to talk to you about crashing at your place. Again."

The desserts had all been enjoyed, and Diane, Alex, Isabel and Liz had played a long session of 500 rum, while the rest of the kids had spent the evening watching a Harry Potter movie on the Evans' home theater. Maria had been looking for her car keys when Tess came up to speak with her. "Yeah? Umm... go ahead I guess, though I think I know what you're about to say." Maria smiled encouragingly at Tess.

"I know we said it was just for last night and I'd ask Alex about crashing with him next, but..."

"*You* said that," Maria pointed out. "Neither my mom or I asked you to... I think you have a ways to go before wearing out your welcome with us."

Tess grinned gratefully. "Um, thanks. It's just, what with Alex's parents being a little taken by surprise about the baby, I didn't want to push anything, and..."

"Umm... you need a place to crash, Tess??" someone else asked. Tess turned around to see Laurie standing there, a shy but pleasant expression on her face. "Umm, because, well... I've got a reservation for a hotel room, and the only one they had was a double, so that's basically a bed up for grabs, the way I figure it. Okay by me if you don't want to room with me, because I can see how it would be a little weird, you don't know me very well and there isn't much privacy in a situation like that, even if you go into the bathroom really. But..."

"Laurie, you're babbling a little," Tess told her happily. "And, I'd be delighted to share your hotel room, for as long as it's available." She sighed contentedly. "Why didn't I even think of asking you what you were doing about accomodations?"

"I dunno," Laurie shrugged. "Maybe you're too nice to try to impose?"

"Nah, that can't be it, considering how much I was leaning on Maria," Tess laughed. "Maybe I just feel like I don't know you well enough to impose on YOU."

"I think we have a winner," Maria wise-cracked. "This one has intimacy issues." The latter sentence was delivered as a stage aside to Courtney.

"Okay... you're not leaving yet, right Laurie?" Tess asked. "I kinduv want to go out into the back for a private goodbye with Kyle."

"Come on, you'll be seeing him first thing tomorrow morning, right?" Maria teased.

"Umm... I kinda wanted to get there before eleven. I know it's stupid, but I'm a little afraid that they'd give my room away."

"Did you call the front desk to confirm that you're in town, and tell them that you're spending the evening with friends?" Tess asked.

"Um, yeah, late this afternoon."

"Then they'll hold it 'til midnight at least," Tess insisted. "Trust me."

Isabel was, at that moment, sitting on Alex's lap on the loveseat in the computer room, holding Lex in her arms. "I'll miss you," she cooed. "We'll both miss you."

"I know -- I won't get a chance to wake up and help get him back to sleep in the middle of the night tonight, at least." Alex grinned. "But I really think it's a good idea to spend tonight with my parents. Give them a chance to get used to the situation, to come talk to me about it if they want to. If I spent the night over with you again, it'd be almost as if I was running away from them."

"Yeah I know," she agreed. "But you get your butt back here first thing in the morning, mister!! Breakfast - no questions asked... is that understood?" She giggled softly.

"Yes, dear." Alex brought Isabel's face down to his for a long and sensual kiss. "And then we're going on a trip out to frazier woods. Just the three of us - and a picnic lunch, and maybe a musical instrument of some kind."

"Ooooh - serenades??"

After a few minutes, Isabel and Lex got up to walk Alex to the front door and find him a ride back into town. On the way through the corridor, though...

"OH, stars about us, Max -- none of the three of us needed to see that!!" Max was pressing Liz up against the wall, the two of them sharing a passionate kiss - and both of Max's hands were underneath Liz's top, which had consequently ridden up far enough that the bare underside of one of her breasts was just about visible.

"Umm, sorry." He backed away and gave Liz a chance to re-assemble herself. "Isn't that usually the brother's line though??"

"Well, you gave me no choice," Isabel groused. "Boobarella -- my man, ride home. Got it?"

Liz took a moment to realize that the term applied to her. "Ummm... sure, yeah, sure. Sorry, we didn't expect... just I'm sorry. Come on." Blushing two different shades of red more intense than human skin would seem to be capable of, she hurriedly led the way out to her car.

TO BE CONTINUED...

[Chrisken]

Part Five

Note: The song that Alex sings is definitely not written by me, it's by someone named Aaron Barker and is on a George Strait album.


Kyle smiled to himself as he parked in the driveway of his father's house and got out. Some faint trace of Tess still seemed to be lingering on his lips... now that the two of them had reunited and dispelled the misunderstandings that used to keep them apart, she was getting increasingly enthusiastic about showing her affections, especially during these nightly goodbyes that would probably become ritual... at least, until the time came when they wouldn't have to seperate in the evenings.

That was a nice thought. Kyle even caught himself whistling slightly as he came up the walk, used his key to open the front door, and went into the kitchen for a glass of cold water before going to bed.

"Hello, son."

The voice took him by surprise, and he spun around in the dining room doorway. One dim light was on in the living room, and Amy DeLuca and his father were sitting next to each other on the couch... not engaged in any particular activity that... well, not any particular activity at all, he supposed, other than sitting there and holding hands. Between his own recent memories of kissing and other more passionate activities with Tess, and his own observations of the two of them, this seemed more than a little out of character. And once Kyle's thoughts had gotten themselves to that point, there were all kinds of other notions that started to occur to him.

Well, might as well tackle the situation head on. He walked back into the living room, standing a few feet in front of the couch, and nodded respectfully to each of them. Then... "Dad, were you waiting up for me? The two of you??"

"Umm... not exclusively," Jim Valenti said after a fairly long pause for thought. "That is to say, you coming home is not the major reason why we're here. Just kind of hanging out, spending some quality time together, listening to a good album." He nodded, and Kyle suddenly realized that the stereo was indeed on softly... something bluesey and jazzy at the same time. "But, well... yeah, I was kind of wondering if we'd still be up when you came home, and thinking that you and I could have a chat if I were."

Kyle considered that, and went to get a dining room chair to sit on, putting in the same place facing the couch. "Alright, you're still up. I'm here. Does Ms Amy want to stick around for this, or is it a man-to-man kinduv chat??"

"I think I'll stay around," Amy said softly. "I'm afraid that I may have been the one who let the monkeys out of the barrel, Kyle, or whatever. Maria mentioned that she'd heard you and Tess making plans... that she was going to get a job and you were intending to move out of here and get an apartment with her as soon as possible."

Kyle nodded... he'd sort of been expecting that. "And what do you think of that?"

"I think it sounds... awfully familiar," Amy said softly. "Not quite been there myself, in my own life, but near enough. Thinking that nothing else mattered but the person who I was in love with, making foo..." She paused, considering. "Making choices based *only* on being with that person and not taking anything else into consideration. They weren't my best choices, looking back."

"Yes, but Tess isn't the guy who left you."

"No," Jim muttered, inserting himself suddenly into the conversation. "But, Kyle... I hate to say this -- she's already left once." Kyle turned to look at his father, horrified at what he was suggesting. "I... I know that you said she had her reasons, and you're okay with them... but isn't it possible that something else will come up? Some reason that she'll have to... to pfft, to just disappear, and that you won't be able to follow? It could happen, and it's going to hurt enough without knowing that you've turned your life to a new direction for her sake. Without, say... ending up in a place that's full of the things she had to leave behind, things that remind you of her. A place that you can't afford the rent on without her wal-mart paycheque??"

"Tess wouldn't want that for you, honey," Amy whispered softly. "Ask her, if you want. I know that she's not thinking in terms of ever leaving you right now... but it could happen. We just want the two of you to be thinking realistically as you move into this... to not jump into the deep end with your eyes closed. I know I sound like the bad guy who doesn't believe in the big love that the two of you share... and I don't mind being the bad guy. I just hope that that doesn't keep you from really listening to what we're saying."

Kyle thought about it. "I'll ask Tess what she thinks. But if she tells me that she's not going to leave, and asks me what I think, I'll say I think we should go ahead with it. It's the truth. I'm not going to hedge my bets just because things *might* not work out. Everything I've learned over the past few years has been about listening to my gut, my instincts, and right now my gut is telling me that this is the right time for the two of us to take a chance."

"Okay, well, I guess I know better than to push when your gut has made up its mind," Jim said with a sigh. "I do hope you reconsider and try to be careful. On a not-quite-related note, there's something that I need to tell you about Tess. She was wanted for questioning... that's probably all over now, but she should probably know."

"Huh??" Kyle shook his head. "Questioning? About what??"

"Umm... her background in general, kinda." Jim Valenty looked very uncomfortable. "Well, I submitted a formal missing persons report around the time that she moved in here, the first time. Never expected anything to come of it... but some special investigative officer down in Albuquerque somehow heard that Tess and the others had disappeared and thought he saw a pattern. This frickin 'super-genius' started delving into Tess' past, her father's history and records, and he's found some evidence of falsifications. Nothing much came of it... Hanson got some complaints about state police investigators coming back again and again to ask more questions, and he got the case closed. But I thought you'd want to warn her to keep a low profile, just in case. For one thing, there was something in the news about a disturbance at the museum of natural history, and the showcase of a white beryl crystal, that I don't think Tess would want to get connected to her. That could *really* get her in trouble."

Kyle was staring at his father in total disbelief by this point. "Umm, dad, do you really think we should be talking about stuff like this, umm, in front of..."

"Oh, honey... umm, I know I haven't come to the club yet, but I knew that they were a-l-i-e-n-s for a little while now," Amy said quietly, and Kyle goggled again, then returned to glaring at his father. "Jim *didn't* spill the secret, not really, though he did confirm a few details, in the process of talking me down from a pretty major freakout." She sighed. "You're probably going to go and tell Michael and Maria that I know, right??"

"Ummm... not just this second, but sometime soon when I see them, probably yeah," Kyle muttered. "I kinduv owe them that much -- they'll want to know." He stood up. "Dad... you didn't bring up that stuff about Tess being wanted as a veiled threat, right?? I mean... I wouldn't have thought of it as the kind of thing you'd do, but somehow it would feel better to hear YOU say that??"

"What... if the two of you DO get your own place, I'll call in a tip telling Johnson where she is, and some of what she's done?" Jim laughed only once. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have... err, well, it isn't anything funny. No, of course not. I would never do anything like that... partly because I don't want you to get involved in that sort of thing if there's any way to avoid it. Also out of affection for Tess, since she was like a daughter to me for most of a year there... and for the same reason that I started protecting Max and the others in the first place. It was meant as an honest warning of possible trouble, so that she can do her best to stay out of the shadow of danger. Nothing more."

"Okay," Kyle sighed. "Sorry I made you say it out loud. Umm... on that note, I think I'm going to go hit the sack. It's been a long day."

"Right. Goodnight, Kyle." Jim got up himself, hugged Kyle, and then Kyle headed straight for his bedroom, the glass of cold water entirely forgotten at this point.

"What did you mean by that?" Amy asked Jim softly as he sat down. "How was it the same reason you started to protect Max? What was that reason?" She'd probably have realized it herself in a few seconds, but Jim whispered the words out automatically.

"Because it's the only right thing to do."

Kyle didn't actually go straight to bed. He took the time to call quickly back over to the Evans house, talk to Max, and tell him what Jim had said about the special investigator. He didn't want to worry Tess about it right away, but still felt the need that someone else in the group should know. 'So dump it into Max's lap,' he thought as he hung up. 'Why not? I never really liked him much.'

-----------

Max put on an old dressing gown and knocked on the door that had been Isabel's for all of the years he spent in this house, up until the night before. "Um, yeah??"

"We've got a danger signal," Max said, and after a moment Michael opened the door, still wearing the jeans and t-shirt he had changed into right after dinner. (Maria had been able to convince him to dress up a little since Mrs Evans was making such a big deal out of the special occasion, but from looking at him you would think that Michael could hardly breathe in the simple button-down shirt, even though Max knew that the neck had been plenty big enough. Michael was just good at psyching himself out in ways like that.)

"What is it?" Max tilted his head, and Michael let him into the room. Max closed the door on his way in. "Tell me you haven't just found out that a flying saucer landed in the middle of town."

"Oh, erm... nothing like that. Kyle just called, he sounded upset and didn't have many details, but... Jim Valenti said something about Tess, that she was wanted for questioning while we were gone. It's a closed case now, but I think that we're going to have to talk to him ourselves... tomorrow."

"Wanted by who??" Michael asked. His eyes and his expression had suddenly gone quite cold and severe.

"Somebody in Albuquerque, state police investigations I think."

"About what?"

"How Nasedo falsified his records and hers, back around the time we all came out of the pods. And he was worried that somebody would figure something out about the Granilith key. It's not an immediate crisis... if it were, you know that the Valentis would have warned us about before now."

"It better not be any kind of crisis," Michael muttered. "Even the smallest little element can go and germinate into an incredibly dangerous situation if left alone long enough... especially here in Roswell. I think the word is already spreading that we're back in town? Tess and Kyle don't want to have to hit the road and live undercover! And they shouldn't have to... but if we had KNOWN in the first place..."

"Cut Mister Valenti a little slack," Max muttered. "I'm a little frustrated too, but remember... he hasn't been living with this stuff for a while. I don't think he really expected Tess to come back to face any of this stuff... and when he found out that she *was* back, it took him a little while to remember that there had been developments after she left. Also, since Kyle left his house this morning, he hasn't really been in contact with any of us..."

"He could have made the rounds," Michael muttered. "Or just come here... wouldn't have taken much logical deduction to figure out that someone here was likely to know where to find one of us."

"Yeah." Max sighed. "I really hoped that all of this stuff about hiding from the authorities could be over."

He hadn't thought about the Granilith key for ages. They'd never really figured out how that alien key, a short, stick-shaped piece of cloudy white beryl with unfakeable command sequences built into its atomic structure, had wound up on permanent loan to a prestigious New York museum, though Max suspected that the dupes protector had probably been involved. Enntrizhj, one of the aliens they had managed to contact with the communication stones, had mentioned the key while teaching them how to launch the Granilith, in order to bring Isabel home, and save her life and little Lex's. He'd described the key, even managed to send them a decent visual picture of it, and Max had found a match by searching just about every computer network available at the town library. Then the hurried planning had begun, for a foolhardy caper to switch the crystal for a superficially identical copy, when the exhibit had come to visit in the New Mexico museum of natural history.

That had been very interesting timing, Max realized. Was it really such a coincidence... or had someone known that they would be looking for the key then, and given them an opportunity to take it??

"Maybe I should call Tess and Laurie at the hotel," Michael muttered, rousing Max from his own thoughts. "They need to know... Tess, particularly."

"Maybe, yeah," Max sighed. "We'll meet tomorrow... see what we need to do right away, if anything. Did anybody figure out that the crystal was switched, aside from Jim?"

"Yeah, guess that'll be good to sort out," Michael muttered. "I'll make the call, and see you tomorrow."

Max smiled to him and left the room.

----------

"So, which bed do you want?" Laurie asked as she put down her suitcase.

"Umm... come on, it's your room, you... you paid for it," Tess said, blushing slightly and looking down at the thick carpet on the floor. "You get to pick first."

"Well, I don't really care, I think," Laurie shot back with a smile. "So, since it's my room that I paid for, I pick that you get to choose!"

Tess shook her head, looked up enough to catch a quick glimpse of the other girls' face, and burst into nervous giggles. "Okay, erm, then I'll take the one against the wall there, closer to the bathroom. You can have the one near the windows. Kay?"

"Sounds good," Laurie agreed, and looked around a bit. After a moment she started unpacking stuff into the dresser next to the far bed. "Okay, umm... if you don't mind my asking -- what was it like? Travelling through space, living on another planet, all of it? I mean... I understand if there are some parts of it that you really can't explain, but I'm really curious."

"Well, there's a lot to tell, really," Tess admitted, sitting on the edge of her bed and bouncing her weight slightly to test how firm or soft the mattress is. "I'll do my best, but if you could give me a more specific subject to start with, it'd really help."

Laurie left her bag still mostly unpacked and crawled up onto her bed to look straight across at the other girl. "Okay -- what were your first impressions of this place, this other planet you were living on while you were gone??"

Tess smiled slightly. "Umm... it was all very scary and overwhelming, really. We got out of the Granilith and found out that it had crashed in the foothills of a huge mountain range. The sky was kinduv green, well, bluey-green but compared to earth's sky it was really the green that I noticed. The ground kinda seemed like ground anywhere near mountains, a mixture of rocks and sand and some kind of clay... but the air felt and smelled a little different, and the weirdest thing was feeling higher gravity. Wasn't really a lot higher than Earth's... maybe, oh what did they say? Up seven percent, but I felt as if it was dragging me down for the first few weeks."

"We could see some kind of settlement in the distance, a town or outpost or whatever, and soon it was pretty clear that they'd noticed us. Wheeled vehicles like Jeeps and flying ones like aircars off some cartoon show headed towards us. We didn't know if they were friendly or not -- if we'd landed where we had meant to, or if they were the bad guys out to capture us." Tess smiled. "Of course, when they finally arrived, they *were* friendlies, and we helped them move the Granilith somewhere safe, and they helped us travel safely across the continent."

Laurie smiled back. "Did... um, did Michael meet any, uhh..."

"Anybody from, well, from the other side of his family?" Tess asked, and Laurie blushed and nodded, looking down just like Tess herself had when she Laurie had first asked her to pick beds. "Uh, yeah, actually, a neice or second cousin, can't really remember, and her kids." There was a silence. "But that doesn't change how much he cares about you, Laurie... you have to know that."

"Yeah... then why didn't he call me himself?"

"Because he just got back from another planet, and was overwhelmed with seeing Maria again and finding a place for himself here in Roswell," Tess pointed out. "Also, well, because he's Michael, and forgets about the obvious sometimes. If Maria hadn't called you so soon, Michael would have remembered to let you know he was around - probably tomorrow sometime."

"Okay, so... um, let's talk faster than light travel, or whatever I should call it," Laurie replied. "What was..." That was when the phone rang. Laurie looked at it a little suspiciously, then picked up. "Umm, hello? Oh, yeah... hi Michael. Um, she's right here, yeah." She held out the receiver. "He wants to talk to you."

Tess was about to reach out for the phone... then something occured to her, how disappointed Laurie was that Michael had asked for someone else straight off. "Umm, I really gotta go to the bathroom right now," she lied. "Tell him I'll be back in a few minutes, kay??"

By the time she got back from the bathroom, Michael and Laurie were chatting so intently with each other that it was actually five minutes more before Tess got handed the phone again.

-----------

Alex woke up the next morning and went through a fairly usual routine. Breakfast with his folks, who seemed very quiet and a little moody, and then the usual necessities of washing and dressing. He wasn't too surprised that his parents didn't know how to act around him, really. They had so much to get used to... the idea that Alex was a father, (which had been a shock to him too,) and that there were levels to his relationship that they had never expected. Hopefully, given a few days of adjusting time, and maybe a couple of other opportunities to meet Isabel and Lex again, things would start to drift back towards the good kind of 'normal.'

After buttoning up his shirt, Alex turned away to look for a clean pair of dark blue dockers. "Isabel... Izzie my love, what are you up to now??"

"Oh, not much... just changed Lex, and Max said something about going over to the Valentis. Want to meet me there??"

Alex nearly jumped eight inches off the floor. Not only had he very clearly heard Isabel's voice, for a second he had caught a glimpse of her out of the corner of his eye... in the mirror. That was impossible, wasn't it??

He peered deeply into the silver, but could only see the same reflection of his room, and himself, that it always showed. "Umm... sweetheart?"

For a long moment, there was nothing. And then a reply, but much fainter, not really aloud. A thread of memory more than speech, except it wasn't something he remembered from the past. *You're trying much too hard, sweetie, concentrating too hard. Relax and it'll be easier. I can hardly...*

Alex blinked, looked around with a confused look, and then, for lack of anything more intelligent to do, he fell down on his bed and took several deep breaths. "Yeah, that's better. I didn't realize that we could do this, but it'll be convenient I think. Just don't pay TOO much attention to what I'm saying."

Alex smiled, sat up a little, and looked in the mirror again. There was a brief flash of something that went away. Ahh, that was the trick - it had to be out of the corner of his eye. He modified the direction he was looking, experimenting, until he was watching the door to his room. And Isabel's image reappeared in the mirror, her head and shoulders, specifically, with a few straps and a bit of lacy fabric over her chest the only bits of clothing that he could see. Alex had to fight down the urge to stare at the mirror, knowing that Isabel's picture wasn't really there, that she would disappear from there if he looked too closely.

"How's Lex doing?" he asked. "And why are we going over to Kyle's place?? Is something wrong?"

"He's great, and I don't know why." Isabel pouted, and it took Alex a moment to realize that that was a response to two seperate questions. "Says he doesn't want to worry me until we know if there's really anything to worry about... but the fact that he's not saying anything worries me a little, I have to admit."

"Me too, but I guess he has his reasons," Alex replied. "My parents are still acting a little weird, but I hope they'll get used to things soon. Ohh, I'll remember to bring my guitar and some picnic food, then we can leave from Valenti's straight to the starwatching rock, yeah?"

Isabel grinned. Alex wondered if she could see him too, if she saw him in a mirror or some other way. "Perfect. And then, this evening... you can come over here for dinner, just the, well, the three of us in my place unless I decide to have Max and Michael babysit."

Alex grinned, thinking that the guys might have their own ideas about whether they were automatically available for babysitting in the evenings instead of spending time with, well, with Liz and Maria, respectively and probably not all four together. He also decided that he'd rather Lex were around, even if he might spoil the mood. Realization of how immense a miracle their child had been was slowly settling on him, and he wanted to get to know the little guy as soon and as quickly as possible. "Are you going to be cooking?"

He caught a clear, though small, nervous gulp in Isabel's image. "Yep."

"Then I wouldn't miss it," Alex said sincerely, fighting back the temptation to make a witty and overly clever joke, since she seemed to be sensitive to the subject. "Well..."

"Alex!" The sound of his father calling suddenly broke the sensation of contact.

"Hello?" Alex mumbled to himself, hoping that Isabel's voice would answer, even in a whisper, an echo, a memory. But there was nothing. "Uh, yeah Dad?"

"You said that you were going to take out the garbage?" It wasn't quite a nag or a prompt, but Alex sighed slightly. His parents didn't really care about the garbage or have a set list of chores that they expected him to do when he was home from school... but they were sticklers about following through on one's word.

"Yeah, sorry. As soon as I finish getting dressed, Dad, okay??" He finally picked up the pants and started to struggle into them.

"Sure." A few minutes later, Alex was done getting ready... he quickly put the white kitchen garbage bag into the larger dark green sack, tied it, and carried out to the curb, then hurried back in for his guitar. "May be out a little late again tonight, but I'll call this afternoon and let you know when I'll be back, okay?"

"Sure, sweetie," his mom said, blowing him a quick kiss. "Say hi to Isabel and Lex for both of us, alright?"

Alex grinned and paused on the way out to his car. "Definitely."

----------

"Umm, well, I'm not sure you all really needed to come here first thing," Jim said, smiling affectionately at the delegation gathered in his living room - all seven of them. (Maria had had some errands to run for her mother and hadn't been able to meet Michael yet.) "For one thing, there's not that much to tell."

"Indulge me," Tess said softly. "From the beginning."

Jim cocked his head just a little, looking at Tess, and she wondered what was running through his head. "Okay, well, let's see. I could tell that something was going on around finals... not the specifics, like how you were trying to find a way to leave or anything, but definitely that some sort of dangerous game was afoot. I was on the lookout for any kind of odd news reports, and asked a few friends of mine to let me know about any strangeness that came their way, quietly."

"That's how I found out about the stunt the four of you pulled to get the white beryl. The guy who's number two at the museum security was the chief deupty here in Roswell about seventeen years ago - you didn't know that, did you?"

"Um, no," Max said, chuckling. "Why did he leave Roswell and go to the big city?"

"Well, when Sheriff Austin retired and I was appointed to replace him, Lou... Deputy Lou Markland, he was upset at first, thought that I'd only got tapped because of my father, even though his term as Sheriff ended in disgrace. So he asked me for a transfer on my first day, and went to the Santa Fe PD a few weeks later. I won't go into the details of how he ended up working museum security, but we started writing each other regularly around then, maybe six years ago."

"There wasn't that much he could tell me, an unusual argument and emotional scene between two of the temp docents for the exhibition. He didn't think much of it, but I realized that it could have been some sort of a diversion, and I managed to show him your photo, Isabel, without making a big deal out of it. He thought he remembered your face, but wasn't sure."

"As far as I know, nobody else who knows your real names suspects you of having been involved there. There's been a question since then as to whether the crystal that's currently in the museum is the same one that used to be there... some scientist who's been examining it under a microscope every so often said that the surface crystallization pattern isn't quite the same. The museum and the owner of the crystal are saying that they're not convinced of the consistency of his methods and research. And within the time frame that he says the change happened, the crystal was shown in about two dozen different cities across the country."

"Okay," Max said. "That's a bit of a load off my mind. How about the other part, this special investigator, the one who thinks that Tess' background isn't what it seems?"

"Well, he called me out of the blue, maybe mid-July, and at first he was trying to get me to believe that he was a private investigator. That he had been hired by some people who might or might not have been related to her, and wanted to find out if she was *their* Tess, and if so, where she had gone. I did my best to probe deeper, partly because I knew that Tess didn't have any other relatives here on Earth, at least, not ordinary human ones, and that's when he came out and told us about the buried clues unit."

"It's something of an experiment... or maybe it was. I haven't been able to get a straight answer from the state police as to if the organization is still active. Something about cross-referencing computer files in an attempt to find crimes that wouldn't have come to light through usual methods and procedures."

"I found out as much as I could about his investigation into Tess, and then I set out to sabotage him. Deliberately put him onto the track of your parents and other people you knew here in town... Brody, Amy, and so on... and then instigated an organized complaint through Hanson and the sheriff's department. There was a hearing... like an idiot, Johnson spouted off about a bunch of things that he couldn't come close to proving, and the commissioner slapped him down. Haven't heard anything about it in over a year."

"Yeah, I remember my mom saying something about this guy asking her questions," Liz said. "I was worried at the time... but I never knew that you were involved in the situation, Mister Valenti."

"Yeah, I didn't know you knew about it either," he said. "So... yeah, just wanted to make sure to tell you..."

"We appreciate it," Michael said. "Looks like you may have saved all our butts one more time. And we'll be careful, but you're right... hopefully this stuff won't be a problem. Just so long as we blend in and don't attract attention."

Valenti grinned. "All I'm sayin'." There was a bit of an awkward moment in that living room. "So, would you young people like to stay for lunch?? I think I can rustle up the fixings for my trademarked hot beef sandwiches."

"Ooooh, we'll stay!!" Tess exclaimed, grabbing Kyle's hand. She was happy... this was the first time she had felt completely welcome in the Valenti home since she'd been back. It was just a little bit like old times... and, (she had to admit while looking at Kyle,) better in some ways.

"Well, Alex and I have another appointment," Isabel said, "after we pick Lex up from my mom. I'd love to stay, really, but..."

"But she's been talking nonstop about this thing since yesterday morning," Michael put in. "And I'm supposed to meet Maria at the Crash in twenty minutes... rain check, huh?"

"Sure," Jim said with a nod. "Max? Liz??"

Liz looked at Max. "I think we'd love to try your sandwiches," Max said, and Liz nodded her approval.

---------

"Oh, that was great," Isabel said, putting down a savory chicken wrap to clap her hands. "It was beautiful."

"Really??" Alex asked. He kinda thought it was a slightly forgettable bubbly love song himself, full of the usual cliche lyrics about moonlight shining on the waters past the shoreline, flying through blue skies, nights full of heated passion after years of loneliness, and tossing logic out to sea. But he'd been able to sing the trite words with a lot of conviction because they pretty much did match what he felt for Isabel, so maybe he shouldn't be too surprised that she had seen value in them for the same reason. "Okay, what next?"

"Anything you want," she told him, and there was silence for a moment. "Why don't you sing something for Lex, actually?? I think you've been more than fair to me - he deserves his own turn."

"Umm... okay," Alex replied, blinking in surprise for a moment, and waving hi at Lex, grinning as the little guy waved back. "Okay, well... this one isn't factually true of course, but it kinda fits how I feel about being a Daddy, so that's why I thought of it." He started strumming a fairly traditional harmonic riff, and after several repetitions of it, began:

"Got sent home from school one day with a shiner on my eye.
Fighting was against the rules an' it didn't matter why.
When Dad got home I told that story, just like I'd rehearsed
Then stood there on my trembling knees, and waited for the worst."

Isabel was smiling slightly and Lex seemed to be enjoying the harmony more than any of Mommy's songs, so far. Alex grinned himself as he put a few more guitar flourishes in, leading into the chorus for the first time.

And he said... 'Let me tell you a secret about a father's love.
A secret that my Daddy said was just between us.
You see, daddies don't just love their children
Every now and then;
It's a love without end amen.'
It's a love without end amen

When I became a father in the spring of '91,
There was no doubt that stubborn boy was just like my father's son.
And when I thought my patience had been tested to the end,
I took my Daddy's secret and I passed it on to him.

I said, 'Let me tell you a secret about a father's love.
A secret that my Daddy said would be just between us.
He said daddies don't just love their children
Every now and then;
It's a love without end amen.'
It's a love without end amen"

Alex's senses seemed to be heightened by the music he was playing and singing as he moved into the final verse... he felt like he was seeing every bit of the forest around them like he had never seen anything before, and that the rustling of the leaves in the late summer wind was a percussion instrument. The last verse-chorus pair was supposed to have a slightly choral feel to it, and he wasn't quite sure how to achieve that with only his guitar and voice, but tried his best.

"Last night I dreamed I died and stood outside those Pearly Gates,
When suddenly I realized there must be some mistake!
'If they know half the things I've done, they'll never let me in.'
Then somewhere, from the other side, I heard these words again.

They said, 'Let me tell you a secret about a father's love.
A secret that my Daddy said was just between us.
You see, daddies don't just love their children
Every now and then;
It's a love without end amen.
It's a love without end amen'"

"Yeah, it is," Isabel agreed, picking up Lex as Alex finished the song. "That was just perfect."

He smiled. "Glad you think so."

"Yeah. Want some food??"

"Definitely!!" He quickly packed the guitar back into its case and came over to join the two of them, taking a chicken finger and some french fries to start with.


TO BE CONTINUED...

[Chrisken]

Part Six


"Are you SURE about this?" Maria asked for the fourth time. Michael just nodded, smiling quietly to himself. "Why can't you just tell me why I'm doing this?"

"Umm... well, because I really think you'll appreciate being shown it as a surprise, instead of being told," Michael said.

"Okay, then show me! But BEFORE I trade in my plane ticket back to school for tomorrow..." Even as she said the words, she realized the reason Michael wasn't giving her that chance.

"No refunds less than 24 hours before departure," he repeated, pointing at the ticket which had that sentiment on it somewhere in the fine print. "We're almost at that point now, well, within about an hour." They moved forward in the line, only two away from the window now, after a lot of waiting. "We wouldn't have enough time to go there and come back. And you getting to spend the ticket refund on something for yourself is part of the point."

"Okay, okay, I give," Maria said. "But this surprise of yours better be good... and it better get me to campus on time!" Michael chuckled softly, but didn't say anything more, until after Maria's turn at the counter had come, and after no more than the usual fuss the tickets were taken back and refunds offered.

"You hungry?" he asked as they walked away.

"Umm, kinda, but not for airport food. We could hit Aunt Penny's for takeout on the way... assuming that you want to head back north towards town, that is."

"Umm, yeah," Michael mumbled, trying not to give anything away -- this felt like a tactic on Maria's part, at least fractionally. "That'll work, sure enough."

They got back into Maria's car and she started to thread her way through the airport's parking lots and traffic lanes, towards the exit that would take them back north. "I am kinda looking forward to going back to the Big Apple," she admitted in a bid to break the silence. "Not that I want to be away from you for weeks and weeks... but it's such an incredible place, Michael. The energy of Manhattan, the history that you can soak up absolutely anywhere... just the incredible variety of it..." She sighed and looked over at him. "Were you serious about following me there?? Because... because I kind of feel like I need both of... hehe, both of you in my life right now."

"Yeah, New York and me, I think that can work," Michael agreed with a small smile. "But what about Roswell??"

"Well, Roswell will always be dear to my heart, of course," she quickly insisted. "But... it isn't quite the same. I'll be coming back here for the holidays of course... christmas, thanksgiving... but my soul is kinda stuck in the big city."

"Alright," Michael agreed. "Should be interesting to see. I've never been in any city larger than... well, Phoenix is pretty big, I guess. Didn't exactly get to spend much time there. Otherwise... Albuquerque or Vegas."

"Not even back home??"

"Hmm..." He blinked slightly. "I guess I still don't consider anything Antarian in the same categories as people and places on Earth, even if they're logically and apparently similar." He considered that for a bit. "Never really asked how many people lived in Estyrria, that's kind of the capital city, and it kind of surrounds the Royal castle at this point, though the palace was there first and the town grew up around it. If I had to hazard a guess though, I'd say in population it was probably a bit bigger than Phoenix, though not as big as Los Angeles or New York."

"More like, erm, like Houston maybe, then?" Maria asked.

"Umm... not entirely sure how big Houston is, but maybe that'll do." Michael let out a breath. "So, tell me more about this college you're going back to in New York? What kind of classes did you have last year? Any good friends there?"

Maria shot a very brief look in Michael's direction that suggested she thought that was an avoidance tactic to keep Michael from talking any more about Antar or Estyrria, or what the four of them might have done there. "Umm... yeah, a few friends, though none as close as Liz and Alex... or Kyle or you or Isabel or Max etcetera etcetera. The classes... are really great. A lot of them are one-on-one or one teacher to just a few students, especially the ones dealing with music directly... the vocal tutorials, which is kind of my big thing, or instrumental classes. Of course, because the teacher's time is valuable and there are so many people who want to work with them, you don't get terribly much time with them like that... one hour a day, maybe, and then you're practicing by yourself or with other students for maybe four hours to perfect what you learned."

"And then there are some theory classes and electives that are a little more like traditional classroom style, though still fairly small classes, twenty or twenty-five students. Like high school classes in that way I guess, not like some of the university courses that Liz and Alex have been in where they're one of more than six hundred students in a giant lecture theater."

"It sounds really cool," Michael said. "And, well, obviously, like the kind of place that I would NEVER get into no matter how well I do on my SATs or whatever."

"Not unless you've got some talents you've been keeping pretty well hidden from me, no," she agreed with a slight smile. "But there's a state school campus just about two blocks down the avenue." Michael thought about that, and smiled a little himself, though he seemed uncertain.

They talked about other things, long-ago shared memories and idle thoughts, as Maria pulled into the drive-through lane and they got some lunch. Most of the food had been eaten already by the time they got back into town, and Michael muttered, "Just go straight on through, keep heading north," through the last bit of his foot-long with pickle relish, mayo, and onions.

Maria shot him an odd look. "Umm, that is, if you don't have anything more important to do right now," he added in a low voice, and she laughed softly.

"Okay bud, north it is. Tell me where I should turn off... if you don't want to end up in Santa Rosa, that is."

"Okay." Michael thought about that for a moment. "Why Santa Rosa?? Have you actually tried going straight north from Roswell just to see where you ended up??"

"Actually, yeah - both ways."

"Both ways? How are there two ways to go north??"

"Well, the highways don't always go straight north," Maria pointed out. "There's kind of a Y-shaped fork in the road, where the 285 turns northwest and the 20 splits off to the north-east. One way leads through Vaughn and the other through Fort Sumner. But if you keep trying to go northward, you'll end up in Santa Rosa either way, and there's no highway going further north from there... not unless you go west a little while on I-40 first, and then you could go north to Las Vegas, New Mexico."

"Okay," Michael muttered agreeably." Don't worry - I'll give you the cue."

They didn't drive very far past the city limits north, in point of fact, before Michael had her turn off onto a little-used one-lane road that led into the desert, and then to an even rougher four-wheeler track that the old Jetta had some difficulty with. "Okay, park right here," Michael said all of a sudden.

"What, like..." Maria didn't finish that expression and, seeing that there was a flat branch off of the track that was just about the right shape for a parking spot, pulled the car into it. "Okay, what now??"

Michael smiled and got out of the car, indicating with an imperative wave that she should do the same. Maria was completely mystified, but she followed him over to a kind of block-shaped rocky outcropping. Michael stepped very close to the rock, which shot straight up about nine and a half feet in the air like it thought it was a wall, and waved his hand close to it. Maria was starting to figure out what was going on as a familiar silvery handprint appeared out of nowhere. Michael pressed his own palm and fingers into the marked position, and out of nowhere a metal door appeared in the rock, and slid smoothly open.

"So... so this is your starship?" she said, waving at what still mostly looked like a blocky rock hill. The general contours didn't look at all improbable for a relatively small spaceship she supposed, sitting on the desert floor. She hadn't really stopped to think what Michael meant when he said it was protected by a 'cloak', except maybe that she ship was entirely invisible, and if you climbed up on top of it you'd appear to be just floating in air. (Was that mental image from one of the star trek movies... the one when they came back in time to save the whales maybe??)

She hadn't thought of this camoflage aspect, the ship disguising it as a relatively natural looking part of the terrain, as something that people would expect to see out here, that they probably WOULDN'T even pay any attention to. (Unless, maybe someone who was familiar with the specific part of the desert that the ship had landed on would be surprised to see it... but hopefully that sort of thing wouldn't be a problem.) Smiling, Maria took Michael's hand and they stepped inside.

The metal door slid closed again almost as quickly as she was through, cutting off the bright natural daylight, and she had to blink a bit before she got her bearings. There was artificial light inside, but it was pretty dim, with a strong purple-blue tint, which added to the unearthly sensation of *knowing* that she was standing in a structure that had not been constructed by human beings, or anywhere near this solar system. Michael was stanind in front of her, in some sort of fairly normal looking entry corridor except for the weird controls on the walls, which led in a few feet to a T intersection with what was presumably a longer hallway, maybe running the length of the vessel. There was one open doorway not far from Maria, leading into a dark unlit space. "What's that??"

"Okay," Michael said. stepping towards it. There wasn't room for him to pass her in the hallway, and she didn't want to precede him into the darkness, so Maria stepped back close to the door they'd come in, wondering if it would open again automatically like a supermarket door. It didn't... (probably you had to press a button or something to get out,) and Michael stepped into that dark room that she'd been slightly afraid of. White ambient lights blinked on, showing some kind of weird computer terminals, or some things related to computer terminals at least. "We can start the grand tour here, in sensor ops."

Maria smiled a little vaguely and joined him. "Okay, but don't spend too long on the technobabble, okay? I don't mind having a look around, but... well, you know."

"Got it. Don't worry, I'm pretty bored by the complicated stuff too," he assured her. "Well, this is where you can find out the most information about what's going on outside the ship, either out in space, or when you're landed somewhere. That's why it's right next to the door..."

----------

"So, erm, what now??" Kyle asked as the four of them walked back out of his house. There were still a lot of cars parked in the driveway and the road in front... even after Alex and Isabel and Michael had left, there was still Jim's car, and Kyle's, and Liz's. Max and Michael and Isabel had come in Max's dad's car, which Michael had then taken along to make his rendezvous with Maria. Liz wondered for a moment to herself whose car Michael and Maria had left in the parking lot, and who would end up collecting whichever car it was and getting it back to its rightful owner.

"Well, umm, I have a few more job applications that I want to drop off," Tess said.

"Oh, again??" Liz asked. She'd heard quite a bit about Kyle and Tess' job hunting from the previous day. "Well, I guess it makes sense to follow up on leads as soon as you can. But... well, come on, Tess, you've got to have some fun too!"

Tess smiled shyly, walking close to Kyle, and giggling softly as he wrapped his arm around her back so that his left hand ended up at the left side of her waist. "Umm... okay, except I can't think of what. Already so happy I'm not sure I recognize myself."

Max smiled a little too. "Well, I think Liz mentioned something yesterday about lying down in the grass, in the park, just staring up at the sky and not doing anything at all. We didn't manage to fit that in yesterday." He looked at the three of them. "Whatcha think??"

"Umm... I'm in, yeah," Liz agreed. "You should come, Tess. Except... right, job applications. Erm... well, what do you think of the idea anyway?"

"I'm in, definitely," Tess assured her. "Kyle?" He nodded, beaming more than a little... obviously he loved the idea, but wouldn't have refused her even if he didn't. "Okay, well... I guess you guys can tag along, or meet us in about, erm, in three quarters of an hour I guess? Uhh, yeah, that should work."

Liz turned to Max. "Umm, I'd like to... oh, wait a second, shoot. There was something that I wanted to do, but I can't quite remember what it is! Man, I hate it when that happens."

Max looked at Kyle. "Okay, see you guys at one-thirty, the eighth street park, north side entrance. We'll try to figure out what Liz forgot."

"Yeah, that'll work," Tess put in. "That park, I mean, specifically. Good grass there, at least there used to be. Obviously that place that Michael and Maria went to yesterday wouldn't work." She shook her head. "I'll just shut up now."

"Don't you dare," Kyle teased her, and the two of them split off to get into Kyle's car, stopping for a deep kiss along the way.

"Okay, do you want to stay here, or drive?" Liz asked as they pulled out of the driveway. Her own car was parked by the curb..

"Staying here doesn't seem likely to jog your memory in any particular way," Max pointed out. "Driving might be better. Is it... is it something to do with your parents or the cafe?"

"No," Liz told him, and then walked out to get into the driver's seat.

"Some favor for a friend? Alex or Maria or... or somebody you've met since I've been gone?" Max continued promptingly. He took the shotgun position and Liz pulled out into the street.

"No, not that either... I think," Liz muttered, concentrating first on her driving and secondly the question of this forgotten something.

"Something about getting ready for school?" Max tried a third time, without much enthusiasm.

"Umm... actually, yeah, I think so!" Liz smiled at the connection once it was finally made. "Umm... yeah, now I remember. The book list for some of my fall courses are already posted, and, well, I thought I could look for some of them here in town and get a little jump on the reading. Ev... well, not everyone, but a lot of the really driven students do it. I'm just trying to keep pace slightly."

"It's okay," Max told her. "If I was in Harvard on a scholarship, I'd probably be driving myself a little nuts over the academic intensity too. So, hit the Barnes and Noble downtown??"

"Yep, that's the plan. Oh, and keep an eye on the time please, and remind me. You know just how thoroughly I can get lost in a bookstore... even if I just stick to books on the list. But I don't want to miss meeting up with Kyle and Tess. Ooohh... the list, erm..." She frowned while turning a corner. "See if you can reach my purse? It should be in the back seat I think."

"Got it," Max assured her after a moment.

"Okay, my organizer should be in the big compartment... theoretically, but I'm not sure I remember putting it in there today," she said. "Could you check?" Max hesitated for a second before sliding the zipper open, and poked around for only a few seconds before taking out a familiar dark shape. "Okay, good enough." They were almost at the bookstore, and she'd have hated to have to go home and find the list first... though wandering around the bookstore without knowing exactly she was looking for hadn't been that appealing either.

"You know, for about two seconds I was worried there," Max said in a low voice.

"Worried? About what??"

"Erm... worried about, well... that I was about to live out the cliche, you know? Like, in a movie, if a girl ever asks a guy to look for something in her purse, he ALWAYS finds something, well, surprising inside, right?? Either something that he didn't really want to know about, or something that she didn't realize was in there and is horribly embarassed that he saw, or both, or something even worse. You've seen moments like that, right??"

Liz chuckled softly. "Yeah, actually, it does sound familiar. Don't think I have anything in my purse that I wouldn't want you to see, or that you'd get upset about, though you probably shouldn't start searching through it just in case I'm wrong." They both laughed nervously. "Though I can think of a few things on that palmpilot that I'd rather you didn't turn on and just happen to open up, actually."

"Should I put it back inside?" Max asked very quickly.

"Either way." Finally they got to the bookstore, and Liz started talking about some of the courses that she'd taken last year and the ones she would be starting soon. Intro biology, botany of the American west, cell biology and biochemistry. All too soon, he'd given her the signal that they should head up to the cash register. Liz had only found a few of the books she was interested in... she'd gotten onto a roll, talked too much, and not spent enough time actually looking. But she didn't mind.

"I do kinda wonder if Isabel and I are going to get started on the studying thing until after you and Alex have left town," he muttered. "I just... I can't quite help it, I've missed you so much, I want to spend every moment that I can by your side."

"Well, know that I have these books, we can probably study together," she pointed out. "You on GED and SAT stuff, me getting ready for fall sophomore classes."

"That could work."

"Umm, can I help you?" the girl at the middle register asked. Liz was at the head of the line.

-----------

"Okay, I have to say I like this room best of all so far," Maria giggled. There hadn't been that much else to the ship... the 'flight control room'... as Michael explained, it had been too small to call a bridge and too big to call a cockpit. A storage locker, small engine room, kitchen, and 'the head' (ie, a very bare and functional bathroom,) had all been shown to her. The kitchen was actually pretty cool, with a computerized alien gizmo that had been programmed for dozens of earth snack foods... or nutritious replicas that tasted identical to them, at any rate.

Michael hadn't opened the doors that he said led to Max's room, or the one that the girls had volunteered to share (with Lex there too, she assumed,) and that was just fine with her. Without any of the three of them being around, it would have seemed like an invasion of privacy. But he'd led her into his own bedroom, or, well, opened the door and followed her in. It was cramped, but somehow homey. A mattress about the size of a twin bed, with just enough room to squeeze by next to it on two sides, and none at all on the other two. A few drawers were evidently built into the walls. A picture of Maria herself was fastened to the wall above the head of the bed... a familiar picture, of her singing on the stage after the big last dinner in Vegas... when Michael had gotten her to come up and sing. Alex had snapped a few pictures of her, and she'd seen them all. This one was her very favorite, and apparently it had been Michael's too. She hadn't even known he'd seen those pics.

And... and how the heck had he managed to get this, this small poster, made of the picture and take it with him? Maria and Liz had been there when the four of them had gone up to the Granilith that last time, and none of them had seemed to be carrying any kind of luggage. The picture looked like it was eleven inches by seventeen, much too big for him to have carried in his pocket. Then again... maybe he had just taken a little print of it in his wallet, and then used alien powers to 'blow it up' into a much larger print later.

Maria climbed up onto the bed, felt the corner of the poster with her fingers, (it felt just exactly like ordinary paper, not glossy like a color photo or a poster of a movie star you might by in the store would be,) then turned away from it and sat down near the head of the bed. Michael had closed the sliding door, and was setting up a chair, a weird ultramodern thing that unfolder out of the wall into the only bit of free space in the room, right next to the door. "No, come on, sit on the bed with me," she suggested. "There's plenty of room."

Michael smiled and crawled on. "Just in case it wasn't clear... the reason that I had you trade in your tickets for tomorrow was because I was volunteering to fly you to New York myself, here in the ship. That was clear, right?? You save the money, we get to spend the time together and travel in more comfort."

"I was wondering," she admitted. "Is it... is it safe? I mean, I realize that the camoflage technique is useful, but can you really afford to go zipping all over? Is it safe, I mean, as far as people noticing it?"

"Well, as much as I'd like to, we probably shouldn't make a regular habit out of it," Michael admitted. "The cloaking routines are pretty snazzy... when the ship is in the air you can look right through it... bending and twisting light around the space that it's taking up, and there are seperate routines for absorbing radar, and blocking sound leakage, and everything. But we'd need to find somewhere safe to land and let you at least get out in the New York area, and that won't be easy. Also, the more this rock appears and disappears in New Mexico, the more likely that someone will notice THAT. But I asked Max about it this morning, and he doesn't think it's a big worry for a one-time thing... maybe a few other special occasions. Otherwise, it'll be the airlines or road trips I guess."

"Okay, that makes sense." Maria smiled, reassured as much as anything else by the fact that Michael had thought about the risks and consulted Max than the specific details. "It was a very sweet thought, and I'd love a private ride to school courtesy of Antar airlines." She grinned and shifted a little closer to Michael.

"Now that that's settled... it occurs to me that we've got a room, and a bed here. Both slightly cramped but homey. And best of all, we have the entire place all to ourselves... well, unless Tess comes by to show Kyle *her* room, or one of the others, and somehow I kinda doubt that. So... I mean, we haven't really had a good opportunity to be alone together since you got back. In the 'truly private' sense of alone, I mean."

Michael grinned. "Actually, that's a really good notion, but, well, how about I show you the last room in the spaceship?"

Maria frowned a little. "Umm... okay I guess... there's one more?" And why, exactly, was he mentioning it now, she wondered, but didn't say that part. Michael smiled secretively as he got up, opened the door again, and led the way to another door a little up the main corridor and on the other side. Maria followed him in, looking around the relatively spacious new room. The floor, walls, and ceiling were an unmarked black as far as she could tell, and white light shone down from nowhere specifically above them. "Okay, what's the deal??"

Michael's grin got even wider. "Create two kitchen armchairs, about eight feet away from each other. And with a funky blip, there they were, almost identical to the seats in the Evans kitchen. Maria frowned at them... Michael went over and sat in one chair, and Maria kicked at the other. If moved aside... she pressed down on the seat, and it supported the pressure. Carefully she returned it to its original position and sat down, facing Michael.

"What is this place?"

"We call it a recreation lounge," Michael whispered softly.

"And... and how did you make the chairs just appear?" He was silent. "Michael, are you trying to get me to believe you've got a working holodeck here??"

"Umm..." Michael blushed a little. "That's kind of the sort of thing we were going for, though it's not quite as fancy as the holodecks on star trek. Still, it kinda worked pretty well to produce some changes of scenery on the trip back home... as a place to exercise, or play games." He laughed nervously. "I also thought it would be a more comfortable place to, umm, to be alone and truly private together, than my cabin. Also, as an added bonus, we, well, the four of us kinda worked out an agreement together. If anybody comes out here to the ship there'll be an indicator telling them that the lounge is in use, which will be a strong signal to take off unless there's an emergency. There, umm, there isn't great soundproofing between the different cabins here."

Maria smiled. "Okay, cool I guess. Have you got any locations pre-programmed into here? Something just a little bit sexy maybe?"

"Stand up," he replied. Maria did, quickly, and when he gestured, backed off to the edges of the space. "Computer, load program Shayy-me and run." Everything changed and Maria saw herself... in her mother's bedroom. Almost every detail seemed to be there, down to the view out of the windows, and the rest of her house visible through a partly open door.

She looked back at Michael and raised an eyebrow. "Doing it in my mom's bed?? That's kind of... well, just slightly twisted."

"Yeah, but I know you," he said, moving over to Maria and wrapping his arms around her. "You've got a kinky streak just under the surface... or am I wrong?"

"Ummmm..." Maria hesitated, feeling the blush rising to her cheeks. "No, not entirely wrong... though we don't have to do something like this all the time."

"Naturally not." Maria smiled a small smile and stepping up to the bed in question, a comfortable queen-size with a big green comforter spread over it that her mom wasn't actually using... but obviously this program was based on Michael's memory from years ago. She sat down on the edge, bouncing slightly to see if the mattress behaved like a real one, and took off her light sweater. "How does... how does it work to create these programs, anyway?? Do you have to give it detailed commands verbally, one by one until everything is right, or does the whole thing come with some sort of brain scanner?"

"Yeah, there's a mental imaging helmet to make it easier to reproduce things that you've seen," Michael said. "Otherwise it really would be a pain in the butt." He sat down next to her, looking straight into her face and smiling. "Okay, erm... do you know how far you want to, um, to go today?? Okay, that was so utterly beyond lame I'd like you to forget you ever heard me say it, if that's possible."

"Umm, probably not," she whispered. "But I don't think it was too pitiful." The unfortunate resemblance to a Microsoft slogan notwithstanding. "Well, er... I'm not sure about going all the way, just yet. I mean, I'm really happy that you're home, but we weren't *there* yet when you left, and even though I've grown and my, uh, my needs are a little more mature than they used to be... uh, our relationship hasn't had time to grow and match it. Also... well, this might not be the best time to bring it up, but did you find out anything about, err... well, all the stuff that Isabel had to go through because she and Alex..."

"You were wondering about what would happen if you got pregnant?" Michael asked, and Maria nodded, blushing fiercely. "Yes, of course we asked. Somehow, everything's all better if the mother is fully human, or at least born human. There are a few nutritional supplements and tests we brought along, but neither you or Liz need to worry, the way that Isabel and Tess do. And, while we're on the subject, I also asked about birth control. Human methods should apply, but for a couple of various reasons, will have a noticeably higher failure rate."

"Okay, well, umm... then no offense, I'd like to stay well away from anything that would be necessitating birth control," she said. "But... we can have a bunch of fun even so I think."

Michael smiled without saying a word, leaned close, and kissed her deeply. The fiery ardor that both of them had been feeling for nearly two days now, and supressing for the lack of a truly private place to let it loose, (among other reasons,) didn't take long to overwhelm Maria, and she nearly tore Michael's heavy shirt off of him, letting her lips and fingers explore all of the bare flesh that was exposed by this. Michael himself was clearly of two minds... enjoying what she was doing, and not wanting to discourage her, but also wanting to take the initiative himself. After a brief moment, he decided to wait for a clearer opening.

That came about a minute later, when Maria sat halfway up and took a breath. Michael ran his hands over the smooth skin of Maria's arms and shoulders, (she was wearing a little black tank top, which had been under her sweater. Maria moaned at the sensation, and kind of shivered all over. Michael then brought up one hand into Maria's hair, which she'd been letting grow out very long, so it fell down about halfway down her back, with a few locks always ending up falling in front of her shoulders. Michael's stroking of those long locks was an incredibly sensual caress, losing himself in their dark smoothness, smiling at the reddish glints that were thrown off. Then, in a familiar move, he brushed all of the hair immediately away from one side of her head. Maria smiled, knowing what was coming and waiting for it, waiting for Michael to bring his attention to bear on that little spot right behind her earlobe that practically made her melt and boil away in fire at the same time. He did, ministering to the sensitive flesh there carefully with his tongue, sucking at it slightly... pausing in surprise when he realized that her earlobes were bare and free of jewelry, before redoubling his efforts.

Maria lay back on the comforter, feeling Michael move to stay with her, his lips leaving her ear, tracing and teasing along her neck, licking at a delicate spot near her collarbone. "Okay," he whispered hoarsely. "How much fun are you up for??"

"Umm... right now, I think I wanna have a whole lot of fun," she admitted. "But remember what we talked about."

"Okay." Michael backed away, and brought his fingers to the snap on her jeans. "May I??"

Maria swallowed. "Umm, sure. Go ahead."

Michael slowly unfastened the tight pants, easing them down and off her full hips, away from her tight and supple butt, down her smooth legs. He kissed her thighs, and caressed her skin, and tossed her sneakers and the denim jean material down onto the floor. Then he reached up towards her waist again and hesitated once more, apparently not sure how much her approval had covered. Maria waved vaguely, and he hooked his fingers into her blue bikini panties and pulled them off entirely in just one movement, which seemed more than a little impressive.

"I realize this might be a going a little too far the first time," he said softly, before, erm, diving in, as it were. "But I have to admit I've been fantasizing about this, well, ever since I left, or maybe even before. I know I was thinking about seeing if you were up for it before all of the stuff with Isabel started, but I wasn't quite sure how to make my move. Do you want me to..."

"Yeah," Maria interrupted him, gulping with anticipation and desire. "Take me as far as you want... so long as the little general stays inside your pants.

Michael laughed softly, stuck out his tongue slightly and dragged it lightly across the delicious skin of Maria's inside thigh, and then started to make his way further up her body.

"Ooohhhhhhhhhhhh, MMMmmmmmmm... ahhhhhhhh" was all that Maria managed to say in response.

-----------

"Ooooh, that one kinduv looks like Isabel when she's got her hair all piled up on the top of her head, doesn't it?" Tess said, pointing up at a cloud.

"I... I'm not sure I see the resemblence, babe."

"Just her head... and come to think of it, you're probably seeing it upside down," she mentioned.

"Oh... okay, yeah, I guess I kinduv get it."

"It's a perfect resemblance," Liz put in. "Down to the 'I take no crap' look in her eye." That made Tess explode into a series of giggles so loud that she'd probably have fallen down, if they hadn't all been lying flat on the grass in the first place.

"Oh, and just to state the blindingly obvious -- this was a really great idea, Liz," Tess mentioned. "Thanks."

"Sure. Some of the credit should go to Max," Liz said. "I may have been the first one to mention this, but he was the one who suggested it for today... and invited the two of you along." She reached out to grab Max's hand.

"Okay, so, um, out of curiosity, have you guys thought about... um, er, something?" Kyle asked. Max turned his head to shoot him a sidelong look. (The four of them were spread out in a rough cross formation on the field, heads pointing inwards, Kyle, Tess, Liz, and Max in clockwise order.) "Okay, that was more than usually unintelligible. I mean... Tess and I are going to move in together, or at least we plan and hope to. Isabel and Alex... well, they have Lex to think about, so they're kind of a different case. But... well, do you think you're going to be doing something special soon, now that you're back together??"

"Umm... I've thought about it," Liz admitted. "Trying to find someplace to live together that we could share, or... well, stuff like that. But... I dunno, maybe it's easy for you guys to commit to the idea, with Kyle being here in Roswell. Since I'm committed to college so far away... well, it kinda makes a little more sense to see how things go for a little while without making big plans, you know??"

"Yeah, I see that," Tess agreed. "Well, best of luck and everything, you know."

"Thanks," Max agreed. "Any idea what you guys are doing for dinner, or this evening?"

"Umm... oh, darnit!! I got a thing I need to go to, a, err... it's just a get together with some of the other guys I'm going through the LE training with, but I said that I'd be there, before you came back honey. I don't want to cancel at the last moment."

"It's okay sweetie," Tess assured him.

"Umm... actually, do you want to come along? I'm pretty sure that some of the other cadets are bringing dates, so it wouldn't be awkward for that reason. But..."

"Yeah, I'd really like that!" It was obvious to all of them by the tone of her voice that Tess was nervous but excited. "Meeting the guys you're training with."

"Also, just to warn you, they're not all guys in the gender sense," Kyle put in. "Though almost. Not sure if Christy is going to be bringing a guy with her or not." He sat up. "Okay, well, if I'm going to be all ready, we'll probably have to grab dinner back at my place or somewhere else quick."

"Okay, well, we could go to the Crashdown actually, that should be quick enough," Tess said, sitting up too, and turning around to face the others.. "And, umm... right, my clothes, well, actually, I'm not sure what I have to wear to a party like that. I took some stuff over to the hotel room, but..."

"You can take a look in my closet I guess, and alter something if you need to," Liz suggested. "We're still pretty much the same body type, with one sort-of exception."

Tess looked down for an instant at her chest, just by reflex. "Umm... well, thanks, that's really generous. You want to come eat at the Crashdown too?"

"Yeah, I'm in," Max said, standing up.

TO BE CONTINUED...

[Chrisken]

Here you go, nice long part.

Part Seven


"If I have five lemons of five different colors, and line them up outside your door..." Alex picked up another carrot and started to peel it, "how many different ways can I line them up?"

Isabel smiled and continued to play peek-a with Lex as she answered. "Well, there are five different choices for the first position, and then four for the second spot in line, and so on. Thus the answer would be five times four times three times two. Five times two is ten, and four times three is twelve, thus the answer is ten times twelve, or one hundred and twenty ways."

Alex grinned. "How would the answer change if two of the lemons were orange, and absolutely identical, so any orderings where the orange lemons are switched don't count as different?"

"Umm... that'd cut it in half to sixty ways, wouldn't it? I can't remember the textbook justification, but it seems like for any of the original 120 lineups, there'd be one that's the same except that the oranges are flipped around. Thus each one gets joined up with its opposite, and you're left with sixty."

"Flawless reasoning, and quite right," Alex agreed. "Okay, moving on slightly. If I show you a triangle where angle A is seventy degrees, angle B is sixty degees, and angle C is fifty degrees, and the length of side BC is five inches. How would you find the length of side AB?"

"Umm..." Isabel frowned slightly. "I'm better at geometry when I can see diagrams," she mumbled, but didn't give up on that account. Lex seemed to be getting tired of the game so she sat down on the couch and let him crawl into her arms, checking vaguely to see if there was anything she needed to take care of for him. There wasn't anything immediately obvious. "Okay, well, one way would be to look up the law of sines and law of cosines, figure out which would help me out here because I think that at least one of them does, and then apply it. But I have an alternate strategy."

"Oh, really?" Alex asked. "Explain further."

"Okay, umm... I'd start by dropping an altitude of the triangle from B down to AC. Now I have two right triangles... if the point where the altitude lands is D, then the new triangles are BDA and BDC, and I know one of the non-right angles in each. I also know the length of one side, of BC, so, erm..." An intense look of concentration crossed her lovely face. "I know the hypoteneuse at C, and I want to know the length of the opposite, because that's the altitude I dropped. So that's the inverse cosine, I think. Once I have that, I plug it in over at angle A, getting the cosine. Because there I'm doing the reverse - I have the opposite side and I want the hypoteneuse. That's the length of AB, and then I'm done."

"Wow, not bad at all," Alex agreed. "We'll have to work it out both ways with a calculator and make sure that they get the results, but I'm not too worried. That was a really clever way of working the problem with the tools you had on hand."

"I've had some practice lately in making do with what I can get," Isabel whispered to herself and Lex. "Okay, come on, enough Math. Try me on something in social studies."

"Okay, umm... name three socioeconomic indicators that contributed to American involvement in the Vietnam war."

Isabel looked up at him, blinking in astonishment. "Is that sort of thing really going to be on the GED?"

"Um... I have no idea, I've just been making up questions out of the blue here," Alex replied. "Carrots are in, so dinner will be ready in ten minutes."

Isabel smiled. "What did I ever do to deserve someone like you??"

"Ahh, you don't," Alex teased her. "You should count yourself lucky that I got hooked back when I was impressionable and easily swayed by a pretty face, big boobs... and a sweet, tender heart. Now I'm in too deep, ensnared in your feminine wiles, and I'll never be free." He'd been walking over as he said this, sat down next to them, leaned over to kiss Lex on the forehead, and then he rumpled Isabel's blonde hair, (which struck her as something of a reversal, but she didn't object.) "Heck, you're the mother of my little baby boy... what choice do I have against the both of you?"

"Not a sliver of a slim one," Isabel confirmed, kissing his lips quickly. "Okay, can you sit with Lex for a moment? Mommy needs to wash up before supper."

"Got it," Alex replied, smiling. Lex was definitely starting to get used to him now, (the singing out in Frazier woods had somehow done wonders in that respect,) and he was playing with Alex's fingers by the time Isabel emerged from the bathroom. Soon after that, Alex heard a little noise that told him he was wanted back in the kitchen area, and by the time everything that was crying out to be stirred had been stirred, he only just had time to wash his own hands in the kitchen sink before draining the macaroni, and taking the roasting pan out of the oven, and spooning food out onto plates for both of them.

When they'd gotten back from the woods, Alex had mentioned to Diane Evans that he wanted to prepare a quiet dinner just for the two of them, and she'd generously offered him an option on just about anything edible she had, since Isabel had only stocked the kitchen in the garage apartment with snack food, and not much of that, because everything had been so busy since they'd first arrived home.

Alex had thanked her quite gratefully, and taken two frozen chicken thighs, (which Isabel could thaw in seconds with her powers, and more evenly than the microwave could,) also the fresh carrots, some dry 'wagon wheel' macaroni, some canned goods and quite a bit of various seasonings and condiments. The chicken got roasted in the oven, its skin carefully seasoned.

"Okay, let me try my chicken first, just in case I mixed them up by accident," he warned. "I can't take it nearly as hot as you can. Mmm, yeah, that seems right. And you can add some tabasco to your macaroni and tomato sauce if you like - it's right there."

Isabel cut a little bit of skin and meat out of her own piece of chicken, speared them with a fork and brought the tines to her mouth... and let out a moan as the savory and spicy flavors exploded in her mouth. "Oooohhh." She dosed the macaroni carelessly with a few sprinkles of hot sauce, then the carrots, and tried both side dishes at once.

"You know, if computers doesn't work, I think you could get by very well as a chef."

"Ehh... nah, not sure I have the temperament to do it all day," he joked back. "Ohh... hey, I completely forgot to get out anything to drink."

"Hey, allow me," Isabel insisted. "You did so much, it's the least I can do." She stood up and went over to the fridge, poured herself a glass of sparkling peach soda. "What do you want... some of the chocolate milk?"

Alex blinked in surprise. "Actually, yeah, that sounds really good." She grabbed another glass, opened the carton, and put his milk down in front of him, very full. "So, umm, any idea how late you can stay tonight??"

"Probably around ten... the parents are still a little twitchy with how much time I'm spending with you and Lex as it is. Well, I think my Dad kinduv understands, but Mom... for one thing, I think she always pictured that she'd get to be at my wedding before any of this kind of stuff started to happen." He sighed.

"Any idea what you want to do after dinner?" she said with a big smile. Alex almost snorted chocolate milk out of his nose, and laughed once he had gotten his respiratory track sorted out enough to do so safely.

"Well... not that I don't appreciate the offer, and much as I'd love to take you up on it... really this evening I'd rather just sit on the couch with you and Lex, maybe listen to some good music, listen to a few stories or tell them, whichever you'd rather. You know... quality time with the fam." He grinned.

"You make an awfully good case against sex... strangely enough," Isabel admitted. "Okay, fair enough, but make no mistake mister, I shall not be denied for long. There's an 'other woman' that I need to wipe out of your brain."

"Then you should stop bringing her up in conversation," Alex pointed out reasonably, and swallowed a bit of chicken amidst several pieces of pasta. "It's counterproductive."

"Okay, umm... tell me something about where you're going to be living this year in LA," she said. "if you know. Do you have a room already assigned, or will you not be finding out until you get there??"

"I've got a room assignment already, though I'm not sure if I've seen that particular room already," he said. "It's in Dempster hall, which is a nice one that one of my friends was in last year... it's three stories tall, and really long, like... erm, maybe two-thirds of the city block that the crashdown and the UFO center are on?" Isabel thought about that, and nodded. "A little twisty and turning, with courtyards alternating on either side so that the hallways inside don't go straight, but... well, not quite like S curves because they don't curve smoothly, but always making right angles..."

"Like a 2 or a 5 on a digital clock, except longer?" Isabel suggested.

"Yeah, that's it. I've got a single on the third floor, facing north onto one of those courtyards. Should be a nice view out to the baseball diamond."

"Cool," Isabel said. "Do you know how big the singles are??"

"Well, not as spacious as this place," Alex said with a sigh. "A little bigger than my room in my parent's place, or your room that Michael took over I think. And there's a few communal kitchens and lounges on each floor too."

He told her a little more as they finished eating, and then managed to get Isabel to open up a bit about what things had been like back on Antar, about the underground hideout that they had spent a lot of their time in, and the flower garden, (which Michael had mentioned in passing at the big family dinner the day before.) The quarters hadn't been short on space there... the Royals had taken over some kind of rambling monastery which had built the tunnels and subterranean chambers about two hundred years before, and there had been more catacombs than the people hiding there needed. But she hadn't really liked staying cooped up in close quarters and not getting out to see the sun for weeks at a time.

"Okay, I'll take care of putting the leftovers and the dishes away," Isabel said with a smile. She could push just about anything off a plate and into the sink or garbage with her alien powers, which certainly came in handy with this chore. "I think I saw a mix CD in the bag you brought with you today... wanna put in on the stereo?"

As Alex got up, he mentioned casually. "It's not actually a mix CD... when I was over here the other night I noticed that new minisystem could play MP3 disks, so I managed to steal enough time to burn you one."

"MP3 disc... that means it holds more music than a regular CD right?"

"Yep. Depends on the compression level... but I have a hundred and twenty-five songs on this one."

"Good," Isabel decided after a moment's consideration. "Maybe that means tonight won't ever end."

Alex's smile looked more than a little bittersweet. "Ah, if only things really worked that way. When the clock says so, I have to go, even if the stereo isn't finished yet." He had got the purple disc out of his bag by this point and slipped it into the stereo's CD tray. The system spent a moment whirring softly, then showed '11 -- 125'. Alex pressed the play button, and a low, melodic instrumental began to play.

"Okay, that's the leftovers dealt with," Isabel reported as she put a few little containers into her fridge, and turned to the dishes. It really didn't take her long to clean those off, including the roasting pan, which would have been intractably messy by any other cleaning method. For a moment Alex stared at it a little forlornly... since he was young he'd always taken a spoon to the chicken pan, in search of a few tasty little splatters of browned-on chickeney goodness, but he hadn't remembered that in time, and wasn't sure if he'd have actually been able to admit it to Isabel if he'd had a chance. After cleaning her hands again, (the old-fashioned way, with soap and water not alien energy,) Isabel picked Lex back up and sat down with him on the couch, and Alex sat down next to her and put one arm around her shoulders.

Isabel sighed again. "This music is really nice." Then she balanced Lex on one leg and started to unbutton her light blue blouse.

At first, Alex was too stunned to even say anything. Once she had all of the buttons free and was apparently trying to work the clasp on her bra without knocking her son over, he managed to choke out, "Umm, what are you trying to do?"

She turned that agelessly beautiful brown gaze onto him. "Umm... well, beyond the obvious... I was going to breast-feed Lex. He's been a little out of sorts all day, and I was worried that the change to Earth atmosphere and the lighter gravity were getting to him. The doctor said that this would help particularly." She paused for a second. "Would you, um, would you rather that we didn't do it in, in front of you, I mean??"

"Oh, err..." For a second, Alex was tempted to blurt out that yes he'd rather, but another, cooler sentiment started to assert itself in his head. "No, no, I mean, I was surprised, but... you just go right ahead. If it's good for my boy, umm... well, I don't want to be squicked out by this kind of stuff, so I guess I'll just have to start acclimating myself."

"Alright."

"Need me to hold him until you're all ready?"

She smiled, and it seemed like her smile was literally enough to light up the room. "Thanks." So Alex took Lex, and bounced him up and down on his knee a little bit until Isabel managed to get her bra undone and everything ready. Then he handed Lex back over to his mommy.

Something was oddly compelling about watching them together like this... mother and child. His son... and the girl of his dreams. "It's still a little hard to believe that you came back to me," he breathed.

"There weren't enough light-years in the universe to keep me away," Isabel told him in a loving and completely serious tone.

----------

"Ohmigawsh, he's not going to... they're not going to... oh lordie lord!!" Maria exploded into a gale of laughter at the animated action on the screen, which set Laurie off giggl.

Once the hijinks had died down momentarily and the movie showed signs of moving into a more heartfelt character-driven scene, Michael hit the pause button. "Sorry ladies..." and he gave Maria a quick kiss and ruffled Laurie's hair a bit, "But I need to go hit the head. Don't start it again without me??"

"Of course not," Laurie assured him. "I'm gonna go get myself a fresh sundae and something to drink." She held up her empty bowl as if feeling the need to demonstrate it.

"I'll come with, and refill on snacks myself," Maria said. The three of them had been hanging out together all night at Maria's place... three fugitives from an unlikely trek across the desert (long ago) who had finally found home. Laurie had brought along some DVDs, and they had been watching one, a funny cartoon fantasy with an unlikely sorcerer's apprentice as a hero, surrounded by various strange and enchanted people.

"I'm sorry, that just kills me every time," Laurie said as she spooned out an astonishing amount of rocky road into her bowl... (Maria stifled a quick rush of jealousy about girls who seem to be able to eat whatever they want and always stay skinny.) "When he uses the disguise spell to make the little dragon look like a unicorn... and then tells the demon hunter that his unicorn is under a dark enchantment and thinks it's a baby dragon... oh boy."

"Yeah, I'm having a little trouble following the disguise spell stuff," Maria admitted as she grabbed a half-full bag of sour cream and onion chips from the cupboard. "Sometimes they show a person the way they've been disguised, and sometimes they show the way they really look. I don't quite understand why the difference."

"Well, it's like the big green guy said when he was teaching the disguise spell," Micahel said, poking his head into the kitchen. "The person who casts the spell isn't affected by it. Sometimes we, the audience, are seeing from Skeeve's perspective, and he cast the spell. So we see through it to. I think they did a really good job with that part. Also, on a more practical level, it helps to have a little visual cue now and then that this character is not quite what they seem to be."

"Eh." Michael was really enjoying the movie... it was based on a book he read a long time ago. So Maria was doing her best not to enter 'rain on parade' mode... not that she wasn't enjoying it herself, just in a different way.

"So, how long are you planning on sticking around here, Laurie?" Michael asked as they headed back into the rec room."

"Um, pretty late, if you guys don't mind, that is. I sorta told Tess that I'd stay clear in case she wanted to bring Kyle back to the hotel room for some, err, alone time. She seemed really excited about it, so..."

"Well, is not to for be worried just yet," I blurted. "I'm having a blast, and I don't need to wake up tomorrow in time to catch an airplane flight to New York Tomorrow, so party on! We can finish watching the movie, and then, umm..." She sighed. "I dunno, you guys have any ideas?"

"Do you have any playing cards around here, Maria?" Laurie asked. "I could teach the two of you German Skat... or we could play something a little easier, like Knock Rum."

"Hmm..." Michael considered that. "Ever played Bismarck?"

They finished watching the movie, through the frightening confrontation with the evil Wizard, and the humorous and unlikely resolution. By the time the credits were rolling up past a daylight picture of a simple country inn, the three of them had agreed on a game called 500, which Alex had taught to Maria and Michael years ago. Laurie wasn't familiar with it, but decided she could probably stand to learn it easily enough, because the game had a lot of resemblances to Euchre, which she had learned from Grampa Dupree when she was little.

The three of them moved into the kitchen once Maria had fetched a deck. Michael started explaining as he sorted through the cards. "Okay, we play with the ace down to the seven, a little over half the deck. Did grampa play euchre down to the seven or down to the nine, by the way?"

Laurie blinked. "Um, down to the nine, for four people anyway. I think I've heard that there are some people who play down to the seven... that just seems weird."

"Well, it increases the role of chance a bit," Maria said. "There's uncertainty, since a lot of powerful cards might have been undealt... or they might be out there in the other people's hands."

"Yeah," Michael agreed. "That doesn't apply to five hundred though, because each of the three players gets TEN cards. That leaves... um, there's a widow of three cards, because we also throw in an, erm, a Joker." He scrabbled through to find one and showed it to Laurie before inserting it in the midst of the other thirty-two cards they were going to play with.

"What role does the Joker take?" Laurie asked. "Highest trump?"

"Pretty much," Maria said. "The best bower, above the left bower and right bower. It's also possible that the joker will be the ONLY trump card... that's called no trump, even if it's not literally correct."

"Fun," Laurie said. "So, if there's no turn-up, how do we decide trumps? Just whoever wants to calls it?"

"Not quite. We can explain after the cards are dealt, okay?" Laurie nodded. "Okay, first to get a bower deals." Having shuffled the cards pretty well, he started rapidly throwing out cards face up, before each of them in turn. On the second time round, Maria got the Jack of diamonds, so he handed the pack to her, then collected the five face-up cards and handed them over. Maria cut the cards and shuffled twice quickly herself... offered the pack to Laurie for another cut, and then started dealing out the cards, two and three at a time. Soon, their hands of ten each were complete, with three face down in the middle of the table.

"Okay, Michael continued. "Now, we bid for particular trump suits, as well as the chance to exchange cards with the widow, which is a complete mystery. The starting bid is six tricks out of ten in whicheve suit, or with no trumps, except for the joker."

"Okay," Laurie said, nodding slightly. "Now, if I had, say, two low diamonds, there's a pretty good chance that I'd be able to put them all in the widow if I won the bidding, right? And you guys wouldn't know, until you tried to lead out an Ace of diamonds and I trumped it."

"That's precisely right," Maria agreed. "Unless there were two or three diamonds in the widow when you picked it up."

"Okay," Laurie smiled. "I'm ready... do you bid first, Michael?"

"Yep... seven diamonds," he replied. Maria blinked slightly.

"Oh." Laurie's face fell. "So I have to go to eight to beat you?"

"Not generally, but nearly," Maria said. "There's a ranking of suits at the same level, first spades, then clubs, diamonds, hearts, and no trump. So you could say seven hearts or seven no trump, but not seven clubs."

"Well, I'm not well placed for hearts," Laurie admitted, "and I'm not sure I can go for eight in my suit either." She considered longer. "I'm tempted to try seven no trump."

"Be careful," Maria warned. "No trump can be very dangerous if your hand isn't well balanced. Maybe you should just sit back and let Michael try his luck in diamonds. He has a tendecy to get overconfident sometimes."

"Mmm... okay, pass." Maria passed too.

Michael swept up the widow with a flamboyant gesture, and started to chuckle as he looked at it. "Okay, we'll see if I was overconfident." He made his discards and led the jack of diamonds.

----------

"Okay, so, um... well, about the time that Kyle found out that Liz had won the blind date contest," Max said, "he somehow got it into his head that I wasn't the bad guy at all, that I hadn't stolen Liz away from him. Instead, now he thought that Liz was the bad guy, err, the bad girl. That she was this 'maneater', who lured guys into her life and then proceeded to give them hell. Which really isn't even applicable to my case, because Liz had been incredibly considerate for that brief window of time that we'd actually been together, and I was the one who had broken things off. But I couldn't really explain why to Kyle, so I think he assumed that Liz had dumped me."

"Okay," Mrs Evans said, checking first on the oven, and then looking at the stove timer, which had a little over a minute left to go.

"So, valentine's day, the night of the concert, maybe ten minutes after you and Dad left for his surprise thing, Kyle and his friends showed up They were all pretty drunk, and Kyle managed to convince me to come along with them and see Liz and her big mystery date. Also to drive the car, so that they wouldn't be driving drunk... Kyle's pretty good at delivering a guilt trip. I locked up here and we got to the French restaurant just a few minutes before they finished, after jostling through the crowd to get a look at them through the windows. When they came out, the annoying DJ asked for a kiss, and after a second they did, and I just couldn't take seeing it and ducked away."

"Neither Max or Kyle noticed just how embarassed Doug and I were, being asked to kiss a stranger in front of the crowd," Liz put in. "That was when he got the idea to run away from the DJ and the radio station people and interested fans. But I'm kinduv interrupting Max's side of the story here."

"That's okay," Max assured her. "Kyle caught up with me and started trying to convince me to take a bit of scotch out of his flask, to 'help with the pain.' Now, I would never have done it if Kyle hadn't been so good at annoying me, and I would *never* have taken more than a tiny sip. Unfortunately, I hadn't clued in that alien metabolism might react to alcohol a little different from normal humans."

Diane nearly dropped the cake pan (that she was just taking out of the oven.) "Oh, no!! What... did you get raging drunk on just that one sip, or..."

"Kind of," Max admitted. "Oooh, that looks realy good."

"Can we eat it like that, fresh out of the oven?"

"Best that way," he quipped.

Mrs Evans was shaking her head. "Not quite, Liz." She had got out several little fruit bowls and a metal spoon, and started serving out portions. "Let it sit there in the bowl for at least two minutes. Then go ahead."

Liz peered at the desert curiously, all thoughts of Valentine's day gone from her head for the moment. It looked like... well, it was clearly a layer of angel food cake over some kind of rich, choclatey pudding. "You always told me that your mom didn't have a secret special recipe, Max."

"Umm, yeah," he agreed. "Guess I never thought of these as a secret... why??"

She grinned. "With the right outer-space themed name, we could sell HUNDREDS of these at the Crashdown. A week."

"Well, thanks, but maybe you'd better taste it first," Diane cautioned.

"I'm not sure I need to... I can just trust my nose." Liz made a big production out of inhaling the definitely appetizing aroma her bowful was emanating.

"Hmm." Max pondered that. "How about 'lunar day, lunar night?' For a name... that is, assuming you'd be willing to sell Liz's folks the recipe, Mom."

"Umm... I'm not sure that I can convince myself to take any money for it," she hedged. "It really isn't a secret, Liz, though I'll grant it's unusual. You could probably find it on the internet if you look hard enough."

"But there'd be about twenty-five different cake pudding recipes, and two thirds of them would be worth *ka-ka*," she predicted. "Yours comes with the Max Evans seal of approval, and that's pretty good by me. As far as that title, though... it's good, but a little highbrow for the Crashdown crowd maybe. We'll talk about it later."

"Okay, that's two minutes," Max reported, and brought a spoonful of chocolate and cake to his mouth so quickly that they seemed to blur together. Liz hesitated, and found herself instinctively copying what Mrs Evans did, which was to spoon a large pile of pudding on top of her cake before taking a bite.

"Ohhh... that really is great!" she enthused.

"Then the recipe's yours if you want it," Max's mother replied, with a pleased smiled. "So, umm, what happened after you got drunk on a single sip of whiskey, Max??"

As they ate their cake, Max mentioned how he had played a few little jokes on Kyle with his powers, and the two of them had somehow agreed to join forces to win Liz back from the new guy, (though Kyle had at least been sober enough to realize that they'd hardly be able to share her if they succeeded, and the team would probably have broken up if the original plan had got that far.)

Liz took a turn then, describing how it ended up that all four of them had met in her room, herself, Doug, Kyle, and Max, with the DJ and his entourage in hot pursuit. "Well, I was really worried about Max, since he didn't seem to care if he dropped clues that he was, erm, different while he was like that, and I didn't realize yet that he hadn't got drunk the normal way. I asked Doug and Kyle if they'd give us a moment, Doug wasn't wild about the idea, and Kyle was actually very enthusiastic about the idea of running interference - physically, if he needed to. Maybe he was just threatened by Kyle and wanting to threaten him with any possible excuse. I hurried Max out to the balcony, and that's when he told me that all he'd had was a sip, and that it wasn't wearing off."

"Everything was happening so fast, there was this sign he'd made out on the balcony, a heart with our initials in it, and Max made it glow and blink for me. and Doug and Kyle were practically wrestling because Doug wanted to get out on the balcony and see what was going on, and the damn DJ got to the door and Max whispered in my ear... he just said 'I miss you, I hate myself for letting you slip away,' and my heart was beating so fast it made me dizzy. He took my hand and led me towards the ladder, and I came along without any objections. I didn't even notice until I was all the way down that I'd let him go first, wearing a skirt... though I don't think you tried to sneak a peek, did you Max?"

"Umm... well, not that I remember," he muttered. "Parts of the night are still very fuzzy... but I think I'd have remembered that." Liz blushed and swatted him lightly.

Right then, Mrs Evans' watch beeped the top of the hour. "Oh, my lord... I was supposed to have been in the car five minutes ago," she said, jumping up with surprise. Everyone's first helping of the cake was well gone by now. "Umm... do you kids want to come with me to the airport and continue the story? I know Philip would love to see both of you."

"Dad's flight comes in tonight??" Max replied, blinking. "Umm... yeah, that's right, how did I lose track? Umm... I think we'd love to come." He looked at Liz for confirmation.

"Just let me grab my jacket," she said. "Weatherman said it would be getting a little on the cool side tonight. What about Isabel, and Alex and Lex??"

"Umm... let them have their alone time," Max suggested. "We're late already, and by the time we get out to the airport and find Dad and come back, it'll be pretty much time for Alex to head home, Dad can say hi to all three of them then."

"Works for me, I guess," Liz said, and Mrs Evans nodded as she led the way out the door. Max locked the front door.

Liz continued telling the blind date story in the car, with quite a lot of attention to detail... how Max had created an astounding light show for her on a deserted street, turned on a car alarm, and set parking meters going off as if they were sparklers... and how his words had courted her heart with their quiet sincerity. How eventually, Max had hailed down the radio station van to ask for a ride, and the DJ had insisted on a final choice between the three guys. But Liz had never really had the chance to choose. Max had kissed her, and that closeness had restored his self-control, and he hurried away from her.

"I guess I was afraid... afraid of how much I'd opened myself up to Liz. Afraid that getting back together with her really was the wrong thing to do, like I thought back in December. Afraid that I was making everything harder on Liz by waffling back and forth. And so... well, I told her that I didn't remember any of it. I know that I shouldn't have, but it was the only thing that popped into my head and I thought that that might make it easier for her."

Liz smiled faintly at that, thinking of all that the two of them had been through since then, all the challenges, the high points and the low moments. Max had admitted to her that he *did* remember the whole thing not long after, actually... once they were together for real. A few days after they'd found the mysterious alien orb out in the desert...

"How much longer til we get to the airport?" Max asked.

----------

"Yeah, I think we're going to take off too," Bryan said, taking the coat that his girlfriend had just handed him. "Thanks for having us Jake; loved the Xbox. Have to do this again sometime."

"Hear, hear!" Christy agreed, raising her beer in salute, and everybody who still had a drink toasted... and they all laughed.

"Nice to meet you Tess," Matt chimed in. "Kyle... you'd better take good care of this lady or you'll have some competition pretty quick, you know what I'm saying."

"Yeah, yeah, I get it," Kyle drawled.

"Sorry, Matt," Tess teased back. "You're cute and all, but what can I say?? I've got it bad for the boy. No hope for me." There was more laughter at that.

"Tess, girl, remember to call me tomorrow about that job lead," Jessica said. Jessica was Bryan's girl, the one who had handed him his coat, and had probably been the most sympathetic to Tess' brief description of employment search woes. She had also managed to remember that her uncle was looking for some entry-level help in his store at the mall.

"Oh, you bet I will!!" Tess quickly checked to make sure that she still had Jessica's number, briefly panicked because she didn't have pockets in this dress, and then, just as she was remembering what she'd done with the slip of paper, Kyle took it out of his pocket and showed it to her reassuringly. He didn't really mind keeping track of it, especially since if Tess got the job, it would move things forward considerably towards project 'get our own apartment.'

The gathering broke up pretty quickly at that point, or at least most of it did... looked like Matt was going to be hanging around for a little longer, but everyone else left Jake's place around then. (Not counting Jake himself.) Kyle got behind the wheel, watched as Tess took a little care to make sure that the skirt of her dress stayed under her as she sat down, and then asked, "So, where to now??"

"Um, well... Laurie said that she was going to be staying late over at Maria's with Michael, so that... erm, so that we could go back to the hotel room and be alone together for a little while if we wanted to," Tess said, blushing slightly. There was a short pause. "And, well, I'd like to if you'd like to, obviously."

"I'd LOVE to," Kyle put in quickly, which made Tess giggle. And sure enough, he lost no time in getting them to the hotel, finding a place to park on the street about half a block away. The key to the hotel room was in Tess' purse, which she'd left in the car and forgotten to take into Jake's house, and during the ride up to the seventh floor they were riding with about three old ladies. Tess couldn't shake the feeling that they could tell how excited she was without even looking at her, how much she and Kyle couldn't wait to be behind closed doors with each other.

When they finally got there, Tess pushed the door open and let Kyle go in ahead of her. He turned on the light, looked around the room and back at her, and smiled. "Well, what are you still doing over there??"

Tess grinned back and rushed towards him, feeling oddly like her lips were leading the way. her arms wrapped around Kyle's body, and his around her shoulders, locking each other into a passionate embrace as he kissed her. Kyle's tongue slipped smoothly between his occupied lips and was eagerly granted passage through Tess' own lips, where it touched the tip of her tongue with a small but intense burst of ecstasy. As a long moment of this was fading away, Tess managed to unwrap her arms from Kyle and brought both her hands to the front of his waist. In only a few seconds she had undone his belt, unsnapped and unzipped his jeans, and pushed them off so that the blue denim fell in a pool around his shoes.

Kyle let out a low, deep moan of surprise and pleasure at this... mostly in his throat, because their lips were still pressed tightly together. He looked intently into Tess' face for a moment, and then freed his own arms and hands. Tess wrapped her hands gently around Kyle's neck to steady herself, and was glad of it, because her knees buckled when Kyle reached down to put his right hand on her lower thigh, just a few inches above the knee, which was pretty much where the skirt she was wearing ended. Kyle then began to move his hand up, pushing the fabric up her thigh as he went, and his other hand took a similar position on her other side. Tess groaned loudly, mostly through her nose, as the slow progress of Kyle's steady palms and fingertips, sliding smoothly across her soft skin, set up all kinds of nervous chain reactions through her entire body.

Kyle continued to push the skirt up patiently until he was within striking distance, then let his fingers slip underneath the bunched fabric, goose her teasingly at the bottom curve of her taut ass, and then, once she squeaked a little at being poked like that, he pulled both of his hands free. letting the skirt fall back down slightly, but bunching up around mid-thigh. Tess pulled out of the kiss at that point, not displeased... mostly surprised, but she realized that it was a good moment to move things along. With a little intense concentration, she undid the buttons on his shirt without touching them... which was tricky, delicate work to use her powers on, but she refused to give up. Kyle smiled as she got the last buttons done, and moves his arms back as if she were helping him off with the garment in a more conventional fashion. The sleeves practically flew off his arms and landed on the low dresser, next to the small television. Kyle took the opportunity to step out of his shoes and away from his pants, falling backward onto the nearest bed, which, luckily enough, was Tess' and not Laurie's.

He managed to grin alluringly at Tess as he quickly threw off his white work socks, which was a pretty good trick she decided. Tess realized that she was still quite a bit more dressed than her dear darling. "Okay, how do you want to do this??"

"Umm... just about any way you like, babe," he said. "I'm just happy to be here, if you'll excuse what would ordinarily have been a bad joke, except that I'm really serious." His eyebrows lowered a bit. "On the other hand, if you're not quite sure where to go yourself, I'll be happy to, um, to try and take charge of the situation."

Tess considered that for a moment. "Umm... no, actually, I was just checking. Let's see." The dress, Liz's dress, was the first thing she was worried about. It had been a little tricky to get into it, and she wasn't immediately sure how to get OUT of it in a situation like this. Let's see... there had been a zipper in back, right?? Concentrating as hard as she could, Tess tried to slowly move the zipper down with only her thoughts, taking as much care as she could to make sure that it didn't get stuck in the fabric. There was one tricky moment, but then it was all the way down, and suddenly Tess realized that getting undressed would not be a problem any more. In fact, the dress slipped down her body without anything but the force of gravity acting on it. Kyle grinned.

She stepped away and out, picked up the piece of clothing, folded it once and hung it over a desk chair. Then Tess wasted no time in climbing onto the bed next to Kyle, kissing him, and laying one hand softly on his chest. "Just a... a warning. From what Isabel, and Max have said... well, once we really get started, things are probably going to get... intense, pretty quickly. Something about the way my hybrid biology works and the tendency to make a connection in the heat of passion."

"Umm, I think I've noticed intense already," he whispered, kissing her cheek, and then down to her neck.

"Not like I'm talking about, you haven't. Trust me. Now... I don't mind the thought of getting totally physical with you... cementing our relationship, whatever you want to call it. Having sex, going all the way. I'm looking forward to it a lot. But... well..."

"You don't think this is the time and place?" Kyle guessed.

"Umm... yeah. I'm not quite sure exactly what I'm waiting for, especially since there's nothing very concrete to be scared of, but... Isabel said that I'd know when the time was right, and I don't think I see that yet. Maybe... maybe once we've gotten our apartment... probably then, if not before." She seemed to be trying to reassure him.

"It's okay, babe. Really. I love you, and I want you... and I do think I'd be ready for that tonight, if you were. But I don't mind waiting for you to catch up." His eyes twinkled slightly. "On the other hand... well, we've got this hotel room all to ourselves at the moment, and it'd be a shame not to go further than we've been able to, saying goodbye out in the Evans backyard or wherever."

"Hummm." Tess reached behind her and unfastened the black bra she was wearing, letting it fall down beside her lap. Kyle's eyes couldn't seem to stop drinking up the pale curves, soft hills of flesh, and proud pink peaks that were thus revealed. "Why, whatever could you be thinking of, mister Valenti??"

It took a few seconds for her words, (and a soft shove,) to shake Kyle out of his nearly entranced state, but he looked up at her then and grinned. "You'll let me know if I'm trying to get too far?"

She nodded. "I think that my panties stay on, this time... and nothing tries to slip past them and underneath either, or anything like that. Beyond that, I don't think I have any limits tonight."

"Then lie down on your back," Kyle suggested. She did, and Kyle leaned over to kiss her, and stroked the smooth skin of her neck and her stomach before centering his attention on her firm and bouncy breasts. Tess gasped as he pinched one nipple softly, amused that it was this contact that sent her a rush of flashes... that let her see herself through Kyle's memories. The look he saw in her eyes when he told her she was his favorite Martian, the time she'd been about to leave Valenti's because she thought he resented her being there. Looking up from his bed and seeing her come back into his life, (and his bedroom,) just two nights ago, after being gone nearly for years. The first time they met, when she'd come up to him in the high school quad and invited him to a study date at the library, as a ploy to attract Max and Liz's attention to what she would be doing there. Slow-dancing in each other's arms in a Vegas ballroom, as Maria sung her heart out up on the stage.

And the first time he saw her, saw a hint of the person inside... as they were standing together in her room, when he'd told her that she wouldn't understand why he became a buddhist, and then realized that she was just as confused and lost as he was.

Kyle's lips kissing her tender flesh brought Tess rocketing back to the present, and she had to fight a strong, lusty urge within her to not overturn her previously stated limits about the underwear barrier. Instead, she just focused on enjoying what he was doing, and antcipating what he might be doing next, (and what she was planning on doing to him after that.) She shouted out suggestions, and Kyle got inventive on his own, letting his hands wanter attentively all over the sensitive zones of her body, except for the forbidden ones, pushing her to higher and higher levels of stimulation, until she felt herself tumbling off a cliff face into ecstasy, shivering and soaking up the passion and the pleasure.

Once her climax had faded, she switched positions with Kyle, took down his boxer shorts, and licked her lips meaningfully. "That was great, baby. Now I guess it's my turn to push your limits. Do you have any special requests or..." She bent down and planted a big juicy kiss on his throbbing rod, "Or should I just do what well, what seems completely obvious??"

"Umm... yeah, I'm pretty sure that'll do for the main event," he blurted out enthusiastically. "But... well, make me wait a little. Tease me -- like I did to you. Warm me up a bit."

"You're already so hot you're burning um," she replied, "and you didn't tease me for long... but okay." Tess crawled up his body and brought her lips and tongue to his skin just about the bottom of his neck, moving slowly but surely down his chest. "How's this babe?"

"Umm... not, uhhhr, not too bad, I have to admit," he moaned. "You could even stand to go a little quicker."

Mischievously, Tess instead tried to slow down, but only just a little. And she took a small side trip to lick her way around one of Kyle's nipples. There was a soft yowling sound coming from down in Kyle's throat when she finally got back to his crotch and took the head of his dick into her mouth and sucked.

She wasn't completely sure, but it seemed like only about fifteen seconds later when the little Buddhist, erm, shot himself off. Tess blinked, swallowed once, and jerked her head back by reflex, which had the effect of sliding her lips off of their target. She hadn't done it on purpose, but she hadn't been expecting that there would be a third blast; a small one, but it sprayed all over her lips, and a little part of her right cheek.

"Oh, god darling, I'm... um, I'm sorry," Kyle mumbled, but Tess turned to face him and shook her head no... she would have said that there was nothing to apologize for, but couldn't exactly talk right at that moment. Swallowed again, then licked off her lips and did her best to clean up the jism that she couldn't reach with her own tongue using a finger.

"No problem, sweetie... it was kind of unexpected, but no disaster, see?" She made a fairly big show out of licking off her finger and smiling. "Salty delicious."

Kyle shook his head in wonder and just a bit of disbelief. "Okay, umm, I'll hit the head and then I really kinduv need to get home. Alright?"

"Yeah, yeah." Though not without a last goodnight kiss if you know what's good for you, Tess thought to herself, but she figured that Kyle would probably think of that by himself. "I'll call Laurie and let her know the coast will soon be clear."

"Okay." Kyle got up, gathering clothes as he went. By the time he was done in the bathroom, he was all dressed, and Tess had put on a long pink shirt to go to bed in. "Did you get Laurie at Maria's place?"

"Yeah, she said she had to finish some game of cards they were playing, could take about three quarters of an hour, and then she'd be on her way back." She stood up and walked over to him. "Have a safe ride home."

Kyle grabbed her, swung her around in her arms, and kissed her more energetically than she'd have thought he'd be able to. "Sweet dreams, my beloved princess. I'll be back here at, um, at seven thirty tomorrow morning to pick you up for breakfast?"

She smiled. "Maybe better make it eight, if I'm gonna get all my beauty sleep in. But I can't wait."

With a grin and a hug and then a wave, he headed back out the door.

-----------

"Max!" The voice rang out pretty much as soon as the three of them had come into the airport terminal. He whirled around and saw his dad, standing near the pay phones with a suitcase sitting on the floor beside him. "Diane! Liz!!"

"Dad!!" Max rushed over to him, and a little impulsively threw his arms around his father. "It's so great to see you, I mean... actually be here with you. Well, not *here* especially, because we don't have to stay right here in the airport, but..."

Philip Evans hugged Max back and then looked into his face. "Welcome home, son."

"It's good to be back," Max agreed with a smile. "That's kinduv what I wanted to say."

He hugged his wife too, then looked over at Liz and smiled at her. "Nice to see you again, Liz." She reached out a hand, and he shook it, then picked up his luggage. "Umm... not that I'm displeased to see either of you, but... um, do you know where Isabel is tonight?? I... well, I can't wait to see her either, or... or my grandson." He blushed slightly just saying the word.

"They're back at your place, having a quiet night in with Alex," Liz said. "We thought, umm... well, by the time we get back there, Alex will probably just about be leaving to go home, so you can see them all then. Oh, and there's more chocolate pudding cake!"

Philip blinked. "Well, alright, let's go! You can tell me more on the way."

And they did... they told him a little about alien worlds and the adventures that they'd had... what plans had been made since Alex and Isabel had come home, and what was still undecided. Max went into some detail about how Michael's sister Laurie had shown up and the big dinner that Mrs Evans had hosted the night before.

"You know, that's something I've been wondering about," he said quietly. "Not... not that you and Isabel exactly need more roots, as it stands, but... well, I knew that meeting Laurie had been good for Michael, even when I didn't understand the exact details of their relationship." Philip had flown out to Arizona a little while after the kids had got back from Vegas, to meet with Laurie, and check that the legal arrangements that she had made were tight, loophole-free as far as was possible, and according to her wishes. Michael had come back to see her too, at that point.

"And, well... if I understand it right, you guys have your biological human side from people who were 'abducted' and then returned a long time ago, like Laurie's grandfather, and they might have living relatives. Maybe... maybe it would be worthwhile to track down those people, and, erm..."

"And tell them what, exactly, Dad??" Max asked. "It's... it's something we've thought of, but that's entirely the problem. Laurie got drawn into all this because of the gandarium queen that took over Grant Sorenson. She was in danger, and letting her know that we were aliens was the only way to figure out enough of what was going on to, well, to save the world from being infected, quite possibly. She already believed in aliens, because somehow she's realized that Grant wasn't just any homocidal maniac who wanted to torture her, that he was acting according to the will of those alien nasties. Maybe the gandarium had communicated with her somehow while she was buried."

"But for someone else... we wouldn't really know where to begin explaining the relationship, and we're not sure it's fair to drag more total strangers into the whole situation if we don't have to, just because we share DNA. We have all the family that we need. At least, I feel that way, and I'm pretty sure Isabel does too."

"And Tess?" Mister Evans asked. Max shrugged. "Okay, well, fair enough. So... Max. This may sound like it's coming out of the blue, but do you remember the dog we had when you kids were little??"

"Um, yeah I remember, and yeah, it seemed like an odd time to mention it." He sighed a little. "Murphy. Yeah... he was a cool dog."

"I... I don't think I knew that you guys had a dog," Liz said, smiling.

"Yeah, well... he died two years before we really met," Max said. "He was a dark brown mutt... part labrador, right Dad??"

"Well, he kinduv looked like that to me," Mister Evans agreed. "We never really knew what his background was... he was adopted from the pound when Max was seven."

They kept on talking about old family memories and other safe topics until Diane pulled the car into the driveway. Just then, Alex and Isabel came out the door of the garage apartment, Lex in Isabel's arms. "Daddy!!" she nearly screamed, hurrying down the stairs as quickly as she could. "Somehow I could tell that you were nearby."

"I think I wouldn't have believed that before I knew so much about you," he said, looking at the little kid. "Hello, Lex!!"

"Wave hi to grampa Phil," Isabel said, and made the little wave herself. Lex waved. "Ohh... come on, somebody else hold him, I've got to hug my dad." Alex, Gramma Di, and Uncle Max each made a move, but Gramma Di got there first. Isabel hugged Mister Evans tight.

"Dad, I'm so sorry I had to... had to..."

"I understand why you left," he whispered in her ear. "Don't worry about it any more. Alex... hi."

"Hello, mister Evans."

"Nice to see you... but I believe you can't stay here long tonight."

"Umm... no, I guess not." Alex hugged Isabel goodbye. "Umm, Liz??"

"Yeah, I guess we should give you Evanses some time to talk amongst yourselves," Liz said, and turned to hug Max goodbye herself. "Okay, I'll be right behind you as far as the Crashdown, bass-man."

"Cool. Maybe I'll stop in and grab a green martian shake," he said, as they headed off to their cars.

"Okay," Philip said... taking a moment to look from his daughter to his son, his wife and his granddaughter. "I think somebody said something about pudding cake??"

"Yeah, it shouldn't be quite cooled down," Max said, leading the way to the side kitchen door.

TO BE CONTINUED...

[Chrisken]

Part Eight


"Okay, are we all ready to take off?" Maria asked excitedly.

Michael thought a moment, and tweaked a dial in the engine room. A small color indicator, (like an LED, but somehow not quite the same,) changed from yellowish to bluey-green. "Yeah, that should do it." He smiled at her. "Now, I know from experience, that it's hard to get a good look out the front viewport while someone else is flying in the cockpit, though you can kinda stand in the cockpit door. As soon as I can, how about I set it on autopilot and we can both go down to the rec lounge and put up a three-sixty projection of the scenery, huh??"

"Umm, okay I guess," Maria said. "Can I try sitting in the cockpit seat myself? Just to try it?? I promise that I won't touch any of the controls."

"Welll..." Michael thought about it, and gave in, as he could have guessed he would. "All right, but I'm going to hold you to that promise, okay?? Hitting the wrong thing could be very bad."

"Got it." Michael had to make himself as flat as possible against the corridor wall in order for Maria to squeeze by... after the maneuver had been performed he realized that he could have ducked into the kitchen/galley. Then again, maybe he'd just WANTED Maria to squeeze past him as closely as possible... he followed her closely into the cockpit, and watched as she bent over and sat down, stretching her legs out in front of her, (which legs were covered in fairly tight jeans,) and resting her back against the seat. The display showed desert scenery and some rocky hills in the distance.

"Okay, cool." Maria waited there for a few seconds longer, not doing anything but possibly trying to soak up the experience. Michael knew that for him, the sensation of being in the cockpit was one of formidable control, but seeing as how Maria had agreed she wouldn't try to control anything, it was probably different for her. "Alright, give me a hand up so I don't bump anything by mistake??" Michael reached out his arms and strained as Maria hauled herself up putting most of her weight on it. As her head came up to around the level of his own, he couldn't resist wrapping his other arm around her back, drawing her in for a surprise kiss.

Suddenly a melodic two-tone chime resonated through the vessel. "What is it??" Maria asked, clinging to him for a second in fright... what was she expecting?? Killer robots attacking them? The power core going critical?? (It wasn't nuclear, at least not in any sense that Michael recognized from the high-school physics classes he had attended, so that was probably impossible.)

He smiled reassuringly at her. "Doorbell." That was a little odd in itself. He hadn't put any sort of override on the door, so anybody capable of working it could simply have come right in... but then, probably they guessed that Michael and Maria were already aboard and wanted to give them the privacy and courtesy of signalling first. They disentangled themselves a bit and headed over to the entry port.

There was quite a delegation out there... Max, Isabel, and Tess, Alex, Liz, and Laurie. (No Kyle, and Michael wondered why briefly.) Since he wasn't sure about talking with all of them inside the cramped quarters of the ship, Michael headed out, and Maria followed.

"Hi. We, umm... we just wanted to have an actual goodbye scene," Max said, stepping forward as if to shake Michael's hand, and Michael brushed the hand aside slightly and hugged him. He and Maria had been trying to slip out of town without really letting anyone know that they were going... but he didn't mind the fact that they'd clued in and raced out to give them a farewell, and he doubted Maria would care in the negative either. Sure enough, when he looked, Maria just seemed to be in the process of moving between an Alex hug and a Liz one.

"I hope you enjoy your classes a lot, Maria," Laurie said when it was her turn.

"Thanks."

"Umm, just asking out of curiosity, Michael," Tess began. "I was, umm... I was wondering when you were planning on coming back... and bringing the ship back."

Michael tried to catch Maria's eye... they had talked about this but not really come to any decision. "I'm not sure... but probably not today or tomorrow. Not more than four days I think either. I'll be calling collect to the Evans house I think, to let you guys know after we've been there a little while." He took a deep breath, realized that Maria was looking at him at this point - he looked at her, and saw her nod.

Though she hadn't said it, Tess had a good reason to ask about when Michael would be coming back... having to do with her housing situation. Now that Michael was leaving, there was no particularly good reason for Laurie not to head back to Arizona, and Michael would be taking the ship, which had been a backup housing alternative for her, with him. Michael could understand if Mrs DeLuca wouldn't be quite as pleased about Tess sleeping at her place now that Maria was going back to campus, and, well...

"If you're interested, Tess, I don't think I mind if you sleep in Isabel's old room in the Evans house, at least until I get back. It was never really mine in the first place, and I just happened to get the first shot at it by the luck of the draw. I don't think Max and Isabel's mom would mind." Max was smiling, appreciating the logic in the suggestion... and just now Michael realized that Max might, conceivably, have been uncomfortable with the idea of Tess living across the hall. Not that that would have been particularly likely... they'd all been in pretty cramped conditions in the catacombs, and on the space flight both ways, and he'd never complained. Well, except for that one time not too long after the Granilith launched and he'd started yelling at Tess for throwing herself at him, literally... she'd said she lost her balance and hadn't been meaning to sprawl into his lap, and tempers had been short for all four of them after having to leave Earth behind...

Ancient history. Now, Michael suspected that Max saw Tess as another sister, like Michael himself did, pretty much. Things had probably started to change once they landed on the alien world, and Tess realized that it was Kyle who had been the one she was really in love with.

Michael shook him out of old memories with a start. "Umm, Max, guys... the ship's engines have been ready to takeoff for a few minutes now. We'd probably better..."

"Oh, right, of course," Isabel said, heading forward to give him a quick hug. Michael suddenly realized that neither Isabel nor Alex had Lex with them... was he getting babysitted, (babysat??) by the Evanses, senior? "Have a great trip, Michael, and come back quick. Max and I are starting the study program today... we've left it too long already. So you'll have catching up to do."

"Yes, Miss Evans," he said in his best bored-Michael-at-school voice, and everybody cracked up laughing.

It didn't take long for them to get on their way after that. Michael powered up the engines, checked that all of their friends had retreated to a safe distance just in case, and powered up the cloaking device from 'camoflage' level to 'full invisibility, radar absorption... and whatever other bells and whistles they put into it for atmospheric flight.' Then lifted about thirty feet off the rocky ground, set a course twenty degrees north of due east, a climbing angle of three degrees, and took off at about three quarters of full engine power. Within about a minute and a half they had reached cruising speed of 2500 clicks.

"Okay, umm... just let me program this thing to level off once we've got to 5000 feet, and alert me when we've travelled, erm, 1700 miles, and then we should be good."

Maria was looking at the front window and the little screen showing airspeed in kph, with disbelief at both. "How... how can we be travelling so fast?? I didn't even feel any sensation of motion."

"You're not supposed to," Michael said, getting up. "Something like... inertia-less propulsion, I think that's the word for it. Whatever powers this ship, it pushes everything aboard it equally, not just the hull structure. It pushes US, so that we don't feel any force operating at all. When you're in a car, or a plane or whatever, the frame of the vehicle is pushing itself to move to a new location. You're not getting pushed, at the start, so you'd move through the vehicle, except that whatever you're sitting in starts to push against you. That's what creates the sensation of motion."

"I... I knew that," she groused back. "But... well, it's one thing to even guess that alien technology could do this sort of thing, and I was only halfway *there*. To actually experience it in practice..." She realized that Michael was leading her back to the 'holodeck.'

"Computer," Michael announced as the doors opened. "Prepare for observation mode." At first, the system only provided two vaguely defined seats... Michael took one and Maria hurried to the other, wondering what was coming. "Complete observation mode."

The walls of the recreation deck vanished, along with the seats themsevles... although they were still physically present enough to support Maria's body. What she saw, aside from herself and Michael, was desert landscape zooming by beneath them, with patches of greenery starting to appear here and there. "Oh, my!!"

"Yeah, I thought you'd like this."

"I do..." Maria said. "The thing is, now I'm kinda hungry, and I don't want to miss any of it."

Michael sighed, but affectionately. "I can do a galley run. What do you feel like?"

"Umm... I dunno," she breathed, lost in wonder as she saw them approach some kind of small river. Were they still in, or over, New Mexico?? "I'll let you know when I've made up my mind."

----------

"Tess!" Kyle looked up as she slid into the Crashdown booth opposite him. "Umm... you're looking really happy and excited. Did something happen when you went to see Michael off?"

"Oh, no. Wait a second, yes..." She shook her head in momentary confusion. "He offered me the room he was using at the Evans', Isabel's old room. But I don't think that's what I'm happy and excited about!"

"Okay... then what??" Kyle made as if to try to lean over the table and kiss her, but the way the seats and the booth were laid out clearly would make that extremely awkward, so he just reached out with a hand to squeeze her shoulder slightly as a hello.

"Okay... Laurie volunteered to take me to a few places that I'd applied for jobs... and I got an offer!! It's the Walmart supercenter up on north main street, near Pine Lodge Road."

"Right." Of course, that was the only walmart in town, the only one nearer than Artesia, and he'd been there when she'd applied for a job there, but Kyle wasn't too surprised that Tess was babbling a bit. "What's the job description, what's the position?"

"Nothing too fancy, of course," Tess sighed. "Customer service associate, ladies apparel. I'd be stocking display racks and shelves, helping customers find things in my department, maybe some register work at the little register next to the fitting rooms. Low paying and long hours, especially at the beginning because I'd be low girl on the totem pole. They asked me to let them know by this evening."

"Hmmm." Kyle considered this. "What are you thinking??"

"Umm... I'm not sure," she admitted. "It's not the kind of place I'd have normally been wild about working. But we want to get money soon, so that we can start looking at apartments... and this kind of gig will actually bring in more money than might seem at first glance, even if I'll have to work hard for it. Probably more than any other job I'm qualified for... or any job that's as unqualified as I am." She sighed. "What about you, do you have an opinion??"

"I... I have some," he sighed. "I'm no big fan of walmart... partly because I know about some of the places that have had to close down since they moved into town. Amy DeLuca's had a harder time of it because of their indirect influence. But I know that sort of nebulous disapproval is hard to weigh against an actual job. I'm certainly not going to tell you what to do."

"Right," Tess agreed, nodding. She took a deep breath and put the fingers of her left hand against her lower abdomen, and Kyle wondered if she was taking the expression 'gut check' literally. "I... I'm going to take it, yeah."

Surprisingly, Kyle smiled... not so much with approval for the decision, but he was pleased that Tess had made a decision instead of remaining ambivalent for longer. "Okay, cool!!" He thought a second. "Then you should order something special for lunch... my treat."

"If you insist," she shot back without pausing for even a second. "Venus meatloaf platter, alien encounter, and asteroid pie it is!" That wasn't particularly special, and she might have even decided on that order before she'd even walked in, but Kyle smiled and chuckled, just enjoying being with her.

"So, talk to me about something," Tess suggested once their orders were in. "I feel like I still don't really know much about what's happened here in Roswell since the four of us left. Plus... well, hearing your voice -- ALWAYS good."

"Umm... I'm not really sure what to say," he said, shaking his head and blushing slightly.

Tess concentrated for a moment. "Your dad... not quite picked out of the blue, but I'd like to hear about what he's been up to lately, if you wouldn't mind talking about it."

"Okay, well, let's see." Kyle took a deep breath. "He was pretty bored and out of it for the rest of that first summer... not doing much other than poking around into possible alien-related mysteries and making stuff in the garage. You remember what he was like right after the council sacked him?" Tess nodded, a sad look on her face. "In the fall, he started this absolutely crazy rock-a-billy music group. With a couple of other guys about his age... old high school friends, men who'd just gotten laid off too or were tired of what they were doing and wanted a change. Most of them... well, not really bad musicians, but I'm not sure if I'd say they were astoundingly great though. Kind of in that in between area."

"They made a pretty good try of really making it in the Roswell music scene, sad as that is... playing out at Cow Patties for a fraction of the cover... except nobody really wanted to come in to see what was going on if there was a cover, so that didn't work so well. Getting a really slim percentage of the bar take over a certain threshold worked better for them financially, but the owner of Cow Patties wasn't wild about that deal, because generally the revenue fluctuates up and down periodically, and he wasn't convinced that they were actually bringing in any extra customers."

"Um, okay." Tess considered that. "I take it the group disbanded?" Kyle nodded. "You wouldn't happen to have a videotape or something that I could watch sometime? I'm just suddenly very curious about what he sounded like... and looked like, for that matter."

Kyle grinned. "You know, I just might be able to hook you up there." Tess actually squeaked slightly and clapped her hands softly. "Okay, then... well, there was something creepy about the people who put up that Chemical lab out of town... MetaChem. They kept asking Liz to participate in this after-school internship program, and after the third time she started to wonder if there was something fishy about the setup. Dad ended up applying for a position in their security division, to see what he could find out."

"Oh, my god," Tess breathed. "What did he find out? Was anything there... um, Checkers-related? I mean, err..."

"I know what you mean," he assured her, lowering his own voice and checking the booths around them. "Well, this freaky lady running the whole deal, she was trying to find an alien healer, because her father was dying of a rare form of cancer. It was his money that had financed the entire plant. They'd heard the rumors about Liz and the shooting, and the little kids in the pediatric ward in Phoenix, and had even managed to get the uniform that Liz had originally been shot in, with the bullet hole. Obviously, they were looking for Max, but he wasn't available."

"What happened??"

"I... I'm not too sure of the details. Think that Dad managed to find out some details of a few dirty deeds that this lady did in the name of furthering the project, and got them sent over to a friend in the state prosecutor's office. In any event, the suspicious business stopped, but the plant stayed open for a while, and my dad kept working there... so as to not attract attention, he said, but I think he really liked having a steady gig again."

"Alright, and then?? Oooh, here's our food." For a little while they were busy getting organized and tasting various items. "Pass the---" Kyle was holding the tabasco sauce out to her before she even finished asking for it.

"Well..." Kyle continued after the first bite of his burger, "a few months after we graduated, maybe two weeks after the plant shut down again, he went back to Sheriff Hanson and applied for a position as a deputy. That was nice, for a while, but I think he's starting to get antsy about it again. Not that he really minds being a junior minion of law and order as such, or anything else particular about the job, just... when he was dismissed as being the sheriff, he had a chance to start over again and be anything he liked when he grew up, at least potentially. He's given all of those possibilities up and gone back into the same field."

"Hmm..." Tess thought about that, and took a bite of meatloaf. "Well, I hope he figures it out one way or the other and is happy about the decision he made."

----------

"Hey!" Mister Evans called out when he heard the side door opening.

"Hi, Dad," Isabel called back. "I think we're done for the day." Indeed, both she and Max looked like they'd been through some kind of grueling ordeal... a mostly mental ordeal, but still an ordeal. "What's going on in here??"

"Not too much... just getting to know my grandson," he replied.

"Liz?" Max said as he got to the living room door. Sure enough, Liz was there too, sitting on the floor as Lex walked around. She had volunteered to help babysit today, since she didn't have much else to do, and 'it seemed like the next best thing to spending time with Max.' (Max, for his part, assumed that that had been said with at least a bit of tongue in cheek, though it was sometimes a little hard to tell with Liz Parker.)

Max walked into the room, scooped his nephew up into his arms on the way, and sat down on the couch next to his dad. Isabel followed him into the room, dropping herself into the armchair and shooting Max a look to say that he'd just done what she'd been wanting to do and kept her from doing it. Max shot her an apologetic look and turned Lex around so that he faced her, knowing that Lex would wave at his mommy as soon as he could. He did, which brought a smile to her face just like it always did.

"So, um, where's Mom?" Isabel asked.

Philip Evans burst out laughing, and Liz turned to him and asked, "Hey, what's the joke?" To Izzie, she added, "She said she was just going to run to the store. Should be back soon."

"I... I'm sorry Liz," Mister Evans once he had some control of his breathing. "It' just... I recognized exactly that nonchalant tone in which both of these two used to ask after their mother. Usually when they were hungry and hopeful about the possibility of a big dinner, home-cooked by someone else, but didn't want to admit it. Am I right?"

Isabel smiled. "I guess so, though I never realized that we used a particular nonchalant tone at moments like these." She sighed. "I was a little disappointed that no appetizing smells were there to meet us on the way through the kitchen."

Liz and Mister Evans traded a look. "Sorry, we've been kind of busy too," he said. "You don't want to cook for yourselves?"

"Umm... not especially, though I guess I will if I have to," Isabel decided. Liz got up without saying a word and sat down on the still-available part of the couch, which meant that Max was surrounded on both sides between his father and his girlfriend. After a second, Liz nudged him gently with her elbow, nodded meaningfully at Lex, then Isabel, and Max hurriedly got up and delivered the little one over to his mother.

"There's something I've been thinking about, vaguely," Liz mentioned. "Like the rest of him, Lex's name is incredibly cute, but with both him and big Alex in the picture, things have already started to get a little confusing. Their names being so close to each other, I mean... I think I even used to call Alex 'Lex' when we were younger... especially when he was reading superhero comic books." Max laughed softly at that. "Now, I know that this isn't exactly any of my business, but..."

"No, it's a fair point to bring up," Isabel told her, "and one that I hadn't really thought of myself." She considered for a moment. "Well, his original name on Antar, as I think I mentioned that first night, was *La'ex*. It fit the naming conventions and language flow, back there. Maybe we could start calling him that, or something in between. Laex."

"That could work, amongst ourselves at least," Max put in. "To strangers, Lex, or Alex junior, would probably be less suspicious."

"You know, that reminds me of something that I was wondering about too," the patriarch put in. "Language barriers. You knew practically nothing about Antar before you left for there, right?" Max looked at his father for a moment and blinked. "So, well... how did you guys manage to deal with Antarians, who I don't guess knew much about Earth or american society? How did you bridge the language gap?"

Isabel let out a long breath. "Well, it wasn't easy. Among everything else we were worrying about, we tried to find some sort of convenient alien gadget that would be able to translate for us, or implant the language into our brain, but... no luck. Time was running out, and all that any of us had been able to work out is a connection technique."

"Umm, we told you that one of the alien tricks is touching someone and... making a connection, right?" Max asked.

"Yeah, you mentioned it in passing, in regards to how you saved Liz's life, but... I have to admit I'm not sure I understand."

"It's not easy to explain," Liz put in. "Trust me. But there are a lot of ways it comes in handy besides just healing... just think of it. Each of us human beings are basically stuck inside our own skin, unable to really... to understand where someone else lives no matter how close we get to them. Max or Isabel can reach out and... and make a kind of contact fundamentally more intimate than anything we know of." Mister Evans' eyebrows raised.

"Well, anyway," Max hurried along, trying to keep his dad from getting the wrong idea. "The trick that we had some success was sharing language skills. When Michael touched Isabel and tried to access her knowledge of spanish, he was able to follow it, despite never being able to pick up a word of it in class himself."

"Turns out that there were people who could do the same sort of thing better when we got to Antar," Isabel put in. "To start with, they learned some english and we learned some Antarian, and it was really messy, especially considering the amount of important stuff that needed to get discussed as soon as possible, but it all got worked out. We're pretty fluent in talking that way now."

Liz smiled. "What does it sound like? Can we hear some??"

Max immediately started saying something, that none of the others could make sense of clearly, a little melodious and full of flowing sibilants and softer consonants than English had. He grinned a little. "I was just saying how hungry I was and wondering when mom would get home."

"Well, that's incredibly co-incidental," a new voice announced. Max turned around -- none of them had noticed the car in the driveway or the side door opening again... then again, maybe he and Isabel had left it open. He got up and into the kitchen, and saw that his mother was carrying a bunch of familiar plastic packages in front of her.

"This store you had to rush off to," he said to her, putting it together. "More of a restaurant, actually? A takeout restaurant??"

"Yeah," she admitted. "Vern's red-hot grill cooking... your favorite, or at least it used to be. Hope you still like it. We thought that you and Isabel deserved a little treat after your first big day of studying."

"Really..." Max turned to look at Liz and his dad, who had pretty obviously known about this, and played dumb to keep it a surprise.

"I just have one question," Isabel said, Laex still in her arms as she passed Max and walked around to the borrowed high-chair. "How did you arrange to head out just a little while before Max and I came in from the garage?? I mean, if we'd stayed an extra hour and a half, say, the grub woulda gone cold."

"That was between Laex and me, pretty much," Liz said. "It was a bit of guess-and-by-golly, but seems to have worked pretty well. He knows how you're feeling even when the two of you are seperated, Iz. I did my best to interpret that, given how much I know of your likely reactions."

Isabel raised an eyebrow. "Wow... I didn't realize that either of you could do that."

"Okay, come on people, we've got hot chicken quarters here and all the fixings!" Mrs Evans said, and Max quickly grabbed a package and looked inside. Dark meat, home fries, and mixed veggies. He hurried to the cupboard to get plates for everyone.

"So," Mrs Evans asked one they had all gotten started with the food. "Max, Liz, are the two of you going out tonight?"

Liz giggled, and Max smiled at the utter normality of the question too. "Yeah, we were kind of planning on hitting the mall... seeing what new music was out lately, me maybe picking up a few things at the value clothes store. Nothing big."

"What about you, Isabel?" Liz asked. "Any plans to meet up with Alex?"

"Surpringly enough, no, not this evening," she quipped. "He had signed up to attend a webcast about some new Oracle computer thing. Didn't really want to leave me alone all for a whole half a day, but I talked him into it. We've been nearly inseperable ever since I came back, but it doesn't really make sense to give up our seperate interests at this point, does it?" She took a bite of chicken. "I'll spend a quiet evening with Laex, and his grandparents, and call Alex right before bedtime. Is no big."

"Alright," Max said. "You guys have always been good at keeping each other company in the past."

----------

"Is that the last of it?" Maria asked as Michael walked through the door of her dorm room, maneuvering carefully because he was carrying a pile of boxes stacked so high that they nearly towered higher than the top of his head. Helpfully she reached up and took the top two, and Michael carefully put the rest down on the single twin bed.

"Yeah, this is the last. I probably wouldn't have taken so much on one trip if it hadn't been."

One consequence that Michael hadn't expected of his offer to bring Maria to New York in a spaceship, (but that just about anyone who knew her could have predicted if they'd thought about it,) was that when she'd picked him up at the Evans house that day, there had been much more stuff in the car than American Airlines would ever have let her take on a plane without charging her extra. Michael hadn't minded that so much on the Roswell end of the trip... he could appreciate that Maria wanted this opportunity to take a lot of stuff to her new dorm at once, which would otherwise have taken many trips back and forth, and the bunk space on the starship 'Repatriate' had been cramped for four young hybrids and a little baby on a weeks-long interstellar journey, but for the short jaunt with only the two of them, there had been plenty of space to put some boxes.

However, the other side of it had been the question of moving that much stuff from a place where it was safe to park the spaceship and get out of it without anybody noticing, to Maria's dorm building. Even parking the ship had been more than a little bit of a challenge. Eventually, cliche as it seemed, they'd landed in central park... with Michael hoping that nobody who wasn't sufficiently drunk would bump into it, since they couldn't really use the camoflage mode and appear as a giant, oddly shaped, grassy hill without attracting even more attention. Then two different taxi trips through the city streets, rushing to stack luggage on the sidewalk because the frickin cabbie wouldn't turn off the meter... Michael was starting to think that it might have been cheaper to fly with the airline.

"Knock knock, neighbor..." a new voice rang out... without even making a token attempt to knock on the door, Michael noticed. It was a deep alto girl's voice that turned out to be attached to a short redhead wearing a long black cotton dress and a white t-shirt with the words "Pale is the new tan" blazoned on it in big reddish-brown block letters. Her skin was light and delicate enough to match the sentiment from the shirt, too.

"OMG, Sophie!!" Maria squeaked a little as she rushed over to the girl, (dropping the boxes she'd taken onto her desk unceremoniously en route,) and hugged her. "They put us on the same hall??"

"I'm right next door, girl," Sophie said, still in mid-hug, with a very small finger gesture to indicate the direction that her own room lay. "They normally do, when people make a request. And... oh my oh my, just where did you find this big tall hunk o' somethin' tasty??? Back home in aliensville USA??"

"Yeah, you could say that," Maria replied with a smile, taking a bit of a step back. "Michael, this is Sophie, one of my best friends here at school, and the drummer in the band that I told you I was in. Sophie... well, Michael needs no introduction, does he now??"

Sophie's eyes had grown wide by now. "Michael, as in *the* Michael?? The one who broke your heart and you swore you'd never, ever, see again??"

"I'm not sure I ever said that," Maria protested. Sophie fixed her with a look. "Well, not when I wasn't drunk."

"Maybe not." Sophie stepped towards Michael, giving him a second appraising glance. "Do you want to get the girlfriend's best friend second degree over with right now, or would you rather have some time to attempt to prepare yourself?"

Michael blinked. "Umm, if I get the choice, then later."

"Normally that'd make me want to do it right now, 'cause I'm contrary," she quipped. "But I could do with some time to get ready for this interrogation myself, so you get off."

"Just out of curiosity," Michael asked after a moment. "How did you know, umm, know that Maria was my girlfriend again?? I could have just come to visit as a friend."

"I guess I didn't have any particular way of knowing. But then, I'm a little spooky like that." She turned back to Maria. "You wanna see if we can find the others??"

"The rest of your band?" Michael asked.

"Umm... yes," Maria told him. "Do you mind if we go? You can, erm, come along of course."

Michael thought about it. "Sure, I'd love to meet some more of your musical friends."

So Maria locked up her room, and they started exploring the dorms and some of the class hallways of the school looking for bandmates. Didn't find any, though they heard that they 'just missed' one or two. After about an hour of this, Sophie suggested going to a diner and grabbing some dinner, which Michael loudly hailed as a great idea. The waiter had just left with their orders when two guys, one very tall with extremely short hair, the other one wearing glasses and a very placid face, rushed in the door. "Hurricane!!"

Maria grinned. "Boys, what have you been doing to me??"

"Just what you've been doing to us," the tall one replied. "We were both chasing each other around campus, I figure. Well, we're all here now. Who's the new guy??"

"Michael," he said quickly. "Maria's friend from back in Roswell." Michael was finding that he didn't really like the idea of Maria being in a band with guys... he hadn't asked many questions about that part, possibly because he didn't want to know the answers.

"Okay, umm..." the guy with glasses took a look at their booth. "Probably too tight to try to squeeze all five of us in... oh, you guys are leaving?" This was directed at a somewhat older couple at the small, two-person booth across the aisle from theirs, who were just putting out a tip. "Guess that solves the problem." The other people were obviously unwilling to be hurried, but it didn't take too long before they were gone, and the band guys just slipped into their place... not touching the dirty dessert dishes or the tip, but not waiting for them to get cleared away before sitting down either.

"Michael, this is Spence, our keyboardist." That was the tall one. "And Brian, who plays the rhythm guitar." The guys waved, and the four of them quickly started to talk about stuff like the classes they had got for this semester, and places that they should try to land gigs at... topics that Michael couldn't seem to follow in the conversation, no matter how he tried. When their sandwhiches and drinks came, he found himself focusing on the food more than on Maria, never mind her friends.

Maria nudged him a little bit, and when he looked up at her, she shot over a quick 'sorry about this' expression, which he appreciated. He was glad that she was enjoying the company of her friends, but it was hard not to feel like an outsider around them.

---------

Alex groaned as the alarm clock started to blare and honk at him, switched the lamp on his bedside table on, and practically slammed his finger into the button that shut the clock radio on. (He didn't even remember hearing the music come on... had he turned that off in his sleep, or forgotten to arm that feature? With this new model it was a little hard to tell in retrospect.) He rubbed his eyes, and a slow smile came across his face. The telephone was just within arm's reach on his dresser, (probably because he had been in bed when he'd hung it up and put it away last night,) and Alex actually laughed to himself as he pushed the speed-dial one, which had just been assigned a new number a few days ago.

It rang three times, then picked up. "Morning?"

Alex grinned to himself. "Good morning, beautiful."

"Alex!! Hey, how're you doing?"

"Better, now that I'm talking to you," he said, and Isabel aww-ed softly over the line. "What's up over there?? Is Laex awake?"

"Yeah, I just got up and finished changing him. So... got any big plans for today?"

"Umm... not really, thought I'd head over there and help your mom watch my son, while you and Max are studying."

Isabel chuckled softly. "Sounds good by me. Actually, the two of us were thinking of trying a slightly different schedule of cramming today... working from the morning to around one, taking lunch, and then having a break of two hours or a little more then. And then back to it, working later into the evening after dinner in exchange. Whatcha think??"

"Sounds like it could work," he admitted. "Any idea what you'd like to do on your break? Take in a movie??"

"Or... we could kick Max out of the apartment and hop into bed," she purred.

"Ummm..." Alex swallowed. "Well, you know I'm not going to say no to that, but..."

"I was kind of kidding," Isabel admitted, "but the idea is rapidly growing on me, I have to confess. It's been too long since I felt your tender touch inside of me, lover."

"Err, okay." Alex cleared his throat. "You *do* realize that I have to spend the entire morning with your mother, with these dirty thoughts you've now put into my head, right??"

She laughed. "I don't know that I see anything dirty about it, but I'll give you 'awkward.' So, enough talking about it for now. Oh, did you know that today is Tess' start at her new job?"

"Umm... I was wondering if it was," Alex said. "Wish her good luck for me?"

"Will do... but if you get here early enough, you can probably wish her well yourself. She probably won't be leaving for about an hour and a half."

"Alright," Alex replied, "I'll probably be showing up in a little over an hour. Love you, and tell Laex I love him too, right?"

"We love you too," she replied. "Can't wait to see you." And she hung up.


TO BE CONTINUED...

[Chrisken]

Part Nine

Knock, knock.

"Hello?" Alex heard Max's voice calling from inside clearly. It wasn't long until the door swung open, revealing Isabel and an excited, determined expression on her face.

"Oh, look, Max, Alex came to bring me lunch. See ya in two and a half hours."

"Umm... wha??" Max blinked in surprise, and Alex couldn't really blame him for not having kept his footing when Isabel threw him that curve. "Uh, would you guys like me to leave so you can have some privacy??"

"Yeah, I think that 'see ya' was your sister's none-too-tactful way of asking for exactly that," Alex filled in. "Hope you don't mind?? Your parents have brought out old wrapping paper for Lex to play in, or you could probably go and surprise Liz... I happen to know that she was going to be catching up on her pre-reading at Choughey's Shoppe." He stepped in through the doorway and turned to address both the Evans siblings with this next sentence. "Any idea how long your mother has been saving old wrapping paper??"

That question elicited a huge laugh from both of them. "Since we were very little at least," Izzie said. "A lot of the time, it it wasn't too badly torn, she'd find some way to reuse it another year. I guess I always wondered what she was ever going to do with the rest. Amusing little babies wasn't ever an answer that I'd have thought of, but maybe it should have. It's a well known cliche that little ones love playing with used wrapping paper, after all."

"Yeah," Max agreed, and chuckled a bit more. "Okay, well, I'm off... guess I'll take a look in at Lex for a minute, and then ask if I can borrow some keys."

"Sounds like a plan," Isabel agreed, and waved. Max nodded once at each of them and then made his exit. "So, what exactly did you bring for lunch??" Isabel asked, getting up and peering intently at the makeshift box affair that Alex had in his hands.

"Home-baked pizza. Your mom donated the use of her kitchen and most of the ingredients, and I did the labour. There's another pie inside. Thought it might be some good energy food for you."

"Hmmm." She took one more look at the box, and then gestured to the kitchen table, so Alex set it down and started to open it up. The smells of pungent tomatoes, creamy melted mozarella, fresh garlic, and something vaguely fishy wafted immediately out. Isabel grinned and bent to examine the pie in greater detail as he slid it out of the box (on one of her mom's largest wooden cutting boards.) "Canadian bacon, little chopped green peppers, and... anchovies? Alex, you don't like anchovies on a pizza!"

"Umm..." his face flushed slightly. "I didn't use to, really... two plus years ago. Things change."

She looked into his face for a moment, wondering if he would add anything more. The fact that she herself had been a huge fan of anchovies on pizza, and had made no bones about it during the time that the two of them had been getting to know each other, seemed... significant. Had he gotten pizza with anchovies at first because they reminded him of her, after she left, and then discovered that he was acquiring a taste for them? It seemed likely.

But he didn't mention any such thing, and Isabel didn't want to ask -- for one thing, it seemed just a little arrogant to presume that this matter of taste necessarily had anything to do with her leaving. So, instead, she reached down, pulled a wedge free... well, mostly free, because little strings of molten mozarella cheese tethered it to the rest of the pie no matter how far she pulled on the slice. So she pulled on the strings with her free hand until finally they snapped, and deposited them on top, then brought the very point toward her mouth. Alex cried 'wait!' as soon as he realized what she was doing, but he was too late.

"Whah?" she mumbled through a delicious mouthful, and smiling.

"Well, I guess I thought you'd burn your mouth again," he said. "You never could seem to learn to be patient with pizza."

For a second she was confused, and then placed the reference. Lunch in the school quad, the day he volunteered himself as a 'subject for erotic experimentation' to her, which was a mental picture that she'd never forget. She'd been eating some pizza from the school cafeteria and had reheated it too much in the little bagel-toaster contraption, and Alex had offered her a napkin.

The next morning had been the first time they kissed. No, that wasn't right, it had been the day after that.

"No, no, I'm fine," she assured him. "No burn. It wasn't *that* hot. You wanna try some yourself? It's REALLY tasty."

Alex smiled and went to the counter first, getting two plates and glasses and pouring pepsi for each of them. After handing her a plate and a glass, he moved two slices over to his own plate, blew on them a little, and tore off a small piece from the edge of one, including both outer crust, sauce, and cheese. "Mmmm... nice." Isabel smiled, struck by the difference between their styles in how they ate their pizza, or at least, in how they started eating.

"So, how's the studying going?" he asked, bringing up one slice to take a bite out of it from the crust end.

"Pretty good, I think," she admitted. "Been working through the english section, which has a fair bunch of stuff that I don't remember learning at West Roswell. But none of it seems that hard."

"Okay," Alex agreed, then jumped in his seat a bit. "Wait a second! How did I never think of this before?"

"Um, what?"

"Well..." Alex tried to think of how to put it. "Before the prom, you said that you had enough credits to graduate that year."

Isabel blinked in surprise. "Um, yeah... *if* I finished out the year, which I didn't."

"You missed, what, two finals?" Alex asked.

"Three, actually... one because I was hiding out at Valenti's so my mom wouldn't realize how pale I was, and trying not to get to know the toilet very well."

Alex frowned. Looking back, he realized that Isabel had indeed not seemed well in those few days before she left the planet, but he'd never even thought that there was a medical reason for it. He'd been too wrapped up in worrying about why she was acting distant to actually find the right reason why. "Okay, three tests," he said. "Couldn't it be as simple as making up those tests and getting your diploma? I mean... the GED kinda makes more sense for Max and Michael, who weren't as far along with high school as you were, but..."

"Just make up the exams -- after more than two years?" Isabel asked. "And what exactly do I tell them when they ask why it's took me so long? What if the records for those classes have been thrown out by now, so that they don't have my midterm grades and papers on file, just a big INCOMPLETE in the ledger? And no-one is going to want to give me a make-up final at least until December, at the end of the fall term, by which time I could already have the GED..."

"Isabel, love, you're babbling," Alex whispered to her. She looked at him, smiled shyly, and took a big bite of pizza. "You might be right... it could be something that would be very hard to do. Or it could be very easy. Seems like the thing to do would be to call up the school and ask. It won't take much time to find out." He paused. "And don't forget how many friends you have in this town, even among the ones who you haven't told your whole story to. Remember Mrs. Fletcher in the guidance office? I used to see other teachers turning around and trying to avoid her if they saw the two of you together, because otherwise she'd pretty much talk their ear off, going on and on about another charity fundraiser you'd helped organize or something like that. She'd go to bat to help you actually graduate, you know that."

"Hmmm..." Isabel still seemed a little unsure. "She probbly would, but I have to admit..." A big sigh. "I kinda feel like this is gonna sound stupid, but I'd feel so foolish calling the school to ask about the whole thing."

"No, that's not so stupid. I can see why you'd be embarassed," Alex admitted. "Maybe your parents would be willing to start the ball rolling?"

"Maybe... I'll have to ask them. And even if that comes together, I'll still have studying to do, first cramming for those make-up finals, and then SAT stuff." She finished the pizza and started wiping her fingers clean. "But I'm not studying now, and spending my break talking about getting a high school diploma was not exactly the plan, was it?"

"We haven't used up much of your break, dear, and shouldn't you..." Alex glanced back at the cutting board, and did a double-take. There were now four slices missing - half the whole, when he had been expecting only three missing. Had Isabel taken a second when he hadn't been paying attention? The answer didn't really matter enormously, and Alex tried to quickly finish his own second slice without actually cramming it straight down his esophagus or anything uncalled-for like that.

Isabel laughed softly, sitting, well, leaning her butt against the edge of the counter to wait for him. "Oh, Michael says hi... he called this morning." Alex smiled and nodded, wondering if Isabel would continue before he finished his mouthful.

She didn't. "How are thing in the large apple going??"

"Not bad, though I think he's feeling a little jealous of all the time that Maria's spending with her friends in the band. I can understand why she's excited to meet them again, but... maybe he got used to having a near monopoly on her time."

"Yeah," Alex agreed. "To be fair, the same thing might happen if you tag along when I go to LA, though I'll do my best to pay all kinds of attention to you anyway."

She grinned. "I was wondering... but you don't really need to coddle me or anything... I hope. Heck, if you're busy, I might just go off sightseeing and exploring the big city!"

Alex thought about that for a moment. "Well, okay I guess. Anybody else, I'd say to be careful, but I kind of doubt that you'd get into more trouble than you can handle just about anywhere on earth... well, except for the kinds of trouble we're all too familiar with, and I kind of doubt they'd be waiting for you in California."

"Yeah," Isabel said. "Oh, speaking of a..." She broke off suddenly in mid-word. "*Oooohh*, you're done!" Alex was wiping off his hands and his lips with a napkin. "Wanna get right down to it, baby??"

"Umm..." Alex stood up and shot her a cocky grin. "A little curious about what you were saying there. Care to finish that sentence??"

"Um, no, not really, because it's a lead-in to a much longer conversation that can wait," she told him.

"Hmm." He pondered that for a second, as Isabel headed over to her big, comfy bed, and he slowly followed. "Okay, just don't forget, alright??"

"I'm *not* gonna forget, okay??" Isabel turned around and grinned mischievously at him, and Alex felt the hem of his shirt start to move on its own and drift upwards. "Hey... come on, now, it's a very clever idea, but... oooh, chafing and tickling at once. That is *not* a good combination."

Isabel let go of his shirt with her mind, and emotionally one-two-punched him with puppy-dog-cute eyes and a full, sexy pout. "Don't l... no, on second thought, DO look at me like that, 'cause I kinda like the way it makes my insides go all mushy," he said, and Isabel broke up into laugher, (which kind of ruined both effects after all.) "But don't *just* look at me like that, baby!"

"What else should I be doing then, sweetheart?" Isabel teased him.

Alex stood there for a long moment and just looked at her, looked at the golden blonde hair which was, naturally, still quite short, (though it could have UNNATURALLY grown much longer in the few days since she'd returned,) at her rich almond-brown eyes, her pleasantly symmetrical nose. Moving downward slightly, his gaze could linger on those soft and supple lips over even white teeth, the cute curve of her chin, the smooth and incredibly caressable skin of her throat, neck, and collar.

She was wearing another casual t-shirt today, a loose rose-red one with a shallow scoop neckline, which did a good job of flattering the lines and shape of her sexy chest, and was just short enough to show a tiny little sliver of midriff. Below the waist, she had on some kind of oddly pleated shorts or coulottes, which Alex didn't really find that attractive, but at least they reached no more than an inch and a half away from her knees, revealing a pleasant amount of shapely leg.

"L--losing the pants," he blurted out, and Isabel arched an eyebrow in surprise. But after a silent moment, she did just that, pushing the fabric down her hips and doing a little kicky maneuver to transfer the shorts from her right heel to her right hand, so she could throw them away.

"Well, you shouldn't be standing there with that zombie look on her face," she replied, getting into the spirit of the game. "You should be right here, kissing me."

Well, a good idea was a good idea. Alex rushed over so quickly that his momentum sent both of them sprawling onto the bed, which was really no bad thing. Isabel wrapped her arms around him as their kiss grew deeper, the sensation of pleasure growing so intense that it threatened to overwhelm him. His body seemed, as far as he could tell, to be acting on instincts... or at least, it was responding in ways that he couldn't remember consciously directing. Glimpses and impressions of their mating activity seemed to come sporadically, through the reddish haze of lusty passion, and the flashes and memories that he was recieving from Isabel through their connection. Mostly it followed relatively predictable patterns, clothes being stripped with little ceremony, fingers and hands sliding across sweaty skin. Tongues and mouths ministering attentively to sensitive spots.

And then there was a moment of clear lucidity, at least by comparison. Both of them were naked as anything, Isabel on her back, legs close together, and Alex was stretched out on top of her, looking straight into her eyes. The world seemed to freeze for an instant... neither of them said anything, maybe neither of them could. But it was like there was a completely different communication channel open between them, a signal laser oriented on the path of their eye contact. Alex was sure that he could sense everything that was in her mind and her heart at that moment... how deeply she loved him and cared about him, how happy she was that she'd brought his son, their son, into this galaxy, and that he was healthy, safe, and happy. That she was a little nervous and uncertain about what the future held for her, and for their relationship, but also excited about meeting those challenges. That she wanted him so badly that they could both taste it, and feel it all the way down to the tips of their fingers and their toes. All of this and dozens, or hundreds, of little details poured into his own mind and spirit, and Alex revelled in it, knowing instinctively that she was getting a similar brain dump from him.

Then time started again, and he kissed her, and squeezed his body a little more tightly into hers, and ran one hand down the side of her arm, trying to memorize the skin that his fingers were touching. Isabel spread her legs and wrapped them up around his, pulling his stiff organ into her soft, moist sheath. It was... it was beyond right, somehow, it was perfect. Alex threw himself into the cue she had fed him, making love like it was a literal thing, like a gift he was making for this incredible woman he adored so much, She did it right back to him, except moreso. The passion and heat grew like a living thing between them, until it pushed them both...

...over the crest.

----------

Alex had the sensation of swimming in a lake of memories. They came at him hugely and not in any particularly sensible order, each one drenching him so that all he was aware of was the elements of that particular recollection. Some kind of tense confrontation or bargaining on Antar, in the middle of a dense and forbidding forest, with several dozen soldiers in different uniforms standing around. Turning for one last look at the scenery, pleasant hills covered with dark blue grass and an orangeish sky, before stepping into the spaceship. Waking up, in her bed in her old bedroom, from some horrible cloying nightmare, and knowing that something was wrong with her but not understanding what. Breathing deeply and fighting through contractions as Max and Tess coached her through Lex's birth. Bringing Lex, as a newborn baby, to the bedside of an old Antarrian woman and letting her see and touch the child. With a mental gasp, Alex realized that the old woman was... was Zan and Vilandra's mother.

The shock of that realization sent him shooting out of Isabel's memories and back into a more regular state of mental alertness.

He and Isabel were lying cuddled together on her bed, still bare & beautiful of course, (well, she was beautiful at least... Alex wasn't quite sure if he could or wanted to apply that adjective to himself.) His right arm was wrapped around Isabel's shoulders, or at least her far shoulder, since her near shoulder was pretty much leaning on the edge of Alex's chest, with her left arm draped across his body and playfully scratching him near his bellybutton. This was the most pleasant mental picture Alex could ever think of, and he hoped her remembered it forever.

And softly, without even knowing that he was about to, he asked "The... the old queen, Zan and Vilandra's mother. Did she die??"

Isabel blinked in surprise, and stalled. "Did you see a flash about that??"

"Not sure I'd call it just a flash, but yeah, I saw something and I think it was from your mind. Taking Lex to meet an old lady... and I got impressions of who she was and how you felt about her. Somehow, between how sick she seemed, and the emotional overtones of that mental image..." He shrugged slightly, or tried to without knocking Isabel off, though even the smallest movement rocked her gently.

"Well, to answer your question, yes, she passed away," Isabel replied softly. "Not long before we left to come back. She had developed a sort of cancer that was resistant to the Antarian healing touch." She took a deep breath, and Alex held her tighter. "But... but she lived a long time, even by Antarian standards, and was able to witness the things that she had been holding on and waiting for. She knew that the four of us had come back and seen her, and with our help, the people of her planet were freed of a brutal tyrant. And even though Lex wasn't her first grandchild, or the one who took after her the most, she was really happy to meet him." Another sigh. "Queen Alinda died in peace, and at peace... and that meant a lot to her."

Alex wasn't quite sure what to say for a long moment. "I wish I'd gotten to meet her," he whispered then, because it was what he felt. "She sounds like one heck of a lady... just like her daughter is."

Isabel smiled at that and giggled softly. "Yeah, I think so too. So, what do we do now??"

"I dunno, I kinda just like holding you like this. Don't you like it?"

"Well, I do, but... maybe not as much as something else." She turned around, kneeling on the bed and bending forward. Alex's breath caught in his throat at just the way her breasts swayed slightly and hung beneath her as she bent over. Isabel wasted no time in licking and sucking at Alex's nipples. "Isn't that better?"

"Well, it, oooh, it's certainly different, and has a lot to reccomend it," he admitted. Isabel went back to nuzzling his chest, and Alex could feel his dick twitch and begin to grow.

----------

"Good morning, honey."

Maria turned around and smiled at the voice. This was the start of her fourth full day in New York, and Michael would be going back home to Roswell this morning... partly because he'd told Tess and Max that he wouldn't be gone any longer than four days, and mostly because for the next several days straight, frosh events and other peer advisor duties would really be keeping her busy all day. Michael was bending down next to her bed and smiling at her. "I'm gonna miss you," she muttered sleepily.

"Yeah, I'll miss you too," he said. "But I'll be back here soon, not quite sure just how soon, but probably a week or a week and a half. And there's plenty to keep you busy and excited without me, from what I can tell."

"That's true," she admitted, struggling up further in the bed. "Busy and excited are possible. But I won't be happy until you're back here with me." She reached out her arms and hugged him, which was a little awkward, and nearly sent Michael sprawling over backwards, which would have dragged Maria herself halfway out of the bed in a pretty undignified way. But they just managed to avoid disaster... which somehow struck her as metaphorical.

"Okay, umm..." she muttered after pulling back from the hug after maybe twenty seconds. "I've got, erm, about three-quarters of an hour before I need to be at the planning breakfast for the Jazz night..." Orientation included, among other things, theme nights at the little cafe/student club in the basement of the residence hall, and Maria was on the committee for several of the nights. It would be a working breakfast, as she had told him the night before, so significant others were not exactly welcome... he would probably be uncomfortable if he went along anyway. "Shouldn't take too long to get washed and dressed for breakfast, so we've got nearly half an hour now I guess."

Michael smiled at her slightly as she got out of bed, wearing a white t-shirt and blue striped fleece pants as pjs. "Are the buses for the museum trip thing boarding right after breakfast?"

"Umm, pretty much, yeah... I should be there then, at any rate, to answer questions and keep an eye as people show up to wait for the buses."

He nodded, and went to pick up the sleeping bag that had been laid out on the floor and start rolling it up. He'd been sleeping in the spaceship most of the time, but this time she asked him to stay in her dorm room, since it was their last night for a while with him in New York. Suddenly decisive, Maria stepped close, pushing the bag out of his hands with her left hip... he'd have time to collect it and pack it up after she was gone, or in the bathroom. There was no need to waste 'together time' on something as trivial as tidying up. Michael blinked a little bit in surprise, but smiled slightly when Maria brought her hands up to his head and pulled it down slightly to meet her own in an intensely fervent kiss. Michael wrapped his arms around her body, meeting near the small of her back.

The effect of Michael kissing her back was making Maria feel even dizzier than it usually did, and she took two steps backwards and fell back onto her mattress, still covered with unmade bedclothes. Michael followed her, well, as intimately linked as they were he didn't really have any choice.

But no kiss is lucky enough to last forever, and Maria had to sever the link and breathe through her mouth, she was getting so worked up. "Talk... talk to me, Michael," she said, hoping that the concept didn't sound entirely ludicrous. "I won't get to talk to you much after you go. Any idea what you'll be up for the next little while in Roswell?"

"Well, like Isabel said, I'll have a lot of studying to catch up on," he said, brushing some hair away from her face. "Working with Max on the GED stuff, and getting ready for SATs. I've been sending emails back and forth with Laurie, she's going to go back to Roswell, said she had something she wanted to talk to me about. And... well, I dunno, I was kind of thinking it might be a good idea to find a job again. Maybe not a full-time gig like Tess has, but just something to keep me busy some of the time."

"Well, that sounds like a lot," Maria said. "Don't forget to come back and visit me, right??"

"Of course not."

"Wait a second," she said, cocking her head. "Working with Max on the GED stuff... what about Isabel?"

"Oh, I thought I'd told you about that," he said. "Isabel isn't going to take the GED... this was Alex's idea I think: Mrs Evans talked to somebody at the high school and she can make up a few missing exams and get her diploma. Because she was taking courses and ahead of us, and on track to graduate like about a week after we left, except that, well, you know."

"Oh, okay. Good for her I guess," Maria said. "Ohh... I got you a surprise!!"

Michael blinked in surprise. "You did??" There was a second's pause. "Wait, when did you have *time* to get me something without me knowing about it??"

"Um... in between the student government campaign meeting and, uhh, something," Maria mumbled. "I really hope you like it, justa sec." She thought about getting up, then settled for just leaning over, opening up the top drawer in her dresser, and fishing something out from under some socks and underthings. "Okay here."

What she removed and handed to Michael was a picture of herself put into a fairly simple five by seven picture frame... a pretty portrait that had her dark hair all loose and a little tousled, wearing a pale purple sweater. "I thought you might like a slightly more recent pic of me, to go along with the one you had in your cabin on the ship, or something like that."

"Awww..." Michael leaned over and kissed the very tip of her nose, and then ruffled her hair a bit. "That was very thoughtful, and you really look beautiful in the picture. Thank you." She smiled brightly, and Michael sighed.

"So, what about you?? More orientation stuff, and then classes starting in... three days?"

"Yep." She looked around. "Oooh, I hear footsteps and voices in the hall. Maybe I'd better start putting my stuff together, in case there's a line at the bathroom."

"Yeah." Michael sat up on the bed as she bent over to search through her dresser again, (probably he was getting a good look at her butt in that position,) and reached out his foot to pull the sleeping bag back over towards him. Maria kissed him once more before running out into the hall, to see if she'd have to wait long before getting a shower.

----------

Tess smiled, checked the clock on the register, and headed back through an unobtrusive door into the employees only area. "Hey, Harding!!" a familiar voice called as she stepped towards the associate time clock... Brenda Tomlin, the assistant supervisor for her department. "Downing called in sick, which probably means she thought it was more important to go to a party than come in to work. Would you like to pick up some extra hours??"

Tess turned around and blinked. "Umm... on any other day, I'd love to make some extra money," she said. "But, umm..." For a second she was tempted anyways... the two of them could really use the money. But... "No, sorry, I just can't." And then she couldn't entirely hide a grimace as a new thought occured to her... since she was the 'low girl', Brenda could probably insist that she stay... either that, or she might find that refusing was a very bad idea in terms of her continuing employment.

"Hot date?"

"Not quite, but kind of," Tess hedged.

"Okay, no big. I'll try calling Langston, and if she can't make it, I'll be able to steal someone from another department to make up the shift. Have a good time!!"

"Um, thanks!" Tess said. Quickly she punched out, hung up her smock, and hurried to the main parking lot entrance. Kyle wasn't there yet, but it was not quite five minutes before she spotted him. "Hey, babe!" They did the rush-together-and-hug thing, with Kyle actually swinging her up and off her feet, holding all of her weight in his arms before he carefully set her down again. Kyle was grinning widely.

"So, how's everything going?" Tess was a little disappointed that they had to start without her, but when you've got to be at work, you've got to be at work.

"Pretty well so far, about half done when I left. Probably more like three quarters by the time I get there."

Tess could hardly keep from jumping and skipping in the air as she and Kyle headed, holding hands, to his car. She could hardly believe that they'd found a place so quickly, and one that they could afford. Well, it wasn't a great place, and they weren't affording it all by themselves, but it was a place that they could be together, and that was kind of the most important point.

It wasn't a long drive from the store, which was another really good point, and Tess could easily see that the others were there, if she hadn't already guessed... Liz's car, and Alex's, and Mrs Evans' were all parked in the vicinity. After kissing her when they were both out of his care, Kyle led Tess over to Alex's car, which still had a few boxes of Kyle's stuff in the back seat, and they each took one in.

Liz opened the door from inside after Kyle had spent about ten seconds trying to figure out how to open it from outside without putting down his load. The door was actually a side door, of a pretty disheveled-looking house. Three guys in their late twenties to early thirties were renting the main floor, and Tess and Kyle got the basement.

It actually wasn't bad, especially now that a few little touches had been moved in and/or unpacked. Pretty crowded with seven people in it, but presumably that wouldn't happen often. There was a bedroom, mostly dominated by a slightly lumpy king-sized bed that had come with the apartment rental, and that the two of them had decided they could sleep on reasonably well, if not excellently. The guys had moved Kyle's dresser and bedside table into the room, and there was an old bookshelf, and a closet, and that was about all that there was space for in that room. Also a small washroom with a shower stall.

There was only one other room in the basement, a kind of combination kitchen/rec room. Only one of the burners on the electric stove worked, and the oven apparently wouldn't go up past three twenty-five... but then, when was the last time that either of them baked anything? The landlord said that he'd try to get someone in to fix the burners, and they had Kyle's old coffeemaker on the counter, and a used microwave that Mrs Parker had sold them.

"Wow... this really looks... well, very much less oppressively dreary than the last time I saw it," Tess said, looking around and around. "Is there any stuff left to bring in?"

"Umm... I think maybe three loads," Max replied. "Don't trouble yourself... we've got it. Right, Michael? A..."

"Yeah, I'm on it," Isabel interrupted, mostly just because Max wouldn't expect it. She looked around and grinned. Alex, Michael, and Liz smiled back.

"Um, okay..." Max said. "Let's go." He went up the narrow stairs, and Isabel and Michael followed him.

"Alright," Kyle said. "Come on, let's get this party started!!" There was a brief pause. "Um, anybody have any ideas what to do?? I'd say watch a movie, but we've got no movies, we've only got that tiny little portable tv with no cable, no VCR, no DVD player..."

"Well, what are you going to do for fun when you get home from school and/or work??" Alex asked, with the glint in his eye telling Tess that he knew he was delivering a setup line.

"Something that we don't wanna do with you guys sitting here and watching!" Tess insisted. Liz laughed a little nervously. "Okay, umm... I think I saw some munchies, we can break those out... and put some tunes on the CD player." That was a very small boom box that had also seen better days, but Tess had tried it and it still played pretty well. "Once there's music, people can dance if they want... or maybe make out, as long as they don't go too far or anything."

Kyle and Alex shared a look. "Umm, yeah, I guess that sounds like a good way to start," Alex said. Kyle went over to the counter and started tearing bags of chips and pretzels open. He only spent a moment looking for big bags before remembering that there weren't any.

"Oh, we can just pass the bags around, no need to worry about that," Liz told him. "And, umm... maybe some kind of a party game to get things going?? We could play charades, or maybe pictionary if we can rustle up enough paper."

"Charades sounds alright," Tess decided. "We'll ask the others once they get back."

The idea of charades was met with some enthusiasm all around, and eventually it was decided that the guys would start out against the girls, with Alex serving as referee, timekeeper, and moderator. The guys were up by four points to three when the game just kinda dissolved. Max and Liz started to dance, the guests of honor kinda disappered into the bedroom, and Michael spent time talking with Alex and Isabel.

This get-together, as well as a housewarming and a celebration of Kyle and Tess moving in together, was also pretty much serving as Alex's goodbye party, since he had to leave for Los Angeles in the morning. Isabel had gone back and forth so many times about whether she should accompany him at the same time as he went, or come a few days later after he had finished settling in, that she hadn't been able to make up her mind about when to get plane tickets. Finally, Alex had set up a random decision table: Isabel had thrown dice to settle things once and for all, and it had landed on 'two days later.'

"Okay, so, enough about me leaving tomorrow," Alex said after several minutes. "Michael, tell me more about Maria and New York."

----------

The party didn't run terribly late into the evening, all things considered, partly because several people wanted to be getting up early the next morning. For a while it looked like a session of 'Risk, the game of world domination' would take some of the participants long into the night, but Michael and Kyle got into a big argument about whether it was or wasn't standard rules that any armies that got accidentally knocked into the ocean by the rolling dice should be removed from the game, and they couldn't come to any agreement and Max said he wasn't wild about playing any more anyway.

Michael was also the one who actually poured a glass of water all over Alex and Isabel because they were still getting hot and heavy when Michael wanted to leave. Tess got a little upset about that, because it left a bunch of water spilt all over the couch, but Kyle calmed her down, reminding her that it wasn't leather or anything of course, so the water wouldn't really hurt it, and she could dry it out with her powers if she wanted to.

Liz grabbed Max's hand as they went out of the side door, nuzzling her face into his shoulder a bit, and Max leaned down and kissed her. "Max, take me home," she whispered in a soft voice.

"Umm... Liz, it's your car," he pointed out. "Doesn't really work too well like that."

"I don't care," she insisted. "Come with me, at least. You can borrow my car, take it back to your mom's place, and come get me in the morning, whatever. I just... I want to kiss you late at night on the balcony, like we used to do."

Max grinned slightly. "Um, Izzie..."

"Yeah, I got it," she said with a smile... Max jumped slightly - he hadn't realized that she had been close enough to hear what he and Liz had been whispering to each other. "I'll see you when I see you." She took the keys to their mom's car from Max and went off with Michael.

As Max drove south through the streets of Roswell in Liz's car, towards downtown and the Crashdown, everything seemed very empty and quiet for not quite eleven at night. He parked in the little lot beside the Crashdown, and they both climbed up the ladder onto the balcony, and kissed each other almost literally like... **Well, exactly how WOULD you kiss someone if it was going out of style??**

Liz pulled away just a little bit, and looked back and forth between the stars in the sky, and Max's eyes. It looked like she was trying to decide if the original or the reflection was brighter. "Max... there's something that I didn't tell you," she whispered. "My parents are away until tomorrow morning."

Max brushed a little of her hair back and chuckled to himself. "Does that mean you had an ulterior motive for getting me here, Miss Parker?"

She giggled back. "Well, that makes it sound a little bit mean, Max." She reached up and licked a pulse point on his neck. Max's knees trembled. "I... I don't want to push you into doing something you don't want to do tonight, of course. I just wanted us to have an opportunity to... to take things further, if we decided we wanted to. And for it to be a surprise, if possible."

"Oh, it's definitely a surprise," Max said, rubbing one hand up and down Liz's bare upper arm... she had worn a flirty tank top and tight designer jeans to the party, which kind of made more sense given what Max realized now about her agenda. He hadn't guessed beforehand that she might be deliberately trying to build up a sensation of arousal in him all evening.

But he wasn't drunk enough on lust as to be unable to look at the situation rationally... or at least, he didn't think so. Just buzzed enough with horniness to raise the stakes on what he was deciding a little bit... if the analogy with alcohol would stretch that far.

He'd only been back on earth, back together with Liz, for a little over a week. But somehow, that didn't seem like a particularly huge problem. They had understood each other better than most old happily married couples did, almost from the very beginning, and all of the ugliness and angst that had erupted in the second year of their relationship seemed to be a long past thing. Maybe the difference was that each of them had matured while being seperated for two years, and put childish... (or teenager-ish at least,) things behind them. Max still wasn't quite sure exactly where they were headed, but they'd talked enough that he was confident that they'd be able to figure all of it out in time... together.

And he wanted, so badly, to... to cement their relationship. (The term that Liz had told him his future self had used seemed very appropriate.)

So Max kissed her and held her close. "Let's go inside."

Liz smiled at him, and moved away towards the window, opening it up easily, and gesturing that he should go inside first. Liz followed, closing it behind her, and turning on a single small desk lamp. That managed to provide a pretty romantic setting in the bedroom, and Max watched the girl he adored carefully, wondering if she would give him a cue about how to proceed. Her gaze seemed to linger on his chest and midsection before she made eye contact, and he decided to take that as a cue, even if it wasn't meant as one. (Could hardly hurt in the vein of 'getting things moving', at any rate.) So he pulled off his sweater and undershirt, and for good measure, kicked off his shoes.

Liz smiled. "Somebody's eager."

"Well, this was your idea," he pointed out, "so standing over there trying to be all calm and collected doesn't really seem like the thing to do."

"Is that what I'm doing??"

Max shrugged slightly. "I'm not sure. Do whatever you like."

Liz grinned at that, and stepped towards him, took his hand. Max let her lead him toward the bed, and laughed softly as she undid his belt, and the button and zip of his dockers. If Liz wanted to take the lead, he'd follow... but not entirely passively, so he reached out with one hand, burying it in the long curtain of dark brown hair that fell from the top of her head. His finger and thumb found the lobe of Liz's right ear, and caressed it softly, and Liz sighed. Max got a quick flash... the two of them out in the desert, climbing up from a blanket and going off to dig under the radio tower. That was about when his pants fell down about his ankles. "Okay, up on the bed," she directed.

Max grinned at her, hooked his fingers in the thin shoulder strap of her top, and pulled it around, off her shoulder, so that the narrow loop just circled around her arm. Then he carefully fell back onto the mattress, not trying to slip out of his pants, so that the bunched fabric came up and hung off of his ankles and feet and lower shins. Liz sighed slightly, pulled the light brown fabric away and tossed it onto her dresser-top. "You take off your socks yourself... somehow it seems like it would be a bit too mommy-ish to do that for a guy."

Max got an odd look on his face, but he scrambled further onto the bed, reached down to his own feet and pulled the socks away without any comment. Liz stepped close to the bed. "Do you want to take the lead, getting me undressed??"

"Yeah... or we can work together," Max said, smiling invitingly at her. He unsnapped Liz's jeans... they were some kind of odd design with a series of snaps running down the front, instead of a zipper, but that didn't slow him down long. Liz tittered softly as she slowly peeled the fabric down her hips and away from her ass, and then shimmied out of the jean legs and tossed them away.

"Put the high heels back on or not?" she teased him. "I know that gets some guys hot and bothered, but you never really mentioned it one way or another."

Max growled softly and just wrapped his arms around Liz's waist, pulling her onto the bed, the shoes in her hands falling away in her surprise at the motion. Another flash, or a series of them, hit him -- hit him both, since he thought he could tell by now when they were getting the same imagery. Liz running away from the pod chamber after they'd got the message from his mother... singing mariachi underneath her balcony. Arguing in the streets of Copper Summit.

They were memories that might have been upsetting, just a few days ago. But Max had moved on, and didn't really mind the slideshow of what they'd been through to get right here. Liz was mostly lying down next to him now, and he brought his head close to hers to whisper. "I love you in high heels when we're out on a date or going to a party," he admitted. "The things they do to the lines of your legs, and the shape of your adorable butt. But for when we're... when we're in bed together, then no... that's where I draw the line I think. The high heels come off when everything else does. And speaking of..." He picked up the hem of her tank top and played with it flirtily.

Liz smiled at him. "Well, go ahead." But with a slightly wicked smile, she leaned forward, starting to kiss and lick his bare chest, her arms reaching out and holding onto his shoulders to steady herself. Max didn't want to stop her, but the position made it impossible for him to either slip the top up or down past her arms.

After a moment, though, he realized he had an alternative, one that Liz might or might not have thought of herself. Moving his hand close to the areas he wanted to affect, he used his powers to 'snip' each strap, knowing that he'd be able to repair them later, and then to slit the fabric down the side from underarm to waist. The tank fabric fell away from her chest... followed by Liz's strapless bra, which he must have cut free too without realizing it. Liz sat up slightly in surprise, making an 'oooh' sound and nearly sucking the tip of his nipple away from the rest of it.

"Sorry... I didn't hurt you did I?" he asked, trying not to ogle all the goodies that had suddenly been revealed.

"Umm... um, no," she admitted. "Actually, it felt really good where you were running your hand like that... like you were actually stroking my skin, except somehow... tinglier. Not sure I can explain it. Just didn't really expect that. You can... can fix them later right?" Max nodded. "Um, okay."

Max smiled, and put his hand close to Liz's upper arm, concentrating on something. Liz gasped and let out a low, passionate moan. "What... what..."

"That was something I wanted to try," Max murmured. "Direct stimulation of the nerves through alien energy. I'm glad it felt good."

"Yeah... that, I have to say, that was amazing, actually. I, uhh..." Before Liz could figure out what she wanted to say next, Max bent down to start nuzzling and sucking *her* chest. At the same time, he tried the alien foreplay trick, letting his hand fall on the front of her right thigh and making a light connection with the nerves in the skin there. Liz practically yelped out loud with the combined sensation.

They messed around like that for several minutes, trying to outdo each other with more inventive kinds of foreplay, playing an odd kind of chicken with who could stay away from moving on to the main event for longest, though neither of them felt like they could last long at this rate. "Okay, can you let me try something?" Liz asked as Max was playing his fingers over the satiny skin of her stomach. "I can't do what you do to me with your powers, through your skin, but maybe I've got another idea."

"Umm, okay, sure," Max said, straightening up slightly. "What... what do you want me to do??" He was feeling out of breath already.

"Just look into my eyes and open a connection," she said, smiling slightly. Max already was looking into her eyes, and still touching her skin, so it only took a very slight mental effort to create the link.

Liz had been waiting for the contact to become active... somehow she sent him a ball, no, not a ball, but a stream of passion, of excitement, of nearly pure sexual energy. It hit Max like nothing that was merely physical could have, spreading all around his body and his psyche, pushing his arousal and his lust to nearly inhuman levels, to a pitch that he hardly thought he could sustain it. Torn between wonder at what Liz had been able to accomplish and resentment that she had pushed him so close to losing control of himself before the main event had started, he formed a mental laser of lust and physical hunger and aimed it right back to her. For a second it seemed possible that a feedback limit had been established that they might not be able to break... that might bring them both to a climax sitting right there, not touching except for Max's hand on his arm, that might conceivably even keep repeating, over and over and over...

But no, somehow Max's neck jerked, severing the eye contact and the psychic link. Max was shaking and shivering all over with need, and he could see that Liz was reacting pretty much the same way. "Okay, umm... we're doing this now??" Liz asked, her voice far from steady.

"Umm, umm... just give me a minute," Max muttered, breathing deeply and trying to force his body to relax slightly. He knew that Liz was just as excited as he was, but it still seemed like he had more reason to be worried about finishing too soon. For one thing, it was easier to get girls to repeat in close succession - or at least, that was what he'd heard.

And then, something else occured to him. "Do you have protection??" Just the mention of it seemed to make his Johnson shrink a tiny fraction of an inch.

"Umm..." Liz's face flushed prettily in the dim light. "My bedside table. What, you weren't carrying one?"

"Um... no, not, err... not since I've been back, at the very least." Liz turned to open the drawer in the table, and Max playfully took the opportunity to hook one finger into the back waistband of her blue bikini panties and pull them halfway down her thighs, fondling her bare bottom. Liz turned around, throwing a mass of dark hair over her shoulder, and tossed him a tiny little package. Max opened up the wrapper the same way he had removed Liz's shirt, (never being really good with tearing this kind of thing open with his nails,) as she finished taking off his underwear. Max quickly shucked off his briefs too.

And that was when he looked at the little latex sheath, looking a bit like a tiny un-blown-up balloon, and at his own hard tool. "Umm... not to sound like a complete dork, but I kind of forget exactly what the proper procedure is at this point." Liz arched an eyebrow. "Umm... do you remember?" He held out the condom as if offering it to her.

"Um, yeah, I think I still have that health class stuff in mind, but I'd probably better not do it myself." She waved a hand at him. "Long fingernails. Risky... don't want to do anything that might cut or abrade the membrane." Stifling giggles, she was able to talk Max through properly applying the prophylactic.

"Okay, and now the main event I guess." She crawled up to straddle Max's legs, and he lay back with his head towards the foot of the bed, happy to let her go on top if she wanted to. Another flash... sitting in the dark Crashdown dining room... the first time he had connected to Liz and offered her a short look inside his heart. Liz sighed happily herself, bent down to lick at the tender skin near the hollow of his hip, nuzzling her face briefly in the wiry hair at Max's crotch and sticking her tongue out to briefly lick his nutsack. And then she hitched herself forward and oriented herself above his latex-sheathed pole. Max bucked his hips, thrusting up, but was only able to get the very tip of himself inside her at first, and not for long. Liz sighed and dropped back down onto him, and both of them started to pump back and forth, blown away by sensations that were not quite like anything that they'd expected.

Max reached his hands back up to Liz's breasts as she rode him, trying to alternate between being gentle and forcefully giving... much as he'd like to fondle her shapely boobs for his own pleasure, he wasn't quite sure that was the best way to make their first time a pleasant memory for Liz. She let out a sequence of louder and louder gasps, and then started shuddering all over. Her cunt clenched and convulsed all around him, leaking warm slippery fluid over him, but Max was far beyond minding. He took a deep breath and realized he was at the point himself, just a few seconds before his dick exploded inside the condom.

Liz bent down to kiss him, and pulled her pussy off of his cock possibly before his orgasm had even quite finished, cuddling close to him, slipping one hand underneath him to stroke his back, and running the other through his hair. She smiled at him without saying anything, and Max muttered, "I love you so much."

"I... I think I've never stopped loving you," she answered. "Not since you saved me." A pause. "Umm, not that it was just because I owe you my life that I, erm... you know what I mean, right??"

Max chuckled. "Yeah, I think I've got the picture."

They snoozed in each other's arms, and then Max got up to quickly clean up... disintegrating the condom entirely rather than taking any risk that Liz's parents might find it and figure out what it meant. When he'd slept after they made love, he seemed to have absorbed some of Liz's memories of what her life had been like when he was gone - he'd have to ask her if she got anything from him. He also used his powers to clean up other evidence of what they'd done from the bed, and checked Liz herself... this was her first time, and there was some tearing and bleeding from where he had punched through what was left of her maidenhood. He kissed her on the cheek as she lay there, and connected to her when she opened her eyes, trying to heal the damage before she even realized what he was up to.

She didn't give any clue whether she knew or not, but smiled at him when he was done. "Do you want to stay the night Max??"

He thought about that, and smiled... both at the thought of being so close to her as they slept, and the possibility that they could do it again, (assuming there was another condom available... or maybe just experiment with other things.) "Yeah."

"Good." Liz let out a loud breath as Max lay down and wrapped an arm around her protectively. She sounded utterly content with her world.

"When you leave for Cambridge," Max whispered into her ear, "I want to be right there by your side... to not leave you for a single moment that I don't have to... which means classes I guess, not sure what else. I can study for my SATs while you're in lectures."

Liz giggled, a little indulgently. "I feel the same way. Not sure if we can *quite* manage that, but I'll do the best I can." She considered. "There's one piece of good news."

"What's that?"

"My room in the Harvard dorms has a queen size bed. Benefits of being a top-ranked scholarship student on a cushy free ride."

Max thought about that... and grinned.

TO BE CONTINUED...

[Chrisken]

Part Ten

Once all their friends had left the new apartment, Kyle turned to Tess, who was lazily picking up some used paper plates, and once she made eye contact he smiled a smile that seemed to be roughly equal parts of tenderness, adoration, and awkwardness. Tess started to giggle nervously herself.

"Ummm, now I know that I hinted a certain, erm, certain something might happen once we got our own p-place," she stammered, "but I d.. d..don't think tonight is exactly the right moment. Don't hate me."

"I could never hate you," Kyle assure her, crossing the distance and wrapping his strong arms warmly around her. "And to be honest, I think I was almost thinking the same thing. I can't wait to love you like... well in the full-body sense, as it were..." Tess snickered slightly, and Kyle shook his head, his eyes telling her how much he regretted that phrasing. "But somehow I think we won't have to wait long for a better opportunity."

"Yeah," she agreed, and reached out to float the dirty plates into the garbage. "But come to bed with me, darling. I've waited too long to feel your arms wrapped tight around me, all night."

Kyle grinned, let the girl he loved slip for a moment out of his embrace, and hurried over next to the bed, taking off the clothes that he didn't want to sleep in.

----------

Ding-dong

Alex grinned a little forlornly as he heard the doorbell, and picked up one of the bags he had packed, a fairly light carry-on. Surely enough, the same face that he had been expecting greeted him when he opened the door to his parent's house... a clasically lovely face featuring high, smooth cheekbones and framed by short strangs of golden blonde hair. "Hi, darling."

"Hey. You already ready already?" Isabel asked, stepping across the threshold. She took his arms in her hands and kissed him, first on each cheek, and then on the lips.

"Yep. Just finished packing. Thanks for the lift."

"Oh yeah... like I was going to pass up a chance to drop you off at the kiss-n-fly," she joked. "Ummm..." She seemed uncertain, as if not quite sure what they were going to do next right at this moment.

"Come on in," he invited, stepping back into the front hall, and since Isabel was still holding one of his arms in a light clasp, she followed him automatically. "We have a few minutes before we have to hit the road. I'm used to this flight, there shouldn't be any unexpected delays."

Isabel smiled a wan smile of her own, forcibly reminded of the seperation that they would be embarking on. In some ways, the delay would have some practical benefits. Mister Evans had called in some contacts, and by the time Isabel and little Lex would be flying to Los Angeles, two days from now, there would be a little apartment not far from the UCLA campus waiting for the two of them. Isabel had protested and squirmed about the fuss her father was making, but the simple fact was that this would make things a lot easier, and she hadn't been able to deny that.

But it would be hard on her not to see Alex for two days. Just like it would be a strain on him, even as the routine of settling back into school distracted him from that ache.

"By the way," she whispered conspiratorially once the two of them were settled next to each other on the couch, so near to each other that a low-level connecton effect was making him tingle. "Max didn't come home last night... until like quarter to seven this morning."

"Oh?" Alex asked vaguely, and then the implications struck him. "Oh-ho. And if memory serves me right, Liz's parents were away."

"Yeah," Isabel agreed. "And Liz showed up for breakfast too... not so soon after Max came into the house that it was completely obvious that they had come together, but I do think she drove him over. They were acting... well,
really couple-ey, in a very sweet and cutesy way. Even more so than lately."

"Mhmm." Alex considered that. "Well, good for them I think. I mean, they love each other and life is too short... though not excessively short for any of us I hope. Why should they wait?"

"No reason I guess," Isabel agreed. "Just sharing the news, not passing judgement on it hehe." She smiled contentedly. "How many bags do you have anyway?"

"Umm, three," Alex answered after a split second's thought. "One bigger, one smaller, and then the carry-on, which is smaller yet. Do you want to grab a bite before we leave?"

"Um, not really," Isabel replied, blinking. "I had breakfast back home too, a good one. Just before I left. You?"

"I'm good, just thought it was a good offer to make," he told her. "Well, there was something I wanted to give you before we started to carry my stuff to the car." He squeezed her hand warmly, then rose and crossed over to the dark wooden bookshelves on the other wall of the living room. From there, as Isabel watched curiously, he extracted a small package and came back to hand it to her.

Isabel couldn't help the way her face lit up when she realized that it was unmistakeably a jewelry box. "Awwww."

Once he had given it to her, Isabel looked up into Alex's eyes as if thinking that she needed further permission to open the little case up, and he nodded at her encouragingly, amusement and deep devotion clear in his soulful eyes.

What she found within and extracted from the box was a golden pendant on a gold chain. The pendant itself was flat and a little irre... it was irregularly shaped, but in a way that was pleasing to the eye somehow. Tiny jewels had been embedded in one flat side of the jewel... but as Isabel looked more closely, she gasped in amazement and wonder.

More incredible than the gems themselves was the engraving they formed a part of... an etching of the whirlpool galaxy into the flat gold. That was the first alien symbol that Isabel had recognized as part of her heritage... and the heraldic icon of her family house, back on Antar. A tiny little crystal that might be a diamond glinted at the heart of the galaxy, and two blue gems, two red, and one yellow marked the extent of the two spiral arms. Isabel looked up from the pendant to Alex, confused. "Where... where did you get this? Did you have it made specially?"

"Yeah, I did," Alex agreed, grinning. "It was an idea that occured to me while you were gone, and I called the jewelry store the morning after you got back, while you were busy with Laex. Max overheard me on the phone, but I managed to swear him to secrecy." Alex grinned slightly.

"It's beautiful," she told him, lost in wonder for a second. A little voice in the back of her head was asking if it was asking for trouble to special-order a new piece of jewelry with an alien logo on it, but heck... it couldn't have attracted THAT much attention. The store probably got weirder special requests. And - well, she'd worn the Mesaliko whirlpool necklace when she was younger, even after finding out that the design was alien. This wasn't really any different, except for being shinier and prettier.

"Thank you so much," she told Alex, slipping the chain between three fingers and letting the pendant dangle in mid-air. "How..." She decided it would be better not to ask how much it had cost, or how he had paid for it. "How did you know I would love it so much?"

Alex grinned. "I must confess that I did not. I had high hopes... I remembered that you liked the one you found in Atherton's secret room, and you've always been a fan of gold jewelry. Beyond that I was going on a wish and a prayer."

"Well, I think your highest hopes have been fulfilled. Do the honors?" She passed the chain over to him, then turned around so that he could drop the unfastened chain over her head and link the ends together behind her neck. Isabel reached down to toy with the bottom extent of the chain playfully. It was long enough that the pendant was hardly more than an inch from the top of her cleavage.

"Well, now we'd better get going," she said, kissing him again quickly, and picking up a suitcase... the big heavy one, and without appearing to miss a beat as she hefted it.

It wasn't long before they were on the road towards the airport. "So... any idea what you'll be up to today, once you've gotten there and moved into your room, I mean?"

"Not especially," Alex mumbled morosely, and then caught a sidelong look from Isabel and decided to try and provide a more upbeat answer. "Probably walk around the campus, getting familiar with it again, and planning out a tour for you. I've hardly spent any time there since the first week of May."

"Really?" Isabel blinked, and then made a quick course correction to keep from drifting out of her lane. "I don't think I realized that. What have you been up to all summer, then? Just bumming around in Roswell, hanging with your friends?"

"Not really," Alex laughed. "Maria and Liz were taking summer classes, although they did come to town a few times, and I spent some time with Kyle. Um, mostly I've been taking freelance computer jobs to earn some extra money... website design, desktop develoopment and support, temping at a phone support helpdesk. Whatever came up, pretty much. Not buckets of fun, but I did make some quarter-decent cash."

Isabel smiled, and made a tentative mental connector between this minor revelation and the question of how Alex had paid for the jewelry. "Gonna pop into one of those fancy computer labs you were telling me about? Once you get to UCLA, I mean?"

"Probably," he admitted. "And maybe going to the computer store on campus and looking to buy one of my own. There's some money in the scholarship that should cover part of it."

Isabel grinned. "A fancy mac iBook or something?"

"Umm... not sure, probably a laptop of some description. Would pay off, being able to take it to lectures and so on. There were a bunch of people doing that last year."

"Cool," Isabel said.

"Oh, I almost forgot to ask how my boy was doing today," Alex realized as they drew near to the airfield. "What he's up to, who's with him and so on. Sheesh!"

"It's okay, though I'm glad you mentioned him before we got there," Isabel assured him. "He was doing just great this morning, looking forward to spending some time with Michael and his Uncle Max."

Alex grinned. "Liz didn't stick around?"

"I think she had something important she needed to take care of back at the diner."

And then, they were driving past the airport parking lot, and Alex couldn't think of a thing to say. Isabel pulled up at the kiss-n-fly zone, and they both loaded Alex's bags onto a little cart nearby, and then Alex swept her into his arms and tried to put as much of the passion he felt into a single kiss.

"Have... have a good flight, lover," she whispered in his ear, staying firmly within his embrace for a moment longer. "And... and check your email when you can. I'll leave at least one little surprise in there."

Alex smiled. "I'll talk to you soon... and I already can't wait for you and Lex to get to LA." He squeezed her tight to him, and then rushed off to make his flight. Isabel watched him go until somebody else who wanted to park where her car was sitting started to repeatedly honk.

----------

Maria sighed to herself, and shifted slightly in the chair, reorienting herself in front of a computer. She'd been in the Amadeus lab all... well, for nearly three hours now, since ten AM that morning, doing some research on a few book references that her pop culture professor had suggested, and also experimenting with a new music editing program. She needed a little break.

Smiling, she went first to check her email, meaning only to take a quick look and then go wander aimlessly through a good 'stupid jokes' website or two. However, there was something waiting that she hadn't expected... a message with no subject line, from... the right side of the email address was the major DSL provider in roswell, and the prefix was... mguerin3?? Had Michael gotten a new email... oh, wait a second. The Evanses were on DSL, and their plan might give them enough email addresses to set some up for the alien kids. It kind of fit that Michael wouldn't have had the attention to detail necessary to type in a subject line, or set up his email program to label it with a name as well as his unique address. Large font, dark blue letters spread across a brand new window, and Maria started to read:

"Hello Maria, this is Michael. Sorry that it has taken me so long to send an email, but I keep forgetting to spend any time on the computer, which kind of slows everything net-related down.

"Yesterday we helped Tess and Kyle move into their new apartment, and then they threw a combination housewarming party / farewell for Alex, because he leaves today for Los Angeles. Actully, Tess didn't show up for most of the moving, and Kyle brought her over just in time for the party to start, but I don't hold that against her because she was on shift at the Walmart. We had munchies, tunes, and some dancing, and pretty much everyone else made out at some point. That made me miss you a lot, obviously." Maria giggled helplessly for a long moment, and got a frustrated sidelong look from the big guy on the next computer.

"We played charades, and some of us, mostly the guys, started a game of Risk, which Kyle pretty much ruined by insisting on this stupid rule that I've never ever heard of. Well, and we kind of got into an argument about it, which made Max back out of the entire war.

"And I talked with Alex and Isabel a lot... Alex was telling us about UCLA, and then they wanted to hear about you and New York and stuff, so I told them about how you showed me around, and the people in your band, and a few other things.

"I also threw water on Alex and Isabel because I wanted to go home and they were about to hit second base. Liz brought her camera and took some pics of the party, and she brought some of them over here on a CD, so I'm trying to attach my favorites to this email. Let me know if they come through okay or not."

And next there was a bunch of little hyperlinks with picture titles, that Maria immediately began to investigate. Sure enough, they all seemed to come through beautifully, though he could probably have shrunk the file sizes some without any appreciable loss of clarity, making the email less of a weight on her mailbox.

'Surprise, okay, not really.' The first picture showed Kyle and Tess, standing side by side and carrying boxes, with a staircase behind them. A portion of what was probably Alex's head, not quite focused, was in frame at the bottom left corner. And there did seem to be some expression on Tess' pretty face conveying that she had been startled... though it was impossible to tell what. Kyle's own countenance was quietly affectionate.

'Off we go.' This was a wider shot of the stairway area, with Max nearly out of sight, only his legs and feet visible on the higher stairs. Michael was following Max, and Isabel just about to climb the stairs third. Kyle could be seen off to the left side. Maria couldn't immediately tell why the three of them were leaving. 'Charades #1.' This had Isabel dominating the picture frame, making an odd gesture that involved pointing his hands and arms up from a low point, and Maria wondered for a moment what word he had been trying to act out. Sapling? Fence? Palisade??

There were five 'Charade' pictures in all, and she flicked through them quickly, knowing that she'd have a chance to look at them in more detail later. Tess on her tiptoes, arms stretched above her head and hands flat and horizontal... probably tall or heights or something like that. Kyle pointing to one of the knuckles on his index finger... probably 'third syllable sounds like.' Liz herself, making a gulpy, funny pursed-lips face... possibly fish or fishy. And Max, wasting time with a completely stumped expression. No pictures of Michael himself, or of Alex.

'Settling our troops on planet Earth.' This one showed Kyle, Max, Alex, Isabel, and somebody's shoulder that had to be Michael, crowding around the Risk board, and Alex placing some game tokens in the west side of Europe. 'The storm clouds gaher.' Another shot of the Risk board, Isabel nowhere to be seen, a few dice thrown next to the map board, and Kyle's arms thrown up in excited celebration at an obvious stroke of luck. 'Things get ugly.' That one showed Michael and Kyle standing nearly toe to toe, frustrated masks on both their faces, while nearby Max rolled his eyes.

'Chatting with friends.' This was Alex sitting on one of Maria's mom's old chairs, with Isabel perching on the armrest, (something that Maria thought was not particularly safe with this specific chair,) and Michael slouching against the wall near them, obviously animated in conversation. 'Before.' This one actually might have been taken before the rest of them, because it showed a dusty and neglected counter and sink in a dark and dreary room. 'After.' The same space, but now clened, better lit, and counter space taken up with a coffee maker, dish drain rack, a toaster that had seen better days, and a spice rack rendered comical, absolutely dominated and towered over by a bottle of tabasco that was almost too big to cram inside it.

'Dance dance fever.' Kyle and Tess were close in each other's arms, while Isabel and Alex seemed to be trying some sort of fancy swing step. Max waved at the camera, (ie at Liz,) from across the room, and she could see a little CD player sitting next to a wall outlet. 'Hosed down.' This was the last picture that Michael had sent along, an image of Isabel with a nearly furious glare dominating her face, her tall figure caught in mid-motion towards camera. One side of her pageboy haircut was plastered flat against her head, and there were clingy and faintly discolored patches on her t-shirt, which had been a pale purple to start with. This was obviously after Michael had 'thrown water on her.' Did that suggest that Michael was the one behind the camera this time, since Isabel seemed to be charging straight at it? What had happened next? Had Michael really stopped to take a picture of his accomplishment, instead of... well, probably in that small apartment he hadn't had a convenient escape route anyway. She'd have to ask someone else about the incident later, on the telephone.

Another thing that she'd have to ask about was pictures of Michael himself. There were only the two where she could see him clearly, and only the 'chatting' one was really a good shot. Maria suspected that Liz would probably have been shooting most of these pics for her benefit, and Liz knew her well enough to know that the one face she'd want to see the most of would be Michael's. Michael might have guessed that himself too, but he was a little photo-phobic, and probably would have not chosen that many pictures of himself to send along. (He might also have been deliberately avoiding the camera, but she thought that Liz would have been clever enough to catch him unawares more than this.) So, there were probably more pictures of Michael, that Liz could send to her directly. That thought made her all fuzzy inside somehow.

She closed all the picture windows and returned to the text of the email. "Let's see, what else is news?? Mister and Mrs Evans are being just great to me... I moved into Isabel's old room again last night, after Tess moved out. La'ex is as cute and clever as ever... Isabel's going to be taking him out to Los Angeles in two days, to be close to Alex. Max is going to be going to Cambridge at the same time that Liz is... he's talking about finding a part-time job around there, if there's any to be had, and working on his studying when he can.

"And... and I'll be coming back to New York soon, though I'm not entirely sure when. Probably won't be able to take the saucer again, so maybe I'll be flying commercial, or doing a road trip thing, greyhound or amtrak. Whatever I can pull off. However, I won't be able to leave again for a few days myself... Laurie wanted me to hang around Roswell until she can get back here, because there's something she wanted to talk to me about in person..."

Someone tapped her on the shoulder at that point, and Maria spun around in surprise. A blonde girl who only looked seventeen at most was standing there. She was saying something, but Maria couldn't hear her... because she still had her headphones on, playing an 18th century spanish waltz at the moment. She took them off. "Umm, sorry??"

"Your time's up," the girl pointed out. "Two o'clock."

"Oh, no," Maria groaned. Had she forgotten to go over to the reservations machine at the other end of the lab and renewed her 'dibs' on this computer?? There was a complicated system of options and bookings that, in Maria's opinion, penalized those who got too deeply into what they were doing to renew at the appropriate time. Still, no sense in complaining about it out loud. "Sorry... I'll clear off as quickly as I can." She took a quick look at the end of the email, wanting to know how he had finished it, and noticed there was a PS. 'Call Liz when you get a chance and ask her about Max. I'll explain after you've had a chance to talk to her, if it isn't obvious why I asked by then.' Maria shook her head and started closing down all her programs.

"I... I haven't seen you around," Maria said once she had finished, and blondie took her place to log on. "Are you taking classes here?"

"Yeah... just a few hours every week... special thing with my high school." She sighed a little bit, and looked up at Maria. "You an incoming freshman?"

"Do I really look that young?" Maria giggled. "No, this is my second year here. Maria DeLuca."

"Hi, I'm Lianne Thomas." They shook hands. "I'd stay and chat... but I only get one hour on the computers a week. See you around sometime?"

"Sure, I guess." Maria headed off, wondering when she could next check her email and read the rest of that letter.

----------

"Well hey hey." Liz looked up from her book and smiled at Kyle. She'd been sitting in the booth closest to the Crashdown kitchen since a little after noon, reading one of her textbooks for a class that was reputed to be brutal right off the bat.

"Hi, Kyle," she replied with a smile, closing the giant textbook. She'd been working on it for long enough... and through two Jupiter-sized cherry cokes, which would necessitate a trip to the bathroom quite shortly. "How's things at the new apartment?"

"Umm..." Kyle blushed. "Not... not bad, I have to admit."

Liz looked into her long-ago-ex-boyfriend's face as he slid into the booth opposite her. "Kyle," she whispered suddenly, "Did you and Tess, erm, go all the way last night? After we left??"

Kyle blinked in surprise. "Umm... no, we both talked about and decided that the moment wasn't right. She was tired, and neither of us really felt at home there yet... so we just went to sleep." He held Liz's gaze for a long moment, and then chuckled under his breath. "But we did the deed this morning!"

Liz stared a moment in shock, and then laughed at herself for missing that possibility. "Well... well congratulations I think."

Kyle half-nodded, then cocked his head. "Wait a second... have - have you and Max already--"

"Last night," she managed to choke out in a giggle. "After the party, we came, well, here. Not here precisely, but back to my room upstairs, and we let one thing lead to another."

"Wow," Kyle muttered. "How's that for slightly weird timing."

"Could have been weirder," Liz pointed out. "And... and I don't think I need to ask how it was... partly because of the smile on your face when you first came up here. Also... well, I'm not quite sure also what." Just because things had been so remarkable with her and Max for so long... was sex with an Antarian hybrid always good? Or was it dependent on the true feelings of those involved, and at least minimally appropriate circumstances?? She wasn't sure how to express any of that out loud.

"Probably best if we don't ask too many questions about any of it, at all," Kyle said. "But thanks for your, umm, your best wishes, and I'll send a bunch back at you."

"Thanks!" Liz gasped out. "Umm... nature calling, back in a few!" As she spoke, she was already rushing towards the bathroom, her bladder very insistent about being allowed to relieve its load.

Once she'd taken care of business, washed her hands, and got back to the table, Liz found a surprise waiting for her. Kyle was still sitting in the booth... but he'd moved to sit beside the spot that Liz had been occupying, up against the wall, and across from that spot where he'd been before... "Max!!"

"Hey, gorgeous," he teased her. "Just got our tickets for Cambridge sorted out... two seats side by side the whole way."

"Perfect!" Liz frowned slightly at the booth, still standing. Much as she appreciated what Kyle had apparently tried to do with the best of intentions, she felt more than a little weird about sitting next to him, even if that way she got to stare into Max's eyes. She'd always felt that the sitting next to each other position was more intimate than eye to eye anyway, so she stepped close to Max's side of the booth and made a little wave towards the wall. After a few seconds, Max caught on, smiled, and shuffled himself over, so that he was opposite Kyle, and Liz had space to sit next to him, which she immediately took.

"Umm... so, how's your school stuff going, Kyle?" Max asked.

"Err, not too bad," he said after a moment. "Nothing too intense at the moment. We don't really have four-month terms or orientation week with no classes or any of that, but we do have two-month class cycles, and we started a new one right after labor day, so it's still pretty low-key. Thing'sll get crazier around mid-October, when the cycle starts to close."

"Okay," Liz said, though she had pretty much known this stuff beforehand. "Well, good luck in advance, with that."

Kyle nodded silent thanks. "And how's Tess doing with the new job?" Max asked. Kyle and Liz traded a secret look.

"Umm... fine so far," Kyle replied. "Or about as well as can be expected. She's having some difficulty adjusting to the working world, but it's not too bad, Working with clothes was probably a reasonably good break for her."

"Cool," Liz said. "So, Max, what are we going to do today?" He looked at her with some surprise. "You mean, you *didn't* show up to rescue me from Professor Blanner and Doctor Sheffield?" She made a deliberately sad face, while indicating the huge textbook that was still sitting on the table.

"I... I have to admit I didn't realize you were in need of rescuing," Max said. "But I think I can come up with an escape plan, if you just gimme a minute." He thought about it. "We could drive over to Hondo. Maybe even see of that fortuneteller is still there."

"Hmmm." Liz thought about that. "Actually, I think I heard from Maria or her mom that she closed up shop. But Hondo sounds fun anyway. Or try to find the old radio tower again."

Max grinned. "That's it." He snapped his fingers, and they got up. Liz collected her books and Max waved bye to Kyle. "See you later." They hurried out to the parking lot.

----------

Alex groaned, but there was a slight smile on his face as he walked out into the familiar space of the LAX concourse. His flight at Albuquerque had been delayed for nearly two hours after he had boarded. Right now... he still had to get onto the bus that would take him towards campus, with all of his luggage. But the only thing on his mind was finding an internet booth and checking for that 'surprise' from Isabel.

It didn't take him long to find one, out of the several that were spread around the huge concourse floor. Waiting in line while two other people used it was longer, but less than fifteen minutes all told, and his determination only flagged slightly in that time. Finally he had his chance to sit down on the stool, feed a crisp and pretty five dollar bill into the slot, and enter the information for his email account.

Sure enough, the top entry, most recently arrived, was a letter from Isabel. "Hi sweetie! I hope the flight went okay, and that you're happily settling in on campus." Alex chuckled wryly, but wasn't too upset. Just reading his words was making him feel better about the delay. "And I'm a little worried that I might have promised more than I could deliver. When I got back from the airport, I realized that I didn't really have the surprise I had promised you... I could send you an email, but that would hardly be very surprising. So, I hope this works..."

And the next thing in the email was a big black rectangle that didn't seem to be doing anything. Alex clicked on it, (using the annoying little trackball and buttons that all internet booths seemed to have, probably because they couldn't be stolen like mice, or easily ruined like fancier touch-sensitive pads.) A tiny message box appeared on the screen. 'This email plugin type, Quicktime video, is not installed or has been disabled through the system settings. Please contact administrator.'

Okay, so that was pretty much that. Isabel had sent a video, probably of herself or Lex or both, and he would NOT be able to see it here at the kiosk. At least it was something to look forward to. He scrolled down to see if there was any more text in the message.

"I'm going to be heading over to the high school this afternoon to pick up my diploma. According to what they told mom and dad, it'll even say 'Honor roll' on it, which I didn't expect no matter how well I'd done, under the circumstances. But whoo-hoo! Max and Michael have talked about taking me out to dinner to celebrate.

"I think Lex is really settling down to life in Roswell... just in time to have about a day and a half before we come to Los Angeles, doesn't that just figure. Still, that probably won't be as big of a culture shock as how far he's come already.

"I talked to Maria briefly around lunchtime... she called for Michael, of course. It was nearly three in the afternoon New York time, which kinda surprised me when I realized it. She asked me to pass along a friendly 'HI!!' if I talked to you, which I'm not doing literally, but oh well. 'HI FROM MARIA!!!'

"We miss you already, and wish we were there. See you in two days.

"Isabel and Lex."

Alex smiled, checked a few things quickly on the web, then logged out and scooped up a few quarters of change from the bowl. Then he let someone else take a turn at the internet, and headed off to the transit platform where he could catch the Big Blue Bus to campus.

----------

Tess woke up lying on her side, curled up next to Kyle, who was flat out and facing upwards, She had one hand resting on his chest, and he had an arm cradling her shoulders, and Tess smiled as she opened her eyes.

"Morning, darling." There was no reply. Tess rubbed her hand against Kyle's skin, then turned around so she was on her knees and one hand on the mattress, letting her gaze and her fingers wander more widely. Kyle remained, to all appearances, dead to the world, his chest rising and falling peacefully, but otherwise not moving.

It didn't take long for Tess to discover an impressive tenting in her boyfriend's sweat pants... presumably from overnight fluid accumulation more than anything that she could claim credit for, but by now just the sight of it made her feel naughty and impulsive. She let the fingers of her other hand dance down Kyle's side, then pulled the hem of his pants carefully over the obstruction and down. His stiff pole jutted up, both in the vertical elevation and towards his head, and the headboard of the bed. There was a slight sigh that escaped Kyle's lips at this, a bit of a shifting of his lower back from side to side on the mattress, but he still didn't seem to be awake or aware of what was going on.

Tess let her fingers stroke ever so lightly across Kyle's bare skin and erect flesh, giggling as he quivered and bobbed, possibly even growing a little bit bigger. After maybe a minute of that, she concentrated on very faintly stimulating some of the many, hypersensitive nerves present in that area... not trying to mimic any particular sensation, just trying to create a vaguely pleasant feeling.

This time, Kyle's moan was quite audible, and he shifted quite a bit, but didn't open his eyes, say anything more, or make a gesture that seemed to signify anything other than unconscious delight. With Kyle's eyes closed, Tess couldn't make a firm connection with it, but surface stimulation didn't require a connection in the traditional sense - it was only a slight variant on molecular manipulation, However...

Suddenly she had an idea, and reached out her own awareness to directly sense Kyle's mind beginning to arise from sleep to wakefulness, as it was inevitably doing under the artful stimulation of her slender fingers. She would have to time this relatively carefully to get the effect that she wanted... While she was waiting, she sliced his sweat pants off, to keep them from possibly getting in the way or tangled up.

Tess reached out with her mind to touch Kyle's, wrapped her hand around his shaft, and did two things with her powers at the same time. One was a more complicated version of the nerve stimulation trick that she had already used, and the other was a mindwarp affecting Kyle's senses in a more general way. Almost immediately, Kyle's body shuddered all over, and his hips started to lift, and then pump up and down in a way that was, under the circumstances, indecent and faintly comical at the same time... or maybe indecently comical. His eyes snapped open, and Tess opened up the visual channels of the mindwarp that she had been leaving on standby.

Kyle groaned and growled, overloaded by the stimulation that Tess was throwing at him. (Tess was feeling overloaded in a different way, with the strain of keeping up the pretense, but also charged in a strange way.) As Kyle continued to wake up, he was able to actually form words and phrases... "Oh, yeah, baby. I can't believe this. You're so sexy, baby, so naughty... and so damn tight!! What exactly did I do to desss. to dizz--"

She was able to keep the whole she-bang for about a minute. Her mindwarp must have frayed around the edges first, because Kyle looked around, confused. She toyed with the notion of trying to finish him off while she still had a firm link to his arousal center, but decided not to get her hands dirty, and leave his stiff rod for later, when she might get some use of it the familiar way. A few moments later, Kyle stopped thrusting, slid back on the sheets a bit, and looked straight into Tess' eyes. Her real eyes, not the eyes of the mindwarped self she had projected to him.

"Okay, this sounds a little weird at first, but I thought you were... well, you were, umm, naked, and, well, you had stuck my cock up your... into your b... wait a second." Kyle blinked, reorienting. "Did... did you just give me an anal mindfuck??"

Tess burst out laughing. "I... I guess you could phrase it that way, yeah. Thought you'd like it better like that than if the butt was on the other foot, as it were." Kyle's eyes nearly popped out as he realized that Tess could probably have given him the experience of being on the receiving end of rectal penetration just as easily. "Sorry, didn't really mean to mention that... you should probably forget that I did. I'd certainly never do THAT without your clear consent beforehand. Not that I can really explain why I tried pulling this one by surprise, I guess, except that it was just an impulse. Are you offended? Did I cross a line? Am I babbling way, way too much??"

Kyle laughed, swooped down to gather Tess up in his arms and kiss her passionately. "I... I'm still surprised, but I... I certainly wouldn't say that I mind."

"I hoped you wouldn't," Tess admitted. "I... I knew from before this morning that you, that you had erotic daydreams, fantasies about it. I'm still not sure if I want to let you get near there for real, but I figured that I could maybe give you a taste. Though it probably wasn't that much better than the daydreams, because I don't really know what it's like to have a dick stuck in anything from personal experience, never mind an asshole, so I pretty much had to draw on what you expected it to be like."

"It... it was a lot better," Kyle admitted. "Maybe you're just capable of bringing fantasies to the flesh better than an unassisted human brain." He laughed, and Tess grinned and ran a hand across his bare chest temptingly. "So, well... now that that little experiment is over, what can *I* do for YOU?"

"You... you know what I like by now, Kyle Valenti," Tess whispered in a throaty voice. Kyle considered, and slowly nodded approval.

"I think I just might." And then he was in swift, constant motion, pulling the old blue t-shirt up above Tess' head, tweaking and sucking at her pointed nipples, and then actually managing to tear off her underwear. Not on purpose, but the panties snapped away as he tried to pull them down and off her legs. This particular pair was one that Tess had used her alien 'slice and rejoin' trick on at least once, maybe twice, and maybe the repairs weren't as strong as the original fabric had been. (Hmm, maybe that was something the rest of the gang should get warned about.)

Soon they were both naked, with Tess flat out and facing upwards, and Kyle leaning down against her curvy body, pumping in and out of the depths of her tender crevice. They'd only been living together for a little over two days, and already she wasn't quite sure of how many times they'd made love. All she knew for certain was, she didn't want either of them to stop... well, to stop permanently, in the sense of never again. Obviously, they had to stop with the sexplay at some point, like to eat, go to classes, or show up for work. Possibly to sleep too, though it was becoming hard for either of them to fall asleep without...

Tess yelled without words and screamed Kyle's name. Someone banged on their ceiling and said to keep it down.

About half an hour later, Kyle had recovered sufficiently to arrange some breakfast. They chatted about this and that while the coffee was perking. Both of them were particularly aware that Kyle had late classes today, and Tess had to be at work for a shift starting at 10:30 that morning... which didn't leave her much time beyond the minimums for eating, drinking, showering, primping, dressing, and driving.

"Oh, Max was organizing a goodbye dinner thing," Tess mentioned while finishing her bowl of cereal. "Since he and Liz are getting ready to leave for Boston tomorrow, and Isabel and Lex are going to Los Angeles."

"They're not going to Boston," Kyle teased her. "Cambridge is not Boston."

"Well, the plane is landing in Boston, isn't it?" Tess grumped, but smiled at him. "Max thought it would be fun to all get together at Senor Chao's or something like that."

"Yeah, cool, alright," Kyle said. "I don't think you'll be wanting to wait for me before eating... not when I get out of the classroom at quarter to eight and they have relatively early flights. But I can meet you guys for dessert."

"Okay... yeah, that's probably best," Tess agreed. "Can you call the Evans homestead and let one of them know?"

"Sure," Kyle agreed, as Tess blew him a kiss and disappeared into the little bathroom.

If she hadn't been running so late, Kyle would have slipped into the shower with her. But he managed to resist temptation... only just.

----------

"Pick you up at the airport at quarter to noon? Yeah, I will definitely be there and waiting. I love you too." Michael smiled, hung up the phone, walked into the Evans living room, and jumped slightly when he saw Max and Isabel's mother sitting there.

"Good afternoon, Michael. Was that Laurie?" she asked pleasantly, nodding at the cordless phone that Michael still had in his hand.

"Um, yep. She'll be coming into town around lunchtime, three days from today." Michael smiled a little sadly. He wasn't particularly looking forward to tomorrow, to saying goodbye to Liz, Max, Lex, and Isabel all within the space of less than an hour, and then of hanging around town, without any of them being around, or Maria or Alex, and waiting for this rendezvous with his sister. Of course he was looking forward to seeing Laurie... he just kind of wished that it could be sooner, or that she had agreed to stay in Tucson and let him come to her, which she was curiously opposed to, for no reasons that Michael could easily understand. Except that Laurie simply liked coming to visit him in Roswell, and didn't want to deprive herself of that pleasure, though Michael didn't really see how it would be less fun for her that staying put in the palatial DuPree residence and having him meet her there.

"Did you tell her that she was welcome to stay here for a few days?" Mrs Evans asked. Michael nodded yes, and muttered an audible affirmative when he realized that she hadn't been looking up to see his face at that moment. That might have been part of the problem... he had promised Diane that he'd pass on that invitation, and Laurie had clearly been touched by the offered hospitality. As far as the Evans parents... Michael suspected that they were trying to put off the return of empty-nest syndrome, what with their adoptive children, and grandson, heading to the far extreme ends of the country, northeast and southwest. Michael didn't mind indulging them on that so much, but he did want to get back to New York to see Maria soon, if he could. He wasn't sure how long he'd been able to stick around there... but hoped that it would be for several weeks at least.

"Oh, I took a message for you guys from Kyle Valenti," Diane mentioned, scrambling for a piece of paper. "Tess will be driving here after her shift is over, and he'll meet all of you in the restaurant once his class lets out - which should be just in time for dessert." She found the slip and reached out to hand it to him.

"Did he mention just when 'in time for dessert' was?" Michael asked, then looked at the message slip. "Guess not."

"Maybe Tess will know his schedule, when she shows up," Diane said helpfully, and Michael nodded, seeing the point of that.

It wasn't long after that that Isabel, La'ex, and Mister Evans got back from his office. Michael rushed out and ruffled his godson's golden curls. (At least, godfather/godson was the closest American english term that Michael knew to describe the relationship between them. Michael had even stood by Isabel's side in a dedication ceremony back on Antar, promising to do everything in his power to protect La'ex when he was a baby only two weeks old, to cherish him and assist in his care, and to grant any boon that Lex might ask of him as he was growing up, as long as the favor requested was within Michael's means and not clearly deleterious to the boy's own welfare.

"So, how did everything go?" Michael asked.

"Umm... alright," Isabel told him, smiling slightly. "I don't really wanna talk about it, though. Have you heard from Max and Liz lately?"

"No, they're probably off... well, canoodling together again," Michael muttered. Isabel shushed him, scooping Lex up into her arms. Michael chuckled slightly. "They'll show up though. And Tess and Kyle will be coming, though seperately. Here you go." He handed her the message slip.

Isabel smiled. "Okay. What about... about Maria? Did she call? Did she email you back??"

"Yes, and yes." Isabel laughed out loud in delight.

Max and Liz showed up about twenty minutes later, and sure enough, they did look a little flushed and overexcited.

TO BE CONTINUED...