Roswell Fanatics

Sorry for the delay - wanted to get an extra max/liz scene worked out for this part. (In case anyone cares.)

Whom among us, part ten
Author: Chris Kenworthy
Email: Chris_Kenworthy@yahoo.com
Disclaimer: No, I don't own any of the Roswell characters. I don't plan to steal them and lock them up in white rooms either. I just let them out to play from time to time and see what happens.
Distribution: Distribute anywhere you like, now based at http://www.fanfiction.net/~chriskenworthy
Feedback: YES PLEASE!
Category: Roswell future-fic
Rating: PG
Summary: Liz's life changes when, as a university junior, she runs into Max again.
Spoilers: Up to 'end of the world,' kinda


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"Come on, admit it." The words drifted clearly into Max's mind as he woke up. He could tell, even before he opened his eyes, that Tess was lying next to him, snuggled into the crook of his arm the way she liked to do. The way *he* liked her to do, to be quite honest about it. As he looked vaguely around, he remembered that they were in the dome tent that Michael and Kenner had set up late the night before, and that he and his wife had crawled into a double-sized sleeping bag and fell quite soundly asleep.

Max got up carefully, not disturbing Tess as he gradually eased her out of his embrace, and looked down at himself. He had slept in his clothes, and aside from being a bit wrinkled they still seemed presentable enough. Michael and Isabel weren't in their sleeping bag - Kyle had taken it by squatter's rights, and Alex was snoring quietly nearby on a couple of blankets.

"Davin is right, Miss Parker." Bentor's voice reminded Max of the words he had heard as he awoke, and he silently pulled aside the tent opening and got out. Twilight filled the morning sky, which was now more blue than black, but Max could see from Liz's dark hair that she was still bent over the radio telescope, jotting out notes and adjusting the device every so often.

"He's *not* right," Liz declared, looking up to glare at Bentor and Davin, who it seemed were now acting as her two assistants. From this position, Liz obviously caught her first sight of Max, walking towards the telescopes' site, and at that moment her denial melted away. "Yes he is. **DAMNITT!!**"

"What's going on?" Isabel asked, walking up to the little group from another direction.

"Liz and Bentor's figures didn't check out," Michael announced from his vantage point on the old park bench. "The space capsule isn't any of the places where they thought it would be." Max looked at Michael with a definite 'warning glance,' anxious not to see a repeat of the dust-up last night. Michael shrugged apologetically, and forced a calm tone into his voice. "Well, it's not."

"Should've carried the two, huh guys?" Isabel wise-cracked, and her soft laugh choked away when she saw Max looking daggers at her. "Whoops, sorry."

"No, it's okay," Liz groaned, pulling herself to her feet and pacing away from the radio monitor. "I did make some educated guesses. Looks like they didn't pay off."

"*We* made educated guesses, Miss Parker," Bentor corrected smoothly.

"Yeah, thanks, Bentor." Liz smiled at him wryly. "That just means we BOTH look stupid right now."

Max spoke up, trying to get the subject away from placing blame. "Well, what's our next step now?"

"Back to the infamous drawing board, I guess." Liz walked over to stand face to face with Max, putting her thumbs into the pockets of her blue jeans. "Re-evaluate our assumptions and try to figure out if there's some way we can still track this thing."

"Not yet, Liz," Max heard himself saying. Liz stared at him, a trace of offense starting to gather in her face. "I mean, god, you're obviously wiped out and uber-stressed. You've been up most of the night, all day, and you were awake at the crack of dawn yesterday morning to help us steal the research on this thing."

"Eight o'clock is not exactly the crack of dawn, Max," Liz bit back angrily.

"And you were up in the middle of the night and wandering the campus the night before that," Max reminded her, not admitting that her correction was right because he didn't have to - and because that wasn't the point. "This isn't the right state of mind to be doing trajectory math, am I right??"

"I *have* to do it now, Max!!" Liz grabbed lightly onto his arm, and he could see the tears shining in her eyes even in the dim light. "This thing is getting close to earth and we still have no idea where to find it. I've already failed you once. To have a realistic shot, we'll have to locate it tomorrow night and there's still SO MUCH to be done..."

"Perhaps a compromise?" Bentor interposed himself into the conversation smoothly. "We work for an hour or two once we get back to the suite, lay the groundwork, and then take a break for sleep. That should strike an appropriate balance between the press of schedule and the need to think clearly."

Liz weighed that over. "I can do that. What do you think, your majesty??"

Max sighed. "It's okay by me."

"Then let's get going," Liz called out. He might be the king, but there was no question that she was in charge. "Wake up everybody else in the tent - they can fight for bunks in the RV if they're still sleepy. We need to get back to base camp now."

Max watched as Liz turned away. He was sure that at least two or three of those tears had slipped out of her eyes and were running down her face. But he didn't go after her, he went back to the tent. Now, where would Ardra and Kenner have gotten to??

* * * *

Alex wandered about the Arizona State campus forlornly, unable to shake his melancholy even in the bright sunday sun and surrounded by the beautiful university grounds. It was nothing like his dream, and that didn't just apply to the physical description of the college premises. Isabel hadn't acted anything like she did in his fantasies.

"Then again, when did she ever?" Alex muttered to himself. But the reality, if less thoroughly satisfying than his dream, had managed to be more interesting. Isabel Evans might not be head over heels in love with him, but at least he had finally won her respect - and she had won his all over again. That mental core-link that she had asked for...

Well, that was what it really came down to: no matter how much Isabel herself asked him to, Alex couldn't keep his feelings for Isabel out of the equation when he thought about whether to go through with it. And every part of Alex that loved her was telling him to do the link - for a couple of different reasons - to help her with this burden that was so obviously taking a lot out of her, to have a piece of her inside himself that he could keep forever, to be a small part of this mentalic journey that was such a huge part of her life now. Maybe even, in a very small and dark part of himself, the impulse to show Michael up by doing something that he obviously couldn't (or else Iz would have asked Michael to do it long ago.)

Sighing, Alex looked up, and noticed a familiar figure on a park-style bench in front of him. Kyle Valenti was sitting with his legs crossed lotus-style, his eyes closed, his hands resting casually on his thighs, motionless.

"Hey, Kyle!" Alex called out before he could think better of it. One of Kyle's eyes cracked open, and a clear look of frstration crossed his face. "Oh, I'm sorry - I didn't mean to disturb your meditation, or whatever. I can go if you want."

"No, it's okay," Kyle assured him, stretching his long legs back out and putting his feet down onto the ground. "What's up, Whitman?"

"Not much, just walking," Alex said, walking up and leaning his back against a tree a few feet from Kyle's bench. "A little too crowded with aliens up there - as I guess you realized yourself."

"A little too crowded, period," Kyle restated. "I have nothing against aliens, but yeah, Not much room to breathe in that suite, let alone meditate. So, what's on your mind??"

Alex considered. He and Kyle had never really become close, but with Liz so busy working on her star charts or whatever, he didn't exactly have a better choice for confidant here in Arizona. And he *did* want to talk to someone about it. "Okay, it's about... Isabel." He caught himself at the last second and almost mouthed her name at Kyle.

"Okay, 'Isabel.' Why are we whispering her name?" Kyle asked the last of that in a stage whisper.

"Because of the android bounty hunters wandering around campus?" Alex whispered back. "With super-hearing? Did anyone mention that to you??" Kyle shook his head. "As long as we're quiet about certain names and unusual words, we should be okay. I shouldn't have said the a-word, but I wasn't thinking."

"Okay," Kyle agreed, looking around them. No-one was nearby and sound wouldn't travel too well in an outdoor setting like this one. "So, what about *her*?"

"Umm..." Alex thought about how to answer that question without using 'unusual words.' "Did anyone mention that her talents have, um, blossomed over the past few years?"

Kyle considered a moment, then shook his head. "Nope, no-one mentions anything to me. Blossomed like how?"

"She... she can read minds, and affect them," Alex said, preferring that phrasing to a couple of different terms that might well be on an killer android's 'scan for' list. Telepathy, psionics, mentalics... (He had a wild notion of the alien bounty hunters breaking up a role players' club meeting in one of the dorms or harassing a few students talking about the latest sci-fi bestseller, but that wasn't really relevant right now.)

"Oh!" Kyle considered that for a moment. "Well, why is that fact brood-worthy for you??"

Alex sighed. "It's not, I was getting to that point. She mentioned, reluctantly, that she's having difficulty keeping her mental balance considering all of the stimulation of other people's thoughts..."

"Yeah, yeah, the 'Tam Elbron' effect," Kyle summarized. "And?"

"And, well... she said that she saw this big 'inner strength' deep inside my mind, and if she... well, basically mind-melded with me, she thought it could help her out."

"Like... well, never mind that," Kyle dismissed the analogy he had been about to make. "Well, do you want to do it?"

"Yeah... I think I do. But she says she's not going to go through with it until she's sure I'm ready. Tells me I'm not prepared for how intense it'll be. How much it'll affect my life once she leaves again. And you know... she could be right. I want to do this for her, but I'm scared too."

"Hmm..." Kyle considered all that for a second. "Are you *really* scared of it, Alex??"

"No," Alex blurted out suddenly, and then did a double-take. Kyle smiled enigmatically. "I mean, I know that I should be, but somehow I know deep down that if Isabel goes through with it, everything will be all right."

"Well there you go," Kyle suggested. "I always reccomend trusting your 'deep down.' Now all you need to do is find some way to convince 'her.'"

Alex thought about it a second, and decided he liked that plan. "Yeah. Well... thanks, and I think I'll let you get back to enlightenment now." He waved at the bench Kyle was still sitting on.

"Funny," Kyle said with a smile. "And good luck." He re-lotused his legs, closed his eyes, and started softly chanting something that Alex couldn't quite make out.

Alex smiled to himself, and started walking around the campus again, with a much lighter heart this time. Now, what line of persuasion would be effective against Isabel Evans??

* * * *

It was a week and a half after the spring dance. A number of people had told Liz that she wasn't talking much lately, and they were probably right.

Liz and Maria were serving shift at the Crashdown, and Alex was sitting on a stool on the counter, sucking down a strawberry shake as his own way of dealing with heartbreak. All three of them were all too aware of the fact that Max and Tess, Michael and Isabel were out on a 'double date' at Senor Chao's tonight. (The pod squad had apparently dropped the protocol of personally informing their human ex-sweeties of every social engagement, which Liz appreciated - she'd heard through the high school grapevine anyway, but by this point it was better not to learn about such things from Max's own lips.)

"I mean, he wasn't even any great shakes as a boyfriend," Maria was rambling, trying to make herself feel better about the whole situation by trashing Michael. "He gave me like *two* presents during the whole course of our relationship, a spice rack and a damn bottle of no-name shampoo and conditioner two-in-one. He'd pick his teeth at the table no matter how fancy a restaurant we were at. He put the Jetta through hell!! But, for some ungodly reason I was in love with him, so I rolled with the punches. And what do I get for all of my patience? *He* dumps ME to get with the girl who's been like a sister to him all of his life. I mean, what crime could I possibly have commited in a past life to deserve karma like this?"

"You should ask Buddha-boy that," Alex drawled, and took another long slurp through his straw.

The phone behind the counter rang, and Liz reflexively hurried over and picked it up. "Crashdown cafe."

"Hey Liz, it's Kyle."

"Wow!" Liz blinked in surprise. "Wow, that's freaky." She took the phone receiver half-way away from her mouth. "Maria, it's for you."

"No, Liz, don't hand me off to Maria, you don't have time." The earnestness in Kyle's voice tore through Liz's paper-thin veil of playfullness. "My dad just got called away on an emergency."

"Uh, okay..." Liz thought about that for a second. "Why are you telling *me* about it?"

"Because the emergency was a fight going down at Senor Chao's. I thought you'd want to know. I'm heading over there myself."

Liz felt as if her heart had been plunged into a pitcher of ice water. Senor Chao's. Kyle thought that Max and the gang were involved in whatever was going down there, and he probably had good reason. "You thought right, thanks." She fumbled the phone back to its cradle. None of the three of them (herself, Maria, Alex,) had quite figured out what the story was between Kyle Valenti and Tess, either before or after she had hooked up with Max, but Liz suspected that he cared very strongly for her, whatever you chose to label that caring. "C'mon guys," she told Maria and Alex quickly. "We gotta go. Alex, you came in the Rabbit, yeah?"

Alex nodded, a confused look on his face. "Wait a second, Liz," Maria spluttered. "We're on the clock here, we can't just..."

"Ryan!!" Liz called out to the cook in the back. "We're off. Emergency." She took off her apron and barette and strode towards the door, knowing that her friends would follow her.

By the time they got to Senor Chao's, the police had already arrived and crowds were milling at the scene. As Alex pulled over, Liz jumped out of the shotgun seat and ran over to an onlooker who seemed to be a year or two past high school. "Do you know what happened here?" she panted breathlessly.

"Well, a little - I was inside when it happened," he told her after a second's hesitation. "One minute everything's normal. then a couple of people in uniforms jumped this table of four kids - about your age, babe - and all hell broke loose."

"Uniforms?" Liz focused on that detail. "Like, what... army? Air force??"

The guy shook his head, as Maria and Alex drew carefully near. "No. Waitress, busboy, maitre d', that kind of uniform. But I don't think they actually worked for the restaurant, at least, I never saw any of them before they made their move, and I eat here about once a week, different days."

Maria put the next question. "And what do you mean by 'all hell broke loose'??"

The witness looked up at her, and immediately blushed a little when he realized he wasn't talking to just one cute girl. "I... I dunno if I should be talking about it. I mean, I haven't even given my statement to the police yet, and some of it sounds really weird. I'm not even sure if *I* believe it."

"Just tell us what you saw," Alex murmured, softly and encouragingly, and the guy nodded, somewhat buoyed.

"Okay. The first waitress pointed at some empty wine glasses on a vacant table - and they broke without without her touching them. Not just into a few pieces, but a lot of really nasty pointy glass shards. And then she looked at the four high school kids, and the shards started flying at them. Just before they were about to hit, this one kid waved, he had short hair, dark like yours," (he nodded at Liz here,) "and this wavy green wall thing appeared in mid-air, and all the glass bounced off of it. I guess that's when I realized that something really weird was going on."

"Okay?" Liz took her turn to prompt again. "What happened after that?"

"The guy in the busboy's uniform grabbed a carving knife and he, like, leapt at one of the girls. This guy could jump like he was a cougar... or a, I dunno, a demon or something. The girl - she had long straight golden hair," he put in that little explanation as Alex was opening his mouth to interrupt. Alex gasped silently. "She tried to fight him off, but he was too strong for her. This spikey-haired guy tried to help, but the Maitre D' just looked at him and he was slammed back against the wall -- well, you know, one of those dividers between tables that they have?"

"Yeah," Maria nodded. "What happened next?"

"Well... the last of the four kids from the table, this babe with light blonde curls, she points and there's this bright white light that knocks the busboy away from her friend, just in time. The four of them crowd together and the green curtain of light appeared in a circle around them again. The other people, they're pointing at it and like blasting away with yellow fireballs - god, it was like something out of a video game - but they couldn't phaze that shield. Finally one of them walks up to the curtain, and all of a sudden it's gone, and the four kids are nowhere to be seen. The other guys roar and start charging out of the restaurant. A few minutes after they'd gone, the police show up."

"Thanks for all your help," Kyle said, surprising Liz, who hadn't realized that Kyle had arrived and was listening too. The witness kinda nodded, a police person came up to him and the four human friends gratefully took the cue to fade into the background.

"Alien attack, obviously," Alex whispered softly. "Probably they made their escape using Tess' mindwarp trick."

"Yeah, but did those Skins catch up to them later?" Maria asked. "Where would they have gone?"

Liz thought a second. "Michael and Tess' place. Let's go."

Soon the four of them were at the apartment that Michael had been living in since he was emancipated, (over a year!) and that Tess had moved into at Christmas. The place was a mess - the front door had been blasted off of its hinges and was still burning slightly. Furniture was overturned all over the apartment, clear signs that the battle had come to them here as well. But no-one remained on the premises.

"Damn it," Liz muttered as Alex took the fire extinguisher from the hall and put Michael's door out. "We have to find out where they went next." Kyle turned to say something to her, and she cut him off. "I know that they don't want us 'involved' any more - quite frankly I don't care. I can't just go home not knowing if my friends are alive or dead."

"Umm..." Maria called from the window. "Liz, you might want to take a look at this." Liz hurried over to the window, just in time to see a black car rocketing down Maple street at what had to be better than sixty miles an hour. "I hate to say this, but... reinforcements?"

"Could be," Liz agreed. "Which means we follow that car."

But by the time they got down to the car, the Skin reinforcement vehicle was gone, and all that they could do was follow in the direction that they had seen it go. There was no mistaking the crowd of onlookers and gossippers that were still gathered at the West Roswell High parking lot though.

Alex parked again and they got the story from someone who had seen some of the action. It had been a horrific climax to the spread-out battle -- with Max and his friends killing several of their alien attackers (including one of the 'reinforcements,') whupping the butts of the rest, and taking off in the Jeep, heading for 285 north.

"I... I guess that's it," Maria said softly. "They're okay, at least for now, and I don't think we can chase them any more, Liz."

"Yeah." It felt like something inside Liz was dying. "Nothing left to do."

It was much later that night that Liz found the note, stuck between two loose bricks outside her balcony window. (How had he managed to get it there, amidst all the confusion of the alien attack?)

"I was hoping to be able to tell you this in person, that I'd have time to figure out how to say the words in front of you. But it looks like my time just ran out.
Our enemies have shown up. I couldn't bear to endanger any of the people I love... like mom and dad, you and the rest of the gang. But you'll be safe if they know that we've bailed on Roswell.
I wish it didn't have to end like this between us. But the road that my life is on has been leading me away from you, and I think you saw that before I did. May all the joy and happiness that a life can hold in this world come to you, Liz, and then a piece of me will be happy too. I'll miss you always, Liz my friend.
Max."

Liz cried for a while, and then she put the note in between the pages of her diary and went back to looking at college catalogues...

...And woke up in the spare room in Max's suite in the Congreve tower, shook off the weird dream and headed into the washroom to freshen up before heading back to work.

* * * *

Max walked into the living room area in the mid-afternoon and saw Liz working away on the huge whiteboard that they'd brought in, all alone. Some kind of sad music was playing on the stereo.

"Hey, where's... everybody?" he asked softly. Liz whirled around, looking almost embarrassed before realizing that she had no reason to be.

"Off on a grub run - you know how it is. And for your information, I ate earlier, so there's no need to nag me about taking care of myself."

"I didn't even ask why you didn't go with them, did I?" Max asked, and Liz shook her head silently.

"Sorry, getting a little defensive I guess. Just wanted to put a little more thought into the minimum-elapsed Mars slingshot." She tapped the board meaningfully, though it had nothing on it that seemed reminiscent of Mars or a slingshot to Max... just columns of odd numeric figures.

"Okay," Max assured her. He sat down in the black chair and waved generally towards the minisystem speakers. "That your disc playing?"

"Umm... yeah, I brought a whole bunch over when I went back to my room... you know, right after we first got the data--"

"It's cool," Max told her. "I was just wondering who the artist is."

"Oh, umm..." Liz hesitated, obviously having to change mental gears from apologizing about the music to realizing that Max was interested in it. "Beverley Mahood. 'Moving day.'" Sure enough, as the young woman's voice in the song finished emoting through a powerful chorus, that phrase echoed at the end.

"Are you... are you happy, here in Arizona??" Max said all of a sudden.

"What... are you asking because of the music??" Liz asked. "I... I would have said I was... when you showed up, it turned a lot of things upside down." Max wasn't quite sure how to take that. "Just a second..." She chewed slightly on her bottom lip and hurried over to the computer, working away on something complicated that Max oculdn't really work out.

I studied all our old photographs...
And then I tore every one in half.
You say you're sorry -- don't make me laugh,
Because it's moving day.

"Mmh." Liz sat back from the laptop and looked at it, a peculiar expression on her face that Max couldn't quite read.

"Is that good news or bad news??" He asked softly.

"I'm not sure," she admitted. "Maybe both. I think I've solved the minimum transit, and that's good. The answer isn't at all what I expected it to be, though, and that may be bad." She took out an old fashioned handheld calculator and started tapping some numbers into it.

"I wish I could do something like that," Max mentioned. "I mean... well, I don't really have a hidden talent, leaving aside the alien stuff."

"I think you do," Liz mentioned absently. "It's just not as obvious a hidden talent as mathematics or anything..."

She broke off, startled by the sound of the CD changer, even though from what Max could tell of the controls, it was set to a random shuffle that would take it to a new disc after almost every song. A piano and some sort of guitar could be heard, playing an extended instrumental before the lyrics started.

"So... where do we stand??" Max asked.

"Umm... I'm not quite sure," Liz had to admit. "It doesn't really look good -- there's far too many variables to be able to predict accurately. I wish there was some surer way of going about it."

"You'll find a way, somehow," Max said, trying to be encouraging, but the look that Liz flashed him suggested that perhaps all he was doing was increasing the pressure on her. All of a sudden, all he could focus on was the chorus of the new song, playing on the speakers.

This ain't Nineteen ninety-nine,
This is here and now - you are mine...
But you're cheatin' on me,cheatin' on us.
Cheatin' yourself right out of love,
You're slipping away from me unconsciously...
And I'm losing you, to some old memory.

As the next verse began, all that could fit in Max's head was that those words were an almost perfect description of how Tess might feel if she thought that he felt anything for Liz but friendship. Liz saw the connection too, obviously, and blushing, she fumbled for the remote and stabbed blindly at the buttons until one of them triggered another CD change.

They sat there for a long moment, not saying anything, caught in the awkward moment. And then Bentor, Davin, and Alex came back from their meal and Max beat a relieved retreat.

* * * *

"We're getting nowhere," Liz finally admitted about two hours later. "We're talking about looking for a needle in the mother of all haystacks here."

"I dunno about that Liz," Alex put in. "We can take about a dozen of the likeliest-looking possibilities..." he started ticking off points on the huge whiteboard that had been set up in the living room. "...and these three, and maybe this one. That wouldn't be too many to check tonight."

"And what if it isn't in any of them?" Liz flared. "We'd be screwed. We relied on guesses and what we thought was likely last time, and got nowhere with it. I will *not* depend on taking any more chances."

"Well, what else would you recommend?" Bentor asked mildly from the couch. The guys switch seemed to be permanently stuck in the 'mild' position, but Liz refused to let it bug her.

"I dunno... there's just got to be some better way to solve this than by trying to construct trajectories by guesstimate and verifying them with the radio telescope. Some way of scanning the whole sky for your stupid space capsule, like a radar pulse that it would bounce back to us, or..." Liz stopped and sighed. "I'm dreaming, I know. But still..."

"Man, we are all *idiots*!!" Davin burst out. Liz hadn't even realized that a second 'Other' was following their planning meeting, but as she turned to Davin what he said started to sink in, and a hopeful grin spread over her face.

"Does that mean what I really want it to mean, Davin??"

"Whatever kind of engine that space capsule has, it'll be quantum resonant," Davin explained, for whatever that was worth. "If we send out a pulse of microwave energy in the upper microwave band, it'll flood the crystal chambers enough to send a similar non-directed pulse out from the engine compartment. We'll be able to track it using that."

"And can we actually generate a microwave pulse strong enough??" Alex asked.

"With the granolith we can," Bentor filled in. "There's a good chance it'll show up on some of Earth's satellite, but I think that's an acceptable risk under the circumstances."

"So it's back to Roswell?" Alex filled in. Davin nodded.

"Okay," Liz said. "Round everybody up, as quickly as possible. By the time we've driven to Roswell, found this thing's signature, and measured its trajectory, things could be getting tight."

A lot of hurry and hubble filled the suite in the half hour that followed. Liz dived into the logistics energetically, aware that the sun was setting already and time was ticking away on them.

"Okay... what else?" Liz asked, looking over the living room.

"Ohh... the laptop!" Michael exclaimed, putting it into hibernation mode and unplugging the power source. "Don't want to forget that."

"No, of course not," Liz agreed out of reflex, and then thought about what she was saying. "Wait a second... this is Pete's laptop!"

"Uhh... so?"

"Well, he's gonna want to use it when he gets back from his parents' place," Liz explained. "I borrowed it for the weekend, but I can't just take off with it "

"Like hell you can't!" Michael exploded. "Liz, we need this thing..."

"Like hell I can!" Liz fired back at it. "Michael, I'm not gonna break a promise just so..."

Max stepped into the living room. "Michael, what's going on here?"

"Liz wants to leave the laptop here in Arizona," Isabel called out from the sidelines, which in this case was standing next to the whiteboard.

"Look, I realize that not having it would make things a little more difficult..." Liz started.

"Try impossible!" Michael flared back. "I've seen how much you guys use it... and the most difficult part is still ahead - calculating the capsule's precise course once we've located and determining where, and when, it'll touch down. You'll be at it for a month if you try to solve that with pencil and paper."

Liz turned to stare at Max. "I promised Pete that he'd have it back by the end of the weekend, Max. I can't break that promise." She couldn't help but think of the sweet email that he had sent her last night.

Max considered things for a moment. "Do what you have to do, Liz, but make sure you keep a copy of all your working notes. I'll buy another laptop once we hit Roswell." He glared at Michael and Isabel. "Is everyone satisfied??"

Isabel looked back unapologetically, expressionlessly, but Michael had the decency to hang his head a little. "I'm sorry, Liz, I wasn't thinking."

Liz nodded as she took the laptop from him. "It's okay, Michael." Then she turned around and left

TO BE CONTINUED...

Whom among us, part eleven
Author: Chris Kenworthy
Email: Chris_Kenworthy@yahoo.com
Disclaimer: No, I don't own any of the Roswell characters. I don't plan to steal them and lock them up in white rooms either. I just let them out to play from time to time and see what happens.
Distribution: Distribute anywhere you like, now based at http://www.fanfiction.net/~chriskenworthy
Feedback: YES PLEASE!
Category: Roswell future-fic
Rating: PG
Summary: Liz's life changes when, as a university junior, she runs into Max again.
Spoilers: Up to 'end of the world,' kinda


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Alex sat in the back of Michael's RV as it sped down the highway towards the New Mexico border. Towards Roswell. Somehow that name still affected him, even though it seemed like everyone he associated with Roswell had been there in Arizona, except for Maria... and his parents, of course. Roswell was where everything he'd been avoiding for years had happened... it was where he'd spent his teenage years, and where his life had become something both better and worse than 'ordinary' for a few months. How he felt about returning he couldn't even tell.

"Hey... play something!" someone called out. Dimly, Alex realized it was the alien hybrid he'd heard called 'Davin.' It was only then that Alex really clued in that he was still holding his trusty bass guitar across his lap.

"What?" he asked, feeling stupid as soon as the word was out of his mouth.

"That's your instrument, isn't it?" the alien asked. "Play us a tune!! A long journey with no time to stop chills the heart and numbs the soul. A little music will be good for what ails me."

Alex couldn't help but smile. "Okay." He clipped the shoulder strap back around his body and tuned the bass' strings with the ease of long practice, then set it back across the lap and began to play, not even sure what would come out.

A strong, up-tempo harmony filled the vehicle... now where the heck had he heard this and filed it away into his subconscious? Ahh, yep. As Alex's brain made the connection, he realized his voice was starting to give words to the first verse...

"After all this time, I guess I finally made it through...
All the darkness, to the point of being over you.
Now and then my mind runs into your old memory,
But it ain't quite as big a deal as it used to be;"

Kyle, Tess, and Kenner were all watching and listening to him play by now... Ardra had even woken up, but they seemed to be enjoying it, so Alex threw himself into the upswing for the chorus:

"Now I KNOW-OW-ow,
Even though - you're not here,
You will never be too - far away.
Any-WHERE-ERE-ere,
You'll be there, like a whisper inside me
Each and every day.
If I win or I lose... ....
You will always play a small part
Like a *fla--ame*... you'll remain,
In your own little corner of my heart.

I thought every kiss you gave me,
Time would just erase...
I waited for the day
They'd disappear without a trace.
Finally I realize, that even though you're gone
There'll always be an ember of you,
Burning on and on!"

As Alex led back into the second chorus, some of the others were joining in too, he couldn't quite tell who was singing and who wasn't, but it was a great feeling.

"Now I KNOW-OW-ow,
Even though - you're not here,
You will never be too - far away.
Any-WHERE-ERE-ere,
You'll be there, like a whisper inside me
Each and every day.
If I win or I lose... (if I win or I lose,)
You will always play a small part
Like a *fla--ame*... you'll remain,
In your own little corner of my heart."

Rather than lead into the instrumental, Alex got creative and medley-d his way into a completely different song, a haunting melody starting to fill the vehicle.

"Cutting through the darkest night,
Are my two headlights...
Trying to keep it clear, but I'm losin' it here,
To the twilight.
There's a dead end to my left, there's a burning bush -
To my right,
But you aren't in sight...
You aren't in sight..."

Kyle and Ardra apparently knew the tune, because they started humming along as Alex headed into the bridge.

"Do -- you -- want -- me??
Like -- I -- want you?

Or am I standing still?
Beneath the darkened sky.
Or am I standing still??
With the scenery flyin' by...
Am I standing still?!
Out of the corner of my eye,
Was that you -- passing me by??"

Alex turned a little so he could face forwards towards the direction the RV was going in as the second verse began.

"Mothers on the stoop,
Boys in souped-up coupes,
On this hot summer night.
Between 'fight' and 'flight'
Is the blind man's sight,
And the choice that's right."

Alex almost forgot the words when he noticed something in the momentary shine of a highway streetlamp. In the shotgun seat, Isabel's face was in profile. Had she been listening too??

"I, uh, I pull the window down,
Feel like I - I'm gonna drown
In this strange town.
Feel broken down...
I feel broken down.

Do -- you -- need me??
Like -- I -- need you?"

Why should it matter if Isabel was listening to these songs? Somehow it did, though, as if something very deep and personal was being exposed here, but only Isabel could see it. (Which would kinda make sense, given her powers.) Not that the notion of letting Isabel see his secrets was a bad feeling, just... unexpected.

"Or am I standing still?
Beneath the darkened sky.
Or am I standing still??
With the scenery flyin' by...
Or am I standing still?!
Out of the corner of my eye -
Was that you... ah, passing me by??

Ah, sweet sorrow, she said 'call tomorrow.'
Sweet sorrow, she said 'Call tomorrow!'

Do -- you -- love me?
Like -- I -- love you?"

Hmm... how long before he could make a break away from this and get to the third song in the medley? (All good medleys had at least three songs.)

"Am I standing still?
Beneath the darkened sky.
Am I standing still??
With the scenery flyin' by..."

(It would have to be at the end of this chorus, no sooner, darnit.)

"Or am I standing still?!
Out of the corner of my eye -
Was that you... ah, passing me by??"

(Bass riff fades to almost silence... and then morphs into something considerably more mellow and folksy.)

"Hey Mona Lisa - who was Leonardo?
Was he Andy Warhol?? Were you Marilyn Monroe???
Hey, Mozart! What kinda name is 'Amadeus'?
It's kinda like Elvis... you gotta die to be famous!!"

Looking back up towards Isabel... it almost seemed to Alex that he could read *her* thoughts.

"I may not go down in history...
I just want someone, to remeber me.

I'll probably never hold a brush that paints a masterpiece.
I'll prob-ly never find a pen that writes a symphony.
But if I will love, then I will find,
That I have touched another life, and that's something.
Something worth leaving behind.

Hey, Midas; They say you had the magic touch,
But even all that shiny stuff,
Someday it's gonna turn to dust.
Hey Jesus!! Musta been some sunday morning.
In a blaze of glory!!
We're still tellin' your story.

I may not go down in history.
I just want someone to remember me."

Isabel stood up from the front seat and stepped back into the living area.

"I'll prob-ly never dream a dream, and watch it turn to gold.
I know I'll never lose my life to save another soul.
But if I will love, then I will find,
That I have touched another life, and that's something.
Something worth leaving behind.,."

As he headed into the instrumental solo, it suddenly dawned on Alex that he had no idea how to finish. The final bridge to the song was so horrendously inappropriate that he doubted he could even force his lips to say the words, with Isabel right there. Finally, he just worked up a few flourishing chords to the guitar and tried to end it like that. There was silence for a few seconds.

"Interesting choice," Kenner whispered softly.

"Nice picks, Alex," Tess told him.

"Okay, show's over," he laughed, putting his guitar back into the case. "I wanna try to get some sleep."

"Alex?" Isabel said softly, capturing his attention like a gunshot. "Could I talk to you alone before you turn in?"

"You can try," he joked faintly. "There's not a whole lot of 'alone' to go around in this car." Isabel smiled slightly in agreement, and in about a minute they were sitting in the back with at least the illusion of a shred of privacy.

"Were you trying to tell me something?" Isabel asked softly. "With those choice of songs?"

Alex knew what she meant. Carrying a piece of someone you loved in your heart forever, love lost, and making a legacy... all three were concepts that touched on the idea of Isabel mind-linking with him before she left him forever. "Not really. I pulled those tunes out of the thin air, though there could be a connection through my subconscious mind."

"Oh," Isabel said softly.

"What I have to tell you, I'll tell you straight out without any hidden messages," Alex continued. "I want to do this, for my own sake and more importantly as something that I can do for you. I don't get why you're being so skittish about letting me go through with it."

"I think you do," Isabel told him quietly. "If you stick by that choice, I won't refuse to take you up on your offer. But I'm going to give you a little bit longer to think about it, okay??"

"Fine, whatever," Alex agreed with a smile. "A day, or a week, isn't going to affect my decision." He smiled at her. "You know, I wasn't killing when I said I could do with some sleep."

Isabel grinned. "Allow me?"

Alex blinked. "You can do that??"

"A little trick I've picked up along the way, yeah. Are you ready to go to bed?"

Alex looked down at himself and shrugged. "Yeah, whatever. It's not like I need to be in my jammie-jams first."

Isabel smiled at him, and Alex knew no more.

* * * *

About twelve seconds further on down the road, Max drove on in silence. Liz peered back into the rear seat. Bentor was sleeping quietly. **It's probably tiring for such an old soul to keep up with the rest of these guys, even though he's in a thirtysomething body.** Liz sighed to herself.

"There's... there's a few things I was wanting to talk to you about," Max said softly, not moving his eyes from the road ahead.

"Uh... oh!" Liz replied quietly, squelching the urge to check around and see if there was anyone else that Max could be talking to besides her. "Umm... like what??"

Max sighed. "I hardly know where to start... everything in my mind seems so confused. Maybe I should begin by apologizing for bringing you into things this time. You would have been better off if I hadn't asked you for your help."

"Are you prepared to face the possibility of not finding this thing??" Liz countered. "Because without me, you wouldn't have had a chance. I'm happy to help, Max, really I am."

"We might have figured out how to use the Granilith without you," Max pointed out in defense of his team.

"Would you know how to use the information we hope to get from it?" Liz argued back. "Bentor knows some of the theory, but he's not good enough to build a trajectory on his own from that kind of data. The rest of you would be no help. Besides, without me you wouldn't have even gotten the basic low-down on this Lightning Bolt thingee. You'd probably have gotten into trouble with campus security for sneaking around the astronomy labs in the dead of night while everybody was around, and then..."

"Liz!" Max said, cutting her off. Liz stopped her ramble and stared over at Max.

"Yeah?"

"What would or wouldn't have happened without you here... that isn't really the point, is it??"

Liz sighed. "I guess not. Then what is."

"I..." Max growled in frustration at himself. "Why is it so difficult for me to say out loud what we're both thinking about? I know how hard this must be for you, Liz. Because... because I'm with Tess now."

Hearing Max say the words so bluntly hit Liz like a wave of ice. Sitting there in the front seat, she found a part of her mind focusing on the song that was softly playing on the radio. ("Looking back, over the years... on all the things I've always meant to say...")

"And... and what about you, Max?" she forced herself to say in what seemed like a shaky voice. "Is it hard for you?? To run into me again and remember the old days? For me to tell you about the guys I've been dating at university? Seeing Pete kiss me??"

("But the words didn't come easily. So many times, through empty tears...")

"It's... is that really the point?" Max asked softly.

"Just answer the damn question!"

("To all the nights I tried, to pick up the phone -- so scared of who might be answering...")

"Okay, you want an answer??" Max muttered. "It's been difficult, yes. You were a chapter in my life that never really got closed, and so it throws me off balance."

("You try, to live your life, from day to day. But seeing you across the room tonight -- just gives me away.")

"But Tess is your future, right?" Liz pressed bitterly. "She's your destiny, and your present. I'm just a loose end from your past that never really got tied up neatly, and it bothers you."

("'Cause the heart won't lie.... Sometimes life gets in the way.")

"Not just my past," Max insisted. "I mean, maybe not, if we don't let ourselves be that to each other. I felt something hit me, Liz, from the first time I saw you back in Tempe." He swatted his sternum demonstratively with a free hand. ("But there's one thing that won't change, I know... I've tried. The heart won't lie...") "*I missed you, Liz*" He enunciated each sound in the phrase clearly. "Not just like an old friend I've grown apart from. Seeing you so suddenly was like a part of my life that's been empty for years just, all of a sudden came back. And I don't want to lose it again."

("You can live your alibis... Who can see you're lost inside a foolish disguise??")

"What are you asking me, Max??" Liz said dully, knowing not to get her hopes up too high.

("The heart won't lie...")

"Can't you feel it too, Liz??" Max asked. "When this is all over... we can't go back to our seperate lives again. We need to stay in touch... stay CONNECTED... I'm not sure of the details yet. Maybe we can find a place to stay near Tempe until you're finished your degree..."

("Long after tonight... Will you still hear my voice on the radio??")

"I dunno, aren't you getting a little ahead of yourself, Max??" Liz replied with a humorless chuckle. "I... I *do* feel what you're talking about, but you're also right that it's *hard*. Hard to see you sharing your life with Tess, in the way that I used to think I would... and now I know I never will. I'm not sure if I wanna sign myself up for a regular dose of that." She laughed again, trying to take the edge off what she was saying, and not succeeding very well. ("Long after tonight, after the fire, after the scattered ashes fly...") "Plus... are you sure you can make plans to come back to Arizona? Maybe when we find this capsule, it'll bring news that you're needed back on your home planet, and tell you how to get there. I'm not about to pick up and move to an alien planet, I'll have you know Max. Maybe once... but definitely not now."

("...Through the four winds blown, and gone, will you come back to me?")

"I guess that's fair enough," Max said, and he reached out and touched Liz's fingers slightly, and that simple contact was like a surge of heat rushing through her body. Could he feel it too? For an instant, Liz thought she had a flash, of that moment in the Crashdown where Max had said he would be coming for her. But she wasn't sure.

("You try, to live your life, from day to day. But seeing you across the room tonight -- just takes me away-ay.")

"How... how long until Roswell?" she mumbled vaguely.

"Umm..." Max looked at the odometer. "Another three hours or so. You wanna see if you can get any sleep?"

"Nah, I'm not tired," Liz sighed, and started staring out the window at the nighttime landscape beyond.

("'Cause the heart won't lie...")

"Umm... Max?" Liz asked, not looking away from the window

"Yes Liz?"

"Being with Tess..." Liz paused a moment to actually deal with putting the thought into words. "Does... does she really make you happy?"

("... Sometimes life gets in the way... but there's one thing that won't change,")

"Yeah, yeah, she does," Max assured her.

"Then I'm happy for you," Liz heard her own voice say.

("... I know, I've tried...")

* * * *

Around a planet known to its people as Ishzkver, more or less... not far distant in the galactic scheme of things, circled a small, dead, airless moon. Within a crystallized dome on this moon, Ishzkver 4, a being sat and patiently watched a device on which he could monitor real-time transmissions from a probe.

He had travelled far, unimaginably far, over the past few [years], and had further yet to go. And yet, try as he might, he had been unable to find a way to make the relatively short side trip to Earth physically, as he would have liked to. This probe would have to serve as his proxy...

Another being entered the dome - a Zxygahtsien, one of the species that inhabited the planet below, who had built this structure, like dozens more upon the same moon, and permitted him the use of it. #Yes?# our friend inquired of the visitor, using an artificial device to convey the message in the Zxygahtsien mode -- which involved no sound, only symbolic patterns of color.

#Most humble apologies, your G--#, the native flashed, using his body to respond to the color patterns our friend had shown on an artificial display screen. From previous experience the traveller could understand these patterns, but was physiologically unable to generate them himself.

#Just Sanren,# our friend interrupted with his screen. #I am only a living creature, now, with no honors that you or the least of your people are not equally entitled to claim.#

#Sanren,# the other began again without comment. #Humblest of apologies, but I intruded only to inquire if there was anything else your gr...# He caught himself just in time. #...if there is anything else you require.# For long moments Sanren did not move to program another flash. #All our people are most sincerely grateful for your assistance, Sanren.#

#It was a fair trade,# Sanren replied. #For the probe you launched for me, the technology it carries, the use of this installation...#

#It was not,# the native countered. #These things are a poor recompense for all that you have done.#

#Then you are quite welcome,# he flashed, weary of arguing against native courtesy. #But for the next three revolutions of your planet, I require nothing other than to left alone in this place. Then I will leave your people and continue on my journey, our mutual debts cancelled out.#

#As your honor wishes. My apologies.#

#It's alright,# Sanren flashed with a smile, even though his facial expressions generally meant little or nothing to the Zxygahtsien. His courteous host bowed in the manner of his people and slithered backwards out of the dome.

Sanren sighed and watched his readouts once again. Soon, the probe would land upon the surface of planet Earth. Then, Sanren would face the moment of truth.

Would he find the family that he had lost so long ago -- find it on this curiously backwards world?? The odds were easily thousands or tens of thousands to one against them being able to find the probe before Sanren had to leave.

But he was nothing if not a creature of hope.

TO BE CONTINUED...

Whom among us, part twelve
Author: Chris Kenworthy
Email: Chris_Kenworthy@yahoo.com
Disclaimer: No, I don't own any of the Roswell characters. I don't plan to steal them and lock them up in white rooms either. I just let them out to play from time to time and see what happens.
Distribution: Distribute anywhere you like, now based at http://www.fanfiction.net/~chriskenworthy
Feedback: YES PLEASE!
Category: Roswell future-fic
Rating: PG
Summary: Liz's life changes when, as a university junior, she runs into Max again.
Spoilers: Up to 'end of the world,' kinda


----------------------------------------------------------------------

Kyle sat restlessly in one of the small seats of the 'Pod Squad's RV, crammed in between the driver's seat and some kind of a storage chest.

His usual routine had certainly gotten shaken and stirred this weekend, and he could tell that that feeling was not exactly unique to him. When Max and Isabel Evans had gone to Tempe, Arizona, they had unknowingly set off a chain reaction of events that had, among other things, led Kyle right into this seat, barreling down Route 70 on the stretch between Alamagordo and Roswell, the final leg of their trip that had started at the Arizona State campus.

It wasn't that Kyle resented the sudden disruption in his life. Way back when, he had normally gotten upset when the alien shenanigans intruded on his idyllic high-school existence, but the days of being a football jock at West Roswell High were far behind him now. He'd felt himself drift into a repetitive groove at University, and was glad that something had come along to jostle him out. But still...

He looked towards the passenger seat, and there was Tess, still, Staring off into the distance ahead of the RV, where Max and his small team of Liz and Bentor led the caravan from the second car. Once, so long ago, Kyle had been wondering if he was falling in love with Tess Harding. Had even wondered if she loved him, though she had never hinted at it. And then, she and the rest of them had left Roswell without any goodbyes, choosing their destiny and their mission instead of the people they had met in the alien capital of the US. That seems to have settled that question.

Now, Kyle wasn't sure how he felt about Tess, about any of them. The nagging questions were chattering in the back of his mind, where he couldn't quiet them entirely, preying on his peace of mind. Well, when all else fails, bite the bullet.

Kyle got up, put his hand on the back of the passenger seat (which only took one step forward,) and cleared his throat, trying to get Tess' attention. She shook herself as if startled slightly, and looked up to face him. Something nostalgic stirred in Kyle as those crystal blue eyes locked with his. "Hey, you wanna talk? I'm... a little bored."

Tess was silent for an instant, and then nodded. "Sure. Davin." She nodded at the slightly older-looking hybrid and undid her shoulder belt, getting out of the bucket seat.

"Send someone else up here, 'kay?" Davin whispered softly. "Just to make sure I don't drift off." He needn't have spoken, though, as Kenner was already heading forward into the cockpit of the trailer.

"So..." Kyle sighed as Tess settled into the seat opposite him, feeling a little nervous because Davin and Kenner were well within earshot. The entire RV was short on 'out of earshot,' of course, and it didn't seem like Tess had any secrets from these people, but still.

"So," Tess replied with a reassuring smile.

"We hardly spoke a word to each other beyond 'hello' when I turned up in Arizona, did we?" Kyle blurted out awkwardly. "I mean... well, there was a time when we were close, wasn't there? Living in the same house... and even after you left our place we spent a lot of time together, right??"

"Of course we did," Tess admitted, with a trace of bemusement in her voice. "You remember it as well as I do."

"Well then..." But Kyle couldn't find the words, yet. Tess cocked her head slightly, as if from that angle she could better read his face.

"Are you upset that I never said goodbye??" Kyle shook his head, but without conviction, since that was a part of it. "Max left Liz a note when we left... did you know about that? No, I guess you wouldn't have. I didn't find out about it for more than a year." Tess sighed. "I'm sorry. I would have handled things some other way - almost any other way - if I had had a choice. But I didn't. What was, was, because that was the way it had to be."

"And now you and Max are husband and wife," Kyle said slowly, trying to keep any trace of emotion out of his voice as he said the words. "For real, now."

"We are," Tess was staring at Kyle again. "Kyle, are you..."

"Did you know I was going to ask you to the spring dance??" Kyle blurted out. "I had it all planned out... the limo, the tux, the corsage for you. I went to your locker to ask you, Monday morning a week before the dance, and Max was there with you, the two of you, laughing and touching each other. I could hardly even say hello before you were telling me how excited you were to be escorting *him* to the festivities."

"Oh, god," Tess breathed, a mortified look on her face... and then her mouth quirked slightly in a long-ago amusement. "I wondered how you ended up with Arlene Peterson."

Kyle didn't dignify that with a response. "I fell in love with you that spring, Tess, and no sooner did I realize it than you weren't there for me anymore. Within a few weeks, you simply weren't *there*. Period. It took me a long time to figure out how to stop falling."

"Kyle..." Tess whispered, more serious now. "I... I never realized you felt that way either. You were very important to me, especially at that time in my life, but... what can I say? Max is the only man I've ever loved. If there was something I could have done, to spare you the pain, then I would have, but..."

"You couldn't," Kyle muttered hollowly. "That's the way love is. No matter how foolish or inappropriate it is, there's no way to keep it from running its course. That's the beauty, and that's the horror of it." He sighed. "I... I didn't really mean to throw all this in your face, Tess."

"Maybe it's best that we actually had it out," Tess said, attempting a faint smile. "Oh, look! We're heading into Roswell."

Kyle was all too happy to remain quiet and watch the old familiar landmarks, rendered into ghosts by the combination of night-dark, streetlamp, and headlight.

* * * *

"Right through here." Liz focused on Max's voice as she climbed on her hands and knees through the hidden tunnel behind what was left of Isabel's pod. So many years later, threads of alien substance still hung down and brushed Liz's forehead and cheeks, making her skin crawl. She nerved herself not to back up and leave.

And then she was through, or at least her head was, and the granilith room opening itself up in front of her. Liz had never been here, but she couldn't help recognize it from Maria's descriptions. She'd always expected a much bigger space, but that mysterious inverted cone said it all. The Granilith. Capital T, Capital G.

This is what brought Future Max back, Liz thought, so intensely she was actually surprised she could help but give voice to the words. This is what ruined my last hopes for a true reunion with Max.

But the Granilith just hummed along, as blissfully unaware of how much she despised it as only an inanimate thing could be. Belatedly Liz realized that she was still blocking the entrance tunnel and scrambled free.

"Hey, Liz, over here," Max called the pedestal at the base of the cone. A control unit of some kind? Tess was standing beside him, looking disgustingly radiant in a gown that looked like it had been poured from the Milky Way itself. When had she changed into *that*??

"What *is* the Granilith, exactly," Liz asked as she walked up to the pair of them. "Did you ever find that out??"

"Pretty much," Max told her, smiling obliquely. "Primarily, the granilith functions to facilitate the genetic alteration of living things. It has a large store of reseve power though, to perform quantum reality manipulations, and that's what we'll be using tonight."

"We don't need to touch any of the Granilith's higher functions at all," Tess continued, breathlessly. Smiling at everyone. "We just need to release a pulse of energy and see what it bounces off, out in space. Care to do the honors, Max??" She waved at the pedestal, which was flashing a large, lime green circle as if it was a huge push-button.

"Delighted," Max agreed, reaching out and tapping the indicator.

A pulse of what seemed like ripples in the air emerged from the Granilith cone and spread out through the room, fading as they did so. "Don't worry," Max said, to no-one in particular as far as Liz could tell. "That was just a small side effect. The true energy pulse was directed outward."

Liz nodded vaguely, and then gasped in shock. A cloud of those ripples in the air seemed to be surrounding her, closing in on her. "Max, help!!" she called, trying to reach him, feeling ironically like Super-man trapped in the time window, unable to touch Lois Lane through it. (Now where had *that* image come from??)

Max and Tess were looking at her with less concern than annoyance visible on their faces. "Liz, what's with you??" Tess asked as the bubble of ripples closed in around her body.

Once anything was clear again, Liz could tell instantly that she wasn't where she had been. Brilliant starlight shone all around her. Slowly she realized that she was standing on a small hilltop, her feet suddenly bare against the the white sand underneath them. She couldn't see the plain that this sand hill presumably rose out of - it was shrouded in darkness. But everything right around her was brightly lit, though the stars didn't seem THAT luminous. It was as if the light came from nowhere at all - she couldn't even see it directly, just the things that it illuminated.

"Liz!" The voice came from behind her, and Liz thought she recognized it as she spun around, then she was distracted with realizing that she was wearing a purple flowered sundress. A sundress that she distinctly remembered cutting into ribbons, if it came to that. The air was warm and dry against her skin, not too hot.

And then Liz actually looked at the man she was now facing. "Max. Future Max??" His appearance was unmistakeable, every detail of the leather clothing, the long dark hair, even down to the tiniest bit of stubble above his lip. "Do... do you recognize me??" she blurted out. "Not just that I'm Liz, but..." She trailed off, not sure how to put it into words.

"I remember," Future Max assured her, with a smile. "I remember coming back for you. Back through time. I remember telling you about our wedding. I remember dancing with you on your balcony, just before I had to leave. Liz, I still believe..."

Liz shook herself out of the magic of the moment. "Do you remember what you came back to do? How we got you to leave me and fall in love with Tess?"

Future Max's face frown in perplexity. "No... no, I don't," he admitted.

"And *how* do you remember?" Liz continued. "You left because your timeline had collapsed completely. So where are we now??" She looked out over the hillside to the dark plain beyong, confused herself. "What is this place?? Is it the future?"

"This is Esparoweel," another familiar voice. Liz turned around and was somehow unsurprised to see Maria. She looked seventeen again, with her hair flowing down from two pins in the back, wearing a red spandex top, a miniskirt, green boots and a pair of tights that were almost hot pink. (When did Liz remember that outfit from??) "It's, well... some kind of place trapped between the dimensions."

"How did we get here?" Liz asked.

"The granilith brought us all here," Maria replied. "Don't you remember that much, Liz??"

The granilith... yes, she did remember. All of a sudden, another cloud of ripples appeared, 'depositing' Isabel a few yards away from them. "Isabel??"

"Alex?" Isabel turned toward's Liz's voice, but her eyes had no recognition in them.

"She's in pretty bad shape," Maria muttered softly. "Not that much left."

"Alex will be here soon, Isabel," Liz blurted out for some reason, and then turned back to Future Max. "Can we... talk? Alone, you know??"

"It's not too safe to wander far from the hilltop," Maria pointed out.

"Wait a second." Future Max waved a hand, and Maria and Isabel vanished. Liz blinked in surprise.

"Where did they go?"

"They're right here, but neither group of us can see, hear, or even touch each other," Future Max told her. "Wow, I didn't know I could do that."

Seized by a irresistible impulse, Liz leaned up on her tiptoes and brought Future Max's face down to meet hers. She'd never kissed Future Max, though she'd wanted to. While they were sharing that magic dance, especially, she'd wanted to. She'd been waiting for the right moment... and then he was gone. In more ways than one.

When his lips touched hers, it took her breath away and ran tingly, hot and cold sensation down her arms and her legs. She smiled, and lowered her arms, not caring that one of the straps of the sundress slipped off her shoulder, and brought her hands up beneath Future Max's jacket, Soon they were tumbling to the soft white sand, and kissing again.

An image flashed into Liz's mind. Herself, Max, Tess, and Isabel. Back in the granilith chamber... they had received an echolocation from the space capsule. Good for them.

Wait a second... herself??

"What am I doing back there?" she whispered.

"Back where??"

"I'm still in the granilith chamber. I can *see* myself there. Why am I still there??" Liz could see herself opening a pad of scratch paper and starting to make rough calculations, in point of fact.

"I'm not that good about explaining..."

"Then drop the obscurity field," Liz snapped, opening her eyes. Future Max groaned. "Drop it!!"

Future Max waved a hand slightly, and Maria, Isabel, and Alex popped into existence. Alex? Yes, he was here too now, and making up for lost time with Isabel, apparently.

"Why am I still in the granilith chamber??" Liz asked Maria. She closed her eyes to check on the gang. Yes, Alex was there too now, though she couldn't see Isabel.

"Why... why wouldn't you??"

"I..." For a second Liz couldn't think of an answer to that. "How can I be here and there at the same time??"

"Well, aren't we all??" Maria shook her head. "I'm back in Roswell, aren't I? When the granilith frees us, one part of us stays behind in Roswell, while the true believer inside us comes here."

"The true believer??" Liz repeated.

"The part of you that never stops trusting in the first love. The part that will never accept destiny."

It was starting to hit home. "So... that Liz Parker who is in the Granilith chamber..."

"She's accepted reality," Alex filled in, in between kisses. "She's moved on, the more fool her. Put Max behind her."

Liz considered that, and shuddered.

"But *you* don't have to!!" Maria insisted, "Here in Esparoweel, you never have to admit that. You can stay here, forever, with Max." She looked at Future Max. "Or the closest available approximation. Sometime, I know that the granilith is going to free Michael too, and then he'll come to me."

"But wait a second," Liz muttered, feeling confused. "When were *you* freed, Maria? The only time you've been to the granilith chamber was years ago, and in all that time you *never* moved on, you never lost faith in Michael."

"I'm sorry, Liz."

Liz waited for the end of that... and then it struck her that everything had changed again. Some strange trick of Esparoweel?? No... reality was hitting her.

The whole thing had been a dream. She was waking up in the RV... and Davin was watching her from the door. "I didn't mean to wake you up, Miss Parker."

"No," she yawned, "it's alright. What is it??"

"The granilith test run was successful. As soon as you're all set to plot a course, we can finally find our capsule."

Liz smiled at him, as she remembered what had really happened. As the caravan arrived in Roswell at around 1:30 am, it had suddenly hit them that there would be no computer stores open until the morning. Michael, Isabel, and Davin had headed up to the Maideckizne rocks and the granilith chamber, to test whether they could get an echo from the capsule. Everyone else had taken to bed in the RV, or the tent that had been pitched next to it in the park, until the morning.

"What time is it?"

"Not quite 5 am. You should get back to sleep."

"No, I couldn't." Not after such a weird dream, at least. Davin smiled and closed the door, and Liz crawled out from under the covers and pulled her clothes from last night back on. She tried to get out the door without looking at Max and Tess sleeping in the double bed, all sweetly cuddled together. And failed miserably.

As she walked through the streets of Roswell in the pre-dawn hours, Liz found her feet taking her towards Maria's building. (She had only been there once, almost a year ago, but from the regular phone calls she knew that Maria was still living there.) Step down through the well-flora'd courtyard and knock on the door.

No answer, of course.

Something inside Liz was unwilling to wait to see her best friend. Sure, it was early, but not early enough that Maria would be uber-pissed, right? And Maria DeLuca being herself, there would have to be, somewhere around here...

Ah, there it was, Third flower-pot from the left, just as Liz had guessed, Buried just underneath the surface of the potting soil was a small metal object. A 'safety key.' She took it to the door and made her way in, locking the front door again behind her.

It took a while for Liz's eyes to adjust to the dimness inside, with heavy drapes drawn over all the windows, but she didn't want to risk waking up a room-mate, (or apartment-mate, Liz supposed,) by turning on a light. Once she could make out the dimness well enough, Liz carefully tiptoed down the hall and into the room that she knew was Maria's, pulling up a chair beside the bed.

"Mare? Sorry to wake you up so early, but, well... surprise!!"

"Go away," Maria moaned without opening her eyes, and rolled over to face the wall.

"Not a chance," Liz whispered. reaching out to shake her friends' shoulder slightly. "Maria, it's Liz. I know it's early, but, well, I kinda need to talk to you."

"Liz??" Somehow that got partway into Maria's sleepy brain. "You can't be Liz. Liz is in Arizona, I just talked to her yesterday."

"It was the day before yesterday," Liz corrected, "and it doesn't take that long to drive from Arizona to Roswell. Sorry I forgot to let you know we were coming last night, but everything was crazy."

"Liz??" Maria repeated again, turning back over and opening her eyes. "Is it really you??" Obviously the light wasn't bright enough for Maria to make out Liz's face, because she flailed an arm out and switched on the small lamp on the bedside table, wincing at its brightness a second later.

"Yeah, it's me, bug," Liz laughed... somehow dredging up that nickname from over twelve years ago. "Surprise!!"

"Boomer," Maria laughed, and gave Liz a big hug. "So, what are you doing here in Rosw..." She broke off, guessing part of the answer. "Chechoslovakian-related??"

"What do *you* think," Liz shot back, laughing.

It was not quite fifteen minutes before Maria was quickly cleaned up, dressed, and the two of them leaving the apartment, to avoid waking up Maria's apartmentmate. "So... you're here to use the Granilith to trace this space capsule thingee??" Maria repeated as they walked up the courtyard steps.

"That's the plan," Liz confirmed. "Michael brought you in there that one time, didn't he??"

"Yeah, not long after they found it," Maria confirmed. "Why??"

After a slight pause, Liz started retelling her dream. By the time she was done, Maria was shaking her head and trying to keep from letting a laugh escape.

"Girl, you got some serious Max Evans issues," Maria laughed.

"So... you wanna tag along with the merry men?" Liz asked. "Everyone *else* is."

"Sure, what the heck," Maria laughed. "So... how tight to Michael and Isabel..." she apparently couldn't keep from scoffing at the two names together, "seem? Really??"

* * * *

Too many people were crammed inside the Granilith chamber - the REAL one this time.

"So, Max..." Maria whispered, sidling up beside the hybrid king. "Just what have you been putting my Lizzie through??"

"What?" It took a second for Max to get his mental balance. "Look, I'll admit that this situation hasn't been ideal for anybody. But it was Liz's idea to help out, and I haven't been keeping her here..."

"If you two are just going to bicker about me," Liz called out, "can you go out and do it among the pods?" She turned to Isabel. "Another pulse." Isabel obliged, touching the granilith base and making the necessary mental command. Liz clicked a stopwatch at the same time, then turned to Bentor. "Do these energy pulses travel at the speed of light??"

"Uh, yes, take away perhaps half a percentage point. Why... you are seeking to use the elapsed time as a measure of distance??" the wise alien guessed.

"Got it in one. We need to identify this thing's precise position in space as well as we can, and there's no time to match it against the old course plans we drew up. Three measurements to pinpoint an object in space, that's altitude, azimuth, and distance for us." A light appeared on one of the walls of the chamber, that had been jury-rigged into a primitive display screen, and Liz stopped the chronometer. "Okay... we'll wait five minutes before doing it again,"

Once the ritual had been repeated, Liz nodded, began a printout from the laptop computer that Max had purchased for her in town, and closed the lid. "That's it," she announced to Max, who had been waiting silently all this time, though Maria had left, perhaps in search of Michael Guerin. "We've got an estimated landing point, and now that I know where this thing is, we can watch along the way for course corrections."

"That... that's it?" Max muttered. "Do we have to get going right away??"

"If we have any hope in hell of catching this thing, yes we do," Liz replied sharply.

"Where's the estimated landing point??" Isabel asked.

"Alberta."

TO BE CONTINUED...

Whom among us, part thirteen
Author: Chris Kenworthy
Email: Chris_Kenworthy@yahoo.com
Disclaimer: No, I don't own any of the Roswell characters. I don't plan to steal them and lock them up in white rooms either. I just let them out to play from time to time and see what happens.
Distribution: Distribute anywhere you like, now based at http://www.fanfiction.net/~chriskenworthy
Feedback: YES PLEASE!
Category: Roswell future-fic
Rating: PG
Summary: Liz's life changes when, as a university junior, she runs into Max again.
Spoilers: Up to 'end of the world,' kinda

"Are you sure you want to come along, Maria," Liz asked for the second time as people hurried around them packing cars. "I mean, I don't really reccomend humans getting mixed up into this." Sigh. "It was Alex's decision to meet Isabel again, but Kyle was just wanting to visit me again..."

"I'm sure, Liz," Maria assured her, cutting off a ramble of uncertain length, and drawing her aside for a little privacy. "Who knows, maybe I can find a *new* alien boyfriend. Possibly Davin, he's cute and seems fun."

"I dunno," Liz played along, shaking her head. "I'm not sure, but he might be spoken for," she commented, nodding in the direction of Ardra.

"Ah, gotcha." Maria chuckled. "Kenner, then."

"Oh, my god!" Liz pulled Maria closer and intently whispered to her. "Maria, he's Michael's *father*!!"

"No!!!" Maria's mouth dropped open. "You're kidding me."

"I am not," Liz asserted. "Well, maybe better to say he *was* Michael's father, you know. Hybridized at about the same time, 'hatched' about five years earlier, but his essence, yeah."

"Wow. So spaceboy finally found his old man," Maria said under his breath. "I wonder how he felt when he found out. What's he like?"

"Kenner?" Liz tried to come up with something. "You know, I haven't got much to go on. He's all about tactics and the mission."

"Like father, like son," Maria laughed bittersweetly. "Maybe..."

She was interrupted at that point as Max called out "Gather up, people!!" As the group assembled into a loose circle, Max caught Liz's eye and nodded towards Maria questioningly. Liz looked at her friend herself, and nodded. Max smiled.

"Okay, we're moving out, there's a lot of ground to cover and not much time," Max summarized. "Liz is going to be needing to stop and take regular observations of the capsule, watching for course corrections, so she's going to be in the car. Need two volunteers to go with her... thank you, Isabel." There was a few seconds' awkward pause, and then two hands raised into the air at almost exactly the same time. Max nodded at their owners in turn. "Davin... Tess. I think you can all fit into the car, and the remaining eight of us will appreciate not being any more cramped in the RV. Alright people, let's roll out. Remember to keep the radios on!"

The 'radios' turned out to be old CB dashtop models, altered to be able to use a couple of unlikely frequencies. Liz kept the laptop open in front of her as they left the city limits, trying to make it look as if she was calculating when they'd need to stop first to look for evidence that the space capsule had made a course correction. (She had taken a reading with the radio telescope while the vehicles were being packed, just before going to talk to Maria.)

But her mind was too chaotic for logical computation at the moment. It was affecting her very stronly to be leaving Roswell again, only scant hours after she had arrived, and not having had the chance to contact anyone except Maria. No time to go by the Crashdown and surprise her parents... though she hadn't come to visit them for much too long, somehow this was different. All the reasons that she had been staying away from Roswell... well, they had found her in Arizona and brought her home with them.

"So..." The voice broke her out of her turbulent thoughts. It was one of the 'others' sitting in the back seat next to her, Davin, the one she tended to think of as a secret agent. The first one that Maria had joked about. "How does it look??"

"Like a bunch of gibberish, to me, at the moment," Liz confessed, closing the lid of the laptop. The laptop Max had bought for her... (now, why did a part of her mind insist on spelling that out silently. Did it really matter? She had needed it for his mission so Max had bought it.) Shaking herself loose from the silent thoughts that threatened to drag her back down into brooding, Liz added "Maybe in a half an hour it won't be so bad."

"You've been pushing yourself hard," Davin observed quietly.

"Yeah, I have," Liz agreed. "And a good thing, too. If I'd stopped to rest, I'd probably only just be getting to the Pod Chamber right now. Be stuck up there for five or six hours, maybe, if I wasn't driving myself. And you guys don't have that time to spare." She sighed and stared out the window. "The hardest part is only beginning."

"Indeed," Davin agreed. "It will be more than a day and night's drive to the region of Alberta that you indicated. How frequently will you have to make observations during that period?"

Liz grimaced. "Not sure yet. The capsule is starting to approach Earth in a spiraling descent, that is oriented mostly above the Western hemisphere. There will be a few periods later on in the approach when we won't be able to see it, as it starts to circle the planet faster and faster in low orbit, but it'll be in plain view for a while." She sighed. "Probably we'll make the first sighting in two and a half hours or so - I don't have any figures to back that up, but intuitively it *feels* right."

"Then perhaps you should r--"

"...Rest until then??" Liz finished. "Maybe in theory, but I don't think so. I could never get to sleep at a time like this, and if I did the shock of waking so soon again would more than cancel out the rest I got. You know what I mean??"

"I believe so, but sleep is not the only way to rest," he whispered. "I believe I could enable you to achieve a restorative trance state. Personally, I find it even more restful than sleep and easier to rouse from after only a short time."

Liz's curiosity was peaked. "How? By talking me through it, or using your powers??"

"Best as a mixture of both," Davin explained. "May I??" He reached out a hand towards hers.

Liz hesitated a second, and then shrugged. "What the hey - go ahead!!"

He reached out to touch her, and after a second, Liz felt something. It was a relaxation, of both body and mind, but not a lack of energy, like she was falling asleep. It was more like her energy was being directed inward, without tension. Healing. Rejuvenating.

"Did you feel that?" she heard Davin's voice asking, and she nodded. "Continue. You can relax your system further than I can at this level of the connection." And she found that she could.

"Have no fear. Surrender to the peace. I won't let anything go wrong." By now Liz could not tell if the voice was Davin's or a part of herself, but it didn't matter. The reassurance was welcome from either source.

Although she couldn't remember it too clearly afterwards, Liz didn't lose awareness or any time. She was aware of time passing, though it seemed to be faster than usual. She enjoyed old memories, worked her way through logic puzzles that she had forgotten the answers to, and thought about the her/Max/Tess situation without distress. When her internal clock told her that two and a half hours had passed, she didn't want to rejoin the outside world. But she did anyway.

* * * *

Maria smiled awkwardly as she came up to the slightly older man that Liz had pointed out. "Umm... Kenner, right??"

He nodded pleasantly at her. "Miss DeLucca."

"Are you... I mean, Liz said..." Nervousness had consumed her vocal chords, and Maria couldn't seem to get the right words out.

"If we are to have a conversation, perhaps I should pre-empt the bedroom??" Kenner suggested. Maria's mouth dropped open. "Since it is the only reasonably private space available."

"Uhh... oh. Yeah, that sounds good," she babbled softly. At first, a very different thought had run through her mind, but what he said made sense. Soon, the occupants of the bedroom (Davin and Ardra, who hadn't actually been sleeping, just reading quietly,) had been evicted, and Kenner led Maria inside. As he had said, it was the one chamber in the RV that was actually enclosed - a double-sized bed and not much room for anything else. Still feeling nervous, if for another reason, Maria propped herself up on one of the window ledges as a makeshift chair, her bare feet resting on the bedsheets, and Kenner sat differentially on the side of the bed opposite her. It struck her that he was making an effort to be as nonthreatening as possible, which somehow didn't entirely reassure her.

"So... you, you're Michael's father??"

Kenner considered that. "Perhaps better to say that I *was* his father, given the lifetime that has passed since then. But since I am still the same individual that I was then, and he as well, your statement is basically correct. Certainly since he was born of no other father and mother in this life, I am the closest thing he has yet found."

Everything always had to be confusing with aliens. Maria shook that level of uncertainty away. "Did he... I mean, do you know anything about me?? Aside from being Liz's friend??"

"Oh, yes." Kenner's face slowly broke into a smile. "I have heard *much* about you, Maria Evain DeLuca."

"REALLY??" she burst out, surprised. "From who? Michael??"

"Mostly, yes. Bits and pieces from the other Royals, but Michael was the one who both had the most to say on the subject of yourself, and chose most often to come to me when he wished to tell."

Maria opened her mouth - and then realized that she had no notion what to say. She realized that she was shaking her head in disbelief, and couldn't seem to stop.

Kenner's voice grew softer, more sensitive somehow. "I suppose there was no way you could know, but he was very unhappy at leaving you behind in Roswell when the foursome had to begin their quest. Even by the time they met our four, he was deeply conflicted about his decision. Miss Isabel wanted to do something or say something to help him resolve the situation, but she could think of nothing that would help. She had very similar issues regarding young Mister Whitman."

"Wow," Maria muttered. "Well, I guess they got over it. Because of your down-to-earth, sports-and-combat-metaphor advice??"

Now it was Kenner's turn to blink in confusion. "I served as a sounding board for each of them to talk out their thoughts, yes. Michael more than Isabel - she would often speak with Davin or Ardra, or her brother for that matter. I take no responsibility for the conclusions that either of them came to."

Maria picked up something subtle in the older Hybrid's tone. "Do you think that Michael and Isabel made the right decision?? Staying together?"

"I would not presume to intervene in such a matter..."

"*You're his father!!*" Maria called out, surprising herself with her vehemence. "If it isn't your place to poke an interfering nose into Michael's love life and disapprove of who he wants to marry, then whose??" And the thought that Kenner could be a valuable ally, if he approved of HER, was something that Maria couldn't shake out of her head. If she was really going to make a play to try and win Michael Guerin back, that was.

"As I said, I 'was' his father," Kenner repeated. "In another lifetime. Now, I am his retainer, the advisor of the Royal Four. It is no longer my place to play a parental role in his life. I feel that down to the core of my spirit."

"Oh," Maria muttered. Her heart was sinking. "Ohh."

"However, I might be tempted to interfere in his life as a well-meaning friend, on your behalf, Maria."

This time Kenner's words knocked Maria off her feet - literally. Caught completely by surprise, she lost grip on her perch in the window and collapsed onto the edge of the bed in a heap. As soon as she could, she picked her head up to look Michael's soul-father (or whatever) in the eye. She had to track a little to find his face, since he had gotten up off the bed in alarm as her impact shook it.

"Run that one by me again, a little slower."

"You love Michael - very much."

"Says who??" she shot back suddenly, though she wasn't really in the mood to argue the point.

"I can see it in your eyes. And there is much about you, Maria, your passion, your fire, which would be good for him now. Though their union seems successful enough from outside, I have been wondering lately if Michael and Isabel have been growing apart over the past year. They do not realize it yet, and it might be entirely an illusion in my mind, I must admit. Allow me to watch the signs, and look for a tactical opening."

"Tactical opening?" Maria repeated, crossing her denim-clad legs underneath her. "Are we planning a war here??"

"Not yet."

* * * *

Alex crawled up on the small chair beside the storage chest, kneeling on it as he tried to get a better view of the road ahead of them.

"Looking for anyone in particular, Alex??" a warm voice said behind him. Startled, Alex twisted around, getting up on one foot to turn around the quicker - and bumped his head against the low ceiling. He grunted in mild pain and frustration and settled down into the chair. As the blue stars cleared away from in front of his eyes, he saw the person who had adressed him. Max Evans.

"Your darling sister," he muttered, not able to quite keep an accusatory tone out of his voice. Max had organized the volunteering process that had let Isabel into the smaller vehicle - and then closed occupancy just as Alex had been deciding whether to follow her there. Now, he had no idea if he'd see her again before they got to this landing site in Alberta, so many hours ahead of them yet.

"Ah." Max settled into the opposite chair. "Just what is going on between you and Isabel, anyway?? I've picked up on the angst but none of the details."

"Really?" Alex laughed shortly. "What do ya know? I guess some gossip doesn't actually travel at the speed of light, after all."

"If you haven't noticed, I *have* been a little busy lately," Max mentioned, chuckling hollowly. "So, care to fill me in?? I won't press if it's none of my business, but..."

"No, it's okay," Alex said quickly. "The nutshell is that... Isabel mentioned something, this core mind-link thing that if she does it with me, it might help her keep a better handle on her powers. Except, no sooner does it get out of her mouth than she's telling me that I can't choose to go through with it, that she doesn't think I'm ready or that I understand what I'm getting into."

"Oh." Max thought about that a second. "Did she tell you anything about it?? I don't think I've heard, though the designation sounds reminiscent of..."

"...Vulcan mind melds," Alex finished in unison with Maxwell, and laughed a little bit. "Yeah, apparently that's not too far off the mark. Each of us would be completely at one with the other's mind for an indefinite instant, and would keep part of the other person in their psyche afterwards." He somehow couldn't add the word 'forever' before afterwards - it seemed too melodramatic, and was probably understood.

"No secrets... no barriers," Max whispered, apparently struck by the thought of it as Alex had been for a second. "Well, I can understand you being frustrated, but -- did it occur to you that maybe Isabel is scared of the prospect?? Total intimacy can be a very frightening thing, and considering you guys' history..."

"Wow," Alex muttered. "You know, I guess I never did think of it quite that way - not consciously, at least. Thanks." His face fell. "I guess that means I should give her her space until she comes to her own decision??"

"Not necessarily TOO much space," Max laughed. He pointed out the window, and Alex turned around just in time to see the sedan screech to a stop on the shoulder. "I'll ask her if she wants to switch back to the RV once we hit Montana."

Alex smiled. "Thanks."

"Any time."

* * * *

Liz jumped out of the car as soon as it had come to a complete stop, before the dust had even settled. Time, as usual, was critical. She rushed to the trunk, wrestled out the radio telescope, and when she turned towards the empty plain that the highway cut through, Tess was there. "Give you a hand??"

Liz gratefully let her hybrid rival carry the heavier end of the telescope until up to the flat rock plateau she had spotted as a good spot to make observations. As Liz was setting up the tripod, Tess muttered "Shouldn't we try to get further away from the road??"

"No time, and it doesn't matter anyway," Liz replied. "Are you worried about light pollution from the headlights and overhead lamps, or about people seeing us and wondering what we're doing??"

Tess chuckled softly. "Not sure. Both, I guess."

"Light pollution isn't a big problem now. I can take my bearings by the guide dials alone, though I'd rather spot a few bright stars if I can to make sure I'm on the nose. As far as people wondering what we're doing -- nothing much to be done about that I guess. None of them will be able to tell that we're using a radio telescope, or know that we have no business with it if they do."

Tess nodded slightly, and things were quiet as Liz took her bearings. "Listen, Liz, I..."

"I'm sorry, but could you not talk to me right now?" She had to admit she got too much secret pleasure out of being able to say that. "The observations will go quicker if they can take up my entire attention. Whatever you have to say to me, you can say back in the car, okay??"

Tess nodded again, and Liz threw herself into her work, avoiding the fact that this excuse would not last her forever. Sure enough, before too long she had found the radio signature of the space capsule, jotted it down, and was packing up. Tess pitched in for that too, and soon they were roaring back onto the interstate once again. Davin had moved into the front with Isabel, Liz noticed, leaving the backseat for Tess and she.

Liz considered booting the laptop out of standby to punch the new figures into it, but that wasn't really something that needed to be done immediately, and smacked so very much of rationalization. She noted the time carefully on the same sheet as the declination and right acension before she could forget it, and turned to Max's wife. "Yes??"

"Umm, I'm not quite sure what I wanted to say," Tess admitted sheepishly. "Thank you, I guess that was part of it. Thanks for helping us to find this thing."

Liz sighed. "You're welcome."

"I never wanted to be the other woman."

Liz looked over at her for a long moment. "Yeah, I guess I know that. But still, you were." And now, maybe Liz was taking that role in her turn, she wasn't sure about that yet.

"I didn't want to take him away from you or make you my enemy. I just... all my life I'd been told things would be a certain way, and when I got to Roswell nothing was the way it was supposed to be. And I loved Max from the first moment I saw him - please believe me, I really did..."

"Look, Tess!!" Liz blurted out. "We don't really need to rehash this. It's over, it's done. You and Max fell in love, and you left Roswell. I thought I'd put it behind me - turns out not one hundred percent, but I'm still trying to, and talking to *you* of all people about it DOES NOT HELP!!"

There was silence for a huge, pregnant moment. Liz suddenly realized that Isabel and Davin had been chatting amongst themselves, but now had fallen silent, obviously because they had overheard most of Liz's outburst.

Liz pulled the laptop to her and pressed the power button to awaken its systems from their power-conservation slumber. The projection of the space capsule's flight sprung to life, and Liz tapped in the figures from her observation and watched as the graphics and numerical figures changed slightly in response.

"Well -- I guess we have a stroke of good luck at last."

"Why?" Isabel asked. "Is the capsule going to be landing closer to us than you expected??"

"No, a little further away actually," Liz said, "but also later. Since catching this thing as it lands or soon after is the important point, I'd say that just got a little bit easier." She considered the projection. "I wonder why after bee-lining it over here from the asteroid belt so quickly, it's braking more quickly than it has to and spending extra time in the vicinity of Earth."

"Maybe it can't take the entry into Earth atmosphere at high speeds," Davin suggested.

"Maybe," Liz allowed. "Well, Max or someone over there will want to hear. Pass me the CB, okay??"

* * * *

"Yeah, I'll make sure that Max gets the message," Kyle told Liz over the speaker, then corrected to make sure he was staying in the middle of the lane. "He just lay down for a rest though..."

"Well, is anyone in charge over there??" Liz's voice came back with a hint of a laugh in it.

"Yeah, I could tell Michael I guess. Over and out."

"Tell Michael what??" the hybrid in question asked, having stepped up towards the front of the RV as he heard his name.

"Results of Liz's first course correction. We're headed a bit further into Alberta than we thought, but we've got more time to get there."

"Hmmm." Michael thought about that a bit. "How much further?? Do we know how we're going to get to the site?"

"Looks like the very north of the Banff national park. Trans canada highway should get us in, and then use the park roads."

Michael nodded, and as Ardra got out of the shotgun seat he took her place. "Okay. How're we doing on time??"

"Still could be tight."

There was a silence for a moment, and then Kyle spoke up again. "Has it been worth it?"

Michael blinked. "What?"

"I dunno. Your life, over the past few years. I mean, from all that I can tell, you've dedicated it to this big alien quest and all. There has to have been some other choice - lying low, making some kind of life with Maria maybe. Dealing with the alien threats as they came, and not going out looking for new ones. Has it been worth the path you've taken??"

Michael thought about that a long while. "There are millions of people, maybe billions -- counting on us back home. It'd be worth a hell of a lot more than I've given away, to live up to their trust."

"Ah." Kyle noticed a large sign coming up at the edge of the highway. WELCOME TO COLORADO was what it read.

"Hey." In the rear-view mirror, he could see that it was Maria, leaning against the back of their seats. Had she been in hearing when Kyle had mentioned her name? "Are we there yet??"

"Lotta miles, and lottuv hours to go yet," Michael told her. "May be good to get some sleep."

"It's one thirty in the afternoon, and unlike most of you, I was actually sleeping last night," Maria informed him. "I'm just *bored*." That complaint hung in the air for a long moment. Michael seemed to be intentionally not responding to it.

"Well, if Michael will take over the wheel, I'll play trivial pursuit or some other game," Kyle offered.

"Fine," Michael groaned, and reached over to hold the steering wheel steady so Kyle could begin to slip away.

TO BE CONTINUED...

Whom among us, part fourteen
Author: Chris Kenworthy
Email: chrisk@fanfiction.net
Disclaimer: No, I don't own any of the Roswell characters. I don't plan to steal them and lock them up in white rooms either. I just let them out to play from time to time and see what happens.
Distribution: Distribute anywhere you like, now based at http://www.fanfiction.net/~chriskenworthy
Feedback: YES PLEASE!
Category: Roswell future-fic
Rating: PG
Summary: Liz's life changes when, as a university junior, she runs into Max again.
Spoilers: Up to 'end of the world,' kinda


The next time that Liz roused herself from the meditative trance she had just learned, (Thank you, Davin,) she was greeted by a voice. "Hey there, Einstein."

Something wasn't right about the voice, and Liz scanned her surroundings quickly, trying to get her bearings. She was still in the back seat of Max's car, but -- the other people had changed. Or some of them had, at any rate. Tess was still here, but Isabel and Davin had left - switched back to the big RV? In their place were Ardra, currently at the wheel, and the person who had spoken to Liz from the back seat across from her, who would be...

"Max?" she mumbled, still a little dizzy at the transition from inner world to outer reality.

"Yeah," Max agreed quietly. "I hope you don't mind."

"Can't say that you're my favorite person to open my eyes and see right about now," Liz mumbled, "but no. Don't 'mind' as such. Any reason your Majesty chose to grace his humble subjects with his presence??"

Max just smiled at her. "Okay, okay, I get the hint. I've been acting like a pompous jerk, haven't I??"

"Little bit," Liz agreed. She saw Tess start in the front seat, as if objecting to this criticism of her 'man,' but she remained silent.

"I'm really sorry," Max continued. "Your life is your own, and if you didn't want to let me back into it after this favor is done, I... would really understand why, actually."

"No, it's okay," Liz found herself saying. "I... I feel it too, what you're talking about. But it -- it's not something that I can decide right away."

"I understand," Max nodded. "So, um..." Max waved at the laptop computer in what seemed like a universal gesture among these aliens. "How are we doing on the course corrections??"

"Not bad at all," Liz informed him. "It's been bang on my projections the last couple of times I checked, and it's heading on its first trip around the Earth right now."

Max nodded. "So maybe this would be a good time to g..."

"If you're about to say 'get some sleep...'" Liz muttered.

"I am," Max confirmed. "I know Davin taught you a meditation technique, but your system needs sleep too. Isn't this a good time for it?"

"Okay," Liz sighed. "I'll give it a try. You need to wake me up in three and a half hours, though. Catching a first look at this thing once it's completed cycle is going to be important - and difficult." She moaned. "Not even sure if I'll be able to get to sleep."

"I think you will," Max whispered softly. And sure enough, as Liz lay back in the seat, she could feel herself drifting off. She just felt so warm... and safe...

* * * *

"Maria... Maria!!" The deep voice rang through the RV. Michael snapped to full alertness. Kenner and Maria had been playing gin rummy at the dining room table, and it was Kenner who was calling out in alarm.

Michael was at the side of the table in moments, but already Maria was slumped insensate, her skin seeming unnaturally pale. His fingers went to her tender neck. "I'm not getting any heartbeat!!"

"I'll get Max over here," Isabel decided quickly, hurrying to the shotgun seat.

"No... no..." Kenner was mumbling, shaking his head helplessly.

Michael's mind raced. What had happened to her? Sudden heart failure? Some kind of psychic attack by extraterrestrial enemies??

"I had just knocked on eight," Kenner mumbled, "and she... she..."

Something suddenly slid into focus for Michael -- his father was play-acting. But why?? What was this scene really about?

Michael touched Maria again and connected. He wasn't trained enough to heal her... but he wasn't surprised to find out that he didn't need to. Her autonomous systems had been supressed, sending her into a very convincing looking death trance - a technique that Kenner himself had taught Michael. And Maria couldn't have done this to herself - well, one in ten thousand chance.

"Wake up, sleeping beauty," he mumbled, his voice still hoarse with the double shock, as mentally he willed the effect on Maria to reverse. Her heart woke from its slumber, her lungs once again began pumping air, and her eyes opened, looking straight into Michael's face.

"Did you agree to this?" he asked her, a little roughly.

Maria yawned, a natural reaction to the light oxygen depletion she had undergone, Michael knew. "Let's say I let myself be persuaded."

Michael turned away. He wasn't sure what to make of this, except that only one motive for the facade occured to him - to make him realize how much Maria DeLuca still meant to him by having him face the prospect of losing her forever. At that, they had been partly successful.

But he didn't like being deceived by the people who said they loved him.

"Let Max know it was a false alarm," he called out to the driver, who at this point was Alex.

A few minutes later, Isabel realized that a small scrap of paper had been tucked into her jean pocket. It read:

I understand, Iz. I'm scared too.

Alex

* * * *

Liz walked down to the foot of the stairs and looked around. Before, she had gotten annoyed very quickly with these frosh bashes, the loud music with thumping bass rhythms, the dark atmosphere punctuated by flashing lights. Tonight, though, for some reason that she coudln't put her finger on, all of that fit her mood particularly. She moved off into the festivities proper.

"What'll you have, beautiful??" Ah, yes, how could she have forgotten? The alcohol, which seemed to flow freely at these things, from fellow student to fellow student, and no asking for IDs of course. She hadn't refused or made a big deal out of asking for dry alternatives just because of the statutory limit, when no one else seemed to be. "Bud draft."

As the guy behind the little table poured her drink out of a keg, she caught sight of herself in the mirror behind him. She still wasn't used to seeing these brownish-red curls framing her face -- the girl in the room next door on her residence floor had dared her to perm and dye her hair. She had almost gone for a dark blonde, but chickened out in the end and gone for a less drastic change.

She'd hoped that the new hair would help her make a clean break from her old life a little more easily, and maybe it did, a little, but it was also disconcerting. She'd probably--

"There you go."

"Huh??" Oh - her drink was ready. She reached out and took the plastic cup of brew. "Thank you," she told him with a nod and smile. He was a little cute, but Liz wasn't sure if she wanted to start flirting with a guy who was this used to giving out alcohol. (Face facts - she wasn't sure if she was ready to start flirting, period.)

"What goes around comes around," he muttered meaningfully.

"What??" The guy just cleared his throat, but he seemed to be jerking his head towards - oh, of course. On the corner of the table was a box - she bent close to read it. BOOZE FUND - PLEASE GIVE GENEROUSLY IF THE SPIRIT MOVES YOU. Liz giggled - that was actually pretty clever. She dug out a bill and dropped it in, then started looking around, scanning the festivities.

All of the happy teenagers around her, (and a few who had passed the threshold into 'twenty-ish',) seemed like they didn't have a care in the world - she knew that this was deceiving, and yet a small part of her still resented them for that impression.

"Elizabeth!!" Liz turned around to see who had called her - it was Tania, her roommate, a friendly redhead who wanted to study kinesiology. "I'm so glad you could make it!"

Ah, yes. Liz hadn't come out to the party tonight because of Tania's impassioned arguments in favor of 'letting loose and having a little fun.' More in spite of them. But she smiled, and went over, and said hi to all of Tania's friends. She'd have to spend all year with this girl - there was no sense in going out of her way to start things off on the wrong foot or upset her.

"Hey, Liz, whar're you drinking??" one of the Tania-ites, asked, breaking the awkward silence after all of the hellos were done.

"Oh, umm... just a beer." Liz tried to act nonchalant about it.

"You should try some of the jello shooters they're passing around," someone else suggested. And sure enough, a few minutes later, with her beer still no more than a third gone, Liz found herself staring at a little dixie cup with a lump of purple stuff in it.

"Umm... what do I..." Liz's faint question died as Tania threw her head straight up, staring at the ceiling, tossed the shooter down her throat, gulped twice, and quickly grabbed her cup of red drink (punch? a cooler??) and drank a few swallows of that for good measure. A scattering of applause broke out.

"Nice form," the first girl, the one who had asked Liz about her beer, muttered.

Okay, well, might as well give it a try, right?? Liz looked up, opened her mouth, and raised the dixie cup to her lips. She turned the little container to right angles, but that wasn't enough to dislodge the shooter, and so she carefully nudged it up further, bit by bit as fast as her nerves would take her.

Suddenly the shot shlupped out of its container and landed on her tongue. Liz could detect a faint trace of fruity flavor from the jell-o - whether it was grape or cranberry or something else along those lines she couldn't say. Much stronger were the sour and bitter sensations overpowering her palate - kind of like beer, but much more so. **It shouldn't be on my tongue,** she realized, and quickly pushed it to the back of her mouth.

A little too quickly - for an instant she was choking. Then about half the shot was going down her throat - the right pipe, at least - and Liz tried to force the rest of it down the same way. A little bit of jello shooter managed to shoot out of her nose, which she hoped no-one noticed. And then it was done. Belatedly she remembered to chase, and the beer was a welcome relief from the traces of much stronger alcohol in her mouth.

"Welcome to real liquor, Parker," the girl who had first suggested the jello shooters wisecracked. "Wanna try a lemon one??"

Liz hesitated. She refused to judge herself by these girls' standards - on the amount and variety of alcohol she could consume. But the sensation that was starting the spread through her was liberating - as if she could leave the pain goodbye, at least for a night. She nodded and accepted the cup of yellow gelatin.

"Could've heard a pin drop...
When they walked through the door..."

Liz looked around a little, wondering vaguely how she'd gotten up on this stage, singing to a karaoke screen, with the Tania-ettes in the front row of the crowd, cheering her on. But she didn't really worry about it...

"Had to turn my eyes away, my heart fell to the floor.
Someone whispered 'where's her halo?'
She had an angel's face.
He stood there smiling, holding on,
To the one who took my place.

So tonight, the heartache's on me."

Some faint cheers began peeling out from somewhere, she couldn't tell where.

"Let's drink a toast to the fool who couldn't see.
Bartender - pour the wine!" (more cheers.)
"'Cuz the hurtins' all mine.
Tonight, the heartache's on me.

I wonder if he told her, she's the best he's ever known.
The way he told me every night, when we were all alone.
She'll find out, when the new wears off,
He'll find somebody new!!
She'll learn what hearache's all about,
And what I'm going through."

Liz let out a little whoop herself - she was getting into this. Especially since the lyrics were doing a pretty good job of reflecting how she felt about that whole Max/Tess mess. Had she known that subconsciously when she picked this song? (Had she even picked this song herself - she couldn't remember. Okay, that was it, she'd had enough to drink.)

"But tonight...
The heartache's on me, oh on me, yeah.
Let's drink a toast
To the fool who couldn't see.
Bartender, pour the wine, 'cause the hurting's all mine.
Tonight, the heartache's on me."

The karaoke screen indicated an instrumental break, and Liz danced around like an idiot. (That was pretty much required.) Then the verse one more time, and the recorded accompaniment wound to a close. Liz waved at the crowd, got down, and Tania clapped her on the back and offered her a little plastic glass.

"That was great, Liz. Your throat's probably dry, huh??"

"What is it??"

"Just a lemonade and vodka."

Hmm. There was something - oh, right. "Nah, I'll have this one virzhin, 'kay??"

"Oh, come on, Liz. You haven't had that..."

"Thatsh not your call!!" Liz called out, a little too loud. People turned around to see what was happening. "You're not the boss of me, and if I wanna damn virzhin lemonade, I'll have a damn virzhin lemonade, so back off, k??"

"Okay, okay, I'll..." Tania broke off. Someone was already hurrying up with a slightly larger glass - were they worried that she was going to start trashing the place if she didn't get her soft drink?? The thought made Liz giggle too much, so she was pretty sure she'd made the right decision to take a stand. Yep, that was plain lemonade all right - not very good lemonade at that, but no matter.

She ended up playing some eight-ball pool - normally she was a dead shot, all it took was geometry and a steady arm, but the latter was not with her tonight, and she kept flubbing plays. On one shot in particular the cue ball missed the three entirely, bouncing up and down a little (she must have aimed too far down,) and jumped up onto the bank, seeming to leap incredibly into the air.

She didn't see it land, but she heard the splashing sound. "Oh my god." As she hurried around the table and to the scene, it was clear that this was a one in a million fluke. A cute freshman guy was soaked with light beer, along with the furniture and floor near him, and Liz's cue ball was settling gracefully to the bottom of his beer mug.

"Ummm... I'm sorry, that's mine," she mumbled. What else did you say in this kind of a situation?? "You can send me the dry cleaning bill."

The guy laughed. "Give me two bucks in small change for the laundry machines and we'll call it even, I think. I'm Peter. Wilson. And you??"

Liz had been giving her name to everybody here in Arizona as 'Elizabeth', but suddenly she felt as if that was a facade she was hiding behind, and she didn't want to hide anything from this guy. "I'm Liz Parker."

"Delighted, I'm sure." Someone had run up with gritty paper towels, and Pete gratefully started drying himself off, while Liz helped to clean up the furniture. "Well, I'll play you a game a little later if you want, but I'm afraid that I'll be taking cover before you shoot."

Liz laughed. "Get out of the way all you want - though I should say that I'm not normally that bad."

"Somehow I believe you."

* * * *

"Kyle, could I see you in here for a moment??" Kyle looked up - it was Tess, at the door of the small bedroom.

"Hey, I..." Kyle shook his head a little. "I thought you were in the car."

But Tess shook her head. "Switched back just after the Canadian border. I guess you were too deep inside that book to even notice."

Kyle smiled weakly and put the hardcover volume down beside him. Without saying a word he stood up and walked over to the door, stepping through when Tess moved out of the way to let him pass.

There was a disorienting moment, and as Kyle looked around he was definitely not in the bedroom of the pod squad's RV. Or, at least... he almost definitely was, but he didn't seem to be.

He was standing in the middle of the West Roswell High gym floor, except that it was now a dance floor, with corny disco-ball lighting, couples slow-dancing all around him, and a soft tune playing. He was wearing a rented tuxedo, almost certainly the same tux that...

And yes, of course, there she was. Tess Harding, wearing the same lavender gown that she had worn for that spring fling so many years ago. She hadn't been standing right there a moment ago, in fact, she hadn't been anywhere that Kyle had been able to see her a moment ago. He suspected that that was part of the effect.

"Is this what I think it is, Tess?" he said softly.

She smiled sheepishly. "Well, I was thinking about what you said before, and, emm... it kinda occured to me that maybe I owe you a dance??"

"One dance," Kyle repeated, a little disappointed.

"I'm afraid that's all," she agreed. "If you don't want to," she waved a hand in the air, "I can send us back right now."

"No." He stepped forward towards her, holding his arms out. "May I have this dance, Miss Harding??"

She curtsied, (an actual curtsy, Kyle was sure,) and stepped into the classic ballroom dancing position.

"If we're going to do this, can we at least do it right?" Kyle asked her reprovingly.

"What??"

"We look like idiots." Kyle gestured to the high school dance scene around him - though none of the couples were paying either of them any attention, of course, but almost all of them were in a more traditional slow-dance position, standing much closer together than Tess was right now.

Tess blushed. "Oh - right." She stepped closer in, and when Kyle put her hands on her waist she linked her arms up behind his neck. The music washed over them, and she rested a cheek against his shoulder. "This is -- nice."

"You sound surprised."

"Well - I guess I am, a little. Considering how things ended - I feel very comfortable with you, right now. I'm not sure why, unless it's all the make believe."

"I don't think it's just that, Tess." Kyle looked down at Tess, and, cued in by some detail of his movement, she pulled back far enough to look into his eyes. "I dunno, I feel as if we still have some instinctive connection - maybe it isn't true love or whatever - if you're happy with Max, then I'm happy for you; both of you. But..."

"But what??" Tess asked after a moment.

Kyle shrugged awkwardly. "If you leave again, promise me that you'll say goodbye, okay??"

Tess was silent for a moment, aware that something very significant was going on between the two of them that couldn't easily be put into words. And then she nodded. "I promise."

They swayed together for a bit, and then the song ended. "That wasn't a full dance," Tess mentioned. "Do you want to..."

"No," Kyle muttered after a thought. "This is enough time to spend in the past."

"Okay." Tess didn't make any obvious gesture, but the mindwarp, the shared fantasy scene, vanished instantly. They were holding each other in the bedroom, the big double bed pushed up so as to clear room, and both of them were back in their ordinary clothes.

He held her for a moment, realizing that she wasn't any less beautiful than she had been in the formal gown, just different. Tess wriggled nervously, though. Kyle let her go, realizing that holding him in reality might be considerably less comfortable than in a vision of the past, as far as her relationship with Max was concerned.

"Thanks," she muttered with a brief, grateful smile. "So, um - any idea when we hit the site??"

* * * *

"Won't be long now," Michael decided after a moment's pause. "Maybe fifteen minutes." He was sitting in the navigator's seat, looking at map printouts that had been gotten off the internet via the new laptop and a wireless access card.

Liz had managed to plot the landing target of the probe to within a quarter-mile margin of error, and Michael was leading the way through the Banff national park paths towards that location.

"So... do you actually have any idea what to expect when we get to this thing, or when it gets to us??" Kyle asked out loud. He had been watching their trip for the past few minutes. "I mean, what if it's packed with enemy warriors wanting to destroy you??"

"Well, first off, it's not that big," Davin told him. "Liz managed to get a pretty good view of it with the optical telescope last stop, and she makes it out to be only about twenty feet long and nine feet wide, more or less. Considering the bulk of the engine, there wouldn't be room for even one living creature and life support. We're probably just dealing with a recorded message of some sort."

"But Kyle's got a good point - we keep our guard up," Max said in his best 'fearless leader' voice. "We don't know what to expect from this thing."

"Take a left here," Michael muttered to Ardra, who was driving.

The radio on the dash crackled to life. "Hey, Michael?"

Michael smiled as he radioed back. "Yeah, Liz??"

"Any word on an E. T. A??"

"Umm..." Michael checked his watch. "Twelve minutes and counting."

"Oh."

"Any reason why you asked??"

"Well, I'm expecting a touchdown in about two and a half minutes." There was a bit of a collective gasp around the front of the RV.

"Is that a problem??" Kyle mumbled.

"Probably not," Michael said. "I don't imagine there's much chance that someone else is going to happen upon it in ten minutes. I'd rather it had been a smaller gap of time though."

They drove along in silence for about a minute. "Hey, Liz," Max called out to the radio.

"Um, it's not on, Maximillian," Michael told him in an aside.

Max gestured in annoyance, and Michael reached out and activated the walky talky. "Liz?" Max called out again.

"Uh... yeah Max??"

"Will we be able to see the probe come down from here??"

"Uh, well, if you're looking in the right place you will," Liz laughed back. "And if there aren't any trees in the way."

"What's the bearing??" Max mumbled to Michael.

Michael pointed, and Max tried to get himself oriented to watch in that direction. Of course, then the RV swung around a turn, and he had to move.

He saw it when it happened, though. A burst of light coming downt through the sky - hard to tell exactly what color it was or how far away. "That was it??" he mumbled, a little disappointed.

"What the heck??" Ardra called out. Max felt the jostle as the brakes on the RV came on full. He looked out the front - there was something stretching all the way across the road instead of them, but he couldn't tell quite what.

"WATCH OUT UP THERE!!" Tess called from the back of the camper. "Kenner almost rammed into us - or maybe it was Maria. I'm not quite sure who's driving back there."

"I'm doing the best I can!!" Ardra snapped. Fairly quickly, both vehicles had come to a stop pulled up against the edge of the road, and everybody was piling out to take a closer look.

A purplish-blue curtain of light fell down across the road, stretching far into the woods on both sides, and a long way up into the air, apparently folding back over itself in a dome.

"It's protecting the crash site," Michael guessed. "This is coming from the capsule."

"Maybe, Michael," Isabel muttered. She hurried over to the car and started the ignition again, creeping slowly towards the barrier.

"Isabel, be careful!!" Max called out.

The car approached the curtain and slowly started to pass through. Isabel parked it just before the entire engine was through and got out, stepping carefully through herself. "What the hell??"

"What's wrong, Isabel??" Max called out, hurrying up himself, but not quite able to bring himself to step through.

"Come here," Isabel insisted, and Max followed her. As he did, he realized what had surprised Isabel.

The car wasn't there. He could see the rear of the vehicle through the curtain, but the front of it, that should be poking through towards them... wasn't.

He stepped back through. "Okay, what the space is going on here??"

TO BE CONTINUED...

Whom among us, part fifteen
Author: Chris Kenworthy
Email: chrisk@fanfiction.net
Disclaimer: No, I don't own any of the Roswell characters. I don't plan to steal them and lock them up in white rooms either. I just let them out to play from time to time and see what happens.
Distribution: Distribute anywhere you like, now based at http://www.fanfiction.net/~chriskenworthy
Feedback: YES PLEASE!
Category: Roswell future-fic
Rating: R, for this part.
Summary: Liz's life changes when, as a university junior, she runs into Max again.
Spoilers: Up to 'end of the world,' kinda


The group of them gathered around the strange barrier, silent for long moments. Then Davin spoke up.

"I've heard of something like this - a reality warp. A generator can create a local pocket of space seperated from our dimension."

Isabel frowned a second, and then turned to the alien covert ops agent. "Explain more."

Davin nodded readily. "There's a computer program controlling the barrier. When the car passes through, I expect, it passes through normally and emerges in the forest behind the curtain. When you or Max pass through, on the other hand, you emerge in an alternate reality of the Banff forest, where the capsule is protecting itself. Anyone who doesn't have a deep connection to those things beyond the completely normal world would probably not even be able to perceive the barrier - they'd just pass through it like it didn't exist."

"And there'd be no chance of them stumbling across the capsule by chance?" Michael confirmed, and Davin nodded. "Well, that's something at least."

"Well, if we can't take the cars into this thing, we'd better load up with some emergency gear just in case," Isabel decided. "And then move."

"Wait," Tess put in. "First, hadn't we better make sure who of us this curtain will take??"

"Yeah," Max agreed. Quickly each of them ducked through the curtain to see if they could see the front of the car. Michael and Tess could not, so that was good, they were going inside the protected space, like Isabel and Max did. So did Liz, Alex, Kyle, and Maria.

None of the Others could pass through, even if they were holding the hands of those who could enter.

"I like this not, my Lord," Bentor muttered grumpily. "Why should the barrier seek to seperate you from your retainers unless it conceals some sinister trap??"

"There may be a way to find out," Kenner suggested. "Davin, the barrier is a direct manifestation of the space capsule's computer, the portion of it controlling the reality warp, right?" Davin nodded. "Then... Max and Michael should be able to tap into it and divine the nature of the program, at least to tell if it's malevolent or not."

Bentor didn't seem too satisfied by this, but he didn't stop Max and Michael from joining their hands and reaching out to touch the barrier. Liz, for her part, was fascinated, this was a power specialty that she hadn't heard of, and it was somehow nice to see the guys doing detail and informational work, which somehow always seemed to end up with the female of the species.

Max drew back his hand, and a fraction of a second later so did Michael. Max turned to Bentor. "It isn't malicious," he reported, "but I didn't get an impression of great control. We have to go in," his tone allowed no argument - it was a Royal proclamation, "but we'll all be extremely careful. Got it?"

"Yeah, we got it, your majesty," Kyle called out.

Soon they were crossing the barrier again, the original elite eight, wearing backpacks filled with just about anything they could think of in under three minutes. "Gotta say, this doesn't really look like an alternate reality," Isabel muttered after about half a minute. "Just the same dirt road through a forest that we were following in the cars."

Liz turned and looked at her, stopping still for a moment. "At first glance, maybe. But the woods weren't that thick before we stepped through the curtain."

Curious now, Isabel walked over to the edge of the path and took a closer look. Criss-crossed branches barred the way, some of them thorny or covered with suspiciously sticky leaves. She carefully grabbed hold of a bough that was neither and tried to break it off. The branch didn't even bend under her hands.

"Only one way to go," Max muttered. "Like an old-time computer game. It keeps you from going out of bounds."

They walked quietly on for a few more minuted, unnerved by Max's conclusion - at least Liz knew that she was.

Soon enough, though, the path dead-ended, at a clearing dominated by a small cottage.

"Do we go inside??" Tess wondered.

"The forest is still thick on all sides," Kyle muttered, having just completed a quick circuit of the clearing. "Unless there's some secret path that's hidden extremely well, the little house looks like our only alternative."

"But where can we go from there," Maria interjected. "A trap door leading down into a lost underground kingdom?? Gotta say I'm not wild about that."

"Who knows - it's not like we really have any choice," Michael replied. "Unless we're ready to turn back, we have to follow the path that whoever's set up. Unless he actually chooses to present us with a choice."

"This place doesn't necessarily follow the same rules as the outside world, anyway," Isabel pointed out. "If we go into the house, we might find an extra door out of it, one that leads to a completely different setting."

At that, there really was nothing to do but explore the cottage. Max and Michael insisted on going first, in case there was some hostile creature that was a part of the program, but like the path, the premises of the cottage seemed to be disappointingly ordinary. A large, L-shaped living room area, with coffee table at one end, a fireplace burning low, (but quickly restored with some of the kindling and split firewood stacked next to it,) a large piano, and four cots spread about the room. Kitchen with wood stove, stocked with a few camping supplies and no perishables. Two very small bedrooms, each featuring narrow bunk beds. That was it. Definitely no trap doors or mysterious thresholds.

"Okay, smart guys?" Maria grumped. "What do we do now??"

Max sighed. "I'm not sure... get some sleep??" He got a couple of very dubious looks for that one. "Well, I'm sure that all of us could use the rest. Whatever the next step, our Gamemaster is doing a good job of making sure that we don't find it, so maybe we're not supposed to find it, or not yet. Maybe it's supposed to find *us*."

Liz pondered that, and slowly nodded. The capsule had already landed, and was protecting itself, and they had entered its domain. All of the old reasons for rushing no longer related -- though it nagged at her that there was a new reason that she should be thinking of. But it didn't want to come.

"Girls on the bunk beds in the bedrooms, guys in the cots out in the living room??" Michael suggested, and no one seemed to disagree. It seemed to Liz that the hybrid couples were a little upset that there were no accomodations that would sleep two, but there was really no one for them to complain about it to.

"I'm rooming with Liz," Maria called out.

Quickly they settled in, though nobody made themselves too much at home - they all hoped that they'd be leaving on short notice. "Okay... can we actually eat this food, or is there something weird about eating food in a reality warp??" Isabel called out from the kitchen.

"Umm... like pomegranite seeds in hell??" Kyle asked.

"Or the banquet of the fairies??" Alex put in.

"I wish we'd asked Davin for more details before charging in," Max mumbled. "But from what I got, it's not like this is a holodeck or anything, everything we can see or touch is real, made up of real molecules at least. So... it's not like the food won't fill us up, or it'll just vanish from our systems once the switch gets turned off."

"But there's no guarantee that the molecules are what they should be," Tess pointed out. "The food could be poisoned, or drugged, all at the whim of the Gamemaster."

"So could the air, but we can't exactly do anything about breathing," Michael pointed out.

"Okay, okay, okay!!" Liz called out, cutting through the clamor. "We've packed food, right?? How about, we eat the food we brought in here for as long as it lasts, which should be plenty long, just because it's marginally safer. If we lose it or run out, we figure out what to do then."

"Umm... okay, I guess," Isabel sighed. They gathered around the fireplace and snacked for a bit.

"Okay... I think somebody should be on watch through the night," Michael suggested. "Taking turns. Those of us with hybrid powers."

"Watching for what, a tribe of wandering hobgoblins??" Maria put in, but she couldn't argue Michael out of it.

* * * *

Liz rolled over as she woke up... and yelped as she realized that she was more than halfway over the edge of the narrow bunk. Luckily she managed to scramble back aboard before gravity, (or whatever imitation of the force of gravity held sway here in the reality warp, perhaps,) could do its relentless work.

Her heart beating quickly from the scare, Liz lay sprawled on what there was of the top bunk for a long moment, trying to gather her thoughts. She had been dreaming, dreaming of the past again. Finding out about Max's destiny, running away to Florida, helping him find Agent Pierce's bones to save Michael from jail and all of them from certain exposure. Why did the past keep coming back to haunt her dreams on this trip??

Okay, that was a stupid question. The past was coming back to her in her dreams because it had come back to her in real life - bumped into her on campus.

Yawning, Liz carefully felt out with one hand for the wooden ladder that led up to the top bunk, then carefully crawled around so that she could climb back down, making as little noise as possible. If she hadn't woken Maria already, (and if Liz had, she'd probably have heard her voice by now,) then she didn't want to disurb her oldest friend's sleep at this point.

Once her feet were on the floor, Liz suddenly realized something that had been true from the moment she woke up -- but then, she had been a little distracted.

There was music playing softly - something lovely and classical. She headed out of the room to see where it was coming from. There had been no stereo or tape player in the cabin when they'd searched it - had someone thrown one in their backpack??

She wasn't expecting the beautiful music to be coming from the piano - especially not with Max Evans at the keyboard.

"I didn't know you could do that," she muttered softly.

Max looked up - a little surprised to see her there, she could tell, but the melody barely faltered. "I picked it up along the way. You look pretty, by the way."

Liz looked down at the clothes she had been using as pyjamas - a pink tshirt and soft white cotton shorts. "What would your wife think, if she heard you saying that?" she scolded Max.

"I doubt my saying it would surprise her. She knows that you're pretty. She knows that I'm particularly aware of that fact."

"Yeah..." Liz frowned. "But you're not supposed to SAY it."

"Maybe not among humans," Max countered, "We've gotten used to saying what we really think, what we feel. No facades. It's very liberating."

Liz considered that for a moment, intrigued. Somewhat impulsively, she decided to say something that she'd been thinking, herself. "I've been thinking about the old days, about all that we went through. Do you really think that we could stay friends and not have any of that old baggage get in the way?"

Max stopped to think about that - literally, he stopped the song almost in mid-note and pondered her question. "I'm not sure," he admitted. "I want to try. One thing I'm sure of: being your friend is something very special, and very precious, Liz. It always was."

Liz smiled a bit, remebering the times before the worst of the badness. Max put his hands back to the piano keyboard and started playing a pretty, simple melody. "Do you remember that one??"

Astoundingly, Liz did... from some quiet afternoon, so many years ago... after the two of them had first met River Dog - before that afternoon on the old highway when they crashed into the bushes trying to avoid a horse. They had been taking a study break in the middle of a difficult chemistry assignment, just channel surfing. Liz had teased Max when he stopped on the country music video channel.

The music from the piano stopped. "Ladies and gentlemen... The ever talented, the ever lovely -- Miss Elizabeth Parker!!" he announced, doing a good imitation of the guest singer in that video. And then he started playing again - not just the melody this time, but quiet harmonizing notes with his left hand too.

Liz choked on the first cue, but Max cycled through and gave it to her again. Very shakily, she managed to force the first line out of her throat. "I believe... in miracles,"

The reason for the slight pause in the middle was a sight that would have startled just about anybody. A bright point of light had flown around from behind Liz's head into her field of vision as she sang - light a star that had floated down to earth. It was about as big as a ping-pong ball, and glowed softly, so that it didn't hurt to look at it, shooting bluish white sparks off info the air... sparks that vanished almost immediately. The star danced around a bit, and then winked out as the sound of her voice faded away. Had it popped into existence when she started singing??

She looked at Max, whose playing had faltered only for a split instant, and he nodded intently at her, urging her without words or hand gestures to continue. Liz agreed that this could be important - it was obviously a manifestation of the reality warp effect - keyed in to her singing. She had to continue, see what came of it. But could she force herself to sing out a second time??

Look into Max's eyes one more time -- yes, she could. "I believe in signs!" she called out to the music. This time the manifestation brought a smile to both of their faces: a large white, rectangular placard intantly appeared on the opposite wall where both Max and Liz could see it, reading 'KEEP GOING!!' in large block letters. So she did. And things just got stranger from there.

It was like the scene became a music video, bit by bit. "...And I believe that mountains move," A hill of grayish rocks sprouted through the wooden log floor, and Liz began stepping up onto it as if it were a staircase. "One prayer at a time." Turn back to Max, still sitting at his piano, and Liz was surprised to see that she was over four feet high off the ground already.

"If I could be an angel..." Step off the rocks, into thin air without a second thought, but of course thin air supported her, as it she were on an invisible glass walkway. She also noticed that Max had come in with the harmony vocals at this point, his rich baritone blending with her mezzo soprano beautifully. (Of course, Liz's own voice had already been enhanced by the magic, it seemed to her...)

"...I'd make your every dream come true," wave a hand, and a rainbow appeared, arcing over the piano, and then fading away. "But I am only human," dancing down the glass walkway back to ground, Max had stopped the harmony at this point, "Just a woman, loving you." Stepping towards the piano, looking into each other's eyes, and Max picking up the harmony again with the last two words in the verse.

"Where your road leads..." On the word 'road', the scene exploded... but not painfully so. "...I will follow." Liz had the impression of flying over a forest, Max soaring along beside her. "When your heart bleeds, I'll be there for you." Without warning, she was underwater, breathing and singing without trouble, and swimming after Max who was leading the way.

"When your night grows dark..." And now they were flying amidst the stars themselves. Max caught her and they spun about for a few seconds in a graceful dance move... "And you can't find your tomorrow..." Hand in hand doubled, they drifted down to the mouth of a convenient wormhole that led them back down to earth with a shimmering effect, "...then you can follow me."

They were on a path that led out to a an ocean beach, just before sunrise or just after sunset, and Liz kept one of Max's hand in hers as they walked in step to the music.

"Someday we'll look back and see our footprints in the sand." Liz couldn't help looking back behind them and sure enough, just like in all those corny inspirational stories, their path led down the beach almost infinitely, not up the path she knew they had just used. "How sometimes you would carry me, and sometimes you'd be in my hands." Max started to sing the harmony a little more noticeably again, and Liz realized that though he wasn't playing the piano any more, its music still surrounded them. Just another music video effect, she guessed. But was the way she was feeling right now a phony effect too, the sensation that no matter what had happened over the past four years, it couldn't keep them apart??

"If we could love forever, that won't be long enough for me.
I wanna hold you tender..."

Not knowing quite why, Liz closed her mouth silently, and Max delivered "be your shelter" all by himself, and Liz came back in on "...All you need." Was that another little effect, how they seemed to be perfectly in sync. Or had Max not even been expecting that??

As the chorus started again, they kept walking - but the terrain changed around them, so that they were climbing hills, and then mountains. By the time it had ended, a full orchestral was crashing invisibly around them with no signs of a diminuendo, so Liz knew that some big climax was just around the corner. She'd forgotten how the song went at this point, though. Would that matter, or would their invisible video director be able to allow her to perform anyway??

It seemed that he, or it, could. "Ohhh..." she belted out, stepping away from Max for a moment but half turning back towards him, stepping close to a cliff (but not too close,) and gesturing theatrically at the incredible view that spread out beneath it, "We can be each other's guiding lights... Through this lonely world alone..." Max came up beside her, and snapped his hands to trigger a fade dissolve to the ravine path in Roswell.

"Where your road, leads, I will follow..." As the chorus began again, Liz kissed him, and then led the way down into the woods. "When your heart bleeds, I'll be there for you." The waterfall was at its perfect flow rate, of course, highlighting the beautiful forest cove. Liz threw every bit of effort she could into the developing finale. "When your night grows long, and yo-ou can't find your tomorr-ow..." There was a short pause, and then they were standing out on the sidewalk in front of the Crashdown.

"When you've lost sight of your dreams," Max sang softly.

"Then you can... follow... me." they finished in perfect harmony, and as the last notes faded away they were in the cabin in the woods, Max finishing his play on the keyboard with a flourish.

"Uhhh. wow," Liz muttered, blinking a little as reality set in again. "I..."

"Liz," Max muttered intensely, gesturing at something behind her. Liz spun around, and saw that a section of the wall of the cabin had disappeared, and a path was leading through the aperture that had developed, a walkway shrouded in fog.

"Gather everybody." Max told her softly. "That's our way out of here."

* * * *

"Well, I certainly can't say that things haven't gotten weird enough," Alex muttered out loud. They had been walking down the strange path, surrounded by mist, for almost an hour now, according to Liz's watch, stopping to rest only briefly every fifteen minutes. Every so often they saw something else unusual to break the monotony, like a family of frying pans crawling across their path, a tiny cloud of fog shaped like a butterfly that actually sat on Maria's wrist for a few brief seconds before flitting away, and a stream that was actually made up of tiny blue rocks, so round and smooth that they 'flowed' downhill. Aside from those kinds of things, it was just more of the path, more white clouds on every side of them, and a twist and turn every now and again.

"Yeah, I wonder who came up with this program," Michael muttered. "Has more of a sense of whimsy than I think I'm comfortable with."

Isabel stepped in between the two of them very deliberately, and muttered, "I've made my decision. I want to do it."

"Do what??" Michael whispered back, but he caught the recognition in Alex's face. "The mind-link??"

"Yep," she confirmed. "Both of you still willing??"

"Yeah, I'd be happy to," Alex assured her. Michael nodded silently.

"Okay... once we're done with all this craziness, then."

"When have I heard that before??" Kyle commented, and Isabel turned around to glare at him for eavesdropping.

They rounded another turn, and all of a sudden the dark at the end of the tunnel was in view, so to speak - a rainbow covered arch spun over the path, and dimly an indoor scene could be viewed through a portal perhaps like the one they had entered. Maria ran ahead, but seemed to bounce off something invisible as she tried to pass underneath the rainbow gate. "What the hey??"

Max and Kyle tried too - it was a soft but elastic force field that resisted even the alien's powers to breach it. "Okay, how do we get through this??" Tess grumbled.

"Hey, there's a clue or something," Isabel mentioned, pointing to white letters that were inscribed in script on the rainbow arch. "'Parler dans anglais, l'ami, et entrer.' Does anybody speak french??" Max noticed that she had botched the pronunciation.

"Too easy," Alex quipped. "That one is right out of 'Lord of the Rings.'" He stepped right up to the forcefield and called out "'Friend!!'" And stepped through. Everyone could go through now - the force field was down.

"Do I even want to know what that was about??" Tess asked Alex.

"The message read, I think, 'speak in english, friend, and enter,'" Alex explained. "But we'd been talking in english the whole time. So I figured that the key was the word 'friend' - like the gateway into..."

"Okay, okay, we get it," Kyle interrupted. "So, where to next??"

They were in another cabin, like the other in general appearance and decor but differing in numerous small details. Michael and Alex checked outside and reported that there were three paths leading away from this clearing.

Max looked around and saw a lot of tired and upset faces. "Let's bunk down again - we can start exploring in the morning, or what feels like morning to our internal clocks. What are the sleeping accomodations??"

There were four bedrooms in this cabin, it turned out, one with a double bed, the other three with two cots each. Max looked at Michael and said, after a moment, "You and Iz take it."

"You sure man?" Michael looked from Max to Tess and back for a moment. "Thanks, man."

"You with Tess, me with Kyle, Liz and Maria??" Alex confirmed. All of them quickly unpacked and fell asleep with almost no difficulty.

* * * *

"Ahhhh!!" The muted cry woke Liz up instantly, and she fumbled for the flashlight. "Maria... are you all right??"

"Umm... huhh?" Maria groaned, and Liz moved the flashlight away from her face. "Ohh, yeah, I'm okay, just a recurring nightmare." Her face crinkled in embarrassment. "Bees chasing me."

"Oh, okay." Liz said, smiling. "Umm... wait a second, what's that on your arm??"

"Huh?" Maria looked, saw something, and brought the inside of her forearm closer to her face, peering at it curiously. "I can't quite tell, can you shine the light on it better??"

"Sure," Liz got up and came over to the bed. "It looks like..."

"A stinger!!" Maria explained. "And one of them got me right there, in the dream... are there really bees here??"

"I haven't seen any," Liz said, "Was there anywhere else you got stung in the dream?"

"Ummm..." Maria thought about that. "On my side, near the waist, but I think I dug the stinger out before I woke up. Ouch." She checked that area - sure enough, no stinger, but the sign of a bee sting was quite evident and real.

"So... our dreams are becoming real??" Maria asked. "It did seem more vivid than usual."

"Or they can at least can have real effects," Liz replied. "I'd better tell the others. You..."

"I'll go outside and start making a mud pack to draw this stinger out," Maria agreed.

Liz woke up Alex and Kyle, Michael and Isabel and told them about their discovery. None of them had noticed any ill effects, though Alex reported having been dreaming and holding a golden wand when Liz woke him up, and it didn't appear, so apparently it was only their bodies or things that were inside the body that the effect extended to, and not things held or carried. Liz didn't want to deal with Max or Tess again, so she asked Michael to go in and brief them while she checked on Maria.

Max came out to see her after Maria had gotten the stinger out and was applying some calamine lotion that Isabel had luckily thrown into her pack to both sting sites. "Are you sure that this isn't just a co-incidence, Liz?" Max muttered. "There could have been real bees in your room, and Maria incorporated them into her dream."

"I didn't see or hear and sign of them," she whispered softly. "Can't tell you any more than that."

"Okay." Max thought for a second. "Do you think we should be moving on right now, instead of resting longer??"

"I don't know," Liz sighed. "Someone could get awfully hurt in their dreams."

"But maybe not," Max countered. "Whatever this effect is, it's still under the control of the program running on the space capsule - the game master, if you will. And we know that that program isn't trying to hurt us. I'd say to stay put. The last strange effect we encountered got us this far. Maybe we're supposed to double down."

"Okay," Liz sighed. "Maria, do you think you can get back to sleep??"

"Not sure," Maria sighed. "I'll make up some powdered hot chocolate, play a game of solitaire or something, see if I get sleepy."

"Okay." Liz stretched and groaned. "I'll be in our room."

"Thanks," Max said to her softly.

"For what??"

"What else? For looking out for everybody, as usual." He smiled at her and left.

* * * *

She carefully pushed the window up from the outside and hopped inside. Liz didn't make much noise, even as her feet touched down on the floor, but apparently it was enough to wake him. **File for future reference: Max Evans is a light sleeper.** "Michael, what the heck is it??" he groaned grumpily.

"It's not Michael," she called out softly. That woke Max the rest of the way up.

"Liz!! But... what are you doing here??"

"I couldn't stay away any longer," she told him softly. "I... I never -- you were right. About Kyle and me, nothing happened. It's too long a story to get into right now..."

"Ssh, ssshhh." Max got up and wrapped her in his arms. "It doesn't matter... it doesn't make any difference. Just that you believe... that you believe in us -- Everything will be all right now."

She believed him... she also kissed him. Suddenly, fiercely, with the supressed passion and lust of many long months. He replied in kind, and all too soon they were sprawled all over Max's bed in an amorous tangle of hair and limbs and other body parts and clothes... clothes which were rapidly being shed by a co-operative effort... hands roaming everywhere.

Suddenly Liz saw where this was heading... "Are you sure that we're ready for this, Max??" But she couldn't resist kissing his ear and licking his neck.

"It'll be alright," he murmured throatily. "I've got protection." But... but he didn't seem to do anything, to use it. A short round of petting and foreplay later... and she realized that he was inside her.

There was no pain. The feeling was almost transcendent. A powerful rhythm was building up inside her, forcing her body to respond, compelling her...

And Liz woke up in her bed in a hot sweat. Suddenly she realized what Maria had meant about the dreams seeming vivid - it had been every bit as realistic an experience as real life. She was still flushed and aroused from the physical sensations of making love, not to mention the emotional complications of it.

But as soon as she felt she could get up without having her condition be completely obvious, she barged over to Max and Tess' room. Max was wide awake too, and seemed to be blusing himself. Had he... had he experienced any of that dream himself?? Tess was snoring quietly.

"We're leaving here," Liz announced in a tone of voice that allowed no argument. "NOW."

TO BE CONTINUED...

Whom among us, part sixteen
Author: Chris Kenworthy
Email: chrisk@fanfiction.net
Disclaimer: No, I don't own any of the Roswell characters. I don't plan to steal them and lock them up in white rooms either. I just let them out to play from time to time and see what happens.
Distribution: Distribute anywhere you like, now based at http://www.fanfiction.net/~chriskenworthy
Feedback: YES PLEASE!
Category: Roswell future-fic
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Liz's life changes when, as a university junior, she runs into Max again.
Spoilers: Up to 'end of the world,' kinda


By the time they had organized and stepped out of the second cabin, an alien dawn was starting to light up the sky. Liz blinked in shock at the clouds lit up in the sky in shades of baby blue and lavender, while the rest of the heavens were beginning to assume a dark peachy color.

"Is a sun going to come up over there, and if so, what will it look like?" Kyle muttered in disbelief.

"Don't be so narrow-minded... it could just as easily be two or three suns," Alex retorted.

"Come on, guys, don't freak," Tess told them. "Remember, this is just another prank of the gamemaster program. We're still on your dearly beloved Earth, the sun and the sky are really the same as they ever were. Only the light entering this reality field has been altered."

"Among maybe a few other effects," Maria mumbled, holding out a compass. "For what it's worth, if anything, that's reading as south by southwest." She pointed out at the alien dawn.

"Probably doesn't mean much," Isabel mumbled.

That wasn't the only thing that had changed. All three of the paths that had been leading away from the cottage last night had vanished, and a single new one set up, leading away in a different direction. "Looks like your guess of the timing was right, Liz," Max said out loud. "The obstacles are gone."

Liz didn't say anything. She hadn't demanded that they leave the cabin right then because of any guess about the timing and the reality field's alternate efforts to block their way and facilitate their progress somewhere. She had done it because of the way their dreams had been coming real at the cabin, and she had had a sex dream about Max that had totally freaked her out. But of course, she couldn't tell people about that... with the possible exception of Maria. Though Max might already know, if the dream had been *real* enough to in some strange way include him... but she couldn't take that chance without knowing for sure.

This path blocked them from stepping off of it, like the first one had, but in a vaguely friendlier way... or was that just the difference that daylight made, strange alien daylight though it was? No, the branches at the side of the road were softer and more flexible, though they restricted you by sheer volume if you were determined to press through.

They walked on in interspersed small talk and silence for about fifteen minutes, according to Liz's watch, which she wasn't sure if she trusted on general principles here inside the warp, but it felt like about fifteen minutes too. Then, the path curved around in a sharp circle, and there it was! The path just deadended, but near the edge of it lay a huge metal object, mostly cylindrical in shape. "The capsule," Michael breathed.

"Little hard to grasp that this is what we've been chasing for... how long?" Isabel whispered. No-one answered her.

It was about three and a half feet in diameter by cross-section, and perhaps eight feet long, with a snub nose at one end. Liz knew that the object she'd been tracking through space had been larger than this, but it had probably jettisoned the propulsion module to crashland in an ocean or something. This was just the payload.

Max rushed forward to investigate, forcing panels open and looking at the circuits and what looked like fiberglass conduits within. He beckoned Tess over, and they discussed a few different topics in hushed tones that Liz couldn't make out into words.

Finally they turned back to the rest.

"It's essentially a Psychic Identity Tranceiver unit, hardwired to a particular frequency and sidereal orientation," Max said.

"And just what does that mean??" Liz asked him.

"Using another P.I.T. terminal, someone can use this one to transmit his self-awareness to earth and into the body of a temporary host here on earth, and then back to his own body when he's done."

"Like the summit?" Alex asked softly.

"Kind of," Max muttered. "That wasn't voluntary, though, those were hostile takeovers. With this unit... well, if we want someone to use it we'll have to connect the designated host up to the equipment and activate the receiver antenna." He sighed. "Do we want to do that?"

"This thing was sent to us for a reason," Michael pointed out. "We've come all this way - are we not going to let it go through with it now?"

"We still don't have any confirming evidence that whoever sent this is friendly," Isabel reminded him. "We might be inviting an enemy agent right amongst us."

"Let 'em come," Max shot back. "The power is rooted in the body - no adept can keep much of his power when using psychic transference. If it's an enemy, we'll be able to handle him and boot him back the way he came using the tranceiver."

"And if the enemy pretends to be a friend??" Liz asked softly.

"Oh, hey," Tess put in, turning back from some readout on the capsule she had been investigating. "There are parameters for the type of host the unit is pre-programmed to accept."

"What kind of host??" Maria asked her straight out.

"Fully human... male gender." That announcement dropped another bombshell.

"Why would an alien want to transfer into a human body??" Michael asked.

"Maybe because that way he can be sure that he can talk to all four of you face to face," Liz thought out. "Instead of beind inside one of your bodies, which could definitely be awkward."

"In any event, this is better from the tactical point of view," Tess commented. "That way, we don't need to worry about him using the powers of whoever's hosting against the rest of us."

"So... are we doing this? And if so... Alex or Kyle??" Maria summarized the questions at issue.

There was a short silence... and Isabel crossed over to stand beside Alex, and somehow the gesture was subtly protecting him from having to bear the responsibility. Liz wondered if this had anything to do with this mind meld thing that Alex had agreed to do for her... she didn't want anyone else messing with Alex's brain before she had a chance to get to it, maybe??

"Okay, I'll do it," Kyle sighed. "Should have expected this." At Max's direction, he sat on a log that had been dragged over next to the capsule, and the strange colander-shaped metal arc was secured into place on top of his head.

"Here's nothing," Tess muttered, and flipped the switch. There was a sudden, sharp impression... like a bolt of lightning whose light wasn't quite in the visible spectrum. Kyle's eyes shut and his head lolled to the side slightly.

"Kyle!!" Maria exclaimed. "Did something go wrong??"

"Not necessarily," Max breathed. "The transfer can be very disorienting." A second after his voice died away, Kyle's eyes opened up again and his body straightened slightly. Slowly, slowly his fingers reached up to the fastenings that attached him to the capsule and undid them. Then, smoothly, Kyle's body rose to its feet and surveyed the rest of them.

Suddenly he focused on one of them. "Max Evans. Once known as Xamiten of the royal house of Liaret, crowned prince and later King of all Antar," Kyle announced... except it was apparent now that this was not Kyle Valenti, that the transfer had been successful in bringing the identity of an alien being into his body.

Max straightened up a little bit himself. "I am. Who is it that I have the pleasure of speaking with."

Kyle chuckled a little. "You may find this difficult to believe, Xam. But I am Sanren of Liaret... your father and predecessor."

There was a sudden pause... broken only by a string of hushed profanities that Isabel was mumbling under her breath. "What the hell is this fucked-up s..." Max hushed her with a brief gesture, never taking his eyes of of Kyle's own.

"I, I..." Max seemed hard put to form words himself, and Liz impulsively hurried up and took his hand, and that seemed to help him come to grips with the situation. "I hate to re-enact the cliche, but here goes: You can't be my father. *My father is dead*."

"'Reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated,'" the figure countered. "Mark Twain, yes??"

"I hate to even say this, but... Kyle, man, are you playing some kind of weird trick on us, man??" Alex asked tentatively.

There was silence for a moment. "No... he is here, but so am I, and this is not a jest on either of our parts," Sanren said. "I can allow you to speak with him directly if you so wish."

"Maybe that would be best," Tess suggested. "Kyle???"

"Yeah, here," Kyle quickly replied in his normal voice. "Somebody's definitely in here with me, and though I know I can't tell for sure, I think what he told you was on the up and up."

Max looked over at Tess, who nodded. "How can we be sure that this is really..." she started.

"Buddha sandwiched between Hustler and Busty biker babes," Kyle said quickly, cutting her off. Max shot a look at Tess again. Liz stifled a giggle.

"That's really Kyle," she decided. "Even if an intruder could get at Kyle's memories, there's no way he could have known to pick out that particular recollection so quickly. Only Kyle would have known."

Max turned back to Kyle. "Sanren, maybe you should explain how your death was 'exaggerated.' All of us remember your assasination... our retainers too, who are stuck outside the warp. I touched your body."

"Not quite... Max," Sanren said, seeming to have a momentary difficulty with using the human name. "Do you happen to remember the visitors that were attending court shortly before the assassination attempt?"

The four hybrids looked at each other in confusion for a long moment. "I think I might..." Isabel said softly after a moment. "They were weird-looking guys... kinda looked like a cross between four-foot high spiders and squid..." She turned to Michael and Tess. "Do you remember who I'm talking about?"

"Oh, yeah!!" Tess exclaimed.

"They were visiting dignitaries, from halfway across the galaxy," Michael confirmed.

"Yes, I remember now," Max agreed. "From..." he paused and turned to Sanren. "Would you do the honors??" He still wasn't sure about this being, and wanted to steer clear of either filling in too many of the blanks for an impostor, or letting Sanren fill in the blanks in his own memory through suggestion. Getting him to confirm a detail that Max was reasonably sure he remembered himself seemed like a good step.

"From a star system known as... I guess the closest human equivalent sounds would be Targlateanu." Max nodded in agreement. "And yes, they were visiting dignitaries, although their people were so alien that we didn't understand them very much. Turns out that that problem went both ways.

"They fathomed Khivar's assassination plot, but didn't warn my court or the royal bodyguard or anything. Instead, the Targlatuanians simply went about quietly diverting me from the place of the attack at the planned time, and provided a lifeless replicon to walk right into the trap. Knowing what I do about their technology, I'm not surprised that no-one ever noticed that my body was a fake. They're very good at what they do."

"W... wait a second!!" Isabel exploded. "You're saying that these... these really alien aliens saved your life, but wouldn't let you come back and let us all know that you were alive... you didn't stop them from crowning Max as king in your place. You didn't come back to help when Khivar started a war against us, for crying out loud!!!"

"I know," Sanren agreed. "I really, really couldn't come back to you."

"So what, they..." Michael started, did a bit of a take, and goggled a bit as he stared at Sanren. "Are you telling us that they took you back to their home planet??"

"The one halfway across the galaxy??" Tess added.

"Got it in one." Sanren quirked Kyle's eyebrow up.

"And what did you do there??" Liz couldn't help but ask.

"Well, let's see." Sanren/Kyle looked around, and after a few moments sat down on a tree stump. "These aliens who abducted me, well-- they're..."

"Wait a second," Michael broke in. "You can adjust the reality warp, can't you? Create a slightly more comfortable locale for this meeting?"

Sanren smiled uncomfortably and shook his head. "Actually, I don't think that I can. That warp generator is unfamiliar technology... I was only just barely able to set it to 'protective field' with a little help from a Zxygahtsien native. Without him, I'm competent to turn the field off, and that's about it... but I don't think we want to do that yet."

"Come on, don't be such a baby," Isabel chided Michael as she sat down on the ground not far from Sanren's stump, wrapping her arms around her knees.

"We could go back to the second cabin, maybe," Maria suggested.

"If it's still there, and the setting hasn't changed on us yet again," Alex pointed out.

"I'm not sure that it's a good idea to leave the capsule behind," Max pointed out, "Sanren will need it to get back out of Kyle's body. And I'm not looking forward to taking it with us, powers or no powers. Maybe we should just stay put for now." There was a pause, and no-one objected. A few other people started sitting down on the ground, though Michael and Tess remained standing stubbornly.

"Umm... where was--" Sanren started, but he didn't finish the question before Max supplied the answer.

"The guys who abducted you, the Tarr-glah-tee-ahn-uians...."

"Right. They are beings of principle, refusing to live on any terms than their own... and sometimes I think there isn't anything scarier in the universe than a being that lives by its principles." He chuckled. "At least their principles aren't very far from my own... which is why they wanted me in the first place."

"They're freedom and democracy maniacs... crusaders against dictatorial, oppressive, and totalitarian governments wherever they travel. They admired my campaign to modernize our planet and curtail the unrestricted powers of the old noble houses, and decided that I could do more elsewhere."

"But..." Isabel spluttered for a second. "Everything that you accomplished on Antar fell apart once you were gone. Did they..."

"I'm not sure if they cared, and I did try to make that argument," Sanren assured her. "As far as they were concerned, the needs of the many worlds outweighed the needs of one." He sighed. "On the other hand, just because they had saved my life, I could not abide dedicating it to their cause forever. So, after some determined negotiating on both sides, a deal was struck - I would work for them for a certain length of time, in exchange for the resources I would need to begin my journey back home. I've been on that journey for..." he thought. "Over ten earth-years, about three and a half Antarian cycles."

"Wait a second," Alex broke in. "I mean, ummm... mister Sanren, sir... your majesty or whatever--"

"You don't need to address me with a title, Alex," Sanren told him with a laugh. "I have no kingdom anymore, not even a house to call my own."

"Umm..." Alex thought about this. It seemed to Liz that leaving the king and lordship issue to one side, Alex was having problems with the idea of calling the true father of the girl he was in love with by his first name. Liz was kinda feeling that herself.

Finally Alex shook his head and skirted the issue. "They brought you from your world to their own in obviously some very fast ship, since you said you were there before you had a chance to object... but you had to work for decades to get a little dinky vessel that would take years more to make the journey home??"

"It wasn't actually like that." Sanren smiled quirkily at him. "They had taken about two and a half cycles to travel to Antar themselves, following almost exactly the same route I've been travelling, and took me back to their home sector through a Trans-space conduit -- a paranatural phenomenon that allows easy travel across long distances, but only at very infrequent intervals. If I wanted to use that route to get back, I would have been waiting about sixty years more. Also, incidentally, though the subjective time for flying through that passage is about thirty-four seconds, the elapsed time is more than two and a half months."

There was a bit of a pause. "Sorry, didn't mean that to be a 'conversation stopper,'" Sanren said with a wry smile.

"Sorry, um, father..." Max replied. "It's just... what now? You're... well, your physical body is with these Zzigastian people... your spirit is here with us, but that can only be a brief visit. What happens when you go back?"

"Yeah," Tess chimed in. "Are you going to come here, for real?"

"Hopefully, I'll find a way in time," Sanren assured them. "For now, although I'm glad to have found a way to come here and make sure that you're all right, my priorities are on the homeworld. I have a score to settle with the usurper." He said that last with an unmistakeable tone of deadly calmness.

There was a moment's shocked pause. "You're serious, aren't you, D-Dad?" Max asked haltingly. Sanren nodded.

"Then you have to wait until we can join you," Michael announced. "Without us, you're one man going up against a planet. We've been preparing for this for years."

"So eager for the glory of battle," Sanren said, looking up at the young hybrid warrior and shaking his head slightly.

"I've faced battle already," Michael told him matter-of-factly. "But this is more than that."

"There's no way," Sanren told him bluntly. "Leaving aside my personal feelings about bringing the four of you into such a dangerous situation, there's no logistic way. Unless you guys already have a captured starsship ready to launch and have been hanging around Earth because you weren't sure where to go..."

"No such luck," Tess confirmed.

"Not at the moment," Michael confirmed. "But if you can just wait there for a bit, I'm sure we could figure out something..."

"I don't have any more time... not on the scale we'd be talking about, little brave. For a number of reasons... my agreement with the Zxygahtsien for one thing... and the advantage of surprise. But come, you don't need to worry about me. I still have friends on the homeworld, including quite a few that Kivar doesn't suspect of being loyal to me. I don't expect great danger... or failure."

Kyle/Sanren looked out into several solemn and uncertain faces. "But enough of that... I've found you, or maybe you've found me. In any case, the universe has reunited family after far too long. We've got a lot of catching up to do."

Isabel was the first to break out laughing, and it spread through the rest of the group.

* * * *

"We got separated very soon after we came out of the pods, or most of us did," Max said. "Tess came out later, she was found by Nasedo -- by the only one of the shapechanging Protectors to win free after the crash. The other three of us found each other in the desert, but when a car came by and stopped, Isabel and I stayed together and Michael hid. We got adopted by that couple who was in the car, the Evanses. Michael went into the foster care system, and Isabel found him again at school, a few years later." He took a breath.

"Just before my sophomore year at high school, Michael and I were in a cafe when Liz got shot - a stray bullet from some stupid argument that had nothing to do with her. I couldn't stand to see her die, so... I used my powers. I healed her. After that, I had to tell her what I knew about us, that I knew I wasn't human, and she told Maria... and Alex, a little later, after he helped us out of a jam and started demanding to know what was going on."

"Nasedo and Tess came to town about half a year later, along with a government organization that was trying to capture or kill us all. During the midst of that Jim Valenti, Kyle's dad, found out the truth about us and decided to help us, but Kyle got mixed up in the whole thing and got shot, accidentally. I healed him too, and that's when *he* found out. A little later, we used the Orbs to get the message from mom, and that's when Kivar's agents here on earth started coming after us." He paused for a reaction from Sanren.

He was blinking sporadically and shaking his head... make that shaking Kyle's head, very slightly, in small jerks. "I knew a little bit about Earth... there had been surveillance missions and such since my father's time. But I never thought that this planet would be so... so dangerous for you. Are humans really that xenophobic or..."

"We didn't know what to expect," Alex blurted out loud. "Speaking on behalf of humanity, I think. It's not that we automatically hate nonhumans for the sake of it, it's that we don't know what we can expect and that's deeply frightening. Considering some of the things that human beings have done to human beings, it's not exactly natural to assume that beings from distant stars will come in peace."

Sanren weighed that. "I understand. My own people, for all that they like to think of themselves as galatically sophisticated, are not that different from you in their hearts, I think." He considered. "And from Kyle Valenti's memory, I know that there are many times that the four of you... five, counting his father - have sacrificed unflinchingly to protect the people that I love. For that I thank you, and I would be honored to call you family as well."

Maria blinked. "Umm... thanks, I guess... even though I still feel like I hardly know you." Liz and Alex seemed to be having a bit of a hard time with this as well.

There was a fairly length silence. "Okay... conversation stopper," Tess quipped.

Sanren seemed puzzled by that for a second, but he must have accessed the expression from Kyle's mind. "Well... okay, tell me more. What have you been doing here on earth since then??"

Michael cleared his throat uncertainly. "Well... fighting and planning a lot, I guess. We found that congresswoman Whittaker was a Skin, an alien agent... tracked her down to her unit in Copper Summit... attacked them... and ended up wiping them out when they counter-attacked Roswell. We started training ourselves in earnest then... we knew that we had to defend ourselves or lose forever. Ummm..." He thought a second. "What was the next really big thing that happened??" He seemed clearly unwilling to bring up the personal stuff in front of Sanren, who he still didn't really know, and so Liz decided not to bring it up herself.

"The summit, the next spring," Isabel said. "Representatives of the other planets contacted us... and their leaders travelled to earth - in other people's bodies, like you are now. Tried to renegotiate bringing us back home, stopping the violence that has sprung up in the local area... Kivar wanted to get the granilith back..." Sanren gasped a little at that reference, "...and to install us as puppet royalty to try and placate the royalists without giving up any real power."

"Of course... we didn't go for that," Tess pointed out. "So the negotiations pretty much broke down."

"Things got hot again as spring turned to summer," Max continued. "A few too many aliens attacking Roswell, where our family and friends were, so we left to draw them away."

"And we'd found clues to the fact that Bentor and the others had been sent to earth too," Isabel added. "So we went to find them..."

"Long story short," Michael broke in. "Some pretty big battles, a few interesting quests, and a lot of time on the road. But we're the ones left standing, and I think that counts for something."

"It sounds very lonely," Sanren muttered, almost in a whisper. "I would have wanted to spare you such a life, if I could. Heavens know I've had to fight far too many battles since I left the homeworld, though probably not quite as literally as you. Haven't you had the chance to have any fun!?"

There was a long silence. "I don't know about you," Alex put in, "but I'm getting pretty hungry. Lunch break, or breakfast, or something like that??"

They started opening up the backpacks and organizing food.

* * * *

"You know, this is actually pretty good," Sanren mentioned, and took another bite of his sandwich. "Though I'm not sure I'd think so if I was tasting it in my true body. What is it called??"

After a moment's hesitation, Liz leaned over to look at his selection. "A hero melt," she decided. "With turkey, ham, bacon, and pepper jack cheese."

Pepper Jack. For a sudden second, since they had been talking about the past so much, Michael couldn't help but flash back to the time, not that long after the year 2001 began, when he caught Brody and Davis and Maria together in the UFO center. They hadn't been doing anything, just sitting together, but somehow Michael knew that they had just kissed.

As far as he knew, neither of them ever knew that he had been there that night. It wasn't that he could blame Maria... he'd been avoiding her and treating her coldly for months... and nothing ever really happened between Maria and Brody, as far as he knew.

But he knew that something small, at least, inside his heart had broken that night.

"Hey... hey there Guerin, you still with us??"

"Huh?" As he looked up, his eyes couldn't focus for a second, and he almost said Maria's name. That would have been a bad idea. It was Isabel that had been talking to him, of course.

"Yeah, I'm here."

All of a sudden, a high-pitched whine erupted from the capsule. Sanren, Max, and Tess hurried over to it. Michael followed them, Isabel and Alex hot on his heels.

"What's going on??" he asked.

"It's stored reserves of energy are running low," Tess muttered.

"Are you going to be able to transfer back, Sanren??" Isabel asked.

"I think so... but we're going to have to shut down the reality warp," Sanren said. "In less than a minute."

"What happens to us when you do??" Alex asked.

"We'll pop back into regular reality, right?" Max asked. Sanren nodded. "Whatever regular reality happens to be at this point."

"I'm pretty sure that the emergency field will bounce us if we happen to be occupying the same space as a tree or whatever," Sanren commented, and flipped a switch.

Reality changed... and Michael found himself hunched down a little bit on one side, presumably so as to avoid a big branch that otherwise would be right where his shoulder had been.

"Okay, this doesn't look too ba--" Alex started, when suddenly a bright blue ball of light streaked through them, almost hitting Maria.

"Duck and cover!!" Max called out. Michael tried to dive towards Maria, but his feet wouldn't move... he crouched down, to present a small target and take a look. Many blades of grass were embedded in the soles of his shoes.

"What the hell is going on??" Isabel asked.

TO BE CONTINUED...

Whom among us, part seventeen
Author: Chris Kenworthy
Email: chrisk@fanfiction.net
Disclaimer: No, I don't own any of the Roswell characters. I don't plan to steal them and lock them up in white rooms either. I just let them out to play from time to time and see what happens.
Distribution: Distribute anywhere you like, now based at http://www.fanfiction.net/~chriskenworthy
Feedback: YES PLEASE!
Category: Roswell future-fic
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Liz's life changes when, as a university junior, she runs into Max again.
Spoilers: Up to 'end of the world,' kinda

Dedication: This part dedicated to fondaroswell, cameraman, and of course Trude.


Liz clung to the nearest body, which happened to be Max, with one arm and tried to peer through the trees in the direction that the blast had come. For an instant, she saw a man-like figure pointing the palm of his hand and firing a devastating energy pulse somewhat to the side of their direction. "Kaffarran?" she whispered hoarsely. "What are they doing here??"

"Damnit," Sanren swore, human-fashion, in an undertone, as he stepped Kyle's body close to them. "I thought I'd lost the Kaffarrans two planets back... how'd they know to look for me here??"

Max, Tess, and Liz all turned to stare at Sanren. "Umm... we had a run-in with the Kaffarrans in Arizona," Tess muttered, also trying to keep her voice down. "Or maybe two. We assumed that they were after us, but if they've been chasing you..."

"Sshhh," Michael interrupted, hurrying over towards them with a supportive arm around Maria. Liz nodded, realizing that against those horrible android-things, any sound might give them away, no matter how quiet they tried to be. "Strategy??" Michael mouthed silently. Isabel and Alex were also heading in to join the loose huddle.

Max considered, waving at the space capsule to indicate that they couldn't leave it behind, and then indulging in some gesturing and pointing that was hopefully meant to help him think silently, rather than to communicate his thoughts to the others. Liz watched as he looked the group over, his gaze lingering over Tess, Isabel, and Liz herself, and then he swallowed hard in the way that she knew meant he was coming to terms with a hard necessity.

First he held up two fingers silently. "Stalk and awe" he mouthed without voice... at least, that was the best guess she could make of what he was trying to say. He pointed to himself, and to Isabel, and questioningly to Alex. "Rear guard?" he asked in that same silent mouth-only fashion.

For a split moment Alex considered, and then he nodded grimly. "No hero," Max warned silently. Then he pointed to Michael, and Tess, and Liz herself, and she understood without being asked that the deal was similar. She was there to keep watch wherever the two of them couldn't, not to indulge in foolish heroics, considering that she had no way to defend herself. She nodded ready acceptance.

Finally, Max turned to Maria and Kyle/Sanren, and indicated the space capsule. then a huge patch of overgrown bushes. Once again, the meaning seemed perfectly clear. Since Sanren had given up his powers in the psychic transfer, and Maria didn't have any, they would watch over the space capsule from hiding and try to find some way to raise an alarm safely if the bounty hunters managed to get this far.

Without a word, they seperated into teams.

* * * *

Michael turned around for just a second to look back at Liz. She nodded at him... the coast was clear behind them, as far as she could tell. He smiled and stepped behind a tree. Liz hunkered down behind a thick bush and watched herself.

Soon, she could see the figure of one of the Kafarran bounty hunters hurrying down the path. All of a sudden, Michael stepped out, his right hand towards the enemy, the base of the palm pushed out furthest, fingers spread. There was a huge shock wave and a flash of light that Liz couldn't really see. Suddenly the android (or exoskeleton, or whatever,) was down on the ground.

Now Tess was on the scene too, streaming unearthly energy towards the fallen figure. Michael contributed a beam of red fire. The Kaffarran struggled, and tried to scream, but both efforts failed as its body started to spark, sizzle, and melt.

Suddenly, Michael nodded, and both he and Tess turned and ran past Liz's hiding place. She hurried to get up and follow them. The sounds of other intruders were quickly converging on this area.

* * * *

Alex rushed away from the approaching automaton... all of a sudden he stumbled and fell to the ground, obviously struggling to get back onto his feet before it was too late. As he got his legs back under him, he quickly ran under a huge, flat rock overhand and rushed away.

The Kaffarran followed relentlessly, not deviating an inch from his path. All of a sudden, just when the bounty hunter was right under the middle of the overhang, there was an ominous crack, and not more than a second later... the huge slab of stone fell. Straight down. It had to be easily three hundred metric tonnes pressing straight down on that artificial body. As far as either Max or Isabel could tell, the two stone faces now met smoothly, without any indication of an obstruction between them.

"These Kaffarrans may be powerful and all that, but they're not that bright," Alex whispered.

* * * *

Isabel walked quietly up behind Michael as the two teams rendezvous-ed. Very carefully, she touched her fingers to the back of his hand and initiated a low-level mental dialog, hoping that this form of communication wasn't even more obvious than talking. It shouldn't be... Tess was good at sensing the use of the power, and yet she couldn't even tell when the two of them were doing this six feet away... unless she knew by the expression on their faces, of course.

**What are we looking at??** she asked mentally.

**They've come together,** Michael replied, waving down a slope through the trees. Sure enough, the remaining Kaffarrans had adopted their own strategies... there were three of them moving together as a unit, with one of them watching behind.

**They're being cautious too... don't think you're gonna lure them into another booby trap like that rock drop,** Michael added after a few minutes.

Isabel considered. With all three of them together, they wouldn't be able to use a sudden ambush and numerical superiority to disable any of the exoskeleton units again either. **Then we play that up. Scare them, try and make them jump at shadows. At least we can try to slow them down.**

And they tried. But the Kaffarrans were canny, not easily fooled, and soon all six of them were running out of plausible ruses. As the hunting party's search pattern started to bring them closer to the space capsule's hiding place, Max made a decision again.

He waved Alex and Liz away and brought the rest to him, obviously ready to face all three bounty hunters in a last, desperate stand to protect his father's retreat.

Suddenly, something stopped him. The blue sky and sunlight above them all darkened, as some sort of thick gray veil materialized about thirty feet above their heads... it seemed to cover the whole area. And then a voice rang out.

Kyle's voice.

"You are here for Sanren of Liaret, are you not?? Then come for me!!"

Everyone froze for a long moment. And then the lead android stepped towards the source of the voice. Max moved slightly to make certain that he was immediately in between.

"Don't interfere, Max. Any of you!!" Sanren called out again. "This is between me and them, now. I don't want you getting hurt over my dealings."

And so, very reluctantly, Max walked aside. So did the rest of them, and the bounty hunters calmly proceeded past them.

"Uhhh... wait a second??" Liz asked suddenly. "What do they want to do with him?? Is Kyle in danger?"

* * * *

(A few minutes earlier...)

Maria looked around from where she was crouched down almost flat in hiding. It had been a long time since they had heard the loud crash, and none of the teams had come back to check on them. What if something had gone wrong?? What if they were all lying out there in the woods somewhere, dead or dying??

Sanren jogged her elbow slightly and pointed. She didn't know if Sanren had somehow been aware of her nervousness, but as she looked she caught a glimpse of Michael and Iz a long way away... seeming perfectly healthy if concentrated on whatever it was they were doing.

Something occured to Maria then, and she poked Sanren back. (How weird was it for Max and Isabel's dad to be here on earth, and to be sharing Kyle's body of all things??) When he looked at her, she pointed at him, then at the space capsule, mimed putting a bowl-shaped helmet down onto her head and pulling a huge switch, and finally made a swooshing gesture with one of her hands flying to the sky. If these androids were after Sanren, shouldn't he use the psychic transfer gizmo inside the space capsule to get back to his own body?? Once he'd left, maybe the Kaffarrans would leave the rest of them alone... though there would be the problem of convincing them that Sanren had left the planet, she supposed. At least *he* would be safe, though.

Sanren seemed to have understood Maria's charades, but he shook his head. Pointed down in the direction that they had seen Michael and Isabel, repeating the point to emphasize further, beyond them. Waved his hands, (or Kyle's hands, whatever,) flat in front of him, fingers waving. Duplicated Maria's swoosh gesture, except that his swooshing hand ricocheted off the other hand, held flat as a barrier, and zoomed down again.

Maria understood him too, pretty much. The bounty hunters were somehow generating some interference that would prevent the transfer device from working correctly, that might even somehow capture Sanren's psychic essence if he tried to use it, or leave him stranded without a body. Certainly better not to risk that, she agreed.

After a long few seconds, another thought occured to her. She pointed back to the space capsule again, and then mimed a huge roundhouse punch, hoping that her meaning was clear. If Sanren couldn't use the space capsule to escape, could he use it to fight the Kaffarrans?

Kyle's face creased as Sanren considered this. Then he replied, pointing to the capsule himself and mimicking her roundhouse punch, (knocking some of his own fingers as stand-in androids,) then putting his two hands together at right angles to indicate a readout with the level low. Then putting the bowl helmet down over his head, and the swooshing hand unable to rise at all.

If he uses the energy of the probe to fight the Kaffarrans, he won't have any to get home, Maria realized. She nodded her understanding to Sanren, but to her surprise he wasn't there!! She looked around frantically saw him at the controls to the capsule.

Quickly a huge dark shadow appeared overhead, obscuring the sun. Maria gasped, and as he noticed her, Sanren waved Maria well back. She got up and edged away, very slowly, trying to keep him in sight.

"You are here for Sanren of Liaret, are you not??" he called out. Maria froze. "Then come for me!!"

There was a long pause, and then Sanren added, still in a clear and carrying voice, "Don't interfere, Max. Any of you! This is between me and them now. I don't want you getting hurt over my dealings!"

The silence was ominous, and Maria shivered. All she could hope was that Sanren knew what he was doing, that he wanted to draw the enemy into some kind of trap.

Soon enough, they appeared... or at any rate, three people that she didn't know walked into the clearing area. Their expessions did seem to be a little inflexible, too. Like wax statues come to life.

"So who is it, anyway??" Sanren asked them. "Archduke Melfis??"

"The red peerage of Bertilsandew," the Kaffarran in the middle answered, in a smooth and very human-sounding tenor. "They seemed most excited about the idea of having your essence imprisoned in a restraining crystal to keep in their great sanctuary hall."

"I'll go willingly under one condition." Sanren shot back. "On the moon Zaltrix three... all eight hellseas freeze over!!" And then he punched fiercely at a button on the space capsule.

It happened so fast that Maria wasn't quite sure that she'd seen it at first... that what she saw had actually happened. It was like... well, it wasn't really like anything else Maria had ever seen, which was another part of the problem that she had graspiing it. It reminded her vaguely of some half-remembered cartoon where a character steps on a section of floor that turns out to be at the arm of a catapult... which device automatically goes off, of course. Except here there was, obviously, no actual catapult.

Each of the three enemy aliens had suddenly been boosted up and backwards by some unimaginable, invisible force... attaining such huge speeds in a split fraction that Maria was sure it must have strained their systems, nearly indestructible metal or not. She was pretty sure that she had heard some kind of faint cry echoing over the wind as they departed.

What happened next was a blur... until she was being shaken out of her stunned trance by Liz on one side and Alex on the other. "Mar... what happened??"

"It... he..." Maria shook her head, which still seemed full of confusions, and decided that, having no answers to Alex's question, she might as well ask some herself. "Sanren... did you really..."

Kyle's head nodded slowly... gravely. "A fairly simple kick-out with the emergency impulse engine. I didn't think they'd be expecting it."

"Do-- do you mean..." Tess muttered. "Was that really the Kaffarrans we saw through the trees..." She pointed overhead with a singe finger.

"Yeah," Maria muttered.

"Wow," Michael muttered, overwhelmed by... what?? The elelegance of Sanren's solution? The sheer power that had been necessary to carry it off?! Or just the simple fact that they were safe for the moment?

"How far did you send them?" Max asked.

"Umm..." Sanren thought about that. Was he working out the physics of their trajectory or just converting the end result into units that would be relevant for the earth-born? "Probably I got ten miles... maybe eleven or twelve. But more importantly, after that double impact, they'll be in bad shape. Probably not dead... but I don't think any of them will be up for heading back here for a few days at least."

"Really?" Liz asked, and Sanren nodded. "Whew!!" There were similar expressions of relief and muted celebration all around.

And that was when they heard the sound of engines pulling up the trail. The guys tensed up, not sure if it was Kaffarran reinforcements or ordinary tourists... but it wasn't either.

"Hey, chief." It was Davin, driving the RV. Kenner was bringing up the rear with Max's car, and Maria figured that the others were riding along in one vehicle or the other. "We came in as soon as the field came down. Sorry it took so long to find you. What's the what with that capsule??" Max started filling him in and re-introducing him to his liege lord.

"Of course," Alex laughed. "The cavalry arrives just in time to be entirely too late, after our heroes have dispatched the bad guys."

"Watch it with them smartass remarks if you want a ride, bud," Isabel teased him.

* * * *

They set up camp after about twenty minute's drive in the general direction away from that in which the bounty hunters had been thrown... not that anyone disbelieved Sanren's judgement that they had seen the last of them, but just because the thought of going nearer to them made most of the group slightly more uneasy than creating a wider cushion of space.

After a bit of discussion, the 'shadow field' had been kept up -- which turned out to be a recharge feature of the space capsule, so that it could replenish with sunlight the energy that had been used to boost the Kaffarrans into their trajectory, and once that had happened enough Sanren would be able to return to the Zxygahtsien moon and resume the journey to Antar, in his own body.

"Should be 'all systems go' by a half an hour before sunset," the old Antarian monarch said when he checked the capsule controls while the camp site was being set up. A jury-rigged trailer had been set up so that they could take the capsule with them, towing it behind Max's car. "Until then, we have some more talking to do."

Max checked his watch and was surprised to see that it wasn't even eleven in the morning. Between the desperate race up to Alberta, all of the strangeness of the reality warp, and the cat and mouse games with the Kaffarran bounty hunters, he felt tired enough for it to be sunset already, if not next Saturday. But... "Yeah, I think I'd like that."

So the two of them sat on a park picnic table for a while, Max and Sanren, sharing little moments from their lives since they'd been separated. At one point, something caught Sanren's eye, and he pointed it out to Max. Maria was leaning up against the back of a tree, forcing a smile as Michael insisted on patching up the several minor injuries she had picked up during the Kaffarran encounter.

"He loves her very much," Sanren remarked softly. "And I think she'll be good for him."

For a second, Max couldn't believe what he was hearing. "Dad!! Michael and Isabel are married now... you do realize that, right??"

For a very long moment Sanren was silent. "Yes, I do realize it," he said finally. "What I'm not sure is if it's a good thing." Max just stared at him.

"Okay." Sanren shook his head. "When I was taken by the Targlateanu, it took me a while, but eventually I realized that they had started a new life for me... an existence in which the rules and conditions I had grown accustomed to had been totally thrown out the window. And, bit by bit, I realized that with a new life, you need to make all of the big choices of life over again. You don't have to make them differently, but you should try and make them for the right reasons.

"The four of you have been given a new life, Max -- even more literally than I was, and I wanted to try to find some way to talk to each of you about this before I had to go. I'd be the last one to argue against fidelity and constancy... but these are far from the usual circumstances."

"Dad... what are you..." Max was belatedly getting the feeling that his whole universe was about to shift.

"Now... it doesn't take a telepath to realize that you and Tess, also, found a very treasurable connection with a young human of the opposite gender when you were younger... you with Liz Parker, Tess with... well, with Kyle himself." Sanren chuckled at the irony of discussing this, given that he was still occupying Kyle's body. "And I think that you turned away from those relationships, re-affirmed your marriage because you thought that it was the only right thing to do. Mm?"

"Yeah... I guess you could say that," Max mumbled.

"I don't believe that. If you're really sure that you belong with Tess, or that you've travelled far enough with her that you can't bear to split up and start again... well, I'm not in any position to second-guess your choices."

"He said, after totally..." Max started, then decided not to finish the thought.

"Hey." Sanren actually managed to twist Kyle's face into a classic 'Dad' look. "I'm just offering a little fatherly advice here - a perspective that you may not have thought of. It's up to you what you do with it."

"Riight..." Max thought a second. "So was there anything else?? I think I've gotten the point that you were trying to get across... though I have to admit, I really have no clue what I want to 'do with it.'"

"Give it a little time," Sanren suggested. "I suspect you'll figure out what's right... and who's right for you... before too long."

"Maybe." Max smiled. "Well, you've got a little time before you have to go have 'the talk' with anyone else, I guess. Let me ask you this -- did you make any 'new choices' out there in the unknown sectors of the galaxy?? Anything you wouldn't be anxious to tell Mom about??"

Sanren grimaced a little. "There was someone, I'll admit that... and to your mother, too, when the time is right. But I had to leave her behind, because there were other things that I needed to do. What I'll do after I've dealt with Kivar... that I'm not sure, I'll admit. Will need to decide which of my lives I want to go back to, I guess."

Something in Max's heart softened. "Tell me about her, this other girlfriend of yours. How did you meet??"

* * * *

Alex had been relaxing against a tree when she came up to him, looking all steely and determined. Isabel. "It's time."

"Umm... huh??" he muttered, though he suspected he did know what she was talking about.

"The psyche-merge... you haven't changed your mind, have you??" Alex shook his head. "Then we're doing it now. I want it to be before my Dad has to go... I'm not sure why."

Alex stood up. "Fine by me. Where??"

She led him into the RV, which was almost empty, though last Alex knew there had been several people playing a board game in there. Isabel waved him into the small, enclosed bedroom, where he was surprised to see the older hybrid woman... what was her name again? Alex was sure that he knew it...

"Ardra will be observing the procedure," Isabel told him, a clinical note in her voice. "Monitoring our general mental energies, and attempting to correct any problem that might arise... not that I expect anything."

"I'd rather this was being done under the care of another telepathic master," Ardra muttered softly. "But there aren't any available, and I'm the next best thing. Still sure you want to go ahead, mister Whitman??"

Alex froze a second, and then he looked into Isabel's eyes. "Yes."

They had him lie down near the edge of the bed, and Isabel knelt beside him, their heads close together. She reached out, touched the far side of his face, and then spread her hand so that the back fingers were spreading through the hair behind his ear. Slowly he became aware of something... not something physical. Her presence in his mind.

**Thank you for doing this for me, Alex.** Iz told him silently. **I hope that neither of us regrets it.**

And then... there was blackness, an unconsciousness so profound that Alex could feel it.

The next thing that he remembered, Ardra was gone, and Isabel was sitting in the chair that the other woman had occupied. He couldn't sense any difference in the character of his mind right away, but as he looked into Isabel's face he could tell that she was already aware of a tremendous difference.

"Well... THAT I didn't expect, I have to admit," she whispered.

* * * *

Liz was looking over the space capsule... trying to get her mind around the idea that they had actually found it, that this was what they'd been racing towards ever since her fateful meeting with Max back in Arizona, more than... what, twelve hundred miles away from where they stood now in Alberta.

And to think that this pile of unearthly electronics had brought Max and Isabel's alien father here to meet with them... it still boggled her mind. She ran her hand an inch above the exposed circuits, careful not to disturb anything, but hoping for some clue as to how it could accomplish a feat that went so far beyond human dreams.

"Hard to believe that the quest is over, isn't it??" Liz looked up, to see Michael Guerin smiling that old, familiar, crooked grin at her. "I wanted to make sure that I thanked you... and that I apologized."

Liz blinked in surprise. "That isn't really necessary, Michael. I understand..."

"I've been rude to you this whole time, and we never would have made it here in time if it weren't for you. I'm so sorry, Liz." He said it slowly, and softly, and Liz felt her heart melt with affection.

"You're very welcome, Michael," she told him back with what she hoped was equal sincerity. "I had my doubts at the start, but I wouldn't have missed any of this for the world... any world. More than one of them, maybe."

Michael laughed. "Umm... there was something that I wanted to ask you."

"Sure, okay." Michael didn't continue immediately. "Ask of me what you will," Liz prompted.

"Welll... erm, you've been staying in touch with Maria, right??"

Liz was starting to get curious now. "Yeah, I have. Well, if you count phone calls every two weeks as staying in touch. And I guess the case could be made that she's been the one who's been staying in touch with me, though it's not as if..."

"Not really the point," Michael muttered, and Liz realized that she had been babbling. "The thing is... you know what's going on in her life back in Roswell, more or less, right??"

"Well, yeah, I think I do at least."

"Is she seeing anybody??" After that, Michael could have knocked Liz over with a feather, but apparently he mistook her surprised silence for uncertainty or something... or maybe he started talking again out of uncertainty. "Does she have a boyfriend? Fiance? Husband??"

"Yeah, yeah, I got the notion," Liz assured him quickly. "And no, I haven't heard anything about that. A few blind dates recently that haven't gone too well... but she hasn't been seeing anybody for a while." And then she couldn't resist. "Why are you asking, Michael?? Are you..."

"Sanren said some stuff to me," Michael said quickly, and somehow that shut Liz up. "So... you're probably missing some classes, huh?"

Liz blinked again and realized that he was right. "It's... what, it's Tuesday, isn't it??" Michael considered a moment, and nodded. "I haven't even been thinking about school, or about classes. I guess I'd better be heading back pretty soon though, huh??"

"Might be an idea," Michael agreed lazily. "If university and getting your degree is something that's important to you, of course." He wasn't being sardonic, Liz realized... he was allowing for the possibility that what she'd been through over the past few days might have drastically changed her priorities... and in many ways, it had.

But not there, she realized. "Yeah, it really is."

Michael smiled and headed on his way. After a moment or two Liz turned away from the capsule's exposed innards herself.

* * * *

"I am so glad that I was able to come, and that you were able to meet me," Sanren said that evening, embracing each of them in farewell. "It has been the one true solace to my spirit since I have begun this long journey."

"Good luck, Dad," Max said softly. "Are you... are you sure that you aren't endangering yourself if you go after Kivar alone??"

"I don't really think so. Many of power on the homeworld... even those Kivar counts as his most loyal follower owe allegiance to me that they cannot forswear. That is why he had to remove me from the scene in the first place." He smiled wryly and turned to Isabel. "Take care of your brother, Vil-- Isabel."

She smiled at him. "I will."

"Hey, why didn't you tell me to take care of her??" Max asked.

Sanren just smiled, and put the P.I.T helmet hack over his head. "All ready."

Tess reached out and flipped a big switch, and all of a sudden the solar energy screen faded out, letting the evening light hit on them full. Liz bent down and waved at the figure still hooked up to the space capsule. "Uhh... Kyle??"

"Yeah." Kyle reached up and took the helmet off. "Sanren has left the solar system. MAN, that was weird!!"

Liz laughed. "So... are we heading off now?"

"Not quite yet," Max muttered. Liz turned to look at him. "I know that you have to get back to Arizona, but there's something very important that I need to talk to you about, and I think it would be better to get to it before we hit the road." There was an awkward pause. "If it helps, we've talked about it," he nodded to Michael, "and we should be able to arrange a plane ticket from Calgary to Phoenix for you. You'll be there in time for classes tomorrow morning."

Hmmm... Liz thought about that. She was still behind on sleep... but she could use Davin's meditation technique on the airplane, and she'd be okay until the afternoon, and then she could crash in her room. "Umm... okay, yeah, that's probably a good idea. Where do you want to, umm..." she trailed off.

"Come on." Max led her towards the trail into the woods, and Tess followed. For a long time there was silence, and then Max spoke up again. "Michael and Isabel are ending their marriage."

It took several seconds for that to penetrate with Liz. "Uhh... huh? What?? Oh, my god!!!"

Tess smiled reassuringly. "Totally mutual - and voluntary. Sanren had stuff to tell us, about the choices that we've made, and the reasons why. Michael and Iz decided that he was on to something... that they'd made the choice to be together because it was something they'd come to believe they *HAD* to do, because of their life on our old world."

"That if they had made those choices based on their new lives alone, based on THIS world, they would have done it differently," Max added. "What happened between Isabel and Alex during the psyche merge helped with that. They're joined now, and I'm sure that Isabel never realized how much that would change HER. They're together now, already, and Michael is going to see if he can make things right with Maria. To get back on track with her. It won't be easy, after everything that's happened between them, all the baggage that they both carry, but I think that they can make it work if they try."

Liz's head was spinning. Isabel and Alex... Michael and Maria... she knew how much those pairings meant to her friends, and had given them up as lost causes so many years ago. And by analogy, and the fact that Max and Tess thought it was so important to tell all of this to her... "And... what about the two of you??"

"We're... not sure," Max admitted laconically. Another long pause, as they walked through the quiet woods. "Tess... has made her choice. She loves me and wants to stay with me. But she's also volunteered to step aside if I find out that that... isn't what I need."

Liz looked over at the young hybrid woman and nodded her thanks. That was a decision that she had thought, at the time, the teenage Tess she remembered wasn't capable of. Maybe she hadn't been, back then. "And what do YOU think, Max??"

"I don't know. I.. I love you *so* much, Liz..." he caught her glance, and she could tell that he was sincere, "and I love Tess, too, very much. It seems to me that there's some..." He struggled for the right word for long moments. "Some QUALITATIVE difference between what I feel for the two of you, and that if I can fathom that difference, the right answer will be obvious. But I can't see it for what it is. Maybe I'm not objective enough."

Liz nodded slowly. "I think I know what you mean. I feel so much for you, even after so long... and I feel strongly for Pete too, back in Arizona. I think I've been in love with him for three years, though we've never been able to get our timing together enough to go out on a date." She sighed. "But I'm not sure if I can help you sort out which is which."

"There's one possibility -- even I have to admit it's a little out there." Liz blinked. Tess hadn't said anything for a while, but Liz realized that maybe she wasn't really supposed to. This was between Max and Liz, really... Tess was just along to establish that it was all above board, that nothing was being done behind her back. To show that she approved of Max figuring this out.

"And, umm... and that would be??"

"We have Isabel link our minds, like she did for herself and Alex. There's no secrets in the merge, no mysteries... as the two of them found out. We would know where we stand... that's almost certain."

"And if we find out that we're not meant to be together?" Liz asked. "Isabel warned Alex away from completing the link pretty strongly, as I remember. She thought that sharing her thoughts without sharing her life would be torture for him. I'm not sure that I want to sign myself up for that, or you."

Max smiled. "I think there's a difference. Right now, I'm confident enough in our connection to say that we'll be sharing our lives. The question is how -- as best friends, as husband and wife, as some other relationship that I'm not even seeing right now, but we'll be in each other's lives. And it will be *right.* We just need to figure out what the definition of that relationship would be." He paused. "Of course, if you decide that you don't want to go into the psyche-merge because it's too great an intimacy, I guess that's an answer, too... of a sort."

Liz stood still. She knew that he was right, and she knew what her answer was.

TO BE CONTINUED...

Whom among us, part eighteen
Author: Chris Kenworthy
Email: chrisk@fanfiction.net
Disclaimer: No, I don't own any of the Roswell characters. I don't plan to steal them and lock them up in white rooms either. I just let them out to play from time to time and see what happens.
Distribution: Distribute anywhere you like, now based at http://www.fanfiction.net/~chriskenworthy
Feedback: YES PLEASE!
Category: Roswell future-fic
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Liz's life changes when, as a university junior, she runs into Max again.
Spoilers: Up to 'end of the world,' kinda


Liz looked at Max, glanced over at Tess, and then back to the young man she had once been so sure was her soulmate. "Okay, I have an answer for you."

She could hear Max drawing in a quick breath. "Uh... and??"

Liz smiled at him. "Of course I'll do it. I -- I feel the same way that you do, and it you think that this mind meld thing is the best way to figure out our doubts and confusion, then... I trust you about that."

Max smiled a little himself and took her hand in his. "It isn't really a mind meld, of course," he told her softly.

"Psyche-merge, same difference really," Liz scoffed. "You link two brains together, that's the bottom line, isn't it??" Max's silence on that score said it all.

"Come on," was all he told her, and hand in hand they walked down the path, and took a turn right at a fork, Tess following silently behind the two of them the whole way. Soon all three of them emerged in a small clearing where a large park picnic table had been rather incongrously set up. A large foam mattress and several blankets had been spread over the table top, and Isabel was standing next to it.

"Get on," Iz said softly, indicating the table. Of course, with her mentalic powers, she would have known what decision Max and Liz had come to by the time she could see them. Liz froze, a little doubtfully, but Max climbed up onto the far side of the table, using the seat bench as a step, and laid down on one side of it, his head pointing in Isabel's direction, and clearly leaving room for Liz to lie down beside him.

Liz turned, somewhat surprisingly to herself, towards Tess. "Are you sure... I mean, this is kind of an intrusion on you and Max's... your private emotional space, you know what I mean?? I wouldn't want to..."

"It's okay," Tess assured her. "How could I build a life with Max if he wasn't sure that I was the right partner for him, if he were always looking back and wondering if you were his destiny all along?? There's no way. Go -- settle it once and for all, and if you *are*... you know, meant for each other, then I'll be happy for you. Really," she insisted, but there was clearly a tear in her eye.

Impulsively, Liz reached out and hugged Tess tight, and then hurried up to the table to take her place. She was struck by a momentary sense of incongruity as she lay there, next to Max but only barely touching him, watching Isabel's face upside down as she started to review the procedure.

"Now, the psyche-merge takes full effect only in a moment of deep unconsciousness," she told both of them. "Consciousness is largely a mental feedback process, and for the feedback routines to be active at the same time as your mind is linked totally with that of another person would be horribly dangerous. You'd be getting feedback on everything that he's thinking about your memories, and... well, it would be really likely that a feedback loop would be established that could only be broken by inflicting deliberate brain damage."

"So... I'll put each of you into a deep sleep first, and then establish the link, let it run for a few seconds, end the connection, and then wake you both up. It takes a long while, though, to sort through exactly what you've learned from the link, and how you've changed as a result of it." Isabel chuckled dryly. "Believe me, I speak from experience."

"By the way," Liz piped up, "congratulations, iz."

"Thanks. Are we all ready now??"

Liz nodded, and Max made a wordless sound of agreement. Isabel nodded back at them, and then... she was aware of the world fading around her quickly.

When awareness returned, though, it was as quick as a snap of somebody's fingers. "Don't try to get up," Isabel whispered softly. "It's gonna hit you in a few seconds. You might want to look at each other." Agreeable enough, Liz propped herself up on an elbow and glanced to her left... where she found herself staring into Max's eyes, as he was doing something of the same sort.

----------

Two hearts. One born and lived in that small desert place... born to a mother and father that had lived in that place almost all of *their* lives. One heart, longing and craving to see more of the world.

The other heart... from a land so far distant that neither of them could truly understand the distance... did not NEED to understand it, perhaps, except to understand that it was greater than they could understand. Did not truly understand either, perhaps, how a heart could live, and die before its time, and be born again to a new life and a new body.

And they met, and -- sacrifice. To keep the first heart from dying before HER time, the second risked everything... (a sound so loud that it rang, the smell of powder -- precious redness leaking out... lost forever) risked its secrets, gambled its life and its family, and won - perhaps. (Fear and uncertainty: argumentative questions in the night. Silver print glowing on pale skin. Bodies flying through a curtain of fire -- tumbling to the ground and burning as the crowds cheered.)

And the two of them slowly came to discover that sacrifice and salvation had propelled them both, and those surrounding them, into a coming of age trial unlike any other. (Silver key and hexagon dome. Lost pages, found once again, sealed up behind brick and mortar and charm of seal. Circle of water around the balance... stepping back,)

And through it all, there had been a magnetism, (beautiful in his eyes, boiling in the wave -- chain reaction) a sense of kismet, between the two of them, that neither had known how to deal with. (Stepping out from behind the tree, Ed on the highway.) At first, the realization of how truly different they were, that they came from worlds apart, had seemed to stand in the way, and neither could admit to the other how they truly felt. (Stepping back, stepping back. Something to throw himself into.) Later, distractions from his old life had resurfaced... another reborn one, who still felt passion for him. An uncompleted mission. (Fifth point of the V, one side of the square. The waiting slaves.)

And throughout it all, they had not yet been mature... not adult, but adolescent, and not truly understanding the rapport between them. Finally he had left the desert place, and then so did she, in the opposite direction. Feeling that they had to separate completely and never meet again in order to live their lives.

But fate is nothing if it has not a sense of humor, and meet again they did, in the last place either would have expected, and at such a time that they could not help but mix their lives again. That remarkable adventure... was not at an end, and what was about to happen next??

Their hearts had touched. Directly, without the conventions of language or society getting in the way. And she had realized...

---

Liz shook her head, opened her eyes again (when had they closed??) and found Max again. "Do you... did you??" she muttered. Somehow it seemed impossible that he could have come to a different conclusion than she had, but she had learned many times over to take no assumptions for granted. They had not truly EXPERIENCED the merge together; it had happened, but they had each experienced it separately after waking up, no matter how much it seemed otherwise.

"Umm... yeah, I -- I think so," Max told her again, searching in her face for something, just as she was probably doing herself at that moment. And then, as she looked at his slightly bemused, but totally satisfied expression, she somehow knew.

"Umm... I, uh... I think we'd probably better get going," Max said after a moment. "Your plane... well, I think if we head off right now you'll have half an hour at the airport, but..."

"Better early just in case," Liz filled in, shaking her head and swinging her legs back down onto the bench. "Yeah, good idea. We... we have some things to talk about, too."

"Ummm..." Both Liz and Max turned to watch Tess, standing nervously next to a thick tree trunk. "Well, uh... should I come with?"

Max and Liz shared a glance, and Liz smiled. "Yeah, I think that's a good idea," Max said. "You'll need to understand."

Tess followed along behind, still seeming very nervous and scared. As they got into the car, Liz muttered "Isn't there something you should be saying to your wife, Max??"

"Um, uhhh..." To stall for time, Max paid a great deal of attention to pulling out and turning the car around to head back out of the park. "Yes, uhh, Yess?"

"Yeah?" Max turned so he could see her in the rear view mirror. "Tess, I want to stay with you." Nervously, he looked over at Liz. "That *is* what you were thinking I was going to say, right??" Liz smiled and nodded at him.

"You... you what??" Tess burst out. "Sorry... am I dreaming here??" Liz reached into the back seat and pinched her on the arm, hard. "OWWW!!"

"Yeah, this is real life," Liz told her. "And you damn well better appreciate it - this is Max Evans we're talking about!!"

"Okay, okay... I appreciate it, even though I'm not sure I understand," Tess shot back. "I... well, to be honest, Max, I guess I always thought that if you had a chance to get back together with Liz, you... wouldn't even think twice." She grinned wryly.

"Really??" Max repeated. "You never let on. I hope you didn't lose much sleep over it."

"Not until you brought her home with you in Arizona," Tess laughed. "I guess it was always just a notion deep in the back of my mind, that she was your soulmate and I was just... well, just the replacement girl."

"Tess!!" Max protested. "Even when I was... conflicted... about having left Liz behind, you were more to me than a replacement."

"That's good to know," she assured him. "So... well, what did you see?? I mean, if you can explain it to someone else."

"I think I can try," Liz volunteered. "Basically... Max and I really *are* soulmates..." Tess gasped in shock, "but that doesn't mean that we should be, well... married. Or anything like that."

"Ohh... so it's a platonic soulmate thing??" Tess asked.

"More like plutonic," Max laughed. "But yeah, that's about the size of it... though I have to say it isn't anything about the intensity of what I feel for Liz that is any less than what I feel for you... just quite different. If you don't mind me saying so, that is."

"Hey," Tess laughed. "As long as we're not breaking up, I don't care if Liz is your long-lost sister... or something like that, I dunno."

"Actually, that's not a horrible way to put it, though not quite right either I don't think," Liz said. "The thing is, it was the *intensity* of the connection that Max and I felt that confused us -- that, and raging teenage hormones. I... I don't think we were ever a particularly good fit as boyfriend and girlfriend, even before you showed up, but neither of us could see the reasons why at the time. Or maybe we were an okay match right then, but only because we hadn't become... who we're on our way to becoming. Does that make any sense??"

"Enough," Tess told her.

"We're... going to have to find someplace to settle down within reasonable driving distance of Tempe, I think," Max told Tess. "The two of us need to be part of each other's lives again. It's been too long."

"Wherever you go, I'll follow," Tess quipped, now suddenly grinning like an idiot as, (presumably,) everything that she had learned was sinking in. "So, Liz... are you going to start things up with that Pete guy??"

"Ummm... I hadn't really come to a decision about that," Liz had to admit. "Things have been developing pretty quickly, if you haven't noticed."

* * * *

"I'm still not sure that I believe it," Alex muttered. He and Isabel were lying on the bed in the RV... they hadn't DONE anything, (well, not terribly much at least.) Both of them felt reasonably content to wait, that there was no great need to jump into things just because of the suddenness with which they had rediscovered each other. The RV was heading south back towards the US border, and from there back to the southwest.

"I think you'd better believe it," Isabel told him with a laugh. "It might start to hold our relationship back otherwise."

Alex laughed, leaned over to kiss her, and then propped himself up into a sitting position. "Try to explain it to me again. What... what did you see? What made you change your mind so suddenly??"

"Ummm... well, let's see." Isabel smiled up at him. "I saw... that is, well -- I knew... how much you believed in us... and yet you respected my choice to be with Michael enough that you never said a word about it..."

"Well, that wasn't entirely respect," Alex countered. "There was also a little something called fear of rejection..."

"Don't try the false modesty thing on someone who's touched your mind," Isabel advised him. "It doesn't work. Let's see... I realized what it really meant that you were so strong inside, and so considerate, and loyal. I have to admit, I think I would have figured it all out even if we hadn't done the psyche merge, once Sanren's visit made me realize that my priorities needed some re-examining. Seeing into your brain just sealed the deal instantly."

Alex smiled, and lay back down, and they sank into the silence comfortably for a few minutes. "So... what's next??" Alex asked.

"Well, I've been thinking about that," Isabel admitted. "I know that I want to be with you, but I don't want to be too far away from my family either. Max... Michael and Tess. Michael is probably going to want to be somewhere fairly near Roswell... he and Maria haven't settled anything yet, but it's pretty clear that they're both interested, if they can get past all the baggage. Max called from the airport in Calgary, by the way, and though he's staying with Tess, he wants to be spending some serious time with Liz, starting as soon as possible. Like, they figured out that they're destined to be best friends or something."

"Huh." Alex muttered. It kind of seemed like an anticlimax after all he knew of the Max and Liz saga, but it wasn't his place to judge... and even if it were, he shouldn't base any judgements on hearsay, come to think of it.

"They'll probably want to find somewhere roughly between Roswell and Tempe, then... near enough to either place, which will be kind of a stretch but workable if nobody minds taking fairly long drives. San Francisco is kind of way off the map, though... you know??"

"Yeah, I get what you mean," Alex agreed. "Well, after midterms are over, I think I can get into a work study program in Albuquerque, come to think of it."

"Really??" Isabel looked over at him, her eyes shining with excitement. "Alex, I hate to ask you to just change your entire life for me like that, on top of everything else you've already given up for my sake, but..." She let the conclusion hang unfinished.

"It's nothing. I understand how important Max and Michael are to you. And it's not like it'll be a big sacrifice to go to Albuquerque -- it's a great opportunity that I was seriously considering before any of this happened, as a matter of fact."

Isabel rolled up on top of Alex and kissed him thoroughly.

* * * *

(Two weeks later...)

"All right everybody, that's it for today. Remember that your chapter fifteen assignments are due at the BEGINNING of Tuesday's lecture, that's at two o'clock by my watch and not whenever you get here, so if it's not ready... please come to class anyway." A few of the student chuckled. "Read through that handout on Klein-Nishina differential cross-sections and come prepared to take up the the seven review questions on the last page in class, too." That earned doctor Lewisson a groan.

Liz booted out of her seat as soon as the professor started packing things into his briefcase. She had already finished the assignment, and had a good handle on the KNDC material, but she wasn't really thinking about that at the mo...

"Liz!!" Familiar fingers managed to tap her fingers as she was weaving cautiously through the students that were already filling the corridor, from lectures that had let out earlier than hers by a few minutes. Liz whirled somewhat unsteadily around to see Pete Wilson.

"Uhhh... yeah??"

"Umm..." Pete took a moment to consider his words. "I... I just wanted to ask you if you want to go see 'Earthsea' at the movies in town tonight... Liz, is there something wrong??" He was looking carefully into her eyes.

"No!! Well, kinda," Liz amended. "I... I'm sorry, I just can't tell you about it right now. I want to tell you, but..." She abandoned that line of dialog and started again. "I have to go, and I won't be able to make the movies tonight. Take a rain check for tomorrow??"

"Of course," he agreed. "Are you... does this have something to do with Max??"

Liz jumped slightly. "Uhh... it does, actually." Pete didn't seem too upset with that confirmation, at least. "You don't have anything to worry about... you know how I feel for you, don't you??"

"I'd like to think I do," Pete joked back with a smile.

She kissed him, quickly and fiercely, and whispered, "Believe it." And then she hurried on her way.

It only took her about five minutes to get to the parking lot. Since the whole thing with Max and the space capsule, she'd dug into her savings from waiting tables and tutoring throughout her years at university and put a payment down on a dependable secondhand car. She had known that she'd be driving back over to New Mexico fairly often, hadn't guessed that the second time she'd make the trip would be over something like this though.

It was the only thing she'd been able to think about since she'd woken up that morning.

As soon as Liz was out onto route ten and heading east, she picked up her cell phone and speed-dialled Maria. "Hello??" the familiar voice answered.

"Yeah, Maria??"

"Oh my gawd, Liz, where are you?!" Liz wasn't quite sure why Maria seemed to be so surprised to hear from her.

"About five miles out of town, where are you?" Liz shot back.

"I'm here in Czechoslovakia." That was what Maria and Alex had dubbed the new place that the pod squad had settled down in, a large rambling, kinda beat-up house about eight miles west of Las Cruces... and where Liz was heading herself.

"What are you doing there??" she couldn't help but ask.

"Umm, uhhh...." Maria was silent for several seconds. "I... I don't want to go into it over the phone. Are you coming here??"

"Yeah, yeah I am..."

"Then you'll hear about it when you get here. I'm sorry, I gotta go." As the phone clicked off, something in Maria's tone was bothering Liz. She seemed about as overwhelmed by some strange news as Liz herself was. Was it possible that... no, she didn't see how, welll...

She pushed speculation out of her mind as well as she could, and put some music on, hoping to distract herself for the long drive. It didn't really work.

After what seemed like an eternity of driving (especially considering that she was far from used to it,) she finally pulled up to the old house a little stretch west of Fairacres, New Mexico.

Everyone, including Alex and Maria, was in either the living or dining room as Liz charged in. "Max... I need to talk to you," she said, running breathlessly up to him.

"Umm... okay," Max replied after a moment. "How about my study?" Liz nodded, and quickly he drew her off to the small, cozy room on the other side of the hall. "What's this about??"

"Max, I'm pregnant."

Max paused a moment, then nodded and smiled. "Well, how about that. Congratu..." He broke off in mid-word, something about Liz's crazed attitude suddenly getting to him. "You're pregnant, as in..." There was a long silence between them. "Okay, I'll ask straight out. Who's the father??"

"That's the thing," she agreed. "As strange as it sounds, the only candidate... is you. While we were in the reality warp... I had a dream -- about you. And Maria's dream had already affected her, physically. I don't know if you had that dream too, but..."

"I did," Max admitted, blushing. "But..." He couldn't seem to think of anything to say.

"Yeah, I know," Liz nodded. "I don't have any answers either. But I thought that you should be the first person I tell."

"Come on," Max said, opening the door, and leading the way back out. He almost collided with Isabel, who turned immediately to Liz.

"Do you know, already??" Isabel was fidgeting nervously with a ring on her third left finger... Alex's ring, Liz was sure. He'd driven her crazy asking questions, trying to make sure that he got the right one.

It took a second for Liz to realize that Isabel could not possibly be talking about Liz's subject, simply because there was no way SHE could know... well, not no way, considering that she was a telepath... but no way she could have known before Liz did, at least.

"Umm... I don't think so. I came here to talk to Liz..."

Liz broke off, Isabel was staring at her, with that look on her face that Liz had come to realize meant that she was getting incoming brainwaves. Getting angry about the invasion of privacy wasn't worth it... Isabel didn't do this on purpose, it was the dark side of her (frankly incredible) gift. Iz blinked in shock and got an odd expression on her face.

"Well, might as well tell you," Isabel said quickly. "I'm pregnant." Now it was Liz's turn to drop her mouth open in surprise, and Isabel nodded.

"Uhhh..." An uncomfortable notion was starting to grow in Liz's mind. "Do you mind if I ask who the fath--"

"Michael," Isabel whispered, pointing over to him, talking in the living room with Maria and Alex. None of them would be particularly pleased at the way that little bundle of joy had come into their lives, Liz realized.

And the same can of worms, more or less, was about to hit Max, Tess, Pete, and herself. "Ohhh, boy."

"Yeah," Isabel agreed. "Hooo."

THE END!