poor Liz, wondering if she would go crazy like her mother....
and Max didn't kill her mother, but instead let Sean do the deed.
What could possibly happen next??
Thanks, Carolyn
Unbreakable - A Beautiful Lie (AU M/L ADULT) COMPLETE 5/5/17 + A/N 5/5/19
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keepsmiling7
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Re: Unbreakable (AU M/L ADULT) Ch 53, 10/25/15, p. 48
Last edited by keepsmiling7 on Mon Oct 26, 2015 3:59 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Re: Unbreakable (AU M/L ADULT) Ch 53, 10/25/15, p. 48
oh my. awesome part
Re: Unbreakable (AU M/L ADULT) Ch 53, 10/25/15, p. 48
Love the visual of you reading a book while taking bloods 
Goodness what a complicated mess. The first thing that struck me was that Max had done so much to save Liz, even allowing her mum to die, and then Liz asked him to kill her anyway. No wonder he completely shut himself off in the eraser room. To have her ask him to do that himself when he'd done so much to save her before hand. What a heart ripping experience. No wonder he was so torn apart there. Poor Liz needs to sleep. How on earth is she to be expected to go to school and the meeting later that night while having had so much trauma and emotional overload? It would take me days to be able to move.
I know Max is angry at his dad for telling, but Mr E did the right thing. Liz has been desperate to know for so long. It really is better she have all the facts. And, importantly, strategically, she needs this information before the meeting. Imagine if she'd found this out at the meeting with everyone else around. Mr E is getting more and more layers the more we learn of him. How wonderful.
Also, the fact that Nancy was going crazy is a very important piece of information. It means, realistically, that the aliens need to get to know their gaeas better. Gaeas are rare and important. Some gaeas can go to anyone and it doesn't matter, but strong gaeas, strong gaeas have to be handled differently. The same as they changed the rules when gaeas died when they were used to soon, the rules now need to be changed again according to this new knowledge. Some strong gaeas need to have more information, more choice. This won't go down well. Not with the power hungry. Strong gaeas will need more choice as to who they give their minds to, otherwise the mental destruction will happen again. It depends on how important the gaeas are to the aliens. The full bloods see themselves as superior to the humans and hybrids. They see the hybrids as lesser but still superior to humans. Not killing off useful gaeas is a sensible rule. Giving up military power and dominance to lower forms of life is not going to be an easy sell.
The other alluded to information that opens up more questions is the Sarge's role in Nancy's death. First up: why didn't he kill her himself? Why get Sean to do it? Is that cowardice? Is it a bit like how doctors can't operate on people they know? Is it to teach Sean how to do tough stuff? (Coz, between you and me and the cat, I don't think Sean would've had much trouble killing Nancy.) I wonder if Sarge was bothered by Nancy's madness? He was in a relationship with her while a teenager. I wonder how deep that was? I could be wrong but it sounded as though Nancy got pregnant with Liz very quickly. Were Jeff and Nancy married or was the whirlwind of their romance that strong? I wonder if Sarge was hurt by the circumstance or just 'alien cold' and unaffected?
You know I complain about how long I have to wait for updates (and never fear, I'm not about to stop
) but the wait certainly makes me delve into what's actually going on before moving to the next bit. Usually I'd simply read and find out as I go.
Having said that, I've mulled now, when's the next bit coming
Goodness what a complicated mess. The first thing that struck me was that Max had done so much to save Liz, even allowing her mum to die, and then Liz asked him to kill her anyway. No wonder he completely shut himself off in the eraser room. To have her ask him to do that himself when he'd done so much to save her before hand. What a heart ripping experience. No wonder he was so torn apart there. Poor Liz needs to sleep. How on earth is she to be expected to go to school and the meeting later that night while having had so much trauma and emotional overload? It would take me days to be able to move.
I know Max is angry at his dad for telling, but Mr E did the right thing. Liz has been desperate to know for so long. It really is better she have all the facts. And, importantly, strategically, she needs this information before the meeting. Imagine if she'd found this out at the meeting with everyone else around. Mr E is getting more and more layers the more we learn of him. How wonderful.
Also, the fact that Nancy was going crazy is a very important piece of information. It means, realistically, that the aliens need to get to know their gaeas better. Gaeas are rare and important. Some gaeas can go to anyone and it doesn't matter, but strong gaeas, strong gaeas have to be handled differently. The same as they changed the rules when gaeas died when they were used to soon, the rules now need to be changed again according to this new knowledge. Some strong gaeas need to have more information, more choice. This won't go down well. Not with the power hungry. Strong gaeas will need more choice as to who they give their minds to, otherwise the mental destruction will happen again. It depends on how important the gaeas are to the aliens. The full bloods see themselves as superior to the humans and hybrids. They see the hybrids as lesser but still superior to humans. Not killing off useful gaeas is a sensible rule. Giving up military power and dominance to lower forms of life is not going to be an easy sell.
The other alluded to information that opens up more questions is the Sarge's role in Nancy's death. First up: why didn't he kill her himself? Why get Sean to do it? Is that cowardice? Is it a bit like how doctors can't operate on people they know? Is it to teach Sean how to do tough stuff? (Coz, between you and me and the cat, I don't think Sean would've had much trouble killing Nancy.) I wonder if Sarge was bothered by Nancy's madness? He was in a relationship with her while a teenager. I wonder how deep that was? I could be wrong but it sounded as though Nancy got pregnant with Liz very quickly. Were Jeff and Nancy married or was the whirlwind of their romance that strong? I wonder if Sarge was hurt by the circumstance or just 'alien cold' and unaffected?
You know I complain about how long I have to wait for updates (and never fear, I'm not about to stop
) but the wait certainly makes me delve into what's actually going on before moving to the next bit. Usually I'd simply read and find out as I go.Having said that, I've mulled now, when's the next bit coming
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Morning Dreamgirl
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Re: Unbreakable (AU M/L ADULT) Ch 53, 10/25/15, p. 48
Since you posted the chapter slightly ahead of schedule I thought I'd post my feedback slightly ahead of schedule.
Unfortunately the pie has been eaten. Don't worry - it wasn't as good as I usually make. I'll send you a better one.
Once again Mezz has taken almost all the words out of my mouth. Maybe we should just start combining our feedback. That way it's easier for you to respond when you post a chapter.
I think it's interesting that Philip knew what Liz was going through even before Max did. I'm not surprised that Philip understands connections better, just that he was able to pinpoint what was causing her reaction to the scene between Max and Diane. (Though your point about being on an emotional roller coaster is a valid one and probably contributes to it. Plus Max wasn't focused solely on Liz like he normally is. He was also concerned about his mother.) I had a feeling the loss of her own mother was one of the reasons Liz was so affected. She also has to be feeling guilty about Diane's fears of losing her son. She knows what it's like to lose someone so close. Add the fear of what could very likely happen to them now and it would be hard to breathe.
I'm glad that Liz was able to trust Philip enough to let him help her. Going into a full blown panic attack isn't really what she needs right now. And in some ways he's the best one to talk to about her mother. He knew her well enough to be able to answer Liz's questions but also to help Liz remember her without having to censor what she says around other humans. No one's really just sat with her (even for a moment) and talked about her mom - the good parts. Everything she's found out regarding her mom lately has been pain heaped upon pain. Philip was able to provide some comfort, no matter how small, by giving her a parent's view (as well as a peer's view) of her mother. That's invaluable as she starts the mourning process.
And Philip absolutely did the right thing by answering Liz's questions about her mother's death. He didn't want to do it to cause more pain but it's what she needs to know. Not only would it have been more painful to find it out at the meeting but if she knows beforehand then she'll be more able to understand anything Philip might allude to in order to keep both her and Max safe. Also, how can you properly grieve if you don't have all the facts? And Philip had to know that his son wouldn't want to tell Liz the truth.
Max is really protective of Liz and wouldn't want to cause her any more pain than absolutely necessary. She's asked him what happened before and he's kept things back. As much as it was to keep Liz from experiencing more pain it was also due to his fear of losing her. Once again his alien side (in his mind) caused her pain. It didn't matter that Sean was the one who actually killed Nancy, Max was bearing the guilt of it since he didn't stop it. It's no different than him wanting Sean dead in order to keep Liz safe. It would be a horrible position to be in. Either allowing the woman you love to be threatened (and possibly killed) by someone she loved and trusted or allow that person to be killed knowing the pain it would put upon those left behind. In his mind he couldn't even begin to fathom that she could or would ever forgive him for his role in the event. Between his heritage, the danger she keeps putting herself in for him and his "role" in her mother's death (and Liz's subsequent burning) - every part of him would have been convinced she could never love him. One of those facts would be enough in his mind but add all of them together and it would be torment to have her getting closer and then confessing her love just to know he'd probably lose it. It's no wonder that he's been pushing her away so hard up until the last twelve hours or so. It's as much to protect her as it is to protect his heart.
And no wonder his walls came down so fast in the eraser room. The very thing he was trying to protect her from is what she requested of him. Between that, all his guilt for everything and not wanting to force her into trying a double (triple?) bond it's amazing he hasn't broken down right along with Liz. Especially since he feels things so strongly. He's been solely focused on Liz and fighting to protect her that I think it's almost like a marathon runner. He's just focusing on the next mile and not thinking about all the pain he's currently feeling.
He has to learn (and I think, or at least hope, he is) that he needs to let himself trust Liz when she says she loves him. That means the good and the bad. Obviously they're not going to have a perfect - or easy - relationship (at the beginning) but keeping things from her out of fear or even to protect her will just cause her more pain later on. On the other hand, maybe it was smart for someone else to answer some of the questions Liz had. Max can't really be objective about his role in things when it comes to Liz. So having someone else start the conversation helped them in the long run and I hope no one (Max especially) blames Philip for being honest with Liz. And it really was better, if you think about it, for her to find out after she was fully bonded with Max. Now she, hopefully, has more protection if she does fall apart.
I really hope that when all is said and done they're able to help each other be whole both emotionally and spiritually. They're both so close to breaking they need it.
And I just don't see how Liz (or Max) is going to be in any shape to attend classes today. It makes more sense for them both to just skip and rest. Plus they could go over whatever plan with Philip comes up with. To me it makes sense to release Liz given her mother's history - and demise - as well as Liz's own "inability" to submit to mind controls. But I don't think you'd make it that easy on us.
I'm hoping that the council doesn't claim that the difficulties are due to the bond Max created when he healed Liz. After all she fought Sean during the checkups and even after he thought the bond was "broken" in the gym. Hopefully they won't believe that the bond can still be broken. We'll have to see what Philip has up his sleeve - and Max and Liz finding out at least a little beforehand seems to be a good thing.
But if Liz doesn't show up at school and Max is gone too they might as well set off some flares to the rest of the alien community. Or at least Sean.
So... Wanna post more? Still interested in learning what the changes are between the two of them as well - and how that might effect the council's decision. If Isabel as a hybrid can see a difference I wonder what the full-bloods will see.
Unfortunately the pie has been eaten. Don't worry - it wasn't as good as I usually make. I'll send you a better one.
Once again Mezz has taken almost all the words out of my mouth. Maybe we should just start combining our feedback. That way it's easier for you to respond when you post a chapter.
I think it's interesting that Philip knew what Liz was going through even before Max did. I'm not surprised that Philip understands connections better, just that he was able to pinpoint what was causing her reaction to the scene between Max and Diane. (Though your point about being on an emotional roller coaster is a valid one and probably contributes to it. Plus Max wasn't focused solely on Liz like he normally is. He was also concerned about his mother.) I had a feeling the loss of her own mother was one of the reasons Liz was so affected. She also has to be feeling guilty about Diane's fears of losing her son. She knows what it's like to lose someone so close. Add the fear of what could very likely happen to them now and it would be hard to breathe.
I'm glad that Liz was able to trust Philip enough to let him help her. Going into a full blown panic attack isn't really what she needs right now. And in some ways he's the best one to talk to about her mother. He knew her well enough to be able to answer Liz's questions but also to help Liz remember her without having to censor what she says around other humans. No one's really just sat with her (even for a moment) and talked about her mom - the good parts. Everything she's found out regarding her mom lately has been pain heaped upon pain. Philip was able to provide some comfort, no matter how small, by giving her a parent's view (as well as a peer's view) of her mother. That's invaluable as she starts the mourning process.
And Philip absolutely did the right thing by answering Liz's questions about her mother's death. He didn't want to do it to cause more pain but it's what she needs to know. Not only would it have been more painful to find it out at the meeting but if she knows beforehand then she'll be more able to understand anything Philip might allude to in order to keep both her and Max safe. Also, how can you properly grieve if you don't have all the facts? And Philip had to know that his son wouldn't want to tell Liz the truth.
Max is really protective of Liz and wouldn't want to cause her any more pain than absolutely necessary. She's asked him what happened before and he's kept things back. As much as it was to keep Liz from experiencing more pain it was also due to his fear of losing her. Once again his alien side (in his mind) caused her pain. It didn't matter that Sean was the one who actually killed Nancy, Max was bearing the guilt of it since he didn't stop it. It's no different than him wanting Sean dead in order to keep Liz safe. It would be a horrible position to be in. Either allowing the woman you love to be threatened (and possibly killed) by someone she loved and trusted or allow that person to be killed knowing the pain it would put upon those left behind. In his mind he couldn't even begin to fathom that she could or would ever forgive him for his role in the event. Between his heritage, the danger she keeps putting herself in for him and his "role" in her mother's death (and Liz's subsequent burning) - every part of him would have been convinced she could never love him. One of those facts would be enough in his mind but add all of them together and it would be torment to have her getting closer and then confessing her love just to know he'd probably lose it. It's no wonder that he's been pushing her away so hard up until the last twelve hours or so. It's as much to protect her as it is to protect his heart.
And no wonder his walls came down so fast in the eraser room. The very thing he was trying to protect her from is what she requested of him. Between that, all his guilt for everything and not wanting to force her into trying a double (triple?) bond it's amazing he hasn't broken down right along with Liz. Especially since he feels things so strongly. He's been solely focused on Liz and fighting to protect her that I think it's almost like a marathon runner. He's just focusing on the next mile and not thinking about all the pain he's currently feeling.
He has to learn (and I think, or at least hope, he is) that he needs to let himself trust Liz when she says she loves him. That means the good and the bad. Obviously they're not going to have a perfect - or easy - relationship (at the beginning) but keeping things from her out of fear or even to protect her will just cause her more pain later on. On the other hand, maybe it was smart for someone else to answer some of the questions Liz had. Max can't really be objective about his role in things when it comes to Liz. So having someone else start the conversation helped them in the long run and I hope no one (Max especially) blames Philip for being honest with Liz. And it really was better, if you think about it, for her to find out after she was fully bonded with Max. Now she, hopefully, has more protection if she does fall apart.
I really hope that when all is said and done they're able to help each other be whole both emotionally and spiritually. They're both so close to breaking they need it.
And I just don't see how Liz (or Max) is going to be in any shape to attend classes today. It makes more sense for them both to just skip and rest. Plus they could go over whatever plan with Philip comes up with. To me it makes sense to release Liz given her mother's history - and demise - as well as Liz's own "inability" to submit to mind controls. But I don't think you'd make it that easy on us.
I'm hoping that the council doesn't claim that the difficulties are due to the bond Max created when he healed Liz. After all she fought Sean during the checkups and even after he thought the bond was "broken" in the gym. Hopefully they won't believe that the bond can still be broken. We'll have to see what Philip has up his sleeve - and Max and Liz finding out at least a little beforehand seems to be a good thing. But if Liz doesn't show up at school and Max is gone too they might as well set off some flares to the rest of the alien community. Or at least Sean.
So... Wanna post more?
Still interested in learning what the changes are between the two of them as well - and how that might effect the council's decision. If Isabel as a hybrid can see a difference I wonder what the full-bloods will see.
Re: Unbreakable (AU M/L ADULT) Ch 53, 10/25/15, p. 48
So very sorry for bothering you. Will you please please please please come back and post more really really really really soon? I can't wait to read what will happen next for Max and Liz. Wow Mr. Evans finally told Liz the truth about her mom. Shocked the Mrs. Parker was willing to kill Liz, Jeff and herself to keep Liz away from the aliens. Poor Liz now she knows more about her mom's death. Glad Max was there for Liz when she needed him. So Max told Liz more of the truth. Now what are max and Liz going to do? Will Max and Liz be the unbreakable bond couple? Will Liz run away from Max? Will Liz stay with Max and his family? Will Liz and Max face the group together? Will Sean, Serge try and break Max and Liz's bond? Will Max and Liz find out what Isabel meant by something besides the bond is different? When will Max and Liz find out what Isabel meant? Will Max and Liz be a couple? Will Max and Liz keep sleeping together? Will Liz becomes pregnant? Will Liz keep the baby? Will Max and Liz run away? Where will Max and Liz go? Will Max and Liz be safe? Will Max and Liz have to keep running? Will Sean try and mind warp Liz? Will Liz fall for it? Will Max be able to save Liz? Will Max be able to protect Liz from the aliens? Will Max, Liz, Mr. Evans, Mrs. Evans, Alex, Isabel and Maria fight back? How will the aliens handle Max and Liz bond? Will they be happy about the bond or pissed? Will Max and Liz have a happy ending together? Will Max and Liz get married and have kids? Will Max and Liz have to get their brains reprogramed? Will Max and Liz remember each other? Will Max and Liz remember the love they felt for each other? Sorry for the questions I was just wondering. Please please please please please please please please come back and post more really really really really soon? I can't wait to find out what Max and Liz will do after their nap together?
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FIFTY-FOUR
Ashley (Morning Dreamgirl)
As we discussed from the previous chapter, Philip is probably more used to connections than Max is, and considering that Max had just reached out to comfort his very upset mother, it was not that far off for Philip to come to the conclusion that Liz was being reminded of the fact that her own mother was no longer with her. And Max's feelings are so strong, so similar to Liz's in the love for his mother, that it just became too much for her.
Thank you from the bottom of my toes for that feedback!
Helen (roswelllostcause) - Thank you, Helen
L-J-L 76 - Thank you for the feedback and for the bump
Eve (begonia9508)
You probably won't think much better of the aliens anytime soon 
Thank you so much for the feedback!
Carolyn (keepsmiling7)
Thank you for the feedback!
Natalie36 - Thank you
mezz
It really is better for Liz to know as much as possible. Max has been wary to tell her too much, both to (in a way) protect her (because he was already hitting her with so much information) and to make sure that Sean wouldn't see anything he shouldn't in her mind if he happened to break through. But more information is coming up. Max is probably realizing that Liz needs to be as informed as possible for the meeting to be "successful".
Thank you heaps and heaps for the feedback!
From FIFTY-THREE:
I knew that it was impossible for him to have stopped it, even though he thought he could have. Even if he had intervened, the ’problem’ that was my mother would have been resolved later anyway. Max wouldn’t have been able to prevent it forever.
Max’s only crime was that he had happened to have been present at the crime scene and that he loved me too much. Which no one could blame him for.
He heard all of this through the connection, but I still had to literally tell him to, ”Please, hold me,” before he reluctantly realized that he was forgiven - never having been accused to start with.
He climbed onto the bed, sat down behind me and pulled me - blanket and all - up against his chest, pressing his nose into my neck.
”You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me,” he whispered against my gradually increasing pulse vibrating against his lips where he put a soft kiss against my jugular.
I sniveled and nodded, still muted by shock, and pressed further back into him. Needing him more than ever.
FIFTY-FOUR
I was alone in Max’s room. He had left just a minute ago - after tucking me into his bed - to ’make some arrangements’. I knew from eavesdropping on his inner monologue that those ’arrangements’ included fixing cover stories that kept my dad’s suspicions about my absence under control and meant that neither Max nor I had to show up at school today.
Max had been very firm on the point of us skipping school, the reasons including 1) Sean would be there, 2) both of us had barely gotten any sleep, which was mostly dangerous to me since I wouldn’t be able to put up any resistance to Sean, 3) Maria was asking too many questions and Max had understood from a first-hand view into my brain that I was having more and more trouble dodging the truth around her, and 4) Max wanted to give me as much information as possible about the members at the meeting tonight. To prepare me.
He hadn’t spoken reason number 5 out loud, but it had rung clearly in my head. He wanted to spend as much time alone with me as possible before our verdict.
Now, my body shivering in the absence of Max, I slowly took in my surroundings. I had been in Max’s room twice (at least that I could remember). The first time I had been in excruciating pain and Max had healed me after my burns had started to reappear. The second time I had been searching for Max while infused with an inhuman coldness, knowing that Max had been/was being abused in some way.
Neither of those events had given me the opportunity to actually look at his room. I finally had the opportunity to catch a glimpse of Max’s personal life. The part of his life that was very similar to that of a regular adolescent boy.
The collection of guitars by the large windows. The black desk, which gave an empty impression due to its organized piles of pens and stacks of paper. The single wooden ruler on the desk was neatly lined up with the table surface.
The bookcase next to the window was filled to the brim with books. Even though some books had been forcibly shelved on top of others, it didn’t give a messy appearance. There was organization in the mess.
I shook my head in thought. Max Evans exercised control in all things.
I would have probably found this amusing, if I’d have the energy to.
My eyelids were growing heavier as Max’s bed linen trapped my body heat and started to warm my shivering body. I felt safe here, surrounded by the smell of Max. There were so many aspects of that feeling that were laughable. I never would have imagined, going back just a couple of days, that I would feel safe in Mr. Evans’ house. Especially not buried underneath Max’s covers, listening to the faint sounds Max’s father was making in the kitchen downstairs.
My mind was processing everything that had happened in the last twenty-four hours, making me grow gradually weaker as sleep crawled closer. Within minutes, I was asleep.
I was startled into wakefulness, not having realized that I had fallen asleep, by the familiar heavy clicking sound of a door being locked.
My heart was, by learned habit, beating quickly in my chest as my eyes sprung open at the sound, only to find Max over by the door, looking at me apologetically, having realized that he had just woken me up.
My heart immediately calmed. I hadn’t realized how tense my body had been until it relaxed in the tracing of him crossing the room to reach the bed.
I stifled a yawn and mumbled, ”Hey.”
”You’re exhausted,” he said regretfully. Like it was his fault.
I looked at the paleness of his face, at the darkness under his eyes, and the slight hunch to his strong shoulders. His own weariness was pulsating off him.
”I guess that makes two of us,” I replied, tendrils of sleep making my voice drowsy.
How much sleep had he gotten?
I watched the distracted soft smile on his lips as he stopped next to the bed.
The thought made me worried and I tried to recollect if he had gotten any sleep at all last night. I was pretty sure he had fallen asleep with me after…
I blushed at the memory and my heart missed a beat as I caught his eyes, knowing that he was - as usual - silently hitchhiking on my train of thought. With an enticing half-smile he grabbed the bottom of his shirt and pulled it - along with the T-shirt underneath - over his head, exposing his well-detailed chest to my greedy eyes.
He continued undressing in front of me as my thoughts - mixed with distracting thoughts about his body, pleasure and sex - continued cataloguing his sleeping habits.
He had been awake, talking with Isabel on the phone, just a few hours after we had fallen asleep. I wasn’t sure if he had actually gone to sleep after our… I bit my lip and traced my eyes down his naked - save for those black boxers - body of his, as I finished my thought with ’second time’.
Max reached forward and pulled the duvet back, providing him with an opening to slip underneath the covers with me. He curled his arms around me, pressed my front up against his, as he positioned us both on our sides, and pressed a kiss to my forehead while he draped his right leg over my thigh and wrapped himself tightly around me.
”And while I was asleep on the way over here, you were driving,” I finished, using my sleepy voice as my body sighed in happiness at the feel of his warm skin all around me.
”I don’t have time for sleep,” he whispered back, his dark eyes heating me more than the bed linen ever stood a chance to.
I narrowed my eyes at him, feeling a scolding that would make my mother proud coming on, ”You need your rest just as much as I do.”
He shook his head slightly and I looked at those full lips of his, already craving his kissing. How long had it been since he had kissed me last? An hour? Thirty minutes?
My soul was going crazy with abstinence.
In response, he brought his hand up between us and slowly fluttered his thumb over my lips. I pressed my lips against his touch, kissing his finger, and he said, ”I couldn’t leave you unwatched. It wouldn’t be safe.”
”Your safety is just as important to me as mine is to you,” I said seriously and added with a touch of sadness, ”And we need all the energy we can get at that meeting tonight.”
He nodded quietly, my observation making his mind turn strategic, plans running through his mind. They continued to do so even when he reached down across my stomach and tugged on the bottom of my sweater.
I frowned at him in confusing incredulous curiosity, making the corner of my mouth twitch as I looked at him for answers. But even though his eyes were burning into mine, his gaze very present, his mind was planning what to say tonight. How to plead our case.
He filled me with awe. Even when he pulled my sweater over my head and innocently reached for the clasp of my bra between my shoulder blades, I could hear nothing but political musings in his head.
With the bra falling off my breasts, I smiled at him in perplexed amusement. ”How are you doing that?”
His lips formed in a teasing smile and he answered all-knowingly, ”Bras are not really rocket science, Liz.”
I rolled my eyes, mumbling, ”Silly,” knowing that he knew exactly what I was referring to. And it was certainly not the art of removing a girl’s bra.
I opened my mouth to ask again when his large hand brushed down my front, over the hard bump of my collarbone, over the soft hill of my breast and down the flat expanse of my stomach. My words turned into a gasp of deep desire, which turned into a yelp of yearning as he squeezed his hand into the back of my pants, folding his palm around the curve of my ass, against the lacy material of my underwear.
In a desperate attempt to prove to him that I was not completely ruled by my desire for him, nor that I was a mindless drone under his control, I fought to keep the conversation going, ”How are you able to think about the meeting while at the same time I can feel you concentrating on me?”
He leaned forward and slowly brushed his lips over mine, moving from the bottom to the top in one very fluttering motion. I moaned, my face chasing after his as he pulled away.
I groaned in disappointment. I just had to admit it. I was a mindless drone.
Max laughed softly at this and squeezed my behind, simultaneously pressing our nether bodies even closer together.
”We call it ’diversion’,” Max replied and started moving his hand from my burning behind to the front. My body tensed in breathless anticipation.
I wouldn’t call it that, I thought distractedly as he brushed teasing fingers over the top of my sex before pulling his hand upwards to work on opening the button to my jeans.
His quiet laughter was like a balm to my soul as he looked into my eyes and directed my attention back to the conversation. I was still acutely aware of what his hand was doing, unbuttoning my jeans, but if I focused really hard I believe I could understand what he was saying.
Maybe.
”It’s a technique where you hide what you’re really thinking behind another line of thinking. To confuse mind readers.”
Max pulled down my zipper.
”Mind readers?” I asked slowly. ”Is that the same as mind controllers?” I frowned, struggling with all the terms. ”Or is that mind wipers?”
Max nodded. ”Mind reading is the advanced stage of mind control. Sean and his father - and the ones that generally are good at manipulating minds - all have the potential to read minds. With training.”
Of course. This was not a surprise. Just a clarification. Max had, after all, told me as much when he had informed me that he had kept some information from me so that Sean wouldn’t be able to access it if he connected with me.
”But your father couldn’t read my mind earlier,” I frowned. ”Because you and I were bonded..? Is that why Sean hasn’t been able to read my thoughts yet?” Before Max could answer in the small pause that followed, I added in confusion, ”If he can’t access my mind to read it, how can he access it to control it?”
Max’s hand was paused on my zipper and I could hear the amusement in his mind. Being amused by me - with all my questions.
”That’s because it takes practice to access different parts of someone’s brain. Those who have mental abilities usually learn how to control the motor cortex of the brain first. The part of your brain that controls voluntary movement. Next they learn to control the temporal lobe, which is involved in the making and storage of memories. Which gives them the power to tamper with someone’s memory.”
I was trying to control my breathing as I was starting to get a bit worked up by the heat from Max’s hand resting on the front of my pants. I struggled to formulate, ”I assume that the process of thinking is operated by yet another part of the brain…?”
Max nodded. ”Frontal lobe. This is the largest part of your brain that is used to reason, plan… It’s where your personality is formed.”
I could feel that specific lobe of my brain working hard as I concluded, ”And even a mind wiper has to have a connection to be able to access that part of the brain.”
”Yes, usually,” Max replied. ”Which is why I - even though I’m not even close to being as good at mind abilities as Sean or even my father - can access your frontal lobe.”
I snorted and shook my head. ”Access my frontal lobe.” I leaned forward and brushed a light kiss on his lips. ”You have such a dirty mind, Max.”
He rolled his eyes at my lame joke, but there was a loving grin on his lips and relief was simmering through the connection. Relief that I was able to relax and joke; a sign that I was coming back from the shock of finding out that my mom had turned insane.
”I didn’t know that the bond could protect against intrusion into the brain,” Max said, his face turning serious. ”Not until dad tried to access your mind.”
”Which is why you were worried that Sean might gain access to my thinking, seeing that he might be getting better at using his gifts and the fact that the bond was weakened while being paused.”
Max nodded slowly, before there was a flicker of something warm and enticing on his face.
”Speaking of bonding…” Max’s fingers brushed up the front of my sex and I gasped loudly before I reached down and grabbed his strong wrist with my hand.
”What are you doing?” I asked breathlessly.
He smirked at me and answered, ”Removing your clothes.”
I rolled my eyes. ”Um…yeah. Obviously.” Then hitched my chin towards the door. ”But your parents are still downstairs. I’m in your room…” I lowered my voice in an indignant hiss, ”We can’t have sex here!”
He laughed and, to my disappointment, pulled his hand out of my jeans. He closed the small inch-long distance between our mouths and sealed his laughter with a kiss.
My body relaxed as I melted into his kiss. Finally.
He pulled back much too soon, reaching down with both his hands now, folding them around my hips, inside my jeans but outside of my underwear, and mumbled, ”Who said anything about sex? I’m just helping you out of these clothes, Ms. Parker.”
My suspicion was amused and filled with overwhelming love for this boy. He was adorable. Who knew that Max Evans could be like this? Who knew that behind that arrogant mask of playboy-persona was a strong man capable of such playfulness, care and love?
”Why?” I asked naturally, really wanting to hear his excuse for getting us both naked in a bed if his intentions were all pure.
He gave me another wink, before he disappeared under the covers. Not being able to see him, knowing that he was under the covers with my nudity, fueled something exciting and enticing inside of me. The anticipation of everything he could do to me caused my body to react with rather intense pleasure only with his act of pulling the jeans down my legs.
Just as my body relaxed in the knowledge (and disappointment, to be honest) that he wouldn’t do anything more than remove my pants, he pressed a soft kiss to the front of my underwear.
My breath got lodged in my throat as my hips rocked forward and my hands automatically buried themselves in his hair under the covers.
But he left it at that, crawling up from beneath the duvet, my hands still in his hair, and pressed our lips together. He slowly melted our mouths together, pulling at my lips, and worked to coax one sigh after another out of me while our bodies heated against each other.
Our breathing fairly compromised, he pulled back and smiled at me. There was a beautiful blush on his cheeks and his eyes were shining with life and happiness.
I shook my head at him, threading my fingers through his bangs and stated, ”You’re a tease, Max Evans.”
Something solemn came over his features, his reaction not the one I had anticipated, and after a beat of silence he said softly, ”You want to know why? Why I’m removing your clothes?”
Confused by his behavior, I nodded. How could he remain an enigma to me even when I had access to the express highway into his brain?
His voice was very serious, his eyes tracing my face. ”I need to feel you. With no barriers.”
I felt my physical desire for him simmer as the emotional need for him exploded.
”This-,” he continued and slowly ran a hand up the side of my upper body, ”-this is not just about desire to me. To feel you like this. To be this close to your body and feel your skin against mine. It grounds me. I can’t…” he dropped his eyes away from me, his hand stilling over the side of my ribcage, while he shook his head slightly, ”I don’t even know how to… I can’t find the words of how-”
My heart squeezed with deep love and adoration for this man and I moved my hand from his forehead to settle under his chin, coaxing him to look up at me again, before I leaned in to kiss him tenderly.
I was falling apart from all of this. I don’t think a body as young as mine is supposed to be able to handle all of these emotions, this type of all-consuming deep love. And I don’t think he was prepared for it either.
I could feel how it was almost drowning him and how he was reaching out to grab a hold of me, like a lifeline, to anchor him. In his words, to ground him.
His feelings resonated with mine. Something that provided me with a security that I suspected not many couples out in the real world were granted with. The knowledge that your partner loved you just as much as you loved them.
”We’re gonna get through this,” I whispered when I pulled back slightly from his lips. His dark eyes blinked up into mine and I added, ”They can’t stop us.” I put my hand on his chest, over his heart, for emphasis. ”They can’t stop this.”
He looked at me for the longest of seconds while I observed the trembles subtly shaking his body, the tightening of his hand around my ribs, his thumb brushing against the underside of my breast, the shift in his lower body to once again put his leg across my thigh and pull our lower bodies close together.
”Diversion is hard,” he whispered and I followed his change of topic without surprise.
In order to survive this, we needed to be unified. We needed to start preparing to fight for our right to an existence in this alien society. We needed to start to utilize what the bond might offer us.
”But it can buy you valuable time. And if you learn to use it correctly, the same method can be used to protect parts of your mind.”
”Blocking,” I whispered back. ”Like you do to me.”
He grimaced and said, mostly in clarification, ”To protect you.”
I smirked at him, but it was too loving to come off as a true disagreement as I told him, ”The jury’s still out on that one.”
His eyes softened in silent apology as he compromised, ”I’ll ease off on my ’protecting habits’ as soon as I’m certain that you can protect yourself.”
I thought back to our secret meeting in the desert in the middle of the night and acknowledged, ”But I’ve already managed to block you.”
He smiled tenderly, looking at me proudly. ”Yes. You have.” He lifted his hand from my ribs and moved it to brush at my hair, tucking it behind my ear. ”Which means that I have high expectations of you, Elizabeth Parker.”
I wrapped my arm around his waist and compelled him closer, connecting our foreheads in close proximity.
A wistful insecurity had befallen me and I wondered if he knew if, ”Am I really different from other gaeas? Stronger?”
He looked up at me through dark thick eyelashes and said, ”I’ve never heard of anyone like you. And I think I would have, considering the turmoil you’ve caused in the alien society.”
This worried me, even when his tone was light. ”Turmoil?”
Max took a deep breath and pulled back slightly. ”Everyone knows about you. It’s been hard to keep all the information about you hidden. You’re famous. Everyone wants to know everything about you.”
I shivered. ”Famous as in that they want to read about me in the gossip magazines? Or famous as in that they hate me and wish me dead?”
He moved his hand to flutter down my shoulder and out along the arm that I had wrapped around his waist. Reaching my hand he threaded our fingers together and pulled our interlocked hands between our bodies, pressing them between my soft breasts.
I tried to ignore the sensations the pressure of our joined hands between my breasts created.
He was troubled as he answered, ”Famous as in that they want to keep track of you. Considering you a loose cannon. Wanting to take the laws in their own hands if you were to jeopardize our society.”
”Oh my God,” I breathed, fear striking me hard and Max’s fingers tightened around mine in response. ”They’re all out to get me, aren’t they?”
He hesitated in light of my fear, before trying to smooth things over by, ”No, it’s not that bad.”
But I ignored his weak attempt at calming me down and thought back to that alien party and the people at school after Sean had forced me into a boys’ locker room. I remembered how they had looked at me when I had stalked across the canteen to practically pull Max out of school and confront him about him not wanting to have sex with me.
Oh God, I thought in embarrassed realization. I really had made a scene that day, which Max had alluded to when we had gotten outside. Max had even been understating the whole scenario, because I had made more than a scene. I had probably fueled a lot of suspicions about a possible relationship between Max and I.
”All those people… They were all staring…” I looked at him to gauge his reactions to my words. ”They were all calculating, seeing what I would do. If they had to intervene.”
Max shook his head and said calmly, ”They wouldn’t have been able to intervene. If they had hurt you, they would have had to answer to the law of having damaged a valuable gaea.”
”But they all knew about me. They knew - know - who I am.”
Max hesitated too long, his thought beating his audible answer. They’ve always known.
I swallowed. ”So everyone knows who the gaeas are?”
”They’d have to,” Max replied. ”We’re all supposed to indirectly look out for the gaeas.”
I frowned. ”We’re really that important, are we?”
”I don’t think you fully understand the heightening of power that a bonding with a gaea will provide a person of the military with,” Max said seriously. ”It could single-handedly save our existence if it came to that.”
I lowered my eyes in contemplative sadness. ”It can save your society, but it can’t save you and me.”
”It’s not the same,” Max replied. ”You being bonded to the military would most likely succeed in a fight against human beings. You being bonded to me in a fight against other aliens might not guarantee the same success. Our opponents are completely different. Our bond would have to withstand alien forces. Your bond with, for instance, Sean, would only have to withstand human forces.”
”But it’s never actually been tried, has it?” I questioned. ”You haven’t had any civil wars, any uprisings?”
”Some individuals have tried,” Max said cautiously, almost like he was afraid that I would get ideas from what he was about to tell me. ”But they haven’t survived for long.”
But in spite of Max’s attempt at not coaxing a flame to life in me, I couldn’t help but ask, ”What have they protested against?”
”Our society,” Max answered slowly. ”Our laws. Our treatment of human beings.”
”Are there any of those individuals still alive, having those same opinions in secret?”
My heart had started a wild beating in my chest and I could feel the vibrations from that forceful and hopeful rhythm bump against our interlocked hands pressed up against my breasts.
”I don’t know,” Max answered and for all I could read in him, he was being honest. ”The possibility of them being secret and all…”
”But there might be?” I hedged, not wanting to let go of the hope. The hope that someone on the other side - the alien side - was against the treatment of gaeas, the treatment towards me. That someone in the ’alien camp’ wanted to live more like humans, peacefully, and abolish their own rigid society which existed outside of the human one.
”As soon as they reveal themselves, they are - if their role in society is not too valuable - punished by death.”
”And if they’re too valuable?” I asked, thinking of Max. Thinking of if the meeting tonight would actually - by some miracle - lead to the aliens accepting our bonding and what that would mean for us. Would I really be able to be a part of a society that had threatened my free will, had killed my mom and had wanted to make me into a slave through rape?
I was thinking of what it would mean if Max and I joined some possible secret group inclined to revolt against the current society and what would happen were we to get caught. I’d probably be assigned to the first best military man for a new bonding, but what about Max? What would happen to Max?
He gave me a soft kiss, his love for my concern about his future well-being permeating our bond, before he answered, ”They would attempt to re-educate them.”
Right… At the institution.
”Has it ever worked?”
”I think so,” Max mumbled, but averted his eyes in afterthought. ”At least, we don’t really get to hear much about the rebels. It gets hushed down very quickly. To not give anyone else any ideas.”
”Which is why they’re all following my misfortunate ’adventures’ with fascination?” I asked, referring back to Max labeling me as famous.
Max nodded, bittersweetness flowing through our bond. ”You’re a rebel. Even if you haven’t consciously broken any rules. Even if you’re - technically - not under alien law. You have still fought us. Fought our rules. Broken our traditions. Rather disrespectfully so. But you have not been reprimanded. They have tried to silence you, through me, but have not succeeded. In a situation where someone like you would’ve been silenced a long time ago - either by re-education or death - the community can watch you break one law after the other and see nothing happen.”
”Which must be considered detrimental to the community,” I filled in.
He grimaced. ”There are a lot of reasons as to why they have been trying to keep us apart.”
”Then why haven’t they just collected me? Locked me up and have Sean force himself on me? That would have shut me up. Would have put me back in the place where they want me?”
I could see by the confusion on his face that he didn’t really know the answer to that one. ”I’m not really sure.” A deep wrinkle of confusion settled between his eyebrows. ”I would say that it’s because they were waiting for you to become ready, waiting for the glow to develop, but that wouldn’t explain everything. They could wait out the glow while you were in their captivity.”
I bit my bottom lip in contemplation and changed gears, ”Speaking of glows…”
His features softened, the line on his forehead smoothening out, before he leaned forward and placed a soft peck on the tip of my nose. ”Yes?”
”What does the glow mean? I get that it’s a step in my development, but how? Why?”
”The glow, technically, is concentrated energy between two individuals. It’s not just the alien’s energy moving towards the human, it’s the human reciprocating. The total of those energies creates an energy overload in a way that produces light.”
”And me reciprocating your energy means…?”
”That your energy has been matched to mine. Before, when I used your energy, you would become depleted. My energy was stronger than yours-” He interrupted himself with a frown, wondering if he was confusing me, and backtracked to, ”All of us with alien blood have a higher energy level than humans. I told you that my body temperature is higher than humans. This is part of it. My body emits too much energy, but also needs a lot of energy to fuel my abilities and will drain a human’s energy very quickly if I were to tap into it.”
”And now? Are my energy levels the same as an alien now? Is my body temperature elevated to that of an alien?”
I wasn’t sure how I felt about this. I had anticipated there to be some changes to my body, considering that I had bonded with an alien after all, but to actually hear that it might result in permanent changes that could be measured - like that of my core temperature - was a bit nerve-wrecking. To put it simply, I would never be able to go to the doctor again without them thinking that I was running a chronic fever.
”Your energy levels are the same,” Max explained. ”But your body can reroute it more efficiently. The mechanism has not been fully studied yet - since there hasn’t been that many gaeas - but your energy can work to assist mine without you losing too much of the energy for your own bodily functions. Earlier, a pull on your energy would pull from all parts of your body, exhausting you. Now it can pull from parts of your body that can afford to lose that energy.”
”Does that mean that my mom was never ready? That she didn’t have the glow? Is that why she was so exhausted?”
”No. Your mom wouldn’t have lasted that long if she hadn’t reached that developmental stage,” Max said. ”The reason why she was so tired was partly because she was fighting the bond, but mostly because the usage has a maximum. We can’t use too much of your energy without letting you refuel - in the form of rest.”
”What was happening in your society around the time of my mom’s death? Why were they using so much of her energy?”
Max looked at me with regret, like he was sorry that he couldn’t give me a concrete answer, knowing that it was important to me. ”I honestly don’t know. I just know that the sergeant was training a lot. Fine-tuning his abilities. Learning new abilities.”
”Like he was preparing for a war,” I mused quietly.
Max didn’t reply, but his mind was considering what I was referring to. I found his speculations matching mine and I picked one thought out and voiced it, ”Almost like there actually is a rebellious group somewhere and he’s preparing to fight them.”
”It makes sense,” Max agreed slowly, surprising me with his acknowledgement. Up until now, Max had appeared reluctant to agree to any of my ’conspiracy’ speculations about his race.
Instead he added, ”Which would explain why Sean was so quick at trying to bond with you, even before your energy had been matched to that of an alien, right after your mother’s death.”
”He even started before that,” I reflected quietly, thinking of Sean taking me out on a date the days before the camp. Mere days before my mom was murdered.
”Because they knew that they might have to get rid of Nancy,” Max said slowly and belatedly grimaced at his choice of words. It had sounded harsh that someone had wanted to ’get rid of’ the woman that had loved me so deeply, but unfortunately it was how they saw it. My mother’s murderers.
”Sorry,” Max mumbled, kissing the top of my knuckles. Taking a deep breath, he finished what he had planned to say, ”They needed a replacement quickly. Because if there actually is a rebellious group somewhere, they would probably see it as a nice opportunity to move in when the sergeant was without a gaea.”
”So why haven’t they?” I asked, confused, and a bit annoyed. If this imaginary group of ours actually existed, why were they waiting, giving Sean more time to work on his bond with me, giving me more time to get ready (in respect to my gaea development)? In essence, waiting for me to become a powerful weapon.
”I-” Max started, but realized that he lacked an explanation. There was frustration in his voice as he admitted, ”I have no idea.”
I held my breath against the flash of hope and almost felt ridiculous suggesting it, because of its naïvety and hopefulness. ”Maybe they’re waiting for us.”
Max frowned. ”You mean…?” His grip tightened on my hand. ”You mean that they would somehow know that we were bonded and would hope that we were to join their side and fight for the rebellion?”
I nodded. ”Is that so impossible though? You said it yourself; every alien is watching us. Most of them probably don’t know about our bond, but there most be some important people that know. I mean, even your mother knew of you bonding with me the night of the fire. And neither you or your father knew that she knew. And you being re-educated at such a young age must have been newsworthy. Maybe someone has followed you - and me - and our relationship with each other throughout the years, perhaps hypothesizing that our connection would come to life again. Perhaps knowing that there was a chance that us bonding again might be a better bond than a forced one. Maybe someone is pretty certain that we would want to revolt against the laws that would work to keep us apart. Maybe to some aliens out there, we’re their secret weapon.”
He was staring at me, his mind shocked into silence.
”Is that a possibility?” I whispered quietly, feeling uncertain under the weight of his silence.
Then the feelings started to unfold in his body, exploding through our bond. The most prevalent was impressiveness and awe. He was looking at me like I was the most precious thing in the world, like I was a beautiful rare treasure.
”Max?” I gulped, his feelings making my voice shake.
”Why haven’t I thought of that?” Max whispered.
I worried my bottom lip and tried to lighten the heaviness of his thoughts with a, ”Because you were too busy worrying about me?”
He nodded slowly, not a trace of lightness on his face though as he mumbled in all seriousness, ”Maybe.”
I breathed a short laugh, looking at him with eyes wide with disbelief and hope. ”There might actually be a way out of this…?”
He swallowed, blinked slowly twice, and then nodded. ”Yes.” Letting that word sink in, a beautiful smile spread across his lips with the realization of what that meant. ”Yes.”
”But we would have to fight,” I observed quietly, a sliver of fear trickling through me. I was not pro-war. I was my mother’s daughter - a pacifist.
A pacifist that might have to prepare for a war against aliens.
His smile slipped off his face and he said with quiet remorse, his concern for me strong across the connection, ”Yes.”
”Us against the aliens?” I suggested, feeling weighed down by the implication.
He nodded slowly, repeating that one-word again, like the implications of what was about to happen had removed every other word from his vocabulary. ”Yes.”
I inhaled deeply, letting my body sink against his, soaking up his warmth and concentrating on the comforting feeling of his skin against mine. ”Let’s do it.”
His hand released mine and he brought it up to cup my cheek, slowly pulling my lips to his.
”I love you,” he whispered against my lips before he united our hopes and dreams with our fears of war and death.
TBC...
Unfortunately the pie has been eaten.
Don't worry - it wasn't as good as I usually make. I'll send you a better one.
As we discussed from the previous chapter, Philip is probably more used to connections than Max is, and considering that Max had just reached out to comfort his very upset mother, it was not that far off for Philip to come to the conclusion that Liz was being reminded of the fact that her own mother was no longer with her. And Max's feelings are so strong, so similar to Liz's in the love for his mother, that it just became too much for her.
And in a way it was even more important that an alien (other than Max, of course) had that talk with her. Because Liz knew her mother - all the good parts - but she needed to hear that an alien (or at least someone from the alien community) also saw her mother the way she was. To hear that someone out of all those aliens didn't only see her beloved mother as an asset, a thing, something to be used. Not even as a person. Not someone that meant so much to many humans. But instead that she was a very loved mother, wife and friend to many.And in some ways he's the best one to talk to about her mother. He knew her well enough to be able to answer Liz's questions but also to help Liz remember her without having to censor what she says around other humans. No one's really just sat with her (even for a moment) and talked about her mom - the good parts.
Plus, aliens are still a lot more blunt than humans (or hybrids). So it was only natural for him that Liz had to find out about 'B' once Max had told her about 'A'.And Philip absolutely did the right thing by answering Liz's questions about her mother's death. He didn't want to do it to cause more pain but it's what she needs to know.
Yup. You see Max. You really doBetween his heritage, the danger she keeps putting herself in for him and his "role" in her mother's death (and Liz's subsequent burning) - every part of him would have been convinced she could never love him. One of those facts would be enough in his mind but add all of them together and it would be torment to have her getting closer and then confessing her love just to know he'd probably lose it. It's no wonder that he's been pushing her away so hard up until the last twelve hours or so. It's as much to protect her as it is to protect his heart.
Max can't afford to break down. He obviously also needs a breather, but that would leave Liz a lot more vulnerable than it would him. And her life means more to him than his own.Between that, all his guilt for everything and not wanting to force her into trying a double (triple?) bond it's amazing he hasn't broken down right along with Liz. Especially since he feels things so strongly. He's been solely focused on Liz and fighting to protect her that I think it's almost like a marathon runner. He's just focusing on the next mile and not thinking about all the pain he's currently feeling.
Yes, you're probably very right about that.On the other hand, maybe it was smart for someone else to answer some of the questions Liz had. Max can't really be objective about his role in things when it comes to Liz.
Let's hope that. They really have all the possibilities for this to be something magical. But right now, too much is happening - all at the same time. They just need a break. To go off to some deserted island somewhere and just "hang out"I really hope that when all is said and done they're able to help each other be whole both emotionally and spiritually. They're both so close to breaking they need it.
AlwaysSo... Wanna post more?
Thank you from the bottom of my toes for that feedback!
Helen (roswelllostcause) - Thank you, Helen
L-J-L 76 - Thank you for the feedback and for the bump
Eve (begonia9508)
No need to apologizeSorry but the more I read this story, the more I despise this alien folk!
You probably won't think much better of the aliens anytime soon Nancy was getting desperate and not thinking straight; it started to make perfect sense to her that the only way she could save her daughter from repeating her life was to kill Liz. Nancy actually believed that her daughter would be better off dead than to have to submit to the aliens.In some way, I understand Liz's mom; To decide to kill her husband and daughter must be the consequences of the mistreat in the hand of aliens - especially the sarge and Sean - and the suffering results on her, following it!
Thank you so much for the feedback!
Carolyn (keepsmiling7)
Weeell...What could possibly happen next??
Thank you for the feedback!
Natalie36 - Thank you
mezz
Beautiful connection/association. Thank youThe first thing that struck me was that Max had done so much to save Liz, even allowing her mum to die, and then Liz asked him to kill her anyway. No wonder he completely shut himself off in the eraser room. To have her ask him to do that himself when he'd done so much to save her before hand. What a heart ripping experience.
It really is better for Liz to know as much as possible. Max has been wary to tell her too much, both to (in a way) protect her (because he was already hitting her with so much information) and to make sure that Sean wouldn't see anything he shouldn't in her mind if he happened to break through. But more information is coming up. Max is probably realizing that Liz needs to be as informed as possible for the meeting to be "successful".
Mr E is getting more and more layers the more we learn of him. How wonderful.
Ooh, I just love how your mind works. You should be the aliens' personal advisor or something. Maybe they'll finally get something right then.Also, the fact that Nancy was going crazy is a very important piece of information. It means, realistically, that the aliens need to get to know their gaeas better. Gaeas are rare and important. Some gaeas can go to anyone and it doesn't matter, but strong gaeas, strong gaeas have to be handled differently.
Why didn't Sarge kill Nancy? Maybe Sean just "beat him to it". Or maybe it's as you said; that there was still some connection between Sarge and Nancy. Nancy was, after all, Sarge's gaea for a very long time. Something must've stuck. Right? Or?The other alluded to information that opens up more questions is the Sarge's role in Nancy's death. First up: why didn't he kill her himself? Why get Sean to do it? Is that cowardice? Is it a bit like how doctors can't operate on people they know? Is it to teach Sean how to do tough stuff? (Coz, between you and me and the cat, I don't think Sean would've had much trouble killing Nancy.) I wonder if Sarge was bothered by Nancy's madness? He was in a relationship with her while a teenager. I wonder how deep that was?
Nancy was not very young when she got pregnant with Liz, if that's what you mean. But how long she was with Jeffrey before she got pregnant, that's still unknownI could be wrong but it sounded as though Nancy got pregnant with Liz very quickly.
Thank you heaps and heaps for the feedback!
From FIFTY-THREE:
I knew that it was impossible for him to have stopped it, even though he thought he could have. Even if he had intervened, the ’problem’ that was my mother would have been resolved later anyway. Max wouldn’t have been able to prevent it forever.
Max’s only crime was that he had happened to have been present at the crime scene and that he loved me too much. Which no one could blame him for.
He heard all of this through the connection, but I still had to literally tell him to, ”Please, hold me,” before he reluctantly realized that he was forgiven - never having been accused to start with.
He climbed onto the bed, sat down behind me and pulled me - blanket and all - up against his chest, pressing his nose into my neck.
”You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me,” he whispered against my gradually increasing pulse vibrating against his lips where he put a soft kiss against my jugular.
I sniveled and nodded, still muted by shock, and pressed further back into him. Needing him more than ever.
____________________________________
I was alone in Max’s room. He had left just a minute ago - after tucking me into his bed - to ’make some arrangements’. I knew from eavesdropping on his inner monologue that those ’arrangements’ included fixing cover stories that kept my dad’s suspicions about my absence under control and meant that neither Max nor I had to show up at school today.
Max had been very firm on the point of us skipping school, the reasons including 1) Sean would be there, 2) both of us had barely gotten any sleep, which was mostly dangerous to me since I wouldn’t be able to put up any resistance to Sean, 3) Maria was asking too many questions and Max had understood from a first-hand view into my brain that I was having more and more trouble dodging the truth around her, and 4) Max wanted to give me as much information as possible about the members at the meeting tonight. To prepare me.
He hadn’t spoken reason number 5 out loud, but it had rung clearly in my head. He wanted to spend as much time alone with me as possible before our verdict.
Now, my body shivering in the absence of Max, I slowly took in my surroundings. I had been in Max’s room twice (at least that I could remember). The first time I had been in excruciating pain and Max had healed me after my burns had started to reappear. The second time I had been searching for Max while infused with an inhuman coldness, knowing that Max had been/was being abused in some way.
Neither of those events had given me the opportunity to actually look at his room. I finally had the opportunity to catch a glimpse of Max’s personal life. The part of his life that was very similar to that of a regular adolescent boy.
The collection of guitars by the large windows. The black desk, which gave an empty impression due to its organized piles of pens and stacks of paper. The single wooden ruler on the desk was neatly lined up with the table surface.
The bookcase next to the window was filled to the brim with books. Even though some books had been forcibly shelved on top of others, it didn’t give a messy appearance. There was organization in the mess.
I shook my head in thought. Max Evans exercised control in all things.
I would have probably found this amusing, if I’d have the energy to.
My eyelids were growing heavier as Max’s bed linen trapped my body heat and started to warm my shivering body. I felt safe here, surrounded by the smell of Max. There were so many aspects of that feeling that were laughable. I never would have imagined, going back just a couple of days, that I would feel safe in Mr. Evans’ house. Especially not buried underneath Max’s covers, listening to the faint sounds Max’s father was making in the kitchen downstairs.
My mind was processing everything that had happened in the last twenty-four hours, making me grow gradually weaker as sleep crawled closer. Within minutes, I was asleep.
I was startled into wakefulness, not having realized that I had fallen asleep, by the familiar heavy clicking sound of a door being locked.
My heart was, by learned habit, beating quickly in my chest as my eyes sprung open at the sound, only to find Max over by the door, looking at me apologetically, having realized that he had just woken me up.
My heart immediately calmed. I hadn’t realized how tense my body had been until it relaxed in the tracing of him crossing the room to reach the bed.
I stifled a yawn and mumbled, ”Hey.”
”You’re exhausted,” he said regretfully. Like it was his fault.
I looked at the paleness of his face, at the darkness under his eyes, and the slight hunch to his strong shoulders. His own weariness was pulsating off him.
”I guess that makes two of us,” I replied, tendrils of sleep making my voice drowsy.
How much sleep had he gotten?
I watched the distracted soft smile on his lips as he stopped next to the bed.
The thought made me worried and I tried to recollect if he had gotten any sleep at all last night. I was pretty sure he had fallen asleep with me after…
I blushed at the memory and my heart missed a beat as I caught his eyes, knowing that he was - as usual - silently hitchhiking on my train of thought. With an enticing half-smile he grabbed the bottom of his shirt and pulled it - along with the T-shirt underneath - over his head, exposing his well-detailed chest to my greedy eyes.
He continued undressing in front of me as my thoughts - mixed with distracting thoughts about his body, pleasure and sex - continued cataloguing his sleeping habits.
He had been awake, talking with Isabel on the phone, just a few hours after we had fallen asleep. I wasn’t sure if he had actually gone to sleep after our… I bit my lip and traced my eyes down his naked - save for those black boxers - body of his, as I finished my thought with ’second time’.
Max reached forward and pulled the duvet back, providing him with an opening to slip underneath the covers with me. He curled his arms around me, pressed my front up against his, as he positioned us both on our sides, and pressed a kiss to my forehead while he draped his right leg over my thigh and wrapped himself tightly around me.
”And while I was asleep on the way over here, you were driving,” I finished, using my sleepy voice as my body sighed in happiness at the feel of his warm skin all around me.
”I don’t have time for sleep,” he whispered back, his dark eyes heating me more than the bed linen ever stood a chance to.
I narrowed my eyes at him, feeling a scolding that would make my mother proud coming on, ”You need your rest just as much as I do.”
He shook his head slightly and I looked at those full lips of his, already craving his kissing. How long had it been since he had kissed me last? An hour? Thirty minutes?
My soul was going crazy with abstinence.
In response, he brought his hand up between us and slowly fluttered his thumb over my lips. I pressed my lips against his touch, kissing his finger, and he said, ”I couldn’t leave you unwatched. It wouldn’t be safe.”
”Your safety is just as important to me as mine is to you,” I said seriously and added with a touch of sadness, ”And we need all the energy we can get at that meeting tonight.”
He nodded quietly, my observation making his mind turn strategic, plans running through his mind. They continued to do so even when he reached down across my stomach and tugged on the bottom of my sweater.
I frowned at him in confusing incredulous curiosity, making the corner of my mouth twitch as I looked at him for answers. But even though his eyes were burning into mine, his gaze very present, his mind was planning what to say tonight. How to plead our case.
He filled me with awe. Even when he pulled my sweater over my head and innocently reached for the clasp of my bra between my shoulder blades, I could hear nothing but political musings in his head.
With the bra falling off my breasts, I smiled at him in perplexed amusement. ”How are you doing that?”
His lips formed in a teasing smile and he answered all-knowingly, ”Bras are not really rocket science, Liz.”
I rolled my eyes, mumbling, ”Silly,” knowing that he knew exactly what I was referring to. And it was certainly not the art of removing a girl’s bra.
I opened my mouth to ask again when his large hand brushed down my front, over the hard bump of my collarbone, over the soft hill of my breast and down the flat expanse of my stomach. My words turned into a gasp of deep desire, which turned into a yelp of yearning as he squeezed his hand into the back of my pants, folding his palm around the curve of my ass, against the lacy material of my underwear.
In a desperate attempt to prove to him that I was not completely ruled by my desire for him, nor that I was a mindless drone under his control, I fought to keep the conversation going, ”How are you able to think about the meeting while at the same time I can feel you concentrating on me?”
He leaned forward and slowly brushed his lips over mine, moving from the bottom to the top in one very fluttering motion. I moaned, my face chasing after his as he pulled away.
I groaned in disappointment. I just had to admit it. I was a mindless drone.
Max laughed softly at this and squeezed my behind, simultaneously pressing our nether bodies even closer together.
”We call it ’diversion’,” Max replied and started moving his hand from my burning behind to the front. My body tensed in breathless anticipation.
I wouldn’t call it that, I thought distractedly as he brushed teasing fingers over the top of my sex before pulling his hand upwards to work on opening the button to my jeans.
His quiet laughter was like a balm to my soul as he looked into my eyes and directed my attention back to the conversation. I was still acutely aware of what his hand was doing, unbuttoning my jeans, but if I focused really hard I believe I could understand what he was saying.
Maybe.
”It’s a technique where you hide what you’re really thinking behind another line of thinking. To confuse mind readers.”
Max pulled down my zipper.
”Mind readers?” I asked slowly. ”Is that the same as mind controllers?” I frowned, struggling with all the terms. ”Or is that mind wipers?”
Max nodded. ”Mind reading is the advanced stage of mind control. Sean and his father - and the ones that generally are good at manipulating minds - all have the potential to read minds. With training.”
Of course. This was not a surprise. Just a clarification. Max had, after all, told me as much when he had informed me that he had kept some information from me so that Sean wouldn’t be able to access it if he connected with me.
”But your father couldn’t read my mind earlier,” I frowned. ”Because you and I were bonded..? Is that why Sean hasn’t been able to read my thoughts yet?” Before Max could answer in the small pause that followed, I added in confusion, ”If he can’t access my mind to read it, how can he access it to control it?”
Max’s hand was paused on my zipper and I could hear the amusement in his mind. Being amused by me - with all my questions.
”That’s because it takes practice to access different parts of someone’s brain. Those who have mental abilities usually learn how to control the motor cortex of the brain first. The part of your brain that controls voluntary movement. Next they learn to control the temporal lobe, which is involved in the making and storage of memories. Which gives them the power to tamper with someone’s memory.”
I was trying to control my breathing as I was starting to get a bit worked up by the heat from Max’s hand resting on the front of my pants. I struggled to formulate, ”I assume that the process of thinking is operated by yet another part of the brain…?”
Max nodded. ”Frontal lobe. This is the largest part of your brain that is used to reason, plan… It’s where your personality is formed.”
I could feel that specific lobe of my brain working hard as I concluded, ”And even a mind wiper has to have a connection to be able to access that part of the brain.”
”Yes, usually,” Max replied. ”Which is why I - even though I’m not even close to being as good at mind abilities as Sean or even my father - can access your frontal lobe.”
I snorted and shook my head. ”Access my frontal lobe.” I leaned forward and brushed a light kiss on his lips. ”You have such a dirty mind, Max.”
He rolled his eyes at my lame joke, but there was a loving grin on his lips and relief was simmering through the connection. Relief that I was able to relax and joke; a sign that I was coming back from the shock of finding out that my mom had turned insane.
”I didn’t know that the bond could protect against intrusion into the brain,” Max said, his face turning serious. ”Not until dad tried to access your mind.”
”Which is why you were worried that Sean might gain access to my thinking, seeing that he might be getting better at using his gifts and the fact that the bond was weakened while being paused.”
Max nodded slowly, before there was a flicker of something warm and enticing on his face.
”Speaking of bonding…” Max’s fingers brushed up the front of my sex and I gasped loudly before I reached down and grabbed his strong wrist with my hand.
”What are you doing?” I asked breathlessly.
He smirked at me and answered, ”Removing your clothes.”
I rolled my eyes. ”Um…yeah. Obviously.” Then hitched my chin towards the door. ”But your parents are still downstairs. I’m in your room…” I lowered my voice in an indignant hiss, ”We can’t have sex here!”
He laughed and, to my disappointment, pulled his hand out of my jeans. He closed the small inch-long distance between our mouths and sealed his laughter with a kiss.
My body relaxed as I melted into his kiss. Finally.
He pulled back much too soon, reaching down with both his hands now, folding them around my hips, inside my jeans but outside of my underwear, and mumbled, ”Who said anything about sex? I’m just helping you out of these clothes, Ms. Parker.”
My suspicion was amused and filled with overwhelming love for this boy. He was adorable. Who knew that Max Evans could be like this? Who knew that behind that arrogant mask of playboy-persona was a strong man capable of such playfulness, care and love?
”Why?” I asked naturally, really wanting to hear his excuse for getting us both naked in a bed if his intentions were all pure.
He gave me another wink, before he disappeared under the covers. Not being able to see him, knowing that he was under the covers with my nudity, fueled something exciting and enticing inside of me. The anticipation of everything he could do to me caused my body to react with rather intense pleasure only with his act of pulling the jeans down my legs.
Just as my body relaxed in the knowledge (and disappointment, to be honest) that he wouldn’t do anything more than remove my pants, he pressed a soft kiss to the front of my underwear.
My breath got lodged in my throat as my hips rocked forward and my hands automatically buried themselves in his hair under the covers.
But he left it at that, crawling up from beneath the duvet, my hands still in his hair, and pressed our lips together. He slowly melted our mouths together, pulling at my lips, and worked to coax one sigh after another out of me while our bodies heated against each other.
Our breathing fairly compromised, he pulled back and smiled at me. There was a beautiful blush on his cheeks and his eyes were shining with life and happiness.
I shook my head at him, threading my fingers through his bangs and stated, ”You’re a tease, Max Evans.”
Something solemn came over his features, his reaction not the one I had anticipated, and after a beat of silence he said softly, ”You want to know why? Why I’m removing your clothes?”
Confused by his behavior, I nodded. How could he remain an enigma to me even when I had access to the express highway into his brain?
His voice was very serious, his eyes tracing my face. ”I need to feel you. With no barriers.”
I felt my physical desire for him simmer as the emotional need for him exploded.
”This-,” he continued and slowly ran a hand up the side of my upper body, ”-this is not just about desire to me. To feel you like this. To be this close to your body and feel your skin against mine. It grounds me. I can’t…” he dropped his eyes away from me, his hand stilling over the side of my ribcage, while he shook his head slightly, ”I don’t even know how to… I can’t find the words of how-”
My heart squeezed with deep love and adoration for this man and I moved my hand from his forehead to settle under his chin, coaxing him to look up at me again, before I leaned in to kiss him tenderly.
I was falling apart from all of this. I don’t think a body as young as mine is supposed to be able to handle all of these emotions, this type of all-consuming deep love. And I don’t think he was prepared for it either.
I could feel how it was almost drowning him and how he was reaching out to grab a hold of me, like a lifeline, to anchor him. In his words, to ground him.
His feelings resonated with mine. Something that provided me with a security that I suspected not many couples out in the real world were granted with. The knowledge that your partner loved you just as much as you loved them.
”We’re gonna get through this,” I whispered when I pulled back slightly from his lips. His dark eyes blinked up into mine and I added, ”They can’t stop us.” I put my hand on his chest, over his heart, for emphasis. ”They can’t stop this.”
He looked at me for the longest of seconds while I observed the trembles subtly shaking his body, the tightening of his hand around my ribs, his thumb brushing against the underside of my breast, the shift in his lower body to once again put his leg across my thigh and pull our lower bodies close together.
”Diversion is hard,” he whispered and I followed his change of topic without surprise.
In order to survive this, we needed to be unified. We needed to start preparing to fight for our right to an existence in this alien society. We needed to start to utilize what the bond might offer us.
”But it can buy you valuable time. And if you learn to use it correctly, the same method can be used to protect parts of your mind.”
”Blocking,” I whispered back. ”Like you do to me.”
He grimaced and said, mostly in clarification, ”To protect you.”
I smirked at him, but it was too loving to come off as a true disagreement as I told him, ”The jury’s still out on that one.”
His eyes softened in silent apology as he compromised, ”I’ll ease off on my ’protecting habits’ as soon as I’m certain that you can protect yourself.”
I thought back to our secret meeting in the desert in the middle of the night and acknowledged, ”But I’ve already managed to block you.”
He smiled tenderly, looking at me proudly. ”Yes. You have.” He lifted his hand from my ribs and moved it to brush at my hair, tucking it behind my ear. ”Which means that I have high expectations of you, Elizabeth Parker.”
I wrapped my arm around his waist and compelled him closer, connecting our foreheads in close proximity.
A wistful insecurity had befallen me and I wondered if he knew if, ”Am I really different from other gaeas? Stronger?”
He looked up at me through dark thick eyelashes and said, ”I’ve never heard of anyone like you. And I think I would have, considering the turmoil you’ve caused in the alien society.”
This worried me, even when his tone was light. ”Turmoil?”
Max took a deep breath and pulled back slightly. ”Everyone knows about you. It’s been hard to keep all the information about you hidden. You’re famous. Everyone wants to know everything about you.”
I shivered. ”Famous as in that they want to read about me in the gossip magazines? Or famous as in that they hate me and wish me dead?”
He moved his hand to flutter down my shoulder and out along the arm that I had wrapped around his waist. Reaching my hand he threaded our fingers together and pulled our interlocked hands between our bodies, pressing them between my soft breasts.
I tried to ignore the sensations the pressure of our joined hands between my breasts created.
He was troubled as he answered, ”Famous as in that they want to keep track of you. Considering you a loose cannon. Wanting to take the laws in their own hands if you were to jeopardize our society.”
”Oh my God,” I breathed, fear striking me hard and Max’s fingers tightened around mine in response. ”They’re all out to get me, aren’t they?”
He hesitated in light of my fear, before trying to smooth things over by, ”No, it’s not that bad.”
But I ignored his weak attempt at calming me down and thought back to that alien party and the people at school after Sean had forced me into a boys’ locker room. I remembered how they had looked at me when I had stalked across the canteen to practically pull Max out of school and confront him about him not wanting to have sex with me.
Oh God, I thought in embarrassed realization. I really had made a scene that day, which Max had alluded to when we had gotten outside. Max had even been understating the whole scenario, because I had made more than a scene. I had probably fueled a lot of suspicions about a possible relationship between Max and I.
”All those people… They were all staring…” I looked at him to gauge his reactions to my words. ”They were all calculating, seeing what I would do. If they had to intervene.”
Max shook his head and said calmly, ”They wouldn’t have been able to intervene. If they had hurt you, they would have had to answer to the law of having damaged a valuable gaea.”
”But they all knew about me. They knew - know - who I am.”
Max hesitated too long, his thought beating his audible answer. They’ve always known.
I swallowed. ”So everyone knows who the gaeas are?”
”They’d have to,” Max replied. ”We’re all supposed to indirectly look out for the gaeas.”
I frowned. ”We’re really that important, are we?”
”I don’t think you fully understand the heightening of power that a bonding with a gaea will provide a person of the military with,” Max said seriously. ”It could single-handedly save our existence if it came to that.”
I lowered my eyes in contemplative sadness. ”It can save your society, but it can’t save you and me.”
”It’s not the same,” Max replied. ”You being bonded to the military would most likely succeed in a fight against human beings. You being bonded to me in a fight against other aliens might not guarantee the same success. Our opponents are completely different. Our bond would have to withstand alien forces. Your bond with, for instance, Sean, would only have to withstand human forces.”
”But it’s never actually been tried, has it?” I questioned. ”You haven’t had any civil wars, any uprisings?”
”Some individuals have tried,” Max said cautiously, almost like he was afraid that I would get ideas from what he was about to tell me. ”But they haven’t survived for long.”
But in spite of Max’s attempt at not coaxing a flame to life in me, I couldn’t help but ask, ”What have they protested against?”
”Our society,” Max answered slowly. ”Our laws. Our treatment of human beings.”
”Are there any of those individuals still alive, having those same opinions in secret?”
My heart had started a wild beating in my chest and I could feel the vibrations from that forceful and hopeful rhythm bump against our interlocked hands pressed up against my breasts.
”I don’t know,” Max answered and for all I could read in him, he was being honest. ”The possibility of them being secret and all…”
”But there might be?” I hedged, not wanting to let go of the hope. The hope that someone on the other side - the alien side - was against the treatment of gaeas, the treatment towards me. That someone in the ’alien camp’ wanted to live more like humans, peacefully, and abolish their own rigid society which existed outside of the human one.
”As soon as they reveal themselves, they are - if their role in society is not too valuable - punished by death.”
”And if they’re too valuable?” I asked, thinking of Max. Thinking of if the meeting tonight would actually - by some miracle - lead to the aliens accepting our bonding and what that would mean for us. Would I really be able to be a part of a society that had threatened my free will, had killed my mom and had wanted to make me into a slave through rape?
I was thinking of what it would mean if Max and I joined some possible secret group inclined to revolt against the current society and what would happen were we to get caught. I’d probably be assigned to the first best military man for a new bonding, but what about Max? What would happen to Max?
He gave me a soft kiss, his love for my concern about his future well-being permeating our bond, before he answered, ”They would attempt to re-educate them.”
Right… At the institution.
”Has it ever worked?”
”I think so,” Max mumbled, but averted his eyes in afterthought. ”At least, we don’t really get to hear much about the rebels. It gets hushed down very quickly. To not give anyone else any ideas.”
”Which is why they’re all following my misfortunate ’adventures’ with fascination?” I asked, referring back to Max labeling me as famous.
Max nodded, bittersweetness flowing through our bond. ”You’re a rebel. Even if you haven’t consciously broken any rules. Even if you’re - technically - not under alien law. You have still fought us. Fought our rules. Broken our traditions. Rather disrespectfully so. But you have not been reprimanded. They have tried to silence you, through me, but have not succeeded. In a situation where someone like you would’ve been silenced a long time ago - either by re-education or death - the community can watch you break one law after the other and see nothing happen.”
”Which must be considered detrimental to the community,” I filled in.
He grimaced. ”There are a lot of reasons as to why they have been trying to keep us apart.”
”Then why haven’t they just collected me? Locked me up and have Sean force himself on me? That would have shut me up. Would have put me back in the place where they want me?”
I could see by the confusion on his face that he didn’t really know the answer to that one. ”I’m not really sure.” A deep wrinkle of confusion settled between his eyebrows. ”I would say that it’s because they were waiting for you to become ready, waiting for the glow to develop, but that wouldn’t explain everything. They could wait out the glow while you were in their captivity.”
I bit my bottom lip in contemplation and changed gears, ”Speaking of glows…”
His features softened, the line on his forehead smoothening out, before he leaned forward and placed a soft peck on the tip of my nose. ”Yes?”
”What does the glow mean? I get that it’s a step in my development, but how? Why?”
”The glow, technically, is concentrated energy between two individuals. It’s not just the alien’s energy moving towards the human, it’s the human reciprocating. The total of those energies creates an energy overload in a way that produces light.”
”And me reciprocating your energy means…?”
”That your energy has been matched to mine. Before, when I used your energy, you would become depleted. My energy was stronger than yours-” He interrupted himself with a frown, wondering if he was confusing me, and backtracked to, ”All of us with alien blood have a higher energy level than humans. I told you that my body temperature is higher than humans. This is part of it. My body emits too much energy, but also needs a lot of energy to fuel my abilities and will drain a human’s energy very quickly if I were to tap into it.”
”And now? Are my energy levels the same as an alien now? Is my body temperature elevated to that of an alien?”
I wasn’t sure how I felt about this. I had anticipated there to be some changes to my body, considering that I had bonded with an alien after all, but to actually hear that it might result in permanent changes that could be measured - like that of my core temperature - was a bit nerve-wrecking. To put it simply, I would never be able to go to the doctor again without them thinking that I was running a chronic fever.
”Your energy levels are the same,” Max explained. ”But your body can reroute it more efficiently. The mechanism has not been fully studied yet - since there hasn’t been that many gaeas - but your energy can work to assist mine without you losing too much of the energy for your own bodily functions. Earlier, a pull on your energy would pull from all parts of your body, exhausting you. Now it can pull from parts of your body that can afford to lose that energy.”
”Does that mean that my mom was never ready? That she didn’t have the glow? Is that why she was so exhausted?”
”No. Your mom wouldn’t have lasted that long if she hadn’t reached that developmental stage,” Max said. ”The reason why she was so tired was partly because she was fighting the bond, but mostly because the usage has a maximum. We can’t use too much of your energy without letting you refuel - in the form of rest.”
”What was happening in your society around the time of my mom’s death? Why were they using so much of her energy?”
Max looked at me with regret, like he was sorry that he couldn’t give me a concrete answer, knowing that it was important to me. ”I honestly don’t know. I just know that the sergeant was training a lot. Fine-tuning his abilities. Learning new abilities.”
”Like he was preparing for a war,” I mused quietly.
Max didn’t reply, but his mind was considering what I was referring to. I found his speculations matching mine and I picked one thought out and voiced it, ”Almost like there actually is a rebellious group somewhere and he’s preparing to fight them.”
”It makes sense,” Max agreed slowly, surprising me with his acknowledgement. Up until now, Max had appeared reluctant to agree to any of my ’conspiracy’ speculations about his race.
Instead he added, ”Which would explain why Sean was so quick at trying to bond with you, even before your energy had been matched to that of an alien, right after your mother’s death.”
”He even started before that,” I reflected quietly, thinking of Sean taking me out on a date the days before the camp. Mere days before my mom was murdered.
”Because they knew that they might have to get rid of Nancy,” Max said slowly and belatedly grimaced at his choice of words. It had sounded harsh that someone had wanted to ’get rid of’ the woman that had loved me so deeply, but unfortunately it was how they saw it. My mother’s murderers.
”Sorry,” Max mumbled, kissing the top of my knuckles. Taking a deep breath, he finished what he had planned to say, ”They needed a replacement quickly. Because if there actually is a rebellious group somewhere, they would probably see it as a nice opportunity to move in when the sergeant was without a gaea.”
”So why haven’t they?” I asked, confused, and a bit annoyed. If this imaginary group of ours actually existed, why were they waiting, giving Sean more time to work on his bond with me, giving me more time to get ready (in respect to my gaea development)? In essence, waiting for me to become a powerful weapon.
”I-” Max started, but realized that he lacked an explanation. There was frustration in his voice as he admitted, ”I have no idea.”
I held my breath against the flash of hope and almost felt ridiculous suggesting it, because of its naïvety and hopefulness. ”Maybe they’re waiting for us.”
Max frowned. ”You mean…?” His grip tightened on my hand. ”You mean that they would somehow know that we were bonded and would hope that we were to join their side and fight for the rebellion?”
I nodded. ”Is that so impossible though? You said it yourself; every alien is watching us. Most of them probably don’t know about our bond, but there most be some important people that know. I mean, even your mother knew of you bonding with me the night of the fire. And neither you or your father knew that she knew. And you being re-educated at such a young age must have been newsworthy. Maybe someone has followed you - and me - and our relationship with each other throughout the years, perhaps hypothesizing that our connection would come to life again. Perhaps knowing that there was a chance that us bonding again might be a better bond than a forced one. Maybe someone is pretty certain that we would want to revolt against the laws that would work to keep us apart. Maybe to some aliens out there, we’re their secret weapon.”
He was staring at me, his mind shocked into silence.
”Is that a possibility?” I whispered quietly, feeling uncertain under the weight of his silence.
Then the feelings started to unfold in his body, exploding through our bond. The most prevalent was impressiveness and awe. He was looking at me like I was the most precious thing in the world, like I was a beautiful rare treasure.
”Max?” I gulped, his feelings making my voice shake.
”Why haven’t I thought of that?” Max whispered.
I worried my bottom lip and tried to lighten the heaviness of his thoughts with a, ”Because you were too busy worrying about me?”
He nodded slowly, not a trace of lightness on his face though as he mumbled in all seriousness, ”Maybe.”
I breathed a short laugh, looking at him with eyes wide with disbelief and hope. ”There might actually be a way out of this…?”
He swallowed, blinked slowly twice, and then nodded. ”Yes.” Letting that word sink in, a beautiful smile spread across his lips with the realization of what that meant. ”Yes.”
”But we would have to fight,” I observed quietly, a sliver of fear trickling through me. I was not pro-war. I was my mother’s daughter - a pacifist.
A pacifist that might have to prepare for a war against aliens.
His smile slipped off his face and he said with quiet remorse, his concern for me strong across the connection, ”Yes.”
”Us against the aliens?” I suggested, feeling weighed down by the implication.
He nodded slowly, repeating that one-word again, like the implications of what was about to happen had removed every other word from his vocabulary. ”Yes.”
I inhaled deeply, letting my body sink against his, soaking up his warmth and concentrating on the comforting feeling of his skin against mine. ”Let’s do it.”
His hand released mine and he brought it up to cup my cheek, slowly pulling my lips to his.
”I love you,” he whispered against my lips before he united our hopes and dreams with our fears of war and death.
TBC...
Last edited by max and liz believer on Tue Jul 04, 2017 1:57 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Morning Dreamgirl
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Re: Unbreakable (AU M/L ADULT) Ch 54, 10/28/15, p. 49
Yay for a new part! *Sigh* I need a personal assistant so I can read it instead of doing errands.
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Roswelllostcause
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Re: Unbreakable (AU M/L ADULT) Ch 54, 10/28/15, p. 49
Hope that these possible rebels are really on Max and Liz's side! I really hope that they can kick Sean and his dad's asses!
Helen
Helen
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keepsmiling7
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Re: Unbreakable (AU M/L ADULT) Ch 54, 10/28/15, p. 49
That Max can "multi-task" better than anyone I know.
Hot, hot interaction between Max and Liz!
Thanks,
Carolyn
Hot, hot interaction between Max and Liz!
Thanks,
Carolyn
Re: Unbreakable (AU M/L ADULT) Ch 54, 10/28/15, p. 49
Great Chapter!!!! Please please please please please please please please please please come back and post more really really really really soon? I can't wait to read what happen next for Max and Liz. Wow Max and Liz have a hot, steamy moment. Wow Max sure knows how to multi task and turn Liz on really quick. Hope Max and Liz can find out about the rebels. Hope the rebels will help Max and Liz. Will Max let Liz know more about the group meeting tonight? Will Max and Liz sleep together before the meeting? What will happen at the meeting? Will Sean, Sean's father and the rest try and break Max and Liz's bond? Will they break Max and Liz's bond? Will Max and Liz be strong? Will the rebels be at the meeting? Will the rebels help Max and Liz? What does Isabel mean something besides the bond has happened? Is Liz pregnant? Will Max and Liz sleep with each other again? Will Sean, Sean's father and others hurt Max and Liz? Will Sean, Sean's father and others try to wipe Max and Liz's mind? Will Max and Liz stay together? Will Mr. Evans, Isabel, Mrs. Evans, Alex, Maria stand with Max and Liz? Will Max and Liz finish school? Will Max and Liz have to go on the run? Where will Max and Liz go? Will Max and Liz be safe? Will Max and Liz get married and have kids? Will Max and Liz have a happy ending together?
From:
L-J-L 76
From:
L-J-L 76