Helen (Roswelllostcause)
I think Max is right the connection will help both of them to heal.
Well, Max has been a rather smart guy so far, so why not
She also needs to deal with the fact that she did kill two people. Even if they were bad people and she did it in self defense.
Yup. Having two people's lives on your conscience is not easy if you're a "regular" person (as opposed to a malicious one). Even if they
were awful and wouldn't have any problems killing
her.
Thank you for the feedback!
L-J-L 76 - Thank you
Eve (begonia9508)
At the end, who were the real aliens?; At least the rest, since 1940... Command, Sean, Mr Evans... surely he is; that was what Mrs Evans told Liz, in the last part but we know only these ones... Are they others in Roswell who they could fear?
Well, Command, Sean, Sarge, Mr. Evans: these are the ones we
know are pure aliens. There are also suspicions that Dresden, Alex's father and Michael's father are pure aliens, but this has not been confirmed. We actually don't know if Alex is a mix or if he's pure alien. But, obviously, the rebellion know who are the supporters of the "old ways" so they know who to fight against, to minimize the risk of anyone appearing later and ruining stuff after the "battle" is done and over with.
Thank you for the feedback!
Ashley (Morning Dreamgirl)
It's so sad that Liz locked her self in the bathroom all day. I'm surprised that no one else try to get her out. Though I imagine if Max was sitting outside it all day they would have known not to disturb them.
I can assure you that Liz was not just "left there". It wouldn't be all that weird if Max actually sat outside the whole day, would it...? Because he's trying to respect her privacy at the same time as he needs to be around if she decides that she needs him. So no, not an easy place for any of them.
It must be crushing him to know that somebody else treated her so cruelly and that he was not able to stop it. Especially since it was somebody who he knew would hurt her just for fun anyways. To know that she was in the hands of two angry full bloods and to *not* know what all they did to her would be beyond words. The imagination just runs wild at that point.
You can be quite sure that this is tearing him apart - even if he doesn't really let it show that much.
I'm glad that he was at least able to undress her without her freaking out. With how she's almost catatonic and with how Sean changed into "Max" during one of the last times she saw him it could have taken a lot longer for her to feel safe enough to allow anyone to take off her clothing.
Well, she recognizes Max - the real Max - not only in his smell but also (mostly) in how he treats her. How he touches her. So even if she's desensitized, she knows it's not an imposter. And her deaden state puts her in a position of "I don't care", which means that she can't even care enough about someone undressing her. Apathetic.
But in some ways (no matter what they did) it probably couldn't hurt as much as her keeping herself hidden from him. In some ways it's worse because she's right there and he can't reach her. It's like being back to the beginning when he was helping with her checkups. She's literally right there within his grasp and he can't take her away from all her pain and suffering. And since he doesn't know what all they did and what all she saw he doesn't fully know how to help her.
Exactly
That brings up a question for me. What do aliens look like? It's not what popular culture says they look like. And I remember she was afraid of the blue monsters with long claws under her bed as a child. Plus the scary men in her bedroom (which could be due to more of their energy or the vibes they were putting out). She also said that she couldn't come up with their form even in her worst nightmare.
Well...
If you think I write freaky nightmares, do you really want to know what kind of aliens I can make up in my head...?
Has Diane ever seen what a full blood Antarian looks like?
No.
*laughs* Would you look at that! That might be the first clear-cut answer I've ever given you
Still, you can tell Max and his father have continued to have arguments. I wonder if they've had even one conversation that hasn't been tense, angry or filled with hurt and (perhaps some rightfully placed) accusations.
Probably not
I think Max would happily shield himself from her as long as she opened the connection but will the shields stay up at night? I imagine they would. After all, they never seemed to have a problem before when they slept.
Makes you wonder if Max sleeps properly? Or if he's sleeps lightly to 1) be on the alert to protect Liz were something to happen, and 2) to prevent stuff from leaking through a block - if their connection is to be opened again (which we are, of course, hoping for).
And "pausing the connection" continued to work even when they were asleep before.
Yes, so it should be an active "on/off"-switch. Which is why they "actively" (i.e. kissing
) had to open the connection before.
Anyways, in that respect at least her fears are very valid. If Max has to keep pulling back every time he lets a little of something through (on purpose or on accident) it might make him pull back in other ways as well. Just like he did with their "option" to double bond because he didn't think she would ever want to sleep with him.
Yes, very much so.
I don't think their connection will break them. It's already protecting Liz from that. I think that it might just cause them to pull back from each other if they don't fully embrace each other. It's almost going to be one or the other. There's not really going to be any middle ground here. There can't be. They'll either get better together or crash against each other.
I love that... "They'll either get better together or crash against each other." That about sums it up, really. There
is a middle ground, but obviously that middle ground is not letting them tap into their full potential. So...
I am also hoping that he believes her when she says that she does not blame him. He does not see her as ruined and she did not see him as at fault. It is so interesting that even in the midst of all of this they demonstrate the basic human flaw of seeing the worst in yourself. If they are going to overcome this (and possibly fight in a rebellion) they are going to have to start seeing the *best* in themselves as well as each other.
And usually, when you're at your worst, all the things you don't like about yourself becomes louder and more insistent. They are both self-critical, but Max probably takes the cake on that one.
The fact of the matter is they were afraid of both of them. They may have given Liz a neurotransmitter block and had Command transport her but they also were taking her to Max. So obviously his demands to see her were finally something they were not going to ignore anymore. It could have been for ulterior motives as well but they were still giving into to him. Even the Sgt. came down when Max called for food.
Was it really because of Max's demands? Would he have that power to influence them like that?
I would glare at you if I didn't love you so much.
I fully expect the next chapter to be nothing but happiness. Maybe with more chocolate and cuddling since Liz is obviously not ready for anything more.
Nothing but happiness? Chocolate and cuddling? I think you've got this fic mixed up with some other fic...
Now... Ahem! *looks around* Show of hands - who is ready for chapter seventy-five? Oh look at that! Everyone raised their hands! You know what that means, Jo!
*scratches head in confusion* What? What does that mean?
Thank you, love, for your feedback!
From SEVENTY-FOUR:
I held his eyes, letting our breaths dance around each other in the inch of space between our mouths, as I considered his words, as I felt alive for the first time in three weeks. As I felt hope at the tips of my fingers, inching to crawl further up my body, into my heart.
Maybe I would never get rid of the monsters in my head.
But maybe I could learn to stand up to them. Take back my power. Reclaim the right to my own life.
My arms moved with their own force, sliding up his bare arms, over his shoulders, up his neck and stopped at the sharpness of his jaw.
He never once let go of my eyes. He didn't even blink. Instead I watched his eyes grow darker and darker with heated flames, waiting for me.
Then I was pulling his face towards mine, closing that annoying distance between our mouths, and clashing our lips together.
____________________________________
SEVENTY-FIVE
I'm not really sure how we got to the bed, but I'm rather sure Max had something to do with it. He had a tendency to move me around. Sometimes so discreetly that I almost didn't notice.
I pulled the duvet up over my bare upper body, looking up at the dark ceiling, waiting for Max while he 'took care of something'. The glow from him locking the door with his 'password' flickered against the dark ceiling and I instantly felt safer.
As if he was locking us up in our private bubble.
Neither of us had broached the subject of me pulling back earlier. I had initiated the kiss, it had quickly turned passionate and naturally deepened. But it was as if I could
visualize the iron walls around my mind shaking against his love for me and my love for him. Not wanting to stay up. Wanting to crumble. Even if iron wasn't supposed to be able to crumble.
But in our case, I wasn't so sure.
Not ready to find out what that would mean, I had pulled back, interrupted the kiss. We had stared at each other with strained breaths circling us, but he had understood why I'd done what I'd done. Especially since we had just discussed my fears about reconnecting my mind to his again.
That's when I had weakened in his arms, tired from all the emotions, exhausted from holding back and not letting him love me. Not letting me fully feel him. That's when I had momentarily lost track of where I was and where my journey to the bed had bypassed my consciousness.
He was basically
running back to the bed and my old self would have laughed at that, but the version of me that was worse for wear didn't really know how to react to that scene.
Pulling the duvet back, he crawled into bed next to me, positioning him on his back before he gently pulled on my right arm to drape my body across his chest.
"I forgot to tell you something earlier," Max started and my mind corrected him
There was not really a good opportunity to tell me earlier, knowing I had been basically catatonic by the time he had removed me from that bathroom.
I wiggled around a bit to make myself comfortable in his arms. He hovered his right arm in the air above my back, to give me space to move (maybe he was even afraid that I might roll away again, and he was giving me the opportunity to do so if I wanted), but next placed it gently in the middle of my back, between my shoulder blades, as I breathed a sigh of contentment and let my body melt against his.
"Really?" I questioned, yawning and closing my eyes.
"Today is Christmas."
I didn't know how to react to that.
"I know it's not the best Christmas," Max said when I said nothing.
"But at least it's not in there," I filled in quietly, referring to our separate prisons.
"Yeah," Max replied somberly and let out a sigh. "But I had pictured our first Christmas together a bit differently."
Max Evans: With the power to surprise me.
I lifted my head and looked up at him. "You've pictured our Christmas together?"
There was incredible warmth in his eyes. "Yeah. Amongst other things."
My interest was piqued. "What other things have you pictured?"
"Our first home. Our wedding. Our children."
I swallowed back my tears. Not necessarily tears of sadness - even though his answer had a bittersweet touch - but rather his words had touched something deep inside of me. Something tightly entwined with hope. With future. With the tentative possibility of even having a future.
It told me that Max still believed. He still believed we could have a normal life. A future after this. That we would not only survive, but live.
My voice sounded more affected in its wobbliness than I wanted it to, as I choked, "I didn't know you were such a girl, Evans."
He narrowed his eyes at me and I could tell that he was trying to look offended. But there was too much play from a smile in the corners of his mouth. "What? A guy can't visualize a future with a girl?"
"Sure he can," I said lightly. "But I would have figured you would picture that new car, that impressive house, that motorcycle on the side..."
"Hm," he said thoughtfully and pursed his lips. "I didn't think of that."
I smiled softly at this, but I could feel the honesty that smile lacked. To cover up my lack of emotion, I pressed a kiss to the underside of his left pectoral.
He held his breath as I did, but slowly resumed his breathing pattern as I placed my cheek back on his chest and closed my eyes. His fingers brushed lightly down and up the length of my spine, spreading goosebumps over my skin.
Silent seconds ticked by, but even if it was still in the middle of the night, neither of us fell asleep. Our awake state was a lot more tempting than sleep.
"Do you really think we'll have children?" I asked quietly, almost afraid to ask. But it had seemed okay, somehow, considering that he had been the one to bring it up.
"Yes," he said clearly without hesitation.
I licked my dry lips. "What about my mom? She couldn't have any children with the Sergeant. She was a gaea. So am I. And he was an alien. Like you."
"If you want children, we're gonna have children," Max stated.
I looked up at him, needing to know if his eyes were as honest and serious as his statement. My eyes roamed his face and here was no question; he was being serious. He would make it happen. Even if it wasn't biologically possible.
But something told me that it was biologically possible. Otherwise the Sergeant wouldn't have tried so hard.
I swallowed and quickly pushed away the images that wanted to rush through my head at how Steven Carter had 'done his best' to produce a child, and dragged myself up the length of Max's upper body.
He gave me a soft smile as I came closer, "Hey."
"Hey," I whispered back and kissed him, squeezing my hands between the pillow and the back of his neck, palming the thick hair at the back of his head.
"Now?" he mumbled against my lips as I pulled back slightly to catch my breath.
"What?" I questioned, my lips brushing his with the word.
"You want a child now?"
The laughter bubbled up in my chest, cascading warmth out to my whole body, while it moved in musical tones over my lips.
Max's eyes shone brightly as he added, "Because I think we should wait a little bit. We're only sixteen, you know. I don't think I can handle all those diapers and the vomit-"
"Shut up," I laughed and captured his lips again.
The happiness felt foreign. Almost undeserved. As if I wasn't allowed to laugh after everything that had happened to me. But I couldn't stop. It kept trickling out between kisses and I could feel Max's mouth turn into a smile as the sound continued.
Rolling us over, my laughter turned into breathy exhausted occasional giggles as he leaned over me and kissed down my neck.
"No babies," I warned, as he kissed along my collarbone, his thumb brushing over my nipple.
Max looked up at me and rolled his eyes. "I'm not the one that lacks stamina in this relationship."
I bit my lips together as heat crept up my cheeks. "What does that have to do with making babies?"
Max grinned at me knowingly. "I'm just saying; I'm much better at controlling myself than you are."
I huffed, offended. "So not."
He raised a questioning eyebrow before brushing his hand down the side of my abdomen, making me moan softly with the caress.
Before he could say anything, I mumbled (with my eyes still closed), "Not fair."
It felt wonderful to focus on other senses than my eyesight as I kept my eyes closed and felt him move slowly up my body. His hands lightly caressed along my sides, his thumbs brushing simultaneously over my breasts, before curling up over my shoulders, while he covered my body with his, making sure to not put his whole weight on me, hovering slightly above me.
He placed a light kiss on my bottom lip, before tugging it between his teeth. I pressed the inside of my legs against his hips, my whole body longing to respond to him.
"Promise me something," he requested softly, breathing against my mouth.
I kept my eyes closed. "Yes?"
"Tomorrow, we'll eat something."
I opened my eyes and smiled shyly at him. "Will you make me pancakes?"
"Yes," he answered.
"Then I'll eat."
He brushed at the hair on my forehead, whispering with deep feeling, "Thank you."
A shiver went through me, making the small smile on his face falter as he searched my eyes, but before he had a chance to ask, I whispered, "I'm ready."
He looked uncertain all of the sudden, his body tensing against mine. "Ready?"
I hadn't really thought about it. I was just following my instinct. My instinct to keep Max close. My instinct that told me that Max and our love was what would save us.
"To let you in," I answered, my voice shaking.
"Let me..." he repeated, confused and probably wondering if I was talking about sex or the connection.
"But I can't get the walls down," I admitted, embarrassed.
I seemed to be a natural at building walls, at creating blocks. But Max had always been the one to take them down.
His body relaxed against mine and he put a light kiss on the tip of my nose. "I can help with that."
The shakes in my voice had bled out into the rest of my body and I was trembling with not only nervousness but mostly fear.
"Shh," he hushed, placing small brief kisses on my lips, while his hands cradled my face, his lips brushing at my tears of fear.
I inhaled deeply, hating that I was crying. Again. Quietly, I admitted, "I'm so scared."
"You
know me," Max whispered back, not wanting me to be afraid of his mind, of his thoughts and feelings.
"Yes," I replied, took another deep breath and exhaled slowly through my mouth. "But I also know our tormentors and what they are capable of. I'm not sure I'm ready to see what they have done to you."
He caught my eyes and said, "I won't give it all to you at once, okay? But I think, in the end, we need to honest. To be our strongest. To be fully connected."
I considered this. He would filter it to me. One piece at the time. For now, that sounded okay. And I guess I could always ask him to do otherwise later. I knew he could. I knew how strong and capable his mind was.
I nodded. "Go for it."
He laughed quietly, shaking his head. "The tasks you give me, Ms. Parker."
I returned his smile, before lifting my face up to his and catching his lips. His kisses warmed me from the outside and in. His breathless breaths breathed life into my cold body. His warm body moved sinfully slow along mine, enticing my skin, making me tingle and heat.
The walls didn't slam down the same way they had slammed up. They slowly disintegrated. I could basically feel them falling apart in my mind as Max's mind reached out for mine.
Then we were connected. I inhaled deeply, a gasp ripped from the bottom of my toes, my back arching as his love hit me full force.
In that moment, I couldn't understand or see what I had been fearing. Because there was nothing but love swirling in the connection. Soul pinching, heart blazing, unconditional love.
"Don't have an orgasm on me now, Parker," Max mumbled against my lips, bringing me back to reality with a short laugh.
"Ha. ha."
But the funniest part was that he might be right. I could feel the pleasure spreading out through my whole body. The all-consuming relief of being loved. Of belonging. Of bathing in warmth. Of knowing no darkness, feeling no fear, no insecurities.
I wondered if the sensations would last forever, because then I wouldn't be having any nightmares anymore. Ever again.
But intellectually, I knew the this was only the connecting. This was the overwhelming phase of feeling everything at once. Later, your mind and body would adjust and it would simmer down.
Because I doubted any human being - or alien, for that matter - could function in this state for very long.
"We would just remain in bed and
feel," Max filled in and I smiled at the knowledge of him hearing my thoughts again. "Like two dopes."
"Mmm," I agreed, liking that thought a lot. "I would love to be a dope with you."
"Making babies," Max whispered.
"Making babies," I repeated. I swallowed, but wasn't prepared for him to hear my concerns before I had realized them myself. "About that-"
He put his finger to my mouth, smiled at me gently and rolled off me. "I heard you."
I was not there yet. Max's touches were amazing, gave me a calmness I couldn't find anywhere else. But the memory of Sean's hands were still too clear in my mind. And now very clear in Max's.
I heard his sharp inhalation next to me and the first trail of fear hit me. This is how it began. This is what I feared would happen. Instinctually, I felt myself start do drift. Already starting to visualize for the walls to come back up around my mind.
Then Max was in my field of vision, looking at me heatedly. "Oh no, you don't."
"I don't want you to see it," I broke. "It's humiliating."
"You did
nothing wrong, you hear me?" he said forcefully with anger. But the anger was not directed at me. Instead he was kinda miffed that Sean was already dead; the things he would do to him otherwise...
His thoughts brought forward another point of deep anxiety in me. That I had killed someone. That I had killed
two individuals. Robbed them of their lives.
"Show me what happened," Max requested quietly but not lacking in fierce determination. As if he was searching for some specific information and wanted it to be confirmed.
I swallowed, closed my eyes, and focused on the memory. My heart instinctively resisted it. Not just because of what I had done to Sean and the Sergeant, but because it had happened as Max had been bleeding out in front of me. Now his pale, dying face, was all my inner eye could see.
Max's hand against my cheek was soft and gentle, making tears run down my cheeks at the contact. His voice was equally soft as he begged me to, "Focus, Lizzie. I'm okay. You know I'm okay. Concentrate on what happened with Sean and Sarge."
My body was trembling from exertion as I forced my mind away from the terrifying image of Max lying in his own pool of blood on a cold concrete floor. Instead I focused on the incidents
surrounding the attack on Max.
I replayed the memory in my head; feeling the hand on my shoulder, the fear that had instantly spiked in me, the sucking sensation that had barreled through me and how I had turned around to see the two tyrants flying through the air.
"The connection," Max whispered, his statement teasing my eyes open.
"What?" I asked, confused.
"It was the connection. Not you."
I frowned, searching the consolation in his eyes that was meant to soothe me. "What do you mean?"
"The connection is protecting us," Max filled in. "You were exposed, extremely vulnerable with me...disabled."
I chewed my bottom lip, wiping the most recent tears off my face with my trembling hand. "But how-"
"Look at the connection as a bubble. It's wrapped around us, protecting us. Brought forward by our feelings and the situation. It probably became defensive because we were failing it, losing our grip on it. So it reacted to any outside possible threat any way it could-"
"By repelling them..." I said slowly.
He nodded. "While we were incapacitated, it pulled on our energies and attacked whatever
we considered a threat."
I bit my bottom lip. "But that would still make it my fault. Because
I had decided that they were dangerous and the bond responded to that."
"They
were dangerous," Max whispered, pressing his thumb into the softness of my cheek while his eyes grew softer. "We might still be in there if the bond hadn't done what it did." He paused and I opened my mouth to object when he beat me to it, "You never gave it conscious permission to do that. You never actively released that energy." He scoffed. "Hell, maybe it was me. Those minutes are a bit fuzzy to me, but it wouldn't surprise me if I helped to initiate the release. I
must have at least fueled the feeling that they were a threat, prompting the defensive reaction."
It made sense and I desperately wanted to believe it. The suffocating guilt inside of me wanted to be released. But I didn't want excuses to explain something I should be held accountable for if I wasn't completely sure that the explanation was valid.
Annoyance crinkled his eyebrows and his eyes turned stern. "I'm sure, okay? Let it go. It might have been a more advanced and definite method of self-defense than what you would ever had imagined, but that was what it was:
self-defense."
He could sense that I was still not convinced and added, "They would have killed you without batting an eye. They were planning to use you as a slave. To take away your free will. To force you into things you didn't want. For a lifetime. They would gladly use you for as long as you were capable and wouldn't feel an ounce of guilt over it. Because they had no conscience. They were heartless, Lizzie. You have to see that. You can't feel bad for doing the world a favor."
"They're your people," I whispered, barely audible. But it was a weak protest. His words were affecting me. I knew that what he was saying was true, even though I would rather never have had someone's death on my conscience, no matter what the reason. "There's not that many of you and I killed two of them."
"
The connection killed two of them. And if it hadn't,
I would have. Even in my condition." His lips were tight as he added, "And they probably would have died in the rebellion sooner or later anyway. Our bond just made it easier for the resistance, considering that two of the strongest members of the opposition are now dead."
I considered this and came to think of something that had irked me since it had happened. "Why would the Sergeant take Sean with him to visit us that day? I'm sure that he knew, just as well as we did, that Sean was unstable. Considering what he tried to do to you at the meeting. Also, I obviously scared him the last time we met. So why expose himself to that risk?"
Max's eyes flickered over mine, his mind silent across the connection, as he replied, "The military uses a high frequency sound, higher than the level of ultrasound, to disturb alien powers. That's what they were using to weaken me. The sound is applied to a room or an area. It can also be directed at the individual, but they found this inefficient in my case considering that I was moving around within the room and they would have to repeatedly 'shoot' me with the sound for it to keep on functioning. So, even if affecting
only me with the incapacitating sound would be convenient, it was more efficient to 'treat' the whole room and, of course, this would then affect any other alien that walked into the room."
I frowned curiously at his explanation. "You knew about this... That's what you were thinking about when they arrived with a gun. That's why you knew they would be without powers as well."
Max nodded. "I've heard of it being used. But never experienced it first hand before. We haven't really had any wars on Earth, so it's never been widely used, but I assume that a local burst of disruptive sound - delivered through a weapon - would be the best one to use in a battle instead of what was used on me in that room."
"So why Sean? Why was he there? And why wasn't there anyone else there? No one stopped me when I left the room to get help."
Max took a deep slow breath before continuing, "Bringing Sean along was not part of the plan, according to my dad. But I think you really freaked the Sergeant out. Or maybe he had finally started to realize what we are capable of. Anyway, even with a gun, Sarge probably felt defenseless and there's safety in numbers, right?" There was a bitter sound to his suggestion before he added, "And I'm pretty sure that no one authorized Sean to be armed. He must have grabbed that knife on his way over or something."
I shivered in the silence of the night and Max pulled on the duvet to tuck it tightly around us, draping my body across his, his arm pressing into my back transmitting warmth and comfort.
"A small part of the rebellion, lead by Dresden, happened to invade the Institute around the time Sean and Sarge stepped into our room. The confrontation between his men and you and I was supposed to have been watched by Command himself, but as he was informed of the invasion, he fled. Maybe because his best military men were in our room, not by his side. It's still doesn't really make sense. I'm not so sure he actually
was there. It doesn't sound like Command would
flee."
"Your dad?" I whispered. "Where was your dad? He must have been close by..."
"No one was informed that you were to be transported. It was all very secret. Dad suspects that Command had already started to speculate at the time that his government might be infiltrated with dissident members, working for the rebellion. So Command moved you himself."
"And then made a desperate attempt at forming an allegiance with you and me?" I asked incredulously.
Max nodded somberly. "Something like that. There was no more time to try and break us. The rebellion was moving in and we've proved more successful than I think Command had anticipated."
A short joyless laugh left me. "Was he really that stupid? Command? Did he really think that we would join his side after everything they had done to us?"
"Not voluntarily. But they could always try and force us."
I shook my head at their stupidity. At their desperation.
Powerful men grasping at straws.
"Obviously only Command was strong enough to control us, and even
he failed to break the connection. How in the world were they planning to get us to do their dirty work?"
Max dropped his eyes, the whisper of panic momentarily forgotten moving from him to me across the bond. "I hope I'll never find out. I'm sure his methods wouldn't be pleasant."
"All is fair in love and war, huh?" I whispered, my voice empty. I was thinking of the fate we had dodged. Of how much more badly it could have gotten at the hands of Command and his people.
Max nodded and moved slightly beneath me, clearing his throat. "Dad was close by. He was part of the invasion against the Institute-"
"He was rescuing you," I realized slowly.
"And you," Max filled in, searching my eyes. "That's why he was not at the Institute when you called him. They were trying to orchestrate a simultaneous rescue of both of us. It was too risky to try to save us at different times. They might have killed the one still in captivity, to prevent the rebellion from acquiring their whole 'weapon'."
"So we're a weapon?" I asked, feeling objectified on more than one level.
He tried to muster up a smile for me and placed a kiss on my forehead. "It's only a word. We know what we are, and that's the most important part.
They have to be strategic.
They have to win this war for the chance of our society becoming a better one. So right now, we
are considered a weapon. Their only defense against Command."
The responsibility of that, the risks it entailed, fell on my chest like a ton of bricks, bringing back that familiar feeling of not being able to breathe.
"Liz," he said slowly, coaxing my attention to his face, to the fear in his eyes and the concern in the curve of his mouth. "Breathe."
I nodded, really wanting to appease him, but my body not being able to let go. It was closing up on itself as tears ran down my cheeks.
Max was staring so intently at me that my chest grew even tighter with his love and I felt his fingers digging into the skin of my back as he repeated, "Breathe," with barely controlled fear breaking his voice.
I buried my wet face against his chest, pain running through me, as I tried to hold my tears back while it kept hitting me. It was good to have some answers again, but I wasn't prepared for the fear those answers would awaken inside of me. Adding on to everything I had already felt, everything I had already experienced, my tight chest left no room for any breaths.
My crying exploded as Max rolled me onto my back, unable to hide the tremors in his hands. I couldn't see him through my curtain of tears or hear him through my sobs. I could only feel him. Those trembling hands brushing warmly over my chest, pushing energy straight into my heart. Light, healing energy, saturating my chest, my lungs. Filling me not only with oxygen, making it possible for me to breathe again, but also soaking me with a soothing calmness.
My crying softened with the feeling, letting myself sink into the sensation. Allowed it to quiet my toxic thoughts. Max's hands had been replaced by his lips and he was placing soft kisses over the top of my breasts, across the front of my shoulders, up my neck.
"I'll keep you safe," he whispered, tears in his voice. "I promise you, that I'll keep you safe." He pulled back, took my hand and tightly entwined our fingers. "You won't have to do anything you're not prepared for. I'll see to it.
They need us, so they'll have to wait. We're in charge. It's on our conditions."
"I can't do this, Max," I whispered. "I'm sorry. I don't think I can do this."
"Shhh," he hushed, brushing my lips, wet from my tears, with his. "There's no pressure, okay? No matter what anyone tries to tell you, there's no pressure. If you decide that you would rather run away, they'll just have to figure this out on their own."
I looked up at him hopefully and whimpered, "Really?"
He smiled at me softly. "Really."
TBC...
