But Max was already gone. And she wasn’t far behind. LATE
FOR THE SKY
Author:
Irene Shafer
Email addy: ibshafer@frontiernet.net
Category: Max/Liz (with some great Michael/Maria thrown in!)
Rating: R (light)
Summary: Heavy AU future fic. This story was written between
seasons 1
and 2, before the Skins, before Tess's betrayal, before Michael and Isabel
lost respect for Max. It was written with Liz's sacrifice -- Max's destiny
over her own happiness -- in mind. Most of the characters are involved
(including Friggin' Eddie!), but I am a Dreamer first and foremost. . .
Though not originally intended, the story has a pretty strong Candy
storyline, as well. Maria just wouldn't be ignored or down played. <g>
Author's Note: This story appeared in the first issue of the
Roswell
fanzine, Late for the Sky. [© 2000 MadSeasonPress] It has not appeared
anywhere else until now.
Distribution: Yes, with author's permission.
Now
the words had all been spoken
And somehow the feeling still wasn't right
And still we continued on through the night
Tracing our steps from the beginning
Until they vanished into the air
Trying to understand
How our lives had lead us there
Looking
hard into your eyes
There was nobody I'd ever known
Such an empty surprise
To feel so alone
*
The end came, not with a bang, not with
a whimper, but with the tortured sound of tires squealing on wet pavement and
the frantic tattoo of a semi’s horn cutting the silence of the New Mexican
night. . .
*
Max was heading back from covering a
brush fire just south of Albuquerque, when the garbled message from Isabel came
in over the Cherokee’s on-board computer. He winced at the transmission noise
and made a mental note to have the techs at the reservation lab take another
look at it. The unit was still pretty buggy and at this point in the
Confrontation, he needed to be able to depend on his communications system more
than ever.
It
had been ten years since they’d gone into hiding. Ten years since their first
interactions with the Others. And while they knew Max and his people were in New
Mexico, they couldn’t get a bead on where.
That
anonymity was due, in no small part, to the work of the team they’d assembled.
He, Isabel and Michael owed the Apache a rather large debt of gratitude.
Max
heard his stomach growl, instantly sorry he’d passed by that roadside stand
outside of Mesa twenty minutes ago. Popping a piece of gum in his mouth to stave
off the pangs, he stifled a yawn.
Man,
am I tired.
Forcing
his eyes open wider, he cranked down the window in the ancient 4x4, hoping the
blast of cool night air would revive him. He massaged his forehead with a free
hand, sparing a few moments to reflect on the challenge of his life.
The
whole dual-existence thing had worn thin years ago. Working.
Fighting. If he could have gotten his editor to take him off this fire story
or quit his job entirely, he would have.
Before
Nasedo had been killed (in the end, it turned out he could
die), he’d managed to stockpile a fair amount of money for them. It
hadn’t lasted long, but at least it had helped them establish their base on
the Mesaliko. Max’s press pass had gained him access to all sorts of useful
information and spared him from having to explain his interest. Somehow he’d
managed these past 10 years (God, was it
10 years already?) to hold down a job and
fight for his very life.
They
all had.
They’d
had no choice.
And
it would all be over soon. One way or the other.
A
signal from the com let him know when the decryption was done. Punching up the
translate filter, he waited for the audio, then froze when it came through.
“—get there as soon as you can, Max!”
Isabel’s
normally smooth tones were stressed, not just from the connection. “. . .I
tried to stop him --- --- know how he is --- --- took off before --- could get a
message to you.”
A map popped up on the tiny monitor, showing a flashing marker, outside
of Roswell. He was just north of town now, heading south on 285.
Flooring the accelerator, Max one-hand-typed a quick note back to Isabel
telling her he’d meet her there in thirty minutes. . .
*
Less than half an hour later, he hit
traffic piling up on Route 285. Sitting behind a dump truck with bad exhaust,
Max sat chewing the cuticles of his left hand and trying not to panic. Something
felt bad here. In the pit of his stomach, something felt very, very bad. . .
He
was about to take a walk up ahead to see what the delay was, when he saw Isabel
run past him on the shoulder.
“Izzy!”
he called out the window after her, but she was too far ahead and didn’t hear
him. Taking a second to grab his press pass, he jumped from the truck and
followed the line of cars south. Once away from the noise of the idling dump
truck, he could hear the troopers’ radios. Then the telltale flashing blue
lights came into view and the stone cold feeling went from bad to worse.
It’s
just an accident,
he told himself, at a full-out run now. People
have accidents all the time. It doesn’t mean it’s him.
Nearer
to the accident scene, he got glimpses, through the rescue workers and their
machinery, of the drama unfolding ahead—glimpses that told him nobody
was walking away from this one.
The
ache in his belly suddenly became more tangible, doubling him over abruptly. It
traveled on to his head where it threatened to explode his skull.
Shit.
Shit. Shit. . . This is not good. . . The
throbbing in his head had him on his knees, one hand out to steady himself. It
could be him. . . He would have been here by now. He could be—
The pain was like a huge, hungry
animal, all teeth and hot breath. It grabbed him around the middle, holding him
in a death grip. In his mind’s eye, he saw the blood pouring to the ground,
saw his insides now outside. Saw it all over. . .
With
his eyes screwed shut against the agony, he didn’t see the State Trooper until
he was at his side.
“Hey,
buddy, you all right? You catch
some exhaust?”
There
was a hand on his shoulder now and it seemed to draw him back from the brink of
whatever it was, forcing the beast to unclamp its jaws and step away. The
throbbing began to ease up, as if the animal had changed its mind about its meal
and was moving back down the road, towards the accident and the noise and the
obvious death there.
When
Max opened his eyes it was to a familiar face regarding him intently,
recognition blooming there almost instantly.
“Ken
Clark! You covering this territory
again?” the trooper said, stooping to help him up. “You all right? What happened?”
“Just
a migraine,” Max mumbled, forcing a pained smile onto his face and still
massaging his temple. The pseudonym was so deeply ingrained that he hadn’t
even flinched. “Wayne Roscoe,” he said with as much normalcy as he could
muster, offering his free hand to the man. “Haven’t seen you in a while. How
are you?”
The
trooper grimaced. “Had better nights,
let me tell you.” He nodded behind him to the accident scene. “Not a pretty
sight back there.”
“Any
ID yet on the victims?” Max asked, trying to keep the edge out of his voice.
To support the reporter-on-the-beat ruse, he fished out his mini-recorder and
switched it on.
Roscoe shook his head. “Not yet . . .
I think it’s gonna take dentals, though, if you ask me. The fire was pretty
hot. That Mercedes ain’t nothin’ but slag now. . .”
Max
blinked in surprise, covered quickly. “Did you say it was a Mercedes?”
“Yup. Big mother, too. Diesel SUV, M series. Nice ride.” He shrugged. “Didn’t stand a chance against that semi, though.” Roscoe’s radio sparked to life. He answered it briefly in clipped tones, then excused himself to return to the accident site.
Max
shivered, pulling his jacket closer around him.
A
Mercedes 400 ML.
Hell,
lots of people drove Mercedes. Not so many of them out here in the New Mexican
wilderness, but people with money were always passing through on their way to
other places. Reno. Las Vegas. Los Angeles.
Still,
a Mercedes SUV.
There
had been reports over the last few weeks of Marcus and his three aids getting
closer to them. Trying to pick up their “scent.” In a black Mercedes SUV. Searching.
. . . And then Michael had run off after they’d gotten word tonight. Max
knew that everyone in the com center would have tried to convince him to wait.
Wait until they could all be together. To face them together.
They
were stronger together.
While
the pain in his head had miraculously disappeared, the cold hard feeling in his
gut was back. Michael had been here. He was sure of it. Was he here
when it happened? Was he. . .
He looked up and saw Isabel frantically hanging back in the crowd of on-lookers, clearly in agony and he took off running, at her side in seconds. “Iz,” he whispered as she fell into his arms.
She
clung to him, distraught, breathless. “He wouldn’t listen to me!
I kept telling him this was just what Marcus wanted. To hit us when we
were apart. When you weren’t here.” She wiped at her face, at the tears
already streaking her cheeks. “He was convinced they were heading straight for
us. To the rez. And he said he could stop them.” She spared a look over her
shoulder to the fire, still burning, barely under control. Softly, she swore,
something Max had noticed she’d learned to do since this had all begun. “I
can’t see anything in there. . . I
can’t see if his bike is. . . . If it’s. . .” She nodded at Roscoe. “Did
Wayne mention a . . . a motorcycle involved in the accident?”
“No,
he didn’t.” He squeezed her arm. “Stay here. I’ll go ask—”
“Wait!
What’s that on the shoulder?”
She was pointing now, up on her toes, trying to see around the chaos. “Is that
a Harley?”
But Max was already gone. And she wasn’t far behind.
They found Michael sitting on the pavement next to his bike, rocking back and forth slowly as he watched the flames, his gaze fixed and intent.
“Michael?”
Max whispered, shaking him gently when he got no response. He knelt at
Michael’s side. “Michael?
What happened here? Was
it. . .”
“It’s
all over, Maxwell,” Michael said, his voice so soft they could barely hear
him.
Max
shot a glance to Isabel, whose eyes widened as she nodded.
“Didn’t
you feel it? Don’t you know?”
Michael was smiling now, but his eyes never left the fire. “It’s done.
It’s over. . .” He finally looked
away from the wreckage. “You know, don’t you?” He turned to Isabel.
“Izzy? I saw you—it almost
knocked you to the ground.”
Isabel
was nodding. “The pain. . .” she
whispered.
In
shock, Max dropped to the shoulder beside Michael, his expression blank. “I. .
. I thought it was. . . I thought
it was you.”
Michael
smiled now, with a growing ease. “You haven’t been there for as many of them
as I have. That’s what it feels like when they
die. The energy sticks around for a lot longer, too. Like it can’t leave until
it hits everyone.” He shivered, perhaps remembering something. Max suspected
he was thinking about Tess. “We . . . we feel different.
Bad, but not as. . .”
“Michael,
what happened here?” Isabel was studying his face intently. “Did you . . . did
you?” She motioned with her head towards the wreckage.
“Didn’t
have to,” Michael said, softly. “That semi beat me to it. . .” His smile
grew faintly ironic. “Sort of anti-climatic, don’t you think?”
Max
blinked at the chaos, seeing the vain efforts of the fire fighters, knowing that
not even dentals would help identify
what would be left when the fire was all out.
The information refused to sink in. This war they had been fighting had begun before any of them had been born—this time anyway. It had been raging for so long, it was like a thing that would always just Be, a thing they’d never really believed would ever end. And now it had.
With
no one left to fight there would be no war. At least, not here on Earth. . .
Inside,
in that place in his gut where the beast had grabbed him, Max knew that it was
true. He closed his eyes and searched elsewhere—for the subtle vibrations that
set them and their enemies apart from the rest of Earth’s population. He felt
only Isabel’s warmth and Michael’s barely contained energy. Nothing more.
He
looked to his sister and to his friend—to his family—and
he knew the barely registering understanding he saw there echoed his own. At the
corners of mouths and eyes he could see a hint of the relief starting to
blossom. Grabbing the nearest hand (Michael’s) and giving it a knowing
squeeze, he watched that ease begin to grow. He caught his sister’s eye,
holding her gaze and smiling. Nodded in understanding.
It
was over.
*
Eddie and the others were waiting when they returned to the reservation.
A bonfire was lit in the main compound and drums beat out an insistent song of
celebration. Had River Dog still been with them, he would no doubt have been
leading a chant in the sweat lodge. After so many years of fighting and
hardship, the relief and the joy they all now felt was a palpable thing, like
fragrant smoke drifting through the cool night air.
Breathless from the dance, Eddie met them as they drove up. “You’re
sure of this?” he asked, and when Isabel nodded, he grabbed her in a fierce
hug and spun her around the parking lot.
Max smiled at the freedom in her laughter. It was a sound he hadn’t
heard since they’d been children. Before realization and reality had set in.
Before she’d lost Alex to the Confrontation. And their parents. Before so many
other painful and devastating things had happened.
He let his gaze linger until Eddie carried his sister into the shadows,
then he headed towards camp.
Allowing himself to be drawn into the circle of celebrants, Max exchanged
smiles and relieved hugs with everyone around him. These people had taken them
in, made this fight their own and, in the end, become family. He, Isabel and
Michael owed the tribe a debt that could never be repaid.
Through the haze of smoke, Max could just see Michael, sitting outside
the crush of dancers, staring intently into the burning column of logs and scrap
wood, a look of slowly dawning wonder on his face. He was only alone for a
moment, though, before a pack of his young art students, flushed and breathless,
rushed over and dragged him, only mildly resisting, back into the celebration,
each holding a hand or a shirt tail. Michael hefted the smallest of them onto
his shoulder while another attached himself to Michael’s leg.
Max watched in amusement as the Michael/kid creature made its lumbering
way into the circle, watched the joy and abandon reflected in Michael’s face
and too, saw the genuine warmth and relief he shared openly with the tribe—all
brought to wondrous, glowing life by the dancing flames.
So many changes in Michael.
So many changes in them all. . .
The celebration at his back, Max found his way to an empty picnic table
and sat silently, trying to take it all in.
Marcus and his aides were dead.
He, Isabel and Michael had felt them die. Felt it and understood it, both in a
way no human being could. The shift in energy, the painful release, the
irreversible movement of spirit from earth to sky. Like
the soul’s passage to heaven, Max mused, feeling both the influence of his
Apache brethren and his Christian upbringing.
More like its banishment to Hell. . .
His people had no concept of Heaven and Hell, at least not as Nasedo had
taught it, but Max was as much human as he was alien and his morality worked
from human models of right and wrong, sin and retribution. If there was a
controlling Being in this Universe, if there was any
justice at all—Marcus and his minions were in Hell right now. For what
they’d done to his people. For the deaths, both human and alien, they’d
brought about here on Earth.
May they roast in Hell.
May they return to the Sun.
Amen.
With that “return,” the Confrontation was over.
They'd
come to call it that early on, when it became apparent that these others had no
interest in talk or peace or of allowing them their lives here. The Others' only
purpose was to search them out and destroy them. And so he, Isabel, Michael and
Tess, as unprepared as they'd been in the beginning, had had no other choice but
to do the same. With Nasedo's help, and later, the help of the Apache on the
Mesaliko, they'd grown stronger and smarter and sadly, more and more skilled at
this business of war.
Not without their losses, though. Not without their deaths.
It
had begun nearly ten years ago, with a singular and devastating event that had
woken them from the false sense of security their presumed anonymity had given
them.
It
had begun, and Max noted the irony here, with a fire. . .
He
and Isabel were attending NMU, both studying journalism; he print, she photo. A
press pass and a nom de plume. Too open an invitation to pass up, Max said.
Legitimate and justifiable reason for asking questions. For traveling around the
country. For following leads. For, hopefully, gathering information that would
help them find the Others.
Home
on Spring Break, they’d spent a desolate evening at the Crashdown with Alex,
who had tried to organize a sort of reunion. Sadly, things had not gone as
planned and definitely not as Max had hoped; it had just been the three of them.
Michael, working over Break, was still in Colorado. Liz was home, but not
feeling well and Maria had stayed upstairs to take care of her. They’d eaten a
half-hearted meal, Max had wasted his time with Mr. Parker and made a pointless
trip to Liz’s balcony, and then they’d left.
They didn’t hear the sirens until they got closer to home. And when they turned onto their street and saw the fire engines and ambulances, there was no question in either's mind where the fire was.
There
were no coincidences in their lives.
Frantic,
they rushed the road block, desperate to find their parents alive and well and
standing outside watching the blaze
that was consuming their home. The thick smoke, the night's darkness, and the
crush of machinery and men obscured their view of the blaze, but they knew what
lay beyond that hellish, almost purple glow; the one place that had truly been
home to them and the man and woman who had stepped forward to become the only
parents they had ever known.
Once
Isabel spotted the Lincoln County Coroner’s van, their desperation to find
their parents, to find them alive, became extreme. About to make a dash through an opening line
of firefighters, they were stopped by Jim Valenti who seemed just as frantic to
stop them from getting any nearer the scene.
Not
to shield them from the sight, devastating though it was.
To
shield them from being seen.
Jim
had managed to drag them toward his truck and something about the intensity in
his eyes, and a pain on his face that seemed to echo their own, made them get
inside and listen to what he had to say. That blaze had been set to kill them,
he said, and for them to get away safely, for them to survive to fight
another day, they must remain “dead.”
Valenti
had gone on to explain how he’d arrived on the scene first, how he’d noticed
a strangeness to the blaze—the way it seemed to have consumed only one room,
at first anyway, leaving the rest of the house untouched. There was something
odd about the fire itself. Brighter than he’d ever seen. And the color
of it; blueish red. An eery shade of purple. The firefighters hadn’t
noticed, they were too busy trying to put it out, but to Jim Valenti, it sent up
all sorts of warning flags.
It
wasn't natural. . .
Knowing
what he knew, it took him only moments to put the pieces together. He saw the
Jeep in the driveway and his heart sank. The Others had found
Max and Isabel; learned their true identities. They’d located the house
the two lived in and known they'd be home on Spring Break. Seeing Max's Jeep in
the driveway and believing that meant he and Isabel were in the house, they’d
set the blaze thinking to kill them in one.
And
until Jim had seen them desperately trying to break through the line of
firefighters, he’d believed they’d succeeded. Because he was ignorant of the
same single fact that the Others had been. They had not
seen the dead starter in the Jeep. The one that had forced Max and Isabel to
take their mother's car into town.
Max
fought back a familiar wave of guilt at the memory of another fire, a kitchen
fire, and of his mother begging him to tell her something, anything,
because on some level she’d known. She’d
known there was something unusual and possibly frightening about her quiet,
sensitive son. And he’d refused her. Begged her
to understand his silence. Promised that it wasn’t anything bad. Then
he’d gone back to Isabel and stuck to his conviction that their parents remain
in the dark. He’d comforted her and reassured himself that this silence was
for the best. That it was safer for all
of them if their parents never knew the truth.
And
now they were dead.
Something they’d known nothing
about had killed them. Something he and Isabel might have been able to
protect them from if they’d had the foresight. If they’d just trusted
their parents to love them enough. If only they’d believed in the reality
of the threat. If
only. . .
That
day began a lifetime of “if only’s.”
Like Tess. Max had failed her, too.
Oh,
God, Tess. I’m so sorry. . .
On nights when he couldn’t sleep, hers was often the story that tortured him.
She’d come to them lost, her only
wishes to find a place to belong and to reclaim what she believed was already
hers; his love. His soul. When she
found him, though, his soul already belonged to Liz. It was irrevocably,
achingly, perhaps disastrously melded to hers. To
Liz. Try though Tess might, in word and deed, to remind him of their former
selves, their former claims to one another, she could not change what had
already been changed inside of him. He simply belonged
to someone else now. Even when Liz stepped aside, in the name of his
destiny, his devotion to her would never waver. Even as the years passed.
Tess
never gave up trying to prove, to remind, to convince him she was all that he
needed. And when the enemy was close at hand and she saw her chance at last, she
set off to fight alone, to protect the people she’d come to love—to perform
an act meant to show, once and for all, her true value. An act that would make
him realize and finally understand her love for him. To make him love her.
To make them all love her. But she
failed.
The
Others had killed her, instead.
Michael, who had followed her to Carlsbad where the Others were camping, saw to
it they paid for her death.
In
all else, though, she had succeeded
He
knew her value. Had, in fact, always known it. Resourceful and dedicated, her
single-minded devotion to their fight, unencumbered by earthly ties, made her
the perfect warrior. Her training by Nasedo, ten years greater than theirs,
showed her command of her powers to be smooth and intuitive.
And
he did know that she loved him. Though he fought that love and fought against
the predetermination of it, the blind and mindless acceptance that was expected
of him, he did understand it. And he did love her—as a member of his team, as
a member of his family—which was not as she wanted.
Her
presence was, through no fault of her
own, a reminder of what his life could not be. Of what, of whom,
he could not have.
Liz.
. .
And
though he knew it was futile and he’d tried to fight it, to section her away
in a dusty part of his memory, he had no doubt that the void in his heart and
his tacit and reluctant acceptance of why, colored his every interaction with Tess.
She
died believing her life had somehow robbed him of his.
Michael had said he’d held her as she’d passed on. He heard her last confessions of love and regret and he made promises to let her go that night. To make no attempt at rebirth, as would have been their custom. Tess had begged Michael not to consign her to another life without Max’s love. She begged him to let it end.
Michael had rocked her gently as her life had ebbed from this existence. After she’d died, after the gut-wrenching pain that marked her passing had released its hold on him, he had dug a hole in the hard New Mexican soil, lowered her gently into it, and after saying Grace, the only prayer he knew, he covered her with dirt.
It was several days before Michael returned to the reservation and even more before he related all that had happened. Max and Isabel had been so relieved to see him ride into the compound, dusty from the highway and far more quiet than usual, they’d let him go without pressing him too hard. He’d radioed from the road that Tess was gone. The rest would come soon, in endless sessions around similar fires, the broad expanse of the universe dark and shimmering above them. . .
That
was over eight years ago and the memory and the pain had neither dimmed nor
dulled for any of them. That bitter chapter of their lives was ending and a new
one was about to begin. Would it be any less difficult? What was there left for
them to sacrifice?
From
his picnic table vantage point, Max searched out Michael, dancing breathlessly
with a group of young men. It took him a moment longer to spot Isabel. In spite
of the drums’ insistent rhythms,
she and Eddie were holding each other close, moving gently in a slow dance. Even
from this distance, Max could see what they were feeling written in their body
language. Their eyes were locked together and Eddie’s hands were woven into
Isabel’s hair. He knew exactly what they were doing.
They
were memorizing each other’s faces.
For
the day was coming. Very soon. The day when he, Michael and Isabel would be
leaving.
There
was still a war to be fought.
At
home.
*
Outside, the dance continued. Once the
tribe had reason to celebrate, they usually didn’t stop until the dawn.
Isabel
had loaded a CD into the deck, one of Jackson Browne's earlier albums, a
fondness for which she'd absorbed from Eddie, but after the last strains of
“Late for the Sky” had played out, the drums' rhythmic insistence once again
filled the room.
Which was fine with Michael.
The beat had found its way into his blood, breathed life back into his limbs,
and made a start at cleansing away the poisonous psychic aftertaste the passing
of Marcus and his goons had left in his head.
Exhausted,
but charged, the three had each found their way back to the little house they
shared. They spent the remainder of the night discussing the preparations for
their departure.
Before he’d been killed, Nasedo, as Pierce, had been able to gain access to a secret hanger at Area 51. Deep below the desert, far from the prying eyes of man and military, a ship now lay waiting to return them home.
“So, then you’re sure
those systems are working now?” Max asked quietly, rubbing at what looked like
a sore spot on his neck.
Michael
watched him and sighed, knowing full well he was ticking items off that little
mental list he always had going.
“Maxwell,”
he
said gently, his lips turned in a smile. “Give it a rest, already. The support
systems are fine. And if they’re not, Randy and I will have them up and
running in plenty of time.” He slid off his boots, wincing as he uncramped his
toes. “Are you still set on the date? January
something-or-other, right?”
Max’s
answering half-grin was gratifying. Only half, but he’d take what he could
get.
Man,
he was wound tight tonight. Tonight of all nights he should be loose.
“The
20th, yeah.” Max nodded to Isabel, dozing lightly against his
shoulder. “Iz’s research turned up that week as the strongest, in terms of
planetary alignments and gravitational forces and. . .” He rubbed at his
temple, as though chasing down a thought. “. . .and other . . . other things.
. .”
Michael
let out a low hoot. “Now who’s Mr. Imprecise?”
Max
shrugged, which roused the sleeping Isabel. “Sorry, Izzy,” he soothed as she
sat up with a long stretch.
“S’Okay.
I was up, anyway.” Reaching over, she put her arms around her brother, then
kissed him lightly on the cheek. “The
‘other things,’ Max,
say that the sun spot activity expected for that week ought to create
‘ghost’ blips all over the radar. We should be able to move right out of the
atmosphere without being noticed. And when the thrusters kick in, well . . . we
won’t be around long enough for anyone to track,” she finished with a grin.
“Our technology kicks butt.”
Michael
laughed softly at the tone of pride in her voice.
She smiled in return and he caught the
warmth in her eyes, at once reminded how glad he was they’d regained their
sibling closeness after that failed attempt to comply with the dictates of their
destiny. He didn’t care what anyone’s mother
said—he and Isabel were brother and sister. End
of fairy story.
Max rose from the couch and stretched his legs, suddenly looking both exhausted, which was understandable, and unsure of himself, which was not. “Why don’t we . . . um, pick this up in the morning, okay?” His voice was even hesitant. Michael knew what was up, what was on Max’s mind, and what he was about to do. He wished he could stop him. Or help him. Or something.
Instead
Michael just watched him hug his sister, watched him hold on a little longer and
a little tighter than might have been necessary, offered his own hand to be
shaken, felt the same reticence in Max’s hand clasp, and then watched as the
man retreated to his quarters.
After Max had gone, Michael glanced over at Isabel to see tears wet on her face.
“Iz,
how can you let him do that? Every night.”
“He’s
a grown man, Michael,” she said, grabbing a tissue from the box on the table.
“He makes his own decisions.”
“He’s
killing himself, you know that?”
Michael
was instantly sorry he’d said it as a fresh wave began to roll down her
cheeks.
“C’mere,”
he whispered, opening his arms to her. She moved across the couch to nestle
against him. “I’m sorry,” he whispered, kissing the top of her head.
She
nodded and he could feel her hair brushing his chin as she did.
“I’m
sorry I showed him how, Michael. I thought he could handle it.” She shuddered.
“I just thought if he could see, he could let go. I
didn’t think it would go on for so long. I didn’t think. . .”
“I
know you didn’t, Izzy,” he said as he rocked her. “I don’t know how to
stop him either. It’s not like he’d listen to either one of us, anyway.”
This
wasn’t the first night they’d had this conversation. Michael knew it
wouldn’t be the last. At least not until January 20th. He hated
watching Max eat himself up over things he couldn’t change. And their time on
Earth was a done deal. They would soon be gone.
They each had their regrets, they each had names and faces that haunted them in their sleep, but torturing themselves wouldn’t change the inevitable. Three months from now, they would pack up their things and go home. And no amount of wishing would change the way things were.
For
them or anyone else. . .
*
Max stripped out of his clothes, grabbed a pair of shorts from the top drawer of his dresser, fiddled with his watch for a moment, then climbed into bed. There was a book on the night stand, one he’d utterly failed to get into and he made another half-hearted attempt before tossing it onto the bed next to him with a heavy sigh.
He
didn’t want to do this. He didn’t want to know any more than he already did.
He
just couldn’t help himself.
From
the drawer in the night stand, he pulled out an old, worn copy of Stranger in
a Strange Land, carefully spreading its dog-eared pages until he’d found
what he was looking for.
He
studied the photo in his hands as if somehow expecting it to look different than
it had every night for the past year. As though it would speak to him and tell
him the thing he most needed to hear. But it didn’t. It just stared sadly back
at him.
There
was a look in those eyes that made his heart clutch in his chest every time he
saw it. It’d been a happy picture when he’d taken it, twelve years ago. Now
all it did was torment him.
With
a sigh of resignation, he ran a finger lightly over the photo, watched as
Liz’s features rippled like water in response, then let his head fall back
onto the pillow. . .
He found himself amidst the chaos of a
busy hospital emergency room. Outside, the sirens of emergency vehicles wailed a
constant accompaniment to the screaming children, ringing phones and the clipped
chatter of the doctors and nurses struggling to get the obvious crisis under
control.
Pulling
a pair of scrubs from a nearby cart, Max slipped into them, pausing for the
briefest second when he realized how familiar they felt. He ignored the sudden
pounding in his chest, at the phantom pain that flared to life over his breast
bone (after all this time), and fixed
his eyes on a nearby door.
He’d been here before. He
knew what was about to happen.
As
if on cue, a muted rhythmic tone sounded from behind it, followed by a groggy
female voice muttering,
“.
. . I’m up! I’m up!”
Max
backed out of the way and behind a cart of used linens just as the door swung
open and a small figure emerged, trying to hold a stethoscope while shrugging
back into a white lab coat.
Liz.
. .
As
many times as he’d done this—stolen into her dreams, witnessed her
nightmares—he would never get used to seeing her this way. Tired. Gaunt. Pale.
. . The Liz he knew, a million
years ago, had been vibrant and full of life, not jaded from it. Not worn down
by it. Not struggling to make it through it.
He
barely had time to register the changes in her, or rather the changes in her
perception of herself, before she was off and down the hall at a run.
“Parker!”
called a commanding voice from behind the main desk. “Pyromaniac in a school
yard. Check the kid in Exam 5. Burns and a chest wound.”
“On it!” She took off down
the hall.
Keeping a good twenty feet behind her,
he slipped through the exam room door only seconds after she did. . . and found
himself, not in a hospital ward, but on a playground.
Where were they?
Liz’s hospital dreams always took place
there, as she struggled in vain to save a life,
reliving the day’s failures again and again. Torturing herself. In the ER. In
the lab. On the ward. But not here on a playground.
A
familiar playground. . .
It took him a moment to get acclimated and then he was spinning to find the bus, just in time to see the young version of himself step down onto the pavement, his six year old sister Isabel right behind him.
How
odd that you would dream this,
he thought. Had she seen the images in
him? If so, she’d never said.
Yet
there he was, all eyes and fear and . . . yes, there she
was, too, the young Liz, happy and laughing with her friends, a special
light dancing in her eyes—even then.
For
a moment, his present self mirrored his younger self as he stared transfixed at
this girl who would, for a short time, become his entire life. Something in her,
the joy in her voice, the care she took with her friends, spoke to him. Resonated
for him. Even at this early age, she was already the person she was to
become. He’d known it then. He could
see it now.
Max
shuddered, his heart beating quicker. This was the part that hurt the most, the
point in her dreams when the realization fell in on him. It felt like life,
expanding and spinning in his chest, but it hurt, too. It hurt like death.
He
loved her.
The years had not dulled that, just found another place for it to rest in his memory. As hopeless as it was, as beyond it as he should have been, he still loved her.
The dream Liz was wandering the crowded playground now, confused, searching for the “case” she was supposed to be working on. The young burn victim. His eyes roamed to schoolyard, as if to help her. There was a sharp cry to his right and when he turned, the present Liz was kneeling over a child’s body.
His
body.
Why
are you dreaming this, Liz?
he thought.
Seeing
himself so young and so defenseless . . . it was hard not to feel fear. The way
she was working over him, though—a doctor and a patient; he stared at her in
wonder and held his breath. Her hands, sure of themselves, moved quickly as she
checked his injuries and his vital signs. Livid, red burns covered his arms and
face, and he could see more in the spots where his clothing had been burned
away. There didn’t seem to be much blood, but somehow he could tell she
thought she was losing him. Her professional calm was holding, but it wouldn’t be
long before it broke down. He could see the desperation at the edges of her
eyes, see the color of it splashed on her cheeks and the way her breath was
quickening.
She was scared.
As she worked over his motionless body,
tears began to stream down her sweet face. “Not again!” she was whispering.
“I can do this. I can stop this from happening!”
Though
he knew it was dangerous, he couldn’t stay away. He was drawn closer to this
scene in spite of his fear she would spot him, of the confusion it would cause.
What would happen if she “recognized” him?
“Max,”
she exclaimed, oblivious to his advance. “Don’t.
. . You can’t die. You can’t.”
She worked over him furiously, swabbing at the gash in his chest. It seemed to
grow deeper as he watched. The blood was flowing red, soaking his shirt, pooling
on the ground beneath him.
Max
had to fight the nausea as the realization hit him. He knew
that wound. Had it bled this much the fateful night that Pierce had ordered
his “surgeons” to cut him? He felt a ghost pain flair to life over his
sternum and refocused on Liz instead of giving in to it.