pygmalion

By DocPaul

Chapter Thirty: Hands

If I could tell the world just one thing
it would be that we're all o.k.
And not to worry
cause worry is wasteful
And unless in times like these
I won't be made useless
I wont be idled with despair
I will gather myself around my faith
for light does the darkness most fear

My hands are small, I know,
but they're not yours they are my own
but they're not yours they are my own
and I am never broken

Poverty stole your golden shoes
but it didn't steel your laughter
And heartache came to visit me
but i knew it wasn’t ever after

We'll fight, not out of spite
for someone must stand up for what's right
cause where there's a man who has no voice
there ours shall go singing

My hands are small, i know,
but they're not yours they are my own
but they're not yours they are my own
and I am never broken

In the end only kindness matters
In the end only kindness matters

I will get down on my knees and I will pray
I will get down on my knees and I will pray
I will get down on my knees and I will pray

My hands are small, I know,
but they're not yours they are my own
but they're not yours they are my own
and I am never broken

My hands are small, I know,
but they're not yours they are my own
but they're not yours they are my own
and I am never broken
We are never broken

We are God's eyes
God's hands
God's mind
We are God's eyes
God's hands
God's heart
We are God's eyes
God's hands
God's eyes
God's hands
God's hands

~Jewel~

Day Forty-four: Wednesday, 7:33 am

It was a normal morning for Arnie Farger. For the last ten years since he graduated from high school, he had worked for the Roswell park system, and every morning he walked the parks with his trash bag and pick-up stick, collecting garbage that park goers seemed incapable of carrying away with them or depositing in the proper disposal container. It was tough that one. The disposal container was large, yellow, and labeled ‘Trash’ with a request for no household refuge dumping.

Amazing. People would rather load up their household trash and drag it to a park, rather than pay a few bucks a month for the city sanitation system which was part of the water and waste management system. People were pigs. Lazy pigs. Inconsiderate.

Arnie didn’t mind walking the parks in the early morning because it gave him time to reflect on his life. On choices he made early, and without real thought. Sissy. His wife. He met her in high school. Actually all through school, but it took her until high school to notice he was alive. Oh, it was like wild fire in the blood! One day, she forgot he was the geek sitting next to her for two years, one of his lab partners that she hardly spoke three words to, and suddenly their eyes met. Kismet. Karma. Destiny. Soulmates reaching across space and time. His half  met her half and together, they were an unbeatable, undeniable team. Oh, sixteen. So in love. Damn the rules and requests of their parents to take time, grow up, and move into adulthood slowly. By the end of sophomore year he was panting to get her shirt off and pants unzipped. They respected their parents and went slow. Oral sex first. Eraser rooms. Back of his car. Raves. The quarry. Lots of grab-ass stuff, hot and heavy, but no penetration. Just a couple of crazy horndogs going at it above clothing and as much under as they could get away with, as those bases looked pretty tempting. Fourth base. Home run. They saved that for end of Junior year. The summer Sissy figured out how to roll on a condom one-handed. By October of Senior year, Sissy was pregnant.

Marriage immediately after graduation with Sissy Taylor waddling like a duck in a hand me down wedding gown expanded for her new girth, and him standing in his rental tux in baby blue. It was a lovely ceremony. His mom cried. Actually, she started crying earlier that year when he had to turn down a scholarship to the New Mexico State University in Las Cruces because the financial aid wouldn’t cover books, living, and a newborn baby and wife. He needed a job.

Ten years later, he was still in Roswell, picking up trash after other people. Sissy was pushing out their third child, and she had never lost the original weight she put on from the first baby. They no longer sat and stared into each other’s eyes with that deep sighing, feeling the connection of true soulmates. It was tragic. He didn’t know when it stopped. Perhaps somewhere between getting her panties off in the Eraser room at West Roswell High, or the first time he couldn’t make the rent in the small two bedroom apartment they rented, and Sissy was crying from postpartum depression. Hard to say.

All he knew was it wasn’t supposed to turn out that way. Someone should have told them that young love was just that…young. And without a hint of reality or even any type of adult rationality, it rarely lasted in that idealized form. High school sweethearts surviving into old age together, still together, and still in love was a small crushing percentage, and more times than not, just a romantic fantasy written for those who needed to believe in it.

Love was actually getting up every day, working a dead end job, coming home to a woman that had twenty-five extra pounds on her, and three kids and choosing to stay anyway. It was her looking at him with his mismatched socks, receding hairline and a tendency towards some love handles around the old middle and thinking he was still romantic. She still thought his boxers were cute. That was love. Staying not because you have to, but because no matter how depressing others might view your situation, it was taking care of the family he created that made his life livable. Now that was love.

Arnie smiled to himself. God, he hated his life. Sometimes, he hated his wife. He definitely hated his job. He loved his children, and at times he looked up at his wife, she looked at him, and in that moment, he remembered why he fell in love with her.

Arnie mused about his life as he cleaned the children’s play area in the park. It was a good play area. In a few hours, little children would be back from the large apartment buildings across the street to toss more bubble gum wrappers and soda cans on the ground. That was okay. It was part of being young and free, and having your entire life ahead of you with no restrictions, no closed doors, and everything was boundless. So he picked up after them and saw it as a way of preserving something special in their lives. Their dreams of a future.

That was when Arnie found the dead body left in the children’s playground with a wooden spoon or handle pushed through its ear.

“Damn. Oh, damn,” said Arnie, and he decided immediately that he wouldn’t act like some hysterical woman. He would calmly walk to the public phone on the corner of the park, only a few feet away, and he would calmly call it in. He would call the Roswell police, and he would give exact details, location and any other useful information they might need. He was a good citizen.

His resolve to show a disciplined calm lasted the three feet it took him to make it to the phone. At the moment the emergency operator answered the phone, he decided on a different course of action.

“Help! Argggghhh! Dead...Help.... Body....Help... Dead...Spoon...Wooden..Body...Dead...” Arnie didn’t pause, even at the operator’s calming voice. “Help...Someone...Police....Help...!”

Arnie would have stood there rooted to the spot, screaming a jumble of information forever if Mrs. Emma Jackson hadn’t taken her poodle, Trixie out for her morning constitution. She quickly took out her cell and phoned the police.

“Hey, you’ve got a corpse with a wooden spoon coming out his ear. Yeah. Better bring an ambulance too,” she said. “There’s a hysterical guy down here crying on the pay phone.”

~~~

Max and Michael walked towards the scene. “What have you got, Sean?” Max asked.

“Believe it or not…a murder….a plain, old-fashioned murder. Someone killed and dumped a guy in a playground. How sick is that? Some kid might have found the body.” Michael was surveying the scene and the body with interest.

“Death by spooning. Any leads?”

“Not yet. But the body is a young man, just barely out of high school. We’ll run down his friends and family, see what he was doing last night.” Kyle was over talking to Simon’s man, George. They were deep in discussion.

Michael nodded towards Kyle, “What does your better half have to say?”

Sean searched his pockets for a cigarette. Finding none, his nose sniffed hard in an attempt to find anyone in the vicinity that might be hoarding or using tobacco on his scene. He might have to confiscate it.

“He’s sure it’s a gang thing. He thinks a wooden spoon in the ear is either a gang thing or an irate girlfriend.”

“Uh huh. Or a maniac chef on the loose. Perhaps the kid sent back his meal in the restaurant?”

Max shrugged. “I could see someone driven to do that if it was you, Michael. This kid looks too young. Not often a person feels a need to drive a spoon in someone’s ear.”

Sean nodded to Kyle as he came over to join them. “I’m ruling out kinky sex. Strangulation….sure, but ‘impaled by spoon’? I don’t think so. What’s up, Kyle?”

“George thinks he might get some prints off the wood of the spoon. There’s a ghost, but it’s pretty bad looking. He’s going to do his best to extract and recover.” Kyle shook his head. “This one looks vicious and cruel. The boy was obviously held down by more than one person.”

Michael frowned. “You might want to check to see if he owed any money to dubious characters. This sounds like muscle punishing him for not fulfilling.” Michael looked at the poor kid that CSI was finishing up on. “Man, can’t they just stay with breaking kneecaps?”

Michael and Sean wandered off in front of Max and Kyle talking about classic organized crime muscle tactics. Max laughed slightly, but noticed that Kyle wasn’t following the conversation.

“Hey, what’s up? You look out of it.”

Kyle rubbed his eyes. “Tired. Tess didn’t sleep well. She’s been tossing and turning over naming the baby Zan.”

Max was quiet for a moment. “Sorry, man. I didn’t mean to shake her tree or get her spooked.”

“I know, Max. I think she’s convinced if you name the baby Zan it means he’ll somehow end up on Antar as King. She can’t think of losing her son before he’s even born.”

“That’s not going to happen. I…” Max looked at Kyle and quickly amended. He wasn’t alone in this. “We’re not going to let that happen.” Max was quiet for a moment. “What do you think of naming him Zan?”

Kyle looked across the taped off playground. A kid’s haven. A place that should be free of the uglier parts of life, and it wasn’t. Not anymore. Not in any town. No place was really completely safe.

“I think that you have to decide. He is your son. We really meant it when we said you should name the baby.” Kyle shared a serious look with Max. “Zan. If that’s the name you feel is his, then that is good enough for me.”

“Thanks, Kyle.” Max stared at the empty swings too. “I want him to have something of his heritage, even if I can’t really remember it. Antar. It was something that both Tess and I are giving him…something that sets him apart from other children. He’s a product of our re-engineering. I believe he’ll give a new meaning to a name I once abused.”

Kyle slapped Max on the shoulder. “I’m sure he will. With you and Tess as parents, how can he be anything but great?”

“Great Zan?” Max laughed and shook his head at Kyle. “Not just me and Tess, Kyle. All three of us. Four if we let Jonathan in on the action, but I vote we hold out on Jonathan. That man has a way of going overboard in everything.”

Kyle laughed at that. His laughter was contagious as both he and Max caught the funny side of the comment. Their reaction and tag team partnership over Tess’s pregnancy was a lesson in access. It was impossible to imagine Jonathan going more insane.

“We’ve got a doctor’s appointment today. You going to make it?”

Max frowned. “Damn! I knew it! I woke up this morning knowing that I forgot to add something to my schedule. I forgot to change the date when you told me.” Max looked at his watch. “I’m scheduled for court in about an hour. It shouldn’t take long. When is the appointment?”

“Right after lunch. One-thirty.” Kyle frowned at Sean and Michael in front of them making strange gestures, and grabbing each other. They were obviously trying to decide how the spoon was inserted. Creepy.

“I can make it. I think.” Max quickly added up how long it would take him. “I might be late, so just go without me, and I’ll catch up to you.”

“Not a problem.” Kyle smiled. “Can you even believe we’re almost at then end of this pregnancy? I have to admit, I’m getting excited to see the little guy. Hope he has Tess’s ears and not yours.”

“What’s wrong with my ears?”

~~~

“It is about time you showed up.”

Freddie paused in the doorway. He hadn’t seen Alex sitting in the dark. Shit. “Alex.”

“Yeah, man, don’t even pull that on me. You’ve been hiding.”

Freddie nodded. It was true. Not from Alex, but from other Skins. Not just Kivar’s, but his own faction, the Commander’s followers. Roswell wasn’t safe for any alien that was wanting to stay out of the thick of it.

“Not from you, Alex. Things were getting too heavy, so I took a breather.”

“Hmm.” Alex drew of his cigarette. He admitted it. He was weak. No willpower. When faced with life without the draw of smoke deep in his lungs, he had a hard time deciding what the use was in living. Wasn’t like he planned on living forever anyway. “I had a request to ask of you.”

“Request?” Freddie took a seat across from Alex. “This sounds ominous.”

“It is. The Commander…Michael...wants to meet you.”

Freddie sat still. Very still. He had talked to Michael before when they were covering the club months back, but not up close and personal. “He wants to meet me? You told him about me?”

“Not you, per sè. He knows I have a source. He asked to meet my source. I told him I would ask and set up a meet.” Freddie stood up and paced a little which amused Alex to no end. Freddie never paced. He was Mr. Cool. “Man, what has got you wired? You follow him...or did, so why so reluctant to talk to him?”

Freddie sat back down. “Do you understand Destiny, or even what it means to be caught in a loop of circumstance?”

“Star Trek crap, right?”

Freddie nodded. “Sure, if that helps…think of it like that. What if you knew something was going to happen before it happened? Would that alter the choices you make? Would you second guess your decisions wondering if this is the one decision that alters a timeline that must not be altered?”

“Back up, Chief.” Alex drew on his cigarette. “This thing…between Michael and Maria. The thing you hint at, but refuse to tell me about, is it like that?”

“Yes.” Freddie took a cigarette and sat back drawing on it, staring at his friend. “They, together, create something this world has never seen. It’s only the beginning for humans, another step in evolution. One that in the course of human history, is lost in obscurity. Who knew when the change began? Just that it did. But in the course of alien history….my people, and those of my solar system, what the Commander and his mate do is crucial. It has all already been done, except for the starting point. That point. That moment must be guarded or we will never exist. The Commander…the Royal Four will never exist.”

“Just tell me, Freddie. Tell me, and let me decide for them.”

Freddie shook his head no. It was too big a burden for Alex…for anyone. He stared at the lit end of his cigarette. “I’ll meet him...under one condition.” Alex waited for him to name it. “I want to meet the Commander’s mate. Talk to her for just a few moments.”

Alex stared at the man. Maria. It kept coming back to Maria. Why?

~~~

“I wish Max had been able to make it.”

Kyle made a comforting sound as he led Tess towards their car. The echo of the parking garage was one he was used to, and he quickly looked around. almost expecting Max to suddenly appear in a hurry to meet up with them. He hadn’t missed a single appointment since they all agreed to co-parent together.

“He was pressed. He was going to try.” Kyle pulled her close to his body hugging her pregnant body as he leaned down and nuzzled the side of her neck. “Did I tell you how sexy you’re looking, my Queen?”

“Piss on the damn ‘Queen’ crap, but feel free to continue complimenting me on my beauty. So what were you going to say about my eyes?”

Kyle chuckled as he pushed her in front of him and wrapped his body around hers as they slowly walked towards the car with him whispering in her ear, making her laugh. His arms were around her middle and his hands rested protectively on her pregnant stomach. He could feel Zan shifting under his hand, and he smiled. He was going to miss this once the baby was born, so it was his intention to impregnate Tess again as soon as possible, if she was willing.

They had cleared the elevator bay and were walking towards their car along the concrete partition, when Kyle looked up, his eyes on the car. It was that momentary flash of light, the ignition of a spark,  that had him suddenly pushing Tess behind the low concrete partition and his body following hers, to fold over her in protection.

There was a deafening roar, followed by an unreal silence and suddenly the very ground around them seemed to explode and buckle. Kyle felt his body ripped away from Tess, the momentary feel of something heavy...pain....and then darkness swept him from conscious thought.

~~~

“Sonnabitch!” Max took the curve too fast. He was cut off from the left by another driver trying to make the lane in time to make the turnoff. Unsafe asshole! Max tapped his brakes and felt the car slide a little. He quickly corrected the problem with a quick maneuver, and as quickly as he fixed it, he increased his speed hitting his siren and lights on his unmarked vehicle.

Bad day. That road hogging asshole almost killed a cop with his car. He was already late for the appointment, but it was worth it to see the man look up and spy him and his lights in his rearview mirror. Max chuckled smugly when he saw the man mouth a few obscenities as he pulled it over.

Max searched through his pile in the glove compartment finding a pad for ticketing. Walking up to the other car, he waited as the man rolled down the window.

“Officer…”

“Detective. I need your license, registration, and proof of insurance.” Max ignored the man as he tried to explain his actions. “Wait here.” Taking the man’s forms with him, he went back to his car and called in the tags, checking for outstanding tickets. The man was clear. “Hey, Steve, can you talk me through a ticket writeup? I’m rusty.” Max listened as the man on the other end laughed and told him how to write up a ticket. He was just finishing when his baby beeper went off.

Taking the ticket and man’s forms back to him, Max handed it over through the window. “Next time, you’ll be hauled in to the station.” Max didn’t have time to give the man the lecture he had intended, so he let the two hundred and thirteen dollar ticket be the object lesson.

Getting in his car, Max grabbed his cell and called Tess. No answer. Staring at the beeper, he called through to Roswell General to see if Tess was brought into maternity. Max pulled into traffic and headed to the doctor’s office. Maybe she was there or home. He was close. He would try the office first.

The beeper went off again. And then again. Max called the company and asked them to triangulate the receiver. Office. She was at the doctor’s office. Hitting his lights, Max turned towards that part of town, but traffic was congested. It was hardly moving. He finally joined a procession of fast moving emergency vehicles as he pulled into the large Medical office facilities, it was the pile of rubble that made him get out of his car and stare at what was once a three story parking garage.

His baby beeper went off again. Tess...? Kyle...?

~~~

“Guerin!”

“I got it!” Michael hung up his phone, and tore a piece of paper from a pad, as Sean swore on his phone.

“How many?”

“Everything they can spare. It’s not going to be enough. The downtown construction crews are sending all the heavy equipment they can. The Medical building is being evacuated immediately, but they have questions about the soundness of that structure as well.” Michael didn’t comment on how upset he was that it was Maria’s doctor’s offices, or at least the adjoining parking structure that was bombed. They could’ve had a doctor’s appointment. “Patrol units are on site and are setting up perimeters three blocks back. CSI and bomb squad are enroute, and ambulances and support staff are also in transit.”

Jim struggled in his coat. “Let’s go!

~~~

It was dark. Still. Tess could hear Kyle’s breathing, but she couldn’t see. “Kyle?”

He remained quiet. Her hand reached out towards where she could hear his breathing, trying to find him. Giving up, she searched for her keys, as her hand hit rubble. Chunks of concrete. Her hair felt gritty when she pushed her hands through it. Ah. Keys. She had a small light on the end to help illuminate a lock at night so it was easier to insert the key.

“Kyle!!”

He was next to her, but over a bit. Buried in debris. His head was sticking out of the concrete pile, but his entire lower body was covered in huge non-ending rubble. Tess scrambled closer to him. Quickly moving the pieces of concrete from around his head, tears fell as she saw the blood on his face. The area around them was pitch black. They seemed to be in a bubble. Tess looked up, but there was nothing there. Only darkness. The air felt thin. Closed in.

“Kyle? God, baby, talk to me!” Her hands moved over his face as she tried to wake him. Her hands moved downward on his body to remove more concrete. That was when she found it. An energy shield. It wasn’t noticeable at first against the dark, but now she could see it. It was like a small bubble around them. Green. Strong. It covered her completely, but Kyle only partially. His lower body was outside the shielding and buried.

The entire area was buried. They only survived in a pocket created by the energy shield.

“Tess?” Kyle’s voice was weak and dry.

“Kyle!” Tess cried and laughed at the same time, kissing his face. He looked confused and in pain. Sweat was breaking out on his forehead, and his breathing was ragged and faltering as if it was too hard to push the air out.

“What?” Kyle paused licking his lips trying to feel moisture. His mouth and noise were filled with the smell and taste of cement dust. “The…I saw an explosion from under our car.”

A bomb? Tess hadn’t noticed. She had been laughing, and then suddenly Kyle was pushing her down, covering her body with his, and then he was pulled from her. Then nothing.

“Kyle…the bomber?” Kyle nodded wincing in pain. “You’re hurting. Where?”

“Everywhere.” Kyle’s breathing was shallow and labored. “Tess…listen to me.” Kyle paused trying to concentrate. “We’re buried alive. The parking level above us has to be on top of us. So they don’t know we are in here. Do you have your cell phone?”

Tess looked for her bag. No. It was gone. Her keys had been in her pocket. The light wouldn’t last long. “No. My bag is gone. What about your cell?”

Kyle gulped. Shook his head. “It was on my belt.” Tess looked down. His body was covered at mid-waist. Past his belt. His right arm was pinned under a large concrete slab. She couldn’t move it. Pausing, she stared at the slab, and with great effort she pushed it. It moved. Not much. There was no space for it to move into. Panting from the effort she leaned over Kyle.

“I can’t move it. There’s no place for it to go, so I can’t blow it up.”

“No, don’t blow it up. In this small space, we would be dead.” Kyle reached out his left hand, and wiped the tears from her frightened face. His hand moved down to touch the baby, their baby. Theirs and Max’s. “Are you holding the space with this shield? How long can you hold it?”

“I…” Tess looked around her helplessly. “It’s not me. I’m not doing it. I was unconscious.” Kyle looked over her face and noticed a small wound on the right side beside her temple.

“Are you okay?”

“Dizzy. Tired. Sleepy.” Tess smiled, trying to comfort him and be brave, but she was scared to death. They wouldn’t find them. Not in time. She would lose Kyle and the baby.

“Then the shield. It must be the little guy.” Kyle laughed slightly and put his hand on her stomach, rubbing in comfort. “He threw it up around you. I would have been in the protected area too if the force of the blast hadn’t pulled me away from you.”

“I hate this bomber. I hate him, and whoever is paying him to hurt us!” Tess lay down along the side of his body in the protected area, the part she could reach. “How long do you think our oxygen will last?”

Kyle coughed. It hurt to breathe, and he couldn’t feel his lower body or his right arm. He felt cold. When he coughed, he could taste blood in his mouth. He was totally fucked up. “Long enough. Max will come for us. He knew we were at the doctor’s office.” Kyle looked at Tess and the keys in her hand. “Tess, push the baby beeper.”

“Oh, God! I forgot!” Tess pushed it, she waited a moment or two and pushed it again. Max said that the company could track her beeper’s signal. He would know they were there! He would come! Tess pushed it again. Waited. Pushed it again and again as her concern for Kyle grew. “Kyle? He’ll come. Don’t…just stay with me!”

Kyle tried nodding but his head hurt. He could barely see her. It was getting darker. “I’m glad you’re here. That I can say goodbye.”

“No! No goodbyes! You promised. You promised to fight to stay with me, to come home.” Tess ignored the tears streaming on her face as his eyes closed. “Don’t…I love you. Don’t leave me, not again. I can’t go on alone.”

Kyle nodded his head, but he couldn’t open his eyes. He was too tired. “I’m here. I promise not to leave unless I can’t hold on.” Tess kissed him. “How long do you think Zan can hold the forcefield?”

Tess didn’t know. She didn’t even know how her son was doing it. It certainly wasn’t her. He was strong. So much stronger than she was, stronger even than Max. He seemed to understand things even though he wasn’t born yet. “I don’t know. I’ll keep watch. I’ll try to reinforce the field, to help him. He has to be getting tired. He’s just a baby.”

Tess’s hand reached out and touched the green shield sheltering them from tons of concrete and steel. Clearing her mind, she tried to concentrate on the feel of the shield, the frequency, and tune in to it, match it. Extending her native powers, she pushed hard.

Kyle heard it first. The groaning, buckling, and then sounds of concrete moving on concrete. He could feel the lessening of pressure on his lower body when suddenly he felt himself move. Free. His body was free of debris! Except for his right arm that was still pinned, the rest of his body was cleared of the material and now in a larger shielded area. Tess joining her powers to Zan’s, was able to push all the material away and expand the space. Her small gentle hand touched the shield, and proved to be so much stronger than her small delicate body appeared.

“You’re free!”

“Thank you, baby.” Kyle smiled slightly when she kissed him, her tears moving over his face. He slowly picked up her hand and lifted it to his mouth. His wife. His lover. His best friend. She was always so much more. She was everything.

“Can you move? Are you okay?”

Kyle met her eyes. He couldn’t lie. No. He wasn’t okay. The pressure in his chest was increasing, as was the taste of blood. He could barely draw a breath into his lungs. He was almost sure that his chest had been crushed. He couldn’t move or feel his lower body. “I…” Kyle looked at her, and his eyes softened. Damn. He had wanted to grow old with her. With her, Zan, and their other babies. Now he didn’t even know if they would find her in time before the air ran out, but he was sure that it would be too late for him. His spine was severed.

“Can you hold the shield lying next to me?” Tess nodded. She could feel the energy matrix once she touched it, and now she could do it without touch, just thought. “Good. We’ll wait together. I want to feel you next to me.”

Tess moved beside him, stretching out fully. Her one hand held the small light going dim, as she continued to press the baby beeper’s button. Her other hand held on to her husband. With her ear close to his chest, she could hear the struggling air rushing into lungs hampered by broken ribs. His cough was painful to hear, and she laid there in the encroaching dark, praying.

They were in God’s hands.

~~~

“Max! Tell me something good!” Jim was sweating, covered in grim and soot. The sling on his arm was dirty and torn, and his one good hand was covered in blood from pulling away concrete debris.

Emergency rescue teams, heavy equipment was slowly digging out the parking structure. Lights were set up. It was already six hours into the search and rescue and they were just reaching cars parked on the top level. Sean and Michael were both on the ground wheezing from the dust kicked up from the removal of large concrete blocks and steel girders. They had both refused to leave the field. Sean was frantically looking for Kyle. Michael and he tag teamed each other. Sean stood as lookout as Michael used his powers to blow large pieces of concrete into dust away from prying eyes.

Six hours.

They all watched each other, uncertain that they would find Tess or Kyle alive. Three hours ago, the beeper stopped.

“I can still feel Zan. He’s in that general area, but I can’t pinpoint the location.” Max was shocked. He could sense his son! From a distance, he could sense his son! He had never had that type of connection before, not like Michael had to his unborn children. There it was. His son needed him. Zan. Zan was reaching out for him, getting weaker, and needing him to hurry.

Michael struggled to his feet. “You’ve got to, Maxwell. If you can get to the place they are, we can clear directly to them.” Michael looked around at other rescuers working to bring out other victims. They had found six people so far. Four alive and two dead. It was unknown how many were in the structure when it went. Most of the people who were visiting the Medical Center were accounted for. They had been in the Medical Center, and it was their cars that were gone. A few were already taken to the hospital. People trapped in elevators, and on the edge of the damage were already rescued and assisted.

“Concentrate!”

“I can’t!” Max pushed his hands through his hair in frustration. He could barely breathe or think. His child. Tess. Kyle. His world was fragmented, how the hell was he supposed to focus?

“Maria.” Michael looked at Jim. They were going to lose light quickly. “I need Maria here.”

Jim looked at the two partners, and then shook his head. “This is no place for her, Michael. She’s pregnant. The air is foul.”

“I need her!” Michael looked at Max. “She can help, Maxwell. Call Jonathan. Call him and tell him to bring her.” Michael looked at Jim. “She makes me think clearer. Focus. Maybe she can help Max. If he can concentrate, tune into the baby, we can use our powers together to lift the stuff out of the way quicker. Faster. They don’t have much time. We’re wasting it arguing.”

Jim took out his cell phone and made the call. He ordered a unit to pick up Jonathan Stiller, take him to pick up Maria, then bring them to the site. As he called for a unit, Max called Jonathan, and Michael called Maria.”

Max disconnected his phone. “This better work.”

“Trust me. Maria will make it better.”

~~~

“What do you want me to do?” Maria asked Michael as he explained what they were trying to do. Her eyes searched the wreckage. “Holy, sweet mother of God! Tess…oh god, Michael…Kyle?”

“Calm down. I need you calm.” Michael held her for a moment and then kissed her head. “I need you to work.”

“How?”

Michael shook his head in irritation. “I don’t know. How do you do it for me?”

“You want me to sleep with Max?”

“No!” Michael’s voice rose in irritation, but he quickly bit it back. “No. I mean how did you link with me across town? You gave me a clear prism…a focus. Can you do that for Max?”

Jonathan was quietly listening to them. “Maria, just clear your mind. Take Max’s hand, and maybe he can make the connection.” Jonathan tried to think through what Michael was describing. Focus. That was it. That was what he first felt when he met Maria. A focus.

Maria nodded. Anything. Anything for Kyle. Anything for Tess. Jim was standing there, daring to hope that she could do something for Max…help him help Kyle and Tess. Maria took both of Max’s hands, and she closed her eyes, and cleared her mind. Max did the same. Maria’s face creased in concentration, but she shook her head.

Max dropped her hands in defeat. Maria covered her mouth, as her eyes filled with tears. It didn’t work. She didn’t know how. Michael turned her to face him. “Do me. Give me a focus.”

Maria placed her hands on his face, looking deep into her husband’s eyes, it was as if her body was pulled into the twin focal of light in their pupils. Michael moaned. There. There it was. Pushing his power through the crystal clear focus, he could feel the control. The raw energy, pure and pulsating. He held the stream.

Maria reached out a hand, and grabbed Jonathan’s hand in hers. Michael gasped as suddenly the focus split into two. His was joined to Maria’s, but there was another. Jonathan. He felt Jonathan. For a moment, he was confused. Jonathan felt like Maria.

Jonathan’s breath caught in his lungs as he tried to stay standing in the vortex of energy the two of them were channeling. He was caught in the maelstrom of the backwash. It was…intoxicating, arousing…intense. All he could think was, ‘I want that.’ Reaching out, he took Max’s hand. “Concentrate on me. I will focus you.” Following Michael and Maria’s lead, Jonathan cleared his mind to give Max an open channel to join to him, a crystal clear focus to push his power through.

Max nodded. He saw it. Saw them. Saw it like a brilliant beacon in a sea of darkness, white light pushed through a crystalline matrix to become a full spectrum of controlling power. The prism next to it was something he knew. Something he wanted. He never wanted anything more. Michael’s voice sounded in his ear, but it sounded like an echo, far off.

“Push through. He can take it. A little at a time at first, careful not to burn him out.”

Max followed Michael’s instructions, and he poured what he was, all that was inside him through Jonathan. The joined essence of Michael and Maria faded away and all there was was himself and Jonathan, working in a unity of form. Joined in a perfect union. His power. He could feel it. See it. It was strong. Stronger than he ever knew or suspected. Focusing, he filtered through the colors, the strands demanding his attention, winding around his hands like tentacles or snakes. No. No. No. A bluish color one demanded his attention. Picking it up, he felt Zan. The thin connection that joined him to his son.

Zan.

Opening his eyes, Max could see the power. A wave almost beyond the human spectrum of sight. It was coming from a special section of the now collapsed parking structure.

“There. They’re over there.” Max walked towards it dropping his connection to Jonathan. Once the link was gone, Jonathan dropped to the ground from where he stood.

“Jonathan!” Maria went to hold him up, as Michael tried to help. The best they could do was gently place him on the ground. He was out. Unconscious. Maria ran her hands over his face in concern. “Michael, I’ll take care of him. Go! Help Max before he loses his concentration.”

“You…”

Maria nodded. “Go. It’ll be alright.” Maria watched him run with Sean and Jim to the place Max marked, her hand never leaving Jonathan’s face. He was tired. Max had almost burned him out. Too much power, too fast. His brain had shut down.

She watched other rescue teams working other areas, but Michael and the others were basically ignored. It was dark now. The fire rescue had brought in large lights, and helicopters from media station flew overhead.

Sean kept a lookout as Max and Michael stood opposite each other, working in tandem to crush, lift, and disintegrate the larger pieces. They cleared the top level, and it took some work for Michael to push the large slab that was once the ceiling to the second level. In his mind, he could feel Maria. She was offering him a focus. The area was too congested. Michael reached out his hand as his power moved through her. Transformation. He needed to transform the material.

Water.

Michael looked over the piles of rubble at Maria sitting on the ground with Jonathan’s head in her lap. He nodded. Water.

One moment they were standing on a pile of rubble, the next, they were standing in a puddle of water, as he quickly turned the surrounding concrete to water. Slowly. He didn’t want to drown them. As fast as he could change a pile, he paused as it trickled away, moving outward through the piles of surrounding rubble. Michael worked fast and methodically, opening up a larger and larger space around the area. Max could still feel Zan. There. He’s there!

It took over half an hour before Max saw it. Green light, almost like a pulse. A green shield. He used his powers to quickly help Michael move the remaining debris, as the green shield became more and more apparent. He could see them. They were lying together. Asleep. Or dead. One was alive. Zan. He knew it was Zan holding the shield up, but he couldn’t tell about Tess or Kyle.

The area was finally cleared, and Maria came over helping Jonathan. As they were helped into the pit that Michael and Max had slowly uncovered, Max reached out his hand and touched the green shield. He couldn’t move through it. Let me in. Zan. It’s okay. It’s Daddy. Let me in.

Suddenly Tess’s eyes were open. She rolled out of Kyle’s arms and slowly stood up to stand on the other side of the force field. Reaching out her small hand, her hand touched Max’s from the other side of the barrier. For a moment, they stood opposite each other, Zan facing his Queen, Ava, and then it was gone. Tess collapsed, as Max quickly grabbed her up in his arms. She was weak from lack of oxygen.

“I knew you’d come. Kyle said you would.” Max held her in his arms as her arm went around his neck. “Kyle. Help Kyle.”

Max handed Tess to Sean, as he and Michael quickly scrambled over to Kyle. Jim was quick on their tail. Kyle wasn’t breathing. Max listened to his heart. It wasn’t…there! A slight beat. Faltering. Weak. He was still alive.

“Call for medical! He’s got to be taken out of here now!” Jim searched to find other teams to help them.

“No!” Jonathan struggled to stand. With Maria’s help, he made it to Max’s side. “Focus, Max! Heal him!”

“What? How? I can’t!” Max looked at Kyle frantically. He couldn’t lose Kyle. Not now. Not this way.

Jonathan took Max’s head in his hands. “He’s going to die if you don’t. Focus. The yellow one. Take the yellow one. Quickly! His life is leaving him.” Jonathan quickly closed his eyes, and Max saw it again. The prism was there, not so pure or so clear, but offering him a channel to use. Jonathan was hardly able to hold on after the burnout from before. Max tempered how much raw energy he sent through the crystal, but he could see it. Yellow. A golden strand. Mentally picking up the strand, he ran it through his hand.

Yes. Yes. He could see it now. Feel it. His hand reached out and touched Kyle’s chest. Broken. He was broken. Max could feel the ribs mending as suddenly Kyle’s body responded in a full, deep breath that rushed into his newly repaired lungs. Moving down. Spine. Crushed. Lower thoracic and lumbar vertebrae. Three regions of dissection. Max moved slowly and carefully along the spine repairing nerves and blood supply, fixing a ruptured spleen and trauma to Kyle’s right kidney.

Moving downward, he repaired broken bones, ruptured organs, and continued up the right side to a mangled right arm once trapped under a concrete slab. Kyle lay very still as his body regained sensation. He could feel his feet again. He moved his head as Max stopped at his forehead and repaired a concussion, Kyle slowly sat up as Max got to his feet with Jim’s help. Reaching over, Max laid his hand on Jim’s left shoulder, and in a gasp of heat and pain, Jim stared at the shoulder in shock. He could move his arm without pain. Max walked towards Sean still holding Tess in his arms, unconscious, and he quickly did an inventory. Concussion, fractured ankle, and a dislocated shoulder. She never mentioned the pain, and she never would. He repaired it. His last stop was his son. Zan.

Zan. Smiling Max closed his eyes. Fine. The baby was fine. Tired. Hungry. But moving actively inside his mother. Tess’s eyes opened, and their eyes met.

“Zan.” Tess said softly as her hand reached up and stroked Max’s face.

Max kissed her palm, and took Tess from Sean. Walking over to where Michael was helping Kyle to stand, Max stood her up on her feet facing Kyle, and he stepped back. Tess stood looking at her husband for a moment, when suddenly he opened his arms and she flew into them to be swept up in a full body hug.

Jim stopped Max from turning away to give them privacy. “Max. I…I don’t understand all this…what you are. What Michael is, or even Tess or Izzy. I just know that I thank God for you every day, and today…today I thank him even more. You are a miracle.” Jim hugged the young man he had chosen to train as his replacement. The man that saved his son and daughter, and helped to create his future grandson.

Max looked at Michael and laughed. A focus. It was so easy once there was a focus. Staring at his hands, he turned to look at Jonathan. The man could hardly stay on his feet. Maria was holding him up with her slighter frame. Max felt it then, a wave of fatigue. The link. He had never closed the link. All that time, he had pushed his energy through Jonathan without a thought. The tiredness was pervasive. It started in his arms and hit his trunk moving downward. Pulling back, his energy reluctantly disconnected from the focus, and without removing his glance from Jonathan, the two men slumped to the ground, both hitting the ground at the exact same moment.

~~~

“Maria.” Michael watched as Sean and a completely healthy Jim loaded Kyle, Tess, and the unconscious forms of Max and Jonathan into Jim’s SUV. He couldn’t leave with them. Not while there were other people possibly trapped. His powers. Possibly they could help.

“I know. Go. Jim and I will get them home.” Maria kissed Michael quickly. He pulled her back to him again. The fire was in his blood, the need to connect with her in all ways. He had come out of the focus she gave him too aroused to stand. “I’ll stay focused. Reach for me. I’ll be there.”

“I don’t want to burn you out.” It never occurred to him that such a thing was possible, that so much raw power could burn out a prism or damage it. But he knew it instinctually when Max went to connect to Jonathan.

Maria laughed. “You couldn’t burn me out if you tried, Detective.”

Michael caught her laughing eyes. Happy. She was happy that they took back today. Took back Jim, and saved Kyle and Tess. It had been a good day.

She was right. He couldn’t burn her out. He had plied all his energy through her for hours on end, and instead of tiring her, it seemed to fuel her body just as it did his. She was his equal in every way.