Thanks for all the great feeback guys! I'm sorry it took so long...I'm a bum...just ask Tracie. <!--EZCODE EMOTICON START ;) --><img src=
http://www.ezboard.com/intl/aenglish/im ... s/wink.gif ALT=";)"><!--EZCODE EMOTICON END--> Hope you like this next part...<br><br>Part 35<br><br>“Are you sure they’ll know where we’re at?” Maria’s not too sure about this new plan to go to New York. They ditch their car and take the train into the city where they check into a seedy looking hotel.<br><br>“This is our east coast meeting place. If Max gets out of there, this is the first place he’ll go.” Isabel tries to reassure Maria. “We set this up a couple of years ago.”<br><br>“I just hope this works.” Michael paces the small room that’s lit by a neon light right outside the small window.<br><br>“It will.” Isabel says with determination.<br><br>Michael and Isabel exchange a look and everyone else is silent. After a few minutes, Kyle gets up and says, “Well, we’ll be waiting for awhile…I can’t stay in here, I have to get out.” He heads to the door and leaves, Serena right behind him.<br><br>Walking angrily down the stairs and out onto the street, Kyle finally realizes that Serena has followed him. “You should go inside.” He says without turning to her.<br><br>“No.” She says, simply.<br><br>Stopping, he turns slowly and looks at her…the way her hand lays protectively over her stomach…and his mood softens. “I’m sorry. It’s just…”<br><br>“No one seems worried about your dad. It’s all about Liz and Max.” Serena finishes for him. “They don’t mean to.”<br><br>Sighing, he steps toward her. “I know. I just get irritated sometimes that me and my dad seem to always be an after-thought. Like we’re not as important as the others.”<br><br>“You’re important to me…and the others. You know that.” Serena takes his hand and squeezes it. “Let’s just go for a walk, ok?”<br><br>He looks at her for a moment and shakes his head. “I love you, you know that?”<br><br>“Yah, I know it.” She grins at him and pulls him along after her down the street.<br><br><!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>Washington D.C.</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--><br><br>Dr. Weston waits impatiently in his office for the results of the day’s work at the chamber. Strumming his fingers on his desk, he checks to see if he has any voice mail messages and looks up suddenly when the door to his office swings in.<br><br>A look of shock crosses his face briefly before he says, “Gerard! Old man, I thought…”<br><br>“I know what you thought.” Gerard steps into Weston’s office and takes a seat in the chair opposite Weston’s desk. “Pick up your jaw and try not to look too disappointed.”<br><br>Weston adopts a look of indifference and says, “I knew they wouldn’t get you. I was the only one who held out any hope.”<br><br>Gerard holds up his hand. “Stop blowing sunshine up my ass, Weston. I don’t have the stomach for it today.”<br><br>Leaning back in his chair, Weston throws his hands up and grins. “Fair enough. So where have you been? You can at least understand my curiosity to your sudden presence.”<br><br>Leveling his gaze at Weston, Gerard says, “I was running a side investigation, which you don’t need to know about.”<br><br>“Of course.” Weston sits back and twirls his $200 pen between his fingers, trying to read Gerard’s mood. Something isn’t right. Gerard’s planning something, he can tell by the look in his eye. Leveling his gaze at him, Weston says, “You know, Matt…if I didn’t know any better, I’d say you’re hiding something.”<br><br>“I suppose you’d be right.” Gerard answers him back as he stands up and reaches back behind his jacket, pulling a gun out of the waistband of his pants. He levels it at Weston’s head and says, “I’m sorry doctor, but your services are no longer needed.” right before he fires off one round that rips neatly through Weston’s temple.<br><br>As Weston slumps forward in his seat, Matt Gerard’s hands shake as he wipes off the gun and folds it within the doctor’s dead hand. Wiping the chair and door of any fingerprints, Gerard turns the light out and quickly leaves the office, shutting and locking the door behind him. Just as he starts down the hall, two soldiers run up to him and say, “Did you hear a noise from this direction, sir?”<br><br>“Just a technician. He dropped some equipment off his cart. You can go back to your posts.” He answers them.<br><br>“Yes, sir.” They answer and turn back around.<br><br>It seems like it takes him forever to get to the central processing room, but in fact it took less than two minutes. When he reaches it, he doesn’t look in any of the cells, but proceeds to a terminal to bring up the cell monitors. Glancing up, he sees Liz Parker standing at the glass in front of her with wide eyes. Calmly, he shakes his head and motions with his eyes for her to move back into her cell. He’s mildly surprised when she nods her head and moves to sit on her bed.<br><br>After scanning the monitors, he finally finds what he’s looking for and Liz watches as she sees him frown and put his hand up to his mouth and rub it absently. She knows he’s come to get them out, could sense it as soon as he entered the building. He must be looking for Max and the Sheriff, but why the sudden hesitation? He glances up at her briefly and she knows…something’s wrong.<br><br>Liz watches as he leaves the terminal and walks in the other direction. What’s going on? What did he see? Then, like a whisper in her head, she hears, “He’s dead.”<br><br>Her heartbeat speeds up and tears come to her eyes. No! Who’s dead? Not Max! Please, not Max! She stands up and sits back down, overcome with the feeling of helplessness. She looks around frantically, hoping that no alarms have gone off. She sees a couple of technicians walking down the hall slowly, talking. They’re talking about a bar they went to the night before and hoping to go back again tonight. That’s good, no one senses anything wrong yet.<br><br>Gerard makes his way through the maze of corridors until he reaches his destination. Checking to make sure no one is near, he slowly opens the door and motions for the person inside to come with him. “Don’t talk, just follow me…quickly.”<br><br>They both make their way quickly to a set of back stairs and up to the main level. Once there, Gerard leads them through a series of locked rooms, opened with a security card. Gerard pauses at the last door and turns to his companion, “This door leads outside. Immediately to your right, you’ll see a black SUV. The back door is open. Get inside and you’ll find clothes to change into. Stay as close to the floor as possible. I’ll be back.”<br><br>Before he has a chance to say or ask anything, Gerard opens the door and shoves him out into the night. Retracing his steps, he follows the same root back downstairs. His palms are sweating and he wipes them on his pants. Adrenaline is all that’s keeping him going now and he tries to appear as calm as possible. At this time of night, there aren’t that many people wandering the halls and he hopes it stays that way.<br><br>As he reaches the central processing bay again, he sees a technician on the phone, waving some papers in his hands impatiently. When the young man sees Gerard, he slams the phone down and says, “Maybe you can help me. I’m looking for Dr. Weston. He said he wanted this report by the end of the night and now I can’t find him anywhere.”<br><br>“I passed Dr. Weston on his way out of the building. Looked like he was going home.” Gerard says with a shrug. “I can take those for you.” He reaches out and grabs the report from the young man’s hands.<br><br>“Well, um…I guess that’s ok.” He says, unsure.<br><br>“Of course it’s ok. Who exactly do you think is running things around here?” Gerard says forcefully…even a bit irritated.<br><br>“Right. I’m sorry. So…if there’s nothing else…?”<br><br>“No. I’ll expect to see you first thing in the morning to go over these with myself and Dr. Weston.” Gerard says as he dismisses him.<br><br>As the technician walks away, Gerard tucks the report inside his jacket pocket and looks around. There’s a young woman sitting behind a desk typing on a computer. Besides her, there doesn’t seem to be anyone else around. He sits down and proceeds to turn the lights off in all the cells as he dims the outer hallway lights. As the young woman looks up questioningly, he says, “Lights out should have been hours ago.”<br><br>She looks slightly embarrassed and says, “Sorry. I lost track of time working on this.” She quickly gets back to work when Gerard smiles at her.<br><br>He makes an attempt to look like he’s settling in at the desk and turns to her. “Sharon, is it?”<br><br>She looks up and nods at him.<br><br>“Could you do something for me? I’m going to be here for awhile and was wondering if they still have that great coffee up on level 2.” At her nod, he continues, “How about you go get us a couple of cups…and see what you can scrounge up in the way of snacks.”<br><br>She immediately gets up and says, “Sure. Anything in particular? I think I saw some muffins up there earlier.”<br><br>“That sounds great, Sharon.” Gerard smiles at her as she makes her way around the desk and down the hallway. When he sees her disappear through a doorway at the end of the hall, he gets up quickly and walks to the door to Liz’s cell. When he opens it, he sees she’s standing right there expectantly.<br><br>“Quickly. Follow me.”<br><br>She does as she’s told and follows him down another long hallway and through a door leading to stairs. As they climb up silently, Liz repeats over and over in her head, “Come on, come on, come on…” When they emerge into another hallway, Gerard leads her through a series of secured, empty meeting rooms. <br><br>Liz breathes a sigh of relief when the last door opens to reveal a parking lot. He quickly leads her to an SUV parked right outside the door and tells her to get in the back as he makes his way around to the driver side and gets in.<br><br>When she opens the door, she cries out in relief when she sees Max huddled on the floor. “Max! Thank God you’re alright!” She jumps in and closes the door, practically throwing herself on top of him sobbing. “Oh Max…Max…”<br><br>He holds her as tight as he can in the confined space as they feel the vehicle begin to move. “Wait.” Max says, lifting his head. “Jim...where’s Jim?”<br><br>Liz looks up as Gerard turns his head slightly and looks at her. She breathes in sharply as she realizes…realizes what Gerard was thinking earlier. He’s dead. Jim won’t be coming with them. A sob escapes her throat as she brings her hands up to her face. “No.” She whispers.<br><br>Max looks at her, realization slowly dawning on him. He looks back up to Gerard and says, “No…we have to go back. You have to get him…I can help…I can…you have to go back!”<br><br>“We’re not going back. There’s nothing you can do…now quiet. We’re coming to the gate.” Gerard keeps driving as he approaches the gate and flashes his badge at the guard. <br><br>Shocked, Max stares at the floor, both hands on his head. Who is this guy? Why is he getting them out? What did they do to Jim? Millions of questions are swirling around in his head when he suddenly hears Liz’s quiet sobbing from next to him.<br><br>He reaches over and grabs her, engulfing her in his arms and burying his face in her hair. The car races through the streets and finally comes to a stop in a quiet residential neighborhood. They’re broken out of their revere when Gerard turns and says, “The car in front of us…take it and leave. Your friends said you would know where to go. I’m sorry about your friend, but there’s nothing anyone can do for him now…not even you.”<br><br>“Why?” Liz whispers, wiping the tears from her cheeks. “Why did you do this?” And just as she asks the question, she knows the answer. She nods in understanding and after a moment of silence says, “Thank you.”<br><br>Gerard looks at both of them and says, “I’m going back to destroy what research I can. I can’t promise to get it all, but if I were you, I’d lay low for a while. Leave the country…and try to stay off our radar.”<br><br>“But…” Max starts to say, but Liz grabs his hand and shakes her head. “Let’s go, Max.” She opens the door and encourages him to follow her to the other car. As they get in, Liz behind the wheel, they look back once more to the man that saved them and suddenly, he turns the wheel and turns back down the street…away from them.<br><br>Liz starts the engine and turns to Max. “We have to go somewhere first…there’s something we have to do. You know where we’re supposed to meet the others?”<br><br>Max slowly nods his head…still not believing that Jim is dead. As Liz pulls the car out onto the street, she grabs Max’s hand and they both silently think the same thing. “How are we going to tell Kyle?”<br><br><!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>Back At The Base</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--><br><br>Gerard walks calmly back down to the work area to find Sharon already there with a tray of coffee and muffins. He sits back down and says, “Ah…thank you, Sharon.”<br><br>She smiles at him and turns back to her computer. Gerard picks up a cup of coffee and looks forward to the cell that Liz Parker once occupied. It’s dark…they won’t realize she’s gone until morning. That leaves just enough time to do what he needs to. Putting the cup down, he gets to work on the computer in front of him…starting with a file named “Roswell”.<br><br><!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>Georgetown University Hospital</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--><br><br>Liz and Max sit in the parking lot looking at the large building in front of them. “I can’t do this, Liz.” He looks at her, the pain of Jim’s death stretched across all his features.<br><br>Liz looks down at their intertwined hands and says, “I’m gonna need your help, Max. I can’t heal anything really serious. This was the deal…the deal our friends made to get us out. We have to do it. That girl in there in innocent…if we can do this for her, in exchange for our freedom…it’s the right thing.”<br><br>Max marveled over how she could think about someone else at a time like this. Someone she doesn’t even know for that matter. They could easily leave…disappear…never to be found again. But she was keeping their end of a bargain that wasn’t even made by her. He looks up into her beautiful eyes and knows this is another reason he loves her. Her selflessness…her willingness to help others…even whey they might not deserve it. He flashes back briefly to the time they were all gathered around deciding Tess’ fate and even then, Liz couldn’t vote for Tess’ death. After everything Tess did to her.<br><br>He sighs and looks down. “Alright. But let’s be quick…we need to get to New York as fast as possible.”<br><br>Liz squeezes his hand before turning to get out of the car.<br><br>They try to be as inconspicuous as possible as they enter the hospital and approach the front desk. A woman sitting behind it looks up as they approach and Liz says, “Hi. I was wondering if you could help us. We just arrived from out of town to visit our friend who’s here right now, and I know it’s not visiting hours, but we were hoping you could tell us where she is so we can go up and sit in the waiting room tonight until visiting hours in the morning.”<br><br>The woman creases her brows and says, “There are some hotels nearby that I could recommend and you could come back in the morning.”<br><br>Liz smiles sheepishly and says, “Well, we don’t have a lot of money…we were hoping to catch a nap in the waiting room until then…if that’s alright.”<br><br>The woman looks them over…at how tired they look and nods her head. “Alright…what’s her name?”<br><br>“Gerard.” Liz tells her as she types into the computer.<br><br>“She’s in room 506. The elevators are just around the corner and there’s a cafeteria on the second floor.” She tells them.<br><br>“Thank you so much.” Liz says as they head toward the elevator.<br><br>When they reach the fifth floor, they follow the signs directing them toward room 506. As they round the corner, they see a nurses station with two nurses. As they approach, one of the nurses says, “Can I help you?”<br><br>“Yah, we’re just looking for the waiting room.” Liz says.<br><br>“Just around the corner there. Visiting hours begin at 8am.” The nurse points down the hallway.<br><br>“Thanks.” Max says as they walk in that direction. On their way, they pass room 506 and see a sign next to the door, handwritten. It says, “Gerard, Jennifer” They keep walking until they come to the waiting room and sit down facing the nurses station.<br><br>After what seems like hours, they finally see their opportunity when one of the nurses leaves the station and disappears down a hallway. The second nurse stands up and stretches before walking away toward the bathrooms.<br><br>Max and Liz quickly get up and slip into room 506. They approach the bed holding a young woman who is sleeping with various IVs extending from her arms. Max walks around to the far side of the bed and they both lean over her, deciding on the best way to do this.<br><br>Liz quietly pulls down the covers and unbuttons the top buttons of the girl’s gown…watching to make sure they’re not waking her up. As one, they both place a hand on her chest and struggle to heal the disease that’s slowly killing her. After a few minutes, they stagger back from the bed…breathing deeply from their exertions. Liz grabs the bottom of her shirt and wipes the sweat off her face as she walks around the bed to check on Max. He’s slouched against the wall, resting on the window sill and Liz touches his arm. She gives him a questioning look and he nods, pushing away from the wall. They look back at the girl who is still sleeping and make their way to the door.<br><br>Liz cracks the door open and sees both nurses back at the nurse’s station. But luckily, they both have their backs turned. They slip out quietly and quickly walk down the hall, hoping to escape unseen. As they near the waiting room, they hear a voice call out, “Hey, what’re you guys looking for?”<br><br>Max turns around to see one of the nurses poking her head over the counter and down the hall, looking at them.<br><br>“Um…we were trying to find the way to the cafeteria. We’re kind of hungry.” Max stammers.<br><br>“Well, it’s this way…down the hall and back to the elevators. Cafeteria’s on the second floor.” She tells them, apparently annoyed.<br><br>“Oh.” Max and Liz turn around and walk toward her, and the elevators. “Sorry. We didn’t mean to bother you.” Liz says as they walk by.<br><br>On their way out, the woman at the front desk gives them a quizzical look and Liz says, “We rethought your idea of a hotel after seeing the waiting room chairs.” with a small smile.<br><br>The woman smiles back and says, “I thought you might. There’s a Holiday Inn just down the street. Their rates are pretty good.”<br><br>“Thanks, we’ll try there.” Max says as they make their way outside.<br><br>Max offers to drive when they get to the car and they quickly make their way out of Washington DC…toward New York. He looks over at Liz when they get on the freeway and sees her leaning against the window, asleep. He smiles and brushes her hair back from her face and drives north.<br><br>~TBC~<br> <p></p><i>Edited by: <A HREF=
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