Fan Fic and More

ok even with that weird thing I e-amiled you about. Aparently it is taking the post. thats good, but???

whatever

Rhonda

Ok so Liz is shifting between the two time frames. Does that mean that maybe we can shift Alex through too so that he doesn't die?? Just a thought.

Love the story Tracie, and can't wait to see where you take it next.

Thanks guys I feedback

This was great, can't wait to see what you are going to do with this.

Winds of Change

Chapter Twenty-Eight – Conundrum

Liz ran for several blocks before fatigue, coupled with a shortness of breath caused her to slow her pace. Instinctively, she looked over her shoulder and breathed a sigh of relief when she didn’t see Max anywhere in sight. As she walked her hateful parting words to Max rang in her ears.

“What was I thinking?” she groaned to herself. “Why did I say that? It was wrong on just so many levels. I’ll be the first to admit that what I know about time travel and the like comes from reading science fiction novels, but they all have one theme in common. Those doing the traveling are supposed to be observers and not mess with the natural order of things.”

The sun peaked higher over the horizon as Liz walked, and the air around her heated up, causing her skin to glow with the faint sheen of perspiration. She absently swiped her hand across her forehead, as her feet moved of their own volition, retracing the path she had taken earlier that morning.

“If we don’t make things right,” she mused. “Will we be messing with the natural order of things. Damn, this is all so confusing. I need to talk to someone but the only person I can think of is Alex, and I can’t talk to him about him dying. Or can I?”

“Can you what?” a voice asked behind her.

Liz spun around in fright. She had been so deeply lost in her thoughts that she was unaware of anyone approaching. She bit back a scream and turned to run when the figure reached out and grabbed her by the arm.

“Liz, what’s wrong? You look totally freaked.”

“M-Michael,” she stammered, a mixture of fear and relief running through her body. “What are you doing here? If you’re looking for Max, he’s about half a mile back that way,” she added as an afterthought.

“Looking for you, actually,” Michael admitted. “Well, I was looking for you, but I couldn’t find you anywhere, so I figured I’d try Maxwell.”

“Looking for me why?” Liz asked. She took a deep breath and tried to relax but adrenalin kept her heart beating at an accelerated rate.

“It’ll keep, what’s the matter with you?” Michael asked. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

“Um, you scared me?” offered Liz, half-heartedly.

“Not buying it,” Michael said. “Now spill.”

“I will, but first, why were you looking for me? Seriously, Michael, was it something important?”

“I had one of those dreams,” Michael admitted. “It was weird. Max, Isabel and I were with some blond chick in this really strange room. There was this purple glowing thing there, and all of a sudden, I knew I didn’t belong there. I was supposed to be someplace else, with, well, with Maria,” he tacked on in a rush. “You’re turn, spill it.”

“I think,” said Liz. “No, I’m positive that someone called Nicholas has shifted time and put us in an alternate reality. The thing is, if we go back to our original reality, Alex is going to die. But, if we stay in this reality, Max’s son will never be born.”

“You lost me,” said Michael. “Max doesn’t have a son,” said Michael. “Wait, that’s why we were leaving,” he said slowly. “The baby couldn’t survive here on Earth. We were going to use the,” he paused for a moment. “The granolith!” he cried triumphantly, proud at himself for remembering. “We were going to use the Granolith to go home, but at the last minute, I decided that I belonged here with Maria, and when I exited the Granolith chamber, you, Maria and Valenti were all outside trying to get in.”

“To tell Max that Tess had killed Alex,” Liz said.

“So what’s the problem?” Michael asked. “We stay in this reality, Alex lives, and Max doesn’t have to go off on his quest to find his son.”

“It isn’t that simple,” said Liz. “Believe me, I wish it were. I think, we’re not supposed to mess with the flow of time. If we do, it could screw up so many different things. I mean, what if, in the other time, someone was close to finding a cure for cancer, or stopping the spread of aids. If we don’t restore time to its original path, those things would never happen. I wish there was someone I could talk to who understood all this time travel stuff.”

“How about Alex. Isn’t he into the whole sci fi thing?” Michael asked. “Hop on, I’ll take you to his house.”

“Michael, I can’t talk to Alex about this!” Liz cried.

“Why not?” Michael asked. He flung his leg over the seat of his motorcycle and waited expectantly for Liz to climb on.

“How can I tell him that if we restore time, he’ll die?”

“How can you not?” Michael shot back. “I’d want to know. I wouldn’t want anybody else making that decision for me, but me.”

Liz stared at Michael; unable to believe that the most reasonable piece of advice she had heard had come from him.

“That makes a lot of sense,” Liz admitted. “It’s just weird, I mean how exactly do you present something like that to someone? Oh hey, guess what, we’re in the wrong time, but if we go back to the right time, you get to die. So what do you want to do about it?”

“That’s a little to blunt, even for me,” Michael admitted with a laugh. “Come on, hop on, you can think about what you’re going to say on our way over to Alex’s house.”

“Oh, wait, uh, we can’t go there,” said Liz, remembering what she had seen through Alex’s bedroom window a short time ago. “I uh, I think Alex has, um, a guest.” Her face turned a bright shade of red, and Michael quickly and correctly guessed the gender of Alex’s guest.

“All right Alex,” Michael crowed. “Who’d have ever imagined old Alex would be getting a little something on the side. Tell you what, let’s round up Maria and Valenti, and then go get Max and Isabel. That should give Alex time to get rid of his guest.”

“No!” Liz shouted. “We can’t do that either.”

“Why?” asked Michael growing instantly jealous. “Are you trying to tell me that it’s Maria over there with that, that geek?” he spluttered.

“Um, no, it’s not Maria,” Liz said carefully.

“Ewww, Jesus, you mean he has Valenti over there. Man that is way more information than I ever needed to know.”

“Michael!” Liz burst out laughing, despite the delicacy of the situation. “It’s not Kyle, either.”

“Well, if it’s not Maria, and it’s not Valenti, and you said Max is back that way, then that only leaves, that son of a bitch,” Michael cried when he realized to whom Liz referred. “I’ll kill him.”

“Michael. Michael!” Liz yelled, trying to be heard over Michael’s ranting. “Calm down. Believe me, I don’t think you have to worry about Isabel. If anything, worry about Alex, he’s had a crush on Isabel since the third grade.”

“No, it’s Isabel we need to worry about,” said Michael, calming down, rapidly.

Liz looked closely at Michael, surprised to hear the sadness in his voice.

“Isabel doesn’t let anybody get close to her. Not me, not Max, not anybody. If she let Alex get this close to her, it will kill her if he dies.”

you tracie i was in the middle of leaving some really awesome feedback and the system shut off. so here is my attempt to recreate it. bummer dude.

ok. this part was hysterical. sorry it was. poor michael and liz. that ws too much. also enjoyed the last lines which gave us an insight into isabel's character. totally agree with michael's theiry that liz should talk to alex and let him in on it...although alex and both isabel already know whats going on.

so can't wait for more.

Love the whole Michael ruling out everyone else but Isabel before he realises, and also that he is the voice of reason as far as telling Alex. Can't wait to see what happens next.

I began reading this yesterday !!! promise to come back with huge fb

:

sorry double post

They have to find a way to fix things and not lose Alex.

: ok right now I am about to read chapter eleven.

Least to say, I am having a blast .. I´ve read stories that came back to the shoot escene, but this is the first one where María is the one healed by Max.
I have to say I found hilarious that there are passages where all María´s lines where said by Liz. I can´t imagine her being the one who freaked out
Agg I am not going to say I enjoyed too much reading Michael´s old behaviour towards humans after being witness of his changes through the 3 seasons.
He become such a sensitive and mature human being (except in one ep, you already must have guessed which ep I am talking about) ..He was the one who trusted in Liz´s gutts when Alex died, enough said !!!

I´d love reviving s1 moments, and imagining Liz´s dreams... Max in a black tux like "Men in Black" lOL LOL LOL saying "I am not from around here" : :

ch 12 - An earthquake !! could it be the other reality trying to surface. Too many events are happening the same way as it did before, you can stop loooooveeeeeeee !!! The sexual tension between those two was so overwhelming it could perfectly caused an earthquake

ch 13 - Noooo Alex your not dead, : : !!! ... I am worried about what´s going to happen when Liz find out about ALL the other ugly things that happened in the other time line, not only Alex dead but all the mistrust, desilussions, fights, etc, etc

ch 14 - ****fingers tapping on my forehead***** thinking ****thinking**** as far as I can see, things are coming to Liz exactly in the same time as they did happened in the past. It took almost two weeks after the shot for her to have this recall of events in her mind.
Why isn´t Alex remembering anything? or he will be remembering soon, according to my hipothesis?


ch 15 - Agg did I mention how much I despise Isabel Evans? eh? eh? Telling all that awful things to Liz !!!

“In my dreams yes, in reality, no,” said Alex. “Not without causing irreparable damage to your social standing. So why don’t you just tell me what you want, or whatever, and that way you can get back to your little friends.”

Goooo Alex !!! perfect answer for a perfect boy !!!

ch 17 - noooooo not that name again !!! dam**** Te*** noooooooooooo : poor Kyle : : poor Alex

: : Las Vegas´s namesssss do you want to know my opinion, they should locked themselves up refreshing and joining their memories for a week and after that they would make a little sense of what´s happening around them.
Goo find the key to Michael´s apartment and throw it into the toilet.

“You might as well tell him the rest of it,” said Kyle in resignation. He flung himself onto the couch next to Alex and began to cough when a cloud of dust rose up around him.

LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL

Winds of Change

Chapter Twenty-Nine – Quandry

“So, basically what you’re saying is that nothing that is happening right now is real?” Isabel asked. She sat, cross-legged on Alex’s bed, looking amazingly unselfconscious at being found there so early in the morning.

Alex reached out and squeezed her hand gently, understanding the hidden meaning behind the question.

“No, what’s happening now is real, this time is real, but it isn’t where we’re supposed to be.” He reached out and brushed a stray lock of hair from Isabel’s face. “It’s real, Isabel, do you understand that. It’s real.”

“But that time when Nicholas shifted you all away,” Isabel said. “You didn’t remember any of the time you were gone. You never knew what happened to you.”

“I think this time is different,” Liz said, breaking into the conversation. “Nicholas keeps losing his grip on whatever it is he’s doing to shift time. We’re all able to remember things from our real time, and when I crossed over into our real time, I was able to remember things that happened here. I was even able to bring something back with me from our real time.”

“Yeah, what?” asked Alex.

“Oh, um, nothing” Liz hedged, unwilling to admit she had a memorial card from Alex’s funeral in her pocket.

“Look,” said Michael abruptly. “We need to know something, and Liz says you’re the one to ask. This thing we’re in, what happens if we stay here, and don’t go back to our original time.”

“Well, I’m no expert but I would think the pattern would erode after time, and we’d be caught in some sort of limbo. Because Nicholas’ grasp on the time switch is so tenuous, we’ve been safe, but if anything were to happen to make this pattern permanent, we would eventually be destroyed,” Alex explained.

“What do you mean?” asked Michael. “I’m confused.”

“Okay, Nicholas, put us here for a reason, and he must have some way of making it permanent, or else he wouldn’t have bothered. Does that make sense?”

“Yeah, go on,” said Michael.

“But there is something he needs to do to make this reality the only one,” Alex continued.

“I’m following you,” said Michael.

“The only problem is, our bodies aren’t made to shift through time. Maybe yours are, but ours aren’t, and eventually, they’ll start to degenerate, and we’ll die.”

“Oh,” was all Michael could manage past the crush of emotions that filled his throat. “So like you, Maria and Liz would all die?”

“Everybody effected by this would die,” said Alex, baldly.

Liz looked at Alex, her expression filled with anguish. She wanted to run from the room and hide away, rather than say what had to be said. She took a deep breath, and tried to steady her nerves before she spoke.

“Alex, about the paper I brought back from the other reality, well, I lied. It wasn’t just a piece of paper. It was this.”

Liz reached into the pocket of her pants and pulled out the creased memorial card and passed it to Alex. She looked down at her hands while her eyes welled up with tears. Finally, she forced herself to look up and saw Alex staring at the card wordlessly, while Isabel sat there with her hands pressed up to her mouth trying to stop the scream that threatened to erupt.

“H-how did it happen?” Alex asked, his voice hoarse.

“Tess mind warped you into decoding the some stupid book from their world. She mind warped you so much; your brain couldn’t take it any longer. Eventually you started to remember what happened, and she tried once more into warping you into forgetting. It killed you,” Liz spoke through the tears that filled her eyes and choked her voice. “She put you in a car, and used her powers to put the car in the path of an oncoming truck.”

For several minutes, the four sat silent lost in the memories of another life, another time. Finally Isabel spoke.

“Why isn’t she here now?” she asked. “Tess, shouldn’t she be here?”

“She didn’t show up until halfway through the school year, Liz said. Maybe we’re not, oh hell, I don’t know what I’m saying.”

“No, you may be on to something,” said Alex, struggling to put the fact that he was dead aside. “Nicholas brought us back to the time that brought us all together, when Liz got shot.”

“Only this time, Maria got shot,” said Liz. “I would have gotten shot but Maria pushed me out of the way. Instead I almost got hit by a truck, twice.”

“And attacked, or almost attacked,” Michael added slowly.

“Michael, what are you saying?” Isabel asked, her voice tinged with panic.

“I’m saying, I think Nicholas is trying to stop Liz from living. If she had died in the other time, the real time, none of us would have ended up together,” Michael said.

“But if we stop him, Alex will die,” said Liz.

“If we don’t, you’ll probably die, and so will the rest of the world,” said Alex. “Any way you cut it, someone is going to die.”

“Alex, you can’t,” said Isabel.

“Nobody’s doing anything, Isabel, just relax,” Alex said. He reached out and laid a soothing hand on her leg but she shoved it away angrily.

“Don’t you dare try and patronize me,” she cried.

“And don’t you try and tell me what I can and can’t do,” Alex replied calmly.

Liz sat and wondered for a moment what their lives would have been like if Alex hadn’t been murdered. What kind of life would Isabel and Alex had, had they been given the chance to have a life together?

“The question remains, what is it that Nicholas wants?” asked Alex. “Why is he trying to stop Max from healing Liz and from,” he stopped, and struggled to remember. A faint memory tickled the edges of his mind, teasing him, darting into the forefront then dancing away as the images started to solidify.

“If Max never healed me,” said Liz. “Then we’d probably never end up together, and Michael never would have destroyed the husks for the skins,” she said triumphantly. “They can’t live on earth. They have to use these husks to house their bodies, and Michael destroyed them all!”

“And Nicholas came after us to get something,” continued Isabel. “He wanted something we had.”

“The Granolith,” Michael and Liz said together. “He wants the Granolith.”

“We need to find Max, Kyle and Maria,” said Liz. “We need to figure out what to do, but it has to be all of us. The four of us can’t make this decision. We all need to lay all our cards out on the table and come up with a plan.”

Liz pulled out her cell phone and quickly dialed Maria’s number. She spoke briefly to her, and repeated the process with Kyle, while Isabel contacted Max. Within minutes, plans were set in motion, and the four left, with heavy hearts, to go to the arranged meeting place.

wow. things are starting heat up. alex the trooper. he sees all sides...even when it means he dies. i think isabel is going to need serious help when this is through. so they figured out what nicky boy wants. talk about a ripple effect. amazing how one act travels into so many others. but there has to be a way to stop this and get what everone wants in the end.

I just finished copying all the things I want to quote and now I have to go out for an hour or two. When I get back, I'll leave you a long feedback! I left fb somewhere on a couple of these last thre or four chapters already. I thought it was here, but ... oh well. Be back in an hour or two! Great parts by the way! They really are onto Nicky boy now! :D


Gerry

- here i go, bursting Gerry's feedback bubble by adding another part

A.N. This was supposed to be the last part, but a late night text fest with TrueLovePooh made me realize there was more to be written. So this part is dedicated to her. Thanks Pooh, for making me remember the importance of goodbyes.

Winds of Change

Chapter Thirty – Never Say Goodbye


They arrived without fanfare, at the cliffs overlooking the deserted quarry. For a while, they all stood silently, looking at each other and pondering the events that brought this strange group together. One by one, Liz, Alex, Michael, Isabel and Max shared what they remembered and their theories on how time was changed and what the outcome would be.

Silence reigned as everybody digested the massive amounts of information that had been shared. Maria was the first to break the silence that threatened to overwhelm them.

“So how do we fix this?” she asked.

“I don’t think we can,” said Alex. “Liz thinks the Granolith is important, but I’m not to sure, but it’s worth checking out.”

“What about Nicholas?” asked Max. “We need to find him, before he finds us.” By us, he meant Liz, and everybody knew it. For some unknown reason Liz seemed to be his intended victim.

“I’ve been thinking about that,” said Alex. “Do you suppose if he eliminates her, it will seal this reality and destroy the other one? I mean in our time, the real time, Max saved Liz. Maybe he planned all along for Liz to die. Does it make any sense?”

“Yeah, it makes all together too much sense,” said Max, bitterly. “Like I said, we need to find him before he finds us.”

“He usually seems to find us,” said Michael. “I mean, none of us really knows what he looks like, so it’s not like we can go looking for him.”

“I know what he looks like,” said Isabel. “He’s a mean, nasty, spiteful man forced into the body of a mean, nasty, spiteful 12 year old boy. But when he looks at me, it’s not with the eyes of the boy, it’s with the eyes of the man he used to be.”

A hot wind circled around them stirring the dust up, and filling their eyes with grit. The sun beat down on them, and in the sky, a lone bird wafted on the air currents, drawing their attention upward for a moment.

“So, does anybody have a plan or something?” asked Maria.

Nobody answered, but all eyes turned to Max, and he blanched under their scrutiny.

“Why is everybody looking at me?” he asked. “I’m not in charge?”

“Max, you used to be a King on your old world,” Liz said, gently. “People look to you for leadership, even now.”

“I’m not a king,” said Max. “I’m just a kid, I can’t be in charge.”

“Well, somebody needs to make a decision, Maxwell,” Michael said. “Does anybody have any ideas or suggestions?”

“I guess maybe we should split up or something, and Liz should not be in the group that goes looking for Nicholas” Max volunteered.

“And the man says he’s not a leader,” Kyle said, his voice laced with sarcasm.

“Do you have a better idea, Valenti?” demanded Max.

“Far be it from me to step on the toes of El Presidente,” said Kyle, holding his hands up. “By all means, let’s split up. As long as I’m not in your group, I’m good.”

“Look, before anybody goes anywhere, and before this turns into a testosterone fest, can I talk to Liz, Maria and Kyle alone?” Alex asked. “Why don’t you three start brainstorming some places for us to search, and we’ll be done in a minute.”

Alex waited until the other three walked a short distance away before he turned to the others.

“I suppose you’re wondering why I called you all here today,” he quipped.

“Alex, don’t,” Liz said, her voice catching slightly. She knew what he was doing, and she didn’t think she was going to be able to deal with it.

“Liz, I have to,” Alex said. “I didn’t get to before, and if there is any chance that any of you will remember this, I need to do it.”

Liz nodded, and scrubbed her hands across her cheek, wiping away the tears that covered her face.

“Kyle, look, Isabel is going to need you when this is all through. Be there for her,” asked Alex. “Be her friend.”

“Count on it, man,” Kyle said. He held out his hand in an uncharacteristic gesture of maturity, and Alex reached out to grasp it, tightly.

Alex released Kyle’s hand and turned to Maria, who was sobbing, silently. He opened his arms to her, and she fell into them, and he held her tightly, as her shoulders shook.

“Maria, don’t,” Alex whispered, rubbing her back, gently. “It isn’t going to change anything.”

“I know, but it’s wrong. It’s just so wrong,” Maria wailed. “You, me and Liz, we’ve been friends fo-forever. I can’t stand the thought of losing you.”

“Maria, I’m already gone,” Alex said softly. “You’re not losing me again, you’re getting a chance to say goodbye. We didn’t get to do that, at least I don’t think we did,” he added. “Now we can, and I can tell you how very special you are, and lucky I am for knowing you.”

“I love you, Alex,” Maria whispered, her voice breaking.

She pulled away from his arms and turned to Kyle who held her tightly, while Alex turned to look at Liz.

“Hey, Parker,” he said, smiling gamely.

“Hey, Whitman,” Liz replied through her tears.

“So, did you ever think, way back when we were sitting in Mrs. Sullivan’s science class that we’d be standing here trying to change the space time continuum or whatever?”

“No, Alex, I can honestly say that it never once crossed my mind,” she half sobbed, half laughed.

“Yeah, me either. Look, you know it has to happen this way, right?” Alex asked.

“Yeah, I guess I do,” Liz admitted. “But I hate it, Alex. I really hate it.”

“Like I told Maria, it’s already happened, this is just like a bonus, a chance for us to say goodbye.”

“No,” Liz whispered. “No goodbyes. I’ll never say goodbye to you, Alex. You’ll always be in my heart.”

“I know that,” Alex said. “And you’ll always be in mine.”

The two friends hugged tightly, saying their last farewells. Alex pulled away slightly and whispered something to Liz and passed a small envelope to her. She nodded, and slipped it in her pocket, and the two, along with Kyle and Maria, made their way to where Max, Michael and Isabel waited a short distance away.

Uhm okay, what's in the envelope? Something to make her remember the time that they had together in this alternate timeline? And if she remembers that then maybe Alex...? Just hoping. Great chapter, Tracie! I'm glad there's another one to come! I don't want it to be over! :
Leave it to Alex to be the voice of calm and reason... even in a storm.

“Maria, I’m already gone,” Alex said softly. “You’re not losing me again, you’re getting a chance to say goodbye. We didn’t get to do that, at least I don’t think we did,” he added. “Now we can, and I can tell you how very special you are, and lucky I am for knowing you.”

That was so touching!

Now about that other feedback...

“It’s just a picture,” she said out loud to the empty room in relief. “Just a,” she stopped as her mind registered the meaning of the words printed beneath the picture June 21, 1984 – April 29, 2001.

A silent scream ripped through her mind and she crumpled the card in her hand.

“No, not Alex,” she whimpered. She ran across the room and looked at the calendar tacked to the wall above her desk.

“Wait, this can’t be right,” she said out loud. “It’s only October 12, 1999.” But even as she said the words, she knew deep within the inner recesses of her heart that it was right. Alex wasn’t supposed to be alive.

Loved it! She's remembering... and the "No, not Alex" part was priceless!

“I know Max. God, don’t you think I know that? But something isn’t right here. Someone is changing things, making them different. There is too much we all remember, and there are too many things that just don’t make sense. Nicholas shifted time before, maybe he’s doing it again! We have to fix it Max, Alex can’t die!” Liz shouted, her voice becoming more and more agitated.

Yes! Yes! Remember, Max! :D

“Like the one Isabel thinks she saw driving the truck that almost ran us down,” Max finished. He looked down into Liz’s dark brown eyes and found his mind filled with flashing memories, but he couldn’t tell which were real, and which this Nicholas person had created. He lifted a hand to her cheek and caressed it gently. “It was you,” he whispered. “It was you.”

"It was you." Excellent! Max remembers that he healed Liz, not Maria!

“But Max, if she shift time back to where it belongs, Alex will die,” Liz said.

“And if we don’t!” Max shouted. “My son will never be!”

Liz glared up at Max and turned and began to walk away. “Maybe that isn’t such a bad thing!” she shouted as she ran down the street.

Wow... such a load to bear. And quite a conundrum.

“How can I tell him that if we restore time, he’ll die?”

“How can you not?” Michael shot back. “I’d want to know. I wouldn’t want anybody else making that decision for me, but me.”

Michael being the voice of reason and empathy! I like it! :D

“Isabel doesn’t let anybody get close to her. Not me, not Max, not anybody. If she let Alex get this close to her, it will kill her if he dies.”

And again it's Michael with words of wisdom! I'm actually quite impressed that he actually thought of this. And he was so right!

“I think this time is different,” Liz said, breaking into the conversation. “Nicholas keeps losing his grip on whatever it is he’s doing to shift time. We’re all able to remember things from our real time, and when I crossed over into our real time, I was able to remember things that happened here. I was even able to bring something back with me from our real time.”

“Yeah, what?” asked Alex.

“Oh, um, nothing” Liz hedged, unwilling to admit she had a memorial card from Alex’s funeral in her pocket.

That card was a real shocker. But Alex took it amazingly well in the end, I thought.

“Okay, Nicholas, put us here for a reason, and he must have some way of making it permanent, or else he wouldn’t have bothered. Does that make sense?”

Yes! Excellent reasoning! They're onto you Nicky!

“Michael, what are you saying?” Isabel asked, her voice tinged with panic.

“I’m saying, I think Nicholas is trying to stop Liz from living. If she had died in the other time, the real time, none of us would have ended up together,” Michael said.

Michael just gets smarter and smarter as they remember! :D

“Nobody’s doing anything, Isabel, just relax,” Alex said. He reached out and laid a soothing hand on her leg but she shoved it away angrily.

“Don’t you dare try and patronize me,” she cried.

“And don’t you try and tell me what I can and can’t do,” Alex replied calmly.

Isabel sounds like... well... like Isabel! And Alex came on pretty solid there himself!

“But if we stop him, Alex will die,” said Liz.

“If we don’t, you’ll probably die, and so will the rest of the world,” said Alex. “Any way you cut it, someone is going to die.”

And Alex gets the final word... the voice of ultimate reason. Did I say I loved this, Tracie? Great parts! Great story! But it's going to be over. : *Sigh* But what a great run! :D :D :D


Gerry

Winds of Change

Chapter Thirty-One – Searching

“I wish I could remember more,” said Liz after the two groups reformed. “I can see it, but I can’t tell you where it is. I just know the Granolith is important for some reason.”

“It’s okay, Liz. We have a couple of places we can check,” said Max, rubbing her back, gently. He didn’t know what Alex had said to her, though he had a pretty good guess, and he could see that she was really upset. “Michael keeps getting these images of a cave with some strange symbols in it.” He looked over at Michael for confirmation.

“Yeah, I uh, well, I think it’s out on that Indian place,” he said. “I don’t know why, but I think it’s important. Maybe we should check it out.”

“Indian place?” Maria asked. “How incredibly politically correct of you, Michael.

“Right,” said Max. “It sounds like a good place to start. I was thinking about going to the place, well the place where we came from.”

“What!” Maria shouted. “I’m not taking off to outer space, girlfriend. I’ll go to the ‘Indian place’ with Michael.”

“What happened to political correctness?” Michael whispered.

“That’s not exactly what I had in mind, Maria,” Max laughed. “But, well, we didn’t just arrive here in a beam of light, we,”

“The pod chamber,” said Liz, breathlessly. “Out by Pullman Ranch.”

“Yeah, that’s kind of what I was thinking about. How do you know about it? We’ve never told anybody.”

“I keep remembering bits and pieces of things,” said Liz. “They just swim in and out of my mind.”

“Yeah, it’s happening to me, too,” Max admitted. He looked down at Liz’s upturned face and found himself getting lost in the depths of her eyes.

“Uh, excuse me,” interjected Maria. “But fun as this is, I don’t want to spend the rest of my day watching the two of you drool over each other, so I’m going with Space Boy over here to go cave hunting, okay?”

“Yeah, and we’ll head back to town and see if we can track down Nicholas,” said Isabel. Her voice shook when she spoke but it was the only betrayal of the emotion she was feeling.

“Uh, sure,” said Liz, her gaze never leaving Max’s. “We’ll catch up with you later.”

“I wonder if they were like this in the other time line?” pondered Alex.

“Trust me, it was much worse,” said Maria, as they walked away from Max and Liz. “I may not be remembering much about what went on, but I can promise you, beyond a shadow of a doubt that what we just saw was mild!”


** * ** *


“Wow, they sure are wrapped up in each other,” Maria said to Michael as she steered her mother’s Jetta down the dusty highway.”

“Yeah,” agreed Michael. “Turn here.” He pointed to a dusty road leading of the highway with a sign indicating they were entering the Mescalero Indian Reservation. “Yeah, well, Maxwell’s just being stupid,” said Michael, picking up the thread of the conversation. “We don’t belong here. We’re just visitors here. We shouldn’t waste our time getting caught up in something that isn’t going to last.”

“That’s kind of harsh, don’t you think?” asked Maria as the car bumped down a rutted dirt lane. “I mean, you’re shutting yourself off to all sorts of possibilities for something that might never happen.”

“Yeah, whatever. Look, pull up here,” said Michael, gesturing with his hand. “We have to walk from here.”

“Walk? Walk?” asked Maria, parking the car and opening the door. “Nobody said anything about physical exercise. I’m not an exercise kind of person.”

“Do you ever stop talking?” Michael asked with a long-suffering sigh. He pushed some tall grasses out of the way and led Maria up a faint dirt path.

“Not usually, said Maria. “Hey, look, it’s a real cave. Uh, there aren’t any bats in there, are there?”

Michael didn’t bother to respond, he just stepped into the mouth of the cave and turned on the flashlight he had brought from the car. The beam flashed against the roof of the cave and against the walls, and Michael made a discouraged sound.

“There’s nothing here,” he said in disgust.

He turned to exit the cave, but Maria stopped him, and grabbed the flashlight out of his hand. She pointed the beam of light at the far wall of the cave, and watched as Michael stepped forward. He reached out and touched the engravings on the wall.

“I know these,” he said. “Maria, it’s a map. I know it. No, I don’t know it, I remember it. I remember. Maria, I remember everything.

He turned to look at Maria and saw the tears streaming down her face.

“Space Boy,” she sobbed, as the memories came rushing back. “You stayed. You stayed for me. You said I was your home, your family.”

“We need to find the others,” Michael said, holding his hand out to Maria. “I think we need to be there when,” he stopped, unable to say the words.

“Yeah, I think you’re right,” said Maria.

Together they exited the cave, climbed back into the Jetta and began the journey back to Roswell.

** * ** *

“This is it,” Max said, stepping back to allow Liz access to the pod chamber. “This is where we were born.”

“Oh, Max, it’s just, I don’t know,” Liz said in awe.

She looked at the four chambers, and then at Max, but he was oblivious to everything. He mind was focused completely inward.

“Max?”

“It’s here,” Max said, softly. He pushed through one of the chambers that housed his pod and gained access to the room that hid the Granolith. “Liz, this is it, come on.”

Liz clambered through the entry behind Max and stood and stared in awe at the Granolith.

That’s it, she thought to herself. That’s the thing that Alex died for; the thing she seduced Max for. She wanted a way home, and she got it. It didn’t matter who suffered.

Liz turned, her attention captured by the sound of retching, and she found Max kneeling in a corner, one hand on his stomach, the other braced against the wall as dry heaves wracked his body.

“Max, what’s wrong? Are you okay?” Liz cried, in a panic. Memories of Michael’s illness came flooding back. What if it was happening to Max. What would she do? She stood beside him, feeling helpless, rubbing his back, talking softly until the spasms subsided.

“God, I’m sorry,” Max whispered. “Liz, I remember, I really remember it all. I thought I remembered everything, but seeing the Granolith brought it all back. Everything we went through, everything I did to you; everything you did for us. I betrayed you in the worst way possible. Can you ever forgive me?”

“I already did, Max. In another time, I forgave you, and I forgive you now,” Liz said.

“Whatever we’re looking for, it isn’t here,” said Max. “Let’s go find the others and we’ll think of something else.”

Wow! For a short chapter, you sure crammed that full of touching moments, Tracie! My manhood is seriously at risk here! Where to start... let's see...

“I know these,” he said. “Maria, it’s a map. I know it. No, I don’t know it, I remember it. I remember. Maria, I remember everything.

He turned to look at Maria and saw the tears streaming down her face.

“Space Boy,” she sobbed, as the memories came rushing back. “You stayed. You stayed for me. You said I was your home, your family.”

*sniff sniff*

“God, I’m sorry,” Max whispered. “Liz, I remember, I really remember it all. I thought I remembered everything, but seeing the Granolith brought it all back. Everything we went through, everything I did to you; everything you did for us. I betrayed you in the worst way possible. Can you ever forgive me?”

“I already did, Max. In another time, I forgave you, and I forgive you now,” Liz said.

First candy and now a sweet dreamer moment! *sniff*

Then there were other moments:

“Indian place?” Maria asked. “How incredibly politically correct of you, Michael.

“I wonder if they were like this in the other time line?” pondered Alex.

“Trust me, it was much worse,” said Maria, as they walked away from Max and Liz. “I may not be remembering much about what went on, but I can promise you, beyond a shadow of a doubt that what we just saw was mild!”

That was funny! Leave it Maria!


Gerry

Wow Tracie. So much emotion in so little time!! That Alex is gonna die again is just too sad - you gotta find some way to keep him!! Please?? As a special little favour to me???

tracie girl you had me crying with that almost last chapter. oh my goodness. and alex so strong so brave. and he knew it would be kyle to help through. i find that very interesting. he didn't entrust her to anyone else.

and when michael remembers and maria. oh my goodness i just knew it was going to be over. I thought they had to find the others. i thought alex was going to go poof as they remembered it all. but wait it so far is only max, liz, maria, and michael thats gotten the full wakeup. where are alex and isabel. get back here.