Rage Against the End of the World (CC Mature) 1/1 - 06/08/11

[PML]

I should be writing a part to whisper. And I should indeed have one ready by this weekend. Then a part for End and then my poor neglected Citadel.... Thanks.

Please read the Summary.

Rage Against the End of the World

Author- PML

Disclaimer- Roswell is not mine and no infringement is intended.

Category- CC ALL

Rating- Mature

Summary- This story starts out right towards the end of the EOtW. It is a participant in the Inferno challenge from Roswell Heaven. Wrath as the Deadly Sin for this story. Don’t expect a happy ending.



Max

Max looks over at his sobbing friend. “I can’t imagine that he would do that to you. He might not know how to show it, but he does care for you, Maria.”

“Maybe he does, maybe he doesn’t. I mean, does it really matter if he’s going to cheat on me all the time?”

Max looked away.

“But then you aren’t truly here to cheer me up. At least not entirely.” Maria said with a sad smirk.

Max looked his friend in the eyes. “Maria! I certainly don’t like seeing you like this. I’ll talk with Michael and….”

Maria raised up one hand, “No Max, I can deal with it. But, what about you? Still not willing to see that humans and hybrids mix like oil and water?”

Max shook his head, “I love her, Maria. Maybe I am pathetic, but I need to try. I can’t give her up. Not yet.”

Maria smiled, but tears streamed from her eyes. Her voice was thick with emotion, “I still love Michael, Max. And it’s not fading. But the pain,,,”

Max reached out to touch his friend….

Flash
Maria looked through the window. She had seen Michael’s motorcycle, and had prayed she had been wrong. A large part of her had demanded that she simply pound on the front door and demand to know what Michael was doing.

A tiny voice told her just to watch. To see what he was up to.

She watched as Michael wandered around the room, almost like he was investigating her. For that brief moment her hopes began to rise. Maybe once again she had jumped to conclusions.

Courtney came out of the bathroom, clad only in a towel. She walked up to him and kissed him.

Maria could feel a mix of rage and despair fill her. The need to rush up and hit them, to make her feel just a portion of the pain she was feeling now.

And she would have.

But she fell to her knees first, sobs wracking from deep with in her. Her breath was ragged from holding it all in, mixed with the torrent of pain.

It was over. It was over for good now.

No going back from this.

She had lost him.

Forever.
End Flash

Max staggered under the weight of the emotion. He looked up at Maria, “Are you going to be alright?”

She wiped a couple of tears from her eyes, “I am going to have to be, aren’t I? I knew we wouldn’t last. That the passion wouldn’t be able to hold us together. I just expected it o last a little longer.” She looked him firmly in the eyes, “We don’t belong with you. I don’t belong with Michael, you don’t belong with Liz. The sooner we all realize that, the sooner we can move on. And maybe, maybe we can remain friends.” Maria looked away and sighed, “More than that is doomed I think.”

“I am not ready to give up yet. Not yet.” He looked away. “Anything, anything at all I can do for you?”

“I will be fine. I expect a long bubble bath with bright sweet smelling candles. Followed by a ton of ice cream. I will get by.”

Max nodded, “Anything Maria. Just let me know.” Max turned to go. He had a few things to pick up at home before he made his last plea.

He had it all planed out. The best time to catch her was after the Crashdown had closed, but before her father had finished counting the books for the day. Liz had usually finished her homework by then. Was usually reading a little or doing something she enjoyed.

Once that had included spending time with him.

Max closed his eyes and tried not to remember the flash he had gotten from Maria.

To be betrayed so utterly by the one you loved….

It didn’t matter what Maria said, he would be having words with Michael. Maria had become a true friend over the summer. Perhaps his only true friend. Michael was to confrontational now. Isabel was keeping secrets. Tess was well, Tess. He knew what she had planned for him, but not the full extent of her plans. He simply didn’t trust her.

Outside of the hybrids, Max’s only friends had truly been Liz and Maria. Sure Alex was cool, but Max had never truly warmed to the man. Maybe it was Alex’s obsession with Isabel.

In the end it didn’t matter. He needed Maria to stay sane. She had been the one to help him through his nightmares this summer. Maria couldn’t really heal him. But she could stop him from falling apart.

His only hope to regain himself lay with Liz. As it had all along.

Why had she run from him? Didn’t the realize how crucial she was to him?

The memory of her leaving him, of abandoning him and going to Florida….

Max closed his eyes and tried to will away the tears.

Strong. He had to remain strong.

His watch beeped. It was time.

Max grabbed the tickets. Gomez. Liz loved them. Surely she would be willing to go. Even if only as a friend. Max was willing to just be friends now with her. Anything to spend time with her.

Anything to bask in her healing presence.

Max pulled up to the Crashdown. He saw the lights flicker out. He knew Liz didn’t work late tonight so she should be on her balcony.

He called softly to her.

Nothing.

He looked at the tickets. He needed her answer now or she would likely schedule herself for work that day and plead innocence. No, the schedule for that week for the Crashdown wasn’t posted. She could have it off easily if she only asked.

No reason she couldn’t go with him. Not if even the dimmest ember still lingered in her heart.

And it did. He had felt it when he had kissed her in Whitakers office. He had seen it in her eyes as she had given him that horrid speech.

She loved him. He knew it.

Max nodded. Liz would probably forgive him.

He began climbing up the wall. Just that tiny bit before the ladder was tricky. Not so much because it was hard, but because he needed to make it look natural. He softly clambered up the ladder, pausing briefly when he heard a male voice.

Alex? This late? It was possible, but Alex had been putting a lot of work into his band lately. And it hadn’t sounded quite like him.

There was a faint amount of answering laughter.

Max just held on for a moment. How long had it been since he had heard her laugh?

She was enjoying herself. Maybe he should just leave. Let her be happy.

But the tickets…. This was his best, maybe only chance.

So he climbed that last distance.

And saw them.

Liz and Kyle.

Together in bed. Kyle was partly propped up against the headboard, his athletic musculature on display. Liz was a little better covered, only the top part of her breasts visible. But he could also see one bare leg, languidly dangling off the bed Beautiful olive skin almost to the hip.

No.

It couldn’t be.

She said she wanted a normal human lover.

Could she have replaced him so fast?

Max ran his fevered mind and tried to figure out what might have been happening behind his back.

Yes.

Yes it was possible.

They had been a couple before. And somehow they had actually grown closer afterwards, becoming close friends.

Kyle said something Max couldn’t quite catch.. Liz laughed, ripping Max’s heart inside.

She had chosen. Had chosen Kyle and hadn’t even had the guts to tell him. No.

She had paraded around trying to push him away, yes, but never letting him know….

Kyle? Of all people Kyle?

There was a loud crack as he crushed the rock near the ladder railing. It took a moment for him to catch his grip to save him from a bad fall.

Part of him wondered why he bothered.

An ocean of pain and anger swirled through him. He looked once more at his betrayers.

Kyle looked apologetic and enigmatic all at once.

But Liz…. Liz’s eyes contained pain and guilt. So very much guilt.

Max closed his eyes and focused on remaining in control of his powers. Powers that wished to lash out. Powers that demanded he get his revenge.

He began climbing down the ladder, slowly and deliberately. When he was halfway he stopped.

They had destroyed him. He would never recover from this. Not from this on top of what Pierce had done. His only hope had been Liz.

She had the opportunity to save him. And she denied him it.

Max had saved her at the cost of such pain and uncertainty. At the cost of being outed when they could have gone on hiding for a much longer time. A longer time when they could all have been safe.

But she would have died.

Would that have been such a bad thing in retrospect?

It would have hurt. But not like this. His Destiny would have been palatable if not precisely what he had desired. But given a clean start. Had the humans not clouded their vision, they could have embraced it fully.

Maria was right. None of them were meant to be together.

Such an unbearable ocean of pain.

And while he should leave. Should just consider himself done from the humans and their caustic ‘love.’

He couldn’t. Not while that traitorous bitch and her human minion retained the gifts he had given them.

Max raced up the ladder. Kyle was standing and putting on his shirt. He said something at Max.

Max simply didn’t care. He blasted Kyle. Not enough to kill, Max wanted to feel the bastard die writhing under his hands.

Nasedo had warned him. Had told him.

He had been right.

“Max! What are you doing?”

Max’s voice was harsh, “Taking back what is mine.” His mind poured into her, feeling as their still active bond poured her life into him.

So many memories. Max ignored them for one of his own. A memory engraved in his mind.

The state of Liz Parker after she had been shot.

He had never healed anything so major before. He hadn’t even been sure he could. But he had known that he’d had to. And so it was permanently ingrained, exactly how she had been before he had healed her.

The wound just so. She hadn’t lost as much blood yet, but that would take but mere moments. He had known that the EMTs would likely not have gotten there in time.

Once more he felt her pain. This time he reveled in it. He felt it thread throughout his body, the physical sensation grounding him even as he sent the waves of emotional and spiritual pain into Liz’s dying mind.

Let her know as she died how much pain she had inflicted in her short time. Let her know exactly how much she had cost the man she had once claimed to love.

The last thing she said as she died was, “Why?”

Max held her close, “Because I loved you!”

Max felt as her mind drifted into shock. As she drifted forever away from him.

As their Bond forever sundered and he was left forever alone.

A hollow but familiar voice called out from the bathroom. “What have you done? How can I be such a fool?

Max looked up, still cradling the bleeding body of his love. He saw an older version of himself. One that was only partly there.

The older Max looked at him, despair in his eyes, “You have made it all worse! My God, what have you done!” He fell to his knees and cried out to the heavens, ‘What have I done?”

Max felt as the anger left him. As the reality of what he had done had finally sunk in.

He would have to make plans. Would have to flee Roswell most likely. He closed the brown eyes that would haunt him for eternity and held her body close. To what had been his last hope of salvation.

For truly he was Damned now.

But before he had to run. Before he had to accept his new reality, he smelled the vanilla in her hair. And tried to ignore the copper scent of blood.

And he wept.