Author: Liz
E-mail: [email protected]
Rating: PG-13
Category: M/L
Disclaimer: I don't own anything.
Summary: Future fic. Liz is married to Kyle and works for the FBI. The aliens never came to Roswell, and there was never a shooting.
Distribution: Back parts can be found at <A
HREF="http://www.inficad.com/~jlaw/Liz/Liz.htm">Stories
by Liz</A>
(Jessi's Page). As for putting them anywhere else, I think I'm
gonna hold off for awhile.
Feedback: Pretty please :)
Subject: A1 (Part 13)
"Oh my God."
The words were out of her mouth before she even realized she had spoken. Her head had begun to spin crazily, the names and numbers dancing before her half-closed eyes. Taunting her.
'57'.
Dear Lord, how naive she'd been.
57 of them. There were 57 aliens, right here in this building. Or had been. There were so many names. Normal names, she thought. But wasn't that just what they were? Normal? She hadn't managed to spot it at first, the name that she had come to think of so often. Perhaps it was the fact that she had never even known his last name. But there it was, first name on the list, cell A1.
'Evans, Max.'
Pending Termination. 6/6/10. Tomorrow.
She swallowed, only to find that she couldn't breathe. Her throat was constricted, her chest tight. She was suffocating.
"Max."
Her voice came out strangled. Followed by another rush of tears. Her eyes scanned down the list of them--Fenway, Fields, Guerin, Hollingsworth, Ingram. So many more. Over to the columns. Experimental. There were so few left, so pitiful few. 10 or 11, at the most. The majority of the names had numbers in the second column, Pending Termination. Which was Max' 'status'. What a cold word to use for a living creature.
And then the one that she dreaded the most. Terminated. Could there already have been deaths, murders?
Her question found an answer soon than she hoped.
There was a date in the last column, a single date that sat in the middle of the screen.
7/4/10.
Yesterday.
She managed to make out the name, even through the blurry curtain of her tears.
Guerin, Michael.
Soon, he wouldn't be the only one.
"Liz?"
She was sure that she jumped when he called her name, startling her from the terrified daze that she had seemed to slip into. Whipping around, she met his eyes immediately.
"What's wrong?"
Quickly wiping the tears from her eyes, she struggled to
muster a smile for him. Failed miserably.
"Just thinking."
What was she supposed to tell him? That there were others like him living in this terrible place, some of them waiting as if on death row. One already dead?
That he was scheduled to die tomorrow?
She knew that she needed to. He, after all, deserved to know more than anyone. It was his life at stake, his race. And yet she couldn't bring herself to tell him. The words loomed at the back of her throat, waiting to be formed. But she just couldn't make herself say them.
What came out was dangerously close to a croak.
"Liz!"
She was falling. No, she couldn't pass out. She had to hold herself up. Clinging desperately onto the arm of her desk chair, she looked away from him. Refusing to meet his eyes. Anywhere but there.
"Are you alright?"
She nodded. Her voice was still lost somewhere, stolen by the same cruel hands that had stolen the life of that poor man. "Tell me."
She couldn't lie to him. He knew. Why had she even tried?
"I've found something, Max."
The look of hope on his face caused the words to again stick.
She had to say something, but what?
"Uh..it's tomorrow."
"Tomorrow?"
She nodded weakly. "Tomorrow."
Understanding dawned on his face, which soon turned to horror. "Are you sure?"
"Yes."
He leaned against the wall, cradling his head in his hands.
"Oh, God."
Seeing him like he was then, and being the weak person she was,
she just couldn't bring herself to tell him the rest.