* * 1 * *


Maria walked down the empty street.

Everyone was dead. Liz. Michael. Mom. Mister and Mrs. Parker. Step-dad Jim. Jesse. Max’s son. Most of the town. All because of, Tess.

She killed them. Now, bits and pieces of the town were on fire. Homes, businesses, trees and everything was black as coal. Maria didn’t know if Max, Isabel and Kyle were charred but she had to leave. Maria shivered. It was suddenly very cold. Maria had killed a psychotic alien. She was bleeding. Tess had been hitting her. Now she had a black eye, her arms were bloody and bruised and so were her face, stomach and chest. Her neck was blue, black, yellow and purple from where Tess had tried to strangle her. After thirteen hours of torture and death, Maria had taken a butcher knife and cut Tess’ head off, and watched as she turned to ash. Just like Nasedo had done after Whittaker had killed him.

Maria walked down the business road where Kyle worked at the mechanic shop. She stopped and saw his Buddha statue. She grabbed it and pulled it to her stomach and wrapped her arms around it. Ten minutes later tears were streaming down her face and she quickly wiped them away as she started to walk back out onto the main road.

* Max: Tess has returned.

Isabel: What?

Jesse: Who’s Tess?

Maria: A Whorie Bitch who killed my best friend and Isabel’s ex-boyfriend.

Jesse: Uh…

Liz: Evil Alien.

Michael: The mother of Max’s son.

Max: Not to happy about that.

Maria: She has to die. Or she’ll kill us all, and then kill the whole town. Who knows if she’ll stop there?

Max: Maria’s right. She’ll bring a war against humans and wipe out mankind. Just for fun. *

Maria cried and looked down. She saw Max’s wallet and Isabel’s bandana. They were dead.

She picked them up and they joined Kyle’s Buddha statue.

Maria’s head screamed. “HOW COULD YOU DIE MAX!?! YOU ARE A KING! ISABEL!! YOU’RE MY ALIEN BEST FRIEND!”

Everything going on in her head made everything look like it was spinning. She dropped Kyle’s statue and it broke, Max and Isabel’s things dropped along with an unconscious Maria.

Max: Everything.

Isabel: Everyone.

Max: Maria, Liz, Michael, Jesse, Kyle…

Isabel: KYLE!

Max followed her pointing finger to see Kyle mindlessly walking around.

Isabel and Max ran up to him. Isabel smacked his face really hard to get him out of his state of mind.

Kyle: Oh my god!

He hugged them both.

Kyle: I thought everyone was dead.

Max: Well we’ve been all over Roswell. The last two places we haven’t been are Maria’s and the Pod Chamber.

Kyle: Maria’s not there.

Isabel: We haven’t been to the Crashdown.

Kyle: No longer there. Burned down. Tess.

Isabel: Oh god. That’s where Maria, Liz, Jesse… All the humans were supposed to stay there!

Max: Let’s go one more time through the town. Maybe we’ll find them, Is.

Maria woke up an hour later. She saw Kyle’s Buddha statue and touched a piece of it. She gasped when it reformed from her touch.

Maria picked up Max’s wallet and pushed it into her jean pocket… realizing her arm was broken. She didn’t feel any pain except a twinge. Everything that had happened today was worse. Then she picked up Isabel’s bandana and tied it around her head to keep to her hair out of her eyes. She picked up Kyle’s Buddha and kept it underneath her arm.

She was the only survivor. And now, she was the Queen of Antar.

Max walked down the road in silence. Unlike Isabel and Kyle. They were talking about what had happened.

*Maria: Max, why’d he say he loved me then leave me?

Max: I don’t know. Why did Liz go to Florida?

Maria: Tess. She wants you to be happy, Max. And if that means staying away from you and sacrificing her own happiness for you to save Antar, she’ll do that for you because she loves you so much. And when she dies she’ll live on in your heart and vice-versa.

Max: Same thing with you and Michael kinda.

Maria: Yeah. I guess.*

They were the only survivors.

Maria could only think of one place to go.

The Pod Chamber.

Isabel: MAXWELL!

Max: Huh? What?

Isabel: I said maybe they went to the Pod Chamber.

Kyle: Yeah. I mean, it’s the only way we’ll find out if anyone besides us is alive, Max.

Max: My car’s at Maria’s.

Isabel: Why?

Max: Long story, short ending. Never gonna happen now.

Isabel: Max, honey. You’re my brother, I love you… but… in case you haven’t noticed. We’re in a ghost town. It’s a good twenty-five minute walk from here to Maria’s then a half-an-hour drive to the Chamber.

Max: It started last night…

Isabel: When Michael called me freaking out when you didn’t get back to the apartment and he thought you were dead?

Max: Yeah… I stayed over at Maria’s…

*Maria: Hey Max.

Max: Hey Maria. I have a question for you.

Maria: Shoot.

Max: What are you doing if you … when you survive, Tess?

Maria: We both know that’s an “IF”. Um, I have a friend who just moved from Las Cruses to Seattle. She already said it was cool if I could come live with her. She’s already said she can have me a job for when I get there.

Max: Good. That’s where we’ll go. Out of the group, who ever lives, we’ll go there. Promise. If we don’t live that you and who ever is left will go there.

Maria: I promise. Max… I don’t think that’s such a good idea. Seattle, it’s very dangerous. More dangerous than here.

Max: We’ll take our chances. *

Maria walked into her empty house. She was going to keep her word and go to Seattle.

They weren’t at the Pod Chamber. They were dead. She just knew it.

She went into her room and packed some clothes and personal items.

Maria walked into her empty house. She was going to keep her word and go to Seattle.

She went into her room and packed some clothes and personal items. She then went to Michael’s and took his sketchpad, she went to the burned Crashdown and remembered something. Liz and herself had buried a box next to Alex’s grave full of pictures. She drove to the cemetery and dug up the box. It had prom pictures, pictures after Enigma and from Graduation. Maria looked up and screamed. Alex was sitting on his headstone.

Alex: Hey ‘Ria!

Maria: Alex? But… you’re …… dead!

Alex: Yeah I know. Just wanted to say hi. I miss you and Lizzie.

Maria: You’ll be seeing her soon. Tess killed her Alex. Along with her parents, Michael, Jesse everyone.

Alex: I know. I was watching.

Maria: You were? Is Max alive? What about Isabel? Kyle? I haven’t seen them. Kyle got fed up and left the Crashdown. Isabel and Max were never found they got separated from Michael and Michael came to the Crashdown looking for them but that’s when Tess showed up… and you know this.

Alex: I can’t tell you if they’re alive or not. I love you, Maria.

Maria: Why not? Alex? Alex?! Get your skinny white ass back down here! ALEX!

He was gone.

Maria gathered the box and went back to her car. She could make it there in two days.

Destination: Seattle, Washington.


Max, Aka, Max Guevara, aka X5-452, is a genetically enhanced human prototype created as part of Project Manticore, an experiment to create genetically enhanced saboteurs and assassins with heightened strength and awareness. Max was created by a scientific technique called Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR), a rapid, inexpensive and easy way to produce large numbers of copies of DNA molecules from tiny quantities of even the poorest quality DNA primers, followed by detection and analysis of the reaction products. Max was one of twelve Manticore subjects in the X5 division that escaped from their military handler, Donald Lydecker. Not long after the escape, terrorists set off an electromagnetic pulse, which wiped out many military and economic records. Cut off from her fellow escapees, Max was driven to safety by a sympathetic scientist and soon came to live with a young girl named Lucy and her stepfather.

Periodically, Lucy's drunken stepfather would molest her. Though Max could've stopped it, she instead ran away because her Manticore training stipulated that she could not compromise herself in enemy territory. Seeking for others of her kind, Max found work at a bike messenger service called Jam Pony Express, but still initially had to resort to theft to pay for the private investigator aiding her in her search. Eventually she tried to rob altruistic cable hacker Logan Cale, the author of a pirate TV program that exposes corrupt officials. Logan knew about her past, and sought her aid in his crusade against corruption.

Though Max initially resisted Logan's advances, she eventually became his samurai in the battle against the corrupt power brokers of the new millennium. More recently, Max has discovered that her genetic data is different from her fellow transgenics, and that she was engineered for a special purpose, unknown even to Lydecker, that she has only begun to understand.

Then Alec, he was vain, egocentric, and unapologetically self-interested, Alec, aka X5-494, has some characteristics that make him somewhat reminiscent of Nero, the Roman Emperor who played his fiddle while Rome burned. Part of a second generation of X5s that were not involved in the '09 escape, he is the genetic twin of X5-493 (Ben), a deceased Manticore escapee who killed 41 people before Max put a stop to him. Alec required several months of psi-op evaluation to ensure that he did not share his predecessor's mental problems.

He initially appeared to be a dyed in the wool Manticore loyalist, considering the escapees to be diseased and happy to at least have a roof over his head. But his loyalty to Manticore was in no small part influenced by the fact that he had a black market operation going on within its walls. On assignment when Eyes Only exposed Manticore, he returned just in time to see the base in flames. In the damage control that followed, Alec found himself just as much on the run as the '09 escapees. Adjusting well to the life of a con man, Alec is habitually seen in shady company as he makes profit and survival his primary concerns.

Max looked over to Alec and saw him talking to his girlfriend of the moment, Alexia Evans.

Max hadn’t trusted her at first thinking she was White’s Familiar pals but then she was different. Alec thought he had met her before but “he never forgets a beautiful face”. Max planted a smile on her face and walked over to them.

Max: Hey guys.

Max looked Alexia up and down. Besides Alec, the girl had good taste. She was wearing low cut hip hugger black jeans, a red tank top with an inch missing from the stomach and it had her name spelled out in black rhinestones across her chest and she finished the ensemble with a black jean jacket and black leather boots. Her hair was light brown and was up in a ponytail with added red steaks. She had waist length hair originally but then she cut it to her elbows. She had full lips a little thinner than Max’s though and brown eyes. They looked like sisters almost.

Then Max noticed it. She looked like Eva. Kinda.

Max: You know what Alexia? You kinda look like a friend of mine. Eva. She’s dead though.

Max felt her tense at the name. So did Alec, surprisingly. They shared a look.

Alexia: I knew an Eva. Couldn’t be the same one though. Eva, the one I knew, she was a traitor. To other people. To me, she was brave. Speaking of old friends. Normal! I need those sector passes.

Reagan Roland. Aka, Normal, aka Satin’s spawn. Sometimes. He was unknowingly helping transgenic’s everyday by giving them sector passes. Not the toughest soldier in line. Or in regular saying, not the sharpest tool in the shed.

Normal: Yeah. Here ya go!

He put his usual scowl on and handed each one of them packages.

Normal: THE PACKAGES ARENT GOING TO DELIVER THEMSELVES, PEOPLE! BIP, BIP, BIP!

Alexia: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Bip this! Bip that! Bip now! Come up with a new word to use three times.

Normal: How ‘bout… MOVE! MOVE! MOVE! Or… FIRED! FIRED! FIRED!

Alexia: Whatever. This doesn’t have a name.

She threw a package past Normal’s head.

Alexia: In Sector 1. Off limits because of a Toxic Spill or something like that.

She threw it past Normal’s head.

Normal: Yeah right. More like a Mutant Freak!

Alexia: Normal. There’s no such thing. The CIA and such are just trying to jump people out of their skins with people in make-up and masks. All so they can claim to actually do something about it by taking more money from taxes for their own twisted work.

Normal: Huh? That makes no sense.

Alexia: They’re scammin ya! Box is misshaped.

She threw the box at Normal’s head with intensions of it going past it. Instead, it his him directly on the nose and it sent his glasses and headset flying to the ground.

Alexia, Alec, Max, Sketchy and Original Cindy got on their bikes, grabbed a few packages and left very quickly.

Alexia: Oops!

Max: You could have just gotten fired!

Alexia: Oops!

Sketchy: Your GONNA gets fired.

Alexia: Well it was funny.

Original Cindy: That is was, suga!

Original Cindy laughed.

Alexia: Alec, are you alright?

Alec snapped out of his thoughts.

Alec: Yeah. I’m fine. Why?

Alexia: Nothing. Never mind.

He was thinking about her. Rachel. His first and only love.

Alexia pulled the brakes back on her bike.

Alexia: Well, this is one of my stops.

Before any one could offer to go with her into the “Bad Part” of Chinatown, she pedaled down the alley next to her.

Max: Ditto. I’ll catch up lata.

Max turned her bike around and followed Alexia. She found her hunched on the ground crying.

Max: Alexia? What’s wrong? Are you in pain?

Alexia: My heart is.

Max backed off. Not her department!

Max: Huh? Sorry. Not my department.

Alexia: He still loves Rachel Berrisford. Not me.

Max: Has he said anything?

Alexia: No. And I’m not psychic but I can tell when he’s thinking about her. He’ll smile and he rarely smiles. He’s been getting distant from me, Max. I thought he loved me but I was wrong!

Max: I’ve seen the way he looks at you.

Alexia: With pity and disgust. Did you know he saved my life? I was pushed in an alley; he saw and came to my rescue from an attempted gang rape.

Max: Oh god.

A flash of pity crossed over Max’s face.

Alexia: Fuck you! I don’t want your pity.

Alexia pushed herself off the ground.

Max: Excuse me?

She was alarmed at this young woman. She’s almost like an X-series. Fiery young woman, though she didn’t act like an X-series or anything else Manticorian that she knew about… then again… Mia. She could make people tell her something or forget something. It was Manticore’s twisted way of hypnosis.

Alexia: You heard me! Fuck! You! I’m sick of it, damn it! Leave me alone.

She breezed past Max. Max grabbed her elbow as she passed and Alexia spun around and smacked Max so hard across the face, she knew it was going to leave a bruise and handprint for a couple days.

Alexia got on her bike and pedaled off.

Max: Ow!

She heard someone pedal up.

She heard her name being pronounced as a question. The meaning? Why the hell are you flat on your ass when you’re a transgenic?

Max: Hi Alec. You know, this is your fault!

Alec: Really? How do you figure?

Max: Alexia smacked me really hard.

She cupped her cheek and at the contact she grimaced in pain. It felt like she had put her cheek against a stove burner.

Max: That girl has got one long yelling coming up.

Alec helped her up.

Alec: Why did she hit you?

Max: She told me everything. That you saved her. She seems to think that you’re still in love with Rachel and that you go out with her as pity.

Alec: Where’d she go?!?!

Max: I heard her mumbling about kicking your ass and finding some Mario.

Alec was fuming.

Alec: Thanks Max.

Max: What ever!

Max and Alec got on their bikes and Alec pedaled toward Alexia and Max towards Jam Pony.

Alexia had rode back to her apartment.

Alexia: I’m gonna kick his sorry pathetic ass!!!

Voice: At least you haven’t lost your bitchy side!

Alexia spun around.

Alexia: Maria!!!

Alexia hugged the blonde girl in front of her.

Alexia: How are you? When did you get here? Where are your friends?

Maria: Breathe, honey! I’m fine. Got here an hour ago and my friends are dead.

Alexia: Oh honey. I’m so sorry.

Maria: It’s OK. We were close but we had warning.

Alexia: Oh. I’m still sorry.

Maria: Well. I got to the New Mexico border and my car broke down. So I had to catch a bus and it gave me time to write some new songs. There angst and dark but it took my mind off of stuff.

Alexia: Well, lets get you moved in and then go to work. Normal, he’s an ass but you can deal with him. Plus he mentioned yesterday three kids would be joining us in a week.

As they were working on moving Maria in Alexia stopped and tensed.

Maria felt it.

Maria: Als? Are you OK?

Alexia: Yeah. I just had a bad day. I’m going to go take a shower. Then we can head over to crash and get drunk.

Maria: What about work? And it’s only 2 in the afternoon. A little early for getting drunk isn’t it… On second thought. What the hell? My best friends are all dead and so is the guy I used to love.

Alexia: Used to?

Maria: Long, long story!

Alexia: Be out in twenty.