After the Cave

by

Domino

Part Eleven

The teens were back in holding pattern - waiting for what would happen next. Under the circumstances no one should have been surprised at what followed. This was Michael and Maria after all. Two more volatile and unpredictable people were not likely to exist.

"What the hell were you thinking. Two months, Maria. You scared the hell out of everyone. Liz came home because of you," Michael began yelling.

The others jumped in surprise when he began. Maria didn't. she knew him best after all. She just yelled back.

It was a few minutes before there was a second of silence - a breather. Alex took full advantage and jumped right in.

"One second, Michael," Alex interrupted, "As much as I want to yell at Maria right now, can I at least hug her hello? You got to greet her." Alex smiled at Michael's expression. He had added the last sentence just for that. Maria was the only button of Michael's that he knew how to push, and it sure was fun.

"Alex!" Maria cried. He wondered if she had even seen them standing there till now. Alex wrapped his arms around her tightly as she flew into them and breathed a soft prayer she was alright.

Liz came running up and hugged her next and before Liz and Maria could get into girl-talk catch up, Max, Isabel and Kyle took their turns. Michael stood slightly to the side of this, separate but not far. He was reluctant to let her out of touching distance. An indulgent expression touched his face, visible for only a second as he watched her greet her friends. He observed silently as Liz and Isabel surrounded Maria and how Tess stood slightly back, afraid of her welcome. Michael smiled. When he saw Maria drag Tess into the group, accepting and forgiving her. His Maria.

Michael notice the other guys bore the same smile he wore. Max. Alex. And Kyle.
'We're all complete saps. We all turned into Max," the wry thought passed through his mind. But still he stood and watched. The grateful look Tess wore at Maria's welcome, the reluctant one Liz wore at first which changed at Maria's encouraging one and Isabel's happy one that all her friends were together. All of this because of Maria. She was back and the group was complete now.

Of course they had a few things still to deal with. They had to yell at Maria some more, find out where she was the last two months, how she sensed Isabel, how….Okay lots of questions for Maria. Michael knew that wasn't going to be easy. While Maria was the most honest person he knew, she was also the most stubborn person he knew. And because of this Michael was aware that Maria wasn't going to tell them anything without a fight, not if she didn't want them to know. And since she had kept it from them for so long she would probably continue to do so. He could wait. She was back and that was all that mattered.

End Part eleven.

Part Twelve

Days passed. The vacation ended and everyone started school again. There was no sign of danger anywhere but they all sustained a state of readiness. Maria maintained her silence on the missing two months, despite several attempts by the 7 teens, who were her friends, to find out.

These attempts ranged from threats to persuasion, guilt to bribery. Numerous dreamwalks were also tried. And failed. Maria didn't budge. Her evasions seemed to get stronger as time passed and she either avoided the constant questions completely or said that she would tell them when it was time. Her mother remained in the dark.

Once again, they were the talk of Roswell High. The strange combination of the 8 of them, the unusual pairing of the couples, the addition of Kyle and Tess - all of these made them interesting fodder for gossip. In some ways it was merely continuation of the talk that arose the previous year when a known loner rebel with his quiet serious best friend and the most beautiful girl in the school, a highly unusual trio joined an equally unusual trio consisting of a pretty brainy scientist, a cute wacky pixie and a geek.

The 6 of them had certainly caused some major uproars during that year. Max and Liz, 2 notable quiet serious students caught making out because they were too loud. Maria and Michael's entire relationship. The weirdness that caused the 'Elle McPhearson' of the school to date Alex, a self pronounced geek. The antagonism between the Max and the no.1 jock in school now mysteriously absent. Hell. That was a lot for one school to take even without the non-human status of some of the group's members.

This year the stakes had even risen further with Alex and Maria's band - the Whits, their popularity stakes had risen. Isabel had always been popular and Michael with his rebel with a cause look and attitude was the cause of many a crush. Max's bedroom eyes, Tess's perkiness, Kyle's jock status and Liz continued dreamgirl reputation didn't help. The things that attracted 8 such different people together and held fast in obvious firm friendships fascinated people whether it their sometimes clueless parents or fellow students.

For the 8 however, things had changed even if they were the only one's that knew it. Their friendships, despite the knocks that Destiny thrown at them still remained intact. A secret bound them all them together and that was bigger than all of them together. Their relationships, however were not as lucky.

It was ironic that Tess who had been the catalyst for the subsequent break-ups, had begun a somewhat tentative friendship with of all people - Kyle. And even more strange, Isabel and Alex whose relationship had been the newest had somehow survived. For the others, love the very thing that should have kept them together kept them apart, caused Liz to walk away and Michael to say goodbye.

Isabel herself found it weird that Michael was still keeping away from Maria. After the kiss that they had all witnessed she thought it was strange that they hadn't gotten back together yet. The same went for Max and Liz. It had been two months of separation and those months hadn't been easy on her brothers. Max was more withdrawn than ever, a combination of Liz and the torture that he suffered at the hands of Pierce and Michael's walls had grown taller and wider than ever before. He practised his powers constantly with Tess and had improved his focus and energy tenfold. Even if she and Tess were both almost convinced that Maria was the focus he used to improve. Maria had always brought out the best in him and even now, apart she was still his reason.

Isabel figured it was limited time before things got back to normal. Normal, being a relative term for them. Actually that was wrong - she just hoped things would get better. It was just a matter of who stronger and more stubborn. Michael or Maria. Liz or Max. One thing she was sure of, was that Max was persistent as hell and no one could out argue Maria. Just a matter of time. Just a matter of time.

End part 12

Part Thirteen

There were 7 teens were sitting in Michael's apartment. It was their weekly seen-anything-suspicious slash lets-search-for-bugs meeting. They were waiting for Maria to show up. She was late.

Isabel and Max were having a slight sibling disagreement in one corner. Liz was doing her homework while Michael, Kyle and Alex played on an old playstation Michael had picked up and Alex helped him fix. Tess wasn't allowed to play, because she trashed them every time and so she watched and yelled instructions. At the moment Kyle was winning but that could be because Michael was otherwise distracted wondering where his almost/kinda/maybe ex-girlfriend was.

The door opened and Maria walked in, her face totally hidden by a huge stack of books she was carrying. Max immediately ran to help her. He was Max.

"You and Liz switch brains or something?" Kyle sounded amused.

"Hey!" It came from both Liz and Maria.

Maria took a deep breathe and let all the books fall to the couch in a jumbled disarray. Michael, Kyle, Alex and Tess made a quick dive to avoid being hit by a barrage of books. Michael picked up one of them, "Attack of the Bodysnatchers," he read aloud. "Anything you wanted to tell us, Maria?" he smirked. The others all laughed. Maria glared at him.

"For your information, I borrowed all the sci-fi books in the library."

Tess ran a hand through her hair, "I know this a stupid question but, why exactly would you do that?"

"Isn't it obvious?"

"No," 7 people replied in unison.

"Oh," Maria looked slightly downcast for a second, then she brightened up. "For ideas. You know. We all take a couple, read them and get ideas."

"Ideas?" Kyle was being particularly dense today.

"What a cool plan." Liz answered him this time, "We can make notes and everything." Liz was still the only one looking enthusiastic.

Maria ignored them all and began to hand two books to everyone there. She gave Michael the thickest ones. Kyle laughed when he saw this. And just to make sure everyone there got why he was laughing he explained it. This caused Tess to exchange a few see-what-I-have-to-put-up-with looks with the other girls and boys to exchange confused ones at the girls expressions. In return for the laugh, Maria handed him a thick book. That shut him up.

Michael didn't say anything. He didn't see anything wrong with Maria giving him the largest books. She was one of the few people that knew he liked to read. During their better times, they often had quiet moments with him reading or sketching and Maria doing homework or writing busily away in her notebook, always singing softly. He missed her voice.

He never asked to see what she wrote and she never asked to see what he drew although it was usually her face that filled his sketchbooks. They both knew that they didn't have secrets from each other and if either one wanted to see they could. This knowledge allowed them to be comfortable with the status quo they had shared at the time.

Everyone had received their books, amid protestations from a number of sources, all overruled. They weren't going to win and they all knew it. No one won anything against Maria.

The basic plan was illustrated by Maria, and expanded on by Liz. They were all to read the books and see if they could come up with any ideas to find any bad aliens, already codenamed Russians by Maria, not that she had anything against Russians as she explained but Czechoslovakians was already taken. This, of course, was in between various other detours Maria took during one of her plans. Everyone there had there Maria filters working at maximum capacity although Tess was a little new to the friendship and had a harder time following the plan. Liz talking behind Maria did help though.

When she was done Maria gave them all a time limit… that was mainly for Kyle and Alex's benefit. Max never argued with Maria and Isabel and Tess both thought it was a surprisingly good idea, and Michael would have done anything for a plan of action, something Max would do anything to try and avoid at the moment. Still for the first time that day, after having quite a few of these meetings they all had something to do.

Part Fourteen

The idea came from, ironically, the book Kyle had been given as punishment. Once he accepted the plan, he did (to his credit) go wholeheartedly into a reading phase. Tess, on the other hand, wasn't too happy with this new development. He ignored her for two days, busy reading and then much to her disgust spent the day after searching the library for other books by the same author.

She blamed this entire debacle on Maria and so in true get even style spent this time away from Kyle with Maria, complaining and making sure Maria knew exactly how unhappy she was with this situation. That plan kind of backfired on her as all it succeeded in doing was to bring Maria and Tess closer together - a development decided by all the guys in the group as extremely bad. Who knew what the two of them together could come up with? Definitely not good.

It was lunch at school and they 8 teens sat in a secluded section of the courtyard discussing their findings. The idea was to scan lightly the minds of all the surrounding people. A sort of dreamwalk, just not as deep. Isabel was the one chosen for the task, dreamwalking being her particular expertise. It was to discover any unusual activity. Maria of course called it 'Mind Patrol.' Michael then in reply said she watched way too much Buffy. That got them both started on an argument, with escalating voices.

"Hey, I'm not the one that watches Dawson's Creek," Maria hit back at Michael.

Six shocked faces turned to Michael.

"You do not. Please say you don't," Alex pleaded. This was ridiculous he thought. Michael is supposed to be scary. Scary people don't watch Dawson's Creek.

Michael didn't answer. That in itself was an answer. Maria didn't have the same qualms,
"He likes Joey. And thinks Pacey is really cool."

"Please, Joey is supposed to be with Dawson," Liz said.

"How can you say that? Pacey is so much cooler than Dawson. Dawson is just boring.," Michael spoke without thinking. The somewhat horrified faces of his friends to statement made him blush slightly and duck his head, "I'll just shut up now."

He knew it was a bad idea to watch the show in her presence. She had been making fun of him about it since she found out. Speaking of the her, Maria was killing it laughing so hard she was practically on the floor. Max and Kyle was just as bad. Liz was looking insulted because he had called Dawson boring and Isabel looked dignified but amused with that face that said one more thing and she would burst out laughing. Tess, on the other hand was wearing her "you'll are strange species" look.

It took all of them at least 10 minutes to compose themselves. Even after that someone kept making small cracks about the show and that would start them all again. With lunch almost over, it was decided that Isabel, Tess, Max and Liz would use the last period of the day, which was free for study to try a daytime scan. They would mind patrol twice every few days, one at night and one during the day. The others would keep watch while Isabel went under. Michael had art and he left immediately, practically running to avoid Maria's laughter following him. Kyle headed for gym and wrestling practise and Maria and Alex left for English soon after.

The four remaining teens walked to the library and found a quiet corner on the second floor to practise. Max and Liz kept watch to prevent anyone seeing Isabel and Tess held Isabel's hand. The idea was to basically surf the surface of minds. She didn't require a picture because she wasn't trying to enter the mind of one particular person but it did require a lot of concentration. It took her a few minutes to reach the place.

She called the place the dreamscape. It was similar in her mind to an endless field covered in mist. A photograph was like directions to a person's mind or subconscious. This time she was just entering the dreamscape and wandering around, lightly picking up stray thoughts and images as she passed. The minds of those closest to her were also the nearest to her physical manifestation of herself in her mind as well.

She walked past Max, Liz and Tess's dreamscape representations without trying to delve deeper and moved further afield to those she could not recognise and began to walk, lightly scanning as she moved. Time moved differently in the dreamworld Isabel was walking in. A few seconds could take an hour and an hour could be a minute.

Tess watched Isabel carefully as she lay against some bookshelves her eyes closed, her eyelids flickering slightly. She glanced at her watch and saw that nearly 60 minutes had passed. It was time to wake Isabel up. You had to be careful when waking someone up from a dreamwalk but Tess had had plenty of practise over the summer during their practise sessions together. But before Tess could lean over to wake her friend up, Isabel sat up suddenly. She blinked a few times and then stood up in one fluid motion and in determined steps moved towards the steps to exit the library.

Tess stared at her in confusion. Isabel looked furious. Tess hurried after rapidly moving friend and moved along with Max and Liz, who had just noticed Isabel's new awake state, to stand in front of her. They three of them blocked her way down and waited for an explanation for her angry exposition.

Downstairs in another building, Kyle was changing in the locker room with the rest of the wrestling team. He had finished earlier than they had and was on his way out when he remembered he had forgotten his book in the gym. He grabbed his stuff and detoured to fetch it. It was by chance he overheard the conversation that began after his departure. One that would never be said in his presence for fear of retribution. They all knew how he felt about her. She was practically family. His sister. To say he was furious was an understatement. Kyle's hands curled into fists. But before he could do anything, the coach saw him and called him over. By the time he had finished discussing the new wrestling teams strategies, the guys had already left. Kyle stormed out of the locker rooms after them.

Part Fifteen

There were many things that were different this year. Liz had stopped working at the Crashdown. She was interning at the new Congresswoman's office. It was a toss up to who took this harder - Maria or Max. Max was so used to seeing her in the Crashdown, it was usually his reason for coming there and also the one place he could sit and watch her without any reprisals. For Maria it was more of a loss of part of their friendship. The two of them had been working together for so long they relied on the other's presence, but still her loss was overset by her happiness for her friend's new job.

Liz felt the loss as bad, but change happened, she reasoned and it was made easier by not having to see Max all the time, to not have to constantly fight the urge to run into his arms and beg him to take her back. They were friends now, her and Max - after finding Maria in the desert, but even though Tess had dropped the entire Destiny thing Liz had spent too much time away from Roswell trying to give him up to take him back now, not when he was better of without her to distract him.

For Max he still came to Crashdown everyday. It brought back memories. Michael was still there and so was Maria. Maria became his saviour. She held his hand, listened to him talk and kept his hope alive. He tried to return the favour but part of him recognised that she didn't need him as much as he needed her. She seemed strong somehow - she radiated strength. Whatever happened in the summer changed a part of her. It was easily visible, in the way she talked, the way she walked and the way she dressed. It didn't just make Michael's blood pressure rise - the longer hair and shorter skirts but it caused him, Kyle and Alex no end of worries especially when they saw the way guys stared at her. Maria herself didn't notice or if she did she didn't care.

Based on that, some of him wasn't totally surprised when he heard Isabel's explanation in the library but the rise of anger came so fast, that surprised him. Anger wasn't his thing. It was Michael's but Maria was his practically his sister. She was his best friend's girlfriend. She was his best friend. How dare they have such thoughts about her. This time it wasn't Isabel that led the way. It was Max. No one got to think about her like that without some payback.

Kyle headed out into the hallway. Before he could do anything he ran into Alex. His short explanation on his eavesdropped conversation resulted in two angry guys. Just then the bell rang and the hallway filled with students. It wasn't surprising that the six incensed friends met and concluded that the thoughts that Isabel picked up on her mind patrol were the same that Kyle overheard. No one there repeated any of what made them so furious. They merely talked around it, slightly calmer now. They were trying to decide what to do when Michael found them.

All of them immediately shut up. It didn't take a genius to figure out that telling Michael would not be an entirely good idea. If Michael was protective normally of his friends, the way he behaved about Maria was magnified 10 times. Unfortunately it didn't take a genius to figure out that they were hiding something. Subtle they were not, and Max and Kyle looked too enraged too fully hide it. Michael's expression didn't change after he heard. His eyes froze over though. One look into them and anyone with a brain would run in the other direction as fast as was humanly, or alienly possible.

All thoughts were forgotten when Michael looked up, his Maria radar alerting him of her nearness. They followed his gaze to the end of the hall where Maria was, heading towards them. It was Liz's gasp that let them know the rest. Walking behind Maria were three of the wrestling guys. The 7 friends watched horrified as the events unfolded.

One of the boys whistled.

"Hey pretty girl,"

"Drop dead, jerk." Maria didn't mince words.

One of the guys pinched her butt. And all hell broke loose.

It took Maria's friends 10 seconds to reach her.
It took Michael 4 seconds to get there.
It took Maria 2 seconds to twist his arm and slam him against the locker.

All noise in the hall stopped. Everyone stared.

"Touch me, again and I'll break your arm." Maria twisted it a little more to emphasise her point. He nodded in haste. She let him go and he slumped to the floor. He lay there looking up at her. She ignored him, picked up her fallen backpack and calmly walked to Michael.

His friends were not as co-operative. They stepped up right behind her. And then stopped. Michael stood there, his arms folded, his expression cold. Before Maria could do or say anything. Kyle, Max and Alex stepped up next to Michael their postures identical. The staring match between the two groups lasted a few minutes. It was conducted in absolute silence before the jocks turned around and left, ironically leaving their fallen friend lying on the floor.

Michael bent down and crouched next to the embarrassed wrestling student. He said something softly and the guy got up in a hurry and ran down the hall after his friends.

The show over, the noise level rose again everyone in the school relishing in the new topic that had just fallen into their laps. People rushed away to tell the story to those unlucky enough not to have seen it. Maria's friends stood there surrounding her slightly in shock over the incident, in shock over her display, in shock in general.

It was only when she continued walking heading to the parking lot, that they snapped out of it and followed her, rushing to catch up. They all stood at the jetta a few minutes later.

"Hey Maria, will you be my bodyguard?" Alex broke the silence. Everyone laughed.

"Why, you need one?" Maria teased in return.

"Will you teach me that move. Man I can thrash the competition with that at the next meet," Kyle said in admiration. Wow could his sister move.

Maria laughed again, "Sure, big brother."

"Me, too," Isabel said.

"Me, three," Liz and Tess stated in unison.

Michael didn't say anything. He just looked at her but it was a look filled with a mixture of shock, admiration, love and pride. Maria stared at him and interpreted the look almost correctly. She blushed and turned around to open the door to the jetta. She hadn't meant to throw that sleaze against the locker but it all happened so fast she just didn't think.

Maria had stopped to talk with Mrs Burrows after English. Alex had offered to wait for her but she sent him along without her. She had just walked out the classroom when a jolt of pure rage went through her. She knew it was Michael so she headed towards him following her instincts. She just caught sight of him at the end of the hall when the jerk started to hassle her. When he touched her, she didn't think she just reacted. Two months of training and hours of practise since left her with quick reflexes. It was an automatic response. She didn't really regret it but already they were asking questions.

A discussion was in order. But not now. She evaded the immediate questions and promised to tell them tonight. At Michael's place. She was not looking forward to this meeting. But she had avoided it long enough. Maria knew this time they would never let her avoid the altercation that had been building since they had found her in the desert.

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