He shouldn't be here. He knows that it makes him a hypocrite. To keep Max from running after Liz only to run to Maria at the first opportunity? So, he is a hypocrite. So what? He doesn't really expect any better from himself. He's a murderer, too. What's a little hypocrisy compared to that?

He doesn't know what he had intended to say to her. Maybe he had hoped that he wouldn't have to say anything. There is so much that he just doesn't have the words for. In his insanity he had hoped that she would simply understand. He isn't sure why he had ever thought that might work. If he doesn't understand, how could she? It doesn't matter, though. She isn't here. It frightens him that he can stand on the front steps of her house and know that she isn't inside. He knows that he would be able to feel her if she was.

He is startled then when the front door opens anyway.

* * *

Amy DeLuca frowns up at the tall boy standing on her porch. She has a list of things that she wants to say to her daughter's fly-by-night boyfriend, but all of her sharp words die on her lips as she looks into his wide, brown eyes. She knows that nothing she could say to him would penetrate the haze of pain he is already drowning in. He is a vibrator, a non-verbal. She would have known that even without hearing her daughter's assessment. And right now he is radiating enough anguish to bring someone weaker to their knees.

She has learned more of his story from Jim than she ever has from Maria. When she had gone to the police station that fateful "morning after" Jim had told her exactly what he suspected Michael had been running from. She had begun to understand then why he was such a contradictory child, such an odd mixture of noble sacrifice and thoughtlessness and anger. She looks up at his wide, brown eyes and knows that if he has ever felt the touch of a mother's hand he can't remember it.

She is her daughter's mother, and like Maria her heart breaks for this broken boy.

* * *

He stares at her, unable to shield himself from those soul-searching eyes that Maria has inherited. He doesn't even try. Somewhere along the line tonight the last of his defenses has crumbled and he doesn't have the strength to rebuild them. He had followed Max back into the cave after Liz had disappeared from sight. They stared at one another blankly. Tess had trembled at the loss of her father-figure and Isabel wept for the mother she couldn't recall. Max's eyes kept turning toward the mouth of the cave, following the memory of a girl. And Michael stood silently as his entire world collapsed.

He knows that he has been a fool. All his life he has claimed that he wanted answers. He wanted to know where he was from. He wanted to know why he was here. He wanted to know who he was. He had hoped that the orbs would be able to tell him all of those things. But the truth was, he realizes finally, all he ever wanted from them was one simple message: There's been a mistake, son. We're coming to bring you home.

He wants to resist Amy as she draws him into the house, but she is a DeLuca and he can do nothing but follow.

* * *

She isn't surprised at how meekly he follows her. She marvels that he has made it this far at all. Whatever has happened to him, she knows that it has shaken him to his core. He moves blindly, reacts to nothing. She wonders if he is in shock. After all that she knows he has already been through she can't imagine what is left that could jar him so badly. His knees buckle as he stumbles across the small living room. She wraps a supportive arm around him as he collapses on the sofa.

She doesn't think he realizes that he is barely breathing. He seems almost afraid to inhale too deeply, as if certain that something would shatter if he did. Tears course down his cheeks. She wonders how young he was when he had to learn how to cry so silently. She regrets that this defensive measure has hidden his pain from those who would have tried to help him if they had only known. He doesn't know how to ask for help, doesn't know what to do with it when it is offered.

She cradles his head against her shoulder and rocks him gently as she hums a wordless lullaby.

* * *

All he has ever wanted is a family of his own. Strip away everything else in the universe and all he has ever wanted is to know what Isabel means when she speaks of a mother's unconditional love. Now he knows that he is to be denied that forever. The family that he has so desperately needed to believe in actually belongs to some dead guy, not him. All those nights that he lay staring up at the stars and dreaming that once upon a time there were parents who loved him have been wasted. He doesn't have parents. He is not someone's son. He is a clone of someone's son. They might have loved him, their original child. But he knows that he is something different. He is a science experiment. Social science experiment. Experiment. And not even a successful experiment, at that. Because he knows he hasn't turned out the way they had planned.

If things had gone right he would have felt... something when that hologram spoke. There should have been some spark of recognition. Something inside of him should have agreed with her. Instead, all he had wanted to do was curl up and hide, to bury his face in his knees and wait for it all to go away. But he couldn't and he hadn't. He had walked to the cave mouth to get some air. And then he had kept walking. Not thinking, simply moving. And he had ended up here.

He knows what it means; it means he needs her.

* * *

Amy looks up as Maria slips in the back door. Her daughter's face is pale and pinched. She knows that whatever has upset Michael this evening has distressed Maria as well. Maria seems surprised to see him here but she is instantly at his side. He stiffens for a brief, hesitant moment then tumbles in Maria's arms. Amy is startled by the fierceness of their protective, possessive embrace. She watches Maria wind her fingers through the boy's wild hair. She watches him bury his face in the curve of her daughter's neck. She doesn't know what has happened tonight and doubts that she ever will, but she does know that she'll be seeing a lot more of this boy.

Whatever has tried to tear these children apart has only made the bond between them stronger.

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