Summary: Tag to “Viva Las Vegas.” Takes place where the episode left off.
Category: M&L
Rating: PG
Spoilers: Yes, to ‘Viva Las Vegas’ and ‘The End of the World’
Disclaimer: The characters aren’t mine, yada, yada.
Note: Thanks David, Mala, and Ying Yi for pointing out what would be an embarrassing mistake in the story, and for editing the rest of it!

***

“Max!” Liz Parker shouted, running down the almost empty street in Las Vegas, as Michael and Max left the coffee stand. The two had finally patched up their differences as Michael spent the last of the money that had been haunting him. Deep in conversation, neither of the boys had heard Liz’s cry.

“Max!” she shouted again, slowing her run to a jog. She stopped moving for a minute or two to catch her breath. They guys were too far in front of her. “Max!”

Upon hearing his name, Max Evans turned around to see Liz’s desperate face staring back at him. It looked like she had been crying. This puzzled the young alien, remembering how happy she, he, all of them were the night before. Max felt a hand clamp his shoulder, interrupting him from his recall.

“Look man,” Michael said, meeting Max straight in the eye. He quickly turned his head towards Liz’s direction and then back to Max. The action was too quick for the other teen to follow in act.

“If there’s one thing that I have learned on this trip, it’s that we need each other. And not just you, me, Izzy, and Tess like we said earlier, but them too. The humans: Maria, Liz, Alex, heck, even Kyle too. I’ll make it back to the hotel and get the remainder ready to leave. You go talk to Liz.”

Before Max had anytime to make a crack about Michael’s sudden enlightenment, Michael turned from gazing out into the distance. “Go to her Max,” he urged. With that, Michael turned to walk back to the hotel, briefly nodding when he passed Liz.

“Hi Max!” Liz walked up next to him.

“Liz,” Max replied, looking down at her.

He slowly reached for her hand and led her in a walk down the street. It reminded him of the night before, and how she had let him touch her again. Everyone was paired off in the restaurant, all with the ones they cared for most: Alex with Isabel, Michael watching Maria, and Kyle and Tess dancing crazily together. When he had entered the restaurant and seen Liz sitting all alone, Max knew he had made the right decision to come back.

“Look Max,” Liz broke the silence. Her eyes were staring straight in front, like they were avoiding his gaze at all cost. But Liz knew that if she had looked up at the eyes that seem to know her soul inside out, she’d forget every part of her carefully rehearsed speech.

“I’ve been thinking a lot since last night. You know, the way Kyle and Tess, and everyone else seemed to pair off. And when the Sheriff came. He demanded Kyle to get in the car and then yelled at Tess too. They’re really becoming a family, you know. And even if she’s not my favorite person to be with, she is one too.”

“One what Liz?” Her sudden babbling confused Max.

Liz stuck a strand of her chocolate brown hair behind her ear and continued, eyes settling on the water fountain.

“A person. Tess has feelings like everyone else, and since she’s moved in with the Valenti’s…she’s changed Max. Kyle and the Sheriff, they’re good for her. They are her family.

“And what you said last night while we were dancing, about some weird flash of the two of us celebrating our wedding here, not to far in the future. And how it seemed like some memory or something. Max, I was going to tell you last night, I really was. But then Maria stopped singing, and I couldn’t get the words out. And everyone stopped dancing, and we were surrounded by the rest of the group, and then the Sheriff came, and Kyle and Tess left--“

“Liz, slow down!” Max ordered, halting their walk. “What were you trying to tell me?”

“That it’s true,” Liz said, letting out a sigh of relief. A huge burden had finally been lifted off her shoulders. Liz finally felt like she could breathe again.

How could that be true? Max felt like shouting out. He had to remind himself to keep breathing. Him and Liz, married? In Vegas? But this was the first time being to the city, and after this misadventure, he never wanted to come back again.

Sensing his confusion, Liz grabbed his hand again and walked over to the fountain. When the two sat at the edge, Liz chucked. She had told Maria everything she was about to tell Max at a fountain back home, back in December. God, my life is so full of irony, she thought.

“Max, this may sound hard to believe, but…it’s all true. And I, I’ve rehearsed this about a thousand times, so please, don’t interrupt.” Liz breathed in deeply, ready to start the tale. “Look, that night of the Gomez concert, well, in another lifetime, that was the night we took our relationship to another level.”

Seeing the puzzled look in his eyes, she rephrased her previous sentence. “Max, we made love that night, and then, from that point on, we were inseparable. Two years from then, we drove down here to Vegas and eloped in an Elvis chapel. The vision you had. And we called Maria, Alex, Michael, and Isabel down here, and the six of us danced the night away. It was the most romantic night of my life, even if it never occurred.

“But after that, things got bad. We weren’t treating Tess kindly at all, so she left. And your enemies came. But without Tess, you, Michael, and Isabel weren’t able to defeat them. And when Michael and Isabel died, you and I decided to use the Granolith to travel back to this time and stop all that from ever happening.”

Liz’s face expressed a far away, sad look, especially in her eyes, as she continued. “Future Max came to my house that night you hired the Marranachi band. The Max from the tale I just told you. And, to make a long story short, he told me everything about his and my future self’s life together, and how it lead to the end of the world. He convinced me that I had to make you fall out of love with me. We figured this way; you’d never push Tess away and Future Max’s timeline wouldn’t exist. It worked.

“But Max, all those things I said, all those things I did, I never meant them. Maria and Ava are the only ones who know this truth. And now, now you do too. I’m so sorry Max, for everything. I should have told you this last night, when we were dancing.”

Max watched Liz as she began fiddling with her hands, staring at them like they were a lecture on an area of biology which she would eagerly be paying attention to. Quickly all the information he had just been told began to sink in. Liz would do anything for him. She still loved him. Max asked the first thing that popped into his mind.

“So you never slept with Kyle?”

“No Max, I didn’t,” Liz replied, shaking her head, trying to hold back the laughter. She was about to say more when Max reached over the space between them and pulled her into his secure embrace, sealing his mouth on hers, an unspoken promise between them.

***

Liz Evans looked around the hotel’s presidential suite that Maria arranged for them to stay at during their spur of the moment trip to Vegas junior year. Was it really just twelve years ago? She wondered. Her husband adjusted his seat next to her, placing his hand around her shoulder protectively. Max was being way too overprotective of her and their unborn twins.

Liz smiled as she swept her eyes around the room once more. In another lifetime, Future Max’s life, the world wouldn’t have been this great. She wouldn’t have been married to her only love eight years ago and they wouldn’t have the lovely five year old girl that was staying at home in Roswell with her grandparents or the twins that still had yet to be introduced to this world. None of their friends would have found their happiness either. Maria, Michael, Alex, Isabel, Tess, and Kyle…even she and Max owed their lives to the brave soul who had risked everything for the ones he loved.

And now…Sheriff Valenti had been the one who had suggested this idea, remembering their other trip to Las Vegas that he had busted them on. She was so incredibly grateful for that. If he hadn’t been there to show how concerned he was about all of them, especially Kyle and Tess, then she might not have ever told Max the truth of what happened.

Tess and Kyle had helped arrange this trip with the Sheriff. Though the couple had been married for four years now, neither Kyle nor Tess had considered moving out of the Sheriff’s home yet. He was their father and meant too much to them to do that. Michael and Maria had gotten married that same year. And as much as both Michael and Kyle had objected, Maria and Tess had convinced their respected fiancées to share the wedding.

Speaking of weddings, Liz glanced to the other side of the large living room, where Alex and Isabel were carrying over the glasses of Shirley Temples. There were only a few months to their own wedding. And Liz couldn’t wait. Alex would finally become her brother in law. Yeah, life was good.

Picking up her glass, Liz spoke. “I’d like to make a toast, to everyone in this room. How one secret brought us all together,” everyone turned towards the aliens at that, “and how old rivalships have turned into blossoming friendships.” She and Tess exchanged smiles for that one, as did Kyle and Max. “And finally, for the true love each of us have found, and the friendship we have and always will share no matter what.”

Raising her glass to meet with those of her friends’, Liz was ecstatic. The agreements and aye-ayes that passed through the room helped to add to her mood. Then she remembered the one thing that should be added to the souvenir book all seven of them had chipped in and brought for Michael as a thank you present twelve years ago. All of them had their own message in it, which seemed to accumulate over the years. But a new one should be added when we return home, Liz decided. Las Vegas was the place for miracles and dreams to come true.

Back to Area 51 (Section II)