Finding Yourself
Author: Cookieman aka Stacey
Email: Cookieman123@go.com
Category: M/L , but strong friendship themes with others
Rating: PG 13 to NC 17, but you will be warned before those post
Disclaimer: I own nothing but a computer, some college debts and a vivid imagination
Author’s Note: This takes place after "Departure". I know, I know, another Departure fic, right? Well, give me a try. The first few parts are trying to wrap up the mess left to us, so it might take me a few parts to get into it. In case you don’t know yet, feedback makes me post far quicker…

Finding Yourself
Part 1

The sky was clear, bringing forth the kind of night sky that you could stare at for hours and lose yourself in. And Liz Parker had been doing just that. She had been sitting in her lounge chair staring at the stars for so long they had all seemed to run together. Her journal lay open before her, the pages blank. It had been months now and she still couldn’t bring herself to write a single word. It had bothered her at first, but now she had come to accept it. Her heart was simply empty. She had nothing left to write. Gone were her hopes and dreams, her visions of the future. She had seen the future already, and it wasn’t all it was cracked up to be.

Liz sighed as she closed her journal. Her parents were worried about her and she found that it was becoming too tiring to pretend things were still okay. Alex was dead. Tess was pregnant with Max’s child and their days were now spent looking for the serpent they had allowed into their circle. Sure, none of them had actually trusted her, but they hadn’t expected her not to murder and betray them. Maybe they had given her too much credit.

Don’t trust anyone had been their motto long before Max had trusted Liz with their secret. They should have stuck with that. At least then Alex might still be alive. They would still be the three amigos. She and Maria and Alex would still be able to get together every Thursday night and laugh. Max Evans would just be someone she had Biology with. And destiny would just be a work in a book. If only Max had lied to her when she had asked him what he was.

As the familiar what-ifs ran through her head, Liz let herself sink into the now familiar depths of depression. Classes were starting up tomorrow. Summer was over. It was her senior year, the supposed best time of her life.

After Tess had left with the Granolith, they had spent the entire summer searching for her, searching for any clue that would tell them what had happened or where to find them. Maria had actually turned out to be a computer genius, much to everyone’s surprise. She had decrypted the remainder of Alex’s files and had even hacked her way into some information that had been useful.

Through that information and the top-secret documents Brody had gotten his hands on, they had discovered the fate of the Granolith. It had not achieved orbit. They could only assume that it had malfunctioned along the way and it had crashed back to Earth. But the big question was where had it crashed? They knew of at least four countries looking for it, having picked it up on their radars, but none had been able to pinpoint its’ exact location.

The group consensus had been that there must have been some sort of cloak or force field around it that was hiding it from view. Maria had found a passage in the decodings that spoke of a cryogenic sleep occupants were put into. After months of discussions and research, they had finally been able to determine why the Granolith had crashed. It wasn’t a machine built to travel long distances.

After exhaustive searches and more decoding, they had unearthed it’s true purpose. The Granolith had been described as a powerful machine, a weapon with cataclysmic capabilities. Legend had it that it had been created by an elite group of entities, beings of pure energy that created it for peaceful purposes. But the ruling forces of the planet each thought they should own it, and a war was begun. Distraught over the possibility of it being used in war, they stole the Granolith away in the middle of the night. They locked it’s power tight, prophesizing that in the last remaining days of the dying moon, a child of Royal blood would be conceived that would possess the knowledge to awaken the Granolith’s true powers, that worlds would fall under their rule and the power of the universe would be in their hands.

Zan and Vilandra’s mother had belonged to a race of people that were guardians of the Granolith. They had hoped that Zan’s first born would have been the prophesized child, but they had been murdered before there had ever been a chance. So, the Queen had sent the Granolith with them, hoping it would be safe from Khivar. It had been modified for some flight in emergency situations over the years, but not for a journey such as the one Tess had undertaken.

Suddenly, there had been an even greater rush to find Tess. If Khivar were to get a hold of Max’s son and the Granolith, they wouldn’t have a home to return to. And through it all, Liz had helped. She had been there to research and hypothesize. She had lied and broken more laws and rushed alongside them to find Tess, to find the child she had created with Max. And Liz had died inside a bit more every time. She still hadn’t told him about her visit from future Max. The guilt over Alex’s death was hers alone to shoulder.

And then there was her relationship with Max, if you could even call it that anymore. They had talked once seriously. Max had explained that he knew she had secrets, things she wasn’t telling him and he respected that. He had treated her horribly and he would have to earn back her trust, her confidence. But every minute since then, he had been obsessed with finding the Granolith. But Liz could see the torn look in his eyes. He knew he was hurting her, but he was powerless to stop it. It wasn’t too long before Liz just stopped looking. They were both doing what had to be done. So, they were friends now. But could they ever be more? She would always be in his way, a distraction from his cause. And just because Tess didn’t turn out to be his destiny, it didn’t mean that she was it now.

A soft scuffling sound in the alleyway caught her attention but she couldn’t bring herself to do more than glance at the stair railing. Friend or foe, it didn’t matter anymore.

A head of light, curly hair appeared and she recognized it immediately. A minute later, Sean Deluca hopped onto her roof. He sent her a sly grin when he saw her sitting there.

"Hey, Parker. I guess I don’t have to worry about waking you up."

All Liz could manage was a half smile, but her heart wasn’t in it and he knew it. She said nothing, knowing he had come for a reason.

Sean stuck his hands in his pocket. What had he been thinking coming over here like this? Oh yeah, he’d been thinking of Liz Parker’s face. He moved to sit in the chair beside her and watched her in the moonlight. She was grace and beauty all rolled up into a neat package. And she wasn’t his, never would be.

"Uh, so look, I sort of had something I needed to tell you." He paused, hoping she would have some sort of response, sighing when there was none. "I’m leaving Roswell. And I want you to come with me."