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In the quiet moments after waking, he’s certain of the man that faces him in the mirror. He’s Michael, not Rath, and the humanity within him currently wins the silent tug-of-war for his motivations. It’s easier to distinguish the others, too, instead of having to remind himself that then is not now, even if secretly, ever so secretly, he’s not entirely sure that his predecessor was wrong about Max—not Zan’s—leadership abilities.
It’s impossible to keep secrets from yourself; however, Rath is far better at it than Michael ever could be—the blacked out memories are evidence enough, although the shadows remain.
He scowls and claws his eyebrow underneath the threadbare blankets, but his movements are enough to draw notice.
“Morning, sleepyhead,” Liz greets with a smirk, pulling back the cover as he growls. “Or should I say afternoon?”
She’s against him now, and dangerously close to catching wind of his stiff breeze. Close proximity made morning—or afternoon—wood awkward as fuck when it happened, and that wasn’t something he wanted to explain to Maxwell.
Liz, however, he’d like to give a hands-on tutorial on the subject—except for the whole marriage thing. Fuck.
“I don’t give a shit what you call it, Parker,” Michael returns and notices the momentary hurt in her eyes. Good, let her think he was a dick.
“What is your deal?” Liz hisses and his eyes widen at the venom in her tone. She’s never like this—and over that? “You’re the one who said you needed an ally last night. And now you’re back to being an asshole.”
“An all—“
“Someone to talk to, remember?”
No.
“Sorry, I didn’t—I’m not good at this,” he replies, trying to cover. There’s a way to figure out what Rath is up to, now, and Parker might soon have all the answers he’s seeking.
“I’ve noticed, Guerin. But it is nice to hear an apology for once, even if it’s not from—never mind,” she whispers and bumps his shoulder, the playful look back in her eyes. She grabs a brown bag from under the seat and hands it to him. “Breakfast. It’s probably cold, but the good part about being an alien is that you can heat it up.”
“Thanks,” he grunts and grabs the food, shoving it into his mouth and ignoring her eye-roll while focusing on the taste and not the quiet voice in the back of his mind that’s noted the hint of trouble in paradise.
Antar was ultimately the plan. It’d been born out of necessity, when everything was set in motion all those years ago on the run. But now that they’re here and this has happened, the crown has never felt more right on her head with him beside her.
He’d remade her in his image and she can’t recollect life before with any true clarity, but this is right and perfect.
And when her subjects come to take their oaths of fealty, the seal burns proudly underneath her skin, their skin, because ultimately they’re two parts of a whole, anyway.
They’re in Pennsylvania or Wyoming or wherethefuckever on their magic mystery tour of America. The scenery is strangely the same, despite the distance traveled. Shithole after shithole—a life forged from bedbugs, food banks, and goodwill.
He’d said six months ago, before Maria left for something closer to a normal life, that they should have left the country for Canada or Mexico. Isabel liked latinos, he liked hockey, but it didn’t really matter. They could make do far better anyplace where the FBI wasn’t hunting them down than on this road to nowhere.
Liz had even agreed, her first real act of rebellion after saying “I do” a month earlier, before the great escape plan came to him.
But Max wouldn’t listen—he never listens—and he had Isabel on his side. And, by extension, the midget, who Isabel was fucking in cheap motels with magic fingers sound-tracking the entire sordid affair through paper-thin walls.
That’s over now; Kyle’s returned to bunking with him on their increasingly infrequent stops to the local Motel 6 and Isabel’s much bitchier than she was during the affair.
Michael thinks he should bring up his idea again. Rath disagrees. The battle was pointless and there’s war brewing under the seams.
It’s not lost on him that he now has conversations with himself, even if most of the time, he has no idea what the fuck Rath is talking about.
Maybe he should mention it to Liz.
But she’s off with Max, something, he’s learned, she doesn’t enjoy nearly as much as Max lets them all think. The pedestal gets higher with each state they cross off their list and identity they adopt.
The changes are subtle and slight—she’s not sure at first if they’re even really happening or a figment of her imagination. Life in close quarters, with the stress of constant running paints them all in a different light, but over time it becomes clear, well, as clear as it can in the shades of grey they navigate, that this is a good thing.
She takes his hand, hot against her palm and holds it tight. Electricity surges through her, but he takes the lead.
The colors are grotesque in their beauty and the brunette wonders if she should feel something, anything, in this moment, but nothing comes as it burns through her until she’s a phoenix rising from the ash and into a new phase.
They’re free.
There’s a town in West Virginia, outside of Morgantown, where Max decides they should set up shop. They need money, badly and who the fuck would willingly go to West Virginia, anyway?
Kyle says people who love their sisters would.
Sometimes, he wonders if Kyle was dropped on his head as a kid. Or maybe took one too many hits in football.
Whatever—he’s one of them now, fully, whatever that means other than powers none of them truly understand (Rath, however, does, though he doesn’t share that with the other part of his brain—asshole); and Isabel has decided she’d like to keep it in the species, after-all.
He doesn’t really give a fuck, but it means Isabel isn’t being a cunt and he could sleep by himself again, so there was that.
Fuck, Rath's in his head again. He loves Isabel, he does—but Rath remembers Vilondra and the lines blur more often than not these days.
He really needs to talk to Liz about this—he’s tried, he thinks, but the topics shift and spin and the words die on his tongue. But what the fuck is he even going to say? It’s probably for the best she doesn’t know, she’s got her own problems in this backass town.
Liz works nights at a bar, Max’s idea, and Michael disapproves. He’d gotten a job there in the kitchens, but their shifts are never together--not since the manager caught him glaring at the patrons for getting a little too friendly with Lil’ Debbie; what a stupid alias that was.
However, her shift’s ending, he knows, because the clock reads 2:00 a.m., and soon she’ll be back in bed with Max, the actress who plays the dutiful wife in his fantasy life that’s her nightmare.
A knock at the door rips him from his thoughts and he scowls—the motel doesn’t have a peephole, but he does have more than enough means to defend himself, and Michael is at attention. He opens it cautiously, only to find Liz with a sloppy grin on her face and liquor on her breath.
“Heya, Michael,” she grins even wider as she embraces him, or, rather, falls into him. Fuck, she’s not wearing a bra.
“Parker.”
“Guerin,” she returns, hands now on her hips and a mock glare on her face. Her skirt lifts slightly as she juts her body outward and he notices just how short the uniform is—shit.
“You’re drunk.”
“You’re astute!”
“Why are you—“
“I dunno, I just—I dunno,” Liz returns with a shrug and collapses onto his bed in dramatic fashion. It’s been so long, Rath thinks, and Michael tries to shut it down, even if he secretly agrees.
“I want to escape,” she whispers, so quietly that he isn’t sure he hears her at first. “I can’t do this anymore—town to town. I lie next to him at night and he still calls out to Her when he’s sleeping. The bitch killed Alex—would have killed all of you—and he still wants her.”
“What.” It’s ineloquent and guttural, but the delivery is pointed and his rage is evident and all the thoughts he has shift from Liz, half naked in her uniform on his bed, to how, exactly he can destroy Max for this—after everything, he calls for Tess when he’s sleeping.
Without thinking, he turns toward the wall and punches it, full force, fist breaking drywall and blood coloring the stale blue paint that surrounds the newly formed hole.
That idiot.
“Michael,” Liz breathes, her hand on his shoulder, but he doesn’t hear her. Rath is in control now and he panics as he loses his hold on his body, solely a silent observer in whatever is to come.
“Michael,” she repeats, louder this time, and he turns, or, rather, Rath turns, to face her. “Your hand.”
“Is already healed.”
“But—“ Liz begins, only to stop when she notices that his hand, has, in fact, healed itself. So, Rath is really good at healing, well, that’s something to know about his powers—their powers.
“Z—Max is an asshole who has no idea just how fucking perfect you are. If you were mine—If you were mine, I’d get you out of here, keep you safe, and never forget just how lucky I’d be to have you.”
Michael cringes at the words, so unlike what he’d say in this instant, even if they’re said with his voice, but he notices the look she gives him—gives Rath.
“So make me yours,” she whispers, her words slurred slightly and unlike something Parker would ever say sober and he fights for control. He cannot—will not—take advantage. He wants her, sure, but not like this. Never like this.
Liz leans in, her dark hair brushing against his cheek and kisses him; she tastes like vanilla rum and forbidden fruit, and Rath forces Michael down further, so he can’t stop the inevitable. There’s a promise that he’ll thank him later, but Michael disagrees.
However a surge of power drowns him out of whatever this is and his consciousness fades away, leaving Rath, and only Rath as he drifts through the dark recesses of his mind.
The idea comes out of nowhere—a year on the run and thousands of conversations that have a different meaning when taken out of context. Or at least that’s what it feels like, but when it comes together it seems right, even if it’s impossibly wrong.
There have been a million moments when things have gone terribly wrong in manners that were born, out of what she thought, at the time, were his good intentions. But time and distance (so much distance) have taken the rose-tinge out of her memories and maybe this is what they need.
Except they can’t—she can’t.
At least not yet.
Rath scratches the surface more often than not, these days, and if he’s being honest with himself, Liz seems different now too. It’s not enough to be noticeable to anyone else, because the rest of them are too preoccupied with their own bullshit to see the changes, but she seems calmer and more focused.
Maybe that’s what happens when she’s away from Max, at least he hopes so, because he can’t imagine what he’d do if Rath had something to do with this and he's powerless to stop it.
Either way, there are plans afoot, he thinks, but Liz hasn’t let them slip even slightly since that night, even if they’re together often enough now—when Max is at work on the farm in the latest shithole they’ve found in Arkansas—that he’s still present sometimes when they fuck.
He hadn’t known what to do, really, the first time it’d happened. He knew he should warn her, tell her about Rath, and everything that had happened, but there was a block there, Michael's certain now, and one thing had led to another and there they were falling into one another; two bodies turned into one.
And it’s so fucking perfect, the way that she fits with him. And what would he even say? My antarian donor possessed me and took advantage of you? Yeah, because what Liz needed was more fucked up alien bullshit in her life.
Plus he did want her, he does want her—hell he might even love her, truth be told.
He just hopes that she’s safe with him, even with the demons he carries within himself.
She wants to tell Max—it’s long past time that she break free of her gilded cage, but Michael has cold feet. The timing isn’t right, or so he says. They’ve left another town under an invisible threat that Max has dreamed up.
Liz wonders, sometimes, if Max does it just to keep them all under his control. But that’s silly, or is it? She’s not really sure what to think, anymore. In fact, she feels like she thinks two different ways most of the time, but it’s probably just all the travel and lack of stability getting to her, really.
Rath lets him listen now. So secure in his control that he can observe the grand plan for what, Michael now knows, is a dangerous combination of control and revenge. It’s for the good of Antar, whatever that even fucking means at this point, and Rath will be king.
Liz is, of course, his most leal subject, even if she’s unaware of what cause she’s truly supporting. She has changed, he’s acutely aware of that, now, and if he hadn’t been, the darker look in her eyes and the sharper lines of her smile paint a picture of an evolution.
“He’s growing more careless,” Liz sighs against him, her hand raking its way through her hair as Rath wraps an arm around her body, drawing her in further. “We need to do something—he wanted to kidnap his son from its adoptive parents the other day.”
“Soon,” Rath replies, with a tone that suggests no room for argument. Not that it’ll stop this version of Liz, well, any version of Liz, really.
“Now,” she purrs, her hand reaching lower into his pants and cupping his manhood with her palm. Liz knows exactly how to get what she wants and her negotiating skills have only gotten better with age.
“Elizabeth,” he whispers—she’s always Elizabeth, now, when they’re alone. It’s more formal, smarter and colder than Liz, and it suits her new persona well.
“Michael,” she returns with a grin that Rath matches with a scowl. He doesn’t like being called Michael—that’s not who he is, not who they are, anymore. Michael is just the small part of Rath’s humanity that hasn’t faded yet, the ghost in the shell that Rath occupies while they’re here, on Earth.
“You know I hate it when you call me that,” he drawls and she drags the nails of her free hand down his chest in response.
“Yes, but you’re not listening to me—“
“Your hand is on my dick; I believe you have my full attention, my dear.”
“Do you want me to stop?” She asks, innocently, ever so innocently.
“No.”
“Well, then, perhaps you’ll reconsider. We need to eliminate the threat—tonight,” Liz states, firmly this time, all hints of playfulness gone from her voice.
“Tonight?”
“I had a vision. It’s now or never, Rath.”
“Fine, tonight.”
“Tonight,” she grins, her eyes dancing this time as she presses her lips against his. “Now where was I?”
Liz fantasizes about a life without Max, free to grow up outside the lines that have been drawn around them as a result of his quest for his son, which he abandoned anyway, in the end. She tries to understand, she does, but she can’t muster the strength these days as the towns and cities blur together and the distance between them grows.
It’d all been so simple, once, when they were so much younger and their biggest problem was Sherriff Valenti and not murdering former queens and alien dictators. They’d been young and in love—she was the damsel in distress and he was the white knight who saved her with his touch. And now their happily ever after feels like anything but.
But now they're older, so much older than three years would suggest, and she isn’t sure if she can ever truly forgive him for what had happened, or herself for marrying him and binding herself forever to this mess.
The plans come together quickly and the two of them manage to gather the three others without any real effort expended. It helps, he thinks, that Rath knows more about their abilities than any of them could ever hope to learn and so when Vilo—Isabel, Zan—no, Max, and Kyle are bound to trees by invisible force, Michael isn’t shocked in the slightest.
“Michael, what the fuck, man!” Kyle screams indignantly and Michael watches as Liz frowns ever so slightly before her mask of indifference appears once more. She doesn’t agree with this, with Kyle, but it won’t matter, soon enough, Liz will be like him—a ghost inside a body that is no longer her own.
“Rath, Kyle, my name is Rath.”
The gasps are audible and Michael thinks that his predecessor is having way too much fun with this. Great.
“And you’re here, Kyle, because you know too much. An unfortunate casualty of war.”
“Casualty? Liz, what the—“
“I’m sorry, Kyle,” Liz whispers, her face cold and unmoving even as he continues to thrash against restraints he can’t see.
“As for you, Vilondra, you know your crimes—and you are here to pay for them.”
“I’m not Vilondra, my name is Isabel and you’re---you’re my brother, Michael. You need to stop this,” Isabel cries, before knitting her brow together in an attempt to start a dreamwalk.
“I can assure you, Isabel, that you are Vilondra—deep down. And as for Michael, well, he’s long gone and I am what’s left. And your powers are no good, here.”
“Go to hell, Rath, Michael, whatever you are. Liz, come on, it’s me, Max, you have to—“
“I have to, what, Max? I don’t have to do anything. This is all your fault, you know. The FBI, the running—all of it. We would all be better off if you’d just stayed dead,” Liz snaps, all sympathy gone from her features and Michael is impressed by the cutting delivery of her reply.
“I saved you! I saved your life.”
“And I saved yours. I told you we’re even, Max.”
“Liz, please,” Max whispers as the tears begin to fall, although none of them know what, exactly, is to come.
“Enough,” Rath commands, wrapping an arm possessively around Liz's waist. For whatever reason, all three of the captives stop screaming, although the tears are falling freely from Isabel’s eyes and the other two are shaking against the restraints.
He approaches Max, who looks into Rath’s eyes with genuine fear and Michael can sense the amusement radiating through Rath’s being. He has him where he wants him and this, this is the beginning of the end of it all.
“Zan, I believe you have something of mine,” he hisses, placing his palm against Max’s chest and firing energy into it. The power is overwhelming and it burns hotter than anything ever has before, but finally Rath removes his palm and undoes his—their—shirt, revealing the seal shining brightly against his skin.
“You can’t—that’s, I am King,” Max sputters, bewildered and drained from the experience, hatred reflected in his eyes and yet there’s a knowledge that this time, he is truly outmatched.
“And now you’re not,” Liz spits her reply, far more cruel than anything Rath could possibly say, and the words have their desired effect as Max hangs his head for a moment as he tries to process everything that has just occurred.
“What are you doing Michael? You’re king. Great, long live the king. See? I pledged you my fealty, el presidente Guerin! Now, let us go,” Kyle rambles as he realizes that they haven’t all been released.
“It’s not that simple, Kyle,” Rath condescends and turns toward the three of them. “The FBI is still in need of an alien and they won’t leave us alone until they have one. So, I am giving them three.”
“Three?”
“Yes, three. You, Max, and Kyle, Vilondra.”
“What the—I’m not an alien!”
“Your DNA is, Kyle,” Liz sighs, detached and bored with the question. The old Liz would have fought for Kyle; Elizabeth, however, accepts that this is part of Rath’s plan. It’s all part of Rath’s plan. “And we simply can’t have you running around after we do what needs to be done. You’re too loyal to them—to Vilondra, to be trusted.”
“If you think we won’t rat you out—“
“Oh, I know you would, Zan. You never were a man with any honor,” Rath returns with a shrug.
“I’m not the one turning over my family to the FBI,” Max snaps, red-faced and angry.
“No, you would have just left the planet without telling them goodbye,” Liz returns with a glare.
“If you know we’ll tell them all about you, then why—“
“Because you won’t remember,” Rath answers and draws energy from within himself, the seal warm against his--their chest. “After this, you won’t remember your fucking names, and the FBI will have three unknown, unidentified hybrids to play with.”
“What about DNA, asshole?” Isabel snaps, still in disbelief over the whole thing.
“That can be manipulated,” Liz shrugs, her body glowing with energy all her own. So, she was going to be an active participant in this, after all. “All molecules can.”
“I’ve heard enough,” Rath states and glares at the three of them—all former friends, but Rath’s enemies so they’re now his as well. “Goodbye, Zan.”
Power rushes through him, strong and electric, firing synapse after synapse as all of his senses overload while directing it outward, toward the three of them. The light grows brighter and brighter as the energy continues to flow through him.
He reaches for her palm, hot in his own and the light that surrounds them grows, shifting color and shape as it embraces them all, burning deeper until it engulfs him and Michael closes his eyes as it swallows him whole until he is nothing but a distant memory and Rath is all that’s left within him.