Chapter Text
Lately it's the mornings when I miss her most of all
I miss her laughter, so long after that laughter's gone
There's no comfort in these tears that I cry
Wish I could find just one person to tell me why
I just want to wake up underneath that open sky
Just want to feel something real before I die
I don't know where I'm going
I've got miles and miles yet to run
Won't you follow me on the highway to the sun?
~Ray LaMontagne
Max sat in the exam room chair, fidgeting, while Kyle silently studied his new test results. He kept tugging on a loose string at the bottom of his flannel shirt. His hand tapped anxiously on his knee as he waited.
He trusted Kyle. He knew Kyle was just trying to do the right thing. But it still felt wrong to be at the hospital. Letting any doctor examine him, even if it was Kyle, made him feel like he needed to jump in his Jeep, peel out onto 285, and just make a run for it. Allowing anyone to run tests on him daylighted his deepest fears; making him feel exposed and defenseless. Even if it was for his own good.
Being examined like this...it even felt wrong when it was her…
No.
He pushed away the image of Liz's gentle hands pressing sensors to his skin, while his heart pounded, intoxicated by how close she was to him.
He couldn’t think like that anymore. She was gone. And it was better this way.
“All right…” Kyle murmured, sliding the imagery of his heart across the table to him. “So this one is the clearest of your latest scans. You see that?”
Kyle didn’t even need to point out the dark blotches. Max could see them clearly. “They’ve grown.”
“They have. Significantly. It looks like maybe 5 percent since last time. See the difference?”
Kyle pulled the previous scans out of the file folder in his hands. The difference was notable.
“So how long do I have, doc?” Max asked with a self deprecating laugh.
“At this rate of degradation...maybe a year before the organ has fully rotted? But, Max...I don’t know how this works for someone like you. There’s no pain or anything?”
“No. There was initially. Any time I overexerted myself or used my powers. But ever since…” Max hesitated, taking a deep breath. “Ever since CrashCon, when I...uh…" Max swallowed. Saying it out loud, admitting it...he was ashamed of his behavior that night. The weakness inside of him that, when faced with certain death, allowed him to give in to his darkest instincts. "Since I almost killed Flint there’s been no pain. Whatever I did to him, it’s like it blocked those receptors.”
“That doesn’t change what’s happening inside of you though, Max. Your heart is rotting. The problem is, we don’t know how much degeneration it can tolerate and still sustain your life. Does it stop functioning at 50% degradation? 75%? You’re already at 15%, Max. That heart is a ticking bomb. And unless you stumble across a perfectly preserved alien body that can provide you a new heart, you are going to die.”
Max smiled sadly at Kyle. “Well, it’s not like it’s the first time. Maybe this time it’ll take.”
“I don’t know how you can joke about this.”
“What else am I supposed to do?”
“I don’t know, man. Write a bucket list? Say your goodbyes. Search the globe for signs of alien life? Drive to California.” The last one had a pointed sharpness to it that made Max flinch.
“Can’t do that.”
“She’d want to know, Max.”
“Thanks for your help, Kyle. See you next time. Or at the Pony. Or whatever. Don’t forget…”
“Yeah, yeah, I know. I’ve got your file under lock and key.”
“Thanks.”
As always, Max left the hospital through a side door, trying to avoid small town eyes that asked questions he couldn’t answer.
While driving home, he kept mulling over Kyle’s question. A year. Likely less. What did he want to do with it?
His family and friends would want him to fight like hell to find a solution. But they had been through this before, back when he died the first time. They fought for him, committed felonies for him, put their lives on hold for months on end. And what was it all for? Here he was, just a few months later, and he’s still going to die. All their sacrifices were for nothing. So maybe it was time for him to make the decision for them. Maybe it was his turn to sacrifice, rather than give hope to the people he loved that this time he could be fixed.
Maybe he was just doomed to be forever broken.
He thought about the highway...driving into the sunset, Liz smiling beside him in the California sunshine. The ocean waves crashing beside them as they drove, windows down. He wondered what it would smell like, the fresh ocean air...
Kyle was right. If he only had a year to live, he’d want to spend that year with her. But he couldn’t. She had been abundantly clear with him on one thing since he returned from the dead for the first time. She couldn’t lose him again. She couldn’t watch him die again.
No, he had made the right choice when he drove her away from him. She would be happier not having to go through this again. In California, she could be extraordinary, make life-altering discoveries. She was going to change the world, just like she'd always wanted. He refused to let her feelings for him hold her back anymore. She had already saved his life once. It was time for her to save human lives.
It was time for Liz to forget about him.
He would never smell the ocean air.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
He kept it a secret.
Secrets were easy for him after all. He had been keeping them his entire life. Being an alien, his special abilities, his feelings for Liz...all his life, he lied and stayed silent, pretended to be ordinary. Dying was just the latest in a long line of truths about himself that no one needed to know. It was easy.
Months passed in monotony, as Max pretended everything was normal and went about his repetitive routine. He worked his night shifts at the Wild Pony, met Michael and Isobel for lunch at the Crashdown, and had beers with Cam and Charlie. He continued his alien research, hoping to leave Michael and Isobel with as many answers as he could find documented in his journals. He wondered where Jones disappeared to after they released him from his decades of imprisonment.
He dreamed about Liz.
He wrote her letters that he never planned to send in a journal that he kept by his bedside. Honest, raw letters confessing why he burned her lab, why he broke her heart on purpose. He confessed that he loved her too much to let her love him back. He wrote to her about his health and his fears of dying, all of the things he kept hidden from everyone else. Maybe she would read them after he'd gone. Maybe she would be able to forgive him someday.
Kyle was the only one who knew his secret. Max had regular scans and follow up appointments with the doctor. He was always cautious, sneaking in through a side door and going straight to Kyle's office. Sneaking out the same way. Parking a few blocks away. So far, he'd managed to avoid questions, but he wasn't taking any chances.
His heart seemed to be degrading at a somewhat consistent rate. 25% degradation became 30%, and eventually 40%. On the surface though, all appeared normal. Except that as time passed, Max began to tire easier than normal. He would sleep heavy and deep...but when he woke in the morning, there was always a brief moment when the dreams still held his consciousness, right before reality swept back in, when he felt perfectly at peace. Because in his dreams he was with Liz, who was smiling in the sunshine, and he was happy.
Kyle thought that he was in denial, but that was far from the truth. Max had already died once. He'd already experienced the consequences of it. Just because he wasn't telling people, just because he wasn't fighting to find some miracle cure...it didn't mean he hadn't accepted the truth. He just wanted to live out the rest of his days in whatever relative peace he could find, given the circumstances.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
It was one morning, months into it all, that Max felt groggy and uncomfortable as he awoke. His body felt heavy in his bed and achy, like he had been hit by a train. As he groaned softly he suddenly realized that there was a soft, steady beeping in the room with him. A flex of his hand told him that there was a needle slipped into his vein.
"Hey...take it easy, Max. You've been down for a while now."
"Michael?" Max asked groggily as he peeked his eye open. "Hey brother, what's going on?"
"I could ask you the same question. How long did you think you could hide this from us, Max?"
"Hide what?" Max replied lamely.
"Kyle came clean. We know you're dying...again. You passed out in front of your house. If it was winter...if Isobel hadn’t felt that something was wrong, you could be dead right now.”
“Maybe that’s for the best.” Michael glared at Max like he wanted to punch him in the face, but he managed to restrain himself.
“Don’t give me that crap. Did you even think about what this would do to Isobel?”
“Isobel’s strong. She’ll survive.”
“That’s bullshit, Max, and you know it.” Max cringed at the anger in his sister’s voice as she joined the conversation. He hadn’t even realized that she was there. “What happened to ‘it has to be three’? What happened to ‘all we have is each other’? You didn’t let me quit when I wanted to die from Liz’s serum. What makes you think we’re going to let you give up now?”
“You two plus Jones makes three too,” Max pointed out. “He’s healthy. He’s...well, he’s me! You don't need me anymore. I’m the spare part, the broken down thing that needs to be replaced with a better model.”
“He’s not you,” Michael argued.
“And he’ll never be able to replace you,” Isobel insisted.
“Anyway, your argument doesn’t work, Max. Where is the guy? He disappeared after we freed him and it’s been radio silence ever since. I’m guessing he isn’t particularly interested in the three of us.”
“Maybe not,” Max agreed softly. “But maybe I was never supposed to make it this long in the first place."
"If you weren't supposed to be here, we wouldn't have been able to bring you back, Max. You know, that's what pisses me off the most. How many months have you known about this? That's all lost time that Liz and I could have been working on--"
"No!" Max interrupted firmly. He could hear the panic in his own voice. The lights flickered and the steady beating of the machines reading his heart rate grew more erratic. He took a deep breath, trying to steady himself. "No,” he repeated. "Leave Liz out of this. She's gone. She's...she's got a new life now. I'm not dragging her back into this."
"She'd want to know. Do you know what we went through to save you the first time? She'd move heaven and earth to bring you back."
"Yeah, and it was hell. It nearly destroyed her. I'm not...I won't put her through that again. Please, man, just let it go. Let me go."
His eyes kept fluttering open and shut as he argued with Michael. Isobel seemed to notice that he was having trouble staying awake and cut Michael off before he could continue the argument, pushing Michael towards Max's bedroom door.
“Rest, Max. Kyle will be by this evening to check on you. Come on, Michael. We'll continue this conversation later.”
Max cringed at Isobel's sharp promise, but his concern about it didn't last long. He was already drifting off to sleep before the door even closed behind them.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
"Kyle texted. Your scans are in."
Max closed his copy of Great Expectations and sighed, rubbing his eyes. "So he notifies you now instead of me?"
"Perk of being off the books at the hospital," Isobel told him with a smirk. "Plus, unlike you, he knew I'd be checking my phone. Do you even know where your phone is?"
"Eh, desk drawer," Max replied dismissively. "I think."
Now that he was too weak to work at the Pony, he didn't really have much use for the thing. The people who wanted to get ahold of him knew where to find him.
"Is it charged?"
"Does it matter?" Max asked, his irritation rising. "I only talk to you and Michael anyway. And you're both always here these days."
"What if--"
"Don't say it," Max cut her off.
"Whatever. I still think you should call her."
"Please. Don't."
Isobel paused, silent for a moment. Max waited, hoping desperately that she wouldn't push the issue. For once, she actually let it go though.
He had been doing significantly better since the day he collapsed, although he was still weak. The incident was a wake up call for Max. Not just accepting that Michael and Isobel needed to know the truth about his health. He also was forced to accept that he shouldn't be pushing himself like he used to. His body simply couldn't handle the strain anymore.
After Kyle pumped him full of acetone, and Michael used his powers to adjust the settings of Max's pacemaker to attempt to manage the current degradation, Max broke down and apologized to his siblings and admitted that he needed their help for even the simple things in life now. Isobel and Michael had both stepped up and helped him in a show of support that Max didn't even feel like he deserved.
It didn't change the fact that he was dying...but at least he felt a little less alone while he slowly shuffled off his mortal coil.
"Kyle wants to know if you want to come in, or do a video call to discuss the results."
"Video is fine." Max sighed. "Just tell him to call me when he has time."
"You'll need to charge your phone," Isobel reminded him pointedly.
"I think I can manage."
She didn't push further, which relieved Max. After she disappeared to get back to whatever she was doing, Max pushed to his feet and made his way across the room to dig out his phone and stick it on the charger. He tried not to focus on how breathless he was by the time he sat back down.
His body was failing him.
It was a few hours later that his phone buzzed and Max accepted the video call request from Kyle.
"So what's the latest, Doc?" Max greeted him.
"Well, it's news. Not sure any of it could be called good. Or all that bad, really. It's what we expected. Here's your scan."
Kyle pointed his phone at the latest imagery and gave Max a moment to study it. The degraded cells shadowed more than half of his dying heart.
"Looks like it's right on schedule," Max commented with a bitter laugh.
"Which means that Michael's adjustments to your pacemaker didn't slow the progression in the slightest," Kyle confirmed. "And the acetone didn't help either."
"It doesn't heal us," Max reminded him. "It's just a painkiller."
"How are you feeling?"
"Well I stopped doing anything remotely exerting, so I'm not planning to pass out again."
"Good," Kyle interrupted. "You need to listen to your body, Max."
"I hear you, Doc. It's pretty impossible to ignore at this point. I lose my breath walking across the room."
"You need to start preparing yourself for the end, Max. You're minimum halfway through this now. At most you have another 6 months. More likely, your heart will fail sooner."
"I get it," Max told him. "Thanks for all your help, Kyle. Until next time."
Max hung up the phone before Kyle could say another word.
None of it was a surprise, of course. But it was starting to feel more and more real. He was going to die. Likely soon.
Time was running out. And he was running out of strength to do anything with his time.
Did he want to spend his last days lying on his couch rereading all of his favorite books? Or did he want something more?
Liz's face popped into his mind's eye, and his heart skipped a beat. He longed for her, more than he'd ever wanted to admit. Even to himself.
But she deserved better than suffering through the heartbreak of watching him die. Again.
There's a reason he blew up her lab. This is why he broke both their hearts.
He drove her away to save her from this suffering.
She could never know about what was happening to him.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Michael and Isobel were both in his house when Max woke up the next morning. He could hear the soft murmur of their voices before he was even out of bed. Kicking his feet around to rest on the floor, he dropped his head in his hand and sighed, as he rubbed the sleep from his eyes.
Pushing to his feet, he wobbled momentarily, before finding his balance. Even standing seemed hard these days. Max hated how weak he always seemed to feel.
He padded across the room to his dresser and grabbed a t-shirt, which he awkwardly pulled over his head. By the time he was at his bedroom door, he felt light headed and out of breath. He leaned against the closed door for a long moment, trying to regain control of his breathing. When he felt capable, he finally made his way down the hallway and dropped onto the couch beside Isobel.
"We stopped at Bean Me Up," Isobel greeted him. "Coffee and bagels?"
"Thanks," Max replied shortly. He couldn't say much more without showing them just how much getting out of bed drained him. Thankfully, they went back to whatever they were arguing about before Max joined them, so he was able to get himself centered, and eat his breakfast without saying much.
When he was done eating he finally addressed the issue.
"Okay, fess up. What are you doing here?"
Isobel and Michael exchanged a glance.
"We were hoping you'd update us on what Kyle had to say yesterday," Isobel explained.
"No more secrets," Michael reminded him. "You promised."
Max sighed and dragged a hand through his hair. He really didn't want to talk about it, but Michael was right. He did promise.
"I'm at or past the halfway mark now," Max told them. "At most I've got 6 months left...and that's assuming that I don't die until 100% of my heart's cells are dead. More likely I've got less, because at some point it probably won't be strong enough to sustain me anymore."
"And the adjustments to the pacemaker?" Michael asked.
"Didn't help," Max told him. "There's no last minute miracle that's gonna save me this time. My days are numbered."
"So what do you want to do with them?" Isobel asked him.
"There's nothing to do with them," Max protested. "I'm too weak to do much of anything at this point. I'm just going to wither away."
"Come on, Max. There must be something. One selfish little thing that you want to do before you die."
This time Max didn't respond right away. Because Isobel's comment triggered something inside of him. One selfish thing… There was no question over what he selfishly wanted. He had been avoiding admitting it to himself, mainly because he was trying desperately not to be tempted, but God, did he want to see her face one last time. He couldn't...he shouldn't…but he let himself dream, for just one brief moment, that maybe he could see Liz one last time.
And that was enough. Because his siblings saw it in his eyes.
"What? What is it, Max? Tell us," Isobel pushed.
"Liz…"
Both Michael and Isobel froze. Max had refused to talk about her for months now, and they respected it and left it alone, for the most part. But now, after all of this time, he couldn't help himself.
"I just want to see Liz one last time."
"I can call her," Isobel offered. "I'm sure she'll come if we tell her."
"No," Max told her firmly. "She can't know the truth about what I'm going through. No. If I'm going to see her I have to go to L.A."
"I'll drive," Michael volunteered.