Rath wasn't certain how long the battle lasted; time seemed simultaneously to speed up and slow down during the fighting. He realized it hadn't gone quickly when he noticed the bright daylight streaming in through the broken windows. He looked straight up and saw the bright cerulean blue that lay beyond the shattered skylights.

He surveyed the now well-illuminated room, which was strewn with upended shelves, wrecked masonry, and lifeless bodies. He saw Ava, standing in goggle-eyed silence. Only then did he realize that his powers felt spent and that he was holding a blood-spattered metal bar. An equally gruesome body lay at his feet.

In an oddly debris-free spot near the center of the warehouse, Lonnie sat on the floor, looking as dazed and exhausted as he felt. Rath suddenly realized that he was looking at what could only be described as ground zero of the battle they had just fought. She's not used to going up against a whole homeless infantry battalion, he thought, running toward Lonnie. None of us is.

"Looks like they're all dead or fled," Rath said gently as he helped her to her feet. He realized that Ava was now beside him as well, concern etched across her pretty but careworn face. "Come on," he said to them both. "We've gotta get out of here, before even more of 'em show up. We're all way too wiped to deal if that happens. “

Lonnie nodded, then stumbled. Rath and Ava both caught her. Finally regaining her footing, Lonnie turned and looked straight at Rath. As always, her eyes were deep and beautiful.

And very frightened, he realized. "It's too late," she said. "I can feel more of them coming in the back way. They're almost on top of us already. “

Rath, hearing angry shouting behind him, turned toward the sound. At least another dozen street people, several of them drawing guns, were heading toward them at a flat-out run.

"Bitchin'," Rath said, already pushing Lonnie toward cover as Ava followed. "Let's go. “

He glanced toward Ava, who had placed a hand against her temple and closed her eyes. "Tell them to take a number. We've got more company." "Who?" Rath asked.

At that moment, a large windowpane over their heads shattered as two metal canisters arced into the warehouse on trails of thick, black smoke that swiftly began filling the room.

" New York 's finest," said Ava.

Great. Just great, Rath thought as his chest tightened; and a painful coughing fit seized him.

In simpler times, Kyle Valenti had the high school hero mantle practically bestowed upon him. He had excelled in football and other sports, and had a smart and pretty girlfriend in Liz Parker. If he ever got into typical teenage trouble, the worst he could expect from his father, the town sheriff, was to be grounded.

And then Max Evans had made a connection with Liz one day at the Crashdown, and Kyle's world began to crumble around him. Soon, not only was Liz infatuated with Max, but so, in a manner of speaking, was Kyle's father. Sheriff Valenti suspected something of Max and his friends, but he didn't really articulate his suspicions to his son. In fact, his bond with his son grew more and more strained with each passing day.

Kyle grew to resent Max Evans, so it was quite a surprise that Max ended up saving Kyle's life. Agent Pierce, a thug for some secret government agency, had exchanged gunfire with Sheriff Valenti at the UFO Museum. During the brief gun battle, Kyle was accidentally hit by a bullet fired by his own father.

Even now, Kyle would sometimes wake up at night feeling the bullet tear into his flesh, penetrating skin and bone and muscle. His mouth filled with a pungent metallic taste, Kyle remembered the darkness in the museum creeping inexorably toward him. But Max's approach banished the encroaching darkness. He had laid his glowing, silver-palmed hand on Kyle's wound, healing him instantly.

Since that time, Kyle had joined Liz and Maria among the ranks of the "I Know an Alien" club, and subsequently had been caught up in many of the misadventures and tribulations the half-extraterrestrial teens faced. Interestingly enough, the shared knowledge of the aliens among them had brought Kyle and his father closer together. Kyle sometimes thought it was actually his momentary brush with mortality that had done the trick, but he knew better; his dad had been obsessed with aliens and UFOs for as long as Kyle could remember. It was an obsession he had inherited from his father. Now, they were among the few people alive who knew the real truth of the matter.

After his resurrection at the hands of Max, Kyle had found Buddhism, and had learned… mostly… to find a more centered space in the universe. He had found that the Buddha's "Four Noble Truths" were tremendously apt for him, as well as for his alien friends: life means suffering; suffering has a cause; the cause of our suffering can be ended; and suffering can be ended by following a path to wisdom, peace, meditation, and growth.

But it was hard for Kyle to stay centered when the cause of the suffering in the last few months had been fear of capture by the government. Indeed, at times it had seemed as though the best path to end the cause of his suffering was to fight back. But the Noble Eightfold Path pushed him toward peace, and taught him not to bring harm to others. On the other hand, the tenets of the Path also talked about not lying or stealing, and he and the others had done their share of both lately, in the interests of survival.

Since leaving Roswell, he had again been healed by Max, and Kyle now wondered if these healings weren't bringing about some form of transformation within him. During his late-night meditations, when the others were usually asleep, another thought kept creeping unbidden into the Zen garden he strove to make of his mind. Haw I been made into something other than what I was before all oj this started? Am I now part alien, like Liz? And ij that's what's happened, then what will my purpose be? Today, Kyle had little time for such internal debates. He stood in the Cybernet Cafe in an open-air mall in Cheyenne, Wyoming, teetering on the brink of mote potential suffering and confrontation. Coming toward him and his friends from the front of the cafe were government agents and police. More cops and government spooks were also likely closing in from other directions… including, no doubt, the section of the mall toward which Max and Michael had just headed moments ago.

Kyle whirled and looked toward the back of the room. He saw a pay phone and a rest room sign, but no door. There's got to be an exit back there, he reassured himself.

He turned to Maria, who stood saucer-eyed as the cops and feds continued their approach. Liz was looking toward the back of the shop. "Find the back door," Kyle said, surprised at how firm his voice sounded. "I'm guessing from the layout of this place that it leads to a service corridor. “

"Already on it," Liz said. "Let's go." Kyle shook his head. "You three go. I'm heading out the front to try to warn Max and Michael. “

Liz opened her mouth to argue, but Maria yanked her by the arm and pulled her to the back of the cafe.

As Kyle opened the glass door to exit out the front, he saw Isabel touching the adjacent windows and doors. Immediately they changed color, an inky black spreading like a viscous liquid across the clear panes. Camouflage, Kyle thought. Smart thinking. Sure, it would likely draw attention, but so would the onrushing peace officers.

He knew Isabel probably would have fused the door locks before exiting through the same back way that Liz and Maria were taking. He also knew he didn't have long to think about it; their pursuers were already less than twenty yards away, and closing fast.

Spotting his opportunity, Kyle moved across the balcony aisle and grappled with a giant garbage can there. It was one of the round, concrete types, with a metal container nestled inside it. There was no way he could pick it up. But he could tip it over and roll it. As he strained to topple the trash bin, he saw that the police had closed their distance by half. He concentrated so thoroughly on his task that they seemed to be moving in slow motion. He could hear them yelling to him, but he blocked them out as he might have done with any small distraction during his meditations; they might as well have been speaking a foreign language.