"I don't see why you only created one light," Aura grumbled from somewhere behind him. "It's not very practical."

Carlos rolled his eyes. "You only created one sword," he pointed out.

There was a moment of silence. "That was different," she said finally, scuffing her foot against the stone floor of the tunnel as they walked.

He had to keep himself from saying something truly sarcastic then. It wouldn't help matters to have the two of them fighting each other when the grid already seemed to harbor enough real danger to keep them thoroughly occupied. So instead he asked, "Any ideas what made Delphinius disappear?"

He didn't expect an answer; how would she know, after all? But he had to say something to keep from getting either bored or irritated, neither of which would be very useful in this situation. Not that he could think of anything that *would* be useful, but at least he had the process of elimination.

"I don't know," Aura said. She still sounded a little sullen, he thought, but then she added, "It's possible that his link with Cetaci was reestablished. The grid is sensitive to things like that."

He blinked. "If you thought that, why didn't you say anything before?"

"If you thought I had already volunteered what I knew, why did you ask?" she retorted.

"I was making conversation!" He felt the flashlight grip digging into his palm, and he tried to relax a little. No sense getting indignant with aliens, as Ashley would say. "They're aliens," she would remind him, quoting her favorite britcom. "They do things in alien ways!"

"If his link with Cetaci was reestablished, the grid might have reacted somehow." Aura sounded impatient. "Now you know."

"Reacted somehow" didn't sound very scientific to him, but he wasn't sure he wanted to push his luck by saying so. "I thought the link blew up in his face," he said instead, remembering only as he spoke that she probably wouldn't have heard that idiom before.

To his surprise, though, it didn't give her pause. "It might have," she said. "Or it might be even stronger for the Power's absence; I don't know. Cestria might even be augmenting it somehow."

He focused on the only part of her reply that had made sense. "You know that expression?"

"What expression?"

"To have something blow up in your face."

"Of course I know it." She sounded surprised. "I didn't expect *you* to know it."

"What?" He tried not to laugh, wondering if she was kidding him. "It's Earth slang. No offense, but I figure I'm more likely to know that kind of thing that you are."

She didn't answer right away, but when she did, it wasn't at all what he expected. "You're speaking..." She trailed off, then tried again. "What language are you speaking, Carlos?"

He frowned, resisting the urge to look over his shoulder. "English. The same language you're speaking. Why?"

There was another pause. "I'm not speaking English," she said at last.

He stopped, swinging the flashlight around. "What do you mean? Of course you are."

"No, I'm not." She reached out and batted his flashlight away irritably. "Don't do that. Point it at the ceiling or something."

"Then what do *you* hear?" he demanded, tilting the flashlight up to shine on the "ceiling". It cast a dim but adequate glow over the both of them, and her expression of irritation faded a little.

"Aquitian," she said with a shrug. "I have heard no one speak anything else since we arrived."

Startled, he shook his head. "My Aquitian definitely isn't that good. Actually..."

He trailed off, then tried to say it in her language. All that came out was, "My Aquitian isn't very good." He blinked. "Even when *I* think I'm speaking Aquitian, I hear English. That's really... creepy."

She frowned, saying, "My English is better than your--" At that, she broke off. "You're right. I can't speak English any more than you can speak Aquitian. That *is* creepy."

He tried not to grin, but he couldn't help it. "That's almost as good as hearing you say 'damn'."

She cocked her head, the most Aquitian mannerism he had seen from her yet. "I assure you, hearing you swear in my native language is no less entertaining."

He had to laugh. "I guess it would be. Weird," he added noncommittally, sweeping the flashlight overhead to illuminate the tunnel in front of them again.

He heard Aura sigh as he started forward. "I still don't like not having a light," she muttered, following him.

He shook his head, deliberately shortening his stride and catching her elbow when her next step brought her even with him. "There's no reason for you to walk behind me," he said firmly, tugging on her arm to keep her beside him. "Anything that sneaks up on us in here will give the same amount of warning whether we're side by side or single file."

She grimaced at him, but she stopped resisting and made no effort to fall back when he let go of her. "None, you mean."

"If it's none, it's none. And you definitely won't hear 'none' any faster back there than you will right here." He frowned at her. "Unless you're hoping that whatever it is will be attracted to my flashlight so it will eat me first."

A reluctant smile tugged at her lips, and he gave her a knowing look. "Yeah, I thought that might be it. Get rid of the human and you can have the flashlight; I see how your mind works."

Her smile widened a little, and she pointed out, "Given that this creature is supposedly going to eat you because you're carrying the light, that would probably not be in my best interest."

"Besides, it would probably swallow the light along with me anyway," he agreed. "I guess you'd better be careful what you wish for."

"I think I'll stick to wishing for my own light," she said wryly. "Thanks for the thought, though."

"You're thanking me for suggesting that I get eaten by a giant slug," he pointed out, pretending to be thoughtful. "I don't think that bodes well for the future of our relationship."

"If it makes you feel better, you probably wouldn't be enough," she offered. "It's probably a really big slug. I bet it would have to eat me too."

He chuckled. "Yeah, that's really comforting. Thanks."

"No problem," she replied nonchalantly. He looked over at her, still smiling. Her former annoyance had melted completely away, and she sounded downright cheerful.

She glanced sideways at him, catching his eye with an inquisitive look. "Did I say something odd?"

"No," he assured her, studying her more openly now. Her long hair bounced a little as she kept pace with his longer stride, strands of it catching the flashlight glow and shining dimly in the darkness. It fell around her shoulders, almost reaching her elbows, making her look somehow exotic even in a tank top and cutoffs. He tried to suppress a grin at the sight. "I probably shouldn't say this," he warned.

She cocked her head. "Really," she said speculatively. "Now you can't not."

He shook his head, knowing he had committed himself as soon as he spoke. "It's, uh..." Now that he had started, he couldn't help an abashed grin. "Well, I can't tell if it's a compliment or not, but you do, uh... you do look stunningly beautiful, you know."

She actually laughed, although whether she was laughing at his words or at his sudden bout of self-consciousness, he couldn't tell. "You don't look bad yourself," she admitted, returning his lazy scrutiny.

"I suppose everyone looks good here," he remarked, struck again by the uncertain nature of their environment. *Was* it a compliment to say that someone looked good to you, when they didn't even look that way to themselves?

"No," she said slowly, a thoughtful look flickering across her features. "I don't think everyone does. I think it's what's inside that counts here, not what's outside."

He blinked, trying to puzzle that out. "Good people look good, you mean?"

When she nodded, he chuckled. "Well, that seems strangely fair. You must be an exceptionally good person," he added with a grin, unable to keep from teasing her.

She grinned right back, not at all fazed. "I am," she answered, with such self-assurance that he laughed.

Then without warning she froze where she stood, glancing back the way they had come. The smile vanished from her face and she demanded, "Did you hear that?"

He frowned, following her gaze. "The giant slug?" he suggested. He was only half joking.

She hesitated a second longer, then grabbed his arm and pulled him back into a crease in the tunnel's interior. The wrinkle was deep enough to hide them both, though not comfortably, as he found out as soon as she tried to wiggle past him to be nearer the main tunnel. "Give me the flashlight," she whispered, peering into the darkness.

"Nice try," he shot back, lips quirking.

"I'm serious, Carlos!" Aura hissed. Without another word, he passed it to her.

She shone it back the way they had come, and by now he could hear it too. An odd sort of slipping sound was drifting down the tunnel, like jello sliding off a spoon. *I'm hungry,* he thought suddenly, then rolled his eyes and tried to listen harder. "What *is* that?" he whispered, as the sound slowly strengthened.

Putting one foot back in the main tunnel, Aura shook her head. "I can't see any--"

Whatever else she might have said was drowned out by an incredible rushing noise, and even as he yelled her name he was reaching out, grabbing her around the waist and yanking her back into the crevice with him. She pressed further backward as *something* filled the tunnel, a green-grey blur that seemed to rise and fall even as it sped by, only half-illuminated by the light Aura still clutched in her hand.

Like a train the blur just seemed to keep going, stretching from the bottom of the tunnel to the top and showing no sign of stopping. The roar was deafening, and even if he had been able to speak he doubted Aura could have heard him. So he just kept his arms tight around her, keeping the both of them as far back from the crevice entrance as he could. It wasn't much--she was only inches from the rushing blur, and he tried not to think about how quickly that thing could have mowed them down if they had been out in the tunnel when it decided to go jogging.

Then, as quickly as it had arrived it was gone, the thunder of its passage fading almost immediately in its wake. Soon only the faint slipping sound was audible, and finally, to his ears at least, even that was gone.

He realized distantly that Aura was shaking, and it was another few moments before she made any effort to move. He tried to relax his death grip on her only to find that his arms weren't responding quite the way they should. As soon as his grip loosened he felt her shudder, and he hugged her close again involuntarily.

Now that the danger had abated, he could feel the rock digging mercilessly into his back and shoulders, but he cared only for the fact that she had just been less than a second from getting trampled. She was right to be scared out of her mind. A little shaking was normal. Hell, *he* was shaking, but as tightly as he was holding her she probably couldn't tell.

"I don't--" He felt her take a deep breath, moving her head a little. "I don't want to hear any more speculation about tunnel-dwelling slugs."

Trying to muster a smile, he echoed her indrawn breath. It might have been more comforting if his senses hadn't picked that moment to kick in, informing him that her hair smelled incredibly good. He rolled his eyes half-heartedly, silently telling his brain to shut up and make itself useful. "Right," he agreed, letting her go with some reluctance. "No more slugs; got it."

She sighed, taking a tentative step forward. "Second time's the charm?" she suggested dryly. She hesitated at the edge of the tunnel, then took another step. "It... seems safe."

"It seemed safe before," he muttered, following her a little more quickly. He wondered if whatever Aquitian expression she had just used didn't quite translate, then blinked as she shook her head and pushed her hair away from her face impatiently.

*Now why did that look odd?* he wondered, studying her as she played the light up and down the tunnel in either direction. He had never seen an Aquitian--

"Oh," he muttered. He supposed that getting hair in their eyes wasn't something most Aquitians had to worry about--but that made him wonder where she had gotten the habit. Or... had she actually done it at all? It seemed the longer they stayed in the grid, the more it confused him.

She gave him an odd look. "What?"

He shook his head. "Nothing." Then he thought the better of it and said, "Hey, give me my flashlight back."

"No," she replied calmly. "I think it's better if I keep it."

"In your dreams," he retorted. "I created it; I get to keep it."

"I'm tired of you having it," she complained. "You keep turning it on the walls and the ceiling and then I can't see where I'm walking. It's annoying."

He tilted his head as though listening. "Do you hear that?"

She froze. "What?"

He felt the smallest twinge of guilt for reminding her of the slug creature, but he lifted his hand anyway. Rubbing his finger and thumb together, he whispered, "That." She leaned closer in an effort to hear, and he added softly, "That's the sound of the world's smallest violin, Aura. Give me the damn flashlight."

She glared at him, and for just a moment, he thought she might actually hit him for that. But then she said calmly, "At least give me the violin. I play it better than you do."

He stared at her, not sure whether to be startled or amused. "When we get out of here," he said at last, holding out his hand for the flashlight, "you're going to have to tell me how that translated."

She held out both hands, the flashlight in one and the other empty. He tried not to grin. Taking the flashlight back, he pressed the imaginary violin into her open hand. She clenched her fist around it and turned her hand over, opening it palm down so that anything inside would have fallen to the floor. Not taking her gaze off of him, she stamped her foot once, grinding her heel into the stone.

*Sneakers,* some part of his mind noted as he glanced down. She would be wearing sneakers. He looked up again, pressing his lips together in an effort not to laugh. "Point taken," he said, as solemnly as he could.

The faintest hint of a smile graced her expression. She nodded once, and they started down the tunnel again in wary but companionable silence.

It didn't last. The tunnel, apparently upset that its occupant's attempt to do them in had failed, decided to try its own hand at the job. It was impossible to say which of them heard the rumble first, but Carlos recognized it immediately. He had gone caving too many times not to be sensitized to the sound of rock grating on rock.

He was sure the tunnel walls had been smooth only seconds before, but another fissure formed the instant he shoved Aura toward the side of the tunnel. He was starting to get suspicious of these crevices, but what choice did they have?

He got his hand behind her head just before she would have banged it on the jagged wall, and he winced as the rock cut into his fingers. Then the horrifying grinding of unstable stone stole any other worries from his mind, and he saw her wide-eyed gaze slide over his shoulder as the ground started to tremble.

He heard something large and mean slam against the stone right behind him. She flinched, ducking instinctively, and he wrapped his other arm around her and pressed her face against his chest, trying to shield her from the rockslide somehow. They cowered inside the fissure for as long as the rocks continued to rumble, and he felt every second of it.

He told himself not to, he told himself to worry--at any moment one of those rocks would fly their way, and no mere crevice was going to protect them. But he couldn't. Maybe it was because he couldn't see it, maybe the blindness made it less real, or maybe he had used up all his adrenaline a few minutes ago when the slug creature went tearing through. Or maybe it was the girl tucked securely in his embrace that convinced him that nothing bad could possibly happen to them right now.

He lowered his head, breathing in the scent of her hair and at the same time trying not to enjoy it. He felt her slight figure shift within his embrace and his skin started to tingle, the air turning suddenly too warm for his liking. "No," he whispered vehemently, knowing she couldn't hear him over the crumbling rock in the background. "No."

He fought desperately to ignore the reaction, trying to concentrate on anything but her and finding it impossible. He wasn't attracted to her; he couldn't be. She didn't even look like this in real life; how wrong was it to want someone who was, for all intents and purposes, an illusion?

*She's an alien,* he reminded himself harshly. *Hello, Carlos, she's a fish person! Grey eyes! Gills! Absolutely no sense of humor!*

His body didn't listen, insisting that she was flesh and blood human and gorgeous to boot. *Why now?* he demanded silently, feeling her push him back just a little as the rumble began to taper off. *Why did you pick now to notice this? Couldn't you have waited until she was complaining or snapping or *something*?*

She peered past him, apparently oblivious to his internal conflict, and he added helplessly, *Some time when she didn't look so vulnerable, and... cute?*

"I want out of this tunnel," she muttered, still staring past him. "It's getting more dangerous in here than it is out there."

He couldn't look away from her. "Any--any suggestions?" he managed, hoping his voice didn't sound as weak as he thought it did.

She looked up, not seeming to notice that he still had his arms around her. "Yeah," she said shortly. "We blast our way out. It can't be any worse than what's already happened."

Only when she stopped talking did it dawn on him that he was staring at her mouth. He lifted his gaze to hers instantly, praying she hadn't noticed, but it was too late. She narrowed her eyes at him. "Why are you looking at me like that?"

"L--like what?" he stammered. God, it was getting worse. He couldn't even talk to her now; this was pathetic. *How did she go from reluctant ally to beautiful woman in a few random seconds? And why can't I let go of her?*

"Like you're about to kiss me," she said bluntly, staring at him. "Either do it or let me go, but don't just stand there staring."

He took a step back before her words even had a chance to sink in, arms sliding reluctantly off her shoulders. He glanced over his shoulder, making sure he wasn't about to trip over anything in what was left of the tunnel, and he found he couldn't meet her gaze again. "Do it or let me go..."

He lifted both hands to his head and buried them in his hair, staring mindlessly at the wall in front of him. "God," he muttered, trying as best he could to ignore her presence at his side. "What am I doing?"

"Not a whole lot," she remarked candidly. "Right now you're staring at a wall and acting stupid. There's some definite room for improvement, if you ask me."

"I didn't," he told the wall. It was only slightly easier than talking to her right now. "I didn't ask you at all."

"Fine," she said. He got the distinct impression that she shrugged. "Get back and cover your head. I'm getting us out of here."

He barely had time to look up before she drew her blade, resting it against the solid stone over her head and releasing a sustained blast that made the rock face glow like heated metal. An instant later it blew out entirely and he flinched back, startled. Bright blue sky peeked through the jagged hole in the tunnel ceiling.

She was already climbing up, one foot on a boulder dumped by the rockslide and both hands on the upper edge of the hole. There was no way it could be cool already, but they were already in the midst of an impossible situation--several impossible situations, he reminded himself with a grimace--and he figured it wasn't a priority worry at the moment.

"Are you going to give me a hand or not?" she demanded, one foot slipping a little on her chosen boulder.

He sighed, stepping forward to grab her foot. He gave her a push until she could rest her sneaker on his shoulder and scramble the rest of the way up. He tried to follow, figuring his height advantage would be enough to get him through. It wasn't an easy proposition, despite the proximity of the tunnel wall and the conveniently placed rockslide, but he did eventually manage.

Aura turned away from her study of the horizon, frowning as he dragged himself out of the tunnel. "What did you do to your hand?"

He glanced down, surprised to find his knuckles bleeding. It didn't start to hurt until he noticed it, and he wondered if she could be malicious enough to have drawn his attention to it on purpose. Then he shook his head at himself. *Great,* he thought, exasperated. *Stupid and paranoid. It's really turning out to be one of the worst days in the history of worst days.*

She was crouching down beside him, pulling something out of her pocket. "A bandanna?" he asked, before he could stop himself. "What, you couldn't manage a bandage or something? Maybe some antiseptic?"

She caught his eye just long enough to glare at him, then grabbed his hand and laid it on her knee. "Hold still," she ordered, twisting the bandanna into a makeshift bandage.

His fingers twitched and he closed his eyes, trying not to think. "I suppose you're a field medic now," he remarked, irritated with her attitude as much as his. "Probably your lifelong hobby, only recently rediscovered. A regular Doogie Howser, even."

She yanked sharply on the bandanna, and he winced. "Serves you right," she informed him. "What's your problem all of a sudden?"

He opened his eyes to glare at her, though the effect was lessened somewhat by the fact that she was still working on his hand and didn't notice. "What's my problem?" he repeated incredulously. "In case you hadn't noticed, I'm--I'm drooling all over you! All I can think about is touching you!"

She finished tying the bandanna and looked up. "So?" she asked.

His eyes widened. "So I have a girlfriend! I can't feel like this! And you're... you're not even real!"

She actually shrugged. "Exactly. Whatever you see is just something your mind made up. You probably invented an image you'd be attracted to; there's no shame in that. As soon as we're out of here the image will vanish and so will the attraction. It's nothing to worry about."

"Easy for you to say," he retorted, trying to take comfort in her words nonetheless. "If you have all the answers, then why now? I was fine around you before; what the hell kind of timing is this?"

"I told you," she said matter-of-factly. "The grid responds to need. I don't know why everything seems to be coming after us, but we have to care about each other if we're both going to get out of here. Maybe playing on the physical attraction was the easiest way to do it."

"Playing on the physical attraction..." Not "playing on your attraction to me". He studied her, trying to see something more than the obvious. Trying to see inside. "We?" he repeated.

"I'm at least as able to protect us as you are," she said dryly.

"Don't pretend to misunderstand," he told her, annoyed all over again. "Answer the question."

She glared at him. "Has anyone ever told you that you're a real jerk when you're uncomfortable, Carlos?"

He started to insist. "Answer the freakin' ques--"

She cut him off, pressing her mouth to his as he leaned into her, trying to drive the incessant pounding of his blood down to a more manageable level. Her kiss was no more gentle than his, and its wild edge answered his question better than words ever could have.

He felt her hands clench on his shoulders and then slide down his arms, setting his skin tingling madly in their wake. He kissed her harder, his hands in her hair as he tried desperately to get closer to her. He needed to feel her everywhere, everywhere that he had feeling and some places he didn't--

*No!* His mind refused to give in and he broke away, gasping for breath. "No," he groaned aloud, bringing his fist down on the stone beneath them. "I'm not doing this. This isn't happening!"

He heard her sigh, but he refused to look up. "It isn't real," she told him, clearly frustrated. "It doesn't mean anything!"

He couldn't help glaring at her. "It means something to me!"

She sighed again, but she didn't contradict him this time. She looked at him for a moment, and then finally nodded. "Okay," she said quietly. "Okay, I can respect that."

He blinked, surprised by her sudden calm. "You... can?"

She grimaced at him. "Thanks for that blow to my self-esteem. I have enough people telling me I'm out of control lately; I really don't need to add someone else to the list."

"That's not what I meant," he muttered, embarrassed. "I just... that's, uh--" He couldn't tell her that he had half-wanted her to say she didn't care, just so he could feel her lips on his again.

She cocked her head at him, closer than she had been before. Either she knew what he was thinking, or he was...

He was the one leaning forward. She was right where she had been before, but he felt his mouth brush against hers anyway. She closed her eyes, not moving, and he laid another whisper-soft kiss on her lips. She kissed him back and he let her, not daring to think about what he was doing. That self-deprecating look had cut all the way to his heart, and he couldn't bear the thought that something he had said without thinking had hurt her like that.

An all too familiar whine interrupted his only marginally successful attempt at not thinking, and he heard her curse as they broke apart again. He tried to muster a smile. "I'm going to miss hearing you swear in English," he murmured.

"Not if we don't get out of here you won't," she said sharply, pulling him to his feet. "Come on!"

He didn't bother wondering why the stone outcropping they had been sitting on was now at ground level, any more than he bothered asking how she knew where they were going. He just followed when she ran, staying, impossibly, ahead of the oncoming fighters. He couldn't even bring himself to be startled when the world shifted almost imperceptibly and the rest of her team appeared in front of them.

He stumbled and he saw hands reaching for him, dragging him up and pulling the both of them forward. He and Aura were drawn irresistibly into their circle, and the world started to darken alarmingly. He heard Aura saying something, heard someone else talking over her just loud enough that he couldn't understand either of them, and then blackness overwhelmed him.