As the cockpit of Mega V2 faded into bright blackness and hovered there, he knew something was wrong. Teleportation wasn't instantaneous, but it was close. If he had time to think about it while it was happening, then it was taking too long.

Before he could do more than register the fact, though, the static color vanished and he found himself in the holding bay on the Megaship. He blinked, wondering if he had imagined the delay--and then his brain caught up with his eyes and he realized that he wasn't alone.

The holding bay was, in fact, filled with every member of the team currently aboard. TJ was leaning against the doorframe with Jetson at his feet, while Saryn stood by the stairs to the jump tubes. Cassie sat on the edge of the half-deck behind him, Kerone leaning on the railing at her side. Ashley and Andros were at the table, Ashley with her chin on her arms and Andros stroking her hair gently.

DECA's translucent form stood near the two Rangers, and she caught Carlos' eye as soon as he appeared. "Andros would like to speak with you," she told him.

Ashley smiled a little, and Andros sighed. "Yes, thank you DECA."

Carlos frowned. The atmosphere was more than just subdued--he hadn't seen everyone this serious since the night the Psychos attacked. "What's going on? And what's up with the teleportation?"

"The Psychos are impersonating us," Andros said, brushing Ashley's hair over her shoulder.

He didn't say anything else, and Carlos raised an eyebrow. "Right now?"

"This afternoon," TJ answered, bouncing a tennis ball off the floor. "First Tess, then Ashley. We couldn't even tell until later when I called Tess and she had no idea what I was talking about. And then Ashley walked in."

"Yeah, that was sort of a giveaway," Cassie murmured.

"You couldn't *tell*?" Carlos demanded. "They're evil! They're not even human, and you couldn't *tell*?"

Andros gave him a disgusted look that reminded him of their first days on board. "They're shapeshifters, Carlos. They can look like anyone, and they know everything we know. Everything. Not some things, or most things--*everything*."

"They know exactly how we react," Ashley added, not lifting her head. "And they know how we expect other people to react. That's how they could do Tessa."

"She asked where everyone was," TJ said. He tossed the ball against the floor again. "The other one asked about Megaship security. And we *told* them."

"There was no reason not to," Cassie put in. "They were perfectly innocent questions, coming from one of us."

"But they weren't coming from one of us!" Andros got to his feet, pacing around the end of the table. "And we couldn't even tell! If we can't trust each other, who can we trust?"

"We can't blame ourselves," Cassie said sharply. "You said yourself that they have all of our memories. How could they *not* fool us?"

"She can hear Andros." Ashley kept her chin on her arms, staring straight ahead of her, but her quiet statement brought complete silence to the room.

"What?" Cassie asked at last.

Carlos glanced over at Andros, but the Red Ranger just ran a hand through his hair and turned away.

"She can hear Andros," Ashley repeated. "The moment I came in, he said my name telepathically. Both of us heard him; that's why he couldn't tell."

Kerovan telepathy had evolved different than that of the Aquitians'. Carlos had heard Zhane explain it once. On KO-35, apparently, it was all or nothing, rather than the degrees of ability found on Aquitar. But Kerovans were only, as Zhane put it, "selectively telepathic"--they could only communicate with those so close or so similar to themselves that they had some intuitive understanding of the other's thought processes.

The word that Ashley used for it was "soulmates".

"She has more than your memories, then," Kerone said slowly, shifting her position against the railing. Her voice was calm but careful, as though she knew she was treading in dangerous territory. "Is it possible that... she has some of your consciousness, too?"

"What are we but the sum of our memories?" Saryn asked softly.

"You're saying that she's... me?" Ashley looked up at last, and her expression was as dismayed as Carlos had ever seen it.

"She is *not* you," Andros said fiercely. He turned around and glared at Saryn. "We may not remember the lives we lived before this one, but they're as much a part of who we are as the memories we have now. You can't be married to Cassie and not believe that!"

Saryn held his gaze evenly for a moment, and Carlos tried to figure out what Andros was talking about without dwelling too much on the "married" remark. It was impossible to think of his teammates that way, and the fact that neither of them had done anything but announce it in the most casual of ways didn't help. Most of the time he found it easier to simply ignore the rings they wore.

"No," Saryn said at last. He didn't look away, and Andros' glare hadn't wavered. "You're right, of course. Forgive me."

Andros folded his arms and glanced at Ashley, who didn't look reassured. "Look, I'm not saying I don't believe in that stuff," she said, shifting in her seat to face them. "But Kerone's right. If one of them can hear Andros, then she can't be just another monster."

The silence stretched just long enough to seem awkward, and then Kerone asked quietly, "How much can she hear? Do you have any way of knowing?"

"You mean was it just that one time, or has she been hearing everything we've said to each other since Sunday?" Ashley sighed, giving Andros an uncertain look. "I wish I knew."

"And if she can hear me," Andros added, "can she hear you and Zhane too?" The frustration was evident on his face, but if he didn't have the answer then he certainly couldn't expect the rest of them to.

"Look," TJ said at last. "This doesn't look good, but we do know a few things." He straightened, stepping out of the doorway and joining Ashley at the table.

"One," he said, sitting down. "The Psycho Rangers can't share the memories they got from us. If they could, Ashley's wouldn't have had to ask about the security levels--she would have known from Andros'."

"Could you not use our names?" Ashley murmured.

TJ cleared his throat. "Sorry. Psycho Yellow and Psycho Red, then."

Jetson looked mildly exasperated at being left alone, Carlos noted absently. The dog was staring at TJ as though waiting for the Blue Ranger to turn around and invite him over. When he didn't, the yellow lab heaved himself to his feet with an audible sigh and padded over to the table. TJ glanced down as Jetson flopped to the floor again.

"Two," he said, reaching down to scratch Jetson's ears affectionately. "They can't share information they've learned instantly. We told the one that impersonated Tess where the others were, but Ash--Psycho Yellow seemed surprised that Andros and Kerone were at the house."

"That's true," Cassie said slowly. "I thought that was odd. And there was another thing, too... she acted strangely when Ashley's dad mentioned taking the kitten to the animal shelter."

Ashley stirred at that. "What? We can't take those kittens to the shelter!"

Cassie smiled a little. "Yeah, that's what I mean. You'd care, but Psycho Yellow didn't seem to."

"That's weird." Ashley frowned, looking a little calmer than she had before. "You'd think she'd act exactly the same way I would."

"Jetson," Saryn said suddenly.

The dog lifted his head at that, turning to look at Saryn. Carlos saw Cassie's eyes widen, and she repeated excitedly, "Jetson! Jetson could tell it wasn't Ashley!"

Jetson jumped up, loping over to her inquisitively, and she grinned down at him. "Sorry I yelled at you, Jetson. You were smarter than any of us!"

"I wouldn't go that far," Saryn muttered.

Cassie slapped his shoulder. "Be nice."

"I am being nice," he retorted. "I'm also being realistic. The fact that he could sense the Psycho Ranger is no reflection of his cognitive abilities."

"But he could sense her," TJ interjected. "That's the important part. Jetson can tell, DECA can tell, and our morphers can 'recognize' each other."

"Don't rely on that," Andros put in, glancing at Carlos. "It's just a Power-verified electronic code, and the Psychos do have our Power. It's possible they could duplicate it."

"Not if they don't know we're using it," Ashley countered. She followed his gaze, catching Carlos' eye for the first time. "We're using a password system, too--how much Japanese do you remember?"

That threw him, and he had to think for a minute. "Not much past the stances. I can count to ten, but that's about it."

"That's all you need," Ashley said, with a hint of her usual cheery smile. "We're using the Mega V numbers in Japanese. Saryn's seven, and Kerone's eight. Your morpher will beep when it sends the code and gets it back, and when you say your number the other person says theirs."

"It's not perfect," Andros warned. "It probably won't take them long to catch on."

"Plus Andros can't remember 'one' in Japanese," Ashley interrupted. "But it's the best we can do."

Carlos grinned at the look Andros gave her, but he had to ask, "What about DECA? If she can tell, why can't she just warn us or something?"

"I can not identify the Psycho Rangers," DECA corrected. "I can only identify you. That's the reason for the teleportation delay that you experienced--I can scan for the Astro Power and prevent anyone without it from boarding the Megaship."

"But if they're using our Power," Carlos began.

"I can differentiate between your Power signatures and the echo that emanates from the Psycho Rangers during battle," DECA told him. "So far, they do not register as Powered beings at any other time."

"Which is too bad," Ashley muttered. "At least then we'd be able to track them."

Andros' head came up. "What did you just say?"

She glanced over at him, frowning a little. "At least then we'd be able to track them?"

"That's how they're doing it." Andros folded his arms, a disgusted look on his face. "They're tracking our Power signatures. That's how they found us today."

"But only other Rangers..." She trailed off. "Oh."

TJ shifted, glancing over at DECA. "Look, the best thing we can do is not talk about anything dangerous unless we're on the Megaship. Keep stuff casual on Earth and we won't give them anything to use against us.

"DECA," he added, tapping the table impatiently. "What time is it?"

"Angel grove time is 4:48," she replied.

He pushed his stool back and got to his feet. "I've got to go pick Tessa up. Don't let this get you down, guys--we've been through tougher stuff than this."

Carlos saw Ashley smile in determined agreement, but Andros just stared down at the table in front of him. Despite the fact that Carlos could come up with several far worse situations right off the top of his head, the Red Ranger didn't look convinced.

***

Staring down at her Spanish homework with unseeing eyes, Ashley came to a conclusion. Two conclusions, actually. The first was that Spanish should be outlawed. The second was that, although she knew she must have been in worse situations than this in her life, she couldn't think of any at the moment.

Finally she gave up any pretense of studying and lifted her gaze to the wall in front of her. It was a standard issue grey metal wall, of the same type found all over the Megaship. This particular one was distinguished only by the few decorations she had left behind when she taken most of her things home over the winter.

"I'm walking down your street again and past your door, but you don't live there anymore," the radio sang softly.

There was a single picture still hanging over her desk. It was a photograph Zhane had taken last fall, of her and Andros in the park. A testament to the Silver Ranger's utter lack of restraint, the picture had caught the two of them in the midst of a less than chaste kiss. Though Ashley adored the photo, she had left it behind for fear that her parents wouldn't share her sentiment.

She sighed, putting her chin in her hand as she stared at the picture. Everything had been wonderful that day. With Dark Spectre gone and his monarchy crumbling in his absence, it had seemed that maybe, just maybe, the Astro Rangers would be free to live their lives however they wanted to. They had all assumed that they wanted the same thing... it hadn't even occurred to them how different their dreams might be.

Ashley sighed again, deciding that if she were supreme ruler, "Everything But The Girl" would be outlawed along with Spanish. She thought dark thoughts about the band, the single, and its reputation as one of the best love songs of all time. In her mind, good love songs were happy, not catastrophically depressing... but she didn't turn it off.

The comm chimed a moment later, startling her. She frowned to herself as she sat up, uncertain who would be trying to get in touch with her through the regular comm system. "DECA?" she asked curiously. "Do you know who's calling?"

"The signal is an official Astro Ranger transmission from Eltare," DECA answered promptly.

That could only be one person. "Zhane," she said aloud.

"The odds are overwhelmingly in favor of that conclusion," DECA agreed.

She slid her chair over to the screen, smiling a little at the phrasing. "Thanks," she said, accepting the comm link.

The multi-colored bar of the Astro Rangers appeared briefly on the screen before being replaced by Zhane's ever-present grin. "Hey, Ash," he greeted her cheerfully. "Miss me?"

Her smile widened involuntarily. "Hey! What are you doing up so late?"

"Clubbing," he answered, deadpan. His serious air lasted only long enough for him to catch sight of her expression, and he burst out laughing. "I'm kidding! I was talking to Andros, and I thought I'd see how you were doing."

She sighed, her smile fading. "Do we really sound that bad?"

He seemed to give the question serious thought, his expression going from playful to pensive in the blink of an eye. "Honestly?" he said at last. "Yeah, Ash, you do. He says you guys almost broke up yesterday."

Her eyes went involuntarily toward the picture over her desk, and she couldn't answer.

"Ash, talk to me," Zhane persisted. "Andros is scared to death, and you look miserable. What's going on?"

"Nothing's going on," she muttered. "We just don't know what's going to happen, that's all."

"No one knows what's going to happen," Zhane told her. "That's what life is about. It wouldn't be any fun if you knew in advance."

He believed that, too, she thought with a sigh. Zhane was just one of those carefree spirits that honestly believed life was a game. Rules were made to be broken, the bad guys got what they deserved, and everything always came out right in the end. She liked to think that he saw more than she did, but in her more cynical moments she supposed he was just naive.

"Come on," he prompted. "Would you really want to know how everything was going to turn out? What would be the point if you knew that whatever was going to happen would happen no matter what you did?"

She caught his eye briefly before looking down at the edge of the screen. "It would be nice to know *some* things," she said, knowing she sounded more sullen than she wanted to. "The important things."

"Like what?" Zhane wanted to know.

She shrugged a little, but he looked genuinely curious. "I don't know. What I'm going to do this summer. Whether I'll like college. Whether I'd hate myself for going to KO-35 or not."

Zhane gave her an odd look. "Those are the important things?"

She looked up at him again, taken aback. She tried to think of something else, but those were the main things in her life right now. "Well, yeah. I'm graduating next week, Zhane. I have to figure out what I'm going to do."

He frowned a little at that, but he didn't answer right away. "You said you wanted to know what was going to happen," he said at last. "What if you knew when you were going to die?"

She blinked, startled. "You mean when I'm, like, ninety?"

It was his turn to shrug. "Or tomorrow, whatever. No one knows when they're going to die. But say you did. Whether it's tomorrow, or ten years from now, or a hundred, that doesn't really matter. Suddenly you know that you only have a certain amount of time--how would you decide what to do with it?"

She just stared at him. It took her a moment to find her voice again, but when she did she didn't even try to answer. "No one can live thinking they're going to die tomorrow, Zhane."

"That's not the point," he told her. "The point is that you don't have time to do everything, so you'd better do what you want to do now. Right away, before you waste all your time on what you think you *should* do."

"But I don't know what I want to do!" she protested. "That's my problem! Don't you think I'd do what I wanted to if I knew what it was?"

Zhane actually rolled his eyes. "How can you not know what you want? Look, if the Megaship crashed on a deserted planet somewhere and you could only have one thing with you, what would it be?"

She felt a reluctant smile tug at her lips, and she tried to suppress it. "That's a stupid question, Zhane."

"Why? Because it's easy?"

"No, because it's really dumb." A smile threatened despite her best efforts, and she gave up trying to keep a straight face. "I'm never going to be stranded on a deserted planet, or island, or anything else."

"You're as a bad as Andros," Zhane exclaimed. "It doesn't matter if it happens or not; it's a hypothetical question!"

"But it's dumb! Why can't it be something more realistic?" She didn't feel at all bad about giving him a hard time right now. It was easy for *him*--he wasn't deciding his entire future all at once.

"Realism is depressing," he informed her. "Trust me; stick with the deserted planet. Would Andros be your one thing or not?"

She gave a token sigh, but she was still smiling. "Yeah, of course he would."

"So not you summer job?" Zhane persisted. "Or your college, or KO-35?"

"We can bring a whole planet?" Ashley wrinkled her nose at him deliberately. "Why didn't you say so?"

"Are you listening?" he demanded. "You just told me that Andros was the most important thing in the universe to you, even more than the other things that you said were important before. So if someone asked you what you wanted more than anything else, what would you say?"

She leaned back in her chair, crossing her arms over her chest. "Andros, of course," she said, pretending to sulk through her smile. "But--"

"No buts!" He glared at her. "You're both exactly the same. If you know what you want, what does any of the rest of it matter?"

She just shook her head. "I wish it was as simple as you make it sound..."

"Why isn't it?" He folded his arms, mimicking her posture. "Give me one reason it's not that simple."

"My parents," she said promptly. "They'd freak."

"Have you talked to them about it?"

She frowned. "No. And I'm not going to unless I have some amazing revelation. I don't need them getting hysterical over something even I'm not sure about."

Zhane studied her for a moment. "Ash, life isn't about amazing revelations. It's just people making the best decisions they can with what they've got. Sometimes we make good choices, sometimes we make bad ones, but choosing not to choose is the one we end up regretting the most."

Her frown deepened as she stared back at him. "Are you lecturing me?" she asked, only half joking.

His expression softened. "No," Zhane answered. "I'm trying to help you make a decision you'll be happy with, whatever it is. That's what people who care about you do. Maybe it's even what your parents would do, if you gave them a chance."

It was only after she had opened her mouth that she realized she didn't know what to say to that. She looked away, trying to keep her gaze from landing on the picture of her and Andros again. She really couldn't think of any way to respond that didn't involve crying or being horribly cold... she wished they could just change the subject.

Zhane didn't say anything, and the silence between them stretched out. She stared over at her desk, wondering how long it could go on and considering just telling him that she wanted to talk about something else. But in the end, he saved her the trouble.

"You know what the problem with friends is?" he said suddenly. His tone was just the slightest bit rueful, and it was so unusual from him that she glanced back at the screen. He wore a small half-smile. "They don't know when to stop talking."

"No," she said, trying to smile back. "The real problem with friends is that they're usually right. I just--I'll keep thinking about it, okay?"

"Sure," he agreed. "Let me know if there's anything I can do."

"I will." She took a deep breath, shifting to sit up a little straighter in her chair. "So how are you? Tell me what's happening on Eltare these days."

He seemed to hesitate, just for a moment. She had almost dismissed it as her imagination when his question registered. "Actually," he said slowly, "do you think you could do me a favor first?"

"Yeah, definitely," she said, surprised and a little relieved at the diversion. "What is it?"

He looked her square in the eye. "Tell me what you know about these Psycho Rangers. All of what you know, not the watered-down version that Andros keeps giving me. I want to know what you're really up against."

***

The room was brightly lit but silent, and he didn't move when the door slid open. Cassie hesitated in the doorway a moment, studying him. Saryn's hand-me-downs weren't perhaps the most flattering clothes on him, but they did make him look comfortably familiar. Though she told herself that she didn't prefer them to his Ranger uniform, she did like seeing him look so... informal, every once in a while.

"Must you let all of the warm air out?" he inquired mildly. His tone was amused when he finally glanced over at her, and she smiled.

Stepping into the room, she let the door close behind her as she set her backpack down. She wandered over to him, sliding her hands over his shoulders and hugging him gently. "What are you up to?"

He patted her hands absently, pointing with his free hand to the computer screen. "Analyzing the data on the Psycho Rangers. Do you see anything odd about this power distribution?"

"Yeah," she murmured, leaning her head against his fondly and then turning to kiss his temple. "The fact that you're still staring at it. Don't you know it's past my bedtime?"

He shifted, turning toward her with a smile as he met her next kiss with one of his own. She felt his arms slide around her waist, but she wasn't prepared to be tugged abruptly off balance. She squeaked as he pulled her into his lap, clutching his arms as he gathered her close and pointed at the screen again.

"Look. DECA measured the Psychos' energy expenditure during the fight on Sunday. She also kept track of their Power levels, which decreased as the fight went on... but not enough to account for the amount they were actually using."

She frowned at the screen, leaning back against him and resting her head against his shoulder. "What about our Power levels?" she asked after a moment.

"Yours and TJ's decreased at a rate which could account for the difference," Saryn said, tapping the screen with one finger. "But that means that they are drawing your Power at a steady rate, even when they're fighting... I've projected that rate into the future, hour by hour since Sunday night's attack."

"The red line is now?" she guessed, staring at the new curve on the screen.

"Time is on the horizontal axis," he corrected, pointing to it. "The red line represents the level of Power the Psycho Rangers had at the beginning of the fight two days ago. This is now," he added, indicating a point on the curve about a quarter of the way below the line.

"So..." She reached out to touch the point where the curve intersected the red line. "This is when they'll be at full power again." She felt more than saw him nod. "That's--"

"Tomorrow evening," he finished for her.

She was silent for a moment. "We should tell the others," she said at last.

She felt him nod again. "DECA has promised to pass the word in the morning. This is only an estimation, though; there are a considerable number of variables that could be involved--"

"But they can wait," she interrupted. "We're prepared for them to attack any time, Saryn. This is good to know, but it isn't going to make us complacent."

"I didn't think it would," he assured her, and she shifted enough that she could see his expression. He was watching her from somewhere far away, and it surprised her to realize that he wasn't focused on this at all.

She had been about to suggest going to bed again, but the look on his face gave her pause. "What is it?" she asked curiously. "What are you thinking about?"

He looked away, keeping his blue-eyed gaze from revealing anything else to her. All she could feel from him was the neutral calm that seemed to have become his default setting when he was trying not to project, and she nuzzled his cheek gently. "You're blocking me," she whispered.

He turned his head a little, letting his forehead rest against hers briefly before drawing back. "Come see Elisia," he said, searching her gaze. "Come see it before you decide that you want to live there."

"I've already--"

He cut her off with a single word. "Please."

His look was too intense to ignore, and she found herself nodding. "Okay. Sure, I'll go before I decide."

He must have known that she was humoring him, but he still seemed relieved. "Thank you," he murmured. He leaned closer and she turned her face toward his, closing her eyes as their mouths met. His kiss was soft but heart-breakingly sincere, and she let out a small sound of contentment as she snuggled deeper into his arms.

***

Her footsteps slowed as she came around the corner and found someone already sitting by the windows at the end of deck five. She had a split-second to decide whether to stop or keep on going, and Carlos' mien wasn't exactly welcoming. But something made her pause anyway, and she put her hands on her hips.

"You're in my seat," she informed him.

He didn't look up. "Tough," he answered. "I guess you shouldn't have left then, should you."

It was far more than she had expected him to say, and she wondered if maybe he wasn't as grouchy as he looked. Taking his response as an encouraging sign, she joined him by the window. "Move over."

He slid over agreeably enough, making room for her on the makeshift windowseat. As she sat down, though, she saw him glance at her out of the corner of his eye and do a double take. "Tired of the old hair color?"

She shrugged, reaching up to tuck the light pink curls behind her ear. "It startles Saryn," she said, by way of explanation.

"Good enough," he agreed. She could hear the amusement in his voice, but it was an absent kind of amused, as though the majority of his focus was occupied elsewhere.

"See anything interesting?" she asked, following his gaze back to the window.

"Not really," he admitted. "But I couldn't sleep."

"Yeah." She sighed without meaning to. Dreams had driven her out of her own bed to seek solace in the stars. It was a pattern that was becoming uncomfortably familiar of late. "I know the feeling."

She saw him glance over at her again. "Want to talk about it?"

"Do you?" she countered, still staring out at the stars.

There was silence for a moment. Then he asked slowly, "Have you ever done something really... really stupid? I mean, something that changed your whole life, and you just wish you could undo it somehow. Something that you *know* you did, but you're not sure how it happened... or even exactly what it was."

She tried to smile, but her reflection in the window didn't move. "That's the story of my life, Carlos."

He didn't reply, but she could feel his curious gaze on her.

"I was supposed to be a Power Ranger," she said quietly, knowing she owed him some sort of explanation. "But somehow I ended up being Dark Spectre's second in command instead of Andros'. I don't know how I got so turned around... Andros says I was brainwashed, but that doesn't change what happened.

"The longer I spend away from evil, the less I can remember how it felt to *know* what I was doing was right," she added. "It wasn't like I was evil for the fun of it; I really thought that it was the only way to avenge my family's deaths. But I can't remember why anymore."

"That's what brainwashing is," Carlos told her. "It makes you totally convinced of something you never would have believed otherwise. Nothing that you did as Astronema was your fault."

"Someone has to take responsibility." If it wasn't her fault, then whose was it? "And I'm the one who did all of those horrible things."

Out of the corner of her eye, she could see him frowning. She thought she had stumped him, until he said, "You can't define yourself by what you've done, Kerone. Only by what you're doing now. And right now you're helping us fight evil, not create it."

She looked at him sharply, but his expression was completely sincere. "You..." She shook her head, looking back at the window. "For a moment you sounded like Zhane."

He didn't answer right away. "Have you heard from him?" he asked at last. He didn't sound as though he was sure that was the right question, but she supposed she hadn't given him any other choice.

"Not for a while." She shouldn't have said anything. The only thing that confused her more than she did herself was Zhane. Reaching up to touch the outline of the medallion she wore under her shirt, she asked abruptly, "Don't you define yourself by what you've done?"

"What?" Whatever he'd been expecting her to say, that apparently wasn't it.

"When I asked if you wanted to talk," she reminded him. "You said you were thinking about something stupid that you'd done."

He cleared his throat. "Yeah, well... I'm working on that."

"Really?" She turned to study him. "Does it have anything to do with Aura?"

He rolled his eyes. "Is there anyone who *doesn't* know about that?"

She smiled apologetically. "Andros told me. I heard you broke up a couple of weeks ago."

"Yeah, you and the rest of the universe," Carlos said with a sigh. "I don't know why I pretend I have any privacy around here."

"I kind of missed it," she admitted, still watching him. At his surprised look, she smiled a little. "On--where I was before, no one knew anything about me except what I told them. Real friends are the people who know what you don't tell them."

She couldn't read his expression at first, and she wondered if he had noticed her correction. But all he said was, "Real friends are nosy, you mean."

"Yeah," she agreed. "I guess. But they do know you. Maybe they ask things you don't want to hear, but sometimes they don't have to ask, and that can be nice too. Everyone knew how happy you were with Aura--I'm sure they knew something was wrong before you said anything."

He looked a little rueful at that. "I'm sure they did," he muttered. At her inquisitive look he added, "I, uh--I haven't been the best company lately."

Between his expression and some of the things the others had said, she found herself hard-pressed not to giggle. "So I've heard," she agreed, doing her best to keep a straight face.

He gave her a suspicious look. "Who have you been talking to?"

"Andros," she said promptly. "Saryn. Jeff and Ashley. Even TJ warned me not to mention Aquitar around you."

He raised an eyebrow. "Really. And you haven't, either," he realized. "Although you did ask about Aura."

She grinned. "Aquitar," she said, wiggling her fingers menacingly at him. "Aquitar, Aquitar!"

"Yeah, okay," he said, holding up his hands to ward her off. "I get it. Aquitar." A reluctant grin threatened to echo hers in his expression.

"So?" she persisted. "You said you were working on it. Are you?"

He hesitated, giving her an odd look. "What do you mean?"

"How are you going to make up for whatever happened?" she prompted. "I mean, you've had two weeks to think about it. Isn't it about time you did something?"

His grin had faded, but it hadn't disappeared entirely. "It's funny," he said thoughtfully, "but you're the first person to say that."

"What?" she asked, surprised. "That you should do something?"

"No," he said slowly. "That I *could* do something. You sound like you assume we're going to get back together."

"Aren't you?" She hadn't realized he thought they might not. "What could possibly have happened to make you give up on each other forever?"

He was quiet for a moment. "You know," he said at last. "That's a good question."

She couldn't help smiling to herself as his gaze slid toward the window again. He might not think this was anything special, but after months of being without the easy familiarity of the Astro Rangers, she appreciated it all the more. It was nice to be able to *talk* to someone again.

"So what about Zhane?" Carlos asked, derailing her train of thought. "Why haven't you talked to him?"

She tried not to wince. When he asked if she had "heard from" the Silver Ranger, she had thought maybe he had forgotten what her self-imposed isolation meant. It hadn't been up to Zhane to call or not--it had been her choice, and it was one she knew she was still handling badly.

"I don't know," she muttered, staring out at the stars as though she could lose herself in them again. She might not have found any answers there, but at least she didn't have to talk so much...

But wasn't that what she had just been enjoying?

"He knows me too well," she blurted. "If I talk to him, he just tells me things that I should be figuring out for myself. It isn't the same."

"Are you figuring it out?" Carlos asked.

She watched the stars wink out at the edge of the window. Why did she think she had to figure it out on her own when she had just bullied Carlos into talking about Aura? And why was it so much easier to talk about him than it was to talk about herself?

"I don't know," she said simply.