A/N: AWWWW, thank you guys SO MUCH for the reviews, you're the best! And UUUGGGGH, I'm so sorry this chapter took so long, this one was so mean to me, I started it over so many times XD.


23 hours and 30 minutes after finding Rex…

"We lost Rex."

"You what?"

For one reason or another, the universe must have been punishing Lucy. She was sure of it at this point. Had she done something? Had she hit a flat note during her singing years that traumatized some poor soul and this was how she was going to pay for it?

"Quiet!" Unikitty hissed, jerking her head towards Emmet, still sound asleep in the bed. Lucy rubbed her elbows as she hiked out of the warm haven, where she had been sleeping almost peacefully before Unikitty barged in. Where was the peace of morning when she needed it? She was cold. She was out of Emmet's arms. She was miserable. It was six in the morning. If Rex's mission was to make her life heck by his mere presence, he had ruined it even more by leaving.

After sucking in a deep breath that provided half a moment's relief, Lucy whispered through clenched teeth, "What happened?"

"I don't know!" Unikitty exclaimed. Her breath hitched. Lucy could hardly understand her words as Unikitty tried to speak through light breath, "I woke up early this morning, I don't know why, but I did. I looked to see Rex because he was upset and I asked if he wanted to stay in my room to make him feel better, and when I looked he wasn't there! I checked outside where he was during the night, I checked all around the hotel, nothing!"

"Unikitty, calm down!" Lucy grabbed her best friend by the shoulders. The princess' eyes rattled in her head like marbles, and Lucy could only imagine that hers weren't much better. "We'll deal with several concerning parts of your explanation later, right now we have to find him."

She shot a look to Emmet.

"I'll be right there, uh, go wake up Batman, I'll meet you outside." Why was it so much colder in the morning? Did shivering have to walk hand-in-hand with freezing skin, trembling lips, and a foggy mind?

As if she could sense the frayed wires in Lucy's thoughts, and Lucy knew she probably could, Unikitty nodded and rubbed her best friend's shoulder. "Ok. Don't worry, alright? Emmet sleepwalks, Rex probably did the same thing."

"Yeah, probably," Lucy mumbled. Her eyes remained fixated on her sleeping boyfriend, and without a word, Unikitty slipped out of the room.

Emmet, Emmet, Emmet.

As Lucy bent down at the side of the bed, where her sleeping prince lay, she beat thoughts about how she regretted meeting him, of wishing he hadn't saved the universe, that it was someone else, out of her head. How she wished she had never fallen in love with him. Life would have been simpler.

No.

With searing tears itching her eyes, she knew it wasn't true. She hated Rex. She loved Emmet. Like a preschooler: Emmet good, Rex bad. Already she was mixing the two up in the worst possible way.

"I love you." Her words were hardly a murmur. "I'll never stop. I promise."

Lucy pressed a soft kiss to her boyfriend's forehead, pulled the blanket tight over his shoulders, and dashed out of the room.

"Found him?" Lucy burst through the hotel doors, checking behind her to see if she had broken the glass. Was she really that on edge?

Unikitty shook her head, though it looked more like trembling, or perhaps shivering. "No, we haven't' seen him. Come on, let's split up." After a quick nod to Batman, the three split directions, and Lucy had no choice but to ignore the sucker punch in her chest every half a second where her heart was supposed to lay. Unikitty went one way. Batman went another. She ran from the both of them.

Rex, Rex, Rex.

The name was stupid. Had he gotten the idea of an alias from her? Rex and Wyldstyle. Now there was a couple. Rex probably would have liked the tough front she had. Emmet saw past that. Emmet saw Lucy when Wyldstyle was there. Was she supposed to see Emmet when Rex was there?

I sound like a nut.

Night was cold. She understood that, without the sun's harsh smile on the parched dirt, it would be colder than ice. That made sense. It didn't mean she had to like it.

A twig snapped.

Lucy whirled around and tripped on her foot.

Nothing. Not a chirp, not a rustle of wind, no sound echoed in her ears. Yet, with her heart rumbling and wracking sobs in her chest, with her breath rattling in shivering fright against her throat, and static pooling like ice and water in her ears, she had never desired the silence of home, of Emmet, of her safety so much as in that moment.

Like a child, a baby, Lucy wanted to go home.

No.

Pushing her hands against the burning of the frigid ground, Lucy propelled herself away from the muck and mud of her self-pity, the one emotion she despised more than all the others, and ran harder. Faster. Farther.

Maybe Batman and Unikitty had already found him.

Maybe he had gone back.

Maybe it was all a crazy dream.

Maybe, maybe, maybe.

Only when she tilted her head to the left, only when she brushed her hair out of her face, only when she took a breath did she see Rex, sitting against a tree, sound asleep and snoring just like Emmet did.

Don't go over there.

Lucy walked the few feet between them, lightly treading the dirt as she did, until bending down next to Rex. For once, for one time, she could see Emmet. If she looked past the marker and the permanent grimace on his face, and if she squinted and tilted her head, she could see Emmet.

No.

Her breath formed a perfect cloud of ice in the air, and she fell backwards off her knees. She rubbed her eyes. Why wouldn't it go away? She wanted to see Rex. She needed to see Rex. No Emmet.

The sound of her fidgeting and panicking was just enough to wake him up, and Lucy froze with the first groan he uttered.

"Aw, is this really where I chose to sleep?" Rex stretched and rubbed his eyes, twice rotating on the left, and up-and-down on the right three times. Lucy could have practically operated him. Why hadn't he changed more? Why couldn't he be so unrecognizable that she would never know who he was, and he would never know who she was?

Unfortunately for her fantasies, the moment Rex shifted his gaze at her, too many emotions pooled into his eyes, and he made sure Lucy saw each and every one of them.

"Oh, you," Rex grunted flatly. Lucy made no response.

Was he upset with her?

Did he hate her?

Did he even love her?

Why did she care?

"Why did you leave?" Biting down on her tongue, Lucy asked the only question that left her heart alone. Safe.

"Couldn't sleep."

"Ah."

"Yeah."

Silence.

The silence was maddening. The silence burned in both their ears and toyed with their ribcages like string and tied them in fantastical shapes. No one wanted to break it, but they desired to have the strength to do so. Lucy could hear the oil of night dripping down the moon and darkening Rex's scowl. Rex could see the fluttering wind running and dancing through Lucy's hair. Lucy saw the drumming of Rex's burning blood. Rex heard the thoughts running wild through the woman's mind.

Lucy dropped her gaze lower.

Rex raised his.

He was tough now.

Like she had wanted.

Lucy was sweet now.

Like he had known.

"Am I–"

"Are you–"

Both went silent.

Lucy smiled, a forced peace offering. "Uh, you go."

Rex nearly didn't look at her diamond eyes. She was looking at him. Not through him, not over his shoulder, not at Emmet, but at him. Wasn't she supposed to look away? People didn't look at him like that. People didn't look at him like he was the hero, the one who had saved the city from disaster. A hero turned villain, but people only stared, disgusted, at the evil burning off his skin.

"Am I what you wanted?"

He knew Lucy was taken aback. He knew it, he was ok with it, and hated that he was.

Her lips parted to respond, her breath hitched as if ready to counter whatever his assumptions may have been, but it all lay in vain. The cruel twist of her beauty forced him to watch, to stare, as she struggled for an answer. She brushed a lock of hair from her face. The blue hair he didn't know she had, the hair she had lied about. He wanted to touch her hair, hold her hand, kiss her and never stop.

Like a bad mood, like a false alarm, it passed. Again. Like it always did. Even though it always came back.

"Uh…what do you mean?"

"You're stalling," Rex smirked. The harsh nature surprised him to this day. Was this him? No. It was Rex Dangervest. Good. "You always do that when you don't know what to say." He scoffed so hard his throat hurt. "Typical."

The burning light in her eyes reminded Rex of stars. Wondrous, mystical, but if any man were to break the space-time continuum and reach them, death would follow shortly after. Her eyes always lit on fire like that when she was mad at him. He smirked – though it felt like a smile.

"Oh yeah?" she sputtered, half of her head in three different places with five different people, and the rest too far asleep to help her clacking heart. "Well, you always play with your hands when you're nervous!"

A moment too late, Rex followed her gaze, and his hands lay, as red as a lake at sunset, twiddling and fidgeting in his lap.

The challenge to yell, to have one good fight, one maddening, terrible, drag-every-wrong-doing-out fight, presented itself in glittering, roaring glory, and Rex scrambled to tower over Lucy's shoulders and meet it. "You always play with your hair when you're flustered!" I didn't matter that he was shouting.

Lucy rocketed up to meet his scalding gaze and let go of the strands she had held. It mattered too much that she was shouting. "You always clench your fist when you're mad!"

"You grind your teeth when you're upset!"

"You never know what to do with your arms when you yell!"

"YOU ALWAYS SHUFFLE YOU'RE FEET WHEN YOU'RE ASHAMED!" Rex planted his feet hard in the ground.

Lucy groaned and screamed, "YOU ALWAYS KISS ME WHEN YOU'RE UPSET!"

With a blazing voice and searing eyes to match, Rex hollered, "FINE!"

Lucy had no time to react as Rex took her by the waist, drew her in, and crashed his lips against hers.

She neglected to push him away.