Again, guys, thanks for all the reviews. I really appreciate it.

Disclaimer: don't own anything you recognize.

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"Tell me I'm not crazy!" Shay stares wide-eyed at his side where he's pulled up his shirt, unresponsive. There's a panic forming in the back of his throat. "Jesus fuck, Shay, say something!"

She blinks and looks up at him. Kili is freaking out and trying to pretend that he isn't. "Nope," she says. "Definitely not crazy."

"But I was asleep." For the first time in a while, he doesn't remember the dream, but Owen woke up him around five in the morning to tell him he was bleeding. He gave the other boy maybe half a second of eye contact before running straight to Shay. It was less about getting patched up and more about just trying to prove to himself that it's really there. "And that's a lot of blood, so I'd really appreciate some help right now."

Her hands are shaking as she pours the disinfectant she has for all the blisters she gets onto a cotton ball. The mark almost completely surrounds his torso. "What the hell even makes something like this?" she says, dabbing the cotton ball all over until it's covered in blood and she gets another one. Kili is trying desperately not to make any sounds.

He answers, "I can't really check my back, but look at the shape of it."

Though she's already administrative the first of many, many band-aids, she looks up at him before circling around. Then: "What the fuck?"

"That's what I'm saying!" Giving up now on simply holding up his shirt, he full-on pulls it off, ignoring the shooting pain going up his sides and back. "Shay, this is a hand print."

She adds another band-aid to the one cut on his stomach. On his left side are four more, and the rest is all bruises. "And these are from nails," she says, worrying her bottom lip. "Kili, this doesn't make any sense."

"Yeah, I've noticed," he says dryly. "Anyway, this isn't like I could do this in my sleep so where did it come from?" She shakes her head, evidently as bewildered as he is. "This is bloody impossible. Look at the size of it!"

There's a strange, still sort of moment where she suddenly freeze, eyes strained on the bathroom mirror. Even more confused now, he looks up and makes eye contact with - well, what? It's him but not him, an eighteen-year-old Kili with scruffy stubble despite his face being cleanly shaven, his hair straight and shoulder length, his clothes done up like something out of the Renaissance Faire Shay works at and soaked in blood, a bow and empty quiver strapped to his back. He screams, jumping backwards, and the image disappears. It's just himself again, same old, curly-haired Kili Joseph Durin.

"You saw that, right?" she asks, voice shooting up a good octave. "I mean it was only there for like a second, but you did see it, didn't you?"

Then Emily's inside the bathroom, worry painting her face as she takes in the sight of the blood and band-aids. "What happened?" she says as Shay's shaking hands starts wiping off the mess.

"I got cut up," he answers, not wanting to explain. "Long story. Sorry for waking you up."

"Go back to sleep, Emmy. I've got it covered."

Though the girl looks doubtful, there are smudges of exhaustion under her eyes. "Wake me up if you need anything," she tells them before shuffling out again.

After she's gone, Shay says, "This'll be a weird question, but what were you dreaming about?"

So, she's starting to get it too. That sinking suspicion that something is wrong. "I don't remember," he answers honestly. "Not a single detail."

"Well, I'm not sleeping tonight," she says, throwing out the paper towels. "Odds are something like this'll happen to me too."

This is true since they seem so synced or whatever, and he doesn't like the idea of her falling asleep either. He isn't a big fan of getting hurt or seeing other people get hurt, but he especially hates the idea Shay getting banged up in any way. It's even more than he feels about Filly, because his brother can bounce back from anything. "We'll go for a walk or something," he says, trying to block the image of that other self from his brain. If Shay hadn't seen it too, he would've thought he was still dreaming.

Because, after all, that's exactly what he looks like.

"I need something more high energy than that," she answers, taking another quick glance at the mirror. "We could play basketball again now that we know that area of the gym is perceptually open."

The constantly unlocked storage area is something of a design flaw, but Kili's not complaining about that any time soon. "Sure," he says. Since he fell asleep in front of his laptop, he's still fully dressed and Shay is too and even though it's getting colder and the side and front of his shirt are bloody, it isn't horrendous yet.

They exit the bathroom and she sends a hesitant look at her dorm room door before saying, "I guess I can go without my cell phone for once," and follows him out into the hallway.

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The cuts on his side don't miraculously disappear. They don't even stop bleeding for another half a day, and it takes a week for them to scab. It's itchy and uncomfortable and every time the two of them are together, Shay has to stop him from scratching. It feels like there's something in his system - poison or disease - though no infection forms. It's weird, and it scares him, though he's not going to say that out loud.

That isn't the only thing that doesn't stay. Out of the corner of his eye sometimes, when he passes a reflective surface, he thinks he sees someone other than himself. Like, someone who's him but not him at the same time, in weird clothes splattered in blood, mirroring whatever facial expression he's actually doing at the time. He's been throwing around words like "insane" or "header" for a while, but he's never really believed it until now.

Until, that is, both suddenly happen to Shay too.

He meets her in her suite's bathroom where she's spitting up blood into the sink. Her cell phone's next to her and she's wearing nothing but a sport's bra. Her lip is split like someone hit her in face and her body is covered in bruises. "I think I bit my lip and cheek in my sleep," she says, voice muffled as she wipes her mouth with the back of her hand. The running faucet washes away the blood mess. "The bruises though? That I can't explain."

But her mouth doesn't look like a bite. "Lips only split like that if someone punches you," he says, moving her face to look up at him. He gets blood on his thumb, smudged now on her cheekbone. "Trust me, I've been in enough fights to know."

She reaches up and touches it. There's light rope burn on her wrists. If he thought he was wreck, he's nothing compared to her. "I look like someone beat me," she says quietly, looking down at her arms. "What's going - Oh my god!"

Like with his, the image is only there for half a second and she ends up jumping backwards, landing against his chest. It was Shay, same horrified expression, but her hair longer and braided under a fancy hat, dressed in a blue outfit straight out of the late Victorian Era, eyes grey instead of their weird blue-green color and face different. But it was gone as quickly as it appeared, same as his. Unlike last time, she asks, "What did you see, Kili?"

So he explains.

Shay turns around and away from him so fast she bangs her back and elbow. "God dammit," she says, roughly grabbing a paper towel and scrubbing her blood from her face. "We saw the same thing, which means this isn't shared hysteria."

It truly is wrong to feel disappointed by finding out he's not crazy. "It's got to be something," he says. "Stuff like this doesn't just happen to people."

"If I start hearing voices, I'm checking myself into an asylum."

"I can understand that."

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Owen makes him a hat. It's dumped unceremoniously into his hands.

"Does that look anything like one your mom knit you?" he asks and dumbfounded, Kili nods. His roommates gives a little smile, obviously pleased with himself. "Awesome!"

He turns the thing over, looking at the other side. "Thanks, mate," he says uncomfortably before adding, "Why?"

The other boy shrugs, somehow looking even more awkward than Kili feels. "You just seemed kind of upset about losing it, you know?" Owen answers. "And I had yarn the same color, so I figured. Is that weird?"

It's somewhat unnerving how perfect of a replica it is, so he just sort of repeats, "Thanks. And it's not weird."

Owen smiles brightly. Jesus is he easy to please. "Go on," he says, "give it a try."

He slips it on, pressing down his curls and fitting snugly against his ears. It fits better than his old one, which was stretched out from years of being worn winter after winter. "It fits perfect," he says before taking it off again, folding it in half and putting it in his top drawer. "I guess I'll need it soon too."

"It gets cold fast up here," Owen answers, and he nods. Ireland gets cold too, but it's more damp than here, especially where he is. He misses the ocean and the cliffs. He's never been so far away from the sea before. "Anyway, glad you like it."

Not knowing what else to do, he gives another nod followed by a sort-of smile before Owen ducks his head back into his school book. Kili shakes his head and opens his laptop, getting a head start on his essay.

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Kili clings to his uncle's leg, face buried into the fabric of his shirt. He's twenty-six and too old for this, but from the look of him no one would know so he gets allowances on these sort of things. It's nearing midnight and he should've been asleep hours ago.

Uncle Thorin shifts, peeling him away and kneeling down in front of him. For a moment he thinks he's in trouble for acting so babyish, but instead his uncle just looks worried. "What's wrong, little one?" he asks, his usual gruff voice softened by the lateness of the hour.

Holding back tears, he answers, "My friends said I'm not a proper dwarf 'cause I haven't even started to grow a beard."

A big hand brushes his loose hair from his face. Like everything else about him, his hair is wrong. It won't hold braids and it grows slowly, still just a fluffy mess on top of his head. At his age, Filly looked normal. "They're wrong," says his uncle and he hiccups. "Don't listen to anyone who says that. You are a proper dwarf - you're a Durin."

Again, his family name. He's royalty and by default, supposed to be the perfect model of a dwarf. Instead he's skinny and fine boned and likes to climb trees rather than spend all his time earthbound. Being best at archery certainly doesn't help. "B-but they're my friends," he tells him. "I thought I was s'posed to listen to friends."

His uncle's eyebrows furrow. "Friends are not always kind," he says and stands, holding out his hand. "Would you like me to walk you to bed? Your mother would kill me if she found you still awake." He nods shyly and takes the outstretched his hand, letting Uncle Thorin lead off to the bedroom where Fili was probably sleeping peacefully. "Listen, Kili," the older dwarf continues, "you will soon learn that not everyone is who they say they are. You need to listen to criticism, but ridicule is something to be ignored. This 'friend' of yours just does not understand."

When they reach the shared bedroom, Fili wakes up, blinking his eyes sleepily. "Is everything all right?" he asks, rubbing one eye as Uncle Thorin picks Kili up and places him on the high bed that he can climb onto on his own with a bit of effort.

"Go back to sleep, Fili," their uncle answers. "It will be dealt with in the morning. You too, Kili. Goodnight."

Kili doesn't think he'll be able to, but he nods anyway. He snuggles under the covers and lies on his side, facing his brother. The two children echo their uncle who snuffs out the the candle. Even in the dark, he can make out Fili's form under the lumpy blanket.

When Uncle Thorin is gone, his brother says, "What happened, Kili?"

Out of a habit Mother is trying to break, his fingers go to his mouth and he bites his nails, nervous. Fili is very protective but he tells his brother everything so this will be no different. "Am I a proper dwarf?" he asks. "Uncle Thorin says I am and that I shouldn't listen to mean people, but I don't know."

Traditionally, Kili is something of a troublemaker, which makes this display of self-consciousness rare. After a moment, Fili says, "If this is about the beard, you're just growing in a tad a late. Who said this to you?"

"If I tell you, you'll beat him up and Mother will yell at you."

"I swear that I won't." But this isn't true and they both know it. He doesn't answer right away. "Kili?"

"Tulsali," he mumbles, burying his face in his pillow. "I want to go to sleep, Fili."

"Fine. Night, little brother."

As his dream self drifts off, the real Kili wakes up, doing so just in time for Professor McKinley to dismiss the class. He hasn't slept in days out of fear (though he doesn't want to admit it) and it's started to take his toll if he's nodding off in class. And for once, he doesn't feel particularly afraid.

Just a little sad is all.

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It starts out like this:

The strangeness of the past week has calmed down, the bruises and cuts healed, and everything goes back to normal. He and Shay sit in the quiet study talking about school-related worries. She says something particularly pessimistic and Kili shoots back, "Well aren't you just a little ray of sunshine."

She just sort of stares at him for a moment before she starts to laugh and he feels his cheeks redden, leaning back against the chair and crossing his arms. "Sorry," she says as she quiets. "That was up there with special snowflake, love."

After the first week or so, Kili got used to his friend pet-naming him - love, sweetie, honey, that sort of Small Town America sort of thing, so it really shouldn't be such a surprise that snowflake ends up getting thrown in there too and sunshine starts out of retaliation. It's not really a conscious decision when the two start doing it, but it gets absorbed into their vocabulary anyway. Both Emily and Owen think it's hilarious.

It feels weird, because traditionally he isn't like this and he's finally forced to acknowledge that Shay does something weird to him. It's not like all the girls back in Ireland, and he prays that it isn't what he thinks it is. She's just as badly messed up as he is and though that makes her great and all, the fact that they need to sleep together to be all right is practically poisonous. He isn't sure why it's something as simple as name-calling that sets this off, but it's there anyway, lodged somewhere in the back of his mind. Both ideas just tangle together is a messy knot of confusion and sometimes he catches her looking at him with her own expression of bewilderment. Maybe she's noticing it too.

But that doesn't stop them.

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On Thursday night he gets desperate for sleep. He and Shay walk the twenty minutes it takes to CVS and buy Benadryl. It isn't the most noble solution in the world, especially since they were both doing it, but he had a feeling that curling up together just wasn't going to cut it tonight and he hadn't slept more than two hours in about the week.

"I feel like a druggie," she says as sit together on her bed, already under the covers. "Then again, I guess it isn't worse than what I used to do."

For him, it was this and Tylenol PM when it hit a point that he needed a good night's sleep. "What was that?" he asks, even though it's personal. "Personal" lost its meaning a while ago.

"Stole one of my mom's sleeping pills," she answers, catching him by surprise. "Yeah, I know it's bad, but I only did it when I was in high school and only during final's week, so like twice a year."

"Did she every find out?" he says.

With a shake of her head, she says, "She hadn't used them in years. Those things don't exactly expire either. I tried using Melatonin, but all of those natural sleeping aids knock me out for about twelve hours."

"I just never managed to get my hands on any," he says. "But I've explained my town to you before."

"True."

Home for him is on a sea coast and it takes twenty minutes to get aware. The town has a market-pharmacy run by Bilbo's family and that's about it. The pharmacy is a mix between over-the-counter painkillers, cold medications, and prescriptions. Other attractions end with a couple of stores, a bakery (run by Brean, one of Uncle Thorin's friends), a movie theater, and a couple of restaurants. Or, more like one restaurant and a pub that Ma wouldn't let him anywhere near until he was about fourteen.

Emily's gone home again, so they're in Shay's room. For once there's no movie on or anything, and it's not even midnight. She's in a nightgown and he in a pair of pajama pants because it's nearing thirty-five Celsius right now so fuck decency. Besides, she's seen him shirtless a thousand times and he's already seen her in only a sport's bra. She pours the proper amount into the measuring cup and hands it to him. When he finishes, she repeats and they lie down with the covers only pulls up to his waist, tangled together.

This is becoming way too much routine.

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Sorry this took so long. And that it kind of sucks. I've been through hell these past couple of weeks.

Also, I hate my brain. I've come up with another OC idea (but for Supernatural) and an AU post-series three of Being Human fanfictions and just ugh.