Disclaimer: Still someone else's sandbox … still play here because its fun.

Author's Note: To all who are still reading I thank you.

Timeline: This part takes place during Billy's aging, and two months after. Although I have made every attempt to stay within the basic structure of the episode, I have taken some artistic license. Anything after Billy's aging is nearly complete artistic license.

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The infirmary was suffocatingly quiet. Silence wrapped the room, like a thick blanket, so tightly that even the quiet swoosh of doors closing behind her made Kat wince at their comparative loudness.

Normally overly bright, the room had been plunged into near darkness. The few backlit monitors on Billy's bed provided the only source of illumination, isolating him from the shadows like some kind of morbid sculpture.

From this distance, in the low light, it was easy to ignore the physical changes that had wracked his body. Reluctant to draw closer and acknowledge them, the Pink Ranger stood rooted in the doorway, only finally taking a step forward when the doors continued to open and close, and then only far enough to take herself out of the sensor's path.

"Hi." She whispered shakily, half hoping, half-afraid he would awaken at the sound of her voice.

The soft hum of the monitoring equipment was the only response.

When it became apparent that her voice wasn't the magic elixir that would cause him to regain consciousness, Kat released a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding. If Jason was telling the truth, and there was every reason to believe he was, Billy had explicitly asked not to see her. Despite all her certainty and bravado in facing down Jason, she didn't know what Billy would say if he woke up, and if it was 'get out' … she didn't think she could take that.

She didn't understand why, but something inside had told her to ignore the request, forced her. Only now, standing in the shadowy edges of the room she had fought so hard to enter, did she realize that she had no idea what she wanted to say.

"I know you told Jason that … um …" The words choked her, causing her voice to break. Finally, she forced them out. "That you didn't want to see me."

"I guess you can see that didn't stop me." She added with a forced chuckle that failed to mask the pain.

Silence.

"Don't blame Jason though … he really tried, but …"

She inhaled sharply at the thought of what she had done --- smashing everything keeping the Gold Ranger together with unflinching ruthlessness. Sometimes, when the ice-cold bitch she usually kept such a tight lock on got loose, she could wreak a kind of havoc that would have made Rita swoon with pride. It horrified her. Horrified her not simply because of what she was capable of, but because she couldn't blame it on any spell.

Why did she have to come out tonight? Why did Billy have to make her fight?

"God, why did you do that, you stupid …" Biting off the accusation before she called him something she'd regret, Kat turned her head away and continued through clenched teeth, "You had to know … you had to know that I wouldn't just go away … Not without … Why did you make me do that!"

No answer was coming, but she waited anyway. Everything around her was crumbling --- the Zord bay, her teammates, her heart … an explanation didn't seem too much to ask. Even as she waited, she tried to explain it for him, tried to follow what could have made him wish her away. It might have been shame, embarrassment at how he had changed, the way he looked, his frailty … but no . . . He had been with her through those things, talked with her, joked about it in his own way.

"I thought that we were good." She whispered softly, and then amended the statement, "Well, not good good, but you know … managing … with the laughing and the whistle …"

It had been a good moment. One of the few truly good moments they'd had in a while. To say things had been stilted between them would have been an understatement. It had been a strange dance these last few weeks, giving each other space enough to sort things out. Seeing each other in groups, but somehow never alone. Meeting each other's eyes across the table and then just as quickly looking away. Wanting to say things but never finding the words. Oh yes, they'd given each other space, so much space they'd practically drowned in it.

Yet this afternoon they seemed to put all that behind them, and it had been so pleasant that she'd let herself ignore the seeming blasphemy of laughing about trivial things when what was happening was anything but trivial. But now, looking back, the moment was like a puzzle piece that didn't fit and had been forced into the picture …

Oh God.

Shaking her head at her own naiveté, Kat managed a bitter smile as realization seeped in. "We weren't managing at all were we? You were saying goodbye. You knew even then … knew there was nothing …"

She couldn't bring herself to finish the sentence.

"One last happy memory for me to keep in my scrap book."

Angry now, she took a few trembling steps towards him. "God, I can't believe you'd do something like this, something so – so fake! That you'd really think I'd want something like that. How can you think so little of me? After everything we've been through? All the ugly things we've shared, we've said, even to each other, and you thought I'd want that sugar-coated fantasy!"

"All I've ever wanted from you was you, the real you. The Billy who thinks a Snickers is meal, who works too hard and sleeps too little. My Doctor who won't share anything unless its nearly beaten out of him, who never manages to hide his frustration when people need things dumbed-down, even though he tries really hard. I want my friend who thinks I'm not a replacement for anyone, and who would wear a pink mini-skirt if it meant helping the team. I want to be here with you through this, even if that means tears and pain."

She had been advancing during this diatribe, each step propelled forward by a desperate need to get through to him, heedless to the futility of the effort. Now she stood before him, up close and personal with the changes that she had avoided taking in. Grabbing his hand, she forced herself to look down and take in the reality she professed to want.

Soft but unforgiving, the green glow gave him sickly pallor and tinged his now white hair a faint neon green. The skin of his face had slackened, obscuring the strong chin that had always made him slightly self-conscious.

She wanted to say that through it all, he still looked like Billy, that she'd know him anywhere … but he didn't, and she wouldn't.

When he had asked half-jokingly whether she recognized him, she was able to answer in the affirmative only because his green eyes had still sparkled with that same combination of affection and perverse humor. They were closed now, obscuring her only point of reference. Slowly, her gaze traced the rest of him, searching for other remnants of her friend. Even the clothes were wrong. He hadn't worn black in ages, taking the color requirements as seriously as any assigned Ranger.

She felt sick, traitorous because she couldn't find him beneath superficial outside. Maybe she never should have come. Maybe she wasn't strong enough to do this, wasn't strong enough to see through the outer trappings she had always thought didn't matter.

Unwilling to admit defeat, she closed her eyes and expanded her perception of him, desperately seeking something to ground her. Strange and disheartening, it was a little like sifting through memories you never knew you had. All the little things you never consciously noticed but came to expect, to depend on. Nothing matched. If his subtle particular scent still lingered it was masked by the sickening combination of antiseptic and age. His breathing, thin and shallow, bore no resemblance to any of her memories, not the heavy pants after a particularly vigorous workout, not the deep controlled breathing that somehow helped him focus when working, and not the few ragged breaths against the back of her neck on prom night that still did something to her insides at their memory.

Most disconcerting however were his hands. For all his shyness and self-doubt, Billy's hands had been magnificent in a way she didn't think he realized. Confident, competent, whether flying across keyboard of a control panel, navigating the inner workings of a Zord, landing blow that should have missed, or even massaging anesthetic into a teammate's shoulder, his hands commanded respect, conveyed surety, even as a self-deprecating smile or shrug brushed it away. But now those beautiful, nimble, strong, passionate hands, were gone.

Dry and soft they felt nothing like she remembered. Folds of skin moved as her thumb stroked the top his hand, and she was thrown back to visiting her great-aunt as small child. Sitting beside the woman, who Kat had always thought must be older than God, she would run her fingers along the fleshly upper arm enthralled by the way the tissue-paper-thin skin moved with them.

She wasn't enthralled now. She was terrified. Looking for her friend, she could only find a stranger. No! There had to be something, some last bastion of familiarity.

Then she felt it, a tiny irregularity on the top of his hand. Holding her breath, she brushed her thumb back over the spot, just to make sure she wasn't imagining it. No, no there it was. Holding her thumb in place for fear it might disappear if she didn't, Kat slowly opened her eyes.

"There you are." She whispered reverently, running the tips of her finger along the edge of one his many scars, in particular the one she had given him when he first taught her to use the micro-welder.

"God, this must have hurt so much," She murmured, remembering how the skin had puffed up, red and raw. Then, remembering Billy's reaction, she smiled, "I didn't think you even knew some of the words you used. I couldn't believe you let me try again."

But he had. After cursing a blue-streak with words she was pretty sure belonged on the Rangers' don't list, he had walked them both down to the infirmary, patched up, reassured her that he had done worse to himself, and wiped away her tears. Then, after making a big show of putting on fire protection, he'd walked her back up, handed her the micro-welder and forced her to try again.

"You never let me run from anything do you? You always force me to be strong. That's one of the things I l-"

She broke off at that, realizing her statement wasn't quite accurate. He had let her run from one very particular thing. He had let her run from him.

Suddenly she knew everything she wanted to say. All the questions she couldn't answer out on the balcony that night, she now could, and she had to let him know. Twining her fingers between his, she ignored how fragile and clumsy the usually nimble hand felt in hers, and lifted it so that the back, the recognizable portion of him, rested against her cheek. Closing her eyes, so she wouldn't have to see the stranger before her, she conjured the rest of him from memory.

"That's one of the things I love about you. I'm stronger when you're around. Sometimes it's because you make me so crazy that I can't help it, sometimes it's because I'm afraid of disappointing you. Mostly though it's just the way you look at me. It's like you see this other Kat I didn't even know was there."

She was smiling now. Even as a few tears escaped down her cheeks, she couldn't help but smile at the memories, at the joy of finally having the courage to say things that should have been said long ago. "I love the way you're confused for thirty minutes after you wake up, the way you carefully file your notes but toss your laundry on the floor, the way you think things like a good patch job or an elegant equation are beautiful. I love that you make me feel more beautiful than either of them."

Shaking his hand a little, she whispered, "Am I getting through to you, Doctor? You're stubborn and closed, and you've got a real talent for shutting people out … and I love that too. You wouldn't be you without it."

"I know I've got really horrible timing, that I should have said all this before, but … I didn't know … isn't that funny?" Her voice broke, betraying that she didn't find it funny at all, "I always know what you're thinking and you always know what I'm thinking, but not this time … "

This they'd gotten caught up in the words, tangled up in the mental labels they'd put on things, and all the rules that went with them. Friends, even best-friends, had certain boundaries of decorum, certain levels of expectation regarding their conduct, especially when one was involved with someone else. Those stupid rules they'd made fun of, pushed each other to ignore, and all the time they'd been shielding themselves with those same rules.

God, they had been so stupid … she had been so stupid.

"You should know, that night, out on the balcony …" Kat swallowed hard, forcing back the tears, "I was scared. It just seemed so sudden, and Tommy was inside, but … I wouldn't have pulled away …"

No she wouldn't have pulled away. In fact, a part of her had been secretly willing him to cross that line, to be brave enough to irrevocably change their relationship. Now there was a chance they'd never cross it; their relationship would stop here, never getting its chance to be redefined.

Unless …

Unless she was the one brave enough to redefine it. If something happened, if this wasn't like every other challenge they'd faced, she wanted this additional claim. She wanted to be able to say that they had been something more to each other, even if it was only whispered to herself.

Not giving herself anytime to lose courage, Kat leaned in, kissing one cheek and then the other, each time letting her lips draw closer to his until finally they met.

Well, it wouldn't go down in any storybooks. The prince didn't wake up or magically transform. His slightly chapped lips remained unresponsive against hers, and she heard no music. But she felt changed, different, and she imagined that he would too, imagined that she had marked him somehow, that perhaps he would taste her cherry flavored lip balm and know.

Shifting so that her cheek rested against his, her lips brushing his ear, she whispered, "That's my answer, okay? Just wake up, and we'll figure everything else out. Please, just come back to me. I don't care about anything else."

She stayed that way, for how long she didn't know, taking comfort in the soft barely audible breath against her ear.

Something in her acknowledged the soft swish of the infirmary doors as they slid open, acknowledged the solid, stalwart form of Jason standing in the opening. That same part of her, knew that she should move, that this tableaux was inappropriate and she should be embarrassed or at the very least concerned at how he would take it. But she felt nothing.

Nothing in her cared anymore.

Keeping Billy with her was the only thing that mattered, and if she moved, if she looked up for just a moment, he might slip away.

To his credit, whatever Jason might have thought, he made no move to intrude, as though understanding how little his opinion mattered at this moment. Even while resenting his presence, Kat appreciated the gesture of respect, this tacit acknowledgment that whatever this might be it was far more complicated that the limited scope of his view.

Still he had come with a purpose and that was not to be put aside.

"Kat." He spoke her name softly, more of a warning that he could not let the moment go on much longer than a demand for acknowledgement.

"Go away." It was growled in a half command, half plea, but there was no real hope behind it.

"I'm sorry."

And the miracle of it was that he truly was; she could hear it in his voice. For that alone she forgave the intrusion, and resolved not to take out anymore of her anger on him. Kissing Billy's cheek and then the palm of his hand, she straightened and turned to face Jason.

"Okay."

She had been afraid that he'd search her face for answers to questions he didn't have a right to ask, but Jason instead looked past her to the inert form of his friend.

"How is he?"

"No change." The words sounded abrupt, impersonal to her own ears, but it was all she could manage and still hold together.

Jason's response was equally abrupt, a curt nod of acknowledgement, his gaze never wavering from the man behind her. "There's a problem."

"Mondo."

"Yeah. Zordon's contacting the others, you can meet them there."

Even as her heart screamed that she wouldn't be missed, her feet were already carrying her out of the infirmary. As she passed by Jason, he touched her arm, and she turned.

"I'll take care of him. He won't be alone"

The promise drew her up short, not for the promise itself, but the acknowledgement that was wrapped within it—that she was the one to whom he should be making that promise. For long moment they said nothing, and then she managed the only thing she could say, "Thank you."

Released by the knowledge that Jason would be there, Kat took back off down the hall, her legs speeding to a run as the Ranger in her took over completely.

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The day was uncommonly still. Acquitar's almost constant breeze had quieted, turning the immense ocean that covered the planet's surface to glass.

It was a beautiful sight, the dark blue expanse broken only by the purple-gray spires of rock that extended up to the sky like fingers reaching out to touch the stars that would appear once the brilliant pink of Novara's first set had darkened into the purple-blue that was colloquially referred to as "tash," or rest, though Billy truly preferred the proper name of Tashal Novara, which roughly translated to the Novara's repose or nap.

Nevertheless, whatever one called this time of the day, it was a truly beautiful time, and were he someone else he might have appreciated it. But instead Billy sat leaning against the rock face, his eyes resolutely fixed on the sky waiting for the first glimpse of stars. It had taken weeks to build up his strength for the climb up here, and the first time he had done so he'd had to stay for the entire tash until he regained his strength. But he had not missed a first set since.

This was the only time to see the three stars that pointed to Earth … to her.

His logical self argued that this just made everything harder, this daily pilgrimage to think of her, to remember the curve of her neck, the feel of her skin, that full-bellied laugh no one else got to hear. To gaze at the stars he had once pointed out to her and wonder if she gazed at them too. If he stayed below, where he couldn't see the stars at all, where he had more to explore and discover than one lifetime would allow, it would be better, less painful and maybe this final part of him could heal.

But he'd never been logical where Kat was concerned.

So as darkness fell, his eyes sought the three bright stars that pointed the way, smiling as they came into view.

"Hello." He whispered. "I missed you."

It was getting harder with every passing day to find things to occupy his time, to take up the space between one pilgrimage and the next. Each day it seemed to take a little longer to come, to extend a little farther out of his reach. Gone were the painful boughts of healing that followed every treatment with the water. Gone were the first giddy days of being back in this entrancing, foreign world. All that remained was this and Cestria.

The corners of his mouth twitched at the thought of the one person who made this whole whatever it was easier. Cestria who had taken every diagnostic, tracked every inch of his progress with an intensity that almost scared him … did scare him a little actually, though he knew that she attacked everything in life with that same intensity. Others looked out over this landscape and saw beauty, Cestria saw spires she had yet to climb. Where Billy was content to have whole realms of knowledge with which he would never have more than a passing familiarity, Cestria studied Aquitar's mythic ballads the same way she studied its biology. It might have been annoying if it weren't for the serenity that she radiated with each new project. He was watching her pray; he knew that. Each attempt at accomplishment whether a triumphant success or a dismal failure was a form of active worship, an offering of this piece of her life to her patron god.

He remembered the first time he had cursed when nothing in his body seemed to obey a single command, and he had fallen three times in his attempt to cross the room. Cestria had looked at him, her head tilted in that odd way that conveyed puzzlement without words. "Why do you speak with such anger?"

"Because …" He glared at her in frustration, self-loathing lacing his voice with ice. "In case you haven't noticed, I'm on the floor. These …" His fists thawked ineffectually at his useless legs, "don't work. I can't do anything. Dammit! I'm broken!"

"It will come. It is not the result that is important to Kantro. It is the attempt."

"Kantro should try having my body for a day."

"He has."

"Don't tell me," He growled, "he's with me now."

It had been meant as an insult, a way to cut off the theology lecture, but Cestria had simply smiled. "You are beginning to understand."

He didn't really, but he hadn't been about to tell her that. Cestria had endless patience when it came to explaining things to him, and it far outlasted his own. Still she made him smile, and even when she was infuriating she was a welcome distraction. Sometimes when he was around her, answering her seemingly bottomless questions about Earth, or listening to the soft lilt of her voice as she sang one of those completely incomprehensible ancient ballads of hers that sounded like a cross between new age classical, Gregorian chant, and sea shanties, he could close his eyes and forget, forget why he was here, forget listening to Jason his heart sinking in his chest.

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"She loves you, you know."

Jason's soft words jerked Billy out of the half conscious state he had been floating in for what seemed like hours, but could have been seconds. Now though he was fully awake, his breath quickening against his will. Cautiously, he half-opened his eyes trying keep himself from appearing to be fully awake in case Jason was standing over him.

The Gold Ranger stood across the room, his back turned. Staring blankly at one of the cabinets marked bandages

"Kat …" He added the name in clarification Billy didn't really need. "She loves you."

Each word was spoken slowly, deliberately, and fell like a death knell, final and prophetic, reverberating in the following silence. He should feel happy, Billy realized. He should feel ecstatic . . . but all he felt was empty. These words were supposed to be full of promise, supposed to be the beginning of something, but they weren't. Twisted from Jason's mouth they scolded, like a dark shameful secret had been revealed.

But it hadn't. Lying here in this wretched body that wasn't his, even the idea of Kat loving him now felt like pity, crumbs of comfort for the dying man. There was no truth to it, no reality to look forward to on the other side.

"When she showed up . . . and then forced her way in here . . ."

She what? Billy felt stunned, the air was thinning out and he couldn't breathe in the aftermath of the revelation.

"I thought at first, I don't know . . ."

You weren't supposed to let her in! He wanted to cry out in anger, wanted to rouse himself, but his body felt like lead. He had begged Jason, pleaded with him, of all people not to let in, Kat was the one, the one person who had to be kept as far away as possible.

Jason shook his head, negating whatever he had been about to say. "No, I knew. I didn't want to, but I did. I guess I've really known since the day I came back."

Billy wasn't listening. His mind had fragmented, spinning in a thousand different directions. He had known this was how she would react, offering this false love because she thought that was what should be done for someone who was dying. You made their dreams come true.

"I didn't really let myself think about it much, but it was all there—how intense she was watching over you, the way you interacted, the look on your face when you told me to back off the Trini comparison …"

It was beautiful and poetic, this revelation to a form so unbeautiful that it had to mean a love of the soul. It was beautiful and poetic, and utterly false. But the great horror was Kat had probably managed to make herself believe it, and if he recovered, she would make herself go on believing it.

"You were in love even then, weren't you?"

Yes, he'd been in love with her. Maybe since she first tried to attack him in the Zord bay, and it was because of that he hadn't wanted her to see him like this, hadn't wanted her to feel obligated.

"So, here's what I don't get . . . You practically threatened Tommy into asking Kat out. Why?"

Because it made her happy. Because I was too scared to do it myself.

"You know what," Jason shook his head in disgust, "I don't care. It doesn't matter. He loves her. You know that don't you? Somewhere along the way, he fell in love with her, just as much as he ever loved Kim. It's going to break him, finding out."

Billy tried to rise, tried to make a sound. He knew that if he appeared to start to come awake, Jason would stop, and he desperately wanted him to. The Gold Ranger spoke with such certainty that he had started to fan the small flicker of hope deep inside, and just as quickly doused it with ice cold reality. It was too painful. The idea of what would happen at the expense of his happiness pressed his chest like so many hundred pound weights, and he wanted it all to stop.

Still Jason pressed on, unrealizing, "You set him up for that, the two of you."

No! We never meant . . . Even as a he struggled to protest, Billy felt the terrible numbness that he started to know heralded another spell of aging, begin to wash over him.

"Maybe you didn't know at first, but at some point you did. You had to. Something like that doesn't stay hidden. If nothing else you knew, you would always come first to her. Anyone can see that. But the two of you just kept letting him string along, letting him fall harder. And he never had a chance did he? It's gonna tear him apart."

The pain was coming now in waves, small, ignorable, but progressively intensifying. Billy clung to consciousness, struggling to hear Jason's words.

The Gold Ranger stood staring at the supply cabinet, as though it showed him the future, and whispered regretfully, "It's gonna tear us apart."

Those whispered words were the last Billy heard before the pain took over, wracking his body, shutting down his mind. He didn't hear the bed alarm finally go off, didn't see Jason rush over to his side, didn't feel the syringe plunge into his the side of his arm to slow the seizure. Oblivion had set it in, transporting him someplace else, so that he also didn't see Jason's tears, didn't feel the strong hands grip his shoulders, or hear the whispered words.

"You are so damn lucky that you've got her. You hear me? Maybe it's going to tear us apart, but we'll mend." Jason shook his friend's limp body a little, "If I had even half of what you've got, I'd claw my way back from hell and damn the consequences. So you get back here. You need a will to fight this thing? She's tall and blonde, and packs one hell of a punch, and loves you probably more than one person deserves. So get your ass back here, and sort this thing out. Because you might break us, but losing you will destroy her."

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Comments and Criticisms always appreciated.

Panache