Aidan spent the rest of the day completely out of it as that weird dream played over and over in his mind. The other boys noticed but didn't say anything about it. He was grateful, though he'd never say it. It wasn't until after school that he got a distraction from the endless loop going on in his head.

"Hey, isn't that the Magix Club?" Marin said, pointing out the window of the record store they were in.

The others all looked out the window and saw the six fairies that they loved to hate walking out of a clothing store with piles of bags on their arms. Ray grinned devilishly.

"Let's go say hi," he suggested, something mischievous in his eyes.

Thorn and Aidan shared an uncertain look as they recalled what happened yesterday, but Ray was out the door before they could stop him.

"Lookie who it is," Ray said when he reached the girls. All six of them whipped around in unison to give the Knights a look of disgust like a group of synchronized swimmer Barbie dolls that were simultaneously catcalled by a man old enough to be their father. You get the picture.

"What do you want?" Snow spat brattily at him.

"I just stopped by to say hi," Ray shrugged. He leaned forward to peer into her bags. "What did you buy? Anything expensive?"

Snow yanked her bags away from him and said, "I don't have time for this. We have somewhere to be."

She turned to leave, but Ray caught her elbow and turned her back around. Aidan and Skye tensed at the same time, but he quickly relaxed so no one would notice. Skye took a step forward in case she needed to step in.

"I'm sure you could spare me some of your time," Ray said, leering down at her.

Snow turned bright red, either in anger or embarrassment, and pulled her elbow out of his grasp.

"You're so annoying," she complained. "Get a life and stop butting into mine."

With that, she whipped around and stormed away with the other fairies following close behind.

"What the fuck, man?" Aidan asked as the fairies left. "Was that about?"

Ray turned around laughing. Marin clapped him on the back as the other Knights surrounded him to congratulate him on his victory. The only boy who didn't look amused was Aidan.

"Did you see her face? That was hilarious!"

Aidan pursed his lips and crossed his arms, trying to act indifferent.

"Yeah, whatever. Just next time, don't stoop so low as to flirt with one of those pixies."

"No, dude, that's the beauty of it," Ray explained, placing a hand on his shoulder. "Who knew that being sweet on the girls would get them more twisted up than being sour?"

"We definitely have to try that next time," Electro said with a laugh.

"Oooo, can we make it a tactic?" Reed offered, bouncing on his heels. He was smiling, which Aidan was admittedly glad to see- despite his discontent with Ray's flirting- considering the boy hadn't smiled since… you know.

Electro pulled out one of his gadgets and began excitedly typing away, presumably on another tactic involving flirting with the Magix Club. The boys were all snickering as they made jokes about the girls being prudes or sticks-in-the-mud. Aidan sighed and held back a scowl.

"Fine. Just don't make a habit out of it."

"Oh, lighten up," Thorn laughed, ruffling his hair. Aidan decided that if Thorn, of all people, was telling him to lighten up, then he should probably just forget about it. Still, something about the image of Ray leering down at Snow didn't sit right with him.

Looking across the street, Aidan caught sight of the yellow caution tape crisscrossing over the door of the cafe. A policecraft was parked outside and the owner was talking to a lady in a suit outside of the window. She was writing things down on a clipboard. When she looked up, Aidan recognized her as the fairy that had interviewed them yesterday after the… you know.

He caught her eye and she turned her nose up at them.

"Come on, guys," Thorn said. "Let's get out of here."

"I saw a dumpster outside that restaurant we passed on the way here," Marin suggested. "Wanna start a trash fire?"

"Yeah!" Ray said a little too enthusiastically. The boys hurried to get away from the scene.

Looking back over his shoulder, Aidan made eye contact with the lady again. She glared at him so he glared back and spit onto the sidewalk. With a look of disgust, she turned away and he stormed off to join his friends.

Actually, a dumpster fire was exactly what he needed.

Every night since the murder, Aidan was plagued with the same nightmare. Very visible bags had taken up residence under his eyes that ran as deep as the valleys he had run into the carpet with all of his insomniatic pacings. The Cabal Knights were starting to get concerned, but he'd be damned if he let any of them fuss over him. Any suggestions to visit the nurse or take it easy were quickly silenced with a harsh look from his blue eyes and a stern set of his bushy red eyebrows. By Friday night, however, he was ready to agree that the nightmares were too much.

That night he found himself out on the balcony, contemplating the meaning of the little he could remember from his dreams, like the blood and the fire and the eyes. Peering out into the night, he was surprised to see a blur of white flying in the woods. He was glad that the one class he hadn't fallen asleep in on Wednesday was teleportation and he used the newly-learned spell to teleport himself into the woods.

When he reappeared in the woods, he saw a girl in a white nightgown. She turned around and he immediately knew who it was, more so from the wide and panicked blue eyes than the white light she had summoned to her pale fingers in defense.

"Snow?" Aidan asked. "What are you doing out here?"

She just held up her hands in frenetic defense of herself. He immediately lit his hands on fire in case this was going to become a battle, but he knew in the back of his mind that he was in no shape to be fighting. Taking a closer look, he noticed that she wasn't in any shape to be fighting either. The same dark marks that sat under his eyes adorned hers. She was looking up at him from the other side of the clearing like a caged animal. The shadows of the tree branches crisscrossing her body made her look paler and more animalistic. Knowing he was probably going out on a limb, he asked, "Are you having nightmares too?"

"What? How did you know about my nightmares?" she asked, voice ragged and scared. She held up her hands again. Whatever was going on, Snow was seriously off her game.

"I'm having them too," he answered cautiously, taking a step towards her and extinguishing himself so as not to scare her. She looked up at him curiously, fear suddenly replaced by an eerie calm. "Snow, what are you doing out here?"

"I can't... I can't... I can't..." she searched for the right words as her eyes bore into his like he was a stranger she was seeing for the first time. "I can't sleep. I don't know what- what- what it means or why or... Where am I?"

For some reason, Snow didn't recognize him or register how much danger she was really in by being alone with him, her sworn enemy, and for that reason, he decided that he wouldn't take advantage of her by setting her hair on fire or something like that. No matter how much he wanted to. The vacant look in her eyes was enough to make him want to get her some sleep and as soon as possible. Plus, torturing her was no fun when she was in an altered state of consciousness.

"Let me take you home," he said, hating himself for helping the one person he hates most in the world. But right now, she really wasn't herself so it didn't really count.

The snow fairy trustingly lifted her hand and let him lead her out of the woods. He felt strange holding hands with her as a hot feeling ran its way down his arm to curl up in his palm where his freckled skin met her pale skin. It left behind a feeling of pins and needles coupled with searing heat. She immediately yanked her hand out of his like she'd been burned.

"Sorry," he muttered, staring at his hand where the sensation was already fading.

Snow tentatively reached out for his hand again, so he pushed the thought away and conjured a portal to Alfea, relieved that the same feeling didn't occur when their hands touched again. Slowly walking her through the portal, he snuck his way past the barrier and stood with her directly under her balcony. He knew where her dorm was because one time he and Ray snuck in and changed all their shampoo to green hair dye.

He noticed the irony that the last time he had been here had been with malicious intent and now he was escorting her home, but he ignored it. Holding her like the superheroes hold the damsels in his mom's stupid Earth movies, Aidan used his fire to propel them both up to the balcony. It was something he had only learned to do recently and thankfully he didn't propel them straight into the wall. They touched down gently on the pink balcony and she removed her hand from his, the memory of the hot sensation lingering in both of their palms.

He turned to leave when she grabbed his hand. The heat returned full force and a blinding light through them apart to different sides of the balcony. Rubbing his head gingerly and righting himself, he asked, "What the hell was that?"

She looked even more dazed than before.

"I don't know."

"Snow, you should really get some sleep," he said. "You're being really weird."

She nodded and opened the balcony door, turning to retreat into her dorm. She turned back to say something when she was cut off by a blood-curdling scream.

"What the fuck was that?!"

Snow waved it off dismissively and explained indifferently, "That's just Scylla. She's been doing that every night since the... you know."

Aidan nodded in understanding. He didn't like talking about it either.

"Anyway, the girls will be up in a second and Skye will be complaining about it disrupting her beauty sleep."

She sounded bitter, but he knew she was a little difficult to read in her current state so he didn't look too far into it. He did notice that some sentience had returned to her eyes and she sort of looked like she recognized him.

"I guess that means I should get going," he said more awkwardly than he would have liked. It felt too much like the end of a date, which, considering all that had happened, was not what he should have been concerned about. Still, he felt like he needed to go vandalize a draconary or a soup kitchen or something to feel badass again.

He took a step back, ready to just about throw himself off of the balcony and beg the earth to swallow him whole, when she turned back quickly and said, "Um, I know I'm super out of it, but thanks for helping me out and stuff."

"Don't mention it."

She gave him a small smile.

"No, seriously. Don't mention it," he emphasized. "I don't want anyone knowing about this."

She scowled, but it lost its effect with her eyes still maintaining that vacant look. Without another word, she disappeared into her dorm and hopefully off to bed. Looking back over his shoulder once, Aidan conjured up a portal and crawled back into his own bed. He was going to take another crack at going to sleep. It hadn't worked so far, but hey, maybe the sixth time's the charm.