Jet arrived in the control room soon after, bringing Kaida with him. All of them looked at the screens.

"Hey," Jet suddenly said. "Where's Jorcy?"

"Still out at the battlefront," Flame said. "He won't get back for a while."

"Crap... Okay," Jet said, staring at the screens. "I guess we'll have to do without him."

"Kaida - I need you to tell me what happened out there." Flame said.

"Well," she began, suddenly embarrassed and ashamed.

"Kaida," he said, softly. "We can deal with that later. Edan's a priority right now."

She lowered her head, unable to look Flame in the eye. "I kicked him, sent him into a cliff face. But he didn't hit. He just ..."

"Vanished?" Flame finished. Kaida nodded.

He looked up at Jet, who just nodded and left the room. That cliff face deserved a second look.

---------------------

Kaida tried to hold back her tears. "I... I didn't mean to," she tried to say, but all she could manage was a mumble. Flame tenderly lay a claw on her shoulder.

"Hey," he said. "Look at me."

Kaida looked up. Flame could see a raging mix of emotions within her - none of them would do the situation any good.

"Kaida, there was no way you could have known this would happen."

She said nothing, just looked down again.

"Kaida, you're not responsible for this," Flame almost whispered. She could hear him, but she didn't respond. Flame was beginning to realise this was more than a mistake for her...

"Kaida," he began again, and suddenly she responded.

"Dammit ... WHY?!" she screamed into the control room. Flame said nothing.

"WHY ME?!" Her arms were waving in rage.

"First time in my life that I try and have some fun, and I fuck it up!"

"Kaida," Flame tried to say, but she wasn't listening.

"TYPICAL ME!! She shouted at the screens, slamming her claws into the panel, breaking several controls. RED had already deactivated them in preparation for her rage.

"Edan, I'm sorry..." she trailed off, and was silent. Flame waited a while before getting up, and standing next to her.

"Kaida," he said softly. "What happened to Edan was not your fault. And he won't hold you responsible for it. Do you understand?"

She didn't move. Her head was down, and eyes were closed, trying to hold back the tears. In the relative dark of the control room, the glow from the screens illuminated nothing more than the back of her head, hiding her face from view.

"Kaida, we can bring him back. Do you understand?"

She nodded slowly, saying nothing. Flame draped an arm around her shoulders.

"But we'll need your help to do it," he said. "And you can't help if you're still feeling guilty about it."

Kaida tried to inhale, but her breath caught in several places.

"Kaida," Flame said. "You need to forgive yourself."

She tensed. But almost immediately afterwards, she forced herself to relax. She knew that what Flame was saying was true.

"Can you do that? Can you forgive yourself of this?"

She thought about it for a long time before nodding slowly.

"Then look at me," he said. She looked up at him, eyes raw. Flame placed one claw on each shoulder, and looked her directly in the eyes.

"Kaida, it's not your fault."

She almost fought the statement, but managed to bring herself back. Flame could feel her tension, but it would have to be broken through.

"Kaida," he began, and her conscience filled in the rest.

As the enormity of the statement finally took root in her, she was unable to stop the flood of tears reaching the surface.

Flame held her while she cried.

------------------------

Jet landed with a much softer impact, folding his wings as he started looking around the valley. There were cracks, scars, and craters everywhere, all fresh. He grinned to himself. Those two really play rough, he thought.

"Now," he said to the valley. "If I was a freaky portal that took me off the plane, where would I hide?" he asked.

His voice barely echoed back to him.

"In the cliff face I was kicked into, of course," he said, answering his own question.

"But which one?" he asked again, scratching his chin in thought.

"And why the hell do you all look the same?" he demanded of the rocks before him.

Searching every one would take too long. But he realised that he woudn't have to do that. He had spotted an impact crater in one of the walls, and one in the ground dead in front of it.

He could picture the scenario. Both of them had hit the ground, and Edan had probably sent Kaida into the wall behind them. Kaida would have retaliated immediately.

His search narrowed to the section of cliff face directly opposite Kaida's impact crater. And it wasn't too long before he found what he was looking for.

Etched into a smooth, vertical section of rock was a ring of alien-looking runes. The ring they formed was almost three feet in diameter. If they indicated a portal, it would be more than enough to swallow Edan whole.

As a test, he looked around for a boulder. Finding one the size of his own head, he tossed it into the air, catching it neatly. While moving away from the cliff face - in case there was any reaction - he kept tossing it into the air, like a tennis player.

"Alright then," he said at the circle of runes, as he stood on almost the other side of the valley - a distance of nearly 50 feet. "Let's see what you're made of."

He drew up his leg and cocked back his arm like a baseball pitcher, and hurled the rock straight at the center of the circle.

"He pitches!" he shouted, then a moment later, "and he ... what the...?"

The rock had vanished. A second ago, it was travelling for the portal, of that he was sure. There had been no 'thud' of impact.

"Heh," he said, reaching for his communicator.

"Flame? I've found it."