Gasping, Ro looked over her shoulder and ran, pounding the ground under her feet quickly. It took her a grand total of five steps before her mind started questioning what she was doing and her momentum slowed enough for her to stop. Where . . . where was she? Just two seconds ago she was . . . she had been holding a sleepy Zee in a messy bedroom, and now she was running down a street for no logical reason or explanation.

Down the road and around the corner Ro could hear a brief burst of laser fire. Oh, so there was the reason she was running. "Rowan, you just know those lasers are for you, don't you," she muttered. "Why else would you have been running?" Of course, she didn't just start running again, opting for standing there curiously and waiting for the holders of the weapons, as this made no sense as to why she was here.

Of course, when the NSA hovercraft started to come into sight, Ro's habit of running away kicked in, and she started to run a great deal quicker than what she had been doing when she popped in. Messed-up dream or not, there was no way she was ever going to get caught by the NSA. Suddenly something yanked her arm and pulled her into an alley, a hand clamping down over her mouth to silence her instinctive scream. Shock and fear attacked, and Ro tried to escape from her captor as he held tighter. She bucked her legs and tried to slam down on a foot, elbow a gut, something, twisting to escape. And suddenly she saw her capture and froze in amazement.

"Shh," Zee hissed angrily, bringing a finger up. "Damn, it's me, Ro! You trying to break my foot?"

As the hand drew away from her mouth, Ro could only let her mouth hand uselessly and stare in shock. Where was her little Zee? She made a strange face and fish-gaped, "Huh?"

A ring of loud fire caused her to jump and Zee wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her closer protectively. Her mind could work past the circumstances to dwell on the fact, wincing as the bullets sounded. She had been running out there not five seconds earlier, and if Zee hadn't grabbed her when he did, she could have . . . her fingers dug into the Zee's jacket cloth.

"Don't worry," he whispered soothingly, glancing down at her briefly.

"Don't worry!" she hissed back in a pitiful squeak. "They're firing at us!" They weren't firing laser blasts, like she had heard, but actual projectiles, and she tried to shrink into Zee as bits of mortar and stone exploded. Such things had been outlawed for the longest time except for the most extreme cases, for death on sight. The NSA had never hunted for them with such weapons. Oh, god, oh god, oh, god, she thought, hyperventilating.

"And they're very close," he agreed quietly, staring at the alley opening.

"That is so not reassuring!" She gave a frightened yelp at blasts appeared right outside her line of sight, and Zee's arm wrapped tighter around of her.

"It's okay, Ro," he whispered. "I think they're going to miss us."

"Really?"

"Shh."

Ro looked up at him as he watched the effects, and then Ro dug her fingers harder. And suddenly blinked, looking down at the deep violet fabric, velvet, water-stained and weatherworn. It was real fabric, real. She was hugging cloth, not figments of light and a metal arm. Actual fabric.

She was still hyperventilating, but deeper and not in the mad panic like most hyperventilating was.

"They're leaving." Of course they were, after scaring the general population with their bullets, gliding away quickly in the hovercraft. His grip on her waist loosened and Ro could hear him breath deeply, as if letting go of some deep burden. "Poor West, I bet Bennett's going to kill him for accidentally knockingthat weapons array."

Ro gave sputtered, feeble laugh. "That's West."

He put his hands on her shoulders and turned so she could face him. Ro didn't put forth any struggle, concentrating on her breathing and not fainting from the blood pounding in her head and shock. She had just gotten used to the whole toddler idea, and it never really occurred to her that the toddler Zee was also human, but this Zee . . . this Zee didn't have any unusual traits that deflected this fact.

"Are you all right?" he asked, concerned. Oh, god, Ro thought she could cry, actually seeing the concern on his face, the world of emotions her Zee never showed. They were there for the reading. His eyes scanned her over. "I could have sworn I saw you get sprayed by the mortar."

"Nope. I'm fine." Although I might faint soon. "Fine and dandy, that's me."

Zee grinned at her, twitching his nose cutely, then shook his head. "Why do I let you follow me, Ro?" he asked softly, holding her cheek.

Ro was struggling to remain thinking, feeling heat from his hand radiating into her skin. He wasn't metallic-cold, but blood-warm . . ."Because if you didn't, you'd get your head blown off five seconds later?"

"Hardly. If anything happened to you . . ."

Now that was her Zee, and she snapped her head back. "Don't you dare pull that one me! I choose to come along, so don't you dare tell me to go away!"

"Ro, I don't even think I could if I even wanted to." And before Ro comment that he couldn't, because that would mean surviving her wrath, he kissed her. Ro froze under the attack. Wait, attack wasn't even the right word to use, because it wasn't an attack, more of a meeting. A soft, hungry meeting that didn't even last long enough (although it was possible that it would never have been long enough) for Ro to regain her senses and kiss back.

Zee pulled back and turned his head quickly, unnoticing of Ro's humorously dumb, shocked expression and possible chance of buying news networks to proclaim the kiss. "We have to get out of the open."

Ro ignored his words, pointing a shaking finger. ". . . Y-y-y-you . . ."

"Come on." He gripped her wrist and tried to move her, but Ro wouldn't budge.

" . . you-ooo-ou kissssssed meee . . . you-ooo're human . . . you kissed me . . ."

"Ro, we don't have time for your games. Break down later." He pulled her wrist again.

"You kissed me!" she hissed.

"Come on," he ordered with a hard yank, and it was enough to cause her to stumble from the abrupt change and into swirling madness. Zee led her through back alleys blindly, but never once did they end up in a dead end. She wasn't really registering any of that though, still focused on that one little happenstance.

"You KISSED me?!"

He glanced over his shoulder at her briefly, then rolled his eyes as he pulled her into the sunlight street and through milling mobs of people. "Ro, that's enough. Quiet down and don't make a scene."

"YOU KISSED ME!"

Ro barely even noticed that Zee had sped up their escape or that everyone within hearing distance was giving them funny looks. All she noticed was that Zee blushed prettily.

"You're blushing?! You kissed me!"

By nightfall in a warehouse that they had found, Ro had transcended from that world of screaming hysterics into the cotton dwellings of dull shock and disbelief. Zee, after starting a small electric fire, had disappeared to get food, ordering her to stay still. Ro was quite positive he thought she had knocked her head or something given the way she had carried on over that monumental kiss and, if she hadn't been in shock, she probably would have knocked him senseless (and it would have worked, too, for once!) for the treatment. She rammed her heel of her hand against her forehead, pounding out a steady beat that matched her racing heart.

Zee thought she was nuts, but of course he wasn't wrong. This was the only obvious answer. She was nuts. There was no way Zee would ever kiss her—and of course there was no way he could even be human, can't forget that. That was the main issue after all. Her head throbbed over the heavy thoughts, stupid headache. She must have knocked her head good sometime ago, and that would explain the whole messed up world she was living in.

A hand gripped her wrist gently, ceasing the abuse on herself, and Ro looked up to see Zee squatting next to her, concern and mild amusement twisting over his face, but not pity. Smart man. She couldn't have taken that from him. "Stop that," he ordered quietly, then reached into his pockets. "Here, dinner fit for a queen."

He held out a burger and Ro laughed spontaneously, although it was certainly off and not quite in mirth. "Lucky queen."

"It's your favorite. And some cherry-coke-cola for a refreshment."

"Stop treating me like a baby unless you want to get kicked you guess where," Ro growled.

Zee put his hands on his knees and pushed himself up, going back to tend to the electrical fire. "All right, only because I'm not looking for that feeling again anytime soon."

Ro gave a choked chuckled. Sounds like something she would have done before.

"I don't find it nearly as funny," he said deadpan. "You all right, though, Ro?"

"You kissed me, you know."

"Would you drop that, please. You caused enough embarrassment on the street. I'm surprised Bennett didn't hear you, the way you cared on."

"I wasn't embarrassed. You were. You kissed me."

"Would you drop it, please?" he repeated.

Ro shook her head, juggling her burger between her hands. "No. You kissed me. Why?"

Zee sat down and crossed his legs, sighing and probably silently wondering to any listening deities what he ever did to deserve this brought onto him, then wishing they wouldn't answer. Even still, he smiled good-naturedly. "Ro, I think your knock on the head gave you amnesia."

"No. I distinctly remember you kissing me. And why are you human? And why did you kiss me, because I know you kissed me."

He ran a hand though his hair, shaking his head. "Ro, why now?"

She blinked and asked curiously, "Why what? Why did you kiss me, I don't know, because only you can answer that one. But I'd like to know."

Zee chuckled and crossed his arms over his chest, leaning back against the wall. "No, Ro. Why now are you making such a big deal about me kissing you? You never complained before."

Ro had some perfect zinger ready to respond to that, but her brain froze after the implications set of the comment set in. She was quiet for what seemed to her to be a very, very long time, but it could have been only a second. Zee wore a comfortable smirk, although it really wasn't a smirk, per se. It was like a very knowing and accepting smile, except sort of bordering on smirk's definition. Ro didn't even think Zee could smile a proper smirk, whether he was human, synthoid, or other.

" . . . you never kissed me before?" she said dumbly.

"Really?" There wasn't so much shock in his tone and manner as there was amusement. "Ro, you must have knocked your head really hard if you don't remember anything about that."

"Wha-huh?!" Ro held her head. He kissed her more than once? Her eyes narrowed at him. "Who are you?" she demanded quietly.

"You know who I am, Ro," Zee said calmly.

"No, I don't, see," she stated somewhat loudly. "My Zee would never have kissed me. I don't even think he could process the idea in him thick titanium skull. And . . . he won't have kissed me, and we'd be spending the night in a hotel, courteous of his wonderful unlimited cred-card. And he won't have kiss me."

Zee whistled. "Unlimited cred-card, huh? Nice, I wish I did have one of those. And spending the night in a hotel? Ro, whatare you thinking?" His eye brows waggled teasingly, but Ro could only stare in shock. What the hell was he suggesting? No . . . He wouldn't! Righteous, sweet, innocent, dense Zee would never ever even think that!

"Don't you dare think that! You kissed me!"

He raised his hands and shook them in her direction for a moment, then smacked them on his knees as he asked, "Why can't you work past that, Ro? Why?" He sounded like bad therapist.

"Well, why don't you tell me how? You kissed me, after all."

"If you even say that once more, it's never happening again," he warned, although still smiling, easy-going. "I promise you that."

Ro had opened her mouth to make another comment, it most likely including the common denominator that had been present in all her other statements to finish it off, but she snapped it closed at Zee's words. After a careful reworking of her statement, she asked, "So who are you, Zee?"

"Who do you think I am, Ro?"

"Not yourself, that's for sure," she muttered under her breath.

"Pardon?"

He didn't have his super-hearing. He was human, he kissed her, and he couldn't hear right. Ro sat up straighter and brushed back her hair. This certainly wasn't her Zee. Three wrongs don't make a right, after all. "All right, who you actually are is this, Zee. You are the government's Infiltration Unit Zeta, but you ran because you didn't like the work. So Agent Bennett's been chasing after you so he can erase your programming, because he thinks terrorists reprogrammed you, while we have been trying to find your creator, Dr. Selig, who can vouch that you really haven't been reprogrammed and really don't want to kill anymore. And you like the dumbest things, smelling roses, snow globes, and the such, have the worst sense of humor, and you don't let me squish cockroaches." She shuddered and glared at his impassive face.

"And I have an unlimited cred-card," he added.

"And apparently you can't let go of that fact."

Zee scratched his head before he answered. "Gosh, Ro, there's only one thing to say to all that. You really bumped your head."

Ro jumped up and pointed accusingly. "Not funny! It's not my fault that you're all messed up and nothing's right! Not my fault and my head hurts really bad, so I don't need to take crap from a fake Zee when the real one is so much better!"

"Now, Ro! I didn't mean it like that," Zee said quickly, jumping up and rushing over to him. Ro waved her hands and fended him off.

"Don't you dare look at me with that face! That's Zee's kicked-puppy face, not yours!"

He looked at her, perplexed.

"And don't use that face either!"

It was with great and obvious effort that Zee tried to put a blank mask on. "Ro, R—"

"Don't look at me like that! You're not Zee and you can't wear that blank look! For god's sake, you kissed me! My first clue that you are so not Zee, so stay away from me!"

Zee barely held back a frustrated yell. "Ro! Listen to me! I am Zee! Yes, I worked for the government, and yes, in infiltration. Where you got that word, I don't know, because you never used it before, as the common word is spy. And all right, I killed people and did a lot of stuff I'm not proud of."

Ro backed away as he came closer. "You're not a synthoid! You're not Zee!" Her foot stomped childishly.

"Ro," he pleaded, not advancing as it appeared to frighten his friend even more. "Ro!"

"Why is Agent Bennett even hunting you if he can't reprogram you, huh?" she ranted. "I mean, can this sick, deluded world be any more wrong! You're not real!"

"Don't you dare feed me the crap!" Zee roared, face beet-red, at the end of his tether. Ro had never seen Zee angry in such a way, just as she had never seen him cry, and she fell backwards on her butt and stared up at the towering, fiery pillar that was almost a monster, but her friend, but not. Was this how his victims felt before he cut them down? Oh, god, oh, god, she had never been truly on the receiving end of Zee's ability, when he knew she was his friend, and it scared her beyond belief.

"Don't you dare tell me I'm not real, I'm not human!" Zee continued, a fury unleashed and unable to see the effect he was having on Ro. She had crossed a line in him and betrayal rang on his face, eyes bright. "The government fed me that crap for years, and I'm not going to take it from you, Ro! Never from you!"

The only thing Ro could even process doing was backing away. This wasn't her Zee, this wasn't her Zee, this wasn't her Zee! Her Zee would never do this to her, scare her like this!

His hair and eyes were wild. "You never cared that I was a damn clone before, so don't you dare start that now! Don't you dare, otherwise I'm going to do something both of us are going to regret! Don't you dare!"

" . . . A c-c-c-clone?" Ro stuttered, trying to comprehend what was going on through a pounding headache and trembling fear. Cloning had been illegal for years, save for cloning new organs, and even that had its opposers, but cloning humans was out of the world. Super-humans, that's what everyone feared.

"Don't you dare say it," he hissed savagely, backing away and shaking his head. "Don't you even think I'm not real, not a person. You just watch you mouth, Rowan, otherwise I'll . . . I'll do something. I will." He turned stiffly and stalked through the darkness to the other side of the building, and Ro winced when she heard something get hit savagely, and then a sort of sobbing snarl.

She sat sprawled on the ground, trying to grip the shreds of what she knew. This was all wrong, this was all wrong, but . . . but . . . this was . . . this was . . . something, something that had no word to describe it fully, 100. Weird was working, but it forgot to describe the wrongness. Perhaps mind numbing, except her head was anything other than numb, a searing pain at the moment. Strange, but also familiar.

Finally, Ro settled with this was so Zee, as Zee was always dragging her into weird situations that had no actual word to describe them. She didn't want to go over to that thing. She didn't call him a thing because he was a clone, but because he wasn't her Zee. But she had to go over there, because, because it wasn't right. Anything that looked like Zee Ro had to help. If there was a rabid pit bull that looked like Zee, Ro would probably try to help it, even if it did attempt to rip off her arm or kill her. After all, that's all traveling with the real Zee had ever done, try to get her killed. The pit bull would just be a bit more straightforward, that's all, and probably actually mean it.

Well, at the rate this was going, if it was actually a rapid-pit-bull-Zee . . .

Carefully she stood up, wringing her hands and listening for any sounds, but where the Zee had gone it was quiet, very quiet. Ro shuddered. If this Zee was anything like her Zee, he was probably dwelling on his private version of my-lot-in-life-sucks-but-I-deal-because-it's-what-I-deserve-since-I'm-a-synthoid, or, considering the circumstances, -clone. Ro hated those melancholy, accepting moods Zee was subjected to. He didn't deserve them.

Like a deer she started over and Ro squinted in the darkness. It was getting colder as she left the fire, somewhere Zee always went, out in the cold, away from the warmth, like he didn't deserve warmth. She was going to beat that idea out of his head, she promised. Zee deserved a lot, less than he would ever get. It was life, totally unfair.

Zee was leaning against a box, looking down and holding his head with his hand. Ro was just suddenly struck that she wanted to know about this Zee, the mirrors that were true to hers, beyond the wardrobe. Had she destroyed something here? Not that this was real, but had she? Had she ruined this Zee to her?

She stood awkwardly for a moment, then asked, "Do you like smelling roses?"

He snorted and asked in a dead voice wearily, "What?"

"Do you like stopping to smell the roses?"

He sighed and ran the hand through his hair, then shrugged. "I guess." He didn't turn to face her, shoving his hands deeply into his pockets. "They smell nice. I never got to before . . . before I met you, you know. Didn't get to do a lot."

"Guess not," she agreed, thinking about the government in general, and if they had an illegal clone, what was probably even less likely to happen. "Snow globes?"

Zee didn't answer her, standing still and breathing deeply. Ro could hear it even from here.

"Zee?"

"They're pretty little worlds," he finally said quietly. "Nothing's ever wrong in them, you notice? Nothing can touch or hurt them, and the snow just flutters down and makes it all tranquil and pretty."

"Oh." Was that why her Zee liked snow globes? Oh, she was going to have a serious talk with him if it was, as soon as she figured out how to get to her Zee.

"Of course, then some idiot breaks the glass and everything's ruined," Zee continued dully, as if to regain something he felt he lost. "And you cut yourself on the glass and blood's everywhere, floor, snow, figures, everything. It always ends in blood."

Ro's heart tore. Her Zee would never think to add, or even think, that. He could never comprehend breaking the domes. "Zee . . .," she started, reaching out a hand to place it on his shoulder, but Zee moved in such a way that clearly said he didn't want her touching him, like he didn't deserve it.

"Just go away, Ro. Let me think."

"Now that's dangerous, letting you think all by yourself," Ro stated, touching his arm and moving to his side to look up at the stars. "You never know what's going on in your mind, what you could possibly be getting wrong in the most complex ways."

"That's not funny, Ro," he said deadpan.

"That's because it's true. The truth is never funny, Zee." She banged her heels. "It always hurts."

"Not always," he countered idealistically, turning his head to look at her.

"Tell me once when it doesn't, ever, in no way whatsoever."

Zee was quiet, and he looked back up into the sky. Ro smirked, although unhappily.

"Told you."

"Just because I can't think of anything doesn't mean there's nothing." He paused. "If I did have an unlimited cred-card, that wouldn't hurt."

"But you don't, apparently."

"But if I did."

"Still not nice. That's how you got me to follow you around, that cred-card."

Zee gave a small chuckle. "I don't think so, Ro. You aren't that materialistic. That'd just be your excuse."

"For what?"

"For your real reason for following me," he said simply.

Ro grinned, crossing her arms. "And what is the real reason then?"

"Because you like me. You think I'm hot." She burst into giggles, unable to help herself. Zee, even a clone Zee, saying the word "hot" outside of its literal meaning was just too ludicrous not to laugh. Of course, her current companion didn't seem to find it nearly so humorous and scowled at her. "What?"

She tried to cover her mouth and stop, but she kept replaying the words and it just refueled the humor she found. "You keep telling yourself that, Zee. 'You think I'm hot!'" she said, imitating him while in a mocking manly stance, then collapsing into even more laughs, tears streaming down her face.

"You can stop now," he said darkly, but his lips were twitching as he tried to not smile at her mockery. "Anytime."

"How about next Tuesday?"

Zee glared at her, then broke into a beaming smile, rushing over and scooping her up, spinning he in a circle. "Why can't I ever stay mad at you?" he growled playfully.

"Because that would involve you being evil, which you're not. Not even an incey, wincey, teeny, weensy bit," she squeaked, holding up her fingers not even the smidgen apart. Zee smiled at her as he set her down, then took her hand and kissed it, locking eyes with her. Ro bit her lip as she watched, and he blushed under her gaze. She felt her own cheeks alit in a chain reaction.

"Kiss me."

He blinked. "What?"

"You heard me. I said kiss me."

Zee toyed with her hair. "You really should work past that point."

She banged his hand away, and he pulled the lock teasingly before the hand dropped away onto her hip. "Shut up and kiss me."

"You have to say please."

Ro glared at him and, with supreme force of effort, said, "Please, Zee, kiss me."

He blinked, this time shocked. "You said please. You must have really knocked your head," he said softly, clearly, truthfully amazed.

"Zee?" Ro pouted, glaring still. "If I have to say it one more time . . ."

With a small chuckle, Zee nodded. "I'm gonna get kneed, right?"

"You'll find out if you keep making me wait."

He grinned and then slowly leaned in, and Ro closed her eyes . . .