I decided to update early today! It's after midnight, it counts. Anyway, I discovered after writing chapter 5 that I'd created two plot holes that were never addressed: did Nagi know Cross, and what was causing the "Crossed Wires." Since Cross never finds out, it never got written into the story. Well, #1 gets answered here, and as for #2... Well, you now have enough info to figure it out. Keep those four hints from last chapter in mind while reading this, and I'm sure someone can guess it. Feel free to guess! It'll make my day even if it's a three or four word review!

For the record, "Blade" is not an OC. He's a Fire Emblem character! Drowning is a technically distant sequel to an FE AU I thought up. The explanation for him being on Earth is "He's an Einherjar." I'm not going to elaborate on him any more, since he has basically no relevance to the main story. (But if you want to guess who he is; he's the character Lon'qu was based off of.)

~Intermission~

Lao woke up before dawn. He hadn't even intended to sleep, (he rarely did), but he'd been speaking to Cross and she'd drifted off, dragging him with her. Doug was in the adjacent bed, snoring loudly. Lao groped for the clock, found his comm. 2:13 A.M. He raised an eyebrow- the last time he'd slept a solid ten hours was… God, probably back on the Whale. (He'd slept a lot, those first few weeks.)

Lao closed his eyes. That dream… He recalled fire, and blood, and tar, and… holding hands? Looking out at the sunset over the ocean? Laying on the beach in a beautiful woman's arms? He frowned. The first night in months his dream was neither horrifying nor wet, and he couldn't remember it. Typical.

He checked Doug one last time, and satisfied that he was soundly asleep, pulled a nondescript earpiece from the ventilation shaft below his mattress. It looked the same as any earpiece, but this one in particular was Ganglion tech- it was tuned in to two dozen bugs planted throughout BLADE HQ. It was too early for any useful info, but just listening to the late-night gossip was mind-numbing, and sometimes that was nice.

Half an hour later, one of his bugs beeped. He scowled. That was only supposed to alert if one of the bigwigs started an unscheduled meeting. That wasn't uncommon, but at three in the morning? Lao switched to that channel.

"Chausson."

"Nagi. What brings you here?"

"I want to discuss Cross."

A pause.

"How bad is it?"

"Not bad at all. She's one of our finest BLADEs- her efficiency is above nearly all other BLADEs, only beaten out in probe completion by Huang and social missions by Alanzi."

"I don't see the problem."

"There isn't one. I want to lessen her restrictions."

"Oh?"

"When we find the Lifehold Core, I want her to get her body back."

"Absolutely not." Lao was shocked- he'd only been half listening before, but that got his attention.

"Elma's rehabilitation is going smoothly. She reports that Cross is effective, obedient, and kind. I believe-"

"Effective is the key word there, Nagi. Dawn Cross is "An irredeemable serial killer with terrifying combat ability." Those are your words. You were the one who insisted on these restrictions- you didn't even want her on board."

"I take it back. She's shown no signs of homicidal tendencies, and has nothing but glowing reports from her fellow BLADEs. She's rehabilitated."

"I'm sure the families of the 26 people she killed on Earth will be glad to hear that."

"Chausson-"

"And even if she does well in her mim, how can you predict how she'll act in her real body? Erasing memory is much easier on a computer than a human body. How kind and obedient do you think she'll be if she remembers that you trapped her in a burning building and killed her father in front of her? I suppose you'll tell her that he killed over eighty men and she'll understand. Maybe she'll even congratulate you! It's not like she held him as he died and screamed "Daddy! Daddy!" over and ov-"

"You've made your point." Nagi sounded pained. "Even so, her baby deserves a chance at life."

Lao's breath hitched. Her… baby? What?

"She lost her baby a week after her bioscan."

"Yes, she miscarried on Earth- after watching her father die, breaking her leg, suffering third-degree burns, being locked in a prison cell for three weeks, and being questioned by the FBI twice. Both of which were after her bioscan, and the second of which was the night she lost the baby. I firmly believe she has a good chance of carrying the child to term here on Mira."

Lao's head was spinning. Cross was… pregnant? A serial killer? And Nagi knew? Admittedly, he wasn't fond of Project Exodus' management (and that was the understatement of the millennium), but even he couldn't have predicted… This. Whatever This was!

"The answer is no, Nagi. I'm sorry, but we'll stick to the plan. Once we find the Lifecore, we'll deactivate her mim and wipe her data."

"Will you listen to yourself? That's murder!"

"That's your plan, Nagi, and this conversation is over."

"Chausson!"

Lao heard the door open and close, followed by Nagi's quiet swearing. He switched off the microphone- he'd heard enough for tonight.

He reached back in his mind, felt her gentle, sleeping breath. She was having one of her Red dreams. A burning building, his blood on her face. Her father's blood. And Nagi was the one responsible. Lao sighed.

None of this mattered, in the end. If they won, they'd kill (no, not kill, turn off) Cross and delete every trace of her existence. If he won, this cruel mockery of life would end. This was important in one way only- Cross was kind, innocent, passionate but shy. She was nothing like her human counterpart.

This meant she wasn't human. This meant none of them were.

He'd had his doubts about his convictions when he'd felt her purity, her emotion. How could someone love, and not have a soul? Maybe he'd made a mistake, he'd thought. Maybe she was real. Maybe they were real.

He had made a mistake. It wasn't that she had a soul- it was that he didn't either. She seemed human to him, because she was as human as he was. And he wasn't human.

He rolled onto his back and smiled. This revelation brought with it a sense of peace. He didn't have a soul. His- no, Lao's, the real one's- soul was with Charmaine and Chenshi. They didn't miss him, didn't feel sad, didn't watch him make mistake after mistake. They weren't apart at all. They never had been.

He went back to sleep with thoughts of death- of holding his girls close as the world ended, unafraid, together always. Lao smiled, and he slept.

"Go! Now, hurry!"

"No! I won't leave you!"

Fire crackled above their heads, the metal walls glowing red. "Gods, listen to me for once in your life! That man is coming, and he will kill you-" Dawn started to protest, but he raised his voice- "He WILL kill you- you couldn't fight him and win even if you were in fighting condition. He has numbers and terrain on his side. Your only chance to escape is if I hold him here and draw his troops."

"But you'll die!"

"And I'll do everything I can to take him with me. He'll never let you live in peace so long as he's alive. This is the way it has to be." He looked at her, grey eyes reflecting the fire and long black hair smoking at the tips. "I love you, Dawn. Never forget that."

"So we meet again, Blade." He turned, faced the man on the stairs.

"Kentaro Nagi. I warned you last we met that you wouldn't survive our next encounter- or has that scar I gave you stopped smarting?"

He wasn't looking at her- she knew once he said his goodbyes, he never looked back. She ran.

The fire nipped at her heels, her hair. She turned, wanted one last look, as his shoulder erupted in an explosion of gore.

It splashed on her face, down her cheeks, into her mouth, the metallic taste almost sweet. She'd craved the taste, once. Now it made her sick.

She knew it was a mistake, running back to him. He'd given his life to save her, and she threw that away without a second thought. She never did listen to him, up to the end.

A second sweep of Nagi's blade, and his throat was severed to the spine. He fell bonelessly- Dawn caught him. "Daddy! Daddy, no! Daddy!"

Nagi raised his sword to Dawn's throat. "Are you ready to die?"

Dawn raised her head, her flickering eyes the color of the sun. "You killed my father, so now you'll kill my son too?"

"Your-" Nagi wavered. "God almighty, you're pregnant."

Her smile was feral. "That's right. You're going to kill an innocent child, Nagi. Go ahead, I'm ready. Are you?"

Nagi grit his teeth. "Does the name Lao Huang mean anything to you?"

"Can't say it does."

"He's a crew member on the White Whale. He came in last month for his bioscan, and on the way home, ran off the road and drowned after being knocked unconscious by the impact. I met his wife at the funeral- she's expecting their second child. She was going to tell him at dinner that night."

"That's tragic."

"You cut his brakes."

Her eyes lit up. "Oh, I remember him! That cute little Chinese man! I'm bad with names, but I remember all of my kills. His wife and daughter didn't make the cut, if I remember correctly?" She locked eyes with him, smiled like a demon. "You sure do kill a lot of children, Nagi."

There were a thousand things he wanted to say; (how she'd found the passenger list was among them), but the floor above them chose that moment to collapse.

A flaming steel beam landed on her leg, trapping her. Her hair and clothes caught fire, and she screamed- Nagi couldn't bare it. He pushed the beam off her leg and picked her up, flames be damned, and ran for the exit.

Next time: Tears, or "Not Dis Shitto Again"

"What are you doing?"

"...Something I don't want you watching!"

"What… oh! Oh. Um."