This is the SECOND chapter I've uploaded tonight (this morning?). Go back and read from 41 if you haven't already.

Enjoy some plotting!

"I'm a fucking idiot..." –Zion

Chapter 4.6 – For Want of Separate Roads
Part 42

Zion's POV

I scowled. 'One more complaint, Luke. One more complaint...'

"I thought they said this seal was opened."

I stopped and looked up at the doorway. Van was right. The Daathic Seal was... still there, despite Arietta and Flick reporting that it had been open when they left. What the hell...?

Sync!

I scowled. "Damn replica... He's figured out how to put a timer on it. I knew it was a bad idea telling Arietta she could use Sync for this..." I grumbled, stepping up and raising my arms. I could do this too, but...

I focused on the seal, carefully unlocking it level by level, and then lowered my arms. Dull pain stabbed through my veins, and I quietly continued to curse the replica. Van frowned.

"Sync shouldn't have been able to open the seal at all. That he could do so and put a timer on it..."

I crossed my arms. "I'll bet Kairi has something to do with it," I muttered. Then I sighed. "Let's just get this over with."

Van nodded, stepping through into the passage ring. Luke followed, and I took a moment to wonder, once again, where Van had found the coat the redhead now wore.

"Zion."

I jogged to catch up to the others. I didn't really want to be here, but Van wasn't giving me a choice. So I might as well just suck it up and get over it. I'd made the mistake of agreeing to work with Van, so unless I wanted to lose my control over him and his underlings, I'd have to deal with it.

For now. If we were right about Kairi's abilities, these fools would eventually be useless, and our chance of using Kairi would be lost. Of course, it would help if she would stop slipping out of our hands.

It still baffled me. Star had said her knee refused to heal, and had said it wouldn't be necessary to continue drugging her, so how had she managed to outrun Danté just a couple of weeks after waking up? And what about the more recent escapes? Flick had said that Asch had slipped up and called her Kairi rather than Mirage just before they left. So when had she remembered? I wasn't totally sure, though I suspected Star might know.

Star... Was that it? Was she helping her? But why would she betray us like that? It made no sense. If it were Flick or Seth, then it might seem a little less ridiculous, but...

Flick!

Flick had gone to Kairi just before being deployed as a God-General. She had been with Kairi when she and Asch left the God-Generals behind. Was she the traitor?

Or were my suspicions just the result of an overly-paranoid mind? After all, Kairi should have been in that side-tunnel when that griffin and I went to get her, but she wasn't. Flick was in Grand Chokmah, a very long way from Akzeriuth. And Star had been with her.

I noted absently that we had reached the passage ring before I went back to my thoughts.

There was obviously more going on than I was aware of. But what? I couldn't risk sending Danté, he'd get pissed off by his replica, his replica would snap back... No, that would be a very bad idea. Flick had obligations to the God-Generals, Ryndor had work to do in order to continue bringing in money for our cause, and Rhunön? Hah! Jade would gut her for her replica research the moment he found out about it.

Star was out of the question, especially with not one, but two of my replicas travelling in that group. Which left... myself, and Seth.

I frowned as I thought about that. Kairi would never let me near her, not after I'd tried to kill Sync. And even though I was sure I could cut my hair and change my clothes, I doubt I'd be able to fool her into thinking I was him. Or the Fon Master, for that matter.

Which left Seth. Hmm...

*Good afternoon, er... Actually, isn't it morning where you are?*

I blinked a few times, choking back the laughter that wanted to bubble up when I realized that it was the very girl I'd been thinking about who was now speaking to us... telepathically, just as Luke had said she could. So, she was nearby? No... The diagram above showed two active passage rings. So, she must be piggy-backing on the connections between them.

*Wait... Who's finding this funny?*

I couldn't help but let loose a chuckle at Van's tone of voice. A faint feeling of pride seemed to slip through the connection, leaving me confused.

*I thought you said you could break the connection!* Luke grumbled at me. I shrugged, thinking that over quickly.

*Why bother? We're not doing anything she isn't already aware of. In case you didn't notice, the Mt. Roneal sephiroth was already lit up when we arrived,* I said, bending the truth a bit at the end. I wasn't sure if we'd gotten to the passage ring first or if Kairi had. Either way... *Besides, listening to you two is so amusing.*

Faintly disturbed amusement trickled along from Kairi's end, while Van's irritation practically slapped me in the face. *I'm surprised you haven't let Asch and Sync in on this yet. Seeing as you survived Akzeriuth, I figure they likely did as well.*

I didn't miss the flash of anger from the redhead next to me, nor did I fail to notice the amusement that was once again trickling from Kairi's end. *Ask Mohs about his failed attempt at an execution, would you? And remind me again why I need to stay away from Daath...*

I raised an eyebrow. Stay away from Daath...? Execution? Wait...

"Didn't Mohs say something about declaring Asch and Sync traitors, to be executed if they were ever caught in Daath?" Luke asked. I nodded.

"That's probably what she's referring to."

"That, and her horrible track record with Daath..."

"Care to explain that half to me?"

"You're the one that's been stalking her for almost a year, figure it out yourself!"

"Enough, you two," Van grumbled.

*Well, if you gentle... er... Scratch that one. If you boys will excuse me...*

I rolled my eyes as Kairi's presence, and the other two minds nearby, disappeared from my mind. She'd been about to call us 'gentlemen' and had cut off... Well, not that I could blame her. It's not like...

I froze, and then chuckled a bit. "I'm a fucking idiot..."

Van looked over at me and raised an eyebrow. "Why?"

I sighed, shaking my head. "I made an amateur mistake. I assumed."

"Assumed what?" Luke wondered. I gestured at the passage ring, then at Van.

"Van is absorbing mass amounts of contaminated seventh fonons every time he uses one of these passage rings. He knew this would happen when we started. Kairi's been doing this for months, meaning she's also collecting up the miasma. However, up until her little stint with the God-Generals, she wasn't taking any sort of pain medication."

"She is now."

"That's beside the point. I had assumed that she didn't know about what was causing it. Therefore, I had every intention of allowing her to build up the miasma in her body, which would weaken her, and then I'd offer to remove it in exchange for her cooperation. I assumed that she wouldn't find the source... or a way to remove it on her own. I assumed, Luke, that she wasn't bright enough to figure it out. And now I'm laughing at myself, because if she ever found out, she'd be laughing at me too."

Van sighed. "Congratulations. She's not an idiot. I figured that out the minute she started asking me where Reighn was."

I groaned. "And when was this?"

"Right before I gave her amnesia... if she ever had it in the first place."

"Oh, I have no doubt that she actually had amnesia... I just want to know when, exactly, her memory came back," I said. "Well, enough of that. We've already done the two that should have been opened already. Where to next?"

Van frowned. "The Meggiora Highlands. If they're in Keterburg, and were in Daath before, then it's most likely they're headed for Grand Chokmah. The Meggiora Highlands are in the opposite direction, and I'm not up to a fight with her right now."

I nodded. "Alright... But I'm going to need to send a letter off as soon as possible."

"Why?" Luke wondered.

I shrugged. "Kimlasca and Malkuth are close to war. Grand Chokmah turns into a fortress during wartime, and I have no doubt they've sealed off the port already. They'll have no choice but to go by land. I'm going to have Seth, Star, and Largo ambush them in the Theor Forest. Well, actually, I'm going to have Star and Largo ambush them."

Van smirked. "You're planting Seth as an informant."

I nodded. "If I'm completely right about Kairi, then I need to know just how much she knows. Seth is really the only option... Assuming Jade doesn't murder him. And then I'm screwed, because Flick is busy."

"Sucks to be you right now..."

I resisted the urge to reach over and knock Luke upside the head.

"Luke..."

I shrugged. "It's the truth, sadly. So, stop in Chesedonia, and then catch a ferry to Sheridan, since we've lost communication with Arietta?"

Van nodded. "Yes, let's—ack!" Luke's eyes widened as Van's sentence devolved into a coughing fit. Now that I thought about it, Kairi did look like she was forcing back a cough the one time I'd watched her after operating a sephiroth. I crossed my arms. So, this was probably part of the symptoms.

If only she hadn't had the medics onboard the Tartarus clean up her medical records. "We should stop in Belkend after the Meggiora Highland. We're going to have to keep tabs on the miasma," I stated. Van nodded, while Luke looked back and forth between us worriedly.

"Zion, you said you could remove the miasma, right?"

I sighed. Of course the redhead would catch onto that. "Not without doing more harm than good at the moment. It would slow us down way too much."

Luke scowled. "Then is there some way we could spread the miasma out between the three of us?"

"Luke, that's a foolish idea," Van started.

"No! Listen!" Luke argued. "Kairi said something in the abandoned factory about her liver and kidney, and I thought Asch said something about her lungs later. If we have to move fast, then I really think we should spread out the miasma so we can minimize the damage."

"Luke."

"No, Van. He's right," I interrupted. "There's only so much damage the miasma can do in the time we plan to take to deal with the sephiroth... We'd have to teach Luke a little about programming, but splitting the load like this really would be the best course of action."

Van crossed his arms. "There are eight sephiroth. It's not going to be an even split."

"The Absorption and Radiation Gates will likely emit more seventh fonons than the other six. If that's the case, you and I will each take one. But Luke... Your replica body may not stand up to the strain as well as Van's or mine. You'll only take two."

"This is the second one Master Van's had to do."

"You can take Meggiora Highlands."

"I note how I'm getting very little say in this all of a sudden," Van commented. I chuckled.

"That's what happens when you drag around your former superior and an impressionable replica." Van rolled his eyes and strode past us, heading back up to the Zao Ruins. Despite the heat in the desert and the ruins, the sephiroth itself was a haven... "Hey, we've been walking all night. Any chance we could take a break while we're still down here?"

Van glanced back at me, then at Luke, before sighing. "Alright. We'll stay down here until it's dark outside. Luke, why don't we work a little more on your footing while Zion sets up camp?"

I crossed my arms. "You know, if it's his footing he's having problems with, I'd probably do him more good than you would. Besides, you need to rest."

Luke nodded. The moment I'd said Van needed to rest, he had sided with me, even though I knew he'd rather learn from Van. The man in question rolled his eyes and held out his hand, and I handed over my wing pack. He'd been too lazy to bother packing up everything for camping in his own, and we'd pretty much kidnapped Luke, so I'd ended up carrying everything.

Once Van had started setting up our camp, I pulled Luke off to the side and we started sparring.

Van had never originally intended to use the replica Luke as anything other than a scapegoat. He had needed the original Luke, Asch. He hadn't bothered to push Luke the way he had Asch. He hadn't raised Luke to be as strong as Asch.

We were desperately trying to correct that mistake now. It was obvious that Asch had lost all faith in Van and would never consent to be used for his hyperresonance. He would never help Van, even if Kairi were to die. So we had to settle for Luke.

Luke, who wanted nothing more than to be acknowledged as an equal. Luke, who wanted companions who were not servants or politicians. Luke... who I had every intention of turning against not only Van, but Kairi and Asch.

"Who are you?!"

I looked up and crossed my arms, more to hide my shock than anything else. "Rhunön. You're supposed to be in the Northern Forest," I said slowly.

Hawk-like eyes landed on me, and the woman smirked. "Of course I am. But I was bored. So I've got A009 watching over things while I'm bothering you."

I couldn't help it. I face-palmed.

Luke and Van stared at me, probably surprised that I would use such an immature method of showing my displeasure. Of course. Things couldn't just be simple, could they?

"Go bother your brother."

"He's after a target."

"Then find Danté."

"He's also after a target."

"Seth?"

"I think he's bothering Flick. Or making out with her. You know, with those two, I'm never quite sure."

I groaned. "Go away."

"Hmm... Nah."

Van chuckled, and I sighed. "Yeah, yeah, laugh it up. Luke, ignore her," I ordered, spinning my scythe around and praying that Rhunön would just go away.

It was unlikely, but I could be optimistic once in a while.

Wait!

I blocked Luke's incoming strike, then shoved him away. "Hang on." Luke stopped and looked at me curiously, while I turned to Rhunön, a small smirk forming on my face.

"What's the next K designation?"

"K013. Why?"

I chuckled and waved Rhunön over to chat.

Fun Fact: Heh, heh... Sorry, Zion. One of those plans isn't going to work out quite the way you want it to. Still... It's amusing to watch Zion lose his cool. Rhunön drives him up a wall.