Bleh... So not enjoying work right now...

Also... I'm not sure what Riku was up to, but blame him for Reighn's line. Though the context of Kairi's second line is a bit... worrying. True, sadly, but worrying regardless.

"Not my fault you're all unobservant. Anise found him." –Kairi

"You wanted one, didn't you?" –Reighn

"Then you really don't want to hear some of what comes out of my head." –Kairi

Chapter 10.5 – Divergent
Part 88

We made camp in Tataroo Valley that night, and I must admit, that was the best night's sleep I'd gotten in a while. I supposed it helped that Van was actually dead this time. We had a body, we could prove it, and that meant there was no worrying about him coming back from the Core with Lorelei trapped inside his body.

When I woke up the next morning, it was to find a blue-haired man standing over me. I smiled.

"Long time, no see."

Reighn gave me an apologetic look as he helped me to my feet. We walked off a ways so as not to disturb the others. It was still quite early, after all. "Sorry. I finally got things straightened out with Aerith. I'm officially the Head of Aurelius... So I came out here for a few reasons. First, to see if you guys had gotten around to looking in the archives yet, and also... Well, I hadn't realized that the entire Aurelius library of forbidden fonic artes had been copied and then placed here. Actually, if what I've found out in the past few days is correct, then there are two more stashes on Auldrant. One's under Rugnica, and I think Dark mentioned it before, so I'm going to pick his brain, and the other—"

"Hey, why don't you save most of this conversation for when the others wake up, huh?"

Reighn paused, then gave me a rather sheepish smile. "Sorry. I guess I was rambling a bit." I nodded with a knowing smile. "So, am I to assume you guys are the ones responsible for the clouds suddenly seeming to rise a few miles?"

I laughed. "Yeah. We lowered the Outer Lands into the Qliphoth, using the dividing line to push the miasma back down into the core. It'll hold... for now."

"For now?"

I paused, glanced at Reighn, and decided I'd waited long enough. "I've lied to you long enough. I should have told you sooner, but... well, we got a bit distracted."

Reighn looked curious now, and I sat down, gesturing for him to do the same.

Two hours later, the sun rose over Tataroo Valley to reveal four things.

Me, doing what I often do when I've got nothing better to do in the morning (practicing with my sword, though I was a bit unused to using Silver Clematis for that).

The Albiore II dropping down toward the largest part of the clearing, where the Albiore III already sat.

Luke and Seth working on making breakfast (they quickly dragged Guy and Sync over to help when they spotted the incoming airship).

And a still shell-shocked Reighn.

Jade and Asch were the first two off of the Albiore II, and Asch immediately made a beeline to me, though I noted that he actually stopped just on the edge of my perception and made no move to interrupt me. Odd. He usually doesn't hesitate to make some snide comment on my footwork... or the fact that my eyes are closed.

Jade headed over to the fire to help out with making breakfast. Dark and Natalia were the next ones off the ship, with Natalia walking toward the fire and Dark heading for me. Flick and Selenia followed him, while Sorylle padded after Natalia. Anise stepped off, did a lot of looking around, and finally decided that she was just going to hover around for a while... At least until she spotted Reighn and went over to bother him. Noelle came out and ran over to Ginji, sitting down next to him and chattering excitedly.

I noted all of this with my ears and what I could identify of where people were using the light telepathic field I'd laid down. My telepathy was strengthening again. Soon, I'd be back to where I was before Mirage had been created.

One last flourish, and then I let Silver Clematis return to its splintered form on my arm as I turned to look at my audience. More specifically, the three who weren't Asch. "You said you had an arte you needed named?"

The three nodded, though with varying levels of enthusiasm. Dark's was a short jerk of the head, Selenia bounced her head a couple of times, and Flick nodded enough to get the bells on the ends of the chopsticks in her hair jangling for a couple minutes. Asch was apparently as amused by this as I was.

"Okay. Lemme see."

The minute Flick launched the red and black wings of light, I knew exactly what I was looking at, and I froze up for a moment before glancing at Dark. "Yours is indigo, isn't it?" I asked Dark. He nodded, more slowly this time, obviously surprised. I turned to Selenia. "And yours are the same dark blue as your Angel Feathers wings."

She looked a bit confused. "How did you...?"

I looked over at Flick again. "What did you call it?"

She looked sheepish. "Black Wings... Even though they've always been more red than black, it just seemed like it fit at the time."

I sighed. "You got it damn close. The arte's called DelQues. It can be translated as 'Black Wings', but the meaning in this case is actually 'Wings of Destruction.' Never thought I'd see it here though..." This last part was muttered, but I think all four of them heard it anyway.

Dark and Asch gave me curious looks, while Selenia looked suspicious, and Flick just looked totally baffled.

Dark nudged my field. *Are you talking about an arte on another world? Or... I guess, from another game?*

*Yeah... Another Tales game, at that... Tales of Legendia... Then again, the entirety of Selenia's base arte set is from Tales of Symphonia, with Angel Feathers being an arte basically unique to that game, so I suppose I shouldn't be so surprised. You've also already pulled out Sacrifice, which I've only ever seen in Tales of Symphonia so far,* I replied.

"DelQues, huh? I like it. It's got a nice ring to it..." Flick said. "DelQues..."

I gave her a curious look. "Have you made a field of fonons transformation for it yet? Because I'm pretty sure there's also ZelDelQues, Wings of Slaughter."

Flick grinned. "Whoo! Project!" She then ran off, apparently to find some monsters to kill in an attempt at creating the second level of it. I rolled my eyes.

"Kids..."

"Well, she is only a year old, roughly. Give her a little slack."

I froze. "What?"

Dark nodded. "Sixteen months."

"Damn. She'd have been born just a couple months before I met Kairi..." Asch said.

"Hey! If you're done standing around chatting, breakfast's ready! And why didn't you tell us Reighn was here?!" Natalia yelled. Sync, Ion, Luke, Seth, and Guy gave me the exact same look Natalia and Jade were giving me, and I grinned.

"What? He beat us here, was standing nearby when I woke up, so since it was early and we had nothing else to do I decided to tell him something and I kinda short-circuited his brain, so I was gonna leave him be until he got that fixed up. Not my fault you're all unobservant. Anise found him."

"And that means what, exactly?" Anise asked. I shrugged, not wanting to grace that question with an answer. Far too loaded a question for safety.

Asch chuckled, amused by my silent response. The four of us walked over to the fire.

"So where did Flick race off to?" Seth asked.

"Apparently she's off to work on an arte," I said, sitting down and accepting a plate of food with a thank you before digging in. I frowned as I worked on eating. "Hey, do you think you could teach me?" I asked. Dark shrugged.

"Why not? I'm actually a bit curious now to see what yours will look like."

Everyone gave us baffled looks, and I smiled. "Oh, they just found out something interesting about an arte of Flick's... The same one she just ran off to experiment with."

Natalia blinked a few times. "Are you talking about the color and shape differences?"

I nodded. "I kinda wanna see what mine looks like now."

Jade and Asch looked interested, and I guessed it was because they'd been with Dark, Flick, and Selenia at the Absorption Gate but didn't know what we were talking about.

Reighn nodded. "That, and..." He reached into the bag on the ground next to him and started rooting around in it, leaving his breakfast half-eaten in his lap. Then he pulled out not one, but five scrolls. He unrolled one, then rolled it back up and shoved it back in the bag before rooting around again and pulling out an identical one. This time, when he rolled it back up after checking it, he was smiling.

"That's for you," he said, holding it out toward Jade, who accepted it warily. He grabbed the next one, checked this, and handed it off to Seth. "For you..." Seth was just as wary as Jade, who hadn't quite dared to open the scroll yet.

The next person he held a scroll out for was me, and, being as curious as ever, I took it and immediately unrolled it. I'd finished eating, anyway...

I didn't notice right off which two he handed the other two scrolls off to. I was too busy staring at what he'd given me.

"You wanted one, didn't you?" Reighn asked, sounding amused.

"Yeah, but... I didn't expect you to just hand it to me at random like this... Isn't this the one you used in Daath?"

Reighn nodded. "That scroll's got a second one on it, too..."

I unrolled it a bit further, and found that Reighn was correct. The second one made me smirk. "Some say the world will end in fire, some say in ice..." And dammit, Mom watched the Twilight movies too much if I'd memorized that poem from hearing it read aloud in Breaking Dawn Pt. 1.

Reighn chuckled as Asch leaned away from me. I rolled my eyes at him and started reading the information on Final Embrace.

Apparently my reciting of the first two lines of a Robert Frost poem had piqued Jade's curiosity, and he looked at his own scroll.

Had I been paying attention, I'd have seen the incredulous look on his face instead of hearing about it later.

Reighn's laughter was what brought me up out of my reading again, and I glanced around. Jade, and Seth, and me... Selenia had been given a scroll, too, and Dark had one. Dark looked a bit exasperated, while the other three looked like kids let loose in a candy shop.

Yes, even Jade.

"So, is this acceptable for a 'sorry for ditching you guys like that' token?" Reighn asked, the smirk on his face telling me he cared little either way.

Judging from the chuckles around the campfire, the others agreed.

Dark then looked up as Flick walked back over, looking a bit sheepish. "Ah... If I'd realized you guys were about to eat, I'da waited until later to take off..."

Luke chuckled and held out a plate. "We saved you some anyway."

She grinned. "Thanks!"

"So, what was that thing you were muttering about fire and ice?" Ion asked. I grimaced.

"Something I heard around my mom way too many times, if I can still recite it from memory."

Jade chuckled. "I get the feeling it's longer."

I nodded. "Some say the world will end in fire, some say in ice. From what I've tasted of desire, I side with those who favor fire. But if the world should perish twice, I know enough of hate, to say that for destruction, ice, is also great, and would suffice."

"That's dark..." Anise murmured. I smirked.

"Then you really don't want to hear some of what comes out of my head."

"I've still got a certain someone's poem from back on the Tartarus hanging in a frame in my room at Curtiss Manor," Jade said. I rolled my eyes.

"Of course that's pretty dark. They were trying to start a war."

"I'm still grateful you showed up... though given your track record with uniforms, I think it may be best if you start avoiding those," Jade said.

Reighn snorted. "Uh, yeah... Did you tell him about the conversation we had last time we were here?" he asked, giving me a look. I shook my head.

"Nah. Been a bit distracted. Though Cantabile says she's gonna borrow my frying pan to remind you exactly why it's a bad idea. I'm not sure how she's gonna get ahold of it, though, short of cutting my arm off."

Reighn looked caught between concern and amusement. "Right... Thanks for the warning, at least."

Asch and Sync were giving us wary looks. "Ahem... What part of this conversation have we obviously missed?" Asch asked. Dark smirked.

"Kairi's going back to Daath with you guys."

"No," Asch said immediately.

"Yup!" I said cheerfully.

Sync gave me a look. "You have a track record that says you really shouldn't."

"Hey, I got in and out last time without any problems! And most of it was Van's fault anyway," I argued. Then I spotted the shit-eating grin on Dark's face and threw a nearby rock. I was careful to throw wide, but he ducked anyway. "You're gonna have your hands full too, Colonel."

Reighn raised an eyebrow. "Okay, I must have missed this. When did that happen?"

"When Mohs got permanently kicked out of Baticul," Sync said. "So, wait, who's going where after this?"

I shrugged. "Well, it's you, me, Asch, Luke, Reighn, Ion, and Anise bound for Daath for sure..." I glanced around.

"I'm going back to Malkuth. I think I've stayed hidden in Kimlasca for long enough," Guy said. Jade nodded.

"Yes, and I need to go back to Grand Chokmah as well. With the Outer Lands lowered now, the citizens of St. Binah should be back in the city rebuilding soon, so I'll assume Selenia is coming with us," he said. Selenia nodded.

"Natalia and I need to go back to Baticul... Luke, Asch, are you sure you both want to go to Daath?" Dark asked. Luke nodded.

"Yeah. I already talked to Father about it, too."

"What about you, Tear?" Anise asked.

"I'll go to Daath with you. I need to return to Yulia City—the Yulia Road's the fastest route that won't involve one of the pilots going out of their way," she said.

Flick and Seth exchanged looks. "We'll go on foot from here," she said. "We've been talking about what we want to do once this was over and until we figure it out, we're just gonna wander..." Seth nodded.

"What about Florian?" Ion asked suddenly. Dark chuckled.

"We'll send him to Daath with whoever drops us off," he said.

Jade sighed. "Now that that's done..." He turned to Reighn. "You brought us here for a reason."

Fun Fact: I had the scene with Kairi and her Robert Frost moment planned out for weeks. Then I go to write it. Guess what Mom's watching just loud enough that I can hear it? Breaking Dawn Pt. 1. So I can hear that poem being read aloud as I type the beginning of that scene. –facepalms- That was just... Urk.