"While we have much to offer the inquisitive mind, we were trying to stop the person behind the sky's changing, and that person has since fled." Keaton replies neutrally.
"Hmm. Well did said person learn here?"
::They won't be pissed once you tell them...
Let's land and I'll port us back.::
::The inherent advantage of bringing good news for a change.::
After taking a moment to catch her breath they teleport back to the school and quickly head to the hall outside the workshop.
"Mom, Dad...okay you're probably gonna be a little bit mad at me, but just keep listening until the end before you start yelling at me. It's important. Hi, Jimmy. You should hear this too."
"So, umm, Krays and I kinda snuck out to go flying, which is the part I think you won't like, especially since I um...had issues with high altitude. I never did before, but that's beside the point. The point is why I was flying that high to begin with...I saw something. Between the stars and us....The wards aren't gone. Well, they're actually a lot different now. They used to be woven into the stone and now they're more like nanites, a whole cloud of them in the upper atmosphere. And they do the same thing as the old wards, but there's strange little swirls in them that let our allies see us...I think that might have been from my trying to interfere. It has that feel to it like something that the Aschen have been messing with. The point is, whatever else Taron did, and as much as I disagree with how he did it, he didn't just leave the whole planet unprotected from discovery."
Tamrin and Aananda just look at each other for a moment.
"....Well, an hour ago I would've wondered why he ran away if that was the case. But I think I know now," he replies with an exasperated sigh.
"A small group somehow managed to get near Emperor Mezzenbone and try to assassinate him. They failed, but managed to injure him and get away. Unfortunately, those folks now have the IPSD coming after them with a vengeance. The timing on this is too close to be a coincidence..." he says, letting those words sink in for a moment.
"I've already told your mother I'm going after Taron before they can get their hands on him. But if those wards are working, that at least buys us some time to work on the other defenses just in case there's a loophole in them."
"Can you two help hold the fort down for your mom while I'm doing this?"
"Emporer who? Oh...big empire guy, got it."
"Wow. That is....epicly stupid. Why would....you know what, never mind. I'm not even going to try to wrap my head around trying to understand any of why Taron does what he does these days. Yeah, Dad, don't worry, we got this. Just you be careful too."
Ephebe nodded solemnly. "Yeah, Dad, we'll do our best. And at least you know that we're not totally unprotected here. Come home soon, preferably with Taron."
"I'll do my level best, sweety...I promise."
He pulls his two children in and gives them both a hug.
"I love both of you and I am proud as hell of what you've become and what you've done. Don't ever forget that."
He lets them go.
"Now let's get back to it," as he gives his wife one more kiss before heading back to their room to take care of one last errand before teleporting to the Harbinger and getting his search underway.
That should about do it.
Before jim is a mostly metal monstrosity. 7 inches around, it's a nearly perfect sphere with an antenna on the top. Jim commands it, testing it's maneuverability.
::Up 2 feet, 3.5 inches. Left 2.678 meters. Down 1 Attoparsec. Right 7 inches. Land. All systems check out.::
The homunculus performs flawlessly, extending small legs upon landing. In an incredibly robotic voice, it speaks: What next?
Wait.
Parsecs are used in astronomy to measure enormous interstellar distances. A parsec is approximately 3.26 light-years or about 3.085×1016 m (1.917×1013 mi). Combining it with the "atto-" prefix yields attoparsec (apc), a conveniently human-scaled unit of about 3.085 centimetres (1.215 in) that has no obvious practical use. 1 attoparsec/microfortnight is nearly 1 inch/second.
"Alright. James, you and I are going to get back to work now."
"Ephebe, come on in for a sec. I want to run some tests. Altitude sickness is fairly normal, but you said you hadn't experienced that before so I think a quick scan just to make sure you're not sick, okay?"
Ephebe rolled her eyes.
"Okay, Mom. Honestly, I'm fine, but if it will make you feel better."
Suddenly looks nervous
"Is this common?"
"Well, I'm pretty sure that everything is fine, Krays, but I haven't really run any scans on her since we fixed her genetic instabilities and if she's experiencing abnormalities, I'd like to make sure it isn't anything bad. Just a precaution," she said as she directed Ephebe to stand in front of the scanner and started the program.
"Oh, that's right. You know, that might be it....although I would have expected it to go the other way what with all the positive energy.....I should have gotten less sick not more, right?"
"Okay, so it looks like everything is normal, except..." Aananda suddenly sat down as she looked at the readout.
"Great Io. And the hits just keep on coming." She looked up at Ephebe and Krays, eyes narrowed. "So. Not a conversation I want to be having with my daughter and son-in-law, but have the two of you been using protection? At all?"
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"Yes, we have. I take it you're about to tell me it was for naught..."
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"Yes, we have. I take it you're about to tell me it was for naught..."
"Yeah....that would definitely be the case. Ephebe is most definitely pregnant. With four babies. The benefits of scanning at a cellular level is that you get lost of detail."
"I'm not sure I'm ready to be a grandmother...not that it matters what I think, since in roughly fifteen months we'll be dealing with four infant dragons...."
Aananda sends a quick message to Tam as he prepares to leave the system.
::Love, this news can't exactly wait....it would seem that the source of Ephebe's altitude sickness is similar to why I always used to get sick after teleporting when I was pregnant with the triplets. We're going to be grandparents. Four babies. And yes, they did use protection. I asked. Apparently it malfunctioned. I thought you should know.::
"I need to sit down," she said, pale from the shock.
"There is no way. There is absolutely no way....this can't be happening.....FOUR?!??!!!!!"
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"Wow..."
<faints>
When Phaezeriel gets to the general magic item workshop, he sets about familiarizing himself with the facility.
"Okay," she says, handing Ephebe a paper bag, "breathe into this so you don't faint too."
She steadied Ephebe as she led her over to a chair."Let's just get you sitting down now."
Props Krays feet up and then dumps a glass of water on him.
"Hey, you okay? Heh. Bit of a surprise there huh?" he asked grinning wickedly.
Without opening his eyes...
"Water doesn't normally work on things that can breathe it..."
He opens his eyes and smiles at Jiminy
"But in this case...thanks, Uncle Jimmy."
He walks over to Ephebe and wraps his arms around her
"Four huh? We don't do anything half-assed, do we?" he gently kisses her forehead.
Ephebe gave a shaky laugh.
"No, I guess we don't. Wow."
She leaned her head against his shoulder.
"I guess we'll have to start thinking of names...so much for following Uncle Ryo's advice and waiting until after we graduate.....Grandma's going to be over the moon happy about this, you know....The timing kinda sucks, but I'm pretty sure I'll be happy about it too once I've gotten over the shock."
Phaezeriel will draw a number of supplies and a small amount of extremely pure mithral from the supplies construct and set about crafting a very small construct.
Ephebe gave a shaky laugh.
"No, I guess we don't. Wow."
She leaned her head against his shoulder.
"I guess we'll have to start thinking of names...so much for following Uncle Ryo's advice and waiting until after we graduate.....Grandma's going to be over the moon happy about this, you know....The timing kinda sucks, but I'm pretty sure I'll be happy about it too once I've gotten over the shock."
"Yeah, we tried to follow his advice. When will we know what gender they will be? We can worry about names then...
I have to say, for the time being I can be happy for the both of us...up until we bonded, I didn't think this was ever going to happen. Now I have a mate who loves me, and hat...err babies on the way. I'm glad it's with you..."
Aananda checks the readout more closely.
"Well, according to this it looks like two girls and two boys. I didn't make the scan any more detailed than that. We can always do more detailed scans later on. I think this is more than enough to take in for now."
"I have to say, for the time being I can be happy for the both of us...up until we bonded, I didn't think this was ever going to happen. Now I have a mate who loves me, and hat...err babies on the way. I'm glad it's with you..."
"I'm glad it's with you, too. I may be startled about the timing, but having a family with you...it's exactly what I want."
Vai's night passes uncomfortably, nightmares of Aegythrax and recapture pervade her dreams.
"Just a moment, my friends." Ruji says as he slips back into the house, through it's connection to the school, and into the workshop rafters.
"Like I said earlier, congratulations." He purrs done at the expectant mother. "I'm not babysitting until teach them not to grab my tail. I've had enough of that with Ryo's children."
Ephebe gasped. "Ruji...this is the secret you were referring to earlier?! But...how could you....how did you know?"
Ruji rolls over one his back and looks at Ephebe upside down.
"I'm a cat. We know things. I told you pick one, it just turns out you had four to choose from."
"You've known me since before you were born, Mrs. Blackscale. Don't look so surprised."
"Yeah....four....oh gosh. I'm not sure I can handle doing a live birth with four babies....but it's so hard to protect the eggs if we do it the normal draconic way....." She sighed. "Okay, not going to freak out about that now. We have some time to decide, so let's just not worry about that yet." she said, a bit shakily, as she tried to take a deep breath and not totally freak out.
"Wait...we have a choice of birth options?"
"Wait...we have a choice of birth options?"
"Well, yeah. At least I think so....actually, Mom might have to run some more tests. Because of the genetic changes that were made to me we might not....but I think we still do."
"Ummm...someone turned the world inside out? There are good-guy dragons who made the world and bad-guy dragons who may be coming to attack it? There's something out there in the sky...the sky just keeps going now....Nope, I sound as totally confused as I am.""That makes two of us then." Michael sighs. "I want to know how this happened, but I've got stuff to do too, like get these rocks of Anthony's analyzed and start work on his familiar. It's pretty late though... want me to walk you to your room?"
"Ummm...someone turned the world inside out? There are good-guy dragons who made the world and bad-guy dragons who may be coming to attack it? There's something out there in the sky...the sky just keeps going now....Nope, I sound as totally confused as I am.""That makes two of us then." Michael sighs. "I want to know how this happened, but I've got stuff to do too, like get these rocks of Anthony's analyzed and start work on his familiar. It's pretty late though... want me to walk you to your room?"
"Yeah, I'd like that."
Kitty held his hand as they walked to her room....and then disaster struck. Her room was completely empty. Even the door plaque was gone. Kitty blinked back tears.
"And things were going so well, too. Well, time to head to the storage unit I guess."
Except that Kitty's things weren't in the storage unit either. Tears slipped down her cheeks.
"I don't understand. It's not like I had all that much. Where did all my stuff go?"
"It's okay." Michael says as he wraps his arms around her. "We'll find your stuff. Until then you can, um, stay in my room? I'll sleep on the floor."
"Okay," she sniffled.
"I'm sorry. It's just so frustrating. And things were going so well too."
As they started walking towards Michael's room, glowing arrows started appearing ahead of them on the floor, the way they did when the school was trying to lead you somewhere. The arrows were going in the same direction they were at first, but when they were almost to Michael's room, the arrows took a turn down another hallway, stopping in front of a door with Kitty's room plaque attached.
There is an envelope taped to the door.
Kitty grabs the envelope and reads the contents. She looks up, stunned.
"It's...it's an apology note...it says they're sorry for leaving me in temporary housing for so long and this is supposed to be my room....and....and there's a class schedule. A real one."
"That's great!" Michael exclaims. "Now you don't have to sleep in my room! Oh... um, not that that would have been a problem or- Forget it, you know what I mean!"
"You realize this means I was right about you just being yourself, don't you? Now you can make all kinds of friends!" :)
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Kitty looks like she's going to cry again, but this time because she's so happy. She hugs Michael tightly. "Thank you, so much! I would never have figured it out without your help."
"I'm really looking forward to being an official student, you know. Oh, I need to look at my schedule...Looks like I still have advanced PE....and history in the afternoon.....Oooh! Care of Magical Creatures. That should be fun. And something called Natural Magic. Not sure what that's about. And culinary arts. This is a great schedule. And we still have two classes together, and it looks like study hall at the same time too!" ^.^
Kitty opened the door to her room and then just stood there in the doorway staring. The room looked a bit different than the usual dorm room. The floor was covered with tatami mats and the only furniture was a low table with pillows set around it to sit on, a dresser shaped like stairsteps that was full of drawers and cubbyholes, and a futon rolled out on the floor. Some of Kitty's calligraphy scrolls were hung on the walls and there were perches and climbing posts for Saffire.
"It's perfect."
"Amazing. They did all this in just two days?" Michael says as he looks around(and rubs his aching ribs). "People here work fast."
Kitty nodded, still stunned. "Yeah, I mean, I knew they were fast at packing stuff up, but putting down the tatami mats and everything....maybe the school's magic helped? I don't know....but I already feel less homesick with this room. It's so much like my room at home. The only thing it's missing is a bunch of siblings I have to share it with," she said with a laugh.