The group was grim, but eventually felt a bit more superior than they had before. Audeo needed no convincing, nor did any of the dragons, to understand that if left unchecked, Julian (the Baron, Foxgrove) would have continued to buy, seduce, ruin and kill whoever he wished. There was a pit filled with the skulls of such boys - Kalkin had the misfortune of having discovered his world's Renaud was doing the same.

Van and the Doc knew that there had been bodies, on their worlds. They were taken at older ages, though, not as young children. Plus it's kind of difficult to bury bodies in cement behind your house, in a popular and wealthy neighborhood. Not for lack of trying.

It became implicit that should they need to, they would continue to kill Jon as they came across him. If he didn't seem to need it, they'd get a second opinion. And if that opinion would have been from the lips of a dead Sanger, the outcome would certainly be the same.

They did almost silently agree, though, that not every one of them would be needing killing. Some of their nemesis might be too old to matter - they ran into one of those in the next world they landed upon. Some had never existed, yet their Sanger was still somehow dead. That one was a mystery that would not be solved - they didn't really need to come back to check, if there was no reason to do so.

Plus, there was an odd sense of urgency to their visits. Each world they visited, and they did half a dozen before returning to the Healing Den, they got the distinct feeling that they were missing something else. A piece of an invisible multi-dimensional puzzle.

They were good at puzzles, though. And with the Den now re-situated back outside of time, and no danger of 'aging', they sat down to figure it out. With a more concerted effort, the group of Sangers (now with the aid of the Zekiran outsider Vanya and the Twoarth-import Crazy Doc who worked at Carramba High) could sort through worldly histories and discover when their doppleganger on a world had died - if there was evidence to support that he'd been alive in the first place. Where there was no evidence of him, they searched for parents names, marriages, children, other such things that every one of them knew would have been affected.

"Jon was a full bore idiot, sometimes," said Van, coldly. "He'd completely forgotten that my family changed its name, that's how Daverin found my school records."

"That girl again?" the Crazy Doc asked. "She's just a teenager in my world." He raised a glass of wine in toast to her. "Here's to robbing the cradle."

"You stole my dragon," Kalkin muttered.

"I did not! Sixth just... likes me!" The smiling, healthy Sanger leaned back on the couch and flipped off the older rider. "Just tell him that he should bring me my own dragon next time he visits." Muttering with a grin, he added, "drag me away from my classroom to come here, anyway, what a dragon."

"I'm sure we can arrange that," Kalkin said. "We're going to send some away to Vaun, right?" The others nodded, "there's no reason not to think you can't find your own. The way these dragons breed here I'm surprised Engell's flits didn't just find one for you already."

"Your Engell is better than mine, then," Vanya muttered. "Well, when mine was alive, anyway." They all shared a moment of silence for his departed bastard employer - one who'd been dead for more than some million years they didn't want to think about. Then they had a bit more to drink.

They did save one of their own on that trip. He was currently still in a coma in the infirmary, tended by Baeris and the other local healers. This would be the best place for him to recover - his world was all but dead itself, ravaged by dust storms and radiation. He would not be returning to it, but he might some day be placed among another population.

The group of them plotted out a complicated tour of duty, trading off the lead role as they could. Since the Den was 'relative to itself' in time, Baeris had to keep reminding them what things had gone on in their absences. Other worlds had held flights, there were births, deaths of others. No one bothered to die on the Den, of course, Baeris would hardly let that happen on her watch.

She was given the duty of deciding where to send anyone if they were rescued. To Vaun she would be sending messages on and off, tendrils of executive nature, to try and see where might the best dragons be found to play in his world.

On and off, then, for the next few months, this group of men came and went. Sometimes they arrived battered and tired, others with a precious new companion. More often they just came home sad or grumpy. Cynonix ducked out after a while, claiming that his wife needed more attention than this. With her Falas Gold and his beautiful brown together, they knew that was right. With the exception of Kalkin claiming Baeris as his own, and perhaps Lucas - Audeo giving him a cute blushing look when he said it - with his Lennuv, dragon mate, the others were unattached. Crazy Doc Sanger of Carramba muttered about his tenure being on hold while he was here, until Kalkin pointed out that he'd just be returning right back to when he was snatched away. Maybe he'd even get to meet himself on the return journey.

"Or maybe I'll just get Gabriel to come along next time," he said.

"You still holding on to that angel?" Vanya of Zekira asked with a grin.

"Are you still holding on to your memories of Zekira?" Crazy Doc replied, and that silenced the extra-tall extra-dark Sengihr.

And off they went again.

***

Though they played against the statistics, they were still running about one in five. The dimension they came to this time had a tint of darkness to it, like others, but they were not so desperate to locate their Sanger here - he came right to them. Somewhat like Vaun, this tall and black proud feline-man was not the meek speedy cheetah kin that they had gotten used to. In this world, Lord Sengihr was the first of his kind and still had been altered by forces beyond his control. He was a heavily built black panther, with a long tail and short thick fur, his hair done in loose long dredlocks. His eyes were as fiercely blue as the rest, and that was how they knew this was one of their own. Always changed from what he ought to be.

However at least in this world, he'd been offered up to the feline gods to protect a group of people that knew they would never survive the influx of the white man from the north. That white man finally did arrive, but Sengihr was ready for them. He hid his village, wrapped it in illusion and spells learned from ancient texts.

With a bit of illusion cast upon himself, Lord Sengihr was a stunning broad-bodied black man, from the heart of 14th century Africa. But he had a mad on for someone, a particular man who had done his family grievous harm. A vampire, of all things, that had bitten his daughter and left her for dead - she'd never awakened in over two hundred years, nor had she died. Her pale figure lay in the village all that time, preserved with magics and kept from harm by other spells. How such a dark man could have sired such a pale alabaster skinned girl was a mystery.

"You could help find him," Sengihr asked, "I would be greatly in your debt."

"Is he blonde?" Asked Crazy Doc, and Lord Sengihr laughed.

"As a matter of fact, he is. A tall skinny rake of a vampire. He goes by the name Spike. If you ever see him, he lives in California last I heard." The furry skinned Sengihr shrugged. "I do not hold much hope of finding him." He needed the vampire alive, in order to take back his daughter's life force. After that, he did not intend the night creature any further harm. As long as they stayed away from the Hidden Ones, they would be fine.

"Didn't Ivo once say something about a guy named Spike?" Asked Doc Sanger. "I swear the name's familiar."

"He gets around, but I doubt very much that this one and yours are the same." Lord Sengihr said. His accent was an oddly thick combination of Dutch and Africaans, his own village's language buried by centuries of neglect. "Vampires are despicable things, though. They taint the world."

"Or the world taints them," said Izzy. "I don't doubt that we'll wind up finding one of us as a vampire."

They left Lord Sengihr to his hunt, providing him with a teleport lift on dragon back to a place that Ivo and Istvan had certainly spoken of - Sunnydale California. Then, they were off yet again.

***

Yet again, they had narrowly missed their window of opportunity. Baeris warned them that their bad timing was only worse with all of them worried about it. The young man they brought to the Den the last day was a frail shadow of what he could have been, shaking and toxified by the drug coctail that he'd been forced to endure in the moments before the group of Sangers had rescued him. It was halfway doubtful that he would survive, but with the comforts of a bed, no confining chains, and a woman with the sweet low voice of Baeris Kshau, he would do as well as he could be expected.

The other of their kind was still sick, perhaps dying of radiation poisoning. He could hardly fight it when any of them would lift his head and force him to drink. It was a grim day indeed when he passed, but the day grew brighter when the other, Vinh, rose to thank them for getting him out.

He'd found someone's clothing, and since 'someone' in the den was at least 10% "A Sanger" that meant they not only fit him pretty well, but they looked good to boot. Vinh was quite young, not yet 16. He was a bit more yellowy than caucasian, and that was due to the whole world being a bit more "asian" in theme. Yet his Julian was blond, just as before. Dangerous. Vinh still had the short cut hair that told Izzy he'd been given the 'treatments' recently. He wondered absently if Vinh's eyes were going to turn black or what.

Vinh stood unsteadily in the doorway of Kalkin's office, where several Sangers were trying to piece together another journey map. Earlier in the day they'd all seen him stirring and listening in to what they'd had to say about the dead one - they didn't even really know his name. But Vinh put two and two together just as well as any of them could. He knew who they were talking about, the name wasn't the same but it was certain who they all meant.

The man was a menace in any universe.

"I want to go with you," Vinh asserted. "When I'm strong enough. I want that bastard to pay."

"That's the way," Kalkin said. "Now, you are supposed to be in bed. I know it's boring. You can help find others, while you're there. I'll bring you a laptop."

Vinh looked at him oddly, and Kalkin realized that his world didn't have computers or television technology yet.

***

The ride to this oddly empty place gave the elder Lucas, Vanya and Kalkin willies. It was so familiar to others among them too, but they couldn't say why. Izzy pointed and called out, "there is the destination," and they circled downward.

The hard white line of a freeway came clearly into view. There were a few cars on it, speeding along. Crossing roads in black asphalt gave a grid feel to the place. The land was all but entirely devoid of landmarks. Except for what Izzy had called the Castle. Crazy Doc's on both sides of a dragon let their hearts sink into their gut.

"We can't go down there," one of them pointed out. "They're very heavily armed."

"It's a well-defended area," Izzy replied.

"It's not a castle, Istvan," yelled the genrehopper Van, "it's a prison!"

Only after they had flown all this way above the empty fields which were tended by the prisoners of this federal lockup, could they see the outline of the barbed wire fencing, doubled with five or six feet between outer and inner gates, the road leading out to the freeway with guards blocking not only exit and entrance but any other accidental entry... Guard posts suddenly came to life when they came into view as a group.

"What now!?" Yelled Kalkin. Oddly he lost his cool first. "We can't go down there!"

We can, Sixth asserted mentally, suddenly taking the initiative to quiet down his rider. Abruptly, with a headache the size of Canada, Kalkin shut the hell up and obeyed. We can sense him too you know.

"I know, I know..." Kalkin said with a weak voice. A bit of blood exited his nostril, it was almost like he'd had a stroke or blown a gasket. Sixth was normally much more careful about his rare mental contact.

"Well what are we doing, then?" Vanya of Zekira said calmly. "They appear to be arming themselves and drawing targets."

"Then we -" Lucas started but Sixth and the other mostly-Pernese dragons gave their answer.

In unison, they bellowed loudly and went into a formation. With graceful firey Audeo in the lead, followed by the two smallest blues Sixth and Ruarth, then Cephari and Fennryth marking the edges of their wedge. Genrehopping Van was with Vanya on Ruarth, and luckily Lucas had chosen to come in human form aback Audeo. Crazy Doc of Carramba clung to Fennryth with his otherworldly namesake.

The formation seemed to get the guards to pause. Rather than trying to shoot these magnificent creatures, they were more set on watching them. As were the many prisoners who came to stand in awe in the courtyard. Their basketball game forgotten, the weights in one's hand simply clanging to the ground and rolling gently away...

"He's not down there," Carramba's Doc said. "Where is he?"

He is inside. But we are asking for him to come out now. Ruarth relayed to him.

"What?" The Doc asked, and Talon's Sanger shrugged and eagerly waited the answer.

We are asking the protectors, the guards, to bring him to us. They will obey. They all want to know what the 'big deal' is. Fennryth said. Are we a big deal?

"Of course you are," Talon's Sanger laughed. The group swept around the wide courtyard and then one by one dropped carefully to the pavement. Lucas, Kalkin and Vanya of Zekira held back, knowing that they did not have the expertise to handle this situation.

Cephari and Izzy remained in the air.

"Come on," Lucas said.

"I cannot," Izzy said, and even from below they could see how wide his blackened eyes were. He was terrified of this place. He'd been in too close an approximate while being used by his nemesis, apparently. Why then hadn't he realized what he was looking at when they chose this spot? Wishful thinking?

"Don't worry about Istvan now," Vanya of Zekira said quietly. "They've brought him."

Van and the two Crazy Docs stood carefully near one another, the dragons protectively watching the guards. Not a word was being said by anyone, except perhaps the dragons and those people inside who had only heard the tremendous bellowing that the dragons did while performing their aerial show. A trio of uniformed guards came through a set of double doors, and were followed by a cadre of men. Young and old alike, mostly with the gang scars and tough looks that a federal prison inhabitant might have. One stood out.

He raised his head in curiosity, and while he was not as impeccably clean or neat as the other Sangers on this journey he certainly carried himself with the same pride and bearing. He walked with a slight limp in his left leg, more carrying himself with the ease of one whose pain only served to remind him he was alive.

"To what do we owe this honor?" Asked one of the guards, someone whose rank would probably have gone unnoticed had the behavior of the inmates been ignored. They backed away - this was perhaps the warden?

"You are not the recipient of the honor, sir," Van said with a faint smile. "We simply needed to know whether he was all right, or not." With a nod, and a clearly met eye contact, Van smiled broadly. "And now we know."

"I'd like to know what the hell those things are doing, and they'd best not be on the fences." The warden said, beginning to bluster. Carramba's Crazy Doc took care of him with a disarming smile. They walked together to make sure that the dragons tails weren't tangled with the wires, and for a little pep talk about who would give orders: the people with the dragons, or the people with the guns that the dragons would ignore?

While they did so, Van and the other Doc watched as their doppleganger came closer. He was older, perhaps in his fifties, but like the rest time wasn't wearing as hard on him as it might have otherwise. He had no scars, wore no shirt and only had on the greyish green pants that inmates wore. He watched these men with interest, obviously, and allowed his gaze to wander over the dragons.

"So, you have to know how I fare? And why would you need to do that?" He sighed, "No one has been interested in my welfare so far." His eyes held that betrayal clearly, but as they all did: he held hope.

"We are, wouldn't you be?" Asked Talon's Doc. Behind them, Vanya muttered, "three, two, one-"

"You're all me?" The inmate Sanger said, half incredulous and half laughing. "Well that solves a lot of problems about the universe doesn't it. And brings up a whole lot more."

"We do have one question, since you seem to be in pretty good shape for being in prison and all," Genrehopping Van said. "Where is he?"

Again, they heard the faint, "three, two-"

"Ah - he's here. Got himself caught molesting a senator's son of all things. Got sloppy. And old." The inmate turned and made a little motion with his hand, and two of the other prisoners glanced at the guards, who let them go back into the building. "I told them chemical sterilization wouldn't work on him. His problems are far deeper than a little testosterone."

"No shit," half the Sangers muttered.

"And here he is," said the inmate, with a gentle smile filled with irony. "Tell these gentlemen what you did, Jon, to get here?"

"Fuck you," the old blond man spat. He was certainly worse for wear here - what would have been a golden crew cut had grown shaggy and greyish, and he had a certain kind of pained way of standing that told all of the Sangers that he'd sustained internal injuries that weren't healing well. It was clear that his shoulder had been broken some time in the recent past, and his Sanger approached that side of him with a slightly menacing look on his face. All the communication in the world went past their eyes - angry algae and clouds, brilliant and superior peacock blue. "I forgot you didn't die," he said at last.

It was pretty clear that this situation was handled - well. But there was always the question to ask.

"Would you like to come with us?" Asked Vanya, who'd come forward to watch the spectacle of Jon being harrassed by a batch of ninteen year old hoodlums. "Come away from here and be free?"

With a start, the prisoner blinked and eyed them oddly. "No, oh, no. I have no need for that." He looked back at Jon with a faintly pitying gaze. "No, I intend to watch him die, and after that I can sleep again. Where better to do that than under a provided roof? I cannot go back to my work, you certainly know that," he shrugged a bit and adjusted his stance.

"What happened to your leg?" Asked Van.

"He broke my hip last month. It's almost healed. You must know how that goes." He smiled widely, and then looked up sharply at the boy on his white and blue dragoness. "What is he doing? He just vanished and came back. You can do that?"

"Where'd he go?" Talon's Doc asked.

"Look," Vanya said nodding, "he's brought an egg."

"An... egg?" The Inmate said. "What for? One of those?" He glanced quickly at the dragons on the ground, who perked up at the arrival. "Surely they don't come in eggs small enough to carry?"

"No - it looks like a flitter egg, of some kind." Said Lucas, approaching since the inmates seemed able to keep their hands to themselves and the dragons hardly needed his protection. Finally Cephari came to join her companions and allow Izzy to walk. He came to the slightly taller inmate, and could hardly raise his eyes without the rest of him shaking.

"This is for you - I always wanted a pet, and he wouldn't let me have one. He beat that out of me. But you can probably use it." He said. He passed off the darkly colored egg the prisoner, and practically ran back to his drak.

The others were about as stunned as the inmate was - but like the rest of them, he too adjusted to this idea quickly. "I was told never to have a pet because I was a bit cruel to them as a child," he quipped, "but I suppose I can grow out of that."

"He's timed this perfectly, Baeris doesn't know what she's talking about," Kalkin said, "that egg's about to hatch."

"Is it?" The intended owner said.

"What is that thing?" Asked one of his group of fellows. "It's an egg?"

"It is my egg," he reminded the younger man, though his voice was far from harsh. He had the start of a wide smile on his face. The younger inmate gave an exhasperated huff, but remained near his Sanger. "And it is hatching."

Even the guards wanted to see this. For the moment, no one was worried about who outranked whom, merely who was close enough to get a good glimpse of what came from that shell. While they did so, Kalkin's own flits (who rarely accompanied him on these journeys since he was running so much they preferred to remain home with Striker and the others) came to the quick rescue with a batch of half-tossed meat. They abruptly left, when every eye in the place went to them.

"We don't allow pets," said one guard gruffly, trying to establish some kind of order. "What'll you be feeding that thing? It's gobbling that meat up like it's going out of style."

"Go to hell," their Sanger said. "I don't eat much and you know it. I'll just share." He examined the Rukel closer, "Look at that. It's got wings. Four of them? Is that normal?"

"For a Rukel, it's acceptable," said Kalkin. "Baeris has one, and it only looks the same on the surface. That's a cute one."

"Wait," Vanya said, "did he steal her egg?"

"No, Savannah's never nested. Might have headed all the way to Darkling Dawn for it." Kalkin said.

"Her," the inmate said, eyes faintly glazed over. "It's a she." She barely fit into his cupped hand, deeply violet and blue. "Violetta," he said, uncharacteristically misty. That elicited a collective set of whining and mockery from the other inmates, but they raised not one hand at him as he gently scratched the little rukel's furry neck. If anything, they all wanted to cuddle with her. "Thank you," he said, quietly but certain that Izzy would hear him.

They always heard. He knew, he could hear Jon's annoyingly irregular heartbeat in the common room more than eighty yards away and through two sets of doors. Why shouldn't he expect this other 'him' to hear something as simple as that?

The group parted company with this world, faintly certain that they'd be here again.