To no one in particular, the orange-haired beauty declares, "I'm gonna find you, Susie, you can't run off on me that easily." Her voice wobbles, and she finally bursts into tears.

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For the first time in years, Susan Kiwirana digs her father's credit card from the deep folds of her jacket. The thing is shiny, new. A plastic chip with infinite possibilities behind it. It's hideous. She approaches an info teller, having wandered down to a string of buildings that sold travel-opportunities. Portals. A ticket out of here for a while. She swipes the card through the archaic keypad, presses a few buttons. Destinations pop up, holographic, above the pad. She drags a few of them into close attention, while the others fade to near obscurity.

Nexus worlds. Some of them look about as high-tech as Star City. Some of them look like magical get-aways. Some of them look about as prehistoric as any civilized world can get. No net, technological or magical... she wants away from that, anyways. She summons Darkling Dawn into singular attention, and skims over the ratings that various reporters have given it. Back of beyond. Half way between any world and hear. Built out of a frigging mountain-face.

Perfect.

Susan swipes her card again, looking over her shoulder and rubbing her hand over her nose. Orange eyes scan for some physical presence. She feels watched. Knows it's electronic, not personal. Hates it. "Well, fuckers, you know where I'm going, now. See y'fuckin' there," she grabs the chip that spews from a slot beneath the keypad, clenches it beneath knobby fingers. Gives the electronic teller one last look, and sets out to find the portal that will take her away from all of this.

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"Darkling Dawn?" A message pops up on the screen of Marie's phone. "But why there?" No answer, of course. There's only the two words sitting on her phone, courtesy of her father. A direction to start in. Not the best direction, considering there's nothing to do there, save maybe scoop herdbeast dung and stare at the giant dragons... but she didn't care for the former, and the latter was only amusing for so long. No parties. No shops. Hick-weyr. She has absolutely no idea why her sister would want to go to such a place. No click of understanding, or even the beginnings of comprehension that her sister just wants to escape. Just confusion. Determination. A packing of bags ensues.

"Fine, Susie. If you're going to run off to someplace boring, I'll just have to follow you. I'm not coming unprepared, though." She makes a cute face at the bag she's packing, the folds of cloth, the neatly tucked in bag of powder--staple of travel, now that it's been made legal. Marie giggles as she realizes: this could be fun. Played right, at least. It's like childhood. Little-Susan runs off, Little-Marie finds her. Hide and seek. More wide-sweeping, but still the same. Her phone buzzes again, and Marie flicks it open. Her ticket is waiting at Daddy's house.

She's on her way.

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Susan feels out of place in the massive, stone cavern. The lighting is wrong, the air feels anti-sterile, moist and unusual. Where is the fluorescence?

She's arrived during a hatching, of all things. Found herself in the hatching cavern, she'd taken a seat as the first egg split. Sitting beside a pair of girls, both look native, or at least more native then she feels.

The first egg splits open, and a bronze dragonet spills over the sands. It noses around, ignoring the row of candidates. Susan, against her will, finds herself entranced. Any dragon at home would have made a beeline for someone--at least, from what she knows. This little sucker would have been dead. But no, it wanders about, fading from attention as a few green dragonets escape their egg-shaped prisons.

The pair of girls beside her shriek as one of the greens stops before a little mutty boy. the Gypsy/Rastafarian-girl jumps up and down, squeeling her head off and clinging to the ox-girl, who grins and joins in on the noise making. Susan grimaces and rubs her head. Fucking fangirls, or what?

"He did it! He bonded a dragon, and the first one to do it, too!"

"Well, he is your brother, what do you expect?"

"Nothing less--well, he should have gotten a bronze--"

"I can't see Apax on a bronze..."

"Neither can I!" Insane Braids cackles, holds Butch by one hand and finally sighs. "I wonder what he'll shorten his name to?"

Butch: "A'ax?"

"No, that sounds funny."

"A'pa?"

Braids cackles again. "Are you kidding me?"

"Maybe P'ax."

"Oh, I like that."

"Get the fuck out of the way, you two, you're blocking the hatching!" Susan interrupts them irritably, as they've migrated down a step in their earnestness to congratulate the new pair.

Braids gives her the Shiny Glare of Death, while Butch gives her a quick look over.

"Sorry," the big girl finally says, dragging Braids down with her to sit in front. Susan can hear the black girl mumbling under her breath, and catches the deep voice of Butch as she explains, "Offworlder. Very Offworlder. Just don't pay her attention."

Braids hunches her shoulders for the rest of the hatching.

Susan watches the rest of the unexpected show with a little more amusement. Touchy locals, she thinks, drumming metal-nailed fingers over her bony knee. Or PMS. Whatever.

She gets the idea into her head, then, as the last dragonet--a dull brown creature at that--bonds some chick. A dragon... well. Maybe. She has the money for it. But she doesn't have the right temperament, or at least she thinks she doesn't. She's not planning on going back to Star City for a while... or so she hopes. And she doesn't want to be stuck here washing dishes... well, she'll see.

The audience filters down to the sands to congratulate the new riders, but Susan stays on her perch near the top of the stone seats. She feels, for the first time in her life, at ease. And then that voice...

"Susie, I found you!" Shit.

She's prepared, this time, for the glomp from behind. Never the less, Marie almost manages to bowl them both over with her heavy packs. "Gods, Marie, what the hell are you doing here?" She knows already, before the twin can say it. The credit card. Shit... again.

"Finding you, of course! I was so worried when you ran off! I'm came to bring you home!"

Susan wrestles herself free of her sister's grasp, stands on the stone steps a foot below her. They're both tall, though Marie has all of the grace. Her orange hair cascades around her and over her dark-silk, v-line gown, her green eyes fluttering in minor confusion as she adjusts the straps of her packs that clunk against her perfect thighs. "I'm not fucking going home with you, Marie," Susan says, talking slowly, as if to a small child.

"But how come? I made up a party for you and everything!"

"I'm..." grasping at straws, "standing for a dragon," Susan finally says, waving a hand in the sand's general direction. Clean-up crews muck through broken shells, sweeping them into bags to take to compost. A lone dragoness guards her clutch in the corner, watching the crews with almost predatory intent.

Marie's eyes widen impossibly, the dark green of them flecked with pretty golden freckles--probably some artificial adjustment to account for the morning light. "Really?" She asks, her voice breathy, the word little more then a whisper. "Oh, Susie," she says after a pause, and her eyes well up with tears again, "We can stand for dragons together! This is too perfect! Come give me a hug!"

Susan glares up at her sister, shocked and infuriated. No! NO NO NO NO NO! She wants to scream and stamp her clunky boots and throw a hissy fit, throw things at her sister and just beat her into the ground. Just leave me alone, you stupid fucking cunt! Get the hell away from me, you're ruining my life! "Yeah, whatever." She gives her sister one last glare and then walks along the tier, hoping that maybe the orange-haired air-brain will somehow be glued to the spot, die there from starvation.

"Yay! Let's go sign up! I hope they have baths here, I feel dirty already. This place is so... unsanitary! Oh, we'll have to make plans!"

Susan raises one hand as she walks, and, ever so slowly, smacks the palm of her hand against her still mildly sore forehead. What will it take...?