Sean, flying his jet ahead of the clan of dragons, saw the border first.  Vallen caught sight of it a moment later, peering ahead and trying to see if there were any holes in the massive laser barrier despite the window of opportunity their battle with the humans had made them miss.

"There, look.  There's the border," he said.  "And there's..."

"There's a gap," Sean said.  "Looks like it's still open, but we'd better hurry.  Come on!"

The dragons put on a burst of speed, and they all made it through the hole in the laser barriers.  "What time is it?" Vallen asked.

"00:05."

"That doesn't make sense.  The barrier should have closed ten minutes ago, but it's still open.  Why--"

"Shh," Sean said, and Vallen heard another voice, but wasn't Dave, or Chris, or anyone else he knew.

"Sean, is that you?  We have a lot on the radar."  It was a human voice, and female.

"Yes, it's me.  I've brought them all through.  Where are you?"

"A kilometer and a half north of you, in a parking lot.  Bring them all down there."

"All right.  See you in a minute."

"Sean, who are you talking to?" Vallen demanded.

"I've found us some more help, which should be able to get us through Canada safely.  She wants us to meet her in the parking lot she mentioned."

"...all right, then.  Are you sure it's safe?"

"I'd trust her with my life, and I swear it's not a trap or anything.  There's the parking lot up ahead; I'll set down first, then you can bring the clan down after me."

"We're landing where Sean lands," Vallen shouted.  "He says he's found us some help.  But," he made sure he was speaking dragontongue, "I don't know if I like this situation.  Carnoc, keep your guard up, but don't do anything unless Nesleh or I specifically tell you to.  Understand?"

He growled loudly enough for his elder to hear, but said, "yes."

"Good.  Now, nice and slow, everyone go down to that parking lot."

Sean paused to make sure Dave was all right before opening the door; the other man just sat there, looking at the floor, but didn't seem to be in danger of doing anything stupid, so he got out and walked over to the only other car in the lot.  A tall brown-haired woman got out as he approached, and they embraced and kissed briefly while the dragons landed around them.

Vallen lowered his head.  "Sean, who is this?"

"This is Elaine.  Elaine, meet Vallen."

Elaine nodded towards the dragon.  "Nice to meet you.  Now, Sean, this may be a bit of a surprise, but...  I did even better than I told you before.  Ron?"  She looked back towards her car.

A bald man in a suit got out of the car's other side.  "Wait..."  Sean said.  "Ron Seifert?  Elaine, you've got to be kidding."

The man grinned.  "She isn't.  Now, which of these dragons is in charge?"

Vallen stepped forward.  "I am.  My name's Vallen."

Ron turned towards him.  "Well, then, Vallen.  I, Ron Seifert, the Prime Minister of Canada, would like to be the first to welcome you to my country."

Vallen froze for a moment, shocked.  "You...  You welcome us?  But the UN hunts us and treats us like animals...  How could you choose anything different?"

"By taking time to learn all the facts before taking any action, and when we learned of an opportunity to help your kind, there was only one possible choice to make."  He smiled.  "Again, welcome, and I want you to know that while you remain in my country I will do what I can to look after your clan's every need."

He paused a few moments longer, then lowered his head and sniffed at the man's shoulder.  "Thank you...  Thank you very much.  But I'm afraid right now what my clan needs to do the most is to keep flying; we've just started a long journey, and the faster we can make that journey, the better."
 

"As soon as we learned you were intelligent, we thought it was wrong.  And then when Elaine told us you would be coming this way, asking us to help you..."  Prime Minister Seifert smiled.  "We were eager to, of course."

"Thank you for sheltering us, Prime Minister," Vallen said, looking around the valley.  Most of the rest of the clan was already asleep, getting much-needed rest after the night's events.  Carnoc was still awake so Nesleh could lecture him, but everyone else was curled up and sleeping off the sizeable meals they had been given.

"Please, just call me Ron.  Anyway, we can't allow you to stay here, you must understand," he continued.  "Allowing UN fugitives to live openly within our borders violates our agreements with them, so your clan will have to keep moving, as will Sean and Dave."

He nodded.  "We would prefer to keep flying anyway; there are other dragons waiting for us to arrive."

"Yes, the other clan of dragons; you mentioned them earlier.  Perfectly understandable, but even if you must move quickly, we will do our best to keep you safe and comfortable during your time here."

"We greatly appreciate your help.  But," he yawned, "I've had a long night--and morning--and I'm always tired after having so much to eat, so I think I'll get some sleep with the rest of my clan."

"Yes, but I have to ask...  How assured can we be that none of your dragons will attack my security officials?  As I understand it, dragons have legendary tempers, and your kind has made the news for killing humans before, both a couple of weeks ago and just last night."

Vallen sighed and looked over towards Carnoc, then winced; Nesleh had just aimed a savage kick at the warrior's belly.  "The only one of us with a truly dangerous temper is Carnoc, but his father and I will make sure he doesn't lose control like he did last night, when he bit that one man's head off.  Still, though, he'll be calm enough as long as nobody makes him angry."

Ron nodded.  "All right, I just had to be sure.  You can go ahead and get your rest now; I'll just talk to the security advisor around here, then call up north and make sure there will be accommodations ready as you travel.  See you tonight, Vallen."

"Good morning," he said.  He found an open space between his two sons and curled up there, but didn't fall asleep; Nesleh would probably need to talk to him once he was done with Carnoc.

"I've just about had it with your temper," Nesleh snarled.  "I thought we got this under control decades ago, but after what you did to that human...  For the ancients' sake, he was apologizing for what he'd done to us!  But instead of accepting his apology and flying on, you lost control and tore his head off!  I swear, I have half a mind to tell these humans to chain you so I won't have to worry about containing you myself.  In fact, you should be lucky they didn't just arrest you for murder."

Carnoc growled.  Nesleh already had a paw clenched around his snout to keep him from speaking, and as soon as he had finished eating after the night's flying Nesleh had paralyzed him again.

"You know how to keep yourself under control.  I taught you, I watched you do it, and for a while I was even impressed by how well you could keep your blood in check.  But first with Alon, then in Florida, with Molthan and again last night...  It's not that you don't know, it's that you just aren't trying to any more.  You can tell that you're losing your temper and you aren't doing anything about it!"

Carnoc tried to say something, but his father just squeezed harder, keeping his teeth locked together and stifling his words.

"I don't want to hear any excuses from you.  I..."  he paused, unsure; it was the worst possible time to have to discipline his son.  With the clan on the move, he couldn't be held from flying, and Carnoc really was getting too old for a beating...  But that was the only thing he could do, and after all, what he had done was quite severe.

"We're going to keep working on controlling your temper.  Until I see proof that you can keep your blood under control in a situation I didn't create for you, I'm going to have to assume that you aren't capable of doing so.  Also, once he's able to see you without trying to kill you, you're going to apologize, sincerely, to Dave for what you've done to him and his family.  Now," Nesleh stood and shifted to give himself a better angle, "I know you're getting too old for me to do this, but your actions have left me with no choice."

Nesleh lifted a hind paw and kicked him, hard, catching him low in the belly.  He tried to cry out, but Nesleh's paw on his snout stifled all but a quiet moan.  The old dragon paused, then kicked him again, this time on the flank; he moaned, trying to shield himself with his wings and tail but still unable to move.

Nesleh growled and struck again, harder this time, and two of his claws broke through Carnoc's scales, drawing blood.  He shook his head--the only thing he could move--and tried to break out of his father's grasp, but he wasn't strong enough in his paralyzed state.  Another kick struck higher up on his belly and he gasped as the air was knocked from his lungs.

Why was his father doing this to him?  It was just a human...  There were billions of them; they wouldn't miss losing a couple.  He looked up at Nesleh and saw the anger written on his face, growing more pronounced as his kicks got harder.  Carnoc cried out again, then...  Why not fight back?  He was the larger and stronger of the two dragons, and if he fought he was sure he would win.  But no, I can't move, he thought.  Just my head...

He growled and tugged away, only for Nesleh to shift his grip, digging his claws into the scales of his face.  "Don't make this worse for you than it already is," he snarled, then kicked him again.  Carnoc stayed silent this time, letting the muscles of his neck go limp, then he shuddered as another bout of pain racked his body.  Little runnels of blood ran down his belly from where Nesleh's claws had punctured his scales, and as his father continued he couldn't keep himself from starting to cry.

Nesleh kicked him one last time, catching him hard under the ribs and piercing through his scales with all four claws, and Carnoc whimpered through his father's claws as the older dragon sat down next to him with a sigh.  He looked at the ground for a moment, then growled, "I hope now you'll try to remember the consequences of your actions," and released his snout.  He hesitated for a moment, then dragged a claw along the sensitive spot in Carnoc's shoulder, allowing him to move again.

"I'm bleeding," he whispered hoarsely, shying away from his father's touch and reaching over to lick at the wounds.

"Not badly.  Those little nicks will close on their own while you rest, which it's time for you to do.  Come on, go to sleep; we're safe here, and you have to get rested up so you can fly again tonight."

Carnoc nodded silently, then finished licking the blood from his side before he curled up, facing away from his father.  He winced at the pain movement caused and pulled a wing over his head to sleep.

Nesleh sighed again once he was sure Carnoc was asleep, then cleaned the blood from his hind claws and looked around for Vallen.  Once he saw him, lying down between Molthan and Aithsa, he walked over to the elder and sat in front of him.

"What did the Prime Minister say?"

Vallen shuffled his wings.  "They can't let us stay here, but we don't want to anyway.  Mainly, he wanted assurance that Carnoc won't attack any of his security."  He paused.  "Can you be sure he won't?"

He looked back over towards his sleeping son.  "I hope I won't have to do what I just did again, but I expect he'll try harder to control himself now."

"Good.  Get your rest, then, and see you tonight."

He looked around at the mountains around them, humans and fighter craft plainly visible on the slopes.  "And you're sure they won't attack us?"

"Yes; they're only here to make sure no other humans get near us.  We're safe."

Nesleh tilted his head, then made his way back to Carnoc's side, curled up and soon fell asleep.

Dave groaned and rolled over in bed, shifting away from the damp patches on his pillow and rubbing at his eyes.  Jim was dead.

Dead.  Not from old age, or illness, or even something sudden like a car crash.  No, Jim had been killed right before his eyes, and by someone he had at least counted on as an ally.  He kept seeing it in his mind's eye, Carnoc's jaws darting forward and snapping shut over his brother's head, over and over again.  No warning, no reason, and certainly no remorse from that great brute of a dragon.  He clenched his jaw and glared at the wall, then slammed his fist into the headboard.  It cracked loudly and split one of his knuckles, and blood began to drip slowly from his hand, staining the bedclothes.

There was a knock at the door.  "Dave, are you all right in there?"

It was Sean.  Dave frowned, but sat up in bed.  Sean had said he could help, but how?

"...can I come in?"

"Yeah," he said grudgingly, squinting as the door opened and light from the other room of the suite spilled in.  He glanced at the clock; it was mid-afternoon.

"Are you feeling any different?" Sean asked.  "Better or worse, but difference will at least mean something."

"What do you care?"

"I can help you," he said, sitting down on the edge of the bed.  "I've lost a lot of loved ones in my life; I know what it feels like, and I can help you recover from your loss."

Dave glared at him.  "Were any of them ever murdered in front of your eyes by someone you thought of as a friend?"

"A death is a death," he shrugged.  "Granted, some of them are more spectacular than others--one of my nephews was thrown from a roller coaster and landed in a parking lot almost a hundred and fifty meters away--but they all end the same way, and that's with the feeling of loss.  Don't think about the loss, Dave, because then you dwell on it, you get depressed, and you'll start to feel so bad that you'll start throwing up.  And believe me, you don't want that."

He sniffled and looked down at the sheets between the two of them.

"The point is, don't think about the bad things.  Focus on what you and Jim did together that you enjoyed, all the good times you spent with him--though not that you won't be able to spend them any more--and you'll start to feel better.  You won't feel good, maybe, not for a while, but better, and better is important."

He thought for a moment, but could still only see the sequence of his brother's death, and shook his head and fell back onto his pillow with a sob.

"Well," Sean stood back up, "we'll be moving on in a few hours.  And at least try to calm down," he glanced at the cracked headboard, "because you and Carnoc are going to be in pretty close proximity for a while.  You know what his temper can do now; if you're plainly mad at him, then he's just going to be angry right back.  And, to put it plainly, he's a lot more dangerous to you than the other way around, so be careful.  Okay?"

Dave nodded slightly.

"All right.  I'll come get you when it's time to go..."  He noticed the blood dripping from Dave's hand.  "And you should probably clean that off."  Sean walked back into the other room and closed the door behind him, shaking his head.  "I really feel for him," he said.

"Of course you do," Elaine answered, looking up from where she sat at the table.  "How could you not?  He watched his brother die less than twenty-four hours ago.  It'd take a person with the empathy of a rock not to feel sorry for him."

Sean nodded and sat down next to her.  "Yes, yes.  But still, we have to figure out what we're going to do about the UN hunting the dragons."

"Protesting.  You got it to work for mutants, so you can get it to work for dragons.  I mean, they're just as smart as we are, aren't they?  And they're capable of understanding laws and government, because they have their own internal hierarchy.  It's virtually guaranteed they can be accepted into society."

"The only question is whether or not we can convince everyone.  Things have changed since I fought for mutants, and I can't even take part, since there's a warrant out for my arrest..."

"Oh, we can clear that in a moment, you know that...  You, and Dave as well.  As soon as we can get someone influential to realize dragons shouldn't have been caught in the first place, those charges will be dropped.  It may take a while longer to get everyone to leave the dragons alone, but at least we should have you and your other form there to help us pretty soon."

He nodded.  "Either way, we'll need a lot of people.  You don't need to follow me along here; go to Geneva as soon as you can and see how many people you can stir up from the surrounding areas.  Call some of your contacts if you have to, just to get the bodies on the streets.  And Canada going this way will be a big help; the UN would never want to be behind an outside country when it comes to something like this.  I just need you and whoever you can get to give it impetus.  I'll contact as many people as I can, but I need people who can actually be there and who know how to control the whole thing if something should change the situation.  And of all the people I know, that's you."

Elaine reached over and took his hand.  "I'll do what I can.  You just stay safe wherever you end up, all right?  You're all I can count on having."

Sean nodded and leaned over to kiss her.  "I'll take care of myself.  You do, too."

They kissed, then Elaine said, "I'll try to get that warrant dropped as quickly as I can.  Once I do, you'll be able to come back, and maybe then you can ask me that question you've been wanting to ask me for so long."

"Maybe I will," Sean laughed, and they kissed again.

Evening came, and Carnoc woke up with a groan, his side and belly bruised and aching where his father had kicked him.  As Nesleh had said, the cuts he'd received had closed while he slept, but a few of them opened again when he stretched out and rose to a sitting position.

He looked over at his father's sleeping form and growled under his breath.  How could Nesleh have dared to beat him like that?  He was the larger of the two dragons, and removing that troublesome human had been a service to the clan, not a loss of temper!  Carnoc growled again and considered kicking the sleeping dragon, but shook his head and took a couple of deep breaths.  That was his temper speaking.

He edged away from his father.  If Nesleh had known about that thought...  There would be another beating coming his way if he even tried to retaliate, Carnoc knew.  He was bigger and stronger, yes, but his father was so fast, and could paralyze him in an instant... and once he couldn't move Nesleh would just beat him again.  He sighed and licked away a droplet of blood running down his side.  At least nobody else had been awake to see Nesleh do that to him.
He looked up as Vallen prowled over to him.  "Evening, elder," he said.

"I hope your father helped you understand you can't lose your temper like that again."

"He...  I will do my best."

Vallen growled.  "We cannot tolerate another loss of control like you had last night.  Human or not, lives are not things that can be replaced.  Who will it be next?  Dave?  One of these Canadian security officials?  Another dragon?  You cannot act like your inability to control yourself is something so trivial.  If you lose your temper and attack someone again, I will be the one punishing you.  I will be much more harsh than your father, and I will not wait for the rest of the clan to fall asleep first."  He bared his fangs.  "Do you understand me?"

Carnoc lowered his head to the ground.  "Yes, elder."

"Also...  I hate to have to think about it, but it's possible we will all be captured again and if that happens you'll be back in that same situation you were in when you killed those humans at your zoo.  If you are returned there or held anywhere else, you must control yourself enough to keep from harming any of them.  We have to make a good impression on humans from this point forward if we want to have any hope of making peace with them, and that won't happen if you kill innocent humans again; I cannot stress enough how important that is.  We both know you don't have that level of control right now, so you must put a lot of effort into your work with your father.  Have I made myself clear?"

"Yes," he said automatically, but he had to fight to keep his tail still.  If he was captured again and there was another human put in charge of him who was anything like Allison...

"Good."  He looked up and sniffed the air.  "It's getting late; we didn't fly as far as I hoped to yesterday, so we should get an earlier start, especially since we don't have to worry about being spotted."  Vallen raised his wings and roared.  "Wake up, everyone!  It's time to fly!"

The dragons in the valley stirred, sitting up and stretching their legs and wings while Vallen walked around them.  A human came down from the slopes and talked to him for a moment, then ran back up towards the other humans, and little while later one of the fighter jets took off and left the valley.

"Did you sleep well?" Nesleh asked, yawning.

"Yes, father."

"How does your side feel?"

Carnoc looked away.  "Sore.  And some of the cuts opened up when I stretched."

Nesleh spread his wings and flapped them a few times.  "You'll feel better once you're in the air."

"Are we all ready?" Vallen called a couple of minutes later.

"Yes," they all said, and took off one by one.  A formation of fighter jets followed them up, separating into two groups: one group traveled behind the clan, while the other went ahead.

A dragon wearing a backpack around the base of its neck met them in the air as they passed over a group of human buildings.  "Decided to fly with us for a while, Sean?" Vallen called.

"Figured I may as well, maybe get to know some of you.  Might end up being with you all for a while, so..."

"What about Dave?"

"I got someone to take him and my car on ahead."

"All right.  Pick an open spot in the formation, try to stay out of other dragons' wind, and so on.  And make sure you keep up."

"I will."  Sean turned to follow, and ended up between Carnoc and Krain.

"You picked a good night to fly, Sean," Krain said.  "Wind's behind us, and there aren't any clouds to block the moonlight.  Going to be a good night of flying, and a long one, too.  My father says we'll probably be most of the way through Canada by the end of the night."

"That's good...  But what are we going to do when we get to the Alaskan border?  There are sure to be UN forces waiting to arrest us."

Carnoc laughed.  "What's the matter, scared of another fight?"

Some of the other dragons nearby flew a little closer to listen.  "Well..." Sean said, "they've already fought your clan once, and you can bet they won't underestimate what you're capable of this time.  Your bolt won't be able to catch them off guard again."

"Yours would if you weren't too afraid to use it."

"I'm not afraid!  I'm... cautious."

"And you've run from a fight at least twice now.  You ran from a single jet the night Dave and Chris rescued me, and you ran when the jets came to try and shoot us down, even though we had them outnumbered more than two to one.  Coward."

"And so what if I am?  I'll live longer."

Carnoc snorted.  "If you don't mind living like a dishonorable rat who's too afraid to fight for what's his."

"Just leave me alone, would you?"

"Why should I?  There's nothing you're going to do about it, coward.  You're too afraid to," he laughed again.

Sean growled and looked over towards Nesleh.  "Can you get your son to stop bothering me?"

"Why don't you deal with him yourself?" Nesleh said, and some of the other dragons laughed.  "It's certainly not my fault if you're afraid of him."

"Ah, there's no point even trying to start a fight with you," Carnoc said.  "You'd probably run away as soon as I glared at you."

More of the dragons laughed at that, and Sean felt his face flush hot.  He glared at Carnoc, but faltered when the dragon glared back at him, teeth bared.  Sean looked away after a moment; why had he decided to come with them in the first place?

Krain raised his voice.  "Guys, leave him alone.  Even if he has a body like ours, we can't expect him to live up to our standards of bravery.  He is only human, after all."

The other dragons growled assent, and after a moment they returned to their former spacing in the formation.  "Now..." Krain motioned with a paw, then switched places in the formation so he was between Sean and Carnoc; he hoped that would keep Carnoc from taunting Sean again.  "Why don't we talk about something friendlier?"

"Thanks, Krain.  Anyway...  I don't know, what's there to talk about?"

He paused for a moment.  "Anything.  We don't know that much about each other...  How old are you?"

"Hundred and forty-one next month, you?"

"One twenty-seven."

Sean bobbed his head.  "All right.  Have you ever made this journey before?"

"No, this will be my first time taking a mate."

"Why do you guys all wait so long to go to them?  It seems like you'd want to have more dragons than you have.  Just twenty-four of you...  If a bad illness swept through your clan, it could make your race go extinct."

Krain looked around at the other dragons and clenched his forepaws together for a moment.  "We've survived before.  Vidac, in his wisdom, saw that even with just five thousand of us we were too much for the planet to sustain.  First the wars wiped out most of our kind, then after the forming of the clans and the restoration of peace with the plains dragons, he instituted the mating cycles to keep our numbers from rising so high that we would hunt all the prey from the earth.  Now our population has never drastically fallen--at least, excluding when Sir Bourdan and his soldiers fought our clan--and if it rises, it only does so very slowly."

"But why do you live so far apart?  A journey of this length must have been dangerous even back then."

"That's just because if you put us and them in such close proximity, there's no way to keep us off each other," Ureth laughed, joining the conversation.  "Now, I saw you kissing that female we met in the parking lot last night, so is she your wife?"

Sean shook his head, weaving back and forth a little in the air.  "No, or at least not yet.  Honestly, if I hadn't gotten involved with breaking you all out, I would have popped the question by now."

After a moment, Krain asked, "what question?"

"Oh, sorry.  I would have asked her to marry me."

"Ah...  How does that work with you, though?  As I understand, you humans care very much for your mates, so how could you bear to become emotionally involved with someone you'll outlive by centuries?"

He smiled.  "She's a mutant--"

"Is she really?  I don't remember noticing one of those pieces of metal on her chest," Ureth said.

"Mutants in Canada have more privacy; they don't have to wear badges, not even when they enter UN territories.  Pretty soon I'll be moving to Canada myself...  Before getting involved with you guys I was just getting ready to put my house on the market."

"So what's her ability, then?"

"Not only can she manipulate the flow of time, but she's found a way to use her power to greatly slow her aging; she may end up living longer than me, if she wants to.  Good luck that we hit it off, or she and I would both be alone."

Krain nodded.

"It must be hard for you dragons, though...  If you live so far apart and see each other so rarely, how can you stand being away from the dragon you love for...  How long do you go without seeing each other, again?"

"Fifty years," Ureth said.  "But with so many humans in the world, your kind is lucky to be able to choose who to mate with.  For us, our elder will convene with the elder dragoness and they will pair each of us with a dragoness to prevent inbreeding as best they can.  And since we can only spend such a short time with our mates, there's no opportunity for us to develop those sort of feelings for each other.  Though even when you are with your mate, you're much more concerned with mating than getting to know each other, believe me," he chuckled.

"So do you even have the same mate every time you go?"

"Depends on the dragon," Krain said.  "My father...  He was paired with a different mate each time, but that's not always the case."

Ureth grunted in agreement.  "Right; my father, Lemnir, had the same mate each time.  I guess it depends on the order the pairs are chosen in, how varied your lineage is, those sort of things."

"That at least sounds simpler than what we have to do," Sean said.  "It was different for me since I didn't have the options, but otherwise... you never know where you're going to meet her.  Maybe a party, at college, a bar, work... but eventually you find a woman who you really get along with--and find attractive--then you have to hope that she likes you, and start dating, then decide whether or not you like each other enough to get more serious, and so on...  It's such a long process.  Makes what you have to do sound so much easier."

"I think I might prefer being able to choose, but I don't know.  I guess we'll find out when we get there," Krain grinned.