A gentle tugging sensation on her tail woke Proquess, and she lifted her head in confusion. Having her tail tugged on while she slept was hardly an uncommon occurrence-- though a less common one, now that Shishayair had hired the many-headed nursemaid Carskadei for the hive's collection of children-- but having it tugged on gently was different. And whoever had been tugging was now pawing at her haunch.

Turning towards the hatchling-- it was too small to be Shishayair or Carskadei, so it had to be one of the hatchlings-- she could make out the softness of fur, two main heads and two secondary heads, feathered wings, and complete silence.

::Mu-Lin,:: she said, bobbing her head at her new, second bond, the mute offspring of her first bond. The hatchling was a sweet, unassuming child and, like Proquess whenever Shishayair wasn't around, had unsurprisingly been shunted to the bottom of the heirarchy. Proquess liked her.

Mu-Lin responded by pawing at her haunch again, and trotting back a few feet to take one of Proquess' tail spines in her mouth, giving it another light tug. Though Proquess liked her, sometimes figuring out what she wanted or meant was difficult, with no way for her to communicate. Thankfully, she didn't ever want much.

::Is there a problem?:: she asked. The hatchling shook her head, and tugged again, then let go and trotted towards the door, stopping to look over her shoulder halfway there.

Well, that was obvious enough. Proquess rolled gently to her feet and followed amiably enough. ::Do you want to go out?:: They were in their stolen suite on Star City, with its fancy sliding doors. This door was locked, programmed to only open for herself, Shishayair, or Carskadei-- a safety precaution, what with having a large number of hatchlings, several of which who would gladly cause them a lot of trouble and all of whom could be attacked by over-zealous city-dwellers or visitors because of their species. The door slid open silently and obediently when Proquess tapped the little pad beside it with a pair of claws.

Just why Mu-Lin might want to go outside, Proquess had no idea. Usually she didn't go far from Proquess, her father Shishayair, or her half-brother Lohress, all of whom were dedicated to protecting her. A mute, weak, gentle child was one in near-constant danger, and one who usually didn't go far from her sources of safety.

But when Mu-Lin stepped outside, she stopped in the middle of the doorway and looked over her shoulder with one of her four heads. There was a vague kind of hopeful expectantness radiating from her.

::What, Mu-Lin?:: Proquess asked.

The hatchling took another step, then looked over her shoulder with three of her four heads. The sense of expectation and hope intensified.

After thinking a moment, Proquess asked hesitantly, ::Do you want me to come with you?::

Mu-Lin bounced. She didn't nod, she bounced, but it was an obvious affirmative. The emotion emanating from her little body was relief and joy, and Proquess, a bit bemused, followed her out into the corridor. ::Is there somewhere in particular you want to go?:: This time she merely got a nod-- well, she got two nods, from two heads-- and Mu-Lin bounced further out, leading her xenodragon bond wherever it was she had in mind.

Apparently it was rather far away. Proquess followed Mu-Lin down corridor after corridor, down a few levels of stairs-- they couldn't take the lifts, because Mu-Lin, the one who knew where they were going, couldn't tell it where to go-- and wary curiosity was slowly turning into boredom. After a while, Proquess decided it would be more efficient if she carried little Mu-Lin: she could go faster, and climb straight down the deck's levels if she had to, rather than watching Mu-Lin negotiating stairs and the like. Mu-Lin heartily agreed, and latched herself to her exoskeleton while she scaled the decks down and out, tapping on her shoulders to direct her.

Finally, they wound up on the furthest, lowest, outermost deck: the flight deck. ::What are we doing here?:: Proquess asked her little bond. ::Did you want to go for a flight?:: Not that M-Lin could fly yet, she was too young, but she had seemed to enjoy letting Shishayair carry her around the flight deck the last time they'd done it.

Mu-Lin responded merely by tapping her right shoulder, so with a shrug, Proquess turned right and started crawling along the wall to her right. A few more directive taps later, and Proquess found herself at the base of one of the docking towers. She paused a moment, head tilted up to get the best "view" of it. Mu-Lin tapped her on the back with her tail, bouncing a little. Apparently she was supposed to climb it.

::This has certainly been entertaining,:: Proquess told her, intrigued despite herself, and did as she was bidden. ::I hope there is something interesting at the end of this little expedition.::

Though she couldn't be sure, Proquess thought she sensed smug assent on the other end of their tentative bond.

They didn't even make it halfway up the tower before Mu-Lin tugged on her carapace with one forepaw, the agreed-upon signal to stop, then tapped her left shoulder. Proquess heaved herself up into the docking tower itself, a panel between the open flight deck and the enclosed corridor within sliding open to admit her, and sat there a minute, getting her bearings. There was a door on one side-- to an elevator, she discerned after a moment-- and an airlock on the other side, a place for a ship to dock. There was a ship there, Proquess knew, having seen it from the outside of the tower. A few more airlocks disappeared around the tower's outer ring, though none of them had ships docked at them.

Mu-Lin hopped off her back, to her surprise, and bounded right up to the nearest airlock. The doors opened for her, and Proquess hurried to catch up as she trotted on inside.

That was when she realized just where she was. This was the usual dock of the Abstract Destiny, where Ominous and Alladross had hatched-- as well as a number more of her own offspring, created via Dark's magic or genetics or whatever it was. Whyever would Mu-Lin want to come here? She had probably never even heard of the place, unless Ominous deigned once to speak to her of it, and certainly had never been here before. How had she known how to get here-- and why had she wanted to come, to begin with?

::Mu-Lin?:: she sent ahead of her, and found the hatchling sitting in front of the doors to the second hatching bay, on the right-- Bravo Bay, it was called. More pertinently, it was not the bay Ominous and Alladross had hatched in. ::Do you, uh, want to go in?::

Mu-Lin wagged her tail, a funny little motion, but one that put Proquess in mind of her father, Shishayair. He'd been known to do that, in extremely rare unguarded moments of happiness. Just what that meant, here, Proquess had no idea, but she approached the bay, anyway. The doors opened for her, and she peered in cautiously. There weren't any angry mothers, this time, and the single individual who stood over them wasn't even a dragon.

She was, despite her two-legged form, a daemon. Proquess recognized the sense of Devika, one of the head doctor's main assistants in the genetic manipulation he did. She'd been present at the hatching, had actually been teased by one of her offspring about bonding her. Before she could duck back and scramble away, however-- which she had fully intended to do-- Mu-Lin bounded right in and down the stairs. Devika, alerted by something or another, looked up. Proquess could sense the scowl all the way across the bay, and when she reluctantly followed her bond, it was at a slink.

"Yes?" Devika asked coolly as Proquess stopped at the bottom of the stairs, at her little bond's heels. "Do you need something?"

For a moment, Proquess didn't answer, looking between Devika and Mu-Lin in nervous confusion. What did Mu-Lin think she was doing? Why did she want her here, confronting the volitile Devika on her home ground, faced with some strange clutch? Mu-Lin's vague, unclarified expectantness didn't help matters. Finally, she just asked the first thing that came to mind. ::Whose clutch is this?::

Devika glowed with surprise. "Uh, it's a synth. The main donor is Dark Shadow."

::Dark?:: Proquess repeated, full of surprise, herself.

"Thaaaaaat's what I said, yes," Devika said, drawing out the first word in a way that could have been mocking or could simply have been confused.

That, apparently, was what Mu-Lin had wanted her to know, because after traipsing over to Devika's feet and giving her knees a friendly rub, she turned back the way she'd come and started happily back up the stairs. ::Thank you,:: Proquess hurried to tell Devika, before scurrying after the hatchling.

"Uh, no problem," Devika answered, still all but glowing with bemusement.

Back in the station proper, this time Proquess took the lift back to their rooms. ::Is that what you wanted me to find out?:: she asked Mu-Lin, who nodded all four heads emphatically. It made sense; Mu-Lin knew by now that Proquess liked Dark. If she'd somehow found out that Dark was having children someplace, it wasn't really surprising that she'd want to tell Proquess about it. But....

::Do you want to bond there?:: she asked curiously. Mu-Lin was already bonded-- obviously-- but it was hardly uncommon for multiple bondings to take place. Proquess herself, lowly though she was, had two!

The response wasn't a yes or a no, but a shrug. Apparently she just wanted Proquess to know about it. Well, Proquess was glad to know about it. She wasn't sure why, but... she was. 

:: ... thank you,:: she told the little one.

Mu-Lin beamed happily.

Chapter Eleven

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