Disclaimer: The world and characters in this story come from the Dragonriders of Pern ® series by Anne McCaffrey. I do not own them, I am merely playing with fictional super-duper cool Pernese Action Figures!

Author's Note: This is an Alternate Universe. It's also like a bowl of cereal so cracktastic that it Snap, Crackle, and Pops with extra fandom 'crack' in the crackle. Just so you are aware. I make no pretensions of plot here, but one may (or may not occur).

The Skyboom

Chapter One

It was foolish to be riding a dragon in the middle of a thunderstorm, although F'lon and Simanth seemed to find it some proof of manly dragonrider-ness, the former laughing challenges into the wind, and the latter simply roaring enthusiastically along with the thunder from beneath their legs. Robinton hung onto F'lon's wide leather belt, in an uncharacteristically dour mood, and prodded through his rather extensive vocabulary for variations of the words "idiot" and "moron" he could use on his friends once their feet were on firm, and hopefully dry, ground again. And if his gitar was soaked right through the casing, well then, he'd go well beyond that and they'd see why you should never, ever piss off a Harper.

Suddenly a crack of lightening went off practically on top of them, and Robinton nearly jumped out of his cold, wet hide at the sound, and then again when an eerie, fey light glowed around Simanth in some sort of aura for a few moments after. "What was that?" he demanded in F'lon's ear.

"Dragonfire," F'lon shouted back over the wind.

"No it's not," Robinton said. "That didn't come from Simanth."

"Figure of speech. It always happens within thunderstorms. It's harm--"

CRACK!

The world went blindingly white for a few moments, and then he smelled burning hair, hide, and the gigantic bronze beneath them let out a shriek of--fear?--before thrashing into something tall and woody with a splintering thunk, a few split seconds before pulling them all into the bitter cold of between.

Six.

Seven.

Eight.

Nine. Wait, nine? There shouldn't be a nine when going through between, Robinton knew. Maybe he was counting fast, panic trying to gnaw open his nerves.

Ten - one thousand, Robinton thought, trying to time his counting right. He could keep a regular beat. Although he'd never tried through the center of a thunderstorm, though...

Eleven--no, twelve - one thousand. That last thought had been long.

Thirteen - one thousand...and, light, heavenly sunshine, warm against wet, between-cold skin, raising steam from them like dawn on a dewy pasture.

Actually, part of it was F'lon's hair on fire, where it poked out of the hole in his helmet. F'lon seemed stunned, so Robinton clumsily dragged F'lon's goggles and helmet off, the buckles unfamiliar to his fingers and smothered the flame with his bare hands.

Something which he'd shove in F'lon's face once it was assured that they'd all stay alive.

Not surprisingly, it burned, but not too badly, and F'lon's gloved hands were trying to poke him in the eye as he flailed behind his head, no clue of why Robinton had taken off his headgear. He slapped them away. "Help Simanth, we're listing," he snapped at the disoriented bronze rider, who seemed to focus at the sound of his dragon's name. A good thing, considering Robinton could see a worrying dark stain on the dragon's head. A dragon's hide was soft, but thick, so he must have done a number on himself when he thrashed into that sky broom, to be bleeding so much ichor. They would need each other to get them to the ground safely.

Most of the land below was covered in heavy greenery, the like of which Robinton had never seen before. Of course, he wasn't a dragonrider so perhaps it was common in other parts of the world. But he couldn't think offhand of any known land quite like this one, with thick forests--nay, jungles all over.

Luckily he could see a coast line, off to his left, and made note of it in F'lon's ear. F'lon nodded, then shuddered, and Simanth tilted a bit drunkenly towards it.

Of course, Robinton would have liked to land on the beach, but perhaps that wasn't possible right now, as Simanth dropped into the ocean like a meteor, soaking them all.

They bobbed in the warm ocean waves for a while, all of them taking inventory of their various knocks and bruises, and Robinton noted F'lon's left boot was smoking, and pointed it out.

"Yeah, I think lightening hit me," F'lon said slightly slurringly, wiggling his toes through the smoking toe. The toes were a little pink, but otherwise unharmed. He seemed bemused to see them.

Simanth flapped his wings a bit against the water, and started paddling his way towards shore. F'lon laughed partway through this, hopefully at something his bronze had said. "He did."

"I did what?" Robinton asked.

"You told us it was a dumb idea."

"Oh no, I've not told you just how dumb an idea it was yet," Robinton said. "But make no worries, I'll enlighten you once we're ashore. And until the day I die, I'm going to tell people stories of how I had to put out your flaming, foolish head with my bare hands. Weyrleader indeed. I'd be surprised if you ever make it."

"My head's on fire?" F'lon asked, feeling it.

"Not anymore," Robinton replied. "Oh, and tell Simanth it's not a good idea to put his head in the water--the salt will sting."

The dragon heard him, and paused in his motion. Thank you, Harper. Simanth told him.

He blinked, surprised to hear the dragon speak to him as always, and sighed. "Thank you for getting us out of the sky safely. We don't happen to have any wine in your packs, do we, F'lon? I'd like to get drunk once we're on shore."

After man and dragon had had their wounds cleansed with fresh water from a stream and dulled with numbweed, both went to sleep, and left Robinton alone to stand guard in what he was more and more certain was a new, and possibly dangerous, but very fascinating, verdant land.

He stripped off his riding jacket, tunic, and shirt to dry, along with his boots and socks, and carefully uncased his gitar to inspect it, taking care not to let the sand get in it. Surprisingly, it didn't have any water damage at all. His mother was right, these cases were worth their weight in marks. He played a quick, quiet little ditty to make sure all was well, then packed it away again.

There was no wine in F'lon's packs, nor food, which wasn't all that surprising, but he did have two empty canteens, which Robinton filled in the stream, and a small compact pack with basic first aid (felis juice, bandages, needle and thread, and the numbweed they had already used) and basic tools; a large hunting knife, a flint and striker, a few matches wrapped in waxed paper. Robinton contemplated hunting his own food, but then realized it would be a lot of work when they'd likely just go between back to civilization once dragon and rider awoke. Or would eat a haunch of whatever Simanth could catch, if there were herdbeasts around anywhere.

Still, he was hungry, so he dug up some tubers he found growing in the muck at the edge of the stream, washed them off, built a fire, and hoped his culinary skills wouldn't poison them all.

Some time later F'lon woke up, and half stumbled over to Robinton to sprawl on the sand next to him. He still wore his riding gear, and Robinton wondered how he wasn't boiling in it, yet.

"What did we drink?" F'lon asked him. "My head feels like Simanth is sitting on it. I'm not sure I've ever had a worse hangover then this."

"We haven't drunk anything--you got yourself hit by lightening," Robinton said.

"I know you wouldn't, dearheart," F'lon said, presumably to some comment of Simanth's. "We drank white lightening?" F'lon asked Robinton. "I thought you said that stuff wasn't fit for pigs."

Robinton leaned over and looked F'lon in the eyes, covering one, then the other, to see how the pupils reacted. They seemed to react normally, expanding and contracting in the middle of the yellow irises, even if he looked a bit woozy still. Then he yanked his head down by the ears to inspect the top of his head.

"Hey!"

"Hold still..." F'lon desperately needed a haircut now, to even out the burned spots, and seemed to have a small blister on his scalp, but seemed, externally, otherwise fine. "Humph. You got hit by lightning. As in, those bright lights that flash in the sky and go boom during thunderstorms."

"Interesting. How did that happen?"

"You decided it would be fun to go flying in a thunderstorm. "

"Why did I decide that?"

"I don't know, go ask Simanth. He's the one that shares your thoughts!"

F'lon glanced over at the large, bronze dragon. "Simanth doesn't know."

"That makes three of us, then," Robinton said, and used a stick to prod a hot, steaming tuber out of the sand under the fire. "Here, try this."

"Is it edible?"

Robinton grinned. "Sure, why not?"

F'lon started stripping off the rest of his riding gear, finally aware of the heat. "I'm not sure that's the reply I want when I ask if something's edible," he said, tossing one boot, then the other, down the beach to lay in the sand to presumably bake dry in the sun. Then he pulled out his belt knife, stabbed the tuber through the middle of it, and went to wash the sand off of it in the stream. He was carefully trying to nibble on one end of it when he came back, but wasn't making much process due to the heat still rising from it.

Robinton dug his own tuber out of the fire, washed it in the stream as well, and set it upon a leaf upon a flat rock so he could slice it into pieces so it would cool faster. F'lon leaned over and nicked a piece, and went over to his bronze and offered it to him. Simanth, however, seemed to refuse.

"I thought you said you wanted some," F'lon said, surprised. Then he seemed to listen to his dragon's comment, and snorted. "Oh, come on. Robinton! You don't mind if Simanth has some, do you?"

Ah. Simanth had probably protested F'lar's stealing of Robinton's food. He suppressed a smile, and waved the concern away. "I'm not going to begrudge Simanth a bite of food." Although to a dragon of his size, it was less a bite and more a speck that would likely get caught in one of his teeth.

"See?" F'lon said, and carefully blew on the slice of tuber to make sure it was cool before setting it on Simanth's great tongue when the bronze opened his mouth slightly. Then he rejoined Robinton, and decided to copycat Robinton's technique of cutting his food up into slices to cool faster.

They ate in silence for a while. The tubers were soft enough...well, mostly, and a bit of crunch in the center wasn't going to hurt them. They were a bit bland. The water from the stream tasted faintly of algae and dirt, but washed their meal down well enough.

"Where are we?" Robinton asked, eventually.

F'lon looked embarrassed. "I don't know," he confessed. There was also a strange undercurrent to his voice, in addition to the humiliation he was obviously feeling.

Robinton chewed a crunchier slice of tuber thoughtfully. As far as he understood it, dragons had to fly straight at least once to a destination in order to acquire an adequate visualization of the place. That was the reason F'lon had suddenly appeared at the Harper Hall one day to drag him out of his classes in order to boast about his dragon. F'lon's official business at Fort and the Harper Hall had been to learn what they looked like, so he and his dragon could between their way there, if need be. But perhaps Robinton had understood it wrong; he wasn't a dragonrider, and given the look on the other man's face, he wasn't going to push the issue. "Well, in any event, this is a very beautiful place. A little warm for this time of year--not that I'm complaining. But I don't think I've ever seen a sea quite that color."

"Yeah. I mean, no, you're right, that color is unusual. I don't recognize some of these plants, either; do you want to explore a little?"

"Why not?"

"When do you have to be back at the Hall? I know Master Gennell has you running around like a lunatic these days--"

"I've been given the afternoon off; as long as we're back before dusk, nobody will particularly care."

F'lon shaded his eyes and looked up at the sky. "We've a bit of time then. How are you feeling Simanth?"

The dragon blew out a gusty sigh, but rose to his feet, a dusting of pale sand clinging to his belly.

"I feel the same; that lightening hit us hard, didn't it?"

"Do you feel we should go back?" Robinton asked. In his untrained estimation, F'lon didn't seem as battered as one might have thought a man hit by lightening would have, and if Simanth was really hurt F'lon wouldn't be acting so casually. But it was possible that--

"--oh no, no. I ache a bit. But I want to see this place! Might as well do a bit of looking around while we're here."

Robinton watched his friend for a moment, then shrugged.

The dusk air was cooling off when they pulled on their riding gear, although not quite cool enough to make the heavy wherhide comfortable in this unseasonable heat. But it wasn't like they were going to fly straight or anything, so Robinton endured it without comment and made sure his gitar was stowed away properly. It was always a worry during the hotter days that the wood would crack when suddenly exposed to between. It happened to the best of instruments.

F'lon and Simanth did not play any games this time when taking off, and flew upwards until they were at a distance acceptable for going between from. Then they hovered, and F'lon reached down to pat Simanth's neck before the cold of between enveloped them.

One one-thousand, two one-thousand, three one-thousand, Robinton chanted to himself, determined to keep the beat this time. And apparently he did; at eight one-thousand, the world appeared around them again, and a few specks of light below from glows and fires marked out where Ford Hold and the Harper Hall existed below.

Simanth began to drop, headed for the Harper Hall courtyard, but then changed direction suddenly and made a low noise in his throat. Robinton saw F'lon pat the bronze's neck comfortingly again, and they were set down in front of the great front doors of the Hall instead a few moments later, in a small cloud of dust kicked up by the dragon's back-winging.

The dusk was cooler here, a fact that Robinton was grateful for. He dismounted Simanth, caught the gitar after F'lon twisted around and unhooked it and carefully held it down for him, and then, with a flourishing bow, thanked the great bronze and his rider for today's adventure. Towards the bronze he was entirely sincere, but there were notes of amusement and sarcasm towards the bronzerider.

F'lon looked appropriately embarrassed, as far as Robinton could tell when the man's face was hidden behind goggles and the light was nearly gone.

Then Robinton quickly strode away to a distance suitable for watching the pair leave, and gazed after them until either the darkness or between swallowed them up again. Then he sighed, and turned back to the hall. His mother would laugh herself sick at this particular mis-adventure.

Robinton climbed the stairs to the hall, ducked in the partially open front door, and nodded to the apprentice on duty, whom he didn't recognize. Then he paused, feeling as if he were making a great error. But for the life of him, he couldn't put his finger on it. He glanced at the apprentice again, wondering if he'd promised the boy something or other, or knew him or maybe his kin from somewhere, but the boy was tiredly studying a vocal score that Robinton knew was a hideous little piece of music, although it was effective for some types of vocalists for demonstrating a certain voice technique.

But the sense of dis-ease had nothing to do with the boy. Robinton walked out of the main corridor, headed for his mother's quarters, but the moment he turned out of the main hallway, he stopped again. There was something wrong here. Aside from the decor--Master Gennell was notorious for getting tired of the current decor and pulling something so ancient it was brand new out of storage and plastering it all over the walls.

Robinton backed out of the side corridor so he was back in the entry way.

"Are you lost, sir?" the apprentice called, finally taking note--or deciding to act--on his obvious confusion.

"I, ah, no." I've lived in this Hall most of my life--how could I be lost? He didn't let the sarcastic words out, however. Boy looked tired enough as it was. "I've decided I'm going to grab a bite to eat, before going to bed," Robinton said. It felt...safest, somehow, and his stomach was indeed purring along in a prelude to outright angry growling. So he followed his belly to the kitchens, the sense of being vastly in error still perusing him, but his feet gradually stuttered to a stop since it felt as if a monster out of a story was about to leap out and--

Something large and heavy suddenly flapped directly at his head and he made a sound that was quite possibly unmanly and bolted three long steps out of the way and nearly bowled over a woman who was his own age or perhaps slightly older. "Pardon me!" he said, putting his hands on the side of either shoulder just in case he had managed to knock her over, but she seemed to be standing quite steadily in place, so he let her go and hoped she hadn't heard that sound he'd made--or had ascribed it to the thing...that...that wasn't there anymore.

Bloody shards and red stars...

"Are you all right?" the woman asked him.

Robinton glanced at her. She was tall, with blue eyes, and an explosion of dark wavy hair that was nominally contained within a tail. She was angular and austere in build, a handsome woman rather than a beauty. She also had a Master's knot on her shoulder, which made Robinton suddenly feel worried for her. It wasn't unknown for a Singer to throw on her lover's shirt, knots and all, although this woman's beau must be as skinny as she was to wear that tunic. But some of the more chauvinistic Masters would go spare to see it, and that inevitably ended up in a brawl of some sort as half the hall retaliated against the boor that threatened the poor Singer.

Robinton reflected that the Hall needed improvement in that area. His mother, for example, often carried out all the duties of a Harper, barring the judicial ones, but to give her a Master's knot? Preposterous! Never mind that she was widely lauded as one of the most popular Singers ever to walk Pern. Actually acknowledging that her talents were equal to any other Harper's would get some untalented, incompetent wher-faced imbecile's underthings in a twist, and...

Well. Robinton sighed. No need to get angry here and now. Besides, he suspected the sudden anger was rooted in his fears of a moment ago, and his embarrassment at someone seeing him like that. So he swallowed it, along with his pride. "I feel as if the universe has made a grievous accounting error somewhere," he told her. "I'm unsure if that falls under the heading of 'all right'. Usually this type of thing only happens when I manage to quaff a white wine against my better judgment, but I'm afraid the last thing I drank was some tepid brackish water. Which was why I was headed towards the kitchens. But I could have sworn something tried to land on my head a few moments ago--the apprentices didn't let loose a flock of geese in here again, did they?"

The woman didn't actually laugh, but her eyes were bright with it. "That would have been Diver," the woman said. Robinton noted she was a mezzo-soprano. "Bronze firelizard. He was probably aiming for your shoulder, but your head got in the way."

"How terribly inconvenient for him," Robinton said.

"Your shrieking and running away didn't help either; they usually like to land on stationary targets." The side of her mouth quirked up.

So she'd noticed. He could feel a subtle blush rise in his cheeks, which he tried to ignore. But--firelizards? It seemed as improbable to have those creatures flying about the hall as it would to have a flock of geese trying to land on his head and then vanishing as if going between...oh. So that's what had happened to it.

"Does the Master Harper know about them?" Robinton asked, and then felt somewhat silly for asking it. How, exactly, could one miss something that looked like a miniature dragon attempting a landing on one's head? Unless that sort of thing only happened to him.

The woman's eyes lost their amusement, and her smile faded. "Which Master Harper?" she asked after a moment, her voice holding a queer note.

The feeling of unease came back again. He thought of holding his tongue, of backtracking and seeing if, by chance, F'lon and Simanth had come back. But in all likelihood, the pair were back in Benden, seeing a Healer for a second opinion on their lightening-struck wounds. "Master Gennell," he said quietly.

The expression on the woman's face immediately became conflicted, several emotions flickering over it in quick succession until it smoothed out and became blank. Not the best actress he'd ever seen, but he didn't know her well enough to decipher that blank mask so it worked regardless. "I think perhaps...you should come with me."

"This isn't concerning these...firelizards anymore, is it?" Robinton asked.

"No. Not really." She carefully closed one hand around his bicep, as if the touch might frighten him away, or break something in him...or her...and led him to the upper level of the Hall.

The woman left him in the Master Harper's office. But it was obvious from the decor that an entirely different man called this office his; redecorating the Hall at large with scenery tapestries was one thing...but you couldn't erase a man's personality and touch from his quarters nearly as easily. If Gennell still called these quarters home, Robinton would eat his gitar, case and all.

There were a few choices of seating in the room; a well-worn but comfortable looking leather couch against one wall, under a set of cupboards Robinton didn't recall as having been there before. A set of wooden armchairs before the desk. A stool to one side of the desk, probably either well-regarded or well-hated by apprentices, depending on this Master's leadership style. Seating himself in any of the choices didn't seem...quite right, and besides he hadn't been invited to sit down. So he paced around the room in lieu of examining it, because he knew some Masters were touchy about others looking at their things, even if they left them sitting around for all to come upon.

Well. He mostly didn't examine things. Could he help it if a half-written score sitting in a pile at the edge of the desk caught his eye? It was a catchy tune, and he ran his left fingers through the fingerings absently, before moving away to pace around again.

After a while, he noticed that up in the rafters, in the dark, were some more of the firelizards. Two golds, watching him as intently as he'd ever seen a firelizard stare at someone from afar. Also a bronze, and a...brown? It was difficult to tell, as they were far away from the glows. He also thought he saw something blue, but perhaps something Harperish was tucked into the rafters. "Hello," he said softly. They were rather fascinating, when they weren't flapping at his head exactly on cue when he was already feeling jittery, and scaring the red right out of his blood.

They didn't make a sound, just stared at him, blue and green hued eyes whirling slowly.

Then the door to the Master Harper's personal quarters opened suddenly, drawing Robinton's gaze, and a tall man, taller even than himself, emerged, and their gazes caught.

Shock. It was quickly masked, and masked much more skillfully than the woman's reactions, but Robinton saw it, and couldn't help but wonder--and fear, just a bit--the reasons why they were so...emotionally affected by seeing him.

It was probably connected to the reason he felt like some grievous error had occurred, whatever reason had caused Gennell to no longer be Master Harper, to cause those...gem-like creatures flying about within the Hall to create little to no comment from the woman. It was also probably connected to the real reason the decor had changed abruptly, and that almost made him laugh--how human of him to automatically ascribe the most likely culprit to that change, Master Gennell in this case, until all this other evidence suggested in a loud, blinding scream that the decor had nothing to do with Gennell's whims.

And then, Robinton suddenly wondered if, if he walked down the hall to the Masters' quarters, would he find his mother and Petiron in the appropriate rooms? Or would there be strangers there, staring up at him and his intrusion as he walked into their private rooms and lives?

Then the man, brown eyed, and brown haired, and brown skin, came up to him, and clasped Robinton's hand in his. He had a warm, confident clasp, but the words that came out of his mouth didn't quite match the confidence. "Master Robinton?" he asked.

Master? Oh no, no, no, no, he was still studying his...and he hadn't walked...Robinton took his hand back and patted down his pockets, and finally withdrew a rather wrinkled and bedraggled Journeyman's knot. "I'm afraid not, Master Harper," he said, and held up the rank knot.

"Oh," the man said in confusion. "You're not Robinton?"

"I am Robinton," Robinton said. "But it's a little premature to call me a Master." He waved the Journeyman's knot like a small flag to call attention to it. Then he blinked and realized it might work better if he just put the blasted thing on his shoulder. Which he did.

The Harper in front of him blinked, then threw back his head and laughed. And laughed. And laughed, and finally stumbled back to sit on the edge of his desk, managing to avoid setting his rump down on open sand by mere inches, still laughing the entire time.

Robinton smiled wanly, game for understanding the joke, if there was one. Then he realized..."How did you know my name?" he asked.

"Menolly told me."

"Is that the woman's name? With the firelizards?"

"'That woman with the firelizards' works too," the Master Harper told him, just as the door into the private quarters opened again, and the woman entered the room. "I use it all the time. 'Woman! With the firelizards!'" This he directed at her.

She rolled her eyes.

"Since she obviously didn't introduce herself, Mast...Jour..." he paused, as if momentarily flummoxed by his inability to get the appropriate title out. "May I call you Robinton? Just...'Robinton'?"

Robinton spread his hands to indicate that he was well and truly lost here, and hadn't the faintest as to what was actually happening. A little informality wasn't likely to hurt things. "I imagine you could call me whatever you want. 'You there!' 'Man without firelizards!' 'Screaming Man!'" He threw out a few suggestions.

"Wha--?" the Master Harper looked a bit confused, but the woman--Menolly--laughed in delight.

"Well, this is the Harper Hall, I expect sooner or later it will get out that I had a firelizard try to land on my head and I ran away screaming. It's usually not as bad if you admit it straight out. Gets it out of the way and all, deflates their sails 'fore the ship even leaves port. Don't ask me why I'm using nautical similes," he added, while shaking his head.

"It might be prudent to use another name," Menolly suggested to Robinton, while the Master Harper started to laugh again.

"You don't like the sound of 'Screaming Man'?" Robinton asked her in jest. "Or is my given name taboo?"

"Well, it's not that--"

The Master Harper shook his head. "It will be the worst kept secret ever."

"You think?" Menolly asked him, cocking her head to the side and regarding him.

The Master Harper just nodded, and seemed thoughtful.

So Robinton took the opening, and said, "I don't mean to be a bother, but I seem to only have bits and pieces of this puzzle here, and I think I'm blind to boot, and if you've ever tried it, putting a puzzle together by touch alone is difficult to do."

Both of them turned to look at him expectantly, which wasn't quite what Robinton was expecting, but he forged on, ticking off letters on his fingertips.

"A--I don't believe I've met either of you, but you obviously have some knowledge of me. B--the Harper Hall is here, but the decor is different, and Master Gennell is obviously not the Master Harper for reasons unknown to me. C--there are tame firelizards here. D--Menolly doesn't think it would be good for me to go by my own name. E--please don't take this the wrong way, I don't mean offense, but you're wearing a rank knot, Menolly, and it would take a very oddly proportioned gentleman to fit into your tunic." Menolly was turning a shade of red, and Robinton hoped it wasn't because she was upset or angry with him now. "The only things I can think of that would explain all of these things are that I'm having a very bizarre lucid dream, or that I ingested an overdose of felis juice and I am now severely hallucinating, and the Healers are probably tying me to a bed even as we speak so I don't hurt myself. Or, as I hallucinate speaking to you." Robinton paused. "There's also a small possibility that someone poisoned me," he added in a smaller voice, thinking of Fax. "Which could also induce--"

"How did you get to the Hall?" Menolly asked, cutting him off, but gently.

"F'lon and Simanth," Robinton said. "They are a bronze pair from Benden," he added, in case the information was relevant.

"Where were you before that?"

Robinton shook his head. "A jungle somewhere, beach, by the ocean. F'lon didn't know where it was."

"How did you get there?" the Master Harper asked.

"Through between. Although we took off in a storm; F'lon was hit by lightening, and Simanth got partially tangled in a skybroom."

They stared at him, and then Menolly walked off and scrabbled in a bin for some hide, while the Master Harper rubbed his chin. "Where did they go after they dropped you here?"

"I presume home," Robinton said.

"It's probably too late to prevent the initial brouha, Sebell," Menolly said. "But this might help, if it gets to the right person. I'm going to send Beauty to F'nor, and let him know."

"You don't think F'lar will recognize his own...?" The Master Harper--presumably Sebell--replied.

"I'm more thinking of Ramoth's possible reaction to a dragonrider she doesn't know. F'nor will likely be close enough to get their attention, but not as immediately occupied if Ramoth isn't happy about this as F'lar might be. Or, on the other hand, I could be entirely wrong and they're all having klah and bubbly pies right about now, listening to the Weyrharper's latest tunes."

"Better safe than sorry. Write a copy for Kimi; we'll send her to F'lar, just in case. I'll get our riding gear."

"I'm afraid I'm lost again," Robinton interjected.

Sebell grimaced. "Once we talk to the Benden Weyrleaders, we'll have a better handle on what we can tell you. You see--you never mentioned this little incident to us."

Robinton tried to process this and failed. "And I should have?" he asked, cluelessly.

"It's typically good form to," Menolly said. "Although I suppose you could have forgotten, you always had a lot on your mind. You can leave the gitar here--"

"No, you should take it," Sebell said.

Menolly gave Sebell a quizzical look, then shrugged.

Robinton chose to keep his gitar with him, and watched as Menolly strapped little harnesses around the two golden firelizards, who had flown down to the table, and then instructed the one called Beauty to go to F'nor, and the one called Kimi to go to F'lar. Then they waited a while, before Menolly suddenly said, "F'nor is here," as eerily as any dragonrider, and the three of them trooped down to meet them.

Author's Notes, part II:

1) There's a good chance of this story being abandoned. It's a cracktastic premise, and I'm unsure if I have the talent to pull it off. I fear my Robinton isn't strong enough. So, just a warning.

2) My Pern canon is not as strong as my Talent canon. However, I'm going to be a jerk here and say that if anyone has issues with my word choices (ie, "that word isn't used on Pern!"), please don't tell me. It drives me insane. I just want to tell a story about characters I love without having to trip over the the truncated vocabulary AMC implemented for this world. She's quite good at writing, say, Robinton, and still giving him an eloquent vocabulary (hmm, I wonder where she got her talent? ;) ), but the words that Pernese CAN'T use are random (runners meaning horses, canines meaning dogs) that once you get beyond the immediate use (ie, you can call someone a dog or cur on Earth, but because Pernese call them 'canines', can you still call a person a "dog" or "cur" on Pern and have it be canon? The words are no longer really referring to the animal...) it's really hard for me to keep up.

3) I have other fics! They are Talent fanfiction, however. Clicky clicky on my profile to find them.

4) You may encounter Robinton/Menolly shipping here. Reallly depends on how it turns out, and if I think my skill is up to it. I would just go read H. S. Shore's stuff to get my R/M fix, but they haven't updated their R/M fics in...forever. :( :sad:

5) Sorry about the partial almost-rant in #2. Heh. All other sorts of reviews should be just fine with me. In fact, if you can nit-pick my Characterization, I would love that. I always worry that my characters aren't good enough. Except in the case of Sebell, who doesn't get much of a personality in canon. :coughRobintonClonecough: :( Poor Sebell...you're every fan-writer's tool now! We can shape you however we want, mwa ha ha ha!

6) NAME corrections are welcome as well. I worry about the dragon names, particularly.