*******

Summer Dreams

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By Sylvana Lorrdain

(C) 2k1 Shadoedancer Creations

Disclaimer: I do not own Hobbie or Janson, nor the mentioned pilots of the GFFA. I DO however, own the terran characters (other than Alison-Sky [Alisky], she owns herself. She's cool like that. *G*) as they are personifications of my family, friends and myself. Please, do not use us, or this story, without my permission. A lot of the things and anecdotal happenstances also really did happen, just not actually with Janson and Hobbie..... but using these stories with them may just be as interesting as when they actually occurred...... There are also some idealizations of realness.... I lived there for a little while, but for those of you who wish to know where I'm from, this won't help you... I haven't lived there for several years now.... Oh, and the email address I use here no longer exists, so don't try to email me there. Email me here... SylvanaLorrdain@juno.com ...... Uhm, I think I'm done now..... No wait, not quite.... Thanks to Vickie for helping me with Beta reading, occasional rewordings, and mucho writers-block-bashing. And to Pik... and WesC/JoshC.... and Alisky... and Crispy... and Sci... and Arrek and everyone else who helped me by answering strange-o questions I ask to try and find a way out of writers block..... Okay, I'm done for real now -=bow=-

*******

PRELUDE

*******

From: BactaBoy@Alliance.Reb.Org

To: Shadoedancer@aol.com

Subject: Going on Holiday.

Date: Sat, 23 June 2001 1925 -0500

Subject: Going on Holiday.

Sylvana,

We're getting leave starting this coming Monday for almost two weeks and I was wondering if it would be alright to come visit you and your family. Perhaps you can show me around the mountains. I've never been to the mountains before, I grew up by the ocean.

~DHK

P.S. Janson wants to come too.

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From: Shadoedancer@aol.com

To: BactaBoy@Alliance.Reb.Org

Subject: Re: Going on Holiday.

Date: Sat, 23 June 2001 2250 -0500

Hobbie,

Yes, that'd be great! Why don't you two get a Terran transport to the airport of Albany, NY, USA, Terra. I'll meet you at the centre luggage turnstile at about 1100 local time. If there are any problems, email me again. An alternate plan would be for you both to just come in your X-wings and land on our front yard. The co-ords are LAT: 42.18532 LONG: -73.881487

~Sylvana

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From: BactaBoy@Alliance.Reb.Org

To: Shadoedancer@aol.com

Subject: Re: Going on Holiday.

Date: Sun, 24 June 2001 0001 -0500

Sylvana,

Sounds like a plan, We'll meet you at the centre turnstile at 1100.

~DHK & WJ

*******

Monday June 25, 2001

*******

Of course I had to sleep late. Lazily I opened my eyes and squinted over at the alarm clock. 0955 AM. "Oh Sith!" I threw the covers off and jumped out of bed. Good thing I took my shower last nite... I thought as I hurriedly donned my clothes.

I tore into the kitchen and quickly downed a small glass of orange juice. "Where are you off to in such a rush, Syl?" my mother asked from the livingroom.

I popped my head around the corner. "I've gotta be at the airport to pick up those friends I told you about!"

"Well, can't you at least try to eat something for breakfast?"

I glanced up at the clock. 1005 "No time! I've gotta be on the road five minutes ago!" I heard her bell-like laughter follow me as I dashed out the door.

I hopped into my 1982 grey, beat up looking mustang and turned the key while revving up the engine.... or at least trying to. "'C'mon Shadowfax, not today!" After another couple of precious minutes, the engine finally turned over. I threw it into drive and tore down the 400 metre pothole laden driveway like a skier through an obstacle-course hill. After 800 metreish km down the dirt road, I hit pavement. After attempting to speed my way to the airport, of course slowing down for all the speed traps (of which I'd been caught by each at least once *sigh*) I finally made it.

Sort of.

*******

"Uh oh..." I groaned. Of COURSE they would pick this month to revamp the parking lots. By the time I was parked and inside the luggage claim area, it was 1120.

The luggage belt had stopped. I looked to the centre turnstile and it was empty. The space around it was empty. In fact, the whole place was nearly empty. There were a couple of young men there, but in no way did they fit the descriptions I'd been given. Well.... I thought to myself. Maybe they're waiting to check me out first, before revealing themselves. I can respect that.

I made my way to the end of the centre turnstile and sat on the edge to wait.

And wait.

And wait.

I glanced over at the clock. 1223 Okay, I've been here an hour. Let's see if something's happened. I found a telephone and dialed home. "Momma? Can you check to see if I've gotten an email from 'BactaBoy'? I'll call you back in five, kay?"

"They aren't there?" she asked.

"Well, no. But I told them to try and get in touch with me should plans change."

"Okay, talk to you in a few minutes, then." We said goodbye and hung up.

I paced around the baggage claim area until the clocks told me enough time has passed, then called back.

"Hello?"

"Momma, was there an email?" I asked straight away.

"Yes, and if you had bothered to check it before you left, you wouldn't have had to go all that way!" she laughed.

"Whaddaya mean?"

"Your friend said they had to run into something, and they'll try to be at our place come evening."

I sighed. "Alright then, I'll be home in about an hour. Bye."

First thing I did when I got home was hop onto the computer to check my email.

-------

From: BactaBoy@Alliance.Reb.Org

To: Shadoedancer@aol.com

Subject: Re: Going on Holiday.

Date: Sun, 24 June 2001 0520 -0500

Sylvana,

Have to run into a couple things. We'll try to be at the Co-ords you'd sent over by Monday after sunset, local time. See you then!

~DHK&WJ

-------

Yep, should've checked before I left.

So I straightened up my room. I pulled out the trundle bed and made it up. I pulled a free mattress down from the attic and put it on the floor in my sister's room for myself. Then, I did what I usually did. I grabbed a book and climbed into a tree, settling down in my special crook for a wait. I think what I liked most about that tree is that unless you looked straight up, there was no way you could really see me among the branches. I did came down to eat supper when my stomach told me to, then back up I went to wait.

True to word, they arrived after sunset.

True to form, it was WAY after sunset.

It was probably 2300 when I began to try not to nod off in boredom. I had finished my book by sunset and, of course, without a flashlight or something there was no reading to be done.

*******

Then again, perhaps I had nodded off after all. Next thing I knew there was a roar of engines. I looked through the maple leaves to see two X-wings setting down in the front yard, they looked just like the ones in the films. I also noticed some black scarring along their sides as they landed and shut down.

Soon, the two cockpits opened and orange-clad figures stood and pulled off their helmets revealing dark and light hair. The pilots each swung down off the edge of an S-foil and dropped to the ground. They stood and stretched, looking around to catch their bearings on the area.

I put a hand over my mouth as my eyes danced. If I didn't know better, it would have been Russel Crowe and Michael Vartan who'd just climbed out, and not the two pilots I had been expecting.

I noticed 'Vartan' had a trickle of blood going down the side of his face from a cut near his hairline. 'Crowe' noticed it at the same time.

"Great way to start a vacation Hobbie..."

The blonde swiped blood off the side of his face as though he had just noticed it. "It's nothing, clean it up and toss a Bacta patch on it, and it'll be fine by morning, Wes," he laughed and the other chimed in quickly.

I couldn't help but laugh along with them. They stopped suddenly and my eyes widened as I saw the dark haired pilot suddenly had a blaster in his hand. "Who's that? Show yourself!"

"It's Sylvana Lorrdain!" I called back from my vantage point up in the maple tree. I dropped silently to the ground and raised my hands as I approached them. Thanks to their conversation, I had figured out which was whom. "You're not gonna shoot your hostess, now put that thing away Janson," I smirked.

As he put the blaster away, I pulled my full-length denim cape tightly around me to protect myself from the cold night air, and shoved my hands into my pockets while I finished crossing the distance between us. "Pleased to finally be meeting you gentlemen, though you are a bit late." I grinned and pulled a hand out of my pocket to shake theirs. I noticed that Janson was about my height, mayhaps a touch shorter, and Hobbie was a bit taller than I. Were I to stand between them, we'd make a cute little staircase.

Janson bowed and kissed my hand. "Pleased to meet you, Lady Sylvana Lorrdain."

I smirked as I rolled my eyes. "What a charmer."

He stood straight and noticed my cape. I always wore it when I would be up in the tree after dark, as it was often quite cool in the summer night. "Where can I get one of those?"

"Purple Barn." Then I turned to Hobbie, thankfully he simply shook my hand.

"Lean down," I told him. With a curious look he complied. He winced slightly as I touched the skin near his wound. I let out a low whistle. "Look at the size of that thing. You've really done a number here." I sighed and pulled a clean handkerchief from my pocket and put it over the gash. "Come on you two, get inside and cleaned up. First you can tell me what happened while I fix up that gash of yours."

I pulled the handkerchief away to see how quickly the blood would re-flow. I put the handkerchief back down and pressed against his head. "Hold this tightly." I turned to Janson. "We don't have Bacta patches, but I'm sure there's a first aid kit on your x-wings. Get me a B-patch about this big," I held up my hands in about a 5cm square, "and come in. You, Hobbie, will follow me so I can get that cleaned up before you lose any more blood than you have to."

They looked at each other than back at me and smirked. "Yes Ma'am!" Janson gave me a sloppy salute and went back to one of the X-wings. Hobbie, holding the cloth to his hairline, followed me back to the house.

The front door opened straight into the kitchen. I flicked on the light and pulled out a chair near the sink. "Sit," I ordered the tall blond. I left Hobbie there while I went to the washroom and into the medicine cabinet. Soon I returned with some clean washcloths, hydrogen peroxide, alcohol, iodide, and cotton balls. I set the items on the table and ran some hot water into the sink.

The door slammed shut as Janson came in. "I've got-"

"Shhh!" I waved a hand in a typical 'lower the volume' gesture. "Everyone else's asleep," I told him, my voice just above a whisper.

Hobbie smirked slightly. "Not everyone," he said quietly.

I followed his gaze down through the living room to the short hallway where my father sleepily stood in his old scrubs. "What's going on, Syl?" he asked as he scratched at his Lincoln-style, bright red and white-flecked beard.

"Nothing Da," I called back quietly. "My friends just showed up and one has a nasty cut - I can take care of it."

He nodded. "Alright then, call if you need me." He turned and went back into the bedroom.

Janson added a smallish white box to the paraphanalia on the table. "Like I said," he began in an exaggerated stage-whisper, "I got the first aid kit." He pulled out a chair and plopped down as I set one washcloth into the sink and shut off the scalding water.

I wrung it out, then tapped Hobbie's hand away. Pulling off the handkerchief, I clucked my tongue as I shook my head at the sight before me. I tilted his head so I could wash the blood away properly. "Alright, so would either of you like to tell me what happened?" I asked as I pulled the bloodied washcloth away, rinsed it, and continued to wash the blood from Hobbie's face.

"Well," Hobbie began. "We ended up with some 'surprise' escort duty, so I sent you an email to let you know we'd be late."

"'Surprise' escort duty?"

"You know," Wes broke in. "The sort where we drop out of hyperspace on a convoy and say 'We're your escort... Surprise'!"

"So what happened? I find it hard to believe Antilles would let you go off without refueling and medical attention." I tossed the washcloth into the sink and put some alcohol onto a cotton ball. "This'll sting," I told him. Hobbie winced slightly as I dabbed at the gash and took a proper look at it. "Good thing you have those B-patches. This is pretty deep and I'd hate to have to wake Da up to help with the stitches." As though on cue, a rumbling snore floated through the house.

I chuckled slightly and put the other washcloth up against the skin beneath the wound, tilting Hobbie's head slightly. "This'll sting too, but it'll clean any dirt and such out." I explained as I poured a little hydrogen peroxide over the gash and it bubbled to show me it was doing its job. Over the sound of a hissing intake of breath I asked Janson to clarify. "So, what happened on your way over?"

"I'll give you the short version..." he began as I continued pouring the HP on Hobbie's wound whenever the bubbling stopped. "We took a zig-zag route here and, at one of our stops, we saw some pirates harassing a small freighter. We stopped them, then we came here." Janson shrugged and grinned.

"So you two played hero on your way over," I chuckled as I patted the opposite side of the washcloth over the wound with my right hand and put some iodine on a cotton ball with my left. I dabbed the iodine over the gash, and poor Hobbie took a hissing breath again. "Yeah, that stings slightly too, but it'll keep it from getting infected." I fanned it slightly with one hand and grabbed a clean cotton ball, dabbing at the seeping blood along the lower edge.

"Wes? Can you grab me a B-patch out of that kit? I can't really read Aurebesh too well."

"Wait a moment, Syl," Hobbie said as Janson rummaged through the pack. "If you can't read Aurebesh, how the Hoth do you send and receive e-mails in it?"

"Oh that's easy." Janson handed me the B-patch. I opened it carefully so as not to touch either side. Amazing how the packaging was the same style as our sterile gauze patches. I held it so Hobbie could see. "Which side has the Bacta, pink or white? I can't remember."

"Pink."

"Okay," I finished opening the patch. "As I was saying, your basic is like our English so it's mostly only a matter of transliterating alphabets. I got a program, sort of a decrypt/encrypt, from Alison Sky, a friend of mine, that'll do it for me. You'd like her, she's really neat. Haven't talked to her in a while though, I should try to get back in touch with her. She's cool like that, no matter how long it's been, she'll make it look like it's only been yesterday."

I noticed Hobbie's eyes dart to Janson with a saddish look and turned to see him sharing it. With a slight frown I shrugged it off, maybe they'd once known someone else by the same name.

I secured the Bacta patch over the gash at his hairline. "There." I patted Hobbie's shoulder and started cleaning things up. "You guys go get your things and then we'll get you washed, fed, and bedded down for the night."

As the two went out the front door, I saw Janson say something that rewarded him with a punch in the arm from Hobbie. I chuckled to myself and finished cleaning up my impromptu med-station. They soon returned, each bearing a small shapeless bag over one shoulder. I led them through the kitchen to a door.

"You will be staying in my room," I pushed the door open while ignoring their new exchange of looks. "I pulled out the trundle, so there's two beds, one for each of you." I flicked on the light and stood aside so they could enter. "That door leads to the commode, just remember to put the seat down, and to flush. Yellow mellow, brown down; we've got a well, and only so much water at a time." I chuckled as they looked at each other with an odd smirk and tossed their bags onto the beds.

"Where are you sleeping?" Janson asked.

"On the floor in my sister's room," I shrugged and left them standing there. "C'mon, I'll show you the washroom, and how it all works." They followed me. "I imagine you're both wanting to clean up and eat something before you go to bed, so one can take a shower as the other eats, then vice-versa." I led them to a doorway off the livingroom and flicked on the light. "This's the washroom."

My boarder-collie/wolf mix lifted her head from where she was sleeping on the couch, hopped down and made her way over to stand by my side. "This is Flora, Wishbone's probably asleep on my sister's bed right now." I pushed my way into the washroom as they knelt to pet her.

"This is the shower, lift the lever to the right for cold, left for hot. Shampoo and Conditioner's on the ledge in the corner, soap's in the nook on the wall-"

"So a washroom's like a 'fresher?" Janson stated as he and Hobbie stood. Flora pushed her head up against Hobbie's hand so he'd continue to pet her. He obliged.

"Yeah, I suppose so," I chuckled as a thought struck me. "You could say I'm giving you a Re-'fresher course."

"That was bad, Syl..." Janson said. "There are galaxies younger than that one...."

Hobbie shook his head and chuckled quietly.

"Anyway, just pull the knob up out of the tap here and the shower will run. The knob above the tap on the sink here is the same as the leaver in the tub, right cold, left hot. When you're done with the commode, again seat down, and you push this lever to get it to flush." I put my hands on my hips, "Any questions? One of you can shower while the other eats, and the towels are in that cabinet up there."

Both shook their heads.

"Alright then, who's first for washing and who's first for eating?" I asked them.

"Feed this pilot now!" Janson said before Hobbie could beat him to it.

"I guess that means you get to clean up first then, Hobbie." I opened up the cabinet and pulled down a couple of towels and a washcloth. I laid them on the counter. "But it also means that you get to eat like a gentleman, while this one..." I poked Janson in the arm playfully, "gets to eat like a tramp, and _then_ wash up." I led the shorter man out of the room as Hobbie closed the door behind us.

He followed me back to the kitchen. As I went to the 'fridge, Janson dramatically collapsed into a chair. "I'm starving!"

"I take it that means you'll eat whatever I give you?" I turned around raising an eyebrow while giving him a smirk.

A flicker of what looked like uncertainty crossed his face. "Uh..."

I chuckled as I pulled a fully loaded plate of leftovers out of the fridge and put it in the microwave. "No worries, I wouldn't feed you anything I wouldn't eat myself." I set the timer on the microwave, and went to the drawer to pull out some flatware. I set them, and a few napkins, before Janson. "Now for drink we have apple juice, orange juice, milk, water, and kool-aide."

"What's kool-aide?" he asked me.

"Well, it's sweet, coloured, flavoured water," I tried to explain to him. Then a thought occurred to me. "It also changes your mouth's colour when you drink some."

"Oh! I'll try that! What colour?"

"Depends on which flavour we made up today," I took out the pitcher and pulled off the top to look inside. "Blue raspberry."

"Sounds good to me!"

So I went to the cupboard and pulled out a glass. I filled it to the brim and set it before the grungy and rakish looking pilot sitting at my kitchen table. He immediately took a sip then turned to face me. "Is it blue yet?" He opened his mouth and stuck out his tongue as though I had asked him to say 'ahh'.

I sighed and covered my smile with a hand while I laughed. "No, Wes Janson, not yet... why don't you ask again when you're done with that glass?"

"Okay!" He picked up the glass and chugged. I sat down at the table and put my head in my hands. The microwave timer thankfully saved me.

I jumped up and grabbed a potholder to put the plate on, took it out, and dropped the food in front of Janson.

"Wow, this smells good!" he inhaled the scent of the food. "What is it?"

"Roman Holiday, kinda like lasagna, but cheaper and easier to make.... A friend gave us the recipe."

"Hn..." I could tell the explanation didn't mean a thing to him, but he took a huge forkful and his eyes brightened immediately. "MMMM!" He began to wolf down his meal and didn't really say much after that.

The door to the washroom cracked open and Hobbie poked his head out. His hair was unruly from its washing so it hung down in his face a little bit, and my heart skipped a beat. "Uhm..." he called quietly. Janson looked towards the door briefly and then went back to eating. I looked up as well. "Wes, can you grab my bag for me? I kind of forgot to grab some clean clothes for sleeping in before the shower and...." his voice trailed off.

"Oh, just wrap a towel around your middle and get it yourself, I'm eating!" Janson said between mouthfuls.

"I'll get it. Wes, which one is his?" I jumped up.

"The blue one," another mouthful.

I dashed off into my bedroom and grabbed the light blue, shapeless pack. I went over to the washroom and knocked on the door.

Hobbie poked his head out again and slipped a hand through the crack in the door. "Thanks."

I nodded and watched with a slight smirk as he tried to figure out how to drag the bag in without opening the door any further. Finally he seemed to get frustrated, and opened the door quickly, pulled the bag in, and closed the door just as quickly. I caught a glimpse of him barely wrapped in the small towel and sighed with a slight blush and chuckle. I went back to put more kool-aide in Janson's glass. He just winked at me.

I rolled my eyes and went to grab the other plate of Roman Holiday out of the 'fridge and pop it into the microwave. Soon Hobbie re-appeared in what looked like gym shorts and a tank top, his hair was combed back in what I would soon learn was its usual no-nonsense style. I bit my lip and turned around quickly. "I've got apple-juice-orange-juice-milk-water-and-kool-aide. What'll-it-be,-Hobbie?" I asked swiftly as I kept my head stuck in the fridge. Maybe the cold would chase the heat of a blush from my face.

"Go-for-the-kool-aide, it's-tasty-and-it'll-turn-your-tongue-blue. See?" Janson imitated the way I had just spoken.

I didn't turn around to look, but I imagined Janson was making the same 'ahh' face at Hobbie that he had at me earlier.

"Alright," he sounded so long-suffering as he let out a sigh... I heard a smile in that sigh and smiled to myself. "I'll try that kool-aide then," Hobbie said as I heard him pull a chair out and sit down.

I grabbed a glass for him and filled it. When I gave it to him, our hands touched a moment and I pulled away quickly. It was a good thing he had a hold of it, or the blue liquid would have ended up all over the table, floor, and himself. When the microwave toned, I jumped and went to go get it with a potholder. Get a hold of yourself Sylvana.... I wondered why he hadn't had this effect on me before, and then realized it was because I was in, what I liked to call, 'medic mode.' I tried to get into host-mind and partially succeeded by the time I set the plate, napkin, and flatware before him at table.

Janson finished his meal and stood. "That was very good, Syl.... I think I'll go wash up now." He disappeared into my room and came out bearing a yellow bag, then disappeared into the washroom.

Hobbie took a bite of his meal then smiled at me. "He's right, this is very good."

I smiled back and looked down, busying myself with cleaning up after Janson. "Thanks," I mumbled and brought the dish, flatware, and glass to the sink and began washing them, turning my back to Hobbie. A startled scream-like yelp came from the washroom.

"Oops! Sorry Wes!" I called back as I turned off the water. "That was stupid, Syl, freeze your guests why don't you..." I muttered to myself quietly as I shook my head and leaned against the sink.

I felt eyes on me and whirled around nervously, just catching Hobbie changing his line of sight to look back down to his plate. I sighed and sat at table again. Flora came over and pushed her head up under my hand and seemed to sigh happily as I pet her. She looked up at me with eyes that seemed to say, 'don't worry, Syl, it's all good'. I smiled slightly and looked up finally, only to meet Hobbie's eyes.

"Enjoying your meal? Can I get you anything else?" I asked.

"Yes. No, I'm fine." He looked back down to his plate and finished his meal in silence.

Janson reappeared then dressed similarly, though his hair was messy as, I suspected, usual, bearing both their bags. He passed through the kitchen and tossed them into the bedroom. He then returned and sat back down at table. "That felt gooood," he grinned.

"Good, I'm glad," I chuckled. I saw Hobbie was done with his meal and stood to take his plate, flatware, and glass. I turned and began to wash the dishes. "Why don't you two go to bed, it's been a long day and I'm sure you need your rest. Feel free to sleep in, I know I probably will."

"Sleep in what?"

Hobbie glared, "Shut up, Wes."

Janson stood and stretched with an exaggerated yawn, "Sounds good to me, Syl." Before I knew what was happening, he grabbed me with one arm and pulled me close. "Now for a good nite kiss," he grinned.

The first thing I noticed was that the handsome man was about my height, mayhaps a few centimetres or so shorter. Then I realized what he said. "I don't think so!" My eyes widened as I panicked slightly and tried to push him away. My left hand fell on the knife concealed at my waist out of habit.

He softly kissed my cheek as he let me go. With that devious grin on his face, he made a swift retreat to my bedroom. I dropped my hand in relief.

Hobbie sighed and shook his head. "I'm really sorry about that. He acts rather strangely around women. It'll be better tomorrow, I promise." He stood and smiled. "We really appreciate your hospitality, Syl."

The light danced in his amazing eyes as he looked at me. I forced back the returning blush until he had turned and moved towards the bedroom. "Sleep sweet, Derek," I said quietly to his retreating back.

He turned and faced me with slight shock registering on his handsome features. "Dream well, Sylvana."

And then he disappeared behind the door.

I turned and finished washing up the dishes, trying not to eavesdrop on what they said to each other as they settled in for the night. Hobbie's voice sounded a bit scolding, Janson's slightly repentant. The two of them made me giggle like a school-girl. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the light flick off and silence soon reigned in the house. Well, except for the sound of my washing the dishes. I finished up and turned off the light in the kitchen.

Flora followed me to my sister's room, where I closed the door and changed into an old pair of scrubs from school, that I often slept in. I opened the door again so Flora could wander the house at leisure, curled up on the cushion on the floor, wrapped the blankets around myself, and soon.... I fell to sleep.

I did dream well.

*******

Tuesday June 26, 2001

*******

"OMITAWG!!!"

I awoke to hear my twenty-year-old brother's exclamation of wonder. He burst into the room. My twenty-two-year-old little-sister just rolled over in her bed and pulled the covers over her head. Wishbone, a teddy rat-terrier, poked his head from beneath her covers and barked at Arrek for the sake of making noise. He then burrowed back in Fiolla's blankets and was quiet. Flora sat up and yawned.

"It's too early, Arrek..." I yawned as he pulled me to my feet. My baby brother was not exactly little, standing at about 6'3".

"There's X-wings in the front yard!" He told me, his eyes wide. He spoke like one would to a child who just wasn't understanding what was happening. Then, he pulled me out into the livingroom to look through the bay window.

"I know," I pushed his hand off my arm and folded them as I stood there next to him.

"But Syl, they're real live X-wings! Just like the computer-game!" He greeted life with such exuberance sometimes, it made life for the rest of us a bit interesting.

"Yes, Arrek, I know! Now, would you keep it down, most everyone's trying to sleep in today!" I looked out the window and saw that my father's 1970 Nova was headed down the driveway. Yes, it definitely was early. Of course, now that I was up and awake, there was no way I'd be able to get back to sleep. I sighed and ran my hands through my long, very tangled, dark hair. I looked over at the clock, it was 0645. I whimpered slightly. "You owe me, kid.... you just lost me at least three hours of sleep." I went over and dropped onto the couch.

He shrugged and went to the den to play around on the computer, probably a game, or checking up on world news or something equally incomprehensible to me.

I leaned back into the couch and curled up, hugging a pillow. I guess I was more tired than I had thought, for I soon fell back to sleep.

*******

"Ooof!" I awoke suddenly when Wishbone landed on my lap. "I sat up quickly and pushed the little dog off, then pet him as he looked to be a little frightened. "Alright, who-" I looked up and stopped mid-scold.

There stood Wes Janson, with a smirk the size of Asia on his face. "Rise and shine, Syl!" he said.

I frowned and threw the pillow at him. "I only dozed off..." I glanced at the clock. 0845. I stood and stretched with a yawn. I pulled my hair out of my face and began to braid it back so it wouldn't get tangled further before I could brush it out.

"Leave it down," he suggested.

I made a face at him, and though I thought maybe that suggestion could have interesting results, I continued to braid it, just to spite him. I went into the kitchen. "Cereal's in here," I pointed to a lower cupboard. "Milk is in the 'fridge. There's bowls up there, and spoons in that drawer. I'm gonna take my shower now."

I turned around and started to head to the washroom. "Sithspit!" I stopped and turned. "My clothes are in my room, and I can't go in until Hobbie wakes up." I sighed and went back to the kitchen.

"Nah, he's out like a light, just get your stuff," Janson told me with a slight smirk.

I shrugged. Sure, why not? I mean, if I'm quiet about it he won't even know I was in there.

Quietly I slipped into my room. Janson must have taken the trundle, for Hobbie was sleeping peacefully on my bed. Or perhaps it was 'finally' sleeping peacefully. I could see he was a bit tangled in the sheets and under the cover. He was on his side, one arm crooked under the pillow, the other sort-of falling before him. His hair was tousled again, and he looked as though he were smiling in his sleep. Must be a nice dream. I wonder what it is... I shook my head when I realized I was staring, and turned to get my things out of the wardrobe. Ignoring the little closet on the left side, I opted for the drawers on the right.

As I quietly pulled out the last drawer to get what I needed, I felt eyes on me again. I paused then turned. Nobody was in the room, beside Hobbie, and he looked to still be peacefully fast asleep. I shrugged to myself, pulled out the pair of shorts, and closed the drawer quietly. I slipped out of the room and went to go take my shower.

*******

Yes, a shower was just what I needed, and it felt good. I put on the clean clothes, and brushed then braided back my hair again. I put the towels away and picked up the scrub suit from the floor. I then headed to drop it under the pillow in my sister's room for use tonite.

When I made it back to the kitchen, both pilots were sitting at table, dressed and ready for anything; I smiled to myself. Or not.

I grabbed a bowl and sat down to eat my own breakfast. Janson was dressed in a simple pair of khaki pants and a dark blue shirt. Hobbie was wearing tan cargoe-pants and a light blue shirt. The term "boy band" popped into my mind when I saw them and I couldn't help but laugh.

"What is it?" they asked in unison.

That only made me laugh harder. "I'm... I'm sorry..." I took a drink of my orange juice. "Nothing," I smirked. "You two brought swimsuits with you, right?"

"We didn't know we needed to," Hobbie said.

"Well, I guess we'll have to take a trip to Amesway when we're done with breakfast then."

There was little talk as we finished eating. I grabbed my keys off from my bureau, and noticed that my bed had been made, while the trundle was still messy. I smiled to myself, put my wallet in my back left-pocket, and went with them out the door.

I headed straight to Shadowfax and opened the door. I pushed my seat forward. "One of you is going to have to sit in the back seat," I said.

"I get the front, I have longer legs," Hobbie said quickly. Janson frowned but got in behind my seat anyway. "Back seat, I called it!" Maybe that wasn't such a good thing.

I pushed my seat back and leaned over to open the door for Hobbie. He slid onto the grey-veloure seat-cover and shut it softly. "Do it again," I told him.

"Do what?"

"Shut the door again, but harder."

"Oh," he tried to figure out how to open the door.

I sighed, leaned over him and pulled the handle, then pushed it open. "Now slam it, Hobbie."

He did and the car shook. "I didn't think you'd slam it that hard..." I said under my breath as I fought with Shadowfax to start. He was nice to me today and turned over on the second try. "Getting better ol' boy," I said as I tapped the dashboard and backed across the driveway. As I wove through the potholes, I turned on my CB radio. Thankfully, I think, it was quiet today.

"I grew up on a farm kind of like this, only we didn't have those big bumps in the sky over there." Janson laughed at his little joke.

"Those are called Mountains, Wes," I said with a smirk.

Hobbie only chuckled slightly and watched the scenery pass.

Soon we were parked in the lot for Jamesway. The 'J' had been spirited away in some sort of prank a few years ago, so I started calling it 'Amesway'. The name stuck. "Here we are," I pulled into a space. I turned off my car and opened the door. As I pulled the seat forward to let Janson out, Hobbie let himself out of the car. Our doors shut at the same time, I couldn't help but let out a short laugh.

"Alright, let's get you boys something to swim in." I led the way into the store, and went straight for the men's sportswear racks. I didn't quite make it there right away. The two followed me, looking around at the people shopping.

As we passed the toy department, a handful of kids bowled me over. "Syllie!"

I grinned as I knelt down to hug my 'kids'. "Hey, what are you all doing here?"

"Lookin' at toys, duh!" answered one little boy.

"An' they got some really neat Star Wars ones in too!" answered another.

Hobbie and Janson looked at each other, then at the kids, then at me. "Can we see?" they asked.

I just knew this would be trouble. What I didn't know, was how funny a form trouble could take. "It's a free country," I said as I allowed the kids to pull me to the Star Wars display in the toy department. Hobbie and Janson followed me, I glanced back to see the confused looks on their faces. When we reached the section, I stopped and turned around to see their reactions.

Hobbie's jaw dropped when he saw all the miniature fighters, action figures, even play lightsabers. Janson's grin widened as he reached out and picked up an X-wing toy. "This is amazing!"

Hobbie picked up an X-wing as well. "They look just like ours!"

The kids pulled out toy lightsabers, the un-boxed kind, and began fighting with them. At the sound effects the 'weapons' made, the two pilots stopped inspecting the toy fighters, and gaped. They exchanged that glance I knew spelled trouble... with a capital 'L'.

Janson picked up two lightsaber toys and tossed one to Hobbie. They squared off and began 'sparring'. At least they had the presence of mind to not hit them too hard.... if they did, the plastic would break, trust me, I know this from experience.

I watched them spar up and down the aisles, much to the amusement of the other patrons at the store. I mean, two grown men, playing with lightsaber toys.

"I'm a Jedi, you can never defeat me!!"

"No I'm a Jedi, you Sith!" The lightsaber twirled.

"No, I am the Jedi!!!!"

I couldn't help but laugh. After following them as they continued with phrases increasingly ludicrous, We ended up in the men's sportswear section, where we would find the swimsuits. Unfortunately, by this time, I had nearly lost the ability to breathe, I was laughing so hard, and finally just fell to sit on the floor because I couldn't stand any longer.

I overheard some workers talking, and quickly sobered. "BOYS!" I shouted at them.

Hobbie stopped suddenly and turned to me in surprise. Janson bopped him on the head with the tip of the lightsaber, then stopped as well. "Huh?"

"You're acting like children, now come over here and pick out a couple of swimsuits," I'd gotten to my feet and stood there with my hands on my hips in a typical offended mother pose.

Hobbie looked at the ground sheepishly as he retracted the plastic lightsaber. "Sorry," he mumbled.

"Gee, you're no fun, Syl..." Janson pouted as he too retracted the toy.

I rolled my eyes, "We came here for swimsuits, now get over here and pick one out." Although it was funny to watch them, I was a bit miffed. Especially after overhearing those workers talking about calling the manager to get them thrown out. I held out my hand, and they shuffled over like whipped dogs to hand me the lightsabers. I took them, and pointed to the rack. "Choose," I said curtly.

"Yes ma'am," they mumbled.

Hobbie found a pair in a light blue, with light turquoise stripes on the sides. Janson came up with a pair in deep yellow, orange stripes on the side. "Now go try them on to be sure they fit," I pointed to the men's changing room. They nodded, and soon reappeared with the swim-trunks in hand.

"They fit," Hobbie said quietly.

"Good," I said and turned to go toward the cashier station. They put the swimsuits down on the counter. "I'll meet you two at the car," I told them.

"Okay," Janson tried on a grin and pulled Hobbie out of the store with him.

I felt badly for the way I'd yelled at them, so I set the two lightsabers down on the counter as well. "Please ring up a third one while I go get it, and put the toys in a double second bag," I told the cashier. I went and selected a lightsaber for myself and returned shortly. I paid for the items and went out to where the two pilots leaned against the Mustang.

I popped the trunk and tossed the bag of toys in, shutting it again tightly. The doors were soon unlocked, and they got in. I tossed the bag with the swimsuits into the back seat and we were on our way back to my home.

Hobbie sat quietly in the seat beside me. I couldn't help but keep stealing glances at him, I hoped my friend wasn't angry.

"So Syl, what's in cargo compartment?" Janson asked. He'd finally gotten over being quiet.

"A surprise," I said with a smirk as we pulled up to the house.

"What kind of surprise?" he pressed as we got out of the car.

"The kind that would be spoiled if I told you," I chuckled. "Come on inside and change into those swimsuits. We're going to the beach."

"But we're too far away from the ocean here," Hobbie put in finally.

"It's a lake, that's what we swim in around here," I laughed.

I grabbed my swimsuit from a drawer, and left them to change while I went to change in the bathroom. I put the swimsuit on, and pulled my shorts on up over it. I pulled my tank top over the swimsuit and retrieved three beach towels down from the cabinet and went out to put them on the kitchen table.

"Where ya goin?" my brother asked.

"To lake Taconic," I told him as I dropped the towels on the table and went to the other room to get a blanket for the beach.

"Can I come?"

"If you can be in your swimsuit by the time we leave, I don't see why not. Just ask Momma and Da first."

Arrek sprinted off and returned wearing his own swimsuit, a dark blue pair of trunks with white side-striping, as the pilots left my room. They also were in their swimsuits, with tank tops on as well.

I sighed my amazement at their good looks and turned to open the door. "Let's went!" I picked up the towels, and Arrek picked up the blanket. Hobbie and Janson went to get into the car as my brother and I put the towels and blanket in the trunk.

"Oh!" I noticed the bag of lightsabers. "Arrek, quick run back and grab your lightsaber. Put it in a bag so they don't see it when you bring it back."

"Why?"

"Just trust me on this one, okay?"

"I hate it when you say that."

He shrugged, and jogged back to the house. He soon returned holding something under his shirt and came to the back of the car where I stood. He handed me his lightsaber toy and I deposited it into the bag of toys already in the trunk. I slammed it down. "You'll have to sit in the back with Wes, okay?"

He grinned, "cool!"

I took that as a 'yes', and pushed the seat forward so he could also get into the back seat.

"Those are real X-wings, right?" he asked Janson.

"Of course!"

"And you guys fly them, like, for real?!"

"No, we sit in them and pose for holographs."

My brother thought for a moment and decided that what he didn't understand didn't matter. "That RAWKS!!!"

I shook my head and started up Shadowfax. This was going to be a long hours drive.

*******

We didn't make it.

Oh, nothing went wrong... we just didn't get all the way to Taconic right away. As we crossed the Rip Van Winkle bridge over the Hudson river between Catskill and Hudson/Germantown New York....

"What's that?!?" I heard Janson ask from the back seat.

"What's what? What is he asking about Arrek?" I asked my brother as we kept going.

"I think he's talkin' 'bout Olana," my brother told me. [1]

"Oh, you mean the castle up there?" I nodded toward the small castle on a hill.

"Yeah, can we go there?" he asked.

"That does look pretty interesting," Hobbie put in.

I shrugged, "Alright." I had to head down through Germantown to get to Taconic anyhow. Slowly we drove up the winding hill. There were trees on either side, and both pilots were looking around at the beauty of the place. We came up to the parking lot, there was only one other car there. "Hmm, busy day," I said sarcastically while I parked the car and shut it off. "Everybody out!" I said, following my own direction by opening the door and pulling the seat forward.

We made our way across the small lot, and headed down the wide walkway. Off to the side, there occasionally was a bench made from tree branches.

"Woah, that looks really wierd," Janson said.

"Go sit in one," I told him. "They're actually quite comfortable," I assured him as I sat in the bench on the opposite side of the path.

He looked at me quizzically and sat. His eyes widened, "They are! Hobbie, you gotta try this."

Hobbie nodded, and sat next to me on the other bench. "Yes, they are quite comfortable," he turned and half smiled down at me as he put his arm up on the bench behind me. I couldn't help but flush a bit at that.

My brother rolled his eyes, "I thought you guys wanted to see the castle?" He started walking down the pathway.

I laughed, "Come on then!" and patted Hobbie's knee as I used it to half push myself up. As I followed my brother, I glanced back and smiled slightly as I saw that it was his turn to blush.

"Way to go Hobs," I heard Janson say quietly after the sound of someone, presumably Janson, slapping someone, presumably Hobbie, on the back.

My smile was gone by the time they'd caught up. "It's not really a castle, but people around here tend to refer to it that way. I guess it does kind of look like one," We turned a bend in the path and Olana came into full view.

"Would you take a look at that....." Hobbie said quietly as he and Janson stopped walking on either side of me.

"Colourful, eh?" I smirked. "It's a Moorish mansion built by an artist named Fredrick Church. He was part of the Hudson River school of painters. This place, inside, looks the same as it did when he lived there, and over in the carriage house is a sort of museum with many of his drawings and paintings."

I started walking again, and the two followed me. "He travelled the world, had six kids, and still found the time, somehow, to build this. I'd get tickets for us to go on the tour inside, but it's closed on Tuesdays." I shrugged, "We can still take a walkaround if you like. All the land you can see from here, well, for the most part, was his estate and farmland."

We walked around the mansion, pointing out the riot of colours, the eccentricity of the architecture, and even the bell tower. "...And if you stand here," I climbed up the steps that said no-trespassing. "You can see most of the valley, the river, and even out to the mountains beyond." They climbed up and stood to either side of me as I pointed towards the right.

"Breathtaking," Hobbie said.

"Yeah," agreed Janson with unaccustomed quietness.

I leaned over beside Hobbie and pointed down to a little peninsula in the river. "And that's Greenpoint, look a bit to the right, and you can just barely see where my parent's house is."

Hobbie leaned back into me and tilted his head to follow where I was pointing to. He nodded. "I can see it now," he looked back at me, his face bare centimetres from my own.

"Hey guys! This hill is amazing!" We turned to see my brother standing on the edge of a very steep, very long hill. "Could you imagine sledding down this thing in the winter?"

I started walking down to where he was standing, "It would be better than 'murder hill' but..." I nodded at the end of the hill, "I don't think I'd like meeting those trees in the speed we'd be going at, Arrek." At the bottom of the hill was another thick stand of trees. This was mountain and foothill country, and if it wasn't a cleared field, or town, it was most likely covered in either trees, or brush, or even wetland.

"I didn't think of that, but we could bail."

"At that speed, do you really think you could bail out in time?" I half-quoted.

"She's probably right, and even if you did get out of the sled, you'd probably keep on rolling down the hill and then..." Janson clapped his hands together, hard.

"Trust me, crashing hurts, Arrek," Hobbie put in.

"You guys are no fun." He kicked at the dirt and walked back on over to us.

We spent the next twenty minutes walking around the near places of Olana and talking.

"I've been thinking," Janson started.

"You've been thinking?" Hobbie said with mock surprise, "Call the NRHN![2] It's a miracle!"

He tossed his taller friend a poisonous glance. "I've been thinking.... Can we go to that Purple Barn place and get me a cloak too?"

I shrugged. "May as well, it's only just across the border."

About ten minutes later, I honked the horn as we passed the "Welcome to Massachusetts," billboard.

"Why'd you do that?" Hobbie asked, looking over from where he was seated in the front passenger seat.

"Oh," I shrugged, "I guess because it's tradition, my Da does it - so do a lot of truckers. We always do it when we enter a new state, or province depending on the country. It's kind of like saying 'thanks for the welcome'!" I waved a hand.

Another five minutes, and I pulled into the shallow driveway before a large barn, painted in, you guessed it, purple. "So, what kind of place is this?" Janson asked as we all piled out.

"It's a consignment shop. When people have clothes that are in good condition, and that they don't want anymore, they sell them to places like this. Then, people like me buy them." I led them over to the shed next to it. "If you want anything out of the ordinary, it'll be in here, this is where they keep their costumes."

The owner was there rummaging through some bags. "Hi there, what can I do for you folks?"

"Mind if we look through your Halloween stuff?" I asked. "I know you don't usually pull it out for another couple of months, but my friend here is visiting from out of country, and would like to take a look."

"Sure, no problem, ma'am. Just go ahead and rummage through these bags here," he tossed out five large garbage bags for us to go through, and went back to the main barn.

The first three bags were filled with children's costumes, outfits that couldn't possibly fit any of us. That didn't stop us from playing around with them though. After rummaging through, Janson pulled out a yellow tutu and stuck it on his head.

For some reason that just struck a chord. I fell over onto the ground, laughing.

"I might.... No, I WILL kill my barber," he said straight faced.

That only made me laugh harder, I curled up on my side. "Stop it!" I gasped out. "Cam Bweeve!"

Hobbie went over and pulled the tutu off from his friend's head, "Wes, you're embarrassing me."

Janson's head turned from me to his friend then back and forth once or twice more. "Oh...." he smirked and took the tutu off and stuffed it back into the bag.

I was finally able to regain my breath and sat up, grabbing a bag for myself to look through, Hobbie and Arrek were looking through a bag of their own.

I found an old kiddie bat-man cowl and cape setup. "What in the world is that!?" I pointed off behind the shed. Before anyone could ask what I was up to, I dashed behind the shed with the bit of black cloth under my arm.

"What is she doing?" Hobbie asked Arrek.

My brother shrugged. "I've learned not to ask."

I tugged the small cowl over my head like a hat, the eyehole-visor coming down like a ballcap. The cloth ears stuck out from the back of my head, and the cape only came down to my sternum. I knew I must look ridiculous, but Janson must pay for what he did that morning. I flicked an edge of the cape over my face and tucked it into the 'cap'.

The best way to get at a joker, is to act as though you aren't joking at all, I thought to myself as I strolled back nonchalantly. "Oh, I thought I saw something back there, but I guess I didn't." Shrugging my shoulders, I sat back down and began looking through my bag again.

Hobbie raised an eyebrow and smothered a chuckle. My brother didn't laugh, picking up on what I was doing. "Oh great, it's happening again..." he said. With a wink to Hobbie he sighed.

Janson looked at me curiously. "What do you mean, what's happening again?"

My brother waved a hand, "Oh don't worry about it. She's mildly insane, and occasionally does stuff like this."

"I am not insane!" I said indignantly from behind my makeshift mask. I was glad of it, because I couldn't help but grin. "I'm perfectly normal, it's you who are crazy."

"See?" my brother said quietly.

"And you let her drive!?!?" Janson said in astonishment. "We could all get killed!"

Arrek shrugged, and so did Hobbie. "Crashes aren't exactly something I'm not familiar with, Wes. Don't worry about it."

"Don't worry about it? Don't worry about it!?" Janson stood, "I'm on holiday, and she's crazy! And she's in charge of what we're doing! AND she's driving!!!!!" He put his hands on his head, "We're doomed...!"

"Guess so," Hobbie said.

"Oh well," Arrek put in.

I pulled off the costume. I nodded to Arrek, and we both turned to punch Janson, lightly, in either shoulder. "Gotcha!!!!"

He blinked and worked his mouth soundlessly. Then he started laughing, "I can't believe I fell for that!"

"I can," Hobbie said, a twinkle in his eyes.

I looked up at him with a smile, then abandoned the bag I'd been rummaging through to go look through one of the final two bags. Hobbie and Arrek were done with theirs, so they started rummaging through the second. I pulled out a garish orange cape, and couldn't possibly think of what sort of costume this had come from. I tossed it over at Janson, and kept looking.

"This is perfect!!!" He shouted grabbing up the long cloak and pulling it up around his shoulders. It came to just above his ankles. Swirling around, Janson asked, "How does it look?"

"It looks ridiculous," Hobbie told him.

"It's very.... orange," I said.

My brother started laughing, "Now you are the crazy one!"

"No I'm not!" he said indignantly, then he struck a pose with his fists on his hips, his legs spread wide. "I am Janson MAN!"

Hobbie chuckled, "More like Janson Boy...."

"Can we go swimming now?" my brother asked.

I laughed, "Yes, as soon as Janson Boy gives me the cape so I can pay for it." I held out my hand.

He took the cape off, whirled it from behind him with a flourish and bowed as he laid it in my hand. "Thank you, my lady," he said. Then he looked up and winked.

I took the cape, rolled my eyes, and went into the barn to pay for the garish thing. Thankfully, it was, true to Purple Barn form, only fifty cents.

I returned, and opened up my door to the car. I pulled the seat forward. "Saddle up!" I said.

"Huh?" came from both Hobbie and Janson.

"It means to get in the car, dufuses," my brother said as they walked to the car.

"Oh," Hobbie replied.

"I'm NOT a dufus..." Janson said, then he leaned over to Hobbie, "Uh.... what's a dufus?"

*******

It took us fourty minutes to reach Lake Taconic, we got there, and I pulled into East Beach. There were two, and the west beach was more family style, the east more for teenagers and young people. I always liked going to this one, the lifeguards there were pretty good looking.

We spread the blanket out in a spot on the beach and dropped our towels onto it. As Hobbie and Janson removed their tank-tops, I knew I wasn't going to be paying much attention to the lifeguards today. I quickly stripped off my own tank-top, and then my shorts. My swimsuit was a high necked one-piece, covered in sea-waves in shades of blue. What I liked about it, though, was that it had a low back, and I had been told on many occasions that my back was one of my best features.

I pulled out the spf15 sun screen, and put some on my hands. I began rubbing it into my legs first.

"What are you doing?" Janson asked.

"Putting on sun screen, you guys should too, or you'll end up looking like lobsters." Now, I never burned, but I had learned that if I, at least, put on a 15, it would help against skin cancer, and _that_ was something I could live without. "Just put some into your hands, and rub it on your exposed skin." I added some more into my hands, then tossed the bottle in their direction. Arrek caught it first, and got a good bit to start off with.

I watched from the corner of my eyes as Hobbie and Janson also began to apply sun screen.

"Syl, can you get my back?" my brother asked.

"Sure thing," I got up and grabbed some sun screen. I dropped the bottle back onto the blanket, and rubbed the stuff into my brother's back.

"Me next! Me next!" Janson said. "I need my back done too!"

I chuckled, "Alright, I'll do your back too, and Hobbie's...." I finished rubbing it in. I put more sun screen into my hand, and pushed Janson around by the shoulder with the other. I started putting it on.

Suddenly, I felt someone putting sun screen gently onto my own back. My brother was already flirting with some teenaged girls down near the shoreline, and I turned my head slightly to see Hobbie. A shiver ran down my spine as I turned back around and finished up Janson's while I blushed. "Thanks, Derek," I said quietly.

When I was done with his back, Janson turned around and winked, then went off to flirt with a few women of the twenty-something set. Hobbie continued slowly rubbing the lotion into my back. Then he was massaging my shoulders and neck, and my head fell forward. "Mmm, that feels good," I mumbled.

Then my mind caught up with me. Here I was, on the eastern beach at Lake Taconic, with a Hero of the Rebel Alliance giving me a back rub. Sure, he and I'd been penpals, even friends, for a few years now but.... I blushed furiously. "Lemme get your back so you don't burn," I said as I dropped to the ground to grab the bottle of sun screen and came back up behind him.

I put the lotion into my hand and began to rub it into his back. I could feel the lean swimmers-muscles beneath his skin and it was all I could do not to melt right then and there. Why did he effect me like this? I finished massaging the sun screen into his back, and beneath the dainty platinum shell'd necklace he wore, then let my hand slip to linger on his shoulder-blade a moment.

"Alright, lets' get those boys and go swimming!" I said suddenly, as I ran to where my brother was.

"C'mon Arrek! Last one to the water buys the ice-cream!" I began running to the shoreline.

"No fair, you're cheating!!!" he yelled as I splashed into the water moments before he did.

Hobbie and Janson soon joined us, and we swam out to where I could stand in water up to my shoulders.

Little fishes began to swim around our legs. "Wes," I said, still intent on exacting revenge for that morning's wake-up call, "if you go underwater, you can hear the fish talk."

He looked at me curiously. "Fish don't talk."

"Oh, yes, I believe they do," I nodded encouragingly. "Right Hobbie?" I asked as I tossed him a 'please go along with this' glance.

"They talk, Wes," he said with a straight face. "Trust me, I grew up near the ocean. Lots of fish there."

He screwed up his face in thought then dove beneath the water. The fish were non-plussed. I lowered myself to water up to my chin-line, and started talking gibberish. Moments later, Janson burst out of the water.

"They really DO talk! Hobbie, you've got to hear this!!!" he dove beneath the water, and this time, the three of us lowered to chin-line and laughed while talking gibberish. He exploded out of the water again. "Isn't that neat!"

"It sure is, Wes," Hobbie said with a slight smirk.

I had to bite the inside of my cheek to keep from laughing.

Arrek wasn't quite so successful, and burst out laughing. I pushed him into the water, and he came up sputtering. "What was that for?"

"Cause I felt like it!" I pushed my brother in again.

He came up and splashed me, then the two pilots. Soon, we were all splashing around in the water, having a general good time.

*******

We got back to the house just after dark, and changed into some dry clothes. Arrek decided to go to bed early tonite.

"I'm bored, is there anything else we can do today?" Janson asked.

I tried to think of something. "Well, there's not much to do out here at night, unless you want to go over to Waves. It's a bar, but it sort of is a dance club too, on most weeknights, and a weeknight it is. Besides that," I shrugged. "Not really anything to do."

"We can go to Waves," he decided.

"How about you, Hobbie, are you up to it?" I asked the tall blond sitting across from me at the table.

He shrugged, "Sure, I guess. I'm not much of a dancer though."

"Maybe she'll teach you, Hobs," Janson put in un-helpfully.

*******

The music was rather loud. We got our drinks, and wandered to the dance-room. I nodded to the few people I knew and moved to stand along the wall.

"Aren't you going to dance?" Janson asked me.

I shrugged, "To be honest, I don't really ever dance if I come here, I usually spend the time playing a game called pool."

"I came to dance, and I'm gonna dance with _you_ first," he grinned and pulled me reluctantly to the floor. A few songs later he told me to stay put and disappeared. I shrugged and did just that.

Soon Hobbie was pushed in front of me. "Now you two dance," Janson instructed before finding someone else to bother.

Hobbie looked at me helplessly. It was a sort of a dancemix song. To the Moon and Back, was the name, and it spoke of a girl waiting for a space-faring pilot to come take her away from the mundane world. "Just kind of move to the music," I told him. "Like this," I demonstrated.

It was surprising how quickly he picked up on it, but as I said, it was pretty simple.

"Somewhere in a private place, she packs her bags for outer space, and now she's waiting for the right kind of pilot to come...."

I half smiled to myself, wouldn't I love that to happen. I shook the thought out of my head. No, not happening. I'm stuck here. At best, I correspond, but nothing more - it won't ever be anything more.

Of course, only a couple more songs played before another Savage Garden song came on... a slower one. I sighed, "Let's go sit down."

I began to move off the floor when he caught my hand. "But this kind of dancing, I know how to do," he told me. He placed my hand up on his shoulder, then set his hands on my waist.

A small shiver ran through my spine, and I slipped my other arm up to his shoulder. We moved together to the song, Truly Madly Deeply. I loved this song, it was one of my favourites. I looked up to his eyes, and saw he was looking down to mine. My breath caught, his eyes looked just like the sky after it had been washed clean by a storm.

"I want to stand with you on the mountain, I want to bathe with you in the sea...."

He pulled me closer and I leaned my head on his shoulder. I've never been to see the ocean, or sea... but maybe I could take them climbing up to the mountaintops, not but a fifteen minute drive.... maybe I could take him... no, get that thought out of your head, Sylvana. Just friends.

Suddenly, the music changed and we (was it reluctantly?) pulled apart.

"Uhm, it's getting late," I stammered. "We ought to go, it'll be a busy day tomorrow."

He raised a hand to tuck a stray tendril of my hair behind my ear. "Okay," he dropped his hand to mine and, to my inner amazement, held it as we left the dancing room.

Janson was at the bar, laughing with the lady bar-tender. He looked up to see us. "Oops, there goes my ride, see you again sometime, beautiful," he said before following us out the door.

*******

"Goodnite Syl!" Janson called to me as he trotted up the stairs into the dark house.

Hobbie had jumped out of the car as soon as it stopped, and had opened my door for me. When he helped me out, he did not let go of my hand. We walked up to the stairs and into the kitchen, where we would have to part ways. He pulled my hand up and bent over slightly to kiss it. "Sleep sweet, Sylvana," he told me.

"Dream well, Derek," I said quietly. I could feel the heat of a blush on my face. "Goodnite," I turned away and went back to my sister's room.

I could swear that just before I closed the door, I heard him sigh.

*******

Wednesday June 27, 2001

*******

"Rise and Shine!" I called as I knocked on my bedroom door. I heard the two pilots stir.

"Tell Siee it's her turn to let the nerfs out, mom..." I heard Janson grumble.

I chuckled and began to hit the door with the palm of my hand, then I got an evil idea. I stood back and yelled... "ATTENTION!"

The sound of people falling over themselves to stand reached my ears. "Good morning," I sang out. "Now come out for breakfast," I laughed.

"Sylvaaaanaaaa! How could you do that to us!?!?" Janson whined.

About five minutes later they shuffled out of the room and moved to sit at the table. I was making bacon and scrambled eggs. When we'd finished eating, I made sure they had their swimsuits and towels. I then put together a food-basket and we all piled into Shadowfax. This time Arrek wanted to be dropped off at his friend's house, so that wasn't a problem.

Or so we thought.

Just before we left, my mom poked her head out the door, "Telephone for Arrek!!!" she called.

Well, seeing as how difficult it was to get Shadowfax started nowadays, I just let 'im run as Arrek went in to answer the phone. About five minutes later he reappeared, as did my sister, bearing swimsuits and towels for themselves.

I rested my head on the steeringwheel. "Nononono," I moaned. "Lemme guess. Kea backed out and you two wanna come with?"

"Nope, Kea backed out, and we're pickin' up Jezi!" Fiolla told us as she and Arrek got into the back seat with Janson. The pilot tried to make more room for the three of them by putting his arm up around the back of the seat. My sister glanced up at him from her place in the middle. "So, you're one of Syl's pilot-friends, right?"

It was a long drive.

*******

"The water's so clean, you can see the garbage at the bottom," Janson whistled low as he looked down at the deep waterhole from his vantage point at the top of Marble Rock.

"That just doesn't sound right," Hobbie told him as he climbed up behind him.

"Remember, make sure you jump for the deep spot, or you'll end up paralyzed or something," I told them as I climbed up at the rear.

Arrek, Fiolla, and Jezi were further up the creek, sliding down the natural waterslides beneath the soft rapids. We could hear their calls of laughter, and looked to see Arrek take down a series of more dangerous rapids, tumbling all the way down a series of small waterfalls, or little-falls, to the deepness of the waterhole before us.

Just past the rock, it opened out to a small lake, but you would have to be careful to stay on the right handed side, for the left ended in a tall waterfall, and if anyone got caught in the current, they'd be swept along and their bodies dashed brokenly against the sharp rocks beneath.

Of course, that didn't faze me.

"You sure it's okay to jump off of this thing?" Janson asked curiously as he peered over the edge. "I mean, if you can see the bottom, it's not all that deep."

"Sure, I do it all the time," I sidled past Hobbie on my over to Janson.

"Syl.... maybe it's just not all that safe and you've been lucky?" Hobbie asked worriedly.

"Gotta live dangerously guys.... I thought you two were Rogues?!"

"Well, yeah, but we're not in X-wing here....Syl!"

I flashed a lopsided grin and took a flying leap off from the precipace. I tucked myself into a ball, holding my nose and shutting my eyes tightly, effectively splashing the feet of the two pilots on top of the tall rock.

I stayed under the water as long as I could, since I'd been laughing before impact, and about a minute later I swam to the top. "There she is! Sylvana, are you alright?" Hobbie asked worriedly.

"Of course I am," I laughed, after taking in some fresh air. "So are you two going to wait up there all day?"

Without a word Hobbie dove into the deep water, swooping up like a silverfish, and coming up a few moments later beside me. "When you didn't come up..." he stopped, unable to finish his thought.

I smiled, "Like I said. It's safe."

A huge splash doused us both, as Janson took a cannonball approach, similar to my own. He came up sputtering. "The water's cold!"

I laughed, "Of course it is, silly! This comes from a mountain spring, and that's fed by each winter's snows!"

"How come I can't see the other side of that lake?" Janson asked, turning to look, for the first time, past the rock on which we'd been standing minutes ago.

"Because that's a waterfall. We can swim across the lake, but not too close, the current could carry us over and..." I hit the water with the flat of my hand. "Bang, you're dead-meat." Then I grinned again, "So, you coming?" I turned and began lazily swimming across the lake, partially against the current, but far enough in so as not to be pulled to where I would be dragged over.

The two pilots treaded water where they were for a moment in surprise, then as I turned around to backstroke a bit, I saw Janson slap Hobbie's shoulder, then turn to join the others at the waterslides and little-falls. Ponderously, I turned around and continued swimming. It felt good to stretch my muscles like this, and how I loved the clear snappish mountain-water.

A few moments later, Hobbie had caught up and was swimming steadily along beside me. "Wes didn't feel up to it, but I thought I'd come along to make sure you'd be alright," he explained without looking at me.

"Okay," I said, shrugging through my stroak. I flipped over onto my back and let the current float me away a little bit before flipping over and returning to my previous course.

We swam side by side, silently, in either direction. One or the other of us occasionally pulling ahead. When he was before me, I couldn't help but admire the rippling motion of his muscles along his shoulders and back. When we were halfway back to Marble Rock, I sighed.

Hobbie stopped swimming abruptly, and I almost collided with him. He steadied me, and held me up a bit until I was able to regain composure and tread water on my own. "Are you alright Syl, is it too far for you??" he asked, conscern etching his handsome features.

"I'm fine," I said quietly. Tearing my gaze from his, I went back to swimming to the base of marble rock, and the end of the little-falls. The howling and shrieks of laughter floated across the water, assuring me that my siblings, and friends, were having a fun time.

*******

When we had finally made our way up to the sunrock, it was time to eat. And we were all quite hungry. I pulled out the basket from the shade where I'd left it, and opened it up, making sure everyone got their food before I looked for some of my own.

There was nothing left. Of course... we have three more people than I'd packed for. I had packed five sandwiches, two for either pilot, and one for myself. Sighing, I grabbed a cup and got some water from the creek, then sat back against the cliff-edge as the others ate. With a slight yawn, I slid to lay on the ground, using my towel for a pillow, and shut my eyes.

Feeling a shadow fall across me, I opened them, and looked up to see Hobbie sitting beside me, holding out half his sandwich. "I'm not all that hungry, Syl," he said.

"I thought pilots were always hungry?"

He shrugged, "So much for being non-chalant," he chuckled. "Let me be a gentleman," he held out the sandwich. "I can't let you go hungry, Sylvana," he said quietly.

I sat up and turned to look at him, then took the offered half-sandwich. "Thank you, Derek," I replied softly.

He nodded, smiled slightly, then got up to go get another cup of water from the creek for himself. I nibbled quietly as I watched him move away.

*******

After we had all finished eating, I tossed my carkeys to Arrek. "Go get the stuff you saw me hide in the trunk the other day," I grinned.

He caught the keys in one hand, as he began running up the path to Shadowfax. "And make 'em accessible!" I called after him.

Soon, he returned bearing a large bag. He and I rummaged through it, and came up holding two lightsabers. "You get Wes, I've got Hobbie," I whispered to him as we turned. He nodded with a grin.

A lightsaber in each hand, we turned to face the pilots. "Stand and defend yourselves!" my brother cried as he tossed the second lightsaber over at Janson, and I tossed my second over to Hobbie. In tandem, my brother and I swing our toy lightsabers in an infinity loop, and stepped back, bringing them up to enguarde positons. His held straight up before him, mine held in a grip above my head, pointing straight at Hobbie's, my other hand reaching ahead of me.

I flipped my hand over and beckoned for Hobbie to 'attack' me.

Fiolla and Jezi laughed. "I guess they're tired of sparring against eachother," my friend told our sister.

"More like they're getting lazy and want easy prey," she replied.

Hobbie and Janson glanced at each other worriedly. "Uhm...." Janson said as he brought his toy lightsaber in front of him similarly to how Arrek had his.

"It's worse than that," Hobbie said as he tried to immitate me. "I have no idea what we're supposed to do! Sylvana, I thought we were friends here!"

"Oh for TAWG's sake, they're toys!!! In case you hadn't noticed, they're the same ones you played with in the store," I pouted. "So... Play!" I advanced on Hobbie.

I heard Janson laugh as he stepped back as the tall boy, my brother yelling a battle cry, advanced on him. But I put that out of my mind, my focus was on the handsome tall blonde man before me.

"Uhm... Sylvana?" he stepped back from my advance uncertainly as I favoured him with my fighting grin.

"Yes Derek?" I asked with an eyebrow raised as I softened to a sweet smile. Before he could respond I lunged at him, and he brought the toy 'saber up to block my attack. I got though easily, and tickled his rib with the tip of my weapon, then pulled back again.

He put his free hand to where I tickled him and looked back to me, "Not fair!"

"Whoever said I was fair? I'm Scottish!" Or at least, that's what I've been told...

"Among just about everything else, you're always saying!" Jezi yelled from where she and Fiolla were watching the two pseudo duels.

I turned to stick my tongue out at her, then pulled back just in time to block a questioning thrust from Hobbie's toy 'saber.

And then... the 'battle' was on.

We ranged all over sunrock, even to where I climbed up along the ledge, against some briars, and leaned down to spar toyingly with him. After a while, we stopped, and went back to where everyone else was watching the two of us. Ended up, Janson and Arrek stopped after a few minutes and joined Jezi and Fiolla as they watched me and Hobbie range over the 'playing field'.

"What'd you do to your leg this time?" Fiolla asked as she pointed to the my left leg.

I looked down, "Nothing."

I turned to grab some water from the creek, and I heard someone hiss behind me. I spun around, "What is it?"

"On the back of your left calf, Syl," Hobbie said with a nod to my left leg. I turned to look, and saw three long marks lashing across the back of it about a handspan above the top of my heel, dripping crimson blood down my leg, across the ankle, and over the heel to fall to the ground.

I shook my head and sighed, lowering my leg into the creek. Thin whisps of red trailed away from my ankle and washed downstream as I let the clean water rinse away any dirt that may have gotten into it.

"Does it hurt?"

I shook my head, "Nah, but it'll scar... they always do." I sighed, "Such is my lot in life, I guess. No worries," I flashed a grin as I stepped out of the water. "So, are we going to swim some more, or just stand around all day doing nothing?"

"Swim!" my brother and Janson both yelled.

*******

"C'mon Syl, you gotta try the falls!" Arrek waved me along beside him as we skipped across the rocks in the creek, occasionally dipping into the water at deep places to swim across, and finally found our way to the edge of the falls. "You just sit down here, and let 'em wash you the rest of the way down!" My brother proceeded to demonstrate, his body being tossed to the side occasionally. When he finally reached the end, he got up to stand on top of marble rock triumphantly. "Your turn Syllie!"

"Momma and Da didn't know what they were thinking when they named me," I grumbled as I quickly followed suit. I looked back a moment as I pushed off, and the others were trying to get there before I did.

"Syl, I don't think-" Hobbie shouted.

"What?! I can't hear you!" I had an evil grin, "The falls are too loud!" I laughed, I could hear him fine, and even if I couldn't I could easily have red his lips. A thought crossed my mind, and I shook my head while pushing off.

So my little brother's quite a bit bigger than I am, okay so he's a little bit taller.. Needless to say, I was tossed around right royally as I made my way down. But I finally made it to the bottom, and laughed as I moved over to sit on Marble Rock to watch the others make the attempt on coming down.

Fiolla and Jesi were picking their way along the cliffside wall, not even thinking about making the attempt. Janson was lowering himself into the place where it all started, I could see him laughing as he pushed himself off, and made his way down the little-falls. With a look of uncertain determination, Hobbie followed suit a moment later.

"Uh, Syl..." My brother pointed to my right side.

I looked down to see that the whole right side of my upper leg was covered in what would soon be dark bruises, along with several abraisions. I sighed, then shrugged. "And that's different from any other time?" I asked.

He shrugged, "You still gotta clean that and your left leg when we get home," he told me.

"Thank you, Mr. Clever-drawers," I stuck my tongue out at him. "Come on, let's do it again!"

Just as Janson and Hobbie were starting to swim over to Marble Rock, my brother and I scrambled down and started making our way along the canyon wall to the starting place again. "You coming?" he called back.

*******

This time, I was the first to go down. As I tumbled down the little-falls, I noticed that Hobbie was still in the deep-ending, and Janson was making his way up for another run down. I tried to slow my descent, but it was nearly impossible, and even as I waved for Hobbie to get out of the way, I fell right into his arms.

We both were plunged beneath the surface by the collision. It took a moment to disentangle ourselves and swim for air, both of us coming up gasping. I ran a hand over my eyes to get the water out of them, and swam over to a small sunning rock off to the left from Marble Rock (which was on the right). I pulled myself up. And looked over at Hobbie as he swam over to sit beside me.

"You're crazy," he told me with a half-smile.

"I know," I grinned back. "But you have to admit, the little-falls are fun."

He nodded and looked away a bit.

"I'm sorry I crashed into you," I said quietly as I looked at my feet dangling in the water. The thorn-slashes had finally stopped bleeding, but there was starting to be a bit of drippage along my thigh. Thankfully, it was on the side facing away from him, I didn't want to seem a clutz. I really am not one at all, just sometimes luck would go the other way; unfortunately it often was whenever I was trying to make a good impression.

"Forgive?" I asked looking back up to him.

He seemed surprised when he looked back at me, "Of course. The way you were careering down, there wasn't anything either of us could have done anyway."

There was a loud whoop and a huge splash as Janson took opportunity of a small rise in the littlefalls to launch himself in a belly-flop in the deeper water before us. I threw up my arm to protect my eyes, and laughed when I was able to see again.

"Having fun, Wes?" Hobbie asked him as the Taanabian came up sputtering.

"Oh yeah!" he favoured us with his maniacly joyful grin and started heading back to try again.

"Ever been in a jacuzzi?" I asked Hobbie when Janson had gone. I don't know what made me ask that. "Sorry, stupid question."

"That's okay, I wouldn't be able to tell you, I don't think I've heard that word before."

"Oh, well a jacuzzi's kind of like a hot bath where the water swirls and bubbles and such," I told him as I slipped into the water. "There's a few pockets near the little falls that are wildish like that, and I plan on taking advantage of them." I slipped a hand momentarily behind myself to rub at the small of my back. I was pretty sure there were bruises there as well. Then, without waiting for him to answer, I swam over to the other side and pulled myself up onto the small path-ledge on the cliffside and made my way up the creek a bit.

I tossed a look over my shoulder and, sure enough, Hobbie had slid into the water, and was following. Whether it was to go down the little-fall slides again, or come sit with me, I didn't know. I made my way over to one of the jacuzzi spots in the creek, my sister and Jezi were already occupying the closest one. Unfortunately they were, most of them, fairly small, two or three persons max. I slipped into the one beside them, and leaned my head back, letting the rushing water massage the sore muscles.

I felt a change in the flow of water, and looked to see Hobbie slipping in beside me. I smiled slightly and shut my eyes again to keep myself from staring at him. We sat in comfortable silence for a short while, then there was a splash as someone jumped into the third spot. I opened my eyes to see my brother.

"I'm hungry, and judging by my watch, it's time to eat again."

I splashed him, "You're always hungry, Arrek."

"Doesn't matter, time to go," he smirked and climbed out. "Everybody else's gone back to dry off on the sunrock." He stood and started backing away, "So, are you and your new boyfriend coming or not?" he asked before quickly turning and skipping along the stones to get out of the way of my imminent fist.

I tossed Hobbie an apologetic look, "He's my little brother," I explained while I shrugged off the comment as I felt a blush begin to heat my face. I pulled myself up out of the ersatz jacuzzi, and made a quick exit.

*******

"I swear, if you ever make a crack like that again, I'll dismember you and toss your parts into the bear-cage at the Game Farm," I growled at my little brother as I looked up at him.

Arrek just smirked, "I knew it, you like him." He winced away expecting a punch, and was not disappointed.

I stepped forward as he stepped back, and landed a punch squarely to his shoulder. "You're delusional," I told him quietly before whirling around and grabbing a towel to dry myself off.

My brother just laughed.

*******

As we headed up the trail on our way back to my car, we passed a tall tree with thick vines hanging from it. "Look at this!" my brother shouted as he dropped his towel and the bag of lightsabers he'd been carrying. He pulled on one of the vines, and put some weight on it. Then he grinned.

"I'm Tarzan!" he shouted before letting out the warbling cry of the ape-raised man as he swung on the vine around, then kicked off of a tree to swing back again. He misjudged a bit, and slammed his back into another tree.

My sister doubled over laughing, "No, you're George!"

"George, George, George of the jungle..." I started to sing.

Janson and Hobbie stood watching him, and the shorter man got a silly grin, "My turn!" he shouted jumping at a second vine, as he started to swing he promptly slammed into the tree. He fell to the ground, and looked up woundedly. "I don't think this is my thing, why don't you try, Hobbie?" Janson moved away and stood with me, my sister, and Jezi as we watched the swinging.

Just then, I recalled that I had a camera with me. I pulled it from its case and took a picture while Arrek was still mid-swing, and Hobbie was heading for one of the vines. We laughed and watched as he pulled it back, and took a running leap into the swing. I got a shot of that too.

It was fun to watch them, and we probably would have for a while, hadn't it been time to get back. Jesi had to go to work by 1830, and so we had to get going.

*******

We stopped at her place first, to get changed into our street-clothes, then headed back home.

"I'm bored," Janson stated as we piled out of the car and started bringing everything back to the house. Then he grinned, "Can we go that Waves place again?"

I just looked at him, "You want to go talk to the 'tender girl, don't you...?" I smirked.

He just shrugged.

"Okay, let's take a vote.... Who all wants to go dancing at Waves tonite, raise a hand."

Everyone did so and I sighed. "Okay, let's go change then, and eat some supper before we go?" I waved a hand and we all went back into the house.

*******

"You realize, Waves doesn't have anything to eat there," I told everybody as I began driving the five of us into town.

"We could go to Burger-Snapper," my brother suggested from the door side of the back passenger seat. "It's just around the corner from there."

"Burger-Snapper? What the Hoth is that?" Janson asked from his place at the driver door-side in the back.

"It's our name for Burger King," my sister said from her place in the middle. "We just don't call it by the right name, is all."

"Sure, why not?" I said. Instead of turning into the Waves lot we continued down the road, and made a left. Another block, and another left, and we were at Burger King. "Alright, we're here," I said as I turned Shadowfax off and opened my door. Hobbie opened his, and Janson, Fiolla, and Arrek all piled out of the back seat.

We got a round of Whopper meals and found a few booths toward the back of the establishment to eat our meal. I smiled to myself as Hobbie tried to figure out how to eat his burger without making too much of a mess. Janson just tore into it, confident that he could wash up before we went to the club.

*******

Fiolla and Arrek were showing people just how to dance. They'd taken a recent interest in dancing, and found out that they made good dancing partners. However, this did tend to make things awkward when people thought the siblings were each other's date. Lately, they'd taken to wearing t-shirts that stated "Sister" and "Brother" respectively, and they were wearing them tonite. It brought a chuckle to those of us that knew them.

Janson had gone over to the bar to continue chatting up the lady 'tender he'd seen the previous night. In the meantime, Hobbie and I stood to the side, watching my sister and brother, along with almost everyone else, as they danced.

A slow song began, and it's gentle, dark-sounding strains caused me to half-close my eyes and small smile to play on my lips. Even before the singing began, I knew what this song was.

Hobbie looked over at me, "Uhm, would you like to dance?"

My smile couldn't help but more firmly affix itself, "I'd love to."

Slowly, we walked out to the dance floor. He placed his hands in a proper position, one at my shoulderblade, the other holding my opposite hand. As Aerosmith's "I don't want to miss a thing" began to blast through the speakers, he led me in a gentle slowdance. It took me a moment to follow his rhythm, it was a form of dancing I'd never done, nor seen, before.

"Every moment I spend with you, is a moment I treasure...."

I was about to ask him what sort of dance this was when he leaned down to speak softly in my ear.

"I like this song."

"It's one of my favourites," I looked up to see him smiling that rarely seen sweet, gentle smile of his. His eyes sparkled as they looked into mine. I was surprised to find myself thinking about how I could get lost, looking into his eyes like that, and turned my eyes away from him, unconsciously stepping closer.

"Cause even when I dream of you, the sweetest dream will never do...."

In doing so, his hand slid further down to rest at the small of my back. He took the hand that had been held in his and held it against his heart.. Closing my eyes, I claimed the final pace, resting my head against his shoulder.

"Lying close to you, feeling your heart beating...."

I could just hear his heart beating softly, and I couldn't help but sigh in contentment. We moved gently together on the dancefloor, until the music began to reach it's climax.

"And just stay here, in this moment, for all the rest of time!"

He pulled away slightly, and led me in an amazing dance. We turned, and he spun me away slightly before pulling me back into his arms and lifting me off my feet as he turned around a few times. Then slowly, gently, he lowered me to the ground again; all the while his eyes looking intently to mine.

And soon, the song began to end, settling down to a near replica of the softness it held at the beginnings, and I returned to his arms once more, my head resting on his shoulder.

"And I don't want to miss a thing...."

The music changed, and, like the night previous, we reluctantly pulled apart. Just then, I heard some shouting on the other side of the dance floor. I looked over to see my brother in an argument. Quickly, I headed over, for my brother had a hot temper, rather like me, but he was a bit less controlling of it sometimes.

I could tell Hobbie was following me, but I ignored his presence as I got close enough to understand what had just been unintelligible yelling moments earlier.

"...away from my girlfriend, Lorrdain!" a teenager, probably a university student, like my brother, yelled, waving a fist.

"Why should I stay away from her, huh? You obviously don't care if anyone asks her to dance, or you'd be dancing with her yourself!" Arrek shot back.

"Please, Andrew," that must have been the girlfriend. "It was just a dance...."

"Just a dance my foot, Carla! You were all over that guy!" he pointed a thumb at Arrek.

"That's how you dance a slow dance!" she shouted back, her hands on her hips. "Maybe if YOU would dance with me occasionally you'd realize that!"

Arrek started stepping back slighty, and I stepped forward. "Whats going on here, kids?" I asked.

"None of your business, Lady," Andrew told me.

I just looked at him. "The minute you started yelling, you made it _everyone's_ business. Now, either you treat your girlfriend right, kid, and stop yelling, or...." I let my voice trail off and raised an eyebrow to convey the unspoken threat. I had no idea just what it would be, but I was sure I could think of something if I needed to.

Sure, it was a bluff. I wasn't always successful either. This time, like most, I was. Of course, it is rather possible that the tall blonde military bearing'd man at one shoulder, and my tall muscular dark-headed brother standing at the other, had something to do with it.

"Yeah, fine." He grabbed the girls hand. "Come on, Carla - we're goin' to the QBC. [3]" As they left, he pointed a finger at my little brother. "I'll be watching you, Lorrdain!"

And then they were gone.

"He can't treat her like that, Syl!" my brother was visably upset.

"You know, there's nothing we can do about it, Arrek," I sighed. "Just promise me you'll never be like that."

*******

What had happened dampened my brother's spirit enough to make him sullen... and when Arrek's not happy, nobody really can be. So we went home.

Once home, he went straight to his room, and the sound of him playing his guitar began to float through the house.

With cursory goodnights, everyone retreated to their rooms. I, however, headed to the computer. The short conversation I'd had with the pilots the night they arrived reminded me of just how long it had been since I'd heard from my friend Alison, whom I'd teasingly called Alisky. In fact, if it weren't for my friendship with her, I would probably have never become penpals with Klivian a few years ago. I typed up a quick email to her, and sent it on its way.

But, I just wasn't tired enough to go to sleep just yet. The house seemed rather quiet, beside Arrek's playing - but that was likely to end soon. I figured I was the only one really awake since it _had_ been a rather full day. I grabbed my cloak and tossed it around my shoulders as I went outside.

Quickly, I skittered up the front tree I considered 'mine'. I settled myself among the branches and watched as the moon began to make his path, across the sky, through a break in the upper branches. I did so love looking at the night sky. It seemed, in a way, to call to me.

The chorus began it's nightly concert of chirps, howls, hooting, and rustlings. I enjoyed imitating the creature's sounds, repeating whatever they had said back to them as an echo.

There was that feeling of being watched again.

I looked down to see Hobbie standing next to my tree, leaning one hand against it as he looked up at me. Or at least, he was. As soon as I had looked down at him, he looked guiltily away.

Resettling my cloak about me, to shut out the cold night air, I silently dropped down and leaned against the tree beside him. "Insomnia?" I asked.

"At least I'm not the only one who can't sleep tonite," he chuckled.

"I often can't sleep at night, so I like to come out and watch the moon and stars, and listen to the animals talking. It's like listening to nature's symphony... complete with her own light show."

"I've never heard anyone put it that way before," Hobbie said as he looked down at me.

I simply shrugged. "Maybe I'm not just 'anyone'?"

"No," he said quietly. "You certainly aren't.... Force sake, you even talk to animals!" he exclaimed.

"Nah," I waved a hand dismissively. "I can only imitate them. I wish I could talk to them though.... I'm sure they've got a lot to say." I looked out to see the nightly herd of deer begin to gather in the fields around the house.

I looked over to see Hobbie watching them as well. "They often let me near... maybe if you're with me.... Would you like to pet them?" I asked quietly. I was quite glad that the darkness hid my blush. What a stupid thing to say! He's been to hundreds of worlds, seen things far more exotic than deer. Why, I'm sure-

"I'd love to," he spoke, his voice shattering my thoughts.

"You would?" My pleasant disbelief must have been plain in my voice. I looked up to see him smiling that rare smile. He nodded, and held his hand out to me and I, of course, took it.

"Walk silently, and slowly," I told him as I demonstrated soundlessly.

I'm sure he really did try to be quiet, but where my footfalls were inaudible in the grass, I could hear him as though he were, compared to me, stomping on the ground.

"Try putting your foot down slowly," I instructed quietly.

He followed my words, and I must admit that this time he was a little more silent. But silent walking on land must be different than that on concrete, or ship-plates. When we reached the field, however, the crunch of his booted foot caused the herds heads to snap up and look at us. I squeezed his hand gently and we froze, until they looked down again.

Then I looked at our feet, for some odd reason. Mine were small and bare, his large and boot-clad. "Do you have to wear the boots?" I asked quietly.

"Well, I don't want to impale my foot on something," he mumbled back.

"You'd be quieter without them here..." I held up a hand to stay his reply. "Maybe a fawn'll follow me."

He looked at me with confusion, then nodded slowly. I could tell he was curious. I picked a small handful of cloverbuds before I removed my cloak, exposing myself to the night air, but also adding a second quality of stealth. I let it fall to the ground and, clad only in a t-shirt and a pair of shorts, slowly made my silent way to the base of the hill.

There was often a seasonal pond there, but it hadn't appeared yet this year, so the grass was soft, sweet, and a favourite for the deer. I sat at the edge of the field to the occasional pond, and waited quietly as I held out the cloverbuds in an outstretched palm.

I could feel eyes on me, and knew Hobbie must be watching, and waiting, curiously. He was probably becoming impatient as well, but I didn't turn to see.

After ten minutes of waiting, I was rewarded with a curious fawn coming for my clover. As it nuzzled my hand and ate my gift, I reached out to gently pet it. It nuzzled my hand when it was finished, and then stepped closer to sniff at my shirt, looking for more of the sweet clover I'd brought from the lawn.

"There's more if you come up with me and let my friend meet you, littleone," I told the fawn quietly. I couldn't help but giggle slightly as it moved forward and knocked me down, nuzzling at my neck in it's search for more clover. I sat back up on my heels and pet it gently, a hand on either side of its face, before slowly standing. It seemed to look at me curiously, and I dropped a hand to rest atop it's head.

"It's okay, Derek's a really nice fellow," I coaxed it and moved backward a step up the hill. It seemed to regard me a moment before following. Another step back, another hesitant step forward. We did this a few more times, and then I turned and the fawn's head was under my hand as we walked up to the clover, and where Hobbie waited.

After a slow walk, we got there, and Hobbie was looking at me curiously. "Hold out your hand, palm up, like this..." I told him as I demonstrated. I waited until he'd done so, then bent to pick up a few cloverbuds and put them into his hand.

The fawn hesitantly stepped forward, then looked up at him a moment before sniffing at his hand, and eating the clover there while I pet along it's spotted back reassuringly.

Ever so slowly, Hobbie raised his hand to pet the fawn. It froze a moment before stepping closer so he could get the place behind it's ears, as it sniffed at his pockets for more. I looked up from the fawn to Hobbie's face, and saw him smiling softly, watching the fawn with a sort of child-like wonder.

He really was a special man.

*******

We sat on the hillside, the fawn having decided to sleep at our feet. I lay back on the ground atop my cloak, beside him, and folded my arms behind my head as I looked up at the stars. "What's it like up there?" I asked finally.

"What do you mean?" He was sitting beside me, leaning back on his hands.

"I mean, what's it like to be up there, among the stars instead of just planetside and looking up at them? I sometimes have dreams about being up there, it's all a terrifying beauty...."

"It pretty much is," he replied, following my gaze. "I mean, there's just a hunk of metal and some transparisteel between you and instant death. But you're right," he looked down at me then. "It _is_ beautiful..."

I turned toward him, leaning up on my elbow. "You think someday I'll ever get to see it for myself?" I picked at the clover a bit. "I mean, here we can't just go up there, or get a plane ticket or something."

He shrugged, "Maybe I could take you up in the X-wing?"

I fell onto my back and arched up onto my shoulders slightly so I could look behind me at the X-wings, they were upside down at this angle that made me chuckle before falling flat onto my back again. I turned my head to look at Hobbie, "Aren't they rather small? For two people, I mean."

I wasn't sure, but I thought in the moonlight I saw him blush as he looked away. I didn't need to see the supposed blush, however, for his body language told me all I needed to know. The way he looked away, and settled back onto one hand, while picking at the grass with his other told me that he was, at least slightly, embarrassed for making the suggestion.

I looked away from him and watched the sky again.

Then I saw it.

I sat up quickly and pointed, "Look, a shooting star! Make a wish!" I watched it fall slightly, then closed my eyes tightly as I made my wish. Then I opened them to watch the star finish its fall.

I looked over at Hobbie, "Did you make a wish?"

He nodded.

"Don't tell me, cause if you tell your wish, it won't come true."

"Okay."

I nodded then lay back down again, watching the stars. I'm not sure when it happened, but soon he had lain down beside me, looking up at the clear night sky.

"They don't twinkle like that when you're out there though," he said quietly. "So you honestly have a prettier view of them."

"I'll betcha a story they're prettier when that's all you can see," I replied softly.

"Well," he asked, "Do you like to watch the simple glare of city lights better than the twinkling of the stars through your sky?"

"Well, the city lights, are pretty..." I conceeded. "But I have to honestly say I like the stars better."

"You owe me a story then," he turned his head to look at me, as he favoured me with another of his rare smiles. Then again, maybe they weren't as rare as I'd thought, he seemed to send my way often enough.

I chuckled as I looked back, "Alright, you win."

I lay back to look at the stars once more. "My Da tells this story a lot. It's about overcoming the impossible.... well, sort of.

"There is the story of a people, who lived a long time ago, in a land very far from here..." I turned my head to face him again, "because that's how all the best stories start."

He nodded, listening, and I pushed my self to sit cross-legged beside him, looking down at him. I do so love telling stories.

"They were captured by an evil country, who destroyed their land without even setting foot in it. From atop their great dragons, they destroyed the land, burning up nearly everything... destroying their villages, and killing many of their people." I closed my eyes and put heart into the story, moving my hands as though they were the dragons, and the people. "They came down from the sky, not giving the people a chance to prepare themselves against attack. Fire was rained down on their heads, and their screams of terror could be heard countries away."

I glanced down, only to see that he'd sat up now and was watching me with rapt attention. I half smiled as I paused dramatically. "That was the final sound heard from the land, but for the sounds of beasts and birds."

His eyes widened, I could tell a tragedy wasn't the sort of story he expected me to tell.

"No, they weren't all dead, not at all. But they'd been enslaved by the evil dragon-riders, and were forbidden to speak to each other."

"Stupid dragon-riders," Hobbie mumbled.

I could see in his eyes an expectation, as though he had a thought of where the story might go, but wasn't sure yet. This puzzled me, because it was one my father'd obviously made up - I spent many years looking for the origin of the tale, but could find it nowhere, in no culture.

I chuckled, "Yes, I suppose so. Because, you see, they still spoke to each other," I quickly held up a hand. "Not with voice though. Because speaking would only earn them a horrible death. And so, they learned to speak without voice. A whole language appeared, entirely of gestures and facial expression.

"For three centuries they lived, they loved, they married, they bore children, all in silence. Then, great warriors came and fought their captors to free them. It was a fantastic war fought with dragons-fire and lightning. The ground itself seemed to rise and give aid to the silent people, while the rain fell to drown their captors, leaving them dry.

"Suddenly, the people were free, and allowed to speak once again. Their historians found old records of songs, and the warriors helped them learn to speak with voice, and to sing, and tell stories once again, in voice. But everafter, they kept much of their silent way of talking, and came to be known in the ancient world as the best mimics.

"Kespeadooksit, and so the story ends."

I looked down to see a puzzled expression on his face. It was the look of one who'd gotten what they'd expected, yet in a way they'd never had it given before. The silence stretched out uncomfortably to me. "I sometimes like to think that's where Sign-language came from, here on Terra. Isn't it a nice story?"

"Yes, it is," Hobbie looked at me curiously. "Have you learned this Sign Language?"

I nodded. "Yeah, my whole family knows. The person we learned from was surprised how quickly we picked it up. She said that most Hearing have a lot more trouble with it."

"Hearing?"

"Yes, she was Deaf." I laughed, "Though she often had to correct my father... it seems he learned a different dialect once. So we all know a bit of both."

"Ah," he nodded and leaned down on his elbow. "Can you show me some? Like.... maybe tell the story with it?"

I shrugged, "Which way? In the dialect we learned from the Deaf teacher, or in the dialect my father taught us?"

"The one your father taught you."

I shrugged. "Okay..."

And so I told the story again, this time with my hands, and facial expression. I watched him from nearly closed eyes, and could see him watching intently, almost anilytically as I spun the tale. When i finished, I lay my hands in my lap and opened my eyes fully. "There."

"Thanks," he said. "It was really beautiful."

With that he pulled some of my cloak I was sitting on over, and lay back on it so he wouldn't get wet from the dew, and returned to watching the stars. With a shrug, I lay down beside him, atop the other side of the cloak, watching the stars also.

I'm not sure when it happened, but I lay close beside him, thankful for his warmth compared to the cool night air. He reached over and flicked the end of the large cloak to lay over me, and a little over himself; and the fawn stirred to move and lay near our heads in stead, before falling back asleep. I soon found my eyes growing heavy, and that is the last I remember of that night.

*******

Thursday June 28, 2001

*******

I lay against something warm, a soft heartbeat fluttered beneath my ear. An arm was wrapped protectively around me, and the hand, that was not my own, rested possessively on my waist. My own arm lay across the stomach of someone who was not me, a warm hand rested atop my own. Confused, I opened my eyes, to see that I had my head resting on Hobbie's shoulder, and that we'd both fallen asleep together in my cloak beneath the stars.

Only the stars were no longer there. It was early morning, and there were storm clouds approaching. I did not want to leave his arms, but something told me that if we didn't both wake up soon, we'd end up drenched.

Sylvana, why don't you just go back to sleep, and let him 'wake up first' so he doesn't get embarrassed. I half nodded to the inner voice, and snuggled up against him, beneath the denim cloak, closing my eyes and letting his even breathing and gentle heartbeat lull me back to sleep.

*******

Soft fingers tucked a few stray strands behind my scarred ear and paused a moment to trace it before gently tracing the thin scar down my right cheek. I opened my eyes to see Hobbie looking down at me with a soft smile that quickly turned into the guilty smile of someone who'd been caught with his hand in the proverbial cookie jar. I half smiled and sat up sleepily, "Good morning," I mumbled as I felt a blush creep up my cheeks.

"Yeah, it is, isn't it?" he asked off handedly as he pushed himself to his feet and held down a hand to help me up.

Just then, the downpour started. He quickly pulled me to my feet and, as I regained my balance, he picked up my cloak, holding it above both of us. We raced around the X-wings and bounded up to the porch to get out of the rain.

He pulled down the cloak and put it over his arm as we laughed. "Woke up just in time, eh?" I asked.

"I think I still got wet," he replied. "Probably gonna catch a Terran cold or something."

I shook my head and laughed, "Not from a bit of a summer rain, you're not." I looked back out, "It's only a sun-shower."

"If that is a sun shower," he pointed at the downpour, "Where's the sun?"

I shrugged, then grinned. "Come on..." I stepped, still barefoot, down a still-dry step.

"Do what?"

"Take off your boots and socks, and come into the rain with me!" I grinned again. "It'll be fun!"

He shook his head, "Sorry Syl, that's not really my- SYL!"

Without waiting, I took off down the brick porch steps and ran across the yard. "It won't hurt you, what're you waiting for?!" I called back over my shoulder.

"For the rain to stop! Syl, don't you have enough sense to come in out of it!?" he called to me from his dry vantage point.

I laughed, "Of course not! Now come on!" I spun around to beckon him out with me.

Instead of spinning gracefully I put in an extra burst of speed, and so designed it that I would lose my footing. My left foot slid out from beneath me, putting me into a half turn fall before I landed, harder than I'd planned, onto my back, knocking the wind out of me. I made no sound as I tried desperately to pull air into my lungs. At that moment, all I knew was that my back hurt, and my ankle was probably, at the very least, strained. I shut my eyes tightly and grit my jaw.

Next thing I knew, Hobbie'd come to my side. "Sylvana, are you alright?"

"Yeah..." I gasped out. After my breathing returned to normal, leaving a dull ache, I grinned, "Hey, you're out in the rain."

He shook his head and sighed, "And I'm getting you out of it Syl."

I went to sit up, then held out my hands. "Help me to my feet?" I asked.

In one swift, smoothe motion, he picked me up and began to carefully carry me back to the house.

"You can put me down, I do have my own feet, you know," I protested.

"I saw you fall, Sylvana," he said patiently, "you hurt your ankle."

"Well, that's no reason to carry me," I pouted at him.

He stubbornly carried me up the steps to the porch, and I saw that the picture window's curtains were open, probably had been for quite some time. On the other side, in the livingroom, stood Arrek and Janson. Both had goofy grins on their faces, and both were applauding... and cheering.

I blushed and sighed as I hid my face in Hobbie's shoulder. My brother was frustrating enough sometimes, but did he have to see my predicament now?

I then looked up at the man holding me, "Well, we're dry, will you let me walk now?"

He shook his head and smirked, "Nope, I'm getting you inside so you can't run off again either." He glared at Janson and jerked his head to the door, and with a silly looking bow, the Taanabian disappeared.

A moment later, he was holding the door open. "Quite a performance, you two.. Quite, a, performance...."

"Shut up and get out of the way," Hobbie shot back.

"Of course, of course," Janson stepped back and held the door as though he were a bell hop.

Hobbie turned slightly to the side and entered the house, bringing me to the livingroom, and sitting me down on the couch. Arrek had turned his back to the window and was now facing me. "Okay Sylvana, what's your excuse this time?"

"I like playing in the rain?" I grinned.

He just looked at me.

"Oh shut up and get me an ankle-wrap, I think I strained it," I stuck my tongue out at him, and went about lifting my leg to rest on my opposite knee so as I could inspect the ankle.

Hobbie sat down next to me, "Are you going to be alright?" he asked with worry.

"Of course she will, Hobs, not every injury needs bacta," Wes chuckled.

"Something like that," I said absently as I felt my ankle... where it hurt, how it could move, etc. "I'll be able to walk on it too, just have to wrap it so it doesn't slip out again while it's healing." I held out a hand and my brother dropped the bandage into it. He also tossed a towel over my foot.

I looked up, "Thank's bro."

"Yeah, whatever," he shook his head. "The things you'll do to get a guy," he stepped out of my reach, but I was still able to bapp him with the towel.

"Nah, I think that was just the icing, we saw 'em sleepin together," Janson rejoined. He, too, was rewarded with a bap, only Hobbie hit him with a throw pillow. "Don't worry," Janson continued, "we stopped looking before the good stuff happened."

I concentrated on drying my foot off then, as I tuned out whatever it was the boys were saying. The heat of a blush warmed my face as I wrapped my ankle up.

*******

"It's still raining....." Hobbie said as he looked out the window.

"I thought we were all going to be going hiking today," Arrek put in.

"We were," I sighed. "But it's not exactly good weather for mountaining right now."

"I'm bored," Janson finished.

"You're always bored," Hobbie told him.

"Well, it's not like there's anything to do right now," Arrek put in.

I sighed.

"I'm still bored," Janson said again.

I started giggling as the way we were conversing, in turn, struck a funny chord in my mind.

"What's so funny about bein' bored?" he pouted.

I shook my head and kept laughing, unable to speak.

Arrek shook his head, "Not again..." he groaned.

The two pilots looked at my brother curiously as I covered the lower half of my face with a hand and slid down in the seat, still laughing.

He shook his head, "She does this sometimes. So does Momma - just starts laughing and goes on until they can't laugh anymore."

I nodded and waved a hand as I segued into the barely-able-to-breath-because-you're-laughing-so-hard part of the outburst.

Then Janson started to laugh. I think it's probably because the situation was just too silly. Of course, his infectious laughter only made me laugh harder.

Through the tears in my eyes, I saw Arrek and Hobbie look at one another, shake their heads, and then head to the kitchen for some food.

*******

We sat at table, just having finished breakfast.

"I'm bored."

Hobbie pointed a finger at Janson, "Don't you dare start that up again."

I started chuckling.

"Oh no......."

I waved a hand as I stopped almost immediately, "No, I'm not starting again. But you have to admit, that was funny...."

"Syl, Wes being bored is never funny."

I got up and took away the empty bowls and put them in the sink before grabbing the cereal boxes and putting them away also. I opened a drawer and pulled out four decks of cards, tossing them onto the table. "Well, we could always play...."

"Play what?" Janson wanted to know.

"Cards. We could play Spite. Or, if you want, something simpler like Go-Fish... or maybe War?"

"Had enough of war... besides, I'll end up in bacta for papercuts," Hobbie mumbled.

Janson, Arrek, and I laughed a moment before we saw Hobbie'd suddenly gotten a very dark look. I saw the blonde bow his head, as though to hide unshed tears.

"Derek, what's wrong?" I asked softly.

"Nothin," he said quietly.

*******

-------

From: Mail Delivery Subsystem

To:

Date: Wed, 27 June 2001 01:27:40 -0500 (EST)

Subject: Returned mail: User unknown

Message-ID: <200111060627.BAB06156@rly-xb04.mx.aol.com>

The original message was received at Wed, 27 June 2001 01:27:15 -0500 (EST)

from m9.jersey.juno.com [64.136.16.72]

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... while talking to air-xb02.mail.aol.com.:

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550 ... User unknown

Reporting-MTA: dns; rly-xb04.mx.aol.com

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From: Sylvana Lorrdain

To: AlisonSky7@aol.com

Subject: Long time no 'see' !!!!!!!

Date: Wed, 27 June 2001 01:27:40 -0500

Hey Alisky!

I've been out of touch with you for a while now, and I think it's just been too long. How have you been? How's the spaceport running along? I've not been all that busy lately, working in the E.R. like usual. Nothing really exciting happening besides patching up stupid people who don't know how to drive on the proper side of the road.

Oh, news! You remember how I've been pen-pal'ing it with Klivian, right? Well he finally came to visit! He also brought Wes Janson with him, I wish you were here, you'd love 'em!

Okay, well I've got to get going, we've got a full day planned for tomorrow, I'm going to take them to hike up Kaaterskill falls - it's going to be a lot of fun!

Alright lady, talk to you later!

~ Sylvana Lorrdain

-------

I frowned. It wasn't like Alisky to change email addresses without letting everyone know. "Hey Arrek?!" I called back into the house.

He appeared a short bit later, "What's up?"

"I dunno, have you used my account at all lately, maybe accidentally delete an email from my friend Alisky?"

Arrek shook his head, "No way, I know better'n that - you'd kill me!"

"Hmmmm," I pursed my lips in thought. "Cause her account's gone - but she never sent me an email to tell me she was changing it."

"Well, maybe she's been busy and hasn't had a chance yet."

"I guess so."

*******

"SYLVANA!" my brother's terrified cry rang through the house. Our father'd gone to work, our mother had gone shopping, and our sister was at ballet, so the only others home were the pilots and me. I jumped up from the table where they, and I, had pulled out Fluxx, and ran limpingly twoard the back bedrooms.

With the sound of footsteps following me, I limp-sprinted through the livingroom and metre-hallway, pivoting on the doorjamb and launching myself through the doorway to the bedroom. In stead of taking the long way about, I crawled over our parent's queen-sized bed to peer over the far edge.

My heart froze and a heavy weight settled low in my stomach. I slid over the edge to sit beside my brother on the floor.

"Syl, you gotta do somethin' to help her!" Arrek pleaded with me.

"Even if I was a vet, there's nothing I can do," I told him quietly as tears clouded my vision.

Slowly, Flora turned in the corner, moving between spasms to lay her head in my lap. Arrek gently stroked her sleek black coat as I rubbed her ears and pet her gently. She whimpered and licked at my hand as though to tell me she would be alright.

"It's okay, Flora, it's gonna be alright, my baby girl," I whispered over and again.

She licked my hand and whined as the spasms became more fierce. Pushing back my own fear and sadness, I softly sang to her the Peace prayer of St. Francis... I'd learned it in college choir, and had heard he was a saint for animals...... And I hoped.

"Lord, make me an instrument of our peace; where there is hatred, let me sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is doubt, faith; where there is dispair, hope; where there is darkness, light; and where there is sadness, joy. Grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console; to be understood as to understand, to be loved as to love; for it is in giving that we recieve, it is in pardoning that we are pardoned, and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life."

My words may not have been as clear as I would have liked them to be, shuddering breaths broke in at inopportune moments. As I neared the end of the song-prayer, her contractiveness abated. Flora weakly turned her head to lick my brother's hand, then back to lick my own.

Her large brown eyes looked up at me as though she were asking if I would be alright. "I'll be okay, we'll be alright. Love you, and see you again someday, Flora..." I whispered.

I leaned down to kiss her forehead as I had so many times in the last fifteen years. I pulled back, looking into her eyes, and she met mine as she took her last shuddering breath.

There was a long sigh and she relaxed into the forever-sleep.

Somewhere in the house, Wishbone howled.

I gently lifted a hand to close the eyes of my best friend. I almost felt her nuzzle my cheek as she had so many times, though her head still lay in my lap. Then, it was almost as though I felt her leave, and the dam that oftentimes held my emotions in check broke. A seeming torrent of tears fell from my eyes as I cried for my loss. I buried my face in her fur and held her as my heart broke.

I could hear my brother's shuddering breaths, as though he were fighting back his own tears, valiently trying to be a strong man who showed little to none emotion.

But my own emotions ran away with me as my heart shattered. I screamed at the unfairness of it all. Strong hands pulled back on my shoulders and I fought to stay with my pet and friend.

"Sylvana," Hobbie spoke quietly to my ear. "Let her go...."

"She's already gone!" I turned slightly to the side and, in my grief, came around with my left fist, connecting the blonde man's shoulder joint... hard.

With a grunt of pain, he pulled back. "Sith, Sylvana. You just about dislocated my shoulder!" he rubbed at it and moved the arm in it's socket to make sure I hadn't done just that.

"Well, I didn't. Think next time you try to pull me from where I need to be," I growled back as I stood.

I left the three rather confused men in the room as I headed to my sister's.

"Let her go, Hobs," I heard Janson say at the edge of my knowing.

*******

After I gathered Flora's blanket up from the floor in my sister's room, having moved it there for the time I would be sharing it, I limped back to my parent's room. By the time I returned, both Hobbie and Janson had disappeared.

"They asked if there was something they could do, so I told them where the shovels were, and where to dig her a grave," Arrek responded to my unspoken question in an empty tone.

I nodded, closing up. "Help me get her ready."

I spread her blanket on the floor besid her and, with Arrek's help, lifted her already cooling body onto it. Gently, I tucked her legs and head into a 'comfourtable' position to sleep in, then pulled out my swiss army knife.

With the tiny scissors I, almost reverently, cut a lock of fur from her coat, and set it on the bedstand. When we came back, I would put it in an envelope for memory.

We wrapped the blanket securely about her, and with tear filled eyes, lifted her. My brother, or I, could have carried her on our own, but we took her between us, and slowly carried her body through the house together. As we exited the house, Wisbone whimpered and ran out between us, off somewhere in the brush. We went around to the window beneath which she would be laid to rest with those who had gone on before.

We came around the far corner of the house to find Janson and Hobbie had dug a deep grave to lay her in. Hobbie had been rubbing at his right shoulder, but dropped his hand as we rounded the corner. Both he and Janson quietly stepped away from the grave.

My brother and I gently lay her in the deep hole, and each took a handful of dirt and sprinkled it over the blanket in which she lay before taking up the shovels ourselves. Silently, we filled in her grave, and eventually smoothed the soft, near-muddy dirt above her. Without a word, he took his shovel and mine, and went to put them away.

I knelt on the muddy ground, smoothing the dirt above Flora gently, lost in thought. It wasn't long until a sad music eminated from my brother's room nearby.

With the back of a slightly dirty hand, I rubbed the tears from my cheeks and stood, gritting my jaw. I looked to the two pilots, lost in their own thoughts; sadness, probably of memories, furrowing their brows. I nodded to them. "Thank you," I said quietly before turning and leaving to the barn.

*******

I pulled out an intricately carved bow I'd been given a few years earlier, and a quiverful of arrows I'd made in spare times of boredom. I kept four arrows, and left the rest into their case before I grabbed a bit of charcoal and put it in a small pocket on the quiver, and headed out.

I had barely made it halfway down 'murder hill' when the crash of unaccustomed field-running caught up to me. "Where you going?" Hobbie asked as he caught up to me.

"That way," I lifted my left hand and pointed across the road at the bottom of the steep hill.

"Isn't that uhm.... a swamp?"

"Yeah, but I'm not going through it, going around it. Well, sort of," I clarified.

"Can I come along?" he asked, shoving his hands in his pockets.

I shrugged, "Whatever."

My eyes were dry, my face expressionless. I moved with a quiet woodenness, still silent, but stiff almost like a doll. He walked silently beside me. When we reached the road, I led him across and into the swamp, taking a semicircle along the edge.

I jumped from hillock to roots, and climbed over fallen and moss-covered trees. I don't know how, but someway Hobbie must have scrambled along behind me, because I could hear his tread as though it were the only sound existant. We reached a place where we would re-enter the fields, and walked along. He gave me the solitude I needed, without letting me be alone, walking along just behind me to the right.

Over hills, across fields, along deerpaths and over stone fences, past old pre-revolutionary home foundations, through an old settlers graveyard, across train-tracks, another road, and then up and over a steep foothill, past two old indian mounds, and finally into the valley between where a brook once bubbled along freely and now only trickled sleepily. I stopped a brief moment to look about, and saw that I'd come through a bit to the south of where I usually did, and so walked 'upcreek' a bit. I stopped at the foot of the triad-tree, a tree that grew from a single trunk, yet seperated into three not far from the ground.

Hidden in the nook was a board about the size of a large man's chest, with a bit of rope tied to the top two corners. I picked it up and leaned back against the tree, leaning my unstrung bow beside me and setting the quiver on the ground, I grabbed out the bit of charcoal and knelt before it as I began to draw on the board.

Hobbie moved to stand nearby, watching me curiously. Studiously, I ignored him as I sketched. When I'd finished, I moved over to another tree and hung it from a branch so that its corners would be only just a handwidth away from another tree, keeping it from swinging too much when hit. It took me a while to find this place, but it was the most perfect place in the area for venting.

And boy, did I need to vent.

Hobbie stepped back in surprise when he saw my bit of art. I drew in charcoal, because each time I came, it wasn't always the same 'enemy' I faced. This time, I faced a black image, with very little light. Masculine and evil, it looked mockingly at me from my target-board.

"Argazdan," He whispered.....

I looked at him curiously, "Pardon?"

"You just drew an Argazdan, Sylvana.... How did you know what they looked like?"

I frowned, "What the sith are you talking about?" I pointed at the nightmarish image, "that's Hedeath. I saw a picture of it once when I was small, and I since have decided that's what he looked like."

He shook his head, "It's an Argazdan," he repeated quietly to himself. "Whats a Hedeath?" he asked in a more highly audible tone.

"Not A Hedeath. Hedeath. As opposed to Shedeath." I turned and went back to string my bow as I spoke. "There are two kinds of death. A She-death, and a He-death.

"She is kind. She comes gently like an angel, and carries you away in your sleep. When you have lived a full life, and are more than ready for the forever-sleep, and for the beyond; she lifts you up gently, and guides you on a beautiful flight through the stars." I smiled slightly.

He nodded, "But the other?" he nodded toward my sketch.

I picked up my quiver and tossed it over my shoulder walking back several metres. "He is cruel. He uses tools such as weapons of war, and cancers; fires and frozenness. He tears the heart from you and feeds on it while you writhe in agony. He takes the young, the promising, the mothers, fathers and children. He takes friends, and lovers, and tears them apart cruelly dashing any future that could have been."

I could see my talk made him uneasy, but I was bitter, and at that time did not care if he heard what I thought or not. I pulled out an arrow and noched it, and he moved to the side, out of the way of my target. "He is my only enemy. Would that I had an arrow that could pierce him, destroy him where he lurks, I could hunt him down and fight him until I was victorious, I would NOT let him take me but - I. Would. Have. Him."

I let fly an arrow that pierced one of the creatures eyes, and smirked when Hobbie jumped a bit at the suddenness of the act, and moved further to the side before slowly picking his way to where I was. "I've seen too much of Hedeath. He's taken ten people close to me this year alone, not counting Flora, and it's barely half over. Other than that, I've seen him too often in hospital." Another arrow flew to pierce the creature's other eye.

"I'd like to see a bit of Shedeath, if only a bit, though I doubt she's in my future." I noched a third arrow. "I firmly believe Hedeath has me on his list for someday." It flew to pierce the place between.

Hobbie finally reached me as I noched my fourth, and final arrow. He lay a gentle hand on my shoulder, "Don't say that Sylvana," he said quietly.

I shrugged. "I would gladly have him, if that would mean she would be the one to carry away those I care for in my stead."

The feather-fletched arrow sped through the air, almost whistling, then it hit the beast-drawing where its heart would be.

"If I, or they, were combatants, I could understand. But we're sithing civilians, here....." I lowered the bow in hand and gripped it hard. "It isn't fair Derek," I ended in a whisper, bowing my head. "It just isn't fair," I shouted, pulling the hidden knife from my hair, it had looked like just another of my hairsticks, and sent it sailing at the creature-board. It hit just beside the arrow.

After a moment of silence, he gently took the bow and quiver from me, but I made no move to stop him. My anger was spent, leaving the usual dull ache. I heard and felt, more than saw, him set them aside at the base of a tree before he stepped up behind me. I felt his hand gently fall to my shoulder, and then he stepped around to face me, dropping another hand to the opposite. He tipped my chin so I could not look away, and he caught my eyes with his. "No, it's not fair. It never is, Sylvana," he spoke quietly. "I wish I could make it so for you, I'm sorry," He let go of my shoulders as the tears suddenly reappeared, and pulled me into a hug. "I know it hurts," he whispered.

As my tears fell I slowly brought my arms up to hug him back. I did not sob, and the tears soon abated. I began to pull away, and Hobbie kissed the crown of my head before letting me go, and went to get the arrows and knife down for me. He brought them back and as I silently returned them to the quiver, he took down my target.

Then he did something I did not expect he would do. He took up some leaves, and dipped them in the cold of the barely watered creek, then determinedly scrubbed the image from the targetboard. Before my mind assimilated this, he was nearly half done. By the time I reached him, he had finished, and the board stood whiter than it had in ages. I usually just let the rain blurr and smudge away the images of my foes, but never had it been scrubbed.

"Why?"

He stood, and brushed off his knees. "Because it's the best I can do," he told me before returning it to where I'd taken it from at the triad-tree.

Then he took the leather, hand-tooled, quiver from me and slung it over his shoulder before took my free hand gently in his. "Let's go back, Sylvana." he said quietly. "And let's walk slowly this time, you're still hurt."

"No I'm-"

"I watched you limp for the last eight klicks, we're going slowly this time."

*******

We talked about nothings, and somethings as we walked. Somewhere along the way, he embarrassedly queried me about the scar on my cheek. I told him that I wasn't sure where it'd come from, but most likely it was from a small plane-crash my family and I'd been in when I was very young. As for the scars on my ears, I figured they were from the same.

We talked about the history of the area, he often asked questions about this oddity or that. What was that mound for, how long had that house's foundations stood, how old were the graves....? As is my wont, we stopped in the graveyard and I cleared away some brush that had grown up since my last visit, and gently lay round pebbles on the tops of the gravestones to show that they hadn't been forgotten.

As we walked along, I slung my bow over my shoulder and picked wildflowers, making one chain, and then another. We laughed as I often stopped mid-step over a particularly diffuclt acting one, and he'd have gone a few paces ahead before he would realize I was no longer beside him. As we walked, we shared stories that we'd heard growing up, and I was amazed to hear that some of his childhood faerie tales were similar to my own.

When I'd finished the first ring of daisies, I set it in my hair, draping across the semi-ornamental sticks I wore there. The second I made much longer, and after stopping one last time to finish it, waited ahead of me as had become usual. I tossed it over his head, and it lay drooping down over one eye.

It made us laugh, and laughter was a medicine it seemed we both needed.

*******

By the time we made it back, it was well after lunch. I put my things away in the barn, then we went back to the kitchen. Arrek and Janson were playing Fluxx together, with Wishbone sitting on the Taanabian's lap, and had left barely enough for the both of us to have lunch as well. I made up a couple of sandwiches and we sat at the table, the others dealing us in to start another game.

We played for a little while, talking about anything except what was on all our minds, creating a little bubble around us that held back reality, even if only for a short while. Yet behind all our eyes lurked the grief, and sadness.

A strange intermittent buzzing, or beeping, sound came from Janson and Hobbie's opposite directions. Arrek and I looked at them curiously.

Janson threw down his cards and pulled a cylindrical thing from his pocket, shutting off the sound. "Sith-monkies! Nonononono, this is not happening....." He stood and exited through the front door, almost stomping as he headed toward the X-wings.

Hobbie was a bit classier. He set down his cards, and shut his device off as he stood apologetically. "We'll be right back," he said before following Janson out to the X-wings.

Both climbed in and shut their canopies.

Arrek and I looked at eachother.

"They probably got a message in through the 'mechs."

"Supposed to have off for just over another week, Arrek," I frowned. "Something's up, and I don't like it."

"Nah, it'll be fine.... Let's see if we can't put an extra card or two into their hands....."

I spitted him with a glare.

"Or not...." he drummed his fingers on the table to some music in his head, and we both returned to watching them through the kitchen windows.

A short time later, the cockpits opened again and both pilots climbed out, looking rather frustrated. "Sith," I muttered. "I bet you twenty bucks they've gotta go back."

Arrek held his hand out and shook mine, "You're on, cause I know they're on holiday and these guys, if anybody, need it."

I saw the two pilots rearrange their looks as they climbed the porch steps and file back in, but they did not reseat themselves.

"Uh, bad news," Hobbie started.

"Wedge just sent us a message.... we gotta-"

"Get back," I finished. I then looked at Arrek, held out my hand, and raised an eyebrow.

He pulled out his wallet and put a twenty into my hand. "I thought you guys were on holiday, can he actually stop it?"

"Afraid so, Arrek," Hobbie said with a sigh. "He just did."

"I'll go get your swimsuits off the line," I said as I stood.

"C'mon, we gotta get our stuff together, Hobs," Janson grabbed his left shoulder and half dragged him to my room.

My brother and I shrugged at eachother, and he headed for his room, and music, as I went out to get the suits.

*******

"You've gotta tell her."

"And ruin her memory of the Vacation? That woman's gone through kessel today, I can't do that to her."

"We can't leave without her knowing, either. She deserves to know, Hobbie."

"You didn't see her, she got so.... so angry about it. And.... this makes eleven," I could hear Hobbie's voice lower perceptebly.

I couldn't hear any more of this, I would much rather be told straight out than have to figure what happened through subversion. Especially something like what I percieved this to be. I opened the door. "Who's been killed now?" I asked blandly.

Hobbie and Janson both turned to face the door from where they were packing up their pilotsbags. A bit of orange cloth stuck out from the Taanabian's, evidence that he was taking the garish cloak back with him. They blinked in surprise, and the sadness that I had caught glimpses of before, was now forefront.

"Who's been killed?" I asked again, stepping through the door. Unconsciously, I lifted a hand to hold the emerald pendant I had worn for as long as I could remember. "Tell me," I said quietly. "It's someone I know, isn't it."

"I didn't really know... uh.... Hobbie should tell you," Janson swallowed hard and picked up his yellow bag, making a swift exit.

I let him pass then looked at Hobbie evenly. "Who?" I repeated.

"I'm sorry Sylvana," he said quietly, putting down the bag and moving over from the other side of the room.

Suddenly, I remembered the sad look the two had exchanged when I had mentioned who had given me the transliteration programme. I remembered who had taught me the card game called 'war', and how the mention of playing the card game had saddened Hobbie. I remembered the inexplicable mailer daemon email I'd gotten earlier.

The pieces fell into place.

I shook my head, "No.... you're not going to tell me she's dead," I stepped back, leaning against the doorframe. "She can't be dead, no. She's taking a hiatus from email, she's busy with her station, she might even have gotten that travel-itch and be on her way down for a visit, she-"

Hobbie looked to be fighting back tears as he swallowed much like Janson had moments before, and he broke into my babbling. "Alison Sky is dead, Sylvana. She is not on hiatus, she is not on her way to visit, she is gone."

The simple words, spoken quietly, gently as though they would break fragile glass, sliced through my disbelief like a sharpsword. I shook my head, "Please no...." I whispered.

"I'm sorry."

"NO!" I turned and hit the wall with the side of my fist. "No, it's not fair, she didn't do anything to anybody! She's good, she's always there when you need an ear, and..... Just no!" I turned to look at him, tears fighting with the fire in my eyes.

His own held tears also. "I didn't want to have to tell you, it wasn't supposed to be like this. I'm sorry."

Tears fell quickly, too much having happened in one day. I leaned back against the door and let my head drop. I looked to the floor as a stony calm settled over me. The tears still wet my cheeks, but my eyes were dry as I looked up at him. You wouldn't have known I'd been crying, the wet streaks on my cheeks could easily have been put there by art. "You have to go."

"I could stay, I'm sure that-"

"No. You have to go, you were called back, they need you there."

"Sylvana, I...."

"I'll be fine, Derek. This isn't a new thing to me. But... How did you know her, and...." my facade almost cracked as I bit my lip. "Did she take her... or did he?"

"How I know her is classified and so is how she died but," he hung his head and sighed, unable to meet my eyes. "He took her."

"Of course, I understand," I said blandly, as though my heart had been cut out. Then again, perhaps it had.

"Don't close up, Syl," He said quietly, closing the distance and lifting his hand to trace the scar on my cheek. "We've had a lot of good fun, this first visit. I'm glad we got to come, even if it was shorter than we planned."

I nodded, "Yeah, I'm glad you came too. Face to face beats writing any day, eh?" I asked with a forced smirk.

He nodded, "You're much prettier than I could have imagined you to be. I wish you'd sent your still-holo when we first started writing two years ago, I could have put it in my cockpit."

"And distract you so you get shot down that much sooner?" I quipped with a half-laugh.

"Or give me more of a reason to not get shot down," he replied quickly.

I could tell it wasn't so much a joking banter as we pretended it to be. We'd known each other only by our words for two years now, and in that time, the penpal friendship had become something special. Now that we'd finally met.... Mentally I shook my head as the past few days flew through my mind. I could see places where I could almost believe.... No, he's just trying to get me to smile before he goes.... Isn't he?

He brushed the tears from my face, and suddenly turned, going back to his bag, "I forgot I had this with me...." he pulled out a device and turned back to me. "Can you muster a smile?" he asked.

"Of course. I can do anything," I gave him my brightest, happiest looking smile, belied only by the darkness hidden in my eyes.

There was a strange flash and he then put the device away, "Now I have one," he explained to my questioning look.

"Oh."

I stayed there watching silently as he finished packing, then set his bag on the floor as he straightened the bedclothes. He then picked it up, slinging it over his shoulder, and came back to me. "I guess this is the end of the holiday, isn't it."

I nodded, "Maybe you can come again someday."

"I'd like to, Sylvana. I really would like to, if you want."

At a loss for words, I again nodded simply. "Sure, I guess so..." I shrugged.

"You guess so?" he quirked an eyebrow above serious eyes.

"Alright, I know so."

That rare smile made a brief appearance as he tucked his finger beneath my chin. "Good," he said quietly. "You be safe, okay?"

"Only if you are," I half smiled. "You outrun Hedeath, okay?"

"For you? I'd fly across the galaxies."

"You already did," I pointed out, still wearing the half-smile.

"I did?" He chuckled.

I rolled my eyes, "Now you're just being silly."

"Well, I have to be silly sometimes.... I blame Wes."

"Everybody blames Wes, be original."

"Okay," he looked at me, his smile just barely there, "I'll blame you, then."

"I didn't do anything!" I opened my eyes wide innocently.

"You could have fooled me.... Thief," he smirked.

I raised an 'offended' eyebrow, "I'm no thief!" I folded my arms and tilted my head slightly to return the smirk and look at him from where I stood, half leaned against the wall, his finger still crooked under my chin.

"Then I'm not a pilot."

"You just play one on T.V., eh?"

"No, that's Face's job," he chuckled.

Through the open door to my bedroom we could hear Janson slam open the kitchen door, "I'm real sorry about this guys, but Hobs, we really gotta get going!" he shouted before letting the doors slam shut again. Before they closed, I could hear the sound of X-wings doing a startup.

I jerked my head toward the door open to my left. "Go on, get outta here."

His eyes darted to the door then back to me, "No. Not yet."

"Derek," I settled my voice warningly and I visably saw a shiver run through him. Whatever gave me the gift of imitation, apparently the tone of my voice sounded enough like a superior's tone to cause this reaction. "Go, time's a wasting. We'll be in touch."

"Yeah," Hobbie dropped his hand and sighed as he headed out the door.

"I'll come watch you off," I said quietly, following behind.

*******

EPILOGUE

Saturday June 30, 2001

*******

"Nonononono!" I heard my brother groan from the computer room. I wandered in to see what was bothering him. What looked like a smoke rose from the entire apparatus.

"You killed it," I shook my head. "Do you have any money to pay for a new one?"

He shook his head.

"Then it'll probably be a while before we can do email, at the very least, from home again... unless we can figure a web-account at the library and remember everyone's email addresses to let them know where we've gone," I shook my head and sighed.

"Sorry, Syl..."

I waved a hand, "Don't be. I'm not going to be around anyway." I turned and left the room, heading across the small hall to my bedroom.

"Woah, wait, what?" Arrek followed me and stopped as he saw that I had an open travel-bag on the bed, and was putting some necessaries into it. "Where are you going, Syl?"

"Dunno yet. Away, to travel, see things while I still can I guess." I stuffed in some batteries atop the med-kit and stuck a flashlight into the side pocket, some dry-matches in a container into another, and slipping my panflute and wooden flute into the side, I picked it up. I went to the kitchen where I'd been cooking, and dropped the travel-food I'd made into some plastic bags and filled up the rest of the bag with them.

"No you're not," he shook his head.

"Yes, I am. Mom and Dad already know. I told them and Fiolla goodbye this morning."

"Oh, and when were you going to tell me, through a post-card from Kalamazoo?" He leaned against the doorframe and folded his arms. "C'mon Syl - what's going on with you, you've been acting weird ever since the Rogues left."

I checked things over and shouldered the pack, then grabbed a warm cloak and jacket tossed over one arm and looked at him. "Maybe I just need a time-out for some change. I'll come back, eventually, and I'll try to send postcards sometimes so you know I'm alright, okay?"

"I'd rather come along."

"Well you can't, and you'll know I'll be fine. No big bad wanderers are gonna eat me," I smirked.

"Not with the heat you pack, they probably wont," he shook his head. "Be safe, Sylvana."

I smiled and went over to him. I tipped up and gave him a hug, "I will. You too, Arrek. Hold things together while I'm gone, kay?"

"Would I do any less?" he smiled down at me as we parted. "Have fun on your little pigrimage."

I grinned, "Of course." I turned and headed out.

"Hey, do you know what sort of things you'll be going to see?" He asked as I opened the door.

I shrugged. "I just want to see what I can, while I still can. I want to see the flatness of the praries, the deepness of the canyons, the dangerous rocky mountain passes, the ocean.... I've always wanted to see the western ocean," I half smiled. "It's the biggest."

"Be safe, God bless."

"You too," I nodded, and left.

Just as I tossed my pack into the back seat and was checking to see if I had everything, my brother came running out.

He had his own pack over his shoulder.

I'd rolled down the window, so I stuck my head out, "What is it?"

He skidded to a stop and handed me a small olivewood bound book. "Don't forget your Jerusalem Bible, Syl... gotta have something to read, right?" He flashed me a grin.

"Always," I grinned back, "You know me too well, brother."

He sprinted around to the other side and got into the passenger seat. "I'm coming with you."

"No you're not." I said as I started Shadowfax up.

"We're gonna take straight roads, Syl.... or at least some fun ones."

I sighed. "I'm selling Shadowfax. It's a foot-trip, no car, just me and the sky."

Arrek grinned, "Of course, just you, and the sky... and me along to beat off all your would-be suitors."

I sighed, "You're impossible. What'd Momma and Da say?"

"They said to have fun."

*******

On Friday I'd called the hospital and told them that I was quitting. Since I hadn't worked for a week, I didn't have another paycheck coming, so I wouldn't have to worry about that.

When we left, we went to the bank first and closed out our accounts, then headed to the local dealer for used cars. I sold Shadowfax for a middling sum, and pocketed it with what other I had. After wrapping the cloak tightly and securing it to the pack, I donned it and my jacket My bow was hooked to the side of the pack, and the full quiver was as well.

Arrek pulled on his jacket and pulled his pack on over it, there was a sleeping bag attatched to the outside, much like I had my cloak. He grinned and held out a hand that I should choose our way.

Then, we began to make our journey.

Even though it wouldn't be all that far from my home, I wanted my first night to be near the triad-tree. We got there by sunset, it being around 2130'ish. I put my pack up high into the branches of one tree, then wrapped myself up in my warm cloak at the foot of the triad-tree.

Arrek unrolled his sleeping bag beside me, and climbed in. Soon, he was fast asleep, not a care in the world, it seemed.

As I rested, looking through the leaves at the beginnings of stars appearing in the sky, my mind wandered back to when Hobbie and Janson had left a few nights earlier.

*

The X-wings had finished their startup sequence. "You two fly safe, and don't go playing heroes!" I shouted over the sound of the engines, hoping that they might hear me.

Janson grinned and waved at me, then gave me a thumb's up before closing his cockpit.

Hobbie waved as well, and his cockpit started to close simultaneously with his friend's. Then it stopped mid-cycle and opened back up. I saw him unhook his support system from the ejection-seat, and climb back out, dropping to the ground and tossing his helmet back up into the X-wing.

"What the Sith do you think you're doing!?" I asked him over the engine roar. Fists on hips, I waited for him as he approached.

When he got to me, he traced the scar on my right cheek with a gloved hand, then let it fall to my shoulder. "I have something I need to ask you."

I looked at him in confusion, and Janson flashed his X-wing's forward lights to get Hobbie's attention. The Ralltiirian looked back and spitted his friend with such a glare as to make the Taanabian stop instantly and look away.

"Time has run out, Derek, you have to go."

"I can't go yet, not without asking...." he tucked some errant lockes behind one scarred ear. "May I kiss you?" He looked at me hopefully, as though afraid I would say no, or disappear like an apparition.

Like Hoth I'd say no! My eyes danced as I nodded, but my eyebrows raised in worry, "Are you sure?"

"I wouldn't ask if I wasn't," with that he wrapped his arms around me and lowered his head so our lips would touch.

Meet they did, gently and fervently, causing lightning to run down my spine as we kissed. It was like being kissed for the very first time, and it was honestly my first True Kiss. My knees became nearly weak and I leaned against him as he cradled my head in one hand, tangling his fingers in my long hair while, with the other at the small of my back, he drew me closer.

The wish I'd made on the falling star had come true.

But the kiss could not last forever. He pulled away, and steadied me on my feet. I opened my mouth to say something, and he lay a gloved finger over my lips as he shook his head. I understood him, no more words should be said between us now. Who knew, maybe, against all odds, we would see each other again someday.

Until then, I would hold the kiss in my heart and memory.

He smiled his gentle smile, and I returned it. He then turned and scrambled back into his fighter, letting the canopy close fully this time. I glanced over to see Janson applauding madly, and shook my head slightly as my cheeks flushed in embarassment.

The two fighters raised gracefully and I lifted a hand in farewell. Janson's X-wing did a barrel roll before blasting through the atmosphere. Hobbie's did a slow loop, flying past and tipping a wing to me in farewell before he also disappeared from my life.

A tear slid from my eye as I watched them fly away, and I turned my back before they disappeared. It was something my father'd taught me with aeroplanes - if you watch them disappear it's bad luck, but if you watch them until just before they disappear, then turn away and don't actually see the vanishing point, then it's good luck. Both for them, and for you.

*

Back to simple words, and a few memories, we would go. I figured that within a month he would probably find a home-galaxy girlfriend, and I would go back to being simply a good friend. Perhaps I hadn't ever been anything more than just a good friend.

How long would it be before we saw each other again? Probably forever.

I pulled Arrek's sleeping bag cover over his shoulder again, then lay down beside him, closed my eyes and wrapped myself in the warm cloak.

The word echoed in my mind as I drifted away.

Forever.

_________________________________________________

[1] http://www.pojonews.com/enjoy/stories/0916962.htm

[2] NRHN = New Republic Holo-News

[3] Quarterback Club

*******