THE HATCHING

"Rzk?"
"I'm here Trri." Rzk said.
Rzk looked at the small space that had been sealed of for his brother. Trri always slept longer than his brother, completely trusting him to wake him up. What would happen when he would be away?
"Do you think we'll ever get home?"
"I don't know." Rzk answered looking outside to hide the expression in his eyes. He didn't want to go back, there was nothing important pulling him back to his home. Now that Rzk was in an unknown part of the universe he wanted to see more of it... most of all he wanted to find out what had happened to Ernay and Tom. That was his priority.
"But once we've got the dragons."
"We could go back." Rzk said, still looking out.
A sudden cry interrupted their usual routine of breakfast and work. The dragons were singing... Rzk focused his eyes on the activity outside. He realised he had been seeing people rushing for quite some time, but he had ignored it because his mind had lingered too far.  
"Are they really hatching?!" Trri yelled.
Rzk turned toward the door and opened it, all but running outside. But he didn't want to draw too much attention to himself. People stared as if he was odd. He wasn't odd. 
When Rzk reached the hatching sands, Trri was right behind him. Rzk felt his brother pushing to get closer to the eggs. Rzk turned and pulled him back.
"No need to draw attention to ourselves." he said.
Rzk pulled Trri into the shadows and there they waited. They didn't have a real clear view of the eggs, but they could see small patches of white and cream through the other candidates. 
The first eggs hatched. Two crimson red dragons emerged and found their bonds. Rzk watched the marvel and suddenly wished they had gone to the front. He didn't want to miss any more of it. But if he rushed to the front now he would certainly be noticed. 
The next two eggs hatched revealing a brown and a green. Or so it seemed seeing the flashes of colours between the legs of the others. Soon though Rzk saw that he had been right. Very small dragons, reaching only slightly above their ankles pushed through toward them. The green found Trri and stayed there while the brown came his way.
"I'm Mnnibuth." said the hatchling, "Are the Grlp really that scary?"
"Uhm. Ahem. Not at all." Rzk said, "Not once you've seen how to deal with them." he admitted.
"Could I take them?"
"Maybe when you're bigger." Rzk said.
"If I recall Tom wasn't as big as you."
"That's right." Rzk said smiling, "But he was older."
"Oh... like that." 

Mnnibuth

TEENS
Mnnibuth lurched from the platform and stayed in the air for  one whole minute before he touched down, flapping his wings for balance.
"Why won't it work?" he asked sad, "Even Xrribeth can fly!"
"You're just a  latebloomer." Rzk said, "One day we'll show them."
"Do you think that day is tomorrow?" the brown teen dragon asked, nudging his rider to get back to the top of the cliff, "I mean, I'm feeling embarassed."
"Practice makes perfect." Rzk said determined.
Mnnibuth sighed. He had practiced more than every other dragon. He had dived and dived until he was sure that any more and he would just end up with his head in the ground.
"Maybe you try to hard." the soft green voice of Xrribeth popped up in his head.
"Not trying won't do anything good." the brown flared.
"But you won't have fun."
"I'll have fun after I fly."
"Whatever you say." the green sighed and returned to her own thoughts.

ADULTS
Rzk ran across the Vella Crean looking for Mnnibuth. His dragon had disappeared early in the morning and the tall light blue alien youngster couldn't find him anywhere. It was not like Mnnibuth to vanish. He was far too self-conscious and strict to just go away without leaving a message. Worried, Rzk could only hope that nothing was wrong. Wasn't he supposed to feel when his dragon was in trouble? But why wasn't Mnnibuth answering?
These questions and others like them ran through Rzk's mind as he searched high and low for his brown. The Vella Crean was starting to feel like home, Rzk pondered, he knew almost as much of it as of his home town and nor he nor his brother Trri had made any plans of returning home. After all, no-one was going to punish them for staying, if they went back they might very well be punished. The young ones of his kind just didn't travel. That they vanished in the middle of a crisis night would not be forgotten either.
"Mnnibuth!" Rzk called out, heading for the lake, hoping his brown for once HAD wanted to bathe.
"If you keep shouting like this you'll draw a lot of attention." the calm voice of Mnnubith suddenly said in his mind.
Releaved, but still angered Rzk kept on shouting: "Do you think running through the Vella Crean looking like I do, didn't draw attention? I mean, me and Trri still get looks if someone even gets a glance of us."
"As long as you didn't run over a small child or dog I imagine no-one will mind."
Infuriated Rzk threw up his arms and made a growling sound. That wasn't the point. He and his brother were different from all the pink-coloured humans and they would never forget that. And even though they were taller than most humans, they were hardly old enough to be considered youths. But try reason with dragons.
"I can be reasoned with just fine." Mnnibuth said casually, "You however."
"Me?" Rzk asked incredulously.
"Well yeah, I know that I need to tell you this, but I know you'll say no even before I finish."
"What?"
"Well, I've been getting older and more mature..."
Rzk' already large eyes grew bigger with the knowledge of what was coming. By the standard of his people he hadn't aged two years since he came to the Vella Crean, like humans would, he had aged barely a year. In human terms he was maybe 16, self conscious and a pale blue alien!
"No... no, I can't." he stammered.
"Not even for me?"
Rubbing his hands over his face Rzk tried to regain some perspective. Was he dreaming? No, something like this would have woken him up. Had he misheard? He took a peek at Mnnibuth and saw the dragon gazing over the water to where a bunch of females were flying. Down with that theory.
"Why now?" Rzk sighed to himself.
"Considering my age, my colour and..." Mnnubith started.
"I know why." Rzk interrupted. "Why me?"
"I like you." the brown said, dropping his short ears and looking sad, "I really do."
"I don't have a choice, right?"
"I'm trying to give you one." Mnnubith said, "But you're making it hard on yourself."
"Who?"
"There is one on the flight boards that looks promising. All the others wouldn't want plain old me. Why I don't know. Who could not want me?"
"Don't tempt me."
Mnnubith flashed a grinn at his rider and patted his back lightly to not injure him. "It's like you said, you didn't have a choice. Let's go sign up."

VELLA CREAN
LANTESSAMA ISLE