See Part One for Author's Notes and Disclaimer.

~ parte the thirde ~

Grace looked around at her handiwork and smiled.  She was still a little worried that Zhaan might take exception to the incredible loony tent she'd constructed, but then she could always, and quite honestly, point out that it was all dragon's fault.  It was her idea, she supplied the supplies and she had sketched out (albeit somewhat sketchily) the basic design before turning Grace loose on the redecorating scheme.  All in all, it looked quite exotic and fairy tale-ish in a somewhat peculiarly loony fiction sort of way.  She sighed and smiled.  Now, to see if she could locate dragon.

dragon had folded out to her lair in New Mexico where she was attempting to figure out whether she could fit her gift for D'Argo in the backpack or not.  Seven feet of sharpened, etched and lovingly cared for bladed weapon was not the easiest of things to carry discreetly.

Something long golden and furry discreetly cleared its throat while repositioning its trifocals to get a clearer look at what dragon was doing.  dragon jumped, dropped the blade with a clang and whirled to face --

"RevSam!"  she identified her frequent cohort in lurk while trying to convince her heart that thumping its way out of her chest was not nearly as good an idea as staying where it was.  "You scared me!"

The praahr looked apologetic.  dragon frowned at it.  Then again, maybe it was laughing at her again.  It was hard to tell.  "Sorry.  You said I could read this, but only in the cavern."  RevSam displayed the large, written on parchment paper, volume she had been perusing.

"It was a joke!"  dragon almost exploded.  "I trust you."  She turned back to the authentic 18th century claymore she was attempting to shove into the block matrix computation <tm> maintained internal dimensions of her back pack.  She made a face.

RevSam wandered over and looked at the blade admiringly.  "Better than Shao Kahn's sword."

"Yep."

"Planning on using it?"

"Nope."

RevSam regarded its unusually monosyllabic friend warily.  "So -- what are you going to do with it?"  it asked in spite of its resolve  not to get involved for a while yet.

"D'Argo."

RevSam looked blank -- which is very hard to do with a large furry golden felinoid face with big aquamarine eyes.  dragon sighed and explained about Moya and Pilot and D'Argo and the rest of the renegade crew on Moya.  RevSam looked blanker.  "Could you use some help?"  After all, she'd never seen SG1 when she helped stencil "Colonel"  on the back of all of O'Neill's shirts.

"Yeah.  Hold this."  she handed the claymore to RevSam and stuffed four cans of iridescently luminescent spray paint into the backpack, two Pizza Hut Pizzas in stasis hot boxes <lurking is hungry work and Grace should just about be finished with Zhaan's room>, a pale pink and blue comforter, and a two ounce bottle of something that looked suspiciously like Bachus' Special from Oberon.

She grinned one of those disturbing grins that made most of her friends feel like there was something really wrong with that many teeth in that particular mouth, thumbed the tesserect controls and blinked.  She made one of those peculiarly dragon faces that usually meant, "oh, hell, what did I do to get me here"  faces and checked her coordinates again and folded herself and the praahr out before the little group contemplating the gray haired god-in-the-bog could recognize the two of them.  Being two different places at once was bad enough, being twice in the same place could cause problems -- big problems -- and while she personally had never had the least desire to test the Blinovich Effect's effective range, she rarely trusted her companions long enough to find out if they were equally wary.

RevSam cleaned her trifocals, cleared her throat and started to speak.  "Wasn't that --?"

"Yes, it was."

"Ah.  Hmm.  Where are we?"  RevSam looked around in admiration.  Not only was the architecture nicely curvilinear, it was apparently manufactured by people who understood that not all races are built at six foot and under.

"This way,"  dragon hissed quietly and led the way to D'Argo's quarters where, as luck would have it, D'Argo was in residence.  The Keystone Cops were amateurs at abrupt about faces when compared to dragon.  Unfortunately, RevSam is not quite so well coordinated and she  was carrying 7 feet plus of claymore.

Clang!!!!!

D'Argo sprang to his feet and rushed into the hall to investigate the clang.  The sight that met his eyes was -- D'Argo blinked.  On the floor lay one of the most beautiful weapons he had ever seen.  The two peculiar characters who had been there only fractions of a moment before were gone.  D'Argo approached the sword as though it might -- bite, explode, emit noxious fumes, spray acid or any combination of the above.  It just lay there.  Finally, he reached down and wrapped his hand around the hilt.  It fit as though it had been made for him.  He picked it up.  It was heavy, but perfectly balanced.  It wasn't as wonderful as his usual weapon, but there was a subtle grace; a beauty; an invitation to -- D'Argo executed several almost dancing defensive moves with the sword.  It sang to him, albeit quietly.  After all, it didn't want to disturb Rygel who was still quiescent.

Grace, cautiously moving through the corridors, peeked around the curve of the hallway and caught sight of D'Argo.  Oh my, she thought with a smile.  He does look like that fits.  And since dragon had not had the sword with her, that meant that dragon must be back.  Now, to figure out where --

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

"Crichton!!!!"  The voice was Zhaan's.  She wasn't angry, exactly.  She was -- "Crichton!!"

The human came at a dead run and stopped dead behind Zhaan.  He was glad his reflexes were good.  Running into the blue woman could be hazardous to your health.  He looked past her shoulder into her room and gawped.  His mouth hung open like a fish out of water.  A flicker of look from Zhaan confirmed that the human knew nothing of this and had not planned it.

"Close your mouth.  You look idiotic,"  she pointed out gently and walked into her rooms.

The effect was quite -- spectacular.  Yards and yards and yards of sheer silver blue fabric were tented in her rooms lending a sort of undersea look to the place.  The panels were held in place by ribbons -- silver, blue, pale green, white -- like seafoam.  She investigated a knot of ribbon and realized that if she pulled at one place, the panel would fall straight, partitioning off a part of her quarters.  It was -- ostentatious.  But it was also quite lovely.  Zhaan smiled.

"I think whoever is doing this actually likes us."

"I'm beginning to think so, too,"  Crichton agreed.  "I just wish I knew who.  And how.  It looks like space and time --"  he faltered to a silent stop.  Anyone who could manipulate space and time with the facility that the gift giver could -- gulp!  Then again, maybe he  didn't want to meet up with them.

RevSam looked around not quite so approvingly.  They were in a dark, very dark, exceedingly dark, bar sort of a place.  dragon relaxed at not having been caught by D'Argo, then stiffened.  Damn!  She thought she'd unloaded those coordinates.  She squinted nearsightedly at the surface of the remote looking thing that was her tesserect and tried to remember the coordinates that -- a door opened and closed somewhere close by.  There was a whoosh sort of a sound and

"Nunkies!"  squeaked dragon and pressed several buttons simultaneously as she was in eminent danger of both Nunklear Meltdown <tm> and panicking into a dead faint simultaneously.

As the praahr and dragon folded out of the Raven soundlessly, Lucien LaCroix allowed himself a very smug smile.  It didn't do to let  that addict get  too comfortable in his presence; regardless of what that ridiculously outsized South African werewolf said.  He wandered downstairs to choose a vintage for consumption.

"Danger, Will Robinson!  Danger, Will Robinson!"

dragon growled in the direction of the shiny robot that was waving its manipulative appendages in a very useless manner while warning the small red haired boy beside it of incipient trouble.  dragon pressed the correct coordinates and --

They were on the bridge of Moya with a very, very happy Aeryn Sun.  RevSam raised its eyebrows at the softly burbling soldier.  She seemed to be singing to herself very, very softly.  She moved her head around to stare into the most beautiful deep aquamarine eyes she'd ever seen set in a golden face.  Carefully, she reached out and caressed that face.  It was furry.  It was soft.  It was delightful.  Before dragon could respond to the problem, Aeryn had moved off her seat and was running her hands through RevSam's fur.  And RevSam, as the massively dignified praahr it was, was subsiding into a golden furred puddle of purr on the floor.  dragon sighed, very, very quietly, and tiptoed off the bridge in search of Grace and Pilot, not necessarily in that order.

She found Pilot first.  "Hi!"

Pilot jumped as much as he was capable of doing so.  His head swung around to goggle at dragon who immediately started spray painting him.  His mouth dropped open as the cool liquid hit him.

"What are you doing?!?!"

"Giving you a celebratory coat of paint.  Don't worry.  It'll wash or wear off in a couple of days, completely non-toxic, edible and flashy.  Pity there's not a Pilot type of the opposing gender, assuming there is one, available to notice it."  She deftly, for someone of her girth, avoided Pilot's manipulative members and continued to spray him until he was an absolutely unbelievably iridescent, shimmering and changing set of colors.  OK, so, technically, you weren't supposed to interact with the lurkees during a lurk.  But this would have been difficult to accomplish behind his back.  dragon smothered a giggle.  "Bye!"

She nearly collided with Grace as she exited the area into the nearby hallway.  "Oh, hi!"

"Oh, Hi! yourself.  What  are you up to?"

"Look."

Grace peeked around the edge of the opening through which dragon had just come.  ::blink, blink:: Oh.  My.  Well.  How very -- dragon.  Grace gave up on trying to find another explanation for the scintillating Pilot.  She looked at dragon and very, very deliberately went ::blink.  blink.::

dragon shook silently, not wanting to make any more noise than absolutely necessary.  "Come on.  We have a baby blanket to deliver."

~ parte the fourth ~

Grace and dragon sneaked into the chamber housing Moya's offspring.  They were immediately surrounded by the little server droids that protected and cared for Moya's baby.  Well, it wasn't as though they could wrap the baby up, it wasn't exactly detached yet.  With one graceful move, they shook out the baby blue, pink, yellow, green, lavender -- etc -- king sized comforter and engulfed about 90% of the little fellows with the thing.  In the very center was a multicolored rainbow hued heart beneath which someone had very carefully embroidered a message:

Be it a boy
or be it a girl
here's a wee gift
to keep it in curl!

Grace read the sentiments swiftly as they darted out the way they had entered.  She grimaced.  Bleh.  What a thing to embroider on the poor babe's blanket.  She considered remonstrating with dragon over this.  She looked around and discovered that, once again, dragon had given her the slip.

Well, at least she didn't leave me with yards and yards of fabric this time.  Left to her own devices, Grace wandered off exploring.  You never knew, you might find something -- or -- someone ------

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

dragon worked on perfecting her sneak.  This was not easy considering that dragon was somewhat rotund, to be kind, and not exactly light on her feet, especially in her favorite boots which teetered on sturdy stacked two and a half inch heels.  Her feet were beginning to ache and tiptoeing in heels is not easy with short feet.  She slid around a curve in the hallway, narrowly missed going "eep"  as she caught sight of D'Argo striding around a corner that wasn't exactly and faded back around the curve to catch her breath.  (She knew it was around there somewhere.)

Aeryn Sun, still kneading the soft fur of the purring felinoid, was beginning to sober up or come down, depending on your point of reference.

She was frowning, ignoring the massage work that was keeping the praahr beside her happily puddled on the floor of Moya's command deck.  The ex-Peacekeeper leaned back against the table leg, missed and sprawled under the table.  She scrabbled to her feet, discovered the alien purring contentedly on the floor, jerked away and thumped her head soundly on the underside of the table.

Stars.  Wow.  Odd, she didn't usually see stars inside Moya.  Aeryn shook her head to clear it.  Ow.  Ow.  Ow.  Wow, that hurt.  Cautiously, a somewhat foreign concept, she got out from under the table and then looked at the still sprawled golden furred thing that must stand over seven feet tall when it was -- what was she thinking about, it was quadrupedal, obviously.  It was still dangerously big.  And where the hell had it come from????

She looked around and spied the flowers on the table, next to the gun she had blamed on Crichton.  The flowers.  The scent crept into her nostrils again, tickling the sensation centers of her brain.  Oh, my.  They must be related to -- this would never do.  Holding her nose and trying to breath through her mouth very, very shallowly, Aeryn Sun picked up the vase of roses and deposited it in a cupboard, an airtight cupboard, and shut the doors.  She backed away and took a tiny breath.  She could still get a touch of the scent, but nothing like what it had been.

RevSam opened its eyes, blinked, suppressed a desire to whine, moan or howl its despair over having been caught, and very, very quietly started moving toward an exit.  The whole purpose of a lurk is to lurk.  This means, no direct interactions with the lurkees.  No getting caught!  dragon was gonna be annoyed. The praahr caught the choke of laughter before it revealed her consciousness or betrayed her escape.

Aeryn turned to deal with the -- alien -- gone.  Oh, hell.  Oh, bloody hell.  Oh, hell.  She hit the alarm.

Pilot, resplendent in his iridescent, opalescent paint, responded to her alert.  "Is there a problem?"

"There is -- an animal -- I think -- It's large."

Pilot digested this.  "Perhaps  it is the anomaly I have been sensing.   How large?"

"Very."  All right, that was succinct and to the point, but it really didn't give Pilot much to go on.  Aeryn took a breath, thought about it and gave a good description of the praahr.  Of course, she didn't remember to tell Pilot it was intelligent and bipedal, because she didn't know that part.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Grace, slinking through the corridors of the Leviathan Moya, really wasn't prepared to run into her quarry quite so literally.  She stepped around a curve and --

"Oh.  Hi."  Well, this was a good start.  She was standing inside the circle of his arms looking up into his eyes.  She smiled brightly.

Crichton looked down into a pair of velvety brown eyes set in a heart-shaped face.  The mouth curved up and blinded him with a smile.  Well, not quite, but it was one heck of a smile.  He became very, very aware of the warm armful of what looked like a twenty-something human female he had caught.  He blushed.  Now that he'd caught her, what was he gonna do with her?

He cleared his throat preparatory to speech.  She giggled.  He made the mistake of looking into those eyes again.  His hold loosened slightly.  The entire front of his body seemed to be hyper-aware of the front of hers -- and considering what she was -- wasn't -- the catsuit she seemed to consider appropriate for wandering around the ship -- oh, my.  His color went up another notch.  He let go and took a step back.

Grace grinned at him.  "You look like you could use a drink."

"Yeah," he agreed with a nod.  He felt uncertain about this, but then he felt incredibly certain about --

"Here."  She handed him a very, very small cup filled with something black.

He sniffed it suspiciously.  The smell alone was intoxicating.  It smelled like -- like -- very good.  He took a cautious sip.  Mmmmm.  It was delicious.  Fruity, sharp, tangy, slightly spicy --  Whoof!  The sip hit bottom and went off in a somewhat thermonuclear manner.  His eardrums felt warm.  On the inside.

"Packs a punch," he commented with a smile.

"Does it?"  Grace took a cautious sip of her own.  She licked her lips and resisted the urge to run her tongue around the rim of the glass.  The stuff was delicious.  What was he talking -- oh.  That.  Yeah.  She had to agree, the small fusion furnace in her tummy felt very powerful, and quite nice.  She offered him another sip.

A few moments later, while they were trying to figure out whether to kiss again in the corridor or find a little more privacy, the praahr discovered them and Crichton decided that he needed another sip --

RevSam was silently lurking through the Leviathan looking for its ride home and wishing this was Cheyenne Mountain, where it could, at least,  borrow a ride home if it lost its partner in -- uh -- lurk.  One of these days it was going to have to talk dragon, or the seaQuest addict, out of one of the back up tesserect devices.

RevSam heard a sound.  It was a -- sound.  It wandered down, or was it up?, the corridor and found Grace mugging one of the lurkees.  It raised both its eyebrows over its trifocals and waggled them at Grace who was ignoring the praahr.  Well, as much as one  could ignore a marsupial felinoid that stood about seven foot tall in its golden furred version with big aquamarine eyes partially obscured by its trifocals, fluffy golden fur and a frown.  Grace choked back a laugh.  Darn it!  Here she was, plying a very nice young human with the Bacchus Wine she'd nabbed off dragon and the pussy cat was intent on interfering.  Grrr.

Grace stuck her tongue out at the praahr.  RevSam gave her a drop jawed grin and stuck its tongue out at her.  Grace looked shocked, well, she tried.  The upward curve at the corners of her lips kinda destroyed the shock.  Crichton turned to see, ulp!  He sat down.  Hard.

"Oh, dear.  It's ok.  It's with me."

He gave her a look, looked at the praahr and back at Grace.  "It's with you?"

"Well, sorta.  It doesn't bite,"  she pointed out brightly.  Though I'm inclined to do so, she added mentally, wishing the praahr almost anywhere else.  (Not Shao Kahn's throne room.  dragon had already done that.  Not a good experience.  For a moment she wondered what dragon had finally done with Shao Kahn's sword.  She pulled her attention back to the  very attractive young man next to her.)

"You're sure?"  John Crichton took another sip of the black wine Grace had offered him.  The praahr looked less scary by the moment.  He smiled.  He smiled at Grace.  He pulled Grace down beside him and kissed her.

RevSam looked long suffering and wandered off in search of dragon.

dragon had found the intake she wanted.  She looked at the map she'd pulled off the internet.  Yep.  This was the place.  She reached into her pocket and pulled out -- wrong pocket.  She checked the other likely pockets, the unlikely pockets and then the concealed pockets, not to mention the ones in her jeans which were way too tight to contain anything, including her fingers.

"Grace!!!!!!!!!!"

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