They met completely by accident, halfway into their first semester of Sophmore year at Carramba High School. Not at lunch, not after school, and certainly not in any particular shared class - though some of them share classes, they're not even in the same period save for two of them in two wildly varied courses.

They met while ditching 4th period.

Every one of them simply hated the class they were in, during that period. They happened to arrive, one Friday, at the same empty warehouse hideout. Thinking they were sly, every few Fridays they continue to do that. Meeting somewhere around town, just long enough to avoid their pet hated class, and then heading back to Carramba to finish out the day.

"It's before lunch anyway," Tabitha said. "That gives us more than enough time to get wherever we're going, and then back for Fifth period." She giggled, "and I'd never want to miss my Speech class!"

"Sure," groaned Tanith. "Just in time to be out in broad daylight."

"Just because you're all pale an'shit," Tonja laughed, "it don't matter t'me what time o'day we're here."

"If I had even half the melanin in your skin," Tanith said with a grin, "I'd be a happy camper."

"I ain't sharin' none o'my skin wit'chu, ice princess!" Tonja swung her head around and then burst into laughter.

The group was clearly friends to the end. Not entirely true, not all the time. But they had enough in common, from their hatred of their fourth period class, to the fact that they all had names that started with T. Trish had to change her name - Patty had been her pet name through middle school, and that just wouldn't do. Not for an up and coming starlet like herself. And no one mentioned that Trudi's name was really Gertrude. Because they all agreed, Trudi most vocally, that Gertrude was a totally suck ass name.

Though they were initially a bit surprised by one another - and everyone was surprised by Tanith, Tzan and occasionally Tabitha's actions - they learned to exploit their differences, as well as their class schedules. Just because they each have a "worst subject" listed, doesn't mean they are actually failing anything. Far from it, in fact. They each are maintaining at least a B average.

When Tonja learns something in Locals History, she passes it along to Trudi, who then helps Taaj with it. If the English 101 class presents something impossible for Trudi, she'll get Trish and Tonja to help later on in the day. The only class that two of the ten share in common is Ancient Scrolls, Tzan and Tanith's studies of all things mystic and arcane, and Tansie and Tami's Advanced Statistics course that Taylee has earlier in the day. Aside from that? Not one class otherwise with two of them in it at the same time.

That all might change.

Monday - end of 1st Period - Carramba High School

"All the props in the world to my baby sista' for writing that poem," Tonja said, as the Music Theory class applauded. A spoken word session, Nagel Singe sat and watched appreciatively and judged Tonja's performance as a 100%. He also thought about what she'd just said, and considered asking if her younger sister Ashia might be let into the program a year early.

After the rest of the students had spoken their haiku, poem or rant, and each of them had graded each other on the performance, Singe dismissed the class. All but Tonja. She looked a bit worried. Teachers tended to pull her aside only when there was something wrong.

"I'd like you to do a reading for my Fiction class on Friday," Singe said, surprising the dark skinned girl. She tilted her head, and her plumes of braided hair tossed around.

"A... a reading? Like, what'chu mean?"

"A reading, as in a sight-read, I know you can read cold, Tonja," he tilted his head a bit and pushed his curly blond hair behind his ear. As always his eyes were covered by his reflective shades. But anyone could read the look he was giving Tonja. "And I know you'd enjoy this project. It's a science fiction workshop, and I've been hoping to have someone start a production of one of the student's pieces."

"But... there'll be people watching?"

"That is the point," Singe smiled again.

Tonja's full lips broadened into a big smile, "then count me in. When is it?"

"I knew I could convince you. It's this friday, for my fourth period class."

When Tonja apparently balked at that idea, Singe gave her a private grin, "what, it isn't like you were planning on being in your class, or is your ditch-day so important that you can't afford to miss it?"

"We do some very important work, on our ditch-day," Tonja said with a huffy black-girl-annoyed head-weave. "Since it's Monday, I'll have to talk to my homies and see if they're good."

"Excellent," Singe said with another knowing grin. "I wouldn't want to be interrupting anything vital."

"You ditched your way through high school," Tonja mockingly said, "s'don't give me that crap."

Singe laughed in his soft way, and shooed her out of the room. But Tonja turned at the last moment and said, "you're gonna give me extra credit, right?"

"Planning on it, yes," he said. Tonja nodded and went on her way.

***

Tonja's bright smile caught Tabitha's eye, as she was on her way to the Physical Sciences building for her Optimism Under Duress class. Tami slid up behind them both and said nothing. They were all headed into that building, to varying degrees of torture and agony. The Chemistry class that Tonja enjoyed was on the south side of the building, while Tami's extremely favorite Practical Anatomy class was on the north tower. And little Tabitha's enjoyable Optimism course was nestled in the middle on the ground floor. They didn't have much to do until lunch, no letters to exchange or anything, but it was clear that Tonja had some kind of good news to share.

Tabitha nudged up against one of the offworld students, and used her powers to teleport directly into her classroom. Tami rolled her dark brown eyes and muttered, "showoff," as she walked toward her own class.

The day was more or less mundane for the others. Their more exotic friends Taaj, Tanith and Tzan wandered through their day and tried cornering Tami for a game of 'guess where we're going Friday'. When lunch time finally rolled around, after the traditional exchange of notes between Tanith and Tonja for their Business Math class, Tonja was finally coersed into saying something.

"I'm going to have to get you guys out of class too," she said, "but I don't know if I can swing that. I'm good," she said wobbling her head around, "but I might not be that good."

"Perhaps I could be of service," said a man's voice, startling all of them. He looked to be as pale as Tanith, he was one of those instructors that didn't get out much to the normal classes. H'lis Blackstone, the ...

"You teach dragonning," said Tami. "Why would you be of any help to us?"

"To get you out of your classes, of course."

"But why would you do that?" Asked Tanith, "I mean, we don't even have a class with you."

"None of you do," he said, a grin starting on his handsome lips, "yet."

That froze them a little. Taaj stood up, coming to just under H'lis' chin, "what do you mean, professor, by 'yet', said in that tone of voice?"

"As though you can't tell?" He said, and then looked up. The group followed his gaze but they didn't see anything. Maybe he was just a complete flake.

Then Tzan whispered, "he is speaking with his dragon."

"Observant," H'lis said, while still aiming whatever telepathic message he had, at his dragon. "I would like you all to come by the field, after school today. If that's not too much to ask you?"

"I don't know," Tonja said, all her friends knew that she was just trying to mock him, "I've got an awfully busy schedule..."

"I know that," H'lis said. "But after Friday you won't need to worry about ditching." And with that, he walked off - as the bell rang for getting to Seventh period.

***

It was almost unbearable, the wait until the bell. Even Tzan in her unusual 'Dungeon Crawl' class was a bit distracted. She didn't get the extra points for cleanly beheading the slimy-headed grask-newt that the class was busy dealing with. Finally, though, they heard the distant bell above, and Tzan made her way back up to the surface. There were several exits from the Dungeon, so she chose the one which would let out closest to the fields.

She was glad she did. She was the first on the scene, and there were several local dragons waiting for her. She strode up to one, and it swung its big head around to sniff at her. Giggling, the India-born godlet scratched its nose.

"You're early," H'lis said. "We didn't expect anyone until -" The rest of the group arrived, having been teleported en mass by Tabitha. "That's ... kind of handy," he finished.

Now that the group of ditch-happy girls were all present, H'lis went over and assembled the ranks of dragons and their riders.

There was a beautiful clouded bronze, head held high, sitting next to another gigantic bronze of a richer color. A stunning gold slunk between them and broke up their bookends attitude. A marked brown with stars on his wings landed near by, while another large bronze of a very pale value sat down carefully near the smaller wildly colored blue-green-glowing one. A sturdy looking brown accompanied another of equal girth to the side of the field, while two stunningly marked blues paced around one another. One small green delicately looked at the group of humans.

It was when the dragons had all assembled themselves, when the riders did likewise. Standing before the gold, was a blackbottomed security agent, Ixoh Giger. The bronzes were ridden by H'lis himself, and other instructors, Gresilla Hagen bonded the clouded one, while Ilya who taught Taaj's "What you can learn by looking at your Brain" class, rode the other. A security agent, Ed, stood before his brown, while Dominique Talshoy the mowhawked Current Affairs teacher stood before the marked one. T'ver Canby who taught the martial arts class (one of them, anyway) was the rider of the other sturdy brown. Sabina and Blue Deck from Finances seemed right about perfect for the two blues, and Disruptor, a student, rode the marked glowing green-blue. The only morph rider, Una Darby, was the green's bond, and she stood pleasantly eyeballing H'lis and the other men. She would probably paint them sooner or later.

The Ten stood before these people, and felt faintly outclassed. It was more likely that they didn't have any of their pets for this meeting, everyone's seemed to have wanted to stay home today.

Maybe they knew, or something... But for sure, they would have felt better with an assortment of Egyptans and other guardians by their sides. H'lis knew they all had pets - maybe he'd planned it this way?

He was like that, after all...

"We've brought you here because your instructors have noticed your absences," H'lis said. Taylee blushed deep red, like her hair, as Gresilla Hagen gazed at her. The martial arts she ditched on Fridays were gonna haunt her... It wasn't just her, either, it was Talshoy and her brown, glaring at Trudi. Well, glaring was too harsh a word, they weren't really angry at all - but the girls certainly thought they were in hot water.

"And we want to do something about it," Talshoy said, stepping forward. Her tall frame was made even more so by the foot high stiff mowhawk she sported, "because we can, and because we see the potential in you all."

"What kind of potential?" Asked Tanith. She was having a hard time with the glare of the afternoon sun on her sensitive skin and eyes. One of the dragons raised his big wing, and shaded them. "Thank you," she said.

"The potential to become dragon riders yourselves," H'lis announced. "We brought the dragons because we wanted to make sure."

The Ten looked up at the big dragons - each one had a head just smaller than a volkswagen, or so it looked. The big bronzes, they did have heads that size... And the dragons looked right back down at the girls.

Each dragon, with the exception of H'lis' big bronze, then kind of cornered one of the girls. "I didn't even know there were this many dragons on campus," Taylee said. "You'd think that Professor Paveh would have said something."

"He's got a bunch of sons and daughters on dragons, on Zekira. He wanted most of them to go into his business." H'lis said.

"He wants me to go into his business," Taylee muttered. The paler bronze that Ilya rode sniffed at her hair, and looked at her like he was going to lick her head or something. She didn't back away, did not flinch. His eyes whirled a pretty green-blue color.

T'ver's brown had found Tabitha, who giggled with her long hair got tangled up in the dragon's nose. Una's green sniffed at Tonja and nudged her gently to listen to her headphones. Ixoh's beautiful gold looked at Tzan and chuffed at her. Ed's brown gave a similar treatment to Taaj, who chuffed back at him - did she understand his language too? Tami was examined by the frosted blue belonging to Blue. The glowing blue-green ran up to Trudi and almost seemed as happy to be searching her, as she was to be searched. The silvery blue that called Sabina his bond carefully eyed Tansie, and decided that he was glad he had long horns to keep her at bay. The star spangled brown that Dominique impressed continued to shade Tanith from the sun, while he examined her. She couldn't really return the favor, being nearly blinded in the sunlight. The softly marked bronze that their Martial Arts instructor brought looked over Trish's pink hair and tried to figure out what to do with her.

When they had all finished, the dragons (all but Ringeth, who continued to shelter Tanith) returned to their line on the field. They seemed to give H'lis' big bronze their opinions, and then the bronze told H'lis.

He smiled widely. "It looks as though we were right, after all." He said, "this will be your last week in your regular classes. Turn in whatever homework you can, and we'll be doing the rest. We will also," he said while glancing at the riders, "be trying to convince your parents that this is the best course of action for you."

"What if you can't?" Asked Taaj. She was on American soil but her family was in Japan.

"It will not be a problem," Ed told her. "There are two kinds of parents, and we've dealt with both, in the past. The dragons always win, in the end."

"Yes they do," T'ver agreed, "so we have to also start hunting up locations for you to bond at." The stunning black woman looked at H'lis and then back at the Ten. "We're going to be trying something new, with you. We want you to bond at different locales, like our dragons are from different places," she waved her hand and the differences were obvious between the dragons, "but we will be requiring you to return with the hatchling, here. That way we will not be isolating you from your friends and family, like it used to be."

"Thanks," Disruptor said with a snide grin, "what made you guys come up with that? The fact that I'm two years older than all my friends now?"

"That would be it," T'ver said.

"That and we want to try getting funding for a dragon roost here on campus," Ilya said. "There are underground caverns, but most of our dragons live in aeries and mountains."

"Ninhursag said she'd be able to raise a mountain for us," Ixoh said, and the Ten were alternately wondering what they were all talking about, and wondering if they could go home and maybe talk to their parents before the riders did.

"Can we go?" Asked Trudi, "I mean, we do want to pack and stuff. And if we're gonna have to do homework," she made a face, "we might as well get started..."

The other girls grumbled their agreement. Tonja wondered how much weirder her day was going to get, while they were dismissed and let to go home.

(( tenbond.htm ))

Though each of the girls were nervous, none of them said anything about it. Especially not Tabitha, whose training specifically helped her rally courage. Over the course of the next few days, they jammed on their homework, and their classmates threw seethingly jealous looks their way most of the time.

It wasn't every day that a batch of people got picked at this school for such an event.

But Tonja had better things on her mind, at least for Friday. The reading. She'd never forgotten in all the hubub, and certainly her instructor wouldn't let her. When the time came for the reading, Tonja had rested up and been drinking water, making sure her voice was going to be okay the whole time.

In front of a class worth of students, Tonja walked with confidence. The fiction writing class was filled with what Tonja would normally have considered geeks - not the physical type, the big brains of the campus. A couple of The Ten would fit in here whether they liked it or not.

"So when do I get to see the script," Tonja said as she entered the room. There was an odd hush at that - muttering, the students didn't realize that it was to be a completely 'cold' read, or one which had no prep time before hand. "I just hope there's no weird ass names I can't pronounce, 'nshit."

"Th-there aren't," said the meek little blond-haired girl whose script it was. She handed off the copy, with some hand-written notes on it. Tonja glanced at Singe, who nodded, and she took a moment to read the notes. A grin embedded itself on Tonja's lips.

"Oh, I think I'm gonna have fun with this..." She said.

Indeed. The class wasn't sure why Singe wanted to maintain such a grip on this piece, but when Tonja started reading, it was clear. It was a massive space epic - but it was also a tremendous comedy. A ship that was piloted by a gang of loonies, traveling at breakneck speeds through the galaxy. Tonja only got through the first two acts before the bell rang, and was sorely tempted to remain and do more.

"That was hilarious," Tonja said, handing the script back to its creator. "When I get back I want to try out for a part, okay?"

The class scattered, and Singe thanked Tonja for playing with the class. "Extra credit, given," he said, jotting it down on his other class schedule. "And now aren't you going to miss ditching fourth period?"

***

"At least it's still all at the school," said one parent.

"It's not halfway across the country," laughed a dad.

"Not across the galaxy!" Cried another, but he had a bit of a frown on his face. "It's dangerous, taking these kids so far from home."

"They'll be fine," promised T'ver. "And you'll see the kids again very soon, anyway."

"That's right," H'lis said, "we're going to be spreading them out across different dimensions and planets, but they'll all pretty much be safe and sound and back home within a couple weeks tops."

That was somehow less than reassuring, to most of the parents. To the siblings, however, it was amazing.

"You're going to come back with a dragon, can you bring one for me?" Asked Trudi's brother.

"No, but I can bring you back one of these," she said, hugging her lemony yellow flitter.

The creatures which the group had slowly assembled over the course of the last few months were all there too - Egyptans, Marella, Chipi and more. Nothing so big that they couldn't handle a flight on dragonback, nothing so tiny that they'd get lost in the shuffle.

Trish was insisting that her stuff in her room be kept exactly as is, nothing to be moved. Simon promised that he'd keep an eye on it for her, and she ruffled his hair. "You are the one I want to protect it from, Simeon," she laughed. But she also kissed him on the cheek and thanked him for her beautiful little Chipi pet.

Tabitha was oddly quiet, though. Her parents had come, along with her brother, but they weren't much for smiling and all the to-do.

"I do have something I need to tell you, sweetie," said Tabitha's father. "You're... a mutant."

"Well duh, dad, I knew that..." She said, tilting her head sideways, "I just wanted to know whose side it was on so I could research it."

Her father ground his jaw back and forth, until he said, "it's your mother's," and abruptly moved himself away from his wife so she couldn't actually reach him with that fist of hers...

Tanith was about ready to blow, because her mother was loading up her bag with all those little tubes of sunscreen and such. "Mom. Mom! I have enough of it! And I'm going to be indoors most of the time anyway!"

The woman with the rich auburn hair and bright green eyes could hardly contain her excitement, her daughter was going to find a dragon! Tanith sighed and permitted her mother to embrace her. It was hard for Tanith to imagine her mother shacking up with some fey lord, but... There had to be some reason she was all albino and all, right? And she'd never met her father, right?

The others said their farewells, and the individual girls were shown to their rides. The dragons who had searched each one were to bring them directly to a place they would stand for an egg. If they bonded, the pair would be brought right back. But it would take often up to a month for the eggs to hatch, so they had to pack and make sure they had enough clean undies for their trip.

Before they left, the instructors for their fourth period classes had been taken aside (apart from Gresilla and Talshoy of course) and 'informed' that the students would be transfering out of their class and into the dragon mastery course. Most of them didn't care, the girls weren't failing, but neither were they flourishing there. So perhaps if it was for the best, they would just bag the worst class of theirs, and succeed in everything.

There was a bit of jealousy even from the instructors, on that level, but the girls weren't going to let a little thing like that stop them from not only enjoying their success, but rubbing the teacher's noses in it if they could.

Except for Gresilla - because she could wipe the walls with any of them.

"While you're at your dorm," H'lis explained, "you and your escort will be going over specifics and information that will help you. Specifically, how to get back here if you need to."

The escorts nodded in agreement, and Ilya explained to Taylee that no, they had already scouted ahead and made arrangements, so they didn't have to pack too. Their stuff was already at the bond sites.

"And away they go," said H'lis. As the girls flew for the first time (well, on a dragon anyway) up into the clear blue sky over Carramba High School, H'lis turned to the parents and helped again explain how long they'd be gone, what they could expect to do when the girls got back, and how they might be changed by the experience. But how would the families change?

That would be something that only time could tell.

(( tentrain.htm ))

Trish was the first to return to Carramba High with her dragon. Everyone was most impressed with the medium-sized female's grace and delicate motion, and her arrogance too. She had the attitude if not the color of the finest golden queen.

Trudi was next, with her violet. Though small, the little terror would be into everything she could possibly fit her muzzle.

Though she actually arrived long after the hatching at Cormwood, Tabitha has brought back the teenaged blue Uthmus, cleverly shrunk down for travel - since he cannot teleport. One or two of the dragon riders/scientists at Carramba High are planning on fitting him with a device that could allow him to do just that. The mages are fighting over it, since they came up with it first...

The crimson-marked green Hakgyoth almost dragged Taylee to classes. Scanner yipped and caught up with them, but even so it would be hard to keep up with this pair. The green was fiercely protective of her bond.

Though she spent a little time at the Realm, Taaj returned right on time with her two dragons, both female. Fire Tuless and Shadow Tameji, dragons who would become some of the largest that the school - and many of the dragon riders at it - had ever seen!

Not to be outdone, Tonja returned from Star Thief Castle with her own copper rainbow Orieyonth, but also with two other sponsors who remain at the school full time! Manakuyth and Chianjerth are able to hold their own, but Tonja often visits them.

With a small but determined blue-black Silleth at her side, Tansie would want to begin his training for heroism soon as she could. It seemed he felt differently about their relationship than she told everyone, because of course he was the hero - she was the sidekick!

Was it any kind of surprise that the weirdest of the bunch - a two-headed Xeno-born bipedra with hathian forelimbs and butterfly markings, named Peleides, came home one night with Tanith? No. No surprise at all.

And Tami's strong, large male Geperna brown, Taloi'Gwmi was fiercely loyal. She asserted that no one would mess with them now!

Last but certainly not least, Tzan came home with a month or so behind her - and time travel wasn't outside her experience. Her blue feathery/furry Daemon/Aven Zamaliss Selamputo would challenge the others in many ways.

Gorilla Milkshake font - ask for it by name at Blambot fonts
All character art made on some ancient Teeny dollmaker and upscaled; adult figures credited on pages