I'm typing this entry while there's a little bundle of grey scale and red mane asleep in my lap. His name is Halcyon Stormscale, and he's the little one that popped out of the purple-silver egg.

I used to think that I'd seen most of the many strange things the world has to offer, and that there was little left for it to surprise me with. Even bloody eggs appearing from nowhere are relatively tame as far as some things go, and I figured the egg's bizarre arrival would as weird as things got with it.

Well! As luck would have it, as I was walking past one of the lounges on the science deck, I saw Dark Shadow herself sitting inside, eating tiny cakes with Xiao Shy, one of the "chibis" that I couldn't stop from following me home from the Vella Crean's final clutch. She seemed a bit sceptical when I told her how I had an egg that "felt" like Lanse'shri, but was willing to come take a look.

Felix was still in place, all wrapped up around the egg so that you couldn't even tell it was there. It was a sight that seemed to amuse Dark, but when Felix moved so she could see the egg, it was like she'd been struck! She grabbed me by the shoulder and fell to her knees, while murmuring that she'd "been there" and that it was "not possible." She said the latter many times.

I wasn't sure to be worried or not. Was it a rare species? Something more amazing? A monster? Something more terrible?

She said "the clutch was destroyed", which didn't answer my question either way, and asked to touch the egg. After she had, I finally got the story.

Dark has a friend named Myrror, who is a weredragon like Dark is. The two of them apparently realm-travel a lot, visiting all kinds of worlds and dimensions and realities. Myrror was expecting during one of these jaunts, and the two of them got trapped in a nearly magic-less world that left them stuck in human-form and with no way to leave.

Though they thought they had time and that they'd find a way, they were unable to escape before the time came for Myrror to lay her eggs. The eggs "appeared through her form", as Dark put it, and were--supposedly--crushed.

Did I not say "blood-coated eggs generally do not speak of good things on the mother's part"? I wish I hadn't been as right as I was.

Dark managed to save one egg, and its birth released enough magic for Dark to use it to take all of them out of that mundane world and back to Lanse'shri. This, of course, was no explanation for how this one egg had arrived with me, but Dark was certain that it was another survivor of Myrror's ill-fated clutch. A curious fact, to be sure, but nothing particularly strange about it.

So then Dark tells me that event happened over a hundred years ago. So now I have an egg that's come to me through space AND time! Now things have reached a level of strangeness I hadn't expected at all.

Dark came up with a theory that Myrror had unconsciously sent her eggs ahead in time to save them. It seems Myrror has temporal magics that she doesn't actively use, and that Dark guessed had activated after the birth of the one surviving egg. Such an unconscious use would explain why neither knew about this other egg… and any others that had survived the same way.

Dark sent a telepathic summons to her friend, who was apparently near enough to respond quickly to such a summons. I asked if they'd want to take the egg home with them, but Dark was unsure--the "loss" of the others had been too devastating for her to even want to raise the one that had first survived. I said, then, that I was willing to keep the egg, and rested my hand on the shell.

That was when it cracked, and things all started happening at once!

I went into the usual procedure--"Grandpa Mode", as some have called it. I washed my hands at the in-room sink, turned on the incubator camera, and lifted the lid so that it wasn't in my way, while Felix jumped to the ground. Meanwhile, Dark's friend Myrror arrived, and Dark explained what was going on and her temporal-magic theory while I kept an eye on the egg. Assured that Dyrmyst dragons--the kind of dragon that the two are weredragons of--did not birth-bond, I did not have to worry about the hatchling suffering a mind-death, and focused on its hatching while the others spoke.

When a swirled grey wing broke free, the two got in an argument over its Clan--a kind of colour or sub-breed effect among Dyrmysts, though it's more complex than that. Dark thought it was a Moonscale, like Myrror, but Myrror disagreed. When the hatchling had broken free enough to show a pair of little black horns, they realized it was instead an "unknown" Clan.

Myrror vanished again, but returned with a robed man who also felt like a weredragon. I couldn't understand his language, but Myrror called him a historian. While the weredragons argued amongst themselves, I kept an eye on the hatchling. Along with its little horns and its scales, which were swirled with faintly different shades of grey, it had a mane of black-tipped red hair along its neck and what I could see of its back, and brightly attentive purple eyes. It didn't speak in any style, but seemed very strong and healthy, and I continued to clear away bits of eggshell as it fought its way free.

When the weredragons were done, the final declaration was that the hatchling was "Clan-kin"--a member of a colouration that was killed off before reaching full Clan status. What that means in detail, I don't know, but that's all right. I know who to ask if I end up needing further explanation.

They declared the hatchling a Stormscale--one of three of these extinct Clans.

I asked again if they would be taking the hatchling home with them, but before Myrror could answer, the little dragon squeaked and put a paw on my hand, making the decision for itself. Himself.

As I said, his name is Halcyon. He didn't come with his own name, nor did Myrror have one to offer. So because he's one lucky little devil, I called him Halcyon, and having had a bath and a meal--in reverse order--he's sound asleep in my lap.

He's not like the usual dragon hatchling. He can't speak yet, and he's quite helpless--all he can do is walk and squeak. He's really going to need me to watch over him while he's small.

What a lovely change.