Tafel stepped through the portal with two phoenixes tucked underneath her arms like bundles of blankets. She looked around, and to her surprise, she saw a very familiar face. “Vur?” She blinked. “You’re not asleep?”

“Is that really the first thing you should be saying to your husband?” Stella asked. “How did you find us anyway? Did you put a mark on Vur that allows you to sense his location at all times? That’s a little creepy, you know?”

“Is it creepy?” Helden asked. “I think that’s a bit romantic.”

“Shut up,” Stella said and shot Helden a glare. “Your opinions about love are immoral and irrelevant.”

“Hi, Tafel,” Vur said and waved. “Did you finish the thing you needed to do?”

Tafel’s brow furrowed as she assessed the group surrounding Vur. “Yeah,” she said, dragging out the word. “I finished.” She walked ahead, and the crowd of pale people parted like a sea of zombies, creating a path for her to go through. She narrowed her eyes at the Generis Squad before walking around them to Vur’s side. “What’s going on here? Catch me up to the situation. We can talk about other things later.”

Vur nodded. He pointed at Helden. “This is our new chef.” He pointed at the women surrounding Helden. “These are his lovers.” He pointed at the balding man. “That’s a person researching ways to regrow hair.” He gestured at the Recordkeeper. “She’s a tour guide.” He rubbed his chin. “We’re here to convince the researcher to make a body for Mr. Skelly as a wedding gift for Alice and Mr. Skelly. The researcher was going to resist, and then you opened a portal here.”

Tafel stared at Vur. She knew he would never lie to her, but … why were only questionable things coming out of his mouth? She glanced at Stella, and the fairy queen nodded.

“That’s basically the situation,” Stella said. “There was a whole misunderstanding with us believing the researcher was an evil wizard bent on creating evil beasts of destruction, but we’re still going to kidnap him regardless.”

“Wait,” Blau said. “Just because he told us he’s a researcher doesn’t mean he’s no longer evil. Human trials are completely unethical. If he was really researching in good faith, he’d have tested his serum on animals first.”

“I did,” Tobin said and cleared his throat after everyone turned to look at him. He gestured towards the giant bird that was standing not too far away. “Pecky used to be a normal-sized pigeon.”

“Why would you test a hair-growth serum on a bird?” Ingwer asked. “Birds don’t have hair.”

Tobin glanced at the big bird before shifting his gaze back onto the group. “Pecky was featherless before I used the serum on him.”

“Excuse me,” the pale old man said from the head of the group of pale people. “Messiah, is this our new home?”

Tafel turned her head towards Vur. “Where are we?”

“Somewhere on the eastern continent,” Vur said.

“Oh.” Tafel nodded. She turned her head back towards the old man. “Yeah, this is your new home.” Her horns glowed silver, and a portal appeared. Her eyes lit up. Her coordinates were working again! She gestured for the pale people to step through. “Go talk to the dwarves and tell them the dwarf king gave you permission to reside in their lands.”

“Are you allowed to fabricate the dwarf king’s permission like that?” Ingwer asked as the pale people marched through the portal in an orderly manner. “Won’t they know you’re lying?”

“Fabricate?” Tafel asked and raised an eyebrow. She glanced at Vur. “You’re fine with them living with the dwarves, right?”

“Yeah, sure,” Vur said and scratched his belly. “They can do whatever they want.”

“He’s the dwarf king?” Ingwer asked. She blinked twice. “But he’s a dragon!”

Vur snorted. “Who said a dragon can’t be the dwarf king?”

Ingwer opened her mouth, but after a period of silence, she closed it again. Seeing as Ingwer wasn’t going to say anything else, Tafel decided to cut in. She tugged on Vur’s arm and pointed at the portal she had entered from which she still hadn’t closed. “I need your help in there later,” she said. “There’s something really strong inside, and I’m not sure if I can deal with it by myself.”

“Okay,” Vur said. “Let’s go.”

“Right now?” Tafel asked. “Don’t you still have things to do?”

“No,” Vur said. “It’ll be fine. The chef can capture the researcher. We’ll come back later when everything’s done.”

“Wait,” Helden said, his eyes nearly bulging out of his head when he saw Vur and Tafel walking towards the portal. “Can’t you defeat this guy really quickly before you leave? You defeated us in a second. I know it doesn’t take much effort for you.”

Tobin smirked. “Can you really defeat me though?” he asked and stomped on the ground. A moment later, the room shook and swayed. “My hair-growth serum might not be complete, but one experimental strain works perfectly as a growth serum! Behold!”

“What’s that?” Forster asked, pointing out the window. A massive paw was reaching out of the ground, chunks of dirt and roots falling off of it as it rose up. It was pink and looked a bit wrinkly. “Is that a giant naked mole-rat?”

“That’s right!” Tobin said and laughed. He ran over and jumped onto Pecky’s back. “Let’s see you deal with—”

A portal appeared beside Tobin, and a hand extended out of it. It grabbed the back of his collar and yanked him through the portal. Tafel glanced at the man in her hand. She opened another portal and shouted, “Alice! Detain this guy for me. Don’t listen to a single word he says.” Then, she tossed Tobin through the portal before anyone could respond. Her gaze landed on the Generis Squad. “Alright. If there wasn’t anything else, we’ll be going now.”

“Uh, there’s still the giant mole-rat out…side,” Helden said, but Tafel and Vur clearly didn’t care about what he had to say. The two of them had left through the portal before he even finished his sentence.

“That was pretty rude of them,” Forster said.

Blau shrugged. “The dragon did say he’d be back.”