A/N: here is the newest chapter. Forever New's chapter is almost done. ALMOST!

Sorry, been sick, been cranky, and just plain irritable and it might show up in any of my writing, FN most especially.

':.`*`.:'

Ron wrinkled his nose. Was it him, or where most of the kids here all dark and tanned with strange hair? "Jake, you never told me I would look like a pillar of marble in a dark tunnel, dude. Okay, that was a weird comparison, but still. Only three people so far are naturally blond, and all are girls that obviously go to a tanning bed and wear too much makeup. Everyone else is like, I doan know, you or Trixie. Which scares me more than you'll ever know."

Jake snickered. "Which? Trixie or me?"

"Trixie. Definitely Trixie. Sorry, dude, but you're not that scary when faced with an enraged girl with hormones like that. She's just . . . I think a female version of the Devil might work well to describe her." Jake had to concur. Trixie was Lucifer incarnate when pissed off. Never say that the girl was a push over. Ever. She'd come after you. Even the magical beings of the TMC ran like hell when she made her appearance. Smart. Smarter than her boyfriend who was clearly clueless to the girls around him trying to chat the descent looking boy up. Okay, if he was a girl, he might go for Spud now with all those slick looking muscles he was getting from his job at the Gym, but he didn't swing that way. Usually. Unless your name was Ronald Stoppable, the boy with nightmares and a dead martial arts ingrained into his mind and DNA. A boy who had befriended a super genius teen and the Twins of Terror ©, with elvish ears he wanted to touch, and the brownest eyes he'd ever seen. He felt his cheeks flush warmly and silently cursed his thoughts. He liked GIRLS. Girls, damn it!

"Okay, class time. Come on, Jake, snap out of it," Ron said, tugging his arm along down the hall, therefore him as well.

And so the day passed, the crazy teacher teaching them about things he didn't understand in the first place causing Ron to burst into laughter and get his first detention . . . until Jake diverted the teacher's irate attention to him instead and said it was his fault. It kind of was since he had forgotten to warn Ron. The next several classes went smoothly, especially since Ron informed Jake in a whisper that "this is so easy now that someone explains it to me" causing the ebony boy to chuckle quietly.

When they let out, Ron told Jake he was going to go home to his Aunt who should be back already. Jake agreed, silently growling about it.

He was startlingly quiet on the way home, making Trixie, who had caught up shortly after Ron had left off to his Aunt's place, glare with worry. She had trouble expressing emotions sometimes.

"What's got you all tangled up?" the dark girl asked with her ever present accent.

Jake startled hard enough that he lost control of the skateboard and fell on his face. Trixie stopped and laughed hard, holding her sides. Jake grumbled and grouched, grabbing up the board and stomping off. Trixie followed, trying hard to stop the gasping need to laugh like a loon. His lips twitched but he resisted. Trixie caught it and relaxed. Ah, he was just too deep in thought again.

"What deep thoughts you have, Long. Care to share them?"

Jake let out a breath. Trixie would be much more understanding than anyone he knew except Gramps. "Well . . . I think I've found someone I really, really like, Trix, but it's . . . complicated."

Trixie rolled her eyes. "Not surprising there, Jake. So, why is it so complicated, huh?"

Jake swallowed hard. "Well, first off, they don't know and second, well, um, it's, um, yeah—right . . . it's, it's RonandIhavenoideawhat'sgoingonwithme!"

Trixie rubbed at her ear as if cleaning out water. "What?"

"I already told you," Jake blushed so hard, he wondered if his head would pop off from the pressure. "I won't say it again."

Trixie gave him "The Eye"and slowly smirked at the boy in front of her.

"No, you didn't . . . oh-ho, boy, you did . . . " she sang quietly. "I knew you were at least bi," Jake spluttered incoherently but the dark girl ignored him to continue in a whisper as she walked. "But this? Oh, I have to tell you, Jake, mah boy, this has been a long time in coming. With that evil little head-hunting bitch out of the country, I'll make good on my promise."

"P-promise? What promise? Trixie? Trixie?What have you done now!?" Jake jogged to keep up and tried to keep passersby from hearing them, blushing so furiously, his face matched his bright neon red shirt. "Please tell me you didn't vow on this, Trixie."

"Oh," she turned to glare at him. "I haven't done that . . . " yet, she amended to herself, "but I won't have that skank running around looking for your head. Not anymore," Trixie growled out very reminiscent of Jake's dragon form. Ooo, he wasn't gonna touch that one. Not right now and not in the immediate future. Ron was right: dragon or not, Trixie was far more terrifying as just a human woman than he would ever be. Heaven forbid if she actually formed any powers in the next year or two.

"W-well, good, uh, good night, er, Trixie. See you at, um, at school?"

Trixie hugged Jake and he heard his spine crackle and pop. Trixie smiled at him and kissed his forehead in a more forward show of affection than usual. Jake rubbed his face as Trixie sashayed off around the corner, her skateboard under her arm and helmet in hand. Jake shook his head. Trixie was . . . she was just so weird sometimes. He shook it off and went on home.

The rest of the day went without incident until it was bed time. Jake couldn't sleep now, not without someone with him. He liked the warmth of another living body laying beside him, the soothing heat of a person he knew and respected. But what kept him from his bed were the nightmares. Nightmares he'd never really had before, not even after all that had happened with him being the American Dragon for several years.

It was something that Ron had tried to describe once, late night-early in the morning to him after a really bad night when even Jake couldn't keep away the night horrors. He replayed it in his mind and shivered.

Held so still, the screams making him sick. He couldn't move, he couldn't save the one screaming, hearing the feminine voice beating against his skull. He heard another sound, the scream of someone he knew was close to him, like the other half of his soul. He tried to breathe, but the fear for them, the feeling of entrapment, held his lungs still . . .

He shook away the memory and shivered. The taste of bile and fear still coated his tongue and made him gag. If it was this bad here . . . how was Ron coping? Jake felt real fear tingle up his spine. Forgetting he was only wearing sleeping pants, he opened his window and let himself fall as he swiftly and silently flowed into his dragon form, gliding on an unexpected updraft. He flew swiftly with little noise and only the shoo-shwump of his leathery wings beating the air telling of where he was. He landed deftly on the balcony outside Ron's room, transforming back to his human body and pushing open the unlocked glass door.

Ron was on his bed, stripped to his boxers, sweating and tossing with little keening cries making Jake's heart ache. Making a soothing murmur, he crawled over to the blond boy and wrapped himself around him, trying to stop the thrashing. Ron quieted quickly, as he had become prone to do, and curled up in a shivering huddle against Jake. Jake soothed a warm hand down his bare back, glad that he couldn't quite feel every rib this time around. The blond was finally eating more and it showed. Ron had already grown two inches, making him a good six inches taller than Jake and, while it galled Jake that he was so short, he was glad that his friend was getting better.

His thoughts turned sluggish, his eyelids drooping with the effort to keep awake . . . He laid his head against Ron's back that was turned towards him and wrapped his arms securely around the blond's waist, legs shifting into something of a shelf behind Ron's own drawn up legs. Calling on his tail, he pulled the covers over them and closed his eyes as the comforting heat of someone, Ron, heated him.

':.`*`.:'

::Previously At Jakes House::

"Mom! MOM!" Hailey was jumping in place beside her bed, "Jake left! He opened his window and flew away!"

Mrs. Long jumped up, staring at her child and hoping that it just been an odd dream. "Why do you know this, Hailey?"

Hailey tilted her head down in something like guilt. "I . . . I wanted Jake to let me sleep with him, since I kept having this nightmare. He did it with Ron, why won't he do that with me?" The little girl quietly sniffled and he mother grabbed her close.

"Ron was a special case. No one else here, not even Fuu or Grandfather with all their magic, could keep Ron from his nightmares except Jake. Ron has to have someone, like Jake, to make him better. That's probably where Jake went, if he felt the pull of another nightmare. Sometimes only those you really trust can make things that hurt you or scare you go away, baby girl, but you really, really have to trust that person with everything you are. Ron did that with Jake whether he knows it or not. So, Jake is the only one alive that can help him," she smiled as her precious little girl finally understood, her eyes widening with realization. Hailey smiled sweetly for her mother.

"Can I sleep in here instead, then, tonight? Please?" How could she say no? She laughed softly and kissed her baby on her forehead, tucking her between her and her husband.

"Good night, my little angel. Sleep well."

':.`*`.:'

Ron woke feeling warm and so comfortable. He snuggled further into the warm, firm pillow under his head and left side . . . left side? He didn't have a body pillow. Heck, his pillow was quite small but bumpy and well used, his favorite of all the others he had left at home. So, with a little bit of worry, he opened his eyes to see . . . skin. Lots of bronzed, firmly toned skin. With a bellybutton and this line of curly downy hair that arrowed down into black pants. His face heated. He was using Jake as a pillow again . . .

Wait, aren't I at Aunt Mel's? He looked around at the room and sighed that yes he was. Then . . . why was Jake here? He peeked up at the face that was so soft in sleep. Huh, he looks so . . . he wasn't sure what Jake looked like, but he knew that he liked it . . . quite a bit. Okay, time to head this off. Ron settled himself away from Jake, curling up against the warmth, at his side, hand touching Jake's limp fingers as he pulled the cover up over their shoulders.