Mj waltzed through the kitchen, humming some unpredictable tune. She was in a good mood; the dragons were staying out of trouble (since they mostly were asleep anyway) and Kyouya was not here. This made her happy.

But as she opened the fridge, her mood died. There was almost nothing in the fridge. No milk. No vegetables. Her mum and dad were on a business trip; and they'd left nothing to eat. She scowled; she'd have to send somebody for groceries.

She sneaked through the house. Perhaps Tsubasa could go? - no. He was fast asleep on the guest bed. He'd had a long couple of days she knew, and didn't want to wake him.

Maybe she could go? Never. Her parents had left her the responsibility of taking care of her younger siblings, and she couldn't take them with her - they were chaos when it came to shopping.

Masamune? He was only 14 and had no car.

She sighed. Either she could call the unreliable Kyouya to get her some groceries, or she could go find Ryuga off somewhere and send him. She chose to do the latter, as even Ryuga was less prone to chaos than Kyouya, and actually had a car in his possession.

And so an hour later Ryuga slid into the front seat of his car with a full grocery list and a dragon on the front seat - Metrion was due for her appointment and Mj wanted him to drop her off. He huffed impatiently. The sooner he got Metrion out of his car, the better.

As he pulled onto the interstate, all of a sudden he heard an unearthly screech and something sharp and scaly flew into his face. He yelled and pulled off onto the side of the road.

A very agitated Atlantean dragon was standing on his dashboard, hissing like a cat. Airblazer had sneaked into the car while he wasn't looking and was on the verge of blowing flames onto his wind shield, ultimately melting it. He carefully grabbed the little dragon and threw him in the backseat; there was no way he could turn around in this traffic. Airblazer would just have to stay at the vet with Metrion.

As he continued down the road, he was certain that no vet who had any sense would accept dragons as his patients.

Ryuga grabbed the rain poncho off the backseat, knowing it had seen its last day; Airblazer and Metrion's claws would tear through it in a heartbeat. But better the poncho than his face.

Walking into the veterinary facility, he dumped the two squabbling dragons on the counter. The vet tech smiled as Metrion crawled out from the confines of the shredded plastic, taking the little dragon in her hands. "Ah, yes, Metrion, here for your appointment, aren't you?"

"Yeah, the sooner the better", mumbled Ryuga.

"You're not the owner of these animals, are you?" She scowled at the infamous Blazer and then at Ryuga.

"No, I'm just dropping them off for a friend."

"Blazer isn't required to be here for another month, and you don't have the ownership papers for these dragons."

"Listen, you can call her or whatever, but I'm not going to leave these two demons in my car while I try to get the groceries."

The vet tech gave him a withering glare and called Mj on the phone. "Hello?...Yes...yes, your friend dropped off your little Metrion over at the office and he's not qualified for possession of her...I see. Yes. Well as long as you authorized guardianship, then I can give you clearance this time. Yes, have a nice day, ma'am. Goodbye."

She glared at Ryuga again. he glared right back.

"I'm afraid you still don't have clearance to leave Airblazer here. We're not authorized to take him until the appointed date."

"I'm not taking him to the grocery store with me!"

As they stood there arguing, neither noticed that Luis had walked in with his own Atlantean dragon, whom was under his care for the summer.

"I'll take Blazer home with me", he said, stepping between Ryuga and the technician. "He's going to melt the entire vet clinic in a second." Gingerly he picked up the plastic wrapped Airblazer and left. Ryuga sighed in relief and glared at the vet tech one last time before stamping out the door.

Ryuga stood under the overhang of the grocery store, stalling and watching the rain pool in the gutters. He didn't know where of 3 places he would rather be: Here in the rain, inside the scary grocery store, or at home with an angry Mj and 3 dragons.

He chose here in the rain. Grocery stores...he hated grocery stores. If only Tsubasa had been awake, he'd still be at home right now.

Finally he mustered up his courage and grabbed a shopping cart. The list was placed carefully in the front of the cart to where it wouldn't fall over on the floor, and he set off through the double doors with a quaking heart.

People...the grocery store was filled with people...and...pineapples... Ryuga raced away from the pineapples. Ever since that incident with the pineapple tree and the freaky unicorn-thing, he could not stand pineapples.

The first item on the list was hot cocoa; as it grew into the winter months, Mj found that just hot cocoa was enough to pacify Kyouya most days. A little boy and his mother were in the same aisle, and the little boy tugged on Ryuga's sleeve.

"Hey, mister?...why you wearing a crown on your head in the store? Cuz my mum said, if you're wearing metal they smash you. In the doors."

"I never said that, dear." His mother was preoccupied with the coffee.

"That's not true, kid." Ryuga turned away, gently tugging his sleeve out of the child's grasp. But the boy followed him.

"My name's Kevin...what's yours?" when he got no answer, he persisted. "Why you buying chocolate milk? My mum says it's only for kids. Not grownups like you, mister. Do you have a kid? Is her name Minny? Cuz she looks just like you, mister. I'm gonna tell Minny I met her daddy, at the store and she'll get chocolate milk later..."

Ryuga rolled his eyes. "I don't have a kid. I'm too young for that. And it's not chocolate milk, it's cocoa..."

The boy was talking into one of those pink plastic cell phones that candy comes in. "Hi Minny, you're dad's at the store buying you chocolate milk...ok I gotta go bye. Why are you getting cocoa?"

"My friend uses it to tame lions", Ryuga said distractedly. "Please will you go away?"

"My mum says it's not nice to say that. Do you have a lion? You look more like a kitty cat kind of guy. Do you have a ferret?"

"NO, I don't have a ferret." Ryuga found the list. Milk. He could get milk.

As he walked along, Kevin trailed behind him. "Do you have a grocery list? My mum has one too. Can you read yet, mister?"

"Yes, I can read."

"Are you getting milk? My mum says if you don't drink milk then you get a disease on your foot. Do you go to school and learn grownup stuff? Are you a DOCTOR!?"

"NO, I'm not a doctor. I will never be. And for that the world will thank me."

"Does the world like you, Doctor Mister Crown Guy? Cuz mum says laugh, and the world laughs with you, and cry, and the hall monitor will send you to the principal..."

"Your mum's pretty smart, huh. Now go find her."

"My mum's right over there. She can see me. Her back head has eyes. And also a nose too and it looks like her face. Do you like chocolate?"

Ryuga ignored Kevin. Hmmm...low fat or skim? He knew Masamune liked to drink soy milk. He hovered near the soy milk.

"My mum says that kind of milk is from fake cows that eat dirt all the time instead of proper food like pizza..."

Ryuga chose 3 per cent milk. Mj often had fresh goat milk but none of the goats had any milk this time of year. The next item on the list was "frozen assorted vegetables." As he tried to pronounce it, Kevin said:

"Are you singing, Mister Crown Guy Doctor Man? My mum says if you sing in public then Ronald McDonald's brother will come to eat you in the night."

"She was wrong. Frozen axe...frozen assorted vet...forget it. Frozen something."

"Frozen-assorted-vegetables?"

"Yes, thank you. Now will you go away please?"

"You're mean. My mum says mean people bite dogs. DO you bite dogs? Cuz if you do, that's very mean of you. Ferrets taste way better anyway, my mum says."

Kevin trailed him all around the grocery store, telling him about his horrible frozen brother and his kitten which ate a tree. Ryuga said nothing in response. Soon, as his grocery shopping got finished up, a voice came over the intercom. "Hi there, we'd like to report a lost child. If you've seen this child, please bring him to Customer Service...his name is Kevin Hallmark."

Ryuga slung Kevin into his shopping cart and headed for customer service. He reached the place just as Kevin was saying, "But my middle name is Martha Andrew Stevens Spiderman..."

His mother grabbed him with a relieved expression on her face and hit Ryuga in the head with her handbag. "CHILD THIEF!" Then she left.

Ryuga paid for his groceries and went home. Mj was happy to see him. "I heard you had a little trouble with Airblazer, are you okay?" She examined his face thoughtfully. "Don't worry. I'm a doctor."

"The world would thank you if you weren't."

"What's this?" She pointed to the welt behind his ear.

"It was Airblazer", he lied. He didn't want to get blamed for being purse-smacked.

And so they put the groceries away. Kyouya got home to a nice cup of hot chocolate. And Kevin's mum got a nice letter from Ryuga telling her she needed to stop influencing her child to eat ferrets.