Author's Note
I do not own the Dragonriders of Pern or any characters you recognise. All rights belong to their rightful owners.
Lily Smith was an ordinary girl who lived an ordinary life. Every day she woke up, dressed, ate breakfast, locked the house, and went to school, where she never fit in with anyone and was ruthlessly bullied by her classmates. She would return home, unlock the house, make her own tea, and read until it was time to shower. If she was lucky, she might see her busy sugeon parents before she went to bed at ten o'clock, but most nights she fell asleep listening for the sound of the door opening.
This day was different.
She was woken not by her alarm clock but by a really annoying humming sound that sounded like some kind of animal. She opened her eyes and was nearly blinded by the sudden light. She closed her eyes again and rubbed at them before opening them a crack.
Her surroundings were the strangest looking trees and rocks she'd ever seen. This wasn't her neighbourhood.
Lily stretched and pushed herself to her feet. Her scarlet red hair tumbled about her face. This was the most exotic looking, green forest she had ever seen. She blinked and rubbed at her eyes to try and fix the colours. It didn't help.
"Mum?" she called cautiously. "Dad?"
If this was a joke from them, it wasn't very funny. Or her taste. They didn't know her very well. She felt like she didn't know them at all.
"Anyone?"
The humming got louder. It was the only sign of life she had so far, so Lily moved towards it. She found a thing that looked a little like a green lizard, if lizards had hide not scales, and had wings and spiralling multi-coloured eyes. It was hunched over a clutch of what she guessed were eggs. Most of them were already hatched. Only four were left. Smaller green lizard things hatched from them. Lily reached for one, but it quickly vanished. The larger green thing chirped and vanished. Lily reached for the remaining egg. It trembled under her hand. She tapped it. It cracked a little. Lily felt in the dirt and found a rock, which she tapped carefully on the egg. The cracks spread.
A small silver lizard thing fell out. It chirped weakly and flapped its wings. Lily scooped it up. "I better find you some food."
She found a rotting corpse of something after a little while, and fed some of the better meat to the lizard thing, which fell asleep on her shoulder. She walked through the jungle for many, many, many hours.
So many hours.
Finally, she found a river. Being an intelligent and brave girl, she knew to follow it to find a settlement.
The first sign of life she found was not a settlement but a body tangled in the reeds of the river. Lily was a kind and caring girl, and so she rushed over to help them.
The body was a girl, younger than her, with a mass of silver hair tangled around her and the palest skin she'd ever seen. Lily waded into the river, bravely battling the current, and checked for a pulse before pulling the other girl from the water. She dropped her on her side, collapsed next to her on the riverbank, panting, and looked at her lizard-thing. "Any ideas for what now?"
They must be miles and hours from the nearest hospital. She had no phone to ring for help, and wouldn't know who to call even if she did. She was becoming more and more doubtful that this was even England. "If this is some sort of hidden camera show, I'm so over it."
The girl next to her began to cough and splutter, throwing up water. Lily held her shoulders until she stopped. She gazed at her with large grey eyes through thick black lashes. "I knew you would find me."
"Do I know you?"
"You do now."
That was true in a roundabout manner.
"Are you okay?"
"There will be better days." She sat up, pushing her sopping hair away from her face, which was scratched and bruised.
"Do you know where we are?"
"Where we are matters not; what matters is where we are going."
"That's a no then?"
The girl tilted her head. "That's a no."
"I'm Lily Smith. What's your name?"
"Luna."
"Nice to meet you Luna."
"Nice to meet you too."
"Do you think you can walk?"
Luna stretched her legs. "I think I can try."
Lily helped her stand, which she managed with some slight difficulty. "You must have come from somewhere up the river, right?"
"That is the past now. We must not move towards the past."
"Is there anything down this way?"
"One can never know what the future will bring. It is always a great unknown."
Lily was now pretty sure she had fallen into a cheesy fantasy movie.
Still, Luna was some company.
The two girls walked for what felt like forever and ever, she finally found a small collection of stone buildings. A little boy ran out to meet her.
"Hi!"
"Hi. Can you tell me where I am?"
"Greenwater! You're pretty!"
"Thank you?"
"Have you come to see the dragons?"
"Dragons?"
There was no such thing as dragons.
There was no such thing as dragons.
There was no such thing as dragons.
Lily told herself that until she was stood looking at the three large dragons stood in a stone yard. They looked a little like larger versions of her own white lizard. Teenage boys and girls were hurrying to see them. Most looked sad when they left.
"But they can't actually be dragons. They can't be."
"Why do you say that when you have dragon-kin right here?" Luna asked, pointing to her own little lizard-thing.
"There is no such thing as dragons."
"There have been dragons on Pern for as long as there have been humans. They must be partnered together." Luna began to drift towards the dragons.
"Wait wait wait. Where did you just say we were?"
"Without the dragons, humans would be unable to live here."
"No, the last part. You said something about a 'Pern?'"
"Are you quite alright yourself Lily? Even I know this planet is called Pern."
She wasn't even on Earth.
She wasn't even on fucking Earth!
Lily felt lightheaded.
And they had got incredibly close to the dragons without her realising.
One of them, the largest, which was a soft brown colour, shoved her with its head. Lily's legs gave way under her. She collapsed in a heap. A man hurried over to help her up.
"Are you alright there?"
"I-I-I-"
"It can be quite the shock, I know."
Luna was smiling and stroking the shoulder of the green – dragon – like it was an old friend.
"Kayorth says you could stand as a candidate if you wanted to."
Lily nearly said she just wanted to go home, but then she thought of it, of the parents she never saw and the classmates who always bullied her. "I'd love to."
And so it was that Lily, born of a different world, and her strange new companions Luna and the weird silver lizard thing set off to the Weyr in search of a new life (and, just maybe, a new family to love them).