"And - maybe something a little more secure than passwords for the portals."

"Yeah. Creepy spying dragon..."

"I want to know how he had the password. I'm okay with the plan if we find that out."

"We'll relay that. Do you want to be someplace other than your house when we turn him loose, assuming he produces an answer?"

"...maybe."

"Yeah. We can - go out to eat, or something. At a nice restaurant, because today has not been a fun day."

"God, yes. Let's get - sushi. Followed by ice cream."

"Sushi and ice cream," agrees Max. He can't really kiss her while he's a deer, but he can nuzzle. Nuzzle nuzzle. "My ice cream's going to have sprinkles."

"Hot fudge," counters Phix, nuzzling back and getting up and shifting.

"Hot fudge and sprinkles." He shifts, too, standing and hugging her.

"Thank you," Phix says over her shoulder to the daeva, and off they go.

"Hey, anytime."

"We have a plan," says Adana, in her best 'I am a nice angel' voice. "You'll get to go home and have your medallion back."

"Grand," drawls the dragon. "What's the catch?"

"We're going to attach a magical monitoring device to your medallion, in case you are planning anything, and have a member of our army of robots monitor it."

"You'll be entirely free. There will be no genocide of anyone you know, even if they happen to be dragons themselves. We just need to make sure that you don't try to hurt Phix again."

"And I will be watched literally all of the time."

"By non-sentient robots that will only inform us if you do something threatening."

"Surely they'll tell you anything else you decide you're curious about."

"What would we be curious about? We want to make sure you don't try to prevent us from resurrecting people, or traumatize Phix and Max some more. That's it. We don't care about your browsing history or your love life or anything."

"Or about whether I am still the last dragon?" he wonders.