Flash, most unusually for him, let out a little sigh.
"It's not that... honest. It's more that I don't want to... don't want to bump into any of my old workmates... if you know what I mean."
"I'm not sure I do," blurted Peter.
"The Crimson Guard barracks is based in London. They consider it their patch. If anything goes on there, they know all about it. Just to make matters worse, I had a run in with a couple of them a few days ago."
Peter's face turned serious.
"Go on," he said.
"Promise you won't tell the king?"
Peter thought for a split second before answering.
"I won't tell him... I promise."
"It was just a chance meeting really. I'd been to run a few errands for the king, nothing too technical or physically demanding. But after I'd finished, I had nothing else to do. I knew the king had a meeting with the council that would run on long into the night so I decided to do something that I'd never done before: go for a wander. I sauntered around the different districts looking in shops, sampling food, just taking everything in."
"You've never really done that before?" asked Peter, incredulous.
"Not as you'd imagine, no. Oh I've wandered the streets and know London like the back of my hand. But I've only ever strolled along them while following someone, training a squad of dragons or chasing down a shady deal or two. I've never wandered them just as an ordinary dragon like you or Tank would have."
"That's one of the saddest things I've ever heard."
"It's not as bad as it sounds. It's what I signed up for. I knew full well what I was getting into when I joined the King's Guards, and even more so when I became a Crimson Guard. Those are the kind of sacrifices that need to be made to guard our domain and way of life."
Peter could feel the passion, commitment and, ultimately, the loss that came through in Flash's words as he spoke. He wouldn't have thought it possible to admire the brave dragon any more than he already did after knowing what he'd been through on that one mission, but sitting here listening to him speak, he found a whole new level of respect for the former Crimson Guard.
"Anyway," continued Flash. "While I was just wandering around, I came across two Crimson Guards in a backstreet in central London. I tried to avoid them, but in reality had very little chance of doing so. They cornered me, more in a playful way at first. I wasn't sure exactly what they'd been told about me so I just played it cool, put on a bit of bravado. I should have known better. It turned out they knew exactly what had happened. How? I don't know. But they just did. Anyway, the long and the short of it is that they gave me a bit of a beating... well, more than a bit. I managed to use a couple of one off mantra scrolls that I'd kept aside for a rainy day to heal myself up so that the king wasn't any the wiser. But as you can imagine, I'm not particularly keen to repeat the experience."
Peter was flabbergasted.
"But why?" he stammered.
Flash shook his head slowly.
"They said I was 'profugus' which as I'm sure you're aware means 'outcast.' It's as simple as that to them. One moment I'm one of the highest ranked among them, carrying out some of the deadliest and most dangerous assignments going. The next, they see me as damaged goods or as one of them said 'something towards the very lowest end of the planet's food chain.' Nearly all of them regard humans as rather... substandard, Peter. It's easy to see how I could be held in a much lower contempt, in their view."
"It doesn't make it right though," snapped Peter angrily.
"I know," replied Flash softly. "But it's just how they are. No excuse I know, but it is how it is."
Both sat in silence contemplating what had just been said. Flash broke it.
"Can I ask whereabouts Gee Tee's shop is?"
"You don't know?" replied Peter in disbelief.
"No," answered Flash shrugging his shoulders. "Should I?"
"Well it just... I thought everybody had heard of Gee Tee's Mantra Emporium, that's all."
Flash screwed up his face in concentration.
"It does kind of ring a bell," he said. "But if my altered human or dragon memory, I'm not sure which, serves me correctly, it was a long time ago that I heard about it. Not short of eighty years if I'm correct."
"Phew," Peter whistled. That was quite some time even by dragon standards and although dragons in theory had perfect memory recall, it didn't always work that way in practice.
"I seem to remember one of the papers, oh hang on there would only have been one back then, that's right, it must have been the Daily Telepath... there was a big story that lasted for the best part of a week involving... that shop losing... its royal licence I think. Differing versions of events were all across the paper with some suggestions of corruption, while others talked of deterioration in the quality of the shop's goods. Anyway, it soon seemed to blow over, but if I remember correctly, the shop was never quite the same again... I think."
"That sounds about right from what little I know," added Peter.
"So whereabouts is it?"
Peter described the exact location.
"Interesting," was Flash's only response. "It's not where I thought it would be and far enough out not to warrant any interest from any of the Crimson Guards. I think I'd like to go and see this shop if that's okay."
Bursting into a smile, Peter asked,
"Are you sure?"
"Hmmm... let's go."
"Just let me grab my keys and phone," said Peter, sprinting into the hall. Flash followed, thinking they were going out the front door.
"Oh," uttered Peter. "It's okay we're not going that way. Let me show you."
Walking back into the living room, closely followed by Flash, Peter made his way over to the piano and, gripping the Galileo thermometer tightly with his right hand, gave it a hefty pull and stood back. Flash watched in amusement as the piano swung silently back across the floor, revealing one of many secret entrances to the world they both regarded as home. Trotting over, Peter began to step carefully down the winding staircase and into the lightless room below. Flash followed hot on Peter's heels, eager to see more of this little known secret. Making their way through the darkness, dust and cobwebs with Peter instinctively leading the way, eventually they left the underground part of Peter's house, making their way swiftly to the monorail station. Forty seconds too early, they arrived at the London bound platform. About to ask Flash if he'd explored the king's private library yet, Peter was shocked when the ex Crimson Guard grabbed him firmly by the shoulder and spun him around. Pointing to a river of sizzling molten lava through a gap between two rooftops about a kilometre away, Flash couldn't stop himself from asking,
"What on earth is that?"
Tilting his head while squinting, the young hockey playing dragon let out a low, "Ahhhh...." before answering.
"It's the left nostril."
"What?" exclaimed his stuck-as-a-human shaped friend.
"The left nostril of the 'runny nose'. You must have heard of it... it's famous throughout the domain."
"If you say so."
"It is," assured Peter, going on to explain that the rock formation from which the lava flows out looks like a giant, three hundred metre high nose, with the molten magma continually flowing from two holes that resemble nostrils.
"Dragon tourists come from far and wide just to see it," he added, before they both boarded the silver bullet-like carriage that had just arrived.
Flash just nodded.
During the journey the conversation between the two of them became very mundane, both realising that discussing the king or anything to do with Flash's current predicament would, no doubt, attract unwanted attention.