By Mixedfan8643 and SonicChaosEmerald
Author's note: This story takes place after Life in Exile and Planet of the Serpents.
Prologue
Planet Avalon, an alternate version of Avalice...
War.
Like many that have taken in place in history, it can change people in the worst way possible. War could take anyone who may have started out as optimistic, happy and carefree and turn them into traumatized, cynical and depressed individuals who are forever damaged and can never be repaired. War was going to change three individuals very shortly. War was happening now.
A huge alien warship was hovering above the vast, luxurious kingdom that was Shang Tu, the city's normally sparkling blue appearance darkened by the shadow of the ship that loomed above. All the citizens in the kingdom were terrified, including the rulers of the kingdom. They all stared up, not sure whether to run and scream for help or watch and wait. The kingdom was huge, a large city surrounded by a slow moving circle of water that gave the city the impression of being an island sitting in a lake. The largest building in the city was a tall blue castle with dome-topped turrets and a large tower stretching out of the centre. There were two people in said tower now, gazing out of the window at the invading ship above their kingdom. They were a pair of hounds, both dressed in royal attire that like the kingdom they ruled, was also blue. They went by the title of Magister, the title that the ruler of Shang Tu went by. They were staring up at the ship with horror and anxiety in their eyes. It was like watching death itself for them. They both held each other's hands, as if that would somehow solve all their problems.
"I'm scared...what will that thing do to us?" the female hound whimpered.
"I don't know..." the male hound replied, shuddering in fear, "All we can do is pray that our daughter and her friends can put a stop to this menace."
"I hope our Mara's alright..." the female hound said, choking back tears as much as she could. Her husband's only reply was to softly stroke his wife's hands.
Up on the ship were four individuals that were planning to bring this ship down and save the world. Only one of them was an alien, but unlike the one who commanded the ship, he wasn't hostile. He was actually trying to stop the ship as well and had taken the three Avalicians along with him for the ride. The trio consisted of three girls, one a dragon, one a wildcat and the third a hound. They had volunteered to help him stop this menace, although the wildcat had more reluctantly done so than willingly.
The dragon had dark purple scales and long whippy tendrils that split into two half way down, giving her the impression of having four tendrils rather than two. She had a large strand of "hair" drooping over one eye and was dressed in an off-the-shoulder top with a gem in the middle, long baggy trousers and trainers.
The wildcat was dressed in a ragged black top that had a sleeve ripped off and the mid section shredded away, leaving her stomach exposed and only one sleeve covering her arm. She wore matching black trousers and black and green shoes.
The hound was the most smartly dressed of the trio, wearing a pretty pink robe that made her look like a princess. In fact, she was one. She was the daughter of the Magisters of Shang Tu and was up on the ship to fight back against this alien threat. The dragon was talking to their alien friend, a green-skinned creature who identified himself as a Chaser and called himself Tomar. Tomar was in charge of this attack and was telling the girls his plan. He had been the one to carry out the plan that involved getting on the ship and was now explaining the plan that would see the invading alien defeated.
"We're near Draven's lair." Tomar explained, "This is what we've been working our way towards. When we get there, we hit him and hit him HARD. Lavender, you and me will lead the attack. Cassandra and Mara, you back us up. Got it?"
"Crystal clear." the dragon, Lavender, responded, "Let's kick this alien's ass!"
An alien warlord, tall, dark, and menacing had his icy gaze glaring over the several monitors that were linked to his cameras scattered around his Dreadnought. A burning anger rose inside him the further the four little 'pests' had infiltrated into his ship. The fact they had even gotten onto the ship was bad enough and now they were close enough to face him. They'd soon wish they weren't.
"So..." He angrily muttered to himself. "This is how they think they'll do it. They think this will be easy." He growled, unsheathing the acidic knife he had used to take so many lives of leaders of worlds before. "They will be in for a rude awakening..."
Now the plan was in motion, Tomar and the Avalician girls ran ahead, charging through a corridor that would lead them to the alien's throne room. Tomar had of course explained where it would be on the ship and that their enemy would be there. The Chaser was speeding along with his jet boots while Lavender, Cassandra and Mara ran after him. Lavender was the fastest though her comrades were able to keep up with her well enough. It didn't take them long to reach the throne room. Once they'd gotten through a couple of corridors, they all arrived at what appeared to be a large door that looked more like it belonged in a medieval castle than an alien space ship due to its tall height and round top. But the door was much stronger than it would appear. It was said to be able to hold out nearly any intruder on the Dreadnought.
"Here we are," Tomar murmured, "Draven lies behind this door. Lavender, Cassandra, Mara, you do what you can to break it down."
"Absolutely sir." Mara said with a polite curtsey. Her royal nature had given her a habit of doing this nearly every time she spoke to somebody.
"Sure thing Tommy." Cassandra growled. She didn't sound very enthusiastic, as if she didn't want to be here. This wasn't some adventure for her, this was just something that wasn't worth her time.
Cassandra launched the first blows, clawing and kicking at the door as heavily as possible while Lavender ran back the way she came and stopped in front of a wall. She curled into a ball and dragon-boosted straight into the door, hitting it as hard as she could and leaving a train of sparkles behind her. As soon as she hit the door, Mara unleashed an onslaught of energy spheres that were blue in colour and the size of beach balls. The combined might of the three Avalicians was enough to make the door creak as it began loosing the battle against the intruders. It couldn't stay shut any longer and was forced open, allowing the Freedom Fighters to run inside and take down the alien inside.
They all ran in and formed a line together as they prepared for battle. Tomar stood forward while Lavender stood on his right side and Cassandra and Mara stood on his left side. Tomar had his pistol in hand and he pointed it ahead at a huge metallic chair that sat in the centre of the throne room. The room was very spacious, with very little of it occupied. The only feature was some glowing machinery and the throne itself. It gave the impression that this was a man who preferred to have a lot of room and had very little desires for what he wanted in it.
"Draven! Turn around and face me!" Tomar barked, "You've done enough damage to the universe and now it's time for you to pay for what you've done!"
"A bold claim Tomar...but words cannot save you from the horror I'm about to unleash..." came a reply from behind the throne. The voice was deep and seemed to reverberate around the room.
The throne then slowly turned around, revealing the occupant that was sitting in it. The very alien who had come to Avalon, the very alien behind the invasion...Lord Draven. He was a grotesque sight for the Avalicians, a large, broad, blue-skinned alien with oversized eyebrows and cold, menacing purple eyes that almost seemed to glow in the half-darkness of the throne room. He wore dark gold armour and a black cape that hung around his shoulders. He had a knife, which seemed to be dripping some kind of viscous liquid as he held it in his hand. He had a cruel smile on his face, one that seemed to suggest that he took pleasure in the terror he was spreading below.
"What more 'horror' can be done, you freak?" Lavender spat, her tendrils twitching. "You've already destroyed and maimed countless lives with your onslaught. When will you realize that enough is enough?!"
"Enough?" The figure, Draven, spoke. "A rather bold claim coming from someone who had forcefully interfered with my plans. Multiple. Times. In one conquest."
"Maybe you should have expected resistance before you dragged your sorry blue ass here!" Cassandra growled, her sharp claws glinting. "Now, you have any last words before I turn you into a personal scratching post?"
"No." Draven merely spoke, a cruel smirk growing on his face. "The correct phrase should be, do any of you?"
"What the hell do you mean by tha-AAAAH!" was all that left Cassandra's mouth before she was brutally stabbed in the back by a syringe attached to a robot arm, injecting the green disgusting fluid into her body before it pulled out, the wildcat collapsing to the floor, twitching violently. She was in total agony and the amount of twitching she was doing made it look as if she was trying to claw her way out of her own body.
"Cassy!" Mara cried, rushing to check on the wildcat before Lavender glared daggers at Draven.
"What the hell did you do to her?!"
"I prefer to show, rather than tell," Draven crooned, his deep voice full of pleasure, "So rather than tell you, I'd prefer to show you what I've done to your friend..."
Lavender and Mara both watched their injected friend as she cried out, her face contorted with anguish. She opened her mouth to try and scream but only a bubbling sound managed to come out. A trickle of blood seeped down the corners of her lips and her eyes opened wide, so wide that they looked as if they were about to pop out of their sockets. Tomar could only watch in horror for her knew what was happening. He had seen this many times before and had hoped he wouldn't have to witness this happening to any Avalician.
"No...no..." he murmured fearfully, "Not again!"
"Not again? Tomar, what's happening to Cassandra?" Mara asked nervously.
"Get back from her!" the Chaser cried, "She's mutating!"
"Into what?!" Lavender screeched.
Their answer came in the most grisly fashion possible. Cassandra's body began to grow in size and her voice became nothing more than an animal growl that didn't sound right coming out of a cat. Her face began to change, becoming more grotesque and monstrous in appearance with her ears becoming horns and her eyes becoming red orbs in a pool of black each. Her tail grew spikes and more spikes began to grow out of her back. Several veins began to glow, the colours pulsating in time with her heartbeat.
The transformation had now finished, with Cassandra looking near unrecognizable. She was a towering behemoth of a beast with oversized fangs, spikes and a monstrous roar that seemed to make the room shudder. The wildcat had simply been transformed into a nightmare, and Lavender and Mara could only stare in disbelief at what had happened. Draven just laughed cruelly, having enjoyed every minute of the transformation.
"Quite the impressive feat isn't it?" he crowed, "I always consider it miraculous at what science can achieve."
"You sick, sadistic bastard!" Lavender screamed, her voice sounding strained and raspy.
"I'm so sorry your friend's had to go through this girls," Tomar said sadly, "I didn't want this to happen."
"It's OK Tomar, we'll just save Cassandra!" Mara declared, "Lavender, are you with me?"
"Whatever it takes to save our friend your majesty." Lavender agreed.
'Cassandra' roared in a mix of agony and rage as she swung her massive spiked tail straight at three, with Mara ducking under it while Lavender back flipped into the air before firing off a Dragon Boost straight at the face of the gigantic creature. It roared in pain as it stumbled backwards before it regained its ground and lunged forward at Mara like it wanted to impale her on its tail, but Mara saw the attack coming and dodged, throwing one of her blue orbs at the face of the creature.
"Cassy! We know you're in there!" Mara cried. "Please! Stop!"
"She can't understand you!" Tomar answered. "Just keep it back!"
"You say that like it's simple!" Lavender retorted, throwing herself down onto the ground as the mutated wildcat swung its tail towards her.
She felt the air whip over her as the huge, spiked appendage swung past. One hit from the thing and the dragon was certain she'd be dead. She and Mara would just have to avoid Cassandra as best as they could if they were to survive. The draconian girl leapt towards Cassandra and spun around in the air in a Dragon Cyclone manoeuvre. Her whippy tendrils smacked the mutant beast in the face, making it roar in pain. It retaliated by firing some kind of energy beam from its eyes, hitting Lavender and knocking her down. The dragon winced as she hit the floor. The beams had lightly singed parts of her body, leaving burn marks on her limbs and face. She forced herself onto her feet, only to be whisked off them again as Cassandra walloped her away with a huge, clawed paw. It felt like being hit by a sledgehammer to Lavender. She came down with a heavy thud near one of the walls and she cried out as she felt something crack inside her. The attack had been enough to break one of her ribs. Thankfully, that was all that had been broken.
Lavender lay on the floor for a moment, waiting for her bones to knit together again and the pain to ease. Cassandra bared her teeth and ran towards the dragon, intent on finishing her off. She was halted from her attack by a barrage of energy spheres launching out and hitting her in the backside. She turned around just as Mara summoned an even bigger sphere and threw it into the behemoth's eyes. Cassandra howled in pain as she was hit and Mara ran forward with another sphere in her hands. She held them forward and the princess fired an energy blast from the sphere that hit Cassandra in the shoulder. To any normal Avalician, it would've felt like being punched by a gorilla. But to Cassandra, it felt more like a hard tap than anything. Growling viciously, the monster batted the princess puppy aside with her paw. Mara cried out as she was tossed aside like garbage and she hit the wall. The impact was so heavy that the royal canine was almost knocked out. She slid down to the floor, coughing loudly as she tried to get the wind back into her.
Tomar had been watching this with a mixture of horror and anxiety in his eyes. The green alien didn't know whether to help or leave them and fight Draven. Draven was the bigger priority but how could he live with himself if he just let an innocent girl kill two other innocent girls due to a mutation? He knew how to cure it of course but he was afraid of using it. The cure could sometimes be fatal and he didn't want to let Cassandra die, not on his watch. He then cried out as something big came charging at him and he only just managed to dodge. It was Draven, lunging towards him with his knife in hands. Although he missed, he still laughed as Tomar aimed his pistol at him.
"Once again commander...right in harm's way," the alien warlord crowed, "When will you learn that sacrificing the lives of others doesn't do you any good?"
"Sacrifice?! SACRIFICE?!" Tomar exclaimed, "You think I recruited these girls so I could sacrifice them to you?! Who the hell do you think I am?!"
"Someone who is out of his depth and has no chance of defeating me." Draven retorted, "Now while your friends kill each other, I'm content to finish off this pathetic rivalry of ours once and for all."
He raised his knife and slashed towards Tomar, aiming for his head. The Chaser managed to dodge and opened fire on the alien world conqueror. His gun did nothing to Draven, who just took the shots as if they were pebbles being thrown at him. Smirking, he drew his arm back and aimed another slice attack at his opponent.
Meanwhile, Cassandra let out another bellowing roar as soon it fired off another set of lasers from its eyes at Lavender. The dragoness back flipped out of the way as she delivered another Dragon Boost straight at the mutant beast, only to cancel it out and deliver a vicious double tendril slash straight onto the mutant's left eye, the sickening sound of tendril slicing flesh filling the room.
The mutant roared in pain as she batted the dragoness away into a wall, the force snapping her right horn clean off her head and a trace of blood escaped her mouth as she slid down, clutching her chest in pain. She got up, looking onwards at the mutant beast as it began to approach.
"Cassandra...no!" Lavender pleaded.
Begging wouldn't save her, not in a situation like this. The Avalician-turned-monster advanced on the helpless dragon, huge strings of saliva stretching between its teeth. It looked down at Lavender with nothing but murder in its eyes. The monster began repeating a strange cycle of opening and closing with its jaws, as if preparing itself to eat the dragon alive. Lavender stared up in terror, dreading to think what her friend-turned-beast was about to do. She closed her eyes tight, not willing to see her end.
Cassandra opened her jaws and lowered her head. She would simply pick up the teen Avalician and swallow her whole. But before it could have its dinner, a barrage of energy spheres came out of nowhere and slammed into the side of the creature. It was Mara. She had recovered in time to attack Cassandra, throwing as many spheres as possible at the mutated wildcat. The spheres came out fast and furious, not giving Cassandra time to defend herself. The princess turned to Lavender, her teeth clenched.
"I've got her distracted, you try and finish her off!" Mara cried.
Lavender just merely nodded before she got back to her feet, her body tightening.
"Cassandra... I'm sorry for this..."
She slowly breathed before she tapped the chargers on the side of her head, the blue crystaline energy glowing brightly before she curled up and shot ahead in a streak of cyan. The Avalician collided head-on with the mutant as she drove her into the wall of the room, the pressure of the forceful Dragon boost starting to imprint the mutant Cassandra's body into its steel framing. Mara watched with worry in her bright, blue eyes as Lavender let it all out on Cassandra. The dragon wasn't going easy on the mutant, even if that was her best friend who had become said mutant. She just prayed that this attempt to stop her wouldn't end up killing her in the end. Draven and Tomar had also noticed what was happening and while Tomar looked worried for the wildcat-turned-monster, Draven looked almost amused by this. It didn't seem to matter that his monstrous weapon was being beaten. In fact, he didn't even seem to care.
Every attack they land on my beast means more damage done to their friend..." he murmured to himself.
The Dragon-Boost attack concluded and Lavender leapt back to see what would happen next. The mutated Cassandra almost seemed to be wedged into the wall, so much so that she looked as if she couldn't even get out. But it was quickly apparent that that wasn't the case as the beaten monster slowly peeled away from the wall. It fell down heavily onto the floor, a huge imprint of itself left in the wall it had been slammed into. Lavender's attack had heavily damaged its face and head, leaving heavy scars and one of the creature's eyes seemed to be dead. It had gone a murky grey colour which left it not matching the black and red of the other eye. Also, the creature was bleeding. Sickly green blood was dripping from the monster's wounds. And because of that, Cassandra began to turn back to normal. The mutagen was in her blood and now she was loosing it, she couldn't maintain the mutant form anymore.
The spikes on her back and tail retracted away, her good eye changed back to its normal colours, her size began to shrink back to normal, her horns became ears again, her veins stopped glowing and her face began to morph back to how it looked before. Lavender and Mara watched as their friend was returned to her normal self. But they couldn't be happy about it. As Cassandra was restored to normal, they could see she was anything but OK. She still had the scars and dead eye and she was still bleeding from her wounds. She looked very weak and could barely even stand. The feline girl also seemed to shiver, as if the room had suddenly gotten very cold. She looked up feebly at her friends, fear etched across her face.
"L-L-Lavender...? I-I-I c-c-can't s-see...th-through my l-l-left eye..." Cassandra whimpered, "W-w-what h-h-happened t-t-to me? I f-f-feel c-c-cold...s-s-so c-cold..."
"Cass!" Lavender cried, running to her friend and kneeling beside her, "Cass, d-d-don't panic, whatever you do. Y-y-you're going to be fine. I promise you, you're going to be fine!"
She was struggling to keep back the tears as she tried to comfort her crippled best friend by stroking her hands. Mara was watching too and the tears began to stream down her face. She didn't even try to keep them in. Tomar looked totally defeated, closing his eyes and shaking his head in sorrow. He hadn't wanted any of this to happen. He shouldn't have ever brought the girls in on this! Draven took all this in with sadistic pleasure, relishing every moment of their torment.
"I always warned you commander...this is why you should never bring children to do a Chaser's job." he crowed.
Lavender's frame started shaking, trying to hold back the tears inside her eyes, a mix of sorrow and anger building up further inside her. Slowly she got to her feet, before she turned and looked at Draven, her eyes filled with rage...
"You BASTARD!" Lavender screeched, firing off ahead in a massive Dragon Boost.
"Lavender no!" Mara cried.
The princess was far too late to do anything now. The draconian teenager had taken off and was now hurling towards Draven at the speed of an arrow. She had launched her attack so quickly that the alien warlord barely even had time to register the fact something was coming towards him before he was hit squarely in the torso by the Dragon-Boost. He was sent hurling backwards, but surprisingly enough, he was still standing. He merely skidded backwards and while his face betrayed any signs the attack might not have hurt him, he barely even lost his composure. He just straightened up and rubbed his stomach lightly. Lavender stood before him, unable to believe that her attack had barely even fazed him.
"Was that really your best shot?" the sadistic world-conquerer sneered, "Even the Chaser's best efforts barely slowed me down, and they managed to do more damage to me than that one attack of yours."
"Maybe this'll knock you down a peg!" Mara declared hotly.
She scampered on all fours and threw herself at the alien, baring her teeth like a wolf on the hunt. She landed on his head and began viciously clawing and biting at Draven, attacking him so savagely that it looked like she was trying to tear his entire face off. Draven cried out, momentarily blind as this bundle of fury unleashed all hell on him. But eventually, he managed to grab hold of Mara and yank her away. He slammed the dog onto the floor as hard as he could, knocking the wind out of her and making her splutter. Still defiant, the princess held out one hand and fired some energy spheres at Draven's face. He already had a multitude of bleeding scratches and teeth marks all over him so getting hit in the face by energy spheres ended up hurting more than it would've done. Draven roared and shielded his face with one arm while he lashed out with his other. He seized Mara by the wrist and hoisted her off the floor. The dog squealed and squirmed, trying to get free. Lavender ran towards the alien with murder in her eyes.
"Put her down you monster!" she screamed.
Smirking, Draven just spun on the spot and roundhouse kicked Lavender in the face, throwing her aside and onto the floor. Mara was still squirming, trying to get out of the alien's grip but his hand was like a steel vice around her wrist. She couldn't break free. Smiling demonically, Draven drew out his knife and proceeded to slice across Mara's arm with it. He severed it clean off, leaving her with just a stump below the shoulder. The puppy howled in anguish, dropping to the floor and clutching her bleeding stump as the horror of losing her limb set in. She was in shock and completely hysterical, both screaming crying from the attack. The dog's howls were like a stab in the heart to Lavender and she couldn't help but scream for her friend. She was only a child, not even a teenager yet! How could this sick, sadistic beast do this to Mara?! Draven just tossed aside the severed arm and held his knife up, the blade glinting in the light.
"You don't look so good now little one. Perhaps I should put you out of your misery?" he purred, his voice completely void of any sympathy for his opponent.
Tomar, who had almost seemed irrelevant to the situation at the current time, had finally taken action. With a quick flick of his wrist, he fired an energy shot straight at Draven's hand, knocking the knife away from the warlord and embedding itself into the wall.
"Your damage has gone far enough," Tomar growled. "Now stand down or I will not hesitate to use lethal force!"
"Your petty threats were always the downfall of the Coalition," Draven would remark, drawing his own gun. "I don't know if you've noticed because of the lack of brain cells you possess, but you have no authority over me."
"I'm a member of the Chasers, part of the Coalition of Planets! I hold authority over everybody!" Tomar declared.
He and Draven then proceeded to shoot at each other, both aliens weaving around to dodge each other and fire. The room was quickly filled with flying laser blasts in every direction, most of them missing with only a few actually hitting their targets. Lavender ran over to Mara and threw herself over the puppy to shield her from any flying laser blasts. She could now see the pain on the princess's face and just how horrible her severed arm looked up close. Mara was still clutching her stump, her remaining hand drenched in blood.
"L-L-Lavender...I c-c-can't f-f-feel m-m-my arm...h-h-h-he c-c-cut off m-m-m-my arm!" she whimpered.
The dragon could only stare sadly at her young friend. She had been the first person to ever take pity on her and Cassandra and had let them be her friends. It made her chest ache to see what had become of such a kind-hearted canine like Mara. Nobody as innocent as her should have to go through this! Would Mara ever recover from such a horrible event? She was distracted from her thoughts as a laser blast came hurtling towards her and Mara. Lavender scooped up the dog and leapt away, leaving the laser blast to hit the floor.
Tomar and Draven were so far still at a stalemate. They couldn't really gain an advantage over one another with their constant shooting. Draven managed to get one lucky shot on Tomar's shoulder but the Chaser had retaliated with a shot to the thigh on the alien warlord. Grunting, the world-conqueror decided it was time for a change of tactics. He reached into his cape and pulled out some mines. He tossed them to his rival, forcing Tomar to jump back and dodge. But Tomar had timed his jump a fraction too late. While he was airborne, the mines were still sliding towards him. And one of them just happened to stop directly underneath him. He landed straight on top of it.
The Chaser didn't even have time to cry out as the mine detonated. He was vaporized, torn apart atom by atom as the blast consumed him whole. Lavender heard the explosion and turned around to see what was happening. All she saw was a charred corpse of what had once been a living alien, its legs completely gone along with every piece of its body underneath the chest. One arm had broken away, the other still attached. The head looked unrecognizable. Tomar was dead, that much was certain. There was only Lavender left to take on Draven. The dragon let out a scream of horror upon the sight of Tomar's dead body. All this horror, all this pain, all this anguish, it was all getting too much for her. She couldn't take it anymore!
Draven just laughed, clearly pleased to have finally disposed of his sworn enemy at last.
"You lasted longer than any other enemy of mine Tomar...but even you couldn't live to defeat me." he gloated.
That had done it. Something had snapped within the dragon's mind; one shred of mental twine that held her together had finally snapped. Lavender's head snapped towards Draven, her pupils now slits, an enraged almost insane look in her eyes as her left one started twitching, her breathing becoming loud and hard.
"Y-you think this is all a game to you, don't you?!" Lavender yelled, her voice cracking a bit. "You think it's just fun to go around killing people and ruining their lives?!"
Mara shrunk and shuddered. She was scared of seeing her friend like this. She was almost afraid to watch and see what happened next.
"And just what do you think you're going to do?"
"Me?!" Lavender yelled, the twitch in her eye becoming more unstable before she yelled again. "I'M GONNA FUCKING KILL YOU, YOU SICK BASTARD!"
What happened next would change everything. Not just for Lavender. Not just for Cassandra and Mara. But for everybody. Avalon was going to change forever and it all came down to this one single act from the enraged dragon.
Boosting towards Draven, Lavender let out a blood-curdling screech of rage and hurled towards the demonic warlord. The scream sounded more like some animal cry of hatred more than an actual scream. Lavender was completely taken over, no longer in control of her own body. Rage was driving her on, blind, furious and completely unstoppable. She slammed straight into Draven, but unlike before, this slam seemed to actually hurt him. The extra-terrestrial invader let out a surprised yell as he was taken off his feet and slammed into the wall. He was so surprised by this that he wasn't even sure if he'd been hit. As he slammed into the wall, Lavender began to cut loose on him, unleashing all hell as her fists and feet began flying out in several blurs, striking him here and there with such ferocity that Draven began to doubt if he was even fighting the same dragon anymore.
He couldn't even fight back for Lavender was moving too fast and hitting him too hard. His brain couldn't even find the time to tell his arms to move. Then Lavender backhanded the alien, knocking him down onto his side and while he was down, the enraged Avalician scooped up his knife. He'd dropped it after being slammed into the wall. Screaming viciously, Lavender stabbed the alien just below his neck with the knife. Draven tried to cry out in pain but he couldn't. He could barely even so much as gasp. The knife had penetrated him and he was now finding it hard to breathe. Blood poured out of the wound and some of it began to bubble out of his mouth. Lavender shoved the knife in as far as it would go, leaving only the handle sticking out, and then she grabbed his head. With Draven barely able to stay conscious, or even alive, he couldn't fight back as Lavender began to yank on his head.
She pulled several times, straining with each pull, but she refused to give it up. She kept pulling, giving the head sharp yanks each time. Mara watched with horror and disgust as her friend was trying to seemingly pull the alien's entire head off.
"Lavender, stop!" she begged.
There was no stopping the purple dragon now. She was deaf to any pleas. Only her own rage was what she could hear. With one final yank, Lavender screamed as she pulled Draven's head upwards...and procceeded to tear it clean off his shoulders! The sickening sound of bones snapping and flesh tearing made Mara throw up. The sight had been too gruesome for her to bear. The earlier stab with the knife had given her some leeway and had allowed her to rip the head off. Blood oozed out of the stump that was left of Draven's neck. The head itself was dripping blood too. Lavender panted heavily, not moving for a few minutes before finally throwing the head down onto the floor. It was done. Draven had been defeated. Avalon was safe...but had it been worth it?
She dragged herself away from Draven's corpse and staggered over to Mara. She no longer felt angry or sad. Just tired. She slumped down on the floor beside the dog. Cassandra was lying nearby. She had mercifully slipped into unconsciousness so she hadn't seen what had happened. Lavender panted softly, allowing her body to simmer down and relax.
"I...did it...I...did it..." she breathed, her voice incredibly hoarse, "The...sick...little fuck...is dead..."
Mara was shuddering uncontrollably, the poor little girl scarred by what she ha just seen.
"L-L-Lavender..." she barely managed to croak out between her shudders before she tried to scoot away, now afraid of the dragoness.
"Pl-please, d-d-don't hurt me..." she choked out before she burst into tears, hiding her face with her only arm.
The dragoness looked a little pained to see that Mara looked scared of her. Deep down, she knew that she had maybe gone too far. But she was too satisfied with what she'd done to care. It didn't matter, Draven was dead. She wasn't at all sorry for what she'd done.
"I'm not gonna hurt you Mara." Lavender said softly, "I did this for you...for Cass...and for Tomar."
She glanced over at the unconscious cat and the charred remains of the Chaser as she said this.
"Avalon is safe now...we did it." the draconian girl replied.
"But...you killed him." Mara acknowledged, "And really gruesomely! How can you live with yourself for doing something so horrible?!"
"Horrible?! The shithead cut your fucking arm off, turned Cass into a monster and blew up Tomar!" Lavender retorted, angered at the dog's words, "And you're daring to criticize me for giving that bastard what he deserves?!"
She raised her arm in temper, looking as if she was going to smack the poor puppy. Mara squealed in fright and covered her eyes with her remaining arm. She whimpered as she braced herself for the smack that was going to come...or so she thought. Instead, the dragon seemed to restrain herself and lower her arm. She let out a heavy sigh as exhaustion caught up to her once again.
"I was perhaps a little too monstrous...but it goes to show that mercy doesn't always get you anywhere." Lavender muttered, "Draven showed no mercy to us and we all nearly died. Tomar DID die! And Avalon would've been conquered. And to think all of this shit could've been avoided if our world wasn't so weak and pathetic! We could barely fight against this ship with what we had and we were so ill-prepared that we were just lucky that we managed to save the world when we could!"
Her eyes narrowed, although only one could be seen as her hair was still hanging over her right eye.
"Avalon is weak, we're weak, and it's about time that somebody did something about it..." Lavender declared.
Once she and her friends departed from the ship, Avalon was going to be a very different world. And it would start with Lavender as she made her first move...
Things don't look good for this alternate version of Avalice. But what about the prime Avalice?
Tune in next time to see how things have been going on there with Lilac and friends!
Special thanks to SonicChaosEmerald for joining me to write this fic. :)