Right, guess who's finally updated! Yeah me that's right! First of all...I have to apologize that it has taken me this long to update but my dad came back so I haven't been able to use this laptop a much in my spare time..Yeah, sucks I know. But here it is ,enjoy chapter 2!
Shadow POV
The rest of the week went by rather quickly and quietly due to lack of missions, we hadn't had anyone come in for a while whether it was because nothing was going down or because it was nearing the end of 'Inkubator' I had no idea. The sun was already down below the horizon, the moon rising from the opposite side as we walked in to our home "Damn...I hate off days like this" Shade groaned as we sat by the entrance
"I know...We were lucky we managed to piss off that Trader at South Claw !" I replied a chuckle escaping as I remembered what we said to him.
"Yeah, even better when some others got involved as well. I swear down dude, Nightmares are so easily agitated!" I slowly began to stamp my forelegs.
"Well done Shade, you used a big word!"
"Shut up!" he lunged at me. I let out a mock shriek of fear and ran to the steps heading up them as quick as I could Shade was right behind me, I could hear his claws scraping against the wall as he pounced trying to reach me. I ducked just in time to see him fly over me, as he landed I ran into my section and concealed my self in a corner hoping that the lack of light would let me blend in making him miss me completely. Alas fate had other ideas, he crashed on top of me and pinned me down "Submit!" he cried.
"Never!" We began rolling and tumbling around as we wrestled for fun and practice.
"Okay okay I give!" Shade yawned as I pinned him down "I think I may just sleep now you know?" I nodded and got off him allowing him to move over to the fur covered slab. "So you staying in my section tonight?" I asked as I lay next to him, not really wanting to lay on the stone floor.
"I can't hear you I'm asleep" he sang.
"Funny" I stated "Goodnight"
"Night..." At that Shade instantly fell asleep I could hear him softly snoring away, I stayed awake for awhile my ears twitching at every odd sound coming from outside. I had a strange feeling that something was going to happen, however I wasn't exactly sure what that bad thing was going to be...
"...What the fu-..." I was suddenly woken up by Shade's rather loud whispering, 'I don't even remember falling asleep' I thought as I shook my head trying to get rid of the drowsiness "What-What's up?" I asked him. He lifted himself up and his head jerked to the left, then to the right and back.
"There's something inside the den..." my eyes widened.
"You're sure?"
"My ears don't lie! Come on, we may have an advantage if we can sneak up on them!" He began to crawl out of the room, I stalked behind making sure to take a quick glance across the passage way "Alright here's the plan, you take this floor and check each room for anything out of the ordinary I'll check the middle alright?" he nodded at me before silently making his way to the wash room. I sighed while walking down the steps to the middle floor "Knew something was going to happen tonight!" I muttered. Slowly, I crept in to the food storage just in case we just had a common thief or a cub somehow found their way in .Last time we found a hatchling in here we almost went crazy since neither one of us could get the damn thing to shut up. I chuckled inwardly at the memory.
"Nothing here" I did a quick check fo any missing food. Satisfied everything was fine within that room I turned to leave but it seemed my stomach had other ideas as it grumbled at me "Ah, right I forgot to eat!" I took a glance at the pile "Meh, one fish won't be too bad!" I walked back over and spotted a fat salmon in the pile "My favourite!" I instinctively licked my lip before reaching in for it, however a movement in the corner of my eye made me forget my hunger as loud shuffling sounds followed after "Ah Crap!" I exclaimed before chasing after the small black figure "Get back here you!" I pounced for it noticing that there was a red dot on it. The dot disappeared to the right "What!?" I turned to find the dot running for the stair case "Shade! It's going to you!" I yelled as I landed. It ran up. Then quickly ran back down as another figure ran down after it "On it!" Shade yelled.
I sprinted down after him ,almost tumbling my way down, and skid to a stop next to him "Where is it?" I asked, Shade took a couple of sniffs before turning his head slightly.
"Emerg section.." he stated "Please, elders first!"
"Fine" I groaned. Slowly, I made my way over to the entrance and got flat on to my stomach "Hey...Come out and we might not hurt you" I tried coaxing out our intruder but when there wasn't any movement inside I sighed. Suddenly a screech came from the passageway so I rushed back outside to find Shade squirming around in obvious discomfort"What is it?" I asked.
"It's a...Take a look for yourself" He said. So I walked towards him only to reel back in shock and slight fear, underneath Shade's claw was a small terrible terror but the species of terror was a 'figura Shifter Terror' you could identify them by their colour which was commonly black with a rather large red dot on top of their head in between their ears "Well it certainly didn't take you as long as I thought it would to catch me" it said.
"What do you want from us?" I growled.
"Is this how you treat all your clients?"
"No, all of our clients come while the sun's up and they don't ever hide or intrude into our other section especially down here!" Shade spat "And we don't exactly welcome your kind here!"
"What do you mean by that?" The terror asked.
"He means that a few years back when we were young-er than we are now, we came across a bounty hunter hired by another dragon to capture us dead or alive" The memory sent chills down my spine "And they nearly succeeded in taking us alive but we escaped and were on the run for ages, nearly got caught dead...So, yeah the bounty hunter and the dragon who hired them were your species so we don't exactly trust you lot" I explained, the terror seemed to have a small smile on his face but that quickly changed when Shade applied more pressure on to his neck "Shade let him up" He reluctantly did what was asked and sat watching the terror's every move.
"Ah, well I suppose you won't take me up on my offer then...To think I was going to give you riches beyond your own dreams" Both our ears perked up at that "But si-"
"Wait just a second, what kind of riches are we talking about?" Shade asked
"Oh you know, Dozen diamonds, emeralds, Gold, Fish...And any other things you would consider riches the only decision you have to make is how much of what you need" Shade and I took a quick glance at each other. I nodded. So did he.
"What do you need us to do?"I asked. The terror grinned
"All I want you to do...Is assasinate two dragon...Zeon and his mate"
"What have they done?"
"That...Is confidential" He said with hardly any emotion in his voice. It didn't seem strange...Right?
"Understandable...So we just have to take them down? Shouldn't be too hard, where about do they stay?" Shade asked.
"A few miles North east of here, you should see a large island with an almost human like structure I think they call a castle or something? They live inside that 'castle' but be warned there are a lot of guards there protecting it, but the key to this is stealth...If any of the guards see your faces you'll be hunted down for the rest of your lives. Stick to the shadows and no-one should see you" The terror began walking away "Oh and you might want to go in to the village first as there is a Flightmare that may be able to help you she goes by the name of Fortue..."
"Wait why would we need to-" Shade suddenly stopped speaking as the Terror seemed to just vanish "O-kay...When do we go?" he asked
"Mmm, We'll go to that village in the morning to see what we're up against and to talk to that 'Fortue' dragon...Then return at night sneak in and do the job alright?"
"Sounds like a plan!" With that decided we went up in to our seperate sections and fell asleep for the rest of the night.
The following morning
"Shade hurry up!" I called as I ran down the steps and in to our food storage, picking up the first thing I could which just so happened to be the salmon from last night and swallowed it whole. Shade quickly came in after and picked up a cat-fish "Lets go then!" he quickly swallowed it down and ran out wasting no time at all to get into the air, I quickly followed after him and we began flying North east in silence...For about half an hour.
"I think I see it!" I called.
"Nah man, probably just another sub-island" Shade groaned as we had come across many sub-islands on our way here, we even had to stop by on one as we got called down by a few kids that wanted to be 'just like us' however, they're parents instantly came in to the picture and (Rudely) shooed us off "Nope it's a pretty large island!"
"Let me be the judge of-" he paused as the island came into clear view "Ah..."
"Told you!" I sped off without him, not wanting to hear him come up with some stupid remark. As I flew over the island I could only gasp in surprise "This is not what I expected..." below was the most complicated village I had ever seen and there seemed to be a large structure in the middle of the vast village square covered in multiple stalls and buildings made from stone and wood. The structure seemed to have a circular face and was labeled with...Numbers? And had two arrows facing towards a number. And that was just the centre, the whole island was covered with caves and other structures which I haven't ever seen in my life in fact the only thing I could say that seemed familiar was the massive 'castle' that overlooked everything.
I came to a stop in front of it, taking in everything I could as it would make the job slightly easier. It was made out of stone and had four towers hugging each corner of the structure, there were small gaps which I assumed were for the dragons to look through, the roof had a peculiar pattern going around it's edges...Oh not to mention all the guards "This is huge...And heavily guarded"I whispered.
"No shit Sherlock" I jumped at the voice and turned ready to attack, only to find it was Shade who was currently focused on the guards "I don't understand how they haven't spotted us yet"
"Yeah, but it better stick that way..." I glanced at the dragons "Damn it, it better not be that tight tonight"
"You and I both know it will be that tight...Maybe even tighter...Too much of a risk to have less security at night" Shade finally tore his eyes from the roof.
"Yeah, we can figure out a plan when we get back for now let's split up and find that 'Fortue' female" I said as Shade nodded in agreement before speeding off.
After a fruitless search, I found Shade in a dimly lit area between two structures, although it seemed he was hunched over something and the closer I got the larger the figure became until Shade finally got up and the shape of a Hobblegrunt could be seen scampering off. Silently, I landed behind him making sure that he hadn't seen me "Damn these dragons, they live here and yet don't even know where this Dragoness is!" Shade groaned before poking his head out. I could only presume he was trying to catch another dragon and indeed he did, this time it was a Flightmare. Coincidence?Perhaps...
"Are you Fortue?"
"No" the Flightmare replied
"Do you know where I can find her?"
"Yes"
"Care to share?"
"I would, but you're kind of pinning me down so I don't know if you want to hurt me to know..." there was a pause. Then Shade slowly got off of the dragon.
"There, now tell me where I can find her" Shade demanded to which the Flightmare let out a childish laugh.
"Not many dragons go around her area, dragons have spread rumours that the things she does also gives her access to your soul, body and mind..." it trailed off.
"...Uh...huh..."
"But if you still want to go, just head in to the forest west of here and keep heading straight after a few minutes you should find a clearing. Large lake, large cave perfect habitat!"
"Guess that makes sense..."
"Why do you need to see her anyway?" The Flightmare asked, Shade's face changed to one of uncertainty. I could tell he didn't know whether or not to tell this dragon that we needed to go there for a mission we had been issued because we're assasins called the 'Shadow Dancers'. Shade always thought it was better to try and make allies so he always tried to gain their trust which included telling the truth, many times had this face been shown when we were talking to random strangers that didn't recognize us...However, the answer was almost always the same each time "Sorry, as much as I would like to tell you it is confidential..."
"Oh..." The Flightmare's mood obviously deflated. It was only then that I realized we were dealing with a young dragon, about a few years older than us but young none the less. This caused Shade to shift nervously since he had no idea how to cheer the dragon up so others wouldn't wonder why the dragon came out depressed 'Then again, there is that dragon that he had pinned down here that ran like it's life depended on it...' I thought. Dragons would get suspicious, guards would be here soon...
"Hey, dude don't get down...I'm sure I'll be able to tell you soon enough!" Shade sounded like he was forcing the words out and it also sounded like he was trying to convince himself as well. What he was trying to convince himself I wasn't sure.
"Okay..."
"Anyway, you should leave...Guards gonna be here soon" he looked up to the sky "And I should get going..."
"Alright, see you round!" with that, the Flightmare ran back out into the public. Shade sighed as he turned around "You coming?" I stepped out of the shadows and got ready to take off "Yeah" and with a slight 'hmph' we took off in to the air but I managed to steal a glance back to see a few armoured dragons heading in to the area we were just in 'Just in time...' I thought.
Once again the journey was in silence, we were still above the forest and no clearing in sight and the silence was slowly tearing away at my brain "You didn't have to 'abduct' dragons to question them you know" I blurted out.
"What? You expected me to just walk around in public asking for the female without giving a reason? You realize dragons could get suspicous...And if everything I've been told is true then we would have been most likely suspected for what we're going to do tonight..."
"Still-"
"Ah wait!" he interrupted "There's also the fact that we are who-Who we are, and if I just blatantly walked out in the open and we attracted the guards attention then there is no way we would have been able to leave the island safely...Hell we probably would have been stalked home to make sure we don't do anything...Worth aresting" I hated the fact that Shade always had a reason to justify his actions, it always proved me wrong and I'm supposed to be the cunning one!
"I hate that you can do that...You know that?"
"Duh!" He grinned. The silence was now more bearable although still annoying. Less than five minutes later, we had arrived at said clearing with the lake and cave "You think she's in there?" Shade asked
"Only one way to find out" I replied before landing just outside the cave Shade following behind me. We slowly creeped into the den "Hello?" Shade called out. No response. "Guess no-one's home?" I said.
"Wait, what's that?" Shade began walking towards a large pool of water how he noticed that I wasn't sure.
"Hey, maybe you shouldn't get so close to it..." I told him but he just ignore me and continued towards it. Then, all of a sudden the pool let out a bright glow causing both of us to turn our heads away "What the hell did you do!" I yelled. The light dimmed down, only lighting up the majority of the cave "Shade?" I looked over to him, he was standing over it practically frozen in place "Shade?" I repeated.
I walkd over to him and sat down, I looked down in to the lake and my mouth fell fell to the floor inside it there was an image and that image was of a young nightfury cub bleeding and aone. That cub, was a deep shade of blue and familiar markings going down his body. That cub was Shade...Young,abandoned and injured "Shade...Is that..." We watched in silence...
I've decided to end this chapter here actually...I was going to make it go all the way to the end of their 'fortue' visit but after typing it up to here I thought that the end was worded well enough to leave you in some sort of suspense about Shade's past also if I had typed it up to that it probably would've had like 5,000 words and I suspect only later stories and my 'Fixing everything' story will hold that many words, and as to why there is a glowing pool...Fortue? Crystal balls? Put 2 and 2 together...Yeah...Also I ended it here so I could work on my other stories aswell...2 new ones comin out! Yay...One that isn't HTTYD related! So yeah...Ciao guys!
P.S: Sorry for any spelling mistakes or anything! The document thing was being annoying so it got difficult when I had to check for spelling errors!