Finally! Chapter 2: Behaviors: Fear. Hope you all like this!

Chapter: 2- Behaviors: Fear

Jonathan Long was having a long day. His boss, Mr. Lockjelly, would not give him a break during his entire day, even a lunch break! On top of that, he even made him stay overtime to do work that the other people had not finished in the office. That was their job, not his! He called Susan and told him that he would be coming home late. Apparently, she was having a long day as well. She got a surprise call from her catering job saying that they needed her right away. That left Jake and Haley home by themselves. Jonathan was not worried, though. He knew his children could take care of themselves for at least an hour or two before he got home.

By the time he got to the front door of his home it was already a quarter past eleven. He took his keys from his pocket and unlocked the door, stepping inside silently. He put his brown jacket on the coat rack and briefcase leaning up against it as he closed the door. The lock clicked in place and the sound echoed in the silent home. It was quiet, as the kids were asleep. It was a school night after all, a Wednesday day.

After eating his favorite dinner consisting of spaghetti and meatballs, courtesy of Susan, he washed his dirty dish and headed to his room, looking forward to a good night's rest. On his way to his room, he paused at each of his children's doors. It was a habit he always did every night—to check on Jake and Haley. He came to Haley's room first.

"No boys allowed! (Except Daddy!)" was taped proudly to her door. He allowed a faint amused chuckle to escape his lips. She was going through the 'older brothers aren't cool phase' like any younger sister would.

He gingerly cracked the door open as not to make a sound and poked his head through. He smiled softly as he saw Haley curled up in a little ball in her bed, completely surrounded by large lavender and pink pillows and her fluffy oversized stuffed animals. Soft snores echoed throughout the pink room.

"Aw, how adorable," he thought. Yes, Haley would always be his little girl.

He silently stepped into her room and knelt at Haley's bed. He brushed her bangs away from her face and softly pressed a kiss to her forehead. "Goodnight, sweetheart. Sweet dreams," he whispered gently.

Jonathan closed the door and moved his way toward his son's room. Jake's door had cut-outs of skateboarders and, ironically dragons, he had printed off from his computer. Like Haley, Jake had a sign taped to his door that said in bold red sharpie, "No Haley's allowed!" Oh, adolescence—a period of endless amusement for a parent (when it was possible). Before his hand could reach the brass door handle, he paused. He thought he heard something. He listened more closely and—yes, he was right! It was coming from Jake's room. He pressed his ear to the door; he heard low, pained whimpers and groans coming from Jake's room. Jonathan frowned.

Jake was having a nightmare.

Without hesitation Jonathan stepped into his son's room and headed straight for Jake, managing not to trip over the skateboard (he had told Jake a million times to put that in place) and random clothing and other junk that had amassed on the floor. He sat on the edge on the bed as he paused and looked at his son. Jake was body was twisting and turning, further entangling his limbs within the sheets. His skin was clammy and quite pale which was a drastic difference to his normal honey-tan skin tone. His hands were clenched so hard that his knuckles were white and his claws tore the sheets. Jonathan knew that they had dug into Jake's palms because he saw large splotches of blood on the sheets around his hands. Jake tossed his head from side to side, mumbling things too softly for Jonathan to decipher. He leaned forward to try and hear more clearly what his son was saying.

"N-no…leave…alone, Dark Dragon. D-don't touch them! No! Stop! Please!"

"Dark Dragon?" Jonathan thought in surprise. He knew that the Dark Dragon was gone—he had been for about two years now. He had seen it with his own eyes. He also knew that Jake knew that; he was the one that had faced him directly, after all. Was this the first time Jake was having nightmares like this, or had this happened before?

Tears started to leak out Jake's eyes and slide down his cheeks. His normally happy face was contorted in an awful expression of pain and fear. "Please, just leave…them alone!" Jake was begging at this point and he sounded desperate. It broke Jonathan's heart; he never liked to see his children in pain, be it physical or mental. He knew it was definitely time to wake Jake up. He shook Jake's shoulder as carefully, yet firmly as he could. "Jake. Jake, you have to wake up, son. Jake, wake up."

Jake shot up from his bed with a strangled yell. When he saw Jonathan he quickly jumped away from him emitting a frightened yelp. With his legs entangled in the sweat dampened sheets, he fell out of bed and swiftly backed away into the wall. Jonathan could see Jake's wide amber eyes glowing faintly in the dark as he stared at Jonathan. Jonathan approached Jake slowly. "Jake?" he asked softly. He did not want to startle him more than he already had.

Jake tried to back way into the wall even more and curled into a little ball. "St-stay away from me, Dark Dragon! Leave me alone!" His breathing was fast and shallow and he was shaking slightly; Jonathan could practically feel the fear radiating off of Jake. Apparently, even though Jonathan had woken his son up, Jake was still in the throes of his nightmare—a bad one as it seemed. How was he supposed to take care of Jake without scaring him even more? Jonathan knew he had to act quickly. When he moved towards Jake, Jake actually let out an animalistic hiss as he bared his teeth at his father. Jonathan was very surprised at this; he had seen Jake and Haley do this in their dragon form when they wanted to scare off others, but he had never seen either of them do this in human form. He guessed Jake was just that scared. He moved towards Jake despite his stuttered protests frightened hisses and quickly engulfed him in a tight embraced. He felt Jake stiffen before he started to struggle. "Let me go! Get a-away f-from me!" He winced as he felt Jake scratch his sides with his claws; however, it was nothing serious, though—just a few shallow scratches, like a cat. Jake was too strained and incoherent to do anything more serious than that.

He held on to his son tightly, trying to will the nightmare that was scaring Jake away. After a few more minutes, Jake finally calmed down. Jonathan waited another moment before he addressed his son. "Jake," he asked softly. "Are you alright now, son?" Jake finally seemed coherent enough to answer. "D-dad?" he asked timidly as he looked around his room. "W-what's going on? Jonathan could feel that Jake was still shaking slightly.

He pulled away from Jake slightly and used his thumb to wipe away the remainder of the tears that had managed escaped Jake's eyes. "It's alright, Jake. You just had a nightmare, is all. You're safe now, don't worry." Jake winced at the reminder of his nightmare. Silence reigned throughout the room.

"Come on. Why don't we go in the kitchen?" He pulled Jake from the floor by under his arms and out of the room; Jake was still a too little shaky to walk on his own. As he passed Haley's room, Jonathan heard that she was still asleep. "I guess we're lucky she didn't wake up with all that commotion. Jake would be embarrassed if that happened." He noticed that Jake was very silent as they made their way to the kitchen. Jonathan did not like a silent Jake. Jake sat down at the kitchen table and folded his arms, putting his head on top of his arms. "I'll make some hot cocoa." Jonathan said as he started pulling the milk from the fridge. Jake silently glanced up and nodded his head, then put his head back down. Jonathan put the cocoa powder in the milk after the few minutes it took to boil the milk. As he grabbed two mugs from the cupboard, he made sure to get Jake favorite one. It was the one the he himself got Jake last Christmas; it was a deep red with a detailed golden Chinese dragon and gold Chinese characters painted on it. The characters translated to 'good fortune'. Jonathan saw it in an antique shop and knew that Jake would like it. It turned out that he was right.

He poured the hot cocoa in each, putting a little extra in Jake's mug. He sat down at the table and handed Jake's mug to him. "Careful, it's hot," he warned. It did not have a handle, so Jake would just have to hold it in his hands. Jake sat up and took the mug from Jonathan, black claws clinking against the ceramic as he wrapped his fingers around the mug without flinching. "Thanks," he said softly. It was a tense silence as the two sat there, quietly sipping their hot cocoa. Jonathan broke the silence as he asked curiously, "How are you not burning yourself?" Jake's lips quirked slightly in amusement. "Every dragon, even in human form is slightly resistant to heat. I don't think this cup will burn me." And that was when Jake actually looked at the mug he was holding.

"You got my favorite mug," he muttered in surprise.

"Yep, thought it might cheer you a bit."

Jake did not answer. Jonathan was about to take another sip of his hot cocoa but stopped as he noticed something dark on the table under Jake's mug. He narrowed his eyes as he looked more carefully. The dark color was a dark red. "Dark red…what could that—?" He let out a silent gasp as he remembered what happened to Jake's hands. He could not believe he forgot. "That's blood!" He put his mug on the table with slightly more force than he intended, which made Jake look up.

"Jake, let me see your hands," Jonathan told him. Jake looked confused as he put his mug down and took his hands off it, and then looked surprised as he saw the state they were in. Jonathan was surprised as well. Jake's hands had four semi-deep scratches in his palms, looking positively ripped up. Luckily, it did not look like Jake needed stitches. Blood flowed slowly from his hands and dripped onto the table. The blood from his palms had smeared onto his mug. Jonathan could not believe he had forgotten about Jake's hands!

"Stay right there, Jake. I'll be right back," he told his son as he swiftly ran to the bathroom. He grabbed the first-aid kit and ran back into the kitchen. When he returned, he saw Jake pressing several wads of paper towels against his palms, trying to staunch the bleeding. From the few amounts of bloodied paper towels on the table, it looked like he was succeeding. Jonathan sat back down at the table. "Here, let me help you," he said. Jake let his father take his hands and started working on them. Jonathan worked in silence as he cleaned the blood from Jake's hands. Jake winced as his father put an antiseptic on his palms. "Sorry," Jonathan apologized, "that's supposed to keep them from getting infected and help them heal faster." Jake nodded silently.

"Why didn't you say anything about your hands, Jake?" Jonathan asked.

"…I didn't notice."

Jake had still barely said anything besides that since they had first come into the kitchen. Jonathan's lips twitched downward into a barely noticeable frown. Jake was always talking; he was never the silent type. Jonathan thought it was time to get his son to talk again. "So," he said as he wrapped Jake's hands in white bandages, "do you want to talk about it?" He knew that Jake knew that Jonathan was talking about his nightmare. Jake gave an uncommitted shrug, still not looking at his father. As Jonathan finished wrapping up Jake's hands, he said, "You know, talking about it really does help."

Jake was silent for a while. Jonathan was patient, though. He knew that Jake was probably mulling over his thoughts, deciding on how to start. After another few minutes of silence, Jake finally began talking. "…It was about you guys, you know," he started off softly. "You, mom, Haley, Gramps, Fu, and me—we were all back in Hong Kong, at the thousand years toast. Dark Dragon had come and confronted us-the dragons-directly." Jonathan noticed that Jake had started to unconsciously scratch at the table, leaving very visible marks on the surface. Jonathan would tell him that after he finished talking, though. "The Dark Dragon…he," Jake visibly started to have trouble explaining this to Jonathan. "he killed off all the dragons! Councilors Kulde, Andam, Omina, and Kukulkhan and Sun Park a-and all the other dragons. All of the dragons except…me."

He took a deep breath and continued on. "He…he k-killed all of you," Jake's voiced cracked, and Jonathans eyes widened. He did not expect to hear that. "He killed all of you and then he came after me! I tried to save you guys, I really did…" Jake trailed off. He began scratching the table again. "Heh, listen to me," he scoffed bitterly. "I sound pathetic, crying over a stupid little dream." Jonathan put his hands over Jake's and gave them a light squeeze, both to keep him from scratching the table any further and also to comfort him. "Jake, anything that bothers you this much doesn't make you pathetic, especially if it's something as serious as what you said happened it your dream."

Jake sighed tiredly, running his bandaged hands through his messy hair. "Thanks, dad."

"Not a problem, son," he smiled at Jake.

Jake finally noticed the scratches on the table. "Uh, dad, what happened to the table?" Jonathan gave a quick glance to the table before he answered. "You were kind of…eh…scratching at the table when you where talking earlier." Jake glanced at his claws and saw that there were indeed wood chips under them. "Aw, man!" He shook his head. "Anyway, sorry about the scratches and blood on the table and the bloodied mug."

"Don't worry about," Jonathan dismissed as he waved a hand flippantly. "Come on, let's get some sleep." After cleaning up the kitchen—including the blood on the table and mug—they headed to their respective rooms. Before Jonathan could step into his room, he heard Jake call him. He turned around to see a very flustered Jake who was shifting from side to side. "Yes, Jake?" Jake avoided looking at him as he raised a hand to rub his neck nervously. "Would you…uh…can you stay with me…until I fall asleep?" he asked, clearly embarrassed. Jonathan was very taken aback; the last time Jake had asked him that was when he was nine.

"Sure, son."

After tucking Jake into bed, he sat in the chair next to his bed. He started to thread his fingers through Jake's hair, an action that had always comforted Jake since he was a little kid. He would continue to do it until Jake fell asleep. "Goodnight, dad," Jake mumbled from under the covers.

"Goodnight, Jake. Sleep well," he said as he gave a comforting smile.

Jonathan continued to thread his fingers through Jake's hair until he heard an odd rumbling noise coming from Jake. He looked down at Jake, quite surprised. Jake was emitting a content noise that sounded like a cross between a growl and a purr. "I didn't know that dragons purred."

Jonathan knew that he raising a fifteen year old teenager was difficult. He also knew raising a fifteen year old dragon teenager was even more difficult. There were behaviors and reactions a dragon teenager did which a human teen would not do; some of which included growling and bearing teeth in a response to fear, unconsciously digging their claws into surfaces when worried or distracted, and emitting happy animalistic sounds when at peace or content (i.e. good dreams).

Yes, his children were different (especially Jake). But, they were his children.

And his children were the best there were.

Published: 3/31/12

Hey, everyone! That was chapter 2 of Observations while Bonding; Behaviors: Fear. There will be other Behavior chapters, but I'm not sure what the next chapter I want to upload will be.

For reviewing, I want to thank Mayonaka no Sasayaki, Major Simi, and KMT. Thanks!

For putting this in their favorites, I want to thank Future Aviator!

And for putting this story in their alerts, I want to thank, again, Future Aviator, Mayonaka no Sasayaki, and Major Simi!

I hope everyone enjoyed this chapter. Review please! (I kind of want to get more than three this time...)