Metamorphosis Chapter 6 – continuation of Sparx and Spyro comic
-Three hours later-
They were making great time, but they had to pause every now and then so Sparx could eat, they had figured out that food prevented any severe cramps from happening, and they had to take Sparx seriously when he said he was hungry. Especially after the first time he complained, Spyro and Skye had rolled their eyes at him, and he had gotten painful cramps mid-flight as a result. It was going to be a long day.
Sparx winced as he felt the all too familiar stretching feeling, he was really getting sick of it and hissed through his teeth as the sensation traveled up his spine and back muscles and then to his wings. Luckily, his wing membranes grew as well, otherwise they would have torn from stretching any further.
Spyro sighed, he hated seeing Sparx suffer like this, and he hated not being able to do anything useful about it. At least Skye was able to hunt for him, he however, was too small to be of any physical use, the most he could do was be there for moral support, and he still had a lot to learn in that particular area. Spyro was honest to a fault; he had difficulty telling Sparx that he was going to be ok, when he doubted that was the case.
-Meanwhile-
Cynder groaned in frustration, for once, the usually talkative Volteer was tight lipped. He knew something else; of this, she was sure, he was being suspiciously quiet. This worried Cynder, but it scared her even more. What secret did he keep from them that left him with such a guilty conscience?
She had a gut feeling that it had something to do with Sparx and Spyro's transformation, and if it had her future mate involved, she would stop at nothing to find the answer.
Not even the other guardians could get Volteer to indulge in conversation, he failed to respond to Cyril's insults, which was a first. She knew it was something serious.
She was in the temple library, scrolls based on magic were spread out everywhere, Volteer had mentioned their transformation had something to do with magic. So he had sent them off to find a witch doctor in some desolate corner of the globe.
At that moment, David walked in to the expansive library, he had been looking for Cynder for some time now. It was easy to lose a friend in the maze of hallways and doors that led to more doors and hallways. He took one look at the piles of scrolls in front of Cynder and hastily snuck back out again. Reading made him bored, and boredom made him tired. He really didn't like being bored.
Cynder called him back.
David groaned and backtracked.
"Help me find something on their change"
David winced.
"You're assuming I can read."
"You said you were raised by elves, remember."
"Yeah but-"
"Then you should know how to read"
"…."
"Pllleeeeaasee?"
David sat down and sighed, he was going to regret this later.
"What exactly are you looking for?"
"Something, anything, that can give us a lead on what's going on with Sparx and Spyro's change."
David sat down across the table, and picked up an unopened scroll. 'Spell Casting', he doubted that the change was deliberate, so he tossed it aside. He picked up another, same thing, different title, 'Sorcery'.
"Where'd you find these?"
Cynder directed him to a dusty corner of the library, well the dust had been disturbed when she had first started rummaging around for clues, so it left dust particles suspended in the air, making him cough. His eyes settled on a scroll titled 'Symptoms Of Sorcery', that sounded more helpful, so he pulled it out. Gazing around surrounding shelves he saw another 'The Natural Phenomena Of Magic', that sounded more like what happened, so he pulled it out with similar scrolls to the first two he found. They would all have slightly different contents to the other.
He returned to Cynder with a bag full of scrolls, sweeping the other scrolls off the desk he emptied the satchel's contents onto the table. Cynder blinked at him.
"You can look at those later if there's nothing in these" he explained.
Cynder picked up a scroll, it was the 'Symptoms of Sorcery' scroll David had first found.
She nodded, it made more sense than reading through a pile of spells.
"I'm glad I asked you to help" she said with a triumphant smile, David rolled his eyes and picked up 'The Natural Phenomena of Magic' scroll, secretly he was curious about its contents.
-Sunset-
They were sitting on a sandy beach, watching their turquoise friend sky-dive into the ocean in pursuit of a decent sized fish. Sparx would have joined in too, but the reason they had stopped was to relieve his painful cramps. He trembled as another wave of pain overwhelmed his already aching body and gave a whimpering sigh when it faded. Sparx was now three times larger than he was yesterday, and weariness from the continuous traveling and constant growing pains were starting to show. They had a whole ocean to cross yet, there would be no stopping like this. He estimated that if they flew at the same speed they had been all afternoon, they would be at their destination by dawn. The plan was to eat while they could, but he doubted that would be enough to get Sparx through the journey safely, if he fell unconscious during the flight, they would not be able to do anything for him. While Skye hunted, he planned on how they would keep Sparx's hunger sated, and his growth relatively painless and un-hindering. They could carry food with them, but the two dragons could only carry so much without exhausting themselves. He watched as Skye dove again and skillfully plucked a fish from the water. He would not be able to do that when it got dark.
That gave him an idea.
Now that he was a dragonfly he glowed, though not as brightly as Sparx did, it was still enough light. He could help Skye look for food during the night, like a lantern. As ironic as it was, Sparx was always his lantern, now he would be one for Sparx.
They would still need to carry some food with them, just in case things didn't work out.
When Skye returned from his hunt, he presented his plan. Skye agreed that it was a good idea. After they had all eaten their fill, and Sparx's cramps ceased, they set off again with a little more confidence.
-Late that night-
David glanced across the table at Cynder, after they had eaten she had rushed back into the library. Now she was sound asleep, her chin and forepaws resting on the table. He sighed and picked his way through the various scrolls scattered on the floor towards her.
"Cynder…"
"Cynder?" he nudged her shoulder, she snored softly in reply.
"Cynder!" and nudged her harder with his snout.
"…I'm awake" she said groggily, raising her head a little.
"You can't sleep in here…" He said, shepherding her out of the library.
Cynder stumbled along beside him, still not quite awake. He lead her to her room, and she clambered onto her bed readily, falling asleep the moment her legs folded beneath her. He sighed tiredly, the idea of walking to his own room was a bit much for him at the moment, and watching Cynder sleep really wasn't helping him either. David hopped up onto the bed and curled up beside Cynder before drifting off into a dreamless calm in the form of sleep.
..ooOOoo..
By dawn, Sparx was a fully-grown dragon. The painful cramping and constant need for food was gone, but it had left Sparx feeling utterly drained. The last cramp had been many hours ago just before dawn. Spyro wondered if each hour was symbolic of a year's aging for Sparx, their destination was now a faded peak in the blue horizon 'not far to go now' he thought grimly. Sparx's pace was gradually slowing though, they would need to stop as soon as they could to let him recover.
Sparx ground his teeth in determination and continued the relentless beating of his wings, then soared several hundred meters. Skye had been keeping up with the larger dragon's flight speed relatively well, but now he was panting in exhaustion, only beating his wings every now and then to maintain altitude, and gliding most of the way.
An hour later they landed on the island's shore. Sparx collapsed into the warm sand, Skye following suit moments later. Both dragons lay there catching their breaths for half an hour. Skye reluctantly stood up, despite the fact that every muscle in his body screamed in protest, he sniffed the air searching for fresh water, but the salty ocean scent drowned out nearly every other smell. It was then he noticed Spyro's absence.
"Spyro? Where are you?" He called out, hoping he had just gone off chasing butterflies or something of the sort.
"He told me he was getting food" Sparx said with a yawn, Skye relaxed a bit.
Just then the purple dragonfly seemingly appeared out of no-where, hovering eye-level
"I found water if you guys are thirsty…" he said with a knowing grin.
"Hey Sparx! Race ya!" Skye called back to the yellow dragon, who flicked sand in his general direction with his tail in response.
"You're only racing me 'cause you know yer gonna win!" he whined.
"On your marks…. Get set….GO!"
"HEY! I wasn't ready!... Wait for me!" Sparx cried out, running after Skye who had gotten a head start.
The run was short lived as they both got tired quickly. Skye groaned and lay down beside the spring Spyro had led them too.
"I wish I hadn't run just now…"
"I wish you hadn't run!" grunted Sparx who flopped down on the other side.
"You look all hot and bothered…" said Sparx slyly
"Lemme cool ya down!" he grinned splashing Skye with water.
Skye quickly sat up and glared at Sparx, drenched from head to tail-tip.
"If I wanted a bath I would've jumped in!"
Sparx laughed, which was interrupted when Skye splashed him back. It was going to take more than that to drench him now.
"You wanna go pal!" he exclaimed, drawing himself up to his full height.
Skye however was not intimidated so easily and sauntered over to Sparx's side.
"You wanna go swimming!" He answered cheekily before using his wind breath to knock Sparx over into the spring. Sparx surfaced moments later and dragged him in with him
"HEY! LEMME GO!" Skye yelped.
Spyro rolled his eyes and continued his search for food while the two dragons splashed each other.
When he returned they were calmly waiting for him.
"Right then, let's go find Silverwing." Grinned Spyro, they were finally getting out of this mess.
..ooOOoo..
Even after the initial surprise of waking snuggled up to David, Cynder had been in high spirits.
However, she had still been intent on returning to the library; David literally had to drag her out to have breakfast. Now that her head was a lot clearer, she believed she was onto something, and she flicked tirelessly through the pages of the numerous books and scrolls. David shook his head, he was going to have to start distracting her again before she got moody and gloomy again.
..ooOOoo..
Sparx's hypothesis was that if this outing was anything like their others, the big ominous looking volcano is where Silverwing would be hiding. Spyro rolled his eyes, as usual Sparx didn't listen to what Volteer said, including the mentioning that Silverwing lived near the big volcano. Still, that was a pretty good observation for Sparx…
However, right now he was not looking too good. He had abruptly landed on a nearby rock and leant against the cliff face, telling them that he was feeling dizzy and nauseous. Spyro doubted it was the height. They had after all been flying much higher before arriving on the island. He looked pale and occasionally trembled, none of them knew what was going wrong, but they needed to get Sparx somewhere safer. Spyro flew higher, past the overhang and saw they were conveniently right under the entrance to a cave.
"We're about twenty meters under a cave entrance, do you think you can fly that much further?" he asked Sparx.
The dragon nodded and launched into the air, ignoring the rush of dizziness from the sudden movement and beat his wings hard until he was level with the cave entrance and swooped in, narrowly avoiding bumping his head on a rock jutting out from the ceiling. He collapsed where he was standing, Spyro and Skye exchanged worried glances as they rushed over to him. He reassured them with a weak smile "I'm not dead yet, relax.".
While Skye wandered off, exploring the cave, Spyro stayed beside Sparx
"How are you feeling?" he asked after a while, he was resting on Sparx's shoulder.
"Tired…" was the somewhat faded reply. He was getting weaker.
"Hey guys…." Skye called out, Sparx slowly got up and walked over to Skye.
"I think we found what we were looking for..." Sparx and Spyro followed Skye's gaze, which led them to the remnants of a dragon, it had died curled up around a clear crystal orb, various pendants and jewelry that would have decorated the dragon's body lay coated in dust beneath its exposed bones.
"That can't be right…" muttered Sparx shaking his head in disbelief, they had come all this way…
"We have to keep looking! That might not be Silverwing and we can't just give up now!" Spyro said firmly, he wasn't about to hang around and watch Sparx follow suit and die of old age.
"Well there's a tunnel over there, I was going to tell you guys, but then I saw the skeleton" Skye said, his own thoughts similar to Spyro's thoughts.
"We'll start there then." Spyro answered grimly.
After five minutes in the tunnel, they could see a faint green glow that marked the end of the tunnel, hoping that what lay beyond the tunnel could help them.
AN
Thanks for reading, any reviews are highly appreciated!
