Chapter 25

Down, Down, Down

Rayne still appeared confident as she dismounted and took up a defensive position in front of her dragon, wielding a blocking staff as Connor had taught her. Dumb dragons! They should have known better than to mess with THIS pegasus!

"Bring it on, chumps!" she wildly grinned, expertly twirling the stick. She was so caught up in "looking cool" that she was unprepared for the first attack. "WHOA!" She quickly retreated to the safety of her dragon's back as reality set in. "Hey! Watch where you fling those! You could fry someone with that!" (She was, of course, referring to the wraith's mag stream that missed her by a hair.) "Variant!" Though the dragon didn't look nearly so confident as he once had, he obliged and returned the blast with one of his own. This one, however, hit his opponent squarely in the chest. The wraith was flung backwards, but two more appeared in its place.

"This is impossible," Variant hissed, temporarily regaining his human voice while maintaining the dragon's body. "We don't stand a chance!"

"Grah!" Artha grunted, jakk-stick slicing expertly through the air and clobbering two of their opponents at once. Kitt also appeared momentarily, her stick coming down on the gear of another wraith and smashing it to shards. The dragon no longer under Word's control, the confused dragon darted away. Parmen and Cyrano also came smashing onto the scene, Cyrano bowling a couple dragons over with his sheer mass while Parmen tried not to let out a scream.

"We do now!" Rayne cheered, regaining her poise and leveling her staff for the next attack.

"Who are you talking to?" Kitt called. Rayne ignored her, and rather drove Variant back into the hordes.

"Rayne, stooOOOOP!" Parmen squealed as a wraith snuck up from behind and yanked him out of his saddle.

"Parmen!" Twilight shrieked in horror from above. Though her heart was still set on returning to Flash Sentry, she had developed a... fondness... for Parmen, too. She leaned forward to get a better view, but perhaps she leaned too far, because Spike was momentarily unbalanced and let out a cry as he toppled off the ledge. "AAH!"

"Oof! Twilight?!" Parmen rubbed his head where she hit him upon falling off the edge. "You were supposed to stay up there with Lance!"

"Sorry! I didn't mean to," she blushed deep red and apologetically shuffled.

"Watch out!" Parmen's whole disposition changed as he noticed a wraith, teeth bared, charging up behind her. He bravely shoved her down with one arm, then used his free hand to deal an unforgiving blow to the dragon. It howled and fell to the side before it trampled them. Parmen proudly grinned down on hunkering Twilight to make sure she was alright. She shot him a grateful and congratulatory smiled before remounting Spike.

"Thanks," she smiled again.

"Get back to Lance," he gently nodded. Twilight readily agreed, and directed Spike away from the battle. As he took her away, she anxiously combed her hair. Parmen's whole attitude had changed when she dropped in on him. She tried to tell herself that he was just better prepared the second time around. But she knew what had really happened. Parmen finally had a damsel in distress, so he made himself step up to the challenge. She knew he had a crush on her; Parm sure hadn't been subtle in that department. But she still had Flash waiting for her back home, and as of yet, she hadn't the heart to tell that to Parmen. But, she reasoned, so long as it's motivating him to do better, it can't hurt anything, right? I mean, we need everyone performing well, and if I'm helping him to improve, then what he doesn't know won't hurt him. And crushes come and go all the time. He'll probably grow out of it before we head back. Yeah, I'm sure.

Twilight still wasn't entirely convinced.

All the time she'd been muttering to herself and tugging at her hair, she'd left Spike to the navigating. She was so caught up in her thoughts that she didn't notice when he stopped, or his frantic whimpers, or even the dark shadow now looming over them. It took the wraith dragon's mag stream removing her from Spike's back for her to finally recognize the immenant danger.

"Wha? Oh! OoooOOOoooh!" She squealed, flailing about as the dragon left her dangling midair. Spike was just as helpless. After two months, he was capable of wrangling some gear onto his back, but no way was he prepared to fight! Another wraith had him pinned down before the pack-class dragon could blink. Spike let out a desperate roar, failing to wiggle out from the other dragon's massive foot.

"Hey! Let go of me! Fracshun!" Twilight jerked up as she realized Lance was nearby in the same predicament.

"Lance? Lance, just hold on! We'll be okay," she soothed, calmly attempting to think her way out of this one. She sifted through all her knowledge on mag energy and gear, but turned up nothing. She was jerked out of her thoughts anyway, when the wraith holding her started to take off with her in tow.

"ARTHA!" Lance cried, desperately looking for his hero brother. Unfortunately, Artha was otherwise engaged at the moment, and it was unclear whether or not the Dragon Booster even heard his call. Spike moaned again, louder, hoping to gain someone's attention. By the time Artha did happen to glance in their direction, they were already growing small in the distance.

"LANCE!" he screamed, realizing that his brother was gone. This had all been a trap! Lance, on the other hand, breathed in relief. At least Artha knew they were gone. Now they would come after them. They were as good as saved.

"YA!" Lance and Twilight were both momentarily blinded as a powerful mag blast rocked their world. The wraiths beneath them shrieked in distress, and their mag streams faltered. Lance and Twilight tumbled unceremoniously to the ground, while their larger dragons skidded another couple of yards, but all were free.

"Shadow Booster!" Lance was the first one up, and shot Moordryd a wild grin.

"Get out of here, stable brat," Moordryd roughly barked.

"Hey, that wasn't very-"

"You too," he cut Twilight off as she started to scold his rude behavior.

"But-!"

"Come on, Twi," Lance yanked at her sleeve, and she reluctantly followed the youth. Moordryd watched them start to remount their dragons before leading Decepshun back towards the fight.

"Where've you been?" Artha jokingly called, teaming up with the late arrival.

"Bailing out your brother," Moordryd snidely retorted, focusing an intense ball of mag energy in the technique known as mag claw. He fired many such orbs at the wraiths, which proved to be an effective method of taking them out. Artha likewise began putting his knowledge in the art to use. In another part of the wraith mob, Kitt and Parmen had also paired up. Not as skilled in mag claw, they stuck to manual force, but between Parmen's knowledge of gear and Kitt's skill in handling dragons, they were able to hold their own. Rayne and Variant, however, were off on their own, trying to outrun their attackers.

"There are so many of them!" Kitt cried, clutching her shoulder as she took a blow.

"Your father's sure been busy," Artha gritted his teeth in agreement.

"Even I didn't know he had so many," Moordryd grunted, running out of energy.

"Artha, we can't keep this up!" Parmen informed. "Our dragons are losing too much energy."

"We've got all the Boosters, now," Moordryd pointed out. "All five are supposed to be able to unleash legendary power."

"We have no idea how to do that, yet!" Kitt argued.

"Better figure it out quick," Moordryd batted another dragon away.

"Moordryd's right- we don't have a choice. Everyone, gather!" Artha ordered. Kitt and Parmen weren't too far off, but still had quite a bit of trouble fighting their way through. "Okay. Now-"

"What about Rayne?" Artha realized with a start that the Energy Booster wasn't present. Upon looking around, he found her cornered at the edge of the street, mere inches away from a plunge down to the Wastelands.

"RAYNE!" She looked battered and bruised, and unable to take another hit from the wraiths. The dragons were, however, relentless, and it didn't matter to them whether she lived or died. One more fatal mag blast rammed into Variant's side, and with a bloodcurdling cry, the dragon fell. He only had time to mag Rayne back up to safety before he plummeted to his death.

"NO!" Rayne suddenly forgot all about the wraith dragons. She scrambled back to the ledge, peering after Variant. All she saw was a black abyss. She didn't even care when the wraiths dragged her away. Variant was dead because of her. She'd failed her dragon. She'd failed her friends. There would be no way home, now.