Hope you enjoy

Sympathy of Stardust

Chapter 12: A Dragon's Rampage

The situation on the main deck of the Black Dragon wasn't what Shulk had been hoping for. The sounds of combat sounded out no matter where he searched.

'Chaos' would've been putting it mildly. The ship was absolutely overrun with Kremlings. Robin was doing his best to fend off as many as possible, but it was clear he was running out of steam. His crew was no better. Most of those who could still fight were clearly straining themselves, and many were sporting visible injuries.

Gari slammed into the wall next to the doorway to the main deck. Despite his ruffled hair, he greeted Shulk with his usual flamboyance. "Finally decided to get in on the fun? Glad you could join us, you soft little thing, you~."

A Kremling grabbed him by the front of his shirt and pulled him back into the fray before Shulk could respond.

He shook his head. "This is insane…"

Corrin was trembling behind him. "W-We're… not going to win, are we?"

"D-Don't worry! It's fine! We'll all find a way to-" His eyes widened at a pair of very human, very familiar shouts coming from the direction of the Kremling ship. They both turned just in time to see Akira and Chrom getting sent sprawling into the ocean.

"A-Akira! And Chrom!" Corrin rushed to the edge of the ship. She looked about wildly. "W-where's Lucina?!"

Unfortunately, it wasn't long before they were noticed by the enemy. Two Kremlings came out from the crowd. One of them leveled a blade at Shulk, the other swung its arm, roughly knocking Corrin to the ground.

Shulk drew his blade. He tried to charge straight for the one threatening Corrin, but its partner intercepted him. "Get out of my way!"

While he was being stalled, the first Kremling unsheathed its own blade and leveled it over Corrin's tearful face. The beastman brought the sword down-

"NO!"

She caught it in her teeth.

Corrin felt it.

The fear.

The stress.

The anxiety.

That horrible, itching, burning feeling beneath her skin.

It had been building up throughout the entire voyage. Every second Corrin spent hiding away from the horrid looks the crew gave her was another second she spent suppressing that bubbling rage. The assault by the Kremling Krew had escalated that feeling even further. The only thing holding her together was her desire to not hurt anybody.

But now this beast before her had tried to hurt her.

Her vision went red.

It dared to try.

A beast-like growl slipped past her teeth, still clamped around the steel blade. She began to rise to her feet. Her form twisted. The familiar feeling of smooth, armor-like scales replaced her soft flesh.

It wasn't long before the Kremling, who had previously looked down on her with contempt; now looked up at her. with a look screaming, it really didn't want to be there anymore.

Corrin stared at it through the helmet-like covering that shielded her eyes from view.

She bit down on the sword.

It snapped in half.

The Kremling couldn't get out of there fast enough. The beast within her wouldn't give it the mercy of fleeing, though. She clamped her jaw down on its shoulder and effortlessly hoisted it off the ground. She shook her head back and forth, swinging her captured prey around like a dead rat before letting go. The poor Kremling went flying off into the sea.

Even though her blood boiled over, the sounds didn't stop. Those aching, irritating sounds. The sounds of metal clanging against metal, and the loud, popping noises accompanied by the smell of gunpowder. She wanted them to stop.

She would silence them all.

Something in Robin sensed it the moment it happened. The explosion of draconian energy would have been impossible to miss for someone like him, even among the mayhem unfolding on his ship.

The ear-piercing, reverberating roar was impossible to miss for everyone else. Human and Kremling alike backed away from the howling beast, their conflict quickly forgotten.

"Corrin!" He heard Shulk shout, "Corrin, calm down! It's me, Shulk! Can you hear me?!"

The draconic beast didn't seem to hear him. She craned her neck this way and that as if she didn't even know where she was. Her tail swished violently back and forth, and her taloned claws dug grooves into the wooden flooring.

"Shoot it!" Someone from his crew cried out.

"No, don't!" Shulk's pleas were ignored as multiple members of Robin's crew pulled pistols on the disoriented dragon. They fired on her without remorse.

It was useless. Not a single bullet even left a scratch on her armor-like scales.

It did get her attention, however.

His crew cowered as her featureless face trailed over them; her body shook violently with unbridled fury. Eerie energy gathered in her mouth…

Robin's eyes widened. "Get back, you fools!"

Corrin let loose her dragon's breath, a furious maelstrom of swirling energy. Aimed at nothing, in particular, the raging vortex wreaked havoc on the main deck. Bodies were sent flying, both from his crew and K. Rool's. Anything that wasn't nailed down was sent flying to and fro. Robin himself slammed back-first into the wall of his quarters.

Disoriented, he tried to reach for another of his tomes. 'I have to… do something…!'

A sharp pain cut through his thoughts. Shakily, he brought a hand to his stomach where the agony was overwhelming. Wincing, he looked down to find a dagger embedded in his gut.

'Did it… get caught up… in the blast just now…?'

He leaned back against the wall, no longer possessing the strength to move his body.

Lucina grasped the edge of the crow's nest with an iron grip. The conflict had long since lost its initial appeal.

'Corrin…'

She had escaped the brunt of the hurricane-like attack from her perch up above. But that was little consolation to her at the moment. This was just like the first time she saw Corrin transform, except now she was hurting more than just her enemies.

The enraged dragon stomped over to a downed member of Robin's crew. She raised a taloned foot, ready to bring it down on the unlucky man's head.

"Corrin!" Lucina shouted.

The dragon hesitated. She shook her head back and forth again as if wildly searching for something. Was Corrin looking for her?

"Corrin! I'm up here!" Corrin halted her wild head movements and looked up. For a moment, Lucina was hopeful that she would be able to talk her down without further incident.

That hope was quickly dashed by a loud *BANG*, followed by a cannon ball-sized shell impacting the dragon's armored hide. She howled in pain, whipping her head towards the source of the attack to find a grinning K. Rool aiming at her with his blunderbuss.

Her fury renewed, Corrin let out another roar and lept off the ship, diving into the waters below.

Lucina bit her lip. She had to stop this.

Akira watched with concern as the dragon with very Corrin-like features dove into the water. However, he didn't exactly have the luxury of commenting on it in the position he was currently in. Dangling off the side of the Black Dragon by a grappling hook with a soaked swordsman slung over his shoulder wasn't an easy task.

Said swordsman had no trouble commenting on it, though. "A dragon?! Was… Was that Corrin?!"

"Looked like it," Akira grunted out as he scaled the side of the ship like a mountain climber.

"I knew she had draconic blood, but I had no clue she could take on such a form…" he said in awe. "Were you aware of this?"

"Nope," Akira replied. 'But I think I know someone who was…'

As he pulled Chrom and himself over the edge of the ship, he sent a very pointed look at a distressed Shulk.

Chrom scanned the deck, trailing his gaze over the crowd of unsure pirates. "Where's Robin?"

"Over here!" Gari shouted from nearby the captain's quarters. While Chrom ran off to check on the captain, Shulk approached Akira.

"Akira! Are you alright?!" Akira had some very pointed questions he'd have liked to ask Sulk, but he decided to hold those off for later in light of his genuine concern.

"I'm fine," he said instead. "What's going on?"

"That cursed wench has gone mad, that's what!" One of the pirates exclaimed, pointing to the other ship where Corrin was trying to claw her way up the side, only for K. Rool to shoot her back down into the sea.

Akira got worried when Corrin didn't immediately resurface. His fears-one of them, anyway-were quelled when a splash of water erupted from the opposite side of the Kremling ship. Spraying water and an angry dragon onto the deck.

"T-The cannons!" A panicked crew member shouted. "We can sink both o' them monsters with that blasted ship!"

"Try it, and I start stabbing people." Was Akira's sharp reply.

"And I'll help." Added Chrom as he knelt beside Robin, who seemed to have received an injury during the scuffle.

The pirate shrunk back in fear. Wimp.

The sounds of angry snaps and growls drew everyone's attention back to the Kremling ship. K. Rool gave his crew a nasty look before turning back to deal with Corrin.

'Oh boy…' He had a feeling he knew what that meant. Sure enough, the Kremlings, who had been temporarily cowed into inaction by Corrin, raised their weapons and renewed their attack.

He and Shulk readied their weapons again while Chrom took up a defensive position in front of Robin.

Akira frowned. 'This fight has to end soon. There won't be any winners at this rate…'

Corrin hated the thing in the fat lizard's hands.

Hate it! Hate it!

It made that awful, loud noise and hurt her. The fat lizard made it happen again, causing her to growl in pain.

Hate him! Hate him!

Corrin charged him, powering through several more shots from the blunderbuss before head-butting the cursed weapon out of his hands. In a blind rage, she slammed her armored head into his gut and shoved, intent on pushing him off the deck.

But the stupid lizard held his ground. Steam flared from his nostrils as he dug his clawed feet into the deck. Corrin dug grooves into the deck herself in her attempts to move the gargantuan reptile. Frustrated, she slammed her head into his iron-hard gut again. Then again. And again. She cracked her head into it until she started hearing a worrying ringing in her skull.

Disoriented, her head lulled, and her claw-grip into the deck slackened. Her opponent took the opportunity to deck her across the face. First, from the left, then from the right. He finished off by bringing both fists down on her head at once, cracking wooden planks as she slammed into the deck.

A groan gurgled up from deep in her throat. She thumped her tail grumpily against the deck, too out-of-it to do much else. She was too slow to react as the wagging appendage was grabbed by the fat lizard. Corrin couldn't do much as her whole body was swung around and tossed off the deck.

She only managed to recover some of her senses as she was consumed by the cold seawater below.

K. Rool was not a happy Kremling at the moment.

When his pea-brained krew had spotted the flag of the dreaded Grim Pirates off in the distance, he had been a happy pirate. It was a prime opportunity to test out the brand-spankin' new Blast-o-Matic. He had recently installed into his prized ship, the result of many hard-fought plunders and raids. The renown he'd have gotten would've been well worth the loss of a haul. Not to mention the satisfaction of firing off a shiny new weapon of mayhem!

Unfortunately, the shot had missed. He shouldn't have expected anything else from his idiotic Krew. Even so, the resulting explosion had been quite magnificent. Very successful field test, all things considered.

So he'd have to get his claws a bit dirty, then. It was a pain, but the Grim Pirates wouldn't have been the first big shots he personally sent to the seabed. Things had been going perfectly swell too until those two pesky humans got aboard the Gangplank Galleon. Leave it to his jelly-spined Krew to leave him to do the heavy lifting.

Things had just gone from bad to worse after that. Even after sending nearly every one of his worthless underlings onto the Grim Pirates' ship, they still hadn't managed to decisively overrun it! And then it turned out they had a dragon on board! He had heard the stories about the Grim Captain being one of those infamous devil-worshippers. But seeing a living, breathing, rampaging dragon on his ship had still come as a surprise.

So he, being the only person he could rely on in his own Krew, took care of it himself.

K. Rool huffed as he retrieved his blunderbuss from where it had landed. Now he had to go over and wrap up things himself before this raid became a complete wash—what a hassle.

The sudden rocking of his ship cut his train of thought short. Curiously, he looked over the ship's edge to find the waters below swirling dangerously. Strange, the sea was calm, but a moment ago.

An enormous geyser suddenly erupted between the two ships, spraying water all around. With a reverberating howl, the spire split and cut off partway, revealing the dragon from earlier, now standing proud atop the unending waterspout several meters above K. Rool. Sunlight glistened radiantly off of its wet scales, a stunning contrast to the dark rage it directed at K. Rool as it glared down at him.

He pointed his blunderbuss at it.

It roared.

Lucina could only watch as Corrin unleashed her second onslaught of dragon's breath. Unlike the first one, this attack was focused, a concentrated hurricane that promised destruction for everything in its path. Bolstered by the torrent of seawater she had summoned, the blast swept away the immovable Kremling captain with the force of a tsunami. Sending him flying off into the distance, and decimating a good portion of the deck in the process.

But the enraged dragon wasn't satisfied. She continued to unleash blast after blast at nothing in particular. Like an ocean god disturbed from its slumber, she lashed out at everything with all the wrath of the seas. Both ships rocked furiously from the waves she was kicking up. Lucina had to brace herself on all fours to keep from falling off the yardarm she had crawled onto.

With determination in her eyes, she made her way to the edge of the yardarm, as close as she could get to the dragon, still perched atop her uplifted tower of water. Grabbing ahold of a loose line of rope, she fearlessly threw herself off the yardarm, swinging as far as she could go.

Luckily, the chains connecting the two ships had stayed intact, so even amongst the raging waters, both vessels stayed centered around Corrin's swirling spire. That meant they were just close enough for Lucina to sail through the air, landing right on the dragon's back.

"Corrin!" She wrapped her arms around the thrashing dragon's neck. It took all her strength to keep from getting thrown off, but it was worth it when she finally felt the dragon start to settle down beneath her.

With one final howl, the spire of water dispersed, sending both dragon and girl crashing into the waters below.

"Corrin! Lucina!" Shulk cried out.

The battle had halted again at the sight of K. Rool getting sent flying. Seeing the young Lucina flinging herself at a raging dragon in the center of a miniature typhoon had nearly halted Shulk's heart along with it.

He was nearly ready to jump in after them when he heard a man from Robin's crew scoff. "Good riddance!"

Shulk grit his teeth, a rare feeling of anger washing over him. "She very well may have just saved our lives!"

"Saved us?! That damned monster was tryin' to kill us!"

Shulk clenched his fists. He knew he couldn't blame the crew for thinking that. Corrin may very well have killed someone if Lucina hadn't called out to her. Even so, their words felt entirely too cruel. Corrin never wished any of this upon them…

Before they could argue further, the sound of water splashing onto the deck drew their attention. The pirates all backed away as Corrin's armored form crawled over the railing. Clenched in her jaws was Lucina, hoisted up by the scruff of her shirt like a drenched cat.

The dragon gently lowered the younger girl to the deck before trailing her eyeless gaze across the gathered crowd. Her gaze stopped on the Kremlings, who, after several long seconds of silent staring, all hurriedly jumped ship in fear of the beast that sent their captain flying.

With that done, the dragon silently curled up around Lucina, purring contentedly. As the younger girl affectionately rubbed her face covering.

Nobody dared to speak up until Robin, leaning heavily on Chrom and nursing a nasty wound, limped forward. "Gather up as many of our stragglers as you can. Find a way to break those chains and ready the ship. We're leaving."

The crew got to work without a word after that. The battle was over.

It had taken some time for Corrin to transform back. Shulk knew she would be on guard but wasn't quite sure how long it would take her to relax. He hadn't expected it to take until sunset, though. She hadn't woken up, however, and Shulk wasn't quite sure if that had been a blessing or a curse.

Chrom walked up to him as he waited for her to wake up, "Is she going to be okay?"

Shulk looked up at the mercenary, "She's probably just tired."

Chrom knelt down next to him, he turned his head to look back towards the central doorway to the dock. "We should probably get her somewhere safe" somehow, Shulk knew the other man was watching for the crew.

"What about Robin?"

"He's resting," Chrom smiled, "and I'll be at his side soon, but first," he scooped up Corrin and began walking towards the group's room.

Shulk jogged up to keep pace with the mercenary. "Thank you."

Chrom nodded, "That's quite alright."

Lucina was curled up on her hammock, fast asleep, and wrapped up in a blanket to ensure she wouldn't catch a cold. Akira, despite getting thrown into the sea earlier that day, seemed to have shaken off any fear of sickness as he leaned against the wall waiting for the last two members of their group.

As Shulk and Chrom entered, Akira placed a hand on Shulk's shoulder "we need to talk"

Shulk tilted his head in concern "alright," and at that, Akira left the room.

Shulk then turned to Chrom, but before he could speak, Chrom only shook his head. "She'll be fine; go see what troubles Akira."

Shulk only nodded and went to see what was plaguing his companion.

Akira was leaning against the railing staring blankly out at sea, his glasses reflecting the setting sun, giving Shulk no inclination about what was on his friend's mind. The difference between earlier that morning and now seemed almost too drastic to be real. Shulk leaned against the railing himself,

Akira finally broke the silence, "you knew, didn't you?"

"About Corrin?" Shulk could feel his stomach turn, "yes."

Akira only sighed, "why didn't you say anything?"

"I ..." Shulk struggled to put his thoughts into works. "I wasn't sure if this one was real or not."

Akira fixed him with a half-lidded stare. "You and I both know that's a bad excuse, Shulk."

Shulk looked away, guilt eating at him. Akira continued, "This was going to happen back at the camp, too, wasn't it?"

Shulk gave a defeated sigh. "Town square too."

Akira only shook his head in disappointment, "Why didn't you tell me?"

Shulk began to fidget. "As I said-"

"Like actually tell me," Akira interrupted, "you trust your visions, and they've never failed you before."

"Only recently."

Akira turned to face Shulk, frustration written all over his face. "That was a dangerous thing to have kept secret."

"I'm know-" Shulk tried to swallow the lump in his throat. "I was just-"

"Just-" Akira cut in again. He removed his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose, "just tell me next time" he looked back up at Shulk, "okay?"

"Alright"

Akira put his glasses back on and reached out a gloved hand. "We're a team, remember."

"Right," Shulk took it, and after a firm shake, let go and returned to leaning against the railing, "By the way, how do you feel?"

"I've been better," Akira sighed and then smiled, "but I've also been worse."

He stretched, "I'm going to get some rest" he then patted Shulk on the shoulder " you?"

Shulk turned his attention to the captain's quarters. "I might try and heal Robin,"

Akira nodded, he then turned to stare back at the other door before looking back at Shulk. "Be careful."

"Why?"

"There's tension," Akira stood up straight. "I can't explain it, but-"

Shulk tilted his head to the side as he watched Akira follow some kind of movement. "I haven't seen anything" in truth, Shulk wasn't sure if that was less concerning or more so. "But … keep the girls safe, just in case," to which Akira nodded and left to head back to their shared room.

Shulk could feel it now that Akira had brought it up. The crew was silent; the boat was far too calm, considering what had happened earlier that day. He would have to stay on his guard.

AN/ damn, that was really a ride, but I hope you enjoyed

In case you didn't notice, the last three chapters haven't had completion dates do to them being written by Wolfy.

And the only reason this chapter has a completion date is that I wrote that last part.

Also … they were all once a 34-page document.

However, we felt spitting it in two was a better idea.

Separating it into the part of dodging the laser and everything else after that

Then we separated the fight with the pirates and Corrin's rampage because it was still over 25 pages.

~ S. Rosey (9/16/20)