Thank you for all those reading. I'm so happy folks are enjoying this little palette cleanser before we dive into the first sequel to Theogony. Three more chapters to go after this.
Chapter Seven: A Dragon By Any Other Name
"What'chya doin?"
Missy quickly minimized her browser window. "Nothing," she lied.
Dennis laughed as he pulled up a second task chair to where she saw at the dreaded Console. "Bullshit."
She should have been out on patrol, but Armsmaster and Old Man Rennick never wanted her out despite her being the best cape on the Wards team. So instead of going out taking names and busting ass she found herself stuck in the Wards base listening to Kid Win prattle on to Triumph about the hoverboard he was making.
Dennis sneaked a hand around hers, grabbed the mouse, and opened the video. "Yeah, that's the stuff," he said. "It's more funny watching it on video than it was being there. You get all the humor without the whole 'Oh shit we're all going to die' vibe from the first time around."
Missy understood, at least on some level, that it was bad for her to enjoy watching Glory Girl get her ass beat so thoroughly. She didn't have anything against the older, prettier flying ball of property damage. In fact, the first time they met she was very friendly.
But then she started dating Dean, and that wasn't right. Dean was for Missy, Taylor said so. And Taylor was a dragon, so she'd know. So, watching Taylor adjust Glory Girl's understanding of her place in life provided a great deal of pleasure. There was a word for what she was feeling, but she didn't care enough to look it up.
With Dennis at her side, they watched the Arcadia gym get torn down again. After a few moments, Dennis said, "You know Taylor's really fucked in the head, right?"
"Yeah. But she's a dragon, it's okay."
Dennis snorted. "Not sure how far that's going to take her, you know. I mean, I get it. She's big, she's strong. But if she keeps going around eating people, someone bigger and stronger is going to come along and put her down hard. The Triumvirate could take her. She'd never catch Legend, Alexandria could rip her head off and Eidolon's power is 'Fuck you and your little dog too'. She's got to learn…"
He was interrupted by a flashing red light on the console top. "Console, Code 99B Omega. Location, Tiamat?"
Missy sat up in alarm when she heard Armamster's stressed tone. "Roger that," she said. "Tiamat at Alpha Hotel Sierra for adjustment." Or, in other words, she was in high school detention.
"Console, confirmed. Override her phone and prevent all phone traffic. Tiamat is not to receive any signal or notification for the foreseeable future."
Missy couldn't help but share a confused look with Dennis. "Roger that. Sending override code now. How else can we help?"
"I've already notified PRT main. PRT Headquarters is on lockdown. All other Wards are returning to headquarters. The ABB has kidnapped a POI in violation of the Unwritten Rules. It is essential we recover the POI at all costs before…"
Dennis, though, shook his head and leaned over beside Missy. "Armsmaster, check PHO. Tiamat's just been sighted in the air."
Armsmaster did not respond. Missy logged the call and then sent it directly to AD Rennick's computer. "Well, Lung means Dragon in Japanese, right?" Missy said.
"Not for long," Dennis muttered.
~~Wyrm~~
~~Wyrm~~
Vicky couldn't quit glaring.
The elf-dragon girl ignored her entirely as she sat at her desk. They were supposed to be writing essays on the detrimental effects of capes on society, and how capes have to do better. It was a canned essay question Vicky was intimately familiar with, having had to do the same punishment three times since she triggered late last year. Even so, she had to write it out.
The elf-dragon girl just sat in her chair staring off into space while her pen flew across the paper as if being wielded by an invisible Shakespeare.
Worse yet, at the front of the room Mrs. Vanderheim appeared to have no shits to give as she sat reading some torrid romance novel. The woman even had her feet up on her desk.
Unable to handle the prolonged silence, Vicky finally said, "So, what's your deal, anyway?"
The elf-dragon girl blinked languidly as she turned her head to stare at Vicky. "I'm a dragon," she said, as if that explained everything.
"I mean, what...people get to be parahumans when something really bad happens. It's called a trigger event. What happened to you?"
The girl shrugged. "I tripped and hit my head on a magic rock."
"That's not the way parahuman powers work!"
"I'm not a parahuman. I'm a dragon. Completely different things."
"You're a parahuman whose power is being a dragon," Vicky tried to explain. "That's how it works!"
Taylor shook her head. "That's how it works for parahumans. I'm not a parahuman. I'm a dragon. There used to be hundreds. Thousands. They were sleeping, but something killed them before they were supposed to wake up. So, when I tripped the ley line node, all that magic power went to me. Besides, I like being a dragon. It's being small that's irritating."
Vicki's New Wave phone pinged her. Mrs. Vanderheim glared.
"Sorry, work phone," Vicky said, which should have been self-explanatory since non-PRT aligned phones weren't allowed to have signals through the schools Faraday-cage. She pulled it out to see if she could use an emergency to get out of detention. "Oh, wow! ABB attacked the Dockworker's Union headquarters. Why would they…?"
The elf-dragon girl stood up. She didn't slip out of her desk, she just stood up and snapped the desk off from the seat. "Dockworkers?" Her voice had dropped two octaves and carried the same subvocal growl that made Vicky's lungs shake during their first confrontation. "How many? Are they still there?"
Alarmed at the change of behavior and fighting back a sudden case of the shakes as she remembered the last time she saw Tiamat angry, Vicky complied without thought. "They're already gone. The notice says they have hostages."
"Ms. Hebert, sit down," Mrs. Vanderheim said.
The elf-dragon girl ignored her as she marched toward the door. She opened it without causing any damage.
Mrs. Vanderheim put her book down. "Go after her, make sure she doesn't kill anyone in the school. I'll contact Principal Howell."
"All right!" Vicky gathered her books in her back and almost flew out of detention. She could see the elf-dragon girl at the end of the hallway. Vicky paused long enough to store her bags before she flew after. She had a teacher's permission, right?
The moment Tiamat cleared the front door of the school, the elf disappeared and the forty-foot- long dragon took its place. With a roar that shook every window in the city, and a flap of wings that almost flipped Principal Howell's Lincoln, Tiamat shot into the sky.
Glory Girl followed after, only to immediately fall behind as the dragon blasted through the sky toward the Docks area of the city. She roared again, so loud Vicky felt sure even Maine heard it.
When an equally powerful roar answered from far ahead, Vicky's stomach dropped and she suddenly realized what was happening. Despite her behavior and appearance, Vicky was far from dumb. Tiamat ate Oni Lee. Oni Lee was Lung's. Tiamat did to Lung exactly what she accused Vicky of doing to her. She took something that belonged to the cape who went toe-to-toe with an Endbringer and beat back the entire Protectorate Team.
And evidently someone who belonged to Tiamat was at the Dockworkers union.
As Vicky approached the docks, she could see a brilliant ball of flame burning in the middle of a section of warehouses. Tiamat was so dangerous, just listening to her roar was enough to push Lung to as large as he'd ever been in the city. The human was gone, replaced by a golden-scaled, fiery demon with the buds of wings from his back.
Realizing this was beyond her, Vicky slowed mid-flight and pulled her phone from her pockets. She quick-dialed the Protectorate Console.
"PRT Console, confirm caller?"
"Glory Girl, associate ID B-A24R35B. You guys better have all hands-on deck 'cause I'm staring at a fifteen-foot-tall Lung about to go toe-to-toe with a pissed off Tiamat!"
"Acknowledged. Protectorate en route. Please assist in evacuating civilians."
Vicky just managed to put up her phone when she had the unique, horrifying honor of watching a forty-foot long flying dragon slam into a now twenty-foot tall burning monster cape. The impact was like a bomb-Vicky could see a pressure wave shoot out from the two monstrous combatants, shattering glass from all around.
For a moment, Vicky thought Tiamat was going to make short work of Lung. That thought lasted until Lung somehow caught the diving dragon and flipped her over entirely to send her massive form crashing through one of the warehouses behind him.
Yup, this is going to suck.
~~Wyrm~~
~~Wyrm~~
Danny was no stranger to violence. He was the son of a dockworker, and both his grandfathers worked at the old Naval Shipyards until they closed them down in the seventies. He'd been born and raised in the Docks, where men settled their differences with a fistfight and a beer. So taking a few punches from a couple of terrified-looking ABB thugs was nothing.
The Danny of two years ago would have sung a different tune. Now, though? These men were threatening his family, perhaps not realizing that Annette was gone and Taylor was a fucking dragon. All they could do was kill him. While he wasn't particularly eager to die, knowing that Taylor would be fine gave him a willpower he'd forgotten he had.
"You guys are idiots, you know that?"
"Shut up!" The leader of the men who crashed into the Dockworker's union brandishing guns and shouting in Japanese was about as wide as a stringbean. He wore a green scarf with a red jacket to mark his allegiance to the ABB, but from his dilated eyes and panting breath, Danny suspected the man knew he was in deep shit.
They pulled him out of the Union building after threatening the others there, and landed a few paltry blows before throwing him in a van. They didn't drive far-unfortunately the ABB maintained their territory fairly close to the Union. They didn't even bother to blindfold him as they dragged him into a vast, long-empty warehouse with broken windows and a concrete floor filled with trash.
A group of twenty-one men stood waiting. Two wings of ten flanked the tallest of them in the middle. This man wore jeans and an ornate dragon mask. He sniffed in contempt when he caught his first sight of Danny.
"This is the dragon's father? This pathetic man?"
Danny was smart enough to keep his mouth shut. He had never personally run into Lung, but he'd had to deal with enough of his men to know they were more terrified of him than the authorities. That type of fear had to be reinforced regularly.
Lung was a killer.
"Your child took something of mine," Lung said. "Now I have taken something of hers. What will she do about it?" When Danny didn't answer, Lung backhanded him. "Answer me!"
The cape's casual backhand was a stronger blow than Kurt's full fist. It took a moment to make sure his jaw was still attached. "Well, based on the fact she almost killed Glory Girl over a pancake, she'll probably come eat you and all of your men and burn all of your territory to ash."
Lung snorted. "Good. Secure him. She comes. I can hear her."
Danny had the unique, horrifying pleasure of watching a massive black dragon whom he knew in theory was his daughter slam into a cape reputed to have soloed an Endbringer. A part of him wanted Taylor to eat Lung with the same ease that she killed Oni Lee.
But he knew no one was that lucky. As large and powerful as Taylor was-Lung was also incredibly powerful. That type of power couldn't just be dismissed.
The increasingly nervous men twitched visibly when Taylor's furious roar blasted through the many broken windows of the warehouse. Danny looked around at the men as Lung exploded into flame and began visually growing as his own infamous power responded to the threat in that roar.
"So, just throwing this out there," Danny said. "Whoever unties me and gets me out alive probably won't get eaten. The rest of you are fucked."
"Shut up!" one of the captors screamed, right before the front of the warehouse fell and crushed him into paste.
The blast of hot air hit Danny and knocked him backward. He gripped the back of the chair, flopped over with all the strength he could muster, and broke the back of the chair away from the seat. He regained his feet, albeit unsteadily, and watched as a white-hot, winged, flaming Lung with four of his own wings lashed a massive claw at Taylor's black draconic head.
He couldn't help but wince when the claw landed with a sound like two cars hitting each other at full speed. Taylor's head and long neck snapped back so hard her whole massive body spun, only for a huge, muscular tail to whip around and hit Lung in his massive flaming head.
Danny ran the moment he saw the tail coming, ignoring the horrified ABB foot-soldiers. When Lung fell through the wrecked warehouse, he vaporized his own men from the sheer heat that surrounded him. Danny's shirt caught on fire despite the distance, but he dropped and rolled before it burned him too badly. Doing so loosened the knots and allowed him to finally free his hands. He stood up in time to see Taylor slam her own claw into Lung's chest and rip.
Burning entrails spread like napalm across the street to another crushed warehouse. Lung's roar turned into a gurgle as he lost the musculature necessary to actually expend breath. It did not stop him from slamming massive arms down on the claw as he tried to free himself.
The blow was powerful enough that Taylor jerked her limb back with a pained roar, only to answer with another.
The blow tore off the entire front of Lung's face. Danny jerked in the far back of the warehouse at the gruesome sight. Somehow, though, the cape's face grew back just as fast as his spilled entrails did. It was at that moment that Danny realized that his daughter was in legitimate danger. Lung would continue to regenerate and grew larger and larger until Taylor couldn't hurt him at all.
A terrible realization sank in. She was not fighting Lung as hard as she could. And it only took a moment to realize why. The PRT charged a thousand dollar fine if Taylor killed anyone. His daughter was literally risking her life and possibly the city because she was so stingy, she couldn't stand the idea of paying a fine.
"Taylor!"
She'd once more spun around and tail-whipped Lung, sending him into a pile of collapsed wall. It bought her a moment to turn and look at him. The moment she did, he shouted, "I'll pay the damned fine! Just finish him!"
It didn't seem right that a Dragon could smile. The thin lips that covered her massive steel teeth pulled back in a smile that looked far worse than her angry look.
Lung took advantage of her momentary distraction to slash up at her jaw with one of his four alien-looking wings, freeing himself enough to stand.
In the distance, like a firefly in the sky, he saw the Protectorate hero Dauntless arrive. He didn't do anything, though. Danny could imagine his reaction-short of Alexandria, Eidolon or Legend, what the hell could he do?
Lung now stood as tall as Taylor did-he had four massive, fully articulated bat-like wings. His mouth did not open like a dragon's, but separated into four mandibles like some strange alien from a bad 80s horror flick. The fire around him burned so hot he looked almost like a walking star.
He lashed again with his claw, and this time drew a long, bloody gash across the black and silver scales of Taylor's chest. Her roar turned into a scream; but her response would leave the city shaken for years. She flapped her wings, launching herself just far enough into the air that she came down with all four of her massive claws right on Lung.
Her hind claws dug viciously into his torso, once again spreading fiery entrails across the crushed, burned foundation of the warehouse. Her front claws dug into his face, pulling his alien jaws open.
She lifted her head on her long neck until her muzzle was pointed directly down into his face, almost as if she were about to kiss him, and suddenly spewed blinding white-hot fire directly into his gullet.
The stream of energy looked almost like a laser beam as it illuminated Lung's entire body from within, momentarily snuffing out the fire without. It shot down between his elongated, bestial legs.
The ground under Danny's feet shook so violently he lost his balance. He watched, astonished and terrified, as the concrete foundation and the earth below it took on a reddish glow as the stone liquified into magma.
The heat of it stole Danny's breath and made his clothes start to smoke. He backed away as far as he could into a corner of what remained of the warehouse, wishing there was something to hide behind. Through it all, somehow, Lung continued to move and slap weakly at Taylor's snout until the impossible burst of laser-like fire ended.
Lung immediately began to regenerate, right up until Taylor's jaws clamped around his neck. She tucked in her wings so tight to her body it actually made her look smaller, and then she performed a massive crocodile role.
Lung's head tore off in a shower of fire and gore. She tossed the head into the air, and once again fired her impossible flame at it. The warehouse roof was already gone, but the support beams of the structural beams that remained began to melt like taffy.
Nothing remained of Lung's head. The massive, headless body flopped down to the ground and began shrinking with wisps of flame.
Danny half expected a triumphant roar from his draconic daughter. Instead, she walked toward him. So doing, he saw how badly she limped. He saw blood dripping from dozens of wounds as she flopped down onto the hot, shattered foundation near him.
"You okay, dad?" She didn't speak aloud, but he heard her clearly in his mind.
"Yeah, sweetie." He walked right up to her, and saw the massive cuts all over her snout. "You?"
"I'm really hurt," she admitted.
In that moment, Danny wished more than anything that she would assume her human shape again so he could hold her. She didn't. Her eyes closed and she just lay perfectly still. "Taylor? Sweetie, talk to me."
PRT agents finally arrived. Dauntless floated down through the roof, as well as a teenager in school clothes. It took a moment for Danny to realize it was Glory Girl-the same girl Taylor thrashed so badly before. More people came, speaking nonsense, as if he were going to leave his baby girl when she was hurt.
The blonde teenager shot back into the sky. Men in armor were trying to move Danny away, but he just pushed them back. He wasn't going anywhere.
Suddenly the blonde girl was back, with a second teen who had mousy hair. It was the sister-Panacea.
"You've got to be shitting me!" Panacea shouted. "This thing nearly killed you yesterday! She broke the goddamn cafeteria!"
The blonde took her shoulders. "Yeah, she did. She's a real bitch. And...we... are... better… than… her! We're heroes, and I'm asking you to be a hero, Amy."
Panacea did not look particularly convinced. Still, she stepped away from her sister and walked right to Danny. Like Glory Girl, she wore school clothes-jeans and an overlarge hoody.
"Do I have your permission to heal her?" she demanded surly.
"Yes, thank you."
The parahuman healer placed her hand on Taylor's scales, and then made a very strange eep sound. Her whole body stiffened and her cheeks flushed so hard they looked burgundy. Her eyes bulged before squeezing shut.
"You okay there, Ames?" Glory Girl asked hesitantly.
Whatever Panacea was experiencing, she also appeared to be healing. Danny watched joyfully as some of Taylor's many massive, bloody gouges closed back up. Clam-shell sized scales grew back into place.
As she healed the dragon, Panacea continued to make the occasional eep sound, with a few ragged intakes of breath and once or twice a disturbing low moan. Danny started having the same feeling watching her that he did when he first saw Taylor stand up back at the summer camp-a strange, inexplicable urge to go beat up any nearby teenage boys.
Finally, Panacea let go, and then promptly folded up into a boneless pile on the floor. Her sister rushed to her side, holding her tightly.
A massive golden eye opened, and then in a wash of heat that felt almost soothing next to the black molten rock nearby, Taylor stood in her shimmering starlight gown, her long black hair making the silver lock glow. She smiled at Danny, but stepped around until she knelt down in front of the vividly blushing Panacea.
"Was it as good for you as it was for me?" she asked the healer.
"What?!" Glory Girl, in that moment, screamed almost as loud as a dragon's roar.
~~Wyrm~~
~~Wyrm~~
Amy sat in the tiny cell with an angry pout. Why the hell did they put her in Master/Stranger screening? She's not the one that shot super-heated plasma down into the city aquifer!
Vicky showed her some of the videos of storm drains getting blown off by steam from the briefly boiled aquifer before the PRT assholes decided her reaction to healing the big lizard bitch-and the big lizard bitch's joke after-was worthy of Master/Stranger screening.
An alarm went off somewhere Amy couldn't hear, but she didn't care. Instead, all she could think about was the unfairness of it all. Why did Vicky have to be such a show-boat? Let the lizard bitch die. It was her own fault for murdering Oni-Lee and maiming those ABB teens. She got what she deserved, right?
But noooo, Vicky had to be the big hero. Had to show the world she was the better woman. Like Hebert gave a shit about things like...like…
Golden eyes stared at her, set above a long nose and too-wide lips that exposed steel-like teeth. Amy backed away in alarm as she realized that Hebert was in her cell, just a foot away from her. "Gah! What the hell, you can't be in here!"
"Sure I can," the lizard-bitch said. She didn't add, I'm a dragon, but only because it was just understood.
Amy stared; the dragon girl stared back.
With a bitter sigh, Amy sank back down into the slim cot. "What do you want?"
She waited for more jokes at her expense. It wasn't like it was her fault that her power reacted the way it did to touching Taylor. The dragon's body was just...just...amazing.
"You healed me," the dragon said, stating the obvious. "You didn't want to, but you did."
"I'm a healer, it's what I do."
Taylor grinned; it was a disconcerting look with her sharp, steel teeth. "I owe you a debt. I don't think I would have died, but you still helped me. I don't like pain."
"You wouldn't have died," Amy admitted. "You were already healing. But it would have taken a week or two."
"So, I owe you a debt. What would you have of me? I will give you anything I have to give; I will do anything within my power to do."
"Leave me and my sister the fuck alone."
"I could do that, but that isn't sufficient to pay the debt." She moved closer, and Amy found herself hyperventilating at the mere memory of touching the other girl. "What is it that you've always wanted, Amy Dallon? If not a want, is it a fear? What fear do you have that keeps you up at night? You have done me a great service, and you should be rewarded."
The golden eyes filled her vision, and as if someone else was speaking, she whispered, "I think my sister's power has mastered me."
Amy blinked, and somehow in that split second Taylor returned to her original position just inside the door. She held in her hand a cracked, black scale from her own transformed body. It must have been one of the scales Lung knocked loose. As Amy watched, Taylor's hands (complete with long, black, claw-like fingernails) moved over the scale until it shrank and somehow sprouted a delicate, filigree black chain.
She then once more, in the blink of an eye, overcame Amy's personal space. The smell of her and the press of her against Amy's body left her breathless. It took only a moment for Taylor to place the scale pendant around her neck.
"You will never be mastered again," Taylor said, no longer grinning. Her golden eyes regarded Amy intently. "Wear that, and not even the Simurgh could affect you. If your sister has mastered you, the effect is gone and you will know. But know this, Amy Dallon. You have healed me. That is a heavy debt. So from this day until you die, you will be my friend. Your enemies will be my enemies-and I will eat them. Your joys will be my joys, and those who cause you sorrow will also be eaten."
It was hard to breathe as the utter sincerity of the dragon girl's words rang in her mind. "I've healed other people, you're not special."
The dragon girl laughed; she heard a deep, second echo to the sound. "Perhaps. But you are, Amy. I like you. And so I shall be your friend. And if anyone ever dares cause you harm, hold the pendent and speak my name, and I shall end them. I promise."
Amy blinked, and she found herself alone in the room. Seconds later and the door opened as Battery and Miss Militia rushed in. "Panacea! Was Tiamat in here? She was supposed to be in observation...is that a new necklace?"
Amy sighed. She wasn't getting out of Master/Stranger protocols any time soon, she just knew it.