Midday's Stories

Sonohra collapsed tiredly in a corner inside their refuge, a cave in the desert. Licht was having a look around the place and she found it a good moment for a little relax after so many kilometres on the cold and nightly obscured desert.

She stayed there resting for what seemed like hours, without moving, her senses extinguished, tarnished to whatever was around her, her conscience left for just a small moment her body to soar free. She was at peace.

But just for a moment.

She was disturbed from her comatose state by the loud noises and voices that surrounded her inside the cave. She was interested only in a small amount about the topic of the conversation, as she preferred to have some sleep knowing what will certainly be a long crossing before them next night.

They spent the whole night without any other trouble, led by Batch. He seemed to go in a very precise direction so much that Sonohra started to think that the dragon knew more than he said the place and she got her confirmation when the yellow dragon arrived at a specific point in the middle of the sea of sand. While the sun was about to rise to send their cover upstream, the male dragon smelled for a few seconds on the ground. Then he stopped and, moving some sand away from it, he revealed the entrance to a cave.

He guided them there on purpose since it would be impossible to find such a hole inside the dersert, hidden that way, out of luck. Probably the dragon had already made this crossing before in his life and he knew where they should stop, probably he found or built those places himself with other resistance's dragons or moles. Sonohra would not be surprised at all if he will come up with another place like that one the next day and that after that.

She wasn't about to complain. It was better that way for all of them. A safe place, hidden by the heat of the sun that the day would bring to the desert outside, and safe from the imperial army that Batch said haunted the desert during all hours.

It was a fortune that Batch was there with them, as they would have never survived such a trip alone, she was quite sure of it.

A tap on her shoulder made her lazily open an eye only to find herself in front of the other electric dragon at the head of their expedition. He was still dirty as the mud of the night before was still attached to his colored scales. Although it dried and faded in a lighter color and that at the edges and in some central areas was falling apart to leave place to the real scales below, it was still a difficult thing to shake off and she surely didn't envy him. The dragon managed to clean his face though, especially those two very watchful eyes staring at her calmly.

"Sorry to disturb you, Sonohra. I wanted to ask you if you wanted to do the next guard turn, but you look like you may need more time. Probably the last one is a better option for you, isn't it?" he said.

Sonohra could not hear a better plan at that time, even considering the position in which she already was, prepared for a nap. She nodded with gratitude and, after a small bow, Batch moved towards the mouth of the cave, hidden from view, where he sat down exactly as a sentinel would do, his eyes towards the entrance.

Sonohra yawned and moved her gaze into the cave to try and locate the little yellow dragon. Licht, unlike them, slept for the vast majority of the time on her back. For this reason, although responsible as a little one can be, he wasn't tired at all and so a problem for someone that wanted to sleep, given the tiredness of the trip, even the best of dragons would rightly become quite irritable with an annoying puppy keeping somebody awake. She had to find him and lock him under her side so that, awake or not, he would behave. Or in the worst-case scenario, he would only bother her.

In the opposite corner, she could see Fire. The red dragoness was curled up on herself, her tail tight to her body. She was not sleeping, but her gaze seemed empty, distant, and thoughtful. She was not with her mind in the same world in which her body was. Sonohra sighed, knowing that she should speak to the dragoness. They were best friends and there has been something wrong with the red female for a long time, but the subject was always avoided and this did not benefit the red one, who was now in a condition that made her dangerous for the pack and the mission as a whole, something it was impossible to even think about the fire dragoness she's known at the base, a dragoness she's known all her life.

She suddenly felt much more tired at the thought of speaking with her, knowing her, so she postponed it again for the moment, as the most important thing now was to rest and so that she won't fall asleep during their night trip.

She moved again her gaze to find Licht and, in the center of the cave, Kohle and Ahmos were one near the other. Or at least, the black dragon and the male dragon that used to be blue. Just like Batch, Ahmos was covered entirely from his head to his tail by what was left of the slime on his scales, with the difference that those of the ice dragon were made of something like ice, of an opaque color, so they now gave the effect of a dirty mirror and again unlike the leader of the expedition, his face was covered in mud too, saving his eyes and mouth thanks to Batch's readiness to find a pool of water to clean a bit before moving. However, Ahmos always found an opportunity to complain about something, trying in every way to scratch the dirt away from what was "his beautiful scales" but failing miserably in the intent. Until he decided that the best thing to do was to lick it out. At his side, Kohle was already lying down, ready to sleep, his eyes closed. But he, like everyone there, was so accustomed to the ice dragon's behavior that he did not flinch when Ahmos began to spit at his side.

"Bleah, shit, bleah, it tastes like death!" complained Ahmos, keep spitting mud from his mouth. Luckily he did not think again of passing his dirty paws on his very tongue. The situation would get worse, and no one would ever hear the end of that one.

Kohle's lack of reaction, however, did not prevent him from speaking his mind, his eyes still closed as he spoke.

"Do you know what death tastes like?" he asked.

Ahmos looked at his black friend, snorting irritated. "Come on Kohle, you know what I meant," he huffed. "This stupid slime is everywhere and if you try to lick it out then it sticks on your tongue!"

"Unexpected, isn't it?" was the other dragon's only dull answer.

Ahmos sent his friend a nasty look. Knowing him, Kohle could feel his friend's blue spheres pierce his thick carbonated black scales, but he didn't seem to care at all and when Ahmos realized that he wouldn't get even a shred of his friend's attention, he simply decided to abandon himself to the fate that perhaps his scales would always be dirty. He landed on the ground with a loud thud, and a frown on his muzzle while looking at the ceiling of the place.

After a few more seconds the black dragon sighed. "Ahmos."

"What?"

"I can hear you thinking."

"Is that even a power?"

Kohle sighed. "Sand has smoothing capabilities so if you strut into the hot sand tomorrow, it should be able to take away much of that patina you have on, speeding up your cleaning process," he explained, adding right after. "As well as your useless complaints."

The blue dragon seemed pleased by the first part of his friend's speech, initially. The next moment, however, he lost his smile and his gaze became annoyed as he looked at his friend.

"And why didn't you tell me that before we entered that cave?"

Kohle merely smiled, eyes still closed. "Where would the fun be then?"

Ahmos growled and snapped at the black dragon and the two began a strange struggle of growls, swear words, limbs, and wings all around.

Sonohra smiled at the pair who seemed to never change despite what was happening all around them. They had this enviable ability to joke, laugh, and be themselves even in the worst of situations.

She shook her head and then she shifted her gaze to the edge of the cave, near where Batch was guarding the front entrance. There she found exactly what she was looking for... and the dark purple dragon.

Phantom was with Licht, talking to him. The little one was shaking his tail joyfully and that made the white female suspicious. As if he could feel her gaze burning a hole in the side of his head, the purple male turned to look at her, then he smiled, before returning to the puppy with a conspirator attitude, speaking to his ear as he kept looking at her across the cave. The puppy's only response was to move his head in agreement and, after another look from the bigger dragon, he nodded with even more vehemence and energy making the purple dragon smile. After that, Phantom stood up and approached Batch, exchanging two words with him to which Batch merely nodded. Phantom went back to Licht and accompanied him to the center of the cave.

There the two dragons stopped and sat neatly on the floor, their wings perfectly bent behind them. The gaze of both was focused on her still suspicious on the corner and, if the little one was excited by whatever the two planned, the purple dragon was a mixture of cunning and the "you owe it to me" looking. Only speaking, however, would he, at last, unveil the trick which they had secretly confabulated behind her back.

Even Fire came out of her mind to observe the two.

"Ok, what are you two up to?" spurred Sonohra, towards the purple dragon, looking at him suspiciously since his smile seemed only to widen.

"Ah, come on Sonohra! Relax for a moment!" replied the male dragon. "It's not like we are complotting something bad…yet,"

She just glanced to him.

"Yeah!" intervened Licht, no longer able to hold back his happiness for something. "Phantom promised that he would tell us a story!"

Sonohra thought something like this, so she could not say she was surprised at all.

"A story, huh?" she said, passing her attention to the puppy. "But Licht you have to understand that we walked all night and now we are tired so we should-" but she was stopped when the puppy laughed, confusing her. She was expecting every type of reaction but that. She looked at the purple dragon, founding the male's snout matching the puppy's smile, giving him a childlike look, she never saw on him before.

Phantom shrugged at her confusion. "I told him you were going to say that."

Licht continued to laugh.

Sonohra felt offended and embarrassed. "Of course, I would have said that!" she defended herself. "Because it is the truth. We walked all night and now we need to rest if we want to continue our journey," she looked at him. "Weren't you the responsible one on the team?"

Phantom smiled at her. "I was, then Batch took my place so I can show you all my funny side."

Sonohra puffed. "Perfect timing."

Phantom chuckled and lay down with the others, focusing his gaze on the white dragoness. "Do not worry," he assured her with a calm smile. "We have a deal, me and the little guy," he said, turning his attention to the puppy by his side who was looking at the bigger male with a smile. "I tell him a story on a topic to his liking, and he promises to be good and not disturb us until night comes," and then looked at him with an even more intense look and a stern voice. "And above all not to get out of the cave while we sleep."

The puppy lowered his head and lost the smile. "I wouldn't have done it anyway…" he mumbled, then quickly picked up the smile. "But yes, I promised! So now keep your part of the deal, come on, come on!"

Sonohra looked interested as the two interacted. It was strange to see, but not unwelcome for sure. Licht had a way with dragons and she experienced it first paw herself. Still, Phantom was the one that hinted at the fact that bringing a child with them was a dangerous idea, so she expected him to be the last to offer himself to tell a story when he should be sleeping.

After all, she insisted on bringing him with them, he was her responsibility and that meant also dealing with him during the night, or better day sleeping sessions. Or so she thought.

She was happy her friend didn't leave her with the burden, alone. They didn't have to, but she appreciated it anyway.

The purple dragon turned with a satisfied smile to her. "See? No problem," he explained, proudly. "I tell him the story that we could lose a few minutes of sleep, and then we can sleep more peacefully"

His logic did make sense and it was a better deal than whatever she could get from the little one herself. After a tired sigh, knowing that she had to stay awake for a while longer to sleep better afterward, she nodded her agreement, noting how the puppy's eyes shone with excitement.

"YESSSSS!" he exulted.

Phantom turned to the other dragons. "You can hear the story if you like or go to sleep and hope that the tiredness will be stronger than the annoyance of my words."

"I'm in," said Ahmos from his seat next to the black dragon. "I cannot miss a story."

Kohle merely nodded when the other male looked at him.

Fire looked away from the purple dragon and probably went to sleep. For a moment silence followed as the others noticed the gesture, and the purple dragon kept looking at her. But the moment after he turned to the puppy with a smile.

"Ok, then little one," he said encouragingly. "What will be the subject of our story?"

Sonohra smiled at the sight. She was tired but seeing the purple dragon behaving like that with a little dragon who, though smart, still was a puppy was well... he knew how to be around one little one, and that was something that warmed her heart from the inside.

That's at least until the puppy said those three words that broke the atmosphere and sent the group into complete silence.

"The purple dragon!" he exulted aloud.

For a moment the air in the cave became much tenser, which could be sliced with her lightning-tipped tail. Silence became the master of the place for some interminable second. Fire raised her head from her resting position and pointed her eyes, much more attentive now, at the couple in the center of the room.

"Licht, you're sure- " Phantom tried softly but was stopped by Licht, who looked at him with two wide-puppy-like eyes and begged him.

"Pleaseeeee!"

Phantom looked banned for a moment, not too sure how to continue. He turned his gaze for some help her, asking her with his eyes if he should indulge the puppy's wish or had to fight him back to make him desist and change the subject.

Sonohra thought of it for a moment. While the subject was certainly not the best given the situation, it would not have hurt him to know the true face of the dragon that he had been taught to idolize together with the Empress in the books of his father's library. Or at least, he would have heard two different points of view, and then he could have chosen which way to go from there.

Something instructive could probably come out from this if Phantom played his cards right.

She turned her head slightly to look at the red dragoness. She continued to stand still and silent without giving any sign of wanting to say anything, or protest.

Sonohra decided that for the moment it was safe to go ahead and nodded slowly to the purple dragon who sighed towards the puppy by his side, accepting the task.

"Very well!" he said. "But only one and then you off to sleep, is that clear young dragon?"

Licht nodded vigorously.

"Ok, so," said Phantom. "What I'm going to tell you is more a set of stories from a set of voices that I heard during my travels between one city and another of the empire, and they all spoke about the infamous purple dragon.

"Everyone knows that the current purple dragon was the hero of Warfang, the one who defeated the former Dark Master Malefor. But not everyone knows that the merit was not only his but also of a black dragoness who had accompanied him on all his adventures to the end. Cynder, the former Terror of the Skies, had been raised and corrupted by the dark lord from a young age and had spent years terrorizing the realm until Spyro defeated her.After the war, the black and purple dragons stabilized in Warfang.

The purple dragon's face became darker as he entered more into the story.

"Rumors have it that the empress with her dark elemental powers concentrated all her efforts on corrupting the purple dragon and making him his faithful servant. The black dragoness first set him against the very people he had saved from annihilation and sworn to protect. They had tried in every way to warn their hero to get out of the dark aura that choked him, to let go of the evil dragoness. But Spyro, that is his name, would not have heard any of it, for he was surrounded by the fog that the future empress had created on his eyes to prevent him from seeing the truth of her actions, obfuscating his judgment. Because of that, the time was soon perfect for putting Spyro against his friends."

A growl broke the narrative and Fire was the cause of it. Her eyes ajar, a fierce growl rumbling inside her throat, her teeth showing dangerously to anyone, she didn't seem very pleased with where the story was heading at all.

Sonohra intervened. "Fire," she warned her friend. "Calm down," she tried, this time managing to make the red dragoness turn towards her, no longer focusing her wrath on the purple dragon and her puppy like a predator with her prey. "It's just a story," she said.

Fire answered with a growl. "It's much more than that," she hissed.

Sonohra's eyes were hard as iron as she spoke. "Let him finish," she said, in a race of looks that kept everyone breathless, neither of them seemed interested in giving up the fight.

The red dragoness snorted and looked away first, moving her entire body inwards of the cave and her head towards the corner, away from everyone and everything, closing up and alone.

Sonohra sighed, knowing that Fire was difficult to treat under normal conditions, but now it was perhaps even more difficult so she would have to be careful and strong if she wanted to make sure nothing bad happened to anyone in there, especially Fire herself.

Satisfied by her win, Sonohra nodded to the purple dragon to resume the story. Phantom turned to the hatchling once again, as if nothing happened.

"Where was I? Ah, yes," he said. "It was evident that the black dragoness intended to cut any bond Spyro had with the city. His friends no longer knew how to behave around him and that wasn't but the beginning of it. As she manipulated the purple dragon to work for her, Cynder would have spread havoc in the city at night, using darkness to her means which, thanks to her corresponding dark element, would have been even easier for her misdeeds to be disguised. When people started to come after her for that, she would go to the purple dragon and ask for help from a city that treated her badly and hated her for what she once was. This only created more hatred within the purple dragon's heart towards the city and towards his friends who were betraying him and his love just like anyone else. Episodes of outbursts and violence also multiplied by the purple dragon toward the population and, although he never hurt anyone or the city itself, the tension was palpable. It was visible to everyone that their savior was falling deeper and deeper into the darkness carved out for him by the evil dragoness. For this reason, his friends decided that it was time to ask the Guardians for help.

"Now, leaving aside the parts of the story that surely have been magnified by the population to intensify the myth of the evil monster, I can list some main event that proves the fall of the purple dragon during his last stay in Warfang before..." he stopped for a moment. "Well, we all know what had happened there."

"Licht knows who the Guardians were, but he certainly doesn't know what their real personalities were as his books were not exactly so specific or detailed about that." Intervened Sonohra, after her experience in the Governor's library. "After all, we were not there either, so we can't be sure that what they told us at the base is completely true either."

"But Cyril and Volteer knew their friends," said Ahmos, a confused look on the muzzle. "How could they have told us something wrong?"

"To protect their memory," said Kohle. "Especially when talking about friends, with the pain of the loss, some defect may have escaped their judgment in favor of the merits, a form of respect for their memory."

Sonohra nodded. "Exactly. We can't be sure of anything because we weren't there."

"Why is this important to the story?" asked Licht, evidently eager to return to the story.

"It is important, little one, because you will realize that even if the Guardians here will be represented as good as the Ancestors themselves, while in your book they were personified as destroyers and corruptors of the world and freedom. Probably the truth is in the middle," explained Sonohra. "And we want you to be aware of it as the line between a story and reality is a fine line in this case."

"Wow," booed Ahmos. "When did you get so wise?" he asked almost astonished, before smiling shyly at her. "Not that you weren't before, of course," he babbled embarrassed. "But, you see, I meant where... that is, when..."

Sonohra chuckled and shook her head, as Kohle silenced the blue dragon with an elbow on his side. It was always good to have those too around, she would know it after so many years.

"All right, all right, can we move on?" asked Licht. Then he realized that maybe he had said it too rudely. "Pretty please?" he added, barely containing the excitement.

Phantom chuckled and nodded.

"Guided by hope, the purple dragon's friends went to the guardians, hoping that they could do something for their friend. But the guardians failed. It was too late for that dragon, as their hero became more and more a puppet of the darkness. They failed because they too had their sight obfuscated by the dark evil of the dark dragoness and that was because they had lost their balance; after the death of the fire guardian and their failure to replace him, a chasm had been created in the power of the guardians that would prevent them from any effective action to save the soul of the purple dragon. A soul that unfortunately was already too corrupt and contaminated to be able to go back.

The yellow cub came even closer to the dark purple dragon, completely captured by the story. Sonohra and the other dragons seemed very interested because they had never heard much of these stories down at the base.

"But that is not the end of it,"said the purple dragon, using a tone that tried to create even more expectation in the hatchling. "The purple dragon had a half-brother, whose name was Sparx. He is described as a dragonfly with an annoying character, but still as a hero. He was the one who identified the evil that the black dragoness was corrupting his brother with and he was the one who tried several times to convince him against continuing that relationship.

Spyro did not listen to him but Sparx was a determined brother so he decided that the best thing he could do was to have his big brother open his eyes with evidence. He decided to spy on Cynder in the fulfillment of her misdeeds, hoping to find some evidence for his brother to see the light again.

Unfortunately, he hadn't come to terms with whom he was playing with... and, one night like many others, the young dragonfly must have seen something because it forced the black dragoness, who never dared to kill someone as her plan could have been evident even to the dragon she was trying to corrupt, to decided that it was appropriate to get her claws dirty. She killed Sparx, Spyro's brother, his comrade-in-arms who had accompanied him on all missions during the war."

"Wow man, that isn't possible, right?" interrupted Ahmos, wide-eyed for the shock. "I mean, I know whom we are talking about but that seems too much… even for her"

"You don't know her, Ahmos," pointed out Kohle. "You haven't even seen her once."

"And hope it stays that way," arrived Batch voice for his position guarding the entrance. "It is not a story when people say "see the Empress and you die"

The dragons remained silent at this for a long moment before they could snap out of it.

"So?" pressed the young dragon, not as terrified as the other dragons in the cave.

Phantom visibly shook his head, clearing his mind from whatever he was experiencing into his mind.

"Right," he said. "What we know is that as the sun went up, the dragonfly body broken by a boulder was found in the middle of the road. The boulder detached and fell from the house near which the young dragonfly's body was found and initially some thought that was the true cause of the dragonfly's demise.

Spyro mourned the death of his brother, completely blind now to the truth before his eyes, to the murderer by his side who now possessed his soul. But the guardians, as well as his friends, did not believe the evidence and investigated more. They were convinced, rightly, that the probability calculated by the electricity guardian that a boulder that fell at any time from a house, could hit such a small and agile creature as Sparx in mid-air and then crush it to the ground, was very unlikely.For this reason, leaving the black dragon and purple dragon completely in the dark of their action, the dragons scoured the vicinity, looking for evidence of anything that could explain what happened, and, finally, someone found something...

The attention of all the dragons in the room was focused only and exclusively on the purple dragon. Even the red one had turned slightly to look in the direction of the purple dragon, observant and interested. Each of them hung from his lips and the male seemed to enjoy the drama of the tale, a grin on his muzzle, as if he was himself on the scene, in front of this clue they found.

Licht by his side got even closer, staring at him so intently that if he could, he would have absorbed the story directly from the other dragon's mind to avoid waiting longer.

But Phantom seemed interested in keeping them hung, something Sonohra didn't like at all.

"Come on! Spit it out!" she incited him.

Phantom glanced at her, a tiny but victorious smile on his face. Probably he wanted someone to press for information and she got him what he wanted as he resumed with the same grave expression.

"A dragon print," he said, darkly. "A dragon print written on the dirt on the roof of the house from where the boulder that had crushed the dragonfly had come off! And it wasn't the imprint of any dragon, it was the black dragoness'. The dragons finally had the evidence to frame her once and for all, but at the same time, they were anxious about the purple dragon's possible reaction to his love interest having murdered his brother. But they went on anyway and, the next day the guardians called the black dragon in front of everyone after having collected the whole city, accusing her of murder. She strongly denied it and prepared to seek the support of the purple dragon in the discussion, but the guardians were ready for this and asked her to prove her innocence by climbing onto the roof of the house and then resting her paw on the print that had been left by the murderer. If it had not been the same, they would have owed her in front of the whole city an apology, certainly raising the level of the black dragoness' low reputation. It would have been a good thing for her, one that she would gladly use for her goals, if innocent. But if it turned out to be the other way around...

He stopped again.

"Oh, come on!" whimpered impatiently both Licht and Ahmos at the same time.

"Man, you can't stop like that every single time," said the ice dragon.

"What he said," added Licht.

Sonohra was unhappy about that too and she proved it with a small puff of electricity out of her nose.

Phantom smiled slyly. "Alright, alright, I was just trying to build some tension here," he lamented, before going on. "The footprint matched as expected and, before everyone's eyes, especially those of the purple dragon, Cynder showed her true colors. She was a murderer. She was the murderer of the purple dragon's brother. You think that may be a good thing, but we all know how this story ends. Spyro was beyond recovery by the threads of darkness even to see from a palm from his nose and proclaimed that the clue was rigged, the evidence was false, created by the guardians and his friends to kill the black dragoness and put him against her. The purple dragon was on the verge of attacking, venting even earlier than necessary for his revenge on the dragon city, but surprisingly he was stopped by the black dragoness who, demonstrating her power over the male, not only calmed him down but also convincing him so much of her innocence that the guardians were forced to banish the black dragon instead of killing her for her crimes. The purple dragon left the town with her.

"But this is not forever," concluded Phantom. "Because as we all know a few months later, he came back and... well, he did what he did."

"He destroyed the old city," said Licht.

"That he did, little one," confirmed Phantom.

Licht seemed to think about it for a moment, before speaking. "I'm sorry for him," he said.

"Why do you say that?"

"Well, he was manipulated," he said, sadly. "She used love to put him against everything he ever knew, even killing his brother. I think… I think he was a victim too."

"A victim you say?" intervened suddenly a voice-over. "A victim…" chuckled humorlessly Fire's voice.

The dragons turned to find themselves in front of a red dragoness at the corner that was just rising to her paws. She looked shaky on all fours as if the laugh made her entire bone structure tremble to the scales. Fire stared at the dragons with wide-fiery eyes, two enlarged golden spheres that gave her an insane look.

"A victim, you say?" she said again, now that she had everyone's attention, staring at Licht. "Do you know what he did?"

Sonohra rose from her position, very awake, staring carefully at the other female, a look as hard as stone printed on her muzzle, her voice that mirrored the gaze.

"Fire," she warned her friend out seriously, trying to make the dragoness look away from the puppy who now looked frightened.

But the fire dragoness did not hear or ignore the call. Rather, she made a step forward, her claws unsealed into the ground beneath her, protesting that it had been pierced with an audible creak in the tense silence of the cave.

"Fire!" she yelled this time, but still she got no reaction.

"The Great Purple Dragon!" she shouted, her voice trembling with rage. "Spyro, the Great Savior!" she rose her head and throw it back into a desperate laugh.

At this display, Sonohra began to worry. She approached Licht intending to position herself between him and the female. When the red dragon looked down at her laugh, she didn't seem too surprised to find someone else in front of her. Sonohra stood out like a shield in front of her goal, a warning growl on her muzzle. She didn't want to hurt her friend, but she didn't want to have Licht hurt by her either.

But Fire didn't even seem to notice the change, or maybe she didn't care, because she kept talking like before, making slow strides ahead with no sign of being scared of what would come. Her smile, however, faded and it was replaced by a growl of fury and a grimace of anger that dominated her features as she came forward like a predator among the vegetation.

"The victim brutally betrayed the trust of the Guardians and that of his friends,"

Another step forward.

"The victim trusted an evil psychopath dragoness who didn't hesitate to use him for his power to take over the Realm,"

One more step.

She was getting closer and Sonohra growled again her warning, but Fire continued undaunted, her gaze empty in front of her as if she could overcome the flakes of her white friend and see the prey behind.

Here her disgust seemed to be increased, her growl even higher in volume and intensity.

"The victim butchered thousands of innocents among dragons, cheetahs, moles, and other creatures, because he is a monster"

A violent hiss, an omen of the impending attack.

"And among them, there was my father!" she cried. "That's, that's what he did!" she yelled as she leaped forward to attack, but found herself facing a wall of white scales, that intercepted the trajectory of the red female, ending up in a pile of claws, jaws, wings, and tails on the floor.

The dragons were all watchful. Ahmos and Kohle rose from their position, and even their guide, Batch raised his head from his position guarding the entrance to check that the situation was manageable. Phantom remained to protect Licht who hid between his paws, covering him with a wing from the vision of Sonohra blocking Fire on the floor, trying to avoid the sharp and lethal jaws and claws that each time lashed out at her face.

Fire did not win, but despite being blocked by her friend, she seemed not to see anything but red. Fire continued to kick, bite, and clawed, trying to hit something with enough force and get the blood out, slaughter, destroy, or anything that would allow her to vent these emotions once and for all from her system. Sonohra, above her, did her best to avoid her friend's blows while trying to prevent the red one herself from getting hurt with her senseless blows.

Soon the fuel provided by anger and hatred seemed to run out and her movements became slower, less vigorous, and tears began to break the barrier of her tight eyelids, gliding inevitably out, her fierce growl turned into desperate sobs.

Finally, she burst into a loud cry. A cry like Sonohra's had never heard from her before. Fire's body trembled to the rhythm of her sobs and deep breaths after desperate screams, leaving her shattered and broken under the white dragoness' grip.

Sonohra was fast to respond to this.

She laid down against her, wrapping her entire figure with her paws, tightening her tail around Fire's, rubbing her snout on the fire dragoness' head to calm her down, leaving a void at neck height, a warm and safe spot where the red female immediately positioned her muzzle, to hide her groans and tears, to hide from the evil world that had left her in misery. Finally, she wrapped all her sobbing figure with her white wings, hiding her from view and the world.

Sonohra didn't even realize how much her friend was suffering from her past. She spent all her life hiding those emotions from them all, even from her, that it was difficult to assess what the fire dragoness kept bottled inside her all that time. She knew there were problems in her past, she knew that those problems were awakened again after their little trip in Warfang, but she didn't expect her friend, a strong and determined dragoness to get like this. She knew Fire very well, she knew her high and low points in life, but she would have never dreamt of assisting to a point so low in her life. She seemed like every time she reached the bottom of the barrel, but with each new crisis, she went ever deeper, wondering if there was indeed a bottom to get to.

"My father…" she whined, her voice drear because of the screams. "I never get to- to…" she stammered among the sobs inside the protective shell of the white female.

She squeezed around her even more, hoping to shelter her from the evils of reality.

"Shhhhh," Sonohra silenced. "I have you."

Fire seemed unable to fight her. She didn't even seem able to do a thing. In a matter of seconds, probably thanks to the white nest she created around the red female, Fire was asleep in no time.

Everyone silently returned to their previous position. Ahmos and Kohle lying down to sleep now at the side of the cave; Batch guarding the entrance; Phantom took Licht between his paws after a nod from the white female to care for him this night; and finally, to the site of their confrontation Sonohra, covering her friend in a white cocoon with shades of red, protecting her from the dangers of the world at least for that night.

Sonohra looked at the slightest of moments. No one spoke, there were no thoughts about what had just happened, nothing to say. Everyone got as comfortable as possible in that cave and closed their eyes to take some rest.

She looked at Fire, kissed her friend on top of her head and she repeated her promise. "I have you."

At least for that night.

MDT - MDT - MDT

A set of scratching and metallic noises stung at the border of her conscience, bringing her out of the darkness and into the world again. When she opened her eyes, Phaya's world immediately was spinning and she was forced to close them tightly again. Initially, it didn't seem very effective, as the world outside felt like it was spinning nonetheless, but with each passing second, it began fixing itself until the orange dragoness felt enough confident in opening her eyes to the world again without the risk of throwing up.

She wished she woke up in the first place and the bile was making its way up her throat even if the world stopped spinning.

She was in that strange cave with the giant crystals dangling from the ceiling, the wooded-stained table at the center of the room, and the black dragoness that was fumbling with boxes containing different kinds of metal things according to the sound.

Even if the bodies of their children were nowhere to be found, she felt her hope being crushed brutally by the reality of her situation. A situation she hoped, probably flattered by her time in the other world, was only just a nightmare, a bad and sick dream.

But when the mad dragoness rose from her position with a strange metallic thing in her paw, a triumphant and sadistic smile on her muzzle, her very heart fell into her stomach and her eyes started to weep automatically.

She must have left a desperate sob of two escape her control, for the Empress turned her emerald eyes on her, acknowledging the fact that she was now awake. A twisted smile broke her delicate and feminine features, while her eyes shone with an otherworldly light, something even scarier than her sneer.

That expression was so wrong, in more than only one way. It was a level of madness no dragon or living creature should possess, especially not the most powerful dragoness in the world, the very head of the government that ruled over them all.

It was furiously wrong, deviating and Phaya instinctively tried to move away from it, to flee, to avoid watching back, but her restraints kept her in place, paws, and neck, and she could go nowhere, no matter whom she tried.

The Empress approached her, her smirk obscuring the atmosphere.

"Oh, don't cry," she said, her voice sounding like the one of a mother scolding ironically her children while she used her other paw to delicately clean the tears from her cheeks. "I haven't done a thing yet, and you're still intact!" she pointed out as if it was a new one.

Unexpectedly her expression darkened from one moment to the other, her eyes becoming vacuous and unconcentrated as she whispered, more to herself than to her. "I had a… thing to deal with." Then her expression changed again, turning back to her smiling and cruelly ironical one. "But it is all done now and so I've returned as fast as I could to begin our experiment."

Phaya would have been shocked by the sudden change if it wasn't for a strange thing the black dragoness was now moving toward her. It was a metal object with eight little metal paws, and a central body made of a strange violet gem. It looked like a spider, and it sent automatically shivers down the dragoness' spine. It was as if her body could assess, even without knowing it, that it was dangerous for her and her self-preservation.

"NO!" she shouted, her trying to force her restraints to escape, to move away from that thing, but failing in the process. "Get that thing away from me!" she cried again when the first time went unheard.

But the Empress wasn't complaining and her fear alongside her self-preservation took over altogether and she began to charge a fireball in her mouth to blast that thing away from her. But she couldn't even start to open her mouth when an agonizing pain broke throughout her whole body out of nowhere sending her completely into a blackout, her screams of agony barely registered by her mind which went out for a moment before restarting, her pain diminishing, her vision and sense blurred and dumbed, her whole body itching for a fire that was expiring but left behind it a painful burn.

Her ears barely managed to register the voice of the other dragoness as she spoke. "I wouldn't do that if I were you," she said, uninterested as she pass with that strange item, now alive with a violent intermittent light, throughout her whole body looking for something. "I designed those strings to make dragons completely helpless as every time you try to use your element, it will absorb your power, repaying you with immense pain."

The fire dragoness grunted, still numb in her body and veiled in her mind, speaking slurredly. "W-What…" she grimaced in pain as she moved her jaw too fast. "What…are you…doing?" she managed to breathe.

The Empress rose her head to meet their eyes, and from the look of it, she seemed thrilled at the idea of explaining exactly that.

"I called this a seeker" she smiled as she showed the confused dragoness the spider-like item, sudden excitement in her voice as she described the thing. "It is made of a metal body which can connect with a convexity core, channeling the convexity energy through its little, tiny paws," she explained, contently. "Together these two can find energy sources, and the crystal will blip with violet energy as near it is to the source. When the light on top of it remains stable, then we are right on top of the source." She nodded to herself, seeming satisfied with her explanation. "I can use this to find the exact position of your energy core."

That last sentence attracted the attention of the dragoness and she managed to fight the numbness in her system enough to babble. "M-my w-wh-what?"

The Empress didn't seem troubled by the question as she returned to work, moving that thing along her whole body, following intensely the blipping light on it. "The energy core," she repeated.

She opened her eyes wide, shocked. She wasn't ignorant and she spent some time alone in her house when her children were younger, reading a large number of books to cheat time. She was a very curious dragoness and she liked to range over different subjects, from history to science, from how to cook a cake to how to correctly fight against another living being.

She read a book about dragons once. It was a book with an old cover, ruined by the passage of time and disuse that she found in the library of the capital when she went there as a young and unmated dragoness. The book's conditions immediately aroused her interest. She didn't understand why the book was so damaged and abandoned, so she took it and the librarian said she could keep it since no one seemed interested in reading it anyway.

When she read it she understood why:

It was a series of crazy things about the physiognomy and elemental powers of dragons, and all scientific and biological things about dragons called eugenics. The author babbled about DNA, dragon's superiority over all the other species, and why nature had created them as they were. At the core of his theory, there was that thing, the energy core, all dragons possessed to connect them with the elements of the world, making them the true sons and daughters of the earth and so the only ones that could rightfully rule over it.

It was a theory. A stupid one, for instance, and she found nothing about an energy core in dragons in no medical book she went to read after that.

And now that dragoness, the head of the Empire out of anyone, was convinced about the same thing a furiously mad author of a century ago theorized.

"T-there is no en-energy core!" she tried to scream the dragoness out of her madness, but she still couldn't articulate batter for her jaws hurt. "I-It is a theory, and not a verified one."

The Empress rose again to meet her eyes, her expression empties this time. "I know that," she said coldly as she bored unexpressive emerald eyes into orange ones. "I searched for it for a long time and I found nothing, no matter how I tried."

She returned to her work again and keep talking while she continued her search. "But there must be something of the like, called energy core or whatever you want to call it that allows dragons to wield elemental power," she said, sounding confident about the matter. "It is the same thing this seeker is attracted by, or it wouldn't work the way it does."

The black dragoness kept passing her strange piece of machinery all over her body, following so close to the violet light and its intermittence as a moth would be by the dangerous light of the fire. The seeker blipped through her neck, her front and hinder paws, blipping faster when the other dragoness passed it over her chest. The Empress consequently concentrated her efforts over that part of her body, and keep searching, while she was forced to just look helplessly as if the body wasn't hers.

The light became stronger on the left side of her chest, and then it stopped blipping and became a stable purple torch when the item was perfectly over the part of her chest where her heart should be.

The black dragoness smiled as she rose her head to meet her eyes again, wearing an I told you to look.

"You see?" she said smugly, showing her dangerous teeth to her and sending shivers down her spine. "There is an energy core."

Then she moved it from her chest and the thing started blipping again. She positioned it over her heart and it stopped, as over again to demonstrate her point.

"It is just a theory, but a verified one," she pointed out, smiling victoriously. "For if I move this away from your core," and doing this she moved the thing down toward her stomach. "It will continue its blipping unless-"

She stopped dead when the seeker, that started to blip again when she moved it away from her heart, stopped blipping again but this time over her stomach. The black dragoness seemed as stuck by this as she was and it was evident when she faded in finishing her last sentence.

"…unless there is another core."

The silence fell over the torture room and the orange dragoness avoided even the least movement. She didn't want to incite some violent or mad reaction from the other dragoness since things were not going as she had planned, and she seemed unstable enough to change from calm to violent in a beat of wings.

"This is not possible," she murmured to herself. "All the evidence shows that there is only one single core in every dragon and every cavy seemed to respect that rule." She rose her head to meet her stare again, her look confused, emerald eyes scanning orange for an answer that she hadn't

"Why?" she asked her voice something more than a whisper. "Why are you different?"

Phaya remained silent but the other dragoness didn't seem to require a real answer from her, as her eyes became distant, probably as she retired to the back of her mind to think about the matter.

That was her moment.

That was the moment for her to try something. She knew that there wouldn't be another occasion, since the dragoness seemed distant enough not to pay real attention to what her prisoner was doing, and she was quite sure that another one or two hours with the dragoness and she wouldn't have enough vital strength to do anything.

It wasn't important that she also knew that the dragoness was strong enough not to let her go. She must try something new. At least, she would have the possibility to stand and fight instead of dying like some guinea pig in an unknown laboratory.

Phaya looked frenetically around her position, trying to find something that could be useful to her escape. But there wasn't anything of real use if not the box the black dragoness grind inside looking for her evil items of torture. Moreover, she was tied up vertically on the wall, strung with some strange, cursed string that forced her not to use her elemental power to try and escape.

Everything was secured by the strings to the wall: her front and hinder paws, her neck, all she needed was to have also her tail tied…

She opened her eyes wide at the thought.

Her tail!

She tried it to be sure and she felt that her tail wasn't tied up to the wall like the rest of her, but it was left hanging from her rear. It means that her tail was free. Free!

It was not a lot but it was a beginning. She could use her tail, especially her tail pointed and sharp tail tip to do something.

She sent another glance to the dragoness in front of her that seemed completely switched off, gone, her emerald eyes foggy and dull as if her body was there but her soul was somewhere else.

Soul, she huffed in her mind. As if the dragoness had a soul.

She didn't waste time and she immediately tried to use her tail to cut the string that kept her hindered legs in place. It was the nearest place her tail could go to, and she poked and stabbed it as strong as she could, but it seemed all useless. The string didn't lose, didn't tear or rip, and it didn't even seem damaged by her tail assault.

It was impossible! How could a string be so strong? What was it made of?

She tried to use her tail to reach for the box on the ground next. Maybe in there, she could find something evil but useful to break those things. After all, it was the same maleficent objects the Empress used, so they could be compatible in some ways.

But it was useless since the box was too far from her reach and her tail was too short to grab it anyway.

But the fire dragoness was anything but one to give up so easily. She changed her tactic and tried to use her tail against the wall to push her body from it. She hoped that somehow the strings, which didn't seem bound around her paws, would slip over her when she reached a good distance from it.

It was a desperate try but she had to do something! She had to escape! She had to know what happened to her last child!

Maybe the Empress was lying.

Maybe she was still alive and in need of her help.

She had to know!

But no matter how much she tried, how much she forced the strings to leave her, how much she risked her very paws to be ripped in between the pressure. They weren't granting her anything, keeping her tied tightly as if she wasn't even trying.

And to make it all worse, before her very eyes, the Empress was returning from whatever place she retired to. Her newly satisfied expression, her malevolent smile, did nothing but send fear throughout her entire system.

She just hoped she didn't see her trying to escape.

"I think I know what it is," she casually said after a long silence between them, using her instrument again over her stomach until she found the place where it stopped blipping.

The Empress looked at her with a twisted smile. "Tell me, weren't enough for you three hatchlings and one on its way? You needed another one?"

Initially, Phaya looked confused at the words of the black dragoness. She didn't understand what the mad dragoness meant and for a moment she thought the other dragoness had completely gone out of her mind, but the more she looked into that malicious and amused smile, the more she understood what the other female was implying.

She gasped when she got it. "I-I…" she tried to say, too shocked to say much more "I-"

How could it be possible? Was the black dragoness lying? After all, her mate died soon after she had their last egg and after that.

She opened her eyes wide when she remembered.

The night her mate died she went to the nearest village when her children were sleeping, and she tried to suffocate her pain with alcohol. When it didn't work, a nice dragon came by and she…

"No…" she whispered.

The Empress laughed. A real, amused, laugh at her expenses.

"You are the best subject I could find!" she said, sounding truthful in her words. "I was looking for a dragon on which I could do my experiment, and then I could try some on your egg." Her eyes shone with barely contained excitement while she spoke. "But now, I have a pregnant dragoness before my eyes on which I could do both in one session!"

Her blood froze into her very veins at the words, a primordial fear striking throughout her body, electrocuting her heart and sending shivers along her whole limbs. Fear was surrounding her, blurring her vision and making her tremble at the perspective, as her heart started to pump frenetically the blood and her breath started to get heavy as she felt her lungs contract less than they should be.

Fear was taking over and was about to swallow her into darkness.

If it wasn't…

If it wasn't for a little light that lit in the surrounding darkness, defying it with its brightness.

She concentrated on this as best as she could to save herself from the obscure void she seemed destined to and the more she concentrated on it, the more the light seemed reinvigorated by her attention, becoming stronger and brighter with each passing second.

In the blink of an eye, the small light in the dark became a hot, boiling, blazing, and burning fire, feeding on darkness to expand itself until it took its place of it in all the right places: her lungs, her limbs, her heart. They were all boiling with pure enraged fire that through her heart started to spread through her veins in her blood, wiping out the fear in her whole body, and taking its place.

She knew what it was, in her orange bright eyes was engraved the name of the new emotion that took the place of the primordial fear.

Anger.

Hot, boiling anger.

First, she lost her parents and community when she freely decided to follow her heart and love a dragon which was considered to be a freak by the village. This forced her and her mate to start a life away from everything and everyone in the forest. There, they created their home, but her mate was rarely there with her as he was a Resistance sympathizer and he often helped when needed to sabotage the Empire, going away at night and not coming back for entire days with her not even knowing where he was or if he was alive for her security. Because of this, she was forced to remain alone in a scarcely populated periphery of a small village, distant from the Empire reaching, and with three children to look after. Initially, they were her new reason to live, her new happiness, but soon they started to grow, making questions about how they couldn't go to the near village, they couldn't go to school, they couldn't go out of the forest and play with other dragons of their same age.

It was heartbreaking for her to lie to them and be severe to them about not going to the village, not speaking with other dragons or creatures at all, only limiting themselves in seeing the others from a safe distance, hidden in the grass.

Every passing year it became more difficult for her until all her world crumbled when her mate didn't return from its last mission for the Resistance. A mole appeared on her door one day, giving her the news, speaking with a sad expression and tone of voice, saying to her that he died a hero, fighting for freedom and her and her children.

But whatever he fought for he was dead, leaving her more alone than ever, with three grown children and the fourth one on its way, as a single mother living alone in the forest.

Then…then all of this happened and her already spiraling down life, rushed down towards the bottom, without any possibility of rising again.

Phaya gritted her teeth trying to contain her anger and hate toward everything and everyone. The world, the dragons, the Ancestors…

Life has been nothing but suffering for her, and the only things she held dear to her heart were brought away from her in blood.

She lost everything, including the right to dispose of her body as she wanted. The Empress was trying to turn her into a useless guinea pig for her experiments, and she knew that her very life was the last thing this life and the black dragoness were going to take away from her.

But she had no intention of facing it passively this time, letting the dragoness and life torture her until she died a painful and bad death.

She wasn't going to go down without putting up a fight.

She wasn't going to face death head down as she lived all this time.

No, she knew she was going to die…she just needed to choose how she would join the Ancestors up there.

And she planned to put up a show for them all to see. To see that she had changed, that the desperation and anger she felt was everything that was left and that was because of them: life, nature, the evilness of dragons, and the apathy of the Ancestors.

Against life and nature, she could do nothing.

About the Ancestors…she made a note to curse them as soon as she joined them and they won't hear the end of it if she will have her way.

About the evilness of dragons…well, she had the physical representation of this just in front of her, the evil ruler of the evil organization suffocating all that was good in the world, the evil dragoness that had killed her whole family in cold blood.

There wasn't a better response for all that was gone bad in the world and her life.

It was her occasion! She could take her vengeance before dying.

She made her decision.

Time slowed at her command. She had her target right in front of her, the smug smile still imprinted in that evil muzzle of hers. She must be swift, the Empress was a skilled dragoness, but she wouldn't surely expect anything of the sort from a prisoner like she was. She just needed to be fast in the execution. A fast movement or her sharp pointed tail and before the black dragoness could even blink, she would find her neck torn apart, open for her malicious blood to flow out and stain the floor, depriving her of her life energy little by little as she was doing with her before life will leave her eyes and body as it happened with her children.

It was perfect. It was right. One thing going right in her whole life.

She moved her tail giving a push with her rear to give it momentum, a vengeful smile already printed on her muzzle as she could already feel the satisfaction of her tail cutting through black scales. She was hers now!

Unless…

Unless what she would feel next was not the satisfaction of her vengeance finally coming true, but the unbearable pain of teeth embedded in her tail's flakes. Phaya howled out of pain, something she never felt before, never even considered someone could feel so much pain. A rush of pain from her tail directly to her brain, blurring her vision and making her eyes water.

But she managed to look down enough to see what was happening, why her plan wasn't successful, why the black dragoness wasn't dying before her very eyes, choking in her blood.

And what she saw through her blurred eyes, now wide-open, was enough to wipe away her anger and hate and be replaced once more by primordial fear.

The Empress was down there, having intercepted the path of her tail she must have somehow avoided her attack and made one of her own, biting her tail with her bare teeth, sinking them deep into her scales and beyond her skin, breaking bones and spilling blood.

But what scarred the fire dragoness, even more, was the look on the other dragoness' face: she seemed like a hell hound, her pupil so expanded as to cover the emerald with black, two black holes so bright and dilated with bloodlust, that she looked like she was going to dine on her.

And she seemed intentioned too.

The wild dragoness was sinking her teeth even deeply and like a rabid animal, she seemed ready to pull and tear her tail out of her own body.

"N-No…" she whispered.

Phaya was too full of pain and fear to even manage a full cry when the dragoness broke the bone, sliced the meat, and then ripped off her tail completely from her body.

Her scream was otherworldly as it was the agony she was feeling. Warm blood was leaking fast and splashing from the place where her tail have been until some moments earlier, now just a bloody stump. Phaya gritted her teeth together so much that some of them snapped, while others jumped straight out of her mouth at the same time she pulled and waved pointlessly against the strings that kept holding her in place, preventing her from doing anything, not even the most basic and instinctive of them all, taking her tail leftovers to her chest and gently cradle it…

Concentrating her watery eyes on the dragoness in front of her, she found the Empress looking as mad and wild as she has ever seen a dragon before. The black dragoness was drinking the blood slipping from her tail, accompanying it all with a loud and disgusting sound.

It was sickening and she felt like she would throw up if it wasn't for her stomach to be completely out of both food and water for days. But the sensation of it did come to her anyway and she quickly found herself with a horrible, sour taste in her mouth, which made her shake even more than the loss of blood was already.

The Empress spit the leftover of her tail on the ground, her muzzle and teeth stained with crimson blood as she smirked in her direction, emerald eyes glittering with madness. But that look didn't remain on her too much, as it moved away from her and to her side.

"You do not have to worry," she said, her voice sounding halfway between exalted and irritated. "I won't let her die. I need her."

Phaya hadn't the physical or mental capabilities to comment or even think about that scene in front of her. She was completely blinder by pain, her throat was dry and sour and she couldn't articulate words and even if she could, she wouldn't say to the unstable dragoness that had just ripped off her tail that she was completely crazy, talking alone with the ghosts of her mind.

She did already understand the lesson.

Abruptly her head started to feel dizzy and light, her eyelids were closing heavily of their own will, and her pain started to lessen, leaving her numb in all parts of her body because of the blood loss.

She was dying and she knew it.

The Empress approached her muzzle with her own, a smile imprinted on her face. Phaya didn't know if the other dragoness looked distorted in her expression because of her dizziness or because the Empress was looking so twisted. But as she was fading away, she tried not to think her last thought of the ugly face she was seeing in front of her now, rather she preferred thinking about her beautiful children in their best moments, happy moments.

Images started to flow in her mind and before her eyes replacing the memories of broken and bloody bodies with memories of warm-hearted smiles, sweet laughter, and intimate cuddles.

A lonely, single tear left the prison of her almost closed eyes, running down her cheeks and accumulating on her jaw. If she could, she would have smiled. That was exactly what she hoped to see.

Until a sharp claw got her tear, cleaning it before it could be called from the gravity and be gone on the ground, speaking with the same tone of voice you would expect from a demon from the deepest part of the underground hell.

"Don't give up like that, my dear, we aren't done yet," said the voice she recognized but failed to identify as she closed her eyes and started to fade away, attracted by the black void of unconsciousness.

The same voice accompanied her down the road until there was nothing else.

"We have barely begun."