The walls around the Dragon city were built out of marble. The Dragons, maybe millions of years ago, decided to build a society for themselves. There was a rumor that the Felines had brought them ancient scriptures that predicted the way of the future would be through the advancing of their technology, and so the Dragons left the skies and cliffs they once lived on and moved to the ground. They still were, in all ways, Draconic. They still set out in war parties against the Demons, still held the old prejudices against the other races and regarded the Hedgehogs with a desperate paranoia. The marble that made up the walls also lined the hallways and walls of most of the houses the race lived in, although Zack only knew this from what he had been told.
In truth, no Hedgehog had entered the Dragon city in all probability since it had been built. It wasn't that they weren't allowed, it was just that the co-mingling of Dragons and other races was frowned upon very seriously. Zack knew that if he stepped through those gates, he was going to be opening himself up to any number of abuses. That wasn't what particularly worried him.
It was the Bird. The nameless gold feathered Bird that was now following him aimlessly that he worried for. The Dragons had been known to keep in league with the Angels from time to time, and if it was during one of those times of alliance, the Bird could be killed outright. The Hedgehog looked over his shoulder, concious of the fact that his spikes were just slightly raised along his spine. It was the pain left over from what the Striped Ones had done that was making that happen, he knew. He could feel the dragging sensation in his leg when he walked, limping even though he tried not to. He felt it all the way up the back of his throat, slick and bumpy like crocodile scales and making him nausous. But he wouldn't say anything about the pain. He had to get to the Dragon city with what he knew, despite how he felt right now.
The Bird followed at a hobbling pace. The avians were not designed for ground travel, their gait on hind legs awkward and no more suited for keeping pace with a limping Hedgehog than doing high kicks. Birds could run, quite well, doubled up with their taut leg muscles. They could fly, and they could hop for short distances. But the gold bird was having a very difficult time keeping up with Zack. That bothered him about the Hedgehog more than the fact that he had taken control of this situation, more than the fact that he had been kissed against his will. It was that he, having no where else to be and nothing to do, found himself drawn in naturally to follow, to be part of a flock. And the Hedgehog was moving at a pace that he could not keep with comfortably.
Looking back at the Bird, Zack grimaced. "Keep up. You can see the city from here, if you look."
The Bird was angry that he kept waiting up for him. It was worse when Zack would stop at the top of a hill, or on the edge of the forest, and look back expectantly. Like he was doing now. The feathers on the edge of the Bird's wings trembled indignantly. "You still haven't said anything about why we're going," he snapped irritably, hopping the rest of the way towards where the Hedgehog now waited. "You had better say somethi-"
He cut his own sentance short, seeing the marbled walls of the Dragon city now that he had reached the same spot where Zack stood. The rough rock barely tinted with its colours, unpolished and facing outward was something all Birds understood from the time they were young. Dragons were not their allies. Dragons, in fact, would often collect Birds and sell them to the Angels for a reward. The dark shingled roofs that peered over the walls reflected nothing but heat, the air above the city shivering with the heat of the entire population of the fire-breathing race. The Bird wheeled on the Hedgehog, whose dark blue eyes reflected very slightly the wall and city behind the avian. He stared at those eyes for no more than a half second before bringing his left wing up, to the side, forward and in a violent arch against the Hedgehog's face, the feather's rough edges slicing into flesh.
Birds were not helpless. In air, they not only used their hind claws, but the edges of their wings had evolved peculiarly- the feathers there consisted not of the same soft, flexable material as the ones on the rest of their wings and backs but of a tougher, most deffinitly sharper substance. They were equiped with natural blades, as Zack found out quite abruptly as his right eye beheld a tiny arch of crimsion following the Bird's wing upward, and he felt a sudden stinging against the left side of his face.
"What..." Zack tried to open his left eye, and could feel the eyelids moving, but in a way that was entirely incorrect. It made his stomach sink down to his knees. There was still no light, no shape, no sight in that eye. He covered the eye with his hand, closing his palm around the socket gingerly, feeling what had to be blood trickling along the base of his palm. It was cooling slowly, hard to sense, still almost body tempurature. The Bird took no notice. "What the hell was that for?" He spat at the avian and took a swipe with his right hand, the digging claws missing the Bird widely, his aim thrown off.
"I'm no slave of yours," the Bird snapped back at him, lowering his head and arching his spine, the primary feathers on his wings splayed dangerously. "And there is no way I'm following you in there."
Zack was furious. The spikes on his back were rattling against eachother, and he could feel the stinging of his left eye increasing. He tried not to move it in the socket, not to blink, but it was impossiable. The pain flared no matter what he did. His digging claws dug into his scalp as he tried to ignore it. "You could have just said that! You could have just DAMN WELL said that! You didn't need to bloody blind me you stupid Bird! What's wrong with you?!" He took another swipe, with no more success than the first. This time, however, the Bird's eyes lost their slitted edge.
"I know the way the Dragons work," he muttered quietly, the edges of his feathers ruffling in warning still. "I-"
With his other hand, Zack grabbed at his forehead and let out a sound of frustrated rage, doubling down as if he would bang his head on something, if there was anything there. The blood trickled between his claws and spattered lightly on the grass at his feet. "You stupid fucking Bird! You think I don't? The Dragons are the only ones who can give me some answers, though, don't you get that? Or are you Birds so braindead you don't even know when the earth itself is being messed around with?!" He dropped his right hand, his body slouched over and panting, one eye upturned desperately towards the avian now, pleeding. "You can't be that dense..."
The Bird's shoulders dropped slightly, his feathers coming togther in a more relaxed way, his head lifting up again. He was begining to regert what he had just done, although he could not altogether understand why. The Hedgehog was going to put them both into clear danger, and as much as he found himself lacking at the moment for a survival instinct, he wasn't feeling outright suicidal. But... What was the ground-dweller talking about? "I...don't know what you're talking about. You never said anything."
Zack straightened, still holding his claws around his injured eye. He could feel the surface of the skin around his eye and palm growing slightly sticky as the blood began to clot on the edges. With gritted teeth, he glared through one eye at the golden Avian. "Well excuse me for assuming you had some clue about what makes our world work. Don't you Birds know anything about Matter?" He watched through a dizzying half-world as the Bird shook his head. With his left eye injured and held shut, the golds of the Bird seemed tinted with fire. He sighed. "Look...I'll explain this to you simply. Think of our world like a field after it's snowed. Now, think of your life like a footprint in the snow. It's fleeting, there's a long generation behind it, and there'll be more before it. When spring comes, or another snow falls, you'll disappear. That's our life, in comparission to the field. Do you understand?" He waited until the Bird slowly nodded his head, taking an awkward sidestep away from where he had held his ground, ready to fight. Zack scratched his skull idolly with the tips of his claws, careful not to move his hand away from the injured eye. He still didn't know how deeply or badly he was cut, and the last thing he wanted was to be picking up bits of his own eyes from the grass. "Right...well. If you're the print, then something had to make you, you understand? That something is the Matter. Matter exists on this world long after we do, and has long before we do, and we never really can understand it or see it, because we can't get close enough. Terra stones, Materia...whatever you Birds call them. That's what Matter is, in a physical form. It's got great power," He tapped a claw in the air, "But it's not meant for fighting. It's not natural for Matter to destory its footprints. It can't, really, it'll only make more. However the Striped Ones got that Materia to be used against people...was deffintily not good."
The Bird, following slowly, looked to the side and the ground a moment before venturing to open his mouth. The Hedgehog spotted him at first, and he stuttered, trying not to sound any more ignorant than he was already. "So...I am a print in the snow?"
Zack shook his head. "Metaphoricly. You, here, standing in front of me, yes. You're a print in the snow, and you'll be gone someday. But Matter doesn't disappear. There's a part of you that you can't see, and you can't control, because it's much bigger than you and more powerful. But it is still you, you are just a part of it. That's what the Terra Stones are. That bigger thing."
"How do you know-"
"We live underground," Zack sucked air between his teeth, feeling a row of spikes rise as the sting in his eye sharpened. He doubted the Dragons would be willing to lend a helping hand, but if he didn't get it taken care of soon...He didn't want to think on it. "The stones grow in the ground, way deeper than you can dig from the topsoil. Hedgehog cities have been digging further and further downwards since we were first brought into this world. So we've known about the stones for a while now...That's why everyone's afraid of us. They know what the stones mean."
The Bird shook his head. "It should be impossiable. The Striped Ones...The shouldn't have been able to even-"
"Touch the stone, unless it was one of their own. That's right. Now you know why I have to see the Dragons." He sighed, gingerly trying to move his hand away from his eye slightly, making light sounds of pain when he felt the air hit the wound. Deciding against it, he closed his claws around the eye socket again. "The stones honestly aren't meant to be moved, or touched. Hedgehogs watch them, but we don't interfear. We never break them, never pull them out of the rock. Whatever the Striped Ones are doing, it's seriously dangerous."
Silent, digging his claws into the soft soil, the Bird adjusted his wings against his back and looked down. Creatures of the air knew nothing of the things that went on underground, but he suddenly felt that because of this they, the Birds, were woefully unprepared for whatever would lie ahead. "I see."
"You see?"
"...Yes."
"Then do you see why you shouldn't have damn well cut my eye apart?" Zack took a third, equally misaligned swipe at the Bird, who this time ducked his head down in response, even though the blow came nowhere close to landing. Despite his pain and despite the Bird's previous attitude, he couldn't help himself and smirked lightly. "Not like you knew..." He turned back towards the Dragon city, watching the shadows of the day passing over the walls. "Why are you following me, anyway?"
"You told me we had to move. So I did."
Zack shook his head, his arm starting to ache from holding position over his eye so long. "You had the choice to turn around and fly home. We aren't that far from the mountains. You are a mountain Bird, right?" The Avian nodded, but said nothing. "So? Why don't you just fly back? It's dangerous if you stay."
Again, the Bird said nothing, only kept his eyes downturned in silence. Zack watched him through one eye, his footclaws scratching into the dirt. "I heard Birds were survivalists." The Avian looked up at that. He continued. "You don't seem too concerned with staying alive."
Silence continued to prowl in the air between them, the Bird boring his cold blue eyes into the earth-dweller. It seemed far too long before he spoke, both of them growing aware of the urgency with which they had to reach the city. It would be night soon. "I should be dead. To my people, I am."
"So you're following me?"
"What you said..." The Bird looked to the side, his eyes avoidant. "What you called me. Why I stayed with you. I don't understand it. I don't understand why. But I can't ignore it."
Zack dug his claws deeper into the earth, watching the Bird until the golden creature's eyes turned back towards him, waiting for their response. "We're footsteps," Zack spoke evenly, his voice feeling oddly devoid of emotions as he spoke, especially considering what he found himself saying. "Whether in packs or in pairs, we were never meant to go alone."
Staring at eachother in the dimming light, the Bird and the Hedgehog were aware of something that, as Zack had said, was much larger than themselves. They were but an extention, a residue, and had no true power. The feeling of it echoed outwards, a surreal ripple that trapped the two of them inside its rings. The first few gusts of the nightfall winds began to blow on the outskirts of the Dragon city, the two beings siloutted against the horizon.