Author's Note: Urp! Sorry this chapter was delayed @_@ I've been pretty sick and alot of activities have been going around school (last week so of course, teachers want to make us suffer one last time -_-;;;) Anyway, here's the third chapter and seriously Tiger, a 35-chapter novel o_0 YOWZA! It'll take me a long time to read though...
P.S. I have made this chapter extra long a bit to make up for inactivity :)
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"What the freak?!" yelped the puffin zoanthrope.
"GANGWAY!!" roared a buffalo zoanthrope, charging away from falling debri.
"By my word, WHAT THE HELL IS THAT!!!"
Kris the Dragon sent a powerful gust straight to the cowering zoanthropes around her, sending backwards in one fell swoop. Screeching in pain and unknown anger, she pounced out of the burning wreckage, half flapping to get clear of the building.
Tripping and tumbling on her ungainly legs, handicapped by having one holding Xan, she fell onto the cool grass, her wings crumpled to her sides and breath coming heavily as her immense chest suffered from the pressure. Steam rose around her as the cool dewdrops on the grass sizzled from her red-hot scales.
Her talons unclasped into a loose grip and Xan rolled out and away. A baboon ran to his side.
"Xan! Xan! Come on Xan!" Tean said, patting Xan's face hard but not painfully.
"Whe...wha...wha?" Xan garbled, his eyes flickering awake.
Tean pulled him up to a sitting position and Xan coughed several times, taking deep, fresh breaths while Tean began to ask questions.
"What," Tean pointed somewhat shakily, "Is that, Xan? What in the world happened down there?"
Other zoanthropes began to gather their courage again and started to go towards the strange and deadly looking red behemoth before them, with its eyes closed and its heavy breaths shaking them even from afar.
Xan shook his head and pushed away from Tean, "Long story..."
"I believe we need answers, even long ones, now Brockett," boomed a voice from behind.
"Major...sir!" Xan immediately stood as straight as he could as a large man, at least eight feet tall with thick, rippling muslces, dressed in old army uniforms, approached the scene.
Major was not his true name, but for obvious reasons, was an apt nickname. He was battle-scarred from some distant war, trained under stringent camps from some unknown time. Nonetheless, he was the undisputed leader of the zoanthropes, of the ZLF.
Besides Xan, he was the only other who was not in beast form. His own human size and apparent strength was enough to keep order.
"At ease," he replied and Xan relaxed but not much.
"This..." Xan looked behind and gasped inwardly, he had not realised what exactly happened and just assumed he was rescued by the rest. But behind him, scaled, spiked and winged, was large red...dragon!
"You don't know either, private? This...creature...flew out of the warehouse holding you,"
"Holding me..."
"Do not repeat me, private. Now, can you tell us what happened down there, what this...creature...is?" Major strained against the use of 'dragon'.
Xan stared at the dragon, his thoughts running backwards or fast forwarding in order to make sense of it all. A big red dragon out of nowhere...a dragon! A dragon! That was enough to think about alone.
But Xan saw the relation, saw something that reminded him of that girl he rescued. A black mane. Slightly scorched, but still very intact, it was thick and flowed from the head down the whole neck, like the girls. And the wings. Or claws he now saw, the wings were directly attached to the arms. The claws, fingers, with deep-set metal rings around them.
The girl...before him.
He ran excitedly to the behemoth, much to the shock and some, horror of the surrounding crowd. Major followed silently behind. He slowed as he neared and slowly placed a hand on the creatures side. The scales, skin, was warm. Very warm, abnormally so.
"She's burning up..." he said in concern as he observed the newly-transformed girl.
"Private Brockett, you are going to answer my question," it was not a question, it was a statement, one which made all uneasy as they heard the silent, biding anger within the hulk.
Xan, in his innocent concern and fondness, missed it and replied jovially and excitedly to Major.
"She was an experiment in the lab! An experimented zoanthrope! And I guess...this is her beast form!"
Tean groaned from behind at the mistake his friend made.
Major was silent, his face dark and Xan at last, felt the growing tension in the air. The other zoanthropes were pacing. It probably wasn't their intention, simply an instinct within most of their beastial sides. A beast paced only when they frightened or hungry.
"Very well, Brockett. Step back," Major ordered, moving closer to Xan and the dragon.
Xan was resolute, and merely shuffled his feet uncertainly.
"Just do it, Xan!" hissed Tean, pulling Xan along, risking Major's gaze.
But Xan stood his ground, staring up at the big man as he stood a mere two feet away from the dragon.
"What are you going to do, sir?"
Something had entered Major's eyes. Usually, they were dark, like tiny ebony stones, it gave him a 'dumb' look that hid his strategic intelligience. Now, they were glinting with a faint hint of maniacism.
The whole area was hushed, not even the true wild animals were daring to cry. Only the flames that still burned and crackled stayed, but even they were dull. The shining eyes of the ZLF watched.
"We are here to destroy all traces of Tylon, Private. Now, step aside," with that, he transformed.
Standing tall and literally overbearing, the huge brown-furred grizzly. Standing at 9 feet, the brutal looking bearman paced up the last step to the dragon in one single stride. His five-clawed paw was held high and back, muscles were framed by his glossy fur reflecting the orange fires. His claws glinted in the moon and firelight.
Her nose already twitching from the bombarding multiple scents of various animals, the light from Major's transformation finally roused the dragon to semi-wakefullness. Scarlet eyes swiveled and rolled beneath half-closed lids.
Xan tore himself away from Tean's grip and jumped in front of Major, facing the bear's huge maw.
"You can't kill her! She hasn't done anything!"
His gaze still transfixed his prey, Major boomed back, "It's not a zoanthrope. It is a mistake, a mistake that we cannot tolerate,"
Her eyes opened wide at Major's words. A...zoanthrope?
"This is murder Major!"
"Don't talk back to me, private!" roared Major, swinging his trunklike arm at Xan.
But he stopped short, Xan stared back at Major in terror, his back leaned against the dragon. Major's brutal single-mindedness made him try and try again in vain, growling as globules of saliva dripped from his jaws. Finally, with a great roar of anger his looked up at his outstretched arm, and paled.
A huge claw wrapped around Major's arm, the dragon rose, jets of hot steam shot from its large nostrils, her neck turned with thousands of black strands of fur hanging beautifully over the smooth neck. Teeth, visible out of its half-opened jaws, her eyes were a single color of crimson, narrowed at Major. Low rumbles emitted out of its throat.
Slow from pained and heated muscles, she rose first on one claw-foot, then the other. To Major, it meant only to extend his uncharateristic fright, for though she was arched, she stood a comfortable two heads taller than he did. The ZLF were at a loss and merely stood where they were, they could feel, the powerful predatorial might from the red beast, one which seared through their human-beast minds and caused only one reaction. Flee. But though they wanted to flee, fear itself also held them in place. And so, they stayed in a perpetual limbo of loss.
Xan could only hope to shrink away from between the two combatants.
Still grasping Major's arm, she kept her gaze on the bear, forcing the bearman to face her. Major felt his stomach clutch and unclutch everytime he saw her pupils dilate and shrink.
It was a standstill. A void bound in control of the dragon. And only the dragon had enough immensity and power to break it.
She felt the heat inside her, on her skin. It hardly cooled by mere dewdrops. Her blood was boiling, the feverpitch ran through and tortured her whole body at once. In that standstill, the heat grew and grew, until it reached its zenith.
"SWAAAAAAAARRRAAAAA!" she roared from pain and rage, flinging Major like some ragdoll to the side. He flew for a distance before finally slamming into the ground. His chest was crushed and his ribs broke. His arm was twisted beyond repair and blood dribbled from his mouth.
In that instant of break, all hell literally broke loose. The zoanthropes cried and ran in all directions, Xan ducked as the red dragon lept clear over him and pounced onto Major. Crushing him under her ton weight, she gripped his throat in one claw and constricted it to a fraction of its original thickness. She raised him and threw him down again, her slew of instincts presented her with different methods to kill and she was unable to choose.
Through all this, Major still lived, if only on the brink of death. He opened his eyes in a cloud of pain and dellusion, to stare in helplessness at the red terror over him.
"Get up! What the hell have you done!" yelled Tean, shaking his friend from his stupor and carrying him up.
Xan could not answer, he merely stared, like many others whose fear left them, at the certain death of their leader.
Suddenly, a clear bolt of instinct rose from the rest of the battling instincts within the dragon. She would not know then, but the instinct was specially designed for her, to use her most powerful and unworldly weapon.
A deep rumble from inside her boiling stomach, she faced down at Major. Methane burst forth from her throat to her jaw, she opened it, big teeth rubbed against each other for just one spark.
Major last sight was that of the flames of hell, engulfing him in a whirlwind of pain and destruction. His head was consumed before he could utter a scream.
And those who saw, saw for what the dragon was. A red terror, a red destruction, a fiery scourge to spread its flames to burn.