Act 1: Scene 2

It was very nearly the end of me when I encountered a silver dragon on one of the roads leading away from Bran Baal. As fate would have it, for once I wasn't looking for a fight to improve my skills, but nevertheless one of Terra's most infamous resident monsters attacked me from the sky.

I'm rarely caught unawares, but that one lapse almost cost me my life. I didn't know whether the dragon was hungry or just feeling violent, but somehow I ended up with my back to empty space and the risk of a long drop into the watery void that Terra spiralled out of.

The only reason I survived its first vicious attack was because of the Protect spell I had cast on myself in the fleeting moments between the initial appearance of the dragon and my back ending up against the proverbial wall. Somehow I dodged around the creature and onto the safety of the path, reeling with the force of the blow it had dealt me.

It didn't stop. Not once did it stop. But I fought it to the best of my ability, until, bleeding and exhausted, I was just about ready to admit defeat.

Then something occurred to me. If I couldn't defeat a silver dragon, then Garland was right - he was superior, and I would never beat him.

"No!"

The silver dragon looked surprised when I stood up, weak but willing, and regarded me with its icy gaze, a faintly admiring expression on its streamlined features. It tensed. I saw the muscles bunch up in its hind- and forelegs, straining against the silvery-green skin . . .

And then it leapt forward.

I did well considering that the dragon was far beyond my level of ability back then. I sidestepped the first attack, quickly drew on enough magic to hit the creature with a rending Blizzaga spell, and grinned as I heard it shriek in protest.

But it reacted far too quickly. Its right talon swung out and slashed me from chest to abdomen. I staggered too far to the right, and found myself falling through space.

I must have passed out on the way down. I have vague recollections of a myriad feathers swirling around me, and being plucked from my plunge by something powerful. When I woke up, the silver dragon was sat close to me, watching me with intensely whirling eyes. I knew it had saved me, but I didn't understand why.

I was weak, and I hurriedly cast Curaga before I passed out again. The cool, soothing magic shimmered in my wounds, stitching them together. It would take a few more before I would be able to stand up, but for now I was at least conscious.

"Why?" I croaked.

The silver dragon blinked slowly. It was a majestic creature, graceful and lithe, one of the noblest races of Terra.

I cried out when a voice echoed in my head.

"You fought on. You fought well."

After my extensive search of the library, I had read up on Terra' flora and fauna. Silver dragons were known to be wise and loyal, but only to a select few. Since the Terrans' demise, they had become agitated, aggressive and wild, and communication from one to a creature that was not one of its own had been extremely rare even before Terra's decline. To think that I had been honoured as such . . .

"I fought on? I fought well?"

"If you had given up, I would have killed you. You didn't. Now you have earned my respect."

Respect? The actual usage of the term was certainly unfamiliar to me, Kuja, Garland's 'worthless' angel of death.

"This is amazing . . . why did you attack me in the first place?"

The silver dragon looked upwards, at the pulsing, swollen blue sky. "The Light . . ."

"Ah. I see."

"I needed a distraction from the pain . . ."

I bristled at being called a distraction, but said nothing. I was hardly in a position to anger this creature.

Thinking of my life's mission, I sighed. "Luckily for me," and my voice dripped sarcasm, "I will soon be leaving this world and its Light."

"You are leaving?" The silver dragon looked up, startled. "When?"

"I . . . don't know."

The dragon was thoughtful. After a lengthy silence, it gazed at me longingly. "In return for sparing you, I would ask that you take me with you."

"What?" I sat up, ignoring the protests of my injuries. "I don't know if I could . . ."

"I would not hinder you. I shall serve you as my kind used to." And it executed a little, draconic bow.

I stared.

A silver dragon, bowing to me.

The appreciation of my being here filled me with warmth from head to toe. A slow smile crept across my face.

"Well, of course! I shall make sure to inform you when I leave."

"We shall be seeing more of each other than that, I expect."

With that, it launched into the air, feathers flying, a silver dart in the sky, and eventually disappeared from view.

***

Surprisingly enough, I did see the silver dragon more often than I had expected to. Whenever Garland infuriated me so much that I stormed from Pandemonium and into solitude, it seemed to sense my frustration and land near Bran Baal to take me far away and exhaust my anger on any nearby monsters who dared to get in my way. The dragon never helped me - it only watched. It would warn me if I threatened to exhaust myself. Garland had built up a lot of anger inside me and I could never, ever get rid of it all, not even if I killed all the monsters left on Terra. But the dragon's presence soothed me in a way I had never felt before. When I wasn't brooding around the lake in Bran Baal, or scornfully watching my fellow Genomes Learn new things, I was with the dragon. It didn't talk often, whereas I talked a lot. But it did listen to me.

And I felt it understood.

End of Act 1: Scene 2