Adrift
Fenris advanced slowly along the dark, bleak corridor, leaving behind a flight of stairs.
There were enough lanterns on the walls to allow him to see where he was putting his paws and, even if they hadn't been, surely he wouldn't have crashed into a wall like a puppy. This place did not have to be very accessible or illuminated precisely for its primary function.
Here at the Imperial Palace, Concurrent Skies, there were two types of dungeons: the kind where the little rebel dragon was kept, was the primary dungeon, and the one used for conventional criminals or rebels or simply creatures that found themselves unfortunate enough to end up under the Empire's iron fist. The second was a special type of dungeon, known only to few, impossible to access if one wasn't on the list, and designed to keep inside and make suffer the worse enemies of the Empire. The real difference? The second one came with a set of torture rooms and instruments that the first simply didn't need.
And this second type of dungeon was perfect for the kind of guests the furry dragon was going to personally meet. Of course, he was the one who brought them down here but he was curious to see the result of the torture on them, especially if this torture method was new and of recent discovery by the Empire's most twisted scientists.
Fenris shivered in anticipation at the thought of the effects of this new machine as he, passing by many different wooden and metal doors, identified the shape of the one he was looking for.
Fenris let himself slip a satisfied smile that almost brightened up the atmosphere with his sharp white teeth. But it lasted not so long, too little to even be noticed if there was anyone down there to witness it
Arriving at the edge of the corridor, he found himself in front of a simple ape guard, dressed in the usual ordinance armor and armed with the usual spear that all the imperial guards were equipped with. As soon as the dragon entered the ape's field of view, it visibly stiffened, saluting nervously and keeping his eyes fixed on him until he stopped in front of that room, clearly anxious.
Fenris smiled, his sharp teeth perfectly visible to the ape just to make the already-frightened ape shit in its own pants. He had always hated these ugly beasts, but after recent events, he wanted to make them all suffer, make them all shiver in front of him, and the repercussion whichever of their actions would have on their very useless lives.
And what was on the other side of that door was exactly what those disgusting creatures needed as a reminder.
"M-My L-Lo-Lord," the ape saluted with a small bow.
The ape continued, resting his spear on the wall, and opening the door for him, the clink of metal of the keys in its hands symbolized just how terrified the ape was in front of him. After he unlocked the door, he returned to his previous position, and taking back its spear, it stopped still and straight-backed, eyes in front of him and distant from the furry dragon's.
Fenris merely stared at him with an empty gaze for the duration of the process. He could easily smell the ape's fear. It was so strong that he could cut it with a claw and he could only feel pleasure for it, knowing that his idea was working as it should and that no one would allow themselves to disrespect him and his master anymore, no matter whom the order came from.
When he began to notice that the ape was practically staggering nervously over his position trying unsuccessfully not to be seen, the dragon decided it was time to stop this torture... for now.
"You are the jailer of this dungeon, are you?" he asked.
"Sir, yes, sir!" replied the guard, never meeting the dragon's feral gaze with his eyes but keeping them before him in the empty darkness of the hallway.
Fenris tilted his head, considering the ape in front of him. "Mmmhh," he approached it slowly, making the ape even tenser as if it was a hidden prey a few meters away from the predator. "And you do know where your loyalty lays, don't you?" as he was saying this, he reached out with a curved, sharp claw and pointed it die-hard at the guard's neck. The ape laboriously swallowed and stammered an incomprehensible answer and only when the dragon advanced his claw into its greasy fur, the ape finally found its words.
"To the Empire, to the Empress, and the Dark Lord, of course, sir!" he rang, clearly making an effort in keeping his voice from stammering.
Fenris' claw stopped but the guard remained still and open-eyed, his terror visible in those sinful eyes, and it was about to add something, but was stopped.
"Don't," whispered Fenris, coldly.
He knew the guard wanted to add his name. It was afraid of disrespecting him by not having appointed him, but honestly, he didn't care about any of this. It was not for himself that he did this process of intimidation of the army to ensure that everyone remained loyal to his master and that… cases such as the one that happened the day before do not repeat themselves, ever.
"Try to remember this, and you may live long enough to see your old age," he told him as he walked past him and inside the room. He could easily hear the ape sighing, probably feeling safer when there was a fairly thick stone door between him and the dangerous dragon. But he didn't know any of this, not yet.
Inside the room was almost the opposite of the prison's hallway. It was much more illuminated and, although the soft lights of the torches surrounding the walls could not illuminate the center, large ice crystals that hung from the ceiling in the center of the practically square room did a great job of reflecting and redistributing the light inside, so that it could be seen as a whole. The only effect was that the light, from that orange color it usually had, passed to a whitish color.
But Fenris's feral yellow eyes quickly got used to it as he focused on what was at the center, under the light of the crystals. Two stone structures, rectangular in shape, separated from a large trapdoor on the floor made of iron. Alongside each of the two stone structures was a dragon. On the right, a red one of the fire, on the left a blue one of the ice.
Fenris slowly approached the stone structures, an evil smile illuminating his features as he took sight of those who were inside those things. The structures were almost entirely closed on their tops, like stone coffins, if not for a minimal part that allowed the heads of an ape, one for each coffin, to stand out. Both heads were slumped on one side, but the apes inside didn't seem in the same physical condition. The one on the right was soaked with its sweat that made his dirty, grayish fur stick to its face, and the other lacked sweat, instead, it trembled like a leaf in a cold, winter breeze.
Both were on the verge of consciousness from what he could see and this could only make his smile brighter. It was not something that was often granted, but on occasions like these, it was true that revenge had a very special taste.
"How are our guests today?" he asked cheerfully, approaching the ape on the left and touching his forehead with his paw. "I hope they're still alive, aren't they?" he pointed his gaze at the blue dragon next to the structure in which the ape was locked.
This dragon looked quite and completely the same as any other dragon of the same element that could be seen around the realm. The only difference was that, unlike other dragons of his kind, that one and all of those who were in the palace and already in the ranks of the dark army, had practically lifeless eyes, completely incapable of feeling emotions. They were the perfect war machine, coming alone from eggs, without a family or relatives of any kind, administered with something the Empress herself invented, and then trained all their lives to obey orders.
Machines. He didn't like it but he had to admit that they had their usefulness occasionally.
"Of course, my lord," replied the ice dragon in a monotonous tone of voice. "The temperature to which the prisoner is subjected in the tank is 15 degrees, in accordance with scientific treaties about maximizing suffering but minimizing the chances of premature death for the subject so that suffering will last more and the procedure of collecting necessary information more efficient."
Fenris nodded satisfied, taking his eyes away from the dragon and also from the ape. He then headed, passing on the iron trapdoor separating the two tubs, to the other side where the sweaty ape and the fire dragon were located.
"What about this one?" he asked, a hint of disgust barely hidden in his voice.
The fire dragon's response was as monotonous but explanatory as that of his colleague. "The prisoner in the tub is subjected to the temperature of 40 degrees as instructed by-"
"Ok, ok, stop you there," Fenris interrupted, not wanting to know the treaty from which the indications came. He only cared about the prisoners' conditions and the assurance that they were suffering, as they had to stay alive for a lot more to atone for their crimes.
He couldn't see what was happening in the tub, but he could hear that something was boiling inside. From where the sweaty ape's head was, whitish steam came out which could only mean that inside there was water warm enough to contrast with the colder external air.
Fenris smiled, feeling victorious. He knew he was enjoying it all too much especially considering that it wasn't him who suffered for those apes' sins. Fenris could not care less. He always enjoyed what he called justice and what others called vengeance served, no matter whether he was involved or not.
He patted two taps with his paw on the sweaty ape's muzzle, waking it up. The ape awoke slowly, and even more slowly with an almost exhausting weakness, it opened its eyes. At first, it seemed confused, looking around the place, frowning, but soon his gaze met that of the furry dragon, and his expression changed as it recognized him.
Fenris took his time to gloat at the sight of the terror printed on the ape's snout. It was so priceless that the dragon couldn't help but widen his smile, even more, making it from ear to ear. He saved into his memory that look of terror in his prisoner's eyes so that he could use it at any time when he felt knocked down for some reason.
The ape began to shake inside his prison, but the only thing that moved was the head because the rest of his body was completely blocked in the tub. Its helplessness soon turned into panic as the ape began to pray.
"No, no, no, no, no, let me out of here, please, I beg you, please!" he prayed, desperate. "I will do whatever you want... only... no..."
The more its voice became desperate, the more it decreased in its volume and intensity, until it became a terrifying whisper when its own words choked in his throat. The ape's expression accompanied this as warm tears started coming out of his reddened, criminal eyes.
A great show for the dragon, a theater to enjoy to the end with its pleas as the music, and the ape's expression as an award scene. He stopped for a moment enjoying the scene in front of his very eyes, only to have the satisfaction of repeating it in his mind over and over again.
But the best part was yet to come.
"Shhh, shhh, stay quiet, stay quiet, there is no need for all of this," he said using a sweet reassuring voice and expression. Gone seemed to be the sadistic smile, as well as the voice full of disgust and hatred, and in its place, the hairy dragon turned into a sweet father-like tone figure who even stretched his paw out to wipe the ape's tears from its muzzle, moving aside a strand of sticky fur that had fallen on its right eye.
"You know that it will do you no good shaking or praying or even crying, so it would be a waste of energy," he purred. "And we don't want you to get tired and trespass so soon, do we now?"
His paternal tone and expression turned again, replaced by the sadistic and bloodthirsty ones that distinguished him upon his entry. His eyes had a dangerous glitter, his smile showed his teeth, and his voice, oh, his voice was of a dangerous bass that would accompany the poor fellow even in his worst nightmares.
"Because you are just at the beginning…" he hissed evilly.
The ape's blurry, reddened eyes opened up full of terror once again, and his desperate movements to free himself only made the young dragon throw his head back into a laugh that broke the monotony of the room and those imperial dragon robots that the Empress twisted.
"Shake yourself all you like in there, it's useless," he said when he stopped laughing. "These tanks are created by earth dragons tailored to every prisoner, so you have no room to escape, only to suffer as much as possible."
"Please, please, I will do whatever you want, I swear it! I swear it!" the ape began to plead as he continued to wriggle. "Name it and I will do it for you! Just get me out of here!"
Fenris seemed to consider this for a moment. "Actually, there's something you could do for me."
The look of hope immediately appeared on the ape's muzzle as the sun would break through the clouds. It stopped agitating to give all its attention to the dragon. "Yes! Tell me! Everything! Name it, and I'll do it for you!"
Fenris approached its right ear, his expression hidden from the ape but gloomy. Then he exposed his teeth and growled dangerously. "Can you bring the dead back to life?"
Hope was swept away by the ape's muzzle as fast as a blizzard would come and pass by, only to be replaced by horror. "No... no, please, not like that!" it prayed as it started its desperate wriggling once more.
"How then?" snapped the dragon, a menacing growl distorting his features. "Did you expect to choose which torture or the way you would die after what you did? You were the jailer of the dungeon and you had one pretty simple task, don't you think? It's never too crowded down there, so the work is low and the pay is good for we're in the Imperial Palace. The only thing you had to do was serve your Master as you were asked to!"
"But I did!, I did!" tried to defend the former jailer, his eyes wild as he looked around to try and look at the dragon that kept himself behind the ape to scare him more. "I said everything I knew to the Empress, just as she asked me! I've been loyal, I swear!"
"Lies!" roared Fenris, making the room rumble and violently placing his paws on either side of the ape's head. Now his bearing was furious, as he growled with shiny eyes and a bloodthirst he never felt like before. "The Dark Master asked you to keep the little dragon a secret from everyone, even from your Empress, and you thought well to see him to her for your gain!"
"No, I swear it! I was just following orders!" he said. "The Empress, she promised-" but he was interrupted.
"Did you really believe the Empress's promise? What did she promise you? Money? Status? Did she assure you she would protect you from retaliation because of the information you so generously brought to her? Ah!" the dragon laughed again, an empty laugh, "You're dumber than I thought if you think the Empress is interested in providing any kind of protection for those who have exhausted all their usefulness to her."
"And you..." his growl was dangerous, the tone icy. "You, my friend, you have exhausted yours…"
Then he snapped towards the fire dragon and nodded. The dragon nodded in turn and then lowered himself under the tub, spitting fire against the rock which, first colored a bright orange, then returned slowly to its original color as the dragon stopped feeding the flame.
Fenris returned his feral gaze to the ape. "And that is 41, I guess," he whispered. "Every hour the temperature of this tub will rise one degree, making your agony and suffering…" he stopped, shaking his head sorry. "…terrible as well as long, very long." Then he nodded to the other tub. "There, your accomplice is lying in the ice, instead, with his tub temperature dropping one degree per hour," as he said this, he nodded to ice dragon to the other tub who just finished lowering the temperature. He turned back to the ape's right ear. "And when you get to a temperature where you'll be cooked so much that you won't even grow back that filthy fur on your body sh, sh, sh…" he silenced it as the ape lashed out, crying uncontrollably. A pathetic scene to witness, to say the least. "Only then will your suffering in there be over, and you will be able to experience the thrill of a cooler climate in the other tub and this will continue until the bodies of both of you can no longer bear the weight of the change of temperature and will lead you both to a death that you will soon come to desire." He smiled viciously, passing on claw to the ape's left side, carving a cut deep enough to hurt but not enough to break the skin and draw blood. No, the ape needed all its blood where it was so that the temperature of the tub could make it boil from the inside.
"Please…" the ape started to fade again into the world of unconsciousness, the temperature taking its tool on it. But Fenris was not finished yet, and he would keep threatening the ape, whether it could hear him or not. He needed to get it out of his system, anyway.
"And then," he whispered, not losing his wicked smile. "Then, you will be both dumped, like the garbage you are, from the trapdoor and into the purple, empty abyss under this palace"
Fenris looked at the ape with one last glance of disgust, his upper left lip trembling from the growl and contempt, revealing at times the white tusk under. "I'm just sorry I can't personally pass you by with my claws and tear you apart slowly, limb after limb, muscle after muscle, tendon after tendon. I would so much like that," he growled as his paws opened and closed out of pure bloodthirst.
He decided to walk away. The ape was already unconscious and could not hear him, and he was on the verge of killing it there, without waiting for the tubs to do their job. But he had to restrain himself as slow death was a better punishment for a betrayal to the Dark Lord, just as it will be a warning, once the news spread through the other jailer and the whole army, for anyone who has stupid ideas like this.
"Enjoy your last days of life," he thought inside sadistically. "I wish you to survive for several moons before sinking into the depths."
Fenris turned to the two dragons in the room. "You two!" he called them out. "As soon as they both arrive at the set temperatures, call a dragon of the earth for the changing of tubs." He began to make his way to the door. "Make sure they suffer and do this until they are both dead."
The door opened in front of him, as the jailer must have heard his approach. "Then throw the bodies into the void," he hissed frostily, giving a final look at the jailer of the dungeon that shuddered on the spot in complete terror.
Fenris will never know whether the jailer's reaction was a reaction to his gaze, or to the cries for help that started coming out from the room as he went out.
"Probably the other prisoner woke up," he thought, smiling at the sound of its desperation.
Anyway, he didn't care whether the reason was for he had what he wanted:
Revenge.
And oh, it was so sweet.
MDT - MDT - MDT
Darkness surrounded him.
Suddenly a bright light broke violently through the darkness and, as a lighthouse does for a ship scattered in the icy night waters, the dragon immediately headed for that salvation. The closer he got, the brighter the light became, hurting his very eyes at the sight. But the dragon continued undaunted towards the only thing that could save him from that void of nothing. He closed his eyes as he kept coming closer and closer to protect his eyes.
A moment later, even from behind the darkness provided by his closed eyelids, the dragon realized that the blinding light was gone and he opened his eyes. He frowned.
He was in a room, or so he believed because all around him was still completely dark. The only thing he could see was a mirror a few meters away in the middle of a circle of soft light coming from above. The dragon was right on the edge of it, on the perimeter of this circle of light. He lay one paw ahead suspiciously on the floor but he met just the smooth and solid rock under his claws. He tried a few more times, starting to push with his paw to see if the floor would collapse the moment he put too much weight on it. He did not know why, but he felt just nervous about all this.
He had no other choice, though, but to get nearer this mirror cause in all the exhausting, monotonous darkness, that mirror seemed to be the only real thing in there. He slowly approached it, closing the space with the mirror in a few steps and sitting in front of it, looking at it as if he expected it to do something.
The mirror was a simple piece of rectangular vertical glass, resting on a metal base and probably supported in its back by something that kept it standing. What it did was exactly what any mirror would do, which was show the reflection of the one dragon in front of it.
The dragon observed how a dark purple dragon was looking back at him with a guarded and suspicious expression. Even though what he was facing looked like a normal mirror, something still didn't look right with the dark purple dragon. He sensed something dark, something dangerous, an alarm in the back of his mind, and he couldn't get rid of this feeling as he kept staring at that strange mirror that came out of nowhere.
He carefully stretched his paw forward to touch the surface of it and make sure it was real and not some unpleasant vision in the darkness. His paw came into contact with the cold and smooth surface of the mirror and…it seemed fine, and yet there was still something that-
"Mmmmh, don't you feel it too?" asked a foreign voice coming out of the blue.
The dark purple dragon got to a combat position automatically as he had always been accustomed to doing since he was a puppy, only to find himself in front of a familiar dragoness.For a moment he looked surprised as he wasn't expecting her to be here. Then, his expression turned furious and his growl rumbled inside the suffocating darkness.
"Spaiha…" he whispered the name out as if it was venom.
In front of him, the red and yellow dragoness simply smiled in return, sitting elegantly on her tight, not at all intimidated by the aggressive male.
"What are you doing here?" demanded the dark purple dragon again, his anger flowing ever more boiling under his scales at the sight of that dragoness all too self-confident after what she had done. "Give me a good reason why I shouldn't tear you to pieces for what you did!"
The dragoness considered it for a moment, then the smile returned on her muzzle. "You want one good reason?" she said, completely unemotional even if she was smiling mockingly at him. "Look at it yourself," she said and with her right paw, she beckoned to the mirror.
The male frowned, unconvinced, unsure that all this was just a trick to divert his attention and then attack him by surprise. At any rate, however, with all due attention, the purple dragon turned his gaze to the mirror and his muzzle lost all its color, his eyes wide open in pure shock, and his mouth falling open too so much that his growl choked itself in his own throat.
The mirror that until then reflected his image was now reflecting the image of a familiar white dragoness, lying on the ground as if she were sleeping.
But the dark purple dragon knew she wasn't sleeping, he knew this was wrong. Sonohra, because that's her name, shouldn't have been sleeping in that place, she shouldn't have been there in the first place!
He threw himself at the mirror, almost breaking it while trying to enter inside it. But he couldn't do anything but starring at it as if it was a screen. His panic was clear on his features, his tail behind him waved nervously.
"Sonohra!" he shouted, beating with his paw on the glass when at the first call she did not answer back. "Sonohra, get up! Wake up! Something's wrong here!"
"You're right," whispered a voice.
The male did not turn to the source of the voice, he knew who it was. Rather, he was too busy fighting the feeling of icy terror that was suffocating his whole being at the sight in front of him.
"What did you do to her?!" he cried as he continued in every way to enter the glass and reach the white dragoness. "What did you do!"
"What did I do?" answered the voice, innocently surprised. "I didn't do anything at all. It was you who condemned her, not I," she cruelly accused him.
"No…" he whispered desperate, not wanting to believe the poisonous words of that strange dragon-shaped spirit of their betrayer. But something, within him, told him that she was right, that it was his fault.
A frosty laugh rumbled in the hall full of darkness. "Would you deny your own sin? Well, let's ask her, yes?"
At that precise moment, Sonohra raised her head and stared in his direction. The male made an instinctive step back at the sight, practically stumbling on his paws and falling with his butt onto the ground, a vision reflected in his purple eyes that he would never forget until the very day he died: a face rubbed by decomposition, pale and scaleless, empty, and white eyes inside bare orbits, and a lower jaw separated from the rest of the head dangling by some defrosted muscle with teeth vividly yellowed by the passing time.
That was all it remained of his friend and it was a horrifying vision to bear.
"Phantom!" cried the dragoness' distorted voice, distorted and spirited, rumbling in the hall and the ears of the male at the same time. "What have you done to me, Phantom!" she shrilled with her otherworldly voice. "Look what you did to me!"
Phantom ended up on the cold ground, his paws on his eyes, not daring to look at her. But it would not matter as he kept recreating over and over again the image in his mind, behind his eyelids. He was shaking like a frightened puppy on the floor and the warm tears were freely breaking through his closed defenseless eyes. But he could not look at her, not in this state.
"Phantom!" the voice of what was supposed to be Spaiha spoke again, or maybe it wasn't her but just a frightening spirit with her form. Now he would no longer know. "Are you still convinced that what happened to your friend was because of me?" she mocked him. "Or maybe it was more your obvious inability to keep the situation under control at the Arena? To convince your friends to abort the mission at the very beginning? To your inability of keeping them safe? I would be more inclined to those ones, wouldn't you say," she laughed evilly, rumbling in the room. "A strong and lived dragon as you are, who lived for years alone and despised by everyone and everything, who trained himself to death to survive… couldn't save the only friends he had from death."
He could feel a swift in the air and then the venomous whisper appeared close to his right ear, speaking in his very brain. "Instead, you flee away like a coward, letting her die!"
"No…"
"It's all your fault!"
"No, I did- I tried-"
He wanted to say he never meant for something like that to happen, he wanted to say that he did not want to let his friend die alone like this, and he wanted to say that he tried all he could to keep them away from the danger of their mission but he found his own words choking in his throat by the continuously broken sobs he emitted. He wanted to fight it, he wanted to say something... but he knew that Spaiha's spirit, or whatever it was, was right. It was his fault.
He couldn't change her mind, he couldn't protect her, and then when she needed him the most, he fled.
"Phantom!" Sonohra's lugubrious, otherworldly voice kept calling him out, kept calling for his murderer. "Phantom, I trusted you! You were my friend! You promised you would have my back, always! Look at me now! Look at what you have made me become!"
"Come on, Phantom," whispered Spaiha's voice into his ear again. "She's calling for you, go to her," she chuckled. "What is it eh? Are you afraid she's going to hurt you? Wouldn't it be right for her to do to you exactly what you did to her? Sounds like justice to me, isn't it?"
"I-I" he tried to whisper. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry," he repeated over and over again, shaking his head, trying to send away those ugly visions and that voice in his ears that kept teasing him.
"Go Phantom, go to her!"
And the shrill voice of a now-dead dragoness who was his friend and counted on him.
"Phantom! Look what you did to me, Phantom! Look at me!"
"Please... Please... stop it…"
"Phantom!" cried the dead voice
"Phantom!" mocked the spirited voice
"Phantom!" arrived a new male voice, a familiar one, one of another friend of his now dead because of him: Batch.
"Phantom you killed me! Why did you leave me?" accused Batch's voice in the same otherworldly and distorted voice Sonohra was using. He didn't have to open his eyes to imagine how Batch's broken body was accusing him next to Sonohra's in the mirror. He could already see him in his mind and it was torture.
"Please, no more…"
The voices mixed and twisted on each other, opposing and joining until suddenly they stopped all at once ad it remained only silence.
From that very silence, a new voice called him.
"Phantom."
But that latter was not like the others. This was… sweet, warm, reassuring, and familiar.
The dark purple dragon raised his head from his hiding place between his paws, tears still littering his face. The mirror was gone but a light in the distance in front of him appeared and in that light a familiar dragon figure.
He immediately stiffened up, afraid that this light and this figure might turn out to be like the one he had seen before. But this time he couldn't feel the same wrongness the mirror exaled. On the contrary, the light felt warm and safe, as well as the figure coming from it. That was all the things he needed at that very moment. He did not know how, but the ethereal voices left, and all around him, there was a soft light that did not leave him in complete darkness as before. The whole atmosphere changed, and it was something far more inviting that the previous one.
"Phantom, come to me," said the familiar voice coming from the figure in the light. It was difficult to see. The light was strong and the figure was merged in it as if it was a part of it and he spent so much time in the darkness.
But he knew that voice. He knew the figure inside the light.
"Sonohra?" he tried, not exactly convinced after what had just happened, what he had just seen, what he had done.
"It's all right, Phantom. I'm here, you're safe," reassured the voice, warm and calming, sounding exactly like Sonohra.
But what if it was a trick, like the one in the mirror? Maybe Spaiha's way of destroying him for good?
It had to be a well-done trick, though, for he had had a bad feeling during all the time he had spent in the darkness even before the arrival of the ghosts. Now he felt nothing but warmth and safety that made all the negative emotions flow away from him, freeing him from pain and despair.
He felt he could trust it. He could trust the voice coming from the light. He could trust Sonohra to keep him safe and in the light.
The dark purple dragon rose slowly from his position and trembling on all four, tripping over his paws, he slowly headed towards the light, which was not as blinding as the one before.
"It'll be all right, I promise you," kept reassuring Sonohra's voice.
He got closer and closer but the light never got brighter or painful for his eyes, just warmer and safer, lifting him out of the cold he had felt just to his very core before on the floor. Likewise, his swirling emotions also warmed up, thawing fear in his blood, and making him feel warm both inside and outside. Safe.
"Everything will be fine, Phantom. I'm here to protect you," said the voice and he could almost see the face of the white dragoness in the figure smiling kindly at him.
And Phantom knew he could trust his friend, no matter what he had just done. For now, in this place, he felt safe, he felt like he could trust the image of a living Sonohra. And so he went to her, inside the warming light, away from those visions, the ghosts, and the darkness.
MDT - MDT - MDT
Kohle snacked noisily on the floor, feeling empty. He emptied his soul in that last desperate scream and now he was left alone with a feeling of nothingness and a severe headache.
He closed his eyes, breathing laboriously on the floor, small pieces of dirt rolling invisibly back and forth depending on his breath.
He wasn't accustomed to all this. He had never been a dragon who showed his emotions.
Parentless, as many of his peers were born at the beginning of the war, he had always thought it was necessary to work hard to achieve a goal, and to do this emotions could do nothing but hinder him. He saw how emotions like fear could put someone in such a powerful block to prevent him or her from progressing. This was something he could not afford as a future Warrior of the Resistance.
Or maybe it was just his character, he couldn't say for sure.
The sure thing, though, was that he had never screamed his despair out loud like that and, he had to admit, he was feeling…feeling, but he couldn't put a paw over what it was. It was surely something new to him to be able to throw his emotions out without having to hold them and lock them in. It was better that way, for he saw with her fire friend how those emotions repressed and seemingly forgotten could easily fire back on the owner. He hoped that by doing so he eliminated any surplus of negative energy so that he would not end up like her.
But the moment he thought about it, he also realized it was hardly the case. No number of screams and outbursts would free him from what just happened. He lost a friend. Two friends.
Warm tears began to come out of his eyes.
As a defense mechanism, the black dragon sealed his eyes trying to prevent saltwater from taking its course, tightening them up and almost hurting himself... but who was he to overlap with water and emotional swirl?
With a loud and defeated sigh, he let the emotions finally swallow him and tears flow freely out.
Sonohra...
Batch…
They were gone.
He hadn't the misfortune to see what happened, but the fact that they weren't there with them was all the proof he needed. And it hurt, it hurt so bad. Worse than he ever expected. His emotions were completely loosed inside and he could feel his chest hurt from the heightened breathing, his head beating for the scream he pulled just before, his muscles now released by the tension of the fight leaving him sore in all his parts.
But none of this was comparable to the pain he felt in his heart. It was as if it was expanding to cover any other organ, an explosion of pain and despair that started from his chest and expanded to the rest of his body as if with an explosion.
It hurt him, he didn't want to feel that way.
But thoughts continued to flash inside his head and he found himself without any power to stop them.
Batch. He had been, in the short time they had known him, an intelligent, brave, and cunning dragon, a perfect guide for the perfect suicide mission they were attempting to do. Without him, they would have never surpassed even the desert. Now without him, what chance had they to survive and head back through enemy territory?
And Sonohra.
He has known the white dragoness for the entire duration of his life, from the very start as she imposed herself as the leader of their group in conjunction with Fire since they were only little hatchlings. He never aimed to be a leader, he was ok to be in the rear, and soon between the white and the red dragoness formed a co-leading that had done only good to the whole group for a long period of time. They learned to speak together, to fly in the small caves of the base together, to use their elemental power together, and all the training they did, everything they did, they did it together with Sonohra cheering them up after any defeat, encouraging them after every step back or failure, praising after every win they brought in their climb to be warriors.
She was their leader, their lifeline, their escape rope from the real world. What would be life without her there? Without their most close friend? Could they even survive?
Plus, with Fire's new condition making her completely unfit for any kind of leading, who would save what little remained of them?
"Sonohra would have known what to do..."
But now she was gone and they were as dispersed as they could ever be. With no base to go back to, no guide to count on. How would they even go back without dying or worse at the hands of the Empire? And who would be the leader of that broken group that had remained?
He was no a leader, nor were Phantom or Ahmos. They were screwed.
*Sniff* "…no…"
Kohle opened his eyes, revealing two orange spheres blurred by tears but still attentive. He moved them to the right corner of the cave. It was dark inside, probably the night was moonless, but he knew it was occupied by the purple dragon. He heard something coming from him, but he wasn't sure of wh-
*Sniff* "Please…no"
Here it is again.
What was initially a choked noise became louder and more defined.
Kohle lifted his head pointing his eyes at the purple dragon positioned at the right corner of the cave, his back turned on them, and he could easily see that the dragon was shaking, sobbing, crying in his sleep. He was clearly having a nightmare.
The black dragon looked away, feeling even more uncomfortable. There was nothing he could do for his friend, especially not erase the horrors of what he had seen.
He felt so sorry for him. He was sorry in the face of something that was not the black dragon, nor anyone else could ever change. What Phantom had seen would never be erased from his mind until the very day he die and things like that might haunt a dragon for a long time before they start fading.
He could not do anything for him but be close to him. But he was not sure if it was the time right time. He had to give him time to process what happened, some time alone so he could mourn. He knew it wasn't easy, none of them had wanted any of this to happen, but if they didn't adapt quickly they would soon follow their friends on the other side.
Kohle remained in his position, sighing loudly and hearing in the background for quite some time only the silence and the sound of his own heart beating in his chest.
No one made a noise anymore. Phantom's sobbing stopped, Fire was out cold in the middle of the cave. She fell soon after she stopped screaming her heart to the sky, probably too much weight on her soul that she couldn't bear just yet. He was trying to keep his breath linear and calm so he could try and get some sleep to be awake and strong when the day came, but he soon realized that someone missed the count.
Ahmos.
He frowned, putting everything aside for a moment to check why the icy friend was so oddly silent, so much so that he had almost forgotten about him.
Kohle turned his left where Ahmos was, also his back at him just like the purple dragon. But unlike the purple dragon, his icy friend did not seem to tremble or sob from what he could see from his position, nor was he making any kind of sound that could be heard in the almost silence of their cave. He didn't look like a sleeping dragon either, as his back moved with harsh and repentine movements, not at all what a calm, sleeping breath should look like.
He was simply standing there, motionless, and silent, something certainly unusual for him. Not that Kohle meant it as an insult, but he had expected his friend to be the first and loudest of them all. After all, he too roared to the moon his pain, but now it was simply over?
Kohle was sure of it. Something was wrong.
Making a greater effort than he would have normally, the black dragon got up on his four. It was not at all easy as he was tired and beaten, his eyes dry and irritated by tears and his lying position on the cold ground did not help his body recover from the fatigue of the battle, his tendons, and muscles brought to the limit that now didn't want to cooperate again.
That's why he managed to make just a few steps before they made him feel their dissent, protesting energetically with a tingling sensation, aches, dense, at all four legs and wings, and a hot pain that was not at all beneficial to his joints. The previous moment the dragon was on his four, unstable but standing up, the next he was tripping a few centimeters from his friend, sitting down with a visible grimace of pain, trying to resist the urge to fall on the ground boneless.
"Ahmos," he called him in the darkness of the cave, his throat so dry and burning that the first time he had to clear his throat and cough for he choked on his friend's name.
The other dragon did not make a move, but Kohle did not fall for that. He knew, somehow, that the blue dragon was awake, alert, and able to respond to him. And he pointed it out to him.
"Ahmos, I know you're awake. Please, look at me"
His voice, he realized, was strangely sweet, as he had never used it, especially with the blue dragon. Or maybe it was just that accent of total defeat or even that hoarse part of the dragon's voice that symbolized that he screamed and cried that night too. Or, more likely, the "please" part in his speech, surely not that used by the black dragon when speaking with his friend of ice. But he didn't regret it or felt ashamed by it. That prayer, that kindness, Kohle had never shown before, not because he wasn't capable of it, but because it wasn't really in his style.
So if now he was using that tone, it meant that he was serious and what he wanted to speak of was important, maybe more significant than anything if the black dragon had chosen those particular words. Ahmos would understand it behind his few words, he knew him.
And his friend did not let him down as he turned to face him.
MDT - MDT - MDT
Ahmos was not sure what he would find himself in front of once he placed his gaze on the other dragon. He knew what Kohle was like, and he had no intention of receiving a sermon about how weak the crying had made him for something over which he had no power. He didn't want to hear the things he'd always heard. He didn't want to see the disapproval on the face of the black dragon. He didn't want to show that his face was still stained with tears.
He didn't want to hear any of that, but, upon hearing his friend using that tone, that word, hearing the black dragon making a plea to him, sounding so afraid, so destroyed… Ahmos wasn't able to continue holding his ground and he turned around.
A few steps from him, there was a broken dragon, sitting on his hind legs, his eyes reddened by uncleaned tears still evident on the black male's muzzle even in the dark. His eyes were not cold and calculating as always, rather they were, tired, lost, and... confused. They were off, his entire friend's being was off.
Ahmos opened his eyes wide, surprised. That's not what he had expected. That was not what Kohle was like.
And his surprise didn't go unnoticed because the other dragon first frowned, as if confused as to why he was looking back at him that way, but then understanding what was supposed to be the problem, he closed his eyes and sighed loudly, lowering his head toward his chest in a sign of weakness that Ahmos would never have expected from a dragon like him.
Then, slightly raising his head after a long moment of silence, the black dragon pointed his weary gaze at him.
"What did you were expecting to see, Ahmos? Mmh? Do you think I don't have feelings? That I don't love our friends? That losing her- " he froze, looking away and closing his eyes again. He paused for a long moment, probably to gain control of his own emotions again. Then, he took a deep breath and went back to him. "I'm capable of love too, Ahmos, even if I don't prove it so well all the time," he slowly lowered himself on his front paws, lying down in front of him. "And that's why I understand what you are feeling."
Ahmos shouldn't have been surprised by all of that. It was unfair toward his friend and he knew it. Since their time at the base, the black dragon had personally taken on the task of "training" him, teaching him how truly live in a world that Kohle saw as more cynical and dangerous than any at the base did, even Cyril probably. He had always been naive and more dedicated to fun and jokes despite his enormous potential with his element. However, he lacked logical thought and often seriousness, which the black dragon had taken on the unseeded task of teaching him. He had helped him spontaneously since they were just fledglings, and all this without being asked to. It was selfless for him to do something like that, even as puppies, but still, he saw what he considered a potential problem for an unknown-at-the-time dragon and he decided to offer his advice, making Ahmos a better dragon in the long run.
This time it was he who looked away from his friend's volcanic eyes. He didn't want to show his guilt for the treatment he was giving his friend and at the same time, it also served as a way to mask what also lurked behind. Behind all his pain, the death of his friends, the failure at the Mountain. He didn't want the black dragon to understand. Knowing him, Kohle wouldn't take too long to bring the problem out of the uncooperative ice dragon and for a moment Ahmos egoistically hoped that his friend's new condition would prevent him from being as cunning as always.
He opted for the tactic of remaining silent, concentrating his gaze on everything but the black dragon, so as not to meet his inquiring gaze. But the silence was deafening and at night it did not lend a hand to the poor dragon for any kind of distraction. It seemed like the night itself agreed with his friend to increase his nervousness until he spoke.
And at last, Kohle's and the Night's plan worked exactly as they had hoped it would against the ice dragon.
Tired of being stared at, Ahmos turned to Kohle and snapped angrily. "You have nothing better to do than to stare at me, Kohle!" he growled.
The black dragon tilted his head in response. Then, after a twinkle in his eyes that looked like something halfway between pity and understanding, Kohle sighed loudly once more, leaving his head dangling a few steps from the floor.
"You don't have to hide it, Ahmos," he said.
"Hide what?!"
"What you are feeling."
"I'm not hiding it," he defended. "I'm just-"
"Ahmos-" Kohle tried but was cut before he could go on.
"Kohle I said I'm-"
"Ahmos, ple-"
"No, Kohle, stay out of-"
"Ahmos…"
That whisper was all that he needed to stop his babbling, his well-formed anger created to shield him and defend him from the other dragon's attack dissipated and left space to a void of surprise and, fastly closing by, fear.
Ahmos was starting to be afraid as hearing Kohle, his cunning and stone-hearted black friend, speaking that way, whispering a defeated and silent plea was something that he counted as the one even right before the end of the world. And it seemed that the end was coming now.
"I'm…I'm scared," he confessed, his voice low as he looked at him with his eyes mirroring all the emotion the ice dragon heard from his voice. "I don't know what to do, Ahmos, and that scares me…a lot."
This confession, that tone, those eyes. All of them struck the blue dragon directly in the heart.
"Without Batch and Sonohra I-I…" his friend's voice started to tremble as he never heard it from him before. "I-I don't know what to do next, I-I-I'm so lost…" he whispered, a tear escaping his grip starting from his right eye and making its way along the salt channels already dug by the other uncleaned tears. Then the drop accumulated on the edge of his chin and fell onto the ground, invisible against the vastness of it.
As Ahmos always saw feelings in the black dragon's heart. A small and flimsy thing, invisible and undiscernible in the vastness of the black dragon's badassery.
It seemed he was wrong. Even after so many years, he didn't know his best friend that much. And perhaps that was the thing that astonished him more, making him stare at his friend as if he were facing another dragon and not his best friend. He felt guilty for in 15 years he hasn't really seen what Kohle was, and at the same time, he was dumbfounded by the fact that such a dragon could be so complex, so able to feel. Probably more than he was and that left him almost without words.
"B-bu-but-its-its-im-Impossible!" he stammered. "You are Kohle, you always know what to do. You know everything!"
His friend gave him a bitter smile, inhaling hard. "No, Ahmos," Kohle said. "The only thing that is impossible is to know everything," he paused for a long moment, and when he went on, his voice was trembling. "Otherwise, I would have known about this... this trap, and I would have done something. I-I w-wou-would-" he faded, looking away from him again. "But I-" he sighed. "It's my fault, I should have figured it out."
Ahmos was dumbfounded by the other dragon's words. They weren't Kohle-like words as they were illogical and nonsense. "What the heck are you saying? How could you have known? No one did suspect a thing, not even Batch!" he growled at him, trying to make his friend understand how stupid his statement was, how unlike him this all was. "You can't blame yourself for something you had no control over!"
It was ironic, Ahmos thought a moment later, that he had just used those words Kohle often used with him to make him realize that he could not always help everyone. Even the black dragon himself must have noticed it, but it was too late to take it back as Kohle was staring at him now with a frightening intensity.
"Then why do you do it, Ahmos?"
Ahmos cursed under his breath for his poor choice of words and, above all, for allowing the black dragon and his cunning to call him out. He knew that the black dragon was really suffering for his tears and his voice felt real, were real. But he also knew that Kohle in his infinite cunning spoke his own emotions, to force the blue dragon to confess his.
Smart. Very smart. Exactly in full Kohle style. He was so wrong for having thought, even for a moment, that the black dragon could do something unKohle like.
Ahmos sighed, practically admitting defeat. He didn't want to, but he knew he was in a position in which his black friend had him cornered and would not let him go until he heard the whole truth.
And so truth he would give him.
"Because it's my fault," he confessed, not looking at his friend while doing so. "Because unlike what you just said, what happened was something within my control and…and I did nothing to prevent it."
"What do you mean?" asked the black dragon, his tone calm and inviting.
Ahmos sighed again before pointing his eyes at his friend's, ice blue versus magma orange. A mixture of defeat, suffering, and guilt, the two opposites became the same as their interior mirrored the other.
"Who is that leads, really leads our group and saves us when we get in trouble?" he asked.
Kohle didn't even have to think about the answer. Still, he hesitated before saying that name as a small whisper. "Sonohra."
Ahmos nodded. "And who is the strongest among us until very recently?"
"Fire."
Ahmos tensed his jaw so tightly that he was on the good way to losing one or two teeth. "Who is the one that saved us in Warfang taking out a whole legion of dreadwings?"
"Phantom."
"And who is the most cunning dragon within our group?" he asked, narrowing his eyes on him.
"Ahmos, now you-" Kohle tried but was interrupted
"Who?" Ahmos pressed, smashing his paw on the ground.
The black dragon stopped, remaining silent for a long time, considering him and the paw he used to hit the ground. Then, finally, when he thought his friend wasn't going to respond at all, he did.
"I think you want me to say that I'm," he said, looking at him deeply with those orange spheres.
Ahmos did not falter as he would do. He had nothing to hide, not now. "Because you are," he said.
"I'm not the only one. Son-"
Ahmos knew what the other dragon was going to say and it angered him as he was not stupid himself and Kohle perfectly knew what he meant. No need for excuses or useless words to soften it. Kohle should know better as Ahmos learned it from him.
"Don't you see it?" he snapped, cutting out his black friend's excuses. "Sonohra was the leader, Fire was the strongest, you are the smartest among us, the one who always calculates all the variables, and Phantom, the story of his life makes us understand what kind of dragon he is."
Traitorous tears began to come freely out of the dragon's blue eyes. "And what about me, Kohle?" he asked with a hint of self-disgust in his voice. "What do I'm? What did I do in the group? The buffoon of the group, the one that planned jokes to Cyril, the one that follows you and the others around complaining and saying bullshit all the time. But apart from all of that, what did I do of use for us? What did I achieve in this life? For what will I be remembered If we die here?"
His vision was now so blurred by his own tears that in front of him he wasn't even able to see his friend, but a blurry version of dark mixed colors like black and gray. "What is my purpose in our group, Kohle? Am I even of use for something other than saying bullshits?" he lowered his head, looking down at the dirt as if it was the most interesting thing in the world and watching as salt water fell onto it, staining it. "I'm useless," he whispered.
He failed. He was a failure, ever since he was a puppy and he even never noticed it, keeping on doing what a hatchling would do. He did nothing useful or noteworthy in his whole life, he did not contribute to the group's life not at the base, nor here on the surface. He was not helpful to the group in any way... and now, now that Sonohra was gone, the only thing he was left with was his own guilt for not being able of doing something.
For a moment, a long moment, silence dominated the cave. A suffocating silence, that kind of silence that left you alone with yourself and your mind full of your thoughts, swirling and attacking from inside. It was a terrible type of silence, one that could destroy a dragon and not what he hoped for at all. Then a voice broke the monotony of it and saved him as a light in the darkness.
"I was thinking," was the voice of the black dragon. " Can you tell me who among you and Fire managed to stay on your feet after fleeing Warfang?"
Ahmos stiffened understanding full well what the other dragon was trying to do, but not wanting to give in to it by responding to such nonsense.
"Or who facilitated our escape from the base when thousands of imperials chased us into the narrow tunnels? Or who-" Kohle went on as if he were listing carelessly.
Ahmos was starting to get angry and tired of black dragon games with words or emotions as he heard the other dragon listing up things that were clearly insufficient and minimal if matched with what the others accomplished.
"Or who-" he was keeping on listing before Ahmos lost it.
"You cannot compare that to -" he cut his friend but was cut back.
"Or who discovered the location of those eggs inside a warehouse similar to many others in Blackashes," continued Kohle as if he had not heard him.
"Luck! It was just luck! I was escaping from apes I pissed off because I wanted to do a night trip in an imperial city!" he growled, raising his head from his curved position on the floor, facing the black dragon with a warning growl sharp teeth on display.
A position Kohle mirrored as he continued.
"Or who defended us with ice walls for the retreat in the last battle against Fenris and the Dark Army, giving us the chance to survive mostly unharmed!" Kohle growled back at him, one of the small times he saw him visibly mad.
Ahmos answered in kind, raising the level of his voice as he growled. "It was not enough because two died anyway from my failure!"
Kohle didn't back down. Quite the opposite, he rose his voice too. "Would you have preferred more than two?"
"What? No, I-"
"Then tell me where you see failure?!"
"Sonohra and Batch are DEAD!" he roared as he couldn't keep it in anymore, so he exploded, his eyes wide open, his growl choked in his own throat, his breath fell short.
Silence fell again in the cave as a dark blanket of death. The other two occupants of the cave did not wake, nor winced. The two dragons remained silent, breathless for their race of roars and growls on top of each other.
"They're dead…" Ahmos whispered. "They're dead because I wasn't strong enough to hold the wall, wasn't strong enough not to faint on the ground like a fledgling."
Ahmos lowered his head, resting it on the ground this time, ashamed of himself for his weakness and ignorance. From his birth to his trip, despite all the death experiences he faced, he never matured like the others, and never learned. He always was, is, and will be stupid and childlike.
That was the reason why it was his fault and not Kohle's or anyone else's. If he had been stronger, if he had been more mature, if he had spent less time joking Cyril around and more time training with Kohle, now that wall could still be lifted, he should not have been dragged to safety, and maybe he could have given everyone, including Sonohra and Batch, enough time to escape.
Kohle, who kept quiet all that time, must have intercepted that thought as he often seemed to be capable of doing as he suddenly intervened, his voice trembling again.
"What if you kept that wall up and the Empress killed you instead of Batch? What if Fenris hit you and you died instead of Sonohra?"
Ahmos rose again, hardly but wanting to look at his friend as he answered that. He saw apprehension as well as tiredness in his eyes, so free and showing, again so unKohle-like. He had been controlling his emotions all his life and hiding them better than many others in the whole base. But now, seeing him so worried, broken, and tired, hurt the ice dragon so, so bad.
"I would have sacrificed myself," he said watching directly into the other dragon's volcanic eyes. "Because you all would deserve it. They would have deserved it."
Kohle tried to do what seemed like an encouraging smile, but nothing came out other than a grimace of pain and fatigue. "Yes," he just said. "They did."
At that moment, an unexpected noise caught the attention of both dragons who turned to the source. Behind them, the purple dragon in the darkest right corner of the cave was shaking, moving his paws frenetically, banging his teeth, and mooing meaningless words.
He was having a nightmare.
Ahmos stood by and watched as Kohle got up on his four flickering paws and he went into the darkest corner of the cave towering on the purple dragon, evidently assessing the situation. Abruptly he laid down by his side with a visible grimace of fatigue. He placed himself on one side of the other male, scales against scales and he put a black wing on his friend to cover him.
Ahmos could not be surprised once more. Kohle cared, it was clear. He was a good dragon.
And Ahmos cared too. The screaming contest with the black dragon had had some effect on him. He had left him with a dry, rushed throat, a headache, and pinching eyes, but he could say that he felt a little, just a little better. He managed to leave out what he had been feeling inside for a long time, letting a small weight lift from the boulder that was holding him down on his back.
And knowing Kohle, he wouldn't be surprised if that was the exact reason why he started that screaming in the first place.
He rose too from his position and headed for the crouching dragons, shaky but surely. First, however, he controlled Fire. He even tried to speak with her, move her or wake her, but no answer came as the dragoness seemed too destroyed or tired or both to even hear him.
Ahmos shook his head, sad, but still made his way to the two dragons at the corner to snuggle up at the other side of the dark purple dragon. He draped a blue and white wing over the black one, but still, his look was concentrated on the lonely fire dragoness at the center of the cave, distant from them as she had been from Warfang's incident.
Kohle noticed this and tried to soothe him. "Ahmos, you can't do anything for her if not wait for her to get out," he said softly, a hint of sadness in his voice. "We must trust her and her capabilities. As you said, she is the strongest among us."
Ahmos nodded. He knew this, but it kept hurting him to see their friend in that state.
At least the purple dragon had stopped shaking and mooring. Maybe he finally manage to do something right during this trip: comforting the purple dragon as he slept.
Kohle, maybe because of his tiredness or maybe because of the sharing warmth they were producing, lowered his head and closed his eyes, breathing a deep breath and then letting it go slowly.
Ahmos followed him right after. He too lowered his head next to the purple scales and closed his eyes ready to sink into a dreamless sleep, without darkness or death for once... for one night.
And just when he was on the verge of the dream world, he heard it, clear and sincerely, his best friend's whisper.
"You're not useless. And I would have sacrificed for you. Always."
He wasn't sure about the first part, but he damn knew the second and his heart exploded with warmth knowing that making his sail for the other side was somehow safer against the demons that were lurking at the edges.
"I know."