Chapter 12

"Um, this is crazy," Vala said. "We are bound to be caught and killed."

"We won't as long as you listen to me and follow my directions," Flint said.

"Why are we even doing this again?" Vala said. "Where is Hunter?"

"I told you, Hunter is with the Tuff Resistance, waiting to see if they can find Prancer and Tulsi."

"Weird that you would want to leave your crush behind."

"I DON'T HAVE A CRUSH ON HIM!" Flint yelled.

"Keep it down," Vala said. "Do you want to have your whole tribe hear us and this to fail before it begins?"

"Well if I didn't have an annoying dragon hugging my tail then things would be better."

"Oh, sorry Ms. Grouchy," Vala said. "I just think that it is weird that I don't remember anything from the past hour while you seem to remember everything."

"I told you already, you ran into a pillar and knocked yourself out," Flint said.

"Yeah, it's just weird that I can't remember any of that," Vala said. "Are you sure nothing else happened?"

Flint thought back to when Dredge interrogated her and forced her to agree with his plan. I want to tell her so bad. I want to open my mouth right now and say, 'Oh hey Vala just so you know there is this massive dragon who is somehow alive from two hundred years ago and he's got our friends. So let's go back there and rip him apart until we can save our friends from him.' But she couldn't. She didn't know if Dredge was listening to them right now and he still had the rest of Flint's friends hostage. Telling Vala about Dredge's plan would put all their lives in danger.

"No, that's everything that happened, now follow along, we are close to the entrance to the village."

"Fine," Vala said and followed in behind Flint as they made their way to one of the side entrances to enter the Cavewing village.

Going in through the front entrance would be a death trap, not only because there would be no area for Vala to sneak in there, but Flint knew that the dragon who guards there never changes until they die and the last guard that was there when Flint was still in the tribe knew Flint. So just to be on the safe side, they were going to avoid it in case that same dragon was still there. Flint hoped that if there was a dragon over at this side entrance, that they didn't know who Flint was. Guards came and went all the time. How likely would it be that the guard stationed here would know her?

They were rounding the bend of the tunnel when the entrance came into view. It was just as Flint pictured it to be, all those years ago when she used it to escape from her tribe. Half of it looked ready to collapse down at any moment and the other half looked neatly carved. Flint never knew why the Cavewings stopped on one side and didn't finish the other. She looked at the entrance and spotted a guard standing there, luckily not one that Flint recognized.

"Stay here," Flint said to Vala. "I will get through and distract the guard and you sneak in behind me."

"Ok, but I still don't like this plan," Vala said. "I feel like something bad is going to happen."

"Trust me, we will be alright," Flint said.

At least, I hope so.

She wandered out from the tunnel and in front of the guard standing there. She saw him get startled when he saw her.

"Dragonet, what are you doing out here at this time of the day?" he asked. "All the other dragonets are in a meeting."

"Oh sorry, I got lost in the caves playing with my friends and when I looked around they went off without me."

"Well, get back in and get off to the meeting," the guard said. "I will have to report this to the queen."

"I don't think you have to do that," Flint said and then the guard in front of her fell over and she saw Vala standing behind him with her claws extended.

"WHAT WAS THAT FOR?" Flint yelled. "I HAD IT UNDER CONTROL!"

"Yeah, under control as him going to tell the queen about you and that would have blown our cover," Vala said.

"Well did you have to knock him out?" Flint asked.

"What else did you want me to do? Leave him there to report in?" Vala asked. "Don't worry I used my spikes to put him to sleep, when he wakes up he will not remember the conversation he had with you."

"Your spikes can do that?" Flint questioned.

"Yes, our spikes can do a lot of things, they have evolved over time with us being stuck down there because of your tribes!"

"Our tribes didn't do it!" Flint protested. "You said it yourself, other dragons from different tribes kicked you out."

"Yeah and your tribes came from those dragons so you all still hold the guilt. If you ask me, I wish they never came here, we had everything perfect for us and got it all taken away because of them!" She then stormed off into the shadows, allowing Flint to proceed in the plan.

WHATEVER DRAGON! Flint yelled in her mind. If you want to think of our tribes that way then be my guest, it's not like your own tribe steals our dragons and kills them for 'revenge.'

She started to walk into the Cavewing village and memories from the place started pouring into her mind and she couldn't stop them. She saw the school that she had gone to, the rock sculpture that she loved to sleep at. She peered around a corner and saw the home that she grew up in. It was a hole carved into one of the walls that opened up into a small cavern. Flint didn't see anyone in there and felt her feet move on their own towards the opening. She looked inside and saw that it looked the same as it did four years ago.

The entrance was perfectly rounded off and embedded in the edges were gold rocks that were given to Cavewings who served in the army and Flint's home had the most. She absolutely hated them. For her, the rocks showed the amount of Webwings that her family had killed just to get them. Once someone who was in the army killed twenty Webwings by themselves, they were given a gold rock to put into their entrance to their home. Flint looked around and saw more gold rocks in the other cave entrance to other Cavewing homes. From what Flint could count from her own entrance, her family had ten gold rocks which meant two hundred Webwings died from just her family alone.

Stupid family, killing does nothing! All it does is continue this bloody war. How many dragons have to die before our tribes start seeing that this war is pointless? Why haven't dragons figured that out already, why aren't there more dragon's resisting?

She stepped more into her home and she saw the same rock sculpture that she had carved when she was one year old. It was the only important thing that she cared about in her tribe. She remembers when she brought it back from school that day, all excited after what she made. Her parents acted excited as well for her and put it near the entrance so that she could always see it when she returned from school. But later that night, Flint couldn't sleep and went to go find her parents when she heard voices coming from the main entrance. She crept closer and saw her parents standing there, looking at the sculpture that she made.

"It disgusts me," Diamond said.

"Yeah, the sculpture doesn't even show her doing any fighting or killing, it's just her smiling," Marble said. "What an absolute waste of an opportunity."

Flint couldn't believe what she was hearing. Up until that point, no one said anything bad to her, everyone was nice to her and went along with whatever she said. No one bullied her, made fun of her, or even thought she was weird. That was the case up until that night with her parents at the entrance. Then Flint started noticing all the strange ways the dragonets acted around her, getting as far away from her as possible when she was walking down the tunnel, always having her being picked last for any activity, and being the only dragon to sit in the front of the class with everyone else behind her. That's also when she started getting bullied and picked on after school. Her classmates would pick fights with her and run away when they saw the adult dragons coming which always ended with Flint getting the blame for everything. One time, one of her classmates punched her so hard that she got a bloody nose and black eye. When she returned home that day, her parents weren't happy with her.

"Why didn't you stand up for yourself more?" Diamond asked.

"I…" Flint always had a hard time speaking to her parents when they were yelling at her.

"No excuses," Marble said. "You should have punched them until they went unconscious!"

"But wouldn't… that be… bad?" Flint asked.

"IT'S SUPPOSED TO YOU WORM!" Diamond yelled and picked up Flint and slammed her into the wall. "YOU ARE A CAVEWING AND PART OF THE MOST MIGHTIEST WARRIOR FAMILY OF ALL TIME! SO START ACTING LIKE ONE!"

Diamond then let go of Flint and left through the entrance with Marble. Flint's back hurt after being slammed into the wall and she went to her rock bed to lay down and started crying.

Why does everything have to be so unfair? Why do I have to be a certain way, why can't I choose my own way to live? What's wrong with me?

Flint felt tears start rolling down her eyes as she passed the hole in the wall that Diamond slammed her into all those years ago. It still looked fresh, almost like it happened just yesterday. She continued down the tunnel and saw the rooms up ahead of her. Each room had a rock embedded into the top that showed who it belonged to. Flint saw the diamond rock for her mom above one room and the marble rock above another room for her dad. She then went to the end of the hallway and saw the room she grew up in, except there was something missing from it. Flint looked above and saw that her flint rock wasn't there anymore. Instead, in its place, was a rock that was similar to flint. It was a chert rock.

That's strange, Flint thought. Does this mean that the daughter that my parents adopted is sleeping in my room now?

Flint didn't have time to answer that question because she heard footsteps coming to the entrance of the home from the outside.

Shoot, I got to hide! Flint looked around the room and then remembered something. I know a place I could hide! She then dove under the platform that held up her sculpture and she backed into the darkness as much as she could. She continued to hear footsteps approaching and then saw who was making them. It was her parents, Diamond and Marble. A little jump in Flint's heart went when she saw them.

Stop that, they hate me! They have replaced me with another daughter and are trying to wipe me clean of their family line.

But what if they didn't and that was just Granite messing around? She is known to do that and the other dragonets follow along with her. Maybe my parents haven't given up on me, maybe they still do care about me.

Flint was about to climb out from her hiding spot when another young dragon appeared in the entrance. She couldn't have been more than one year old. The dragon walked up to her parents and her mom picked up the dragonet in her arms.

"Aw, who's my little sweetie," Diamond said to the dragon.

"ME, ME!" the dragonet said.

"Yes you are," Marble said. "And you will be our little sweetie." Flint then saw him lean over to Diamond. "And this one will be better than our original daughter."

That statement hit Flint like a punch to the gut and she couldn't help but stay still and watch the rest of the conversation, unable to comprehend what she just heard. Yes, she was told she was replaced but up until that point, she wanted to believe that it was a joke and that her parents would take her back just the way she was.

"Yes, our little daughter," Diamond said. "And your name will be Chert." With that, her parents and their new adopted daughter walked down the tunnel and into Flint's room.