Chapter 2: The Winds' Revenge

In the 17th century, Aristocratic dragons were having a spring family reunion in the forest. Extended family members gathered here to share their stories and tales with one other, having friendly competitive sports, and letting their hatchlings play with one another. An emerald green baby dragon with a dark yellow underbelly was playing tag with three other hatchlings, including his own sister. The green disaster hatchling tagged the blue one and passed the "It" status on to him before he and another hatchling ran away from their pursuer. They passed by four male dragons who were having a conversation. The ash-gray dragon broodily groaned, *This century just keeps getting better and better... Last week, a bunch of humans came in with bows and arrows and shot down Freddy and his friends. Then those savages threw the wounded in cages and tied the dead to the back of their wagons and took them away into the village. I tell you, folks. Days are getting grimmer and grimmer when everybody would either get shot dead or put onto the market as a fresh slave ready to be broken dry. I wouldn't be surprised if the next century turns out the same way as this one did.*

*Me neither. I bet it's only a matter of time before we're all next,* said the pessimist dark orange dragon. The moonstone and summer dragons both nodded their heads in agreement. The disaster hatchling overhead what the adults were saying and instantly became worried. Would the humans come and take him away eventually? Or would they probably kill him on the spot? He didn't want to be stolen away from his family and be a slave for the rest of his life or wind up dead. The thoughts about these two treacherous fates were scary enough to make his belly churn.

While pondering in his thoughts, the disaster hatchling was taken by surprise when the blue hatchling ran faster and pounced him down to the ground. *Gotcha! Now you're It!* the blue said, laughing before he ran off.

But the green hatchling didn't bother to go after him; instead he asked this question, *Hey Bam, do you think the humans will ever kidnap us?*

Bam stopped running and turned around to look back at his playmate. *Huh? Why would you ask that?* he asked, wondering.

*Well it's because I heard the grown-ups saying that the humans were going to get us someday. So thought that maybe someday we all would be next eventually,* replied the disaster hatchling.

Bam laughed at the nonsense he was hearing and said confidently, *Hah, me next? No way, pal! There's no way the humans would get to me as long as daddy's around. He's a really strong dragon and he can kick those humans' butts easily! And when I grow up, I'm going to be as big and strong like my daddy.*

*Yeah, but what if the humans do get you? Then what?* asked the green, not sure if Bam and his father's strength would protect them from the strange-looking primates.

Three other hatchlings came up to them when the game had taken a break. The female green hatchling asked, *Brother, what's wrong? Why aren't you chasing Bam?*

The brother would have answered the question had Bam not beaten him to it first, *Oh he just heard the worrywart grown-ups say that the humans are going to get us all and now he thinks it's going to happen someday.*

The sister smiled gently and went over to her brother and assured, *Brother, relax. Everything is going to be alright.*

The orange hatchling approached too and said, *Yeah Aeolus, let's just keep playing the game and worry about that stuff later.*

Aeolus, now comforted, let go of his fears and said, *Yeah, I guess you're right. Let's get back to playing, shall we?* Then he had a mischievous smirk on his face and shoved his paw into his sister. *By the way, you're It now!* he teased.

*Hey, get back here!* the female hatchling said in her playfully annoyed tone. She gave chase to the fleeing hatchlings as they all laughed and have a good time.

About 30 minutes later, all the dragons gathered together for a meeting and toast to their reunion. A dark green dragon, who was the host of this party, landed on top of the monolith and said to his family, *Everyone, it has been an honor to have you all here for this family reunion. It makes me so happy to see how many of us are here to this day after all the hardships and losses we've suffered in our long lives and in this dark age. And even though our enslaved and dead kin are no longer with us, I can feel their presence among us in spirit.* Some of the dragons lowered their heads in grief while a few others shed tears for their lost loved ones. The host understood their sorrow and felt sympathy for them as he said, *Yes, yes, I know these tragedies must pain you so. But never fear, my fellow brothers and sisters, maybe some day there will come a new era when dragons will no longer be exploited by mankind and we can all get on back with our peaceful lives without fear of losing our lives, freedoms, and loved ones at the hands of these fiends. We'll even be reunited with our friends and family. Now I know this sounds like I'm giving you all false promises here, but how many times in history did we as a species survive death and injustice? For every despair, there is always hope for us; a miracle waiting to happen. And I assure you that miracle will come one way or another, no matter how many years or centuries it takes to get there. So let us keep hoping for that day and for the humans to get the punishment they deserve. For now, I give a toast to all of us here in these woods and all around the world and the life beyond.*

All the dragons roared out in applause and cheers. Even little Aeolus was giving out his cute high-pitched roar. His father's speech had put down half of his worries about his future fate. 'Well I guess even if I do get captured and starved, I'll be able to get out of slavery free and alive,' the hatchling thought. Hope would be there to save him in the end. The celebration soon was put to an end when a gunshot was heard. Aeolus's father had taken a bullet to the heart as he grunted out in pain and fell over dead. The astonished dragons gasped at the murder that had taken place right in front of them. Aeolus and his mother & sister had taken the hardest hit as they were all struck with grief. *Father!* the son cried.

Within the next second, human soldiers came in with swords slashing and bayonets firing at the crowd; wounding and killing some of them in the process. Panicking screams and roars filled the air as parents gathered their hatchlings and fled, while those, who can afford to fight, bought time for them by fending off the humans with fiery breaths, plant-controlling magic, and other magical powers to fight against swords, guns, and cannons. Despite the dragon's incredible powers; the humans came prepared with anti-dragon magic to subdue their dinosaurian prey. The humans cast barriers to shield themselves against the offense and used sleeping spells to knock out the dragons. The mages cast magical webs to catch and paralyze the captives with electric shocks. Not even Bam's father, who was the strongest as the hatchling claimed to be, was tough enough to avoid succumbing to the sleep spell and getting a killing stab through the neck. Bam, was in disbelief and shock, and would have been to the fullest extent, if he wasn't feeling very tired at the moment. *Daddy, no...* were his last words before his unconsciousness.

Aeolus's mother tried to escape with her two hatchlings carried in her forelegs like arms. She surrounded herself with magical winds to prevent the sleeping gas from going into her lungs, but that didn't stop the weapons' ammo from being fired upon them. One bullet flew into the skull of Aeolus's sister and blood started gushing out of her head from where she got killed. Both the brother and the mother were horrified to see another member of their family had been taken. *No!* Aeolus shouted.

*Selicia!* the mother cried out in grief over the death of her precious baby. Soon afterwards, a cannon shot out an iron that flew hard into the mother's back and broke her spine. The light gray dragoness roared out loudly in agony as she crashed down onto the ground, dropping both of her hatchlings in the process. Aeolus rolled on the ground and hurt himself before he stopped and lifted his head up to see the painful state his mother was in. She was belly flat on the ground, moaning in pain as she struggled against the will to lay down and keep herself from hurting any further. Her son, the only one she had left, needed her and she had to keep him safe from the humans.

The dragoness managed to raise her head, but she didn't get to stand on her legs next, because the soldiers came at her with spears to jab her with. Aeolus got all frantic and worried watching the two-legged monsters attack his parent. *Mother!* he shouted.

Then a hand grabbed him by scruff as a gruff voice sounded from behind, "Come here, you!" The hatchling was lifted up off the ground and thrown into a small cage. The man carried the cage over to one of the wagons where the other caged hatchlings were put. The sleep spell started to take its toll on Aeolus as his vision became dark and the last thing he saw was his mother getting dragged by the soldiers.

Since that tragic day, Aeolus Gallion had spent all his 448 years doing grueling work for all the slavers he had in his life. As of now, the green dragon and other dragons with electric abilities were in the power plant zapping the generator's lightning rods to provide energy to the entire city. It was exhausting to everyone's mouths, which the electric breaths came from, and bodies, which the magic originate. Aeolus could feel himself wanting to stopped and take a much-needed break for his mouth and lungs, but then that would earn him the sharp stings of the whips and painful shocks of the tasers. The humans wanted their slaves working constantly for like 24 hours a day to keep the town running. An overseer walked by the line of slaves, keeping a sharp eye for anyone who fails to do their jobs. The man cracked his whip on the hard floor and yelled, "Keep zapping, you scaly scums! I want to see you all work!"

His words weren't that much helpful as everyone knew what would happen to them should they fail to do their jobs. Aeolus's red eyes shifted to the side to look at the man with contempt for him and his species. How he wanted to break free and destroy all humans and make them pay for that he had suffered over the centuries, including getting revenge for the death of his mother, whose spine had been fortunately healed by a white dragon, but was unfortunate to die after being worked to death years later. He already had a such a plan that would achieve this desire and liberate all the dragons around the world. That plan was the Spell, which he and another older and wiser dragon by the name of Arcaon worked on. Arcaon was a dragon that Aeolus heard about from a fellow slave who got transported from Rudvich; the disaster dragon came into contact with Arcaon via telepathy and discussed how they were going save all of dragonkind. Thus, they came up with the solution of disabling all human weaponry and dragon-suppressing tech on the whole planet. In order for the Spell to work, nearly all the dragons around the world must combine their magic energy into the global telepathy to power up the spellcasters who would then unleash the Spell's global effect. Plus with the several natural disasters and the natural resources used to repair cities such as metal ores and oil running low, the humans will be too weak to fend for themselves against the dragons' wrath as their number of weapons were getting fewer every day. Tonight was going to be great!

After the slaves were sent back to their cages with two dragons dead from starvation and over-exhaustion, the dragons waited until most of the humans left the room and only the few guards remained. Aeolus laid down in his cage with tail curled around his body and wings down as he waited for his fellow mastermind to give him the signal. The other slaves were too anticipating the coming the of the Spell as hope was shining in their eyes. The disaster dragon heard Arcaon's telepathic message, 'Now's the time Aeolus. Tell the other dragons to release the Spell now.'

Grateful that the time had finally come, Aeolus formed a telepathic bond with the whole world and said, 'Everyone, the time has come for our freedom! All dragons cast the Spell now!' So the dragons worked together and unleashed the Spell. When the electricity coursing through the barbed wires curled around the bars of his cage shut down, Aeolus felt content to see that his brilliant plan had worked like a charm. The Spell did the same thing to the cages of his fellow slave dragons. The green dragon of earth and wind ripped the wires off his cage door while resisting the pain the thorns gave to his paw. "My brothers, the time for liberty has come and the genocide and slavery we've suffered at the hands of the humans has finally ended. No longer will we work ourselves to death while the humans flog us. No longer will we eat rotten food, while the humans fill themselves fat. No longer will our lives be of misery and pain, while the humans live in luxury and greed. No longer will our hatchlings be torn away from their families and be robbed of their childhoods. No longer will our eggs be used as food for the humans. And no longer will any more of our wild brethren be slain or captured to live what we went through. Today is the day, we dragons take back our freedom and revolt against these wretched hairless apes! Everyone, RISE!" Around the room, dragons roared and broke out of their cages.

The guards saw what was happening and grabbed their guns and metal pokers to attack. Their weapons failed to do their job and the men were quickly electrocuted and eaten by the rebels. One guard scared for his life at the chaos going on, frantically took out his walkie-talkie and spoke into it, "Alert! Alert! We got a code red down here at Section 22. Those dragons are breaking out of their cages and killing our men. I need backup ASAP!" Then he was quickly zapped by Aeolus's lightning breath. The man's body flashed a few short times with his skeleton showing every second before he collapsed down and burnt.

"Thanks for giving us more victims to kill, fool! They'll thank you in the afterlife," the disaster dragon said coldly and glad that he was going to have more of these damn apes to murder.

The reinforcements soon came in, armed and ready to quell the rebellion. "Alright you lizards, prepare to die!" one of the men said. The slaves, knowing that the guards can't do a thing anymore, quickly zapped them to death before the humans would realized that their guns were useless after pulling the trigger once. Then the slaves left the cage room and went to kill the rest of their human masters in the building before they all left the place of their servitude. Aeolus destroyed the powerplant with his earthquake power before he and the others went out into the city to join up with the other free dragons to attack the humans. The disaster breathed out lightning at a crowd of humans, killing most of them while paralyzing the survivors, who would most likely get finished off by the other dragons. Then he came across a blue dragoness brutally killing a group of hunters in a bloody scene. 'Hunters... Serves them right,' the green dragon thought, feeling no pity for the dragon slayers.

The frightened humans tried to run away from the dragoness, but only to be slaughtered by other angry dragons. The others tried to fight back with their now useless weapons and anything they got with them, but the dragoness was much quicker and experienced in close combat than they were. Plus, she was driven by a grief, rage and sorrow, which gave her more strength. There were also humans, who immediately realised, what they have done. However, they also knew that their fate was sealed the moment they became slayers and slavers. So they just stood there, ignoring others and waiting for vicious claws to take away their lives. The number of hunters was rapidly decreasing, now reduced to one hundred. As time went by, the human populace in the city was dropping rapidly from death by dragons and humans who were lucky to escape into the outskirts. Even the buildings were getting torn, burned down, or crumbled by the dragons' might. Aeolus kept on killing and killing every person, both civilian and fighter, until he saw a hunter going at the blue dragoness with a knife. The green dragon quickly zapped him to death before the man could touch her with blade. The dragoness turned instantly to find the electrified corpse of the hunter. She quickly found the reason of his death, who happened to be the emerald-greed dragon himself. Nodding to him in thanks, she shoved the corpse so he would drop the knife, grabbed the knife and continued to kill the humans, now with less brutality, but with more thinking. She carefully watched the number of humans killed.

Aeolus kept helping the blue dragoness to kill off the hunters until soon there was none left. Time went by with the city becoming more desolated and destroyed with hundreds of human bodies laying dead; the survivors escaped the city and went out into the desert. Aeolus went over to a dying man, who was lying face flat breathing and bleeding, and stomped down on his head to crush it. There was another survivor nearby, which happened to be a man, presumably around 25 years old, with a gash on his foot. The dragoness immediately leaped to him, pinned him to the ground, and telepathically said to other dragons not to interrupt. Then she looked at the man. "Drop all of the weapons you have with you. Every single one," she ordered with grim expression on her face.

"No, you lizard," snarled the man. The dragoness just raised her eyebrow and gestured to look around. Human did so to see a lot of dragons that were staring right at him.

"I can just leave you here at their mercy, and I doubt that they will spare you. Now do as I said: drop off. Every. Weapon. You have. NOW," she said the final word with a growl. Shaken, the man began to quickly set aside everything he had: pistol, some sort of a rifle, a pair of combat knives, a phone, a grenade and camera. Rina immediately took away the grenade and knives, setting them out of human's reach.

Aeolus looked at the lone human survivor and asked mockingly under his cold and disapproving expression, "So human, how does it feel to have all your technological powers, family, friends, and rule stripped away from you all in one night? How does it feel to have the tables turned against you after all the dragons around the world grew tired of being your third-class slaves and retaliated in revenge. You arrogant fools should have thought of the consequences when you first threw us in cages and killed the others for sport. Because of what you've done, your kind has paid for your current generation and your ancestors' actions in blood. And I doubt my fellow dragons will stop until every last human dead has fulfilled their thirst for revenge."

The man just laughed and said, "So what? What are you going to do about this? Annihilate all humans or something? I know you want to, ya lizards. Now that you threw out your magic thing and now we can't use even a microwave! SO WHAT?"

"I am not going to kill you," said the dragoness suddenly, but the human just mockingly laughed again. Then she added, "But I can make so and I WILL do so that you will never be the same as you are now. Tell me, did any human return to your town with a certain mark on their backs?"

"Well... yeah. What of it?" huffed the man.

"Now tell me: what did you do to those humans?"

"Well, we tortured and killed them, since they... befriended you, lizards... or something... wait..." Suddenly, the human's face became ill as he realized what what about to happen to him and said, "You are not going to..."

"Yes, I am," nodded the dragoness. "And believe me, it is much worse than you think. Even worse than death... well, for you murderers, that is." She roughly turned him around and exposed his back. There she began to draw her clan's mark with her claws. Of course it was painful for a man, but it was bearable, so he didn't gave any sort of scream. But he was afraid; very afraid.

Aeolus watched the dragoness carve some kind of insignia on the man's back. He didn't know the exact purpose of putting it on the human, but from what the man said about the marked humans who befriended dragons, Aeolus guessed that she was going to frame him as an ally of dragons so that the other humans will turn on him like a pack of wolves. 'This should be a fate quite fitting for someone who kills their own kind, even though these people would side with dragons for some reason,' he thought. Come of think of it, the disaster dragon found it rather odd and peculiar that there were some humans who would befriend his kind at the cost of getting punished by others, whom a majority were about enslaving dragonkind. But he was quite suspicious of their motives, because he had befriended some humans before who pretended to be dragon sympathizers, but in the end they all ended up betraying him.

But Aeolus thought wrong; when the dragoness was done with drawing a sign, she let the man go. But immediately after that she started to quickly chant words that were forming a Curse. As soon as the man stood up, he fell back on the ground, screaming with pain. The mark was glowing now and with each word chanted, the glow became larger and larger. Soon every dragon nearby began to receive telepathic signals, which were telling them information about the man. His physical and mental condition, emotions, name, thoughts. But most importantly, what he has done: participating in annihilation of the clan of Eternal Wind and personally killing 6 dragons with 2 of them being children. When the dragoness finished the Curse, the human whose name was Simon went limp on the ground, not being able to move from all the pain that was racing through his body seconds ago. "This is your punishment, human," said the dragoness coldly. "Now every dragon nearby knows what you have done. The guilt and the memories of your crime will haunt you, until you try to actually think about it and change yourself. Death is a too swift punishment for the likes of you. That means you don't have to worry about being killed by dragons or attempting suicide. And I doubt that you would be killed by another human after the Spell. But don't think that you are free, human. Like I said, the memories will haunt you and painful memories tend to be sharper than claws."

Aeolus growled to the man as well, "You had better learn from your past, if you wish to get on our good side and live in peace for the rest of your miserable life."

Simon passed out from the exhaustion the Curse caused, but deep in his mind, both dragon's words were "carved" in his memory. 'Maybe this lizard is just scaring me. It has to be!' were his thoughts before passing out.

The disaster dragon read what was in Simon's head and thought, 'Deny us all you want, but you'll know how it plays out for you later.' Then he took a better look at the mark for a few moments before recognizing the familiar mark he heard about in stories shared by fellow slaves a long time ago. Then he asked the blue dragoness, "That mark on his back; it looks like it belongs to a clan. Would you happen to be of the Eternal Wind clan?"

The dragoness turned her head to him and replied with somewhat sorrow tone, "Yes, I am from the clan of Eternal Wind, which ceased it's physical existence three days ago. Now it exists only in memory."

Aeolus felt pity for her and said, "I'm quite sorry to hear. You have my sympathies, Miss... I'm sorry, what's you name?"

"It's Rina; Rina Windcutter," she said, "and thank you." Then she looked away over to the side as if she was mourning something that was over in that direction.

"You're welcome, Rina, and may your clan rest in peace now that it has been avenged. Farewell and take care," said the dragon. Then he walked off and picked a some dead humans to eat so that he could fill his belly before traveling out of the city. The meat was definitely a lot tastier than the horrid foods the slavers had given him, but there was the nuisance of the clothing that felt inedible to eat. So Aeolus remove these covers and enjoyed his nude meal. After his hunger was satisfied, Aeolus left the city and traveled across the desert lands. It felt good to finally be out of human habitat, because now he can enjoy his newfound liberty of a better life. He went on for while until he got to a destroyed village where dragon bodies and a few human hunters were lain dead with dried blood and flesh eating by vultures and maggots on the ground. Among that village was the Eternal Wind Clan insignia on the tall rock. He recalled earlier of Rina looking off towards the side with a sad look on her face. 'So this is where she lives. No wonder why she looked off in this direction like that and now I've stumbled upon her home. I should give this clan a proper burial,' thought Aeolus. He started to dig up holes here in clan territory to make as it felt right for the clan to be rested here at home. After that was done, he proceed to putting the dragons in their graves and fill the holes back with dirt to prevent their bodies from being desecrated any further by scavengers. No burial was made for the humans as they were taken out of the village to be laid to waste away from sacred grounds.

After finishing burying the Eternal Wind clan in their graves, the dragon decided to rest here for the night after all the hard work, his first job not ordered by humans, he did. He went to the tallest rock and carved words in Draconic language, "Here lies the Eternal Wind Clan." The green dragon went to one of the caves and went to inside. He would need a lot of energy to make the journey to a biome suited to his breed, such as a forest or a volcanic area, where he would make his home. But more preferably the woods, since there was plenty of food that thrived there.

When Rina reached her now destroyed village, she noticed that the bodies were no longer there. She noticed that the sand is slightly deformed in places and guessed that someone buried the bodies. 'Perhaps it was Aeolus... that was his name, if I'm not mistaken...' she thought, recalling to hear this name from a group of magis. She closed her eyes in appreciation and when her eyes opened again, Rina headed the place she knew that would give her an answer to her question; her chieftain's cave. She stopped near the cave, which belonged to her best friend, Itakira; someone was there. Her suspicions cleared, as she recognized the emerald-green dragon, or rather Aeolus, from before. For the first time after the disaster, she smiled.

Note: This story starts off with a never-before-seen backstory, albeit rushed, to give more depth to Aeolus's character. The last part of this chapter is probably the only time I will use the PoV of another person's character. On the next chapter will go back to Atlas who will be fighting to save a fellow slave's friend as well as fight a bunch of nasty monsters to save her family.

UPDATE: So with the introduction of what the dragon language is like in dialogue form in Airazena's 2nd giftstory, I've decided to update this chapter to make it look like Aeolus and his clan are speaking in their native tongue. Looks like like I can't use the less-than and greater-than signs on Fanfiction, so I'll just have to use asterisks for characters speaking in dragon language.

Aeolus, Bam and Selicia (c) me
Rina, Simon and Itakira (c) TheTron852