Artha and Lance jerked simultaneously, Artha almost losing his hard-won footing. Their home was across the courtyard from the stall they were in, but they still felt echoes of the blast through the ground. The noise from the explosion itself hit them like a physical force, more than simple sound waves.
Artha and Lance alike stared in horror out the open stall door, a reflection of the fire dancing in their eyes. Their home, with their father still inside, was on fire. A lot of fire, TONS of fire.
Lance made a squeaking noise, suddenly leaning into Artha's side and gripping his foreleg. Artha swiveled his head around, to see what his brother was in further distress over. Icy chills rand from his nape to tailtip as Artha beheld the three shadowy figures creeping closer to their stall. It was the maroon clad rider from before, back again to steal him. This time, he brought friends, each with their faces similarly hidden behind opaque visors.
Artha reared his head and hissed threateningly, causing the interlopers to falter momentarily. His threat display did not dissuade them for long, however. After a moment's hesitation, the maroon rider made a hand signal and his two flanking goons fanned out to either side of him, blocking all possible avenues of escape. The thieves were trying to trap Artha and Lance into the 3 sided stall.
Artha, despite not wanting to be closer to the thieves, trod forward, out of the stall, several paces. Lance continued to silently cling to his leg, Artha wasn't sure if the thieves had noticed him or not. He hoped they didn't. Thankfully, adrenaline seemed to be helping his coordination somehow. He felt more steady now than he felt all night.
Now properly out of the stall, Artha still faced three intruders, one to each side. They seemed more wary, now that he was out in the light, standing at full height. To be fair, when faced with a cornered multi-ton animal, Artha would be wary too. That said, he still needed to get past them. Artha lowered his head and made his best attempt at a snarl. It came out closer to a warble, but seeing the goon on the left flinch meant it was still effective enough.
It also marked where Artha would have the best luck escaping. Could he run? Artha hadn't tried running on his new legs yet. Despite his newfound stability, he wasn't sure if he could actually maintain balance at speed.
The intruders took another step towards Artha and his brother, trying to herd him back into the stall where he would make for an easier catch. Lance flinched at their movement and clung tighter to Artha's leg. Artha glanced down to meet his terrified gaze. Well, that settles it, thought Artha. Even if they catch me, I still don't know what they would do to Lance if they caught him. Whatever happens, I can't let them hurt him.
A low growl sounded out across the courtyard, dark and menacing. Artha was shocked to find that it was coming from his own vocal cords. It caused the one goon to take a step back and that was all the chance Artha needed.
He jerked forward suddenly, bobbing his head towards that goon, who threw himself to the ground with a cry. With that side free, Artha forced his legs to move as fast as he could, angling himself to keep Lance hidden behind his shadow as he moved.
However, as quickly as his escape escalated, it ended. With silent precision, the maroon thief had thrown a green control gear, slamming into Artha's right shoulder and pinning him to the wall on his left. Lance was between Artha and the wall, thankfully short enough that the bulk of Artha's body didn't crush him, behind Artha's fore legs. He was hidden there, but Artha was sure that when the goons dragged him into their trailer, which he could now see just behind the corner of the stable, he would be discovered.
Although the force of his impact with the wall initially knocked the breath out of him, Artha began to shriek and panic as the goons closed in, now confident in their catch. The maroon one approached his head first, reaching to run his hands along Artha's angular cheek bone. Artha lashed his tail in distress, struggling to pull away from the unwanted touch. He was sure the maroon rider was smirking smugly behind his helmet's visor, filling Artha with a unique sense of helpless rage and terror.
"RRRRAAAAWRRRRRGGHHHH!"
A ferocious war cry pierced the night, startling thieves and victims alike. Suddenly, the maroon rider and his cronies were gone, knocked away by a red and blue blur. The blur slowed to a stop, skidding on red paws several feet in front of Artha. It was Beau, loyally placing himself between the boys and their attackers.
Beau snarled in the direction of the thieves, scales along his neck standing up in a definitive ruff, aggressive body language common to adult dragons when protecting their young. Despite having the advantage, Beau didn't attack further, remaining in front of Artha and Lance. Even as the thieves stood back up and regrouped, Beau remained between them and Artha.
If the thieves were surprised by the addition of a new, aggressive dragon, they didn't talk about it. Actually, Artha realized, they hadn't said anything at all. The lack of speaking, combined with their colored visors and nondescript clothing (not one of them had any markings or gang signs), likely guaranteed that their identities could not be tracked down later. This had been planned well. The thought of someone else knowing about the constellation and specifically planning an attack during it gave Artha a cold tingle down his spine, from head to tail.
Now with a familiar ally in sight, Lance began to squirm, wriggling out from between Artha's legs and the stable wall. With Beau's massive body in between the boys and the thieves, Artha doubted that they could see Lance.
"Run!" Artha urged Lance, but despite doing his best to be understood, he knew Lance only heard a distressed, squawking growl. Lance didn't seem keen on listening to Artha anyways, regardless of the language barrier. He was too busy pulling at the green gear that trapped Artha.
Beau glanced back at them and huffed. A voice groused, "Don't just pull on it, press the buttons, kid!"
Lance didn't seem to hear the instructions, simply continuing to jerk at the green gear. Artha lifted his head, searching for whoever had spoken, hoping they would help, but he saw no one. They were the only ones there.
Click!
Apparently, despite not having heard their mysterious benefactor's advice, Lance had managed to hit the manual release on the green gear anyway, likely by accident. Even so, the green device retracted its energy arms, freeing Artha from the stable wall. He lurched back to equilibrium, managing to catch himself on his paws. Using all of his newfound mobility skills, Artha quickly moved himself in front of Lance, further protection for the child.
Now that Artha was freed, Beau turned his complete attention onto the intruders, yellow eyes narrowing in a particularly predatory manner. With Artha's release and Beau's appearance, the thieves were looking much less confident, or at least, Artha thought so. He couldn't see their faces, but somehow he could tell their morale was waning.
Their leader was not to be deterred, making swift, angry hand gestures in communication with his goons. Again, their team spread out, the two goons stalking to either side, flanking Beau. Beau snarled in response, likely feeling threatened by their movement.
Beau twisted his head from one side to another, struggling to keep all his enemies within view. The goons took advantage of his inconsistent focus, moving when he looked away, further stressing and disorienting the red and blue dragon. Artha growled and snapped his teeth in warning to the goon on his side, but it didn't do any good. Artha was several feet away and this goon wasn't dragon-shy. He didn't even flinch.
Their maroon leader made another hand sign and his cronies struck. From each side, they threw a gray/black blur. The blurs made contact with Beau's front legs revealing themselves to be black gear. The gear expanded and forced Beau's forelegs to bend at the joint, causing the dragon to bend over in a dark imitation of a bow.
Artha let out a shrill cry of alarm as Beau was caught in their trap, Lance once again clutching at his leg in terror.
Now that Beau was no longer a threat, the thieves stalked around Beau's incapacitated form, keeping a wide distance from his lashing tail or furiously snapping at them- despite not being able to reach the intruders.
Even as the menacing figures closed in on Artha and his brother, Artha couldn't help but think he had never seen Beau so furious. Beau was the same age as Artha, they had grown up together. Seeing him like this was new for Artha, reminding him that while Beau was normally a gentle giant, he was still one of the world's largest predators.
As the attackers passed Beau, Artha heard someone yelling, "Run! Get out of here!"
Again, there was no one else around.
Though, thought Artha, it wouldn't have mattered. Even if he could outrun the thieves, which was a very large if, Lance would never be able to keep up and Artha refused to leave him behind. As though to validate this thought, Lance whimpered and gripped harder onto Artha's foreleg.
Artha growled again, feeling an alien sensation along his body as various fins or spines rose in an involuntary threat behavior. He could see the goons preparing mag-tethers as they neared him, a special kind of material woven into a cable that was commonly used on dragons due to the natural mag-dampening effects in the material. It kept dragons from repelling the cable itself and had the added effect that the dragon would have great difficulty repelling anything else, either.
Artha's heart caught in his throat as Lance cried out, "Beau! Beau, help!"
The thieves halted for a moment, finally seeing the figure of a child behind Artha's legs. Artha hunched lower, trying to keep Lance's features in shadow, or at least provide some kind of protection.
The thieves, ignoring Beau's furious snarls, signed swiftly between the three of them, with the leader ending their pseudo conversation with a sudden swiping movement. The two goons turned back to Artha and raised their mag-tethers, now looped into lassos, in preparation to wrangle Artha.
Artha tried to growl again, but he was scared, and it came out as a warbling whimper. This was it, he was going to be stolen away, never to see his family ever again.
CRACK!
Shrapnel and other stray projectiles peppered the courtyard, making impact along the ground, stable walls, and the intruders. The intruders jerked and one of the goons cried out, only the second noise they made all night.
Beau, in a show of monstrous strength, had overpowered the black gear, bursting the coils and shattering it across the courtyard. He roared, absolutely furious at the humans that would dare threaten his people. Unlike before, Beau did not wait for them to react. One goon fell to a powerful tail swipe, sending him to slam into the wall with a thunk that made Artha wince. The other goon screamed as Beau sank his teeth into the man's meaty calf, lifting him upside down and swinging him around like a ragdoll as the man continued to yell. Eventually, once he gathered enough momentum, Beau let him loose. The man flew through the air to land directly on top of the other goon, who was too stunned from the impact to get up.
Beau lowered himself to a crouch, prowling closer to the last thief, the maroon leader. The leader, apparently out of gear and minions, considered Beau for a second, taking in his teeth, claws, and rippling muscles.
Beau didn't give him the chance to regroup or reconsider. With a snarl, Beau charged forward and struck the thief with a headbutt, full force in the chest. The power behind the blow was immense, Artha swore he could hear the man's ribs crunch on impact. He landed on top of his goons, who had just been getting up.
The attackers had been thrown further into the stable compound, leaving the exit open. Beau didn't let the opportunity go to waste, immediately moving to Artha's side.
Beau sniffed at both Lance and Artha, as though checking that they were both unharmed. This close, Artha could see that Beau was actually bigger than Artha by quite a bit. Artha's own head only came to a little above the massive red and blue dragon's shoulders. After making sure that the boys were alright, Beau dipped his head and grasped the back of Lance's shirt with his teeth. Lance squeaked as he was lifted off the ground and placed onto Beau's broad back. Lance quickly leaned forward and rested his hands upon the mighty dragon's shoulders, made familiar by a lifetime of dragon handling.
With Lance secure, Beau's attention turned to Artha. Artha stumbled forward, pushed from behind by Beau's insistent snout. After a few more pushes, Artha realized Beau was trying to get them to leave the compound. He stalled, glancing back at their home- still burning, where is Dad!? Is he okay?- but Beau's persistent prodding, along with the unwelcome sounds of the thieves gathering their strength for another attempt, got him moving again.
A voice, once again seeming to materialize on its own, said, "Come on, pick up the pace, they're going to catch us all!"
Choosing to ignore the mystery origin of the voice, Artha pressed forward, shakily picking up his pace into a haphazard trot. Beau, loyal as ever, stayed at his side, providing a welcome support when Artha stumbled. Lance clung to Beau's back, silent as the trio crossed the bridge, leaving Penn Stables.
Upon reaching the other side, Artha kept trotting, following Beau's urgent movements without looking back. Later, he would regret being unable to at least have one last glimpse of home. It would be a long time until he saw it again.
Wow. I'm back again, without waiting a year this time. I honestly had all but a few paragraphs written within 2 weeks of my last update, but it took me a while to sit down and remember how I was going to finish this chapter. Super happy to be updating so quick tho. I have gotten some requests to work on some of my other stories, but I don't think I'm ready to work on them again yet. This one is what's coming easy right now. I even got requests to return to Timbermanes and Hagar's Bane. I haven't thought about that one in ages. I actually hate the netflix version of voltron with a passion, I think the original was better, so when everyone kept talking about how good the netflix one was... It kind of turned me off the fandom. I may go back to it after I finish this one, tho. I have a thing for unfinished series, Dragon Booster and Voltron Force being a couple of the best that were never completed. I also want to see about writing something for Tai Chi Chasers. Technically, it was finished, but the third season was never translated into English, so I will never know how it ends... :'( ... IF YOU SPEAK KOREAN, PLS TRANSLATE IT! It's a very good series!
Life update, for anyone who cares: CASPA season has restarted! CASPA is the third party that handles PA school applications online. Most PA schools only accept applications through CASPA. Currently, I am building this year's application. I have gotten agreements for two letters of recommendation, now I just need a third :) The earliest application deadlines I'm looking at are in August, so I still have plenty of time to get everything sorted. It's just much better to start early. I've got a battle strategy this year and everything. :) It feels like it's taking so long to get into PA school. I just have to remind myself that I've actually only been graduated for a year- even if it feels like FOREVER!
So, I have been thinking of a challenge for all my fellow Dragon Booster lovers. What if we rebooted the fandom? I hate checking the DB page and seeing no updates, it makes me sad and nostalgic. I would like to issue a formal challenge to all my reader- the odd dozen of you, lol- to write a DB fanfiction before my next update! It doesn't have to be big or impressive, I just want to see some life in this fandom again. Feel free to message me when you post it, I would LOVE to read it! Point is, the more high quality writing that you put in to the fandom, the more people pay attention and read, even if they don't originally know the fandom. This actually happened with Katekyo Hitman Reborn. The anime and manga don't get good for aaages. But a bunch of people wrote some really good fanfiction and suddenly it was interesting. In my opinion, the fanfiction for that series was actually better than the actual manga and anime. If we did that with DB, it would be great.
So, please write! anything! as long as it's in the Dragon Booster world. I, at least, will read it.
Thanks for reading my story! See you next time :) :) :)
