For everyone, I'm so sorry this has taken this long to come out. I'm not the best at things like fluff so this chapter I struggled with, which may be why it is not my best. I apologize for any inconveniences and accidents ahead of time in this chapter.

Grumman Tomcat~ I'm glad you like my characters, as I have taken quite some time in developing them and their past. You'll also be happy to know that I've used your name Linna for this chapter.

MovieGirl44~ Just read on to find out some about Lightning Pack, hopefully you'll like it. I have also taken one of your names: Silentwing.

Chapter 8

I opened my eyes, at first confused at where I was. The one of the cave's stalactites was dripping onto my nose. I shook my head to snap out of my befuddled daze, whipping it from side to side with jolting motions.

"Keep it down, will you?" a voice snarled from somewhere beside me. I stopped to look in the voice's direction but only made out a blurry line of a forest plane. "Thank you," he said again, "Thunder Pack," he snorted, "never considerate."

"Coryn," a female voice said this time, "by telling him to quiet down, you woke me up!"

Yet another plane joined in the conversation, "You can say that again, Linna."

"All right, all right," the first voice, Coryn, groaned, "Are you trying to make it worse?"

"In all of Bolder Clan!" the voice named Linna exclaimed, "Will you stuff a deer in it?"

"Come on, Linna, let's go," said the still unnamed voice quietly.

"Ethra," Linna replied, "I thought you'd never ask." With that hustling could be heard as the two planes made their way out of the den. I decided to join them.

The two planes, as I had suspected, were females. One was Ethra and the other, the one I assumed was Linna, I had not yet seen. Her frame was even smaller than Ethra's and marred with bullet holes and scratches. They looked recent and raw, but attended to. Her tail was wrapped in deer hide to hide what lay beneath. Over all, she had almost pink markings that spun into a dark maroon. They twisted in intricate designs along the edges of her wings and what wasn't covered by bandages on her tail. The two planes were deep in discussion. I hung back and listened. Perhaps, if I were lucky, I could come to know more about the fate of Lightning Pack.

"The hatchlings," Linna said in a soft whisper, "They were of Llegar's brood."

Ethra dipped her nose to meet the smaller plane's eyes, "They are your kin then."

"Indeed," she began to scan the edges of the cave, resting her eyes on me and lowering her voice to an even quieter level so that I might not hear. She then smiled sweetly, but with suspicion in her eyes. "You must be the plane from Thunder Pack?"

"I am," I said, dipping my nose in a polite nod. It was odd, yielding to a plane half my size. "My name's Roven."

"Ah," Linna said with a snort, "Thunder Pack always gave their hatchlings odd names." Odd names? I thought my name perfectly normal… but when I thought about it, never did a plane in the pack have the same name. She must've seen the look of pondering in my eye. "I suppose you're thinking: What's my name. Well, it's Linna, spelt with a double N."

I was lost as soon as she said 'N'. The planes of my pack never learned to spell as hatchling, which was something only the elders did when they wanted to keep things away from even the leaders. They said it was passed down from the first forest planes, along with the ability to write and count. This was only a piece to deepen the mystery of Lightning Pack even more.

"The hatchlings you brought, the ones named Enstryke and Sorreltail; they are the offspring of one of our warriors. You did a favor by bringing them back." Ethra explained what they were talking about earlier. "Unfortunately…" she trailed off and seemed reluctant to say more. She gave a look of question to Linna, who gave an unobtrusive shake of her nose.

"Whose hatchlings are they?" I asked, now curious to as who they really were.

"Llegar's," Ethra answered immediately. Linna gave a look of scorn to her but this I did not catch. I was too busy in thought to notice the details of their statures. Llegar was a name I had heard among the stories of the elders. He was a plane with powers almighty, some say he was the reincarnation of Greatwings himself. Of course, that was an old tale and hardly reliable. It was also said that Llegar could only use his powers in the most deadly of circumstances and seemed normal all other times.

Starlight, at that very moment came in, "He's not that Llegar if you are wondering, which you are." I started at her sudden appearance, having a black fuselage helped in slipping in and out of shadows. "We can meet him if you please. He, after all, will be glad to see his hatchlings safe and alive," she gave an angered glance back in the direction of Ethra and the sleek she-plane rolled away in a rudder flick. Linna drove off with her head high in victory as she followed Ethra. Something told me the two small planes didn't get along very well. Starlight, as soon as they were out of ear shot, sighed. "Never, ever keep them together if it can be helped. Too bad they are the only ones capable of caring for the orphaned hatchlings." She then rolled off, motioning me to follow.

We came to one of the rooms not yet familiar to me a few offshoots off the dining room. This cavern was wide and roomy with small holes along the ceiling lighting up the room with the golden rays of dawn. Still, a fire brightened the dim areas of the scene. I stayed well away from the hot, flickering flames. Any moment now, I thought, they're going to jump out of their boundary and take this cave and turn it into dust. Although I hadn't been in any deadly situation dealing with fire, I had heard that planes had died in fiery infernos many times before. I didn't want to think about those rumors at the moment.

Instead, I focused on the plane that sat in the middle of the room, staring vacantly at the wall. His body, like Linna's, was blemished with scars. They were bullet holes, the typical wounds of pack battles, and odd, vertical lines running, and sometimes slightly crisscrossing each other. The thin lines almost created a pattern but did not quite, as if he had been struggling strategically against something. If the scars of struggles and battles weren't enough to make you wonder, his color was. He was flat out silver, nothing more, nothing less, except for a few odd markings that looked drawn onto each side of his nose. They looked familiar, as if I had seen them before.

Starlight approached him slowly, from the front but gave him a wide girth. She was being cautious but I wasn't so sure why. "Llegar," she said softly, "Llegar, I have some good news."

The plane turned his head but his eyes were mist. He seemed far away and unable to be reached. I was surprised when he responded, "The humans have left? That would be real news, Star."

"No," Starlight replied sadly, "but we've got the next best thing. Your hatchlings are alive!"

This snapped the plane out of his daydreaming state, "What?"

"Roven," Starlight motioned with a wing to me, "found your hatchlings, alive and well."

Llegar adopted a hopeful expression but still his eyes were distant, "What of Silentwing?" Starlight looked to me for help. I only shrugged, if I had known what the plane looked like, perhaps I could have answered.

Starlight's eyes grew sad, "She was ill, Roven, chances are she wouldn't have made it very far for very long."

Hearing this news, the blank eyed plane deflated, crawling up and hiding almost like a turtle. Then he asked, his voice shaking and higher pitched, "Where did you find the hatchlings? How did you find them?"

I told them the story of the dying female plane, and how there were three. I also told them about Isrock's death. Llegar's nose just kept dropping lower and lower until it was only inches above the ground. It was like watching my mother being told about the death of my father, or that of Kadesh or Lockjaw. It was depressing just being near them. When I finished Llegar turned his head slowly towards Starlight, "That was Silentwing. She's dead…" the hurting plane's blank eyes sparked to life for seconds, flashing red, "They killed her. The humans killed her, like the hundreds of planes they have captured! They are to be slaughtered!"

Starlight tried desperately to calm the warrior down, "Llegar, we know. We won't let any harm come to the pack."

"But we will let all the rest of plane-kind die at the hands of the humans?" he screeched, "We will let them do to the innocent what they did to me? I was lucky, Star! That's all I was: lucky! It could have been me!" By now this sounded like nonsense from my point of view. I hung back as Llegar raged on, "I won't let any other forest plane be tortured in that way!"

Starlight suddenly flung her nose under his as he rammed into a wall uncontrollably. She caught him before he lost his balance. "Llegar, we know what is happening. We know the twolegs…"

"Humans," he corrected.

"Yes, alright, humans. We know the humans have been torturing and killing off plane-kind but we aren't strong enough to fly into battle."

"I am," the plane snarled, this time now facing me. His blank eyes were directed towards me, like bullets of the twolegs, "I'll fight and die if I have to. They have to be free."

Starlight nodded as if the comment had been directed to her, which it seemed like it was. "I will do my best but can promise nothing," she said in a cool, even tone. I had to hand it to her, she could make a compromise.

Llegar calmed down, the raging storm of words now a controlled shower of rain. "Yes, Starlight, that will do." He still held a flare, "And bring the hatchlings when you come back. If I can't have Silentwing, I'll have my hatchlings, and my revenge."

"I can't promise you revenge at the moment, like I said," Starlight said softly with a respectful nod, "but I can bring the hatchlings. I can't say they can come out for long, you'd have to clear that with Linna and Ethra."

It was Llegar's turn to give a curt nod of thanks, "I will." But he did not give this nod to the leader, but to me. Somehow, he must have thought I was her, a shocking predicament as I was much larger and a male plane. I wondered for the first time if this plane had poor eyesight, but that was impossible. The planes of the forest, at least those that I had heard of, all had amazing sight. Most had night vision sight, and others had stripes to light up, as I had discovered. Even they, though, must have had good eyesight to see very far ahead of them.

Starlight interrupted my thoughts with a knock to the wing. "Come on, Roven, we have to retrieve the hatchlings." She made her way out of the cave, there was only a trace of fear in her eyes, but even that was surprising. "Llegar is our eldest warrior, or at least that's what he says."

"What do you mean by that?"

"Well, he is still a warrior, even though he's blind and the twolegs have taken his toll on him. He arrived at our pack just before it was attacked. He was captured. We hadn't seen him for days upon days. Almost an entire moon passed before he returned."

"Moon?" I asked aloud, "What's that, or what do you mean by that?"

Starlight rolled her eyes, "This just proves you come from the deep forest. A moon is about a month in your tongue. If you want to live here, you're going to have to learn our words." I didn't respond, embarrassed that I didn't remember that Lightning Pack had their own language. I tried to think back to what the elders had said when I was younger.

"A moon is a month, friskakill is fresh kill, flashnbooms are storms, and… let's see, to be called a plane from the dark forest is an insult to less knowledgeable planes."

Starlight's face lit up with shock, "Friskakill? We haven't used that one for a while, but Llegar uses it still. That's a start, dark forest plane, but there are still what you'd call 'crazy' terms to learn."

"And what do you call crazy?" I asked as we drove down the offshoot back to the hatchery.

"We call it bonkers, absolutely bonkers," she responded with a laugh. Then she grew serious, her eyes cold once more, "But what's bonkers is the humans." Once again I was stupefied at her terms, giving her a look of confused stupor. "Sorry, new term for twolegs," Starlight explained without looking my way, "they've gone like rabid squirrels, I tell you. They've got planes on their side, all of them looking like Llegar."

"I've heard that planes have joined them, but they've never come to the forest."

Starlight's eyes grew troubled and distant, "Then you're lucky. Linna was nearly killed by one."

At this point I interrupted, "Linna said that she was kin of Sorreltail and Enstryke. Is that supposed to mean anything?"

"Linna is Llegar's daughter," Starlight explained, "Llegar was captured to save her. She could have been killed."

I desperately wanted more details. I wanted to learn how they came to harness the power of fire, or how the mighty pack had come to rest its landing gear here, as a small group. The great Lightning Pack was now hardly more than a tribe, a shadow of its former self. This planted a fear for Thunder Pack deep inside me. Could every pack come to this? How could it be stopped? I needed to know, for the with fear came doubt and doubt was a luxury nobody could afford to use. "I hope I'm not intruding," I knew, though, that I was, "but how did Lightning Pack fall?"

Starlight's eyes grew wild with rage, all her flaps rising as if a switch had been thrown, indeed, one might have as well been. A growl escaped her throat, and her fury was barely contained, "Lighting Pack has not fallen." She said these words so fiercely that I rolled back, "shame on you to think so."

I lowered my nose, respectively waiting for her teeth scrape the top of my nose. I had crossed the line, and this was my punishment. I braced for it, but it never came. I finally risked looking up, something that in my pack would have been extremely disrespectful.

"What are you cowering there for?" she snarled, but not unkindly, "Did you do something to offend me? Did you think I was the leader of Lightning Pack?"

I gasped audibly, if she wasn't the leader, Lightning Pack was impressively odd. I nodded.

"I might be in spirit, but Vylocity is in flesh, many might consider me the Super Alpha, but I am not." She almost chuckled as my shocked expression grew into one of confusion. "No, Roven, I am not who you think I am. I am the daughter of Vylocity." Then her eyes grew dark with fearful light, something I thought was never to occur with her, "Vylocity was taken by the humans." She then looked away, mouth forming into a growl, teeth glistening in what little light there was in the cave. "This is Lightning Pack's fall, in that we are leaderless."

"But you're the rightful heir, aren't you?"

"I am," she admitted, "but Vylocity is not dead. Captured is far worse than death, and the first planes of the forest did not plan for this in their code. They lived effortlessly, it seems."

I shook my nose, had Starlight not heard the tale of Sorcanar, the plane who had tried to rule the forest? I shivered as I remembered Conleth, I had gladly forgotten about him in my haste of finding Lightning Pack and taking care of the hatchlings I had found, now a chill ran down my back. Conleth was somehow connected to the twolegs, or humans.

Starlight looked at me, her green eyes piercing through me as if looking at my thoughts, "What are you shaking our nose for?"

"Sorcanar, the first evil," I whispered, for it was said that his mane was a curse if said in certain circumstances, "he was the problem of the first planes."

"That old myth is a tale of impossibility," Starlight huffed scornfully, "Sorcanar was a tale invented to scare hatchlings into doing what they're told." Many she-planes, including my own mother, used such words as 'Sorcanar still lurks in the shadows and will get you if you misbehave' to strike fear into hatchlings. I admit, in my early days, these sayings worked.

Just then Ethra poked her nose out of the hatchery and smiled with an amused light in her eyes, "Oh, Sorcanar is real, all right. He's here in the form of a human." But there was truth to her words, if ever there was a Sorcanar lurking upon us he was in the form of the humans. Ethra was joking, though, "So, what can I do you for?"

"Llegar's hatchlings," Starlight responded briskly, "Enstryke and Sorreltail."

Ethra's nose disappeared behind the blackness of the small cave and returned only a moment later carrying Enstryke lightly in her jaws. Sorreltail was asleep, Ethra said, and she thought they should come back later. After some persuasion from Starlight, Ethra took Sorreltail out as well. The little plane was looking rather tetchy at being woken up. "Good luck with her," Ethra snorted. She slipped out of the blackness of the hole and looked at Starlight with sad eyes; a message seemed to pass between the caretaker and leader. It must have been a terrible one, because for a few moments Starlight's eyes were flickering dully.

Starlight took Sorreltail up in her mouth and drove off, only leaving after giving a nod to Ethra of dismissal. I took up Enstryke and followed.

By the time we reached Llegar, the huge warrior was staring off at a wall, his stance anxious and eyes, although clouded and unseeing, were in turmoil. He must have recognized our scents, for he knew us from the start. "You brought them, finally" he said flatly.

Starlight nodded, but did not speak, for if she did she would risk injuring Sorreltail. She set him down, "This is Sorreltail and Roven has Enstryke."

Llegar rolled over to us, graceful despite his blindness. "Who named my hatchlings, Silentwing?"

"No," I said, setting down Enstryke, who immediately cowered behind my nose gear. "I did."

Llegar snorted, "You did well." He swung his nose toward Starlight and flicked his rudders, chuckling under his breath as Sorreltail grumpily glared at him. I wondered how he could "see" this without his eyes. He gave me a glare as I thought this, it was almost disturbing. "May we have some time alone?" he asked in a cold voice, "To get to know each other?"

Starlight looked as if she wanted to protest but thought better of it and nodded, "You may have as much time as you'd like, Llegar." He gave an approving nod.

I, however, felt and odd twinge in my belly, that of jealousy of Llegar. Half of me had wished that Sorreltail and Enstryke would never find their parents, but now they had.

Notes:

I want to thank those who have contributed names for these characters. Linna is the creation of Grumman Tomcat and Silentwing is the creation of MovieGirl44.

Second, I want to thank Natasha for encouraging me to write on even when I was completely stuck.

I am still accepting names for characters. Please note they may or may not be used. I have another many characters, most of them minor, that need names. Any names, unusual to common, can be useful.