Chapter 4

A/N: Just so I don't confuse anyone; I removed the chapter 'Twigs Are Bad For A Snipers Health'. I felt the plot was moving along before I had the time to flesh out my characters as much as I'd like to so I decided to add a chapter or two before it.

Also, I'm so sorry this took so long. I swear the next chapter will come out faster.

Lila was awoken by the sunbeams beating down onto her face. The purple dragoness pulled the sheets over her head, but the blades of light sliced through the fabric like knives. Realising that she wasn't going get anymore sleep, she climbed to her feet with an exasperated sigh.

A yawn and a stretch later she was on her way to the mess hall to tell Atash and Suishou of the previous night's discovery. It only took the purple dragoness a moment to reach the dining hall; a large room, in which sat four long tables, platters of food rested atop them. On the walls hung paintings of past Guardians, the oldest of which dated back to Spyro's day. But the most spectacular feature by far was the ceiling. Painted on it was a massive mural of Spyro and Cynder standing triumphantly at the edge of a cliff face. Behind them was an erupting volcano spewing fire and ash as far as the eye can see.

Most dragons would stand stunned, awestruck by the beautiful piece, but for Lila who saw it the times a day, it wasn't even worth a second glance. Instead she searched the tables for her friends, whom she soon found sitting in the far corner of the room, laughing about something.

Lila plopped down between them, "You guy's will never believe what happened last night."

"Hm?" Suishou grunted through a mouthful of venison.

"Well, you see I snuck into Kaze's classroom last night to- er... inspect the back wa-"

She was cut off by Atash, "Again?"

Grinning, the purple dragon nodded.

"One of these day's you're going to get caught."

"Like heck I am." She retorted cockily. Then before Atash could respond she added, "As I was saying, Kaze got a letter from the CEO about an attack on the airship Oblivion."

Her friends stared at her in a shocked silence. Almost a minute passed before Suishou finally asked, "You're kidding. Right?"

The purple dragoness shook her head.

"Daaaaamn..."

"I knew Fire-Claw was bad, but I never would've thought they'd do something like that." Atash muttered, then asked "How many dead?"

"The entire crew."

Atash cringed and Suishou let slip a second curse. Again a shocked silence surrounded the three friends. After what felt like hours Atash asked, "Why'd the CEO send the letter to Kaze? Why not Kopaka? I mean, what's so special about Kaze?"

Lila shrugged, "Does it look like I know?"

Before the red scaled dragon could respond the bell signaling the start of the days first classes rang. The three friends stood up from their half finished breakfasts and set off for their first classes. Atash had history with Terrla while Suishou and Lila chemistry with Kaze.

A moment later the dragoness' slipped into two empty seats, just as the white scaled dragon was starting a lecture on... something. Neither payed their teacher much attention. While this wasn't an uncommon occurrence for Lila, Suishou normally clung to each word of a lecture as if her life depended on it. Lila realised the news of the attack was bothering the ice dragoness as much as it was her.

What would the CEO do in response? Would he strike back? Would there be a civil war? This thought scared the purple dragoness; she wasn't Spyro. She didn't think she save the world like he did!

As the science lecture drug on, Lila found the previous night was starting to catch up with her. Her eyelids felt heavy and her head seemed as if it had turned to lead. She decided it wouldn't hurt to rest her eye's for a moment.

She was shaken to wakefulness by Suishou. "Wha- what?" The purple dragoness muttered.

"Were you paying any attention to that?" The ice dragoness asked.

Lila shook her head, "No."

"Aw, Ancestors. We're so screwed... I have no clue what we're do-"

She was cut off by their teacher, "I want everyone to split into pairs and get to work." He paused for a moment, then added, "And be very careful, I have some explosive chemicals stored in the back of the room and I don't want anyone-" Lila felt the older dragon's eyes fall on her, "to touch it."

A few moments later Lila and Suishou found themselves sitting at a table surrounded by beakers and various chemicals, completely clueless as to what to do. For a few moments they sit there in silence, trying to figure out what to do. Finally Lila poked at a beaker filled with some blue liquid, "Maybe we do something with this...?" She suggested.

Suishou shrugged, "Why not?"

A few seconds later the duo had concocted a steaming, foul smelling green mass in the larges of the beakers provided. Lila glanced over at her friend, who's snout was scrunched up at the awful stench, "I think we may have done something wrong..."

"Gee, really? Thanks for tellin'." The ice dragoness paused, "At least we're doing better than them." She gestured towards a team a few feet away. They had somehow managed to light a fire inside their beaker. Lila couldn't help but let out a small chuckle at her classmates misfortune, but was cut short when the beaker exploded, spilling the flaming contents across the counter.

Both dragoness' leapt back as their own experiment was overrun with the flaming gunk. After a second their own beaker exploded, spraying them with it's reeking contents. The blue dragoness was swearing loudly as she tried to brush off the foul smelling gunk. By now Kaze had rushed over to the exploding experiments and was trying to put out the fire, though without much success.

Lila noticed the flames moving towards the explosive chemicals Kaze had mentioned before. Realising that they'd soon be overtaken by the fire, she dove to grab them. She glanced around the room for a safe place to store them until the fire's were put out. After a second she found a large bucket of water stored near the back of the room. The purple dragoness rushed to the far wall. The Wind Guardian shouted not to, but it was too late, the purple dragoness had already dropped them into the bucket.

A moment later a loud 'boom' echoed through the classroom as the bucket exploded drenching everyone in a ten foot radius and flinging the purple dragoness a good meter and a half.

"Lila! Are you alright!" Kaze shouted, rushing over to the purple dragoness' side.

"Yea-yeah. I'm fine." A shocked and soaked Lila stammered as she climbed to her feet.

"What in the Ancestors names were you thinking!?" The white scaled dragon shouted, "I thought I told you all not to touch them!"

"I-I'm sorry! I was trying to keep them away from the fire, I didn't think they'd explode in the water..."

Kaze sighed, "I'm just glad you're all okay." He turn to the rest of the class, in the now destroyed room, "Class is dismissed for today. I've got one serious mess to clean up."

As the students filed out of the remains of the chemistry lab, Lila noticed a crowd had formed outside. The explosion likely had been heard all around the temple. As the purple dragoness pushed through the crowd Suishou ran up and clapped her on the back, "That was freaking brilliant!"

Lila cracked a grin, "No kidding! Did you see the look on Kaze's face when the fire started?"

The blue dragoness laughed, "You should have seen him when you went flying. I swear, his eye's were about to fly out of his head."

The two dragoness' doubled over laughing, ignoring the confused passers bys.

The sun beat down on the the flying city of Volans, capital of the Warfang empire. The low hum of the propellers, maintaining the buildings altitude echoed through the streets- narrow walkways, suspended between the massive skyscrapers- as two young dragons walked home from school.

They both laughed at a joke the younger of the two, a muscular, green scaled earth dragon named Tremor, had told.

The older, a yellow scaled wind dragoness, who had a single horn protruding from the tip of her snout, playfully commented that the joke her brother had just told was too dirty for a "child" to know.

"Aw, lay off it, Breeze." The younger dragon muttered, "You're only a year older than me!"

"But I'm still older than you and you're to respect your elders." Tremor gave a fake pout and his sister smirked then jabbed him in the ribs, "I'm just screwin' with ya."

As they bantered, Breeze noticed a cloaked figure standing atop a nearby building, she pointed this out to the earth dragon,

"I don't see anything."

The yellow dragoness looked back, but the figure had vanished. "Weird..." She muttered, before continuing on her way.

Several hundred feet above them Plomistis stalked along the city rooftops, he had been tipped off that an airship enroute to the mainland was going to be passing the capitol building. If he could leap on without being noticed, he'd receive a free ride to the Dragon Temple. And his target.

A grin spread across his lips as he saw the small fortune he was being payed for this mission. He wouldn't fail. That much he would make sure of.