"Speach"

'Thought'

[Writing]

—=—

Gamma controlled the pipes a final time, comparing them with his blueprint. He couldn't allow himself to have made any mistakes. Not after all these months of work.

Satisfied with what he found he screwed the plate back into its place, before taking a step back to admire his work.

The Armory had finally been finished, months and months of trial and error having passed since the faithful day he had crashed the motorized carriage, the prototype that started everything.

The armory was copper/brown due to the alloy he used for the hull and reached up to approximately an adult dragon's shoulder in terms of size and being the same width while having a bit over double the length.

It was a vehicle that was separated into two main parts, the cockpit, and the passenger/storage module.

The cockpit was a small cabin that was somewhat triangular-shaped if you looked at it from the side, but more aerodynamic in terms of shape. The windshield was from armored glass and had a metal grid covering it as an additional safety feature.

The module on the other hand wasn't as nicely shaped in terms of aerodynamics and was more or less an armored cube of steel with a double door at the back to enter. Gamma didn't spend as much time on that part as he had been running low on time and resources, but nevertheless, it didn't lack in terms of functionality.

Two caterpillar tracks were used for propulsion, half-hidden by the fender liners, allowing the heavy vehicle to move over a variety of different terrain choices.

Two pipes were located to the left and right behind the cockpit. Those were the exhausts for the heavy-duty steam engine that brought life to this machine. The engine itself was hidden beneath the protective plates located between the passenger module and the cabin.

Finally, there was one of the balistas from Gamma's design located on the roof of the Armory.

He wasn't fully satisfied with it however as he hadn't been able to find a way to properly include its rotation mechanism, meaning that it could only fire towards what was in front of it for now, but that was enough to do the job for the time being.

At last the vehicle's fire rate of 5-6 shots per minute where a pretty solid upgrade from what humans could achieve in terms of weapon reloading time. Especially for such a heavy model.

He pushed his thoughts to the side for now and entered the cockpit. Time to take the armory on its first official test drive.

—000—

Sparrow returned to the campfire Summit had set up, a freshly caught deer dangling in her talons.

While doing so her eyes nervously darted around, in fear of any possible scavengers planning to attack them. Hell, maybe she should call them savages instead, as that description fit this particular type way better. Hopefully, the normal ones still existed and hadn't all been turned into monsters like those that attacked her.

Alright, now she was once again paranoid. Of course, normal ones still existed. These kinds of things didn't happen overnight.

She hoped.

Banishing these thoughts, for now, she landed at the fireplace, dropping the deer.

"How is he doing?" she asked, looking at the SkyWing they had found. He had woken up by now and was blankly staring into space.

Summit shook his head. "I don't think he's with us. I can't get a reaction…"

She nodded, walking over to him. "Are you hungry?" she asked, offering him a leg of the deer.

The SkyWing blinked, before taking it after a few seconds of staring into the void, mumbling some kind of thanks. Viewing this as a good thing she tried addressing him.

"What happened for you to be so nervous?"

The SkyWing fell silent again, chewing on the meat. She thought for a second he wouldn't reply, but in the end, he did.

"Monster… It was huge… ate a mountain… so loud…"

Summit looked unsurely at that, but Sparrow spoke again before he got a chance to voice his doubts.

"Were scavengers involved?"

More to Summit's surprise than to her the SkyWing nodded. "Yes, a lot of them. Swarming the thing like ants. Seemed to be worshipping it or something."

She noticed satisfied that the SkyWing seemed to be more present now, no longer staring into space.

"Were you attacked?"

"Only by the scavengers with their spear-throwing machines. The monster was sleeping until recently. Then it woke up and started to eat the mountain." The SkyWing shuddered. "I ran before it noticed me…"

"Are you sure that the monster you saw wasn't just a trick of your mind?" Summit asked. "I'm sorry, but that sounds somewhat unbelievable…"

Instead of replying the SkyWing wordlessly pointed at the horizon. Looking towards the location he was pointing at they noticed two pillars of smoke rising towards the sky from behind the mountains.

"I see… Well, at last, we now know where we need to head towards."

"You can do what you want, but I'm going home."

"Wait!" Summit interrupted the SkyWing. "We could use your help."

"I'm not going there, and neither should you."

"The queen herself send us."

"Then tell her that she should send an army instead of a scout." he replied, taking flight. "I don't care if she throws me into a dungeon for this. It's better than to fall into the claws of whatever that thing was…"

Sparrow gulped nervously.

[Later]

"Are you sure we shouldn't get back up?" Sparrow asked nervously as they approached the source of the smoke pillars.

"We're already too close to turn back. If this is a legitimate threat we need to know about it. Also, we're just going to inspect the situation, not engage. We can still get back up later, but we need to confirm our source first before calling in the army."

"Are you sure that there's no alternative?"

He nodded. "We're almost there, the source of the smoke is from behind this mountain. Let's land and continue on foot and most importantly, don't make a sound."

She whispered a soft okay before diving after him.

The first thing she felt upon landing was the slight constant rumble that went through the mountain. Summit seemed to notice it too as he tensed up, switching into a more defensive stand.

Her heartbeat was like a drummer parade when they slowly sneaked up to the top of the hill, every fiber in her body was screaming that this was a bad idea.

Nevertheless, there was a small part of her brain that was curious when it came to seeing this creature even if she wasn't sure if she wanted to actually see said monster.

She could hear a surprised hissing from Summit who was already ahead of her, his body growing even tenser as he peeked over the edge of the ridge.

Taking a deep breath she did the same.

Her heart screeched from a tantrum to a halt.

There, in the light of the undergoing sun, she could see the giant bulge of its form, even bigger than in her wildest imaginations. While she was almost unable to see Summit anymore, the darkness consuming everything with the setting of the sun, the thing below her was so massive that its shape was still clearly visible.

While she couldn't make out any details or colors, the thing below her was so massive that she was unable to see how long it was, its form fading away in the darkness, but in terms of size, it was massive, maybe even bigger than the SkyWing palace.

Finally, it seemed to be feeding off the mountain they were hiding in, a giant hole in the mountainside, with what she pressured being the creature's head disappearing inside it, continuing to eat away at it in slow, but powerful movements.

Her entire body and even mind were by now screaming at her to run, fly or even crawl away, but she was unable to do even a single thing of those, her body frozen in fear as she continued to stare at the giant below.

She was snapped back to reality when Summit finally spoke up.

"How the hell am I supposed to report this to the queen?"

New chapter once again. I'm not sure if i'm 100% satisfied with the result, but this is the best I could get in my opinion. What do you think?

As always, a review is highly welcome. :D