Shell

A book was slammed in front of my head shaking me out of sleep. Around me was stone and there was a thick mossy scent in the air, so I was clearly under a mountain. When did this happen? I gave a loud groan glancing up at the dragon who had thrown the book, "Basilisk, where the flip am I?" My brain felt foggy and the only memory I had before this was very much like this, appearing in a random place, discussing rooms and the Skywing Festivities with Basilisk… now I was here…

Basilisk proudly crowed, "Shell remember this?" Examining the cover closer was a picture book, it did look familiar but I wasn't sure what he was alluding to. "I didn't at first either. We would laugh every time we read this when one of us would get sick and we would use it to cheer up saying at least we weren't vomiting slimy yellow liquid mixed with blood with warts bleeding out in the middle of the-"

I was trying to not let the panic seep in but… "Basilisk I remember, I would rather not visualize it again," I broke in before he could continue rubbing my temples, "Could you answer my question first?"

"This is related to your question though."

"Huh?"

Basilisk jumped right into it. "Well uhm you know I've never been good with words but I think you have a mental disorder which makes you well… have multiple personalities living inside your head and that's why you keep changing and forgetting." He tapped a page in the book, "It makes sense."

I stared at him as if he just announced he wanted to go back and live in the rainforest, "I don't have some sort of split personality disorder." That was extremely rare, and I was fine wasn't I? I didn't have some horrible traumatic event or anything like Basilisk or so many others, I was just an orphan, nothing really special especially in war times.

If I had it, why could they take it and I couldn't?

I didn't have it. Couldn't have it. If I did I'd just be a letdown. "What are you talking about? Basilisk. It's a book, you can't just pick up a random illness in a book and claim it as fact, your not a healer."

His wings fluttered nervously, "We seriously aren't going to address this? Shell… you haven't been yourself the last couple of days. Don't ignore it. You've been popping up in weird places, and have scrambled memories. Sometimes you don't even know me, or your home, or even your name. Maybe it's not this specifically but it's something! So unless you upset an anumis dragon recently…" His eyes look expectantly at me, what did he want from me?

"I'll go to a dragon psychiatrist and get diagnosed. Waste some good coins we will need on the run for probably nothing worth mentioning. Are you happy?" That came out a bit more aggressive and sarcastic than I wanted it to but Basilisk looked happy.

It was true though, I glanced around at the small cave we were in, I had almost no memory of getting here besides some blurs that felt more like dreams… it was probably curable, I never had any problems like this before…

That wasn't exactly true but who didn't have trouble remembering things sometimes? "Are you feeling better?" asked Basilisk before the silence could stretch too long and become awkward. I felt a little stiff but other than that I felt fine, I gave a nod of my purple head. "Good. I have a crazy story to tell you." This was a going to be a long story and if Basilisk said it was crazy it was going to be crazy.

Basilisk started, "So I was mad at you for ignoring me," What? " So I was hanging out at your beach because of reasons, and then a small platoon of Skywings came down and were like, "Rawr! You are our prisoner!" Also I'm a wanted criminal for no reason." I snorted. "No… no really, I swear! The Skywing Princess was after me and then we fought them all off and then we flew into this mountain with a WHOLE bunch of random dragons that you knew and then they started telling you how everyone died so you passed out!" He finished proudly with a swoosh of his tail as if that explained anything.

He got a deadpan look in return like there was any other reaction I could have given. "What? I think that was pretty clear."

"Why was I ignoring you?"

He shrugged, "I don't know. Like I said you have multiple personalities, I just know it! I feel it! Everyone here calls you by a different name, Urchin, that could just be a code name but you don't have any memory of this place. Plus look," He began tapping the page in certain spots, "Memory lapses, headaches, don't think I haven't noticed that you get an unhealthy amount of headaches! Anxiety, depression-"

I sighed once more, seemed like I had been doing a lot of that lately, "I've been working through my anxiety, it's almost completely manageable now, well unless you count all the times you do something stupid," I attempted to joke but Basilisk's frills flared in frustration instead, "Okay, okay I'll take this more seriously…"

"I should become a mind healer," muttered Basilisk, "Then you'd have to listen to me!"

"I could just not show up."

"You can do that?"

"Yeah, you chose to go, they aren't going to hunt you down." There was silence, and I already had a horrible suspicion, "Wait Basilisk… when's the last time you've gone to anything regarding your health?" Basilisk sputtered and I burst out laughing.

"H-HEy! You just said you'd take this more seriously! I genuinely thought that they just SUMMONED you!"

"I'm sorry-" I burst into laughter again, Basilisk scowled at me, if Basilisk could change colors then I just knew that he would be a shade of reddish pink just like the coral around my underwater home, somehow the thought of Basilisk as a shade of blush pink set me into another fit of giggles.

"Uhm excuse me… Urchin?" Urchin? Standing in the entrance to the cave we were in was a young adult Nightwing, "Commander Mantis wishes to see you, he figured you'd be back around this time… I mean, who doesn't want to see their mission come to fruition." She looked hesitant for a minute before saying, "It's… It's good to see you. It's been a while. A long while, uhm… I'm really sorry for our differences as kids, I'd like to put that behind us, if you'd accept my apology and forgive me, it's always eaten me up inside especially with all you've done for our cause. I should have been better. So I humbly ask for your forgiveness," her voice had shaken as she continued speaking and all I could do was I blink, it was probably really rude to stare but I had no idea what she was mumbling about. This dragon had just poured her heart out and it was to the wrong dragon…

"I think that you have the w-" Basilisk coughed loudly looking meaningfully at me.

"Yeah, Urchin, this is your cause. Remember?"

I ignored him in favor of lightly patting the sobbing dragon. "Erm, no problem. Bygones be bygones right? Water under the bridge," I laughed nervously.

"It's not alright! You should, you should be angry!" they said jerking up causing me to flinch away, "S-Sorry again, look you don't have anything you want to say to me?" I shook my head. "But… that's not… I Eerie would have been so disappointed in me." Who was Eerie?

"Well I'm not Eerie, and it sounds like you hold them in high regard, I'm sure they wouldn't have been that upset with you. Everyone makes mistakes," I reassured her gently resuming patting her back awkwardly waiting for her to recompose herself.

The dragon wiped away her tears voice still having a quiver in it, "Ugh, your so preachy. I guess that hasn't changed… Sorry I'm such a mess, thank you for not holding a grudge. I don't know how to make it up to you but…" I just nodded trying to not think about this whole weird situation, it felt like a dream, nothing felt real like I was just floating in an empty void where nothing made sense. Where in a few minutes I'd wake up with a splitting headache. "We should, we should probably not keep the commander waiting."

Basilisk's expression gave no answers and we followed the Nightwing through the halls.