Chapter 8: Useless

"Powerlessness is an excruciating pain; it is torture insurmountable."

- Richelle E. Goodrich

Kilat wept for Ancestors knew how long. She had long lost track of her time, preferring instead to wail away her sorrows on the first person who embraced her. The electric dragoness wiped her tears on the furless ape's arms and blew her nose on his shirt.

She felt him stroke her head. Kilat did not resist curling more into the warm body that cradled her so tenderly. Until now, the child still couldn't believe how an ape—an ape!—was so friendly towards her, a dragon. It almost seemed too good to be true. Sometimes a nagging doubt would enter her, and the dragon child would peek out of the folds and creases of the furless one's green-stained shirt, expecting to see a hint of betrayal, may it be the frightening white glow on those arms, or even a weapon of some sort.

The only forepaw she could move—the only one that hadn't been broken by that fall into the Dry Canyon—remained wrapped around the furless ape, whose body currently stayed relaxed. Consoling, perhaps. If he betrayed her, then she had a chance, a fighting chance to plunge into his neck or spine and destroy it.

Yet every time her doubts compelled Kilat to suspect deceit, every time Kilat checked, no weapons waited for her in the periphery. No hands were held out, ready for a kill. The more the sun sunk down into the horizon, the more the child realized this was real. She was not dreaming. She, honestly and truly, was safe in the arms of an ape. It sounded ridiculous to her, and she wouldn't have believed it if she wasn't experiencing it for herself right now.

Kilat wanted to thank him. But strangely, she could not bring herself to move. Her body would much rather stay where it was, taking in the salty and foreign scent of the person promising her safety.

"You're dying."

I'm what!

The dragoness sniffled. She brought her eyes upward, and found herself staring into the ape's. "W, w-what did… what did you say?"

He did not reply. He started shaking his head uncontrollably. Those green eyes darted left and right, always gazing in her direction. "No. No, no, no, no." The hand snaked around her torso moved away. Remnants of her doubts stirred to life, even as the furless ape's other hand slithered around her jaw to better support her. A familiar terror began seeping in and with it the sting of terrible betrayal, but such thoughts vanished when Kilat felt the back of his other hand touch her neck without any sign of malice.

His mouth made another clicking sound. The same hand went to her nose and pinched one of the oozing nostrils, lifting it up. Another clicking noise. She felt his hand brush against the base of her left wing. She jolted when it touched the sensitive stump. There was that sound again.

"Damn it," he muttered. Kilat observed the way this same hand went for her broken foreleg and lifted it. Only when she noticed the great care he made in avoiding any sudden movements or mishandling did the electric dragoness realize he was examining her battered and beaten body. "Damn it all to hell." She gazed up in silence, watching the furless ape's face vary between two curious expressions she associated with sadness or surprise.

Kilat did not know what those clicking sounds meant. But regardless of this oddity, all doubts left the dragon in an instant. Someone out to mislead and deceive her wouldn't look over her body like this. If this ape did not care about her, he wouldn't be doting over her condition. He would've even left her to die. Now, she knew without a doubt he would not trick her—he would never betray her and stab her in the back. Kilat decided that, from now on, she would always stand by this ape and put her trust in him. Assuming, of course, she survived—

His voice interrupted her thoughts. He sounded young, perhaps as young as Explodon had been. "When was the last time you had something to eat?" he asked her. "To drink?"

Kilat tried to speak. Her mouth was hard to move, and dizziness consumed her. "I… I, I, I… I don't know…" She remembered she ate those sweet, yellow berries and parched her thirst from the fresh water. "It's been, a while." Her voice shook. "B-b-but, but… it was here."

That scared her. Her voice never shook.

"Okay," he said. "Okay, I got it. Wait." He closed his eyes, remained still, and began taking deep, heavy breaths.

"Uhm, uh, wha, what—

"Shhhhhh," he hushed her. "Quiet. Just give me a moment."

Give him a moment, he said. Had Kilat been feeling just fine, she would've laughed at him. Like she had a choice right now!

After the fourth breath, he opened his eyes and stared at her. "Good. No apes within a kilometer."

"W, what's a ki-kilometer?"

He gave her a smile. "A word that means 'far'." One of his fingers pointed at the glowing orange disc in the sky. "That sun will have to go down a little bit more before you can walk a kilometer."

She nodded in understanding. It was a measure of distance. Apes sure had a funny way of measuring things. The foxes liked to measure their distances in terms of landmarks and territory, and the dragons based theirs on their wings and "airtime", as Lani told her once. Though how he knew there weren't any apes close by was a question she filed away to ask another day.

The furless ape kept one arm supporting her head, but Kilat felt the other one slide beneath her body. "What're you—

"Carrying you," he said. "Closer to the water."

She blanched. "Y-you, don't have to." He didn't need to carry her, did he? The child struggled to move. Kilat hoped it wouldn't hurt her right side any more than it already was. She put her unbroken forepaw on the soil and rose to her four feet…

Only to fall down.

The furless ape caught her in mid-fall. "Easy!" he said. "Easy! You'll just hurt yourself more."

Kilat stammered. "B-b-but… but…!" But I made it here from way over there, she wanted to say.

He cut her off. "No. Don't do anything. I'll carry you, okay?"

"O-okay…"

Somewhat secured in those brown furless arms, Kilat's body rose slowly from the ground. The child felt his arms quiver a bit. He grunted. "Good God, you're heavier than you look."

He gathered some momentum and made his way towards the pool at the base of the waterfall. "As small as a dachshund but worth f*cking three of them in my arms," he grumbled under his breath. Kilat took his words as a compliment, not thinking about what exactly a "dachshund" was. She might have thought differently, or acted differently, had she asked the furless ape for clarification.

Kilat coughed twice. She leaned over the hairless arms and spewed green filth on the grass. Her new friend sent her a worried gaze. Subsequently he hastened his strides and willed himself to carry the dragoness all the way to the edge of the pool. The water lapped at the ground. While clear and transparent near the banks, the pool became a dull green further out, where a current pushed the water out towards the threshold of this mezzanine ledge.

The furless ape lowered the child towards the water. He set her down next to the shallow bank. "Just drink as much as you can," he said. The furless ape rose to his feet. Kilat found it odd how he had only a thick clump of leaves strapped to his feet, rather than the leather sandals worn by the people of Mungo Volpe. But the child said nothing, opting to take a drink from the pond as he advised her to. She did not know why she felt this way, why she could barely move or talk, but at least she wasn't struggling with this on her own. Not anymore.

Kilat felt relieved when the furless ape did not leave her sight and in fact gazed in her direction many more times than she did with him. Intermittently, her cobalt eyes followed his movement through the surrounding brush. He went after the taller trees surrounding the waterfall, she saw. He climbed them until he was as high as a pair of foxes standing on their shoulders. He picked the red and blue berries dangling from them rather than the sweet and tasty yellow berries close to the ground.

Why not the yellow ones? She wondered. I'd like to have those again…

"All right," said the furless ape. He dunked the collection of berries into the water and set them aside within arm's reach. "Here's some food. And don't worry," he reassured her. "They're good for you." He took two of each and plopped it into his mouth. "See?"

Kilat looked back at the yellow ones reluctantly. But trusting his judgment, she once again said nothing and moved to try the literal fruits of his labor. The electric dragoness found the red ones sweet and heavenly, even much more so than the yellow ones. The blue berries were sour, slightly bitter, but at least palatable.

As Kilat ate what she could, the furless ape drenched his hands in the water and splashed some of it on her yellow scales. He wiped away all the blood and grime he could without hurting her. She found it odd, if a little alien. The foxes and mongooses did not clean themselves this way, and neither did the dragons. But Kilat would not get the chance to ask him about this strange custom today, as she had to inch away from the water. It was simply far too cold for her, and she began shivering uncontrollably.

"Bear with me," he said. "I'm almost done." He lifted her tail and started washing the soiled cloaca until it was free of dirt and discoloration.

Meanwhile, Kilat did all she could to tolerate the temperature and continued to slurp up one berry after another. Unfortunately, as much as she liked his offering, the child could not eat it all. She wanted to. She really did, yet she did not have the appetite for it. The dragoness could not understand why.

Neither could the furless ape. He ogled her as soon as he finished the long process of cleaning everything but her stump and broken leg. "W-why, why aren't you eating?" he asked her.

Kilat shook her head. "I, don't know. I… don't, feel like having anything." Like she'd vomit if she forced anything more down her throat.

He recoiled. Made that clicking noise again. "F*ck," he mumbled. "I thought that'd work." He ate a handful of the berries left over before reaching over the side of her underbelly and pulled her away from the water, into the grass. "How do you feel right now?"

The dragoness reclined on the ground. Her eyes stared at the afternoon sky. It called to her, urging her to rest, and let the world slip away. She couldn't have known they were beginning to glaze over.

"Talk to me," he said. "Please. How do you feel right now?"

"Like I want to sleep," she replied. "A nice, long sleep…"

The expression on his face twisted from dismay to absolute horror. Kilat might have seen the anxiety and worry emblazoned on the furless ape if she wasn't so lethargic right now. "Oh no. No. Don't sleep. Stay awake." The child watched him put his hands on her chest. He gave it a violent shake, but to her it felt numbed over. "Don't close your eyes. Come on, stay with me. Stay with me!"

He shook her again, but by then Kilat had shut him out, staring into the peaceful, afternoon sky. A bright, vanilla sky.

"No, no, no, no. What am I doing wrong? What am I missing? There's got to be something—

Kilat turned her head at the panicking ape. Why couldn't she bring herself to care? Why did she feel so drowsy? Why was her mind so languid? So exhausted she could barely get it to work right. "Hey," she muttered. "I, I just wanted to ask…"

"Yeah?" he crouched close to her, staring attentively. Expectantly.

"Why didn't you… get those yellow berries earlier? Those were sooooooooooooooooo… sweet. So, much better than those, than those blue ones." She stuck her tongue out and laughed, but for some reason it sounded hollow.

The ape's emerald eyes widened at the question. His mouth hung open from shock. "Y-you… you…"

"What's, wrong?" She tilted her head. "Are you, are, you… crying?"

He was. Even at her most listless, Kilat still saw the teardrops falling down his cheeks. "Those berries are poisoned, damn it!" he yelled at her. "W-wha, WHY? Why'd you eat them? Didn't you know better than that?"

Poisoned.

Worse, a poison that was mostly asymptomatic.

It explained Kilat's lethargy. It explained her lack of appetite, and the constant urge to curl and sleep. Combined with the shock from her fall, her stuffy nose, and the uncharacteristic coolness of the air, no wonder the dragoness had no symptoms.

It also explained Kilat's stoic reaction towards the furless ape's agitation. "I, I don't know," she mumbled quietly. "I, I was desperate for, for food, and… a-a-and… and it tasted so good…"

He remained still for a second to process her reply. His lips puckered into a deep and angry scowl, but he did not direct any of his anger at the child. "Damn it." He curled his fingers until they became fists, then he pounded the ground repeatedly, flailing next to the dragoness even if it did nothing for her. "Damn it! Damn it! Damn it! God f*cking damn it!"

The furless ape glanced at her again, into her enervated eyes. "You need Spirit Gems," he echoed Explodon. "You need Spirit Gems!" He took a deep breath. "F*ck me, where's the nearest cluster?" He closed his eyes. "Gotta calm down. Got to calm the hell down and focus.

"All right. Deep breaths, man. Slow, deep breaths."

A few moments passed.

A curse Kilat did not understand went out of his mouth as soon as he opened his eyes again, but she was so enfeebled and languid that she could no longer bring herself to care about it at this point. "F*CK! Seriously? Seriously?"

The furless ape strode to the brink of this ledge. He cast his gaze down the steep, precarious slopes of the Dry Canyon. "Why did it have to be at the f*cking bottom of this f*cking canyon?" He fell to his knees and bawled almost as hard as Kilat did. "Why? Why, why, why, why?"

Though Kilat was mostly listless at this point and failed to understand what exactly he was yelling about, she still sought her new friend, seeking his company. "Are you… are you still there?" she called. The child hated the feeling of loneliness, especially now when her loved ones have been taken away from her. She wanted someone to be with her, even if the only person around her was an ape. "Where, w-where are you?"

Before she knew it, she felt the hairless arms underneath her again. The dragoness gave the furless ape a warm smile, grateful for his company. To her surprise, he did not draw any comfort from Kilat's own little happiness and instead hugged her, burying his head on her neck. "I'm sorry. Life isn't making this easy. I want to help you, I really, really do. But I can't leave you alone. The forest predators could kill you while I'm gone. Or…

He choked. "Or… or those stupid apes will find you. I know they're not close right now but I won't underestimate them a single bit." His embrace tightened. "And, a-and, and even if I could, there's no point when I'll just absorb the f*cking gems anyway." He sobbed and cuddled against the child. "I'm sorry. I, I can't do anything for you. I'm really sorry…"

A moment of clarity gripped Kilat. She sensed death itself coming for her. She could hear the hymns of her Ancestors, calling her soul back to the earth. To be one with the Dragon Realms. But in these last few minutes before the poison numbed her into unending sleep, the electric dragoness regained enough lucidity to realize what her death would do to this person, to the furless ape who cared enough to actually cry for a dragon. For someone he did not even know.

"It's okay," she comforted him. The dragon child pushed him away a little, to look at his mournful visage. Was that how she looked like, when Lani died for her? When Explodon died for her? "It's okay," Kilat continued. "You did everything you could. You kept… you kept me company, and, a-and… you cared. You really cared. That means so much to me, a-and… and you don't know how grateful I am for that—

The ape silenced her last words by uttering only one. "Kilat."

He knew her name. Ancestors, he knew her name. Even pronounced it right. But how? She never introduced herself to him. Not even once.

"You don't understand." He looked away from her. His expression and body language radiated immense shame. "I was there when you faced those apes. I was there when you were being strangled by that Ape Commander. I was there, when that invisible baboon cut off your wing!"

A frustrated growl escaped him. "You don't know how much—how f*cking much I wanted to jump out there and fight those apes, too. I wanted to help you all. I didn't, I, I didn't want the three of you to die! But, but I, but I couldn't even force myself out there." He made eye contact with her. He sniffled. "Because I look so much like one of those apes you'd attack me anyway and because I… Because I…

"Because I can't fight at all! I can't use a weapon. I can't use magic. I'm just not a hero!" He lifted his hands and glared at them, revolted. Disgusted with himself. "All I have is this, this stupid power that refuses to work with me. I'm still figuring it out, but I've absolutely no idea how to control it. If I had gotten this thing to work right, maybe you three would all be alive. Maybe I'd be going with you all to Warfang, because that's where I'm headed, too! But how can I help you when I can't even help myself?

"I'm far from home. I'm lost. I don't know which way to go. Thankfully I do know a little bit about Warfang and Avalar, but until I found myself here, I thought it was a beautiful place. It's only after I spent the past three days surviving the forest that I learned this is a cruel and dangerous land. Deadly." The furless ape raised his hands and pulled the astounded dragon into his lap, hands over her neck. "Look at you. You're so young! You didn't deserve to have your wing cut off. You didn't deserve to be orphaned and come so far just to be killed because of someone else's f*cking insecurities."

Tears fell on her golden snout. "I've already failed you once. When I saw you here, I, I thought… I thought it was my second chance. To.. .to make things right, you know? I know I can't bring back Lani or Explodon, but right now I have a chance to help you before it's too late… if I can only figure out f*cking how!" The furless ape took her left forepaw in his hand and clasped it tightly. "I can feel you slipping away from me, Kilat. Believe me, I can, but this world doesn't give a shit. God doesn't give a shit! I feel so f*cking useless! I just want to help you, in any way I can. That's all I want! But I don't know what to do."

"I don't know what to do…" He sobbed. "I don't want you to die, Kilat."

Kilat had nothing to say to him. She was no less speechless than the first time he hugged her, when he defied every expectation she had for an ape that had her dead to rights. How could she possibly console someone who wanted to make up for his past mistakes? Who clearly wanted to help her and be her friend?

She felt herself slipping away, too. It must've been terrible for him, constantly aware how she faded slowly away from life. But Kilat saw a silver lining to this dark cloud, and she hoped the furless ape perceived it, too. At least she was dying in the arms of a friend. Not someone who wanted her to suffer until she went.

"I'm sorry for being such a disappointment," the adolescent said.

The dragoness did not say anything to that. Instead, she nuzzled her snout against the ape's dark shirt. "Can you, c-can you stay with me?" Kilat asked him. "Please? Until the end? I can… I can feel it coming too."

"Gladly. I'm not leaving you."

The child smiled and closed her eyes as well. A long and dreadful minute passed before Kilat spoke again. "You know, I, I-I never got your name. What is it?"

"My name is Joshua Renalia. I usually go with just 'Joshua'. And I'm not one of those damn apes. I'm a human." You-man? Hoo-man? They both sounded the same to her.

It sounded a lot like hoo-man to her, she decided.

"I've never heard of a 'hoo-man'."

Joshua corrected her. "It's human." He sighed, gripping her forepaw as he hugged her hard. "You know, I wish… I really wish there's something else I can do for you. If we… if we met under better circumstances, I think, I think we would've made great friends."

"I think so, too," the dragoness murmured. "And maybe, by then you would've told me all about your species."

"You'd be surprised by what I'd tell you," Joshua laughed. "My species accomplished quite a bit." The sadness in it was unmistakable, but he tried to hide it in an effort to remain strong despite this disappointment.

Kilat, however, could not hold it in for long. Tears fell from her eyes, but the electric dragon no longer had the strength to wail as she had. "I wish you could do something too," she said, clinging to her life as long as she could before she couldn't fight off the poison any longer. Because she wanted to see what a life of peace was for dragons. Because she didn't want to disappoint Lani or Explodon. Because she still wanted to see if she has any family in Warfang. To learn more about her parents, about her siblings.

Because she also wanted to be better friends with someone who spent so much effort and care trying to help her. "I… Joshua, I, I don't want to die either."

.

.

.

.

.

Neither the dragon child nor the human teenager expected anything to happen here, not at the very last second. The Ancestors apparently did not care, and as all-powerful as Joshua's sole God sounded like, even He appeared apathetic to their plight.

But something did happen.

Without warning, Joshua's hands radiated a blinding light in response to something the teenager would never figure out by himself. Not for weeks. Not for months. Indescribable horror etched itself on his face as he watched white mist engulf the electric dragoness. It completely enveloped Kilat, and the brown-skinned human gasped, upset at the turn of events. His only power triggered out of the blue and—

Kilat shrieked. All her bones flared as though a great, massive fire invaded her body and burned from within. Her scales prickled, throbbing with the sensation of countless stakes stabbing her poor nerves again and again. The agony of something flowing into her tormented her, and it was so painful the child wouldn't wish it on her worst enemy.

Joshua groaned and shook his head. He pictured something terrible. He found himself on the brink of crying, of throwing himself off the ledge. But he couldn't let go. He couldn't relinquish Kilat. Not the one, the first friend he's made in the messed-up Dragon Realms. Her screams shook him and almost broke his eardrums. Her high-pitched screeches imprinted themselves forever in his mind, but nonetheless he stayed with her. He promised to stay with the dragon child until the end, and he was loathe to break this promise, and to an innocent little girl, no less. Joshua Renalia collapsed on the ground, but held on, refusing to let go until the light surrounding the dragoness vanished.

Seconds passed.

Every second felt like hours, but the screaming eventually ceased.

The white fog dissipated into the air and it left behind… not a dead and mangled body, but a clean and woundless dragon. Kilat opened her eyes slowly. Everything hurt, and her nose still had some gunk left in it. She stretched her neck. She moved her paws, waving it around energetically to see if her fingers still worked. Her left wing was still reduced to a repulsive and unsightly stump, but at least it did not bleed anymore—

Wait. She was woundless? She was full of energy? Her stump no longer bled? Ancestors, was this even real? She must be dead. But why did she still hear the sounds of a waterfall? Why was the sky a mixture of blue and orange? Why—

"Oh, my, f*cking God."

Kilat turned and saw the furless ape—saw Joshua looking up at her, sprawled all over the grass. His eyes dilated. Even he couldn't believe what he was seeing. "You're… you're, not dead. You're okay." His teeth slowly revealed themselves in a happy and cheerful grin. "Holy shit! You're actually okay!"

Joshua attempted to pick himself up, but inexplicably he's lost all the energy and strength in his body. His arms shook uncontrollably when he propped himself, and it lasted so shortly he flopped back on the grass at once. "Did I do that?' he spoke, staring at his hands again. A confused frown began to form. "Did I… did I really do that? But the last time this happened, I, I…"

Kilat interrupted Joshua by lunging at him as soon as her mind finally processed this sheer impossibility. She remembered how it felt like a thousand red Spirit Gems flushing themselves into her body, removing the poison, and mending every bone and every cut on her. It had hurt terribly, but in the end it was all for the best. "Joshua, I don't know what you did but thank you!" she squealed at the human, worming her way into his shirt until she felt his two arms hug her. "Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you!"

"K-K, Kilat! I didn't do anything." They made eye contact. "I don't have any control over my power. But even if I did, it wasn't supposed to… it wasn't supposed to do this! Now I, I-I-I, I don't know what it does now! None of this makes any sense to me!"

"I don't care!" The child nuzzled the furless ape. She also licked his cheek multiple times, out of gratitude. "I'm alive. Ancestors! I'M STILL ALIVE! And it's all thanks to YOU!"

In the near future, Joshua Renalia looked back at this moment and disclaim anything pointed straight at him, instead asserting this miracle as an act of God or the Ancestors for as long as he lived. Yet the Guardians of Warfang eventually denounced his words—refuted them, rebutting that it had been something within him all this time, something that he could—that he should master so hundreds of others may benefit.

In the present, Joshua wrote it off as another strange characteristic of his unique element. It changed everything he assumed about it, and now he was back to the drawing board of figuring it out. But the sudden reversal of Kilat's fortune had not fully registered in his mind yet. He simply yawned. Drowsiness was coming, and it was coming very fast. "Ugh, for some reason now I feel like sleeping. Can't even move. Too… freaking tired."

Kilat looked at him, her cobalt eyes bright and full of life. The fringes of her lips slightly curved into a smile. Something she did not have for the past few hours. "I'll keep an eye out for you," said the dragoness. She padded to the sprawled human with all four of her paws—all four working paws—and coiled right next to him. "And I'll be right here."

In one automatic movement, Joshua wrapped his arms around the child's golden scales and embraced her. "Thank you," he said.

"No," Kilat retorted. "Thank you."

Author's notes:

Kilat's survival, of course, was intended from the very beginning. She's briefly mentioned twice in the opening sequence in the first chapter, so it's pretty obvious that I've got her survival—and the method behind it—planned already. This also means that the underlying nature of Joshua's element remains consistent and has not yet been violated, despite all that I've shown so far.

Anyway, looking back, I could have very easily made the executive decision to simply kill her off, but with dignity and happiness in Joshua's arms. Still, as I was mapping out this story, I realized Joshua will eventually need a friend in this world. He needs someone to be his anchor, to keep him grounded and sane in a world he doesn't belong in. Soooo I guess Kilat got to live then. Lucky for her right? lol. I still feel regret at not killing her off, but eh, I'm sure I can make up for it later.

See you all next chapter.

4/29/2019 EDIT: Fixed end-chapter author's notes, to reduce the spoilers.