Striker

Son of a university president and a successful professor in the Sunbeam Ruins, this young Guardian was once known as Cookiecream. He's always been the determined type who wanted to prove himself.

He found a charge in his colleagues in the Shifting Expanse and dutifully works as a clan guard. He has also found a mate, Thundercloud! Their firstborn daughters Nimbus and Tempest directly serve under the Stormcatcher in a guard unit as well. In general, he is a brave and loving individual with good leadership skills and a readiness to sacrifice himself for his loved ones. He can be rather serious and blunt but he is well-meaning.

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Art by Ittybittybug!

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Striker leads his companions into the refinery building. It is still dim, but with their lights one can see a maze of passageways; rusty, metallic scaffolds that go deeper into the earth, housing all sorts of floors and machinery. Vines like those in the previous building are present in ever greater numbers. He takes a look back and counts his companions one by one– Desertrose, Revel, the Clausius brothers, and Passionfruit. All present, thankfully. But he notices a distressed look on Heat’s face. He pensively looks downward into the dark of the floors below.

“I hear something walking.” Heat looks downwards. “Something big.”

Striker knew it was just a matter of time until this would happen. Could this be a sentient creature? A wild beast?

“Stay close by. Don’t forget– buddy system,” he exhorts. As they navigate through the area, the Guardian jots down notes on his notepad and annotates the large map from earlier in pencil– so he can erase things later. The bare skeleton of the area seems to be accurate to the map at the moment, save for the places with debris and platforms fallen to disuse. Alas, he couldn’t judge how many floors downwards the building has.

Desertrose has been on guard. There are some angry little rodents but when she rumbles at them, they run away. Meanwhile, Revel has been paying attention to the walkways on which she steps; as a Sandsurge– incapable of flight– she knows to be extra careful. There’s the occasional foliage to claw off; the occasional screw to tighten. The Clausius brothers– glad to info-dump as always– speak of the facilities to expect: the boiler, the superheater, the condenser, the big magical tubes through which the magic from the Lightning Farm flows into the power plant. Revel points these out to Striker, whose expressions shift from confused to satisfied when this context is given. He continues writing his notes.

After nearly half an hour of work, Revel comes to a surprising realization: the complex’s structure is surprisingly safe for dragons who cannot fly. It’s almost as though it was the norm for the workforce population not to fly. This is the Shifting Expanse– what more could that mean?

“There are lots of platforms around here– platforms safe for dragons like me. I don’t suppose… a lot of Sandsurge might have worked here before?” She furrows her brow, deep in thought.

“Hmm? Your folk do originate in the Shifting Expanse and have lived here for ages. I think that sounds plausible.” Striker looks up from his notebook.

“Care to give a bit of context to someone who comes from the Sunbeam Ruins?” Passionfruit eyes her curiously with his big eyes. Both he and Striker happen to be children of the Sunbeam Ruins who later moved to the Shifting Expanse, on the account of education and work. Passionfruit only had faint knowledge about that big incident that caused the rediscovery of the Sandsurge breed. Something that involved some workers bulldozing too deep…

“For a long time in Sandsurge history, dragons like me stayed isolated underground. My predecessors liked it that way! We could work alone, according to the high-efficiency workflow that we loved. As my parents used to say: To be a Sandsurge is to have both hands and mind like machines.”

Desertrose listens eagerly while shooing a small scorpion away. “Well, I’ve never met a Sandsurge who doesn’t get the job done!”

“During that time, it was not surprising for complexes like these to reach crazy depths.The lower portions– populated exclusively by Sandsurges– were not plotted on any map. That sort of setup was coordinated by the so-called Project Manager. They did that in compliance with the wishes of both the Stormcatcher and his, well, reclusive workaholic children.”

She pauses. “Reclusive workaholic employees.”

“However! If you go centuries before that, there was indeed a time when our kind begrudgingly worked with other breeds.” She holds her tongue before she speaks of “clueless micromanaging by authority that has no engineering expertise.” The classic bogeyman for any Sandsurge child!

“Wait a second!” Heat speaks up. “If I’m catching what you’re trying to get at, you think the map we got might be incomplete?”

“Well… if my suspicions are right, then yes!” she says. “Of course, I could be totally wrong. This place’s history seems to be undocumented, so unless the Bossman divulges more context, it’s hard to date this facility.”

Work looks down into the darkness. “In any case, the power stations we know shouldn’t go so deep that we couldn’t see the bottom. Although to be fair, there is a fair lot of greenery obscuring the place. In fact, there’s lots of greenery leading up to…” the Aberration brothers take a few steps forward. They comb through the vines until a small signage is revealed: “The control room.”

Passionfruit winces. It seems that the overgrowth has gone so out of control that the leaves place the door slightly ajar, but stuck in place. “I think it’s the perfect time to collect a sample.”

This excess of sand creepers seems atypical considering the typical desert conditions. He couldn’t put a finger on what in the mundane world could be nutritionally special about this area to justify them growing to these alarming extents. His extensive knowledge of phytochemicals and chemical processes tell him that these botanical oddities have a magical nature to them.

He starts snipping off the ivy and inspecting them for anything that is amiss. The first few bits seem fairly normal– he takes note of that in his field notes, along with his observations of how the extent of these growths no longer seem to be explainable via mundane logic. Striker remains close by; he is ready to accompany the engineers into the control room, and for now he just goes over his map annotations. With his ocular device, he traces the path they’ve taken on the floor so far and adds the finishing touches to his notes about the floor. He is even able to get previews of the floor below from certain angles– rather similar to the current floor, but with more plants.

As Passionfruit goes deeper into the layers of ivy, he gets an increasingly rotten feeling. He feels a bit tired– even if his work hasn’t been too physically intensive. It’s almost as though his magical energy is getting sapped into the plants, which have been taking on a progressively darker and more wilted appearance.

“Guys… stand back.” He gestures at the other dragons to go a few steps behind.

“What are you doing?” Desertrose looks at him, concerned.

“Something about these plants makes me feel weakened. I have to see what’s going on!” He musters energy to conjure up a ball of light– classic Light dragon magic– but it only produces a small, amorphous blob. It shrivels up and gets sucked into the ivy, which seems to pass the glowing essence deeper into the control room. He stares at this in horror.

“See! Please tell me you saw that!” Passionfruit hisses. “Light magic shouldn’t work like that! One of you Lightning dragons should give it a shot.”

The Clausius brothers look at the scene in utter bemusement, then they turn to each other. “Well, don’t mind if we do,” Heat says. The Aberration stands back and tries to conjure an electric bolt, only to be surprised by a piddly spark that gets sucked into the ivy overgrowth.

“Now that is a load of garbage.” Work sighs, unamused.

Passionfruit harvests the plant samples in a shaky and panicked manner. He stores them in clear plastic containers. “It’s absorbing the magic, guys. In other words, these plants seem to be Shade-touched. We have to exterminate them; can’t let them take over the Shifting Expanse.”

At that point, there is a dull thud within the area. The Aberration brothers seem wary.

Striker frowns. “So we should physically destroy the plants? Magical bolts don’t seem to affect them.” As a physically oriented fighter himself, he has no doubts that he can do that, but it’s disconcerting to think magic just gets absorbed into them and rendered useless. It doesn’t take a mage to realize that magic is a dragon’s lifeblood!

“That's a good idea. If my understanding is right, using magical attacks and abilities may be ineffective, but a good old slash or burning with a matchstick or mechanical flamethrower should do the trick. I'd say we should deprive them of any nutrients, but since they soak up magic, that'd be a problem. There's magic in the air of the shifting expanse.” Passionfruit continues snipping samples. “You see, my containers here are not just waterproof, but magicproof. Magic can’t go in or out of them–”

“Closed magic system,” Heat jests while still trying to decipher the nature of the sound. A fallen object? Just a teammate’s wing that beat against the wall?

“Yeah, yeah. That’s the kind of system you’d want to contain these. But while we can have tiny ones like these, can you imagine making a version large enough for this whole facility? That’s going to be a challenge in engineering." Passionfruit starts curling up in stress. Desertrose comes closer to him and gives him a comforting nuzzle. “This isn’t something that we can handle alone, but I’m sure our Bossdad will understand the urgency of this situation and modify plans as necessary. It will be very clear in our mission report.”

Heat frowns skeptically. “The operation could end up really expensive. I know, Bossdad knows best and all, but I have a feeling this whole plant revival operation will get discontinued unless we can get the best darn plant exterminator ever!”

“There’s a lot one can do with more manpower.” Work adds, in a nonchalant tone.

Striker simply claws against the door, shredding a swath of plants.

“Plentiful as they may be, we can be grateful that they’re not indestructible. Let’s go.”

There’s a rumble in the ground– which especially catches the attention of the ground-bound Desertrose. “That’s surely not a little swift volt. Keep your watch, everyone!”

The door swings open, revealing the full horror of what was in the control room: vicious, writhing garden watchers, many times their normal size. Their shadowy faces in their flower heads have angry, glowing eyes, and visible spiky maws with teeth like needles. Their stalks contort, and as they move it is apparent that they possess more limbs than usual. Although they make no sounds, save for the pounding of their stems on the floor– they seem ready to prey on these draconic intruders.

Passionfruit grows pale from fear– did his sample harvesting anger these grotesque creatures? He zooms to the back for cover and hides behind Revel’s back. Striker makes a flying dash up to the ceiling– he looks ready to shred the monsters. Desertrose takes a few steps back before charging and trampling across a bunch of them. At least six of these giant garden watchers– plant watchers, if one may say– turn their attention to the Snapper and look ready to whip out their dreadful vines…

Revel takes out her electrified crossbow. She expects them not to work at their best given the nature of the plant life in the area, but surely they’d still do damage, right? It’s worth a try!

The last in line to see the commotion are the Clausius brothers, but they could already hear those pounding stems; Striker flying up above; Desertrose stomping over the creatures. Before they could do anything, Heat catches a vision down the corridor, and the swift motion of his upper body causes Work to face the same direction. There is a tall, shadowy figure with large wings and a sharp, sharklike profile. Perhaps a Ridgeback?! What seemed to be a dragon was gone in an instant– gliding in the direction of the boiler– but the brothers had no doubts that they saw something.

Heat thinks of Aurelius, the clan leader; Fulgura, the feared Storm Emissary; then finally, the mighty Stormcatcher himself. Could there be a similar mastermind watching their every move? His blood runs warm. "I saw someone. We really aren't alone."

“No time to contemplate. Those floral monstrosities… we can’t just escape them now.” Work whispers.

At that moment, the brothers felt the urge– fight, or flight? They readied their claws and their primal instincts– it was time to fight.