Some-what copy/pasted from the original thread, I had to do a bunch of edits to make it look better
Petalmonarch | Elder
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One of the oldest dragons in the clan. After growing up in the Gladeveins, she moved to the Carrion Canyon and found a lair to adopt her. She was then given orders to go help out a clan in the Windswept plateau; their leader was a friend of her leader's and they were having some trouble and needed the help pretty badly. Petalmonarch is now the elder and cook of the kite-lair in the Windswept Plateau: The Jade Vivace.
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Jumanji | Healer
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Having an interest in plants while living in the Clouscrape Crags is rare since hardly any plants grow there at all. After leaving her old clan, Jumanji headed inland to pursue her dreams of being an apothecary. Almost all of her research is self-conducted and almost all of her treatments revolve around plants. It's guaranteed that she has a tincture for any ailment.
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Myren | Librarian
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Books have always been a favored item to this dragon. Since she learned to read, you could always find her with her nose in a book be it a textbook or novel. Her parents used to punish her by taking books away. But even though Myren now spends most of her days in the library reading, she is a skilled spellcaster and has no trouble taking care of herself.
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Noctbloom | Fighter
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Growing up in the Rotrock Rim is something this dragon prides herself on. Her clan had built its center a little too close to the Wyrmwound and it had a terrible effect on them. She had to fight her way through her diseased clanmates to ensure she stayed alive and was able to flee the Scarred Wasteland. Having to slay her friends, she says, is what hardened her and made her the killer she was. She eventually found herself wrapped up in the Icewarden's prison and was lucky to have escaped.
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Prologue
The mimic's attack wasn't exactly unexpected, but it certainly was overwhelming. It wasn't that they were too strong, or big, or terrifying, it was just the sheer number. There had to be thousands of them, all in different shapes; swords and shields, spears, mirrors, pots, origami, lamps, puppets, chairs. Even the potted plants seemed to be watching the kite's inhabitants. The first hint of an attack were the psychic's visions; she saw the clan falling to ridiculous objects like goblets, paintings, and clocks; the second warning was when the blacksmith's furnace seemed to have a mind of its own. The last sign before chaos ensued was the lanterns. Hundreds and hundreds of smiling lanterns appeared in the evening sky hours before the battle began. The whole lair was put on alert when the lanterns started floating closer and closer to the balloons and sails holding the kite afloat, and lockdown when they started floating along the platforms. Everything began its downhill plunge when that song started being heard on the wind. It was almost so quiet it couldn't be heard, until one of the hatchlings piped up about how pretty the music was. Archeus, the clan leader, then told everyone to prepare every spell they knew and every weapon they could to get ready to fight like they never had before. And then it was like they were everywhere, they came out of the sky, up from the ground, even out of the walls.
And our defensive had begun.
“If we don’t rescue Shadowsong before this long
night ends, she’ll be Thana’s forever.”
"Thana? Why does that name sound familiar..?" Mumbles the black Coatl. The green Coatl who tended to Nightsong now turns and begins rubbing salves and using small healing spells to quickly fix up Voidsong.
"There you go, good as new. Anybody else need any healing?" The green Coatl asks. The black Wildclaw holds out her badly-gashed wing for the Coatl to fix.
"Guys, we've got company!" Yells the Wildclaw, shaking out her wing and
pointing towards the kite when the Coatl finishes. Everyone looks to see a dozen mimics catapulting towards them from the kite. "Remember, if one turns into you and we can't tell you apart, play dumb!" The Wildclaw says rather loudly, then winks and gives a sinister smile before launching herself at the group of mimics. The black Coatl and purple Spiral follow close behind her. The green Coatl healer stays behind with the Nocturnes.
"You said your teacher was taken by a Thana, right? Do either of you have any idea where we could fi-"
"JUMANJI!" Someone yells. The green Coatl startles and looks around frantically for who called her, finally she sees a black and white Skydancer and runs over to them, the Nocturnes getting a feeling they should follow her.
"Archeus! Sir, what happened?" Jumanji asks the Skydancer who looked gravely injured.
"I-I'm not sure, they were everywhere. Shaula and Evroult- th-they tried their best b-but-" He collapses and sobs. Jumanji lays down close to the deep gash on his chest and starts pulling something out of her bag. She gently rolls the Skydancer over so she can see the wound better, and as fast as lightning, plunges a dagger into her clan leader's chest. He shrieks in in surprise and claws in vain at the knife before going still. Voidsong and Nightsong start backing away before the Skydancer starts dissolving until all that's left is a pile of pale green dust with a knife sticking out of the center. Jumanji pulls the knife out of the ground and cleans it off.
"I thought you Nocturnes could sense mimics." Jumanji says, standing up. "The first mistake that mimic made was coming from that direction, he was coming towards the kite. The second was that Archeus is the only black and white Skydancer that lives on the kite." She points up at the kite with her dagger, "And if you'll look right there, you can see him battling that serpentine lamp." The Nocturnes look and sure enough, there was the dragon they just saw Jumanji stab tearing a lamp to shreds. "The third was that he would've bled out based on how much blood was everywhere. And number four was that Evroult is at his lab in the forge a few miles from the kite. I'll stop rambling, it seems Myren, Noctbloom, and Petal have finished fighting the mimics." She says, flapping back over to where everybody was circling around two of the same black Coatl from earlier who were glaring and bristling at each other.
"Myren?" Jumanji asks the black Coatls.
"Yes?" They both innocently turn to her. Suddenly, one jumps on the other and starts tearing out feathers and mauling them. The Nocturnes try to jump in to help the Coatl being attacked but the black Wildclaw blocks them. Eventually the attacking Coatl backs away from the other, now limp on the ground, and dusts herself off.
"Number one rule," the black Coatl says, panting, " 'play dumb.' " She holds her hands up in air-quotes as the second black Coatl dissolves into another pile of green dust.
"I'm not sure we've introduced ourselves yet," The Coatl continues, "My name's Myren, the Spiral is Petalmonarch, the Wildclaw is Noctbloom, and this is Jumanji." She says stiffly walking over the the green Coatl and motioning to her back.
"Seriously though, I thought Nocturnes could sense mimics." Jumanji says, pulling the back of Myren's sweater up to rub some salve on the scratches near her wings.
"We can," says Nightsong, "they were just too close together for us to tell." Voidsong shrugs sadly. Myren pulls her sweater back down and stretches when Jumanji finishes.
"We should get back up to the kite, we've been gone long enough." Petalmonarch says, hovering just off the ground. "Archeus will need his best fighter and healer back, I'm sure there are a lot of injured dragons that need help." She takes off back up towards the kite. Jumanji and Noctbloom follow close behind her. Myren stays back with Voidsong and Nightsong.
"Everybody in the lair knows the rule, not that you'll need to know that since you can already sense the mimics, but if you're really not sure and the dragon hasn't already pounced on the mimic, ask a question the mimics wouldn't know the answer to, it'll give the real dragon time to act. Now let's go."
Eden, the psychic, sat in her tent under the main platform of the kite staring at the circular pool in the center of the room.
"No, no, no, no..." She murmurs to herself. "We won't go down so easily!" She says louder, slapping the pool with her hand, sending water flying everywhere.
Are you so sure, deary?
"Thana!" Shouts the Skydancer, standing up from her seat by the pool, "You coward! You ran off without coming to say hi!" She sneers.
All in good timing, sister. I'll be back, I just had an errand to run that involves this Singer.
"Don't you dare call me sister! You lost that relation when you swore yourself to the Shade!" She scowls, then chuckles, "Does your Patron know that you plan to forsake her?"
The less the Shadowbinder knows, the better. Does our brother know who I am yet? Or are you still trying to protect him?
"Leave Archeus out of this! This is between you and me." She pauses. "You said you were going to come back, right? Then why don't you come and tell Archeus yourself? He is our older brother after all, he can take care of himself. And make sure he can see you- the real you."
All in good time...
A chilling laugh echoed through the tent and Eden felt Thana's presence evaporate. She sat down next to the pool and gazed into it, seeing the possible futures ahead for the clan.
"MYREN, LOOK OUT!"
Myren looked up just in time to see a chandelier crashing down on her. Almost flattened in the chandelier's impact, Myren manages to wrestle the hunk of mimic off her with help from Voidsong and Nightsong who pummel it after Myren Congeals the chandelier to the ground. A black and white Skydancer swoops down next to her ripping the pages out of a flying book.
"I need you to go tell everybody at the forge that we need their help. Take one of the Nocturnes with you in case the mimics have already made it there." Says the Skydancer.
"Right away, Archeus sir!" Myren replies, punching the chandelier in one of its many eyes and starting into the sky, calling for Nightsong.
"And tell Raiden that it's time his plan 'Binary' be put to the test!" He yells after her, snapping the bow of a haunted violin in half.
"It should be just up ahead!" Myren says to Nightsong as the glow of the forge comes into view. Myren swoops down towards the door and pauses before opening it. "You sensing anything?" She asks Nightsong.
"Nothing. It seems the mimics haven't gotten here yet." Nightsong replies, pushing open the door. "Hello?"
"Aye! Welcome ta th' Singing Hammers forge an' laboratory!" Says a brown and navy Nocturne. "What brings ya he- Ah, how are ye, Myren?"
"Hey Magiere, this is Nightsong. Archeus sent us to tell you guys that the mimics attacked and we're not doing so hot on the kite. Is Raiden around?" Myren asks the Nocturne, coming into the forge behind Nightsong. The metallic clank of a wrench hitting the floor echoes across the forge and an "Ow!" can be heard following it. A few seconds later, a black Coatl with bright blue plumes trips out from behind a huge curtain off to the side of the forge.
"You called? Er, someone called?" He says picking himself up and dusting off walking towards the group. "Hey Myren, what's up?"
"Not the kite if we waste too much time! Magiere, go tell Sapph, Evroult, and Schlamm that they need to get to the kite as soon as possible, especially you and Sapph, we need all Nocturnes on deck to help sniff out the mimics." Myren says. Magiere nods and heads off into the forge. "Raiden, I've got a message from Archeus for you, he says that it's time your plan 'Binary' be put to the test." As soon as Myren says 'binary', Raiden almost jumps for joy.
"YES. FINALLY." He says, quickly flapping over to the curtain. He yanks on a rope and the curtains fly open revealing two Skydancer-shaped automatons almost bigger than him. "Ta-da! Presenting the latest in Raid-Co engineering, the enhanced defense A.I.!"
He hops over to the first automaton, a blue and grey heavily-armored robot that sits booted down next to the other. He opens a panel on its neck and flips a switch and presses a few buttons before closing the panel and hopping away, clipping a small metal object in his plumes near his head. He hums a short sequence of notes in the Coatl language and the A.I. lifts its head and begins its POST operations, transformers in its limbs crackling to life, electrifying its forelegs and wings.
While the blue automaton boots up, Raiden flits over to the other bronze and brown automaton and repeats his actions; panel, buttons, metal piece on the other side of his head, hummed sequence. The bronze bot lifts its head as well and blue gems embedded in its body begin to glow. Dust starts to swirl lazily around the bot's feet.
Raiden rubs his hands together and pushes a button on a control panel a little ways away from the bots and starts disconnecting cables from them. After the cables have all been unhooked, Raiden takes a few steps back from his creations.
"Alright, let's see what months of building and programming have led to! Sedai! Redai! Run file_name mimic_find!" Raiden shouts at the automatons.
"RUNNING . . ." Both bots reply, un-moving.
Raiden looks at Myren and Nightsong, "You should both get going, it might take these two a while to get warmed up. And I might have to debug the mimic-sensing software I added for such an occasion as this."
"RUN COMPLETE. SCANNING . . ." The bots say together.
"See? Now go! They need you on the kite, I'll be there as soon as I can! Go!" Raiden ushers them towards the door while humming more short note sequences and then gets back to work with the control panel and humming more commands in Coatl, most of which even Myren couldn't understand because they were so random.
As Myren and Nightsong left the forge they ran into Magiere and the rest of the forge's inhabitants getting ready to head towards the kite. As they exited, Nightsong got a creeping feeling that was often associated with the presence of mimics. She looked at Magiere and could tell he was sensing the same thing, as could the blue Nocturne next to him.
Nightsong pokes Myren, "Something's not right." She whispers.
"Mimics?" Myren whispers back.
"Somthin' li' that," Magiere says looking around. "Th' shadows only crawl li' this when-" His eyes fly wide, "Run, go now. Right now. We don' hav' much time. I hate to leave Raiden here alone, but if his artificial intelligences are e'en half as good as he says, he won' hav' a problem." Despite being frantic, Magiere keeps his voice down. Nightsong's eyes widen in understanding as everybody rushes to get in the air.
"What? Wh-what's going on?" Myren asks again, almost bumping into the white Coatl blacksmith trying to get his wings open.
"Crawlers. Thana's elite minions, beings of pure shadow. They're worse than mimics." Says the blue Nocturne.
From inside the forge, the automatons can be heard;
"SCAN COMPLETE. ERROR. mimic.aura DETECTED, NO entity.mimic DETECTED."
"WHAT?!" Yells Raiden. "You guys should be able to sense mimics from over a mile away! How can there be no mimics if you sense their aura?!"
"Tha' jus' prooves mah point. We need ta go. Now." Magiere whispers to the group, speeding up and heading towards the kite. The white Coatl blocks him and sings at him in Coatl. Myren had to translate;
"If someone doesn't go back and tell him, he might program the drones the wrong way and he might get ambushed trying to get to the kite."
"Yes, I kno', bu' we need to keep movin'. It sounds li' th' dragons at th' kite won' last much longer if we keep dilly dallyin'!" Magiere tells the Coatl. The Coatl crosses his arms and hums a soured note at him.
"Schlamm! I am not translating that!" Myren fires at him. "I'll go. You guys need to get to the kite." Myren swoops back down to the forge and quickly ducks inside feeling eyes on her back.
"Raiden, have your robots run the scan again. And don't fix anything yet!"
"Myren? Why are you still here?" Raiden asks her.
"Magiere told me that something might be watching the forge, now have them run that scan again!" Myren says.
"Right," Raiden turns to the automatons, "Redai, Sedai, run program mimic_find again. And hold a continuous scan."
"SCANNING . . ." The bots say together.
"SCAN ALERT. ERROR, mimic.aura DETECTED, NO entity.mimic DETECTED. SCAN CONTINUING."
"Raiden, your bots might be sensing what could be watching the forge!" Myren says.
"No, they're obviously bugged. You should fix them before heading to the kite or they might kill someone." Says a voice behind Myren. Her voice. She turns around to see a copy herself closing the forge door behind her.
"Seriously? Again? Geeze, you mimics really like copying me." Says the impostor. "Is it my sweater or something?"
"M-Myren?" Raiden asks them both. He inaudibly hums more commands to his bots who issue a beep-code in response. "Could this be what's-"
"Watching the forge? Probably." Myren says. "Look at me, Raiden, why would a mimic tell you to run a scan that could find it?"
"And how would a mimic know that other mimics have turned into me tonight?" Asks the impostor nonchalantly. Raiden looks at the two dragons, afraid to trust one in case he trusts the wrong Myren.
"One of you could be lying. And we're about to find out who." He says. The impostor smiles at him expectantly. Raiden raises his fingers and whistles sharply. All of a sudden, the automatons fly out from where they were standing and tackle both Myrens, pinning them to the floor. They both lower their heads as if glaring at the Myrens.
"ALERT. IMPOSTOR DETECTED." Says Sedai, the blue bot, standing over Myren's impersonator.
"OBJECTIVE: NULL. NEW OBJECTIVE: SEEK AND DESTROY." Redai, the bronze bot, replies standing over the real Myren. As fast as the electricity pulsing through its claws, Sedai rears and plunges charged razor-sharp claws into the fake Myren's chest. The fake yelps in surprise and jumps and twitches with the electricity jumping from Sedai to them.
"Y-you won't- GAH- win!" Yells the fake, voice cracking as it struggles to hold Myren's shape. Electricity snaps and crackles until the impostor goes limp and Sedai hops off the melting body, which now seems to be congealing back to an original shape instead of disintegrating.
Sedai walks over to Raiden on its' hind legs, keeping its' bloody forelegs off the ground,
"SANITATION REQUIRED." It tells him.
Redai releases the real Myren and offers a hand to help her stand,
"APOLOGIES. I DO HOPE I DID NOT HARM entity.dragon, USER_NAME: Myren."
"N-no, I'm fine, thank you." Myren tells the bot, surprised that it knows her name. She takes its' hand and it hefts her to her feet. Myren turns to Raiden. "When did you have time to program that stuff into them?"
"I was doing it the whole time, I made it so they can understand both Draconic and Coatillian, as well as a few whistle sequences. And these bits here," He points to the metal clips in his plumes, "make it so I can program and give them instructions from anywhere." He smiles proudly, then sees the black mass that used to be Myren's impersonator and scrunches up his nose at the unsightly blob.
"Can I use the bots too? Like, give them commands and stuff?" Myren asks. Raiden nods. "Cool, um, Redai? Could you see if this thing is still alive? Even though I'm guessing your shocking counterpart fried it?"
"AFFIRMATIVE." Redai walks over to the mass alongside Myren and pauses.
"NEGATIVE. entity.imposter IS: DEAD."
Myren looks at the blob as it forms back into the shape of a dragon, a young black Ridgeback. Her skin shifts and moves as if it were made of slime.
"Oh no..." Myren murmurs. "So this is a Crawler. Dragons sworn to serve Thana in exchange for a mimic's powers..."
"That's awful." Replies Raiden. "I'll add this to the A.I.s' programming so they can tell the difference." He begins humming instructions and picks up a rag. Before he begins cleaning Sedai's limbs he asks it, "Are you grounded?"
"AFFIRMATIVE. TRANSFORMERS GROUNDED. POWER CUT TO GENERATORS." Replies Sedai, rotating its' arms so Raiden can clean them fully.
"Well, it seems my droids have passed their first test (
"OBJECTIVE: COMPLETE" says Redai). What do you say we give them another?" Raiden asks Myren. Myren smiles and looks at each of the bots, then to Raiden.
"I think they're up for the task."
After Myren and Raiden arrive at the kite, Archeus calls an emergency landing so the mimics stop targeting the balloons and sails holding the platforms in the air. He knows it will make them susceptible to land-bound mimics, but he won't risk having the kite crash and deal more damage than what's already been done.
Following the inevitability that mimics would turn into the lair's inhabitants to confuse everybody, Raiden's defense droids pulled their weight and did their job of determining friends from foes. Many headaches where stopped in their tracks, and the lair's few Nocturnes weren't a last resort in the critical decision-making.
Myren, allowed to give the rock-enhanced droid, Redai orders, was able to double the amount of mimics destroyed, since Raiden had trouble issuing separate commands to both the shock-enhanced Sedai and his sister-droid at once.
Jumanji, with help from the leader's healer wife, Vivian, was able to keep up with the steady stream of injuries that seemed to decrease by quite a bit when Raiden joined the defensive with his automatons. Only having to deal with a handful of fatal injuries thus far, found that fewer and fewer dragons needed immediate attention for their wounds.
Petalmonarch charged herself with balloon and sail maintenance before the emergency landing was called, then with sweeping all the mimic dust off the platforms when the kite had landed, which she quite enjoyed, she was too old to be fighting, but kept a fighting spirit and didn't turn down the opportunity to help someone finish off a mimic or two.
Noctbloom was dubbed the Dust Queen after the mimics retreated. Even though she wasn't fond of the name, it stuck for a few weeks after the battle until she got all the mimic dust scrubbed off her armor.
Nightsong, Voidsong, and a whole group of dragons (and two robots) went to the Ashfall Waste looking for Thana and their teacher, Shadowsong, after Myren picked up a clue for where Thana might have been hiding in a book of old Shadow fables. They found her secret fortress in a mess of grey brambles along the southwest coast and fought through a whole lot of Crawlers trying to find Shadowsong. At the heart of the fortress, where Thana was thought to be hiding, the group found not one nor two, but five different Shadowsongs and were forced to pick only one, the rest would die instantly by strange magic means. With help from Raiden's droids and Voidsong and Nightsong, the group managed to pick the right Shadowsong and retreat back to the kite before Thana returned to find her prisoner gone.
Eden went missing just before the battle ended, leaving her brother worrying about what could've happened to her. She returned the next morning carrying with her a small vial of black ooze. 'All that's left of an estranged relative.' She said when asked about it.
Fin
Credits
- Flight Rising for the awesome prompt, thank you guys so much
- @/cynicalCrows' coliseum dividers
- @/PolarisFox, I may or may not have taken the idea of droids from their story :'D I tried my darnedest not to completely plagiarize them. At least I found something to add to my lair's canon..?
