This story is 8,724 words long, and contains themes of ;
-Blood
-Death
-Chemical burns
-Horror
Read at your own discretion!
The Corralled Caravan
Gathrus stopped in front of the caravan, the gaudy purples, greens and… every-other-colors in various complex patterns hurting his eyes and showing to them that whomever was inside was obviously not from the wasteland.
He knocked on the door.
He knocked on the door again after no response.
He nearly knocked a third time when, suddenly, a spray of shiny pieces of plastic and paper showered his face. His teeth bared and his wings flared outwards as he stumbled back, vigorously scratching the stuff away from his face as he hissed out and growled, anticipating an ambush after that attack on his senses.
For all intents and purposes, it simply must’ve been a shadow ambush tactic!
He stood there, panting, waiting for a battle in the hot, humid breeze, the only sound greeting his hisses and growls being the howl of the wind and the calls of distant vultures.
He opened his eyes to find a monochrome nocturne in jester’s fittings sitting eerily in front of him, completely silent. He looked into their eyes- it was a shadow dragon! An ambush! One of their many tricks! A battle! A fight was about!
Gathrus was about ready to hurl insults and scare the caravan from the first circle when an imperial gingerly stepped from the door. Red eyes.
Gathrus kept his wings flared, but eased up a little. Ah. A Plague dragon with the caravan. Perhaps… perhaps. Well, at any rate it was good to have someone of the proper element nearby.
He straightened himself up, tucking his wings against his sides again, and remarked, “What is your business within the first circle of the Fallen’s Fang Clan?”
The nocturne silently stepped aside for the Imperial to trot forward and chirp out in this… strange… all-too-cheery tone, “Party time.” She pulled out a deck of cards from… somewhere… and began to juggle them this way and that, and Gathrus could’ve sworn that she had managed to make a circle of flying cards. “Oooo wee oooo yeah Ooh yeah OoH yeah woah oOh yeah woah yeah party time, it is time for partying, yes?” She kept making the cards fly around.
Gathrus raised some eyebrows in absolute confusion. What was this? Some rival clan’s distraction? Some shadow trickster with red contacts? Or… maybe…
By the Plaguebringer…
Gathrus tried to wave the cards away with his claws. “Ma’am, stop! Stop at once, these heretical purple-eyed freaks have obviously brainwashed you! They have taken you away from the pestilent light of your true mother!”
She lowered the cards for a moment before making them fly towards Gathrus and bounce back as though connected by a string to her hand. “… You are loud for a sad little man…” she muttered to Gathrus in a curious, whispered voice, before noticing his expression of concern change to fury. She stopped the card thing and put them back. “You should cheer up, sad little mirror man.”
Gathrus stepped forward and screeched out, “YOU SHOULD LEAVE THIS AREA BEFORE I SEND MY HUNTERS AFTER YOU AND THE REST OF YOUR CARAVAN, INTERLOPER!” He began to scratch his claw at his chest in an attempt to find his whistle. “LEAVE AT ONCE! LEAVE, OR SUFFER THE CONSEQUENCES!”
Gathrus’ yelling was interrupted by a small, long dragon swirling out from the door to the caravan. “Hey, hey, hey, what’s the racket out here, what’s the ruckus, the matter?” The spiral was holding a cane and seemed to wear the clothes of a purple and green ringmaster. He scouted around for a moment before finding Gathrus and chirping, “Well, well, well, it seems like someone is in need of being cheered up!”
Gathrus stomped his foot and barked, “WHAT IS THE PURPOSE OF THIS TRESPASSING, FILTHY TRICKSTERS?!”
The spiral held his claws up. “Woah, woah, woah there Buddy! Slow down! Calm down, even! Please, give us a moment to introduce ourselves!”
The spiral pointed to himself. “I’m Nago, the leader of this operation.”
He pointed to the nocturne. “That’s Frame, they’re the clown. Super funny, as you can tell!”
Frame stared at Gathrus, unmoving. Gathrus shuddered, not knowing the intentions of Frame.
Nago pointed to the Imperial. “That there’s Basava! She’s our resident magician ‘slash’ plague negotiator. You’d be amazed at the stuff she can escape from…”
Basava raised a claw and waved, before reaching into a random rabbit hole and pulling out a hat. “I am magic...” She muttered, her voice hushed in an artificial tone of mystery and wonder.
Nago then did some vague gestures towards the caravan. “And in there would be Sunlight, our bard, and Rohan, our acrobat. Sunlight’s a bit shy, so…”
Gathrus growled, “Bring them out at once or I peel your face like a tiny banana.”
Nago held his hands up in submission. “Jeez, okay, okay! Calm down… Sunlight, Rohan, if you’d pretty please come out here!”
It was a hot minute before Nago turned to Gathrus and remarked, “Just a second, if you’d please?”
Nago flitted over to the caravan before looking back at Gathrus, who gave him a deathglare. “Sunlight, Rohan, I’m serious, you two are reallllyyyy gonna wanna come out here… pretty please. With a berry on top.”
A green skydancer and a grey and cyan Nocturne stepped out from the caravan. The skydancer held her head low, the musical instruments strapped around her body banging and slapping against each other not helping the impression of being weighed down by something.
The Nocturne, meanwhile, was completely lethargic, his eyes barely being able to stay open as he stumbled out and laid down on the wasteland soil.
Gathrus noted that neither of them were plague. Stalking towards Nago, he hissed, “… How did you… acquire Basava?”
Nago shrugged. “She just appeared in our caravan one day and we’ve kept her ever since.”
Gathrus retaliated, “You really think me enough of an idiot to believe that?!”
Nago shook his head. “No, no, I don’t think you’re unintelligent. Basava, how did you find us?”
Basava made a few hand waving motions. “Magic.”
Nago nodded. “See?”
Gathrus grumbled a bit before demanding, “Tell me your business here.”
Nago clapped his hands together and chirped, “Oh, well I can answer that! That’s an easy question!”
Nago flew back a bit and sung, “Sunlight! Could you maybe play a few tunes?”
The green skydancer nodded before slowly and shakily pulling out a ukelele.
She nearly began to strum when Gathrus pounced, breaking the ukelele with a single strike. “Don’t act like I know not of your bard magics, wind mage…”
Sunshine just looked on confused before pulling out another ukelele, which also got broken in half.
Gathrus looked back at Nago, saying “Tell me this in a straightforward speech. No bard, no magic, no blinding shiny paper pieces.”
Nago looked to Sunshine, making a cutting motion with his hand. Gathrus looked back at her to find her putting away a third ukelele.
Nago cleared his throat. “Well, we’re the traveling five-dragon circus! We’re originally from the Tangled Wood, but the second we heard about the gruesome zombie apocalypse plaguing you poor plague peoples, we figured that a whole lot of you would need cheering up! Some good ol’ pep, yaknow?”
Gathrus growled out, “We do not need your ‘cheering up’. We Plague dragons are hardened warriors and survivors, and I’ve seen us personally handle worse than a few heresies to the Plaguebringer. It’s practically an insult that you believe the Fallen’s Fang Clan in need of being cheered up!”
Nago awkwardly looked around before asking, “Well, is there at least anything that would make you happy that we could do?”
Gathrus pointed a claw towards the horizon. “LEAVE.”
Nago nodded and quietly returned to the caravan with his crew, the vehicle beginning to sputter and cough into life before driving off on its own into the evening.
Gathrus spat on the ground, turned, and began to head back towards the inner circles. “Good riddance…”
MEANWHILE, IN THE CARAVAN
Nago tapped a claw on his chin in thought, curled around his own baton, which was stuck into a hole in the caravan wall. “Usually the Plague clans around these parts don’t mind a little festivity…”
Sunshine nodded. “Yeah… when they said that the Fallen’s Fang Clan was a particularly well-known ‘pinnacle of all that is Plague’ I thought they’d be a pinnacle in knowing how to celebrate as well.”
Nago nodded. “Exactly! And, well, their wishes are their wishes, but I can’t help but to feel guilty about not cheering up these sourpusses! Basava, what do you think?”
Basava looked towards Nago, before saying, “I don’t know.”
Nago looked to Rohan and waited for an answer.
Rohan yawned and stirred, before muttering, “I dunno… they said they don’t want us around… and he did say he’ll peel your face like a banana.”
Nago scratched his chin. “Well, yes, but I can’t help but feel we’ve done something horribly wrong by not putting a smile on the faces of these folks in such a dire time!”
Nago looked up to the ceiling, where Frame clung. Frame looked back down, and silently nodded.
Nago laid back, before getting an idea. “Wait, Basava! Every other clan we’ve been to, there’s always been at least one dragon like that, right?”
Basava nodded.
Nago smiled. “Well, maybe we just ran into the grump first, and the others’ll appreciate a party a bit more than he would!”
The whole gang nodded in agreement. Sunlight then noted, “Though, I don’t see how we’re gonna get to that clan without knowing where their main turf even is… or without getting caught by that one guy again.”
Basava wisely smiled before whispering “… Magic.”
Nago raised an eyebrow. “Oh? Basava, what is it that you plan to do?”
Basava walked over to the door, before opening the door, which looked out into what seemed to be a massive growth of native plague flora, tangling around the area. Basava pointed out to the outside of the caravan. “Surprise party!”
Nago nodded. “Of course, we’ll give them a surprise party! Great idea, Basava.”
The crew stepped outside of the Caravan.
Nago gave an inquisitive look around. “How did you even get us here, Basava?”
Basava grinned. “Magic.”
MEANWHILE, IN THE THIRD CIRCLE.
Haxtax Poxkeeper diligently wandered around the gardens, flitting about through the brush and occasionally watering the plants with the murky water from the pail held by his tail.
Haxtax sprinkled a little bit of water on the dragonsnaps, before sprinkling a little on the beastfruit, before turning to see that not enough had been sprinkled on the dragonsnaps, and returning to sprinkle the dragonsnaps.
He once again turned to the Beastfruit, seeing that it was watered enough.
Haxtax began to fly deeper into the gardens to water some more plants, when he noticed a peculiar shade of white peeking through.
Haxtax drew closer, whispering to himself, “The dragon-eater daisies aren’t supposed to be blooming right now…”
He gingerly placed a hand on the leaves, pulling them away…
To find that the white was gone, and only the obscured darkness of the night ahead greeted him.
Haxtax raised an eyebrow before turning around to find the leaves behind him rustling and the smell of some kind of sweet taffy nearby.
Haxtax immediately flew above the brushline to try and see what was going on, but noticed nothing out of the ordinary with a bird’s eye view.
Haxtax went back to pruning the crimson leaves of one of his prized plants.
He blinked, before noticing a white figure next to him.
Haxtax jerked around to find a monochrome nocturne in jester attire staring him down.
Haxtax sputtered, stammered, and whimpered as the shadow dragon watched him. He flew backwards, accidentally stabbing into his prize plant with his pruning shears. He heard the crunching, breaking sound behind him, and froze, turning pale.
The two stared at eachother for a while before Haxtax was scared half to death by a loud sound of screaming and horns.
“SURPRISE!”
A colorful crew of non-plague dragons (except one) jumped out from the brush, giving Haxtax the scare of his life and trampling his plants.
Haxtax squealed, crying out “PLEASE DON’T KILL ME I ONLY WON MY INITATION FIGHT BECAUSE A ROCK FELL FROM THE CEILING AND KILLED MY OPPONENT-“
The dragons in front of him paused. A fellow spiral flew towards him and asked, “You good?”
Haxtax sputtered, gesturing around. “I- you- my plants!”
The dragons looked down and looked back up at Haxtax before muttering some awkward apologies and regrets.
Haxtax looked behind himself at the plant he had stabbed. “My plant!”
The dragons around him let a green skydancer step forward. “We can leave if you want.”
Haxtax snapped his head over to her, and screeched, “GUARDS!”
He felt a giant hand pinch his mouth shut.
“Shh. It is a surprise for them as well.”
The crew heard loud stomps from behind them, turning to find some guards.
The spiral muttered, “Well, that was fast. My name’s Nago, folks, and, well, I figured you’d need some cheering up considering the current apocalypse!”
One of the guards growled, “Your name’s ‘prisoner’ now.”
LATER, IN THE FALLEN’S FANG PRISON
Nago watched as the door in front of him slammed shut, and looked to Basava. “Well, I guess these people happen to believe in private property, huh?”
Basava nodded in agreement.
From the other side of the serrated, barbed bars, an armored red ridgeback looked at them.
He hissed out from between his fangs, his prosthetic long nose sharpened to a knife point. “Welcome to the Fallen’s Fang prison, interlopers. Don’t enjoy your stay. It’s the hardest to escape in the whole area.”
Basava stared directly into the eyes of the assistant warden. “What is your name.”
The ridgeback replied, “Gaksis. Gaksis Rotwing.”
Basava kept staring. “Bet, Gaksis.”
Gaksis groaned and turned away before walking off into the dimly lit caverns. “That’s what they all say…”
Nago looked to Basava. “Basava, what do you plan to do?”
Basava smiled. “Magic.”
Gaksis turned the corner to the barracks before finding that, staring him in the eye was the Imperial he had just shoved into the prison. “WHAT IN THE-“
Basava was thrown back into the barren walls of the prison cell.
Rohan looked up at her with his tired eyes. “How’d it go?”
Basava looked to Rohan and smiled. “Magically.”
Rohan nodded knowingly. “That’s nice, Basava.” He yawned and curled up on the floor before taking a nap.
Nago looked up at Basava and asked, “Say, can you get us all out with that?”
LATER
A guard walked past the cell rumored to contain a traveling circus, and turned their head to find that nothing was in there.
“What do you MEAN you lost an entire IMPERIAL?!”
Kothrok snapped at the guards, hissing out her venom-laced words.
“I should take your blood for this incompetence!”
The guards gulped and shook their heads. “No, ma’am! Please don’t!” One called out. “I’ll show you the cell, it was still locked tight when I found it!”
Kothrok looked into the empty cell, seeing that it was, in fact, still locked.
“So you think I wouldn’t consider the possibility that you’d just re-lock it?”
The guard shook their head. “No, ma’am! You’re the one with the locking key.”
Kothrok paused, sighed, and muttered, “Well, let’s find these escapees, then. I’ll notify the Conquest that we plan to execute them.”
MEANWHILE, AT THE LIBRARY
In the labyrinth of knowledge, torches of green fire lit up walls of bookshelves fifty books tall, and the occasional breathing rooms with tables and chairs, light flickering onto the books and old carpets and tapestry hanging from the cave ceiling. They also lit up a certain green skydancer.
Sunlight flew up to the top shelf of the books labeled ‘Wind magics’.
Gently opening a book, she found that inside the pages it read ‘If you’re reading this, you’re a heretic.’
Sunlight raised an eyebrow before putting the book back and taking out another one, which said the same thing.
And another.
And another.
Sunlight began to pour through hundreds of books, not noticing the runes beginning to glow on their spines.
Meanwhile, a librarian had been looking up at her, his red eyes not narrowed nor widened, just staring in a sort of expression of patience and waiting. “Those runes call the guards in.”
Sunlight paused, looking down at the librarian and widening her eyes. “Oh…” she timidly said, crawling back to the top of the bookshelf. Looking down, she saw that about fifty runes were glowing.
Three guards walked into the room, holding up some very loudly beeping runic tablets, each connecting to a specific book. “Alright, who’s spamming the runes?!” One called out. “Who’s being a nasty little heretic?!” Yelled another.
Sunlight slinked behind the book case, slowly walking away from the guards to somewhere good to hide.
The guards walked to the book case, about fifty feet tall in height, and covered in blinking lights.
“Ugh…” one groaned, rubbing their hands over one of the runes, causing it to blink off.
The rest of the guards did the same, painstakingly turning the runes off one by one.
Sunlight waited, grabbing a ukulele.
Once the guards were done, they began to search the whole library.
One guard turned a corner to find Sunlight sitting there, with a ukulele.
They gritted their teeth and hissed, before a twang from one of the strings stopped them.
They stepped forward again, before the music began to play again. They stopped in front of Sunlight, curious about the new sounds. Usually, the only music they were used to didn’t include much in the way of strings.
The other guards slinked out from the corridors of bookshelves, also leaning in to listen.
A few more guards from outside the library also began to follow, leaving their posts to find the curious sound.
Sunlight found herself surrounded by guards, but not ones prepared to strike. She was surrounded by guards who listened intently. An audience which finally stayed and listened intently to her music.
Sunlight smiled, playing her instrument faster.
MEANWHILE, IN THE LABORATORY
A medium to small room of glowing vials and bubbling contraptions and brimming shelves and instruments sat in a hall, entrance left open to the rest of the labs outside. Everything was lit with some candles, glowing green and orange. It was a round room, encircled by counters and shelves and cabinets, all within wing’s reach of a Nocturne in the middle of it all, who was very displeased.
Nago sheepishly grinned at the Nocturne who held a vial of… something likely very dangerous to life itself towards him.
“Hey, hey, hey! Buddy, buddy, please calm down! What exactly are you wantin’ here?”
The Nocturne narrowed his eyes. “I want test subjects, and you just happened to sneak into my personal lab here from a hole in the wall, like some kind of annoying little miracle.”
Nago shrugged. “Ehhhhhhh… I wouldn’t exactly call me little when I’m actually longer than you are, mister.”
The Nocturne, Typhardias replied, “Size is usually measured by mass. I weigh more than you do, so you are still little.”
Nago grabbed some food from the counter he was currently pinned against. “Wanna… bet on that?”
Typhardius scoffed. “If you can suddenly gain enough weight to be considered larger than me in the span of a minute, then sure.”
Nago went silent, then spoke again. “Well, I, uh… I can try.”
Typhardius let out a hiss from between his teeth, quipping with his usual nasally, cold voice “Then try.”
Nago nibbled at the food he held in his hand before coughing it up. “ACK! Sorry, sorry… it’s just that I’m not used to something so…”
Typhardius grabbed a jar from a shelf filled with the same food.
Nago smacked his lips a little bit, scratching his chin, and chirping, “… Sharp, with a sour aftertaste like that of a swarm of biting little tinges of nutty aftertastes…”
Typhardius placed the jar down on the counter, and raised an eyebrow. “You are… oddly adept at discerning the taste of cheese.”
Nago’s eyebrows raised. “Cheese?” He gazed into the jar, seeing the fuzzy green globs of bacterial growth floating around in some liquid.
Typhardius nodded. “Yes. It’s a Fallen’s Fang Clan delicacy. Along with… well, most other plague clans I’ve heard of.”
Typhardius held the jar up to his face, magnifying and distorting his visage through the glass and the murky liquid. “As an assistant alchemist, of the Pestilence End, science and the study of chemistry is my post… my forte, my destiny, even.”
The sickly green nocturne sighed, placing the jar back down. “Of course, it’s not what I wanted. Sure, I can mix all the concoctions and craft all the calamities I can, but what use is it if I… well, if I feel little joy out of it? It’s not like I can change to the Famine end, where making cheese can be my entire job…” Typhardius shuddered at the thought. “… THAT… would be a three point crime.”
Nago raised an eyebrow. “Is… making cheese your joy?”
Typhardius shrugged and nodded. “Yes, yes. But it’s not all that impressive.”
He sifted through a variety of vials on a rack, his claw landing on one which glowed a virulent green. “Of course, the one benefit I find…”
Typhardius opened the jar of cheese, a foul odor escaping and causing Nago to cough and wheeze. The nocturne opened the green vial and wafted the smell to his nostrils before wrinkling his nose in disgust and tapping a few drops into the cheese. He swiftly slammed the lid to the jar back on, and put the cheese back onto the shelf. He sighed. “… is that in this End, while I can’t routinely create cheese, I may do all that I wish to experiment with it.”
Typhardius turned to Nago. “… Take a guess at how old that cheese was. The cheese in the jar.”
Nago looked around, looking for a guess, before landing on, “Fifty years at the least?”
Typhardius shook his head and grinned. “It’s only existed for a few weeks.”
Nago gasped, “Wait, really!? A few weeks?!”
Typhardius nodded. “My life’s work is experimenting to find faster and faster methods of fermenting cheese. The clan allows and supports it, since they believe that such a quick fermenting method may be somehow used against enemies. Really, though, most of my knowledge is being used by those up in the Famine end looking for a way to nearly instantly age their wines or cheeses. The War End hasn’t asked me for much of anything lately considering our current major threat is already fermented enough, being undead heresies against the name of our holy mother the Plaguebringer, I mean.”
Typhardius suddenly snapped silent, before turning pale. His eyes flicked to Nago. “Did… did you get a word of that?”
Nago was currently busy trying to get more cheese. “Huh?”
Typhardius let out a massive sigh of relief. “Oh, thank Plaguebringer… had you been listening, you would’ve learned of… well, let’s just say that would have been a four point crime and I’d surely be imprisoned.”
Nago slinked back down from the shelf. “Well, if it makes ya feel any better, I like your cheese!”
Typhardius smiled before suddenly regaining focus and slapping himself. “Janustraps! I shouldn’t be befriending you, I was about to start brutally experimenting on you in the name of my Clan! To think I was so weak for so long just there…”
Nago gulped. “Oh- well- uh- hmm… we can still talk! I’m certain you’ll be fine!”
Typhardius growled, “… I’m not a heretic.”
Nago shuddered, backing up against the wall. “Well, what do you plan to do, then? Will the experiments involve tasting more cheese?”
Typhardius grabbed that same green vial again. “… I’ve yet to find out what happens when a shadow spiral gets fermented.”
Nago shivered against the wall, cringing and shutting his eyes and preparing for the worst.
Reflexively, just before Typhardius tapped the goal to coax out a few drops, Nago reached into a pocket and whipped his hand forward and out, instantly spraying a flurry of confetti.
Typhardius yelped and stumbled back when the sparkling, technicolor flakes hit his face, and began to scratch at his face in a desperate attempt to get the confetti off, just as his vial flew into the air above him and began to fall back down.
MEANWHILE, IN THE BARRACKS
The barracks, as per usual, were rows upon rows of beds, sitting still in the darkness, save for the red glow of the torchlight each bed sat in, and by each bed were sets of spears glimmering in the dim light, glimmering save for the splotches of dried blood.
A guard woke up from a quick nap to find that all the other beds were left behind, oddly enough. Just a half hour ago, he could have sworn that they were all standing straight in the awe of Kothrok.
He hopped out of bed, his claws scratching against the hard floor and his feet making quiet thumps upon the rock. His wings tucked in and tail dragging, he began to look around for his lost comrades. He whispered out a call for them, but found no response save for the sound of quiet, odd music from what he assumed was the library. Which, he could’ve sworn was too far away for sounds from it to reach.
The guard shrugged and figured it was his imagination, and decided not to leave the barracks until he was sure nobody was left.
Returning to stalking around the halls, the guard sniffed the air, but found nothing save for lingering wafts.
He narrowed his eyes, and suddenly heard something.
The sizzle of a torch being extinguished.
Turning around, he saw that one of the torches had, indeed, been extinguished. The guard ran over to the torch, investigating it.
Another sizzle.
He turned around to see yet another unlit torch.
He nearly ran to it, before more sizzles cut through the darkness.
One by one, torches suddenly began to sizzle out, including the ones in the hallway.
Soon enough, he was left in complete darkness, until his eyes adjusted enough to barely see into the void.
He kept walking, the bones upon his necklace clicking and clacking against one another.
The guard squinted, and…
Something in his peripheral vision moved.
He swung around to see wherever it was, and once again saw nothing.
The guard’s heart began to pound in his chest, a bead of sweat falling from his brow. “Where are you, interloper?!” He made an attempt at intimidation, but his voice began to shake with terror.
A clanging.
He turned around, seeing a spear on the ground. He darted to it, grabbed it, and whipped his head around everywhere to try and find any semblance of an enemy.
He stalked to the middle of the room, turning around and around and around to get a full look.
One turn.
Beds and darkness.
Two turns.
Spears and unlit torches.
Three turns.
White.
The guard startled back, looking up at… some white nocturne, who had snuck up on him without any notice. Their eyes were purple.
Tricky shadow Magics.
The guard hissed, and prepared to stab the intruder.
But… it wasn’t like what he was used to.
The dragon stood unmoving, staring. Not even the bells on their jester outfit made a noise.
The guard hissed again, jabbing at the enemy, once again confused to find no signs of them intending to fight back.
The guard attempted at a jab once again.
The wood of the spear was instantly held in an iron grip by the white nocturne.
The guard tried to rip the spear from the hold of the nocturne, only to find that the second they tried, the wood shattered in the enemy’s grasp, and the spearhead fell to the floor with a clink.
The guard dove for the spearhead, hoping to use it as some kind of knife when the nocturne kicked the sharp tip away, causing it to slide into a wall and ricochet into somewhere where it likely wouldn’t be found for a long, long time.
The two stared eachother down.
The guard could only watch the nocturne as it began to let out a quiet hiss, jaws beginning to open wide into what looked like a mess of ivory needles and barbed tongues.
MEANWHILE, IN THE HATCHERY
Rohan crawled onto a ledge in the wall, figuring it suitable as a resting place.
Settling upon it, he looked down to the various glowing green and orange pools which pockmarked the floor, their bubbling and churning fluids surrounded by decorative bones and entrails. Within the pools quietly laid semi-transparent eggs, their gelatinous shells barely hiding the squirming, wriggling embryos within.
Rohan yawned, his eyes beginning to close, the soothing noise of bubbling ooze like a lullaby to him.
Meanwhile, a caretaker of the nests was staring up at him in disbelief. A wind dragon had just somehow made his way into the hatchery! Of all places, the HATCHERY! What in the world were the guards up to which they felt so important as to neglect this?!
The caretaker huffed a bit before grabbing a spear from the wall and making a throw at the interloper.
The spear missed, and with a twang had pierced into the wall right below the intruder.
The caretaker groaned and prepared to grab yet another spear when the nocturne had begun to, curiously, stir in his sleep and latched onto the spear’s handle with his tail.
The caretaker reached for the next spear when he had then, still in his sleep, pulled himself off the ledge and began to hang from the spear by the tail.
The caretaker raised an eyebrow, and attempted to throw again.
Once again, they missed, and this spear landed to the side of the nocturne.
They sighed, looking at their elephantine feet. Snapper claws were good for digging a little, but not for throwing.
Nevertheless, they tried again.
The spear missed again.
It landed next to the one they had just thrown.
The nocturne suddenly flared out his wings, spun around on his spear, and flew off of the spear after unwrapping his tail.
The caretaker watched as he almost perfectly landed on the next spear, before repeating that same step and latching to the third.
The caretaker began to panic, throwing more spears in a desperate attempt to hit the nocturne.
Again and again, the spears gradually made a path down to the floor which the nocturne followed.
The caretaker, in a moment of clarity, decided that maybe throwing all of these spears was not the best idea.
They yelled back into the caverns and tunnels, “INTRUDER IN THE HATCHERY!”
They looked back to check that the nocturne hadn’t awoken.
Nobody replied.
Again.
“THERE IS AN INTRUDER… IN THE HATCHERY!”
No reply.
The caretaker groaned and decided that throwing spears was really the one choice at this point.
Eventually, the caretaker stood in front of the nocturne, crumpled and snoring on the floor after slinking from the last spear.
Well, at least now it would be easy to kill this nocturne with the mind of a spiral.
The caretaker lifted their hoof, preparing to step down on the head.
Once their hoof reached the highest point and they nearly crushed the nocturne, his claw whipped out and landed on an egg in the hatching pool next to them.
The caretaker narrowed their eyes and lowered their hoof a little before noticing the Nocturne’s grip on the egg tightened as they did so.
They removed their hoof from the space above his head
The nocturne removed his hand from the egg.
The caretaker tried again.
The hand was placed upon the egg again.
… Quite the predicament, then.
MEANWHILE, IN THE ARENA
Basava found herself in the arena, in front of a recently finished battle.
It had been a battle where an entire group of clutchmates had fought to the death.
In the middle of the Sandy circle, were stains of red, torn scales and tattered wings. It smelled like death, for that’s exactly what it was.
Before Basava was a panting dragon, in their young adult years, four eyes narrowing at this sudden intrusion to their rite of passage.
Basava looked around, seeing banners, likely the banners of the clan, and statues of the Plaguebringer. The seats surrounding the battle were mostly empty, save for five dragons, each wearing skulls and each about as unhappy at Basava as the young dragon was.
Basava paused.
Basava didn’t exactly know what to do here, so she looked for some way to entertain the onlookers.
She slowly sauntered over to a crack in the carved walls of the arena, and reached her arm in.
The five dragons hissed and spat from their special seats.
The most imposing of them, a white and red wildclaw clad in scars and armor pointed at the young dragon and growled an order. “Kill the interloper, do it and you shall be known as absolved of your previous crimes and disappointments.”
The young dragon barreled towards Basava, and she began to pull her arm from the hole.
The dragon stopped in their tracks, and all watched as Basava began to pull a writhing, panting figure from the hole.
Basava threw her arm out from the hole, and with it, a dragon.
They landed on the floor, skidding to a stop in the sand in front of their own corpse.
They lifted their head, red eyes widening in confusion. “Huh- what- I… I died!”
They began to scratch at their face in terror and bewilderment.
One of the five seated dragons rose from their position, a brown and red Obelisk adorned in furs and fangs running into the arena.
“HERESY!” She yelled with vigor, landing on the sands and kicking up dust all around her.
She lifted a muscular claw, preparing to strike down the enemy, repeatedly stomping down and leaving a red stain where there was once a dragon.
Now, there were two corpses of the same dragon, right next to each other.
Basava stared at the scene, before reaching in the hole again and pulling out a different dragon.
As Basava held the dragon up, they barely caught a glimpse of their own body in the middle of the ring and screamed. Before she could through them into it, the obelisk interrupted the act by ramming her massive hand into the resurrected dragon, leaving them splattered on the walls.
The obelisk huffed, and turned to Basava. She raised her claws, preparing to turn Basava into another corpse when a white mirror flew down from the stands and blocked her path.
He held his arms out and cried, “Bathrus, wait! If you kill her… well, she’s obviously adept at some sort of heretical magic! Imagine the studies and- and- she could give us information on the undead hordes! On some other enemy!”
Bathrus growled, gritting her teeth. “I don’t CARE about what this heretic can tell us! I care about the well-being of our clan, obviously unlike you, Langtry!”
A small cry echoed from behind Basava.
Biting and scratching at her tail, the young dragon ferociously attempted to rip into her flesh, through their smaller jaws barely scratched a scale.
A voice from the stands sighed and echoed out, “You are excused, Kobax. As for your end, the War End is obviously your home.”
Kobax nodded nervously, before darting off from the arena to the War End Order Hall.
The wildclaw flew down from the stands and landed behind Basava, barking, “We will capture her, interrogate her about this abominable heresy she has just committed before us, and then execute her. Quick, simple, and easy.”
The two other dragons nodded, and Bathrus grabbed Basava by the wings, flying her to the prison through the caverns. “You’re rather unlucky that I was known as the ‘iron grip’ throughout my years as an Assistant of the War End… no dragon has ever escaped-“
Bathrus looked down to see that the imperial was gone, without a trace in sight. “HOW?!” She roared, beginning to frantically search the lair for any signs of her.
LATER, IN THE LIBRARY
Festetch waltzed into the library, feet gently dancing along the torn and worn carpets towards a most curious music.
Winding in and out of twists and turns of books and carved stone and torches throughout the labyrinth of knowledge, she ended up standing behind what was almost the entire force of guards, all leaning forwards toward a green wind skydancer playing the ukelele.
Festetch fidgeted her with necklace of bones for a while, thinking back to that… necromancer? Magician? Heretical performer… she considered the possibility of these two equally odd events being connected.
Festetch tapped the shoulder of one of her guards, who snapped out of their daze and whipped around to see their very own Grand Scythe.
Their complexion turned pale, and they tapped the shoulder of the guard next to them, who tapped the shoulder of the next, who did the next, and the next, and the next.
All until the music had ended and each and every guard was staring with terror at Festetch, who calmly looked back up to Sunlight and frowned. She looked back down to the guard, and quietly ordered, “Capture her, and bring her back to the prison. Go out and search for any messes you may have left unwatched, and bring them with her. I will be waiting with Kothrox, Gamon, Vulgulus and Gaksis, eager for what you will find for us.”
The guards nodded in unison, five of them leaping to tackle Sunlight, cuff her and carry her back to the prison, making sure that her ukelele had been shattered first.
LATER, IN THE LABORATORY
Typhardius screamed and scratched at his blistering and cracking skin and scales, the contents of his now shattered vial all over him. “GAH! ACK! YOU LITTLE… MY- MY SKIN! MY SKIN! AND MY WORK, MY VIAL!”
Nago gulped, shifting his eyes and remarking, “Would you… would you like some help with that?”
Typhardius pointed to an orange vial on the rack, and Nago grabbed it, spilling it on Typhardius, who sighed with relief as the blistering and crackling stopped.
He sat up, panting and wheezing, his dried, cracked skin quite the sorry sight.
Typhardius began to hiss out some curses and threats, eyelids caked in confetti and dead skin slowly creeping open.
Nago looked for somewhere to hide, but decided it was pretty futile at this point as Typhardius’ eyes fixed on him and wouldn’t let go of their enraged gaze.
Typhardius slowly lifted himself off of the floor, limping over to Nago. “You…” he hissed with a vile venom, his voice harsh and forced out between gasps.
Nago chuckled a little in some pitiful attempt to lighten the mood. “I mean… heyyy! It uh- it seems to work great as an exfoliator!”
Typhardius gritted his fangs. “Do you KNOW how little moisturizing cream a Plague Clan has on average?”
Nago shook his head, “No, uh, no I don’t, actually! Maybe you could.. tell me?”
Typhardius spat, slashing a claw towards Nago, who backed himself up into the wall to dodge the attack. “Wow! Okay! Uh… not one for moisturizer facts, uh…”
The green, dried nocturne grimaced. “You cannot talk your way out of this one, shadow heretic!”
Nago furrowed his brow. “Well, uh…”
Typhardius nearly snapped his jaws at Nago’s stomach before a guard shoved past him and placed a steady hand around the circumference of Nago’s abdomen.
The bogsneak grabbed a pair of tiny handcuffs and gingerly fixed them onto Nago’s wrists, before leaving about as fast as they had come.
Typhardius sputtered and stammered. “I- what?! No! I was going to kill him! Give him back!”
The guard glanced back at him, rolled their eyes, and grunted, “You seriously couldn’t kill one spiral?”
Typhardius shrunk in posture and began to babble and leave his mouth agape in disbelief. “He… he had attack confetti…” he mumbled, before turning back to clean up the mess.
LATER, IN THE BARRACKS
The team of guards ran into the barracks to the sounds of screaming and struggle, holding up torches in the darkness.
They stepped a few steps forward, hearing the screaming had stopped along with a wet crunching noise echoing through the catacombs.
They began to pick up the pace.
One of the guards felt something wet on his face, and the other held the torchlight to him.
Upon his snout was a drop of blood, which tickled as it ran down his scales and landed on the floor, leaving a single small stripe.
The guards looked up, seeing a light trail of spots, red spots, spots of blood, on the ceiling.
“How did that happen…” one of them mused, before the other lowered the torch to the ground to find a thicker trail of blood, likely where it had been pooling after falling from the ceiling.
“Oh. That’s… concerning.” One muttered under her breath.
They began to follow the trail of blood, leaving their own trail of red footprints beside it.
They found themselves at a puddle of red blood, and looked around the room for any signs of the cause, until one had the bright idea to look upwards.
Their eyes landed on a white dragon, hunkered on the ceiling, wings concealing something.
From the edges of the wings and body, blood poured, staining their black and white checkered clothes.
One of the guards held a torch up to the dragon, and demanded, “Hey! Who are you and what do you have?!”
The white dragon looked down at the guards, neck contorting around until the head was parallel to the ground, unlike the upside-down body, and was looking behind the body at the guards.
The dragon’s purple eyes just… stared. Their red lips were soon licked clean by some uncountable number of tongues licking their chops.
“Oh what the hell.” A guard groaned, staring on at the scene.
The other guard cringed. “Well… you know what the Grand Scythe said. If it’s weird, bring it to the prison.”
Another guard felt like running out, but hesitated. “We’re… we’re supposed to capture THAT thing and bring it back to the prison?! Without anything but our spears and cuffs?”
A guard looked back at the fearful one. “Don’t be cowardly. We’re Fallen’s Fang guards, we’re strong enough to take it!”
The white dragon watched on as the conversation unfolded, before releasing their wings and arms from the ceiling, their body swinging as they held on by just the feet.
Falling onto the floor, from the original position of being held by the nocturne, was a shape which slammed into the floor with a flop. It was bleeding from almost everywhere, and seemed featureless save for the half-a-tail, wing stumps, left back leg, and the gaping holes and wounds where the other limbs used to be. There was one slightly longer stump, which must’ve been where the head once was.
The guards stumbled back. “OH WHAT IN THE NAME OF PLAGUEBRINGER!”
The white jester fell from the ceiling, grabbed the tail end of the body in their jaws, and began to run away through the halls with the half-eaten corpse dragging with them, like some animal running away with it’s catch.
The guards stood flabbergasted before one yelled, “WELL?! WE GOTTA GO CATCH THE THING!”
They began to run out of the barracks, panicked, following the trail of blood and sounds of disturbed roars and cries.
LATER, IN THE HATCHERY.
A guard gently grabbed Rohan’s shoulders, preparing to quietly drag him off into the prison. “See? It’s not that hard.” They huffed at the caretaker, before the caretaker let out a gasp. The guard looked back, seeing that the top of an egg had been ripped off, the fluids leaking into the hatching pool.
The guard went pale.
“Oh.”
The caretaker mocked his voice. “SeE? It’S nOt ThAt HaRd!” They’d snapped their jaws together and growled, “And now, we have one less egg!”
Rolling their eyes, they pulled the egg from the pool and watched as it shriveled up and went rotten. “I told you, this one can swing from spears asleep, and was threatening to break an egg! But did you listen? No! ONE. LESS. EGG.”
The guard looked down at the nocturne. “My apologies.”
The snapper caretaker stomped over to a hole in the floor which leaked steam. “Ugh… and you almost made me miss my duty of heating the eggs!”
They stomped down on the vent, and watched as geysers suddenly billowed from the pools with a deafening roar.
Rohan awoke, startled by the noise and looking up at the guard. “Huh? Oh.” He yawned, and quipped, “Are you here to take me to prison?”
The guard nodded, and Rohan replied. “Okay… they got smooth floor there, at least…”
The caretaker stared at Rohan. “Seriously?! NOW he’s barely a threat at all?!”
The guard shrugged and began to drag Rohan off to the prison. Rohan just dragged along the floor behind him, held up only by the shoulders.
LATER, IN THE ARENA
Bathrus ran around the circumference of the arena, irritated and anxious to catch Basava. The other Scythes were long gone, but if they were to come back soon and saw that she lost the imperial- AGH! It would be TERRIBLE!
She snorted and growled in annoyance, checking every nook and cranny again, and again, and again.
From across the arena, she heard, “Grand Scythe, what are you doing?”
Bathrus flew up and towards the guards at the entrance, landing with a furious thud in front of them and causing the rocks on the ground to shake. “WHERE IS THAT HERETIC IMPERIAL?”
One of the guards cleared their throat. “Ah, well we believe-“
Bathrus stomped her claw. “I don’t want what you BELIEVE I want what you KNOW!”
Another guard clarified. “There’s a brightly colored plague Imperial in prison right now, smiling and playing with her deck of cards.”
Bathrus did not sigh of relief, but groaned in irritation. “… If the conquest asks, I put her there.”
One of the guards raised an eyebrow. “But… you didn’t?”
Bathrus flared.
The guards nodded in unison. “Yes, ma’am!”
LATER, IN THE PRISON
Festetch watched as four dragons were presented before her. One green, one wearing bright clothes, one black and white and red all over, and another barely awake.
Well, the black and white and red all over one wasn’t presented as much as it had slammed into her legs and skidded to a stop, in front of some very winded guards, but it still at the least stopped.
She looked over to her Hands and Wardens, and looked back at the prisoners. “Guards, explain.”
“This one was like a green pied Piper!”
“This one… yeah, apparently Typhardius is a wimp!”
“I DON’T WANNA TALK ABOUT THE CLOWN.”
“He broke an egg. While asleep.”
“Bathrus captured the imperial.”
Festetch narrowed her eyes in curiosity, before nodding and opening the door to Basava’s cell. “Put them in. The Comquest and I will discuss their execution after more pressing matters have subsided.”
A guard stepped forward. “MORE PRESSING MATTERS?! A GUY’S HEAD JUST GOT EATEN BY A KILLER CEILING CLOWN!”
Festetch sighed. “Well, maybe he should’ve fought the ‘killer ceiling clown’ better. It had all the right to win.”
“BUT IT ATE HIM!”
Festetch looked down at Frame. “It’s good to be resourceful in your battles.”
“IT. ATE. HIM.”
Festetch groaned. “Yes, yes, but I’m certain our warriors would do the same if given the chance. It’s a plagueish quality to do what you must to survive.”
The guard stopped talking, deciding the conversation was no longer worth the effort.
A passing War End Hunter yelled through the corridor, “It’s true! I did eat a guy once!”
The guard turned around, did some gestures and stammered, “DUDE?! THE HELL?!”
They shrugged. “Hm. I guess you Death Enders will all your ‘sibling companionship’ and ‘making friends with your clutchmates’ business can’t handle a little average Plague survival tactics.”
The guard growled before turning around to face Festetch again, silent.
Basava watched as all of her friends were thrown back into the cell.
Sunlight slumped down, solemnly remarking, “I tried to play them a song…”
Nago shrugged in disbelief. “I tried to taste test potential party food and throw some festive confetti!”
Frame coughed up a skull and Nago glared at them. “Frame, what did we say about eating people?” Frame looked to the floor in disappointment.
Rohan snored.
Basava shook her head. “Magic tricks don’t work for this clan!”
Nago frowned in defeat. “I guess operation ‘surprise cheer-up party’ was a bust…”
Basava patted Nago on the head. “Try again sometime?” She asked.
Nago lit up a bit. “Yeah. Yeah, I suppose we could try a few more times before we give up on this clan!”
The group nodded in agreement, save for Frame, who was shoving the skull back down their throat, and Rohan, who was taking a nap.
Nago leaned back. “But first… Basava, I think I’m craving some cheese. You got any?”
MEANWHILE, IN THE LAB, AGAIN
Typhardius reached to his shelf to find that his jar of extra-aged cheese had disappeared into thin air.
“OH, COME ON!”
-Blood
-Death
-Chemical burns
-Horror
Read at your own discretion!
The Corralled Caravan
Gathrus stopped in front of the caravan, the gaudy purples, greens and… every-other-colors in various complex patterns hurting his eyes and showing to them that whomever was inside was obviously not from the wasteland.
He knocked on the door.
He knocked on the door again after no response.
He nearly knocked a third time when, suddenly, a spray of shiny pieces of plastic and paper showered his face. His teeth bared and his wings flared outwards as he stumbled back, vigorously scratching the stuff away from his face as he hissed out and growled, anticipating an ambush after that attack on his senses.
For all intents and purposes, it simply must’ve been a shadow ambush tactic!
He stood there, panting, waiting for a battle in the hot, humid breeze, the only sound greeting his hisses and growls being the howl of the wind and the calls of distant vultures.
He opened his eyes to find a monochrome nocturne in jester’s fittings sitting eerily in front of him, completely silent. He looked into their eyes- it was a shadow dragon! An ambush! One of their many tricks! A battle! A fight was about!
Gathrus was about ready to hurl insults and scare the caravan from the first circle when an imperial gingerly stepped from the door. Red eyes.
Gathrus kept his wings flared, but eased up a little. Ah. A Plague dragon with the caravan. Perhaps… perhaps. Well, at any rate it was good to have someone of the proper element nearby.
He straightened himself up, tucking his wings against his sides again, and remarked, “What is your business within the first circle of the Fallen’s Fang Clan?”
The nocturne silently stepped aside for the Imperial to trot forward and chirp out in this… strange… all-too-cheery tone, “Party time.” She pulled out a deck of cards from… somewhere… and began to juggle them this way and that, and Gathrus could’ve sworn that she had managed to make a circle of flying cards. “Oooo wee oooo yeah Ooh yeah OoH yeah woah oOh yeah woah yeah party time, it is time for partying, yes?” She kept making the cards fly around.
Gathrus raised some eyebrows in absolute confusion. What was this? Some rival clan’s distraction? Some shadow trickster with red contacts? Or… maybe…
By the Plaguebringer…
Gathrus tried to wave the cards away with his claws. “Ma’am, stop! Stop at once, these heretical purple-eyed freaks have obviously brainwashed you! They have taken you away from the pestilent light of your true mother!”
She lowered the cards for a moment before making them fly towards Gathrus and bounce back as though connected by a string to her hand. “… You are loud for a sad little man…” she muttered to Gathrus in a curious, whispered voice, before noticing his expression of concern change to fury. She stopped the card thing and put them back. “You should cheer up, sad little mirror man.”
Gathrus stepped forward and screeched out, “YOU SHOULD LEAVE THIS AREA BEFORE I SEND MY HUNTERS AFTER YOU AND THE REST OF YOUR CARAVAN, INTERLOPER!” He began to scratch his claw at his chest in an attempt to find his whistle. “LEAVE AT ONCE! LEAVE, OR SUFFER THE CONSEQUENCES!”
Gathrus’ yelling was interrupted by a small, long dragon swirling out from the door to the caravan. “Hey, hey, hey, what’s the racket out here, what’s the ruckus, the matter?” The spiral was holding a cane and seemed to wear the clothes of a purple and green ringmaster. He scouted around for a moment before finding Gathrus and chirping, “Well, well, well, it seems like someone is in need of being cheered up!”
Gathrus stomped his foot and barked, “WHAT IS THE PURPOSE OF THIS TRESPASSING, FILTHY TRICKSTERS?!”
The spiral held his claws up. “Woah, woah, woah there Buddy! Slow down! Calm down, even! Please, give us a moment to introduce ourselves!”
The spiral pointed to himself. “I’m Nago, the leader of this operation.”
He pointed to the nocturne. “That’s Frame, they’re the clown. Super funny, as you can tell!”
Frame stared at Gathrus, unmoving. Gathrus shuddered, not knowing the intentions of Frame.
Nago pointed to the Imperial. “That there’s Basava! She’s our resident magician ‘slash’ plague negotiator. You’d be amazed at the stuff she can escape from…”
Basava raised a claw and waved, before reaching into a random rabbit hole and pulling out a hat. “I am magic...” She muttered, her voice hushed in an artificial tone of mystery and wonder.
Nago then did some vague gestures towards the caravan. “And in there would be Sunlight, our bard, and Rohan, our acrobat. Sunlight’s a bit shy, so…”
Gathrus growled, “Bring them out at once or I peel your face like a tiny banana.”
Nago held his hands up in submission. “Jeez, okay, okay! Calm down… Sunlight, Rohan, if you’d pretty please come out here!”
It was a hot minute before Nago turned to Gathrus and remarked, “Just a second, if you’d please?”
Nago flitted over to the caravan before looking back at Gathrus, who gave him a deathglare. “Sunlight, Rohan, I’m serious, you two are reallllyyyy gonna wanna come out here… pretty please. With a berry on top.”
A green skydancer and a grey and cyan Nocturne stepped out from the caravan. The skydancer held her head low, the musical instruments strapped around her body banging and slapping against each other not helping the impression of being weighed down by something.
The Nocturne, meanwhile, was completely lethargic, his eyes barely being able to stay open as he stumbled out and laid down on the wasteland soil.
Gathrus noted that neither of them were plague. Stalking towards Nago, he hissed, “… How did you… acquire Basava?”
Nago shrugged. “She just appeared in our caravan one day and we’ve kept her ever since.”
Gathrus retaliated, “You really think me enough of an idiot to believe that?!”
Nago shook his head. “No, no, I don’t think you’re unintelligent. Basava, how did you find us?”
Basava made a few hand waving motions. “Magic.”
Nago nodded. “See?”
Gathrus grumbled a bit before demanding, “Tell me your business here.”
Nago clapped his hands together and chirped, “Oh, well I can answer that! That’s an easy question!”
Nago flew back a bit and sung, “Sunlight! Could you maybe play a few tunes?”
The green skydancer nodded before slowly and shakily pulling out a ukelele.
She nearly began to strum when Gathrus pounced, breaking the ukelele with a single strike. “Don’t act like I know not of your bard magics, wind mage…”
Sunshine just looked on confused before pulling out another ukelele, which also got broken in half.
Gathrus looked back at Nago, saying “Tell me this in a straightforward speech. No bard, no magic, no blinding shiny paper pieces.”
Nago looked to Sunshine, making a cutting motion with his hand. Gathrus looked back at her to find her putting away a third ukelele.
Nago cleared his throat. “Well, we’re the traveling five-dragon circus! We’re originally from the Tangled Wood, but the second we heard about the gruesome zombie apocalypse plaguing you poor plague peoples, we figured that a whole lot of you would need cheering up! Some good ol’ pep, yaknow?”
Gathrus growled out, “We do not need your ‘cheering up’. We Plague dragons are hardened warriors and survivors, and I’ve seen us personally handle worse than a few heresies to the Plaguebringer. It’s practically an insult that you believe the Fallen’s Fang Clan in need of being cheered up!”
Nago awkwardly looked around before asking, “Well, is there at least anything that would make you happy that we could do?”
Gathrus pointed a claw towards the horizon. “LEAVE.”
Nago nodded and quietly returned to the caravan with his crew, the vehicle beginning to sputter and cough into life before driving off on its own into the evening.
Gathrus spat on the ground, turned, and began to head back towards the inner circles. “Good riddance…”
MEANWHILE, IN THE CARAVAN
Nago tapped a claw on his chin in thought, curled around his own baton, which was stuck into a hole in the caravan wall. “Usually the Plague clans around these parts don’t mind a little festivity…”
Sunshine nodded. “Yeah… when they said that the Fallen’s Fang Clan was a particularly well-known ‘pinnacle of all that is Plague’ I thought they’d be a pinnacle in knowing how to celebrate as well.”
Nago nodded. “Exactly! And, well, their wishes are their wishes, but I can’t help but to feel guilty about not cheering up these sourpusses! Basava, what do you think?”
Basava looked towards Nago, before saying, “I don’t know.”
Nago looked to Rohan and waited for an answer.
Rohan yawned and stirred, before muttering, “I dunno… they said they don’t want us around… and he did say he’ll peel your face like a banana.”
Nago scratched his chin. “Well, yes, but I can’t help but feel we’ve done something horribly wrong by not putting a smile on the faces of these folks in such a dire time!”
Nago looked up to the ceiling, where Frame clung. Frame looked back down, and silently nodded.
Nago laid back, before getting an idea. “Wait, Basava! Every other clan we’ve been to, there’s always been at least one dragon like that, right?”
Basava nodded.
Nago smiled. “Well, maybe we just ran into the grump first, and the others’ll appreciate a party a bit more than he would!”
The whole gang nodded in agreement. Sunlight then noted, “Though, I don’t see how we’re gonna get to that clan without knowing where their main turf even is… or without getting caught by that one guy again.”
Basava wisely smiled before whispering “… Magic.”
Nago raised an eyebrow. “Oh? Basava, what is it that you plan to do?”
Basava walked over to the door, before opening the door, which looked out into what seemed to be a massive growth of native plague flora, tangling around the area. Basava pointed out to the outside of the caravan. “Surprise party!”
Nago nodded. “Of course, we’ll give them a surprise party! Great idea, Basava.”
The crew stepped outside of the Caravan.
Nago gave an inquisitive look around. “How did you even get us here, Basava?”
Basava grinned. “Magic.”
MEANWHILE, IN THE THIRD CIRCLE.
Haxtax Poxkeeper diligently wandered around the gardens, flitting about through the brush and occasionally watering the plants with the murky water from the pail held by his tail.
Haxtax sprinkled a little bit of water on the dragonsnaps, before sprinkling a little on the beastfruit, before turning to see that not enough had been sprinkled on the dragonsnaps, and returning to sprinkle the dragonsnaps.
He once again turned to the Beastfruit, seeing that it was watered enough.
Haxtax began to fly deeper into the gardens to water some more plants, when he noticed a peculiar shade of white peeking through.
Haxtax drew closer, whispering to himself, “The dragon-eater daisies aren’t supposed to be blooming right now…”
He gingerly placed a hand on the leaves, pulling them away…
To find that the white was gone, and only the obscured darkness of the night ahead greeted him.
Haxtax raised an eyebrow before turning around to find the leaves behind him rustling and the smell of some kind of sweet taffy nearby.
Haxtax immediately flew above the brushline to try and see what was going on, but noticed nothing out of the ordinary with a bird’s eye view.
Haxtax went back to pruning the crimson leaves of one of his prized plants.
He blinked, before noticing a white figure next to him.
Haxtax jerked around to find a monochrome nocturne in jester attire staring him down.
Haxtax sputtered, stammered, and whimpered as the shadow dragon watched him. He flew backwards, accidentally stabbing into his prize plant with his pruning shears. He heard the crunching, breaking sound behind him, and froze, turning pale.
The two stared at eachother for a while before Haxtax was scared half to death by a loud sound of screaming and horns.
“SURPRISE!”
A colorful crew of non-plague dragons (except one) jumped out from the brush, giving Haxtax the scare of his life and trampling his plants.
Haxtax squealed, crying out “PLEASE DON’T KILL ME I ONLY WON MY INITATION FIGHT BECAUSE A ROCK FELL FROM THE CEILING AND KILLED MY OPPONENT-“
The dragons in front of him paused. A fellow spiral flew towards him and asked, “You good?”
Haxtax sputtered, gesturing around. “I- you- my plants!”
The dragons looked down and looked back up at Haxtax before muttering some awkward apologies and regrets.
Haxtax looked behind himself at the plant he had stabbed. “My plant!”
The dragons around him let a green skydancer step forward. “We can leave if you want.”
Haxtax snapped his head over to her, and screeched, “GUARDS!”
He felt a giant hand pinch his mouth shut.
“Shh. It is a surprise for them as well.”
The crew heard loud stomps from behind them, turning to find some guards.
The spiral muttered, “Well, that was fast. My name’s Nago, folks, and, well, I figured you’d need some cheering up considering the current apocalypse!”
One of the guards growled, “Your name’s ‘prisoner’ now.”
LATER, IN THE FALLEN’S FANG PRISON
Nago watched as the door in front of him slammed shut, and looked to Basava. “Well, I guess these people happen to believe in private property, huh?”
Basava nodded in agreement.
From the other side of the serrated, barbed bars, an armored red ridgeback looked at them.
He hissed out from between his fangs, his prosthetic long nose sharpened to a knife point. “Welcome to the Fallen’s Fang prison, interlopers. Don’t enjoy your stay. It’s the hardest to escape in the whole area.”
Basava stared directly into the eyes of the assistant warden. “What is your name.”
The ridgeback replied, “Gaksis. Gaksis Rotwing.”
Basava kept staring. “Bet, Gaksis.”
Gaksis groaned and turned away before walking off into the dimly lit caverns. “That’s what they all say…”
Nago looked to Basava. “Basava, what do you plan to do?”
Basava smiled. “Magic.”
Gaksis turned the corner to the barracks before finding that, staring him in the eye was the Imperial he had just shoved into the prison. “WHAT IN THE-“
Basava was thrown back into the barren walls of the prison cell.
Rohan looked up at her with his tired eyes. “How’d it go?”
Basava looked to Rohan and smiled. “Magically.”
Rohan nodded knowingly. “That’s nice, Basava.” He yawned and curled up on the floor before taking a nap.
Nago looked up at Basava and asked, “Say, can you get us all out with that?”
LATER
A guard walked past the cell rumored to contain a traveling circus, and turned their head to find that nothing was in there.
“What do you MEAN you lost an entire IMPERIAL?!”
Kothrok snapped at the guards, hissing out her venom-laced words.
“I should take your blood for this incompetence!”
The guards gulped and shook their heads. “No, ma’am! Please don’t!” One called out. “I’ll show you the cell, it was still locked tight when I found it!”
Kothrok looked into the empty cell, seeing that it was, in fact, still locked.
“So you think I wouldn’t consider the possibility that you’d just re-lock it?”
The guard shook their head. “No, ma’am! You’re the one with the locking key.”
Kothrok paused, sighed, and muttered, “Well, let’s find these escapees, then. I’ll notify the Conquest that we plan to execute them.”
MEANWHILE, AT THE LIBRARY
In the labyrinth of knowledge, torches of green fire lit up walls of bookshelves fifty books tall, and the occasional breathing rooms with tables and chairs, light flickering onto the books and old carpets and tapestry hanging from the cave ceiling. They also lit up a certain green skydancer.
Sunlight flew up to the top shelf of the books labeled ‘Wind magics’.
Gently opening a book, she found that inside the pages it read ‘If you’re reading this, you’re a heretic.’
Sunlight raised an eyebrow before putting the book back and taking out another one, which said the same thing.
And another.
And another.
Sunlight began to pour through hundreds of books, not noticing the runes beginning to glow on their spines.
Meanwhile, a librarian had been looking up at her, his red eyes not narrowed nor widened, just staring in a sort of expression of patience and waiting. “Those runes call the guards in.”
Sunlight paused, looking down at the librarian and widening her eyes. “Oh…” she timidly said, crawling back to the top of the bookshelf. Looking down, she saw that about fifty runes were glowing.
Three guards walked into the room, holding up some very loudly beeping runic tablets, each connecting to a specific book. “Alright, who’s spamming the runes?!” One called out. “Who’s being a nasty little heretic?!” Yelled another.
Sunlight slinked behind the book case, slowly walking away from the guards to somewhere good to hide.
The guards walked to the book case, about fifty feet tall in height, and covered in blinking lights.
“Ugh…” one groaned, rubbing their hands over one of the runes, causing it to blink off.
The rest of the guards did the same, painstakingly turning the runes off one by one.
Sunlight waited, grabbing a ukulele.
Once the guards were done, they began to search the whole library.
One guard turned a corner to find Sunlight sitting there, with a ukulele.
They gritted their teeth and hissed, before a twang from one of the strings stopped them.
They stepped forward again, before the music began to play again. They stopped in front of Sunlight, curious about the new sounds. Usually, the only music they were used to didn’t include much in the way of strings.
The other guards slinked out from the corridors of bookshelves, also leaning in to listen.
A few more guards from outside the library also began to follow, leaving their posts to find the curious sound.
Sunlight found herself surrounded by guards, but not ones prepared to strike. She was surrounded by guards who listened intently. An audience which finally stayed and listened intently to her music.
Sunlight smiled, playing her instrument faster.
MEANWHILE, IN THE LABORATORY
A medium to small room of glowing vials and bubbling contraptions and brimming shelves and instruments sat in a hall, entrance left open to the rest of the labs outside. Everything was lit with some candles, glowing green and orange. It was a round room, encircled by counters and shelves and cabinets, all within wing’s reach of a Nocturne in the middle of it all, who was very displeased.
Nago sheepishly grinned at the Nocturne who held a vial of… something likely very dangerous to life itself towards him.
“Hey, hey, hey! Buddy, buddy, please calm down! What exactly are you wantin’ here?”
The Nocturne narrowed his eyes. “I want test subjects, and you just happened to sneak into my personal lab here from a hole in the wall, like some kind of annoying little miracle.”
Nago shrugged. “Ehhhhhhh… I wouldn’t exactly call me little when I’m actually longer than you are, mister.”
The Nocturne, Typhardias replied, “Size is usually measured by mass. I weigh more than you do, so you are still little.”
Nago grabbed some food from the counter he was currently pinned against. “Wanna… bet on that?”
Typhardius scoffed. “If you can suddenly gain enough weight to be considered larger than me in the span of a minute, then sure.”
Nago went silent, then spoke again. “Well, I, uh… I can try.”
Typhardius let out a hiss from between his teeth, quipping with his usual nasally, cold voice “Then try.”
Nago nibbled at the food he held in his hand before coughing it up. “ACK! Sorry, sorry… it’s just that I’m not used to something so…”
Typhardius grabbed a jar from a shelf filled with the same food.
Nago smacked his lips a little bit, scratching his chin, and chirping, “… Sharp, with a sour aftertaste like that of a swarm of biting little tinges of nutty aftertastes…”
Typhardius placed the jar down on the counter, and raised an eyebrow. “You are… oddly adept at discerning the taste of cheese.”
Nago’s eyebrows raised. “Cheese?” He gazed into the jar, seeing the fuzzy green globs of bacterial growth floating around in some liquid.
Typhardius nodded. “Yes. It’s a Fallen’s Fang Clan delicacy. Along with… well, most other plague clans I’ve heard of.”
Typhardius held the jar up to his face, magnifying and distorting his visage through the glass and the murky liquid. “As an assistant alchemist, of the Pestilence End, science and the study of chemistry is my post… my forte, my destiny, even.”
The sickly green nocturne sighed, placing the jar back down. “Of course, it’s not what I wanted. Sure, I can mix all the concoctions and craft all the calamities I can, but what use is it if I… well, if I feel little joy out of it? It’s not like I can change to the Famine end, where making cheese can be my entire job…” Typhardius shuddered at the thought. “… THAT… would be a three point crime.”
Nago raised an eyebrow. “Is… making cheese your joy?”
Typhardius shrugged and nodded. “Yes, yes. But it’s not all that impressive.”
He sifted through a variety of vials on a rack, his claw landing on one which glowed a virulent green. “Of course, the one benefit I find…”
Typhardius opened the jar of cheese, a foul odor escaping and causing Nago to cough and wheeze. The nocturne opened the green vial and wafted the smell to his nostrils before wrinkling his nose in disgust and tapping a few drops into the cheese. He swiftly slammed the lid to the jar back on, and put the cheese back onto the shelf. He sighed. “… is that in this End, while I can’t routinely create cheese, I may do all that I wish to experiment with it.”
Typhardius turned to Nago. “… Take a guess at how old that cheese was. The cheese in the jar.”
Nago looked around, looking for a guess, before landing on, “Fifty years at the least?”
Typhardius shook his head and grinned. “It’s only existed for a few weeks.”
Nago gasped, “Wait, really!? A few weeks?!”
Typhardius nodded. “My life’s work is experimenting to find faster and faster methods of fermenting cheese. The clan allows and supports it, since they believe that such a quick fermenting method may be somehow used against enemies. Really, though, most of my knowledge is being used by those up in the Famine end looking for a way to nearly instantly age their wines or cheeses. The War End hasn’t asked me for much of anything lately considering our current major threat is already fermented enough, being undead heresies against the name of our holy mother the Plaguebringer, I mean.”
Typhardius suddenly snapped silent, before turning pale. His eyes flicked to Nago. “Did… did you get a word of that?”
Nago was currently busy trying to get more cheese. “Huh?”
Typhardius let out a massive sigh of relief. “Oh, thank Plaguebringer… had you been listening, you would’ve learned of… well, let’s just say that would have been a four point crime and I’d surely be imprisoned.”
Nago slinked back down from the shelf. “Well, if it makes ya feel any better, I like your cheese!”
Typhardius smiled before suddenly regaining focus and slapping himself. “Janustraps! I shouldn’t be befriending you, I was about to start brutally experimenting on you in the name of my Clan! To think I was so weak for so long just there…”
Nago gulped. “Oh- well- uh- hmm… we can still talk! I’m certain you’ll be fine!”
Typhardius growled, “… I’m not a heretic.”
Nago shuddered, backing up against the wall. “Well, what do you plan to do, then? Will the experiments involve tasting more cheese?”
Typhardius grabbed that same green vial again. “… I’ve yet to find out what happens when a shadow spiral gets fermented.”
Nago shivered against the wall, cringing and shutting his eyes and preparing for the worst.
Reflexively, just before Typhardius tapped the goal to coax out a few drops, Nago reached into a pocket and whipped his hand forward and out, instantly spraying a flurry of confetti.
Typhardius yelped and stumbled back when the sparkling, technicolor flakes hit his face, and began to scratch at his face in a desperate attempt to get the confetti off, just as his vial flew into the air above him and began to fall back down.
MEANWHILE, IN THE BARRACKS
The barracks, as per usual, were rows upon rows of beds, sitting still in the darkness, save for the red glow of the torchlight each bed sat in, and by each bed were sets of spears glimmering in the dim light, glimmering save for the splotches of dried blood.
A guard woke up from a quick nap to find that all the other beds were left behind, oddly enough. Just a half hour ago, he could have sworn that they were all standing straight in the awe of Kothrok.
He hopped out of bed, his claws scratching against the hard floor and his feet making quiet thumps upon the rock. His wings tucked in and tail dragging, he began to look around for his lost comrades. He whispered out a call for them, but found no response save for the sound of quiet, odd music from what he assumed was the library. Which, he could’ve sworn was too far away for sounds from it to reach.
The guard shrugged and figured it was his imagination, and decided not to leave the barracks until he was sure nobody was left.
Returning to stalking around the halls, the guard sniffed the air, but found nothing save for lingering wafts.
He narrowed his eyes, and suddenly heard something.
The sizzle of a torch being extinguished.
Turning around, he saw that one of the torches had, indeed, been extinguished. The guard ran over to the torch, investigating it.
Another sizzle.
He turned around to see yet another unlit torch.
He nearly ran to it, before more sizzles cut through the darkness.
One by one, torches suddenly began to sizzle out, including the ones in the hallway.
Soon enough, he was left in complete darkness, until his eyes adjusted enough to barely see into the void.
He kept walking, the bones upon his necklace clicking and clacking against one another.
The guard squinted, and…
Something in his peripheral vision moved.
He swung around to see wherever it was, and once again saw nothing.
The guard’s heart began to pound in his chest, a bead of sweat falling from his brow. “Where are you, interloper?!” He made an attempt at intimidation, but his voice began to shake with terror.
A clanging.
He turned around, seeing a spear on the ground. He darted to it, grabbed it, and whipped his head around everywhere to try and find any semblance of an enemy.
He stalked to the middle of the room, turning around and around and around to get a full look.
One turn.
Beds and darkness.
Two turns.
Spears and unlit torches.
Three turns.
White.
The guard startled back, looking up at… some white nocturne, who had snuck up on him without any notice. Their eyes were purple.
Tricky shadow Magics.
The guard hissed, and prepared to stab the intruder.
But… it wasn’t like what he was used to.
The dragon stood unmoving, staring. Not even the bells on their jester outfit made a noise.
The guard hissed again, jabbing at the enemy, once again confused to find no signs of them intending to fight back.
The guard attempted at a jab once again.
The wood of the spear was instantly held in an iron grip by the white nocturne.
The guard tried to rip the spear from the hold of the nocturne, only to find that the second they tried, the wood shattered in the enemy’s grasp, and the spearhead fell to the floor with a clink.
The guard dove for the spearhead, hoping to use it as some kind of knife when the nocturne kicked the sharp tip away, causing it to slide into a wall and ricochet into somewhere where it likely wouldn’t be found for a long, long time.
The two stared eachother down.
The guard could only watch the nocturne as it began to let out a quiet hiss, jaws beginning to open wide into what looked like a mess of ivory needles and barbed tongues.
MEANWHILE, IN THE HATCHERY
Rohan crawled onto a ledge in the wall, figuring it suitable as a resting place.
Settling upon it, he looked down to the various glowing green and orange pools which pockmarked the floor, their bubbling and churning fluids surrounded by decorative bones and entrails. Within the pools quietly laid semi-transparent eggs, their gelatinous shells barely hiding the squirming, wriggling embryos within.
Rohan yawned, his eyes beginning to close, the soothing noise of bubbling ooze like a lullaby to him.
Meanwhile, a caretaker of the nests was staring up at him in disbelief. A wind dragon had just somehow made his way into the hatchery! Of all places, the HATCHERY! What in the world were the guards up to which they felt so important as to neglect this?!
The caretaker huffed a bit before grabbing a spear from the wall and making a throw at the interloper.
The spear missed, and with a twang had pierced into the wall right below the intruder.
The caretaker groaned and prepared to grab yet another spear when the nocturne had begun to, curiously, stir in his sleep and latched onto the spear’s handle with his tail.
The caretaker reached for the next spear when he had then, still in his sleep, pulled himself off the ledge and began to hang from the spear by the tail.
The caretaker raised an eyebrow, and attempted to throw again.
Once again, they missed, and this spear landed to the side of the nocturne.
They sighed, looking at their elephantine feet. Snapper claws were good for digging a little, but not for throwing.
Nevertheless, they tried again.
The spear missed again.
It landed next to the one they had just thrown.
The nocturne suddenly flared out his wings, spun around on his spear, and flew off of the spear after unwrapping his tail.
The caretaker watched as he almost perfectly landed on the next spear, before repeating that same step and latching to the third.
The caretaker began to panic, throwing more spears in a desperate attempt to hit the nocturne.
Again and again, the spears gradually made a path down to the floor which the nocturne followed.
The caretaker, in a moment of clarity, decided that maybe throwing all of these spears was not the best idea.
They yelled back into the caverns and tunnels, “INTRUDER IN THE HATCHERY!”
They looked back to check that the nocturne hadn’t awoken.
Nobody replied.
Again.
“THERE IS AN INTRUDER… IN THE HATCHERY!”
No reply.
The caretaker groaned and decided that throwing spears was really the one choice at this point.
Eventually, the caretaker stood in front of the nocturne, crumpled and snoring on the floor after slinking from the last spear.
Well, at least now it would be easy to kill this nocturne with the mind of a spiral.
The caretaker lifted their hoof, preparing to step down on the head.
Once their hoof reached the highest point and they nearly crushed the nocturne, his claw whipped out and landed on an egg in the hatching pool next to them.
The caretaker narrowed their eyes and lowered their hoof a little before noticing the Nocturne’s grip on the egg tightened as they did so.
They removed their hoof from the space above his head
The nocturne removed his hand from the egg.
The caretaker tried again.
The hand was placed upon the egg again.
… Quite the predicament, then.
MEANWHILE, IN THE ARENA
Basava found herself in the arena, in front of a recently finished battle.
It had been a battle where an entire group of clutchmates had fought to the death.
In the middle of the Sandy circle, were stains of red, torn scales and tattered wings. It smelled like death, for that’s exactly what it was.
Before Basava was a panting dragon, in their young adult years, four eyes narrowing at this sudden intrusion to their rite of passage.
Basava looked around, seeing banners, likely the banners of the clan, and statues of the Plaguebringer. The seats surrounding the battle were mostly empty, save for five dragons, each wearing skulls and each about as unhappy at Basava as the young dragon was.
Basava paused.
Basava didn’t exactly know what to do here, so she looked for some way to entertain the onlookers.
She slowly sauntered over to a crack in the carved walls of the arena, and reached her arm in.
The five dragons hissed and spat from their special seats.
The most imposing of them, a white and red wildclaw clad in scars and armor pointed at the young dragon and growled an order. “Kill the interloper, do it and you shall be known as absolved of your previous crimes and disappointments.”
The young dragon barreled towards Basava, and she began to pull her arm from the hole.
The dragon stopped in their tracks, and all watched as Basava began to pull a writhing, panting figure from the hole.
Basava threw her arm out from the hole, and with it, a dragon.
They landed on the floor, skidding to a stop in the sand in front of their own corpse.
They lifted their head, red eyes widening in confusion. “Huh- what- I… I died!”
They began to scratch at their face in terror and bewilderment.
One of the five seated dragons rose from their position, a brown and red Obelisk adorned in furs and fangs running into the arena.
“HERESY!” She yelled with vigor, landing on the sands and kicking up dust all around her.
She lifted a muscular claw, preparing to strike down the enemy, repeatedly stomping down and leaving a red stain where there was once a dragon.
Now, there were two corpses of the same dragon, right next to each other.
Basava stared at the scene, before reaching in the hole again and pulling out a different dragon.
As Basava held the dragon up, they barely caught a glimpse of their own body in the middle of the ring and screamed. Before she could through them into it, the obelisk interrupted the act by ramming her massive hand into the resurrected dragon, leaving them splattered on the walls.
The obelisk huffed, and turned to Basava. She raised her claws, preparing to turn Basava into another corpse when a white mirror flew down from the stands and blocked her path.
He held his arms out and cried, “Bathrus, wait! If you kill her… well, she’s obviously adept at some sort of heretical magic! Imagine the studies and- and- she could give us information on the undead hordes! On some other enemy!”
Bathrus growled, gritting her teeth. “I don’t CARE about what this heretic can tell us! I care about the well-being of our clan, obviously unlike you, Langtry!”
A small cry echoed from behind Basava.
Biting and scratching at her tail, the young dragon ferociously attempted to rip into her flesh, through their smaller jaws barely scratched a scale.
A voice from the stands sighed and echoed out, “You are excused, Kobax. As for your end, the War End is obviously your home.”
Kobax nodded nervously, before darting off from the arena to the War End Order Hall.
The wildclaw flew down from the stands and landed behind Basava, barking, “We will capture her, interrogate her about this abominable heresy she has just committed before us, and then execute her. Quick, simple, and easy.”
The two other dragons nodded, and Bathrus grabbed Basava by the wings, flying her to the prison through the caverns. “You’re rather unlucky that I was known as the ‘iron grip’ throughout my years as an Assistant of the War End… no dragon has ever escaped-“
Bathrus looked down to see that the imperial was gone, without a trace in sight. “HOW?!” She roared, beginning to frantically search the lair for any signs of her.
LATER, IN THE LIBRARY
Festetch waltzed into the library, feet gently dancing along the torn and worn carpets towards a most curious music.
Winding in and out of twists and turns of books and carved stone and torches throughout the labyrinth of knowledge, she ended up standing behind what was almost the entire force of guards, all leaning forwards toward a green wind skydancer playing the ukelele.
Festetch fidgeted her with necklace of bones for a while, thinking back to that… necromancer? Magician? Heretical performer… she considered the possibility of these two equally odd events being connected.
Festetch tapped the shoulder of one of her guards, who snapped out of their daze and whipped around to see their very own Grand Scythe.
Their complexion turned pale, and they tapped the shoulder of the guard next to them, who tapped the shoulder of the next, who did the next, and the next, and the next.
All until the music had ended and each and every guard was staring with terror at Festetch, who calmly looked back up to Sunlight and frowned. She looked back down to the guard, and quietly ordered, “Capture her, and bring her back to the prison. Go out and search for any messes you may have left unwatched, and bring them with her. I will be waiting with Kothrox, Gamon, Vulgulus and Gaksis, eager for what you will find for us.”
The guards nodded in unison, five of them leaping to tackle Sunlight, cuff her and carry her back to the prison, making sure that her ukelele had been shattered first.
LATER, IN THE LABORATORY
Typhardius screamed and scratched at his blistering and cracking skin and scales, the contents of his now shattered vial all over him. “GAH! ACK! YOU LITTLE… MY- MY SKIN! MY SKIN! AND MY WORK, MY VIAL!”
Nago gulped, shifting his eyes and remarking, “Would you… would you like some help with that?”
Typhardius pointed to an orange vial on the rack, and Nago grabbed it, spilling it on Typhardius, who sighed with relief as the blistering and crackling stopped.
He sat up, panting and wheezing, his dried, cracked skin quite the sorry sight.
Typhardius began to hiss out some curses and threats, eyelids caked in confetti and dead skin slowly creeping open.
Nago looked for somewhere to hide, but decided it was pretty futile at this point as Typhardius’ eyes fixed on him and wouldn’t let go of their enraged gaze.
Typhardius slowly lifted himself off of the floor, limping over to Nago. “You…” he hissed with a vile venom, his voice harsh and forced out between gasps.
Nago chuckled a little in some pitiful attempt to lighten the mood. “I mean… heyyy! It uh- it seems to work great as an exfoliator!”
Typhardius gritted his fangs. “Do you KNOW how little moisturizing cream a Plague Clan has on average?”
Nago shook his head, “No, uh, no I don’t, actually! Maybe you could.. tell me?”
Typhardius spat, slashing a claw towards Nago, who backed himself up into the wall to dodge the attack. “Wow! Okay! Uh… not one for moisturizer facts, uh…”
The green, dried nocturne grimaced. “You cannot talk your way out of this one, shadow heretic!”
Nago furrowed his brow. “Well, uh…”
Typhardius nearly snapped his jaws at Nago’s stomach before a guard shoved past him and placed a steady hand around the circumference of Nago’s abdomen.
The bogsneak grabbed a pair of tiny handcuffs and gingerly fixed them onto Nago’s wrists, before leaving about as fast as they had come.
Typhardius sputtered and stammered. “I- what?! No! I was going to kill him! Give him back!”
The guard glanced back at him, rolled their eyes, and grunted, “You seriously couldn’t kill one spiral?”
Typhardius shrunk in posture and began to babble and leave his mouth agape in disbelief. “He… he had attack confetti…” he mumbled, before turning back to clean up the mess.
LATER, IN THE BARRACKS
The team of guards ran into the barracks to the sounds of screaming and struggle, holding up torches in the darkness.
They stepped a few steps forward, hearing the screaming had stopped along with a wet crunching noise echoing through the catacombs.
They began to pick up the pace.
One of the guards felt something wet on his face, and the other held the torchlight to him.
Upon his snout was a drop of blood, which tickled as it ran down his scales and landed on the floor, leaving a single small stripe.
The guards looked up, seeing a light trail of spots, red spots, spots of blood, on the ceiling.
“How did that happen…” one of them mused, before the other lowered the torch to the ground to find a thicker trail of blood, likely where it had been pooling after falling from the ceiling.
“Oh. That’s… concerning.” One muttered under her breath.
They began to follow the trail of blood, leaving their own trail of red footprints beside it.
They found themselves at a puddle of red blood, and looked around the room for any signs of the cause, until one had the bright idea to look upwards.
Their eyes landed on a white dragon, hunkered on the ceiling, wings concealing something.
From the edges of the wings and body, blood poured, staining their black and white checkered clothes.
One of the guards held a torch up to the dragon, and demanded, “Hey! Who are you and what do you have?!”
The white dragon looked down at the guards, neck contorting around until the head was parallel to the ground, unlike the upside-down body, and was looking behind the body at the guards.
The dragon’s purple eyes just… stared. Their red lips were soon licked clean by some uncountable number of tongues licking their chops.
“Oh what the hell.” A guard groaned, staring on at the scene.
The other guard cringed. “Well… you know what the Grand Scythe said. If it’s weird, bring it to the prison.”
Another guard felt like running out, but hesitated. “We’re… we’re supposed to capture THAT thing and bring it back to the prison?! Without anything but our spears and cuffs?”
A guard looked back at the fearful one. “Don’t be cowardly. We’re Fallen’s Fang guards, we’re strong enough to take it!”
The white dragon watched on as the conversation unfolded, before releasing their wings and arms from the ceiling, their body swinging as they held on by just the feet.
Falling onto the floor, from the original position of being held by the nocturne, was a shape which slammed into the floor with a flop. It was bleeding from almost everywhere, and seemed featureless save for the half-a-tail, wing stumps, left back leg, and the gaping holes and wounds where the other limbs used to be. There was one slightly longer stump, which must’ve been where the head once was.
The guards stumbled back. “OH WHAT IN THE NAME OF PLAGUEBRINGER!”
The white jester fell from the ceiling, grabbed the tail end of the body in their jaws, and began to run away through the halls with the half-eaten corpse dragging with them, like some animal running away with it’s catch.
The guards stood flabbergasted before one yelled, “WELL?! WE GOTTA GO CATCH THE THING!”
They began to run out of the barracks, panicked, following the trail of blood and sounds of disturbed roars and cries.
LATER, IN THE HATCHERY.
A guard gently grabbed Rohan’s shoulders, preparing to quietly drag him off into the prison. “See? It’s not that hard.” They huffed at the caretaker, before the caretaker let out a gasp. The guard looked back, seeing that the top of an egg had been ripped off, the fluids leaking into the hatching pool.
The guard went pale.
“Oh.”
The caretaker mocked his voice. “SeE? It’S nOt ThAt HaRd!” They’d snapped their jaws together and growled, “And now, we have one less egg!”
Rolling their eyes, they pulled the egg from the pool and watched as it shriveled up and went rotten. “I told you, this one can swing from spears asleep, and was threatening to break an egg! But did you listen? No! ONE. LESS. EGG.”
The guard looked down at the nocturne. “My apologies.”
The snapper caretaker stomped over to a hole in the floor which leaked steam. “Ugh… and you almost made me miss my duty of heating the eggs!”
They stomped down on the vent, and watched as geysers suddenly billowed from the pools with a deafening roar.
Rohan awoke, startled by the noise and looking up at the guard. “Huh? Oh.” He yawned, and quipped, “Are you here to take me to prison?”
The guard nodded, and Rohan replied. “Okay… they got smooth floor there, at least…”
The caretaker stared at Rohan. “Seriously?! NOW he’s barely a threat at all?!”
The guard shrugged and began to drag Rohan off to the prison. Rohan just dragged along the floor behind him, held up only by the shoulders.
LATER, IN THE ARENA
Bathrus ran around the circumference of the arena, irritated and anxious to catch Basava. The other Scythes were long gone, but if they were to come back soon and saw that she lost the imperial- AGH! It would be TERRIBLE!
She snorted and growled in annoyance, checking every nook and cranny again, and again, and again.
From across the arena, she heard, “Grand Scythe, what are you doing?”
Bathrus flew up and towards the guards at the entrance, landing with a furious thud in front of them and causing the rocks on the ground to shake. “WHERE IS THAT HERETIC IMPERIAL?”
One of the guards cleared their throat. “Ah, well we believe-“
Bathrus stomped her claw. “I don’t want what you BELIEVE I want what you KNOW!”
Another guard clarified. “There’s a brightly colored plague Imperial in prison right now, smiling and playing with her deck of cards.”
Bathrus did not sigh of relief, but groaned in irritation. “… If the conquest asks, I put her there.”
One of the guards raised an eyebrow. “But… you didn’t?”
Bathrus flared.
The guards nodded in unison. “Yes, ma’am!”
LATER, IN THE PRISON
Festetch watched as four dragons were presented before her. One green, one wearing bright clothes, one black and white and red all over, and another barely awake.
Well, the black and white and red all over one wasn’t presented as much as it had slammed into her legs and skidded to a stop, in front of some very winded guards, but it still at the least stopped.
She looked over to her Hands and Wardens, and looked back at the prisoners. “Guards, explain.”
“This one was like a green pied Piper!”
“This one… yeah, apparently Typhardius is a wimp!”
“I DON’T WANNA TALK ABOUT THE CLOWN.”
“He broke an egg. While asleep.”
“Bathrus captured the imperial.”
Festetch narrowed her eyes in curiosity, before nodding and opening the door to Basava’s cell. “Put them in. The Comquest and I will discuss their execution after more pressing matters have subsided.”
A guard stepped forward. “MORE PRESSING MATTERS?! A GUY’S HEAD JUST GOT EATEN BY A KILLER CEILING CLOWN!”
Festetch sighed. “Well, maybe he should’ve fought the ‘killer ceiling clown’ better. It had all the right to win.”
“BUT IT ATE HIM!”
Festetch looked down at Frame. “It’s good to be resourceful in your battles.”
“IT. ATE. HIM.”
Festetch groaned. “Yes, yes, but I’m certain our warriors would do the same if given the chance. It’s a plagueish quality to do what you must to survive.”
The guard stopped talking, deciding the conversation was no longer worth the effort.
A passing War End Hunter yelled through the corridor, “It’s true! I did eat a guy once!”
The guard turned around, did some gestures and stammered, “DUDE?! THE HELL?!”
They shrugged. “Hm. I guess you Death Enders will all your ‘sibling companionship’ and ‘making friends with your clutchmates’ business can’t handle a little average Plague survival tactics.”
The guard growled before turning around to face Festetch again, silent.
Basava watched as all of her friends were thrown back into the cell.
Sunlight slumped down, solemnly remarking, “I tried to play them a song…”
Nago shrugged in disbelief. “I tried to taste test potential party food and throw some festive confetti!”
Frame coughed up a skull and Nago glared at them. “Frame, what did we say about eating people?” Frame looked to the floor in disappointment.
Rohan snored.
Basava shook her head. “Magic tricks don’t work for this clan!”
Nago frowned in defeat. “I guess operation ‘surprise cheer-up party’ was a bust…”
Basava patted Nago on the head. “Try again sometime?” She asked.
Nago lit up a bit. “Yeah. Yeah, I suppose we could try a few more times before we give up on this clan!”
The group nodded in agreement, save for Frame, who was shoving the skull back down their throat, and Rohan, who was taking a nap.
Nago leaned back. “But first… Basava, I think I’m craving some cheese. You got any?”
MEANWHILE, IN THE LAB, AGAIN
Typhardius reached to his shelf to find that his jar of extra-aged cheese had disappeared into thin air.
“OH, COME ON!”