We don’t even need to say anything to each other. We just turn, spread our wings, and shoot off at top speed to the source. The whole time I'm thinking. Considering what we have found, I wouldn't be surprised if it were humans. No, i'm betting on it. That sound I heard was definitely a human, if Snowstorm is a valid source, and considering i've lived with him my whole life, I can say that I believe him. But that's not important. What's important is figuring out what's happening right now. Darkness is a magic powerhouse, and despite Smokewind being pathetically timid, she is great at healing magic and can just hug you to death with her hot scales, which get hotter when infused with fire or earth mana. But I feel strange. I feel mad. I'm furious right now. I haven't felt this way in… ever.

  We land in the entrance to our own bedroom, planning to sneak around the back way to surprise whoever is here and find… a really big metal thing. It looks like some weird hatchlings drawing of what a human may look like. 2 large, bulky armored metal legs with 3 flat toe-like things that grip the floor. The base is large like some big cube with a glass front that I cant see through. its arms are loaded with all sorts of strange pipes that look like they can shoot things out of them. Its hands are like its feet, 3 large curling flaps that look good at gripping things. And judging by that bulky wing-like thing on its back, that thing can fly.

  It turns when it sees us and Snowstorm's eyes widen in horror.

  “Thats a Mecha!” Snowstorm shouts in horror.

  “We need to-"

  “Halt lizards.” Comes a distorted, almost mechanical voice from the massive hunk of metal. It raises one arm to point at him, and the other to point at me.

  “Resistance is futile-” I don't care to listen anymore. I full body tackle the thing with all the force I can. I hear crunches and cracks as it is knocked over. Yeeeeouch! That hurt my scales way too much! My wing looks a little bent, and it's hard to use. But by the looks of it I crushed one of that things arms and smashed the glass, revealing the human inside. It looks like a short female. She wears what looks to be a camo pattern of jumpsuit and a visor covers her face. Metal plating covers parts of her body, attached to the metal of the Mecha. She looks slightly bloodied and hurt from the tackle.

  I don't give her time to raise her weapons. I just pounce on the suit and pin it down. I open my jaws.

  Crunch!

  I bite the other arm of the armor off. The human lets out a shriek of fear. I reach in with one talon and pull her out of the armor.

  “What. Have. You. Done. With. My. Parents.” I say with barely restrained fury.

  “I-I… I…” The human stammers. She looks terrified. I don't care. I'm seeing red, all I want is to destroy anyone in my path and save the guardians. My family.

  “T-they are down below!” She manages to stammer out. “There's 10 mechas there to capture them or k-k-”

  “I don't want to hear it.” I say coldly. Snowstorm is staring at me like I'm someone else entirely.

  “Take the human.” I say, dropping her infront of Snowstorm.

  “What are you going to do?” Snowstorm asks uncertainty. He wraps his tail around the human to pick her up without using his jaw. The spikes on his tail retract so he doesn't just impale her.

  “Take a fucking guess.” I say coldly.

  “Im going to rip some throats out if Smokewind or Darkness are hurt.” I start to move towards the exit of the tunnel, but I feel something grip my tail.

  “Snowstorm. Let go of my tail.” I say. I am so mad. I am so furious at these humans for what they are doing. What did we do to deserve this?! NOTHING! They've brought this upon themselves. then

  Slap!

  I am shocked out of my thoughts by a wing slamming into my face.

  “Abhor, get a hold of yourself!” Snowstorm growls at me.

  “You're mad, I get it. So am I! But running in there in a blind rage just to get a thousand holes shot into us won't solve anything. We need to think this through.”

  I want to argue so badly. I want to rip apart those people that are doing this and- and- … that isn't me. I don't want to kill people. Why… whats come over me?

  I slump down to the floor, all the adrenaline leaving me and the overwhelming pain in my very damaged wing coming back to me in a rush. I look up at Snowstorm.

  If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

  “What do we do?” I ask desperately. My claws dig into the rug on the floor. “Snowstorm, what do we do?”

  “We are going to sneak in.” Snowstorm says. His voice is calm, reassuring as he looks down at me. “We take in the situation. If they need help we will help. But if they seem to be able to handle themselves, we let them do their thing. Both of them are strong. If Darkness does the fighting and Smokewind does the healing and support, they can win.” He explains. The human in his tail's grasp has stopped struggling. She looks resigned to her fate. I look to her.

  “Hey, human.” I say, and her head jerks up.

  “Y-yes?” She stammers a response.

  “What's your name?” I ask her. She seems surprised I asked. She takes a moment to respond.

  “Evelyn.” She eventually responded. The human girl, Evelyn, has long straight brown hair and green tear-filled eyes. She looks short, but that may just be because I'm the size of a large horse.

  “Keep your voice down and you'll be fine, got it?” I say to her and she nods vigorously. I take that as enough and gesture for Snowstorm to follow me. We take our time creeping down the cave. The lights are all off, and its making it hard for Snowstorm, but I have no problem. I can see in the dark, after all, so I'm fine. I assume the little human Evelyn is having the same problem too, but I don't care much. She was trying to kill me a few minutes ago, so I don't feel really any desire for mercy. Keeping her alive at all is a mercy of its own, and that's just because I don't really know how to feel about the idea of commiting murder against a sapient creature like her.

  Eventually we get to the place we were looking for. The kitchen. This was where the smoke was seen. And sure enough, the place is absolutely destroyed. The walls and floors are smashed bits of rubble to the point I'm shocked there hasn’t been a cave-in. 3 Mechas are shattered on the ground, blood leaking out of them. Evelyn makes a choked noise when she sees them, but she quickly muffles her mouth with her hands at my glance to her. She knows what will happen to her if she gives away our position.

  Me and snowstorm crouch down at the entrance to the kitchen. The entrance is slanted up and to the left, which provides good cover.

  “What do we do?” I whisper to Snowstorm. We haven't seen any Mechas nor have we seen Darkness or Smokewind. There is blood everywhere, but without getting close to smell it I can't tell if it belongs to a human or a dragon. I cant hear anything out there.

  “Do you hear anything?” I ask Snowstorm, and to my suprise, he nods.

  “Down the hallway to their rooms. I can hear something there.”

  “Do you know what it is?”

  “No.” Great, so we are going in blind. Maybe it would be safer to just turn around and flee. Leave them behind and hope we survive. But thats not an option for us. It would never be an option for us.

  “Lets go.” I say, creeping into the kitchen. Once I confirm that nobody is there, we continue on.

  “Evelyn.” I say and Evelyn stiffens again, turning to me.

  “Y-yes?”

  “What else did you bring with you when you came here?” I ask, though it's not really a question. More like a demand.

  “W-we brought 2 large cages and 50 armed soldiers.” She responds nervously. “I was left alone in what I assume was your sleeping quarters to watch for you and alert the others if you came in. But you… took me by surprise. I never had the chance.” She droops considerably, though I ignore it. Even as I feel a little bad for this poor sad human, it's not my problem. I won’t let it be.

  “Thats what you brought to take down 4 dragons?” Snowstorm says skeptically, lifting her up to eye level with him.

  “W-we have only seen y-you two training from our scryers. We assumed all four of you were equally… inequipt with magic” She stumbles over her words, not meeting his gaze. “We were ordered by the Grand General to eliminate or capture the two of you, and get rid of the others…” I let out a snort.

  “Darkness is a magical prodigy and Smokewind has spent her whole life practicing healing magic.” I mutter. I don’t care about telling her our secrets since we don't plan to let her escape. Evelyn goes very pale at that.

  “We assumed that… level 2, not 5… they're all dead… but if he… maybe…” She mutters to herself, rambling on to herself.

  “The hell are you talking about?” I say and she lets out a noise of embarrassment and something else when she realizes she was rambling aloud.

  “N-nothing!” She stammers out, looking down. “I have no idea what you’re talking about!” I eye her skepticality, but sigh. I turn to the entrance to Darkness and smokewind's room and we walk in. Then, while we are walking down the twisting halls deeper down into the cave I realized something. How did they not know about darkness and Smokewinds abilities if they had scryers? I turn to Snowstorm. They must have known, so why didn't Evelyn?

  Snowstorm knows what I am thinking and mouths the words ‘cannon fodder’ to me, gesturing to Evelyn. That makes a gruesome sort of sense. The important people must not have told the less valuable members the danger they were actually getting into. My pity for her has just gone a lot higher. Pity that I immediately stamp down. Shut up, sympathetic brain, she tried to murder or capture us. Who cares if she was uninformed about the fire she was being thrown into?

  fire… wait, why id there so much smoke everywhere, but no fire? I whip my head around to search for the heated plasma of fire. The destroyed mechas aren't on fire, and they aren't smoking either. Smokewind, despite her name, does not give off smoke or anything. So why was there so much smoke? We continue walking up the caves until I start to hear what Smokewind was. Movement of many feet and orders being given.

  “Lift that up! Open the cage! We are on a schedule people, get moving!” A voice shouts. I assume its human, but it's far deeper than most human voices. I stop just before the entrance and peek inside. And then my blood runs cold. Blood is every where. Blood and magma and fire. Humans wearing suits that let them walk through the flames are dragging anything they can find into a large Mecha with what looks like a metal backpack attached to the end.

  Darkness is lying unconscious, bleeding and hurt, inside a large glowing glass cage that hovers a few inches off of the ground. In the center of the rubble is a man. He looks large for a human. Very large. Besides being large and a man I can't tell any of his other featured due to the suit he wears. It looks as if he had mecha parts strapped onto him and welded to him. The suit is made of durable blue armor that shimmers in the soft light of the large lights set down in the corners of the room by the soldiers. And he is… standing on something. Its a corpse. The corpse of a dragon. Smokewind. Shes dead.