Bloodworm Hive

Bloodworm Hive is a book which takes place in Bloodworm Hive, hence the name. Below, you will find the starring protagonists, and the story itself. This story is quite old, and will be edited very soon.
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== Protagonists ==
=== Azure ===
He's an A student, he's obedient - oh wait, of course he isn't. This SilkWing is a rebel down to the bone, despite what it seems like to most HiveWings. And surprisingly enough, maybe this strong-willed soul of his will save him.
=== Promise ===
Promise is a kind dragon who lives with her mother Firefly. She isn't to high nor low of a rank, sort of average. Despite this, she treats everyone fairly - well - everyone who deserved it. SilkWings. They ruined everything. You can't go outside! That's a SilkWing thing. You can't pick flowers! That's a SilkWing thing. Well, Promise was certain it wasn't her fault it was a SilkWing thing. But she can't stay oblivious forever. She can't watch the eyes of her mother turn as white as pearls. She cannot stay in oblivion much longer.
=== Abispa ===
Bloodworm Hive is a warzone. As rebellions spring up, more possessions happen. As wars are brewing, violence is occuring. And as secrets are being unearthed, the tunnels get darker ...
== The Book (Ongoing) ==
=== Chapter 1 - Azure ===
Azure was in Bloodworm Hive-AKA The Worst Hive in Hive History.
Who wanted to be a silkwing? It wasn't exactly fun to have a burning bracelet on your wrist and communicating with hivewings who treated you like their property?
"Oh! Hi again!" Agrias said from above him, her odd wings fluttering.
She had her metamorphosis about a week ago, now an artist for Lady Bloodworm. Not that it was a good thing.
Agrias was away almost all the time, working on silken arts of different shades which were dyed to match their concept.
This was her break day, she only had one per 2 weeks so it was always a special occasion for her.
Azure, sadly, had his metamorphosis in a week. He would be assigned a job, and possibly a partner.
Bloodworm didn't want Agrias to be partnered just yet, for some reason, though.
"What have you been doing lately?"
"School." he said dryly, his head lifting as he adjusted his neckband.
"What were your grades? As again?"
"Well, ya, not like I care."
Azure was especially good in History. He loved learning about silkwing and hivewing evolution and how they were once one tribe. It was oddly and uniquely 
beautiful, how everything was glued and fit together this way because of that.
If Azure could go back in time, he would probably change that Wasp had the Book of Clearsight. He would steal it and rip it into pieces! That would teach her 
a lesson about making silkwings look bad.
As much as he hated how his tribe, he hated to see them in such a bad spot.
Agrias yawned and curled herself on a web before saying "I made Lady Bloodworm a canvas of her flying, with lots of hivewings and silkwings behind her. It 
really was a work of art. I wonder how they'll dye it-hm.."
"Are you asking me?" Azure muttered, bad-tempered.
"N-"
Azure heard some hivewings shouting from outside and forced himself out of bed, adjusting his neckband again and saying "Cmon. We need to go outside 
before they kill me."
"They wont kill me. I'm on my break day." she said pointedly as Azure let out a grumbling sigh and stepped into the main department, watching as hivewings 
scanned his position as he ducked his head and softened his judging glare.
"Hm. Azure, still alive, eh?"
"Yes, sir."
"You do know that you'll be imported early, right?"
"Yessir."
"Good. Now get to school. I would give you detention for not coming on time if I was a teacher."
"Yeah. Make sure to be on time." the other commented.
These were known as Louse and Triatoma. They weren't quite mean, but not nice either. They 'guarded' the halls to make sure no silkwings escaped.
"Well--have a nice day, sirs."
"Good luck. Dont fail your test."
That was the nicest the guards got, actually.
Azure zipped out of the hall hearing them mumble annoyed protests of "Slow down" ad "No running in the halls." behind him as he ran. The school was only 
a bit away.
---------------------------10 minutes later------------------------------
Azure had found his school.
Silkwing Highschool it read as he zipped through the doors-or at least tried to.
"Your late." a guard commented.
It took Azure all of his strength not to punch the guard in the face.
He was already tired of how the hivewings held their tribe against the silkwings. It just wasn't fair.
"Your late." Honeybee commented (yes his teacher was a hivewing) and gestured him to a pile of grass.
Yes. Silkwings also sat in piles of grass, since hivewings didn't want to waste precious resources on making them proper chairs.
How lazy. He said it-hivewings were lazy. Who would argue?
Silkwings only went to highschool for one week, stopping one day before their metamorphosis. This was his second day.
"Now. I hope you all bought that silk I told you about because we're having a quiz."
Oops. I think-oh thank Clearsight I didn't take it out of my bag last night.
He zipped open his neckpouch and dipped his tail in the ink bottle, waiting for the teacher to write the first question.
------------------------1 hour later--------------------------------------
Azure was at gym class now, running the tracks like the rest of his classmates. He was the most athletic in the whole class (arguably, not at all from his own opinion)
Azure scrambled across the tracks, taking rapid strides over the rough stone. He sprained his talon again as he yelped, but kept going.
"Remarkable." the gym teacher said, nodding to him.
This was his favorite teacher, Mason.
Mason has a completely black underbelly and tail, but a whitish yellow back and glassy colored wings, like most hivewings.
His eyes were also glittering black.
"Now-climbing!!" Mason commanded as Azure clinged himself onto a silken pole. He was the first to react, and he also knew everything was made out of silk 
today, since treestuff had ran low.
A dragonet had clinged on a metal pole a millisecond after, but their talons made a scraaaaappppeeee as sparks started flying off, their eyes widened as 
they fell off.
Azure didn't catch them since he didn't think it would be worth it, but he did stare, like most dragonets.
"Try again." Mason said, helping them up.
Man, he really was kind.
"I-ok.." the dragonet's voice sounded small as she latched on again, succeeding this time.
"See? That was easy."
Azure was far in the course by now, rushing through hoops and catching pieces of wood with his teeth for extra credit.
He thought about his metamorphosis day. What would happen then?
Leave that for then. Leave this for now, though.
Soon, he had reached the top.
"Good, Azure. Any wood pieces?"
He quickly counted and said "5, sir." while Mason nodded and said "Instant A."
"Thank you, sir." Azure ducked his head in respect.
Even if he had to work as a servant for someone, it would be Mason (if he could choose, of course)
But-perhaps something better awaited Azure. Perhaps his metamorphosis would be a new stage of his life.
Perhaps it would be a change in his world.
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=== Chapter 2 ===
Promise was a hivewing with only a mother.
And a crazy one, at that.
""Hun, when in Clearsight's lifetime will you compliment my baking?"
"Mmm..probably never." Promise estimated as her mother sighed.
"Little one, don't talk to me like that."
"I'm not a 'little one' anymore," Promise pointed out while marvelling a few flowers
she had picked today from the Savanna Shop.
That was actually the only place allowed to bring nature inside the hives, to give hivewings a good source of air.
It ranged from harmless flowers like asters to deadly ones like oleander.
Promise added the best of the pink flowers to her flower crown as her mother smiled "Some things will never change."
"Mom-why are you so sappy." Promise groaned as her mother said "Your ruining the moment-"
"Hmph." Promise responded, looking at some more varieties of pink flowers.
"Why don't we ever go flower-picking?" she asked as Firefly said "Silkwings like to do that stuff-well, when they have time. Not us hivewings, though, hun."
Argh. Silkwings ruined everything. Why they couldn't play in the savanna-because silkwings did that. Why they couldn't pick their own flowers? Because 
silkwings did that. Funny how she didn't be ruder to silkwings.
Firefly guessed her thoughts and agreed "Silkwings are terrible. All they do is limit us hivewings from freedom."
That was the only thing she agreed with her mother on.
"Whats your favorite flower?"
"Marigolds, of course."
"Don't you use that tone with me," Firefly warned
"Why not?" Promise asked sarcastically
"Because I'm your mom. I'm supposed to be respected," Firefly complained
"Sure, kid."
"Hey!" her mom yelped
"So, what do we do? I don't think we have school today, right?"
"No, but you can stay up in your room"
"Why do you always send me there?" Promise asked wearily as her mother said
"Because of your bad attitude. Now begone."
"Not nice." Promise huffed, going up to her room. At least it was colorful in there.
She always felt a sentimental attachment to her flower crown and rarely took it
off.
Promise looked down at her talons again, wishing she was the Queen of
Floralwings-if those were even real.
Floralwings were dragons who looked like flowers, adorned themselves with flowers, and fed themselves with nectar from flowers. But they were just a little-known rumor from Clearsight's time.
How they were discovered? Here was the story
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THE FLORALWINGS
Once upon a time, millenias ago, tribes were different.
Leafwings and a mysterious tribe which could change their scales and supposedly shoot venom were once merged as FloralWings.
Slowly, flowers started to die.
Years went on and the Paradise Kingdom lost it's lush, and some accussions broke out.
One FloralWing accused the leaf-winged part of the tribe for 'stopping the growth
of the plants with their plant-control'.
This caused rivalries and anger to grow among the tribe.
"No!" one of the plant-controllers cried, pointing to the other tribe (which she
called RainforestWings, Rainwings for short, she didn't know why, it just felt right) and said "You are accusing us because you are afraid of the punishments if you take the blame!"
Trust broke down rapidly in the tribes, none of them interacting with each other-until the Edenwings, a section which did not fight at all pointed out that they were destroying their tribe.
Leafwings and Rainwings did not listen to the Edenwings' warning cries, and it
started with an angry rainwing who snuck into the queens' palace side at
midnight.
Her name was Ocelot-and she hated Queen Eden with all her heart for
supposedly 'not doing anything about the rivalry.'
She crept into her room at night, armed with toxins and knives, and successfully assassinated the Queen.
The tribe broke off into 3, Leafwings, Rainwings, and Edenwings, who had went
extinct a while ago.
But rumor says that any oddly colored leafwing is the reincarnation of an
Edenwing..
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Too bad leafwings were extinct now.
It was unfortunate the only two-winged tribe was too stubborn to accept Wasp and had gotten themselves killed forever in the Tree Wars.
That made Promise wonder what Edenwings looked like.
She had heard that Clearsight had a faint vision, a blurry one of what might be an
Edenwing reincarnated as a colorful leafwing.
Who was this colorful leafwing, anyways? Were they alive? Or did Clearsight's
visions not go that far. But they must have-or else the whole Book of Clearsight
would be a lie. Was that possible?
Argh. Too many questions and not enough time to answer them.
Promise realized she was daydreaming and leaning quite far out her window as
she quickly put her head back inside the house, mumbling "Owch" as she hit her
horn on the sill.
Windowsills were not very useful at the moment.
Funny how her mother had them.
Promise sighed as she fiddled with more of her flowers-and her talons again.
The hivewing was only nice to other hivewings, since the only other option was
silkwings, and she knew she didn't like silkwings.
According to her friends, they did act similar to her, and she didn't like that.
"Your thinking." her mother guessed from behind her "Remarkable."
"Hey-" Promise yelped, jumping "When did you get here?"
"Half an hour ago." her mother said dryly.
"So you were basically stalking me for that long?"
"No-I was just watching you." her mother said, nearly sitting on a flowerbed Promise had misplaced.
"Mother!" she yelped, quickly grabbing the flowerbed.
"That's why you should clean your room."
"I do organize my room," Promise said pointedly as her mother said "Well, you do
need to clean it more." in the same tone that Promise used with her.
Promise sighed and said "This is boring. Can we go do something?"
"Like what?"
"Hmm..I don't know.
"Promise to do it?"
"Fine, tell me, please."
"Good." her mother said as Promise drifted off into her head again.
Edenwings. I wonder if I would like how they acted if they were still alive. I wonder
if they had any special powers. I wonder how I would react if I met one-I wonder
what Wasp would do with them. Edenwings are extinct, but what if thats not true?
What if leafwings aren't extinct and there are still some reincarnations left?
"It was.." Promise's mother said but she wasn't even listening anymore
Edenwings, a tribe of paradise. she thought, daydreaming of talking with one.
"Hello!" she imagined an Edenwing saying
"Hi!" Promise imagined herself saying back, looking excited
"I have come to tell you that you, your Majesty, have inherited the Edenwing throne!"
"Really?"
"Yes!"
But Promise's mother had to ruin her train of thought and say "Eating some of my cookies!"
"Aw no-"
"You promised." her mother said and dragged her downstairs.
"Hopefully you don't set the kitchen on fire this time." Promise added
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=== Chapter 3 ===
Abispa was laying down tiredly. Today was boring, and they hadn't gotten much sleep last night. They twitched their tail vigerously, bored of their surroundings.
The hives were plainly-colored and terribly bland. There was nothing to do in Bloodworm Hive, other than yell at SilkWings (which was rather cruel in their opinion). Speaking of SilkWings, why were there no LeafWings? Why did they all have to be wiped out in the Tree Wars? Such a shame, really. They could have been rather useful when it came to treestuff. Imagine having a little baby leafwing pet! They would be such a nice change from all the yellow. SilkWings had a barely limited color variety, but were often covered in scars or dirt. Making them look as boring as everything else.
Abispa looked at their claws, and then their scales. Mostly black, and speckled with that unique gold - made her stand out, actually. They had darkly colored wings, too. They had more black scales than most hivewings, having their scales mainly the color hivewings usually had as a secondary color, and their secondary as a hivewings usual primary. It actually made them feel special, in a way.
Abispa saw a surprisingly brave silkwing wave, as they stared a bit before waving back slightly. Silkwings weren't supposed to wave! They weren't even supposed to look at hivewings like equals! Hivewings were higher than silkwings by far (or at least that was what Lady Bloodworm and Queen Wasp said). Avispa, personally, disagreed with this logic, though.
They (Abispa) growled a bit, before spreading their wings. The hives were large but at the same time they felt so dense and cramped. The sky on the other hand, was so vast, so free. Why couldn't the hives be more like that? And why was there no change of color at all? As they said, it was very bland and boring and dim.
Terribly dim compared to the sun. When Avispa felt sunlight on their scales, they somehow felt happier and faster - most of all stronger.
Abispa saw an angry SilkWing storm by. They recognized him as Azure. Actually, they'd been watching the athletic SilkWing at his school.
Abispa waved. He seemed to notice her presence, growling very slightly before waving back. Abispa frowned before walking a little closer, watching him take a step back. Like most SilkWings, he was spooked of most HiveWings - yet he was unfriendly towards them.
Abispa cut off this train of thought and slowly approached as tension arose between the two, both looking at each-other competitively.
"Hi." Abispa said as he slowly turned his gaze to meet theirs, but didn't say anything. He simply paused before waving very slightly. Such an odd little silkwing. They could see him from up close now. His face was startlingly unemotional and he had something pale yellow wrapped around his neck, along with some stuff wrapped around the edges of his horns. Most SilkWings here were injured, but this one didn't seem to be injured - but what were those accessories for? SilkWings never bought accessories. They realized Azure was wingless, but was unusually stern for his age. Most SilkWings were the exact opposite, goofing off whenever the HiveWings weren't around. Abispa looked at him, as he grumbled a bit.
But Abispa was really hungry . . maybe they could ask him to get something for her. He looked a bit unpredictable, so it was a slim chance he would say yes and actually carry out the order. But Abispa was willing to take it. "Hey. Can you go grab me some food?" as he looked at them blankly, but they quickly added "If I get you something to eat." Abispa was worried Azure would refuse, but he slowly nodded as HiveWing guards came over.
"What's going on here?" one asked as Abispa said "Oh. Just telling him to get me some food. In return for something" Abispa said with a shrug, acting smooth. Unfortunately, it wasn't enough. "What something?" the second guard accused as Abispa responded "Food." as Azure nodded. He's actually backing me up here. they thought, bewildered because of Azure's behavior to other HiveWings as the guards stared at them both suspiciously, as the dialogue paused. "Alright." one said, keeping a close eye on her as they both went back to their posts.
"Phew." they said adding "Hivewing guards are scary sometimes." Azure stared at them for a moment as they opened their mouth "They can be." he said in a blunt tone before Abispa could start throwing around apologies. "Oh. Phew. Thought you didn't agree with me there." they let out a nervous laugh as the SilkWing in front of them sighed. He didn't seem that energetic after school. "So . . that test.
How did you do?" they asked as he raised his eyebrows "Now how do you know
that I even had a test?" as Abispa realized their mistake before making up a lie
"Oh-uh-I saw other SilkWings talking about the curriculum." as he muttered "Hm." skeptically before saying "100." as Abispa said "Congrats!" with a tad too much enthusiasm which bought the attention of most of the hivewings as they said
"Well . . A-um-I don't know your name." she said, stopping herself before she could say Azure. "Azure." he said, looking down at his scales tiredly.
They said "Wanna stay at my house tonight?", breaking the awkward silence.
Azure looked at her skeptically again before saying ". . sure." She could see why he was pausing a lot - it was unusual for hivewings to even start a conversation with silkwings. Soon, the two were walking to Abispa's home. It wasn't grand nor humble, like most houses on the block. A few HiveWing guards were storming around as Abispa said "Duck." as Azure obeyed in a split-second. He was actually one of the most clever SilkWings they hd ever met, as he was now looking exactly like a servant, using his tail to brush dust over him. His scales almost immediately turned brownish as did his neck band. Abispa blinked at the quick reactor, and then raised their head as if they were a prinxe. The HiveWing guards didn't notice anything suspicious, and let the two past, and eyeing Azure like a rotten honey drop. They could see he was trying his best not to rip them into shreds.
They could see it was nightfall now, but the guards were unorderly. They would never notice Azure was gone - well, hopefully. HiveWings were shutting off the lights everywhere, leaving them lost in complete darkness. "Come." Abispa whispered, holding onto Azure's talon to make sure they didn't lose him in the confusion and bewilderment. Azure didn't struggle as they dragged him towards the familiar but shady shape of their house.
Abispa finally got to their house as both went inside. They slammed the door shut behind her with a sigh of relief. "This is where I live. I hope they don't notice if you're gone for too long." Azure snorted and said "They're too busy talking to notice any SilkWings - well - unless its me. But they don't talk to me that much.
I'm sure they wont notice." he added, seeing the nervous look on Abispa's face.
They added "Lets hope so."
=== Chapter 4 ===
Azure heard voices around him, but he didn't want to wake up. He wanted to stay comfy and . . wait. It was nearly time for school! He sat up straight, seeing Abispa still asleep. They don't need to know. Its best to leave them asleep. as he ran out of the house, ignoring the stares of hivewing guards as he rushed by. Today was the day jobs would be assigned, apparently, and Azure definitely didn't want to miss out on that. Imagine if he was a constructor and didn't notice! Personally, Azure wanted to be an athlete, but he knew that wasn't a job - that was a 'hobby'. Still seemed like a job to him.
Azure rushed around the blocks. He was unfamiliar with them, but he had great memory, perhaps even photographic. He wasn't sure about that though. Turn right, left, go forward, onto Honeycomb Block, 6th building on that street his mind recited as he followed, and soon found himself in front of his school.
Azure quickly composed himself, slowing his pace, ducking his head, keeping his eyes low, and his talons pacing as he entered the school. It wasn't that grand compared to Abispa's home - well, to any HiveWing's home from what he knew. The halls were bumbling with students and high-pitched, nervous chatter filled the hallways. He could see a few dragonets running out of the building, and others shaking - you might even say trembling. Mason was eyeing Azure hopefully as Azure ducked his head. Mason and Abispa were going to be the only HiveWings he would even consider friends. Azure didn't have any SilkWing friends, because most were afraid of him or thought of him as a rival because of his skill in PE.
The halls fell silent as a dragon stared at them. A HiveWing . . and she looked exactly like Lady Bloodworm. But right behind her, with her wings spread, was Queen Wasp. Azure stifled a gasp of pure terror and froze on the spot. Queen Wasp? He would have expected Lady Bloodworm but Queen Wasp? He stopped himself from shaking and eased himself - but he was still in a rather stiff position.
Wasp's judging gaze fell over the near-adult SilkWings, scanning them with those merciless cold eyes. Her voice felt like spiders crawling under his scales as she said ". . . I would like to see . ." and despite all his silent pleading she said "Azure." No, no, no, no, no! Azure thought as everyone turned their gaze towards him. Wasp did too as she said "Come forward." Lady Bloodworm seemed to open her mouth to protest, but Wasp glared and she fell silent too. Azure instinctively obeyed, his legs moving towards her with his head ducked and his gaze down. "Hm . . perfect position." she said before continuing "Hold out your wrists." as he did, confused. But then a cold realization hit him, like a spear stabbing into his mind. She was checking if he was a flamesilk. He heard rumors both of his parents were, indeed flamesilks but he never thought it was true. Wasp scanned his wrists and said "Inform me to arrive the day before his metamorphosis." as Lady Bloodworm seemed to glare before pausing and saying "Of course, your majesty." Bloodworm usually acted like she was queen, but it was clear Wasp's rank was higher by far. Wasp was the true ruler of all hivewings, of all hives. And she was going to make sure that title stayed for a very long time.
Wasp briskly walked out of the room, handing the teachers papers. He could see a few students try not to smile while others let out choked sobs, as they looked at their papers. Azure waited for his, and when all the papers were handed, he still hadn't gotten his. He raised his talon quietly as Ms. Honeybee turned towards him "Yes?" she said mildly as he explained "I have not recieved my papers." as to his surprise, she waved her talons dismissively and said "Wasp wants to postpone it." Azure was relieved. He was not ready to face his future just yet. Lady Bloodworm eyed him before brisking away herself.
Azure tried to ignore his heart pounding loudly, and looked around at other students. None got As, but Azure didn't remember failing anything this year, so hopefully he would get a good job. What was on his mind right now, though, was flamesilk. Was it real? Was it a lie to keep little silkwings in order? Or was he actually going to morph into one, in 3 days? That was a train of thought he didn't want to continue.
Azure went back to his regular schedule. It was math class now, and PE had to be
skipped for the ceremony. He hated math, it was terribly bland in his opinion.
SilkWings barely got to learn high-level math, from what the teachers said, so his
class was only learning a bit of multiplication. "Azure." the teacher said. Everyone
seemed to have their attention on him ever since Wasp called him up as he said
"10 x 10 would be 100." in a blank tone as she said "Correct." and called up another
student named Karner to answer something like 7 x 9. He answered incorrectly
and was scolded.
Azure's mind drifted away. What is a flamesilk's life like, anyways? I wouldn't think it was good. Why are they kept locked away from society? It just doesn't make sense! I need to tell Abispa about this later. I hope they wont be too upset with me for sneaking out. Probably not, after all it was for school. But . . something tells me that something is up with Lady Bloodworm. I wonder what. Did she figure it out? Or is something else terribly wrong . . ? Azure shook off the crazed fear from earlier which was still lingering, but the same didn't seem to work for his current creeping dread. He frowned and looked at the board, hoping the problems displayed on it would distract him or override his fears, preferably both. 5 x 4 = 20, 2 x 3 = 6, 8 x 12 = hmm.. 96? Azure guessed before quitting his board answering thingy which kept him distracted, but annoyed him and focused on his mental image of Abispa, which was quite distracting, actually. The black which clashed against the specks of gold and gold lining. Perfectly neat, as if painted, although from what he knew, they weren't. He'd need to ask them about that today.
Math seemed to last forever, before the bell rang. Students stayed in their seats though, as Ms. Honeybee eyed them - well - him in particular (she was staring straight at him). Azure usually didn't bother to stare back, and today was no different. He kept his eyes on the ground, but his antennae more than usual. Oh - he didn't need to go home today! He was permitted to wander after midnight because his graduation was coming up - but what would he tell Agrias? She wasn't going to be happy. Maybe he could ask the mailman to deliver a note? That sounded like a better idea than coming back, but Agrias would still be very upset (and betrayed if she heard he liked to stay with Abispa better). Poor Agrias - but he would give her the address! She could visit him anytime. But for now, he would like to go back to Abispa. By the blood of Clearsight, since when do you get clingy to hivewings? but his subconscious responded Abispa is different. You can't deny that. as Azure shook his head vigerously. "Dismissed." he heard her say. He needed to get back to Abispa as quick as possible and tell them about today, or else he might not get the possible help he needed right now.
Azure walked out of the building, one thought lingering at the back of his mind What if I am a flamesilk?
=== Chapter 5 ===
Promise was flying around the hives next morning, daydreaming of a few flowers she was fond of. A fight seemed to be taking place below her. A few angry - looking dragonets (most likely silkwings based on their color palette) with aggressive faces plastered on themselves were chasing a whimpering young yellow dragon. It turned right and left, and it was a blur from here.
Promise wanted to get closer, but she couldn't without dragging attention towards herself, which might have gotten others to get suspicious. She tried her best to see the dragonet clearly. All she could see is that it was a blindingly bright yellow and had a scared look on its face .
She decided to land from afar, watching as the guards grabbed the bright yellow dragonet as it squirmed, clawing at the two who held it firm. It had faint black speckles and freckles, and seeing more, it pushed against their claws as they chuckled. "Now, now. What should we do with this one?" as it shoved against them.
"Oh no, you don't." a brown and mahogany silkwing said, readying his claws. The dragonet only seemed to be 2. It squeezed its eyes shut, but Promise interrupted the scene. "What are you doing!?" she hissed, flying down from her hiding spot with her wings spread to protect the little dragonet as she snatched them from the silkwings' claws. One yelped while the other shouted angrily as she turned to face their supposed leader calmly. He was an odd dark yellow silkwing that had dim green eyes and dark golden horns. "You really think you're so tough, hivewing?" he scoffed. His voice sounded deep, and he was tall, with a twisted tail and broken snout. Promise hid her true feelings and said "Do you think you are?" as he growled. Ok, now she really needed to get out of here. The other SilkWings were flexing their claws as he said "A-ttack!" Promise cut him off in the middle by smacking his already twisted snout, which he didn't seem happy about.
In an instant, Promise found multiple hivewings swarming towards her as she quickly dodged one's razor sharp talons and dropped the dragonet saying "What are you waiting for? Run!" as the little one rushed off. The other SilkWings circled her like sharks. Most were metamorphosized and had some sort of injury. Some seemed startled while others were looking ready for the challenge. And all of them had the same marking, the same pale orange moth marking their necks, some had one on their forehead along with it. That included their 'leader' and most of the SilkWings near their leader. "We live for justice!" they chanted as their leader twisted his head towards Promise threateningly as she backed up a bit before saying "SilkWings. Knew they weren't as kind as everyone stereotyped." "We are kind to those who deserve it!" snapped their leader as he continued "We are the Wings of the Lonomia, and we live for justice!" The 'we live for justice' chant echoed due to the others trying to make cringey side effects.
Promise snapped at one before saying "Shoo. There isn't enough to fill your nosey noses here." as the SilkWing leapt for her as she dodged, trying to run off before more leapt at her, swarming her as she squirmed out of an orange and purple SilkWing's grasp and leapt back before another could lunge at her. Her heart pounded as she thought I need to run. I can get the guards if I manage to get close enough to my mother's house. They can deal with the SilkWings. so Promise took slow steps back before leaping off her feet, zipping away in an instant, watching SilkWings fly after her. Oh wait- why wasn't she flying? She'd get more attention that way! Well, that might be a good or bad thing. Promise twisted around some curves as HiveWings all over shut their windows. Had they seen this before? Ack! Not time to focus on questions, time to focus on running! She zipped around, dashing past a few unluckly HiveWings who ran off as soon as they saw the swarm. The SilkWings behind her were getting farther into the distance, shouting angrily about how 'righteous' their causes were. One said "COME BACK HIVEWING! PAY THE CONSEQUENCES FOR YOUR MISTAKES!" as Promise yelled back "WHAT MISTAKE? SAVING A DRAGONET FROM A MOB?!" as the dragon gaining responded "NO! FOR ENSLAVING INNOCENT SILKWINGS!" as Promise shot back "DO YOU HAVE MY FILES? YOU DON'T KNOW IF I ENSLAVE SILKWINGS SO STOP ASSUMING THINGS!" as the other dragon didn't respond as the group chanted "We live for justice!", their voices were getting louder . . meaning they were getting closer.
Promise dodged a few yelling HiveWings shoving past each-other, and saw a few cops run off too. Were you kidding? The cops were too cowardly to deal with this mob? Wow, they must be real infamous Promise thought wearily, still running. A few dragons behind her were trying to distract her by throwing fruit at her feet, but she kept her gaze averted from the food and was finally getting close to Honeycomb Block. This was called Flannel Lane, and it was notorious for crimes and rebellious SilkWings. How fun. A grumpy SilkWing mob chasing after her. She nearly ran into a box of something, but jumped over it. She felt like she was in that Subway Surfers game. How she knew what it was? She heard rumors that Clearsight had oddly predicted that it was a game of the future on something called a . . a what? An electrozip? An electrorip? Oh! An electronic. But it wasn't going to be available to dragons, unfortunately.
She yelped as a few dragons rammed into buildings nearby, seeming angry that she was escaping. They were yelling angrily over it, fussing like it was a big deal. What did she ever do to them? Well, she'd have to ask them that later because now wasn't the time. And plus, she probably couldn't ask them without being - uhhh - what would they do? She didn't care - she just needed to get away from those startling faces.
Once she got past the border, SilkWings all around her lurked away, while some lingered, hiding in their surroundings, probably hoping she would come back. Which she was not going to do. She saw their sneering faces and their markings. Was that a sign of who to watch out for? Hmmm. Oddly enough, silkwings in general never caused trouble. Why would they start a gang? For 'justice'? This 'justice' didn't seem very just, though.
Promise decided against running to her mother's house and slamming the door shut. It would be better to fly around a bit, just in case some of the SilkWings were following her. If she went home, they could target mother, too. In fact, I did see them muttering about something while I was running - but what? They had let her go . . and that was what worried her. Was it because Honeycomb Block was better guarded . . ? Or was it because they were planning something bigger ?
I was zooming around the hives, ignoring the weird looks other HiveWings gave me. Note to self - never go to Flannel Lane ever again, and especially not to confront a bunch of angry - looking silkwings with weird orange moth markings and called themselves 'The Wings of the Lonomia' and wouldn't shut up about 'justice'. Weird dragons. The oddest thing was all of them had already grown their wings and had their silk. Why didn't they use that to tie her up? Maybe she was farther from them than she thought. Or - but just as she started that sentence, silk flew, missing her by a strand. By Clearsight's foresight, why did this have to happen? she thought grumpily, dodging strands of silk. The authorities here were better than Flannel Lane, surely. "Hey!" Promise said, as the strands of silk stopped as she turned to a random adult HiveWing "Some silkwings were attacking me." as he snorted "SilkWings? Everyone knows they don't attack dragons, is this a joke?" as Promise said "No! They were shooting their silk at me!" as the HiveWing sighed "Where are they now?" as Promise pointed behind her where she had located them "THE LONOMIA-" the HiveWing seemed to shout, fainting. Promise ran off again - maybe her house was the best option.
Her heart pounded as she ran across, dodging strands of silk on her way. When would they ever leave her alone? Why were they not reported to Queen Wasp?
Promise guessed they ate baby HiveWings for dinner or something like that. And that wasn't very fair, if you asked her. Not very fair at all. What did the HiveWings do to them? Be honest? Not sugarcoat the world like the SilkWings wanted them to? Rude. But perhaps she could focus more on her sense of navigation at the point of time. Yikes - now she really wanted to be a SilkWing, for the first time in her life. Partially because she was being chased by SilkWings, and wouldn't be if she were a SilkWing - or did the Wings of Lonomia target everyone, including their own tribe? Alright, back to the subject. And partially because she wanted to check how much time the SilkWings had been chasing her. HiveWings had a good sense of time, but SilkWings had a near-perfect one. She finally spotted her house and rushed over, a swarm - well - a mini swarm of SilkWings behind her with their arsenal of silk following. She slammed the door as Firefly, her mother thundered "Where have you been?!" as Promise said "Oh, sorry, couldn't come home earlier, had a MOB OF SILKWINGS chasing me." as Firefly facepalmed and said "Go up to your room." with a grumble as Promise set up for her room. The flowers didn't
comfort her much anymore. She adjusted her flower crown and watched from the
windows. The SilkWings seemed to have left them alone, but she didn't want to jinx it.
She shuddered, knowing today was not going to be a very good day. At all.
=== Chapter 6 ===
Inhale. Exhale. It's all going to be alright. Abispa tried to tell themselves while preparing to block - maybe even - most likely - ok, definitely barricade the door just as Azure ran in yelping "Moons whats with all the angry silkwings?!" as Abispa said "Thats the Wings of Lonomia! Those psychotic gang-wannabes! Always pick on the HiveWings, why don't they run offf and annoy some other hivewings! Why not Queen Wasp if they hate us so much!?" as Azure grumpily sighed, muttering "What is wrong with them. . ." as Abispa blinked, saying "Is it just me or are your wingbuds larger?" as Azure paused for a minute before saying "Wait . . BY ALL THE SILK MOTHS AND BLOODIED, FALLEN MOONS MY METAMORPHOSIS IS TOMORROW!" the last part had come out a sharp, high-pitched yell - screech - scream which annoyed Abispa.
"Quick. Get up somewhere, I think they aren't targetting us. But they will if we show ourselves." they said, noticing Azure's relieved face and adding the but they will if we show ourselves part. They didn't want to ruin his day, but they didn't want to leave him blinded to the dangers of these SilkWings either. Otherwise he would be in huge trouble if he were to encounter one of of their members. The Wings of Lonomia was a warped group that thought by killing HiveWings they were bringing justice. Why didn't they understand that HiveWings - well - at least not all of them - fine - some of them weren't evil, even if many were. Abispa could admit, they thought it was wrong to enslave SilkWings, but that wasn't their choice to make.
Suddenly, they felt a huge bang in their head as they hissed, a splitting headache coming in. Their heart started to beat rapidly and their wings started to twitch on their own. "Azure-hide!" they hissed, covering their wings over themselves. Azure looked concerned, but nodded and brisked upstairs, not leaving a trace of himself anywhere. Abispa started to try to fight back, like they always did, feisty struggling and aggressive pulls of their head, trying to snap themselves out of the unision that most HiveWings had no problem with. Abispa hated not being in control of their actions. They hated being Wasp's puppet!
"Grrr . . ." Abispa muttered under their breath, tossing and turning visibly and quiet vigorously. Wasp snapped into them as they felt their pupils go up into their eye socket. Abispa started clawing at their eyes, but Wasp snapped into them as they flew up with the rest, in a single movement. They hated feeling so ordinary. It felt like centipedes crawling up their spine and biting off their pupils, which weren't visible at the point of time. Just that dead grub white. That blasted dead grub white. Abispa hated the control, it was the worst thing in the world. Why couldn't they be a normal dragon with a normal life which did not involve being possessed by their own Queen!? Terrible was all they could say. Life of a HiveWing was terrible. Swarms of yellow were around them, and they could only wait for this to end. To wait for this whole, horrible thing to end.
Abispa grabbed a spear, like all (well, most) of the other HiveWings and charged at SilkWings all around the block vigorously. They grabbed one and dropped it from a high angle, watching it fall to death as they snarled, clutching their head again. "No! No, no, no!" they shouted quietly, getting a hold of themselves for a split second before falling under control again. No! it always felt as if they were trapped inside their mind No! Get out of my head, Wasp! they thought again, but she couldn't transmit thoughts into Wasp, and Wasp couldn't transmit thoughts to them. "Leave." they said, yet they never said it. Their heads twisted towards the SilkWings who, outnumbered, were slowly backing away. Just as backup arrived . . and everyone charged, including Abispa, who's wings were going fidgety as they, themselves tried to fly the other way. But their wings stopped as the control went firm, and they moved in unision with the others. They felt pretty tired now, probably to tired to struggle more, so they relaxed as their wings were pulled. They charged into a silkwing who wrapped up their wings with silk as Abispa tried to flee. Wasp's control wouldn't allow it though, as they fought from ground now, slashing at a SilkWing and killing it. The others gaped and gasped, but Wasp reacted first as Abispa killed two others in a single, painful blow which made their heart hammer against their chest as they lunged at another, being thrown aside this time. A SilkWing tore at their back before they (Abispa) threw them (Unnamed Silkwing) off vigorously.
SilkWings circled them everywhere, but Wasp still tore them free and made them kill some more SilkWings. Abispa was lunged at, but they tore free once more, slashing at anything that came near them including a few SilkWings who recoiled with their snouts bleeding. A few other HiveWings came as backup Thank the moons this is the Queen. Otherwise I would have been dead by now. they thought, for the first time in their life they were relieved Wasp was controlling them. HiveWings started swarming them, and finally, after what seemed like forever all the SilkWings stopped shooting and dropped to the ground, most either worn out or limp, as if they were dead. Some might have been playing dead, but that was none of their (Abispa's) concern. They were going to get themselves killed either way since HiveWings burned dead bodies most of the time. But it was not over yet.
Abispa's claws clinged onto a SilkWing and smashed them into a wall. She was greyish blue, and seemed unwilling, unlike the rest of the SilkWings who were lashing out oblivious to hivewings punching them and tearing at their skin. Well - for a split second. One screamed loudly, collapsing. Abispa - or - Wasp punched at the SilkWings, who hissed in anger.
Abispa felt a faint push against their scales, a soft, tickling one. The smells were sharper over here . . . and these smells were very odd. She could smell tons of silkwing, a bit of hivewing . . but a trace - just a small strand - of something other. Something . . different. Something dragonesque but not familiar to Abispa's senses. This couldn't be a SilkWing - they always smelled like honey, and this couldn't be a hivewing - hivewings smelled a lot worse than this, actually. They smelled like rotten zebra meat and dead bugs (disgusting!). And this certainly couldn't be a LeafWing, those were dead. And they would be dead forever. They were EXTINCT. Or were they? Odd how Abispa was thinking so deeply about a smell that could just be a weird hivewing or silkwing! There wasn't much more to it, was there? It was sort of a fresh scent, like mint, but a bit drowned out by another smell wafting over it, which they (Abispa) couldn't quite identify. It smelled sort of . . . like the bushes, but fresher? How strange.
Abispa managed to get a sense of what was around them. They could smell a lot of dragons nearby, most being HiveWings, but a nearing sense of more SilkWings clouded both their senses and head. As Abispa finally gained control over their eyes, they saw that they weren't in the hives anymore. That was what their small wavering smell must had been supposed to tell them! But there was still that smell which confused them. It wasn't air or the breeze, and Abispa was pretty sure LeafWings would smell like trees, whatever that smelled like.
Uh oh. Did trees smell like bushes? Or was Abispa going too far to be safe from the perils of the outside world? The terrors that were awaiting them? Abispa shuddered a bit, although still in control of Queen Wasp. They felt their head whip towards the direction of the scent of the minty bushes from earlier. Suddenly, the silkwings were left behind, most blinking in confusion, while others collapsed to the ground from exhaustion almost immediately. A large HiveWing was in the lead of the group, and Abispa was a near-random one in the middle of it. Hivewing tails smacked her snouts as she unwillingly snapped at them, since they couldn't protest at this point. Was Wasp actually this weird? Snapping at herself? How peculiar.
Abispa kept their face forward unwillingly - well - they had no problem with it but they didn't particularly want to for any particular reason (well they didn't care either way but still). Zombie - like hivewings were everywhere, mumbling and grumbling just as Abispa was. They guessed Wasp was the one grumbling by the plain, uniform unision of the grumpy hivewings who were flying. Suddenly, the smell got a lot stronger in Abispa's nose, a shocking scent that wafted in their ears, unfamiliar and foreign, but yet so dragon-like. It was 1 dragon actually, which smelled of (what Abispa imagined) dirty earth's (smell to be like) and mint. All the hivewings' heads swung around before snapping towards the exact direction the smell was coming from, heading over in an instant. The smell seemed near, but it was going to take a while to get there, from Abispa's internal senses' - well - sense.
It was hot outside, and the sun beat against their wings mercilessly as they flew in a tired manner. That got them thinking .. Can Wasp really feel what the dragons' she's controlling feel? Is that why all the hivewing's are tired, and that still reflects on themselves (the HiveWings) although they aren't the ones in control? Does that make Wasp 1,000,000x - (ok - that was an exaggeration, but still) more tired than us? Does she feel that worn out after controlling dragons - even if just the HiveWings? Does that effect her own physical health, or just ours? Why aren't SilkWings controlled? Why doesn't Wasp have power over them? Does it only work for HiveWings? and that was how, rather swiftly, quickly and suddenly, Abispa's mind was buzzing with questions like never before. But that was what made them realize there were holes stabbed into that world, as if it was just paper. Why did Wasp really control HiveWings? Why did nobody know? If nothing was wrong, Wasp would reveal it! Which meant Abispa needed to find out. They needed to tell Azure! But he was too far away now, back in Bloodworm Hive and probably blinking in dumbfounded confusion. They had a feeling he was doing exactly that at the moment. Or did he know about the mind - control? Not likely, yet possible. But then again, how would a SilkWing know anything about mind - control? Especially such a young one. By watching . . . Abispa tried (and failed) to not let their mind whisper faintly, like a distant breeze, a soft howl in their ears. They didn't know why, but they were spooked right now, especially since that tone of their mind was startlingly quiet and creepy, like the eerie voice of a ghost in an abandoned town. When on earth would they be able to stop flying? This was tiring and making them think they would secrete sweat right now if they could, like one of those weird mammal thingies. Mammals were furry, and generally odd. HOW HOT WERE THEY GOING TO BE?! Moons, they hated how many hivewings were bumping into them, and they were getting hostile due to heat. That was normal for HiveWings, as most were sensitive to temperature, especially hot temperature. Abispa saw more HiveWings hiss and all snap at each other. Wasp's work.
This heat was scorching, and unfair in general. They wished they had a flamesilk lamp to set something on fire with right now. Staring at their scales (well, the black areas) might have calmed them down but they could barely glance around thanks to Queen Lazy! ARGH! More hivewings clawed at their heads angrily, including Abispa, but kept moving, getting slower every moment.
Suddenly, Abispa felt the control over themselves surge back to their talons as they fell out of the sky. Stupid Wasp! She dropped the control while the HiveWings were in the air. Abispa tried to correct themselves, but they plummeted below, like a few hivewings who lay dead. They weren't dead - yet - though (they hoped). They saw a crowd over a small hole in the prarie, and stood up. Luckily - VERY luckily - they weren't hurt, so they went over to check out what the crowd was about. The mint smell was stronger here, so strong it nearly knocked Abispa off their feet. And then, they stopped as a dragonet came in view. Small, tiny, colorful but pale, and . . . it had 2 wings.
=== Chapter 7 ===
Azure hid, with his heart pounding vigorously. He'd seen this before, but although he knew it must have had to work on his supposed friend, he never thought he would have to see them go all crazy white eyed and stupid and unision and evil and - ok, that was too many ands. Resuming that - and under control of the horrible queen. Every HiveWing has gone outside the hives - were they OK? Was something wrong? Ok, that was sort of a stupid question. Of course something was wrong! Why else would Queen Wasp call the hivewings outside? Especially on such a hot day!
He was originally planning to follow Abispa, and that would be loyal, but it would express how much he was attached to them. After all, they were one of the only HiveWings - well - that was a lie - the only (so far) - he could trust. Well, only partially. They were mind-controlled and zombie-brained sometimes, as he had just seen. He did see them twitch while fighting, as if to resist, but they never got free. That was pretty scary, actually, especially the part where they were talking in unision with the others. They - her - it - sounded like cold honey, but layered with poison underneath.
Feeling untrusting, Azure growled. He was hiding somewhere Abispa never told him about - was that a bad sign? Or was that just him being paranoid again? What if Wasp could see in Abispa's thoughts and see Azure? Wait - what was with the visit? He had forgotten to worry about that, because of everything else to worry about, such as The Wings of the Lonomia, Abispa, his silk, etc. It was still about 6:40 in the morning, so he didn't have to leave for school yet, which would give him a bit of time to wonder what Wasp wanted him for. Whatever in the blasted moons she wanted him, just another SilkWing to even talk to her for.
Well, just another SilkWing was a lie. Azure was a possible - most likely (unless the rumors had been complete hoaxes, of course) flamesilk. A type of SilkWing which could probably burn down the world if they wanted to. A type of SilkWing who disappeared from the world and never came back after. A type of SilkWing who could really, never, ever, not as long as Wasp was still living, not as long as any hivewing was still living, could be free.
There was a break day for school, to prepare for metamorphosises? Was that the plural form of metamorphosis? Azure had always been worse at spelling and plurals, although it was so 'simple' according to other students. Abispa still wasn't back after that one day, and the Wings of the Lonomia had fled - not all of them - but most of them. A few were still lurking around, and Azure could peek out from the window a bit, but even from his high vantage he could practically see the furious scowls on their faces. And he was not going to just come outside as if the sun could shine in the hives and say "Hiii! How are you doing today? Bad deaths outside right?"
The paranoid silkwing kept checking his internal clock, watching the minutes tick by. What was going to happen? Wasp was probably going to come 5 minutes early. She always did that. Tick. 6:42. his internal clock rang. What if this was the end? Tick. 6:43. it rang again, as everything slowed down. What happens when Wasp arrives? What happens if I'm late? What happens if Abispa doesn't come back? What happens if they stay zombie-minded forever? Why would Wasp even do that?
He was now rushing to school, his tail swishing behind him rapidly. This was not a time to be late, but he could still be early without getting into trouble. He was already in a mess, he didn't need any more of one. All he needed was some time off from his worries, and worrying about HiveWings. How stupid was that? How stupid was it he was worrying about a tribe that he hated for what seemed like centuries? How stupid in the burning, bloodied, blasted moons was that?
Azure was coming 10 minutes early for some reason, even though he had planned to give himself 5 more minutes. Today just made him feel paranoid and worried. Over a hivewing. Of all tribes, a hivewing. Agrias was probably very mad with him - he bed she would , and she would be visiting the school today due to something in her work. She told him about it a while ago, when none of this happened. This mess was terrible, and so chaotic that Azure could never imagine himself being in the situation. Yet, somehow, he was.
And now he was rushing, his antennae flattening as he rushed past a few dragons, HiveWings and SilkWings, but some (the HiveWings, of course) eyed him skeptically and oddly, but turned away as they continued their day, as if he was no more than a bug. That was how HiveWing treated SilkWings, as if they were no more than nuisances. Was that the plural form of nuisance? Azure, as he mentioned bit ago, had a problem with plural forms for some reason, and this wasn't a great time for it. He was still worried about Abispa, though.
But now was not the time to think of that. Now was the time to rush to school. It's like any other day, except a creepy queen wants something with you that might make you vanish forever!-. he said, a nervous exclamation at the end of his mind's sentence which he tried to cover up with a period. This was sort of stupid, but he made his thoughts writing, which was why he was usually annoyed. Tons of letters scrolled in one documentary which was his brain, apparently, and occasionally he had to rip off some pieces to make it fit. It was tiring to have your mind a book, you know. It was sort of pointless as he probably wouldn't remember any of this and write it into an epic saga when the SilkWings were free when - if he wanted to. But it was absolutely just high hopes to think this would ever be over. But, then again, as impossible as it seemed, Wasp would have to die of natural or dragon causes sometime, right? Even if it wasn't in his lifetime (somehow), it would happen sometime.
Azure was rushing already, not keeping mind of where he was going and running straight into a pole, hearing a faint yell behind him, and he could practically read it as if it was a book. It always went like this Hey! SilkWing! Watch where you're going! but at the same time, quite hilariously, he realized that was what the angry shop - owner had said! He snorted, but kept focused - or - at least tried to. It was impossible to not be terrified of what was to come in a few minutes. He could practically feel his heart slamming around in his chest, like a hummingbird trapped in a dense cage with no room to fly - nor breath, actually.
This was horrifying, really. His wingbuds itched as he rubbed them, and his talons burned as he scraped them against the ground while rushing around aimlessly. He was going to school, but on the way he was making few unnecessary turns, looping around poles and things that held up the hives for no particular reason, maybe just to give himself more time before he faced his worst fear - Wasp. His (supposed, although he didn't dare write that in his mind) 'Queen'. She ruled 2 tribes, and she was already turned cruel by the power! Already is an understatement. She's been like this for - what - 50 years? he challenged himself to write that fearlessly, and obviously failed. He was afraid she could peek into her subjects' minds somehow.
Maybe mind-control worked on SilkWings too, but Wasp thought they were too insignificant? Maybe. But this was all probably just a mistake. Just a mistake. In a paper world. his subconscious shot back annoyingly like that dumb barbie song baby hivewings sung, as he muttered under his breath, annoyed as he finally reached the school.
It loomed over him. He thought of Mason . . his old teacher. He was really going to miss him, especially after being partially convinced not all HiveWings were evil. Partially, though. Even though, he really wanted to stay here forever now that he thought of it. He hated changes, even though there had only been a few in his life. But those changes were huge ones, which must have led to his attitude. He thought I hope I don't get partnered . . I want A- WHAT AM I THINKING ERASE THAT THOUGHT IMMEDIATELY MISTER!- Azure scolded himself in a panic as he scrabbled over that thought frantically, as he walked inside, twitching.
Instead of Wasp, he saw a glittering black hivewing with orange - yellow markings which were practically glowing. His heart skipped a beat for a moment. Were they really back? Were they safe? Why were they so late?! It was Abispa. They had came out almost completely uninjured, except for claw marks on their talons, which looked unfamiliar and sharp - probably painful, too. They were still red and bleeding, showing they were quite recent, which worried Azure for some reason. He didn't care for this HiveWing. Not even the tiniest bit. Or did he . . ?
Abispa wasn't to be friends with him. It would get both of them into trouble, and they were a HiveWing. HiveWings were evil, and that was always the case, no matter the whispers of his subconscious. Abispa was a HiveWing, again, Abispa was a HiveWing. Ok, now he sounded like he was trying to hypnotize himself, which he sort of was. He was doing this for the sole purpose of not getting himself or Abispa into trouble for being friends. That wasn't a thing between HiveWings and SilkWings - it simply didn't fit. HiveWings and SilkWings were in different places, and they were 2 separate tribes, residing in the same area or not. HiveWings were above SilkWings, and that was final. Well . . . not final. Wasp needs to die soon, you know. After that someone else (hopefully someone more sensible, but that was pushing his luck) can take over, and maybe things will go back to 'normal'. I don't think there is a normal anymore though. The lives of dragons are too warped now - especially the HiveWings. I know I probably wouldn't have thought this a week ago, but they have terrible lives. Wasp makes them do things they wont want to do, and I admit, it was wrong for me to blame them. Some HiveWings were rude to me, but I might have been judging them. They might have been raised this way. They aren't the true enemies. Wasp is. She's the one doing this. And I think I can stop her. I need Abispa to help though . . but how? They're controlled! They wont be able to help me, unless I keep them in some capsule with a box over their head, which seems a bit cruel - I would do it to a lot of HiveWings, but not Abispa. They didn't do anything wrong. They aren't just a random HiveWing, they're a different one. They don't hurt SilkWings, even though its dangerous to act even the slightest bit kind towards them. Them. Azure had always dreamed of being a leafwing instead, actually. It seemed to suit him more, the fierce green tribe who had fought back against Wasp. Well . . they were dead now, but maybe Azure could've changed that. Maybe he could be a hero among the LeafWings, be able to kill HiveWings in battle - but - again, it probably wasn't their fault. He did want vengeance for how terrible they were towards SilkWings, though.
Azure's talons dug into the treestuff ground below him (which was rather uncomfy, if you asked him) and looked up towards Abispa, in the posture of a servant as he bowed, and as much as it scraped against his instincts to run and never come back, he needed too, unless he wanted his head on a spike. Maybe it doesn't matter. Maybe they drain flamesilks' silk and then kill them. Maybe being mounted on a spike is less painful. he tried to reassure himself, but at the same time alerting himself of all the danger to come, yet that (the 'mounted on a spike is less painful') was hard to believe. He didn't want to end up either. He wanted to leave this horrible place already. But if he did now, he would have to leave everyone else behind - including Abispa. And that was exactly what he was not going to do. Instead, he would try to break Abispa out of the mind - control - but to do that, he needed to understand it. Wasp was straight in - front of him, so technically it would be easy to ask her - but then he'd sound too obvious, plus, she probably would just throw him in jail and not tell him anything, anyways, which would make it even harder than before! He needed to consult his books, but then again, he wasn't very good at that. He picked up things randomly, or used common sense to ace his test - he never actually studied, just pretended to so Agrias wouldn't get upset.
Speaking of Agrias, where was she? She was supposed to be here today, yet she was nowhere in sight, which worried Azure. Was she zombie - minded? Or did that only work on HiveWings? His eyes darted around while Wasp wasn't looking, looking for those creepy eye designed wings and dark purple, bright pink, and blue scales. She was usually easy to spot because of how diverse she looked compared to other SilkWings - well - any dragon! But today, he and Wasp were the only ones visible here, and Agrias was nowhere in sight. His talons tremored a bit and his antennae twitched and quivered very slightly, trying to pick up any sounds which sounded like Agrias. But there were none.
"SilkWing." Abispa - Wasp finally said. It was Abispa's voice, a unique light shining on your scales, but layered with frostbite which made you want to scream as loudly as possible and rush away at the speed of light, and keep running for a year along with that. He sucked his breath in and held it as Abispa - Wasp picked up his talons and examined them, before saying "So I was correct. He is one of them." as Azure froze, in a sort of terror and a sort of confusion - maybe even a mix of both. He felt the burning in his scales heat up as Abispa - Wasp dropped them with a pained hiss before more HiveWings rushed in, grabbing Azure, who didn't have enough time to react as he was dragged away, both his wingbuds and wrists twitching painfully, and the last thing he saw was Abispa's white eyes, so concerned, yet so strained. And then everything faded black . . .
=== Chapter 8 ===
Promise's tail curled as she looked outside the window blissfully. The streets were empty right now, eerily quiet, but alright with her, since she liked quiet time. Her ears seemed to lift as she heard bees quietly buzzing nearby. They didn't bother her, though, unlike most dragons. Instead, she smiled at the one taking nectar from a flower on her crown as it flew away. This was a bumblebee - so cute. Not as cute as butterflies though. Oops - that was a SilkWing - ish thought. No. I am not a SilkWing, but I dont need to restrict my thoughts. I need to restrict my words, but not my thoughts. But then again, thoughts do turn into words eventually. But I can keep them in. I think - I know I can. It'll be easy, as long as I don't think about them - well, that wouldn't work out since I want to think about them, but -
Then she looked up absentmindedly. EdenWings. The would know what to do. But it probably wouldn't involve action, from what she'd heard of them. They were wise, but they loved nature, so they would do anything to stop dragons from doing anything, including wars and clearings which would mean potential harm to them.  But then again, EdenWings would probably have died from lack of fresh air or depression because of the lack of actual plants other than grass. EdenWings needed tons of more air than every other tribe she knew of (other than LeafWings, since she never met one - obviously. What kind of dragon met another from an extinct tribe? And before you go complaining about how they might not be extinct, there were no recorded sights  for 50 years since the Tree Wars. Those made-up stories by those random miners who were probably sleep-deprived, hallucinating, and overworked because of current lack of volunteers and dragons willing to get their claws dirty in the savanna who weren't SilkWings, who didn't have a choice to go work there and were instead assigned a job didn't count, unfortunately, since - well - they were SilkWings. At least that was the stereotypical HiveWing thought. Argh! That meant I was turning into one of those normal stinging butterfly-brains? Ack! Silkwing insult and forbidden thought - according to me this time - ! Well, the forbidden thought part - shut up mind!)
As soon as Promise got her mind to be quiet, she sat quietly, looking outside the window and examining below. Still nobody. Hm. She looked down at the store titled The Sweet Hive, although the sweets had a limit of 1 gram of sugar. A bit mean, according to Promise. The dragons who made them still found a way to make them tasty, sugar or not though - and since Lady Bloodworm had no rule about that, she couldn't argue. It was especially good that she herself enjoyed the sweets, and Jewel or Cicada would point it out in meetings whenever she discussed this, according to the book Fight For The Sugar!. HiveWings usually loved sugar, and Promise personally thought Bloodworm limited it for anyone who wasn't royalty deliberately, as a sign of Go back to where you came from. The streets. She had actually said that to SilkWings once, as Promise read in the news. How, you might ask? She had gently grabbed the newspaper from Firefly's hands 2 weeks ago, after another cookie session. Unlike the majority of the ones Firefly made, these ones were undercooked and mushy, not burnt and tooth-shattering. Unfortunately, the cookies were worse since they felt like batter in Promise's mouth, and batter made dragons sick sometimes. The recipe of cookies was made by a HiveWing called Alcon, who happened to be a 20 year-old noble who was the best at making them. Rumors were he had a crush on a SilkWing servant, but nobody believed it. A regular HiveWing alone was a low chance, but a noble? They were practically raised knowing SilkWings are inferior. And they always will be. That was the lesson every HiveWing should be taught, according to Lady Bloodworm and Wasp. Queen Wasp! her subconscious yelped, but she ignored it on purpose. Wow. She even respected Lady Bloodworm more than Wasp. Probably because she had never seen Wasp, and only Bloodworm - quite a lot actually. The top spire of hives, where only the ones in the royal bloodline resided - with a few exceptions of extremely important dragons - where schools rarely visited, was the most popular spire, yet the most mysterious one. Nobody who went there (other than the occasional other hive rulers for a visit - usually for a meeting about the flamesilks, the rumors all said) came back below. That was why it was called 'The Above'. It was dreaded, but it was honored at the same time. Alcon lived at the top spire, along with his most trusted 'servant' in a huge mansion. He sometimes sent letters to dragons below, and showed them copies of the goldprint. Promise had seen one and how big it looked, even on such a small paper . . that would be worth all the gold under Pantala, if there was any left. Pantala had been on a lack of gold for some reason, probably because of overmining. There were some rumors of an unknown tunnel down there which had ghosts. 
Promise's talons dangled out the window, which was pretty dangerous, but she didn't know why, and she did it everyday her mother was away. Firefly wasn't home much these days. She said she had 'work to do' but Promise suspected she was having all the tea parties in the world with Wasp for some reason. And that was not a joke. She came back with jars of honey EVERYDAY. It was annoying. Speaking of her mother, was she still asleep? She knew Firefly could be awfully lazy sometimes, but sleeping so much seemed off. She hadn't even heard the door close.  Maybe it was best to check downstairs . . but what if she was controlled? Na, the chances of that weren't likely. So . . ok. I am going to check, but only a tiny peek. Only a tiny peek. Only the smallest but full view of mother's eyes will do. Just making sure they aren't white, and returning to my normal day. But precautions should be taken first. 
Promise dressed in her SilkWing Costume, which was actually a Wasp Costume costume which was painted pinks and reds, due to little Promise. It was tight enough to look like it was real - very uncomfortably real. It was so tight that it trapped too much heat - enough to make it itchy. Promise then put on the antannae headband and did some crafts to make that look real too. First, she cut a lot of the headband, and then stuck the rest onto the costume with Honeybar! A Taste of Royalty. A small candy bar  (in the shapes of Wasps) which happened to be sticky, which was a bit annoying and only for the smallest dragonets, such as 2 year olds, but was often used as a substitute Honeystick, which was super expensive and barely even worked. When it did, it was usually sheer luck.
Agh. Enough dawdling over Honeysticks and candy bars. Promise didn't even like them, so what had made her so interested in them all of a sudden? They were too gooey and got stuck in your teeth for at least an hour, and made dragons laugh so hard. Not from being hyper, but from how amusing i was to hear voices muffled and to see the faces of the dragons being laughed at. When they got the honey out of their teeth though, you were definitely in trouble. Teachers never did anything about it, so students threw around harsh insults.It was time to check on Firefly (even though Promise would certainly be fine if Firefly was doing something stupid and random with white eyes and a crazy who - knows - how - old dragon in mind - literally. 
She peeked under the stairs, which were a bit sharp and hurt her feet since they couldn't afford someone to smooth them. Ow. Ow. Ow. her brain grumbled as she crept down, her feet recoiling every few seconds because of how sharp and annoying the rock was. If thoughts were words than she would be dead due to being caught and Wasp reasons. Although she was in yet another train of thought her conscious was still there thankfully, so she immediately recoiled her stare as she saw Firefly pacing around, bristling. She didn't get a view of her eyes, but she knew the answer. Wasp was here, not her mother. Which meant Wasp wanted her mother for something. "Nothing. Where is that dragon? They cant have possibly drowned, and they took Snowspeck, too." Promise seemed to notice she didn't call 'those dragons' by their tribe, which meant something was going on. Wasp never called someone dragon unless she was frustrated. Something another newspaper she managed to yank from Firefly informed her about. And what did she mean by Can't possibly have drowned? Wishful thinking? Or a mystery dragon - maybe even 2 - on the loose? And what kind of name was Snowspeck? There was no snow in the hives, and LeafWings would probably hate Winter, as EdenWings would too.
I slowly crept back up the staircase, my mind twitching with dread as Firefly turned, eyes clear as snakeskins. "Who's there!?" I heard her as I jumped, but caught my harmless fall and came down slowly instead, but I kept hiding. I dug into my closet, filled with supplies and whatnot. There was a lot of stuff in there, cookie recipes, more disgustingly melted, half eaten honeybars which I wriggled away from quietly, and a book. It was a good idea to read quietly, but it wasn't really appropriate for the situation. She probably wouldn't even be able to read since the light was very dim.
Promise hid deep in her room, at the edge of her closet, laying down with her wings concealing herself rather tightly in a ball. She was near the edge of it, hiding in a shadowed corner under it with her eyes squeezed shut, in fear anyone would see her. Even though she was disguised, she didn't want to get in trouble at all. Everyone who wasn't a HiveWing seemed to be in hiding - actually, just SilkWings. The only dragons that weren't HiveWings were the butterfly dragons Promise frowned upon, who happened to be free of all this mind - control chaos (which she was honestly jealous of - why did a bunch of silly dragons who were already having a good life get to be free from Wasp, too?). 
Promise had never liked the idea of mind control. She knew it was necessary to keep control over hivewings so they wouldn't cause trouble, but seriously  - was it necessary to rip them away from any chance of freedom? In Promise's opinion, when you wanted dragons to be loyal to you, you needed to give them a choice so that they wouldn't hate you, even from the start. Then again, that was risky and she could see why the Queen wanted to make sure there was an absolute 0 chance of any dangers to the hive, although that was a bit absurd, since nothing was perfect, and there would always be a flaw, even in a perfect gemstone. You just had to hold your eye close enough to it. Nothing, and she meant nothing was different with the world - that included the hives, whether Wasp liked it or not. Oh! That might be a forbidden thought! Oh well, not that I probably amen't that legal myself, according to her rules. 
She frowned, shaking her head and asking herself, internally Why can't they control me? What happened with me? Wasp controls every HiveWing, and I am no SilkWing. Certainly not a LeafWing, either. I looked at my dark green scales before thinking Why is my name untraditional, anyways? And where was my father? There had to be one . . since it was impossible for a dragon to have eggs without a mate, from what I knew. It actually felt weird to be thinking about that, so I took my mind off it - and threw it rather violently to the other side of my brain, which was still thinking about the mind control. 
I bumped into something. Aha! The source of light! A flamesilk lamp. I detached it from the wall it was dangling off of, and grabbed the book which was now visible in the golden-orange light. Now we needed to hope it wasn't something that would confuse my mind even more. We needed to hope so. 
The Tree Wars.
A Journal Belonging To . .
It was scratched off of the cover, and dusty. Argh. She'd have to figure out which HiveWing had this later.
Day 1 . .
Today the Tree Wars have begun and Queen Sequoia has told us all to be ready. I'm afraid though . . who dies first? Will I be the one to fall? Be read for what? To die? I have enough going on in life. I never asked for this. Why must I be thrown in something I never caused?  That foolish Queen.
I wish I were a SilkWing, staying in peace. Wasp has gained mind control, and we stand no chance now. I feel like I want to be a SilkWing. The territory in the mountains is abandoned now, other than the EdenWing Spirits. I hope they take me if I die. I hope I get to stay there in peace, with no more death. No more loss. Maybe we could make peace. 
But no. I was just some stupid commoner, so I would be declined. Of course it had to be this way. But I wouldn't abandon my friends. Here were her exact words "We shall not die! We shall fight!" How foolish can she be? Someone will die, and instead of someone who was 'just a random LeafWing', why couldn't it be her friend this time? So she gets the feeling of knowing you can loose dragons. My little brother needs to go to war, too, and he's only 4. I hate her. I amen't letting him die, tribe or not. 
He's staying in the house, either way. I'd do anything to keep him out of this. Maybe even send him to the mountains for safety. That was an option, but he wouldn't like it there. I don't want to depress him. I can't leave though . . or else our tribe could die. But they would die either way. There were so many leafspeaks, yet most of them were cowards and only had very weak leafspeak. How fun. I wish I could help them, but still have no chance of dying. Please, pray to Clearsight, for my brother's safety. I wish I could grant it myself, but I have no immortality. I'm weaker than most LeafWings here too. 
I'll probably die the first day. But . . my parents have already moved out. Cowards. Leaving me and Blackberry alone. At least Berry had venom. Although I was defenseless, I could rely on the fact that it would keep him safe. Me though . . anything could happen to me. I never got to see what I was named after. I never got to meet the RainWings. 
I never got to go to Pyrrhia. I never got to meet my anonymous Queen. Although I was part LeafWing too, it didn't mean I liked them. I'd probably stay in the Kingdom of Rain, if it was my choice. Well, journal, I have to go. Wish me luck, that I don't die the this very day. And take care of yourself too, my friend. Don't die, that was a lot of writing.
Promise shut the book as 2 little dragonets scurried inside and one snapped "Shush!"
HiveWing Vocab:
Goldprint - Hivewing version of 'Blueprint'.
Honeybar - A candy bar made of warm honey and a cold honey stick underneath which comes with a case so it doesn't drip.
=== Chapter 9 ===
Abispa was restless, sitting down, walking downstairs, and coming back up every few seconds with a coiling and uncoiling tail. Was Azure alright? The grumpy SilkWing was still an ally, toxic towards HiveWings internally or not. Well, he was outerly to be honest, but he rarely showed it unless it was for lower class HiveWings which couldn't do anything to him. But then again, he wasn't that mean towards them (Abispa). It wasn't fair that Wasp controlled every single HiveWing. Otherwise, everyone's lives would be so much easier. Abispa's wings twitched irritably as they snapped up more honeydrops to distract them, which was utterly unsuccessful.
Azure, Azure, Azure. That was all Abispa was thinking about, weirdly, haha brain. Very funny, stressing them out for no reason at all. They didn't seem to wind down, spreading their wings and closing them again, as if they were ringing Go save him! Go find out where they're taking him! and attempting to force them to fly up, but they were in control and there was nothing their wings could do about it, although they seemed to be trying. 
Their wrist stingers retracted and became visible rapidly, tiring them out as they sat down. Moons. This isn't that scary, but yet I'm so worried. If I had the Book of Clearsight . . or be Clearsight herself, although I would never be able to control her power - I could find out that we'll all be OK. | You sound as if you're sure about that. Abispa's subconcious murmured at the same time, blurring out the rest of the sentence.  They frowned, talons stumbling over each other as they tripped over something. Agh. They hadn't tripped in a while (which was actually rare, since they were rather clumsy, although their appearance made them appear quite elegant.). And when was Click coming back? A question they did not know. He wasn't here for a year now, and his memory was blurring away, unfortunately, although Abispa liked him very slightly, and although he was Wasp's lacky too, they believed he could help in some way. Sometimes, they trusted him with important stuff more than they should. After all, he was super distant, but they were Abispa's only parental figure. Her oh-so-mysterious mother had left her egg for some apparent reason which Abispa did not know of, and Click was always very distant. Sending Abispa to a HiveWing school must have made him thought they wold be busy, but unfortunately, the exact opposite happened. Abispa started to dislike HiveWing School, all the dragonets were rather stupid to be honest. And the teachers - their nonchalent tones were so boring and plain. All the dragonets were always giggling about the other gender, which I was disgusted by. My younger mind often responded with Blegh! The way they talked about it still made my matured mind say the same thing as my immature one too.
I sounded like I was 5 again - not that I didn't want to be 5 again. 1 week and 3 days ago, before I started 'stalking' (I didn't think I was 'stalking' Azure, just watching him work, like a normal dragon - if that normal dragon's time went 30x slower) Azure at his school I would have groaned at the thought, but a lot had happened since then.  Azure had been in metamorphosis for two days, and yesterday Waspy just couldn't get her talons off my mind, could she? Yeah, Waspy will be what I call Waspy from now on. I hate her, just so you know. This is an internal way of taunting her. | Why internally? Why not do something for once in your life? Be a dragon, not a zebra, Abispa. | I am NOT a zebra. I know she'll make me die in horrible ways which I cant bear to think about if I expose her for all the wrong she does. | Well, instead of sitting there why don't you go do something about it in secret then? Like help Azure, recruit a rebellion, anything! | You might be onto something, actually . . a rebellion does sound sensible. We could burn down HiveWing shops in secret, boycott their goods - oh no, what am I thinking? I'm a hivewing! I can't lead a rebellion which will be packed with angry SilkWings like Azure - except they'll hate me! That would be even worse! They'd elect a new leader, too! This is the worst, how am I supposed to make a rebellion of HiveWings against Queen Wasp? | Hey, calm down, don't be such a paralyzed sheep. | I am NOT a paralyzed sheep! Stop insulting me! |  Why? I know your trying to think this through, but dragons who spend all their time thinking never actually do anything! That's why some dragons are heroes, and others aren't! |  I know, I know. I'm just not in the most courageous mood right now. | After he wakes up somewhere, knowing you didn't save him, he's going to hate  you. | I have a feeling he would understand I was controlled by Waspy. | Then find a cure, idiot! | How am I supposed to do that? It's just something from birth, its not an infection or anything. You cant cure having black scales. You can only ignore them.| So tell me, how will you ignore that blasted hivemind?! All HiveWings have it, and they cant ignore it, or else there would be more HiveWing protests, right??| True. True | So what will you do? | the voice said, fading into darkness again.
I shuffled through the drawers. "Agh. Out of food again, and I don't work a job, unfortunately. This time I don't have Azure to fetch me something, since he's - wherever - all - the - flamesilks - are! Moons, is he even a flamesilk? I don't think flamesilks get much pain while metamorphosizing. Moons, is that even a word? Or was it metamorphosing?" in a rather loud voice, lowering it until the end, where it turned out a mumble. Thankfully, nobobdy seemed to hear me since the streets were almost empty today. The majority of HiveWings were patrolling. Actually, they didn't know whether it was patrolling or hunting for a runaway SilkWing. Runaways had been shined a light upon these days. Or maybe the Wings of Lonomia were screaming their whiny complaints about SilkWing life. Sure, it was true, but they were sure stupid to think that raising their voices that loud wouldn't get them killed - or in pain for a very long time, probably with a penalty of a loss of a limb from nature, and execution from Wasp-y. Did I say that? Well, still, escaping untouched would be near impossible, at 0.19% - ok, they were just making random numbers up now. Going back to the topic,  they needed to get outside and wander around the savanna boringly to find zebras to eat. Hunting. Something Abispa had done before, but only in secret, when Click was gone and they needed food. They wouldn't sink low enough to ask their slow classmates which had brains trapped in a jar of honey. Ick. They didn't like how they would always stare at dragons who looked 'pretty' according to them. The whole school was glassy, plain, and disgusting.  And again, I was drifting offtopic. 
The dragon they hated the most, you might ask? Andrena. A disgustingly sweet dull gold and black HiveWing. Her stripes were typical HiveWing stripes, and her eyes were obsidian black, and again, SO GLASSY. Her wings were transparent red, which was the only thing about her whch wasn't normal. Book of Clearsight, Abispa was thankful they looked special when they thought about it. Andrena was pretty stupid, despite her popularity. She got Fs on tests, and although she had convinced everyone it was deliberate, Abispa suspected otherwise. She had a few lackeys who followed her everywhere. 2 of them were her most loyal henchdragons - Clarkella - a dark orange HiveWing with huge black parts spreading over her body, and regularly colored transparent whitish-blue wings, like GLASSY glass. She, like a few HiveWings in the chool had a stinger - a wrist stinger which could paralyze, pretty normal and all but still very dangerous to the dragons Andrena decided to arch her smug face and lackies at.
I still remembered when she chose to bully me, at the back of my head it kept replaying, in such pride that it made me grin in my worst times, such as this one. A funny tale to tell, although I wondered if I was the only one who thought it was hilarious - most other HiveWings who went to my school would find it nerve - wracking. 
"Greetings, my friends!" Andrena said to everyone around her, clapping her hands with a slight smirk as dragons cowered before her, siddling off in an instant as she entered the room with her wing spread as wide as possible, probably to make other HiveWings make way for the queen-like-figure Adrena appeared to be. "Awww. Looky here." she said, whipping in my direction, Clarkella and Cordyceps stumbling after her with their heads ducked low like the SilkWing janitors I sometimes saw rushing through the halls, although there were very few of them, since nobody wanted SilkWings at a HiveWing school, janitor or not. I was talking in particular about the yellow and bright blue male we sometimes saw whisking through the halls, teetering near the walls, but avoiding touching them. His antennae were always curled defensively in the way ram horns appeared, twitching and raising occasionally, whenever there was gossip or loud noises to be heard. 
At first,I thought it must have been the dragon in front of me they were going to pick on. The bulky orange one with dark brown eyes they called Horsehair, nicknamed Worm since although he was powerful he never stood up to anyone, and most of the time ran off when time to fight came. He really wasn't interested in physical battles, just staying fit from what I knew. He exercised a lot these days, since 3 years back he was as skinny as a horse hair, wiry and small, being the shortest in the crowd. That's when he inherited the nickname 'Worm'. Although he wasn't much of a worm now, the name stuck and it bothered him much more than he seemed to like. Then, I realized Andrena was looking at me. And my black scales with golden flecks. She must have noticed me fairly quickly, since this was the first time I had gotten in her sight range (which was super small! I would have bet she was blind if she hadn't picked on others before me!)
"I haven't seen you around before, have I?" she mused, striding closer to me and circling me like a viper and its prey. Uh oh. That meant I was the target today. "Cordyceps! Clarkella!" she snapped at them, as they whipped their heads towards her. At first I thought they were going to fight her, but they bowed their heads low as if she was some queen. "Well, of course you haven't." I answered dryly. "New here?" she guessed as I answered "Not exactly." as she demanded "How long have you been roaming my halls?" Ugh. What an arrogant little fly that dragoness was, thinking everything was hers. It technically belonged to the school, not some small-brained idiot who dropped classes just to pick on others. "4 years now." Abispa responded as her eyes seemed to pop out of their sockets "What? You're lying. You can't be above 4 years to be here!" as I sighed "I am 4 years old, actually."  as she hissed "Not true! Nobody comes here newly hatched! as I responded in the same nonchalant tone the teachers used on us to make students who couldn't shut their mouths (usually Tachinid or Braconid, the twins, those were the only students who seemed like they wanted to trouble the teachers, whereas others  simply wanted to lighten the mood of the bland, monotone mood that the school often gave off "I did, unfortunately."  before attempting to whisk away just as she called "I'm not done yet." I turned instinctively, hurriedly erasing the fear that spasmed on my face before her eyes could land on it. "Ok, so? Get done." I responded, as if I were bored out of my mind by this conversation - that wasn't reality though, unfortunately, but what it was that I was petrified she was going to use one of her henchmen, especially sice I would't have money to pay for bandages, and my dad wouldn't bother even though he could afford them. Click wasn't very close to me, although I tried to keep our relationship as father-child going, although I was the only one, and it wasn't working so well at the moment. Click was always out with his friends for some reason, and left me home alone, so I barely ate anything at all at home or school, but I never asked to share lunch with the others since they were glassy and their lunch and life probably was too. I still hadn't discovered if it was infectious or not, but I was suspecting so since EVERYONE was boring and glassy. There was no way this wasn't an infection due to eating the same thing as boring dragons.
I thought being boring was like being boring zombies back then, which was funny. I thought it was an uprising so I packed tons of honey drops I stole from Click's bags (which consisted majorly of jewels and treats, although I wasn't interested in cookies or pastries - only honey drops.)
As the tension grew between us, Andrena circling me and my wrist stingers appearing as she took a small step back, but nobody seemed to notice. Then, she continued, eyeing me like rotten maggots on her food when she had ordered it cleanly in the cleanest restaurant in Pantala. "So . . how did I not notice you before?" she questioned, leaning closer to me creepily as I explained "I don't often come around these parts."
"What kind of student is so laid back, hm?" she turned to me. "Clar-" but the bell rang in our ears as straight after I smugly said "Whoops. Time for class. Don't want to be late, now do you, Andrena? Not like you are everyday, hm?" before she turned red out of both anger and embarrassment, lunging for me, but I evaded her as she landed on the ground with a thud as I stiffled a semingly endless burst of laughter. "Oops." I said sarcastically, snickering as she hollered angry curses and insults, hissing at Cordyceps and Clarkella who flinched away, seemingly quitting at the feat of trying to help Andrena get up without being yelled at or complained to for being 'useless'. Andrena the spoiled brat gets roasted. That needs to be on the school newspaper. I thought to myself, snickering again before heading off to another awfully boring class.
I wondered where Andrena, Cordyceps, Clarkella, Horsehair - all of them - where they were now. Looking into the past made anyone feel guilty for leaving it behind, leaving behind everyone, strangers, allies, and enemies alike. Even the merest characters in my life - like Polybia, the only one who actually saw me and waved once in her life - I missed them. I realized my talons were shaking unstably, so I fixed them to the ground, doing the same thing with my gaze to calm down as I cleared my mind of all in its depths - including Click, doing that meditation exercise of breathing slowly. Then, after a minute I quit it since it was boring and started shovelling through my pictures until I found one of Click and me. Abispa shook their head, and put it away back where it was, closing the drawer gently. Think about something else. Abispa's mind suggested, and since she didn't have another option, she started to think about what they didn't have to worry about in their past.
Haha. At least I didn't have to worry about the Wings of Lonomia and Azure figuring out I was watching him for the past week. Just then, some dragon banged on my door, causing me to jump in alarm. A gray-blue SilkWing stood there and snarled "Fast! Let me in!" as Abispa opened the door for them, still skeptical and edging away from the intruder they had let lose in their household. A HiveWing wearing a cloak trailed after them, as the gray-blue SilkWing slammed the door, causing the ground to vibrate as Abispa hissed, their wings twitching. The hooded dragon didn't look too appealed with his cloak, judging by how his talons weren't moving in peaceful movements. Then again, nothing was peaceful these days - not for Abispa at least. Maybe this dragon was facing a similar situation. Then again, Abispa didn't barge into houses like a weirdo. Maybe that wouldn't be weird anymore, nowadays, from weird standards. "Are you controlled by Wasp?" the hooded dragon demanded as Abispa nodded. "WE REVEALED OURSELVES!" he shrieked (Abispa was assuming he was a he, based on the masculine voice). He grabbed the blue spotted SilkWing and hid under the table as Abispa asked "Wouldn't it make more sense to run from me?" The hooded dragon considered that, grabbing the blue SilkWing but Abispa yelped "Wait!" They slowly turned to face them, a they admitted "I need to get a friend back. He's a flamesilk, I think, which is why he was taken." An awkward silence as he hooded dragon turned to Abispa, asking "Can Wasp ransack your memory?" I didn't think so, so that was exactly what I said "I don't think so . ." before he took off his hood, revealing eyes as red as blood and scales periwinkle blue with his ruff flared, responding "Well, HiveWing, you've got the right person for the job."
=== Chapter 10 ===
I woke up in caverns of gold and bright red. My eyes couldn't adjust to the brightness for a while, actually, but when they did I could see millions of things were going on, doors opening and shutting, talons reaching out creating a blue light, and my eyes were fixed on it in curiosity. "Where am I?" I questioned wearily, reaching out into the middle of it, finding there was everything I could imagine in there. LeafWings flying, moons made of diamonds and gold, dead bodies of HiveWings littered around the area, all contorted in horror, and millions of SilkWings staring at me. Most of them were ghostly pale, with eyes as red as burning embers, but very few had eyes which glowed yellow like flamesilk lanterns. Flamesilk. I realized, looking around me. I was in a cavern of flamesilk. This matched the exact color of the silk Agrias sometimes bought to display on the eyes of her paintings. Speaking of her paintings, this looked exactly like one of Agrias's works! What was it called again? I thought it was called 'Dream' or something, maybe 'Upon' with it, hmm. I touched some of the dripping silk which looked like honey - if that honey was burning - I immediately retracted my talons, waiting for the singing sensation of a stinging fire. But . . there was none . ?
"If you're out there then tell me what's going on!" Azure shouted, hearing his echo throughout the caves. The translucent white animals hid behind fountains of flame moving as slow as honey.  He started looking down at his blue talons, and then asked "What is this place?!" rather loudly - that wasn't a good idea because it all struck back at him, making the wingless silk dragon cover his ears as aggravating noises originally coming from him attempted to infiltrate them with that wretched noise. Azure slowly emerged from his defensive position again, rubbing his neckband once again. "Argh. Why is this place so weird?" Azure muttered angrily, hooking up onto a wall so he could get a good look at the vast, golden-weaved caverns which seemed to be dripping lava or something like that. "I'll bite your head off if you don't let me out of here!" Azure threatened, scanning the place for anything that wasn't white or gold. He looked like an odd speck in this place, a blue dot against a sea of golds and whites. But what worried him was a "Don't shout .. spirits are resting." Azure's head shot up to see a LeafWing fluttering down towards him.
But this was no ordinary LeafWing. This LeafWing didn't look fully .. LeafWing? For one thing, his horns were curved in a strange way, and they were crackly-like, not like the smooth ones from the books that he had stolen from the library at times. His wings did have the general shape of a leaf, and he did have the webs, but they didn't end like they were supposed to. But then I noticed something. This LeafWing had spikes. Yes, spikes. I didn't realize the look of confusion on my face before he called it out "You seem confused. Something wrong?" "Why do you have spikes? Are you part SilkWing?" I demanded from him but he shook his head "No, I'm not." "Then are you part HiveWing?" He facepalmed. "Ok, ok. I'm not here to play guessing games!" I shot back as he rolled his eyes. Of course, my mind hadn't processed at the time that he seemed to be an extinct tribe "Fine. My name is Autumn, and I'm part SkyWing and part LeafWing. Happy?" "What's a SkyWing?" Azure demanded as Autumn sighed once again. I hated how much he was sighing, honestly. "It's a tribe of Pyrrhia." "What in Wasp Hive is Pyrrhia?!" I shrieked again, earning a more noticable deadly glare from him. He had been giving me that judgey glare since he came, and it made me uncomfortable. "Why are you glaring at me?" I ironed out my voice, and it didn't waver due to years of doing that.
He paused. "Am I?" "Yes, you are, Sir Judgey." I said sarcastically "Was I talking to your shadow?" "No. I knew you were crazy but not that crazy." Autumn responded as Azure rolled his eyes. "Back to the question. What is Pyrrhia?" Azure demanded "Another continent, obviously. What does it sound like? Another tribe? An animal species?" Autumn said. Looks like 2 can play at the sarcasm game. "Hey, what's your name?" Autumn said, raising an eyebrow before sighing "Oh, that's right, I already know it, Azure." "Why do you sigh so much?" Azure grumbled as Autumn only shook his head "I don't remember sighing." "You just sighed half a minute ago! Do you have memory problems?" "No. Quite the opposite, actually." "How is that the opposite?" "My brain just remembers the wrong things - it doesn't have time for stuff as feeble as sighing."
"Well then you must have memory problems." Azure argued, his tail flicking and lashing behind him as Autumn laughed "Chill, Angryzure, it's not like I'm Waspy." "WHAT DID YOU JUST CALL ME?!" Azure threatened, seeming to cause an earthquake as the ground shook below him. "Wow, good way to spoil the fun Angryzure." Autumn said sarcastically but then jumped up, saying "Let's explore a bit!" "Don't you already know this place?" "Nah, I just came here to wait for you." "For me?" Azure said suspiciously, raising his eyebrow at the 'SkyWing'-LeafWing in front of him. "Yes, for you. You're a Flamesilk, and I train all Flamesilks. Well, all the Flamesilks like you." he added as Azure facepalmed "Very clear. Thank you SO MUCH." "Yes, I love frustrating you out like that! Keep the show going!" Autumn said cheerfully as Azure snarled in his throat and decided to stop talking and giving Autumn such fun. "Awh, fun's over." he grumbled and said "Come up here!" leaping up on a few rocky ledges before lifting off into the air, but he didn't flap his wings, but instead glided towards the next rocky ledge of the color representing molten lava. "Bu-" Azure started as Autumn sighed "Go along with it please, and try climbing instead." "Argh, fine." Azure mumbled, and frowned, hooking his talons onto the wall as he started to climb. 
By the time he reached the top of the huge ledge, minutes had gone by and his muscles were aching. They were reliant on speed rather than stamina, unfortunately. Hey, everyone has their flaws, even Azure. Autumn jumped up and down "Let's go!" "What's with the sudden mood change?" Azure asked as Autumn frowned, and stopped "Yes, I seem to be acting out." "Ok, I have officially confirmed you are super weird, Sir Judgey." "You read my mind, Angryzure."
"You need to stop with the nicknames, Sir Judgey." Azure responded indirectly as Autumn grumbled "Only if you stop with the nicknames, Azure." "Hah! You said my name correctly!" Azure grinned. "Well, I'm leading you to someone else to moniter me, since APPARENTLY I'm too 'soft' on everyone, according to a certain SandWing I know." "SandWing?" Azure questioned. He was a straight A student (unfortunately) and even he didn't know that term. "Another Pyrrhian tribe, actually, Azure." "Oh." It was funny that even the smartest of people could forget such simple things, such as the suffix wings usually meant a tribe - and right now, Azure wasn't ambitious enough to think of an example of a word with the suffix wings that wasn't a tribe.  
"Angryzure, meet Equatorial and Blue Racer. Blue Racer and Equatorial, meet Angryzure." "EX-" Azure was about to break into a huge scream but Autumn casually clamped his snout shut as Azure kept scratching Autumn who frowned. But I felt something warm near me .. to warm for comfort. And when he looked behind him - there was RAW FIRE! Autumn clamped his mouth shut again, earning a hiss from the SilkWing. "That's enough playing with Azure, Autumn." the Equatorial one said mildly. I could tell because her mainscales looked very much like an Equatorial Spitting Cobra's - I'd learned about those from what. And the other must have been Blue Racer. His scales were much brighter than Azure's, and they had this mystical aura about them. That didn't make Azure jealous though - to him, the 'SandWing' looked like an overly beautiful eyesore with glittery diamond patterns.
"Hi Azure Flame." he said, knocking me out of my thoughts. The eyes struck me though - they were aggravatingly hypnotizing.  "Good. At least someone doesn't call me angry." "But you do have anger issues!" Autumn pointed out as Azure glowered at him, "Erm - right, sorry." he apologized, as his underscales dimmed a little, looking around at glaring white SilkWings who frowned and went back to slowly, mind-numbingly drifting about. 
"Sir Judgey told me I was here for training, but he didn't specify for what. So, can we quickly go over that?" Azure asked as Blue Racer just blinked "Flames, fire, dance, pyre."  "What Racer is trying to say is that we will teach you about your purpose." "Then what does-" Azure started but Equatorial had already continued "ANYWAYS. I think you would've noticed this already, but let me summarize. You are one of the only with eyes opened to reality, meaning you and your future friends are the only one who can uncover the secrets that have been buried underground for centuries. Funny thing is that Truthsight didn't have a prophecy about this. Powers don't seem to be functioning back in Pyrrhia." Azure remembered Autumn's explanation, and he didn't want to ruin the ominous air the SandWing's voice cast around the room so he didn't ask for further detail. "This is the first time anything like this has happened. It's 25 years before the date of it, but it's still coming." Equatorial explained, pacing like a military soldier in a rigged way "The storm is brewing, and it's gaining thunder." Racer agreed, flapping around above them and causing dark shadows, which Azure guessed was for drama.
Equatorial scowled at Racer and looked down to Azure again, glittering black eyes and frost white pupils meeting his. "Long story short, we need your help." "Wait, how am I supposed to help?" Azure interrupted, causing Equatorial to sigh and say "I wish I could tell you, but if I did I would tip off your future for the worse .." "Storm brewing, spirits in woe, blackness spreading, darkness around the soul."" Blue Racer said. "Don't mind him. He utters out bits of prophecies that barely ever happen." "Well, that barely could be now, Equatorial." Autumn's voice cut into the conversation like a knife, a tone I hadn't heard - a one which sounded 100% ominous, making her turn and frown at him "You're the paranoid idiot always worrying over the future too much. I don't think you get a say in this." Equatorial shot back. "Blue Racer. Do you believe your prophecy scrap is real?" Autumn demanded, ignoring Equatorial who hissed at him, her tail raised. Azure suddenly felt like a backdrop instead of the purpose of the conversation. "Souls rising, eyes clear, don't fog over, don't blear." Blue Racer said, resting on a ledge with a frown. "So does that mean yes or no?" Azure asked slowly. "Truth lies underground, hidden for hundreds of years." Blue Racer continued. "I-i-it's t-t-t-the t-t-t-truth." Blue Racer stuttered, his voice distorted, as Equatorial's harsh face softened. "Racer is barely himself anymore thanks to this prophecy nonsense." So, while they argued, I looked around me. 3 more perched dragons were watching from above, their tails curled and their heads inclined, staring at me. 
"There are secrets hidden in the past." a voice rumbled from above me. I had noticed the sky darkening, but didn't think much of it. Let alone thinking it could have been the cause of a dragon. Autumn held his wings like a wyvern's defensive pose's, and the dragon glared at them all. I had noticed the other dragons behind me leaping into the air in alarm. "He's not prey, Fear." Equatorial said, flying up to meet his head level. "I do have a name." he snarled, attempting to slash at her, but she quickly dove to avoid his outstretched talons and bit him again. Autumn was forcefully dragging Azure away from the scene and asked "Do you want to go fight him?" "Well, I would certainly love to jump into a battle without knowing anything about my oponent." Azure said sarcastically. "That's The Fear. He's a hallucination - he can't really hit you, only in the dream world. He's the ghost of a mysterious NightWing King who died at the age of 7." "Do you know anything else about him?" Azure demanded and Autumn snorted
"The 1st King of The Continents
Once upon a millenia before recorded time, the continents were ruled united. There was no such thing as a tribe, and there was no such thing as prejudice. But as dragon minds developed, so did their questions. "Why does this dragon look like me and this one not?" "Why does this dragon breathe ice while I breathe fire?" Questions a young king named Wanderer could not answer. Just like everything else, he was left in the dark on this.
But his excuses could not hold dragonkind for much longer. Some tribes knew this would happen. They were called EdenWings. They were highly intelligent compared to the other tribes of their time, and could predict this without a seer to do it for them. So, convincing the BeetleWings, a close relative, to leave along with them, they fled the continent.  And arrived at here you live now."
"Where are they?" Azure asked, couldn't being able to help it, and Autumn sighed "That is a story for another time."
"But back on Pyrrhia, tension was rising. That's when a dragon tribe decided to rid the world of the unity they hated once and for all. Those were called the DewWings, later known as LeafWings. DewWings were a hybrid of sky, sea, and rain, and they usually barely contained any abilities, other than one. A dangerous, mysterious ability unlike Pyrrhia had ever seen before - Leafspeak. Leafspeak was a danger to all dragons around them. So, on the first three full moons ever recorded, the DewWings murdered Wanderer. Chaos broke out. Dens were burned, and dragonets were stolen in hopes of getting information out of. Dragons fled the central grounds where they once lived, in hopes of avoiding conflict. And since all dragons thought of the same thing, all smart dragons thought of counters - that was the first record of invasion rushes. This one in particular was called "The Invasion Rush of the Starting Line." which related to how many dawns of new concepts came upon the Pyrrhians. Without unity, they learned something that would soon lead to their fall .. fighting. They figured out how to use their natural weapons to their advantages, SandWings being the first to do so and all the other tribes following not so long after. That was how the first war of history started .... The War of Individuality, which lasted 13 years."
"That's not so bad." Azure pointed out as Autumn frowned "Back then, it was - they were the first dragons, and they could have easily pushed us to the same direction." "Oh." Azure said, feeling stupid, and Autumn seemed to notice. But unfortunately, he didn't care. 
"Back on Pantala, problems arose. EdenWings decided to explore an amazing channel of tunnels, vast, but that may have been the biggest mistake the tribe had made because they never returned. Not a single EdenWing returned from the darkness they had wandered to, and sooon, they became forgotten. New tribes of hybrids had arose, called the Mothwings and Grasswings. Mothwings were a hybrid of rain and sky, and Grasswings were a tribrid of sky, sea and rain. So that's how it begun. Grasswings claimed too much territories, and adapted to grow wings as life on the ground was hard. These wings were shaped like leaves, which is how they were grown to be called LeafWings. Mothwings developed an adaptation to the vast hills they lived in, to spin a special kind of silk to travel over it easily. EdenWings were the common ancestors of LeafWings, although they didn't know that. LeafWings also later grew to develop a mutation of the healing powers some EdenWings had .. and it was called leafspeak. There was also a development of the harming abilities, but that was much, much rarer and only one LeafWing per 5 generations had it, but knowledge of it faded overtime, since without normal trees to create normal breathing air, these powers could not activate. They would stay useless until an inhale of pure air came through their nose. But some RainWings had came along - rumors say they couldn't adapt in time and were lost to the lions. Nobody knows why they didn't adapt - perhaps they had lived in the rainforest for too long - or perhaps something else happened .."
"What are you hinting at?" Azure demanded, but Autumn made a face, not a trying - not-to - make - a - face face, but more of a surprised face. "Hm. Didn't think you were that smart." "EX-" "Shut up for a minute Angryzure, Fear might hear us!" Autumn whisper shouted, twisting Azure's jaw shut with his tail. Well, now he knew Autumn could scold, for one. He didn't think that was possible with Sir Judgey. So Azure just blinked, once, twice, and then Autumn continued.
"Erm .. that's sort of all I know." Autumn said as Azure was about to say All you know? Sir Judgey, that's a lot to just know. Seemingly reading him, Autumn explained, there's much more to the story, but something tells me I can't tell you the rest. But, I warn you. One truth, many lies. One way out."
=== Chapter 11 ===
"Do you promise to keep this a secret?" the purple dragonet with blue eyes said, and surprisingly, she didn't sound like a child at all. I noticed another, which was slightly older, but I could only see it's purple corneas at the moment since it was watching from a distance that didn't allow me to see it. "Keeping your existence a secret will be tricky, but my name isn't Promise for nothing." Promise responded, bending down to look at her. She was rather small, but with her wings spread, you had to admit, she looked dangerous,  and her flared ruff sort of made Promise want to hide in her flowers. She frowned, and then said "Eclipse - you can come out now. This is a SilkWing." "Erm, actually-" I started in a low voice but the dragon rolled her eyes and said "Come out." and the dragon from the shadows obeyed, and even at first step into the dim silklight, I could see her talons were as dark as night. "Clearsight?" I asked, blinking as the mystery dragon came to view. "No, I amen't Clearsight. I am a young dragon named Eclipse, who just found out her real name is supposed to be Quicksilver." she responded, scowling as her wings became visible, which had a quick fade to silver. Now I got what her name meant. "Can you see the future?" I asked almost immediately, but she just blinked and said "No..? I thought my tribe didn't have those anymore." "Wait - no seers like Clearsight?" "Erm .. no?" she responded again, edging away from Promise. "What?" Promise responded before frowning and continuing "So what you're saying is that your seers just vanished in thin air?" but the dragon hissed "Shut up for a minute. They're coming!" in a whisper-yell, and ran back into the dark, as Promise hid in the corner. The purple dragonet seemed to disappear, only her eyes visible now. The other, small green and blue dragonet who had been staying silent this whole time just put themselves flat to the ground. "I heard an annoying voice here." a voice scowled, making Promise almost jump. "Firefly has to give up that dragonet of her's, or there will be consequences." the voice continued, as if it knew they were listening somehow. "The Hive has many dangers that managed to intrude in it, but we will pick them out one by one .." Promise couldn't believe she was hearing this! The Queen admitting something she could have never imagined - the Hives weren't perfectly safe after all.
I started flipping through the pages of the notebook. But an idea rang in her head. She had a SilkWing costume on! She could easily pass for one, since Wasp didn't really pay close attention to them. It was a risk, but better than lying in here for hours. So, she signalled to Breakthrough to not come out and emerged, with her head down. "M-m-my Queen," she said lowly, bowing. "Another SilkWing. What is it?" Wasp growled, lashing her tail as Promise ducked. It looked like her disguise had worked! "D-do you need anything?" she asked, still going for the stutter. "Do not stutter in my presence." the HiveWing hissed, in it's double Wasp voice and it's eyes like pearls. "Of course my Queen. Do you want anything?" I asked, which must have been the wrong thing to say, since she paused and a minute returned "Musn't you be working?"Wasp snapped as I let my head hang even lower "Firefly told me to organize her basement." "Well get to work then!" It was disgusting, being a SilkWing. She wondered what it was like, always being confined to what people thought of your tribe. It wasn't possible 100% of the tribe was as gentle as butterflies, like the guide to Pantala said - but if there were SilkWings with a backbone out there, they weren't doing a good job with rebelling. But they do. her mind whispered, as she remembered the attack at Flannel Lane, just less than a week ago. But now that she thought of it, there was a lot of action rise these days. Something was going on. And maybe, if she listened to Wasp, she could get answers. But the queen now knew of her presence, so it was pointless trying to listen to anything. 
"How much did you hear?" the HiveWing suddenly snarled. "All I heard was something about a consequence. The rest was blurred out since I have a headache today. The HiveWing's face relaxed a little "Do you know her daughter?" "Yes, but only through brief dips of head. Firefly dislikes it when I talk to her." Promise responded. This HiveWing was pretty, actually. Pure black scales were in vision, with underlines of gold, the opposite of most HiveWing patterns. "I'll leave this one to watch you, but don't get any ideas." Wasp growled, and the dragon's eyes returned to the way they should have been in the first place. Without this epidemic Wasp had spread, known commonly as possession. Like some demon, she was always there. Always waiting to pounce. The dragon shook their head vigorously, and looked at me. "Wasp was in my head again, wasn't she?" but the dragon paused and said "Yes, she was." "Wait a minute .. how can you remember that? Firefly always acts confused after she wakes from the control!" I demanded "How would you know that?" the HiveWing hissed, twitching nervously. "Because I'm a HiveWing too." "B-b-" "It's a disguise" Promise explained but the HiveWing frowned. "What I was going to ask, before someone politely interrupted me and wanted to play a guessing game, was how were you free?" "Oh. Um - I guess since I didn't look like a HiveWing she couldn't remember and get in my head ..?" Promise lied, although it sounded more like a question. That would be useful though, as a tone of confusion. "I saw people in all sorts of costumes snap into control, though." "Strange, hm?"Promise said nervously. "I'll try to figure it out." "You don't need too-" Promise started before the HiveWing paced again. "Sooo .." Promise said awkwardly as the dragon hissed a little before mumbling "I know you're immune." "UUhhhh - too what? I'm not immune to disease, if that's what you're talking about." "You might as well be, since you're immune to the mind control." "Wait - how did you know that?" "The Queen spits out a lot of information carelessly." the darkly-scaled HiveWing laughed a little, which surprised Promise. Wasn't she upset just a minute ago? "So, let's get straight to the point. I need you to help me free someone." "From what?" Promise demanded as they sighed "I'm Abispa, and I'll explain everything on the way." "Don't forget us!" a few certain dragonets piped up from the corner simultaneously, other than the blackish blue one who just frowned. Abispa opened her mouth, but I gave a little smile and said "I'm Promise, and I'll explain everything on the way."
So, that was how Promise ended up following a possibly crazy dragon out into the open. Lights in the Hives were always dim, compared to those outside the Hives (she had snuck out to the savanna once, when she was younger, only to be lectured by her mother on how that was 'too silkwing-like'. SilkWings ruined EVERYTHING. EVERYTHING. You want to buy honey drops? Those are for SilkWings. You want to paint? That's a SilkWing thing. You want to have an opinion? That opinion is for SILKWINGS. The dragonets were, of course, not in plain sight. But what they had to do? Stuff them all into a bag, that's what. "We aren't pokemon to be kidnapped!" the LeafWing whined as the purple one just huffed saying "They're dumb, that's why they're doing this." "You know, you could actually be quiet, right?" Abispa said, as she hissed. "Ok, can we at least introduce ourselves before we go on yelling into madness?" Eclipse asked as the purple drgonet rolled her eyes. "Fine. MY name is Halflight, but don't call me that, call me the one and only Hal!" Promise and Abispa rolled their eyes simultaneously at that. "I'm Breakthrough." the fidgety LeafWing said, fixing his glasses.  "And I'm Quicksilver, but call me Eclipse please." the other said quietly from the bottom of the bag "Why Eclipse? Why not Quick or Silver?" Abispa asked "My title used to have Eclipse in it .." the black dragon said, still not bothering to show her face. "Fine. We're on our way to the Flamesilk Caves of Bloodworm Hive. Try not to make too much noise, will you?" Abispa said beating her wings. Many thought HiveWings buzzed their wings up and down but from up to down. HiveWings flew the way other dragons did - just a LOT faster when it came to beating their wings. To the point you couldn't see them, only hear a buzz. But that was studies, and this was heroism. So she didn't ponder over it longer.
So, instead, she scoured each dragonet of their descriptions individually. The purple one first. She had a ruff, which was her most noticable feature, and the membranes of her wings were a dull deep pink that looked like a sunset's pink - if it was an extremely old painting, with extremely dried paint of hundreds of years ago, when everything was at Clearsight's time, except there was no Clearsight, so dragons only did things primitive style. Her eyes were a spectacular blue, not slate blue which was close to silver, but actual blue, which was something Promise barely saw around. Her tail, draping out of the bag, was seemingly prehensile and coiled, like that of a snake. Long spines, not as defined in edges that of a SilkWings,but not as short as a LeafWings ran across her back, ending at her tail.
The green and blue one looked like a LeafWing, but with bioluminescent stripes. They had bright eyes which seemed to be full of wonder about the surroundings around them. They seemed like a mad scientist - if that mad scientist was somehow shorter and younger than in the silk-woven books Promise read. They also constantly fidgeted with their glasses, which at this angle seemed white. His scales were very different from the other two, being much brighter colored. She guessed he wasn't nocturnal, since he wasn't squinting at the light like the other two or hiding in the bag to sleep.
"One question." Promise asked, propelling herself higher in the air before stating to glide again, making a slight buzz as she continued on in the air. "What is it?" Abispa answered "I was talking to the weird dragonets, Abispa." Promise said apologetically as Abispa made a face. "So, can you describe your homeland to me?" "Yup! It's huge! Much more diverse than this place,w here there are only hives for miles!" "Actually, there's the talon peninsula, Scorpion Lake, Beetle Lake, the abandoned hills-" "So lakes and hills. And one peninsula. Boring!" Hal said, rolling her eyes "Why can't you have a forest or something like that?" "Because Wasp ordered all the trees to be cut down." Promise responded bluntly. "Oh, that's just sad. These stupid dragons don't know they need OXYGEN to live. And TREES make oxygen." Halflight started but Eclipse groaned "Not another Hal lecture .." "ExCUSE me! I get better grades than the two of you combined." Hal said, spreading her wings before Abispa rolled her eyes and shoved her back in the bag, and the small dragonet emitted a muffled angry yelp.
"How do we find the Flamesilk Caves though?" Promise asked Abispa and she said "Well of course I know where they are. I actually follow up, unlike everyone else in the Hives." "They." Abispa said, quickly reading the look on Promise's face. "I use ae and they pronouns." "Oh - ok." Promise then said, diving below Abispa and regaining position again, just because she was bored. Despite the interesting topic, they weren't talking about much. Eclipse was staring out into the distance, and Breakthrough was reading a book. "Don't read in the dark." Promise reminded him as his head whipped up. "My mom says the exact same thing to me, actually!" he laughed. "Well, you know you should just stop being annoying." Hal huffed from in the bag were Abispa was holding her down. "And you, Pantalan dragon, do you know I could burn your claws off right now?" Abispa immediately retracted their talons and the smaller dragonet had an insufferably smug face on. "Much better." "Your dragonet is insufferably arrogant, Promise." Abispa told me "Oh, that's not my dragonet. I don't know who's dragonet she is, or why in the moons she was at my house." Hal's face darkened "Don't you - call me a dragonet." Promise could clearly see that wasn't why she was mad though. I decided not to ponder over it.
"So, we're going to the Flamesilk Caverns to rescue who again?" Promise asked "A SilkWing named Azure." they responded, turning to Promise like she was a 2 year old who wanted to come with her mom to the office.  "Hey! What about us? Our friends need rescuing too!" Hal complained "You didn't tell me that." Promise shot back "Yes I did!" Hal protested "No, you didn't." Promise responded, ignoring Halflight's whining, which included something like "But you should know that!" and some other things. To be honest, Promise didn't care one bit, even if she was an otherworldly dragon. Otherlandly? Othercontinently? Were those even words? Probably not. Promise would probably stick with otherworldly for now.
"Alright Abispa. Well why would you want to rescue a SilkWing again?" "BECAUSE. He's my friend, and no loyal friend leaves their - friend in a cavern all alone." Abispa explained, in that tone of an impatient teacher explaining to a dragonet there are only 3 moons. Promise wondered why their voice had cut off though. Maybe just a voice break?  "How are we going to rescue him again?" Promise asked. Abispa stopped. "Uhhh ... actually I haven't thought that over." "So you broke into my house all Wasp-eyed, lost control, said 'hey let's go rescue some silkwing!' randomly, and now you're telling me you don't have a plan?" "Ummm ..-" "You know what, fine, I'll do the work here. What we need to do knock out all the guards and rescue your friend." "How will we knock out the guards?" Abispa demanded. Promise paused "I didn't think of that either. Maybe some Sanseveria?" "WHAT IS SANSEVERIA." Abispa demanded "Snake plant." Promise explained. "Ok, now you're just trying to show off." Abispa huffed as Eclipse made a face at them both, suddenly sticking her head out of the bag and wincing at supposedly the bright lighting. She was called a 'NightWing' so Promise didn't suspect she liked the sunlight. Maybe she was nocturnal or something, which would explain the name of her tribe.
"Tell me about your continent." Promise suddenly said to Halflight. "If you're so smart, educate us." noticing her weird silence. From what Promise gathered, Hal usually never shut her snout, and without the whining, it was sort of eerie. "I already did earlier." Hal huffed "I want to know more. It sounds interesting. How many tribes do you have?" Promise asked. Of course, she wasn't really interested, but she wanted to cheer Hal up a bit. Why was she sad in the first place? That, Promise did not know. She had been perfectly fine just a few minutes ago, but then she went silent and didn't talk again.
"We have 7 tribes. First, we have the SandWings. They have the second largest territory of any of the Pyrrhian tribes, having a vast desert all to themselves. This was pretty easy to claim, since SandWings are the only tribe accustomed to the desert. They live in the Southwest corner of Pyrrhia. Their current Queen is Queen Equatorial. Their Queen lives in a Stronghold. She is known for her tyranny." Hal flicked her tail, saying "Next, in the Northwest we have the IceWing Kingdom. This is the highest point of Pyrrhia, slightly higher than the Northeast, and IceWings inhabit it. IceWings are known for their magnificent yet mysterious palace. Their whole kingdom is protected by the Great Ice Cliff, a structure known for its ability to shoot arrows at anyone who crosses not from the IceWing tribe." "How does it shoot arrows?" Promise questioned, noticing Abispa was listening curiously too. They were out in the savanna by now. The pale green grasses blew in the cold wind, and the sun was barely shining through a blanket of silver clouds. The wind howled loudly in her ears. The grasses looked pale and unhealthy, like some sort of fogg green. None of the grasses or plants outside the hives were healthy nowadays. Promise had a feeling it had something to do with the lack of trees.Promise didn't know why Wasp had cut down the trees though, of course.  She was now actually interested in Pyrrhia, despite her boredom of it earlier. "It's a special magic Pyrrhians have called animus magic. No tribes here have it though - I hope." Hal frowned. "Where do I get it?" Abispa asked. Hal sighed "Genetics. Not moons like the NightWings used to think. You have to have animus blood in order to be an animus yourself." "How can I test if I have it?" "Uhh .. just say 'I enchant this uhh .." Hal pulled out a purple amethyst bracelet "I enchant this bracelet so whenever someone wears it, it protects their soul and fits them." the bracelet was already too small for Abispa, conveniently. "Err ... OK? I enchant this bracelet so whenever someone wears it it protects their soul and fits them." Abispa then touched the bracelet. It gradually got huger. Its dimensions were slightly unearthly, but it fit Abispa's talons and arm. "Animus magic .." Halflight breathed
=== Chapter 12 ===
Animus magic, animus magic, animus magic my soul whispered excitedly. All the power. Change anything, fix anything, be anything. Halflight looked very surprised, and Promise had already fell over. Eclipse's eyes were gleaming with an unknown emotion, and Breakthrough seemed to be plotting how he could successfully steal her talons. "So, where are we anyways?" Promise asked. "Under the h-hive." Halflight said, dumbfounded from the sudden discovery, but she shook her head. "Here's the basics on magic - don't use it or else you'll go crazy and use it smartly, not to do the dishes or anything like that, alright?"  Hal said to Abispa, who jumped a little. "Dishes? Can't I just destroy mind-control or teleport Azure here?" "Nah, those spells are too big for a beginner. You need to do enchant something to keep your soul intact first. But that spell only works when you don't use your magic 24/7, so only emergencies will you use it, alright?" "EMERGENCIES?! Azure is an emergency!" I argued. "Don't be a howler monkey! Just make it!" "My soul is perfectly fine!" I huffed, offended but also wondering if Halflight was telling the truth. "Suit yourself but don't blame me when you go on a massacre rush!" she huffed "If I go on a massacre rush. It's not going to happen." "That's what all the insane animi say, and WHAT HAPPENS TO THEM." Hal remarked loudly, rolling her eyes. "I'm not insane." Abispa shot back, "And I wont ever be." they finished, and grumbled, looking down at their talons. "I'm just LOOKING OUT for you, you very dumb hunk!" Hal snapped, huffing as I resisted the urge to tell the ground to drop her out of the world.
"So how are we sneaking in?" Abispa demanded, but Eclipse just shook her head "We can't. Too many guards." "Ah. We can't." Hal said, and then turned to Eclipse. "Why are you looking at me?" she demanded "My wings are terrible at camouflage." she said, narrowing her eyes. "So, fold them." Hal flicked her talons as her ruff raised a little "It's easy." "Well, it's not easy to fly away with your wings closed." Eclipse shot back, flapping her slightly large wings a little. "Fine. What can we do?" Hal asked, rolling her eyes "Summon him!" Abispa suggested "That's stupid. You'll hurt your soul." she argued, flicking her tail again as Abispa sighed "No, I amen't. This soul thing doesn't exist!" Hal's ruff twitched a little, "Fine. Have it your way." before flapping her wings and taking off "I'm going to go get some lions." Abispa looked down at her talons, but Eclipse smacked them away from her vision. "No, no, bad Abispa. When Hal says that she's being sarcastic." "I noticed." Abispa hissed, grumbling a little. She had always felt something in her talons. It felt like liquid, but it never fell out, only moved with her through her very steps. She thought this was normal for dragons, but apparently it wasn't. Promise hesitated. "The nobles might know what's going on? Eclipse, can teleportation work with this 'animus magic'." "Yess.." she said unenthusiastically, slipping away like a shadow. Promise sighed, and said "We shouldn't teleport Azure here. We should get contact with him, somehow, but he could gather useful information if he stays for a bit. But the nobles might know what was going on with all these weird sitings. Summon Alcon." "Er ... sorry, but who is Alcon again?" "Nevermind, just teleport us to him!" Promise said, avoiding the question. "Not until you tell me who they are." "Alcon is a noble who lives on the High Grounds, alright? Now let's go!" Promise snapped "What about Hal-" Abispa started but Eclipse interruptd her from the dark, making the two jump "I'll tell her you ditched her to go talk to some rich guy." Abispa was about to open her mouth when Promise said "Rephrase it a bit nicer, please." before urging Abispa. "Ok, NOW teleport us." "Why should I teleport you there in the first place?" Abispa argued "Because we need to consult him and recruit him!" "I'm sorry that you think some rich HiveWing is going to help in this situation." "Maybe not, but his servant can!" "WHO IS HIS SERVANT?" Abispa snapped back as Eclipse groaned and covered her ears "How am I supposed to know her name? Now get us there already!" "Fine, tsundere!" Abispa scoffed "I'm just annoyed today!" Promise huffed "Ok, now you sound like Hal. She muttered a quick enchantment, and suddenly she felt as if she was somewhere different. The air was much more fresh, and she had dropped on something. "What in the 3 moons?" someone muttered from below them. Promise? No, this dragon had golden scales with red flecks. 
"Ah-erm-sorry. We sort of teleported here."  the HiveWing gave them an odd look, and Abispa quickly realized that was definitely the wrong thing to say. "Ok, you 'teleported' here. Now why are you here?" "She told me to!" Abispa pointed a talon at Promise "We wanted to speak to Anise about something." Alcon narrowed his eyes "What do you need to talk to Anise about? She's my servant, if that's what you're thinking." "WHY would we steal Anise? We aren't looking for servants, we're looking for INFORMATION." "On my secret recipe? Then you're not getting it. I know you were lying about teleportation, how should I trust you now, tell me." Alcon huffed. His eyes were dark ginger red, and he was freckled with orange speckles from head to tail. "BECAUSE." Eclipse said from behind him. "What was in that cake?" Alcon muttered. "THIS IS NOT BECAUSE OF A CAKE. I DOUBT YOU EVEN HAVE THE BRAINCELLS TO IMAGINE THIS." Promise snapped and Alcon sighed "I think you're right about that."
"So, can we see Anise?" I demanded once again, annoyed by his persistence. "Why can't I visit?" "SilkWing business." Promise said grimly as Alcon raised his eyebrow. "You two aren't SilkWings." "I ench-" I started as Promise shook her head at me and said "We might as well be, judging by what we're doing. So please-" "What does that mean?" "REVOLUTION, THAT'S WHAT IT MEANS!" Promise shouted and shoved him aside (how she could even manage, I don't know). She stormed around the house, nearly breaking pieces of pottery I barely managed to save with outstretched talons "Hey!" Alcon complained, and hissed as Abispa caught them "Don't touch those!" "So you'd rather have it smashed by my unwieldy friend I see." I said sarcastically, "Oh, my dirty talonprints have stained their purity! Oh Clearsight, please forgive me!" I continued as he snorted "Fine, fine. Make sure to stain everything she tries to knock over with your dirty talonprints." I yelped, catching a gleaming white glass cup and quickly putting it back on it's shelf. "Where's Anise?" she demanded, turning towards Alcon so quickly I nearly dropped the pottery.
"GIVE ME A BREAK PROMISE!" I hissed, quickly uprighting myself and adjusting this vase. It was made of brown ancient metal that someone had definitely tried and failed miserably to polish. The intricate flower and tree designs were still visible. "Whoa." Abispa breathed. "Do you support LeafWings or something?" "I will not answer that question." Alcon declared "I just wanted to keep an antique that so happened to have ONE tree on it? Is something wrong with that?" "A very visible tree!." Promise pointed out. "We're getting off-topic. And why are you not suspicious we teleported out of nowhere?" Promise seemed to be reacting weirdly, but it probably was because she wasn't used to stress. Back when Abispa stressed about a test in their old school.
"ARGH! THAT DUMB FORMULA!" I hissed, covering my ears in hopes it would shut up my headache for a little, which didn't work. I lied on the bed. Flick wasn't here, and I had no siblings - older or younger geniuses - to ask for help. My brain simply  was dead this night, and it happened to be the one before my math test. I was in 3rd grade. "WHY IN THE 3 BLASTED MOONS DO WE NEED TO KNOW THIS?!" I yelled. Being alone was good sometimes, like the fact you only followed your own rooms - but the worst thing was that, when you didn't know something, were missing homework, or stressing on a test, like, for example, RIGHT NOW, you had nobody to save you.  I sighed and my tail lashed like it always did when I was stressed. THIS WAS MATH! I had always hated math, but this was the one exam that could help me pass! And all grades were sent by messenger to parent, so Flick would see it no doubt! I groaned at the blue silk-woven book that spelled out  M A T H  in bold letters and spaced out writing, like it made it any better than all the other identical boring math books which droned on and on about useless things only a few jobs could use. Why didn't they give dragonets the choice, she had wondered. Probably the same snooty grown-up reasons. "BLA BLA BLA! DRAGONETS DON'T KNOW WHATS BEST FOR THEM BLA BLA!" as her Agriculture teacher, Ms. Phasmid would say - no - drone was a better word. Guess that applied to both agriculture and math. I couldn't ask anyone. I had no friends at school. Maybe I could ask Carnifex. She was the mysterious kid in my class, always staring at everyone with cold, calculating eyes. 
Apparently, I had proof from a doctor I had gotten a fever, but that wouldn't work out with my teacher. She said "STOP THE EXCUSES, SO ANNOYING, BLA, I aMEN'T STUPID, BLA BLA!" So boring. And so annoying. She didn't even allow me to show her the doctor's slip, that silly creature. All she did was open her mouth, close it for a millisecond, and open it for another 5 million years to say what was coming out of her annoying throat. She walked, talked and thought slow.
"So, you wanted me?"
=== Chapter 13 ===
Azure had awoken after a while. His brain seemed fuzzy in a way he couldn't grasp, and he felt .. larger? He felt as if he was asleep for a bit, but for a time he couldn't grasp. He didn't exactly feel well-rested, but instead very tired. And since when was he so hungry? 
As his vision came into focus, he noticed he was in a brightly lit series of caves. Stalagtites and stalagmites stuck out of the floor, but they were only slightly smaller than him, with the stalactites towering over him dauntingly, at least twice the size of an average grown SilkWing, which was terrifying, because most stalagmites a normal dragon could crush under their talons. Slowly, the numbness started to disappear from his feet as he stood up, wobbling slightly. "NEW VISITOR!" someone screamed from the dark, making him jump. "Cookie, you're scaring him," another voice reminded the voice from before, who hesitated. "Right, sorry. BUT NEW VISITORS!" "Can you please not .." a soft voice came from next to it.
"Hi, hi, hi! I'm COOKIE! Oh wait, you already know that! What's your name?" Azure didn't bother to make sense out of the rest of it. "Er .." he frowned "OHHH! ITS AZURE RIGHT! I HEARD A LOT ABOUT YOU!" Cookie said before the other flew down and clamped her snout shut. "That's Cookie, as you know. I'm Mosaic, and the one in the corner is Starscape." "Starsky." she corrected softly "The one in on the ledge is Monarch." I took a closer look at Mosaic, to realize she was extremely brightly colored, with turquoise eyes and scales which were arrays of blue, pink, and softer yellows. Not the kind of yellow that hurt your eyes, the normal, calm yellow. "I suppose we're located in the flamesilk cave as of now?" Azure said, his eyes narrowing at the hyper excited one, 'Cookie'. "Yes." Mosaic said, letting go of Cookie's snout. Oddly enough, Cookie had nearly black scales, and brown wings that looked feathery. Her eyes were a very bright blue, but under the light you could notice brown and green specks. Starsky seemed barely visible, but Azure could tell her wings seemed to be silver or something, since from the shadows they seemed dark grey. 
"So to let you in, we are going to escape!" Mosaic said to him as he tilted his head slightly "Yeah. From this place. Sure." "I already told you, Mosaic, dragons do not escape from the flamesilk caverns." Cookie sighed. "For the last time, I'm going to escape. I can blast the guards with flamesilk, remember?" "Any flamesilk can do that, Mosaic." Cookie said planatively, and for once she sounded more logical than her 'friend'. "So, where are you from?" Mosaic asked as Starsky came out to join them, but Monarch stayed in the corner. "Come over here, Monarch." Mosaic sighed but Azure shrieked "Queen Monarch is a flamesilk!?" "HUSH. And that's not Queen Monarch." Mosaic said, as he frowned. "God, what is with dragons naming their dragonets after known figures?" Monarch made a face at him, before walking over. "I'm Mosaic from Hornet Hive, I enjoy burning HiveWing faces. I came out from metamorphosis about 2 months ago." "Sounds like the kind of friend to have." Azure snorted but Starsky continued "I'm Starsky, I came out of metamorphosis a few days ago. I'm from Cicada Hive." "Monarch from Bloodworm Hive. I was out of metamorphosis about a month ago." "I'm Cookie from Wasp Hive. I like pranking HiveWings and I don't know how long I've been here." there seemed to be a leak in a wall of something, but Azure ignored it, simply concluding he was overthinking. "She's been here before I got out of the cocoon." 
Azure sighed. "When did you get here?" "Er .. I actually don't remember that either," Cookie admitted, but adding "It was before metamorphosis though." "Hey, you never told me that." Mosaic complained. "Hm. Sorry." Cookie said dismissively, before saying "That's pretty all I remember about the time I came. Anyways, Alfalfa is coming to collect silk now. They shouldn't collect silk from you yet." she said, pointing to Azure "This is Star's first day." Almost as if right on cue, a HiveWing guard walked in. Her eyes were dark brown, nearly black, and she had only speckles and freckles of black here and there, the rest of her seemed to be pale, similar to the color of Mason's scales. Odd.
Cauldrons were handed out. Cookie secretly singed hers (it was fireproof), Mosaic hid hers in her cave, but Starscape ACTUALLY did as told, as bright, golden silk spewed out of her wrists, dropping into the cauldron below. Her silk was much brighter than Cookie's. Mosiac's was slightly dimmer, but not by much. She probably conserved her silk well. I heard Mosaic walk up to Alfalfa. "Don't tell me this is a prank." Alfalfa huffed, narrowing her eyes at Mosaic's wrists. "Hey! Drop some flamesilk on her head!" Cookie whispered with a smirk Azure snorted and spilled a bit of liquidish flamesilk on her head. "A-" she started to scream, before she paused. "Hey! This doesn't burn!" she hissed angrily. Azure ran off quickly into the shadows. He was actually enjoying this prank. He high-taloned with Cookie as Mosaic grinned, while Starsky facepalmed at the three. "Please stop you guys." she whispered as Mosaic rolled her eyes "Only because you're little." "I am not," she seemed to mumble, her antennae twitching.
"So, guys. When are we escaping?" Mosaic said as Azure's antannae twitched, and Starsky muttered "Someone help me." "Mosaic .. how many times do I have to tell you there isn't an escape .." "Everything is possible, Cookie." she argued and Azure hesitated before saying "Well, it's not as if we can't burn their faces." "There are too many to do that, Mosaic and you know it." "How many are there? 12?" "18 which come down here, 20 more which watch from above" Cookie corrected "Same thing." Mosaic said "I hate to say, but I'm with Cookie on this one." Starscape said softly. "HELLO? You're forgetting about me!" Monarch said, bonking Cookie's head. "OW! But fair." she said. "We need to get out of here somehow. I am not going to waste my life in the dark like this!" Monarch said. "I don't really care much about the outside world. There's not much to live for." Cookie shrugged as Azure frowned "Suit yourself, but I'm sure the rest of us have a life out there that we need to get back to." He had been oddly quiet in the conversation. One moment it seemed like they were enjoying the cave, next they despised it.  
"Cookie .. I'm sure someone misses you." Starsky said softly, her tail curling as her antennae lowered. "No, they don't. My family is in Wasp Hive, remember? Barely anyone cares about their children. I have nobody who's going to remember me by now anyways." Cookie shrugged. By now? Azure wondered. Just how long has she been down here? "Cookie! Well, we care and we certainly wont leave you here to rot for 20 years!" Mosaic shot back. Cookie fell silent. "Fine. But I'm telling you we won't even make it halfway through." "The guards are idiots! They probably fall asleep over that glass." Cookie shook her head "I doubt that. There aren't 38 Alfalfas." "Ok, let me get this straight, one minute we're pranking guards the next we're running away?" Azure demanded "Yes, that's exactly what we're doing." Mosaic responded. "So. Are there any escapes around?" "Well, there was one." Cookie shrugged "But it was too small for me to go down. And they probably sealed it off long ago." "Don't be so pessimistic, Cookie. We can still escape!" "No, we can't. How many times do I have to tell you there is no escape from here?", but that ended up sounding more like a statement rather than a question. Her antennae twitched, and then curled around her horns as she sighed, saying "Don't blame me if you're killed too." before flying up to the ledge she had recently perched and throwing some flamesilk at Alfalfa out of boredom. "MOS-AIIIIIIIIIIIIIIC!" she yelled as Mosaic shrugged and told them "She'll follow us anyway, sooner or later." Azure frowned at Cookie, who had her eyes narrowed at Alfalfa like she was going to char her face on both ends. Azure looked away. 
"So, where is it?" "And I so happen to be out of metamorphosis at such a convenient time that we escape 3 hours later?" "Yep, that's exactly what I'm saying." Mosaic said proudly as Starscape groaned and mumbled "You guys are such a headache." Cookie narrowed her eyes a little, mumbling "We'll end up like the rest of them, but then again that's better than this place." "What are you mumbling about now?" "No-nothing." Cookie stuttered. Mosaic's antennae curled themselves over her horns. It even surprised me a little. I didn't know what happened to the 'others', but I could only assume it wasn't good. "So .. basically if we ruin this we're doomed." Starsky said while Mosaic hissed "Why THANK YOU, Captain Obvious, for stating ABSOLUTELY POSITIVELY DEFINITELY UNKNOWN facts." Starsky sighed a little at her tone. Cookie just narrowed her eyes at Mosaic. They walked in silence for a minute. "So, how much farther is it?" "A little bit." Cookie said coldly, frowning. "Seriously, Cookie. Is something wrong?" Cookie growled a little, but kept silent. "Co-" Mosaic started "NO! There isn't anything wrong, so stop bothering me about it!" Starscape whispered "Is it weird that I think she's nervous?" as I snorted "Well, yes. I think we all know that. The question is, why?" Azure responded  Starscape frowned "I .. think she was saying something about other flamesilks. Maybe it's something that happened to them?" "Or .. she said she didn't know how long she was here. It's possible it was longer than Mosaic first expected." 
"I can't say I oppose you." Azure whispered back, eyeing Cookie warily as her mood started to act up. She kept mumbling something under her breath, earning concerned looks from Mosaic, but even she seemed to be holding her breath, as if waiting for a ghost to come out from the shadows. "What is with you two?" Azure demanded, but both were silent. Monarch trailed behind, looking as if she felt like she only had 10 minutes left to live. Oddly specific, brain.
Cookie was twitching a lot more now as the tunnels got darker. "Are you afraid of the dark?" Mosaic said teasingly, trying to lighten the mood. "NO!-No, I am not." Cookie quickly regained her composure. "So you're afraid of the dark." Starsky concluded "Not the dark .." Cookie snarled a little. She was acting so out of control right now, it was hard to believe this was the same Cookie from the morning of laughing and pranking guards. Apparently, this dragon was either paranoid or two-sided. "Why are you so nervous?" Mosaic said to Cookie, frowning a little "THIS IS-" Cookie nearly shouted but she took a deep breath and counted to about 200 (that was not an exaggeration, she was mumbling under her breath until she reached 200) and said "Nothing important." she finished, although that was clearly not what she was planning to say at first. I opened my mouth to ask, but she said "It's up ahead. HiveWings used to stand guard over here." she said, brushing the metal spears dipped in dried flamesilk "Probably to guard against traitors." "What?-" I started. "Hush!" she snapped as talonsteps approached, along with the soft thudding of some heavy bag things. "I thought I heard something over here," a roughly accented voice said. Their tone was dark and low, for a HiveWing at least. HiveWings often talked in a snooty way, or at least kept their voice neutral - Abispa was funny. Don't think of Abispa. Cookie's antennae only flattened as they heard the angry grumbling. "Let's stop wasting our time here. Come on." Azure wondered if this was what Cookie meant. But judging by the look on her face, he knew that wasn't it. Not by a long shot. 
Azure blinked a little, realizing. Were those ... LeafWings? His heart started beating faster. Not out of terror or panic, but pure excitement. LeafWings were alive?! All this time? How had he not known before? They could save the hives! They could take revenge! They could burn this whole place down and it would be the greatest thing ever! He could help! He'd help if it had to do with harming the HiveWings! But ... would Abispa want that? his mind echoed as it finally returned to its normal speed. Suddenly, he was thinking What exactly do those pouches contain?
Suddenly, it occurred to him that everyone was acting calm. Everyone knew about this in the hive. Everyone who tried eventually found it. But there was something more to it. It wasn't just 'LeafWings exist, flamesilks exist, rebellions rise, and none of these events have anything to do with each other. It was just too big of a chance, judging how rarely these events came on individually, not just alone. What were they hiding? What did these flamesilks know - and how? They couldn't have picked it up from the guards, surely. Azure doubted the guards knew a thing about this. But why else would they have left their posts? Could the LeafWings have caused something that scared them off? Not likely. HiveWings were always persistent - AKA they were little bugs who kept coming back. So what had happened? Really, though, he didn't think he'd be able to handle the truth if he heard it. He didn't know why, just this creepy crawling feeling he wanted to squash down like a bug. But of course, he couldn't, since it was a feeling and not a miniature Wasp statue (do not ask where he got that example from).  As if that wasn't bad enough, the LeafWings wouldn't leave. He wrote 'Can I throw a rock' in handwriting that should've gotten the world record for being the most disorganized, with letters out of place, and other letters covering each other. Cookie seemed to shake her head in the dark though. I narrowed my eyes, confused. Could she see in the dark or something? But perhaps that was what living in a dimly lit cave with only yourself for light did to your vision. 
Most of the LeafWings had left, a few hours later. Azure had nearly fallen asleep, but Cookie shook him and clamped his snout shut so he wouldn't complain about it. He only managed a small growl, glaring at her, immediately regretting his decision by the intensely aggravated look on her face. He quickly turned away, which was odd of him, but this dragon's angry gaze could make the room drop a few degrees. So he wasn't at all interested in pride right now. If pesky temperature didn't bother, he decided, neither should he. And hey, temperature was annoying. I remembered one time.
"Carny, it's humid outside!" I complained to my older sister who just smiled nervously at me and said "Well, it's not like we can do anything to change the weather unless we can convince the sun to set and the clouds to buzz off." I laughed a little. She was the funniest older sister in the history of older sisters.
"I wish we could so I wouldn't have to go to school today. The teachers are always so mean." I complained, my antennae curling defensively as I thought of them. They were mean, and always blamed students for their problems whenever the principal walked in. "Why didn't you clean the classroom this morning?" "The students ruined it." "Why are you late?" "I had to help a student with a homework assignment!" Apparently the principal was exceptionally stupid for running a bunch of teachers, since she never wondered how a student knew a teacher's address. Or maybe she did, but didn't care. The latter was highly likely. But we all got in trouble anyways.
I hesitated as I was sucked back into the real world when a gruff voice called out "Somebody there?" Had I been mumbling? By the look on Mosaic's face, I probably was. And Mosaic didn't look happy. She looked like she was giving me a 'stare - time - now - murder - time - later'  stare. I thought about a few HiveWings I had got detention for punching in the face a few years ago, when I was 4. But ... they did deserve it. A thought - did I still have my neckband? My brain went into a flurry of panic as I quickly felt the scales around my neck. A soft feeling. It was still there. Why it was there? Don't think about that. he reminded himself. He didn't want to remember that day. Azure simply wouldn't be able to stand it. Subconciously brushing his talons against the ground, tying to get his breath to level, he tried to see where the LeafWings were at. He caught a barely visible shadow. "Let's get out of here already, General." "No. Someone could come and alert them that a cave is open to the way out. We need to keep it up or else .." he snarled a little "Just - stand watch, Nemus! I won't be gone long!" The second voice, 'Nemus' sighed. "Guess I'm stuck guarding against nothing because of a paranoid general." he muttered "I heard that!" came a faint reply as the dragon seemed to stiffen up. Why he was so scared of this weird general, I did not know. But I had only seen them for a few seconds.
Should we knock him out and just take our leave? Azure thought, glancing at the LeafWing fiddling nervously with a laurel branch - or so it seemed, from his view vantage of barely peeking out of a rock. And that wasn't exactly a spot (pun not intended) where he could make judgement. Why was he holding a laurel branch, though? And why were LeafWings digging into HiveWing tunnels. A cold feeling sank into my stomach at Cookie's calm expression. And slowly, I realized. They're here for one of us.
Category:Fanfictions
Category:Fanfictions (Incomplete)
Category:Fanfictions (Fanon)
Category:Content (AutumnTheSkyLeafWing)