Broken Butterflies

A fanfiction by Laurel Willow, in progress. Feel free to correct spelling or grammar errors. 
=== Teaser ===
How did we get here? What happened to him? Am I in danger?
She clutched the ruby heart between her talons, feeling the webs shake underneath her, when her eyes caught on something. Underneath the dew collector was a pouch. It looked like it was made of silk, but it couldn't be, because it was the wrong color- eerie gold instead of the usual pale silver. 
She tugged at it tentatively and felt a slight warmth radiating off of it, and everything clicked in her mind. 
Flamesilk. 
She opened the pouch and pulled out something inside- a tiny, folded scrap of paper. It was a note- from him. 
== Chapter 1 ==
Aquamarine hurried through the Hive. 
She kept an eye out for dragons looking suspicious of her, as she usually did; now that she was a Chrysalis member, she felt like it was extra important to stay a background dragon. Unrecognizable, quiet, ordinary. 
She opened the door to the office as she'd been instructed to do. Inside, a golden yellow HiveWing was writing on a scrap of paper. A SilkWing assistant stood behind him- a salmon pink dragon with bright orange wings. She smiled as Aquamarine came in. "Hello. Are you here for your partner assignment?" 
Aquamarine nodded. She'd received a letter a while back about her partner assignment; she'd known she would have one at some point, and then the letter came saying to come here. 
The SilkWing rummaged in a cabinet for a while, and the HiveWing looked up. He nodded quietly to Aquamarine, and the SilkWing pulled a sheet of paper out of the cabinet. "Here it is, I think. Do you mind checking this, Junebug?" 
Junebug, the HiveWing, took the paper and studied it for a moment. "Looks all right," he said, and grabbed a stamp from the side of his desk and stamped the paper. "There you are." He neatly folded the paper in half and slid it across the desk towards her. Aquamarine took it and walked out, waiting until she was in the hallway to unfold it and look at it. It was clearly a form, neatly filled in by someone with very fancy handwriting. 
Aquamarine, the partner chosen for you is Clubtail. He is a SilkWing, originally from Bloodworm Hive, now/still living in __________ Hive and will arrive at your home within a few weeks. We hope you have many happy days together. 
Underneath there was a bunch of random information about Clubtail, and at one side was a drawing of a purple and lime green dragon with blue eyes. She looked back at the form again and noticed the empty line, presumably where a Hive name would be put. Does he somehow not live in a Hive? Or did whoever filled out the form forget to fill that in? It seemed unlikely. 
Underneath the random information was a box marked Approval Stamp and the stamp Junebug had put on it. It was the shape of a butterfly, in black ink. She ran one claw over the lines of the stamp, then folded the paper up again and hurried back through the Hive. 
Aquamarine came out onto the edge and nodded to the HiveWing guard. He did not respond, as always, and she clambered out onto the webs, flapping in the sunlight. She slipped inside her silk cell, simple and a bit flappy because she hadn't worked on it in a while. She put the letter in a drawer, quietly made dinner and watched the sunset over the savannah. 
When the sun had gone down and it was rather dark, she turned around and looked in, towards the Hives. They glimmered with lights, golden and a few duller blue or green or red. She washed off the dinner dishes and went to bed. 
== Chapter 2 ==
The next week passed fairly quickly. She carefully wove another hammock above her own and tried to make the cell less prone to flapping around in the wind. It was tricky to balance working on her living space and going to work and catching Chrysalis meetings all at once, but she managed it. Mostly. 
However, the next week went by way too quickly, if you asked her, until one afternoon, when she was coming home from her job at the SilkWing hospital, there he was. 
Clubtail was sitting in the "street" of silk webbing, tugging two of the threads apart to look down towards the faraway savannah. He released them, letting them bounce back into place, and looked up. "Oh!" he said. "Hello. I didn't see you there. You're Aquamarine, correct?" She nodded and he grinned. "Good. I am on the right web, then. Nice to meet you, Aquamarine." He seemed at a loss for words, and she stepped towards him, balancing with her wings and tail. "Nice to meet you too, Clubtail." 
"is this one yours?" he asked, touching one of the cells with his tail. He stuck his head in without really waiting for an answer, and Aquamarine hastily said "No, that's my neighbor," before he stepped inside. "This one's mine." She stepped in, a bit self-conscious about how plain it was- there wasn't much there aside from her cooking things, the two hammocks, a few shelves with stuff on them and her dew collector. 
Clubtail stepped in behind her and smiled. "It's very nice. What's this?" He looked up and touched a small model of hers with his claw. 
He thinks it's really nice? This must be the least nice cell in the Hive, Aquamarine thought. "Oh- that?" she said, trying to take her mind off the compliment. "It's the Temple of Clearsight. Have you ever seen it?" He nodded. "Once, when I was a dragonet. I'd love to see it again." 
Aquamarine tilted her head. "You should probably get settled in before we start thinking of traveling," she said. "Wasp Hive is a long way away." 
"True, true," Clubtail said. He turned around to see the sun, moving down through the afternoon sky. He sat down on the floor, apparently all out of conversation. Aquamarine didn't know what to say, either, so she turned away and started organizing vegetables for dinner. Okra, sweet potatoes, hmm... maybe a bit of starfruit. It was a special occasion, after all. 
After some chopping and frying, which Clubtail happily joined in on, they ate it and Aquamarine got out a bit of fruit for dessert. That went very well after the usual taste of yams, and Clubtail volunteered to wash the dishes. "You mostly made dinner," he insisted. "Not to mention making an extra hammock for me. Go ahead and get some rest. I'll rinse them off." She considered for a minute before giving in. It would be nice to just relax for a bit before bed. 
Category:Fanfictions
Category:Fanfictions (Incomplete)