An Unexpected Legacy

“The worlds...” An elderly woman spoke, dressed in colorful robes and an eccentric headdress of feathers, holding a staff entangled with vines with a little blue orb resting on the top.

“Grandmother?” A young, tan-skinned woman with dark hair and bright red markings painted all over her skin stood behind the old woman cautiously.

“The worlds...” The oracle repeated, unmoving with her eyes closed as the sun began to set on the horizon. “They are...nearing.”

“Nearing?” The oracle’s granddaughter questioned with an inquisitive tilt of her head.

“The worlds are about to run into each other.” The oracle put it in layman's terms.

“What? How?” The granddaughter straightened instantly.

“The dimensions are ever moving and changing, it’s happened before; it was how our world came to be in the first place.” The oracle spouted the old story of the land her granddaughter had heard too many times before to count.

“But...I fear this will not be a pleasant merging.” The old woman finished.

The granddaughter remained silent, taking all of this in with a worried frown tugging her proud lips.

“What should we do?” She finally asked.

The old oracle didn’t say anything for a long time, only releasing an ominous breath once the sun fully set behind the Fire Dragons’ mountains, casting the land before them in darkness. The oracle had a strange forewarning of something good despite all the ghastly feelings, she just couldn’t pinpoint it.

“Perhaps...” She muttered to herself, not humoring her fretting granddaughter’s previous question.

The conversation ended there.

***

“Come on, hurry up!” Danny urged his two tall, dark friends to move faster.

He had taken some sort of bet with Ben to get to the food tent first. Andy and Matt hadn’t many details on it, they had just seen Danny look up from his phone in a moment of intense determination before getting pulled out of their individual lawn chairs.

“Why do you have to drag us with you?” Matt complained lazily.

“Because!” Danny answered unhelpfully.

“That explains it...” Andy rolled his eyes sarcastically.

“’Splains everything.” Danny smirked mockingly.

“Because?” Matt shot an incredulous look Andy’s way.

“Because.” Andy stated with faux-seriousness.

“Exactly!” Danny cheered, slowing down for his friends to catch up so he could throw his arms around their shoulders.

“This conversation is going nowhere.” Andy observed, ducking under Danny’s arm and putting his long legs to good use, using them to strut further ahead.

“Nowhere at all.” Matt also escaped Danny’s arm lock and caught up to Andy with ease.

“But that’s what makes it fun!” Danny laughed, his British drawl catching the attention of several Tour-going kids.

Warped Tour was hot, humid, roasting, vast, and crowded. Danny, Matt and Andy’s bands were all playing later, or had already played so, they had the next two hours until Black Veil Brides was meant to play. Two hours to do absolutely nothing.

Or so they thought.

As Danny started catching up with Matt and Andy, the latter noticed a bizarre crack in the dry field. He paused and crouched down to investigate.

The small crevice was about the size of his hand, but what caught his attention was the odd blue glow emanating from it.

Before he had to time to question “What the fuck?”, the crack shot outward several inches towards him and away from him. Andy jumped in surprise as the glow shot under his feet, but before he could hit the ground, his boot fell through the dirt around the glowing crevice.

The ground was starting to collapse around him. First was his foot, leaving him in a stunned, awkward sitting position before the rest of the dry soil crumbled beneath him. Matt quickly grabbed his friend by the wrist while Danny successfully pushed a girl out of the way of the crack shooting towards him, now more like a growing abyss.

His feet fell through the crevice, but he caught himself on his arms, clinging to the collapsing sides of the glowing blue crag.

The ground around Matt and Andy crumbled away next, sending the two men falling into the blinding blue light with nothing to grab onto. The sides Danny was holding onto broke off like a melting glacier, also sending him plummeting to his presumed death, but not before he saw several kids get caught in the collapsing ground.

No one had anytime to fully react, it just happened. Everything was fine one minute, and the next, they were falling to their doom.

“Andy!” CC, who had watched the scene play out in shock, like many other Tour-goers, peered over the gaping edge of the abyss, now two or three yards wide. The only good thing was that it appeared to have stopped growing.

There was a strange, sinister wind whipping around the proximity of the blue abyss that made CC’s hair lift up from his shoulders and fly in multiple directions. He heard Ben on the opposite side, calling in vain for Danny.

“Shit!” Ben swore in a panic. “Shit! Shit! Shit!”

He swung around, grabbing Cam as he was just pushing through the crowd swarming around the crag and dragging him back out of the chaos.

“What are you doing!?” Cameron shouted after him.

“I...!” Ben scrambled for an answer. “I going to...find a really long ladder!”

Cameron didn’t question this clearly flawed plan, but decided to cross that bridge when he got there. His fucking singer just fell into a glowing hole, there were better things to worry about than Ben’s insane decision.

***

Andy came into consciousness dazedly, his body was aching, but he wasn’t in agony. He didn’t think.

He slowly opened his eyes, not sure what he expected to see, but he hadn’t expected to see towering stalagmites jutting up from the floor around him. His breath caught as he did a default mental reevaluation of his body.

He didn’t feel anything particularly painful, just a familiar throb like he’d fallen off something onto a hard surface. Or fallen through something, in this case.

Sitting up slowly, he triple checked himself, making sure there wasn’t anything stony, sharp and fatal sticking out of him. Once he confirmed nothing of the sort had happened, he breathed in relief.

Andy then took stock of his surroundings. It was all pretty much the same dark-gray color with the same (if only differing in height) pointy rock at every turn. He stood up confusedly, wondering what had happened.

Looking around again, the memory of that glowing crag, Matt catching him, and then falling...falling...falling...falling...

Everything had gone black at one point, and he had no idea how long it had been, but a faint blue glow lit his way from way, way, way up high. So far up that he could only vaguely see it. The light was more like a nightlight glow at this distance, but it was plenty to see. It did, however, cast the very edges of the...cave?...in total blackness.

While making this observation, Andy turned and froze at what he saw.

Something dark was slowly running down the stalagmite before him. Looking up, he made the horrifying discovery of a girl dressed in reds and yellows staked through the abdomen, her body unmoving – dead.

Fuck, that could’ve been me! Andy thought in shock, backing up quickly and bumping into another pointed rock, this one thankfully bare of any corpses.

Then, a chilling realization hit him.

Where was Matt and Danny?

“Matt!?” He called into the forest of stalagmites. But no answer came.

“Danny!?” Andy started making his way in between the sharp rocks, some reaching a full storey above his head, some too small to reach the rim of his boots.

That’s when he heard a pained groan ahead of him. The area wasn’t large, but it took several seconds to get to the form of Danny lying on the rocky ground with one of the shorter spikes piercing his left shoulder. His blood covered his shirt and it was apparent he’d been there a while, but he was still alive and coherent.

“Danny!” Andy squeezed through the last of the massive stalagmites and went to his friend’s side. This led him to make the connection that there were random rows that were clear of any rock, and these rows were usually lined with cracked and damaged stalagmites.

It was as if something – something rather big, to be precise – had rammed through the area in a rage. The walls were mostly clear of anything sharp and deadly, unless you counted the disheartening bones scattered along the lining of the cave.

And the two-foot stalagmite that had stabbed Danny.

“Are you okay?” Andy asked him rather stupidly.

“Am I okay?” Danny cringed in pain as he tried to sit up. “I’m bleeding to death! NO, I’M NOT OKAY! WHAT KIND OF DUMBASS QUESTION WAS THAT?!”

“A dumb one?” Andy offered a pitying quirk of his lips.

Danny just glared at him, breathing heavily.

“Where’s Matt...?” Danny drawled, tiredness rimming his voice. Andy guessed bleeding out was a tiring endeavor.

Something coiled coldly in Andy’s stomach, but before he could answer...

A troubled grunt sounded from somewhere to Andy’s left, and not long after did Matt’s hunkered form trip into the lit area of the cave.

“Damn it...” He swore from his place on the floor.

He looked behind himself, seeing the cause of his sudden acquaintance with the ground was a stalagmite-wannabe rock jutting only a few inches from the stone floor. It was small, but it was big enough to be broken.

Matt took his rage out on the little stone by bringing his foot up and kicking back at it once...twice...thrice...four times until the stubborn rock finally broke off its base and went flying somewhere in the corner.

With that out of his system, Matt got back to his feet and staggered over to his friends. He was still a little disoriented.

“Oh, fuck, dude!” Matt finally fully registered Danny’s predicament. “Are you okay?”

Danny looked up at him incredulously. “NO, I’M NOT OKAY! I’M BLEEDING TO DEATH! WHAT KIND OF DUMBASS QUESTION WAS THAT?!”

“A dumb one?” Andy smirked amusedly.

Matt looked between the two, nonplussed.

“No shittin’ way!” Danny snarled sarcastically, then groaned in pain.

“Someone’s in a bad mood,” Matt crossed his arms.

“Just-!” Danny stopped himself from further insulting his only friends in this situation.

“Okay, just...just get me outta this, please?” He drawled almost genuinely.

Matt shrugged nonchalantly, unfolding his arms and bringing together a quick “plan”. He rested his foot on the side of the bloodied stalagmite, much to Danny’s dismay.

“What the fuck are you doing?” His face visibly paled.

“Gonna get you out.” Matt responded and started kicking the sharp rock.

All the while, Danny was screaming for him to stop or...

“WHAT IF IT BREAKS OFF IN MY-!” The stone snapped off inside Danny’s shoulder and, causing mild tearing in the process, was flung across the room with the force behind Matt’s boot.

“ARGH!” Danny howled in searing pain.

“YOU WANKER! YOU FUCKING AH-..! ARH! Hah...! Hah...” Danny grit his teeth and let out a gravelly groan.

Andy jumped at the sudden flood of profanity, but otherwise had no idea how to help his pissed off British friend.

Matt leaned down behind Danny to see if there was anything else he could do. Other than that, he was completely unfazed by the singer’s name-calling.

“Do you...need anymore help?” Andy asked tentatively, nervous to cause Danny anymore pain.

“No!” Danny refused loudly. “I’m fine, I’m fi-!”

He stopped immediately after beginning to sit up on his own, face contorting in momentary agony before he leaned back to the floor.

“Okay, I might need a little push,” He corrected as Matt grabbed his shirt.

Before Danny could object, Matt yanked him off the remaining base of the stone.

“AH! DAMN IT, MATT!” Danny yelped as Andy joined in helping get him back to the ground without causing anymore damage.

“What? Would you prefer it if we’d left you there?” Matt defended himself.

“No, but I wasn’t ready!” Danny fought back.

“Well, that’s good because then it would’ve hurt a lot more.”

Danny just sighed, relieved it was over as Matt and Andy crouched back down beside and behind him.

“Jesus...where the fuck are we, anyway?” The British singer questioned tiredly.

“I don’t know,” Andy answered honestly. “All I know is, we fell down a hole.”

Then, he added, “A really big, glowing hole.”

Matt then got distracted by something in the dark corner behind a rock. Had Andy or Danny noticed, they would’ve seen a multicolored glow reflect in his face.

“Yeah, that’s all I got, too.” Danny continued.

“I’m just...glad we didn’t...” Andy paused, lips pursed. He looked cautiously over his shoulder to another staked body on a nearby pillar.

Danny followed his eyes and felt a sickening churn flip his stomach.

It wasn’t as much the corpse itself since it was dark and the gore couldn’t be very well seen, but it was the damning realization that that could’ve easily been one of them.

They were still in shock and seeing a dead person shish-kabob’d didn’t seem like a big deal at the moment. They knew it was bad, and they knew it was a horrible way to die, but they couldn’t dig up the proper emotions to mourn or grieve.

Sometime between then and Andy’s last sentence, Matt had completely detached from the conversation and meandered over to the curious object behind the rock.

“What...the fuck is...?” He saw a red, oval shaped thing leaned against the snuck space between the wall and larger stone. This red thing stood easily at Matt’s waist, gestating softly and occasionally glimmering in...four different colors.

“Matt?” Andy stood up at his friend’s incomplete inquisition.

Matt carefully reached out towards the red oval, gently stroking his hand down the smooth little bump-like veins that raveled randomly around the shape. The surface was hard, almost like a shell, but that being said, it was also soft enough to be broken. Matt placed his hands at the top of the oval and, with care, began to pull it free of the rock.

It wasn’t badly stuck, but with how careful he had to be, it took quite a sum of effort to pull out into the open without damaging it.

He managed to tug it free, getting thrown back and knocked off his balance with the remaining force. The red oval just wobbled on its smooth bottom while Matt hit the ground with a thud.

“What the hell is that?” Danny drawled, gesturing at the strange new object.

“I don’t know, I just found it!” Matt lifted himself back up and sat in front of his discovery.

Andy gazed down at the red item, seemingly transfixed by the glistening colors and soft red glow emanating from deep within, highlighting a curious shape inside the oval.

“It’s an egg...” He said quietly, not meaning to have said it out loud. It was put as a statement, but it had, in fact, only been a guess.

There was an embryo of some kind inside. That was clear to him, though.

“An egg?” Matt and Danny looked back to the, indeed, rather egg-like object.

Danny and Andy got closer to the large, red egg, standing around it.

Well, Matt and Danny were sitting on odd sides of it, but Andy stood opposite Matt before crouching down in front the oval.

The embryo inside was now facing Andy, and he could get a better look at it. It was pretty big itself, but still only three-quarters of the size of its protective chamber. Andy could see two big eyes on either side of a vaguely triangular head, as well as what looked like a tail and...wings?

The embryo inside twitched, its head lurching up fractionally. Andy leaned back away from the egg, surprised.

Could it see him?

Could it feel them?

Could it hear them?

Then, the egg cracked.

“Shit!” Matt and Danny both jumped in shock, unprepared for the sudden, sharp noise. Andy didn’t move.

The embryo started to move around, squirming fiercely, hitting the sides of the egg and causing further damage to the glowing chamber.

First, a piece near the top chipped off, the crack spreading down and around the shell like a lopsided halo. Then, a little clawed foot went through the near-bottom of the egg before retracting and kicking out a chunk of the breaking shell.

The three men could only watched in stunned silence, maybe slowly backing away, as the egg came away under the thrashing force of tail, feet and wings.

Finally, as the final pieces of shell broke off, a bizarre sight met them.

In the center of the crunchy wreckage sat a quadruped, green and off-white lizard standing at about Andy’s knees with a yellowish underbelly, a wagging, scaly tail with little, tiny spikes barely sharp enough to be called so running halfway from the tip to its back, leathery yellow wings connected to forest-green talons stretched out to double its size, a slight squared triangular head with a soft “beak” hanging a bit over its lips, and two, large, cat-like yellow eyes.

No one spoke for a long while, rather, all three men stared down at the little winged lizard with fascination, slight horror, and overall shock.

It looked up at Andy with expectant sunflower eyes.

“Is that a dragon?! ” Matt exclaimed, unsure whether to grin or scream.

The little green lizard turned its head towards Matt with interest. It had never heard such a language before.

It wasn’t used to high syllables the creatures in front of it were speaking. It remembered the soft, low rumble of its mother’s voice forming soothing vibrations that it understood.

“God, where the fuck are we...?” Andy breathed, confusion drawing down his dark, elegant eyebrows.

The little dragon’s head snapped around at the sound of his voice...deeply smooth like caramel, a soft rumble from his throat.

The baby lizard stood shakily on all four clawed feet, golden eyes wide with recognition as it almost toppled over itself on its way to Andy. There, it butted its head against his leg and rubbed its little body against him like a cat.

Andy stiffened and froze, not knowing what to do.

Matt burst out laughing at the expression on his face while Danny grinned wolfishly, shoulders shaking with silent puffs of laughter.

The little dragon ignored them happily, for it had its Momma.

It paid no mind to the fact that “Momma” was clearly a different species altogether, much less the fact that Andy was male, but the baby lizard had no idea of the difference in scents between male and female creatures yet.

“The little lizard-Pegasus likes you!” Danny teased in a mocking baby voice.

Andy didn’t respond, just stared down at the baby dragon trying to garner his attention.

Danny shook his head, swaying to his feet. He was starting to get dizzy and the blood from the hole in his shoulder was starting to drip onto the floor. Bad sign.

“Can we...can we try and get out of here? I...I think I want to see the sun again before I die...” Danny gripped his wounded shoulder with his other hand.

“Die?” Matt looked up at his friend’s asservation. “But we haven’t named it yet.”

Danny deadpanned before scoffing incredulously.

“Hey, Andy,” Matt went on about his business with naming the dragon. “is it a boy or a girl?”

“Huh-wha...?” Andy blinked uncomprehendingly, then shut his eyes and shook his head once before addressing Matt again.

“Why...would I know that?” He questioned in returned, speaking slowly.

“Well, you’re its mom! I just figured you’d at least know what gender your baby is.” Matt poked fun at Andy’s situation with a teasing grin.

Andy glanced back down at the little green dragon, bending to the side to catch some sort of glimpse of genitalia underneath it, and completely ignoring Matt’s mockery.

He didn’t see anything hanging, and with something as large as the lizard confusing him as its mother, you’d definitely see something.

But this was something no one in their world had ever encountered before. Then again, its body was similar to that of a lizard’s, even a cat or dog. It couldn’t be that different, right?

“I...guess it’s a girl...” Andy muttered, straightening back up.

“Hm...” Matt thought while Danny leaned his back against a corpse-less stalagmite.

“Gale.” Matt snapped his fingers as he decided on the name.

“Gale?” Danny spat, still in disbelief.

“Yeah!” Matt went into explaining his choice. “She’s got wings, wings are for flying, flying relates to wind, wind is gale!”

“Andy’s its mother...shouldn’t he name it?” Danny wasn’t entertaining the idea of that thing having a gender. He was too preoccupied with trying to stay conscious.

“Yeah, but I found it.” Matt reasoned, much to Danny’s incredulity.

“You’re a piece of work, Good.” He drawled tiredly.

“The best.” Matt stood up victoriously.

Andy said nothing, not caring, but agreed Matt’s name was better than what he could’ve come up with.

Gale...

“Alright, let’s get out of here.” Matt spotted a dark cloth hanging from a stalagmite of about seven feet.

Contrary to his nonchalant approach, he was actually very worried about Danny, but he learned that it was best to highlight bad moments with laughter. Friendly, companionable conversation always lightened the mood and that’s particularly important when someone’s dying. Why should they’re last moments be angry, depressed, heavy, frantic goodbyes and desperate searching for help?

That didn’t seem right to Matt and he’d be damned if Danny’s last moments were like that.

He hoped with every fiber of his being that his British friend would be okay, but he had lost a lot of blood...

Matt flapped the cloth in front of him, shaking off who-knows-how-many years of dirt and dust and whatever else.

He went over to the bleeding man and carefully tied the fabric around his shoulder in a way he hoped would help stop the blood. Danny groaned in pain as Matt tightened the cloth and turned to Andy, who was just reaching down towards the little dragon.

The baby lizard let him pick her up with ease, and hold her so they were face-to-face. She reached out with her little clawed paws and gripped Andy’s shirt to make her feel safer from the pull of gravity.

“Andy?” Matt attempted to get his attention

“We know, it’s your baby, and it’s beautiful but...seriously...dying here...” Danny wheezed a bit, starting to find it difficult to stand up straight.

Andy’s face projected bemusement as he sent them a sideways glance.

“Get out where?” He asked, to their confusion.

“Huh?” Matt looked around the dimly lit cave.

There didn’t appear to be a door anywhere, or even a hole minus the one they fell from, but that one was over sixty feet above their heads.

“Argh!” Danny shouted in frustration. “I’m not fucking dying here! That thing has wings!”

He gestured to Gale, who stretched and contracted her yellowy wings in response. “Send it up there to get help or something!”

“I don’t think she can fly yet.” Matt commented, gazing observantly at Gale. “Baby birds can’t fly when they first hatch either, and she can barely even walk.”

“So, we’re fucked, that’s what you’re telling me?” Danny said rhetorically.

“Maybe you’re on to something, though.” Andy muttered, detaching Gale from his shirt and putting her down.

She just sat down in front of him like a loyal dog, gazing up at him with adoring canary eyes.

“That we’re fucked? And not in the good way.” Danny clarified.

“No, dude,” Andy shot him an incredulous look. “That Gale can help us get out of here.”

“How? Bitch can’t fly.”

“She can’t walk.” Matt added.

“She can walk,” Andy corrected, “and she might be able to fit between tight spaces.”

“And that’s going to help us how?” Danny, nor Matt for that matter, could understand how that was useful.

All the while this conversation was going on, Gale was trying desperately to follow what Momma and these other creatures were saying. It was clear they were communicating through those high syllables, but Gale didn’t understand a bit of it. She was confused that her mother hadn’t said anything to her yet, at least nothing she could understand. But she smelled blood strongly on the one leaning against the stalagmite, and this made her worry.

Dragons were very protective about family and she noticed Momma looked similar to the other two creatures, thus, she thought they were related to Momma. One looked more similar, so she connected they had to be siblings. That made that one her Uncle or Aunt. The other one that was bleeding looked like them only in stature, so she concluded that that one was a friend or a distant cousin. Or perhaps Momma’s father (Gale decided he was male since a mother would look just like Momma, right?) since he appeared to be older?

Yes, that seemed more likely as Momma nor Uncle/Aunt seemed hostile towards the injured one, in fact, Uncle (she decided fit better) tried to help him.

She knew Grandfather was hurt and she didn’t want to lose her family. She wanted to protect her family. Gale knew she needed to get her family out of this chamber or Grandfather wouldn’t be okay.

Andy, Matt and Danny had no idea the little dragon was making so many, albeit, mostly incorrect connections and was already plotting how to save them.

Gale looked around, seeing her busted red egg in pieces all over the floor. Funny thing was, she had already forgotten how she got out of it, but she knew she somehow came from it. That’s when she noticed a soft draft whisk around her feet. The little dragon stood up shakily and took a couple short, feeble steps towards where the draft came from. Nothing appeared out of the ordinary, just a dark stone wall, until you got down to floor-level. And that’s what Gale did.

Her slitted pupils widened in a curious fashion as she spied a crevice under the wall. She surmised it was was too small for Momma, Uncle or Grandfather to fit through, even being a little too small for her, but she guess she could get through if she made herself smaller, too.

She sucked in her belly, folded her wings very tightly against her body, and hunkered her head down low so her chin touched the ground. Then, she started crawling for the crevice.

“Oh, what’s it doing now?” Danny watched Gale head towards the wall in an arrow-like shape.

“I don’t know,” Matt bent down to see what she was doing better.

On his hands and knees, he watched her fit her head into a crack between the stone acting as a dome wall and floor. Gale got stuck at her shoulders, but she just rolled them down far enough to be able to scrambled through.

The rock made an interesting scraping sound against her scales as she continued to squeeze through the crevice.

“Uh,” Matt straightened as she disappeared into the wall. “I think she’s out.”

“What?” Andy and Danny exclaimed simultaneously, Andy bending forward to try and catch a glimpse of her escaping.

“That little traitor!” Andy’s only real plan fell through the cracks with that dragon.

Gale could hear the frustrated shouts behind her, making her think she maybe should have told them she was leaving first. To make up for her mistake, she let out a little rumble of apology and told them she’d find a way out big enough for them.

Her diaphragm vibrated with the sound.

“What the fuck?” Matt looked up at Andy when a strange growl came back at them. It was odd, the growl didn’t seem angry, in fact, they could feel the good intention vibrate through their feet.

The sound didn’t echo like their voices, it was almost like it travelled through the floor and never penetrated the air. But that wasn’t true since they heard it. However, they also felt it, like a very minute earthquake of goodness.

It was weird. The “good” feeling just projected from the sound to the gentle rumble that massaged their feet.

This eased their worry a little, it reassured somehow.

“What now?” Danny inquired, surprisingly calmer.

“What can we do?” Andy shrugged.

“Wait for the lizard-Pegasus to come back?” Matt suggested, mocking Danny.

“Ugh,” The British singer slid down the stalagmite to the floor, dizzy.

Andy and Matt crowded around him.

“Hang on, dude,” Andy told him, “she’ll come back, and then we’ll get out of here. You’ll be okay.”

As Gale crawled through the crevice she noticed it starting to get bigger the further she went. This made her journey easier as she could move faster with more space. She disliked when a ridge protruded from the ground and cut the space in half, making it very difficult for her to squeeze through. She always did, though and continued on.

She couldn’t be stopped by some lousy rock when her family was in trouble. Even if it scraped her wings painfully.

After a painful two in a half minutes, the space was wide enough for Gale to stand up in, but she had to remain hunched down to avoid hitting her head on the rough surface above her.

She saw a delightful patch of green up ahead, and felt a not-so-delightful wind blow into the miniature cave, brushing over her scales and wings.

Gale didn’t like this wind, it was cool and she was quite interested with the lowered temperature as it was different from the humid cavern she came from, but it felt...

No, it smelled wrong.

It carried a rather repulsive scent with it, the wind did. It made the green grass bellow before it, the smell was so bad. Gale ever so slowly walked out onto the dark grass, feeling it beneath her paws as she peeked out into the cooler world.

She saw a large tree with leaves shaking in the wind several feet away. The dark horizon full of strange twinkling lights that congested the whole cobalt blanket overhead silhouetted the tree nicely.

Gale thought it was pretty, but the pungent smell kept her from fully appreciating the scenery. She wanted to return to the cave with her Momma to escape the decidedly scary smell, but she knew she needed to get them out somehow. She couldn’t go back empty-handed.

The little green dragon wandered around the outer wall of the cave, following the slight curve it took every now and then. It was quite large, much bigger than her, even bigger than Momma!

In fact, it towered so far overhead it was like it scraped the very sky. It took up so much space that Gale felt she could walk for miles and never make a complete circle around it.

That wasn’t true, of course. Although the cave was large, it was only part of an even bigger segment; a mountain.

As Gale, after several minutes of walking, trying to run, and humorous attempts at flying, finally saw the mountain behind the cave. She had found the open entrance, a stunning pillar shooting up behind it and disappearing into the dark sky, drowned by clouds.

She paused and gazed up in awe of the mighty mountain, wondering how high it was and if she’d ever reach it if she tried to fly to the summit.

Then, she remembered her injured family trapped inside.

Her golden eyes sharpened as her head snapped back down to peer inside to shadowy cave. Her pupils widened considerably, cleaning up the darkness to a clearer gray spectrum. Gale’s night vision wasn’t perfect as she was still young and inexperienced, but it made most of the shapes inside evident as something and not just a black mass of speculated silhouettes.

She saw...something strange leaned against a rock a few feet in. Its body type was similar to Momma’s, but it was sitting, legs spread out in front of it with its arms hanging limply at its sides, and its head lowered in a way that disturbed Gale. The creature’s whole appearance was frightening to her. It wasn’t moving, but it reeked of that hideous smell getting blown on the wind.

She could see pieces of flesh hanging off the corpse, and some kind of fluid that smelled like blood soaking its entire shirt. Gale didn’t know what had happened to it, but she knew it wasn’t alive. There was no steady hum of a heartbeat like their was in her family stuck deeper inside the cave.

It only made her more determined to save them as she was afraid Grandfather would become like that poor creature if she took too long. The dragon slowly walked around the body and continued on.

Gale discovered more lively beings inside the cave as well. There were strange squeaky things running around the floor and into holes way too small for her to fit through, and more squeaky things with flapping wings like hers hanging from the ceiling in large numbers. She had first mistaken them for the ceiling, but her presence seemed to make them stir more than they had been before, making it clear that they were living things.

Continuing further, she was stopped curiously by one of the squeaky-ground-things that scampered in front of her.

“What are you doing here?” It squeaked in two short bursts, bobbing its head up and down.

Gale rumbled in response, “Trying to free my trapped family.”

“There are more of you!?” The rat squeaked in horror, and quickly ran away deeper into the cave.

“Wait!” Gale growled and ran after it.

She was still rather clumsy on her feet and she quickly lost the rodent, but could here the startled squeaks echoing through the walls. She followed them post-haste.

The bats ignored her, not bothering to say anything to her. They just watched her progress with mild curiosity.

It would be bright outside soon and they didn’t want to be out when those creatures began stirring en masse...

Gale eventually followed the squeaks to a cavern...with eight different paths.

There was an unusually large black rat standing on a rock close to the eight-way fork. It squeaked out something similar to a snicker.

Gale’s head whipped around in surprise, not seeing it at first. It had just blended in with the rock.

The rat stood up on its hind legs and regarded her with two red, beady eyes.

“Little dragon,” It acknowledged her.

“What are you?” Gale rumbled in inquiry.

The rat laughed again. “I’m a rodent. My people an I, we are the rulers of this mountain.”

“Oh...” Gale thought passively, taking a minute to make an important connection.

“Does that mean you know how to navigate this place?” She asked hopefully.

The rat gazed down thoughtfully at her. “Perhaps.”

“Do you know how to get my family out?” She didn’t understand the implication.

“Your...family?” The rat blinked in confusion.

“There are no more dragons here. The last one perished months ago.” It explained further.

“Huh?” Gale especially didn’t understand that.

The rat saw a golden opportunity as bright as Gale’s eyes. It hastily recanted its previous claim.

“I mean, of course! Of course we can get to your family! I was just confused for a second.” It fixed as sweetly as a rat could.

“Oh, good! Where are they? How do I free them?” Gale questioned excitedly.

The rat only knew of three humans that suddenly fell into the old torture chamber that those oddly painted humans used to use until they moved out a decade before. The rat wondered if those painted humans knew of the two dragons that had moved into the mountain after them and were angry, causing that scary blue light.

Or maybe it was those walking corpses...

The rat didn’t know, but it knew that dragons were dangerous when they got big and it didn’t want this one to grow up and eat its vast family.

The rat also knew humans were like any other animal and would take whatever they could get in times of desperation. Hunger was a treacherous thing, the rodent knew. It had lost many cousins because of it.

Now, it would make sure this potential danger would be removed thanks to hunger.

“Come with me.” The rat leapt off the rock and started down the third path. Gale followed behind it.

After many turns, two more confusing forks and one jump scare with a bat that had lost its footing and fell down directly in front of Gale, the black rat led the dragon to a vaguely glowing door with a bizarre symbol on it.

The rat disappeared into a decent sized mouse hole that didn’t quite touch the stone door. Gale didn’t think she’d be able to fit through that one. It was big, but it too small for her frame. As a dragon, she was hatched rather large to begin with.

The glowing symbol shined a little brighter in her presence. She looked back towards the door. The blues and purples reflected off her scales, making her look blue-violet instead of green. Gale decided she was fond of this color, but she couldn’t let herself be distracted by some flashy lights...

Okay, maybe for just a second.

She walked up to the symbol, the energy radiating from it making her feel very happy.

So happy, in fact, that she tried to let out a little fireball in joy. It was more of a really short burst of flame that went out almost instantly after escaping her mouth, but a smoke trail hit the door and pooled out from it before vanishing into the air.

The symbol stopped glowing.

Gale found herself disappointed, but she perked again as the glow returned with a passion. In fact, it shined so bright it shot through the cave and illuminated every crack and crevice. The bats flew into a fury at the shock of light, flying in a panic to the entrance where they flooded out into the brightening sky.

When Gale reopened her quickly closed eyes, she discovered the door was gone and the black rat was staring back at her with disbelief in its little red beads.

“What did you just do?” It asked, unsure if it should be angry or not.

“I don’t know!” Gale hunkered down in apology. “I’m sorry...”

The rat just stared blankly, trying to figure out what to do.

With this large exit now wide open, it would be easy for the dragon to escape the hungry humans...and then come after it for betraying her.

The rat fled, darting left and escaping through another mouse hole in the wall.

“Hey!” Gale rumbled in surprise, making a half-assed attempt at chasing it.

She quickly realized it was gone and found herself standing on a rock platform overlooking the cavern she had come from originally. She was closer to the ceiling and could see a soft blue glow shining down from somewhere higher up. The stalagmites pointed up at her, the tallest just passing the platform.

Excitement and relief washed over her as she realized she had a way out for her family.

Andy, Matt and Danny had seen flash of light near the ceiling, but couldn’t make head or tails of it. It was still too dark to see once the flash faded, and the stalagmites blocked their line of sight anyway.

“What...was that?” Danny asked weakly, exhaustion riddling his features and voice.

His bleeding had slowed, but the cloth around his shoulder was already drenched. He just felt tired now.

Andy and Matt were still at his sides, but couldn’t come up with an answer for him. They’d been trying to keep Danny from falling asleep.

Matt and Andy had been trying to see around the many pointy rocks to see if they could spot anything, but they came up empty for a few moments.

Then, Andy saw Gale carefully leaping from stalagmite to stalagmite, trying to get to them.

“Where...the hell...?” Andy couldn’t comprehend where the hell she could have possibly come from.

“There’s Gale!” Matt reported excitedly.

That meant they’d get out, right?

Gale released a joyful rumbled from atop a stalagmite, the sound picking up the men’s spirits. Then, Gale turned around and started hopping back to where she’d found a way out for them.

“Come on, Danny,” Andy and Matt took either of Danny’s arms and lifted him up. Half-dragging him, they followed Gale through the forest of spiky pillars.

She stopped at the point of one stalagmite and jumped onto some kind of platform they could barely see. Problem was, it was thirty-eight feet above their heads.

“Jesus Christ...” Andy looked up at where Gale was standing. She looked extremely tiny so high up.

The dragon didn’t exactly think through how Momma, Uncle and Grandfather would get up there. Now that she saw this problem her diaphragm vibrated in disappointment.

“Hey, look!” Matt’s head was turned towards a shady corner. “A ladder.”

A makeshift rope ladder sat long forgotten amongst a pile of bones.

“Well, that’s convenient and disturbing.” Andy commented, following his gaze.

“Great, now how do we get it up there?” Danny did the math, there was no way they’d be able to throw it all the way up to the platform. It was no guarantee the ladder would even be long enough.

Thirty-eight feet was pretty fucking high.

“We have a dragon,” Matt said as if it were obvious.

Gale was already making her way down the stalagmite, her claws digging into the stone and making her descent a little less difficult. Matt carefully took Danny’s arm off his shoulder and left him to lean mostly on Andy while he got the rope ladder.

A few bones meant nothing if it meant saving the guys he considered brothers.

Matt managed to find an end of the piled up mess of rope connecting many wooden planks, and handed one up to Gale as she waited patiently within distance. She’d gathered that her family would need that contraption to climb up to the platform.

Gale took the end rung in her mouth and started back up the stalagmite. The rope snaked out after her, many bones getting disturbed in the process.

Impressively, the rope was long enough for Matt and Andy to just reach up and be able to pull themselves up on it, but Danny would definitely need more help. The ladder didn’t reach all the way to ground, or even to Matt’s shoulders, but it was within reach. It still made it difficult to get Danny up onto it.

He wasn’t really in any condition to be climbing a rotting ladder anyway.

“Matt, you should go first so if it breaks, only you get hurt.” Andy teased with a smirk.

Danny chuckled, “Yeah, go make sure it’s safe!”

“This is how you fuckers repay me for saving your asses?” Matt feigned hurt, but was already reaching up to the first rung.

Gale had put the plank she had on a rock so that it would fit between the first and second rung. She hoped it would hold.

“You?” Danny retorted, “I thought it was the dragon that found a way out!”

“Yeah, but I found the dragon!” Matt defended, managing to haul himself up so he could get his foot in the first rung.

Nothing broken yet.

The “argument” continued from there while Matt got further up the ladder. Andy wasn’t going to help Danny onto it until Matt had gotten to the top. He wasn’t positive the rope would be able to withstand the weight of two men at once.

If it could even handle one.

Gale watched anxiously, pacing back and forth in front of the rock she set up the ladder on. When Matt got to the platform, scrambled in and out of his arms happily as he tried to pull the rest of himself up without hurting her.

“Seriously!” Matt laughed, pushing her away so he could get his legs onto the platform.

“Come on!” Matt turned around and called down for Andy to send Danny up.

Andy walked Danny over to the ladder and bent down to give him leverage. Danny placed his foot in Andy’s cupped hands and used the boost to grab the third rung with his good arm.

It was slow going with a hole in his shoulder, but Danny, albeit nervously, made it up the ladder safely, where Matt helped him onto the platform with Gale.

Then, it was Andy’s turn.

It was uneventful at first, and it appeared they’d all make it just fine. Then, he got to the final stretch of the ladder.

Gale noticed, much to her horror, that the rung around the rock was breaking. She began making odd, panicked sounds unlike any the men had ever heard before. Matt thought she was dying or something, swinging around to see what was wrong.

Gale was hopping around the rock impatiently, jumping onto it when she heard Andy yelp.

A rung under his foot snapped, putting more stress on the plank around the stone.

“Aw, shit,” Matt finally saw the splintering rung and his brain took a second to send the command to grab the ladder before it broke and send Andy plummeting back into the cavern.

“Hurry up!” Danny demanded, peering over the edge.

“Nah, I’m fine, don’t worry!” Andy answered the unasked question.

“Seriously, dude, that thing’s not gonna fucking hold!” Danny felt the urgency that Matt and Andy must’ve felt when he was bleeding on the floor and Gale was searching for the way out.

“Really? I had no idea!” Andy shot back sarcastically, all the while trying to get up the ladder as quickly as possible.

Gale gazed down worriedly at him, urging him to get up there soon.

Her fear was replaced with relief as Matt reached down and Andy grabbed his hand, ensuring no one was going to fall now.

Matt hauled Andy up with them and Gale jumped happily onto his shoulders. She rubbed her rough, scaly head against his neck and purred.

Andy flinched and shivered at the unpleasant feeling, instinctually raising his hand to push it away. Gale made to rubbed against his palm instead.

“Aw, she loves you!” Matt cooed mockingly. Andy smacked him over the head and stood up.

“Hey! Ow...” Matt complained, resting his hands protectively on the back of his head.

Danny laughed and staggered to his feet, falling back against the wall as a rush dizziness overtook him for a moment. Matt stood as well and moved immediately to help Danny walk, placing the British singer’s arm around his shoulders and letting him lean against him for support.

Gale leaped off Andy’s own shoulders and trotted into the cave, expecting them to follow her.

“Hey, wait!” Andy jogged after her surprisingly quick form. The last time he saw her, she was clumsy and slow, but it seemed the experience of traversing the cave adjusted her faster.

Matt and Danny trailed after them as quickly as they could.

When they got to the first fork, Andy felt a flash of anxiety coil the base of his ribs, but Gale just continued on, taking the rightmost path. She had a good sense of direction, she discovered. She remembered where that conniving rat had taken her and followed that path back.

Said rat was watching in astonishment with its thousands of family members through the mouse holes. It’d expected the humans to eat her, but they were following her?

There was no way she thought the humans were her family...did she?

Gale joyously led Andy, Matt and Danny back to the mouth of the cave, happy to smell that disgusting rotting scent. It meant they were almost outside at last.

Her joy was interrupted when an oddity struck her.

Something was...missing.

In a moment of realization, she noticed the corpse was no longer there.

Gale paused in confusion. Andy stepped behind her, following her gaze to a stone still bathed mostly in shadows as morning light began filtering into the cave. Something like water glistened at the base of the rock, but it was too dark to make any connection.

“What?” Matt with Danny still on his shoulders questioned easily.

“I guess the rock scared her or something, my parent’s dog back home used to freak out when he saw things he thought were out of place.” Andy responded, picking Gale up and carrying her the rest of the way out.

Her cat-like canary eyes remained glued to the bloody stone.

“He grew out of it when he got older so, it might just be a puppy thing.” He added, glancing down at Gale.

“So, it’s a dog now?” Danny sighed, referring to the dragon.

“Well, we could call her a puppy. We don’t know what the baby name for her kind is anyway.” Matt reasoned, his sci-fi mind easily accepting this.

“The puppy dragon,” Andy chuckled deeply, the sound garnering Gale’s attention.

It was similar to the happy, sonorous rumbles she remembered her mother making when she was still inside the egg.

“Does that make her a mutt?” Danny joked while Matt led him out into the soft blue morning light.

The sky was starting to lose its cotton candy shades in favor of a bluer color similar to Andy’s eyes. The sun would soon bath the land in a fresh yellow radiance similar to Gale’s eyes. Then, Danny would have his wish of seeing the sun again.

The men paused upon sight of the coming morning, feeling the breeze blow through their hair, and for all intents and purposes, everything looked akin to the world they knew. But Danny voiced the now glaring question.

“Where are we anyway?”