Pain Redefined

Things didn't start as expected for The Dragon Society; Clyde, Patrick and Furia will now try to look for help.

Pain Redefined

I woke up the next morning… got down from Furia´s back and stretched. I heard her on the same deeds.

Mornings Furia…

Mornings Pat... what are you going to do?

Not sure; have some breakfast first of all… I'll see if I meet the others…

I'll stay here, say them mornings for me.

Alright

Furia went back to the ground and I headed to the house. I was for sure the first one getting up; Clyde always got me up if he woke up first. When I entered the house, it was empty. I headed to the kitchen and saw Clyde's mother.

-Mornings, Ma'am.

-Mornings, Patrick… looking for some breakfast?

That was a sweet approach from someone who marginalized me… until now, by the looks of it. She sensed my blankness and lowered her sight. With a soft tone, she spoke.

-I'm sorry for all this time… We should all have welcomed you with open arms…

-I understand why you didn't…It's not a big deal…

-Yes it is. That same foolishness was the reason it all happened, it had nothing to do with Dark Dragon Riders. You made me feel so guilty when you expressed your thanks to me and my husband last night. I hope you can forgive us…

That wasn't by far my intention. But well, I smiled and said… -I forgive you.

-Thanks… let me prepare you breakfast; it's the least I can do now.

-I really appreciate it, thanks… Have you seen Clyde and the others?

-They are upstairs, still sleeping.

Clyde and the guys arranged themselves all over the second floor, sleeping on foldable beds; it was that way since they came by. I wasn't sure about waking them up. They woke me up to train or talk an important matter… mostly to train, but at least it was to do something, and at the moment I didn't even know what to do myself. So I decided to let them be.

-I'll let them sleep.

-Would you mind telling me how you found your dragon?

-Of course not.

So I told her my story. We commented sudden aspects. It was a nice chat, even long enough for me to finish breakfast. I thanked again for the food and headed outside. I got out of the porch and weakly kicked a rock, to then looked around. I was so bored… so I began to toy around with Vital Energy. And an idea ran through my mind… What if I invented a weapon? Or generated something far from the regular weapons I had already mastered?

After deliberating for a while, I managed to pick the weapon I would create from scratch using only Vital Energy. The hardest part was the handle; it had solid properties never used by me… the properties of Rope. Clyde and the guys woke up one by one, eventually. I had to explain what I was on to almost each of them.

After around an hour of trying and failing, I got it to work. A flexible, strong and moderately heavy chain-like weapon was the result. Before starting with step two, I did some combat moves with it… like hitting some objects until I learned how to aim properly. Then I was ready for step two; the end of the chain would have a blade. That meant I had to generate a mixed weapon, a chain attached to a blade; easy deed when talking about forging it, but it was a great challenge when talking about Vital Energy. Lunch time arrived without me getting the least progress.

Clyde summoned me and the guys to eat outside, next to Furia. My dragon and I weren't trainees anymore, we had now the right of voice in important matters. We would talk about The Next Step.

The Dragon Society had a simple, flexible and completely effective course of action: Step One, Find an egg or someone who had one, whatever came easier or earlier; Step Two, Train the Rider; Step Three, Get Eggs in Bermuda Triangle; Step Four, Train every Newborn Rider; Step Five; All-out Assault to the Government's Headquarters. Five simple steps that would be followed by whatever blood chain which managed to get to Step One.

The bad thing was that we needed a lot of impossible to find elements just to get started. There was no way for us to take Furia across the Ocean to the Bermuda Triangle. An idea popped up: Sabotage. We could just start killing Hunters until the Government decided to retrieve them all from the state, luckily from the whole United States; that way the possibilities of people finding their eggs would raise. That if the Government decided to retreat; actually, they would just send more men, until they find us and kill us all. Or we could just fly during the day for other members of the Dragon Society to see us; that would make them take action. But the Hunters would do as well, same results. The only thing that had kept us alive this far was that no one knew we were here. Any slip would get us killed, therefore, before any movement made, we had to be prepared for the Government's answer.

What about sympathizing with someone of power? We would get a transport along with some protection. Said Furia

It was unexpected, yet clever. I replayed the idea to Clyde and the others. They seemed shocked as well, but not for the matter of talking with someone else, but for the possibilities of that person being part of The Government. That would be a total disaster; we could bring a whole country against the seven of us. We gave the idea a deep thought and... in the end it clearly was a good idea. It was risky as hell, but it was the best option we had.

We decided not to go to the President of the United States; we were barely enough out of our minds to approach a political leader in such a situation. We discarded Levelland's City Manager because that's where our hiding place was. We had to approach the Manager of one of the nearby cities.

We could go north to Amarillo or south to Midland. There were also closer options such as Clovis and Hobbs; north west and south west respectively. There was also Abilene to the far south east. We decided for Hobbs because it was surrounded by other cities in exception of one direction: north east. We would get there without meeting any other city but just a bunch of small towns that would serve as decoys, along with the rest of the cities. If the City Manager was part of The Government, we would have to flee immediately; we would disappear in the night. They would first look for us locally… but by the time they realize we were outsiders; we would be in the safety of Clyde's lands back in Levelland. And they would then use more time to figure out where we came from.

Where to go arranged, now we had to decide how to go. We couldn't just arrive with a huge dragon like "We come in peace, with weird as f**k story about the world, we plead for thy assistance". An analysis of our available resources: there were six humans, one was a Magic user, the rest was armed with hunting weapons such as shotguns and bolt action rifles; not very effective in combat, but well… a fire breathing Dragon and a pickup truck. It wasn't much if something went wrong. We decided to avoid any confrontation; flee would be our only choice there.

In the end we wouldn't use all of the previously mentioned resources. The less people involved, the less would be lost in a worst case scenario. Only three humans, plus Furia, would go. Clyde would go with Thomas on the pickup, while I would go with Furia. They would depart at late afternoon, that way they would arrive by evening. Furia and I would depart at evening; it wouldn't take us longer than an hour to get there by air.

Having planned everything by nightfall was a success. Funny thing was that we were actually going to suddenly appear and ask for help.

We waited for around a month for Furia to master her Fire Exhalation. She could now burn something eight meters away. Furia couldn't hold a flame for longer than a couple of seconds, any longer would calcinate her throat from the inside. She had to wait a bit to be able of exhaling more fire without hurting herself. Having in mind that condition, the total time Furia could exhale fire until complete exhaustion was now by far bigger than when she started; making her a Living Flamethrower.

I myself didn't waste time either; I managed to generate a blade at the end of the chain. It was like Multitasking, it required a lot of energy and concentration. I could use it momentarily, so far. I called it The Chain Blade and further mastering would have to wait.

Day Zero arrived, at the beginning of February. That morning I went to hunt with Furia, she had to be already fed and ready for everything before the night. Who knows what sort of dangers we would face…

Welcome to ground hunting 101… I told Furia.

What could you possibly know about hunting? You always used a rifle…

Sky Hunter, through my eyes you would starve to death by the looks of it… You don't know the first thing about ground hunting, now follow me…

And what's the first thing to know about ground hunting?

"Be Quick enough to surprise and Strong enough to kill"

We have got a bunch of problems then…

What do you mean?

Unless they are completely blind, they would see me a mile away.

Maybe, but they won't me.

But you haven't got the size to kill a fully grown cow.

And you do… This makes you the killer and me, the runner.

I can see where this will go…

We saw the herd at the lake; it was too open for us to go any closer. We would take advantage of the hill we were at.

This is the plan: You'll stay here, crouched and without making the smallest movement. I'll round up the lake and scare the herd this way. Then you know what to do.

I trotted around the lake and made the herd run towards Furia's hiding place. She jumped from behind the hill and bit a cow on its back. Furia dragged it away and with a twist of her head, she snapped broken the animal's spine, pulled it outside and ripped it completely from the corpse along with the head to then swallow it whole.

I can't believe you did it! We actually hunted something! You do know your business…

Furia said with joy and amazement. While she ate we talked about random stuff, most of it being hunting topics. We rested a bit, and then headed back to the house. At noon, the guys and I had lunch. At afternoon we had a last reunion to review the plan. Being all set and checked, we went to the pickup. Without any more to say, Clyde and Thomas parted away and eventually got lost in the distance. A weird coolness ran through my spine.

Soon will be our turn… said Furia.

Tension could be felt in the air; Jack, Alan, Oliver and I were sitting on the porch talking and waiting for the sun to go down. When it did, it felt like it was just a second, when we actually waited for a couple of hours. I saddled Furia and got ready myself. The guys wished us the best of lucks and we took off.

We did a quick stop on the lake for Furia to drink water and went on. Around an hour later, we arrived to Hobbs' outskirts, where Clyde and Thomas were waiting for us. After Furia located them, we landed. I got off her and got in the pickup, then Thomas got us to the main road and entered Hobbs while Furia would wait for new instructions. The point of this was that if there were any Hunters involved, we couldn't allow them to see the dragon and even less who's the Rider.

Thomas dropped us a few blocks from the City Hall and headed back to Levelland. Clyde and I were now on our own; once again, we could only rely on Furia. We walked silently until we arrived. The entrance didn't worry us; we didn't carry anything with us but our clothes, without mentioning the pair of gloves each of us wore. Making me the only armed one of the two of us.

It was early night, so the City Manager would still be there. There was a bunch of armed personnel; it gave me chills to think something would go wrong… I would have to kill all these innocent people if not Hunters. We approached a receptionist. Clyde did the talking while I kept my guard up a few meters away from him, attentive for any suspicious activity. He then approached me and I asked him…

-What happened?

-One does not simply meet up with the City Manager.

-So this was a whole waste…

-Not at all, I got her to put me on a line with him. I told him this could be of a lot of profit for the City of Hobbs and that we didn't asked a lot, we just wanted to be heard and stuff like that. This was an opportunity for him to change the whole world I told him. We have to wait a few minutes though.

-Wasn't that too easy? -I said, worried.

-It bugs me as well… We'll have to pay attention to everything he does.

-On everybody's moves…

We walked around as time passed. A few minutes later from the conversation, a tall guy in a tuxedo approached us. And said…

-The City Manager is ready to see you, but first I have to check you up.

I stepped aside and the guy searched Clyde patting him around his body. Then it was my turn; I've been searched before, but this guy did it so rigorously that it made me feel uncomfortable when he went to my groin. Finally done with the revising, the guy got upright and said…

-Good, now follow me.

I was somehow exited; this could actually mean the answer to our problems. The guy took us through a long hallway until we reached an elevator. The City Manager's office was on the top floor. There would be guards for sure on each floor, something that gave me goose bumps just to think on something going wrong. We entered the elevator.

When the elevator's doors slid open, there was before us a fancy corridor. We went out and walked it all through, at a fast pace. There were many paintings and pieces of art all along, but the only thing that I managed to notice solidly were the guards that followed us just with their eyes, without making a single movement.

We finally made it to the end of the hallway. There was a pair of doors with awesome decorations. The guy opened one and let us in, then he closed the door behind us. This remembered me a lot of the time I was in the Hygiene Facility back in Lubbock. I only hoped for this guy to be nice and most of all… not to be related to The Government.

There was this man, standing in front of a window, looking outside. At the moment the door shut closed, the man turned around and faced us. He fixed his eyes on me and a Dellinger pistol popped from his sleeve. I generated a blade to kill him but it was too late for me. Clyde jumped in front of me and took the 2 bullets in his chest. With a quick movement I severed the hand which he was holding the gun with and then stabbed his stomach all the way through. When I dissipated the smoky sword, he crumbled to the floor and I headed to Clyde.

- Clyde! Hang on man!

-The door! -Clyde shouted.

I turned to the doors and saw one getting open. It was the guard who brought us here. I jumped and stabbed his head midair, kicked the body out and locked the doors. Then pushed a sofa there was in front of the doors to block them.

There was suddenly a rain of bullets through the door. I crawled to Clyde, took off my shirt and wrapped it on his chest, putting pressure on the wounds.

-We are going to make it out of here, you hear me!?

Clyde was coughing blood.

-Save yours…(cough)…self!

-Don't talk!

I looked at the City Manager; he was dead. The bullet rain had stopped… it was a matter of time until they popped the doors open with an explosive or something. I took my gloves off, reached for my energy and prepared for everything. But I was surprised… there was more shooting, but not to this room; the guards were like shooting themselves up. I readied a dagger with each hand and approached the doors. Suddenly, a man said…

-Dragon Society…

Only members knew of that name, besides, I didn't have much time if I wanted to get Clyde out of here. I moved the sofa away and let the guy in.

-Follow me, Rider, hurry! -Said the security guard.

-How did you know? -I said getting Clyde up to my shoulder.

-I'm from the surveillance room, I saw you using Vital Energy. Now come!

I followed the security guard out of the office and through the hall. He took Clyde from me while saying "My rifle is out; kill whoever comes from the elevator, you hear me!?" I nodded readying a pair of daggers. With a lot of practice I had learned how to throw them really fast, one after another.

The doors of the elevator opened, but I was ready. The first face I saw didn't last a single second alive because of my dagger. One by one the response team fell all, due to my sharp rain. The amount of energy I used left me panting.

We entered the elevator, Clyde was still holding on. I asked the security guard…

-They will be waiting for us on each level, are you sure about this?

He answered me while taking a card out of his pocket and introducing it in a panel.

-Not on every level, there's a secret one only the Security Staff has knowledge of. We will use it to escape, just like would do the City Manager if the City Hall was under attack.

The elevator went down nonstop because of the priority card my new comrade used. When we came out, there were a lot of lights pointing at us; soldiers yelling "Drop to the ground! Now, or we'll open fire!"

I have never felt this scared… Will this be my end? All I went through, just to become a terrorist?

-We are trapped… -the security guard said.

-No we aren't…

I pushed the him to the ground and dropped myself along. Hell was brought to Earth as Furia bathed with fire the troops in front of us. With each pass, she brought up new screams of pain. Furia also burned some nearby rooftops and flamed down a helicopter that had a spotlight on us. When the three of us were the only human souls around, Furia landed right in front of us and said...

There were armed men on the rooftops, I didn't take any risks and killed them along with the flying thing. Are you ok, Patrick?

I am, but Clyde needs help quickly.

-My family has a cargo ship in Corpus Christy's harbor. Call this number once you are in town. -Said the security guard, putting a piece of paper in my pocket.

Without questioning, I strapped Clyde to the saddle and then got up myself. Furia took off. A few minutes later we were over the outskirts and I told Furia to land. Once she did, I unstrapped Clyde and laid him on the ground. Clyde felt incredibly heavier this time. I had never thrown so many daggers; I was damn tired. But I had to try to heal Clyde. He was panting and pale, he would die at any moment.

I knelt beside him and pressed my right hand on his chest and got ready. Suddenly Clyde pushed my hand away. Interrupted by grunts of pain, he said…

-What the f**k are you doing!?

-I need to heal you!

-Don't be a fool!… you would kill yourself trying to heal me after all you did.

-No… Noooo! Clyde! Let me at least try!

-To then what!? I would kill myself if you died just because of healing me!

I looked at Furia… There has to be a way… there has to!

I felt pure sadness on her answer… This time there isn't…

Tears born on my eyes; I cross-held Clyde's right hand.

-I won't forget you…

-I know you won't.

Clyde made a signal to Furia with his left hand. She came closer and lowered her head so he could reach her side and pet her…

-Furia… Take care of this a*****e… and stay awesome.

Furia hummed and nodded. Then looking at me, he said…

-Patrick… Thank you… for giving me the opportunity to live…

-Always… Brother…

Clyde didn't say anything more. Moments later, his hand softened and his breathing stopped. I put his hands stretched by his sides, like he was just resting there. I stood up and looked at Furia. At a moment, I couldn't hold our combined sorrow and cried… like a little kid I hugged her forearm and cried while she patted my back with her nose. I didn't do the least effort to hold myself… I just let it out. I let it all out… just like I would do with The Government.

Since that moment forth… This was Personal.