Alyona

20g

Thank you to @Kilonian for the help!

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I don’t understand the problem here.

All this whining and complaining, you’d think I was taking them to the dentist. A little sparring never hurt anyone.

It’s not my fault Daffodil and Nemoh were so frail when we met. They are clearly in much better shape now. And they’ve even bonded over their little gardening hobby. I don’t understand the appeal, but it let them connect. They’ve become far better hunters as well. They’d be dead if I’d left them there after the drone attack.

Don’t give me that condescending “well you just don’t understand” expression. I see the judgement in your eyes.

You don’t understand.

Even Tasha and Raissa understand that you need a bit of strength in this life.

And don’t you give me that ‘magic’ excuse either! I haven’t seen Nemoh shoot a single beam of light at anything other than a plant. I’ve known plenty of magic users, and trust me, they aren’t it. They need real, physical strength to survive.

Oh I see how it is. You think I’m a bully, working these dragons to the bone for my own enjoyment. You think this is all just some kind of game. The sparring may have been a rash choice, but I don’t want to hear your complaints.

You want to know what I’m about? Why I push my dragons so hard? Fine. I’ll tell you. Listen closely, and pay attention! It’s a long story, and I don’t like to repeat myself.

———————————————————————

My story doesn’t start like most dragons. I didn’t come from a clan. I didn’t have any parents. No family, no friends, nothing.

My egg hatched alone in a black murk. My siblings had died long before they even had the chance to hatch. It was just me, right from the start.

The dunes surrounding my pitiful excuse of a home were succumbing quickly to a shady, black sort of rot, and even back then, when my mind was new, I understood that I could not stay here. I had to leave, unless I wanted to end up like my siblings.

And so I set off, young, weak, and alone.

Unfortunately, I wasn’t alone for long.

A drone found me.

One of those creatures that aren’t quite dragons, but pretend to be. The drone picked me up, and I knew immediately that I was about to join my brothers and sisters.

However, in that moment, something changed my fate.

A dragon, Wildclaw like me, cloaked in gilded leather robes, attacked the drone. They fought, and the new dragon defeated it, pummeling it to the ground. They took me with them, lifting me into their arms, and bringing me far away from that awful place.

Unfortunately, I didn’t get out unscathed.

That drone had injured me before the Wildclaw came. My whole body was in agony. I couldn’t move, couldn’t think.

I soon lost consciousness.

And when I awoke, everything was different.

…

In most stories involving drones, that is where the story ends. The victims become drones themselves, lost to time. Never able to experience the life they were promised.

I was different though. That dragon in the robes brought me to Light. They gave me a second chance. Not a lot of dragons get one of those.

A dragon named Iouri raised me. He taught me to defend myself. How to fight, how to anticipate enemy attacks. How to see their weaknesses in their eyes. He made sure I would never be defenseless again.

I grew up in Light, learning all I could from the dragons around me. In the process however, I ended up learning something else. I was very different from other dragons.

The dragons around had far too many emotions. And in turn, I had for too few. It was like everything was extreme to them, all the time, but dulled to me. Their extreme terror was my minor worry, their intense hatred was my mild dislike. It was like every emotion they had was illogical. Why were they reacting like that? It didn’t matter nearly enough. I couldn’t understand why they would make such confusing and blatantly incorrect choices.

Along with this, I noticed that there were noises only I could hear. It started faint, but grew louder each day. The sounds became words, codes and commands. I tried to tell the others, but no one listened.

Even when the new dragons showed up, the sounds now so loud they were unmistakable, no one believed a thing until they attacked. They were drones, drones I had somehow been hearing.

We fought them back, but no one came out unscathed. Not even me.

We were sent to get our injuries treated, and in that moment, my life changed.

The medic found something in me. A truth that made everything make sense. It was why everything others did was so illogical to me. It was why I alone could hear the drones.

I was a Hive Queen. A drone, like the creatures we had just fought. It must have happened at the start, when that first drone attacked me in the desert. The cloaked dragon must have not noticed.

I turned to Iouri. I hoped he would understand. But I saw the truth in his eyes. He was afraid of me. That fear, that weakness, was the last thing I saw before he turned and fled.

Disgust at his cowardice was all I felt.

Despite this, life went on. No one ever trusted me again.

I had to learn quickly how to defend myself against all kinds of attacks. The drones kept coming, but they were easy to decipher. Being mimics, they lack the true creativity of dragon kind, and their attacks became ridiculously predictable. They never changed. And if they were presented with a new type of attack, or a new problem to confront, they became confused. They all run on the same patterns of logic, but once that’s disrupted, they have nothing to rely on. Such simple creatures.

The dragons around me began attacking as well, once they learned the truth.

Their reliance on emotions and critical lack of foresight made fighting them simple as well. Their lack of logical reasoning made them easy to beguile. Fighting them was like reading a book. No, something even simpler…

A picture book.

It didn’t take long for the combat to become far too easy. I mastered all of the techniques and calculated all the potential variables that it was quickly becoming boring. I started giving myself handicaps to challenge myself, and to stop the fights from becoming so repetitive. I would allow myself to use only one wing, or one arm, or one leg. I would not use any magic, or limit my natural strength. I would even announce my next attacks before I did them, just to see how miserably they’d fail to defend themselves, despite being given every advantage. I never killed them, just fought them back until they knew they were defeated. I had to break a limb or two, but those were only for the stubborn ones who didn’t know when to quit.

The drone attacks were even less effective. I let a Hive King send their best drones after me, knowing full well how easily they were susceptible to trickery. They were slowly learning how to fight me, gaining minimal ground before I snapped their neck and stole their drones.

I was hoping to make use of the unquestionably obedient drones, but their lack of true intelligence was disappointing. I could barely do a thing with them. Oh well, at least they made for some good hunting practice. And the occasional tasty meal.

Life had become boring. Repetitive. I was struggling to find something to break my pattern of monotony.

And one day I did.

I found some young wildclaws, dragons that looked like me. Dragons that were like I was once, sick, injured. Half assimilated. Unlike the cloaked dragon, I could tell.

They looked afraid. They looked up at me like I had looked at that very first drone. With desperation, with fear. I could see how vulnerable they were. I could see that they were afraid I would kill them. And I could have, very easily.

But I must admit, after having spent most of my life alone, killing was the very last thing on my mind.

———————————————————————

It’s been two dozen years since that day.

A lot has changed.

Nemoh and Daffodil are still with me. They tend to ignore my clan, understandably. I don’t care much for them myself. I know they are safe, and that’s all I need to know.

My real focus is on that hive, the one that brought us together. I need to find them. And believe me, I will. There are only so many places they can hide.

I can sense the magic signatures deep underground, despite how often they change. Tonight, it’s ice. A cold, calculating magic, and the signature is the strongest I’ve felt. It’s also lasted far longer than the others. Most only remain for a few hours. This has lasted all night.

And I think it’s moving. The wavelengths I’m detecting are diminishing where the ice signature was. And they’re shifting now. I know what that means. It means I’m close.

It is alive.