There Was a War

Chapter 2: First Loss

Lexi practically drags us through the front door of our unit dorms.

"You'll find government supplied clothes on your beds girls room on the left, boys on the left," she explains quickly before a man's voice from another room catches her attention.

"Lexi, I need you to take care of something for me,"

"I'll be there in just a sec!" She calls back. "That's Malachi, our unit leader, I'll see y'all again in the morning." She waves over her shoulder before dashing off to the room Malachi's voice came from. Markus and I look at each other, unable to suppress our giggles caused by his sister's excessive energy.

"Well, I'll see you later, I'm gonna go check out the girls room," I say after a moment before walking to the left. The first thing that greets me as I walk through the door is yelling and a knife being thrown just a few inches next to my head as it got stuck in the wall.

"Fey, I told you he's not like that, why can't you get that through your thick skull? It's not that hard of a concept to understand that maybe, just maybe, he's a good guy!" When my eyes finally adjust to the darkness of the room, I see two lionesses arguing. I duck as another knife is thrown, the lioness with her back turned to me jumping to the side to avoid being cut.

"Kayla, he doesn't care about you or anyone else but himself, the man will do anything in order to keep himself alive. The second you stop being useful to him is the second he leaves you behind," the lioness, Fey, growls back.

"Tell me, how would I be of any use to him? He has nothing to gain from me yet he still sees me as a friend," Kayla, the lioness who originally threw the knives retorts.

"Um... is now a bad time? I can come back later when you aren't trying to kill each other," I interrupt their argument. They both turn towards me, Kayla's blazing golden eyes catching me off guard for a moment while Fey's are darker storm clouds. There's an awkward moment of silence in the room. Both lionesses immediately drop their aggression.

"Sorry, we didn't realize you came in, I'm Fey and this is my sister, Kayla," Fey introduces them. Ah, they're sisters, that explains a few things. Sibliing rivalries are most common between lions and lionesses considering they're one of the most aggressive and easy to provoke species.

"I'm Hope, I just got here with my friend, Markus," I respond.

"You're a dragon right-?" Kayla starts before Fey punches her shoulder.

"Don't be rude Kay," she hisses. I laugh quietly.

"Don't worry about it, it's fine, but yes, I am." Kayla's eyes light up at my response.

"With you in our unit, there's no way we'll lose a battle!"

"Well, I don't know about that, I've had a little bit of experience in a fight but that was when I was still a drake, so I'm not sure how much help I'll be, but I'll do what I can." I scratch my neck sheepishly. Despite my calm demeanor, I silently flinch at that memory that I’ve suppressed for so many years. Before I can allow myself to fall down that rabbit hole of trauma, I quickly change the topic. “I’m just uh... gonna get settled in then.” Wow, that came off more awkward than I was expecting. 

“Okay, I’m gonna go bother Lucien,” Kayla giggles with an almost evil glint in her eyes before running off. Fey lets out an exasperated groan.

“I’m gonna go make sure she doesn’t get herself killed.” Fey walks out as well after her sister. The room was a lot quieter now than it had been a couple minutes before. It almost makes me feel uncomfortable, maybe a little bit vulnerable. I walk over to a light switch and watch as the lights flicker to life. I would have done this sooner but that wouldn’t have been in either of our best interests. 

While dragons are equipped for seeing easier in the day, we see things a lot darker than any other species. But on the other side of the spectrum, we have any variations of cat species. They’re equipped to see easier at night so they see things a lot brighter than any other species. I would much rather be half blind than have a knife lodged into my throat. I rub my neck gently with that thought before going over to one of the bunk beds. The covers are pulled tightly around the thin mattress and there’s a navy blue duffle bag that has a tag with my name on it sitting on top of the lower bunk. I grab the bag before heading towards a door opposite to the one I just came in from. I close the door behind me as I start changing into a t-shirt and shorts in the moderately sized bathroom. 

The second I take off my shirt, the first thing I do is stretch my leathery wings. I'm often confused for a bat at first glance since our wing structures are almost exactly the same, but the major difference is that I don’t have the giant bat ears. Dragons have retractable horns, talons, and tails but our wings can’t be hidden so easily. Most dragons wear their wings as a sort of badge of honor since there’s not much left of our species, but I prefer to keep more of a low profile so I normally hide my wings under my clothes. I lay my wings flat on my back again before getting dressed.

I’m suddenly startled out of my thoughts by a loud noise that sounds like a gunshot. Without a second thought, I race out of the room towards the noise which leads me to the door Lexi had disappeared through. I’m about to push my way through the partially open door, when a hand wraps around my mouth to silence any possible screams and the stranger pins my arms to my back. The scent of blood on their hands is too real for comfort. I attempt to struggle free to no avail until a man's voice whispers next to my ear.

“Don’t go in there and don’t make a sound if you want to live,” his voice is harsh as he slowly walks backwards, dragging me away from the door. I can tell we both hear the running footsteps as he freezes momentarily and curses under his breath. “Sorry about this.” Without another word, something hits the base of my neck and the last thing I see before losing consciousness is a black silhouette silently climbing through an open window.

Word count: 1134