Never Lost

10 - Everything Was Pain

A/N So this was supposed to be posted yesterday with the other part, but we will have a lot of talking before we move around a whole lot again. It's necessary I swear XD. ENJOY. Honestly this whole talking thing is all better read in one take so I will try and post this all close together.

. . .

"Was that foreshadowing that you never took him home or— ?"

"No, no I did take him home the next day," Torch admitted with a nervous smile. "At least I'm pretty sure I did, but man." Her gaze moved to the window where it lingered thoughtfully. The day was cloudy now, not as bright as it had been. Her mood reflected that, still and sullen as she relived the life she never knew existed. "Lait was in a league all of his own. Matthias – the dragon – got along with him almost as well as he did me. He was one of the only good things I think I ever held on to. We were close. We had to be 'cause we were the only family we had."

Kayda nodded in agreement, her expression grim with resonance. "So, why does that memory in particular stick out to you?"

Torch paused for a moment, her tongue peeking out of the corner of her mouth as she thought. Her hands were laced together on her lap when she finally spoke. "This was the memory stuck in my mind, when I lost him forever."

"Oh," Kayda sat forward abruptly. "I'm so –"

"He didn't die –" She back pedaled. "—Thank everything I never had to witness him get any worse." 

A lock of hair dangled in front of her face and her eyes seemed to narrow every time it brushed her cheek. "But I never got to see him get better either – it's just that, eventually...I...um..." She stirred the air by her ears while fishing for the words. "I-I I didn't die, but I went through a portal – and I was in so much pain for the longest time – I never went back again."

Torch's eyes grew misty. "I never did find out what happened to him."

"I see," Kayda replied deliberately. "So...you went through a portal and never came back." Unfortunately it was too common of a story nowadays. Life could end in an instant and you'd be left to live out the rest of your days in one's own personal hell.

Torch narrowed her eyes as if she were trying hard to figure out which memories went into which spot. "Yes," she replied with a hint of uncertainty. "They were going kill them all – the dragons I mean. I think they were trying to set an example..." Her eyes narrowed even further. "To me. I think I finally put my foot down. They were doing something...terrible. I ran away from my brother...and I never saw him again."

. . .

I wouldn't have been able to face him, if all the dragons died. Part of me wanted to just brush it away. If I let this happen, then we would both be safe. There would be nothing left to hunt and then we could go on with living – paycheck to paycheck, buried up to our necks in hospital bills – but together at least.

But Lait would never be over it. It was naïve of me to think otherwise.

My heart was a marching band in my chest as the thunder of dragon wings shook the ground. Their silhouettes were like ink stains against the pink blue sky and just like that I knew I had lost. The sounds that shook the air were something prehistoric, as the roar of the greatest predators of all time were livid right inside my ear drums.

Matthias's eyes didn't look away as each dragon, trapped and tagged by the Forester Co. now took wing into the upper atmosphere, like a shuttle clear from the earth. I could hear quiet clicks emanating from the back of his throat unlike any I had ever heard before. I pried my eyes from the dragons, yet couldn't bring myself to look at him. 

"I know I ask you this a lot, Matthias." As I spoke I started methodically unbuckling the harness from his back, lowering the panels down one at a time so that his back was free from all things. He raised and lowered his wings experimentally, his red eyes aimed at me like a spotlight.

"I know you know nothing about modern healthcare." I pulled my gloves from my pocket and slid them on one at a time. My fingers were stained blue with dye; Lait had asked me to refresh my hair color in honor of him being able to walk around on his own. "You don't understand fighting lawyers, and you can't make sure he goes to school every day." I rubbed both hands up his snout and pressed my forehead between his eyes. "But please, can you make sure that he's always okay?"

I wrapped my arms around his snout tightly, the hot air from his nostrils cutting through my coat like a knife. Around me the air was alive with thunder, the wings of a hundred or more dragons stirring the air into cyclones; they rode past like falcons in reverse. 

"He's really difficult." At this point I couldn't tell if I was saying or thinking, but either way I knew I was screaming from the top of my soul. "He only likes to eat junk and you can't convince him any better because he knows it's bad for him."

"And he doesn't know when to stop." My eyes moved quickly catching the streak of a dark object shooting up form the ground. There it was again from my other side. Matthias staggered as more of these streaks barreled through the sky to meet us. The reigns carved canyons into my palms; my grip was starting to grow slick. Matthias jerked again and I knew our seconds were limited. "Make sure he's okay?" I whispered hoarsely one last time.

Please. For an old friend?

His eyes narrowed to slits and I knew he understood. He banked a sharp turn in mid air, snapping through the air like gun shots. A creature so big shouldn't have been able to move so boldly. One moment he was fighting for any foot of altitude and the next he was pistoling toward the ground, already what felt like a mile below as I was flung straight into the sky. I closed my eyes and fell up into the next great void.

Everything else from there was pain.