Resurfacing Tales | Wings Of Fire Fanfic [REWRITTEN]

II

A loud yell rang throughout the cave, although Seven couldn't quite figure out if it was from him or the dragon he accidentally landed on instead of the cow.

He'd tried to swerve to the left out of reflex, but still collided painfully against hard scales. The two dragons were tangled up in a mess of locked spikes and wings for a few moments before managing to separate themselves. Seven could've sworn he heard cold laughter from the other side of the cave.

"I'm so sorry." Were the first words that he heard come out of the stranger's mouth. They sounded breathless, but genuinely apologetic. "I thought— I thought you wouldn't go for— I acted without— without thinking— argh, I'm sorry."

Blinking to clear his vision, Seven realized with mild surprise that it was a HiveWing, one of the Pantalian dragons who'd traveled all to way to Pyrrhia centuries and centuries ago due to some disaster back on their continent. This one had mostly orange scales, with large black splotches and smaller light brown dapples all over their body.

There were also an alarming amount of various scars, some bigger than others. Untreated burns, cuts, and bruises that left marks all over their scales. They looked old but still visible.

But the thing that had shocked Seven the most was the fact that this HiveWing had both of their right bee-like wings clipped, permanently disabling him from flight. How in the world did that happen? He wondered.

"It's alright." Seven muttered, still kind of peeved but decided to let it go out of sympathy. "Um. Who are you?" He asked, hoping he didn't sound rude.

"Mason." The HiveWing sat up a bit straighter, as if proud of his name or something. "It's a self-chosen name by yours truly." Ah, that explained it. Although Seven had never heard of a self-chosen name before. Perhaps Mason just didn't like the one his parents gave him. He seemed to be feeling much better after catching his breath.

Wait, uh oh. Seven felt a fresh wave of anxiety wash over him. That's one of the names in my Winglet. Not again.

"Who are you?" Mason tilted his head. "Oh, ack, that didn't sound aggressive or anything, did it? Lemme start over. Uh, who are you? That sounded better, right?"

"...It's okay, that sounded fine. And I'm Seven."

Mason looked confused for a moment before realization dawned on him. "Ohhh, you're my clawmate!" He awkwardly grinned, looking more like a grimace than anything. "Nice to meet you! I've never seen a real SeaWing before. Isn't it weird, only being surrounded by your own tribe your whole life and then suddenly going to this whole new area with a bunch of whole new dragons?" He talked quickly, but for some reason it was much less annoying than Rhodo's rapid chatter.

Seven nodded, feeling a sense of empathy with this dragon. "Sounds like we have some mutual feelings." Maybe I will make friends here. He thought unexpectedly, then beat down that sense of hope before it could overflow. No, that's ridiculous. Father is wrong— being lonely is the only way to stay safe.

No one can use another dragon against you if you don't care for other dragons.

"Seven?" He was snapped back to reality at the sound of his name.

"Seven, are you okay?" Mason was staring at him with concern, which was kind of sweet but agitating at the same time. "I swear you looked sad for a moment there."

"I'm fine." He shrugged his wings, trying to act more carefree than he felt. "Sorry. So, do you want to continue hunt—"

"SEVEN!"

They both jumped at the loud voice.

Seven flipped through several stages of panic before realizing, oh, it was just Rhodo. That overly enthusiastic monkey dragon.