Night Fury's Wrath

Chapter 62: Confliction

Extinction... Extinction... Extinction...

"Vaskr!"

I snapped out of my trance with a start, my heart pounding. "Extinction...?" I repeated in a shrill whine. "E-Extinction?!"

Star sighed. "Vaskr, calm down."

"Calm down?! How?! Th-They're all dead!"

"Your family is still alive," she said, sparing me a level stare. "You are still alive—technically. This was meant to be an extinction-level event, but it obviously failed. Even though your family might be the only ones left, the species is still alive. Take comfort in that."

"How is that comforting?!" I swept a wing over the grim view before us. "Half of what I am is nearly wiped out, and I'm looking at the bones of most of them!"

"Well, technically, it isn't half," she corrected. "You're more Dark One than Light One—"

"Does that really matter?!" I snapped, making her wince. "Even if it did, how is that any better?! That only makes me feel worse!"

Nibbler crooned worriedly at me, the look in her red eyes urging, begging.

But I didn't listen. I flared my wing in an effort to push her away, shaking my head unsteadily. "No! I-I can't... I can't be here right now. I can't." I sharply turned and retreated the way we came, heedless to Star's demands to come back. "Don't follow me!"

It felt like a pit had opened up in my chest as I ran, leaking dread and grief into my heart. I couldn't handle seeing the thousands of skeletons of a species that made up most of who I was. So, I ran. I didn't know where I was going, but it was away from the empty skulls, the lifeless husks telling the story of the Dark Ones' nigh-extinction.

The story of the Dark Ones' inevitable demise.

I wasn't stupid. It was easy to make the connection. Most of the Dark Ones I knew of were female, and only one such female wasn't part of the same bloodline. Even if, somehow, I reproduced with Nox, the eggs wouldn't be Dark Ones. I couldn't and wouldn't do that with my siblings, so the Dark One species was doomed to die out with Shadow, the youngest Dark One. The species couldn't continue. Part of who I was will be snuffed out forever.

I found myself crying softly under the cover of an oddly short tree roughly a tail-length tall, whose branches hung like flexible leafy icicles in the cold-season. I didn't like seeing so much death, and that wasn't even including what all of it meant. Seeing that total extinction was possible with my own eyes hit me hard. What if I was next? What hope did I have to stop it?

I wasn't surprised to feel a warm body snuggle into my side and lay a wing over me or to feel a certain dragoness's grey head set down in the dirt right beside mine. "I s-said not to follow me," I whimpered in a strained voice. I didn't even bother trying to clean up my face; she had already seen enough.

Nibbler's eye showed a little amusement under her worry. 'You know I never listen...'

I sighed. "Yeah... I know." That was one thing I liked about her; she was stubborn, and she refused to obey anyone if it meant doing something she didn't want to do. "But I-I need to be alone." She simply stared at me, unmoving. "I'm serious... please?" Still, she didn't move. I reluctantly sagged fully to the ground, meeting her gaze with my still watery eye. "You're not leaving, are you?"

She hummed and squirmed a bit further into my side, giving me a look. 'Not even when you feel better... Talk.'

It was futile to refuse her when we both knew I'd eventually give in. She seemed to know exactly how to persuade me into doing what she wanted, all without me realizing it until it was too late. At least she was acting more like herself right now. "Thousands," I murmured waveringly. "All... gone."