Pala14: Thieves

Part One: Escape From The Crimson Castle

I woke up on a red carpet, it was huge and long, way too big to be human, or maybe it was a human and some guy just really liked big carpets? I don't know the way the native humans on this planet do it. One thing was certain, this wasn't ours. 

I looked back, and watching me from the far corner of the gigantic room, was a giant dragon on the stone floor. Luckily, it was sleeping, must have been huge. Its scales were red and had an orange underbelly, unlike the other dragons, smoke was rising off its scales. So that's why everything was melting?

Hostiles–4

I looked around and saw another one, the one with the armor from earlier, I quickly raise my weapon and aim... before I notice the frame, it's a portrait of that dragon. "Wow... ego much?" I ask aloud. I heard a growl from the burning one and turned to see it staring at me, albeit sleepily. It cast a glance at me before turning away and going back to sleep. "I think I'll call you Burn."

Where were the other ones though? As if hearing my thoughts the, "Queen," I presume and its two guards entered. None of them looked as vicious as last night, they seemed more organized, more in control.

The queen had similar colors although the crown and chest piece made it recognizable, the others were just like goons, boring and the same colors.

The queen gave the Burn some large black rocks, even the smallest ones were larger than my jet. Burn eats them in one bite, swallowing some of them whole. Then the big one turns to me, it drops something on the floor before suddenly leaving, closing the behemoth stone gates behind her.

I looked at the deer she dropped, at least it looked like a deer from back home, though it had lost a leg and was pretty mangled, the bloody stump where its head use to be was still visible. I sighed as I heard another growl. The dragon slowly walked next to me and looked at the dead creature. Just her being near me was warm. Burn looked at the food, then back to me.

"Knock yourself out." I said waving it off as I left and walked to the other corner. Burn just watched as I ate an emergency ration bar, pulling my mask on and off between bites so I wouldn't die of the planet's suffocation.

It stepped away from the food, even motioning to it with its claw. I just shook it off as I tasted the bland taste of dehydrated food. The dragon growled and bit at it before passing it to me. The two teeth marks were charcoal black, and to be frank, smelled like it too. It went back to feasting on its rocks.

I groaned as I went to the dead creature, hopefully those emergency survival lessons paid off. I grabbed my knife and started to get to work.

***

It wasn't too bad to be honest. I picked up another rib and ate from it. It actually tastes pretty good. I saw some pink spots, so I did what any reasonable person would do and used the burning dragon as a campfire.

"There we go." I said as the rib was cooked to perfection.

I was about to get to my last rib when the doors opened.

Roar.

Burn responded and followed the big one before looking back to me and motioning for me to follow. I followed suit, not before grabbing the last rib. The big dragon and small dragon were communicating with each other till we reached a balcony, growling this and growling that. There was even a dragon sized throne and down below was an entire arena, similar to that of the ancient colosseum, all the stands were filled with other dragons. And then they released a dragon, it was a new one, it had a mane that ran along its back, head to tail and then other than the pitch black eyes, on the end of the tail was a barb. 

"That's not... terrifying at all... So who's the other contestant?" I asked no one in particular. The dragons just looked at me before the big one swatted me off the balcony, towards the arena.

I activated my glider but it was too late, I was already too far in the arena. The yellow dragon seemed to... laugh? It didn't matter. "Let's end this quickly." I muttered while I couldn't hear a thing since the dragons in the crowd were all roaring enough that I'd become deaf. I grabbed the railgun and aimed at the dragon. It took two steps towards me and then I fired. Pulse! A long red beam erupted from the weapon.

There was silence, then the decapitated body fell to the ground. The only sounds were those of the shuffling of claws and the murmurs of the surrounding dragons. I checked the battery, sixty-six percent.

Thud!

I looked back to see the big one behind me, it was growling and roaring to the other dragons, constantly motioning towards me.

"Hey!" I shouted at it in the middle of its speech. It whipped around to face me. Pulse! I missed as it instead hit the wall behind it, completely crumbling the structure that it hit. The dragon growled and snarled at me before flying towards me.

ROAAAR!

I charged my weapon up again but I was smacked with its tail, getting knocked into the wall, winded. I tried to get back up but it picked me up and threw me on the throne. The shield I had activated promptly broke on impact. I was a bleeding mess at this point.

"Please." I whimpered, the dragon just seemed to grin as it heard me. It raised me to eye level before growling something and then. "AAAAAAH!" I screamed as it stuck one of its claws and dragged it down my back. It finally let me down, dropping me on the floor. I grunted as I hit the floor.

It growled something at one of the guards and it picked me up and put me back into the chamber, although disgruntled. My hands were free so I popped some painkillers and tried my best to strap some Med-Tape on my back. The dragon dropped me off before leaving me in the chamber. I was left there, in pain, cursing, and no one to look after me but myself. "How the hell am I gonna get out of here?"