𝐖𝐀𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐂𝐎𝐋𝐎𝐔𝐑 𝐄𝐘𝐄𝐒 || leo valdez

𝐗: but I can still fight.

✧ ೃ༄*ੈ✩

        VERONICA THUMBLED THROUGH THE SKY. As her sleep dissolved, she opened her eyes and screamed. Far below she saw city lights glimmering in the early dawn, and several hundred yards away the body of the bronze dragon spinning out of control, its wings limp, fire flickering in its mouth like a badly wired lightbulb.

A body shot past her—Leo, screaming and frantically grabbing at the clouds. "Not coooooool!"

She tried to call to him, but he was already too far below. Veronica extended her arms and legs and fell through the sky like a skydiver. She tried to
get as close to Leo as she could without killing herself.

Somewhere above her, Jason yelled something to Piper.

Finally, Veronica reached Leo and extended out her arms to him.

"Leo! Grab on." She shouted. His eyes widened as he flailed through the sky, desperately trying to latch onto her.

And then, thump! Piper and Jason slammed into them. Leo, still wriggling and cursing.

"Stop fighting!" Jason said. "It's me!"

"My dragon!" Leo yelled. "You gotta save Festus!"

"You're kidding, right?!" Veronica shrieked over the gushing wind.

Jason was already struggling to keep the four of them aloft, and Veronica knew there was no way he could help a fifty-ton metal dragon. But before she could try to reason with Leo, she heard an explosion below them. A fireball rolled into the sky from behind a warehouse complex, and Leo sobbed, "Festus!"

Jason's face reddened with strain as he tried to maintain an air cushion beneath them, but intermittent slow-downs were the best he could manage. Rather than free-falling, it felt like they were bouncing down a giant staircase, a hundred feet at a time.

As they wobbled and zigzagged, Veronica could make out details of the factory complex below—warehouses, smokestacks, barbed-wire fences, and parking lots lined with snow-covered vehicles. They were still high enough so that hitting the ground would flatten them into roadkill—or skykill—when Jason groaned, "I can't—"

And they dropped like stones.

They hit the roof of the largest warehouse and crashed through into darkness.

Unfortunately, Veronica landed on a sharp piece of wood, which impaled her and sunk into her thigh.

For a few seconds she wasn't conscious of anything but pain shooting through her. Pain so bad that her ears rang and her vision went red. Tears stung her eyes and a sob was forming in the back of her throat.

Then she heard Jason's voice somewhere below, echoing through the building. "Piper! Where's Piper?"

"Ow, bro!" Leo groaned. "That's my back! I'm not a sofa! Guys, where'd you go?"

"Here," Piper said from beside her. Her voice a whimper which Veronica could barely hear.

She heard shuffling and grunting, then feet pounding on metal steps.

Her vision began to clear. She was on a metal catwalk that ringed the warehouse interior, Piper laying beside her, with her foot looking funky and bent. Leo and Jason had landed on ground level, and were now coming up the stairs toward them.

Veronica looked down at her impaled thigh and tried not to gag. Blood was seeping from the wound and onto her jeans which were tattered and dirty. Oh, gods. She forced herself to look away before she threw up. Focus on something else. Anything else.