The Land Forgotten

Chapter 7

Dragon laughed. "I'll bet you that I can kick your butt in at least two minutes! After all it's obvious that you've still got nothing on me, I mean you still haven't changed your name from Little Dragon to Dragon and it's been... what? 5 or so years!"

I was breathing hard slightly struggling to keep Dragon pinned down. "Ha! You've had what... five or six kids? You're bound to be out of shape."

To my surprise Dragon rolled causing her to be sitting on me instead of the other way around. "Nope, I ended up with nine. My sixth child became twins and what do you know I was pregnant again with another set of twins. But that hasn't stopped me from staying in shape; heck nine kids are a work out all on their own!"

I struggled to attempt to push her off of me, but it was useless. "This is impossible! I've trained for years trying to finally be able to beat you! I have to be stronger than you!" I yelled, I have to admit I was freaking out!

Dragon laughed. "Listen kid, you were 8 the last time we sparred. I wasn't going to go all out on a little kid!"

Out of nowhere Drew walked by, whistling. Dragon and I turned our heads to stare at him. I winced out of embarrassment... Whistling? That was so lame.

He stopped walking and stared at us momentarily confused. I stared at him silently pleading for him to go away so he wouldn't embarrass me further. He miss read my signals as pleas for help. He tried to tackle Dragon but she ducked and punched him in the stomach as he flew over her.

Drew skidded across the grass and just lay there groaning in pain. Dragon arched her eye-brows and gave me a funny look. "Is he a friend of yours?" She asked nodding towards Drew.

"He's not my friend!" I objected.

"Yeah... sure." Dragon rolled her eyes, before I could argue with her she got up off of me. "Get up and fight me like a man... NOW!" She commanded stepping into her battle position.

I stood slightly surprised that Dragon would actually allow me to fight her. I spread my feet shoulder with apart and raised my arms in fists ready to strike.

"Go!" Dragon cried and charged towards me. I tried to doge her but I was too slow.

Everything went by so fast that I could barely tell were Dragon was actually hitting me. I was defiantly punched in the face and kneed in the stomach as I had bent over in pain and in the end I was laying on the ground my mouth dripping with blood. I sat up, body aching as the absent members of our gang returned from the raid.

Rock was at the front of the crowd absorbing the scene. It was quite a scene after all; Drew still lay sprawled on the ground, I was dripping blood and Dragon was standing there calmly as though everything was normal. After a while Rock turned his attention directly to Dragon. "Dragon, you have a family to look after you shouldn't be here."

I looked at my former mentor who scowled. "I don't remember ever having to take orders from you. Besides, it's because that I'm not with the gang anymore that I don't have to listen to you."

Rock's face hardened. "Dragon, this is my turf now which means you have to listen to what I say or else we will have no choice but to use force."

"Will you shut the hell up?" Dragon cried, her British accent subtly making the words sound unusual to everyone in the group. "I can do whatever the hell I feel like doing! Besides you expect them to beat me; after all I did just beat up Little Dragon over there without even losing my breath."

Rock scowled. "Fine, we'll talk about this in private." Dragon nodded and walked away. Rock walked over to me and offered me his hand. I ignored it and stood up without his help, and wiped the blood from my mouth on the back of my hand bitterly.

Rock stared at me before pulling me into a tight hug; he gently kissed my forehead and rested his chin on my head. We were so close I could feel our hearts beating in unison. Out of the corner of my eyes I saw Pea rushing over to Drew's limp body. "So you think he'll be alright?" I asked a bit worried.

Rock gave me a squeeze. "I'm sure he will be fine after a few hours of resting."

"Good." I said my eyes welling up with tears. "It's my entire fault! If I hadn't tried to attack Dragon he wouldn't have tried to help me. I wouldn't be able to live with myself if anyone got hurt because of me." I began to sob.

"Shhhh." Rock said soothingly, stroking my head to try and comfort me. "Its fine, no one's hurt seriously. It's only some scratches and bruises." Rock pulled away from me and searched my face. "I have to go but later we'll go on a nice walk so you can get some fresh air Ok?"

I smiled weakly and nodded. It wasn't until that moment that I had realized that my leg had been bleeding the whole time. My whole body felt weak and as I began to pass out I spotted a piece of a mirror that had dug into my leg, it was covered with scarlet blood that glinted with the mirror in the sunlight. It had cut in deep and I was loosing more blood by the second.

As I fell I heard shouts and screams of alarm and Rock trying to catch me. He did not make it to me in time, instead I hit the ground and everything became black and silent.