back to the main page | DJ, Velcro and Hanger's Experience! (darnit, aol.)

While the trio was curious to see what all was going on at this Dragonstake, they had barely gotten into the groove of things when the most terrifying thing happened. The place got attacked!

Dragons and half-hydra hurried into the air, mobilizing like a relatively well-working army. There was some confusion because no one quite knew how far away the enemy was, or in fact how many they were going to face.

But it became clear soon enough - this was the end of this dying Dragonstake. So Sherra, the Head Knight of Cy, threw her dragons into action. She demanded that the dragons of her crescent start taking eggs, candidates and non-riders away from the doomed place, and drop them off at Cy where they would be safe.

So it was with their hearts in their throats that the trio was gripped by a big dragon's claws, and hefted into the skies. Since none of them really took anything much with them, they had nothing to lose when they vanished from the darker 'Stake. They were hastily deposited down at Cy, whose inhabitants were quite surprised to see this happening.

"They're being attacked," DJ announced to someone who ran up and asked what was going on. "By hydra or something. We didn't get a chance to see - we were taken first. The dragons will need to put the eggs on the sands - do you think they'll teleport right into the cavern?"

"They will if they're good at it," someone else said, "but they might need people to help take the eggs. Come on!"

The three of them ran with the attendant down to the sands, where true to their words, some of the smaller dragons had no trouble flying in, clutching the eggs in their talons. But a couple of them couldn't move well enough in the space over the sands, so they left the orbs in the hands of the waiting crew. This had never happened before - no one knew what to do.

Velcro took Hanger and they went to the sands, and helped pile the hot sands over the roughly deposited eggs. DJ continued in his typical way of finding out first what was going on, and relaying it to others in the manner he thought best.

When he came in, white as a sheet, it was similar to the way that many others - all riders - looked. He staggered up to Velcro and Hanger, and pressed into them for ... for comfort?

"They say she's gone. Sherra, the Head Knight. Her gold won't leave, she thinks that she'll be back. But... Tenken is gone somewhere too - captured."

"Well he was dangerous anyway," Hanger said. "I'm sure that he'll be more trouble than he's worth to someone who's captured him."

DJ smiled at that thought - it was true, the man was just a body waiting for an excuse to explode. But they had lost the Head Knight's dragon from the other 'Stake, and he would be distraught. Perhaps even try suicide. That's the way of these people, he realized.

"We'll have to stay for a while," Velcro said. Grim. "They talk of war. Will they bring it here?"

"Probably," DJ said. "But I hope not. We got a good look at the other 'Stake from hanging out of that dragon's hands, right?"

"I did," Hanger smiled, sharklike, "I sure did."

"Then we'll be able to go back and reclaim it, maybe. That's going to be our first act. We can return to the Mall when we're done."

They agreed - when their dragons hatched - if they hatched, they would remain to see that stake either freed and used again, or at least rendered unusable for the invaders.

***

It took only a while for things to really get rolling at Cy. Though everything was still a bit in chaos, and Sherra had been declared dead, the Dragonstake was still in relatively good hands. The captured Tenken and his odd dragoness came back - and something seemed rather odd even to the candidates.

Eventually, though, the hatching would happen. Of course, it had to happen at the same exact time that the enemy hydra and their occasional foreign creature attacked! Everyone was amazed when the Altair dragons came along - how they'd come so far in such a short time, since apparently they could not teleport, was beyond the ken of most people at Cy, and certainly beyond that of the trio of Mall Crawlers.

The fight went on above, suddenly - and one of the candidates announced that the eggs were hatching. She was almost entirely ignored, until someone else started dragging people into the sands. While they were still standing and staring at the fight, a huge creature appeared and began laying waste.

Someone commented that she could kill all the hydra with a snap of her fingers, and Velcro chuckled as someone else asked if she had power over death.

"It seems like just about all the candidates at the 'stake have some sort of paranormal power. I think that there are a few with death actually." She wondered if she had any mystical powers. Probably not. Only her velcro closures.

Then Faris, the leader of the now-dead Shinoku Dragonstake, upon golden Delith whose rider Sherra had perished, drove his lance deep into one of the leaders of the attack. But it wasn't as final as everyone wanted to believe. The creature came back suddenly, from nowhere.

And a moment or two later, as things got exponentially odder, one of the big creatures - a demon, apparently - rose and shrieked. "Candidates from other worlds who already have been doing my work! I command thee now! Destroy this world and destroy the demon of war with it! The time has come!"

More than half the visible candidates moved as though under a spell. Velcro, DJ and Hanger were kind of in awe, but they weren't so compelled.

"So, he didn't think that we were important enough to mind control, eh?" Velcro grunted, half laughing, "Of course not. We aren't killer gods of doom so we are just mortal trash. Stupid demon." She wasn't sure herself whether she wanted to be important enough to be under his spell, or glad that she was left out of the carnage that was going on.

Well I think that you're important, said a voice behind Velcro, softly. She turned to see a Shinoku dragon with odd coloration between yellow, green and blue, standing near two other hatchling dragons. They'd all but forgotten the hatching!

There was a word fluttering around in Velcro's mind, and as she spoke it, she knew very well what it meant. "Seranoth," she said. The hatchling's name. ((SEE VELCRO'S PAGE!))

Hanger! Look behind you! Came the voice of the blue-spotted yellow dragoness on the left. As Hanger turned the dragon flipped onto her back and gazed at the others, Is this really how you stay all day?

Laughing, Hanger came to the hatchling and petted her lovingly, "I'll be happy to show you, Diyae." ((SEE HANGER'S PAGE))

DJ looked at the last hatchling, who was purple and very pretty, and said, "I guess that would make you mine, huh?" But the dragon didn't go to him. He was a bit put off, but knew there was something more to it. The dragonet walked to another candidate, pushing her head across a feline creature's knees. Another batch of hatchling dragons appeared, and they seemed to have the effect of pulling the candidate's minds away from the destruction of the world. It was weakening the power of the angry demon who was apparently trying to get away from his master War.

At long last, when the battle had been raging all this time, the demon Deception was betrayed by another of his minions. When the dragons of Cy and Altair and the few remaining Shinkou were pulled together they rained fire down upon the demon to destroy it. However, the demon of War came to stop them. He pulled Deception out of the smoking crater he'd been in as the dragons above were killing him, and apparently decided that he needed a stronger lesson than just this.

While that had been going on, DJ had quietly located his own beautiful blue irridescent colored hatchling. A male named Demaris. Several others had gone into the sands and come out with their quiet, wide-eyed dragonets.

A party was held, then, and actually celebrated with the attacking Takis forces who had survived the day. They had all been duped, by Deception and War, and though they were not expected to become allies in the aftermath, they were no longer strident enemies of Cy or Altair. It would take a while to patch things up, but it looked as though the other dragonstakes which had been razed by Takis would be taken back by Altair and others.

Leaving DJ and his crew to learn how to fly, without the spectre of war over their heads. A sigh of relief was all he let off.