by Milana Jacks
I thanked her and ran the few yards to Clem’s place. The tent’s flap was closed. I breathed deep before opening it and smelled blood. “Clementine!” I barged inside and rounded the table. Seven lay on the floor, crying. I knelt next to her and turned her on her back by her shoulders. I reared back. “Jesus, who did this to you?” The left side of her face was swollen, her left eye completely shut, her jaw dislocated.
Seven opened her good eye and tried to speak but couldn’t.
“Where…” I swallowed past the lump in my throat. “Where is Clementine?”
Tears spilled from Seven’s good eye. I didn’t need her to speak. I knew something horrible had happened here.
“Cyborgs, cyborgs!” people shouted. Seven gipped my arm, fear registering in her eye. I picked her up and exited the store but couldn’t leave before knowing more. What the hell had happened here? The man next door whistled, and Seven pointed at his store. I walked in, and he closed the tent flap behind us, then put up a Closed sign. After putting Seven down on his desk, I stayed by the entrance and peeked though the flap. Cyborgs rushed past every store in my line of vision. Whoever didn’t open up got their tents ripped apart. Hundreds of level fives, lots of military power. They were searching for something. Or somebody.
I turned to Seven. “What are they looking for?”
She pointed at me.
“Me?”
Seven nodded.
“They came by your store and took my bird?”
She nodded.
Something snatched the ground out from under my feet. I looked down and realized I was levitating, the air under my feet holding me up, spiraling around my body. Seven and the man bent over, holding their throats. I locked eyes with the man. “When I leave, take Seven and get out of here. There’s a place called Molly’s Junk Yard not two hundred yards west of the habitat. Do you know it?”
The man nodded, his face red.
“I’ll meet you there, and Seven better be with you.” I released the air back into the room and walked outside. It took two seconds for the level fives to stop searching and train their weapons on me. With no humans on the streets, the cyborgs made my work easier. Air whooshed out of their lungs. They stood there for a few seconds until their knees folded and they collapsed. I kept walking, sniffing, sorting though millions of scents for the one that called to my beast.
I rounded the corner. At the dead end of the street, a group of cyborgs walked toward the military transport tubes. Air sliced between them. They flew against the buildings, one after the other until only Clementine and the colonel stood on the street, his army choking and coughing, attempting to breathe.
The colonel gripped Clementine’s throat. I froze, the air around us stilled, all the sound muted. Those mechatronic fingers could crush her windpipe.
“You hurt her, and everyone dies,” I said.
Rose’s stepdad smirked. “Turn yourself in, Knight, and the girl walks.”
“I hear you,” I said and walked toward him as he walked back toward the transport system, dragging Clementine with him. “The Cy are interested in dragon kind.”
“Very interested.”
“How much will they pay you for me?”
“It’s not about the money.”
“What’s it about, then?”
“Sovereignty. I want it, and I’m not willing to answer to the Cy. I want full control of the habitat.”
“The habitat is in my territory.”
“I start here and expand. I have big dreams.”
I wanted to chew him up. “You have big delusions,” I answered in a voice deep and gravelly. It echoed in the still air. “Let her go.”
The colonel looked around at the dead cyborgs. I could see he debated with himself, and I saw the moment he decided not to let her go.
“Change!” I ordered the bird.
White light burst around her.
A flap of wings.
My bird landed on my shoulder.
I leaned my face into her so she could rub her head on my jaw as the colonel retreated into the tube. I let him leave. Air whooshed, and Clementine and I lifted. I manipulated the air to propel us through the streets as fast as I could, gunning for the plasma barrier as the cyborgs on the main street rained laser fire on us. We pierced through the angry red plasma and flew into the freezing winter winds. Home free.
Or so I thought. I smelled them, their scent that of rain, but I couldn’t see them. Not until I ignored my immediate surroundings and focused on the clear sky and winds blowing around me. I spotted air disturbances where the wind current bypassed pockets of air as if something stood in its way. The Cy.
“Clementine, can you see them?”
“Peep.”
“Is that a yes?”
A bird screeched in my ear. I winced and shrugged her off.
She flew around me, then batted her wings in front of me, something I knew from experience was difficult.
“Seven is leaving the habitat and may have already left,” I told her, because I knew the news would take the burden off her shoulders. I needed Clementine clearheaded and thinking only about her own safety. The Cy were surrounding us. They intended to take me. “I need you to fly to my house and stay there.”
In a flash of light, I changed into dragon. My spirit and I hovered in the air. A dove and a dragon. One predator, one prey. Two completely different creatures. And yet she was all mine, and I was hers. “Leave now. I’ll take care of the Cy.”
Clementine disobeyed me, landing on my horn and changing into her human form. She said nothing and nestled in her place right between my horns. The winds picked up, dust rose, construction cranes creaked, cars moved, old park benches ripped out of the ground.
My spirit started gathering the storm.
“I don’t like to repeat myself,” I said.
“The wind is blowing your nonsense in one ear and out the other. I can’t leave my dragon.”
My chest tightened as my heart expanded. She would not leave her dragon. Okay, then. I flew higher to get a better position and survey the area. The winds blew stronger up here and made the pockets of disturbances easier to see. Unmistakably round pods. I recalled Nentres had said that the Cy flew inside their…air bubbles. Yes, these must be those bubbles. They descended from the sky, circled me, paused, then went on their merry way as if I didn’t exist. They headed for the habitat. What the fuck?
A shriek sounded.
My sister’s building crashed to the ground.
I roared and plunged down at the same time as a golden dragon gunned for the sky.
Arthur beat his wings with fury. But I knew he couldn’t breach the plasma. “Don’t fly into the plasma!” I told him.
He took a sharp right, and that was when I saw them. Cyborg pods like a flock of crows, all laser fire trained on him. They didn’t shoot. “Rose is with you,” I said.
“We’re trapped,” he said, his breath coming out in pants. “I’m hit. Don’t know how long I can stay in the air.”
Shit. I stilled as a fast air current whipped my tail. Three pockets of air circled me, their winds spinning around their own axis. Clementine was spinning tornados. If they touched down, everyone would die. If they didn’t, we’d die. “Arthur is in trouble,” she said.
“I’ll take care of it.” Three tornadoes threatening to touch ground would distract them. Civilian pods spilled out of the habitat first; ground cars and screaming people followed. I focused on the red plasma, and the air stuck to the red molecules I’d detected yesterday. If I broke the structure of just one, the chain should break and the plasma should crack open. Theoretically.
I stilled over the top of the habitat and guided my spirit’s tornadoes, merged them together. A giant tornado spun around us, and the pods circling Arthur headed our way. In the eye of the tornado, Clementine and I stayed untouched. The pods neared. Just a little more. As they breached the barrier, I forced the tornado down. It hit the plasma, bent it, and caught the pods in the centrif
uge. But I didn’t stop there. I pushed the tip of the tornado, trying to drill a hole in the barrier. The plasma held, but Arthur wouldn’t. I felt his pain, his will to live and make it out of there.
“The Cy ship,” Clementine said.
I looked up at the tiny speck in the gray sky, and the next thing I knew, it hovered right above us in the tornado’s center, immune to the winds. Jesus, they flew fast.
Something stuck to my tail. I whipped around but couldn’t shake it off.
“Knight, what’s happening?” Clementine asked.
“Something’s on my tail.”
“What?” Clementine screeched.
I felt her coming out of her nest for a look. “Stay down.”
She didn’t listen. She climbed out. I whirled and plunged down, trying to shake the thing off. A laser shot pierced my gut. I shrieked to high heavens, and a trail of blood poured out from under me.
Clementine screamed. “You’re hit!”
“It’s gonna be fine.” I would bleed out. My vision would muddy, and if I couldn’t see them, I couldn’t fight them.
Something latched on to my back. I snapped my head and bit the air. Slime and tiny bones crunched under my teeth. More things landed on me. The Cy crawled all over my body and stuck to me, and I just ate one. The taste of a Cy or two lingered on my tongue. Mmmm, not bad. Edible. I snapped my head back and bit the ones working on my tail. I crunched and ate.
Lasers seared my tail, cut the arrowed tip right off. Blood spurted and rained down, the pain making me bend in half. They’d fucking cut me into pieces. I felt their footsteps running the length of my body, and then my spirit screamed.
I roared.
Air whooshed out of my lungs in a white current of wind.
The plasma froze for a second, turned blue, crystalized, and shattered. Blue crystal pieces rained down on the upper level while the golden dragon flew away. My vision blurred, the fucking Cy still crawled all over me, and I couldn’t feel the weight of my spirit as I plummeted down, tornado all but a breeze.
I landed on the destroyed building’s roof and scraped my wounded belly as I slid off the building and hit the ground hard. My jaw rattled, my wings flopped. I couldn’t lift them. Epic landing. I chuckled as warm blood seeped under me. I lifted my head toward the Cy ship and whined. Clementine floated on air, struggling with something, and I knew the Cy were trying to capture her, take her to the ship, examine her, poke her, dissect her. Because, hey, there was a human girl flying with no wings who also happened to turn into a dove.
Clementine’s pale eyes locked with mine. “I’m sorry I failed you,” I told her, though she couldn’t hear me.
On cue, Mother Nature appeared, her translucent shape now black. I guessed this was her as Grim Reaper. My chest tightened, my dragon forcing my change, and I knelt before her as a man. The pressure in my chest lessened. Mother Nature must be drawing the beast out of my body.
I spread my arms out so she could rip the beast out of me and give it to someone more worthy. I’d called the colonel delusional when I was the delusional one. I’d deluded myself into thinking I could do some good for a change. Me, the boy who’d run away instead of facing the woman who’d killed his dad and putting the murderer in jail. I was not worth this beast. I shouldn’t have touched Clementine. “Take it,” I snarled at Mother. “Take the beast.”
“No.” A gentle whisper on the wind. “I love him. He’s mine.”
I glanced at Clementine, her voice the last thing I’d hear. It pleased me to go this way. It pleased my beast to hear her. A painful sting in my chest. I gritted my teeth as my bones started rattling, my jaw staying locked in place. Against the black ship, only a few feet from the ground, Clementine’s body glowed, her hair swirled around her, her arms spread. My muscles gave out, and I hit the dirt, barely able to keep my eyes open. Clementine was draining me, pulling the element from my bones. “Either we both make it, or we both die,” I mumbled.
My spirit used my element and spun, a blur, became the wind itself, and came at me. Her power slammed into me, bouncing my body off the ground. I landed on dragon feet and roared. Ice-cold air flew out of my lungs, traveled as far as my eye could see, and engulfed the ship.
The Cy ship spiraled out of control and crash-landed somewhere behind me.
I wavered on my feet, blood still seeping out of my belly and the tip of my tail. I stared helplessly as my spirit fell to the ground, her small body only a few feet away, but too far for me to reach. Mother Nature hovered above Clementine’s body and touched her hand to Clementine’s chest.
I tried to protest, but my breath hitched, darkness folding around me.
Before I passed out, Mother Nature winked at me.
17
Knight
During the time my body lay on the warm cushion of my bed, my dragon soul traveled on the wind, overseeing everything around me. This also meant I healed much more slowly, but it was worth it. Two days ago, after Arthur had come out of his healing slumber, he and Clementine had made a decision to take my sick sister to a Detroit habitat for care. The colonel’s idea of helping Rose never get sick again was to get her fitted for an implant at seventeen. Rose hadn’t finished growing yet, and fitting an implant into a young body carried risks. The colonel went ahead and sent her into the ship anyway. Arthur found her at a local doctor’s home, sick with the flu and with a swollen arm. Rose’s body had rejected a test implant.
Arthur vowed to protect her and get her treated with the latest in Cy tech. I knew he’d do whatever it took to help her. He loved Rose as he would his own sister.
Completely immersed in my element, I worked to rebuild the plasma barrier, much like the Cy’s but my own. I packed air molecules as if I stacked bricks, and my plasma would stretch through the entire city, past my vast property, and cover the small marketplace right around the corner from my butcher.
People needed shelter. The humans would freeze out there in the winter never before witnessed on modern day Earth. And I hadn’t forgotten the Cy ship. I reinforced a separate layer of impenetrable plasma around them. Whenever the Cy attempted to leave, the barrier turned blue and froze the aliens in place. A taste of their own medicine.
The humans watched as I erected the thick transparent dome around them while Arthur did damage control, explaining to those who’d packed their bags intent on fleeing that the air elemental had come into his power and that the Ice Age would soon end. I hoped he was right.
My belly wound healed slowly, all my energy used to preserve human life. Without it, nothing mattered, not even aligning the elements and returning Earth’s normal temperatures. So I worked for however long it took to secure the life inside my territory so people who’d fled the tornadoes and hurricanes would have a place to go back to. A better place, with open fires raging to warm them up and with free hot water flowing from pipes.
Clementine
On Christmas Day, I wiped sweat from Knight’s forehead. It had been a week since the Cy had attempted to take us, and Knight had gone under, unable to wake up. I felt his presence in the air and every time the wind caressed my skin, so I didn’t worry about him waking. I just wished he would quit fortifying his air fortress around us and use some of his energy to heal instead.
Mother Nature had ripped the dove creature from me, freeing me from my duty to Arthur. I hadn’t expected to miss the pressure in my chest or the way the creature reminded me of Clare. I wondered what had happened to the dove. Did it get a new owner, or did it simply vanish? Sighing, I stepped away from the bed just as Seven climbed the stairs. The swelling on her cheek had gone down, but the bruise remained. Seven vowed that one day, she would return the favor to the colonel tenfold. I hoped she’d forget about it and move on. The colonel was a dangerous man and still alive somewhere.
Seven winked at me and sat in the chair I’d vacated. She picked up a book, cleared her throat, and began reading for Knight, convinced he’d come out of a coma just so he wouldn’t have to listen to S
even reread Little Red Riding Hood over and over again.
“Any news from Arthur?” I asked.
Seven lifted her gaze from the story. “None yet.”
Knight’s sister had spent days on the couch, soaking her sheets in sweat every night. Each time I’d changed the bedding, I hoped it would be the last time, that she’d get better and quit hallucinating. While feverish, she’d told me stories that made me shiver. She’d spoken about a mad dragon who set the world on fire, kept asking the Mother to receive her body. Arthur and I didn’t know what to think of it and finally decided she needed urgent care only available in the research center inside Detroit habitat. Seven and I had loaded Rose onto Arthur, and they’d flown for the North the day before yesterday.
I walked downstairs and dumped the tea I’d made for Knight in the sink, then rested my palms on the counter. A breeze from the slightly opened window caressed my skin. I used to fly into his house through this gap. He wouldn’t need to keep it open anymore. A tear slipped down my cheek, and I swiped at it. If I went down this road, I’d spend the entire day in bed next to Knight, mourning his loss and the loss of my sister. Even the loss of the stupid bird I no longer carried.
But another tear slipped, and I hitched a breath and pinched my lips so Seven wouldn’t hear me. Footsteps sounded, and I said, “There’s still tea left if you want a cup.” I wiped away tears with the back of my hand. They wouldn’t stop falling. Oh God, it would be one of those days. Wind blew the window open, and I jumped away. It wrapped around me and squeezed as if to comfort me. I closed my eyes. “I wish you were here.”
The wind became strong hands, and they wrapped around me, then pulled me against a hard chest. I tilted my head and looked up into dark brown eyes that softened instantly. “I will always be here,” Knight said, his voice deep and gravelly.
I spun around in his arms and pressed my ear to his beating heart. “You scared me.”
“Oh my God, he vanished!” Seven screamed from the top and ran down the stairs. She paused at the sight of us. “Oh. Well, there you are.” She tapped her fingernails on the rail. “I better get going, then.”