Chapter Text
"Hey, Lizard," Skipper asked. She turned toward her friend. "What rhymes with supercalifragilisticexpialidocious?"
"What..?" Lizard replied.
"Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious; what rhymes with it?"
Who wouldn't know the answer to that? Oh wait, I don't. Ha. Skipper thought.
"Why?... I- what about, um," He thought for a moment. "Super-bad transmittable contagious awful virus? Oh, that reminds me of the Darkstalker," He continued, "Like that IceWing plague and stuff."
Caribou, who happened to be an IceWing, twisted her head as she heard that,
meanwhile Skipper shrugged and flopped onto her hammock. "I don't know what to do— I've finished my homework and revised that opinion-writing piece for ELA," She sighed. "I'm gonna write a song," Skipper continued.
"About.. um... something. I dunno,"
She sauntered over to her bag, which sat on a stone ledge, and opened it. Skipper pulled out her leather notebook and opened it to a random page near the middle.
Then, she pulled out a pen. She was ready to write, but then a question came to her mind. "Lizard, I have another question,"
"Yeah?"
"What if aging is a disease, and that's why aliens don't visit us?"
"Skipper, you're-"
"Oh, and I just realized something,"
"Skipper!"
She whipped around to face Lizard and spoke, "Oh. Sorry, I-" Before finishing her sentence, the bells rang.
"LUNCH!" It was so sudden that Lizard almost had a heart attack; his ear frills were white on the edges.
"FINALLY, I am SOOO HUNGRY."
"Caribou," Lizard chuckled. "Are you MudWing in disguise?"
"Let's go already!"
...
After lunch, they went to social studies. Caribou asked, "We have a quiz today, right? Like, on The Darkstalker and stuff. I think. Am I right?"
"Yes, kind of, and yes. It's also about the Scorching," Lizard replied as he took a pen from his bag. Caribou glanced at a sign that wrote, "Webs' Social Studies Class" and there was a small board under it with small, messy words scribbled "Quiz today on Darkstalker and the Scorching."
"I don't really believe in Darkstalker," Skipper said.
Lizard asked, "Hm? Why?"
"Seriously?" He was huge, was an ICEWING-NIGHTWING hybrid, and-"
Caribou interrupted, "What's wrong with being a hybrid?" Skipper frowned.
"IceWings and NightWings had, like, a billion wars."
"I'm an IceWing, and I don't think NightWings are bad," The trio walked into the room and sat down. The three of them were in the front.
"That's the past," Skipper continued. "I mean they used to hate each other. In Darkstalker's time, they were always fighting." Webs began passing out the quiz. "Oh," Caribou sighed and asked,
"Can I borrow one of your pens? I know you have two," Skipper nodded and passed her a pen. The first question asked to list Darkstalker's powers. Skipper wrote,
Mind reading
Future sight
Animus magic
...
"I wonder what I got on the test," Lizard asked.
"At Least an A," Caribou blurted. "You're the smartest person I know!" Skipper nodded, and Lizard blushed. Caribou glanced at her, and then asked,
"I wonder where you got that scar on your tail," Lizard nudged her and frowned. "What?" She said, Skipper looked away from her. "Um," She stuttered, "It's not something I'd really know how to explain right now. Or talk about."
"Oh." Caribou looked down shamefully. "Sorry. ...If you're feeling bad about it, I think it looks kinda badass," She mumbled an apology. Lizard slightly smiled. They walked into their cave, and Lizard sat down and began his homework, Caribou was already on a hammock sleeping, and Skipper was sketching a picture of what she thought Luna looked like.
Luna was from the other continent, Pantala, and she would be coming to Jade Mountain the next day (She would come once a month to either talk about Pantala's history or to hang tapestries.) Skipper herself was half SilkWing (Luna was also one), so she got a few of the details in. Although, the eyes looked too small. And the wing anatomy looked weird, and the tail was WAY too short. The claws also looked as if a 1-year-old dragonet drew them, and...
Skipper scribbled all over the drawing and flipped over the paper. Lizard looked behind him and at her. He asked,
"Hey, ...Is everything okay?" Skipper nodded without looking behind her.
"Okay, just... tell me if something's wrong, got it? I'm here if you need me," Lizard assured her and looked back at his homework. Caribou was still snoring loudly, and Skipper decided to draw something else, but couldn't think of what.
So she went to sleep.
...
Darkness surrounded Skipper; she couldn't even see her own talons when she looked down. She didn't feel alone, though, as if there was something watching her every move. She glanced behind her to find the same never-ending shadow... until she heard something whispering. She couldn't understand it; they were like words jumbled together and layered to make a...language of some kind.
Skipper couldn't see who- or what- was saying it, though. But the words suddenly got louder and louder- until a blood-curdling noise pierced a hole in her ears.
"Hello, Skipper."