Chapter Text
The marching of drones echoed out in the forest. The dark path was lit with torches, held in hands along with various household weapons. Drones, dressed like peasants and angry beyond compare, carried with them a cage.
Their shouts and cries for a coup, a new ruler, a new king upon the throne and heir in the castle, rang out loudly into the night sky. Any small, miniature Monster Drones scampered away from the riot.
Soon, they came upon a relatively sizable area. Drones moved branches, shrubs, and rocks out of the way. Once an area was cleared, they all but tossed the cage down.
With it, the girl inside fell onto her torso and face. She got back onto her shaky, scraped hands and knees, her nightgown ruined. Dirty, torn, and speckled with drops of her own oil.
“HEAR US, MONSTER DRONES!” A Worker Drone cried into the dark and startled forest. “TAKE THIS POMPOUS, RUFFIAN OF A PRINCESS AS A SACRIFICE!” He called, waving his torch around.
The others agreed, lifting their feeble weapons, their burning sticks and dim lamps, shouting out with contempt at the girl.
Said girl scooted away as far as she could from the raging townsfolk. Her core all but thrashed inside her chassis, as if it wanted to break out and flee.
“THIS ‘PRINCESS’ IS CHILD TO A TYRANT!” The same drone yelled. “HE HAS ONLY HURT US, IN THE NAME OF ‘PROTECTION’! WE SEEK TO FINALLY FREE OURSELVES! AND IN ORDER TO DO THAT, WE ASK THAT YOU RID US OF THEIR OIL LINE!” He begged angrily.
While the forest did not reply, the Worker Drones sure did. They all called for her head to be set on a silver platter and served up to the monstrous robots living in the expansive forest.
“WITH THIS OFFERING, WE HOPE THAT WE CAN RESTART OUR LIVES, AND THAT WE WILL NOT HAVE TO FEAR YOU ANYMORE!” The Worker Drone shouted. “LET US LIVE IN PEACE, AS WE HAVE TRIED FOR YOU!!”
Everyone around him agreed in an uproar.
“And you!” The Worker Drone pointed his fire poker at the princess. “Let this be a lessen to your paranoid father!” He told her.
“…” She didn’t say anything, just stared blankly back at him with crying eye lights.
The Worker Drone sneered, then promptly turned away. He rallied all the other workers, heading back to the revolutionized kingdom. Uzi watched them all stomp and tromp away, up until the glow of their torches and lamps faded and their echoing bellows couldn’t be heard.
As soon as she was alone, Uzi’s shoulders slumped. She sobbed, curling up and holding her knees. Her frame trembled from both her tears and the cold.
A rustling of bushes had her startled, Uzi whipping her head towards them. But she only saw nothing. Well, it’s not like she can see anything anyway, with how dark it is.
Turning her head back down, Uzi resumed her crying. If she heard a noise, she may have or may not have flinched. Over the course of the night, she grew to not really care.
And she grew to feel her plating and wires slowly numb within the chill of the night and occasional breeze. Her cuts and scrapes burned each time a breeze passed by. Her messy, dirty hair’s loose strands blew in the wind. Her night gown ruffled from the short gusts.
And as the hours stretched on, as the night came to pass, as the sun finally began to arise over the tree-covered horizon, Uzi stopped crying. She let out all the tears she could, then simply sat there in that small cage.
With every passing minute, it became harder and harder for her to care about her life. She’s got nothing left, and word had no doubt already began to spread about the king’s downfall.
She’s got no money, no protection, no friends, no family anymore, no place to call home.
Truly, Uzi has nothing.
Nothing but a wish to be torn apart by the claws and fangs of the Wyvern Drones.
Farther out, while the moon still hangs in a crescent form in the sky, in a valley of seclusion, a beast slumbers within the dark, damp depths of the aforementioned valley. On his black visor are the words [HIBERNATION MODE].
The area around him is barren of most, if not all life. Sandy rocks, rigid cliff walls, tall spires of bright beige stone, a slit opening in the ceiling like a ravine are all a few layers above. It all reeks of stolen bioenergies.
The place he currently resides in is cave-like. Dark stone, chilly air, stretched and torn metal skins, dripping stalagmites above. The area is spacious, more than the resting robot really needs.
But the Wyvern Drone doesn’t sleep for long, as three dots blink across the large visor in place of the words. As the minutes tick by, closed eye light lids pop up. In an instant, amber-colored optical lights snap open. From the inner corners form short, curving lines.
A tired, sleepy growl rumbles from his rough chest. Scale plating juts out and down from his chest, shaped not unlike dripping metal.
Along his back are sharp, dark spines and beige spikes, all the way down to his rough, long tail. Upon this tail are even more large and thick spikes, layered like eroded rocky cliffs.
The large horns on his head curve and face backwards. There is another, smaller pair of mimicking spines just before them. The Wyvern Drone’s wings are huge and imposing, easily as long as his own frame at full length.
The membranes are so huge they connect along the length of his shoulders and the red back of his waistband. Adorned on the arches are large, dark wing talons.
His back legs are ombre, red-scaled hips and thighs turning into dark-scaled, digitigrade, tough legs from the knee down. His draconic feet and drone hands sport impeccably sagittate claws. They have a slight curve, and are as dark as the night sky itself.
His elbows have small, dark spines on them, and his arms’ plating is a bit muscular. His shoulders also hold some small spines, facing towards the back of his frame.
Not one inch of metal on this Wyvern Drone is smooth, all rough like sandpaper at the least, and rigid like broken rock walls at the most.
A breeze passes by in the dark cave from above, ruffling the messy hair growing from the Wyvern Drone’s head. Its color is white, but tinted in the same red as its scales and the back of its waistband.
The Wyvern Drone shifts, starting to stand. As he does so, dust and stray pebbles fall from his frame. He can feel some between his joints, being crushed into more dust as his plating moves and his joints stretch.
Which reminds him, he is quite stiff.
The Wyvern Drone slowly lifts his tired rump into the air, straightens out his back and tail, and stretches like a cat. His arms stiffen up and his clawed fingers splay out as he warms his cables.
He then does the same for his back legs, lifting his chest, flaring his wings, and straightening out his draconic legs as much as he can. Once his wires are reasonably warmed up and his gears are in relative working order again, he shakes himself.
More dust, tiny rocks, and even a few shed scales fly off him. He pays no mind, simply starting to move. His large wings unfurl from his spiky, rigid back, and his tail drags limply across the ground.
He flaps, lifting himself off the cave floor after a few attempts. He then soars up, towards the entrance in the ceiling. Once he’s out, he heads towards the open ravine just above.
As he meets the sun’s morning rays, feels its soft heat upon his metal plating and metal scales, the Wyvern Drone opens his maw wide. Taking a moment to bask in the sun, he lets out a mighty, echoing roar.
It takes a good few minutes for him to wake up some more. But once he’s up, he’s off, away to find his first meal after a long hibernation.
N wonders what is out for the hunt on this nice day.
Uzi still sits in this tiny cage. She’s seen some Monster Drones watch her carefully, but not approach. She has to wonder why. Her on-going theory is that they’re trying to figure out how to open the cage without totally obliterating her with their abilities or powers or something.
Either way, Uzi is still waiting for her demise. And at this rate, she thinks it’s going to be in the form of starvation. She can feel her tanks rumble with a need for fuel. A warning will pop up onto her HUD sometimes about getting some oil into her systems.
‘That’d be lovely, but I don’t think that’s happening anytime soon.’ Uzi thinks to herself, still curled up.
As she waits to either starve to death or for a Monster Drone to finally break her from this cell and eat her alive, Uzi watches a tiny Shepherd Hare Drone hop by. Another follows it, to which it grabs a Blue Mushroom to eat.
Uzi has always wondered how that worked. A mechanical being eating something organic? It sounds like magic to her.
But those partially fluffy endemic life critters are soon to leave, their big, floppy brown ears catching something she can’t hear. They hurriedly hop away, the one even leaving the mushroom behind.
Uzi sighs, alone again unless the Monster Drones are still watching. Which… They aren’t, now that she looks around again.
‘Why… Why did they leave?’ Uzi has to ask herself, a questioning brow on her visor.
She gets her answer soon enough, the sound of flapping wings growing louder. Uzi turns, just to slam herself against the other side of the cage. Her eye lights hollow out at what she sees.
There, descending just a couple yards away, is a Safi’jiiva Drone.
N spotted the small grey speck with an odd reflection of the sun’s rays from the bottom of his vision. He grew curious, as he saw a few other wyverns staring curiously at it. With a growing sense of intrigue and an also growing sense of post-hibernation fatigue, he dips down.
Slowing his descent as he nears the grassy ground, N lands on it. He looks up, finally getting a better look at the cage. He snuffs through his vents, smelling the mud and dried oil of the scared Worker Drone sitting inside.
N steps closer, his curved claws digging into the ground. Once he’s only about a foot or less away, he stands onto his hindlegs. He knows he towers over the cell, and the girl inside, but he also knows he needs to stretch himself out more. He’s still pretty stiff…
Blinking down at the hollow-eyed worker, N wonders why she’s locked up like a captured wyvern. Worker Drones don’t tend to like hurting each other or placing them in confined spaces. Only the really bad ones, from what he hears.
Thus, he takes a deep vent in and speaks.
The Safi’jiiva Drone walks over towards her, then stands on its hindlegs. His height alone frightens her, the Wvyern Drone standing at a staggering thirteen feet tall.
Uzi’s plating trembles again, and she finds herself fearful once more. She knows she was wishing for her death to come already, but did life really have to make it in the form of a damn Elder Dragon?!
“YYooouuuu-“ The said Elder Dragon speaks in a staticky voice.
But he is abruptly cut off with a painful hack. He bangs on his chest, falls back onto all fours, and continues to cough his vents out. Uzi can’t help but flinch each time, the coughs so bad even she can feel them.
After a full minute, the Safi’jiiva drone eventually spits out a whole rock from his throat. A few more weaker coughs later and he wipes the drool from his chin. Uzi stares at the rock, then the Wyvern Drone.
She could see his teeth during that entire thing, how they were razor-sharp and able to easily rend apart and turn metal into shrapnel.
“You. Why are you in there?” He speaks again, this time with less static and hacking. His voice is also much younger and less gravelly than she’d thought it’d be.
But Uzi shakes her head and snaps out of it. Her tense posture sags back into her sad, depressed one, her hands falling between her legs.
“I was overthrown.” She says quietly.
“Overthrown?” The Safi’jiiva questions back with a cock of his big head.
Uzi nods.
“And they, the Worker Drones, left you out here?” He then asks, starting to circle her cell.
Again, Uzi simply nods. She keeps her despairing gaze to her cage floor.
The Elder Dragon rumbles out a hum. He pauses in his circling. He sits down, out of breath from walking just half a circle.
“I need more darn exercise…” Uzi hears him mumble. “Have you not tried to escape?” He then asks, voice louder again.
Uzi shakes her head. She still doesn’t look at him, doesn’t try nor dare. Maybe, if he sees this as disrespectful, he’ll shred open her cage and shred her apart.
“Do you think you can escape it?” The Elder Dragon asks from behind.
The ex-princess’s response is another shake of her head.
The Wyvern Drone growls in thought. Uzi waits for his next words.
N stares tiredly at the girl held inside the small cage. He thinks, growls, feels himself growing tired again, and realizes that he should really move around more to wake himself up.
He finds it strange. This girl isn’t afraid of him. Usually, all the other Worker Drones go running away at the first sight of him, some even crying in fear for their lives. Well, they really wouldn’t be wrong to, as he does sometimes eat them.
But this one simply stares solemnly at the floor of her cage. She doesn’t bother to look up, to show anymore fear, to acknowledge he’s there aside from the silent responses.
It’s simply so strange to him.
And tiring.
‘I’m so darn tired…’ N thinks, his optics lidding from lingering heavy fatigue.
He turns them to the worker girl again. She looks to be waiting for something.
“What was the reason the other Worker Drones put you out here again?” He asks, his wings starting to droop.
“Sacrifice.” The worker responds softly.
N blinks. His brows blink onto his visor and furrow. His tail flicks once in confusion.
“Huh?” He hums. “A-… A sacrifice?” He mimes in question, cocking his head.
The girl nods.
“…” N blinks again.
He thinks his CPU is lagging behind, but it’s probably just the absurdity of what she said, really.
“You still do that?” He opts to ask.
The worker shrugs. Guess they sometimes do, N thinks.
“Okay…” He trails off.
A beat of silence passes between them. N thinks more.
‘I hear they used to sacrifice each other, but I thought they stopped that?’ N wonders, cocking his tired head to the other side. ‘If so, what did this girl do to get sacrificed?’ His thoughts continue.
“Are you going to kill me?” The girl suddenly asks.
N startled, being fully awoken for a moment. He snaps his horned head towards her, spotting the Worker Drone now looking at him from over her shoulder.
“Uh- I don’t- I dunno.” He fumbles with a shrug.
The girl’s brows appear and furrow in what looks to be disappointment and incredulousness.
“Sorry.” N says in response to her look. “I’m kinda too tired to right now.” He explains, just before a yawn hits him.
His teeth are shown off again, and the girl stares at them. From the corner of his tearing optic, N can see her expression change to wanting and wishing.
“I mean, do you really wanna die?” N asks her, licking his hand and rubbing at his face like a cat.
“…” The worker female doesn’t reply. “I don’t know…” She finally says after a pause.
N blinks at her. He resumes cleaning.
“Why were you asking?” He questions, turning to nibble on an itch in his hindleg’s scales.
“…I don’t have anything to live for anymore…” The caged worker replies quietly and sadly.
“How so?” N scratches off some pebbles stuck beneath the back of his horns with his back leg.
“I don’t have anything anymore.” She says. “No home, no friends, no family, no money, no fuel, no kingdom. Just… Nothing.” She then lists.
“…” N sits there, amber eye lights closed and his CPU lagging. “Mm.” He hums sleepily.
More silence passes by. N starts to drift off to sleep again. His wings slowly fall until they rest on the ground. His head lolls as he begins to fall into Sleep Mode.
The Worker Drone simply watches him for a minute.
This Elder Dragon is so strange, Uzi thinks. He’s so damn tired, so sleepy he’s struggling to stay awake. If there’s any sort of quietness between them, he starts to fall asleep.
‘Did he not get any last night?’ Uzi can’t help but wonder.
“Why are you so tired?” She decided to ask her thoughts.
The Safi’jiiva Drone startles awake, his eye lights snapping open in hollow and his frame jolting. He quickly shakes his head and rubs his visor, lifting his wings once again.
“Mmmm, hibernation…” He mumbles out.
“Oh…” Uzi hums back.
She then watches him stand back up. He arches his spiny, spiky, sandpapery back plates and waistband. His wings flare out in a stretch as well. The Elder Dragon looks like a cat doing that, Uzi can’t help but note.
“I’ve got another question for you.” He suddenly speaks.
“What is it?” Uzi replies back.
“Have you heard of Wyvern Brides?” The Safi’jiiva Drone asks her.
“…” Uzi blinks at him. “Yeah…” She replies after a moment, a brow brought down in confusion.
How could she not have heard about Wyvern Brides? Female Worker Drones who become basically handmaidens to wyverns. Usually a last resort type of a thing, if they’re even lucky enough to find a Wyvern Drone that merciful.
“Well, I’m kinda still out of it from my hibernation, and I could use some help arrrroooouuuu…” His words devolve into another jaw-stretching yawn.
Once it ends, he shakes his head. The Elder Dragon goes quiet. Uzi waits for him to continue. His head starts to loll and she realizes he’s falling asleep again.
“Hey. Hey! Wake up! You were telling me something?!” She snaps her fingers at him.
“Huh-? Oh, right…” He snaps back into being awake. “Uhm, if you wanna, you can be my Wyvern Bride.” He offers bluntly.
Uzi blinks at him, her eye lights void. She saw it coming from his question about if she knew of them, but she still didn’t expect the offer outright.
“I need someone to keep me up, and it gets lonely sometimes. Since you’ve been, like, totally left out here to die and now have no place to go, I thought you’d be a perfect fit.” The Safi’jiiva explains.
‘Wow, way to make me feel better.’ Uzi thought bitterly.
But, she supposes, she doesn’t have much other choice. It’s either die out here all alone, or go with this Elder Dragon and become a Wyvern Bride. She may essentially be turning into a handmaid, but it’s better than starving to death or being ripped to bits by a Monster Drone.
“…Fine…” Uzi responds quietly, breaking her gaze with the monster.
He gives no response at first. Uzi wonders if he fell asleep again. But the whirring of joints and the shifting of metal scales tells her he’s still awake. For the most part, at least.
“’Mkay. Gimme a moment…” The Elder Dragon says.
He then turns to her and sluggishly walks over. Uzi scoots back from him, watching as he lifts a clawed hand. Swiftly bringing it down, the cage is torn right open. Metal bends and breaks, bars pop off, and a sizable hole is made.
“Hop on. I’ll take you to my den.” He says, plopping his butt on the ground with his back facing her.
Uzi blinks, eye lights hollowed again and her frame tense. But she shakes her head and moves. Out of her cage and onto his rough, spiky back, Uzi holds on tight to him. She winds her arms around his neck, wraps her legs around his waist as best she can with his wings in the way.
“Hold on tight, okay? I may be sleepy, but I can still fly pretty fast.” He warns.
“W-Wait!” Uzi cries, making the Elder Dragon freeze.
“Hm?” He hums sleepily, turning his head just a bit towards her.
“Do you have a name? Or literally anything I can call you besides ‘Safi’jiiva Drone’ or something?” Uzi asks.
“…” The said drone doesn’t say anything right away. “N.” He then replies simply.
“…That’s it?” Uzi questions with a quirked brow.
“Mhm.” ‘N’ hums back with a small nod.
“…Huh…” Uzi hums in return.
“What’s yours? I know you Worker Drones have them, too.” N asks, spreading his wings.
“…It’s Uzi.” She says after a short pause.
“Mm. Nice name.” N says.
Before Uzi can reply, he crouches down, then leaps and flaps his wings. Uzi holds on tighter to him as he ascends into the skies.
N makes a wide U-turn, heading back the way he came.
N slows his wings as he heads toward the rocky ground. Once he lands on it, he crouches down to let his new Wyvern Bride off.
Uzi steps onto the ground with shaky legs. The flight had admittedly frightened her a bit, the girl refusing to open her optics. Now that she’s back on the ground, she feels a lot better.
“This is my home. It’s, uh… A home.” N says, gesturing to his ‘lovely’ abode with a wing.
Uzi looks around at the… Completely dead and barren place.
“It’s uh… It sure is a home…” She says.
“Feel free to explore. But don’t go outside! I’m too tired to hunt you down…” N tells her, his shoulders lowering from sleepiness.
“Sure thing.” Uzi nods, giving him a narrow, semi-confused look. “Oh, uhm, do you… Have any spare clothes, by any chance?” She then remembers, her visor lighting up in embarrassment.
“Uhhh… Maybe. I’d need to look.” N replies after a moment of thought. “This way.” He then says, starting to move.
Uzi follows the sleepy Elder Dragon. As they move through the large place, she takes the time to look around more. Everything looks all the same, except for a few large rock spires and shredded metal skins. She has to wonder how N doesn’t get lost.
‘Well. Maybe he just flies in from the roof.’ She thinks, staring up at the long opening in the ceiling.
Soon enough, the two are descending into the valley’s depths. The second floor had to be reached by flight, to which N carried Uzi down. Upon getting there, the Elder Dragon began walking again.
This trek would take quite a few more minutes, until N walked over to a small hole in the wall. He started to shimmy himself inside, wriggling his spiny frame and squeezing himself into the near-hidden room.
Once he managed to pop himself through, he continued forward. Uzi followed with much less trouble, though she had to wonder how N doesn’t get claustrophobic doing that.
“’Kay. Here’s where I keep my treasures an’ stuff.” N said, sitting just in front of a large pile of, well, things.
Many things were stacked on top of other things, which included, but were not limited to, clothy things, gold things, silver things, mundane things, monster things, worker things, old things, new things, and even more things!
“There’s uh, probably something in there.” N spoke, glancing at his large mountain of treasure. “Wear whatever you’d like. I don’t… Really- Care…” He trailed off, becoming sleepy again.
“Why do you even have this?” Uzi asked, gazing up at the mountain.
“I dunno.” N shrugged, snapped out of his dozing. “I get bored sometimes and steal stuff I like. It’s not like anyone can really stop me.” He added.
“Oh…” Uzi replied, a sweat drop on her visor.
“Well, I’ll be going now. Gotta hunt or whatnot.” The Safi’jiiva Drone then spoke, already walking off again. “Don’t leave the den! In fact, don’t go too far from this spot!” He called back to her.
“Uh- Yeah, sure.” Uzi nodded.
With that, N squeezed himself through the small opening in the wall, grunting all the while. Uzi turned back to the treasures.
Looking through them, there were many things she didn’t think a Monster Drone would take interest in. A lot of toys and shiny rocks, the clothes, too.
‘Why does he have so many…?’ Uzi asked herself in her thoughts, lifting up a dirty tuxedo.
Tossing it behind herself, the ex-princess began rummaging through everything again. A lot of stuff was for guys. Made sense, the Elder Dragon is a dude. But he did have a few girly clothes. Sparingly, but at least there was something.
‘Though, maybe wearing a dude’s clothes wouldn’t be too bad, considering I’m gonna get dirty living in a place like this.’ Uzi thought, dropping the pile of scavenged clothing. ‘And I don’t think N will care less, either.’
Taking a moment to stare and think, Uzi kneeled and sifted through the clothing once more. She picked out comfy, loose clothing. Just something she won’t care if it gets dirty.
That just so happened to be a plain red dress with elbow-length sleeves, an off-white apron that covered her whole torso, and a similarly-colored kerchief with a red stripe on the front. She also managed to find a pair of brown boots and pants.
It wasn’t anything spectacular, and they were most certainly all dirty, but it’d work. And somehow, the clothes were in her size. Well, mostly. The dress? Yes. The socks? They were a little big.
Ditching her ruined nightgown for the dusty maiden clothes, Uzi looked down at herself. She felt odd, wearing something so non-expensive and non-princessy. Ever since she was created, she’s worn dresses, heels, corsets, crowns, and the like.
To wear something so… Not, is almost foreign. But… It’s also welcomed.
It just feels… Right, to wear this. It’s not constraining like a corset, not fragile like a tiara, not poofy like a dress, and not aching like heels. It’s loose, comfy, flexible, covering, airy, relatively warm for what it is, and feels more her style.
‘I could… I could get used to wearing this.’ Uzi thought, a few small blush lines on her visor.
She shook her head, deciding to move on. She kicked back the remaining clothes, turning and leaving the treasury. Once outside, she looked around again.
The place, while big like previously stated, was so devoid of life. No plants, no critters, no other living things whatsoever. It was almost scary how dead and lonely it was here.
Even the molted metal skins felt like echoes of death, sitting stiff and rusting on rocky cliffsides and towering stone spires. It even made Uzi wonder how long N’s been living here.
Speaking of, she could hear a roar echo out across the ravine. Looking up for the source, Uzi spotted the Elder Dragon come flying down through the natural cut above.
N slowed down as he neared, eventually flapping his wings a few swift times and blowing sand away as he landed. He dropped the freshly-killed Monster Drone, a monkey-bird Bishaten Drone.
“Lunch.” N said simply, licking away some drops of oil from around his mouth.
“Apparently so…” Uzi trailed off, grimacing at the corpse.
N wasted no time in tearing off a feathery wing-arm. He dropped it in front of his Wyvern Bride, letting her have that fill. Uzi stared down at the leaking arm, stained with dirt and oil.
“It’s oil is spilling. Don’t let it go to waste. I’m too tired to hunt again right now.” N told her, glancing at her with a slight glare.
“You are so lazy…” Uzi muttered.
She’d only realize too late that she let the words slip. As soon as they hit her, she slapped her hands to her mouth. Sweat drops rained down her visor in fear of the Elder Dragon’s reaction.
And for a long moment, he didn’t react at all. He then growled, making his chest rumble with it. Uzi flinched at it, preparing for a gruesome death.
“Sorry.” N said instead. “I just need to wake up. It always takes me a while to become fully awake after hibernation.” He told her.
Uzi peeked an optic open, frame still tense in anticipation. After N simply returned to eating and tearing apart the Monster Drone corpse, she let her tense shoulders fall. Turning her gaze to the ground, Uzi finally picked up the arm.
“It’s… Fine.” She said as she sat down. “I didn’t mean to let that slip out.” She admitted.
“So you were still thinking it?” N chuckled. “It pains me that my Wyvern Bride thinks so lowly of me.” He feigned being hurt by putting a hand to his jutting chest.
“Well, you aren’t exactly selling yourself here, Mister.” Uzi retorted with a small smirk.
“True.” N shrugged.
Some quietude fell between them as they ate. Uzi couldn’t help the persistent sweat drop on her visor at drinking straight from a Monster Drone’s dismembered arm, but she has no other choice.
Uzi did appreciate the refuel, though. The warnings about low oil were starting to get annoying.
“Thanks, by the way.” Uzi quietly broke the silence, taking a break from drinking.
N glanced at her, maw-deep in the Bishaten Drone’s torso.
“I wouldn’t have survived out there on my own, stuck in a cage or not.” She continued at his silence. “I was fully ready to die. I was even hoping you would kill me, after I got over the initial fear.”
“…” N blinked at her.
“You probably only did it because you’re lazy and don’t want to do everything yourself right now.” Uzi said as a small joke. “But thanks. Even if you’ll kill me later once you’re fully awake from your hibernation…” She paused, looking for her words as her optics turned away.
“Thanks, for at least giving me a semi-happy end. Even if it is as a Wyvern Bride.” Uzi finished, her expression turning sad.
“…” Still, N was silent.
He then suddenly got up. He walked right past her, into his treasury. Uzi watched him, confused at his reaction. She then sighed, her shoulders sagging as she figured he already got fed up with her.
‘I can’t even keep the one relatively good relationship I have with a freaking Monster Drone.’ She thought. ‘Turns out those bullies who talked behind my back were right-‘ Pale blue tears pricked at the corners of her eye lights.
But her thoughts would be abruptly stopped when N came back over to her. Before Uzi could open her mouth to speak, the Safi’jiiva picked up the little worker by the back of her dress.
Uzi flailed in surprise as she was carried back into the treasury. Once there, she was plopped down on an old, dusty, stained mattress that’s seen far better days. N was quick to lie down next to her, curling up as best as his thirteen foot stature would allow.
He wound a careful arm around her, pulling her close into his chest while still being aware of his jutting metal. His tail curled under their feet, the mattress’s springs creaking with each minute shift of the hefty Elder Dragon. The last thing N did was drape a red and beige wing over the ex-princess.
Uzi suddenly found herself lying in the arms of the Elder Dragon, even being blanketed by one of his wings. She could feel a subtle warmth radiate from his chest, helping to warm her up in the dim room.
“I’m not gonna kill you.” N spoke, stirring the Worker Drone from her stupor. “Sometimes… It gets lonely, being an Elder Dragon.” He said.
“Everyone fears you, hates you, wishes you were dead or didn’t exist. I can’t go anywhere without the local Wyvern Drones running away in fear of their lives.” He elaborated. “For as much as they’re right to do so, it also makes my life… Very boring.”
N curled into himself tighter, pulled Uzi closer. She felt her visor light up with some blush lines. She doesn’t even know why.
“I’d been considering getting myself a Wyvern Bride for a few years now.” N went on. “And I avoided it because everyone was so fearful of me.”
“But when I found you, and you had showed no fear, or at least had gotten over it, I-…” He trailed off. “I didn’t want to lose it. So I made that offer.” N said.
He then sighed, a hushed growl coming from his secondary voice box. His chest plates rattled with the ex-vent, the scale plating shifting towards each other.
“So… Thanks. For being my Wyvern Bride.” N finished in a quiet voice.
Uzi had to take a minute to process his words. For someone so strong, powerful, fearsome, too, they were quite moving.
“Yeah.” Uzi finally said at last. “I’m… glad I agreed.”
Uzi held onto N’s draping wing. She lifted it over her shoulder more, curling up into a ball to keep warm in the chilly cave area.
“When we wake up from this nap, why don’t we… Do something… Together… Maybe?” N asked hesitantly, a sheepish amber blush blinking onto his visor.
“Sure.” Uzi nodded, her own bashful flush popping up. “So long as you aren’t too lazy to do it.” She giggled.
“I won’t!” N exclaimed. “Maybe. I’m still getting over my Hibernation Mode.” He added.
“Alright.” Uzi quietly laughed again. “Maybe we can find something to wake you up.” She said, looking at him.
N stared back. He huffed, looking away as his blush lines increased.
“That’d be nice.” He said.
With that, tired silence reigned supreme. N was easy to fall into Sleep Mode, soft, rumbling snores escaping his vents. Uzi took more time, still a little awake from the oil she drank.
But as the minutes ticked by as she continued to listen to N’s rhythmic snores, felt his radiating warmth, and subtly heard his core pulse, she drifted off as well.
She wasn’t sure what being a Wyvern Bride truly had in store for her, but Uzi hopes it’s better than castle life. Especially since she’s living with a drone who truly cares about her.