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Starflight had awoken to find himself lying in a bed, the scents of the rainforest invading his nose.
I can’t see
He reached his hands up towards his face. He felt bandages wrapped across his face tight.
I just need to see
He clawed at the bandages. Trying to tear them off before a set of talons grasped his own.
“Starflight!” Fatespeaker’s voice rang through the room as she startled him. “Starflight stop. You’re heavily burnt and the bandages are so your wounds don’t get infected.”
“Fatespeaker?” Starflight croaked out. “I can’t see anything. I can’t see the future.” He could feel her talons recede. “I’m lost and I don’t know what’s happening anywhere right now. Please let me take the bandages off.” Someone was approaching quickly, he was tired and it was a mind so clouded with doubt, fear, and anger so he couldn’t identify it.
“Oh, Starflight…” She started.
“Fatespeaker please! Someone very angry is approaching and I can’t see them or who they are.”
“Your eyes are…” She hesitated. The pause felt like an eternity until she finally finished. “Gone. You got injured in the volcano.” She explained. “You have burns all over your body including… including your face and eyes.”
It was true Starflight could feel the parts of his scales that were touched by lava. They ached and were covered in bandages as well. He knew underneath all of them were horribly warped scales.
He could feel the mind approaching grow clearer and clearer as it got closer and stopped just outside the healing center.
Tsunami
Starflight heard her walk through the entrance and drop something she was holding. It clattered to the ground with a sharp noise as he heard her talons scrap across the floor as she quickly approached.
“What were you thinking?” She was suddenly up right next to him and shouted in his face. “You think we’d be okay with that?”
“Tsunami! Tsunami!” Fatespeaker pleaded from somewhere behind her. “He’s still very hurt. I understand you’re very angry, I am too. But you need to calm down. How about you go and grab the rest of the Dragonets.”
Tsunami grumbled something and walked off. Her mind slowly fading away from the immense turmoil it was in and fading into the distance. Fatespeaker then became incredibly silent. He could feel her hovering right beside him. He wanted to reach out and comfort her, but he could barely move. He felt water drop on his scales.
Oh, she’s crying.
“Please don’t cry,” Starflight feebly reached out towards her, barely lifting his arm. “You didn’t do anything wrong, so you shouldn’t be crying. What happened to me was entirely my decision.”
“That’s why I’m crying,” She explained. “Because you chose this for some reason. Was there really no other option?”
“I had almost seven years to come to terms with my death, it was going to be okay. I guess the part I’m surprised about is that I’m alive.”
Fatespeaker only began to cry harder. “You can read minds, why are you so terrible at comforting people?”
“I can’t read yours for some reason.” He felt the familiar approach of his friends' minds all in a turmoil similar to Tsunami's. Sunny entered first flanked by the rest of his friends.
“Hi Starflight,” Sunny started, her voice cracking. “I am speaking first because I am the most composed right now.” Starflight didn’t need to be a mind reader to understand the emotions going through his friends right now. Doubt, anger, fear, and sorrow. “Before everyone else speaks we would like to start by saying we love you. You are our brother and you’ll never not be our brother.”
“What were you thinking!” Tsunami shouted. “You could just die in lava and it’d be okay.”
“I came to terms with it years ago.” He argued. “You guys would’ve too.”
“No we wouldn't have.” Clay said, avoiding eye contact. “I would never have gotten over it.”
“And,” Sunny added. “How’d we fulfill the prophecy if you were dead?”
“You would’ve had Fatespeaker.”
“You think we’d replace you so easily?” Glory said with scorn of the very idea. “You’re family Starflight. When you pulled your little stunt we’d only known Fatespeaker for an hour at best and no offense to Fatespeaker, but even though we did fulfill the prophecy with her, she could never replace you.”
“Well what did you want me to do? Morrowseer had to die and I never would’ve sent one of you in there. You’re all too important.”
“You’re important too!” Fatespeaker yelled, he hadn’t noticed when she moved, but she was standing alongside his siblings. “Well all care about you a lot and you’ve left a positive impact all around Pyrrhia. Like the Claws.”
“Oh yeah by the way.” Tsunami started. “You must think you’re very clever, naming your organization of super-powered charity cases The Claws of the Blind Prophet. Real comical Starflight.” Her voice was scalding.
“And what about Moonwatcher?” Sunny asked. “Who would’ve taught her about her powers?”
“I left letters for her as well. They’re at Jade Mountain.” Starflight understood. Clay’s doubt in himself, Tsunami’s anger at Starflight, Glory’s fear for Starflight, and the sorrow that Sunny felt.
He took a moment to let their emotions flood him and he reached out to the future. He couldn’t see past this point because he assumed he died, but paths still branch out; they were just all dark. But he had more sense than just sight.
He inhaled and smelled fruit.
He moved his talons and felt the bed.
He opened his mouth and tasted the dampness in the air.
And eventually he moved his mind to the future and did the same.
He inhaled and smelled salt.
He moved his talons and felt paved stone.
He opened his mouth and tasted ocean winds in the air.
All that was left was to listen. His ears flicked as he began to listen to the future. Many voices crowded around him but only one caught his attention.
“Papa, over here!”
He snapped back to the present and turned to his friends. “I do not regret that I sacrificed myself.” He spoke firmly. “But I do regret the way I hurt you all in doing it and if I had the chance to redo I would inform you all of the issue beforehand and let the group decide the best course of action together instead of forgoing all of your opinions.”
The tension in the room did not entirely disappear, but it did lessen. Clay moved first, then Glory, then Sunny, then Tsunami, and finally Fatespeaker. Clay embraced him with the others all following his lead.
It hurt.
It hurt Starflight as they rubbed up against his burns.
But they needed this more than it hurt him.