Spyro: Dawn of Light, 3-33

SPYRO: DAWN OF LIGHT
Part 3




CHAPTER 33




"It's been several days now.  I can feel my body deteriorating from lack of sun.  The food here is terrible.  I'm sure I'm going to die soon."

Cynder facepawed.  "Flame, you don't have a diary and you're not dying."

"My compatriots constantly dissuade me, attempting to paint this all up in a good light, but I know what is really going on.  They can't handle the truth of the matter."

Neves sighed and shook his head.  "Let him be stupid to himself.  There's no way to measure time passage in here but my gut tells me it's been several days.  At least."

The black female smirked.  "Is that your gut telling you, or is it complaining from that gruel mush?"

He made a face in return, his wings clenching at his sides.  "Maybe both at this point.  I wish I could access the jerky I stored away.  Some of mom's styled jerky would be awesome right now."

Staring at the ceiling again, Cynder huffed.  "Remember when you used to prank us?"

Nodding a bit, he stared at the far wall above the cell entrances.  "Yeah.  I guess I lost that with all the training and getting ready to fly and all that...it's been too long."

"How much have we changed from all this?" she murmured.  "Things are way different now than they used to be..."

"Dunno.  I remember some of my pranks but it's mostly lost in all the training."  Crossing his paws he huffed in annoyance.  "If I end up succeeding Cyril, I'm changing the way things are done.  We were pushed through too much training and not enough...time being kids.  Like our childhood was stolen away."

"Heh...but if not for all that, we'd probably have been crushed by an evil creature long ago."

"Granted, but still."

Turning to look at Caelos, Cynder sighed when she saw he'd barely moved.  "Is he sleeping or meditating?  He hasn't moved for hours."

"Dunno.  Last I checked on him he was signing something to himself."

Sighing again out of sheer boredom, she flopped onto her back and pawed angrily at the air, as if trying to gouge open the ceiling high above.  "I wanna fly at least, even if in circles...these collars suck.  Are they coming to get us or not?"

"They'll come.  When, I don't know.  Spyro and Plazyma did kinda piss off the Sorceress.  Who knows who else might be after them after the Warfang attack failed."

Silence fell, the trickle of the false-water fountain partially masking the muted chatter and mumbling between the other prisoners.  The Moles were discussing something, and the cats and dogs were huddled together and glancing at the dragons from time to time.  "Neves...what do you think would happen if Spyro went all-out in a battle?  I mean, he keeps saying he's gonna go all-out, but each battle he does so, it gets way stronger than before.  Like...when we faced Grendor-"

He shook his head and made a motion of glancing around.  "Not here.  But I get what you're asking.  Honestly, I don't know.  And that scares me."

"That's what Spyro said too."

"I don't blame him.  But we're being watched and monitored in here.  This isn't something we should go into detail with, until we get out of here."

Out...was a question they had no answer to yet.  It was obvious there was a way in or out; despite trying to stay up and awake, even in shifts, somehow everyone in this room ended up falling asleep, and when they woke up, someone would be missing, only to turn up the next time they all fell asleep together.  The Moles had tried using the dirt to show any possible doors, rubbing it on the walls and carefully studying drawn patterns in the dirt's surface, but the walls were too smooth for the dirt to stick reliably, and the floor seemed to remain untouched, unmoved, except by the two somnambulant cats, a tiger and a cheetah.  One would simply walk across the room at night and then back to his bed, the other would pace in circles but always at a fixed distance from his bed.  They had been here the longest it seemed, vagabonds from within the Department, but they knew almost nothing of these newer dealings and technologies.  They knew about the disappearances at night, but by this point had shrugged it off.  It was alarming at first when one woke up to find the other gone, only for them to reappear the next "night" waking up as if they'd never been gone.  Even with Flame's jittery worry about being taken, he was still the first to fall asleep and the last to wake up each round.  None of the dragons had been "taken" yet, but they all knew the next time they fell asleep, it was likely one of them would be next.

Nightshade's warnings rang in Cynder's ears.  Something about "creating more purple dragons".  The mole had said earlier that the Department often spoke of capturing her and her friends...was it for this purpose?  Because they were the elemental avatars?  Or were they looking to capture and study the purple dragon himself?  The thought had occurred to her many times already in this short captivity, and it filled her with anger at Flame for standing down without a fight, but there was nothing much they could do now.  At most, she and Caelos could manifest small breezes, barely more than a whisper's worth of movement, and they could refine their hearing to pick up muted conversations across the room, but that was about it.  Flame and Neves had tried all sorts of elemental charges but couldn't pull anything.  Given that their abilities relied on temperature changes, if they were able to do anything at all, it was almost indiscernible.  Flame had been clawing and rubbing at his collar trying to find a way to loosen it, but the only thing they knew of was a very slim keyhole, too big for their claws.  There were elemental switches same as on the collar Flame had worn for the raid on the Fellmuth, but their covers seemed welded shut.  It wasn't just their elements that were disabled either, their natural passive magic was also inhibited.  They couldn't access their inventories of stored items, nor could they fly.  It was a rather sore blow to Caelos; even with his broader, wider wings, he could only hop up and flap a few feet but couldn't gain enough purchase on the air to ascend.  

What could the Department gain from monitoring them with these collars?

"Irritation and psychological reflexes."

Cynder blinked back to reality when she heard Flame's voice.  "What?"

The red dragon was a few steps away, scratching furiously at the collar with his hind leg.  "Uuuuurrrrgh I hate these things!"  He tried to crane his neck enough to bite at it but his neck wasn't flexible enough, leaving him snapping at his shoulders.  "By now I'm damn sure they put these on us to look at how we react when we can't be dragons."

"But the Moles and others have them too."

"Placebo effect, it's gotta be.  I just want this frickin' thing off!"  He yelped when his claw finally caught one of his scales and pulled it off, leaving a small bloody patch on his neck.  "Ow damnit all!"

"Told you to stop scratching," Neves remarked.  "You're neck's gonna be all swollen and inflamed by the time the others rescue us."

"I don't give a damn right now it itches too much!!"  

"It was itching him before too when we put a different one on him," Cynder added.  "Could he be allergic to it maybe?"

"Eh, I'd chalk it up to a psychosomatic reaction."  Neves shook his head and sighed.  "Just go lie down and nap again.  Sleep it off."

"Hard to fall asleep with this damn itch and nothing else to do..."

Flame kept scratching at the other side of his neck even after everyone had retired to their cells.  Laying on his cot and idly rubbing the tips of his claws against his scales just under the lip of the device encircling his throat, he laid there and grumbled to himself, but he was also listening intently.  While trying to see if he could heat up his body at least with his fire powers the previous "night", he'd noticed that everyone else seemed to fall asleep at the exact same time.  He had managed to get himself rather warm inside, and he'd stayed up noticeably longer than the others for once, but finally felt too tired to continue heating himself.  Now, as he laid there fussing about the collar, he waited, listening for the Moles' noisy snores.  There was something strange at work.  He knew himself to be a loud snorer, a point of occasional contention at the Temple with Caelos and his excellent hearing, but the wind dragon dozed right through the Moles, who snored loud enough to put Flame or even a fully grown dragon to shame.  Such a noise, especially in this stone room with very little to dampen it, would've normally kept him up, and his friends, but something about this place made them all crash.

At the same time.

That bothered him immensely.

What caught his attention was that heating his body last night seemed to have helped him stay up longer.  Or perhaps it was a fluke.  But he was keen on trying it again.  Still keeping up his complaining about the collar, acting like he was trying to get comfortable, he slowly warmed himself inside with his fire.  It wasn't much, barely more than raising his body temperature than actual fire power manifestation, but it was enough that he could feel it reflecting off his cot back at him.  

Thus, he waited, listening for the heavy slow breathing and the snores.

A if they were all participants in a synchronized sleeping competition, the snores and heavy breaths faded in together.  Flame closed his eyes and pretended to join in, faking his own snoring as best he could tell, but he concentrated on keeping his body heated.  The more he focused on it, the longer he found himself staying awake.

Was there something in the air that he was burning off, maybe, or was the heat making his body work off something?

His question was rather rudely answered when his cot simply fell into the floor, pulling him into blackness.  

"Damn!" came a voice and a motion near him.  "Why is he so warm?  I can feel it through my suit!"

"This isn't normal," came a cold, emotionless and rather analytical voice in reply.  Heavy straps of some strange material clamped swiftly over his body and his limbs, and a muzzle was fixed over his face.  "Get him to chamber 15, quickly.  He's worked his hide too much around that collar, he needs treatment immediately."

Ha, it worked...I think... Flame mused to himself.  They think I'm sick.

Letting his body cool off, he tried to memorize the directions he was taken, but everything was pitch-black.  He lost his sense of direction quite quickly with all the sharp twists and turns and ups and downs.  From the sounds of it, his carriers were bipedal, probably felines from the very soft footfalls and the smoothness of the transit.  They didn't speak, though, beyond the initial encounter.  He heard heavy wood doors framed in metal grind along the floor before them, then close behind him as he was whisked into a room.  The only light came from a dim purple crystal in the ceiling, everything else was still black as a void.  

"He's cooled back down but he still requires treatment around the collar.  Possible allergic reaction," came a different but still very cold and emotionless voice.  With his body bound to whatever was carrying his cot, he felt scared all of a sudden.  These voices sounded like individuals who would have absolutely no qualms dissecting him slowly and watching him bleed out purely for the science of it.  "Prisoner 17-81, fire dragon male..."  Fingers along his neck and jaw made uncomfortable prodding jabs, feeling his bones.  "Approximately...16 years of age, 3 months error.  Primary scales red, external bone structure and crests are gold...unusually dense muscle build for his age, fitting with suspected Guardian-based training regimens for..." More prodding; he had to really fight to pretend he was still asleep, though he suspected this examiner could tell already he was faking it, "hmmm...three and a half years.  Observed to be impulsive in captivity, impulsive yet lazy, preferring to sleep most of the usual waking hours.  Cause of examination: suspected ailments.  Possible allergic reaction to elemental binding collar, carriers report unusual body temperature tangible through their armor.  Possible reaction to the nightly anesthetic mixture in tandem with marked extreme elemental levels observed by guard members prior to arrest, and repression by collar proxy.  Observations regarding unusual body temperature increase will be marked and sent to Genetics for research into PDR utilization."

The figure finally moved away and Flame heard something small and metal being retrieved.  His pulse suddenly raced; a knife?!  Surgical tools?!

Clik

The collar suddenly loosened around his neck and fell off, someone else lifting his head and slipping the device away.  "Sir, I think he's waking up, his pulse is racing!"

"Well dose him then, he's going back in a few minutes anyway."

A wretched chemical smell was forced over his nose, and the next thing he knew he was being shaken awake by Cynder.

"Yo, lazyass, your food's getting cold.  You were whining about that yesterday."

Looking around quickly, he spotted his food, then stretched and raised his wing, blocking his face from the common area.  "Cynder, we are definitely being watched," he whispered as low as he dared.  "We're being gassed at night to go to sleep, and they're definitely watching us during the day."  He pulled his wing back and faked another stretch before hopping down to the tray of protein mush.  "Ew."

The rest of the day went by quite boring, though Cynder did manage to sneak to the others that Flame had something to talk about.  Flame kept scratching madly at his collar, more as a ruse to cover Cynder's whisperings, though he did rip a few more scales off and had several scabrous lines along his neck by the time the others gathered around him in his cell.  Neves pretended to look over the damage while they chatted in very hushed tones.

"How do you know they're not listening to us right now?" he asked, poking a scab.  The fire dragon flinched.

"They don't seem to monitor the individual cells aside from some sort of visual range from the common area, I think.  They couldn't tell I was faking being asleep last night."

"But what does all this tell us?" Cynder asked impatiently.  "Sure, they're putting us all to sleep, probably to keep us all on the same schedule."

"They sent my information off to some project...PDR?"

Cynder blanched under her black scales.  PDR...Purple Dragon R-something? she wondered.  Caelos raised an eyebrow but remained silent, not wanting to convey anything through sign language if it was observed from the outside.  

"I couldn't memorize the path they took me down, I think it was designed specifically to disorient transported prisoners, but it's completely pitch-black.  They have some method of seeing in the dark."

"They're cats, obviously," Cynder grunted, but Neves shook his head.

"Cats can see in about 10% lighting conditions, but still require some light source.  If it was pitch-black as Flame says, they might have some simulated vision like what you and Spyro do with your shadow sense."  He pulled on the collar and Flame gagged and fell back on his cot.  "Damn, thought I'd found the lock mechanism..."  He tried to breathe ice onto his paw, then clenched it in frustration when the collar blocked it.

"But how did you keep the gas from working?" Cynder pushed.  "Surely we should be able to do the same thing?"

"I don't know, I was able to focus my power into my body and heat myself up.  But I don't know if I was burning off the gas, or making my body me...um...metabo...whatever the term is."

"Metabolize."

"Yeah that."

"At least we know the collar blocks external manifestation," Neves replied, prying around the collar again and wincing at the scabs.  "Are you trying to get yourself taken in again?"

"Kinda.  We need more info.  They took my collar off but a noise had scared me so my pulse was racing, and they felt it.  They thought I was just waking up though.  But I didn't like the sounds of metal I heard.  It was like...small knives or something."

"Do you remember anything about the room?" Neves asked, pausing in his ministrations.

"The only thing in there that I could see was a very dark purple crystal in the ceiling.  Maybe that's their light source?  But it didn't give enough light to see anything else by."

"Hrmm..." Cynder growled.  "I don't like this.  Nightshade said they're looking into something called genetics? and that they're probably trying to create artificial purple dragons.  We need to get more info, but the longer we stay here, the more likely we're advancing their research."

"If they take my collar off I can escape I think, I can use my fire as a light source."

"Too risky," Neves replied.  "They'd surround you and catch you and probably put you in isolation.  We should all try this inward power focus to try to stay awake, but right now you're the only one who can do that, so far as we know.  Don't endanger yourself.  They have terrain advantage after all, while we know nothing about this place.  We should probably wait it out a little bit, I'm sure Spyro and the others are trying to bust us out of here."


------


"There it is..." Plazyma snorted, tossing her crests back.  She reached up to reposition her flower behind her horn, only for her claws to pass by nothing.  She clenched her paw, missing Caelos giving her a fresh flower in the mornings.  Spyro merely stared at the titanic stone tower.  Shimmer hung back nervously by Sidian, who was decked out in his armor.

"Shimmer...how did you find this place so quickly?" the purple dragon asked.

"I was...in league with the Summoner, for a short time."  Plazyma and Sidian looked at her in shock.  "It was the only way to lock down definite locations for the magic vortices.  I used a little disguise illusion magic to pass myself off as him, and we would exchange information so our stories matched whenever we had to switch places.  I also had contact with the Jester from time to time.  They have him hostage somewhere and I wanted to find out where."

Spyro's eyes narrowed as he gazed up at the huge orb at the top of the tower, most likely the command center.  "Alright.  You sure Tephra's in there?"

"It doesn't move without her power," she replied, pointing with her wing at the trail of dust behind it as it slowly ground its way across the land.  "I don't think anyone else but Ripto could move that."

"And he's off in the Forgotten Realms most likely with the others."  Plazyma rolled her shoulders and huffed, her teeth sparking.  "Shall we engage them?"

"Not just yet."  Spyro's eyes narrowed a bit more as he thought.  "We need some sort of isolation tactic...a cave maybe.  Someplace away from that tower where we can't be interrupted.  Gnasty and his idiots might be in there too.  We can't risk them interfering."

"This is so dangerous..." Sidian whimpered.

"I know.  We don't necessarily need Tephra's assistance, but there's a lot to be gained even with a neutral agreement at best...at worst we might end up provoking her more."  Looking at the girls, he sighed.  "I'm the one she's after, and she knows nothing of Sidian.  You two will be a distraction.  I'll engage her alone, and I'll need Sidian to intervene in that fight.  If Gnasty's in there...Shimmer and Plazyma, you'll have to draw him out and away.  We know for sure now that he has the Fire Orb.  That's our decoy target for now."

"So we act like we're after that last Orb?" Plazyma asked.

"Exactly.  They should fall for it easily, and when Tephra comes out, I'll make myself known to her and draw her away."

"But Gnasty wants your head too."

"We'll figure it out as it plays along I guess.  Right now we've gotta move.  She's keeping that tower along the base of the mountains, I could try to draw her back to the Elamrof ruins.  Sidian, you hang out on the side and hide yourself."

"N-no complaints h-h-here..."

Inside the tower, Gnasty had already spotted the two brighter-colored girls.  By the time they reached the base, it had ground to a halt and Gnasty was waiting for them.  Shimmer and Plazyma slowed to a crouching halt, preparing to attack.

"Where Spyro?" the Gnorc captain snarled, hefting his war hammer on his shoulder.  

"We're here for that Fire Orb after your last mess you ugly toad!" Plazyma spat.  

"UGLY?!" he roared, then lunged at them, his hammer glowing brilliantly with fire power.  The two girls shot away, the Gnorc heatedly pursuing.  

"GNASTY!!" Tephra roared after him, phasing herself through the stone.  "Oh for-"  She stopped and stared when she saw Spyro approaching the tower.  Looking quickly between him and the irate Gnorc, she snarled.  "How dare you show your face around here you bastard!"

"Says the one grinding up the ground with this tower," he replied.  "I'm here to destroy it."

"Hah!"  She grinned evilly.  "I think I'll deliver you to Gnasty myself and watch him tenderize you."

"Since when do you work for Gnasty?"

"Oh I don't...I'm just so sick of you I'd rather watch someone else torture you.  Besides, it was Ripto's broken promise after all."  With that she alighted and stalked up to him, flaring her wings in open challenge.

"Perhaps the mountain would be a better spot to duel?"

"Oh I don't think so," she growled.  "You've got some trap or something up there."

"Nah, I just don't want to tear up the ground here.  The stone's better for combat."  Flaring his wing in a sweeping gesture he indicated the world around them.  "Look at this, Tephra.  It's brown, drying, and dying.  Is this really a world you want?  After you showed me the wonders of that cavern, the power of the earth itself, this is what you're participating in?"

She snorted, twin jets of Earth Shot breath blasting from her nose and smacking him back a few feet.  "You have no right to lecture me on destruction.  Oh...but I forgot, you're still ignorant of your true purpose aren't you?"

"Those word games don't work on me any more, Tephra, as I said before.  I've made my own destiny, my own purpose."

"But can you act against what you were made for?" she snarled, then bolted in at him, the ground shaking with each footstep.  Spyro yelped and skittered away, circling around her and making for the mountain.  At the very least, he wanted Sidian's confrontation to be hidden from view of that tower, anywhere out of eyesight would do.  Tephra growled and leapt up, letting herself fall and then disappearing in a muddy ripple and grassy splash as the ground seemed to turn to water around her.  Her head popped up and bobbed as she swam through the earth.  "GET BACK HERE!!"

Looking over his shoulder quickly he winced when he saw the tower still had a very clear line of sight over them.  From up there she commanded quite the view.  Looking around quickly, he leapt into the air and charged himself with electricity.

"Oh no you don't!" Tephra yelped, lunging forward and grabbing his tail with her teeth.  

"OW!" he cried, gritting his teeth against the pain as she drew blood.  With a roar he coated them both with his electric breath and the next thing Tephra knew she was suddenly in a cavern, her whole body tingling unpleasantly with static electricity and the smell of ozone.  

"You idiot," she snarled at him as he paced away to examine his tail.  "I am to be the overlord of dragons, why do you continue to defy me?!"

"That's a little uncharacteristic for you," he replied, pulling a Health Crystal shard from his storage and touching it to the bite marks on his tail.  The wounds glowed and closed up.  "Ow that really hurt."

"Oh please."  She showed him her tail, still bearing scars where his claws had dug into her over four years prior at the Settlement.  "So what do want from me, since you're soooo desperate to have us isolated from my tower?"

"I want you to set aside your allegiance to the Dark Master and turn your powers to the real good of this world."

"HAH!!"  She breathed on her paws, creating two cannonballs of earth energy.  "Over my dead body."  She flung the orbs at him; they were easy to dodge, but the blast upon contact with the stone echoed through the cavern and made his ears hurt.  She breathed rapidly in succession, blasting him head over paws several times with Earth Shots.  Rolling to a stop but otherwise unharmed he scrabbled back to his feet.

"That'll be more true than you think if you continue with him!"

"This coming from the one with the sheer power to destroy everything anyway!" she shot back angrily, stamping the ground.  A flash of gravity power anchored his paws to the floor but he quickly countered it and shot a fireball at her face.  She hissed, blinking through the smoke.  Charging at him with earth-laced claws she swung at him, her blow going rather wide but sending shockwaves of power at him.  Spyro grunted as he was flung against the wall.

"I may have that power...ow...but I haven't done anything destructive!"

At that, her face slowly crinkled with pure rage.  "You...you ignorant little... HOW CAN YOU SAY THAT WITH A STRAIGHT FACE?!"

"Because I-"

"YOU STOLE SIDIAN AND THEN GRENDOR FROM ME!!!" she screamed, blasting him with another Earth Shot.  Spyro winced as the blast raced over him and pushed him back a few inches.  "I finally found a true friend after all these years and YOU KILLED HIM!!!"

The ground under her suddenly lurched and she yelped as it sent her sliding on her side.  Up from the ground rose a chunk of black rock, which promptly exploded in a shower of green light to reveal a black-scaled form curled up inside, wings quickly unfurling to expose an earth dragon covered in obsidian scales.  He alighted on the ground by Spyro, the ground closing up behind him with a flick of his tail.

"Spyro, the girls need your help, I'll take care of things here."

"You sure?" Spyro asked.  Tephra scrambled to her feet in total confusion.

"Yes, now go!" he replied with a sweep of his wing.  Spyro's body glowed and he shot off with a crack of thunder.  Tephra glared, sizing up this new threat.  A black earth dragon?  Was he related to Cynder somehow?  Had they found a stand-in for earth or something?

"I don't know what you plan to do but whatever earth power you possess pales against mine!" she announced, then blasted him with another Earth Shot.  When the glow faded he was still standing there as if nothing happened.  Confused, she pounded the ground with her paw, spikes of rock shooting up at him only to shatter into dust against his scales.  Growling in frustration she roared again, the rocks around her levitating as she nullified gravity around them.  And yet he stood there just blankly watching her.  "WHAT TRICKERY IS THIS???"

"None, Teph," he replied, then stamped the ground with his own paw, reversing her reverse and pinning her to the ground under her new weight.  It was only for a brief moment though, enough to shock her out of her senses.  

"H...how...only Spyro can contend with my earth powers!  Who the hell are you??" she demanded, scrabbling to her feet again.  The black earth dragon sighed heavily and looked away.  Without warning his paw glowed and the rock beneath it spiderwebbed.  She tensed and splayed her legs in a crouching ready stance, prepared to lash out at him.  The shards of rock floated to his head and arranged themselves in an oddly familiar shape, then glowed.  He yelped, crashing to the floor under a hat of lead.  

"Ow...damnit I still can't get that straight..."  The hat glowed again several moments longer than before, and he finally stood up with a familiar armored wizard's peak.  Tephra's pupils dilated in utter shock, her knees giving out under her.

"I-I-I-Impo-impossible...." she stuttered, then shook her head with a snarl.  "QUIT SCREWING WITH ME!!"

"I'm not, Teph."  He angled his head just right to let the light illuminate his eyes beneath the wide brim.  She froze.  

Those eyes.
That look.
There was no mistaking it.

"...Grendor?"

He sighed again, the hat crumbling back to rock.  "Yes...I was.  The same magic Ripto used on you and Cynder, was used on me.  Had I known I would find you again I wouldn't have allowed it..."

"Find me again?  I've never met-" she started, but he swayed his tail just then, deliberately, to show her the silver snowflake on his glassy black tailfin.  Her jaw quivered in total disbelief.  "S...Sidian...it can't be..."

"I am..." he whispered, head hanging with guilt.  "All this time I was with you...yet I was too stupid and preoccupied with our plan to tell you..."

"B-but...how..."

Sidian's gaze steeled as he looked back up at her.  "Lay aside your allegiance with Malefor and I will tell you what happened."

She snarled at him.  "After all I've worked for?  What he has promised?  Not a chance."

"Malefor is a liar and a cheat.  The only thing he cares about is returning to fulfill his mission, the first thing he's going to do is cast you aside...or worse..."  He shivered.  "Teph, please...open your eyes to what you're doing!!"

"He promised me a normal life!!  He promised everything would go back to normal!!"

"THERE IS NO NORMAL ANYMORE!!" Sidian screamed, the loose rocks around him shattering into dust.  Panting from the emotional surge he glared at her.  "That bastard whispered all kinds of promises to me too, Tephra!  Not a day went by without Grendor or Malefor making promises to me!  I should've known when they forbade me from letting you know my real identity...but Malefor is a liar, a usurper, a cheater and...and...just...he's bad, okay?!"  He winced, feeling his stuttering coming back.  "I-I was so glad to h-have found you again but that bastard told...told me...told me that if the world was to be changed so that we could live together, I couldn't ever t-tell you who I really was."

She stared at him, not knowing how to react to this.

"I loved...I loved you Tephra, and I still love you, but I c-c-can't stand knowing that you are still following him and he-he-heading down a road of destruction!  He tried to k-k-kill me when I was no longer u-useful, and he'll do the same thing to you!  Look what he's done to the Apes that...that gave their lives to him!  Th-They're poisoned by Convexity now, neither living nor dead, al-always tortured in their search for gems!  He promised them power and glory and control, and that's how he rewarded them, with a living hell!  What makes you think he'll treat you any differently if this is what he's done to the race that supported him for eons??  You're only a tool!"

"SHUT UP!!!" she screamed back, blasting him with another Earth Shot.  His body merely absorbed the energy, glowing faintly for a few seconds.  "I'm too close to world domination for this crap, Sidian!  I was expecting this from Spyro, but you should know better!  You've teamed up with the world's natural nemesis, you should know how terribly deadly he is if he's allowed to live!"

The earth dragon sighed heavily.  "Is that what you really believe, Tephra?  That Spyro is the bane of the world enfleshed?"

"You were sold out for that information!" she snarled, tears running down her cheeks.

"But it's the wrong information, Tephra.  The Settlement elders w-were wrong, they were perpetuating old rumors that arose from Malefor's rule.  Spyro is not M-Malefor.  The purple dragon possesses every possible natural power, yes, but while it can be used for evil, it can also be used...be used for good."

"Spyro was born to destroy the world, Sidian, nothing you say will change that fact!"

"Is it fact if it's never been proven?"  She blinked, unable to retort.  "Another rumor and nothing m-more.  If someone did say those exact words, they may have been metaphorical.  Do you know wh-wh-who said that?  Were you their friend?  Did they tell you what exactly they meant with such a statement?  If such a statement was made, for all we know the 'world' could've been metaphorical for the current state of things.  Maybe Spyro was born to destroy the world that society has been regressing into, in order to start a new world of respect.  No one can ever, ever say what another was born for.  There is no possible way for us to know that, even for someone born with such enormous potential."

Tephra snorted, leaving small craters in the sandy floor.  "You act all high and mighty on the matter but you're still working for someone who could destroy the world."

"And you're w-working for the ones who kidnapped m-me, and the ones who WILL d-d-destroy the world instead of restarting it."

"Ripto and the others did not kidnap you!!"

"They themselves did not, but the rhynocs who ordered a p-powerful young dragon for their Eternal Night training were under Ripto's employ, the order was given by Malefor himself."  Tephra's eyes flared in shock.  "You m-m-may think Spyro was...was...was the one responsible for you losing me...twice... but Tephra, the fact still stands, that you are working for the one who submitted you to such hardships in the first place!  You've been working for your true enemy this entire time!"  Her legs shuddered beneath her.  

"No...no..."

"You're working for the real purple dragon w-who tore us apart!  He tore me from you in order to control you!"  A sudden searing pain shot through his head and he cried out, clutching his horns and writhing on the ground.

"SIDIAN!!" Tephra shouted, instantly bounding over.  "What happened?!"

"It's...it's him...p-p-punishing me for...for remembering...AAAAGH!!!"  The pain intensified, tears rolling down his cheeks as he flailed desperately against the pain.  "GET OUT OF MY HEAD YOU BASTARD GET OOOUUUT!!"

Tephra looked around frantically for someone, anyone to help, but they were still completely alone in the cavern.  What do I do?! she cried out internally, watching painfully as he screamed on the floor.  Not knowing anything else, she winced and clenched her eyes shut, bringing her paw whipping around with a sickening SMACK to the back of his head.  His screaming instantly stopped.  Shaking and leaning in close, she pressed her ear to his chest.  A rush of relief flooded her body when she heard shallow breath and a soft heartbeat.  "Thank the ancestors I didn't kill him..." she whimpered, standing over him, her mind in turmoil.

All these years she had devoted herself to revenge...
But, was Spyro her real target?
Was Sidian right?  Somewhere in the back of her mind it all made sense, far more sense than all the groundless goading she'd received about how Spyro was the enemy.
But...those promises of power...
Promises of a better life...
Promises of a world where no one would be bullied or forgotten...

Were all those promises truly lies?
Was Malefor really using her as a disposable tool?

Outside, Spyro and Plazyma waited anxiously, Shimmer having gone off to forage.  They had managed to shake Gnasty's chase rather easily once he realized that Spyro was nowhere to be found, though he was still pretty angry at them for coming so close to the base tower.  The yellow electric dragoness pawed at a loose stone, then swatted it aside with a heavy sigh.  "We should go in and check on him.  He might be stuttering his way into a bashing."

Spyro shook his head.  "He said to let him handle this alone.  Let him have his pride."

"At the expense of his life if things go wrong?"

Spyro merely nodded.  Plazyma grumbled.  "This is important to him, and probably will be for her as well.  He's exposing her to a lot of the trickery she's undergone, including his very presence when she thought him dead.  Our presence would make her less willing to listen, she might think we're coercing him into lying."

"Fine..."  

Shimmer came back with some berries to snack on.  Just as they were finishing their snack, they heard pawsteps in the cave.  "I'm gonna go check it out," Shimmer offered, sprinting in before anyone could stop her.  There was surprised and angry yelling, then murmuring.  Finally Shimmer came out scowling, followed by Tephra with Sidian draped over her back.  

"Sidian!!"  Spyro and Plazyma both shot over, but Tephra flinched and hissed at them.  

"What's going on?" Spyro demanded.  Shimmer cleared her throat.

"Sidian's okay.  He had another attack and Tephra knocked him out to spare him the pain.  She's coming with us."

Spyro sized up the situation, warily studying Tephra, who was uncharacteristically avoiding all eye contact.  She looked thoroughly dejected, her wings and tail were limp and her whole frame seemed to sag beneath the unconscious black-scaled earth dragon on her back.  What caught the purple dragon's attention the most though were the faint, salty trails on her face.  "Alright then, let's get going," he said quietly, turning to leave.  

"But Spyro-" Plazyma started, stopping when he glanced back at her.

"We're going."