Chapter 1 #2
“Jorusk, please.” Osiris gasps. The rattling breath that leaves him shatters my reservations. I am losing him.
“Yours is not today,” I tell him.
“Don’t be an ember. Just let me go. I’m tired.” He gazes skyward and rests his head back in the grain.
Hundreds are dead just today because the Talhuskins, who traded with the Denarso for Novark stolen tech, have come at us with more advanced weapon designs than we took when we fled the Talhuskin homeworld and our servitude to them.
“Take what is left of my Inferno.” Osiris begs me. “Don’t let the brothers think I died without purpose.”
I crouch over his body, consider what he is asking for, and pretend I accept. I cross my forearms, then take his wrists in my hands. He thinks I’m going to let him give me his power. But I don’t need it.
He needs mine.
And I have plenty to give.
I push back against the heat his veins carry through his hands into my arms, close my eyes, and send a prayer to Magmium, the source of our power and the realm we will all descend to one day. Brothers in fire, brothers in flight, let my injured brother rise again. He is worthy of this gift.
The roiling scourge inside me surges through my chest in vibrant red crags, down my arms, and into Osiris’ body. He arches as my power crawls up his neck and finds his eyes, filling them with vibrant bloody light. A cry of agony leaves him.
It is rare for an Inferno to overheat a Drathious, but I could do it to a lower power class like a half-breed. I break my hold and back up.
Osiris smokes and scrambles away from me with a speed that seems to surprise him. He pants and holds his side while he lifts a hand between us as if to ask me to wait. “What… The fuck…”
He gasps for breath. Light burns in his chest.
Osiris should be dead. He was so far gone.
I hunker back, afraid of what he thinks of me. His reaction is not quite what I anticipated.
His wings are riddled with holes and oozing dark liquid, trying to heal. They flop around at his back, uncoordinated and twitchy, as he steadies himself. “You’re…”
“Nothing special.”
“Bullshit. You’re a fucking Dragon class Drath!”
I glare at him. “They did not classify me that way when I swore in. Mother Cinuska said nothing.”
Osiris looks down at the fire in his veins. “You can’t deny this! What the fuck did you do to me?”
“Who cares? You’re alive,” I yell over the increasing roar of hail, disappointed that he’s in denial.
All hatchlings are born a class one Drath with just enough power to keep themselves warm.
Sprites are class two, able to share small amounts of power and ignite things they touch.
Class three, Ifrits, can manipulate fire, like Osiris.
Class four Demon can launch tephric blasts of debris and fire with their hands, which is what most of us are.
But for Osiris to say I am Dragon class, capable of everything, including controlling my Inferno, he’s wrong. Mine doesn’t listen when I let it out.
But it’s mostly the attention that I don’t want. I am right where I am supposed to be, helping the ones who get forgotten in the shadows between the firelight.
I didn’t ask to be born a monster.
I hear someone climbing through the structure and free a handgun from the thigh of my suit. Vryskas, another soldier from our usual team, slides down a sheet of heavy metal and to the ground beside us. “Thought you were with Sidius.”
“I was. They’re moving east. Osiris went down. I wasn’t going to leave him there.”
“You’re insane.” Rykarn glances at Osiris. “I would have.”
Vryskas scoffs and punches him in the shoulder. “Guess I’ll leave your ass out there when the time comes.”
“You’ll definitely die first.” Rykarn smirks and rolls his shoulder like he’s shaking off the hit, swings his hard shell bore backpack around in front of him, and sets it on the ground, switching it on.
Red rings of light blink on and climb the towering pack.
Every squad now has one. “You only try to keep up.”
I spare a glance at Osiris, who seems to be holding himself together for the moment. He catches my attention on him and shrugs, then shakes his head.
Vryskas snorts. “But I burn hotter than you. Poison will take longer to turn me. You’ll be meat soup long before I am.”
“Can we focus, please?” Osiris asks. He’s on his feet again and pressing his bandage against his side. It will take another hour, maybe more, for his recharged Inferno to cauterize the wound.
“Jorusk…” He glances at me, and I tense in anticipation of my secret coming out. “Patched me up. Can we try to not die?”
Rykarn gets up as his device unfolds. “Do you want to do this?”
Panels shift above us. The clanging of hail on the collapsed silo tells me Talhuskin forces in orbit aren’t done blasting our location yet. They’ll likely keep up the barrage until we’re flattened.
“Rykarn,” I call to him.
Osiris and Rykarn keep arguing about priorities while Vryskas laughs like he’s watching an old married couple fight, and we aren’t on the edge of annihilation. My team is…different. Sidius would say we're sadistic with addictions to pain and self-torture. I agree, with a bonus of taunting death.
The window for escape is closing. So I walk to the bore pack, climb on the foot pegs, set the depth, and ignite the burner. When it punches into the soil, chars a hole, and submerges, I step off, grab Rykarn by the collar of his armor, and sling him down the hole.
Rykarn lets out a maniacal yell of joy and then curses my name.
“Fuck you too, you crazy bastard.” But really, I’m grateful he and Vryskas came back for us after they rescued a squad on civilian duty, whose bore soldier took a devastating hit.
The unit’s hum changes, and I know Rykarn has taken over, carving a new path below.
“Vryskas?” I ask.
He points between Osiris and me. “Something is going on here that I think I should…”
I shove Vryskas into the hole with my boot and hear his swear echo up at me. All it takes is a look at Osiris.
He lifts his hand, the other still holding the bandage at his side, and walks to the edge. “I won’t say anything. I got upset because that power was…more than I’ve ever felt.”
When he has dropped below the surface, and I’m left alone on top without having to listen to any bickering, the sobs of a hatchling reach my ears. I look around but can’t see anyone close.
“Jorusk?” Osiris calls up to me.
“I think there’s a hatchling up here. I’m going to search.”
“There’s no time!” Osiris calls up.
I glare down at him and study the red eyes that peer up at me. “I’m not leaving a hatchling to die.”
Osiris gapes at me but gives me the devil’s horns with his fingers. “Til Magnium.”
“Get to the outpost. I’ll find you. Switching to local coms,” I reply.
“Don’t be late,” Rykarn simpers in his most feminine voice.
Vryskas makes a playfully disgusted noise on coms. “Command is coalescing resources for another exodus. We can’t stay here.”
This world is wrecked. Deep down, I hope wherever we go is far away from Talhuskins. We need time to recuperate.
I hunker under my shield as hail breaks through the structure.
“Jorusk, you’ve tempted fate enough,” Osiris sounds desperate. I should listen to him. But out here, we are soldiers first, brothers second, and friends last. Hatchlings are our future. Without them, we are nothing but fading embers.
“Go. I will find a way.” I stalk off to snake through the debris, searching beneath panels, and following the sounds of the crying hatchling. But every time I think I’ve found them among the misshapen silo panels, their volume quiets.
Stepping through a gap in the pile, I get a glimpse of the other side of the farm.
An entire squadron is frozen, several hundred encased in green-tinted ice.
But it is the two in front of me that stop me dead.
A hatchling, mostly buried, reaches for another smaller one, who is already entombed in a frosty pale green stalagmite.
His cries become muffled as hail clumps up and closes him in.
I feel his fear, his agony, and his anger.
I know it.
Watching him strain for his sibling even as death claws its way up his neck and swallows his face brings memories rushing back to me with fresh force.
Fury builds in my chest, hot and explosive. My Inferno monster rakes at my body, begging to be set free. I have worked hard to cage him, train him to be still, be patient, and focus his energy. But now all I want is to burn everything.
I charge across the crusty ice toward the hatchlings and feel the fire lick up my neck, consume my shoulders, then still again. My Inferno isn’t sure it has permission.
“Don’t bitch out the one time I fucking need you!” I growl.
The hatchlings and the entire squadron are going to die if I don’t summon a blaze strong enough to melt ice. The devastation around me digs into my core with vicious fingers and claws apart the walls I built around my Inferno.
Flames swell again with my frustration. I close up my battle mask with a simple notion in my mind, and it unfolds from behind my ears, covering my face and leaving only my eyes open.
Then I release my wings, and they ignite from pent-up tension. Bringing my hands together, I focus my hatred of Talhuskins, of innocents paying the price for me, and the unfairness of this wretched galaxy.
I channel my rage into a swelling fireball. Then, I let it go, launching the thunderous tephric blast across the land, melting icy caskets and scorching everything not buried.
My monster, the Inferno within me, now has control. And it will until I am taxed or I am dead. It is why I never let it out. Dragons are supposed to have control. I may have their power, but I am not in control.