The Tail of the Twin Dragons

13

Sting and Rogue were welcomed into the house; they noticed that Kinana kept a close eye on them, understandably so - they had just tried to kill her husband. Then they explained who they were and how they had found him. They explained about their father's and their mother's escape. Then they showed that Frosch and Lector could speak, which the convict (surprisingly) wasn't that startled about.

"Okay, we poured our heart a soul out for you, now do you mind telling us who you are?" Rogue asked critically.

The man's face lit up in a dangerous grin, "You are your father," he chuckled, "My name's Erik, although I was known as The Cobra"

"The Cobra!" Sting cried standing up.

"You were - " Rogue began.

"Yeah yeah, part of the old alliance, glad to know someone knows me," Erik growled not sounding happy.

"No, you don't understand we've been looking for you - " Lector cried.

"I do understand," Erik chuckled, he pointed to Sting, "Let me guess. You want to make some allies, get super strong, and then walk up to Acnologia and kick his ass?"

"That's an extremely oversimplified version of our plan, but yes," Rogue nodded.

"Well Dragneel?" Erik asked staring into Sting's eyes, "how exactly are you going to manage to that?"

Sting was taken by surprise, "Well Rogue and I-"

"I'm not talking about Redfox, I'm talking about you," Erik growled, "Because you're gonna be the idiot that dies first."

Sting looked at Erik rather startled.

"I didn't know your father too well, but I knew him well enough," Erik growled, "Mostly because I'd been on the receiving end of his fist. But there's one thing that I know, you can't put a Dragneel in the dirt." Erik's eye was full of anger, "And Acnologia's goons got him like that - " he snapped his fingers. "He hardly got started and they took him down and dragged him before his majesty to die.""

Sting felt something stir in him.

"The hell makes you think that you can do better then him?" Erik growled.

Sting looked to Rogue who looked back. Then Sting swallowed the lump in his throat.

"Because... because my father was fighting to protect me," Sting growled, "And I'm fighting to avenge him. My father fought for something that could be taken away, I'm fighting for something I already lost."

Erik smiled and leaned back in his chair, "Well you got the mind of your mother, so that's something."

"We're looking to rebuild the alliance," Rogue said stepping forward.

"Well, I don't have much," Erik chuckled, "and I've been trying to find the other's for years."

"What happened?" Rogue asked.

"Hmm?" Erik asked.

"The old alliance, we read about it a book created for propaganda... but what actually happened?" Rogue asked.

"Well," Erik sighed, "that's a difficult question. Not surprising, I've been in jail many times, even before I was an enemy of the "great king". Well, one time I was released because I gave the royal family some information, I settled down, and then Gajeel approached me about joining an alliance."

Sting and Rogue sat forward.

"I was young, dumb, and frankly thought he was crazy." Erik chortled, "some guy I didn't know asking me to be his friend. I rudely dismissed him and then Natsu showed up and beat my ass before Gajeel could kill me. Naturally, I ended up joining."