Dragons of War - Rising Storm

Chapter 19 (1/3)

"Fall in!" Fred called out and then toppled over the edge next to me and dropped in the air. His wings filled and he was lifted in the sky. The others followed instantly, and I was left for only a moment on the beams alone, a pit of dread in my stomach. The fear made my claws tingle and before I could think about joining that chaos above me, I shoved myself off the beam and into the open air after them.

Right away I entered into the tail end of a tight diamond formation. At first, my scales buzzed and my thoughts ran wild with the fear of slamming into another dragon. Every formation we zoomed past and I held my breath. Every dragon that came within a scales width, I cringed. Yet, the moment I had calmed down enough to actually look around me in the sky, I felt something, and everything changed.

It was as if the intent of direction of every single dragon there was buzzing through the air, and my mind. When I looked ahead of me in the sky, to where Fred flew point, I knew where the clear path was, and was not, for both myself and the ones around me. So clear the way became, that I questioned how those dragons had even smashed into each other like that in the first place.

The first orders were given to us. I heard them at a distance. They were directed at Fred, but we all heard them. Once the command was clear, without words or thoughts we knew what to do and as a whole, we dove through the air and scraped claws with a group that swept by us.

The rush of such an action sent excitement jolting through me and I could hardly wait for the next command. Now aware of my surroundings, my confidence and ease grew. The rush of flying so quickly, every turn and challenge, it filled me with joy.

Again and again, we swooped to scrape claws, and wings, with another group and formation. Every time my human mind would scream out to me that we would crash - but we never did. Up through the air, down along a building. The flight path we took had no order or meaning to us, until we again met claws to another team. The actions, so perfect, I felt as if I was in a matrix.

Something dull and black swooped before my eyes and my attention was ripped from my surroundings. The only form there that the light did not shimmer off of, I knew instantly who it was. I felt his energy in the air I passed through.

Despite seeing each other in passing more than once a day, we had not spoken since meeting. While in training Omega was always with Aarons group, and I didn't want to run into Aaron again if I could avoid it.

Yet, from within the buzz and excitement of that hurricane of dragons, I felt Omega's different energy all the more clear. How drawn to it I was. How familiar it seemed.

That was when everything around me shifted once more.

The dragons all around came into a new focus. Every single one caught my attention. Hundreds flew by in mere seconds faster than my eyes could catch and the sheer chaos of it all made a sickness surge through me. My sight flickered and the feeling in my limbs faded completely.

I hardly recognized the forms that rolled across my vision. Or the sudden impact and pain that laced across my shoulder as something slammed into me. I hardly noticed anything until Fred's voice shot through my mind.

"Jaya!"

The words snapped me from that state but when I came too I was falling through the air with nothing but sand below. Only a mere second to react, I removed everything from my mind but the target.

Fly.

My wings unfurled to their max, my arms and legs tucked high against my chest, and my tail angled against the right, I swooped across the ground in a tight left hook. Sand filled the air from the almost impact and my wrists and chest smacked against wires and poles that stuck out below.

Gasping for another breath full, I pressed against the air around me and rose with a powerful beat of my wings.

Saved from crashing, I had the next hurdle to overcome. The higher I rose, and the more dragons that surrounded me.

Fear slammed like a brick wall on my chest and my wings paused in flight. My mind was no calmer than before I had blacked out, and the once reassuring buzz that filled the air now seemed to completely overwhelm my mind. At least I knew how those other dragons had crashed, now.

"Jaya, what happened, are you alright?" Fred called out but from the still fear-filled haze of my mind, I knew the question had not come from him, but Luke. I had broken formation.

But why?

How had I broken free from the buzz of commands? The path that had once seemed so clear to me was now completely lost.

My head turned to the side so one eye could look above me. Dragons flew in such a flurry I couldn't watch a single one before another swooped past and made me lose sight. When I finally saw Fred and the others, my heart sank. They were at the highest part of the storm - their formation complete without me. As the tenth member, it was no wonder I had fallen out of rank so easily.

But that wasn't really the reason, was it?

The statement so clear in my mind, it was like the words of another. Even before entering that formation I felt apart from it. So if not with them, where did I belong?

Without another thought in my mind, my head lifted to the clear blue, empty, sky above me.

What was that old saying once? The sky's the limit?

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