STA Studios: The Final Battle Part 2 and 3

Chapter 8: The Mystic Discovery

(Chester's POV)

It was dawn again. I watched the blood-red sun slowly rise over the horizon line. I yawned and stretched, realizing that I was probably the first one up. Well, better get started on the day. I walked around the Airship, cleaning trash that had fallen on the floor. When I reached Your Mom's and Mr. Grits's room, I heard someone crying. Looks like I wasn't the first one up.

I peeked into the room and saw Your Mom sitting on the bed and sobbing in her hands. "What's wrong?" I asked. Your Mom looked up from her hands. "Oh, hi Chester. I can't find Mr. Grits. Can you help me?"

"Sure."

"Thank you. I'm just so worried about him. He won't just disappear all of a sudden! Something must have happened to him." We strolled around the ship, checking every nook and cranny, but still couldn't find Mr. Grits. "This is terrible!" Your Mom sobbed. "What if he got taken by the aliens?" I asked. "I sure hope not." "Let's tell the others."

"How did this happen?" Snowball asked.

Everyone was sitting around the meeting table, just finding out that another one of our crew went missing. "I don't know." Your Mom sniffed. "He was sleeping right next to me last night, so I don't know how he would have gotten taken." "What do you mean?" Star asked. "If he was taken by the aliens, wouldn't they have taken me too?" "That makes sense. Mr. Grits must have gone outside on his own or something and an alien got him." Pigeon said. "Yeah. That's probably what happened, but why? He wouldn't do something as stupid as going outside in the middle of the night on his own when he knows that the aliens are out there. Would he?" I asked. Your Mom shook her head. "I don't think so. But all I care about is getting my baby back safe and sound.""And the others?" Banana asked. "Yes, them too." Your Mom replied.

"Chester!" Jeff whispered near me so sharply, it made me jump. "What?" I asked, perplexed. "I think I just saw a flash over there." Jeff pointed to the elevator that had never been open before in front of us. "Wanna check it out?" "Um..." I said. "I don't know, Jeff. We're in a serious situation right now and we can't figure out what to do. Is this... glow, really important?" "Well, there's only one way to find out! Come on!" Jeff exclaimed. He grabbed my hand and dragged me towards the closed elevator. "And uh, how exactly are we going to open this?" I asked. Jeff grabbed a crowbar out of nowhere and answered, "With this." "Where the heck did you get a crowbar from?" "Umm..." Jeff paused. "Cartoon logic?" "What's that?" I asked. "Never mind. That's besides the point." Jeff stuck the crowbar in the crack of the doors and pushed downwards. When the elevator opened, the teal light burst into flames right in front of us. I jumped backed, almost bumping into Jeff. "Fire!" Jeff yelped. I grabbed the fire extinguisher next to the elevator doors and did the P.A.S.S. rule. When the fire was out, Jeff peeked in the elevator. "Jeff!" I hissed. "What are you doing? Didn't you see the flames?" "Yep, but that's over now. Come on Chester, let's move."

I groaned but, hesitantly, still followed my friend.

The elevator was dense but inside, it was lit up like a ballroom. There were crystals on the ceiling and almost everywhere else. But in the far end, the teal glow was visible again. "There it is!" Jeff exclaimed, his voice echoing through the elevator, which now seemed more like an underground cave. He bolted to the light. "Wait! Jeff! Slow down!" I shouted, unable to keep up with his excitement.

I waited a few seconds for Jeff to call out again, but didn't hear anything from him. By the time I caught up to Jeff, I caught a glimpse of another bright light, this time coming from my right. But that wasn't really important right now, so instead I darted to where he was going to. I finally discerned Jeff, who had stopped in his tracks to stare at whatever was in front of him. The teal light was incredibly bright that I had to shade my eyes to look at it. Apparently, Jeff was too zoned out to comprehend the light. What was the matter with him? He never behaved like this before, even since the "tragic incident", we now call it.

"Jeff?" I asked. "Are you okay?" My voice snapped Jeff out of his trance.

"Huh? Oh, yeah. I'm fine." he responded. Then, he reached forward for something. "Look what I found." Jeff announced in a sing-song voice. He brought out something big and round with teal scales on it. "What is that?" I asked. Jeff shrugged. "I dunno. But it seems to me that it's a giant, colorful chicken egg." I slapped him on the back of his head. "Don't be stupid, Jeff. No chicken egg in world history is the color teal." Jeff rubbed the back of his head and giggled. "I know, I know. But there are some chicken breeds that lay blue eggs. So I thought that maybe it had overdosed on light blue food coloring." I ignored him and took a closer look at the egg. I had never seen anything like it before. No way an egg was going to be that big and that light shade of teal without being an oversized robin egg. 

"What are you two doing?" a voice suddenly asked behind us. We froze in surprise and then whirled around to see Snowball, Your Mom, and Banana looking puzzled. "When did you guys get here?" Jeff asked. "That's not the point." Snowball stated. "What are you doing?" "Nothing!" Jeff exclaimed nervously, quickly hiding the egg behind his back, which caused me to facepalm. Your Mom raised an eyebrow. "Really?" she asked in disbelief. Banana still looked confused. Snowball strutted up to me since Jeff wasn't going to say anything. He jabbed a finger in my chest. "If you don't tell us what you're up to right now, I'm gonna tell everyone that you snuck away from a very important meeting," he warned. I shrank under his gaze. "We were just exploring, we... we found a huge egg but we don't know what's inside it." Snowball looked over my shoulder to see the egg and then gazed back at me. "Sorry, Chester. I didn't mean to threaten you. I'm just tired." he apologized. "It's alright. I understand." I said.

I heard a small cracking sound near Jeff. He had taken out the egg behind his back at some point and was staring at it. "Guys! I think it's about to hatch!" "Now?" Banana said something for the first time. Since nobody knew what the egg had in store, we backed away from Jeff as he set the egg down on a flat rock. The top of the egg shell collapsed to the ground as a strange blue creature rose from the egg. At first I thought it was a baby goat, but what kind of goat would come out of an egg? When the creature fully crept out of the egg, we gasped in surprise. The animal was supposed to be a fantasy, a myth. But instead, it was real. Right in front of our very own eyes.

It was a dragon.