Stalking Shadows

Chapter 2: Regrets & Flashbacks

Reaper and Shadowshifter get back about an hour later. Mizu was waiting for them. "Reaper. You little-" Mizu sucked in a breath and pursed her lips. "You kill the dragon at the front desk. And a great worker at that, I must say. It'll be a massive pain in the tail to replace her. And then, you go, and you attack a random SkyWing village for absolutely no reason."

"We had a reason, Mom. It was fun. Plus, It all went normally. We just didn't get some cryptic scroll to go along with it!"

Mizu scoffed. "You know the rules! You are forbidden from missions for a month!"
"But MOOOM" Reaper cried. Mizu was Reaper's adopted Mom, and the head of the company. Reaper's real parents had been killed in the most gruesome way possible, and she had been left an orphan, scarred, a young dragon with a lot of potential and the anger to do something with it.

Mizu had taken her in, taught her, and now Reaper could probably take care of Mizu herself, if she wanted to. 

"Mom. If you don't let me go on a mission, I will quit."

"You love your work too much to do that"

"I'll kill anyone you assign to a mission!"

"What if I assigned Shadowshifter?"

"Then he would be dead within seconds!"

"Uh... Reaper? You're kidding right...?"

"I never kid about killing. Please. Mom."

"No. You are forbidden" Reaper's eyes lit with anger, and you could tell she was going into a killing frenzy. Shadowshifter dove out of the way, but Reaper charged forward. She killed everyone in the room, maybe, thirty dragons? All elite assassins, ready for anything. Now, it was just Mizu, Shadowshifter, Silencekeeper, Shadowbinder, Starseer, Shadeflyer, and Reaper.

Shadowshifter was still hidden from Reaper, but Mizu was Reaper's real target anyway. Mizu's aquatic lights flashed nervously. "Reaper. You don't want to do this..."

Reaper took another step. She got out a flask of poison. "YES. I. DO!" She blasted Mizu with a scary mix of venom and fire, and threw the poison at her as well. She stood there for a while, blasting Mizu, and finally let down. Mizu fell to the ground, dead.

Reaper fell to her side, exhausted from using that hard combo. She laid there. She got up. She crawled over to Mizu. And did something she's never done before ever since her parents were brutally killed in front of her, she stared to cry. Shadowshifter came over, and hugged her.

~FLASHBACK~

"Reaper, run! Hurry, get out of here. If you don't, they'll kill you too!" My mother, Swiftflyer, yelled as she stared at me with pleating dark green eyes. My little sister, Hopeseaker had been stabbed in the chest multiple times with a spear, her dark red blood was pooled all around her.

I felt like I was going to be sick as I watched my father, Lemur get his side and wings slashed to the point where he couldn't escape. My mother's words echoed in my mind, but my body was frozen in place. I screamed for them to stop, to leave my parents alone, but they just laughed and slashed my fathers throat.

When my mother was grabbed, I screamed even louder, tears were cascading down my face and I was forced to watch as they slashed her throat, and then they turned their blood-thirsty gaze on to my trembling form.

I then ran as fast as I could run. I was only four, so I couldn't run very fast or that far. I screamed in terror as the SkyWings caught up with me. One of my wings was slashed and my right front talon was broken. My back left talon was sprained when I had tripped of some muddy slopes. I foght them off of me and I sprayed them in the face with something black, not the color of frost breath. I was to scared and terrified. I was scared for my life, and I turned tail and ran.

I had branches smack in my face and I tripped over tree roots and rocks. I remembered that my mother always tod me that if I was ever In danger, then I flee as fast as I could to the NightWing or SkyWing Kingdoms. And that's where I was heading at this very moment. It would take a while to get there, so I'll need to rest and find something to eat.

The only thing that was keeping me alive right now is running on fear and adrenaline. I stopped under the folds of a tall tree. I was panting heavily and everything ached. But my mind was still on high alert, these SkyWings and NightWings killed my family, they won't stop until they find me. I finally took a full recount of what had just happened. My parents and sister are dead, I'm all alone now. I'm a hybrid, an NightWing/RainWing hybrid.

Tears began running down my face once more as I thought of my parents and younger sister. I would never see my mother's smiling face, nore would I hear her soothing voice when I woke up crying from nightmares. I would never get lessons from my father about how glide from trees, nore would I get to snuggle close to his warm scales and comforting embrace during Sun Time. I wouldn't be able to have food fights with my little sister, nore would I be able to teach her to fly like I had promised. I curled up into a tight ball as sobs racked my body. My body hurt, I was scared, tired, hungry and I just wanted my parents and little sister back. I ended up crying myself to sleep that night.

The sound of singing birds was what woke me from my restless sleep. I groaned and slowly opened my eyes, I went to sit up and instantly, pain flared up in my entire body. I collapsed back down to the forest floor with a cry. I whimpered and my stomach growled, I haven't eaten since yesterday morning. I curled up into a ball and tried to stop the pain. The sudden sound of a twig snapping made me shot upright in a panic, my whole body cried out in protest but I was now on high alert. My eyes went wide as one of the SkyWings entered the clearing that I was in. The last thing that I saw was a knife rushing towards me, then everything went dark.

~END FLASHBACK~

Reaper slowly stood on shaking talons, her eyes were burning with shed tears and her throat felt like it was becoming smaller and smaller with each raspy breath she took. She took one more shaky breath through her noes, shook the tears away from her still-blurry vision, cleared her throat, and finally looked up from the stone floor.

Through her slowly clearing eyesight, Reaper could faintly make out the fuzzy shapes of four worried and concerned faces staring down at her from her half-standing, half-crouched position in front of Mizu's dead corpse. Reaper's emerald green eyes started watering again upon meeting the worried pairs of eyes boating deep into her very soul and before Reaper could stop it, her throat righted for a second time and she chocked back another anguished sob.

"Hey, hey, Reaper, it's okay. I mean, I know you just killed your own adopted Mom, not to mention the entire company, but, it's okay."

"NO! IT'S NOT OKAY! I'M A MONSTER! A MONSTER! No one should be around me." She was quivering, tears streaming down her face. Her scales were a mix of colors, most of them dark, regretful, awful colors.

"No, no, Reaper, it's okay!"

"No. It's not. Nothing will ever be okay again, as long as the Reaper continues to exist."

"You're not gonna-"

"No. The Reaper will be no longer." She took a deep breath, and turned her scales to a lovely, rose pink, and stood there. Her scales still flickered with dark, mournful colors, but she was able to mask it pretty well. She threw down her weapon pouch, and walked right out of the cave. Shadowshifter, Silencekeeper, Shadowbinder, Starseer, and Shadeflyer, were the only ones left standing there. They just stood there, not saying a word as they watched Reaper leave the cave.

"Reaper!" Shadowshifter called.

She shot him one final glance. "I'm not Reaper anymore." And she was gone.