Lovey huffed with boredom. She was sitting, her legs crossed, on Zoonzu's giant belly, the colossus having fallen asleep from the boring discussions. Oliver might've had the knowledge to break up fights between children and simple minded folk, but this was far too distant from his basic knowledge. Cobalt, Scarlet, and Stremlin were discussing terms between three different dragon tribes about who a certain family of dragons rightfully belonged to as well as their possessions.
"Their ancestors have been traced back to my tribe," one of the chiefs said.
"But a large portion of their family tree also comes from my tribe's herds as seen here," another stated.
"You forget that they made deals with mine to acquire all their territory and treasure. They've also married into my tribe quite a few times," a third added.
"Yeesh..." Lovey sighed. "I didn't think dragons were capable of doing anything but yelling and using each other to hit another dragon." Her chin was resting on an upright arm. She narrowed her eyes and looked around. "Maybe I can get away and walk around if I'm careful," she whispered to herself.
The pink dragoness was well aware of what happened last time she had gone on her own, so she was going to stay within ear shot of the dragons she had left with, even if it meant them scolding her like some sort of child. Calmly and carefully, she slid down Zoonzu's belly and ran along the sporadic bits of grass growing in the ashy lands. Every so often the pink dragoness would look ever her shoulder to see exactly what she was compared to the lovie dovies.
She paused for a moment, stretching cracking her joints.
"Uf. It feels good to be able to stretch and move about." Her neck performed a tic, twitching her head to the right. "I HATE standing around doing nothing." The dragoness tapped her chin. "And now I need to figure out a way to return to my home. I haven't had the time to think about about..."
The dragoness wandered around, forgetting about her need to stay near the giant dragons, and mumbled to herself along the way.
"Maybe if I asked that rainbow fan underneath the Pueric Mother...She must know the best way to get back, even if she tries to hide it. I'm certain she knows. She's supposed to be the eldest there." A smell of burnt grass attracted the attention of Lovie's nose, but she ignored because of where she was. "How do I convince her to tell me, though? She said she wanted me to 'change', but I don't want to...at least, not in the sense she said...maybe?" She scratched her head. "I'm not sure anymore...That smell is really strong now." The dragoness started sniffing the air, her nostrils twitching in the process. "What the hell. That smell is WAY stronger than it was in that pit I went to before."
She sneaked about, looking over hills and large mounds of stone jutting through the ground and into the air. Rounding more large stones hanging over a hill and possessing some trees, Lovey saw, in the distance, a caravan smoldered and left to burn in the distance. She tapped her lower chin, unsure of what to do, but her innate human nature saw her curiosity triumph, and she jumped down, sliding along the hillside and faceplanting at the end.
"Ow," she grumbled. Wiping the dirt off of her face, the dragoness took a closer look at the caravan. "What happened here?"
The caravan was actually comprised of around three wooden wagons with no harnesses for ponies to pull them. A few green sparks made the pink dragoness figure out that magic was involved, but she didn't care about what kind. Strewn about the burn site were multiple ponies whose armor was turned as black as the ground and the wood. Shards of wood, additionally, accompanied broken weapons and armor pieces all around. Wheels and metal plates bent by extreme heat also decorated the landscape.
"What ever happened here, it was one hell of a firefight." She picked up a plank of burnt caravan, only to watch it turn to ash in her claws. "This is Michael Bay levels of firefight."
She went further in, checking the inside of the three carriages, eventually coming upon a pony in the remains of a colorful wardrobe, slack jawed and with half his face burnt. The light was very dim inside, but the contents of the carriage were still illuminated well enough despite the filtering effect the light was undergoing. The dragoness cringed at the sight and saw a small box on his chest. She extended two claws, flicking the box to try and grab it, but retracting herself out of sheer disgust. Every attempt was accompanied by a brief grunt until she finally managed to clip the box off the pony's chest and onto the floor. The pink dragoness grabbed it and took it outside, preferring to get some light on whatever the little metal box was.
"What the hell is this tiny thing supposed to be? A message box?"
Lovey opened the container to find a rolled parchment within. She placed the box on the floor and carefully unfurled the missive to see writing on it...of a sense.
"...This would be much more 'plot twisting' to me if I could read these bizarre scribbles." Lovey heaved a smoke-filled sigh. "I should take this to Scarlet. See what she can make of this." The pink dragoness scratched her cheek. "Maybe she'd take us back to the garden and I could get into that sleeping volcano."
"Ssssstupid dragon. Give that to me," a voice ordered.
Lovey turned around to see a dragon, a few heads taller than her, covered head-to-toe in vast amounts of soot, obscuring their features. All the shifting ash changing what they looked like, creating horns, removing them, and modifying body shape with every movement and gust of wind.
"Give that message to me. You don't need it," they insisted.
Lovey tilted her head and narrowed her eyes. "And why should I believe that from a complete stranger. Judging from your body, you don't want me to recognize you, and with what I can see all around here, you're most likely the one responsible."
"J-jussst because I'm covered in soot?" the dragon responded with an insulted tone. "That's a very convoluted conclusion...d-d-don't you think?"
Lovey's face contorted with confusion. This dragon had a bizarre tick causing his head to twitch multiple times in one direction. "How would you even know that I had a message if you weren't attacking this carriage, for a reason no less."
The dragon outstretched their hand and gestured Lovey to go to him. "Just give it to me. Come on. There's no threats to you here."
Lovey scoffed. "Like I'm going to fall for that. Your insistence on getting this just tells me this is important. I've read enough mystery novels to at least recognize a few queues." The pink dragoness smiled smugly.
The dragon blinked a few times. "You read books?" he asked in an innocent tone.
Lovey blushed and stammered several times before finally being able to form words. "Uhhhh, n-no." She crossed her arms and looked away. "They were assignments for my school. I was forced to read them."
The dragon had another tic accompanying them clenching their fist and slowly bringing it to their side. "I j-jusssst want the parchment. That's ALL I want. NOTHING MORE!" he yelled.
"You're not getting it, and I'm going to leave now."
Lovey turning her nose to the dragon enraged him. He jumped at her, sweeping her into the air with his tail then headbutting her into the hillside, making the dragoness bounce over it and tumble several feet further. The burner flew up only to land in front of Lovey, and performed bizarre, robotic motions before he stomped his foot down for every word.
"SSSSTUPID DRAGONS! You always do that!" He pointed at the dragoness angrily. "You all think yourselves high and mighty! You all consider yourselves better than everyone else! And when something bothers your narrow, undeveloped brains, YOU BEAT THEM UP AND REJECT THEM!"
The figure slammed his fist downwards, attempting to crush Lovey, but she rolled out of the way in time, parchment still in hand. The pink dragoness panted and looked behind her. She cursed herself internally. The dragoness had accidentally wandered too far from her companions.
"My only solution here is to flee, and reach them."
Unfortunately for Lovey, her plan didn't go unnoticed by the ashen dragon. "Thinking of fleeing to your fellow dragons?" The pink dragoness stared blankly. "Unlike you and your 'books', I have personal experience. I know what you're going to do before you do it, and your body betrays your spirit in this task."
Lovey got back to her feet and started sprinting away as fast as she could, but despite the ashen dragon shrinking into the distance, the pink dragoness could not escape. The dragon took flight to glide next to Lovey and taunt her.
"If only you could fly, eh?" he mocked her.
The dragoness took a swipe, missing, and found herself getting tripped and tumbling in a circle and sliding to a halt further away.
"There's no point in trying to run," the dragon told her. "All you need to do is give me the parchment, and you'll be free to go unharmed."
Lovey wiped some dirt off her mouth and stood upwards. "Then why don't I BURN you first instead of just running?"
The dragon crossed his arms and lowered himself to the ground. "Go ahead," he said calmly.
Lovey took a deep breath and focused. Embarrassed, she still performed a few arm movements and leg placements that had her target tilt his head in confusion and curiosity. Her mouth started to fume with smoke, then with pink fires. She opened her mouth and exhaled, creating a steady stream of pink fire creating heart-shaped smoke. The dragoness coughed when she was done and smiled proudly.
"I did it!" she cheered. "Well until I tell Asherk."
"Yes. Wait until you tell whomever that is," the ashen dragon commented. "That was supposed to be fire?" He waved his hands to extinguish whatever flames still lingered. "What was that?!"
"What..."
"That wasn't even fire! That's was just a small fit from a candle."
"YOU...!"
Lovey bolted away, causing the ashen dragon to roll his eyes and continue his chase. It didn't take long, actually, for Zoonzu to notice that Lovey was missing from her belly, and she was currently rampaging across the growing plains. The colossus was swiping everything away in her search until she spotted a vibrantly pink dot on the horizon that she rushed to. The three other lovie dovies tried to get her to stop, but they were unsuccessful.
"What in the abyss is that?!"
Zoonzu charged at the ashen dragon, narrowly missing him and tripping over herself to roll away into the distance.
"Who is that, Lovey?" Scarlet asked.
"A weird guy who killed a bunch of ponies and burned away a caravan, just so he could get to this." She showed a parchment.
"If that's the case," Cobalt chittered. "Then that means that he's up for a fight!"
"We're all up fer a faght, Cobalt," Stremlin assured.
The ashen dragon clenched his fists even more. "That's exactly what you ssssstupid dragons always do! Ganging up on others you don't like just so you can kill them then ostracize them from their homes!"
"What is he talking about?" Scarlet asked Lovey.
"No idea. He talked about that earlier."
"Let's just fight already!" Cobalt shouted.
She jumped at the dragon, using her green arm to slash at him and create streams of green light. One slice managed to hit the dragon's stomach, making him cry out in pain ad stumble backwards. Green light started to spread along his belly, and Cobalt laughed at the sight, but the green left when her adversary removed the soot from his body.
"What?!" Cobalt yelled. "That's cheating!"
She charged once more at the dragon, but her attempts to cut him with her arm were no longer working. She could still get hits in with her other limbs, however, something that was annoying her. Stremlin put her back to the blue dragoness' and the two rotated in place to switch who was fighting.
"What now?!" the ashen dragon complained. "I just want the parchment! I don't want a fight!"
"Too bad," Stremlin said.
Her 'tired' eyes fixed themselves to the dragon in front of her. She stomped forward, throwing kicks and punches along with twirls to smack the dragon with her tail. Strangely enough, he was meeting most of her attacks, but her strength was having a visible effect on the would-be killer.
"Conventional techniques aren't working well enough, Scarlet," Stremlin commented.
The yellow dragoness backed away, letting the ashen dragon lean over and pant in fatigue. His moment of resting didn't serve much purpose as he was confronted by Scarlet belching lava onto her fists and feet.
"You're crazy!" he shouted.
"Yes, but I'm certain that my crazy can defeat your 'sanity'," Scarlet.
The ashen dragon growled and took his position to meet with her blows. "Fine. I'll take this more seriously instead of just wanting to press forward and flee."
Scarlet threw a punch forward, one that was evaded by sliding to its side and throwing a left punch at her jaw. The large dragoness ignored the attack and corrected herself by bending her arm back and hitting the dragon in the chest with her elbow, sending him flying. Correcting their trajectory in mid-air, the ashen dragon managed to land on the ground and grind to a halt.
"Very clever," Scarlet praised. "You waited that I bend over to hit you so you could get one in on my face." She laughed. "But I'm not as easy to hurt as you are!"
The red dragoness jumped in the air and slammed a leg down, attempting to crush the ashen dragon with her heel. Instead of jumping out of the way, the dragon braced against the impact, using the opportunity to flip his adversary, but the molten fighting gear burned his hands and let lava seep out. He screamed in pain but still flipped her around, grabbing her leg to take with him into the air and slam down into the ground.
Scarlet responded by spinning on the ground after the impact to hit the ashen dragon multiple times in the jaw and send him soaring away. Battered and bruised, he could only get himself to stand upwards, regardless of how dizzy he was.
"You put up an impressive fight, but I'm not letting you off so easily, if you're not willing to negotiate."
"I...told you." He stretched out an open hand. "I just want the parchment."
"No," Scarlet answered dryly.
The dragon lowered his arm and said nothing else, leaving Scarlet to shake her head in disappointment. "I'm afraid, then, that I will have to deal with you in a more permanent sense considering your actions prior to our encounter and your clear relationship with the Red Sun."
"What? How do you know if I'm related to the or not?"
Scarlet pointed to the parchment behind her. "That parchment is sealed with a wax seal depicting the sun and moon. That's quite clearly from the princesses of the ponies. The fact that it was part of a caravan and you wanted to get it so badly must mean it's quite important."
"And because it was in these lands means it was either directed towards us or the current empress," Cobalt interjected.
Lovey said 'ooooh' at what the two dragonesses revealed.
Scarlet's lava weapons glowed brightly. "You've ignored the chance for a peaceful discussion, even after we fought with you, and your actions can only bring devastation to everyone in this world. I'm forced to be rid of you."
The ashen dragon growled. "Then I'll just have to leave and 'lock the door' behind me."
"What?"
The soot covering the dragon moved around so much that it was impossible to see their outline. A bright red glow appeared in the black fog followed by a tremendously enormous torrent of fire that engulfed the four dragonesses. Stremlin, however, dived in front of Lovey and covered her with her body and wings, protecting both the pink dragoness and the missive. When the torrent was over, the ashen dragon had vanished, leaving their soot behind. The three dragonesses, however, were scorched through their scales and could barely move. Lovey did not cry, but a vast well of emotions and 'rules' taught to her welled up inside her mind and soul as she tried to figure out how to react to the situation before Zoonzu came.