//------------------------------// // XXII - Looking Up // Story: Flames // by Olakaan Peliik //------------------------------// Over the next week, things got a little odd. Dwiin moved in with Algae, his argument being that she’d soon need help with her day-to-day, but I guess that’s not all that weird. Kii was acting strange whenever Niirah was around; uncomfortable looks, excusing herself from the room whenever Nirrah entered, and hesitating when Niirah tries to ask Kii a simple question. It was weird. Alezah and Nikita seemed to be avoiding me. I didn’t like it. Nirah was being genuinely nice to me, even laughing at my crummy jokes. That, above all, was weird. I had to make some adjustments at the Embassy. First off, I had to make some pay adjustments because Lord Torch issued a coin-based currency like the ponies have here. The coins were called “Talons.” On the front of the coins were depictions of one of the previous Dragon Lords, and on the back, they all showed an un-detailed outline of the dragonlands. The first Dragon Lord was on the “One Talon” piece that was made of cast iron. Our fifth on the “Five Talon” piece, that was made of silver. The “Ten Talon” piece is made of platinum, and apparently, we do not have anything higher than that right now. I was surprised we had so many Dragon Lords over the ages. None had Lord Torch on them as of yet, I had yet to find out why. On another note, I had Dwiin take over security at the embassy since that position needed to be filled for the time being. He started to have the guards assist the receptionists to move the lines quicker: things like handing out forms to be filled out before they got to the window and line control, Also the Embassy Guard seemed happier, more willing to stand there all day or assist our citizens. Dwiin even gave them each a raise; they had a choice now between Talons and Bits, they mostly chose Bits since that is what they could use here. On the cusp of this new currency, we had to do a little expanding to the Embassy. There was an empty building next to us. It wasn't very big, but I bought it for the Embassy, and I would be adding a Bank and Treasury section to the building, and finding somedragon to manage it. Eventually. We have a bunch of stone dragons building it right now, and a specialist is coming to do something clever with the vault that is to be built. Said specialist was supposed to arrive by train any minute now. I glanced up at the clock on the pole on the curb. Where were they? “So who do you think it’ll be?” Niirah spoke up. “Hmm?” I shook myself out of my thoughts. “Oh, probably somedragon Olakaan has chosen to send in his place rather than come himself.” Niirah had joined me for lunch. We were only a block away from the Embassy, eating some Tuna Sandwiches in a little Griffin owned sandwich place we passed frequently. I was happy to be spending time with Niirah, but I still can't tell her how I feel. Especially since I still don't know what this feeling is. “He needs to get out more,” Niirah said through her food. I nodded. “I agree. But it'll take a lot of persuasion to get him away from all those books.” “Yeah it will,” she laughed for a moment, then stopped. She suddenly looked uncomfortable and fidgeted a little, looking at her feet. “So hey. I um… I have a performance coming up. At the school. Next week. I'll be playing the harp. My instructor is encouraging me to do it.” “You seem like you wanna ask me something,” I pressed. She scratched her head. “Well, I was hoping you could come,” she shrugged. There was a question in there, but she couldn’t quite put voice to it. Internally I was excited but I had to hold that in. “I'd be honored to go,” I said calmly. “Great!” she said, a little louder than she meant. Her face turned red and she turned away again. “Great, um…” she cleared her throat. “I have to get to a mid-day class, but this was nice.” She stood to leave. “And I'll get you a ticket for the concert.” “Yeah, I'll see you tomorrow!” I called as she left. Curious behavior. I stood as well, paid for the meals, and headed back to the Embassy. I took a moment to think as I walked. I was still having those dreams of Niirah, only lately the dark dragon figure has taken on the appearance of Ash. Every time I have the dream, I swear Niirah becomes just a little nicer to me. I can't put my claw on it. Before I realized it, I was in the Embassy and was headed up the stairs. I heard chatting at the top of the stairs where I was headed. The voice was all too nerdy and familiar. “...then in our twelfth age, Dragon Lord Lotus attempted to take over the world, only there wasn't much to rule over, so she just grew old until Dragon Lord Stalker came to power. He was a weird one as I understand it.” I got myself out of my thoughts and hurried up the last of the stairs. “Well, I’ll be a golem’s uncle. Olakaan?” The nerdy ice dragon had just been boring my friends to death. “Hey!” Olakaan turned and hugged me. “I'm starting to wish I had come sooner. Equestria is so interesting.” Behind Olakaan, Dwiin and Algae hurried into their offices to hide from the info-storm. “Come on into my office. Tell me about your trip,” I said, guiding Olakaan into my office. He sat on one of the pillows that were opposite me. “My trip was interesting. The progress we've made as a civilization is astonishing. It's evident in our construction of our airships. Something we've never done before, but we were so determined to catch up to modern times we did it anyways. Truly amazing.” “Yeah, I suppose it is pretty great,” I nodded, trying to cut him off before he got too deep. “So what finally convinced you to make the trip over here?” The bridge to Olakaan’s nose and cheeks turned pink when he didn't answer. “So… Lord Torch might have assigned a guard to the Library.” This was gonna be good. “Go on.” “Well, she started asking me questions about our history, and about ancient dragons from times past. We started hanging out, and well…” He sounded scared. “Did you get her pregnant or something?” I joked. He went completely silent and looked away. “Oh…” I winced. “Did you?” He nodded. “Spring shedding. I like her enough, but I'm just terrified of being a father. Mine wasn't exactly winning any awards. So right now, you’re the closest example of a parent I have.” A parent? Me? “You left on this little trip because you needed advice?” I asked. “In a nutshell, yes,” Olakaan confirmed. I stood and walked him out of my office, with a reassuring wing over his shoulders. “Tell you what, I will answer all the questions I can tonight after we close the Embassy, but first you need to have a look at that vault they are installing. I'm assuming you are the expert Uthiik was talking about in his last letter?” “Oh, yes. Since this is a security matter, perhaps your head of security should know how this works.” He looked over at Dwiin, who was working on next month's schedule for the guards. “Come, come!” Olakaan hurried down the stairs. “Do I have to?” Dwiin almost whined as he stood and started in the same direction. “Yes, you do. Cheer up, you only have to deal with him for a little bit. Then he becomes my issue.” I patted his shoulder. “That isn't really reassuring,” Dwiin muttered, following Olakaan out the door. I was the last one in the Embassy for the night. Dwiin and Algae had gone home together, and the rest of the staff was home with their families. A whole bunch of approvals on trade routes and cargo shipments came in through Algae’s office, and just needed my approval to be ready for tomorrow. I heard a knock on my office door. One of the night shift guards? “Come in!” I called, rubbing my tired eyes. Olakaan opened the door. “You done yet? It’s a little creepy out here.” I honestly kinda forgot he was here. “I'm sorry. I have to get these signed tonight so Niirah can get them mailed out in the morning.” “Niirah...she's a part of the Lahvirn clan? Like Viing?” Olakaan sat down across from me. “Um…” I didn’t look up at him as I kept scanning the pages and signing the ones that needed it. “...yes. She is the youngest of her siblings.” “Yeah… I thought so. She looks a lot like her sister. Her sister is bigger though. Closer to my size.” He was thinking aloud. “Oh, you know one?” I asked not thinking about the question. “Yeah, she's the one I mentioned earlier,” he said, scratching his arm nervously. I stared at him in disbelief, momentarily forgetting the ten forms I had left. “The dragoness you have taken as a mate is one of Niirah’s sisters?” I burst out. He nodded. “Oh, this is gonna be interesting. Does Niirah know yet?” Olakaan thought a moment. “I don't think so. Krah has been busy taking care of Fo, so she hasn't had the time to send Niirah a letter.” I just scanned and signed three documents. “Who is Fo?” “Krah’s son,” Olakaan said as if it was common knowledge. I stopped him from speaking further. “Okay, okay. Hold on! You need to let me finish these, then you and I are going to my place so you can explain everything from the beginning. Because right now I'm getting confused.” “Okay, fine.” Olakaan sat quietly and waited. I was curious now. He was with a dragoness who had already had a mate? Why am I seeing this so often right now? First Algae and Dwiin, now Olakaan and this Krah. Is this more commonplace than I think, or is this not normal? Once I finished, I put the files and letters in the “outgoing” pile and Olakaan and I left. Once we were outside and the door was locked, I looked over at Olakaan, who had been following me around patiently. “Okay…” I laughed a little, “...start at the beginning: Who is this dragoness and her youngling, and why isn't she with her first mate?” We started walking back to my house as Olakaan explained. “Her name is Krah, her son's name is Fo, her former mate died in a territory dispute before she and her family came to Crater. She started guarding me and my collection when I moved it to Crater, we slowly grew close, and we are now mates.” I let the information sink in. “Okay, so why did you come to me?” “I don't know how to be a father. You do, or at least kinda do.” Olakaan held his head low. I thought a moment. “What about Krah’s youngling? You take care of him, yeah?” He shrugged. “Well, yeah, but he's already a year older than Kii. He's manageable. But Krah might have more than one egg. I don't know what I'm gonna do. I didn't exactly have a good father figure.” “I hate to break this to you, but I don't think any adult dragon alive today had a good father figure,” I replied. “I'm trying to ignore that.” Olakaan kicked a pebble across the cobblestone. “Look, I can't tell you what kind of father to be. I was only a brother-parent, raising my baby sister on my own. But I'm sure you know what kind of father you don't want to be.” I bumped his shoulder. Olakaan scowled. “Not my father that's for sure. He was only concerned with who will inherit the Archives.” He stood a little taller. “I want my younglings to want their own things. I can worry about who will inherit the Archives later in my life.” “Sounds good to me. Now, why don't you tell me how you and Krah met.” Olakaan’s face turned red again. “Well, as I think I mentioned, she was assigned to guard my collection. At first, I was annoyed, somedragon was gonna be interrupting me with security concerns. But then she surprised me…” “...then Fo laughed so hard milk came out his nose,” Olakaan had finished saying as we laughed. We were at my house now. Kii was asleep, to my disappointment. I was hoping we weren't making too much noise. Olakaan yawned. “I think it's time we got some rest.” I nodded in agreement. “Probably for the best. I can take you to see the Canterlot Library tomorrow.” Olakaan yawned. “That'd be great. See ya in the morning.” He headed up to the guest room. I stayed to finish my tea before heading upstairs. I was happy that Olakaan found a partner. I wonder how many other of the dragons or ponies I know were moving into another part of their lives. I was kinda in a stagnant position. I was okay with that but everydragon and pony were moving around me. Kii has been becoming more and more independent from me and I find that I'm missing her greatly. My sisters were moving on, Dwiin and Algae had each other...and what about me? I put my tea away and headed up the stairs. I stopped at Kii’s door. I cracked the door open to look in on her. She was asleep, letting out a quiet rumbling noise as she breathed. Stepping inside, I looked around her room. Music albums, magic formulas, notes on magic, drawings of herself and her friends. I sat next to her bed and just watched her sleep. Like I had done so many nights before moving here. She looked so happy, a sleepy smile on her face. I couldn't help but smile. I was happy that she was happy. She didn't have school Saturday, perhaps she'd like a day together. Just me and her. Or maybe I could pull her out of school Friday and we could make a trip someplace for the weekend. I'll ask her in the morning. As I stood to leave my tail knocked over a stack of books. Kii started to stir. “Krein?” she asked sleepily. “Sorry, my fault,” I whispered. “Go back to sleep.” I kissed her forehead. She yawned. “M’kay, goodnight brother.” “Goodnight sister,” I said stepping out the door, as I closed the door I took one last peek at my sleeping baby sister. Once the door was shut I quietly went to my room to go to bed. I was happy with the life that we made here, got all my siblings back, got my baby sister safe, I've got great friends, and I am helping my kind thrive back home by representing them here. But even after all that I feel like something is still missing. I was dreaming again. I knew I was dreaming because it all looked the same as it did the last several times. But I couldn't find Niirah like I had in the past. I finally settled on a dream-rock to wait for the dream to be over. This was kinda boring. I kept looking over the landscape. Finally, I spotted a dragon that hadn't been there before. He looked a lot like me from this angle. As I got closer, I realized that he actually looked exactly like me, except he didn't have the Dragon Lord’s Mark like I did. He wore a leather bracer with a red gem on his wrist and looked older than I, more serious looking. It was at this point that I realized the landscape around me was changing. Volcanoes sprouted all around me. It was a location I had been to a few times. It was the suspected home of fire dragons, where we first learned to breathe fire like the volcano. Much more believable than the fable of us coming through some interdimensional portal. Dragons called this place The Cradle of Fire. My elder-looking double was focused on one of the volcanoes in the ring and flew toward it. I felt this was important so I followed. We flew up to the volcano and circled it. Elder me was looking for something in the wall of the volcano. I followed his sight and saw what he was looking for. A doorway carved out of the stone, big enough for a fully grown dragon, like elder me and myself. Elder me dove into the smoke and fire toward the door, I followed again. I was genuinely curious as to how this was gonna end. Once we landed, my double went deeper into this old construction. I took a moment to look around in each room. A stone coffin in each room and a story told by pictures carved into the walls, in each room. This was a tomb. Why was an elder version of me here? I realized I had lost track of myself. I went deeper and found that dozens of dragons had been buried here. Soon I found me again. He was going into the oldest room at the bottom of the tomb. I followed him in to find that there was nothing here but an open coffin. I walked up to it to see elder me laying inside: he was dead. The walls around me started to get farther and farther away, elder me started to rot away, except for the bracer. I tried to go toward the door but I couldn't move. I couldn't even turn around. A skeleton claw reached out and grabbed me by the neck. I whirled around to find elder me, now a skeleton, glaring right into my face with empty eye holes. “FIND US!” he screamed. When had I started panicking? I couldn't snap out of the dream. Was it still a dream? Skeleton me started to drag me into the coffin. I screamed and tried to struggle out of his grasp, but he was too strong. “Enough!” I heard a regal voice boom. Blue light washed over me, banishing the skeleton and the tomb around me. Once again, I was in that barren landscape on my dream-rock. But the moon had appeared through the ash cloud. My heart was pounding in my chest and my entire body was trembling. “What was that?” I asked, terrified. “I feel I must apologize for not intervening sooner,” the same regal voice said. Princess Luna descended from the moon and landed in front of me. “I have only just figured out how to enter a dragon’s dreams, still trying to learn good dreams from bad ones for your kind.” “Do you know what that was?” I asked, still shaken from what I had seen. “Dreams are tricky. Time doesn't apply here in the dream realm like it does in the real world. I learned that the hard way. Here, the past, the present and the future are one and the same thing. One simply needs to know how to separate them.” “I hate to sound like a broken record but; do you know what that was?” I asked again. “A message from your past,” Luna said plainly. “My past? But I haven't died yet!” I protested, suddenly imagining me laying in an open coffin, reduced to bones. “Not this you, that you,” Luna explained patiently. “Past you. Ask your bookworm dragon about this, I have a feeling he knows what it is you saw.” That seemed like a good idea. “That would be wise,” I agreed; having a plan calmed me down immensely. “I will bid you goodnight now Speaker. For I have another nightmare to stop tonight.” Luna flew up to the moon and vanished in the light. “This has been an interesting night,” I muttered, sitting back down on the dream rock. I wanted answers as soon as I woke up. However, I knew I had other responsibilities, so I restrained myself. I got up and prepared breakfast for Kii and our guest. Waffles, eggs, and fish sticks for breakfast, with a choice of milk or apple juice to drink. I was finishing with the eggs when Kii came downstairs, drawn by the smell. “Good morning Kii,” I said to her. She smiled up at me. “Morning, brother.” “Breakfast is ready for you, be sure to leave some for our guest,” I instructed. “Okay.” She started gathering her servings. I waited a little bit before sitting with her to eat. She had to leave for school in half an hour; Hex would be by soon to walk with her. I had to tell her that she wasn’t allowed to teleport until I got the okay from a teacher. I was midway through a bite when I remembered that I wanted to take Kii on a weekend trip. “Hey, Kii so I was planning a little something for us to do this Saturday. Just you and me. Maybe we could go see Manehattan or one of the other cities we haven't been to yet? Leave Friday night, spend the whole day there, see a show?” I offered. “That sounds fun. But um… will we be back by Sunday?” Kii asked hesitantly. I tilted my head. “Most likely. Why?” “My friends and I started a study group. Sundays at noon. I've been meaning to ask you if it would be okay to go,” she admitted. I really had no problem with it, but I really wanted to spend time with my baby sister. “How about this: you spend Saturday with me, and I'll let you go to study group. Deal?” She giggled. “Deal.” “Alright then. I’ll try to pick a fun place. You go get ready for school now; Hex will be here any minute.” I took her plate into the kitchen. As Kii went back upstairs to get ready for the day, Olakaan came downstairs. “Something smells good,” he said, sniffing the air. I nodded. “Yeah, we don’t exactly have access the same foods in the Dragonlands here, but we make do. It’s all easy enough to make.” I helped him get his plate, and after that, he was surprisingly well versed in table manners. I started cleaning up the mess I made cooking while he ate. I was about halfway done with the dishes when he finished. “Alright I need to learn to make that, Krah would love this,” he commented, licking his chops. I dried my claws off. “Perhaps we can get you some cookbooks while we are in town. But hey. I want to ask you something.” “Sure, what about?” Olakaan asked. I took a breath, gathering up the courage the speak, and trying to push the image of my skeletal self out of my head. “What do you know about visions? Specifically visions of a past life?” He looked at me like I was talking crazy. “Very little. Why?” I took a breath. “Well, it went like this...”