Let me tell you something.
I. Like. Guns.
If I could, I would take some home and have them breed. Raise a gun farm. Blunderbuss and flintlock hybrids, cannon and musket mix.
Alas, that’s not physically possible. Maybe if I just applied magic to it, that might work.
Anyways, after we put Teldar to bed and discussed a general plan of attack(which involved a lot of guns), me and Gilda made a quick stop at Ironclaw’s forge. As I drooled over a rack of blackpowder bombs, Gilda talked to the blacksmith.
“Scale piercing rounds? Shit, those are expensive, Gilda. Ah only got about two-thousand rounds or so in stock mahself.”
The female griffon raised an eyebrow. “Two-thousand rounds seems like more than enough.” Ironclaw let out a chuckle that sounded like a hammer striking an anvil, “Not with a dragon, honey.”
“He’s right,” I piped in, “Unless you’re hitting him with every shot, and then you’re definitely not trying to shoot it down from the air.”
Gilda looked over to me. “So…. We just have to take out his wings so he can't fly and fill him with lead. Sounds simple enough.”
“Thing is though, that’s the first move it’ll make if it gets the chance. Which means we’ll have to catch it in its cave. And even then it can just turn the place into an oven.” I started pulling tightly on the straps around my thighs and chest for four flintlock holsters. “The big mistake most people make is the fact that scale piercing rounds are just supposed to wear it down, not actually kill it. You’d need a shit-ton of rounds to do that. What you really wanna do is get it to roar out at you when it’s pissed off, and right before it breathes fire-” I hefted a metal canister of blackpowder, “-you get this little baby down its throat. The fire gets stuck, ignites it, and pop!” I gestured with my hands like my head blew up.
Gilda raised her other eyebrow this time. “That’s pretty brutal. How could we get the thing in its gullet, anyways? Throw it in?” she laughed, jokingly suggesting that last part.
“Yup,” I responded with a devilish grin. There was a pause from Gilda, and if I could see the skin under her feathers, I bet it would have paled. Her eyes certainly made up for it, mimicking dinner plates. “You’re kidding.”
“Nope. Gotta get right up in the things face and chuck it in there.” I chuckled, giving her a reassuring pat on the back. “Don’t worry, my scales are fireproof, so you’ll just be on pissing-it-off duty.” I slung a long-barreled musket over my back, along with a sawed-off blunderbuss. A belt of black-powder charges and rounds went around my waist, enough ammo to fight a small war. Which was pretty much the equivalent of what we were going into.
All in a day's work.
Fast forwarding to the town, after Gilda suited up with her arsenal of death and destruction, we arrived by carriage a half a day later in a small and depressing setting. All the griffons seemed exhausted, that was probably because of the burnt down warehouse that once held food and supplies. Probably from the dragon. Asking around, we learned that it had also burned down any attempts at tilling the soil or planting crops since the farmlands were so near its cave.
When we went to the mayor, a griffon by the name of ClawQuill, to tell we’d come to the people’s assistance, he told us that they in fact were not the ones who had sent the original distress letter. A white cat had carried the letter out of the cave to them, assumed to be the pet of one of the trapped people, but died a few hours later due to exhaustion.
When I prompted him to tell me who the damsels were, he responded with: “Equestrian Refugees, ponies. Four mares, three of younger age than the fourth.” The mayor rubbed his head, “I’m sorry that I can’t provide an appearance; everything’s been so troubled lately, I barely noticed them pass into town.”
There was a long, silent, awkward pause. Gilda stood there, her gaze hard. Her eyes were on the mayor, but they looked as if they were gazing past.
My own were pointed downward, my face dark. I could feel my mind getting mucky.
Gilda saw my reaction, and cut in before things got worse. "Is there anything else you can tell us? Anything at all?"
The mayor was absolutely bewildered by the scene, not sure how to take the sudden plunge in mood. "U-ummm, well,... The mares, the three younger ones, they kept calling themselves the "Crusaders" or something of the like. Though I'm not sure what that could me-"
I couldn't have slammed the door harder.
What had once been a simple search and rescue mission of a failed search and rescue mission had suddenly taken a twisted, sick turn for me. I stormed through the streets, bee-lining it through crowds, scattering griffons with tired and long faces.
"Spike!" I heard Gilda call, but I didn't heed it, only kept with my objective. We'd memorized the map of the place and estimated the location of the dragon's cave. I was going there, I was going to kill the damned thing.
Except I felt a sharp pain in the back of my neck just then, and suddenly I was on the ground, looking up at a griffon with a long-rifle. For a moment I thought it was Gilda, and was about to throw her off, but then it registered that this claw was way too heavy for her size. The dust settled, and I looked up to a surprising, yet familiar face.
"Oi, Spike, did you come all this way just to save my dumbass?"