Reading · A New Breed of Dragon

Previously on Sea Dragon Apocalypse … Tranquilizing the dragons in his cave turned out to be more difficult than expected. Blayde and Sam follow the sea dragons from a distance only to end up being hunted by younger, faster versions.

BLAYDE WOKE UP ON WHAT HAD MOST RECENTLY BEEN JADEN’S MEDI-BED, vaguely recollecting showing Jaden how to navigate and supply the medi-bot so it could reconnect broken bones in his leg, foot, and possibly, some ribs — if reattaching ribs was a thing. Nevertheless, he couldn’t remember how he’d ended up at Ja Sinth in the first place. He winced from pain, triggering a more intense wince, which in turn informed him that bunched facial muscles increased his pain. Nasty stinging sensations from numerous facial cuts, coupled with a migraine, immediately made him regret waking up, not that he’d chosen that state of being in the first place. Based on the itchy, edgy stinging sensations, he estimated that the scratches he’d received from the crustacean people were laced with infectious bacteria, like many cat scratches.

He needed pain meds. Ja Sinth had plenty but based on present levels of pain, he probably hadn’t been able to inform Jaden how to find and administer proper doses with the medi-bot. That, or he was overdue for his next dose — a very strong dose. At least, he thought, he’d been given an IV.

Without thinking, he adjusted his position, wished he hadn’t, swore a string of explicative words he hadn’t heard escape his mouth in a very long time. Decades, maybe. Wearing neither his mithril armor nor his diving suit, he was sporting a one-piece medical robe with several sealing seams similar to his diving suit. Each allowed access to different parts of the body to accommodate various injuries. After raising the head of his bed using a touchpad on the railing, he unsealed and then resealed various parts of the robe to inspect various wounds. For the most part, the graphene mithril had protected him from abrasions and it had probably helped protect him from breaking some bones as well, but none of the mithril clothing had been designed to withstand shooting out of the water into a rocky cliffside or getting smashed by a massive dragon. Blayde was more than certain he had multiple broken ribs and probably, a fractured skull, despite wearing a mithril cap underneath his helmet.

As he moved to release the long seal along his inner, right leg, he winced, remembered his left wrist had been broken somehow, traded hands to do the job with his right hand instead. Unsurprisingly, the mithril armor hadn’t protected him from breaking a leg in half, a sharp bone puncturing through both muscle and skin. He wondered whether the graphene mithril would have a cut in it as well, guessed it wouldn’t.

A spike of pain, probably subconsciously generated from seeing extensive stitches decorating his leg, registered alongside his migraines, made him wince again, resulting in another round of trying to control subconscious wincing responses. Despite not having satiated his curiosity about his other injuries, Blayde pressed the help button on the railing, regretted not doing it earlier. How’d I let myself get distracted from that? he wondered.

Faster than he’d expected, Jaden and Sam rounded the corner from different directions. Unintentionally, a smile registered on Blayde’s face, quickly retreated from the pain. Curiosity told Blayde to touch his face to feel how badly it had been cut up by the crustaceans. Instinct ordered him to do no such thing.

He’d be a long time healing from all of his injuries, even with high tech medical creams he could print. That would be a long process that would likely be easier if he did the legwork on the medi-bot instead of explaining it to anyone, but that was an uncertain luxury. He didn’t know how long he’d feel up to doing anything at all.

“I’d say it’s good to see you awake,” Jaden said the instant he locked eyes with Blayde, “but honestly, you look like—”

“I need pain meds,” Blayde interrupted, trying to muster a smile acknowledging Jaden’s effort to cheer him up. “Could you bring the medi-bot and I’ll walk you through sending an order to the bio-printer? I’ll need you to stock it, but that’s also on the medi-bot.”

“You got it,” Jaden answered, hefting the medi-bot to the tall table adjacent to Blayde’s bedside. Five minutes later, Jaden went to the printing room to start the process.

Blayde determined the laceration antibiotic creams could be done later when his head wasn’t reeling from so much pain, though, if he was being honest with himself, the stinging overpowered other pains. There was definitely something to crustacean scratches, he groused, wondered if there was something more than dirt and bacteria at play, perhaps a mild venom or poison.

The instant Jaden left the room, Sam rushed to his side, leaned over, grabbed his right hand to hold, found a small spot above his left eyebrow that had been spared crustacean slicing, and gave it a meaningful kiss. To Blayde’s surprise, she was crying. “I’m so sorry,” she began at lightening speed, “When I saw neither you or the dragon were behind me, I should have gone back to help but—”

“Hey,” Blayde interrupted, grabbing her hand stronger to get her attention. “I did what I did so you’d be safe. There was nothing you could have done. They were faster and more agile than the first ones we followed.”

“I could have found you,” she interjected, “could have called Jaden for help before crustacean’s came, could have—”

“No,” Blayde insisted. “You would have been eaten on your way to help. I prefer you alive.” He made a valiant attempt to offer a comforting smile but it transformed into a wince, which made him chuckle from the irony of his failure. “And … I’ll live, too.”

Sam’s empathetic expression shouted her doubt as she visually traced his numerous facial lacerations with her eyes, and opened her mouth as if she was going to object more.

Blayde tried his ploy at smiling a second time, wished he hadn’t. “I know,” he said in a more playful voice. “You were hoping to have a boyfriend who wasn’t so ugly. I get it, but I have creams to slow down scarring and midi-bots that can clean up scarring after I heal. It’s all good.”

Sam appeared like she was going to interrupt again, so Blayde pushed the tease further. “I promise,” he emphasized the last word before repeating it, “I promise not to be offended if you don’t look at me until then. In fact,” he added, “I have a set of those gimmicky AI glasses that transforms how everyone looks. I’ll program it to see me like I was before the accident and you won’t be allowed to take them off until I’m healed. Deal?”

Sam tilted her head, forced a smile as she held back more tears, and gently shook her head. “Is your chest okay?” she asked.

Blayde pursed his lips, looked to his left. “I suppose. I have so many pains, it’s hard to tell what’s what,” he said, trying to sound funny.

It didn’t work. The small vestige of Sam’s smile disappeared. Gently, she adjusted her arms to wrap around his, slowly lowered her head until his chest bore its weight. Admittedly, it hurt more than he expected. At the same time, he welcomed her feminine energy, her closeness. The comfort outweighed the pain.

Although relishing the moment, Blayde’s mind began racing. “I tagged the larger of the two dragons. Did it take? Are we getting transmissions?” He felt Sam’s jaw move and mouth open as if she was about to answer but he added another question, “it didn’t die, did it? It was injured badly.”

Sam giggled. “Trying to be the tough guy now, are you? Are you really going there? the ‘I know I look bad but you should see the other guy’ gag?”

Blayde tried not to laugh, didn’t succeed, groaned as he tried to regain control. “Yeah, that’s it,” he confessed. “I have a helluva left hook. Did I kill it or do we have transmissions?”

“Seriously?” she asked, lifting her head to stare him in the eye. “You didn’t try to kill it, did you?”

Blayde held back a chuckle, only a little more successfully than the first time. “He impaled himself,” he explained.

Sam’s eyes grew wide like full moons. “Wow.” She put her head back on Blayde’s chest. “I don’t know the details but we got some transmissions. We think they’re headed back to where we first found them in the deep. Jaden probably knows more about that.”

“Probably,” Jaden chimed with great confidence as he entered the room again. Changing tone, he added, “What do I know?”

“Where the dragons are,” Sam answered.

“Ah.” Jaden looked at Blayde, tried not to look at Sam who was striking what men universally perceive as a provocative pose with her back toward him. The effort didn’t escape Blayde, who smiled slightly with his eyes. “I have my theories,” Jaden began. “Transmissions were sketchy for the first day but they seemed to indicate the beast was injured. Its readings—”

“Blayde tried to kill it,” Sam interjected, giggling nervously.

Jaden scrunched his brow, wondering what to make of the comment. Blayde closed his eyes slowly, nodded at Jaden to continue.

“The readings suggest a loss of blood and quite a bit of trauma but like I said, transmissions were sort of hit and miss that first day so I wasn’t sure what to make of it. If you speared it or something, my guess makes more sense. I was thinking that the loss of blood and other odd vital records meant that it was hurt and wanting protection or comfort so it appears to be heading back to the deep. I can only assume the companion went with it. Regardless, sometime during the second day, transmissions stopped. Again, I’m guessing it’s because they traveled too far away or too deep but I also considered the possibility that it died — maybe it fought the other dragon and didn’t fare well or something.”

“Holy Hades,” Blayde spat out, wished he hadn’t responded so negatively.

“Those meds will be ready in a few minutes, buddy. I have a timer set to go off on my holo-unit so we don’t miss any time.”

“You’re awesome,” Blayde answered. “It isn’t that.” He took a deep breath, slowly and carefully to avoid hurting anything from the effort. The rise and fall of his chest hurt nonetheless but it was manageable. “You’re telling me I got beat all to hell and back for nothing? The transmissions were a failure?”

“I didn’t say that,” Jaden said defensively, looking for a way to assuage the conversation.

Blade grunted, rolled his eyes. “I’m just messing with you,” he said. “I’m pretty sure the dragons are not rivals. They were hunting together. So, presuming it didn’t die from chasing me, nanobots will preserve data when unable to transmit. When we get closer, we’ll get updates.”

“I thought you said Sea Journey was dead,” Jaden said. “You have a spare around this pad somewhere?” Jaden scanned the room as if he was seriously scouting out the possibility.

“No, it’s deader than dead,” Blayde agreed. “I’ll have to dive.”

“No, I’ll have to dive,” Sam corrected with a very strong emphasis on “I’ll.”

“Okay,” Blayde conceded. “We’ll both go … after I’m well enough.”

“Deal,” Sam said. “Do you think we’ll see that massive beast, too?” she asked.

“What?” Jaden interjected. “There’s another new species?”

Sam moved her head on Blayde’s chest, probably to make eye contact, but Blayde didn’t dare reciprocate. His facial stitching was burning worse than ever. Blayde release his hand from hers, moved it toward her side and teasingly thumped her ribs.

Blayde watched as Jaden’s eyes shifted from Sam to Blayde and back. He hadn’t missed the tease.

“That was supposed to be a secret,” Blayde playfully chided. “Now, we need someone to keep the secret you couldn’t,” he added, querying Jaden with raised eyebrows. It stung. Everything stung.

Jaden nodded in return.

“The dragons are much smaller than this kraken or whatever we found,” Blayde began, “but we’re keeping that under wraps until I can explore the area more carefully. I don’t want someone else taking all of the credit for finding it. I know that’s a stingy way for a scientist to think but—”

“No worries, buddy,” Jaden said. “That doesn’t sound stingy to me, anyway, but all things considered, that may be the least of our worries. Over the past few days, we received transmissions from May Aislen and I’ve been scouring a deluge of global news reports. The world as we know it doesn’t exist anymore. It’s one big battlefield and it isn’t just the crab people. We have lots of new … critters … of every sort. Those saber-toothed octopuses you found might be some of the more friendly ones.”

“Serious?” Blayde asked, all but certain Jaden was jesting.

“Actually,” Jaden answered with a pregnant pause, “yes. I can’t believe half of what I’ve seen reported but even at that … we’re beyond world’s end. We can’t undo this apocalypse. We can only ride it out.”

“Mmm,” Blayde answered, feeling an unyielding surge of grogginess overwhelm him as Jaden’s alarm chimed. Ignoring it, Blayde tried to ask more questions but disappointingly, only incoherent mumbling escaped. Aware of his failure, he continued to try but then, everything went dark. He woke again when Jaden checked his IV before adjusting the drip with new meds. After that, resisting sleep was no longer an option.

Sea Dragon Apocalypse || World's End

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