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In the dragon world of Pyrrhia, between the very outskirts of the rainforest and Jade Mountain Academy, five dragonets were… camping out.
Hey, they were totally allowed to be there. The teachers at the academy had said they wanted the winglets to bond, so… here they were, bonding. They'd even gotten permission—from Sunny, no way were they asking Tsunami—and had been allowed to borrow some supplies.
And most surprising of all… they'd actually convinced Winter to come.
Yes, the whole thing had started out great.
Of course it rained.
It was currently pouring outside, actually, raindrops battering the twined-together leaves of their borrowed tent.
The inside, however, was kept safe from the elements. Several blankets were piled up, forming nests for the half-awake dragonets on top of them.
It was so late it was practically early. After a long night of not sleeping, eating snacks, and teasing each other, Moon—who was a NightWing and therefore nocturnal—was the most awake one. Kinkajou was leaning on Moon's inky black shoulder, her usually vivid pink and yellow scales a droopy, sleepy, blue. Turtle was already asleep and snoring, half buried in a pile of blankets. Winter was sitting in the corner, with his IceWing face on that meant he was too stubborn to visibly appear tired.
Qibli sighed. If they all slept now, it would completely ruin the idea of a sleepover. After all, everyone knew that a sleepover meant your time of sleeping is over. But everyone was bored and exhausted, and they were out of food and ideas.
Wait, what was he thinking? Qibli must have been more affected than he'd thought by the lack of sleep. He was never out of ideas! Just try to conquer this brain, sleep!
Hmm. Well, now Qibli actually had to prove that. He began to think of things that they could do. Most of them, Winter would hate. That was inevitable. But if he found one that the others would like enough to convince Winter to join in…
Quickly, he mentally listed the pros and cons of each idea, then dismissed the ones the others probably wouldn't agree to. Out of the few that were left, he picked the most likely option.
"Hey guys." Heads lifted and three sets of eyes met Qibli's. He grinned. "Want to play Truth or Dare?"
"Oooh! Yes!" Kinkajou's dull scales instantly turned back to her usual bright pink and yellow.
"Whoa!" Qibli pretended to shield his eyes.
"Sorry." Kinkajou toned her scales down an infinitesimal amount. "But great idea! I'm in!"
"Cool!" Qibli looked expectantly at Moon and Winter.
Moon shrugged. "Okay, sounds fun."
Qibli smiled. Yes, Moon was playing! Now to convince Winter… he'd need all his sneaky Outclaw tactics for this—
"TURTLE! Wake up, wake up, wake-up-wake-up-wake-up!" Kinkajou sang, bouncing around on top of Turtle.
"Mmmmm… rather sleep," Turtle mumbled. Finally, he opened his eyes. To find Kinkajou staring directly at him.
"Aaah!" Turtle cried.
"We're playing Truth or Dare, Turtle!" Kinkajou cried.
Turtle sighed. Qibli could almost see his thought process: "I really do want to sleep, but I don't want to be the most boring one here… and it might be fun, so…"
"Okay," Turtle agreed. Qibli mentally congratulated himself. Who said Moon was the only one who could tell what other people were thinking!
Turtle crawled out of his blanket fort, muttering about how there had to be "a million better ways to wake someone up."
Three convinced… one to go.
"So, Winter," Qibli started.
"There is no way I'm playing," Winter said firmly.
Oooh, he was going to make this hard. Time to employ… Secret Outclaw Strategies (SOS for short).
"Oh yes there is," Qibli wheedled, walking over to Winter and plopping down next to him. "Don't you want to play a game with your best friends in the world?"
So maybe the Secret Outclaw Strategies that Thorn had taught him hadn't involved quite so much touching, but oh well. Too late now.
"You are not my friends," Winter grumbled, shoving Qibli's head off of his shoulder.
"Yes we are," Kinkajou chimed in. "I mean, why else would you be in this tent? With us? In the middle of the night? When it's raining? And you could be in your sleeping cave?"
"Good point!" Qibli agreed.
Winter rolled his eyes.
Okay, guilt-tripping him about friendship wasn't working. Time for a new tactic.
"Oh, I'm Winter, and I'm not going to play because Truth or Dare is for the lowly peasants and I'm too IceWing-y and royal and… stuff. Haughty sniff." Qibli used his best Winter voice and sat up with an Aloof Stare.
The other three burst out laughing. Kinkajou's scales turned icy blue and she mimicked Winter's pose.
" Okay, first off, that sounds nothing like me," Winter argued. "I do not haughtily sniff. Hmmph—" He paused, mid-haughty-sniff, and thought for a second. "...you may have a point about that."
Across from them, Moon laughed. Qibli was so glad that she'd agreed to this instead of staying in Jade Mountain. Really though, which was more preferable: rainforest camping with friends, or Tsunami yelling all night?
"Come on, Winter. You have to play," she said.
Yes! Now that Moon had agreed, that increased the chances of Winter agreeing! Because even though Winter knew the purpose of this game was to humiliate each other and he'd probably regret it, he wouldn't want to seem disagreeable in front of Moon! Even though he is! Because he's Winter the IceWing and has never once willingly done anything in his life!
"Fine, I'll play," Winter sighed.
"Yes!" Qibli cried. "And I'll even let you start."
Who is the master of the Secret Outclaw Strategies now, Thorn? VIC-TOR-I-OUS!
Looking very much like he didn't know why he'd agreed to it, Winter asked the first question. "Truth or dare, Qibli?"
Qibli thought for a minute. Let's start off easy. "Truth."
Winter appraised him with such a serious look that Qibli was genuinely nervous, before he said, "What is wrong with you?"
Qibli grinned mischievously. "There's usually something wrong with me."
Everyone laughed. Minus the chilly IceWing who never laughed. Typical.
"Truth or dare, Moon?" Qibli asked.
From the look on Moon's face, it was clear that she'd expected them to tease Winter for a little longer before moving on to her.
"Um… truth?" she answered hesitantly.
Wait, what? He had a really good dare planned. What was he supposed to ask now? He was not prepared he was not prepared he was not prepared—
"Qibli?"
Oh no must think… there's always the question he knew everyone in this tent was thinking about—besides maybe Turtle—did Moon like Qibli or Winter? But he couldn't ask that, it would be uncomfortable.
"Qi-ibli?" Kinkajou this time.
Uncomfortable because if Moon said him, Winter would probably attack him. And if she said Winter… hmm, let's not think about that. Yes. Have decided. Will not ask big, friendship-dynamic-altering question. Need to play it safe and ask a meaningless question.
"Uh, what's your favorite color?"
Nice job, Qibli.
Thankfully, Moon seemed to actually think about it. "Hmm. I like green. Like the rainforest."
Winter was giving Qibli a weird look. Or maybe that was just his face.
Moon looked around the tent. "Um… truth or dare, Kinkajou?"
"Nobody's done a dare yet, so dare!" Kinkajou exclaimed.
"I dare you…" Moon paused, thinking for a minute. "... to stay the same color for two entire minutes."
"What?" Kinkajou cried. Her scales flashed about a thousand different colors, then settled on a bright, lemony, yellow.
"Now, no changing," Kinkajou instructed her scales sternly. "Truth or dare, Turtle?"
"Hmm?" Turtle was barely awake, but he was stubbornly keeping his eyes open using his talons. "Oh, uh, truth."
"What was the first animus spell you ever cast?"
Oooh. Qibli had been kind of wondering about that one for a while now.
Turtle shifted awkwardly. "Well, it's kind of embarrassing, but it was on an earring I couldn't get to stay in my ear."
Qibli frowned. He'd been expecting something more amazingly magical and heroic, and judging by the look on his face, Winter had too.
Pause.
"Now you ask someone," Kinkajou prompted.
"Oh! Right," Turtle said. "Um. Qibli, truth or dare?"
"Truth," Qibli answered. He figured it was easier to come up with a truth, and he didn't want Turtle's exhausted brain to have to think too hard. Besides, truths were fun.
"Why are you so loyal to Thorn?"
"Queen Thorn," Qibli automatically corrected. "And a better question is: why wouldn't I be? She's amazing and she saved me."
"Saved you from what?" Kinkajou asked.
"Oh. Er. Y'know, Scorpion Den stuff." Qibli waved a talon vaguely. "Winter, truth or dare?"
"Dare."
"Ooh! A dare!" Qibli said excitedly. "I dare you to admit your true feelings to the dragon in this tent."
And… that had slipped out without him thinking about it.
"'The dragon'?" Kinkajou repeated.
"He… knows… who it is…" Qibli said weakly, wishing he'd thought before he'd spoken.
Winter's tail was lashing. "And what if I don't want to?"
Kinkajou jumped in. "You have to! It's the dare."
Winter growled. "I'll show you—"
"Hey!" Qibli felt the rushing energy of bad decisions in his veins and decided to commit to his question. "Leave her alone and answer the question. You have to answer it now I've said it."
"Who says?"
"I do!"
"Well, I say otherwise!"
"Just because you're Queen Glacier's nephew doesn't mean you get to make all the rules!"
"And just because you think you're smarter than all of us doesn't mean you get to, either!"
"That doesn't even make sense!"
"You don't even make sense!"
"You're a reflective lake!" Qibli blurted out, because he and Winter were standing eye to eye, and all he could think about was how much Winter's blue eyes looked like mountain lakes.
It at least shut him up for a few seconds.
"What's that supposed to mean?"
Remarkable, how quickly a few seconds can pass.
"Can both of you just stop it?" Moon asked, edging in between Winter and Qibli. "Let's get back to the game."
"Sorry," Qibli said immediately, sitting back down. Winter followed suit a second later.
The dragonets sat in silence for a few moments before Qibli broke it.
"Winter, I dare you to eat this banana."
Winter looked up at him. The anger had gone from his eyes, replaced by something like… gratitude? Nah. He had to be misjudging. "We don't have any bananas."
"And you clearly don't believe in me," Qibli tsked as he pulled out a banana.
"Seriously, where did he get that," Kinkajou muttered to Moon, who shrugged.
Qibli presented the banana to Winter, who looked at it with distaste. "Do I have to?"
"Yep!"
Winter took the banana from Qibli, holding it between two of his talons as though it might infect him.
"Come on, Winter, they're not that bad," Moon said.
"Oh yes they are."
Kinkajou started chanting. "Eat it! Eat it! Eat it!"
"Will you shut up?" Winter snapped. Reluctantly, he unpeeled the banana, eyeing it with supreme disgust, and took a tiny bite.
They all watched him as he finished chewing and shook his head violently.
"No. Never again. That was disgusting. How can you eat those."
"You're crazy and bananas are delicious," Kinkajou pronounced.
Winter dropped the rest of the banana on the floor of the tent. "Fruit-eaters. Hopeless."
"At least us fruit-eaters don't live on hairy, smelly, carcasses," said Kinkajou.
"Fish don't have hairy, smelly, carcasses."
"Ick."
"Okay, guys, we get it," Qibli said. "Winter, it's your turn."
"Fine. Truth or dare, Kinkajou?"
"Dare!"
"I dare you… to go and eat a fish."
Kinkajou made a face. "Seriously?"
"It's only fair," Winter protested.
"But it's the middle of the night and we're in the rainforest. Where am I supposed to get a fish?"
Winter shrugged. "That is up to you, as the acceptor of the dare."
"Meh." Kinkajou turned around on the spot and lay down again. She seemed to be counting something in her head.
"Kinkajou?"
"... and the two minutes are up! My dare is completed!" Kinkajou announced, allowing her scales to shift colors again.
Turtle yawned. "Now that we've taken care of that, can we go to sleep now?"
"But my dare—" Winter started.
" Oh, shut up, Winter," Qibli murmured, lying down in the pile of blankets. Moon and Kinkajou did the same, pulling one over their black and periwinkle wings.
"Hmmph." Qibli's eyes were closed, but he could feel the IceWing crawling past the heap of dragonets, toward the empty corner of the tent.
Oh no you don't, he thought.
Qibli reached out an arm and found a spiky, cold, wing. "Get over here," he said, yanking said wing over to him. Winter stumbled and fell on top of the blankets.
"Hey," he said irately. "I don't want to sleep on the blankets! It's too warm—"
"Too late." Qibli's voice was muffled by the blankets. "You belong here now."
He could hear Winter rolling his eyes.
But the IceWing didn't move back off the blankets for the rest of the night.
……………………………………
"Wake up! It's morning! Wonderful, glorious, morning!"
Qibli pulled apart his eyelids a crack to find a bright pink-and-yellow face staring directly at him.
"Aaah!"
Kinkajou giggled and backed up, pouncing on the dark mound next to Qibli. "Come on, Moon! Wake up! Let's go!"
Her scales shone brighter and brighter with every word until even Qibli, whose eyes were used to the blazing heat of the desert, had to shield his face.
Moon groaned. "How early is it?"
"About that." Kinkajou momentarily paused in her bouncing. "Er… the sun is up, which means it is waking-up time!"
"How long has the sun been up, though?" Qibli said. Kinkajou became mysteriously deaf and continued poking Moon, whose head had fallen back onto her wing.
"You might as well get up," Turtle's voice drifted from somewhere in Qibli's peripheral vision. "I tried to ignore her, it did not go well for me."
"Sorry about that!" Kinkajou said cheerfully.
"All right. I'm up." Moon dragged herself out of the blankets. "I wish I was not, but here I am."
Qibli laughed and rolled out of his own blanket. He bumped into something pointy and chilly. Hmm…
"Oh, Winter," he called. "Winn-terr!"
"It can't possibly be morning yet," Winter complained, lying on top of the blankets instead of underneath them. He opened his eyes, spotted Qibli, and immediately closed them again. "Go away."
"Haha, nope!"
"Qibli!"
"What—? Ow!"
Winter had just thrown a pillow at him, that sneaky little ice cube!
From across the tent, Kinkajou spotted the pillow—which Qibli had caught- in Qibli's claws. She gasped.
"Great idea, guys! Pillow fight!"
Might as well. "You're on!" Qibli called back. "And so is Winter!" he added, tossing the pillow back at Winter.
"Hey!"
As Winter leapt to his feet, Kinkajou found another pillow and threw it at Moon. It hit with a whoof on her wing.
Reflexively, Moon grabbed the pillow and threw it back, missing Kinkajou but nailing Qibli.
"SandWing down!"
Another one smacked him in the back.
"I'll get you, Winter!"
"That was revenge for waking me up!" Winter called.
"You can't really be that upset about it. Don't you IceWings rise with the sun in the name of vigilance or whatever?"
"All right, I lied. It was because you're annoying."
Qibli grinned and scooped up a pillow. "That I can understand."
Before long, a full-scale (haha, scale, Qibli really was hilarious) pillow war had erupted. Pillows were winging around the tent, usually not even hitting their target. Qibli even made a little fort out of blankets and neglected pillows, but then it was accidentally crushed by Kinkajou. Moon threw a pillow at Winter, but it got stuck on one of his horns and refused to get off.
It only ended when Turtle—how had they forgotten about Turtle that whole time?—sat up and said, "Hey, aren't we supposed to be back at Jade Mountain before breakfast?"
Dead. Silence. Then a couple whumps as the few pillows that were in the air hit the ground, but other than that: dead. Silence.
In these types of situations one could really only say: "Ohhh… right ."
"Ohhh… right," Qibli finally said. Hey, he needed something to break the silence. Silence made him nervous.
Qibli's words seemed to act as a call to action for the others, because they immediately started rushing to pack up all the blankets and pillows.
"Hey, Turtle," Qibli called. Turtle poked his head up. "You want to help take down the tent?"
"Sure."
After that, Turtle disappeared for a while, and yeah, maybe Qibli should have questioned that, but that dragon was never really on anyone's radar anyways, so it wasn't exactly a cause for alarm.
Until, of course, the tent collapsed. With the four dragonets still inside.
Qibli suddenly found himself buried under a heap of tent. Muffled squeaks and yells of "hey!" and "ow!" came from around him.
"Everyone okay?" Qibli asked into the tent.
There were assorted noises of agreement.
"Guys, I am so sorry, I didn't mean to do that!" Turtle cried from outside. "Qibli said I should help take down the tent, so—"
Qibli sighed. "I meant when we were not in it." Turtle made another sound of distress, so Qibli quickly added, "But that's okay! This is okay. And it's all going to be fine."
Winter growled from somewhere on Qibli's left.
"I think I found the tent flap, guys!" Kinkajou called. There were shuffling noises and footsteps from outside. "Turtle, can you just—hold this up—thanks."
Qibli could see a piece of sunlight now, probably through the tent flap. He did a very adult-like wiggling motion over to said tent flap and squeezed out. His talons hit squishy rainforest mud. Kinkajou and Turtle were both holding up part of the tent for him.
"Thanks," Qibli said, wriggling all the way out. Almost immediately, Winter's head stuck through the flap. Qibli helped the other two hold the tent as Winter squished himself through.
"Ugh. Mud." Winter stretched out his wings to their full length and moved his feet around with distaste. Qibli couldn't resist flicking a little mud at him as Moon came through the flap.
"All accounted for," she said as soon as she was out. "Come on, we need to get back to Jade Mountain."
The dragonets rolled up the blankets in the (empty) tent and—each of them gripping a corner with their talons—lifted off.
The leafy canopy of the rainforest passed underneath them, glistening with raindrops left over from the previous rainfall. The tall peak of Jade Mountain looked in the distance, and the dragonets arrowed toward it; Qibli and Winter in the lead, Moon and Kinkajou on either side, and Turtle in the very back.
Finally, they touched down on the smooth stone of the entrance cave.
I sure hope we aren't late, he thought.
The tent, pillows, and blankets were returned to the empty storage cave where they had originally been stashed. Qibli wasn't sure why they had been there—maybe the teachers had planned some sort of field trip?—but as long as they were willing to lend them to a bored winglet, it was fine with him.
The dragonets raced through the twisting hallways to the prey center. Inside, all the other students had started breakfast. There were Icicle and Alba on the "designated" IceWing ledge, Anemone and the other SeaWings eating fish, the MudWing siblings sharing a cow, ever-antagonistic clawmates Pike and Flame arguing with each other, and Coconut, who had about eight papayas arranged in a stack in front of him. The only dragonet missing was Mightyclaws, who was probably in the art cave already.
After looking around, the Jade Winglet headed over to the food. Moon and Kinkajou approached the fruit pile, despite Coconut having eaten most of it. Qibli stabbed a lizard, and Turtle and Winter selected a fish each.
Once they had gotten their food, Qibli, Moon, Kinkajou, and Turtle found an empty table and gathered around it.
Winter was looking back and forth between them and the other IceWings. Qibli chewed his lizard, watching him.
He has to know that they're probably going to tease him for coming to our little bonding trip last night. I told him he didn't have to tell anyone else, but of course he had to make a big scene about it…
"Move over," a voice said from Qibli's right, and Winter sat down at the table.
Qibli grinned. "Graced with the presence of a royal IceWing prince today, are we? What have we ordinary dragons done to deserve such an honor—"
"Shut up or I'm moving," Winter said, but Qibli caught a gleam of a smile on his face.
"Hey look, it's Peril," Turtle said, oblivious to the whole situation.
Qibli automatically swiveled his head at the prey center entrance as Peril did indeed come in, scales smoking. Every dragonet who was standing took a step back.
Peril grabbed a goat, which briefly burst into flames before cooling into a charred black as it came into contact with her fiery claws. She took a bite and spotted their table.
"Hey, Turtle," she greeted, mouth full of goat. "How was your campout? It sounds like that kind of thing might be fun. Very flammable, though, so… not that I'm jealous or anything. Nope. Completely un-jealous dragon right here."
Turtle laughed. "Yeah, it was pretty fun."
"I think you mean totally amazing!" Kinkajou exclaimed. Her scales danced with magenta as she addressed Peril. "We stayed up practically all night and played Truth or Dare! And had a pillow fight!"
"Cool, cool, yeah, sounds very cool," Peril nodded.
Qibli felt a stab of guilt. "We'll have to have another one that's more fireproof, maybe in one of the caves—"
Just then, the argument between Pike and Flame—which had been quietly sizzling in the background noise of the prey center—burst into full volume.
"I hate you!" Pike yelled.
"Well, I hate you!" Flame yelled back.
"No, I hate you!"
"I hate you!"
"I hate you!"
"I hate both of you, now shut up!" Peril called out, ripping another chunk off of her goat. A ripple of nervous laughter echoed around the room, but Pike and Flame restrained themselves to glaring at each other.
Huh, Qibli was thinking. Even though those two are clawmates, they really can't stand each other. He guessed the teachers must not have been able to predict how everyone would get along…
He looked around at his table. Moon, Kinkajou, Turtle, Peril. Even Winter.
The teachers had done a pretty good job in this case.
"So guys," Qibli said conversationally. "I personally think the camping last night was fun, and we should do it again. Thoughts?"
"Definitely," Moon said immediately.
"Yes!" Kinkajou.
"Sure." Turtle.
"As long as there aren't too many flammable things," Peril agreed.
Pause. Everybody looked at Winter.
Qibli opened his mouth to begin a convincing speech—the type that required several minutes of thought, careful analyzing of Winter's mood, and which tactics would be best—but Winter just looked at Qibli, sighed, and nodded.
"Oh, all right, fine."