Venturing: Storing Habits

We had arrived onto the scene of the crime. We landed upon the cold grounds beneath us while folding our wings, we turned our attention towards the store in front of us. None of us had said anything in the past hour for silence had befallen upon our heads, eyes narrowed to the front of the store as Kyro and Zander started breaking our line and walked right on in. They entered with Natty following from behind. Ozkun and Maujur stayed at our backs, turned around to look at the streets behind us while I stared upon the door. When the door was opened, Kyro started peering inside, before nodding silently towards me. I acknowledged him and faintly smiled. Before motioning Ozkun and Maujur, we started forth for the door. Entering in as a breath of fresh air penetrated our scales as we transition into the store from the parking lot outside.

The store was small and packed with many items inside. Although the majority of their products were eggs, hence it makes sense that the egg would come here, we also started seeing other things. Such as fake dragon wings and canine fur. Additionally, we saw food products for canine and dragon themselves too. I exhaled a breath upon seeing such products, closing my eyes before nodding towards the others whom have gathered around me. They split up suddenly and headed their own directions, leaving me alone upon the front door just as my eyes were opened again and peered up in front of the shelf. I spotted the fake wings, all plastic and were not real. Picking one up, I stared at it for a moment before flipping the wing over and gaze at the other side. A sticker was attached to it; along with the words 'Made by', but the third word was scribbled and marked as if no one wanted to know where it originated from however. A short grunt came from my mouth before I settled the plastic wing down and gazed away. I walked leftward and away from the front door.

Further into the store, towards the frozen projects where Ozkun and Zander were gazing upon the frozen products  inside. I stayed with them and looked momentarily, eyes narrowed upon the products. Zander and Ozkun shook their heads, turned themselves over towards me before peeling away. Once again leaving me alone upon my spot as I found myself staring down onto the product in front of me. Shaking my head, I flipped around, Kyro was on the other side of the store, closest to the front door. He seemed to be holding something in his paw, although I was not sure what it was. A few seconds into the silence had came the gathering of my unit towards me. I stayed silent watching them all however. As we all gathered, they started talking in a lowered voice. Whispers were about as their attention were to one another and their topic seemed to be the things that the egg had needed. We had already confirmed two of those things. Wings and canine fur. But we were still looking for the third product however.

With a grunt and passing of my claws to behind my back, I stand up straight and allowed the conversation to die down until only I was speaking. To which I took advantage of it by commenting my suggestion towards them, they nodded in response. Faces pure red upon the embarrassment of my suggestion as they shifted their heads away from me. Zander seemed to be the only one left staring up towards me as he commented back, “Are you sure that it is the last product he needed?" “Whatever he is making, he can find it here. But to bring someone to life, he needed it." I growled, defending my suggestion as Zander nodded, hang his head and stayed silent. Seconds had gotten by upon the silence unfolding above us as Natty picked up on a thought lingering in her mind just as we headed forth towards the front door on the other side of the store. “By the way, what is with all the egg products inside of the store? Why were they a majority than the others that we had found inside of there?" “Think our egg culprit is a mascot or something?" Ozkun picked up on that thought, Zander frowned and shook his head, countering “If he is an mascot. Then why is he stealing the three products from different stores? Two of which was inside this store after all." “Very good question however." Muttered Natty allowing the silence to fall once again.

We pondered in the following silence before I pipped up, “However, we do not know where all these egg products came from. We only know two different store locations of where our culprit would hit upon. This." “And that donor store on the other side of the street…" Zander trailed, feeling hot underneath his uniform. Kyro and Natty gaze his way; but the black dragon averted his eyes from them and looked elsewhere. “Alright," I remarked, quickly having noticed Zander's embarrassment, “Natty take Zander to a nearby factory. The rest of us will head to the donor." “Right." Natty chimed quickly and grabbed the arm of the black dragon, pulling him away as the two of them flew off together. I turned towards the rest, they nodded upon the silence which I turned around and headed forth towards the street. We ran perpendicular against the parallel road, thus reaching the other side in quick motion just as Ozkun grabbed for the door. Only he and Kyro entered in, Maujur and Abavina stayed behind me as I watched them in silence before motioning them inside. Quick, they entered in following me as another fresh breath of air washes underneath us just as we had transition into the cold floors below our feet.

With wings already folded and eyes gazing ahead, We spotted the pair of dragons talking to the clark nearby. She seemed to be inside of a booth or something, behind her was another door with a white sign that submerged from the wall above it. Words that I could not see because they were blocking the way however. Ignoring the sign and already noticing Maujur and Abavian gathered up with the rest of the dragons, I peeled myself away from the group and bypassed the booth. Setting my eyes upon the attention of the wall in front of me while raising my claw up towards it. Touching the roughness of it as I stared in silence. My ears picked up their conversation, confirming my theory and suggestion that the egg culprit was here all along. Although only having stolen three canisters was odd and unusual, even for me however as I had expected him or her to have a bag and loads of them by now. Shaking my head of the sudden heatness that came from the back of my throat, I closed my eyes and exhaled a breath. Calming myself down while Kyro walked up towards me, placed his claw over my shoulder and whispered.

“It is just as you thought it was however." “See." I smirked in kind, earning a chuckle from the red dragon as his eyes turned back towards the booth where the clark and the rest of our unit were heading back down the length of the short hallway entering into the door on the other side. They disappeared suddenly and the light above the door lit up suddenly. Me and Kyro stared at the light, noting how it was colorless. Yet the letters of the word were colorful somehow, changing slowly from the top color rainbow towards the bottom color of the rainbow. It was weird yet neither of us raise the subject up as we had dropped it suddenly and shifted our attention back towards the wall. It had taken them a while, perhaps an hour or two before the said dragons came from the doors. The light turned off, darkening itself once again as we taken noticed of their arrival, smiled upon our own unit gathered up upon us. “Well?" Kyro questioned them, “Three products of dragon seed had been confirmed stolen. They had belong to some young dragon who had came in here a month ago." “So the egg resorted to stealing young dragon seed huh." I commented, Natty nodded although a frown came from her face as she spoke, continuing the report. “The egg that came to steal them was twice the height of a young dragon. Although they were not able to see the psychical appearance of whomever was donning that costume however, they were able to know that this egg is old. Sadly, not that old that it would be slow in both running or walking."

“How?" I questioned, interested in their conversation as Natty turned to me and answered, “They were able to hear grunting and groaning from the egg. In an language that we, dragons, were able to communicate with one another about." I raised a claw to my chin. Gazing to Kyro, he and I had the same thought and we were able to nod off towards Natty who frowned at them both, taking a step back to join the group in front of us as I consider our next action. “Should we head towards the factory?" Started Ozkun despite the nudge that Natty committed towards him. Kyro frowned upon that question, yet he turned his head to me meeting my eyes slightly. I shook my head, exhaled a breath at the stress already submerging upon my face and body as a headache was starting to formed, I spoke quietly towards Ozkun “We do not even know where this factory is however. We could spend the entire day finding it and not getting anything-" “Let me and Maujur find it then." “Me?" Exclaimed the said dragoness as her glare shifted towards the blue scaled dragon. I too scowled at him and he reel his head back and said nothing in response. “You are not to suggest anything." I growled, “It is a waste of resources and time if we were to run like headless chickens, finding the factory of wherever it was. Heck, it can be-" “Enough Ling." Natty commented, I nodded in response. Slowly calming myself down as I spoke towards the rest of the group, “Lets head back towards the store, we might be able to find something there."

“Like what?" Ozkun remarked, yet no one answered him anymore.

We returned to the store. But later we found out that it was closed. A white paper sign emerged upon the window adjacent to the doors in front of us. As Kyro ripped the paper off from the window and show it towards us, I narrowed my eyes upon it and spoke up towards him “This is not the 'we are closed' sign. This is something else." “Yeah, Ling is right." Zander remarked, stabbing the paper with his claw adding, “Why is there a stopwatch in the center of the paper?" “Thats real… right?" Ozkun questioned, no one answered him. “Regardless, look at the stop watch." Kyro added, poking at the paper again and added, “Notice how the numbers say, 0' 0"? What does it mean?" “That clearly means the starting point of a race. Any form of race will do with that time alone." I informed, remembering the racing games I used to play with Yang among other things however." “ 'Racing games huh' ?" Kyro echoed me, “And you also said 'starting point' too right?" “Yeah." I nodded, knowing where he was going with this. A bright grim smile escaped his face as his red wings held up behind him, he spoke narrowing his eyes towards me “I think I know where we are to look now."

We splitted off suddenly and without warning towards the other members. As they looked shocked and surprise by our sudden announcement, they also nodded their heads and said nothing in response watching as we fled from their sights. We headed northward and a bit towards the east however. To the center of Vastertown, adjacent to our headquarters was where we arrived upon our destination. A warehouse, located at the end of the familiar street that we worked upon. It was old and rusty. The planks and bricks that make up the building looked worn out. The airs had exposed the planks creating what looked like moles were attached to them. I shivered at the sight of it, but creating no words or breathed anything at all while watching Kyro started forth towards the front door of the building. Entering in and disappearing in silence with me following behind him. The insides of the building was empty. Nothing was inside here however. I was surprise by this and frowned, even tugging against the tail of the dragon in front of me which Kyro shifted his attention to me. I shook my head, pointing out towards the emptiness we found ourselves in and he quickly nodded before fleeing with me hanging onto his tail suddenly. Thus, we exited out, the door slammed behind us as broad daylight submerged upon our eyes. To our surprise, the other members had arrived too.

“What happened?" “Nothing." Kyro growled, rather disappointed in himself as I noticed it however and patted his shoulder, nodding while he looked with a smile towards me. Returning serious, I shifted my attention towards the others and spoke, ordering “Kyro had the right idea. But it was not the ruined abandoned factory that was along our street. Rather, it might be too easy to find the culprit and arrest him right there and then." Everyone nodded, yet I continued onward, “I want the rest of you to find the factory. Same setting as the one behind us, But do not go in. I fear that our culprit might rigged the factory locations just to burn down his evidence for his arrest." “Alright." Everyone nodded without any sort of hesitation as they split up amongst ourselves, leaving me and Zander behind once again. I chuckled at our predicament while Zander looked flustered and hang his head. Although he was quiet, he still had some red roses upon his cheeks and between his nose and mouth. I spoke quietly towards him, allowing his head to raise meeting my eyes.

“Seeing this factory that shares the same road/street as the headquarters we worked at. We should perhaps find something different." “Different?" Zander questioned me, I nodded at him with a smile before commenting again, “Yeah. The others would be heading further North or South of Vaster. But never farther east or west. I bet you that is where the factory that this 'egg' worked at." “You are betting it all upon eastward?" I nodded at him, a small smirk submerged upon my face as I spread my wings. So did Zander. We headed eastward, with false hope that our prediction it would come true however. To the surprise of nowhere, it never happened. I frowned upon this predicament, but calmed myself slowly despite my heart pounding in my chest. I chuckled rather nervously which caught the attention of Zander as his eyes shifted towards me, I waved him off suddenly. We stayed silent. Flying upon the cold airs of nighttime as we headed southward where Natty's group was. Soon to arrived towards them, we landed upon the corner streets of town and shifted our attention towards the left, spotting the factory three houses down from where we were at. We left our post. Heeding down the length of the sidewalk before stopping in front of the factory and entered right on in.

The factory was the same as the previous factory we headed in. Empty. Nothing else was in here and I frowned upon noticing it. Zander looked disappointed to and turned his attention back towards the door behind us and started forth for it. But I stopped him suddenly. A short distance ahead was a machine. Rotten and moldy since it was exposed to the air of many years perhaps. As we walked our way towards the machine, we slowly realized that it was smaller than we had expected from far away. Yet there were millions of buttons laid upon the surface of the machine however. All of those buttons were red or yellow, maybe a mixed of them both however. Strange symbols were written onto them. All of which we were unsure or uninformed of however. As I frowned, quickly noticing our unawareness of such symbols, I gaze back towards Zander who shook his head and raised his claws into the air before starting to pressed onto one of the million of buttons.

Suddenly, the machine came to life. The colorful yellow and red buttons ceased and all that was left was white. The symbols were even gone too surprisingly. As me and Zander stared at the machine in silence, I flicked a tail and motioned the black dragon to pressed another. He committed himself into doing so and the machine roared. VIbrated intensively, if that was a word and suddenly broke down. Smoke submerged from the cracks of it, rising to the ceiling above. Small fire burned the machine too, melting its metal armor down until it was reduced into nothing. All of which, left behind a golden stopwatch. The numbers show the same single number, everytime. “6" I heard Zander breathed as rapid running echoed the factory floors and we were suddenly regrouped with Natty Ozkun and Abavina. All of which looked surprise by the broken down machine and the pair of us. As the pink dragoness glared upon me and questioned “What happened to the machine." I answered, “We pressed two 'correct' buttons and got this from it." “What is it?" Questioned Zukun as we held up the golden stopwatch, “A stopwatch? Golden? Why is there six numbers saying the same thing repeatedly?" “That was what we liked to know too however…" Zander frowned, I nodded in kind. “What about you guys?" I asked, changing the subject quickly as Natty frowned and spoke to us,

“We found twelve eggs, cracked opened. We estimated that the heights are twelve hundred feet." Natty informed, “That could be any of the birds." I commented, acknowledging the numbers and Natty nodded once again. I thought about the numbers for a moment but before I could opened my mouth, Ozkun piped up “Hey wait. Could the egg thief is looking to revive his species?" “If so…" I trailed off, counting onto Ozkun's theory, “Then what species is he?" “A bird also?" Ozkun frowned answering me, I shook my head “No. If he is looking to revive his species after twelve eggs had been forced opened from a great height…" I trailed, narrowing my eyes upon Ozkun as I heard a snapped of a claw and exclaimed, “Then he must be a prey of those birds! So going by that logic, he must be something that crawls on the ground." “Or someone with four le-" Zander suggested but I interrupted him, growling “No animal or reptile with four legs has ever laid eggs before-" “Count platypus or echidnas however." “What are they?" Natty questioned Zander who shrugged, “I do not know." I exhaled a breath and shook my head, closing opening my eyes afterwards I spoke towards the group “Alright so we know that the culprit species is either platypus or echidnas. They are the only mammals that lay eggs. Other than dragon species." “What if our culprit is a dragon?" Zander questioned me, “That is actually… a good point." Ozkun commented.

“It could be a dragon too." I reworded my suggestions with a smile that reflected off from the black dragon's face. As I breathed again and spoke to calm myself down, I flapped my wings to gain their attention once again and growled “Alright, so three species in question." I summarized, gazing at each of them while they nodded in response. “Good. Return back to headquarters, inform Yang of this vital information and see what she wanted for us to do." They left without hesitation and left me alone upon the factory's floor as I quickly turned to the broken machine behind me. Still heating up for some reason, but I never tried to fix it however. A breath escaped my nose as I snorted and started walking out of the factory. Back upon broad midnight where the moon now hangs above me.

It was set after midnight when I heard my walkie started staticing. My eyes shot opened when I heard it and I blinked in ponderance before grabbing the walkie and raised it to my face. Pressing the button, I spoke responding to the static. “Hello? Anyone?" “LIng?" I heard Yang on the other line, “Yes, Yang?" “Come quick. There is something interesting that you will have to see." I narrowed my eyes, scowling at the walkie for a moment. Dropping my voice down into monotone as I spoke back “This better not be one of the newer shows on dragonet, Yang!" “it is not! Its black tapes that we had received from Chaos. From R7!" I blinked in surprise, a wave of silence washed over me while I slowly lowered my claw holding the walkie and shook my head. Thousands of thoughts entered and exited my filled mind as I pondered what our enemy was giving onto us. Yet with a small growl that escaped from my mouth, I relentlessly agreed and spoke back onto the walkie, “I will be there."

So spreading my wings, I took into the cold air that washed over me. As I flew back west back towards our home, I pondered over the tapes and the R7. 'Why are they giving it to us…" I pondered with a frown.