Mumei liked flying at high altitudes. As long as she didn’t go too high and break through the stratosphere, the air was cool and moist. It was a surprisingly effective strategy to beat the heat on hot summer days. It was even more pleasant when she was flying around at night like she was right now; with the moon hanging overhead, she didn’t have to bother worrying about getting sunburnt this way. She flapped her wings and climbed higher, touching the clouds and smiling as the cool water vapor brought a pleasant chill to her skin. Since the winds were also much faster and stronger at these heights, Mumei could let her wings catch the breeze and glide on them instead of making a conscious effort to fly, making for effortless air travel. She also found it fun to wave hello and goodbye at random people whenever airplanes passed by and see their shocked faces. As long as she gave the Council and the rest of her friends a heads-up, she could go wherever she wanted on Earth without paying for travel. In her mind, the pros of flying like this far outweighed the cons.
In this moment, however, Mumei was reminded of one of the few downsides to touching the clouds: poor reception.
“Can you say that again? It’s kinda hard to hear you,” Mumei looked down at her phone with a frown, tilting her head worriedly. She held the gadget over her head, hoping it would help clear the static that muffled the caller’s voice. “Please repeat that, Ame? All I’m getting is skskdssf!”
“You’re flying at over one hundred miles an hour. Of course, you’re gonna have a hard time hearing me, duh,” a garbled, mildly frustrated voice managed to pierce through the veil of static. “Slow down for a second, at least.”
Mumei opened her wings as wide as she could, grunting when they caught the wind to slow her down. She braked into a slow descending glide, taking the phone off loudspeaker mode and putting the earpiece to her ear. “Is that better? Or do I have to get closer to the ground? Or maybe I hafta fly even higher up?”
“Mic test, one two three.”
“Ooh! Okie-dokie, your voice is clearer now.”
“Good,” Amelia cleared her throat. “Back to what I was talking about: you asked why we were sending you out here, right?”
Mumei nodded, looking up and smiling at seeing the full moon. The ceiling of stars felt almost close enough to touch from this height; even with some of the clouds obscuring them, Mumei could see the twinkling light of constellations clearly against the dark-blue night sky. Her eyes wandered from the sky to the ocean far below. She took a moment to appreciate how the moonbeams bounced off the ocean’s surface hundreds of feet below her. The sea gleamed with the brilliance of a jewel, yet the reflections of light weren’t blinding. Mumei allowed herself to descend, approaching the ocean until she was only a few feet from the waves. Her gaze flickered from one wave to another, appreciating the way the water’s surface played with the moon’s light. “Yeah. Bae told me that I needed to come out here, but nobody told me why, just that it was important.”
“Oh, okay. Gimme a sec, let me dig up the file…” The sound of papers being flipped and a metal filing cabinet being pulled open could be heard behind Amelia’s voice, much to Mumei’s amusement. After a few seconds had passed, Mumei could listen to a barely audible click of the tongue from the earpiece pressed to her face. “Let’s see…okay, here we go. Yesterday, Gura received word from some New Atlanteans that suspicious activity was spotted off Canada’s West Coast. She sent some of them to investigate earlier this afternoon, and we found out that there’s a group of poachers using a remote island here as a hideout.”
Mumei tilted her head, beginning to ascend once more. On the horizon, she could make out silhouettes that sat above the waves and cast long shadows. Ships. Her eyes narrowed, and she beat her wings to increase her speed. “A hideout? What for?”
“Uh…lemme find my notes real quick…” Mumei could hear Amelia flip a page of a notebook. “Ah, here we go. It’s a smuggling operation. They’re poachers running a trafficking operation for baby dragons and dragon eggs. They’re not from Earth, I think. They’re just using some island out here in the ocean as a halfway point before moving their stolen stuff to somewhere else. Probably not on this planet, either.”
Mumei’s eyebrows knit. “That doesn’t sound good. So, uh, what’s the plan? Do I go down there and slap them silly?”
“Well, they do need to be stopped. It has to be done here, too, because we don’t know where they’re headed if they escape. But since we don’t know anything about who they are or where they came from, try not to let anyone die. Just knock ‘em out or something, Mumei.” The detective snickered. “Once you’re done, just lemme know, and Gura can send some of her minions to go round ‘em up for questioning.”
“Sure, no problem,” Mumei took on a burst of speed with a strong flap of her wings, accelerating as she plunged at a forty-five-degree angle to the ocean far below. With every passing second, her descent grew faster; she sharply angled herself upward and barely skimmed the waves with her boots, laughing and shielding her face as a spray of cold seawater bounced off her face. Mumei opened her wings up and sharply ascended with a powerful beat of her wings. She began to flap her wings faster, speeding like a bullet across the water toward the silhouettes of the ships she had seen earlier. “But Ame, I don’t think I need to be here.”
“What do you mean?” Amelia paused, her finger still on the papers in front of her, before raising an eyebrow. “It’s not like a you’re a bad fit for this kind of mission. In fact, I think it kinda suits you.”
“It’s not that,” Mumei said, shaking her head as she began climbing again and putting distance between herself and the waves. As she flew higher, Mumei could clearly see several ships in the water. A few large cargo ships were surrounded by many smaller vessels, many of them either blue or black. Mumei squinted, trying to get a closer look. Though she didn’t know too much about ships, Mumei could sense that these ships didn’t belong here. She slowed down as she drew nearer, descending and hovering just above the water's surface while approaching the convoy. “It’s just…I think it’s a big mistake if these guys thought they could get away with mistreating dragons anywhere near West Canada.”
“Whaddaya mean, Mumei?”
“It’s nothing,” the owl-girl smiled up at the full moon above. “Anyway, I just found some weird-looking ships, so I think I’ve found what we’re looking for. I’ll let you know when I’m done. I’m pretty sure that everything will be taken care of before I even get there, though.”
Pocketing the phone, Mumei beat her wings and soared up to the deck of the nearest cargo ship. She stopped just shy of the handrail and clung onto it with her hands, peeking over the edge to see if there was anyone that might spot her. Seeing that it was deserted, Mumei vaulted onto the rearmost deck. Her wings folding in and retracted into her body. She crouched and pulled her hood over her head, keeping a hand over the knife handle on her belt. Mumei kept her shallow breathing quiet; she recognized the smell of gunpowder and blood in the air. Looking around, she noticed scattered bullet casings littered on the floor in front of her amidst shards of what looked like torn metal and broken rifles. Mumei slowly returned to a standing position, taking ginger steps forward while looking around.
“What the…?”
Mumei wasn’t sure what it was, but she could detect something inhuman mixed in the air, a mild acidity that left a burning tingle on her nostrils; this was only reinforced as Mumei noticed some gashes in the steel a few feet away that looked much too large to have been made by a human being. The marks looked nothing like the damage a baby dragon could inflict. Coming closer to examine them, Mumei recognized them as claw marks as though a large beast had ripped through the iron. She ran her fingers over the remaining layers of metal, sensing that it was still warm to the touch. Many of the shipping crates and iron boxes had been destroyed or torn open. It only took a glance inside for Mumei to know they were all empty.
I guess she got here before me. Mumei shrugged. She sighed, and the tension in her shoulders loosened. Then again, she’s always been really fast. No surprise there. She couldn’t have gotten far, though.
Now that she was calm, Mumei could sense no signs of life on the ship. There were no heartbeats she could hear, nor were there any signs of breathing. The gunpowder smelled smokey, like it had been freshly used, though Mumei couldn’t hear any signs of a conflict. A brief inspection of the ship’s lower decks yielded no results, either. All she’d found were broken wooden boxes and torn cages; whatever had been trapped in the cages was gone without a trace. To Mumei, this was all within expectations. Gliding over to the next ship in the convoy, she was faced with more of the same: shattered rifle barrels, large claw marks, bullet casings on the floor, and the iron-laced stench of blood.
“…maybe she isn’t here. Did the dragons break out on their own?” Mumei wondered out loud to herself, bobbing her head from side to side as she peered into the captain’s office of the ship. Entering, Mumei grimaced at the sight of the destroyed control panel; it had been shot up with bullets and blackened to a crisp. She ran her hands along the walls as she walked around the office, being careful not to step on the shards of broken glass that were strewn across the floor. The walls had been charred and filled with even more bullet holes. Mumei followed them along, observing that the bullet holes seemed to be following a pattern; the spray was drawing a line from one end of the room to the other, almost as if the shooter had been trying to hit a moving target. The claw marks that she’d seen thus far were also present here, both in the metal floor and in the walls. “…or maybe she left already. Maybe she took care of every-”
The sound of a distant explosion preceded the sound of distant gunfire, cutting off Mumei’s train of thought and sending her into a sprint. She bolted out of the office and scrambled down the stairs to reach the ship's front deck. Stopping at the handrails, Mumei cast her gaze about in search of the source of the noise. Following the sound of bullets, Mumei’s gaze landed on a nearby island where one of the cargo ships had been beached. She leaped off the handrailing before her and spread her wings, flying toward the conflict. As Mumei touched down on the shore, the sounds of battle died down, and it was silent once more.
Mumei surveyed her surroundings, her wings retreating back into her body. The smell of blood was much fresher here. Many of the smaller ships were also beached and docked here, the sand covered in footprints. She frowned at the sight of the first body, an older man with his face buried in the dirt and his hands tied behind his back with rope. Noticing that his body rose and fell to the rhythm of a person’s breathing, Mumei quietly approached and knelt beside him. She turned him over to see that his face was battered, blood seeping from a few light scratches on his forehead. His eyes were closed.
“…unconscious but alive,” she commented quietly, rolling him back over and getting to her feet. Her gaze wandered from the man’s bound wrists to the footprints in the sand. Following the trail, Mumei found another body: a young woman bound with rope to a tree trunk with her head hanging limply. Much like the first man Mumei had seen, she had been left bruised and unconscious. The remains of a broken rifle lay at the woman’s feet. “Another one,” Mumei muttered to herself, getting to her feet and looking back at the wreckage on the shore.
A whimper.
The silence was broken by a sudden high-pitched whine. Though it reminded Mumei of the kind of noise a scared dog would make, the sound didn’t resemble a creature she recognized. She turned around and narrowed her eyes, scanning the beach for the source. It was softer and weaker the second time she heard it. It was coming from the other end of the shore. Following it, she swept through the debris of broken wooden crates and dismantled ship parts until she reached the shredded remains of some metal shipping crates. She heard the cry again and followed it until the noises led her to a cage that was partially submerged in seawater and sand. Inside the cage was what appeared to be a small lizard-like creature with spines from head-to-toe and bat-like wings that were folded into its body. As Mumei poked her head into the cage to examine it more closely, the creature shriveled up and shrank into the corner as much as possible.
A dragon. By the looks of it, a baby.
“Aww, what are you still doing here, little guy?” Mumei extended an open hand to the hatchling. The creature stared back at her with bright yellow eyes. It did not attempt to move toward her. Maintaining a smile, she reached further into the cage to touch it. When her finger made contact with its snout, the baby dragon recoiled but did not fight back or resist. The baby dragon eyed her finger intently, its forked tongue slipping out from between its lips to lick the finger. She smiled gently, beginning to rub the creature’s head comfortingly. “I’m not gonna hurt you,” she whispered, her voice soft.
It took a few minutes of cooing and gentle words before the small dragon felt safe enough to crawl out of the cage. It looked at her, blinked once, and let out a tiny whine before nuzzling its snout into her hand. “It’s okay, don’t worry, little buddy,” she said, giggling as she stroked the dragon from head to tail. “I’m not gonna bite. Don’t worry about it.” Mumei took the opportunity to run her hand over the scales and look for any signs of injury. To her relief, not a single scale seemed out of place.
The baby dragon cooed again, licking the palm of her hand. Another round of gunfire split the silence, and the hatchling cowed, hiding behind Mumei and shrinking into a ball. Mumei turned to look in the direction of the source: the forest. Looking back at the little creature next to her, she placed her index finger under the baby dragon’s snout and turned it to look into her eyes. “…it’s not safe here, okay? Go on, get outta here, little buddy.” Though she wasn’t sure if the dragon understood her words, it whined once more before extending its wings and flapping them. It struggled to take flight, clumsily flapping its wings and wobbling before it finally caught the wind and flew in the direction opposite of the clamor. A sense of relief overtook Mumei as the baby dragon disappeared from sight, its outline melting into the waves. She got to her feet, took a deep breath, and broke into a run toward the gunshots.
That’s definitely her.
It didn’t take long for Mumei to find the clues she needed: a trail of unconscious men and women, all bound with rope and tied to trees or dangling from branches overhead. The smell of blood was fresher here than it was at the beach. The bodies marked a path that led further into the forest. As she followed it, the gunfire grew louder; Mumei could make out faint yelling somewhere in the distance, a sign that she was getting close. Another explosion rocked the ground, and this time, Mumei was close enough for the tremors to threaten her balance. Wobbling and nearly tripping over the roots of a nearby tree, Mumei crouched and took a moment to breathe and compose herself. Her ears still ringing from the blast, the owl-girl shook her head and rested her weight against the tree.
As the seconds passed, the high-pitched ringing began to fade away.
But she could hear something else now.
Something big.
Mumei could hear a large growl from behind her, and the hairs on the back of her neck stood on end. The noise grew into a loud snarl, and she felt a chill run down her spine. Her body moved before her brain could think of what to do; Mumei ducked and tucked her chin against her chest, shielding the top of her head with her hands. The moon's light was blotted out by the shadow of something passing overhead. Mumei felt a large creature leaping over her, the scales on its belly brushing against her hair. Once it had cleared her head, she leaped to her feet and jumped a few feet in the opposite direction to distance herself from the creature now in front of her. It glared at her with its beady black eyes, cerulean flames spilling out from in between its fangs. Its wings were fully outstretched as it roared, flames spewing out of its open maw and blackening the forest floor.
A dragon. From how it looked down at her while standing on its hind legs, Mumei could tell it was twice her height. It glared down at her, approaching her with slow and heavy steps while its tail made a loud scraping noise as it snaked along the soil and leaves. It snarled again, its tail lashing out against a tree and splitting the bark easily.
Mumei blinked, looking the dragon up and down, and smiled. She recognized the dragon’s dark-purple hide, its feathery wings, and the goggles that hung from its neck. “Oh, hey, Ember! Long time, no see!” she said, approaching the dragon with a hop and a skip in her step. “Still remember me? Haven’t seen ya in a while!”
Confused by Mumei’s visible lack of fear, the dragon took a step back from her and regarded her with caution. It growled once more, albeit more softly, as its tail whipped out from behind to strike the ground in front of Mumei. It peered at her curiously, slowly circling her while maintaining the distance between them. Not paying any mind to the dragon’s attempts at intimidation, Mumei approached it and placed her hand on the top of its head to affectionately pet and stroke it with a giggle. “You’re so big now since I last saw ya. Sorry I haven’t visited for your birthdays like I used to, Ember. I promise I’ll be around for the next one!”
The dragon retreated a few steps once again, eyeing her. Mumei was glad to see that though it still looked confused, she could no longer sense hostility from it. “Anyway, where is she? You’ve been helping her fight all these goons, right?”
He nodded his head and turned on his heels to begin running deeper into the forest towards the gunshots and explosions from earlier, not bothering to wait for Mumei. Thanks to Ember’s dark purple feathery hide, Mumei immediately lost track of his form when he disappeared into the shadows and the forest's underbrush. She followed his trail instead, looking down and tracking the large footprints he left behind. After minutes of running, Mumei could see the trees open up into a large clearing. She slowed from a run to a walk as she approached when she saw a lone figure surrounded by the bodies of several unconscious men and women; even from a distance, Mumei could see the blood splattered on her cheek. Her clothes were torn and burnt, her braided hair was tousled and messy, and sweat dripped from her chin. The young woman’s mouth hung open as her shoulders heaved up and down, fighting to catch her breath.
“Heya. Thought you’d be here, Selen.”
The woman turned to look at Mumei, her eyes widening when they made eye contact. “M-Mumei?” she managed to get out in between tired breaths. “Wh-what are you doing here?”
Mumei entered the clearing and approached her, taking an extra-large step to avoid stepping onto the head of an unconscious woman at her feet. “Heard there was something going on around here. I know you live close by, so I figured you’d be on the case pretty soon. I came to check anyway. Y’know, just in case.”
Selen let out a big sigh and grinned, combing her hair with her fingers in an attempt to tidy it up. Small bundles of her purple locks remained matted against her sweaty forehead. As she ran her fingers through her hair again, the sound of rubber snapping could be heard. One of her braided pigtails came loose, and the lunar sky dragon rolled her eyes before returning her gaze to Mumei. “You should’ve showed up fifteen minutes ago, then. We could’ve taken them out together, just like old times.”
Mumei perked up at that. “Just like old times…you mean, like, back when we first met?”
“Yeah, man, that was pretty fun,” Selen snickered, resting her hands against her waist. “We kicked some major ass back then.”
“The Council never forgot about that, by the way,” Mumei laughed, shrugging her shoulders. “We still have your record, and I think Ame still has it in her office somewhere. You have your own file, y’know.”
Hearing that, Selen’s tail struck the ground once with a loud scrape while she let out an exasperated groan. “Aw, c’mon, Mumei; I thought you were gonna sweep that under the rug for me. It was for a good cause, remember?”
“I did my best, Selen. And yeah, we did know that you were doing it to free imprisoned dragons, so we know where you were coming from…it’s just, y’know…” Mumei tilted her head by a few degrees, smiling. “…you did burn down a few villages and cities too.”
Selen gave her a flat stare. “I mean, they were literally making food out of dragons and wearing our skins and scales as a fashion statement, Mumei.”
“That’s why we ended up deciding not to bring you in, after all. I made sure of that, too. I mean,” Mumei walked up to Selen and pushed her index finger into the lunar sky dragon’s forehead. “You didn’t find Fauna or Bae knocking on your door, right?”
Selen laughed nervously. The wings on her head folded into her hair as she shifted her weight from one foot to the other, her tail beginning to coil into itself. “…would they have shown up?”
“Oh man, you should’ve seen it,” Mumei nodded with a small giggle. “Bae was in a horrible mood that day, so Kronii and I had to talk her down. She kept saying that if she caught you razing another town to the ground, she’d show up at your door and teach you a lesson herself. Or something like that.”
“Yikes,” Selen grimaced. “I, uh…guess I’ll be more careful.”
“Mhm~” Mumei nodded. “I know you’re strong, Selen, but fighting Bae might be a bit too much even for you.”
Selen scratched the back of her head. “Yeah, I’m not gonna try my luck,” she said as she crouched and hefted one of the unconscious men onto her shoulder. “Well, since you’re here, help me tie them all up so that we can call the authorities on their asses.”
“No problem~”
After scavenging some rope from the abandoned ships, it took the two friends all of thirty minutes to make sure none of the poachers weren’t going anywhere. To ensure none of the criminals wouldn’t make a lucky escape, Selen and Mumei had tied their bonds into knots so needlessly complicated that they didn’t know how to undo them. Some of them were secured against the trunks of trees while others were hanging from the branches of other trees; all the firearms, whether broken or intact, had all been grouped into a neat pile on the opposite end of the clearing along with the remaining explosives that some of the poachers still had in their vests and pockets.
“You sure that this is okay for now?” Mumei asked, grunting as she secured the knot of the last group of unconscious poachers around the base of the gnarled branch of a half-burnt tree. She pulled on it to test if the knot could come undone. Satisfied that it didn’t move a millimeter, she exhaled loudly and turned to glance at Selen. “What if they wake up before someone gets here to fetch them?”
“Nah, it should be fine,” Selen waved her hand dismissively, bending one of the leftover rifles in half and taking it apart with her tail. She tossed the metal remains onto a pile of scrapped guns in a manner that emulated a basketball player. “A lot of them are out cold. Even if they do, we tied their wrists and ankles too. They’re gonna be fine. Even if they wake up, they won’t be able to break out of the ropes. Probably.”
“Probably?”
“Probably.”
“You’re probably right,” Mumei got to her feet, dusting her clothes off and readjusting the fit of her gloves before beginning to retie the ribbon of her cloak. “So? What happens now?”
“I’m just about finished up here,” Selen walked up to Mumei, her hands behind the back of her head. The wings on her head wiggled up and down, flapping gently as she spoke. She wiped some of the sweat on her forehead with the tattered remains of her sweater, letting out a tired sigh. “Probably gonna head back home. I’ve still gotta stream tomorrow, anyway. I could use a nap after all that.”
The lunar sky dragon had only walked five paces, however, before she felt a tug on her tail and something pulling her backward to prevent her from advancing. Confused, she turned around to see Mumei with a frown and a raised eyebrow. “Oh no, you’re not.”
Confused, Selen took retrieved her tail and turned to face Mumei. “What?”
The owl-girl looked Selen up and down before giving her a look of disbelief. “Uh, you’re wounded.”
Selen looked down at herself. Her sweater and pants were torn and burnt to expose the lunar sky dragon’s skin, showing off the light-red grazes and purple bruises on her thighs and belly. Her arms were worse off; plenty of blue and purple marks dotted Selen’s right arm. Though her left arm seemed less injured, some cuts and scrapes were still clearly visible even through the purple scales. “Yeah… well, I mean, that kinda ends up happening when you’re fighting people that have knives, guns, and grenades.”
Mumei rolled her eyes and sat down on the grass, patting the ground across her and looking up at Selen expectantly. “C’mon, sit down. Lemme fix you up.”
Selen shrugged. After a few seconds of silence and maintaining eye contact, she walked up to Mumei and sat down with her legs extended. “It’s not really a big deal, y’know. Besides, isn’t your healing magic out of practice, Mumei? When was the last time you had to use it?”
“No better way to practice it than to put it to use in situations like this one, right?” Mumei knelt next to Selen’s legs and placed her hands onto her left thigh. With a deep breath, she began to channel energy from her core and into her fingertips. A faint green light began to emerge from her hands. Wisps of the energy escaped from her palms and sank into Selen’s skin, and the dragon let out a sigh of relief. Mumei could feel Selen’s thigh relaxing underneath her touch. “…you don’t have to pretend like you’re not in pain, y’know,” she said with a smirk.
“I’m not. It just doesn’t hurt that bad.”
Mumei paused and stared at Selen, a few seconds of silence passing by before she let out a loud giggle. “You really said the same thing, huh?”
Selen could only offer a confused look in reply. “Huh? What do you mean?”
“Nothing. It’s the same thing you told me when we first met.” Mumei said with a nostalgic smile. “Remember? You just got done freeing a bunch of dragons, and I showed up…”
Selen’s wings perked up, and her tail wagged a little. “Oh yeah, I remember. Dude, you totally fuckin’ scared me back then when you showed up outta nowhere, y’know? I thought you were a completely ordinary little girl.”
Mumei’s laugh only grew louder. “The look on your face when you realized I was fireproof was so funny. I’m sad that I never got to take a picture of that.”
“I don’t think you know how scary you are sometimes, y’know, Mumei? You literally tanked my fire breath like it was nothing.”
“I kept telling you I was just a normal little girl, but you wouldn’t believe me.”
“I mean, your full name literally means ‘no name’ twice.”
“You were so aggressive back then, too. Do you remember trying to pick a fight with me?”
Selen groaned, closing her eyes. Mumei caught a glimpse of the lunar dragon’s face flushing at the memory. Her head-wings closed in to shield her face and her tail thumped the ground loudly. “God, don’t remind me.”
Mumei removed her hands from Selen’s thigh, satisfied to see that the wounds, bruises, and burn marks were gone. She leaned forward, placing her hand on the dragon’s other thigh and channeling her energy into it. “At least you’re a lot nicer now than you were back then. You were a lot wilder before. I thought you were kinda feral, in a way. But now you’re more chill and mellow. I like that.”
Selen’s face flushed, the wings on her head scrunching up. “I mean…it’s not like I really changed all that much.”
“No, it’s a big change. Bigger than you think, actually. Maybe you just haven’t realized it yet,” Mumei squeezed Selen’s thigh once. “But it’s probably because you have a lot of new friends now.”
Selen’s eyebrow climbed. “Where’d you hear that from?”
“Kiara.”
“Figures. Heard she’s been hanging out with Pomu lately. She didn’t tell you anything weird, did she?”
“Who knows~?” Selen rolled her eyes at that, and Mumei giggled in response. The owl-girl leaned in a little to make eye contact with Selen as she finished with the dragon’s thigh moving onto Selen’s arms. “Has it been fun?”
Selen was silent for a few seconds. After all these years, Mumei knew her well enough to realize that she was taking the time to think of her answer, so she didn’t say anything that might interrupt Selen’s train of thought. “…yeah,” the dragon sighed, leaning back and planting her palms into the grass. She propped her weight against her arms, looking up to the sky. “It’s been…really, really fun lately.”
“I’m really glad to hear that. I was always worried about you, y’know?”
“Worried? About me?”
“Did I ever tell you I was afraid you’d never get along with humans?”
Selen tore her eyes from the sky to look back at her friend. “No, you didn’t.”
It was Mumei’s turn to pause for a few seconds. Selen’s upper arm had long since healed, but Mumei’s gaze remained fixed on the air in front of her, hands still gripping Selen’s bicep. “You were always so…hmm…what’s the word? Hateful, maybe? Yeah, you were kinda hateful back then. You were so quick to get back at humans and get revenge for your fellow dragons whenever humans did anything bad to them. I don’t blame you for it. It’s just…after all that, I figured you’d have a hard time fitting in with humans. When I heard you came to Earth, I was worried that maybe…y’know, you’d hate them too much after all they’ve done to dragons and stuff. Maybe you’d hate them too much to even try getting along with them.”
“…I think that I felt that way about humans before, to be honest.” Selen leaned forward and gently pried Mumei’s hand off her leg. The sudden sensation of the dragon’s hand on her own hand brought the owl-girl’s attention back to reality, making her turn to look at Selen. “I mean, I did watch them kill a lot of dragons before. You’re not wrong. Probably, at some point, I thought making peace with them would be impossible.”
Mumei blinked. “What changed for you, then?”
“People changed my perspective, I guess. There were people that helped me see things differently. Elira was one of them.” The corners of Selen’s lips began to curl upward into the softest, smallest smile Mumei had ever seen on her. “She came to Earth way before I did. She showed me that the humans here aren’t like the ones I knew before. I mean, I’ve met humans before, so I know what they’re like. But after I came here, I met someone who came to Earth to study humans. Together, we met humans and learned more about them…and eventually, I guess I just had my mind changed for me before I realized. Besides,” Selen snickered. “It’s pretty exhausting to hate something for a long time, y’know? I guess I got tired of hating.”
Staring at Selen’s face reminded Mumei that there was still a cheek wound to heal. The owl-girl reached out to Selen’s face and pressed the pad of her thumb against the dragon’s cheek. “Someone who studied humans, huh? Is that the anthropologist girlfriend from under the sea that Pomu mentioned to Kiara? I forgot her name, though. All I remember is something about finances…”
Mumei felt the dragon’s cheek grow hotter under her touch right before Selen recoiled, putting an inch of distance between them. “What the fu-? She’s not my girlfriend, Mumei,” she replied, her head-wings flapping faster and her tail striking the ground.
The owl-girl smirked. “Oh? A blush? From the Selen Tatsuki, of all people? Am I hallucinating? Is Ragnarok coming again?”
The lunar sky dragon chose to ignore the remark, offering her cheek to Mumei. “Oh, shut it. Yes, I was talking about Finana. And no, she’s not my girlfriend.”
Mumei giggled, gently running her finger over Selen’s cheekbone and pouring her energy into the scratch on her face. She watched intently as the wound began to close “Aww, is the little dragon getting embarrassed? It’s okay, you can tell me. I won’t tell no one.”
“You don’t get to say shit to me about this, Mumei. You’ve been going on and on about Kronii for the past…what, seven centuries? What’s the status on that, huh?”
It was Mumei’s turn to feel the blood rush to her face. “I-it’s just…y’know, it’s not a good time right now. I’m waiting for a good opportunity.”
“Any time is a good time for someone who can literally control time, Mumei. Pretty weak excuse, if you ask me.”
Mumei’s brow furrowed, and she flicked her finger against Selen’s freshly healed cheek. Selen yelped, rubbing her cheek and glancing at Mumei only to snicker when she saw the owl-girl’s frown. Mumei stood up, batting the grass out of her skirt, and then offered a hand to Selen to help her stand. Taking it, Selen let out a surprised yelp when Mumei tugged her with enough force to pull the dragon to her feet. Cricking her neck and stretching her arms over her head, Selen arched her back and let out a high-pitched whine. “Okay, that feels much better.”
“Funny how getting rid of pain and bleeding will do that, huh?” Mumei giggled. “Anyway, I’m probably gonna head back home. You too?”
“Yup,” Selen yawned. “I’m pretty beat after all that. I hope I don’t sleep through my alarms. Oh, good luck, by the way.”
Mumei looked up at Selen, tilting her head slightly. “Hm? With what?”
“With the Kronii thing. You’ve been at it for a while, so…”
“Nah, don’t worry about it. What’ll happen will happen, y’know? Besides, I’m not too worried.”
“Oh? You’re confident. Got a plan, Mumei?”
“Not really. But there’s a reason I’m not worried.”
“What is it?”
Mumei curled her finger inward, beckoning for Selen to lean in closer. The lunar sky dragon obliged, bending forward and offering her ear. Likewise, Mumei leaned in to whisper something into Selen’s ear.
“Uh…let’s just say Kronii’s not the only person on my mind lately.”
Selen felt her heart pause for a few beats as she felt Mumei’s lips suddenly peck at her cheek. Flabbergasted, Selen stepped back and stared at the owl-girl in disbelief. “Y-you-?!”
“Bye-bye!” With a laugh, Mumei’s wings sprouted from beneath her cloak. She beat her wings and shot up into the sky, her outline quickly fading into the night sky until she was lost from sight.
Still shocked, Selen stared after her. At a loss for words, she remained standing there for minutes as she tried to absorb what had just happened.
“…well, I guess some things never change, after all.”
A loud growl from behind. Selen turned to see Ember staring at her with a flat expression on his face. He growled a second time, sitting down on the grass.
“No, Ember. I’m not cheating on Finana. You can’t cheat on someone if you’re not in a relationship with them.”
Ember growled again, the corners of his lips visibly curling up into a smirk.
“No, Mumei is not my ex-girlfr- one more word out of you, and I’m not feeding you dinner.”
“…”
“Don’t give me that look, Ember.”