Chapter Text
…
…
(Look out for yourself)
The walk to the third-closest lake from the Academy was one that Changbai found quite familiar.
It was peaceful, quiet, and usually devoid of other dragons, since most other students didn’t even think to go for a stroll along this path in particular.
Even the other members of the Silver Winglet usually went to the second-closest lake to their dorms when they weren’t swimming.
I wake up to the sounds of the silence that allows
For my mind to run around
With my ear up to the ground
And even when they were, not one of them but Anemone actually minded the acidity in the water there “being off,” or whatever.
Changbai, though, preferred the familiarity of the scenery surrounding him as he walked.
Plus, the path actually being a bit longer (but not too much longer) made it so the walk actually felt productive, and was heart- and lung-healthy enough to be worth the time it took.
I'm searchin' to behold the stories that are told
When my back is to the world
That was smilin' when I turned
Changbai’s music played quietly, atmosphere-makingly through his wireless earbuds.
It was the theme song to a show he’d been watching recently.
Maybe a slightly edgy choice for an afternoon walk, sure, but it wasn’t like there was anyone around to judge him for his music choice, either.
Tell you you're the greatest
No, it was just him, the trees, and his thoughts.
But once you turn, they hate us…
Suddenly, though, Changbai heard some sort of sound.
A rustling, maybe?
He quickly moved to take one of his BreezeBuds out.
The music immediately paused itself as it detected this motion.
…
Ah, well.
Probably nothing.
Oh, the misery
Everybody wants to be my enemy
Spare the sympathy
Everybody wants to be-
A rustling sound again.
This time, Changbai took out his right earbud even more rapidly, turning back and looking all around for whatever could have made the noise.
…
…
Still nothing.
Changbai was suspicious now, though.
He slowly moved to put his earbud back in, hearing the music already start back up again before it even touched his ear.
-my enemy-y-y-y-y
(Look out for yourself)
Changbai slowly started back up once again, his steps slow and tentative as he stayed alert for any sort of potential danger.
My enemy-y-y-y-y
(Look, look, look, look)
(Look out for yourself)
But I'm ready…
Suddenly, a muted thud resounded behind Changbai.
He immediately ripped out his BreezeBud again, trying not to panic as he turned back to face whoever or whatever it was that just made that noise.
“Oh, nice.”
Changbai was faced with none other than the Silver Winglet’s NightWing.
“You are out here around this time of day.”
Fearless.
It looked like she had just landed in front of him, after flying some distance.
“I finally found you, dude.”
Changbai was honestly a bit surprised to see her make this entrance of hers from the air, as she wouldn’t have made those rustling noises if she’d flown to get to him.
In other words, whatever was rustling about just then, it wasn’t Fearless.
The IceWing decided he had a bigger problem than that at the moment, though, withdrawing into a more defensive posture as he stuffed his earbud into his inhaler satchel.
His phone, however, sensing that the other one was still in his ear, continued to play the music he’d been listening to.
Your words up on the wall as you're prayin' for my fall
And the laughter in thе halls and the names that I've been called
Slightly distracting, but again, bigger problems.
“… F-Fearless?” Changbai began hesitantly. “What are you doing here?”
“Oh, nothing,” Fearless’s tone was surprisingly rather malicious from the offset. “Just wanted to have a little talk. A conversation, if you will.”
The NightWing took a step towards Changbai, and he took a reciprocal step back in response.
“Um… about what?” the IceWing asked again. “You know you could’ve just waited until I got back to the dorms, right?”
Fearless brought a talon to her chin at that, humming effeminately and imitating considering the possibility he’d just offered her.
“Hmmmmmmmmm… nah. This is something we should talk about in private.”
I stack it in my mind, and I'm waitin' for the time
When I show you what it's like to be words spit in a mic
Another threatening step, and Changbai grips his pouch close to him as his heart begins to race.
“Look, Fearless,” he begins, trying not to let his voice shake too audibly as he does so. “I don’t know what I did to make you angry at me, but I apologise. I hope you can just forgive whatever it is I did, and maybe we can move-”
Fearless, however, didn’t seem interested in negotiation, interrupting Changbai’s sentence with a loud laugh.
“There you fuckin’ go again, huh? Trying to play the nice guy? Trying to make me feel like I’m the one in the wrong here?”
“What? N-no, I don’t…”
Tell you you're the greatest
Changbai didn’t know what to say to that, slowly backing even further away as he tried to distance himself from the NightWing physically.
“… I-I don’t know what you’re talking about…”
But once you turn, they hate us
(Ha)
“Hahahahah! You’re telling me you don’t know??” Fearless laughed again, her voice grating against the tranquil silence of the forest. “Moons, I knew IceWings were supposed to be arrogant, but I didn’t think you’d be this bad. You can’t even bother to take your fucking BreezeBud out while talking to me.”
IceWings?
Arrogance?
Fucking hell…
Why was this always what it was about??
Oh, the misery
“Again, Fearless,” Changbai did his best to keep his voice utterly calm, “I have no idea what you think I said or did, but whatever it was, I’m sorry. I’m sure I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings.”
Fearless’s smile was starting to turn into a sneer now.
“Heh. You’re ‘sure you didn’t mean to.’ How sincere.”
Everybody wants to be my enemy
“You know I didn’t mean it like that, Fearless,” Changbai sighed. “I’m just telling you that-”
“What I know is that you hate my tribe, Changbai!” the NightWing’s voice suddenly rose to a roar. “You hate us! You hate us, and I was right to hate you for it!!”
Hated them??
There was no way she actually thought that.
All Changbai had ever done this whole time was tolerate NightWings!
All the goddamn discrimination, and animosity, and disputes he’d had over the idiotic fucking hatred their peoples had for each other…
Spare the sympathy
Everybody wants to be my enemy-y-y-y-y
(Look, look, look, look)
(Look out for yourself)
Changbai was starting to get angry now, too, his lips curling into a slight snarl as he replied.
“I’ve never done anything this whole time but cooperate with you, Fearless!” he raised his own voice almost to a shout as he spoke. “Even after you showed me nothing but hostility ever since we first enrolled here, even after you abandoned our winglet in order to fight for Darkstalker, I’ve been willing to forgive you and all your actions for the sake of peace.”
Fearless seemed taken slightly aback at the mention of her defection during the Battle, her eyes flickering ever so slightly with doubt at what she was doing as Changbai continued to yell.
“To tell you the truth, yeah, I did sorta fucking hate you and your tribe. There was a time when that was true, as ashamed as I am to admit it,” he went on. “But I have never outwardly shown an ounce of hatred towards you or any other NightWings in all my time here at Jade Mountain. If you didn’t notice, I had the manners and common sense to keep that shit to myself!”
My enemy-y-y-y-y
(Look, look, look, look; yeah)
(Look out for yourself)
“Oh, yeah?” Fearless challenged him. “Is that really so?”
“Yes! It literally is, dude, I’m telling you!”
The NightWing replied to him without missing a beat.
“Then what about what you said in the hallways that day, huh?”
…
Well, shit.
“Don’t tell me you don’t even remember.”
Changbai’s heart dropped as he did, in fact, remember exactly what she was talking about.
Uh, look, okay
I'm hopin' that somebody pray for me
I'm prayin' that somebody hope for me
Moons, he’d been such a fucking idiot to say all that shit to Clairvoyance…
He maintained his innocence here, however, trying his best to mask the weight of this realisation.
“I… I don’t know what you’re talking about, Fearless. Seriously.”
Fearless immediately, wordlessly pulled out her own phone then, tapping to unpause something that she’d seemingly had prepared before even confronting him.
I'm stayin' where nobody 'posed to be
P-p-posted
Being a wreck of emotions…
And over the rap section of the theme song of his favourite show, Changbai heard all his former hatred come voice-memoed right back to him.
“If you really wanna know so fucking bad, then no, I don’t have anything to do with Lawspeaker! I don’t have anything to do with NightWings, and their horrible lies, and their creepy fucking psychic powers!”
Fearless held her phone up high, the glittered star patterns on the case shimmering in the afternoon sun, her grin triumphant as if this was some sort of victory for her tribe.
Changbai stared down towards the dirt ground of the path, feeling utterly irritated at Fearless’s smug attitude, but also severely guilty at the bigotry he was hearing his own distinctive voice spew.
“I was always taught that I had to be careful of you people, and now, I finally know why! You just never want to treat dragons like us honestly, do you?!”
As the voice memo stopped playing, Fearless let her phone drop to the ground as she started speaking once again.
“You see, Changbai? You lie, you pretend, you claim to be the nicest fucking dragon in the world, but you know. You know that you blame and gaslight and victim-blame everybody else, when the real victim is anybody but you every time!”
Changbai genuinely had no response to this, moving back step by step while Fearless again began to advance towards him.
“But you know what? I’m done,” the NightWing continued. “I’m fucking done dealing with your closet-racist bullshit. I’m done dealing with you people putting up that goddamn front of civility!”
Fearless’s talons were starting to look awfully sharp now.
Their white surfaces glinted dangerously as the rapper’s words in Changbai’s BreezeBud began to quicken in pace.
They wanna plot on my trot to the top
I been outta shape, thinkin' out the box, I'm an astronaut
“H-hey, man, get the fuck back!” Changbai was starting to actually panic now. “I-I’m sorry for what I said, alright? Can’t you just believe me??”
“I stopped believing you the moment I heard those damn words come out your damn mouth, Changbai,” Fearless snarled in reply. “When I was already that close to being ready to forgive you? Thinking for once in my life that, ‘hey, maybe IceWings aren’t so bad after all?’”
I blasted off the planet rock to cause catastrophe
And it matters more because I had it not
“But Fearless,” said IceWing was getting increasingly frantic, “you’re doing exactly what you say I’m doing by doing… whatever it is you’re about to do! Y-you’re becoming what you hate!”
Fearless, however, didn’t seem to care, baring her teeth and claws as she seemingly prepared to pounce.
“I’m just defending myself and my people, Changbai. I did treat you honestly, I did think it was possible for us to become friends at one point, but you went and ruined every possibility of that. I’m setting a rightful boundary here, against all of your bigotry!”
Had I thought about wreaking havoc
On an opposition, kinda shockin'
Seeing no way to run or fly away quickly enough that she wouldn’t catch up, Changbai postured his body shakily and prepared himself to fight.
“S-stay back, Fearless, I’m f-fucking warning you!” the IceWing desperately wished he sounded even a little bit intimidating here. “I… I won’t fucking hold back.”
“Haha! What, hold back from slashing me with your short, gay-ass talons?” Fearless laughed. “I don’t think so.”
Changbai glanced down momentarily at his talons, and realised she was right.
They wanted static
With precision, I'm automatic quarterback
He cursed himself for picking the piano to play, of all the instruments out there, before a final resort of a threat came to his mind.
“I still have frostbreath, though,” he told her. “Frostbreath, which, I’m sure you know is pretty fucking shit to deal with if you get hit.”
Nevermind that he had never fucking learned to use it before.
“Just… please, Fearless, can we please just talk this out?”
I ain't talkin' sackin', pack it
Pack it up
“Sorry, Changbai,” Fearless said, “but if you can’t trust my ‘horrible lies,’ then I can’t trust yours, either.”
I don't panic, batter-batter up
Who the baddest?
With a leap, Fearless lunged straight at Changbai’s snout, claws and jaws bared and ready to attack.
It don’t matter
Changbai tried to summon his frostbreath-
'Cause we at your throat
And with a yelp, Fearless was knocked down by another, larger body of night-blackened scales.
!
Everybody wants to be my enemy
Changbai began to hack and cough, gagging like he never had before, feeling like he was about to vomit his lungs out.
He had not, in fact, been able to summon his frostbreath.
Spare the sympathy (Ah)
Everybody wants to be my enemy
Lawspeaker began attempting to subdue Fearless by throttling her, his muscles clearly bulging against the other NightWing’s frenzied resistance.
Oh, the misery (Ah)
Everybody wants to be my enemy
Changbai scrambled around for his inhaler, ripping what few straps kept his satchel together for those precious, precious sprays of medicine.
Thankfully, he actually had it with him this time, and he took a panicky few breaths from the blue device as he watched Lawspeaker fight his fellow tribesdragon.
Spare the sympathy (Ah)
He and Lawspeaker made a brief, almost infinitesimally short moment of eye contact, while the latter was holding Fearless down by her neck.
Everybody wants to be
The NightWing’s eyes were almost screaming at him, begging him to just go.
My enemy
Go! Go!!
Just go!!!
Pray it away, I swear I'll never be a saint, no way
My enemy
Changbai grabbed his inhaler and got up with frantic effort off the dirt ground of the path.
The IceWing opened his wings and began to fly, tears beginning to stream down his face as he left the two NightWings to their bitter struggle below.
Pray it away, I swear I'll never be a saint
(Look out for yourself)