Backing up a bit, Hermes had managed to slip inside the makeshift lab the scientists were using, although doing so made his anxiety skyrocket. He could tell that this was meant to be a temporary base of operation. The metal structure was disorganized inside, with dozens of strange and horrifying machines scattered around and covered by white sheets. Despite their unnerving appearance and purposes, Hermes was thankful they were here and in such a cluttered state because they provided excellent cover.
In the next room over, he could hear Al yelling and struggling. A wave of relief washed over him once he heard that because it confirmed that she was alive. Of course, now the issue was how he, Toothless, Truth, and Pat were going to get her out of here, also while still alive themselves. In the midst of these thoughts and his planning, he noticed one of the scientists enter with a rather bulky, hand-held gadget. It was very different from the rest of the mechanical abominations in the room, which all required multiple men to move anywhere. Although cumbersome in shape, it was only half Hermes' size.
He witnessed one of the scientists place it on a wooden stool while whispering to another. They seemed to regard it with great reverence, as if it were some sort of effigy. Hermes had to wonder what its purpose might be. An inkling of a possibility dawned on him, then. He wasn't absolutely sure, but he had a guess as to what such a small machine did and why it was so important to the scientists.
His train of thought was starkly interrupted when a third man entered the room and started barking at the other two. Apparently, he had commanded them to take part in something more important than staring at a metal box because they rushed into the other room after him. Once they were gone, Hermes trepedatiously crawled up the stool and ogled the machine for himself. He picked it up and was surprised by how heavy it was. He was a little shocked that the skinny scientist he had seen holding it earlier was able to lift it with such ease. Flying back to Toothless and the others with it wouldn't be easy, but, if his guess was correct about what it was, then it would be well worth it, and they would be able to succeed in their mission.
He didn't want to risk breaking it here. He wanted to test his theory first, but before he could, Al released her chilling nightmare screech from the torture the scientists were forcing her to undergo. Hermes was completely frozen as the thin steel walls of the building trembled as if an earthquake were hitting them. He sort of shut down for a moment, just chilled by the sheer volume of the scream. Smaller dragons like him were more affected by sounds. He might've died on the spot had he been even closer.
Fighting his instincts and the locking up of his brain, Hermes snapped out of it and forced himself to move. He needed to get back to the others. If they could determine that this device was what Hermes thought it was and destroy it, they would win. They would save Al. He hobbled off of the stool, dragging the device behind him. He collapsed a few times, the noise causing him great pain.
And, then, right as he was about to reach the exit, it stopped. It took Hermes a few seconds to adjust. His ears were ringing, and he couldn't understand what had happened. Slowly, new sounds began entering his ears. He heard the hunters outside getting restless and confused. But... he also heard the scientists beyond the other door. And, now, they were screaming. In fact, it sounded like there was now a mass panic back there. Hermes stared at the door in cold fear and confusion. What on Earth was happening? Was Al OK? What was happening to her? What was happening to the scientists?
He got some semblance of an answer when one of them, in fact it was Bartholomew "Cottonmouth" Willistar the Fourth himself came bursting out of the door, looking downright mortified. Or, well, it was a bit hard to tell what expression he was wearing because at least half of his head was gone. Just gone. Nowhere in sight. Hermes screamed and ducked, both at the hideous sight and also because he didn't want to be caught, but Bartholomew ran right over him. He didn't even seem to see Hermes.
He rushed out the second set of doors and into the gathering crowd of panicked dragon hunters, who were certain to be more panicked now than ever. Hermes watched him running, not even paying attention to the unworldly growling behind him, that is until something shot out of the room like an arrow and caught Bartholomew in its teeth. It was hard for Hermes to describe at first, mostly because it came right out of nowhere. The most visual information he could about it was that it looked like the head and neck of a dragon, more specifically a Zippleback. However, it was huge, far bigger than any Zippleback Hermes had ever seen, and the neck was far more snake-like.
He got a better look at the face when it brutally thrashed Bartholomew around, tearing what was left of him in half and causing mass panic among the hunters. They all reached for weapons and started lashing out at the- whatever it was. Hermes rushed out of the makeshift lab with the device in his claws and tried to get a better look. It did look like a Zippleback's head, but the features were less defined, and its eyes were clear and glassy. He realized very quickly that it could not see. Through all the chaos it was causing, it just plowed right through the mob of hunters and swallowed whichever ones stabbed at it the closest.
At one point, Hermes froze when he saw another, even less defined head and neck sprout out the other one's side and start gobbling up attackers on its flank. It was one of the most bizarre things Hermes had ever seen in his life. The serpent kept traveling forward, spawning infinite length as it raged in its path of destruction. And more of them just kept coming! Every time Hermes glanced back at the makeshift lab, at least two more serpents had sprouted out of it and were blindly engaging in wholesale massacre.
By a miracle, Hermes managed to avoid getting hurt in all of this while carrying the heavy device no less. He finally found a space empty enough of chaos to take off in, and, once he did, he didn't look back. He had no clue what was going on, but he knew it was bad, catastrophically bad. He struggled to gain height with the device weighing him down, but it's remarkable what enough adrenaline can do. Hermes bolted into the sky and was looking around wildly for his friends. He desperately hoped one of the weird serpents hadn't found them. As far as he could tell, they were indiscriminate eating machines that probably wouldn't stop, even for the dragons who were there to help them.
Finally, he spotted them among the trees up on a hill overlooking the open grassland-turned-nightmarescape. Even from this distance, he could see their horrified expressions. Even the blind Pat looked ready to out, and he couldn't even see the craziness going on down there. He shouted at them as loud as he could to get their attention, "Heeeeeeey!"
Toothless caught his gaze, a look of baffled confusion on his face, as if Hermes was somehow responsible. Hermes didn't have time to accuse him, especially once he heard another bone-chilling screech below him. He looked for one moment and saw... Al? Or something like Al. It was bathed in blue fire and had two enlarged Zippleback heads emerging from where its eyes should have been. The serpents grew from its neck like tumors. Eight in total sprouted from the base of its neck, and they, in turn, sprouted about two heads themselves, and all of them kept growing and writhing and feasting on everything in sight. It was the picture of an eldritch beast, something ancient and unspeakable from a realm long forgotten. But all Hermes could think was, "Nope."
He turned his attention back to his horrified friends. He had a mission to complete. Even if his leader and good friend was an unrecognizable monster from the abyss, he couldn't give up now. He shouted instructions at the others as loud as his little lungs would allow, "Break this!!! It's Keebo's control box!!!"
With that, he threw the device as far as he could.
•••
Toothless managed to catch it and glanced at it for a split second. That was about how much time he had to process all of the information given to him before he watched one of the airborne serpents drift over and swallow Hermes. It happened so quickly that none of the three even fully ed it happened. One second, Hermes was flying like mad toward them to a backdrop of nightmares. The next, he was gone.
"Wh-wh-what the hell?!!" Truth screamed. She was hugging Pat at this point, either for her own safety or his. They both could've used it. Pat was stunned into silence and trembling.
Toothless looked back out at the chaos and realized Al (or whatever she was now) was growing at an alarming rate. She was going to destroy the whole island. He, then, eyed the 9000, which was still standing completely motionless in the ocean nearby. In that moment, he broke the control box in two. He threw it on the ground and smashed it to bits, even blasted it with a plasma shot. For a second, he desperately hoped Hermes hadn't been mistaken, that he really did find Keebo's cursed control box and not just some random junk.
"Oh god!" Truth screamed. Toothless looked up and noticed a couple of the serpents were now ripping apart the cliff they were standing on. On instinct, the three lifted off so they wouldn't be caught in the ensuing landslide, but that only made them easy prey for the roaming serpents in the air.
One of them, even with its limited eyesight, noticed them and came careening toward them. It was fast. Way too fast for how big it was. And, it's unhinging jaws were too wide for an escape. The three of them froze up, their lives flashing before them. And, then, darkness. They were subsumed by a huge mass, but it was not the blind raging serpent. No, rather than sharp teeth, they felt cold metal. It was Keebo. The island sized mecha had caught them out of the air and was now cradling them gently in his palm.
The three were too disoriented to tell what was happening. They couldn't even that they were safe before Keebo blasted off and took them away from the dangerous scene. Just before he did, though, he locked eyes with the creature that was once his best friend and confidant. In an instant, he ed everything that was going on, and he silently vowed to come back and save her.
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Cover Credits
Order: :arrow_up:
:green_heart: Hermes :green_heart:
Belongs to Al Pha (Me)
Design: School of Dragons
Breed: Terrible Terror - HtTYD Franchise
:blue_heart: Al Pha :blue_heart:
Belongs to Al Pha (Me)
Design: School of Dragons & Al Pha(Me)
Breed: Human & Hideous Zippleback Fusion - HtTYD Franchise
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