-250 exp. Instance 65 assigned. Good Hunting

  “Not a very popular instance.” Zelda quips as they head for the portal.

  “The taller races complain about joints too much.” Frankie scoffs.

  “Cyber knees are expensive.” Dagnit notes.

  “Not to mention mating dances look rather droopy in such gravity.” Flocks picks a weird note to derail the conversation.

  “Ah, doing a bit of preening, Flocks.” Frankie asks.

  Zelda only wished the conversation had derailed.

  “I find it important to always be at the top of my game.”

  Lalala, not part of this conversation anymore. Zelda rushes into the portal.

  “Seriously pet, are you running from talks about procreation?” Dagnit asks as she emerges from the portal, “Quite certain your species would have been on an acceleration repopulation schedule.”

  Zelda frowns at the cat, “Blighted, wasn't expected for anything of that sort.”

  The cat looks at Zelda with a bit of pity. The other two emerge.

  “I do admit it can be more exhausting.” Frankie opines.

  Zelda frowns that the conversation continues.

  -----

  Gain 1 Exp from party kill

  Zelda pulls the blade out. She frowns.

  “Something wrong, pet?”

  “Nothing important.” Zelda huffs out. She sees Dagnit stare. It's answered with an eye roll and an explanation, “I can't get Str or Agi gains from using hardware. Exp gain is important, just now that's all I am getting.”

  “Could try to accelerate your changes again.” Dagnit points out.

  Zelda shakes her head, “I'm as far as I can go.”

  “What do you mean?” Flocks asks.

  “At this point I will stoop a bit more, have a real tail and wings, and then die.”

  “You seem to have skipped a step there, Zelda.” Frankie interjects.

  “My blood will shift, it will be toxic and I will die. Is that clear enough for you, Frankie.”

  “Do you know…” Dagnit couldn't finish the sentence.

  “Depends on stress levels.”

  Zelda walks forward while the others stare at each other.

  -----

  “At the fives, good time to go ba—”

  Zelda ignores Frankie and walks forward. Then she charges forward.

  “Damn it, Pet.” The others quickly go to engage as well.

  They are only able to peel off three. Leaving Zelda to deal with two. She has her shield in front of her while keeping an eye on the one circling behind her. Her view stretches, keeping them both in sight despite them not being close enough for that to be possible. She doesn't blink the distortion away. Instead she slams the shield into the first and stabs. The Kobold falls back bleeding. The other advances on what it assumes is her blind spot. Its club raised above its head with both arms. A quick turn and the sword buries itself in the creature's chest.

  Gain 1 Exp from party kill

  The other advances only to have the corpse zipped in front of it. Sword hilt pointing towards Zelda. She grasped the blade and a firm kick both dislodged it and pushed the still alive Kobold to the ground underneath the corpse. The sword enters the pinned creature's head.

  Gain 1 Exp from party kill

  She ignores the rest of the messages and moves forward. A hand grabs her shoulder. The vision swivels without turning her head.

  “What do you want, Dagnit. Is this not the warrior way?”

  “Zelda, I applaud your ability to take two now but the others are not as confident. It won't always be you with the extra.”

  “Are you all not higher level? I don't understand the problem.” Zelda snaps.

  “Do not shame us for prudence.” Dagnit growls.

  “I don't have time for prudence.” Zelda returns the growl.

  Dagnit grabs Zelda and pulls her into a back hug. “You'll have even less time if you're reckless.” She hisses.

  Zelda wants to move forward, to not care but just slumps in the embrace.

  -----

  “Still pouting?”

  Zelda frowns at the cat's question. She huffs a sigh. “I was starting to understand something…I'm annoyed I couldn't keep refining it.”

  “What’s that?”

  “I was warping my vision. I could see in front and behind myself at the same time. It was strange but I understood it for a bit. Now it's just causing a headache.”

  They are waiting again for evening light to wake the dead.

  This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

  “Is that how you handle two then?”

  “Yes, the Kobold gave an opening because he thought he was in my blind spot. It's weird to see more than what you are looking at.”

  Dagnit frowns at that. Then shrugs, “Think you can see yourself fully?”

  Zelda looks at her, confused at first then eye widening at the implication. If I could see myself I could…

  She focuses on the spot she was in. Bend the vision to be behind her. Then tries to move the vision behind her to look backwards. To see her. It struggles. Then snaps and she longer is seeing in front of herself at all but a few feet behind her. She frowns seeing the bulging back shoulder slowly coming together behind her back. To form her wings. I don't want to see this. But the vision doesn't shift back. The tail thrashes the ground. Her body zips to the side trying to flee her vision but it just follows her. The cybernetic arms grab her face, willing herself to stop seeing. It does not succeed. Noooo. She feels a pinch in her arm. My wing. Her consciousness wanes.

  “Sorry p…”

  -----

  Zelda glances to the side. She sees the arms on their charging dock. She sighs. Her vision was once again out of her head.

  “I thought that port was for stimulants.”

  “Seemed necessary to put you under should you start stressing out. I would of prefered that sooner but your core was a worry.” Pamulur says while staring at her tablet.

  There is a flat square box next to the arms. Is that? The doctor grabs a plate and places a slice of pizza on it. She holds it out to Zelda. The proto-wing comes forward and upon seeing it, she begins to shake. The doctor places a hand on her shoulder to steady her. The hand takes the plate. Two fingers are almost twice as long as the others. She tries not to look at her other hand as she maneuvered the slice to her face. Her dread is replaced by annoyance. The nutty sweet flavor tells her that this was no dairy cheese.

  “I'm not having the best of days Doctor and you got me vegan pizza.”

  The doctor shrugs, “Was the closest Arth food this planet has.”

  Zelda continues to frown as she chews. The hatch opens and Flocks is there.

  “Ah back awake, calmed now?” Zelda simply grumbled at the giant birdman. He continues, “Grant got a presentation to give on our upcoming action. Figure you want to sit in on the meeting.”

  The Dragon. Zelda nods and scarfs down the travesty. She follows the bird man towards the back of the ship. Aft? She enters a room with a couch and two stools. One appeared newer than the other. Frankie sat in the older one. She smiled at that and joined him. Making sure to follow tail etiquette, she wraps her mechanical one around the legs of the stool.

  Flocks joins the couch with the lounging Dagnit, the cat only barely making room. All settled and a flick of gaze to the side from Dagnit caused a large screen to appear before them.

  Grant was there over a large three dimensional model of a planet. The model zoomed in a rather rocky terrain that had a green Dragon sitting in the center.

  “The juvenile. As we all know, Dragons are rather resilient. There have been documented cases of Dragons reviving even after removal of their hearts. So far, the only known method of destruction is dumping their corpses into a star or gravity well. This tends to invite swift retribution to the perpetrators by more Dragons. On that note, our goal here is pacification and harvest.” Zelda grumples at that. “Eyes, Horns, wings, claws, scales, and heart. Those are the main goals and are ordered in priority.”

  “Why is the heart such a low priority?” Frankie interrupts.

  “Being a juvenile, it's likely its mother will come to its aid. Removing the heart, while prized, is not exactly the quickest thing to extract.” Grant answers.

  “How will we handle the situation should mama come in?” Dagnit follows up.

  “Retreat.”

  Zelda frowns at that. Sounds like a good setup for an ambush to me.

  “Seems doomed from the start.” Flocks posits.

  “Not exactly, the Dragon is unlikely to make the call until they think they are in mortal danger. My ship will deploy an interference field.” The image shows spikes surrounding the dragon, a dome plopping over a moment later. “Your team will need to keep the creature inside this area. While untested, I hope to confirm its ability to block the Dragon's call for assistance.”

  “Untested!” Frankie exclaims.

  “Dragon slaying has to start somewhere.” Zelda chides.

  “You're rather hopeful.” He barks back.

  “Just hungry.” And desperate. At least one, even a whelp will do. Before the end.

  “Dagnit's ship will be overhead to prevent the target from escaping while my ship will remain in orbit. Should the mother come, I estimate five minutes of interdiction before I will need to retreat myself. Due to the moved up time schedule, only one of the mechs will be available. Frankie will be piloting it.” Zelda frowns at the news. Grant notices, “We are actually moving this up due to the corporate warfare. Seems Red Deliverance is set to lose more than one planet.” A pause as Grant fiddles with his tablet, then a new screen showing something akin to diver suits appeared, “I was able to procure some exosuits for the rest of you.” This was met with grumbling. Grant rolls his eyes. “I will reimburse for any Returns. As well as provide ten percent over market rate for what is harvested.” The grumbling stopped and instead met with a whistle. “I leave ground strategies to you, Captain Dagnit.” Captain? I guess if she owns the ship.

  The cat in question rolls her eyes and flicks the screen off.

  “Right, pet, you're in front with your shield. Frankie and I will harass from the sides. Flocks will be piloting the ship. Do your best to keep its attention. While Frankie gets set to bowl her over. Then we all pounce to see if our blades can find something important. Should the beast look like it's about to breathe on ya, I want you to zip out of the way. Truthfully your ability to reposition is why you're going to keep its attention.”

  Zelda frowns, “I only did it once and you had to sedate me afterwards.”

  “Well pet, we are going to need to work on that.”

  -----

  It was only Zelda and Dagnit in the room now. The other two went off to prepare in their own ways.

  “Alright pet, I assume your stress was based on seeing your changes.” Zelda nods, then murmurs a thanks. “For what? Should always be clear, shit can get lost in translation.”

  “For killing the rest of the Kobolds while I was still there.” She murmurs.

  “Ah, I considered chucking you through the portal but neither Flocks nor Frankie wanted to carry you back to the ship.” A wry smile from the cat was met by her pet's glare. She continues, “Take your time but look at your hand.”

  “My wing.”

  “If you want to give in to that. Fine, your wing.”

  Zelda moves it forward. The two middle fingers were twice as long as the others. All the fingers were longer except her thumb. Her breathing hitches a bit. Dagnit comes and rubs her back. It's soothing. Zelda can see the beginning of webbing to form between the digits.

  “Think I will get the chance to fly before the end?” Zelda says wistfully.

  “If that's all you want I can find a planet where even I could flap my arms and fly.” Dagnit deadpans. It earns a rare chuckle from Zelda. “Ready to see more?” Zelda nods. A screen pops up showing her front view. She still had her med gown on. It showed her shoulders pulling behind her. It looked like a contortionist in a straight jacket who dislocated their shoulder. It takes a bit then Zelda notices something.

  “Is my chin wider?”

  Dagnit cranes her head and examines it, “It's jutting out a bit more too.”

  Zelda grips her face and gives a huff. Right, snout. She opens her mouth to witness the progression of teeth. The fronts all look rather sharp while she still had grinding molars in the back. I would have assumed all fangs but guess Dragons diet is more than meat. She steadys herself.

  “Ready to see more?” Dagnit asks, slow, patiently. It's answered by another nod. The cat undoes the knot at the top, the gown falls down. The scales continue to spread across Zelda's chest. The waist looks smaller while the hips are wider, muscle and bone not fat. A bag is connected where her belly button should be. A few more breaths. Then a screen showing her back. The shoulders that are slowly converging towards each other. A bit of stress starts to grow again in Zelda.

  “I'll make sure you get a chance to fly before the end, Zelda.” Dagnit says softly. An attempt to recontextualize her changes. It steadies Zelda a bit. When she finally calms, the screen wink off. Zelda gives a questioning look to Dagnit. “You need to use your own eyes now.”

  Zelda squeezes her eyes shut at the words. More back rubs. Again they open and her vision warps, first seeing behind her then looking at her back. It's stressful to do. The knowledge that she is using Dragon eyes to look at her rapidly becoming Dragon back is almost too much. But she wills herself to see it. To own it. I can't run away from it. Her breathing steadies once again.

  “Good, every cycle until we engage. Look yourself over. Can't have you locking up when the time comes. Try to zip a few times, I'm sure it must be disorienting.”

  “And when is that time?”

  Dagnit just has a big grin.