Chapter 2

Chapter 2: 

“Hey! I think she’s awake!” A  muffled voice called. 

“ Mrf”

Calypso rolled over on her side in their hammock, her head hurting. Wait, HAMMOCK!? Calypso sat up so fast (which was hard in a hammock) that she got a head rush. Spots danced around her eyes. 

“Hey, you're okay,” the same voice said calmly and gently, as if talking to an injured animal.

“Who are you?” Calypso said with suspicion in her voice as she tried to grab her dagger in her boot. 

“I’m Kai,” the soothing voice replied. 

Calypso’s eyes cleared. She stared at a person with big brown eyes that were almost black, long lashes, a soft flush spreading across the nose bridge, and short, wavy brown hair that lightened to a soft hazel in places. But, despite the soft features on their face, they held the same fierce expression that met Calypso when she looked into a mirror.

“I’m Calypso,” Calypso muttered, her throat surprisingly dry and hoarse. Dry…. “I was in the ocean, how did I get here?”

“I saw you passed out on a piece of driftwood when I was flying on Tsunami doing my daily scouts.” 

“What do you mean flying?” Calypso asked cautiously, her brain finally spinning correctly. 

“Oh! Tsunami’s is my favorite dragon and really, I’m the only one who she will let me ride her.”

“I thought that dragons were hunted to extinction by ‘The Dragon Hunters'?" Calypso questioned, curiosity creeping in at the edges of her voice. 

“Correction: dragons were almost hunted to extinction. We shelter the last species on this island.” Kai spoke, their bubbly energy coming back after the darkened look in their eyes when Calypso mentioned ‘The Dragon Hunters’. “Come on, I’ll give you a tour of the island.” 

Kai reached out their hand out to Calypso, urging her to get out of her hammock. 

“Okay,” Calypso replied, her brain still stuck on the fact the dragons still existed. Both humans walked out of the hut. Calypso squinted, her eyes adjusting to the bright light of the sun after the dark hut. 

SQUACK!!!! 

Neon purple birds scattered from somewhere beyond a couple yards of trees and vines. Kai rolled their eyes and smiled.

“Those idiots are probably causing chaos again. I've got to go and check to make sure no one died. You'd better come along as well, 'cause if you're going to stay on this island for a bit, you're going to have to get used to the mayhem caused by these 4.” 

Kai brushed aside a curtain of vines to a clearing that showed probably the strangest sight Calypso had ever seen; two pink sparkly pink dragons--one spewing out rainbows and the other breathing out laughing gas--with two boys in clothing that matched the dragons scales perfectly, as if it was a matching set. They were playing some sort of monkey in the middle type of game, and both boys were laughing, so carefree, it made Calypso’s heart feel heavy.

“The dirty blond boy is called Orin, and his dragon is called Emmett.” Kai pointed their finger to the boy flying on the dragon who was breathing out laughing gas. 

“The brunette boy is called Ben, his dragon is named Abe.” Kai moved their hand so that it pointed to the boy who was now free-falling and landing on the dragon who spewed out rainbows.

“HEY!” Kai yelled out, and then whistled such a high note that both the boys and the dragons snapped around to look at Kai. Kai made a hand signal that looked very similar to a salute. 

Ben and Orin commanded their dragons to fly toward Kai. When they reached them, Orin slipped off of his dragon, tripping on a gnarled root on the ground and Ben fell backwards to land in a pile of limbs on the light green grass.

"I would like a full report from your morning scout,” Kai asked them as they brushed themselves off while they stood up from the ground. 

Calypso moved silently to the shadows of the trees, watching both walking chaos storms from afar, wondering if she could trust them. Both boys looked at each other. Calypso’s eyes scanned their faces trying to read them. What Calypso got from her quick scan was that the boys' expressions were drained from the look of joy and mischief and transformed into one that held fear and guilt. Calypso started to wonder about what the duo must have found, but with what she just witnessed it could have been anything.

“Well?” Kai asked expectantly, using the same tone that an older sibling used on her younger siblings.

"We were doing our usual scouting around the North and East of the island, and then our dragons jerked their heads and were growling at something in the distance,” Ben started. 

“Since we know dragons have more heightened senses than humans, we decided to trust them and let them fly us to whatever made them worry," Orin continued. 

“So as we got closer to the thing that made our dragons alert--which they never are--we saw that there was a ship which  got blown up by the looks of it, the biggest shell we have ever seen. We circled around a couple times and saw that about 4 young women all huddled on a large piece of stray wood.” Ben finished, staying silent to let all the information sink in.