The Egg Assignment, part 4
#46 of The Life and Times of Jarzyl Mintaka (Slice of Life Stories)
2,828 words
Not really related image, but cute
It was a good nap. When Jarzyl finally stirred from her slumber, it was from Atlas gently shaking her shoulder. "Hey. Jarz. Jarz... Can you...? Jarzyl..."
Jarzyl blinked her eyes half open. "Yeah? Mmhm. Sure." Sleep inertia was still holding her down, leaving her floating in the halfway space between asleep and awake. Atlas was saying something to her, and though some part of her mind heard the words, none of it registered to her higher thought functions. Then Jarzyl blinked again, but her eyes stuck closed and she dropped back to sleep in an instant.
In her light doze, Jarzyl was vaguely aware of Atlas moving--he had been lying beside her, but then suddenly he wasn't. Then Jarzyl felt something tugging on her wing, unfurling it open then laying it down against the bed mat, but the motion was gentle enough that she didn't resist.
Finally Jarzyl felt something brush against her neck--was it Atlas's tail or his wing accidentally bumping her as he moved about his cramped bedroom, perhaps? Or it might have been his snout, briefly nuzzling under her chin. That possibility made a rumbly, pleased sound roll from Jarzyl's throat. "Hmmrrr..." It had definitely been Atlas in some way. She recognized the scent of his scales.
For another few moments Jarzyl enjoyed her nap. However as her mind shifted from dream to memory, thoughts started to cascade as she slowly comprehended what Atlas had been saying to her just a short while ago. That made Jarzyl abruptly crash into full awareness, and she snapped her eyes wide open. "Wait."
She was lying on her side, resting on Atlas's bed mat in his cramped little bedroom. But her friend was gone, and she was all alone.No, not alone. Jarzyl realized that her left wing was stretched out and mantled, covering her legs and her underbelly, and there was something underneath it--roundish things, with smooth and hard surfaces, which felt warm.
"Wait..." Flicking her wing upwards, Jarzyl found herself staring at six dragon eggs--two fake, but four not.
Raising her head, Jarzyl glanced all around and behind herself, but Atlas was definitely gone. He'd left her! He'd left her with the eggs--the real eggs, with the real hatchlings inside them--whom were clanless but still needed to be cared for. Atlas treated this like a routine chore, because for him it_was_, but Jarzyl certainly did not consider herself adequately responsible for this duty.
Her tail tip flicked from side to side anxiously, but otherwise the young fledgling was completely still. "Um..." With trepidation she stared at the eggs, worried that somehow in her slumber, after Atlas had pushed them against her belly, she might have crushed or cracked them. But they looked perfectly fine. Jarzyl sniffed at the eggs--they still smelled fresh, with that oddly pleasant scent.
"Are you all... ok? Everything fine? Warm enough?" Jarzyl whispered to them. She felt silly for even asking, but she was so nervous. Certainly she wasn't expecting a response, though she got one anyway.
A faint squeak came from the smallest of the eggs. "Meep!"
Jarzyl wasn't sure how to interpret that. "Um. Ok, then. I'll take that as a yes." She lowered her wing again, gently and slowly, until the edges of her flight surfaces touched the bedsheet and the eggs were all covered. And then all was quiet and calm again, except for the furious racing of her heart. A cool breeze wafted in through the window, and the young fledgling flinched as a shiver ran down her spine.
"It's fine. The eggs are fine, I'm fine, everything is fine..." Jarzyl murmured uncertainly. She was breathing quickly, almost in a pant, and with deliberately effort she slowed down. Breath in, hold, breath out, hold. Jarzyl closed her eyes and went perfectly still as she calmed her mental state.
Yet as her heartrate gradually slowed, Jarzyl felt like she was become increasingly aware of each steady_beat_ that sent blood flowing through her body. That odd sense of awareness expanded, and Jarzyl opened her eyes and slowly raised a paw to stare at it. Muscles and bones, skin and scales. She didn't understand it, but she abruptly became deeply aware of how_alive_she was--she was living, she was breathing, and she knew it. Her gaze slipped downwards, and that same awareness extended out to the eggs even though her wing was still covering them all.
Of the six eggs, all of them were warm, yet two were dark and quiet--just artificial machines, without spark. And the four real eggs were in varying states of life. The smallest and yet oldest of the eggs was humming with life energy, and Jarzyl could vaguely sense the little hatchling inside that was nearly fully developed, with its head and wings and legs all tucked up tight inside the shell. Two more eggs were midway through development, also clearly emanating that luminous force of life but in smaller, fainter quantity. That last egg was curious--the pulse of life felt so faint that it was barely even detectable, yet it was still there--forming a subtle web of cells, gradually organizing and dividing themselves, with the dream of eventually one day become a little hatchling.
Jarzyl did not feel calm any more. This was magic. It was power running through her body, granting her some sort of arcane awareness--was this what it was like to be a healer, just like her mother? It felt like she was dreaming, yet her eyes were open.
But then the bedroom door opened, and Atlas returned. The sooty-coloured fledgling looked thoroughly normal and mundane, with his plain black scales and his asymmetric limp. With a practiced motion he used his tail to close the door behind him, then he noticed she was awake.
"Atlas!!" Jarzyl hissed. Still lying down on the bed mat, she hurriedly beckoned with her paw. "Come here, come here."
This earned her a surprised look. "What?"
"Now!"
Atlas strolled over towards her, and he became even more surprised when Jarzyl reached up and grabbed his snout to pull him down to her level. She tilted his chin around, then placed her paw flat against the scales of his chest, before finally grabbing him by the neck--for a brief instant Jarzyl could feel that living energy inside her friend, and he felt so warm and alive, but then her inner senses went blind again. The moment was over, and that sensation of power and potential was gone.
"What... are you doing?" Atlas was watching her with a very wide-eyed look, as she continued to hold him by the throat.
Jarzyl let out an annoyed sigh, and she released him. "Arrgh. It was... I think I had another magical surge. Just for a second, I was pretty sure I was channelling healing affinity. I could feel the... life energy in myself and even in the eggs. Even in you too. But now it's gone. Or was it all a dream?"
"Healing magic, just like your mother? That is possible," Atlas admitted. "But it could also have been a dream."
"Maybe." Glancing down at herself, Jarzyl noticed something--her right wing, where earlier in the day she'd cracked a scale from a rough landing. The flight scale was no longer cracked, and now felt smooth and whole under her touch. Looking up at Atlas, Jarzyl pointed. "No, I had a damaged scale earlier, right there! Did you notice? Well, it was definitely cracked, but now it's healed up. So I did have a real surge! I think. Ah, whatever..."
"This is what--the second, or third time you had a magical surge? Lucky you. I've never had anything like that. That's supposed to be a sign you're getting your magic soon enough."
Jarzyl let her eyes lose focus as she thought back over the past few moments. Had it really been magic? The two of them were certainly right at the age where fledgling dragons started to get their magical power. With a soft sigh, she turned her thoughts back to the present. There was no need to worry about the future, for it would surely come soon enough. Atlas was watching her, and now she glared at him.
"You left me!" Jarzyl grumbled, with an accusatory tone.
Atlas raised an eye ridge. "Yes? I asked you if you could keep the eggs warm for a moment, and you said 'sure'."
"I wasn't fully awake yet, otherwise I wouldn't have agreed! You... you left me! With the eggs! Don't you know I can't be trusted?!"
Atlas now looked amused. "I trust you."
"Well thanks, but I don't trust me. Where did you go, anyway?"
"Washroom."
"Ehhh..." Jarzyl jerked her head towards her mantled wing. "Can you... can you take over again now? I'm worried that I'm not keeping these eggs warm enough or doing something wrong."
Atlas strolled over. "You're doing fine. As long as the eggs are underneath your wing or against your side, your body heat will keep them sufficiently warm. And besides, my shift is almost over." A large woven basket with a handle had been sitting atop the storage chest, and now Atlas picked it up with his jaws and brought it over.
Jarzyl obligingly lifted her wing, and with no small relief she shifted away from the eggs. Using his snout and his forepaw, Atlas very carefully picked up each egg and put them into the basket, which was lined with a blanket for padding and insulation. He put the four real eggs as well as his own training egg into the basket, then he pulled the blanket over them. "I'm going to pass these over to the next shift." He also slid the last egg over towards Jarzyl--her egg. "This is yours. I'll be back in a moment, and then we can go over to your house and figure out how to get your nesting box working."
Jarzyl grabbed her egg and hugged it against her chest. "Thanks. I'll buy you dinner."
Atlas nodded. He picked up the basket's handle in his mouth. "Sounds good," he said, with his words slightly muffled. Then he headed for the door again.
Left alone once more, Jarzyl stared at her egg. "I definitely am never going to make a real one of these. Nope. Never. Maybe? No. I don't think I would be able to take care of it. Though maybe I could just have... Hmm..."
Idly she ran her paws over the egg, before pressing the button again. "Beep! Event reporting: Two... temperature too low. Remember to keep me warm! One... shaking detected. Don't shake me! One... hard impa--"
Jarzyl pressed the button a second time to silence the training egg. "Shh."
Jarzyl released the winding handle on the side of the nesting box, and with a soft click the rollers in the base started to turn, very slowly rotating her egg before coming to a stop again. Every few hours or so, the clockwork mechanism would rotate the egg. From what she had learned in class, this would be necessary to ensure proper development of a growing hatchling.
Atlas was standing up on his hindlegs, and he clicked a small silvery crystal into the appropriate slot on the nesting box. There was the faint buzz of electricity, then warm light began shining down from the top of the nesting box and onto the egg, casting its white shell in reddish colour.
Sitting down on her haunches, Jarzyl let out a long sigh. It hadn't taken much time for them to figure out how to get the nesting box working, but overall it had a long and stressful day. She had certainly learned a lot, though.
"There we go. It should be working now. All you need to do is keep the handle wound every day and replace the crystals if they run out of energy." Atlas nodded, looking pleased. The two fledglings were currently in the living room, where they had dragged the nesting box out from Jarzyl's parents' bedroom. "Do you want to bring it into your bedroom?"
"Not at all. Just leave it here. It'll be fine," Jarzyl immediately replied. "All this trouble! This was the most stressful assignment we've had for this whole semester."
Atlas was standing on the other side of the nesting box, and he watched her through the glass. "Is it? No way. That really long math assignment from last week was much worse."
"The math wasn't that bad. Although you did let me copy some of your homework. Thanks for the help--for today, I mean." Jarzyl stared at the training egg as it sat inside the nesting box, and a question occurred to her. "Atlas, can I ask you..."
"Yes?" replied her friend.
Jarzyl thought for a moment, then thought again. "Where shall we get dinner?"
EPILOGUE
Several days later
Jarzyl was sprawled out atop the dining table and lazily reading from a novel, when there came the sound of a key sliding into the front door's lock. Putting down her book, the fledgling rolled off the table and landed gracefully on all fours, just in time to see the front door swing open and reveal a drake and drakka, wearing flight harnesses which were laden with various overstuffed pouches. Zilarin and Galon Mintaka--her parents.
"Jarzyl!"
"You're back! Heee!" With a happy giggle, Jarzyl sprinted over to her parents and the three dragons embraced. "I missed you."
Her father put his wing around her back in a tight hug, and both he and Jarzyl's mother nuzzled her neck and briefly licked at her scales. "We missed you too. How have you been?" asked her mother.
"It's so good to see you, Jarz. No trouble being all on your own here?" asked her father.
Jarzyl beamed, with her neck frill perked up. "I've been great. Everything is fine. Although... the house feels really quiet when it's just me. But you're back now! How was your trip to Grendium? Did you have an adventure?"
Her parents exchanged a glance, and in unison they both nodded. "I guess you could say we did," said her father.
"We should really go on more trips. I've forgotten just how fun it is to leave the city and forget all about responsibilities and stress," agreed her mother.
Jarzyl's father gave her another affectionate lick on the neck, then he closed the door and strolled into the living room. Jarzyl was still grinning widely, and she happily bounced between her paws. "I really missed you two! Shall we go out for dinner later?" Taking a step back, she noticed something about her mother. "How was the food at Grendium? Must have been good? You're looking a bit... uh..."
Her mother snorted amusedly. "Fat?"
"Heheh. I didn't say fat. You said it," Jarzyl teased.
"Yes, yes, I know. I'll lose the added mass soon enough." She definitely looked to be carrying more weight than before the trip. There was a certain plumpness to the drakka's form, especially around her belly, where she looked particularly round.
Jarzyl nodded encouragingly. Her mother's job in the medical centre required significant use of her healing affinity, and using magic took energy just as much as using muscle would. Furthermore, as a healer, her mother could literally alter her own body as she desired.
Bouncing from paw to paw, Jarzyl turned around and trotted back to the living room. Her father had just unstrapped his flight harness and left it by the side of the room, and now he strolled over towards the nesting box, in which Jarzyl's egg was enjoying its last day before it was to be returned to the school. "Jarz, you got the nesting box out and prepared already? How did you know?"
"Hmm?" Jarzyl skipped over to her father and stood beside him. "Ah, that thing! I got a training egg from school. It's this... this fake thing that I'm supposed to take care of, just like a real egg. And I saw this nesting box in the store room, so I took it out to incubate the fake egg. See?"
Her father's neck frill perked up. "I see. Just a convenient coincidence then."
"What? What coincidence? Anyway, tonight's the final night. I'll be bringing the fake egg back to school tomorrow." Jarzyl frowned. "I don't think I'll score high on this assignment. I... may have accidentally dropped the egg a few times, but I learned from that experience, and that's the important thing. Anyway, tomorrow I'll shut off the nesting box and put it back into the store room."
"Oh, that won't be necessary," said her father.
Jarzyl blinked. "Why not?" she asked, confused."Wait..."
Her mother just laughed. "Good thing you've just learned about taking care of an egg. You can practice for real, now, with your upcoming sibling."
END