Shimala

"Knowledge is just as important as bloodshed. I'll support you, but I'm no fighter."

A scholar. Shimala was not a victim of DERG, but rather an intern: he fled upon seeing the horrors they enacted. While he isn't a fighter, he has begun a library in the lab and spends most of his time researching. He buys old books off of Finnegan and anyone else who comes across them but only occasionally goes out to gather them himself.

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Entry #304: Postulations and the World Around the Laboratory.

Today I began ruminating on the world beyond these walls, and in specific began thinking about some of the other clans we have encountered since Spinehome began to expand diplomatically. Many of the dragons of said clans have been very interesting, from both a scientific and psychological perspective. However, it occurred to me that some have been... more interesting than others.

Some dragons have always sent prickles up my spine. Of particular offense are Rattle, the undertaker; Strawman, who does not do much of anything specific; and Drip, who appears to be using the laboratory as a base of operations for his mercenary career (he was offered a place in the Amber Down, but did not accept it. I wonder why? I feel it has something to do with Strawman.). Interestingly, all three of these dragons are 'saturated', a term coined by Dr. Nautica for the result of some of my previous employer's experiments: they are laden heavy with their element, so much so that it 'leaks' into the air around them. One can easily track Drip by the sprigs of newly-grown grass he leaves in his wake, and as nice as Strawman is, he wears his mask for a reason. Rattle's quarters are ever too hot for comfort. One of the others so affected, Stratus, gives everyone around her a static charge at a distance of several feet.

I do not, however, get the same feeling from Stratus, Andromeda, or any of the other saturated dragons that have come and gone as I do from Drip and the others: a sort of intense foreboding, a mild discomfort, the nagging feeling of something being slightly off in a way not quite possible to put into eloquent language. The next several pages will consist of drawings of these dragons, as well as short notes about who they are and what they might be doing.

The first biography features myself as a sort of template for the others to follow. I do enjoy being organized.

SHIMALA Allegiance: Spinehome Ah... I am afraid I'm not that interesting, unfortunately. I was raised in a small Light clan dedicated to research at the cost of anything. I witnessed many experiments on birds and beasts alike, and was raised to think little of those we called subjects. As one might derive from this, our clan had a few very close ties with DERG, and it was through these that I obtained my internship- a rite of passage in my home- with one of their labs. I discovered rather quickly that experimenting on dragons was not something I could handle, and seized my opportunity to escape when Spinehome raided the facility some months later. I stand no chance in physical combat and my magic is much more utilitarian than militant in nature, but I have found a place here as a source of information and a bookkeeper. It is home, and for the most part I am at peace here.

EON Allegiance: S.P.L.A.T. There are plenty of strange dragons in S.P.L.A.T.. Indeed, I doubt I've seen any normal dragons in their ranks. Their leader is an absolute monstrosity of a Ridgeback, violent and intelligent; at his right wing is a supposed descendant of Naomi herself; their most sociable member is a Mirror of all things; the entire lot are playing parent to a small, angry Nocturne. That being said, Eon is still their most baffling member, and not just because of the sick-to-my-stomach feeling I get when I look at her. Her job for the group lies in assembly, building the bombs her comrades design. Much like Meryl, Submecha, or even Stratus, she seem to be not so much a dragon as a dragonlike object, a semblance. Her personality is much more akin to that of an Imperial than any Spiral I've ever seen, and her movements are just barely robotic in nature. Being around her leaves me with a headache for days after the fact, and strange dreams of her leaning over me in my sleep, driving clock hands into my skull, persist for even longer.

RATTLE Allegiance: Spinehome Of the three aforementioned dragons currently residing in Spinehome, Rattle is the most sociable. As an undertaker, he is really only busy when someone (or something) dies nearby, and spends the majority of his time with his mate, Athena, herself quite outgoing. He has developed a mechanical sort of solution to his overpowering fire magic: the large furnaces strapped to his wings act as siphons, and his mask helps prevent accidental fire breathing. Despite his size, I have heard he is skilled enough to work with even the bodies of Fae. He was terrifying to see at first, especially as a scholar working with old paper, but as time goes on one inevitably grows to fear Drip far more. He also has an absolutely dreadful sense of humor.

CRISPIN Allegiance: Amber Down When I first met Crispin, I thought him far too soft-spoken to be as gentle as he presented himself-- and I was right. The rest of the clan did not expect him to follow in Nevada's footsteps when she left Spinehome to form the Amber Down, but to me it was no surprise. I have heard that he has killed nearly as many dragons as Nevada herself- surely an impressive number- and that he has clawed his way to being her number-two.

STRAWMAN Allegiance: Spinehome Everyone (except for other Plaguelings) is frightened of Strawman when they first meet him. Dreadfully skinny, with an odd gait and a hoarse voice, he reeks of illness and death. He goes about his days with most of his body covered, because a mere touch is enough to infect another dragon-- unless Drip, his near constant companion, is nearby to cancel out the effect. Unlike most Plague dragons, he is not proud of these diseases so much as embarrassed or even horrified. All considered, he is a fairly nice dragon if you get to know him: he stops by my library to read fairly frequently, and always brings a copious amount of sanitizer to help me keep everything clean.

TEPHRA Allegiance:

RIME Allegiance:

TANGENT Allegiance: Cadavery There have been rumors floating around this part of the desert recently, rumors about huge Tundras looking for a secret clan called Spinehome. They've been making everyone here nervous, quietly preparing for another war, pulling out of our few aboveground settlements and back into the expansive laboratory we all call home. Recently, they were proven more than rumors. I was running a stand selling old books at the market when a blindingly colorful Tundra with dark eyes and ooze dripping down his chin approached me. He introduced himself as Tangent from the 'Cadavery', and asked politely if I had ever heard of an elusive clan called Spinehome. I, of course, told him I hadn't, and he went on his way easily enough. It could be nothing, but given that a cadaver is a corpse, I'm rather worried about what his organization wants from us...

AILBE Allegiance: The Lapin The Lapin has been a regular trading partner of ours ever since dear Rise, the second of Lachlan and Verena's living children, joined its ranks. It pays to keep them close: the last dying remnants of DERG are aboard, and the thought makes every one of us ill at ease. But the blasted Eran and the people who created him are far from the only ones aboard the airship, and it's a posse of three that we usually see coming down to perform transactions: a large Ridgeback named Gambit, Rise herself, and an oddly pearlless Pearlcatcher named Ailbe. She is strange, nervous, and always seems somewhat out-of-place, but seems normal in every other way but my physical reaction to her(described near the beginning of this documentation). My darling Shock says that Ailbe is amnesiac, and nobody knows what happened to her pearl. Most curious.

ANEM Allegiance:

DRIP Allegiance: Spinehome(?) Ah, Drip. I was there the day he was taken into DERG's custody, calm but angry, with a cold power coiling in his muscles. The procedure that left him Nature-saturated did him more harm than good: it's hard to be stealthy when daisies spring up in your footsteps. I was horrified to see him in Spinehome, and he quite frankly nearly killed me, spawning a cactus that came within inches of impaling me against the ceiling. It took him a while to back off even with my situation explained to him, and we've never been friends, though he tolerates me as an occasional companion of Strawman.