Starbound

Starbound’s fingers hesitate for a moment as you ask the question, the leaves of the egg she was tending resting between her fingers.

She’s quiet, her face contemplative. Her fingers move around the stem of the egg’s leaves again, but without purpose now. More like she’s just trying to find something to do with her hands while she thinks. “The me now? Anything. Everything.” She carefully lifts up a single leaf, examining it. The very outer edge is yellowing ever so slightly. “There was a long time where I could not even look at these eggs, without seeing… without seeing their faces. The parents' faces.” She drops the leaf, drawing her paws inward, pressed together against her chest. She doesn’t make eye contact with you.

“Without seeing… What was left of them.”

She is clearly struggling with talking about this, as she wrings her hands together, her wings pressing tighter against her body, as if to hug herself. Her shoulders are slumped. Her body language just screams the words guilt, defeat.

She sighs, deeply, troubled. “The me then?”

Her paws move down to sit in her lap, her thumbs rubbing over each other. “She would have just run away.” She barks a cold, harsh laugh, that does not match the rest of her expression. “I almost did. Would have, if the shock had not shaken me so hard that I could not move at all.” She unclasps her hands, instead gripping her knees. She visibly braces herself, sighs, and looks at you, not quite seeing you. “She was a coward. But she would have laughed at you if you told her that.”

Starbound reaches for the egg stems again, continuing her work. “She was lying to herself.”

"I assume you mean the dragon who destroyed our nests." You follow her as she walks between the nests, looking for anything out of place. "We did find out. We...weren't their only targets."

She stops to turn to you. "It was a coordinated attack. Several plague dragons came to the Veridian Labyrinth to destroy our progeny. To weaken us. To cripple our morale." She looks out towards the den's entrance, a distant look in her eyes. "Some of them were sneak attacks from outside forces, but I... I let them right in. I let them through our barriers, introduced them to my clan mates, showed them where the nests were..."

She shakes her head. "I couldn't have been any more naïve. Champagne warned me against it, tried to tell me he was bad news. But I was stubborn. I would not listen." She nods. "I paid the price for my naivete."