Our eyes were getting used to the dark, so when fire suddenly exploded all around us, we were temporarily blinded.

     "My eyes!" Nota screamed. Someone stumbled in to me and their foot crushed my tail. I let out a yelp and the foot got off. "Whoop, sorry Zepth."

     We rubbed our sore eyes with our paws as we unfolded our wings to get out of the fire.

     "Oh, that's what we were standing in." Deltul gasped as we patted our tails to put the small fires out.

     And then we all followed Deltul's gaze.

     We were in the center of an endless swamp. Luckily, the fire we were standing in didn't spread because it was only caused by the stationary and flammable gas bubbles.

     It took a few minutes, to which our aching feet were thankful for a small rest, but we waited for the bubbles to go away long enough for the fire to completely die.

     We were standing in a small clearing of black water, so there were no nearby trees. I doubt they would catch on fire, though, as they were all damp with moss covered goo.

     But our wings were tired. We couldn't just hover above the water forever, and eventually landed again.

     "This is disgusting." Nota grimaced as the mud between our toes squished under our weight. "Where do we go from here?"

     "Maybe something will just happen." Deltul offered.

     "Shh!" Kintes silenced us. We all looked to him expectantly. "Did you hear that?"

     "Hear what?"

     "It sounded like..." he cocked his head to the side. "Hissing..."

     The water in the center exploded like a geyser. Black muck splattered everything as the water came crashing back down.

     The cause of this random blast of water was painfully obvious, and plain horrifying.

     "I don't know what the Taliig that is, but I don't like it." Nota backed away. "I don't do snakes!"

     "Snakes?" I chuckled. "You're afraid of snakes, Nota? You know you are kind of snake-like, right? Being a reptile and all..."

     "No I do not like snakes, Zepth." She glared. "Laugh at me all you want. I won't be dying today, thank you very much."

     "Maybe it's friendly." Deltul cautiously stepped closer to the apparently blind creature. "It has wings like us. Maybe it's just a weird looking dragon-"

     The thing lunged like bolt of lightning, striking the water inches from my brother with huge fangs dripping with green liquid.

     Deltul yelped and jumped back. Nota loudly scoffed and I rolled my eyes.

     "See? Deadly snake." She lifted her chin.

     "You're a deadly lizard!" I shot back with a laugh. "C'mon worm brain, it's blind. Let's just go around-"

     "That is going to be a problem..." Kintes cut in, gesturing around us.

     Every few feet surrounding us was another explosion of water. More of these blind snake things flicked their tongues out. Were they grinning? It looked like they were grinning...

     "Okay..." I gulped and backed away from the sides. "This complicates things a tad."

     "At least they're the same size as us." Deltul weakly smiled. "Could you imagine if they were colossal?"

     "Shut up!" Nota shut her eyes at the thought of a huge snake. "I don't want to imagine that, worm brain!"

     "Let's just fly over them." Kintes suggested. That seemed like the best idea I've heard all day. We all unfolded our muddy wings and shook them clean.

     The very instant we brought our wings down and took flight, every single surrounding viper shot in the middle and blindly stabbed with their fangs.

     I swept my tail out of reach just in time.

     Unfortunately, our wings were making more noise than our talking, and these things seemed to hear. They slithered through the water, cutting through effortlessly and staying just below us.

     This was a disaster.

     "Stay high!" Kintes yelled, watching them gather underneath.

     "I'm so tired!" Deltu complained. "Were our wings always this heavy?"

     "We've been sitting in water and mud for some time." Nota replied as she strained to keep flapping her own wings. "They're damp and wet. Of course your wings are heavy."

     "What are we going to do?" I shrieked as the tallest snake tried to snatch us out of the sky.

     The water bubbled.

     "Anyone got any ideas?" Kintes desperately looked around.

     "Blast the water with fire!" I screamed. "Start another fire!"

     Everyone shared a look like a lightbulb clicked on. We all faced down to the vipers, opened our mouths, and released our fury.

     The water instantly caught again. The snakes let out a hideous hissing as they burned. I doubt they died, but they were too weak to keep trying to kill us because they sunk back into the water and vanished.

     We fell out of the sky and landed back in the water with a splash. Our aching shoulders thankful for a rest.

     "Okay, now where do we go?"

     Aaaand our lightbulbs went out.

     "Um..." I glanced around. It just looked like the swamp continued forever. "Maybe... uh..."

     "Guys where did Nota go?!" Deltul shouted. My blood went cold as I franticly spun around in search.

     Then I practically had a heart attack as the water right in front of me exploded.

     Nota grinned after the water came splashing back down. She was under the water.

     "What's wrong with you?!" I angrily roared. "If you didn't paralyze me, I might've blasted you with fire or something!"

     "Oh, you wouldn't do that to me." She chuckled and gestured to the water. "It gets clearer if you swim in this tunnel."

     "Swim?" Deltul nervously piped in.

     "Don't worry, we'll hold on to each other's tail so we stay together." I said. Nota nodded and took a deep breath before submerging in the water once again.

     Deltul went down next.

     Kintes grinned and disappeared.

     And I inhaled as much air as my lungs could carry before dunking my head below the murky depths...