Venom looked over her shoulder to Dreamseeker's wilted corpse. She may have decided to be a dragon, but she was no monster. She reached a talon out to him and closed his eyes. Blood trickled between them. The great SkyWing queen also lay dead once more. Her people would have to give her a good burial. A good service.

But they'd have to wait until this was all over.

She took a running leap off the end of the balcony, wings unfurled to catch the air, which was hot and smelled of smoke and death and sulfur. On the landing strip, Inishgt's plane revved to a start. She swooped down to the ground, and escorted him off.

But there was no time to watch his flier disappear over the horizon. Around her screamed dragons and their fire and bullets from scavenger's weapons alike. She squared her shoulders and roared, grabbing a stalled flier in her teeth and flinging it out into the sky. She ran for a tanker, squaring it's muzzle to fire, and grabbed it with both talons. That too soon soared into the air, and down to the rocks far below where it would shatter alongside hundreds of others.

MudWings came soaring on amber wings above her, and Venom watched them slam into the main gates of the SkyWing palace like a collective battering ram.

"HEAVE!!" cried their commander. The MudWings widened their stances and reared back.

"HO!!" His battalion cried.

The MudWings smashed into the iron grates and it was wrenched off of its hinges with a sickening screech. Dragons flooded inside. And the commotion grew louder as they and the scavengers clashed.

Venom flared her wings and shot up to a flier above her taking off. She and a SkyWing collided with it at the same time, and brought it down together. The dragon flew away, and Venom turned to launch back into the sky.

She was almost overcome with a wave of Dragonfire as Night and SandWings both let loose on the turrets lining the walls. Their bullets stopped popping, and they were charred to a crisp.

But most were soon shot down as soldiers moved to replace the turrets. Venom lunged forward for them with fellow SandWings. Many scavengers were skewered on the ends of their tails like kebabs. Venom pushed past them, back into the palace, and scanned the halls and vast caverns.

General Sergeant lay on the ground, pinned between the jaws of an IceWing. Blue blood leaked from it's neck, so the man remained unfrozen. Venom ran for him, and speared her tail between the IceWing's jaws. She removed it from General Sergeant's chest, and snorted as the light faded form his eyes.

"That'll teach you." Venom huffed. She caught the IceWing's body as it collapsed into her. They gurgled once, blue blood bubbling from their throat, and choked out their last breath. Venom laid them on the ground.

Stained with blue blood, the SandWing flared her wings. On the highest floor of the palace stood the Commander. Her next target. Her eyes locked onto his position.

"Venom, wait!" Ash yelped. He burst out from nowhere and stopped Venom with a talon to her chest.

"What?"

"Look at what he's got." Ash pleaded.

Next to the commander was a hulking egg-shaped thing. Striped with red and yellow. Bigger than the barrel of her chest.

"A bomb." She breathed.

"We don't know how to neutralize him yet. It's too risky."

Venom growled and pushed past Ash's hold. "Then give the order to retreat. I'll take care of it myself."

"Venom you can't!!"

Ash tried in futility to grab Venom and hold her back, but her wings were up and she was in the air before he could stop her.

She beat her wings hard, straight up to where that smug little bastard sat. Blood on her jaws and tail and running down her talons.

It was then that she saw something, shift, behind where the Commander stood.

And it was too late when she saw Capuchin's eyes.

Too late to stop him when his jaws snapped open.

Too late to warn him of the corrosives.

Capuchin's shot a jet-stream of venom straight for the Commander. The man barely had time to register the pain, and open his mouth to shout, when black droplets seeped into the metal of the bomb.

It was too late for the RainWing to tune tail and take cover.

It was too late for Venom to do more than shield her wings.

It was too late before the top-half of the Sky Palace was blown straight to hell.