Retrix stared at the Machine, a thousand thoughts running through his mind. The most prominent was... why? Why had Raize destroyed his own life just so he could power the Machine. It made no sense. Yes, it had probably powered it up to a point that it could wipe out the entire human race. But Retrix could simply take it up into space. He would have to take it further than planned, but that shouldn't be too much of a problem. Slowly he walked over to the Machine, the others watching him.

"Well..." he said softly, "I guess I better take this out of here."

He took a deep breath and focused on the area behind the Machine. It was slightly difficult to concentrate with the power radiating from it, but it shouldn't be too difficult. As the void portal began to open there was a yell from behind him.

"Wait!" Tyler said, "Stop!"

Retrix turned toward the human in surprise, "What is it?"

Tyler quickly walked over to the machine, studying it for a moment. He peered into one of the crevice's, wincing slightly at the bright light, before turning back to the others. They all looked at him, wondering what had caused his sudden outburst.

He let out a frustrated sigh, "I don't know if you will be able to get it into the void, let alone up into space."

"Why?" frowned the void dragon.

"The element stone inside... it's been overloaded with power. So much so that it is unstable. Any movement of the machine will cause it to crack... and well I'm sure you can all guess what would happen next."

"Wait, so we can't move it at all?" growled Blaze, "Then how on earth are we going to stop it."

The human gave a nervous shrug.

"Can't you just push it into the void?" asked Zepos, looking at Retrix.

The void dragon shook his head, "No... I wish I could, but for something of that size to enter the void... I'd need to bring it with me. And when I leave I also have to take it with me. It's like the void doesn't allow anything to be present inside it without me there."

"But... you managed to get Raize's equilibrium into the void without going in there," he said.

"It's fire. The instant it enters the void it disappears anyway," sighed Retrix, "And small things are okay as well, but the Machine... it wouldn't work."

"Besides, it wouldn't matter anyway. I doubt we could get it into the void before it went off," said Tyler.

"Tyler..." Faen whimpered softly, "Are... are you saying that we won't be able to stop it?"

His silence answered her question.

* * *

A low chiming sound was ringing through the silver dragon's head. The world was spinning in a haze. Nothing seemed right. The sky had blurred out, along with everything else. Rubble of the destroyed city surrounded her in large mounds. She was laying on a small part of the road that still remained visible, with a broken lamp post flickering on and off beside her body.

She was so tired. Her wings felt like lead and her body lacked the energy to even move her tail. It was like an enormous weight had settled down on top of her. It was so tempting just to close her eyes and sleep. Rest. She wouldn't be able to do anything anyway. She was just simply too exhausted to even get up.

"You know," a massive voice boomed through the sky, "I think I have figured out a name for my machine. The Grand Reckoning. What do you think of that? It suits it so well. For the reckoning upon human kind will be grand. It will give them exactly what they deserve."

A growl escaped Silver. She forced her legs to move, pushing herself unsteadily to her feet. A wave of dizziness washed over her, and she staggered, nearly falling once again. Once the nausea had passed she looked up at the mind dragon, who was still in equilibrium. He was hovering a fair way above her, seeming slightly surprised when she got to her feet.

"Well, she can stand after all," he said, "Not that it'll help you much."

She tried to straighten herself up, but failed miserably. Her body just wasn't moving like it usually did. She had used up too much energy. She didn't even have the strength to fold her wings up at her side. Her head lowered. She had failed. Everyone had been relying on her... and she had failed.

"Silver. Do not look so glum," said Eldawin, "You were never going to defeat me. Look up, for the new age of dragons will be more glorious than you can imagine. I am unhappy with the amount of dragons that were slain... but their deaths will be worth it."

She growled again, this time more deeply, looking up at the conscious of the equilibrium with anger and helpless frustration, "You... you don't need to do this. Freedom isn't worth this. It isn't worth killing billions of innocents."

"Human kind isn't innocent, Silver, not a single one of them," he snorted, "They all deserve death. They all deserve this punishment."

"If that's true then so do we!" roared the dragoness, surprising Eldawin for a moment, "We are just as bad as they are. You can't just kill them all for something we are guilty of as well."

The mind dragon narrowed his eyes, "It's either us or them."

"No... it isn't. It doesn't have to be," Silver begged, "Just... wait and see."

He sighed softly, shaking his head, "Either way. It is too late. The machine has already been fully charged, thanks to your brother. I do not want his death to be in vain."

"Wait... what?" Silver gasped, glancing up at the tower, the machine's light pulsing through the sky.

"It is a pity. But it was necessary. It just so happened to end up this way. Though if you hadn't of forced us to fight, then it wouldn't have come down to this," he said.

The dragoness fell back onto her haunches in shock. Another death. Another pointless sacrifice. It had all been for nothing. It had all ended up at nothing. She should have just chosen the other path at A.O.D.H. At least then they would have had more time to think up of something. Maybe all of this would have been prevented.

She closed her eyes and shook her head with a small growl that could have been a sob, a single tear leaving her eye. No. She couldn't let him win. But there was nothing she could do. He was still in equilibrium, and there wasn't a single way she could win. Her eyes snapped open, or was there?

"You know Silver, you are defeated, but somehow I don't trust you to remain down when I turn back. You realise that I am the only one that can control the machine and prevent it from destroying everything."

There was that as well. Even if she did stop him, there was no way she could stop the machine. She frowned for a moment, an idea coming to her. It was risky, extremely risky, but she knew it would work. But to do so she needed Eldawin out of the way.

She let out a deep breath and closed her eyes. She was going to need to fly fast, faster than she had ever flow before. For that she couldn't allow anything to slow her down. The metal shell around her back slowly began to retract from her back, forming into a tiny ring on the end of her left horn.

She would also need a massive amount of protection. She stretched out her mind, finding it a little difficult with how tired she was, but the instant she connected with the metal fragments left behind from her equilibrium, it was like new life had been breathed into her. Of course, it hadn't restored any of her energy, but that was unimportant. She would push her body as far as she needed to.

Eldawin watched with slight suspicion, "You know Silver, despite that fact you have been defeated, I somehow doubt you will stay down when I turn back. I can't have that, so I am going to have to knock you unconscious for a bit. Don't worry, when you wake up you'll be in a new world."

The ground rumbled beneath her, just as a rock came jutting out from the ground, aiming for her jaw. She didn't even move, but a plate of metal came flying from the ground, shattering the rock before it touched her. She let out a heavy breath and opened her wings, the very effort excruciating. But she forced herself to ignore it. No matter what happened... she couldn't allow Eldawin to win.

She flapped her wings once, and pushed herself into the sky. Her lighter body also made it far easier to fly than usual. She didn't focus on that however. Instead she put all of her concentration on the mind dragon and what he was doing. She didn't think about the pain every movement caused, or the amount of energy she was using to simply rise. She didn't think about how difficult everything was supposed to be, or the blurry haze that she was constantly shaking off.

She focused on the dragon in front of her. On everything he was doing. On the power around her, ready for anything he was going to do. A large wind gust spiralled through the air toward her, and she felt it, somehow, before it even hit her. Mentally she reacted instantly. Her metal shot up from the ground, forming a large pyramid like spike in front of her, breaking the tension of the wind before it even hit her.

In the same moment she had another small spike of metal shoot upwards at the mind dragon. He saw it coming, but reacted slightly too late, moving upwards at a surprising speed. The spike hit him in the foot, and for but a moment the power he was radiating waned and shimmered, before returning again.

He let out a surprised roar, the wind around Silver twisting and practically throwing her back to the ground. Metal moved around her and caught her before she hit, but even that was a struggle. Everything was spinning, and her head felt as though it were about to explode, but she shook it off, forcing that pain into the back of her mind. She had to continue going.

"Silver! Stop fighting!" he roared, "There is no use for that now. Even if you some how break me out of my equilibrium the Machine will go off, and if I'm not there to control it then the whole world will die. Do you want that?"

Silver let out a heavy breath, trying to suck some oxygen back into her lungs, "Not if I stop it."

"And how on earth do you plan to do that?" he growled.

She didn't answer, and instead used her metal to give her a much needed boost into the sky, spiralling toward him at a speed she had never moved at before. The mind dragon roared in frustration as another barrel of wind surrounded her. This time she allowed the metal to meld onto her wings, but instead of using her body to control it, the metal controlled her body. The wind slammed into her like a battering ram, but the metal wasn't affected and pulled her forward through it. The pain was excruciating. While the wind didn't manage to push her back, it hit hard enough that she felt something in her rib cage crack at the impact. Still, she forced herself to ignore the pain and continued upwards.

Eldawin snarled and moved backwards, far faster than she could, and the light seemed to bend around him, and he disappeared into thin air before she could reach him.

"Silver, give up, you stubborn dragoness! Don't force me to do something I don't want to do."

Once again she ignored him and closed her eyes, focusing on that piece of metal she had managed to stick into Eldawin's foot. She didn't want to do anything with it, not just yet, for if he took it out it would make the fight a lot harder. Instead she focused on its location, and flew toward him as fast as she could.

Another blast of wind attacked her side, throwing her wildly threw the air before she righted herself again, barely able to keep her wings flapping. Her breaths were being forced out in ragged gasps, her body struggling to keep up with the effort she was making. But she wouldn't give in. Not ever. No matter what.

A cool feeling in the air around her touched her scales, and she reacted instantly. A block of ice froze around her, but metal had already surrounded her in a ball, protecting her from the cold. She landed on the metal surface, taking a moment to catch her breath, before making the metal walls form into giant razers that sliced through the ice as easily as claws through flesh, shattering the prison.

Almost instantly a giant green vine shot from the ground below and wrapped around her, trapping her wings and holding her. Then it squeezed. She let out a cry as the pain became too much. The bones in her wings snapped under the pressure of the vine and her head fell, her vision going black for just a moment as she barely managed to hold onto her consciousness.

"Silver, don't make me do anymore. Stop this foolishness. I don't know what you plan to do to the Machine, but you need to stop," he growled, appearing in front of her.

She raised her head to look at him, tears of pain sprouting from her eyes, "No... no."

He tilted his head, "I must say, I'm impressed. You have far more fight than I anticipated. But you need to stop. Your body has far surpassed its limit. If you push yourself too much further you won't see tomorrow."

Silver breathed in and out, focusing on removing the pain from her body. Removing the exhaustion, just for a little longer. She needed to focus. She needed to. If her idea was going to work than she needed to stop Eldawin.

"I will never stop," she hissed, "What happens to me, what you do to me, it doesn't matter anymore. I will take all the punishment in the world and still continue going."

"You don't need to," Eldawin narrowed his eyes.

"But I do. Because if I don't... if I don't... seven billion people will die. Seven billion souls will never get the chance to prove themselves. Seven... billion souls will never experience life again... and if I have to throw myself away so that they can... it's worth it."

"So, you, the rarest dragoness in the world, would rather die than allow a race to live that doesn't deserve it. You would make your brother's sacrifice worthless! You would take away our only chance of freedom, even if it costs you your life!"

"Freedom isn't worth it if it takes away the freedom of others," she said softly, before turning to look at him, "What you would create is a world of despair, a world that was built of the blood of billions. I don't care how peaceful it is, only a soulless monster would fight for that."

"That is what I've been forced to become to accomplish this Silver. Because someone must make that sacrifice if we are ever going to find a peaceful world."

"If that is what it takes than it isn't worth it."

"But it is for me."

"NO!" Silver allowed her metal to slip through the air, cutting through the vines around her.

Instantly she tried to open her wings and fly, only to find them unreactive, the broken limbs unable to move. So instead she fell, nearly helplessly through the sky. Her metal moved down around her, catching her and settling her down gently on the ground. She staggered, nearly falling to the ground, but the metal caught her, allowing her to stand upright.

Eldawin narrowed his eyes, angry that she was still managing to find her feet, even if she couldn't fly, "Silver, I don't want to kill you."

"Well you're going to have too," she roared, "Because I will not give in. Not while billions of lives rely on me. Not while I can still stand. The moment I give in is the moment I loose. I can't let you do this Eldawin. I don't care how small my chances are."

"They aren't worth fighting for!" the mind dragon roared.

"But they are," Silver replied, "Because every singly being on this planet has a small amount of good still inside them. Every single one of them has something great inside them. Every one of them has the potential to change the world, Every single one, no matter where they've been born, or how small, or how old. And as long as they have that good, even if just a small amount, they are worth fighting for. They are worth dying for."

The two dragons stared at each other, neither willing to back down. Eldawin sighed softly, shaking his head, "So be it."

The air around Silver shifted, and suddenly she couldn't breath. A gasp came from her mouth but nothing went back in. Her eyes widened and she stumbled forward, for a moment loosing control of her metal before quickly gaining it back again and catching herself. He had taken her very breath away.

Growling she closed her eyes. The longest she had ever held her breath for was twenty minutes. But that had been when she was relaxed. It had been a silly competition between hatchlings when she was younger. She also knew that a full grown twenty year old dragon could hold their breath for nearly an hour. Where she came in for that she didn't know. But at the very least she had twenty minutes before she passed out because of lack of oxygen.

She looked up at Eldawin once again, trying her best not to open her mouth and breath. He seemed sad. Her eyes narrowed as metal began to flow into her wings like small needles, piecing her sky. She winced slightly as they moved down the bone, quickly melding it back together with metal. It hurt... a lot, but pain had no place in Silver's mind.

Once she was sure she could move again she launched herself into the air and flapped her wings... only to find that no air caught onto it. She fell back to earth, landing a little awkwardly but managing to keep her feet. Her eyes widened as she realised what Eldawin had done. He had removed all traces of wind from around her, leaving no air to breath and nothing for her wings to catch to fly.

"If you stay still Silver, I can end it quickly," Eldawin spoke, "But if you continue to fight, then I guess you will suffocate."

She silently snarled. She pulled the metal inwards from her, allowing it to catch onto her wings, and she lifted herself into the air, feeling a little strange, and instead of flapping her wings to fly, she pulled herself forward. It looked as though she were in full metal form, but the metal seemed more like a liquid than a solid.

Eldawin growled and suddenly the small amount of heat around her disappeared, and the sky around her became the coldness of the void. She silently gasped as the cold quickly surrounded her, dulling all her senses and making it difficult to think.

She managed to react however and metal surrounding her began to move over itself, warming up to a more comfortable temperature. Despite having barely enough energy to sustain movement, Silver managed to make the metal heat up, keeping her warm enough to survive, and she continued to move.

"Curse you Silver!" roared Eldawin as she came toward him.

A lightning bolt suddenly struck from the sky, but before it came Silver felt a small shiver run down her back, right where the lightning was going to hit, and she reacted, using her metal to throw herself to the side just as the bolt sailed right past her. She could feel the intense heat it created, and narrowed her eyes. One hit from a bolt and she would die.

"How!?" roared Eldawin as pieces of ice rose into the sky and shot toward her, easily being sliced to pieces by her metal, "How are you still able to fight!?"

A piece of metal shot up toward him again, but this time he managed to slash it out of the sky with fire. He also finally took out the spike from his foot as well, growling as it hurt him slightly, but ignoring it and continuing to focus on Silver. Little did he know that as he removed it the dragoness allowed a small piece of it to come loose, remaining lodged in the wound.

Fire erupted through the sky, instantly surrounding Silver in a massive explosion. Her metal saved her once again, surrounding her in a protective shield of elronium. The heat instantly began to conduct through the elronium however, making the temperature rise to a considerable level. Inside Silver quickly warped the energy moving into the shield, making the elronium cool down instead of heat up.

The shiver that came just before lightning suddenly ran down her back. Her ball moved left, and the lightning bolt hit the outer part of the shell, but because of how cold Silver had made it to combat the fire, the lightning wasn't able to instantly melt through it, and instead ran through it like a normal bolt. Silver quickly redirected it at the mind dragon, still able to tell where he was from the small piece of metal lodged in his foot.

There was a cry of surprise and suddenly she could breath again, though the power surrounding her still remained. But she took Eldawin's surprise to her advantage and launched out of her shell toward him, flapping her wings and pulling herself forward at the same time with a roar. The mind dragon blinked and reacted, moving backwards. Lightning bolts appeared from the sky so quickly that Silver knew she would have no chance to dodge this time.

Everything ran in slow motion. The yellow bolts of electricity beginning to rain from above. Eldawin moving backwards to avoid Silver's strike. Silver reaching forward with her claws. The wind around her began to swirl, and she knew instantly that she wouldn't catch him fast enough. So... she connected herself with the metal still stuck in the mind dragon's foot, and pulled.

He let out a cry of pain and his concentration was lost for a split second. But that was enough. Silver tackled the mind dragon out of the sky, the equilibrium shattering. The lightning disappeared. The temperature returned to normal. The sky began to clear. Together the two dragons fell from the sky, landing a number of metres apart.

For a moment neither of them moved, both breathing heavily in the frigid air. Slowly Silver rose to her feet, barely able to keep herself conscious, and began to limp over to the mind drake, her wings dragging by her side. Her shell was completely gone. She had used every piece of her metal to protect herself during that fight, and she had barely the strength to call upon it again.

Eldawin groaned as he slowly got to his feet as well, his legs shaking slightly as he turned to look at the dragoness. Instantly he made a grab at her mind, only to find a rock wall surrounding it, one that was impossible to break through.

"You talk about a reckoning Eldawin," growled Silver as she approached him, "Well this is my reckoning."

She opened her mouth and the mind dragon closed his eyes, flinching, expecting to be riddled with a thousand metallic bullets, only to find nothing. He opened his eyes... surprised, starring at her. She let out a slight breath and turned away to look at the machine.

"You don't deserve to die either," she said softly, "Or at least... it's not my place to decide. You're no different to any human, or dragon."

Slowly she began to walk away from him, limping and obviously in pain. Eldawin growled slightly looking into her mind, trying to find what had happened, what she planned to do. His eyes widened slightly in disbelief.

"No... you can't," he said.

"I can't what?" she replied.

"I can see what you are planning to do Silver, and it won't work. You have barely the strength to stand, let alone use your equilibrium," he snarled, "If you don't let me control the Machine, everything will die."

She smiled slightly, "I can still use my equilibrium. It won't be for long, but it'll be enough."

"But you will die," he growled, "Just like your brother."

Silver tilted her said, "When I said I was willing to give everything, I wasn't joking. If I die... well it will be worth the lives of billions of others."

She turned and continued to walk away from him. The dragon's breaths were coming in ragged gasps, anger and frustration flooding through him. He didn't understand it at all. How had she beaten him? She had been at her utter weakest, just coming out from her equilibrium. How had she had the strength? He couldn't comprehend it. And now... now that he knew her plan he realised just how close he was to seeing his efforts result in nothing. The anger seethed through him.

"Stop!" he roared at her, "You can't do this!"

She ignored him.

"Silver! If you do this, I will make it my mission to destroy everything you've ever loved. Everything! Just like you have done to me! I will wreak havoc upon this earth! I won't stop until I have found and killed every single damned human being on the planet, starting with your friends!"

Silver froze and let out a shaky breath, a slight realisation running through her, "Well... I can't allow that. Can I?"

Suddenly metal shot up from behind Eldawin. He noticed what was running through her head a moment too late and could only grunt as a plate of metal sliced through his neck and head, continuing its way over to Silver and reforming the metal shell on her back. He stood standing for a moment, before his body collapsed onto the ground, completely separate from his head.

Silver watched in silence as the most powerful dragon on the planet fell. This time... it was no illusion.

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Wow... this chapter was intense to write :) Though I felt I didn't do it as well as I wanted to. Anyway, vote if you enjoyed and comment what you thought. It's finally over... almost. With Eldawin gone, how do you reckon they're going to stop the machine? The next chapter will be out soon, as there is only three chapters left. See Ya!

Pennator^^