Juniper | Demi-boy (he/they) | 17 | Rider
M: Ming, Henry, + Fathom (dir)
Boom!
A loud rumble filled their ears as Juniper
sat up quickly in alarm. For a few moments, Juniper was frozen in place before reaching over to the oil lantern.
“What was that…?” Juniper mumbled as flicked a match and the room brightened with the warm glow of the gold lantern, looking over at Ming. Placing their bare feet on the ancient, wooden floors, Juniper rose from bed and placed his lantern beside him as he crouched down to grab his things. Juniper pulled on their dark green sweater over their soft shirt and put on their gold-rimmed glasses to their face. Pushing their circular glasses further up the bridge of their nose, Juniper remembered seeing a small circular window above the desks so maybe they could peer outside and see what happened? Their feet made a soft plop, plop, plop as they tapped against their floor on the way to the window between Juniper and Ming’s beds.
Ming replied with nothing into his pillow, or at least nothing Juniper heard, with the thick blankets over himself when Juniper lifted the lantern in his direction to better see the other recently-recruited academy member. Huffing, Juniper climbed on top of the desk in frustration that his roommate was so unresponsive.
“Okay, so it’s probably not the dragons— my mom and older brother both have dragons and they never— and I mean never— got that loud— so what in the Valley made that sound?” Pushing the dark green curtain aside, Juniper pressed their face to the circle window above their bed, trying to peer out of it.
Juniper’s eyes widened with horror as the oil lamp was not the only fire to illuminate his face. “Ming? Ming, wake up! Ming, there is so much fire!” Juniper hissed, while turning back at Ming, throwing a pencil from the desk at him in an attempt to get his attention. “It looks like a massive chunk was just taken out of the barn and— Oh my gods, the dragons could be hurt! Ming, we have to go make sure they are—”
Boom!
Before Juniper could even finish, it suddenly felt like he was flying. The desk he was standing on was no longer beneath him as he realized he was falling. Time froze as Juniper could only wonder what went wrong. Only a few hours earlier, he was the greatest moment of his life, but now, he fell.
A few hours earlier, Juniper was practically skipping down the halls as a giddy smile covered his face. Juniper smiled down at their big black boots and fiddled with their dark green cloak while he carried his satchel and bag on his shoulder. With Henry’s heavy footsteps beside him and his heavy guitar case swinging beside them, Juniper felt even better knowing their brother was here with them. Henry was Juniper’s older brother, his eldest sibling, too, and was the tallest and physically strongest in the family, outside of their mom, of course. As the two passed by other students, everyone had to literally and metaphorically look up to the massive building of muscles that was Henry as he sported his alumni jacket. Even though Henry was incredibly tall, incredibly muscular, and a dragon rider, something only few could aspire to be, the quality Juniper loved most was his kindness which was evident in his dorkish smile. This dorkish smile was what Henry was wearing at that very moment. Juniper was fully aware his brother was smiling down at him but was too excited to return his gaze.
“Third in the family to bond with a dragon,” Henry finally spoke up as they roamed the halls of the school. “That’s a pretty big deal. Most families are lucky to have just one person who has a dragon.” Henry chuckled to himself and shook his head, ruffling up Juniper’s hair as he starred fondly at his sibling. “Man…, mom and dad will be so proud to hear this.”
“And all our siblings and Nani, too, right?” Juniper replied, already knowing the answer but still wanting to hear it from Henry regardless.
“Well, Nani is easily impressed with anything you do, obviously,” Henry replied as he held up fingers and counted to make sure he was talking about everyone. “We both know the triplets and Freddy will be amazed by you and will love to meet your dragon. It’s Fandom, right?”
“Fathom.”
“Right, Fathom. I knew that.” Henry absolutely did not know that. He was always terrible with names. “Anyways, Daksha might pretend like she does not care but I know she will be proud of you regardless. And Falla—” Henry had to take a deep breath before responding as Juniper finally looked up at their much taller brother— “now, she might be jealous of you, she did always want a bond like mom and I and she was heartbroken when she didn’t get one.”
“Thanks for reminding me,” Juniper mumbled, turning away from Henry as they pulled their hood over their head, their strides became shorter, and they slumped foward in guilt.
“But—” Henry placed a reassuring hand on Juniper’s shoulder— “I am sure she will be immensely proud of you.”
Juniper walked slower beside Henry and lowered his voice as he felt people’s eyes on him as the two of them walked down the candlelight hallways. “That still doesn’t make me feel great… I mean, she really deserves a dragon more than me and you know it. I mean, I love Fathom, but— I mean— I really don’t deserve just how sweet and goofy and amazing he is.”
“Don’t worry about that, Juni,” Henry mumbled as he pulled the smaller teen close. “She might have worked hard for it, but she bounced back and has found a lot of things she is passionate about.” Henry poked Juniper in the chest with a smile. “You just worry about you and do the thing you’re good at: being great with animals and being yourself. Who knows! By doing those two things, maybe you’ll enter a dragon breeding program, form a whole club about animals, or even meet a hot guy or gal or person!~” Henry nudged Juniper and wiggled his eyebrows with a smirk while Juniper looked up at Henry in confusion.
“Why would I want to meet someone who potentially has a fever?” Juniper asked, tilting his head and narrowing his eyes.
“Eh, you’ll learn what I mean soon enough,” Henry laughed, shaking his head as he slung his arm around Juniper. “The Academy is a great place to learn new things so I am sure you’ll figure it out in no time.”
“I hope so.”
There was a long silence for a while before Henry wrapped his arm around Juniper’s throat, pulled him to his chest, and began ruffling his hair so much to the point where Juniper’s shoulder-length hair was pulled from the tie which had kept it out of his face. Juniper let out a small shriek in surprise, drawing some attention from the students as he thrashed in Henry’s arms.
“Let go of me you monsterous heathen of zero hygiene!”
“Let me hug and give my wittle itty bwitty sibling affection before they leave me to go do cool things in the academy!!”
“You’re staying the night and can visit me whenever you want, you cotton-eared rhinoceros with a flat nose!!!” Juniper screamed, kicking and thrashing as Henry picked him up and swung him around like a tiny doll.
Wordlessly, Henry dropped the guitar case he had slung over his shoulder and grabbed Juniper’s satchel and bag and tossed them both to the floor.
The moment Henry dropped Juniper just enough that the teenager’s toes could touch the ground, Juniper wrapped his arms behind Henry’s head and, with all the strength he could muster, flipped Henry over himself and onto the ground before him. Henry was momentarily stunned as he laid on the school floors, making students around them gasp and stare. Without another moment of hesitation, Henry burst into laughter and stood up, dusting himself off in the process.
“Well, you beat me this time,” Henry mumbled, cracking his back as he stood. “Did ya have to flip me that hard though? My poor fucking—”
“Language.”
Henry sighed.
“My poor fricking—” Henry placed a lot of emphasis on ‘fricking—’ “back will be sore for weeks because of that little stunt.”
“Well, you shouldn’t have grabbed me like that, ya kitten fart,” Juniper huffed before slinging his bags back onto his shoulders and walking ahead, forcing Henry to trot to catch up with them.
“You might be a piece of work, but I am still proud of ya, ya know?”
“Yeah, yeah.”
“I mean it!”
“I know you do,” Juniper mumbled, smiling up at their brother as they pushed the rim of the glasses further up the bridge of their nose.
Stopping at dorm number 207, Juniper turned to face Henry as he shifted the bag on their shoulder to access the pocket of their cloak. After digging for a moment, Juniper discovered the key to their dorm with the number 207 etched in. Juniper took a deep breath, looking from the key then back to Henry.
“So uhh… this is my dorm,” Juniper mumbled softly.
“Yeah, I guess so,” Henry murmured in response as a forced smile was carved into his expression.
“You’ll still be around though, right?”
“Oh yeah,” Henry replied with a nod and a smile, “Xev is tired and I am tired so I will definitely hang around for a few more days at least. Don’t think you’re getting rid of me that easily, Juni.”
“Good,” Juniper chuckled before sticking the key into its slot. “I’ll see you soon then?”
“I’ll see you around,” Henry replied as he turned.
Waving over his shoulder, Henry decided not to linger much more than that even though Juniper wish he would. This was the first time Juniper left home and this was the first human he was about to potentially befriend. This was, of course, a great thing, but Juniper was afraid that they’d mess it all up. Taking one last deep breath, Juniper opened the door to the dorm room.
The dorm was small: two beds with green blankets, two small drawers at the foot of the bed, and two desks pressed together opposite he door under a circular window partially hidden by curtains. It was definitely smaller than Juniper had been expecting but what was more interesting was the black haired boy that knelt before the left bed as he seemed to unpack his bags.
“U-Uh— Hey there!! I’m Juniper!” Juniper mumbled, holding his satchel close as he waved at the boy.
Even in recalling these previous events, nothing struck Juniper as odd. Nothing bad had happened and it seemed like everything had gone right. Why would the stable be blown to bits? Why was Juniper falling? It all made absolutely no sense.
Before Juniper could further rewind and remember previous event, time decided to continue as Juniper stopped falling and crashed to the floor. Every bone screamed in agony as his head began to ring. Sitting up slowly, Juniper looked around him and tried to take in his surroundings as his vision was clouded in a red lighting. He was in a small room with shelves stacked with cleaning supplies and a mop shoved in the corner with the desk and the floor he had been standing on crushing some of the objects in the small space. Juniper had to adjust their glasses, which were surprisingly not broken as he glanced up from where he fell. There was a hole in the ceiling with pipes and wood planks jutting out from it as the room above seemed to be what was giving off the warm colors that lit the broom closet. Juniper squinted at the room above, trying to see what the light was as it was far to bright and bold to be his lantern.
Just then, a creaking sound came from above. Flaming and falling, a massive support beam tumbled downwards from the crumbling, burning ceiling. Juniper tried to roll out of the way while covering his head with his arms, but the wood crashed into his forearm, burning into his flesh as it pinned his left arm down. Crying out in pain, the wood made his skin sizzle and pop as Juniper quickly rotated himself and aimed his leg at the wood. Rapidly, Juniper began kicking at the wooden support beam with his bare feet as tears and smoke blurred his vision. With one final blow, Juniper managed to free his arm as adrenaline was the only thing keeping Juniper from shutting down in that moment.
Having suffered with severe asthma his whole life, despite desperately needing a moment to catch his breath, Juniper could not do so as smoke filled the room. Crawling helplessly to the door while clutching his arm, Juniper was wheezing for air and only stopped to cough loudly into the cold floor when too much smoke entered his lungs. Juniper would need his mask to get out of this room or else Juniper would die without ever getting to spend time with his family, with Henry, or with Fathom again.
Reaching through his psychic connection with his dragon, Juniper managed to concentrate on one word: Help.
Summer Month: 2 
Night Weather: 
Fog Moon: 
