ORIGIN

Once again, the little dragon surprised it. "Uh, no! No, you didn't make me feel bad. I'm just explaining. I don't really care what you think about my name, to be honest. Doubt anything you could say would make me feel bad." Not after everything that it had heard so far in its life. It doubted anything outside of that sandy tunnel could make it feel bad.

It sighed. She was very naive and innocent. She didn't know, it guessed, or perhaps she had just never encountered anyone dangerous. "I don't know. On accident, maybe, or because they wanted you to get hurt. Or just thought you shouldn't be alive. All kinds of reasons."

Ruby friend. Was it really that easy, to make friends? Beta wasn't really sure what it had done to warrant this little dragon to name it as a friend, but perhaps it was her nature to be so loving and accepting. It was a very very strange concept to Beta, who had known nothing but harsh judgement, brutal training, and a competitive atmosphere of "prove yourself better then everyone else". Friends were not required. Oh, to be Lass...

"I don't know how many, but yeah, there's definitely some gembound around that do harm." It sighed. It couldn't just go and tell her about its life, could it? Or who it was, who it was supposed to be? "No, I won't go and hurt anyone without reason. But I know people who would." Or, at least, with something like the tiniest or most foolish reasons. The world that Vargas wanted to bring back probably wouldn't allow such creatures like Lass.

Alright, so, this tiny little dragon probably was part of that big white dragon's Monoceros family. She was probably new and hadn't met her yet, but that just meant that...uh, well, it wasn't sure what that meant, but hell of a coincidence that it would run into her not long after attacking a family member. It should probably inform Master Vargas about this.

Beta paused its train of thought, not looking at Lass as it considered the question. "It's called being dead. It's when your life ends and you can't do anything anymore. I'd imagine it does hurt to die, since death usually comes violently. I don't know if it hurts after you're dead but...probably during. I wouldn't know, I've never died."

Beta snorted with amusement. "You drew butts all over your dad? Man, if I drew butts on my life-giver he'd probably rip me in half!" It laughed, as if this was hilarious, despite the fact that it was...quite true. It didn't doubt that it would be punished severely for a prank like that. "Nah, never saw the point of learning to draw. It doesn't help with training or anything, so didn't see any reason to do it."

It remembered the conversation (or more like yelling match) that it had with Imp before it had gone to sleep and how the hybrid had asked in a fit of hysterics if it had ever even bothered to try and do art. And it had given the same answer. It felt a lot more hollow, though, giving the answer to Lass. Maybe because she was so innocent and so hopeful...and not, uh, cursing endlessly at it.

Beta wanted to refuse, it really didn't want to be wasting more time scribbling on the ground, but it didn't have a heart of stone - it took one look at Lass jumping around on the ground and giving it those big hopeful eyes and it had to bend. "Alright, fine. I'm sure I'll find a way to make it more useful to my training. What do you draw with?"