How about 1. (Guess I’m a Parent Now) with Logan as the parent and a side of your choice as his newly adopted person for the random prompt fics :)
Title: Rest Your Head Close to My Heart
Summary: In a world where humans are the practically extinct ones and dragons freely roam and rule the skies, Logan is a young draconic adult in search of a human to decipher the knowledge lying within the books of his hoard. He just didn’t expect to find a crying human hatchling by itself all alone.
Pairings: Parental logicality
Warnings: Crying, Language Barrier, Death Mention, Blood Mention, Hurt/Comfort
Heh, this could easily be applied to the most recent fic I posted, but this sparked another idea which nearly ran away from me in the process.
Once upon a time, there were humans. They were small, squishy beings. Not equipped with spikes or thick-plated scales to protect them from harm. Oh, but they were magnificent, fearsome beings. In the midst of their biological shortcomings, they had intelligence that rivaled even the smartest of dragons, living or dead. They crafted their own spikes and armor out of rock. They were very good at making all sorts of things in fact. Good enough that dragons from across the lands coveted their things.
At first, it was peaceful between both dragonkin and mankind. The dragons would trade the humans materials in exchange for their craft. But then, a war broke out. And in the billowing, heaving smoke and ash that resulted, the humans vanished completely from the world. As far as all dragonkin knew, not a single human sighting has been reported in half a millennium.
Logan thought this to be a great shame. His hatching had taken place one-hundred and seventy-nine years after the war’s end--far too late to have personally seen a human. Several elders in his clan had.
“They were dangerous, conniving vermin,” A Clan Elder scoffed, “as wondrous as their things were, it’s better they stay gone.”
Perhaps this was true, but Logan couldn’t help the ineffable curiosity that ignited his inner flame so. Humans were the creators of the things he found worthy of coveting.
Things like rocks molded into impressions of humans, beasts and forestry. Furs and skins humans took from others and remade to fit over their own like shells. His favorite were the things called books. Rectangular objects filled with leafy material that contained black markings on them. Knowledge was stored on them, though no dragon alive could decipher its meaning.
Knowledge was what Logan coveted most. He wasn’t likely to give up easily unless another could offer something of equal or greater value for it. Knowledge rarely manifested in physical objects, thus making his hoard easily transportable. This was good, because Logan traveled aplenty in his years following maturity.
He wanted to find a human. He needed to know what his books contained and only humans held the key to the knowledge he was so close yet so far to absorbing into his hoard. Humans had to be out there somewhere. And he was determined to be the first dragon in half a millennium to see one.
He just did not expect it to be a hatchling. Or what he presumed to be a hatchling because while humans were small, this one was very much small. Only just the size of a newly hatched whereas adults were described to be three times that. And wailing. It had to be wailing, a high-pitched cry for a caretaker not present.
Logan stared at the hatchling for a long while, hidden away from its view. It’s golden floppy not-quite fur hung over its head. It strangely did not cover the rest of it’s body. Just the head. It wore a blue-and-grey covering over its skin. Its’ strange talon-less forepaws covered its head as it shook. All curled up like a hatchling trying to disguise itself like a rock. Poorly, he might add with the aforementioned shaking and wailing.
He did not know what to do. He was never one to take care of hatchlings even back when he lived with his clan. He did not covet them like his hatchmate had. He also did not dislike them. He felt very neutral towards them. But this was a human hatchling--a being that had not been sighted in so, so long. Perhaps this hatchling still knew the knowledge that laid within his books.
So very cautiously and very, very silently, he coiled himself around the human hatchling. He did not want to spook it away, as he heard tales of humans being fast when fleeing perceived danger and able to wiggle themselves into spots full-grown dragons like himself couldn’t reach. Then he let out a soothing warble, one his parents used whenever Logan or his hatchmate had a nightmare. This quieted the human hatchling. Not because it was consoled by the action; startled would be the better word for it.
The human hatchling lifted its head upwards, limbs folding away from its body in the process. It was then Logan saw it. Dark red stains soiling its skin covering. Logan leaned his head towards the hatchling to inspect it closer. His inner flame trembled at the tinge of copper that wafted into his nose. Humans’ blood was not like dragons. It didn’t glow the color of a dragon’s inner flame, boiling to the touch. Their blood was known for a bright red color that turned brown in time and its coppery scent.
The hatchling had to be injured. No wonder it was crying. Only, that in and of itself presented another complexing problem; he did not know how to care for injured humans. The knowledge out there about humans was very bare on the subject. He knew a plethora of ways to harm a human. But not a single one on how to go about caring for an injured one.
He did not have much time to ponder this. For the human did something unexplained. It latched its cold, soft forepaws to his snout. Logan’s neck frills flared out in surprise but he did not move. An incomprehensible gurgle emanated from the human hatchling. A puff of smoke exited his nostrils, intriguing the human hatchling further. It stuck a forepaw closer to the opening, as if trying to discern what caused it.
Carefully, he eased his snout away from the human hatchling. This seemed to upset the hatchling, making a distressed noise as it reached upwards for him. He hesitated, dropping his head back downwards. Instantly the human hatchling latched on, running its cold forepaws against his scales. The human hatchling’s blue eyes widened as it made an inquisitive sound.
“Curious, aren’t you?” Logan rumbled, keeping his maw closed as much as possible. The human hatchling stilled for a second. Then it squealed back in its own language, its forepaws resting on the ridge of his snout. He hadn’t quite realized that of course, if dragons hadn’t seen humans in centuries, the same in reverse had to be true for humans. Not until now, with a living human hatchling touching his scales with the same reverence he held for a book or another thing touched by humans.
“I know you can’t possibly understand me, but are you injured? There’s blood on you and unless I’ve been misinformed, that generally remains inside of humans just like it does for dragons. Also, I wonder, where are your parents? Surely humans are just as protective of their young as dragons and other species.”
The human hatchling predictably did not understand him. Or if it did, it could only respond in the lilted, melodic odd noises that made up human speech. It was fascinating to hear even if Logan couldn’t understand it. None of the stories talked about human languages and what they sounded like. It was something lost to dragonkin after the war.
The human hatchling chattered on and on as it stroked his scales. At first it started out bright and happy-sounding. But then an odd choking noise came from the human hatchling. This alarmed Logan who presumed it was a sign of the human hatchling’s injury. It alarmed him further as it continued as the human hatchling attempted to speak through it, its chatter stilted and stifled.
He pressed his snout closer to the human to reassure it. And this time, unlike before, it seemed to work. For the human flung its forelegs very clumsily around his snout. It couldn’t possibly envelope him. It tried its best though as the choking noise continued intermingled with the first cries of before.
It was then that Logan realized something. There was human blood on the human hatchling, yes, but it wasn’t their own. It belonged to a different human with a different scent. A scent nearly identical to the human hatchling but not their own. Most likely their parent’s. And if the human hatchling had been all alone, crying, with its’ parent’s blood on them...well.
A strange feeling stirred in Logan’s inner flame. As much as he previously sought after humans and their knowledge of books, all of that paled considerably to this new feeling. It wasn’t exactly a new urge to covet something but it was quite similar. It was a “Oh dear Agni, I presume that I’m a father now” feeling.
He hardly knew how to care for hatchlings, much less human ones. But this didn’t matter, for the human hatchling chose him and denying a rite of parentage would be grievous. He would care for the human hatchling to the best of his ability. Above all else, he’d see that the human hatchling would never meet the same fate as their bloodparent.
“There, there,” He awkwardly crooned, easing gently the human hatchling underneath the protection of his wing, “for as long as I can fly swiftly and breathe fire fiercely, you will be safe.”
And while the human hatchling couldn’t possibly understand him, he almost believed they could as they clung tightly to him, their sobs dissipating at last into a few final quivering hiccups.
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