By the time they reached the tree that Efron had left the fish under, it was gone. Gretel sniffed the ground where it had been that morning, and caught the scent of something familiar; she couldn't place it at first, then it registered. It’s the same kind of underlying smell that Gavin and Wren have. I guess it’s from electric types in general.

“Looks like someone else beat us to it,” Clay remarked somewhat breathlessly. “Oh well. I’ll go hunt some more.”

“Really? Are you sure? I mean, you went through all the trouble of hunting for us the first time…” If he’s out of breath just from climbing the slope to reach our tree, I can’t imagine hunting a second time so soon would be easy for him.

“I don’t mind it. Honest,” he assured her.

She shook her head. “The birds are already on the move to start migrating. There’s still time for me to catch some before it rains, right?”

“I reckon you got about an hour. If you're okay with getting rained on while you're out, though, that’s your choice.”

The wind type giggled. “I’ve been rained on before. I don’t like it, but I’ll live!”

“Alright. I’ll be on the shore if you need anything, then.” Clay waved one of his green-tipped dorsal fins in farewell as they both departed.

Gretel searched the treetops of the cottonwood trees, but frowned to see they were beginning to shed their gold-tinted leaves for the autumn season. Migratory birds wouldn’t like to stay for too long in trees with less leaves. She turned to look over the prairie instead and then spotted a pink bird with a long neck standing on one foot. What’s that? Oh, there are more of them all around, too!

The wind type hatchling silenced herself and quickly dove toward it. Right as she did so, it seemed, the odd bird shuddered before collapsing. Gretel hesitated, perplexed, before a movement caught her eye: a fluffy young electric dragon popped up from between the tall blades of grass, snatched its kill up from the ground, then dragged it back into the grassy depths where he hid again.

Woah. Getting prey before they do might not be easy… But luckily they can’t shock targets that aren’t in some degree of physical contact with them, right? Electricity needs conductors like the water in the wetlands. She shook her head. No time to waste; I need to find something before the weather gets bad.

Not wanting to chance electrocution, Gretel flew away from the prairie, searching the skies above other islands. She traveled a few miles south until she spotted a V-shaped flock of ducks in the distance. She maintained her silence but unsummoned the tailwind; she didn’t want it to give them a speed boost too. Instead, she positioned herself a fair distance behind them and then changed the direction of the existing air to move toward herself in a strong enough current from in front of them to disrupt their flight. When that alerted them and they broke formation to flee, it was too late; Gretel had swiftly moved in for the kill during the chaos, latching her jaws onto the nearest one as the rest dispersed.

She fought back her instincts to chomp it down despite the fact that she was still full from the fish Clay had brought her. This is for Efron, she scolded herself with an outward chuckle, then spun one-eighty degrees to head back to the wetlands.

The first droplet of ice-cold rain startled her as it landed on top of her muzzle. The purple-striped wyvern glanced up, then flinched as a second one plopped near her eyes. Oh boy. Gretel immediately summoned a tailwind to quicken her pace, hoping to beat the storm clouds to her retreat.

To her disdain, the clouds seemed to have originated over it. I guess I should have known. It wasn’t too rainy on Efron’s old island, but it was when I had passed by this one when I had first landed there last season, she realized. That knowledge did little to help her reach it, though; by the time she was above her new home, it was pouring.

Gretel instinctively looked the beach over to find Clay, but was shocked to discover that the familiar old water type wasn’t alone there; he was with a younger, pinkish-brown dragoness whose aquatic back-fins were similar in color to his. There was a third water dragon, a more burgundy color, who surfaced from the shore right after she did, followed by eight hatchlings of similar colors to the first two adults, who were presumably their parents. The juveniles swarmed Clay and tackled him down.

Gretel was so intrigued by the situation that she momentarily could ignore the fact that she was drenched by the downpour. She moved her kill between her hind paws and landed undetected underneath the uppermost branches of the closest willow tree. Unfortunately, Clay’s voice was drowned out by the burgundy male who was nearer to her.

“Settle down, let’s not crowd him,” he was telling the hatchlings, who obliged by giving Clay a bit of breathing room despite the latter seeming just as excited as the juveniles.

“Papa, can we play in the puddles while we’re here?” the oldest, a yearling, asked.

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“Yes, but just keep an eye out for electric types. They're flighty and hard to spot, but if you stumble across one, you're likely to get shocked,” he said.

“Oh… Maybe I shouldn't risk it…”

“N-No, it's okay! I'm also keeping watch; I'll make sure you don't get hurt. All I'm saying is that we all need to be careful. We can have fun and be careful at the same time, right?”

He brightened. “True! And since the others are smaller than me, I can look out for them too. If I see an electric type go near my siblings, I'll blast ‘em with water!”

“That's very responsible of you to look out for them,” the father praised him, “but we should only attack the electric types if we absolutely have to. This is their home, not ours; you wouldn't like it if they swam in our waters and shocked us if we approached them, would you?”

He froze. “When you put it that way, it sounds bad…”

“Hey, now. You have very good intentions here. I'm proud of you for wanting to keep your family safe,” he assured his son. “But you're too young to bear that responsibility all on your own right now, okay? That's what I'm here for.” He grinned at the hatchlings. “Go on, you can all have fun in the puddles. But if any of you do see an electric type before I do, you need to say so and let me take care of it. Understand?”

“Yes, Papa,” five of the hatchlings agreed before eagerly running off under his watch. The other three didn't seem as interested; they remained bouncing around their mother and Clay.

“Grampa! Grampa, guess what?” the youngest of them said to Clay.

“What?” he played along enthusiastically.

“I've learned to hold my breath for two whole hours!” she excitedly boasted.

Clay gasped with genuine astonishment. “Woah. Impressive! That’s thirty minutes longer than I could at your age. You're really shaping up to be an elite!”

She beamed with pride from his affirmation.

“W-Well, I can hold my breath for three hours!” the oldest of the trio said, pushing her way between the youngest and Clay as if to steal his attention.

Clay looked up at the other adult, who stifled a nervous chuckle as she rolled her eyes with a slight shake of her head in response, subtly telling him that it wasn't true.

“You liar!” the middle hatchling chastised his older sister, even though none of them had noticed their mother's reaction. “I can hold my breath for three hours. And when we had that contest, you almost drowned after two and a half!”

“Sh-Shut up!” the latter whined as if humiliated that her bluff was called.

“Hey, be nice–both of you. I'm sure you all just want to show off how much you've grown since we last visited your grampa,” their mother murmured. She turned to the oldest. “Maybe we shouldn't embellish the truth around family, though, okay? Your grampa loves you just the same as he loves your siblings.”

The oldest sniffled and looked away guiltily.

“It's okay!” the youngest tried to cheer her sister up. “Holding my breath for so long is really, really hard! But I got scared of slowing you all down every time I had to surface for air, so I also practiced really really hard! One time I got so dizzy during practice, I almost didn't make it to the surface in time. But you'll get the hang of it, too!”

Everyone froze at that casual revelation. “When was this?” her mother asked, trying her best to hide worry by way of a forcibly neutral tone, but to Gretel it was loud and clear.

“When you let us spend the night with our big unkie’s pod. One of my cousins kept complaining about me stopping for air, and everyone agreed with him…”

The adult dragoness couldn't disguise a scowl. “Alright. That's the last time I'll ever leave you and your siblings with his pod without me or your papa present.”

The youngest shrank. “Sorry… I didn't mean to get them in trouble…”

She shook her head fiercely. “Sweetie, if they bullied you, they should get in trouble. Holding your breath for that long is dangerous…! What if you hadn't made it to the surface in time?”

The hatchling shrugged, not meeting her gaze. “But they were right; I really was slowing them down…”

“No, no; you could never slow anyone down. Don't ever think that way about yourself. If they're so impatient that they can't wait a minute for you to catch your breath, then that's their problem, not yours.”

“Yeah! You're the smallest one here, but you're tougher than all of us!” her brother said encouragingly.

“You guys, come look at this frog! It’s the biggest one I’ve ever seen!” the yearling called to the trio.

The older sister took that opportunity to escape the conversation, and her brother made sure the youngest was okay before playfully chasing her to join the others.

Gretel gazed down and could see the frog clearly from her distant perch. Wow, that is pretty big! I wonder if it’s safe to eat?

The pinkish water dragoness’s quiet voice drew the wind type’s attention back to the two adults. “Don’t you miss this?” she asked her father. “How long has it been since you last had a hatchling tell you to check out a frog? Seeing them discover the small joys of the world… It really makes you appreciate the everyday things we’ve grown to overlook.”

“Heh. Hard to forget; I still see that on this island. Wind types who stopped to roost here in late autumn, electric types balancing on their tails for the first time.” Clay smiled.

“But they aren’t yours,” she pointed out.

“They don’t have to be.”

“They’ll attack you even if you try to help them…”

“More often than not, they don’t need help. That’s why their alliance with me is genuine. We respect each other, instead of taking advantage of one another through lies like so many water dragon singles do.”

“I don’t get why you’d trust a solitary type after that shadow dragon killed Mom… And then there’s Gavin–”

“Hey, now; I turned him down.”

“That’s exactly the problem! I know you go either way, but you refuse to settle with a new mate! Why? I just–don’t understand it.”

“Nobody can replace your mother. I’d rather spend my final years surrounded by friends than worrying about mates, anyway.”

“Alright, Dad. You win,” she laughed. “It’s your life. I just worry about you, that’s all.”

“I know.”

“C’mon, everyone. Finish your games and let’s head back before the rain stops,” she called to her pod.

“‘Kay, Mama! Will Grampa come back with us this time?” the youngest asked.

Clay laughed. “Naw. This is my home. But you can always visit anytime,” he welcomed them.

They said their goodbyes, and by the time they all dove into the ocean out of sight, the rain had let up.