“You’re getting slow, old man. Why did you hesitate?” Lazarus asked Vikta with a scowl as he held down the entire Sullivan family under his brute strength. The grip in his claws and tail was enormous. Combining that with his sheer weight, even if they did struggle, they would never have a chance to wriggle out of his grasp.

Vikta coughed as Lazarus let up some of the pressure on his throat. While laid out on his back Vikta said with a hoarse voice, “I figured that I’d let you have the chance to live this time. I’ve always regretted what I did to you.”

Lazarus made clicking noises with his throat as he asked, “Chance to live? Regret? Are you sure about that?”

Vikta spoke, “I…”

Vikta reeled in pain as electricity surged through his body. Convulsions overtook his muscles as he screamed. Massive blue sparks of lightning broke the air around Lazarus’ right arm and engulfed it from his shoulder to his claws. The electric sparks seemed to travel down the length of his arm and along the surface of the metallic black armor until it reached his claws and arced into Vikta’s neck. Vikta continuously convulsed in pain as Andrea and Echo watched in silent horror. It seemed to last an uncomfortable amount of time. After a while, Lazarus looked as if he was attempting to kill Vikta, but he suddenly stopped without notice.

Lazarus’ long thin tongue flopped happily out of his mouth for a moment before he regained his composure and closed his mouth. The corners of his reptilian jaws upturned into what looked to be like a smile. Lazarus says with joy in his voice, “Well I certainly hope you regret it now. It’s not enough though. We’re going to have a lot of fun when we get back home. We’ve missed you for far too long. We have some new toys to play with. You’ll love what we’ve done with the place.”

Andrea screeched through choked breaths with red, teary eyes, “This isn’t a game, Lazarus! Please! Let us go! We only want to be left alone.”

Lazarus grunted, “Hell no. Orders are orders. If you wanted to be left alone so badly, why do you keep sending your brother on errands to find the crystals?”

Andrea frowned and asked, “How did you…”

Lazarus cut her off, “How did we know? We’ve known exactly where you were since you landed on this planet decades ago. All we had to do was find Felix and follow him back here. To our surprise, this planet was perfect for keeping tabs on you. We figured it would be better if you were in a place that was easy to access and didn’t run off while we were searching for what you lost. Did you think you could hide from us? We’ve known exactly where you’ve been since you ran off with the dragon spirits. The only problem now is finding them. I… We… need your help to find the Draegona Crystals. What we didn’t know is that you had a son. He’ll be coming with us too, all things consider…”

Andrea spit a massive loogie into the mouth of the talking Skera with impressive aim. After cheering for a brief moment, she yelled out, “Fuck you! Don’t you dare touch my son!”

Lazarus coughed and then screeched as he reeled backward in anger. Lazarus landed on his knees and currently had Vikta's throat in his right hand, Andrea's throat in his left hand, and his tail wrapped around Echo’s neck. Lazarus squeezed hard on all of their throats, choking them and nearly crushing their necks. Picking up only Andrea by her neck, her body leaves the ground, but her feet drag across the concrete.

Holding his position, Lazarus deals a devastating electric shock to the entire family as he choke slams Andrea back into the ground. Andrea thuds loudly into the concrete, and she screams louder than the rest of her family. Bolts of lightning engulfed the entire body of the Skera and his armor as he electrocuted all three of his prisoners. It looks as if he was now attempting to kill them, instead of capturing them, but again he stops without notice.

Lazarus growls loudly, “What the fuck do you mean stop? I’ll do what I please, Yethica.”

A purple glow emanates from under the cape on Lazarus’ back. A streak of purple lightning travels along the surface of the back of his armor, down the back of his leg, and into the concrete. Roughly a meter behind Lazarus, a spark of purple lightning strikes from the floor to the ceiling as a purple smoky dragon spirit appears instantaneously on the bloody ground. Flashes of purple lightning travel along the floor of the bloody corridor and causes some of the dead bodies to convulse.

The smoky transparent dragon spirit has two front feet and an elongated body resembling a serpent, and its glowing body made the dark corridor shine with a deep violet hue. There are no wings on this transparent dragon, but it still seems to float above the surface of the ground. The face is broad and squarish with a flat square snout lined with serrated teeth. On both sides of the muzzle is long tendrils roughly half a meter in length that floated behind the dragon, like two flags on a windy day. The length of the serpent-like dragon was about a meter in length, and it also drifted from side to side as if being blown by the wind. Along its spine, it has long thick fur and has a mane of smoky purple hair around its face. Only its clawed feet touched the ground as its serpent-like body squirmed from side to side as if it was swimming in a current of water or wind. This species of dragon is known as a Lindwurm.

The dragon spirit speaks in a voice that’s sharp, harsh, and coarse, “Stop this sick torture at once, or you’ll end up getting thrown in front of a firing squad. Our orders were to bring them in alive. We can’t afford them to die accidentally. You’ve had your fill of violence. Stop this feral behavior right this moment!”

The Skera loosens his grip on the family and lets their throats go. Lazarus also unwraps his tail from around Echo’s neck. Too tired and exhausted from the torture that Lazarus laid out on them, the Sullivans lay there in a heap of heavy breaths. None of them could move after what they had just endured. Lazarus reached down with both arms and his tail and proceeded to drag the family of three by their ankles. Echo was dragged across the chest of his mother and into a spot between his parents. Lazarus then pulled all three of them out into the bloody hallway, covering all of them in a mess of gore as they were drug across the bodies of the dead soldiers.

Echo immediately vomited upon the floor once he became covered in gore and started crying loudly. Echo asked through short dry heaves, “What the fuck is going on!? Why are you doing this to us!?”

As Lazarus passed by the dragon spirit, he stops in his tracks and roars, “It’s not my fault that your parents are cold-blooded murderers who just slaughtered over a dozen soldiers. If you are paying any attention to the blood that you are now covered in… It seems as though they overwhelmed an entire squad of my expert soldiers with two gauss rifles, a hallway, and some fucking flashlights! After what these fugitives have done, I would like to think that I was rather generous with my mercy. So don’t chastise me for well-deserved punishment, child. Your parents are monsters.”

The dragon spirit now floats above the ground to eye level as Lazarus passes by and keeps pace with his walking. As Lazarus continued to drag the family down the corridor, the dragon spirit asks, “Is it worth risking decades of espionage for some simple enjoyment?”

Soon after, Yethica, the dragon spirit flew a lap around Lazarus before disappearing into the small oblong purple crystal embedded into the back of Lazarus’ black armor set.

Lazarus made a couple of clicking noises resembling a laugh as he spoke, “Yes… Yes, I believe it is. Don’t underestimate them, Yethica. They're stronger than they look. Isn’t that right, Vikta?”

Vikta coughed out a reply, “Fuck you, gizzard fodder!”

Lazarus laughed once again with a series of clicks, “Give your insults a bit more enthusiasm next time, would you? Don’t worry, though. I’ll beat a good insult out of you soon enough.”

Lazarus continued dragging the family down the corridor of the shelter and towards the ladder. He began humming a tune as he slowly strolled along the bloody hallway. The family in unison started flailing around wildly on the ground and were attempting to escape while they hurled ignored insults at the Skera. Lazarus increased the strength of his grip on their ankles as he continued onwards and jumped up half the length of the ladder with little effort.

The Sullivans flail wildly in the air while being hung upside down and smack hard against the concrete back wall. Echo gets knocked unconscious as his forehead slaps a rung on the ladder sending a short, sharp ringing noise through the metal. Lazarus yanks hard as he reaches the top of the ladder and pulls his limp prey out of their hiding place like a hunter that successfully caught his quarry. Lazarus continuously hummed his little tune as he brutally dragged the family up the basement stairs.