When I opened my eyes, I felt like something was wrong. I could immediately tell that I was right because I saw I was lying on grass.

“What the heck?” I asked myself as I stood up.

That’s when I noticed my hands; they were my old human hands. I felt my face, no scaled muzzle, just flesh. My wings and tail were gone too. I was a human again, but I still had my black jeans, black shirt, red coat and red, wide brimmed hat. They were reformed to fit me.

“Okay, this is weird.” I said.

I looked around to see I was in a pasture, but not just any pasture. I was back at the camp site for Storming the Farm. All the tents and stuff was around, but nobody was there. I turned around to see Pat and Sam lying on the couches they feel asleep on, but those couches were now in the camp site.

“Hey guys, you might what to get up.” I said as I kept looking around the area.

“Some people are trying to sleep.” said Pat.

“Stop bothering us you big lizard.” Sam groaned.

“No, you should really see this.” I said, louder this time.

“Fine what’s so impor…” Sam said opened her eyes to see that we were not in our living room, “What the hell?”

“What are you two, HOLY CRAP!” said Pat as he sat up straight.

“How did we get back to the farm?” asked Sam.

“I don’t know, but I don’t like it.” I said as I turned around to face them.

“Whoa, you’re human again!” said Pat.

“How?” asked Sam.

“I don’t have a clue.” I shrugged.

“Perhaps I can fill you in.” said a voice that seemed to roll on the country side.

“And who are you?” I asked.

“My name in Materon, I am a powerful wizard in my dimension. I like to look into other dimensions to find entertainment. You three are my latest find.” he said in very high pitched voice. He sounded like a munchkin from the Wizard of Oz.

“Where are we?” asked Pat.

As soon as he finished that question, a small man appeared right in front of us. He was short, very short. No more than four feet tall. He had white hair, orange eyes and rather pudgy. With his dark blue robes, he defiantly looked like a wizard.

“You are in a dimension I built just for you, but don’t worry. It’s based exactly on the specifications of your “farm.” Everything that is there is here.” Materon replied, “If you are wondering how you got here. I simply transferred your minds here. You bodies are lying right where you left them. And as for you, dragon, I changed your physical representation in this world to match the one you had before your little, transformation. I couldn’t have a being as powerful as you ruining my fun.”

“Fun?” I asked, keeping myself restrained.

“Yes, my game. I want to play a game with you and it is one you are fully familiar with. Airsoft.” he said with a disgusting smile on his pompous little face.

“You want us to play airsoft with you?” asked Pat.

“No, not me silly. I have a full line of characters for you to battle. I have created thirty such beings in the dimension and you all will fight them.” he said as he clapped his fat little hands together.

“With what? We don’t have our weapons.” Sam said.

“I unfortunately do not have the proper understanding of the sport to know what your idea of your perfect airsoft weapon is, so you will mentally build your own weapons.” he said.

“You mean we can have any gun, from any manufacturer, with any upgrades we want?” asked Pat.

“Yes. As long as you know what it is, you can make it appear on the work bench over by that tree.” Materon said as a table appeared right where he pointed.

Pat and Sam both jumped up and went to the table. As soon as they were standing, the couches they were on vanished. I just kept staring at Materon; I don’t like to be a pawn in someone else’s game.

“You don’t trust me dragon?” he asked.

“No, I don’t.” I said bluntly.

“Good, because you shouldn’t. I brought you here to amuse me, not to fulfill your petty dreams.” He said as he got right up to me. I was still taller than him, but he stared right into my eyes, “I can still see the dragon in your eyes. Your body wasn’t the only thing to change, but your perception of yourself as well. You see yourself as a dragon now and to be thrown back into that fail human body you once were so comfortable in. That must be hard.”

“Listen, I just what to get this over with and go back to my life.” I said.

“Well then all that stands between you and that goal is thirty armed men.” He said with that smile.

“What will happen if we lose?” I asked.

“You will start again and again till you win, but you have to win while I am watching. I will only be watching this one. If you do lose, then you will have to fight fifty more games till I will watch again.” he said with glee.

“What?!” said both Sam and Pat.

“That’s the game, play it. Oh, you can‘t fight in those outfits.” he said as he vanished. As he did, my clothes changed to my uniform and gear. Sam and Pat both got their gear as well.

“Hold on!” I yelled, but he was already gone.

“Well, this is bad.” said Sam.

“What are we gonna do?” asked Pat.

“Play his game. We can do this.” I said as I walked over to bench.

We all created our weapons. Pat built the SCAR of his dreams. High rate of fire with range and accuracy maxed out for the configuration. Twenty 100 round mags. He even got a tactical M1911 Colt with six mags for it. Sam got her G33E and maxed out its range and accuracy, for going any rate of fire increase. Eight 70 round mags and a high power scope was all she needed for it.. Then she built her dream MP5, the opposite of the 33, rate of fire with only a tighter barrel to increase accuracy. It had ten 90 round mags. A backup USP .45 with four mags and she was done. I built my M16 with all of my planned upgrades. High speed balanced with range and accuracy to give me the most options in one weapon.  Eighteen 100 round mags was all I needed. I grabbed my Colt .45 with four mags. We conjured up ten 5000 round bags of ammo and three red gas bottles and loaded up. After we were done, we all grabbed a full bag of ammo and two speed loaders for the mags to reload in the field.

“Are we really going to do this?” asked Pat.

“Do we have a choice?” I asked back.

“Come on, we can do this.” Sam said.

“GAME ON!” yelled Materon. His voice seemed to echoes across the hills.

We just started to walk across the field, giving the house a wide berth. It was a good ways off, but we didn’t want to take any chances. Then we saw four people running straight at us from across the open field. They looked like guys with full face masks, just your normal airsoft player. I’ve seen tons of these guys. You can never see their faces, but they had on camouflage and tried to be tactical. They were all the same, the masks, the woodland camo uniforms, M4 carbines and even the build of them. They looked as if they were the same guy. They opened fire at us, but their rounds fell short. They were stock weapons. We fired back with our weapons and we hit them with no trouble. What was weird was instead of calling hit and walking away, when they were hit, they went poof. I mean poof, puff of smoke and they were gone poof.

“Well, that was interesting.” said Pat.

“I want to do that again, I like the poof.” said Sam.

“At least our weapons work the way they should.” I said.

“They seem to have stock weapons.”  Pat said.

“Ya, I bet he couldn’t find out how upgraded guns behave so he just gave them stock weapons. I said.

“That’s a good thing.” Sam said.

“Well let’s not get too excited, that was four. We still have twenty six more to go.” I said.

We kept walking around the house till we heard a whiz of a high powered sniper round. We all hit the dirt.

“Where did that come from?” I asked.

“The house, second floor, third window from the left.” Sam said as cold as ice.
She steadied her rifle, peering through her scope, and pulled the trigger. A puff of smoke came out of the window.

“Got him.” she said.

“Okay, we know people are in the house. So if we take out all the other people outside, we can tell how many are in there.” I said.

“Sounds like a plan, I really don’t want to go in there blind.” said Pat.

“Same here.” Sam said.

We moved on through the field, we found seven guys in the field. They tried to set up an ambush, but they sprung it too early. Next we swept the junkyard and gorge, there were ten guys there. Pat and I suppressed them while Sam flanked around them, she ripped them up. We moved on to the sawmill, it was a hard fight. Five guys were buried in there. We all had to break up on flank on our own. I popped two of them in the lumber shed. Pat got two himself in the sawmill. Sam snuck up on the last guy and tapped him out. With twenty seven guys down, that meant three guys left. They had to been in the house. As we walked out of the woods on up to the house, my suspicions were confirmed. A player was dancing in a window. A less experienced player would shoot at him and run into the house, it was insulting to think that we would fall for it.

“Well he’s trying to bait us.” I said calmly as we took cover at barn, “Sam, flank right and try to see what his hiding.”

“On it.” she said as she moved out. She stayed out of sight as she went, she’s just that good.

“Okay, there’s a guy at the front door and a guy at the back door. Surprise, surprise, they have the same M4s that every other guy has had.” she said over the radio.

“Okay, any other ways in?” I asked.

“No, they have the only ground level entrances on lock down.” she replied.

“What about the window where you sniped that guy, is it still open?” I asked.

“Yea, but it’s on the second story?”

“Exactly, one of us can climb up to the second story, sneak in and get the drop on them.” I replied.

“Tune back in Eth. I can’t do it because I need to be the one to watch them, Pat can’t do it because he’s not physically able to do it, No offence.” she said.

“None taken, I know I can’t do it.” Pat said.

“And you don’t have your wings anymore. None of us can do it.” she finished.

“Wrong, I can do it.” I said, “I’ll crawl around to the left side of the house that has the bed rooms. The living room is one giant room that takes up both stories on the right side of the house. They could see me climb up there, but on the left, they can’t. Once up, I will sneak my way in the house through the window and sweep the second floor. Then I will take out the guy on the back door and then the guy on the front door. Hopefully dancing guy will buy it in the cross fire.”

“That sounds like a risky plan.” said Pat.

“There aren’t any other options.” I said, “Pat, keep their attention on you.”

“You got it.” he said.

I when around to the side of the barn and got down on my stomach. Starting to crawl to the house, I was suddenly thankful to be a human again. My camouflage actually works well in this form. I made it around to the side of the house thanks to Pat randomly shooting at them. I climbed the side of the house as best as I could and as quietly as I could. I could not let them know what we were doing. I made it on to the roof and crept to the open window; I slowly checked the corners and slipped in. Slowly checking each upstairs room for anybody, I did not want to be shot in the back. When I finally was certain that I had the second floor clear, I moved to the stairs that lead down into the massive living room. This place was a log cabin and a huge one at that. I was thanking Steve for building it so sturdy that it didn’t creak under my weight. I knew that the guy was directly below me, so I turned my carbine around and lowered it on to the stairs, aiming it right through the gaps in the stairs. I had to judge the aim while up-side-down and backwards. Not a very easy thing to do, but I lined it up. He never saw it coming; I just pulled the trigger and poof. But the guy at the front door reacted faster then I expected and pulled up on me. I fell back into the hall behind me just time.

“Back door clear!” I yelled into the radio, “Taking fire, need backup!”

“Targets are falling back to the back bedrooms.” Sam said, “You’re clear into the living room.”

“Moving.” I said.

I ran down the stairs and leapt behind the couch. Rounds hit the other side of the couch just as I got behind it.

“Targets are in the master bedroom straight down the hall.” I said.

“I got them.” said Pat over the radio, “the master bedroom is a large room the takes up the entire lower floor on the left side. I got an idea. Farm, draw fire. Sam try to find a stick to push these windows open. We can get them in a cross fire.”

“On it.” she said.

I fired at them randomly; I didn’t know how long it would take. My last mag was draining fast, but I heard Sam’s and Pat’s guns open up at the same time and silence after that. Pat broke the silence.

“Clear!” he yelled over radio.

“Clear!” Sam yelled back.

“Clear!” I yelled as I stood up.

Sam and Pat walked into the house and met me in the living room.

“Well, that was fun.” I said.

“Yea, let’s not do that again.” said Sam.

“Same here.” said Pat.

“Marvelous, simply marvelous.” said Materon as he faded into view in the middle of the living room, clapping as he did. “You didn’t disappoint, you truly are good at this game. I am so glad I recorded this whole thing, now I can make copies of you and pit your expertise against some of my more interesting finds.”

“Hey, what?” I said, “Why would you do that?”

“You don’t like the idea of having a copy of you made do you dragon? Well if you feel that way, I could just use you instead.” he said with that sickening smile.

“On second thought, I’m cool with the copy thing.” I said a little shakily.

“I thought so. No matter, I no longer need you people. You are free to return to you bodies. I will spend centuries pouring over the data I have gathered today. Farewell.” he said as the entire world seemed to fade into darkness.

My eyes shot open and I was greeted by the living room ceiling. I sat up and looked at the couches; Pat and Sam were both up to and looking at each other and me. I held my hands up to see what that looked like now. They were back to being red and scaled with black claws. My wings and tail were back; well I guess the technically never left. I stood up and looked myself over, I was a dragon alright. I felt my face and found my muzzle. I felt so happy to be back in my scaly body, but then Materon’s words found their way into my mind. My perception of myself had changed, I did think of myself as a dragon now.

‘How far have I come from what I was?’ I thought, ‘How much of my humanity was left?’

My only worry was if I had gotten comfortable too quickly. I came to the conclusion that I had to get comfortable if I was going to make any progress adjusting to my life. I was still me and that’s what mattered, no matter what I was. Pat snapped me out of my thoughts.    

“That happened right.” asked Pat.

“Did you have a dream were we fought thirty guys at airsoft at the bidding on a little guy named Materon?” I asked back.

“Yea.” he replied.

“Then yes, that really happened.” I said.

“That was a head trip.” said Sam.

“Man, being around you guys is never boring.” said Pat.

“We aim to please.” Sam said.

“Sorry about that, my luck is just crap lately.” I said.

“It’s not your fault, I’m sure it will get better soon.” said Pat.

After we got ourselves sorted, we got breakfast. It was 8:30 Saturday morning. We spent the early morning just going over what happened, that was a bit of a trip. Pat had a 40K game at the game shop so he had to leave. That left Sam and me with nothing to do.

“Let’s call Lucas and James, they might be bored.” said Sam.

“Sure, why not.” I replied.

So Sam called Lucas. As luck would have it, James was at Lucas’ house and they were indeed bored. They had tickets to a Disturbed concert that night and wanted something to do to pass the time. We went over a number of ideas, but the one we settled on was going to the beach. Now, there is only one good beach and that is near Alton by the Mississippi River. I hadn’t been there in forever, mostly because I stepped on a chunk of metal on cut my foot when I was ten. I was never really fond of water ever since. To this day, I do not know how to swim. But everyone else thought it was a good idea and it was hot. So Sam and I got in the truck, picked up Lucas and James, it was a tight fit, and drove to the beach. When we got there, it must have been around 11:00, there must have been a run to the beach. There must have been almost one hundred people there. Sam, Lucas and James all changed into their swim wear. James had a pair of Punisher swim trunks, Lucas had Trigun swim trunks and Sam had her two piece blue swimsuit. Since I wasn’t going near the water, I stayed in the boots, blue jeans, dark blue T-shirt and my big red hat.

“Come on you big scaredy dragon. A little water isn’t going to kill you.” teased Lucas.

“I don’t like the water; I never really liked the water.” I said, “You guys can have your fun, I’ll just stay on the beach.”

“Come on guys, don’t push him on this.” Sam said as she walked toward the river.
I set up a spot on the beach. I had my towel laid out on the sand, my folding chair set up, my umbrella in place and my radio on. I was so thankful my red, half rimmed sunglasses still fit me. I just sat down in my chair under the shade of my umbrella and listened to my radio (I had the Point on, they play good music). I was happy; I just let my head rest against the back of my chair. I had to modify it a little to make it work, just a few parts from another chair, a few cut straps for my tail and presto, dragon folding chair. Since I had my eyes closed, I could hear a little better. Several people were talking about me, but mostly they were just talking about how cool it was to see me in person.

James and Sam were tossing a beach ball around in the water and Lucas was trying to get a date with almost any girl. He was failing miserably. Lucas would get a girl to talk to him and then he would say something stupid to make her laugh. He would just get slapped and then the girl would walk away in a huff. It was pretty funny to hear this nerdy little kid get turned down by so many girls, usually flowed by Sam and James yelling “Fail!” every time they saw him get shot down. The slaps were just so loud; I could hear them no matter where they came from. He finally walked over to me.

“I can’t get a girl’s number to save my a**.” he said.

“You’re doing it wrong.” I said with my eyes still closed, but he couldn’t tell that because of my sunglasses.

“Oh am I?” he asked with obvious sarcasm.

“Yes, you are.” I told him as I opened my eyes and let my sunglasses fall a little down my snout so my eyes could be seen.

“Then, oh great dragon of love, what am I doing wrong?” He asked as he put his hands on his hips, sarcasm dripping off every word.

“You are trying to use your humor to get a girl to like you. Your humor is mostly dirty.” I said.

“It works at school.” he said defensively.

“Well this isn’t school. This is the real world and women don’t like dirty humor.” I told him.

“Then you get a girl’s number.” he challenged.

Now I know a few girls at college, I work with some really good looking ones at the library. But I always like to keep things professional. That doesn’t mean I haven’t been asked.

“Okay then. I will show you how to talk to a lady properly.” I said in my southern tone that I use if I’m going to act civil.

I got up out of my chair and started to walk around the beach in search of a girl that I liked. It didn’t take long to find a girl that must be around my age. She was getting a tan; she had brunette hair and had tanned to a lovely alabaster skin tone. She had on a very skimpy bikini that was red with pink trim and cords. She was a very good looking young lady. Her eyes were closed when I walked up to her.

“Hello.” was all I could think of saying.

She opened her eyes and immediately they widened when she realized what just talked to her.

“Hi.” she said nervously.

“I couldn’t stop myself from talking to you,” I said as politely as possible, “You’re just so beautiful.”

“Thanks.” she said, “Wait, I know you. You’re that dragon on the news, Ethan Compas?”

“That’s me.” I said with a smile.

“You’re a hero for saving that little boy and you didn’t kill those guys that attacked you. You’re really a good guy.” she said as she stood up.

“I just did what I thought was right.” I said. If my face wasn’t red normally, I knew it would be red now.

“Well, I’m glad to meet you.” she said.

“Me too. Do you want to get a drink with me?” I asked. Moment of truth time.

“Sure, I’d love to.” she said.

There was a little beach restaurant conveniently there, so we pulled up a seat at the bar and ordered sodas. We must have gone through five sodas each as we talked about each other’s lives. Her name was Jennifer and she was 22. She goes to SIUE, studying to be a dentist. She liked going to the beach (duh), long walks on the beach, dogs, a diehard Ford car driver, alternative rock and the color red. We talked for quite a while, it was a little later that I found out she had a love for dragons. Though she admitted she thought she would never see one, let alone talk to one.

“It’s just that a few weeks ago, my friends told me I shouldn’t be hung up on something that doesn’t exist.” she said. “Now here I am, drinking soda with a dragon.”

“I know, I didn’t think dragons existed either,” I admitted, “Now I am one.”

“Well, It was nice meeting you.” she said as she got up.

“You too.” I said. ‘Dang, I still don’t have her number.’ I thought to myself.

“Listen, can I ask you a favor?” she asked with a worried expression.

“Sure, go ahead.” I said.

“Me and three of my friends are going to St. Louis next Saturday. Can you come along? We plan on staying out late and four girls alone in St. Louis at night sounds like a bad idea.” she said.

“Sure, I can give you my number. Call me when to need me to come.” I said as I took out my wallet to find my scrap paper.

“Here, let me give you my number too.” She said as she scribbled down her number.

“Okay, that’s it.” I said as I put her number in my wallet.

“Okay, I’ll call you around 10:00 on Saturday. We’ll meet at Fast Eddie’s Bon Air.” she said.

“Got it, nice talking to you.” I said as she walked away.

“You too, see you Saturday.” she said as she collected her things and walked to her car. It was a cherry red Ford Focus.

I watched her get in a drive away. Lucas walked up to the bar and sat down right were Jennifer sat.

“How did you get her number? She was smoking hot.” he asked.

“I just talked to her and she asked me to go with her and her friends to St. Louis next Saturday.” I said.

“You know what she just did there don’t you?” he asked.

“What?” I asked.

“Come on, she’s showing you off to her friends.” said with a laugh.

“What?!” I said.

“She totally is going to show you off to her friends. She’s showing off her new boyfriend so they don’t go after you.” Lucas laughed.

“You don’t know that.” I said as I took another sip of my A&W Root Beer.

“I’ve seen it happen before. She going to parade you around like her big dragon boyfriend.” he said.

“Don’t you have a concert to go to?” I asked impatiently.

“Yes, and so do you.” he said.

“What?” I said in a low voice. Surprised at this statement.

“We were going to surprise you guys, but you called us first. We have tickets for you guys too.” Said Lucas.

“You can’t be serious.” I said.

“I am, you’re going.” he said.

“Well, I guess this is going to be my first concert.” I said as I got up.

We all got ready to the Pageant, where Disturbed was playing. I like Disturbed, but I have never been to a concert before. I had to park a good ways from the Pageant itself.  I threw my coat on and straightened my hat. The walk there was fairly uneventful. When the ticket guy saw us coming, I saw his eyes widen.

“Are you who I think you are?” he asked.

I just put a big draconic smile on my face that showed off my fangs.

“Awesome! Go right in.” he said as he took my ticket.

I just walked through the mass of people; none of them really paid too much attention to me. The warm up band was playing; I can’t remember who they were though. A massive roar came from the crowd when Disturbed took the stage. The sounds were deafening, the smells were overpowering and I loved every minute of it. They kicked off with Inside the Fire, then Stricken. After that came The Night, a favorite of mine for Gears of War. I was going deaf from the noise, but I didn’t care. Then came Indestructible. I love that song. I just banged my head to the beat; everyone else was doing the same thing. People were crowd surfing all over the place. I was tempted to join in, but I thought better of it. When the song was getting close to finish, I couldn’t help myself. I let a stream of fire go straight up above me. The band finished the song without pause, but everyone was looked at the place where the huge fire had come from. Suddenly, I felt really out of place.

“GIVE IT UP FOR THE DRAGON!” yelled David Draiman, the lead singer.

The crowd’s roar of cheers was deafening, but I belted out a draconic roar of my own. Disturbed then played Ten Thousand Fists, it was awesome. That went on till about 10:00 at night, I lost Lucas twice and Sam three times. Once we found the missing people, I decided that it was time to leave. I was not going to wreak my truck because I was tired. On the drive to James’ house, I had to force myself to stay awake. Once we got there, I knew I couldn’t make it any further. We all passed out in the living room except for James who stumbled to his room. I just laid on the floor and passed out while Sam called Mom to tell her where we were.

I was awakened by a scream at about 8:00 Sunday morning. James’ mom, that’s all I know her by, had walked in her living room to find a 12’ long red dragon on her floor.

“Oh man, my head.” I groaned as I got up. Sam and Lucas were still asleep.

“Stay back!” she yelled.

“Easy on the volume, my head still hurts from the concert.” I said as I covered my ears.

“What are you doing in my house?” She asked is a lower voice.

“James said we could crash here after the concert.” I said.

“Who are you?”

“Ethan, Farm Fresh, James friend, you met me at his birthday party last year.”

“Oh! I remember now. James told me about you. I’m sorry, I just forgot there for a moment.” She apologized.

“It’s okay.” I told her.

“I didn’t mean to wake you up like that; I just got a little concerned.” She said.

“That’s understandable. I would be too.”

“Would you like some waffles? I’d be happy to make some for you.”

“Sure, that sounds nice.”

I sat down at the dining table when she finished making the waffles. We just sat there a talked about anything that came up. James’s relatives always seem to like my company better than any of James’ other friends. After a while I just went back to lying on the living room floor, trying to get my strength back, James’ little brother and sister woke up. By the time Lucas woke up at about 10:00, James’ little brother had asked me every question that came to his head and his little sister had taken her entire stuffed animal collection and buried me in it. It was surprisingly comfortable.

“Ethan, you in there?” asked Lucas.

“Yes.” I said, slightly muffled by a stuffed ape.

Sam and James woke up about the same time; I could hear James come into the room and Sam moving around on the couch.

“Wow that was fun.” She said as she got up.

“That was fully awesome.” said James.

“Where’s Ethan?” asked Sam.

“Under there.” said Lucas as James little sister ran into room and tossed another stuffed animal she found on the pile I was under.

“Come on, don’t bury a dragon under your toys.” said James as he ran off after her.

“You can come out now.” Sam said.

“Nah, I’m good.” I said, still muffled.

Just then, James’ Grandma walked in the front door.

“Grandma, you may not want to come in right now.” said James from the front door.

“Oh, I need to make an appointment to visit my grandchildren.” she said.

“Mother, you may not want to come in the living room.” said James’ mom.

Despite their warnings, she came into the living room and sat down in the same spot she sat at when I was at James’ birthday party. She was right next to Sam and right in front of me.

“Grandma!” yelled both of James younger siblings.

They ran over and gave her a hug. I could see this through a gap between a stuffed bird and a stuffed rhino.

“Oh, it’s so nice to see you.” She said as she hugged them back.

“Did you meet the dragon?” asked the little brother.

“No, I did not.” She said in a clearly grandma voice, thinking this was a game.

“You didn’t, he’s right there.” said the little sister, sounding a little confused.

“Oh, he’s a new stuffed animal.” she replied, still in grandma voice.

“No, he’s under my animals. I buried him.” said the little girl with a smile, clearly proud of herself.

“Oh, he’s under there. Well you can come out mister dragon.” said James’ Grandma. It was still clear that she didn’t expect anything to happen.

“Ethan, stay under there.” said Sam, “She doesn’t believe that your really there.”

“What are you talking about?” she asked.

“There’s really a dragon under those stuffed animals.” said Lucas.

“Are you serious?” she asked, sounding a little shocked.

“Yes, they are.” I said from under the pile.

“Oh my God.” said the Grandma.

“You okay Grandma?” asked James.

“I’m just fine, just a little hard to believe that I’m sitting less than five feet from a dragon.” she replied.

“Well, you are.” I said.

“You have seen the dragon on the news, haven’t you?” asked Lucas.

“Yea, but I thought that was a hoax.” she replied.

“I’m not.” I said, a stuffed giraffe fell on my snout, but I was still covered by a zebra.

“Okay, bottom line. Are you ready to see him?” asked James’ Mom.

“I think I am, but slowly.” She said cautiously.

“Okay, take the stuffed animals off his face.” said James.

I still had my hat on, so that was the first thing she saw. I just laid there as more stuffed animals came off, soon my head was exposed. After that came my wings, then my arms and body and then finally my tail. I just stayed still on the floor; my eyes were the only thing I moved. I still had to breathe, so my chest rose and fell as I laid on the floor. She just looked at me in shock.

“Oh my.” was all she said.

“Don’t worry, he’s totally harmless.” said Sam.

“Yea, I doubt he would let a little girl bury him in stuffed animals if he wasn’t.” said James’ Mom.

“Can I stand up now?” I asked.

“Sure.” said James.

I stood up to my full height, thanks to their house’s high ceilings.

“That’s better.” I said as I stretched my limbs.

“You sure aren’t a hoax.” said James’ grandma.

All I did was give her a smirk.

“I’m hungry.” said Lucas.

“I am too.” Sam said.

“If you had woken up when Ethan did, you would have had waffles.” said James’ Mom.

“Yea, but I could go for some Chinese food.” I said.

“There’s that Chinese Buffet in Edwardsville.” said Sam.

“We’re fine, you kids go.” Said James’ Mom.

“You sure?” I asked.

“Yea, have fun.” she said.

So we all said bye and went to the Chinese Buffet in the Edwardsville. It wasn’t a long drive, we got there about 11:00. Went we all walked through the big doors, the Asian guy behind the counter looked at me like I was some kind of monster.

“Table for four please.” I asked as nicely as I could.

“You really a dragon?” he asked in a thick Asian accent.

“Yes I am.” I told him.

“You don’t look like dragon from China.” He told me.

“That’s because I’m an American dragon. Now can we please be seated?”

“Sure, sure, this way. Smoking or Non Smoking?” He asked.

“Non Smoking.” I replied.

We all were seating at a table along the right side of the restaurant. We each took turns getting our food. Lucas got Chicken Chow Mein and fried rice, James got General Chicken and few other things I can’t remember. Sam got anything with noodles in it and a few egg rolls. I got anything deep fried. We all just sat around eating and talking about what we were planning to do for the rest of the day.

“I think we should go see a movie.” said James.

“Nothing good is playing right now.” Sam said.

“How about the batting cages?” offered Lucas.

“No way, you always crank the speed all the way.” I said.

“I know, Laser Tag.” said James.

“That sounds fun.” I said.

“Sure, why not.” said Sam.

We all finished our meals and I paid the man and we were off to Caseyville to play Laser Tag. It was fun to walk into an arcade with a bunch of little kids running around, they all stopped when I walked in. We just walked up to the counter.

“Four for Laser Tag.” I said.

“Cool, the dragon in my arcade. You guys can play for free.” said the owner.

“I don’t want to put you in a spot.” I told him.

“You won’t, I can tell people the dragon played here.” he said.

“If you are sure?” I asked.

“I’m sure; just let me take a picture of you.” He said as he grabbed a camera and walk around the counter.

“Sure.” I said as I put a big smile on my muzzle.

He took a picture of us with him in it as well.

“There, that should help business.” He said.

“I hope so.” I said.

We all got suited up. My chest piece fit with a little adjustment. We were all on the same team for the first game. The dark places, the black lights, the strobe lights, random noises and the mist was enough to make my draconic senses too overloaded to make them effective. I had to go on my own regular instincts. I just searched for enemy team members. We were on red team, so green and blue guys were tagged on sight. I like the respawn system. If you got shot, just walk away for about twenty seconds and you were back in. We used our airsoft skills to gang up on the enemy. Covering each other and flanking around in the tight hallways. There wasn’t a lot of room for me, but enough. I took up the entire hallway in few of the smaller places. I had fun ripping little kids’ defensive lines apart. Sometimes a dad would try to hold a line, but we broke though and blew their base up. The only reason to do that was to get a ton of points for your team, the base resets itself in about ten seconds and so we just formed a line and took turns holding the base while one of us blew the base. After about ten minutes into the first game, we had blown both bases. Now it was just tag as many enemies as we could till time ran out. We held our base against the enemy waves, they almost broke through twice, but someone would respawn right when we needed them. It was awesome. The siren blared, Game over, time to see who won.

When we all walked out, a few new people stopped what they were doing and just stared at me. I didn’t pay much attention to them; I was too busy looking to see if we won. I was so happy when we did; Sam had the highest accuracy rating, I was right behind her. They broke us up for the rest of the games; I was always on red though. In the next game, I fought Sam and Lucas on Green Team for about ten minutes trying to get up to the second story. James was on blue, so he wasn’t going to help me. I never broke their line, so I just went hunting. I did that for the next five games; I just walked around and tagged any enemy I saw. That must have been a sight, a big dragon with blinking red lights on him walking around with a little plastic gun. Right before the next game started, we were all in the starting room. Sam, James and Lucas where sent by their teams to hunt me.
“You guys came in with that dragon, you deal with him.” said some guy.

“So glad you guys want to come see me.” I teased.

“Your mine.” said James, he was very confidant in himself.

“Come and get it.” I said as I wiggled my tail at him.

I just walked around for the first few minutes of the game, but then I ran into James.

“Found you.” he said as I ducked back around the corner.

“You found an eight foot dragon in a small area. Good for you.” I said back sarcastically.

We had a bit of a fire fight, but Sam and Lucas came up on either side of me. I was hit and I fell back. I walked for as long as I could till I found a good spot. It was a very dark corner, tucked under the second story, completely dark and out of the way. I folded my wings in front of me so my chest was covered; I was just a dark thing in darkness. I heard someone coming, it was Sam and Lucas.

“I think he went this way.” said Lucas.

“Okay, stay behind me.” said Sam.

They walked right in front of me and didn’t see me. As soon as they turned around to walk down the hallway, I opened my wings and fired at both of them in the back.

“Oh you prick; you used your wings to cover yourself.” Sam said as she glared at me.

“Ha ha.” I said as I darted down the hall to get away from them before they respawned.

I darted down the hall and tagged three little kids before I ran into James. He didn’t even see it coming; I just shot him and kept going. I just kept going till the end of the game. I had the most tags on my team as well as the highest accuracy, red won.

“You jerk.” Sam said as she looked over the score.

“You spent too much time hunting me.” I told her.

“Well, I don’t know about you guys, but I’m tired.” said Lucas.

“Me too.” said James.

“Yea, I got to go to class tomorrow.” I said.

“That’s right; this is your last day of summer vacation.” James said.

“Yea, back to the grindstone.” I said.

So, we got back in the truck and we left. I dropped James and Lucas off at their houses and then I drove home. It was 9:37 when I pulled up in the driveway. We just went inside and climbed into bed. My summer vacation was over, college begins again. I wondered what my coworkers at the library would think of me now. Maybe they’ve seen me on the news, but I knew the seeing something on the TV was different then seeing it in person. I just put those thoughts out of my head and feel asleep. College life was about to get even more interesting.