The College Drag, Part 31

When I woke up I felt a shiver ran down my spine all the way to the tip of my tail. My back tensed up and my eyes shot open. I felt like something was very wrong, but I couldn’t hear anything to indicate that. The chickens weren’t clucking, the goats were quiet so that meant everything on the place was in order. I rolled out of bed and put on my normal outfit. I would stop whatever I was doing for a moment at random times and listen for anything wrong; I would get just the normal sounds back. A creak of the floor joists told me that someone was moving around in the back rooms upstairs.

“I’d better go check that out.” I said to myself as I just finished up putting on my socks.

Being as quiet as I could be creeping upstairs and through the kitchen and living room, I made it to the back bedrooms. All the doors were closed, but the sounds of someone shuffling around in Sam’s room got my attention. Two options popped in my head. One, Sam was awake and getting ready for the day. However, it was almost 8:00 in the morning and Sam normally sleeps till 9:00. Two, someone else is in her room and she needs help. That was also highly unlikely since Sam is so paranoid that she’s booby trapped her room and have knives hidden everywhere in there. Not many people brave her room, me included. Helpful tip, stay away from the walls. I took a risk and knocked on her door.

“Sam, you in there?” I asked

“What do you want?” she groaned, sounding half asleep.

“I’m just making sure you’re okay.” I replied through the door.

“I’m just getting ready to go feed the chickens.” Sam said, she opened the door and gave me a funny look, “What’s got you all spooked.”

“Huh?” I asked, not knowing what she meant by that.

“You look spooked, like something is about to happen.” she replied, “Your shoulders are all tensed, your back is arched and your ears are more forward. Even your pupils are smaller, like you’re ready to fight at the drop of a hat. Something wrong?”

“I wish I knew.” I said, trying to calm myself down, “I woke up with this overwhelming feeling of danger and I heard sounds coming from your room.”

“Listen, I know you’re spooked over the screening.” she said, sounding like she was trying to calm me down, “I get the same vibe you do from it. You want my advice, bring a knife. You’ll feel better armed.”

“Sam, it’s in a capital building.” I sighed, “There are metal detectors and guards that will not take too kindly to me bringing a knife.”

“You got claws.” she said, looking at my hands and then back to my face, “Sharpen those things up, you might need them.”

I looked at my claws. They were dull, very dull, pretty much just rounded off at the tips to make them easier to work with at my job and pretty much my everyday life. Sharpening them would mean I was prepared to use them and that use would not be pretty. That feeling wasn’t going away though, the day felt like something bad was going to happen and I wanted my options open.

“Alright Sam,” I said as I looked back at her, “Where’s your sharpening kit?”

“You don’t have the skill to put a fine edge on those things.” she said with a smirk, “I’ll sharpen them for you.”

I just nodded and Sam pulled me into her room. I sat on her bed as she went to work sharpening my claws. If you want sharp, Sam can do it. Her knives aren’t done till they can split a hair. She filed away at each claw, putting an extremely sharp edge and point on everyone.

“Poke this.” Sam said.

She held up a block of wood that she uses as something an intruder would fall on, it’s got four wooden dowels poking out of one side so the force of the guy falling rams them in and embeds into where ever. One of the many traps she has in her room. I poked the wood block with my right index claw and it penetrated about a half inch into the two inch block of oak.

“Wow, that’s sharp.” I said as I made sure to watch where they went, “Do they need to be that sharp?”

“You have a lot of strength to, but they are razor sharp,” she said with a satisfied grin on her face, “But to help you through the day when you don’t need them, I have this.”

She pulled out a small yellow can that said ‘liquid tape’ on it.

“This stuff hardens and acts just like electrical tape, but it’s a dip coat and it will look like your normal claw color.” She said, unscrewing the lid, “It’s black and should match just fine. Here, let me put it on.”

“You know Sam,” I said as she dipped each claw into the black goo, “This is the Sam equivalent to having my nails done. The difference is that instead of pretty looking nails or in my case claws, deadly hidden weapons are the end result.”

“Oh I sharpen my nails too.” she said, finishing up my left hand, “I’ve gotten then sharp enough to cut right through paper with no ragged edges. I like to be able to gash anyone open that tries to attack me even if they manage to get my knives away from me.”

“How many knives do you have on you right now?” I asked.

“I just woke up Ethan.” she said with a groan, “I only have two, my pocket knife and my stiletto.”

“What? No K-Bar?” I said with a slight smirk.

“No, that’s for when I go to the mall.” replied Sam, dead serious.

I just smiled and shook my head. I took a look at the job she did, it looked really good. They looked like she had done nothing, they were all rounded at the tips and everything, but that was all just a rubberized cover for the extremely sharp tip underneath.

“Okay,” she said as she went into instructor mode, “If you do have to use them, press hard the cover will scrap off and you’ll be free to use the claws for whatever you need them for. Until that point, press lightly and try not to poke anyone.”

“Thanks Sam.” I said, giving her a big draconic smile, “This makes me feel a bit less vulnerable.”

“The joys of being armed.” she replied with a big smile of her own.

I left her to get ready for the day, mostly coming up with new places to hide her knives, both in her room and on herself. The record she has had completely hidden on herself was fifteen knives, but the standard carrying amount for her is four, six if she’s going to Wal-Mart. Even as a dragon, she scares me.

I went downstairs and prepared my ‘oh sh*t’ plan. I took out my revolver and made sure it was unloaded, I always leave my weapons unloaded. After a quick check to make sure it was in firing order, I put in back in its case and took it out to the Ford.

“I sure hope I don’t need this.” I said to myself as I put it behind the seat and covered it up with an old heavy coat I keep back there.

I got my breakfast of cereal and watched a little TV to calm me down. As I flipped the channels, I saw a news report that caused me to stop and look.

“You know what I think; I think having these creatures basically come back from the times of old is a great thing for humanity.” A man in a very nice blue suit and black hair stated, “I mean a whole new species has emerged and there is no telling what advances we could make with them. Maybe within those beasts lies the cure to so many diseases, maybe improve our lives with more vitality and maybe even extend our lives.”

I was about to flip the channel in a huff when another man got my attention.

“You mean you want to use these people as some kind of medical harvest animals?” said a brown haired man in a brown suit and glasses, “These are not pigs or rats we’re talking about here, we’re talking about people whether you like it or not. They have thoughts, feelings and emotions just like us. Hell, they were all once human beings and look at you, sizing them up to benefit yourself. You want to use them for medical advances for human use and I feel that’s just wrong. I don’t know about the people at home, but you disgust me. Completely ignoring the situation these people are in and only caring if you get the go ahead to cut them open and see what you can make money off of.”

“You can’t tell me as a doctor that you wouldn’t want to pursue a cure for a disease that is inflicting human beings worldwide.” The blue suit doctor said, sounding very strongly that he wanted to get the green light for experimentation on dragons, “They aren’t human anymore, but they should be glad that their lives will mean the difference for so many people across the globe.”

“You will never get that permission.” said the brown suit doctor, just dead straight, “The government has given the rights of the people to dragons that willingly register themselves. They are not beasts like you claim they are, they are people just like you and me and there’s nothing you can do about that, what’s done is done. Dragons are busy trying to put the pieces of their lives back together, they don’t need self righteous people like you seeing dollar signs instead of them.”

I shut the TV off and put the remote down.

‘Well, at least there are opposing sides on the news and not slanted.’ I thought as I emptied the bowl of milk into my jaws.

I waited time about 9:00 A.M. to get going. Dad had to install some cabinets so he couldn’t make it like he said.

“Sorry,” he apologized, “I forgot I had to do that today, but I told Mom and she wants to go and make sure you’re safe.”

I swallowed when he told me that. Mom’s a little more of a wild card then Dad. Dad would try to be even handed, but he wasn’t a man you wanted to push. All my life, I never once saw Dad angry, but from the stories I was told you really didn’t want to be the guy to do push him that far. Mom was either all the way calm or all the way angry with no middle ground. One way she made herself feel better was to pop off shotgun rounds out the kitchen door. She doesn’t do that anymore; probably do the limited amount of ammo. When she came out the door carrying the over-and-under and a box of 20 gauge shotgun rounds, I just knew she had the same feeling I did.

“Things come to a head,” she said as they too joined my revolver behind the seat, “I want to be ready. No way all this was setup and readied in this amount of time, government doesn’t move this fast.”

She covered up the shotgun and the ammo with an old coat liner that I also keep back there and climbed into the passenger seat. Dad just shook his head and said,

“Now you two be careful and don’t jump the gun.”

“I know Dad, I’ll be careful.” I replied.

“I’ll make sure he’s safe.” Mom told him, “No one’s getting him today.”

“I’m glad you feel that way Ma.” I said with a slight grin.

“You’re my baby boy, I’ll be damned if I’ll let a bunch of suits take you away from me.” she replied, “They’ll get you over my dead body.”

I just started up the Ford, slipped on my sunglasses and drove off to Springfield. It was a haul, three hours of driving straight up, but the Ford could handle it. I did have to stop for gas about half way to make sure we had enough. The gas station guy said I was the fifth dragon to show up that day, but the first one buying gas.

“All the others were in here to get a drink or to get something to eat really quickly and take off again.” he said as I handed him my twenty for my gas, “You are quite a rare dragon it seems, one that drives rather than flies.”

“I’m a sucker for the American highway.” I replied with a big grin on my muzzle, “The open road with my arm out my pickup’s window and the radio playing seeing it all through a pair of nice sunglasses, that’s something flying just doesn’t have.”

I just went back to the truck and continued on to the Capital Building in Springfield. It’s hard to miss, even less so when it’s literally covered in dragons. Some were on the ground, others perched on the light posts and on the building itself. I spotted a parking space open up on the side of the road as a guy pulled out a space and I whipped in before it could be taken again. As I popped the door open, I suddenly felt a lot of eyes lock onto me. I slipped off my sunglasses and put them back on the dash as I opened the door to climb out. When I was out in full view and closed the door, the feeling like every dragon was staring at me was like a crushing weight on my shoulders. Mom and I made our way up the steps, walking like nothing was wrong so not to provoke a response.

“Its him.” said a dark blue dragon perched on the back of a bench, “It’s the dragon that revealed us.”

My stomach hit the ground, I was sure this was a bad thing. But suddenly the entire crowd of dragons erupted in a huge cheer.

“Thank you, thank you.” said a green dragon as he ran over and grabbed my hand, “You had the courage to do what we couldn’t. I heard about you and I got the nerve to go home. I have my life back thanks to you.”

I got a bunch of dragons that said similar things and would shake my claw so much that I felt like it was going numb or about to be jerked out of place. Mom just pushed me through the crowd as we made our way to the top. The clock just struck twelve noon as we made it to the top and a man came out of the front entrance. He had on a nice dark blue suit and had light brown hair, about 6’ tall and was very clean looking. With a megaphone he shouted,

“Welcome dragons! We are proud to offer to all of you the chance to be fully accepted back into society. With the recent dramatic increase of your number, this is to ease the public’s suspicions about you and be fully confident and secure in the knowledge that none of you will be a problem for anyone. I’m convinced after today that all of you will be able to leave here without any trouble and live your lives without fear of anything happening to you simply because you are a dragon. Now please follow me inside and we’ll get underway.”

We all filed into the building after him and were lead to a large room, what I guess was the meeting hall for the State.

“All of you take a number from the lady here and then please be seated.” he said as he motioned to a lady sitting at a folding table with a roll of numbers, “When your number group is called, go through that door were the two officers are and there you will be screened and if you are approved to leave you will receive your updated papers and identification cards from the officials as you move on. Please be patient.”

It was a lot of shuffling and a few stepped on tails, but we all got our numbers and found a seat. I spotted Bethany way off in the distance and I waved at her, but she didn’t see me. I didn’t see Heather, probably because she lived in Missouri and had to go to Kansas City for her deal. There were a lot of different dragons there, all shapes and sizes, ranging from twenty-five foot long quadruped dragons to a few five foot tall anthro dragons in pretty much every color imaginable. Most were western style dragons, but there were a few ropey eastern dragons as well. They had wings which I thought was weird, but I guessed if they wanted to fly they needed them. I never did get how the eastern dragons could fly without wings in the stories myself. The major difference between an eastern and western dragon there was mainly the torso, neck and tail length. Typically the tail on a western dragon is the same length as its torso, neck and head length combined. An eastern dragon tended to have a stretched out neck, long torso and a very long tail. The ones I saw standing tended to look like a capital letter “S” when they were walking on two legs, but only a hand full did. Most of the eastern dragons there were quadrupedal and they had a slither to their walk as well, like a ribbon or something along those lines. They also tended to have facial hair, little beards and those funny mustaches that they have sometimes. They did pull off that wise dragon look, but when one of them said,

“This is one long f***ing wait, my a** is falling asleep.”

I couldn’t help but try to suppress a loud laugh. There were other types of dragons there to. I spotted a few wingless dragons. From the different shades of blues and greens with fins on their backs and a large one on the tips of their tails they had to be water dragons. At first I thought they were the wingless eastern dragons, but they other features told me otherwise. It was hit and miss with clothes as well. Some had on full outfits; others had on only pants at least while others were in nothing but scales. Pretty much I was the only one with my style of boot. Mine is a full boot that encases my entire foot and that was a rarity it seemed. I saw a lot of bare dragon feet that day. Some had half shoes, a sort of strap on leather piece on the top of the foot to look like shoes, but the bottom of the foot was what was being walked on. A handful had hats, but a bunch had hair. Most of the time is ran down their back like a ridge and just puffed out on the top of their head to give the look of a full head of hair. I saw one with a long brown mane that ran all the way to the tip of his tail and ended in a puff of long hair.

“That has to be a record.” I said to Ma, “The world’s longest mullet.”

She just smirked a bit. I just looked at the massive amount of dragons there, it was awe inspiring. From the digital counter on the far wall that read the numbers being screened, the grand total of dragons there was three hundred and twenty eight. I was just impressed by that many dragons in the state of Illinois. Granted that wasn’t a lot, but it’s still a fair amount.           

“Number 124.” I said as I looked at my little number sticker, I stuck it on my jacket so I didn’t lose it, “I wonder how long this will take?”

“Well, depends how many screeners they have.” Mom replied as she sat next to me, twiddling her thumbs, “Oh I brought a Miniature Magazine to read.”

She dug into her purse and got out a Dollhouse Miniatures magazine. She began to read it as the first numbers were called out over the PA system.

“One thru twenty, please come to the screening center.”

Twenty dragons got up and went through the doors. They all looked nervous, but that was to be expected. I just sat there and waited for my turn as time wore on. Every few minutes twenty more numbers were called and twenty more dragons would disappear into the back rooms. What got my attention was none would come back.

‘Some of them had to have friends back here,’ I thought as I looked at the doorway, ‘surely they’d let them come back after they were done so they could talk to their friends.’

“One twenty thru one forty, please come back for your screening.” said the PA lady.

“Well that’s my group.” I said as I stood up and started for the door.

Mom put her magazine away, got up and followed after me, but when we got the doorway, the officers stopped her.

“You can’t go back there ma’am.” said one as he held out his hand to stop her.

“Like you can stop me from seeing my own son through this.” she shot back, “All you are doing is making sure he’s not a danger to the public right, how would me being there effect that?”

“Ma’am, I have my orders,” the other officer said strongly, “Only dragons to be screened go back there. You can wait for the results of the screening in the lobby.”

“I know what the results will be.” Mom said, sounding upset and getting worse by the second, “He’s harmless, that’s what the results will say.”

“Never the less, you can’t go back there.” said the first officer, still stopping her from moving forward with his hand.

“Ma, I’ll be fine.” I said, reassuring her, “Just please wait in the lobby for me, I’ll be out before you know it.”

“You mind yourself in there.” she said, waving her finger at me, “Be careful.”

“I will Ma.” I said as I pushed through the doors.

I followed the red arrows taped to the floor; the other dragons in my group had already gone down the path so I was left on my own. As I rounded a corner, a man stood next to an open door about twenty feet down the hall.

“In here please.” he said kindly as he walked into the room.

I just shrugged and went down the hall and turned into the room. I felt a sharp pain in my right side just as I cleared the doorway and out went the lights. The next thing I remember was waking up in a cage in the back of a moving semi trailer. I tried to speak but found my muzzle strapped shut and my arms, legs, wings and tail chained to the floor of the cage I was in. The cage wasn’t very high; probably due to the fact I was tied to the floor of it and didn’t need head room. A chain over my neck held my head down, so I could only look around using my limited neck movement and my eyes. I could see other dragons in cages like mine and they were stacked one on top of the other. Fear began to take hold.

‘What’s going on, where are they taking me and what do they plan on doing with me?’ were some of the questions that jumped to my mind.

It was about an hour of till I felt that the truck was slowing down. Of course I was unconscious for a while so I had no idea how far away I was from Springfield or even find we had left Springfield, the truck could have been going in circles for all I knew. The brakes kicked on and the truck came to a halt. There were a few cages between me the door, a gold dragon’s butt was in my way when the door was opened, but I heard a guy say in a scraggly voice,

“Don’t be afraid, you’re all free now. We saved you from the oppression of the government and big business. Now you can be yourselves, wild and free as nature intended. Be free and live in peace and love.”

‘You have got to be kidding me.’ I thought, ‘PETA guys.’

“Quick, get them out of their cages and into the woods before the cops show up.” said the guy and two more guys started to drag the cages out and release the other dragons.

As each cage was opened, every dragon just walked a little ways away and stopped. By the time they let me out there were a lot of very confused dragons just ambling about. I just waited for them to completely unchain me till I shot up.

“WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOPE HEADS THINK YOU’RE DOING?!” I roared right in the leaders face.

He looked shocked, but replied,

“We are setting you free. You are a wild animal and we want to make sure you are not mistreated or abused by humanity. You can now run wild just as nature intended for you. Go on, run free.”

I just raised an eye ridge and asked him very calmly,

“Which way is it back to Springfield?”

“You can’t go back; people will try to abuse you there. Force you to dress up so you look like them. Force you live by human rules. You are a dragon; you should live by natures rules.” The stoner said.

I was about to say something when I breeze got my attention; the pricks took off my clothes.

“Okay potheads.” I growled, “I want my clothes back. Those were my lucky pair of jeans and my nice gray shirt; it didn’t have any rips or stains on it. I’ll find my way home on my own.”

“You don’t need clothes.” he replied, “Be wild and free.”

“Okay, had enough of you.” I said as I grabbed him up by the shirt collar and put his face right in front of mine, “I’m not a wild dragon, I’m a modern dragon and I think so is every other dragon here. So you can show us the way home or we can find it ourselves. If you make us do the latter, I’ll press charges for kidnapping. You hear me?”

He went pail and I smelled something foul and few moments later, but he managed to say,

“Your clothes are in the van over there. We were planning to return them to your family.”

“Yes, as for that. What was all this about? Why go to all this trouble?” I snarled, still holding up to my muzzle.

“We managed to get in tight with some of the officials,” he began, still looking terrified that the plan backfired, “They were totally going to give you all they said they would, but we were all like ‘nuh uh’ so we set up the screening rooms to get you guys to your natural habitat. A quick shot with a powerful tranquilizer gun and lights out. We hauled you all to the trucks and took you here were you could be safe and free. We thought that’s what all of you would want.”

“You idiot.” snarled a black dragon, “We just came from this. We want our lives back.”

“Yeah,” said a gold dragoness, “You have any idea what it’s like out there. It’s not wild and free fun times; its survival by whatever means necessary. I don’t want to do that again, I’ve done that for the past three years. I just got back with my family and they love me for who I am, I’m not about to abandon that again.”

A bunch of draconic growls rose up as the dragons turned on their supposed ‘saviors.’ I had to make sure this didn’t end badly.

“Just take us back and this will all go away.” I said calmly.

“You want to go back?” he asked, sounding like he couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

A loud chorus of ‘YES!’s came from all the dragons.

“Well if that’s what you truly want, we’ll take you all back.” he said, “Just get back in the trucks.”

“That’s better.” I said as I sat him down.

I went over to the van and rooted around till I found my clothes. It was all there in a box. I checked my pants pocket for my wallet and keys. My wallet was there and so were my keys, but all my money was gone.

“HEY!” I shouted, “Which one of you stoners took my money?”

One of them wondered over to me with a depressed look on his face.

“I thought you wouldn’t want it anymore.” he said as he pulled my money out of his pants pocket.

I glared at him as I snatched it out of his hand and quickly counted it.

“Thirty eight dollars.” I said as I made sure it was all there, “And I want my Blockbuster card back too.”

He handed it over as well and sulked off. I put on my clothes tied my boots and slipped on my hat. I felt a lot better with my clothes on.

“Now please get in the trucks and we’ll take you all back.” the leader said to all of us.

I trusted these guys just about as far as I could throw them, but I give everyone a chance to fix their mistakes. We all got back into the backs of the trucks, no cages this time, and just sat on the floor of the trailers.

“Maybe I’ve been gone for too long, but who are these guys?” asked a bronze dragon sitting across from me.

“PETA more than likely.” I replied, “The extremist group of them anyway.”

“PETA?” he asked, looking puzzled.

“People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.” said a blue dragon near the back of the trailer, “They want animals to be treated fairly.”

“But we’re not animals.” said a white dragoness, “We’re people.”

“These guys think differently.” growled a dark blue dragoness, “To these pot heads we’re just like lab rats and need them to stand up for us. I don’t know about all of you guys, but I’ll be surprised if these idiots do what they said they would do.”

“I have to agree,” I replied, “Something isn’t on the level here.”

I shut my eyes and just felt for which direction we were going in. I’ve always had a good sense of direction; it was easy for me to tell if I was going in a specific direction, my last name is Compas you know. From what I felt, we were heading west and that was the same direction we were going before. They were taking us even further away from Springfield.

“Okay, I think something’s up.” I said in a low growl, “We’re headed west and Springfield is east.”

“I knew it!” growled the blue dragoness, “Those dopers aren’t taking us back, they’re taking us out so far that we can’t find our way back.”

She stood up and began to sink her claws into the metal sides of the trailer. I did the same thing, the rubberized coat just peeled off and the razor sharp tips dug into the metal, most likely aluminum. Pretty much every dragon began to rip the sides open like the metal was nothing but aluminum foil. As soon as I had a hole big enough to stick my head through, I peeked out to see what was out there. We were on an interstate and we were booking down it. I looked back to see the van, but that wasn’t what made me pull my head back in so quickly, it was the fact that there was a guy hanging out the side with a rifle ready to tranquilize us the second he had a clean shot.

“Everyone stop!” I shouted over the sounds of ripping metal, “They got a guy ready to knock us out if he gets a clean shot!”

They stopped tearing the sides the second I said that.

“They really want to get us to the wild.” A red dragon said in shock, “Whether we want to go or not.”

“We have to think about this.” I said, “Use our heads and get out of this situation.”

“What do you purpose genius?” said a gold anthro dragon with his hands on his hips and a displeased look on his draconic face, “You obviously are so much smarter than all of us.”

“Hey!” I shot back, “I didn’t say I have a plan, I just asked if you guys had any ideas.”

“Oh come on,” he said as he got right in my face, he was a little taller than me, but not by much, “I’ve heard of how you always seem to step in and take control. You love to be in charge.”

“No I don’t!” I roared right in his arrogant face, “I only step up when no one else has the balls to! I will not sit back and watch as arrogant pricks take charge only for themselves and people get hurt for it. Now if you think you can do a better job than me, fine, you take control, but I’m going to do what I think is best and go from there.”

I stormed over to the front part of the trailer and began to rip open a small hole in the bottom of the wall. I heard him say that they should continue to rip open the sides and the ones that get hit will get pulled inside and another dragon will try to get away.

“Idiot.” I grumble to myself, “What happens if one gets hit in the air over the highway? They’ll end up road kill.”

I just worked fast to try and get my plan to work before someone got hurt or worse. I widened out the hole till I could fit through it and get at the semi truck that was pulling the trailer. The hole was low so I wouldn’t be spotted by the driver through the back window if there was one. When I carefully crawled through the hole, the rushing wind from the open sides and past the cab was strong. I had to sink my claws into the metal to hold on as I pulled myself up to the back of the cab. Sure enough, there was a back window and I could see the tops of two heads, the driver and the passenger. I had to be quick; I broke out the back window with a solid punch and grabbed the passenger. I heard a terrified scream as I dragged the guy through the busted window; it was the leader of this whole thing.

“Sorry, I didn’t like being in the back.” I snarled as I shoved him into the trailer through the hole I made.

After he was taken care of, I went back to work on getting driver to pull over. I stuck my head through the window and politely asked,

“Would you mind pulling over, I need to use the bathroom.”

I smiled a big draconic grin to show off my teeth mere inches from his face and that got my message across. I hit the brakes and pulled the semi off the road as fast as he could. I could hear sirens blaring as police cruisers came speeding toward us. After pulling my head back out of the cab, I peeked around the side of the trailer to see the van had stopped to. The guy popped a shot off at me and I just made it back into cover as the dart stuck into the grid of the semi’s muffler. The cruisers all stopped around the set of trucks and vans, then officers all came out of their cars with weapons drawn.

“EVERYBODY OUT WHERE WE CAN SEE YOU!” bellowed one of the officers. “HANDS AND CLAWS IN THE AIR!”

I put up my claws, hopped off the semi and walked out. It the back of the group of police cruisers was the Ford. Mom was there and we she saw me she shouted,

“Ethan! Quick, get him out of there!”

Three officers came running at me and circled around me, all with their weapons at the truck. They walked me out to Mom and she immediately wrapped her arms around me.

“Oh I knew they were lying b******s when they told me you were a danger to public safety and told me to leave.” she said as tears ran down her face.

“How did you know where to find me?” I asked while hugging her back.

“Well,” she replied as she cleared her throat, “After they gave me that bullsh*t, I decided to go to the police about this, knowing full well that they were lying through their teeth. When I was headed for the truck, I saw the semis roll to the back of the building so I investigated and what I saw horrified me. They had dragons in thin cages and just stacking them up like cargo. They were chained to the floors of the cages and that just sickened me. Then I spotted you being loaded up like that. I got so mad that I tried to go right up to them, but some officers stopped me. They told me that those were all the dangerous dragons and were being taken to a wildlife refuge. They couldn’t stop me from getting to the bottom of this. I plowed my way to those screening rooms only to find guys with tranquilizer guns. The officers that chased me back there didn’t have a clue and put a stop to it, they thought they were talking to the dragons, not knocking them out the second they walked in the door. PETA set this up and is in a lot of trouble for it. I followed the officers when they said that they had spotted the trucks carrying you guys to the wildlife refuge.”

“Thanks Ma.” I said as hugged her again, “You really saved my tail.”

“I’m your mother, what else was I going to do?” she said, squeezing my waist.

The other dragons were all let out of the back of the shredded trailer. A white dragoness pushed the leader I had shoved back there out of the trailer and into the officers’ custody.

“You all just threw away a chance to be wild and free, what nature intends for you to be!” he shouted.

“Listen, we are the only ones that intend us to do anything!” I shouted back, “Each of us lives our own lives, nobody will tell me otherwise!”

All of the extremist PETA people were put under arrest and we were sent back to Springfield for the screening for real this time. Mom and I drove there while the other dragons just winged it. Since PETA had screwed up the deal, officers took the role of screeners and when I was called in after a few hours of waiting in that room again, I was less than thrilled about being seated in front of a big Sergeant in a dark back room with only one light and rather stuffy. It was more like an interrogation room than anything else.

“Let’s get this over with.” he growled, “Do you have urges to kill humans?”

“No.” I calmly replied.

“Do you, at anytime have a wish to dominate mankind and rule over the planet?” he asked, clearly just reading off a list.

“I’m not a people person,” I honestly said to him, “I don’t really want to be responsible for the care of a lot of people. The answer is no.”

“Yes or no answers please.” he shot back at me, “I have a lot of other dragons that need to be screened and you flapping your lips just wastes more of my time. Now, do you have any instinctual urges that would cause you to act out beyond your ability to control in a manner that would be considered in violation of the law or civil liberties of others?”

“No.” I replied, returning to my normal speech pattern, dull.

That when on for about fifteen minutes and like all other lists the government hands you, the desired answer to each question is no. The human flesh question was fun.

“Do you have a taste for human flesh?” he asked.

All I did was look disgusted by the thought of it, which I did just as a reaction; he marked it off as a no and just moved on to the next question.

“There, you are fully screened and determined to be safe.” he said, “Hooray for you, now get out and get your papers. Follow the arrows.”

I did as he instructed me to do; I just would follow the arrows to each station and fill out form after form. Each time I would get to the front of a line, the person behind the counter would do the same thing.

“Take this form and fill it out.” said each of the interchangeable officials, “There’s an area for you do that over there. Present the completed form at the next station and follow the instructions of the next official.”   

I was glad all the ripping through metal wore my claws down enough because I would have ripped a few more forms then I did. Some of mine had tape on them to hold them together after I accidentally cut them as I was filling them out. After that mind numbing gauntlet of forms and parade of dry people all with the just about the same line each time, I got my new driver’s license, FOIL card and a passport. As I walked out the door, I looked at all my new ID cards. They all had my new pictures on them and my new description. They now read ‘Species’ instead of ‘Race’ and mine said ‘Red Dragon’ instead of my old ‘Caucasian.’ My social security number was the same, so I got to keep my old card for that.

“I guess I’m all updated.” I said to myself as I put all my new cards in my wallet.

They had cut up my old IDs, but handed me back the picture part. I just looked at my old pictures. They used to be able to identify me, but now I didn’t look anything like the person I saw in those images. I just sighed and put them into the small compartment in my wallet and put it in my back pocket. Mom was waiting for me in the lobby.

“Well, they treat you alright in there this time?” she asked as she got up.

“Better then the last time.” I replied, “I got to stay conscious. But it wasn’t too bad, all I had to basically say I wasn’t going to kill people, eat people, try to take over the world or oddly enough attempt to stock pile gold and gems.”

“Well we both you know that you wouldn’t do the first three, but the fourth might be a good thing.” she said with slight smile, “Let’s go home.”

“Yeah, I’m ready for this day to be over.” I said to her as we walked out the door into the setting sun.

We got to the Ford and set off for home. The radio made me feel better as it usually does as I drove home. Mom just sat there in the passenger seat looking a bit proud.

“You know, you going through all that really meant something today.” she said after a long period of silence.

“Oh, what would that be?” I asked in return.

“You are still pretty much a person that can be fed through the same boring bureaucracy that all the rest of us can.” she said in a straight forward way, “You jump through hoops that they throw at you like everyone else and still walk away with nothing more than a few pieces of paper and plastic that they only use to keep a record of you.”

“I’m just trying to get by.” I replied, staring at the road ahead, “That’s all. If this is what I have to do, then it’s what I’ll do.”

“Same attitude as your father.” Mom replied, “What I think that whole thing was about was to accomplish three things. To force you dragons to come out and be run through the gauntlet to see if you’d still act the same as a human. To give them a reason to point at for unregistered dragons and say they’ve broken a law. Finally, to keep tabs on all registered dragons so they know right where you are at all times.”

I just nodded, what she said was most likely true. I had just handed over all my personal information to be registered as a dragon and given a new driver’s license number and that gets used for a lot of financial things. They could track how much money I have, what I buy, where I’m employed, probably even where I like to eat as well and put it all together to form an image of the places I go the most. My life to them was an open book, but I really think that everyone can be tracked just has well as me. The only difference being I must be of interest to them. I always had a suspicion that they were monitoring me; it was pretty easy to guess that since I was the first dragon to show my face to the public. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that the government would at least look into it. Whoever they had monitoring me was good since I never seemed to spot them nor did I feel like I was being watched. That alone made me think that either nobody was there or they were there and professionals. I particularly didn’t care, it just meant that all they were doing was watching and I hoped that what they saw convinced them I wasn’t worth the trouble of keeping tabs on.

As we drove down the highway back home in the failing light, all I could think about was what was going to happen next. It was one twist after another it seemed and I was hoping that things would settle down soon so I could catch my breath. Sadly that wasn’t that case because my neck tingled and I knew something was coming up fast behind us when I looked in the rearview mirror to see a large winged shape coming straight for the Ford’s tailgate.

“Ah sh*t!” I said, “Ma, grab the shotgun!”

As Mom got the shotgun, I saw what was coming. It was a huge copper dragon, had to be thirty feet long, and it was coming up fast from up high. It let out a deafening roar as it swooped in and tried to grab the Ford by her sides. I swerved to the right at the last available second, it claws missing by inches. In the setting sun I could see that this dragon was very blocky. From what I knew about dragons from my books, that was a battle dragon. More along the lines of a scaly tank than a majestic creature, but what it lacked in grace it made up for in spades with ferocity.

“Go away!” Mom screamed as she fired two shots while hanging out of the window.

As soon as she was back in to reload, I floored it and the Ford sped up as best she could. She’s an old truck and can only do so much, but her acceleration is always her best bet. I got her up to eighty miles per hour in seconds and I was thankful I put those new shocks in a while back because I need every bit of maneuverability I could get when that dragon swooped at us again. Mom hung out the window just as it committed to the dive, she was lined up for the perfect shot as it hurtled straight for us. She fired both barrels into its side as I swerved to the left. She nailed it in the wing pit and the shock of the rounds knocked it off kilter. It dove into the blacktop and skidded to a stop. I hit the brakes and pulled off to the side of the road to make sure it was dead or to put it out of its misery.

“What are you doing?” Mom asked as I brought the truck to a halt and got out.

“I’m finishing that thing off so it can’t follow us.” I replied, reaching behind the seat, grabbing the box with my revolver in it, pulling it out and quickly loading it.

“I’m coming with you.” She shot back as she slammed two new rounds into the shotgun.

“What are you shooting anyway?” I asked, both of us walking down the road towards the huge lump on the road.

“Slug rounds.” she answered, “Figured we’d need knock down power if it came to shooting.”

I just nodded while we got within sight of the huge copper dragon. It was still breathing, but it looked hurt pretty badly. It was roughed up; bleeding from various cracks all over its body and it looked like its left wing was broken. I thought it was just about dead till it snorted and stood up, turning its head to glare at us. Mom and I both opened fire as it charged us, pulling the triggers as fast as our weapons would cycle. It just kept coming as our rounds blew chunks off of it, snorting and snarling with each impact. We rolled to avoid getting trampled as it ran into the opposite lane of traffic. An air horn blew and I looked up to see an eighteen wheeler was coming the other way and couldn’t stop in time, the copper dragon was hit broadside and rolled over. The sickening noises it made as it was flattened by the massive vehicle were just horrible. The truck came to a stop and the truck driver got out.

“What the hell?” he asked as he saw that his rig was sprayed with blood and other things from the mangled dragon.

“You alright?” I shouted to him.

“I’m fine and so’s my rig.” he yelled back, “Good thing I bought a MACK instead of a Peterbilt, these things sure are built tough.”

I walked over and looked at the front of his truck. Sure enough, it was unharmed, mostly due to an oversized and thick front bumper that didn’t even have a dent. The dragon was just smacked and run over, crushed by the massive tires and sheer weight of the rig. When I went to see what was left of the dragon, there wasn’t much. It was pretty much road pizza, so I just grabbed its tail and drug it to the side of the road to rot in peace. It was heavy, but I got it to there. The truck driver just wrote it off as a road kill incident and drove off.

“Highway patrol will see it in the morning and send someone to get it.” The driver said as he climbed into his truck, “I don’t think it was supposed to be running around anyway with it attacking you two.”

“Well thanks, you saved us.” Mom told him, “We might not have been able to take that thing out alone.”

“Glad to lend a hand.” he replied with a smile, closing the door, “Or in this case, a bumper.”

As walked back to the Ford which was still just idling next to the highway, I was just happy that no innocent people were hurt. What bothered me about that dragon was the way it attacked. It was head on and full bore from the get go, the other dragons that had attacked me at least said something before trying to carve me up into lunchmeat. Half way to the Ford, my neck tingled again. I thought it was just adrenaline from the fight wearing off, but then I heard a slight wing rustle. I turned around just in time to get a swift punch to the muzzle. I was sent staggering back, but I squeezed off a round at my attacker. I was seeing stars, but I made out the shape of my attacker. It was an anthro dragon and it was very well trained. It saw me aim my revolver and dodged the round. I tried for a second shot, but all I got was a click. I had forgotten to reload and by the second set of clicks from Mom’s shotgun, she had forgotten as well.

“You are coming with me.” it snarled, readying its claws at its sides to rend me to shreds.

My vision wasn’t clear yet, so I couldn’t react fast enough when it charged me and slash at my chest. White hot pain came from the wounds as it torn a sizeable chunk out of my chest plates and I let out a roar of pain. Through blurry eyes I saw Mom desperately trying to reload the over-and-under, but the dragon saw her doing that and knocked her to the ground with its tail.

“Interfere human and I will kill you.” it growled at her.

That set me off. Blurry eyes or not, I dove at the big dark thing and tacked it to the ground. I tried to pin it, but it was too quick. It opened it jaws and clamped down on my neck, biting hard. Its tail must have a spike on it because it speared through my left wing, piercing through wing membrane and then just ripping it by moving its tail around in the open wound. So much pain so fast caused me to lose my grip on it and I didn’t waste a second. It let go of my neck and landed a hard punch to the side of my head. I slumped over, dazed by the blow. Everything was all dark and hazy, but I could feel myself being lifted up and then being taken into the sky. Mom’s shouts faded out as I felt I was being taken away into the night’s sky. I was just so tired; I couldn’t help but fall asleep.