by Gabe Hudson
All this talk is getting me riled up. Or maybe it’s the flaming coals scalding my wings, I don’t know. Anyway, I hiss and spray sparks out of my black beak.
Then Nog presses a button on his powerstaff and growls: “Now this photo was taken at the You Belong to Me Now ceremony on planet Breg 3.27, which is in the Sarconian Quadrant. In this photo, as you can see, Dr. Terrible is assuming rule over the Slitch species on planet Breg 3.27. Now the Slitches have very long forked tongues they use as propellers to fly up and down the timestream.
“So your grandfather Dr. Terrible had to travel as far as possible up the timestream and conquer the futuristic Slitches there and then return to the present-day Breg 3.27 with a holovid showing his victory. Upon seeing the holovid, the present-day Slitches surrendered to Dr. Terrible, as you can see here in this photo.”
Then Nog presses a button on his powerstaff. “Now here’s a photo of your father, Stenchwaka The Terrible—”
“Sir, what was my father like?” I say. “I never got to know him. He’s always been a big mystery to me, sir. On account of him dying during his Fertility Mission.”
“Well,” he says, “come to think of it, your dad, Stenchwaka The Terrible, was more like you, as I recall. He was, how shall we say, challenged. He had small horns. And his BIOCON LEVS were atrocious. Then during his senior year he turned into a time-travel addict. A junkie. Or so I heard, anyway. I’ve never been very clear on that part of the story. But for him to have procured your mother as his Queen, well he must have had something special that the rest of us couldn’t see. It came as a tremendous shock to everyone when she accepted your father’s crown.”
“What was she like, sir? Did you know her? Nobody ever talks about my mother. I don’t know anything about her, sir.”
“Ah, your mother,” says Nog, his ancient scaly green face brightening as if lost in pleasant memory. “She was one of the special ones, wasn’t she? She was incredibly smart. Your mother had a gift, she did. Maybe the best poet we’ve ever seen at WarWings. She could sing her poems and make things happen—”
“Make things happen, sir? What do you mean?”
“Well,” he says, snorting blacksmoke out his nostrils, “it’s very hard to explain. We professors had never seen anything like it, to tell you the truth. But your mother was an incredible dragoness, who possessed the very essence of poetry in her blood. When she was a senior, every fella was trying to get her to be their Queen. The whole thing caused quite a ruckus, I’m afraid.”
Professor Nog coughs and quickly wipes the corner of his eye with a talon.
Why are Nog’s eyes all misty? Is this ancient monster crying?!
“But sir, why did my mother go with my father?” I say, squirting blacksmoke out my nostrils. “If my father was such a loser, sir.”
“Well,” says Nog, with a mournful streak in his voice, “I heard your father promised your mother great things. Because of his facility with time travel. He claimed they could do things a new way. Set an example for generations of dragons to come. Of course it was malarkey. But I’m afraid your mother was a romantic dragonette at heart. Plus she had the gift. And sometimes when a dragon has the gift of poetry, it makes them too confident. I’m afraid she didn’t understand that there were limits, even for a dragonette as unique as your mother. It’s very sad, I’m afraid. I’ve never forgotten your mother. I’ve always wondered how things would’ve turned out for her if she’d accepted a different cadet’s crown for EggHarvest. Please don’t quote me on any of this, young Gork. I can’t claim to know all the specifics.”
All this talk about my dead parents is making me feel sort of weird, and I can feel this terrific pressure in my skull.
“What about me, sir? Do I have the very essence of poetry in my blood too? Like my mom did? Is that possible, sir?”
Nog snorts blacksmoke out his nostrils, and his enormous green belly heaves as if it hurts him to say what he’s about to say. “Of course not, young Gork. Here you are with your giant heart and your Snacklicious ranking, and you have to ask me such a question. Your mother was a true fiend. She had the highest WILL TO POWER ranking in her senior class. No, I’m afraid that you are more your father’s son than anything else. As much as it pains me to tell you this. It’s the truth. For some reason, your mother wasn’t able to pass her gift for poetry along to you when she laid your egg.”
I turn my scaly green head and start looking around Nog’s lair.
“Well, are my mother and father down here in the Underworld, sir? Could I talk to them, sir?”
Nog closes his eyes and keeps them shut as if he is thinking deeply about something. I can hear the lava rumble in his belly. Then he opens his eyes and looks at me.
“I’m afraid not, Gork,” he says, snorting blacksmoke. “Your parents died on planet Earth. So their ghosts are contained within Earth’s underworld. It’s really too bad. Because they’d certainly be most welcome here—”
“Ummm, Professor,” I say, “I think I feel a little dizzy.”
Professor Nog stops and turns and looks at my scaly ass and then he sniffs the air suspiciously. “My God,” he says. “Gork, are you sweating?!”
“I can’t help it,” I say.
“I can smell you from here!” Nog pinches his scaly snout with his index and thumb claw, as if he’s trying to keep himself from gagging. “Here!” He throws me a white towel from the stack he keeps next to his couch. “Clean yourself up before I puke!”
I use the towel to wipe my green scales. And if you want to know the truth, my sweat really does stink. By any measuring stick, I’m repulsive. With the sweat pouring out of my green scales like this. I mean I can’t even stand to be in the lair with myself. That’s how gross I am.
Now at this point, I do something stupid. I reflexively reach up and touch my horns. Just to check and see if maybe they’ve grown since I last touched them. And I guess if I’m being honest I’m desperately trying to find the silver lining in all this.
But Nog sees me touch my horns like that and he jumps all over me.
“Gork, do you know the reason why your horns are so small?”
“Am I a Mutant, sir?”
“No you’re not a Mutant, Gork!” he says, snorting firestreams. “Your problem is you’re underdeveloped emotionally! You need to act like the Terrible that is your birthright! Then your horns will grow so long that this Runcita chick you’ve been chasing all morning will be begging you to let her be your Queen for EggHarvest!”
Now by this point I’m listening to Professor Nog but I’m also busy wiping my forelimb pits with the towel, and it seems like the more sweat I wipe away, the more I start sweating. And Nog’s sarcastic commentary definitely isn’t helping matters, that’s for sure. And by now I’m pretty sure I really do hate old Nog. It really is a very dirty trick for him to have pulled on my scaly ass. Sucking me down into the Underworld like this and making me lie on this hideous couch made of fiery coals, and then lecturing me like a real crazy old dead dragon.
Professor Nog watches me wipe my pits and he shakes his scaly green head and says, “I don’t know, Gork. I don’t know.” Then he says, “Perhaps there is no hope for you after all!”
And with that he claps his talons together three times and there’s a giant explosion of blacksmoke. And as I feel my particles being sucked several thousand leagues back up to WarWings, I hear Professor Nog whisper inside my head:
“Don’t forget! When you want to rule over a foreign land, you must first offer it a drop of your blood. Then wait to see if the land gives you its blessing in the form of a sacred bud. Do not forget this, young Gork! Do not forget!”
[ 22 ]
SPLASH, MY SCALY GREEN ASS IS BACK FROM THE UNDERWORLD
Splash.
I’m back from the Realm of the Dead.
I’m crouched here in the dark fiery corridor of WarWings. Just as I had been right before that mirrored triangle suddenly appeared in front of me and Professor Nog lassoed me with his col
d dead tongue and yanked me down into his lair.
I glance around. One thing is for sure, Professor Nog wasn’t lying when he said he dropped a Time Freeze on everyone. All these dragon fools here in the corridor are still frozen. Including that maniac Rexro.
Frozen in time.
It is totally silent and peaceful.
Maybe too quiet? I can’t even hear my heart beating. Oh my God, am I still dead?! That would be the nastiest trick of all for Professor Nog to pull on me. To send me back up here and for me to still be dead!
I clap my talon over my chest and am instantly relieved to hear my gigantic and foolish heart beating away in there.
I snort flames of joy out my nostrils.
Thank goodness! I am alive!
So for a couple seconds I am just kind of standing here in the corridor and looking around and it’s perfectly quiet and still. And I can see that depraved Rexro frozen still and his black beak is twisted up in a sneer. He’s got one green webbed foot raised, and it’s clear he was bounding toward me when he froze.
Then I glance around at Twelk and his fiendish dragon pals, who are frozen in the middle of their chaotic gestures. Their yellow eyes are bugged-out, looking extremely psychotic.
Some of them have their tongues sticking several feet out of their beaks, frozen in the middle of some lewd gesture.
Some of them have flames jutting out their green snouts.
A couple of them have their spiked tails arched in mid–Threat Display.
The sight of all these nasties frozen in time is hideous.
At that moment, Professor Nog’s voice pops up in my scaly head and says, “Get out of there, Gork! The Time Freeze is almost up!”
Yes sir!
I leap into the air and flap my wings like a maniac and zoom down the corridor.
But then at that moment the Time Freeze must have expired.
I can just picture the last grain of sand dropping down inside Professor Nog’s timer.
Now behind me I can hear all those fiends leap back into motion. And the sonic boom of Twelk and his dragon pals snorting with wicked laughter, and the general pandemonium in the corridor, comes rushing back into my earholes.
“Where is he?! Where did he go?!” shouts Rexro.
I flap my wings and turn left down a dark corridor.
Thwack-thwack.
Inside my scaly head, Professor Nog’s voice whispers, “You must hurry! Rexro is coming for you!”
[ 23 ]
ENTER MY SECRET WEAPON, WHICH WILL HELP ME GET ON WITH THE BUSINESS OF HAVING RUNCITA LAY MY EGGS
I whiz in among the crowds of other flying cadets and I keep casting my green snout back and forth, hoping to catch a whiff of Runcita’s juicy scent.
Now the wind cutting across my black beak is screaming for mercy.
I flap my leathery wings like a maniac. I zoom past the Lava Pools and see naked cadets laughing and horsing around and splashing each other and shooting lava out their nostrils and using their tails to throw lavaballs. On any other day I would stop for a good soak. Because there’s nothing to boost your CORE FLAME TEMP and your MATING MAGNETISM and your overall WILL TO POWER like submerging your scaly green ass in a lava pool and holding your breath for an hour or so.
Well according to Dr. Terrible, the only other thing that’s better than lava baths for boosting your WTP is swordupuncture.
And Dr. Terrible would always make a point to say, “And when it comes to swordupuncture, I’m talking about someone who really knows how to use a blade. Not one of these bozos they got on the mainland who just because they took a fencing class, now they think they can call themselves a swordupuncturist!”
Out at the Institute, my scaly grandpa promised me that if he wasn’t able to cure my WILL TO POWER before the EggHarvest, then he’d introduce me to his personal swordupuncturist. This chick he was forever raving about, named Metheldra. But since we aren’t on speaking terms anymore, and because he’s gone and vanished, well I guess there’s no chance of that happening. Though what I wouldn’t give right now for a session with Metheldra the swordupuncturist. Dr. Terrible promised me that after one session with this dragon chick Metheldra my THRASH OPTIMIZATION score and my MATING MAGNETISM score and my STRATEGIC DESTRUCTION COMBAT READINESS score would skyrocket and that my horns would grow as a result.
A legit swordupuncture session would definitely hit the spot right about now. I guess I’m starting to feel a little desperate and all.
But then I tell myself to stop getting so downhearted about the fact that there won’t be any swordupuncturist rescuing my scaly green ass today. And so I better just focus on the things that I can control.
Thwack-thwack.
Now I flap my wings and swerve and bank and hook a sharp left down a dark fiery corridor. I keep casting my snout back and forth, hoping to catch a whiff of Runcita’s juicy scent.
Where is my Queen?
I fly by the Firing Range, where dragons are squatting at their posts and shooting their tongues fifty yards downrange and trying to impale or lasso the furry humanoid creatures scurrying around in the Target Zone.
Thwack-thwack.
There are dozens of fiendish nasties whizzing off to my left and my right and there are deranged cadets zooming straight at me, flying in the opposite direction. The cadets’ flight patterns are so jerky and hyper that you have to keep a close eye on everything going on around you there in the air, or you can easily wind up as a dead splat on the wall.
I fly by the Egg Hatchery and see Professor Pruck lecturing a group of female cadets on caring for their eggs. And ways to fend off the father dragon who typically will try to eat his mate’s eggs when she’s not looking. Now Professor Pruck appears to be demonstrating an extreme combat maneuver that involves slicing the neck with her powerstaff. And I know it’s not uncommon for a female dragon to kill and eat kill her mate if she catches him trying to scarf her eggs.
Thwack-thwack.
But my Queen-to-Be, Runcita, is nowhere to be found and I start to panic because it feels like I’m running out of time. The dark fiery corridor is now overflowing with flying cadets and I’m busy trying to keep from getting knocked unconscious by all the leathery wings beating around my scaly green head. Seems like no matter which way I turn, somebody’s nasty toe claw is dangling right in front of my face.
Then I whip out my powerstaff and tap the screen and pull up something I’d really hoped I wouldn’t be forced to use. Something to help me close the deal on my Queen Quest. Just a little something to tilt the odds in my favor. The extra edge I need.
So I can get on with the business of having Runcita lay my eggs.
The wind blasting across my beak makes a whistling noise.
It’s definitely time to use my Secret Weapon.
Now as I shoot down the dark corridor I feel cadets knocking into me and dinging me and of course none of them say excuse me or sorry. Because here at WarWings it’s illegal to apologize, and any dragon caught using the S-word is instantly sentenced to death by firestream. Per Dean Floop’s orders.
Thwack-thwack.
Now as to my Secret Weapon. The device which will enable me to move on to the real business of the day.
The nanotracker. Now don’t judge my scaly green ass when you hear this, but last night I stuck this nanotracker on Runcita’s left wingjoint while she was asleep in her lair.
Now before you go jumping to conclusions, let me make it clear I didn’t personally sneak in and stick this tracking device on Runcita’s left wingjoint while she slumbered in her lair.
I mean, what kind of monster do you take me for, anyway?
No, what I did was I used one of my tiny little micro-drones to delicately fasten the tracking device onto Runcita’s left wingjoint while she was asleep in her lair. I felt really bad and guilty about doing it, if you want to know the truth. That’s why I called it my Secret Weapon.
Now as I fly along in the dark fiery corridor I hold the powerstaff screen out in f
ront of me and see the entire WarWings campus laid out on the screen. And then I see it.
The blinking red dot that’s Runcita.
Yes! It’s working! Holy crap. I can see Runcita right now on the screen. God I feel a little guilty about this. Using a tracking device and all. But hey, not so guilty that I’m not going to use it.
The tracker is alive and well. Thank goodness for my micro-drone. Let me come right out and say it: a micro-drone is the best friend a dragon could ever hope to have.
Now I tap the screen with my index claw to triangulate Runcita’s location and watch the blinking dot as it processes all the data.
Then Runcita’s location shows up on the screen in big block letters: COLISEUM OF HEROES.
Ah, so that’s where my little Queen is hiding! The Coliseum of Heroes. Hold tight, my dearest Runcita. I am on my way! It won’t be long now!
So I flap my wings and hook a left down a dark fiery corridor. I am on my way to the Coliseum of Heroes. I flap my wings and swerve and bank and then take a sharp right. I fly by the WarWings Museum of Natural History. Which is full of strange creatures that have been captured from foreign planets over the centuries and then killed and stuffed and put on display.
When I was growing up as a young dragon here on the island, my grandpa Dr. Terrible used to bring me to the Museum of Natural History on the weekends. We’d go to the special wing of the museum dedicated to just the creatures Dr. Terrible had caught and killed and brought back from his fiendish adventures as an Intergalactic Conqueror. Those were good times. Walking talon in talon through the museum with Dr. Terrible as we strolled through the hushed environs of the museum and gazed at the stuffed creatures in their glass cases. Our hearts filled with a sense of awe and the miracle of existence.