5
ETHAN
Pain.
I'd been in a NyQuil daze all night, barely aware of the cute temp leading me from the office and toward a car and then into my apartment. The only thing that registered were soft hands on my body, pushing me into place, wrapping blankets over me and around me and making me feel safe.
And then the pain began.
Every nerve in my body was lit on fire at the same time, then doused with lemon juice. I screamed in agony, a wordless cry for help, and in my daze I heard something scream back.
Something inside of me.
I felt my muscles expanding like balloons, stretching my skin painfully. My clothes tore as my body changed, a maelstrom of unnatural flesh.
And before I could stop myself, I was running for the sky.
I don't remember crashing through the window, except that suddenly I was in open air with beautiful sky above. Sky was safety, I somehow knew. Sky was where I belonged.
I plummeted from my apartment toward the hard ground below, but with a thought I spread my wings. Wings, yes fucking wings, I had wings on my back that spread wide like open arms, muscles being stretched after an eternity of sleep.
And somehow, I knew how to use them.
I beat them as easily as shaking someone's hand, and their strength slowed my fall and turned it into a glide. I soared toward the treetops, then above them, and soon I was beating my way back into the sky.
I tried to yell, holy shit, because that's how I felt, but nothing came out but a screech.
Adrenaline pulsed through my body, excitement at flying, because again, holy shit, I was flying through the air on feathered wings. I turned my head and examined my body; wings of pale green beat steadily, made of feathers as large as computer screens. My arms were paws, and I flexed the claws within my pads. Something hung around my neck, but it was tough to tell what. A collar, like a dog's? A worry for another time.
This was the craziest NyQuil dream I'd ever had.
I spun in a wide circle, admiring the view of downtown Dallas from here, the buildings that once seemed so high but now seemed so close, just right there, all I had to do was beat my wings and I could perch upon their roofs and gaze down on all that was mine! The power of my body, and whatever strange energy this was, almost overwhelmed me. It was like holding a gun for the first time, except the gun was me.
Something's wrong.
I sensed it rather than thought it. As I turned my flight in a wide arc, I saw that temp watching me from a window. My window, the one to my apartment. I didn't know why she was there, but she was looking up at me like I was the Mongol Army descending on Baghdad.
From a hundred feet away I saw her eyes roll back into her head, and she slumped toward the open air.
With animal speed, I pulled my wings close to my body and dove toward her. The rush of air through my hair--no, my feathers--was an ecstasy unlike any sexual encounter. And then she was falling out the window, toppling forward and head over heels and toward the deadly ground.
Faster, I thought, urging my new body on with willpower alone.
I aimed for where I thought she would be, perilously close to the ground, and dove as quickly as I could. It was more of a fall than a glide then, a heavy sack of flesh plummeting to its own death.
But all I could think about was her, and how she needed my protection.
At the last possible moment I opened my wings into a glide, and reached out with my paws to grab her body. I wouldn't have been able to if not for my claws tearing into her clothing, but I held on, and my glide carried me a mere two feet off the ground.
I pulled her close to my body as if she were precious prey.
The reality of everything began to crash into me. I was some sort of flying monster, and very slowly was I realizing it was not just a dream. Power aside, such realization was horrifying. In a flash of insight I remembered a book my high school English teacher had made us read, some French guy who woke up as a beetle. The character's horror had been funny at the time. A ridiculous thing deserving of, well, ridicule.
But now I knew that horror myself.
Focusing on the need to keep this woman safe, I turned and flew north away from the city. I didn't know where to go, but I knew I had to get there fast.
I was halfway to Oklahoma, flying over rolling hills of pasture land, when the voice returned.
EMERALD GRYPHON.
The voice boomed in my head like it had installed speakers and cranked them up to 11. It was the same voice that had screamed with me earlier, during my transformation. And it shocked me so much I almost dropped the cargo I was carrying.
I HAVE WAITED FOR YOU.
The voice was deep and rasping, and its words held the weight of eternity. I steadied my flying, careful beats that kept me moving toward the distant horizon.
Hello? I thought, testing.
WE KNEW THE GREAT ONE HID THE TOTEMS FOR THIS DAY, it boomed inside my brain. FOOLISH FOR US TO BELIEVE IT WOULD BE EASY.
I tried to bite my lip, realized I didn't have one, and then said, Dude, I think you've got the wrong number.
DO NOT MOCK ME, EMERALD.
This time the voice brought with it pain, on the same magnitude of my transformation, electricity searing my skin and muscle and bone. I screamed, which came out as a bird's screech, and I was temporarily blinded by the pain.
I regained sight, and control, just in time to see that I was crashing.
I beat my wings twice, but it wasn't enough, and at the last moment I extended my two back legs. They struck the grass and sent me forward in a tumble. I pulled the two most precious things close to my chest--my wings, and the woman in my arms--and did my best to protect them as I crashed along the ground.
Finally I came to a stop, dirt and dust floating through the air around me. When it settled I had a clear view of a brown cow, who watched me from ten feet away.
It made a noise that was half surprise, half boredom.
DO YOU UNDERSTAND NOW? the voice said, thankfully devoid of pain.
Dude, I don't understand shit right now, I thought.
The voice laughed, a deep chuckle that was like boulders rumbling down a mountain.
WE ARE THE FIRST OF OUR BROTHERS TO AWAKEN, EMERALD. FORTUNATE FOR ME. UNFORTUNATE FOR YOU.
Uhh, why is that unfortunate for me?
WE WILL JOIN TOGETHER IN BATTLE, AND SUCH WILL BE GLORIOUS FOR ALL TO BEHOLD. AND THEN, WHEN YOUR BONES HAVE WITHERED TO DUST ALONGSIDE THOSE OF YOUR BROTHERS, MY FELLOW DRAGONS AND I WILL SING THE NOTE THAT ENDS THIS WORLD.
What the fuck. I'd heard of people hearing voices in their head, but I'd never heard of anyone to be threatened by them.
And dragons?
Hey, buddy, I said as if this were some stupid bar dispute. How about we go to Happiest Hour, I buy you a beer, and we pretend that whatever I did to offend you is forgiven. Cause right now, I've sort of got my own issues. Yeah?
I WILL FIND YOU, EMERALD GRYPHON, it echoed in response. WATCH FOR ME, FOR I WILL ONLY NEED TO COME ONCE.
And then, as quickly as it had arrived, the voice was gone.
I shivered when it was over, a sensation which felt strange while wearing feathers. While possessing feathers, long green feathers that felt like an itchy beard all over my body. I craned my neck around and used my beak to scratch an itch at my shoulder--which was now the place where the wing attached to my back.
My brain refused to accept most of this. It still felt like a dream, no matter how realistic it was. Because that was still more likely than the truth.
My wings ached from flying, like muscles that had not been worked in ages. I was famished, too.
I looked at the cow and thought, what am I going to do?