Legacy

I wrote this little story in response to an online prompt. The prompt said that you were an adult dragon who comes upon a human toddler that has been abandoned in the forest. Write about what happens next. Here's what spilled out of me.

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I really wish they would stop doing this. They’ve been doing it for years now. It’s getting old. I’m half inclined to just let this one hang there. But in the end, I know I won’t. I never do. 

Years ago, someone, probably a goblin, told the humans in Port Mullek that they needed to appease me with an offering from time to time or else I would rain fire down on their town and kill them all. I suspect goblins for two reasons. First, they always try to get to the offering before I see it, so they can take it for themselves. Second, I know it’s a big joke to them to spread rumors about fire breathing. Humans are afraid of us enough as it is. Add the threat of flaming breath to the equation and they feel obligated to hire foreign armies to come wipe us out. They’ve just about done it, too. Of late, there’s been a lot less of that kind of thing because the towns are poor, and kings don’t like to lose a bunch of perfectly good soldiers fighting some dragon in a faraway land in exchange for a few bushels of grain or a couple of broken-down donkeys. 

Of course, I don’t have fire. It’s not something we are born with. As a matter of fact, no one knows if we can do it at all. None ever have to my knowledge. Oh sure. There are the old legends. My great-great-grandfather used to tell me stories about the mighty Krovonik, also known as the Inferno Worm, who would reduce entire towns to ashes in a single breath. I know. Hard to believe. It might be true, but my guess is it’s been highly exaggerated over the centuries. I know I’ve never seen a dragon breathe fire. I’m pretty sure great-great-grandfather never did either. It’s just something to fuel story time for the young. 

Back to the bag. Yes, it’s a bag, hanging from a tree branch about twenty feet off the ground, right in my line of sight. It’s wiggling, as always. It’s got some kind of cryptic writing on it, as always. The humans always paint weird symbols on the bags. I don’t know why. It’s probably part of the goblins’ stupid lies. They think they are communicating with me. They aren’t. The symbols are meaningless. Surely, they know dragons have mastered the common tongue, as well as dozens of other languages and dialects. They could just speak to me like they do one another, but they rarely try. Most of the time, they just scream and fall all over each other trying to get away from me. Their screams drown out anything I might try to say to them like, “Hey stupid. What’s wrong with you? Stop leaving little humans in bags for me. I don’t want them.” 

Yes, that’s what I always find in the bags. Little humans. They’re not exactly babies, but they are small. Times I have let them out of the bag, they get up and try to run away, so they’re old enough to walk. Baby humans can’t even crawl for several months. They have to be about a year or more along before they can try to walk. 

I guess the goblins told the humans that dragons like to eat small human children. That’s not true. Dragons won’t kill anything that can talk, unless they are being attacked or seriously threatened by the something in question. We have ethics. Mostly, we get all we need from elk, deer, and the occasional wild pig. We’ve certainly killed humans, mostly knights and other mercenaries, sent to exterminate us, but we don’t eat them. I’ve killed my share of goblins as well, but they were all asking for it, gouging at me with their nasty spears or trying to hack my legs with their crude swords. But there’s nothing a young human child could do to provoke me to kill it, and I certainly would not eat a dead one should I stumble upon it. That’s one thing the goblins must be telling the truth about when they try to get the villagers to give me their children. Dragons only eat live prey. We’re not vultures. 

Generally, I open the bags out of curiosity and then just wrap the kid back up and drop it off just outside the town, close enough that the villagers will find it before the goblins do and far enough away to keep the more zealous townsfolk from getting brave and charging at me with spears and axes. I don’t know what happens to the bags after I leave them. I guess the villagers assume I refused their offering for some reason. They probably think I keep the ones the goblins get to first, so that’s enough to keep them at it. 

So, this little bag is just hanging there, its contents wriggling and squeaking. I sigh and trudge heavily toward it, my exasperation on display for no one. I reach up and snap the branch off the tree. I’ve learned that’s safer for the occupant than ripping the bag open with a claw or trying to untie it. They don’t do well with twenty-foot falls. I put the bag down on the ground and slice the knot holding it closed with the tip of a claw. I wonder what the deal will be with this one. 

I say “what the deal will be” because it’s always something. Usually, it’s a birthmark, an unusual hair color, eyes that are too close together, too far apart, or an uncommon hue. I guess they’re looking for some kind of sign that would indicate the sacrifice would be worthy of my attention. Honestly, I have no idea what they are trying to do with this exercise. If only I could find out what the stupid goblins were saying to them. I hate goblins. Did I say that already?

The mouth of the sack sighs open as the rope falls away. There’s more wriggling as the creature inside sees light and starts to move toward it. I wait, half annoyed and half curious. 

Squinting in the light and raising a limb to shield its eyes, the occupant emerges. I cannot believe what I am seeing. I’ve never seen anything like this, certainly not among humans. I can’t be certain it even is completely human, but it looks mostly like one. The face is mostly human, except for the eyes. The eyes are large and golden. The pupils are not round, but instead they are horizontal slits, kind of like my own. Yellow hair, concentrated down the center of the skull, is silky and flowing, leading to a ridge running down the entire length of the child’s back and onto its tail. Wait! Tail? Humans don’t have tails. This little one does. Again, not sure if this even is human. The skin on its face, chest, stomach, arms, and legs is mostly the soft, pinkish stuff the rest of the villagers have, but the back side of the child is covered with iridescent scales, not unlike the ones that adorn my entire body. 

What is this? 

I don’t have any time to ponder my own question. In a flash, the child assumes a determined gaze, narrowing its pupils, lowering its brow, and leaping to my left foreleg, the one I had used to open the bag. Before I can react, it’s clambered up my leg, across my shoulder, and onto the back of my head. The speed of its movements is truly impressive. I’ve got to get this thing off me. Who knows what it will do?

***

I have got to stop eating those wooly mountain boars. They give me the worst nightmares. Sheesh, I feel really awful. Why is the sun so high in the sky? Have I slept that long?

“Four days,” a voice answers.

I spin around, shaking my stiff bones loose from their slumber. I shout out various warnings, insults, and unrepeatable slurs. I’m sure goblins have ambushed me. 

“I’m not a goblin,” the voice assures. 

Wait a minute. How does this thing, this voice, know I’m thinking about goblins?

“Because I’m part of you. Don’t you understand? Actually, it’s more than that. I am you.”

I am very far from understanding, and I loudly proclaim that fact to this unseen entity. I’m just about to panic, but a soothing wave of warmth flows through me. I’m actually kind of sleepy feeling. How can that be? I’ve just woken up. 

“Shhh,” the voice whispers. “Relax. Let me fill you in.”

“I am you. Well, that’s sort of right. I’m part of you, but it’s that and more than that at the same time. Oh, dear. Now I’m rambling. Let me start over. There is much about our ancestry you do not know. Many thousands of years ago, our kind was much different. We ruled this world without peer and without challenge for millennia. It was a time of glory. Something happened, however. Something terrible. It’s a long story for another time but suffice it to say it interrupted our natural way of living. It changed us.”

I’m feeling groggy and relaxed, but this voice is not making a lot of sense. Why is it saying, “us”? I don’t see another dragon here. There was that little creature in the bag. But that was a dream. At least, I think it was. It cannot be real. The voice snaps at me.

“Pay attention!” 

I stop my pondering to listen. I feel like I need to ask more questions, but I am compelled by this thing, whatever it is, to just listen. 

“Yes, I said, ‘us.’ And yes, I know what you are thinking and why you are thinking it. Our minds are one because we are one. The ancient race existed not only of mating pairs of dragons who gave live birth, but also creatures that hatched from eggs. Yes, eggs. I know you have heard of some females laying eggs, but no one ever understood why. Actually, they just forgot why. They think it’s some kind of throwback to a time when we used to raise young from eggs, since the eggs never hatch. They just solidify into stone and are discarded. Well, most of them. Not me.

“I came from one of those eggs. Your mother’s egg, to be precise. I was left in our parents’ den when they were driven out by goblin and human mercenaries. You were too young to remember, but I know you understand mother and father were lost. Our grandparents, great-grandparents, and great-great-grandparents raised you, but they didn’t give the egg a second thought. It was just a dead stone in the back of the den. An oddity not worth going back for. 

“Time passed. Eggs like mine wait. They wait until the other part of being matures to the point they can join it. At least, that’s the way it’s supposed to work. Almost all eggs just turn to stone and die, but not me. I awoke and hatched. I knew immediately I had to find you, but I did not know where I was. I could feel you, but you felt far away. I came out of the den, which was just a shallow cave in a hillside, and was immediately spotted and bagged by a group of humans, who were out hunting pheasants that day. They crammed me into a nasty pheasant bag and hauled me back to their village. The humans there did not know I could understand their speech, but I could. They were very excited to find me. They thought for sure I would be the sacrifice the great dragon would want. It was quickly decided they should take me out to the edge of the forest and hang me from a tree. You know the rest, but you awoke thinking it was a dream. It isn’t.”

I stir from my fog and ask tentatively what this thing is exactly. I’m still pretty confused, and it’s not making a lot of sense to me what this voice is telling me.

“I already told you. I am you. I am a part of you. When you let me out of the bag, I instinctively merged my body with yours. Your head probably feels a little strange. It’s larger and heavier now that I am blended into it. So, again, I am you. I am the part of you that you and every other dragon living today has been missing their whole lives. Specifically, I am your Kindling.”

A thought awakens deep within me. More than a thought. A realization. A revelation. Knowledge. Joy. Completeness. Suddenly, I feel energized, free from the slumber that held me inert. I leap from the ground, spread my wings and flap into the sky. I climb higher and higher, rolling my body and finally leveling off onto a path heading straight over the town. Faster and faster I fly, feeling the strength and power of my being, finally complete, a feeling no dragon has had for thousands of years. 

As I reach the edge of the village, I stall my flight, poised high in the air, giving as many townsfolk as possible a chance to notice me hovering high above their city gates. I throw my head back and open my throat in a mighty roar, enough to shake the villagers below in their boots. And now that I have their attention, I call upon my new, complete self, no longer a voice within me, but truly a part of me. I reach deep inside and summon the Kindling within. My nostrils flare and release a scarlet, blue, and golden flame that fills the sky above the town. I can only imagine the newfound terror and, hopefully, respect this display has yielded. I’m not going to hang around to find out. It’s time to put some goblins in their place. 

Stephen

I was six years old in the fall of 1971. I remember the first day of first grade in Mrs. Cartmel’s class at Sullivan Elementary School like it was yesterday. Well, I remember parts of it that clearly. Kindergarten didn’t exist at that time, or at least it didn’t exist for me. Despite my lack of formal education, I could already read, and I had a decent grasp of rudimentary math. This advantage was courtesy of the presence of two older sisters, Donna and Lisa. They found much joy in pretending to be teachers tutoring their baby brother in knowledge mined from the vast caverns of wisdom that made up their extensive elementary school experiences. I owe them a tremendous debt of gratitude for that head start. Elementary school didn’t really challenge me at all because of the sturdy foundation they provided. 

Even though my sisters had already armed me with most of what I would be presented with in first grade, I didn’t know that, so I was nervous. All the kids were strangers. The teacher, who seemed really nice, was also a stranger. The room was big and loud. The smell of chalk dust mingled with that distinctive old building aroma hung thick in the air. I didn’t know what to expect. 

I certainly did not expect Stephen.

I don’t recall Stephen’s last name; however, the memory of that little boy has remained ingrained in my mind and influenced the man I have become over the course of more than fifty years. Amazing, right? Yeah. I know. Let me share some stuff about Stephen. I don’t know a lot, because I was six, remember? Six-year-olds in 1971, just like six-year-olds now, had a short attention span and a limited scope of interests. For me, it was Hot Wheels, baseball, and Robert Conrad as James West in “The Wild, Wild West” on television. Not much else was going on in my little blonde, burr-cut head. 

Stephen arrived a little late to class. Everyone else had gotten settled in. Mothers, my own included, had accompanied each child and made over them in all sorts of ways, the way mothers do. One by one, they reluctantly left their children to Mrs. Cartmel, looking over their shoulders as they departed. Finally, one last mother appeared in the doorway. Mrs. Cartmel met her there. This mother seemed even more nervous that the others. She had a kind of forced smile that didn’t seem all that happy. It was like a mask meant to disguise worry smoldering underneath. Behind her stood a little boy. He was tethered to his mother by her iron grip on his hand, but he was spinning left and right as he attempted to take in everything around him. He was obviously very excited to be at school. 

He was also completely bald. 

I had never seen a real bald kid before. Sure, I thought it was a little odd that Charlie Brown appeared pretty much bald in the funny papers, but he was a cartoon. Rules were different for cartoons. Real boys had hair on their heads. I did, even though it was buzzed down to about a quarter of an inch of yellow stubble, looking like a harvested wheat field. As Stephen made his way into the classroom, kids began staring at him. I couldn’t help it. I stared as well. Stephen didn’t notice. He had a desk reserved right at the front of the room, all the way to the left, near the door. He practically dragged his mother over to it and climbed into the attached chair, beaming with pride and anticipation. This kid was ready to learn. 

Looking back on this day now, my heart breaks for Stephen’s mother. Even as a little kid, I was aware of the obvious, almost physical pain it caused her to leave the classroom that day. She tried to be brave, but her eyes and her body language spoke of palpable anguish. I know she must have cried for a long time outside in the hallway once she was out of Stephen’s line of sight. 

I was bewildered, as were all my classmates. My desk was near the middle of the room, about halfway down the row. Stephen was at least three rows away from me. I saw a couple of kids sitting behind and beside him lean in and say something to him. I imagine they were asking about his hair situation. That’s what little kids do. They notice things like that and innocently want to ask why. I couldn’t hear the conversations, but I could see Stephen’s interactions. Every comment, every kid, was met with a beautiful smile and a cheerful response. I don’t know what he was saying, but he was happy to be talking to his classmates. 

That night, at home, I found out why Stephen was bald. He had leukemia. Treatments for the disease caused his hair to fall out. My mother told me. Apparently, Mrs. Cartmel had communicated Stephen’s situation with all the parents of children in her class. The apparent aim was to allow parents to handle the subject at home, where they could explain what that might mean for Stephen. My mother did a good job with this, probably better than most, but my mother was pretty amazing that way. That’s a longer story for another time, but just know that she was a terrific mom and a great human being. 

Mom explained Stephen had an illness that you could not catch from him, like a cold or chickenpox. It was OK to be around him. She stressed Stephen had no choice in his plight, and that he would need friends who would treat him just like any other kid, without drawing attention to his lack of hair, or the fact that he would likely miss a lot of school days because of the difficulty of dealing with leukemia and the associated treatments. 

My mother was also honest with me. She told me that Stephen’s parents probably worried a lot about him because leukemia was a serious disease that could take Stephen’s life. I distinctly remember the feeling of absurdity this discussion aroused in me. It made absolutely no sense. Old people got sick and died. My grandfather, Mom’s dad, had died only two years prior. He had a heart attack. He was old, though. Stuff like that happened to old people all the time, but six-year-olds didn’t die. They just didn’t. But Mom never lied to me. She almost cried while trying to explain Stephen’s illness. I knew it was real. It still didn’t make sense, but it was real. 

I resolved to make sure I followed my mother’s instructions regarding Stephen. I talked with him. I played with him at recess. I joked with him. We talked about Hot Wheels, baseball, and “The Wild, Wild West.” I got to know him. I learned Stephen was extremely intelligent and immediately able to understand and master any topic in the classroom. He was articulate and had a vocabulary that was much larger than any of the other kids in the class. He looked pale and fragile, but he had energy and life inside him that seemed to defy his obvious physical condition. He was out sick a lot, but he never fell behind and always came back eager to get back into the day-to-day routine of class. 

I didn’t always understand Stephen back then. I understand a lot better now. 

The last time I saw Stephen was in the spring of 1974, at the end of third grade. He had been homeschooled for the entire year. I had not seen him in what seemed like forever. His attendance was spotty during first and second grade, but third grade saw him unable to come to school with any regularity. It was better for him to just learn from home, or I suppose it was. It’s hard to understand that, given how Stephen just lit up when he was around other kids, but I don’t know all the details about the medical horrors he was going through.

Stephen appeared, out of the blue, at the end-of-year academic awards celebration. Starting with third grade, the school had Honor Roll awards. There was First Honor Roll and Second Honor Roll. I don’t recall the rules, but you basically needed to have high marks to make the cut. If you kept it up all year long, you got a trophy at the end of the year. That’s what the celebration was about. 

I was sitting in a metal folding chair, waiting for the event to start, waiting for my shiny blue, white, and gold trophy, when Stephen walked in and plopped down in the chair next to me. I was stunned. My gaping stare was met with Stephen’s golden smile. He looked terrible, but he looked great. His eyes were sunk into his face, but they shone with Stephen’s ever-present glow. His skin was pale, paler than I remembered, but his lips stretched nearly ear to ear. 

I remember wanting to hug him. I wanted to grab him and pull him close and tell him I had been worried about him. I didn’t do that, partly because it wasn’t something eight-year-old boys did and partly because I was still governed by Mom’s instructions to treat Stephen like I would any other kid, not drawing attention to his problems, allowing him to just be a kid among kids. I did, however, pat him on the back and tell him I had missed him. I will never, ever forget what happened next. 

Two boys sitting behind us were giggling. Obviously, they had not shared a classroom with Stephen in first or second grade, like I had. One of them tapped Stephen on the shoulder and said, “Hey, why’d you cut all your hair off?”

I was never a bully. I never picked fights in school. I rarely engaged in any kind of pushing or shoving or fighting at all. I nearly went over my seat to throttle the kid who said that, but without saying a word, Stephen stopped me with what I can only describe as the grace of being Stephen. 

Smiling broadly at the boy behind him, he said, “Oh, I didn’t cut it. It fell out.”

It’s hard to punch a kid who has just been replied to like that. The kid said, “Oh,” and just sat back in his chair. I didn’t go after him, but I gave him a look. I turned my attention back to Stephen. 

“I didn’t expect you would be here, Stephen,” I said. “I didn’t think you would be able to make it.”

Stephen looked straight into my soul with those incredible, defiant eyes and said, “Wild horses could not keep me from coming here tonight to get my trophy.” 

The rest of that event is completely lost in my memory. Nothing after that moment meant anything at all. I don’t remember going up to get my trophy. I don’t remember going home. I don’t remember Mom and Dad making a big deal about it and placing it proudly on top of the behemoth upright piano in the living room. I know all that stuff happened. It’s just that none of it mattered. 

Stephen left this world that summer. He died peacefully at home. Maybe facing something like a horrible disease makes kids mature faster than they would (or should) otherwise, but I can tell you this. Stephen was mature far beyond his years. Maybe that’s because Stephen had something to share with me and the other kids in Mrs. Cartmel’s class. Maybe his response to the kid behind him at the awards ceremony two years later was something that kid would need as he grew to adulthood.

Maybe all of that worked together for a greater good, something no one close to Stephen could possibly understand when it happened. I was just a schoolmate, and I can’t understand it even now. Stephen was smart. Stephen was gentle. Stephen was good. The world was a better place with him in it. Maybe it’s a better place just because he passed through it. I know I am a better man for having known Stephen. I’m stronger. I’m more resilient. I look at challenges with a better attitude. I’m just better. I owe Stephen a lot.

Somehow, I hope he knows that. 

Tech and War - A View from 1952's Player Piano

I read a lot. (You should, too.) Right now, I'm reading Kurt Vonnegut's first novel, Player Piano. This book is 70 years old, yet it feels so relevant today. I'm an IT person. I have been for nearly half the lifetime of the aforementioned book. I live in technology. I am a promoter of technology. I put food on the table by bending technology to my will in order to serve industry. (Wow! That's a pretty grandiose description of "IT Manager", huh?) Anyway, I say that to say that I don't believe tech, in and of itself, is a bad thing. However, tech can certainly be applied in bad (or even evil) ways. It also can forever change how we think about fundamental facets of human existence, including warfare. Check out this passage from the 1952 book and think about how we plan for, and carry out, military exercises in the twenty-first century. Remember; this was 1952. 

"There had been plenty of death, plenty of pain, all right, and plenty of tooth-grinding stoicism and nerve. But men had been called upon chiefly to endure by the side of the machines, the terrible engines that fought with their own kind for the right to gorge themselves on men. Horatio on the bridge had become a radio-guided rocket with an atomic warhead and a proximity fuse. Roland and Oliver had become a pair of jet-driven computers hurtling toward each other far faster than the flight of a man’s scream."

If you don't know those references (Horatio on the bridge and Roland and Oliver), take the time to look them up. It will help you understand the poetry in Vonnegut's writing.