“You don’t think Runcita is going to be down with those freaks?” growls the robot, as she uses her silver index claw to point out the windshield at the group of dragon cadets up ahead. “Come on. Give me a break!”
“Fribby’s right. She’s not gonna be down there with the Mutants!” I say. “ATHENOS, what are you doing?! Hurry up already! You need to find us a parking spot and get us on the ground!”
“Don’t be so sure, sir,” says ATHENOS II. “I urge you to take a close look, sir. I ran the data myself, sir, and Runcita’s psych chart fits the profile for ‘Fiend with a Mutant Fetish.’?”
And right now as we whiz by you can look down there and see the Mutant dragons mobbed together. There’s a ten-headed schizoid. I call him schizoid on account of those ten scaly green heads are busy snarling at one another and trying to gore each other with their horns.
I see another dragon who shoots his long tongue out of his beak and the tongue detaches and flies across the parking lot like a spear. This fella flaps his wings and then flies over and retrieves his tongue and sticks it in his beak. Then he shoots his tongue again and chases after it. There’s another one with dozens of eyeballs scattered all over his scaly green body.
These Mutants are the offspring of the Creative Evolution Lab. And each of them has been awarded a medal for bravery by the Council of the Elders for hatching out of their artificial egg here on campus. These dragons are considered brave because only 7% of these genetically engineered Mutants choose to peck their way out of their egg and start their life. While the other 93% are so horrified by their monsterish figures that they never leave their embryonic membrane.
Now the main difference between the Mutants and us Normals is the Mutants for some reason can’t breathe fire. Though I heard there’s a sophomore Mutant dragon this year at WarWings who can blow smoke rings.
ATHENOS II banks and cuts back around and starts up the other side of the rotation. Other dragons’ spaceships fly off to either side of us, and a few of them cut in front of us as they zoom up the loop.
“Traffic is heavy this morning, sir,” says ATHENOS II.
Now as we pass by overhead you can look down and see the Multi-Dimensioner dragons crowded together. These are definitely my kind of dragons. Not like I’m a member of their society, but I would be if I could be. On account of theirs is the tribe which makes the most sense to me. And it’s not just because they’re sophisticated, it’s more than that. And this morning as per usual, they are only visible in bits and pieces.
Because their whole deal is they prefer to inhabit several dimensions at once in order to make their crummy teenage lives more bearable. So down there in the parking lot, all you can see is a lone wing here and a spiked tail there.
And a disembodied green head floating through the air.
“Congestion is tight up ahead, sir,” says ATHENOS II, as she cuts and weaves among the other zooming ships that swerve into our PROJECTED TRAJECTORY PATH. “Please keep scanning the parking lot, sir.”
I can see the Datalizards are flexing their chrome wings and peering around the lot with their glowing red eyes. A young scaly green Normal dragon throws a lava rock at one of the Dragodroids and the rock bounces off the back of its steel-plated head. Now this robot whirls around with his silver tail arched high in a Threat Display and blasts a firestream at the Normal, who skitters away laughing with his beak hanging open.
Meanwhile I’m just hanging upside down in the cockpit and clocking all these different fools yukking it up in the parking lot this morning.
“Don’t worry, sir,” says ATHENOS II. “Runcita will be appearing soon. And I’ll have you down on the ground in no time. You will offer her your crown and she will agree to be your Queen. Your triumph is imminent. I believe in you, sir.”
I unhook my toe claws from the ceiling and do a half-flip so that my green webbed feet land with a thud on the cockpit floor. I flap my leathery wings.
Where is my Queen?
[ 5 ]
FRIBBY THE SILVER DRAGON, PLUS A WORD ABOUT THE DATAHATERS HERE ON CAMPUS
“My computational expertise indicates that you and Runcita will be a very felicitous match for EggHarvest, sir,” says ATHENOS II. “And if I may add, my bio-gut-wired instincts tell me she will surely say yes.”
Now if you want to know the truth, I am freaked out this morning on account of it being Crown Day and all. Because this is the day at the end of our senior year when dragons have to pair up with a mating partner and register for EggHarvest, or spend their life as a slave.
The sacred ritual itself is fiendish. A senior male and female dragon climb aboard a spaceship and blast off into space on their Fertility Mission. While en route to their Designated Foreign Planet, the couple mates continuously until the female lays a clutch of eggs. The spaceship is equipped with a special Incubation Vault and the sacred eggs are immediately sealed in there.
The dragon couple perch together in the cockpit, holding talons, and silently watch through the windshield as they enter the foreign planet’s atmosphere. They land on the planet and conquer it. The eggs are lovingly relocated to the foreign planet, where they hatch. Now this couple raises a Colony on their newly conquered planet.
And we call that ritual EggHarvest.
And this is how we ensure the survival of our species.
And in terms of me finding a chick from my senior class at WarWings to mate with, it’s definitely now or never.
“Servomechanism engaged in SEEK & LOCK, sir,” says ATHENOS II. “I’m sure a spot will turn up soon, sir.”
The spaceship darts through the thick air traffic.
Meanwhile Fribby is still perched on her anti-grav mat, which is floating in midair, and she’s striking a pose called Your New Name Is Barbecue. This is part of her EPU, Emotional Processing Unit, doing the yoga like that. Because that robot’s been programmed to seek refuge in yoga whenever her EPU senses the onset of a scenario which might send her over the edge.
This is yoga as emotional firewall.
And half the time I can’t even keep track of what Ms. Cyber Scales over there is getting her lug nuts all bent out of shape about when she does her yoga, but on this particular morning I’ve got a pretty good idea. Because today is Crown Day. And if some Datalizard fella doesn’t ask Fribby to EggHarvest, then that’ll seal her lifestatus fate. And maybe you’ll reckon this sounds sort of harsh, but Fribby will have to live out her days as a slave working in a budding dragon Colony out on some godforsaken backwater planet in a galaxy nobody’s ever heard of.
Now perched up there on the anti-grav yoga mat, Fribby opens her silver beak and blasts a demented flamestream. And the robot’s flamestream is a good fifteen-footer and she holds it during her exhale for what seems like a full seven-count.
When it comes to flamestreams, Fribby’s skills are legit.
Then, when she inhales, the flamestream suddenly vanishes.