The dragon flew over us and
then straight for the city. From our vantage point, we were able to see how the
creature spew fire all over the place, making fires light up the morning
landscape. The crimson color of the flames combined itself with the pink and
blue hues of the morning haze, which looked beautiful but wasn’t any of the
sort for the people in that place. Some had already died and others would die
pretty soon, for sure. They didn’t even have the opportunity to wake up and see
what was going on, as life had just caught up with them in the most awful of
ways. Death was always an unwelcomed guest.
The group overlooking the city
soon split into two groups: some of them were responsible for the release of
the creature and ran somewhere to try and contain it. Doing that was ridiculous
and they knew it very well, but it would have been worse if they had stayed
there, looking at the creature destroy the nearest center of population. They disappeared
quickly and left the rest of the people there, only a handful of humans that
had no real connection between themselves except the fact that they had learned
of the other people’s plans and had attempted to thwart them, failing horribly
in a matter of minutes.
They had carried a bomb with
them, hoping to seal the cave the creature had been sleeping in for centuries, but
the device had failed and now they needed to know what to do. The destruction
of their birthplace had begun and it was very possible that the creature would
turn it all into ashes before they could do something to capture it or, of
course, killing it. It was an obvious idea to have after seeing the creature
for the first time. It was such a huge amount of flesh and bones, heavy, with
fangs protruding out of its mouth and the deadly capacity of producing the deadliest
fires one could ever imagine.
The creature, to be fair, didn’t
seem to have much of a mind, but it was precisely that what scared people so
easily. They couldn’t know what kinds of things that beast was able to do. The
only real problem was that one group of people decided to wake it up and find
out, while the others only wanted to keep the creature away from the rest of
the planet, sealing it away in order to protect them from a potential
catastrophe, that ultimately happened. They had neglected to realized that some
of nature’s creations cannot be controlled, no matter how much effort and money
people could put into it. It wasn’t like that at all.
So, the creature had awakened, as
they had planned, but it had escaped in a matter of minutes and now death and
more loomed over them. Several transports carrying personnel from the team that
released the creature, cruised through the forest in order to get close enough
to attempt some kind of trapping mission, which was obviously not the best idea
to have but it certainly was one of the few things they could do, without
losing the support of the people.
But when they reached the
outskirts of the city, they realized what the dragon had actually done: it wasn’t
burning the city randomly, as it had seemed to them from the top of the
mountain. The creature had created a perimeter of fire, burning houses,
buildings and so on to create some sort of ring to protect its new home. As
they couldn’t see it in the air, they sent robots and drones to check for the
creature’s position, only to find out that the dragon was sleeping quietly in
the center of the city, where a large square surrounded by ancient buildings
enclosed a yard made with very old bricks and stones from many parts of the
country.
Apparently, the creature was
exhausted and had decided to avoid looking for food, as sleeping to gain
strength back was the wisest idea, or at least it felt like that. The creature
did not seem dangerous at all, but the group behind its release was not going
to let it go so easily. They had decided it was better to pretend there was a
bigger crisis and use that to propel their own image in the face of such a
strange occurrence. So, in a matter of hours, they helped evacuate the whole
city by piercing a whole in the fire ring with the help of some very powerful
fireman hoses that they had available for other emergencies.
The creature did not notice the
humans in the outskirts and slept all day, almost through sunset. Unexpected as
they always were, a group of humans, not allies of those idiots that had
liberated the creature from the cave, decided to infiltrate the city through
another point that the dragon had not completely covered in fire. It was difficult
and they risked their lives when doing so, but it was worth it as they believed
the creature was not one to be disturbed and they needed it to understand that
it was better for its well-being to fly away to some other place, instead of
sleeping in the middle of a square, an easy target.
Although many humans infiltrated
the city, only three were brave enough to come closer to the creature. As soon
as they got too close, the beast opened its eyes and looked straight at them.
Then, two of those people ran away and only one remained. The dragon moved its
formidable paws in order to get closer and the poor human shook nervously, but did
not move from the position it had been when the dragon opened up its eyes. The
creature grew as close as it liked and then sniffed the human for a long time.
It was as if it was looking for something special, as if it knew something that
no human knew anything about.
The dragon then put his nose very close
the human’s chest and started building up some fire. Of course, everyone in the
vicinity thought that poor person was going to die in moments, burned alive by
the fiery flames of a creature that people didn’t even thought existed. But the
dragon did not kill the person, it just heated up its nose and then expanded
its wings and flew away, somewhere where he wouldn’t be bothered, very far from
those greedy bastards trying to make money out of it.
The creature was never really
seen again. Some reports came to the ears and eyes of the people in that
region, but nothing could never be really confirmed. In time, the fires where
finally extinguished and people were able to go back to their homes and enjoy
their city again. The ones responsible for the destruction were brought to
justice after some private citizens had formed a coalition who brought up proof
that they had been planning for a long time the awakening of the creature to
use it in many kinds of tests and medical investigations.
The people of the city, however,
never thought of the whole things as something inherently bad. After finishing
repairs in many parts of the city, the mayor decided to erect a huge statue
honoring the dragon, right in the middle of the square where it had slept. Most
people in town were very happy about the idea and many children, as well as
adults, submitted thousands of designs for the statue. It was unveiled a full
year after the events of that day, when they had been awakened by the rumbling
of such a majestic and mysterious creature. It became a legend of the region
and a story to pass down through the generations.
As for the dragon itself, no one knows
where it rests these days. Some say it must have looked for another cave. Other
claims that it now takes advantage of its freedom and roams the world changing its
home from time to time. That idea is very popular with children, as they seem
to enjoy a lot the idea of a travelling dragon. But the truth is that most
people just want to see it once again, just once before they each return to the
ground, as we all must do.
And maybe it will happen… Maybe
it has already happened. But that’s a story for another day.
