Something to Discover

By Andrew Chandler
Copyright © 2010

Brandon half listened to the loud drone of his math teacher Miss Ida. He looked at the clock above the door and willed for the arms to move faster, but if by spite they seemed to move even slower. Brandon muttered under his breath,and turned his attention to the homework sheet that Miss Ida had past out. He flipped it over and started to doodle. A couple of stick figures walked across the page brandishing their swords. They came to the entrance of the cave. “Do we go in?” one of the figures inquired. They looked at each other and shrugged (if stick figures could shrug, Brandon chuckled at this). Suddenly a dragon shot out of the cave burning half the “knights” to ashes and let the others run around their hair on fire and screaming for their mothers. The dragon laughed out loud.

Brandon scanned his creation and added some detail, redid some lines, erased some unnecessary marks.

He stopped and considered the crudely drawn picture of the dragon. Brandon wasn’t much of a daydreamer... but he found himself thinking how cool it would be if he could morph into a Dragon, or at least something like it. He sat back looking at the ceiling. 
No, he thought, impossible, what a stupid thought. But there was something nagging at the back of his mind that just seemed... he bit his lip and looked back down at his desk, a drop of something crimson fell on his desk. What the? he though, he fingered his lip and a trickle of blood slid down his arm. He heard a sharp gasp and turned to see Sara Rollins wide eyed and staring.

“Blood! Blood!” she pointing at Brandon. Bleary eyed students turned their heads toward Brandon, a little confused.

The teacher slowly faced Brandon, she sighed and rolled her eyes.

“Be quite girl, it's not nearly as bad as you're making it sound,” Miss Ida said sighing loudly. She walked over to Brandon as he hurriedly flipped his comic over.

“Why don't you go clean up in the restroom,” she said handing him a hall pass then walked back to the white board.

Brandon walked out of the classroom, down the hall, and into a boy's bathroom; one hand cupping his mouth. Standing in front of a sink he let his lip drip a bit, turned on the sink, cupped some water in his hands and washed the blood away. He stared up at his reflection in the mirror. He wrinkled his brow. He couldn't see a sign of a cut, or even a scratch. While he was inspecting his lip, he noticed something about his teeth. Brandon opened his mouth to it's widest extent, sharp dagger like teeth glistened in the mirror, they looked rather comical in his mouth. Brandon closed his mouth, and opened it again.

“I'm going insane,” Brandon said lightly brushing a tooth with a finger. He wished for normal teeth, and with that they were human teeth. Then he remembered a sense or instinct, he thought this over in his mind. Lets try it! Just a thought was all it took, giant blue wings sprouted from his shoulder blades; but he couldn’t end with that. In his minds eye he pictured himself changing into a dragon. Instantly his body expanded, his neck extending, his face narrowing and elongating. Sharp spines erupted along his neck, down his back and his powerful tail. His nails grew through the tips of his fingers ending in curved hooks. Scales grew all over his body, shining a brilliant blue. For a moment he stood there in awe, testing powerful muscles and flexing his wings as much as he could in the confined space.

He again shrunk to his human form smiling, he knew what he really was, a dragon!