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It was a sunny Friday afternoon. Middle of June, it was beginning to feel uncomfortably hot as each day seemed to crawl slowly on. It was a heat wave; it had reached a record high for early June, 35 degrees centigrade. If the heat wave did not kill me, sitting in a stuffy 8th grade math class would. Not to mention I had one of the teachers with the shortest fuse. I swear, last year I actually felt sorry for him because of how he always looked scared as a gym teacher. This year though, Mr. A was on me like stick on rice, any time I tried to sleep during class, any time I said a wrong answer, he would hound me. So of course since it was so hot out, he yelled at anyone in the class. I could swear I could see steam rising out of his ears.

In a time span that seemed to drag on forever, the bell signaling the end of the day finally rang. I was out of there, knowing Mr. A he would have tried to keep me in just to see me squirm. Well, not today, it was Friday and I had plans of my own. See, every Friday I spend the night with my friend and his family. I had known Rick since the beginning of the year, he had seen me playing a card game that I had learned earlier and asked to join in. Sure he is kind of nerdy with braces, acne, and a goofy look to him, but granted I am no shining cherub.

We have many of the same interests; Video games, card games, role-playing, and music. He actually admitted he liked to dance a while back, although I thought it was weird I appreciated the fact that he could trust me with that knowledge. Funny thing being that he does not strike me as a person who is light on his feet. In fact he strikes me as one of those people with two left feet. Anyway, Today I had made plans to walk home with Rick and his brother, Chip. Chip was a year behind me, and 2 years behind his older brother. He was a small boy, thin and lanky, it always surprised me that he did so well on the wrestling team. On top of that, both of the guys took Judo as well as Karate. I have only had some experience in Tae Kwon Do, so needless to say I didn't make it a habit of picking fights.

Before the long walk to his house I stopped by my locker and dropped off all my useless books, and I was glad Mr. A had forgotten to assign homework in his fit of yelling. All I needed was my Language Arts book; we were to write some story using vocabulary words. Yeah, I can't think of a story in a month and I have to write one over the weekend? Great. I closed my locker and locked it, and then set out through the door near the wood shop.

I met up with Rick at a corner of the brick school and we proceeded to walk across the soccer field.

"So Rick, how was last period?" I asked.

"Awesome, we were in the library for LA, the only air-conditioned room in the school," he replied.

"Ah, I had to sit in Math class on the top floor, not to mention I have Mr. A screaming at us."

Suddenly I felt this weight on my back and turned around to see that Chip had jumped on top of my back. He jumped off as soon as I noticed him.

"What's up Alex?" Piped the small boy.

"Not much," I replied, "Just talking about the school."

"Well, how about a less depressing topic," said Rick, "for example I got a new D&D book."

That's right, guilty as charged; we were all Dungeons and Dragons geeks. What can I say, I saw it in a store, spent 125$ on my first 3 books and for the past 9 months we have been collecting miniatures and books and all that jazz.

"Really?" I asked, "Which one?"

"Players Handbook 2."

"I also got Monster Manual 3," said Chip. This meant we now had all 4 Manuals.

"Well," I said, "I got Leberis Mortis, and for those that don't speak French, that is the book of the Undead."

At the mention of the words Leberis Mortis, both of the brothers froze in place in the middle of the soccer field. I only noticed this about 10 seconds after I said it. Once they saw I was ahead of them they quickly caught up to me.

"What was that?" I asked.

"What was what?" Replied Rick.

"That, you kind of stopped dead in your tracks back there."

"I saw a bee," said Chip almost yelling it.

Chip is allergic to bee and wasp venom; the kid even carries an epee-pen. That is nothing compared to the allergies Rick has though. Rick is allergic to pollen, dog hair, cat hair, animal dander, dust, etc. The poor kid is even allergic to grass. His symptoms are not as severe as Chip though, Rick just breaks out in pimples and rashes, nothing serious. Granted I guess the pet hair part bothered him enough, he has one of those dogs that doesn't shed its hair, the one with white curly fur that you think could never see through the overgrowth.

"Well, anyway we had better get going," I said.

At that we continued on across the cross walk. Once we hit the elementary school, we knew we were just a few hundred meters to Rick's place. However, as seems to happen a lot with me, trouble seemed to follow me. I felt a sharp pain hit the back of my head. I turned around to see Billy and Randy throwing stones at me. The second one missed. Billy and Randy were two kids in my class that always gave me trouble for no reason. I think maybe its because I caught them sneaking out of school once for god only knows what. Anyway, they threw a third rock at my face; this one was caught by Rick.

"Hey losers, I know a way to straighten those teeth," said Randy, the slim fish faced one. Which was kind of funny cause both him and Billy looked like they were part of the Beverly Hillbillies.

"Leave us alone," said Chip, which was greeted by a pebble to the forehead. "OUCH!"

"Alright that's enough!" I said as I knelt to see the damage to Chip's crown. Surprisingly enough, there was no damage, and Chip replied with an "I'm fine" look on his face.

"What, you want to fight us?" asked Billy.

"No, we just want to get home," said Rick.

"Fine then, if that's the way you want to play it."

Randy started charging towards Rick with a fairly large rock cupped in his hand. I was worried that he would hurt Rick, but I underestimated his skills in Martial Arts. Before I knew it, Rick had hit Randy in the stomach, retrieved the rock, thrown it away and pined him on the cement side walk with one arm. Billy had followed closely behind him, but in a flash Chip had head-butted him in the stomach and wrestled him to the ground.

"We Give! We give!" said both of the bullies almost simultaneously.

Immediately the brothers let them go, and Billy and Randy ran in the opposite direction. We continued walking down the street, and I was still admiring both of them for their strength and skill. We got to the house in about five minutes, and the parents of the two brothers greeted us. Mrs. Carlo was a short woman with brown curly hair, and by chance was actually smaller than my own mother. Mr. Carlo by contrast was much taller than myself, he had short black hair much like Rick, but the gray was beginning to show in his hair.

"Hey, come in you guys," said Mrs. Carlo.

"You boys look hungry, Good thing I started the Kraft Dinner," said Mr. Carlo.

That was the thing with the Carlo Family; they always jumped at the opportunity to make some of the most mundane foods. Some of these included Kraft Dinner, Sandwiches, Chicken fingers and French Fries. I think it might be because they had just gotten a deep fryer a few months ago. Still, I enjoyed their cooking and their enthusiasm to feed their guests.

"Yeah, it was scorching hot in that school, I'm starved," I said.

The whole Carlo family seemed to give a little chuckle and Mrs. Carlo replied, "Well, it will be ready soon. Rick, can you show Alex to his sleeping quarters?"

"Sure, come on Alex, I think you know where the room is."

I followed Rick up the stairs to the spare bedroom. I put down my backpack that was filled with D&D books, video games, and a few change of clothes. I followed Rick into his room; there I stopped at the doorway. I was surprised I had not noticed them before, I had only been in this room a few times, but it was only now I had noticed the numerous amounts of dragon statues that decorated his room. There were statues of Chinese dragons, Wyrms, European dragons, of gold, red, green, and other assortments of colors. They were made of wood, glass, ceramic, and metal. Looking behind me at Chip's room, I saw the assortment of trophies, and a few dragon statues. Not as many as his brother owned, but he had his own assortment of shields, and statues of knights in armor.

Rick walked out of his room and said, "Alright, lets get some grub."

Dinner with the Carlo's was interesting to say the least. Everyone had KD but they found their own way of personalizing it. I had salt and pepper with mine; Chip added a sandwich with his meal, Mrs. Carlo added a bit of Parsley to make it look nice and to add a bit to it. Mr. Carlo added Tomato's to it, and for some reason Rick enjoyed almost covering his with ketchup. Like father like son I guess. After dinner we set the table to play some D&D. It was Rick's turn to be the DM. We played for a little while just going through a dungeon, one of the pre-made ones I had picked up at a store from a freebee bin. The whole game lasted a good three hours, and then we were able to play some video games.

I had rented a game from a video rental place yesterday. We must have spent at least 4 hours playing video games, eating chips, talking about movies, and other stuff. Eventually Chip and me were feeling sleep come down on us like a heavy blanket.

"I am going to go to bed Rick, see you in the morning," I said.

"Yeah, same here," Chip followed up.

"Alright, I think I'm going to stay up a bit," replied Rick.

It seemed like Rick had a much better span than the rest of us, he always stayed up later, and Chip usually had some wrestling thing to go to in the morning, or Judo. We climbed the stairs and the lights downstairs turned off. I retreated to my spare room and crawled into the twin-sized bed, and immediately fell asleep.

That didn't last very long though, I was feeling parched. I put my pants and t-shirt on and walked downstairs to get a drink. I walked down the stairs and heard something, but I brushed it off and continued to the fridge. I got a glass and the carton of milk. There was another sound that came from the room Rick was in, this time I didn't dismiss it, I put the glass on the counter and the carton in the fridge. I walked closer to the room and saw in the blue flicker of the TV screen that Rick was doubled over in pain. I quickly ran to his side and put my hand on his back. I instantly recoiled; his skin was cold and hard like rock.

"Don't,..." he said through gritting his teeth, "Don't touch me..."

I was about to get help when he said, "Don't... leave..."

I just dropped onto my rear and watched as his body changed color to a green tint and was being covered with a scale like pattern. It looked like it hurt, a lot. There were green scales on his arms and legs, and harder, darker scales on his chest and stomach that seemed to continue down his torso. Suddenly a tail grew from his pelvis and his back jerked a bit. I could see the darker scales growing along the bottom of his tail. I could not imagine the pain he must have been going through. One of his fingers disappeared and so did two of his toes. Those remaining digits elongated and grew claws. His feet elongated and I could see some dark green scales forming on the bottom of his feet. Wings grew from his shoulder blades and flapped a bit. Then I saw horns growing out of his short brown hair and his face elongated into a sort of muzzle or snout. He stopped shaking and breathed a few heavy breaths; I was still in shock from seeing this whole ordeal happening.

I was just about to bolt out of there when Rick, or I guess the dragon that Rick had turned into stood up on his legs. It was really intimidating, I mean he was now a lot taller than before, and I had never seen anything like him in my life. He stood up straight by standing on the ball of his foot. In fact, I did try to get away, but the dragon grabbed my shirt with one hand, and when he had me close to him he put one arm around my torso and one hand over my mouth. I was quite literally being held just a few feet above the ground. I panicked and tried to bite his hand. Bad Idea, it tasted terrible and it didn't seem to affect the dragon in the least bit, I tried the oddly shaped feet next by kicking it, but again there was no reaction.

"Oh will you be quiet?" whispered the dragon in my ear, "Do you want to get me in trouble?"

His voice was the same as it used to be, and the sound of his voice did help to calm me down. I stopped flailing and relaxed as much as I could.

"Now can I let you go and have you not run and scream?"

I nodded my answer. Instantly he let me go and I nearly fell over. I turned around to look at him, and planted myself on the sofa just opposite of him. He sat on the far side of the sofa. It was slightly awkward cause his tail was long enough it was resting on my leg.

"I guess I have some explaining to do," said Rick.

"Yea," I said a bit startled.

"Where to begin?"

"How about, what are you?"

"Well isn't that obvious? I am a dragon."

"I never heard of dragons that can turn human."

"Yeah, well that is a sort of thing we do to fit in with this world."

"This world?"

"Yeah, earth."

I was taken aback by the small amount of information. First was the fact that my friend was a dragon, and then there was the fact that he was not from this world.

"So, does that make you, an alien?"

"Hardly, it in the same place as earth, it's a different dimension."

"Ok, now that we have that done, mind telling me why you are in your in this whole getup?"

"I do this every night, cause well, there is no easy way to explain it..."

"What?"

"I am your Guardian."

I paused for a moment, then continued, "What do you mean my guardian?"

"Humans have a sort of, vibration, all living and some non living things have a vibration of their own. Anyway, dragons are attracted to vibrations given off by certain humans."

"So you chose to be my friend cause you sense something about me?"

"There is no simple way to put it, but yes, I can sense something about you I like."

"Can you tell me what that is exactly?"

"Not right now no. I have to ask the permission of my family to discuss that sort of thing."

He moved a bit closer to me, which again was awkward not only because his tail was now between us, but he had no clothes on, granted with the scales he didn't really need them.

"So," I said, "You are my guardian. Does that mean you shadow over me like a body guard or something?"

"Not really, I am in touch with you always, like mind to mind."

"Like telepathy? So you know what I am thinking?"

"More like GPS, I just know where you are, not what is going through you head. But I will explain all of that later."

A few moments passed in silence, I didn't know if he was thinking or trying to figure out if his parents had awakened yet. Then I decided to break the Ice, "Why do you change like this every night?"

"I do it to protect you," said the dragon, "The home of a dragon is never disturbed by creatures from our dimension, but when a human comes along, well then it is like bees to honey."

"Wait, so there are other beings on earth besides dragons?"

"Yes, to name a few gnomes, goblins, Fairies, elves, the list goes on."

A few more moments of silence passed as I gathered my thoughts. Then Rick asked the oddest question I had ever heard, "Do you want to go for a flight?"

I jumped up and accidentally stepped on part of his tail while also pushing my hand on it for leverage. He winced but that was about it. "What do you mean?"

He flapped his wings a bit before saying, "These things are not for decoration you know, and I have been flying since I was born. I can also hold well over 200 pounds while in flight."

I thought about it for a long time, or at least what felt like a long time. I had known Rick for a long time, and he has protected me from harm before. Not only today when he ended the fight with Billy and Randy, but probably a few other times when I might not have known it. Not only that but I really could not pass up this opportunity, to fly with a dragon. The Carlo family had invited me to go water skiing with them before and I passed it up, only to see how fun it really was. So I gathered up as much courage as I could, and told the dragon, "I would be honored to."

Rick gave a quick smile and said, "Alright."

He opened the sliding door that lead to the wooden patio of his back yard. We walked outside and he told me to put my arms out, and he held me in a full-nelson hold and he asked me to hook my arms around his.

"What if a nosy neighbor sees us?" I asked.

"Everyone is asleep, and I am really quiet, not even my parents will wake up. You ready?"

"Yes"

There was no countdown there was just a sudden rushing sensation as we lifted off and he flapped his wings to gain more height. Before I knew it we were flying over the whole city. I had that weird feeling like I was going to fall through his arms and the legs he had now crossed to support my own. I could feel the rough scales of his chest on my back and the ones on his tail with my feet. But that feeling was soon gone as I realized that we were now flying! I was doing something that people have only written about in fables. For the moment, there was no earth, no sky, and no city; there was just me, Rick and the sensation of security, and most of all flight. Not just of my physical body, but my newfound spirit.