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Friday, March 16th 2029

Naomi flew.

With her wings fully extended she could glide effortlessly and watch the world turn underneath her. Everything was a balance, a transfer of energy from one place to another and she alone decided where it would go. A twitch of a tendon and she would slip through the air, darting between invisible air currents she couldn't see but could feel nonetheless.

All of this without even thinking. Some part of her brain still retained whatever avian instinct etched into it by tens of millions of years of evolution, and the meticulous line-by line coding of the engineers at Goddard Genetics. She existed as a perfect blend of nature and man-made engineering, a creature of the sky in her natural element, and the sky was hers to use.

Higher. Ever higher. She glanced down at the altimeter strapped to her hind leg. 500 metres. She flapped, heaving her great wings, twice the length of her own body, breathing hard but steadily.

For the first half of her life she was a creature of the ground, forced to walk on a wing that refused to work, like a cruel mockery of what it could do. For hours she'd look up and watch birds flying above her. Alex would tell her not to, because it'd only make her sad, but she still did.

And now she looked down and saw birds flying beneath her and the thought of it was so brilliant it made her laugh out loud. After the surgery her entire left wing was numb and it was a few days before she could walk properly. Then she had to wait three weeks for it to heal and that felt like an eternity but when the day came, Alex took her out into his back yard, held her, and she spread her wings as wide as they could go, forced them downward, and for the first time in her life the ground pulled away from beneath her.

Then she fell to the ground in an awkward heap and was worried she'd never figure it out. He said she was overthinking it, so she just imagined herself in the sky, crouched, spread her wings again, but she could sort of hop in the air while pushing down with her wings but she couldn't time it right, and she thought she would never be able to fly.

He picked her up again and held her close. “Don't try to fly," he said, murmuring softly into her ear. His cheek was warm against her scales. “Just fly!" and threw her into the air and she was so surprised she forgot everything... except she was hovering in the air. She thought up and went up. She looked down on him for the first time, and he was beaming with pride. She flew up to his roof and perched there, and looked around his yard, and the trees and the path she would walk all the time. The same sights she had seen all her life, but now it was from an entirely new perspective.

She jumped and glided down to the grass, as soft as landing as you could have imagined. He just sat there and held her with tears in his eyes, and she thought if she could cry she would have. She struggled to find the right way to describe it. It was like gaining a new sense or opening her eyes after they were closed her entire life. She practised all day, and the next and the next, until she was sore.

Even now, if she stopped to think about it, it was remarkable how she could stay up here, supported by nothing. Remarkable how she didn't have to think about it, but that was the point of instincts, she supposed.

1000 metres. People below, too far away to hear but she saw them point and took pictures. Two years ago, Goddard officially announced they had perfected what they were working so hard on the last few years: intelligent, sapient dragons. There was just one problem: by then, Naomi was already a full-grown adult, so they were forced to admit the truth: she was the first. Once the public knew about her, people starting writing articles, and it wasn't long before the interviews started. When Alex did get paid for the interviews they did together he insisted that half of it was hers, so he opened a second bank account which he said was hers. Obviously her name wasn't attached to it, but she could still have cash and actually bought things sometimes. That was something, she supposed. She even had her own credit card, but for some reason, people didn't seem to trust that it was hers.

At first she had enjoyed the attention; everywhere she went, people knew her. Complete strangers became instant friends. No matter what she said, people were fascinated. She posed for thousands of pictures with fans. Some actually asked for her autograph but of course she couldn't hold a pen. It quickly grew annoying, to the point where she couldn't go outside for a walk without being mobbed by people – and the fact that she was a dragon meant people were constantly trying to pet her. She was immensely glad she could simply fly away from them and they couldn't chase her.

1500 metres. A crow squawked at her, jealous no doubt, and she ignored it. With one flap she was above it again, but then it dive-bombed her, she could feel the wind from it. How rude.

When it approached again, she twisted in the air and caught it in her hind legs. It struggled and screamed at her, and she brought it up close to her face, watching it. There was intelligence behind those eyes, but it was forgotten now, clouded by the fear and anger.

“I could eat you if I wanted to," she said.

The crow said nothing, just struggled fruitlessly, cawing and trying to bite her. She tossed it away and it sped away in a flutter of black wings, complaining all the while.

2000 metres. She spread her wings to their fullest extent and felt them lock into position stretched open. This way she could glide quite effortlessly without flapping or expending any energy at all, although it was boring. She could, and did, glide for hundreds of kilometres at a time. Once she got lost and had to ask for directions. Luckily, people were just starting to get used to the idea of sentient non-humans (Although they still insisted on posing for a picture with her.) Only two years ago, she'd have to pretend to be mute so she wouldn't arouse suspicion.

The sun had just risen above the horizon: blood-red and massive, she could imagine it was labouring just as hard as she was, heaving itself above the ground and into the sky. Rivers meandered through the landscape. On maps they looked random, but from up here where she could really see them, she could see how they followed the land, always seeking the lowest ground, always joining up into bigger and bigger streams, like they wanted to be together. To the south, the border showed itself as a dead-straight line in the trees. She could cross it, and nobody could stop her. She laughed to herself. Even Alex couldn't do that.

Highways a dark slash through the city and leaving, cutting between mountains like a knife and jumping over rivers. Below, the city sprawled out in all directions, laid out in a perfect grid. Little white grey rectangles of buildings looked like blocks. Parking lots were squares of black sprinkled with toy cars. She could sense the warm air rising above those dark surfaces, and when she passed above them, felt the air rise and take her with it, taking her ever higher. Somewhere below was the Goddard Genetics building, a place where she was hatched, and visited again for her surgery. They had created her from nothing and had fixed her. But for some reason when she thought back to the memories of that place they were... unpleasant.

3000 metres. To the west, the coast ran north and south, a jagged tear in the world and beyond, the ocean continued on forever. North and East, tree- covered mountains stood like hills covered in green fur and capped with snow, wreathed in fog, like islands in a white ocean. The tops of the highest mountains were level with her. Still, she wanted to be able to look down upon them, and flapped harder, gaining height with every stroke.

After the operation she was supposed to exercise her wing muscles, and she was more than happy to spend the entire day flying, no matter how sore she was at the end. She doubted Alex had this in mind, but she didn't need to tell him, he'd only worry.

Higher. The air was cold and thin up here, and it was getting harder to breathe. Still, it wasn't as high as she had been before, and not nearly as high as the highest bird which (she looked it up) was more than 11,000 metres. And if some stupid vulture could go that high, a dragon could.

She checked the altimeter again. 4000 metres. That was about as high as she ever flew, and she knew from her research that the air here had only half the pressure it did at sea level. Less and less air to move with her wings, and she was gaining less height with every flap, and was starting to feel the cold, and she was getting hungry. Also, negative eight degrees, according to the device. That made her pause, she barely felt the cold.

Still, a new personal altitude record. That was enough for today. She checked again: 4028 metres - and pressed a button on the altimeter which saved the altitude so she could show Alex later.

She tucked her wings tight against her body and dropped through the air like a bullet, the wind streaming against her body, ruffling her feathers and making her eyes water. She angled her tail just enough to direct her plummet, moving northwest, away from the big city centre to the smaller towns near the mountains.

The ground rushed up to meet her but at the last second she spread her wings again and was speeding across the ground, her chest muscles burned with the effort but it felt good. She followed a river, scanning the surface. Her own reflection shimmered along the water, wavering but keeping pace with her. “Hello!" she called down to her twin.

The undersides of her wings showed the same ink-black streaks trailing from the leading edge to the back, tapering to narrow points. Like a spaceship, Alex had said once. She tried making a rocket engine sound but it just sounded like she was just yelling and she was glad there wasn't anyone around to hear her.

Then, with a ripple in the surface that most animals and all humans would miss, she spied her prey. In one motion she dived, reached out her talons, and plucked the fish from the river. It didn't even see her coming and with squeeze from her iron-hard grip, until it stopped struggling, and ate it in the air. The first time she managed to successfully hunt it was a revelation: she could now support herself and didn't have to rely on Alex for food.

She tossed the bones and entrails into the river and flapped harder to regain the height she had lost. Up ahead and above her, a little hill that wasn't quite tall enough to be called a mountain, and on the edge of a cliff a small clearing among the snow-covered evergreens.

She landed gently on a light blanket of snow that covered the ground, no more than an inch thick. Just enough to make it look nice, she thought. Far below and to the south, a couple of boats sat lazily in the marina. Once in a while she saw hikers on the trails below but they couldn't see her from up here. She stretched her wings so they wouldn't get cramped, as far as they would go. Nearly four metres from tip to tip, she had Alex measure. Not even a hint of pain from her left elbow. Nothing left but a thin grey scar against the perfect black and white scales. Alex said they could have the scar removed but she preferred to keep it as a reminder.

And just near the cliff's edge, what looked like a little hut made of sticks and branches, just big enough for her to curl up inside. Decorated with eagle feathers, river rocks of different colours, maple leaves in various hues, forming a spectrum from bright green to dark brown. A few Blue Jay feathers fanned out above the entrance.

It wasn't much but she had created it by herself, without any help from anyone. It was her secret place, one which she had told nobody about, not even Alex. And far enough away that people wouldn't disturb her, but not so far she couldn't easily find her way back.

Ever since she found this place, she came here more and more often, enough that she decided to build herself a nest. It made sense, as it sheltered her from the rain, and it was a fun thing to do. And something else, she imagined, compelled her to do this, the same thing that granted her the ability to fly without thinking about it. Whatever the reason for it, it was satisfying in a simple way.

Immediately after her surgery she found she was able to pick up and manipulate objects with the claws on her wings. Previously, she could only hold herself up on her good wing, and her bad wing couldn't pick up anything. It was a simple thing, the ability to pick up an object and look at it, but one that fascinated her. Sometimes she could pick up objects with her mouth but that seemed undignified. Humans didn't need to hold things in their mouths, that's what animals did, and obviously she couldn't look at it while it was in her jaws.

She brushed the snow off her nest as well as she could, then fanned her wings to blow the last of the flakes off. Some evergreen needles and pinecones had fallen near it, and she brushed those away as well, until the area around her nest was a pure white as she was. Only then did she curl up inside it, resting her head on her folded wings, and look down on the bay below. A couple of boats sat lazily in the marina and big glass-covered houses sat on the edges of cliffs, just like hers.

She could stay out here as long as she wanted. She could easily support herself hunting and fishing and stay warm and dry in her own shelter. But it wasn't enough just to live here and there'd be nothing to do all day. No one to talk to, nothing to watch or read. Obviously she would never leave Alex because they loved each other, but it was nice to know she could take care of herself.

She got up and explored the area around her nest. Near her nest was a large, flat rock covered in snow. She dragged a claw through the snow, revealing the rock underneath; dark charcoal flecked with pink and white veins of quartz, and potassium and plagioclase feldspar coursing through it. “Plagioclase feldspar," she said out loud to herself, because she liked the sound of it.

Ever since learning to read it was all she ever did in her spare time when she wasn't flying, and her current obsession was with minerals. Book pages were hard to flip but she managed. She had started with children's books but had quickly outgrown them to. Alex was impressed and Naomi proud.

She wrote NAOMI in the snow. After he had taught her the sounds each letter made she was able to spell words out and find online tutorials, reading along with a virtual teacher. She wrote CASA above her name, and an arrow pointing to her nest.

With both of her wings resting on the rock and her hind legs supporting her weight, she tried to take the weight off her wings. If she used her tail as balance, she managed to stand on just her hind legs. She didn't know why she wanted to do this, but it felt right for some reason.

She took a step back and let go of the rock. Spread her wings for balance and looked around. Even with that small change in height, things looked different. She slowly managed to turn around, shuffling awkwardly and took a single, hesitating, quivering step, and fell into the snow. She shook the snow off herself and even though she knew she was alone she looked around all the same to make sure nobody saw.

She walked on all fours, now, much easier. Near her nest was a little pond, barely bigger than she was. The surface was frozen over as smooth and clear as glass and as shiny as a mirror. She could see the reflections of trees in it and the undersides of their leaves, and the clouds above that were now below. And her own reflection, looking back at herself looking back at herself looking back at herself... she used to look into a mirror and see only a dragon, and she learned to ignore it since the reflection didn't do anything. And yet, one day, she looked at the same thing and saw something else: herself.

One of her feathers was out of place and she ran her wing over it to fix it. Alex had explained that most people, practically everyone, didn't approve of them together, even if she was just as smart and capable of consent as he was. And they thought it was repulsive and morally wrong.

“Repulsive," she said to herself and watched her mouth form the words.

He didn't find her repulsive, why should anyone else? It wasn't fair that he could kiss Lily in public but not his Naomi. Naomi thought, not for the first time, that if she was a human they could be together. She used to wonder what it'd be like to be a human, to manipulate the environment so easily, to fit in the world made for humans. But then she wouldn't be able to fly, and now that she could, she wouldn't trade that for anything. It was more than just physical pleasure, more than a way to get from place to place. It was what she was made for.

But that wasn't what she was really made for, she thought bitterly. She was made for a specific purpose. And maybe that was the only reason he really liked her – because she was built for that purpose.

She shook her head. There was no point thinking about this, nothing good could come of it.

She glanced back at her reflection and left the clearing, took a running start and leapt from the cliff.

* * *

She landed in his back yard and saw through the big window that both Alex and Lily were home in the kitchen. He was cooking something in a frying pan, Lily came up behind him and wrapped her arms around his waist. She whispered something in his ear and they both laughed, and he turned around and kissed her.

Naomi let herself into the garage. Alex and Lily's cars sat in there, his was plugged in and charging. The charge port was steady green, so she pulled it out with a claw, then plugged in Lily's and it started blinking slowly.

She looked at his car, sitting there and saw her own reflection in the reflective silver. Now that she could fly anywhere she wanted, Alex rarely drove her anywhere. He joked that she could drive it if she wanted but obviously she never tried.

She used both wings to open the door to his car and awkwardly managed to fit in the front seat, but she was sitting on the base of her tail, and she wouldn't be able to do it for long. She rested her wings on the wheel and imagined they were hands. Of course the car wouldn't turn on without Alex's keycard or his phone. The main screen showed nothing but her reflection, the screen that he apparently broken years ago when he thought he might lose his Naomi.

It was already hurting her tail from sitting there so she let herself out of the car and wandered over to his workbench where he built things. A half-finished wooden sailing ship sat on a stand, surrounded by bits of miniature railings and string.

Sometimes he had her hold a piece of wood while he worked on it or held two pieces together while the glue dried – like an extra pair of hands, he said, and that made her feel useful. Once in a while she'd fly up onto his roof to clear the leaves off the solar panels, that made her feel useful too, since it was something he couldn't do on his own without a ladder. Once she got rid of a beehive on his chimney. Their stingers couldn't penetrate her scales, so they just sort of buzzed angrily around her.

She saw a screwdriver on the floor and tried to pick it up with one wing. Fumbled and dropped it and it rolled under a cabinet – she bent down to retrieve it, but it was out of reach. She looked down at her wing – on her knuckle, one of the joints ended in a single claw, the rest continued down along the length of her wings. She envied watching Alex type, ten fingers all hammering away at the keyboard, like 10 times a second. He could do it without even looking at the keyboard. She could hold herself up on one wing and type on a laptop keyboard with the other. Or if she leaned on something, sort of half-sitting on a chair, she could put it on the floor and use both wings to type but it was still very slow.

She gave up trying to retrieve the screwdriver and let herself into the house.

There was a smell of coffee in the air, so that meant Lily had made it before she went to work, and she'd be leaving soon. Naomi peeked her head around the corner so they wouldn't see her listening.

Lily was seated at the kitchen table, eating breakfast – a plate of pancakes was in front of both chairs but Alex was pacing around the kitchen, reading and holding a tablet and reading out loud.

“...with another scandal. It's the Non-Human Persons Liberation Society again, trying to classify sentient dragons as “non-human persons..." He put the tablet down to make finger-quotes in the air, then picked it back up and continue reading – Naomi saw Lily roll her eyes at that and return to her pancakes.

“I think they're right," Lily said with a full mouth and swallowed. “Naomi's just as smart as you or me. Why can't she have the same rights?"

“Morally, she deserves them of course, but since when does Goddard allow something as trivial as morality stop them? They're fighting this because if dragons have rights, they can't be bought and owned. But to be fair to Goddard, if they stopped making dragons, they'd go extinct."

“They could just reproduce the normal way."

“No, remember they're all sterile specifically to prevent that, so people can't breed their own. There's no way Goddard will allow people to make them for free. Not while they monopolize the market." He scrolled through the tablet. “Remember when they bought Sigma Synthetic Lifeforms? That was the closest thing they had to a competitor. Now it's just Goddard."

“Still, you'd think the government would make a law against owning something sentient."

“I'd be willing to bet that plenty of government officials own one of Goddard's products themselves. They're not going to give them up. Right now they're protected under animal cruelty laws so you can't like, kill them for fun, but that's it."

“She's just as smart as us, obviously, so she should have the same rights as us."

“It's more complicated than that. How would Naomi have a Social Insurance Number? Or, like a driver's license?

“They could just have different seats," Lily said.

“Why would I need to drive a car when I can fly?" Naomi asked.

They both looked at her. “When did you get home?" Alex asked.

“Just now," she said.

There was a dinging sound, and Alex glanced down at the tablet, shook his head, and put it down.

“What was that?" Lily asked.

“Another politely worded cease and desist letter from Goddard, they want me to stop doing interviews with Naomi."

“Why would they want you to stop?" Lily asked. “I thought they liked the free advertising."

“I'm not sure. Remember there was talk of doing a documentary, and we did that interview with the film crew, but then Goddard shut it down before it could be aired? I think they don't mind me talking about now great Goddard's products are, but they don't want me explaining their history. Maybe they're doing something they don't want the public to know about. Maybe the anthro rumours were true."

“Anthro rumours?"

“Anthropomorphic human-animal hybrids. I read it online."

“Oh, online. I've been there. Sounds credible."

Alex pursed his lips. “It just sounded a lot like what Dimitri Goddard mentioned once. I can't find any proof, but I like to keep tabs on what the company is doing."

“Do you think that's wise? They threatened to sue you, and have you arrested, and they might have done worse. You won, so I think you should just leave them alone for now."

“There's no harm in reading. Besides, they can't actually stop me from doing these interviews since I'm not breaking the law, and I'm not using company property. They can't admit I stole Naomi without admitting the truth about her. The only people that know that are the people in this room, Dimitri Goddard and Lukas Koskinen. Nobody will say anything or I'll just... oh, that reminds me, I have to log into the DMS."

“The DMS?"

“Dead Man's Switch, the one I threatened Goddard with when they tried to take Naomi. If they try anything, it'll go off and reveal everything I know about them."

“I know what it stands for," Lily said. “I just mean do you really need to keep logging into it every three days?"

“I have to." He tapped his fingers on the tablet. “Actually I already changed it so I only have to do it once a week. Maybe I can change it so it's monthly." He typed some more and looked up at Lily. "If you want, I can make a guide so you can update this too, just in case I can't for whatever reasons. Just read the instructions. You'll figure it out."

“Why bother doing it at all? They've probably forgotten about you. It was years ago. I'm just worried you'll forget one day, and all this information will be released, and you'll have nothing against them."

He finished typing and put the tablet down. “I won't forget, I set up reminders for myself. And I have to keep it up, it's the only thing stopping them from coming after us. The fear that I might reveal the truth of what they're doing."

Lily stood up and came over to him and wrapped her arms around his shoulders. “I just don't want you to do anything stupid or dangerous. I've got some long-term plans for you."

Naomi left the room – they were still talking as if she wasn't even there. She lay down on his bed and rested her head on her folded wings. Down near the floor she spotted something under the bed – a small grey C shaped object. She frowned at it, then got up and pawed it towards her. A single soot-grey feather. She bent and sniffed at it, and it spun away.

Alex had told her how she lost her feathers – she was born covered in them, and only shed them after she was eight months old. She didn't remember much from that far back.

She managed to grab the feather and bring it closer. It moved with every breath she took no matter how slowly she breathed. Even the random air currents in the room made it shiver, as it wanted to fly and be free.

Was she still the same person back then if she had no memory of it? Would she still be the same person years or decades from now when she had forgotten this moment?

Someone stood up – Naomi heard the handle of Lily's purse being jingled. Naomi didn't look up when she heard Lily give Alex a kiss, walk towards the garage door, and open it.

“Oh, thanks, you remembered to plug in my car – thanks Alex!"

“I didn't even remember I did that. Have fun at work!"

“See you later, love you! Bye, Naomi."

“Bye, Lily."

** ** When the door closed Alex turned to Naomi and said, “okay, what's really on your mind?"

“Do you still love me?" Naomi asked.

He stopped, paused, and sat next to her. “Of course I still love you. What makes you think I wouldn't?"

“Because...." Naomi glanced up at him and flicked her eyes back and forth. “It's like you have everything you want with Lily, and I'm just something extra, like a pet you take care of. I don't do anything on my own. I don't have a job, and I can't drive, I don't have-"

“Naomi, I don't care if you can drive or not,"

“You're not allowed to admit that you love me, to anyone except to me and her, you can't kiss me in public, you can't even hold my hands because I don't even have hands! I'm just an animal and I'm... I'm not your equal."

Without saying anything, he took her head in his hands. She closed her eyes and nudged towards him and he took her in his arms and, held her close. She rested her chin on his shoulder, feeling the heat from his skin. He was always so warm. With him standing on the floor and her on the bed, they were the same height.

“Would you like me better if I were a human?" she asked.

He was silent for a while. Then he pulled away and looked into her eyes. Before she could answer she said, “Would you have married me instead of her?"

He opened his mouth to say something, but nothing came out. He looked down at her left wing he was holding, as if imagining putting a ring on it.

“It's okay," Naomi said, and tried to pull away.

“Naomi, I don't know to answer that; I never thought about that. I love you because of who you are, and what you are. Would you have liked me more if I was a dragon?"

“No," she said.

“You see? I like you the way you are. I know sometimes it's difficult being together, but every relationship is like that. Nobody is truly perfect for each other, but of you love each other enough, the good parts outweigh the bad and you do what you can. Plus, why would you want to be a boring human anyway? Dragons are awesome."

“Because everything I am, I owe to other people. Someone I've never met commissioned me. And a company made me. You raised me. I didn't do any of that."

“Naomi, nobody makes themselves. Nobody starts off from nothing. I didn't choose my parents, or where I was born. But I chose to save you, and I choose to be with you still. If you're with me it's because you choose to. You can go wherever you want, even more than I can. That's a level of freedom that literally no human has."

He sat down next to her and put an arm around her shoulder. “Think about what you've learned in the past three years. You can talk, you can read. Hell, you can fly. That's more than I can do. When I was your age I couldn't even spell my own name. You're a genius compared to a human your age.

She looked down and slowly nodded. “But wouldn't things be easier if I were a human?"

He took both the knuckles of her wings in his hands, held them together, and kissed them. He took a deep breath and shut his eyes. “I won't lie to you. Yes, things would be easier." He opened his eyes and they were fierce, the look he had when he was concentrating on a hard programming problem or building something complicated out of wood. “But I don't want easy. I don't want what's convenient or conventional or mainstream. I want you. I want you the way you are, with all your flaws and wonderful quirks. I don't love you despite what you are but because of it.

“I remember one time, more than a year ago. We were lying in bed together, you were asleep, and I was just watching you. I remember thinking, maybe I only felt that way because of what we had just done, and all these feelings were just manifestations of the physical urge and my attraction to you. And I thought, it's one thing to love someone because they're beautiful or because we have attractive personalities. But it's another thing to look past our differences, and to love you no matter what. Not despite our differences, but because of them. And I whispered, 'I love you,' for the first time. And I knew it was true. And I still do, no matter what.

“So even if nobody accepted it, even if everyone but you and I hated us for it I would still feel the same way about you." He kissed her then, and ran his hands down her scalp and over the feathers decorating her head like a crown. It tickled in a good way. Sensual, sending a shiver down her neck.

She kissed him back, tasting the sweet metallic taste of his mouth and the faint coffee on his breath. When she spoke her voice was husky and choked. “Why are you so nice to me?"

“Because you deserve it, and you're nice to me." He hugged her again. “Where were you this morning? I missed you."

“I just went flying and exploring. I caught my own breakfast. And look!" She showed him the altimeter on her leg. “A new record!"

He glanced down at the device and looked genuinely impressed. “Four thousand and eighteen metres, wow! That might be a world record for a dragon."

Naomi glanced away, thinking if she could blush she would. It wasn't a world record, she had already looked it up and the highest recorded flight of a dragon was more than a kilometre higher than hers, set by another Goddard dragon. Still, there was plenty of time to beat it.

“I tried walking on my hind legs today," she said." And I fell. I managed to stand up though, just not walk. You make it looks so easy."

He laughed. “Well I've had a lot of practice. I'm pretty sure I fell a few times when I was learning. Can you show me?" He let go and stood up. She hopped off the bed and looked up at him. “It's embarrassing."

“Naomi, I've caught you doing more embarrassing things than that."

“That's different!" But she held herself up on her wings, climbing up the bed like she did on the rock at Casa Naomi, until she was upright. Then slowly let go of the bed so she was standing on her hind legs. It was easier this time on a flat floor, but it still hurt her legs having them back so far. She looked at Alex.

“Hey, I'm almost as tall as you!" she said.

“Wow. This is different." He took her wings in his hands again. Despite their differences, they fit together. He clasped his fingers over the knuckle of her wing, and her single claw fit between his thumb and fingers, like they were holding hands. They stood there for a while, just looking at each other. He had held her hundreds of times before, but it was different just because of the perspective. It was like they were equals.

“Try to take a step forwards," he said.

He held onto her wings, not enough to take her weight, but enough she knew he was there.

While she looked into his eyes, took a single, hesitating step forwards.

But she couldn't balance and stumbled, but before she could fall he had caught her in his arms and pulled her back onto her feet. She looked up at his face – he looked calm as always with a slight smile he always had when looking at her. She leaned forwards and kissed him, gently at first, just to feel his lips against hers. He put his arms around her shoulders, and she wrapped her wings around him and pulled him close and rested her head just under his chin, like when they were lying down and cuddling.

She closed he eyes and breathed out a contented sigh. Standing and cuddling. Studdling, she thought, and couldn't help but kind of move her head around while trying not to laugh. A few days worth of his stubble tickled the top of her head and he tensed up.

Without looking up she said, “what?"

“Your feathers are tickling my neck."

“Well your beard is tickling my head," she said, and moved her head back and forth just a bit, just to tease him.

“It's not a beard, I just haven't shaved in a few days."

“Well you should grow a beard," she said into his chest, without opening her eyes. “You'd look hot." She could feel his smile at that.

Without thinking about it, they both started gently swaying back and forth, she in his arms and he in her wings, staying in one spot. “It's like we're dancing," she said. He hugged her tighter and moved his head away long enough to say, “House, romantic ambience." The lights in the room dimmed, and music started playing though the ceiling-mounted speakers; gentle as a warm breeze and individual notes fell upon them like falling leaves.

Again she rested her head on his chest, just under his chin. One of his hands rested on her waist, the other held her wing and they danced together, weaving in between the strands of music flowing around them like a gentle stream flowing over river stones. She could close her eyes and imagine they were the same – not as a human or dragon, but equal. Balancing on two legs was easy as long as he was there to hold her. Sometimes when she stood upright it hurt her legs but now, she felt like she could do it forever, as long as he was there, holding her.

She kissed him again, properly this time. She opened her mouth and their tongues met and he kissed her with more passion, pressing his lips against her snout. The warmth of their bodies flowed between them and was captured by her wings, enveloping them both, until the song ended.

When they finally parted he was holding her left wing and his finger was wrapped around the claw like a ring. He looked at her and said, “Yes. I would have."

* * *

Long after Naomi had fallen asleep, Alex was still up, his face illuminated by his laptop screen.

He had written crawler programs to search the Internet for any mention of Goddard in the news

and he would receive an automatic alert if the words “Goddard" and “Sobek" were ever used in the same article. So far they had turned up nothing.

Until tonight.

_ _ Reports of alleged human – animal hybrids have so far been dismissed as hoaxes. An unnamed source from Goddard Genetics claimed these were due to conspiracy theorists and viral marketing campaigns by Goddard's competitors, or by disgruntled ex-employees of one of the rival companies Goddard had bought out.

_ _ An anonymous source, claiming to be a former employee, leaked information pertaining to this so-called “Project Sobek." In a recent interview with another former employee, Alex Chapman, denied knowing anything about the rumoured Sobek Project, and claims he was never involved with the genetic coding.

Goddard Genetics has not responded to these rumours.

He checked his Dead Man's Switch for the tenth time that day – it was still encrypted and hadn't been released. So who had leaked the information? He didn't know how many people were involved in it. He wondered if Dimitri Goddard would believe Alex if he said he wasn't the whistleblower.

He tapped his thumbnail against his teeth. The Dead Man's Switch was his trump card – the only thing between him and Goddard. If it was taken away or rendered useless by someone else...

He closed the laptop and put it away. Naomi's sleeping body lay next to him, slowly rising and falling with each breath. There was just enough light to see her eye twitch, nothing more. He reached out, gently, and held his palm on her scales and felt her heartbeat, beating in time with his, as it always did. He laid his head down on the pillow but kept his eyes open, watching her, and he kept his hand on her, as if he was afraid of losing her.