TALES: Origins Part 2

     She had twisted herself into every position she could to get as much light as possible from the setting sun onto her book. It was annoying. Why did she need light to read, anyway?  That was stupid. When the effort was eventually futile and the sun had made its voyage over the horizon, she closed her book with a sigh of discomfort. She was almost finished, too. Stupid light. She rose from her log to stretch as her weary joints cracked at this sudden and frankly unwarranted usage. Oh well. Time to head home and get some breakfast and a good scolding. Maybe even a nap. It was only then that she paused to take in her surroundings. A very terrible realization dawned upon her: She didn't know where she was. This wasn’t the hilly enclave she was familiar with. These lands were flat and the shrubbery wasn’t as dense. She hadn’t paid any attention to how she had gotten here. She had walked for who knows how long, and who knows from what direction. Slowly, she spun around hoping she might remember which direction she had traversed from.
     That's when she saw it. It was just sitting behind a tree with its head poking out. The head alone on this creature was just as big as her body, although it didn't blend in too well with its red scales. She would have wondered how she could have ignored something like that had she not stumbled backwards and tripped over the log she was previously resting against. Landing with a thud, she rolled her body alongside the chunk of wood for protection. Did she just see what she thought she just saw? She'd never seen one before! Maybe it was her imagination? She would check, but she was shaking so badly she couldn't even move. It took her what felt like an eternity before she realized she was nearly crying. That thing could hear her! Yet if that was so, where was it? No, if it was a dragon it wouldn't have waited to strike. That's what all the stories she's ever heard told her. She'd be in its gut by now. Or worse. The stories said that these beasts would sometimes take their victims alive so their children could practice on live bait. In no way was she capable of controlling her whines as her mind seemed to create more fear than the creature she saw.
     "Don’t be scared."
     "Help!" Twisty blurted out before covering her mouth. She couldn’t control her ears as they darted around in autopilot searching for any sort of sound to help her current predicament. It would be adorable were it not for the gut wrenching death in front of her.
     "C-can you understand me?" the voice asked as she heard a few footsteps coming closer; her ears focused on that. The dragon was approaching! She forced her tearful eyes shut. "You know, I haven’t talked to anyone in...I forget how long." Silence. She couldn’t answer. Anything more than a whimper was impossible. "You can come out." Oh that's right. Dragons can talk. That was in the stories too. "Please come out?" Then...nothing.
     What little sunlight that had existed was gone. The crescent moon was the only light source now, and the bat was too scared to squeak her way around. She waited; waited for whatever fate was willing to bring next. It didn't help that her bladder wanted to empty itself either. Yet at no point was anything happening. No teeth sinking into her, no fire roasting her alive, nor any creature playing with her as a cat would with a mouse. The longest minutes in the universe passed. The petrifying fear had time to dissipate. Her shaking arm pushed herself off the ground so she could peek over the log. Faint moonlight hit something big laying in front of the log that she knew wasn't there before. She clicked. Yes, it was still there.
     "Hi," it said.
     Twisty winced. "Hi," she squeaked.
     "Cozy back there?"
      "I...uh...," she mumbled.
     "Was just sitting here staring at that...?" It cocked its head as it drifted off the end of that sentence, not certain on what it was she was glued to for so long.
     Twisty took a few deep breathes. She was actually talking to a dragon, and it wasn't trying to kill her. Yet. "B-book? I-it’s…it’s a book. This isn't your...territory, is it? "
     It nodded, not that she could see it with great clarity. "It is."
     "I'm sorry!" the bat said quickly, lowering her head onto the log. "I didn't mean too! I was just reading and I...I...uh...."
     "I'm not angry."
     "Was reading, and...." She lifted her perplexed head and twitched her ears in response.
     "You were absorbed in that for a while."
     Twisty laughed nervously.  "I...I was." She stared down at the log. "How long were you watching?"
     The dragon gave a weak, fake laugh. "A while. I didn't want to startle you because I didn't want you to…well…freak out...like this." Twisty blinked slowly and gave herself the few seconds she needed to mentally sort this out. This both is and isn't what she expected such an encounter like this to be. She really wanted to believe the stories were all just to scare the kids and that they were all crazy hyperbole, but she fell into them when she actually met a subject from one. When the moment came, she let the horror stories she grew up with dictate her fears. This realization killed most of her panic. There was still a voice in her head that tried to tell her of the dangers that would come of this, but with her fear vanishing, her endless curiosity was coming back like a raging tsunami.
     "Why were you watching me?"
     "I...you know…didn’t want to disturb you. Say,” it added quickly, “it's dark. I should make a fire."
     "I don't plan on staying." Twisty stood up, leaned over the log and groped the ground for her book. "I need to get home."  When she couldn't find the book in question, she groaned in annoyance.  "Where did it go?" she hastily mumbled.
     "Hmm?" the dragon responded. She clicked, allowing a little map of the area to fill itself in her head; the glory of echolocation. There it was. Its forepaw was on it.
     "My book," she answered. "Your foot is on it." The dragon moved its paw to the side. "Other foot." When the weight was lifted, she stared at the book. It was right next to the large beast; practically under it. She was nervous about reaching that close. Taking a deep breath, she dropped to her knees and crawled up to its legs to snatch her most precious possession. Goodness, how absolutely massive this dragon was compared to her was mind boggling, and with each click she could ‘see’ it curving its neck around to watch her move under itself. She didn’t take her time. Once she snagged her book she was back out to the log faster than she had ever moved before. Her heart was pounding like it wanted to beat its way out of her chest.
     "Are you scared?" It seemed to laugh slightly. "I won't bite." The bat gave a quick but weak laugh; she simply didn’t have the breath to make a longer one. "Do you have a name?"
     "Um...Twisty." she responded in between rapid breaths.
     "I'm Sanoon, but...you can call me Sanny. I haven’t really seen bats around here. Where are you from?"
     "A cave." Twisty couldn't believe it. This was her first time alone in the outside world and she runs into a dragon. She had been out before, but that was always with her family. Yet that was limited since she refused to fly. No one wanted her on the ground outside the cave.
     "...Near here?"
      Twisty twiddled with the thumbs of her wings. "I don't know. I'm kinda lost."
     "I see." The dragon clicked its tongue as it thought about the subject. "I'll help you. I don't have anything to do."
     She blinked. This seemed...odd. "Why?"
     "I just told you.” It lowered its head to her level and gave a weak smile. The darkness hid this detail. “I do a whole lot of nothing all day every day. This seems like a fun little adventure for once."
     Her eyes lit up. That was the magic word: Adventure. It would be! Just like in the books she loved! She could be the hero exploring the world; no longer just the young woman reading about it in a cave in the middle of nowhere. "Okay! Let's go!"
     "Right now?" the dragon complained. "It's dark."
     "I'm a bat! I can get around just fine."
     "Maybe, but I'm also tired and cold. Aren't you?"
     Twisty stared at the dragon, blinking a few times. "...Have you ever seen a bat before?"
     "Yes, of course," the dragon responded defensively. "I was going to say we should go in the morning when it's bright out."
     "Bat. Bat. I am a bat," she responded, her light voice showing slight annoyance. "I'm nocturnal."
     "Fine!" the dragon shouted in a frightening growl. The sudden outburst dropped her behind the log. Then there was silence for a few long seconds. "I…. Sorry,” it mumbled out, shaking its head in seeming disgust at its own behavior. “I don't know that much about bats. I didn't get to talk to too many growing up. They weren't as courageous as you are."
     The bat laughed. Her, courageous? "Well," Twisty said as she slowly rose from the log. "I live in a colony with a few hundred others; we eat bugs. We sleep during the day and we can ‘see’ at night with echolocation. My colony also has big problems with anything that isn't from our family."
     "That sounds...mostly nice."
     "Oh!" Twisty suddenly shouted as a new idea stormed through her head. "Tell me about where you grew up! Please? Are you from the mountains? Do you have any siblings? And where are they?"
     The dragon didn't respond. Instead, it stood up on its hind legs and extended its long neck into the branches above. The trees shook as a smaller limb was ripped off. Small twigs rained down causing Twisty to cover herself with her wings for safety from the tiny debris. The bat wasn't certain what the dragon was doing, but she found herself ducking once more when that branch was dropped to the ground, shaking the earth. The dragon landed with an even greater thud. Next arouse the sound of more wood snapping. Curiosity forced her to lift her head above the log once again.
     "Stay down. I'm going to light a fire." With no reason to disobey, she tucked her head again. This was getting annoying. All this bobbing up and down like she was a duck or something was going to cause her neck cramps or something similar. From the dragon came the sound of an inhale followed by the splash of a roaring fire. She could see from her hiding spot the light from the fire illuminating the surrounding area. Lifting her head, she could see that it had used the branches to create a bonfire.
     "I thought that whole 'breathing fire' thing was an exaggeration," Twisty said with amazement.
     The dragon shook its head as it laid down by the fresh fire. "No, I can do that. Though not every dragon can do fire. Some can freeze things, some can conduct electricity, and some have the most putrid breath you will ever smell."
     "That's so neat!" The bat climbed over the log and sat in front of it, only now getting a real opportunity to take in the dragon’s features with her real eyesight and not just pictures of sonar in her  
head. Goodness, do dragons’ really need all those spikes on their bodies? It had a set of three on each cheek, two giant horns at the back of his head, and a row of spikes lining from his snout to the end of his tail. How, she wondered, if that ever got in the way of anything, like lying down on his back. Then again, with his wings, could he even lay on his back?
     "Heh," the dragon seemed to smile. "I'm going to just warm up a little bit before we head out.”
    “Warm up?” the bat questioned. “It’s not really cold out.”
    “I feel it could be better,” the dragon replied. “This won’t take long, ya?”
    “Ya?” Twisty questioned back, unsure if she was supposed to answer or not.
    “Ya.” Sanny nodded and curled up, resting its head on the blade on the tip of its tail. It still never took its large amber eyes off of her.
    Twisty could only sit there and stare back in amazement. The more she thought about her situation, the more surreal it seemed. Here she was on her first trip away from home alone, and she found a dragon who wanted to help her find her way back to the colony. She still had her doubts about his intentions in the back of her mind, but this was a once in a lifetime experience. Or this happens to everyone every time they leave the cave. She couldn't be too sure. When she got back, she was going to tell everyone! After, of course, she got the worst punishment she could get. Her parents would have to make up new forms of punishment to cover this! She was actually going to bring a dragon back to the cave!
     Her eyes widened with sudden realization. Was this its plan all along? Let her lead it back to a den of dinner? With a colony her size the dragon could eat for a year! She held the book up to cover her mouth as she stared at the dragon. Maybe she should venture off? A glance into the darkness let her disregard that idea. If she could fly she would, but not if she had to walk. Why did she never learn to fly!?
     She shook her head. What was she doing? She was letting her fears get the best of her again. Every story was supposed to be exaggerated, right? That’s what she told herself. So why did it still keep her so unsettled?
    “Are you okay?” the drake asked. The bat nearly jumped at the question. Oh how it was so her to be lost in her mind so quickly. “You look worried.”
    The fire cackled as it made its way through the dry wood with ease. Twisty sat in silence as she tried to best figure out how to form her question without seeming so accusatory or insulting. The dragon was being generous. The last thing she wanted was to spite it for its benevolence. “Well….” She pulled her legs up to her chest and used the thumbs of her wing to open the back cover of her book to fiddle with the last few pages. Having had access to only two digits her entire life, she certainly made manipulating objects with them look easy. “I don’t…know how to ask this.” There was no reply from Sanny, and when the bat adjusted her gaze from the book to the dragon it still only stared back from its rested position. The drake seemed confused, but like it also knew where this conversation was going to go. “Okay…so…we have stories at the colony, you see? And well, some of them are about dragons, and you see…dragons…well…eat bats….”
    “I see…,” The drake hummed out disparagingly.
    “No, it’s not like…I mean…I want to trust you. It’s just….”
    “No, I get it.” The dragon mumbled out. “Why would I help you but to feed myself, right?”
    “I didn’t mean to imply that.” Twisty sunk her head behind her book to hide her face. Even her ears fled behind the safety of the pages.
     “Some dragons do eat bats. I don't," the drake answered, and for the first time since lying down, turning its gaze away from the small mammal. "I’ve spent a long time out here alone. You’re the first person I got to talk to in so many moons."
    “Really?” the bat asked with the twitch of an ear. “So you’re just…looking for company?”
    Sanny turned his gaze back to worried bat and gave a reassuring grin, or at least the best one he could put on. “I promise I won’t hurt you, if that’s what you were looking for. You or your colony.”
    “Thanks, Sanny.” The bat raised her head from behind the safety of her impenetrable book and gave a weak smile. “And…sorry. I didn’t mean anything by that, you know.”
    “It’s okay.” The light from the bonfire began to finally dim as the majority of the wood had now been consumed by the ravenous flames. The fire was on its decline. Silence again overtook the two. The bat sighed and cursed to herself; she was unsure if she had caused a divide between them, but at the very least she got a satisfying answer out of him. Wait a tick...she didn't even know if the dragon was a boy or girl. It's not like the drake had any physical details that would give it away, and asking at this point would just be rude. It had a male sounding voice, she guessed, but what would say females had to sound feminine? They were big and scaly too. Maybe she should play it safe and say he. If she messes up, he'll correct her, right? Right.
    “Do you know which way is home?” Sanny eventually asked to break the long silence.
    “I don’t.” Twisty regretfully replied. A sinking feeling grew in the pit of her stomach knowing that she could have gotten lost without even knowing how to get back home.
    “What does your home look like?”
    "A cave," the bat answered.
     "Yes," Sanny sighed, "but what are the surroundings? What will we be looking for?"
     "Weeeell,” the small mammal began as she stared up past the tree canopy and to the star-covered expanse of the night sky above, “the entrance to the cave is on the side of a grassy hill with rocks. It’s like a large hole in the side that's just a little bigger than you, Sanny. There are a lot of trees around too, so it’s protected from sight."
     "I don't know of any hills in my territory," the dragon stated.
    “I couldn’t have walked that far!” Twisty groaned while rubbing her face with a free wing.
    “You walked here?” Sanny asked, finally lifting his head off of his tail. “Why not just fly back then if you know what it looks like?”
    A fake laugh found its way out of the bat as she once again buried her head in her book. “Funny story. You see, I uh, can’t really…fly.”
    “Why?” the dragon probed dryly.
    “I never did, and now we’re here,” was Twisty’s quick yet muffled reply to hopefully kill the topic before it could continue.
    “Why would a bat not learn to fly?”
    “I can’t fly so we have to walk, okay?” She lifted her head enough only to see peer at him from the top of her brow. “We gotta walk.”
    “That’s going to take forever,” Sanny bemoaned as he plopped his head back onto his tail. “I was thinking we were going to fly.”
    “Sorry,” came her muffled reply. “I walked here in less than a day. We can walk back in less than a day.”
    “Assuming we find the place,” the dragon added in now realizing the hassle of his generosity.
     “I have to get home,” Twisty mumbled out weakly. What if they couldn’t even find her home? What if she was lost forever? What if she never saw her mother or father again? Or any of her cousins or uncles or aunts? What would they think if she never returned? All she ever knew was life at the colony. She didn’t know how to forage for her own food! She didn’t know how to farm the bugs she needed or where to find them. That was done by the ranchers! She was going to starve! That thought alone brought her attention to the hunger in her gut. She had been ignoring it so far from all the adrenaline, but it was starting to wear off, and with the curiosity becoming satisfied, regret and trepidation were arriving to take their place. She could already feel the waterworks welling up in her eyes.
    “Tomorrow I can take to the sky and see if I can’t see any hills that match that description. I won’t see anything tonight.”
    A high pitched whine emanated from the bat. “How did I do this!?” The book fell from her thumbs as she wrapped herself as best she could from her seated position in her own wings and let out a few wailing sobs. The drake instantly lifted his head at this new sound.
    “Please don’t cry,” the dragon pleaded quietly, becoming confused at this sudden and unwarranted emotional display.
    “What if we never make it back?” Her question was quiet and spoken in between quick gasps for air.
    “Why wouldn’t we?”
    “I-I don’t know.”
    “Please stop crying,” he asked again. “It’s scaring me.”
    “I….” When Twisty lowered her wings she almost jumped to see Sanny had lifted himself up and was standing close enough to put his massive head just a foot away from her. She quickly closed herself off behind her wings. This isn’t how she wanted to be seen.
    “What if we start walking now?” the drake asked with a small smile. It’s almost like he tried to give the reassuring expressions when he knew she wasn’t looking.
    “Now?” came a muffled reply from behind the bat’s wings. At the very least the crying seemed to have stopped. “But we don’t know where home is.”
    “No, but is your cave in the mountains?”
    “No,” she answered as she lifted her head above her wings and wiped her tear-stained face in one long motion.
    “Did you cross a river?” Sanny never took his head away, and the dwindling light from the fire behind him casted large eerie shadows across his face. It also didn’t help that she could see his teeth when he talked. If he wasn’t trying to be intimidating then he was failing horribly.
    “Does a stream count?”
    “Was it a big river?”
    “No.”
    “Then I know two directions you didn’t come from, so right there we have a good idea where to go, and I’m not going anywhere near that town, so that leaves one direction left.”
    “The town?” Twisty asked, her ears perking right back up. “Are we close to it?”
    “Doesn’t matter,” Sanny stated as he took a step back. “We’re not going.”
    With a defeated groan the bat picked up her book and stood up, her bones cracking from disuse as she did so. “How long will we walk?”
     “Just a bit,” he answered as he lowered his head to her height. “I’m not usually up this late, and I’m tired and to be honest…hungry.”
    “I’m sorry,” Twisty replied, pulling her wings to her chest. That last part seemed like a weird admission. Not like she could do anything about it. At least she certainly hoped not.
    “Come on.” The drake turned his head away from the bat, and his neck, and then his body, followed with the initial flow of a snake before he adopted a slow trudge through the woods. Silently the bat followed, brushing off forest debris from her bum as she did. The light from the branches was now, for the most part, gone. Only embers were all they left behind. “Stay next to me,” he said not before too long. While he traveled slowly to avoid running into the many obstacles the forest provided, Twisty was far more adept at avoiding them. She found his side with ease. What a surreal situation this all was. She was actually walking by the side of a dragon. Goodness. What a day so far for her. A very tiring day. She couldn’t help herself as she a yawn forced its way out. Maybe she would need to take the dragon up on that nap sometime soon.
    “I’m sorry for crying earlier,” she eventually said when she realized a few dozen minutes had passed in silence.
    “You say that a lot.” he replied without stopping.
    “Yeah…I do.”
    “And it’s okay.” He curled his neck over so one of his amber eyes could peer at her in the pale moonlight. “Don’t be scared.”
    “You should see yourself when you say that,” she squeaked out with a tired giggle. “It’s so creepy.”
    “I don’t try to be,” he said with a small laugh.
    “You’re like Grandhorn in ‘The Great Onion’,” the bat said, referencing a book she had read a long while ago.
    “What?” the dragon asked as he turned his attention back to his front.
    “It’s a book! There’s a dragon in there named Grandhorn who is super nice but he’s always just kind of creepy because of how he looks.
    “Books are about dragons?” Sanny asked with a sudden burst of surprise.
    “They can be!” the bat answered with equal enthusiasm. “They can be about anything! Do you read?”
    “Read?” he asked back quizzically.
    “Yeah. I mean…dragons have a language, right?”
    “Of course,” he answered back. Then, as if to show off, he began growling and snipping off a few short lines. It was as terrifying and sudden as it was impressive for someone who had never heard the draconic language.
    “Ow,” the bat mumbled, trying to hide her sensitive ears from the sudden outburst. “Well,” she eventually squeaked, “do you have a written script?”
    “A what?”
    “So you don’t have a written language.” The dragon huffed at her quick lines of questioning. “That’s interesting to know.”
     "What...uh...are the stories you read about?" the drake asked as if trying to take the subject off of himself.
     "Lots of things," she replied cheerfully, her large ears wiggling up and down in her excitement. "Exploring ancient wonders, saving the world, and fighting evil."
      "All from books?" Sanny commented. “But they’re so tiny.”
     A series of giggles escaped from Twisty, which the dragon did not find too entertaining at his own expense. "I’ll have to show you tomorrow. I'm telling you, you would love it, and I will so teach you how to read since you're so interested." Sanny hummed in newfound amusement. "I can show you the stories that have dragons in them."
     "Oh?" the fire drake hummed curiously.
     "Yeah! Like the one where a dragon terrorizes a town and a group is formed to hunt it down." The dragon couldn’t help but wince. "Or the one where a huge dragon starts eating the people in a town and townspeople have to figure out how to survive as they start to run out of food. There's a good horror one about a small group of vacationers who become stranded on an island and are slowly picked off by a dragon and they have to figure out how to kill it."
     "Okay, that's enough examples," the dragon said with a bit of frustration. "I'll pass on the whole reading thing."
     The bat's eyes widened in sudden realization of her mistake. "I'm sorry! Not all books-"
     “No-no, I get it. Big bad dragons.”
    “They’re just books!” the bat squeaked out, running in front of the drake and throwing her wings out to stop him. “There’s plenty with good dragons! Promise.”
    “Hold on,” Sanny said as he adjusted his gaze over the bat’s head and to the distance behind her. “Do you see that?”
    “Huh?” Twisty hummed as she turned her head to see the soft yellow glow of light in the distance.