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Posted by Jonah on May 23, 2009, 12:53 am, in reply to "Dragon Holiday, part 3"
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“And what type is that?” Val asked. She scratched idly at Seth’s neck scales, making him rumble pleasantly. “We know you have sex with a lot of them before you eat them. You must have some preferences for which meals you stick yourself into beforehand.”
Susan gasped again, wide-eyed, but Dax nodded casually. “Well, small ones, of course. Easier to swallow. And adults as well. I don’t like the thought of preying on the elders, if I can avoid it.”
Susan scoffed. “You mean you actually have some standards?”
Dax shook his head. “It’s unworthy of an alpha predator to pick off the old and helpless. The younger adults don’t have to be weak, if they don’t want to be. Yourself, is a good example of that, Susan. But a goodly number of humans choose to make themselves easy prey, so I take advantage of that.”
“I think we were talking about your preferences for women you like to have sex with,” Val reminded Dax.
“I do not have preferences that way!” he said wagging a finger. “I eat humans. If I #### them beforehand it is only to sate a momentary need.”
“Uh-huh,” said Val, hand on her hip, unconvinced. “So there’s nothing at all that excites you about a human female? There’s not a type or a size or a personality you’re more likely to #### beforehand than the others? Be truthful now.”
Dax shifted in his chair uncomfortably. Dragons were not good at outright lying, even Dax, and when confronted with a direct question had a difficult time squirming out of it. “Well ... I am perhaps just a little fond of human females who, when they bend over, have ... ample hindquarters.”
“You like big butts!” Val exclaimed, both women looked at each other and broke out into laughter. Even Seth sported into a huge grin.
“It’s not like that!” Dax protested.
“There’s no shame in that,” Seth interjected. “We males like well-developed hindquarters on female dragons. Why wouldn’t you look for the same in the human victims you rut?”
Dax crossed his arms and harrumphed. The girls were down to only a giggle now. “You two do not need to know any more details about my hobbies. Seth, your two females are safe from that in any regard, for various reasons.” He glanced at Seth meaningfully. “But you ask me, I am actually doing the human race a favor, when you think about it.”
“And how exactly do you figure that, Dax?” asked Susan, an anticipated look on her face.
He spread his hands wide in a gesture of magnanimity. “Evolution, of course. Culling the weak from your herd. You humans have had it easy for so long, not having any large predators to challenge you for dominance.”
Seth nodded. “And now they have one. Us.”
“Two,” Dax corrected, pointing up two taloned fingers. Seth scowled, not understanding. Dax continued. “Humanity is now aware of two other major competitors. One is us dragons, yes. The other is the aliens who brought us here.”
Val laughed. “Hardly competitors, Dax! We saw them once, briefly; they arrived, and then they disappeared. And besides, they’re so far advanced compared to us that it’s unlikely that human or dragon alike would ever stand a chance against them; and besides, they would’ve done humans in instead of dropping off dragons.”
“Maybe it’s the same difference …” said Susan quietly.
“And you think the world government and the other powers that be just forgot about them? Just because they’re rarely mentioned on the newsnets, you believe the aliens have been dismissed?” Dax slowly shook his head. “It is the exact opposite, really. Just about every major political decision of the last two generations has been influenced in some way by the very existence of the aliens: the military build ups, the vastly more generous space program budgets, the ever-increasing subsidies into exotic fields of research.
“It’s very clear who the leaders of your race consider the real threat. To them, we dragons are nothing but a nuisance. A bunch of eight-hundred pound gorillas whose very presence everyone seems to want to ignore.”
“And that will be their big mistake,” he grumped under his breath.
“What was that?” Val asked.
A low buzzing from his smart phone saved Dax from answering. He pulled it out and talked low for a few moments before turning his attention back to his hosts. “The other guests are on their way. They will be here in a few minutes.”
Seth nodded at the girls. They moved to the kitchen to prepare more lambs. Dax turned to Seth. “I trust there will not be any problems with our new guests and your...” He raised an eye ridge. “And your pit bull.”
“I won’t guarantee anything if they don’t behave. But if they don’t threaten my pets, everything should be fine.”
Dax pulled out his phone again. “Perhaps I should call and emphasize this to them. After all, I do not associate with them because of their restrained behavior.”
“And I’ll go talk to my pets, just to make sure,” Seth added. He heaved himself up from his chair, and lumbered into the kitchen.
Dax winced as heard voices rise violently and heated words exchanged from beyond the kitchen door. The sounds of cussing and the crashing of pots and pans were heard. Amidst all that he heard a very heavy pounding at the front door in the opposite direction. He heaved himself out of his seat and went to let in the new arrivals.
Seth emerged from the kitchen, and greeted the new guests. “Goggles, Shadow. It’s been a while. Merry Christmas”
Shadow responded in kind to the holiday greeting, but Goggles grumbled an irritated, “Bah, humbug.” The goggles wearing dragon wore one of his eyepieces down, and seemed distracted even as he moved into the main living space.
Shadow was more talkative. “It’s good to see you again, and I hear you got some valuable property since the last we were here!” He spoke in his usual rapid, high pitched voice.
Seth stared at him blankly.
“Your new pet,” said Dax casually with a bemused snicker.
“I remember her from last time I was here and I’m sad I didn’t get a chance with her,” snapped Shadow, his skinny raptor-like head and flickering eyes snapping from dragon to dragon and briefly on Susan, before flicking back to the dragons.
“Pfah! The black woman? She wasn’t all that great,” Goggles said distractedly. “All weepy and whiny. You really do need to get a male pet, Seth. Start breeding them.”
Dax barked out a laugh, slapping Goggles hard on his back so that his eyepiece fell down past his eye. “Now that would be something to see! Breeding humans! We could keep them in kennels, perhaps even put on the equivalent of dog shows to display the best of breed...”
“Ahem,” all four dragons turned to see the two human women standing in front of the kitchen door, holding a lamb between them. Everyone went quiet.
“You know,” Val said very seriously as they struggled to lay the re-warmed carcass on the table, “there were a lot — and I mean a whole lot — of humans who didn’t want any of the dragons harmed, after the Migration dumped ya’ll on Earth. And some among us decided that since you were thinking creatures, that maybe all of you deserves not only life, but rights as well.”
The room remained silent.
“A sign of weakness,” said Dax after a moment. “Letting a potential rival live when you could have eliminated him.”
“And that’s the difference between human and dragon,” she said haughtily as she turned back to the kitchen. Susan quickly followed.
Dax laughed. “I do think your pet just insulted us!”
“Only if the truth is insulting,” Seth said. “Nothing she said was a lie.”
Dax snorted. “You sound almost sympathetic to her.”
“She’s my pet,” he asserted. “And Dax, do you expect humans not to be proud of being human? They’re the ones who developed firearms and fighter planes and nuclear bombs while we were grubbing around in the forest, swamps and thatch huts. No matter how you may despise an animal, Dax, you still must respect the size of its claws.”
* * *
Inside the kitchen, Susan immediately headed toward the back door. “I can’t go through with this,” she said, opening the oversized door and taking a step outside. Tell Seth I’m sorry, but if I have to look at those scaly bastards one more time I’m likely to just start shooting until they’re all dead.”
Val blinked at her. Susan had gotten a new firearm since the incident with Dax, Goggles and Shadow some months ago. It was a very new make she’d never seen before, with unusual-looking ammunition. She’d never really asked about the weapon much, but given the circumstances and Susan’s background, it was probably a sure bet that Susan wasn’t bluffing when she said she could kill every one of the dragons then and there.
In some ways, Val saw Seth’s bargain with her as dangerous as his association with Dax. Not only because of Susan’s affiliation with the police, but it had become clear after her rape by Goggles that she had hardened a great deal. Not just in acquiring the new gun, but she worked out fanatically over the last four months, and she had a much more steely, hard-edged quality to her. That pleased Seth, claiming she’d become somewhat more dragoness-like in doing so. But Val thought it also made her a potential ticking time bomb. One who would not be intimidated by Seth being a dragon if things turned sour.
And yet, Susan had sought Seth out voluntarily after her violent treatment by the dragons, struck the bargain with him to become a pet like Val if he would protect her. And the police dispatcher had played her role well, even eagerly, in the months since.
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