Author's note: a short and rather silly story, but one I hope people will enjoy. As well as dragons it features male-on-male action, so if this isn't your cup of tea read no further.
* * *
The man stared at me as though he'd never seen a dragon before. Then I remembered that he almost certainly hadn't. I was, after all, the last one.
"If you'd like to come this way, sir?" I followed as he led me through several sterile, interchangeable corridors, my talons clicking on the tiled floor.
As we walked the man kept glancing over his shoulder as though to check I was still there, and grinning when he found I was. It must be strange for the humans: a few years ago they'd thought us extinct for so long that they'd forgotten we were even real. Finding me must have been quite a surprise.
I was the last dragon. You couldn't revive a species from one male. But just in case, and for the sake of conservationists' consciences, I'd agreed to donate what they politely termed a "sample of genetic material".
"In here, sir." I folded my wings tightly to squeeze through a door. In the centre of the room I was being ushered into was...
"What
on Earth
is that supposed to be?"
It was a female dragon. Or at least, it looked a little like a human's idea of a female dragon if I squinted at it from a distance. Up close it looked more like a vaulting horse over which had been thrown a pink scale-patterned sheet, with some wings and a tail and a papier-mΓ’chΓ© head stapled on.
"Ah!" said the man, clapping his hands in enthusiasm. "Meet Debra."
"
Debra?!
"
"Isn't she beautiful? I made her myself! Here sir, I'll give you a demonstration!" He ran over to the thing and I followed, bewildered.
"You'll be at the back here, sir, and I'll be underneath." He pulled up one side of the sheet and slipped inside, out of sight. "There's a slit right here sir, where the business happens." A hand emerged through a gap in the sheet at Debra's rear and waved; a strangely unsettling sight.
"Wait, wait," I said, "so you're actually expecting me to..."
"And I'll be holding this," he interjected, emerging from Debra's belly. Apparently there was no interrupting him mid-demonstration. In his hands was a long, soft, flexible tube with a plastic bag on the end. The inside gleamed with lubricant. "You see, sir, I just put this..."
"I think I can guess where that goes," I snapped.
"...right. And when you've, um,
finished
, sir, then I can run over here and drop your sample into our state-of-the-art flash freezer for safekeeping."
I stared at the man, at the machine, and at Debra, wondering if all humans were insane. "Now look here, I thought you were just going to give me a little pot and a private room? This is..."
"Ooh, and you haven't even seen the best bit yet! Hang on a moment!" He fished around inside with an arm and must have pressed a hidden button, because red LEDs lit up in Debra's eyes, and a little flash of flame flared out of her mouth. "RrrAWRrrgh!" she said in a tinny voice.
I stared, lost for words.
"Well, what do you think, sir? Sexy or what?"
"I... but... you... I mean to say, young man,
what on Earth
were you thinking of? There is simply no way I'm using this...
thing
. Please just give me one of those bags and show me to a private room
right now
or I'm walking out of here!"
He looked crestfallen. His shoulders slumped sadly. "But... but I spent
ages
building Debra, making her perfect. I... I thought you'd like her. You... don't want to use her?" He looked like he might be about to cry.
I sighed. Sometimes it's hard being a
nice
dragon. The things you have to do to make people happy.
"On the other hand, perhaps I'll give Debra a chance. After all she's very, ah, fetching," I said through gritted teeth.
"