The Dragons Read online

1

  Now that everything has changed and we are one, so many things from our past appear mysterious to us. Like faces in faded photographs from a bygone era, they are at once familiar and unsettlingly alien. The intervening years, few though they might be, have worked their inevitable magic, throwing a distorting veil over all that we once considered normal and customary, and transforming it into something rich and strange. After the Gatherings, when the rituals are over and we have reluctantly left the warmth and reassuring Presence that pervades every inch of the temple, we stroll back on narrow, tree-lined paths to the modest dwellings we all live in now. When the moon is full we will sometimes catch a glimpse of the brooding hulk of an abandoned skyscraper or factory, one of the few that remain standing. And we then turn to our Brothers and Sisters and ask with astonishment, “Was the world really so? Did people actually build things like that? It can’t be true!” And we shake our heads and laugh ruefully, because of course we are speaking about our own younger selves. But the truth is that those poor unfortunates have as little to do with us as creatures from another star.

  No one can remember just when it was that the visitors first began to appear. That bothers some of us--that we can’t recall the first one we saw. Our records are of little help. Research as one might in archives that grow dustier by the day, no newspaper article, TV report or online source can be found which was the first to unequivocally state what has in the fullness of time become so clear: that they had come to live amongst us.

  At first we thought they were some unknown type of bird. From a distance they certainly looked like birds. Dark grey and about the size of a large pigeon, they congregated in trees or on the tops of buildings and statues-- anything that commanded a view. There they would perch, uttering their peculiar purling cries and leisurely cleaning themselves with long dark tongues. The city’s pigeons, sparrows and crows didn't seem to mind their presence in the least. They behaved as if they had always been there.

  But they weren’t birds, and this soon became apparent. Their heads were smaller than a bird’s and sported a set of erect, foxlike ears. Their necks were much longer and they had grey, featherless, scaly skin that had a slight sheen in direct sunlight. The creatures had striking, deep-set blue eyes that gleamed like amethysts. They didn't appear to have any young. In fact, they were all, so far as we could tell, indistinguishable from one another, having exactly the same size and coloration.

  They didn’t behave as birds did either. First of all, they were never seen to eat or drink. And no amount of birdfeed, grain, raw or cooked meat, fruits or vegetables could bring them closer to the ground than about 5 meters. Not that this stopped people from trying. Officials finally had to make televised appeals in which they asked people to stop leaving food for them, as it had begun to draw rats and other vermin. They didn’t seem to interact like normal animals: no communicating, breeding, or fighting could be observed.

  The creatures appeared to be indifferent to the weather, favoring neither hot climates nor cold, sunny areas nor rainy locales. And when they did start to show up, it was worldwide, although they seemed to be more numerous in larger cities.

  Another strange thing was that they were never seen at night. Around dusk they would rouse themselves, flap off heavily, and disappear. Their numbers would dwindle gradually until by nightfall not one could be found. And no one knew where they went. Enormous undiscovered caves, abandoned areas of the subway system, secret government installations—every possible explanation, however unlikely, had its champions.

  The creatures moved altogether slower than birds do; they possessed none of their vivacity and nervous, hopping grace. Instead, their movements were slow, almost languorous. Watching the creatures for extended periods of time gave one the distinct impression that the air surrounding them was more viscous than normal. Things seemed to simply slow down around them. The leaves didn’t so much flutter as lazily nod; brisk winds softened to slight breezes; and the very light altered, taking on a slight yellowish tint that made it appear that the beasts had been dipped in amber. Even sounds produced in their immediate vicinity became muted and indistinct, as if they were coming from a great distance. This dimming and blurring could not be observed in photographs, where the beasts showed up as sharp as a tack.

  All this dulled the senses. Indeed, it had such a powerful soporific effect on people that if no one came along to disturb them, they would lose track of time and sit and gaze at the creatures for hours. This psychological phenomenon became so common that it developed a name. It came to be called, “Being in the Dragon’s Eye”.

  For, inevitably, that is what we wound up calling the creatures. By tacit consent it was a term we had avoided when they began to show up. To say the word, or even think it, would be to irrevocably acknowledge something just too ridiculous to be true. Dragons were the stuff of myths, fairy tales, and fantasy novels. They weren’t, couldn’t be, real. So we referred to the creatures as “the visitors” or “the new ones”, or just “them”. This made us feel a bit better at first. But once they had appeared in all the world’s major cities, using these euphemistic phrases came to seem not just artificial but simply wrong. It was our children who taught us this. Soon after the beasts’ appearance, some of the more adventurous (or foolhardy) parents allowed their children to watch them in the parks and open places where the they could be found. Almost without exception, the child, after staring in wonderment at one of the creatures perched high overhead, would turn to a parent and exclaim something like, “Look, mom, it’s a dragon!” It was the only word that fit, and so that is what we began to call them.

  2

  World governments, after a brief, rather understandable “What the hell?” phase, stayed true to form by attempting to execute some version of a contain-and-control strategy. They cordoned off the parks and public places where the dragons were. Then they blanketed the Web, the airwaves and the print media with anodyne statements designed to reassure the public and isolate the situation: “The unidentified species of bird or reptile which has recently appeared in our public areas is being monitored and analyzed by the authorities. Your government is making every effort to identify these animals, as well as their origin, and ascertain whether or not they present a danger to humans. So far they have given us no indication that they mean us harm. However, we strongly advise all members of the public to keep their distance from these creatures until we can be absolutely confident that they are not hazardous. We regret to inform you that until further notice the following areas are off-limits:…”

  Leaders viewed their top priorities as 1) protecting their citizens; and 2) ensuring that their own power and authority were not threatened by these unforeseen and unwished-for agents. They wouldn’t have thought of it in precisely those terms; indeed, they would have bitterly protested any implied authoritarianism or harboring of ulterior motives. “It’s our sworn duty to keep our people safe, and we don’t know anything about these things. Anyway, someone has to take charge of this situation, don’t they?” Exactly. God forbid that they just let events unfold, that they for once refrain from creating an enemy where perhaps none need have appeared. The fact that most people accepted the validity of the government’s self-serving rationale is an indication of the vast gulf that lies between those times and our own.

  In any event, all plans our leaders might have had about keeping the public away from the dragons quickly proved to be impractical. There were just too many of the little creatures, and they were gathering in precisely the same places we liked to. When there are miniature dragons perched on the top of the Forbidden Palace, the Arc de Triomphe, the Kremlin, Big Ben and the Lincoln Memorial, not to mention every patch of green space that boasted a tree or structure taller than 5 meters, it is rather challenging to “maintain a sanitized environment”, or convince your citizens that nothing out of the ordinary is happening. Something quite definitely out of the ordinary was happening, and within a few weeks everyone on the planet who wasn’t e
ither comatose or in solitary confinement knew it.

  The media of course had a field day. One could almost see the infotainment overlords drooling as they realized the enormity of the story. “‘Dragons in Central Park!!’ It’s a goldmine! There’s no telling how many units we’ll sell, how high we can jack up our advert rates! Why, this is the biggest thing since A was caught cheating on B! Yippee!”

  They threw every reporter with a pulse and any device capable of recording sound and image into the parks and squares where the dragons were. The public had been flocking to these areas since people actually realized we were sharing the planet with flying reptiles. Following their standard playbook, the networks, newspapers and other sectors of the media and entertainment industry (no doubt with the silent collusion of governments) had done their best to ratchet up the pressure to the point where something, somewhere, was bound to explode. On a warm spring day about a month after their arrival, all the elements seemed in place for a showdown.

  One should really step back and take a moment to fully appreciate the drama of the scene: the