Here Be Dragons: Book 1 of the Emergence Series

After finishing his daily routine, Pryce grabbed a pair of wire cutters and sacrificed some length of chicken coop to create rudimentary barbed wire. He wasn’t expecting this to stop the raptors at all, but it might give them some pause as well as forcing them to step over the wires instead of creeping over the sand.

It took him until noon to wire up the rebar poles he’d hammered into the ground yesterday. If he connected all the poles to each other one panicking raptor might pull out all his poles in one fell swoop, so he simply wrapped wires in horizontal lines running parallel to the shore.

If worse came to worst, at least he could hold out inside the ship for a long time. Pryce double checked the water stores and confirmed he had about 9,000 of the initial 12,000 liters of water left. At a rate of 2 liters per day, the water would last him over a decade, so that was basically a non-issue.

Food was a bit more of an issue, but potatoes, onions, and beef jerky had a shelf life in the months while dried rice, beans, and canned goods could last years. The raptors were a possible source of meat, though the ones he killed were too old by now. Something to think about later.

Having prepared the battlefield to the best of his ability, Pryce made himself comfortable on the deck of the ship. If all went well, today would be a day of rest and recuperation. If not…he’d think about it when it happened.

He waited, and waited, and…quickly got bored.

Pryce grunted, pushing himself up to get something more done before nightfall.

[JOURNAL ENTRY]

Day 26,

Fortunately, today was an uneventful day. Nothing of note happened, save for the progress I made towards fortifying my position.

I cut up some of the chicken coops to make barbed wire, which I wrapped around the poles I set up yesterday.

As for my perch on the deck of the ship, I’ve left three new rifles on the deck of the ship so that I won’t need to reload in the unfortunate event I use more than six bullets. I’ve also stitched together a patchwork mask that covers my entire face with a slit down the middle, that way I can use the scope of the rifle to see. Hopefully this mask will keep the raptors from recognizing my face as something alive. It might not work at all, but a second of hesitation could mean the difference between life and death.

Next time they won’t find me so unprepared.

SHRIEEEEK

Pryce started awake upon hearing a blood curdling screech. He sat still and strained his ears over the sound of his thundering heartbeat for a moment.

Another ululating cry, though it was quieter this time. That sounded like a cry of pain. Had a raptor stumbled into his barbed wire trap?

Pryce waited.

One minute.

Two minutes.

At the third minute mark he sat up, putting on his coat and trusty – and fully loaded – rifle to go and investigate. He lit a lantern and shuffled down the hallway, climbing up the stairs and grasped the cold metal handle leading out onto the deck.

He turned the handle with a clunk, before remembering he was supposed to be cautious.

Double checking his rifle, he knew that the moon was relatively full, so he should have some visibility, and the deck of the ship was safe so long as he wasn’t attacked by anything that could fly.

…actually, he knew there was at least one gargantuan flying creature, so that was a distinct possibility.

Having thought out a plan, Pryce cracked the door open. Luckily the moonlight was bright enough that he could see quite well. When nothing happened, he opened it further and stepped out…to see nothing. He looked around at the skies until he was certain he was safe, then he walked alongside the bulwark just in case, ready to duck behind it if he heard so much as a faint flap of wings.

He shuffled to the nose of the ship, where he quickly saw that some of the bars were knocked over. A closer inspection with the binoculars showed a large disturbance in the sand, evidently a raptor had an encounter with barbed wire.

Pryce grinned, glad that one of his plans finally worked.

Despite this success, he felt some sense of unease, why did the Raptor come at night? Their camouflage was much more useful in the daytime, and both of his encounters took place during the day, so they had to be diurnal, right?

Pryce held his fist against his chin in thought, he had a feeling the raptors were trying something, but what could they possibly do?

He was torn between going back to sleep and staying up to keep watch. The problem was he would need to sleep sometime. If he went without sleep too long, he might find himself exhausted when the raptors did attack. Pryce sighed, hopelessly wishing there was at least one other person to help with keeping watch…

In the end, he decided on returning to his bedroom for his much-needed sleep.

Pryce didn’t get any sleep before dawn broke. Mostly because his mind was occupied trying to predict what the raptors could possibly be planning instead of resting.

Giving up on a good night’s sleep, Pryce decided to do his daily chore of taking care of the livestock first.

Thud

Pryce jumped at the loud thud that echoed through the hull. He frowned as he collected his rifle and headed to the cargo hold. It sounded very similar to the first trick the raptors pulled, but he wanted to make sure he wasn’t hearing things.

Sitting in the cargo hold, he saw the crate full of machetes and after a moment’s hesitation, buckled one onto his belt. It couldn’t hurt.

And sure enough, several minutes later he heard another thud, the same tone as the one he heard yesterday.

He frowned, why would they try a tactic that had already failed? Perhaps he gave their intelligence too much credit.

Climbing up the stairs, he opened the door to the deck, walking past the wheelhouse as he creeped towards the nose of the ship….

Until a raptor flew above the bulwark, flapping its wings as it arched through the air and landed with a thud that Pryce felt through the deck.

“Shit!” He swore, drew his rifle, aimed, and fired – just as the nimble creature dashed to the side, its skin bloomed into black as the bullet embedded itself deep into the steel plates behind it.

Pryce's heart hammered as he forced himself to calm. Fortunately, the bulwark was red, so the raptor camouflaging black didn’t help it avoid the second bullet that sent the creature sprawling, its skin flickering white as it died.

Another raptor landed on deck as he dispatched the first one, and by the time he took aim it had ducked behind the foremast – it wasn’t nearly small enough to hide behind it, but Pryce’s hesitation bought it enough time to dash behind the much thicker smokestack.

Pryce backed up, wary of being caught in a pincer attack as a third raptor landed on deck, which he immediately killed with a round to the torso.

Then he quickly pivoted towards a skittering of talons – the second raptor was dashing at him, as if waiting for the moment after he fired. Pryce chambered in a new round just as the raptor leapt towards him feet-first, its black talons gleaming in the sunlight.

He fired point-blank into its torso, its skin blooming white – but inertia kept it going. The second raptor’s heavy body clipped Pryce as he ducked, sending him sprawling across the deck.

He pushed himself up to a kneeling position to see a fourth raptor landing and wasted no time in charging him before he got back up.

He chambered another round and fired…missing the raptor entirely. He grunted in frustration as he reloaded, took aim, and fired, knowing there was no time for another.

The raptor flared white before it hit the floor, rolling across the deck like a puppet with its string’s cut.

Pryce groaned as he stood, then grasped his left shoulder in pain. He examined the wounded area, and saw that red was slowly seeping out of the gash. The second raptor must’ve clipped him with its talons when it sent him sprawling.

He panted as he took a few moments to recover. He was lucky there were only four raptors, if there had been any more –

The fourth raptor slowly stood back up; a deep and throaty pained hiss sliced through the air as it did so.

Well shit.

His shoulder screamed in protest, but he gritted his teeth and powered through, reloaded the rifle one more time, took aim, and fired – only for nothing to happen.

He’d used six bullets. Desperately he patted his empty pockets, there were no magazines on his person, the only ones on deck were at the nose of the ship.

Pryce looked up with dread to see the last raptor taking a step forward, sharply hissing as it put pressure on its right leg, though that didn’t stop it from putting one foot in front of the other to advance upon Pryce. He saw that the raptor’s thigh was bleeding, but it was neither fatal nor debilitating enough to keep the beast down.

But the raptor didn’t know he couldn’t shoot anymore, it didn’t even know how he killed the others. Perhaps a bluff would be worth a try?

“Get out of here!” Pryce roared, or at least tried to. He had never yelled much in his life, and had spoken very little in the past month. His voice cracked at the very start, but at least the raptor seemed to pause.

Then it staggered towards him, advancing step by step and making pained, throaty vocalizations as it did so. Well, he didn’t really expect the bluff to work.

It was moving slowly enough that he could see the animosity in its baleful yellow eyes, incentivizing him to quickly run through possible options. What could he do with an empty rifle and a machete…?

Decision made, Pryce swung the rifle around and flung it at the Raptor as hard as he could. It flew in an arc, end over end. The raptor tried to dodge, but stumbled, and the rifle bounced ineffectually off its back.

No matter, he had bought a second or two as he walked backwards, drawing his machete. The sunlight glinting off the wide, half meter long blade. He hoped it would be able to cleave through flesh as it was designed to do.

A gust of wind, and a thud sounded behind him. A part of his mind distantly told him it must be the open door leading to belowdecks banging against the wall.

…Wait, why didn’t he just run away?

Pryce swore as he chucked the machete at the raptor, not bothering to stay and watch before dashing towards the open door. He’d been so focused on fighting he completely forgot that retreat was an option.

He heard the sound of the machete clattering against the deck, either it missed, or he hit the raptor with the handle. Even when injured, the raptor was still faster than him. It accelerated quickly despite its wounds, halving the distance between them as Pryce neared the door, he reached for the open doorknob to –

An ear splitting roar caused him to stumble as he clapped his hands over his ears in pain. Pryce couldn’t help but turn towards the direction of the alien sound even as he kept running.

First his eyes registered that the raptor had screeched to a halt and was flattening itself against the deck, and before he could comprehend the scene before him a massive creature leapt over the bulwark with a noise that sounded like the dull crack of a sail catching on a sudden gust of wind.

Another thunderous flap, and the winged creature descended upon the cowering raptor with the sound of bones wetly snapping.

It was a dragon.

…No, it felt almost wrong to call this a dragon, the mythical beast of humanity’s imagination failed to compare to the creature before him. The glossy scaled hide rippled with muscles, its scaled and scarred hide was a dark blue like an ocean storm, while the great wings were a shade lighter in color. Its serrated talons were a glossy black in contrast to the gleaming ebony horns and spines that lined its jaw, and its teeth…were hidden by the corpse of the raptor in its maw.

Thud.

The corpse of the raptor fell onto the deck, its formerly menacing yellow eyes dull and lifeless.

Pryce stared at the raptor, then up at the dragon, dumbstruck. Why wasn’t it attacking?

The dragon stared at him for a few moments that stretched on for an eternity before extending its maw towards Pryce.

Part of him was terrified, but a larger part of him was simply amazed by the creature before him. Pryce stared into its massive red eyes that were nearly as wide as his palm, at the finely pebbled scales on the dragon’s muzzle as it flicked its tongue at him – it was so close Pryce could see tiny snake-like pits at the front of its muzzle.

Then the dragon pulled away, walking to the nose of the ship as its tail gently lashed the air. It stopped abruptly as its eyes caught on the shining blade of the machete, making what Pryce could only interpret as a delighted crooning noise…albeit an extremely deep one.

It moved its head this way and that, apparently admiring the shine of the blade. The machete itself wasn’t smooth like polished steel, but it was reflective enough that it must have been something the creature had never seen before in the wilderness. After a few moments of prodding the dragon shifted its attention to his discarded rifle, flicking its tongue out at it before nudging both rifle and machete along towards the nose of the ship. It quickly reached its destination – Pryce estimated it was twelve or fourteen meters in length from nose to tail, so it covered such a small distance in only a few paces. Upon reaching the nose of the ship, it noticed the other rifles, and set the empty one on the ground next to them.

The dragon then stared back at him; its gaze seemed…expectant.

Pryce only stared, still uncomprehending as he was torn between curiosity and caution. The way the creature moved and acted belied intelligence in every way. He wasn’t sure if he would have closed the door in time, but the dragon had most likely saved his life, and it seemed amicable enough. Perhaps it was the residual adrenaline in his system making him reckless, but if the dragon didn’t kill him earlier then it probably wouldn’t do so now.

Right?

He took a deep breath and followed the dragon, walking at a quick pace so that he didn’t test the creature’s patience.

He cautiously approached the dragon; its size alone was intimidating, yet alone the wickedly gleaming black talons – Pryce paused at that. The talons weren’t completely black but seemed to have a slight tint of red at the base. He filed away the oddity to think about later.

The dragon sat much like an oversized cat would, its tail curling around its four limbs. It stared at Pryce staring at it, then looked at the beach. Now that Pryce was closer, he could notice various scars all over the creature’s hide. Most were faint lines, but some were deeper than others. One particularly notable scar was the matching set of raking lines on its shoulders – almost resembling bars of rank.

Pryce followed its line of sight, and the first thing that caught his attention was the dead tree leaning against the side of the ship that was definitely not there before. He examined the tree more closely, and saw its trunk was relatively narrow while its branches looked to be gnawed or snapped off at consistent lengths, almost as if it were a…

“Ladder,” Pryce breathed in astonishment. The raptors had used a ladder to climb up eight or nine meters and jumped up the rest of the distance.

The dragon cocked its head, then made an odd noise. Its eyes narrowed as it made another noise, causing Pryce to inch away and watch it warily.

“…Gll…L…Lah…Dher…Lah-Dher,” it said, then held its head higher, looking…pleased?

Pryce’s jaw dropped. Did…did it just parrot his words? It sounded as if someone with an inhumanly deep voice were talking through a long tube. The word was heavily accented – if it could be called that – but still recognizable. No, not ‘it’, the creature was obviously far too intelligent for that. He didn’t know the sex of the dragon, so for now…‘they’ were still staring directly at Pryce.

He supposed it was rude of him to not introduce himself.

Heart hammering in excitement, Pryce tapped his fingers on his chest, saying his name while doing his best to keep his voice level.

The dragon blinked, then they brought up its own taloned hands to mimic his gesture. “Hhh…Fhh…Khh…Prr…” The dragon seemed to have some difficulty with the ‘p’ sound, but was soon able to sound out a passable “Prai-sss.”

Okay, that was half a success. Did they not have names, or did they simply misunderstand the chest tapping as a greeting? Trying again, Pryce tapped his chest with an index finger and repeated his name before pointing at the dragon.

The dragon’s eyes seemed to widen a little, then they tapped a claw on their own chest and…made a throaty warbling noise ending with a click. It wasn’t really a warble, as it came from a creature the size of a bus. It was naturally far deeper and richer than anything a bird could make, but it was the most accurate word Pryce could think of…or perhaps a croon would be better? The noise sounded as though it came from deep in the throat, so the way dragons produced sound was probably differently from humans. And that clicking noise sounded strangely like…an electric spark? Pryce had no idea if that was what it was, and he added that thought to the ever-growing pile of things to think about later. Now that Pryce considered the matter, it was amazing that the dragon could replicate human speech at all. The dragon’s own speech was nothing he could ever attempt to replicate to any degree of success, let alone with the English alphabet.

But the dragon was looking at him expectantly, so he tried using his throat to produce the deepest bass he could.

“Huroumh-click,” he said, the click emulated with a click of his tongue.

The dragon drew their head back, spines flattening as they stared at him in such a doubtful way that Pryce could only awkwardly glance away. What was he going to call the dragon if he couldn’t even pronounce his name? He was saved from having to respond by the dragon pointing at the beach; apparently his attempt at their name was so hopeless that they decided to move onto another subject.

Slightly wounded, Pryce followed the path of the gesture and widened his eyes as he saw the body of another raptor on the sand. He looked up in awe at the eyes towering above him as he realized the dragon had saved him twice.

The dragon made no noise but extended a foreclaw, pushing the machete to Pryce’s feet with a rattle, then they pointed at the raptor on the beach, and finally pulled the machete over to their side of the ship.

Pryce only stared in bemusement until he chuckled at the realization that the dragon wanted the machete as payment. He stepped closer to the dragon to pick up the machete, intending to demonstrate the dangerous tool that it was. He wouldn’t want the dragon cutting itself on the blade, but despite his intentions the dragon gave a deep warning grumble as he approached.

Pryce stopped, and so did the grumbling.

Pryce moved forward, and the grumbling turned into a growl.

Sighing, Pryce unbuckled the machete sheath and held it up to the dragon for their perusal, then inched towards the machete again. The dragon growled even louder than before, this time baring their fangs.

Scared and a little exasperated, Pryce held up a finger and said, “wait,” before going down the stairs to retrieve another machete while wondering if this a good idea or pure foolishness.

A minute later he was back with a new machete in its sheath, and the dragon looked at him from the same spot as before. Holding it up so it was easily visible, Pryce revealed the shiny blade inside the leather sheath.

The dragon made a rumbling noise, their pupils widening while their spines flared at the sight of a second shiny object.

Pryce decided to quickly move onto the demonstration before the dragon decided they wanted this shiny new thing as well. Walking up to the nearest raptor corpse, he swung the machete down as hard as he could on its neck, the blade cleaving through flesh and coming to a rest up against bone.

Pryce pointed at the machete resting near the dragon’s talons and said, “Dangerous.”

The dragon, who was staring intensely at him, shifted their gaze to the machete, then the sheath, and the idea seemed to click. Pryce smiled as the dragon tried to sheath the weapon, but their talons were evidently ill-suited to picking up things. He was about to reach out to help while hoping the dragon wouldn’t growl at him again, but then the dragon pinched the machete between two talons – humorously reminding Pryce of someone using chopsticks – and dropped the blade into the sheath with a shunk while the dragon rumbled at his success. Perhaps those talons were more dexterous than he expected.

“Good,” Pryce said, giving the dragon a thumbs up.

The dragon glanced away from the tool, pupils shifting as they examined the gesture. Bringing up one foreclaw and splaying their talons, they closed the hand into a fist while leaving the thumb out. The thumb seemed to lack range compared to a human’s thumb, but at least the gesture was recognizable.

Pryce paused for a moment to marvel at the situation, causing him to realize that he was really communicating with a sapient, non-human species!

The dragon did not seem to share in his wonder, and instead picked up the rifle and handed it back to Pryce stock first, pinching it between two knuckles this time. Pryce raised an eyebrow in confusion but accepted the proffered weapon…or at least tried to.

The dragon didn’t let go of the rifle and began growling. Pryce stood frozen for a moment, confused at the contradictory actions. Then the dragon let go of the rifle and then pinched it between two talons, pushing it so that it aimed away from them while ceasing to growl.

Then they aimed the rifle back at themself and resumed growling before pushing it away again and stopping, only then did they finally let go of the rifle.

Pryce’s eyebrows shot up in understanding.

The dragon was probably the creature who took the pigs and left tracks on the beach, so they have probably been watching him for some time now. That means they may have seen him kill a raptor before rescuing him…if that was true, then that means they might have been waiting for him to leave his rifle behind. The dragon didn’t have to know how the rifle worked, but they only had to realize it was useless based on the fact that he threw it away instead of shooting the last raptor again.

On top of all that, the dragon took advantage of the situation to use the useless rifle as a prop to warn him not to aim a rifle at him. It sounded almost too far-fetched, but Pryce glanced at the pile of rifles laid behind the dragon’s haunches and couldn’t help but feel that the creature was keeping him from picking another one up.

…either that or the dragon was simply content to watch until he pulled out the shiny machete, but after grossly underestimating the intelligence of the raptors, Pryce decided that overestimation was probably more conducive to a long life.

Pryce nodded his understanding, then said, “Understand,” while very pointedly pointing the rifle in the opposite direction of the dragon.

“Uhn…her…der..sss…h…t…tah…nd……Un…der…stand…” The dragon said, drawing their neck into more of an S-shape. Pryce thought they looked pleased, but it was difficult to tell when the creature had little to no facial expression save for eye movements. He’d have to pay more attention to their body language in the future.

Then the dragon opened their mouth – Pryce would be lying if he said that didn’t cause him to panic a little – then spat out a pig hoof onto the deck.

Well, that’s one mystery solved, Pryce thought.

Pryce only stared at the hoof, then at the dragon. When he didn’t seem to understand, the dragon pointed at the raptor that had been chasing him. Pryce blinked in realization, and was bemused at the fact that a dragon was apparently haggling with him. Pryce rolled his eyes and gave the dragon a thumbs up before he pointed at the beach and said, “wait.”

The dragon blinked and leapt off the nose of the ship, flaring out their wings to land with a gentle whump onto the beach. The dragon sat down and looked at Pryce with their tail flicking back and forth as if to say “Well? I’m waiting.”

Pryce smiled, holding up an index finger again before reentering the ship. Hopefully the dragon would learn that meant ‘wait a moment’, but judging from his scant few interactions with them, that shouldn’t be a problem.

It only took Pryce a few minutes to guide the pig out of the pen and towards the exit hatch. The poor thing seemed so excited to finally leave the confinement of the pen that he barely needed to guide it as it trotted down the hall and out onto the beach.

Only for the dragon to kill it with a clean blow that snapped its spine.

At least they didn’t let it suffer, through whether that was out of pragmatism or kindness, Pryce wasn’t sure. He decided to take advantage of the situation by teaching them another word.

“Pig,” he said, pointing at the body.

“Ph…ihg?…pig,” the dragon said, looking at the pig while licking their chops. They seemed to be getting better at making English noises…or maybe it was just because the word was a single syllable.

Having had a few moments to think about the situation in the ship, Pryce pointed and said, “Dragon.”

“Drah…gahn?” they said, cocking their heads to the side while pointing at themselves.

“Dragon,” Pryce confirmed.

“Dragon,” the dragon said.

“Dragon take pig,” Pryce said, gesturing at the pig.

“Dragon tay…take pig,” the dragon said, looking a little uncertain but picking up the animal in one taloned hand.

Pryce gave them a thumbs-up, and the dragon returned the gesture with their free hand before making something like a shooing motion at Pryce.

Pryce took an involuntary step back, though he didn’t think the motion was meant to be hostile. It was still difficult to not feel fear when talons nearly the length of his forearm were waving about his face.

The dragon gathered themselves up, leg and thigh muscles rippling before they leapt up into the air, then began ascending with powerful flaps of their wings that sent sand flying everywhere.

By the time the artificial sandstorm had died Pryce’s own shoes were buried under a few centimeters of the stuff. The maneuver seemed almost clumsy compared to the usual grace the creature exhibited, and Pryce wondered if taking off with the pig in their claws made things more difficult. Perhaps a running start led to a more graceful ascent?

Regardless, he stood and watched as the dragon flew away, disappearing over the canopy of trees.

So…he just made first contact with another sapient species who happened to look almost exactly like legendary creatures. That…was a bit too much to think about right now, so instead he turned to examine the dead raptor the dragon had killed on the beach and noted that it seemed bigger than the others. He also saw a long scab mark along its thigh – a half healed graze from a bullet, this was definitely the one that got away from him.

Pryce wondered what it was doing hanging back at the beach, was it a leader? That made sense, though he wondered if it was a patriarch or matriarch, but if there was any sexual dimorphism in the species then it wasn’t readily apparent.

Well, at least there was plenty of daylight left and lots of work to be done. He should remove the barbed wire first, a pissed off dragon was the last thing he wanted right now.

[JOURNAL ENTRY]

Day 27

The events that occurred today have been so exciting that I can scarcely wrap my mind around them, I feel almost as though I might wake up at any moment – if not for my shoulder wound.

I wonder if this day will ever be celebrated as the first day humanity has ever made contact with another sapient species. That would be something to see.

I know people are prone to anthropomorphizing the actions of animals, but there is no way this creature is anything less than sapient. It is a pity that the dragon’s name does not seem to be pronounceable by any human, their voices sound as though they are produced somewhere at the base of their very long throats.

Come to think of it, some parts of their name may be outside the human range of hearing…there goes any hope of me learning to speak their language, but maybe I can still understand some of their words?

Given the fact that their name is unpronounceable to me, I’m not sure how I should refer to them. Perhaps I should give them a name? But what if their name has meaning in their language? I think I will only refer to them as a ‘dragon’ for now. I have already taught them the word for it, though I’m not sure if they think it is a personal name or the one for their species.

Some part of me wonders if the raptors are sapient – creating and using tools to solve a problem like they did requires no small amount of planning and teamwork, and the ladder was too heavy to be carried by a single raptor. They had to be working together to transport it, and they were working together to attack me. I do wonder how they carried the ladder – what a strange sight that would be.

Unfortunately, any chance of peace with the raptors is out the window – at least with this group; they have shown no desire to communicate at all, unlike the dragon.

If today has taught me anything, it is that I need to be even more cautious than I have been already. Despite all the measures I have already taken, I seem to find myself in avoidable scenarios. My most egregious error today was deciding to attack the raptors, if I retreated to the doorway while providing myself with cover fire then I could have easily made it back inside the ship where the raptors could not reach me, at least not without entering the hallway where they’d be unmissable targets…Though now that I think about it, the raptors probably would have avoided the stairway after my first or second kills, and then I’d be stuck inside the ship with no way of knowing when the raptors would have left.

Even still, I should have considered my options more thoroughly…I have never experienced such a powerful fight or flight response, but at least I know which disposition I have now.

I’ve recorded the measurements of Raptor Specimens 3-7 in a separate notebook as to keep this one relevant to personal thoughts, but I can distinctly categorize the raptors into two groups; one that is slightly smaller but with a proportionally larger wingspan, and another that is slightly larger with a proportionally smaller wingspan.

I have no observations to back this up, but in nature males are often the ones who must make colorful displays to attract mates. I suspect that if these raptors do the same, then larger wings would not only be beneficial to better flying/gliding prowess, but also more surface area to display their colors on. It is a pity I will likely never see such a display – their ability to change the color of their hide is like nothing I’ve ever seen.

Of course the difference could simply be due to some other currently unknown factor.

Despite how interesting they are, they completely pale in comparison to the dragon I saw today. I don’t know why or how a mythological creature exists, but perhaps it is not as unlikely as it seems. Some creatures on this island clearly had a hexapedal ancestor, and if one lizard-like species specialized a pair of limbs for flight then the result would be quite close to a dragon.

Even still, the resemblance is quite uncanny…and I’ve only seen two large creatures on this island, I can’t even begin to imagine what kind of animals I will see in the future.

Of course, there’s nothing much for me to do on my own, I cannot just assume the raptors are no longer a threat – in fact, I should be more wary of them than ever.

My current plan (as insane as it sounds) is to try to teach the dragon English, the information I could obtain from a native inhabitant of this island would be valuable beyond belief. The dragon seemed quite amiable, especially for a predator about 13 meters in length, hopefully they’re interested in having some conversation.

If not, then I’m sure I can catch its attention.