Chapter One: Chinese Fricken Dragon

One of my ribs might be cracked and I think my wrist is broken. Not the best thing to wake up to, but I had little time to lay there and b***h. Seeing as the thing that had knocked me out was crouching over me currently, waiting for a chance to attack, I had basically no options. So I did was any logical young man would do in my position; I screamed a battle cry and head butted the thing.

I call it a thing because it was not humanoid, and held little resemblance to any single species on Earth. It's body was long and thin, serpentine, and it had thin but long legs, four, that seemed to tip-toe over the ground of three-fingered hands, equipped with talons.. The rest of it's body seemed to float, weightless. But it's face is what scared me to hell and back. Almost like a dog, with a heavy jaw and black lips, it had a mouth of vicious, predatory teeth, and it's eyes were narrow and black.

It's a Chinese frickin Dragon, god damn it. I screamed this at it, kicking up and smashing my foot into it's underbelly, my worn and old tennis shoes driving against it's shimmering white scales, and the rubber souls running over it, ripping out the delicate pearl-like coverings. It screeched in defiance, striking down at my head with one elegant but dangerous foot. I avoided it by rolling, hitting one of it's legs from under it with the force of my body. It landed on me, and was heavy as hell, but I didn't stop rolling, and ended up to the side of it.

And didn't stay there for long. As the beast scrambled to get back up, yowling in rage, I shot to my feet and hit a dead sprint back towards the road.

Note to frickin' self. Do not, under any circumstances, wander into dark, tall grass out in the Florida mosh, unaccompanied, and slightly drunk. Apparently, that is a open invitation for ancient fire-breathing beasts to attack you.

And that brought up another note to self. Look up how the hell a Chinese dragon ends up in Florida. I mean, damn, some people get exotic pets like pythons to let them escape and kill neighborhood pets, but a dragon?! Got to be something special.

My feet hit pavement, and I sang to the heavens with relief. Well, until the grass behind me rustled violently. Then I just tensed and started running again, adrenaline filling my veins like cold fire.

"Sweet Lord Almighty!" Tory barked, hopping out from the passenger seat of my car, immediately alert. "What the Christ is going on?!" Tory, just over six feet tall with a strong jaw, roman nose, a natural tan, and dark hair the swung just past his shoulders, was my best friend. And had been for a good eight years. We'd been through a lot together. From turf wars on the playground to fighting over girls in a haze of hormones, we'd stuck together for some time. And now we'd both be attacked by a foreign dragon. Best friends forever!

"Dragon." Was all I could say, my attention set souly on getting us into the car, and getting the car away from here. When I think about it, it was no wonder why Tory looked at me weird. But at the moment I hadn't had time to explain, instead shoving him back into the passengers seat and heading around the front of the car to get in the the driver's.

By now my attacker had emerged from the brush and was standing on it's hind legs, it's head now a good seven feet from the ground. Tory spat out more blasphemies, enough to probably make God himself wonder what the hell was up over in America's wang. I didn't pay attention, though. I didn't close the car door. I just got my feet to the peddles, and I sure as hell didn't put on my seat belt. Driving under the influence without a seat belt. Maybe I deserved a dragon to the face?

I just shifted gears and kicked down at the acceleration. But probably because my buddy here was spouting off words of hot sin, the car stalled. With a noise similar to a bat being beaten with a flashlight, the car shuddered and refused to move. This was a tad odd, since I drove an automatic, but I didn't think about that just then.

I cursed, going into momentary harmony with Tory, before I started the car again, and gave it another shot.

Don't think my dragon friend was just standing over there, though. Having fallen back down to four legs, it's body shot towards the car with disturbing speed. It tried to get at Tory, but the tall and built guy was already in panicked defense mode, and slammed his door shut, cutting off the dragon at the last minute, who slammed into the side of my car with denting force. It bellowed a cry of frustration, thrashing widely around, hitting the roof, the windows, the tires, and everything in-between with raging, flailing limbs. If it stopped spazzing, it might have realized my door was wide open, but I guess dragons don't have colleges to learn how to properly murder things.

I got the car going, hitting the gears and peddle with less frantic speed, and there for more order. The car got going, and I hit the acceleration hard, causing the wheels to screech. The dragon, currently tap dancing on my roof, got a little car ride for a few yards before slidding off, hitting the pavement with a fleshy 'thud'.

No matter how fast the creature was, it could get me at seventy five miles. And since it wasn't the right species to fly, there was no chance of it's following us for long.

At least that's what would make sense. But today was not a day for making sense, it seemed.

It was back on my roof after launching itself into the air and gliding for a bit. And it had found my door, YIP-EE! One claw sliced at the steering wheel, and I was barely able to yank my hand away. Those talons would have ripped my throat open, but Tory let out a cry of challenge and kicked a leg at the searching limb, his back to the passenger window, and barely avoided my face when he shoved the arm back through the open door. I took that as my cue to slam the door shut, and managed to catch on of those creepy fingers in it, smashing it immediately. It happened so quickly, so violently, that a spray of blood splashed at me, the color of melted led. It also smelled like rot, and made me suddenly want to puke.

But there was no time for puking. I put both hands back on the wheel as Tory searched the back seat for something to defend us with.

And there was a lot too choose from. I'm not to popular a guy, you see, and these things happen too often for me to feel safe. So the whole back park of my car, a gay-a*s-hell HHR, was litter with innocent-looking items that turned out to be weapons straight from a James Bond movie. A cellphone that was actually a stun gun, a cane that was really a sheathed sword, and pile of folded newspapers that covered a semi-automatic hand gun were just a few pieces of my arsenal.

Tory, being the over dramatic guy he was, snatched the cane from the back seat's floor, recklessly swinging it over the front seats, and clunking me in the back of the head.

"OW! S**t!" I snapped, and the car swerved from my instinctive attempt to jerk myself away from the attack.

"Sorry." Tory said without much empathy, yanking the blade from the carved but hallow wood that concealed it, and smacking me in the nose with the sheath.

"Tory!" I spat, shaking my head and touching my nose. My wrist hurt like hell, I was having trouble breathing, and now my nose with bleeding. I seem to be the one getting beat up the most here, which is just swell.

"Sorry." He said again, shoving the blade up. Sharpened to a deadly point, my old friend managed to punch through the roof, and if the shriek was any indication, hit something.

"My car!" I cried, completely helpless to stop the damage from coming.

"Sorry." Third time now, and not a bit more passion. Tory ripped the sword back out, awkwardly holding it both hands, then thrust it back up, stabbing the beast on my roof yet again.

It whined now, weaker, and stopped thrashing as much. Tory must have hit something vital, because after a few minutes, the beast slid off my car, hitting the pavement with a fleshy 'thud'.

When we were far off, long enough not see the shimmering white line in the distance, I started shaking. My hands, then my legs, then everything else. The rush was gone, and all that energy was leeched from my nerves, leaving me weak and nauseous. Too much action, too quick. I'm sure you agree.

"What," Tory was shaking, too, wide eyed and just as startled as I was, "was that, Vivian?"

"Dragon." I responded again, using the same tone as before.

"Dragon." He repeated, more to himself than me, "Dragon. Dragon, dragon, holy damned dragon."

"Words, so well put yours are." I mumbled, taking in large and supposedly calming breaths. You'd think I'd go into shock, seeing as I just battled a mythical monster in under twenty minutes. But I guess I'm sort of used to it. Mythical creatures fought other mythical creatures, after all.

To make it more clear, I'm a Siren. No, not a sexy fish-thing from ancient lore, but rather a mortal granted with a voice the can alter a human's mind and will. Songs were passed on via kiss, and once you gave your song to someone, you died.

It also meant that my scent was different than a humans. And apparently more appealing to the predators of the super natural world. Sirens, as I had learned, are considered a delicacy do to their rarity.

Personally, I don't think I'm that tasty, but I also think that monster back there would disagree. Still, though, no matter how much werewolves and giant octopuses might drool over me, I don't think I'm worth a swim across the ocean. Which meant that the dragon had come for a different reason, and I just happened to be the unlucky b*****d hanging around to be killed.

So why was the dragon here in America? My head was hurting, thanks to my being knocked out then clobbered several times by a clumsy friend. I was still shaking too, and I would pull over to hork up my three beers and nacho cheese chips had I not been too scared to stop the car for anything. But I still had to figure it out. Tory had stopped repeating the word 'dragon' and was no shuffling around the stuff in my back seat, trying to suppress what just happened. Not the healthiest thing he could do, but I'm sure he'd be fine. Like I said, we'd been through some s**t, so he wasn't in the dark about why that had just happened. Even if he hadn't been with me during other attacks, his Native American grandmother was quite the practitioner, so I doubt he'd know nothing of the super natural world, even if he never met me. Point was that's he'd be fine.

I, on the other hand, might become chow for wandering beasts if I didn't figure this out. Dragons, Chinese and otherwise, are highly territorial creatures. Turf wars ended in death, always. Young  dragons flew off from the nest, found a place they wanted, and either took over or died. And any dragon that was challenged fought to the death. There was no losing and finding a new place. The only time dragons left their territories was to mate, and they only stayed out four a week or two. And since dragons usually didn't go far, species stayed in their respective countries. Which meant the dragon I had just met had selected the mosh area when it was young. Which meant that it was either super picky and couldn't find a nice place in China, or that someone raised it here in America. And if they got one dragon, why not get two? Or three? Or an army?

Question; Is there a magical black market, and is this a case of the pet-pony-going-to-the-glue-shop, or what?

I drove by a gas station, but didn't stop. After what happened, I suddenly didn't care if I didn't have gas in the morning. I expected Tory to object, but he was busy playing with the stun gun. The loud crashing sound of high-voltage pain hit my ears several times before I snapped at him to stop.

"Jeez, man, why do you have this?" He waved the obviously fake phone at me, "Sorta girly."

"Hit yourself with it."  I suggested, rolling my shoulder in a shrug, "Tell me how 'girly' it was after you lose bowel control."

"Okay, okay." He rolled his eyes and got back in his seat, "Sorry. So where are we going? Better be your house. You owe me a damn shower and bed after that s**t."

"Yeah, that's were we're goin'. I got stuff to look up, anyway, and you don't have a computer." I explained, watching the sides of the road with caution. It was pretty dark, and I wasn't up for another game of tag-the-monster.

"I have books you lazy b*****d." Tory frowned, apparently offended. In truth, if he had the money for a computer and internet, he'd be Googling everything, too. But everyone has to justify their lives with something, so I guess being old school was his excuse. "What're you looking up, anyway?"

"Oh, not much. Just how much a baby dragon costs."

Author's Note

I scanned over this, corrected a few things, but I'm sure there are still some grammatical mistakes.