The Dragon & The Wolf

The Dragon & The Wolf

by Douglas Christian Larsen

^© Copyright 2011 Douglas Christian Larsen. The Dragon & The Wolf. All Rights Reserved by the Author. No part of this book may be reproduced (except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews) or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the publisher, Wolftales UNlimited. This book is a work of fiction. People, places, events, and situations are the product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or historical events, is purely coincidental.

Dedication 

for Harrison, Dirklan, and Wolfgang

Part 1: A Lizard Catcher

HE CREEPS through the weeds holding his breath, considering each lush lime-green stalk before he touches it. The weeds are green because of all the rain the past few weeks, and because of the rain the air is clean, perfect for great snortings, fullest lungs, and the rain, even more importantly—wonderfully—brings the lizards. He moves quietly, yet swiftly—his lithe body more nimble than the bodies of other boys his age—swiftly because he only has a little time, not even half an hour; in that short time he will dye the knees of his dungarees crawling through the lime-green weeds and he will muss his hair and he will collect caches of dirt beneath his fingernails and he will, most importantly, capture a lizard.

I am the Lizard Catcher, the boy assures himself, the thought making him feel important—much more important than the term...prodigy, the word grown-ups use when he plays Cutting-Edge Thought.

Being smarter than anybody does not make him feel important. He is a genius, or so his stepfather says, and this only makes him feel cautious, because if he does not guard his words, or listen with empathy to the phrases of his friends—his peers, even his elders—he will make them feel very stupid, which will make them very angry with him, which in turn will make the boy feel very unimportant.

The sadness in him, he cannot explain to anyone, and thus he never speaks of it. He does not quite understand the sadness himself.

He feels the grass move. His pulse slows. A salamander is there, just there, separated from the boy by no more than a few inches of soft grass. The boy is a statue.

Will the lizard feel the emanations of the boy’s hot blood?

The boy bids his muscles loose.

All the fears about tonight. Gone, puff, like the smoke from Da’s cigarette.

He lets everything go. Calm, the boy closes his eyes. Calm, he releases his fears, his tensions, his angers and his frustrations. You are cool, so cool, very cool, you are cool.

He opens his eyes. The grass moves, is moving. Softly, gently—there!—a thumb-sized snout appears. A beautiful shimmering lime green, a color almost identical to the grass. Almost. Not close enough to fool the boy. The corners of his mouth lift and his teeth shine, but the flexing of his lips is all the movement he allows himself.

Slowly, but deliberately, he extends his hand, palm upward.

Yes. My hand is grass, my hand is your home. And I am the Lizard Catcher.

I am Lizard Catcher and you are Lizard. Let us work together.

Friends. That’s us, friends, Lizard and Lizard Catcher.

The lizard emerges, its bulbous eyes appearing, pink splotches upon its lime-green back. The salamander lizard, a tiny dragon, regards the hand, the glistening white palm.

The bright dazzle of the rain-washed air, the succulent swell of the breathing grass and the arrogant weeds, the boy breathes deeply, because, Come, let us work together on this, Lizard, my hand is your home, your home is Lizard Catcher.

Come to Lizard Catcher.

As if in answer Lizard flicks out an obsidian tongue. Lizard cocks its head and its oily bulbous eyes swivel darkly.

A twitch of a cat’s whisker, the lizard rests upon the boy’s palm. The boy sits back in the weeds and grass, smiling, petting the green and pink lizard.

“Dirklan,” comes the gruff voice from just behind the boy. The voice is quiet, the spoken word obviously eased into—to spare the boy a start—even so, the boy jerked about.

Da stood above the weeds, staring at the boy severely, but the boy understood immediately the man’s exasperation, the anger which lurked like a terrible bear just outside the weed patch.

Da was okay. True, he was a confused man, angry all the time, with growing bitterness, and much fear. But there was none of the darker stuff, the stuff that greasily moved dark men into dark thought, and then into dark action.

The boy lifted his hand to display his green and pink prize.

The man sighed.

“Dirklan. You have only fifteen minutes until the contest. Fifteen minutes. Look at your pants, look at your hair, look at your fingernails.”

The boy rose, stroking the lizard.

“I can be ready, Da.”

“You must be ready. There is no choice. Do you understand how important this contest is? How important to your mama?”

The boy nodded. He understood very well. Too well. Mama was not happy, not anymore. Actually, the boy was not certain if he had ever known her to be happy, just varying lesser stages of unhappiness, or fluctuating bitterness, swelling wrath. And lately the bitterness was not fluctuating: It swelled bigger and bigger and the boy attempted mightily not to see her bitterness as a volcano, heating and cooking and readying to burst, or an angry red pimple, twitching and jerking and readying to explode! He tried not to think of the skittering spiders that would emerge, the skittering, stinging, biting spiders.

The boy did his best to soothe Mama but lately this only angered her more. She desired her anger, she craved her bitterness, and now Da drew more and more of the sour backsplash of her stoppered septic well-being. Da would do anything to please Mama, or placate her—the boy knew Da would do anything in the world to keep Mama.

It was only last month while Da was at work that Mama had thrown some of their possessions hastily into two large suitcases and hurried the boy into the street. The boy, dragged along the dark street by his Mama, remembered the beach sounds, the waves foaming upon the dark wet sand—the seashell Da found and they took turns listening to—the squeaking noises of the bed they made when they thought the boy was asleep.

Mama uttered a quiet shriek and slapped the boy across the cheek.

“You just stop it,” she whispered. “Don’t you want me to be happy?”

The boy decided he could think a little harder on...him, whoever he turned out to be. As things turned out, the “he” never showed up, and after standing in the park until nearly dawn, they returned home and nobody ever mentioned the strange occurrence to Da.

But the boy knew he never wanted to go back to the days before Da, those terrible and thankfully-only-distantly-remembered days when there were so many faces, so many daddies, so many whiskey-breaths and slaps and angry voices.

The boy patted the lizard. The creature remained motionless save for the rolling of its fluid eyes.

“Here, let me show you something,” Da said, pausing to extract a cigarette and light it. “Hold out that reptile.”

“What are you going to do?” the boy said, holding the lizard protectively at his side.

“Hey. Dirklan. Trust me. Okay?”

The boy swallowed. He did trust Da, who had not only been his stepfather for three years, but also his only real friend. He held out the lizard.

Da held the cigarette as if he were offering it to the lizard, only backward. The cherry glimmered a dull red. The lizard cocked its head. Da moved the cigarette closer. The boy held himself in check—his impulse was to yank the little green and pink lizard away from the mean man with the cigarette, but he said to himself: calm, quiet, easy, cool.

The lizard’s obsidian tongue flicked out, too close to the burning cigarette. The slippery tongue brushed the cigarette cherry. Then the lizard darted forward and snapped at the cigarette. It happened almost too quickly to see. But there was the lizard, motionless on the boy’s palm, and there was the cigarette, now a hollow paper tube missing its cherry. Briefly, the boy perceived a heightening in the temperature of the lizard’s belly. The salamander’s orbs rotated slickly. Its tongue flicked contentedly. A wisp of smoke rose from its now-red snout.

“Cool,” the boy said.

“And you call yourself a lizard catcher,” Da said, smiling from behind his greasy moustache. And the boy noticed for the first time Da’s braided hair, the blue and purple ribbons interwoven in the long dark strands. And Da’s clothes were new, velvet, nappy and sparkling. Da had even bought new boots, the kind that looked like they were made out of snakes!

“That’s a salamander you just caught. A very lucky sign, Dirklan. A sign that you are going to win tonight.”

The boy set his jaw. I am the Lizard Catcher. The Cutting-Edge Thought Contest is very important. I am not afraid. I must win. For Da, and for Mama.

“Run in and clean yourself up. We have to leave in ten minutes, Dirklan. You don’t have a choice.”

Dirklan Dubois had no choice, he had to win tonight. There was no doubt in Dirklan’s thoughts that he could win. He had never known anyone as smart as himself, except for maybe Papa, whom Dirklan barely remembered. He only knew his father from old circulars and a few bios that discussed pioneers of Cutting-Edge Thought.

Dirklan Dubois had no choice about winning because he had to win for Da who had been better to him than anybody else he had ever known—Da, the only man, the only person, to stand up for him, and stand by him.

Gus Ahtibat watched the boy vanish. Such a good boy. A boy who never gave any problem. A boy who cared and who tried to help the confused people about him. So strange, so unique and precious a heart in such a young punk.

Gus had always tried to do right by the boy. He had always understood that he carried a great responsibility. Dirklan was not at all like other boys. So Gus attended three full-day seminars on coping with the child prodigy. His bookcase was full of books that dealt with heightened intelligence. He had learned the correct ways of channeling a boy’s energies into developing genius, challenging him, helping him. And he had spent much of his salary on shuttling the boy from contest to contest.

Gus Ahtibat was certain, like a flaming sword behind his eyes, that what motivated him in cultivating the boy was just, it was righteous.

“You’re crazy! Gus, you’re crazy! I don’t want Dirklan doing this—don’t you know you’re turning my son into him?” Bitty hissed, her hands contorted into talons, her eyes writhing snakepits. “I want a normal child! I want a happy child! I want him to play with other kids! You’re wasting all our money so that my son can turn out to be a poor man! I want my child to make money! Lots and lots of money!”

“Bitty, Dirklan has talent. He’s never lost once. In Atlanta he simultaneously eliminated five grown men—Artists! Only one other Thinker—Clarence Roiclaw—has ever done anything like that! He’s got talent, Bitty, and he’s not going to be poor.”

“He had talent! He worked hard! He didn’t lose! And he was poor!” with each extra-stressed word, Bitty clawed the air and snapped her jaws.

“Dirklan has me to support him. It will be different for Dirklan. I promise.”

“You’re wasting all our money! We used to be happy. Go places. Do things! I used to have nice clothes! We used to party! Now you just work and coach my son! What about me! You don’t care about me!”

That was an argument that seemed to replay itself at least twice a week, for all of last year. Because Bitty didn’t understand. She just didn’t understand that Dirklan was their chance at happiness. Dirklan was their only chance. And they were so close!

Tonight!

Just minutes away!

Because in just a few minutes, Dirklan Dubois, eight-year-old prodigy at Cutting-Edge Thought, will meet the unbeaten best of the best, the seven-year-old beater of men, wielder of dragonfire: Clarence “The Dragon” Roiclaw.

And Dirklan Dubois would win, he just had to!

Part 2: Dragonfire

CLARENCE BOUNCED a little on the thick leather seats of the limousine. He was bored. Bored! And he felt like killing something. He wanted to kill something big, fat and hairy!

Just kidding.

Clarence was not a bad boy. He just hated being bored. He was a healthy seven-year-old genius who was beginning to suffer burn-out. They pushed him out to the islands and he beat one hundred so-called “smarties” in three contests. Then they went to China and he beat the baldies, to The Home of the Brave where he sent them squealing for their mommies, to Station Delta where his calm, superior mien was broadcast into the thought screens of two billion adoring fanatics.

Clarence won his first contest, if you could call it that, when he was two years old—he made a ten-year-old so-called prodigy bawl like a two-year-old toddler (Clarence never bawled, not even when he was a two-year-old toddler). At the age of five he almost exclusively faced adults—artists and scientists and performers and doctors and all those who were supposedly “smart,” those who could “project.”

Fifty percent of his opponents never participated in Cutting-Edge Thought again, never ever ever (but they did participate in depression and night terrors)!

Twenty percent of his so-called opponents entered hospitals after facing Clarence and then embarked on cutting-edge therapy itineraries.

Twelve percent of those he met from chair to chair suffered unconsciousness during the bout, minor aberrations in memory for indeterminate periods of time, but were nonetheless unchanged from the meeting (these were the extremely lucky opponents).

Ten percent suffered no damage and were able to compete afterward—in fact there was one young man, a monk he was, who had grappled with Clarence on three separate occasions and had performed quite well, if uninspired. And seemingly, the monk gained intelligence points upon each contest.

The remaining eight percent did not survive the encounter (this eight percent was divided into two categories representing: 1. the very worst, the not-even-mediocrities and, 2. the sharpest thinkers, those with more talent than common sense).

Needless to say, his opponents were screened vigorously, so that now days if there was a death, it was almost always a member of the latter category.

Dummies need not apply.

After the first death, when Clarence was only a little over five years old, he had begun to view opponents as puzzles, objects with which to play, solve, and ultimately, disassemble. Someday, he thought, I will gain the ability to put them back together again.

The limousine pulled to the curb and the door opened and Doctor Buzzbee nearly dove into the backseat with Clarence. His tweed jacket was rumpled and the aureole of his white hair made him look like an absent-minded saint just recently unstuck from stained glass.

“Oh?” Buzzbee said, “and why are you laughing at me today?”

“Nothing,” Clarence said shrugging. It pleased him to keep secrets, even if the secrets were his own thoughts.

“Good news, Master Clarence. Your latest test results are out, and they are more positive than ever!”

Clarence lifted his eyebrows and said: “And will I live?”

Buzzbee blinked. This child, as much his own creation as anything born normally beneath God’s heaven, scared him. This was a child that had existed for not even eight years, and yet his superior expressions were those of a satyr, some hobgoblin druid whose hobby was dissecting human beings for the amusing sight of their blood, the gore of their stirred innards.

“Master Clarence? Live? I don’t quite understand, no. Your intelligence scores? You broke two hundred twenty!”

A joke, Buzzbee. I was being funny, Buzzbee. But Clarence did not speak. Another secret. That is right, Buzzbee, a secret. The secret is that nobody understands my jokes.

Clarence grinned.

Then he saw a fly crawling on the leather seat next to Buzzbee. Clarence Roiclaw withdrew into his seat. His eyes swelled and he pointed a finger at the insect, his mouth working silently.

“What? Oh what is the matter now?” Doctor Buzzbee said, quite alarmed at the boy’s color. He followed the boy’s terrified gaze, saw the fly, and he smiled to himself. “Master Clarence. It is only a fly.”

He slapped his veined hand upon the insect. Brushed the body to the limousine floor.

“See? All gone, Master Clarence. Just a fly. A little insect.”

“A bug,” said Clarence Roiclaw, as if that was more than enough explanation.

They rode in silence for a few seconds, each looking out separate windows.

“And the CQ numbers?” Clarence Roiclaw queried, turning away from the window, staring at the old man with his strange, cold eyes.

“Oh, those were quite acceptable, really,” Doctor Buzzbee replied.

“What were my Creativity Quotient numbers, Buzzbee?”

A warm beat of silence. Doctor Buzzbee did not wish to say.

“Oh, two hundred sixty-five.” Doctor Buzzbee licked his lips. He stared out the darkened limo window. His rheumy eyes swam beneath his aquarium spectacles.

A CQ rating of 265 should make any monster happy. For comparative purposes, an average joe working as a graphic designer might be justifiably proud of a solid 120 CQ, and the average worldwide was no more than 99.9 CQ.

This boy had the CQ of a great renaissance artist such as Michelangelo or Leonardo.

Clarence “The Dragon” Roiclaw made a fist. He stared at his knotted bunch of little-boy fingers.

His hand grew hot. Damn! (Oops! A bad word, damn, not to say that Clarence!) Damn, damn, damn, damn!

The CQ numbers were the only important ones. Damn.

The Dragon wanted to burst the three-hundred barrier.

Of course, he was the only person really close to bursting that barrier. Only one other man had ever come close, and Clarence “The Dragon” Roiclaw had already beat his CQ numbers.

Clarence “The Dragon” wanted to do something. He wanted to take a living thing and light its head like a blazing match. Poof. That easy. Yes. Incendiary blood—sizzling blood, exploding blood, painting the inside of this limo bright fire-engine red.

Clarence gulped a deep breath. He sighed and eased back against the leather.

Just kidding.

“I am bored, Buzzbee.”

“Well, Master Clarence, your next scheduled competition is in only fifteen minutes. That should be exciting, should it not?”

Clarence sighed. “That is what is boring. I would like to have a pet. I would like to have a puppy.”

“Not while you tour, Master Clarence. Your IQ scores should make you happy, Master Clarence.”

“Intelligence is very boring.”

I want to have fun. I want to play. If only children were not so stupid. If only adults knew how to have fun. If only I had siblings, or perhaps parents other than sweet Mama Pool and dear Papa Bank.

Oh, sadness, thoughts of sweet mama Pool, and dear Papa Bank.

If only I were not so alone.

He fidgeted with his satin robes. He wanted to wear pants, and a coat, not these silly Prince of Persia costumes, but Clarence understood the concept of selling, he knew he had to satisfy the expectations of a dim-witted public. He had to be politic about his life.

“Tell me about my opponent. A boy? A real live boy for a change?”

“Hmmm? Oh yes, Master Clarence. Name is something French, I think. Eight years old, I believe. A talent, I think. Well, local talent, you know? Should take you one or two minutes, if you go easy on him. Have some fun, Master Clarence.”

Clarence sighed and nodded his head. Yes, he knew about local talent.

Buzzbee monitored the boy-creature’s vocal-pattern thoughts with the custom-made ear piece which was linked to Fat Boy, the New Age AI Computer dominating the trunk of the limousine—he had more than once heard Clarence speak (almost fondly) of Mama Pool and Papa Bank, referring, of course, via his twisted sense of humor, to the Egg Pool and the Sperm Bank from which he had originated.

It was seven years before, Buzzbee had selected the perfect pair, the ovum of a celebrated poetess/medical doctor (suicidal, of course, locked away now, thank God, safe from the boy-creature), and the sperm of one of the most promising early Cutting-Edge Thinkers (locked away for a very long time in the Quartz Hillton, a minimum-security facility).

“Ironic, how very, very ironic,” Doctor Buzzbee muttered, stroking his perfectly coifed goatee.

“Excuse me, Buzzbee?”

“Oh what? Nothing, Master Clarence. Just thinking.

Just thinking. Thinking of irony. An eight-year-old boy and a seven-year-old boy, one natural and one very unnatural. Even with all their explosive intelligence they would never be capable of appreciating this irony.

This irony. The irony of their meeting. The irony of not knowing. With all their intelligence they would never know. With all their intuitive creativity they could never quite make that leap into understanding.

He smiles, beause only Doctor Eugene Constantinople Buzzbee would ever really know. Would ever really be able to appreciate the golden irony.

He chuckled. He remembered staring at the sedated man, bound and spread like a biology class frog, primed for dissection.

“You’ll never know, will you? My tragic, tragic genius?” he said to the sleeper as the three technicians deftly produced the man’s semen. The man was already a convict and Doctor Buzzbee felt no guilt at robbing him of the building blocks which would ultimately produce Clarence the boy-creature.

Of course, it was different with the sedated woman, the very beautiful woman—unfortunately there would be a scar, and she would have a general suspicion of the violation perpetrated upon her lovely, lovely body—self-tortured already, a unique thinking woman in a world of blank slates, the slight scar would push her over the edge into the comfortable institution where she now resided, sedated and beautiful, and blank as all the other slates in the world.

Doctor Buzzbee peered over his spectacles at the strange creature, his creation. For all practical purposes, the creature sitting there was an average child, perhaps a little shorter than the norm, maybe a little pale for lack of exposure to the sun, with two complimentary eyes and ears and all the usual amenities. But what went on inside that head—goodness, but no one could say, not even the most sophisticated AI, because Clarence did not normally think in words. The strange boy-creature thought almost exclusively in terms of pictures, but not every day Kodak pictures—the pictures locked inside Clarence’s boy-sized cranium were constantly moving things, shifting and twisting and made of some strange three-dimensional substance, a fiery ectoplasm—the closest approximation of Clarence’s mental images would be pictures composed of breathing fire.

“Buzzbee?” said Clarence, his mouth shaped into that chilling otherworldly smile.

“Yes, Master Clarence?”

“I would suggest you desist monitoring me through Fat Boy.”

Buzzbee gulped saliva.

“If you ever look inside my head again, or listen inside my head again, I am afraid of what I shall not be able to restrain myself from doing to you.”

Doctor Buzzbee, smiling stupidly, saw a volcano pushing out of the dirt. The volcano had a face, a face replete with spectacles and a white ring of wispy hair.

Fire came out of the volcano. Doctor Buzzbee saw the face of the volcano. It was not a pleasant face. In fact, the face of the volcano shrieked—it screamed and wept.

Doctor Buzzbee saw the face of the volcano consumed by the terrible orange and blue fire.

Shivering, Doctor Buzzbee continued to smile and gulp saliva, nodding his head, nodding his head, nodding his head.

He had never, absolutely never in his entire life, experienced someone forcing an alien thought into his head.

He might not survive.

He smiled and nodded his head.

Part 3: Papa Wolf

FARKUS Dubois observed the guards with peripheral vision over the end of his cigar as he cupped his left hand about it and fired a match with his right hand. Standing near the outer walls of the small courtyard he puffed upon the flame a few moments. Too many guards, both private security and local-boy cop. He knew security would be very tight here, after all Clarence “The Dragon” Roiclaw had to be the most famous child in the history of the world, except for maybe Baby Jesus, maybe.

Maybe, Baby.

Farkus, stood haggard and thin at the outskirts of the growing crowd. He must spread himself very thin, like one pat of butter shared by one hundred slices of toast; like that image, what he attempted to do was impossible; however, that is exactly what he had spent his life striving to do: overcome the impossible. However again, unlike that silly metaphor of too little butter on too much sooty bread, when Farkus Dubois ran out of Farkus Dubois spread, he would be more than gone—he would be in a new world of unbelievable pain.

Impossible? Impossible for me, Farkus Dubois?

Yup, pretty much, impossible. Period. No chance.

He smiled. Bizarrely, he was enjoying himself. This was the defining excitement of his life, and fail or not, I intend to charge to the sound of the guns.

But I won’t fail, not this time, because famous or not, you are not going to damage my son, you little bastard. Dubois had sworn this oath at least a hundred times over the last four days, escaping from the Quartz Hillton in New Lancaster two days ago to be here today.

Of course, escape was an overly dramatic word, considering he merely laced his shoes and walked away from the complex. Even though it had been two days since his “escape,” his absence would probably still be unnoticed.

He hoped.

Farkus Dubois pushed back his coat sleeves and checked the insides of his arms. Only a slight rash. That was good. He was lucky to have a strong body.

Grind me down. Hammer me with a mallet. Aerate me and shred me. I will do what I must do.

Inmates generally did not leave their minimum-security prisons without first obtaining an almost-impossible-to-get LOA, because there was a very, very severe penalty for breaking even one of the only two rules—a very severe penalty, yes-indeedy-do.

Over the past three years not even one inmate departed without permission and survived.

Dubois puffed his cigar and stretched. His spine and all his joints creaked and popped. At thirty pounds underweight, his frame jutted lanky and his skin stretched too tight. His only sustenance was coffee, for two days, and now he felt light and jittery—it was hard to stand still, he had to concentrate to keep his toes from tapping, his fingers from reaching up into his haggard shadow of a beard to nervously stroke and pull.

At his best, he was a twitchy man, so this was torture, this remaining still, being calm, so cool.

Calm, he told himself, just let it all flow out. Relax and picture an azure sky, a desert sky, the true picture, just before evening, the sunset forging, glowing red embers beneath the clouds, the mist of a ruby sword fresh and steaming like breath from the forge into the icy bath, the sibilant whisper, the perfect hush of the readied weapon—

—all is still, all is calm, sighing, breathing, beneath the deepest azure sky—

—he jerked awake as the cigar nearly slipped from his teeth. He blinked at his watch, damn, it is getting late, the show should be on the road by now, and looking around, too many guards, too many fat boys in gray uniforms, too many too many too many, they’ll stop me from saving my boy, oh my God, Heavenly Father, I haven’t seen Dirklan since he was a baby! What does he look like now?

When Farkus Dubois was a younger man his arrogance had been nearly uncontrollable, a man—a wolf—seemingly alone in a world of idealess sheep. Taller than most men, and much stronger, both physically and mentally, he was Frankenstein’s creature, remote in the world, pursued by frightened, torch-waving villagers. But these things were nothing compared to his will, his ego, a smooth steel ball, compressed and dense, impenetrable.

Farkus Dubois’ intelligence quotient was measured at different times over a period of years at 139, 160, 140, 155, 163 and 144. This meant nothing to Dubois. He knew who he was and it had nothing to do with whatever measurements other men might apply to him.

But the who of whom he was shone brightly in his creativity quotient, measured at the same time as his IQ, rated 195, 235, 200, 250, 268 and 200.

To date, only Clarence “The Dragon” Roiclaw scored a CQ higher than Dubois’ highest rank: a startling 272, four points beyond Dubois, four points closer to that unbreakable 300 barrier.

If anyone would break the 300 CQ, it was Clarence “The Dragon” Roiclaw.

It was not overly difficult for the prosecuting attorney to display the insolence of Farkus Dubois regarding authority. Authority and Rules. Authority and Rules and Society.

Authority, more often than not, was a collective devoid of dream and imagination, comprised of mean-spirited mediocrities. Rules were things created by these bitter, mean-spirited mediocrities; limitations applied to ordinary men, established to keep the ordinary men truly ordinary, and Dubois was hardly ordinary. Society was made up of many such groups of mediocrities.

The prosecuting attorney queried Dubois: “Do you have a free will?” to which he replied: “Definitely.”

The prosecuting attorney fired: “Do you believe in Destiny?” to which he replied: “Definitely.”

The prosecuting attorney concluded with this whisper: “What if the Law, the Law of Society, gets in the way of your so-called destiny, Mr. Dubois?”

There was a beat of time, a pregnant five seconds in which the jury held its breath and the judge peered at Dubois through the corners of his eyes and the defense attorney considered objecting to the line of questioning, but decided instead to see if Dubois might again disrupt the court with one of his famous barbs of wit.

Farkus Dubois cocked his head to one side. He returned his head to an upright posture to look squarely into the prosecuting attorney’s face (the attorney blinked and looked away from Dubois’ smoldering eyes, and uneasily half-smiled for the jury to show he was still in control of this dangerous individual).

Dubois cocked an eyebrow, curled a lip for the prosecuting attorney, blinked significantly at the judge, and then trained the full force of his considerable dual-laserbeam gaze upon the jury.

“I believe it is my destiny to be thwarted by your so-called Laws of Society,” he said in a loud voice, speaking directly to the jury, “I believe it is my fate to suffer the injustices demanded by the idiots who call themselves the officers of your so-called Laws of Society—idiots such as this corrupt judge, this idiotic attorney (the judge’s gavel was slamming at this point and the prosecuting attorney was voicing many objections and it was about this time that the defense attorney attempted to salvage whatever he might by raising a few objections of his own and the jury, not understanding half of what Farkus Dubois was saying but realizing that he was again mocking the court, began to giggle and titter behind their hands—in this confusion, the booming voice of Farkus Dubois could yet be heard clearly)—these things are my fate and destiny and I do not deny them nor attempt to apply logic to them.

“I am a moral man, one moral man alone, and so will always be one moral man at odds with an immoral system. I am an honest man (at this point Farkus Dubois was awarded his eleventh count of Contempt of Court) so what do you people expect will happen to me when I insist on wrangling with these filthy liars—this dishonest, lying judge, and his dishonest, lying puppet attorney?”

At the conclusion of the court proceedings Farkus Dubois, practitioner of the then little-known medium of art called “Cutting-Edge Thought,” was found to be a felon, convicted of the very serious crime of Kidnapping, with garnishments of twenty-nine counts of Contempt of Court.

There was more involved in the situation than just a sleazy ex-wife and a sleazy lawyer and a sleazy “justice system,” because Dubois was famous, and Cutting-Edge Thought was increasingly becoming the commercial success of society, cutting in on football and baseball, as well as the more intellectual “sports.”

Big money talks louder than IQ, CQ, or society’s version of justice. And a man such as Farkus Dubois collect quite a few enemies through the years, from many different quarters, and he stood there, grinning, in the very middle, while all converged upon him to exact vengeance for his insolent singularity.

How dare a man exist, a man such as he?

Farkus Dubois was sentenced to seventeen years of incarceration at a minimum security facility, to be considered for parole only after seven years.

Farkus Dubois would be considered for probation five weeks from this day, this day in which Farkus Dubois stood puffing his cigar and tapping his toes, willing away the scrutiny of the milling security goons.

He tapped his toes and puffed his cigar. Irony so ironic it would be unbelievable in the conventions of fiction. So ironic it could only happen to Farkus Dubois, in real life.

Five weeks! Five weeks from today, and I could have come out to see Dirklan.

He grinned behind his cigar.

I am here.

He coughed. His throat tickled. Just ignore it. It’s just too many cigars in too few days. His throat tickled a little worse. It itched. He pushed back his sleeves.

He felt his insides sink. Because this was a definite rash upon his forearms.

Damn, but it was going to be close, very close—but I believe in Destiny. There is a reason. And God, if You’re up there looking down at little old me, please wind your watch! Let’s synchronize our timepieces.

I can only do the best that I can do, or try to do so, and that is why I am here. I must protect my boy.

Almost eight years ago he had been married. It was an average marriage, with only a little more than the usual misery. But one night while he participated in a Cutting-Edge Thought promotion, his wife packed a few suitcases and departed their home with their six-month-old son, Dirklan.

Farkus discovered their hiding place three weeks later and retrieved his son from his wife and the rough customer who played the role of her protector.

Three months later he was served with an Order to Produce Child. After many legal maneuverings it resolved that Bitty Dubois had hired the sleazier lawyer and Farkus was awakened in the night and handcuffed and had not seen the true outside world again until two days ago.

Ultimately, Farkus Dubois grinned, I proved myself an idiot, maybe the most intelligent, most creative idiot to mess up everything he loved, a catastrophe out of everything he touched.

But if you believe in destiny (and I do) there is a true reason I linked with Bitty. That really true, truly real reason is Dirklan. The boy had to be. And now he must survive.

The boy was an incredible talent. He was beautiful and sweet and intelligent and creative and magical.

Farkus, worshipful of his seed, maintained a slight one-sided contact through the circulars and the newspapers, but mostly through his imagination. He conjured the boy into his cell—they talked, laughed, sang, wept and discoursed, conversed, sang and held—he knew his son better than most fathers knew the children in their physical custody, he knew every line of the boy’s face, every turn of his dark hair; however, a virtual world, though vibrant, never quite satisfies like the physical world.

And if you believe in Destiny (and God, but I do) you have to know that you have no choice, that the boy’s life is far more important than your own, that all the hours of all the days of all the years spent honing your mind was for this day, that he must live, live undamaged, and only you have the strength, the native talent, the guts to save the boy.

I will give every drop of my life.

And so I raise my cup to you, son—a toast: my guts, your life, son!

Dirklan Dubois, eight years old, was a talent—no expert would attempt to dispute the reality of his young genius.

But Clarence Roiclaw was something else altogether.

The haggard man with the grumbling belly stood puffing his cigar. His eyes did not move much, but he observed all that evolved about him. A dispassionate observer would never fathom the depth of his insecurity, the incredible terror washing against his psyche like black acidic waves.

He was a lone man, lashed to the very last piece of driftwood, bound but calmly waiting upon the bleak beach of an electronic world, and even though the dark tide was far out, the lone man could see the turbulent waters building, mounting into the dark tidal wave which would soon rush upon him.

Come on, then.

I am here.

His arms itched like crazy. He ignored the pain. His eyes watched the pedestal. His mouth, spitless, also began to produce the tell-tale chemical itch. His eyes fastened upon the right side of the pedestal.

The small crowd began to stir as the “opponents” mounted the open-air pedestal from opposite sides approximately one hundred feet away from where the cigar-smoker stood not tapping his toes, not fidgeting with his beard and not puffing upon his cigar.

Part 4: Coin Toss

GUS AHTIBAT paced nervously about the raised platform between the facing chairs. The common-looking padded leather chairs, separated by a distance of ten feet, were actually composed of candid macroprocessor chips, millions of intricate brains, and the floor, which seemingly was solid-wood flooring, actually housed the most complicated projection system ever devised.

These apparatus had absolutely nothing to do with the “opponents” or the actuality of what would occur between them—what took place between the boys would be organic, frighteningly concrete, and possibly, fatally final. The complicated machinery merely provided a “peek” inside the cerebral confrontation, for entertainment purposes, so the watchers in the near vicinity might appreciate the immense power ricocheting between the “opponents,” while the “peek” was simultaneously broadcast to nearly thirty-two million thought screens around the country, and recorded for distribution to the aficionados of Cutting Edge Thought about the globe.

Truthfully, this particular event was no extravaganza. Other than the acolyte or aficionado of the art, there was very little public interest in today’s confrontation. As in the old-time heavyweight boxing competitions, this was merely another “bum of the month” ho-hum blurb, an event which might command five full seconds on the evening news.

Even if someone died.

Because the massed excitement and churning hoopla about the tremendous genius Clarence “The Dragon” Roiclaw had finally peaked. He was unbeatable, an acknowledged demigod. The Dragon was a given power, like the sun, part of everyday life, and now it was merely a matter of form—a redundant matter of increasing the staggering record, a record already unbelievably unbalanced at 5,287 wins with zero losses, zero ties over a period of just under five years.

The contender’s record of 107 wins, zero losses, and eight ties in one year did little in sparking interest in today’s “contest.”

Satisfied with the setup Gus Ahtibat retreated to the Civic Center to collect his charge. He could not suppress the shiver of excitement forming bubbles in his gut. Dirklan was going to win! His boy was going to teach this rich, snot-nosed brat a lesson in Cutting-Edge Thought.

Dirklan was going to do it, and do it big, oh yes—he was going to win, he just had to!

All Gus Ahtibat’s dreams would bear fruit today.

The glittering HD-TV camera orbs hovered above the crowd, sampling the excitement, “peeking” into the inner gambling circles, measuring the odds, totaling the wishes, circling the cold electronic arena in ever-broadening circles.

A skeletal man in old worn clothes, back toward the courtyard walls, puffing a cigar, one hand buried in his pocket while the other hand itched at his arm, fell into measured step with one of the cameras—as it moved slowly outward, he moved slowly inward.

Nearly two hundred people milled in the smallish courtyard. The two hundred or so people ceased milling as the two combatants entered at the same time from opposite sides of the courtyard.

The boys eyed each other as they mounted the pedestal. The Dragon watched the local talent through hooded eyes. Yes, it was a boy, a real boy, not the egghead genius prototypes that usually attempted to ram head-butt him from the opposite side of the pedestal.

The local talent did not look too unlike a walking matchstick.

Dirklan Dubois shyly watched Clarence Roiclaw rise onto the pedestal. He was awed—because The Dragon had been a big part of his life for the last five years. If he was not hearing about the genius prodigy in school, he read about him in the Cutting-Edge Thought circulars, or watched him on HD-TV. It seemed he had been compared to The Dragon his whole life.

And here he was now, Clarence “The Dragon” Roiclaw.

Funny, in real life he looked just like a kid. Not somebody who was famous everywhere, or that had killed people.

Dirklan himself had never so much as hurt anybody while playing Cutting-Edge Thought, nor would he ever wish to.

Dirklan Dubois smiled at his opponent as he circled about his leather chair. Smiling made Da angry, because you were supposed to look at your opponent as if he were your enemy, as if he killed your mama, or wanted to steal all your toys. Dirklan never remembered to dislike his opponents. Usually they were just kids, little girls and boys Dirklan would love to play with, if he ever had the chance.

Tremendous applause washed over the pedestal but neither boy acknowledged it. Dirklan waved at The Dragon, and nodded his head.

Clarence Roiclaw tilted his head and regarded the local talent through the bottoms of his eyes.

Gus Ahtibat gripped Dirklan’s small shoulder.

Come on boy, don’t let me down. This is no legend you fight. It’s only a little boy. A snot-nosed rich brat that wants to steal away all our dreams, boy.

Please, oh please God, let my boy Dirklan kick this rich snot-nose’s ass! Dear God in heaven this means everything!

Dirklan looks up at Da and smiles. He thinks of a meadow, grasses and a slight green rain. Wind rustles the leaves of the many trees. Gus Ahtibat sighs and smiles down at the boy.

“You’re going to do good, son, real good,” Gus whispers.

Clarence Roiclaw opens his eyes wide. It is like a fresh breath of mint, or orange rind—fresh and clean, that is the signature of the local talent, Dirklan Dubois. Clarence felt it like a wind pushing through his hair, or the lush aroma of dark loam after a light, chilling rain.

He smiles. Perhaps this will be interesting, perhaps this will be fun. Maybe the kid will last more than five minutes.

For the first time it clicks for Clarence. He looks at the local talent with more interest. Of course, why had he not perceived it before?

The last name is a dead give-away.

Dubois.

This kid is the son of Farkus Dubois. More than any other Cutting-Edge Thinker, Clarence is interested in Farkus.

Farkus Dubois had held the CQ record for many years—he held the record until Clarence “The Dragon” Roiclaw arrived in the world, and, so far, Clarence had only been able to pull four measly points away from Farkus Dubois’ highest Creativity score.

He had always been a little angry with Farkus Dubois for being too close in creativity. So, Clarence Roiclaw nodded, this will be rather like a grudge match.

Only, it will be the son who pays the steep fine for excessive creativity.

Doctor Buzzbee and Gus Ahtibat meet at the center of the pedestal and bow low to each other and to each opposing boy, the traditional token extension of goodwill. Doctor Buzzbee, as handler of the Grand Master Champion, withdraws a shiny coin from his suit pocket and tosses it into the air. The coin lands upon the pedestal and bounces and spins. Doctor Buzzbee steps on it.

The two men stand over the bright coin, another token tradition. They smile and shake hands. Gus Ahtibat retrieves the coin and pockets it.

And then the two handlers hastily vacate the battleground.

The boys sit in their specialized chairs. Dirklan Dubois swallows and eases his breathing. Calm. Calm.

Clarence Roiclaw watches his opponent carefully. He smiles, realizing that the meditation techniques the child utilizes are purely instinctive and that Dirklan Dubois will not be capable of naming the techniques, or really, that he is even using them.

This is the same way Farkus Dubois prepared for Cutting-Edge Thought. Most Thinkers attempt to psyche themselves into aggression, into courage, into bravery and the higher echelons of self esteem.

Part 5: Contact

FARKUS DUBOIS, standing only twenty or so feet away from the boys, rolls his dead cigar between his teeth. He keeps his plastered fake smile on his lips, staring at the boys as if this are the greatest show on Earth.

A camera lens sweeps close.

Heavy, I am twenty pounds heavier, my cheeks sag, my eyes are puffy—I am very excited and my face is flushed. Heavy and excited. Blob man, that’s me—oh-yesirree!

The HD-TV orb passes on. Farkus Dubois allows his fake smile to slip. Both his arms burn. The skin is livid, red, with white splotches appearing. The burning sensation spreads to his armpits, where it will get very bad very soon. And now his legs feel the effects of withdrawal.

Oh soon—so slow, buddy Farky me lad, slow, your respiration, your circulation, down, slower, it’s too soon, Farkus, hold on, keep control. Just hold it back, do not let it spread, hold your ground.

The Quartz Hillton knows he is AWOL. The effects of withdrawal will increase dramatically in a matter of minutes.

Gus Ahtibat, seated in a front-row folding chair, clasps his hands in his lap and strangles his fingers. If only Bitty were here. Oh, if only she were here. She would see that he is a success, he is here, now, he stood on the pedestal with Roiclaw, with the most famous child on Earth! Oh, but Bitty, slut, she is with Martin, the conflagration technician, and no one but Gus Ahtibat and Bitty knows where she is spending every extra moment of every day.

Thank goodness the boy does not have to learn—after his win today, after the new revenues and fame and adoration, Bitty will stay with Gus and Dirklan, she will come to her senses, please God.

Gus Ahtibat’s eyes flick for a moment to the fat man standing on the other side of the pedestal, the fat man with the dead cigar in his teeth. The fat man’s eyes are bright and dark. In his excitement the fat man keeps itching at his arms.

Yes, yes, be excited, fat man, because you will see Dirklan Dubois—my wonderful son, my savior—in action today, yes you will. Watch, fat man, and cheer!

His eyes move back to the two quiet boys.

And so, it begins.

Clarence “The Dragon” Roiclaw closes his eyes briefly. Then he looks across the pedestal to the waiting boy. He nods, allowing himself the tiniest of smiles.

A bright red curtain halves the pedestal. Upon the curtain is a lizard motif, fanciful green lizards stitched ingenuously, nose to tail, nose to tail. The intricate green lizards have ruby eyes, eyes brighter than the crimson curtain, eyes shining red light. Suddenly the lizards are not merely stitched designs, but living, breathing beings, scrambling upon the face of the softly blowing curtains. The lizards bump and turn, puffing silvery smoke rings—the smoke rings smell distinctly of cigar tobacco.

The curtain bows, blows full, and begins to roll upward. The lizards cease to scramble, glow brightly a beat, and spin into luxurious pinwheels of dazzling orange and fluorescent pink, throbbing lavender, shedding sparkler glints of fire.

The curtain, moving faster, rolls into a coil, the pinwheels collecting into a massed pool of fireworks. The curtain is no longer a curtain, but now a coiled serpent made of twinkling bright fires, twining high into the air, arcing like electrical fire, and now turning, crossing sinuously to one side of the pedestal, a beautiful chrome tongue like a mirror, flicking, flicking and flicking.

Legs pop from the serpent’s fire scales to the accompaniment of cartoon sound effect—- poop, plurp, nup, plop—a cascade of gorgeous Rapunzel locks unfurl from the serpent’s head, and exaggeratedly long blonde eyelashes whisk above the serpent’s agate-fire eyes, big shimmering tears of pearly water squirt to the floor, and the serpent, now a ridiculous blonde-wigged lizard, settles gracefully to the pedestal, rolls onto its back, and offers its great fat belly for rubbing.

The crowd bursts into spontaneous applause. Delighted and more than a lot surprised by the vivid images bursting in the air between the two chairs. Usually it takes a few minutes of posturing and mental circling for the opponents to produce anything even remotely recognizable for the imagers to reflect.

Dirklan Dubois blinks. He distantly hears hands clapping and voices cawing. The sounds fade away. Because the boy ten feet away from him is producing a splendid creature—what is it?

Another snake? No, this one is much more extravagant.

A dragon! Boy, this Clarence Roiclaw is the best! The dragon is beautiful, rearing probably thirty feet above the pedestal, all glinting black chrome with nose leaking white fire.

Dirklan was very surprised when Clarence took his curtain and coiled it up into a snake! So smoothly! He had never experienced such strength—not even when he faced those five artists, who could never quite erase his best images, only fight with them, or attempt to modify them. But Clarence just snatched his lizard curtain away and rolled it up into his very own creation. And what a creation, the snake was really pretty!

Dirklan Dubois smiled. His hair is already dripping wet, but this is the best! Here he is, Dirklan, just a kid, playing Cutting-Edge Thought with The Dragon!

Clarence “The Dragon” Roiclaw is completely dry but nevertheless feels more than a little stung. He isn’t sure, but maybe the local talent is trying to make fun of him. That better not be the case, it better not!

Maybe this Dirklan kid didn’t know that this was serious, that a wonderful thing like a serpent wasn’t supposed to grow blonde hair and eyelashes and squirt tears like a sissy cry-baby.

Well, Clarence has to admit that he is enjoying himself. He feels he finally has a chance to flex his muscles and do something really cool.

This is not boring. No way, this is anything but boring.

Clarence will not allow himself anger, not yet.

Normally he would save the big fireworks until later, until his opponent was good and wet, but let’s just see what the local talent can do with my trademark heraldic beast.

Clarence “The Dragon” Roiclaw flexed his left arm.

Farkus Dubois stands shivering in place. His belly seems down in his knees, and his heart feels too big, too big, and all his symptoms of illness have absolutely nothing to do with amino-acid withdrawal, or the general heating of the blood it entails—what causes Farkus Dubois to nearly bend double with nearly a million butterfly sneakers bouncing in his gut is sheer excitement.

Never had he witnessed anything like this—the opening twenty seconds of this Cutting-Edge Thought collision was far better than anything he had ever witnessed. Or anything he had ever participated in—already, these were the most vivid images he could ever hope to imagine.

He had no idea that his son was this good, this talented. Hell, Dirklan was better than Farkus could have ever been, prison or no. And the boy didn’t even seem to be concentrating. He sits there relaxed in his leather chair, a silly boyish grin lopsiding his face, his tongue poking through his lips in concentration.

Farkus Dubois nearly bursts with love.

Still, his trained eye and senses already discern the marked dangerous turn of The Dragon’s fire magic. Most observers were concentrating on the beauty of the lights, the spectacle of the movement and the creative force at work.

Farkus Dubois had noticed the look in the serpent’s eyes as it turned toward his son.

The black chrome dragon rears three stories above the pedestal, its elegant thin swan throat arching, white fire erupting from its crocodile-long jaws, its shapely deer-like legs pawing.

The black chrome dragon blares a challenge, sounding like an entire woodwind section in the finest orchestra.

Suddenly the boy Dirklan Dubois is running in circles upon the pedestal!

This is madness—it is offering oneself to the hungry electronic gods!

And the black chrome dragon seizes the initiative, plummeting its great jaws upon the hapless boy, seizing him up—but there! The boy yet scrambles upon the pedestal, wiggling his fingers in his ears, sticking his tongue at the giant monster, a comically huge cigar jutting from his teeth.

The black chrome dragon roars enraged, spewing fire like vomit, engulfing the foolish boy! As the fire clears the boy remains intact, inconceivably unharmed, the cigar now lit, puffing smoke rings from his lips. The smoke rings rise swiftly into the air and lasso the black chrome dragon, binding it tightly about the snout and throat.

The giggling, smoke-ring-puffing boy vanishes!

Dirklan Dubois, yet seated in his padded leather chair, laughs and slaps his knees.

He knew he could do it! He had been warned, thousands of times not to attempt such a foolish stunt—had been warned since he was a baby, and as far as he knew no one had ever tried projecting himself, and boy was it fun! It was an idea he had while he hunted lizards—to be the boy setting the cage, the lizard home, and at the same time be the cage the boy set to trap the lizard!

And he had not leapt blindly. First he had experimented with his lizard curtain. He had looked at Clarence “The Dragon” Roiclaw through the eyes of one of the lizards—and at first he had found the experience unsettling, but his brain adjusted quickly.

Gus Ahtibat leapt to his feet with everyone about him. His mouth stretched in a wild cheer and he slapped his hands together so hard they would hurt for weeks. Yes, yes! Dirklan was going to whoop the snot-nose! It was certain! Nobody had ever managed to enter the fray through projection—it was deemed impossible by all the experts; it would fry your brain; your mind could never split in two ways, allowing you to think and control while at the same time peer through virtual eyes to glimpse dual stimulus—and no one had ever had the guts to try.

Victory, yes, sweet victory!

Farkus Dubois the father exhaled finally. Sweat poured from his face, from his torso, from his head.

He had been certain his boy was dead, if not in body, then certainly in brain. That fast. Nothing he could have done, poor old man Farkus, to protect his one and only son.

He did not applaud as did the excited crowd. He sagged weakly and the virus in his body gained much ground as he stood unguarded. All this way and it would have been for nothing, I would not have even had the chance to save you, son!

Oh Dirky! Dirky!

I was certain, as was everyone else, that it was actually you dashing about the dragon, entering that no-man’s land where anything imaginable could shred you limb from limb or cremate you in an instant blast of dragonfire—never in a million years could I have guessed you would pull such a stunt, or that it was even possible despite your great talent to even manage such a feat—if I was still your father in the true sense I would give you a spanking like you would never believe! But he had to admit it was a beautifully unpredictable trick.

It was a good thing, this good trick, Farkus Dubois knew—he was able to postpone his own actions (actions playing upon theories just as untested, just as ridiculously unstable as Dirklan’s self-projection trick)—Farkus could wait and slug back the encroaching death in his veins and pores. And it was also a good thing that seemingly his son was capable of coping in these early stages.

The bad thing was that the stunt was sure to enrage the very real Dragon.

Clarence Roiclaw twitched in his chair. That squirt, the filthy, glory-gobbling kid! Clarence had been experimenting with that very technique, for nearly two months.

The thief! Clarence was so close to perfecting the technique; however, as yet he could not complete the projection without vomiting—and there sat the grinning kid, sweaty and smiling!

Clarence gripped his small hands into fists and squeezed the warmth, squeezed the fire. His eyes honed small and furious and he stared across the pedestal into the eyes of the grinning boy.

Dirklan Dubois sits upright abruptly. He feels a wave of heat ripple across his skin. All over his body the sweat evaporates.

There was much talk about The Dragon’s ability to generate direct heat, talk in school and talk amongst the experts, and those that had wrangled with the seven-year-old genius swore to the awesome pyrokinetic power.

Most experts agreed that the force was more a manifestation within the receiver’s mind than any molecular disturbance measurable in the physical world.

Dirklan did not really care whether or not what he was experiencing was happening within his mind or outside his mind.

All he knew was that it was truly cool. Clarence is great, utterly great!

Dirklan stares across at Clarence.

And he burps.

A smoke ring wafts from his mouth.

Clarence Roiclaw lifts his fists. An arrow of bright orange flame erupts from his knuckles and leaps across the space to consume Dirklan Dubois.

Before the gout of fire reaches the boy it becomes a hand with two taut yellow fingers extended to gouge his eyes.

Dirklan casually lifts his hand and holds it knife-edge out before his nose. The flying eye-poke shatters and falls in pieces about Dirklan in thousands of glistening turquoise blooms of confetti.

“Nyuk-nyuuuk-nyuk!”

Dirklan Dubois chuckles, giggling. He loved the ancient Three Stooges and thanks them now for this potent martial arts training.

Clarence Roiclaw stands before his chair. He points his finger at Dirklan Dubois.

“You don’t know,” utters The Dragon in a steel, small voice.

Metallic vibrations warble the pedestal.

Dirklan Dubois plunges into blackness. All about him the light winks dark. Tears spring to his eyes.

I am alone.

It is true.

I am the only one.

Yes.

Alone.

He feels these things. He knows what it is like to be less than an orphan. His body seems to curl upon itself. He shrinks in the darkness. Shrivels in the emptiness. Floating in scentless, tasteless, lightless, lukewarm water.

He experiences the flat lovelessness of Mama Pool and Papa Bank.

Dirklan shakes his head.

This is not me, he thinks.

He reaches out against the blackness. He extends his hand, reaching, extending his fingers a foot through the primordial void, he stretches his arm two feet through the vacuum of loneliness, three feet, four feet, then five and six and his arm keeps going, his hand rippling and wavering like a vapor snake, seven feet, eight feet, the air growing warmer in the darkness, nine feet, and...

—this is not me, reaching, not alone, ten feet, and he—

—touches Clarence upon the chest and then deeper.

Clarence inhales.

See? Feel? This? And This?

Mama’s kiss blossoms upon his cheek. He feels warm arms about his chest. Papa carries him close.

There-there, sweet baby boy, there-there, my little pumpkin.

He is stretched between Mama and Papa. He inhales the heat of their bodies. Papa’s hand warmly rubs his delicate baby chest. He feels the bristling tickle of Papa’s big moustache.

Mama spanks him, and then holds him and rocks him and kisses him and explains her love as best she can. And then only emptiness where once was Papa.

See? Feel? This? And This? Feel!

Flickering faces. Ugly men. Mean looks. Hard eyes. Black-and-white postcard roughs, Post Office snapshots, stop-action blurs of hands descending, bruises, and yes, void, darkness, emptiness. Pain. Fear. Trembling. Naked bodies roiling. Church bells thundering ominously.

Then Da. An encouraging arm about his shoulder.

This is me.

Clarence shrugs off the too-warm embrace. There is something odd in his chest, a hurting thing, and the local-talent grinning monkey boy across the way has done this painful, hurtful thing to the insides of his chest. He raises his hands and with them raises the fire, he lifts the volcano.

Dirklan Dubois thinks of the beach. Gus Ahtibat took him to the beach one time. The water comes rushing onto the sand, thinner, thinner, until it is only a white poppling foam. You can smell salt, a dry and yet happy smell, and if you snort in the air, moosh your lungs full of the smell, you know that you cannot be sad, that something healthy is inside of you just not letting you be sad.

Dirklan stands on the firm wet dark sand and holds out his hand.

Clarence takes the proffered hand.

They stand holding hands and the foam popples upon their naked toes.

“Cool,” Dirklan Dubois says, looking from his toes to the boy standing beside him, holding his hand.

The boy—Clarence—is thin and four or five inches shorter than himself.

The pale boy has light brown hair and very dark eyes. His round cheeks flush a simple red glow. The boy looks up from the foam poppling upon his toes and meets the eyes of the taller boy holding his hand.

“Cool,” Clarence Roiclaw says.

Then he does a very strange thing.

He smiles.

“Wanna be friends, maybe?” Dirklan Dubois sayes. “I’ve never really had a friend before, you know, not another kid, like me.”

Clarence Roiclaw considers.

His eyebrows lower.

His lips purse.

He is sitting again in the padded leather chair looking across the far distance to the other, older boy.

“This,” Clarence “The Dragon” Roiclaw says, softly, “is me.”

Part 6: Conflagration

THE PEDESTAL becomes a disk of too-bright fire. A pillar of fire, three and a half feet high and perhaps two and a half feet around, rises from the center of the pedestal. The pillar is orange-yellow with a blue center.

It opens eyes looking at Dirklan Dubois. It has a mouth that says:

“This...is me.”

The gaunt man stands close to the pedestal. He blinks his eyes in pain, attempting to clear his vision. A trickle of blood runs from his nose into his moustache.

He nearly faints, not due to the rampant virus coursing through his body, but because of the virulent power emanating from the pedestal.

Power, palpable and consuming, washes out of the pedestal like flood through a burst dam.

People screams and crowd those behind them.

The heat.

The heat. Suddenly they are not observing fascinating images, fireworks and comical shapes. No, suddenly they are not smelling salty oceans and feeling poppling foam. No, suddenly they are burning and their lungs sear in the steady waves of increasing heat.

Gus Ahtibat wails.

Turn it, Dirklan! Turn it boy! Nobody can diffuse anger like you!

He lifts his arms against the heat but it is no good. Too hot!

Turn it turn it please don’t let this happen boy turn it God help please because help nobody like you is nobody like you son...nobody can cope with hatred like you!

Your precious heart! You’re good, so good! Oh your precious heart! God! Don’t let him kill you son! Don’t kill him God!

Good-boy Dirklan should never have been pitted against this darkly boy-god.

Gus Ahtibat staggers backward from the heat. It is almost impossible to breathe.

Soon only one haggard and gaunt man stands close to the maelstrom of angry heat. Both sides of his nose stream dark blood. He stands as if mesmerized, as if impermeable to uncommon holocaust.

An HD-TV orb soaring close to the pedestal shatters and plunks to the ground. A droning klaxon rises low and wailing. The crowd tramples itself.

This is no show, it is real, the power is real, the fire is real, and in moments the conflagration will consume everything.

A security guard with a coat pulled over his head bravely dashes for the lone man near the pedestal. He seizes the man by the shoulders and yanks him back.

Farkus Dubois pivots and swings his fist. His forearm cracks the guard in the chest. The large man lifts from the ground and drops unconscious in the pool of super-heated air.

Farkus cooking now from both inside and out stands blinking. He looks from the pedestal to the fallen guard. Then he stoops and gathers the unconscious man below the arms and scuttles him backward, dragging him fifty feet away from the pedestal before he starts running—

—running as if there is not much ticking remaining to his singular life—

—running straight toward the heart of the evil sun.

Dirklan screams. He stands from his chair and starts to run. He turns and runs the other way.

He is burning. He is catching fire. It is too hot.

Then he remembers, and turns and says: “Cool.”

He stands in his little play pool, the one Jim—or was it Steve—had bought him when he was about four years old. Little pink fishes are painted on the inside.

Dirklan always loved the little pool. No matter how hot it got he could be cool.

It is cool now.

He is cool now. He looks down at his arms, at all the singed hairs, and he has burns everywhere, but he is cool now.

Smooth, everything is okay.

The burns on his arms heal and smooth and he feels fine again.

Dirklan Dubois reaches down and pulls the pool up about himself. The plastic stretches and shimmers into a turquoise bubble which he pulls up over his head. The bubble glows turquoise deep inside and cyan echoes like a halo, shimmering and cool, reverberating about him, like a shell, or force field.

He sends a tentative baby bubble toward where the boy Clarence must be. But the bubble explodes into hissing gas.

“This is me,” says yet another pillar of too-bright fire. There must be five or six of the pillars scattering about the pedestal, each bearing the stamp of Clarence’s face, shimmering pillars of fire, swaying like cobras.

“This is me.”

“This is me.”

“This is me.”

And in moments many more of the pillars rise. “This is me this is me this is me,” they speak, calmly. Each of them is the boy Clarence.

“This is me.”

The earlier pillars are grown taller, some of them as tall as six feet now. “This is me,” says another pillar of fire, standing very close to Dirklan’s airy bubble.

The Dragon smiles from himself. It feels good to smile, especially with all his mouths. He is thankful to Dirklan Dubois, local-boy talent, for teaching him the magic of smiling. As well as the perfection of projection, for now he is able to project himself, as had Dirklan.

And there is no need to vomit. It helps, seeing someone else do the trick first. And now his full power is upon him.

The power of fire.

The power of projection.

The power of creativity.

The Dragon understands if he were to take the silly CQ test right now he would probably go right off the scale. Projecting his number he would have to say, oh five hundred, maybe six hundred.

Perhaps three times his earlier attempts.

He looks from his eyes at himself standing looking at himself and smiles to himself who is also smiling back at him, and this is only the beginning, this isn’t even his left arm anymore, this is maybe his little finger, or the little toe on his right foot, he hasn’t even begun to flex his muscles, and in no way is this even just the beginning and how far can he go before there is anything close to an end?

Visions fill his many fiery heads, visions of a gigantic cloud in the shape of a mushroom, rising higher and higher.

I suppose I am a god, The Dragon thinks from the close distance of his many selves.

Clarences The Dragons turn their myriad eyes upon Dirklan Dubois.

“We are your friends,” say Clarences The Dragons in one impressively booming voice.

Dirklan nods his head without hesitation. Yes, we are friends.

“You are our only friend,” says Clarences The Dragons, several more pillars appearing, all smiling at the boy Dirklan.

The tallest of the pillars is now ten feet high and rising, swelling, breathing.

Dirklan thinks of one of those eco-bubbles, the kind they put over the dirtier cities, like the many agricultural bubbles spread on the moon.

One now forms about the pedestal, a perfect airy-blue globe which goes perhaps forty feet into the air and another forty feet into the ground.

“You wish to contain us,” says Clarences the Dragons in perfect unison.

“Uh-uh,” replies Dirklan. His personal bubble shrinks about him, comes close, fits down, and he absorbs it into his skin.

He stands in the waist-high flames and smiles at all the pillars.

“I just don’t want any of them out there to get hurt.”

The pillars chuckle with the crackle of pine cones popping.

“They are little, Dirklan our friend. They are not alone like us. We do not need to worry about hurting the little things.”

The pillars move toward the walls of the shimmering blue eco-sphere. They flicker and swell, testing the ethereal shield.

“We can get out.”

“We can escape,” the fiery pillars mumble.

“We can get out.”

“You cannot hold us, Dirklan.”

The walls of the sphere bulge ominously.

Dirklan reaches into his pocket. He produces his little salamander. Of course it isn’t really his salamander—that lizard he freed before coming here. Then again, wasn’t this little lizard—this little dragon—wasn’t it real?

He holds it gently in his palm and strokes its green scaly back. Even though he has created it, is maintaining its very life, it does breathe of its own will, it does have life.

He shows it to the Clarences.

“We hate bugs.”

“Ooh. We hate bugs.”

“Out! Keep it away! We hate little bugs.”

“He’s like a little dragon,” Dirklan says, smiling, petting the creature’s back.

The pillars lean in for a closer look. They hover and flame above Dirklan, peering down at the little green and pink lizard.

“We’re a lot bigger than this little dragon,” says Dirklan.

“Pretty.”

“Nice little dragon.”

“We like dragons,” the Clarences agree.

“We have to be careful with little things,” Dirklan says, smiling about at the pillars. “We have to take care of little things.”

“Little things.”

“Pretty things.”

“Little dragons.”

“Take care of them.”

Then something very unexpected happens.

One of the pillars close to Dirklan speaks up, louder and more dominant than the other pillars: “I...disagree. Strongly.”

Dirklan swallows hard and looks at the pillar. It is one of the middle-sized pillars of fire, perhaps six or seven feet tall. It flares a deep green blaze, in contrast to all the other Clarences.

“Dirklan is right,” speaks a pillar across the pedestal. “The strong must care for the weak.”

The green-fire pillar chuckles. “You only say that because you are weak.”

There is silence, save for the frightening music of the massed crackling flames.

Then the green-fire pillar bends low and consumes a four-foot-high orange pillar. The green pillar flares brown before returning to a dazzling green hue, more powerful than moments before. A green tendril shoots from the top of the pillar and snatches up the pillar that disagreed. Three more four-footers disappear into the green-fire pillar.

Suddenly another pillar of fire, this one fifteen feet or more, blazes deep red, mulls to burgundy, and sharpens to a bloody crimson.

“You stop it Clarence. I am the strongest Clarence. I say that Clarences may not consume Clarences. The others, the weak ones, the little people who are not gods, they are fair game. Except for Dirklan, who is friend to Clarences.”

Green Clarence roars laughter and shoots as high as the eco-sphere allows, broadening also, consuming several small- to medium-sized Clarences in the process of expanding. Burgundy Clarence also flares huge, also sucking in many of the other Clarences.

Dirklan swallows hard. He is very afraid. There is not much that he can think to do. Clarences Roiclaws The Dragons are out of any kind of control and warring amidst each other. He stands very still, stroking his little salamander.

Another Clarence, one of the tallest, flares a shimmering rainbow of blazing colors that are painful to look at, and loops down between Burgundy Clarence and Green Clarence.

“I am the oldest Clarence, and, as you can see, the most beautiful Clarence. Stop fighting, Clarences. Stop killing Clarences. We must talk, all of us—all of us Clarences must confer amongst ourselves.”

“Maybe,” replies Green Clarence, looping down to place his fiery eyes close to Rainbow Clarence’s eyes. “But Dirklan must go. He is not one of us. He is not a Clarence.”

“Dirklan is a bug,” says Burgundy Clarence, looping in to join heads with Rainbow and Green.

“We hate bugs,” says a flaring Ice-Blue Clarence, a much thicker pillar of fire, in fact; this Clarence appears more a constant electrical arc than a pillar of flame. It jolts in stop-action surges of power, illuminating painfully bright to see.

“We hate bugs.”

“Bugs, yuk.”

“Yes, it’s true, we hate bugs!”

“Dirklan is our friend.”

“Yes, Dirklan is a friend of Clarences.”

“Dirklan is a bug!”

The pillars are adapting new colors, flaring to different heights and breadths, some looking like pools of lava, others like fountains of acid, flames and sparklers and torches of intense fire.

Even the least of the Clarences is a powerful spectacle to behold.

Dirklan knows he can not leave, even if the Clarences were to allow him to depart. He is the only person, probably in the world, who might be able to handle the very real monster Clarence has become—actually, the many monsters that the Clarences have become and are even now becoming, becoming and altering and evolving.

One Clarence “The Dragon” Roiclaw—seven-year-old boy-creature prodigy—is more than a handful to control; but to attempt soothing forty, fifty or sixty fiery Clarences, some of them forty feet tall, all of them composed of powerful, ethereal thought matter, all of them demanding individuality, morality, and especially superiority—well, Dirklan Dubois has not even the faintest beginnings of a strategy.

It is impossible.

Nobody can do the impossible.

Dirklan flicks his eyes to the left, to the wall of the eco-sphere where some disturbance pulses and glows. Uh-oh. If the Clarences decide to escape into the general world...

A shimmering blue circle, seemingly composed of the same matter as the eco-sphere, purs and hums with the noise of a lasersaw. The circle, swirling, honing, is perhaps six feet tall, a perfect circle aswirl with atmosphere, earth, and conflagration.

An image appears within the circle—the profile of a man—at first Dirklan thinks it must be a giant penny forming within the matter of his eco-sphere. But there is no Lincoln beard on the man’s face. Rather, a large moustache which hides the man’s mouth. It is not a penny, but it does seem to be a glowing six-foot-high coin.

Words appeared at the top of the coin, above the man’s profile, or rather one word: Liberty. Then another word appears at the bottom of the coin, below the bust: Creativity.

Dirklan almost recognizes the face.

A man with a ton of dark back-swept hair, with shocks of silver at the temples, silver shocks that trail tendrils waving back over the man’s ears. Below the hair is a large, prominent forehead free of wrinkles, below that a strong, sloping nose, high cheekbones, glaringly powerful dagger-eyes, a protruding and sensually full lower lip above a rugged jaw and a boxer’s chin.

“We know this man.”

“I know this man.”

“He is familiar, although I cannot place him...yet.”

“I do not know him.”

“We know him, yes we know him well.”

The Clarences murmur and chuckle, spark and flash.

Dirklan Dubois cocks his head.

Yes, very familiar, like the actor in some movie he had watched when he was a child but could no longer quite remember.

The profile is no longer the embossed metal of a coin. It is a real face, the head three feet high, the bust another two-and-a-half feet. Slowly the head turns, the face revolves into full-front view. The man’s face is rugged and intelligent, angry and humorous. The dark eyes look contemptuously about at the flames, the pillars, the rainbows and bolts and teardrops of fire. The brows above the eyes are exaggeratedly flexed like muscles.

The dark man’s gaze find Dirklan. The huge face softens. What must be a smile forms, quirking the luxurious moustache.

“Boys. Oh boys, boys,” the dark face speaks in a voice of deep thunder. “Boys. What mischief have you gotten into?”

Dirklan is confused. He has not created this image. And seemingly the Clarences are as mystified as himself.

The true face freezes. Turns to ice. The coin falls away from the eco-sphere, leaving the wall intact, as if it vibrated through the ethereal bubble. The coin falls upon the fiery surface of the pedestal and it rings like a silver bell. It spins and revolves, then rises above the surface to hang suspended five feet in the crackling air.

And then something rises up out of the surface of the coin. A dog. The dog looks left and right, its tongue lolling in the heat. The animal throws back its head and rips the air with a startling howl.

It is no dog.

The wolf leaps from the coin and lands in the fire.

Part 7: Drawing Three

Dirklan Dubois starts. He forms a blue eco-skin to send after the beast, fearing for its life, but the animal seems impervious to the flames. It lopes amidst the pillars of fire, collecting the flames, absorbing the heat, dashing faster and faster, until it is a wolf composed of flame and smoke. The wolf flashes near Dirklan and he extends his hand and barely brushes its flank with his fingers.

The wolf returns to the coin and effortlessly leaps to its surface. Again it rears back and howls and the flames fall sprinkling away from its pelt like rain, a myriad winking red rubies.

The wolf sits back, panting.

“Another bug.”

“We hate bugs. Yuk.”

“This is not a bug, but we do not know him.”

“Yes. We know him.”

“A childish display. Obviously old-time Thinker.”

“Smash it. Burn it.”

“No. I almost know him. Look into his eyes. Don’t we know him?”

“You don’t know me, Clarence Roiclaw. But I know you,” says the wolf, teeth flashing in a toothy grin.

“Who are you?” Dirklan says, his throat feeling plugged. He blinks. He does know who this is. He remembers pictures. A snippet in the HD Encyclopedia. But the appearance here seems impossible—possibly Dirklan has created this image, has created this visitation because of his terrible fear.

The wolf turns upon the coin to regard the blue-skinned boy.

“Don’t you know me?”

Then the wolf flows up. It melts and twists in reverse, rising tall upon the coin, its pelt sweeping inward until a pink, naked-from-the-waist-up man stands tall and powerful upon the coin.

“Dirklan Harrison Dubois,” says the man, “I am your father. Do you remember me? Farkus Wolfgang Dubois. Do you remember me? Do you remember Papa?”

Dirklan Dubois feels he might burst into tears.

You’re supposed to be in prison. You left me.

He opens his mouth to speak, but cannot form words. Mama said you were a bad man—are a bad man. Do I remember you, even though I was just a little kid when you left me? Do I remember you?

He nods his head, once, shyly. Then nods again.

Yes, I remember you, Papa.

Farkus Dubois nods to the boy.

The tall man does not look quite as fit as the coin apparition. This man looks nearly worn away, lean, emaciated, and steadily looking more faded. There is a dark growth of beard upon his slack cheeks, about a week or two’s worth, and his hair is nearly all gray. And there is a high color upon his face, upon his body, as if he were consumed with fever.

There is movement within the sphere. Rainbow Clarence approaches the man, looping down, coiling, its fire eyes moving close to the man.

“You are making me angry,” Rainbow Clarence says.

“I’m going to make you a little more than angry, little boy,” Farkus Dubois says, squarely facing the rainbow display. He flexes his big bony hands into fists.

“You said you know me,” Rainbow Clarence says. “Do you know me?”

The other fire creatures converge upon the man.

“Leave him alone,” says Dirklan Dubois, holding the little green salamander in both hands.

“I know you, Dragon,” says Farkus Dubois, his bristled eyebrows drawn together, his jaw set.

“Know this,” says Rainbow Clarence, looping in about Farkus, coiling around him like an anaconda about a rabbit.

Farkus Dubois sways. His eyes blank.

He sees himself lying upon a metal table. He is larger and younger, his hair only partially gray, and he is naked. Three figures in complete surgical garb bend over him. The scene is familiar, somehow, and yet completely alien. The figures are moving about him—and it is obvious what they are doing to him, with beakers and devices.

They are milking him. Stealing his genetic future. Stealing him.

“Oh, but...” Farkus Dubois breathes, his eyesight returning to him, standing within the coils of Rainbow Clarence.

“Now you know me,” Rainbow Dubois says, oddly quiet. “Now you know me. And now I know you, Papa.”

It is a vivid image stolen from Buzzbee—but only now has it become evident to Clarence, decipherable, clear in his new powers, his new strength.

Clarence understands, finally, he understand Papa Bank.

Before it had been only coded twitches of black and white, memories of an old man, a pervert, a dirty old man—a monster. Now the image is three-dimensional and perfect, colorized, filled with virile smells and dynamic shadow.

Farkus Dubois looks at the rainbow creature circling him. His eyes fill with tears.

He is undone. Utterly undone. He has come here to slay a monster. He has come here to save his son. He is undone.

The virus in him rises up nearly as powerful as the rainbow creature. He cannot sacrifice one boy to save the other, even if one is a monster. He exhales as if he has taken a punch to the gut, and drops to one knee.

The coin hitches, drops through the air a foot, then abruptly plummets to the pedestal.

Farkus Dubois rolls into the fire, and begins to burn.

“Leave him alone!” Dirklan Dubois cries, running toward his father, shooting out his best blue bubble to save the burning man, but before he can get to the fallen man Rainbow Clarence catches Farkus up in shimmering coils.

“I will not hurt Papa,” says Rainbow Clarence. “But he is dying, Brother.”

That is what Buzzbee meant, silently cackling about irony. The irony of brothers meeting unknowing. Of course Buzzbee could not project the further and more dramatic irony of the father of the boys arriving.

“He is not my father,” roars Green Clarence. “The bugs are not my family. My father was dear Papa Bank, my mother was sweet Mama Pool. I hate bugs. I am alone. I hate family!”

A wing sprouts from Rainbow Clarence’s back and slaps Green Clarence in the face.

“You,” says Rainbow Clarence, “are not me. I am Clarence Roiclaw. No. I am Clarence Dubois.”

“I hate bugs!” roars Green Clarence, spreading thicker, absorbing many of the fire pillars. “I hate you! I hate you, Clarence!”

Many of the pillars, the Purple Clarence, the Violet Bolt Clarence, and the lesser-merely-flame Clarences, rush from the path of Green Clarence. They flow like waves and enter Rainbow Clarence.

Green Clarence snatches Orange Clarence as it races for Rainbow, then Burgundy Clarence, who fights briefly before consumption.

Ice-Blue Electric-Arc Clarence dives into Rainbow Clarence.

Only two great pillars of fire remain. Green roars and bellows from its titanic maw.

Rainbow Clarence, holding Farkus Dubois in its shimmering coils, sucks in all the flames from the pedestal.

Dirklan Dubois peeks from behind Rainbow Clarence. He reaches like he has never reached before. He brings up his hands above his head and pulls.

The blue eco-sphere shrinks, tightens and intensifies. It zips down and passes through himself and Rainbow Clarence, collapsing like a shriveling skin, to fall upon Green Clarence. The sphere tightens like a hundred huge flickering blue hands to throttle the green monster.

Green Clarence rears back, roaring. It pushes at the sphere and blares fire. Shrieking horribly, the monster writhes in the enveloping blue skin. Green Clarence begins to shrink, compress, condense, and possibly fade.

Rainbow Clarence reaches out a tendril, wraps it about the green hater—and draws in. Rainbow Clarence throws several more tendrils about the struggling behemoth.

Green Clarence rocks against the forces, ripping its talons through the blue curtain, rending it aside, biting down its maw into the rainbow tendrils, and shakes its great self free.

“Child’s play,” Green Clarence says, rising higher, greater, passing the limits which the eco-sphere had contained it. “You cannot stop a god!”

It is true. Nothing can stop Green Clarence. It is impossible.

And nobody can do the impossible.

But Dirklan looks at the stranger that is his father. Grimly, he nods his head and turns back to the titanic green monster.

“Look!” Dirklan Dubois yells, stepping around Rainbow Clarence. “A bug!”

Green Clarence ceases roaring.

“Where? Liar! I don’t see a bug!”

Dirklan Dubois releases his tiny shimmering green salamander. It creeps forward, its bulbous eyes swiveling fluidly. The lizard dashes toward Green Clarence.

Green Clarence bellows laughter.

The salamander flicks out its obsidian tongue.

“Ouch!” Green Clarence roars.

And then the green salamander rears up, suddenly the size of an iguana, flowing faster than Dirklan can control, as big and dangerous-looking as a Komodo dragon, and this is obviously Rainbow Clarence aiding him, and glancing down, Dirklan sees that Farkus Dubois is also concentrating, adding his own creative force to the powerful mix, the drawing of the three, Clarence and Dirklan and Farkus, and the swelling lizards is now as long and bumpy as the most humungous crocodile, and now is bigger, bigger, a green wingless dragon the size of a truck with a long black tongue uncoiling.

“Wait!” Green Clarence shrieks. “Wait! I am the dragon! Stop copying me! You stupid cheaters! You stupid cheater bugs! I hate you all, I hate bugs, I hate you, cheaters, I hate, I hate...”

The green dragon snaps out its tongue, and screaming, Green Clarence whips down, funneling down, attempting to form cylindrical arms even as he vanishes to grapple at the pedestal, but the dragon inhales him, inexorably deeper.

“I hate—” and Green Clarence is gone.

The dragon rumbles. The pedestal shakes. Suddenly the dragon’s belly bulges, impossibly pregnant.

Dirklan Dubois grips his hands tightly. His knuckles pop, straining bone white. Green Clarence has not given up, not yet. There is still some fight left in him.

Then the green dragon that once was a small salamander opens its mouth and burps, a loud sour belch. A perfect white smoke ring wafts above its nose. Slowly, the dragon melts, shrinking, and the little green salamander swivels its fluid eyes, crawling upon the charred pedestal.

Dirklan looks to the small boy standing next to him. Clarence smiles shyly.

“I really feel different, Dragon Catcher,” Clarence says. “Dirklan? I feel very...different—happy.”

Dirklan drops to his knees alongside the burned man. The man trembles, his breath wheezing, eyes squeezed shut. Dirklan puts his hand upon the man’s fevered brow and smoothes back his hair.

“I’m here, Papa. Me. It’s me, Dirklan, your son. And Clarence, too.”

The man softly laughs, and coughs.

“Funny. Ironic. Came here. Save. Son. Try and give. Disease. Prison sentence. Rash. Kill. Save son.”

Clarence kneels next to the man and takes his hand. “You were successful—um, Papa. You saved your son. You saved both your sons.”

“We have to help him,” Dirklan says, even as he speaks feeling the poppling bubbles upon his toes, hearing a seashell he finds on the beach, warm sand and cool breeze, smelling the healthy salten air.

“Over.” Farkus Dubois draws into a fetal ball. “Happy. Okay. Don’t. Worry.”

“No!” Dirklan cries, tears leaking down his face. His memories of the beach break up. He cannot hold it all together. He reaches out, trying again, with his heart, with all his heart, and feels his father.

“Here,” Clarence says, taking Dirklan’s free hand. And he joins him, reaching with his heart.

Together the boys enter, feeling, looking and knowing, exploring and sensing, and they taste the tainted blood, blood riddled with holes, blood steaming and thinning.

Artificial viruses and nano machines, chemical releases, and other horrors, all in here, inside their father.

Brother, Clarence breathes, here, for Papa, my blood.

Dirklan gulps and nods, and here is my blood, for Papa.

They smooth the corrugated fluid and create patches. Clarence finds several holes and plugs them. Dirklan presses himself into an inner wound and brings flesh in close, together, channeling and breathing, moving and straightening.

Clarence chases down the machines, squishes them, these man-made bugs, removes them. Dirklan draws together all the chemical wastes and removes them.

The fading man exhales, eyelids fluttering.

“Papa!” Dirklan blubbers. “He’s too weak. He’s dying! Clarence!”

Clarence reached down to another series of black-and-white codes folded neatly within his brain.

He converts them.

He breathes luminous colors.

A beautiful pale woman with dark hair and perfect eyes lies quietly, sleeping, unmoving as if enchanted, lovely and enchanted, perhaps awaiting the magical kiss to awaken her. Ah, yes, for the first time, Mama Pool, my Mama—look Papa!

Another lone wolf, waiting, like us, Papa, waiting and alone—waiting for you, Papa! Waiting for us! You’re not finished yet, there is still work to do! You have always been alone, Papa, as is she, and if you leave, Papa, she will always be alone.

The pale man shivers.

Does he even hear? Does he even know his boys?

It is too late.

Too late.

“Breathe,” Dirklan whispers.

Too late.

“Breathe,” Clarence whispers.

Just too late.

The pale man exhales and his body relaxes. His face smoothes, tension pouring away from his tired body. He finally lies at peace.

“Oh Papa, you can’t leave! You don’t know me yet!” Clarence wails, shedding the first real tears of his life. His small body shudders with anguish, as if he were no more than an uncontrollable toddler demanding affection.

“Wait! Wait Clarence! Look, look at him!” Dirklan shouts.

Farkus Dubois opens one eye. He turns his head, briefly. His pupil expands and contracts. His eyelid blinks moisture. His eye rolls around to focus on the boys.

“I better not be dead,” he mutters.

The boys laugh, their voices pure and thankful.

Clarence drops and hugs the man. He buries his face in his father’s hairy chest and remains very still, as if too shy to move. Dirklan snuggles in close, placing an arm about his brother’s waist and the other about his father’s neck.

“Us,” someone breathes.

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