Fiction: Greg and the Dragon

I'M BACK.

Hi. Yeah. I am indeed back. Haven't done one of these in a while. This here piece of insanity is a response to Chuck Wendig's flash fiction challenge of the week. My opening line belongs to tbianconi and it is:

“You amuse me, human,” the Dragon said, swallowing several thousand Smarties in on gulp.

 Now, on to the story. :D Enjoy!

 Greg and the Dragon

“You amuse me, human,” the Dragon said, swallowing several thousand Smarties in one gulp.

“Glad to be of service,” said the human through gritted teeth. The Dragon sniggered and a puff of smoke jetted from his nostrils and surrounded his guest, an unfortunate beanpole of a creature that called himself ‘Greg’.

“Oh dear,” said the Dragon. “Excuse me.”

He waved a scaly paw in Greg’s direction and the cloud dispersed, leaving a sooty and disgruntled Greg in its wake.

“Alright there?” the Dragon inquired. The hanging chain squeaked as it swung, slowly bringing Greg back around to face him. Greg glowered. His face glowed scarlet under the soot and little showers of ash fell from his hair every time he moved. His face contorted.

“Just—spiffing,” he bit out.

“Good, good,” said the Dragon. “I do like to think my guests enjoy themselves while they’re here.”

“I see. And do most of the humans you’ve encountered enjoy being chained and hung upside down from the ceiling of a chocolate factory?”

The Dragon’s brow furrowed. “Upside down?”

“Yes, you bloody lizard—”

“Language, young man!”

“What?”

“Watch—your—language. I do not appreciate such… intolerant vocabularies,” the Dragon said, drawing himself up. The pair glared at each other, eyes narrowed. Greg scowled and crossed his arms over his chest. The Dragon raised a scaled ridge above his eyes that seemed to serve as an eyebrow. Greg sagged and the Dragon preened slightly. “Now,” the Dragon continued. “What was that you were saying about being hung upside down from the ceiling of a chocolate factory?”

“What is there to say? I am hanging upside down from the ceiling of a chocolate factory—a chocolate factory that does not belong to you, I might add. The issue seems pretty self-explanatory.”

“But you’re not upside down, are you?” the Dragon said, peering closer at the slight figure.

“I’m sorry?”

“I did put you the right way up, didn’t I? I was quite sure I had…”

“You did what?”

“Did I—how would you say it nowadays… fuck up?”

Greg blinked.

“Erm… just a bit.”

“Oh bollocks,” the Dragon said, sounding so dispirited that Greg almost felt sorry for him. “My apologies. Here you go.”

And without quite knowing how it was achieved without the use of interposable thumbs, Greg found himself unchained, standing on the small platform to which his feet had been bound, and—mercifully—facing up the right way.

“Is that better?” the Dragon said, eying him critically. Greg nodded, still slightly shaken. The Dragon shifted uncomfortably. “I really am sorry, you know. It’s just—it’s been a while.”

“A while?”

“Since I’ve had human company,” the Dragon elaborated. “I forget these little details.”

“Of course, of course,” Greg said understandingly. “Could happen to anyone.”

The Dragon seemed somewhat cheered. 

“You think so?”

Greg waved a hand. “Of course. Really, I mean I forget little details all the time. It’s just part of getting old, you know…”

The Dragon drew back slightly.

“Not to say that you’re getting old, though,” Greg hastened to assure him. He thought back desperately everything he’d ever read about dragons. “You look fit to be storming down castles and kidnapping virgins—you know; all that sort of stuff…”

The Dragon drew back further and Greg realised this had probably not been a brilliant plan.

“Err—never mind. More Smarties?” Greg offered.

For a long moment, Greg thought he might be about to find out what the inside of a fireball looked like—but then the Dragon seemed to relent, mollified by the prospect of Smarties.

“If you insist,” he said, and swiped his tongue through the mountain of multi-coloured chocolates. Greg grimaced and wondered how he was going to explain all this to the plant manager when he arrived for work in the morning.

“If you don’t mind me asking,” Greg ventured. “What are you doing here?”

“Where?”

“In a chocolate factory. Specifically this one.”

“Well,” said the Dragon. “I went over to Europe for a while to have a look at their St George celebrations, and when I came back, somebody had built over my dungeon.”

He shrugged.

Greg frowned. “This place was built twenty years ago. And the land had been empty for years before that. How can that be?”

The Dragon thought. “Well what century is it?” he asked.

“The twenty-first,” Greg said.

“Ah,” said the Dragon. “That explains it then.”

“How?”

“I left in the fifteenth.”

Greg nodded slowly. “Yeah… I reckon that might be it.”

And then neither of them spoke for a while, the Dragon because he was again preoccupied by Smarties, and Greg because he was busy identifying and regretting every life choice that had led him to this moment.

END.