The Fight Between Goofy the Dragon Hunter and Zhyldyz the Multiversal Dragon
By Conner and Landon
On a luscious green hill, where fierce winds rushed off the edge of the hill, and where green trees grew abundantly, a dragon slept in a soft patch of grass. That dragon’s name was Zhyldyz. It had only meant to take a brief nap to regain its energy after several days of non-stop travel, but that nap had quickly turned into a deep, restful slumber. The slumber was so deep that it didn’t hear the dragon hunter’s stomping footsteps, nor the cage that the hunter hauled behind him.
When the hunter reached the top of the hill where the dragon rested, he smiled a dirty smile and saw that the cage in its current form was too big. This dragon could be no more than ten years old, though he guessed that it was perhaps closer to five. He gently touched the dragon on the back and noticed that it was unique, different from any other dragon he had seen. Instead of the typical reptilian scales that dragons had, this dragon had scales like cardboard and teeth like a vampire’s. Its body was also peculiar: short and not seeming to fit in proportionally with the rest of the body. It had three legs, two in the front and one in the back that was shorter than the other two, but the foot made up for the difference. Above the back leg it had three tails, one orange, one green and one brown, tightly coiled around each other, and at the end of the tails there was a spike that was as sharp as a thousand knives.
The hunter grinned, thinking of all the money he would make off of this dragon’s scales. The more unique they were, the more people wanted them. Clothing, carpets, arts and crafts… Whatever existed in the world, people wanted it to be crafted with exotic materials.
Goofy picked up the cage, a metal platform that could magically grow, and there were iron ribs that sprouted from the platform, and those too could magically grow, and snap shut at incredible speeds too. He prepared his mighty muscles to throw it at the dragon, and from there it would wrap around the dragon and make it easy to get the dragon back to its evil lair. He could feel its weight as it grew to the dragon's. Unfortunately for the hunter, as he began the throwing motion, there was a SNAP! A twig had broken beneath his feet. That sound broke through the dragon's sleep and it quickly woke, confused. Zhyldyz started flapping its wings that most certainly did not seem to be proportioned relative to the body in a way that would make it a volant creature, but then dragons were hardly logical in any other way.
The dragon flew up from the hill hovered in the air, far enough away that Goofy couldn’t hit it with the cage, as it had seen what cages such as this could do. The cages were forged by the humans, and they drained the magic from everything they touched.
“Darn you, dragon!” cried the hunter in a heavy accent that made it sound as though he was talking through a fan, though neither had any idea what a fan was. His breath smelled of sewage. “They call me Goofy: Goofy the Dragon Hunter, a name to strike fear in all enemies! I will capture you!”
The dragon didn’t wish to engage in a fight at the moment, so it turned away from the hunter. It beat its wings, preparing to fly away, adding to the already fierce wind. It flew forward, and it started at what could be described as a walk, and then a run, and then a sprint, and then faster than any human could ever travel. In all this time, Zhyldyz hadn’t noticed that the hunter had made a powerful leap and latched onto its back legs and was clinging on with an iron grip.
The dragon struggled against the wind, which howled like a thousand people. It pushed against their every move, but the dragon pushed back, and flew and flew, the scenery becoming a blur, until something odd happened.
The blue sky remained, but the wind and grassy scenery was gone. In place of the grass was water that stretched for miles and miles; the planet was water that spilled into infinity.
Goofy was shocked when he saw the new scenery around him. He had never before seen a dragon with this ability, whatever it was. Then again, he reminded himself, one never could predict what a dragon could do.
“I’ll get you, dragon!” he shouted.
Zhyldyz turned its head to look at Goofy, not believing that a human could have followed it across universes, and yet its eyes confirmed what its ears had told it. A human had somehow managed to travel across universes with it. At first, Zhyldyz was filled with anger at this occurrence. It took a lot of energy to transport just one being across universes, and to transport two would drain it of even more energy. After thinking on it for a moment, though, Zhyldyz began to respect the human for being able to travel across universes and remain in one piece, and not only alive but conscious too, and so it decided that instead of shaking the hunter off and marooning him, it would return him to his home universe and then travel off.
Following that decision, Zhyldyz started speeding up. Again, they flew and flew until the scenery around them became a blur, and they were again transported to another universe, and then another and another. They traveled through shadow and sun, through beginnings and ends, through shattered plains and forgotten realms.
Goofy, mistaking the dragons attempt to aid him, thought that dragon was trying to desert him, and decided that not only did he want the scales for money, but also to get revenge on this dragon, and so when they arrived back at his home universe, he let go the dragons leg, took a moment to catch his breath, then threw a cage at the dragon.
Zhyldyz saw the cage coming for it and evaded it.
“Why, human?” the dragon asked in a voice like that of a whining baby. “I was helping you.”
“Because, dragon, your kind are the most dangerous beings to ever exist!” Goofy shouted, trying to buy time. As he spoke, he reached into his belt and retrieved several poisoned darts that would knock numb the dragon’s body. “And your scales will definitely sell for tons.”
It was only when he said his last part that Zhyldyz realized the greed that was rooted so deep in the heart of this man.
Goofy quickly threw several darts, and while Zhyldyz evaded most of them, one of them hit its right wing. Numbness spread from it to the rest of its body, and it fell to the ground, just barely able to feel its legs. A feeling of helplessness quickly came over the dragon, who had never been in a situation like this.
Goofy walked over to the cage and picked it up. He quickly returned to the dragon, already imagining the money that he would make off of it. But when he got back to Zhyldyz, he was greeted with an empty patch of grass.
When Goofy had walked away, the dragon had found that it had a little energy in its legs. It had rolled and rolled, slowly inching toward the edge of the cliff, until it had tumbled off. It fell and fell, and the dragon became concerned that perhaps the darts had also disabled its abilities. Closer and closer to the ground it fell, and higher and higher its concern grew, until at last it gained the proper amount of speed and was able to teleport away. It settled down to rest to regain its energy, glancing at the crimson sky above and then down to the crimson rock floor. The dragon couldn’t wait to return home.
Goofy looked behind every rock, tree, and hill in search of the dragon but Zhyldyz was nowhere to be seen. Goofy, filled with regret, realized that Zhyldyz was gone. But then again, there was always another dragon to hunt. And with that thought, Goofy smiled.
