The Hideous RuffleTuffleback Chapter 4
They got through that day in reasonably normal fashion, finishing their chores and doing nothing remotely reptilian. Their main thought throughout the day was that the weird event of two nights ago was just one of those crazy things that happened to them now and then, and it was over, and it wouldn't happen again. They didn't voice that thought to each other, but they were both thinking it, right up until the midnight moment when Ruff got out of bed and staggered toward the door.
"Where are you going?" her brother asked weakly.
"I don't feel so good," she moaned.
"Is it just an 'I ate something bad' feeling, or is it a 'like two nights ago' feeling?" he pressed her as he reached for his boots.
"The second one."
"Did I mention I wanted only good news?" he said as he joined her in heading for the exit. "You're supposed to tell me it's just Mom's rancid cooking, and we'll both be fine once we get it out of our... oh, man, that hurts! That very much hurts!" He barely made it out the door before he doubled over and fell to his knees. She held out a little longer, and tried to put some distance between them.
"Where are you going?" he asked.
"Maybe, if we aren't so close together, we can't turn into a dragon," she gasped as she sank to her knees. "I mean, if it takes both of us to make one Zippleback..." She couldn't finish; she felt too dizzy to take another step. A few moments later... she was staring at half of a Zippleback, and she knew she was the other half. They both cried out in surprise, even though they knew both of them were looking at their twin.
"Now what do we do?" Tuff asked after a second.
"I don't know," she hissed with a shake of her head. "I haven't had much practice at being a dragon."
"Duh! You aren't a dragon!" her brother snapped back.
"Well, I'm pretty sure I look like one," she retorted, "because you look like one, and I'm part of the same dragon you are! And you sound like a dragon, and you smell like a dragon – yecch! Your breath is even worse than usual! How did you do that?"
"You should talk! You're the one that will have the green gas coming out of your mouth!" Tuff shot back. "Talk about bad breath!"
"Well, I never did that, so you can't talk," Ruff answered. "I don't even know how to do that! I bet you can't make your mouth spark, either."
Tuff considered that for a moment. "When you start a fire, you strike your flint against steel to make sparks. So if I'm going to make sparks, I have to strike something against something else. Maybe all I have to do is hit my teeth together!" He tried it. "Ow! No, that didn't work."
"My brother is seriously trying to make sparks with his mouth?" Ruff shook her head. "Can you imagine what Snotlout would say if he knew about this?"
"He'd probably try to kill us," Tuff answered. That ended the conversation for a few seconds.
"Tuff, what are we going to do? So far, we're turning into a dragon at night, when no one can see us, but what if we turned into a dragon in the daytime?"
Tuff considered that. "Hey, what if we turned into a dragon in the middle of Dragon Training? They wouldn't know who to fight! That could be totally cool!"
"Tuff, do you think Astrid coming at you with her axe would be totally cool?"
"Oh. Yeah. Maybe not. Maybe you could breathe some green gas and scare her off."
"Tuffnut, I don't know how! I don't even know how to learn how! Who's going to teach me – you?"
"Maybe another dragon would show us how."
Ruff rolled her eyes; it was a familiar gesture to her brother, even though her head was green and reptilian now. "Seriously? What are we supposed to do – just walk into the training ring, open one of the doors, and say, 'Hi, nice dragon. We don't know what we're doing. Can you show us how to breathe gas and spark it?' Those other dragons don't even have gas! They're fire-breathers!"
"I bet they'd have some gas if we fed them beans!" Tuff said, and giggled at the thought. Ruff rolled her eyes again.
"Idiot! Even if they knew how, there's two big problems with your stupid idea. One, they'd attack us if they saw us, and two, dragons can't talk!"
"Hmm." Somehow, Tuff's dragon face managed to look thoughtful. "Would they attack us if they thought we were just another dragon?"
Ruff considered that. "Maybe, and maybe not. I don't know."
Tuff pondered some more. "And who says dragons can't talk? We're talking, and we're a dragon, right?"
"No, we're people who got turned into a dragon," his sister retorted. "We aren't a real dragon! It's different. I'm sure the real dragons can tell the difference, too."
"Okay, if you don't like my plan, then what's your plan?" Tuff demanded.
"We wait until this dragon thing wears off, like it did last time," she answered after a moment. "Then we go back to normal."
"Until we turn into a dragon again, and then we'll still need a plan to deal with it," Tuff replied smugly, pleased that he'd actually proven her wrong for a change. "This dragon thing probably isn't going to just wear off and go away. We've been a dragon tonight for longer than we did last time. What if it keeps getting worse every time, until we're a dragon all the time and never go back to being people?"
"I don't want to think about that," she said.
"Well, we need to do something!" he went on. "What if our friends catch us like this? We don't know how to fight, or fly, or anything! They'd kill us! We have to do something to learn how to protect ourselves! Only a dragon can help us be a better dragon."
"Tuff, the last time I sneaked into the training ring with you, it was the biggest mistake of my life! Now you want me to do it again?"
"Why not?" he demanded.
She thought about it.
"I guess we don't have much to lose," she finally nodded. "I mean, they can't turn us into dragons again, right?" They turned toward the training ring... and fell flat on their faces.
"What just happened?" he asked, slightly stunned from the force of his head hitting the ground.
"I tried to walk, and it didn't work," she answered, a bit groggily.
"What do you mean, you tried to walk?" he demanded. "I'm the one who was trying to walk! Just like this!" They struggled to their feet, and then fell down again. "Quit that!" he ordered.
"Quit what?"
"Quit trying to control our legs! I'll do the walking here," he ordered.
"Says who?"
"Says me!" Again they tried to stand, and again it didn't work.
"I guess only one of us can do the walking at a time," she said. "I'll tell you what. I'll start us walking, and as soon as I know what I'm doing, I'll let you take a turn. Deal?"
"How come you get to go first?" he asked suspiciously.
"Because I'm a lady," she answered with a saucy toss of her scaly head. "Duh!"
"A dragon lady!" he added, and snickered. She realized that she had no hands to hit him with, so she lunged and tried to bite him; he pulled back and she missed. She lunged again, and missed again. The third time, she got aggravated and tried to scream at him. What came out was a draconic bellow, and a puff of green gas.
"Yuck! Sister, that stinks!" he exclaimed. "Don't you ever complain about my odor again!"
"Did you see that?" she gasped. "I did it, a little! I made the smoke! Let me try that again."
"Sure, but face away from me this time," he urged her. She opened her mouth, and a thick stream of the green smoke poured out. Some of it pooled in a small depression in the ground right in front of them; the rest spread out all around them.
"That's it!" she nearly shouted. "All I had to do was try to shout and cough at the same time. I can totally do this!"
"Shout and cough?" Tuff wondered. "I can do that, I think." He tried it. Sparks shot out of his mouth... and ignited the green gas, which blew up with a sharp blast that made their ears ring and was probably audible all over the town.
"I didn't mean to do that," he said apologetically.
"We better get out of here before somebody wakes up and sees us!" she exclaimed.
"Yeah, but where do we go?" he wondered.
"Anywhere!" she shot back. They started to run, and tripped again. "Hey! I said let me do the walking first!"
"You can walk later!" he retorted. "I run faster than you, and we need to run, so let me do it!" She gave up and nodded, and they began running, awkwardly at first, but with better balance as Tuff got used to running with four legs.
"This is weird, but it's working," Tuff panted.
"Where are you taking us?" she asked.
"The training ring! That's where we agreed to go, right?"
"That was before we woke up half the village!" she answered heatedly. "If they start looking around and they find us in the training ring, they'll trap us there!"
"They won't look there," he said as they crossed the wooden bridge that led to the ring. "If you were a dragon and didn't want to get caught, the training ring is the last place you'd go, right?"
"Yes, I am a dragon," she nodded. "Yes, I don't want to get caught. And yes, the training ring is the last place I want to go!"
"Great! Then we're agreed." They stopped in front of the closed portcullis door that blocked their way into the ring. "How do we open this thing?"
"With our hand, just like we did when we were people," Ruff said. She reached out one stubby foreleg, hooked her claws into the wood, and lifted. The portcullis shot up as though spring-loaded. "Wow! I'm really strong now!"
"So am I," Tuff reminded her.
"Yeah, but odor isn't anything to brag about," she answered snidely. "Now let me do the walking." She lowered her head and cautiously stepped into the dragon training ring. He was looking around, and banged his head against the top of the door frame.
"Duck," she said mischievously.
"I'm not a duck, I'm a dragon!" he argued as he belatedly lowered his head and entered the ring with her.
"Yeah, I noticed," she muttered. The closed dragon-cell doors lay in front of them, dark, silent, and vaguely threatening.