I made my way to my room and got ready for bed. I put my tanto beside the bed and got my MP3 player. I turned it on and tried for half an hour to get comfortable, It turns out dragon bodies are more suited to different sleeping positions. I settled for a position my cat slept in, on my side in a crescent position. After listening to random songs for a few minutes, I took the earphones out and quickly fell asleep.

I woke up later that night and couldn't get back to sleep, so I decided to go for a walk. I got up and instantly realized something was different. For one my butt was way up in the air. Then I realized I was in my old room! I looked at myself, I was human! I stood up and walked over to the door; I reached for the doorknob and was relived when my hand didn't go through it. I wasn't dead! "I guess it was all a dream." I said.

I went to the living room and started watching late night TV. It was in the middle of my favorite show that I heard a gunshot. I stood up, ran to the kitchen, grabbed the 11 inch serrated bread knife, and got the 12-inch meat knife for my offhand, then I made my way down the hallway. I stopped outside my sisters room, There was a man in the dark holding a shotgun. I just stared in shock as he tuned and looked at me. I rushed at him and slashed with the knives, but he vanished in a flash of dark light. I don't even know how that works!

I turned and looked at the bed, but when my back was turned, everything on Jacy's bed had vanished and was replaced with a body under a white sheet. I pulled the sheet back and dropped the knives. There was a manikin under the sheet with words carved into its face: IT IS YOUR DUTY

I woke up yelling. When I had calmed down, I looked around, I was in the dragon temple again. I looked myself over and confirmed I was dragon. "These dreams just get weirder and weirder."

It was well before sunrise but I didn't feel like sleeping, so I practiced standing again. I could now stand without a problem, so I practiced walking. After an hour or so, I got the hang of it and could do so without looking silly. So I went outside and walked around on the roof. As the hours passed, I had almost mastered two-legged movement again. I remembered what Volteer told me and went back to my room.

When I opened my door, I was surprised to find fever in my room, looking through my photos! I snuck up on him and got on two legs, then tapped him on the shoulder, He jumped and turned around to come face to waist with my 12 foot frame. He looked up at me and grinned.

"What are you doing in my room, looking through my stuff?" I asked firmly.

"I uh… I was told by my dad to come help you get ready for your first day of school." He said.

"But that doesn't explain why your going through my stuff."

"I wanted to know more about you." He said "Who's that?"

I got down on all fours and looked at the photo in question. "That's my wife, Perrin."

"She's beautiful" Fever said. "Is the baby with her yours?"

"Yeah, her name is Laura. I loved them more than anything, and now I'll never see them again, not even in the next life. Or I hope I never see them in this life." I said, thinking of the strange dream about my sister.

"What was that?" Fever asked.

"Huh? Oh, nothing. Just thinking out loud."

"Who are these people?" Fever asked.

"My family, My parents, and sister, Jacy."

"Wait, did you just say 'Jacy'?" Fever suddenly said, sounding alarmed.

"Yeah, do you know that name?"

"Uh… it's just a coincidence."

I stared at him,, waiting for him to say more but he didn't. I finally gave up and we went to the classrooms together. We entered the hallway and for the first time, I could see just how many young dragons lived here. It was like the population of a small city. I got many looks being the dragon who went schizo the other day. I also noticed looks in my direction from the female dragons before I realized they were mostly directed toward Fever. I don't know much about dragon standards, but guessed he was the Jacob Black of dragons.

School in the dragon realms is very similar to school in our world. First period is Academics. (Reading, writing, arithmetic.) Second period is physics. I excelled at these two, considering I already went to school. Third period was history. I was eager in this class as it was a chance to learn more about my new home. Before fourth period, I was put under a short test to see if I had any talent in magic. My skills were under the category "Low-Minimal" so I got out of Magic class along with most of the other dragons. Fourth period was Flight class, you'd be surprised how many dragons, myself included suck at flying. Fifth period was athletics. Once again Fever was swarmed by females. Sixth period was combat training, I took this class very seriously whereas Fever just seemed to loaf around. I asked him about this

"Fever, Why aren't you taking this as seriously as your other classes?"

He looked at me, "I don't need to. Me and Spyder have a fighting style that can't be taught or copied by anyone, we seem to move in synch and balance each other. The teachers know that even though I don't train much, when me and Spyder tag up, were nearly unbeatable."

I accepted what he said and decided to train with Zoulu, bad choice, I had bruises for a week.

The last period of the day was my favorite, Element class. The instructor, Cyril told me he had never heard of an element like mine, so I would have a custom training routine. So until they figured out how to train me, I would simply practice on my own. I soon discovered my element had different intensities, I could range my attacks from anything from an explosive blast to a harmless source of light in my hand. After seeing the latter technique, Cyril decide to aptly name my element "light".

After class, I went to Selenas room. I knocked on the door and heard noise inside "Who is it?" she asked

"It's James."

"Don't come in yet!" she yelled hastily.

I wondered what she was doing. "Actually, I was hoping you could take me to the library."

"Oh! Yeah, sure I'll be right out!"

The door opened and immediately I was blind. "The heck?!"

I heard the door close again and my vision returned. "Sorry." Selena said "My rooms a mess and I didn't want you seeing it."

"Ohhh kay… I really don't care, I'll bet as a human my room was way messier than yours." We both laughed at that and went to the library.

When we got there Selena turned to leave. "Selena, wait! I actually need your help in here."

"With what?" She asked.

"Well, I didn't make it into magic class but I want to see about learning a spell."

"What kind of spell?" She asked.

"Transformation."

We entered the library. I had never seen such a place in my life. The shelves were crammed with books, scrolls, stone tablets, dioramas, anything and everything that could be used to pass on information. They went on seemingly forever and the shelves reached to the ceiling which towered above us. The shelves were a rich brown, the floors were a honey colored stone tile and the ceiling was shrouded in shadow. There were lamps evenly spaced along the aisles that held a glowing orb instead of a flame, the light given off gave the entire chamber a golden cast to it. There were several dragons and moles milling about. Even a few cheetahs. From what Selena told me, what few apes had survived Malefors curse had begged for redemption and were now allied with the dragons. I saw a few of these creatures walking the halls as we searched the aisles.

Eventually a mole wearing a long robe walked up to us. "Can I help you find anything?"

"Yes." I said. "Were looking for a spellbook."

"We have plenty of those." The mole replied. "right this way."

As he led us down the halls, he talked to us over his shoulder. "I've never seen you before, so I'll tell you the rules. You cannot take anything out of the library, If you take something off the shelf, put it back where you found it when your done, and since your reading spellbooks, I will supervise you. You can study all you want, but there will be no spellcasting in the library. Am I understood?"

"Yes." We both said.

We soon came to a room filled with arcane objects. It looked like a witches house. There were spellbooks, crystal balls, models, jars with who knows what and countless other things. "Is there anything in particular you needed?" the mole asked.

I turned to him and explained how I wanted to find a transformation spell.

"Well, there are a couple of methods, do you want an illusion spell or a physical morph?"

"I want whatever is easier to learn, I'm not very good at magic.'

"Alright" The mole led us to a shelf that held several scrolls. He looked at the seals on the ends, trying to find the right one.

They were in another language, but it looked oddly familiar. I suddenly realized what language it was and pulled a scroll of the shelf that said "self illusion" The mole looked at me in shock. "How did you know that was it? Owossic has been dead for millennia! Only a handful of people can read it!"

"It's a long story." I told him "But basically I invented this language."

The mole looked at me with an expression I was starting to get used to and I went to the table and opened the scroll. There were a few diagrams, but nothing that would help with what I wanted to do. So I turned to the text. It was indeed the language I invented in 9th grade and refined throughout high school. It was much more flashy than my original language consisting of straight lines, but I could read it with some difficulty. This world was getting stranger and stranger. After seeing Owossic, I wouldn't at all be surprised to find out the last president of the US before Armageddon was a hamster.

After a few hours, I finally thought I got what I wanted. I stood up, surprising Selena who had fallen asleep. "Sorry, I thought I could use your help studying, but since you couldn't read it I guess I wasted your time"

"It's ok James. I at least got to spend time with you."

I stopped what I was doing and looked back at her. "Uh… Selena? You do remember I don't want a relationship, right?"

"Yeah, but I can always wish right?"

We finished at the library and went out to a training room so I could try the spell. Selena transferred some extra mana to me so I wouldn't be in danger of overdoing it. When I was ready I concentrated on the steps required and after a little trial and error, there was a flash of light. When the light dimmed, Selena was staring at me in horror.

"What?" I asked.

"Did you mean to turn into that- that THING?!" she asked.

"What do you mean?" I asked again.

Selena performed a spell that turned a part of the wall to a mirror. I looked at myself and nearly jumped out of my skin. Apparently, my concentration wasn't hard enough as I had turned into a certain indestructible black alien from the movies. "Oops."

I cut the flow of mana and reverted to my normal form. I tried again; Once again, there was a flash of light. When it cleared I looked at myself and was pleased to see this time I had at least gotten to human. However, the body I was in appeared to be a jumble of random features, as I didn't recognize the person at all. After a few more tries I could become myself, but I had trouble getting the age right. After a while, I ran out of mana and decided to call it quits.

Me and Selena were going back to her room when I had an idea. "Hey Selena! Let's get your brother and sister, I want to show you guys something."

We found Zoulu in a training room, no surprise there. After getting her, we searched for Fever. He was just as easy to find. He was with Spyder in his room.

We all went up to my room and I got out the book that had The Ballad of Spyro in it. I let them read a few chapters of the short story before we decided to go to bed. After they had left, I put the book back and climbed into the bed and though about today and everything that had happened since I arrived here. I wondered if I could ever go back and fell asleep thinking about Perrin.