It was early in the morning, perhaps a while after sunrise. Summit had just woken up, groggy and tired. His eyes opened at a snail's pace, he took his covers off of himself, and got out of bed. Hedid not bother getting dressed this early; he was too hungry and too tired. Summit started to walk towards the door to the main room of the house, and pushed its oak handle to the flat stone floor that continued between the two rooms.

Summit's parents were talking between each other about something he could not make out, before Acorn looked at Summit. Her pupils shrunk, she stopped moving entirely, she looked petrified. Moments passed as she stared at her son, and then in an instant she sprinted to somewhere else in the house. Oakley noticed Summit about a second later, but instead ran after Acorn ran past him, joining in with her without a scream, he did not have time to do it.

Why are they running? What's so scary? Summit asked himself. He quickly ducked his head to get through his door. That's new, I guess I'm growing. Summit swiftly formed his hand into a cone as he called "Why are you running! Come back! You're scaring me!" As he took his hands out of a cone, he stared at his own hands. No, not hands, talons. Blue, scaly, talons, with claws that ended each digit. He was a dragon.

Summit's talons shot up onto his head in the stress of the situation. No, this can't be real. That's not how the world works, I can't just become something entirely different overnight. This must be a dream or something. But deep down, he could just feel how conscious he was, there was no way this could be a dream.

Summit started shaking violently, he could start to feel his new appendages. The wings that laid on his back, the tail that extended far beyond his old spine, the horns that stood on his head like a crown of evil. He curled up his body as best he could with his limited understanding of his new anatomy. There was pain in his chest, he started to to breathe faster and faster, breathing in and out and in and out and in an out. Over, and over again. He sat in his ball for about a minute more, cut off visually from the outside world, under a shield of his own thoughts. What do I do? Will I want to kill people? What will mom and dad do to me? What will happen to Dexterous? Will I have to live in the wild? I'm a monster. But suddenly, he felt a hand being laid on a part of his back, then it went off, but then it came back. It must have been one of his parents. Summit moved his head back into the world, it was Acorn who was putting her hand on him, with Oakley accompanying her. They still looked very afraid, but they pushed it down, for him.

"Mom? Dad? Are you not scared? I am-I'm a m-monster," Summit stuttered out at a violent pace.

Acorn exhaled to calm herself, "It's alright, you're still Summit, it's-s alright."

"No," Summit argued, with his anxiety and adrenaline still sprinting through his blood, brain,

and body. "You're lying. I'm a monster, I can feel that that's how you feel. Just tell the Invincible Lord and have me killed already."

Oakley walked up to intervene, "We would never do that, you didn't do anything wrong. You belong in this family, no m-matter what."

Summit could still feel his parents' fear inside of them, they showed it in the way they stood and spoke. But he knew that at least he would be able to live at his home for a while more, so he decided to at least take their offering, no matter how frail. "O-Okay," Summit replied.

Acorn took in a deep breath. "It will be hard to adjust, we'll still be scared. But I hope that we can make it work," Acorn said to reassure his scary son's fear.

"Thanks," Summit said. He started to get out of his ball, and for the first time since he was an infant, he stood on all fours. It felt feral, the true scale of his inhumanity sunk in for him with this, Summit winced nervously. After a few seconds of trying it, he sat up, revealing his underbelly. At this stance, he must have been about half of a meter taler than Oakley, much smaller than the dragon that wronged them, probably smaller than any dragon for that matter.

Oakley's eyes darted around the room, before swiftly refocusing on Summit. "Let's forget about this for a bit, we can talk about it over breakfast, what do you want?" Oakley asked his light blue son.

"Well, I'd love some berries and bread, but can I even eat that stuff anymore? I think that dragons can only eat meat. At least that's what I learned in school," Summit responded.

Acorn spoke up, "I can check the library, maybe you could be proven wrong."

Summit responded, "I sure do hope I'm wrong, I want to eat things that aren't meat."

Acorn looked towards Oakley, "Oakey, do you want to come with me? An extra set of eyes will help me out."

Oakley responded "of course Acorn." His eyes darted around Summit, "goodbye, see you in a bit!"

"You too!" Summit called back.

Acorn and Oakley slowly walked out of their home, leaving Summit on his own. Summit tried once again to walk on all fours. He got up into a standing position, and slowly moved his top right leg forward. After that small success, he did the same with his bottom-left leg, then his top-left, and then finally his bottom-right leg. He had made his first steps again! I still don't like this, I want to walk like a person, Summit thought. He tried doing that, standing up, trying to keep balance, but it was too unstable. His arms shook and spun in attempt to keep balance. How did I do this this morning? In defeat, he went back on all fours and continued to walk into his room again.

Summit saw himself in the mirror, his scales shined in the lantern's light, he looked at his entire self for the first time. He could see that he was a sea dragon, if he remembered correctly. I guess I can go underwater? He thought to himself. He could see that his horns curled back in a helix, like his old hair. At least something is the same, Summit thought. Summit then focused on his own head. He looked at how his jaw now stretched out much further than his eyes now, he opened his mouth, revealing his forked tongue and many teeth. Summit said to himself "I really do look like a monster now..." Summit gave a frown, he looked at his lengthy jaw, and sighed. "What will I say to Dex? I don't want to loose him, I lost a lot of friends before him, I can't loose him."

But all that felt elementary to the main thing that he noticed about himself: his size. Just yesterday he was a bit smaller than his peers, but now he towered over almost anyone. And in addition to that, the light blue scales also alienated him even further from the people he knew. They shone light all around, each little scale like a mirror. I can't even say "I'm only human" anymore to my mistakes. What have I become? A shiny monster? A scaly menace? No, I need to stop talking to myself like that, my parents still love me... But do they? Yes, they have the same trauma as you, they're only human...unlike me. Humans fear dragons. It will never be the same. Summit looked down as he shed a tear or two.

Then, he heard the door open, and then he heard his father call him hopefully, and he obliged, wiping up his tears, trying to look confident. Summit returned to the main room. "We've got good news!" Oakley said to his son.

"You can eat things that aren't meat! It's just pretty rare, so you should be fine," Acorn added.

"What a relief..." Summit responded. "Can I eat now? I'm getting pretty hungry."

"Of course, help yourself! You need it after this... predicament," Acorn generously added.

"Okay," Summit responded. Oakley and Acorn walked into their room to get ready for their work.

Summit got to work in making his breakfast. He went to the pantry and grabbed a jar of berries and fruits, along with three slices of bread. Summit put it all on a wooden plate, and he put the plate on the table. He ate rather quickly; he was very hungry. But even with all that food, he was still hungry, so he grabbed two more slices of bread to satisfy himself.

While he was fumbling his hands through the pantry yet again, his parents returned to to the main room. Oakley was the first to spot him, and he said "need seconds?"

Summit felt embarrassed at his discovery. "Yeah, I guess that I'll need more food now that I'm like this," Summit responded. He gave an anxious chuckle.

Oakley responded "it's okay, just let me know if we need more food."

Summit noticed how his parents were in their baker's uniforms, they were on their way to work. "Okay, goodbye!" Summit said.

Acorn said "you too, I hope that everything's alright today." Then, both Acorn and Oakley speedily walked out of the house, leaving Summit all alone.

Summit studied the main room with his eyes in attempt to find something to do, before he found the bookshelf. Him and his parents had slowly accumulated a small collection of books over the year that they lived there. His parents tended towards cookbooks, with little variety: they were always too busy to read between work, parenting, and everything else. Summit on the other hand er- talon, preferred a larger variety of books, some were just stories, some real events, and many things in between, but he never kept them all. They just could not afford to keep a huge library at home.

So, most things he read were from the library of first layer. Despite that, Summit still had about half a dozen that he actually owned. Summit browsed through his collection, and he eventually settled on a book titled "Outskirts," which was about a man who was banished from his home and had to live in the outside world. Summit liked it a lot because of how it portrayed the main character becoming better at living in the wild from the start of the book to the end, and how that story was relatable to his experience with loosing his home, and long travel between settlements. The book helped him become more calm and confident in the first few months of him living in the Indestructible City because of this.

As he turned the first few pages of the small book, he could feel how hard it was to turn the book's thin, fragile pages with his big, sharp, clumsy talons. Nonetheless, Summit powered on to experience the book, reading pages and chapters as they came and went. Until suddenly, he heard knocking at the door.

"Summit! Are you there?" the voice called. It was Dexterous.