Philosophical Question: Is a dragon's personality such as it is because we are dragons, or are we dragons because of our personalities?

I've been possessed of what you'd call a dragon-like personality for as long as I can remember. Also for as long as I can remember, I've been a sort of human lightning rod. Not a single electrical storm has ever passed by that hasn't tossed at least one bolt in my general direction; almost as if something were taking potshots at me.

For some reason it never really bothered me; maybe even raised my spirits a bit that Something considered me worth such spectacular effort. Never could aim worth a damn, though. . . .

Things changed for some reason when I got assigned to the tropics. Scarcely a day had passed since my arrival in Central America before an incredible storm just about succeeded in demolishing the building I was billeted in.

A week passed, and it seemed there wasn't a day that a tree didn't get blown to smithereens in my vicinity. The night the hangar I was working in was struck five times, I realized this was getting serious. Was that old Something getting frustrated? Or was it because the storms down here were so much stronger?

After another week or so of scarred roofs and decapitated palm trees the game finally ended. In the far corner of my room, the westward-facing window has a hole in it; about the size that a .30-caliber round would make, save with melted edges and a dribble of congealed slag. It's right beside my bed, which I was sleeping in the night twelve months ago when my world went blue-white.

Has it really only been a year since this madness began?

It's a hell of a way to wake up. The bolt hit the window frame squarely, then spat through vaporizing metal to catch me broadside as I slept. I awoke to a sound so loud I couldn't hear it, and a light so bright it threatened to burn my eyes out. Every muscle in me was trying to tear itself apart.

The pain was so great I couldn't even scream.

It lasted maybe two seconds . . . or maybe two eternities. But the sizzling blue-white arc finally winked out, to let me flop bonelessly back down onto the mattress. I lay there for I don't know how long; my body was a classic study in pain, my heart a searing fist of agony in the center of it all.

I think I almost died that night, but finally the knot in the center of my chest loosened and began beating again, and my lungs drew in a shuddering gulp of air. I drifted in and out for awhile, my body draped across the bed, my head lolling over one side. Finally the agony washing across me subsided enough that I could think about moving. Panting with the pain, I slowly dragged my wrenched body off the bed and onto the floor. I lay there for a moment, fighting a sickening surge of vertigo, then began to crawl for the door. It was a long trip: Every muscle in my body was screaming obscenities at me, yet my skin felt strangely numb as I crawled. A thin tinkling noise was beginning to penetrate the ringing in my ears. There was a weird fisheye distortion to everything, and my point of view seemed too high off the floor.

More and more messages from my body began to penetrate the haze surrounding me, every last one of them unutterably wrong. I wasn't on hands and knees; I was on all fours. That tinkling noise was getting louder and deeper. And there were other things. Lots of other things.

There's a dresser about halfway to the door of my room, and on top of it sits a large mirror. By the time I got that far I was shaking all over. I already had a pretty good idea what I'd see when I turned to look in that mirror, but that didn't stop me from scaring myself half to death.

I recoiled violently, hissing, heavy jaws dropping open to bare long, carnivorous teeth, wings half-spreading defensively. The muscles in my massive hind legs bunched, tensing for either fight or flight while my serpentine tail lashed in agitation.

I crouched there, panting with fear and confusion, staring up into the glass at the reptilian nightmare that cowered there. It took a long time for me to calm down, but finally, slowly, I managed to gather the courage to rear back on my haunches and prop my forefeet on the edge of the dresser.

I studied the apparition in the mirror. Golden cat's eyes stared back at me, set within a reptilian skull armored with bluish silver-grey plates of what looked like carbon-steel. Scales of the same metallic color feathered the jowls, then swept down the neck and body, becoming larger and thicker as they went. A thicket of razor sharp spines started on the forehead and ran protectively along the entire length of the backbone to the tip of the long tail.

Starting just forward of the crown, then running back perhaps half the length of the long neck there grew what appeared to be a thick horse's mane composed of long strands of the same metallic substance as the scales. It made strange tinkling sounds at any movement; like steel wind chimes.

To either side of the neck's muscular base bulged the double shoulders, from which sprouted both the huge silvery wings and the slender forelegs. Those armored forelegs were surprisingly human; and the hands, though thinner and armed with long, wickedly curved talons, were still hands.

The wings were enormous. Long, narrow struts buttressed vast webs of thin, silver-gray skin that stretched between those struts to the flanks of the reptilian body; running its length from double shoulders through the loins. From the tip of each strut and from the vestigial thumb there protruded a long, sharp talon. Cable-thick tendons ran down the limbs and swelled out into huge bands of pectoral muscle that swathed the barrel chest and anchored at the massive, birdlike breastbone. Past the ribs, the waist thick and sturdy with sculpted muscle, then out into the powerful, catlike hind legs, their heavy talons gouging the tile floor. Finally, the body ended in a sinuous, spined tail.

I looked up again at the face in the mirror, and stared into the eyes. A long, black forked tongue (my tongue) slid smoothly from between the heavy jaws (my jaws) to lick at nonexistent lips.

I heaved a sigh, then for the first time really looked down at myself. It was me, all right. I lifted my right foreleg and stared at my hand, flexed my murderous talons.

Okay, hotshot, now what?

I couldn't come up with an answer to that, so I spent awhile examining my new self; running my hands over my smooth scales, feeling my wings, fingering the mane.

Strange sensations were beginning to run through me as I explored. The last of the pain was fading, rapidly being replaced with odd feelings of comfort and familiarity, which didn't make any sense at all. My new appendages, my wings and tail, should have been useless to me, or, at best, clumsy as a baby's limbs. I should not have been able to flex and move them with such power and grace, and yet I did.

My wings were like a second set of hands, huge and distorted, but hands nonetheless. I unfurled them slightly, flexed individual finger-struts. I coiled and uncoiled my powerful tail. It felt strangely pleasurable to move my new limbs, and also increasingly natural.

Shock had saved my sanity at first, then had been supplanted by curiosity. That in turn was now being rapidly replaced by a tremulous feeling of hope as I studied my wings, then my tendons and massive pectorals, and finally my heavy breastbone. Slowly, an old, dead dream began to resurrect itself.

Y'know, this stuff just might actually work!

Fear and confusion were instantly forgotten as I bounded back to my window. My talons scrabbled at the frame, then threw up the sash and I hopped up onto the sill. I peered out into the wild night. The storm that had transformed me was still raging, lashing the base and surrounding jungle with huge whips of lightning, the rain coming down in torrents that made even breathing difficult. Nobody in their right mind would be out in a night like this.

Perfect.

I glanced down at the three-story drop yawning in front of me, then fully unfurled my lovely wings and stared at them. If this didn't work, I was going to be one hurtin' lizard.

Screw it. I launched myself forward. I felt my wings instantly cut upwards, then my pectorals contracted and the ground sank silently away. It was that easy. I was right about my wings being huge hands, for I felt them scoop up the wind and trap its power within their vast webs, ruthlessly enslaving it.

And I flew. My God, I actually flew.