And then I heard it — whompwhompwhomp — and then I really panicked. I started shouting and waving my hands at Bud again — I got so crazy I actually grabbed one of the . . . the spiny wart-things on one of his front feet, like I could pull him toward the cavern door, like a dog on a lead. (I was pulling on a toe, you know, because that's what I could reach.) And for the second time since I'd met my first dragon I burst into tears, for reasons not too dissimilar from that first time, and if you want to despise me, feel free, I don't care. I didn't want to see another dead dragon. Another dragon stupidly killed by humans. And by then Bud was also my friend.
The choppers found us all right. Bud would be pretty hard to miss if you were even half looking. Most chopper flights don't see dragons only because dragons get out of the way as soon as they hear the chopper. I can imagine the guns trained on him and all that. But they saw me too, and they tried to get me out of the way first since I was (no doubt mysteriously) still alive. It was like something on a bad TV movie, the blast of the broadcast voice telling me to move slowly away from the dragon. It was almost funny. Like moving slowly away from something the size (and firepower) of a dragon meant anything.
I suppose really they were not being that stupid — they could always try to kill the other end of him, which was a long way away, but I was stubbornly sticking by the fire-breathing end, and remember that dragons can breathe a lot of fire after they're dead. I should say that Bud was now lying flat on the ground — he'd put his head down as soon as the choppers came into sight — the way Gulp had the day she met us, or when she was inviting us for transport — and all curled in on himself too, so maybe you couldn't see quite how many miles of him there were. Well, it makes perfectly good any-old-species sense, doesn't it? If you're trying to look non-threatening you try to look small and weak. It's just very hard to do effectively if you're a dragon (but proves they have, you know, imagination).
And I think they didn't realize just how big Bud is. Or maybe Major Handley involuntarily found himself wondering what the hell he was seeing — because I was jumping up and down beside Bud's nose screaming idiotic things like Don't shoot, Don't shoot! He's okay! We're all okay! Please don't shoot! Although how, exactly, even a bright human at the head of a deliberate show of military force (to impress the dragons?) figured out that I wasn't begging to be rescued I'm not sure. Maybe he didn't know either and — since I'd survived this long — was waiting for clarification. The "extermination" order for our dragons hadn't come yet — there was still room for doubt. Or negotiation.
I tried to talk to him about this, later. He just looked at me and shook his head. He's still a career military guy and I'm still a bleeding heart dipstick. I'll be sending him birthday cards for the rest of his life to thank him though.
Anyway. Lois was jumping up and down with me and shrieking — I think I've mentioned she had a very piercing shriek — and the poor major wouldn't have known about her. Even if he thought Bud was not making any moves because he was dead, Lois was obviously alive, and big enough to do damage if she had the inclination. She even looked enough like a dragon by then that you might even guess she was one.
There were three of them, but it was the major's helicopter that sank down a little lower as if for a better view. As I say, I think they didn't really get how big Bud was. But there was a sudden, gentle picture in my mind not unlike a nudge with an elbow, and I turned around and flung myself up Bud's shoulder a lot more enthusiastically than I'd ever climbed Gulp's. But then I was even more desperate that day than when she'd flown us away from the first helicopter coming after me.
I galloped up all that neck, half bent over, scrabbling at the spinal plates with my hands — remember that dragons are slippery — but I didn't perch on his neck. I climbed the rest of the war, on to his head. I could brace my feet against the nobbles and hold on to the smaller, less sharp-edged spikes. Lois, for once, remained where she was, although she stopped shrieking to peep at me, and there was a gust of something through my mind that I'm pretty sure was envy.
And Bud slowly uncurled. First he raised his head and neck, and then he stood up, and then he stood on his back legs and craned. And I found myself staring into the major's helicopter at a lot of platter-sized eyes and wide-open mouths, and shouting over the helicopter din, It's okay, see? He's okay. I'm okay. This is Bud. We can talk to each other. Sort of.
CHAPTER TEN
The rest of the story everybody knows. The whole world knows. They ran that first TV news shot with a thirty-second delay because they weren't sure they weren't going to find themselves running live footage of a brainless seventeen-year-old boy being made into dragon canapes during prime time. The Searles actually did us a favor about this. They pulled all the stops out to get us off the air after that first live broadcast, and the head of NYN got so pissed off that he said nothing would prevent him running it — and ran it at the top of every hour as a news update on every one of his 1,000,000 local stations all that day, just to spite the Searles. It's possible that what he was really pissed off about was the amount of money he'd been spending on having several of his camera guys at the Institute waiting for something to happen, but when Carol Domanski started transmitting what she was watching out of Major Handley's helicopter all was forgiven in a really big way. (You probably know Carol later got a Pulitzer for what she's done on dragons, but she's actually done it well, so good for Carol. And the Pulitzer committee.)
If you saw it that first time, you know that it looks pretty bad that's our fence tangling up the transmission — and the beginning is a big grainy blur. (The picture would cut in at the worst possible moment in terms of me looking like a deranged lunatic.) But they cleaned it all up later, so that the Searles couldn't get anywhere claiming it was faked. Not that they didn't try.
I'm not sure they aren't still running all our live programs with delay, in case of accidents. There haven't been any accidents and Gulp has got quite blasé about all the people and lights and wires and fuss that TV programs create — especially a lot of fuss, because of what our fence does to the equipment, and the Wilsonville garage isn't a plausible alternative if you want to film a dragon. Although even if you really desperately want to film a dragon and have the best fence-resistant gear going, you still have big problems because you have to get it to the dragon. We go to them.
Dad flatly refuses to let more road be cut into Smokehill — and some suggestion about motocross-type bikes or three-wheelers made him apoplectic. Noises have been made about pack ponies, which Dad would consider, but first they have to come up with a solution to the fact that every pony, horse, burro, donkey, and whatever else they've tried so far has instantly lost its training at the first whiff of dragon. (They haven't tried camels yet.) Sometimes they go nuts before they're even taken off the truck. Horse van drives through gate, sound of meltdown in back of van, van drives back out through gate. Meanwhile the sky would be black with helicopters — if Dad would allow that either, which he won't. Fortunately Smokehill's Friends tend to the eco-loony fringe, so Dad's got some help.
Gulp was our first star, more than Bud or even Lois, although Lois is a close second, and anybody who even half understands what all this has been about loves Lois best (I'm not partial, of course not) — but fifty feet (plus tail) of Gulp is impressive. Gulp, of all the big dragons, is the only one who really cooperates with being filmed, although there are snaps and crackles of several of the others. Gulp doesn't really get it, about people being fascinated by her. As far as she's concerned — at least this is how I read it — she's just doing her penance for almost frying me, that day we met. Want to imagine how fast a dragon holding a human baby would have got itself killed (supposing someone just happened to have a lightning rifle in his back pocket)? Especially if the kid's mom had recently been made into kabobs?