Death is but a doorway.
#1 of Dragon's Flight
This will get some revision and editing in the next week or so.
Aiden
I lay on my bed, panting as what felt like iron bands constricted around my chest. It was a sensation familiar to me, though it had been at least 40 years since I last felt it. Swelling the doctor had told me in the tissue between the ribs, nothing to worry about. It sure felt like something to worry about. I waited a few minutes waiting to see if the pain lessened, but it did not.
Grunting and wishing I had kept my cell phone in reach when I had one to bed last night, I sat up. The room spun slowly around me, and I figured that was a really bad sign. That and the black spots swimming slowly in my vision. I dropped my legs to the floor and for the first time in a very long time didn't feel the pain of my arthritic knees. A small blessing perhaps.
Standing took long moments and the room had to be furnace hot because I could feel perspiration breaking out all over my body as I worked my way towards the foot of the bed. I rummaged around the table at the foot of the bed looking for my phone in the poor light. It was only as I distantly felt myself falling that I remembered that I had awoken to the light of dawn flooding into my room as it did every morning.
My last thought was a pedantic, "Well shit, gona be late feeding Fuzzbut."
Aiden
I lay there certain I had forgotten something; something important. That thought however was chased away by a sudden awareness of a physical sensation that was familiar to me. I had morning wood or at least wood. My dick ached like it hadn't in far longer than I cared to ruminate on. Laying on my belly as I was it was pinned beneath me, and I gave a slight hip thrust, it ached so badly with the need for release.
Until that moment I had been unaware of the fact I was laying in the sand, but the feel of the ultra fine sand on my cock was uncomfortable and yet I couldn't keep a low grunt of need from escaping me as I did so. I gave serous consideration to fucking the sand like no tomorrow, for a lot longer than I would have ever believed I would.
With a grunt of discomfort I rolled on my side and reached down to stroke myself. The feel of my fingertips gliding down the ridges of my cock fed back sensations that I hadn't felt since the first few times I has stroke one out as a teen. But then I hadn't felt such an urgent need for release since that time in my life too. Each stroke was pure bliss, the feel of my fingers sliding along my cock's ridges teasing little wines from me. Even in the have of lust fueled need, I noted the ridges my cock had, as something to investigate after I came. I may not have ever had the best memory but I would have remembered my cock having those.
The pressure in my belly muscles built, as I held back my orgasm. Need for release warred with the fact that this was the best masturbation I had experienced in a long long time. Getting old had sucked in many ways and I hadn't realized how much I missed sex pleasure until now. However I was feeling pent up beyond anything in my experience, except maybe when I had been a tween and not known how to get that release. When my orgasm crested over me like an unstoppable force, my shout of of pleasure was a roar that reverrated off the walls.
Dimly aware though the pleasure, I could feel my cock pulsing with what felt like fire hose force as I shot seed all over. I just lay there on my side feeling ropes of seed splash me from time to time, shoulder, neck,even face. As I came down from the euphoria of my orgasm I remembered I had been a teen the last time I had spurted hard enough to reach my face while laying down.
Laying there feeling the sensation of hot jizz slowly roll down to the sand off of me I rolled onto my back. It was the position I normal had masturbated in back when that had been a thing in my life. I felt a number of unfamiliar sensations as I did so, and processed them as I lay there.
I felt vulnerable on my back, not something I could say I had ever felt before. My softening cock wasn't as sensitive as I would have expected given the amazing orgasm I had just had. That said it was still sensitive enough to feel an odd texture on my belly. It did not feel like skin. My arms and legs were splayed out x fashion but oddly not settled fullyon to the sand like I would have expected. Expect that my brain was saying my arms were laid flat on the sand, even as I open and closed my fingers in the air. It took long moments for me to register that I was getting feedback from what felt like two sets of arms, though the new set felt a little strange and flexing the fingers got way more feedback from the webbing between them than I was used to. I blame the extra arms for missing the additional limb I had between my legs at first.
My eyes popped open at long last, and I popped up into a sitting position. Or at least tried to. I didn't get to observe what it looked like but I'm pretty sure it looked like I flopped around like a fish out of water, and that might have been a disservice to the fish. I did learn that I could smack my head like it was on the end of a whip into the ground though. I spent a few moments regretting that particular painful experience and tried lifting my head up afterword slowly to pear at myself.
I blinked a few times, bringing things to to focus. Given the need I had for glasses much of my life my ability to bring things into almost painfully sharp detail was amazing. My chest was covered in small pale tan scales. Given the extra body parts I was aware of it was less surprising than it might have been. Still scales? I worked to bring my head closer and realized I had not only a lack of neck pain, a blessed relief let me tell you, but much more flexibility available than I had ever had. My neck was long and supple. Looking from better vantage at my body, I saw what could only be described as a dragon body.
I lifted a hand? Paw? Paw hand? I wasn't sure what to call it, but it was covered in metallic red scales. The red was just a hair darker than fire engine red. They glittered in the light in a way that was best described as mesmerizing. I ended up staring at them for a time like I was vain or something. Chuckling softly, and hearing it echo back at me I looked up wondering if I was going to turn vain, not something I had been before, but then I hadn't been a freaking dragon before.
I went back to a more general self examination. I was long bodied and muscular. No exposed male bits between the hind legs and yes they were clearly hind legs. All that could be scene right now was a slit above an anal opening, and they were pretty discrete. Looking at my palm, I saw I had animal like pads, a very dark grey in color, with ivory talons on the ends of my digits. They were a little short for human fingers but clearly long enough and articulated well enough to grasp objects. The talons after a little experimentation were retractable like a cat's claws.
Turning my head to the side I examined the extra arm on one side to find it was a wing. The membrane between the fingers of the 'hand' the only word I had for it, was vaguely translucent and dark red, at least on the underside.
I had to tuck my wings in tight to roll onto my belly and stand. Doing so proved slow and a bit awkward as well as a tad uncomfortable when my body weight rolled over the wing. It felt natural enough to stand on all fours, not something having been a biped all my life I thought would be the case. Looking at the top of the wing I saw the red of my scales ran into the wing, with the light passing through them I saw dark strips radiating out from the hand like appendage at the end of my wing.
Looking back and bringing my tail around to the front I saw it started out thick and powerful, narrowed down along its very long length to something no thicker than my wrist, if that's what that was called on a dragon, where a bony looking club ended my tail. A weight perhaps to act as a rudder to help with steering in flight?
I snorted and stopped looking myself over and took stock of my surroundings. There was a pool of water that smelled clean if mineral laden, oddly it glowed with a soft pale white light. The sand under my feet was very soft and fine, white in color like it made of white quartz or marble. There were walls of rock, limestone perhaps. I could see a tunnel out of the cavern to my left and looking about behind me I saw a second exit point, both looking large enough for me to get though.
Taking a moment I considered the sand under my feet, and then rubbed the back of a paw hand through the sand. It felt nice on my scales, like rubbing your hand along an ultra high thread count sheet, textured but smooth. Also it felt like I was feeling things through thick but supple cloth, so I had reasonable tactile feedback though my scales it seemed.
I paused and sniffed again as something belatedly came to my attention. I could smell things like I never had before. I could smell a spicy tart scent that with a little investigation was coming from my drying jizz. The water smelled like rain but more so, with an undercurrent of many types of trace minerals. Sniffing an armpit or at least as close as I got to one my own smell, was metallic with something that I could only define as 'dragon' mixed with it. The cleanliness of the chamber suggested that nothing had lived here in a very long time if ever. There were no other smells. This body clearly had a vastly better sense of smell than I had as a human.
I cocked my head listening. The first thing I registered is the ringing that had been in my ears for a very large part of my life was gone. The water made almost no noise yet you could hear it flowing down the wall where it came in at. I could hear a sound that took a moment to place but it was my heart beating after a moment of concentration. More startling was that the faint sounds of my movements told me how far away the walls and ceiling where. Closing my eyes and saying, "Echo," softly and listening I got a feel for the room around me how far way everything was, and even a sense of the two, no three tunnels from the cavern. The third tunnel that I had not seen but heard was at a high point in the ceiling, and was no bigger than my fist in diameter.
My stomach growled in an unsubtle message of what it wanted, as if to get me moving faster. I stepped over to the water and drank deeply. Turns out I could slurp water up my muzzle like a straw and the water was icy cold, with a hint of minerals to the taste. The minerals were rather pleasant accent to the water's taste. Given that when I had noticed such flavors in the past I had hated them I found it an interesting change. Perhaps there was something in the minerals that my body craved.
Hydrated to the point of sloshing on the inside I considered what next. The water would only hold me for a short while, it wasn't food and this body wasn't being shy about telling me it was hungry. Witch way was out? I picked up a fist full of sand and let it drop from shoulder height, looking to see if it moved in a direction at all. The dust in the sand fell more to the side passage than the one behind me.
I walked to that passage and revealed in walking easily without joint pain. I felt young again, like the world was new and I was an immortal being waiting to conquer it. I ignored that feeling, age had brought wisdom of a sort. Everyone could die, and the universe played no favorites. Still had there been space he would have run and jumped and quite frankly expressed what in animals was laughingly referred to as 'the zoomies.' I wasn't tired, I wasn't in any kind of pain, and the world wasn't being filtered though senses damaged by age and abuse from day to day life.
Looking down the tunnel I saw the light did not go far, but I could still kinda see it. Or maybe sense it would be best. I could hear how the simple sound of my paws on the floor of the cavern bounced off the walls defining it for me so clearly I didn't hesitate as I plunged into the primordial darkness, of a realm completely absent of light.
I followed the tunnel for what felt like hours. In a few places it opened up in to other caverns but never branched out. It was the smell of plant life, so faint as to be easily missed at first that told me I had to be coming up to an opening to the outside. The smell of green growing things, mixed with the scents of decaying plant life suggested rich fertile ground to me even without seeing it. The air was cooler as well, not cold but no longer comfortably warm.
I stepped up to the mouth of the cave and looked out over a large stretch of forest of evergreens. It looked to be late in the morning, and I was on a cliff face up maybe half again as high as the tree's below. I wish I had some reference to the size of things. Was I large or small?
Looking around I saw no easy way down, and considered climbing at first. It was a long moment before I mumbled, "Doh! You have wings now idiot. You can fly down." Birds could jump out of a nest and fly, a dragon should be able to jump off a cliff and fly right?
I backed up a half dozen body lengths and ran as fast as I could at the cave mouth. Leaping into the air, I spread my wings and beat them with all my might. I am a little ashamed to admit, I closed my eyes as I slept, but after a few moments feeling like I was climbing I opened them again.
"Fuck yea Baby! I'm flying!" I screamed to the world at large. Dignified at the point I was not being. To be fair though it was my first flight. I learned two things very fast. I was moving very fast. I mean like what seemed stupidly fast. The second was that flying was work for a dragon, there was no casual soaring, the wings were meant to be constantly beating. I was probably a poor distance flyer, something I would have to check out at some later point.
A growl from my stomach reminded me that I needed something to eat. I saw a deer in a clearing. A stag at a guess as it had antlers. I dived at it. As I did so I realized I had no idea how to land. I pulled out of the dive without hitting the ground and made what had to be the worst grab in the history of dragons at the deer. I managed to grab it behind the head as I went zipping past, and it bleated what had to be a bleat of abject terror, as my talons dug into what felt like butter soft flesh. I tried to flick the deer in a way to break its neck.
Something in the corner of my eye had me look up, and I realized I had been looking down at the deer as I flew. This means I had an excellent view of the trees as I went into them. I started back winging as fast as I could in an instinctive effort to break, sadly that started as the first branch clipped my left wing knocking me off what sense of balance in the air I had. A dignified scream of, "Fuck Me!" erupted as another branch caught my right hind leg tumbling me in the air even more. I lost count of the trees that went by, or branches that slapped me or I smashed through before I slammed into a tree with crunch of shattering wood and possibly bones.
I hung there for a moment before I dropped out of the tree hitting a few more solid branches on the way down. I thudded into the ground and lay there for awhile, the world spinning. I mumbled "Watch out for that tree George."
With a groan I took stock of myself. Outside a burning pain along the ribs on one side I was pretty sure nothing other than dignity had been damaged beyond heavy bruising. Looking at the burning pain in my ribs looking down I saw a tear in my scales and bits of wood, really nothing more than over sized splinters. As I watched one fell out, and looking closely I noted that I was barely bleeding even though there were some deep gashes in the center. Even as I watched another splinter worked its way out and fell away. I wasn't healing Wolverine fast, but it was still observable if you watched.
I won't lie I sat there watching the process as my aches and bruises faded away. Even a slight dizziness that I only noticed after it passed faded away. As I watched new scales grew in even. I looked up as fading light drew my attention to the passage of time and I saw that the sun was sinking behind the mountains. If I had been hungry before now I felt almost sick with hunger.
Looking along the path of broken branches I found the deer in time. Looking at it I hadn't lost my grip on it so much as had my talons slice their way through the muscles I had grabbed. The deer had died not from that, but I suspected but from the branch impaled under its jaw up into at a guess the inside of its skull, and if that hadn't killed it it looked like the neck had broken as part of that impact and sudden stop.
Lifting the stags body down I sighed, I liked animals and hadn't meant for the deer to suffer. My stomach growled and I realized I was starting to drool and stopped thinking about my klutzy attempt at hunting and the fact that the deer's blood smelled divine. I had never been one for raw meat but now I was drooling over it. Even as I considered how to cook the carcass, I picked up the deer in my mouth to carry it to an open spot and try to make fire, However instead of picking it up when I bit into it I ripped a piece free and swallowed convulsively.
I hadn't been a fan of venison when I had been human and my fore brain was going ew ew ew ew. Even as my taste buds were screaming 'OMG this is so good!'. I ended up eating the whole deer, and I do mean the hole thing, bones and all. Even as one part of me cringed another was ripping pieces off like a starving wild animal and swallowing without chewing. Most of what I tasted was just the blood and the rich iron tang of it was clearly something I craved as a dragon even as my human mind grumbled about it. I finished the deer and began licking my muzzle and forepaws clean. Even the dirt being impregnated with blood tasted good if gritty. I felt full, even over full by the time I was done the hunger pains gone.
I tried not to focus too much on what future meals would be like and instead considered what to do from here. The cave had to be miles away, and I would need to fly to it to get back before full dark. Not sure where else to go I walked out into the clearing, and got back into the air. It took four tries and if my dignity hadn't already been mortally wounded today take off would have done so. Turns out that simply leaping into the air and flying away looks easier than it is. I finally had to take a running start and leap.
It was close to full dark when I finally got back but I could still perceive the cave mouth clearly. Unlike an owl my flight wasn't particularly stealthy and sound reflections made its location very clear. I started back winging carefully as I came at the cave mouth. Turns out the landings are tricky to, as I started to fall out of the air just shy of the cave mouth and had to lunge for it with my fore paws and scrabble to get in.
Sighing I sat down at the cave mouth. Not so tired really to go to sleep yet. I hoped there were no cameras out there as I didn't want to end up in a hang in there poster. I finally had no pressing needs to fill and could sit back and think. How had I gone from dying as a human to waking up as a dragon? I remembered that there had been something I wanted to remember as I had woken up in the moments between waking and being filled with a desperate need to rut. But like a dream it was gone. All I could recall was that I was here for a reason and rubbing out orgasms and mutilating deer in poor attempts to hunt as a dragon.
I don't know how long it took me to fall asleep curled up a few body lengths in from the cave mouth but in time I did. The sounds of the night singing me to sleep, owls, wolves and insects mostly.