A handful of minutes later, and panting yet again, Theo reached the top of a ravine sort of thing in the middle of the mountains. A faint breeze of wind blew around him, brushing his soaking hair slightly out of the way.

“Whoa. What?”

His eyes widened as he looked down over the ravine that definitely wasn’t there the day before. Scorched earth and broken trees lay all around, a deep groove in the earth where the meteor must have landed. Theo stood at the precipice for a moment, stunned. Surely the meteor hadn’t been that big? It hadn’t seemed like it was all that large last night…

Large, full spruce trees were completely broken, toppled over, roots up. Shattered bark littered the ground, and the ground still seemed to smoke faintly. It smelled like burned wood, and Theo got a good whiff of it as another breeze dragged the scent close. Grimacing, Theo glanced around briefly, before cautiously sliding down into the ‘ravine’, moving towards something he saw shimmering at the end of the break in the earth. A shimmering object that was clearly still smoking. A soft cloud of silvery smoke rose from what Theo could only assume was the meteorite.

As Theo slid down to the bottom of the deep gouge in the earth, his legs nearly gave out from weakness. Muttering softly, Theo wobbled and then steadied himself before moving closer to the smoking object. His boots cracked over a few stray branches and burnt wood, but he ignored it and navigated through the shattered roots and burnt ground towards the smoldering mess. It was perplexing how the rock was still smoking after so many hours of being on the Earth’s surface, but Theo figured he would find out eventually. Perhaps it was covered in a mineral that had a low melting point? It certainly hadn’t looked like any meteor he had seen before- which was the main reason he had hiked all this way up into the mountains.

Legs shaking weakly still, Theo moved closer as a gust of wind blew by once again. Smoke drifted out of place, and Theo froze, now only about two feet away from the meteorite. A Meteorite that was definitely not a meteorite.

For the second time that morning, Theo froze in absolute shock, his mouth hanging open, eyes wide, looking something like a deer caught in headlights. A dirty, sweaty, non-athletic deer. Startled, Theo took a step backwards. His heel caught on one of the exposed roots, and he tumbled down like a sack of potatoes. “Oh god,” he cried out, as he slipped and fell, ass landing hard on the burned earth below. Tears sprung to his eyes, his poor tailbone bearing the brunt of the fall, pain ricocheting up his spine. Blinking away the stinging tears rapidly, Theo lifted his eyes once more to the burgundy figure that the smoke was emanating from.

If he hadn’t recently had his eyes checked, Theo might have thought he was seeing things. It was still possible, but after a quick- and painful- pinch, Theo at least knew he wasn’t dreaming either. His tailbone hurt enough- he should have known, but he tested with the pinch anyways. He wasn’t so far up the mountain that the thin air was causing him to hallucinate.

Chest heaving, Theo shoved himself up from the ground, his heart thundering in his throat as he wobbled closer. The air felt hotter as Theo approached the little figure curled up at the center of the ravine. It was small, but there was no mistaking what it was-though Theo could hardly believe his own eyes.

Deep, wine colored scales, leathery wings, and claws. Silver horns curled at the base of the creature’s skull, and though it was only the size of a medium dog, the claws at the end of its paws looked deadly enough to kill. The shimmering he had seen before had either come from its scales, or the large gem laying a foot away from it. There was also more blood than he could have expected from such a small thing. It coated the ground around it, and had dried on the burgundy scales.

The meteor wasn’t a meteor at all. It was a dragon.