Page 64 of Escaping my Dragon

“Not with me. I had one back at McMurdo, but it’s probably gone by now.”

“Then you shall acquire more.” Ordered as if it were the most natural thing for Leviathan to do.

“As you command, oh, mighty master.” Joslyn quipped.

“You are interesting, female. And since I shall require portraits that people admire me, you live, for now, as well.”

“What about us?” the little orange dragon chose to speak despite the others trying to hush him.

“I’ve yet to decide what to do with you.” An ominous warning Tigger ignored.

“What’s there to decide? We’re family. So, what do we call you? Gramps? Grandpa? Grandfather? We already have a Tutu. Pops?”

“You will not address me at all,” huffed Leviathan. “Now be quiet. I am participating in an interview.”

My cue. I stared up, way up. Couldn’t even see Leviathan’s eye, putting me at a disadvantage and giving Joslyn little to work with

“I don’t suppose you could rest your chin on the ground.” Ballsy of me to ask, given the situation, but I should at least try and treat this like any other interview and give it my one hundred and one percent. Could this interview possibly kill me?

Yes.

But it was also the moment of a lifetime. If I was going to die, let me go out in the most dramatic and memorable fashion.

“Are you demanding I lie my head directly on the ground?”

“We can’t see you at all. Which is fine, if mysterious is what you’re going for, but the people watching are really going to want to see the full picture. Your face, to be precise.” Or at least an eyeball. I still hadn’t forgotten my reaction the first time it opened.

“You are lucky I still have use of you because otherwise⁠—”

“Yeah, yeah, you’d eat me. Whatever.” I interrupted and waved my hand. It seemed the way to deal with Leviathan was to not act in awe. To treat him… like he was just a regular Joe. Or so it seemed, thus far. I guess we wouldn’t know if we’d gone too far until he followed through with his threat.

“I can only blame myself,” he exhaled on a long-suffering sigh. The cryptic words didn’t get any explanation as he slid his arms away from the peninsula and rested his chin on it.

“That’s somewhat better, I guess.” I could at least see its eye now, if I craned way up. Pity we didn’t have time to build an icy ramp, like in my dream.

“You’re still down too far.” The purple dragon minced over to me and glanced around. “You need to get higher.” Before I could say anything, Persephone gripped the shoulders of my jacket in her claws and hoisted me into the air.

“What are you doing?” I squeaked, afraid to thrash, lest she drop me.

“Putting you on a podium.” AKA the roof of the station.

I caught my balance on the slight slope and tried to not gulp. No sliding, or that fall would likely break something. But on the positive, I could now look Leviathan in the face. “Thanks. This actually works. But I’ll need Joslyn and Vernon, too.”

Unlike me, they grinned goofily as Abaddon and Pollita grabbed and deposited them on the roof.

Noah didn’t join us. He went inside, likely to grab a first aid kit for any impending fall.

Vernon handed me a wireless microphone, and I did a few test phrases before turning to Levithan, who was surprisingly quiet during our setup. “Okay, before we start, there are a few ground rules.”

“I am already on the ground.”

“I don’t mean it literally. The way this works is I am going to start off by speaking. Introducing myself, telling people where I am, and giving them an overview of what’s happened.”

“I thought this was an interview.”

“It is, but people need context. I can’t just say, ‘look I found a city-sized dragon.’ They’ll want to know where you came from. How you escaped the mountain. Those kinds of things.”

“When do I get to speak?”