And another one!
(Prompt from CallMeGallifreya on Tumblr)
Everyone was staring. Callie could barely move, but she still tried to scoot away from the boggling faces. They were afraid.
Fear leads to anger...
Even her best friend, Mekena, was retreating. She was the last of her human classmates to curl her fingers into a fist.
Anger leads to hate...
"...please don't?" Callie quavered. She knew what they saw. A monster from legends so old that they were hard-wired into the psyche. Shapeshifting had been the only way for dragons to protect themselves against humans.
Everyone thought dragons were automatically more powerful than anything that had ever lived. Yet they were nearly wiped out by soft, squishy, ingenious and inventive humans.
Hate leads to... dragon-ka-bobs...
"...oh my god," whispered Mekena. "Callie. You're a dragon?"
And in the moment of most tension, on the very cusp of violence from her classmates, Callie's sassy damn mouth took over. "Well, geez, Mekena... The scales and the wings are usually a dead give-away."
The world held its breath.
Callie wished she could bite her tongue out.
And then the mood broke. Not in thrown things and screaming, but in peals of laughter. And only then, when most of the class were in the fits of tear-streaked mirth, did the chem teacher finally turn on the vents to clear the room of the fumes that that asshole Vitura had made sure she got a face-full of.
"And this," said Miss Callenti, "is why we create gaseous outputs in the fume hood."
"Reddit said it was a love potion," complained Vitura.
"Euw gross," said Mekena. A sentiment echoed by all of the girls in the classroom. "What part of 'bug off' do you not understand, you asshole?"
Strength finally returned to her limbs, but not enough strength to begin to change back to her human guise. She could at least sit up and furl her wings in. And curl her tail away from so many feet and chair legs.
"Yeah," Callie agreed. "What next? Try to add GHB to the water supply?"
"Yeah, that didn't work," said Vitura.
Miss Callenti scribbled a note. "Mister Vitura? You are now assigned to Sensitivity Training. You obviously need it."
"Again?" whined Vitura. "I keep failing that class."
Mekena came over with fake coughs that masked the words, "Forever alone."
"Dyke bitch," muttered Vitura on the way out.
Miss Callenti waited until he was gone and Callie had at least gained some verticality. "Now. Since Mister Vitura has opened the door... let's go through some easy ways to detect date rape drugs..."
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