Drake the Dragonboy (4 page)

“You're a good person, Drake. You always think the best of people.” No, I don't, thought Drake. I just know he happens to be tied up and unable to get to the bank. At least with his mother distracted with her own misery, she wouldn't notice that he wasn't himself. He made them both a goose sandwich, put hers carefully in front of her while she remained glued to the television, and took his up to his room. Sometimes it was okay being a small family of just two. You could do what you liked without brothers and sisters interfering. He sometimes craved for a busy house, with a brother and sister or two to chat with, but he knew deep down he'd probably hate it. Most people he knew fought with their brothers and sisters all the time.

The next day Drake, Juniper and Ronan were sitting on the floor of the shower in the girls' toilets with the door shut. Juniper had brought a blanket and some snacks. Today Juniper had her hair in two long pigtails sticking out just above her cute little ears. She'd laid out the blanket and then the snacks and then Ronan had laid out all the bomb components. All Drake had was a pen and paper to help work out the plan. When Drake had met them in the shower, Ronan and Juniper were already chatting and he again felt jealous. He probably didn't have a chance at all with Juniper. Ronan was tall and dragonly and had that whole bad boy thing going for him that girls just loved. Drake was small and skinny and smart. His mother told him that he would be the one the girls would want when they grew up. Maybe this was true but it didn't help one bit right now.

“You've really got four brothers and three sisters?” Juniper was asking him with amazement. Dragonfolk generally had pretty small families. Seven siblings was really unusual.

“Wow, your mum and dad sure have been busy,” Drake said clumsily.

“Drake!” Juniper scolded. Drake went bright red and silent.

“We don't really have a dad. My dad left years ago and then we had another dad but he left too,” said Ronan.

“I'm lucky. My dad's great but let me tell you, my mum can be a bit crazy,” said Juniper.

“Really?” said Ronan smiling shyly at her.

“Really.”

“My parents are divorced,” said Drake, trying to make up for his mistake and get back into the conversation. Juniper gave him a look that said ‘whatever'. But Ronan gave him a smile to show there were no hard feelings.

“My family's pretty crap, really. I mean, I love my mum and all but she doesn't have much time for me. And I always have to look after my brothers and sisters and stuff. She doesn't even notice all the work I do,” said Ronan, sadly.

“Is that why you're never at school?” asked Drake.

“Yep, pretty much. I want to come more but I never get any time to study and it kinda seems pointless.”

“Oh, I thought you just didn't care,” said Juniper.

“Sometimes I don't. Other times I do. It all just seems too hard.” Drake nodded.

“I wish there was something I could do to help,” said Drake, tapping his dragon claws on his forehead.

“Thanks,” said Ronan. Juniper smiled at them both.

“You know,” said Juniper taking off her cape and flicking her wing buds. “I can feel my wings growing already. It's making me feel a little bit …” She grinned. “A little bit wild.”

“Imagine what we are going to be like in a few days!” grinned Drake. Although he was putting on a good show, Drake was having a very difficult time and was so worried about his dad that he was barely sleeping or eating. He really hoped that they were doing the right thing by trying to find him themselves. If it weren't for Juniper and Drake he would definitely had told his mum by now and asked her to help.

“I've got a great place to hide this stuff,” said Juniper. “And we need to start collecting some food and water to take with us.”

“We'll be carrying front packs instead of backpacks with these boofin' wings,” said Ronan.

When Drake, Juniper and Ronan met back in the girls' toilets two days later, they had almost fully grown wings, cramped up beneath their capes. The wings made them feel powerful. Drake had noticed a change in the way the other kids looked at him and treated him since the three of them had begun hanging out. The three of them would stride down the hallways, capes flowing behind them, with a sense of confidence and purpose that was enviable.

In the safety of the shower, they dropped their capes and excitedly examined each other's wings. This morning Drake was also wearing knee-high bright red boots that his dad had given him. You pressed a little button and the shoe gave you a whole lot of bounce. He hadn't worn them to school yet because he'd known the other kids would tease. Today he had felt beyond that and thought that the red boots actually looked pretty good with the red cape. He sort of looked like a superhero.

“I can't believe how great they feel,” said Juniper. “And for some reason, they seem to help with my Tourette Syndrome. I've really been able to control my fire-breathing lately,” she said excitedly.

“I can't believe we've had our wings clipped all these years,” said Drake. “And why? Why can't we have wings and go for a fly every now and again? I've never even questioned it!”

“I know,” agreed Ronan. “There's a whole lot of stuff that doesn't make sense. Why cut our wings? Why make us think that there's nothing but wasteland beyond our city?”

“Why kidnap my dad?” asked Ronan.

“What's your dad like?” asked Juniper, now sitting cross-legged on the floor of the shower. Drake moved down onto the ground next to her and Ronan crouched down on his knees, still towering above both of them.

“He's great. He's super smart. He's the one who invented the force field that's up around the city. Before he did that they had some kind of huge plastic wall and people guarding day and night to shoot down any Quintas that came close by.”

“That's pretty cool,” said Ronan. “I wonder if that has anything to do with why he was kidnapped.”

“I dunno,” said Drake, tapping his dragon claws lightly against his chin. “But it does remind me of the other issue we have. How are we going to get through the force field?”

“I was kind of thinking you'd be able to do it. You are such a technical whiz,” said Juniper. Drake blushed, although he knew being called a technical whiz often wasn't meant as a compliment. Technology wasn't that cool at Dragon High School.

“I'd need to know a bit more about how it works.”

“Does your dad have any stuff lying about the house?” asked Ronan.

“He moved out two years ago … but there's still a filing cabinet in the study that my mum complains about all the time.”

Drake was rifling through the filing cabinet in the study, completely absorbed in what he was doing. He'd looked through all sorts of weird and wonderful inventions — some of which came to life but many of which only existed in drawings in this cabinet. Drake's dad had always said that of all your ideas about inventions, only a few will actually happen. That's how it needs to be. You need to be free just to think up stuff and not worry about whether or not it will work and then sometimes out of all these crazy ideas, something will just work. He pulled out the design his dad had come up with where you add a tiny little camera to a mobile phone and take videos and pictures and send them to each other. He'd been so excited about it. Obsessively so. And so disappointed when he'd taken the designs to work and the elder board members of the company Gerry and Hubert had laughed him out of the room. His dad had still insisted that he was right. Once he got his teeth into an idea, he never let it go. Drake had just got his hands on a file named ‘Force Field' when the doorknob turned and in walked his mother.

“What are you doing, baby?” she asked. He wondered how old he'd be before she stopped calling him her baby. He suspected it wouldn't matter.

“Ummmmm … just looking at some things of Dad's.” He let the Force Field file drop down in the cabinet so she didn't see it.

“Darling, you do miss him, don't you? If you ever want to talk about it, I'm here for you,” she said and he knew she meant it. But he also knew she wouldn't be able to help saying negative things about his dad if they did talk about him. She didn't even seem to know she was doing it.

“I've got the plans my dad created for the force field. They were all in his file and I think they're pretty close to the final version, if not the final versions themselves!”

“That's great, Drake!” said Ronan.

“And have you got any ideas about how to break a hole in it?” asked Juniper anxiously biting her dragon claws. She had her dragon wing glasses pushed back on her head like a hair band.

“What he's done, is created what he calls an impenetrable wall of energy,” explained Drake. Juniper gave him a blank look.

“Nothing can get through it,” translated Ronan. “We already know that,” he said, a little impatiently.

“It sounds very superhero,” commented Juniper.

“Yes, that's what inspired my dad to think of it. He's very into superheroes. So, what he has done is created a vacuum of space where the atmosphere of Dragonland is kept protected from the outside world … but it seems that certain objects can in fact pass through it.”

“Oh,” said Juniper. “Not Quintas, I expect.”

“No, it specifically blocks them out based on their body mass.”

“So what objects can get through it?” asked Ronan.

“Well, it seems from his plan that dragonfolk are free to pass through any time they want. It's only been a force field to keep us in because we thought it was,” said Drake grinning.

“That makes me feel very stupid,” said Juniper, breathing out deeply. “But that's great. One more thing off the list!”