20. Aurora
AURORA
In retrospect, I never should have gone to the Flight Simulator alone. But I told myself I needed the extra practice. Of course, I had no one to work the controls for me, but I could at least practice the right flight stance and get used to moving up and down the wooden dragon’s wings and spine.
So I took to getting up even earlier in the morning and going up to the Flight Simulator alone.
Of course, in theory our Dorm Monitor, Professor Hanmish, should have stopped me.
But in practice, he snored like a drunken bear and almost never woke before First Bell himself.
It wasn’t difficult to sneak past his room and the rows of slumbering cadets in their cots to get out of Dorm A without anyone being the wiser.
Or so I thought.
One morning, about two weeks after I’d started my new routine, I made my way up the endless stairs to the Fourth Level where Woody was hung.
There were only a few lights burning high up on the ceiling and the natural light from the holes in the cavern wall to let in sunlight was absent, since the sun hadn’t risen yet.
So the area below the wooden dragon was still obscured in darkness.
I couldn’t see the rope net swaying below Woody, but I trusted it was there—it was always there.
That knowledge gave me the courage to run lightly across the wooden beam and onto the wooden dragon’s back.
I settled in the saddle and reached as far as I could with my legs, trying to find the stirrups with the toes of my boots.
Unfortunately, my legs were too short, which was one reason I got bucked off during class so much.
I was still reaching, willing my legs to stretch just a little further, when Woody twitched underneath me.
I frowned and gripped the wooden dragon spine in front of me. What could have caused that? There was no one to run Woody’s controls from the Observation Balcony above. How could the simulator work if no one was working it?
Before I could answer that question, Woody twitched again. And then he started moving—dipping and jerking in a way that made me gasp and hang on for dear life.
There was only one explanation—someone was working the controls!
I looked up at the Observation Balcony, twenty feet above, and saw a pale, lumpy face studded with patches of angry red acne staring down at me.
“You like that, you little shit?” Chud Larson’s face broke into a savage grin as I struggled to keep my place in the saddle. “You like riding a dragon? Well, you better enjoy it while you can because a wooden dragon is the only kind you’re ever going to fucking ride!”
And then Woody really went wild.
I cried out in fear as the wooden dragon thrashed under me. Dipping and diving and jerking—it was like it was trying to buck me off—which of course, was Larson’s goal, I was sure.
Maybe I should just let myself fall—the net will catch me, I thought.
But then I looked down and saw something awful in the weak sunlight that was finally beginning to seep in through the cavern windows…
The net was gone.
Not completely gone, but two of its four supports had been cut, and the rest was hanging down, flapping uselessly on the far side of the wooden dragon. If I fell now, I would meet the hard stone floor twenty feet below.
I didn’t think I would survive a fall like that, so I hung on grimly, wrapping my hands around the wooden spine in front of me and squeezing the saddle tightly with my knees.
“I’m like a tick on a dog,” I told myself. “I’m dug in tight—nothing can get me off!”
But my positive self-motivation wasn’t working.
My hands were slippery with sweat and my thigh muscles were cramping from trying to stay in the saddle.
And Chud Larson was jerking the controls so hard that Woody was twisting in ways he never had before.
I doubted that even a ride on a real dragon could get this rough—how was I going to hang on?
But hang on I did…until the ropes controlling Woody’s left wing abruptly snapped.
As the huge wooden wing sagged, so did the left side of the dragon. Woody was built to be the size of a Silver-wing and the weight of one wing was enough to pull the entire simulator out of whack.
I gasped as I lost my grip and went rolling out of the saddle and down the length of the sagging wooden wing.
I tried to grab onto it, but the wood was smooth from years of use and I couldn’t get a grip.
The wing acted like a slide, and I found myself slipping and sliding faster and faster down its length as the ground loomed up below me.
“Help!” I shrieked as I fell. “Help! Help! Hel…”
And then I slid off the tip of the wing and dropped like a stone to the ground below.