Well I got it done. My apologies, I haven't had time to proof it. But it is short so you don't have to suffer too long.

 

Lost In Translation

by Dave Krenitsky

 

I was in the pet store looking at the micro dragons. I had wanted one ever since they became available two years ago.

"They’re so cute," she said.

I jumped at the sound and turned to see a young woman beside me. "Yeah, but gene engineered pets are expensive. These start at ten thousand and go up as the size goes down." I glanced over at her. She was wearing a name tag that read, Amanda. It was from the shoe store a few stores over. "Don’t you get some kind of mall employee discount?"

"Like $500 will make a big difference. My break is over. If you ever get one you know where to find me," she jiggled her name tag and smiled as she walked out.

# # #

I sat in front of the screen and tried to listen to the news but the girl kept creeping into my mind. "Hal," I called to my assistant, "Find a good price on a micro dragon."

"Micro dragons are quite expensive. The best price locally is eight thousand. You can mail order an egg for about seventy five hundred. They do grow quite fast."

"There has to be a better price somewhere." I said but Hal remained quiet. "Hal, are you searching or what?"

"Older dragons are available but be aware that they imprint on the first moving object they see. If you get one of those it will see you as an enemy and you would have to keep it caged. Or..."

I waited. "Or what Hal?"

"There are non-sanctioned sites which sell most anything cheaper. My programming will not allow me to interact with those sites."

"But you can tell me how to access one." I said.

"I can give you the address but you would have to type it in yourself."

"Give it," I said and took a picture when it popped up on the screen. I hunted around for the keyboard and mouse. They were under the sofa and covered with a layer of dust. It had been a while since I needed something other than voice recognition.

I typed in the address hunting and pecking at the letters. It seemed like gibberish to me. I hit return and waited. ANd waited. "Hall why is this taking so long?"

"The request seems to be bouncing through several anonymizing proxy servers. I don't feel good about this site."

Finally a screen popped up. It was in some strange language. "Hal, translate please."

"My security protocols won't allow that."

I took out my phone and fed an image of the screen through its translator. It was asking for my name and what I was looking for. I typed in my name and micro dragon. The screen switched to a clock face. I hoped its translation routines were good enough to understand me.

A list of items popped up. At the top was a half meter dragon for five hundred thousand somethings. Next to that was a price of three thousand dollars. I scrolled down. At the bottom was an unflameable fly-weight dragon egg for five hundred dollars.

I smiled and clicked 'buy'. It took a little bit to get the transaction secured and set for payment on delivery but finally all was done. In two days I would have my egg.

# # #

DHL called to be sure someone would be home and that they would have an ID and all that crap. I opened the door before he had a chance to ring the bell.

"I need to see an ID and then sign here and here. Initial here to indicate there was no damage. And the package is yours."

The box was big enough to hold a basketball but I assumed that it was padding. After all it was an egg. I slit the box open carefully and stared. There was no padding. Inside was a scale covered egg and a folded sheet of paper with various languages on it.. I unfolded it until I found the english instructions. All it said was: To open egg place in oven at ninety degrees C for eight to ten hours.

It was too late to start that now In ten hours I would be leaving for work and having blown off today to take the delivery I really needed to go in. I could pop it in the oven when I left and it would be ready when I got home. Maybe I could invite that girl from the mall to see the hatching.

# # #

I turned onto my street as Amanda and I talked about dragons and almost ran into a cop. He walked to the drivers window.

"Do you live here?" he asked.

"Yeah, third house down. What's happening?"

"A full sized dragon got loose. Ate a few dogs and we're still checking to see if anyone is missing. Your name and address?"

"That must be your dragon," Amanda cried.

"You have a dragon?" the cop asked sliding his hand to his gun. "You have a license for a dragon?"

"No, Yes. I mean it can't be. It just hatched."

"Step out of the car sir." he said. A ball of flame belched up and a police helicopter swerved to avoid it.

He took me to a squad car and put me in back. As he walked away I pulled out my phone. I called Hal. "What the hell happened? It was supposed to be a small," another ball of fire rose in the air, "non-fire breathing dragon."

"I had to get permission to check that web site. It wasn't an unflameable fly-weight dragon you bought. It was a Fire wasp waist dragon. There was an error in translation."