Who cares about free speech, we're dragons

There weren’t always dragons in the Valley. But then, there never used to be dragons anywhere—dragons being supposedly fictional creatures. But then there was a politician. I mean me. I admit it. I feel personally responsible because I kind of am.

In my defense, I did it with the best of intentions. My reasons were utterly noble, rational, and logical (at least in my opinion—you may disagree). I mean, what else was I supposed to do?

Rhode Island v. Biggs—you’ve heard about the case. Mr. Hiram J. Biggs was an “intuitive and mystical” individual who was sometimes overcome with the desire to shout “FIRE!” in crowded venues. He did so during a screening of the blockbuster The Elephants of Wabawambi, leading to a stampede inside the cinema and mass casualties. Miraculously there were no deaths. Biggs—or Biggs’s lawyer, an oily toad of a man—argued that when Biggs yelled “FIRE!” this was his “opinion.” Biggs, being an “intuitive, insightful person,” felt compelled to share his insight (“FIRE!”) because it was his honestly held opinion at the time he yelled “FIRE!” He wasn’t lying—in fact, he was stating what appeared to him to be a complete “metaphysical, not necessarily literal” truth. His lawyer argued that “FIRE!” was an “opinion.” He pointed out that we live in a civilized society, a democracy that enshrines free speech. Besides, argued the lawyer, the people who behaved like crazed elephants chose to act like crazed elephants. “We can’t abandon personal responsibility,” he said. “Everyone has a responsibility to make a judgment based on the facts and act on it. My client, Mr. Biggs, merely expressed his opinion, which was ‘FIRE!’ The people in the theater should have calmly observed the facts and drawn their own conclusions about the presence or absence of an actual fire.” His lawyer further argued that perhaps the people were behaving like mad elephants simply because they were watching a movie about elephants—good elephants, bad elephants, and some elephants that were very mad and very dangerous. “Just because the people in theater chose to emulate insane elephants doesn’t mean that my client, Mr. Biggs, should be held responsible for them. He merely expressed his opinion. Are we now responsible for what other people think and do?”

He argued persuasively, and the buzz was that the Supreme Court agreed. Experts claimed that most of the nine Supreme Court justices sided with Biggs. Free speech, even total lies, lies that were obvious lies, lies that could cause others to get hurt or even die—such lies could be “opinions”—and how could you punish people for having opinions?

Even though I disliked Biggs’s lawyer—he was an easy man to dislike—it was difficult to argue with his logic. It was a slippery slope. How could we both have free speech and not have free speech? Well, I wanted to have it both ways.

Given how long it takes for the legal process, it appeared I had about ten months to do something about this dangerous case. In about ten months, the Supreme Court would deliver its verdict. Ten months seems like a long time, but it really wasn’t—not if you wanted to do what I wanted to do.

So the only solution—and it seemed like a completely reasonable solution to me at the time—was to do what I did.

***

It doesn’t matter whether I have a (D) or an (R) after my name, does it? I am what I am, we have a party system, and I belong to a party. That’s just the way things are. The fact of the matter is that, as I said before, at first, there were no dragons anywhere, including in the stupid valley. But then, this whole free speech debate came up, and I desperately wanted the Supreme Court to decide against Biggs and make it clear once and for all that free speech has to have some limits. I thought that free speech that was not only false but could incite mobs and cause violence and death—such free speech was dangerous. To allow dangerous, homicidal free speech to rampage through our society was sheer madness—or so it seemed to me. Because the Supreme Court was made up of our finest legal minds, I was sure that if they wanted to, they could come up with excellent legal reasons to vote against Biggs. The Supreme Court justices were humans first and justices second, and I’ve heard it said that we humans decide first and justify later. So, it followed that the nine justices in the Supreme Court were the key to preventing national chaos—if only they could somehow decide to decide against Biggs. And this led to the inescapable conclusion: dragons.

***

I don’t typically believe in fairy tale stuff, but I wanted to believe that dragons were possible. Let me explain.

I came across the discovery of the ancient Egyptian papyri on the web. It was a tiny item—some archeologists had discovered these frail, decaying scrolls containing Egyptian hieroglyphics. I made a quick trip to Cairo, where these papyri were being displayed. Why, you ask? I’ll tell you why. During my college years, I was undecided for a whole year about what to do. And a course on ancient Egyptian language seemed to be a good idea at the time. I dove into ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics. Honestly, it’s not such a complicated language if you put your mind to it, provided you get past the strangeness of it. For example, as you probably know, ancient Egyptian has four different types of verbs: strong verbs, doubled verbs, weak verbs, and extra weak verbs; and you read it from the top-down, or from right to left, or from left to right (depending on which way the animals are pointing). But, if you focus, work hard, and pay attention, ancient Egyptian is a lot of fun. Sure, it’s tough to practice since no one in the world speaks ancient Egyptian—except for scholars and experts. Also, you’ve got to be a bit nerdy to study it, and I confess I’m a nerd. By the end of my year, I became fluent in ancient Egyptian, even though it was a pointless skill—ancient Egyptian doesn’t exist, for the simple reason that it is ancient and a relic of the past, and the past, as we all know, is no longer present in the present.

This ancient papyrus scrolls in the museum in Cairo were of interest to experts, archeologists—and me. Especially me. In it, I read something, and my eyes widened with amazement. I was shocked, surprised, and hopeful. Here’s what the ancient document said, in plain ancient Egyptian: Dragon hearts, when chopped up and ground with celery, then lightly torched, and then eaten, along with some yogurt and cumin seeds, gave you abnormal, superhuman powers of persuasion for—get this—for the rest of your life! Just imagine. If I ate this ancient Egyptian dragon heart dish, I could convince anyone of anything. A part of me wanted to believe this very badly. I could eat this and then meet with the Supreme Court justices and persuade them to agree with me. And all I had to do before I could persuade the justices was to nosh on appropriately prepared dragon hearts. The only problem, of course, was the complete absence of dragons anywhere.

And that was when I remembered Jonas, my crazy college roommate, who—the coincidence is baffling—was convinced it was possible to create dragons all over again (obviously, he believed that dragons existed in the past; full disclosure: I didn’t). Jonas thought he was in possession of ancient dragon DNA, and with some modifications, he could make a dragon. “You mean like Jurassic Park, except with dragons?” I asked. “Yeah,” he said. “But dragons don’t exist,” I said. “That’s what you think,” he said. He told me that he had made a dragon theoretically, on paper. He just needed the funding. His lab was situated in a small valley a few miles east of the Grand Canyon.

My mind went to work in a hurry. I was in the government. What’s more, I was in the appropriations committee, which handed out the money to various people for various things. All Jonas needed was a measly 2 million to set up the lab and the proper conditions to get the dragon DNA injected into eggs (yes, plain old eggs from a grocery store). Then he would use a hyperbaric incubation method (the most expensive part of this whole procedure). Then, after a short period of time, this egg could theoretically hatch a teeny tiny baby dragon. I told him I needed a dragon as fast as possible. No problem, Jonas assured me. He would do some DNA modifications to make this dragon grow fast. He would use specially engineered DNA with the right mix of telomerases and guanosine-cytosine base pairs (a little over 28 million, to be precise). Jonas claimed a dragon could reach full dragon size in just a few months or even sooner. The next thing was to kill the dragon, get the heart out, sprinkle the celery, chop it up, grind it and eat it. And then I could be on my way to win friends and influence people, specifically, our Supreme Court justices.

Well, I got the funding. It was for conservation of threatened indigenous flora and fauna in the East Brosnan Valley, 2.4 miles east of the Grand Canyon. 2 million dollars in total, and it all went to Jonas. He would use the money to both make the dragon and save the flora and fauna—because no dragon can grow unless he eats the right quantities of flora (and fauna—especially fauna).

And one day, I got an email from Jonas: “The flora and fauna are flourishing in the sunshine.” This was our code phrase to indicate that the East Brosnan Valley, hitherto free of dragons, was no longer dragon-free. We had agreed upon a total of one dragon—one dragon heart was all that was needed. Also, it didn’t make sense to have dragons running—or flying—all over Arizona or the rest of the world. One had to be careful with all the dragon business because—while dragons, like free speech without any limits, may seem like a great idea, one can’t let them get out of hand—because of UC (unintended chaos).

I had to move fast because I was all set to meet the Supreme Court justices at a dinner party at the house of a friend (who belonged to the other party). President Truman was wrong—it is occasionally possible to have a good friend in Washington, even if that good friend isn’t a dog. The two of us had been friends since college, ever since I was nose-deep in ancient Egyptian. We were on opposite sides of the political divide and disagreed about everything, including this free speech case. But we were good friends. Naturally, I didn’t tell my political frenemy about my plan to consume dragon hearts and persuade the Supreme Court justices.

***

Dinner was a week away. All nine Supreme Court justices were expected to be there, and only one or two of them needed to switch sides. And then, the free speech case would go the way I wanted it to go. You may say that it’s crazy that a few justices can determine the fate of free speech (and so many other things) in the country, but that’s just the way the system is. But forget that—I don’t want this to get political. I wanted to get to the dragon. I had no time to lose. I was on a tight timeline.

***

East Brosnan Valley was a few hours away by plane. We had to quickly eliminate the dragon and obtain the dragon heart. Jonas confirmed he had tons of celery, yogurt, and cumin. He, too, was keen to try the dragon heart puree. Jonas needed to persuade his soon-to-be ex-wife to get back with him. They had three kids. He had made a colossal mistake, a mistake involving a hallucinogen that did something very strange to Jonas.

***

The dragon was an awesome creature, 50 feet by 50 feet. As big as a huge house, except that it was not a house, but a dragon—and therefore very scary. Jonas had seen the dragon breathe fire. And so it was a relief that the dragon was dead.

Jonas appeared tense. I assumed it was because it is unpleasant to kill anything, even a fire-breathing lethal dragon. There were multiple bullet holes in the massive dragon head. These were small in comparison to the long, massive head. They’d done the job, though. Pump enough bullets into a dragon’s brain, and the dragon will die.

Getting the heart out was tough. I averted my gaze and played Sudoku on my phone while Jonas grunted and shoved and used the buzz saw to crack open the dragon’s chest and extract the heart. A huge heart! Jonas grunted as he carried it, his gown, face shield, gloves, and cap completely covered with dragon blood. An industry-grade blender (cost to the government, $800 plus tax from an approved vendor) turned the heart plus celery into an unappetizing red smoothie. The ancient Egyptian scroll was unclear about the yogurt and cumin. We assumed it was to be consumed on the side. Jonas had a blow torch with which to flame the dragon heart puree. Then came the big question: to salt or not to salt? After much discussion, our consensus was that the ancient Egyptians would have surely mentioned salt—and the fact that they hadn’t meant that salt was out of the question. So, no salt. This made the dragon heart concoction—well—dreadful to consume. The ancient Egyptian document had mentioned a cup, but how big was an ancient Egyptian cup? Googling provided no answer, and so, just to be on the safe side, we both drank five cups of the dragon heart smoothie. Ugh! It was awful, so awful that Jonas brought up the subject of the hallucinogen, X-43, responsible for his impending divorce.

The taste and then the aftertaste were two of the worst tastes either of us had tasted in our entire lives. So, I suppose we had to talk about the hallucinogen X-43.

***

Here’s the history of the hallucinogen:

Jonas was a rational scientist and not a kook. But he had only one kooky explanation for what had happened to him after taking X-43 vis-à-vis the cat. The family cat, humble Alexandra, saw the world vastly different than any human. Jonas believed that the hallucinogen X-43 caused his soul, his inner body, or his astral body or whatever, to come out of him. On a whim, Jonas decided to enter Alexandra the cat. That’s when the whole world plunged into hues of green and yellow and red and blue and eighteen other colors for which he had no name. He saw his own body, lying on the recliner, appearing like a collection of multicolored Legos put together in an unattractive human jumble. His wife appeared marginally better. The kids—well, the less said about them the better. What ugly people! Jonas remembered cat-thinking. He also had several other cat-thoughts, including, I want to eat that cockroach, I want to pee in the litter box, and I want to press my anal glands into the recliner. Fascinatingly, human thoughts also occurred to him. One of these was, “The magic word is I want to go back to my body now.” (Technically, this is more than a single word, but in his intra-cat state, it seemed like one word to him.) He, that is to say, his soul said the magic word: “I want to go back to my body now.” Instantly, Jonas was back in his body. His wife, in the divorce petition, complained that she found him rubbing his behind in a strange, cat-like way into the recliner. She found the action disgusting and divorce-worthy. Jonas’s opinion was that a cat-thought had made its way back into his human head after his soul returned to his body—and he, under the influence of this cat-thought, proceeded to act on this thought. So he needed to apologize to his wife again and convince her to come back. Hence his need to consume the dragon heart puree.

Then Jonas explained the real reason for his worry. “I got carried away,” he said. “There’s more than one dragon?” I went white with fear. “What do you mean more? How many more.” “Ten—or 18, if you want the exact number. 17, now that Fred is dead.” “You named him Fred?” “I did.” “Jonas, that’s bad, that’s very bad—and this thing tastes horrible.” “Yeah, I agree. 18 dragons seemed like a good if slightly naughty idea at the time.” And then, after a pause, Jonas popped the question. “You want to take it? You know, we won’t taste a thing if we take the X-43.” “You sure?” “Absolutely sure. I took it, and so I know.”

The lingering aftertaste was spectacularly dreadful, and so it seemed like the logical thing to do. Especially as I was reeling from the thought of 17 fire-breathing dragons over the southwestern Arizonan sky.

***

X-43. The effect was immediate. It was unlike anything I had ever experienced. The taste, the fear—I felt none of it. And we both had the same thought, almost at the same time.

Could we? Should we? And then, because it seemed like such an obvious thing to do, we stared out of the sky window into the late afternoon sky with precisely one dragon flying above.

We should, we said to each other. Now!

And our souls zipped out of our bodies. And our bodies slumped in our chairs.

And we both entered the flying dragon.

And the world became a hundred colors—colors we had never seen before.

And we both had a dragon-thought—to belch fire.

And we did.

And it was marvelous.

***

The Grand Canyon is like Paris for dragons, said Jonas.

It was an understandable thought. All 17 dragons were there, looking up and down the hundreds of feet of the canyon. It didn’t appear like a canyon if you were a dragon. It looked more like the Eiffel Tower if the Eiffel Tower were to be taken apart and reassembled in the shape of steps going every which way.

But if this was Dragon-Paris, something was off. Because all of them, all 17 of them—they were all breathing fire. And all were hopping mad.

And we were hopping mad too. We were both thinking angry dragon-thoughts.

The two men—they had killed a member of the tribe. The dragon flying over the lab had seen their comrade killed, his chest cracked open, his heart taken out. Both the murderers deserved to die.

As best as they could tell, a portion of their soul wanted to incinerate and destroy those two bastards who had killed a fellow dragon. However, another portion of their soul was terrified. Should we try to talk them out of it? I asked. I am a politician after all, I can sweet talk them, I can try to lower the temperature. Jonas disagreed. You’re not in Washington, Abe, he said, Washington’s got some smooth talkers, but even the Washington crowd can’t con homicidal dragons. Look around, said Jonas, these dragons mean business.

He was right. Some dragons stomped their feet angrily. Some swished their tails. One snorted. And four of them were grunting and heaving and bearing down on the ground almost as if they were constipated. But in a moment, the mystery cleared.

Eggs. Four enormous dragon eggs. These dragons had not wasted any time. In the space of a few months these dragons had not just grown huge. They had gone ahead and mated with each other, resulting in four eggs. The eggs were also on a superfast schedule (it seemed) because they began to crack almost immediately, and little dragons popped out, yawning and making cute cries. I say cute because they sounded amazingly cute to the dragon-thinking parts of both Jonas and me, in the same way that human baby cries would sound cute to humans.

But there was more to come. Amazingly, these cute dragons, in a few minutes, went through the infant, toddler, and ugly pimple-ridden adolescent stages (yes, dragons can have acne, it can now be stated with complete certainty). And, in less time than it takes to tell, these teenagers were full-blown adults.

Jonas’s mouth fell open (an astral body or soul with a mouth open looks exactly like a normal human with a mouth open—except that it is transparent and a bit yellowish). I asked, Are they supposed to be growing so fast? I don’t think so, said Jonas, it must be the modified DNA I used.

Then reality began to dawn even more frighteningly. These new dragons were interested in only one thing, it seemed. And we witnessed what must be the dragon version of an R-rated movie. These dragons shed all inhibitions and proceeded to engage in highly inappropriate acts right there. We watched, unable to take our eyes away.

I don’t want to belabor the point. In a very short period of time, the canyon was crawling with dragons. I counted about 65, but then I could only see 65. There were many more, I’m sure, beyond what I could see from my perch point. And all were infected with anger, even the new ones who couldn’t possibly know about the terrible humans who had killed their colleague.

I suppose the smart thing would have been to head back to our bodies and flee like mad. But that didn’t happen. Instead, we were both getting angrier and angrier, listening to our leader, Brambo, as he filled our soul hearts with hatred towards those evil humans (us) who had killed poor Fred.

The leader was a damn good speaker (from the dragon point of view). He developed his theme with passion and skill. Like a surgeon, he dissected the important points of what he termed the “human problem.”

1. Horrible humans had killed Dragon Grobgo (Fred’s dragon-name)

2. Therefore horrible humans had to be killed

3. In fact, the fact that horrible humans could kill them so horribly meant that ALL horrible humans had to be killed

4. Therefore, the next step was to reproduce like mad and make many, many, many more dragons who could then kill all humans

Point number 4 was met with loud cheers since all the dragons, it appeared, were very pro-reproducing. They got to work immediately.

I suppose the clever and lifesaving maneuver would have been to return ASAP to our human bodies in the lab and escape—from Earth, if possible, because these were gargantuan and very angry dragons. And they were hell-bent on destroying not just us but all humans. However, the clever idea didn’t immediately strike us.

Instead—

Both Jonas and I felt a strange impulse towards this other dragon who appeared to be making eyes at the dragon we were inside. The strange thought we had—and it was very strange indeed—was that this dragon looking at our dragon was a truly fine-looking beast—the kind we felt our dragon should get pally with right away, without losing a moment. I don’t want to embarrass you or myself, and so I will pass over the unsavory aspects of two dragons having a really good time. I tell you, it was exhausting. Both Jonas and I, although we were disembodied souls inside our dragon, felt emotions and feelings that were distinctly physical. It is impossible to explain how we felt what we felt, but Jonas thinks it has to do with the fact that our souls were being colored by dragon-ish elements. Ordinarily, as human beings, we would find dragons repulsive and terrifying. But from the point of view of dragons—well, as I said, that other dragon was quite something.

The next item on the dragon agenda after about five minutes of active, pulsating, throbbing reproduction was, of course, the elimination of ALL humans, beginning with those two vile creatures in the lab who had killed Comrade Grobgo.

This meant only one thing. We had to get back right away. We had to get our souls back into our slumped, soulless bodies in Jonas’s lab.

At least, that is what should have been on top of our minds. But it wasn’t. I didn’t feel like going back. Jonas felt the same way.

But we’ll be dead, right? If we don’t get back, these dragons will kill us—and every other human, right? I asked

True, said Jonas. But what chance do we stand against these homicidal dragons? I say we’re as good as dead.

That doesn’t sound very good to me! I protested weakly. Though privately, I really wanted to hang out inside this dragon. It seemed much more fun to me.

That’s settled then, said Jonas, we’ll just stay here and see what happens.

But what about Rhode Island v. Biggs? I asked. I’ve got to get to that dinner at Ron’s house and convince the Supreme Court justices to vote against Biggs. You know, the free speech case...I've got to persuade the judges to see the free speech case the way I see it.

Oh, I see, the way you see it has to be the correct way, is that it? Jonah said whimsically. You're always so sure of yourself! I'm sorry, I'm being mean. Truthful, but mean. Anyway, it doesn't matter. Look at these dragons. We’re doomed, don't you see? These dragons, they’re going to burn all of us crisp. Humanity is going to be gone in a very short time because what chance do we stand against supercharged dragons who are breeding as fast or faster than cockroaches. Face it, Abe, for all practical purposes, we’re dragons now. Who cares about free speech, we’re dragons!

Yeah, but for how long? I asked. Once the dragons have torched us to death, we’ll be, well, dead. I admit I don't have all the answers. I could be wrong about the free speech thing. I don't know for a fact if I'm right. It's just my opinion. And for just an opinion, I've done something catastrophic! And so have you. We broke it, Jonas. I broke it by being idiotic enough to give you the money to do what you did, and you broke it by doing something as insanely stupid as creating a dragon infestation on the planet. You know the rule, you break it, you fix it! I admit I screwed up! You screwed up too. We both screwed up. But now, you've got to think of your kids. What kind of a person lets dragons burn their kids to death? We’ve got to do something! We’ve got to get back!

Jonas didn’t look happy. You’re such a spoilsport! I was looking forward to some really good dragon times. Dragons have all the fun, you know, he said. But I suppose you’re right, he added begrudgingly.

So let’s get back, shall we? I said

OK, he said, OK. Let’s do it.

So what’s the magic word? I asked impatiently. The one you said to come out of the cat?

Yeah, the magic word, the magic word…Jonah looked bewildered. I seem to remember it was more than one word…

Yes, yes, go on, let’s hear it. Let’s use the magic word—and you know, save the world, like we’re kind of obligated to.

Jonas gulped. It’s interesting to see a soul gulp because souls don’t have physical throats or physical anything, so a gulping soul is a peculiar sight.

Hurry up! I said. These dragons—look at them! They’re gearing up to go kill us all. Except for the ones laying eggs.

The problem, Abe, said Jonas, is that I can’t seem to remember the magic word. Do you remember it?

I don’t! I shouted. It was more than one word, is all I remember.

But you’re sure there was a magic word? Jonas appeared confused.

Of course, there was a magic word! You said there was. How the hell did you come out of the cat without one?

Good point. Yes, said Jonas, makes total sense. I do have a vague recollection of it…I tell you being inside the dragon does weird things to your memory.

For crying out loud, Jonas, rack your brains!

I’m a soul, Abe, so I don’t really have a brain. Maybe that’s the problem. I—I—I—just can’t remember it!

So what the heck do we do? I was screaming hysterically now. We’ve got to get back and maybe use weapons of mass destruction or something to get rid of these dragons. They’re multiplying in front of our eyes! There must be at least 200 of them now. Can you imagine how many dragons there’ll be if we don’t get back, like right this minute? I MUST contact the President, my mother—everyone! We’ve got to mobilize the government immediately and use all the firepower we have to blast these dragons out of existence RIGHT AWAY—otherwise, otherwise, we’re toast—literally.

I see your point, said Jonas. But how exactly do we do this? I can’t remember the magic word! So, um, how do we get back and solve our dragon problem?

That was a great question. How to solve our dragon problem? We were just a couple of souls—or astral bodies—trapped inside a dragon. The dragons were flapping their wings and doing pushups, and gearing up for human destruction. So we had to get back ASAP and take care of the dragons before they finished off the human race.

But how? How? How? HOWWWW?

We racked our non-existent brains. There had to be a way…