The Superior Species
(Second Draft)

It seemed that the top of Mount Everest would never appear. Or at least the extra 20,000 feet of towers that the humans had just recently built. My wings were damaged from all of the recent activity that had taken place, and were of no more use today. The final task of the day, bring the beast home for dinner. With almost all my energy gone, I scampered up the snowy pinnacle, feet crunching against the snow, claws tormented from hours of climbing, back aching, and from time to time I would collapse onto the ground in agony. I would sometimes try to go at a quicker pace, but my limbs would become heavier and weaker (1).I was so tired but I knew that I couldn’t fail. Otherwise, I would face the consequences.
We are the Dragons of the Himalayas, discovered by mankind in 2045. We had been inhabiting these mountains, unseen, ever since the Paleocene (3)(the era after the extinction of the dinosaurs). We were much weaker than the humans. They carried unknown, powerful technology that we had never seen before. The people became known as Dragon Lords, forced us to serve them, and have been making us build giant cities in the mountains. For the 19 years that they’ve had us, we’ve obviously hated them.(2) But we had no choice.
Over a couple years, they kept searching and made even more ancient discoveries including the sphinx, minotaur, goblin, giant, werewolf, and many marine creatures.
As I continued climbing, I started wheezing, and sparks would suddenly jump out of my mouth. The Dragon Lords didn’t care about our condition and expected us to know how to fend forourselves. They’d make us work 15 hours a day and would let us do our own things whenever we weren’t working, but were really cruel. If one of us was caught not working or was talking to another during instructions, he or she would be shot with an electrical pulse and would be put out comission for a short while.

After about half an hour more of climbing, I made it back to the “Fire Dragon's Den” which was a 2060’s modern residence, except it was 30 times larger. This was one of many homes for the Dragons. We get our own rooms, and are organized by our type, obviously me being a fire dragon.
After washing up in my room, I lugged out the food into the dining area.
“Yo, Osiris,” I turned and saw my friend Matt walking slowly towards me,“what’s for today?”
“I caught some fresh leviathan, the big fishy thing that Marcus loves,(6)” I replied. I wasn’t in the mood for partying. Some rest would be good. We only got half a day on Sundays.
I set down the creature on the dining table and pressed a button on the wall. A few seconds later, there were dragons all around the table. I had no energy left, as I hauled the humongous creature onto the big table. I just wanted to fall asleep. Tonight however was a special night; I had some words to say(4). After everyone fell silent, I asked our Den Leader, Marcus, if I could speak.
He nodded and I began, “Fellow beasts of the mountains, I have something important to say tonight. We dragons have been working for humans for almost 20 years. Of course, it is because they want a metropolis built in these mountains, and they know that we dragons will be able to complete the task very quickly. I completely understand why we should help them do this. Long ago, I thought we would live peaceful lives, side by side with humans, with no conflict. I thought that we would simply coexist with them, without harm, and we would fight together against any enemy. When we first met them, we saw them as harmless little creatures who came in peace and wanted to share theHimalayas as a home with us. Neither of us wished the other harm. I thought all was well. But I was wrong. In the end we agreed to share our home, and the humans started to show their true colors.

It started when they repeatedly asked us for favors. Then started to take us in as ‘pets’ and made us do all of their dirty work. I was confused of course, having seen a different future. Then they started to ‘train’ us as beasts of war, making us exercise all day by doing all sorts of fitness and training until we had not a single ounce of energy left. Finally, they decide to build the biggest cities ever in the world within the mountains. They somehow find this ‘good exercise’ for us and make us work for the entire day until our muscles feel like rubber. Whenever we’re caught not working, they harm us in every possible way(5). They never even tend for our injured and sick, expect us to get our own provisions. We’ve done so much for them! What have they done? Nothing! Fellow beasts, we are working for some of the weakest beings on this planet!
I am tired of this! Is this really how dragons are meant to live?! Remember the old days, when dragons were the ultimate predator! They were bold, strong, fierce, scary, beautiful, ancient, invincible, magnificent, and most importantly: free! Is this what our current lives are? The  humans have made us believe that they’re stronger than us, but deep down on the inside we are stronger than them! We hunt down beasts, we soar above the clouds, we breath fire, we rip our enemies to shreds, we’re bigger, stronger, faster, and smarter!
Rebellion! Soldiers of the Himalayas, this is our most desperate hour! We are the only hope in stopping these vile creatures! We must rise up, and defeat the enemy we could have so long ago! This is our soil! Our land! Our home! I ask you all brothers, join together, fight together, and win together!”There was a tremendous uproar. All the dragons cheered and blew fire in the air. I was satisfied and managed a smile. Then the feast began.

We organized the rebellion to be the next day in the morning during the ceremony of sacrifice where everyone would be, dragons and humans. We shared the news and strategized with all the other Dragon Dens. But best of all, I finally got a good night’s sleep.
The next day, all of the dragons were lined up on the snow. They had all positioned themselves correctly. We would strike once the horn was sounded. The humans lined themselves up  and we started by praising the flag. After 20 minutes, we were done and the humans prepared to blast the horn. We were ready. They weren’t. When the horn blared, the sound of hope reverberated around the mountains, and they were taken by surprise. We had killed at least 30 before they got out their weapons and started firing back. There was a combination of fire, wind, water, air, dust, and ice everywhere. Many of my friends were getting injured. The humans attacked us from all sides and pushed us back against the water. They got into their planes and started firing. They outnumbered us five to one. We weren’t doing so well. Suddenly, everything changed. We started using EMPs which messed with their electrical systems and produced damaging current and voltage surges. Their planes all went down at once. They rushed to the ground and started firing rockets. But our wings shielded us. We dove down and disintegrated them, many at a time, with our waves of flame.  We blew up their explosives which also was also a very efficient killing method. They took the high ground but that didn’t work either. The tried to snipe us but we had been practicing, and we shielded ourselves within the trees and attacked them from there. I began to feel hope. Suddenly, gases sprayed in the air and we couldn’t see them. More dragons fell. There were only 200 of us and 1000 humans. When the gas cleared and the dust settled, they were in giant machines I’d never seen before. More missilessoared, but we took them out with our own abilities. We started blasting smoke in the air. We could use our five senses much better than any other creature on the planet. We sniffed them out and attacked. They couldn’t see anything. Tanks, machines, robots, and drones were all taken out. Some of them started to flee. I felt bad for the rest of them as the last 150 dragons wiped them out. They ran for their lives. The days of the Dragon Lords were over. We had done it.

I yelled, “Victory!!!!” All of the dragons were bursting with pride and roared so loud that the world could hear and we celebrated our freedom, something we hadn’t had in 19 years.