Story © Vargr

"What 'cha lookin' at up there, Vargr?" his friend asked as he followed the wolf's line of sight towards the distant clouds.

"The play ground." The big dragonwolf replied distantly, his smile still dreamy.

"Playground? What playground?" The littler fur asked, sitting away from the wolf's flank for a moment to peer harder at the sky. "I don't see no playground up there." He said, puzzled, as he lay back once again against the wolf's plump and comfortable side.

Vargr chuckled at his friend's tone, jostling the smaller fur gently as the wolf's tummy shook with his mirth. He took a long draft of the cool drink at his paw, and lapped the driblets from his muzzle and whiskers before he turned his ice blue eyes skyward once more.

"It's not a playground you can reach from the ground." The big wolf said softly.

The smaller fur settled himself more comfortably amidst the scintillating rainbows of the wolf's thick fur and perked up his ears. He'd heard this tone before. There was a story coming on. He smiled happily and prepared to listen.

"To reach this playground," Vargr continued, his blue eyes glowing happily as he stared into the sky, "You have to be able to soar…"

************************************

To Soar.

The running liftoff, the struggle to heave my heavy carcass off the ground. The ground seems to suck at me, holding me to the earth as I struggle to break free. Finally, one last mighty leap, and my paws spin in the air, free at last.

Still laboring, my wingtips slapping the earth with each stroke as though chastising a lover too eager to draw me back into its embrace, I rise slowly. My breath begins to whistle through my gaping maw. I can feel the quickening pound of my heart even above the rush of wind down my throat and the surge and heave of flight muscles. I vow once more to shrink this round swell of belly that drags me back towards the ground. Then I laugh despite the effort, knowing that the temptation of a good meal will win out over my longing for a svelte and easy takeoff.

Finally, I gain enough altitude that I can take full and long sweeps with my wings without bashing and bruising them against the ground. I fall into a steadier, less frantic rhythm, and climb gently towards the cloud-strewn sky above. My body is heating from the steady effort. My breath still rushes through my throat, my ribs heaving like bellows, as I work to lift the results of too many good meals skyward. My heart is pulsing harder and harder, I can feel it pounding in my chest now, shaking me with each beat.

At five hundred yards up, I hit the wall. It's always there waiting for me, though it grows in stature and formidability in direct relation to the number of extra pounds bulging my belly and thickening my body. My tongue lolls from the side of my mouth, and my throat seems too narrow for the air I try to draw into desperately starved lungs. My nose and sinuses feel scalded, dry and parched. I can hear the pounding of my heart over the gasp of my breath now as the blood slams through my body and drums in my ears. My vision reddens around the edges, narrowing a tiny bit more with each beat. Little twinkles like intermittent stars scintillate before me. It would be so easy, so easy just to stiffen my wings and glide my overweight and exhausted body back to the hungry, clinging arms of the Earth.

But I was never a Dragonwolf to give up on something I wanted, even though I risked destruction to achieve it. I fight on and on, knowing that I've been here before, knowing that my second wind will come at last. Knowing that the winds will ultimately have pity on me and lift my tiring wings upon their strength. I keep holding to this knowledge and ignoring the possibility that there may be no second effort waiting within me this time; that the fullness of a life lived too well and a belly grown too heavy may one day surpass my endurance. That I may one day force my struggling body beyond its limits, to explode my heart and fall from my beloved skies and crash in a sprawled, ungainly pile of fur and meat, and cause the farmers and poor earth-bound creatures below to wonder what manner of foolish and frightening thing had irritatingly chosen their patch of ground to smash itself upon.

This is not that day, however. The first touch of thermals brush past me. Almost as if triggered by the recognition of the rising air, the second wind within me eases the painful straps around my chest, quiets the pounding thunder of my heart, and wipes away the encroaching redness within my vision. The beat of my wings comes easier to muscles relaxed and reinvigorated. Another breeze ruffles my fur, and I bank into the column of heated, lifting air. The ground slides away as I spiral tight within the warm wind's rising embrace. Too soon, it wanes and I level out to seek the next column, and the next after that.

It seems only moments later that I am close enough brush the dark, lowering underbellies of the clouds above me. Below me, the land is a mosaic of home, farm, field and forest, all covered in pinto splotches of sunlight and shadow from the clouds just above me. I take the time to soak in the beauty. Then, in a fit of whimsy, I roll onto my back and strike out with all four paws, to whisk them through the hazy darkness of the cloud above and tickle its bulging underbelly.

The cloud responds in a warning gust of wind. The draft tumbles me in a roll and, laughing, I straighten up to 'fly right'. Having begun my friendship with this growing cumulonimbus, I am reluctant to part company so soon. Arching my back, I pull around in a steep turn that points one wing toward the ground, and temporarily brings the tip of my long, serpentine tail into my vision. I can feel the pull against my belly and feet as the speed of the turn draws my legs outward from their streamlined tuck and makes my belly bulge out roundly even more than normal.

As I straighten out, I look for the tell-tail signs in the churn and roil of the dark, heavy cloud above me. There! There is the peculiar bubble and churn that signifies one of the mouths feeding the warm, moist, rising energy of the sun-warmed land to the growth of this powerful cloud above me. Wings beating once again, I plunge daringly upward and into the roiling mists.

In an instant, the strength of this rising air surges under me and buoys me upward. My guts and stomach sink within me as tons of flesh and bone are sucked like a leaf up into the midst of the cloud. I am immediately surrounded by a cool, wet blanket of mist. Featureless gray momentarily overcomes my vision as my eyes struggle to compensate from the sunny landscapes viewed moments before. My inner ears and guts tell me I'm still rising, and I bank once more to stay within this powerful current of air. The air chills refreshingly, drawing the surfeit of heat away from my laboring body. The rich, dense moisture eases the parched linings of my nose, throat, and lungs. Dew forms and drips off my whiskers and fur, and my eager tongue reaches out to lick away the cool, quenching, bounty. Pure liquid, like none other: Not yet sullied by the touch of ground nor pipe nor cup. I laugh as I lap at my whiskers and muzzle, intoxicated by the heady taste of its crystalline clarity, grateful for this gift of refreshment after my earlier struggles.

My cloud is affronted at my presumptive intrusion. In seconds, the rising column shifts and vanishes. A gust rushes at me from behind, but I surf its insistent shove and use its power to gain speed and flight energy. Recklessly, I spin and twirl down the face of this invisible wave of air, indulging in cloud-shrouded acrobatics that none but this cumulus shall ever witness. My cloud views my sporting as a challenge. A gust swipes at me from the right flank, and I roll and porpoise as the two masses clash. Another gust, stronger this time, shoves powerfully against my left wing and shoulder. As I begin to roll into its embrace, a third strikes me strongly in the belly and chest and heaves me like a toy hundreds of feet upward.

My wings, legs and tail sag like sandbags under the load. But in a moment, the gust is gone. Laughing, I use the push and fling to tumble into a summersault, and bat playfully at my tail as it once again emerges into view through the swirling mist around me. The cloud swells itself at my laughter. How dare this puny, insignificant bit of fluff disregard its might? Whirls and tides surge against me, and I spin and roll in a dance with them, laughing in the delight of the challenge. The cloud grows darker around me, the tempests and gusts grow from shoves to blows. A century of flight gives the skill to know that this cloud is herding me to its heart, though there is no way to see this through the ever-present mists.

An enormous blast of air momentarily steals the breath from my lungs. A wing groans warningly as the winds twist it dangerously near to breaking. Pulling in their expansive membranes until only a Peregrine's streamlined stoop remains, I aim myself towards the mighty heart of this thunderstorm, and relinquish myself to its power.

I close my eyes to a world where vision no longer has a purpose. Instinct and decades of knowledge guide the twist of tail there, an extended leg here, the least exposure of wing and a faint twist just … there. In these tiny ways I guide my path, slow a spin that sucks the blood to extremities until my vision is pure red behind my closed eyes, ease from one roaring column to its neighbor. I am tossed and flung like a cork in a rapids. I know that all my skills and instincts are ultimately meaningless against the growing power of this storm. I abandon myself to its mercy, even as I still twist and strive to keep enough control to remain conscious.

Its might wraps itself around me. Lightning, so close it dazzles through my closed eyelids, strobes the mists around me. Thunder bellows loud and low enough that it seems to reach directly inside me to tremble my guts in its grasp. I am lost in the immensity of it, but my laughter never fails. It is a laughter of awe and delight, a joy at experiencing an energy so vast and natural that it thrills me to the very fiber of my being. No simple sense of sight or vision could approach this appreciation of being directly in the midst of the storm and becoming one with it with my entire being. I feel filled by it, renewed, even as the sheer power around me threatens to rip my frail body to pieces and shower me back to earth to renew the lands with my substance.

Finally, my cloud realizes that I am not laughing in defiance, but in acceptance and joy. It accepts the indomitable spirit of the one who dared to intrude upon its majesty, and gifts me its tolerance and humor. It tosses me about, playfully now. Can we spin this wolf until he throws up? How fast can he plunge, how tight he turn, how quickly he rise? Does he tickle as the lightning statics his fur to a frizzy ball? Does he flinch as the thunder shudders his innards like jelly? Such is cloud humor. My cloud and I dance together on a playground of air in the grey and wet featureless tides in its midst, and my laughter rings in duet to the chuckling rumble of its thunder.

At last, my cloud tires of our games, for clouds have much more important things to do than waste too much time with such toys as I. But it grants me a parting gift in recognition of our time together. Within its heart, it seizes me in a rushing column of air like none other. In seconds, I am propelled up! Up! A hundred feet! A thousand! Two thousand! Five! I swallow against the popping in my ears, and I can feel the gasses and atmosphere within me expanding, bulging my belly larger as I rise faster and faster.

Ten thousand, fifteen, twenty. The magical nature of my being surrounds me, protects my body and my fragile life, holds the air within my lungs and keeps the blood from boiling in my veins as I rise higher and faster than I have ever flown.

Thirty thousand, forty, fifty. My belly swells like a balloon as my guts expand from the pressure inside them. I rub my paws across its bulging surface, feeling it stretching farther, growing tighter and larger, and I wonder in delight and fear at how much bigger it will become, and how big it can grow before its limit is surpassed. I wonder if the magic of my being will protect me from exploding, as well as suffocating and the bends. The dew on my coat becomes frost, then ice, but the icy nature of my core magic welcomes the refreshing chill. The gray mass of the cloud around me seems to be growing lighter, or is this my vision playing tricks as the air vanishes around me?

At last, at over seventy thousand feet, I explode out of the top of the cloud like cork from a champagne bottle. The updraft hurls me, tumbling like a ball, far above the anvil top of my cloud. My wings instinctively snap open as the momentum of my rise finally expends itself, and I find myself floating in a world few living things have every known.

No hawk nor eagle has soared to such lofty heights! The sun is no longer a soft yellow presence; it is a blazing sphere of arc-light brilliance, as hard and perfect as a radiant diamond. The dark and menacing underbelly of my cloud is transformed upon its top to a pristine whiteness who's purity and brilliance stabs at eyes accustomed to the grey of its interior. All around me tops of my cloud's friends and neighbors rise to white, puffy, softness, though not to such a great height as my cloud, I notice with pride. I glide on outstretched wings to swoop and bank across the bulges and pillows of the white top of my cloud, and it chuckles and bubbles upward at me, burbling me upwards playfully on tiny outgusts of air. In turnabout from our initial encounter, it reaches upwards with a filament of static, and tickles the tight roundness of my stretched and bulging underbelly.

I laugh at the tickling, and clutch at my itching belly with my paws, and then I gasp in amazement at what it has become. It has inflated like a huge, furred balloon! It bulges roundly, almost spherically between my ribs and groin, and I have to straddle my hind legs to let my hips slide past the bulging curves of my flanks. Never have I seen my belly so huge and round! I press tentatively at its taunt surface, then more forcefully as it refuses to give way. It's difficult, but I manage at last to make an indentation in its tight roundness. I had no idea I could be inflated to this size, and for a moment I wonder if this is my limit, or if I could get even bigger were I to climb higher? I find the thought, and my current expansion very exciting, but I know I haven't the strength of wing to rise any higher to test the question.

I realize that I have grown so big around that I can no longer see the middle of my belly, nor am I able to reach around its extended girth to touch it with any paw. But the tickling from the cloud's tendril demands to be rubbed away. I curve my long, serpentine tail beneath me to rub at the distended floor of my belly. As I rub away the itching, my tail also encounters my excited state, and the touch is nearly overwhelming. I clutch at the round sphere of my belly with all four paws, unable to encircle it, and I can feel it growing and shrinking minutely in time with my breathing. I draw as deep a breath as I can, and I can feel it grow just the tiniest bit larger, but that miniscule expansion is the last trigger I need. The release is exquisite, and I tremble at the impact of it on top of all else I've experienced this morning.

I roll over on my back and sprawl spread-eagled in relief, wings out and coasting slowly downward, and at last I open my eyes. There above me is the moon, shining in concert with the sun. And my draconic vision glimpses the stars through the dark cobalt blue of the sky above me. I realize in wonder that I find myself at the threshold of space itself, and the awe of the universe just beyond my touch pours through me. I gaze upward in rapt wonder until my untended flight immerses me for a moment in the wispy top of a neighboring cloud.

It seems to chuckle at my obsession with the view, and a pulse of wind spins me over until my feet dangle properly earthward once more. I join in its laughter and throw it a salute in appreciation. Then at last I turn my attention to the world beneath me.

I find that the countryside is not the one I left at takeoff. There are no familiar landmarks, no towns or villages I recognize. But on the horizon, a wondrous forest catches my eye. The distance is great, but I have altitude to burn. Gliding easily, I turn my path to the tall trees and rainbow'd waterfalls my vision points out. I give my cloud a last barrel-roll in playful salute, and it responds with a rumble of thundery laughter. The glide to the forest is peaceful, compared to the adventure that came before. There is enough lift and slip in the air to keep the interest awake, but nothing to strain tired wings and spent body.

************************************

Vargr turned a smile, radiant with the memories, back towards his smaller friend.

"I heard my cloud had a very exciting day that day. The news was full of the stories of this powerful thunderstorm; a real 'super cell'. It caused a wide swath of chaos before it was spent, but there was not a single injury or death." The wolf's grin widens. "I think it was laughing at our sport. Cloud humor is robust and wild, a bit like me. It's not quite what we poor earthbound types always define as funny. Perhaps it's all in my imagination, but the stories of this line of disaster are just too odd to ignore."

"The old man who was picked up in his bathtub and set down, water and all, in the parking lot of his church. The semi-truck load of Styrofoam packing peanuts that was dropped on city hall, with enough static charge to make them cling to every square inch of the building - I hear they're still finding the remnants hiding in nooks and crannies." Vargr chuckled.

"But what really makes me sure it was my cloud was what it did to the kennels: It picked the roof off a warehouse in one town and carried an entire week's production from the Purina factory over to the biggest boarding kennels in the state, two towns away. There it used the bags of dog food, swirling in the midst of the funnel, to rip down the inner fences separating the individual kennels from the center exercise yard. And before it left, it dropped all the food it had been carrying."

"The workers found all the dogs in the middle of the compound, without a scratch on a single one, gorging on the biggest pile of food any of those dogs had ever seen." Vargr's grin grows wider. "My cloud might have trouble recognizing the difference between a dragonwolf and a normal canine, but even it could figure out how much I like to eat!"

The little fur joined in his big wolfish friend's laughter, and Vargr turned his wistful gaze back on the skies.

"To soar…" The big wolf repeated softly, longingly. "The winds are right today. And I haven't put on _that_ much weigh."

A mischievous look gleamed in the dragonwolf's brilliant blue eyes as he looked back at the little fur pillowed against his flank. "Feel like taking a ride?"