One Sadistic Dragon

“What’s this I see crossing my path?”

“N-n-nothing.”

“Why I think I spy a little gnome there.”

“Yes. Yes! That’s surely what I am, and you appear to be a rather large dragon in my path.”

“How do you know I’m a Dragon?”

“Your size…and your scales really are a dead giveaway you know.”

“Maybe…maybe not. How do you know for instance that I’m not merely a really large human dressed in dragon scales?”

“First of all a really large human doesn’t even come close to your size. Secondly…Oooooh your eyes are shiny…what was I saying? Oh yes secondly you have a mountain of jewels behind you.”

“Those are merely circumstantial. I could be a human wearing a large suit with a tail to scare smaller creatures such as you away from these jewels; a scarecrow if you will. Those humans are quite clever you know.”

“Well I can see your underside. It doesn’t appear to be wooden. Even if it were possible for your underside to be faked, I’ve yet to see a dragon that was felled by humans with one completely intact, and I don’t think even the most skilled human could fabricate something so convincingly beautiful.”

“You’re missing the point. All the reasons you have given me do not unequivocally prove to me that I do indeed happen to be a dragon.”

“What do you mean? You are a dragon and that’s that.”

“I don’t believe that I’m a dragon. You need to prove to me that I am. You need to prove it in a way that I can’t argue.”

“Your claws make you a dragon.”

“Again, you miss the fact that the claws could be forgeries.”

“YOU ARE A DRAGON!”

“There’s no need to shout. If I were an old dragon, and I’m not saying that I am, then that sort of behavior might irritate me quite a lot.”

“There…you just admitted that you were a D-R-A-G-O-N.”

“I most certainly did no such thing. I attached a disclaimer, apparently you weren’t paying attention.”

“I must have been distracted by the way the sun glistens off your exquisite teeth. They are dragon’s teeth if you were unsure.”

“They could have been taken from a dead dragon.”

“I bet they weren’t.”

“You don’t know that, do you?”

“Well, no…no I don’t.”

“So you have still failed to prove to me that I am a dragon.”

“How do I prove to you that you’re a dragon?”

“That, my friend, rests squarely on your shoulders. Hurry up though; I may have to try to convince you that I’m a scarecrow.”

“You’ll never do that. I can’t think of one way I’d believe you were anything other than a stubborn old dragon.”

“Well I have kept you away from the jewels far longer than you would expect, correct?”

“I suppose you have a valid point.”

“Then it would stand to reason that I might be a scarecrow?”

“Yes, I guess it would. I’m making a run for the jewels then.”