Tuesday Kuykendall

There’s No Such Thing As Humans

In November (2025) I participated in a writing challenge called “Novel November.” I wrote the first draft of a science fantasy novel about multiple universes, spies, dragons, and how no matter how old you get, you can still discover wonder in the universe. Below is my first chapter–for now. It’s a first draft so lots of things are likely to change. I hope you enjoy it.

Eirjin stood in the center of the room, doing his best not to fidget; he concentrated on taking deep slow breaths and kept his forward digits intertwined and on his back to keep from clicking his claws together, a nervous habit he never could overcome. The five council members scrutinized him from their perches in silence. He struggled to look simultaneously innocent, confident, serious, and humble; a singular challenge for a plump dragon in such a tiny space.

This was his second mishap; a third would get him kicked out of the science program; and for once, it wasn’t even his fault. If Wyruk hadn’t left the bottle of sulfuric acid sitting so close to the edge of the counter instead of putting it away before she left, Eirjin’s tail wouldn’t have accidentally knocked it over.

“What do you have to say for yourself, young man?” The old council chairman scrutinized Eirjin behind large thick glasses, chin feathers twitching.

Eirjin signed and struggled to keep from rolling his eyes. “I am mournful and I prostate myself before you in humble supplication to pray you forgive my stupidity. I only seek to learn.” Eirjin recited the required formal apology and tried to bend forward and place his head down on the floor as expected, but he only succeeded in bumping into Council Malnor’s desk.

The clerk read out the offense.

 “After chemistry class, Eirjin returned, alone, to the lab, claiming he forgot his notebook. He failed to properly manage his tail and on his way out he swept a bottle of acid onto the new and expensive phenolic countertop creating an irreparable hole and endangering the health of the evening janitorial staff.”

The clerk slammed shut the investigation volume with a crack that echoed up to the tall ancient ceiling and back again, and stepped back into the shadows.

Eirjin tried to smile and shrug. The lab had been newly remodeled, and the table, while still functional, would forever be a constant reminder of his clumsiness. Eirjin loved science, but as the lab assistant, he was on the lowest status rung despite his family name. He had to do what the others told him. This was especially egregious when it was Wyruk barking orders to move this or clean that. Ever since primary school, she’d talked down to him, literally because she was taller, but it was the way she did it, as if she was better than him.

This week, Eirjin’s offense was all the worse because it meant the promotion he was sure he was about to get wouldn’t happen. If only he could have had one more accident-free day, he might have been promoted to lab manager. The best he could hope for now was a spot in the general science graduate program.

The time before this mishap, he was working in the materials lab and mistakenly started a fire inside the muffle furnace, ruining the inside, and, if his lab mate and favorite cousin, Zyjin, hadn’t noticed the smoke and molten metal seeping from the edges there might have been a serious fire. How was he supposed to know that the metal was aluminum and not steel? They looked so much alike.

For reasons only the director knew, he sent Eirjin to work in the chemistry lab, his least favorite discipline, and now, he stood in front of that same director in shame.

He came back from his wandering thoughts but missed the first part of the department director’s closing remarks.

“… ause our charter constrains us to follow our own rules. Let’s see if you can do better in the physics lab. Dr. Laldor requested a lab assistant to help him test the particle accelerator he just finished building. This is a sensitive instrument but he seems certain that you can’t cause any damage since you’ll never be allowed alone in the lab or near the controls and they don’t store chemicals, or operate high temperature furnaces. This is your second offense Eirjin. A third and you will be placed on academic probation, no matter who your mother is.”

Eirjin nodded and did his best to look sufficiently contrite and hide his relief. He liked physics better than all the sciences, and it meant he was out from under Wyruk’s thumb.

“You’re dismissed.” said the clerk.

Eirjin curled his tail tight under his back legs. He had to maneuver without showing the council his bum. It meant he had to back out the door, blind. The Apex of Arrogance (number six of the eleven deadly sins) would be to back out with a raised tail, and he couldn’t leave it hanging down because it would hit something. That made this encounter all the more mortifying. He lowered his head respectfully, did his best to fold in his wings, and backed slowly out the door. His second left wing hook snagged on the hinge as he passed, and his eyes watered as he pulled it free, ripping it out partway. He did his best not to cry out, but a couple of whispered grunts escaped.

At last, he was through the door. He closed it gently and plopped down, his chin on the floor, and closed his eyes for a count of ten. That was the third hook he’d lost today, and he blocked out the throbbing. All he needed was to stub one more, and all four of them would be wounded. He wouldn’t remove it on purpose, of course, but he appreciated the symmetry. He shuddered at how close he was to being kicked out of the science program; but he’d survived this round, and he had another chance.

The floor vibrated with the stomping of a group of students coming toward him. He pulled himself together, stood tall, his tail straight up, wings back, head held high and trotted down the hall in the opposite direction.

He pushed open the double doors and scampered down the steps, two at a time; the university didn’t allow flying this close to Knowledge Hall . With each step away from the building, his stress faded and his excitement grew. He couldn’t wait to get home and tell his mom about the events of the day; despite the humiliation, this was going to work out for him better than he’d expected.

Tomorrow morning he would report to Dr. Laldor, and if he did a good job, maybe his application for graduate studies would finally be accepted.

Being brought before the council was taxing, and he was hungry. As soon as he cleared the restricted airspace, he launched himself up and over the trees and into the slow lane.

****

The physics labs were all in the basement of the science building because it had the least amount of electromagnetic interference and acoustic vibrations. The concrete walls were reinforced with copper and steel, and the walls around Dr. Laldor’s lab had been specially fitted with shielding—it was the newest and most modern laboratory on campus.

He was early. He stood outside the wide lab doors and knocked gently. There was no answer, and Eirjin was about to sit down to wait when a large gray-blue dragon ambled down the hall towards him.

“Hello Dr. Laldor.”

“Hello, hello, Eirjin. Sorry to be late. And please, call me Dr. L, everyone does.” The old physicist was short of breath, and little puffs of smoke escaped his left nostril. He fumbled with the large ring of keys around his wide middle, and after the fourth try, the door opened to reveal a bright, wide space filled wall-to-wall with shiny instrumentation; monitors with red digital numbers blinked; tools and inexplicable metal piping and glass chambers littered the countertops; and Eirjin noted with relief that there wasn’t a fume hood in sight. He hummed to the music of efficient motors. Just inside the door, to the right, stood several workstations, and Dr. L motioned towards them; “Please pick anyone you want; my workstation is on the other side of the room.” He pointed to a small office across from a bank of controls.

“Can I offer you a morning beverage?” he asked Eirjin. Before Eirjin could answer, the professor walked over to a galley kitchen on the left side of the entrance.

Eirjin set his bag down on the floor under the first empty workstation. He spun around in excitement and knocked over a plastic plant stand. Luckily, it didn’t include a plant. He bent over to pick it up and accidentally presented his backside to his new boss.

“Oh sir, I’m so sorry!” He spun around to face the older dragon, his face flushed indigo. He bent himself at an odd angle to keep his tail where it belonged and try to right the plant stand, but instead, fumbled and dropped it, this time breaking it.

“It’s fine. I understand.” Dr. L sighed and handed Eirjin a steaming cup of coffee. Eirjin was grateful. He was going to have to manage his emotions better. This was where he wanted to be. This was his chance. He wouldn’t blow it.

His first job was to sort the tools. They were scattered throughout the lab, and Dr. L’s grad assistant, Ms. Jyhxter, a somewhat arrogant student who preferred not to talk to Eirjin, complained she couldn’t find anything. Eirjin was eager to impress them. He opened cupboards and drawers looking for every kind of tool he could find and collected stray tools on the countertops and next to instruments. He found a stack of pink foam and cut the tool shapes out of several of them for storage.

When he proudly showed his work to Ms. Jyhxter; instead of the praise he was hoping for, she puffed a little heat his way in frustration. “I was using that foam for an experiment!”

“I’m sorry, I can take them out.” Eirjin reached to remove the tools.

“No, don’t bother. I’ll get more from shipping. Just ask next time.” She stomped out in a huff.

Eirjin worked hard not to make any more mistakes; taking each task seriously, moving slowly—deliberately. After several weeks, he demonstrated real competence for the first time in his life. Dr. L showed him how to tie up his tail and how to tuck his wings so that they didn’t snag on things. He put mirrors up in the corners so Eirjin could see what was behind him.

Even Ms. J grudgingly accepted him. They both gave him more responsibilities and eventually, Dr. L showed him the start-up procedures for the particle beam. They weren’t allowed to go over 8 ZeV. Dr. L said it could go considerably higher, but the newest set of experiments didn’t need more energy, and they hadn’t ramped it up to full power yet. Some of Dr. L’s colleagues insisted that he not go over 10 ZeV because of the danger of wormholes and black holes and they were forcing him to wait for their final approval to move forward with his next set of experiments.

Dr. L often complained to whoever was in the room that the council didn’t have a single physicist on it and the chemist and the astronomer couldn’t possibly understand the math involved. Eirjin was skeptical though because if he could understand the math, so could they, but he kept that opinion to himself.

On a cold winter day, a year after he’d started working in the lab, he went looking for Dr. L to sign his graduate application. He’d had a few minor accidents, knocking over the coffee cups, or dropping small screws under the baseboard of the magnet casing, but nothing that caused permanent damage or reached the level that required Dr. L to report him. Ms. J even let him help her with setting up one of her electron experiments. He would finish his undergraduate studies in another month, and he wanted to skip the holiday break and start right away.

He used his key to get into the lab and, for only the second time in a year, he was alone. The first time was only two days ago after he’d finally passed Ms. J’s safety test. He went to his workstation and sent a message to Dr. L and sat to wait.

In the quiet, a strange whine filled the lab, as if a motor were running hot. He had to check it; he didn’t consider leaving it alone. In the accelerator control room he noticed a blinking red light; one magnet was a couple of degrees Kelvin over temperature. He tapped the light, but it didn’t change. He looked around, wondering what he should do.

Eirjin had operated the beam several times, and he was confident he understood how it all worked well enough. Ms. J probably forgot to swap out a liquid helium tank. He hadn’t done this himself before, but he’d watched Ms. J do it several times.

The beam was active, and Eirjin checked the other magnets and the proton concentration; everything looked nominal. He noticed that the beam energy was decreasing slightly and considered that might be because one of the twenty-two magnets was warming, so he increased the energy to compensate and headed down to the beam line to see what he could do about the cooling system.

He didn’t give the energy monitor another look, but he should have. The value on the digital readout kept ticking upward, 7.5 ZeV, 7.55 ZeV … 8.35 ZeV… Eirjin forgot to set the rate of increase, and ceiling, and it was set to ramp-up speed. By the time he was standing next to the beam line, the energy had exceeded its design maximum, and tiny, swirling dark spots warping the air, popped in and out of existence.