Nemo

Nemo was content with life, or as content as a frog could be. He would spend his days looking for insects, hopping across lily pads, and swimming. Occasionally, he'd have to dive down to watch for predators, but this was a rare occasion. Time passed in this fashion, and yet it every day felt new and he had no complaints.

One fateful day, a large dragon appeared before his pond. He'd never seen a dragon before, and so he froze, hoping it would not notice him. The dragon seemed oblivious to his presence, and instead started to shed large, salty tears into the pond. They rippled across the pond's surface. The frog was alarmed, and quickly jumped off his pad and peeked out from under it.

The dragon started to make loud noises, almost like a chant, and he saw the water begin to change from deep green to an alarming clouded pink. He tried to swim away, but the pinkness caught up with him and when it touched him, he felt a zap and his world fell dark.

When Nemo woke up, he looked down to see the pond had shrunk to the point that his body touched the bottom and that he was somehow high in the air above it. Frightened, Nemo tried to grab hold of the pond's bank, and with horror he looked down and found that instead of cool, webbed appendages, he had scaled hands with claws. Nemo almost fainted right there when a voice spoke to him.

"It's ok-kkay!" the voice said, sputtering halfway between words and sniffles.

He looked across to see the same dragon he saw earlier, except that the dragon didn't look nearly as large as it did before and the dragon was still crying.

"D-don't move! i know it must be a-alarming, but, you'll b-be okay!" it called out to him.

Nemo was still very alarmed, and wasn't sure how he was understanding the dragon now, but he could. He looked down, halfway squinting his eyes to not get overwhelmed, and saw that the rest of him had changed too. He was no longer a frog, but a dragon.

He was aghast, and started to become distressed. He felt the scales all over his body, and saw an enormous tail. Nemo started to claw at himself, hoping that maybe underneath this dragon exterior was himself.

"S-stop! P-please, don't hurt yourself!" cried the other dragon.

"I'm s-sorry I did this to y-you. It was really an ac-ccident. I was practicing a spell and, somehow it all went w-wrong.'

The other dragon started to cry even harder at seeing Nemo in complete distress.

"I-I am no g-good at magic. I s-should p-probably go h-home. I'm so s-sorry!"

The other dragon, crumpled into a heap of scales and started to moan.

Nemo stopped his self-destructive behavior, and even though he was still very upset of having been turned into a dragon against his will, he felt sorry for the collapsed dragon a few yards away from him.

Carefully, he moved his legs and slowly crawled from his home, to the grassy area where the other dragon lay sobbing. Instinctually, he rubbed his snout against the other's in a gentle manner. Nemo didn't know why he did that, maybe it was due to his new body's guidance, but it appeared to work as the other dragon lifted its wing and stared at Nemo in wonder.

Nemo didn't know what to do next, and so he just sat down, still feeling a little uneasy on his new limbs, and stared at the other dragon. The dragon's tears seemed to be slowing down and so he hoped he had done something right.

"T-thank you," the other dragon said, softly. "I-I'm so sorry I turned you into a d-dragon, and I really have n-no way to t-turn you b-back, but I c-can show you how w-wonderful it is to be a d-dragon if you w-want?" it croaked.

Nemo felt some despair at never being able to be as he was, but figured that the only way forward was, well, forward. He sighed heavily.

"Okay," he said, "Show me what it is to be a dragon."

The other dragon looked up hopefully at him. It had finished crying and its eyes were red.

"F-first thing's first. You need a name. Do you have one?"

Nemo thought for a moment. He didn't recall having a name as a frog. He was no one, as all frogs are. But after pondering the question for a few moments, he found one that felt right.

"Nemo," said Nemo.

"Nemo?" repeated the other dragon. The dragon seemed to roll the word on its tongue, "Nemo... I t-think that fits quite nicely."

The other dragon beamed at him.

"Yes, that's the perfect name. Welcome, Nemo!" the dragon exclaimed, gesturing at the vast expanse. "Welcome to Sornieth!"

And with that, the other dragon took Nemo's hand, and Nemo began his first flight.