Tyrei stirred slightly at the noise, shifted positions on the warm rock she was sunning herself on, and tried to go back to sleep. Then the noise came again, an animal cry with a sort of gulping undertone, and she decided she really ought to investigate. She had been sunning herself in a small clearing of an otherwise dense forest, and was rather closer to the human infestation than her mother liked her to be. It was, unfortunately, the best place to go when she wanted to be alone for a while and besides, mothers, wise as they were, didn’t know everything.

The young dragon slipped off the rock and into the forest with a mere whisper of sound, stirring the leaves less than a stray gust of wind. Despite their size, dragons could be extraordinarily quiet when they wished, and little Tyrei was one of the quietest. She slid noiselessly through the branches, heading cautiously but steadily towards the source of the strange sound. As she got closer she began hearing another noise in between the calls, a mournful, sobbing noise, almost like... crying?

Finally she was upon the cause of the disturbance. Although she was careful to remain hidden from sight, what she found almost shocked her enough to cause her to reveal herself anyway. A human! She had seen them before from afar, but never one so close. This particular specimen seemed even smaller then most of its kind, and it wandered the dark woods, its face and body language seeming to radiate confusion, fear, and sadness all at once. Their faces are so expressive! Tyrei thought. How odd, for an animal incapable of having feelings, to have features that give the illusion of possessing them! The human, a clumsy little thing with longer hair than much of its kind and a brightly colored outer layer, paused in its search to call out once. This final cry ended when it broke down in a fit of sobbing and collapsed to its knees. Tyrei was somewhat taken aback by the display. What is wrong with the creature? Is it lost? Is it hungry? Has it something in its eyes?

She watched for some time, her curiosity getting the best of her common sense, and tried to figure out what, if anything, she should do about the situation. The little voice in her mind that sounded like her mother chided her, reminding her that humans were but dangerous animals and that the best course would be to sneak away now before she was noticed. The voice that was her own, however, was touched by the display and goaded her to try and do something, anything, to soothe the little creature. For just a moment she even entertained the idea of picking the thing up and carrying it to the nearby colony, even though she knew she’d have to spend virtually forever cleaning herself after touching such a dirty creature. The worry of how others of its kind would react when she dropped the tiny animal off never even entered her mind.

Fortunately, she was saved from having to make such a drastic decision by the arrival of two larger humans. When they came into view one of them, the more slender of the two, made a soft sound, just loud enough to attract the little one’s attention. The little one looked up and her expression was transformed instantly from sorrow to joy. It picked itself up off the ground and immediately flung itself at the larger two, embracing them as much as its little arms allowed it to. The slender-tall human embraced her in return, its face conveying relief, while the bulkier creature made scolding noises directed at the smallest one. Slender-tall tutted Bulky with lips curled into... amusement? Yes, that looked like amusement. Bulky looked stern a moment longer before breaking into a smile, and then he playfully ruffled the top of Little-one’s long head-fur. At that he turned and began to move off towards the settlement, while Slender-tall took a moment to brush dirt off of Little-one’s outer-layer before following.

Even though the humans were quickly out of sight, it was a very long time before Tyrei stirred. She kept mulling over every detail of the display she had just watched. In her mind she took each little detail out, turned it over and over to examine all its sides and edges, and looked to see how they fitted together into a whole. When she put all the pieces together she could only come to one conclusion, one that flew in the face of everything even the wisest of her elders taught her and called much of the philosophy of her kind into question: humans do have feelings.