My short lived obsession over comics has died out and my social insecurities have for the most part dissipated as I have matured.

I owe a lot of my current strength of character to the trial by fire that was my first two years of university; the people I’ve met, the lessons I’ve learned on the social stage. And now, in the waning years of my degree, I look forward to my future prospects as an adult with a confident smile and a heart of gold.

I may post here again to give a lecture to those who feel overwhelmed with their own insecurities: How I conquered my own with my very strange philosophies, and how some insecurities will never truly leave a person, and only evolve and change with every passing year.

Or I may not, for my voice is only one of many in this world and the words of the individual are quickly becoming meaningless without power or conformity in this age of misinformation.

But I digress.

Goodbye blog: You were a good little vent for my late-teen angst.

A Larger version and Individual frames with no speechbubbles are on my deviant page.

Also an exec on Rocksoc now. Looking forward to organising merchandise!

Anyway, had a recent art dump so check them out: http://wyrmdraken.deviantart.com/. Also:

I that is to say; what knowledge surpasses belief in your mind. How much of your knowledge is proven and how much is taken for granted.

Is the earth round or flat?

Where did you learn this from?

What proof is there?

And now a harder question:

Why?

Theists and atheists will (hopefully) answer the first three questions in a very similar manner. The last time I checked schools still taught basic astronomy and science (though this may enter debate in one certain country west of us) and there are various ways to prove this fact, even from ground level.

Why varies. Atheists or knowledgeable theists will go along the lines of ‘gravity’ and ‘condensing of space dust and other matter’ but that would not fully answer the question (this would be the answer to how). Theists will say ‘because god made it so’ and the vast majority of these will have learnt this from their family that indoctrinated them. Wait, does the Qur’an mention a round earth? I’ll look that up sometime; it certainly mentions Jesus as a prophet among other things. Also if the Qur’an is correct then everyone will enter heaven someday, maybe after a prolonged period in hell with the lake of fire and the tree which bears fruit made of puss.

Where was I? Oh yeah…

Why is a difficult question not because it is so difficult to answer, but because it is so difficult to prove/disprove that answer to be correct. Theists have it easy, they can answer every ‘Why’ question with a single sentence, atheists, on the other hand, go through a process of updating and renewing the answer to why to suit any new evidence that arrives. Both sides, through their own logic, are absolutely correct. Both sides are most likely to be absolutely wrong if there is a definitive answer.

Now Agnostics either don’t know which answer to choose or believe that the truth aspect of these claims are unknown. Either that or they just don’t want to wind up in the tangled mess of belief systems in the world today.

Personally, I’ll just stick with the latter!

I, being me, begin to categorise the people. Begin to see the pattern of skill and lifestyle out there on the rink. First there are the children, and those that act like children. They cling to the edge of the maelstrom and slip and skid on the ice, but they are safe, they struggle to understand but they are happy to try and fail with no risk. Then there are those that hold their hand tempting them out into the dangerous open spaces where the far more confident couples, they are always couples, glide past so carefree and proud.

Eventually they catch on and slowly but steadily they are released form their guiding hand, they slip and flail a little until someone puts them on their feet. It hurt.

Others do the same; they slip and look around bewildered as their partner slides off with another. They get up and soldier on. It hurt but they keep going for the joy of it, for the rush and the inward glow they feel when they skate together. But it still hurts and people have been crippled on ice rinks.

The experienced skaters move far more smoothly and gracefully than the others, they have fallen so many times before and they bide their time before they meet another. It is not like they have any problems doing so.

And there are those couples that totter along so slowly but so happily that people would see them as far wiser and experienced for being careful if it were not for the daredevils flying backwards on one foot to impress the crowd. They look on in awe. I look on with angry green snakes in my gut.

I cannot skate. I’m not even on the ice.

The Bouncing Gentleman

(An avian riddle by Matthew Broxham)

(To be sung, roughly, to the tune of Christopher Robin went to Buckingham Palace)

A gentleman in suede and whites,

Going skippety, hippety hop!

Shiny things for him to sight,

Going skippety, hippety hop!

He holds his head high and dignified,

But mention his shoes and he will lie!

Going skippety, hippety hop!

He bounces all around the town,

Going skippety, hippety hop!

Never, not once, looking down,

Going skippety, hippety hop!

For then he’ll see the common-folk,

And that’ll upset him; they’re old and broke!

Going skippety, hippety hop!

Out of the corner, of his eye,

Going skippety, hippety hop!

Another male will go passing by,

Going skippety, hippety hop!

Such a rival, so slick and sly,

Will surely lead to his demise!

Going skippety, hippety hop!

He advances on the trespasser,

Going skippety, hippety hop!

Believing him to be looking for her,

Going skippety, hippety hop!

Bounding up and, all too cruel,

He Smacks the poor man in to a duel!

Going skippety, hippety BOP!

Limbs flailing, spinning round,

Going flappity, scratchity crack!

Both men fall clums’ly to the ground,

Going bumpity, thumpity clunk!

The men both now filled with hate,

With no time, but to retaliate!

Going scuffily, stabbity stab!

A crowd begins to congregate,

Going skippety, hippety hop!

Like the men, one now of late,

Going skippety, hippety hop!

Getting a look vicariously,

Just to settle their curiosity!

Going skippety, hippety hop!

Just then the sheriff comes to town,

Going skippety, hippety hop!

The crowd naively looks around,

Going skippety, hippety hop!

For they are safe, for so you see,

They are protected by their anonymity!

So they go;

Skippety, hippety hop!

Now the trick here is to give you some information about this bizarre creature that I have dreamed up without spoiling many plot details. So I’ll describe them only as they appear in the first book.

The first thing I set my mind on when I decided to make the dragons in my book scientifically correct is how to be true to the legends that describe them as well as being true to the theory of evolution. In my field research I focused on the fact that dragons bear many different forms:

The Chinese, Japanese and Korean dragons bear a similar resemblance, a serpentine body and a head with a mane and whiskers, and yet the Chinese had five digits on their talons, the Koreans had four, and the Japanese had three. In addition to breathing fire they also controlled the weather.

Gothic dragons, four/two legs and wings had very little variation apart from size; the ones of Norse legend towered above armies whereas the dragon that St. George slew was only just smaller than a man. These horded gold and took virgins prisoner.

Even more puzzling was the bridge between these two dragon types; Quetzalcoatl, a feathered serpent with no legs. Many a bloody offering was made to him… er… it? Similar dragons appear in other alternative religons.

So from this I deduced that in order to do justice to the multitude of dragon legends out there I believe they needed a constantly changing form throughout their lives, and they had to grow to be ancient. Merely having different breeds of dragon would not suit the ideas I had for them in the plot.

Not only did I focus on form but the behaviour of dragons. Here is but a small example; in most dragon legends the dragons fight on the ground against the knight. There are many exceptions but to have such a gigantic beast to fly on bat wings would be unsuitable in terms of energy expenditure and heat loss (through the blood vessels in the wings). However, coming out of legend and back to evolution the pterosaur had an 18m wingspan, supposedly lived on a diet of fish and possibly made good use of air currents, just for comparison a spitfire aircraft has only a 10m wingspan. Big, yes, strong, no such a creature would have trouble moving around on ground and this would possibly support the victory of the knight on horseback, if the dinosaur was flying it would be a different matter. BUT as stated previously the 1 on 1 fight between dragon and knight (St. George) generally occurs with a small(ish) dragon.

Now dragon breath and gold were a different matter, no creature in history that we know of breathed fire apart from us (fire eaters and people who smoke), but we are not alone in our interest for shiny things. Magpies are the example of this, and they too are intelligent to the point of being able to adapt to a changing environment and are highly social creatures, frequently meeting in large groups out of mating season. There have also been urban legends surrounding the level of intelligence that magpies bear, such as mourning for the dead. Making my dragons intelligent was one of the things I had in mind and so I took note of this.

Next, on to the renowned impenetrable scales of dragons; Not only did these creatures have to fly at one point in their life, they also had to have armour strong enough to resist the blows of the fiendish weapons from the medieval armoury. Armour-plated dinosaurs such as the Anklyosaurus (the one with the big club-like tail) usually used bone, not necessarily a good thing to have a lot of if you are trying to fly. Considering that keratin is the main constituent in nail, hair, scale, horn and feather, it would be an ideal tough material for the dragon’s armour, crocodiles and alligators have keratin in their skin.

Now, the specification for my dragons:

• They must grow seamlessly into the many forms of dragon and other mythical creatures and must resemble them as closely as possible.
• A single tin man on horseback with a pointed stick must be able to take one down, and yet, they must be able to hold their own against an entire army of bloodthirsty Herculean soldiers.
• They must breathe smoke or fire. (though some dragons breathed toxic fumes smoke could come under that category)
• They must like precious metals, gold particularly.
• They must fly, with wings, at one point in their life.
• They must either retain or grow a near-impenetrable array of scales.
• They must be intelligent, and possibly social.

Now, here is my solution…

And my David Attenborough impersonation:

The dragon’s life starts at the beach, it hatches under the sand and burrows its way to the surface in the form of a phoenix. At this stage it is merely a bird of prey with a bi-plane design like early flying dinosaurs, it has strong back legs, similar to those of a cat, to assist its launching into the air. It uses air currents and thermals to gracefully glide over mountain valleys in search of prey. The most bizarre aspect of this fledgling is the fact that it has two sets of shoulder blades and large number of ribs. Immediately after burrowing out of the ground with its seemingly feeble and withered front legs it is engulfed in the ash of a fire, set burning by the next form of the dragon to aid its incubation process, the gryphons.

For you see, the phoenixes, barely just the size of a man grow and mature into a far more cat-like creature, two feet taller than your standard racing horse. It begins to walk on all fours instead of hopping like a rabbit and over the course of twelve years, increasing its hunting effectiveness on ground but essentially eliminating its reconnaissance abilities, its wings, though they do grow in proportion to it’s size, are no longer able to sustain its flight. Although the gryphons are omnivores like us, they hunt more like lions in their mountain environment. Phoenixes are used to locate and harass the prey and they communicate this to the gryphons on the ground vocally, this allows for a perfectly orchestrated ambush. The gryphons may appear big and powerful but this illusion is caused by the giant feathers, they are much more vulnerable than they appear and so this task is truly a group effort.

The gryphons do their job, they suffocate their prey like cats, they clench their massive vulture-like beak around their prey’s throat while another dragon assists in dragging it to the ground. They have claws, but they’re not retractable, and they have opposing thumbs, not talons. And that’s where intelligence comes into play. The gryphons butcher their prey and build tree-branch sleds to transport the meat back to their roost; this simple act of transporting meat contributes to their intelligence very much like how we started using tools. This cognitive process is present at the roost: They grind herbs to preserve the meat and they smoke some herbs for leisure. Burrows are made in the mountainside using digging tools and precious metals are found in the deepest of those, which is inhabited by the Wyrm. And until he/she has his/her fill none will get a share of the meat.

The Wyrm is the sexually active dragon of the roost, 80 years old. It rarely leaves its lair and is subject to increasingly violent mood swings, killing any ageing gryphons in the group. It has grown horns and a thin, black mane of hair. Its feathers have been replaced by barbed, overlapping, iron-hard scales and due to this the wings and plumed tail have become delicate, frail but fearsomely spiny. It has outgrown its gryphon slaves; its neck is longer, its body leaner, larger and more powerful than ever before. This is a real dragon! The Wyrm is only impregnated when a rival Wyrm forces it to submit (the males being significantly stronger than the females due to testosterone) whether the male succeeds or not the loser is banished. Then it must either find a stray roost of gryphons or to die of starvation because though it may be a fearsome fighter it has lost all of its aspects of stealth and acts too irrationally to set traps like it once did.

Upon the first successful act of copulation a chemical trigger initiates the final stage of transformation. The dragon becomes yet more serpentine, its scales drop off and it grows a thick layer of fat across its body. It begins to grow feelers just behind its beak; its heart rate drops and the hormones causing the change have an adverse doping effect. Before it fails to support its own weight and before its arms, legs, wings and tail all become an array of fins it descends into the ocean and is rarely seen again. The female goes to ground multiple times to lay her clutch of eggs in the sand upon the beach and calls to the gryphons to start the fires. The males are usually spotted herding fish close to the shoreline for the gryphons and phoenixes to catch by swimming with nets (later upon a network of rafts and nets). Both events are very rare occasions indeed, happening once every decade, and so gives the gryphons a cause for celebration, have I mentioned that they smoke already?

Oh, and the fingers of a dragon grow as they progress though life, the phoenix has two digits and a thumb along with two withered ones, the gryphon and Wyrm have three digits and a thumb and finally the ‘descended’ dragon has all four digits and a thumb. What they use them for though is a mystery, even to the surface dragons, but that is revealed much, much later in the plot and it would spoil the surprise if I tell you.

So, I’ll leave you with that mere snippet of information. I’m not going to tell you how the ‘Draken’ empire emerged or how humans were enslaved by the dragons. That would be far too much!

Plagiarism is frowned upon! Make your own; think objectively, there is more than one solution to the same problem.

Sometimes I think too much, I ponder over the smallest of things and eventually it speaks to me in its rasping voice. It tells me I am worthless, pathetic even. It tells me there are people in the world far better than I am, there always will be. It nags on about how I am inferior as a person, how I cannot relate to anything anyone else does, or says, or writes.

And it’s evil; oh yes it’s evil.

Every time I look upon anyone it judges them, and hisses an insult. Every time I speak it tries to taint my breath with its racist slander. I cage it within my mind, but it’s like gas under pressure, it heats up scorching my rational thought and it clouds my judgement. It makes me clumsy and irate. I do things hurriedly, as if my duties are merely in the way of a larger task at hand.

Eventually it is the only thing in my mind; it has devoured my philosophical pondering and replaced it with its own dark plots. It makes me feel evil, dark, unclean and angry. Though I cover it the best I can I cannot help but partially agree with its hurtful crooning, and eventually a whisper of its voice parts from my lips:

“Ahhh…” I sigh, crushed by its torments.

Then the memories arrive; the voices of the past and the taunts of the present. Every person that has attacked my confidence in the past, every person that judged too quickly come flooding back to stab me. Their false criticisms suddenly strike true as they loop inside my head. I clench my fists as the beast takes hold, and my pupils dilate with a feral glare; I frown in anguish, but only slightly. Its voice escapes my lips again.

“Kill…” it whispers; I whisper!

In sudden defiance I brandish my pen and paper. It is suddenly silenced but I don’t stop there! I stick it like a pig as I scrawl, it writhes and screams in fear. I ink its blood onto the page and skin it with an outline, starting with its head. Decapitated its futile squirms only distorts its image as I butcher it. It gains a shape in the real world, trapped in a prison of wood pulp and ink. It loses shape in my mind, and without a mouth to chide me it limps to the back of my head, bleeding euphoria, and awaits the next meal of logical thought.

* * *

An old lady paying at my till in Tesco once caught me in the act of this…release. I simply said;

“Sorry, I sometimes feel like I have demons in my mind and I need to get them out. It’s very therapeutic.”

She replied; “Well you are not a very good artist anyway,” and sauntered off.

I whispered; “I know…”

It whispered; “We know…”

It’s a list of nicknames that my friends so fondly use to refer to me (actually it’s just one member of the group and it spreads, but he will remain anonymous ).

My real name is Matthew Broxham (as stated in the ‘about me’ section)

Quite frankly I don’t care what you call me; I’m still the dragon guy I don’t mind.

Matty B (latest)

Foxy Broxy

Cardboard Broxes

Bratt Moxham

Broxynite

Rumble in the Broxham

Broxham class starship

Broxo granules, cube, gravy

Bling ming

Maximus Broximus

Broxonium ion

Ma Ma Bo Bo (this is an old one from year 9, very childish)

Ming (Don’t ask)

Matt Broxham (Ok this one is normal, but being referred to by your full name constantly is a little irritating (not to mention contagious))

The Broxinator

Vanish broxy action

Broxyl group

Hybroxyl

Brox meister

Broxy baby

This list will continue to be updated for as long as my friends can be bothered.

Lots of laughs! ‘Ming’ out!