Rico sat up in his bed and stretched, the wooden frame he slept on creaked and popped almost in tune with his bones. Standing up and allowing the fur skins to fall free from his body Rico walked out of his simple humble home as naked as the day he was born. Taking in a deep breath of the cold, clean mountain air Rico exhaled a cloud as if he was smoking.

It was another beautiful day in the Himalayas and Rico felt content and happy..... up until the point he actually felt cold. Dressing up in animal skins he took a walking stick and turned to walking the mountain lands that his yak farm covered.

Out of nowhere a military black hawk appeared, the downwash of its rotors scared off the yak and caused the grass lands to kick up fuss. Shaking his head Rico could not help but grumble, "Damn Americans".

At the moment he really wanted to turn into his dragon form and destroy the helicopter. Not to mention devouring the survivors. But he would give the arrivals a chance to explain themselves and give a reason why he should not kill and eat them all. If these were the kind of Americans he thought they were, they would not dare intrude on his solitude unless they had to. The American government knew better.

When the black hawk finally settled and the rotors slowed to a stop "G men" type figures came off the helicopter in suits and black shades. Rico never understand what it was with Americans.... or humans in general for that matter, that thought social status was determined by ones apparel. Rico never much liked suits, or ties, they always got stuck in between his teeth.

"Brave souls to come here into my mountains", Rico said with a tone of amusement. "Did management not tell you? Here there be dragons".

"That and I am a respected member of the NCP  party here in Nepal. I might be seen as a traitor for even talking to you".

With that Rico turned around and turned to the small structure that was his home. "Well? Come on and tell me what you want and be on your way humans. But If you are here about me flying over to kill anyone in Pakistan or China, I don't eat people or mutants just because I'm told to anymore. Since I spent some time in a Ashram in Tibet and here in Nepal. I try not to eat people anymore...... you I might make an exception.'

Sitting at a small table Rico motioned with a hand. "Take a seat anywhere you can find one, there should be a bucket or two over there. If not the ground should do if your not to proud."  The supposed leader of the two suits looked over the structures interior and did not even bother to hide the wrinkled nose of distain. "So this is what you have been doing with yourself all these years, running a yak farm? You look about as hairy as the beasts you tend".

If Rico was offended about the jab at his long hair and beard he did not show any sign of it, if anything, he looked disinterested. "Yup, Yack are useful unlike people. They give me meat, furs, and labor. The milk is not half bad either. So enough with the song and dance. I take it you used a mutant to locate me. So tell me why you went to all the trouble finding me. Be quick about it, I'm getting bored and hungry."

The lead agent took a folder out a briefcase and put it on the table wordlessly. Rico picked it up and looked through the contents for a moment before tossing it back down towards the agents. "I must admit this is a interesting job you got for me. A crashed spy satellite out in the middle of the Gobi Desert. Sounds like something right out of a movie or book. But what I fail to understand is why this concerns me? Why should I give a damn and why should I not eat you both and smash that stupid helicopter sitting out there on my land.'

As if to send home the message Rico stood up abruptly and let out a inhuman growl as his eyes started to turn yellow and snake like. The other agent having been quiet thus far reached in his coat to grab the weapon out its holster but the lead agent put a hand on his shoulder to calm the man. "We know the location of that PMC lab you were looking for years ago and not the one that you trashed out in California in the Mohave.'

"I stopped caring about revenge a long time ago. The government knows this. Something is not right." Rico said angrily. "Who are you people and why are you here!" Rico demanded.

"We are here for you". The two human figures said in unison like twins with eyes glowing white as bright as the sun.

"All time stands still on this mountain. All life we devour like vanished colonies of times past. We will devour you and your world.'

Everything started to distort and Rico shook his head as the air grew wavy and the air heavy as if he was in a desert. "I don't know what you things are but you have no idea what it is to devour life! I will devour you!" Rico continued moving to the figures and extended a hand only to watch it start to break apart slowly in particles of dust.

"You cannot devour us, we are a god that has existed since ancient times. We are the beginning".....

Rico continued to walk forward and spoke right before he took hold of one of the entities throats. "I am the end"

It was not a pretty sight to devour a person much less a god. But still it was done and Rico awoke in an instant on the opposite side of the planet in central park with every living thing in the park dead. Human, mutant, and plants alike. "I am Croatoan". Rico said in a dazed state and in his dragon form. Standing up and limping out of the crater in the middle of the park he did not notice the words carved in all the dead trees among all the dead bodies. "Croatoan....."

THREAT TO THE ASHRAM/BROOD

Rico woke up from his nightmare as he always did among his family. Those who were part of the brood, part of the ashram.

His family were a mass of flesh, feathers, scales, and tails. At the moment he grunted and pushed a dangling reptilian creatures foot out his face in the gaggle of bodies in the cave with a wing joint. Not soon after a tail fell down out the mass to to cover his face. Tempted as he was to bite the tail he did not.

'Your sleep is troubled my child'. A voice said into his mind.

'Yes matriarch'. Rico thought knowing she would read it.

'I am haunted by nightmares'.

'Of my future, and worst, my past.'

Rico spoke this time, "I do not want to hurt our..... my, family. Our clan....."

'I can feel that your mind is troubled.' The calm voice said in his mind. 'Perhaps you should take time in the hollow of solitude carved in the mountain cliffs to reflect with mala in hand and mantra on mind.'

Rico shifted out of the mass of other mutants like himself and instantly was hit with the cold Tibetan air. 'Or you can come keep me company. It is beautiful out here tonight.' Rico liked that idea more then going to spend a few hours in meditation in a hollow carved in the side of the mountain.

Following the tunnel out of the cave Rico spread his wings and let the air currents take him up to were the matriarch was. She was a old mutant from what he gathered and very well might be the oldest living thing on the planet. Perhaps even the first mutant with the particular  mutation powers he and all the others in the ashram shared. Rico was not surprised he ended up here. In his travels he encountered a group of all psychics. That he would be at home among a group of mutants that are lizard or dragon like in one way or another was pretty normal.

We all stick to our own kind. He once heard before. World leaders stick to world leaders as company. Same went for movie stars and the rich. We all stuck to our own kind.

Rico landed on the mountain ledge and closed his wings to nestle alongside the old mutant in all her grey and white scaled glory. She flicked out her forked tongue to get a better sense of everything as her eyes were very much blind and white with cataract.  Rico in turned did the same and stopped when she did. "I still wake up with hunger for......" Rico did not finish his words as the Matriarch did it for him.

'The flesh of man?' Rico took a deep breath in and exhaled a thick cloud of air into the cold high altitude air that no human could survive without a oxygen tank. "Yesssss". He replied with a long hiss. Rico would have asked why the old mutant always talked in his mind but he already got that answer years ago. When you reach her age talking with words instead of the mind was a waste of energy.

It was there on top of the world that he revealed his dream to the matriarch of his ashram, the matriarch of his clan.

'Hmmm...', the Matriarchs thoughts said as they coursed through Rico's mind. 'Living on a farm alone could indicated a feeling of isolation or peace.' After pausing the old serpent moved a bit and closed her eyes only for time itself to stop at her wish, the flakes of the snow moving in slow motion like they would in a movie. 

Opening her eyes she added, 'The appearance of the men could indicate a fear of the past coming back. There glowing eyes being the hunger that you have, the hunger to devour all things that your body and cells desire. As for the death and devastation in the park, that I would think is a feeling of unresolved things, a thing you have to come to terms with. You told me New York is where it all began, perhaps it is time you went back and found closure.'

Rico did not like this idea and let his lower jaw hang open to give a very dark and evil laugh that would carry for miles in the winds of the mountain. "You would wish me to live among the humans? There existence is a plague, a parasite upon the world. I would devour them all, I would devour this world to rid it of those, things."

The old dragon shifted her head to look into Rico's eyes with her cloudy ones. 'You think so little of humans, yet you forget you were raised by them and are in fact a human. Not like us as you can take there form, but you are human.' Her psychic voice entered Rico's mind but he was not quite convinced.

"What about me looks human?" Rico growled and opened his jaws a few inches from the Matriarchs face revealing his sharp teeth and the strands of drool connecting them, not that she could see. "We are not like mutants or humans. If you looked into my mind you would know that. All those labs all the experiments, mutants were there as well as humans, they all hate us.'

I spent time at a school run and led by mutants for mutants. They could not help me and I could smell there fear.  They could not help with the hunger for human flesh. They hated me. It was only a matter of time until they sold or gave me away to the very ones that experimented on me. So I ran away and you were the only one that could help me. We don't need the world, let it burn".

'Who do you hate Rico?' The old female lizards voice said as it entered his mind on top of the mountain. "Humans? Mutants? Or is it the world?' Rico's answer was quick and simple.

"I am what the world has made me. It wants me to be a monster, why should I not be a monster. I will give them what they want."