Zheng He and the Dragon

Novelette by Dave Creek

Zheng He, a 15th century Chinese admiral sees a spaceship crash into the ocean and proceeds to "capture" a "dragon" which curiously enough wears boots and clothing. A nice historical first-contact, both the alien and Zheng He are well fleshed out and their interactions are great, which is good since that is the whole point of the story. The ending is particularly nice in that the scribe writing this all down after-the-fact takes entirely the wrong lesson from Zheng He's tale. Or perhaps the right one, in the eyes of the Chinese admiral. 4 out of 5 water dragons wish they had boots as sweet as Merabor's.