Chapter One
2066
Her fingertips slid over the cool surface of the gun metal, there was grit under the small crescents of her fingernails and the pads of her fingers were now slick with oil. A pale slender hand engulfed the child's hand. "No, honey." Her mother whispered in her ear. "Don't touch that."
An old soldier picked up the rifle and slung it carelessly over his shoulder, he flashed a brief crooked smile, a half smoked cig drooped between his lips a long scar ran up the right side of his chin. He joined the stream of other men, their boots forming a rhythm as they marched.
"Where are they going?" The girl asked her eyes move rapidly over the marching soldiers.
"To the city, honey." Her mother said clinging tightly to her daughter's hand, holding her close. "To war."
Soldier pulled up her collar against the hot eastern wind. Funny how one little memory could slide so immediate and vital into one's mind, it stole the breath from her lungs putting her momentarily in a place out of time, she remembered with startling clarity the scent that clung to her mother's dress…
"Will they come back?" She asked, young, ignorant and hopeful.
"I don't know, honey." Her mother replied.
"You okay, Soldier?" The voice startled her; the chip was embedded in the skin behind her right ear, feeding the voice direct to her brain so it was audible only to her.
"I'm fine, Sarge." She said, her voice quavering a little.
"I thought I lost you." Alan Edwards muttered in her mind before he cleared his throat and put on a more bureaucratic tone. "What do you see, constable?"
Soldier stood on the precipice of the Shard, or what remained of the once tallest building in the city of London, she looked down on the ruins spread beneath her; the remains of a city ravaged by war and fire, a city now in the sway of The Dragon.
She watched Revenants scuttle like rats between shadows and concrete crevices, three Ravens perched below observed the spread of the land and a legion of The Dragon's men were carrying out their routine march across Southwark bridge.
She slid her index finger up the smooth steel cuff on her left wrist and a 4.8" three dimensional screen popped up, she modulated the image in a rapid series of taps, a 2-dimensional 36 square grid appeared dividing the map into sections and she began to record what she saw; the surveillance information would be fed back to the central mainframe and the colony tacticians would collate the information received by all surveillance constables to formulate their strategies for moving about the city for supply routes and rescues.
"It's business as usual." She sighed. "Three Ravens on the tower and The Dragon's men on the bridge."
"Any sign of the German?"
"None. No movement on the river."
They had been waiting for the arrival of German dignitaries; several European governments had been ingratiating themselves with The Dragon, thinking to protect their land by pledging fealty to him. With each new territory he gained he gained more power. If he secured the fealty of Germany it would cut off Britain's supplies from Eastern Europe.
She cast her gaze down the dark glittering Thames, she saw the spine of a Kelpie appear and disappear in the blink of an eye and she shuddered. "None." She murmured.
"That's enough for the night." His voice crackled slightly as the sulphur clouds gathered above her, interfering with the signal. "Come back in, it looks like rain."
"Yes, Sarge." She murmured.
"My King." Jan Van Dorman spoke slowly, deliberately pronouncing the words in a tongue that was foreign to him. He spoke slowly, trying to ignore the cloying stench of the dead, the corpses that surrounded him and the dead feasting upon the dead. "I have come all of this way to show my respect-"
His voice sounded broad and hollow in the amphitheatre, real fire torches lit the hall throwing a sick orangey glow on the gathered and dark shadows on the rest.
"Respect?" The Dragon's voice carried with it the sibilance of snakes; he stood and his dark robes audibly scraped against the concrete floor. "Do I command your respect or do I command your fear?"
The sound of flesh being sundered from flesh and the cracking of bones filled Van Dorman's ears. "Fear." He exhaled in one long, shuddering breath.
The Dragon laughed and the sound echoed around the dome. His face was youthful, handsome, a cop of dark hair fell messily onto his forehead but it could not disguise the tapering horns protruding from his brow. "I accept your gifts, Jan Van Dorman."
Van Dorman bowed his head, his hands clutched together in almost a prayer like gesture but it was only to stop the trembling of his fingers.
He beckoned for the nude, manacled girls to be brought to him and they were pulled roughly by Gunderman, the large, porcine man in the ill fitted black suit.
Van Dorman was glad that The Dragon's attention had shifted from him, he felt his shoulders sag with it and he suffered himself to watch the gaggle of women he had helped transport from his homeland to The Dragon's den.
He could see how The Dragon took pleasure in their slender, shivering flesh and naked fear; he sniffed the air and sighed with delight. Each one was beautiful in their own way, some tall and slender, other small and voluptuous, each from a different land, representing a different vein of the same Power.
His people had spent years hunting them out, knowing their great worth and what a great ally they could make in their trade.
"Bring that one to me." The Dragon said a hint of dark amusement in his voice.
The woman didn't struggle as Gundermann gripped her arms and tugged her to stand before The Dragon. She was marked with intricate patterns of torture, her flesh and been sliced and scored in spirals. She spoke in a language no one understood, except The Dragon who was old enough to remember.
Her voice was the hissing sibilance of an angry serpent and her head reared back as she spat at The Dragon's feet in sheer contempt.
A sudden, heavy silence fell in the room, the writhing, feasting creatures in the outer darkness ceased to move waiting for The Dragon's reaction.
He stood from his chair, dark robes flowing, snaking across the floor, the fabric looked wet, slick like coils and whispered across the stone floor.
"I do not wish you to forget, Jan Van Dorman." The Dragon spoke, his voice like a crack of thunder, his Power eddied and swirled about him, palpable, tickling on Van Dorman's tongue. He took hold of the woman's chin between thumb and forefinger, pulling her face so close it looked as if they would kiss. "I eat my own kind." He murmured those words against her lips in an intimate gesture until he darted forward taking her mouth between his teeth and tearing the flesh of her face, blood erupted against his ivory features, the woman fell to the floor paralyzed by pain but she did not scream.
Her hair was limp against the cobbles exposing her face that was half ruined and her head were the dark nubs of seven horns.
Van Dorman was shaking from head to toe with fear and underlying that was disgust.
The Dragon's eyes were lit by infernal flame and they focused on the German alone. "I rose from the abyss to hold dominion over the earth, go and tell your masters, no one can stand against me now."
Miss S
