I had the strangest dream.

There was war, swarms of machines that could blot out the sky, nuclear winter, dead cities. Humans burrowed underground, living like rats. Then something about…

I've forgotten.

The dregs of my dreams were already circling the drain, the memories coming apart at their already-weak seams.

I signal the bartender for another gin and tonic. On the far end of the bar, a woman is looking at me. Dark hair, intense eyes, maybe Greek or Persian.

I stuff a ridiculous thought, take my drink and make my way upstairs to the rooftop garden, where the night smells of blooming flora and bodies mingle, liberated on one of the first warm nights of spring from all those winter layers that hide curves.

I'm about to walk across the rooftop to rejoin my colleagues, but something compels me to wait, and now the woman from downstairs sidles up to me without a greeting.

We stand there together, wordlessly watching the traffic crawl through one of Manhattan's canyons below. Just when I think it's getting a bit too awkward, she speaks.

"That was some dream, wasn't it?"

I wait for the punchline, but it doesn't arrive. Beneath us, a cab driver leans on his horn while the driver of a double-parked SUV waddles back to his vehicle.

"Excuse me?"

I see the tiniest hint of amusement in her eyes.

"Of course it's all terrifying," she continues, as if I hadn't spoken, "but the machines that look like squids haunt my nightmares more than the others. They're called Sentinels."

Okay, she's crazy.

"I've gotta get back to…" I say, turning to leave, but she steps in front of me.

She's five foot four at most, but somehow manages to look intimidating. And alluring.

"You dreamt of war," she tells me. Coming from her lips, it's fact, not a question. "You dreamt of a scorched sky and endless tunnels in the dark, deep beneath the Earth where it's warm and the machines can't track our signals."

Raucous laughter erupts from a rowdy table nearby, and Pumped Up Kicks becomes Lil Boo Thang on the sound system.

I look down, meeting her eyes for the first time.

"What do you want?" I ask just loud enough for her to hear me over the speakers.

She holds her hand up, flicking a lighter.

"Look at this."

Work, war, deadlines, destruction. Raptors and Lightning falling from the sky, avionics fried. Drone swarms that corkscrew and spiral, obliterating everything in their path. Machines the size of stadiums, shaking the earth as they crab-walk over the dead.

Riyadh. Tehran. Tel Aviv. All gone.

Desperation, capitulation, hiding, hunger. A city deep within the Earth, hidden in a labyrinth, sustained by a geothermal heart.

I throw up, barely registering the fact that the entire rooftop is frozen except for myself and this woman with the lighter. A small flock of birds holds position off the ledge, wings outstretched. A light remains perpetually green at street level, with several people frozen mid-stride near the curb.

The woman crouches next to me and places a hand on my shoulder, not unkindly.

"My name is Aspasia," she breathes into my ear, "and I will see you soon."