Dante

  But it is one thing to read about dragons and another to meet them.

  --Ursula K. Le Guin

  People have freaked out when I tell them that my dragons are scientifically based... what else can you call a genetically engineered life form?

  --Anne McCaffrey

  My glance flashes from Aurelia to the Dragon to Arden’s mecha to everything around me on the ground. If I’m about to drop into real time, I need a plan using the resources available.

  “Speed, plasma and many other Gifts,” Aurelia tells me without asking, nodding at the Dragon even as its form seems to shiver. “But the Nexus’ countermeasures will neutralize many of its advantages. Concentrate on survival if you can not fight.”

  I nod briefly at the mecha. “Friend. Here to save me.” My voice is flat, but my meaning is plain.

  “Ah.” Aurelia’s voice holds sympathy and sorrow. And an edge of respect. She continues. “I have seen a Dragon repelled, but never destroyed. But we are not a warlike people.”

  She pauses, and in that instance I can feel the whole world balanced on a razor’s edge, and time caught on a fleeting moment.

  “We shall aid you, blood of Keiron. May your strength equal that of your kin.”

  And like a mirror breaking, time is once more in motion, and the world is in chaos.

  A raging blast of pale green and blue plasma erupts from the Dragon’s jaws as it hurtles towards the mecha, and its fire meets a raging column of golden energy from the machine’s left hand.

  The towering robot’s right hand vibrates as it comes forward, something spinning in its grasp, even as the Dragon circles past it, still blasting the metal warrior with more energy while trying to slip around Arden’s countering golden fire.

  She spins, not as fast as the Dragon moves, but she doesn’t have to be that quick to keep him in her sights. Her right fist shoots forward, and suddenly I can see its holding a massive chain.

  And on the end of it… a wrecking ball.

  The steel sphere, several feet across and whirling with incredible speed, darts under the Dragon’s guard as it is still focused on Arden’s countering plasma fire. The wrecking ball takes it in the head, knocking its skull back and slamming closed its jaws.

  Which shuts off its breath in turn and opens it up for Arden’s torrent of fusion fire to hit it as well.

  The Dragon reels back – more in surprise than pain or fear, I think – and then the wrecking ball hits its skull again and again, creating an endless one-two punch of fire and steel.

  I’m racing across the ground as they fight, snatching up rifles and other gear from fallen Circle troops nearby. Their equipment is strange. I think some of them rappelled in. But right now, I’m more interested in weapons.

  Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.

  Something strange is happening to the air around the Dragon, and suddenly blades seemingly made out of distortions in space itself descend on it from all directions, even as wisps of green and blue plasma arc away from the creature.

  I think we’re winning this round, but I keep running. I know nothing of its true power, and my sense from Aurelia is this thing is deadly even in a place where it can not bring its full power to bear.

  I have a couple of plasma rifles, a blade each from Aurelia’s people and the Circle, and a lot of magazines for the weapons. I don’t know how they store and release power for their plasma bursts and railgun rounds, but my best guess is they aren’t spinning up a generator to do it with each individual shot.

  The fire is too fast, and too powerful.

  No, they’re storing it in something that can release a huge amount of energy, instantly. A supercapacitor, a superconducting coil, or something else? No clue.

  But if I’m right, every magazine is a small bomb. Or a large one.

  I’ve also got a few nylon rappelling lines and a few grenades.

  Time to cook.

  The Dragon is writhing around the spatial blades, half-dodging Arden’s blast and wrecking ball and twitching slightly as more wisps of its substance rip away from it to teams of Aurelia’s people in the streets below. The thing is fast, and he’s barely pulling back from the mecha at all, but is instead circling with its great length, increasingly surrounding the device with it coils.

  “Arden!” I snap over our comms, hoping the Aspects patched her in. “He’s going to coil around you. Try to disable and crush you.” Basic snake tactics, but I’ve never seen even a striking serpent this fast.

  “Got it!” she shouts back. “Got… countermeasures!”

  I leave it at that, for now. No time to chat, and we both need to focus.

  A stray piece of leather from one unconscious troopers kit goes on the end of my chain, a smaller cord binds half-a-dozen magazines to a grenade, and I check the time helpfully on the explosive before pulling the pin and spinning up my sling.

  I picked the longest time interval – five seconds.

  I have my sling chain whirling at blinding speeds in my now-gloved hands in four seconds.

  Then I release.

  I’m not sure how alert the Dragon is, but my best guess is very.

  Still Arden and Aurelia’s troops are clearly taking enormous attention, and when you aim at something fast, you don’t shoot for where it is, but where it will be.

  In this case, the head coming around the mecha’s bulk in another coiling circle. The Dragon’s jaws whip around, plasma blazing as it pulls free of the battering wrecking ball and meets Arden’s fire with fire.

  And then meets my makeshift explosive, coming in right at jaw level.

  The Dragon’s eyes flare in the last sliver of a second as it recognizes an attack, but its coils are already descending on the mech, its breath is holding back an assault, and unnatural blades hem it in on every side.

  There is no space and no time.

  And then my makeshift ordinance detonates with a force which rocks even me back on my feet. A globe like miniature Sun crossed with a blast wave of solid force detonates inside the wave of plasma expanding from its mouth. All of which merges into an even greater explosion.

  My contacts do their super-photoreactive thing and I’m blinking through silver for a split second. Fortunately, most of the mirroring fades just as fast, and I can peer through the shimmering haze that remains.

  To see… not much remains of the Dragon. As far as I can tell, Aurelia’s spacetime blades and Arden’s plasma and wrecking ball all ripped through it in the fraction of a second I was half-blinded.

  The creature’s substance is scattering, but even more is being pulled down by Aurelia’s troops. I have a gut sense it’s not dead, but definitely on ice for now.

  I wonder if we should celebrate, by which I mean run out of here as fast as possible.

  Reality flickers, and suddenly a ghost of Aurelia is before me, like an afterimage of her real existence.

  And she speaks. “Two more Wyrms made it through the wormhole,” she says. “The Path is sealed, now, but I do not know if we can hold this ground.”

  “What happens if we lose?” I ask. If I’m about to sell my life, I’d like to know what I’m buying.

  “I cannot seal the Way on your end, and I doubt the Tower would let me if I could. Unless you can have them do so, the Dragons will rise, seize the bridgehead and use the Tower’s instruments to control the Path. They will bring in their forces, slaughter any defenders who remain here, and take control of Earth and any other domain they desire.” She spreads her hands. “I do not know their full intentions, but they came here without demands or diplomacy, only violence. I would not bet the lives of your people on discovering merciful overlords.”

  I’m taking a great deal on faith, but what she’s saying lines up with what I’ve seen.

  I give a sharp nod. “Let’s stop them here, then.”

  And time unlocks again, and two Dragons surge over the horizon, coming straight for us.

  “Arden,” I say over the comms. “We need to either stop them here or get you out.”

  The truth, but I leave one thing unspoken. If this is for the Earth, then I’m staying, win or lose.

  I ready another supercharged grenade for my chain-sling, and step into Arden’s shadow.

  Patreon page for subscribers there. The first chapters released on here are already up there, even for free subscribers.