Chapter One "Father and Son"

         A strange sense of ugency pulled the boy's thoughts from the limbo of white haze that they drifted in. His eyes refocused on the white padded walls of the room and he looked towards the door. In a sudden moment, the door flew from its hinges and crashed into the wall with such ferocity that he felt a gust of air brush by his face.

         The alarms were the first sounds he heard, ringing in his ears in painful stabbing beats. In the doorway, illuminated by the red flashing light of the hallway beyond, a man with vibrant golden eyes stared at him. A tingle rolled up the boy's spine when he noticed that the man's pupils were vertical slits.

         The man wore a black trench coat with what looked to be body armor underneath of it. Showing over his right shoulder was a beautiful golden hilt of a katana sword. The boy's eyes widened when he seen that the man's hands, covered in white gloves, had strange markings and symbols that blazed with a firey blue light. He could tell that the man's black hair was very long with waves and streaks of blond running thruoughout its length.

         He walked into the room and extended his hand towards the boy; who could feel the man's iron stong will and love him like a suit of armor. Then he sensed a presence fo loyalty that he knew he felt before; a timeless loyalty that reminded him of what he had shoudn't have forgotten.

         "Father, you must come with me!" The man said with his hand in front of the boy's face, waiting for a response. The boy could tell that there was an uncertain look on the man's face, a feeling of hope passed into him. For a breathless moment the boy thought of his daughters and then the white hell that they made him endure for as long as he could remember. He loved them but he knew that this man was his son.

         The son pulled his father out of the room and into the hallway without another word. The two of them ran down the crimson corridor, the son leading the way, pulling his father so hard that his feet barely touched the floor. They turned the corner and came to an abrupt stop and the father seen what his son's grim face was focused on.

         A group of seven huge horrible men in grey army fatigues with assault rifles blocked the only elevator out. The father noticed instantly by the putrid smell that wafted in the air that the men were no where near human. There faces also betrayed their foul nature; they appeared lizard like, with a wide mouth full of razor sharp teeth and glowing red eyes with vertical slits.

         "I hate worms. Father, take cover behind the corner, this won't take long." it was the only words his son said as he stepped towards the frightening creatures. The father ran behind the corner of the hallway and stared at his son just a few feet out of range.

         "Open Fire!" One guttural voice cried out as the son approached the group of worms and the gunfire began. The bullets hit the son's body blowing off chunks of flesh and bone. While his body quaked with multiple impacts, the son's face remained calm. The father's eyes grew wide when he witnessed his son's fall to the floor in a bloody mass of flesh.

         The gunfire stopped and the hallway was covered in a thick foggy silence. The worms strange guttural voices mumbled in a different tongue then the father could recongnize as he listened to them down the hallway. He knew that the worms were approaching judging from the sound of their voices. Hot tears formed in his eyes and the father felt a stab of pain in his chest at the sight of his son.

         Suddenly, the father watched with astonished eyes as his son's body turned into a black shadow of himself with a pair of intense glowing eyes that faced the worms. In a quick moment, the son was himself again; smiling without a scratch on his body.

         "You pathetic creatures, it will take more than bullets to stop me!" The son screamed, and used the fingers of both hands to close the group of worms into a box as if he was taking an imaginary picture. No sooner then the movement was done the markings on the son's hands flared to life, and what seemed to be a thousand clawed hands emerged from the walls and grabbed at the worms. The worms panicked cries echoed in the hallway as the son placed his hand on the hilt of his katana and vanished.

         The father ran to the corner to see that the hands that came out the walls were gone and the group of worms was in pieces surrounding his son. Their green blood now covered the floor like a shallow lake. He noticed that his son did not have a drop of the putrid smelling substance on him and it didn't even looked as if he had drawn his sword.

         "Come, we must be going now, Father. We must hurry, I do not want to chance a family reunion happening. An encounter like that will not go as smoothly." The son said as he grabbed his father's hand, lifted him up and carried across the green muck and body parts that covered the floor in front of the elevator.

         The two of them entered the elevator and the son pressed the buttons for the fifty-second floor as their destination. The father looked up into the son's determined face and then hugged his arms around his waist. The son looked down into his father's face and smiled.

         "I am sorry, but what is your name? I cannot remember what it was." The father asked his son with wide stony eyes filled with curiosity. No matter how hard he tried the memories still remained a clouded jumble of images.

         "I have gone by many names, Father. You may call me by the name that you gave to me when I was born. It is Fafnir." As soon as left his lips, he knew that it was truth and it was indeed the name that he had given him.

         "I have a hard time remembering things, Fafnir. Your sisters told me it is the human blood in my veins and they were trying to get rid of it so that I will remember. Will you tell me what we are? What wer those creatures you just fought? How did you make those claws come out of the walls? Weren't you scared when they were shooting you? Do you know what my name is?" The father's questions fired out of his mouth so fast that it caused Fafnir to smile.

         "Your human blood is holding back your memories but not your true nature's hunger for knowledge. Telling you those things will not help you to understand as well as remembering them will, Father. I am surprised that my sisters did not tell you what we are, at least with there massive egos and immovable pride." Fafnir said, and the fater could sense that his son wrestled with some decision in the back of his mind. Fafnir raised his father's chin and gazed into his eyes with the same golden intensity that he had used on the worms.

         "We are Dragons and you are our father, Tiamat." Fafnir said, while he took his gaze off of his father and looked up to the floor display on the elevator door.
         "My name is Tiamat? How can we be Dragons? Your right, I don't understand. I can smell human blood in your veins too." As Tiamat finished his words the loud bell rang sounding the arrival of there floor and the door opened to reval another hallway painted by crimson flashes.

         "There will be plenty of time for questions later, Father. We must leave this place." A crackling sound emitted from the inside of Fafnir's coat, causing him to pull out a small two-way radio.

         "Fafnir, we got the helicopter en route! Have you acquired the package?" The voice sounded out over the background static.

         "I have the package and I am about to exit to the rooftop now!" Fafnir shouted to the radio as he grabbed Timat's hand and raced down the hallway. The two of them continued to run, weaving around a few corners until he stopped at a white metal access door that said, "Private Personal and Maintenance Only!" In a quick second, Fafnir grabbed the handle and pulled the door from its hinges and tossed it to the side with a loud crash.

         "This is too easy. It's like they wanted me to come here and take you, Father. I had expected more worms or at least a couple of she-dragons." Fafnir said as he led hsi destroying it to be greeted by a harsh gust of wind and rain.
         Fafnir pulled Tiamat out into the raging storm that hovered in the night sky above the rooftop. Streaks of lightning illuminated the sky and the sheets of rain came down so hard that it stung the skin under Tiamat's flimsy medical gown. Within moments they were drenched as they ran across the massive rooftop. In the distance the shadowy forms of other skyscrapers loomed at them, the lights from their many windows made them look as if the buildings had a thousand eyes that were trained on their movements.

         Fafnir stopped and Tiamat ran into his back and fell on the ground. Tiamat could hear his son suck in a sharp breath through his teeth despite the pounding rain and sensed the strong aura of fear from him. With the things that he had seen Fafnir do; Tiamat had a hard time believing that there was fear coming from his son now and looked up to see what was ahead of them. When his stony grey eyes made out the dark form some distance in front of them, he felt his heart stop and knew what his son was afraid of.

         In the distance ahead with a smile on her face, stood Vitra; her blonde hair wet and spider-webbed across her face and her emerald eyes gleamed with malicious delight. "My, my, what do we have here? My little brother is trying to steal my Father away from me! Are you jealous that we don't need you anymore? Or did you just miss big sister?" Vitra's laughter sounded out with a ferocity that rivaled the mighty sounds of the lightning above them. She slowly removed her jacket to her pinstriped business suit, tossed it to the side and took a menacing step forward.

         "It's been a long time, Vitra. I see you' re still quite insane but that's okay. I still love you." Fafnir said and smiled while he used his hand to push his father back a couple of steps.

         "No! The two of you are not supposed to fight! Vitra, please don't get angry, I just wanted to leave that room. Fafnir was not stealing me away from you; I wanted to go with him!" Tiamat screamed, trying to make his voice heard over the storm.

         "You shoud listen to our Father, Fafnir. It takes a worthless excuse for a Dragon who want his own kind to be extinct! Just go back to the cave you crawled out of before I will have to rip you pieces in front of our young Father." Vitra was still smiling as she took another step forward.

         "Father is not staying here with you and the others. This war is about to come to an end and you and your sister are the ones that have made it possible." Fafnir's face returned to its grim appearance from eariler while he slowly drew his katana from its sheath.

         "We have done a lot more then you can even dream possible, little brother. This is the begining of a new age and it will start with our return to dominance over the creatures of this world. Father's other half will be awakening soon and when she returns this world as you know it will cease to exist!" Once again, Vitra's laughter cracked the heavens, while she ripped her only remaining shirt to reveal the black bra that cupped her large breasts and her tight muscular abdomen.

         In the next instant a strike of green lightning struck in front of her with tremendous explosion. Tiamat covered his eyes from the sudden light and then seen when his eyes adjusted that Vitra had seized the strange bolt of emerald lightning with her bare hand. Suddenly, it had became a magnificent spear that she held in her hand, its shaft glowing with a green incandescence; its long narrow blade pulsed with a current of green electricity.

         "Father's other half? Do you mean to tell me that you have also found some way to return our, Mother?" Fafnir screamed; Tiamat could sense that the aura of fear that Fafnir felt was gone now. Instead, it had been replaced with a golden glow of determination that surrounded him. With his katana held out before him, he looked as if he represented the very image of what a protector was. "You and your sisters are fools! Mother will corrupt and destroy everything that she sets eyes on! I guess that's what I should have expected from all of you; you're just like her!" Tiamat ran to grab hold of Fafnir's waist only to be pushed aside by his son.

         "Get as far away as you can, Father! Vitra will destroy this entire rooftop. I will protect the ideals that you taught to me!" Fafnir screamed as the golden aura around him intensified.

         "Let's see how much, draconic pride you have left after I'm finished with you, my sweet little brother." Even as the words fell out of her mouth, Vitra's emerald eyes exploded with light, her pupils changing into vertical slits. Tiamat's heart skipped a beat as he witnessed his daughter rush his son, her awful spear sending a crackling sound through the air and her laughter echoing in his ears like some haunting memory.

         The violent shockwave of their weapons impacting sent Tiamat flying through the air; he let out a scream as he hit the ground hard with waves of dizziness bluring his vision. Tiamat's eyes refocused and he beheld the hauntingly breathtaking spectacle that took place before him; his children fighting each other to the death.

         Vitra soared through the air, her spear pointed in a downward noise dive towards Fafnir; her eyes were jewels of emerald fury. Fafnir moved so fast it seemed as if he had vanished then reappeared a distance away when Vitra's spear collided with the rooftop. The impact was fallowed by a sizziling strike of emerald lightning that caused a chunk of the roof to explode. Concrete rained down over Timat's head and he ran to the doorway they first came out of for cover.

         Fafnir was next to press the attack. With a quick series of hand gestures, the markings on his white gloves flared to life. Tiamat eyes widened as he witnessed Fafnir's sword become many. A haze of golden swords surrounded him and with a grim face of stone he pointed his finger foward. The golden swords rocketed so fast towards Vitra that they turned into shards of dazzling light.

         Vitra's laughter rang out into the sky as she was instantly airborne, flipping and somesaulting over the lethal shards of light. "You will not defeat me with those lame parlor tricks, little brother!" Vitra snarled and threw her spear into the air above her; the wepon exploded in a thunderclap so tremendous that the shards of light were repelled along with the rain, causing massive sheets of water to fall on the rooftop. As Vitra finally began to fall, she summoned another spear and hurled it at Fafnir with a mighty roar of victory
.
         For Tiamat, the spear descended in slow motion and he watched in horror as it became a streak of emerald lighting so bright that the entire sky turned green for the briefest instant. The surrounding skyscrapers were monsterous green shadows; the rain turned into shards of green crystals, even the very air around them tinted green, the entire world was green.

         Fafnir leaped into the sky, screaming, "Father, get inside of the door!" Another swift series of hand gestures and suddenly his arm became a gigantic golden claw that snaked towards the falling Vitra. Her eyes widened as the claw wrapped around her and she screamed with rage.

         For Tiamat it was already too late. The rooftop exploded and it felt like the entire building rocked on its foundations. From his bare feet being in the water a current of hot electricity ripped through his body and his blood boiled like liquid fire and his skin blacken and cracked. He jerked savagely and fell to the floor and the current ravaged him.

         Fafnir, seeing his advantage used another hand gesture and smiled at his sister, placing his two fingers on his lips; the claw expoded into a massive ball of golden light. Vitra's screams of agony and rage fallowed her all the way down as she fell into the blackess below the rooftop to the city steets below.

         Tiamat felt his son, Fafnir scoop him into his arms. Wisps of smoke wafted from his charred body and he coughed up a mouth full of blood. His hair was gone, replaced with patches of burnt flesh. His watery eyes looked through the haze of pain towards the tear steaked face of his son. Despite the intense pain in his lungs, he wheezed out some feeble words. "I...am dying." Tiamat whispered.

         Fafnir buried his face in his father's chest and cried. In the distance the sound of the helicopter was fast approaching. Fafnir looked in to his father's bloodclotted grey eyes and then pulled the glove off of his right hand. "If your body is human than this must work! Please, if there is a God in Heaven, help us!" Fafnir cried out in a disprate plea to the sky above but the only lightning and rain was his response. He bit into his hand and cupped it over Tiamat's mouth. "You must drink, Father!" Do you hear me?" Fanir screamed.

         Tiamat felt the blood ooze down his throat and with it ancient memories through his mind in violent images. He felt Fafnir carry him towards the load whirling blades of the helicopter. In moments, they were in the air and Fafnir cradled his father in his arms. The voice of the pilot called out to them, "Is he okay?"

         Fafnir did not respond to the man's question; something outside caught his immediate attention. In the dark gloom of the storm; Vitra approached the helicopte carried in the air by two gigantic green leathery wings spanning from her back. In her right hand her spear was aimed towards the helicopter. Fafnir could see the cold smile that painted her beautiful face as she hurled the spear towards them. "You will not escape from me, little brother!" Vitra screamed and once again her laughter cracked the sky.

         Fafnir's eyes widened as he hugged his father tighter to his chest and let himself fall out of the helicopter. Tiamat felt the wild rush of air around him followed by another magnificent streak of emerald lightning that caused the helicopter to explode in a massive fireball. Tiamat wondered as he drifited of into blackness if he had only traded his white room of boredom for the blackness of death.