Faye yanked hard on Dillon’s collar when the glass door shattered as the wolf’s rider slammed the hilt of his sword into it. It seemed to surprise him, as he jumped back for a moment, unsure of himself.

The camera hit the floor and a piece snapped off of it. Dillon went to reach for it, but Faye grabbed him by his collar.

“Leave it,” she said. “We need to get out of here.”

“But--” Dillon protested. He then looked up at the soldier as he began to climb under the metal handle still remaining on the glass door and thought better of it. He quickly got to his feet and started to walk backward, then turned to run through the lobby with the rest of them.

“Get everyone back into shipping and receiving. Evacuate the building, get everyone out the back!” Dane Bishop yelled. “We’re under attack! Harlowe! Get everyone upstairs to go down through the warehouse stairs. Get them to shipping and receiving, everyone! You hear me?”

Confused and frightened staff members started rushing about. Some ran with them and others standing still. Faye looked back to see the soldier was fully inside now, quickly coming down the hallway after them. He wore a look of unadulterated rage.

Faye followed Dane through a set of metal double-doors. “Come on!” he exclaimed, keeping it open for those who had yet to make it out. Faye watched as one young man emerged from a side-hallway with a fire extinguisher. He released it on the man with the sword, causing him to lurch back against the barred windows lining the main hallway.

“Dammit Tony, get out of there!” Dane yelled. Tony looked back at them just as the soldier began to recover, then brought his sword around and slammed it into the side of Tony’s neck.

It didn’t make it all the way through. Tony fell to his knees, gagging with the sword still stuck in his neck. The soldier placed a foot on the man’s back and wrenched it out, staining both his armor, face and the surrounding walls and windows with Tony’s blood.

“Holy fuck,” Owen observed.

“Christ!” Dane yelled, then closed the doors and knelt down to push the locking pins into the floor.

The soldier arrived at the door with force. He was trying to kick it open from the other side.

Dane grabbed Emma’s hand and looked to those gathered. “Get everyone out through shipping and receiving. Don’t go for your cars, go out the back and run around the fence to the alley and get the fuck away from here.” He looked to Faye. “Miss Fong, you and your crew follow me.”

Faye nodded as everyone started walking toward the back of a room with several large metal vats. Around her, people were nervously talking, asking what was happening. Faye had witnessed the whole thing from start to finish, and even she couldn’t wrap her head around what was going on. 

In a way, she supposed it was pretty obvious what was going on. A portal opened up in the middle of Cliveden Avenue, and a bunch of soldiers riding direwolves came through and started killing people indiscriminately. Made perfect sense.

Except that in her mind, it didn’t. That was the stuff of fiction. The realm of HBO and Peter Jackson. Of Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson. Things like that stayed in the pages of comic books and video games. They didn’t emerge from a tree and start attacking people.

Not till today, at least.

She suddenly had a thought and pulled her phone out of her pocket as she ran. She paused as she entered the next room and started to tap wildly on the screen.

“Faye what are you doing, we need to run!” Owen exclaimed. Dillon was still hot on the heels of Dane and Emma.

“This is it, Owen. This has to be it,” she said. She listened over her shoulder. The pounding on the door continued, but it had a more hollow sound. The soldier would be through in moments. She quickly loaded up her Instagram app and set up a livestream in record time. Once she was certain it was live, she turned it toward her face.

“Ladies and Gentlemen,” she said as she started to run. “My name is Faye Fong and I’m with TTV News in Vancouver, British Columbia. We are under attack at the Bishop & Rook brewery on Annacis Island. Please send help immediately,” she said as she ran. She turned the camera toward the others as they moved further back into the building. “We are currently evacuating from the rear entrance of Brewery. Do not, under any circumstances, approach the area. We are under attack by what… by what could only be described as direwolves being ridden by human soldiers. They are using bows and arrows and swords. We’ve already witnessed several fatalities”

They eventually made it into the shipping and receiving area. Dozens of people were filing out the bay doors, running at varying speeds alongside the chain link fence that led to the alley beyond.

Once again under the sun, Faye squinted, then turned back to the bay doors. She couldn’t hear the pounding on the door any longer. She couldn’t tell if she was too far or if he’d given up.

The question was gone from her head as Emma suddenly screamed, pointing upward to the sky. Faye turned around and looked up just as a massive shadow passed over her. Her jaw dropped, as she caught sight of what it was.

It was a thirty foot wingspan. It was a toothy snout and a pair of monocular eyes. It was razor-sharp talons and a leathery, scaled hide. It was a dragon.

And it, too, had a rider on its back.

The dragon screeched as it flew overhead, then suddenly flew low and picked up one of the fleeing brewery employees, lifting the poor soul twenty feet into the air and dropping him to the grounds, breaking both his legs in the process. It suddenly banked and started coming back at them. Faye had caught it all on her livestream. Already, people were commenting. She only had fifty viewers.

“Jesus!” Dillon exclaimed. “What’s next, minotaurs?”

“Dillon shut up,” Owen exclaimed. “We need to hide!”

Dane and Emma scuttled back toward the entrance to shipping and receiving. Faye saw the look on Dane’s face. He was scared. She understood why. Faye herself was terrified.

But he had something she didn’t. He was a frightened father with an even more frightened child. That meant fear took on a wholly different meaning. For all the look of terror on his face, he was a man of intent. He pulled a set of keys out of his pocket and held it with purpose.

“Keep to the wall so those things can’t get at you,” he said, watching the sky. There were more of them, but they were more focused on his retreating employees than the five of them. Unfortunately, nobody had the time to think about that. “Move to the east side of the building,” he said, starting to jog along the side of the building. “There’s a big box truck!”

Faye and the others wasted no time in following him. She kept her head on a swivel and her phone trained on any of the present dangers she could find, even looking behind her to ensure the soldier hadn’t made his way to the back yet. They turned a corner, and in the distance she could see more direwolves bounding through the parking lot and streets. She made sure to include them on the livestream.

She briefly checked her viewer count. She went from fifty to over four hundred in… how long had it been? A minute? Less?

Thankfully, the direwolves and their riders hadn’t noticed them. The dragons, on the other hand, screeched angrily above them as they circled around in the air above.

They made it to the truck in record time.

“We won’t all fit in the cab,” Dane exclaimed. He ran to the back of the truck and swiftly unlocked a padlock. Faye was impressed. She was shaking from the adrenaline and could barely keep her phone still. She wouldn’t have been able to put a key into a lock at this point.

He flung open the sliding door, then looked to Faye. “Make room, get in and keep my daughter safe,” he said. “You hear me?”

Faye blinked in surprise. She looked over to Emma.

“Dad?” she asked.

“Get in the back with them,” he said.

“I want to go with you,” she said.

“We don’t have time for this, get in the back!” he exclaimed.

“Come on, Emma,” Owen said, jumping into the back of the trailer. “We’ve got you.” He reached out a hand.

“Can we hurry this up?” Dillon asked.

Emma reluctantly climbed into the back, followed closely by Faye and Dillon.

“Promise me,” Dane said. “No matter what happens, you keep her safe.”

Faye nodded. “I promise.”

Without a word, he closed the door, bathing them in darkness and silence. The only light was coming from her phone.

She had nearly two thousand viewers, and it was climbing by the moment. A moment later, Owen flipped his phone’s flashlight on and pointed it at Faye. “Keep that stream going,” he said.

Faye nodded. She looked at her phone. Comments were flowing by at an alarming rate as people discussed what they were seeing.

celesery

This can’t be real.

RootstoRiots

Lol so fake. I’ve seen better CG in 80’s films.

fableproject

No it’s real this lady was just on the news here! They came out of some crazy tree!

_aethyria_

Technically that’s a wyvern, not a dragon. A dragon has four limbs plus wings, a wyvern only has two limbs plus wings.

vikingerblood

Lol dragonologist over here

nocheeseforteem

They’re talking about it on the news in Toronto.

shanecouver

This is just down the street from my work, I can see the top of the tree you guys this is legit.

RootstoRiots

It’s a viral ad campaign. Wake up, sheeple! There’s no way this is legit.

She felt the truck start and quickly held on to the side of the trailer. “Ladies and gentlemen, I assure you everything you just saw was real. I’ve just witnessed at least four people die and more hurt. We need assistance immediately. Please send help.”

“Okay, Faye-- I don’t think that’s helping right now,” Owen said.

“Actually it is,” Dillon said. “Probably the smartest thing she could have done. At least now people know where we are.”

The truck lurched again as it turned, and then suddenly sped up. Faye dropped her phone as they were knocked around. Dillon picked it up and handed it back to her. A wide crack had appeared on the face, but it wasn’t too bad.

At least not until she dropped it again as they took another corner. The four of them fell off of their feet and began to slide around the interior of the trailer, often colliding with each other or the walls. Faye lost all interest in keeping track of her phone in the process of trying not to injure herself.

Suddenly, a loud squeal erupted from the brakes, and all four of them slid violently toward the front of the trailer, piling up against each other. The truck suddenly flew into reverse, pressing them even harder against one another.

A moment later, something smashed against the side of the trailer. The ensuing force mixed with the pristine darkness caused Faye to lose her sense of up and down entirely, and then the four of them smashed up against the side wall.

The truck had stopped moving.

It had stopped moving because it had been pushed onto its side.

“Is everyone okay?” Owen asked.

“Ah, no,” Dillon replied. “My rib-- ahh,” he said. “I think it’s broken.”

“Emma?” Faye asked.

“I’m… I’m okay. I think,” Emma responded. She sat up and felt around her. Faye could make out her hands moving toward Owen. “Are you sure your rib is broken? I have my first aid, I--”

“Well if it’s not broken it hurts like it’s broken,” he said.

Faye could hear noise from outside the truck. It was muffled, but unmistakable. It was Dane Bishop’s voice crying out in pain.

“Everyone be quiet,” Owen said. “They may not realize we’re in here.”

Faye quietly felt around for her phone, and spotted a thin sliver of light nearby. She picked it up and used the light to look around. Surprisingly, her livestream was still running.

“Faye, leave it,” Owen whispered.

She looked at her viewer count. Despite the image being pitch black, nearly twenty thousand people were watching.

She jolted as a loud knock came at the side of the truck. It continued to knock as it circled around to the back and got to the sliding door, then stopped as it continued to knock.

“Don’t say a word,” Owen whispered again.

The sound of metal on metal echoed through the interior of the trailer, followed by a period of silence.

Eventually, she heard the latch that kept the door shut release, and as light flooded into the back of the trailer, she said a short prayer, then turned off her phone.