Dragon Girl in her Natural Habitat

The rain was pretty angry now at being ignored in the last few posts, and was increasing in intensity as the sky was filled with lightning and thunder. Xia leads Epsilon down the steep mountain, and they eventually find themselves within the village.

It felt strange to come here, returning to her place of origin after thinking perhaps she could never do so again. It seemed the demolition work originally intended was not pushed through; still, it was much more depressing with so many stores closed down and homes abandoned. The housing development was quiet, with only a few street lights turned on, the houses dark. The river was fenced off five meters from the bank, and a dike had been built up. The elegant, traditional river houses were now condemned structures despite being in fairly good condition, replaced by socialized housing. Xia leapt over the fence to reach her village.

Xia reached her house, the last house at the end of a long rowhouse cluster. She paused a long while to look at it; even compared to her small apartment building in Chicago, she never remembered the house being so small, with its meter wide ‘yard’ in front, the grass still maintained. The whole property was about as wide as Xia’s wingspan of about six meters, not even having a view of the river. She lifted up a particular rock, fumbled about with her large, ungainly digits remaining on her hybrid wing-arms and after smearing her hands with mud found the key.

Xia invited Epsilon to follow, and then entered her house, her massive frame sliding in through the door. The house smelled of age indeed, dust having collected over the year she was gone. Dark as it was she felt everything was familiar, using echolocation to get around, finding the large pile of boxes containing their possessions that never quite got shipped to Shanghai.

In a few minutes Xia had a few oil lamps bathing the house in a dim orange light, and she sat at the dining table, the block chairs holding up well to support her weight. Xia also found a small book, an english-chinese dictionary, and handed it to Epsilon, thinking maybe he could do something with it. She even found her old doll from her childhood, smelly as ever. She wondered what was going to be next...

After they get into the small building, tiny flames burning in the sheltered glass covers, and she hands to him a parcel of leaflets bound on one side... It seems to be filled with  writings...

He sits awkwardly in the angled chair, so unlike the smooth curves of his ship, his home stranded in orbit around this tiny little world.

Epsilon swiftly flips through the first few pages, cybernetic eyes taking picture after picture after picture of the pages and pages of knowledge. His vast intelligence analyzing the text and assigning meanings, learning the language at a startling speed.

Epsilon brings out a slim silver device, and uses the laser pen to sear a series of symbols into the surface of the table.

"Meet you, nice, Philosopher I." he writes, his mind easily understanding the language, but the way that words connect to form sentences has not yet been learned; And apparently also manners...

Xia let out an annoyed grumble. Her guest had just ruined her family table. She fetched her art box and retrieved a small whiteboard and a black marker. She scribble-scribbles something quickly on it

"No writing on things. Write on this." She penned out, then rubs out the message with an old rag. "Tired. I will sleep now. You can stay here. Wait until rain stops." She erases it again and hands the board, marker and rag to Epsilon.

Xia climbs the ladder up to the bedrooms above, the dragon girl momentarily struggling to enter her old room. It was empty now, her bed long since been covered with plastic... but there was no place else in all of China that Xia was more comfortable to be in. She sleeps in her old bed, and gradually falls asleep.

After Xia leaves, Epsilon writes a lengthy message upon the board. He brings out a micro-replicator, running it back across the burns that were inscribed into the table, fixing the damage he had caused, with his laser pen.

he uses the marker and whiteboard to write a lengthy and formal apology, even though most words are out of place the general meaning of the script is clearly visible.

The alien spends most of the night examining the boxes and boxes of stuff, fascinated by the most tiny of details.

The boxes contained mostly items belonging to her mother and herself, chronicling a life lived in rural China, from a box of Xia's baby clothes -which were frequently torn and repaired - to a box of Xia's normal clothes and underwear. Another box contained their China wares, which were just called wares here in China... then Xia's elementary books and personal books.

The Government issued Patriotic Chinese Education books were in good, unused condition, containing scant few facts and abundant propaganda about the greatness of the Chinese state. Xia also had a great many western books and novels, which showed frequent use. She also had literature from neighboring Japan and Korea, with corresponding dictionaries.

Another box contained photo albums. Most of the pictures were of Xia growing up, chronicling her mother's difficulty in raising a half-dragon child that regularly broke everything. Still, her mother was patient, and there were many happy moments - birthdays, holidays, festivals, relatives' weddings, grandparents, sports; Xia was ultimately most fond of swimming... Xia's father was absent of course, since he was a dragon.

The rain persisted until dawn. The sunrise was bright and golden over the river, and more details of the village slowly came to light. The village was actually fenced off, difficult to tell yesterday night when the rain was still pouring. Large trucks, wrecking balls and bulldozers were parked near the gate. A military office and watch tower at the village entrance blockaded the village, and a large sign indicated that the whole place was condemned for demolition- three months ago.

The boxes of books, and the knowledge contained within the pages are quickly devoured, every word registered as perfect fact, the pictures of the families life are archived with ease, every detail of her life, all of the memorable moments are categorized and analyzed emotionlessly.

When the rain lets out and the golden sun starts rising up over the horizon, Epsilon peers outside and sees the equipment for the destruction, looking at the wrecking ball and bulldozers, he walks out of the tiny hovel, examining the primitive devices more closely... trying to understand all of pieces, and why they made them so ineffectively...

The reason for the village's eerie silence and abandoned demolition slowly became apparent, as a convoy of military trucks and soviet-era battle tanks was driving towards the village. The bright red, gold trimmed star indicated this was the Chinese military- The People's Liberation Army. heavily armed soldiers quickly disembark from the trucks, while tanks stationed outside the village, their guns aimed in. The soldiers form columns and march into the village. As many as 1 in 4 of them had rocket launchers, and heavy machine gun emplacements were set up.

The last two trucks were brought into the village on its main road. Soldiers shout orders at the people to disembark; one truck was filled with men and women of various Asian and European ethnicities in chains, orange jumpsuits with shaved heads. They were silent, head downcast, and quiet. These were prisoners of the State.

The second truck had only about a dozen civilians, most of them children... Children with metahuman abilities, guarded by many more soldiers than the prisoners. They were tired, hungry, angry, exhausted, and a couple tried to protest- a soldier came forward to hit him in the back of the head. The child turned into metal and tried to fight, only to have specialized troopers with heavy tazers subdue him. These were metahuman children.

The prisoners and metahumans were brought near the river, and for a moment, everything was quiet... until the waters of the river stirred, and two large alien craft emerged from the water. The Gene-Vaders, they had come to this village for their tribute of genetic stock, of baseline humans and the special metahuman breed. The Escort ship deployed Lobstermen to land, while the Harvester ship landed on the riverbank, to begin collecting their tribute...

...It was around this time Xia awoke in her room, nostalgia and the sunrise of her home making her sleep the first peaceful one she's had in months... she was in for a most rude awakening.

Epsilon watches from his position near the 'dozer, staring quietly and watching the scene unfold... He understands the weaponry up to a point, the novels and stories featured them quite prominently... These soldiers were the champions of their people, men of high morality and discipline.

The trucks deposit peoples that must be prisoners, criminals of the state and deserve punishment, but why do they come to a town? Prisoners should be separated from the general populace and made to carry out their sentences. Not taken to a civilian area... The young humans are irregular... the ones classified as "Meta-Humans". Children can also be criminals, Epsilon knows, but the treatment is not reasonable.

Epsilon starts walking closer, about to intervene when the ships started to rise. The Gene-Vaders. Epsilon stops dead in his tracks, feeling... fear. He takes a half step back as his mind analyzes the classifications of the ships.

The first one to rise was the Nykuck I-Proto Escort Class, a heavily armed, fully loaded warship with high damage sonic cannons, a fully loaded one of these was capable of taking down two light cruisers and a scout if not taken by surprise... The second ship was the Yrsek GeneRipper, a high capacity ship that can take in thousands, most of those that get into one of those ships never come back out again.

These were the ones responsible for his ships damages, their people were the rivals of his own peoples galactic empire... His hands shake almost in tandem with the engines hum, his heart pounding loudly in his ears. Turning and slipping quietly into the house, Epsilon hopes that they did not detect him.

Xia rushed to sneak a peek through the dusty curtains of her living room window, and she witnessed the scene unfold. They had even come here. It seemed she could not outrun them; though their reason for being here was in fact tied to Xiao in the first place.

Xiao collapsed and cried in her tiny living room. She was tired of fighting, tired of having to struggle. She could not even bring herself to do something.

“We’ve delivered the captives, now we await payment as we agreed.” She heard the voice of one of the Chinese representatives, one speaking with the aliens. Xiao looked out the window, seeing the aliens have already begun loading the prisoners onto the ship.

“Ma... mama?” She whimpered, peering out the window.

The woman in the uniform was escorted by a pair of rocket troopers, speaking with a Lobsterman on a floating platform surrounded by machinery, as well as the holographic projection of a hooded being... there was something utterly dark and malevolent about this figure, this projection of the aliens’ masters. Lobstermen bring out large crates from the harvester ship containing large amounts of gold and minerals found in the deep oceans. The Chinese military look on quietly as the aliens deliver their payment and the children taken away.

The woman was the most silent of them all, her face downcast as the military took their payment. She quickly moves on, not wishing to exhibit weakness or regret to these beings. This was common for collaborators of the aliens, unimaginably large compensations dulling the evil of their deeds, of selling lives to these invaders. Xia looked on in utter silence, and eventually collapsed into a state of blankness, as she finally found her mother again... selling out metahumans to the aliens.

Epsilon grabs the whiteboard and marker, rushing straight up the ladder, destroying the apology with broad swipes...

"The outside enemies them , they are... , they ship, they are we must dangerous destroyed my, hide Aliens from." he writes quickly, trying to get the point across with the foreign language...

The alien writes the words perfectly, even though they should be choppy and rushed, judging by the body language of Epsilon, and the quickness with which he writes...

Xia was unresponsive to Epsilon's message. Xia's mind had quite literally left her body, the crushing weight of events unfolding around her too much for her young, innocent mind.

The metahuman children cry and plead, trying to use their barely matured powers to escape; the last child was being forcibly herded onto the ship, and tried to talk to Xia's mum.

"Miss Nurse, please don't let them take me away. I want to go home and see my mother." The little girl cried out in her dialect, pleading with the officer. The soldiers themselves keep walking, knowing the folly of any displays... but Xia's mother stopped in her tracks, she too burdened with guilt. She had sent her own daughter away for safety's sake... but now here she was, trading another's child for gold and security.

The aliens stationed around looked her way. The human had stopped in her tracks, looking around desperately for an answer from the heavens. They primed their weapons wondering what she'd do.

Epsilon garbles a lengthy sentence, shaking Xia's arm, looking out the window as well, wondering if the Yrsek had induced a trance upon her, possibly caused by an "altered", one of the soldiers that they specially breed for specific tasks.

Epsilon grasps the curtain and yanks it shut in front of Xia's face.

Xia's mum looked at the aliens. She'd been doing this for a year now, and it had been a horrible experience, having to willingly abduct and take away children.

"Our business is concluded. You may go. We will see you within 90 days." The hologram of the Hooded One said, speaking in a synthesized mandarin with the aid of the lobster at the control panel on the floating platform.

"...When will it end? You said you needed only 20. Then 50. Then 200..." Xia's mum blurted out, voicing her objection briefly, but realizing her mistake. Her own soldiers

"Your effectiveness has diminished and your mental state compromised. Take the woman and appoint another agent." The Hooded one said again, Xia's mum taken aback. She realized her mistake all along; perhaps it was simply because she could do this no more.

"I... no! I didn't mean to..." She looked at her soldiers, who had no choice but to obey the aliens as well. Xia's mum quickly ran, but there was really no where left to go. She took a few steps toward her old house, tripped in the mud, until Xia could virtually smell her mother. Her own soldiers placed manacles on her and slowly brought her to the waiting ship.

"Xia... Xia I'm so sorry... I never wanted this to happen...I was so scared... unable to do anything... I just wanted to protect you... Xia... wherever you are, I love you." She said, no way she'd know Xia was really present right behind that 150mm of concrete wall. It was more likely her expressing her remorse. It was about all Xia could stand anymore. The ambient sounds of the forest animals seemed to fade away, the wind growing eerily still.

The door to their house exploded from its hinges, bludgeoning Xia's mother's captors. Epsilon would've been caught in the vacuum of Xia's explosive movement, as the dragon girl moved at an excessive top speed, her every step sending dust and debris into the air.

The Lobsterman who came near Xia's mother found much of its upper torso split open, crumpling to the ground clutching his sonic pulse caster. Epsilon would likely know that the weapon would self destruct the second the lobsterman's vital signs go out.

Moving like a blur, before any of them could even react, Xia punched a hole straight through another lobsterman's torso, then using him as a projectile to send a third Lobster flying into the water. Xia's eyes glowed with such a fury the very heavens seemed to tremble. The aliens only then begin their counter attack, opening fire not only on Xia, but also on the human forces present.

Xia quickly decimates the Lobstermen before they mount an effective counter attack, smashing apart their gun lines and crushing their heavy emplacements; the Command Platform quickly ascends back to the cruiser, but Xia was also there to wreak her dark vengeance on the offending leader. Most frightening of all, Xia stood upright like a human all this time, making no sound. There was a serenity in her face, absolute icy calm and conviction, and being in absolute control of her actions.

"The dragon specimen! Capture her! priority target!" The Hooded One said, his hologram projector destroyed when the Lobster Operator's face was repeatedly smashed into it by Xia's unbreakable grip.

The Alien cruiser unleashes its massive sonic pulse weapon against the human heavy armor, vibrating tanks and tank crew apart in the blink of an eye. Commands are shouted on both sides, and rockets, shells, bullets, sonic weapons, alien lasers and grenades fly. The whole place became a war zone, with the alien Cruiser providing overwhelming firepower, its force field beset by the army's weapons.

Epsilon is caught in the vacuum, sucked through the wall and lands heavily on his shoulder near one of the lobsters, and his eyes widen, seeing the devastation that the woman had wreaked upon the chitinous aliens.

His militarily honed ability for strategic thinking kicks in, moving quickly to his feet with a pained wince he charges forward and spins, landing a heavy blow on the jointed limbs that barely hold up the extremely damaged creature. Epsilon's fighting style is highly reminiscent of Ju Jitsu, hitting the weak points of a larger, stronger foe to take it down quickly.... As it begins to fall he grabs his laser pen and activates it, slamming the makeshift weapon into the eye of the creature, ruining the frontal lobe in the brain of the soldier, destroying the creatures voluntary motor skills. Grabbing the sonic gun out of the lobsters now limp hand and tears open the main control panel.

Quickly ripping wires and relocating the chips that scan and read genetic coding, Epsilon starts reprogramming the software of the weapon, as well as altering the hardware that causes self destruction.

The lobsterman, missing a few limbs and organs thanks to Xia, proves unable to offer Epsilon much meaningful resistance. Once he had the alien armament in hand, the weapon's systems initially attempt to activate a self-destruct sequence, but Epsilon's handling manages to delay it. Eventually the weapon gives off that positive 'ping' that indicates Epsilon was now in possession of a fully functioning Sonic Rifle.

Now, Epsilon was in the crossfires with bullets, rockets, and sonic pulses flying everywhere. The Alien forces devastate the humans, but they didn't go down without a fight; seeing a single lobsterman absorb insane amounts of punishment, several rocket troopers commit their weapons against one lobsterman- he was still alive and intact, but the kinetic force sent him flying.

Xiao continued her rampage, and leapt to the Harvester ship as it was starting to take off. She rips into its hull and goes in... causing the ship to promptly crash down river barely a minute later.

Epsilon Sigma Tau rushes out of the crossfire, taking cover behind one of the ramparts built to prevent the flooding of the river from destroying the town. Looking down the barrel of the weapon that is too large for Epsilon to handle easily... He braces the Sonic Rifle on top of the stone barricade and pulls the trigger once, sending one of the devastating sonic pulses toward the most deadly squadron of the chitin covered alien creations. The Yrsek try their hardest to make their soldiers utterly identical, but their method is imperfect. Their soldiers have slight differences in their skill levels, and Epsilon's perfect memory has recorded the hits and misses of each soldier. The most successful one is his first target.

The rifle gives a major kickback, causing a ton of painful strain on his already wounded shoulder. The bolt is aimed at the Lobster-man's thorax, and if it hits where Epsilon hopes that it does, it will destroy almost all of the cybernetic equipment located within its body and heavily damage all internal organs in the path of the sonic bolt