This story begins in a place once familiar to many. It's ending will be the end of us all.

In ruined city of London, smoke rose from ashes. Thick and black in the morning's cool chill, it hung over the once busy remains of buildings like a sorrowful servant at it's once master's grave.
   From his place in what was left of the old Canary Wharf building, David Shaylor looked deep into the unwelcome cloud, searching for signs of life. Sad at the state of the sleeping city, he shouldered the large rifle that Duke Webb had issued to him, and set about climbing his way down the creaking structure of the tower.
   David had spent roughly the last 16 hours mounted in defense against the dragon vanguard, and tiredness was creeping into his bones with every beam of sunlight that hit him. At the age of 36, he was one of the oldest surviving inhabitants of the city of London, and he was beginning to feel every second of it.
   As day broke in earnest, David crawled through the hot, cloying, ash-riddled air that rose up from the recently straked ground, feeling the gaseous tar and dry, acrid dust coat his skin and clothing with every step. Say what you like about dragons, they knew how to make you feel miserable.
   His night time battle was already fizzling out of his short term memory. His kills no longer seemed to matter, and the deaths of his friends could wait until he was rested. Numbing his heart to the thoughts that would so totally consume him later, he trekked on back to the underground, unsure whether the tears rolling down his face were from inside him, or meerly a byproduct of the sweat and heat that drenched him as the twisted molten girders and vehicles all around cracked and cooled in the morning's embrace.

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