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Description
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"Man, come on, the pedal to your right is the accelerator!"

Matt pushed the horn, trying to get the attention of the cars in front of him, pressing the accelerator while having his gears in neutral position. But the only reaction of his car was a bleep of the computer, telling him to stop in order to safe energy. He was still not totally used to his new electric car.

Mat let himself fall back into his seat, angered that he could not express his anger with his car. That was one of the disadvantages of an electric car, you can barely hear it.

In the next moment he remembered all the sensible stuff in the rear part of his car and leaned back on the steering wheel, pressing the horn again.

"Damnit!" he yelled out, angry at himself for being so careless. He had paid nearly 25 000 € on bribes to a pharmacy, so they would get him several cartons of long-lasting antibiotics. They would be worth their weight in gold, that was for sure. Together with some other stuff he would probably need soon, they filled nearly his entire station wagon. His entire trunk was filled too, but not with antibiotics or other stuff, but with gold coins. He had used nearly all the money he had won a few years ago in the lottery where he had won about 70 million Euro in the Euro-Million lottery and bought silver, gold, and even a few hundred platinum coins. Matt was sure that he had bought nearly the entire reserve of the precious metals of the local branch office of the national bank. Most of it was brought to his house with an armored car, while he was using all his credit cards to their maximum together with a great number of small gold bars and a great amount of silver coins to bribe people if necessary.

He had always been law-abiding, never had a speeding ticket, never tried any sort of drugs. The people Matt knew had asked him why he was following the laws so strictly and he was always telling them that it felt wrong to him if he would do so. Which didn't mean for example that when he was doing his tax return that he wouldn't try to find a loophole, he just wasn't doing it till excess, like everybody else was doing it. Although he knew that surely a great deal would disappear in some black holes in the politician's pocket, he still felt bad about it, he simply couldn't help it.

But now everything was different. He had paid several ten-thousand Euros within the last hour in bribes and he didn't feel bad for it, He just wanted to get everything necessary that he and his family and everybody that was close to him would survive.

The sudden buzzing of his cell-phone let Matt wince, pressing the horn for the third time now. Matt was still using a normal cell-phone and not one of these unreliable things that people gave the name 'Bone-Crusher'. A wrong move with your jaw and you could turn it off. Matt looked at the small display on top of his phone and was glad what he was reading. He flipped it open.

"Mom, are you okay? Is everything alright? Where are you?"

"Matt, don't worry my dear, we are fine. We are at your place, just as you said we should do. But where are you? There has been an armored vehicle that brought a lot of steel boxes to your house. What is going on?"

"Mom, I don't have enough time to explain it now, but just stay calm. Get Jake and Dad, and the Huntington family, and stay inside the house. We..."

All of a sudden the connection was cute off. No bleeping, no interference, it was simply gone from one moment to the other. Matt looked at his phone and tried to figure out what was going on. Instead of reading the label of the cell-phone company he read 'News Blackout'.

A news blackout? Why in gods name would the government cut off all cell-phone activity?

Matt was still looking confused at his cell-phone that was not working anymore, when suddenly one of the few foil-screens, that had been installed in the last months on several buildings all over the city, changed to another channel. While most times it was showing news channels and stuff, now it was showing a simple word moving from the right side to the left, a simple long beep sounding through the streets. Matt lowered his side-window, moving his head outside to see what was going on.

Now he could see that that the foil screen was showing the word 'Emergency'. Matt was hoping that it was not because of what he was hurrying the last hours so much.

'Please let it just be a stupid coincidence. Please let it all be a great, stupid coincidence and all the stuff I've just bought and all the money I've bribed was totally senseless.'

All of a sudden the screen changed to a totally different view. The word 'live' in the corner of the screen made it even worse. The image the screen was showing was dancing around like the person that was carrying the camera didn't really knew where to point at. But then it focused at one point and zoomed to a cloud that was growing at the horizon. A large orange-red-brownish, mushroom shaped cloud, raising higher and higher into the sky. Then all of a sudden the screen returned to its former state, just showing the word 'Emergency'. Maybe it had just been an accident that these pics have been broadcasted, nevertheless – they were out now.

All people on the streets stopped at once, the honking of the cars, the scared chattering of the people on the sidewalks, all just got quiet. There was no sound, only the long stretched bleep of the emergency broadcast.

Then without warning the air-raid-sirens began to howl. Matt didn't even knew that they have been active until today. But it would make sense to keep the siren network in the same shape like during the first cold war in the twentieth century. For about five seconds nothing happened. The people were just staring into the sky, trying to figure out where the sound was coming from, not showing no sign of any emotion.

Suddenly Matt heard the sound of spinning tires for half a second, then his car shook like it had been hit by something. Mat hit the window frame with his neck because of the bump. He was disorientated for a second, before he realized that the man in the car behind him had pressed the accelerator without thinking, crashing into the rear of Matt's car.

The sound of the spinning tires and the crash somehow triggered a button within the people's mind all around them. The pedestrian run away screaming like somebody was strangling them, while other car-drivers behind and before Matt tried to drive away as well but without more success than the first driver.

Matt knew this situation. He had been in a mass panic during a soccer match one time and knew how people react to this. If he wouldn't stay sane now, he could get killed. Matt concentrated for a second, his eyes closed, trying to find something he could focus on. It didn't even take him this second to know what to do – to get home safely as fast as possible and protect his family.

Matt spun the steering wheel around, so he wouldn't hit the car in front of him like the other car-drivers did, when they accelerated without thinking. He pushed the accelerator to the full, the electric engines pushing the car forward with such force that Matt was pressed into the chair.

When Matt veered out of the queue, he was barely able to avoid another car, then he accelerated and drove across the crossing, while the traffic lights were still red. He overtook a a jeep, who tried to do the same, way slower because of his combustion machine.

While Matt was able to drive over the crossing without any problem, the jeep was not so lucky. Matt could see how in his rear-view mirror, how a truck crashed into the side of the jeep, sending glass and metal splinters over the crossing. Matt thought for a second about stopping and trying to help the drivers of the cars. But he decided against it, despite the horrible feeling in his guts. He could already see other cars trying to drive over the crossing, some people getting out of the cars. Within the next minutes all the streets would be in total chaos.

Matt pressed the accelerator till the hilt, trying to get home as fast as possible. He wanted to help his family as quickly as possible. He hoped that nothing has happened to them yet, like looters trying to get into his house.

'No, don't think such stupid things.' Matt told himself. He shook his head and concentrated on the road.

Matt had to break hard because of the truck that was standing in his driveway. He had been so fast that he had nearly overseen it the big car. His breaking maneuver sent the small pebbles of the driveway into every direction.

When Matt calmed down and drove his car around the truck towards his garage, he could see that it was the truck of the wholesaler, his rear opened and a great deal of the stuff he bought was scattered along the way to his house.

'Jeeeez, where is the driver?' Matt thought. He stopped his car and got out of it, his mother already coming towards him.

"Matthew. Hun, are you alright? What happened? This truck...they came just about 15 minutes ago but when the siren started to howl, they got into the other truck they have already unloaded and got off. What's happening? None of the electronics in your house are responding to us, we don't know why the sirens started."

"Mom, please. Let's get inside the house." He hasted to his house, feeling guilty that he did not program the electronics of his house that way that his family could use them too. He had to change that soon.

When they got into the the living room, his father and his younger brother as well as the Huntington family, parents and their both children, a four years old son, and her daughter of just six months.

Nobody did say a word when Matt did activate the foil-screen and they immediately saw a mushroom-cloud in the distance of the footage, right behind the Taj Mahal.

All of a sudden the baby started crying as if it knew something terrible was happening and Sarah, her mother, couldn't do anything to stop her from crying.

"So, that's it? Is this really the end?" Jake asked, but nobody answered immediately. Everybody was just looking at the screen. "Matt, tell us. You are the information geek here. Do you know how bad it really is?"

Matt sighed deeply, trying to collect his thoughts as well as as the few information he got over the internet. He skipped through various news pages, but there were barely any new information than anything they already knew. Everybody in the room was watching him silently but also somehow amazed of how he was doing it, with nothing more than his hands, several meters in front of the screen, just like Tom Cruise in 'Minority Report'.

"Crap there is anything new. Only that India launched an preemptive strike against Pakistan and they attacked back. But since than nothing new, but that is not really surprising. Nearly all big news agencies moved their servers to India because it is or better said was cheaper there. And now the entire global news network is destroyed. God damnit."

He sat down, holding his head that feels like it would explode any moment. All the information that so many people were dying in this moment right now was just too much for Matt.

"So...how worse can it get? I mean...how many nuclear missiles do they have?" George Huntington asked. He was not really that well informed about international political, economic or military issues, but that was okay for him. He only wanted to protect his family and stay happy. He could never really understand how Matt was so eager all the time to look for any information he found on the internet.

"Both...of them have about 300 nuclear warheads, both nuclear and thermonuclear. They don't have ICBMs that can reach Europe but I fear that the conflict could spread to China and from there to Russia and America and from there to Europe. But maybe only half the Indian and Pakistani population will die and the rest of the world is safe, I don't know, for god's sake. I'm not a fortune teller, I am just some normal stupid guy trying to survive." he yelled. Now even the three year old son of the Huntington's started to cry, sobbing while clear tears began to flow down his cheeks.

Matt fell into a big whole that was even bigger than when he got the information about the nuclear attack. These attacks where far away, but now he was here at his home, scaring the younger generation with information they were barely able to understand. He felt just horrible now.

He was glad when Sarah together with his mother brought both children into the kitchen after asking if Thomas, the four year old boy, want a hot chocolate. Luckily he was glad to get one and get something that distracted him from the shouting adults.

While the women together with the kids where in the kitchen, Matt and his brother Jake, his father and Marcus (the father of the Huntington kids) got outside and continued to unload the truck. They were all really surprised how much Matt has bought. The deliverers had already brought all the freezers into Matt house but had just unloaded the truck with the food by only twenty-five percent. So they hurried before the frozen stuff would unfreeze.

It took them nearly two hours before the truck was totally unloaded and all freezers where in Matts cellar. His entire family together with the Huntington family got nearly a shock when Matt opened the steel boxes and showed them his reserves he just bought, just in case that normal money would get useless.

They spent the rest of the day with nothing more than waiting and eating now and then. Despite all the things that have happened until then, they didn't knew about how fast the war between India and Pakistan would end. But they also had no idea of the seventeen minutes war, the Chinese assault on central Russia, the Euro-Russian war, the Second Russian revolution, the first Chinese revolution, the global unification in so many things like in the military or the economic branches, all these events that would occur within the next months where still unknown to them, they were so unimaginable to them that nobody would have thought about them to happen. But until that would happen they would live in permanent fear for months.

---

Syrren was still holding Matt even when the film first was already finished for nearly ten minutes, but it was still showing another film, already some time after the first nuclear strikes with the mushroom clouds still visible.

Matt listened to the noise of Syrren's strong heartbeat. It gave him the strength to continue. There was so much he had to tell Syrren what happened, so much horrible things that cannot be ignored.

Matt leaned his head on the Syrren's took a deep breath, taking in the dragon's scent. Since he was not a mammal, he didn't have any sweat glands or any sebaceous glands, so his scent was not that intensive as for example Toby's scent. But still, there was a scent of the reptile that was holding him, one wing wrapped around his back and his tail around Matt's waist. It was deep and rich, with a delicate note Matt was not able to describe.

But when Matt realized how close he had got to his dragon friend and that is pants were already getting a little bit tighter, he stopped loosening his hug a little bit and getting up, just that fast that Syrren wouldn't suspect anything.

"Syrren, thanks. Just thanks for being here at my side. These...memories are sometimes really hard to go through." Matt sighed, still having the scent of the dragon in his nose. 'Damnit I let myself go way too far. Hope he didn't notice' Matth thought.

"Okay, I...I guess I can go on. It was just...well, you know, overwhelming. But I think I can do it now without breaking down."

Matt took another deep breath, trying to focus and what happened next and to suppress the horrible feelings of that memories he gained during that time.

"Okay, where was I? Yeah, the Indian-Pakistani war. Well, what should I say more...it was one of the most destructive wars we have ever experienced."

Syrren's jade colored eyes looked at the foil-screen again, monitoring the scene. He could see at least 50 nuclear blast sites. He was shocked to see so many of them. But there was one thing that bothered him. He thought about the scenes he had seen before. He knew there was something wrong but he couldn't say what it was.

"Matt...can you rewind the film? There is something I have to see. I don't know exactly what it is, but...well. I just want to make sure."

Matt didn't say a word but did as his friend asked him to do so. Matt stopped the film when it was just after the first few strikes showing already some blasts.

"Stop." The computer reacted to the command instantly, halting the film.

Yes there it was. That scene Syrren had seen only for an instant and that he didn't understand.

"Matt, what's that?" He pointed at one certain point on the screen.

"What do you mean?" Matt looked at the foil, wondering what the dragon was pointing at. He could only see the horrible site of a nuclear blast where once Karachi has been. "I don't know what there is so remarkable about it."

That statement surprised the dragon.

"But this...this beam. Can't you see this beam of blue light that is cutting the screen into two halves?" He pointed at a certain in the middle of the screen.

Matt didn't know what the dragon meant. He couldn't see anything unusual, except for the mushroom cloud.

"Can I show you what I see?" Syrren asked. Matt thought about it for only a short moment, then he nodded.

When Matt felt the pressure on his brain, it took only a few moments of milk-glas-view before he saw through the eyes of the dragon.

What he saw would have made him gasp in surprise. When he had seen through Syrren's eyes the first time, it was during the night, so there were not much colors he could see but now...the colors looked so much more powerful, so more...he didn't know how to describe it. He could see so much more patterns, the yellow wall that his foil-screen was hanging on, was now showing a complicated pattern of different shades of yellow, obviously a result of his attempt to paint the wall in an evenly way.

But the remarkable thing he could see, was the bright beam of blue light that did cut the screen nearly in two halves. It was pointing into part somewhere in the middle of the Indian subcontinent.

Matt didn't have any sort of control over Syrren's eye movement, but he could see himself standing somewhere in the periphery of the dragon's eye-sight. But maybe it was better that way. It would be pretty awkward to see oneself through the eyes of somebody else.

When Matt had gained the control of his own body, it took him a few seconds to regain total control. It was still an amazing experience, being able to look through the eyes of somebody else. It was beyond anything he could have every imagined.

"Wow, that was just...wow. You are able to see the lasers from the PODSS. I don't believe it."

The dragon blinked a few times, again these damn shortening. "Podss? What does that mean? Why cannot humans just say straight what they mean?"

Matt snickered about that comment for a moment. "I don't know why, maybe humans are even that lazy today that they don't want to talk in full words anymore. But anyway...the P O D S S is the reason that not even more people died in the war between India and Pakistan." He looked at the screen again. He was still wondering how the dragon was able to see the Ultraviolet rays on a normal screen. They were a by-product of the defense-lasers, when it passes through the atmosphere. But he would wonder about that later. He shook his head. His draconic friend never stops to amaze him.

"P O D S S stands for 'Planet-wide Orbital Defensive Satellite System'. But most people just call it 'the system'. I guess the people from the eighties would have called it 'Star Wars program'."

The dragon's eyes widened in surprise. He had read of the such a system, but in an article that was nearly forty years old.

"You...you built the SDI system? But...how? And who?"

Now it was Matt's turn to be surprised. He was really astonished that his friend knew about something that happened nearly forty years ago. He knew that many humans didn't know about that idea anymore, although the current system based on the idea of Ronald Reagan.

"Yeah, it is pretty much like the idea from the eighties. The greatest difference was that it is not a system built by the United States. Instead it was built by the European Union, Canada, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Indonesia, South Africa and Brazil. All these nations decided in the 2017, just a few weeks after the start of the Second Cold war to start with that program. You have to know that the United States, Russia and China have become pretty paranoid, so many nations that had been at risk of becoming a battlefield in the first cold war, thought that this could happen now, mostly Germany but also a lot of nations in eastern Europe and Asia. They didn't want their cities to end in a nuclear craters. They were so afraid that one of these nations would start a nuclear war that they decided to built the system to prevent every launch of nuclear missiles."

"Even France and the United Kingdom? I mean,...didn't they have nuclear weapons too?"

Matt who had already prepared himself for another difficult explanation, of how the MAD concept works and which nations would be involved in it, was again taken by surprise. It seems that Syrren truly has sucked up all the info of human history.

"Yeah, as it was later revealed, there were quite a lot of politicians and also military guys that were against the system, since it would render their own nuclear arsenals useless. But in the end of the secret negotiations they gave in to the wishes or orders or what-ever you may call it, from the other non-nuclear powers. They said it would make no sense to have nuclear weapons if the US and Russia would destroy the entire world. So in the end they gave in and accepted that their own nukes would be useless when the system was finished."

Matt got up and started walking around, trying to get rid of all the tensions, shaking his arms and legs. All the sitting around and the talking about all the horrible experiences of the past have caused his legs getting all stiff. He had to get rid of that feeling, and prepare himself for all other stuff he wanted to tell his draconic friend.

"You see, the system could be created that fast because every nation did bring something unique and necessary into the project, different to the SDI-project, where the US tried to build it on their own. France built the Ariane 6, the heavy rocket that would launch the satellites. They also founded a lot of dummy firms, so they could pretend that the rocket would launch normal satellites of these 'firms', while other nations brought other technologies. In the end the system was not even completed when the war started but they were able to shoot down all missiles.'

He lowered his head, a clear sign that this was not everything he wanted to say. Syrren watched Matt for another few seconds, letting him call down again. He would wait until his human friend would be able to continue.

"Unfortunately that was only about half of their nuclear arsenals, the other half were simple bombs that were dropped from bombers and fighter-planes or cruise missiles. The system was not built to shoot them down, so there were still horrible losses. But in the end that was not what the war ended, but the threat of being eliminated by their allies."

"What...what do you mean?" The dragon was now even more surprised. It was still difficult for him to figure out how humans were thinking.

"You have to know the PODSS can be turned off if all nations that participated in building it agree to that unanimously. And they did, they did deactivate the PODSS and the big five, the US, Russia, China, the UK and France threatened both India and Pakistan to destroy them with their own nukes. They didn't say what they would destroy, but when both nations did not respond they...they started nuclear missiles. All of them, except for France and the UK who launched them from submarines, started a single ICBM with a low-yield nuke towards both nations and exploded them at a height of ten kilometer a few hundred miles out to the sea."

"Wait...I don't get it. They...tried to prevent a further nuclear exchange...with nuclear weapons?"

The dragon shook his maw, that sounded just too crazy

"Actually yes. But it worked. When they really got into the war, they had only eyes for the other one. So somebody had to pull them out from their state. The leaders of the two nations were nearly in a hypnotized state, with only one goal – destroy the other side. So we needed something really big and really shocking to pull them out of this state, and a nuclear explosion was definitely a big shock, especially when it is launched from your ally. It didn't even take 15 minutes that both sides, which was just the surviving members of the military and politics, to agree to a cease fire. But believe it or not...the next war was already knocking on the door."

The dragon's wings twitched at the notion of another war. He had already seen so much footage of war scenes, he didn't really know if he wanted to see another one, or even more.

"You know I don't like to talk about that shit either. But it's...when the PODSS's existence was revealed you cannot imagine how pissed off the Americans were. They were like 'YOU BUILT ALL THIS STUFF BEHIND OUR BACK, AFTER ALL THE YEARS WE PROTECTED YOU AND EVERYTHING ELSE WE DID...' and other blablabla. They were so pissed off, and simply didn't want to accept that they were part of the problem, that is why nobody did tell them about it. And they were so busy with watching Russia and China they didn't not notice it that other nations were putting laser-satellites into orbit, which was our luck."

He shook his head covering his eyes for a second.

"Well, what they demanded was access to ten of the satellites, they could control on their own, which was nearly half of the entire system."

"And...I guess they did not agree to that."

"Yeah, you can say they were not really happy about that reaction. Since the satellites were built to prevent any launch of nuclear weapons, the US would have reprogrammed them for they own use. That is at least what they would have liked to do. But even if they would have get a hold on some satellites, it would have been useless, since all of them are equipped with a system that would destroy them if they would for example be aimed at a target like a city or so."

"But...I still don't understand how would that start a war, since it is only meant for defensive measures?"

Matt didn't reply anything, but instead opened another file with a vocal order.

Syrren was surprised to see a something that looked like a live-footage from Sky-News from Berlin, at least that was what the date was telling. It was about one week after the nuclear war and the broadcaster was standing in front of the Reichstag building, talking about negotiations between the US and the nations that were participating in the PODSS.

<NEVERTHELESS, LATEST SATELLITE PICTURES ARE SHOWING THAT ALL THREE SUPER-POWERS ARE READYING THEIR ARMED FORCES. ON THE OTHER HAND, ALL OVER THE WORLD, PEOPLE HAVE GATHERED AROUND AMERICAN MILITARY BASES, DEMANDING THE IMMIDEATE WITHDRAWAL OF ALL US-AMERICANAN FORCES FROM THEIR COUNTRIES. SINCE THEY BLAME THE USA FOR FUELING THE CONFLICT BETWEEN PAKISTAN AND INDIA, THUS BEING RESPONSIBLE FOR THIS WAR WITH ALL ITS CASUALTIES TOO. MORE AND MORE PEOPLE AROUND THE WORLD ARE EVEN DEMANDING SEVERE SANCTIONS AGAINST THE US, TO FORCE THEM TO DISARM. WE CAN ONLY HOPE THAT THIS SITUATION CAN BE SOLVED WITHOUT ANYMORE FORCE.
I AM LINDA CLINTON, LIVE FROM BER...>>

The woman was interrupted by a sudden boom, an enormous explosion cloud showing up right behind the Reichstag building. Both the reporter and the camera-man winced, both kneeling down on the ground. It took them both a few moments to realize what just happened, the camera man aligning the camera to the black and orange cloud rising into the afternoon sky of Berlin.

<> The reporter's face just showed total surprise, having no idea what just happened.

Suddenly there was the noise of numerous police sirens approaching. The camera-man was barely able to turn to the left when suddenly over a dozen police-cars appeared from all sides, nearly all of them panel vans. With them were several APCs together with some of two wheel tanks with AA-guns, Syrren assumed. Although the dragon was still having problems of understanding how humans react to certain things, it was obvious that something major had happened, if such a great number of military vehicles were appearing right here in front of the German Parliament.

All of a sudden all Air-Raid Sirens of Berlin started to howl, while dozens of people were pouring out of the government buildings of the quarter, escorted by soldiers of the Bundeswehr, leading them to the APCs as quickly as possible. Pedestrians were also running towards the next entry of public subway stations, obviously awaiting an air-attack.

The reporter and the camera-man didn't know what was happening, they did hear a warning broadcasted over the loud-speakers of the police cars, but couldn't understand them.

A German soldier in full body armor, together with all his weapons, carrying a heavy MG on his back, walked towards the two reporters, shouting some harsh orders at the two reporters so fast that they couldn't really understand it.

For some reason Syrren had to snicker at that sight, it was nearly comical.

After some seconds the soldier realized that the two were reporters from Sky News, and obviously couldn't understand the soldier, so he switched to English.

<>

<> She crossed her arms in front of her chest, giving the soldier a really confident look.

<>

Out of nowhere a sudden sonic boom shook the entire area, windows clattering and even a car nearby was shaking, . Everybody near them was looking upwards, seeing three Typhoon jet-fighters making tight turns, trying to get behind two other Fighter-jets, which just ejected two rows of flares.

<> The camera-man said, trying to focus on the air-fight.

<> The soldier yelled at the two, not noticing that the camera was still on.

<>The three of them were now stumbling backwards, still watching the air-battle above them, more flares raining down.

The soldier now finally lost his temper. <>

When the soldier mentioned that the attackers were American, Syrren's maw just dropped. He looked at Matt somewhat surprised. He still didn't get it how humans were doing this politic stuff and all. But he knew that Europe and the US have been allies for decades that they would suddenly become enemies all of a sudden...Syrren couldn't really believe or even understand what happened back then.

He looked back at the foil-screen, watching the camera shacking up and down, indicating that the camera-man was running backwards, still trying to focus on the battle above them. Suddenly a missile, launched from one of the Typhoon's, hit one of the other planes, scattering pieces of glass and metal over Berlin. Syrren shuddered at the sight of the missile, knowing that some time ago it could have been him, that he would be hit by a missile too, when he and Matt tried to escape that surveillance plane.

The camera-man let his camera fall down, rolling around until the Reichstag building was in halfway in sight, people running away, while the air-raid-sirens were still howling. The AA-guns of the Boxer GTK APCs were hammering, shooting at the remaining aircraft above them. Then suddenly the hissing zip of a bomb drawing nearer and nearer. Without warning the left side of the Reichstag building exploded, shattering the world famous glass dome into million pieces and scattering debris all around the place, one hitting the camera and interrupting the connection, now only showing the snowy noise pattern.

Syrren was shocked. That was the only way he could describe his own condition. Now that he had read so much about humans, of how they have been working on relationships between this weird entity humans call nation.

He looked at Matt expecting some sort of reaction. He could feel/see that Matt had difficulties to suppress several emotions He didn't like to watch it, Syrren could tell easily. But Matt didn't say anything he just pointed at the screen again, so he looked at it again.

The film has continued, now showing a group of dark clothed people walking through along a forest route, it seems. They were whispering only now and then, and that so quiet, even Syrren's skilled ears couldn't understand what they were talking about.

After a minute or so, the group came to a small ridge and climbed upwards. When they were on top of it, the screen was showing some sort of village, but Syrren wasn't sure.

<>

Syrren somehow expected now that these people would start some sort of attack or anything like this. But instead they started assembling protest signs made out of fabric. Some were showing slogans like 'Ami go home' and others some more insulting slogans. Another one was showing the American flag upside-down but the stars were replaced with little swastikas.

All of a sudden a glare lit up the screen, the person that was holding the camera swung around, pointing at the source of the light. It was a Humvee, a searchlight on its top pointing at the group of people.

<>

The soldier who gave that command pointed his assault rifle at the group for a few seconds, but then he realized it were not terrorists but instead angered civilians, so he hung he assault rifle over his shoulder again.

<>

When the soldier gave the protesters the order to follow him, they just started shouting at the soldier, yelling at him anti-American slogans and other really insulting stuff.

<>

Despite the imminent thread of being attacked, the protesters yelled even louder at the soldiers in the Humvee, some even throwing stones at them.

Out of nowhere an obvious ear-piercing sound let everybody break down, the camera-man letting the camera fell down, rolling around, showing all the civilians lying on the ground and pressing their hands on their ears in an futile attempt to shut the horrible noise out.

Although the sound was damped through the TV, for Syrren's sensible ears it was still anything else but pleasant.

After a few more seconds the sound stopped, the soldiers stepping closer. One of the protesters weakly tried to grab the camera. He only succeeded after a few more attempts, still weakened from the sonic attack. When he was able to grab the camera he was still lying on his back, pointing the camera at the soldier, the base with the long runway behind him.

<>

He didn't even finished the last word, when all of a sudden the entire runway exploded, several plumes of fire erupting in the air. The soldier turned on the spot, aiming his rifle at the source of the explosions. The other protesters saw it too, getting up slowly, both because they were still weakened of the sonic attack, but also because the surprise and fear of that explosions.

<>

The plumes of the explosions were fading away, the soldiers as well as the protesters watching in horror what just happened.

Syrren was just as surprised as the people on the screen. The situation back then seemed to have become worse and worse each day, so it was no wonder Matt didn't want to speak about it.

The soldier totally seemed to have forget of the protesters, grabbing his walkie-talkie.

<>

But instead of a response there was only static noises. The soldier's breath was going heavier by each second, he obviously didn't know what to do. For Syrren it seemed that soldiers without somebody to give them orders where extremely dangerous. That seemed to be true back then with this soldier. The soldier took his rifle again, turned around and aimed at the protesters. Some of them started to yell at them but most of them took several steps back, obviously now much more frightened than before.

But before the soldier could open fire at them, another soldier from the Humvee ran to the first soldier and prevented a possible massacre.

<>

The soldier grunted, angry but also frightened. What would he do next? But before he could lower his rifle another sound overpowered every other noise, like an airplane was flying at extremely low altitude.

<> One of the soldier yelled out, pointing towards the sky.

The guy holding the camera pointed into the direction where the soldier pointed to and what he saw made him gasp in surprise.

The European attempt to create a pendant of the Tomahawk cruise missile had led the Americans to call this 'Storm Shadow' and Taurus' missiles 'flying desk', because of their square edges. As a payback the Europeans started to call the Tomahawks flying salamis. But these things in the skies were no flying salamis, but flying desks.

Syrren could count at least seven or eight of them, flying in formation towards the base. The camera man followed them slowly, holding them in the center of the screen. Suddenly the missiles dissolved the formation and started to head downwards. Only a few seconds later several hangars on the base and other buildings went up in flames.

If the soldier had been frightened before, he was now totally horrified.

The camera started to vibrate, like a giant truck was approaching and shaking the ground. Syrren could nearly feel it, because the screen was so big that it filled a great deal of his vision.

Again the camera man turned around, just in the right moment to capture a Leopard 2 tank breaking through the bushes, a soldier standing inside the hatch, looking around with some binoculars. Then he noticed the group of protesters and the four American soldiers with their Humvee.

<>

Just three seconds later the tank shot into the direction of the Americans, a rocket flying out of the main gun, hitting the Humvee directly. It all happened too fast that anybody had been able to react. All of them were just standing still, except for the soldier inside the Humvee, who was trying to start its engine. But it was in vain, the small rocket had clearly hit the car. It did not explode, but it was sending small blue sparks all around, obviously it has damaged the engine.

Another tank approached, a model Syrren was not able to identify, but he could see some words on the tank – Armèe de Terre. So it had to be a French tank. It aimed at the frightened soldiers.

<> a soldier yelled through a loudspeaker in broken English with a strong accent.

The camera-man and the other protesters were suddenly surrounded by other soldiers that pushed them into a third tank that was standing behind the Leo 2.

When all of the protesters where inside the tank, another soldier slammed at the side of the tank twice with his fist to signalizes that they were ready. The hatch began to close slowly. The camera-man tried to get a clear picture of what was going outside before the hatch was closed, but he could only see a formation of the same helicopter that had chased Syrren during his last flight, and Matt had been afraid of.

<> The soldier's accent was not as strong as the other ones but still recognizable.

<> a woman yelled out. She was still holding a small piece of fabric with a peace sign on it.

<> he looked at his watch <<...ABOUT SIX MINUTES AGO THE AMERICANS STARTED ATTACKING LONDON, PARIS, BRUSSELS, STOCKHOLM, HELSINKI, BERLIN, WARSAW, MADRID AND ROME AS WELL AS VANCOUVER AND TORONTO, BUT WE LOST CONTACT WITH CANADA ABOUT TWO MINUTES AGO, BUT THE LAST THING WE HEARD OF IS THAT SEVERAL MEMBER OF THEIR PARLIAMENT WITH THEIR PRIME MINISTER IS FLEEING RIGHT NOW TO ICELAND. I ALSO WATCHED A LIVE-TV BROADCAST AND THEY SAID THAT AN ENTIRE TANK-BATTALION NEARLY LEVELED THE CITY OF LONDON NEAR TORONTO. I GUESS THEY SHOULD BE RIGHT NOW IN THE CENTER OF TORONTO. SEEMS LIKE WE LOST CANADA.>>

The protesters did say nothing. They just stared in disbelieve at the soldiers, trying to process what he just said. Syrren tried as well to gather his thoughts. That was so much information at once it was hard to handle.

<>

<> a young man asked, obviously confused. They same question has been in Syrren's mind for some time now.

<>

<> the camera-man asked, trying to hold the camera still while they drove through the forest, the tank shaking up and down.

<>

<>

<> ANOTHER SOLDIER SAID, THIS TIME A FRENCH ONE IT SEEMED. <>

Syrren couldn't believe it. With every minute it seemed more and more like a disaster movie.

"Matt, can you please stop that? I...I don't want to see that anymore. It's just too..." He didn't finish the sentence, but he didn't have to. Matt could exactly tell how Syrren was feeling, horrible just like himself.

Matt ordered the TV-foil to shut down and sat beside his friend. Syrren was slightly shaking because of all the sudden bombardment of info. Not even three weeks ago, he couldn't have tell apart a washing machine and a cardboard and now his mind was flooded with pictures of places far away with conflicts he could have never imagined that they could happen.

"I'm...I'm sorry Syrren." He gave his scaled friend a short half-hug. "I didn't think that far that this could affect you that much. I'm sorry." He rubbed his head along his friend shoulder, surprised that he had done this. It really seemed that some draconic features have rubbed off.

"Please Matt don't think about it. It was me after all that asked for this explanation. But...I didn't expect all this..." he pointed at the screen "this horrible things to happen. You know I've read through all the stuff you gave me, and I was truly shocked. I mean...I somehow thought...I mean it looked like you humans would getting along better and better, despite some smaller conflicts."

Matt sighed even deeper now. Should he really tell him now what happened in the months after all this or should he wait a little bit to let Syrren calm down? Maybe it was best to give Syrren just the basic facts of what happened afterward and not such a long description like he did with this film from youtube.

"Unfortunately Syrren, it was far from over. You have to know when the European nations conquered the American bases in just seventeen minutes there was still Canada. I guess Canada would be part of the US today, if it wouldn't have been for the American President to stop it all. It was revealed that neither he nor the US-congress did order the attacks on Europe and Canada. It were ultra-nationalistic soldiers and officers from their armed forces itself. They thought that if they would wait for their 'weak' civil government to react they would become a European colony again. I know it sounds ridiculous, but that's how they thought. Somehow they managed to gather enough firepower to strike us this hard. But we had much more men and equipment, so it was a futile fight from the beginning. The Americans tried to apologize and said that it wasn't them that ordered the attack, but that was the worst that they could do, because now there was the question who was ordering the American forces at all? Could that happen any time again? That was the main question."

Matt groaned, rubbing his temples with his finger tips.

"In the end the Americans had to withdraw from Europe, Asia and Latin-America, and their soldiers were replaced by soldiers from Europe, Australia and Brazil. We also kept most of their material as a compensation for what they destroyed during their attacks. So you can imagine they were even more pissed of. But I'm way too fast now." He sighs again. Syrren thought if he would continue to breath that deep Matt would probably pass out from hyperventilating.

"Well, in the last minutes of the war between Europe and America, the Russians all of a sudden started an attack on several central Asian nations as well as the Baltic states. I guess they tried to restore the USSR somehow. But they did only fight for two hours. When the people in Russia heard that their country had started another war, they went to the streets of Moscow, St. Petersburg, Volgograd...everywhere in Russia. I guess they didn't expect that to happen, they didn't really know how to react to nearly two million people protesting all over the country. And then something really stupid and tragic happened. The Russian president ordered a special team to take care of the protesters. Unfortunately one of them has been able to hide his color blindness. He couldn't distinguish between green and red."

The young man slightly slapped his forehead to show his anger about that.

"Man, that they didn't notice that before. So instead of grabbing a green tear gas shell he grabbed a red RVX-shell. Can you imagine it, he thinks he grabs something that would only chase away protesters but instead he gets one of the most toxic substances known to humans. So when they fired three of these shells into the crowd...they..." he had to swallow hard before he could continue "...they all died. The wind blew it all over Moscow and so several ten-thousand people died within minutes. Since some protesters were broadcasting the demonstrations live on the internet, within minutes the entire world knew that Russia had used Chemical weapons on their own people, even if only by accident. But they shouldn't have had them anyway. But it is always the same with the big superpowers, they don't apply the rules on themselves they have set for others. Well...after that attack, most soldiers in Russia, mostly the younger generations started rebelling against their leaders, several thousands politicians, military leaders and oligarchs were killed right on the streets and in their offices. It was nearly exactly a hundred years after the first Russian revolution. But while back then all leaders were killed, the Russian president with a great deal of loyal soldiers fled to Belarus, together with over two dozen nuclear weapons, maybe as a insurance to stay in power."

He groaned in disgust. Syrren could feel Matt's disgust like a neon light, so bright was this emotion shining.

"Okay, the last thing that happened then was the Chinese invasion in Siberia or what else that place is called."

Syrren's ear-fins twitched several times. The country of China was one of the most weird ones he had read about. It was one of the oldest cultures in the world, but also one of the most authoritarian cultures, at least that is the impression he has about this country. But somehow he wasn't that surprised anymore that China was joining the fight back then.

"So they tried to use the confusion during the Russian Revolution and conquer the oil-rich parts of Russia I guess."

Matt just nodded, while Syrren shook his muzzle. That was something he couldn't really understand about humans. Why would somebody kill somebody else for an object. He knew that his father had once killed another rival when claimed his mother as his, but that was a totally different matter.

"And...who did win?"

"Nobody did. The PODSS member used their lasers to melt the Chinese armies to slag. The French had even launched a nuclear powered Particle canon that they could use against ground targets, although they were heavily criticized for launching this machine without telling the other member of the PODSS. But is has the same security system like the other ones, and since there were no cities or other important places there they could fire without any problems."

Matt shrugged, letting his hands fall to his legs, clapping when they hit his thighs.

"Well. That was what happened back then. It took us another year to calm down. But after that there were no more wars. Can you imagine it? People were so frightened of war all of a sudden that nobody wanted to fight anymore. But is was till no heaven. The US for example did shut down their borders, as well as their internet-connections. With this last act they wanted to force the rest of the world to accept their power and leadership. But this time it didn't work. Instead of the world having problems because the US didn't help, it was the US that was experiencing it."

He shook his head, stroking through his hair.

"Gods, I hate it. I goddammit hate what happened back then. Humans are just so...so... I cannot tell how stupid they are. Sometimes I just...hate humans and how stupid they think and act."

"That somehow sounds as if you don't count yourself as a human."

"Maybe I don't. I mean, so many things that other people were doing...I simply cannot understand why they would do them. It feels so alien sometimes to think that I am of the same species."

"How...how many people died?" For some reason Syrren wanted to know how many lives it did cost. He didn't knew exactly why. It was still something new to him that within seconds more humans could vanish in a simple flash than a normal person would be able to meet in an entire life.

"...five hundred..." The last words were too quiet that even Syrren couldn't understand them.

"Five hundred-thousand?" That surprised Syrren. He had read that even the first nuclear weapon humans had used killed nearly a hundred-thousand people in an instant.

"No, five-hundred millions." Matt said, sobbing a bit while shaking.

Syrren's maw just dropped and his wings and tail were just hanging down. Five-hundred millions people...dead?

"So...many? So many people died in India and Pakistan?"

"No." He wiped his tears away. He always got that emotional when he thinks about that part. So many lives simply wiped out, they would never come back. "Because of the nuclear attacks 'only' one-hundred million people died within two hours. After that about one-hundred-fifty millions died of radiation sickness, hunger disease and break down of civil order. The rest died around the world, mostly because of hunger. I...I don't want to show you the pics of the people that starved in Africa that is just...indescribable."

Syrren stood there, just shocked. He couldn't even imagine how much that many people were, but according to what he read it was like all humans in Europe had died.

Matt dried his tears and sighed deeply, looking at the digital clock above him. It was nearly six pm. He couldn't believe that they have talking and watching videos all afternoon long. Suddenly he realized he had forgotten something.

"Hey, I am sorry but I totally forgot to shopping today, and the grocery stores will close soon. "

"That is not a problem Matt, really. I will stay here and watch Toby until you return."

Matt got up and hugged the dragon tightly. He wasn't able to close his hands because of his wings but he wanted to show Syrren how much he like him. He on the other side tensed up because of the unexpected hug, but loosened himself after a few seconds and hugged his human friend too.

"Thanks Syrren, thanks so much. I will be back in no time, maybe even with something that you won't get that much in these days."

"Hmm, what do you mean?" The dragon gave him a confused look, not knowing what Matt meant, also his ability to see/feel somebody else's emotional expressions couldn't help him.

But Matt just grinned and said "Just wait and see. Only that much...if I get what I hope to get, we will have a good desert tonight."

And with these words he was already on his way to his garage.

---

Description
---

"Man, come on, the pedal to your right is the accelerator!"

Matt pushed the horn, trying to get the attention of the cars in front of him, pressing the accelerator while having his gears in neutral position. But the only reaction of his car was a bleep of the computer, telling him to stop in order to safe energy. He was still not totally used to his new electric car.

Mat let himself fall back into his seat, angered that he could not express his anger with his car. That was one of the disadvantages of an electric car, you can barely hear it.

In the next moment he remembered all the sensible stuff in the rear part of his car and leaned back on the steering wheel, pressing the horn again.

"Damnit!" he yelled out, angry at himself for being so careless. He had paid nearly 25 000 € on bribes to a pharmacy, so they would get him several cartons of long-lasting antibiotics. They would be worth their weight in gold, that was for sure. Together with some other stuff he would probably need soon, they filled nearly his entire station wagon. His entire trunk was filled too, but not with antibiotics or other stuff, but with gold coins. He had used nearly all the money he had won a few years ago in the lottery where he had won about 70 million Euro in the Euro-Million lottery and bought silver, gold, and even a few hundred platinum coins. Matt was sure that he had bought nearly the entire reserve of the precious metals of the local branch office of the national bank. Most of it was brought to his house with an armored car, while he was using all his credit cards to their maximum together with a great number of small gold bars and a great amount of silver coins to bribe people if necessary.

He had always been law-abiding, never had a speeding ticket, never tried any sort of drugs. The people Matt knew had asked him why he was following the laws so strictly and he was always telling them that it felt wrong to him if he would do so. Which didn't mean for example that when he was doing his tax return that he wouldn't try to find a loophole, he just wasn't doing it till excess, like everybody else was doing it. Although he knew that surely a great deal would disappear in some black holes in the politician's pocket, he still felt bad about it, he simply couldn't help it.

But now everything was different. He had paid several ten-thousand Euros within the last hour in bribes and he didn't feel bad for it, He just wanted to get everything necessary that he and his family and everybody that was close to him would survive.

The sudden buzzing of his cell-phone let Matt wince, pressing the horn for the third time now. Matt was still using a normal cell-phone and not one of these unreliable things that people gave the name 'Bone-Crusher'. A wrong move with your jaw and you could turn it off. Matt looked at the small display on top of his phone and was glad what he was reading. He flipped it open.

"Mom, are you okay? Is everything alright? Where are you?"

"Matt, don't worry my dear, we are fine. We are at your place, just as you said we should do. But where are you? There has been an armored vehicle that brought a lot of steel boxes to your house. What is going on?"

"Mom, I don't have enough time to explain it now, but just stay calm. Get Jake and Dad, and the Huntington family, and stay inside the house. We..."

All of a sudden the connection was cute off. No bleeping, no interference, it was simply gone from one moment to the other. Matt looked at his phone and tried to figure out what was going on. Instead of reading the label of the cell-phone company he read 'News Blackout'.

A news blackout? Why in gods name would the government cut off all cell-phone activity?

Matt was still looking confused at his cell-phone that was not working anymore, when suddenly one of the few foil-screens, that had been installed in the last months on several buildings all over the city, changed to another channel. While most times it was showing news channels and stuff, now it was showing a simple word moving from the right side to the left, a simple long beep sounding through the streets. Matt lowered his side-window, moving his head outside to see what was going on.

Now he could see that that the foil screen was showing the word 'Emergency'. Matt was hoping that it was not because of what he was hurrying the last hours so much.

'Please let it just be a stupid coincidence. Please let it all be a great, stupid coincidence and all the stuff I've just bought and all the money I've bribed was totally senseless.'

All of a sudden the screen changed to a totally different view. The word 'live' in the corner of the screen made it even worse. The image the screen was showing was dancing around like the person that was carrying the camera didn't really knew where to point at. But then it focused at one point and zoomed to a cloud that was growing at the horizon. A large orange-red-brownish, mushroom shaped cloud, raising higher and higher into the sky. Then all of a sudden the screen returned to its former state, just showing the word 'Emergency'. Maybe it had just been an accident that these pics have been broadcasted, nevertheless – they were out now.

All people on the streets stopped at once, the honking of the cars, the scared chattering of the people on the sidewalks, all just got quiet. There was no sound, only the long stretched bleep of the emergency broadcast.

Then without warning the air-raid-sirens began to howl. Matt didn't even knew that they have been active until today. But it would make sense to keep the siren network in the same shape like during the first cold war in the twentieth century. For about five seconds nothing happened. The people were just staring into the sky, trying to figure out where the sound was coming from, not showing no sign of any emotion.

Suddenly Matt heard the sound of spinning tires for half a second, then his car shook like it had been hit by something. Mat hit the window frame with his neck because of the bump. He was disorientated for a second, before he realized that the man in the car behind him had pressed the accelerator without thinking, crashing into the rear of Matt's car.

The sound of the spinning tires and the crash somehow triggered a button within the people's mind all around them. The pedestrian run away screaming like somebody was strangling them, while other car-drivers behind and before Matt tried to drive away as well but without more success than the first driver.

Matt knew this situation. He had been in a mass panic during a soccer match one time and knew how people react to this. If he wouldn't stay sane now, he could get killed. Matt concentrated for a second, his eyes closed, trying to find something he could focus on. It didn't even take him this second to know what to do – to get home safely as fast as possible and protect his family.

Matt spun the steering wheel around, so he wouldn't hit the car in front of him like the other car-drivers did, when they accelerated without thinking. He pushed the accelerator to the full, the electric engines pushing the car forward with such force that Matt was pressed into the chair.

When Matt veered out of the queue, he was barely able to avoid another car, then he accelerated and drove across the crossing, while the traffic lights were still red. He overtook a a jeep, who tried to do the same, way slower because of his combustion machine.

While Matt was able to drive over the crossing without any problem, the jeep was not so lucky. Matt could see how in his rear-view mirror, how a truck crashed into the side of the jeep, sending glass and metal splinters over the crossing. Matt thought for a second about stopping and trying to help the drivers of the cars. But he decided against it, despite the horrible feeling in his guts. He could already see other cars trying to drive over the crossing, some people getting out of the cars. Within the next minutes all the streets would be in total chaos.

Matt pressed the accelerator till the hilt, trying to get home as fast as possible. He wanted to help his family as quickly as possible. He hoped that nothing has happened to them yet, like looters trying to get into his house.

'No, don't think such stupid things.' Matt told himself. He shook his head and concentrated on the road.

Matt had to break hard because of the truck that was standing in his driveway. He had been so fast that he had nearly overseen it the big car. His breaking maneuver sent the small pebbles of the driveway into every direction.

When Matt calmed down and drove his car around the truck towards his garage, he could see that it was the truck of the wholesaler, his rear opened and a great deal of the stuff he bought was scattered along the way to his house.

'Jeeeez, where is the driver?' Matt thought. He stopped his car and got out of it, his mother already coming towards him.

"Matthew. Hun, are you alright? What happened? This truck...they came just about 15 minutes ago but when the siren started to howl, they got into the other truck they have already unloaded and got off. What's happening? None of the electronics in your house are responding to us, we don't know why the sirens started."

"Mom, please. Let's get inside the house." He hasted to his house, feeling guilty that he did not program the electronics of his house that way that his family could use them too. He had to change that soon.

When they got into the the living room, his father and his younger brother as well as the Huntington family, parents and their both children, a four years old son, and her daughter of just six months.

Nobody did say a word when Matt did activate the foil-screen and they immediately saw a mushroom-cloud in the distance of the footage, right behind the Taj Mahal.

All of a sudden the baby started crying as if it knew something terrible was happening and Sarah, her mother, couldn't do anything to stop her from crying.

"So, that's it? Is this really the end?" Jake asked, but nobody answered immediately. Everybody was just looking at the screen. "Matt, tell us. You are the information geek here. Do you know how bad it really is?"

Matt sighed deeply, trying to collect his thoughts as well as as the few information he got over the internet. He skipped through various news pages, but there were barely any new information than anything they already knew. Everybody in the room was watching him silently but also somehow amazed of how he was doing it, with nothing more than his hands, several meters in front of the screen, just like Tom Cruise in 'Minority Report'.

"Crap there is anything new. Only that India launched an preemptive strike against Pakistan and they attacked back. But since than nothing new, but that is not really surprising. Nearly all big news agencies moved their servers to India because it is or better said was cheaper there. And now the entire global news network is destroyed. God damnit."

He sat down, holding his head that feels like it would explode any moment. All the information that so many people were dying in this moment right now was just too much for Matt.

"So...how worse can it get? I mean...how many nuclear missiles do they have?" George Huntington asked. He was not really that well informed about international political, economic or military issues, but that was okay for him. He only wanted to protect his family and stay happy. He could never really understand how Matt was so eager all the time to look for any information he found on the internet.

"Both...of them have about 300 nuclear warheads, both nuclear and thermonuclear. They don't have ICBMs that can reach Europe but I fear that the conflict could spread to China and from there to Russia and America and from there to Europe. But maybe only half the Indian and Pakistani population will die and the rest of the world is safe, I don't know, for god's sake. I'm not a fortune teller, I am just some normal stupid guy trying to survive." he yelled. Now even the three year old son of the Huntington's started to cry, sobbing while clear tears began to flow down his cheeks.

Matt fell into a big whole that was even bigger than when he got the information about the nuclear attack. These attacks where far away, but now he was here at his home, scaring the younger generation with information they were barely able to understand. He felt just horrible now.

He was glad when Sarah together with his mother brought both children into the kitchen after asking if Thomas, the four year old boy, want a hot chocolate. Luckily he was glad to get one and get something that distracted him from the shouting adults.

While the women together with the kids where in the kitchen, Matt and his brother Jake, his father and Marcus (the father of the Huntington kids) got outside and continued to unload the truck. They were all really surprised how much Matt has bought. The deliverers had already brought all the freezers into Matt house but had just unloaded the truck with the food by only twenty-five percent. So they hurried before the frozen stuff would unfreeze.

It took them nearly two hours before the truck was totally unloaded and all freezers where in Matts cellar. His entire family together with the Huntington family got nearly a shock when Matt opened the steel boxes and showed them his reserves he just bought, just in case that normal money would get useless.

They spent the rest of the day with nothing more than waiting and eating now and then. Despite all the things that have happened until then, they didn't knew about how fast the war between India and Pakistan would end. But they also had no idea of the seventeen minutes war, the Chinese assault on central Russia, the Euro-Russian war, the Second Russian revolution, the first Chinese revolution, the global unification in so many things like in the military or the economic branches, all these events that would occur within the next months where still unknown to them, they were so unimaginable to them that nobody would have thought about them to happen. But until that would happen they would live in permanent fear for months.

---

Syrren was still holding Matt even when the film first was already finished for nearly ten minutes, but it was still showing another film, already some time after the first nuclear strikes with the mushroom clouds still visible.

Matt listened to the noise of Syrren's strong heartbeat. It gave him the strength to continue. There was so much he had to tell Syrren what happened, so much horrible things that cannot be ignored.

Matt leaned his head on the Syrren's took a deep breath, taking in the dragon's scent. Since he was not a mammal, he didn't have any sweat glands or any sebaceous glands, so his scent was not that intensive as for example Toby's scent. But still, there was a scent of the reptile that was holding him, one wing wrapped around his back and his tail around Matt's waist. It was deep and rich, with a delicate note Matt was not able to describe.

But when Matt realized how close he had got to his dragon friend and that is pants were already getting a little bit tighter, he stopped loosening his hug a little bit and getting up, just that fast that Syrren wouldn't suspect anything.

"Syrren, thanks. Just thanks for being here at my side. These...memories are sometimes really hard to go through." Matt sighed, still having the scent of the dragon in his nose. 'Damnit I let myself go way too far. Hope he didn't notice' Matth thought.

"Okay, I...I guess I can go on. It was just...well, you know, overwhelming. But I think I can do it now without breaking down."

Matt took another deep breath, trying to focus and what happened next and to suppress the horrible feelings of that memories he gained during that time.

"Okay, where was I? Yeah, the Indian-Pakistani war. Well, what should I say more...it was one of the most destructive wars we have ever experienced."

Syrren's jade colored eyes looked at the foil-screen again, monitoring the scene. He could see at least 50 nuclear blast sites. He was shocked to see so many of them. But there was one thing that bothered him. He thought about the scenes he had seen before. He knew there was something wrong but he couldn't say what it was.

"Matt...can you rewind the film? There is something I have to see. I don't know exactly what it is, but...well. I just want to make sure."

Matt didn't say a word but did as his friend asked him to do so. Matt stopped the film when it was just after the first few strikes showing already some blasts.

"Stop." The computer reacted to the command instantly, halting the film.

Yes there it was. That scene Syrren had seen only for an instant and that he didn't understand.

"Matt, what's that?" He pointed at one certain point on the screen.

"What do you mean?" Matt looked at the foil, wondering what the dragon was pointing at. He could only see the horrible site of a nuclear blast where once Karachi has been. "I don't know what there is so remarkable about it."

That statement surprised the dragon.

"But this...this beam. Can't you see this beam of blue light that is cutting the screen into two halves?" He pointed at a certain in the middle of the screen.

Matt didn't know what the dragon meant. He couldn't see anything unusual, except for the mushroom cloud.

"Can I show you what I see?" Syrren asked. Matt thought about it for only a short moment, then he nodded.

When Matt felt the pressure on his brain, it took only a few moments of milk-glas-view before he saw through the eyes of the dragon.

What he saw would have made him gasp in surprise. When he had seen through Syrren's eyes the first time, it was during the night, so there were not much colors he could see but now...the colors looked so much more powerful, so more...he didn't know how to describe it. He could see so much more patterns, the yellow wall that his foil-screen was hanging on, was now showing a complicated pattern of different shades of yellow, obviously a result of his attempt to paint the wall in an evenly way.

But the remarkable thing he could see, was the bright beam of blue light that did cut the screen nearly in two halves. It was pointing into part somewhere in the middle of the Indian subcontinent.

Matt didn't have any sort of control over Syrren's eye movement, but he could see himself standing somewhere in the periphery of the dragon's eye-sight. But maybe it was better that way. It would be pretty awkward to see oneself through the eyes of somebody else.

When Matt had gained the control of his own body, it took him a few seconds to regain total control. It was still an amazing experience, being able to look through the eyes of somebody else. It was beyond anything he could have every imagined.

"Wow, that was just...wow. You are able to see the lasers from the PODSS. I don't believe it."

The dragon blinked a few times, again these damn shortening. "Podss? What does that mean? Why cannot humans just say straight what they mean?"

Matt snickered about that comment for a moment. "I don't know why, maybe humans are even that lazy today that they don't want to talk in full words anymore. But anyway...the P O D S S is the reason that not even more people died in the war between India and Pakistan." He looked at the screen again. He was still wondering how the dragon was able to see the Ultraviolet rays on a normal screen. They were a by-product of the defense-lasers, when it passes through the atmosphere. But he would wonder about that later. He shook his head. His draconic friend never stops to amaze him.

"P O D S S stands for 'Planet-wide Orbital Defensive Satellite System'. But most people just call it 'the system'. I guess the people from the eighties would have called it 'Star Wars program'."

The dragon's eyes widened in surprise. He had read of the such a system, but in an article that was nearly forty years old.

"You...you built the SDI system? But...how? And who?"

Now it was Matt's turn to be surprised. He was really astonished that his friend knew about something that happened nearly forty years ago. He knew that many humans didn't know about that idea anymore, although the current system based on the idea of Ronald Reagan.

"Yeah, it is pretty much like the idea from the eighties. The greatest difference was that it is not a system built by the United States. Instead it was built by the European Union, Canada, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Indonesia, South Africa and Brazil. All these nations decided in the 2017, just a few weeks after the start of the Second Cold war to start with that program. You have to know that the United States, Russia and China have become pretty paranoid, so many nations that had been at risk of becoming a battlefield in the first cold war, thought that this could happen now, mostly Germany but also a lot of nations in eastern Europe and Asia. They didn't want their cities to end in a nuclear craters. They were so afraid that one of these nations would start a nuclear war that they decided to built the system to prevent every launch of nuclear missiles."

"Even France and the United Kingdom? I mean,...didn't they have nuclear weapons too?"

Matt who had already prepared himself for another difficult explanation, of how the MAD concept works and which nations would be involved in it, was again taken by surprise. It seems that Syrren truly has sucked up all the info of human history.

"Yeah, as it was later revealed, there were quite a lot of politicians and also military guys that were against the system, since it would render their own nuclear arsenals useless. But in the end of the secret negotiations they gave in to the wishes or orders or what-ever you may call it, from the other non-nuclear powers. They said it would make no sense to have nuclear weapons if the US and Russia would destroy the entire world. So in the end they gave in and accepted that their own nukes would be useless when the system was finished."

Matt got up and started walking around, trying to get rid of all the tensions, shaking his arms and legs. All the sitting around and the talking about all the horrible experiences of the past have caused his legs getting all stiff. He had to get rid of that feeling, and prepare himself for all other stuff he wanted to tell his draconic friend.

"You see, the system could be created that fast because every nation did bring something unique and necessary into the project, different to the SDI-project, where the US tried to build it on their own. France built the Ariane 6, the heavy rocket that would launch the satellites. They also founded a lot of dummy firms, so they could pretend that the rocket would launch normal satellites of these 'firms', while other nations brought other technologies. In the end the system was not even completed when the war started but they were able to shoot down all missiles.'

He lowered his head, a clear sign that this was not everything he wanted to say. Syrren watched Matt for another few seconds, letting him call down again. He would wait until his human friend would be able to continue.

"Unfortunately that was only about half of their nuclear arsenals, the other half were simple bombs that were dropped from bombers and fighter-planes or cruise missiles. The system was not built to shoot them down, so there were still horrible losses. But in the end that was not what the war ended, but the threat of being eliminated by their allies."

"What...what do you mean?" The dragon was now even more surprised. It was still difficult for him to figure out how humans were thinking.

"You have to know the PODSS can be turned off if all nations that participated in building it agree to that unanimously. And they did, they did deactivate the PODSS and the big five, the US, Russia, China, the UK and France threatened both India and Pakistan to destroy them with their own nukes. They didn't say what they would destroy, but when both nations did not respond they...they started nuclear missiles. All of them, except for France and the UK who launched them from submarines, started a single ICBM with a low-yield nuke towards both nations and exploded them at a height of ten kilometer a few hundred miles out to the sea."

"Wait...I don't get it. They...tried to prevent a further nuclear exchange...with nuclear weapons?"

The dragon shook his maw, that sounded just too crazy

"Actually yes. But it worked. When they really got into the war, they had only eyes for the other one. So somebody had to pull them out from their state. The leaders of the two nations were nearly in a hypnotized state, with only one goal – destroy the other side. So we needed something really big and really shocking to pull them out of this state, and a nuclear explosion was definitely a big shock, especially when it is launched from your ally. It didn't even take 15 minutes that both sides, which was just the surviving members of the military and politics, to agree to a cease fire. But believe it or not...the next war was already knocking on the door."

The dragon's wings twitched at the notion of another war. He had already seen so much footage of war scenes, he didn't really know if he wanted to see another one, or even more.

"You know I don't like to talk about that shit either. But it's...when the PODSS's existence was revealed you cannot imagine how pissed off the Americans were. They were like 'YOU BUILT ALL THIS STUFF BEHIND OUR BACK, AFTER ALL THE YEARS WE PROTECTED YOU AND EVERYTHING ELSE WE DID...' and other blablabla. They were so pissed off, and simply didn't want to accept that they were part of the problem, that is why nobody did tell them about it. And they were so busy with watching Russia and China they didn't not notice it that other nations were putting laser-satellites into orbit, which was our luck."

He shook his head covering his eyes for a second.

"Well, what they demanded was access to ten of the satellites, they could control on their own, which was nearly half of the entire system."

"And...I guess they did not agree to that."

"Yeah, you can say they were not really happy about that reaction. Since the satellites were built to prevent any launch of nuclear weapons, the US would have reprogrammed them for they own use. That is at least what they would have liked to do. But even if they would have get a hold on some satellites, it would have been useless, since all of them are equipped with a system that would destroy them if they would for example be aimed at a target like a city or so."

"But...I still don't understand how would that start a war, since it is only meant for defensive measures?"

Matt didn't reply anything, but instead opened another file with a vocal order.

Syrren was surprised to see a something that looked like a live-footage from Sky-News from Berlin, at least that was what the date was telling. It was about one week after the nuclear war and the broadcaster was standing in front of the Reichstag building, talking about negotiations between the US and the nations that were participating in the PODSS.

<NEVERTHELESS, LATEST SATELLITE PICTURES ARE SHOWING THAT ALL THREE SUPER-POWERS ARE READYING THEIR ARMED FORCES. ON THE OTHER HAND, ALL OVER THE WORLD, PEOPLE HAVE GATHERED AROUND AMERICAN MILITARY BASES, DEMANDING THE IMMIDEATE WITHDRAWAL OF ALL US-AMERICANAN FORCES FROM THEIR COUNTRIES. SINCE THEY BLAME THE USA FOR FUELING THE CONFLICT BETWEEN PAKISTAN AND INDIA, THUS BEING RESPONSIBLE FOR THIS WAR WITH ALL ITS CASUALTIES TOO. MORE AND MORE PEOPLE AROUND THE WORLD ARE EVEN DEMANDING SEVERE SANCTIONS AGAINST THE US, TO FORCE THEM TO DISARM. WE CAN ONLY HOPE THAT THIS SITUATION CAN BE SOLVED WITHOUT ANYMORE FORCE.
I AM LINDA CLINTON, LIVE FROM BER...>>

The woman was interrupted by a sudden boom, an enormous explosion cloud showing up right behind the Reichstag building. Both the reporter and the camera-man winced, both kneeling down on the ground. It took them both a few moments to realize what just happened, the camera man aligning the camera to the black and orange cloud rising into the afternoon sky of Berlin.

<> The reporter's face just showed total surprise, having no idea what just happened.

Suddenly there was the noise of numerous police sirens approaching. The camera-man was barely able to turn to the left when suddenly over a dozen police-cars appeared from all sides, nearly all of them panel vans. With them were several APCs together with some of two wheel tanks with AA-guns, Syrren assumed. Although the dragon was still having problems of understanding how humans react to certain things, it was obvious that something major had happened, if such a great number of military vehicles were appearing right here in front of the German Parliament.

All of a sudden all Air-Raid Sirens of Berlin started to howl, while dozens of people were pouring out of the government buildings of the quarter, escorted by soldiers of the Bundeswehr, leading them to the APCs as quickly as possible. Pedestrians were also running towards the next entry of public subway stations, obviously awaiting an air-attack.

The reporter and the camera-man didn't know what was happening, they did hear a warning broadcasted over the loud-speakers of the police cars, but couldn't understand them.

A German soldier in full body armor, together with all his weapons, carrying a heavy MG on his back, walked towards the two reporters, shouting some harsh orders at the two reporters so fast that they couldn't really understand it.

For some reason Syrren had to snicker at that sight, it was nearly comical.

After some seconds the soldier realized that the two were reporters from Sky News, and obviously couldn't understand the soldier, so he switched to English.

<>

<> She crossed her arms in front of her chest, giving the soldier a really confident look.

<>

Out of nowhere a sudden sonic boom shook the entire area, windows clattering and even a car nearby was shaking, . Everybody near them was looking upwards, seeing three Typhoon jet-fighters making tight turns, trying to get behind two other Fighter-jets, which just ejected two rows of flares.

<> The camera-man said, trying to focus on the air-fight.

<> The soldier yelled at the two, not noticing that the camera was still on.

<>The three of them were now stumbling backwards, still watching the air-battle above them, more flares raining down.

The soldier now finally lost his temper. <>

When the soldier mentioned that the attackers were American, Syrren's maw just dropped. He looked at Matt somewhat surprised. He still didn't get it how humans were doing this politic stuff and all. But he knew that Europe and the US have been allies for decades that they would suddenly become enemies all of a sudden...Syrren couldn't really believe or even understand what happened back then.

He looked back at the foil-screen, watching the camera shacking up and down, indicating that the camera-man was running backwards, still trying to focus on the battle above them. Suddenly a missile, launched from one of the Typhoon's, hit one of the other planes, scattering pieces of glass and metal over Berlin. Syrren shuddered at the sight of the missile, knowing that some time ago it could have been him, that he would be hit by a missile too, when he and Matt tried to escape that surveillance plane.

The camera-man let his camera fall down, rolling around until the Reichstag building was in halfway in sight, people running away, while the air-raid-sirens were still howling. The AA-guns of the Boxer GTK APCs were hammering, shooting at the remaining aircraft above them. Then suddenly the hissing zip of a bomb drawing nearer and nearer. Without warning the left side of the Reichstag building exploded, shattering the world famous glass dome into million pieces and scattering debris all around the place, one hitting the camera and interrupting the connection, now only showing the snowy noise pattern.

Syrren was shocked. That was the only way he could describe his own condition. Now that he had read so much about humans, of how they have been working on relationships between this weird entity humans call nation.

He looked at Matt expecting some sort of reaction. He could feel/see that Matt had difficulties to suppress several emotions He didn't like to watch it, Syrren could tell easily. But Matt didn't say anything he just pointed at the screen again, so he looked at it again.

The film has continued, now showing a group of dark clothed people walking through along a forest route, it seems. They were whispering only now and then, and that so quiet, even Syrren's skilled ears couldn't understand what they were talking about.

After a minute or so, the group came to a small ridge and climbed upwards. When they were on top of it, the screen was showing some sort of village, but Syrren wasn't sure.

<>

Syrren somehow expected now that these people would start some sort of attack or anything like this. But instead they started assembling protest signs made out of fabric. Some were showing slogans like 'Ami go home' and others some more insulting slogans. Another one was showing the American flag upside-down but the stars were replaced with little swastikas.

All of a sudden a glare lit up the screen, the person that was holding the camera swung around, pointing at the source of the light. It was a Humvee, a searchlight on its top pointing at the group of people.

<>

The soldier who gave that command pointed his assault rifle at the group for a few seconds, but then he realized it were not terrorists but instead angered civilians, so he hung he assault rifle over his shoulder again.

<>

When the soldier gave the protesters the order to follow him, they just started shouting at the soldier, yelling at him anti-American slogans and other really insulting stuff.

<>

Despite the imminent thread of being attacked, the protesters yelled even louder at the soldiers in the Humvee, some even throwing stones at them.

Out of nowhere an obvious ear-piercing sound let everybody break down, the camera-man letting the camera fell down, rolling around, showing all the civilians lying on the ground and pressing their hands on their ears in an futile attempt to shut the horrible noise out.

Although the sound was damped through the TV, for Syrren's sensible ears it was still anything else but pleasant.

After a few more seconds the sound stopped, the soldiers stepping closer. One of the protesters weakly tried to grab the camera. He only succeeded after a few more attempts, still weakened from the sonic attack. When he was able to grab the camera he was still lying on his back, pointing the camera at the soldier, the base with the long runway behind him.

<>

He didn't even finished the last word, when all of a sudden the entire runway exploded, several plumes of fire erupting in the air. The soldier turned on the spot, aiming his rifle at the source of the explosions. The other protesters saw it too, getting up slowly, both because they were still weakened of the sonic attack, but also because the surprise and fear of that explosions.

<>

The plumes of the explosions were fading away, the soldiers as well as the protesters watching in horror what just happened.

Syrren was just as surprised as the people on the screen. The situation back then seemed to have become worse and worse each day, so it was no wonder Matt didn't want to speak about it.

The soldier totally seemed to have forget of the protesters, grabbing his walkie-talkie.

<>

But instead of a response there was only static noises. The soldier's breath was going heavier by each second, he obviously didn't know what to do. For Syrren it seemed that soldiers without somebody to give them orders where extremely dangerous. That seemed to be true back then with this soldier. The soldier took his rifle again, turned around and aimed at the protesters. Some of them started to yell at them but most of them took several steps back, obviously now much more frightened than before.

But before the soldier could open fire at them, another soldier from the Humvee ran to the first soldier and prevented a possible massacre.

<>

The soldier grunted, angry but also frightened. What would he do next? But before he could lower his rifle another sound overpowered every other noise, like an airplane was flying at extremely low altitude.

<> One of the soldier yelled out, pointing towards the sky.

The guy holding the camera pointed into the direction where the soldier pointed to and what he saw made him gasp in surprise.

The European attempt to create a pendant of the Tomahawk cruise missile had led the Americans to call this 'Storm Shadow' and Taurus' missiles 'flying desk', because of their square edges. As a payback the Europeans started to call the Tomahawks flying salamis. But these things in the skies were no flying salamis, but flying desks.

Syrren could count at least seven or eight of them, flying in formation towards the base. The camera man followed them slowly, holding them in the center of the screen. Suddenly the missiles dissolved the formation and started to head downwards. Only a few seconds later several hangars on the base and other buildings went up in flames.

If the soldier had been frightened before, he was now totally horrified.

The camera started to vibrate, like a giant truck was approaching and shaking the ground. Syrren could nearly feel it, because the screen was so big that it filled a great deal of his vision.

Again the camera man turned around, just in the right moment to capture a Leopard 2 tank breaking through the bushes, a soldier standing inside the hatch, looking around with some binoculars. Then he noticed the group of protesters and the four American soldiers with their Humvee.

<>

Just three seconds later the tank shot into the direction of the Americans, a rocket flying out of the main gun, hitting the Humvee directly. It all happened too fast that anybody had been able to react. All of them were just standing still, except for the soldier inside the Humvee, who was trying to start its engine. But it was in vain, the small rocket had clearly hit the car. It did not explode, but it was sending small blue sparks all around, obviously it has damaged the engine.

Another tank approached, a model Syrren was not able to identify, but he could see some words on the tank – Armèe de Terre. So it had to be a French tank. It aimed at the frightened soldiers.

<> a soldier yelled through a loudspeaker in broken English with a strong accent.

The camera-man and the other protesters were suddenly surrounded by other soldiers that pushed them into a third tank that was standing behind the Leo 2.

When all of the protesters where inside the tank, another soldier slammed at the side of the tank twice with his fist to signalizes that they were ready. The hatch began to close slowly. The camera-man tried to get a clear picture of what was going outside before the hatch was closed, but he could only see a formation of the same helicopter that had chased Syrren during his last flight, and Matt had been afraid of.

<> The soldier's accent was not as strong as the other ones but still recognizable.

<> a woman yelled out. She was still holding a small piece of fabric with a peace sign on it.

<> he looked at his watch <<...ABOUT SIX MINUTES AGO THE AMERICANS STARTED ATTACKING LONDON, PARIS, BRUSSELS, STOCKHOLM, HELSINKI, BERLIN, WARSAW, MADRID AND ROME AS WELL AS VANCOUVER AND TORONTO, BUT WE LOST CONTACT WITH CANADA ABOUT TWO MINUTES AGO, BUT THE LAST THING WE HEARD OF IS THAT SEVERAL MEMBER OF THEIR PARLIAMENT WITH THEIR PRIME MINISTER IS FLEEING RIGHT NOW TO ICELAND. I ALSO WATCHED A LIVE-TV BROADCAST AND THEY SAID THAT AN ENTIRE TANK-BATTALION NEARLY LEVELED THE CITY OF LONDON NEAR TORONTO. I GUESS THEY SHOULD BE RIGHT NOW IN THE CENTER OF TORONTO. SEEMS LIKE WE LOST CANADA.>>

The protesters did say nothing. They just stared in disbelieve at the soldiers, trying to process what he just said. Syrren tried as well to gather his thoughts. That was so much information at once it was hard to handle.

<>

<> a young man asked, obviously confused. They same question has been in Syrren's mind for some time now.

<>

<> the camera-man asked, trying to hold the camera still while they drove through the forest, the tank shaking up and down.

<>

<>

<> ANOTHER SOLDIER SAID, THIS TIME A FRENCH ONE IT SEEMED. <>

Syrren couldn't believe it. With every minute it seemed more and more like a disaster movie.

"Matt, can you please stop that? I...I don't want to see that anymore. It's just too..." He didn't finish the sentence, but he didn't have to. Matt could exactly tell how Syrren was feeling, horrible just like himself.

Matt ordered the TV-foil to shut down and sat beside his friend. Syrren was slightly shaking because of all the sudden bombardment of info. Not even three weeks ago, he couldn't have tell apart a washing machine and a cardboard and now his mind was flooded with pictures of places far away with conflicts he could have never imagined that they could happen.

"I'm...I'm sorry Syrren." He gave his scaled friend a short half-hug. "I didn't think that far that this could affect you that much. I'm sorry." He rubbed his head along his friend shoulder, surprised that he had done this. It really seemed that some draconic features have rubbed off.

"Please Matt don't think about it. It was me after all that asked for this explanation. But...I didn't expect all this..." he pointed at the screen "this horrible things to happen. You know I've read through all the stuff you gave me, and I was truly shocked. I mean...I somehow thought...I mean it looked like you humans would getting along better and better, despite some smaller conflicts."

Matt sighed even deeper now. Should he really tell him now what happened in the months after all this or should he wait a little bit to let Syrren calm down? Maybe it was best to give Syrren just the basic facts of what happened afterward and not such a long description like he did with this film from youtube.

"Unfortunately Syrren, it was far from over. You have to know when the European nations conquered the American bases in just seventeen minutes there was still Canada. I guess Canada would be part of the US today, if it wouldn't have been for the American President to stop it all. It was revealed that neither he nor the US-congress did order the attacks on Europe and Canada. It were ultra-nationalistic soldiers and officers from their armed forces itself. They thought that if they would wait for their 'weak' civil government to react they would become a European colony again. I know it sounds ridiculous, but that's how they thought. Somehow they managed to gather enough firepower to strike us this hard. But we had much more men and equipment, so it was a futile fight from the beginning. The Americans tried to apologize and said that it wasn't them that ordered the attack, but that was the worst that they could do, because now there was the question who was ordering the American forces at all? Could that happen any time again? That was the main question."

Matt groaned, rubbing his temples with his finger tips.

"In the end the Americans had to withdraw from Europe, Asia and Latin-America, and their soldiers were replaced by soldiers from Europe, Australia and Brazil. We also kept most of their material as a compensation for what they destroyed during their attacks. So you can imagine they were even more pissed of. But I'm way too fast now." He sighs again. Syrren thought if he would continue to breath that deep Matt would probably pass out from hyperventilating.

"Well, in the last minutes of the war between Europe and America, the Russians all of a sudden started an attack on several central Asian nations as well as the Baltic states. I guess they tried to restore the USSR somehow. But they did only fight for two hours. When the people in Russia heard that their country had started another war, they went to the streets of Moscow, St. Petersburg, Volgograd...everywhere in Russia. I guess they didn't expect that to happen, they didn't really know how to react to nearly two million people protesting all over the country. And then something really stupid and tragic happened. The Russian president ordered a special team to take care of the protesters. Unfortunately one of them has been able to hide his color blindness. He couldn't distinguish between green and red."

The young man slightly slapped his forehead to show his anger about that.

"Man, that they didn't notice that before. So instead of grabbing a green tear gas shell he grabbed a red RVX-shell. Can you imagine it, he thinks he grabs something that would only chase away protesters but instead he gets one of the most toxic substances known to humans. So when they fired three of these shells into the crowd...they..." he had to swallow hard before he could continue "...they all died. The wind blew it all over Moscow and so several ten-thousand people died within minutes. Since some protesters were broadcasting the demonstrations live on the internet, within minutes the entire world knew that Russia had used Chemical weapons on their own people, even if only by accident. But they shouldn't have had them anyway. But it is always the same with the big superpowers, they don't apply the rules on themselves they have set for others. Well...after that attack, most soldiers in Russia, mostly the younger generations started rebelling against their leaders, several thousands politicians, military leaders and oligarchs were killed right on the streets and in their offices. It was nearly exactly a hundred years after the first Russian revolution. But while back then all leaders were killed, the Russian president with a great deal of loyal soldiers fled to Belarus, together with over two dozen nuclear weapons, maybe as a insurance to stay in power."

He groaned in disgust. Syrren could feel Matt's disgust like a neon light, so bright was this emotion shining.

"Okay, the last thing that happened then was the Chinese invasion in Siberia or what else that place is called."

Syrren's ear-fins twitched several times. The country of China was one of the most weird ones he had read about. It was one of the oldest cultures in the world, but also one of the most authoritarian cultures, at least that is the impression he has about this country. But somehow he wasn't that surprised anymore that China was joining the fight back then.

"So they tried to use the confusion during the Russian Revolution and conquer the oil-rich parts of Russia I guess."

Matt just nodded, while Syrren shook his muzzle. That was something he couldn't really understand about humans. Why would somebody kill somebody else for an object. He knew that his father had once killed another rival when claimed his mother as his, but that was a totally different matter.

"And...who did win?"

"Nobody did. The PODSS member used their lasers to melt the Chinese armies to slag. The French had even launched a nuclear powered Particle canon that they could use against ground targets, although they were heavily criticized for launching this machine without telling the other member of the PODSS. But is has the same security system like the other ones, and since there were no cities or other important places there they could fire without any problems."

Matt shrugged, letting his hands fall to his legs, clapping when they hit his thighs.

"Well. That was what happened back then. It took us another year to calm down. But after that there were no more wars. Can you imagine it? People were so frightened of war all of a sudden that nobody wanted to fight anymore. But is was till no heaven. The US for example did shut down their borders, as well as their internet-connections. With this last act they wanted to force the rest of the world to accept their power and leadership. But this time it didn't work. Instead of the world having problems because the US didn't help, it was the US that was experiencing it."

He shook his head, stroking through his hair.

"Gods, I hate it. I goddammit hate what happened back then. Humans are just so...so... I cannot tell how stupid they are. Sometimes I just...hate humans and how stupid they think and act."

"That somehow sounds as if you don't count yourself as a human."

"Maybe I don't. I mean, so many things that other people were doing...I simply cannot understand why they would do them. It feels so alien sometimes to think that I am of the same species."

"How...how many people died?" For some reason Syrren wanted to know how many lives it did cost. He didn't knew exactly why. It was still something new to him that within seconds more humans could vanish in a simple flash than a normal person would be able to meet in an entire life.

"...five hundred..." The last words were too quiet that even Syrren couldn't understand them.

"Five hundred-thousand?" That surprised Syrren. He had read that even the first nuclear weapon humans had used killed nearly a hundred-thousand people in an instant.

"No, five-hundred millions." Matt said, sobbing a bit while shaking.

Syrren's maw just dropped and his wings and tail were just hanging down. Five-hundred millions people...dead?

"So...many? So many people died in India and Pakistan?"

"No." He wiped his tears away. He always got that emotional when he thinks about that part. So many lives simply wiped out, they would never come back. "Because of the nuclear attacks 'only' one-hundred million people died within two hours. After that about one-hundred-fifty millions died of radiation sickness, hunger disease and break down of civil order. The rest died around the world, mostly because of hunger. I...I don't want to show you the pics of the people that starved in Africa that is just...indescribable."

Syrren stood there, just shocked. He couldn't even imagine how much that many people were, but according to what he read it was like all humans in Europe had died.

Matt dried his tears and sighed deeply, looking at the digital clock above him. It was nearly six pm. He couldn't believe that they have talking and watching videos all afternoon long. Suddenly he realized he had forgotten something.

"Hey, I am sorry but I totally forgot to shopping today, and the grocery stores will close soon. "

"That is not a problem Matt, really. I will stay here and watch Toby until you return."

Matt got up and hugged the dragon tightly. He wasn't able to close his hands because of his wings but he wanted to show Syrren how much he like him. He on the other side tensed up because of the unexpected hug, but loosened himself after a few seconds and hugged his human friend too.

"Thanks Syrren, thanks so much. I will be back in no time, maybe even with something that you won't get that much in these days."

"Hmm, what do you mean?" The dragon gave him a confused look, not knowing what Matt meant, also his ability to see/feel somebody else's emotional expressions couldn't help him.

But Matt just grinned and said "Just wait and see. Only that much...if I get what I hope to get, we will have a good desert tonight."

And with these words he was already on his way to his garage.

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