The Dragon Engine (2015) by Andy Remic

Author:Andy Remic [Remic, Andy]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: legendary heroes, heroic, Fantasy, the morning after, Epic Fantasy, dragon quest, Epic
ISBN: 9780857664556
Publisher: Angry Robot
Published: 2015-07-17T14:00:00+00:00

Predicament

BEETRAX HAD A recurring nightmare. He would awake, to find himself in a coffin. He’d open his eyes, but nothing changed; everything was black. He would reach out, but find his arms pinned by his sides. He would try and move his legs, but find them similarly restricted, so that all he could move were fingers and toes. His breathing would become shallow, chest rising and falling rapidly as he felt panic build quickly within him, feel his entire body and mind become a pressure cooker as the world spun around him and he realised he was trapped he was fucking trapped underground, buried alive, and he’d open his mouth to call for help but no words would come out, nothing would come out, and he tried to speak or cry or wail or scream, but no sound would come out and he was mute. “Help me!” he wanted to scream, “I’m not dead, help me!” But nobody was there to help him, because he was six feet under the soil. And as panic flooded him like a shower of red hot razors flowing through his veins and brain, and panic welled in his throat like a fist, he would awake, into a cold grey morning, bathed in sweat, panting, fists clenched, sometimes with piss staining the sheets. It had always been this way. Ever since he could remember. And though he would never admit it, Beetrax was afraid of the dark.

Now, here, in reality, as consciousness finally came to him, at first he thought – believed – he was trapped back inside his nightmare. It was little comfort, being buried alive, but at least some small recess of his brain understood; yes, he would go through the usual agony but at least at the end he would wake up, change his bed sheets, burn his pissy mattress, and get on with his life.

This time, however, it was different. It felt different.

This time there was no black. Just a fuzzy white; an off-grey.

His eyes flickered open, and he was hot, and yet the world tasted cold. He turned his head to the left, and tried to move his arms. The left was trapped, but his right one came up before his face and he stared in wonder, in confusion, at his rough, tattooed fingers, with their chewed, broken, dirt-ingrained fingernails.

“What?” he mumbled, and his voice emerged as a cracked croak. “What happened?” Nothing more than a whisper.

Why has the dream changed? What is this new place? What is this new terror sent to mock and haunt my deepest nightmares?

And then he realised. And it chilled him to the very core of his soul.

He was buried.

He really was buried alive…

Beetrax started to scream, struggling, his right fist pounding the snow around him, the compact white shell which had formed like a protective cage to bury him, bury him, and everything was a swirling rage which growled like raging fire through his brain, and this was it, this was the end and

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