Ghost Spark - Essence Engine

One

**Copyrighted Material:
All my works are copyrighted. No part, including characters, may be reproduced or used without written consent from the author.

Author's Note: I started this work in 2013 and initially wrote about 40,000 words. After that, I would come back to it when inspiration struck. Over time, I became invested in the characters and wanted to see  where their story would go. Finally, I  made a commitment to finish a few months ago. I figured the best way to commit was to write a chapter and post a chapter. 

A German drone hovered in the air, its wings whispering at 100 beats per second. Manufactured in the German Provence of the Russian Federation, it was impossible to recognize as anything other than a dragonfly. It hovered, waiting patiently for the door to open.

Marcus was late getting out the door. His mind had been occupied with Maggie lately and he wanted to see her before his next op. Scooping up the tablets from the armchair he had slept in the night before, he walked over to the sequencing unit and put them inside.

"Recycle", he said.

--

Two Kilometers above, a sentient raptor soared on its 10 foot wing span. Instructed to loiter, it soared in lazy eights, until it received confirmation.

--

Walking out of the house, Marcus's muscular six feet slowed only once to check that he had everything he needed. Following his shadow across the paver stones, his body looked less like one broken by war and more of one shaped by it.

The car slowly rolled out of the garage to meet him in the driveway. The dragonfly hummed over the flower bed in front of the house. The insect lowered itself to a charging station that was disguised as a bright white daisy. The dragonfly's wings slowed, then stopped.

--

The bright blue modified Baja Beetle skittered across the road as he took a right turn at full speed. Registering a loss of traction, the car activated two other drive motors. Pulling out of a fish tail, the motors whined as the 300 Mega Joule battery spun the drive wheels faster. Speed was of the essence, he thought to himself; "no time, no time."Driving down the pitted road, swerving to avoid the larger holes was enough to jostle anyone out of their seat. The seat belt tightened automatically as it sensed the increased urgency of the car's driver. 

Above, after receiving the Go Command, the raptors figure eight's became tighter and tighter. Summoned via an E-Star satellite that the target was in range, the next step was simple: lock onto the target and generate enough descent velocity to destroy it. Locking sensors onto the car, a quick calculation of current weather conditions and altitude was all the raptor needed to begin its run. Lining up on target, the raptor jettisoned its wings and dove to reach terminal velocity.

The potholes had become much more evenly spaced and the staccato rumble of the unimproved road vibrated the Beetle's cheap plastic fittings to a crescendo.

The raptor crashed through the roof at 350 mph, led by its depleted uranium-tipped cone. Once the sensors had registered that the roof had been pierced, a small fragmented explosive detonated.

The car continued on for a few hundred more meters, then slowly lost power and finally stopped at a berm on the side of the road...

--

Marcus's HUD flickered red. Touching the stem behind his right ear, he then verbally entered in his security ID number. The array of tiny, low power cameras embedded in the windshield scanned his retina, completing clearance.