The Amalgamation

“There weren’t always dragons in the Valley!” read the poster stapled to the bus stop. Next to the text was a picture of a red serpent coiled around a cartoon dollar symbol. The little cartoon dollar had eyes that were rolled upwards, indicating that it was being choked by the serpent, who had a vicious snarl on their face and smoke coming out of their nostrils.

Sean had seen plenty of these posters over the past few months and he always thought it was funny how it was the dollar sign was so prominent.

“We used to be a real country! A nation we could all be proud of!” Sean wasn’t sure what was true. He’d been around ten years ago, before the Amalgamation. There were plenty of arguments back then about how things ought to be run. But the one thing everyone could agree on was that nobody was proud of the nation.

People weren’t mad at ‘dragons’ back then. They’d been mad at the senators, CEOs, politicians on both sides, presidents, judges – and with good reason.

“The Knights of St. George need YOUR help to slay the dragons, the elves, the orcs, the dwarves, the communists, and all the other invaders to our country. Together, we can restore the natural order and make the world like it used to be!”

In Sean’s experience, people forgot how things used to be. The last couple of presidents before the Amalgamation would’ve arrested you for putting up a poster like this about them.

Life was far from perfect now, of course. But Sean was doing a lot better. Ten years ago he’d been working as a fry cook, his minimum wage just barely covering his rent and his student loan payments.

Now look at him. Chief programmer at Razorfang. On good money. Nice house in the valley. No rent. No student loan payments. All thanks to the company.

And all it’d taken was a so-called ‘invasion’ from another reality.

Sean used his keys to tear the poster down just as the bus pulled to a stop.

“Good morning, Mr. Kielty,” said the driver. He was a large, barrel-chested individual with tusks curving up from his lower lip and green skin that was covered in tattoos.

“Morning, Dave,” Sean said. “Still counting down the days to your vacation?”

“Aye, Mr. Kielty,” said Dave. “Only three more shifts.”

“Can’t say I’m not jealous,” said Sean. “You take care now.”

“Take it easy, Mr. Kielty.”

Sean took a quick glance around the bus as he found a seat. There were only a few other passengers on board this early in the morning, all human like Sean. The buses came regularly enough that you could almost always find a seat. Yet another perk of working for Razorfang.

Everyone else on the bus was wearing the standard red polo shirt with the stylised dragon wings on the breast. The only person who wasn’t was a slim man in a hoodie at the very back of the bus. Seemed a little warm to be wearing a hoodie but Sean didn’t think twice about it. Maybe it was someone who was late for work and planning to get changed on the way? Or it could’ve been someone just hopping on the bus for a couple of stops?

Dave was nice like that, so long as non-employees were off the bus before they reached the Razorfang campus he didn’t much care.

The bus turned up onto the freeway, giving Sean a gorgeous view of the San Francisco bay sparkling under the clear blue sky.

He managed to get one headphone in his ear before he heard a voice behind him.

“America First!”

He glanced over his shoulder. The man at the back of the bus had tossed aside his hoodie. He was wearing a Kevlar vest with what looked like bricks strapped to the front. Colourful wires were looped through the bricks and coiled into a small plastic object the man held in his hand.

Sean thought it was a bomb. But there was no way it could be a bomb. That sort of thing just didn’t happen anymore.

The man flipped the switch. There was a sudden rush of heat and then nothing.