Issue 1 Downtime

As Gemma and Trev reached the outskirts of London, she frowned. "Well, we'd heard it was bad, but seeing it is something else," she comments.

Trev just whistled. "Can say that again...looks like something I had planned for a D&D game..."

"Little different when it's real life staring you in the face," she said. "I suppose we should start working our way in. Think I should go big for this?"

"Better now when you can save your clothes than later when you might not have a chance,"

"Plus you get to ride the dragon again," she teased, changing out of her clothes and shifting with a short grinding noise.

"That too," he grinned, neatly folding and rolling up her clothes and then tucking them securely into his backpack before clambering up onto his wife's back.

"Going to let Ignata have the reigns for a bit," Gemma said before the dragon's eyes flared brighter. Ignata and Gemma had drifted closer over time, so they weren't as different as they used to be. They still had different tastes and desires and Ignata had even tried having a girlfriend before Trev and Gemma got married. "Feels good to stretch my limbs again," Ignata said as she began pushing into the overgrowth.

"I'm not going to complain about getting to ride a dragon through this mess either," Trev joked, looking around in awe, but also on guard for anything that approached.

"If I was sure I could find a place to land, I'd consider flying, but on foot is probably better."

"Less conspicuous from a distance, at least. Wouldn't mind an aerial perspective but a dragon's sort of easy to spot and I'm not exactly quiet when I'm up in the air."

She scrambled over a fallen tree, peering up and over some foliage. "Looks like the remains of one of the roadways," she said, shoving through the bushes and onto a vine strewn section of cracked asphalt.

Trev flattened himself against Ignata's back to avoid getting clocked in the face with a bunch of branches. "Not much of a road left...but it's a bit less of a mess than the shit we were just going through and we're probably most likely to find friends or foes along a road like this."

"I'd much rather fight foes on this surface than in that crowded brush," Ignata said, following the remains of the road.

Trev nodded, not that Ignata could see, "No arguments there. Bugs are less horrible out of the trees too.

Ignata trundled along in silence for a bit, following the remains of the road deeper into the city. "I don't think I've ever known London to be this quiet," she said. "It's kind of nice and kind of sad all at the same time."

"Just creeps me out...I'm waiting for a horde of zombies or a pack of radioactive cockroaches to come flying at us,"

"You do realize you've just jinxed it, right?"

"...well fuck," he chuckled. Still he did keep scanning the surroundings.

"If I get turned into a zombie, I promise to eat your brains first," Ignata said with a chuckle.

"Zombie dragons are even worse than regular zombies."

"Dragon anything is inherently superior to the normal variation," she said with some certainty.

"Well of course. One of many reasons I married you, Dragon Wife."

"You're a dork," she said, "One of the many reasons we married you, Loud Husband."

"There were many?" Trev joked.

He resumed scanning their surroundings. "Think we'll really find anyone? This...'Seer?'"

"One can hope. Unless we look like warlords to whoever it is, then I'll take a pass."

"Well we do live in a castle..."

"Yeah, but we're not massive arseholes like the ones who've been swinging through Cardiff."

"Well we know that...hopefully anyone else will."

"I'm guessing the fact that we didn't bring any goons with us may help. Though you do look sort of shady."

"I blame the beard," he chuckled.

"I concur," she said, shuffling around a hole in the pavement where the road had collapsed into the Underground.

"Well, you try shaving this baby soft skin with a 3 month old disposable razor," he chuckled. "We'll have to see if we can find a drug store."

"Your skin isn't as baby soft as it used to be. You should really consider a different kind of razor."

"I am cut to the quick," he said with mock indignation, chuckling. "I just need a hedge trimmer at this point," he said rubbing his face. "And once that's better, just about any razor will do. Though I should probably avoid a straight razor if I want to not bleed to death."

"You just have to ask. I can cauterize injuries," she teased.