The floating city of Kaiika slept.

To be fair, it didn't really sleep. Between the fishing industries working between the massive concrete pylons anchoring the city to the sea bed, and the rejuvenating industries trying their damndest to undo the fisher's work and keep the cycle of food going, the city never really switched off. But it at least slowed down at night. The majority of the residents at least recognized the need to get at least 5-6 hours of rest, and the night was the best time to do so.

Not that it was dark during the night in Kaiika. The city was lit profusely by neon attached to the towering concrete structures, advertising all manner of businesses and products in their usual way. Not even the 22nd century could bring a halt to the capitalistic greed of big business, and it's accompanying glitz and glamour.

But the biggest light source at night was not neon. Kaiika was only 30 miles from Australian Territory waters, and only 50 miles from the proud sea-city of New Adelaide. Sometimes on a cloudy night, residents of the city could swear they saw the reflected lights of their neighbour city in the clouds. To assist any pilots not paying attention, the smaller city had a hologrammatic New Zealand flag on the top of the tallest towers in the middle of the town. Several hundred metres across, but maintaining the proper flag ratio size, it's bold blue, red and white colours flickered as the occasional raindrops passed through it. It was not a pleasant night to be out.

And yet...

Oliver skulked around in the alley-way next to the jewellry store, furtively looking around. The store had been closed 6 hours ago, but that had no bearing on his current actions, except to encourage his plan. His hands gripped a slightly-faded laser rifle as he scanned for anyone passing nearby.

Oliver was a man who had fallen on hard times. He came from the slums of the mainland, and had been a talented criminal doing the kind of burglary he was now attempting. Kaiika, being a primary industries city, had very little violent crime, and he had seen it as an opportunity to remedy that and make off with a good haul. 

He checked his ruffled notebook, going over the plan in his head. Police response was at least 5 minutes away, and the weather wasn't going to help them. The jewellry store's valuables were one shop window and a number of glass display cases away, nothing that could stop his rifle. 15 seconds to destroy the cases, 3 minutes to grab what he could, and a minute to get back to his customized hover-bike. 45 seconds left to account for anything unexpected and make good his escape.

He touched the spikes of his mohawk for good luck, hefted his bag, and made another furtive look around. Did something just fly past the flag? He could have briefly sworn he saw the flicker of some large bird up by the towers, but a closer look revealed nothing to his bionic eye.

He finished the sweep. Now was the moment. He took a deep breath, steam condensing in the air as he hunkered down, ready to spring into the street and begin the robbery. A few droplets fell on his bare arms, and the notebook was put away in the bag. One last check of the battery on his rifle, and he started.

He spun around the corner, and levelled his rifle at the jewellry store window. Roswell's jewellry, with it's alien head design, sat there, unexpectant, and he fired, the kick of the laser charge burying the stock of the rifle into his shoulder. The particles sang through the air, and impacted with the glass. As the laser particles pushed the glass out of the way, it sent a chain reaction through the rest of the window's molecules, and it cracked into a million pieces of jagged glass shards, falling down onto the sill and the interior floor. 

A klaxon went off, it's unearthly screeching echoing through the concrete buildings, disturbing the quiet night air. A fog machine erupted inside the building, bathing the area with thick smoke and nullifying normal human eyes from seeing anything. Oliver smirked and dove into the smoke, his bionic eye unaffected. He levelled the rifle at the display cases, one by one. 

Six display cases met their fate at the hands of the laser rifle, shattering onto the jewellry they were designed to protect, before the rifle announced it was out of charge on the battery. The human emptied the battery into his bag and pulled out a new one, installing it quickly, and as the hum of the laser rifle fired back up, he got to work. Opening his bag wide, he began scooping up the treasure trove.

First were the watches, magnificent time pieces, and functionally useless nowadays due to people's need for vid-screens and other entertainments. But they looked nice on a wrist, and as they had been for centuries were a status symbol. He paid no attention to the types for now, he could admire his work once he was safe.

Then the rings. Embedded in the display, Oliver simply grabbed the felt up in it's entirety, inverted it, and shook it over his bag, watching the rings fall on top of the watches. Discarding the felt, he moved on. Forty seconds since the heist had begun, telling himself to stay calm. He had this. 

Next were two displays of necklaces. He pilfered them with speed, knocking over neck displays with gay abandon. Then a display of bracelets, embedded in the felt in the same way as the rings, and the same tactic was utilized. As the felt fell to the floor, Oliver was already turning to the last shattered display. It was earrings, and they joined the rest of the loot in the bag. A minute twenty.

Oliver looked around towards the main counter. When he had scoped the place earlier, there had been one thing that had caught his eye. A special diamond studded tiara had been given it's own case behind the counter, but elevated so customers could look enviously at it. It was by far and away the most expensive item in the store front, and while it was in a much stronger looking case, Oliver wanted it. He took aim at the front plate of glass, and fired.

The laser did not penetrate. Instead it deflected back into the counter itself, hitting the till in the middle of the number pad, with a ghastly noise. Oliver didn't have time to be confused about this, and instead took careful aim at the lock.

The metal lock took two shots before it gave up it's attempt to remain secure, and dropped to the floor, bits of molten metal pooling next to the case. Oliver grabbed the handle, and pulled.

The case swung open easily, and the tiara was unceremoniously yanked out and dumped on top of the rest of the treasures. Two minutes.

As he turned, his bionic eye recognized similar technology turning to look at him. An infra-red camera of some kind, piercing through the smoke. He turned to look up at it, and then dived behind the counter. A section of wall had slid upwards, and a small turret weapon of some kind was turning just behind the camera. The camera swept over him, and locked on him, but he was behind cover just as the turret fired.

A tear gas grenade shot into the counter and detonated, filling what wasn't smoke with tear gas. Oliver's human eye instantly started watering, and he knew he had to leave now before any other surprises started appearing out of the woodwork. He knew there was nothing lethal due to business regulations about this sort of thing, but there were plenty of ways it could still hurt.

He peeked out, rifle first, and sunk two rounds into the turret, and was rewarded with breaking the trigger mechanism and setting off a second tear gas grenade before it could be fired. Then he ran through the camera's field of view, through the hole in the window and out into the street, heaving for clean air, one eye crying.

Three minutes and ten seconds, not bad. He ran back into the alley-way, the klaxon echoing accusingly behind him as he did up the bag, slinging it over one shoulder. His sneakers splashed through a puddle as he pounded down the alley, reaching his hover-bike. He primed the starter motor, and then fired up the three jets before jumping on board. With one hand still holding his rifle in case someone spotted him, he rose into the air, did a 180, and took off into the sky, the sound of the alarm quickly dispersing behind him. Freedom.

Oliver looked around rapidly. No police bikes as yet, no helicopters, nothing. His heart pounded at speed, as he wondered if he had gotten away with it. His face had been seen, but he could be out of the city before any serious hunt could be...

The tackle was unexpected. Oliver was at least 200m above sea-level and looking to the left, and a single heavy-set arm caught him around the chest and stopped him practically dead. The hover-bike went whirling to oblivion, it's jets roaring and whining in final fury as it spiralled down to the sea, impacting the water and shattering into multiple pieces. The bag of loot likewise  left his shoulder and fell away after the bike, but unlike the bike it caught on an elevated walkway with a heavy thump and a rattle of crystal. The rifle ALMOST left Oliver's hand, but despite being winded, he just managed to hold onto it. In a daze he tried to look around at his attacker.

The hand let go as he tried, and he briefly started downwards, until a long tail wrapped around his chest twice, catching him. Oliver started in surprise from the sudden reintroduction to gravity, and looked down at the tail. Glistening, wet, white scales glinted back up at him, and the realization this was not a human that had him in it's grasp sunk in. He felt the tail shift as wings beat the air, multiple white wing tips appearing in the sides of his vision.

He tried to twist his head back to look at his captor, and saw the massive pair of left side wings beating the air for height. He tried to struggle further in the grasp, and his captor spoke.

"If you continue to test my patience, thief, I will let gravity have it's rather final opinion of you." it's voice was a harsh Scottish tone, and it cut through the air like a knife with venom. Oliver, despite the warning, tried to turn further and speak back with what little air he had recovered.

"Who...WHAT are you?"

"Your arresting angel. You have the right to remain silent. If you choose to waive this right, I will enforce it."

Oliver had heard enough. He started to twist the rifle around. If he shot his captor, he could survive the fall into the water. It would hurt, but it could be done. The rifle got halfway to a firing line on one of the wings when a silver streak appeared in Oliver's vision. It looked like the flat end of a spear...oh fuck.

Oliver woke up with a splitting headache. He was lying on the concrete somewhere, his hands cuffed behind his back. His nose was most definitely broken, he could feel the blood dripping down onto his lips. His human eye was too woozy to see anything, but his bionic eye took in a strange sight.

He was in front of the police station, the door to his right. Two policemen were in front of it, but they weren't looking at him. One, the shorter and slightly bulkier of the two, was holding his bag and his rifle in his hands, staring at something to his left. With superhuman strength, fighting the pain in his head, Oliver turned his neck to look.

What was there shouldn't have existed. Dragons weren't real. It was an impossibility, but there it stood. Silver and white, seven foot tall, standing on it's hind legs, holding a white spear with a dragon's wing guard. Four glowing gold eyes staring at the policeman levelly as it was speaking. Oliver couldn't make out the words through the ringing in his head, but he gazed in awe as the six winged dragon conversed with the policeman. His clawed hands played against the spear, and his wings rustled in the breeze. His long thick tail swayed back and forth as he shifted weight from foot to foot.

Oliver tried to speak, say something, anything to this majestic vision, but all he could managed was a cough and a splutter around the blood on his tongue. The stranger turned, startled, and ran off into the street, leaping up onto a police car, spreading his wings, and simply rocketing off into the sky, all six wings working in harmony to attain maximum speed.

And with that, the creature was gone, leaving the two stunned policemen to turn to Oliver.

"I don't suppose he told you who he was?" the shorter policeman asked. Oliver shook his head weakly. The taller policeman was handed the loot and weapon, before the shorter policeman helped Oliver to his feet.

"Well, he's done a number on you, that's for sure. Let's get inside and clean the blood off."

Oliver was led inside tenderly, and he found the ability to speak.

"What was that?"

"Not sure. Said his name was Ashkente, spouted something about being a seraphim, and what you had done, and what he did to you. You ok?"

"Head hurts. Hit me with something."

"His spear. He said so. Looks like a broken nose, we can get a medic up here in a mo."

"Thanks." Oliver was led to a chair in an office, and sunk gratefully in it.

"Don't get me wrong, you're in a lot of trouble, Oliver. Armed robbery isn't getting swept under the rug or anything, but first we should make sure you're not going to die on us through some vigilante's action."

Oliver didn't care, he was just grateful to be alive right now, although he could have done with less pain. He took some tissues and held them against his nose, as the chief sat down in his seat. The rookie stood by the doorway, and opened up the bag. The first thing was a bible, which Oliver knew hadn't been in there before hand. It was an old bible, and it had a golden bookmark in the middle somewhere.

"Religious man, Oliver?" the senior policeman asked.

"No sir, I think he put it there."

The policeman paused, and opened it to the bookmark. His brow furrowed, and his eyes gazed upon the page.

"Xavier, chapter 5, verse 4. And, amongst the clamour of the demons, there was a panic, as a light appeared in the sky above the battle. An eight pointed star of golden light, radiant as the sun, lit up the battlefield.

The world went silent, trapped for eternity in a single moment in time, as the star grew in size and intensity, heat washing over all those below, only broken by the sound of the demons backing away.

And then a voice spake from the light, with a fury unmatched by any else found there on that day, in tones foreign and terrifying, in a way that made every demon scurry back to their hellish hiding holes.

"I am Ashkente, the Seraphim Angel of Law and Vengeance. And I am Very Angry."

And there was silence in the police station.