William Angevine quickly learned that the only heroes left in Lawrence, Kansas were the criminals. As the THOR class war cyborg stepped from the shadows cast by the vodka still's fractionating columns, the air in the warehouse chilled. He saw the massive creature's blue vidorbs first, then it stepped into the light. The cranial fuselage was aerodynamic, smooth, based on the skull structure of a dire wolf. The skull and chassis itself were made of reinforced, unpolished titanalum the color of slate. The beast was designed to inspire terror. Yet William Angevine felt none. A human tether, he alone could hear the cyborg's thoughts. They called to him, like Voices in the Stream.

Southern California was 50 years gone and 500 feet under the Pacific Ocean as Tara Dean's stolen 2079 Mustang left the hovroad at 199 kph. Halfway through the first mid-air rotation, charges exploded along crumple junctions in the hovercraft’s roof and the polyaluminum cabin blew free. Ejected into the sky and clear of the disintegrating Ford, Tara Dean's unconscious body shot clear of the wreckage and into a pack of waiting cybernetic canines, drawn into the darkness by the scent of her blood. The Dawn of the Courtezan begins.