Valley of the Beasts

There weren’t always dragons in the Valley. The humans would never suspect it, but the Beast Clans knew they'd come.

Silicon Valley was, after all, the global center for innovation, and destined to become a gold mine as the world leaped toward the new. The human need for attention and entertainment met the latest technological treasure trove. Beast Clans created a hoard of wealth that was never before imagined in the minerals of computer chips and 20th century transistors. It was only a matter of time before the Dragon Lords jumped on board.

Beast Clans raced to the west coast to set up their shot in the Valley. So many of them came and went. Not every Clan has what it takes.

But the Dragon Lords were patient. They waited for the right piece of the treasure. They sat idly by as AOL went LOL, and Walmart ran awry. No, the Dragon Lords searched carefully for the best, most succulent, most promising capital venture Silicon Valley had to offer.

It wasn’t tangible treasure, like Ebay, or conceptual money, like Paypal. No, human attention was always the most valuable asset in the world. Humans were perpetually wasteful, unwise, simple creatures, unaware of the strengths they held within them. And yet, they were incredibly powerful. All of the Beast Clans - that which humans would call “mythical beasts” - fed on that human energy from whatever source they could find.

The Dragon Lords watched from afar for so long, many Clans thought they'd given up the hunt, but they were enticed into the Valley when Facebook set up headquarters.

Yes, the Dragon Lords knew Facebook held the greatest prize. But Facebook was just the name for humans, made so they felt apathetic about its infinite power. Its real name?

Faebook.

That's right. Devised by the Faery Queen herself, the platform was the perfect trap. With every click and scroll, her Ladyship devised the most clever plan to harness the energy of humanity and sent her most wizened sorcerers to the task.

If the humans knew what the internet really was, it might be wiped out in a second, but the Queen's plans for total secrecy prevailed. Faebook brought together Clans from all over the planet to feed all Beast Clans. She formed a stable theocracy based on mutually assured survival, harnessing human energy and occasionally hosting a casual get-together.

The peace between Clans had never been so long lasting, and all credit was owed to The Faery Queen.

She was inspired by young Tom, a Hobgoblin who signed away his realm to pursue a passion in photography amongst the humans he so loved. His realm was called: Myspace. The Queen, in all her infinite wisdom, carefully perused its pages. She saw a generation of children with colored hair and raucous music, posting pictures and blogs and screaming for attention in a land of tumult and trauma. The internet bred anger and connection in a way no previous generation had experienced.

And all that angst? It produced incredible amounts of energy.

The vibrational feast procured from Tom’s software was enough to power the entire Valley for the next fifty years. It was the most powerful siphon of humanity that any Clan had discovered since the First Dragon Lord gave the Youngest Men his language and his flame some ten thousand years ago.

Her Ladyship The Queen sent her sharpest knave to lead the task of creating Faebook. The humans know him as a man called "Mark Zuckerberg," but the Unseelie Court named him High Lord Zuck the Time Hacker.

He was a weirdo. He interacted with the humans so much and for so long, it even got him in some trouble with their courts.

But he completed the task her Ladyship assigned, and he was rewarded for this beyond measure. They even built a statue, because High Lord Zuck did what no previous faerie was able to do: collect the energy of billions of humans in one place, to be shared among all Clans of creatures.

Those humans never saw it coming. Endless people handed their names right over to the control of The Unseelie Court. In doing so, the humans inadvertently fed all of The Court’s most powerful allies around the world as well – the Google Gorgons, the AmaZombies, even the shapeshifters at Snapchat.

The Dragon Lords arrival to the Valley finally united every Beast Clan under Faebook. With their assistance and protection, the Clans shared the wealth of information and energy. Faebook collected all the joy and the sorrow, the fighting in the comments, the fake news, the pokes, the likes, the baby pictures, the Minion memes -- any and every single thing humanity had posted online was ripe for the picking.

The Dragon Lords wouldn’t have missed it for the world.

All the while, new clans came to the Valley. With each new clan, a new alliance formed and the Valley expanded. The Netflix Nephilim loved working with Imp-stagram. Uber Orcs collaborated closely with the Vampries at Verifone. The Valley expanded so much, Faebook was able to expand to a second platform called Meta – though the paperwork alone was a nightmare.

The Beast Clans lived together in prosperity and harmony. Energy was abundant. Every single Clan was well-fed, working hard, and happy. The humans were completely unaware. There was a cooperation in the Valley that had never been known in the history of the world, and it seemed like nothing would ever change that.

But nothing lasts forever. One day, strangers slipped into Silicon Valley.

Nobody knew they were there.

Nobody knew they were coming.

Everyone was shocked when one morning, a company of vagabonds seemed to rise out of the depths with no warning, overtaking everything Faebook had worked to build.

A wave of terror shook the Queen and the Dragon Lords. Their empire was under fire from the very creatures whose energy they needed to harvest.

The humans were in Silicon Valley and they called themselves… TikTok.