Fan Fiction ❯ Two Worlds ❯ Destiny Awaits ( Chapter 1 )

Destiny Awaits

By Jack

***Author notes***

Well, since this is an original story and really has nothing that that could get me in trouble there isn't much reason to have this note section other than to say that this story is my one year anniversary creation, which happened on the 14th of April. So it's a little late, sue me! (Originally posted on the 28th of April 2002, Fictionpress.com :) )

(Attention: The previous statement was written by the Author's ego and in no way represents the opinions of any other of his emotions and should be ignored, so don't sue us. Please.)

***End Notes***

***

The peace that marked a warm summer day was suddenly shattered by the harsh tones of the final bell at Campbell Collegiate. As the last notes died into the air, they were replaced by the mad dash and happy voices of students who were anxious to get out of their daylong imprisonment and into the bright sunshine.

As they emerged, the students blinked their eyes against the sudden brightness of the sun glinting off the snow-covered peaks of the Rocky Mountains to the west. And they turned their faces to the playful breeze coming from the prairies from the east.

The sidewalks and nearby streets were filled with teenagers walking or driving home or wherever else they wanted to spend the rest of the daylight hours. They laughed, yelled and generally had a good time.

There was one person however, that wasn't paying the weather and life around him much attention at the moment, although he did appreciate their efforts. He was deeply engrossed in the magazine that he was holding and weaving and dodging though the crowds with an almost uncanny agility.

As the teens around him began to thin out, the boy's pace slowed and became more thoughtful as he read over the articles in his `New Tech' magazine. Turning the corner of the school and walking down the path that would bring him home, the boy gradually realised that something was out of place and nagged at his attention. The boy stopped and looked up around the general area in front of him, though nothing seemed to be different. It was only when he looked down towards the ground that he found the thing that had alerted him.

It turned out, upon closer inspection that his shadow had in fact grown. It had bulked up, it seemed more muscular and not only that, it seemed that it had invited two of its friends along too. Now this was very confusing for the boy. He wasn't aware that his shadow had been working out and even more, had a social life of its own without him knowing, which was quite disconcerting to say the least. Not having control of something so personal as your own shadow was something of an embarrassment really. He was still pondering the implications of this when a large meaty hand took him by the shoulder and spun him around to face the persons that obviously were the owners of the three intruding shadows.

The boy recognized the biggest of them immediately and with an utterly calm voice said, "Hello Nathan, are you feeling alright? You look a little green."

One of the two teens flanking Nathan tried and failed to control a small snicker at the comment, because in fact, Nathan was green. Neon green paint to be exact and it covered his entire face and most of his upper body and he was looking none to happy about it.

Nathan quickly quieted his companion with a harsh glare before returning his full attention to the smaller boy in front of him, "You! You did this to me! You little piece of…"

"No," the boy interrupted, "I didn't do anything. It was you who decided to try breaking into my locker again. You brought this on yourself." With that said, he turned smartly on his heels and started to walk away.

"I don't care," growled Nathan from behind him, "I'm going to kill you anyway." He charged after him.

The boy had been expecting this, and as soon as he heard the three bullies pursuing, he broke into a full out run.

Now the boy prided himself on being in quite good shape, especially in his legs. They weren't very muscular but what was there was strong. He never passed up an opportunity to exercise them. Of course with Nathan around he sometimes didn't have much of a choice in the matter. So, as he rounded another corner of the school he had already gathered a sizeable lead on his pursuers. His feet pounding on the pavement, he angled towards a nearby grove of trees, and quickly ducked between the concealing branches.

He had used this spot before to escape Nathan and he hoped it would serve him again. But before he could congratulate himself or even stop running for that matter, his feet suddenly flew out from underneath him. The boy let out a yelp of surprise as he fell backwards, arms pin wheeling. His head hit something hard and stars exploded behind his eyes.

The world started to swim and the distant treetops swirled as the boy tried to see through his clouded vision. Something in the back of his mind told him that he probably had a concussion and that he shouldn't go to sleep unless he never wanted to wake up again. But even as the boy tried, his vision shrank as if he was looking though a tunnel. He could make out the pounding of Nathan and his lackeys footsteps as they raced past, still looking for him. He tried to call out to them but his voice wouldn't obey and the footsteps continued on. The boy groaned as the blackness consumed the last of his thoughts. He slowly fell into unconsciousness.

And dreamt of wonders…

***

Samantha, First Apprentice to the High Sorceress of the Guilds of Magic, rushed around her small room in the fortress that served as a home and a defence for all the magic users of the country and the immense collections of tomes that they possessed, with what could be called no less a frenzied pace. She was tearing the room apart, checking every nook and cranny as if looking for something of great importance. Her few personal possessions were scattered all around, dispelling the almost perfect tidiness that used to reside there.

Finally, she screamed in utter frustration, "Augggh! Where is it? I'm going to be late!"

She whirled about at the sound of a light tapping on her door to see one of the senior sorcerers standing there with a look of surprise on his face. "Samantha? What are you still doing here? You're supposed to be with the high sorceress."

"I know!" she gasped as she turned back to ransacking her room, "but I can't find my notebook and quill!"

Before the sorcerer could respond a small cough drew both their attentions downward to a small elfish face that was peaking around the frame of the door and looking quite chagrined as he did so. "Uh, Samantha?" he asked quietly.

"What is it Marcus?" she replied, once again turning to her search.

Even from her place inside the room Samantha could hear the young elf shift uncomfortably from foot to foot. "Well, you see, I kind of borrowed your notebook and quill…"

Upon hearing that Samantha whirled around with such a mask of contempt it could have frozen a golem in its tracks. Seeing this Marcus immediately knew he was in serious trouble and blurted out a hasty explanation. "I'm sorry! I just wanted to learn how to do some magic! I didn't think you would mind! Please don't be angry!"

With a remarkable show of restraint on her part, Samantha didn't budge an inch. "Marcus," she asked evenly through gritted teeth, "Where are my book and quill?"

"Here!" he yelped as he held up the objects, "They're right here!"

Samantha didn't waste any time. She dropped everything and grabbed the offered items. She dashed out of the room and had already made it half way down the hall before she was once again stopped by the sorcerer's voice.

"Good luck Samantha," he called.

She turned and actually smiled. "Thanks," she said and then turned towards Marcus, "I'll deal with you latter." This caused the elf's eyes to go wide and he took off down the hall. She sighed and before running off again bowed in respect to the sorcerer. "Destiny awaits," she joked but was already too far away to hear his reply.

As she weaved her way through the numerous passageways and halls, that little voice of reason that everyone has made an appearance.

Maybe I was too rough on Marcus, she thought, after all, all he was trying to do was learn to do some magic. Poor guy, forced to work here for enough money to feed his family. It would be a big help to him if he knew a few spells, and I did sense that he had at least some magical abilities.

She rounded another corner and hurried on past the stables, pausing only a second to wave to one of the stable hands when her mind made itself up. "Right, as soon as I get back from my lesson with the High Sorceress I'll teach him some of my easier spells," she spoke out loud and immediately felt better. "But first, I have to get there before I'm late!"

Picking up her pace, Samantha was literally sprinting down the stone halls, her leather-soled shoes making no noise as she moved forward. Her panic was very understandable to those that barely had time to move out of her way as she passed. It was a great honour to be the first apprentice to the High Sorceress and it was extremely dangerous and impolite to keep her waiting especially when it was your first day of full training, for her temper was almost as notorious as her skills in the mystical arts. And Samantha for one wasn't about to experience it first hand if she didn't have to.

As she entered the final corridor, she could see the heavy wooden door to the Sorceress' study where she spent most of her days creating new and wonderful spells or divining some ancient wisdom or something of that sort. "Come on, come on!" she encouraged herself as she covered the last few meters. She skidded to a halt just before she would have planted her face in the heavy oak timbers.

Gripping the handle with both hands, and without bothering to knock, she pulled the door open with a grunt of exertion. As soon as there was enough room, she slipped inside head bowed in respect and to hide the blush of embarrassment for being late. "Forgive me High Sorceress, it was not my intention to be late especially for my first lessons as a full sorceress. Please forgive… me," she trailed off as she realised something was amiss. Silence, which was always a bad sign. Raising her head, instead of seeing the full on glare of a really ticked off Sorceress as she expected, she found her teacher running about her lab in a frenzy of movement that rivalled Samantha's actions just a few minutes earlier.

"High Sorceress?" ventured a very wary Samantha as she quickly moved out of the way as the older woman swished passed her without even realising that someone else was in the room. Instead, the Sorceress just stormed right on by towards another one of the many bookcases that lined the room. She reached up to one of the shelves and started to pull old, dusty tomes off and onto the ground with only a glance at the titles.

Samantha cautiously moved forward, narrowly dodging a large heavy book that was falling towards her unprotected foot. She was starting to get concerned over her mentor's strange behaviour; this was nothing like anything that she had seen in the four years she'd been at the school. Deciding that this could be something significant, Samantha placed her hand on her teacher's shoulder and repeated, "High Sorceress?"

The response was immediate and terrifying. The old woman whirled around, the look on her face was mirrored in her deep brown eyes: terror, pure and absolute terror and that look turned the blood in Samantha's veins to ice water. Stumbling backwards, Samantha tripped over the piles of discarded magical items and fell, quite undignified onto her backside.

The Sorceress was over to her in an instant, gripping the front of her light tunic, she hauled her back up and brought her face mere inches from her own. "Who are you? Why are you here?" the old woman demanded, her voice rising in pitch to an almost inhuman wail and her breath was foul as if it had not been cleaned recently.

Samantha fumbled her words in her mouth and tried to get them out in some way that would make sense. "High Sorceress, it's me, Samantha. And I'm here for my first full lesson," she managed to say.

As she watched, Samantha could see the cloud of fear and confusion momentarily lift from the eyes of her teacher, only to be slowly replaced by the sharp glare that was the woman's trademark. She trembled slightly as the eyes moved, searching her face as if to check every detail, then turned inwards to search her own memory. With a noise that was more sigh than grunt, the Sorceress let go of Samantha's tunic. "Samantha, yes, excellent," she said as stepped back and moved towards the centre of the room. "Come, there is little time and we must work quickly."

Samantha obediently complied and followed her teacher. As they moved across the room, Samantha began to notice things about the Sorceress that she hadn't before. The old woman's silver grey hair was completely undone out of the tight bun that she normally wore. Her clothes were wrinkled and hung loosely around her slight frame as if they were hastily thrown on and left. This all was highly disturbing to Samantha, for even in the more than ten years that she had been living and studying under the High Sorceress, not once had she had even the slightest thing out of place. Everything about her was perfect and for this all to fall apart now… well, she wasn't sure that she wanted to know the reason why because it must be something very horrible indeed.

But despite her fears, Samantha needed to know. "High Sorceress, what is going on? Why is there no time?"

Without even turning away from the open tomb before her, she answered the young woman's question with grave words. "The Forever Disk has returned."

Samantha let a loud gasp escape her lips. "The Forever Disk? Are you sure? I mean, of course you are but why?"

The young sorceress' astonishment was well deserved, though the Forever Disk was thought to be just a legend, a children's bedtime story and nothing more. It was told that the Disk's power could have been used to make the possessor immortal; he would live forever. All sought this power, great armies destroyed themselves over it, mighty kingdoms fell and countless others lost their lives. But the worst to come of this was the stirring of the forces of darkness, demons and unimaginable creatures that rose from the underworld, seeking to bring the Disk to aid in their own evil ways. Seeing this want of power causing their world to spiral into bloody chaos, the Guilds of Magic all bound together in one immense casting to catapult the Disk into the void of the worlds where they thought it would never return from. And as the years stretched on the terrible events, as these things always do, evolved into myth and story, with only the Guilds to keep the truth. And now, the unthinkable has happened.

"I sense its power," her voice was harsh and gravelled, "though it is weak. I do not know how or why it has returned but it has, child and the forces of evil know of its presence as well. Even now they are amassing to attack this stronghold."

This revelation only added to what was building up to be the most fear and anxiety that Samantha had ever had the displeasure of experiencing. "The Evil, here?" she gasped, "But why? Do we have the Disk?"

"No child, we do not," said the High Sorceress as she finally turned back towards her. "They seek my magic to open the portal pathway to where it lies. That is why you must get to it first and see that they never obtain its power."

"Me?" she squeaked, "But you are the one with the power!"

The old Sorceress moved right up to Samantha grabbing her shoulders again to emphasize her point. "I cannot go, as much as I loathe sending you into danger child, I must stay behind and open the portal!"

"But High Sorceress, the evil, you will die!"

"My life means nothing child! As long as the Disk exist every life is in peril." She let go of the girl's shoulders and moved over to a beautifully decorated chest. Kneeling down, she undid the magical clasp and pulled out something that made Samantha's eyes go wide. It was the Dragon Claw staff, the High Sorceress' most powerful possession. It was said to hold immense magical energies that could give an experienced magic wielder powers that could rival the Sorceress herself. Samantha had only seen the staff once when all the different guilds met for their discussions of magical matters every twelve years.

The High Sorceress caressed the wooden staff gently, and seemed to be lost in some pleasant memories before returning to the task at hand. "You will need to destroy the Disk," she said as she moved up to Samantha and placed the staff in her hands, "and you will do it with this."

Samantha's eyes were wide as dinner plates as she looked from the stony face of her teacher to the staff in her hands. She ran her fingers over the knarred wood of the shaft and over the to the delicately carved dragon claw as it clasped the giant crystal that glinted brightly on the firelight, almost as if promising its power to her.

It was now, as she hefted the weight of the staff that Samantha truly realised what was expected of her. A great feeling of purpose flowed through her body, heating her blood and melting the cold hand of fear. She had a mission where everyone was counting on her and she would see that they wouldn't be disappointed. But before she could even open her mouth to accept, a terrible shudder ran through the castle stones.

The High Sorceress yelled over the rumbling outside, "Hurry child! We are out of time! The evil ones have begun their attack, you must leave!"

Samantha nodded only once as she followed her teacher thorough the crumbling archway. The castle seemed to start into what seemed to be fatal convulsions into a smaller room where circular frame mounted on the wall was the only object present. The High Sorceress quickly busied herself with the preparations for opening the portal, leaving Samantha alone to prepare herself.

As she steadied herself for whatever might be to come, she listened to the noises outside. Pushing past the low growling of the stones around her, the sounds of higher pitched growls came to her along with inhuman howls but the noise that retuned the grip of icy fear to her insides was the all to human screams of terror and pain. Out there, she realised with a sickening feeling, were her friends, some she had known all her life fighting and dieing, probably with no idea why.

Fighting back tears of pain and loss, Samantha's mind was pulled back to the small room by the gentle but firm voice of the Sorceress. "Samantha my child, the portal is ready, you must leave now."

Nodding her head, she let the High Sorceress guide her to the frame where now a pure white radiance glowed inside, almost as if to welcome her in. She paused on the threshold and turned to the old woman. "I promise you High Sorceress, I will give my friends a reason for their deaths."

The look of pride in the Sorceress' eyes answered her pledge and was about to be joined by her words of encouragement when the heavy wooden door gave way. Without hesitation, the old woman pushed Samantha through the portal and into the light.

As the energies began to envelop her, Samantha managed to cast a glance behind her, and looked into hell itself. Through the splintered door hundreds of hideous demons poured through, making way for a huge terrifying horned daemon that filled the entire outer chamber with its size. And there, standing before it all, a spell on her lips was the High Sorceress, arms raised and ready to meet the hellish army head on.

As her vision blurred and the portal took her, Samantha, First Apprentice to the High Sorceress of the Guilds of Magic, heard only a single strangled scream, then silence.

***

As the white light faded around her, Samantha tried to blink away the horrible images she had just witnessed that seemed to have burned themselves into her eyes. All her friends, everyone in the castle, gone; killed by the demonic hordes. Now she was in an unknown land with unknown dangers, alone and by herself. Tightening her grip on the staff, she rose from the spot where she lay; she began to look at her surroundings.

The portal had dropped her in a grove of a kind of tree that she was not familiar with, instead of the leaves that usually adorned a tree's branches, there were some sort of pointed spears, and a surprisingly comfortable blanket of them covered the ground beneath her. Through the branches she could make out the flat walls of a large building made from some strange material she was unfamiliar with.

Samantha shivered, out of cold as well as fear. A chill wind blew through the grove and bit at her unprotected arms and legs. Wherever this place was, it was much farther north than she had ever been and the light tunic she was wearing did almost nothing to stop the wind from driving the heat from her body. Wrapping her arms around her chest, she stamped her feet on the ground trying to keep the circulation going though to her leather clad feet.

This went on for a few minutes as Samantha waited for her heart to calm down enough so that it returned to something that at least mimicked normalcy only to be catapulted back up to a terrified surge by the sound of a human groaning. Turning sharply, she dashed through the trees to another clearing expecting to find hell's army waiting for her.

There, on the ground, a boy lay rubbing the back of his head with one hand and massaging his eyes with the other. Luckily, he had not seen or heard her enter the clearing, which gave Samantha some time to take a closer look at the stranger.

He was about her age and wore long blue pants and a white short-sleeved tunic of some kind. On his feet he had a laced pair of strangely designed shoes. His hair was short and dusty brown and pushed up onto his forehead was a pair of rectangular spectacles.

The boy groaned again, "Jesus, what the heck did I hit?"

Startled by the sudden question, thinking it aimed towards her, Samantha took a step backwards, snapping a twig as she did.

Turning sharply towards the noise, the boy moved his hands away from his eyes and gasped in surprise. Samantha watched as a number of emotions flickered across the boy's face: fear, surprise, shock, and worry. However, the one emotion that caught her completely off guard was recognition. She could see it plainly in his face, he knew her. Somehow this boy, who she had never met in her life, recognised her. It just was not possible.

***

"This isn't possible," breathed the boy as he looked at the girl standing in front of him. "It was just a dream, and you can't be here, unless I'm still dreaming. Yeah, that's it, I'm still dreaming and you don't exist that's all."

The dream girl in front of him seemed surprised by what he said. The light, forest green, sleeveless shirt she wore swished as her hands tightened around the odd staff that the old woman gave to her just before she entered the portal. Her mouth moved slightly as she tried to form words that could cut through her astonishment. "You know who I am?" she asked.

The boy rubbed at his eyes again, trying to dispel this dream as he answered. "Of course, I saw the whole thing. You looking for your book and feather pen thing, you running to the old woman's library, you being recruited and sent through the portal, everything!"

If the dream girl's eyes couldn't have widened any larger, they sure tried now. "How is that possible?"

"That's just it," snapped the boy who was starting to get annoyed, "This is a dream, everything is possible. Granted, this is the strangest dream I've ever had but I guess a concussion can do that." The boy kept grumbling as he managed to stand up without wobbling too much and dusted his pants off. Turning around, he looked back towards the ground, knelt and brushing some pine needles away, unearthed the thing that he had slipped on. "Stupid place to throw away a dinner plate if you ask me."

The boy turned the plate around in his hands. It was about the size of a normal dinner plate but now that he looked at it, it was shaped more like a Frisbee with some kind of strange writing on both sides. And the colour, it was gold, definitely very unusual for something that you eat off of and even more stranger that someone would throw it away. And yet, it seemed to the boy that it looked somewhat familiar, he couldn't understand where he might have seen this thing.

"Hey, this thing looks familiar," the boy said as he turned back towards the girl, "Since you're a part of my subconscious and all, do you recognise… it?" the boy trailed off as he stared down the business end of the girl's staff as the crystal crackled with barely contained energy. "Uh, I take it you do," said the boy in a forced calm voice.

"Put down the Disk," growled the girl.

The boy's eyebrows shot up as he looked back to the thing in his hands. "What? This thing? This is the Forever Disk?"

"I said: Put. It. Down," repeated the girl.

With a shocked expression on his face, the boy looked at the girl in front of him, "I can't! My hands are stuck!" To add to the point he tried again to free himself from the Disk but his hands refused to release.

"Don't toy with me, put it down or I'll blast you into the next life along with it."

The boy gulped, his mouth moving up and down, he was terrified. Here he was seventeen years old and he was about to get his atoms blasted by a magical stick, held by a witch. Of course, some part of his brain told him this was only a dream and he couldn't die. Though, another part, a dark, scared voice, told him that this was all too real and that he was really going to die. But there was another voice, something growing louder, something that wasn't part of him…

***

Samantha could not believe it. Here was this boy, holding the most dangerous piece of metal in existence and refusing to let it go because he was insisting that this was all a dream and she didn't exist. Plus there was the fact that he knew everything about her but Samantha didn't have time to give it much thought; she knew her duty and she must carry it out.

And yet, she hesitated. All of her eighteen years, she had been taught to revere life and to preserve it no matter what the circumstances even at cost of her own. But the Disk changed everything. She had been charged with destroying it and everything that stood in the way to save her world. But as she looked into the frightened eyes of the boy sitting on the ground before her, the fear that she was causing, it tore at her soul and everything that she believed in.

She couldn't do it; she couldn't take an innocent life in cold blood even if it meant disobeying the High Sorceress.

Her face loosened and her eyes lost their edge as she sighed a heavy sigh. She quieted the flow of energy surging though the staff and raised the crystal away from the boy's nose. "I cannot do it," was all she said as she leaned heavily on the wood.

"A wise decision, I assure you," a loud voice boomed.

Samantha's head snapped back up in astonishment. The voice had come from the boy, but from the renewed look of terror in his eyes it was obvious that he had no part of it. The Disk in his hands pulsed a golden glow at every word that forced its way though his mouth. He was not in control of his voice nor his body, the words sounded ancient like they had witnessed the dawn of time and would see its end, something that the Disk had claim to.

"Yes Samantha, you know what I am, and I know who you are and your quest," the voice seemed very out of place coming from the boy, it chilled her even as it kept talking. "You seek to destroy me, do you not? That is something I do not wish to happen."

Samantha could not believe it; the Disk possessed a sentience and did not want to die. "But surely you know of the evil that seeks your powers. If you fall into the hand of evil then it would mean the death of all good people. You must be destroyed to protect them."

The Boy/Disk entity sighed, "I am aware of their efforts to find me but I will not allow you to destroy me," it said with a firm finality.

"I have not choice in the matter, there is no other way! How could you sacrifice untold numbers of lives to save your own?"

The mouth curled into a mirthless smile as it answered. "Their lives will not end."

"And how are you certain?"

"Because you will protect me." With that said the control the Disk exerted over the boy loosened somewhat, allowing him control over his own mouth once more.

"This is a dream," the boy repeated, "all of this is not real."

"Oh it is all too real, my boy," responded the Disk in the boy's voice.

He looked at Samantha, terror, fear, helplessness; they all passed over his face and struck her deeply in the soul. "I am sorry," she said, "but you are not dreaming."

The boy was shocked. "But why me?" he pleaded, "Why did you choose me? Was it that I was destined to have this happen? Or am I related to someone who created you? Am I that important?"

The Disk took control once more over his mouth keeping the arms locked on its form. "No, you are none of that. You were just the first to discover me, nothing more."

"Oh," said the boy as his shoulders sunk somewhat "That's it huh? So what now?"

"Now, I destroy it before anything else happens," Samantha growled as she levelled her staff once more at the golden Disk.

For the third time that day, the boy's eyes widened but the Disk answered calmly, "You will not destroy me. You will protect me from the evil."

"And why would I do such a thing as that when I can just end it all here?" demanded Samantha as she charged the crystal.

"Because," the Disk's voice resonated, "you have no choice."

And before she or the boy could react, the pulsing of the Disk increased, speeding up and forming a solid bright glow. And as both watched in horrible fascination, the Disk lost its shape, liquefying, and flowed quickly up the outstretched arms of the boy, absorbing itself into his chest. The boy gasped in pain as the last remnants disappeared into his flesh, leaving him to fall to the ground and clutch the soil in agony.

Samantha was at the boy's side almost before he finished falling. Her staff forgotten, she helped him to sit up and rest his back against the trunk of a nearby tree. The boy just stared down numbly at his chest as it rose and fell quickly from his shallow breaths. Samantha too was drawn to the place where the Forever Disk disappeared in awed amazement.

It was a few minutes of silence before the boy spoke, his raspy voice surprising her. "So what now?" he gasped.

Samantha sighed and took a few seconds to answer him. "Well, it seems as if the Disk was correct, I have no choice in the matter: I must protect it. And it seems that I must of you as well. I am sorry that you are now involved in this."

The boy actually laughed slightly as he rubbed his chest lightly. "S'okay," he muttered quietly. "Well, it seems like we're going to be working together, so we'll need some proper intros. "He looked back up to her and stuck out his hand. "Samantha, First apprentice to the High Sorceress of the Guilds of Magic? My name's Daniel Matheson. Welcome to my world."

***

In a darkened office somewhere in the US, the light shut out by black curtains, a single imposing figure sat behind a large oak desk. The shadows seemed to cling to him naturally in an ominous shroud and danced quietly around a single pool of light from the small lamp on the desk.

The frightened man that stood before this figure took all this in and shivered out of fear. He coughed lightly before speaking. "Uh Sir? I have the reports you asked for," he said as he pushed a large envelope into the circle of light, "We detected energy emissions that match the specifications that you gave us."

A large gloved hand reached forward and drew the envelope into the shadows. "Where are they coming from?" rasped the figure with a voice that made the smaller man cringe as if the dead had spoken.

"In a small mountain town in Canada, Sir."

"Excellent, you know what is to be done."

"Yes Sir!" he saluted smartly, turned quickly on his heels and rushed out of the room.

As the man emerged into the hall, he tried desperately to wash the last image his boss and from his mind, hoping that those weren't glowing red eyes he had just seen. What ever was in there had him and everyone else working with him terrified to the core.

***

Well, that's it; the first chapter of the series.

I'd like to thank Anorexic Chibi for Beta Reading and putting up with all the mistakes.

To AC! May he never loose his sense of grammar and his sarcasm be ever lacerating!

~Jack