Creation(first Revision)

CREATION

Written By E. Allen Ko.

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Section One Discovery

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Chapter 1 My name is Mojave Sands. Not a given name but one that I chose. Most people are given a name by their parents. Not knowing mine I chose my name from where I was found. Wandering the desert with no memory of whom I was or where I’d been. They tell me it’s a good, strong name. I just wish that they would stop calling me Mo. After they found me, half dead and incoherent, they admitted me into the psychiatric ward in Barstow Hospital. They have had six months to investigate. Neither the State of California nor the Federal data bases turned up anything. Nada Six months of therapy didn’t bring back any of my memories either. Just reinforced what I knew after the first week. I wanted out. But, with no other option, I had too wait. First they had to investigate to figure out who I am. When that failed, they had to make sure that if released, I’d be no threat too the general public. Then I had to have the State court system approve the name I had chosen for myself. The State required a six month investigation. Then I was to be released with $1800 and three changes of clothes. Which they say is more than they give a convict when released. I’ll just have too take their word on that. The only thing I can relate with the convict is the feelings he or she must have on the day of their release. For me that day was today. So there I sat on the edge of my hospital bed… waiting. A dark blue backpack containing two changes of clothes resting by the door. A new wallet with $1800 in cash and an Identification card bearing my new name was resting in my back pants pocket. I was wearing a light cotton black T-shirt with blue jeans and brown hiking boots, boots that I had chosen for a reason. My name wasn’t the only thing I had chosen. I had also chosen a destination. I had decided that if they couldn’t tell me who I was then I would find out for myself. Somewhere, out in the desert were answers to the question that I and others had been asking. Who was I? I stood up and stepped towards the mirror mounted on the outside of the bathroom door looking at myself looking back. A man a little over six foot tall with brown hair and blue eyes stared back at me. Six months and I still have problems recognizing my own reflection. They say that I could be 30 years old maybe younger. Now, looking at myself in the mirror I couldn’t tell either. Walking to the open door I stuck my head out into the hallway, looking left and down the hall towards the nurse’s station. I was trying to catch a glimpse of the nurse coming with my release papers. Seeing no one I sighed. ‘What was taking so long’? Glancing at the clock above the door it read 10:32AM. I had been told by the staff that 10:00am was the typical release time. I didn’t want to spend another minute in this place. I tried for a few minutes to take slow breaths and calm my nerves but wasn’t getting anywhere. Feeling the tension tightening the muscles in my chest I couldn’t resist a sideways glance at the clock. 10:38. Damn! As I felt the tension move from my chest to too the back of my neck a figure appeared in the doorway. A woman in her fifties stood there. Grey hair up in a bun wearing a pink smock holding a clipboard was looking at me head tilted down looking at me over the top of her glasses. “Mr. Sands”? She asked. “Out?” I asked Smiling out the corner of her mouth she said “Yes, Mr. Sands, out.”

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Billy Keene was waiting for me out front of the hospital in a beat up Honda Passport. After six months in close quarters with the hospital staff, all nice people I’m sure, if I had taken the time to get to know them, he was the only one that I’d become close too. He was the night shift security guard for the ward where I was interred. A tall and gangly twenty three year old with dark green eyes and an unruly head of blonde hair and a boyish way of looking at life. Most people would underestimate his intelligence and his physical prowess, I would do neither. After all of our late night conversations I would never doubt his intelligence. And after watching him take down a three hundred pound drug addict, who had decided he didn’t like nor want the accommodations of our ward, in less than fifteen seconds didn’t leave his prowess much in doubt either. Respect him, yes. Underestimate him? Not if you knew him. “Well, I see that the Hospital is as punctual as usual.” He said as I climbed into the passenger seat. “Sorry.” I said as I threw my backpack over and into the back seat. “The Doc took his time signing off.” Doctor Hathaway had been my psychologist for the past six months. “Did the Doc try to talk you into being in his amnesia case study group again?” “Yes.” I said with a grin, remembering my response. “And what did you say?” “I told him that my name was Mojave Sands. And since I already knew who I was I didn’t think it would be appropriate for me to participate in his study group.” Laughing as he put the car in gear and slid away from the curb he asked. “And what was the Doc’s reaction?” “He looked at me like he had made a mistake in signing my release papers.” I said with a chuckle. “I bet he did.” He said between laughing and gasping for breath. After a few minutes he finally stopped laughing. As he continued driving through to town I had a few minutes to collect my thoughts. Billy and I had talked many nights about what I wanted to do. And, though he didn’t think it was a good idea to go back to where I was found, He insisted that he go with me and had volunteered to be my advocate upon my release. Even taking his vacation and accumulative sick time to take me where I wanted to go. So, as of then, we had five weeks and six days to accomplish what the authorities couldn’t in six months. Whether or not I found the answers I sought it was all the time I had to look full time. After that Billy made me agree to get on with my life as Mojave Sands and to start looking towards the future. “Where to now Billy”? I asked as we drove by a Seven Eleven. “Well, the way I figure it, we need camp supplies and a few other items if we’re going to be wandering the desert looking for that long lost memory of yours. So its time to do a little shopping”. It was the that I noticed that he was pulling in to the parking lot of a run down strip mall with a wooden Indian out front. A faded sign out front read: JOHN WALKERS Desert Outfitting As we pulled into a parking spot, came to a stop and he put the car in park Billy turned to me and said. “Old John’s a friend of mine. He should have all that we need for our little adventure.”

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Not commenting on the dilapidated look of the building I got out of the vehicle and followed him into the store. Just inside the door I noticed that the store inside was stocked floor to ceiling with all sorts of equipment. Canteens, denim jeans, knives, shovels and packs and some things that I didn’t know what they were. And, on the far back wall behind a glass counter containing various hand gun models, were racks and racks of rifles. Stepping up to the counter Billy reached his hand out and rang a bell sitting on the counter. “Hello?” he said. From out of an open doorway behind the counter a voice rang out, Irritation clearly sounding in the underlying tone. “Give me a minute!” While we waited the asked for ‘minute’, I took the chance to look in the glass case in front of me. Lined up in neat rows were handguns. New or old all seemed to be it good condition. One on the top row caught my eye. And for some reason I could not take my eye from it. For some reason the thought ‘mine’ kept going through my head. I stood there as if in a trance. A figure appeared in the doorway. Tearing my eyes away from the gun case a feeling of despair washed over me. A thought crossed my mind. If something like this pistol brought this kind of feeling was it connected to my past? And, if it was, what did that say about me? To what kind of person I was/am? Did I want too know? I did know that my hand wanted to hold that gun in the worst way. Down at my side, my right hand clenched as if it were already holding it. I could almost feel the cold steel in the palm of my hand. Trying to get my feelings in check I forced my hand too relax and took two slow breaths. The figure emerging through the doorway turned out to be a man long past retiring age. Just how far past you just could not tell. He had shoulder length grey hair and a face that looked like old parchment. But the way he moved belayed a military bearing with a cat like grace. The same grace that Billy carried himself with. “Hello, John.” Billy said as they shook hands across the counter. “Sorry, I was in back watching the news. It seems. China and Russia are up in arms over something and they think that, whatever it is, it’s our fault again.” “I brought someone for you to meet.” Billie said as he released John’s hand. “Is this him?” John asked, nodding in my direction. “That’s him.” Billy said. Stepping sideways behind the counter too stand directly in front of me. He must have stood there looking at my face for a good ten seconds. He seemed to be looking for something there. Then the old man held out his hand across the counter. Taking his hand he proceeded to shake it vigorously. His old face abeam with the biggest smile I thought I had ever seen. It seemed to me that if he smiled much bigger his ears would soon have to move to the back of his head, just to make room. Billie was right. I took an instant liking to the old man. “The name is John Walker.” He said, looking at me though eyes so grey that they resembled old and weathered steel. “Mine’s Mojave.” I said returning the shake and the smile. “I’m glad too know you came out okay. You look a lot healthier since the last time I seen you.” he said. Detecting the genuine sincerity in is voice I turned to Billy and asked: “Okay, what gives?” John turned his head and looked at Billy. Billy nodded his head. “You didn’t tell him?” “Tell me what?” I asked

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“Well, son,” he said, looking at me through those grey eyes. “This isn’t the first time we’ve met.” It was then that I understood what he had been looking for in my face. It was recognition.

Chapter 2

Bewildered, I just stood and stared back at the old man. Releasing the handshake the old man stepped back from the counter and sat on an weathered barstool. He took a deep breath, squared his shoulder and looked up at me from the stool. “I am the one who found you wandering half dead in the desert.” I turned to look at Billy and he returned my gaze with a shrug. “You knew.” Another shrug “Of course he knew” the old man said. “He’s the one I called when I found you.” Chuckling, the old man continued. “He’s also the one who delivered you too the hospital.” “Why didn’t you tell me Billy?” I asked, giving Billy a look that could freeze water Looking a little uncomfortable under my gaze he said. “I couldn’t.” “Why the hell not?” what was going on here? “Neither one of us could.” The old man interjected Between them both I got the whole story about how they were trespassing on military property searching for a lost treasure from the 1800’s. Something that could have gotten them either imprisoned or shot. Billy and John had gone onto Fort Irwin Military Reservation looking for treasure. Billy had gone back too town to get some water and other supplies and left John at the dig site. John had been elbow deep in the hole when he heard a noise. Looking up and out of the hole he saw a figure standing on the pile of earth that had been removed from the dig. Standing there was a fully naked man who was sun burnt, covered with blisters and swaying back and forth in the sun. “Holy shit son! You’re a mess.” he had said. And, with that statement I had promptly collapsed into the hole, and on top of John. After extricating himself from under me and out of the hole, John had then placed a call from his cell phone to Billy having him return to the dig site. When Billy arrived he and John decided that Billy would take me to the hospital and keep Johns name out of it. He had already been caught once before, digging in places not open to anyone but military personnel, and had paid a hefty fine. If caught one more time he would be imprisoned and the state would close his business down. So, Billy took me too the hospital with the story that he himself had found me 20 miles from where I had actually stumbled across John. After listening to the story from both men I turned back too face John. “You have been keeping this from me all along!”

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“I’m sorry Mo; I had wanted to tell you.” Billy said. Regret clearly written across his face “And why are you two telling me this now?” I asked “We couldn’t really help you unless you knew the whole story.” John interjected “And we could not let you start your search until you knew exactly where this all started.” Feeling betrayed by the only friend I had. I took a few moments to collect my thoughts and get my emotions in check. Neither of the other men was talking, just looking at me expectantly. “Is there anything else that the two of you have kept from me?”

Johns smile disappeared and he glanced at Billy. “Tell him” he said. “You did have one thing with you in the desert.” John said as he looked away from Billy and down into the gun case in front of us. “It took both Billy and I to pry that pistol from your hand.” Looking back into the case I immediately new the pistol he looked at for it was the same one that I had wanted to hold so badly. The one that I knew and felt was mine. Something else that I hadn’t noticed before, not only did it look to be the most dangerous gun in the case. It was also the only gun in the case without a price tag attached to it. “You weren’t trying to sell it.” It wasn’t a question “No son,” John said “Could this help me figure out who I am?” “In a normal situation, yes it would” “But?” “But this gun isn’t like all the others you see” “And why not?” I asked “This gun was made without a serial number.” He said, as he slid open the door on the back side of the case retrieving the pistol from within and bringing it up to place it on the counter in front of me. “It wasn’t ground off. Nor was it removed with acid. It was just never put there.” he said with a look of bewilderment on his face. “Just like you son, no one knows where it came from.” Looking down at the pistol sitting on the counter, the same feelings that came over me earlier started to fill me. Suddenly there was a sound like someone popping a small balloon and the weight of the gun appeared in my hand. The gun was no longer on the counter, but in my right hand that was still by my side. Raising my hand too stare with disbelief at the weapon I got the sudden urge to throw the thing away from me. But I found myself unable to move. The popping noise must have been from the air rushing back in to fill the void the gun had left. I had not picked it up. I hadn’t even moved. But there it was, in my hand, looking as if it belonged there. “Holy shit!” John said. Looking up, both men were looking at me with stunned expressions on their faces. “Did you see that?” John asked Billy. “Who are you Mo?” Billy asked me Trying to keep the fear out of my voice I responded “I don’t know Billy, I just don’t know.” “How did you do that?” John asked, leaving no doubt that they had witnessed the gun materialize into my hand.

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Not answering, I tried to focus on the pistol in my right hand. ‘What’ and who am I? How did I make the gun appear into my hand? Just two more questions that I had to find the answers for. One question though had been answered. Like it or not, no matter what the meaning was, this gun was mine. And just because it was mine it didn’t mean that I had to use it. I could feel myself start to relax. The weapon in my hand no longer seemed so frightening. I could feel the tension in my chest start to loosen. The desire to hold the weapon also started to wane but I couldn’t bring myself too place it on the counter so I settled on lowering the hand holding the gun slowly too my side. And for the second time that day I got another shock. As I was lowering my hand and it reached just about my belt line, with a ‘pop’ it just disappeared, the weight of it gone along with rest of my desire to hold it. Again, John and Billy were looking at me, both men not even trying to keep the look of fear from their faces. Ignoring their stares I turned my gaze back onto the glass countertop of the gun case. For some reason I was not surprised that the gun had not returned to its previous position. Nor had it returned to the case for it previous spot there was also empty. Both men’s eyes had followed my own. “Gone!” Billy said in a voice three octaves higher then his usual voice. “Gone where?” John asked as he continued staring into the gun case. Neither man moving from their positions to search for the weapon. Both men seemed to be sure that it wouldn’t be found anywhere in the shop. “As long as Mo’s not holding it anymore,” Billy said a look of relief settling across his face. “‘Gone’ is a good place for it to be.” “That’s for sure.” Said John “Mojave, there’s something else you should know about that weapon.” He continued. “It may have looked like any other pistol in this case but the resemblance stopped there.” “What do you mean?” I asked. Not really curious, just trying to ease the tension that had come over the other two men in the last few minutes. “Not only did it have no serial number I also couldn’t figure out the make or the model. And when I looked harder at it I discovered that it may look like a semi auto it didn’t even have a clip to hold any ammo. Hell, I can’t even tell you what the damn thing was made of or what it fired.” He paused, taking a deep breath. “What I do know about it is this. One day I took it to the gun range and fired it off. It blew a hole clean threw the concrete wall behind the target! It ‘is’ a weapon. And it may look like all of the others but the resemblance stops there. Most of these guns were made for protection. That one of yours was made for killing!” A weight appeared on my shoulder. Turning my head, Billy had stepped up to my side and his hand now rested on my shoulder. I turned to face him. A look of wonder upon his face as he looked into mine, he asked. “What does this all mean Mo?” “I couldn’t tell you, but I think its time we go back to where it ‘really’ started and try to figure it all out.” I let the determination that I felt show in my voice. “You two aren’t going without me!” John blurted out. We both turned to face him. John stared at the both of us, a look of consternation on his face. “Why?” Billy asked “I can’t say why, I just have this feeling that you two are going to need me.” He said. The look on his face said that he couldn’t believe what he was hearing himself say. “I think he should come too.” I said

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Billy was looking at the both of us like we had the same communicable disease and that, if he got too close to either of us, he was sure to catch it. Dropping his hand from my shoulder he said. “After what the three of us just witnessed, you two just figure we go traipsing around in the desert after answers that just ‘might’ be found out there?” “John, if you want to come, I have no objections” I said, trying to ignore, but still amused by the reaction that Billy was having. “Guess I’m in.” he said with a shrug. “You two are crazy!” “Billy,” I said. “If you choose not to come, I won’t hold it against you.” He seamed to suddenly realize that, with or without him, we were going to continue searching for the answers to questions that kept mounting up. He had made me a promise to help me find the answers and I knew that, in the end, Billy would keep his promise. “No, I was there when this all started. And I will see you through to the end. I will help you find your answers.” He said, as he seamed to relax. Looking from my face to John’s, a slight smile appearing across his face he said. “I swear, the minute I see something else just appear or disappear, one of you nuts is going to be cleaning up what materializes in my shorts!”

Chapter 3 After loading enough camping supplies for the three of us into Billy’s Honda, and John locked up his shop, we hopped in and continued driving east on Highway 15 and out of Barstow. After about twenty miles we took a left onto a dirt road. A small sign read: Coyote Lake 1 mile The road went up the right side of the lake and dead ended at a ten foot high fence that had seen better days. Not only was the fence highly oxidized from the dry desert air but there were also entire sections between posts that were completely missing. The space between was more than large enough for a car to drive trough. Instead of driving on we pulled up to the left side of a large boulder on this side of the fence and Billy parked our vehicle. Getting out of the Honda I walked around to the opposite side of the boulder to stand and relieve myself on the ground. There, on the ground, was another sign that informed me in no uncertain terms that ‘Trespassers would be shot’. Apparently the sign had once been attached to the fence. For the first time I began to think that have doubts. Was this all going to be worth the knowledge that I sought? Was I putting my life and the lives of my companions in danger in a vain attempt to find answers to questions that, in the end, I might not want answered? Finished relieving myself I stepped back around the boulder. Billy and John were already unloading our gear and setting up camp. Neither spoke, working silently. Watching them work it was apparent that they had done this countless times before. But this time it wasn’t

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treasure that brought them too this spot. It was a man with no past. And a connection, even if someone were to ask, the three of us seamed to feel but couldn’t explain. Walking up to where Billy was already setting up our three man tent I asked “Are we going on the other side of the fence?” Pausing in his task to look at me he said “No hurry now, Mo. Where we need to go is about a mile on the other side of that fence.” “So we’re going to stay here tonight.” It wasn’t a question. “It’ll be dark in a couple of hours and my guess is that we will need our rest for tomorrow.” he said, returning to his task. I turned and started to walk to the Honda to help John finish unloading the rest of our supplies. In about thirty minutes we had our camp all set up. And John was heating some water from a five gallon container in a pot on a Coleman stove. Setting on a small boulder Billy tossed me a small green package. “Here’s your dinner Mo.” “What’s this?” “Something worse than the hospital food you’re used to eating.” John said with a grin With the memory of the stuff that the hospital tried to pass off as food still fresh in my mind I held the package away from me. A look of discussed written clearly across my face for both men to see. “And you two expect me to eat it?” “Those are MRE’s. The Army’s idea of fast food, just add hot water and you have everything a growing boy needs!” Billy said with a chuckle. “If you haven’t noticed, you have Chicken Stew.” Said John “If you two haven’t noticed. I think that I finished ‘growing’ a long time ago.” I said, still holding the package away from me, eying it now with distrust. “Come on Mo the stuff won’t kill you. Besides, it’s all that we brought.” John continued. “We brought enough to last the three of us two weeks. So you might as well get used to them.” Not relishing the idea of going to bed hungry I gave in. Twenty minutes later both men sat there staring at me as I finish the last of three ready to eat meals. “Have you ever seen such a thing?” John asked. “That’s even weirder then the gun thing.” Billy replied. “A lot scarier too.” “Do you still think your friends still human?” asked John playfully “Nope,” Grinning Billy continued “Definitely alien. A human would have died from the shock.” While the two men were laughing at their joke I sat in the fading light of day. The sun had set fifteen minutes before and all that was left of the day was a faint pink line stretching far across the distant horizon. Soon even that would be gone, leaving all three of us in the deserts perpetual darkness. Tomorrow would be a day of discovery. I just got the feeling that this would be the last time both men would laugh so genuinely and freely in the days ahead of us. I just hoped that after the trials waiting ahead, all three of us would live to laugh again. Far in the distance a lone coyote yelped in the night as the moon started to clear the horizon.

Chapter 4

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After an uncomfortable and restless nights sleep we rolled out of bed at dawn. It had been cold that night in the desert and everything in camp had a thin layer of frost covering its surface. People who assume the desert is always hot and dry have never stepped foot in the Mojave in February. Hot it was during the day. But the temperature can drop to just above freezing in less then an hour after sunset. And during the winter months rain storms can appear without warning. Saturating the ground and turning it to mud in moments. In the desert it isn’t wise to take the weather for granted. Before we put our shoes on we turned them upside down and shook them out. John had told me that all sorts of nasty creatures had a habit of crawling in shoes to escape the night time chill of the desert. Of which, scorpions and rattle snakes were just two. During my stay at the hospital I had a voracious appetite for reading. Both I had read about when I was allowed to visit the county library adjacent to the hospital. Neither would I want in my shoes when I stuck my feet in them. After a quick cup of black coffee which Billy had brewed on the Coleman in a tin pot, we began to prepare ourselves for out hike to the dig site. I filled my canteen with the water from water jug and I slung it around my neck putting my arm threw the strap to let it hang down at my side. I turned to walk to where I had put my pack the night before. Rummaging through it for a moment I found the belt pouch that contained a folding knife with a four inch blade that John had insisted that I take with us. Clipping it to my belt as I straightened I turned to wait for the other two men to finish getting ready. To my surprise, both Billy and John now wore side arms. John’s was in an old holster which had been tied down low on his leg like a gunfighter from an old western. Billie had his in a shoulder holster, the black grip facing out from under his left arm. “Where’s mine.” I asked the both of them. Not really wanting a weapon just to start a conversation. “Where’s you’re what?” Billy asked as he looked up from the day pack he had been busy filling. Noticing my eyes resting on the weapon strapped to his chest he replied. “John gave you yours yesterday, remember?” he said. He had a serious look on his face, the first that I could ever remember seeing there. “You know,” John piped in “the one that you made disappear. “Seriously, Mo,” Billy continued “if we gave you a gun, would you know how to use it?” “I don’t know.” “Then you don’t get one.” “That’s alright with me Billy. After yesterday I don’t really think I want one.” After a few more minutes we were ready to go. The three of us walked away from camp single file. John in the lead and Billy bringing up the rear with me in the middle I felt as if they both were both trying to protect me. I guess that in a way they were trying to protect me, from myself. We walked in silence for what seemed like an hour, when John came to a stop at a small rise in the trail he had been leading us down. Billy and I took up positions on either side of him. The trail seemed to continue another fifteen feet then to dead end at a hole that had been dug into the desert floor. From where we stood it didn’t look as if the hole was much more then four feet deep and maybe twice that across. On the far side of there was a pile of loose dirt apparently removed from the hole by the two men. It was also where I had been standing when John said that I had collapsed onto him. As one we walked the remaining few feet to the edge of the hole. My eyes focusing on the mound of dirt I walked around the right side of the hole to stand atop of it. Standing with my back to my companions and facing north, my eyes were drawn

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to a large outcropping of rock standing in the middle of the desert four hundred yards away. From behind me I heard Billy ask: “Anything look familiar Mo?” Not bothering to respond, I started to walk north, making my way towards that distant outcrop of rock. Something was drawing me toward those rocks. Somehow they looked familiar and somewhat comforting. I didn’t look behind me but I could tell from the sound of their footsteps that both men had fallen in and were now following close behind me. As we came upon the outcropping a feeling of excitement filled my chest. The feeling you get when you’ve been away from home after a long absence. Why I was having those feelings for a pile of rocks I had no idea it was just another question to be answered. The formation consisted of four giant rocks, each forty feet at their base and twenty five too thirty feet tall. Tapering in towards the top all four sides leaning in against each other seemed to give it the appearance of a crude pyramid. As I started to walk around the structure I could here the two men talk to one another as they followed. “What do you mean this wasn’t here before.” I heard Billy ask “I’m telling you, I have been here digging off and on for twenty years and as of six months ago this place didn’t exist!” was John’s adamant response. No longer paying attention to their conversation I continued around to the north side of the monolith. There at its base I discovered a small opening, just large enough for a man to crawl into, with little room too spare. Without hesitation I dropped to all fours and entered the opening. Ten feet in I could hear John and Billy enter behind me. This far in, all the light from the opening was gone and I was moving in total darkness. Slowly I worked my way forward, the darkness felt like a tangible thing pressing in against me from all sides, threatening to close in and trap the breath in my chest. Still, I continued forward for what seemed like hundreds of feet, and yet knowing that it couldn’t possibly be anywhere near that distance. Suddenly I couldn’t feel the walls around me. Just open space. I had come out into a large open space in the middle of the monolith. Still in darkness, I took my right hand and reached out and back. Feeling the cold stone of the rock under my hand, I slowly stood up, using the hand on the wall steady myself in the darkness. Not knowing what the darkness held, I thought it best that I wait for the other two men to catch up. They weren’t far; I could hear their breath in the darkness. Something brushed lightly against the outside of my left leg. Lowering my left hand slowly, it came to rest on someone’s back. That ‘someone’ stiffened under my hand. A voice broke out of the darkness. “Mo?” Billy asked “That you?” “It’s me.” I said as I tried to get a hand around his arm in the darkness to help him stand up. “Do you have a flashlight?” I ask. In response I could here a rustling sound in the dark. A moment later a bright light appeared in front of my face. “Hey!” I cried out, turning my face away. “Sorry.” Trying to clear the spots in my vision, I closed my eyes for a five count and reopened them. Seeing a little better I took the time to survey the room. Fifteen feet square with walls that reached up at least that far, all four smooth stone walls coming together at the top to form the ceiling. The floor of the room in front of us dropped down six inches to form a circular pit ten feet across. As Billy and I stood there not believing what we were seeing, John appeared out of the crawl space, standing up between us. Glancing quickly around while trying to brush the dirt from his knees, he said sarcastically

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“This just keeps getting better and better” “What the hell is that?” I heard Billy asked John and I turned our eyes to where Billy had centered his flashlight on the floor. There on the ground lay a heap of what appeared to be clothing. All three of us stepped forward and down into the pit, trying to get a closer look. The clothing looked to be black and made of padded material. There was something familiar about it that tickled the back of my mind. Suddenly I knew. A familiar feeling spread through my chest. Something about the way I looked must have stunned my companions. For both had frozen in place and were looking at me mouths agape. Ignoring them both I stepped forward, saying one word. “Mine.” The clothing on the floor was no longer black. But consisted of the clothing I had been wearing moments before. Now I was standing dead center of the pit naked. My skin tingling from the static electricity that coalesced over it, the blue sparks making my skin appear as if it wore a suit made of blue flame. In a span of breaths, the sparks slowed and seamed to solidify becoming darker slowly coming to a stop. There I stood, dressed from the neck down in the black padded material. Now on, the clothing resembled a skin tight suit of body armor. It was padded more in the center chest area, then anywhere else, as if to protect vital organs. And though it looked heavy I could not feel the fabric against my skin and had to keep looking down at my body to reassure myself that I wasn’t still standing there in front of my friends stark naked. Looking to the floor I noticed my clothing that had been on the floor had disappeared. Billy broke the stunned silence. “Okay, I warned you both, one of you two had better be prepared too wipe my ass!” A quick retort from John was broke off when the walls started to coalesce with the same static electricity that had covered me only moments before. Small at first the sparks became larger and began jumping from wall to wall, barely missing our heads. A high pitched whine, like escaping air, now filled the chamber. Somehow it seamed familiar also. Another feeling filled my chest. This time it was fear. Fear for my companions. I felt the ground jump beneath my feet as if in earthquake. The walls of the chamber swayed and dust began to fall on us. Reaching across to both men, I grabbed a hold of both men by their shirts and yanked, pulling both men too me. “Hold on to each other!” I yelled out above the every increasing whine. “What’s happening?” John asked as the three of us locked our arms together and dropped to our knees in the middle of the pit. “I just have this feeling!” “Great!, Now what’s going to disappear?!” Billy said in a panicked yell As if on cue, with a bright flash and a popping noise, it was our world that disappeared…

Chapter 5 I awoke on my back with a throbbing headache. I could hear the other two men breathing shallowly close by and knew that I should try to get up and assess whether or not they were hurt. But I ached from head to toe and didn’t even know if I had the strength to even open my eyes. So I just lay there and concentrated on getting my eyes open. After a few minutes I slowly opened one eye at a time to find that we were once again in total darkness. Not wanting to move afraid to stumble or step on one of my companions, I said

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“Billy?” I heard movement in the darkness. “Billy, are you okay?” I said a little louder “God I’m sore” he grunted “Do you still have your flashlight?” “Hold on.” More movement Billy must have learned his lesson the last time for he said “Shut your eyes Mo.” Shutting my eyes I heard a click. I could tell Billy had turned the flashlight on because my eyes registered the pink light through my closed eyelids. Hearing a quick intake of breath I quickly opened my eyes and sat up in a hurry. Sitting up on the stone floor directly across from me Billy was playing the flashlight beam around the chamber. From left to right finally settling onto the wall behind me there seamed to be something odd about what I could see of the chamber. But I couldn’t put my finger on it. Moving the light to one side to keep the beam out of my eyes Billy said “Mo, we’re not in the same place.” “What?” I asked. Disbelieving “This chamber is at least twice the size of the one we were in.” Glancing quickly at the wall to my right, then to the one on my left I concluded that Billy was right. The chamber we were in was about thirty feet across. It resembled the previous room but was definitely not the same one. On the wall directly behind Billy there seemed to be three alcoves carved into the rock, the openings looking dark and ominous, in the dim light. “This is weird.” I said, not want to think about the implications. “And Mo,” “Yes” “You’re back in your own clothes.” He said, voice almost in a whisper “Bloody hell!” I said tearing my gaze away from wall. I looked down at my legs that still stretched out away from me across the floor. Billy was right, the dark clothing seemed too had vanished like the hand gun in John’s shop. There I sat wearing my own clothes once again. “You need to wake John up.” I said, having the sudden urge to leave this place. If there were a way out that is. From what I had seen of our new chamber there was no entrance. The three other walls were smooth and devoid of any doorways or ornamentation. That only left the three alcoves. One of them had better be a way out or we were screwed. I stood up while Billy tried to revive John who was still passed out on the chamber floor. And in the dim light I stepped up and out of the pit to survey the alcoves. From right to left I checked all three. All appeared to be seven feet in tall, four feet across and recessed into the stone wall a little over two feet deep. Just deep enough for a man to stand in with inches to spare on either side. As I checked the last alcove I noticed that at its back was a scene carved into the stone. The scene seemed to depict the three alcoves but, standing one in each, were three men facing outwards. What was most unsettling was that all three seemed to be wearing the same clothing that had appeared on me in the previous chamber. Then, as if to reassure myself that the carving was real I reached into the alcove run my hand over the depiction. As my hand touched the stone I felt a slight pull on my arm, startling me. Quickly pulling my hand back out I stood there a moment and stared at my right hand in shock. On the back of my hand a smaller version of the carving had appeared and the raised skin seamed to be glowing in the dim light. Looking back into the alcove I discovered that the carving was no longer there, just smooth stone.

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Hearing voices behind me I turned away from the alcove and returned to the pit. There Billy was knelt down and had John propped against one knee, giving him a drink from his canteen. “Is he alright?” I asked with concern, John looked pail and shaky. “I think he took it even harder then we did. He’s not as young as we are” “I may be old,” John said as he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand “but I can still whip your ass Billy.” Helping him up from the floor Billy replied “I just bet you could.” “And I know that I can still out shoot you.” John said with a grin as he steadied himself on his feet. Looking at me, rolling his eyes Billy let go of Johns arm and asked while he started running his hands over Johns head. “Are you sure you didn’t hit your head or something? Because you sure are talking like you have brain damage.” John stepped back and away from Billy’s searching hands. “You asshole, stop touching me like one of your girlfriends, you’re making me nervous!” Turning to me chuckling out loud, Billy asked “Did you find us a way out of this place?” “No, but something did happen when I put my arm into one of those recesses.” I showed them the back of my hand and related the story of how it had come there. As I finished I discovered both men were looking at me as if they needed to tell me something. “What? Is there something about what I said?” Looking at one another both men shrugged and turned away from me raising their shirts to reveal their lower backs. Just above their beltlines the same depiction that was on my hand stood out in bold relief softly glowing in the light just like mine. “Okay, spill it you two. When did you guys get those?” Pulling down their shirt both men turned to face me. Billy spoke first. “We have ‘always’ had these” “What do you mean by ‘always’?” “Well son,” John said “Billy and I were found abandoned as children. Both of us were adopted by families here locally. Both of us had these things on us when we were found.” Taking a breath he continued. “I was found as a baby out in the desert close to where we found you over sixty years ago. Billy was found when he was four years old at a rest area just outside of town. It wasn’t until last year, when Billy was at my shop helping me move some stuff and bent down to pick up a box and I noticed part of it showing from out from under his shirt.” “We always wondered what it meant but nobody could tell us.” Billy interjected. “They said it was some kind of birth mark or birth defect.” “We never mentioned it to you because there was no reason.” Understanding now raced through my mind. Turning to Billy I said “That’s why you both took an interest in me, wanted to help me. You both were looking for the same answers before I came along!” “That’s right Mo.” Billy affirmed. “We were all found around the same place. When we found you we thought to check you first for the mark but couldn’t find one. So we thought it was just a coincidence that you had showed up in the same place.” “For some reason I don’t think that this is just a ‘coincidence’.” I said “Well, like it or not, we are all connected. And if we are going to get back to where we were we had better put our heads together and figure out what we’re doing here.” John said Forcing my mind to let go of yet another mystery, I took a slow breath and spoke to the other two.

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“I already know why we are here. We are supposed to stand in the alcoves.” “How did you figure that one out? Did you se a sign that read ‘please stand here’?” John asked sarcastically Looking down at the back of my hand I answered “More or less.” “What now?” Billy asked. The expression on his face said that he knew already knew what I was going to say. But that he didn’t feel very good about the idea. “We take our places in the alcoves just like the picture shows.” “What if we just disappear like everything else around here?” “Well, if you two haven’t noticed, this room has no doorway, no openings at all. And, if we don’t figure this thing out, we are probably going to be out of oxygen soon.” Turning to look at the alcoves remembering the slight pull on my arm I continued. “You two can stay here if you want but I want out.” I stepped towards the last alcove that I had checked and came to a stop in front of it. The other men must have come to the some silent agreement between themselves. For a moment later each had assumed positions to my right, Billy next to me in front of the alcove in the middle and John in front of the one right. “We need to turn around.” I said as I turned to face pit in the center of the room. Silently the other two me did the same. “Now, step back into the alcoves” As one, we took one step backwards. As my foot entered the alcove I felt the now familiar pull. Suddenly I felt something invisible wrap around me and pull me back against the back of the alcove. It was holding me in place. I tried to call out to my companions but I found myself unable to talk. Looking from inside the alcove into the center of the room a small glow appeared in the center of the pit about four feet from the ground. Growing from a small spark the light grew and grew. Soon it became a ball of blue plasma, hovering just above the floor. A thought appeared in my mind. Shocked I stopped struggling with my invisible bonds. Words that came into my mind said, in a distinct female voice…. “The time has come.”

Chapter 6

Time for what, I wondered in silence. “It is time for you three to do what you were created for.” The voice said in my head. Created! What was that blasted voice talking about? “Yes. The three of you were created by me in this very chamber. You’re not of this world. Not of this time.” “What?” I said to the voice in my head “I created you all from the bodies of men that had died in the desert close to this place. From their DNA I grew the life that would become you. If you seek your past you have found it. In this very chamber I brought you three to life. If you were to have a mother it would be me. And the family you search for would be your companions. For, in a way, they are your brothers.” “How do you know my name?” I thought.

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“I know all that you three know. I took the memories from you and you companions as I have countless others over the millennia.” “Others, Millennia, what are you talking about?” I asked “For thousands of years, since the end of my world, I have had others that had stumbled upon the entrance. From their minds I took memories of the world outside. I have waited for your civilization to advance. I had hoped that it would not make the same mistake that mine did, but to no avail. When your country started to test nuclear weapons I began to prepare. The first of you I sent into the world to wait and watch, to gather information.” “John.” “Yes.” The voice continued. “The next one I sent out was to wait. Wait for the time that your civilization would repeat history and I would have to send you. He was supposed to be your protector.” “Billy.” “They were imprinted with this location and would never stray far from here. They were supposed to find you and you were to return here. But something happened. A malfunction occurred; your mind and body were injured when I sent you from this place to gather your companions. But time has passed and now I can’t stop what has happened. Only try to fix it.” “So you created us?” “Yes.” “So the three of us have no parents, families or past?” “You have searched for a past that none of you have. You are who you are. You are the sum of all of your experiences. You are whom you chose to be, Mojave Sands.” “To what ‘purpose’ do you plan on using us for?” “The world outside, as you know it, is gone. I brought you here to protect you three from the Change. You three have to protect the world from that which has destroyed the civilization that made me. You three have to close the Doorway and kill the entity that even now ravishes your world.” “What Entity?” “A creature that has already taken over its own world and reduced its inhabitance to drones under its control, from the smallest creature too the largest, all serve it. All of the ones that it could not change it killed. And now it’s on your world. When your government turned on the machine that opened the doorway into its world it came here. And with it came other life incompatible with your own. Invasive species, each harmful to your own, are taking root and will soon transform your world into a mirror image of the other.” “And we must stop this from happening?” “Yes. Because if you don’t it will bring death and destruction upon this entire world. And finish what the military not long ago started. What happened in the other chamber was not of my doing, when your military turned on the machine it caused massive earthquakes world wide. They thought that they could control the vast amount of power that the machine produced. They were wrong. It opened the doorway and now the two worlds will remain connected until someone can turn the machine off and destroy it so that it may never be used again.” “How do you know all of this?” “I have been monitoring your radio and television transmissions for the last hundred years. Including the military channels. Even now I am monitoring current events and know what is happening around the world. Be glad Mojave. I have spared you from the worst. And will keep you safe, for now.” “Are you another entity like the one you say destroys our world?” “No, Mojave. I am all that remains of a civilization that once covered your world. We, like you, advanced scientifically. Though, ours was much more advanced. We had opened the

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same doorway and in trying to close it we destroyed ourselves. I am a construct built by the last survivor, built to make sure that it didn’t happen again. I have all of my maker’s memories of her world. And I used to have great power. But, over time, my energy stores have been depleted. I have been reduced to what you now see before you.” “So you can’t stop this?” “No. But you and your friends might.” “And how do you propose that we do this?” “With the little remaining power that I have I created the three of you, the suits and the weapons you now have. With them and the device that will be waiting for you in the other chamber you have a chance to close the doorway and kill the entity that now controls you world.” “But my suit and weapon disappeared, and the others have neither one” “You have your suit with you Mojave. All you have to do it want it.” “How is that possible?” “The suit is where it has always been, in your mind. Just look for it there.” How do you store something ‘in’ your mind? If this thing was a machine then it has a serious glitch. Taking what it said at face value I still came no closer to understanding what was going on. Still needing clarification I asked “How about Billie and John, where are their suits?” “They also have theirs. But were unable to call them because they didn’t know they were there. As we have been talking I have been showing them where to look.” “You have been talking to them also?” “Yes.” “But John is old. And Billy’s just a kid. How do you expect us three to accomplish all of this?” “I have also thought of this and am rectifying the problem.” Alarmed I asked “What are you doing to them?” “I am doing to them the same thing that I am now doing to you. I am finishing the work that I left unfinished. Modifying your DNA to make it easier for you to survive what comes. You will be still be human but much more. You will heal faster and live much longer then anyone else of your species. And be able to utilize more of your higher brain functions.” “And that will help us?” “In the end, perhaps it will.” “And what is that supposed to mean?” Not answering my question she continued “When you awake all will be clear.” Suddenly I felt very tired and as much as I wanted to ask more questions I couldn’t seam to hold onto the thoughts for more then a fleeting second. I felt my eyelids getting heavy and start to close. As sleep started closing in I heard a quiet voice in my head. “Sleep Mojave, sleep until you are needed”

Chapter 7 When I awoke I found myself still upright in the alcove. I opened my eyes to look around. The force that had held me seemed to have lessened and I found myself able to move my head from side to side. Hopeful, I tried to move one foot out of the alcove and felt little

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resistance. One foot out I drew the rest of my body out behind it and was standing there looking around the room. Two men were standing in the middle of the pit lost in conversation and had not noticed me exit from the alcove. I recognized neither one. Beginning to worry about my friends I turned my head to look into the other recesses. Empty! “What the hell!” I blurted out. Startled to find my companions gone “Well he’s awake now.” Billy’s voice said behind me. My head snapped back too the pit and the two men standing there. It was then that I noticed that both wore Black suits identical to the one I had previously worn. There was something familiar about one of the men. Though he seemed older and much more thickly built the face under the blonde hair was definitely Billy Keene. There was nothing familiar about the other guy. He appeared to be around thirty years old, five foot ten with shoulder length black hair. Walking to the center of the pit up to the men standing there I looked into the face of the blonde man and asked. “Billy?” “Yeah, do you think that I look different?” he said as he held both arms wide, turning around so I could take a good look at him. Not bothering to reply I turned to the other man. “John?” “It’s me, thirty plus years younger, but still Me.” he said. His voice no longer having the roughness that old age brings. He also looked much more muscular. His grey eyes, youthful and clear shone brightly in his now unwrinkled face. He seemed a man in his prime. “Do I look as differently as you two?” “Naw,” Billy said eying me up and down “maybe a little heavier is all, more solid.” “How did you guys get your suits on? I’m still in my regular clothes.” “She said all we had to do was look in our heads and we would find them there.” John said, looking at me expectantly. “John and I tried that a little while ago and ‘poof’ here we are dressed to kill. We were just talking about it when you decided to wake up.” “You give it a try Mo. She told us to have you do it when you woke up, said that we all had to practice.” “I’ll try.” I said still not convinced. Closing my eyes, trying to will myself to be calm, I searched my mind. Trying to visualize my suit and picturing it on me. Not feeling that anything was happening I reopened my eyes after a few moments. John and Billy were grinning at me. “What?” “Look down.” Billy said. Looking down I was surprised to find myself in my own suit. And the clothes I had been wearing, gone. “But where are our other clothes?” I asked already knowing the answer. “Why, in our heads, of course.” John said still grinning Feeling a little irritated I raised my hand to point at the both of them to tell them that the situation we were in wasn’t humorous in the least. Suddenly the familiar weight appeared in my hand. Pointed at John’s head was my pistol, the shock in his eyes mirroring my own. Startled I went to throw the gun onto the floor but, just as it left my hand, it disappeared. Looking at the stunned faces of my companions, I stood there unable to speak. I could have killed John, and it scared me. “She told us to practice ‘that’ too.” Billy said in a shaky voice. “But we both were too scared to try it so we waited for you to wake up.” Looking at John I said “I’m so sorry. I could have killed you.” “Okay. Just remind me to show you how to use that thing before you end up killing one of us or yourself.”

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“Consider yourself reminded.” I said dryly “So Mo,” Billy said a concerned look on his face “how do you feel?” I took a moment to answer while I did a self assessment. I did feel good. I felt stronger and more alert then at any time in my short life. Lifting my hands up to look at them I wasn’t surprised to discover that they seamed to be much bigger then they were before. I opened and closed them a couple of times feeling the strength in them. Strong, my whole body felt the same way. The clothing I wore, bought an extra size bigger for comfort, now was stretched uncomfortably across my much wider frame. “I feel…good.” I said, taking my eyes from my hands to settle them on Billy’s now broad and sculptured face. “Why?” “Well you were in that alcove much longer then we were. And, when we asked that thing why, she said that she was making ‘special’ changes to you.” “And, that when we left here, that the both of us had to make sure nothing would happen too you.” John said, finishing Billy’s sentence. “I wonder what changes she made to me.” I said, more to myself then my two companions. “Lots of changes Mojave” the familiar voice said in my head. I took a wild step backward and looked around the chamber expecting to see the floating ball of plasma appear. Both of my companions were now looking at me as if I had suddenly lost my mind. “What’s wrong Mo?” Billy asked “She’s talking to me again. Don’t you two hear her?” Both men shook their heads and continued to stare at me. “The others can no longer hear me.” “Why?” I responded out loud “Because, now, I reside ‘in’ you” “Why inside of me?” “It is the only way for me to leave this place. There is no time for me to train you three here in the use of you weapons and suits. Time is short and we all must return to close the doorway as soon as possible or your world doomed. I made me a place in your mind just like I did for your other equipment. I will help you in your training along the way.” A sudden thought came to mind so I asked. “What else can we store in our minds?” “The room in your minds is limited. The information about each item takes up vast amount of the overall capacity of your brains, even with the changes I have made. Your companions have more room to store the equipment and supplies you will need. But you have no more room because of the space required to hold me in your mind.” “So I can make you appear any time?” “No. You can talk to me and I can help you out in that manner only. If you make me appear I will be unable to return to your mind. And the limited amount of energy that I have left will dissipate quickly outside of this chamber. I will cease to be Mojave.” “If I am stuck with you in my mind I think it will make me feel more at ease if I knew your name.” For the first time the voice in my head paused, as if taking a moment to think. “I have no name Mojave. But if it will make you feel better you may call me by the name of my maker.” “Which is?” “Her name was Torinasha Sho’enari Ariana.” “Well how about I just call you ‘Tori’ for short?” “That would be wonderful.” The voice said sounding pleased. That unsettled me, because I thought the thing was suppose supposed to be some kind of advanced machine, what kind of ‘machine’ expresses emotion?

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“You must return to other chamber quickly.” Tori said urgently “the power in this chamber is almost depleted and soon it will not have enough energy to send you back!” Alarmed I asked out loud “How?” Listening to Tori in my head for a moment I looked at my companions. Billy must have seen the alarm on my face for his had a look of panic starting show on it. He asked “What’s wrong now Mo?” “We need to get the hell out of here. Go grab your pack and get your ass back to the center of the pit!” Saying nothing he sprinted by me to the run to where he had set his pack next to the alcove he had stood in. By the time he returned with the pack slung across his shoulders the walls of the chamber had already started to glow and crackle with sparks. The high pitched whine filling the room, becoming louder, we three stood in the center of the pit as we did before. “Now hold on!” I said. Again we interlocked our arms. Big sparks of electricity jumping from wall too wall just above our heads. Every thing went black and I felt the floor disappear beneath my feet. Seconds later it was back and the flashlight in Billy’s hand illuminated the three of us. The beam pointed downward at our feet, unlocking our arms Billy played the light around the room. “Well, the good news is we’re back in the first chamber.” Billy said. “And the bad news is?” John asked “Now we get to go outside and see just what has happened since we’ve been gone.” I said. Feelings of apprehension filling my chest, making my heart skip a couple of beats. “Sure we want to do that?” John asked as I turned and started to kneel in front of the entrance to the chamber. Preparing to enter the tunnel I turned my head too look over my shoulder. Noticing Billy pick up an object from the floor and place it in his pack. “What choice do we have?” I said. With that statement I faced forward and began to crawl.

Chapter 8 When we returned to our campsite we were surprised to find our tent had collapsed and everything, including the Honda, had a thick layer of dust covering it surface. As if a lot of time had passed. While John and Billy worked to get the tent erect again I turned my thoughts inward and asked. “How long has it been?” “Two months has passed since you were last here Mojave.” Tori responded “Two months!” I said with wonder “I took time to make the three of you into what you are now. And I had to keep you safe from the fallout. So I kept the three of you in stasis.” “What is ‘Fallout’?” “When the change started your civilizations governments blamed each other for what was happening. First one country fired it nuclear arsenal, then the rest. It took this long for the radioactive particles to settle to the ground and the background radiation to drop enough for me to allow you three to return.” After she took a few minutes to explain to me about nuclear weapons and radiation I asked “And is this ‘radiation’ harming me and my friends?”

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“No. I modified your bodies to withstand much more radiation then the rest of your species. And with the suits you can withstand much more. You must not go into a blast zone without your suits on. Even with my modification you three would perish.” “I think we’ll just stay away from these ‘blast zones’.” “You may not have that choice Mojave.” Her voice seemed to relay impatience. “Why?” “You’re cities lay in ruins and the first place you will need to go sustained almost a direct hit. There is no other way Mojave. You must enter the blast zone and close the doorway.” “When are we supposed to leave here?” “You will leave when your training is complete here.” “We only have enough food to last a couple of weeks.” “Then you have two weeks. Two weeks to prepare for what is to come.” “You expect us to train ourselves here?” “Yes Mojave. Train like your lives depended on it.” And train we did. Over the next two weeks John trained me to handle the weapon that Tori had provided. It seemed to fire nothing at all. But when you pointed it at something and pulled the trigger whatever you shot at reacted as if struck. Either flying apart or a hole appearing in it, depending on what you shot at. The first time I aimed it at a fist sized rock it blew apart. The noise the weapon made was like a sharp crack of electricity. “Well,” John had said “now we know these guns can kill.” To John’s surprise I became a dead shot in three days, able to hit a can sitting on a rock at fifty yards, even if I was on the move. I learned from Tori that the weapons had the capacity to shoot forty times and then it would take it an hour, to build up a charge of what ever kind of energy it used, before we would be able to fire it again. And John suggested that, when our training was done, we stop by his shop and pick up more weapons to augment the ones that Tori had given us. He and Billy had already taken to wearing the normal side arms, only calling up the others when they needed them. We became familiar with our suits also. The suits not only protected us but were able cover our entire bodies when exposed to high radiation. Forming a black mask that covered the entire head, the mask had some type of goggles built in, from which we could see through, but were mirrored on the outside. On our hands the fabric of the cuff would extend out to from the wrists to cover our hands, forming skin tight gloves. We also trained our bodies. Billy giving John and I a crash course in self defense. We learned pressure points that would bring down a man twice our size screaming to his knees. And with our supped up reflexes we quickly became proficient in striking and blocking. The strength in our bodies was enormous. As I found out when Billy threw me with a hip lock and I had to pick myself up off the ground twenty feet away from him. And the more we used them the stronger we became. Billy and my favorite game was to strip down and jump from the top of the large boulder in camp over the Honda and into the lake thirty feet beyond. We were like children who were just beginning to learn their limitations. Which, in our minds at the time, were few. John and Billy also practiced storing some of the items around camp in there minds. Learning what they could store and how much. They found that eight items were about the average. Less if an item were large. More if the items were small. It seemed that the over all mass of all items couldn’t exceed a certain limit. So both men agreed to use the space in their minds wisely. Only storing what we couldn’t live without. Everything else would have to be carried on our person or put into in the Honda. On our last night in camp while John and Billy slept Tori and I conversed. “Tomorrow you leave this place.”

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“What will we find out there?” “You will find the world you left in ruins. The survivors are desperate and will try to take from you, not only your possessions, but your lives.” “Cant we help them?” “Some you can. Most of others belong to the entity now and do its bidding. They will also try to stop you from closing the doorway” “Can we save those the entity has control of?” “Only the death of the Entity can save those that are left in your world. And you may have to kill those that try to stop you.” “What if I can’t bring myself to kill another person?” “When the time comes, Mojave, you ‘will’ kill.” “How do you know?” “It is what you were made for.”

Chapter 9 Billy had had a kill switch installed in his Honda. It disconnected the power supply to the engines electronic parts. Just in case someone tried to steal the vehicle. And, in turn, it prevented the EMP from the nuclear blast from frying the electronics. So the Honda started right up and saved us a long walk back into Barstow. Most of the vehicles we would come across would probably not run so we had to hope the Honda held up. The drive back into town was uneventful save for one thing. As we got closer to the town we came upon a wrecked tanker diesel rig flipped over onto its side in the middle of the highway. Its contents had long ago caught fire and burnt the rig and the surrounding roadway to slag. When Billy went onto the shoulder to go around the charred remains we found that we could go no further. For, behind the wreckage, we found abandoned vehicles lined up taking up both lanes of highway for as far as eyes could see into the distance. It looked as if all had been stopped in the process of trying to escape whatever was happening behind them. Most of the vehicles driver’s side doors were open, apparently abandoned by their occupants so that they could flee on foot. “We’ll have to go off road to go around this mess.” Billy said. Not taking his eyes from the scene in front of us. His hands were clutching the steering wheel so hard that the knuckles turned white. “I just hope my shop is still standing.” John said from the back seat as Billy turned the Honda away from the highway and into the desert, still going in the general direction of town. After twenty minutes of bouncing around it the inside of the car Billy found a dirt road that looked as if it went the right direction so he turned onto it and headed west. Finally we crested a hill and could see the town of Barstow below us. Or what was left of Barstow. Billy had slowed down so we could take it all in. Below us most of the town lay in ruin. From what we could see of the commercial part of town it looked like fires had broke out and destroyed the mall and all of the shopping centers there. Other fires had broken out all over town. From our vantage point we could see black spots all over the city where fires had been left unchecked and seemed to have burnt whole neighborhoods to the ground. We kept going into town. After a quarter of a mile the dirt road gave way to pavement.

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Looking out of the passenger side window as Billy drove to John’s shop I kept looking out at the devastation. The burnt out husks of buildings and houses alike seemed to return my gaze. Their windows looking like eyes, looking back at me accusingly. Tori was right… I was glad she had kept us safe. But what other horrors would our eyes see on our journey? “There is no radiation here?” I asked Tori. Wondering if were should put our suits on. “No. The bombs fell on more populous areas and high priority military targets. This destruction was caused by desperate people long after the bombs fell.” “Are those ‘people still here?” “Some surely are so you and your companions must be careful.” As she spoke the back window exploded, showering John in the back seat with broken glass. The sound of a gun shot quickly followed. Billy pushed the accelerator to the floor pushing us back into our seats. Speeding away we heard more gun shots. Looking back over my seat I couldn’t see where the shots were coming from. “Why in the hell are they shooting at us?” John asked as he picked broken glass out of his hair and clothing. Billy slowed down the vehicle to go around the burnt out shell of a ford truck. Trying to put it between us and whoever was shooting at us. After a couple of blocks he resumed heading towards John’s shop. His voice shaky he responded to John. “I don’t know why. But we had better get to your shop soon and pick up something other then pistols to fire back with. Who ever were shooting didn’t like us trespassing in their neighborhood.” “We were both raised here. It’s our town to!” Turning to john in the back seat I said. “It isn’t your town anymore John. It belongs to the survivors. They are just trying to protect what they have left from whomever and whatever wants to take it from them. To them ‘we’ are trespassers.” John fell silent crossing his arms in frustration. “We’re here.” Billy’s voice rang out. I looked from John to stare out the window. We had come out on a road directly facing John’s shop. It lay collapsed on itself. Charred remains of the fallen roof could be seen through the font windows. As Billy crossed the road and entered the parking lot he said “It’s all gone.” “Drive around to the back of the building Billy.” Billy complied in silence. We came around to the back of John’s shop and John had Billy park the Honda. We exited and Billy and I stood there staring at John. “Why are we standing here? The building is totally gutted John.” I said, anxious to be on the move and away from this place. “It’s not what was in the shop that we’re after.” With that statement John turned to the businesses trash receptacle and began to wheel it to one side. There, under the receptacle, were two large steel doors held closed by a chain and padlock. John produced a key chain from his pocket and unlocked the padlock. Billy and I opened the doors until they were resting on their hinges. John had already disappeared inside and down the stairs. As we followed I noticed that the stairway lead away from the building and out under the back packing lot. We descended to the bottom and we came upon the concrete floor of a tunnel that led farther back away from the shop. The light from the entrance faded about ten feet in so Billy and I used the brick walls of the tunnel to feel out way into the darkness. In front of us a light appeared and John’s voice rang out. “Are you two going to take all day?” Billy and I came out into a room stacked with boxes. The light in the room was coming from a Coleman lantern that John had lit and was setting on the top of one of the boxes. As John was busy opening boxes and going through there contents I asked.

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“What is this place?” “My shop used to be a Speak Easy during prohibition. This room is where they would store their illegal alcohol. Now I use it for storing my, shall we say ‘Illegal Acquisitions’.” Billy was now helping John sift through the boxes. Setting things into a pile on the floor that John had already started. Soon they had more on the floor then we could possibly carry. And yet they continued to add to the ever growing pile. Hand guns, Rifles, Ammo, MRE’s. All went into the pile. When they were done Billy and I stood there looking at all the supplies while John disappeared into the back of the room. He returned with a small lock box and a grin. “What’s in the box old man?” Billy asked “There Geiger counters, ones that fit on you wrist.” “And why do you have them down here? They aren’t illegal to have.” As Billy spoke John had opened the box and handed me what looked like a digital wrist watch. I put it around my left wrist and tightened the strap. “These are not your over the counter Geiger Counters. They are Military issue proto types. Not only do they tell you radiation levels they also double as locators. They can help us find each other if we become separated. They are accurate up to a mile.” “And how did you get a hold of military proto types?” I asked “A designer who worked for a lab that they had closed came in with a few guns to sell. He was trying to move his family back to Kansas and needed to come up with some money to get there. The guns he was trying to sell me didn’t amount too much so I asked him if he had anything else to sell me. He said he didn’t and left. But the next day he was at the shop waiting for me to open up. That’s when he showed me these. I paid him $1000 dollars for all four and he made me promise never to tell anyone where I had got them. He said that they had told him to destroy them but he couldn’t bring himself to after spending three years designing them.” “How are they powered?” Billy asked “He said that they ran on the temperature fluctuations of the skin. As long as we wear them they won’t ever go dead.” ‘Unless we do’. I thought to myself. After John and Billy put there mini Geiger’s on and John had set the counters to receive from each other both men started to store the equipment. Item after item disappeared from the pile until all that was left was a sawed off pump action shotgun and two boxes of shells. “Are we going to leave those behind?” I asked “No Mojave,” John said as he turned to leave the room. “Those are yours to carry.” “Come on.” As he turned to follow John “We have been here to long and we need to leave town before the people who took those pot shots at us get curious about what we’re doing here. And come to take a look.” Thinking that he was probably right I bent don’t to retrieve the shotgun and shells. Slinging the shot gun over my shoulder by its strap I emptied one box of shells into my front pockets. The other box I had to hold in my hand, figuring to put it under my seat when I reached the Honda. As I walked back up the hallway to the stairs I noticed that John and Billy had already exited. In front of me were the stairway and the sunshine. That’s when I heard the voices coming from above. They were not the voices of my companions.

Chapter 10

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As I reached the bottom of the stairs I heard a stranger’s voice from above say “I told you. We are taking your car and if you don’t hand me those key we’ll kill you for them!” the voice sounded like it meant business. So I slowly eased up the steps until I could see out of the stairway. There, standing in front of the Honda, were my friends standing with their hands in the air surrounded by a group of seven men. The group of the men looked rough. Their clothing was ripped in places and none looked as if they had seen a shower in months. They held either pistols or rifles. All pointed at John and Billy. The man in front of them was huge. As tall and wide as Billy was after Tori’s transformation this man dwarfed him. He wore a tattered and stained tee shirt with the sleeves cut off. The dark stains on his jeans looked to be dried blood. He had a gargantuan bald head with a face that looked like it had been through a meat grinder. As I looked closer at his face something caught my attention. Along the right side of his face I thought I had seen a burn scar that stretched from behind his ear, down the side of his neck to disappear beneath his shirt. But as I looked harder I could have sworn that I watched the scar tissue move and pulsate. I felt a chill creep into my bones as I watched the man open his mouth and speak. “Now,” The giant man said taking a step towards Billy “Are you going to give me those keys or are we going to have to take them?” It was then that I noticed the two men standing behind Billy and John start to inch slowly forward. I had to stop them. Dropping the shotgun shells to free my hands I launched myself forward and out of the stairway my black suit materializing on my body as I flew forward. In mid air I heard Billy say in a soft voice. “Take them.” “If you can.” John finished equally as quiet. Then the man that had done the talking noticed me flying through the air and his eyes opened wide, his mouth agape. Billy and John started to move and I landed in the middle of a free for all. As I landed I reached out and grabbed one of the men who had started to move in on my friends by the neck with my left hand. I felt my fingers sink into the flesh of his neck crushing his spine. His left eye popped out from the pressure and came to rest on the back of my hand hanging there by the optic nerve. Turning my face away from the blood spray coming from the eye socket I saw the other man start to raise his pistol looking at me with blood lust in his eyes. My reflexes were faster. Before he could get his gun up my weapon was already in my hand and leveled at his head. He was still bringing his gun up when I pulled the trigger. His head vaporized. A fine mist of atomized blood spray, tissue and bone came to rest on the pavement behind. The only part of his head that was left were his ears which, for a split second, just hung there as if still attached to the mans now non existent face. Then they fell to the ground his body closely following. When I looked to see if John or Billy needed help John was just letting one mans limp body fall to the ground. His face looked to be caved in, his forehead and chin seemed to be almost touching. As I watched Billy hit another man so hard his head almost come free from his shoulders something hit my suit from behind. Letting the body that I still held in my left hand drop to the ground I spun around to face this new threat. Standing there holding a rifle buy its barrel was a kid not much over eighteen. The rifle had apparently jammed and the kid had used the rifle as a club. I stood there looking down at him a stain began to appear in the front of his pants. Looking from his reddening face to the urine stain then back to his face he suddenly

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dropped the rifle and ran away, disappearing around the corner of the shop. I turned back towards my companions. The remaining men had already been dispatched by my companions and they now stood over the body of the giant. Billy must have broke his neck because, as I reached them, I noticed that the bald mans head was lying there turned completely face down while his body lay upwards. John was poking at the scar with the tip of the knife. The scar seemed to move away from the knife. As I looked closer I discovered what John and Billy had already come to realize. This wasn’t a scar but something alive that had attached itself to the man. “What the hell is that thing?” I asked no one in particular. John and Billy remained silent. In my head Tori made herself heard. “It’s a part of the entity. The other men are infected too.” “Shouldn’t we burn them or something?” “That would do no good. We would just be destroying a small piece of it. But the whole of the entity would be unaffected by such a small loss. Soon it will die because its host now lays dead.” “Can it infect us?” the thought alone sent a chill up my spine. “As long as your minds stay free, you will remain free. But the moment you lose hope and give up your free will you will be infected like most of the people in your world are now. You must never give in to doubt. Believe in your selves and all will be well Mojave.” A thought came to mind so I asked. “If this is a part of the entity then does it now know what has happened here?” “Yes. It sensed me in you just like I sensed the infection in the others. It has lost to me once before so now it will come after you. It will only get harder from here on out.” “How much time do we have?” “A few hours or a few days, I can not say. But, believe me Mojave, it will send others who are infected and they will try to stop us from destroying the doorway.” Looking around at the six dead me I shuddered. Any doubt that I’d had in myself and in my ability kill was now gone. We had just killed six men in less then fifteen seconds. The fact that we were outnumbered didn’t matter. These men never stood a chance, and that bothered me. How many others would lose their lives at our hands never really knowing what kind of men they faced? “I’ll have to kill more people wont I?” “Yes Mojave. Maybe many more before we are through. There is no other way. If you destroy the doorway and kill the entity your race will survive. All those infected will be free because when the entity dies the infection dies with it.” “I know that I don’t have a choice. But I don’t have to like it.” “But, you must admit, you and your companions are good at it.” After taking a few minutes to convince my friends that they didn’t have to burn the bodies John disappeared back down the stairs. Half a minute later he emerged from the stairway at a dead run. As he reached us I felt the ground jump beneath my feet and a plume of smoke mixed with flames shot up from the stairway to reach skyward. “You blew it up didn’t you?” Billy asked, looking at John with mock disappointment on his face. After he tossed me my discarded shells he turned to Billy and said “You didn’t expect me to leave it here for our local buddies did you.” “So what did you set off ‘this’ time?” “I dropped an antique grenade into a box of reloading powder and ran like hell! I didn’t even know if it would go off.” “It would seem that it did.” I said as I watched the smoke rise into the air.

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We relieved the dead men of their weapons and ammo leaving the bodies where they lay. We put the weapons in the back of the Honda and the three of us piled back into the car. As we reached the parking lot entrance Billy stopped the car and asked me “Which direction?” Taking a moment to consult with Tori I looked at Billy and said “East.” “What’s east Mo?” “Area 51” Billy didn’t say a word. He just crossed the highway and headed back the way we came. From the back seat John’s voice rang out. “It figures!”

Chapter 11

Retracing our route back to where we had left the highway. We headed east on I15 heading towards the town of Baker. We turned off of the interstate just before town to cut over to highway 127 heading into Death Valley. None of us wanted to take the chance of driving through Las Vegas and drawing more unwanted attention. As we drove the sun started to set and Billy decided to pull over for the night. When we reached Shoshone we turned off of the highway and parked the Honda behind an old abandoned gas station. Billy John exited the car and began to unload some of our camp supplies while I walked around to the front of the station. In the fading light I looked north up the highway then back the way we came. No tell tale lights from other vehicles broke the darkness. Even though I had my companions with me, at that moment I felt more alone then I ever had. Something was bothering me. With all the destruction back in Barstow we had not seen one body other then those of the men we had killed. I didn’t know much about death but we should have come across some bones or decaying corpses. Even when we had stopped on the outskirts of Baker to search some houses for canned food, not one body did we see. It was as if people had just walked away from their homes and just disappeared into the desert. ‘Where is everyone?’ I thought to myself “They are either in hiding or they belong to the entity now.” Was the response from Tori. “But where are all the bodies?” “The first things in your world that were infected were the flies. As they landed and fed on the dead they released a micro organism that dissolved any remains that were left, even dissolving the larvae of the flies themselves. After a few months the flies themselves perished. Leaving an ecological niche that has already been filled.” “Filled by what?” “In your language we called them Blood Flies. They are the size of your fist and are attracted to the scent of blood and death. No doubt the men you killed have already been consumed by these creatures. Once the Blood Flies smell blood they will come after you, alive or dead. If you are alive and get stung by one you must cut out the flesh around the sting. Because if you fail to do so you will become host to its larvae and they will consume you from the inside out.” I couldn’t help the shudder that raced though my body. What kind of world did things like this evolve in? How long before everything in this world was overrun and became extinct?

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“What other niches have been filled by things from that other world?” “Most of the insects, plants and small animals around the Doorway are no longer of your world. Each day that it takes you to destroy it the farther the Change will spread. The closer you three get to it you will see more and more things not of your world. And everything not of your world will try to kill you.” “When will we begin to see these things you talk about?” “Tomorrow Mojave, you will see more then you could ever imagine. You will see what it was that destroyed my civilization and is now destroying yours.” Tori fell silent. A feeling of dread burned in my chest. A light touch in my mind comforted me. Tori always seamed to know when I was upset and her ‘touch’ settled me down. Easing my emotions and settling my nerves. And, though I had no experience with relationships, her touch was one of tenderness and reassurance. But to my heart it was the longing touch of a lover. Tori and I were closer to each other then any man and woman could ever be. I knew she wasn’t a real person. But I had decided a week before, that if we were to come through this in the end, I would make sure that she survived also. I didn’t think that I could survive the hole in my heart and my mind that her absence would bring. Another light touch No longer feeling alone I turned away from the road.

Chapter 12

One minute John was asleep. And the next he was wide awake and sitting up in his sleeping bag staring around camp in alarm. Both Mojave and Billy were still asleep and softly snoring in their bags. Not seeing anything out of place John eased out of his sleeping bag and stood up. He walked into the desert a little ways and was relieving himself when Billy’s voice came from behind him. “Still have an old mans bladder huh?” Startled, John spun around almost peeing on Billy’s leg as he did so. Billy jumped back, narrowly evading the steaming urine stream. “What the hell are you doing following me?” John said as he pulled his zipper up. “Cant a guy take a piss without you sneaking up to take a peak at his manhood?” “Sorry,” he replied as he rubbed his booted foot in the dirt to get the few drops of urine off his boot. “I woke up and you weren’t there I thought old age had caught up with you and you were wandering the desert with Dementia.” “Do I ‘look’ old to you?” John asked as he stepped up to stand in front of Billy. Looking down into the other mans face smiling Billy replied. “You may be younger on the outside but you’re still an ‘old man’ at heart.” John reached out and put his hand on Billy’s chest and gave him a little shove backwards. “This ‘old’ man’s is going to whip you ass.” He said with a chuckle. Billy gave him a lopsided grin and said.

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“You’ll have to catch me first!” With that statement Billy spun and ran off in the moonlight into the desert with John close on his heels. Their laughter lost on the still night air. They ran for two miles before John managed to bring Billy to a sudden stop by bulldogging him to the ground from behind. John wound up with Billy in a head lock while the bigger man stood trying to shake the other from his back. Suddenly Billy stopped struggling and a moment later John released his hold to drop to the ground. Billy stood stock still and was looking off into the desert. Coming around to stand next to his friend John looked in the direction Billy was looking. Off in the distance he could see headlights in the distance. And they looked to be heading towards them or at least towards their camp. John and Billy looked at each other. The realization that they had left their companion back at camp alone and unprotected hit both men simultaneously. Without a word both men were on the run.

▬▬▬▬▬▬

I awoke in the pre dawn hours to the rumble of engines in the night. Setting up in my sleeping bag with a start I looked towards where my companions had bedded down for the night and discovered that they were both gone. In the dim light of the moon their sleeping bags lay on the ground across from me, unoccupied and open to the night air. The sound of engines drew closer. Growing louder and louder. Slipping out of my bag I quickly stood up and walked past the Honda to the corner of the station. With my back against the wall I leaned my head out to look up the highway. About a quarter mile away I saw headlights coming in the direction of the station. Single headlights, one after the other, stretched into the night. Motorcycles! Who road them probably spelled trouble for us. As I watched them I hoped that they would keep driving by. But as they neared the lead bikes slowed and turned into the front parking lot disappearing from my view. Bike after bike followed. In all I counted almost thirty bikes. Most appeared to have two people on each which meant that there were a minimum of fifty riders. It wouldn’t be long before our camp behind the station was discovered. When it was they would come searching. And my friends and I would be in trouble. One by one the bikers turned their bikes off and soon the only noises other then my pounding heart were the voices of men and women coming from around front of the station. I could here them laughing and poking fun at one another. If one of them came around the back of the station and found me that person would probably be poking more then fun my way. I knew that I had to get out of site, and quick. Hiding under the Honda was out of the question. I would surely be discovered .Where had my companions disappeared too before I awoke? Were they watching from somewhere in the night? If I ran into the desert, with as sparse as the vegetation around the station was, I would be sure to be seen. So, if not away, then up.

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Taking two steps away from the back of the building I turned and looked at the back wall of the station. The roof of the station was flat and about fourteen feet up. Sticking out about above the back door was a metal rod four feet long with a motion light attached to it. I walked to the door and stood under the rod. I jumped up and grabbed the bar in my hands and pulled myself up and onto it in a sitting position. From there I slowly pulled myself onto the roof. Crouching down I slowly inched my way to the front of the building in the darkness. The biker’s voices becoming louder. When I reached the front I lay prone and looked down. What I seen didn’t look encouraging. On the far side of the pump island thirty bikes were lined up in five neat rows. Between me and the bikes were around fifty men and women in riding gear going about the business of bedding down for the night. In the moonlight I could see that all of them were armed to the teeth. They all positively bristled with knives and pistols in their belts. Some had rifles slung over their shoulders and a few even had bandoleers of shells crossing their chests. Like the characters in some of those spaghetti westerns I had watched in the hospital. Every one of those people looked fit and able to take care of them selves. Good news for them, bad for us. I suddenly remembered the location feature of my Geiger counter. Looking down at my wrist I touched button to illuminate face of it. There I saw two arrows in the digital display. One pointed directly across form my position off into the desert on the other side of the highway. The other pointed to my left and into the field next to the station. My friends had apparently waked before me and when they heard the bikes had taken up positions on either side of the road. I felt reassured that my John and Billy were out in the darkness. But I didn’t know how we were going to come out of this in one piece. As I continued to look down at a large blonde man giving orders to some others I heard a metallic ‘click’ come from behind me. Turning my head to look over my shoulder I found the dark barrel of a gun pointed at my head. On the other end of the pistol stood a tall man with long dark hair that fell down onto the leather vest that he wore. A voice came from under a thick mustache. “Move and your dead.” It said softy Who was I to argue?

Chapter 13

After we had gotten down from the roof of the station he marched me around the building with his gun in the small of my back. When he had first poked the weapon into my back I had tensed, preparing to strike him down until Tori spoke in my head. “Not yet Mojave, wait until we find out what they want.” “But when we reach the others I might not be able to fight my way out.” “These people aren’t infected. I do not detect any influence of the Entity among them. Do not harm them until we find out where they stand.” Not liking the idea but not having a choice I allowed the man to direct me around to the front of the station. Seeing the man and I round the corner of the building the entire group fell quiet, all eyes following us until I stood face to face with the blonde man who had been giving the others orders.

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He was as square as he was tall. Large chest and shoulder muscles made him seem as if he had no neck. His blue eyes looked me up and down as if I were a bug that he couldn’t decide whether to step on or ignore as harmless. “What did you bring me this time Paul?” he said as we stopped in front of him. “A Peeping Tom Jim, he was watching us from the roof. When I went up to take up the night watch position there he was.” Paul said from behind me, His gun still resting in the small of my back. The other people of the group began to gather around us. “Is he clean?” “He didn’t have a weapon on him. But there are a guns and other stuff in the back of his vehicle around back.” Paul said “When I seen he wasn’t armed I decided not to shoot him where he lay.” “Did you ‘check’ him?” “There was not enough light up on the roof to do it up there.” Turning his eyes back to me he said “Take your clothes off, all of them!” His tone left no doubt in my mind that if I did not comply he and his group would probably fill me full of holes. So comply I did, stripping in record time, I stood before the whole group naked in the pre dawn light. “Now turn!” Slowly I raised my arms out away from my body and turned completely around, receiving cat calls and laughter from men and women alike as I turned. When I again faced Jim I stopped. It seemed as if I had passed inspection because he no longer looked at me like a bug about to be stepped on. “You’re clean. Get dressed before some of the ladies decide to turn in their men for a better model.” As I got dressed he just stood there waiting to continue his questioning. In minutes I was again standing before him fully dressed. “Who are you?” he asked “My name is Mojave Sands.” “Where are you from ‘Mojave’?” He said the name as if I were making it up. “I’m from Barstow.” “Is there anyone left there who hasn’t been infected yet?” “If there were, I never seen one.” Now I knew why he had made me strip. It wasn’t to check me for weapons but for infection. As fearless as this group appeared to be, they all shared one fear. Fear of the infected. Tori was right again, I might not have to kill anyone in this group after all. I started to relax. It was then that I decided to ask a question of my own. “Where are you and your group from?” Pausing as if to decide how to answer or if he should he responded “My people and I are from all over. We travel the highways gathering others that have not been infected. Killing anyone and anything else that has been. There is safety in numbers now days. That’s why I’m surprised to find you by your self.” Raising one eyebrow at me he continued “But you ‘aren’t’ alone are you?” Smart man, now it was my turn to pause before answering. I liked this man in front of me. He was strong and self assure. I just had to decide if I were willing to risk the lives of my companions if I were wrong in my assessment of this man. Coming to a decision I shook my head and said “No, I am not. I have two friends out in the desert.” “You need to tell them to come in.” “Not until I’m sure that you or your group won’t harm them.” “We don’t harm people that don’t intend to harm us. But we will defend ourselves.”

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“What assurance can you give me?” “None, but if you don’t tell them to come in, I will have to send my men out to get them.” Stepping away from the man behind me I stood less then a foot away from Jim. “If you send men out to get my friends your going to get them killed.” I had no doubt in my companions’ abilities to defend them selves. “And what could the two of them do against all of us?” he asked with a chuckle. Deadly serious I looked into his face and responded quietly. “If you were to hunt them or harm me my friends would start killing your group one by one. Even if you wound up killing them I guarantee not even half of you would live to ride another day.” He now stared at me with that look in his eyes once again. “Am I supposed to believe that two men could kill half of my men before we could stop them?” he asked. The sarcasm fairly oozed from his voice. I wanted this man to know what kind of men his group would face if they decided to hunt my friends down and that left me only one option. There would be a lot of unnecessary deaths today if I couldn’t convince him. “If you don’t believe me, Test me. I’m not as well trained as my friends but I am sure I could take on at least ten of your men.” Jim just stood in front of me looking as if he couldn’t believe what I had just suggested. I think he knew whether or not to believe me. But I figured he cared enough for his men not to put them in harms way. The look on my face must have convinced him. Or at least gave him doubt. After a moment he shrugged “If that’s the way you want it then that’s the way it will be. I’ll pick out ten men and you will have your test. I will tell them to take it easy on you. Maybe this will be a good lesson for you and your friends.” “Don’t bother telling your men to take it easy on me.” I said with a grin. “As for the lesson, it’s going to be yours to learn.” Without another word Jim turned and began to sort through the volunteers in his group that had suddenly decided they wanted a piece of me. My cockiness got me what I had wanted. I just hoped that it didn’t just get me killed. I had to make sure that they didn’t take it easy on me. But I would have to restrain myself from killing one of these men on accident or my well intended lesson would probably end in my own death. In minutes Jim had his ten men picked out and we were all now standing in the middle of the highway. Surrounding us, were the rest of the group forming a wall of bodies, leaving an open circle twenty five feet across with me at its center. Jim stood at the edge of the circle and looked like he was about to say something. Before he did I raised my voice and yelled to my companions. “Billy.., John stay out of this. This is my fight!” that said I turned to look back at Jim. He smiled at me and said “You can always back down and just have your friends give themselves up.” Returning his smile I responded “Not bloody likely.” Looking from one to another of my opponents I realized just how big they all were. Not one of them was under two fifty. I didn’t know any of their backgrounds and histories but every one of them looked confident, capable and dangerous. Jim’s voice rang out. “Begin!” I heard footsteps racing up behind me so I sidestepped and as a biker raced by I reached out and grabbed his shirt and belt picking the man up above my head and threw him into the faced of three more men rushing me from the front. All four men went to the ground.

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Sensing motion on my right I turned to face two more men coming at me. The one on the left threw a punch which I dodged letting his momentum carry him past me I reached out and grabbed his wrist twisting his arm backwards as I stepped forward. He promptly flipped forward landing hard on the pavement the air escaping from his lungs in a rush. He lay there, staring skyward gasping for breath. As I had let go of the man’s wrist I continued my forward motion stiffening my arm as the other man came in. The clothes line caught the man across the throat lifting his feet off the ground. He flipped completely over and he landed face down. His head making a hollow sound as it bounced. With those two down I spun around to face the other eight men. The first four were still trying to untangle themselves and stand up. The other four men approached me more slowly. Apparently they had learned how fast I could be and didn’t want to wind up on the ground like the rest of their friends. Until that moment I had only been reacting to their attacks. It was time for me to go on the attack before the other four reached their feet. One of the men coming at me was a step ahead of the others so I stepped forward to meet him. e swung his left hand in a attempt to punch me in my face. As he did I dropped to my knees and punched up between his legs, nailing him in the balls. Jumping up from my knees I received a kick to the left side of my head. Through the stars that suddenly appeared in my vision I could have swore that I seen a shoe flying through the air away from me. I backed up three steps to clear my head. Looking at the three men I noticed that, sure enough, the man on the right was missing a shoe. I was about to make sure he got one back. As the three men came in range I jumped up and delivered a spinning back kick. Aiming it at the man with the missing shoe it connected with his head so hard he spun around and just stood there swaying. A split second later he collapsed to the ground. That seemed to make the other two men hesitate. Taking advantage, I reached out with both hands grabbing their heads in my hands and banged them together, hard. Both men collapsed onto the third without a sound. Six down with four to go, I turned in time to get bum rushed by the others. I brought down an elbow onto the back of one mans head and he stumbled to his knees. But the weight of the other three pushed me back into the crowd as they pummeled my body and head with their fists. As I fell backwards I felt the heat of their bodies closing in from all sides. Suddenly, there was a sharp, burning pain in my right side. Looking down I seen a hand holding a knife draw back and forward sinking the blade again into my side. Someone from the crowd was stabbing me, so much for a fair fight. I went mad. For the first time I wanted to kill someone. Stepping away from the crowd I shook of the other three men like a dog would shake off water. Turning I looked into the crowd spotting the man who had stabbed me. He stood there grinning at me with the knife in his hand, my blood dripping from its tip. As I stepped forward he tried to bring up the knife in a vain attempt to defend himself. I slapped the knife to one side and grabbed his head in both of my hands and squeezed. He let out a blood curdling scream just before the top of his head split open and his brains erupted out and into the air. The crowd took a loud intake of breath and stepped away from me and my victim. My anger still seething in my chest, I released what was left of his head. Before he fell to the ground I caught him under his arms. Spinning around I threw his body at Jim twenty feet away. It flew threw the air and landed at his feet like a lifeless rag doll. I staggered back into the center of the circle and fell to my knees. Blood flowing freely from the two knife wounds in my side as my vision started to cloud. I could no longer see my other opponents.

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If they came at me then I couldn’t even raise a hand in my own defense. As darkness closed in to take me I heard Jim’s voice ring out. “Enough!” I fell forward and the ground rushed up to meet my face

Chapter 14 I dreamed of a woman. She was tall with long black hair cascading down her back. Olive skin and a voluptuous figure were covered by a gown that looked to be made of green silk. The green of her gown matched the green of her eyes. Eyes the color of emeralds seemed to be filled with passion. She spoke to me with Tori’s voice. “You must heal yourself Mojave. Time is short.” “What do you mean heal myself?” “While you sleep your body dies and I cannot help you this time.” “Tori?” The woman smiled, full lips pulling back to reveal perfect teeth. “Yes Mojave. It is me.” “You’re here in my dream?” “It was the only way that your fevered brains could hear me. So I projected this image of my maker into your dream. I wanted to try and help you.” “Help me how?” “As I have said before, your body dies. Only a conscious effort by you can heal it. When I told you your body would heal faster the other people it was true. But in you current unconscious state you body can’t repair itself from the damage it has sustained.” “What can I do?” “You must wake up.” “How do I wake ‘myself’ up if I am asleep?” Her smile disappeared. “I have to force you to.” “How are you going to do that?” “I’m going to give you a nightmare Mojave. Only a bad dream can wake a person who’s body doesn’t want to wake so I am going to show you what happened to my world.” “Was it really that bad?” Tori nodded “I can tell you what happened. But it would be better to show you so that it’s something you will never forget. I never will.” And show me she did. I awoke screaming.

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Hands held me down as I thrashed about, my feverish shin burning under their touch. I could hear voices talking to me. I tried to focus on the voices. One appeared to be John’s but that couldn’t be for also I could hear Jim’s voice. Had my friends been captured? Forcing myself to stop struggling against the hands that held me I slowly opened my eyes. Above me I saw the faces of my friends. John and Billy were kneeling on either side of me holding my shoulders down. Standing behind them was Jim and the man with the mustache who had brought me down from the roof. A look of concern was written on all four men’s faces, friend and foe alike. “Where am I?” I asked my voice dry and raspy. I could feel the wound in my side twinge and burn as I spoke. Picturing the knife wounds in my mind I concentrated on them. Trying to tell my body to heal them, the burning sensation suddenly ceased, and was replaced by an irritating itch. In my minds eye I could see the wound slowly seal itself. Muscle and skin tissue that were severed by the knife drew closed. Without seeing the wounds with my eyes I knew in moments that the wounds had closed and were well on the way to being fully healed. But I still felt weak and feverish. All of this had only taken seconds. What other things could this body of mine do? All four men’s eyes came to rest on me as I spoke. John and Billy removed their hands from my shoulders. Jim spoke first as Billy and John returned to their feet. “We had to move you into the gas station because you were bleeding.” “How do you feel?” Billy asked. “I feel like hell.” “I am sorry about all of this Mojave. I didn’t expect you to get knifed. I just wanted to teach you a lesson.” Jim said an apologetic look on his face. This big man seamed to have a heart for everyone not just his own people. “I’m sorry to,” I said “I didn’t have to kill your man.” “If you wouldn’t have I would have had to do it sooner or later.” The look on Jim’s face made me shudder. It told me he would have done it ‘sooner’ than later. And he would not have regretted it one bit. “I can’t have my people killing anyone not infected. There is so very few of us left.” “So are my friends and I free to go?” I asked. “Do I have a choice?” Jim asked as he looked down at me with a smile. I returned his smile and slowly shook my head. Jim looked from me too my companions. “After what your friends did when they showed up I didn’t think so.” Startled I looked at John and Billy. “You didn’t kill anyone did you?” “No, we just knocked a few heads around.” Billy said “It’s a good thing your new friend here told his people to calm down.” John said “Or we would have had to get serious. Jim laughed. “Don’t let your friends fool you. They had half of my people disarmed before you even hit the ground. And the other half couldn’t get rid of their guns fast enough. It was quite a site.” Looking back to Jim I said “I told you so.” “Is he always this cocky?” Jim asked with a smirk on his lips. “Usually he’s quite docile” John responded with a laugh. Ignoring the rest of their conversation I tried to sit up. As I did the room began to spin so I put a hand out and Billie reached down and helped me to my feet. “Are you sure that’s a good idea?” Jim asked as I stood their with Billy’s hand holding me up by my arm. “You could start bleeding again.” “I think that I’ll be okay.”

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“You should have Scott here” he nodded toward the man with the mustache “look at you wounds just to be safe. He used to be a doctor for the military.” I looked at ‘Scott’. His mustached rose in a smile and he shrugged. This man was a doctor? Was nothing in this world what it seemed anymore? Returning Scott’s shrug I turned away from him and raised my shirt. Looking down I saw a gauze bandage covering my side. What appeared to be scotch tape held it securely in place. Scott stepped up to me and began to gently remove the tape from my skin. When he had finished he removed the blood stained bandage. Still looking down I could just make out two faint pink lines under my blood stained skin. Scott stepped away from me his eyes wide and fearful. “No way!” He exclaimed. “What is it Scott?” Jim asked. His voice sounding alarmed. Turning to Jim he said “He’s all healed. There isn’t even going to be much of a scar.” Looking back at me he asked “What are you?” Jim was now looking at me accusingly. “You heard the man. Now answer his question!” As I was trying to figure out what to tell these men Tori spoke. “Tell them Mojave.” “Tell them what?” “Tell them all of it.” “They won’t believe me.” “You must try to make them believe. If were going to succeed we might need their help, if they are to be worthy while allies, then they need the whole truth.” “Are you sure Tori?” “Yes Mojave.” She was right. I did have to try. Looking at the other two men I started the story out by the one, obvious sentence. “You’re not going to ‘believe’ this.”

Chapter 15 And he didn’t, at first. As Jim and his people road away I handed the satellite phone that he had given us to Billy. As he took it, it disappeared. Knowing that it would be there when we needed it I turned away from Billy to watch the motorcycles recede down the highway and disappear in the distance. The land lines for the telephones had ceased to be functional after the bombs had dropped. But all the satellites in orbit were left unaffected. Jim had come across a few phones that were still in working order. They were how his people kept in contact with the other groups. Jim had explained to us that there were other groups like his that road out in different directions from their home base in Tonopah Nevada. He said over three hundred riders in

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six different group’s road all over country looking for those that weren’t infected. When they found them they returned them to Tonopah too live under the protection of the bikers. He had also told us that the city had over three thousand people now living in it, all trying to survive in a world that was increasingly deadly and alien to them. The one place in Nevada that no one had ever wanted to go had now become the only safe place too go. John had come up beside me while I was lost in thought. After a few moments he said too me. “That went well.” “You think so?” I responded as I turned away from the road and started to walk to the back of the station where Billy had gone to stow our gear back into the Honda. “Ya, I do.” He said as he fell in step beside me. As he walked he let out a chuckle. I turned one eye to his smiling face and I asked him. “Now what?” “I was just remembering the look on his face when you decided to pop into your suit. I thought he was going to crap himself!” Remembering Jim’s expression I smiled too. The story hadn’t been going well. Jim had been again looking at me in that way of his. He wasn’t buying into it at all. He had suddenly stood up and in an angry voice yelled out “What do you take me for, a fool?” As he yelled he had reached out and grabbed a handful of my shirt and pulled me to him, his breath hot on my face. “There isn’t a lie that I can’t see through. And I don’t like liars!” I came up with an idea. I wasn’t sure if it was a good one but I had to convince him that my story was true. I looked into Jim’s eyes and smiled. In my mind I had pictured my suit. Holding it there as I said to Jim. “And I don’t like to be called a liar.” I said softly Suddenly Jim was left holding nothing but air. Looking from his empty hand too my black clad chest, his eyes opened wide. A look of surprise replacing the angry one he had on his face only seconds before. The man named Scott stood a few feet away and looked as if he would bolt if there was a clear path through the door, which Billy had been conveniently leaning against. Bringing my right arm up from my side in a fluid motion, my gun appearing in my hand as it rose, I placed it at Jim’s left temple. Still smiling I asked the stunned man “Still think I’m a liar?” Jim had swallowed real hard and looked into my still smiling face. He seemed to relax and a moment later returned my smile. “Do I have a choice?” he asked “Not really.” I said Finally we had come to an understanding.

Chapter 16

We continued our journey at a slow pace. There were spots on the highway that we had the find our way around. The road being blocked by abandoned or burnt out vehicles. At one spot the road disappeared into a huge sinkhole that must have been caused, at some point, by heavy rains. The hole was at least a quarter mile around and fifty feet deep.

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We had to take another rough ride through the desert to find our way around. Following motorcycle tracks into the desert we worked our way back onto the highway past the sinkhole. For half an hour we watched as a storm front moved in from the west. The sky was soon thick with dark storm cloud. With the back window missing in the Honda we thought it best if we found cover to wait out the storm so in Amargosa Valley we left highway 373 to look for shelter. We came upon an abandoned ranch house. It was made of brick and looked to be in decent shape. Its garage door stood wide open so Billy parked the Honda and we entered the house through the door in the garage. The house was lavishly decorated. Antiques and artwork were everywhere. There was one whole room that was set up as a study. On two walls book shelves stretched from floor to ceiling. And in one corner was an old desk facing inwards towards the center of the room a lamp and a stack of books resting on its top. I walked around the desk and sat in the plush leather high back chair. Reaching across the desk I grabbed the top book from the stack. Glancing at the cover I noted the title ‘War of the Worlds’. As I read the introduction I wondered if the owner of this home would have found the irony in the situation if he would have known what was going to befall our world. I closed the cover and place the book back on top of the stack and got up to go help my companions search the rest of the house. As I left the room I turned left down the hallway towards the living room. I reached the living room to find John and Billy relaxing. Billy was stretched out on a couch half asleep and John was sitting in an old rocking chair. John looked up at me as I entered the room. “Find anything interesting?” he asked as he threw me a can of Vienna Sausages. Prying the top off the can I replied by shaking my head and popping a sausage in my mouth. “There is a pantry full of canned goods in the kitchen.” He said. Then he looked at Billy who was now softly snoring on the couch. “Billy ate two cans of chili and you know what that means.” “Means we set up front and his ass gets the back seat.” I said trying to talk around the food in my mouth. “Be thankful that the back windows missing.” He said with a grin Lightning suddenly lit up the windows. Seconds later we could hear the thunder it was so loud I could feel it reverberate in my chest. I walked to the sliding door that opened to the patio in the back of the house. Looking through the glass I watched as the first rain drops began to darken the red brick of the patio. More lightning and thunderclaps filled the air. I could feel the electricity in the air make the hair on my forearms stand up. John walked up to stand beside me and looked out the window a somber look on his face. “Going to be a bad one.” He said “How bad?” “With all the particulates in the atmosphere from the bombs I bet there is going to be a lot more lightning strikes then normal. Not to mention this time of year it’s been known to storm and rain for days, sometimes longer.” He fell silent as he continued to watch the storm through the glass. Suddenly something heavy and dark hit the glass. Startled John and I stepped back from the door and just at that moment lightning lit up the creature that clung to the glass. It looked like a dragon fly with two sets of wings and a long thorax but the resemblance ended there. This monster was over two feet long and its head the size of a grape fruit. Its

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mouth was four inches across and lined with teeth like a shark. Row upon row of teeth we could see as the creature banged its head on the glass in a futile effort to get at us. The main body of it was split down the middle and hooked forwards forming two stingers like that of a scorpion, each stinger taking turns striking the glass. I could see drops of venom sticking to the glass where ever a stinger toughed it. I came to realize what it was just as Tory spoke in my mind. “Those are Blood Flies Mojave.” “But I thought they only go after the dead or injured.” “They are trying to find shelter from the storm. Soon there will be many more. This house stands all alone and there is no other cover for them close by.” “At least their outside and we’re in here.” “Sooner or later Mojave one will break a window. And when it does all of the others will enter to escape the storm. When they do you will have to kill them all or die.” I turned to John beside me and said “We have to wake up Billy! Tori says that there are going to be more of these things coming.” “What are they?” Looking back at the creature I said “Trouble for us if they get in!” “I’ll wake up Billy.” I said as I turned away from the window. “You keep an eye on that thing.” I walked to the couch and I laid my hand on Billy’s shoulder. Before I could give him a shake he spoke without opening his eyes. “Trouble?” he asked as I heard something hit one of the windows in the living room. “Is Rush Limbaugh fat?” Billy opened his eyes and they settled on my face. In a serious tone he said. “That’s a lot of trouble.” As Billy sat up we could hear more things hit the outside of the house. I looked in the direction of the sliding door. John still stood there but he was now in his suit, his gun in hand, pointing at the doors that were now completely covered in the creatures. If things were going to get ugly, they were going to get real ugly, really fast. There came a loud crash of breaking glass from one of the bedrooms down the hallway. Billy and I looked at each other and in seconds we were I our full suits, guns in our hands, running down the hallway. We searched all the rooms except for the master bedroom at the end of hallway. As we stood outside the closed door I turned to Billy and asked. “Want to flip a coin for it?” “You go ahead. You’re supposed to be our fearless leader.” Billy replied. His face unreadable behind his mask all I could see was my own reflection in the mirrored lenses. Shrugging I turned back to the door and reached down with my left hand and grabbed the door knob and slowly turned it. My heart racing in my chest I could feel sweat starting to trickle down my face behind my mask. It was then that I reached a conclusion. Their leader I may be… But ‘Fearless’ I was not.

Chapter 17

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On the other side of the door I could here a noise like the constant buzz of flies. But the noise was much louder and deeper in tone. As if the room on the other side of the door was filled with some kind of machinery. I could feel the knob in my hand vibrate; the noise seemed to get louder as I turned. I didn’t know how smart these things were but I had the feeling they knew we were outside of the door. And they were on the other side waiting for me to open it. I slowly released the doorknob and stepped back from the door. With one hand I motioned Billy to stand back from the door. I leaned back and delivered a solid kick to the center of the door. The doors hinges let go with the sound of splintering wood and the door as a whole flew into the room. What befell our eyes turned the blood in my veins cold. The room was filled almost completely with the creatures. Not one square inch of the room’s walls was visible as the insects there vied for position on the crowded surfaces. Like bees on a honeycomb. The four poster bed in the center of the room seemed to sag under the weight of the creatures. The noise in the room was deafening. As I brought my gun up the creatures in the room seemed to sense my motion. One of them launched itself from one of the walls straight at my face both stingers aimed forwards. Before it reached me I heard Billy’s gun fire and the thing blew apart. Blood and pieces of the creature showered me as my gun joined Billy’s and we entered the room guns firing. One after another they came at us and we blew them away. There were so many that when we fired, not only did we kill the one we shot at, we also killed any behind it. The floor of the room was soon covered with their dead carcasses. And still they came. Over the sound of the creatures I suddenly heard the sound of breaking glass and John’s voice rang out. “I need help in here!” He said. I could hear his weapon firing. “Go help John!” I yelled at Billy as I shot at one of the creatures that were on a post of the bed. Billy spun around and bounded down the hallway heading toward the kitchen at a full run. As he did I focused on the far side of the room and its only window in. I knew that it wouldn’t be long before my weapon ceased too fire and I had to find something to cover that widow. I didn’t have the benefit of storing extra weapons like John and Billy so fifty shots were all I had. If I ran out I would be in trouble.

▬▬▬▬▬ What Billy saw as he ran into the kitchen made his heart skip a beat. John was standing in the same spot that he had been when he and Mojave had started down the hall. But now he stood with a pump action shotgun in his hands firing round after round threw the now shattered glass of the door. At his feet lay empty shell casings and dead blood flies. As Billy reached him he also switched to his own shotgun and began adding his own weapon to the fray. As he looked outside while he fired he saw dead creatures lying on the ground. Their dead carcasses littered the backyard. And yet there seemed to be more and more of them trying to fly into the house. Clusters of them would try to get through and when they tried one round from either shotgun would leave them falling dead to the ground.

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As Billy chambered another round he heard John swear when his firing pin fell on an empty chamber. “Damn, I’m out.” He said as he threw the empty shotgun away from him. He didn’t bother storing the empty weapon because he would have to reload it later anyway. He suddenly had an AK47 in his hand and was firing short bursts through the doorway. Outside the storm raged. Rain was now coming down in sheets and when lightning lit up the darkness Billy noticed that the rain looked to be slowing the creatures down. Their wet wings were losing their lift and they seemed to be struggling to remain airborne. Already there were a few of the creatures not even bothering to fly. They were on the ground now trying to make it into the house on their legs. Both stingers arched up, over their backs. As scary as these creatures were in flight, they looked even more menacing on the ground. In the air they could take down multiple creatures with a single round. But on the ground John and Billy were forced to take out one at a time, eating through their remaining ammo that much faster. In minutes John and Billy were down to firing the pistols that Tory had given them. All the other weapons they had been carrying were now empty and strewn around them on the floor. John suddenly had a concussion grenade in his left hand. His mask disappeared and he put it to his lips he grabbed the pin in his teeth and returned Billy’s head shake with a grin. He lobbed the grenade under handed out the doorway. It should have landed well out onto the lawn but barely five feet out of the doorway it struck the only creature left that wasn’t on the ground. It and the creature it had hit fell to the ground. Seeing what had happened, both men turned to run but it was already too late.

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Looking around the room as I fired I spotted a large armoire in the corner to the left of the door. At six foot wide and eight tall I figured it would suit my needs. As I worked my way to the armoire the bodies of the creatures crunched beneath my feet on the hardwood floor. Reaching the armoire I grabbed it by my left hand and began to drag it to the window. Most of the creatures in the room were now dead but there were a few that were still flying around. Those, I would take a pot shot at just to keep them away from me as I moved the armoire. Finally I reached the far side of the room and slid the armoire in front of the window. It completely covered the opening. No more of those creatures would be coming in through that window at least. I had turned my back to the room as I slid the armoire into place. Something impacted my back hard. I felt something bite my back through my suit again and again. Feeling a burning pain as my flesh was torn from my body. I could feel it trying to sting me through the material of my suit. I reached over my shoulder with my left hand and tried to grab the creature but it couldn’t reach it. I had to do something quick. I spun around and ran straight at the opposite wall. As a reached it I turned and let my back, and the creature on it, take the full impact. The wall shook and gave as I hit. Drywall

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powder showered down my suit and I felt the creature on my back squish flat and relinquish its hold. In the middle of the room only one more of the creatures flew around aimlessly. As I stepped away from the wall I could feel the blood pouring out of my wounds and down my back. The creature must have smelled my blood because it suddenly stopped and hovered in mid flight. As I raised my gun up it headed for me. I pulled the trigger. Nothing! The creature headed straight at my face. I put my weapon ‘away’ and raised both hands to fend off the creature when it neared. My hands were suddenly bare of covering and as the creature reached me two spheres of light shot out from my hands met the creature in flight. It stopped in mid air and hung there motionless. Slowly it started to fall apart. Small particles of itself drifting away and settled to the floor as I watched, within ten seconds all that was left was dust. For a few seconds I just stood there staring at my hands. Not believing what had happened. I turned my thoughts inwards and spoke to Tori. “What just happened?” I asked “Did you do something?” “That was all you Mojave. I can not interact with your world while you hold me in you mind.” She said as I could feel her touch and sooth my troubled mind. “But how was I able to do it?” “I once told you and your companions that I made you three ‘more’ then human. In your case that’s more then true. The DNA that I used to create you was so degraded that I had to combine it with another so that your fetus would be viable. I think that this is where you got this power. There might even be more powers waiting to surface.” I took a moment to let what she said sink in. Finally I asked her a question that begged to be asked. “Who was the other DNA from?” It was Tori’s turn to pause. “The DNA I used was from my maker’s husband. He was the one that I was supposed to bring into your world to save it. He had the strongest powers of all his people. Over time his DNA became degraded and non-viable. So I combined the two DNA’s and here you stand.” “So where does this power come from, my mind?” “No Mojave, no one body can hold all that power. You can only channel it and wield it. You must never hold it for it would kill you from within.” “So where does this ‘power’ come from?” “It comes from the world around you. Your world never took notice of this power all around them. So your civilization invented technologies to help them survive when all around you the power went unused. My world did use this power. Our civilization was based on it and our own technology enhanced it even further. We used that power to shape our very world. Your people have myths and legends that have been based on our civilization. The legend of Camelot and Merlin, of dragons and wizards, in those stories you will find the source of your power.” “And am I supposed to believe that I’m some kind of sorcerer?” “No, Mohave, something much more. All of the people of my time could wield this power to some extent. Some better then others. They were what the people of your time might call Sorcerers, Wizards or Witches. But if you have even half the powers my maker’s husband did the others of your world would call you something else.” “And what would they call me, a freak?” “No Mojave.” She must have felt my distress because the soothing touches in my mind became more frequent. “They would call you a God.” Suddenly, the house shook from an explosion.

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As if god had something to say about that. ▬▬▬▬▬ The explosion threw John and Billy back and away from the door. Billy crashed into the dinning table while John landed hard onto the kitchen floor. Billy lay for a stunned moment in the remains of the table; his ears ringing, nose bleeding from the concussion of the explosion. “Can you give me a hand here Billy?” Something in his voice made Billy scramble to his feet. When Billy looked he discovered John on the floor with a blood fly attached to his chest. The stingers were arched over its back and were taking turns stabbing down at John’s bare face. John evaded the strikes while he held the creatures head away from him. The stench that exuded from the creature’s maw was pungent and made John gag. When he did the creature managed to pierce his right eye. It made a popping sound and John felt warm fluid running down his face. He sat up and tried to pull the creature away from his chest but it clung there with unbelievable strength. Billy reached John in two strides. Without thinking, he reached down with his left hand to grab the creature by its head. When he did it raised its head up and clamped down on his fingers. Startled and in pain he pulled his hand back. It was too late; two of his fingers were gone, blood spurting from the nubs that were left. The creature suddenly released John and headed towards Billy. John fired from the floor at the same time Billy fired at the creature. It blew apart showering both me with blood and tissue. Billy walked to the door cradling his mangled hand in the other and looked out as John got up from the floor. When both men stood side by side they looked at the carnage in the back yard. Not a creature stirred. They were all dead and lay in pieces all over the back yard. Billy turned to look at John’s missing eye and said. “Now I bet I could out shoot you.” Looking from Billy’s grinning face to his missing fingers John replied seriously. “No son… you can’t.”

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It stormed for the better part of two days and while I rested and healed John and Billy kept the house secure from the blood flies. We all had sustained injuries. Billy had lost two

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fingers on his left hand down the gullet of one creature, John had lost his right eye while trying to pull the creature off of Billy’s mangled hand. My back had been shredded to the point where you could see my ribs through my mangled flesh. All of us were well on our way to being completely healed by the time the storm had past. Billy’s fingers were already growing back and almost as long as the previous appendages. John’s eye was also almost grown back in and he said he could see through it but the images were still a little distorted. So, until it was completely healed, he had cut up an old pair of boots he had found in the ranch house and fashioned an eye patch. There was so much tissue that had to be regenerated on my back that I had taken the longest to heal. The new skin on my back was again covering bone and tissue but the skin was extremely tight and painful. Anything that touched it made my shin itch and burn. I sat in a chair on the patio; I stared out across the open desert behind the house, lost in my own thoughts. I had been sitting there for more then an hour when Tori broke her silence after two days. Her soft voice filled my head and calmed my thoughts as she spoke. “I have been thinking Mohave.” “Thinking about what Tori?” I asked. Not really wanting to know but just glad to hear her voice. When she remained silent for extended periods of time I found myself feeling empty and hollow. Almost like a part of me was missing. “I think it best that you send your friends on ahead of you to Tonopah.” “Why do you say that?” I asked, a little surprised that she would suggest separating us. “They will need to go there and wait while you try to discover what powers you possess.” “Why should they have to leave?” “While you learn to use your powers you will put them in danger. No one around you would be safe if something were to go wrong.” “Am I really all that powerful?” “That is what we must find out. I had assumed that you had no powers so I had never taken the time to test you before I sent you out into the world. Now it is imperative that you learn to control your power before we go any further. If we don’t, you could be more of a danger to our cause then anything the entity could throw at us.” “What could happen if I didn’t learn to use this power?” “In my time there was a story about a man who, as a child, was not allowed to use or learn to control his powers by his parents. They belonged to a group of people who decided to turn their backs on the rest of our world and raise their children without the knowledge of the power. They found a remote part of the world and started a colony of their own, far away from civilization. One day, not long after his thirteenth summer, the young boy ran away. He wandered from place to place for years never realizing the vast amount of power his body could wield. One day he came upon a community of what your people would call monks. They brought him into their sect and began to teach him to use his powers. They first taught him to see the power then to reach out and draw it to him. Unfortunately they never got any further. He came down with a sickness. And in the delirium of his fever he began to draw the power into himself. As more and more power poured into him the monks got scared. All but one, a healer, decided to leave and get as far away as possible. The other monk was to stay to see if he could break the fever. The man finally died three nights later. And in his death all the power he had been gathering was released all at once. The blast was felt a thousand miles away. The morning after there was a crater fifty miles across in the landscape.” “So I could do that to my world?” “Worse Mojave, that explosion threw our time into an ice age that lasted a thousand years! Millions of people died.” “One man could do all that?”

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“If he’s strong enough; but not fully trained, someone like that could destroy half the planet.” I decided right then that Billy and John would leave first thing in the morning…. I just hoped that Tonopah would be far enough away.

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Section 2 Trial and Error Chapter 1

The first few days in the house by my self were hard on me. In all my recent memories I had never once been alone. Even with Tori’s ever present voice I still felt all isolated. John and Billy had left me all the food and supplies that they could spare. That along with what was in the pantry of the house would be enough food for over a month. After that I would have to leave in order to find food. On the third morning, at Tory’s request, I had ridden a mountain bike that I had found in the garage out and into the desert about ten miles. She had told me that I had to find a remote spot to learn how use the power because not only was it dangerous but it would hopefully keep anyone that was infected from noticing what was going on. She had assured me that if someone saw me working with the power the entity would immediately recognize what had banished it millennia ago and would take steps to make sure I would never live to reach my full potential. I had chosen a spot between two small mesas to stop and was taking a drink from my canteen when Tori spoke. “Are you ready Mohave?” “Just about Tori.” I said out loud as I screwed the cap back on and hung the canteen back on the handlebars of the bike. I had started talking to Tori out loud since my companions had left. It seemed to ease the loneliness that I felt. I dismounted from the bike and put the kickstand down with my foot. After making sure the bike didn’t fall over on the uneven ground I walked away from the bike and stopped in front of a large rock on the desert floor. “Okay. I’m ready now.” I said. “I want you to look at the landscape around you. Now, close your eyes.” I closed my eyes and stood there waiting for Tory to continue.

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“Remembering what you seen I need you to hold that picture in your mind. Now slowly open your eyes.” I did what she said and slowly opened my eyes to stare at the rock on the ground. “Do you notice anything different?” “No.” “Look harder Mojave. Compare what you see now too the picture you have in you mind.” I closed my eyes again and pictured the area around me and again slowly opened my eyes. I took two steps back in surprise. For as I opened my eyes and compared both images I thought I saw two of everything. Both images seemed to overlap but were slightly off center. Almost like double vision. But the second image was negative of the other. It seemed to glow and move as if the images were trying to meld and form one. It was like the image I held in my mind and the one in front of my eyes were competing for the same space. As I concentrated on what I was seeing I began to notice shimmers like the ones you see coming from hot pavement. The shimmers seemed to come from everything. From the rock and the sage brush that spotted the ground around me. Holding my right hand in front of my face I discovered that even I had a faint glow. “What you see Mojave is the power in you and in every single thing. The power is what holds this universe together. The next step is to find out if you can control this power. What you did back at the house was child’s play. You used the power you have in your own body to dispatch that creature. Now you’re going to try to reach and hold on to a power that can destroy or create, to kill or heal. It is a great responsibility Mojave. Once you take hold of it you can never go back to being just human. Are you ready to take the next step?” Still looking at my glowing hands I slowly replied. “If I do this what happens to the rest of my world?” “If all goes well, then you will have brought what your people would think of as magic back into your world.” “And if it doesn’t?” “Then your time ends. Along with your world, just as mine did.” Looking up from my hands I thought of my friends and of a future without people like them. That was a future that I had to keep from coming true. No matter what the cost. “Then I’m ready Tori.” I said with determination. “Good Mojave,” Tori’s voice in my mind sounded pleased. “Now I want you to concentrate on the power before you. Keep concentrating until what you see becomes one picture. And you can see the power separate from everything else.” I concentrated so hard on what I was seeing that I started to sweat. Not just in places that normally sweat, but all over, all at once. In moments I was completely drenched. As if I had gone for a swim with all my clothes on. Suddenly my vision cleared and I could see the boulder and sagebrush around me with crystal clarity. But there was something more. The shimmering waves were more visible. They seemed to dance around everything, on everything. As if they were alive and happy that someone had finally noticed them. “These ‘sprites’ are the manifestation of the power.” Tori continued. “If you concentrate you can bring them to and into yourself. One at a time Mojave, when I tell you to stop you must stop. Just remember the story I told you earlier.” I did remember the story. So I concentrated on one ‘spite’ willing it to me. To my surprise the one I was focused on paused in its never ending dance. Then it slowly came to me. As it reached me I had to resist an urge to step back and away from it. It stopped only inches from the toes of my hiking boots. “Why did it stop?” I asked “You are stopping it from entering you. You must open yourself to the power in order for it to enter.”

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“You make it sound as if it’s alive.” “Mojave,” Tori said in a motherly tone. “You have to realize that ‘everything’ is alive, in one way or another. The power you see before you and all like it are the original creators of this universe. They made the planets and the stars and everything that has ever made up life as you know it. And even more life that you don’t. You must trust in it for it has always been here. It’s always been a part of you. Just allow it to come into you and you will see the truth.” Trusting in her words I looked at the sprite and forced myself to relax. After a few moments it began again to move forward until it merged into my legs and disappeared. A feeling of euphoria raced threw me. For the first time in my short life I felt whole and complete. As if I had found something that I should have always had a part of me. Raising my right hand I could almost see the sprite there underneath my skin. Waiting to be released and used as a tool or a weapon. “Now, you must gather more to you. As you do hold your hand away from you and concentrate on making the power manifest into a ball in your hand.” Doing as she said I began to draw more sprites to me. One by one they entered me. As they did I concentrated on my upturned palm. Soon a small glowing ball appeared floating inches above my palm. Slowly the ball grew and soon it was two feet around. Minute after minute more sprites entered me and the ball grew larger. Tori spoke in a dire tone. “Mojave, you must stop. If you continue, you will lose control and all that power will destroy you. ” “How do I stop this?” I asked as I stared at the glowing ball which had grown to be fifteen feet around. I could feel the power increasing by the second. And still the sprites entered me. “You must try to ignore the sprites. Just try to forget their there. And they will stop.” I did as she said and in moments the sprites stopped moving to me and continued their dance. I was left holding the glowing sphere which now seemed to be coming apart. Sparks flew from the top and, from a cloudless, sky lightning rushed down to meet them. I found myself at ground zero of a thunder crack, the sound so loud the loose soil of the desert floor shook. Scared and deaf I heard Tori speak in my mind. “You must release the power or it will kill you Mojave. You must direct it away from you before it becomes more unstable.” I looked for anything close to me that i could direct the sphere at. From boulder to sagebrush my eyes wondered until they came to rest on the mesa to my right. I had found my target now how was I supposed to ‘direct’ it away from me? Tori must have been listening to my thoughts for she answered my question for me. “Push it gently with your mind Mojave. Push it too hard and it might come apart on you.” Glancing up at the sphere that now dwarfed me I concentrated on pushing it gently away from me and towards the mesa. It suddenly rocketed away from me, pulling me forward and into its wake on its way toward the mesa. As I fell to my knees I watched in slow motion as it hit the mesa a quarter mile away. The sphere hit the mesa dead center and the mesa seemed to swell in size. Not knowing what to expect next I threw both arms up to cover my face as I hit the ground. Seconds later the world tried to shake itself apart. The ground seemed to come alive beneath me and I was thrown high into the air and I could feel my ribs on my left side break as I hit the ground, hard. Debris and dust pelted me from above as I lay on my side gasping for breath. A large piece of the mesa around forty feet across landed near me and I was again tossed high into the air. Though, this time I came down into a pocket of brush that broke my fall. When the dust finally cleared and I had extricated myself from the brush I stood and assayed the damage.

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In awe I stood with my mouth wide open. The mesa was no longer there. In its place was a crater two hundred feet deep and a mile across. All around me boulders that used to be part of the mesa were strewn in a circular pattern away from the crater. Every bush and cacti in my vicinity were uprooted and lying on their sides, flattened by the concussion. “You did good Mojave.” Tori said quietly. Looking all around at the destruction I had wrought I said. “This is a ‘good’ job? I just blew up a whole mountain!” “Yes. But you didn’t kill yourself in the process.” Rubbing my broken ribs I replied. “Did I do something wrong?” “On the contrary, you did everything right. Better then I expected.” “I thought you were going to teach me how to use this power slowly. One thing at a time is what you said.” Spitting out the dust and saliva in my mouth that was trying to become mud, I continued. “So why did I cause this much damage?” “You are much stronger then I had imagined Mojave. What you did today on you first try was better then the strongest of my time could do after years of training. Most it would have taken at least weeks to just be able to see the power. After that it would have taken months to produce a sphere five inches across.” Worried I asked. “Am I as strong as the man in your story?” “More so Mojave, if we don’t get you safely trained; and something were to happen to you, like the man in the story, there’s a chance you could destroy the entire planet.” “That doesn’t make me feel much better.” “I’m sorry Mojave. You’re an enigma. Your DNA is half from my time and half from your own. By all rights you should not be stronger then the people of my time. But you are. And that means you carry a greater responsibility then anyone from my time or yours.” “What ‘responsibility’ are you talking about?” “For the first time in the history of our world one man holds the life of all others in his hands. Do you know what that makes you Mojave?” “No.” “It makes you, truly, your brother’s keeper.” Still looking around at all the destruction I answered dryly. “If only I can ‘keep’ from killing all of them.” ▬▬▬▬▬▬ Forty miles away Billy and John lay on the ground on top of a small hill that overlooked Tonopah. John was staring at the city through the scope mounted on a 303-British. A World War II sniper rifle that he swore was so accurate that he could shoot a bird off a power line at a mile away. Billy had seen him use this rifle many times before and if John said it could, Billy was of no mind to argue. Anything this old man shot with he was uncannily accurate. No matter what he was shooting with or at he always hit his target. They had taken their time getting there, searching abandoned houses along the way to replace the supplies that they had left Mojave. They had arrived outside Tonopah the previous evening and had set up camp three miles away, had hiked in the pre-dawn hours to their current position overlooking the city. The current residents had erected watch towers every three hundred feet around the entire perimeter of the town and had also built roadblocks at every road access into the city. In order to enter the town you had to pass through a check point guarded buy heavily

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armed men. Also at every checkpoint John could see 60 caliber machine guns on turrets surrounded by sandbags. “Looks like a good place to hold up while we wait for Mojave to catch up to us.” John said to Billy as he eased back from the top of the hill on his belly and stood up. Billy eased himself back and stood to face John, brushing the dust from his clothing. John had discarded his eye patch the previous day and he now stood returning Billy’s gaze through both of his steel grey eyes. “I still don’t like leaving Mojave back there alone. He might need our help.” Billy said. He had almost turned back a couple of times in the last two days. And would have had not John talked him out of it. “Easy there Billy, We’ve been through this already. Mojave wanted us gone in order to protect us. If we go back we could put him in danger as well as ourselves.” John said as he turned and headed back down the hill towards their camp. Falling into step behind John; Billy followed in silence, his eyes wondering towards the west in the direction of his friend. As they reached the bottom of the hill and headed in the general direction of their camp Billy and John stopped in mid stride, a feeling coming over both men. “John?” Billy asked as he noticed that John now, too, looked west. “Mojave…” John said his voice just above a whisper. Off in the distance a rumble started, as it reached them, the sound was deafening. They could feel the ground shake beneath their feet. A few moments later, in the distance, what looked to be a mushroom cloud of dust and debris rose. Both men knew what had just happened was caused by their friend. And both men instinctually knew that Mojave was okay. John turned to face Billy. “Still want to go back?” he asked Billy slowly shook his head, still watching the mushroom cloud rise. After a moment he turned to look at John and asked. “Do you think anyone noticed?” “I’m sure someone did. I just hope that ‘it’ didn’t.” John replied. The worry clearly expressed in his tone. “And if ‘it’ did?” John turned back to watch the rising cloud. “Then I hope we are far enough away when whatever it sends after Mojave finds him. Because when it does I get the feeling we had better be in a different state.” Nodding towards the rising cloud in the distance, he continued. “It’ll come for him, sure enough.” ▬▬▬▬▬▬

A thousand miles away, deep underground the entity stirred. It had seen what had happened, sensed the power unleashed, through the eyes of one of its hosts. Inside of it emotions raged unchecked. It feared the power that it felt. It had lived millennia and taken many worlds under its control. Even though many had put up a fight it had been to no avail. The entity had crushed those worlds with impunity, all except for this one. The last time it had come through it had been beaten and hurt by the inhabitants of that time. Though it had cost them their lives, they had succeeded where no other had before.

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They had hurt it and thrust it back to the world from whence it had come and closed the doorway. It had never faced the power they wielded against it before. Never before had it felt the kind of pain inflicted on it on any of the other worlds. They had hurt it and the fear had turned to anger long ago. So it had waited millennia for a new doorway to be opened so that it could take its revenge on this world and its inhabitants. To its surprise it had discovered that the people of this world had lost the knowledge to use this power. So it had been acting with impunity and going about its business without a care, until now. Though it felt fear it also had something it did not have before. For when it was burned by the power it gained something. It had gained the ability to see the power. And, over time, it had learned to use it. This world would fall. The entity had no doubts about that. And when the one with the power came he would have a surprise waiting for him… But first a test Reaching out across the miles with its mind, and through the open doorway to its world it summoned them. And they came.

Chapter 2 That night I dreamed. I dreamed I was standing on the edge of the crater looking down at the bottom where something dark and sinister called to me. ‘Come to me’ the darkness called. “I know you.” I replied unafraid. ‘Let go of your life and your free will.’ “Why would I want to do that?” ‘It is the way of things. Your people fight for their freedom and yet, deep inside, they want someone or something to control their lives and give them guidance. I offer all of that and to give their lives meaning.’ “You offer them nothing but slavery and death!” I said. The anger welling up in me, threatening to overwhelm me. ‘Your people are mine. As such I will do with them what I please.’ “I will stop you. And I will send you back to that hell you call your world.” ‘First, you must help your friends.’ “What about my friends?” I was startled. How did this thing know about my friends? ‘I read your thoughts as you slept. I was planning on sending my creations to you, to destroy you. But when I came across the memories of your friends I decided to go after

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them first. You sent them away to protect them, but you only put them in harms way. Their deaths are going to be on your hands.’ Sudden calmness settled over me. “No.” I said softly. “I have changed my mind. I won’t send you back to your world.” ‘You will give yourself to me to save your friends?’ The entity sounded hopeful. “I’m not going to send you back. Because there won’t be enough of you left to send back.” ‘So, you plan to fight me?’ “No.” I said as I looked down to the bottom of the crater. The darkness there seemed to seethe and boil as if alive. ‘Then what will you do? You are but one man. What harm could you do to me?’ “I am more than ‘one man’.” I said thinking of the DNA that made me who I was. And I thought of Tori whom I held in my mind. “And ‘we’ are going to kill you” The darkness rushed up in anger from the bottom of the crater. I could almost smell its fear. ▬▬▬▬▬▬ I awoke standing on the edge of the crater with the morning sun beginning to rise in the east. I had no idea how I had got there but was relieved to discover that it was all a dream. “It wasn’t a dream Mojave.” Tori’s soft voice spoke in my mind. Startled, I stepped back from the craters edge, speaking out loud. “It was real?” “Yes. The entity came to you in your dream, much the same way as I did.” “How could it?” “That’s the problem. It takes knowledge of the power to do something like this. And, if the entity has learned to use this power then we are all in trouble.” “Will I be able to stop it now?” I asked. Not liking the idea that the entity now possessed the same abilities that I was just learning to use. “I have no idea Mojave. But will need the help of both Billy and John. You must reach them in time or they will be lost for good.” “Oh damn, I forgot about Billy and John.” I said, looking from the crater to the desert that surrounded me on all sides. “How am I supposed to get too them? I am miles from anywhere.” “You will get there the same way you got from the house too here.” “What kind of answer is that?” Sometimes I really hated the way Tori spoke in riddles. She must have sensed my distress because her soothing touch was again easing my troubled thoughts. “Now listen closely Mojave and I will explain the other aspects of your powers. Powers beyond what you could ever imagine.” As if in a trance I stood there and listened to her. As she talked I came to realize something. What I had told the entity in my dream was true. Someday, I was going to kill it. Nothing that evil should have that kind of power. In the sky, dark clouds began to form.

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Chapter 3 Billy and John were granted entrance to Tonopah with no trouble. They had wandered and learned their way around town for two days and had took up residence in an abandoned house on the side of town from which Mojave was expected to come from. They could see the check point through the bay window in the living room. John came out of the hallway to find Billy asleep on a ratty looking sofa in the living room. It was getting late in the day and both men were expected to attend a party in their honor tonight at the towns civic center. They had been told that it was becoming a tradition to throw a party for any survivors though their seemed to be less found as the months past. Two showing up on their own was cause for the whole population to celebrate. John walked across the room and kicked the base of the couch and said. “Wake up ‘sleeping beauty’ your going to be late for our own party.” Billy opened one eye to look at his tormenter. “Just trying to get some beauty sleep,” Billy said as he sat up rubbing the sleep from his eyes. “You should try it sometime.” John stepped back from the couch to allow Billy space to stand up. Watching him John replied. “Hell, I’m pretty enough after what Tory did to us. I was just getting used to the fact that I was getting old. Now look at me,” He said as he spun around in a pirouette, arms half raised. He stopped facing Billy and struck a body builders pose, both arms flexing to show of his substantial biceps. Billy just stood there shaking his head in disbelief. “What?” John said as he relaxed his pose. Still shaking his head Billy responded. “I think your going through ‘another’ mid life crisis.” He said with a chuckle. “Nope, I’m just a man with ‘needs’.” John poked a finger into the center of Billy’s chest and looked up into the taller mans face, a grin spreading across his features. “And right now I ‘need’ the company of the opposite sex. And I swear, if you don’t start getting ready I’m going to go around town spreading rumors that we’re a couple!” “You wouldn’t!” Billy said in shock, now looking at his friend as if he were now a stranger. “Ah yes…my young friend,” his smile disappeared “I would.” As Billy made his way quickly past John heading down the hallway in a hurry now to get ready John stepped to the window and looked past the checkpoint and off into the distance. He could just make out dark clouds in the distance. Not just dark but black as night. He thought he even seen lightning rolling along the outside edges of the clouds. Remembering what happened the last time it stormed when the three of them were at the house John hoped that Mojave would find safe haven somewhere out of harms way. Rubbing his newly rejuvenated eye John said a silent prayer. As he turned away from the window he said to an empty room. “Stay out of the storm Mojave.” Little did he know that Mojave wasn’t trying to stay out of the storm…. At that moment in time Mojave ‘was’ the storm.

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I stood in the middle of what only could be described as the base of a tornado. All around me the walls spun, becoming darker as the circular winds sucked up dirt and debris from the desert floor. Through the dark clouds I could see lightning striking all around. I knew that I was safe as long as I stayed put in the center of the funnel. The storm had come up suddenly. Not in minutes as it sometimes happens in the desert. But in ‘moments’ the wind had picked up and dark clouds formed high above my head. And if it hadn’t been for Tori’s warning I knew I would have been dead and now food for the blood flies. At Tori’s first warning I erected a wall of energy around me and I had to concentrate to hold the wind and lightning at bay. I had been standing in the same spot for half an hour when Tori’s voice spoke in my head. I could barely hear her, let alone my own thoughts, over the roar of the wind. “I don’t think this is a normal storm Mojave.” “I could have told you that.” “I think the entity is trying to keep you from saving your friends. It wants you to lose them and in turn lose hope. If you lose hope you will belong to it. You must find a way to break free of this storm or your friends are dead.” “If you have any ideas I could really use one right now.” “I have nothing I could come up with that would help you. In this you’re on your own. There has never been a person who could handle the amount of power that you have. And now the entity seems to be able to come after you with as much if not more power. You are the only one who could get yourself out of this situation. I am sorry Mojave.” Not bothering to reply I began to concentrate on the churning clouds. I had to find a way out and nothing was going to stop me. If the entity could cause a storm like this what could I do to stop it? I suddenly noticed that the area of spinning wall of clouds that my eyes had been concentrating on had started to spin slowly in the opposite direction. Then I had an epiphany. If the entity could cause this storm then I could make another, but one spinning the opposite way. From the inside out I was going to try to blow this storm apart. I began to draw power into myself and directing it into the air just inside the spinning clouds. At first there was little reaction. I could just barely make out where the air began to spin counter clockwise as it began to pick up dust from the ground. It didn’t look like much, just a little whirlwind with me at its center. More and more power I fed into it. Soon I had a full fledged tornado, its funnel stretching up above my head and disappearing into the dark clouds. Where my wall of spinning air touched the other the static electricity would discharge, trapping the lightning between the two walls. Releasing the wall of energy that had kept me safe I put my full attention to making my tornado spin faster and faster. Feeding it more and more energy it soon became almost visibly solid. But I held it in place not wanting to release it until I was sure it was ready. I again put up a wall of energy. But this one was inside my own spinning tornado. Now it was time to see if my idea would work. In a split second I stopped pumping power into it and released my hold on it. I watched my creation swell in size and break out of the outer circle and expand out in all directions at once. Clearing the air as it went. Above me there was clear night sky with the stars shining brightly. As I watched the clouds were forced away and broke apart in the distance. Whatever power the entity had used to form the storm dissipated with the clouds. I looked at my surroundings. The area around the circle in which I stood was scorched and smoking from all of the lightning strikes. Some spots in the sand were heated to a point where the sand had fused to form glass. I could see little patches of it all around, the

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reflective surfaces mirroring the stars in the sky. Looking out in the distance, the desert floor was a sea of light. “You did good Mohave.” Tori said “Now what?” I asked. “Are we to late to save the others?” “I don’t know. All we can do is try.” I walked the thirty feet back to the edge of the crater and looked down. Out loud I said. “As soon as I save my friends I’m coming after you. This I swear.”

─────── In its lair the entity writhed in pain. Again it had been hurt by this arrogant species. When the other had broken apart the storm the entity had been trying to put more power into it. The backlash had been bad. It had erected a barrier around itself but not before it was severely burned. Now it burned in a different way. It wanted revenge. It hated the other more then all of the other of its species. In the darkness it made itself a promise. To the darkness it said. “After I take care of your friends Mohave I’m coming after you…This I swear.”

Chapter 4

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