Rise of Aen (31 page)

Once encased, the ship rose from its long slumber and came clear of the sand and rock which had long held it in a blanketed embrace as the hull moaned and creaked with the effort. The very depths of the ocean were lit up with an unnatural light and the ship at the center began to shimmer as the local marine life vegan to flee from the area. Bolts of electricity danced from the bubble inwards; striking the Amarra’s hull and caressing it before dissipating completely. First this event started out with the odd strike, but as the seconds ticked by it increased until the ship was barely visible in the storm of lightning. Then, as if it couldn’t get any more breathtaking, an explosion of energy occurred at the epicenter of the bubble and it collapsed on itself in an instant; the Amarra was gone and the water rushed in to fill the
void.

Total darkness returned slowly to the depths, but the bedrock was still glowing brilliantly as it was cooled by the sea which sought to reclaim its dark serenity. The cataclysm below created a massive new crater and let loose tidal waves on the ocean surface. Magnetic resonance left behind by the jump would scar the planet`s EM field for the rest of time, the main reason that inner atmosphere jumps were prohibited by Imperial law. This section of the ocean would be nearly impossible to navigate in the future. The move had been done in sheer desperation for the survival of the planet but the consequences would scar the Earth for
eternity.

Lyarran Vessel Dark Light, Uncharted Space -
Four Months and Nine Days until Arrival

“The sensors show what?” Lyxia was in shock. She had turned in for the night to rest as the daily grind of staring at the nothingness of jump space. Her ship, the Dark Light, was hurtling towards Terra Sol using the faster-than-light travel known as jumping. Huge gravity distortion bubbles were created by massive fusion reactors to essentially warp the universe around the ship itself. Defying all logic, the ship became a single point in time and space as the rest of the matter was flung past it at astronomical speeds. And travelling at faster than light meant there was none to see; it was dark and lonely and took its toll on each and every being on the
cruiser.

But now she had been awakened from her much needed rest with perplexing news. The Empire had scattered a network of probes and sensors throughout the known galaxy to gather and transmit data in real time across her reaches. Ships in jump space would often drop out randomly to tap into the data stream, much as in the way a submarine would surface to receive orders and updates. The Dark Light had just done one of these drop-outs and what they learned shook them all to the
core.

“Terra Sol sensors recorded a jump in atmosphere, four kilometers below the ocean surface, to be exact. I’ve checked and rechecked the data for validity before resuming course.” Lyxia’s top lieutenant Onai looked slightly scared to continue her thoughts, but after a moment hesitation she did. “Why would anyone do that? It’s beyond
insane!”

Lyxia grabbed the data pad from her and began to study it. The Husk Harvester had entered the solar system and was just about to pass the outmost planetary body called “Pluto” by the
humans.

“What is our timeline for arrival?” she asked
quietly.

“We have lost a bit of time with some drop-outs; maybe eighty-six days out; maybe
more.”

Eighty six days. Lyxia wondered what would be left of this beautiful planet by the time they arrived. History had not been kind to races enslaved by the Husk and most had fallen rather quickly when they
arrived.

“What of the Empress and her armed escorts; how far behind us are they?” Lyxia braced herself. Given the fuss the Guild would make about the Empress rushing out to the rim to face an age old enemy, she doubted they would even arrive to see the hull of the Dark Light still burning from the suicide mission they were
on.

“At last reported, they were to arrive three to four days after us.” Onai let loose a sigh of frustration. “We are going to die out there, aren’t we Council?” she asked with a resolution in her
gaze.

“Maybe we are; and if we do, we will die gloriously and the gods will be pleased. But I have to think that we will
triumph.”

“Why?”

“Because of this.” Lyxia waved the data pad in front of her long-time friend. “Because I believe this to be the work of the Harbinger the prophets heralded; the power it would take to jump a ship that has been dead for two thousand years is beyond measure and I think it is something the Husk haven’t accounted for. Not only does this creature possess a Lyarran vessel with a full armory, but he has an unorthodox way of doing things. The Husk are in for the fight of their lives and I believe they might very well be on the defensive when we arrive. Either way, my friend, in eighty-six days we will be a part of
history.”

She dismissed her lieutenant with a nod, Onai’s confidence in the mission restored. Lyxia’s door closed as she reviewed the data once more. Her thoughts turned back to the Council session when he had appeared. Never before had she been so captivated by a being, never before had she been so taken aback by a plea for help. He had looked at her with such passion in his eyes, so much sorrow and pain, and had reached down into her soul and touched
her.

She lay back down on the bed and closed her eyes to rest. As she drifted off to sleep, her dreams were haunted by his eyes—the deep pull of those dark eyes with the ring of blue flame encircling them. Her heart began to yearn for him, for a being she had never met in person. Instead of fighting the feeling, Lyxia fell further into the dark well and lost herself. Feelings of warmth and caring surrounded her in her sleep. Soon she would see the Harbinger and look into those eyes in person; soon she would meet her
destiny.

Groom Lake Military Installation –
Code Name Area 51, Nevada -
Four Months and Nine Days until Arrival

All around the planet everyone and everything felt the reverberations of the Amarra’s awakening—whether it was by feeling the ground shudder or nausea from the Earth’s magnetic field being tampered with. Animals, birds and insects all reacted in near hysterics for an instant; their bodies being more in tune with the planet then humans made the effects of this event more painful to them. For a moment, the peacefulness of the planet was broken by minor chaos. All Earth’s inhabitants knew something had happened, but none knew what it was. When scholars looked back on this day, they would be able to pinpoint that this was the moment that mankind should have known that something dangerous loomed
ahead.

General Patterson was one of the few that knew about this danger, but he too scrambled to figure out what this shockwave of energy was that encircled the globe. Within thirty minutes of the event, the scientists at Groom Lake had pinpointed it to an ordinary and empty part of the Pacific Ocean which raised more questions than it answered. Coupled with the incoming transmission from Aen, he had little doubt this was something he wouldn’t find an answer to until he needed
to.

It was an odd email that his newfound but cautious ally had sent him. There was no “sent from” address with it, only a multitude of adapted strategies and suggestions to put in place before the enemy arrived. Along with this, there was a mention of alien weapons that would be dispersed to his location to better assist in the fight to come along with a “how to” manual for usage of the weapons which he immediately turned his attention
to.

There were no bullets or projectiles to use; these were energy-based weapons with a finite power supply that launched plasma rounds. The schematics were all included so that the scientists could get to work reverse engineering them as to resupply the power cells to the front line and to replicate the weapons—all of which Patterson was unsure would happen in time. Before all this had happened, he had received a similar email containing nothing but coordinates for a telescope and without hesitation they had sent orders out and aimed their military satellites and controlled telescopes at the proposed destination and looked upon death itself: the Husk ship. The sheer size of it astounded and frightened all those in the new Earth Alliance bunker out in Area 51, as the leaders of each country’s military looked on at the true reality of
horror.

The Husk vessel was near to Pluto; and while not technically a planet any longer, it was dwarfed by the massive hulk of the ship passing by it and casting a sinister shadow upon its cold surface. Patterson himself could only imagine what kind of invading army lay within this structure and shuddered to think of what horrors it would unveil when they
arrived.

“We are so fucked,” he muttered, so no one else could hear—although others in the room were saying similar things. The task was thought to be difficult enough when they first heard of the alien craft on its way, but now seeing what they were up against it seemed near impossible. How could they ever hope to win against this? Time stood still as all in the war room were paralyzed with this one question. There was nowhere to run or hide from this, and no clear answer to whether or not they would
survive.

Himalayan Mountains, Mount Kailash, Tibet -
Three Months and Twenty Six Days until Arrival

It had been more than a month and a half since they had arrived at the monastery, but Sara continued to struggle with her own emotional state after her breakdown at the gates. Reality in a way seemed twisted and her sense of normality was gone. There were no friends to go hang out with, no work to absorb herself in and no Facebook or Twitter to get lost in as time ticked closer to the end. She couldn’t shake the thoughts of all her friends and everyone else she knew dying when the aliens came; her nightmares were full of this and
more.

And just as she seemed to get her feet on solid ground, the solid ground moved like liquid this morning, leaving her just as shaken as before as well as sick to her stomach. But this time, the rest of the little colony felt it as well. A few of the monks even doubled over to throw up on the ground. It was as though, for a second, the entire planet moved awkwardly and shifted. She noticed even the birds were very agitated from this incident as they chirped loudly at anything around
them.

Sara herself simply sat down on a large boulder at the side of the path that jutted out from the mountain beneath as she was unsure if anything else was safe to be on. To her, it was like having vertigo during an earthquake; everything seemed wrong with no explanation why. She remained seated there for over an hour afterwards, waiting for everything to be right again. When the birds had calmed down and the ants resumed their quests in the sand, she too got herself to her feet and walked slowly and carefully to the
temple.

At the rim of the great crater in which this temple resided, she paused and looked sheepishly at the steps winding down to the basin. After feeling what should have been unmovable and solid rock beneath her feet turn to Jell-O, Sara hesitated to make the trip down these rock stairs to the awaiting temple doors in fears of falling; it was more than two or three stories down and she was still shaken from
earlier.

After much debate in her mind, Sara started the climb down towards her “bed” of sorts, so she could rest her head and lose the woozy feeling. It seemed like an eternity to descend the stairwell; one by one she carefully took each step until she was all the way at the bottom. When she looked up, her head swam again in a wave of dizziness and she quickly looked down and rushed inside to lie down. Whatever was going on had to be linked to the alien craft that was speeding towards them, but her head was far too fuzzy to even begin to solve this mystery. Her best option was rest and to leave this for
tomorrow.

Lyarran Vessel Amarra, Southern Pacific -
Three Months and Twenty Six Days until Arrival

He sat there in the darkness in a mild state of shock. The energy his body had expended left him feeling weak and lightheaded. His heart beat slowly and steadily, and he began to feel calm once more. The ceramic like plating of the reactor chamber was still warm; he could feel it on his skin. The troubling part was that Aen sat four feet away from his own body, lying face down at the bottom of the
chamber!

Looking at his hands, he could see that he was almost ghost-like; there but not really there. The pressure of the chamber on his physical body was constant, something he could even feel from within this ethereal form—somehow he was still connected to it. Closing his eyes, he began to concentrate on being back in his body, but to no avail. For some reason he was on a different plane, he just had to figure it
out.

“Do not panic my child, it is not permanent.” A female voice sang to him from the darkness. It was instantly recognizable as the one he had heard leading the Grand Council meeting; it was the Empress
herself.

“Your body was pushed to an extreme and in doing so you thrust your essence right out of its host.” She continued as she began to appear from the dark; looking like an apparition as he did. “But you have yet to even tap into your potential and you have so far yet to go to realize
it.”

“I have no time to study and learn, your majesty; there is a war coming to our front door, if you haven’t
noticed.”

“Yes, Terra Sol will burn, but it will not fall. But you sit on the precipice of a new life—you are no longer human and yet not of Lyarran dissent either. What sits before me is a creature unlike any the universe has ever seen; you, my dear Aen, are
unique.”

“And how does that uniqueness help me now?” Aen retorted in anger. “My life is gone; my family stolen from me. How does this help me?” He motioned to the body lying before
him.

She let him spill his anger out and looked at him with kindness and love. Her intense beauty began to soothe his frayed nerves; a trait she had perfected over time, no doubt. Smiling, she glanced down upon his form and began to
answer.