The Awakening (The Hyperscape Project Book 1)

by Donald Swan

With a nod from Arya, Karg kicked in the heavy door and they all stormed into the building. They came to an abrupt stop just inside the shadowy doorway, all of them listening intently for any sign of movement. But only an eerie silence greeted them.

  The dreary room was filled with an array of strange, dusty gizmos and apparatuses. Arya scanned the area for signs of life, but just as before, there seemed to be nothing alive. Fanning out around the dark room, they searched for the source of energy concealed there. Through the dark cluttered rows they crept. Shadows cast from their gun-mounted lights danced through the odd assortment of objects and across the floor, making the whole scene even creepier.

  Nick’s heart felt like it was in a race as it thumped away at higher than normal speed. This was too much like being in one of those horror movies where someone or something was about to jump out of the shadows and eat him. A sudden tug on Nick’s arm sent him into a frenzy. He spun around, screaming like a little girl. “Aghhh!”

  The light from his gun landed on the face of a monster. Rows of razor sharp teeth gleamed in the light as the beast lunged toward him. Nick jerked away, plunging backward as he fired two rounds point-blank into the hairy creature. Unable to break his backward momentum, Nick fell on the floor, the creature landing squarely on top of him. He struggled under the stout beast and fired a few more rounds into the monster’s chest as he screamed for help. “Help! Karg! Something’s got m—”

  Just then he heard the low roar of Karg’s laugh. The deep guttural chuckle snapped Nick out of his panic. Nick opened his eyes to look at the creature on top of him. It wasn’t moving. He felt no pain. Perhaps he’d killed it before it could hurt him. As he looked up from beneath the thing, there stood Karg, his light illuminating the hideous beast.

  Karg reached down and picked the hairy thing off of Nick and pushed it upright.

  Nick stared at it, confused for a moment. The damn thing was stuffed! A trophy, perhaps? It looked sort of like a grizzly bear. A grizzly with a Pacman-like mouth containing a hundred pointed teeth. No, maybe it was more like an ape. Whatever kind of beast it was, it sure looked scary as hell.

  Nick studied the oddity as he got up and dusted off his pant leg. The eight foot tall beast stood ominously on its wooden base, its long claws reaching out into the darkness. The damn thing’s claw must have snagged on his vest, and he had pulled it over on himself when he tried to run.

  Nick shrugged and glanced around, too embarrassed to say a word. He figured Karg wouldn’t let him live this one down any time soon. He’d be getting plenty of grins from the crew when he got back to the ship.

  “Over here!”Arya yelled. “The readings are coming from this device.”

  The two rushed forward, stumbling through the cramped row of equipment as they followed Arya’s voice. They found her standing over a strange device which sat atop a table in the center of the room. A corpse lay face down on the table, one emaciated hand still holding something attached to the device.

  Nick carefully studied the apparatus in the dead alien’s hand. “It looks like…. A dead man’s switch! We have to get out of here!” he exclaimed.

  Arya rolled her eyes. “Relax, the device has already been triggered. It’s not a bomb or any kind of weapon. It seems to be more like an energy storage device of some kind. Maybe they were hoping someone would spot the energy signature and come to help them.”

  Arya reached down to flip open a cover on top of the device.

  Nick automatically reached out to stop her, but it was too late.

  A green glow radiated outward from a crystal embedded within the unusual device, illuminating the faces of the team as they leaned in to take a look.

  “Alright, we’ve looked. Are we done? Can we go now?” Nick said nervously.

  “Wait, I want to take this back for study. Round up the papers on the table so we can translate them,” Arya commanded of Nick. “Karg, grab this thing and let’s get back to the ship.”

  Nick pulled the pile of papers together, glancing curiously at the diagrams and alien writing as he quickly stuffed them into his tactical backpack.

  The three left the creepy, equipment-laden room, and headed back down the path to the transport.

  Arya’s scanner suddenly emitted an odd beeping sound. She pulled it out of the pouch on her hip, and with a quick glance at the screen, stopped dead in her tracks. “Sket!”

  Tension soared as the team surveyed the landscape in front of them, looking for any sign of impending doom. Nothing but silence in every direction. Not even the buzz of a single insect broke the eerie quiet of the foggy, alien forest. The unnatural lack of noise had Nick’s nerves on edge from the moment he’d stepped onto the planet.

  “What is it?” Nick whispered.

  “I’m not sure. This distortion is playing havoc with the scanner. I think it could be…. Dragorans! They must have found the transport.” Arya looked over at the alien device Karg was carrying. “They’ll be able to track the energy source to us. Maybe we can use that to our advantage. Get back to the village.”

  The fog rolled in thick as the team reached the courtyard of what was presumably the town square. Karg placed the energy device at the center of the square and ran for cover.

  Arya removed her com-badge and placed it behind the device.

  “What are you doing?” Nick asked, perplexed.

  “I’m using the scanner to configure the com-badge.” She continued pressing buttons on the onscreen keyboard as she spoke. “I need it to amplify the energy signature being emitted from the device.”

  Nick gave her a confused look. “Won’t that help them find us faster?”

  “Yes. And no. The added signal strength should help to mask our bio-readings in all of this background interference, making it harder for them to pinpoint our location. We better hide, they should be here soon.” Arya put her scanner back in its holster and motioned to a nearby building and the second floor vantage point it offered. Without so much as a glance at Nick, she turned and went off in the opposite direction.

  Nick made his way to the second floor balcony that Arya had pointed to, and waited for the advancing enemy. “Why is it I can never get a break?” Nick muttered to himself. From the minute he’d popped into this part of the universe, people had been shooting at him. It would be nice to have one day that his life wasn’t in imminent danger.

  Feeling frustrated, scared, and even…dammit…a little hungry for a good old American cheeseburger, he pushed his back into the dark corner of the balcony and waited. He was barely settled in before a small pebble smacked him right between the eyes and landed at his feet. “Ouch!” The whack in the head snapped Nick out of his daydream. Glancing up, he saw an annoyed Arya trying to get his attention from the rooftop across the square. Arya threw her hands up and then pointed to a nearby alleyway. She was signaling the approach of the Dragoran troops. He leaned forward and peered down vigilantly from his second floor hiding place.

  Within moments, a group of three Dragorans cautiously approached between two of the buildings at the edge of the square, pausing momentarily to assess the situation. Nick was finally able to get a look at these reptilian aliens. They were just as big as he had been told, with hard scaly skin that looked even tougher than a gator’s hide.

  “I’ll be damned, they’re…red.” The reports he’d seen hadn’t mentioned their color. He expected them to be greenish or brown like an alligator, but they were big, bright-red reptiles. They stuck out like a sore thumb.

  The lead Dragoran stood like a confident warrior in his flashy metal armor, sweeping the area with his eyes and tasting the air with his tongue. The big lizard hesitated at the corner of the building.

  “Yeah, buddy,” Nick murmured. “The scene smells of an ambush and you ain’t falling for it.”

  With a gesture, the lead lizard sent two soldiers off behind him to circle around the buildings as he stayed in the shadows, scanning the area.

  The team needed a clean shot. It would take all their
combined fire power to take down the Dragorans. From what Nick had been told, the lizards were cunning adversaries but prone to over confidence. Apparently, Arya was counting on that weakness, but they had to get all the Dragorans together in one place. If they didn’t take them out all at once, they risked one of the lizards slipping away to warn the others.

  The team watched the streets closely from their hidden vantage points, waiting for any sign of the elusive enemy troops. Nick felt like he was in a vacuum, overwhelmed by the silence of the moment, the eerie fog, the dead bodies of weird aliens strewn about, and now a band of assassins speeding up his tailpipe. He felt alone and damn scared out of his mind, not knowing what to expect or what direction death would come from.

  “Where the hell did you two lizards go?” he whispered, one eye to the site of his rifle as he peered down at the Dragoran leader.

  They were going to have to force the lizards out into the open, and, despite his fear, Nick was already formulating a plan. Flipping off the newly added chamber ignition switch on his rifle, he switched his ammo magazine to the specially modified rounds they had used on the Mok’tu. He held up his weapon and gestured for Arya to change her magazine as well.

  Arya caught on right away and relayed the message to Karg. Ammo changed, they were ready.

  Plasma bursts suddenly erupted from the tree line that surrounded the town. Unable to pinpoint where the fire was emanating from, the Dragorans fired haphazardly into the woods, trying to defend against their unseen enemy. Exploding plasma blew dirt and rocks out of the ground near the Dragorans, driving them toward the center of town to take cover. The shots appeared to be coming from everywhere but nowhere. There were none of the tell-tale incoming plasma lines as seen with normal plasma rifles. There was no way for the lizards to trace where their enemy was hiding.

  Nick watched from his perch as the three Dragorans fled to the courtyard in the middle of town and regrouped. He knew what they were thinking. The Dragorans would have a better chance if they forced the enemy to come to them. They would attempt to pick off their enemy one by one as they approached. It was a tactic commonly employed by the scaly beasts.

  The lizards quickly took up defensive positions within the low walls of the center courtyard. The leader sneered, no doubt confident in his strategy.

  With the Dragorans in the open, the team opened fire from three sides. The reptiles wheeled in circles, desperately trying to pinpoint where the incoming rounds originated, without success. Left with little choice, they fired wildly into the fog, obviously hoping for a lucky shot. They never got one. One by one the lizards succumbed to the fury of plasma blasts bombarding them from all sides. After the last Dragoran fell to the ground, smoke pouring from its wounds, Nick met Arya and Karg back down in the square to assess their victory.

  “Okay, they’re dead. Now can we please get the hell out of here?” Nick impatiently queried as he glanced nervously into the surrounding fog.

  “Wait, we need the energy device,” Arya replied.

  Nick glanced at her, one eyebrow raised in disbelief. “Are you kidding me? That thing’s nothing but trouble. I say we just leave it.”

  “It’s okay, I have a plan,” she said. “Most likely there are two or three more Dragorans guarding the transport.”

  Nick grabbed at Arya’s arm as she tried to step around him. “Two or three more? Between their armor and scales, they were damn hard to take down. I’m not sure we’ll be so lucky next time.”

  “If you have another option, speak up. Otherwise we need to hurry.” Arya pulled her arm free of Nick’s grasp and headed in the direction of the landing site.

  Karg stepped over one of the smoldering Dragoran bodies, snatched up the device and fell in behind Arya.

  Nick threw his hands up in the air and stared upward into the thick fog for a moment, as if seeking guidance from a higher power. “Yup, this part of space is definitely going to kill me.”

  With a heavy sigh, he dropped his arms back down to his sides, readied his rifle, and took off at a jog after Karg and Arya, who were already disappearing into the dense fog ahead.

  As Nick caught up, Arya reached down and pulled out her scanner. “Frek.” She stopped dead in her tracks and stood staring at the scanner.

  “What now?” Nick stepped around her and looked at the scanner she held.

  “You have got to be kidding me,” he groaned. “Can my life get any better?”

  The scanner was fried. A plasma blast had sliced it open during the firefight. One of the Dragorans almost got in a lucky shot, after all.

  Arya stuffed the useless device back into its damaged pouch. “That was close,” she muttered. Without seeming overly concerned, she started walking toward the landing site again.

  Nick was amazed by her cavalier attitude. If the Dragoran had fired a few inches to the left, she’d be dead. He guessed that’s what made her a soldier and him a scientist. She was battle hardened, and he was only just beginning his journey into the madness of war. Still, he doubted he would ever get used to being fired at, damn near killed, and scared out of his mind every second of every day.

  The team stealthily continued down the path to the transport’s location, until Arya held up her hand to signal for them to stop. Nick had his head turned, busy looking into the woods for any sneaky Dragoran soldiers, when he plowed into the back of Arya. Arya rolled her eyes, ignored Nick, and motioned to a spot on the ground.

  Karg set the device down on the damp forest floor, just within the tree line.

  Without a word or a sound, Arya waved for the two to follow as she made her way around the edge of the clearing to an area of dense brush on the other side.

  “Okay, now what?” Karg whispered.

  “Fire the modified rounds at the ground on the other side of the clearing. With luck the power source will mask our presence and they will think they are being ambushed from the other side.”

  “Not a bad plan,” Nick commented.

  Arya grinned at him, an impish, cute sort of grin that made her seem more human than ever. “I’m learning,” she replied.

  The team fired a burst at the far side of the clearing. Plasma explosions blew dirt and debris into the air as each round impacted the ground. Several small trees blew in half, showering the area with splinters of wood. They stopped firing and waited, but nothing happened. No Dragorans taking cover. No return fire. Absolutely nothing. Until….

  A twig snapped behind them as a cold rifle barrel pressed against the back of Nick’s head.

  “Don’t move,” a deep, slurred voice commanded.

  Nick moved his eyes left just far enough to see the rest of the startled team frozen in their tracks, rifle barrels held to the back of their heads as well. Damn, the Dragorans had ambushed them!

  “Hey, fellas,” Nick replied nonchalantly, already starting into a deflective spiel.

  “Drop your weapons,” the Dragoran commanded, nudging Nick’s head with the barrel of his rifle.

  “Not much on manners, are they,” Nick quipped. A swift punch to the kidney was his only answer. Nick twisted in pain and tried desperately to maintain his composure. His smart mouth might just be the death of him one day. Hopefully, this wouldn’t be that day.

  “I said drop your weapons!” the Dragoran growled.

  The team started to lower their weapons but paused when they heard a strange roar in the sky. The sound quickly grew louder.

  The Dragorans peered up at the foggy sky in an attempt to determine where the noise was coming from.

  A silvery craft appeared in the morning sky, diving down on them through the mist. The Dragorans raised their weapons toward the approaching craft and prepared to fire.

  While the Dragorans were fixated on the craft, Nick’s team took the opportunity to turn on them. Weapons still in hand, the three of them spun around and began releasing a barrage of plasma blasts at their captors. Hot plasma ripped into hard lizard flesh, burning holes almost clean through the torsos of the beasts
. After quickly emptying their clips into the Dragorans, the three dove for cover.

  Before the dazed Dragorans could even defend themselves, a second fury of rounds hit the big red lizards in the chest. The incoming craft had fired a devastating high-power torrent of plasma, almost cutting the Dragoran soldiers clean in half. They fell limp and smoldering to the ground, dead as a doornail. The ship roared by overhead and turned to make its way back to the clearing. Circling around with its landing gear deployed, it descended in the nearby field. Swirls of thick fog billowed toward the team as the craft touched down next to the transport.

  The rush of damp, cold morning air filled Nick’s lungs and eased the adrenaline rush that still had his heart pumping survival into his veins. “Damn, I thought we were all goners that time,” he huffed as he stared at the strange craft.

  As the small ship came to rest on the ground, a ramp seemed to roll out of nowhere, providing an opening for exit and entry. Nick stared, waiting for the worst, hoping for the best. He was relieved when Sirok appeared in his three legged, shiny metal contraption.

  “Slimy! Holy Jesus, am I glad to see you!” Nick crowed. Sirok gave him a glare from all four eyes, silently reminding Nick that the nickname Slimy irritated him, a fact which Sirok had reminded him of just hours ago.

  Nick’s grin faded, but only marginally. He was so damn thankful to be alive he didn’t care who was mad at him, as long as he had someone on his team. Frankly, the gooey alien gave Nick the creeps, but he didn’t want him to know that.

  “It’s not slime, it’s protective mucous. It has natural antibiotic properties,” Sirok said defensively.

  Ignoring Nick, he buzzed over to Arya. “We spotted the Dragoran Raptor on approach to the planet, and I thought maybe you could use some backup down here. Looks like I was right. Fortunately, the magnetic storm at the pole was strong enough to mask the Ashok’s presence as the Dragorans approached.”

  Arya walked up and patted Sirok’s metal rover. “Thanks, Sirok, we owe you for that one.” A mischievous gleam came over her face. “Ever fly a Dragoran Raptor?”