CHOSEN: A Paranormal, Sci-Fi, Dystopian Novel

by A. Bernette

  “I’m sure. It’s why I wanted to catch you before you left. I wanted to make sure we were going to have a smooth break and wouldn’t have any surprises. You understand?”

  “No, I’m not sure I understand that there would be any surprises.”

  “Gregor Magiro, I’m certain I don’t need to explain myself. You are a smart man and you’ve been in this position a long time. I’m sure you value that privilege of being able to serve. Am I right?”

  Magiro pressed his lips together for a moment as he looked around his office. The sun had faded in the time he’d spent with Mirkal and the skyline now showed. It was nothing like the pictures he’d remembered seeing in his history studies. He could see the lights from the UniCorps Headquarters tower. They weren’t leaving for the break and he was certain it was where Preston was calling from, with a room full of people.

  “Look, Preston. I know what you are saying. I’ve gotta get going. I have people waiting on me. Perhaps we can talk after the break?”

  “I don’t think you understand Magiro. I need to know that you understand. I need to be sure that we won’t have any trouble from you,” Preston said, his voice becoming more somber. The threatening tone was now unmistakable.

  Magiro thought of his wife at home, waiting for him and the security he’d personally hired for both inside and outside.

  “I plan on having a nice quiet break with family and friends. You don’t have to worry about me working over it, if that’s what you are asking, Preston. I am taking a vacation,” Magiro replied, giving Preston as much as he could and nothing more.

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Lies

  Santoria and Valencia Major, Southern Allegiance

  Marco picked at the leftovers from the night before. His mother had to be almost to the coast by now. Shortly after Marco had learned of the earthquake, she was in the hovehicle Sandro had bought her when they’d learned they were expecting Marco.

  She was going right into the hot zone. Even before trying to convince her not to go, he knew it was pointless. She wasn’t going to stay put if there were people who needed help. It wasn’t her way and wasn’t how she’d raised her sons. She had to go.

  Marco connected to the subsystem again. He saw the red blinking indicator for his chats. Stephen had sent him a message.

  “Marco – are you okay?”

  Marco typed back, “Yes, the quake was near the coast. We just have a few aftershocks. What are you hearing about it?” He wasn’t sure Stephen was still on, but after a minute the words appeared on his screen.

  “There is almost nothing being officially reported Marco. What I have found says it was not too bad. A 6.0. But, our reporting equipment here shows something different. I show it was about a 7.7. I checked repeatedly and even had my dad check too.”

  “The reports coming through the sub-system said the same as you. Do you show any other earthquakes around here that I need to watch out for?”

  “You are in a pretty safe location. Keep inland, away from the west and north coasts. You should only have aftershocks. Our reports show the aftershocks near the coast are still in the five to six range.”

  Marco swallowed hard. His mother was nearly there.

  “My mom is headed to the coast. I have to go Stephen.”

  “Get her out of there. I’ve got a bad feeling, Marco!” the message read. “Can you call her?”

  Marco looked at it. “Stephen?”

  “No. It’s Stella. Just trust me. You need to warn her and get her out of there.”

  Valencia Major had become one of the largest coastal cities in the northern area of Southern Allegiance. The metropolitan area had swelled to more than seven hundred million people and in the medium cities and smaller towns that bordered Valencia Major to the west, south, and east, were another two hundred million within fifty miles.

  The idea of her driving in or out alone in her old hovehicle made Marco cringe. She’d been a nurse for nineteen years and an aid worker for seven years before that. If she were called to serve, she would never say no. She wasn’t going to come back just because he asked. She’d have to pretty much be carried out.

  “Thanks Stella. I gotta go guys.”

  Marco clicked off the chat with the twins and sent a message to Locan. Calls still weren’t going through to anyone outside of Southern Allegiance and Marco wasn’t sure if Locan had made it to their home region yet.

  An aftershock of a five or six on the Richter scale could kill his mother if she got trapped in the city or even nearby. Marco rubbed his forehead, sending his dark hair back over the top of his head. Locan needed to find her and bring her back. After their mother was safe, then he could get Rupert. There was no way Teresa knew how bad it really was and what she was driving into.

  “Locan? Emergency here.”

  Moments later Locan responded.

  “On way. Fast as I can. Had to check in with border agents. Be to Santoria in less than an hour.”

  “Mom is headed to Valencia Major. She’ll be in the area in the next hour. Once you are officially in our air space can you pull up her registration and location and go get her?”

  “Yes. It’ll mean cutting it close for Rupert,” Locan responded. “Never mind. He can’t go there anyways.”

  Marco looked at his watch. 12:31 p.m. “Locan keep me updated with when you get mom.”

  “Definitely.”

  Marco’s watch buzzed with an incoming call from Alexis again.

  “Did you see the last report?” she asked hurriedly.

  “No. I was on with my brother. I’m pulling it up now.

  “It’s bad, Marco. I talked to Mr. Pritchard too. He called me this morning. I guess there was something that is supposed to happen. Some ceremony with us and he says it’s important that it happens next month. They can’t delay it anymore,” Alexis reported to him.

  “I don’t know if I can think about that now Alexis. I’ve got more important things to deal with,” Marco said as he searched for the newest update.

  “Do you have the latest report pulled up yet?” she asked again impatiently.

  “You forget I don’t have the same fancy systems as you. Yes. Got it. Give me a minute to read it.”

  TRANSMITTED REPORT START

  The earthquake that hit the northern coast of Southern Allegiance today at 7:26 a.m. EAT is confirmed to have been a 7.7 on the Richter Scale and not the 6.0 officially reported. Aid workers have been called in from everywhere within a four hour commute with workers assigned to the areas of worst devastation.

  Loss of Life: Nearly seven hours after the earthquake there remain no official numbers of lives lost or numbers of persons missing. There remain no official reports of any kind regarding this earthquake. We do have unofficial local reports that, aggregated, put the current estimate of missing people or those killed in the earthquake at 350 million. This is a conservative estimate given the number of people en route or already at work in this heavy tourist area.

  Again, there was no public warning of the earthquake though data surfaced three days ago that the information warning of an imminent earthquake was available weeks to months prior to the incident.

  We expect that our ability to transmit photos and video will continue to be hampered, just as the truth has been.

  ###

  Next Update Scheduled for 4:30 P.M. EAT

  TRANSMITTED REPORT END

  Marco’s fist met the top of his desk, causing a small cup of microdots to fall off and splatter on the floor.

  “You still there, Marco?” Alexis’s voice broke through the cloudiness. He’d forgotten all about her.”

  “Yes, still here,” he said, nearly speechless.

  “I told you it was bad. What are we gonna do?”

  “We’re gonna do whatever we have to for the truth to get out. They won’t get away with this, Alexis.”

  ***

  Locan had locked in on Teresa and was just twenty minutes from where her communicator showed her.
She was almost in the city of Valencia Major. His charter aircraft began to fly over the area affected by the earthquake. It didn’t look like any 6.0 he’d ever seen. He radioed in to the checkpoint where he’d entered.

  “Eastern Border Control- Southern Allegiance,” the man said into the radio.

  “Yes, this is Captain Locan. I am heading into Valencia Major. I need to report that the damage appears worse than the 6.0 reported. Perhaps I can help. Where is air support currently? I can work a different area. Land support may have been called but there is no way anyone is driving in and a normal hovehicle would have a hard time clearing this much debris.”

  Locan looked out of his window at the scene below. He’d been trained for combat and peace keeping but this would require something else. There was no way that nurses, medics, and doctors on the ground would reach the people in need.

  “Copy?” he called into the radio after several seconds without a response.

  “Captain Locan?” a different voice came in. “I was told that you were heading to Santoria. Is there a reason you are headed to Valencia Major instead?” the voice asked.

  “Sir, my mother is there. I have to get her before heading home.”

  “I see. I advise that you hurry and do only that. That is an order. We have everything under control. Air support will also be dispatched. Carry on with your immediate business and head to Santoria. I’ll expect you to check in upon your arrival. Over.”

  “Over,” Locan answered back after hesitating a moment.

  He looked down to the streets and ruined buildings, with smoke still coming out of the windows. Small fires still burned in some. Between the standing buildings, there were others crumbled in heaps and others with sides lost. He could see people waving scarves and sheets out of the windows.

  Air support will be dispatched? It had been more than six and a half hours since the earthquake and no air support was on the scene. They’d called in the local support of people who would come in regular hovehicles, knowing they would never get through the debris.

  “Marco? Marco?” The interference in the call was worse than usual.

  “Locan? Where are you?” Marco answered choppily.

  “Almost in Valencia Major. Mom is here. I need you do to do something. Check for a local airfield. I need a light hover aircraft.”

  “What? I thought you were getting mom and coming back!” Marco said surprised.

  “I am, but they haven’t dispatched any air support, Marco. None. I’m not coming all the way here and doing nothing.”

  “Okay. Let me search. Hold on.” Marco went back to his system and began searching for airfields where pilots could land and that had the aircraft Locan needed. The light hover aircraft was named accordingly because it could hover as low as fifteen feet above ground and as high as fifty feet above ground but could also land in place like the hovering plane Locan usually flew.

  “Locan, there is a field twenty miles east of Valencia Major City. It’s called Valencia Eastport.”

  Locan entered it into his navigation and studied the route in detail before turning his aircraft east. Looking at the devastation, his mother would never forgive him if he just came in without trying to help. It would be nearly impossible in the craft he was flying, given its bulk and inability to hover at low levels for more than a few seconds. He sped up and flew off. There had to be another option and he hoped it was where he was headed.

  ***

  Teresa’s hovehicle came to a standstill amidst a sea of rubble dotted with broken down and crushed hovehicles. She took a deep breath at the sight of the bodies strewn in odd places, trapped by large cement blocks or pinned under the fallen debris. The buildings in the distance, hotels, businesses, and the casinos were crumbled, some lay waste along the road in front of the coast.

  There was no way she could reach the place she was supposed to be meeting the other aid workers, not by car at least. Looking at what remained of the city she wasn’t sure the meeting place would be standing or stable. She would have to go by foot.

  As she looked around at the damage, far beyond any description she’d gotten; she was startled by the face of a child whose bloodied hand slapped against her window. The girl looked to be ten or eleven despite her height. Debris was in her hair and drops of blood ran down her face. Dirt and dust covered her as she stared through the window, a look on her face that Teresa quickly recognized as shock.

  Teresa tried to open the door but the girl didn’t move. She tried again but the girl simply stood there staring blankly into the hovehicle at Teresa. Teresa couldn’t get the girl to respond in her current state and she had to get out of the car to help her. She climbed into the backseat, snagging her leg on the grey faded and torn fabric of her rear seats before opening the back door.

  The girl followed with her eyes, without any other expression, to watch Teresa as she crawled out the back seat into a pile of loose detritus blocking the street.

  “It’s okay. It’s okay. Te voy a ayudar. I’m gonna help you,” Teresa said to the girl whose eyes glazed over. She fell to the ground, from where she’d been standing on her knees, the rest of her legs missing somewhere in the crumbling city.

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Sorrow

  Master Keane bowed his head and placed one thin hand over his darkened eyes. A single tear escaped, finding freedom from the pain.

  Your Review Is Appreciated

  I hope you enjoyed reading Chosen: A Paranormal, Sci-Fi, Dystopian Novel.

  Would you please leave a brief review to help others find it? Word of mouth is one of the best ways for an author’s works to be discovered and it won’t take but a minute. Here’s the link: www.Amazon.com/db/B01H7TAQXW

  Thank you so much and I hope you enjoy my other works. A sample of book 2 in the Chosen series follows.

  Preview of Book 2 - Awaken

  Chapter One

  Valencia Major

  The small hovering plane circled the debris looking for a place to come in low enough. Locan could see his mother’s hovehicle at the edge of the rubble. She was crouched down against the car, a child in her arms. The trunk was open and her red medical bag lay on top of a cement block.

  He would have to try to hover over one of the larger box-truck hovehicles now turned on its side and hope the natural magnetic pull from the earth would be enough. He brought the small craft down and let it rest all the way. He planned to get his mother and then search for other survivors.

  Locan crawled down the side of the truck by the passenger side door and looked in the open back. He thought he’d seen it from the air but now he was sure. A ladder was thrown against the side, beaten up but it would work. He placed it against the side of the truck he’d come out of and then ran over the broken buildings to where his mother sat just twenty yards away.

  “Locan! Over here! Get her to the plane. I have to go help others, but I couldn’t leave her,” Teresa said as she loosened her hold on the panicked girl. Her legs were bandaged at the knee but she needed a hospital.

  “Mom, you have to come with me. I’ll go find anyone else I can but you have to get on the plane. You stay with her.” Locan tried to order his mother but she just steeled her eyes.

  “Locan, what did I just say?”

  “Mom, I know what I’m doing, too. I’ll find them and bring them back for you to help, how about that?”

  Teresa looked at Locan. He was stronger and younger than she was. It was only more efficient and logical that he use that strength to bring them back where she could treat them.

  “Fine. Hurry. They haven’t had any help. No one can get in except on foot. Many of the aid workers who came didn’t stay. The few who have can’t get out. We have to help them, Locan. When is the rest of the help coming?” she looked up to him and asked as he took the girl with thick white bandages on her knees. She was weak, in and out of consciousness.

  “They said they were sending air support. I don’t know when. I’m here because Marco told me you
came here and we have to bring you home.”

  “Home is no place to be when there is this much work to do, Locan, you know that,” she said standing to her feet, grabbing her supplies, and following him to the turned truck and his plane.

  Once he had the little girl settled into the plane, he left again. His little plane couldn’t do much justice out there. At most, it could hold thirty people. Two hours passed as he brought injured men, women, and children to the plane. His body was fatigued and Marie’s supplies were running low along with space for any more passengers.

  In the hours they’d been in Valencia Major, no other air support had come through.

  Locan would have to get them somewhere safe and then come back for his own plane, stationed at the small airfield Marco had found for him.

  His wrist was blinking again. This time it wasn’t Eastern Border Control in Southern Allegiance. Marco was calling to check in again.

  “Hey, Marco,” Locan answered out of breath.

  “Are you two okay, man? When are you and mom heading back?” Marco asked. He could hear the sounds of pain in the background.

  “We’re about to pull out in a few minutes. I just have to make sure everyone is settled,” Locan answered irritably.

  “Did the other help come yet? How many did you get?”

  “No. No one else came, Marco. Not a single craft of any kind. Nothing. I can only carry so many. They are back there like sardines, but I can’t hold anymore and Border Control is on me to get to Santoria.”

  “Locan, you did everything you could. It’s not your fault they let this happen,” Marco said, steaming on his end. They let it happen and didn’t bother to send any help that could actually be of help. They couldn’t be allowed to get away with this.