Dark Rain: Book 1 of The Aetherium Saga

by Jilly MacKenzie

  Axel frequently found his eyes drawn to Cat’s small form, sat cross-legged at Lenore’s feet. She did always like to sit on the floor... he lamented to himself. Then he would notice her healing neck wound, the faint remnants of purple bruising around her eyes and bridge of her nose, and he would remember. The scene of that fateful night would replay in his mind. The taste of his love’s blood coursing into his mouth. The sound of her pitiful cries. His own name called out in fear. Oh the fear. And he saw that same fear when she caught him looking, and he would tear his gaze away in shame. Pure, regretful, and guilty. Heartbroken shame. His heart felt like it could rip itself apart with it. Within the clamour and activity of the room, amongst the chatter of hope and doom, Axel was dying inside. And nobody noticed, except one.

  Emile knew that look of turmoil and pain all too well. The hopelessness, and the overwhelming feeling of losing your purpose. Your purpose to breathe. Your purpose to go on. She had felt the same all her life. After her first heartbreak, and the others afterwards. After her many failed attempts at taking her own life. She looked briefly around the room at her friends, and at Johnny. I hope Axel comes to realise the benefit of just carrying on.

  ‘And then… that’s it settled then,’ Wyatt announced with a slap on the arm of his chair, ‘I’m going to another planet!’ he mused and raised his bottle of cider, before taking a swig.

  ‘Two days until the fate of our world is decided...’ Johnny stated in a low faraway voice, and Emile squeezed his hand in comfort.

  ‘Two days until the fate of your world is countered,’ Marduk corrected, ‘We’re not going down without a fight.’

  ‘I like the way you talk, Satan!’ Wyatt laughed, clapping and pointing at Marduk with approval.

  ‘It’s looking to be big fight...’ Finn added.

  Lenore nodded in agreement, ‘Involving all of us. Human. Anunnaki.’

  ‘Splice,’ Axel muttered with a nod.

  ‘The Saboteurs,’ Wyatt voiced proudly.

  ‘ECIT,’ affirmed Lenore.

  ‘IGS…’ Anubis growled.

  ‘The Greys,’ Lenore huffed in amusement, looking across to Marduk with subtle concern, and he nodded slowly in confirmation.

  The gravity of the situation, and the weight of the coming apocalypse, suddenly bore down on the group, and silence befell the room. The crackling of the fire seemed to sing of scorched desolation and a few of them looked to the flames uncomfortably, until a voice broke the silence.

  ‘I need another drink...’ Finn moaned.

  ‘We all do little man,’ Wyatt concurred, shaking his empty bottle with disappointment.

  ‘Let’s say we all go somewhere to drown our sorrows? Is there a bar nearby?’ Wyatt suggested.

  Lenore laughed, then suddenly stiffened in shock, ‘Shit!’

  Finn sat up to attention beside her, ‘What!’ he demanded, looking her over for any unexpected injuries.

  ‘No,’ she smiled, ‘It’s just, I can’t believe I forgot!’ She laughed to herself.

  ‘You gonna let us in on the joke or...?’ Wyatt muttered.

  ‘I was going to tell you all, but then… they arrived’ she mused gesturing to Axel and Wyatt.

  ‘Aw, we rained on your parade?’ Wyatt grinned.

  ‘Our notoriety…’ Finn realised, ‘I forgot too!’

  ‘What is it Lenore?’ Cat probed, placing a hand on the arm of her chair.

  ‘When me and Finn went back to Blois, Deacon called me,’ Lenore began, ‘He’s going to help erase our records with the IGS. To grant us anonymity. Freedom.’ Lenore turned to Cat who was smiling up at her, and then met Emile’s warm brown gaze.

  ‘All of us,’ Lenore began, she then found Axels amber eyes, and he managed a crooked toothy smile of gratitude. Anubis uncrossed her arms with a small knowing smile as Lenore met her gaze, ‘Even me?’ Anubis asked with a raised eyebrow.

  Lenore huffed a small laugh, ‘Of course you,’ she declared wholeheartedly, and Anubis nodded and grinned with thanks.

  Wyatt abruptly stood, ‘So, we going for a drink or what?’

  ‘I’ll check with Deacon first to see if it’s all done, and we’re cleared of our sins,’ she smirked up at him. ‘Then hopefully,’ she stood, ‘We can celebrate our new freedom.’

  ‘Well I’m all good to go,’ Wyatt shrugged.

  ‘You really gonna drink alone?’ Axel chuckled, ‘Commander Nolan No-Mates.’

  Wyatt feigned a punch in Axel’s direction, and laughed with resignation. ‘Well I guess I’ll just have to wait for you lame lot,’ he groaned.

  Finn stood up beside Lenore, ‘Yeah, why not go and drink to our newfound freedom, and impending demise?’ He announced with a sigh.

  Cat sprang to her feet, ‘I’m so up for some fun!’ closely followed by Johnny and Emile as they strode forward in agreement. Axel heaved himself out of his chair, and nudged Wyatt as he passed, to get himself another drink from the side table, and Wyatt followed, relishing the prospect of more cider.

  ‘There’s only one place we should go to forget the potential end of the world,’ Anubis uttered, unmoving from her leaning position against the wall beside Marduk. Wyatt took the opportunity of everybody’s drawn attention to observe her details once again, unnoticed. She never spoke much, and he guessed it was just the way she was. She never spoke even once at the IGS holding facility, he recalled. She never betrayed Marduk’s identity, no matter what that bastard Richard did to her. But whenever Anubis did choose to speak, it was like she casted a spell on everybody in her vicinity. A proud, defiant, silent beauty. He was present at her weakest hour, and he had witnessed a pivotal experience in her life. They shared a secret moment in time together, and he would never forget it, and probably neither will she.

  ‘Enigma.’

  Her voice snapped Wyatt from his thoughts, and when he realised the word she had spoken, he clapped once, and loudly proclaimed, ‘Yes!’

  ‘I actually agree with that reaction...’ Finn concurred pointing in Wyatt’s direction.

  ‘Oh my god...’ Lenore chuckled with a slow shake of her head, and Cat’s eyes lit up with excitement.

  ‘I’ve always wanted to go. I’m old enough now,’ she trilled.

  ‘Enigma it is then!’ Wyatt proclaimed and pointed to the door, ‘Onwards to London!’ he declared, and the group began to disperse out of the room in a hubbub of laughing and discussion.

  Jenny leaned forward to rise from her seat when an upturned palm entered her view. She looked up and met Wyatt’s steely eyes regarding her with a hopeful raised eyebrow.

  ‘You coming, little maid?’

  She felt like melting back into her chair, but found herself compelled to take his hand, allowing herself to be hauled out of her seat by the blonde mercenary she had been eyeing since his arrival. She was suddenly aware of how close she was to him, and the smell the oil and craft fumes on his clothing. It was euphorically intoxicating. It reminded her of the oil-stained old barn which housed the disused farm machinery of decades past. Finally removing her hand from his, how long had it been there? She managed a weak acceptance, ‘Yeah, I’ll tag along.’

  ‘Awesome! The more the merrier,’ he clapped her on the back and strode out of the room to join the others.

  Emile gently caught Axel by the arm, ‘She may yet return to you,’ she muttered quietly to him with earnest, and he smiled softly in understanding.

  ‘But if she doesn’t,’ she continued, ‘It is not the end. It never is.’

  ‘I will try to believe that,’ he moaned with a pained frown, and she patted his arm once more with sympathy and returned to the group, as Axel downed his drink.

  Chapter 37

  Fifty Floors Of Bliss

  ‘It is all done,’ were the words everybody had been waiting for. ECIT has succeeded in clearing the groups notoriety rating, and they had all packed for the short trip, including a variety of energy weapons, which they stashed on each craft, agreeing that they will all remain vigilant whil
e in the sprawling megatropolis of London.

  Lenore felt uneasy about withholding their recreational visit to Enigma, from Deacon. But she was sure that the authorities gave Enigma a wide berth nowadays. Its relentless unsavory activities, such as prostitution, and drug dens providing SparkLite, were eventually left to their own devices. Resulting in Enigma being a law unto itself, but still providing a reliable flow of tourism, and of course, money.

  The group split between the two skycrafts, Lenore's beloved silver Cirrus, and Wyatt's sleek black and red, converted IGS fighter, Diablo. Finn, Anubis, and Marduk had joined Lenore on the Cirrus, while all the others wanted to experience the thrill of flying on an ex-IGS fighter craft, and as she predicted, Wyatt had disappeared quickly into the clouds above her.

  ‘Show off...’ Finn moaned to himself, in his usual seat beside Lenore. She flicked him an amused sideways look, ‘You're not keen of our new friend are you?’

  Finn shrugged, ‘It says a lot about a guy when he struts amongst strangers, and listens only to the sound of his own voice...’

  ‘I second that,’ Marduk concurred, in a low tone, from the back, and Anubis smirked beside him.

  ‘See?’ Finn remarked, ‘I even have the agreement of a god.’

  Lenore laughed, and steadied the Cirrus onto a direct course across southern England, for Enigma, within the Mayfair district of the West End of London.

  ‘You never told me why you were in Drakestoke, Finn,’ Lenore quizzed, curious to the mysterious beginnings of one of her most trusted companions. She did not know of him back when she had access to the Drakestoke records, but a part of her was glad she did not know about him. She wanted him to tell her himself, willingly.

  He sighed, and Lenore could sense that he was taking himself back to a place he didn't want to go.

  ‘The same as all the others I guess’ he began. ‘My family saw something in me, they did not like.’ He had taken on a façade of nonchalance, but Lenore wasn’t fooled. Finn was hurting, and she remained silent, watching the passing cloud vapour as the Cirrus sped through the atmosphere. 12 minutes until we reach London.

  ‘My family is a military one,’ Finn suddenly announced. Lenore was surprised by his continued willingness to divulge his painful story to her, and she listened to him, watching him with a soft expression. An expression which showed attentiveness, but did not drown him in unwanted sympathy. She knew him well enough. Sympathy and sad frowns are the last thing he would want.

  ‘They all serve in the army, or navy, the SAS, city authorities and the like,’ he divulged. ‘Not IGS though. My parents think it’s a dictatorship,’ he laughed, then settled back in his seat, looking out at the cold horizon.

  ‘You'd think, for people who hated the IGS, and resented being controlled, that my parents would at least understand and admire me...’ he mused aloud, ‘They didn't,’ he shrugged, ‘They didn't even love me. I wasn't like them. I didn't want that life, even though my physicality suggests I should. I had the breeding alright. Strength, fitness, endurance, all that. But not the drive,’ Finn sighed and rubbed his brow, the actions of his parents still baffling him to this day.

  ‘It wasn't that I couldn't do it. It was that I wouldn't do it,’ he sullenly revealed, ‘That’s what really pissed them off. My personality. My inner thoughts, hopes, and wants. My actual mind. That's what my parents didn't love about me. They didn’t love me,’ he gestured to his heart, ‘And that's what hurt the most.’

  He slowly shook his head, smiling a pained smile. ‘They were distinguished. And I was disposable. So hello, Drakestoke. And they threw me to the very organisation they despise.’

  Lenore couldn't help herself, and she shook her head in irritation. Her heart cried for Finn’s teenage agony. Humanity. Ever like a continuous flip of a coin. The good and bad, living side by side, as they always have, and always will. Though, it sometimes feels like the bad outweighs the good most of the time...

  ‘It's alright,’ Finn admitted with a strained smile, ‘It turned out okay in the end. Drakestoke wasn’t that bad. And… I found you,’ he turned to her with a vulnerable face, and his hazel eyes were subtly watering. Lenore gazed upon him in surprise, then regained her composure and grinned, ‘Actually, I found you,’ she corrected.

  Finn burst out in a relieved laugh, thankful that she had made light of the increasing awkwardness of the situation. The he cocked his head to one side in amused confusion.

  ‘No... I remember,’ he nodded deep in thought, ‘I joined you during the Drakestoke escape.’

  ‘You were stumbling around in the smoke, no clue of where you were going. We came across you,’ Lenore insisted, and they both smirked at each other.

  The Cirrus began to descend through the clouds, revealing a sea of buildings and activity below them. It was lightly snowing, but the flakes were unable to settle upon surfaces.

  The megatropolis of the London area covered a large expanse of south eastern England, having almost doubled in size since the 2040’s, when the Human Congregation Protocol was initiated.

  Like every populated city and megatropolis of the new era, it boasted environmentally friendly design, sustainability, and almost as much greenery as there was buildings. Green infrastructure had been intertwined with the urban environment, and hundreds of large green spaces were present within the city as nature oasis'. Used by humans and wildlife alike as refuge and escape from the artificial surroundings.

  The Neo-Earth Movement was to thank for these new era ‘Green Cities.’ Urging modern cities to grow upwards, more than they did outwards, and with the increased vertical area available, there was enough housing for every soul in the megatropolis. And as a result poverty and homelessness are problems of the past. Although homelessness remained a voluntary choice, albeit a strangely popular one. There were many people joining the off-grid, neobedouin communities in the abandoned wildlands of the world.

  Every space and surface of modern megatropolis’ had a purpose. The sides of buildings were utilised as vertical farms, and rooftops were covered in either gardens or solar panels. Rainwater was collected in huge quantities, enough for public use in swimming pools and irrigation. Zero-emissions cars still zoomed along roads on the ground, yet skycrafts of hundreds of makes and models were the growing vehicle of choice, and they followed routes marked by suspended wires, above the traditional road networks.

  With such new era prosperity, came a stable global economy, homes and jobs for the masses, and optimum quality of life. It’s the golden age of Earth, and who was to guess that it may be short-lived. The Anunnaki threat is still very much real. To us at least... Lenore lamented.

  After living in isolated, abandoned, and rural surroundings for so long, Finn edged forward and absorbed the view with awe. The urban scene before him was the embodiment of human potential, ingenuity, and will to thrive. Re-imagining, and re-engineering the cities of the world, along with the de-population of most areas of the Earth has helped heal the global environment considerably, and is continuing to do so. This long, cold winter is proof enough of that, Lenore mused, but she was also proud of the work of ECIT and the Environment Agencies who created the Neo-Earth Movement, and conducted such a large-scale and quick solution to the problems associated with habitat destruction, and human-influenced global warming and its side effects, such as devastating natural disasters. Many endangered species are no longer endangered, important habitats and their supported ecosystems are safe and thriving, and natural disasters are decreasing.

  Another skycraft pulled up close beside the Cirrus. Diablo, she smiled as she saw a number of familiar faces grinning at her from the sleek windows.

  ‘We've been hovering around here for ages waiting for you!’ Wyatt's American accent came in loud and clear over the comms system, as Cat stuck her sticking her tongue out in jest at the Cirrus.

  ‘I highly doubt that,’ Lenore replied after accepting the communication with a swipe on the console.

  ‘You probably got lost i
n your own reflection in that lake back there,’ she quipped, and Finn laughed loudly. Even Wyatt's group could be seen chuckling at him through the windows, and he nudged Axel in protest. Cat pushed through the raucous and spoke into the comms, ‘Come on Lenore! Let’s go already!’

  ‘Yeah, yeah,’ she laughed, and pulled the Cirrus down into a steep descent between the colossal skyscrapers, and carefully joined the busy skycraft traffic of Mayfair. Diablo joined soon after her and they made their way through the traffic a short distance, before turning into the cavernous skycraft hanger of Enigma. They landed their crafts side by side in two free spaces, and disengaged the energy drives.

  Cat was the first to spring out of Diablo's opening door, and Axel watched her with concern, apprehensive about her being amongst the frivolous chaos of the largest nightclub in the UK. The group converged, and exited the hanger with other newly arrived visitors. Their excitement was tangible as they passed through large glass doors, illuminated with a lilac neon sign, ‘Enigma ~ lose yourself.’

  Like a self-contained city, the Enigma tower was a 200m high complex of hotels, lounges, restaurants, and of course, nightclubs. Its most famous being Enigma itself, spanning 20 of the tower's 50 floors, to accommodate specific dancefloors of particular genres.

  The group checked into the Hotel Equinox on the 23rd to the 27th floors, and quickly made themselves comfortable in their individual apartments. Wyatt had already popped open a bottle of iced champagne when Axel entered, frowning at him.

  ‘What!’ Wyatt laughed, ‘We're celebrating, aren't we?’

  ‘Never could handle the taste of that stuff,’ Axel muttered as he walked to the window of Wyatt's room. ‘It's been many years since I've seen a city like this one. It's bigger than Stockholm.’ The sky was beginning to take on an orange hue as the sun started to descend below the horizon.

  ‘Lighten up,’ Wyatt declared, jumping backwards onto his bed, managing to not spill any champagne from the bottle he was still gripping. ‘It’s a holiday!’