Parallel - The Awakening

A Rice Paul

Description

Everyone knows how things work, the natural order of the world, right and wrong, good and evil - everybody knows how that works?Kenneth Robinson thought he knew all about those things too. Using all of those hard-won life experiences, and with a lot of hard work, he has started himself a nice little business down in the hell-hole that is Kandahar airfield. Life is looking rosy, the money is starting to roll in and it's all going to plan. That was until the storm arrived.

Sujets

• Science fiction

Informations

• Publié par: eBookPartnership.com
• Date de parution: 01 juillet 2010
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780956276957
• Langue: English

Extrait

Parallel
The Awakening
Paul A. Rice
The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead is coincidental and not intended by the author.
Copyright © Text Paul A. Rice
First edition
(Revised)
ISBN: 9780956276957 eBook version published by ebookpartnership.com www.ebookpartnership.com
The right of Paul A. Rice to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the author nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent publisher.
Contents
Chapter One The Storm
Chapter Two Escape
Chapter Three Chaos and Confusion
Chapter Four The Funny House
Chapter Five Hotel California
Chapter Six Private Show
Chapter Seven Side-Order of Fear
Chapter Eight Breaking it softly
Chapter Nine Truth Hurts
Chapter Ten 20/20 Hindsight
Chapter Eleven The Tale of Mike
Chapter Twelve Darkness Revealed
Chapter Thirteen Balloon World
Chapter Fourteen A Fatal Collaboration
Chapter Fifteen Red Puppeteer
Chapter Sixteen Disappearing Digits
Chapter Seventeen Spears
Chapter Eighteen Shrinking Down
Chapter Nineteen Looking for Trouble
Chapter Twenty Killing Time
Chapter Twenty One Seeing Red
Chapter Twenty Two Turning Tables
Chapter Twenty Three Death of Friends
Chapter Twenty Four The Awakening
About The Author
Chapter One The Storm
“Do you fancy another brew, mate?” It was an offer that Ken couldn't refuse, with a grin he passed his empty mug to Mike in readiness for a refill – the Australian made the best, bloody tea Ken had ever tasted.
They had risen early that morning and by five o'clock the two men had already been for a jog, showered, and were now back in their air conditioned office with a boiling kettle on the go for a second time. Whilst Mike put the makings in their mugs, Ken looked back down at his paperwork again – it was set to be a busy and hopefully profitable day for them. If the equipment trial went to plan then things could get big, really big.
“Here you go, me old Pommy tea monster!” Mike said.
Ken looked up from his paperwork and grinned as he accepted the steaming mug from his dark-haired partner. Lifting the mug to his lips, he said, “Cheers, Mikey! You know what mate, I think that one day you'll make somebody a really, really… ugly wife!” Ken reached across and stole the last digestive biscuit from under Mike's hand. Mike looked at him and shook his head in disgust. Ken laughed and said, “Ya snooze – Ya lose!” He knocked back the last dregs of his sweet tea and turned to Mike. “Right, big guy, I'm off down the bunker, will you ring the Yanks again and just make sure that they're still on for ten o'clock?”
Mike grinned. “Yeah, no problems, give me a shout if you get stuck with any of that gear, eh Kenny, I'll probably come down later and give you hand anyway.” he said, and took the empty mug from Ken's outstretched hand.
Knowing full well that he most likely would need his friend's expertise, Ken laughed and said, “OK then, I'll see you in about ten minutes, yeah…” With Mike's laughter flowing over his wide shoulders, Ken walked out into the early morning sun and looked at the dust blowing across Kandahar airfield. It was the leading edge of a much bigger storm, one that had been brewing for a couple of days now. In the distance he could see the redness of the sand as it flirted with the sky above. The storm teased the occupants of the airbase as well, was it coming or would it simply disappear again, twisting fingers of dust scratched upwards at the clear blue horizon, suddenly dissolving like magic, their passing leaving behind a brief period of eerie calmness. Then without warning, like a terrible genie, the red cavalry of mayhem appeared, its unstoppable rolling advance covering everything and everyone in an avalanche of dust and wind. Ken had been caught in the open on more than one occasion and had been picking sand out of every orifice in his body for days afterwards. No one could stay in the open and face that particular demon for long.
The airfield was massive, it must have covered a least a couple of square miles and was really an enormous military base that happened to surround an international airport. From the air the place looked as though an intoxicated spider had woven a giant web, one consisting of makeshift buildings, shipping containers, portacabins, and hundreds upon hundreds of tents in all shapes and sizes. Huge aircraft hangars, fuel stations, kitchens and prefabricated shopping areas littered the area in organised chaos; a maze of dusty roads and endless gravel tracks tethered the whole lot together in a crazy weave – all of it was covered in dust.
Every few minutes there would be the clatter of an overworked helicopter whirling its way across the airbase, the thudding ‘Wokca-Wocka’ of their spinning rotors easily being drowned out by the incoming thunder of the cargo planes, which took off and landed morning, noon and night. It was, however, the explosive howl of the fighter jets that completely dominated the endless noise war. They always took off in pairs, the wingman about fifteen seconds behind his leader. The ground vibrating as the jets hurtled into the dirty sky with a deafening scream. One of Ken's American friends had once said: “You know what that noise is, buddy… that noise is the sound of freedom – the sound of freedom!”
The irony of that particular comment still made Ken think, even to this day.
It was already hot at this early hour; endless streams of traffic had picked up their daily momentum and begun to bustle across the base. Huge military transport trucks, Land Rovers, Hummers and the ubiquitous herd of Toyotas, all zooming everywhere – their scurrying movements only adding to the dust that rose slowly into the tepid air. “Where in God's name do all these bloody people go everyday?” Ken shrugged and looked at the sky again. The brown haze had already started to hang above the base like some filthy net curtain, covering everything with its dirty stain. The dust was relentless, every single day the same routine; the damned stuff found its way into everything! Half of him hoped for a nice strong wind to blow it all away, a nice wind followed by a good burst of rain, too.
“Yeah, a nice long downpour to wash some of this crap away, that'd be good!” Ken thought, as he rumbled his Land Cruiser to a halt besides a half buried shipping container.
Killing the engine, he stepped out of the dirty blue Toyota and into the early morning heat. Walking toward the container, he waved nonchalantly at the sentry who watched him from the guard tower over to his left; the American infantryman raised his hand in a lazy return salute. They were used to seeing Ken as he was there two or three times a day, every day, and anyway the sentries were more interested in what was happening on the outside of the wire where the insurgents still caused havoc whenever the fancy took them. There was a rocket or mortar attack almost every other day, but it was a numbers game… the base was so large you would have to be pretty unlucky to be hit – Ken figured it would be one of those ‘shit happens’ moments if you got hit and didn't let the thought stop him from going about his daily business. As he turned to go down the stairs, he paused and shot another look at the horizon behind the airbase, into the far distance where he could see the dust rising again. The storm still brewed and he could feel it thickening the air, the sensation pressing down on his mind. “Yep, this is gonna be another a big one, that's for sure.” The thought stayed with him as he walked down the stairs to the bunker and reached for his keys; the last really big storm had been during his first year working in this shitty place. “That was nearly four years ago and I'm still here, I must be bloody crazy!” He grinned to himself and fumbled with the Chubb padlock. Once unlocked, he pulled the heavy steel door open, took one last look at the threatening sky and then stooped his six foot, broad-shouldered frame into the bunker.
The bunker was a long steel affair they'd made from an old shipping container. He and Mike had placed the long steel box into a large hole they had excavated in the unyielding Afghan earth. Then, using the hired digger, they had made sure the container was covered with all the loose soil from the hole, the job had been a good one as the container was now rock solid and well protected from the elements. It suited their purpose nicely as it was out of the sun and wind; a perfect position to keep the sensitive electrical equipment inside cool and dry. They had built some steps from old steel plate down to the doorway and also wired in a security light for the outside; there were four fluorescent lights for the interior as well. In addition there was an air conditioning unit pumping cool air through a hole they'd cut into the front of the container. Mike had run the power from one of the nearby guard towers that littered the base – one thing was for sure, those guys would never have a power cut as there must have been one of the world's largest collections of generators in that place. All in all it was the perfect location, Ken was proud of the work they generated for themselves from this bunker and also from their little office situated in the centre of the camp.
He flicked the dust covered switch and the security light went out leaving a dull glow burning in the filament. Ken left the inside lights on as it was still fairly dark inside, even with the door open behind him it was still gloomy in the steel box. He'd completely lined the container w