Noticing the power level on the ECM pack, Eastaway said, “We’re about to run out of juice.”
“Then quit wasting time, and let’s blow the doors off the structure.”
Eastaway glanced once more at the freighter in the distance. It neared the empty colony landing pad. While watching it, Eastaway thought of the events on Oeskone that had tested his faith and flaws to their limits. He wondered if he would succumb to uncertainty and inexperience and perish along with the rest of his platoon on this godforsaken planet.
“Come on, the bad guys only get stronger when no one does anything to stop them,” Sapp said, grinning at Eastaway.
The comment jarred Eastaway out of his uncertainty. The giant freighter landed on the pad. While he looked at it, Eastaway gritted his teeth and said, muttering, “I will fear no evil.”
Hasty movements followed as he and Sapp scurried down the granite structure to consolidate ammunition and equipment before attaching explosives onto the entrance of the ancient alien structure….
The End
Be sure to join Eastaway, Sapp, and others in the continuing battle against evil in the next installment of The Outworlds series, entitled Resurgence II.
Excerpts from Resurgence II
___________________________________________________
“There is something much worse at work here than Harel, Rodenmeyer, or their resurrected Angorgals,” Tatiana said.
“They’re just the soldiers,” Eastaway said.
Tatiana nodded. “And the Outworlds is humanity’s tip of the spear in the fight against an ancient, radical evil.”
“Does this evil have a name?”
Tatiana steadied herself, her fists tightened. “Ruuksauro.”
An inexplicable iciness shivered its way up Eastaway’s spine.
Continuing, Tatiana said, “From what little we know of their language, Ruuksauro loosely translates as ‘Resurgence.’”
“Resurgence…” Eastaway said, under his breath. He focused on Tatianna. “How do you know all of this?”
“Unique placement and access,” Tatiana said. A smile curled out of the side of her lips. “But mostly because I’m a data acquisition and exploitation engineer.”
“Because you’re a hacker.”
“Oh, Jerod, save the dirty talk for the bedroom, please.” The pair enjoyed a reserved, cheerful moment. Then, Tatiana said, “David’s father used to say, ‘Evil thrives only when others do nothing about it.’”
Eastaway allowed himself a small smile. He nodded. “Sounds like David’s father was a good man.”
“You remind me of him….” Tatiana paused, and stared hard into Eastaway’s intensifying, sympathetic features. “Jerod, Resurgence is insidious, subversive, and malignant. Its manifestations and influence must be rooted out and eradicated with extreme prejudice. We must have the utmost faith and trust in our allies who fight against it.” Tatiana studied Eastaway’s sudden inscrutable appearance. “You in?”
Eastaway tightened his jaw and nodded. “You had me at ‘tip of the spear.’”
___________________________________________________
Eastaway clutched the power cable with diminished strength. His hands and legs seared, and with every tugging clench, emergent blisters on his palms heaved a moan from his gut. Panting and swaying, he hung suspended nearly fifty meters above ground level and then another twenty-five meters above the circular structure’s base below ground. Fear of plunging to his death onto the solid concrete below stole his breath and tightened his chest.
Blurry-eyed, he saw two black, buzzing colony militiamen with turbine packs approach the platform above his head in haphazard maneuvers. They spat blue poison at him, impacting and then sizzling on the platform’s pedestal nearby. The familiar sound of heated energy fire crackled in his ears as the two militiamen zoomed out of view overhead.
Summoning his remaining strength, and gutting through the throbbing soreness in his hands and legs, Eastaway pulled himself up the last bit of distance to the top of the platform. He peered over its rim, and saw the two soldiers settling down and slowing their forward momentum from a swift landing. They still had their backs turned to him, so Eastaway wrenched himself up and over the platform’s edge. Crying out in pain, he loosened his grip from the power cable. He shook out his arms and raised up, lunging forward, unsheathing the Angorgal short sword from his backside in the process.
The first soldier aimed his blaster pistol, but Eastaway chopped through the man’s forearm, sending the weapon and appendage tumbling. A hot energy pulse sizzled out of the pistol’s barrel and into the sky. Eastaway spun around, and using his body’s twisting momentum, he thrust the sword deep into the man’s chest.
He let go of the sword and flung the round shield off his back and into his left hand, just as the second soldier fired at him. The blast ricocheted off the shield and disappeared overhead. While the first man remained upright, Eastaway grabbed hold of the sword again, and, while rushing forward at the second soldier, yanked the weapon from the dead man’s chest; who collapsed onto the platform in a heap.
More blasts deflected off the shield as Eastaway narrowed the few strides between him and his enemy. The militiaman bolted to his right, trying to out flank Eastaway, but the young lieutenant twisted and leaned into him. With hastened paces, they converged near the edge of the platform. Realizing too late that he approached the precipice, Harel’s follower braked his quick steps, sending him off balance. That’s when Eastaway lunged in with the shield and rammed the man backwards off the platform.
Eastaway watched the soldier tumble and heard him shriek, but then he spun and faced Harel. The militiaman’s scream faded into nothingness, and then a reassuring, distant thud told Eastaway his adversary had failed to restart the turbine pack in time to save himself.
Harel glowered at Eastaway from inside the tinted bubble in the center of the platform. He sat on a chair with the Angorgal insect-like harness strapped to his back. The rectangular antenna elevated behind Harel focused at the only other person on the platform with him. In that moment, Eastaway realized Harel now targeted him in the crosshairs of a telekinetic horror weapon no doubt responsible for slaughtering his platoon. His comrades. His family.
And in that moment, Eastaway stood determined that no one would use the weapon ever again….
About the Author
Daniel P. Douglas is a US Army veteran who has also served as a senior analyst in the US intelligence community. A long-term civil servant, he also holds degrees in Political Science and Russian Area Studies.
As a writer, Douglas creates epic tales – of the past, present, and future – with the most unlikely of heroes, and calls upon them to join extraordinary and mysterious struggles. His characters' sometimes-reluctant choices and actions put them on a collision course with destiny and reveal unimaginable truths. In every pulse pounding, edge-of-your-seat adventure, survival means confronting personal flaws and doubts, and forging unexpected fates as inspiring new champions in the eternal battle against evil.
Douglas explores this theme through science fiction, conspiracy, mystery, suspense, and thriller books and screenplays. His first novel, Truth Insurrected: The Saint Mary Project, centers on a decades-old government cover-up of contact with extraterrestrial life. Other works include The Outworlds series; a hard-boiled, World War II-era detective series called Richter’s War, and Glimpse, a science-fiction Cold War thriller.
Born and raised in Southern California, Douglas has also lived in Virginia and Arizona. He now lives in New Mexico with his family, pets, and livestock, and enjoys reading science fiction and conspiracy thrillers as much as writing them.
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