After I finished 'Wintertale', I announced a sequel to the story. The fact is, I don't like unfinished stories, broken promises etc. Therefore I immediately after 'Wintertale' came to its finale, and its prequel had been posted, started to work on this story. It's a pure sequel to 'Wintertale', meaning that it's highly advisable to read 'The Night That Changed Everything' as well as 'Wintertale' to understand the relationships and characters, depicted in this story, unless you've already read them. Not that I'd be advertising my work (OK, maybe just a little … LOL), I simply believe that if you start reading this one, you'll be a little lost as how characters changed to become like they'll be in this story.
I also wrote that this would be completely different story than 'Wintertale'. Perhaps I'm risking losing some readers by taking the "mainstream" direction (with that I mean that in this one there will be other terminators, there will be fighting, there will be huge problems for our heroes, there will be angst …). But the idea was there, forcing itself into my mind and I couldn't simply discard it. I still hope that some of you will like it.
Again, as always: I'm not a native speaker, so, please, keep that in mind as you stumble upon my grammar, spelling and syntax mistakes. I have no beta reader so everything you read is mine and I'm the only one esponsible. Maybe I should ask someone to beta read for me, but …
'Wintertale' was a fluffy, romantic and humorous story, while this one is much darker, dealing with much more unpleasant situations and things. Humor and romance were not in the foreground as I wrote the concept for the story, so they will be far scarcer than in 'Wintertale'. Still, here and there, you'll find some, I hope.
This prologue will undoubtedly open many questions and leave all of them unanswered; it will absolutely be confusing, making the readers asking themselves 'What the hell did he mean with that?' Al I'm asking for, is a little patience. The story will have about 40 chapters and (almost) everything will be revealed and answered at the right time.
Not to forget: I own nothing but the plot and OCs and am definitely not making any money out of it.
Prologue
Unknown Time, Unknown Location
The wind blew across the plateau, raising clouds of dust that whirled into the air, following the direction of the wind gusts, spreading over the seemingly endless plains and enveloping the countryside in a veil, blurring the sight. They travelled across the barren lands until reaching the rim of the plateau, where the plains suddenly fell into the abyss, on the bottom of which the silver streak of a river carved its meandering eternal way through the depths of the canyon. The dust clouds continued their way over the edge for a while before slowly beginning to fall down towards the bottom of the abyss, following the dying wind that seemed to be tiring from its forceful journey across the plains and allowed itself to slip down, deeper and deeper into the canyon, getting weaker and weaker as it approached the bottom.
The sun shone mercilessly down on the plateau, raising the temperature high above comfort zone. Almost no vegetation could be found anywhere, just small cactuses here and there witnessed that there was still life here, struggling for survival in the hostile environment. And even these tiny pockets of life seemed to fight a losing battle with the relentless wind and sun. It looked like the nature decided that this wasn't the place for living beings to prosper and set its devastating forces on fulfilling its decision, obliterating every trace of life.
At the edge of the plateau, a man with long raven hair, carefully bound in a pony tail, stood like a statue. His eyes were closed and the face revealed complete concentration. Head slightly bent backwards, so that his face faced the piercing blue skies, slightly blurred by the dust clouds, slowly tilting from one side to another and back in a repeating motion that seemed like it would be made subconsciously. Arms spread slightly and fingers outstretched only underlined the state of his concentration. He didn't bother the wind that tossed his pony tail over his shoulder and settled it flapping on his chest. His lips moved slightly in silence, regardless of the dust particles, gently stinging the back of his head.
It seemed like he would be standing there for hours, but it was in fact only few minutes since he came here and stopped at the edge of the abyss. His eyes opened abruptly and gazed blankly towards the sky for few moments. Slowly, his head straightened up and his look concentrated on the vast plain on the other side of the canyon, which split the landside in two halves, making every passing to the other side by land almost impossible. After few seconds his eyes focused on the rim and his arms sank the short distance to his body and now hung limply.
"It's time." A soft whisper emanated from his lips and almost got lost in the howling of the wind that seemed to have suddenly gotten much stronger. As if these were the magic words, his body suddenly became alive. He turned resolutely and walked away from the rim, slowly vanishing into the clouds of dust, seemingly completely unfazed by the obscured visibility and almost sand storm.
"So, what you are saying is basically that we have to deal with a machine, built in the future and sent back to fulfill its programmed mission?" The man who spoke these words in a calm, almost cold, emotionless voice was dressed exquisitely in well tailored suit. His eyes slowly shifted from the memory stick he held in his hand to look at the other man, sitting beside him on the bench.
All around them children screamed in delight and ran to and fro, engaged themselves at the playsets, chasing dogs and kittens as well as other kids too, while their parents, mostly mothers, sat on the benches, mainly in pairs or three together, talking, but still keeping an vigilant eye on their offspring. It was an ordinary day on the children's playground, if it were not for the two men, sitting on one bench, the farthest away from the others, obviously not being a part of this everyday's social gathering. Furthermore, should someone pay attention, they'd soon find six other men in dark suits, wearing sunglasses, standing on the strategic points that ensured them control over every possible threat to the two men on the bench. Actually, quite a standard situation, only underlining the wide spread cliché of how the high ranking officials of the semi government agencies conducted their dark business. It was obvious that they tried so hard to act unsuspicious that the efforts resulted in highly suspicious picture.
The other man, looking a bit older than the first one, dressed more casual in a dress that could have been bought in any clothes store, nodded: "Yes, that's the bottom line. However, I have to warn you, that this machine can take out entire squad of seals in a matter of seconds if it's allowed to act. You have to stop it before it gets a chance to attack, otherwise you're doomed."
The first man smirked arrogantly: "I have my professionals who know what they have to do and according to the data you gave us it won't be too difficult to find it." He tapped slightly at the memory stick, paused and turned to look at a little girl, maybe 4 or 5 years old, running after a small white dog, which barked enthusiastically and kept its pace just fast enough as to not allow the girl to catch up on it. Her giggles echoed across the playground and her face glowed in glee. There was no chance she could ever catch her prey, but she continued after the dog undeterred, and enjoying the race she could never win with all childish innocence and enthusiasm.
As soon as the girl and the dog disappeared between the other kids, the first man turned back to the other one: "Why are you giving me these data? According to my information, your company needs that machine to complete their contract." He paused and smirked arrogantly again: "Are you expecting some personal bonus from this? I couldn't imagine you going back after such betrayal."
The second man wiped his forehead, on which now the small drops of sweat formed, with shaking hand and after a second answered, without looking at the first man: "I think that the company hides some crucial facts from you. I assume they are trying to double cross you, so I decided to act to prevent them from doing it. I don't expect any personal bonus apart from your help in disappearing from their radar."
The first man's smirk widened: "Pure patriotism then. If we only had more men like you." He looked at one of the men, standing guard and slightly jerked his head towards the second man with raised eyebrow. After he got the guard's attention, he shook the head, and tilted it away from the second man while closing his eyes for a second. The second man kept his gaze to the ground and missed the complete exchange. The guard nodded barely visible after receiving the unspoken command and turned to the other guards.
"Are you definitely sure that this information is correct? No chance that it could be a trap?" The woman's eyes bored holes into the face of a scrawny young man, who seemed to almost fidget under her glare.
"Yeah, I'm absolutely sure. I've checked it over and over again and could find nothing that would prove it wrong." The man, probably in his twenties, spoke in calm voice, which was in perfect contradiction with his looks and his clothing. He spoke very self assured, like he would be just pretending to be someone from the bottom of a social ladder, whilst in reality he'd be on the top of the food chain.
The woman's stare softened a bit and a small smile appeared on her lips: "OK, I'll forward it then. " Her face momentarily got the threatening expression again: "But … should I find out that you sold me a lie, I'll find you and take care that you'll never sell anything to anyone again. There's no hole in the ground in which you could hide yourself from me. Understood?" Her dark eyes glared at the boy, who smiled nonchalantly in return, showing that her threatening face made no big impression on him.
"I wouldn't try to double cross you, especially not with such vital information. You know me." His voice was calm and soft and revealed that he really meant what he just said.
The woman's face softened and she grinned at him and nodded before she turned on her heel and left him with quick steps.
A young black man in an expensive looking suit sat at the polished, antique looking desk. His eyes were glued to the screen of his notebook and their erratic movements made it clear that he was reading something that got his attention. Besides the computer, there was nothing else on the smooth surface of the big table, making it look very small in the middle of the vast shiny table panel. His face was slowly beginning to show his astonishment and his eyes widened ever so slightly as he came upon something that obviously peaked his interest. After few seconds he absorbed the message or whatever it was that he was reading and leaned back, his eyes staring beyond the screen into the wall but seeing nothing.
It took him quite a long time to get out of his daze and his eyes slowly refocused on the screen again. Slowly, he lifted his hands, neared them the keyboard and rested there for a while like he would still contemplate if he should type anything or not. His eyes flickered from the screen to his hands, gazing at them and noticing that they were trembling slightly. Then he looked at the screen again and murmured so quietly, that even he himself had problems to hear the words: "That can't be true! You bastards! I'll have my revenge! I'll have it and it's going to be very, very messy!"
His hands lifted and touched the keyboard. He hesitated for a second but then began to type furiously, while his eyes got the distinctive dangerous, even murderous, gleam, revealing how at the moment hate marked and even directed his feelings and actions.
Few minutes later he finished his typing slide the mouse slightly and after he clicked the mouse button, he leaned back into his chair. Hate was gone from his face, there was only smugness and self assured smirk visible on his face. He intertwined his fingers, put his elbows to the table and leaned his chin against the intertwined fingers, while grinning at the screen: "The trap is set! Now you'll see that it's not good to mess up with me! You'll learn it the hardest way!"
TBC