Tales of the Spirit: the Legend of Maras

Part 02: The Wakening...

"They recovered extraordinarily fast."

"Well their vitals are fine so I'm guessing that there is nothing wrong with them."

"That may be but this one here gives me the chills."

"Me too. There is something strange about this one."

A bell rang in the distance.

"Finally a break. What are you going to eat today?"

A door opened.

"I don't know..."

The voice trailed off as the door closed behind the two people.

Terra opened her eyes. Water swam around her as she woke. She moved her body and was stopped by what seemed like glass. Her head span around as she came to her senses. Panic started setting in as she tried to remember, in vain, how she had got where she was. She put out her hands towards the glass. Her hands were stopped by chord like cables running from each part of her body to the bottom of what she now thought must be a tank of sorts. The cables all connected to a central unit right at the bottom of the tank. She thrashed around as she tried to get the cables off. Her heart rate was increasing as her panic increased. Somewhere close by came a strange beeping sound. Terra was on the verge of a nervous breakdown when she felt something inside of her. It felt right to her, as if it was meant to be there, but she had no idea why. It felt as if it was expanding, reaching out to every part of her body. Panic was replaced by complete calm as she felt in tune with everything around her. Her eyes misted over. Images past her vision but she couldn't make out what they were or meant. That strange feeling was leaving her body now and expanding in every direction around her. It touched and molded itself against the glass around her. She felt it pulsing around her. She felt it without warning push out at an alarming speed. The glass around her shattered to pieces as she fell to her knees. The cold hit her hard as she hit the floor. She shivered and, pulling off the cables, slowly got to her feet. The mist had left her eyes and that feeling had left her to. She vaguely wondered about what had happened but for some reason it didn't seem important to her. What was important to her was getting back her memories. Why this was important to her she had no idea but it seemed right.

She looked around where she was for the first time. She was standing in a largely rectangular dark room surrounded by mechanical equipment and what seemed like very large blank T.V screens. The now shattered glass tank was the only one in the room and it seemed as if all the equipment was connected to it. There was only one light coming from the top and two doors leading out of the room. A beeping sounded nearby and as she turned towards it she saw a screen with what seemed like lots of information on it. The beeping was coming from a large button on a panel on the wall. She walked towards it and read what was on it: "PROBLEM IN TANK!"

'I'm guessing that was because of me' thought Terra.

She looked up at the information on the screen.

'That must be about me I guess' she thought as she read everything about it.

Information on subject:

Name: Terra

Surname: UNKNOWN

Age: 18

Home Planet: Earth -- 'Well duh' thought Terra. 'Duh what? What's earth? Why did I think that?' she thought.

Blood Type: UNKNOWN -- 'I wonder what all these Unknowns are about?'

Diseases: None

Location Found: Meteor Crash site on earth.

Suddenly everything came back to her. Everything about her life flashed by her in the space of seconds yet it felt like hours. She watched every moment of her life like it was an ongoing movie. She came back to the present lying on the floor with her arms wrapped around her wet naked body. She was breathing hard. She made her way to her feet and looked down at herself.

'Why am I naked?' she thought. 'And where the hell am I?'

She looked around the room and, seeing no clothes and nobody in sight, decided to try the buttons in front of her to see if she could find out any information on where she was. She looked at the buttons and, not knowing what any of them did, decided to push one at random. The door to her right opened as she pushed the button and she saw what looked like a room with strange brown suits in them. She walked in and took the smallest one she could find and, after struggling for a bit, managed to get it on. It fit snuggly around her small lithe body.

'Now that I'm dressed I think I should have a look around this place.' She thought.

She walked back into the room she was in before and went towards the other door in the room. As she got near it it opened outwards allowing her to go out. The corridor outside of the room was brightly lit and seemed to stretch on forever. On the right were doors and on the left what seemed like windows. She walked towards the window closest to her to see what was on the other side. A chill ran down her spine as she looked through it. Hundreds of those tanks with liquid in them were lined up in rows. Each one had a person in it and it seemed that they were being monitored by a computer at the far left of the room.

'What's happening here?' she thought as she turned away from the site before her.

She decided to try one of the doors. She picked a random one and walked towards it. It opened and she walked inside. There was one tank in here. Inside was a young athletically built male. As she got near to the tank the person inside turned around. Shock ran through her as she recognized who it was.

"Matt!" she said.

Matt's eyes opened and he looked straight at her. His hands went to hold his head as he crunched up into a ball. Terra realized that that had happened to her before when she got her memories back and therefore Matt must be getting them back. After a few seconds Matt seemed to regain himself. He looked around him and then at her, a puzzled expression on his face, and tried to hit the glass. Nothing happened. Terra looked around for something to hit the tank with and found a light looking stool. During that time Matt was taking off all the cables from his body. Terra walked up and took a nice stance holding the stool up. She took a swing at the glass missing it by an inch. Matt's hand went to his forehead as he shook his head. Terra tried again, this time actually hitting it, and broke the glass. The liquid rushed out everywhere as Matt fell to his knees. He coughed as he swallowed some of the liquid. Terra went and helped him to his feet.

"How did you manage to not hit the glass?" he asked once he was sure he could talk.

"Shut up and put some clothes on." She replied.

He looked down and realized he was naked. His face went red as he moved to cover up his private parts.

Terra grinned.

"You don't have to be so modest. I already saw it." She said.

"Ah. Uh where are the clothes?"

"Out the door to the left is a room with another room with clothes in it."

"Thanks."

Still blushing he left the room to get the clothes. When he returned his head was turned around as he looked towards the windows on the other side of the corridor. He turned to look at her.

"Where are we and why was I in a strange tank?" he asked.

"I don't know. I woke up in one of those tanks too." She replied.

They heard a sound coming from outside the room and as they crept closer to the door, to try and hear better, they realized it was footsteps they were hearing. A lot of footsteps.

"I promise you that my informer can be trusted. There is going to be a raid starting in the next 10 minutes. We have to be quick and get the 5 of them out of here without attracting attention. Let's start with this one." Said a deep voice.

"For your sake I hope your right. How come the government hasn't done anything to get them out of here?" replied another deep voice.

"That's because they are idiots and think themselves invulnerable. Quick get him out of there and move on to the next one." Said the first voice again.

"Got him out. Wow he is a big one!"

"Yes he is Joal. Now get him in the pod so we can send him away."

"Stop stressing Arnie? There it's done." Said Joal.

"Good and I'm not stressing. Get the next one while I send this one away." Replied Arnie.

"Right. Whatever you say." Replied Joal.

The footsteps were coming nearer to Terra and Matt when they heard a door open a few meters from where they were.

"Wow this one is quite the hottie! Look at those. Wow!" said Joal.

"Stop goggling at her and get her inside that other pod. This one here is nearly done." Replied Arnie.

"How long did you say we had till the raid began?"

"About 5 minutes now. Why?"

"Oh no reason." Replied Joal.

"No reason? Ya right I know exactly what you are thinking. That's just gross man!"

"Hey I'm pretty sure you have also thought about it. There she is in."

"For your information I haven't. Move onto the next one." Replied Arnie.

Terra and Matt heard a door open up in what must be the room next to where they are. Matt looked around for a way to escape but couldn't find any.

"Hey this one is already gone. There is a dead scientist here as well. He must have escaped!"

"What?! How could he-"

An explosion rent the air behind Terra and Matt pushing them to the ground and temporarily making them deaf. As they came to their senses they managed to hear a few scraps of sentence that made absolutely no sense to them.

"Lets......here......now."

"Not.......guards.....surrounded."

Terra managed to get a look at Matt, whose face was blackened by the explosion, before rough hands grabbed her and pulled her to her feet. She lost consciousness soon after.

Daniel looked around as he heard an explosion coming from where had just been a few minutes ago. After killing that scientist by trying to defend himself, he was afraid of needles and especially when what was being injected into him was supposed to put him into a deep sleep for a few years so he could be examined, and stealing his clothes he heard noises outside. It seemed to be a female and male voice but he couldn't tell. One seemed to tell the other about clothes in another room but at that moment he was too busy looking for a way to escape to really care. The computers were useless as all they did was give him errors about something or other. Not long after hearing those two voices he heard another two voices coming from the room on his right and, thinking they might be here to help the other two out in capturing him because with all this high end computers they must have realized by now that he had escaped, he searched frantically around the room for a way to escape. Eventually he gave up and decided to hit the computer out of frustration. This worked and the wall seemed to open up next to him. He didn't give the darkness coming from behind the wall/door a second glance and ran full out into it. He found himself in a dark corridor and it took his eyes a few minutes to get used to it, especially when the wall/door closed behind him cutting off his only source of light. For the most part of walking down the corridor he had to feel his way with his hands. Not long after walking down the passage he heard a massive explosion which caused him to spin around and look for the source. After realizing that he couldn't see anything in the dark passageway he decided to carry on at a faster rate. He willed his eyes to work better and let him see more. His senses were heightened as he listened for any sign of pursuit. Miraculously his eyes adjusted to the darkness so well that he could see properly.

'Wow that's weird.' he thought.

He carried on going and didn't stop to think about what just happened. He saw what seemed to be the end of the corridor up ahead. The problem was that it looked like an ordinary wall and not like a door to escape from.

'There must be some secret button that I must push to open it.' He thought.

As he got near the wall he searched the wall on the right frantically for a button or anything to press or pull to open the door. He found nothing so he decided to try the wall itself and see if the button or whatever was one it. Once again he found nothing. He started to lose hope as he turned towards the left of the wall. He looked straight at it and slapped himself on the head. Straight in front of him was a ladder leading up to what seemed to be a man hole cover. Daniel sighed as he started to climb up it. When he got to the top he pushed on it with all his might, which nearly caused him to fall off the ladder as it was as light as a feather, and looked straight up, making him temporarily blind as light streamed in from everywhere, into the most depressing sky he had ever seen. The sky was blood red as if the clouds were bleeding and smoke covered up most of the sky. After raising himself out of the hole and into the open air he looked around. He was in some sort of valley but the river that must have run through here before had dried up and all the grass was dead as well as the trees and bush. In the distance he saw what he guessed was a facility with a huge hole gaping out of the side of it.

'That's were I must have been before.' He thought.

'Where am I? This can't be earth.' he thought.

He heard noises behind him and quickly ducked behind a big rock on his right. He peered over the edge of the rock to the top of the valley where he had heard the noise and saw a group of men attired in army gear, though he had never seen that type of army gear before, marching in a straight line. There were about twenty of them all in all and two of them seemed to be carrying people in their arms. He tried to catch a glimpse of the people they were carrying but couldn't and decided to rather stay behind the rock so as not to get caught. He sighed again as he sat down with his back against the rock as he wondered what had happened to him, why he was being experimented on, where his friends were and if they were still alive, if this is earth and if so how did it get like this, who those people were, what to do now and why he was talking to himself in his head. He slapped himself a few times to try to wake himself up but it seemed as if he wasn't sleeping.

Daniel looked towards where those men had been and decided to follow them. He got up and moved off onto the top of the valley. When he got to the top the site below him took his breath away and gave him a chill that he didn't like at all. The ground below the valley was blackened and small fires ravaged what little grass remained. It was open flat land and in the distance he could just make out the group of men whom he had seen earlier. Red lightning struck down from the heavens as he descended the valley. He started off across the plains at a brisk pace as he tried to catch up to the men. Halfway across the flat land he heard a roaring sound some distance to his left and right. He looked around for somewhere to hide but due to the fact that he was on flat land with little brush or rocks. The little that there was was on fire so it would be useless hiding behind them. He had only one choice and that was to keep on going and try and outrun whatever was following him. He ran as fast as he could but within a few seconds the roaring seemed to be coming from right behind him.

'Well this was a stupid idea of mine to try to follow those men.' He thought as these strange jeep like tanks pulled out of nowhere in front and behind him. People in cool looking swat gear and helmets that covered their entire head jumped out with weapons. They surrounded him all shouting for him to get on the floor. Daniel put his hands up to show he was unarmed and one of the swat people came forward and hit him in the stomach knocking the wind out of him. He fell to the floor holding his stomach.

"Tie him up and get him in the van." Said the one that had hit him. It sounded like a female voice to him but he couldn't be sure as the helmet roughed out the voice. One of the other swat people came forward and tied his hands behind his back. Another one came forward and picked him up and carried him towards one of the vans. He through Daniel in the back then climbed into the back and sat next to him.

'How do I get myself into these messes?' Daniel thought.