Book entry part one final cut.

Clineaus Grey sat as still as the boulder of cold granite beside him, his black body-length trench-coat waving slightly in the breeze, his long black hair falling in front of his cool grey eyes and his black combat boots crunching the gravel as he shifted positions into a crouch. Clineaus was somewhere in the wilderness of the mid-west. He was waiting for the inevitable arrival of Special Agent Gabriel “Cody” Matthews of the F.B.I. The reason for Cody’s arrival was that twenty four hours earlier Clineaus Grey had placed a call in to the Federal Bureau of Investigations regarding a confirmed tip that he had about a potential threat to national security. Clineus had requested Cody, and Cody alone for the simple fact that he was the only one Clineaus trusted even though neither man had ever met the other. Clineus chuckled at the thought and disappeared into the forest to wait.

Special Agent Gabriel Matthews looked out the window of the ancient black hawk heli-copter at the rolling hills of central Missouri. The last seventy two hours for him had been a whirlwind to say the least. He had just finished busting the biggest drug producer this side of the Mexican border and he had totaled his jeep in the process; a reason why he was in this chopper. And of all the things that could be going through his mind at the moment, oddly enough, was why people kept on calling him Cody. He had been called that as long as he could remember. He would ask people why they called him that and he would always get the same answer: “I guess it just fits you better” they would say, and even his own mother would agree with them! Waking up from his day dream, Cody heard the pilot’s twangy southern voice crackling in the ancient headset reminding him that they where almost to the rendezvous point.
“Thanks Mac!” Cody said, checking his gear and drop harness.
“No problem Cody.” Mac replied with a smile. Mac had been Cody’s friend and mentor ever since Cody had joined the F.B.I. Cody doubted that he could have even made it this far if it had not been for Mac’s help.
“I know it’s none of my business, but why you and why here?” Asked Mac
“I really don’t know Mac.” Cody said. “I’ve never even heard of anyone named Clineaus Grey. I’m not sure if Chief is doing the right thing sending me into the unknown after a tip that we don’t even know is credible!”
“Now Cody you don’t need to go and get mad at him now.” Said Mac “He probably has a good reason for this, and even if he doesn’t and this turns out to be just another idiot crackpot out to get on T.V, everything will come out in the wash.” This kind of calm counsel from Mac was what had kept Cody from getting kicked out of the academy, or college for that matter.

Cody looked out the window of the chopper for the signal flare that Clineaus had said would be the sign for them to let Cody out. Suddenly the sky directly to Cody’s right was illuminated with a brilliant blue streak that stood out drastically even against the mid morning sun.
“That’s odd.” thought Cody “Never seen a blue flare before.”
“There!” They spoke at the same time.
“You gona’ be ok kid?” asked Mac.
“I’ll be fine Mac. No need to worry. Just don’t crash or anything like that wile I’m on my way down.”
“Ha-ha! I’ll try not to! See ya’ later kid!” Mac waved Cody off the chopper and watched as Cody slowly released the rope and lowered himself to the ground. Once there Cody jumped clear of the harness and began to wave the chopper off only to see it burst into blue flames and spiral out of control spewing smoke and flames as it crashed into the upper canopy of the forest.

“No! Mac!” Cody screamed over the reverberating echo of the explosion. He was just about to run to where the chopper went down when he saw that he was surrounded by five creatures that he could barley see. Sometimes they would be a brilliant sapphire blue but as soon as Cody looked at them they appeared no more than extensions of the trees behind them. From what Cody could see, the things stood on two legs, standing about seven to eight feet tall at the top of the head and appeared to have a hard exoskeleton of sorts that reminded Cody very much of a beetle or crab. The creatures claws were what frightened Cody the most being four inches long, bright red and came in multiples of six on each hand. Cody was thinking of what he should do when the largest one of them spoke to him in a strange growling, whisper that seemed to reverberate inside his head and sent involuntary chills of icy fear down Cody’s spine.

“Gabriel Matthews.” said the largest one “we are the warders of the Omen. You have some information that is very valuable to our master and our orders are to take you alive. If you refuse we will have no choice but to use force and make you come with us.”

“And why should I?” asked Cody tentatively, as he reached behind his back and turned on his emergency transmitter. He guessed that the rest of his team should be here in 5 minuets so he would have to stall them until then. Cody wondered how interested theses things would be in a little small talk. “I do not know of anything that could be useful to anyone other than me and my President. You must be mistaken. I’m sorry, you have clearly wasted your time.”

“We are never wrong!” snapped the creature through its sideways jaws full of crimson colored teeth. “You are what we are looking for and you are the key! Now stop stalling and come with us or we will force you.”

Cody stared at the creatures beady black eyes and wondered where the heck his team was and if he had to; whether or not he could take five, seven foot tall creatures that he was assuming to be aliens at the moment despite how absurd it sounded.

“I see you have resorted to trickery to try and get away, Gabriel Matthews. Yes, that’s right. Our ears are much keener than yours. I can hear the hovering craft that you called. And do not think for a moment that this makes any difference. Just the five of us could take down three-hundred of your puny race. Now you have forced us to take drastic measures.” Motioning to two of the smaller warders to grab Cody the largest one stepped forward and made a lightning fast attempt at grabbing Cody’s shoulder. With a sharp duck and a roll Cody managed to escape with his life but his right shoulder exploded in mind searing pain as the warders talons sank into his flesh, tearing it clean to the white bone. Seeing his one chance in a small gap between the warders that had moved to take hold of him, Cody make a break for it.
Running through the woods at full speed is difficult enough, but running through the woods with a backpack full of equipment and an alien chasing you is nearly impossible. A half mile later Cody stopped and looked back, not seeing anything as he collapsed on the ground with exhaustion. To his horror the larger of the two warders sent to seize him was standing right in front of him!

“Now, now” it said in a raspy, baritone voice “let’s not take the fun out of this just yet. If you’re smart you’ll keep running, if you’re really smart you won’t make me chase you.” The warder chuckled and turned as if to leave.

Cody instinctively reached for his side arm and pointed it at the creatures head.
“Turn around and we’ll talk about this.”

“I’m done talking.” It said “I’m here for you and I’m not going to let you just talk your way out if it. Now be a good boy and stand up, turn around and walk in a straight line until I tell you to stop.”

Cody’s hand trembled slightly. He was having a hard time telling if it was the adrenalin rushing through his veins like a torrent of unstoppable flow or the fear that was beginning to eat at his senses. Before he decided to take the time to care, the warder turned and roared charging Cody’s mid section in an attempt to literally bite him in half. Grimacing as his shoulder screamed at him with pain and reluctance to move, Cody fired two shots in rapid succession into the warder’s open mouth.

The creature stopped as if in utter shock of his defeat, put a weakening hand to its bleeding mouth and with one last mournful groan the warder dropped dead at Cody’s feet. Without taking the time to revel in his surprising victory, Cody turned and began to jog/walk towards the screams, roars and gun fire where he knew his team to be battling the remaining four warders. Reloading his gun Cody’s vision began to fade into an inky blackness. “No! No, no, no, no, no! I can’t pass out now! I can’t I can’t I ca-“And with that last desperate thought Cody fell face first into the ground, out cold from the loss of blood that was still oozing through his scabbed skin.

Clineaus Grey watched in horror at the scene that was unfolding before his eyes; twenty highly trained men being beaten and mauled by the two remaining warders who stood in the middle of a circle of the remaining sixteen men who were under cover and firing madly at the two beasts that continued to hurl ammo cases, leftover guns, helmets and stones at the helpless men. Seeing that Cody was relatively safe for the moment Clineaus decided to help the remaining members of Cody’s team before they all were killed, mauled or worse. Drawing his katana shaped ion-blade, Clineaus leaped 15 feet in the air off of the elevated rock out-cropping he had been sitting on and descended upon the two remaining warders without mercy. After slicing the smallest one vertically in half upon landing, Clineaus began to duel with the largest remaining warder who was still holding a member of Cody’s team by the waist and appeared to be about to maul him.

“Put him down before I kill you!” demanded Clineaus.

“Well, well, well. If it isn’t Clineaus Grey: friend of the resistance and the biggest traitor ever to live through deserting the Omen. You won’t live through our duel this time Clineaus. As you can see I’ve fully recovered and am stronger than when we last met. I’m going to enjoy this.”

Dropping the limp form of the hapless man out of his way the Warder bent down and retrieved his weapon that he had dropped wile picking up the man. It was a strange weapon to say the least. It was bent like a “U” with the prongs being at least 2 feet long. Its color was a glowing white and the tips were a strange shade of blue not unlike the shade of the warders themselves.

Grasping the weapon by the center of the curve, the beast pointed in at Clineaus who had been making sure the poor man was alive. Satisfied that he was, if only by a thread Clineaus drew his fire arm as well as his blade making himself look all the fiercer.

“Let’s get this over with. I’ve got things to do.” remarked Clineaus sarcasticly as he began to circle his opponent.

“I’m going to enjoy this” said the warder, copying Clineaus’ movements.

Without warning Clineaus yelled and charged the warder. Swinging his katana over his head, Clineaus aimed at the left shoulder of his opponent in an attempt to cleave the warders’ from his left arm to his right hip.

The warder was ready and blocked Clineaus’ blow with the under side of his weapon. Then giving a strong upwards heave, hurled the much lighter Clineaus ten feet up and twenty feet back from where he started.

As Clineaus flipped backwards he managed to fire off two rounds from his high-powered assault pistol both shots hitting their mark in the creatures left shoulder.

Howling in pain the warder looked down at his shoulder that was beginning to ooze dark green blood and gave Clineaus a savage look of hatred and utter distain.

“You’ll pay for that you slime!” roared the beast as it hurled himself at Clineaus wile firing blue plasma bolts from in between the prongs of his gun-sword.

As the creature rushed towards him Clineaus used his blade to deflect two of the oncoming bolts and dodged to the left to avoid the other four. Rising up from a crouch after his roll, Clineaus used his momentum, speed and smaller size to his advantage as he dropped his sword, jumped forward and landed a double fisted uppercut into the warders “chin” sending the beast toppling backwards to land on its back. Before the warder could get up, Clineaus stepped on top of him, one foot on its stomach and the other, planted sideways on the creatures throat.

“Looks like I win.” panted Clineaus in a cold, flat tone that showed no hint of possible mercy.

“You got lucky.” The creature managed to ground out through its half crushed throat. “Just remember this: If you kill me it will only worsen the wrath of the Omen when they find you.”

“I’m sure.” said Clineaus in the same flat tone, right before he pulled the trigger, spattering green blood on the ground around where the Warders head used to be.

Meanwhile, Cody was lying on the ground about fifty yards away and was in serious trouble. The loss of blood and the bruising on his face from his fall had left him in near critical condition. Clineaus knelt by Cody’s limp form and dressed his gaping wound the best he could. Knowing that he couldn’t do anymore for him Clineaus called for a medical evac’ transport and upon standing, looked at the limp form of Cody on the ground and then to the twitching body of the alien, then set about burning the bodies of the aliens and making it look like a bear was the cause of the carnage among the four badly mangled humans. Clineaus secretly mourned the brutal and careless loss of human life before him and vowed again for the countless time that he would stop this madness if it killed him. Clineaus did not have to wait long for the rescue party. His radio crackled with the sounds of a human voice.

“Clineaus, are you there? I need the victim’s status ASAP!” Said a gruff, yet friendly voice aged by thousands of cigars, barking orders and years of yelling over the crowd in order to be heard.

“Al, is that you? It’s about time you got here!” Clineaus call back into his radio.

“Yeah, yeah, just give me his general status and I’ll get you guys out of there.”

“He’s pretty banged up Al. Claw wound in his shoulder that looks like it goes all the way to the bone and major bruising on his face from a nasty fall.”

“What did you do to him Clineaus?! You were told to protect him for us, not kill him.”

“It wasn’t me. Some how our plans got intercepted and I had to rescue him from a squad of those dang Warders!”

“Oh boy, H.Q isn’t going to be happy about this one. I’m sending a transport now. See ya’ soon.”

“Alright Al, I might have to skip this one. I have some business to take care of. Chief will understand.” Clineaus then put down his radio and continued to tend to Cody’s wounds the best he could until the transport arrived.

As Alorduv Bekascon - a massive specimen of a man, with blonde hair and a bushy beard, standing 6’10” and weighing in at about 225 lb, Al looked very much like a Viking. Born in the country of Australia, Al had been with the resistance since about age 15 - arrived at the rescue point, stepping over the dense undergrowth and the dozens of fallen trees that lay rotting on the forest floor he looked around for Clineaus, who was nowhere to be seen, “Al” was beginning to wonder if this was the right spot when he heard a mournful and muffled groan coming from the bloodied pulp that was Gabriel Matthews’ half buried in the mulch form.

“Oh man” said Al “What did you do to tick the Omen off so badly?”

Shaking his head and muttering to himself Al proceeded to give Cody first aid and lift Cody onto the waiting stretcher that was not encumbered by wheels since it floated without sound or movement. Still wary of Omen clan members in the area Al drew his side arm and checked his ion-blade – A metal alloy based blade with a virtually indestructible ion-harnessing edge that could cut through almost anything has become the weapon of choice for most of the special forces members from the Resistance; Al’s preferred shape of his blades were similar to those of the Sais.- As Al did this he pushed the hover-stretcher into the back of the orange colored aircraft, Al slid into the unmanned pilot’s seat and assumed the controls. Piloting the bulky craft up through the tops of the trees, Al set his course for the Resistance’s main base in the center of Aires Rock in Australia.

“Hang on.” Al called to the incapacitated Cody “I’m not used to flying something this big.” He chuckled at the absurdity of talking to an unconscious body and set off for Australia’s wild outback.

Clineaus was franticly searching for his quarry. He had been at this all night and most of the day and had not intention of giving up until he found it. He had known what he had to do since the day he left for America from the Resistance. This was, by far, one of the most important missions he had gone on in a long time. And for once Clineaus knew precisely how to go about this and how to achieve his objective with perfect precision and delicacy.