Awaken His Eyes | The Awakened Book One

Chapter 1

The young analyst glanced around the room, his intense eyes darting between the flickering computer screens and scores of other technical personnel. His knee bounced with nervous energy, resonating with the frantic mood pulsing through the communications center. As he waited impatiently, he reached forward and grabbed his coffee mug to take a quick swig. It had gone cold. From a television on the wall to his right came the sound of yet another news reporter trying to present a different perspective on the same story that had dominated the media for more than a week.

"... as ocean levels continue to rise across the globe. This event is only adding fuel to the already heated environmental debate that is drawing new lines of separation between members on both sides of the aisle. But while some argue over the potential cause of this global catastrophe, others believe that the issues of greatest concern are the ghastly death toll and the millions of displaced people in nearly every country who are seeking refuge by moving inland. Already, the burden of supporting these refugees is being seen ..."

"What did you want?" sounded a coarse voice from behind.

The analyst jumped, spilling his coffee. He quickly wiped at his wrinkled slacks, but the coffee had already soaked in. Giving up, he turned to address his superior. "Have you been watching any of this?"

"I'm well aware of what's happening," the older man said, his eyebrows wrinkling into a scowl. "It's on every news station on the planet. But we still have jobs to do. And yours is to gather data on your target."

"But that's why I called you over here. They're the ones who caused it!"

The older man's once impatient body language softened. "Show me."

"OK. So, I was going over the surface contour data from the satellites when I noticed that the ocean levels were rising faster in the southern hemisphere. And that gave me the idea to run a simulation, comparing the current mapping data to the—"

"Skip to the point, Matthews!"

Setting down his mug, the analyst leaned forward and grabbed hold of the mouse. Frozen on one of the four screens at his workstation was a distorted satellite image. "This is their facility in Brazil," he mumbled to his superior without making eye contact. He pecked a key and un-paused the video footage, the distortion disappearing immediately.

"This is last week," he said. "Watch the atrium roof."

The older man stood with his arms folded, watching the screen.

In the midst of a lush jungle was a compound surrounded by high fences, topped with razor wire. The interior of the compound had been cleared of all vegetation. At the north end sat an enormous rectangular building with a circular glass roof at its center. A six-digit time display showed at the bottom right corner of the screen with the seconds ticking by.

At 10:06:54, the glass roof exploded upward, scattering shards of debris in every direction. A dark object materialized in the void where the roof had been. When it sprouted wings and began to rise in elevation, it became obvious that it was some sort of bird.

The analyst paused the footage and increased the magnification. "You see this rectangular box on the roof?" he said, pointing to the screen. "It's an air handler manufactured in Germany. I tracked down the schematics and got dimensions. It measures sixteen feet on its longest side, which—"

"Puts the wingspan at about thirty feet," the older man interrupted. "What the hell are they doing down there?"

"Synthetic biology? Who knows? This is the first real development I've seen so far. I have someone tracking the bird," replied the analyst, resuming the footage. "But watch this."