I dug through my bag, tossing various articles of clothing and footwear onto A’s bed. “Where Is it?” I frantically thought to myself. The rush to leave my humble abode, and meet Aurora for the first time in years, left me uncertain if I had packed my own survival uniform. They were unparalleled in the field. Capable of integrating with our wristbands, and providing protection form the elements. However, they weren’t combat uniforms, so you wouldn’t want to get into a fight with them. But they were excellent at maintaining homeostasis for minor injuries, as well as, providing insulation from temperature changes.

In my unparalleled frustration, I had just about emptied my entire bag onto the bed, and lost hope when I spotted my uniform folded neatly in the bottom of it, sitting under a pair of my ruggedized boots. “Finally!” I bellowed out loud. I pulled the uniform from the bag, unfolded it, and admired the Dark Green color (No back though) before quickly put it on. Next, came the footwear, and then finally my wristband. Everything felt good, and the suits communication ability which was powered by integrated redundant nano solar cells powered up.

Taran technology is remarkable, it has always been designed to integrate well with nature and blend in with most environments. As I’ve said before, we blend in well. I made one final trip to the wash room, used the toilet, and admired my appearance in the mirror for a moment.

“RAWR….. Look at you”. Aurora had made her way back into the bedroom and was watching me from the corner. Her arms folded across her chest, as she shot me a seductive look. I laughed, “How long have you been standing there?” I asked. “Long enough, to be ready for round three with you……” She replied. I smiled in approval, walking over to her and giving her a kiss on the cheek. She kissed me back, and we made our way back into the main living area of the cabin.

Unparalleled Terran For Unparalleled Twins…….

I made my way to the sink, and looked out the window. It was already late morning by the time we were both dressed and ready to adventure out. “Soooo what’s this other surprise you have for me?” I asked Aurora, my tone emphasizing my curious nature. Aurora grinned another one of her classic grins, wrinkled up her nose in a cute way, and took off through the side door of the cabin. “Follow me, Love!” She beckoned.

I didn’t waste any time chasing her, and I would have kept running but when I exited the side door I stopped fast. The back yard of the cabin was beautiful; Home to an array of massive pine trees, and berry bushes. A few hundred feet from the door, was a little fire pit that Aurora had positioned a few old logs for seating around. There was a hammock hanging from two of the pine trees which looked delightful to relax in. There were even a couple rain barrels sitting up against the back of the cabin which collected water that ran off the roof. This was truly an unparalleled sight to see, and made tears come to my eyes.

Aurora looked over her shoulder, to see if I was still chasing her, but when she saw I wasn’t she put the breaks on, turned and walked back over to me. “I used to lay in bed at night, and imagine us spending lifetimes here, just enjoying nature together. We would swing in the hammock giggling to each other, growing food, hiking, perhaps raising some animals for companionship. No one would ever bug us, and no crazy missions, just the never ending moment while we took a break from it all.” Her voice quivered as tears filled her eyes.

“A…., I would absolutely love that.” I replied softly. Reaching out to embrace her with a massive hug. She reached back grabbing and holding me tight. We stood there in silence for a a few moments, until the sounds of both our communicators chirping broke the vibe. We both looked down at our bands. “It looks like Andrez is on the move, we should get going.” Aurora said wiping her eyes, and reconstituting herself. “Let’s do it!” I announced. Aurora turned and pointed to a large shed, a few hundred feet from us. “You’ll love what I have in there!” Aurora laughed playfully as she turned and raced toward the structure.

I smiled, following quickly behind her. When we reached the shed, Aurora grabbed the doors and swung them open. Inside were two old school ATVs that had been well taken cared of. My mouth dropped. “Aurora!!!” I shouted in excitement, “I haven’t seen one of these in forever, where did you get them?” “Ohhh I found them, a few years back in one of my adventures. They had been abandoned, but they were in great shape so I packed them up and moved them here.” Before I could say what was on my mind, Aurora continued. “They absolute run great, but they do run on gas”. I laughed, “Not surprising” I giggled back. “Do we have enough?” I questioned. Aurora laughed, “Of course, I found them abandoned in an old rock quarry, where they must of done a lot of mining at some point. There were a couple of large storage facilities there as well, that had more than we could use in a few lifetimes. One of my side projects was to move some of it to strategic locations around the area. We should have more than enough to make it to Drew, back, and still have some left over before needing to make a special trip.” I was ecstatic, “Let’s go lover!” I shouted in joy. Aurora laughed again, “I know you’d love this.” She giggled.

Into the Unknown……

I walked around the ATVs admiring how well they were maintained. Aurora also had some gear in the shed, that could be strapped to the rear platform of each. A couple of small solar stations for power, a popup tent, sealed freeze dried rations (nasty but high in protein and vitamins), sleeping bags, and a portable water filtration system were among the supplies. I helped her strap in our gear, check the oil and gas levels of each ATV, and give them one final good look over.

“Well love, are you ready to go? We will have to make one refueling stop halfway between here and the destination.” I nodded in anticipation, “Sure Am!”. With that, Aurora tossed me sleek looking black full faced helmet, which I promptly put on. It fit perfectly, and contained a heads up display, that would be useful. We synchronized our comms, and Aurora set the refuel destination. A location roughly fifteen miles through narrow forest trails from her cabin.

I followed Aurora’s lead, starting my ATV and powering on the front lights. “Check… Check, can you hear me?” Aurora’s voice echoed over the helmets built in speakers.” “Big roger, I hear you loud and clear.” I responded. Aurora turned to look over her shoulder, giving me a thumbs up, before peeling out of the shed. “Follow me Lover, her voice beamed in my ears, with that classic Aurora laugh”. I laughed back, jumping on my ATV and peeling out myself.

Within moments, Aurora and I were flying around the shed, and making a hard left onto a hidden trail. I must admit, even with the heads up display keeping me updated in my helmet, I didn’t make sense how this back yard trail was going to connect to the larger forest. But within moments Aurora hung a hard right onto another trail. I followed closely behind her, and through some heavy trees I could see her Cabin, as well as my Jeep sitting Parallel to our movement. The trail itself being placed roughly 30 yards from a clearing where we could have pulled into the area. Although the area between the trail and clearing was heavy with bushes and tree limbs.

Before we knew it, Aurora and I were moving quickly parallel to her long driveway. I focused on my heads up display, taking note of the ATVs status. Fuel Level: 96%, Temperature: Green, Air Pressure: Green, :Speed: 30 Kph. “Everything all right back there?” Aurora’s voice echoed over comms. “Yes Ma’am”. I responded back. I imagined my response, left A. with a big smirk on her face. She often got a kick, with some of my more Earth like responses. “You’re adorable.” Her voiced echoed in my helmet. “Ok love, there is hard right coming up. Once we cross my driveway and hit this trail, we can pick up speed for a bit. Do you see the turn?”

I glanced at my display, and saw exactly what she was talking about. “Aurora that is some turn, and is that a small incline we are going to launch off of?” Aurora giggled “Yup, hit it dude!” I didn’t have time to respond, Aurora swung right, increasing her speed and launching her ATV off a small incline. Clearing her driveway entrance in the air. I quickly followed her, my heart beating fast, like it was about to be launched into my throat. When I hit the incline, I gunned the ATV, launching it several feet into the air before landing on the other side of her driveway.

Now fully onto the new trail, Aurora speed up to roughly 60Kph. “Whooo Hoo!” I heard her screaming in my years. Aurora was a thrill seeker, I could imagine the unparalleled thoughts going through her head. Me, I was surprised I didn’t blow chunks in the helmet, there was a moment in the Air that I thought I was going to. I looked at my speed, 60 Kph, but Aurora was still a few lengths in front of me.

The ATVs appeared to have a top seep of 100 Kph, which was insane considering we were moving on unmaintained trails. Luckily our gear was good enough to spot dangerous situations in advance. I glanced at the my display again; twelve miles until we reached the refueling destination…..

Something Unnatural Comes This Way……

For roughly another 25 minutes Aurora and I maintained a pretty constant speed, going around large bends, rolling over dead leaves and small branches. The sides of the trail being well defined enough for use to have little trouble, besides the occasional spot where water had eroded the trail slightly. Only to cause us to be shaken on our ride for a moment or two. It was an unparalleled rush, I hadn’t had such an experience in some time. Looking off to the side of me, at a distance of about 50 yards, was the old country road that I had traveled to make it to the cabin. “Damn!” I thought. “This road is long!” And it was, it was extremely long, so long that it was eerie.

I was about to check in with Aurora, when my heads up display flashed an upcoming warning. There was something on the trail, roughly 40-50 yards in front of Aurora. She must of got the same alert because she slowed down considerably. “Love, are you seeing this?” She asked. “I am.” I responded. “Let’s stop and take a look.” She quickly replied.

Aurora and I slowed to a crawl as we approached the obstruction. The trail was wide enough for me to pull up next to her and we moved in unison. It didn’t take us long to see what the issue was. A large tree had given way, and completely blocked the trail going forward. “Damn.” Aurora whispered. She must have forgotten we were connected still, and I could hear her. We came to a stop and I throttled my ATV down to standby. Aurora followed suit and we removed are helmets. That’s when I saw it, a dead deer lying next to the downed tree. At first I thought the tree must had killed it… But I was wrong, very wrong. Getting off my ATV, I made my way overt to it. Aurora still was throttling down, when I noticed the Deer and a contorted look on its face, one of pure horror. Further down the body there were perfect circular wounds in the body cavity. No blood anywhere, no fluids anywhere, nothing but a husk remained.

I shouted to Aurora to come take a look, and she quickly rushed to my side. “Oh my word!” She gasped. The look on her face said it all. Aurora locked eyes with me, which was an indication of the shock we both shared. Aurora, this isn’t human behavior.” My voice cracked. “I know, not human at all”. She replied softly.

I glanced up at the sky through the trees, it was overcast making the area look dark, when it was only mid afternoon. “How far until reach the refueling area?” I asked. Aurora stood staring at the ground, almost unwilling to look up”. “Love” she said, “I think there are Lizzies are still active in the region, I’ve seen shadows every now again, and what appear to be creatures moving through the forest at times”.

I walked over to her, and put my hand on her face, guiding her to look up at me. “I’ve seen them too, the night I got here, I saw shadows darting around your driveway. And that thing we saw in the clearing earlier, it wasn’t natural. This is typical behaviors for them.” Lizzies loved to project themselves, acting like ghosts and all sorts of demonic things. Though they usually did it from a good distance away. The deer was an indication that they were harvesting DNA still in the region. Which was a reason for great concern.

Aurora snapped out of her gaze. “We need to keep moving love, It’s not safe around here. My refueling hideout is still about five or so miles from here, but we are going to have to take an alternative route.” I nodded, and pulled out my wristband opening the display in search for an alternative path.

Aurora got close, looking at my display as well to try and shorten the process. It didn’t take us long to notice a large field on the other side of the country road. It was up about a mile or so, on the opposite side we had been traveling. From there there was an another wooded trail, that we could pick up for about three miles, before crossing back over on this side of the road for the final mile or so. “I set the new route and re-synchronized with Aurora’s band. All we had to do now was to get moving, and I was about to head back to my ATV when Aurora grabbed my shoulder.

“Apollo, promise me I won’t lose you. I remember the Omega project. If it made its way here, please don’t get reckless. I know you blame yourself.” The Omega project was an early attempt at creating an etheric living weapon. Combining genetic material and various vibrational field frequencies. It was a disaster, and caused a great amount of headache on many systems in the cosmos. It was called Omega, because it was thought it would end a Galactic War that had raged eons ago.

Aurora held my shoulder tight, until I looked her. “I promise my Twin.” I replied. Aurora grabbed me hard and hugged me tight. ” I love you, so much”. Aurora whispered in my ear. I hugged her back hard, “I Love you so much too.” I whispered back. With that Aurora and I released each other, giggling as we just about tripped over each other’s feet.

“Aurora”, I said quickly, “Do you have any type of defensive equipment in that gear of yours?” A concerned look now on my face. Aurora smiled, “You know I do Love.” She shouted back to me over the sound of our idling ATVs. Aurora now straddling her ATV continued to shout over the engines hum, “When we meet up with Andrez, we can make sure we’re prepared fully!”. I shot her a thumbs up, and ran over to my ATV, saddling up, before switching the engine to full power again. I inspected the ATV’s status: Fuel Level; 52%, Temperature Green, Air Pressure: Green.

“Check, Check can you hear me Lover?” Aurora’s voice once again echoed in my helmet. I smiled hard, “Sure can lover.” I replied. Aurora shot me a thumbs up, revved her engine, did a quick turn towards the country road and took off. I waiting a split moment for the dust to clear, and then I raced off after her. Once again we were one our way to our destination. Apollo and Aurora, never too far from each other!………

Author’s Note:

Hey All 😎! I hope you enjoyed the sixth episode of Taran Ascending. If so give it a like, or share it via the share buttons at the top of the post. Episode Seven, will mostly likely be out early next week.

I’ve been aiming to complete two episodes per-week. One early in the week, and one mid-week. Also, I’ve updated the About page, which contains cool information about the site. As well as a like to my latest update, which discusses etiquette for sharing work found on Taran Station. Thank you in advance for reading, and stop back often for updates. Or subscribe using the fields in the footer on the homepage.