Chapter 1: Nightmares
[A/N: This symbol * represents flashbacks.]
The dark sky thundered with lightning flashing occasionally as it rained heavily. The heavy downpour woke up Derek.
Derek opens his eyes and the familiar dark gloomy sky appears in his sight. He stares at the raining sky for a while before everything comes back to him.
His eyes widened as he remembered the stronghold was under attack. The stench of blood stunned him as he lay among piles of bodies, and his back was drenched in sticky blood.
He frowned and stood up slowly. "Uhh!" He yelped and stared at his abdomen, his ash top was glued to his body like a second skin and his blood had dyed his top.
Long claw wounds scarred his ab-less abdomen and his movements had aggravated the huge wound, his muddy mind was getting clearer and memories of what happened before he passed out resurfaced, those dreadful nightmares had breached the walls and the entire stronghold was in a panic.
His path back home was blocked and he could remember the horror on people's faces as they ran without any specific direction.
While he struggled to squeeze through the crowded street, the nightmares had arrived, and unluckily; he was at the back. Those saw-like fangs were his last sight as his brain shut down.
He stared at his injury and wondered why he wasn't dead. Even if the nightmare did not finish the job, the blood loss should have finished the job perfectly.
Diverse thoughts ran through his mind as he suddenly remembered what had happened to his family.
He ignored the stinging pain from his gaping wound and ran towards his home, but after a couple of steps, he stopped and began to walk slowly.
If he continued to run, he may die from the blood loss or the pain; running was not a good choice.
Derek's muffled groans echoed mildly as his soaked black sneakers collided with the asphalt road, each step sending a mild tremor from his feet to his injury, causing the opened flesh to bleed.
The state of his wound could not hold a candle to the state of the once glamorous stronghold, corpses littered everywhere, most of them were piled into small hills as the heavy downpour caused their surroundings to be a mixture of blood and water, forming a red pool that washed over the wide road.
The road was littered with broken glass, which fell from the once exotic tall glass buildings.
His pupils contracted at the sight of expensive hover cars that he could only dream of; marred with deep claw marks and bloodstains, which were slowly washed off by the rain.
Derek's face turned pale as the horrible sight of mangled bodies with missing parts filled his surroundings.
After a while, he saw the mailman he met this morning. His bike was upside down, his mangled body had a sticky bone spike impaled in his chest, and his legs were missing.
*"You've got the job bro" a tall guy clothed in a blue jacket chortled as his arms slammed heavily on Derek's shoulders.
"What! I got the job!.. haha haha" Derek exclaimed in a loud tone as heartwarming laughter followed. After a long time, he finally got a job.
He rushed and wrapped his skinny arms around the tall, muscular guy. The tall guy chuckled as he also embraced Derek.*
His memory cleared as he squatted and gently closed the mailman's eyes. His eyes were moist, but the rain washed away his brimming tears.
He exhaled loudly and walked away with a heavy heart. The sound of his shoes colliding with the wet asphalt road couldn't even reach his sensitive ears, only the thunderous sounds in the sky and the heavy torrent could be heard in the entire stronghold.
A few meters away, he saw the building of the company where he last worked. It was devastating.
No window was left intact and even with the heavy downpour, the stench of blood was thick, Derek's nose wrinkled, for the number of people who died in that building would not be small.
His sharp senses didn't bother him because he had it since he transmigrated to this world. It was a normal thing to him. Derek remembered the old woman's house was nearby.
He loved that woman, for she had always encouraged him through hard times, so he bore the pain and moved in the direction of her house.
A destroyed compound was before him, although it was in a better condition than other buildings he had seen so far. It didn't mean there was hope. His shoulders trembled, and he turned back and walked towards his home, this time at a faster pace.
His thoughts kept alternating between the realistic fact that his family will be no different from the stronghold and the illusion that his family may have survived.
The sound of his sneakers colliding with the road began to echo as the rain had reduced into a drizzle. The light pellets brought a strange sense of eerie calmness to the stronghold.
Soon the sight of a huge G1 mecha laid across the asphalt road with rain pellets bouncing off it with a low metallic sound appeared before him.
"how did this get here?"
He muttered while his large eyes feasted on the dream of many guys at college. Although the G1 is already an outdated mecha, it was the only mecha they could dream of and have a small possibility of achieving.
The mech, made in human shape, had some differences. A normal human like Mecha could not restrict or withstand the constant barrage of nightmares.
The limbs had major modifications which gave the mechas stronger capabilities. The G1 was equipped with such an armory that Derek could not close his mouth for more than five minutes when he first saw its capabilities on holovision.
But now such an advanced weapon lay on the ground with more than six bone spikes impaled into it.
One of them hit the cockpit squarely so Derek had little hope for the pilot's survival.
Derek etched closer to the mecha and pressed an emergency eject button. This was in case the pilot couldn't do anything from inside, and since it was damaged, the security functions also stopped, which was why Derek could easily use the eject function.
The cockpit slowly opened. Derek thanked his stars and struggled to the cockpit. He saw a young woman inside. Her body was already pale, but he could still hear her faint heartbeat.
To be sure, he stretched his hands towards her face when she suddenly opened her eyes.
Derek screamed with excitement, "You're awake!!".
The woman's brows furrowed. She had not seen a man scream this loud before, but when she looked around; she understood the reason for his current gait.
Derek's delighted expression changed drastically when he looked down and saw a spike pierced deeply into the woman's abdomen. The woman chuckled when she saw Derek's frozen face.
".. It's alright, I know I won't be alive for long, but I need to tell you something. " She struggled to speak, her body trembled from the pain but she endured.
"the blue district… it's empty. The Z-organization has collaborated with the dark cyber organization, .. Tell the Rescue te… Team, the stronghold was a part of their experiment. "
This was classified information, but she was the last surviving soldier who was against the organization, and she clearly could not proceed further. She hoped this boy would deliver the information.
"What are you talking about? We need to think of a way to save your life"
"Please listen to me. Do not forget to tell the rescue team or more strongholds will fall"
That caught Derek's undivided attention, the possibility of another stronghold ending up like this was horrible news to him. "I will tell the rescue team, now can we focus? "
Derek yelled while looking around for anything that could help him. He soon realized that the woman didn't reply.
He turned back slowly and saw a satisfied smile on her face with her eyes closed; the drizzle caused her hair to stick to her face.
Derek removed the wet hair covering her face and called out, but no response. He couldn't hear her heartbeat anymore. She was dead.
Derek pounded the surface of the mecha and screamed. He had finally found a survivor; she signified hope that maybe his family could be alive, but it turned out to be a pipe dream.
Derek still refused to accept the fact and ran towards his home. His wound began bleeding seriously, but Derek didn't care.
As he got closer to his residence, the destruction he saw caused his heart to drop, but he still had a little hope and he kept running. The closer he got, the heavier his breathing, "Help me!"
Derek looked around and slowly moved toward the direction the voice was coming from.
When he got closer, he saw a man who was so badly wounded that it was shocking to see him alive. The man's outstretched hands kept trembling intermittently. Derek turned to see what the man was trying to reach.
And his eyes widened when he saw a dagger embedded in the asphalt road. It shook softly and slowly rose from the road, then it suddenly stopped.
Derek realized the man had stopped breathing. His death wasn't that alarming to him, for the man should have died long ago. Derek slowly walked towards the dagger with a single name ringing in his mind, 'Teleporter'.
He reached down, dropped something, and pulled the dagger with both hands, but it didn't budge. He tried all he could and gave up.
His eyes caught a vague creature ahead of him. Derek abruptly raised his head and stumbled backward as his heart rate spiked and cold sweat instantly soaked his already wet body.
A few meters away from him lay a dead nightmare, three meters tall and seven meters long, with its three tails taking up most of its length.
He patted his chest and exhaled loudly when he saw it was dead.
"whew!, It must be the one that wounded the teleporter" he mumbled while distancing himself from the beast and moving forward, after a few steps a loud sound pierced his perked ears and he quickly turned back, his body trembled as fear reeked off him but subconsciously his fists were tightly folded, he surveyed the vicinity vigilantly and his tense muscles relaxed when he saw nothing of alarm.
After a while, Derek approached his home. From afar, he could see the roof bent in an awkward position. He stopped, his legs refused to move further, and his various efforts to calm his rapidly increasing heartbeat were futile.
He slowly stepped forward, each step taking him closer. He could even hear his booming heartbeat the closer he got. Some part of him was clamoring for him to restrain from going there while the other part encouraged him.
Derek finally arrived. When he looked at what he used to call home, he was devastated. He expected something like this, but when he finally saw it, his fragile heart couldn't handle it. Tears pooled up and began streaming down.
Right before him was the split body of his younger brother on both parts of the broken building, the sight of his father's bloodied remains clouded his teary eyes.
Derek rushed into the house and searched for his mother. Maybe, just maybe, his mother survived. But such a na?ve thought was crushed to dust when he saw scattered pieces of his mother.
She was divided by multiple nightmares. He could see the gown she wore this morning in different directions, soaked in blood.
They were gone, his loved ones, his family, there were gone and here he stood, back to the same position he was on Earth, the same loneliness. He felt mocked; he felt sad; he felt pain.
Derek sat on the clawed couch with trembling shoulders and tears streaming from his eyes. The vanilla cream he bought for his brother came into view. He had gone to buy the cream for his brother.
Unknown to him, a huge beast with Black hard scales and three long tails with weird openings had arrived. It stared at him with saliva dripping from the gaps between its fangs.
Derek, who was drowning in negative emotions, never knew his fate would soon be decided.
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