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PROLOGUE

A Shadow Among the Sands

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"I hate this rock"

The words were muttered by a lone man, standing in the golden desert. He had a rugged face, brown hair and eyes, and skin that was just barely a dark tan. A cigarette was flung to the ground, left to smolder in the heat as booted feet stepped away across the sand.

Garbed in white and light brown, he was about as prepared for the heat of this planet as he could get, though it was easy to tell it wasn't any more comfortable. Already, two of the canteens he had brought with him were empty, and the third of four halfway gone. Of the other items brought with him, all that remained was a hand gun, one that looked like it should be an antique. In fact, it was. A Desert Eagle his ancestors had taken with them when fleeing the planet Earth.

Surprisingly, it still worked, and had gone through a few choice modifications. None of it was noticeable from first glance, and hard to spot otherwise. Along with this was a small pack slung across his back, one that held perhaps a day's worth, maybe more, of food, and a few other choice items.

Pausing for a moment, one of those items was removed from the pack and opened. It was a round object, with a needle that spun for a moment before pointing somewhere behind him. A compass. After double-checking that he was indeed heading in the right direction, the canteen was further emptied, and he started on his way again.

Soon he found himself, thanks to the heat and perhaps the repetitious motion of his legs, wandering through memory. In his mind's eye, he saw a row of metal chairs before him, which were very like the one upon which he himself was seated. On his left, a slightly slanted metal wall that had not been there a few minutes ago when he had entered the craft. It was closed now, however. To his right was a row of empty seats, facing the perfectly identical yet opposite row. Further to his right was another steel wall. However, this one had a rectangular doorway cut into it, with the bottom of this doorway about half a foot above the floor. Through this opening he had been able to watch out the viewport as the craft travelled up, through the blue atmosphere, and into space. And then, watching the stars seem to fly past them and feeling as if he were still, he had fallen asleep.

He suddenly found that the air had gone cool, and his feet had stopped. He beheld a straight cut cliff of a black and red color before him, just far enough that he could not quite reach without taking one last step. This he did, and his fingers came into contact with the smooth coldness of unnatural metal.

Turning back the way he had come he saw the golden sea of the desert running behind him until it met the similarly colored sky in a perfect horizontal line. Above were no clouds. There never had been, and as far as he was concerned, never would be. It was barren, save for this strange metal cliff which now impeded his path.

It seemed to stretch out infinitely to either side, the distance wavering slightly in the heat. Here and there the cliff had crumbled, and the smooth surface was broken by rough gaps and holes, most of which were too high to reach. The color itself was faded, in most places simply a dull black, though a few spots retained the red-black glossiness that had been this cliff's former glory.

Above him, the cliff extended. The top was in sight, though far beyond the reach of any man whether he jumped or reached. A curse was muttered, and a cigarette drawn to be lit and he smoked.

He stood there for quite awhile, in thought about this new obstacle and how best to overcome it. Over it was impossible, and obviously through it was not going to happen. Not unless he could find a gap that went through to the other side that was within his abilities to reach. He would have to either go back across the merciless sands, or attempt to go around the seemingly endless cliff. His water and food supplies shrank in the time he was there, debating his options with himself.

After relieving himself under the now red sky and dropping the cigarette to the ground, a decision was finally made. His feet carried him west, along the cliff.

The metal cliff seemed to just be going on forever. He'd been walking for an hour since he'd come across it, and the sky was now a dark red. It didn't look like it was going to be getting any darker, with the light coming from this planet's three moons. That didn't bother him one bit. It meant he could see where he was going. He was down to his last canteen of water, and was now wondering if he would ever get past this wall, or cliff, or whatever it was.

He hadn't noticed it at first, the opening was just as dark as the wall itself. Then he paused, just feeling the open space on his right. This opening in the 'cliff' looked more like the entrance to a long abandoned building of some sort. One glance down the way he had been going, and then he pulled out a flashlight and started into the opening.

It was cold, a nice change from the heat of the desert, though perhaps a bit too cold for the way he was dressed. The flashlight was the only source of light, which he used to examine the 'hall' he was now walking down. The ground had gone from sand, to some sort of black concrete, the walls metal, and the ceiling also metal, several feet above his head. This opening was obviously man-made, unlike the various holes he had seen that had come from time.

Everything was smooth, though faded. He wondered for just a moment how long this place had been here. The hall extended farther than his flashlight would shine, but went in the direction he needed to go, so he moved on.

What felt like several long hours, but may have only been one judging by how much water had been drunk, passed by in the silent darkness. Everything looked the same, and he knew that if it weren't for the compass, he would have no clue whether he was going north or south.

Then he saw a light, or the reflection of a light, when he swept his flashlight ahead of him. A pause, then he moved toward the 'light' he had seen. A metal door, half open, was set into the wall. The door handle still held a shine, that's where the light had reflected from, and he peered inside.

On the other side of the door was a smaller hall, just as dark as the one he was in now, but the ceiling was lower, the walls closer together. The main hall looked big enough to fit two vehicles side by side, but here, you'd be hard pressed to fit one. On both walls were a row of doors, each one a few yards apart. Some were closed, some open, and others seemed to be missing. One he noticed was off its hinges, bent in the middle as if something had rammed it open and torn it from the wall. Everything was silent, no sign of movement or life of any kind, and he smelled nothing except metal and dust.

There was no source of light, except his flashlight, which gave the appearance of a simple cone of existence, outside of which was nothing but a void. It was quite disorienting at times, to feel like you're in a pit of nothingness.

He drew his Desert Eagle, and proceeded slowly down this hall, pointing both the flashlight and the gun where he looked. Through one door opening then the next. Each door led to a small room, each room seemed to have been a bunk. In one he found nothing but an empty, metal bed frame. The springs were lying in a small pile on the floor, seeming to have been put there due to how neat the pile was. The room across from it still had a door that was shut and covered in dents. Upon trying the door he found it stuck. The next pair of rooms down were both missing doors, and furniture, though there were pieces of metal littered inside and just outside both of them.

Further down as he went, another set of rooms were checked. The one to his left held a bed, and something on the bed... He froze, then silently moved into the room. Whatever it was, it appeared to be still, and beneath a cloth that was tattered and covered in holes. His foot kicked something, and it rolled across the room, the sound seeming to echo loudly all around him in the silence. Freezing again, he kept the gun pointed at the mass on the bed. But it didn't move. Once the echoing stopped, and his heart rate had slowed, he reached forward to pull the cloth off the bed.

He jumped back as something came out of the cloth, right for him, and unleashed a round. The creature make a sickening cracking sound, and flew back from the force of the bullet's impact, hitting the wall and falling to the ground. He fired another round, just to be safe, and heard that sickening crack again as the round impacted the thing. Then, curiously, he leaned forward to see exactly what he had just killed.

It was milky-white, and looked very brittle. After a moment, he realized that before he'd shot it, it had been somewhat round. Kicking a few pieces around, he saw a hollow looking face that was missing eyes, a nose, and ears, and was just as milky white and brittle as the rest of it. Then he realized that he had been shooting at a skull. A harmless, old skull.

He sighed, and backed out of the room. Swinging the flashlight around slowly, he made sure he hadn't woken anything up with the gunshots. No sound was heard, no movement seen. The light then rested on the other end of the hall, not where he had come from but where he had been slowly heading to.

That damaged door was still halfway down the hall from him. He moved slowly, more so than he had before, a sense of foreboding growing as he moved forward. That scare with the skull had him on edge, and he knew that if anything was here, it would've heard those gunshots.

Then he came to the broken door. Kneeling down, he took a moment to examine it. There was a good sized dent right in the middle, as if something heavy had been thrown against it. There were also long scratches, everywhere across the door. A small opening, just big enough to be able to see through the door, was cut into the upper part of the other doors. But this one was missing that opening. It had to have come from somewhere else.

Then he noticed something about the door. Or, rather, the ground beneath the door. Brushing dust away from the concrete, he saw marks on the floor. There were small gouges, leading from the door to the end of the hall that he had been walking to. He slowly followed it with the flashlight, unable to see it farther than a few feet, but guessing where it led. Then he noticed what the darkness had hidden before; another opening in the far wall.

"Where the hell am I" He muttered, though in the silence, it sounded like he had spoken aloud. His voice echoed down the hall, back the way he came, and he could have sworn he heard something in response. It was behind him, or so he thought, as he turned around but saw nothing, and no other sound was heard.

After a moment, he gave a sigh then started for the opening down the hall. He moved slowly, quietly, glancing toward the other rooms every now and then. Coming closer, he saw that the opening was larger than the other rooms; A hole big enough for two doors. One of which was accounted for, since it was currently back down the hall behind him, but the other was missing. Beyond this opening was what appeared to be a large room, with a large, round opening in the middle of the floor. A warm draft seemed to come up from this opening, hinting at a heater of some sort. He also noticed a quiet sound, a slow humming of a machine of some sort. It was noticeable only because of the silence of this place. Though he could hear it, he couldn't really tell where the sound came from because it was so quiet.

Across this room, was an opening just like the one he had come from. The same was found to the left, and the right. The door ahead was closed, and to the left only slightly ajar. The one to the right showed damage, one door missing from its hinges, the other thrown wide open, resting against the wall. This room wasn't empty, there were machinery and computers along the wall, most of which seemed damaged or destroyed. A light caught his eye; a simple red dot, flashing on and off across the room.

Curious, he moved for this light, his footsteps echoing lightly and easily drowning out the humming that he now believed came from the opening in the middle of the room. He took a moment to shine his light down this opening, but couldn't see the bottom. It was darker than the hall outside had been, but the air around the edge of this opening also felt warmer than the hall. He then continued to the light, that he soon saw was on the screen of a computer.

It was still intact, and simply in 'stand-by' mode. A quick keystroke woke the machine up, and a soft whirring sound came from the CPU as it warmed up. Who knew how long this thing had been sitting here. Then a screen came up, requesting a password of some sort. On the screen was a symbol, a black, shiftless, narrow arrow with an orange circle situated in the direct center. To the left of this symbol was a U, the right had an F. It took him a moment to recognize the symbol as an A. UAF. United Arshian Federation. Has he just come across an abandoned outpost?

He thought for a moment, before easily typing in a password. It was denied, and he scowled. The gun was placed beside the screen and he looked across the keyboard a moment. Another password was typed in, and denied. A moment of thought, and a glance to the screen, then he smirked

"Of course..." He muttered as another password was typed in. This one was accepted, and he found himself looking at a simple screen. A history log, last dated about a year ago. The words that jumped out at him from the last few entries were not encouraging.

July 17, A3X2.

The Experiment has gotten out of hand. It has begun spreading at an alarming rate, among the other scientists. Many of my comrades have already begun the second stage of the experiment, and I have locked them outside of this room. I fear for what may happen once they reach the fourth stage. They become uncannily smart once the mutations have stopped. Perhaps the mutations are not just physical, but mental as well. It is only a hypothesis, one that I cannot test here. I must escape, but in the event that I cannot, let these logs be the legacy of my work.

July 20, A3X2

Things have gone quiet, the fighting outside the doors seems to have stopped. There are only three of us in this room. Myself, a soldier, and another scientist. Using the security camera feeds, the halls seem empty. We are planning our escape, and hope to be free of this hell we've created soon.

July 21 A3X2

Our guide, the soldier, led us into a trap. I managed to escape back to the room, but my fellow scientist has died. The sounds against the doors have begun again, and now I am certain there is no escape. My only choice is to document every detail of the experiment, in the hopes that others will take on my legacy and perfect the Zavos.

Error: File not found (E:/ENCRY~/A76D8F/ZAVOS)

Connection to Database server could not be established.

Those entries had not been encouraging at all. An experiment that had gone wrong, scientists dying and soldiers betraying their comrades? Though it made no sense to him, this 'Zavos', whatever it was, sounded quite dangerous. Perhaps it was some kind of alien parasite they had uncovered, or some brainwashing technique. And then that file that was missing. Obviously it had been the files detailing this Zavos.

To be honest with himself, he was curious, though reluctant to pursue this curiosity. First off, where was this scientist that was in the room? There certainly weren't any bodies that he had seen. He could think of three possibilities. One, they had all left this place, and were wandering the desert. Two, he would probably run into them somewhere deeper inside if he kept going. Or three, that they had all crawled into a dark corner and died.

But if they were dead, he would've thought the bodies would be strewn about. But he had seen no sign of life, or the dead bodies of things that had once been alive, aside from that skull in the hallway. Nothing human, or inhuman. He certainly hadn't heard those sounds mentioned in the logs.

He already knew that if he wanted to learn more, he would have to go deeper into the facility and find a computer that wasn't having these connection issues, or find the database itself. He could do that, or he could just turn and leave, and continue on his way. Checking the canteen, he saw it was half empty. One thing was for sure: He needed water, and food. And he was more likely to find that here, than out in the middle of the sands.

His decision was made, the Desert Eagle picked up. He turned and walked through the door that was already open. His flashlight lit the way ahead as he delved into the unknown.

The sound seemed incredibly loud, unoiled metal hinges giving a loud, unnatural screech. He winced, and stayed stock still for several minutes after the door had been opened fully. No other sound came, and he breathed a quiet sigh.

"There probably isn't a single living thing in here aside from me" His voice echoed back down the hall he had come from. It had been nearly an hour ago that he had read those logs, and his thoughts kept going to that 'experiment.' Several times already he'd jumped at shadows, and the occasional miscellaneous object he had kicked. Several times he'd drawn his magnum, and twice he'd fired shots at nothing. One of the incidents had the bullet ricochet off the metal wall, and fill his ears with a loud ringing sound that drowned out everything else, including thought.

The room he was in now was just as dark as the rest of the facility. He'd by now assumed it was some sort of lab, obviously UAF from the clues the computer he'd accessed had given him. He was greeted by a soft humming noise, but this one wasn't like the last time. It sounded electrical, like a power generator or a transformer. Swinging his flashlight around, he noticed large, metal-cased cables running along the walls and ceiling in various direction, all originating from the center of the room. Pointing the flashlight forward, he saw what seemed to be a large power generator, where the humming was coming from. It looked like a pillar, metallic and black, with yellow high voltage warning signs pasted all around it.

Looking around the room, he saw several more power generators, though he could only hear the sound coming from the one. It seemed to be the only one working. This room seemed to be a dead end, and after a moment of searching around a finding nothing, he turned his back to the generator and started back down the hall.

The humming was just loud enough to drown the sound of something moving furthur in the shadows.

It happened fast. Something hit him in the back, knocking him to the ground. The flashlight was knocked from his hand, and rolled under one of the generators. As he fell, he heard a hissing sound behind him, then a sharp pain in his leg. He kicked, rolled onto his back, and saw the most hideous looking thing. It had no hair, it's flesh looked mutilated and burnt, and it was biting down on his leg. He didn't have time to think, only react. In an instant he had fired every shot in his desert eagle at the creature. It jerked, tearing through his skin before collapsing in a bleeding heap.

He stared at it, still pulling the trigger repeatedly. The room echoed with the clicking sound of the empty chamber. Then he lowered the gun, breathing heavily.

"What the hell.."

Unaware of the bleeding in his leg, so transfixed on this grotesque creature he was, he rose to a kneel over the corpse. It was humanoid.. Kind of. If you thought of it as a human, you would say it's arms were longer than they should have been. Torso bulkier in proportion, and the head was held at a weird angle. If this thing had stood on its hind legs, it would be staring straight up.

The body twitched, and he smacked it hard on the cranium with the magnum. A sickening crunch greeted the hit, and brain fluid mixed with blood started seeping out of it's ear. It smelled terrible. Was this the Zavos in those entries?

Realizing that this may not be the only creature, he ejected the clip in his weapon and inserted a new one. He looked around slowly, through the dark. He heard nothing other than the droning of the generators. Bit by bit, he became aware of the dull throbbing pain in his leg. Taking off his coat, he tore off a strip of cloth and wrapped the wound. With the absence of any kind of first aid equipment, this would have to do.

He stood, and had been just about to leave the room when he heard something. A voice of some sort that was quiet and distant. He was not able to make out the words. Quietly, he moved toward the door of the room. Yes.. The voice grew slightly louder. It was coming from out there somewhere. Back down that long corridor leading to the room with the pit.

He advanced down this corridor, cautiously. The voices steadily grew louder, at a rate faster than they should have for how slow he was moving. He stopped. The voices still grew louder. Whoever it was, they were coming down the hall toward him. Quickly, he pressed himself against the wall, behind a long dead console, and waited. The voices grew loud enough for him to catch the words.

"They're close... Always close... Always watching..."

For some reason, this voice wasn't echoing down the hallway like other sounds. Nor was this voice accompanied by footsteps or any noise of movement. The voices stayed at that steady volume, and he peeked around the console. He saw nothing.

"They can see you. They can all see you." The voice continued. "They know you're here. You killed their brother."

Quickly, he moved back behind the console. They? This was not sounding very good.

"Who are you?" Was called out. His voice echoed. The response didn't.

"We are your new friends."

"Yes.. Your new friends.. All you have.. All you ever will have.."

"They hear you.. They're coming.."

Something in the distance made a noise, resounding down the metal corridor to him. His grip on the desert eagle tightened. The voices continued, but he tuned them out. By now he figured it was all in his head. How else could they know his name? Moving from behind the console, he raised the gun, and moved forward. This was no time to cower behind something. He had to get out of this place before more of those things came after him.

In his head, the voices grew louder. Another noise came from down the hall. Closer. Something seemed to be.. Sniffing.

_They're coming for you, Ensherio. You killed their brother. They want your blood_

"Shut up" He muttered. A mistake he realized, a moment too late.

The sniffing sound stopped, then a long, drawn out exhale of breath drifted down the hall. He froze, gun aimed into the darkness. He now realized the stupidity of coming back down this hall without retrieving his flashlight. He could barely see anything.

_Here they come!_

Just as those words sounded in his head, he heard a scratching sound come closer at a rapid pace. Suddenly, a dark shape lunged for him, and he got several shots off before the creature had tackled him. It was already dead from the bullets, and stank like death. Shoving it off, he rose. The voices were quiet, and he heard no other signs of movement.

Without a second thought, he hurried down the hall. A trip that had taken a slow, cautious hour before only took him 15 hurried minutes, back to the room with the pit. He took a left, and shot down that corridor with the doors. He could hear something behind him, almost like the galloping of horse hooves, and he shot blindly behind him. The sound of a squealing, that quickly retreated gave sign of a hit. Then he was out the door, and running toward the square of light that was the desert.

_You will come back. And they will be waiting._