Age of Power 1: Legacy

LEGACY

A NOVEL OF THE AGE OF POWER

By JON DAVIS

This
is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in the book
either are products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously.

Copyright-2012

All
rights reserved.

Published by Jon Davis to Amazon Kindle.

CHAPTER ONE

The
sky was clear and bright, with every star a luminous beacon in the night. Even
the Milky Way was a gold and azure blaze that stretched out in all its glory.
Yet, for all the beauty above, there was serious competition on the ground
below. Looking over the scene, I saw the freshly fallen snow as it shimmered in
a range of bright and cheery colors brought about by Christmas decorations.

Red
and green lights intertwined with artificial icicles that were hanging from the
edges of roofs. Decorations of reindeer pulling Santa’s sleigh sat on the top
of a few of those roofs. It was a common theme this year. But I saw that two
homeowners had stayed unique and showed their religious faiths instead. One
roof had bright-yellow lights in the shape of a cross while the other showed
the celebration of Yule with a pentagram constructed of green blinking lights.

The
two religious symbols were across the street from each other, showing like a
competition. I had to smile. That had to make for some fun debates. I continued
to look up and down the streets, watching the drifting white mist of my breath
soften and mix the colors into a rainbow haze. Lost in thought, I knew that I
could look at the stars and Christmas decorations until sunrise. And I probably
would have, if not for the shock of cold metal touching the back of my hand.

I
jumped at the feeling and glared back at the cause of it. My best friend, Brand
Houseman, chuckled and waved the beer side to side.

Then
treating it as if it were a microphone, he said, “Earth to Vaughn Hagen. Are
you there, Vaughn? Or are you going to just stand there with your head up in
the clouds all night?”

Decisions,
decisions…oh 
who
 was I kidding? I reached
out and grabbed the beer. Brand pulled it back as he gave an amused snort. He
said, “Doofus. You’re a geeky doofus.”

I
chuckled and then said, “Hey, I like what I like. Give me the beer.”

Handing
it over, I took it and opened it. Taking a drink, I tipped my head up just as a
meteor trail flared and died, but the cold beer was more important.

After
all, a guy does have priorities.

Taking
another sip, I continued looking for more trails until I heard Brand unzipping
his backpack. I glanced over and saw him pulling out another beer. I said,
“Brand, just one. We won’t be up here long. Save the rest ‘til later.”

He
looked at me with a grimace and said snappishly, “Well, if you’re going to take
pictures, then do it. It’s cold up here!”

I
gave Brand a sidelong glance. I said, “You’ve been growly all day now. What
happened? Did Sherry turn you down? I know you wanted to ask her out.”

Brand
grunted, and looked away. “Ah, she turned you down.”

Brand
suddenly glared back at me. “What?”

His
voice was flat with annoyance. “She turned me down, all right. Then she asked
about you.”

I
stared at him for a moment, the idea of taking pictures forgotten for a moment.
I couldn’t help grinning. He gave me a growl back. He said, “Do you want us to
get caught up here? We don’t have all night, you know.”

I
chuckled for a moment and then asked. “Sherry would have been…what? 
The fifth or sixth girl, this year?
 
Aww.”

His
eyes narrowed for a moment before he grinned at me. “Yeah, well, that’s
what—five or six more than you’ve gotten? I think this would’ve been
number…what? 
One?”

I
winced. Damn, but he had me there. Between the two of us, Brand was better
looking. Now, I knew I was handsome—in a goofy smile sort of way—but Brand had
it easy. While he was my height and even a little thinner, he had his mother’s
gently pointed chin, which somehow softened the look of his crystal blue eyes.
When the white-blond of his hair entered the equation, he became a magnet for
girls. I’d had all of one date, and she was…well, she was fun to be with, yet
it never went past that first kiss. Then she moved away. Go figure.

After
that, I hadn’t found anyone who enjoyed my company past a nice smile. I never
seemed to be able to talk with a girl for very long before she lost interest.
Brand was more easygoing around the opposite sex. He could talk casually with
girls while I usually stammered and—um, oh look, a falling star.

No,
I didn’t like thinking about it.

Reaching
into my jacket, I pulled out my camera. I didn’t say anything for a moment.
Snapping the picture, I looked at the screen and found that I had managed to
get the trail just before it faded into the night. Then I looked down at Brand.
He had his head cocked to the side, studying me.

I
waited for a moment, but he said nothing. Impatiently, I said, “What is it
now?”

He
said, “You do look like Ryan Kwanten, the actor on 
True Blood
. You
ain’t
anywhere near to his muscle build, but you’re about his
height, and your hair is the same style and color as his. Though, I think your
eyes are a darker shade of blue.”

“And
this came from…where?” I asked, confused by the comment.

Brand
snorted, and said, “Sherry. When she said she was interested in you, she
mentioned that you looked like the guy. And now that I think about it, you do.
I just never thought about it before when I watched the show.”

I
was startled. I said, “Wait, what? You watch 
True Blood
. 
Why?
 It’s about vampires!”

Brand
laughed at my surprise. He said, “Bro, it has hot women vampires trying to bite
people. Do you think I’m 
not
 going to watch hot looking
women?”

Huh.
Sexy looking women aside, Brand usually didn’t enjoy watching shows with
vampires, or any shows with monsters in them. Between the two of us, I was the
science fiction and fantasy geek, not him. I loved those types of shows, and I
watched them all the time. Brand was more likely to watch NASCAR racing, or a
boxing match.

But
once I thought about it, I said, “Why, yes. Yes, it does have very good-looking
ladies of the bloodsucking variety.”

He
waved a hand at my camera before he folded his arms underneath the arms of his
coat. “I’m glad we agree. Now, take your damn pictures. I’m cold!”

Good,
he was starting to relax. But it was cold up here. So I began sighting for
pictures. It was a good vantage point. We were in a squared off space at the
top of a large four-story high church in my hometown of Riverlite, Iowa. The
space hadn’t always been here. There used to be a large open-air bell tower at
the front of the building. Growing up, I remember it ringing across the town
for services and holidays.

Eventually,
they took it down. But instead of filling the left over space, the roofers had
put in drainpipes to keep water from leaking into the church atrium and the
nave below. Those drain pipes were how Brand and I had gotten up here tonight.
It was a regular place for us, and we knew that, as long as we kept out of
sight, we would be fine.

Tonight,
climbing up here was my idea. Normally, we wouldn’t be up here at this time of
the year—what with the cold and snow. But I wanted the pictures of the holiday
lights and the town to hold onto. Graduation was this year, and come next
Christmas, I’d be in Chicago for my first year in Chicago University. 
If I could pick my major that is.
 Ah well, I’m sure I’d
have it decided by August.

I
hope.

I
shook off the thought and took my pictures. This late at night, the
streetlights had no competition. However, for the next few days, the city would
keep the decorations lit twenty-four hours a day until right after New Year's
Day. As usual, there were homeowners competing with each other.

Looking
at the yards, I could see lit candy canes, small Christmas trees, and panoramas
of scenes from the Christmas stories I’d grown up hearing. Some scenes were
silly. Rudolph fought hard against some elves in one yard, and two neighbors
had decided to put as many lights as possible on the trees in their front
yards. It was a wonder that the trees hadn’t burst into flames. I took a few
pictures of the crazier looking efforts, thinking that, with all these lights,
it would have to be a miracle if anyone was getting any sleep.

Because
I do have some taste, I focused on taking close-ups of the better-looking
decorations. Still, while the lights were beautiful—especially with the fresh
snow—the best sight, out of all the ones I’d seen, was the biggest decoration
on Library Square. Lighting the whole area off Main Street was an
extremely tall evergreen wrapped in various shades of white lights, and topped
with a bright blue star. Blinking lights wrapped around the branches to come
together with the electric blue light of the star to create dancing shadows
around the tree. It made me think of the Christmases I had had with Mom and Dad
before they had gotten divorced. Mom still decorated our tree like this.

I
continued taking pictures until I saw a police car driving slowly down the road
just west of Library Square. Stupidly, I tensed, and brushed a finger against
the flash button of the camera.

“Get
down!” I said to Brand.

Kneeling
below the edge of the recess, we held our breath, wondering if we’d hear a
siren in the next few seconds. I really didn’t want Mom waking up in the
morning, just to find out that the police had arrested her son, for trespassing
and underage drinking. That would be the worst Christmas present ever. And
because she worked at the town’s courthouse as a court stenographer, she’d
never hear the end of it from her coworkers.

After
some long moments, when we didn’t hear anything, except for snow shifting
against the tiles of the roof, I took a chance and glanced over the edge. The
cop car sat there at the corner of Fifth and Main. Was the cop thinking on what
he had seen? Was he about to head over here? Was he thinking of doughnuts? Dear
gods, I hate it when they just sit there!

Finally,
the car turned west onto Main Street. As the cop drove away, I nodded to Brand
that it was safe. He let out his breath in a sigh of relief and, pointing to
the backpack, he said, “I’m getting a beer, don’t bitch.”

“I’m
not.” I said.

Brand
got to his feet. Brushing snow off his pants, he went over and pulled another
beer out of the bag. I stayed kneeling for a moment, watching him. Okay,
whatever was bugging him had nothing to do with Sherry turning him down. He’d
just used that to push me off the real issue. I knew Brand. He wouldn’t want
another beer. 
Not over the simple possibility of the
police putting him under arrest.
 If anything, he’d normally just
laugh about it. Not tonight, though. But the problem was
,
I couldn’t just demand an answer. With Brand, you had to coax things out.

Shivering
slightly, I decided to do it on the ground, not up here on a cold roof. I
glanced at him, though, while putting my camera away. Then I froze midway to
putting the camera in my coat. Just behind his left shoulder, as Brand drank
his beer, I saw two more streaks of light in the night sky. I lifted the
camera, but the trails faded by the time I hit the button.

“Huh,
there’ve been a few falling stars tonight.” I said.

Brand
glanced behind him, then back at me. He said, “Eh, it happens, doesn’t it?”

“I
suppose. We must be passing through a meteor shower or something. I think I’ll
take a few pictures of the sky for good measure.” I answered.

Ignoring
his sigh of impatience, I took a few more pictures of both stars and
decorations but noticed that no more meteors appeared. I looked around one more
time, to see if I missed anything, and then, taking notice of another sigh from
Brand, I put the camera away.

“That’s
it—we can head home now,” I said.

Brand
finished his beer then let out a burp. After that, he said, “Or we could walk
around until sunrise.”

I
looked at him, letting the worry show. “Um…what’s going on?”

Brand
looked away, but said nothing. It was annoying when he acted like this. Brand
Houseman could go from his usual fiery, hotheaded attitude to a sullen tense
mood between one breath and the next. I’d grown up with it since we were kids,
and while the sudden shift wasn’t new, I wasn’t sure about the reason this
time. Nothing about tonight or today had been bad, with maybe the exception of
Sherry. We’d gotten out of school. Now was technically the first day of
Christmas vacation…oh, now I knew what it was. “With the holiday stuff in
school, I totally forgot what else today was. I hardly took notice of the
craziness, but Karla must have been driving you and your Dad nuts.”

Brand
laughed and said, “Got it in one, genius! Wondered if you’d noticed her
freaking out—what with all the news articles she’d bookmarked on the Internet.”

I
sighed, “Brand, you know she’s going to feel silly in the morning. Everybody
who believed the hype will feel like an idiot. Give her a break. By this time
next week, she’ll be interested in something else.”

Brand
groaned, and then said, “Oh Christ, not another Doomsday prediction—anything
but that! Haven’t we had enough?”