Evening all,


            Well the report I feared so much is nearly done, jezz 
comparing Tartuffe to Candide to Blake's Songs of Innocents and 
Experiance is just _so_ fun....rolls eyes. i had enough time to put 
this together and mail it.
            If anyone has The Beginning. This takes place about a year 
before the events. As mentioned in the first two pages of spam in the 
Beginning Prologue. The group of kids know as the Phantom Riders have 
now undergone their first trial by fire and survived, bearly. I realize 
this is confusing, in fact very confusing. It was either put something 
together that takes place in the future for these kids or put their 
past up. The past won, but hey at least it's not Ranma.... (dives 
behind armored Gateway 2000 computer).
            As one person has mentioned my diving in and out of past 
and present tense is grading on the nerves, I skimmed over some parts 
and fixed some. None of this has been speeled checked or grammer. Check 
the little list of people I put on part 2 of the Beginning to know who 
some of these people are. Tomarrow night I will be able to get list o 
characters for this story Flight. (aieee way too many characters Bents. 
;))
            As Rufus would say: Flame C+C on!


        Phantom Riders:
        Flight

    By. R. Bentley
    10-1-95-?
    Alpha Version 00.01A

    Chapter 2
    Flight Prologue
    To Heaven's Gates

    The cliff above the falls was still covered with moss and tree 
limbs. Across from the cliff was the rest of the bridge that has been 
built there many years ago. But it had been destroyed in a lighting 
strike. A few feet away from the edge of the cliff, a man tried to 
catch his breath. He sat on his knees, his knap sack lay next to him 
while his weapon was in front of him. His hands still trembled from the 
encounter with his old enemies.
    He looked over his shoulder, back at where he had come from. The 
dark forest that he had ran through only a few moments before still 
stood there, tall trees with branches reaching towards the sky.  The 
forest in this area seemed to encompass all, until it reach the camp's 
boundaries and with that the tree's receeded. He winced, his arm was 
giving him pain while the right side of his body was completely numb. 
He looked down at the weapon, it was burnted to a crisp, the body still 
hot. "Damn you!" He yelled. "Damn you all!"
    "Carefull Miles your voice may carry," a female voice to made him 
turn to his right. Chris, Linda, Jen, Karen and Stacy were all standing 
there. The five Tendor females were a sight for sore eyes, Miles let 
out a soft sigh, it was sight to see that all of his training and hard 
work had not gone to waste. Thank the gods they survived, he thought. 
The five armored females had survived the massive assult inside the 
Dowtown Providence Skyscraper. They were all leaning on each other for 
support, Jen and Karen leaned against a tree next to them while the 
others stood there. They looked like they had gone through hell, their 
scrotched and still smoking battle armour showed that, they themselves 
appeared to have been used as a punching bad. "We lost them," Stacy, 
the team's leader commented, her dark long hair was tucked underneath 
the red and purple armor plate now black and flaking off.
    "You can never loose them, Stacy," Miles shook his shaggy gray head 
of hair. "They will always come after you." He has learned this from 
experiance, from one life time to another the Riders were always there, 
no matter what a person did they were always there.
    "But we saw the place blow up," Karen has gotten enough strength to 
crawl over to Burke and then nearly collasped on the ground. She had 
taken most of the damage herself. She was the demolitions expert of the 
group and on her at all times were her small box of exotic explosives. 
>From all corners of the galaxy she had gotten the explosives from, her 
pride and joy. Her pride and joy had been the first thing to explode 
during the fire fight with Micheal Basile and Elizbeth Markian. She had 
to smile at her master work though, something she'd done as an act of 
love and hatred.  She rolled onto her back and breathed, knew she had 
busted some ribs. "I blew them all to hell."
    "If that's possible," Miles pulled himself up and looked over at 
the other side of the falls. The thought of blowing these Riders to 
their heaven was something he did not want to think about. Later he 
would gloat, oh much later he would. But at present tome celebration 
was not on his mind. Escape. Escape frok this horrible world and back 
to his own where he belonged whrre he would start again. In the castle, 
in the lab, with enougn time to- "We need to get out of here, now!"
    "The troop ship,"  Chris slumped against the tree. "Around the 
moon." The only thing left working on her battle armor was the comm 
sat. She opened the panel on the side of her armor and entered the 
S.O.S into the comm sat and waited until she recieved an answer, an 
answer which was full of hope. "The ship should be here in an hour. We 
can get back to Hirala and start over again."
    "We could now couldn't we?" Linda laughed.

    Luire Brahm and Stacy Swanson didn't even go near the rubble of the 
mess hall. Their friends and loved ones were buried underneath the 
rubble and burning wood. Stacy tried not to cry, but the tears already 
started to trickle down her face, onto her battle armor. The weight of 
the armor wasn't what she was feeling now, she couldn't feel anything. 
The feeling of something in her thoat started and a soft scream started 
to rage in her vocal cords. "Burke you asshole!" She screamed, nearly 
throwing out her vocal cords.
    Lurie sniffed, her hands were already trembling, she dropped her 
rifle onto the ground. Her memory flashed back to Basile, he had pushed 
them out of the hall, telling them to just run like hell. Then the hall 
blew up with every Rider in it. "When I find him," she started.....

    "Doctor to medlab, stat."
    The darkhaired doctor put her iced drink down on the small metal 
table, patting the napkin to her mouth and checked the time: 0012. 
Damn, twelve minutes into her R&R and she was already getting paged. 
She was in no hurry either, after fixing and patching up all of the 
soldiers that had come back from the Podaci Cargo Carrier, she needed 
some time off. Her eyes wondered around the empty rec room, most of the 
window cowls were opened, the darkness of space beyond. And another 
ghost ship looming in front of them. Aloi Squad had been shuttled over 
a few hours ago. Something about a Kasarian Time Gate, that didn't ease 
her nerves either. She tapped her bracer comm panel buttons and sighed. 
"Wilson here what do you guys want?"
    "Doctor we have a patient in Med Lab Prine that needs your 
assistance," Kylara, one of the Essi Secoians replied briskly. She has 
been born only a few months ago and even now she was being a pain in 
the ass. "Stat please," her voice echoed in the room.
    Amille Wilson sat back, closing her eyes and let out a deep sigh. 
Her yelled eyes focused again as she watched the darkness of space 
outside the officer's rec room. The Kasarian cruiser sat out there too, 
some faint signs of starts dotted the skin of space, like a rash and 
these two ships like bugs, like all the other ones they had come 
across. She enjoyed this view of space, or at least where ever the 
Phoenix was....
    She got up, stretching the kinks out of her tired bones and flipped 
some change onto the table. She pushed in her seat and started towards 
the door. She was out into the corridor, letting the door's of the rec 
room close when it hit her how quiet the ship's corridors were. Ever 
since the defrost eight months ago only a small percentage of the crew 
had been reawakened. Mostly lower ranking officers, a few doctors, a 
contigent of techs, three or four ranks of soldiers and one or two 
command officers. The rest of the crew were still locked behind ten 
feet quawnstan made doors and still locked in stasis.
    She walked down the long gray/blue door and access hatch lined main 
corridor of the Phoenix. It would only take her another hour to reach 
the end of the ship, but she needed to get to med lab, at Section 5 
Block 12. She took the lift down three sections and over three blocks 
untill the three sections and twenty blocks containing the medlabs lay 
in front of her.

    Kylara eyed the Terran once morewith disconcering eyes. Her red 
eyes has already gone over every inch of him, always stopping at the 
bracer that was attached to his right arm. For the last hour she had 
been trying to gain access to three deep memory core files the bracer 
had but to no avail. It denined her all right, it denined her 
access....by jolting her with ten volts of energy, subsquencly throwing 
her across the room and out the door into the main medlab area. There 
were only a few med lab officers in the room, awaking and working, the 
others were stuck behind quanstan doors and frozen like beed. Most of 
them had oped to go back into the staiss chambers, out of the ten 
medlab officers five remained.
    The three triplets were running tests on the Terran's body when the 
doors opened and Amille Wilson walked through and doors, opening her 
mouth to say something, but stopped in mid step and sentence when she 
saw what was in her medlab prime area...a Terran.
    "That isnt..."
    Kylara nodded. "Standard Terran Male. Sixteen of their years old. 
Condition was that of critical when he folded in here-"
    Amille snapped her heard up from the recent report and looked at 
Kylara. "Folded? Folded in here??"
    Kylara nodded once more, pointing her white/blue pen at the 
Terran's right arm. "Bracer of unknown origin, Secoian make and model. 
I believe it was used to be used on high risk soldiers during the 
boarder wars?" Kylara looked away from the Terran and watched Amille's 
face for a reaction. The reaction was one that somewhat surprised her.. 
"I thought you would be the person to ask about these bracers. You were 
the one who perfected them..."
    Amille nodded. "Was he wearing anything? Clothing, name tage, 
weapons-"
    Kylara nodded and took a deep breath. "He was wearing Secion Class 
One Battle Armor, name tag on left shoulder, group patch on right. 
Weapons consisted of a pair of Snapp Rifles Model 101-D. Some 
modifications made to them too, looked like he's been through hell." 
She walked back to one of the twins to check on some information while 
Amille had a moment to look over the Terran.
    "Name?"
    "Basile, Micheal L. Rank of what seems to be Lt. Commander. The 
patch-"
    Amille looked over her shoulder at Kylara, eyebrows now knit. "What 
group?"
    "Phantom Riders. Alpha Group. Third of Twelve."
    Amille's jaw dropped. "That's not possible."
    "What is not possible commander?"
    Amille and Kylara both spun around to see one of their Command 
Officers standing behind them. She was looking at the bank of monitors 
that occupied the left and right walls of the main medlab center. Her 
blue eyes fell onto the Terran and stepped forward towards the glass 
that seperated the center and the medlab prime. She blew a stand of 
green hair out of the way and studied her first Terran. "I take it he 
is not Secoian."
    Kylara shook her head. "No he isn't, he's a Terran. I'm sure you've 
seen one of those in your life time Commander."
    "Actually no I haven't," the commander's eyes stopped at the 
bracer. "He seems to be a Rider...."
    "He's not fully recovered, he's resting now, I can wake him if you 
want." Amille eyed Kylara, she was starting to live up to her name of a 
pain in the ass, too eager and willing to please. Kylara stopped and 
looked at Amille. "Doctor's discrition of course."
    "Course."
    The commander seemed to thing it over, she had been with the Riders 
since the very beginning of their travels. She and Tanya O'Hare had 
been inseperable during their time as high ranking officers. She had 
been one of the Phantom Riders's main supporters of staying together 
and a very good friend. Out of all the friends of the Phantom Riders 
had made over their long journey's in space she was the most mysterious 
one of them all. "Can he breath in this atmosphere, Doctor?"
    Amille leaned over one of the read out boards and checked those 
readings with one of the med techs. "According to this he can," her 
voice faded as her eyes scanned the readings, she made a face and asked 
the computer for a deeper scan of the Terran. The answer from the main 
computer made her eyebrows knit.
    "What's wrong?" Kylara asked, alarmed. What had she missed that 
would make the doctor so interested in this alien?
    Amille looked at Kylara almost out of anger but aimed the remark at 
the commander instead. "It appears Mr. Basile has been in this 
atmosphere before, his lungs have adapted quite quickly." She looked at 
the Terran once more and narrowed her eyes. A little too quickly, she 
nor mentioned.
    "Wake him."

    "Something's not right....."
    Micheal Basile turned, eyes sweeping over the mess hall.  His 
bracer scanners gave him a HUD in the front of his pupils, giving his 
eyes an errie green look. He hadn't even sat down yet and Robert 
Bentley's words sent chills through his bones, the look in those hazel 
eyes and the appearance of the cannon has made him summon the Snapp 
Rifles to his arms. "What?" His voice echoed over the rising noise in 
the room.
    Shannon Barske came into his line of vision, her eyes were looking 
around too. She was about to sit down at one tables but now she pushed 
it back from the wooden table, making the wooden bench slam down onto 
the floor. She flanked Bentley, arms crossed and shivered. If she had 
been a cat her ears would have been twitching and being very cautious 
of everything. "He's right," she turned, looking up and then kneeling 
down. Eyes slits as they emited a red light.
    "We can't leave," Melissa King's voice wanders into the room. She's 
been tending to James Ried's wounds. She and Suzanne Snyder are both in 
the next room over, Jim is on a cot with most of Missy's med-kit 
strapped to the left side of his torso. The med-kit beeps quietly over 
the wound from Linda's shooting spree. "He needs another hour tops."
    "Their right," Jim tries to get up but Suzy gently pushes him back 
onto the soft cot. She shakes her brunette head of long hair. He 
complies, knowing his body and is to weak to be moved. His bracer as 
well helps Missy the best it van, a three dimensional display of what 
she is doing hovers over the body.
    Richard Baggesen's swear makes all of the turn. "BOMB!!"
    The doors swings open and the others are there. Stacy Swanson and 
Lurie Brahm both still wearing their armor, their weapons slung over 
their shoulder while most of the secondary group of Riders make their 
way up the hill. They are weak and in no condition to fight another 
battle like they just have done. Most of them collapse underneath the 
pressure of exhustion and begin to fall asleep on the wet grass.
    Their senses and minds have all gone to mush from all the fighting 
they have done in the last four days. They have won the battle against 
the Tendor Army reawakened by Burke through the same process he had 
perfected during the Secoian/Tendorian Huntsman War, six thousand years 
ago Earth Standard among the stars. Now rest for the first time in what 
seems like weeks only to hear scraming at the top of the hill. Ears 
perk up, bodies roll onto their stomachs, lift up their 
darkshades/ionsapers and listen the best they can. Only a few get up 
when the one word dances over their bodies, a word that make their 
minds work and their spines shiver in fear.
    "BOMB!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
    Becky Brewster hauls off her leg mounted weapon, the back pack 
comes off too. Flinging it onto the grass and runs up the hill with all 
her might. The wound from Stacy's little bombing run on the old Secoian 
City three days back pulses. The med-kit helps the wound byt her 
adrenalin is pumping inot what feels like her concrete legs. She's half 
way up the hill when she's joined by Brian Ameral, Joe Bishop and 
Nicole Borque. All of them in better shape then she, but they are not 
wearing the hover boots she does. Their extra traction helps her gain 
speed and ground and also makes her stop when she sees the bright light 
spark from the mess hall....
    Joe Bishop slides to a stop, tired arms are brought up, muddled 
thoughts are carried from his mind to the weapons on his back. The arm 
bracers reconfigures for a better shot, similiar to the Snapp Rifles 
these will fire almost anything. He aimes his targeters at the mess 
hall and fires off a few rounds of deflection damn energy.
    Brian Ameral follows suit, slamming the special clip of energy 
casing into his Cutter Rifle. He doesn't need to aim, the casings will 
activate as soon as they hit the a surface, no matter what it may be. 
He jams the selector switch to auto and pulls the trigger.
    Nicole Borque follows Becky who has kept running. She's 
three-quarters of the way to the mess hall as Brian's and Joe's weapons 
casings zip by. Red energy tenticles nipping at her long hair as they 
arc towards their target. She doesn't see Basile push Lurie and Stacy 
out of the hall yelling at them. She doesn't see Becky blast up next tp 
Lurie and Stacy grabbing them and kicking in the boosters sending them 
high into the night sky. She does see the flash of light and the 
temperature increase, the grass dries within seconds and then carches 
on fire. Then the heat wave starts.......
    Nicole feels the explosion of air push her back down the hill as 
the mess hall explodes.....

    Micheal Basile opened his eyes. The pain he felt is gone. The 
ringing in his ears is gone. He remembered what happened and rose. As 
he does his head comes in contact with the medical scanner and he edges 
back quickly. He rolled off the bed and looked around, blue and white 
walls all around him, other beds with screens on the walls but no one 
else is in the room.
	"Great, I've died and gone to the frozen food section of Stop and 
Shop," Basile blinked as his own voice echoed in his ears. He rubbed 
the sores where the shrapnel hits were, the head and energy pulse that 
had set off the bomb had made all the chairs and metal fixtures 
explode, impaling everyone in an instant. The pressure from the heat 
blast came next and then....then.. They were all healed, even the ones 
to the head and necking making him black out.
    "Location."
    Silence.
    He blinked quickly, raising his right arm and tapped the bracer on 
his wrist. He heard the sounds he's used to, but the visual would 
appear to be inop. He looked around for a med-kit lock, he found one 
and opened it. He indentified the junction nodes quickly and opened one 
of the input junction nodes on the underside of his bracer.

    "Interesting."
    Kylara turned slightly at the Commander then looks through the one 
way mirror and back at the Terran. "What is so interesting?"
    "He's comprimising for what he has, he's making fo with what is 
around him. Interesting." The Commander's eyes narrow, by the gods girl 
what have you been doing? She thinks. She watched the Terran fix his 
little toy through the close circuit camera and wonders what else he 
can do in such a sort amount of time-
	She doesn't have to wait. He looked up from his work, over his 
shoulder, as if somehow knowing he is being watched. The camera zooms 
in on his eyes as they lock with the Commander's and with that the 
lights in med lab prime died. Thus leaving only the lights in med bay 
to shine into the darkened room. The triples begin to scramble for the 
back ups while the Commander's jaw drops. "What did he just do?" 
    "He cut the power to the med lab prime-" Kylara blustered...
    "I can see that how did he do it!" The Commander's hands were now 
fists and looked like she was going to sick her teeth into Kylara when 
Amille who had been watching the Terran perform his little surgery on 
his bracer sucked in her breath and blinked.
    There behind the glass....
    Behind the darkness was Basile's glowing red eyes glaring back at 
her. His face was lit from beneath, some kind of white light, while the 
rest of his body was ecased by the darkness. His eyes narrowed at her, 
the harsh red light played over her, ident scan. She knew. She took a 
step back, hand coming up to her mouth as it opened to say something. 
My god what are you? She thought.
    Rider, he replied empathicaly and then he was gone. As if he steped 
back into the darkness and was gone. She blinked and thoughtfully took 
a step foward to get closer to the glass that encased the darkened 
area. She let her eyes get used to the darkness and saw him. Just to 
the right of where he originaly was, at the med-kit access port. His 
jacket had gotten longer of sorts, now a very short duster and dark 
glasses now lay on the bed where he had been laying. His back was to 
her as he dabbled in some magic and computer fixing what had been 
destroyed. She leaned forward a little more, squinting. "What are you 
doing," she muttered.
    What do you think, Doc? He looked over his should once more, eyes 
now a lighter red. A smile came to his face, a blue neon one at that. 
Thank you for saving my life, now how do I get back?
    Amille shook her head. "I can't let you out of there, you know the 
proceedures. The Earth viruses you may have."
    This, he held up the bracer as it glowed and changed color, takes 
care of everything. You should know that.
    "Of course I do, do you think that they will let you," she stopped. 
His bracer had stopped glowing, it slipped back under the sleeve of the 
duster. His attention had been caught, his eyes looked at something to 
her right. They narrowed, with that he dipped his head and disappeared. 
She looked at the edge of her sight and saw that Kylara and the 
Commander had turned their attention to her and who she was talking to.
    "Your in contact with him?" Kylara's words made her turn. "Your 
file says nothing of being impethic!"
    "Where is he."
    Both Kylara and Amille looked at the Commander. Amille swallowed 
and looked back into the room. She leaned foward more and got nose to 
nose with the glass and gazed into the darkened room. Where are you, 
she thought.
    She didn't have to think long. The door activator came to life, it 
beeped and the emergency lever to open the doors from the lab's side 
slammed down, it's metal casing pushed to one side. The triplets jumped 
and froze in their tracks. The buttons under the lever beeped one at a 
time, three sets of combintions beeped until the final set was pressed. 
With that out of the way the doors opened, the darkness flooded the 
room, the metal doors screached as Basile leaped from the 
darkness......
	

    Part 1 end.

    bentley4@ix.netcom.com