Hello everyone.

I managed to get this story ready to go faster than expected so here is the first chapter. This first one has a lot of last story re-cap in it just in case some readers start here, but it soon gets going with its own story. It is nice to be writing another long story so I hope you like it. :-D (Fingers crossed)

Red Sky Rising

Return of the Dragons Series

Book 1

Chapter 1

The Boy on the Mountain

"Planets eh? What a hassle; you can't live without em,
and you can't stop em being pelted by gigantic rocks from space"
Professor Linton Adisa: University of Technology, Jamaica.

Time; 06:47 pm
Date; August 18th 2085
Location; A planet 230 million kilometres from Mars (sometimes known as Earth)

Blue sat down near the external door of the reinforced concrete monolith and gazed down onto the top of Mount Singgalang, hundreds of meters below him. His work was complete, but he did not feel like returning to the underground complex just yet. It was often at times like this when the day was almost done, when a strong feeling of accomplishment would wash over Blue and he would begin to think about the things he knew, and the things he did not know.

He knew the Earth had been decimated by an unexpected deluge of meteorites many years before he was born, and he knew more of the rocks from space would fall again in the future. He knew the population of the Earth had once been in the billions, but when he was born it down to the millions. Blue had spent his entire fifteen years of life living in a very secretive place, so he did not know how many people were left alive today, or where in the world they were living.

He knew his mother had been killed the day after his birth, but he did not know much about his father. He knew the man's name was Luis Dias and he was now on Mars, but was he still alive? Blue simply had no way of knowing and no way of finding out.

He also knew why he, along with the people who raised him, had to remain hidden from the rest of the world; it was because the trapezoidal structure where Blue was sitting, was in fact the exit port of the last remaining operational Electromagnetic Space Launch Railgun on the planet. At one time, there had been three such facilities around the equator but Blue, nor anyone else at the site, knew what had become of the other two.

The story of how the young man with the colourful name, came to be sitting high above the top of an equatorial mountain in Indonesia, really began fifty three years prior when a massive cloud of asteroid debris passed close to the Earth; many of the pieces came far too close and many people feared the end of the world had come.

The cloud had formed in the asteroid belt after two large objects, each over one hundred kilometres in diameter, destroyed each other in a very rare collision. Most of what remained later settled into an elliptical orbit between the planets of Mars and Venus, occasionally passing the orbit of Earth. The first encounter between Earth and the asteroid cloud had lasted for several days and had resulted in the destruction of almost 70% of all life.

A few months after the first bombardment was over, humanity had begun to take stock and rebuild, until it was discovered that the destructive meteorites could return at any time in the years to come as they circled the sun. When they did return, sometimes they were just lights in the sky, but some exploded in the atmosphere with great force and a few impacted on the ground. The most destruction however, came from those meteorites which struck at sea with the resulting waves travelling thousands of kilometres in every direction. Eventually it was decided; humanity must leave the planet in order to survive, although most people doubted the idea would succeed.

The passing cloud of space debris had of course, destroyed every last piece of man-made technology in Earth orbit. Science, navigation and Com sats, along with the abandoned ISS, were all nothing more than orbiting monuments to what once was. So if humanity was going to live on into the future, drastic measures would have to be taken. To this end, any and every past idea for getting large amounts of supplies and equipment out of the Earth's gravity well as quickly as possible, was resurrected and studied for viability.

One of the methods chosen for trial was the Electromagnetic Railgun and so, less than six months later, construction began on three underground complexes in West Sumatra, Kenya and Venezuela. Each of these bases were multi purposed as prototypes for the planned Mars base with living quarters, underground farms and construction facilities along with the Railgun Tunnel running from below sea level, to the top of an adjacent mountain.

Ten years later, although still far from complete, the Railguns began their task of hurling cargo payloads into orbit, assisted by Scramjets and Solid Rocket Boosters. The number of construction robots sent to the red planet soon went from dozens to hundreds and were followed eighteen months later by the first four members of the Mars Base construction crew. It was not long after their arrival on the red planet, when the trouble started back on Earth.

The plan was to build up the Mars Base over time until it could support a population of two thousand self sufficiently, with supplies sent from Earth until the goal was achieved. Most people were happy to stay and take their chances on Earth where the danger was high, but the living was easier. There were however, more than ten thousand people who did want to leave but could not. Some accepted it was their fate to stay, but others refused to do so.

Problems arose when many of these people banded together; not to seek passage to the Mars Base, but to stop it from proceeding altogether. The new group called itself the Earth First Alliance and was formed in an attempt to redirect all the efforts being put towards building the Mars colony, into a renewed push to make Earth more survivable through the construction of deep underground shelters. The leaders of the EFA would not be swayed by the argument that some of the objects orbiting in the asteroid cloud were large enough to destroy all life on Earth and make the planet uninhabitable for hundreds or even thousands of years. At first the two groups simply agreed to go their separate ways, but eventually battles broke out over the best territories and war was not far behind.

As months turned into years, more pieces of the asteroids were pulled into the Earth causing various levels of destruction while construction on Mars steadily continued. With a population of over one hundred, the initial stage of the Mars Base neared completion and the final transfer of another nineteen hundred colonists could begin. The first people to join the construction crews would be a team of biologists who had been preparing to commence the growing of food crops on Mars. The surface of the planet was no place for a farm, so the colonists planned to take advantage of ancient Martian underground caverns formed from the lava tubes of long dead volcanos. Many of these caverns had now been sealed by the construction crews and were ready to receive a new earth-like atmosphere.

April Dias had been slotted into one of the first groups of biological scientists to make the trip, but she decided to stay on Earth a little longer. She sent one of her colleagues to Mars in her place with the intent of comparing the first Mars grown crops, with the test beds in the underground railgun complex in Sumatra. Her decision did not please many of her superiors, nor did it go down well with her husband Luis, who was leaving to become one of the pilots of the Mars Transfer Vehicle (MTV).

One week after the rocket she should have been on had left the Earth, April's plan to proceed to Mars fourteen months later were thrown out the door when it was discovered she was pregnant with her first child. Even though the next opportunity for her to leave Earth would occur during her third trimester, the decision was made to send April on the MTV's next trip but fate (and her baby) had other ideas. While travelling by ship to the Sumatra site for a final inspection of the various crops being grown, April unexpectedly went into labour and gave birth to Blue.

A Medical Evac helicopter was sent to retrieve mother and child but before it could lift off, the ship came under attack from an EFA drone. April could feel the panic in the people all around her, as she was stretchered towards the waiting helicopter but at the same time, a dull calm swept over her. April knew she could not avoid being loaded onto the helicopter, but there was no way in hell she was going to risk the life of her child. Much to the surprise of her friends on the ship, April insisted they take the baby and keep him safe. Her instincts were proved to be correct a few minutes later when the helicopter was destroyed by an air to air missile fire by the attack drone.

Although Blue had known of his mother had passing for many years, only a few weeks had gone by since his fifteenth birthday when he was told the whole story about the ship and the attack drone. Ever since that day, he had begun to see his situation in a different light and had begun to weigh up his life.

Not many people in all of history knew about the large family of the Bluebird of Happiness but one of his cousins, the Pink-Headed Fruit Dove of Frustration, had been spending a lot of its time with Blue lately. So many scenarios and so many decisions made by so many people over so many years had all lead up to a young man, who could have grown up on another planet with loving parents, instead hiding out in a forgotten part of a dying world, with a group of well meaning scientists and engineers. It took a lot of thinking about but it was not leading him anywhere.

"Control room to Work Tram Four; over" a static filled voice brought Blue out of his daydream.

The young man knew what Sid was going to say before he got to his feet and answered the call.

"The relay is all fixed Sid" Blue declared into the microphone "Switching back to remote in one minute; over."

"Good; I was worried when we didn't hear from you. We don't want any bats getting in and making nests in any inconvenient places; over."

"Sorry Sid, I was just enjoying the view."

"Come on Blue, you know we can't let the sun go down with the doors still open; the lights could be seen for miles in every direction."

"Packing up now, I'll be back in twenty minutes; out."

After hanging up the microphone, Blue returned to the junction box he had been working on and returned all switches to their normal operating positions. In less than ten seconds the massive door began to close just as Blue noticed the tool bag he had left where he was sitting and thinking.

"Oh crap" he declared and dashed over to retrieve the bag before the door could push it out over the edge.

Even though he had spent his life inside the railgun complex, Blue still had the opportunity to see many old Hollywood films, where the hero had to reach back to get something important before he was crushed by a closing door or dropping stone. It was not that way for Blue as the door slowly swung around giving him plenty of time to pick up the tool bag and get out of the way. Still, it was the most exciting thing to have happened to him all day, all week and for his entire life.

If Blue could only see the Pink-Headed Fruit Dove of Frustration, he probably would have strangled it.

As I often say at times like this, "So it begins and life will never be the same." Many people are saying the same thing after the recent elections.

Next chapter introduces some new character in space and is quite short so I'll have it up in a few days.

Bye for now.