Story that has yet to be named :)

Forward by the author (me! ;] )

Near the end of summer 2008, I had a very long dream that was the clearest one I had ever had! When I woke up, I was able to remember all of the details. Everything that happened in chapters one and two, besides the small insert with the security tape, I dreamed. I lived through it as Ryn. When I "opened my eyes" as I was dreaming, I was immediately in Ryn's shoes and I suddenly knew everything that was written in the prologue. I thought, this is a great story! I want to know what will happen! So I decided that I would write the ending. So I started writing, but school started and I laid it aside. I wrote some more the next summer, and it still held my interest, but I really didn't know where it was going, what the plot was, what the story of the characters was going to be, or many other things. So once again, school started and I laid it aside until July of last year. That's when almost everything fell into place.

Prologue
(January 2021) 
War. It's everywhere; the whole earth is in chaos. Everyone is calling it "World War III". The soviet is taking over and enforcing socialism wherever they conquer. All who believe in freedom are fighting against it. The US is torn. Some say "Socialism is not so bad. It has not ever been allowed to reach its full glory. We should help the soviets." Others are strongly opposed. "We want freedom! Socialism will take that away! The government will have too much power."  Alliances have been made, trusts have been broken, countries have fallen. The struggle has become so fierce that children, even girls, are eligible for recruit and immediate training by age thirteen. Only those who are too weak to fight are left at the homefront. but they are not idle. Everyone is involved. A few pray. They pray for a world that has given up on God. For a world that doesn't believe He exists, or that He cares. But.... that is not so. 

Chapter One

    Ryn Entar crouched in the corner of a dim, empty casino. On her left and about two feet in front of her was a wall. Her back was to a booth that held slot machines. She was vulnerable to her right; she could see straight to the other side of the slot machine packed room. 
    Ryn's current assignment was to find and copy secret documents from somewhere on the casino floor of this hotel without being detected. She had a partner in another part of the building and a team hidden outside in case anything went wrong. Ryn carried a new phazer model. It stunned the victim and allowed the carrier of it to walk away. The victim would never remember what happened. They would resume their previous task immediately after the effect wore off. That was the theory anyway. In reality, the weapon was unstable. Sometimes it did not last long enough and other times it didn't work at all.
    Footsteps approached from the other side of the booth Ryn was leaned up against. She crouched and slowly poised her phazer. The last thing she wanted was to be discovered and have the alarm sounded. The footsteps continued to approach and Ryn knew it was inevitable for the guard to come across her hiding space. Just as she was in position to flip around the corner and stun the guard, his body landed with a dull thud in front of her. She tensed. What in the world? Ryn wondered when right at that moment her partner came from around the corner of the booth. “Where have you been?” Ryn asked in a hushed voice. “Well," Mary, her partner, explained. "When you headed in here, I turned into another room and found the computer that has all the files on it. I was headed back to get you when I saw the guard come in here. I knew where you were, so I sneaked up behind him and knocked him out.” “Good thing too,” Ryn said, “I ran the risk us of being discovered while I phazed him with this new model." "but now we have a new problem," Mary said. "He could be found or someone could notice that he is missing." Ryn sighed. "Come on, let's tie him up." 
    They made sure that his gag was firmly in place and his ropes were tied securely before hiding him. They moved on to the room Mary had been talking about. Just as they had opened up the files, an alarm sounded and the whole building was alive. "Oh boy," Mary said. "bet they found that guard we left." "Or they DIDN'T find him." "Come on, flash the files and lets hide. I don't think there is a way we can escape now. Here, through this door, its a blank room. Easier to defend; only one door in and out." Ryn followed her into the room and shut the door. "Ryn!", Mary hissed from the other side of the room. "Come here!" Ryn walked to where Mary was standing and stared.
    There were two shafts, side by side with elevators in them. They were not normal looking elevators though. These were made of wood and looked like tall fruit crates. They were odd; painted blue with a rope that was tied to the top of the crate and went up into the shaft so far that Ryn couldn't see the end. On the floor of the elevators, there were odd, gold stones. There were fifteen in each elevator and every one was about the size of a golf ball. Another rope was hanging down from the shaft and on the end of it hung a red bucket. Below the bucket there was a small hole cut into the floor just large enough for the bucket to go through. Ryn looked down the hole but she could not see the bottom.
    "I wonder how these things work. This could be our way out." Ryn said. "Well," Mary replied, "it appears that you step into the crate and place these stones in the bucket. Like this.. oh, my! These are heavy!" Indeed, each stone weighed about ten pounds. Ryn stepped into the other "elevator" and proceeded to lift the objects into her bucket. After she put about ten in the bucket, her elevator started to move upward. "Hey, Mary! Look! Its going up!"  "Yeah, I know. Mine has started to move as well." "Quick," Ryn said. "Put the rest of the stones in." They finished adding the stones then stood in their crates until they had reached the very top. Ryn stepped out of her elevator and looked around. "Wooow! Would you look at this place!"

*****

"See, Sir?" "Yes... That's very odd. Show me again." The guard hit rewind on the security video until he got to the beginning then hit play. The short clip showed two people walk into a room and close the door. The first one inspects a wall then calls the other over. They discuss something for a while then the second person steps forward and walks through the wall. The first person stands still for a couple of seconds then walks through as well. The guard stopped the tape. "That's it, sir. They have completely vanished. Our experts examined the wall but found nothing out of the ordinary." "Hmmm. This is new technology. I have seen nothing like it before. We must find out what it is." "Sir?" "Yes?" "They took the files." "Curses! We must catch them! Those files in the wrong hands could mean the end of this war!" "I know, sir." The man sighed and walked across the room to look out a window that overlooked the city. "If they escape, its all over."

Chapter 2

Ryn and Mary found themselves in an enormous cave. They were high up from the bottom of the large cave on a ledge but there was a natural staircase that led to the down to it. The ledge they were on was very large and set back into the rock face. Like a small cave within the big one. The small cave was large enough to park two average minivans in. The main cave was massive. Its walls were painted to look like a forest. The artist who painted them was a master. It was difficult to tell that it was not real. 
    "This is so odd..." Ryn said. "We were just in a hotel. It didn't look this big from the outside.." "Ryn!!" "What?!" "Turn around! Look, the elevators are gone!" "Okay, something's up. This is really weird." "At least we won't be followed."
    Mary started climbing down the staircase to the floor of the cave. "Hey, Ryn. Look at this wheel." Mary started to turn it while Ryn came down the steps behind her. "Mary.... What's that sound....?" They turned to see a thick, blue, liquid rushing into the cave from a hole in the opposite wall. Instinctively, Ryn knew it was lava. But... blue lava? "Mary... we have to get out of here. NOW." The lava was quickly rising. The floor was not flat, there were raised pieces of stone. Mary and Ryn were standing on one of those. "Look! Up there is a way out!" On the side of the cave opposite where they originally came in there was another staircase that led up to an opening with blue sky beyond. They rushed across the cave floor on the raised sections and started to climb the staircase. Water began to pour out of the hole in the wall instead of the lava. Steam, accompanied by a hiss, filled the air and the boiling mixture rose faster. They finally reached the mouth of the cave and realized they were now on the side of a mountain. "To-to, we're not in Kansas anymore." Mary muttered.
    The view was amazing. They were looking at something straight out of a Swiss postcard. Everything was a luscious green. Pines stood tall with blue sky behind them and more mountains could be seen in the distance. Ryn and Mary were just below the timberline. Snow capped the mountain they were standing upon. 
    The water was still rising behind them and it was starting to spill out of the cave. They ran down the hill. The water was beginning to gain on them when they saw a young man in a boat sitting on the side of the hill. "Okay, THAT is really weird." Ryn said. "Hurry!" the young man called. "Jump in!" They scrambled in just before the water overtook them and lifted the boat off the ground. The ride down the hill was a rush. How they made it down without hitting any trees, Ryn thought she would never know. They finally reached the bottom where a gentle river was flowing and slowly started to drift downstream.