A Tale from the Dark Dimension

Chapter 1: Cade

There were many things Cade Myers enjoyed in his life. He loved spending time with his wife Kara and his daughter Katrina. He enjoyed his job, allowing him to work in the private military known to the world as Alpha. He was a part of the organization that partnered frequently with the United States military in order to protect the country they loved so dearly.

However, one of the things he did not enjoy were the calls he had to go into work so early in the morning. Apparently no one in Alpha slept because at least once a week he would be called in around 2 to 4 in the morning, leaving his wife and daughter mostly by themselves. This call seemed to be no different.

Cade awoke to the ringing of his phone. He begrudgingly picked up his phone and answered.

"Hello?" Cade said, not attempting to mask the sleep in his voice.

"Glad to see you're still awake," the voice of the head of Alpha, Sam Fury, responded to his friend.

"Well you know me Sam. I'm a fucking night owl," Cade whispered into his phone, trying not to wake his sleeping wife.

He carefully moved the sheets and got out of bed. He opened the door to their bedroom and walked out, heading to the stairs.

"Good. I need you to come in. It's urgent. I already called the rest of your team and they will be coming in shortly.," Sam told him. He could hear the concern in his voice. Whatever was going on it must have been big.

"Yeah I gotcha. I'll be heading out now," Cade replied, heading back up to his room. When he returned to his room, he met a now awake Kara who asked him the same question she asked every time he was called in.

"You have to go?" She asked.

"Yeah, Sam said it was pretty urgent so I have to. I'm sorry," Cade replied.

"It's okay. Just be careful with whatever he's asking you to do please," she said, concern laced in her voice.

"I will. I promise," he said, moving to give his wife a quick kiss before he pulled on his jeans and shoes and moved down to the garage to take his Hellcat to the base. While having to go in super early in the morning annoyed him most of the time, he always enjoyed the drive over to the base. Something about having the quiet brought him peace. It allowed him to clear his mind and prepare for the mission ahead of him.

He arrived at the front gate to the neighborhood and met the guard. "How're you doing today Mr. Myers?" the guard asked him.

"Ah, can't complain. It's too goddamn early for this though," Cade complained.

"Yeah the hours are ridiculous," he said back, hitting the button in the gate building to lower the ramp to get into the base, "But you have a good rest of your day sir."

Cade nodded and the gate in front of him opened, the ramp lowering down about 10 feet in front of him. He drove in and followed the road to his parking space. Their base was close to the city of Covington, Louisiana. They were able to mask it as a neighborhood on the surface, but the base was underground. They had a landing platform that was hidden under giant double doors that rested beneath a lake. When needed though, they could open up the neighborhood and destroy it, making way for their base to come fully up from under the ground.

Cade turned his car off and walked into the building. The low humming of the overhead lights lulled him into a sort of trance, keeping him lost in his thoughts. What could they possibly need at this hour? Different scenarios played through his head until finally he reached the briefing room. There he met with Sam, who looked like he hadn't started yet. Sitting around tables he was met with his team members. He locked eyes with Justin Storme, the man he had practically grown up with. They had been close friends for years now, so he knew something was wrong when he saw the look in his eyes. It was fear, uncertainty, and determination all at the same time.

Then there was Sam's son, Cole Fury. He hasn't known Cole for that long but since he was assigned to his team he had proven himself to be a useful asset. He was quiet but he knew how to take on multiple enemies at once.

Next to him was Justin's twin sister, Elizabeth. She was the resident marksman of the group and hardly missed a shot. Her skills even earned her the nickname of Artemis from their other teammate Gale.

Speaking of him, right when Cade walked in he got a look at his face and could tell even more so that whatever was happening was serious. Gale Clayden wasn't a man who took many things seriously. In Cade's honest opinion, he was a smartass to the point where it was very annoying, but he knew how to talk to people. With the way he acts, he can get information out of people relatively easily, but he could be a bit more "persuasive" when he needed to.

Finally, there was one of Cole's best friends, Adam Dempsey, but everyone just called him Frost. He earned the nickname after surviving for a little over two weeks with a small squad in an Antarctic research base. The base had lost power and one by one they all froze to death except for Frost and another teammate before getting a signal out to Alpha who extracted them both.

However, there was one person missing. A girl by the name of Xavier Washington. Normally she would be seen seated next to Justin but she wasn't there. He moved over and took his seat quietly, starting to understand what was going on

"Now that you're all here, this is the situation. As you can tell, one of the members of your squad is missing. I had assigned Ms. Washington to a secret mission in UTF territory, and her transponder stopped putting out a signal 12 hours ago. At first we believed it was just a technical glitch but-" Sam was cut off by Justin, who asked the question everyone was thinking, "Why was she sent over there? I thought we were at peace with them."

"We are, but we still have our suspicions about them. The last thing she reported was that she believed they were building a machine that could theoretically open a breach to another dimension," Sam informed them. So that's why she wasn't here. While Alpha was probably the biggest threat in the West next to the South American Federation, the UTF, or United Terran Federation was bigger and more advanced than anything America had to offer. They consisted of the entire continent of Africa, as well as some territory in the middle east. For a while they were just a few countries that had banded together with the goal of retaking the continent and uniting it under one flag. While no one took them seriously at first, they quickly rose to power and became the largest unified nation on the planet. Now they have the mission of one day uniting the whole Earth under one flag.

While America maintained a fragile alliance with the UTF, if they found out Alpha sent a spy to check on one of their bigger research projects, it could bring up big problems in the future. They wouldn't be able to take on the UTF by themselves, and they doubted any other countries would give them support either.

"Won't there be a lot of soldiers at the research base that focuses on dimensional breaches?" Frost asked.

"From what our satellites have picked up there hasn't been too much activity outside of the base, so it should be easy to get into. Once you're in, find their lead scientist. His name is Imran Zhabiv. He used to work in Russia before defecting to the UTF. He should be able to tell you where she's at. You'll be going in with Blizzard Team, so the rescue mission should be a bit easier with them," Sam explained.

Unlike the Ghost team, Blizzard specialized in rescue missions in heavily damaged areas such as in harsh weather or in a warzone. They were led by a man who went by the name of Dex, and under him were Joker, Cards, and Cruise. They had all earned their nicknames for a reason, but Cade wasn't too close with them so he didn't know why they had gotten them. However, despite the arguably silly names, they were the best at what they did.

"Alright, you're dismissed. Meet Blizzard on the flight deck in 15," Sam said before leaving the room. They all stood up and exited after him, heading to the flight deck. Frost and Cole took the lead, and at the very end was Justin and Cade.

"Hey, you doing okay?" Cade asked him.

Justin let out a stressed exhale before responding, "Yeah. It's just hard not to be nervous, you know?"

"I know this is kinda personal for you, but you gotta keep your head on straight if we're gonna do this successfully."

"Yeah I know. I will, don't worry," Justin replied.

Cade gave him what he hoped was a reassuring pat on his arm before turning to his locker and getting his gear.