SHORT STORY | DAY OF RECLAMATION

I woke up that day with my mom shaking me off my bed.

It was early in the morning - and she was extremely nervous.

Where is dad ? - I asked

All she could say is that we were going to meet up with him later

I had to go with her

I didn't have time to take any clothes of my stuffies... She shoved me in the car and took off like crazy

The road were packed with people doing the same, some didn't managed to pass through the traffic jam and ran with their kids - mom was ruthless and bumped everything off our way

I was tired and scared, before I fainted, i looked up the back window and saw what i could only describe as hell.

I woke up by noon, at some sort of shelter - mom was no more, and they said i was a brave survivor, well, they were too... The military always full of brave men and women, the best of the best of our people - despite the positivity in their words, their faces showed they had already accepted defeat...

Not even before the end of the day they turned their radios off - the screams and distress calls were too much...

By the next morning, we all had to leave because they had found us, but for the rest of the day - it was eerily calm as we traveled in trucks to a countryside bunker with better security and more food...

We were being invaded, by who - i would found out a couple of weeks later.

When I was testimony of the most beautiful and terrorising scene to this day... They outnumbered even the darkest swarm of locusts, but in opposition to that, they had the grace of a dancer, always knowing where to hit, where to move

Always moving forward

Never stopping to celebrate

Or mourning their dead

They did take little of any damage or casualties in that macabre ballet

Despite our best efforts in the battlefield

We moved to the countryside, where we once heard there was no incidents over there... Which held true for a year... The surprise massacres became more of a routine

We could barely stay on the same place for over a month, we were reduced to scavengers and gatherers - and as they pierced further into the land, we attested to their true nature...

Their mere sighting was enough - not to cast fear or terror but to summon Chaos itself.

The generations after me canonized them as unrelenting forces of nature, as if it was natural...

They had little to no respect for any living being, that flew, crawled, or swam... Little did matter to us what they wanted, dialog was futile in this new world that had taken over our holy land, be it with the invaders or our own kind, now divided...

Now, thirty years later, the most powerful of our survivor groups have gathered together, and today is the day of reclamation, the day we will avenge our fallen parents, brothers, and children, and purge for once - these Humans off what once was our beautiful home!