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Tara

Four years ago, an alien species came to Earth.

They weren’t interested in our technology or resources.

And they definitely weren’t here to reenact any ‘Mars Needs Women’ tropes.

No, they were seemingly conquerors for the sake of conquering, killing our people, or infecting them until they were mindless drones, aggressive toward their own kind, but not our extra-terrestrial invaders.

I was thirty-two when they were first spotted, living halfway across the planet from where I grew up, separated from my parents and little sisters…

isolated from anyone who would give a damn.

As humanity’s governments toppled, gangs formed, the strong taking advantage of the weak, the unfortunate nothing but fodder for slaughter.

By some stroke of luck, I ended up being taken into the fold of resistance fighters, those rare few humans who didn’t demand child brides in return for a cot and threadbare blanket.

The resistance cell I’m in is led by ex-military men and women who taught us how to shoot, how to fight, and how to protect ourselves and those weaker than us from the monsters from above.

Those first months were hell. We had no warning, no idea what was about to descend on us.

We didn’t know that getting scratched or bitten by the aliens would infect our brains in a matter of minutes.

Confusion, hallucinations, and a complete loss of control over your actions.

That’s what happens once you’re exposed to this alien virus.

We have no idea if the mindless husks shuffling around are aware that they’re attacking their own, trying to eat their mothers and fathers, their children, raping indiscriminately.

While I’m sure various militaries, now funded and controlled by the surviving one percenters, are testing for cures and vaccines, we’re far from their clean laboratories, fighting here in the slums. We have no choice but to neutralize the threat and, perhaps, put them out of their misery.

At first, we didn’t even know what the aliens looked like.

They were wearing full-body armor and helmets from a dark alloy of some kind, like something out of a horror sci-fi video game.

Then the first footage came, showing the creatures under smashed helmets, all serrated teeth and sickly, pockmarked gray-green skin.

They were as horrible as their actions, and it took me years to be able to close my eyes and not dream of them.

Just as we learned to make peace with our circumstances, new spaceships appeared above us.

The first were spotted a couple of months ago.

Sleek and shiny, silent and deadly, they began shooting the boxy invading ships from the sky.

But I know better than to trust in alien benevolence, not after what happened the first time.

Just because we share a common enemy doesn’t mean they’re our friends.

Maybe once our invaders are gone, we’ll be left with a new, deadlier threat, with seemingly even more advanced technology.

There were fewer of them than the first arrivals, and we haven’t run across any of their corpses to know what they even look like.

Though both species are bipedal, the first invaders proved to be anything but human-looking underneath their armor.

The newcomers, however, seem less bulky, closer to our proportions, though they appear to be much faster than us.

The reason why we haven’t gotten a chance to peek under their helmets is that they seem to have some sort of invisible shield around them, bouncing off the other aliens’ lasers and, of course, our bullets.

If they had casualties, we do not know about it.

I’m not sure who fired on whom first when it comes to the new visitors, but I’ve been told that they don’t hesitate to shoot back if fired upon.

Not that I blame them, but all this distrust breeds more distrust, and I’ve heard skirmishes where all three species are involved end up with the newcomers as the last ones standing.

We’re definitely at the bottom of the pecking order.

Our base stands on a cliff overlooking the Pacific. That means we have a few seconds of pissing our damned pants as we see the brutish alien ship approaching, the vibrations and groaning sounds not far behind.

“Tara!” one of the resistance officers, Kyle, yells over the blaring claxon of the warning alarm. I tear my gaze off the incoming ship and spin to meet his gaze. “Get the kids to safety!”

Shit, the kids.

We teach them how to shoot as soon as they can grasp the concept of a gun not being a toy, but they’re also the aliens’ favored prey. The monsters probably enjoy the anguished cries of their parents. Well, the parents who aren’t dead, thanks to them.

I sprint toward Josh a football in his hands, his eyes on the approaching vessel.

“Let’s go, pipsqueak,” I urge, my hand on his back, pushing him to the closest shelter.

We try to avoid being outside when there’s action in the skies, though they might have some kind of heat-seeking technology and just spared us so far.

It really does seem like they’re going straight for us, though, the metal groaning becoming unbearably loud as it approaches.

Is it slowing down?

When the spaceship stops right above us, I know our luck has run out.

Aliens drop down from hatches, the distance between their vessel and the ground seemingly not an obstacle.

The tank-like brutes do their superhero landings, massive guns in their hands.

I know they’re not likely to shoot us, though, not if their goal is to infect as many as possible.

They’ll incapacitate us, then use their creepy morphing claws to pump us full of whatever virus or bacteria turns us into drones.

I pull out my twin Glocks and face the nearest alien, covering a trembling Josh. Flicking off the safety, Islowly walk backwards, pushing the boy to the closest building.

“Stay back, motherfucker!” I yell at the hulking alien and extend my arms in an obvious threat. “You do not want to fuck with me today!”