Chapter 1

I rushed out the back door, my briefcase ajar, hair flying in every which-what way. This was the latest I'd ever been. Ever! To think it was my daughter's fifth birthday today and I was running late to pick her up from the daycare.

"What kind of a father am I?" I muttered quietly to myself as I rushed across the parking lot. "That meeting! It was only supposed to be fifteen minutes! How'd it turn out to be an hour? Something about UFOs…" I grumbled about this all the way to the daycare. I was relieved that I'd gotten there at least before the daycare had shut down completely. I got out of my car and speed-walked up to the front door.

The daycare attendant greeted me with the usual cheery smile and asked if I was here to pick up my daughter, Sasha. I told her that I was and followed her back to the playroom, where Sasha was playing happily with some dolls that had been left out on the floor for her.

I hung back at the doorway while the attendant approached Sasha. They whispered about something for a minute. I could hear Sasha giggling from the other side of the room. The attendant then rose to her feet. and stepped to the side, revealing my daughter. Her hair was up in some kind of man-bun, but she seemed to like it, so I liked it too.

I crouched down, and called out to her, "Hi, Sasha! How's your birthday been so far? I'm sorry for being so late. I promise I won't be next time,"

Sasha ran up to me and hugged me around the neck, declaring loudly, "I had the most wonderfullest day ever today, Daddy!" As she smiled up at me with her big eyes, I felt as though I truly had done good as a father.

"I'm hungry," Sasha said a short while later.

"How about we hurry home then?"

"Ok, Daddy!"

She released my neck, and began trotting over to the door. The daycare assistant handed me Sasha's bag. From there we both proceeded to follow Sasha out into the lobby.

It took me a minute to load Sasha into the car because she'd started throwing a tantrum about having to leave. I waved goodbye to the receptionist, with an apologetic smile; it had taken her walking all the way across the parking lot to finally get Sasha to calm down.

I got in the car and, pulling out of the parking lot, began the familiar drive back to my home. As I drove I began to think in a pattern that my thoughts had followed recently, as if I was an author. The idea had always piqued my interest, but it wasn't like I had the ability to simply give up my job to take up a pen when I didn't even know if I had what it took.

My mind trailed off to dinner tomorrow as I turned down the road two away from the one I resided on. The sun had already set by now and it was pitch-black outside. Or at least, it was supposed to be.

s I drove down the road, I recognized the clearing up ahead with the familiar narrow side street that I would have to shimmy my car down so as to not fall into a ditch. It took me a hot second and a half to realize that I shouldn't have been able to see the clearing up ahead. I slowed to a halt once I was inside the clearing and exited my car, all the while telling Sasha not to leave the car. However, she was as persistent as ever, so eventually I had to let her step outside the vehicle too.

I finally looked up at the sky to see what the foreboding light was once we were both outside the vehicle. My eyes widened, unable to believe what I was seeing. I couldn't believe it. No, I refused to believe it. I was probably just seeing things because I was tired. However, as Sasha started laughing and pointing at it yelling, "Look Daddy! It's a flying banana!" It cleared all doubt from my mind.

There really was a UFO… and it looked absolutely nothing like a banana.

"Yes, you're right. It's a flying banana. Now let's get back in the car and…"

"But I want to keep the banana! I love bananas!" She squealed over me. She was jumping up and down now. I repeated what I'd said before, this time adding on some extra, "I know you like bananas, but we have even more at home, and we also have all the cake for your birthday as well as your presents from all your friends."

This seemed to catch her interest. She gasped, and ran back to the car door and started shouting "Open!" over and over again.

"Yes Sasha, I'm nearly there," I mumbled. I opened the door for her, and let her into her seat, strapping her in. I stepped out of the car to return to the driver's seat and dared to look up again. It was an obsidian black, little deep green lights glowing out of every crevice. Granted it didn't have all that many. It was gigantic too. I'd reckon it was at least the size of a city.

"Holy," I breathed. It was beautiful. I'd spent my entire career life - well, it was only two years of career life though, working with machines and never had I ever seen a machine as beautiful as this one. Sasha's impatient wails brought me back to reality. I remembered that it was a UFO. An unidentified flying object and that meant it could be anything. And if it was anything, it was probably dangerous.

I set my mind straight and smiled to Sasha as I got back into the car. I wouldn't want to worry her. I pressed down a little too hard on the gas and the car screeched loudly as it lurched forward. I was only narrowly able to avoid sliding down into a ditch as I turned onto the side street. Five more minutes and we'd be home. I evened my speed out to match that of the speed limit, took the last turns to reach our house, and pulled into the drive.

I let Sasha out of the car and walked her up to the house. I could still see the UFO from our home, lights pulsating hypnotically. I unlocked the front door and Sasha dashed in, nearly knocking me to my knees.

"Presents! Presents!" She shouted running around in circles, her backpack being flung this way and that as she waved it around like a banner of sorts. I chuckled to myself, Sasha really was so adorable when she wanted to be.

I led her to the kitchen and opened the door to the pantry. I'd been fighting to keep her out of the pantry for the past three weeks and I'll say! That was just about the most difficult thing of my life! She gasped as the door swung open, followed by her jumping into it, on top of the small pile of wrapped gifts. I flinched; my savings for the entirety of this year had gone into getting her these.

About an hour later, I had Sasha lying down in her bed ready for sleep. I read her her favorite story, which was quite a treat, considering its length. I finished tucking her into bed and left her room, silently shutting the door behind me. I tiptoed across the hall and up to the front window, pulling the curtains to the side and peering up at the UFO.

This had become a horrible habit of mine as of the last hour. Its foreboding light poured into my room tenfold as I did so. It appeared to have only budged a few hundred feet or so, but that didn't change the fact that it was still completely blocking my view of the night's sky.

I looked at it for a good while before eventually giving up on our imaginary staring contest. I couldn't fall asleep the rest of the night, which was probably the worst scenario imaginable for me seeing as I had work the next day and there was absolutely no way they would ever cancel for a problem 'as small' as a UFO. I mean, it's a UFO for Pete's sake!

At exactly six thirty in the morning, I started getting ready for work, pulling off yesterday's clothes and issuing new ones, making my morning toast, and preparing my suitcase; all the while, a toothbrush clenched between my teeth and a comb barely hanging into my hair. I wasn't late yet, but I would be if I didn't hurry.

I got Sasha up out of bed by six thirty-nine and had her ready by six fifty. We were off in the car on the way to the daycare under a false sky that gave the appearance that the time was still somewhere around midnight.

I just managed to make it to work with a minute to spare. It seemed I was always late when it came to work. I heaved a great sigh as I finally made it to my seat in my cubicle. I had almost, almost, been late, but not quite.

The foretelling announcement that summoned us to the meeting room went off almost immediately. I slouched over to the meeting room, almost systematically, while yawning heavily; I spotted a few others doing the same. They must have all had sleepless nights as well.

I took my seat at the far right, and prepared myself for the usual lecture about how we weren't doing enough around the workplace, but this time it was different. He wasn't lecturing us over all the minuscule little things we'd been doing for the past week. I should've known, of course, he was going to be talking about the massive thing blocking out the sky.

He inhaled deeply and cleared his throat, as though this was actually something important. As he began speaking, me and my coworkers found out why.

"As you have likely already seen, there is a massive unidentified object above us currently."

For the first time in ages, it seemed that every employee in the room was listening.

"This has been occurring all over the world for the past week. This is the first that most of us have heard about this though, only because of what's followed everywhere these massive ships have been."

The intensity of which everyone was listening went up a notch.

"It's been nothing good at all. The only reason I'm bringing this up is because our military needs strong young people like yourselves to stand up and give us a fighting chance." He paused. "Any questions?"

One of my coworkers on the left spoke up, "Yes, over here. I'd like to know, just what has been happening everywhere the UFO things have been?"

Our boss tensed. Then he sighed, "I had my reasons for not wanting to tell you, but," he paused for a second before clearing his throat again and continuing, "Desecration."

A murmur rippled through the uneasy crowd. "Not one person from inside the 'chosen' cities has survived. Those cites are now nothing but ash and craters in the ground," he finished.

A few gasped. Others wailed. I simply stood in shock. Granny - what I called the couple that had taken me and so many others in - was she alright? More importantly, what about all of the children they had adopted?

He then proceeded to pull down a shade from the ceiling. The projector flashed a long list. The names of the cities that the ships had already visited. They were listed in order of the dates when they'd been destroyed from the first to the last. Our city was up there too.

The date read to be approximately half a week from now. I shuddered. At least, it wasn't tomorrow. A few people started to cry, finding the names of cities that loved ones lived in. The ones who weren't crying were letting out sighs of relief. Their families were still safe.

Our boss stated once again that the military was looking for 'fine young people' like ourselves. He considered something for a minute then decided to inform us of a final fact.

"For the record," he started "If you're nineteen years of age or older, and you don't have some kind of a life-threatening illness, you're kind of required to join. I suppose you also have to be younger than seventy, but there's no one here older than that."

More upset words filtered through the room.

"Anyone who meets the standards will be expected to meet at North and Rouse at ten a.m. tomorrow. With that being done and said, those of you who are not summoned by the military, I expect to see you here bright and early tomorrow. After all, we're going to need to makeup for the work that others will be missing. As for the rest of you, this will probably be your last day here at work, so let's make it a good one."

This statement was the only thing that made sense coming out of our boss's mouth; he was probably the greediest man alive by now, and had never taken proper care of the employees, all too often making us work over time and filling in for others who had recently quit.

He presented us with a small smile, probably trying to ease off some nerves. He then turned and escorted himself from the room, closing the door to his office behind him, flipping over a sign that read: Work in progress, do NOT enter. As we all heard the latch click shut, the ear-splitting silence broke as everyone in the vicinity erupted into loud and obnoxious chatter.

"Oh... my God…"

"My granddaughter lives in Branson! I hope she's alright…"

"SHIT!"

It's so loud..

"I can't believe it, to think… Does this mean aliens are real too?"

"DAMMIT"

Please, stop.

"Why didn't we hear about this earlier? I could have told my Dad to get out of there…"

"FUCK"

STOP

"Why is this happening to us?"

"WHAT IN THE HELL?"

"Would you all just SHUT UP already?" I yelled. I'd been unable to simply sit there anymore. I looked around, and saw my panic reflected on the faces of all those around me. They all looked at me, as if they were judging me from head to toe.

"And for what reason should we do so?" replied a tall, black woman standing to my left.

"Because it's giving me a horrible headache" I said. Honestly it felt like my head was going to split open, like I was losing touch with reality.

She sighed and rolled her eyes at me, obviously thinking that this was a stupid reason to have interrupted the people speaking. She then turned to exit the room.

"Sorry," I muttered grouchily, mostly to myself.

She was able to hear it somehow though, and replied saying, "You should be more than sorry. Many of the people in this room have just found out that they have lost their entire family," she said coldly. After saying this, she finished the short trek to the doorway and slipped out into the hallway.

Talking erupted once more as I stepped out into the hallway. This time, it was discussing me and the woman. Apparently her name was Angela. I followed her at a distance. Our cubicles appeared to be in the same direction, but I didn't want her to notice if they were.

I trailed her closer and closer to my cubicle; I should've known something was amiss when she entered the room that my cubicle was in. I had never seen her before. Was she new? No, probably not. If everyone knew her name, she must have been working here for a while.

She sat down in a cubicle in the far back, pulling a briefcase out from under the table. That's odd. I also keep my briefcase in the same place, not to mention it looks identical to hers…

Wait…

Is that...?

"Hey!" I jumped out quickly from behind the beam I'd been hiding behind, "That's my cubical! A-and that my briefcase too!" I said pointing at my briefcase desperately.

She simply looked at me, blinked once, and disappeared. My briefcase was gone too.

"Figures. Why am I not surprised?" The rest of my savings had been that briefcase. I hadn't even been able to keep a bank account open with what was left and I'm likely going to get evicted from my house next month anyways.

"At least I'll be dead by then," I gumbled. I was almost happy that I'd be dead until I thought about Sasha. What would become of her if I wasn't around? Who would be there to support her? To make her giggle and laugh?

Suddenly, my life had a purpose. I was going to the 'military meetup,' or whatever it was, and I was going to fight against the aliens. I'd fight and I'd damn well win.

"For Sasha," I declared, full of pride. Apparently, I had been standing in some weird heroic pose because the person closest to me started whispering to one of his friends about how weird it was.

***

I managed to get some sleep that night. However, it wasn't nearly enough. I woke up more tired than I had been yesterday at work. Then again, it was probably just nerves. I'd have to take Sasha with me. The daycare had officially shut down as of yesterday. I just hoped they would have somewhere for her to stay while I was busy doing… military stuff.

I woke her at nine. I would really hate to be late to my first ever day of being in the military. We were both ready to leave by nine thirty-five. I strapped her into the back of the car, along with any necessary belongings, and drove away from the quaint, little neighborhood, perhaps for the last time ever.

I was actually early to something today. I was so shaken. I even had to check the clock twice. Just so I was sure of it:

'9:43' it proclaimed on its small screen.

I groped around in the dark glove box for a minute, eventually finding the straps to mine and Sasha's bags. From there I unloaded Sasha from the back and headed off.

For a town that was on the verge of desecration, it certainly didn't look like it. Massive crowds of people flowed back and forth, cars still speeding up the streets and birds still squawking out their daily calls. After a while, I decided that it would be best to carry Sasha. She was moving at quite a slow pace compared to the one I wanted to be moving at. I carried for about a block or so before finding the designated place where the children of those enlisted would be put. I set her down there, leaving both my and her stuff in a small locker.

"I'll be back to check up on you in a little, so behave yourself," I said. By giving her a smile, I attempted to hide the fear that this had stirred up from her. Then I straightened up and turned to leave, but Sasha, pulling me by pant leg, stopped me.

She looked up at me with the biggest eyes and said, "I'll be brave for you Daddy," she looked terrified as she said this, tears starting to well up in her eyes. Her statement just about melted my heart away and cleared my consciousness of everything except her face.

"I'm glad," I said. This time I gave her a real smile, cocking my head slightly. She sniffed loudly, a tear falling down her cheek. She bore a small smile.

"I love you Daddy,"

Shoot.

Now I was crying too. I scooped her up and hugged her tightly, embracing this moment.

"I love you too," I choked.

Then I set her back down. She'd stopped crying now, only her smile left behind.

"It's ok, Daddy. Don't cry," her face told me just how concerned she really was. I wiped the tears from my cheeks and looked at her.

"It's not me you should be worried for. Look out for yourself, ok? If anyone's mean to you, you kick them. As hard as you possibly can," I knew I probably shouldn't have worded it like that, but I was back to choking up.

"Okay!" She exclaimed. She seemed excited that I had told her to kick someone. As long as she wasn't upset.

"I best be off then," I told her, straightening back up.

"Okay!" She said again. "Bye Daddy!"

I waved to her as I stepped out of the small building.

"Bye," I said quietly.