Incursion

Chapter One

       Today is October 14th, 2017. I lost count a long time ago. When the world was invaded. Attacked. Hostile. My brother Michael and I call them Dashers. It was just a normal day for us, driving home after a long normal day from school, People on the news thought it was a meteor, I knew it was the end of normal. The Dashers crash landed one by one, ran and slaughtered millions. Others they captured and took them back to their mother machine to brainwash them into what I call Servants when it finally arrived. I have only gotten glimpses of them; they have bioluminescent brains that glow green in the dark. That is their only giveaway, they have adaptive skin and can camouflage to any environment.

       Everybody is gone. My brother and I have been hiding and running since day one of the invasion, hoping that someday we would find someone, anyone, out here. Still, days have gone by and not a single person is in sight. Only empty, destroyed buildings and trashed roads. The silence of a thousand men, the aftermath of a warzone. All Michael and I have left in our backpacks are three days of food, bandages, wrappings, clothes, and two bottles of alcohol. Our father was a soldier, two years in Afghanistan, He never made it home, he died three years before by a drunken man in a car on his way home from the air base. I do not know what happened to our mom. The last time I saw her, she was being dragged away by a Servant, which was the first day. Michael and I have been walking in a forest near a main road for days, not a store or building in sight, until....

"Ben, Look," Michael points at an old factory with smoke coming out of its chimney, they have power. We scout closer to the factory, sticking to the bushes so we do not get spotted by Servants, I crouch down by a bush as Michael crouches next to me, we are feet away from the factory, there is a back way in.

"Okay, no servants. Let us go," Michael says as he starts to run to the door. Thankfully, I grabbed him just in time.

"Relax Michael, we cannot just walk in there like idiots. What if it is a trap?" I speak.

"Well, I don't know about you, but I'm tired with waiting and playing safe." Michael responds. He rushes to the door like a ridiculous man and breaks the lock. I tried, but he is too stupid. I quickly rushed to the door and entered behind him.

We quietly sneak down a corridor, we enter a room with light, the room destroyed, a hole in the roof, water damage, mold. Not a Dasher or Servant in sight, the only remaining in the room rows and rows of steel body capsules. Chills ran down my spine.

"What the hell is this?" Michael asks.

"I don't know" I respond, of course I knew what it was, and he does too, but putting it into words was an offense in itself,

"Are they- "I interrupt him.

"No, I don't think so," I could not bear the thought of him finishing that question, those four words. The thought of all these people being dead or worse. Drugged, ready to be brainwashed into Servants, made me sick.

"All these people," Michael whispers, he turns to me but looks past me and without hesitation rushes past me.

"We got to help them."

"What?" He runs up to a motor and flips the switch. A shock of electricity hits his arm. A loud hum begins to shake the factory, I hang onto Michael tight until the quaking settles. Well, whatever did not know we are here, knows now. I look at the body capsules again, all of them gray. Except one. I sit Michael down against the door and rush over to the capsule.

The capsule shined a warm light, I walk towards it cautiously, I try to see inside but fail to. The dust and condensation make it difficult to see inside, I lean in closer. Suddenly, a hand appears from inside. I push off it in fright. Their hands wipe the glass, giving me a way to see inside. It is a girl, covered in sweat and still alive. I quickly look for something to open it with, find a crowbar and jam it into the top and bust it open, the girl is delirious, she has curly brown hair, her skin a light bronze. She fights to keep her eyes open.