Emma

Earth: Day of Arrival

Wind rustled through the trees surrounding the forest trail. The breeze coupled with sunny skies created the perfect weather for the first week of summer vacation. Pulling her phone out of her hip pocket, Emma sent a quick text message to her best friend. Picking blueberries.

LOL, blueberries aren’t in season until next month, Kayla replied.

There could be berries this early.

Snort! You keep thinking that.

Berries n cool whip will be awesome!

Dream on.

Moments later, a few notes of her favorite song played. Answering her phone, she eagerly asked, “Hey, what’s up?”

“You know Dad. He gets this emergency call at two in the wretched morning and ten minutes later, we’re in the car heading west,” Kayla said with a heavy sigh.

Emma grinned at her dramatics. Kayla might fuss and groan, but she loved going with her parents. During the school year, she stayed with Emma when her dad got called-out. She wasn’t quite sure what he did, but she knew he worked in software development for some huge company, something to do with security.

“Where did your parents drag you to this time?”

Kyla snorted. “We’re on our way to Carlsbad, New Mexico.”

Her good mood deserted her. She had really been looking forward to the weekend.

“Is Saturday still on?” Emma asked without much hope.

“Absolutely, Mom said we should be home by the weekend,” Kayla said excitedly. “Dad bought me The Lord of the Ring series on blue ray!”

Emma laughed. “We’ll have to flip a coin. I just ordered the Twilight set from Amazon with next day shipping.”

Kayla chuckled. “You hit below the belt.”

“Thanks, I try.”

Kayla groaned. “My phone’s beeping low battery. I’ve got to run, see you in a few.”

Emma said bye, and hit the lock button on her keys. Slipping the phone in her hip pocket, she emerged from the forest, entering the sunny meadow with a spring in her step.

Looking forward to proving Kayla wrong, she grinned and made a beeline toward blueberry bushes growing along the far edge. She was halfway across the meadow when her world turned upside-down. One minute the sky was bright blue, the next moment it was not.

Storm clouds boiled across the afternoon sky. Lightning flickered. Thunder boomed. Clouds engulfed the entire sky in a heartbeat. Dark and intense, the storm filled the air with menacing presence, flickering with an unearthly reddish-purple glow. Lightning streaked across the sky in a jagged display. Thunder boomed in an unceasing roll of bone jarring noise.

Fear shot through her, tightening her chest in mind chilling shock.

She didn’t have time to dwell on the freaky spring weather, not when a giant tree popped into existence, nearly on top of her.

Emma screamed and stumbled backward. She hit the hard packed trail with a bone-jarring thump, cutting off her screech of shock; her teeth snapped together barely missing the tip of her tongue.

She looked up. The longer she looked at the weird tree that nearly squished her, the bigger her eyes grew. Holy crap! Ten more steps and her favorite pizza topping would’ve crushed her to death. She sucked in a harsh breath, choking a desperate urge to scream her head off.

The giant tree had an odd rubbery looking bark that was blue with black and yellow splotches. Sharp, six-inch thorns swirled-up the trunk. The tree didn’t have leaves; mushroom heads covered each branch.

The heads spread across the thick branches, displaying vivid blue colors, ranging from baby blue buds to dark purple beach-ball sized heads.

She scrunched her dark eyes shut and jerked them back open. The blue tree trunk did not disappear.