Zombaria Attacks – Chapter 1
VVVVRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAMMMMMMPPPPP
Skirting through the night sky over the remote village of Passchendaele, New Jersey came an invisible form not of this world. Populated areas would have been no issue anyhow – the physical size of the new arrivals belied their strength and purpose.
It would not have seemed obvious to anyone that something was amiss at first…the newcomers had long ago mastered the art of structural invisibility – including those contents within. Meteorologists would have said later of the sudden gust of wind in the area that a passing mixed front was the cause.
In any case, they would not linger here for long.
Shortly after the wind had ceased, another ominous sound - softer in tone, but nonetheless more "industrial" - floated across the landscape. Sharp breezes…the swirling of old leaves through the underbrush… and the sense of impending doom encroached as the babbled whispering of tiny voices weaved through the darkness.
The sleepy town of Eastminster, some thirty miles distant from Passchendaele, stood basking in the sun of a chilly April morning. Danforth Halloran was tending to his dizzying array of hunting equipment and supplies in his half-finished living room, wondering when that little bastard from the Chronicle would deliver his frigging paper. "Third time this month…" he half-muttered and half-spat under his breath as he rolled another handmade and duly fired it up, despite the various combustibles that surrounded him. Tobacco was probably his one and only friend at this point, considering the local townsfolk (especially the staff of the Chronicle) certainly didn't want to be within a mile of him. Nor was it any reassurance that odd happenings in and around Danforth's house were raising a few eyebrows lately. It had been rumored for many years that his stepparents had been practitioners of the Black Arts, and had raised him in the faith of nameless, sinister daemons from antiquity. Despite having been reared in this manner, he had managed early on to cultivate a less serious aspect personality-wise, and was even a model student at the local high school during his tenure. However, soon after this, he opened up a rod & gun store just outside of town, where he became legendary for screwing patrons out of their hard earned money by shorting them – a little less gunpowder in here, a pinch extracted from this shell there… Eventually his shenanigans caught up with him, and in exchange for not running him out of town, the citizens decided he would permanently sweep the halls of his former alma mater for his next career.
But none of this mattered much to Danforth.
What he had informally preached for years was at hand…the "Second Arrival" as he branded it.
When –
"nomadesque kliptrik rhanadamask – SSSSSSCCCRRREEEEEEEEEEEEEE!..."
On a sudden, first the whispered, jumbled words sounded from directly behind him, followed by an inhuman squall that could stop a speeding freight train dead in its tracks. The murky gray fog that had entered unnoticed from the rear of the house had gathered quietly, when its progenitor struck to the quick.
Not a sound came from the man now lying on the floor.
In a flash of blinding white light, Danforth Halloran – custodian, outdoorsman and town scourge – was no longer… {himself} …
The room slowly cleared, with an almost ghostly light barely managing to illuminate the surroundings…
And what happened then was what some would call "insanity", others "catastrophe".
Danforth had quite another word in mind… EPIPHANY.
Rising, he suddenly became conscious of a heightened sense of awareness; eyesight far stronger, hearing with unparalleled clarity, and a rush of thoughts plowing through his brain like a geyser. A maddening grin washed itself over his face, unfurling like an old scroll whose seal had just been breached.
"It…Is…Time" was all he said.