Author's note: This is yet another companion story to Falling Skies: Korea detailing the adventures, struggles and loss of the central characters' families back in the US, notably the Vargas daughters. Initially I didn't want to make a bunch of separate stories branching off from my main one so I can keep the whole continuum in one place (this was going to be another sequence of chapters within the main story) but it's getting to where FS: Korea has so many diverging plotlines going on (i.e. the crew of the Nevada, the fighter pilots etc.) that it's hard to stay on top of them when I get a chance to write. May end up moving this back into FS: Korea if it appears that it wouldn't slow down the story progression too much. Let me know what you think, any and all feedback is welcome.
Chapter I: The World That Was, The World That Is
They came in silence. For a whole month they watched us from their ships in orbit around our moon. They listed to our phone calls, our television shows, read our entire internet, and learned our history, culture, languages and customs. They knew the collective sum of all human knowledge and still they would not speak to us. Then they came down from the heavens and yet, more silence. The governments of the world did everything to contact them, from mathematical codes, to music to blinking lights and all the silly things that were done in the movies. None of it worked, the watchers watched from their ships and did nothing. In the days that followed UFOs were everywhere, even over the White House. The armies of the world were told to stand down while we waited on the aliens to show themselves. We did everything we could to avoid provoking hostilities. They did not.
One morning in October they withdrew their ships and disabled most electronic equipment worldwide. Within the first ten minutes they bombarded our cities, coastlines and military installations with meteors. Then came the bombers; the aliens sent ships down into our atmosphere and struck every major urban area with weapons analogous to neutron bombs. Riots broke out around the world and civilized people so rapidly devolved into beasts, trampling and clawing at each other to escape annihilation. Within one hour between 75-85% of the world's population had been eradicated. That wasn't the end of it. Within a few days the aliens landed herded us together and took most of the surviving population captive. We have since seen some of the children they took walking around with these wormlike parasites on their backs. What became of the adults no one knows. Through the past two months the fortunate ones who got away tried to fight back. Really I believe that the dead are the fortunate ones here. Only they have seen the end of this war.
Nov 23 2057 CST
Near Galveston, TX, United States
Inez and Melinda Vargas ran through the tall reeds onto the highway. It was as they expected, the bridge to Galveston Island had been taken out. Across the channel they saw faint blue lights glowing on towers connected to an expansive alien structure that covered much of the island. "That's where they've taken him." said Inez, the older of the two siblings who had just turned 17 in September. She was just under 5' 11" and slender and lithe but not fragile in appearance with long wavy thick black hair that went down to the center of her back, granted now it was quite frizzled from the humidity and spending weeks on the move. Her face was long and angular, with a sharp nose, smooth cheeks, light olive skin and piercing hazel eyes behind long feminine lashes. She was wearing tight fitting blue jeans, sequin studded dark red boots and a grey undershirt beneath a plain black leather jacket. She had an M4 carbine slung over her shoulder and a Colt revolver tucked inside her jacket. Melinda was the youngest child of the family at age 13. Just barely into puberty she looked like an overgrown child at 5' 5". She was of a more stocky build than her older sister but was not fat. She was still well proportioned for a child of her age. Her straight black hair was cut at shoulder length though it was starting to get rather uneven in places. She had a wide face a round nose and plump cheeks and was two or three shades darker brown than her sister. She wore a tattered Pierce the Veil band T-shirt and faded grey jeans over black combat boots and carried a silenced AR-15 for protection. Even before the invasion both girls had been taught how to shoot and were skilled marksmen in their own right. "Are you sure about this?" Melinda asked. "That's what the kid attached to the bug thing said. This is where they were taking all the children." Inez told her. "But, how are we going to get there? You know there are those things in the water." Melinda whined. "We'll find a way." Inez sighed. "I wish Dad was here." sniffled Melinda. She remembered what happened to her mother and started to think the same happened to her dad. "Mija, please don't cry now. Dad was stationed overseas at an army base in Korea. Remember what happened at Fort Bliss? I think he's got enough to deal with on his own." Inez said to her sister. "He's still out there. He's fighting the spiders; he's going to make them go away." Inez continued. She gave her a hug and the two of them walked away from the Island and got onto other adjoining highways which could lead to another bridge or a ferry. "We've got to be the ones that save Carlos, Mama's gone, Dad's overseas, it's up to us now. You're strong enough to do this mija." Inez encouraged her. They passed under a bridge and entered into an abandoned small coastal community. As they approached the intersection of two state highways a two legged robot walker confronted them, sprinting out from behind a convenience store and stopping directly in front of them. It was between 10 and 12 feet tall with bird-like legs and spindly arms connected to a central egg shaped body. One of the arms ended in a four fingered hand with long slender digits and the other capped into a boxed off chain gun of sorts. At the rear of the main body were two wing-like protrusions in the shape of the curved half of an axe head. The forward facing portion of the tops of these protrusions shone a bright spotlight down upon the two terrified girls. The machine did not fire upon them; rather it intended to hold them here until the spiders arrived to take them away. Neither did the girls fire upon the machine for experience had taught them that most gunfire didn't even scratch the surface of these things. Inez looked frantically around trying to find a way out. She couldn't let this be the end, not like this. She heard another sound, not the dull droning hum of the mech but the roar of a terrestrial diesel engine. A green 18 wheeler with a steel reinforced front bumper came thundering down the cross street and slammed straight into the mech with the force of a freight train. After dragging the mech about a quarter mile down the street the truck backed up and slowly pried the damaged machine out from underneath it leaving behind a sparking hulk of dented in metal with the gun arm dangling from wiry internal servos. The truck stopped in front of the girls and released its parking brakes. The name on the side of the truck read "Vasquez Trucking, Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas, Mex." The passenger door opened and a gruff, chubby bearded man backed away and sat back into the driver's seat. "Hop in. You need to get away from here before the spiders arrive." the man said to them in Spanish. "Thank you." Inez replied. She then helped her sister into the truck and climbed in after her. It used to be that she would never get into a strange vehicle with a creepy old guy but this was the way the world was now. There were bigger threats out there than what people could do to each other; by now most people had kind of got the message that they had to work together to survive. The assholes were some of the first to die. Nonetheless both of the girls had their guns and if this guy wasn't a genuine friend to them they knew how to use them. Inez shut the door and buckled her seat belt. The truck backed up some more and then turned west down the highway Inez and her sister were walking along.