Just Breathe

Author's Note: No, I do not own Falling Skies. It is just an amazing show that inspired me to write this one sleepless night. No, I did not make any money off of this piece of fiction. I only wish I could make some real money as a writer. I promise that I did no harm to any of the characters or settings of the TNT series Falling Skies. Please don't sue me. I have nothing to really give you if you did. The story is all written in the first person and it's a nameless OC. Not sure where it came from. It just came out of me when I was supposed to be going to bed. Hopefully with all the edits and additions and rewrites, it makes sense and is an enjoyable read for you all. Thank you! Comments are welcome and appreciated!


It's amazing how one action, no matter how great or small, can create such a domino effect. Just one act on someone else's part can affect so many others, even if it was never their intent. Just one day can change the whole world, even if no one wanted it changed in the first place. It's really amazing and quite scary when you think about it. Suddenly it doesn't seem so big anymore. Does it? I can't be the only one who feels this way.

When the aliens attacked everything was …

I don't think there are really words to describe what that moment was like. It changed everything though. In fact, it changed the whole world and everyone in it. No one's lives were left untouched after the attack. It changed my little world in many ways, although honestly I'm just one person in all of this. I'm not so sure my story is all that interesting. In fact, I really doubt it's all that different than anyone else's story at this point. There are so many people who had their lives changed when the aliens attacked. Families were ripped apart. Children were taken and harnessed or by the grace of God, they were left orphans. It seems like only an even luckier few were able to stay with their families through this all.

How odd is it to think that being orphaned could be a good thing? Ha. Yet when you consider some of the alternatives, it's really not so bad anymore, is it? When you really stop to think about it, lives were altered by all of this and our perceptions of so many things are skewed now. Things you never thought would be 'good things' are suddenly the best alternative to what could've been. Crazy, isn't it?

For me …

For me, it was …

It wasn't easy to get where I am today. That's for sure. In fact, that's a bit of an understatement. My family had already been changed before the attack though. There was a time when I guess some people might've called me a 'little princess', a 'daddy's girl'. I was an only child and I suppose that I did get everything I wanted. Within reason. It wasn't like my family came from money but I know that I never felt like I wanted or needed anything more than I had at any given moment. Life was good for so long. Then my mom got sick. It seemed like the worst possible thing in the world and at the time, I suppose it really was the worst thing in the world for me.

It was a couple of years before she passed. That was just months before the attack. It was cancer or complications from it that took her life. Funny how now I look back and think that she was the lucky one. She didn't have to be here for any of what followed. And what followed turned out to be some of the worst things to ever happen to any of us in my opinion. No matter how much I miss her, I can look back and say that at least my mom didn't have to be here when the attack happened, at least she didn't have to watch while the world seemed to fall apart.

My dad fell apart after my mom died though. He'd always been stoic. He was a military man after all who rarely gave anyone a hug and never cried in front of others. For awhile though he was falling apart all of the time after my mom passed, crying at any mention of her. It didn't matter how big or how small it was, everything seemed to bother him. Then came the attack. It was like a switch was flipped in his head or something. He did everything he could to keep me safe after that.

It was only a few months after the attack that he died … protecting me. Yeah, some mechs came through our neighborhood, looking for survivors I suppose. My dad showed me where to hide from them. He left me with some food and some water and told me to stay right there. He promised to come back for me.

He never did.

I was only hiding for a day, maybe two, when a stranger found me. I already knew my dad wasn't coming back by then. He would've come for me already if that had been the case. This stranger said something about militias forming and how she was going to try to find one of them. It seemed safe to come out of hiding so I said that I'd go with her. What else could I do? I was an orphan now. We didn't have much, this woman and I, but she shared her food and water with me as we wandered together. Then we met a few others. And a few more after that.

It was amazing how our numbers grew from there in such a short time. I could hardly believe that there were so many survivors just wandering around. For awhile I had even hoped that I'd find my dad. Except I ran into one of our neighbors who gave me my dad's old leather jacket. He never took it off so when I got it, I knew that my dad was truly dead. It was a hard blow but at least it confirmed my suspicions. I truly was on my own now but I felt like he would've been proud of the way that I was handling everything.

Eventually our group found our way to the 2nd Mass. Some of us were pretty skeptical and still on guard when we met up with them. Too much time spent hiding from skitters and mechs will do that to a person I guess. Not me though. My dad had always called it my one big fault, this tendency to just talk to strangers like I've known them forever. Still that tendency got me that far so it couldn't be that bad. It seemed like a good thing in those first few days with the 2nd Mass after all. I can't say that I felt like I'd made new friends but I did feel like I wasn't alone anymore. It truly felt like I'd found people who would understand my story and who would be happy just to have me around.

I did what I could to help with the younger kids from the start. I've always loved kids, after all, so it seemed like a good fit. Plus the kids seemed to like me. So when they tried to start up a 'school' of some sort, I was there to help out as much as I could with getting the kids together and everything. It wasn't bad but it wasn't what I wanted to be doing. I wasn't some 'little kid' myself and I was tired of being told that I was 'just a little girl'. I'm short, yes, but that has never meant that I couldn't take care of myself. Still I did what I could to get along. One day I was cutting my own hair actually, using a really terrible pair of rusty scissors and a broken piece of mirror when someone saw me. They asked if I'd cut their hair too. It became my thing, I guess, although I doubt that I'm any good at it. Even now, it's nice to have something to do though.

That's the part that bothers me the most. I try so hard to help everyone but because I'm smaller than most, I get told to stay behind and help with the kids or watch over someone or something. Guess what? My dad was a Marine. He taught me how to shoot a gun when I was just a kid. I'm not a kid anymore. I'm 17 now. I just want to be taken seriously for a change. With everything that's happened, I don't see how they can overlook me much longer.

I don't have much left at this point. No family to speak of anyway. At least not blood relatives. This is my family now. The 2nd Mass is my family and wherever they are is home to me. With all the things that have happened, I just know that when it comes down to it, I'll get my change to go down fighting. Who cares if I'm 'just a little girl'? Right?