• The Second Invasion
    As the sun sets over the western horizon, the smell of burning corpses and decaying bodies in the streets linger in the air above Washington DC, buildings crumble and lay in heaps of rumble block after block and the sounds of an unending battle rings loud and clear. A body sprawled on the ground begins to stir. Feeling a sharp pain in the head the body groaned as it got up.
    “Stella! Stella, are you ok?” a man said while running toward Stella. “I’m fine, Bret. I just got hit by debris’.” groaned Stella. Still feeling pain, Stella felt that her hair was moist with her blood. The pain worsened by the second but Stella knew that she had to go on.
    “Come on, Stella, we need to find a place to rest awhile and bandage your wounds,” Bret said as he pulled Stella to her feet, “Follow me.” Trying not to waste time Bret ran as fast as he could but made sure Stella was still following. After taking a right turn, Bret turned around to see if Stella had followed, but found it impossible to see through a crowd more congested than a stuffy nose. When Stella found out that she lost Bret, she franticly ran forward but she wasn’t getting anywhere by trying to get through the immense crowd. Tired Stella stopped so that she could catch her breath and resume searching for Bret.
    Suddenly a bone chilling scream exploded behind her, freezing her in her tracks. The voice sounded familiar to Stella but she didn’t recognize it. Curious, Stella ran toward the voice to only find something so shocking that she couldn’t believe her eyes. That familiar voice belonged to Allen, an officer in the army that she met a few days ago. On the ground Stella saw a dozen of other dead soldiers laying there as limp as rag dolls surrounding an unknown being with disfigured human like features. The feelings of rage and distraught crept slowly through Stella’s body. Without thinking Stella picked up a dead soldier’s rifle and shot at the ugly beast until she was out of bullets. In a blink of an eye the beast was standing in front of her and swung its arm swatting her to the side like swatting at a fly. Stella knew the arm impacted her so hard that when she coughed she hacked up blood. While Stella was still on the ground she didn’t hear Bret walk up and drag her to her feet.
    “Stella, get a hold of your self. Stella!” Bret said calmly but loud enough for her to hear. Slowly Stella’s head began to clear. As sun slowly sank in the evening sky, Stella and Bret saw that there were more of these ugly beasts and as night fell they began to blend in to the scenery like a chameleon camouflaging into its scenery. Bret and Stella knew that there was an army base near and that they need to store up on weapons. Signaling to each other, they both ran up the block and took a sharp turn hoping to lose the beasts.
    When the base was insight, Bret and Stella saw that there were herds of people trying to get within the base and the soldiers closing the gates. Knowing that they had to be quick, Stella and Bret hopped over the fence and took whatever they could carry. They also knew that they couldn’t rush into this fight without planning so Stella thought they should lure the beasts away from the base, but before they could put the plan to action there was a large crash out side the base that sounded like a land slide and pleas for help can be heard across town.
    “Bret, we need to help them.” Stella said while running to the window to see how the fight between the beasts and the army was holding up, “We have to go out there now! Aren’t you coming?” Stella turned around in time to see how hesitant Bret was.
    “Not until we find escape routs first,” Bret finally answered still unsure if he should help.
    “It’s now or never, Bret! Those things have the upper hand. You saw how the blended in when the sun went down.” Stella said franticly but clearly. In Stella’s mind, she kept playing how the beasts changed to match their backgrounds. “What’s the closest building generating the most electricity?” Stella asked as she was looking out the windows to find it.
    “The House of Congress, why?” questioned Bret who was still puzzled about where the question came from. Stella turned around to see what else she should grab. She saw night vision goggles and walky-talkies lying on a desk in the room. Grabbing the goggles and walky-talkies, Stella ran out of the room and went room to room looking for a P.A. system. Relief flowed through Stella when she finally found it.
    “Listen up army boys! For those who can hear me, I want you to split up into two groups; one group will lure the beasts to the House of Congress. My friend, Bret, will lead this group and for the second group you will follow up and block all escapes. At this time I’ll move on ahead to congress to jump start the generators. Just trust me boys, no questions asked!” Stella said trying to motivate them but deep inside Stella didn’t know if they would follow her when she gave unexplained orders. Shaking of the thought, Stella gave the one walky-talky to Bret as she put hers away smiling her farewells and hurried off to the House of Congress. Running, Stella felt the adrenalin kick in making her head ach and fractured ribs hurt even more.
    Finally at the House of Congress, Stella entered the generator room in the dark damp basement. Lost in the unknown building, Stella felt as if she was being watched by something like an assassin would its victim. Stella turned on the night vision goggles and strapped it on her head while walking cautiously through the room. Every step she took echoed back as she walked in between rows of crates full of files stored for the congress and senates. When Stella reached the back of the room were the generator was the ugly beast shoved her into the wall so hard she ricocheted and collapsed to the ground. Struggling to get up, the beast picked Stella up by her shirt and threw her at the crates knocking them over. Realizing that she lost the rifle, Stella reached for the army knife stored in her left boot and readied her self to attack.
    “Where are you, you stupid beast?” Stella whispered to her self as she began to search for the beast with the night vision goggles. Through the goggles, Stella was able to see every thing as if it were day time. Finally spotting the beast, she crept behind the beast and jumped on its back. Taking the army knife, Stella sliced the beast’s throat as if she were cutting beef. Before the beast could scream in agony, she stuffed its mouth with wood planks from the broken crates and took the knife stabbing the beast in the beast cavity. Stella pulled the knife down the beast’s abdomen and ripped open the torso to remove the heart as to finally kill it. Then there came static noises from the walky-talky tucked away for safety.
    “Stella, we’re almost there. Are the generators up?” it was Bret on the other side. Knowing she needed to hurry Stella ran to the generator and switched the flip turning on the generator. In front of the House of Congress, Bret saw the lights flicker and shut off. Stella heard the generator stalling and stopped running so she went to check how the gears were working.
    “s**t!” Stella screamed as she saw her rifle jammed in between the gears that were trying to turn as it was made to do. She grabbed for the barrel and pulled towards her self. Outside, Bret heard a rifle go off and suddenly the lights shown brightly as if it were the sun. Worried about if Stella was fighting the beasts by her self; Bret ran as quick as a cheetah to the generator room and found her lying on the ground. Bret rushed over to Stella’s side and gently tried waking her.
    “Come on Stella! Wake up. The battle’s not over.” Bret said franticly. Stella was covered with many untreated wounds and she wasn’t getting better. Slowly, Stella opened her eyes which brought relief to Bret. As soon as Stella opened her eyes, the cries of victory were heard from outside. Bret and Stella smiled at each other; both of them were happy and glad that the fight has ended but they didn’t know that another unknown creature in an unknown area was getting for another invasion.