EPITAPHS E-Book

Suzann Dodd

• Herausgeber: BookRix
• Kategorie: Fantasy und Science-Fiction
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

Defeat feels different for each one who has experienced it.  A bomb had been fired.  A nuclear bomb has fallen on the house in which the Administrator of the Engredi Zoological Preserve resides.  In that house was supposed to be Ki-Zershaz the god/king of the ZerShaz people. The ZerShaz, who have defeated humans and captured their planets.

Leseprobe

Suzann Dodd

EPITAPHS

BookRix GmbH & Co. KG81371 Munich

Life on Earth

LIFE ON EARTH

DIANA BANDAZIANBROOKLYN, NEW YORKEARTH

During the day I hide in the storeroom. Once this was an upscale Fooder. Every year, my husband and I would take a loan so that on our birthdays we could have real food, not nutri-cubes or mox.  The last we were here drifts into fantasy.

I remember walking up the road under a blue sky... Blue?  Seeing the sun...Sun?  I remember walking at night under stars.. What are they? 

There is no sun, there are no stars the sky is grey always grey. Thick grey like a heavy fog, lighter in day. Whatever was fired into the stratesphere to prevent the Zerks invading, ended life on Earth.

Why did those war mongers have to fire that weapon? Even if the Zerks invaded, life would be bette on the surface of Earth than under it.

If this is life...

We heard the Zerks attacked and turned a Limogyene planet into asteroids. Limos were 'allies' and the Terran Space Force promised retaliation.  They went to attack a Zerk planet, I think it was Keytash, and were destroyed. The Zerks went to Shalimar, one of our worlds, captured it, included it in their Empire.

We hadn't processed that when they captured Xenos, another of our worlds.  Then to Beta Mar...

Where were our forces?  Were the Zerks so powerful we couldn't stop them?  How is that possible? Didn't we have superior weapons?   We knew they were coming here to Earth.. we were ready.  When the order went to go underground, we hadn't been frazzled. We'd been practicing the Shelter Protocols all our lives.  I recall at school when we'd go down and down into the rooms under the building. Schools, Government buildings, other places had shelters... just in case.

Living underground wasn't wierd, there were homes and businesses built underground to facilitate 'Green Spaces'.  I'd been in many, and happy to get back out under the sky.

Living underground wasn't that bad the first week. But those of us who'd lived up top began to chaff. Then the admission that we hadn't been attacked or invaded but had poisoned our own atmosphere to prevent Them from entering...

The riots started.  Murders, insanity.

Attempts to break out of our underground 'prison' resulted in OUR security forces firing on us. Then, we fired back. So many died, my husband died.

I, maybe all of us in this shelter decided to get out.

I knew exactly where we were, what was above us, and where the exits were located. I made a choice of which door to go through. I joined a crowd which smashed its way out.

Maybe I was the only one aware of the dangers of an ionised atmosphere.  Maybe no one believed it, but I did.  I didn't run up the road, I turned into an alley, blasted through a back door.  

I knew the fooder, knew where I could hide and ran down, not up.  Others entered, went up, I heard them grab and run.   I hid and waited. I heard screaming, thundering, slamming, hours of noise, then silence.

I slowly emerged, waited. Heard nothing. I went up slowly. It was night, dark, a few lumis which focused on signs , bright enough to cast a bit of visibility.

I went to the entrance door which was transparent. I could see in glimpses as search lights roved back and forth. There were bodies.  Lots of bodies of people dead and dying. Some being eaten by animals.  I moved from the door, shoving some shelves in front of it.

Hungry. I found edibles the others had overlooked and filled my stomach with food I couldn't afford to buy.  These were 'dry' goods, crackers and cookies, and jams and peanut mixtures I had never tasted.

I took as much as I could to carry down into my hiding space. Then I went up and up to the roof. There had been tables up there where we had dined. As the downstairs door, this one was transparent. I waited until the search lights passed before coming out.

It was cold but I didn't mind it. It was real.