《Evancamp's Folly》 Fallen Earth - 1 It was a beautiful, clear, blue sky day on Saturday. Lisa and I decided to take the dog to the dog park. Rufus was bouncing off the walls all week long, and so we threw him in the car and headed out. He kept on trying to scoot up into the front seat with Lisa, but she wasn¡¯t having any of it. ¡°He might be small, but his nails are pointy,¡± she said. ¡°We should go to the groomer¡¯s soon.¡± I just shrugged. ¡°I guess. We also have that thing, the buzzy thing we could try.¡± She gave me a look. ¡°Yea, I know, he hates it,¡± I said. We got lucky with parking, a spot right in front of the park. It was still early, and the sun hadn¡¯t gotten high enough to be warm. It felt nice to not need sunscreen for once. The second we let him off the leash, Rufus was gone. Lisa laughed, watching him zip around the park like a ping pong ball. After Rufus was done terrorizing all of the slightly smaller dogs in the small dog park, we opted to walk along the river. There is a sweet grassy area, set down almost at water level fifteen minutes along the path that had the softest grass. A few people were out there already, throwing a frisbee, and one cute fluffy dog who promptly begun a staring contest with Rufus, his pink tongue hanging out. I curled up next to Lisa, sat on the leash and just leaned back under one of those big oak trees dotting the river. This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.A nice cool breeze swept across the city, a rare touch for Houston. There are only two seasons in Houston, sweat lodge and summer. But for a few weeks on the shoulders of the year, it was perfect. Well, perfect before noon. ¡°Do you want to go grab lunch somewhere,¡± Lisa asked. ¡°Sure, in a bit,¡± I said quietly. I was enjoying this weather too much to want to pack up. The slight whisper of the leaves, the fresh smell of nature. No swampy smell, no humidity. Heaven. ¡°Thank god it isn¡¯t this nice all year long, or we¡¯d be priced out of living here,¡± I said, smiling down at Lisa. She leaned back into my lap, a contented smile on her face, looking up at me. I nervously felt the small felt box in my pocket. ¡°Hey, Lisa, I¡¯ve been wondering...¡± I started, slowly smiling. I could see her eyes widening slowly. I guess it wasn¡¯t a surprise after all. ¡°What is that,¡± she asked, pointing upwards. I followed her finger upwards. ¡°An oak tree,¡± I said, teasingly. ¡°No John. What is that?¡± she said more insistently. I looked past the swaying leaves, up higher. In the sky it looked like someone had stuck a tiny aurora borealis, really far away. Really, really far away. We both stood up, and I stepped out of the shade and put my hand up to my eyes to block out the sun. It was about the size of the moon, a rippling curtain of color that seemed to be spewing out of a spot in space. ¡°Huh...¡± I idiotically said. ¡°I don¡¯t know.¡± Everyone else around us had noticed the weird ripple as well, and were looking up at it, pointing. Some tried to get a picture on their cameras. I tried, but it just looked like a smudge. As I looked a bit closer, little dots started to cross my view. Gnats or something. I looked back at Lisa and Rufus. ¡°Let¡¯s head home?¡± I asked. ¡°It might be a solar flare or something.¡± Lisa looked at me, disapprovingly. ¡°The sun is over there,¡± pointing a good 45 degrees towards the horizon. ¡°What solar flare?¡± ¡°Fine, then google will have something,¡± I said, unlocking my phone. ¡°Holy shit!¡± Lisa cried. I swiveled my head back up, only to see what looked like a frozen lightening bolt, rip a short line in the sky. Even more unbelievable, the rip started to stretch, creating a jagged black spot, a vicious counterpoint to the tiny rainbow vomit. Fallen Skies - 2 We both stared, thunderstruck, at the skies. Rufus was hopping around our feet, confused. It was like a split in the sky, a voltaic bright blue that screamed electricity. Every second, the blue became brighter, and stronger, until it almost hurt to look at. All of the sudden, I could almost smell electricity. A copper taste filled my mouth, as the streak ripped. It tore in the middle, splitting into a jagged oval shape. At the same time, a silver thing started to come through this hole in space. Behind the silver prow, a bright blue nebulous cloud seemed to float, and as the silver ship pushed its way through, it rode a seemingly endless wave of bright blue clouds. My jaw dropped open. Rufus''s wet tongue on my palm shook me out of my trance. "What. The. Actual. Fuck," I said out-loud, as Lisa held my arm, just above the elbow. Her gripped tightened. "Look," She said, pointing at the rainbow bridge thing. The lightning gate had left an afterimage in my eyes. Everywhere i looked, that jagged edge was encircling it. I had to blink the image away. By the time I could see, there were so many tiny gnats around the rainbow that the swarm was starting to cover the rainbow itself. That''s when I realized something. They weren''t gnats... they were some sort of spacecraft or creature. Their swarm was past the clouds, and the swarm spiraled upwards into a funnel. As I watched, the silver leviathan slowly eased out of the rift, right as the swarm''s funnel twisted and turned to point at it. The swarm formed a drill shape, wrapping itself around and around. Towards the end of the swarm, which had shown no signs of petering out, larger shapes were starting to appear. Almost as if on que, as the first of these smaller box shapes, still nowhere near the size of the lightning ship, drifted away from the rainbow, the swarm reached the silver leviathan. It still hadn''t fully emerged from the rift, but as the swarm spiraled in, a looming sense of dread or fear overtook me. A bright flash blinded me, and both Lisa and I cried out. Rufus yelped and cowered behind our legs. When I could see again, a chunk of the swarm was gone, like a dog taking a big bite out of a biscuit. "Jesus, what was that?" Lisa asked. Around us, others had stopped, and were looking up. The frisbee group had all stopped and started pointing at the sky. "The bugs got eaten by the big silver log," I said. Lisa gave me a side-eye. "Bugs?" I shrugged. The bugs had done something, although I couldn''t see it. The silver ship had small spots start appearing on its side, pock-marking the clear sheen. It had just passed through the hole, revealing its full size. It was impossible to be sure, as there was no size reference, but based on how ponderous and unstoppable it seemed, I felt like it was impossibly huge. That was when a second prow started poking its way through the rift, also riding a bright blue wave.You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version. "We need to go. We have to find out what the hell is going on!" Lisa said, grabbing Rufus''s collar. Light bursts started flashing above us, tiny, impossibly bright light flashes. It was like firefiles on steroids, but brighter than a laser pointer in your eye. A tiny voice in my head whispered ''nuclear...''. "I don''t think anyone knows, but you are absolutely right." I grabbed our picnic bag, and started heading to the car. As if it was a signal, everyone around us started crying out and running away as well, or frantically calling people on their cell phones. "Does anyone have service? Or the internet? I can''t get any bars!" One of the frisbee players called out to us as we passed by. I pulled out my phone, but dropped it in my haste. I picked it up off the path, and shook my head. "I don''t either!" I called back. "Those things must have messed with the satellites." We hurried back to the car, and hopped in. Rufus refused to get in the back seat, he hated it, when I felt the world ripple somehow. It felt like the universe stretched and then snapped back like a rubber band. It wasn''t really uncomfortable, just... weird. Lisa and I both looked back up. Behind both the two silver logs, and the rainbow swarm, was now a hexagonal pattern. It warped my mind a bit, like those pictures you have to look at cross-eyed to see the ship. It felt like time has stopped, as the swarm unraveled and frayed, and the silver leviathans engines had gone dark. When both my eyes finally agreed on what they were each independently seeing, and got done disagreeing with each other, what I saw was a phalanx of ships. They looked like pinpricks, but as I watched, they turned, as a formation, to head towards the swarm. A thin red line started to reach out from each of the 8 ships, ending in a boiling red miniature sun at the center of their formation. The leviathans started to pull away from the hexagon, rotating achingly slowly in either direction. The swarm frantically pulled itself back in, towards the main tendril, swirling seemingly tighter than before. The sun boiled, slowly growing larger and larger, until it erupted, catching all 8 ships in its firy tendrils. "Did they just explode themselves," Lisa asked, looking at me. "No, look, its a bubble now," I pointed out. The ships were still there, just encircled by a red soap bubble. "Oh god," I whispered. "Aliens are real, and they are pisssssssed off." As if I had cursed us by saying they were real, the swarm blob exploded into three tendrils. One of them probed towards the silver ships, while another pushed towards the soap bubble. The third, however... it sheared off of the main body, and whipped its point towards us. "Shit, shit, shit" Lisa said. "We gotta go!" "Hop in!" I said, jumping in the drivers seat. Lisa just grabbed Rufus, and hopped in with him on her lap. The road was a shitshow, so typical Houston driving. The only difference being that I was the asshole cutting across four lanes with no blinker. Of course, normally its not a damn bumper rink. Cars were piling up everywhere, and people had gotten out of their cars and were staring up at the sky. It was a madhouse. Lisa grabbed on to the ''oh shit'' handle, and the dog, and closed her eyes tight, as I weaved through the debris at slightly higher than walking speed, and passed by stopped cars on either side. Our house was in sight, and we were almost home. I would have made it, too...
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Setting Sun - 3 The damn box blocked my view, and I rear-ended the car parked out in from of our street. The dog went flying into the dashboard, I faceplanted on the steering wheel, and Lisa choked on the seatbelt. "Ugh!" I groaned. My nose bleeding profusely. "Do you.." Lisa said, coughing. "see that?" How could I not?
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"This is not good," I said. "This is really not good." "It won''t go away! What do we do?" Lisa said, anxiety creeping into her voice. "Whatever happens next, if there are options, babe." I said, side-eyeing her from around the blue box. "Dont." I grabbed her shoulder for emphasis. "Pick. Impossible," stressing my words.
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My stomach dropped and my heart started thumping in my chest. Oh god, what had I done... "Babe, pick norm..." and with a silent whump, everything around me disappeared as my vision went white. It felt like my body was stretched, and then shrunk instantly. Like there was no air at all, and yet like water was trying to rush into my lungs. It felt like eternity. I ended up passing out. ----- When I came to, I was I was halfway up a clean green hill. Muddy rocks and moss was around the area, but otherwise I was alone. I spent a good 15 minutes going through the gamut of my cursing vocabulary. Then I decided to get down to business. "Alright god dammit. ''Status'', ''General'', ''Show me''" I said, slowly. I listed off every possible random word I could think of, and nothing. No blue screens showing me myself, my stats, or health. No mana. "Fine. Be that way," I said. "Let''s inventory." It was a very short list. I had my clothes, my car keys, a belt, my shoes, and my wallet. No knife, no bag, no change of clothes.The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement. "I can do this. First up, shelter, then water, then food," I said, listing my priorities to myself. Then I just stood there for a minute, totally lost. What was the point? I was in the impossible tutorial. I wasn''t some uber-athlete. I wasn''t a crack solider or navy SEAL or some crazy asshole. "I''m an Eagle scout. I can make fire from nothing," I murmered to myself. "I can make a spear and stab things. I can weave a basket underwater," chuckling at my little not-joke. I aimed up the hill, and started heading upwards. I figured I could see the surroundings at least. The top of the hill was rocky, but gave a clear view of the surrounding area. It seemed like a basic temeperate forest. A mountain range was off in the distance, snow topped and peaky. More Rockies, than Appalachia. A large river ran from the foothills of the mountain, and towards my hill. It meandered through the forest, or so I inferred from the clear gap that sheared through forest top. It ended over to the east, spurting out into a large body of water. Clearly, a large lake or an ocean. Luckily, it wasn''t desert or an ice tundra or something crazy environmentally difficult. I could work with this. Fortunately for my stomach, there were clear signs of birds, and small animals in the area. Both the noise of the surrounding forest, and some movement in the treetops indicated I could find small game across the area. However, I was alone, and humans are pack animals. I would be easy, well not easy, I would hope, prey for any pack of wolves, or bears. Or mountain lions. The creepy cats. I''m more of a dog person. I sighed. I would love to cuddle Rufus or Lisa right now. I missed my couch. "Work to do, miles to go," I said, as I headed down the hill. First things, first. I headed towards the nearest stream that fed into that massive river I saw. Rivers meant fish, and I might as well be close to the water I would need. Walking through the forest felt surreal. The light flickered through leaves, and the temperature was perfect, but something about it just felt off. I''d done my fair share of hiking and mountaineering, but you would be amazed at how difficult it is to actually find a place free from humans. No matter where we go, it always felt like someone had been there first. Not here. There were no trails, no sound of talking, no signs, no trail blaze. A soft loamy ground, with fallen logs and mushrooms. Faint birds chirping in the distance. After about half an hour of walking, I reached the edge of the river. It was massive, maybe a mile across, and the water was moving quickly. It was a murky brown, and my skin started goosebumping as my imagination wandered back to crocodiles, massive sharks or any number of things that could hide in that river. Leeches... massive leeches. I shuddered. For that matter, I hadn''t seen anything living yet. There could be dinosaurs. Nessie could be right there, and I would even see her coming. I slowly backed into the brush behind me, turning to make sure there wasn''t some sabertooth tiger stalking me. There wasn''t. I started walking parallel to the river, heading west towards the mountains. I shortly ran into a small creek, and decided this would be my little piece of heaven. "I coin you, ''John''s Point''," I crowed, taking a page from my historical forefathers, claiming everything in the new world like assholes. Water, check. Next up, Shelter. A quick walk around the area turned up a thick downed tree. I decided to make my lean-to right there. I spent the next few hours going around picking up medium sized sticks, and placing them up against the log. A few long strips of moss for a bed and pillow, and as the sun set, I was ready to hide away in my little hole. My stomach was feeling empty, but I was not going to risk getting hurt wandering around in the dark, and shoving things into my mouth. Food for tomorrow. Sleep for now. Just as I fell asleep...
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