[Third POV]
Every television, smartphone, digital billboard, and smart-watch on the planet abruptly cut to a stark, black screen with blocky white text.
[CLASS-1 EXISTENTIAL THREAT DETECTED. PROCEED TO THE NEAREST SHELTERS. THIS IS NOT A DRILL.]
In downtown New York, the ensuing panic itself had shrouded the public like a physical weight. People abandoned their cars in the middle of intersections. Coffee shop windows shattered as crowds trampled each other, surging toward the designated subway stations. But as they looked down the concrete stairs, and then looked up at the sky, seeing the rough shape of large objects incoming for them, the sheer futility of it settled into their bones.
It was, undoubtedly, an apocalypse.
On the western horizon, the clouds were completely blotted out by a sprawling armada of cobalt-blue warships. To the east, the stratosphere tore open as Crimson Red teardrop vessels descended, bringing the dying Viltrumite Empire and its subjugated planetary armies.
A man in a business suit slammed his fists against the reinforced steel doors of a subway shelter, screaming as the capacity locks engaged from the inside, leaving thousands stranded on the street.
"It's over." a woman whispered from the mob, looking at the descending white ships. "What does it matter anyway?" She sighed, "There wont be an Earth left to live in after this is over."
Her dreary outlook was shared by many others. Although she could not have known what exactly was attacking Earth, the numbers blotting out the sky were more than enough to bring her towards despair
Then, cutting through the wail of air-raid sirens, the screeching of tires, and the deafening roar of atmospheric entry, a single sound vibrated across the globe.
TWANG!!!
It wasn't particularly loud, yet it resonated deeply in the bone marrow of every human being currently standing on asphalt.
The screaming stopped as a collective wave of relief washed over the panicked masses. They had heard this trick before and some had lived through the previous invasions.
Below their feet, the concrete and asphalt rippled like water as Gargantuan, golden tatami doors materialized flat on the ground across every major metropolitan hub on the planet. The doors slid open with the soft sound of wood gliding on wood, revealing a bottomless yet dimly lit abyss.
Gravity did its work and millions of people were pulled downward into the ever-shifting structure of a Japanese castle.
Suspended on a floating wooden stage in the center of the infinite dimension, sat Nakime. Her single eye was closed in deep concentration and her pale fingers were a blur of motion, bleeding sluggishly onto the strings of her biwa, as she played a slow, hauntingly beautiful melody.
With every pluck, the gates snapped open and shut on the surface of the Earth. She caught the falling civilian's mid-air, manipulating the spatial gravity to deposit them softly into vast halls already stocked to the ceiling with Chaos Corp emergency rations, bottled water, and medical cots.
And witnessing this, the people understood that Earth wasn't going to fight a ground war with eight billion hostages in the crossfire.
********
The Orbital Front
High above the exosphere, humanity's first line of defense was already dying.
The Global Defense Agency's "Hammer" satellite was a Four hundred-billion-dollar masterpiece of orbital lethality, and Cecil Stedman was watching it burn in real-time from the GDA's sub-basement.
"Target lock on the Coalition vanguard," a technician shouted, his fingers flying across a holographic console, sweating through his uniform.
"Fire the damn thing," Cecil barked. He was chewing aggressively on his lip as his scarred face was illuminated by the harsh blue light of the tactical table.
In low-Earth orbit, the Hammer's massive solar arrays flared blindingly white, unleashing a concentrated beam of hyper-dense plasma, thick as a skyscraper, directly into the void of space. The beam struck the lead Coalition dreadnought square in the bow but the alien kinetic shielding flared a brilliant violet for a microsecond before shattering like cheap glass. The plasma chewed effortlessly through the hull, turning the front half of the massive warship into a drifting hunk of molten slag.
"Direct hit, sir!"
"Don't celebrate yet," Cecil snapped, his eyes tracking the telemetry data. "Look at the swarm."
And he was right. The rest of the Coalition armada didn't even break formation, as if the loss of a dreadnought meant nothing to them. From the bays of the surviving ships, thousands of smaller, agile fighter craft poured out like angry hornets aiming directly for the Hammer.
A synchronized volley of disruptor beams struck the GDA masterpiece simultaneously. The GDA's prized weapon didn't even have time to re-angle its shields. The hull crumpled inward, its core overloaded, and finally, the Hammer detonated into a useless cloud of radioactive junk.
Cecil spat onto the immaculate floor. "Well. That was a waste of taxpayer money."
*******
Space HQ
On the other side of the planet, the Tech Jacket's Space HQ was a fortress under siege.
The station shuddered violently as another barrage of plasma fire slammed into its deflector shields. Sparks showered from the ceiling of the command deck, and the harsh red strobe of emergency lighting bathed the room in a bloody glow.
"Dad, get in the goddamn pod!" Zoe Thompson yelled as her suit formed over her, grabbing her father by his jumpsuit and physically shoving him into the cramped escape cylinder. She slammed her hand onto the launch sequence keypad.
"Zoe, I'm not leaving you and your brother up here!" her father protested, struggling against the automated harness restraints.
"I'm sorry, but you're squishy and dead weight in space, old man!" Zoe screamed over the wail of the decompression alarms. "I'm right behind you! Go!"
The heavy glass door slid shut, sealing him inside. The pod shot out of the airlock, rocketing toward Earth's atmosphere just as the station took another direct hit from a Viltrumite cruiser.
Outside the station, floating in the terrifying silence of space, Zack Thompson was holding the line.
The sleek, silver and blue Tech Jacket armor shifted and whirred around his body, microscopic nanites aggressively repairing the micro-fractures in his plating. He raised his arms, the suit forming massive, shoulder-mounted cannons and squeezed the triggers, unleashing a torrent of hard-light projectiles that blew two incoming alien dropships into scrap metal.
[Warning]. His suit's AI droned in his ear, the synthetic voice perfectly calm despite the chaos. [Heart rate is at one hundred and eighty beats per minute.]
"Yeah, yeah, tell my cardiologist I'm busy," Zack grunted, his breath fogging the inside of his visor.
[Incoming threat. Three pure-blood Viltrumites approaching on a direct intercept vector.]
Zack looked up and saw, tearing through the debris of the slave ships, were three adult Viltrumites. They were flying in a tight wedge formation, wearing crisp white and grey uniforms, all of them sported thick mustaches and wore their signature arrogant sneers.
"Come get some, you fascist freaks," Zack muttered.
He raised his gauntlets, pointing his palms directly at the incoming Viltrumites, triggering the maximum-yield sonic shockwaves.
The gauntlets flared a brilliant, blinding blue. The internal vibration chambers fired at maximum capacity, shaking Zack's own arms up to his shoulders from the sheer recoil.
But to Zack's surprise, the Viltrumites flew right through the blue light.
They didn't bleed from their ears, scream or even flinch. They just kept accelerating, looking mildly confused by the glowing lights flashing on the human's hands, before their arrogant grins returned.
Zack froze. The targeting reticle in his HUD flashed a useless green. His heart hammered against his ribs like a trapped bird.
"Why... why aren't their ears bleeding?" Zack stammered, raw panic finally bleeding into his voice. "The frequency is maxed out!"
[Zackary. We are currently in the vacuum of space] the AI replied dryly. [There is no atmosphere. Therefore, there is no medium for sound to travel. The sonic weapons are functionally useless.]
Zack stared at his glowing hands, the reality of the situation crashing down on him. He was a teenager in a tin can, floating in an airless void, about to be ripped in half by three men who could fly through cruisers.
"Right. Physics, that useless bitch," Zack groaned, squeezing his eyes shut for a fraction of a second. "I'm a fucking idiot."
He didn't have time to retreat, seeing as his father and sister were still retreating, so he aggressively diverted all auxiliary power from his weapon systems, routing it directly into his kinetic thrusters and armoured knuckles. The armor plates on his fists thickened, locking into heavy impact configurations.
"Suit, activate Omega Jacket!"
[Omega Jacket Activated! Warning! Warning!]
"Old-fashioned fist to jaw it is, then."
Zack fired his thrusters, the blue exhaust flaring brilliantly against the blackness of space, and launched himself head-first into a suicidal collision with the Viltrumite vanguard.
******
The Earth Front (West)
The Western Hemisphere was a Xeno meat grinder.
The Coalition of Planets had deployed their infantry in endless waves. They dropped into the ruined streets of Washington in heavy, cobalt-blue armor, carrying plasma rifles that both pierce human flesh and instantly cauterise the wounds, leaving victims to die of systemic thermal shock, if they were to find one. The alien soldiers moved in tight phalanx formations, dropping interlocking energy shields to slowly and methodically suffocate the city blocks.
But Earth was not rolling over.
The old and new Guardians of the Globe were holding the line, fighting a desperate war of attrition.
Black Samson vaulted over a burnt-out city bus. His body hummed with crackling electrical power as he drove a super-charged fist directly into the center of a Coalition phalanx. The kinetic impact shattered the alien energy shields like glass, caving in the lead soldier's helmet and sending the rest of the squad flying backward into a storefront.
Across the street, Dupli-Kate was bleeding from a dozen minor lacerations, but she wasn't slowing down. Instead, she flooded the intersection with dozens of clones, burying the alien vanguard under a literal wave of bodies. Every time a plasma bolt took out a clone, Kate manifested two more, overwhelming the highly trained soldiers with chaotic numbers.
But throwing bodies at heavy armor wasn't working fast enough, so she got creative. Horrifyingly creative.
A Coalition shock trooper grabbed one of the Kates by the throat, preparing to execute her. Taking the alien by surprise, she jammed her hand straight into the alien's roaring mouth, shoving her arm deep down its throat, and activated her power. The duplication that ensued happened directly inside the alien's chest cavity.
The sickening sound of rapidly multiplying biomass echoed over the gunfire as a new clone's organs, bones, and flesh violently materialized where the alien's internal organs used to be. The trooper exploded from the inside out in a geyser of blue armor and alien viscera, physically birthing a brand-new, blood-soaked Kate from the gory wreckage. The new clone wiped the gore from her eyes, duplicated again, and lunged at the next soldier, aiming her hands right for the gaps in his armor.
In the center of the crossfire stood Brit.
The grizzled veteran was chewing casually on a piece of nicotine gum, actively trying to quit smoking for his upcoming baby. A Coalition plasma bolt struck him square in the chest. The thermal energy burned a hole straight through his jacket, but the skin underneath remained spotless.
Brit looked down at his ruined shirt, his face twisting into a scowl.
"Hey, Xeno scum! Do you have any idea how hard it is to find a good tailor who works with Kevlar-weave?" Brit growled.
A massive alien trooper charged him, swinging a heavy kinetic-enhanced hammer directly at Brit's face. Brit didn't even raise his hands to block and leaned his jaw into upcoming the strike.
CLANG.
The hammer struck his cheekbone and instantly shattered into useless shrapnel, the abrupt, immovable recoil snapping the alien's own wrists. While the trooper screamed at its broken arms, Brit grabbed the alien by the shoulder straps, pulled him down, and delivered a vicious, full-body headbutt. The alien's reinforced helmet crumpled against Brit's indestructible skull, dropping the trooper to the asphalt.
Another soldier lunged forward, thrusting a plasma blade directly at Brit's gut. Brit simply caught the burning energy blade with his bare hand. Ignoring the heat, he used his grip on the weapon to unbalance the terrified alien, yanked him forward, and drove a standard military combat knife straight up into the unarmored gap under the trooper's chin.
"Goddammit," Brit sighed.
[A/N]:
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