***
Seth left the hospital in his car. He had made an appointment to meet his girlfriend, Laura. The two had been in a relationship for two years.
The streets were crowded with luxury cars, most of them going out for lunch with their coworkers or partners.
The location of Laura's favorite restaurant wasn't so far from where Seth worked; it only took fifteen minutes to arrive. From a distance, Seth, who was in the car, saw Laura arrive in her black sedan.
She drove into the parking lot right next to the restaurant. Seth parked his car next to Laura's, and they immediately met when they stepped out of the car.
"What do you want to talk about?" Seth asked flatly.
"We'll talk about it inside," Laura replied, seemingly behaving more nonchalantly than usual.
Seth, still wearing his doctor's coat, walked into the restaurant. The restaurant had two floors, with an outdoor-themed floor, so the atmosphere was very cool.
They sat near the railing of the second floor, adjacent to the outside area of the restaurant, so they could enjoy their meal while watching the beauty of Lake Michigan as far as the eye could see –the restaurant was located close to Lake Michigan.
"What do you want to talk about?" Seth asked.
"I want to end our relationship," Laura replied, speaking spontaneously without a second thought.
"But why? Is there something wrong with me?" asked Seth, surprised.
Laura sighed softly, her arms crossed over her chest with her head turned to the right, reluctant to look at Seth.
"I'm getting married," Laura said.
"A young CEO came to me, and he proposed to me. He's actually my ex-boyfriend, and I still have crushes on him," Laura said.
Laura's words were exactly the same as what Seth remembered earlier. All the way to the restaurant, Seth had guessed that Laura's invitation must be related to their relationship.
"Is that so?" asked Seth. Even though he already knew, his heart still felt a little disappointed at Laura's decision.
"AKH!"
"What's wrong?" asked Laura.
She began to show a different expression when she saw Seth looking like he was in pain, one of his eyes closed with his right hand holding his head, feeling dizzy.
"It's okay. It's just a normal headache," Seth said.
"So, what do you think?" asked Laura.
Seth took a deep breath, looking back at Lake Michigan as he prepared his answer to Laura's question. Seth had also accepted Laura's decision before, but at that time, Seth was so angry that he dropped the food he ordered.
"Fine. It's your decision, after all," Seth said.
"Huh? Wait! Aren't you mad?" asked Laura, gasping at Seth's relaxed expression.
"I'm a little disappointed, but I'm certainly not angry. That's because-"
Seth's speech stopped when he realized the table before him was shaking. He stood up from his seated position, staring out over the Michigan lake at its surface. Waves were rising in a rhythmic beat.
"They're coming!" Seth complained.
The man squinted his eyes, looked up, and saw a large black object, the size of a Kent Island, hovering until its size made the city become dark.
"What the hell is that?!" moaned Laura, shaking with fear.
"Aliens. We should leave here before—"
BLINK!
A green laser beam shot from the alien craft aimed at Chicago. Its location was elsewhere, but the impact was felt all the way to the restaurant where Laura and Seth were having lunch.
All the mobile phones shorted out, sending out electric sparks that startled Laura. She threw her phone away in fear, while Seth didn't. The man had known this would happen.
"Look out!" someone shouted.
He pointed towards the dark city sky. A flickering blue light could be seen coming down as if falling. Seth didn't know what it was because he didn't see it clearly.
A large explosion occurred in another area south of the city. There wasn't one, but fifteen large explosions, and none of them were directed towards the city. Seth reflexively lowered his head as he grabbed Laura's hand.
"Where are we going?!" asked Laura frantically.
"The stadium. It's the only outdoor place we can use for shelter," Seth replied.
"Are we leaving our car? We can go there by—"
"That's useless! We'll walk," Seth said, interrupting Laura.
Previously, Laura had parted ways with Seth after the meeting, not even touching the food she had ordered. A few days later, Seth saw her body floating on Lake Michigan in a rotting condition.
Seth didn't want it to happen again, so he decided to take Laura with him to be safe. Seeing Seth's aggressive demeanor frightened Laura, and she obeyed his demands.
The two ran through the city streets without a single vehicle, along with thousands of people who panicked and screamed in fear, thinking that the apocalypse had arrived.
Old people were run over and stomped on, children cried as they were separated from their parents, chaos broke out all over the city, and robbery was inevitable. All the bad things that could be imagined in the apocalypse were happening right now.
But Seth wasn't thinking of looting a single store at the moment. The only thing he needed to do was to take cover in a spacious area, not inside a building, let alone a military installation.
"Instruct the people of the city to evacuate!" shouted a soldier, holding a rifle in his hand.
Thousands of soldiers were alerted, not only from the city of Chicago but soldiers from nearby cities were directed to be centralized in Chicago. After seeing many soldiers arrive, Seth was even more convinced of the memory in his head about the events at the beginning of the alien invasion.
The people of the city obeyed the instructions given by the city army. They directed the residents to go to the underpass. However, Seth refused and chose to go to the stadium, which wasn't so far from his location.
"The soldiers told us to evacuate there," Laura said.
"Listen to me! We'll go to the stadium and stay there until all this mess settles down," Seth insisted.
"No! I feel safer with them," Laura snapped.
"I DON'T WANT YOU DEAD!" snapped Seth.
He stopped his steps, holding both of Laura's hands tightly as his sharp eyes tried to scare her. Seth had never shown such a harsh attitude before; it was the first time Laura had seen him.
"What's wrong with you?" Laura asked.
"We have to go!" Seth said, pulling Laura's hands again, creating reddish marks on her white wrists.
"AAAKH!"
"ATTACK THEM!" shouted the soldiers behind Seth, signaling that the aliens had begun their attack.
A teleportation portal appeared in the center of the city, connecting to the alien craft as large as Kent Island. Hundreds of thousands of alien creatures came through the portal. They were 2 meters tall, white-skinned, with two blue, glowing antennae on their foreheads.
A tuft was created all over the back of their heads, backs, and tails that looked like lizard tails. Their arms and legs were muscular, with their faces covered in black spiral masks with three holes for their eyes and mouths.
Seth once killed one of the aliens with a weapon awarded as a floor duty reward. When Seth opened the spiral mask, he saw the horrifying appearance of the alien's face. Both eyes were round without eyebrows, with red eye color with a white dot in the middle.
They had no noses, so flat, no holes of any kind. Their wide mouths spread from the right side of the face to the left side of the face. Their teeth were sharp and numbered in the hundreds, yellow in color with two tongues inside, creating green saliva that smelled so foul it stung.
Their physical strength was tremendous. A single crushing blow from them could break a human's ribs, and some had even been hit so hard that their heads had been chopped off.
The best Seth could do was to take cover inside the stadium. When the man arrived at the venue, there were several people taking shelter there as well.
"We'll stay here," Seth said.
"But they'll slaughter us if we're in the open!" moaned Laura.
A small, round alien craft flew over the stadium, right above Seth and Laura. Several people threw things around them at the plane, suddenly, the plane fired red laser beams at the people who resisted.
The red laser beam hit the bodies of the citizens, creating a circular hole in their bodies the size of a volleyball, making them die instantly with blood pooling on the field.
"KYAAA—"
Seth swiftly silenced Laura's mouth, who was about to scream out loud, tears flowing from the corner of her left eye, a sign of sadness and fear. However, Laura looked to the side, finding that Seth was not frightened at all.
"Don't make any noise. If we don't threaten them, we won't die," Seth said.
From the bottom of the alien's spherical craft, a portal door opened. Blue light emerged from it into the stadium, three aliens arrived with guns in their hands.
The three walked toward the crowd of humans who were silent and terrified in the middle of the stadium. Seth could see it clearly; the two holes in the spiral mask were a deep red color.
They stopped right before Seth and the others, its head continuously checking everyone, not detecting a single threat to them.
Surprisingly, the three turned around and returned to the teleportation portal. They disappeared after entering the blue light as if moving faster than the light speed into the aircraft.
"What the hell is going on?" asked Laura, confused.
"They're aliens. They want to invade Earth."