"To all intelligent lifeforms on this planet - the Swarm will invade this solar system in 85 hours. Please prepare to defend or evacuate immediately".
Broadcasted via maximum strength telepathy starting from the outskirts of Uranus down to the underground railways of Tokyo, the message pulsated through my brain as I pushed my way through the crowd forming in the streets of New York City.
I'm sure everybody around me thought this was a prank, but the sudden message and common bewilderment of everybody around me quickly proved this wrong.
"Did you hear that too? Evacuate? To where? What's the Swarm?"
People were already asking all the right questions, and soon there was more panic than questioning as they realized humanity did not yet invent technology that enabled telepathy.
My head was still hurting from the message, but I knew I needed to get back home. I had already given up on taking the subway - the entrance was a lump of people shoving past another, and I assumed getting on a train would be impossible. My apartment was only a few blocks away, so I started running on the sidewalk, and I decided I would cut through an alley to get back faster.
As I ran through the backstreets, I dodged puddles of grime as I thought about what the fuck just happened. Was I dreaming? Are we all gonna die? Just as I was trying to answer the last question, I noticed a shadow in front of me.
"Help… help me." - I heard a weak voice, gasping along the dirty wall of the alley. It was not a human. Laying on the ground, it was some kind of large bug, with a quarter of its body crushed, and 2 limp appendages stretched out next to it.
I would have immediately turned back the way I came and called the police, but before I could slow down one of the appendages rose and shot at me, grabbing my arm.
"Holy shit let me go, what the hell is this thing, am I still dreaming?" By now fear was the only emotion describable, and I couldn't free myself from the bug grabbing me.
"Help….."
As I prepared to give my unwavering refusal, the appendage sprouted even more limbs, like a propagating tree branch, and dug itself into my skin. Fear was replaced by pain, and I couldn't even muster a response.
"The Propagation… survives". This was the last message I heard before I collapsed on the ground.
I don't know how long had passed when I regained consciousness. I heard sirens on the streets - it meant that the panic was still very real, and I was definitely not dreaming. My body no longer experienced pain, the appendage was gone. I almost believed I had hallucinated the previous event, until I saw that the bug in the alley was still in front of me, still badly damaged, but now completely still. Whatever life was left in it when I came across it was no longer there. I thought about reporting this, but remembered that I was rushing to my apartment so I could figure out what the fuck was going on, and immediately began running forward again.
When I opened my laptop, everything I saw was the same. "Cryptic message is heard by every human around the world", "The Swarm - worse than nuclear destruction", "Did North Korea brainwash humanity?". It seemed like everybody heard the message, but nobody really knew what it meant. I had been knocked out for around 30 minutes. That left 84 hours before this "Swarm" arrived.
I wanted to know who sent this message, and why didn't they say anything else? How did they expect us to defend or evacuate ourselves, and to where?