Pussycat669
Liturgist
It is over.
Humanity has lost the War of the Worlds and its status as an independent species. Now they have the control over our everyday life. Alien creatures, far beyond our biological understanding, that feast upon the human body and destroy the mind, leaving nothing but a soulless tool.
No one can be trusted. Every face could hide the inhuman enemy, no matter if it belongs to a police officer, a doctor, a grocery clerk or, in the worst case scenario, one of your closest relatives and friends.
Fear and paranoia rule the streets of Selgenfeld, a small country town in western Germany, during the cold winter of 1991. Almost a year has passed since humanity’s defeat and the citizens have tried to adapt to their new situation as best as they could. But under the thin layer of normality lies a world of terror, where someone watches your every move and people are taken from their homes never to be heard of again.
If you’re smart, you keep your head down and pray that they won’t come for you next. Still, as it always was, someone ought to fall out of line sooner or later. Dissidents, opportunists or just reluctant heroes caught in the wrong place at the wrong time. You are one of those unfortunate individuals and about to experience what may be the worst night of your life. What starts out as a disaster, however, might unravel a plot that could reveal other, far deeper cracks in this new society and a chance for you to save both your body and your soul.
Yeah, it is over, and humanity, as it was, is lost. Yet the world keeps on spinning.
Who dares to resist?
The Pensioner
Sometimes you could really believe that the whole town has gone crazy ever since the newcomers arrived. You are hardly able to enjoy a beer together with your peers nowadays without them telling you about the strange things they hear and see at night. Unsettling noises, bizarre shadows in the woods, walking dead, all the spook stories you would expect to hear, if you would still live in the medieval era. Whenever intoxication kicks in, they often whisper of rumours they’ve heard from a second cousin about the unspeakable things those other folks do in the basement of the hospital. As a former teacher and convinced rationalist, you never gave in to their superstition, of course, but one story from an old colleague involving missing children left you deeply concerned. It was only a matter of time before a sociable person, like you, would have to express that concern to other people he considered as being of decent character. One conversation lead to another and before you knew it, you suddenly had become the organiser of an improvised underground movement. It’s a dangerous position for sure and you don’t like to think about what will happen to your pension if someone should ever find out about your involvement. Then again, who in his right mind would suspect a blabbermouth in his early seventies to pose a serious threat?
The Nurse
Out. That’s all you wanted after you had left the burning ruins of Cologne behind you. Everyone keeps on talking about people disappearing. You saw them dying. Saw them being shot, saw them being torn to pieces, and you even saw worse. You managed to escape the battlefield but not the memories, no matter how hard you tried. After countless nights that you spent restless in your bed, you came to the conclusion that you would either have to open up to somebody or to completely loose it. But your outcry for help didn’t have the desired effect, far from it. You were one of the few living persons who ever had any close encounters with the enemy. Such knowledge couldn’t be left alone and so neither could you. Oh, you could tell them alright but you wonder if anyone would really appreciate to hear about creatures that were cruel, calculated and, above all, efficient at what they were doing. You should have told them that there was no chance of winning. Maybe you would at least have saved their lives. Yet you remained silent, even agreed to play along to the best of your abilities. Out of despair, you keep telling yourself, but beneath all your fear and the memories that haunt your dreams is a faint glimmer, a last, stubborn spark of resistance, and it’s ready to burst into a flame.
The Handyman
So, you still need toilets after the apocalypse. That observation was enough to keep you going at first. You were content to have something of a regulated life back after all the turmoil the war had caused. Not exactly happy, mind you, but you’ve never been much of a demanding person. However, no amount of gallows humour and no routine could have prepared you for the moment where you were forced to realize how much that war had really cost you. It was the last job for the day, nothing remotely special. You didn’t recognize the name on the doorbell, the face, on the other hand, all the more. It was a stranger, reserved, direct and it obviously had no clue who you were. You finished the job and left in less than an hour. You spent at least double that time in your van, brooding until you couldn’t take it any more. When you rang the stranger’s doorbell for a second time, you were not expected. You had a hammer in your hand but no plan in your head. It ended as well as you might expect. Next thing you knew, you were back at the wheel, without any clear idea where to go and with a deep stabbing wound to the stomach. You found shelter in a small guesthouse on a hill, God knows where. There you tried to isolate yourself until sickness and fever got the better of you. When the proprietor found you collapsed on the floor, the little piece of your remaining conscience was certain that you were done for. Instead, he brought help. He told you that there were still others like you and him and that there may be a chance. You can’t believe your luck, you still don’t, but the last thing you want to be at times like these is to be on your own.
Humanity has lost the War of the Worlds and its status as an independent species. Now they have the control over our everyday life. Alien creatures, far beyond our biological understanding, that feast upon the human body and destroy the mind, leaving nothing but a soulless tool.
No one can be trusted. Every face could hide the inhuman enemy, no matter if it belongs to a police officer, a doctor, a grocery clerk or, in the worst case scenario, one of your closest relatives and friends.
Fear and paranoia rule the streets of Selgenfeld, a small country town in western Germany, during the cold winter of 1991. Almost a year has passed since humanity’s defeat and the citizens have tried to adapt to their new situation as best as they could. But under the thin layer of normality lies a world of terror, where someone watches your every move and people are taken from their homes never to be heard of again.
If you’re smart, you keep your head down and pray that they won’t come for you next. Still, as it always was, someone ought to fall out of line sooner or later. Dissidents, opportunists or just reluctant heroes caught in the wrong place at the wrong time. You are one of those unfortunate individuals and about to experience what may be the worst night of your life. What starts out as a disaster, however, might unravel a plot that could reveal other, far deeper cracks in this new society and a chance for you to save both your body and your soul.
Yeah, it is over, and humanity, as it was, is lost. Yet the world keeps on spinning.
Who dares to resist?
The Pensioner
Sometimes you could really believe that the whole town has gone crazy ever since the newcomers arrived. You are hardly able to enjoy a beer together with your peers nowadays without them telling you about the strange things they hear and see at night. Unsettling noises, bizarre shadows in the woods, walking dead, all the spook stories you would expect to hear, if you would still live in the medieval era. Whenever intoxication kicks in, they often whisper of rumours they’ve heard from a second cousin about the unspeakable things those other folks do in the basement of the hospital. As a former teacher and convinced rationalist, you never gave in to their superstition, of course, but one story from an old colleague involving missing children left you deeply concerned. It was only a matter of time before a sociable person, like you, would have to express that concern to other people he considered as being of decent character. One conversation lead to another and before you knew it, you suddenly had become the organiser of an improvised underground movement. It’s a dangerous position for sure and you don’t like to think about what will happen to your pension if someone should ever find out about your involvement. Then again, who in his right mind would suspect a blabbermouth in his early seventies to pose a serious threat?
The Nurse
Out. That’s all you wanted after you had left the burning ruins of Cologne behind you. Everyone keeps on talking about people disappearing. You saw them dying. Saw them being shot, saw them being torn to pieces, and you even saw worse. You managed to escape the battlefield but not the memories, no matter how hard you tried. After countless nights that you spent restless in your bed, you came to the conclusion that you would either have to open up to somebody or to completely loose it. But your outcry for help didn’t have the desired effect, far from it. You were one of the few living persons who ever had any close encounters with the enemy. Such knowledge couldn’t be left alone and so neither could you. Oh, you could tell them alright but you wonder if anyone would really appreciate to hear about creatures that were cruel, calculated and, above all, efficient at what they were doing. You should have told them that there was no chance of winning. Maybe you would at least have saved their lives. Yet you remained silent, even agreed to play along to the best of your abilities. Out of despair, you keep telling yourself, but beneath all your fear and the memories that haunt your dreams is a faint glimmer, a last, stubborn spark of resistance, and it’s ready to burst into a flame.
The Handyman
So, you still need toilets after the apocalypse. That observation was enough to keep you going at first. You were content to have something of a regulated life back after all the turmoil the war had caused. Not exactly happy, mind you, but you’ve never been much of a demanding person. However, no amount of gallows humour and no routine could have prepared you for the moment where you were forced to realize how much that war had really cost you. It was the last job for the day, nothing remotely special. You didn’t recognize the name on the doorbell, the face, on the other hand, all the more. It was a stranger, reserved, direct and it obviously had no clue who you were. You finished the job and left in less than an hour. You spent at least double that time in your van, brooding until you couldn’t take it any more. When you rang the stranger’s doorbell for a second time, you were not expected. You had a hammer in your hand but no plan in your head. It ended as well as you might expect. Next thing you knew, you were back at the wheel, without any clear idea where to go and with a deep stabbing wound to the stomach. You found shelter in a small guesthouse on a hill, God knows where. There you tried to isolate yourself until sickness and fever got the better of you. When the proprietor found you collapsed on the floor, the little piece of your remaining conscience was certain that you were done for. Instead, he brought help. He told you that there were still others like you and him and that there may be a chance. You can’t believe your luck, you still don’t, but the last thing you want to be at times like these is to be on your own.
Anyway, I'm voting for the pensioner.
This cannot be. I must be seeing things.
