“Attention. Attention. This is an emergency broadcast system. Take shelter immediately. This is not a drill. Repeat: this is not a drill. An unknown threat has attacked the people of the United Kingdom. Take shelter and stay tuned into this frequency for further instructions.”
The father sat and scoffed at the broadcast, “this is a joke if you think I’m following these instructions, I’ve got a construction site to go to.” The father shouted with passion.
The mother replied with concern, “we have to follow this broadcast, if we don’t, something could happen to my son!”
“Our son! Why can’t I just go out for work, we’ve been locked in this house for the last two weeks, I cannot handle it any longer!”
The mother sat with her head looking down to the floor, she thought he had right to complain, but he should be composed, if not for him, then for their son. Though, she knew it would be hard to keep her husband happy. She was sad, but with sadness came beauty, the mother was so appealing with long blonde hair that flowed down the thin, pale, but elegant body. A jawline that was carved perfectly.
“Should we put the news on? Hello guys, are you there?” She got frustrated and shouted as they ignored her, “Danny and Kiran Ambrose, listen to me right this second!”
Kiran and his big head looked up at her and said, “listen babe, we are just looking at our phones, its useful, we can find out more information about what’s going on. We can’t just watch the news all day.
“This is hypocrisy! You say we shouldn’t watch the news all day, but you can go on your phones all day,” she exclaimed. As the parents agued, Danny felt despair. Danny was a young boy with short and spiky hair and broken glasses that made him stick out in class. Danny was a born and bred nerd, it was just as natural as nature for him. He enjoyed his life; although, he always felt like he was in the dark abyss due to his parents having such a poor relationship.
“You want the news on? Well, there you fucking go!” The father shouted.
As the news turned on. The family was shocked to see that cell towers were being destroyed by unknown threats. Then suddenly a news reporter began to speak urgently, yet the tone of his voice remained calm. “This is very distressing, and we advise that young audiences should not hear this!” The news played a recording that sounded a lot like screaming animal’s, the family thought. The recording also had people speaking about garlic, the family was confused by it and so was the news. “As you can hear, this is a very confusing, but the people in the recording are not normal, I can promise you that. The scream in the recording was performed by the same people who was talking about garlic. The government are most worried about the chances of any survivors because ten minutes after the recording was sent, a bomb blown the structure of the cell tower. This message comes from the government: barricade your windows and doors. If possible, board windows with plywood. This is a worldwide threat that is unknown. Beware and always stay inside.”
As the tv goes to no signal, the family feel trepidation, but the father remained sceptical.
Danny screamed, “what are we going to do? Our lives are over! If I can’t go outside, what’s the point in living... isn’t life meant for the outside, isn’t that what we’ve evolved to do, go further outside. In fact, I remember an elegant quote by an author, it went like this, “just living is not enough. One must have sunshine, freedom, and a little flower.” Mum, Dad, are you even listening?!”
As the mother approached Danny, she spoke sympathetically, “it’s okay Danny. Look…I don’t know when we can go outside again, but I know that you’re have a life again, I promise.” Danny’s face was brightening up. His mother had a gift when it came to giving him solace. As she walked towards Kiran, she felt a mild pain from the top of her back, it felt like someone cutting her with a sharp object but from the inside, she thought.
“You okay babe? You look tired.”
“Yes! And I am tired, Kiran. Shouldn’t we start to board the windows and doors,” she said.
Kiran knew he had to, even if he was sceptical, he just witnessed his son have a panic attack. So, Kiran went to check the attic for supplies and as he did, he remembered that the plywood, tools, and everything he needs to board the windows are in the garden shed. He goes into panic mode and runs down the stairs and heads straight to the kitchen, then grabs a knife and heads for the back door without his family’s permission. He opens the door with his humongous hand, then steps outside, with his feet being small in contrast to his hands. He makes a joke, “I’ve got to be cool running’s right now.” As he investigates his own garden as if he has never seen it before, and it’s then, he realizes that he himself fears the unknown that awaits.
He moves towards the shed, but as he does, a branch falls from a tree. The branch sends him over the top, and he runs to the shed, but nothing happens to him, nothing at all. He thinks to himself and knows that he is overreacting. The shed door is locked, so he takes the knife and hits the lock. He celebrates as the lock broke.
But a breath of ice exhales on the back of Kiran’s neck, Kiran looks up but wanted to prolong the identity of the mysterious breather. However, Kiran went to stab the mysterious breather behind him. As he swung his right arm, the knife punctured the cold thin air. Kiran was shocked, did he imagine it, or was something there? He thought, the paranoia had kicked in and thought how stupid he was.
Kiran walked in the house, banging and crashing with all the necessary things for boarding the windows and doors. Elizbeth seen that her husband went to the shed, and he thought he was in trouble, but she gave him a look to say that he’s on the right track. So, he took that momentum and grabbed his tools which consisted of a circular saw, measuring tape, and a drill. Kiran also grabbed materials for this process, which were massive planks of plywood, nails, and screws. As the father grabbed the measuring tape to go measure the windows, he notices that he will have to board the outside windows as well as the inside windows. Dread fills in his body.
“Babe, we have a problem. If we board the inner windows, then I will have to go outside to board the outer window… because if I don’t it will be extremely easy for someone to break in.” The father explained.
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“You sure about this? We don’t even know what’s out there… could be anything.”
The father pleaded, “this must be done!” Kiran also noticed that they hadn’t seen anything dangerous outside the windows.
“How are we doing this then?” Elizbeth asked.
Kiran Ambrose knew that he could pull the majority of the job on his own, so he needed to measure the windows, then cut the plywood with a circular saw into the right measurements. As he was planning, he heard Danny playing with the radio. His dad gave him that radio when he was Danny’s age, but Kiran had passed it down to Danny. Kiran smiles at him and thinks to a time when him and his son was listening to hip hop, and not dealing with this horror show.
As time passes, Danny is studying chemistry, and it’s threptic for him. Danny always enjoyed chemistry and was very competent at it, thus, he was being taught by some of the best chemists in the world. He’s never been into people, only his mum and dad. Though, he has always loved animals, especially dogs, Danny has always said that dogs are his sanity and freedom. However, he also had a big passion for engineering and was planning to study that next. Being stuck inside had some silver linings, he thought.
“Danny, I’ve got a brilliant idea,” the mother said with such enthusiasm. “Why don’t you help with cutting up the vegetables?”
He sighed, “do I have to, I’m incompetent when it comes to cooking.”
“Well, I wouldn’t call cutting vegetables cooking.” The mother laughed, “It’s about time you start chipping in, you haven’t helped once while we’ve been incarcerated in this house, for the last two weeks…no, in fact your whole life has been easy!” His mother was suddenly inflamed, “do you hear me? You’re always causing mayhem, whether its stripping batteries, creating gunpowder, or even blowing my kitchen up, if you are a chemist, you’re an incompetent one! And you still do that.”
Kiran heard everything that his wife had just said to their son as Kiran rushes over to her, “what is your game?” He says concerningly, “why are you scolding our son like this, you never speak to him like this, what’s going on?”
Elizbeth’s looks at her husband, “I am queen of…” the mother faints and goes down like a sack of potatoes. The father tries to catch her but it’s too late, and she hits her head on the hardened floor. While being hysterical, Kiran picks her up and tells Danny to open the door to the playroom. Danny goes to the sliding door and opens it with aggression. They both put Elizbeth gently down, as they do, her eyelids open but don’t stay open for long. Danny is in shock and is very worried for his mum, but he thought the weirdest aspect of the situation was what his mum said to him, he’d never felt such dejection from his mother.
“Right, that was a nightmare, but it looks like your mother will be okay for now.” Although, he felt like something was awfully wrong, he knew that they needed to prepare the house for what was ever going on. “You ready son? We need to continue with boarding the windows up.”
The son wanted to be brave for his father, so he grabbed himself up and followed his dad.
“Boy, pass me that screw!” Kiran said commanding, “I do not believe that we have only one more inner window to do, good job kid.” His son looked like he waited years to hear that.
“I’m extremely happy we’ve nearly done here, I was expecting this to be a long, gruesome, and tiring process.” Whilst the boy was relieved about the inner windows being boarded up, he was terrified on whether his mum was going to be alright. But he was also terrified about asking his father on the matter. Danny was also missing chemistry and all the hobbies that he could do when life was normal. He realised that he’d missed his whole routine due to this mess, he missed the hard days that contained studying, the days where him and his mum would go out to parks, beaches, and his great grandmas.
“What are you doing? Stop daydreaming! We haven’t got time for anything like that, we need to concentrate on the task at hand.”
“Yes, father.”
They finished boarding the inner windows and the father now needed to board the outer windows, but he didn’t want to take his son outside to complete the job. He also knew that he only had to board three windows up, which were at the front of the house. As the father grabbed his equipment and begin to head outside, Danny tugged on his father’s white t-shirt which was covered in dust from the plywood that Kiran chopped up using his circular saw.
Danny shouted at his dad, “please…don’t go, surly you don’t have to board the outside windows.”
“I do! It wouldn’t be secure enough if I didn’t.”
“What if something happens to you dad, I’ll be alone, and what about mum? If you go mum has no one to look after her! And shouldn’t we take mum to the hospital?”
“Nothing will happen to me, I promise. I got a soul like a trooper, remember? And like the government said, we cannot go out and the phones are not even working.” Though, Kiran’s son still looked worried. “God forbid, but if something did happen to me, you would look after your mother, you’ve matured so much there’s past couple of weeks. I’m so proud of you, my son.”
“What do you mean, “if something happens to you. I don’t want you to go outside now!”
Kiran was getting fed up with his son, “Danny, I must do this, with or without you but if you help me, and you are composed then I will have a greater chance at getting through this. So please shut up.” Danny face dropped but was used to his father getting mad at him with just a flip of the coin. The father began to leave the house.
As Kiran touched the knob of the door, he begins to think how spooked he was in the garden but continues. He twists the doorknob and prays to God but no answer, maybe he should ask nicer, he thought. Kiran opens the door, looks at Danny, “wish me good luck.” As the door opens and to his expected outcome, no one is there.
Kiran begins to walk outside with his equipment and prepares to board the first window, while Danny is watching cautiously. Kiran grabs a plywood board and places it on the outer window, he grabs his screws and starts drilling the screws in one by one. As he gets to last screw, Kiran hears something fly over his head, but he thinks it’s a bunch of insects.
As he boarded the window, he began to wonder why no lights were on in his neighbour’s houses. He thought he hadn’t seen anyone in a while, which freaked him out. He wished the street liked his family so he could just knock on a door.
“That’s the first window done then.” Danny says with relief.
“You know it son, I told you no sweat, we’ve got this kid.” The father had confidence, he felt no strain whatsoever, and it made him work efficiently.
“I wouldn’t get carried away, we don’t even know what’s out there, even the news hasn’t told us anything, well it’s not like the news is competent at telling the news.”
“It’s like I said, it’s all…” the father feels something bite him, he turns around to have a look, but to his surprise nothing is there. “Did I just imagine that?”
Danny looks confused, “who are you speaking to?” His father gives him no reply, but he sees that his father is continuing with boarding the second window, so Danny lets it go.
As Kiran begins to board the third window, he feels a pain on where that creature bit him. Blood is racing down his neck, but he tries to hide the blood from Danny. The father tries to multitask by boarding the window and hiding the blood from Danny; however, it doesn’t go to plan. Danny sees his dads’ blood. But in the sky, Danny sees multiple flying creatures that is coming towards his dad. Danny panics, forcing his dad to notice and eventually he looks at the flying creatures.
As the father sees his life flash before his eyes, “close the door! Close it, Danny! Now!”