Thunder struck the streets of Sonnedrift, and the rain torrented like the earth was a flame that had to be put out. Angelo tossed and turned endlessly in his bed. He had tried to force himself into a slumber, hoping a sleeping pill or two would solve the problem. Maybe crashing on caffeine was the answer. Every sliver of a moment he manages to get close to drifting off. The voice would start whispering again. Telling him lies and promises. Like a different consciousness was worming it’s way inside his head. Telling him things he was never meant to hear.

Was he hallucinating, or did he finally go mad? Did the paranoia of being alone for a long time get to him? Or could it simply be the storm fucking with him?

He had locked every door in the house and with every window shut tight. His paranoia had calmed a bit down. The thing was still in his head, working overtime, whatever it was doing. It had no power if it didn’t get to him. At Least nothing else would get in. Shoving his face inside his pillow he finally gets some half-sleep, fully clothed, and his 9mm by his side. Just in case he needs to shoot, even if it was him.

The whispering however did not stop and ratted its way through his frontal lobe.

In his dream, he was sitting alongside his family in mid-air, every other seat was vacant. The humming of the airplane engines set the stage for a calm atmosphere, outside of the window, he could see the storm raging, The sun’s rays barely piercing the wild clouds. Every member of his family sat happily in the plane, even his grumpy father, and his sisters were giggling and his mother was resting calmly.

“You need to wake up,” a voice said to him. He recognized it, but he did not respond. He did not want to respond. He shakes his head.

He felt a hand holding him, his youngest sister, but something was off.

She was no longer being jubilant, her hand was cold, cold as a freezer. She was staring outside of the window, pointing with him at the raging clouds. Clouds that now were rising, racing to meet the plain. Shadows crawled out of the corners of his vision, but he struggled to look at them while they disappeared.

Warning lights of red and yellow, started flickering inside the interior, he could hear an announcement over the speakers. He couldn’t make anything out, but there was clearly an emergency ongoing. He turns to the other side, The storm had turned unhealthy and an unruly red. Every one of his family members reaches out, but only his sister firmly held on to him.

“You’re life may be in danger.”

He hears a thunderclap loud andviolent. Lightning hits the plane, and the hull bursts open, splitting in two, the plane loses it’s ability to fly and crunches as it drops into the sea below. It was just him and his younger sister, everyone else had drifted off. As they plunged into the water. He loses touch with her, separated and alone.

He calls out her “Angeletta!” but no sound, nothing. Just the endless void of liquid that was the sea. He feels himself being dragged below by something, the sensation of falling and floating at the same time–spirited away, forever lost.

“Wake up now!”

Angelo woke up alone, realizing that somewhere out there his family was on their way to a foreign nation. He could not reach them.

A few hours had passed, and He noticed he did not hear the voice again. Perhaps his overactive imagination had taken hold of his mind. Next to him lay his chips and an unfinished can of energy drink. Just the way he left it, before the storm raged, he looked outside.

The storm had calmed down significantly. The rain had slowed both in size and in tempo. He noticed a sliver of the network had worked itself back. Anxious, tired, and afraid, he turned on to local news channels. And he saw one thing chaos.

Every MSM was covering it, most live even. There was no sense of normality, in every livestream he scrolled by, there were severe riots in the stress, claims of celebrities offing themselves, and news of international peace treaties being signed without physical interaction.

Televangelists and self-proclaimed prophets, crying and praying about the end times, and politicians taking full advantage of the situation to further their political interests. Scarlet rain and blood-red skies in some places of the world. Even sightings of extinct animals and cryptids.

‘This was it, it was happening. It wasn’t some dream, this was real.’

“And you’d be right. You have little time to prepare, the storm was only the beginning."

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It could read his thoughts.

His eyes went wide, the voice was still there in his head, it had changed in a short period, and became very feminine.

“I know you are confused Angelo, but I need you to focus.”

A migraine formed on the right side of his head. Was he possessed was there a demon in his head?

He had read numerous times that demons often disguised themselves as aliens or spirit guides, could this thing be one?

“What the fuck are you, get out of my head.”

“I need you to focus, the circumstances weren’t ideal, but if you don’t pay attention. You will die, both of us will die.”

The shock he had experienced earlier was no longer as strong, whatever it was, the novelty had worn off and he wanted to be free of it.

“I don’t know what this is, but I’m more than willing to blast my brain out if it means stopping you.”

He could hear something akin to an audible sigh in his head.

“My name is Atena, a companion or a guide of sorts, made to help your kind get through the incoming destruction of your planet.”

He laughed erratically.

“Nonsense, you’re a nanomachine made by a green-glowing intelligence agency, and you’ve been sent here to destroy me. I know all about their activities, and I know why they would target me.”

“Listen to me, Do you think it’s a mere coincidence that you’ve, that I fell from the sky and landed near your house? You’re one of the chosen few, I know how much you care about your family. I know why you distrust the world government, I know how you felt earlier when you met that girl. I saw it all in your head, you see the world for the lie it is.”

He bumped his head on his desk.

“shut up, shut up , shut up.”

“The Ai system you call Curie, I need you to destroy it, completely terminate her hardware. It’s for your own good. It has been compromised by outside forces.”

“Not listening, not caring about more lies,” he said. He stood, immediately threw himself a glass of water, and chugged, more and more.

“I'm dead serious, do you think the mass communication shutdown you experienced was just due to the storm? Your world systems have been turned inside out."

He had slowly gotten used to the sensation of being able to handle to voices talking in his head at the same time. He kept on ignoring it, his heart rate climbed as he realized he should probably contact his family.

He attempted to phone every member but received no call. Perhaps they were in the middle of the flight at the moment. His next thought immediately reminded him of his absurd dream.

“No way that could happen, right, now way.”

“No way what.” The AI announced from the living room. INtrusive as always.

“Angelo, a new update has been pushed by the developers, for the stability and the assurance of a safe home assistance droid. Please force push the update.”

“Do not do It. Your machine has been compromised, used by something else. Go outside, look in the air, if you don't believe me it has started.”

He said nothing. But was severely annoyed. Even if it was true. Was he going to start listening to crazy voices in his head?

“Are you going to keep ignoring me?” Atena as her names was called, said again.

He feels something invasive messing around in his brain. Like someone was messing around with his brain.

“Hey stop it.” He yelled at the head invader.

“The A.I machine has been compromised by the enemy's machines, go outside and see Nibiru for yourself. Then you'll believe me. Her tone had been softer than usual, but she was pressing him. He could feel the influence of her words hanging on him.

“MOVE!”

Like he was possessed his body was moving on its own, nudging him forward. He briefly loses control and stumbles outside. His feet are thrown out of the way. Almost without him.

“ANgelo, I need to reboot, ANgelo I need a new update." The house ai. said over and over again. He did not reply.

He opened the front door, to a world transformed. The sky was purplish, the red mist swirling around in the thick iron-tinged clouds. It felt he stepped into the mythological realm. There past the moon, he could see a round object, slowly getting closer and closer.

“Nibiru has appeared,” Atena states, chills ran down his spine. A sense of dread lingers on him on, he knew for along time this shit was going to happen. He could see the planet-sized thing casting it's shadow on the earth. The world seemed entirely otherworldly now.

“You need to learn to fight. She said.”

He could hear something rustling in the bushes near the tree, in front of the house."

“Take a weapon please.”

He runs inside of his room, grabs his 9mm, and moves straight towards the strange object. Usually, the house AI would complain about such behavior, but she was entirely quiet.

“Investigate. It's important.”

“Another one of you.”

“No! We do not land near each other as a rule.”

As he moved towards the source of the noise. He heard an animalistic growl in the trees above him. There on a tree branch, stood a freak of nature. A hairless monkey-like beast with two spindly arms. It was small but unsettling. Sharp teeth, and face malformed by whatever evolution it underwent. It screeched at him, And he could feel his legs shake.

It threw a massive rock at him, and he barely evaded it. It lunges at him, before he even knows what he is doing, he raises his pistol and fires.

Bang!!!

The thing crumples letting out a painful squeal and falling down into the muddy earth.

He shot something, he shot something that was alive. He shot something alien.

“You attained one point. Would you like an explanation now or later?”

“Points, what the fuck you one about, what the fuck is that."

Confusion and anger drive him. And he shoots the thing a second time.

“Don’t waste ammunition you may need it soon."

His hand was trembling with the gun in his hand, his mind full of questions. He panics again and runs inside. Locking everything all over again.

"What is that."

"A primitive drone, a experiment. Call what you want. It serves no purpose other than probing information and scouting."

He shook his head, shit just got real. He takes out his counterpart to the satellite phone he gave his sister. Pressing the right combination to awaken it. He tries reaching the other. It kept buzzing, meaning it was still active but not in use.

He hoped they were alive.

“I’m sorry but it's pointless to worry about them, if their flight wasn’t caught in the storm, then I’m afraid they are in another country now, nothing you can do about it, It’s time you started listening to me. You probably won't know their fate. Until some time has passed.”

“Fuck you who are you to tell me this shit. Why don't you get out of my head!”