There were three things that Al cared about.

One, was sleep.

Two, was books.

And three, was games.

Everything else? That was to stay alive and comfortable enough to enjoy the first three.

A simple enough concept with an even simpler equation for it.

Work equals getting money and that equals staying alive and mostly comfortable.

That was also why he saw nothing wrong with the blue window now in front of him.

Despair Mortal!

Your world has been found by eldritch powers that wish to do things to you and your people and/or world! You're pretty much screwed.

HOWEVER!

REJOICE, FOR WE OFFER SALVATION!

Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to join the fight against the invaders! While you may die horribly, but you may also gain things beyond your wildest dreams! Or you could choose not to. Less strain on our resources. No pressure.

Have a good day!

Y/N

7:23:59

Yep.

That was fun to wake up to. Or be woken up by if his alarm clock was right.

Yes indeed.

So. He had seven days to decide what to do.

Seven days for salvation. Inaccurate or not, it had a nice ring to it.

Al knew he was distracting himself. He didn't want to wake up to a pronouncement of basically certain doom. Eldritch horrors?

Anyone who'd seen anything with legit eldritch horrors in it knew you couldn't fight those. The Old Ones were scary.

Then again. The fact that it offered at least indicated it was possible. Slightly.

Then again again, he could be dreaming.

He could just be in a lucid dream - a common occurence - and still sleeping in reality.

But it said he had a week. And unless his dream included time skips...no, that was possible.

The feeling of his bed underneath him, the blanket around him, and the pounding headache that came from waking up too early?

That was...too...real.

Rule one of weird possible dreams, Al thought as he sat up in his bed, was 'always act under the assumption that it's real and dying is bad.'

The red blanket slid off of his pajama-wearing upper body as he stretched and looked around his simple room.

It was simple as simple could be.

White-washed walls, the simple fake-wood flooring, and the bare bones furniture.

Even his bed was just a metal frame with a mattress.

Red? Because digcraft beds were like that. Color hardly mattered price-wise anyway.

There was animated discussion outside and he could hear constant ping's from his phone too.

With a sinking feeling in his stomach he quickly checked the newest message.

'Did you get a blue box too!?'

Darn. There went the dream theory.

For now...

Al sighed deeply as he went and did his usual bathroom activities and switched into a blue t-shirt and grey sweatpants.

He stared at the window and decided he'd make the selection now rather than put it off.

There was only yes and no, and to be honest, if both basically meant dying, then yes meant that he could possibly not die if he didn't die early.

If he picked no and stayed away from fighting - highly unlikely in his mind - he'd live longer but probably still die accidentally anyway.

Physically, he tried to touch the window and felt a glassy surface as he pressed on 'Y.'

Welcome to the service mortal!

No takebacks now!

But before you're prepped for battle, answer some questions.

What do you fear the most?

Answer honestly now...we wouldn't want you to have to learn obedience the hard way, right?

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

Oh like that wasn't ominous at all.

Great.

Al stared expressionlessly at the window. It was comfortably hovering near his hand now, instead of in his eye like before.

He'd just signed up and he was already getting threats.

Amazing customer service.

Al groaned out loud as he gave up his silent contest with the window and held his face in his hands.

He was already regretting this bit of stupidity on his part.

But, what did he fear most? And how specific did that have to be?

Like. Pain?

Or...spiders?

Fear of spider blood that caused pain?

Well, if pain was an answer...

"Pain."

The window rippled a bit as it changed.

Invalid answer.

Mortal, did you really think that would work?

Be more specific. Pain and death will accompany you always.

Consider the following: The dark. Bugs. Spam emails. Angry pm's. Demented ducks. Wererabbits. These are examples of valid responses.

Sounded like something a bad fortune cookie would say. His future sure was looking good!

Great, even!

'Breathe that stale, new paint smell! Doesn't it smell of success!?'

Al snorted to himself as he absently scratched his right hand, where a new mosquito bite now sported.

Strange.

When had that happened?

Ah. Wait.

That was it.

"Something I can't kill."

If he could kill it, then it was ok. It was what you couldn't kill - or re-kill - that sucked. Though he wasn't sure why spam emails was a more valid answer than pa -

Interesting.

This sates our curiosity!

O...kay?

So. That question was...meaningless?

Silence Mortal!

Now then.

There is a week before the Invasion begins officially and shields start to fail.

Until that time, you may familiarize yourself with the system and do your best to prepare for the end. Purchasing weapons, and supplies, is recommended.

While the shield is currently stable, some Incursions will still come through.

Try not to die horrifically before the week ends.

Good luck! You'll need it.

Well whoever - or whatever - was writing these responses sure loved to end its messages positively.

How comforting.

Right, well. Wallowing in self-pity could come later.

Information.

Al quickly plugged in his phone and booted up his laptop, tapping his finger on it as he waited.

Annoyingly, he realized that he needed a haircut too. The long hair was starting to get in the way of his eyes.

That, and it made it slightly more effort to wash his hair.

Soon enough though, his computer was on and the only posts he saw on Seeit were mostly similar to his own experience. Though, with this, he knew it was global.

Some had different...message writers?

Whatever those were.

The tone was different for some.

Some seemed pitying. Others disdainful. Still others were cold, and bare bones.

It was strange that the responses were not...standardized. Though there were already plenty of theories about who - or what - was behind this, and whether it was real or not, to be honest, he didn't believe most of them.

Why and how would the government do this?

How did that make any sense?

Even Martians or aliens in general were a better explanation. Though the messages seemed consistent in referring to them as mortals so he could only assume it was the fantasy one.

All of this made no sense, but few seemed willing to just believe it and prepare.

Most were saying it was a hoax.

Even stranger was that when people tried to select 'no' it only sometimes worked. For some people the button didn't even work.

For others, it wasn't even there.

There were still people whose no button had worked but, well, he wasn't particularly interested in picking no when it seemed yes was kind of the option you had to pick.

So basically, they had a possibly schizophrenic overseer or many different ones, and he honestly wasn't sure which seemed better.

'We' made it feel like the latter though.

Also if eldritch powers, plural, existed, weird magical/super sci-fi overlords in the plural was hardly strange.

Ah, yes. The power of ignorance.

There were things to do and places to be, but buying early groceries at least, didn't seem too shabby an idea.

What could go wrong?

----------------------------------------

A lot. That was what.

Fighto!

Hah, as if.

Nope, he was noping right out of -

"BLEGHUGHGEH! WHAT THE FUCK!"

Parhaps screaming in the middle of this wasn't the smartest of ideas, but it had hurt a lot.

And, at a second look, everybody else had too.

He had blanked out when the pain came though and was currently on the floor as his senses returned.

The first thing he saw were toppled grocery items, fallen out of their places on the shelf.

The second, was a guy who was slowly getting up beside him in the aisle.

The third, was the spear going through the guy's throat and creating a gout of blood that sprayed the shelf and dropped the man.

Then his hearing and smell returned and the screams, shouts, bangs, thuds, and the ululating reached his ears, even as the stench of blood started to overwhelm the normal grocery store smells.

He could hear footsteps coming.

He could hear that thing cackling with glee, and then starting to run in his direction.

He could feel the moistness in his pants that could have come from the pain or the terror, and honestly couldn't bring himself to care.

He was about to die.

It had all started when he was just going around, minding his own business and putting some milk bags into his cart, when a bag of milk popped open and the milk packets turned green.

Then? Then, freaking green guys popped out as the bags splattered and they with them.

That was when he - and most people - freaked out and ran.

Being showered in blood and guts wasn't fun.

Then, more and more appeared from the same spot, but this time there were no milk bags for them to explode with and they threw their spears around, stabbing and screeching as they murdered people.

Al was having none of that crap and pushed people out of his way as he desperately pushed the cart he had a death grip on.

It slowed and stopped whenever he hit someone, but he could have cared less as he ran, gasping for air.

He was unfit. He knew that.

He was screwed. He also knew that. The blue box said as much.

An Incursion has started!

Slay the goblins!

37/50

What about the seven days?

The 'prepping?'

Well, at least most of the goblins seemed to have splattered in the cold storage.

That was the one positive.

The negative was that still left 13 goblins that, apparently, were pretty good at killing people anyway and one was currently running at Al, who had already soiled himself.

Fantastic.

And not at all something grocery shopping was supposed to involve.

But as it ran ever closer, what he felt, aside from terror, was that desire to do something.

Not to drop dead, if his random limb spasms meant anything, but to do something.

Unfortunately, Al's scattered mind refused to think straight and productively.

As it was though, the goblin ignored him and tore the spear from the dead guy's neck, his poor retirement age body flopped about as the goblin shook it out of his flesh.

Eyes teared, Al did the only thing that came to mind.

Grab its foot, in a plea.

Yet, the gleeful smile and spear it pointed at him, made him jerk his arm back as he panicked and dropped the goblin.

Coming to his feet he stared down at the...goblin, and stomped down hard, yet the blow was practically ignored as it pushed him off and he fell back on his butt.

The goblin angrily kii'ed as it rose to its feet, but Al was already running.

Only a strangled cry escaped his mouth as he ran, shoving abandoned shopping carts out of the way.

Somehow, the only thing that he could think of was...

Which idiot said goblins were trash mobs?