An apocalypse and then s.., p.25
An Apocalypse and Then Some, page 25
Wait, how about this. Can you alter the program to make protecting the humans the prime directive? In other words, don't order the robots to attack the Dostivex, just make them defend any human above all else.
Let me check, she said.
"Is anything going on up there?" Natalie called up to me.
"No. All's quiet."
"Well, keep it that way."
"Yes, ma'am."
"Chris."
"Yes?"
"That's the first time anyone's called me ma'am."
"Ah, okay. And?"
"I find I instantly hate it."
"Then I will never do that again."
"That's a good decision."
Captain. Peaches was back.
"Got to go, Natty." Yes?
I have replaced in the robots’ programming 'Dostivex masters' with 'human chattel' as the organisms that must be defended and unharmed at all time.
Peaches. Human chattel? That's harsh.
It is what they are officially deemed to be. Sorry.
Can you give me a live feed from Seattle again? I want to see the results of your subterfuge.
The video popped up where it had been before as the audio kicked in. Is this the image capture from a Gamma? I asked.
Precisely, she confirmed.
There was a lot of jockeying artifact, and the sound quality was terrible, but it was clear that as the queens and their minions surged toward the fleeing humans, the robotic units were interfering. I wouldn't say they were fighting and striking the giant wasps, but they were making an enormous nuisance of themselves. Peaches switched feeds. This robot was on some higher ground. It showed scattering, screaming people running every which way. Any pursuing wasp was blocked, like an offensive lineman would try to stop a defensive player from reaching the quarterback. It was almost comical.
But on more than one occasion, the Dostivex would skip over the Gamma's back to snag a human. They'd then either fly into the air to consume the doomed soul or skittered away on foot with their prize. The Gammas would give chase if they could, but once someone was seized, they were lost. It was gory-grim lite, not salvation, that ruled the day for my species. And I couldn't come up with any other solution. There was no way the disorganized, frenzied victims could group up and mount a defense. If there were guns and hand grenades lying scattered on the ground, maybe they stood a chance. But all the humans had were their feet.
Aw, Peaches, this looks like it's not going to end well, I lamented.
I'm afraid matters have gotten seriously worse. Multiple craft have launched from Seattle and Calgary. They are heading in our direction.
Do you think they were able to locate us because of our hacks? I asked, pretty much already knowing the answer.
That is the most logical explanation. I attempted to conceal the source by variably routing my transmissions, but something clearly tipped them off.
ETA?
Minutes, perhaps three.
Shit. Peaches, I got nothing, I exclaimed in exasperation.
I have defensive shields, but those will only hold up for a certain number of direct hits from their weapons. I am sorry, Captain.
My mind raced. I couldn't think of one last rabbit to pull out of my hat. I leaned down and shouted to Natalie, "We have incoming hostiles. Two minutes. I need you to come up here and help me fight them off."
The look on my true love's face, it shattered my heart. Confusion, disbelief, and, above all, fear. That's what I saw looking back at me. But in an instant, she shed it all. She shouldered her rifle strap and vaulted up the stairs. Once she was by my side, she swung the gun into fighting position.
"Which direction do you need me to cover?" she asked cool as a cucumber.
Recalling that the ship had crashed herself right up against a sheer slope, we had only slightly more than one hundred and eighty degrees to protect. No one, not even a flying alien AI, was coming down on us from behind.
I extended my right arm in a chopping motion. "I'll take everything from that tree," my arm swept to my right, "over to that ledge." I pointed at the tree again. "You got the tree," I moved my arm to the left, "to that upslope." I turned to face her. "You good with that?"
"Roger that," she said in a deadly serious tone.
I almost teased her about her excellent military jargon usage, but stopped short. This wasn't playtime.
"Our primary targets will be the ships themselves. If and when they land, we'll have to focus on any bugs advancing on foot. Got it?"
"Ready, willing, and able, Captain." Again, I had to admire her control.
So, there we were, two untested, untrained teenagers, armed with alien weapons, about to stand off against a murderous horde of meat-eating monsters with an established pattern of depravity. It could be worse, right? Please lie if you have to when you respond.
All of a sudden, five or six craft shot over the summit and immediately began raining energy weapons on us. I wasn't sure if they were lasers or what. All I knew was they meant to fry us. As Peaches had predicted, the initial bursts were deflected by her shields. Natalie and I opened up and I was relieved to see that our plasma bolts did pass through the force field. It was unidirectional. How cool was that? Unfortunately, as one might have guessed, no alien ship was in danger of us hitting it. They were too fast and too nimble. But it felt good to shoot back.
"Shields at fifty percent," Peaches announced via both our helmets.
As if on cue, three or four enemy ships plummeted to the ground and immediately disgorged multiple wasps. They, either because of their training or their fury with us, made no attempt to seek cover. They charged right at us. And the bombardment from the remaining ships didn't ease at all. The Dostivex were all-in on killing us with extreme prejudice.
While the shields still held, the wasps on foot or on wing bounced back off like they were in an old Keystone Cops film. Once they were stunned and stationary, both of us started picking a few off. One plasma packet from the Death Bringer-1000 half exploded the wasps and what it didn't was consumed in a brief, intense fireball. That pleased me greatly.
"Shields at ten percent," Peaches advised.
I imagined we had a minute of protection left to us. After that, one way or another, we were toast. If a ship above didn't nuke us, we'd be overrun in seconds without the force field.
I thought about saying something brave or romantic or encouraging to Natalie. But I just kept quiet and kept firing. The tip of my rifle was beginning to glow red.
"One percent," Peaches shouted in our ears.
This was it, but I was good with it. To die fighting after vaporizing millions of enemy combatants, with my girl at my side, and my finger still on a trigger ...
Out of nowhere and instantaneously, white lances of something silently plunged from the heavens. Each lance pierced directly down through a ship or a wasp. And whatever was struck was instantly incapacitated. The ships exploded and the swarming Dostivex dropped where they were.
And the battle was suddenly and inexplicably over.
Aside from the sounds of fires caused by the crashing of the alien ship, our world was silent.
"Peaches, what the hell just happened?" I shouted.
"I am working to determine the origins ... Captain. In low orbit, there are eleven spacecraft of unknown configuration. They are equally spaced above the planet. They were the originators of the white pulses we witnessed."
"What do you mean, unknown? Are they Dostivex ships?"
"That is definitely not the case. I have no records of such vessels. I am also completely unfamiliar with whatever power surges killed and destroyed our assailants."
"Do you have eyes on other locations?" I shouted back.
"Yes, and I can confirm that every single Dostivex combatant and all the Dostivex ships have been eliminated. No Dostivex is moving, no robotic unit is operational, and no enemy ships are intact."
"So ... it's over?" I all but whispered.
"The Dostivex defeat is absolute," she confirmed.
"Now all we have to do is find out who the hell extinctified them and what they intend to do with what's left of our sorry asses," I said mostly to myself.
Natalie ripped her helmet off and tossed it to the deck. She grabbed my arm, "I can't believe it, Chris, we're safe. Someone saved us!"
As I stared at the mangled remains of the once mighty Dostivex war machine, I flexed my jaws and ground my teeth together hard. "We're safe from the bugs. Let's just hope we're safe from whoever it was that wiped the Dostivex out like they were filing their nails."
To be continued in How to Survive Surviving the Apocalypse, Book 2 of A Teenager's Guide to Saving The Earth
GLOSSARY:
Brown, Charles: General and US Army representative on the Joint Chiefs.
Burke, Miles "Salty": The admiral who represents the US Coast Guard on the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Chang, Grace: Chris's middle school computer teacher and a friend. Married to Molly Cooper.
Cooper, Molly: The wife of Grace Chang. A really sweet person.
Cootie Bug: A slang term for the alien invaders, the Dostivex.
Defiant: The name Peaches chose for the ship she was the AI for after she co-opted the ship.
Dostivex: The horrible alien race that invaded, conquered, and then ate the people of Earth. Toyota 4-Runner-sized yellow jackets. I'm not a fan.
DuPree, Taye: USMC lieutenant on guard duty in the bunker the US government hid in during the alien invasion.
Farrah: Grace and Molly's youngest daughter.
Felicia: Grace and Molly's oldest daughter.
Filter One: The rank of the first officer on Visquisor's Peerless.
Fuller, Gus: Crotchety old man living in Montana Rockies who befriended Chris during the alien occupation.
Glandys, Tommy: Classmate and co-bully in Chris's middle school.
James, Buck: General and USAF representative on the Joint Chiefs.
Lang, Melinda: One of POTUS Carl Sellers's security advisors.
Miller, Beth: USMC sergeant on guard duty in the bunker the US government hid in during the alien invasion. Part of the intel mission to confirm the Dostivex were dead.
Mitchell, Wendy: Admiral and the Navy representative on the Joint Chief. Also the chairwoman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Monk, Darrin: The president's chief of staff, mostly by default, while the US government hid in a bunker during the alien invasion.
Nash, Fenton: One of POTUS Carl Sellers's security advisors.
Pender, Ben: Classmate and co-bully in Chris's middle school.
Parrentians: The species that Visquisor was a member of.
Peaches: The name that popped out of Chris's head when he decided Defiant's AI needed a proper name.
Peerless: Visquisor's flagship/home in space.
Sellers, Carl: Sitting US president at the time of the alien invasion. Survived in a bunker and continued as POTUS after the liberation. A tad impulsive and self-absorbed.
Severide, Ernie: The official head bully of Chris's middle school. A real dolt.
Te-Momgre: First officer, of Filter One, on Peerless under Visquisor. He met a particularly foul fate at his captain's hand.
Visquisor: One messed up dude–but never refer to him as one. The Master of the Parrentians, he is very human like, but a total head case. Narcissistic, egomaniacal, prone to violent excess, and he cheats at board games.
Welsh, Natalie: The apple of Chris's eye and ultimately his partner. They went to middle school together.
Yamato, Donald: One of POTUS Carl Sellers's security advisors.
AND NOW A WORD FROM YOUR AUTHOR
Thanks so much for joining in on the Teenager's Guide Trilogy! I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed squeezing it out of my head like toothpaste. Nice visual there, right? The adventure continues in How to Survive Surviving the Apocalypse, Book 2
I'll be starting soon on the next trilogy in this universe, The Alanverse. Tentatively, it will be titled The Immortality Wars. Hopefully, it'll be out in early 2026.
As you know, posting a review for any book is a loving gift to us writers. So, please post a review from whatever source you purchased it from. If you do, I will know and then be able to mystically thank you via the ether.
A bit of background. My first series, The Forever, came out in 2016. It has been successful way beyond any response I could have dreamed of. As of this writing, there are thirty-three books in The Ryanverse. If you haven't yet, check them out. It all starts with The Forever Life for print and The Forever in audiobooks. You'll be glad you did, seriously, I, the author, say it's good stuff. What better guarantee could there be?
I can't leave without mentioning my Time Diving Series. Beginning with Letters From Hell (print/audio) it follows Matt as he discovers he has the ability to travel to and to change his past. I really love this series, so give it a try. A few readers mention it's too dark or wordy, but that's only Book 1 of the four-book series. It was also intentional on my part so I was able to show Matt's development.
Finally, don't be a stranger! Sign up for my mailing list by dropping me an email: contact@craigarobertson.com. I'm on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/craigr1971. And what about my website, you ask? Well here it is: https://craigrobertsonblog.wpcomstaging.com/
So, there you have it. Again, thanks for joining me and my nutty characters. If we've made your journey any lighter, then we all agree we've done good.
Craig
Craig Robertson, An Apocalypse and Then Some
