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  And Chuchews: large, flightless, feathery birdlike creatures, that hopped around on one large leg in small flocks, constantly pecking the ground for seeds, making little ‘choo choo’ calls as they went along.

  They appeared to be a nimar favorite.

  And sometimes at dusk, when the setting sun basked the jungle in a gloriously golden yellow-orange glow, thousands of tiny, fairy-like creatures of glowing white light, called jungle wisps, could be seen, wisping in and around the jungle, adding a special magical quality to the scene.

  They would also sometimes come and inspect the fence, flying so close that they could almost touch it, but never near enough to get shocked.

  Not much was known about the jungle wisps, only that they could be spotted at night and would mysteriously disappear and not be found during the day.

  The team’s monitoring equipment – with some once-off modifications by Fresi – picked up that they had unique electrical signatures and appeared to be somehow connected to each other by some sort of wireless network.

  Grex had hoped to capture a few for study and breeding back home, but unfortunately they had been eluding capture so far.

  Chapter 4: Dream State

  Helley was adrift and floating above a surreal green sky filled with countless stars.

  She had no recollection of who she was or how she got here; she had no sense of self, her self-awareness was switched off.

  All she was, was a detached observer, watching as her broken mind was lost in this weird, timeless and constantly changing dream world – a continuous twisted film of a place with no rules, where the laws of logic and sanity did not apply.

  It would flit her from one scene to the next, but sometimes the film would be stuck in one place or frame for an age.

  A scene once of a one dimensional full-stop, taking up the entire view, filling up eternity in size and in time – becoming everything.

  Another, a journey through the intricate formulae of her most complex theories, superimposed on a background of swirling characters in a vortex, going around and around, nothing making sense, everything being totally unrecognizable; the camera moving up and down and around the intricate curves of giant symbols and figures in the foreground, on some nauseating ride.

  Sometimes the film would drop her in a universe of alternating colors that faded from one into the next, over and over again. Sometimes the film would hit a dead spot and there’d be nothing, just black blank emptiness.

  Other times, the film would display random observations and memories, like a piece of dirt on the floor or the out-of-focus dust on a window or a blade of grass, or an image of her father – all still-images frozen in time.

  Sometimes, the film would replay random moments from her memory undistorted. A moment as a child, were she was running happily through a park.

  Another, where she watched a ship explode in full detail above a planet.

  Another, where she met someone important in big old offices.

  Another, of her mother, not that she recognized her, after she had scraped her leg open during play, soothing her, telling her everything was going to be ok.

  Many of the moments were meaningless, random recalls. One, where she was eating, the hands cutting food with utensils and moving it into her mouth. One, where she watched her hands move as she put on her garment, getting dressed.

  Then the film would alternate again, this time venturing into the realm of sound and sometimes encountering throbbing banging, loud electrical humming or high pitched screeching, echoing through the caverns of her mind.

  Later, the film would move on again, sometimes into a place of distorted multi-colored moving shapes, and other times into a realm where all of this was layered one atop or on the side of the other, losing all distinction, all happening at once.

  There was no pattern, no direction; it was a crazy journey with no end, through the deep and broken distorted recesses of her mind.

  There was a scene just now, when Helley was a little girl. She and her dad were standing next to a recently dug and covered-up small grave in the garden.

  It had been a pivotal moment, Helley’s first experience with death, with the passing of her pet jixxly, Fluxly.

  Jixxlys were small dog-like creatures – they had three eyes, eight legs, two tales, were furry and came in a variety of colors and patterns on their fur, sometimes the patterns were stripes or strange shapes.

  They were friendly, energetic, and loyal and made great pets – especially to children.

  It had been a strange experience for Helley. One day Fluxly was running around, playing and being silly, but the next day Fluxly suddenly stopped working and didn’t want to play anymore.

  Helley had found it difficult to come to terms with this new concept of death.

  “Why do things have to die, Daddy?” Helley had asked.

  “They just do my angel,” her dad replied, “it’s part of reality, part of life.”

  Always highly inquisitive, Helley wouldn’t let it go and asked “But why Daddy? What is reality, Daddy?”

  And when his initial answers did not satisfy her, she asked again and he replied, his face now the focus and set against the backdrop of a green sky twinkling with stars.

  “I don’t know, Kiddo, maybe one day, you’ll figure it out.”

  Her dad faded away and the focus shifted to the sky beyond. The stars were sparkling and gradually the green sky turned into black.

  A small dot was moving across the sky. A slightly closer view now, and the dot was revealed to be a lone ship, traversing the celestial heavens.

  In Praxian terms it was a relatively large ship, but here, in the cold emptiness of space, set against the vast backdrop of a billion stars, it was tiny, insignificant, vulnerable, out-of-place and alone.

  The stars were still twinkling, but now, rapidly one by one they began winking out of existence, like some sort of universal black-out was rolling across the starry sky. Soon the last star blinked away, leaving the ship completely alone in the void.

  From a distant somewhere a voice said: “You’re the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”

  Suddenly the ship disappeared, leaving Helley alone in complete dark emptiness.

  But somehow it wasn’t empty at all, something was there; it was as if she had her face pressed up really, really close to some gigantic celestial monster.

  Chapter 5: The Forest

  Mark had been running in the emergency lane on the highway past stationary vehicles for a while.

  The twins were scared and his arms were beginning to hurt.

  At last he realized that he was seriously out of breath, his lungs felt like they were on fire and his heart felt like it was literally about to pound uncontrollably out of his chest. He had to stop and finally, he stopped running.

  He lifted the kids over a metal road barrier, and then climbed over as well. They walked on an embankment next to the highway for a few minutes, and then Mark let them stop. He scanned the sky for any floating blobs, there weren’t any that he could see.

  He was panting heavily, his face was flushed red, he was looking at the ground and he had his back bent forward and hands resting on his legs as he tried to catch his breath. He couldn’t remember the last time he had run so hard.

  At last he caught his breath and when he stopped panting he looked up. The twins were both staring with questioning gazes at him.

  “What’s going on daddy?” asked Liz.

  “Not now, my angel”, said Mark as he grabbed his phone out of his pocket. It still had a signal and he tried calling Stacy. The phone just rang. He tried her mom’s place; same thing. He tried Stacy again, and when he still couldn’t get through he sent her a text to call him.

  The city sirens were still wailing faintly in the distance. He looked around.

  They were just far enough from the road to not see any vehicles, and high enough to see the little town-slash-suburb of Jasperville in the nearby valley, where Aunt Jo and Uncle Frank l
ived. They happened to be the twin’s favorite aunt and uncle.

  The twins were going to stay with them after school today, while Mark was in Washington. A footpath led from the embankment through a nearby small maple forest below and into Jasperville beyond. Mark recognized the old church tower sticking out above town.

  He needed to get them to safety. Jo and Frank’s was the nearest safe place he could think of and was only a few blocks away from the old church. He tried phoning Jo, then he tried Frank and the house – same thing, the phone just rang. No matter, thought Mark. He knew where they kept the spare keys.

  They also had two vehicles, and he could use one to get out of town. But if they were there, he’d convince them to come with them. Mark and Stacy had a cabin in the woods, located roughly between the two cities they were in now.

  His gut said they needed to get out of town and to the cabin. Hopefully Stacy felt the same. He would tell her to meet them there, if only he could get through to her. He tried again. No answer.

  “Damn it” he mumbled.

  “Why you swearing Daddy?” asked Harry.

  “It’s nothing, Daddy’s just tired,” replied Mark, “we need to get to Aunt Jo’s place.” And with that the twins’ faces lit up. They always loved it there. He held their hands and let them to the footpath. It was too small for them to walk side by side.

  “Ok, guys, I’ll go first, walk behind me – slowly, ok?”

  “Ok” they replied.

  The first bit of the path was a little steep, but they worked their way down it carefully and seemed to be doing ok.

  Then from somewhere behind them Mark could hear a low-pitched whining noise, building in intensity. It sounded almost like a jet engine. He looked back, just as a big low-flying jet suddenly screeched overhead in a fast blur.

  It looked like it was about to crash, and it had a large one of the blob things on its tail section. The force of the plane flying so close caught Mark by surprise and he lost his footing, tripped and tumbled down the path.

  As he tumbled uncontrollably, he heard the kids scream “Daddy!”, and then a few seconds later he heard a loud boom from somewhere nearby reverberate in the air.

  Oh shit! Is this it? Is this how I’m going to go? What about the twins, what will happen to them? He thought as he tumbled down the path, his arms and legs painfully hitting rocks and thorny hard shrubbery on the way down.

  It didn’t take him too long to tumble to the bottom, and he crashed to a halt on his tummy with a force that kicked the wind out of him. Thankfully he didn’t hit his head on a rock on the way down.

  He lay with his face in the dirt for a moment, thinking Owwww... Then he painfully and slowly flipped himself back onto his back. His arms and legs stung and his whole body ached. He stared at the sky for a while, trying to catch his breath again, and did a mental check to see if all his limbs were still functioning and intact.

  He heard the twins come down the path, and it wasn’t long before two concerned faces, with red, teary eyes, were looking down at him.

  “I’m ok” he said and forced himself up. It was still painful, he was nicely bruised, but at least he hadn’t broken anything, as far as he could tell. His arms and legs were bleeding lightly from scratches.

  He checked the kids – they were both ok. “You’re bleeding Daddy!” cried Liz.

  “It’s not deep, my angel, I’ll be ok” said Mark.

  He checked his phone in his pocket, by some miracle it had survived his tumble unscathed.

  The twins both hugged him tightly. “I’m ok,” he said again, cringing from the bruising “we need to get out of the open, and get to Aunt Jo’s place quickly, ok.”

  The small forest was nearby and Mark scanned the sky again; no blobs that he could see. But he did notice a black plume of smoke rising above the trees, billowing in the sky from, he guessed, somewhere on the other side of Jasperville, possibly near Prospect hill.

  Mark took the twins by the hand and hurriedly walked down the path, which was a little wider now, towards the forest.

  The late-fall leaves were gently rustling in the light breeze and he heard birds chirping in the background. Everything felt deceptively peaceful and quiet; he didn’t hear the city sirens here.

  For the first time since the highway he now had the time to think.

  What just happened? He wondered. Short of any proper explanation, doubt was now playing its games with his mind, making him wonder if what happened had been real.

  He recalled the strange lights on the highway and running away from the car and that blob of light landing on several vehicles behind him and what happened to those people.

  He glanced at the plumes of smoke in the distance. Well, that just happened, he thought to himself. He had the scratches and bruises to prove it.

  But the blobs? What the hell were they? Were they part of some sort of alien invasion?

  But if it was one, then surely the government would’ve warned people that it was about to happen? Besides, an alien vessel arriving at Earth would be one of the most momentous events in human history.

  It would not go unnoticed. Unless it arrived cloaked.

  But if it wasn’t that, then what was it? Could these things have come from a different dimension?

  Mark’s mind was filled with questions. But wherever it was, it was serious, the fighter jets and city sirens proved as much.

  He thought for a brief moment about his meeting with the President. He was definitely not going to make it in time now. He pushed all other thoughts out of his mind.

  The twins’ safety had to be first and foremost in his thoughts. He tried calling Stacy and Jo again, but the phone had no signal this time.

  They entered the small maple forest and continued down the path, leaves crunching under their feet. The forest was a small, peaceful snapshot of nature – pretty, leaves strewn everywhere, the breeze blowing through the trees, the gentle sound of a stream from somewhere. It was hard to believe that they were right near town, filled with people, vehicles, concrete, trash and pollution. And possibly, aliens.

  A surge of fear gripped him.

  For all the appearance of peacefulness, something was wrong.

  He only realized what it was that was bothering him, when they got almost halfway through the forest.

  Even though it was almost the end of fall, and the trees had started shedding, they still had plenty of leaves – more than enough to be obscuring the view of the sky.

  Mark had no idea what was above them. For all he knew, a blob was busy drifting down to land right on top of them. As soon as he realized this, he quickly told the kids he was going to pick them up again, grabbed them and started running.

  He could see the exit of the forest ahead; it would take him about two minutes to reach it. For Mark, the entire forest had taken on a foreboding feeling, making him run even faster. He had his eyes on the exit and needed to get there as quickly as possible.

  Unfortunately, he should’ve kept his eyes on the path instead as next moment, his foot tripped on a stray root that stuck out from the side of the path, causing him to fall forwards and sending the twins flying. He hit the hard leaf-covered path face-first with a painful thwack.

  For a brief second, his imagination played horrific pictures of one or both the kids, laying ahead – dead, head bashed open against a rock or impaled through an eye by a branch – a tiny body laying still in a pool of blood that was slowly spreading outwards on a carpet of leaves.

  Please God no... He thought. The children were quiet. He felt that scared sickening feeling in his heart.

  And as he hurriedly got up, he heard Liz whimpering from somewhere and then she started crying. A few seconds later Harry was wailing in pain.

  Mark saw the kids a short distance ahead and painfully hobbled over; his right leg felt like it had been sprained.

  He reached Liz first and quickly checked her over; she’d landed on her butt on an open patch of ground nearby. She was a bit rattled, and a
bit sore, but she was ok.

  Mark hobbled as quickly as he could over to Harry, who was still crying loudly.

  Harry had cut his leg on a sharp rock, and blood was oozing from a thin but relatively long gash.

  “It’s going to be ok my boy” said Mark as he took off his pullover, his shirt and tie and ripped off a piece of cloth from his shirt, then he applied pressure to the wound.

  Harry stopped crying, but was still whimpering. Mark wiped off some of the blood and inspected the cut. It wasn’t too deep or serious; the bleeding made it look worse than it actually was; the boy was going to live. Mark, moving as quickly as he could, tore off another piece of cloth, then covered the wound and tied it tight with the tie. It seemed to stem the bleeding.

  Mark soothed Harry and he stopped whimpering. Still wary of the threat of the blobs, he put on his ripped shirt and pullover quickly.

  Then with some effort, he picked up the kids, and limped out of the forest.

  The path led them through a small patch of greenery, and eventually it stopped at a street on the outer edge of Jasperville.

  Tired, bruised and stiff, and still limping, Mark battled to carry both kids, and let Liz walk on her own.

  Harry was still sore and traumatized from his cut and needed to be carried, but at least the bleeding had stopped.

  The outskirt of town was eerily quiet as they made their way to the town center and there were no people to be seen.

  Luckily, it was only a few blocks from there to Aunt Jo’s place.

  The sound of police sirens drifted towards them from somewhere deeper within town.

  Chapter 6: The Jungle Crickets