POV: Andromeda Mei, Proconsul of the Imperial State of Cascadia

"Why the hell does everyone want me in a goddamn bunker?" I was getting rather annoyed by this now.

"Because you're the fucking proconsul, we need you, you know, alive."

"Listen, I'm not going to sit by helplessly and watch my countrymen die. I'm going into orbit."

"Like hell you are! Are you fucking mad?"

"Fine, go hide in your little fucking bunker and enjoy yourself. I'd rather die fighting for my country, and for humanity, then live and see it fall!"

"Oh, you're so full of yourself aren't you? I'm the Andromeda Mei, defender of Earth, glorious savior of the Cascades!"

"Oh fuck off Lissa, you're just lucky we didn't have elections or your ass would be out of here so fast..."

That did it. The Minister of War stormed out the door and slammed it shut.

I sighed and found my way to my desk chair. I had what could have once been compared to the oval office here, a nice living room with a desk of power. I stared out the windows at the evergreen evergreens, which were swaying ever so slightly in the winter wind.

An alert broke me from my thoughts, it was a message from The Throne. How kind of him to allow me the privacy of thought.

"Yes?" I answered it.

"Railgun emplacements in Portland and Seattle are nearing complement. I would also recommend emplacements at production facilities in Spokane and Ritzville, as well as near disease control facilities in Bend."

"Can we afford it?" We'd been burning through money like mad recently trying to prepare for them.

"Monetary value is of little importance at this point."

"Very well, authorize it. Proconsular order."

"Yes ma'am."

I was left to silence once more.

It all seemed so sudden. First the plagues, now the preaching aliens. What could be next? Was it really the long fabled apocalypse?

I lied down on one of the couches. The cool leather felt nice, and I felt like taking a nap. I hadn't been sleeping well since the plagues began, not to mention the aliens and terrorists.

At some point I'd actually fallen asleep because I was abruptly wakened by a rapping on the door.

"Come in!" I groggily yelled.

"It's locked" I heard a voice say on the other side. I wasn't entirely sure who it was, but it sounded vaguely familiar.

I somehow made it all the way up to a standing position and journeyed to the door, where I shoved my thumb in the biometric scanner and a clicking noise was heard. The door opened and I saw the face of... shit what was her name. She was a Guardian and she'd earned an Emerald Fir. We'd gone out one time as well, but I didn't remember for the life of me what her name was.

"Hey!"

"Um... hi!" she said. It then occurred to me that I was essentially in my pajamas and I was greeting someone as head of the state.

"Can I talk to you?"

"Of course, come in and take a seat."

We both sat down on opposing sides of the desk.

"So what brings you here?"

"I want into orbit."

"You hardly needed to ask me for that. Aren't you a Guardian?"

"I was taken out of ops."

"What for?"

She lifted her shirt up where I could make out at least seven bullet entry wounds.

"The air service won't take me because of 'prior injury'."

"That can be fixed. Do you know how to fly?"

"Not really, no. I was planning on getting some training."

"Okay, you're coming with me then."

"Wait, what?"

"I need someone in the cockpit with me. Orbital combat is a whole different animal."

"You're going into orbit...?"

"Why does everyone expect me not to help defend my own goddamn planet?"

"...Well I guess that works."

"Good. Wednesday we're leaving for High Avalon. Chances are it'll be the last time we see home, so be sure to enjoy it."

"You expect to die?

"You don't?"

POV: Thomas Alderstrom, Uni student visiting back home in Bellevue

I was getting sick of the lines.

Every weekend, instead of going out like I was used to, I got to go to the nearest distribution center and wait in a line thousands of people long for my weekly allocation of food. My father couldn't be bothered to show up, nor could my stepmom. It was their idea for me to come home, since it was supposedly safer than the armed-to-the-teeth Heartland, but I had begun to realize that they just wanted me for work.

My dad hadn't been such an ass until he married that Stella bitch. She was rich, Cali trash that showed up here after she felt 'threatened by Catholicism'. I wish she'd waited until the border was closed before trying, because my dad would be back to himself and maybe he would be here with me now instead of fucking her.

I usually considered myself a nice person, but stress had gotten to me. The constant fear of annihilation was hard to live with, and for the first time I knew what it was like to live in a warzone.

I peered up the line. It looked like another couple hundred meters to the front, where some soldiers were emptying out the last of the QFC's supply and bringing in their own via truck. The government had promised that there was plenty to go around, but that didn't stop people from being scared. The government hadn't said anything about the aliens until they announced it themselves.

I looked at my watch. It was 19:49, and there was the chance now that curfew could hit before I got my allocation. I looked behind me at the hopeful line even more ambitious than me to think they'd have enough time.

Why couldn't my collection date be a weekday? At least then I'd get out of work for a couple of hours. The Throne had decided that I, as an engineering student, would be most effective as a laborer. I had been tasked to help clean up the mess that was Seattle Center, after the bomb that had gone off felled the only thing non-Cascadians knew us for. It had finally been the tipping point for me. I'd sobbed myself to sleep that night because it finally hit me that humanity may be reaching its end, that the world could actually be ending. And that was before the aliens.

The thoughts made me anxious and I wanted to cry again. Once I began, it was hard to stop, and a teardrop rolled down my cheek. As if on cue, water began pouring from the dark, evening sky. The line shuffled forwards a meter or so before coming to a halt again and this time a sob escaped me. A little girl, no older than 8, turned around and looked at me. She was with her family, who was mostly trying to ignore me. Her big, young eyes stared at me and then she came and hugged me, or rather, my leg.

"It's gonna be okay mister. Mommy says that no matter what it'll always be okay."

A woman who I presumed to be her mother looked back at me and simply nodded. Her exhausted eyes began to water a little as well.

The line shuffled forwards once more.