Prologue

July 2015

The Plaza de Mayo looked eerily quiet as Juan peeked out from beyond the white plaster walls of the Cabildo Museum's balcony. Quiet, yes, but it would never be the same. Debris and garbage were strewn across it, the Pirámide de Mayo was no more, having shattered when a stray bomb hit it. Smoke was billowing out of the Casa Rosada, across the way. In the last few days, television, radio, the internet, it all went down. Juan did not know whether the government was even in the building when it was hit or if they had fled to safety, leaving the normal citizen to fend for themselves.

But it could have been worse. Just a few months ago, that was when they first made contact. It was a distant, but horrifying thing for Juan to see on the internet: Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles...all destroyed in a flash of light as debris rained down from space. At first, Juan felt shameful relief. World War III was starting but surely their missiles would not hit distant Argentina!

Then the ground quaked and Juan took cover. His windows were shut, but he could smell smoke and when he finally arose from under his table, he saw a horrifying sight. Where there used to be countless homes making up the South-Eastern districts of Buenos Aires, there was nothing but mangled concrete and rebar.

Juan no longer felt a shameful relief, but rather a guilt that ate away at his stomach. If he had been just a few blocks closer to the impact zone, he would have been gone. In fact, in an hour he was going to head out in that direction to meet up with his family…

That was when he began to panic. He took out his phone, furiously calling each of his family contacts: his mother, father, brother...all silent.

Until he called his brother's fiancee, Rosa, who stayed behind in their apartment in downtown Buenos Aires because she was both pregnant and feeling under the weather. Juan cried the whole time as he told her what happened and vowed he would help her until his brother could return and he must return!

The traffic was unreal, but was mostly in the opposite direction. People were fleeing the capital and into the countryside, fearing that the next bomb wouldn't miss the city itself. No one had any idea who it was just yet: with Juan's radio constantly blaring about the Americans, Chinese, and Russians, but none of the hosts were able to answer a basic question, “Why Argentina?"

Conspiracy theorists began to fill the void and a popular subject of theirs became “aliens," and worst of all, Juan began finding himself nodding along with them in agreement.

When Juan met up with Rosa, the city was declared under lockdown by the government and all able-bodied men and women were to report to the nearest recruitment station to take part in the nation's defense. Juan refused to leave Rosa and stayed hidden in her apartment, the two of them arming themselves with Juan's brother's hunting shotguns.

It would not have mattered. Come March, the truth became clear: sightings of spaceships landing in an isolated part of Angola were reported and alien beings exiting them. Strange videos were uploaded on Youtube, ordering people to report to new shelters, in direct contradiction with what the government had reported and in a strange, almost growling voice giving the orders in broken Spanish.

By the end of March, the aliens would launch campaigns in North America, Europe, Russia, and China. Videos of the aliens were first made public, most of them were Lion-like, but they also had ones that resembled wolves, dogs, and foxes. Shortly after, reports of the governments of the UK and France collapsing spread across the world.

April, May, and June passed with the news getting increasingly dire. The world powers: USA, China, and Russia, had put up a fight, but by now they were effectively lost all in the span of one season. Reports of POWs being executed or gone missing to unknown fates began spreading, along with reports of atrocities such as civilians being killed or mass-raped. Juan was now fearfully waiting for the day when they'd come to Argentina.

Come July, they did.

Plaster exploded across the column, inches away from Juan's face. He darted his head back behind cover. He couldn't see where the sniper was, but they could see him. Sweating, Juan pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose.

When the bombardment started again, Juan had taken Rosa out of the apartment. She was nearly due, but it was too dangerous to stay there. He tried to take her through the city and find a way out, but they didn't get a few more blocks until they had their first encounter with the Regulians, as the emergency radio broadcasts started calling them before they shut down.

Juan and Rosa were staring at them from an alleyway in shock. It was one thing to hear about them, but to see about ten hulking lion-men taking cover behind wrecked cars and firing at their countrymen with strange weapons, some sounding very similar to normal rifles and others were firing...lasers was the only thing Juan could think of.

The Regulians didn't know they were there. Juan was about to drag Rosa away but a sharp explosion caused him to clutch at his ears. One of the Regulians fell against the side of an overturned car, his face shredded with buckshot. Rosa's shotgun was smoking.

Juan grabbed her by the wrist and they darted down the alleyway before the aliens could return fire. Even over the popping of gunfire, Juan could hear their armored boots trampling after them.

They had no choice but to take cover in the Cabildo. Juan had to protect Rosa and his unborn nephew. There were a few people who also had chosen to take their last stand here but had fallen, they had shells for Juan to use. Both him and Rosa, despite her pregnancy, fired down into the Plaza at the slightest sign of movement until everything went silent.

They had been there a few days now. It would only be a matter of time.

“Rosa," Juan whispered to his sister-in-law. She was laying on the ground moaning, a circle of water forming underneath her. She was still clutching her shotgun. “Give me the gun, you're going into labor!"

Rosa tightened her grip on the shotgun and held it away from Juan, “I won't let them have us! I will kill them before they hurt my son!"

Juan swallowed, mentally counting their ammunition. The thrill of victory had given way to a grim acceptance of the truth: that he had not truly beaten the savage invaders back, but that they didn't view him as a real threat. Any day now and they would raid the building and finish the job.

But as far as Juan was concerned, this was humanity's last stand. The only humans Juan saw occasionally in the Plaza were being marched away at gunpoint or even more concernedly, like one woman he saw, dragged around naked on a leash by what looked like a Regulian officer. Whatever the aliens had in story for humanity, Juan didn't like it.

“If my brother were here..." Juan thumped his head against the wall.

“Shut up!" Rosa hissed. “Dammit Juan, don't be a sadsack now! You've done everything right!"

“If my brother were here, I'd have him hide you in the cellar and I'd give them a last stand to remember!" Juan grimaced. Rosa couldn't give birth by herself and even then, if the Regulians had thought for a second that he abandoned his post, they might storm the building and take them unawares.

“Then I guess we're all gonna give them one!" Rosa moaned, clutching at her bloated stomach with one hand while still keeping the other on her shotgun. “Me, you, and my son! We're all going to go on a fucking safari and hunt some lions!"

“My brother was always the hunter, not me!"

“For a biology professor, you're not bad!"

Juan smiled at Rosa. In the months they had been together, he had grown attracted to the young woman, but he refused to act on it in honor of his brother's memory, whom he had now accepted was lost.

Pumping his shotgun, Juan shouldered it confidently, “Alright, let's show those lions what we-"

Juan was knocked across the room as the column they were behind shattered with a booming explosion. He felt nothing as the back of his neck slammed into the wall and he was deaf to the horrifying cracking noise it made underneath the ringing of his ears.

“Rosa...Rosa...Rosa..." Juan mouthed. He couldn't move anything except for his eyes, but they could see nothing in the thick cloud of dust that surrounded them.

Finally the dust cloud began to fade and Rosa was lying on the ground completely still. She was still clutching both her stomach and her gun.

“No..." Juan rasped.

He tried to move, but his arms wouldn't respond. His gun, it was just out of reach. He had to get it, he had to stop them! He was the last hope for humanity! For his brother, he had to grab it!

One of the lions stepped onto the balcony, followed by a flank of bodyguards armed to the teeth, one of which was another lion and the other one a slim canine, one of the fox-like ones, Vulpeculans were what the radio called them. All Juan could do was watch them with his eyes as they approached Rosa.

The lion knelt down, his tan longcoat, the same color as his fur, flapped in the wind as he examined Rosa's belly. He motioned for one of his men to come closer and Juan caught a glimpse of a steel blade glistening in the evening sun.

“No!" Juan finally cried out. Some feeling was returning to his hand and he desperately reached for the shotgun, grasping it and beginning to raise it. “Get away!"

One of the soldiers, the Vulpeculan, shook his head wearily but looked to his officer before acting. The lion in the longcoat gave him a nod.

The soldier drew a pistol and fired.

Juan gasped as pain erupted from his chest. Thick fluid began to fill up in his lungs, making them feel like a wet paper bag when he breathed, which grew almost impossible. Blood ran down his lips. The shotgun was on the floor again, but he was still reaching for it.

The Vulpeculan sighed with a cruel smile on his face. The Regulian angrily growled at him in a strange tongue that Juan could not understand and the Vulpeculan flinched a little bit, tucking his bushy tail between his legs.

“Won't..." Juan coughed up blood, “...won't..."

Before Juan could lift up his gun, the Vulpeculan sneered down at him across his long muzzle with a look of contempt.

This alien...this animal...how could he!?

Those were Juan's last thoughts before the Vulpeculan raised his pistol again, aimed it at Juan's head and pulled the trigger.