Before Us

            It was the night of October 28th, 2016. I was walking home from work late that night around 11 o’clock or so when I saw her. After all these years, to think she was just a black cat following me along the sidewalk that night and I thought nothing of the sort. Just another neighborhood cat walking around, right? Oh, how I was so wrong, I never in a million years could have predicted the events of that night and so on, but first I must take you back to that dreadful night.

            Halloween was three days away and I was overfilled with joy, Sarah and I would be attending the biggest Halloween party in all of Michigan. We were invited to a costume party at Michigan State University, college students and teenagers would be driving from all over the state to attend this party. Luckily Sarah’s boyfriend, who attends MSU, invited us to come stay for the weekend, and all I could think about was the party. I was working the closing shift at Maurice’s and after getting all the drawers counted, restocking the shelves, and cleaning everything up, I was ready for bed. I couldn’t find a ride that night, someone had mysteriously slashed my tires last night while I was sleeping, and I had to rely on my legs to get me to work instead. The most peculiar part was the fact that my building's security cameras malfunctioned that night. I took the Lianas Trail which led right from the busy downtown shopping center of town to my apartment complex on the other side of the tracks. Unfortunately, once you cross the tracks, streetlights are no longer a source of visibility leading me to rely on my iPhone flashlight app. That’s when I first heard her, a small hissing sound behind me.

            Frightened, I spun around to flash my light on the sound I had just heard emit from behind me to be confronted by nothing more than a black cat wandering around the neighborhood. Harmless. I continued towards my building, and without hesitation opened the door and entered building C, where I lived at the time. Much to my surprise, the cat followed behind me, as if she was waiting for me to open the door. I climbed the 15 steps up to the second floor and stopped, looking at my door. Apartment C-4, I was ready to go inside, but this cat was at my feet, and I never intended on taking it home. I pondered this conundrum for approximately 5 minutes until I decided I was too tired to argue with a wild cat seeking shelter for the night. I put my key into the lock slowly turning the mechanism to unlock the door, I then put my phone, wallet, and other belongings into my North Face pockets, and began gently nudging the cat away with one leg while I entered my apartment leading myself with my other foot inside the door. I was certain I would be able to carefully close the door behind me and nudge the cat all the way out, until her claws latched onto my leg and seeped through my American Eagle jeans and pierced my skin. I screeched in pain and slammed the door, closing me and the cat in my apartment living room, the cat standing between me and the door.

            I looked down at the little creature with such dismay, it hissed yet again, and an eerie chill went down my spine. The cat began to grow, shift, and change in such terrifying ways. There was a flash of lightning that burst through the sliding door of my balcony, a moment of blindness in all the confusion, and in place of the same black cat I had just witnessed, a beautiful fair skinned woman with emerald, green eyes, and soft, thin pink lips stood. Her hands were small and pale, with long blood-stained claws where fingernails should be, and her attire fit something more of the 1800s or perhaps an even earlier time. She wore a beautiful red ball gown, with black ruffles and a black corset with red ruby buttons down the middle, a wealthy woman I’d assume. She peered into my soul with her piercing green eyes, yet she surprisingly spoke slowly and gently, “I am Lord Victoria Romwea, queen and ruler of Earth before the humans existed until they destroyed our kind. I took power seven million years ago and led my people to peace and integration among our civilizations. Early humans began to roam this land five million years after the Great War of Seizan where my father was killed in battle, these creations resembled monkeys better than they resemble your present kind”. I couldn’t even fabricate words, what do you say when you just witnessed a cat turn into a queen that ruled Earth before mankind evolved into a creation? The only thing I could do was look at her and admire her alluring essence, while fearing her terrifying presence. “Early humans were a creation, crafted by the greatest inventor this world has ever witnessed, Johan Vlacksi, he brewed a potion in which he would call blood, and he poured this blood into a figure he built from the skins of monkeys, bears, and pigs, mixed with berries and seeds, and held together by the tusks of Mammoths and the sacred stone dust. Johan watched his creation begin to blink and squirm, he had created a new life form, he gained the capability to create an army of slaves that the Seizan people could control. The humans were originally a beautiful creation and a brilliant idea in the aspect of Johan’s dreams, now look at the worthless being and waste of Earth your people have become. You kill this utmost beautiful planet as a hobby to revolutionize and industrialize your land while causing more harm than good. Your people are starving and homeless, but you will fund wars instead of educating the young.” What does one even say in such circumstances, I’m sorry your royal highness, I’ll just die? I stared blankly, silent tears streaming down my face as I watched the woman giggle with joy, the joy of watching me suffer from her horrendous appearance. “The humans are adorable, how they plead for mercy knowing they deserve nothing of the sort, how they destroy other humans who were never their creation to begin with. They learned how to reproduce and overpopulate the world, causing difficulty for our people to keep control of all of them. They would eventually all escape their farms and revolt. What do you know about the overthrowing of the Seizan Court? The infamous battle in which the humans took over.” I could barely mutter a response to the crucial look that appeared over Miss Victoria’s face, her eyes no longer the peaceful emerald green, had turned to stone cold black with a touch of purple hinting about. “I’ve never heard of the Seizan Court, it’s not something we learned in school, nor have I ever heard anyone bring it up.” I knew I sounded weak, I knew she could sense my fear and anxiety, this powerful being could tell she frightened me, and I believe she found pleasure from that. “You imbeciles decided you wanted to be free, humanity had their own ideals of what life could be like, Johan had created so many of you monsters and with the discovery of your ability to reproduce a war broke out. We were outnumbered, the planet only inhabited a few hundred Seizanally and the humans were projected to be in the hundreds of thousands. Every Seizanlly, rich and poor, man and woman, old and young, powerful, and sick, came to my castle seeking protection. My people believed they could hide within the barriers of my castle in the mountainside until we could all build our strength enough to terminate the humans, an experiment gone horribly wrong. It was Johan that saved you. He couldn’t let his creations be destroyed, so he burned the bridge connecting my castle to the stone road our people would follow. Without a way into the castle the humans closed in on the herd. I watched from the tower, as the humans slaughtered my kind with spears, fire, stones, and other torturous methods. Our own creation turned against us; they believed us to be evil when we created them. They didn’t oblige by our rules, and so they overthrew us, Johan was killed in the massacre, trying to get the humans to listen to him and obey their ultimate masters orders. My dearest sister and I have been working diligently for 2 million years to seek our revenge on humans and the idiocy they’ve done to my beautiful planet, we perfected the potion that will allow humans to transform into an indestructible killing machine and serve me as a part of our army and revenge against humans.” I froze, tears streaming from my face heavier and heavier, no longer able to obtain my fearful cries “Ma’am I don’t know what I can do to help, but please don’t hurt me” were the only words I could muster. I felt as if I was the innocent victim in a tragic horror movie, but this wasn’t a movie, this was real life. 

            With a wave of her hand a small glass bottle appeared in front of my very own eyes, floating in air with a thick and vibrant green liquid inside. “Drink the potion and join my army or you will suffer a slow and painful death.” With no other option in reach, I grabbed the floating bottle, pulled off the cork barrier, and brought it to my lips. The concoction smelled of plants and an unfamiliar scent that overtook my nostrils. Victoria gave me an urgent nod and an unpleasant smile. I held my breath, opened my mouth, and allowed the mixture to slide down my throat. I felt my body grow heavy and my thoughts went fuzzy, as I collapsed and lost consciousness. 

            I awoke in a beautiful countryside surrounded by mountains; I had been placed on a small and fluffy cot amongst the tall grasses and sunflowers. The sun was beating brightly against my skin, and the air was warm, much warmer than it had been when I fell unconscious that cold October night. Then I heard a soft and calming voice “you’re awake, oh good, I was afraid none of you survived.” I looked around to see hundreds of other bodies in neat rows and lines, in the same soft cots scattered amongst the grasses and flowers. I didn’t recognize any of the people, but they all had scars, bumps, bruises, cuts, gashes, and there was so much blood on their bodies. However, the soft satin sheets of the cots were spotless, as if someone were changing the sheets and had tended the wounds. I tried to stand and speak, but I was so weak and fragile. The feeling of a knife being stabbed into my stomach slowly sank in as I looked down at my abdomen, I had been stabbed. My shirt was drenched in dried blood and partially ripped from my body, exposing a scar above my belly button. How could I survive a stab wound to my aorta artery? I couldn’t move or talk, and the figure approached me slowly. “I am Vanessa Romwea, sister to the former leader of power, Lord Victoria, who has since been slain. We were successful in building our army of humans to fight this final war and help us regain control of this world. However, our potion turned humans not only into monstrous killers under our control, but it also turned humans into one of us, a gifted individual with incredible talents and abilities, like the Seizan people. Perhaps we didn’t know all the effects of such a powerful liquid, as we used the very hair follicles of Johan Vlacksi himself, unaware you all would transform. It was very painful for Victoria to see that she had turned a monstrous creature that once killed her people, into her very people who were tragically slaughtered. The army you were a part of killed 3 billion humans, until I realized we brought our war to your time. Victoria couldn’t see we weren’t seeking revenge like she thought, we were reigning terror on an innocent civilization instead. The kind we were fighting, were not the same kind I watched torture and rip apart the man that I loved and cherished, evolution was real, and your kind heavily showed the evidence. I couldn’t watch as she slaughtered and transformed so many civilians. Five hundred civilians were transformed, including you, and over 200 of the original army were lost in the battles. All these years later, I have had the courage to stand up and murder my sister for her arrogance towards innocence, ended the war, and saved a civilization. Now I will care for all the individuals left with such unique abilities. The humans will try to come and kill you all as well, it is neither your fault nor theirs, it is my kind's fault, my sisters hatred led to this shift in power. The humans perceive us as devilish creatures who come to hurt and kill them. However, although so much damage has been caused, humans on Earth are unified now, unlike ever before. They work together across seas and rebuild lands they don’t occupy to assist others in rebuilding the planet. The world you once lived in, no longer exists, and there is little memory or knowledge of such a world. Regardless, it is time to finish your healing process now that you have awakened.” I couldn’t understand what she was telling me, incapable of wrapping my thoughts around her words “Tell me all that has happened since I met your sister.” Her response was unlike anything I could have ever imagined, “we have seven hundred years of catching up to do young one.”