Have The Planes Arrived?

I press the video call icon.

Only a few seconds seem to pass and the notification chimes, letting me know that he’s on the other end. It’s like he was waiting.

I hear some high pitched sort of noise ringing through from his end. Probably interference. I sometimes hear similar noises randomly when we video chat on other services. Something was a bit different about this sound though. It gives me more sensory uneasiness than usual.

I ignore it.

I decide that since he seems to be having trouble on his end to connect to his camera, I will just start telling him about the nightmare. He can hear me, at least.

“I’m scared.” I begin.

“Have the planes arrived?” I hear him asking.

But the words don’t quite compute in my head, despite the solemn tone.

The soothing melody that is his voice plays its effects on me. The sort of comfort that swaddles your soul. It puts me at ease if ever so momentarily. The relief I feel to hear him on the other end. Sharing this same moment in time with me.

The present.

The lovely sensations diminish as it hits.

Realization.

I make the correlation between the energy of his words and their meaning. And the dreadful realization that he knows what’s wrong already.

The nightmare; it seems it was a premonition. But with little warning time, because I think it’s already happening where he is.

“No, I don’t think so.” I finally say

I look out the window. Scanning the obsidian sky, half expecting them to glide out from behind a hazy cloud.

“How are we going to make it through this?” I ask.

There’s a pause, but I can’t tell if it’s actually as everlasting as it feels in this moment. Time seems so immeasurable.

“We’ll be home together soon.” He says.

Not quite the response I was expecting. That string of words that he’s used time after time to calm my storms usually has such a soothing effect on me. But the context for them is different this time. There’s a fearful, daunting element that goes with them.

He knows. I know. We’re not getting through this.

He still hasn’t turned on his camera. An eerie thought invades my mind and with it visions of the words made alive.

It makes me break.

“I can’t go on.”

“Remember the promise you made me?”

“Yes.”

“Promise me again.”

“Okay. I promise.”

“Good girl.”

“I love you.” I say.

Wholeheartedly I do. So much it hurts.

“I love you t—.” Deafening static cuts him off.

The call disconnects.

Three months have passed since the premonition. And nothing. Nothing has happened. Maybe I was wrong.

I had fallen back asleep that same night and woke up a little disoriented, yes, but in a less “We’re all gonna die” mood. Liam called me back, too. Calming my fear; clearing it away like wispy cobwebs. It was just an electrical blackout. And the perfect spooky coincidence to set off my imagination.

Mom always told me my imagination was as wild as a weed; that I let my thoughts become too real to me.

Perception.

“It’s all your perception.” mom always says.

It felt like words said to a crazy person in a psych ward. I would get so mad at her.

But maybe there is truth to her words.

It felt so real in the depths of my sleep, though. Oh well. It would make a cool story.

I do feel disappointed in a way. I felt it so deeply to be real, and still, it was false. I can’t see what the future holds. I’m not special. I’m nothing.

Click…. Click. What is that sound? Click, click, click. It was getting annoyingly more rapid. I look up to see my peers all staring at me. And my professor clicking his fingers together at me. It took a few seconds to realize I was utterly and completely lost. Lost in my head of swarming thoughts.

“Emelia, do I need to repeat myself? Or should I just give you that “F” here and now?”

His voice sounds muffled but I get the gist of it.

In an attempt to snap back to reality, I subtly shake my head; hoping he doesn’t take that as an answer.

I scan the room; looking to my peers again. Silently begging one of them will help me come up with a professor-appealing answer.

No one does.

So I keep awkwardly silent.

“I see, then.” My professor says with a sad tone.

But his facial expression is unreadable to me.

“Well, that concludes today’s class.” He says.

Everyone begins to gather their things and I watch as one by one, they all leave the room.

“Thank you, Universe.” I whisper to myself.

Tonight, before the party, I set an intention for myself; to not allow my imagination to conceal what’s actually happening. To just stop and see things as they are.

The halls seem hauntingly bare. Why is nobody out here?

I stagger a bit and set my hands on the door, bracing myself for what I think is just sensory overload or the beginning symptom of burnout. I can hear the loud music and feel the rhythmic thumping through the door in my hands. It would make sense if I was overwhelmed, sensorially.

Images flood my mind. Gruesome ones. They play in my mind like a slideshow. I see the bodies of my college peers. All dead. Some of them I didn’t even recognize. I hear the same noise more clearly that I heard while video chatting with Liam. I hear screams. Then something else, as if it happened moments before all the horror. A hysterical voice, screaming out. “Listen to me!! They are real! They are here!!”

Laughter.

The visions dissipate.

I take a deep breath; coming back to the here and now. Those sights and sounds, they all seemed…. familiar. Like memories. But how is that possible?

Something was familiar about the hysterical voice, too.

Maybe it was mine.

The door swings open, stopping me from further examining the thought.

“Emmy! You’re here!” Allie says.

“I guess I’m here.” I say more to myself than to her.

Allie excitedly ushers me into her dorm room. It’s crowded. So many people.

Too many people.

I sit on the couch and scroll through my phone. I’ve never been much for parties, even my own birthday parties as a kid. I wouldn’t even be here at this one if it weren’t for Allie, I barely knew anyone else.

Knew anyone else? Why do I keep thinking in the past tense?

I randomly remember a funny meme. One with an unamused cat wearing a party hat. “You’re all dead to me.” the caption reads.

I giggle aloud just a little too hard and the room falls quiet.

It beckons me to look up.

Everyone’s staring.

But not at me.

They’re all staring out the window; a few pointing.

“Have the planes arrived?” They all say.

This must be a joke. It has to be. They must know of my false premonition. I expect they’ll all burst out with laughter any moment.

But they don’t.

They just stare out the window. Blank, far away expressions.

Then… they drop.

Everybody.

There’s a unison of thuds against the floor.

My vision seems to glitch, like a screen.

My sight fixes itself, as if it were buffering, and I see the bodies again.

Bloody eyes.

Click, click, click.

I hear coming from somewhere in the room.

I try to ignore it. Not only the sounds, but the fact that I know what’s making them.

Click. Click.

It’s getting louder. I cover my ears.

Blood gushes out from eye sockets.

I squeeze my eyes shut.

Click. Click, click.

It’s getting worse the more I try to ignore them.

Click, click, click, click, click.

I know what’s making the sound, but I don’t want it to be true.

Click, click. Click.

I didn’t want them to come, I only warned them at the party that they were here.

Click. Click.

Echoes of the hysterical voice become clearer, and I know for a fact it’s me.

Click.

I remember.

They stop.

Silence once again beckons me to open my eyes.

The bodies are gone.

In their places, deep burgundy splotches stain the hardwood.

The window is shattered, the curtains torn.

The room is filled with a haze of dust illuminated by sunlight.

Five of them stand before me.

Quiet; observing me.

They get closer.

“Don’t you fucking touch me!!”

They look at each other.

Tilted heads.

The clicking starts up again, only gentler.

I know they’re communicating.

Deciding.

“Just do it then! Kill me!!”

“We don’t wish to kill you.” A voice echoes through my head.

It belongs to one of the aliens.

“Why keep me alive? I’m nothing without everyone else.”

“You are nothing... and you are everything.” It says.