The Swimmers

“And, above all, we are so lucky to be here at the beginning of all of this.” The news correspondent said gesturing behind her to the oblong-shaped ship protruding from Chesapeake Bay.

The ship contained no windows, just white triangular paneling that hurt human eyes to look at for too long in the glaring sun.The camera crews panned to the large crowd that gathered around the banks. The mass diverged into groups that could be heard screaming at each other while throwing in the occasional “welcome” or “leave” at the expansive ship nearly a half a mile away from their location.

The correspondent continued, “This ship appears special because, by our estimate, it is the largest of the thousand ships that landed at approximately 1:47 am this morning”.

All of the ships landed in various oceans, seas, and bays, but did not appear to be distributed in any apparent order- according to top news military contributors.

“Cat, where’s Mom and Dad?” Ivan asked.

“I guess they’re at Henry’s celebrating,’ Catalina answered.

“Celebrating what?” He questioned.

“I don’t know. The end of the world as we know it!” Catalina sarcastically, emphatically answered before giving him a quick tickle.

Ivan giggled knowing that his parents used any excuse to go to the local bar.

“Did you hear that one of those ships parked in the Gulf of Mexico?” he asked, squatting down to scratch Jenga behind his orange ears.

“They’re pretty much everywhere bro,” Catalina sighed.

“My teacher says that we should PREEMPTIVELY STRIKE!”

“What if they aren’t mean though? What if we make them mad for no reason and a ton of people die for nothing?” Catalina saw the confusion in the crinkling of his blond eyebrows.

“You’re right. Maybe they’ll be nice. Or maybe they’re humans from the future!”

Catalina pushed his skinny, 10-year-old, body over on the couch, “No more watching that time travel trash on Youtube,” she said and he giggled.

The screen door slammed and they heard stumbling through the front door.

“Cat! You’re here! I’m hungry!” she heard her Mother yell from the kitchen.

“There’s no food. We had the last of the cereal. Go to the grocery store!” Catalina yelled back.

She heard her mother grumbling to her step-father. Ivan drank the now room temperature milk out of his cereal bowl and rubbed the milk mustache off this thin upper lip.

“Catalina. WE are Drunk” go to the grocery store and get some food since you’ve blessed us with your presence.” Brandon, her step father shouted from the kitchen.

“I don’t have any money.”

She could her Brandon mocking her. “You’re a dentist! That’s bullshit!” she heard her Mother retort.

“I’ll give it to you,” Robert answered.

Catalina thought back to a few years ago, when she was so excited to get her driver’s license, but then realized she was just the glorified babysitter errand girl. That car gave her freedom though and she still loved it.

She reflected that some of the darkest days of her life was when she held her driver’s license in her hand but could afford to put any gas in the car. She took a deep breath and grounded herself in the present, done with school or not, gas was expensive and she was done blowing all her money on them.

Catalina took the twenty dollars from Brandon’s sticky fingers.

He grabbed her shoulder to steady himself, “Now Catalina. I want that change back.” He waved a finger in her face.

“What do you want me to get?” She asked unwavering.

“Um. Pizza of course.” her mom said slumping, leaning on the dingy yellowing fridge.

Catalina nodded and grabbed the keys to her mother’s rusting 2009 Toyota Corolla. After two tries the car started, and Catalina just knew that one day that car would leave her stranded somewhere but not for lack of trying. It seemed that the car had been running on three wheels for at least four months. On May-Pop tires at that.

May-Pop tires, Catalina smiled remembering her dad saying the tires like the Corolla had may pop at any time, and all that all she and Monica would be left with were their patas-mobiles.

When she closed her eyes, she couldn’t remember what her dad looked like anymore. He didn’t want her to visit him in prison, and he was fifteen years into a thirty-year sentence for multiple car thefts and armed robbery. He used to call her every day, then every week, but now it was only every few months.

Catalina wondered how he could forget about her in prison as the brush and barbed wire fences rolled by on the county road that led to town. Dad went to jail. Mom got pregnant. Brandon moved in. Life continued. She stopped to say it a little louder for the girl still trapped in her now woman body: She moved out. She put herself through school. She was a doctor, a pediatric dentist. And she was only here this weekend for her little brother Ivan.

The local Walmart was packed. Outside, all of the gas pumps were full and the lines stretched out into the parking lot of the store. Catalina pulled down her shirt to hide the holes in her jeans she only recently realized existed and yawned. Walmart always seemed to be crazy busy, but something seemed different about this.

Catalina felt the tension in the air and shuffled inside, which to her surprise was only more chaotic. Women frantically trotted down isles throwing as much food into their overloaded carts as possible. Most of the shelves in the store were empty. Catalina grabbed one of the few remaining Hill Country Fair supreme pizzas and a personal size pepperoni pizza for Ivan.

Catalina pulled her basket out of the isle and a lady slammed her cart into Catalina’s.

“Hey! Watch what you’re doing!” she screamed at Catalina.

“Woah. Calm down,” Catalina responded slowly as if in a daze and took a few steps back.

“They’re here, they’re here.” the lady muttered and quickly walked away.

Catalina realized that those ships were the cause of this panic. People were preparing for the worst. She thought about picking up some canned goods. The aisle only contained people walking slowly, browsing empty isles in shock. It reminded her of the run on the stores in 2020 during the Covid pandemic. That same surreal, mind-numbing shock crept back into her body like an unwelcome old friend.

Catalina felt anxiety creep deeper into her chest. She eventually found four twelve packs of shrimp flavored Ramen Noodles, a couple of gallons of distilled water, and two bottles of generic multivitamins. She looked at the packages of noodles and for half a second as embarrassed of her doomsday prepping – not only the quality and quantity, but the fact she succumbed to the fear mongering the store induced, just like she had during Covid.

For a second, she thought about picking up some toilet paper and then almost audibly laughed. There was no way any toilet paper was left on the shelves. Back at the car Catalina hid the shrimp flavored ramen underneath the back seat absolutely sure that she would get yelled at for buying the worst ramen flavor in existence.

“Mom, almost all the aisles were empty at the store. Everyone is freaking out. Don’t you think we should get ready for the worst too?”

Monica laughed, “Those people are crazy. We will be totally fine. We are country people,” She hiccuped.

“Monica!” Brandon yelled from the back patio.

“Watch Ivan for tonight okay. We sort of scored at the bar,” Monica smiled faintly looking down.

Catalina tried not to scream at her mother, she tried not to cry. She pushed all the angry, frustrated, and above all sad emotions down and let out the coolest response she could, “Get out of here with that shit. And don’t accidentally kill yourself with all those needles.”

“Stop being judgmental Catalina. It’s not attractive” she said cruelly before scurrying away with the pizza in both her hands. Her head held down.

“Catalina look! Something is happening.” Ivan nodded towards the TV, and Catalina turned up the volume.

The welcomers, and the protestors, were silent.

Hydraulic hissing began and some of the white triangles began to fold back on each other revealing an opening in the ship. The camera zoomed into the opening of the ship, and the silhouettes of two tall humans appeared. They launched themselves into the water, so the divided group of people became one again in mass panic. Most began to run away shrieking while others stood extraordinarily still.

Almost as quickly as the beings entered the water, they emerged, gracefully. First visible was their dark green ribbed bodysuits covering from their wrists to their ankles. The dark green covered, what appeared to be, grey frog-like skin. One of them raised its hand displaying long fingers, webbed up to their middle knuckle. They didn’t wear shoes and their feet were completely webbed. Their movement through the bay truly was second, or better first, nature. With its hand raised the being opened its mouth to speak showing rows of black spikes for teeth.

The being let out a high-pitched scream. People still around covered their ears and cowered before the nearly seven feet tall beings.

The screen went black.

Catalina sat mesmerized in their image, horrified by the subtle realization that, no matter the outcome, life would never be the same.

Ivan taped his fingers together in awe of a webbed hand never meant for this world.