This story is by Addison Gray and was part of our 2024 Fall Writing Contest. You can find all the writing contest stories here.
It was a bright early autumn morning on the eastern side of Sicily. The summer heat had dissipated down to the normal warmth of the Mediterranean. The dark red haired, and green eyed Julia Messalina yawned away the sleep and the early sun filtered through the blinds. Getting up and stretching all the way to the blinds and opening them letting the warm sun fall upon her skin & night slip the reality of the world replaced the bliss of dreams. Urnuian aliens invasion was real and they were still here. The tall, strong, white skinned, and determined aliens had arrived a year and a half ago causing her fathers death. He was the King of Sicily when they aliens descended. He fought bravely but died in the fighting Julia tried to get to him to help, grabbing a Beretta 2030 sprinting down the hallway through a hail of fire with the smell of plasma charge in the air. Only to arrive at the end being pulled to cover watching her father Lombardo be brought down by the bright burning flashes of the aliens weapons. The soldiers dragged her kicking and yelling “You are the Queen now, we have to get you to safety!” It was a day that she couldn’t let go, she should have been faster…
The memories hurt quite a bit, evidenced by her green eyes welling out tears freely as the gravity of that day still stung. Never again she thought. The old capitol of Palermo had fallen that day and sustained heavy damage. The royal guards had ushered Julia to Syracuse to regroup at the families home & personal olive grove. There she absorbed the duties and the news that battles across the world were being fought and the self proclaimed “Urnuian” were here for retribution. Retribution for what? It took a while before the intelligence agencies of the world figured out a Russian man, Lusser Petrov was the cause of the alien invasion. His unbridled greed had lead to the damaging of a scout ship and their escape.
Oh, wherever this man is, I have some choice words for him. Turning the world upside-down & causing the death of millions. Julia’s thoughts raged at the man she knew not. But here in in the Villa in the hills looking out over the sea, at least the sights & slightly saltiness of the air made her feel better. Walking from the window to the dresser she threw on a comfy set of utility clothes, consisting of her tan t-shirt & armor weaved black leggings being ready for whatever the day may bring. The next stop was the kitchen where the staff was prepping food for herself, younger brother & sister plus all the security and staff. Today it seemed to be a choice between a omelette and a brioche with garnita which is a tough one. But since I had the latter yesterday I opt for the omelette with orange juice. The breakfast is uneventful as advisors come in and start briefing the state of things as I slept. Ugh always more things to do especially with the Urnuian running amok.
It was time to go the newly built seat of government with the still unfinished royal palace. I insisted that all that was needed was a overhaul of Villa de Messalina to which the politicians balked and insisted on a proper residence. At least I won on embracing the proper old greco-roman designs brought into our modern era. Heading outside with the security detail along with the senior advisor get into the MA-34B3, the replacement of the archaic and dangerous helicopters of old. It shared a similar body and a tail, but had two tilt rotor enclosures on either side to replace the singular more dangerous rotor in the center that their predecessor had. Getting in three Sicilian Royal Marines were in defensive spots along with their two pilot squad mates manning the controls. “Your highness, Lets have a good day.” The tanned soldier said as he handed an armored vest over. Oh yeah, alien sympathizers still are all over wanting to join François Roux’s new alien collaboration government. The thought train leads to an audible sigh form Julia one that is not caught over the noise of the rotors as she donned the vest along with the headset helmet. “Lets hope so!” she replied through the headset. At the end of her words the MA-34B3 soared off towards Syracuse.
It was not a long flight and luckily no crazies had gotten close enough to the flight path to be able to attack the delegation. It was bad enough that so many people had died in the initial Uruian attack & driving away of their ground forces. But now random smatterings of people haven fallen into the mindset that the Urnuian with their advanced technology should be supported. Reports of people getting cybernetics like what was written about in Cyberpunk or Star Wars back in the past. Its been a year and a half yet some people are willing to let the aliens gene edit them to ‘cure diseases’ despite the fact that many of them had to flee homes due to them… truly amazing. The MA-34B3 touched down at the landing pad not far from the parliament. The delegation left the squad with their vehicle and headed in through the massive white columns into a few hallways before entering the giant one hundred twenty nine foot diameter circular chamber with a dome with some specifically placed light inlets in it. It never ceased to amaze Julia of how fast they had built the place considering everything that was going on. But the project became more of a symbol of the peoples will to not be displaced by the invaders.
The session of the senate had commenced, a activity that Julia still hadn’t gotten used to having to be at. In her mind she was still blissfully away from the hustle and bustle of work and duty that her father had been embroiled in. He had taken the ground work of his father with his movement built around the island identity. Then in the nineteen fifties getting the presidency and the votes necessary to transform the Sicilian government into a modified parliamentary monarchy under the Italian republic. At the end of the four hour session Julia banged the gavel to bring it to a close “I hereby declare todays session done.” Such a formality one that she understood, but also was gnawing at the bit to be back outside the chamber so she could het back to work rebuffing the invaders. Someday we will be able to have peace again. It was a nice thought, one that seemed forever away. To her surprise her siblings had made the trek to the parliament and were checking out the construction still going on for all the rest of the buildings offices. They had rushed the main chamber with its dome to show solidarity with the people caught in the middle of it all. She strolled over to her siblings with the ever present security detail linking up with theirs “Hey! What brought all of you away from the Villa?” The siblings stopped talking as Julia walked up her next oldest sibling her brother responded “Well checking out all the antiquity artifacts dug up from the construction of this place and the palace.” There were quite a few pieces of old sculptures, pots, and other things found set up on various displays. On the other side was metals, weapon pieces, aircraft pieces and other things from the first battles with the Urnuian. We lingered for a time taking in the fact we were all together still despite what had happened.
As we go our separate ways as I went to see the construction that was going on else where and meet defense contractors. Walking onto the site the first thing that struck me we the dome finished in the middle proclaiming itself a link to the past, it was inspiring since it was one my father had sketched. Walking ever closer to see the rest of the building complex and seeing the different molds for pieces it was cool seeing behind the curtain of how they were constructing it. The quiet reflective time was shattered by the whirr & whine of engines. It was the MA-34B3 flying in fast before dropping low kicking up dust as we run towards it. The Royal Marine grabs my arm and helps me up “More different alien ships are descending!” I shake my head in acknowledgment. He throws me my vest, helmet, and a Bretta 2030. They are not going to harm my family, not like did to dad. I am not loosing another family member. As the MA-34B3 accelerates towards the descending ship and her families Villa
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