Portal Storms

[Tenebrous]

"Good morning America, this is Stormwatch. Breaking news, officials have confirmed that a new portal storm coalesced four hours ago and is now on a destructive path towards the Philippines, and will begin strafing the archipelago in several hours. We'll return later for news on what the authorities are doing to prepare for their country's first storm.

One year ago to this day, a similar story was reported at very much the same time, though with a much greater deal of astonishment and even fascination. On March 19th, 2009 the portal storm phenomena began with the Turkish Event, and we witnessed the first strange energy effects on that fateful morning. In the year since, we have observed a total of 148 similar storms of varying duration and intensity, and with the Filipino Storm, 44 portal storms have traversed overland, each of which have been the cause of national emergencies in the 46 countries that have encountered them, as well as other countries in the region. We are distraught to acknowledge that since the Turkish Event, we have made very little progress into understanding the portal storms or of defensive processes that can be used against them.

French President Royal, whose nation is still reeling from their first storm last November, expresses her fear that the frequency of the portal storms will only continue to increase, especially in light of the events of five days ago, and has demanded martial law across France 'until the end of the phenomenon'. Last Sunday became the first day that two storms raged overland at the same time, over Manchuria, China, and the western coast of Australia. Reports of clean-up and quarantine progress in Australia, which was, up until a week ago, the last habitable continent untouched by the storms, are due later this afternoon.

Due to the cooling of hostilities between People's Republic of China and Taiwan, thanks to Beijing's second portal storm interrupting the shouting match, the United Nations is preparing a resolution to establish what they call a 'New Agreement' between Taiwan and mainland China, which they hope will reduce the probability of an armed conflict. The UN reports that the resolution will include a substantial allotment of World Coalition forces to speed the Republic of China's removal of martial law, a status that has caused a vocal minority to turn to violence in order to achieve unification with the PRC. The People's Republic's fortunate lack of portal storms comparative to its land area and population, continuing militarization, and acceptance of refugees, has given pro-Beijing individuals throughout East Asia much of their motivation to turn to violence in order to gain the PRC's goodwill. With the new portal storm in Manchuria, the United Nations is distraught to admit that they 'hope this will help pacify violent rogue factions in the region.'

Scientists associated with the Stormwatch Department of Observation and Statistics have decided on a new estimate that the portal storms have introduced more than two million xenotheric organisms throughout the planetary surface, and more than seven million into our planet's aquatic habitats. We turn now to the Stormwatch Department of Xenobiological Studies to bring to light new hopeful technologies that may help rescue the ocean habitats from the horrible xenotheric onslaught..."

 

[Tenebrous]

"It was going to happen sometime."

"Don't talk that way. There have only been nine so far."

"Overland, you mean."

"Well. Yes. Still... you know what they are doing with SCORPIO. There's been progress."

"Sure there's been progress. We've come all the way in the last four months to... detonating nuclear explosives in the storm clouds! Oh, yeah! That's going to do something! We should have been doing that over Turkey, or at least Tibet, in March! God the government is slow."

"There has been progress. Its in the statistics. The bomb works."

"Maybe, for a little while. The problem is, how long are those going to last?"

"They should use SCORPIO tactics on the new one over Borneo. Anything to keep the quarantine, even if it doesn't do much."

"First aliens, and THEN the flu! If someone had a bet on which would come first, you know what I would have chosen. The pandemic."

"Problem is, it makes it worse. Even if we do use SCORPIO over Indonesia, the radiation will still create a huge refugee problem. The flu is going to spread. Storms... Always where they'll do the worst damage."

"Storms aren't intelligent. If I was rooting for them, I'd've told 'em to hit New York first... not Batman, Turkey! It's always just coincidence."

"Well, there's a lot of strange coincidences with these, I guess. Like, a hundred countries haven't been hit, and Mexico has already taken two."

"Hm."

"Bad time to be a refugee. Aliens and a pandemic... who knows if the aliens STARTED the flu?! Lotta people are going to die waiting for the soldiers to get off the borders."

"Nothing wrong with that. Gotta worry about our own country."

"Just wait until the States are hit. We can't last forever. If this thing is random, well, probability is against us. Its in the probability, man."

"We're not the worst off. We're the most powerful country in the world. We'll deal with it when it comes.

"Not the worst off yet. Still... bad time to be a Mexican refugee, I should have said."

"Definitely."

 

[Jintor]

French President Royal

Awesome name.

Awesome story.

Keep up the good work.

 

[Tenebrous]

December 17th, 2009

Matt had lost himself in the tired stupor of a night watch. The propane lamp cast a dim light over a stranger?s room, while his brother Andrew snored like a train engine. He had stared for two hours at a portrait of a family whose house they had decided to sleep at. It was torture. Only a week and a day ago he had been happily shopping for Christmas. He had bought his wife a brand-new car, his family a brand-new television, the kind that you could surf the internet on. Except for the constant news of alien warfare in far-flung other countries, the new draft, the dropping economy, things had been going well. His start-up company was finally making money after a year of hard work.

And now Matt had been flung into a battlefield that his generation had never expected to fight in.

The Great Salt Lake. Water surrounded by sand and city. "One of the most favorable habitats for the xenotherics in the entire country." They had said. And he was approaching it, only eight days since the stormfall.

Matt could remember that day watching the television, the old one he couldn't wait to get rid of, when he discovered that the dreaded portal storms had begun to appear over the United States of America. He could remember the camera shots of the quickly-darkening clouds, the strange vivid-green lightning, the surreal twisting of the clouds, the hot alien wind. The American Storm, the Nevada Storm, the Belmont Storm. The news had made it seem so far away. Scientists knew that the storms often changed direction, but never when or to where. When Matt awoke after a quick four hours of sleep that night, in the morning Matt's wildest fears came into existence, when he discovered the Nevada Storm was approaching Salt Lake City, Utah. A direct collision course unseen since Katrina.

He had phoned his entire extended family, his church friends, and while their caravan was not the first in the human wave out of the Salt Lake area, they made it out safely. It was a good time then, a comfortable time, finding security with others you knew, trading ideas on how to survive. But reality dawned shortly after. They had become refugees. Matt and his family had left all that they had known, their home, their belongings, Christmas, and Matt's new TV, his wife's new car, his prospering company, for a life of squalor at a military-enforced refugee camp near Rock Springs, Wyoming.

Only a few days later, there was a case of Indonesian Flu in the camp. Maybe Stormfall did cause diseases. The military quarantined the whole thing off, tens of thousands of people. No one objected, at least not in outside, where it could do some good. The new war, the third world war, some called it, gave the military the power to do as they needed to. But... Matt managed to buy his way out, along with Andrew. His family agreed on the idea. He'd go get some things from the old house, things he should have taken in the first place, then make a trade for the safe delivery of his entire family to the outside, where they wouldn't be slowly killed off from the influenza. He had wanted his little girls out first, because if the flu hit their family, they would be the first to... but where would they go if they got out? He only had enough money for two tickets. It was necessary.

Matt had made a deal with criminals, who knew they could make more money off of him if he returned alive. They gave him weapons and supplies. They said many others were out here, dodging military patrols and aliens to get back their goods. They said that it was good that he go and get his things, before the military ransacked his house beforehand. Matt had never seen others yet. Military patrols. And one alien they called the ant lion... but they survived. They had learned and that was the only time. But they were approaching the city. It would change.

It was dawn, the twilight hours. The time his providers had said it was best to move. The military was moving out to safe positions, but there was still enough light to see the crabs, to a catch a glimpse of the rustle in the sand that meant there was an ant lion. Matt hadn't done this before, but he was resourceful, he would survive. All of humanity would have to become resourceful, to survive. He felt ashamed that he had not paid more attention to the portal storms earlier in the year. But he had taken the rifle practice they recommended last July. Matt hoped that the short course was enough.

"Andrew. Let's go. It's a long ride."

They got on their bikes and continued down the asphalt. They'd be there shortly.

"Matt, when do you stay on the road?"

"We always stay on the road, Andrew."

 

[Tenebrous]

Segolene Royal.

Thanks man.

 

[highlander]

That was so awesome, keep it up.

 

[soulslicer]

Citadels

i dont understand this teleporting thing with the combine. I know that combine cannot teleport within earth but they can teleport from planet to planet? And then how did they bring that huge ass citadels into earth? from spaceships?

 

[Asknoone]

Portal storms.