7

“Are you having temperature fluctuations?” said a booming voice.

“Yes,” came a melodic, singsong reply.

“Do you see flashing lights? Hear a constant buzzing?”

“Yes. Yes, exactly! And I have trouble breathing.”

“You have humans.”

A short pause, like a quiet desert at sunrise. “I was afraid of that.”

“Why did you wait so long to come to me?”

“I thought I could deal with it on my own,” said the cosmic singsong voice. “I tried famine, flood, drought, plague….”

“That won’t work,” the booming voice said. “They’ve spread everywhere. Filled your lungs with toxins, contaminated your blood. Without drastic measures, you won’t last 24 hours.”

A racing beat that pounded like an earthquake. “What kind of measures?”

“… Apocalypse.”

A sharp intake of breath that roared like a hurricane. “Not again. It took me years to get over the last one.”

“I’m afraid so. But we’ve had advancements since eradicating dinosaurs. The procedure will only take seven minutes. Recovery time will be a few months.”

“Seven minutes?” said the melodic voice, with a tremble that echoed like thunder. “Will it be painful?

“Yes…very. But you will be rid of humans forever.”

Another pause, like the dead of night. “I’ll do it…”

There was a violent jerk in my stomach and I shot backward through space, past streaks of stars, galaxies and planets, zoomed for a crash-landing on earth and sat bolt upright in bed.

What the hell was that?

Outside my window, a black shadow eclipsed the rising sun, turning the world a cold grey.

And a booming voice echoed in my head.

“Seven...”

The countdown had begun.