How does the saying go? "They came, they saw, they destroyed"? Is that how it goes? Whatever. It happened seven years ago. Just as I said. They came. They saw. They destroyed. They wiped nearly all of us out. I was the only one left. I lived in a city, the size of millions of people! Why was I the only one left?! Once everyone and everything was gone, they came. I knew why. They were looking for me. They knew I was the only one left. I had to leave what was left of my only home behind. I was only little back then, but I was able to run. I made it out of the ruins and I didn't stop, for fear that they would catch up to me. I couldn't stop. I knew that I would forever remember that day. February 29, 2052. That day became known as the day when it all started. World War Three.

    In this war, it is not country versus country, All forms of government were destroyed. No government anywhere. Global anarchy. Not only are the survivors fighting each other for resources, but they are also fighting them, and as far as I know, I am the only one who has seen them, and lived. What they look like, their image, their form, have burned themselves onto my retinas. Never will I forget what they look like, and what they do to those they catch. I knew that I have to do whatever I can to survive from now on. Even if that means I have to kill another person. I will if I have to. Nothing else matters anymore. Nothing but survival.

2: Entry 1: April 22, 2059

    I was scouting around the building tops for them. Them, and their nightly raids, have slowly been picking us off one by one. I hate them so much. Ever since I've joined with this band of fellow survivors, we work together to survive. We're held together by the ideology of Akira, everyone decided to have him be the leader of us. He keeps us together, and we stay with him. The reason that we survive longer than other groups is because of Akira.

    "Do you see anything?" I whisper to my comrade Aeron. She was the first one to join Akira.

    "No sight of them," she responds.

    "Good." I look through the scope of my rifle to double check. Yeah, I don't see anything. We're clear for now.

    "Hey, your time on watch is done. You can go back and rest." Oh, thank the almighty gods.

    "Who's after me?" I ask.

    "Send Amon. It's his shift now."

    "Right," I say with a nod. Amon joined before I did as I was the last one. Since I've taught myself how to use a sniper rifle, Akira said that I had a lot of potential and that no one else knew how to handle one as good as I. That's what makes us strong. We all have a different set of skills, but Akira wants us to make sure that we can all at least handle two different types of weapons. I know how to use a sniper and Aeron is teaching me how to use close-combat pistols. It's kinda hard to aim a gun that moves around so much, but she has faith in me, just as I have faith in myself. I make my way back to the camp and find Amon sound asleep. "Amon get up. It's your turn."

    "It is?" he asks tiredly. He yawns and stretches his arms.

    "Yes, now get off your ass."

   "Alright, alright." He takes his assault rifle and walks away from the camp. "Sheesh." I watched him walk away as I sat down at the camp. My stomach rumbled and the others who were there looked at me.

    "You hungry?" my comrade Takara asks. She's undoubtedly the strongest fighter. She is an excellent swords-woman, with unequaled skill with either single or double-blades. She's been practicing her knife skills with Akira and he himself said that she's caught on really quickly.

    "Aye," I nod, even though I know Akira is doing his best to save whatever food we have.

    "Well... here. I didn't finish my portion of the bread we found earlier. Here." She takes her uneaten portion, breaks it in half and hands one of the halves to me.

    "Thanks."

    "Don't mention it."

    "Don't mention what?" Akira asks from his sleeping position.

    "Nothing. I thought you were asleep."

    "Really? With all of this conversation. We really should stay quieter. We don't want them finding us." I've seen what they do to us and sometimes I wish I hadn't. It's the very image of nightmares. The only things we know about them is that since they mainly attack at night, they must have poor eyesight and cannot see very well in daylight. During the day they must relay on other senses, scent or hearing. But since we're not them, we really do not know. "Kyu, you should rest," Akira says to me. I stop writing in my diary and look over at him.

    "Yeah," Takara agrees, smiling at me. "You should rest."

    "Alright," I say, putting my diary in my bag and lay out a mat and I lie down on it. Takara hands me a meager blanket.

    "It'll be getting cold soon."

    "Thanks." Takara is so nice to me, she treats me as if I was her younger sister. I fall asleep asleep a few moments later.

3: Entry 2: May 3, 2059

    We've moved on and haven't stopped since we ran into a pack of them a few days back. Thankfully none of us were injured or killed. That's the last thing we need, one of them possibly infecting one of us.

    "Alright," Akira says when we reach the next ruined city. "We'll have to stop here for the night. We have about 20 minutes until sundown. Let's secure a location on the fourth floor of this building." That's above their scout level and below their ship level. That's how we know when a raid is coming, the sound of their ships. At least I don't hear it, for now. Amon gets ready to prep a fire. "No fire, Amon."

    "Why not?" he asks, looking up at Akira.

    "It'll be a near-full moon with no clouds. We should be fine. Aeron, take first watch."

    "Sure," she says, climbing up through a hole to get to the level above us. I'm doing my best to set up the tent that Akira made a while ago, but it's really more of a two-person job.

    "Kyu, is the tent finished?" Amon asks.

    "Well it could be," I reply sarcastically, "if you could get off your damn ass and help."

    "Alright, alright." He stands up and helps me finish the tent. "There."

    "Good," Akira says. "The sun should finish setting here any moment now." He was right. The gold and red had left the sky to show nothing but blue and black with the sprinkles of white stars. "Kyu, you should join Aeron on watch." I nod and climb up to the level above us.

    "See anything?" I ask her as I take my post, looking off in the other direction.

    "Nothing yet," she responds. About halfway through my watch, that's when I hear it. A ship. Them. I frantically look through the scope to try to pinpoint them and I see the ship weave through the buildings, its spotlight trailing a young girl.

    "Somebody help me!" the poor girl cries out.

    "They're after her!" Aeron says.

    "Kyu-" Akira starts, but I'm way ahead of him. I can target the enemy pilot in the ship and with a pull of the trigger, I send a bullet into the ship, hitting the pilot. The ship stalls out and crashes. There's going to be a couple of scouts inside the ship, there always is. Takara and Akira jump down to save the girl while I keep my sights on the ship. Like I said, there's two scouts. I put a bullet into the head of one of them, while Aeron uses her pistols to try to shoot the other. After reloading, I aim the rifle, trying to get a good shot, when there's sudden machine gun fire, the other scout being ripped to shreds. There's another group of people. The mysterious group of people begin to show themselves as someone makes sure that they are dead. There's a signal and others show up from the shadows.

    "You others," a man from the other group says, referring to us, "come out." Akira gives us the signal and we step out. We line up in front of the man. "A group of fellow survivors."

    "Yes sir," Akira says. In situations like this, Akira always does the talking, unless we're directed to.

    "And for what reason are a group of kids doing out here?"

    "We're just trying to survive sir. We've been moving from place to place, trying to avoid them as much as possible."

    "I see. That's understandable." He looks off toward other people in his group who are caring for the girl. "We are based underground. If you wish, we are more than happy to allow you to rest with us." Akira motions for us to huddle into a group for discussion.

    "Should we?" he asks.

    "Maybe just for tonight," Takara says. "I've had enough of them for one night."

    "Agreed," Aeron says.

    "I wouldn't mind it," Amon says.

    "Sure," I say.

    "Alright," Akira says as we turn and face the man. "We'll gladly come along."

    "I'm glad you decided to stay with us. If you please just follow me." We follow the man as we head underneath the ruined city.

4: Entry 3: May 7, 2059

    Okay, okay. I know we said just for one night, but with the high and sudden rise of nightly raids of them and more scouting during the day, we've been staying with the man we met a few days ago. His name is Jerall, and he's the leader of the small town he's built under the city. Akira said that the reason for the rise in the raids was because we shot down one of their ships. Jerall had a similar thought.

    "Are you sure that you wish to leave when the raids quiet?" Jerall asked Akira.

    "Yes," he answered. "We really should be moving on."

    "I understand. But for now you're going to have to wait until they leave the city."

    "If anything, they know that we're down here," Takara says.

    "Yeah," I say. I think for a few moments while the others talk to try to come up with a plan. If they know we're down here, they could then "leave" but then ambush us when we thought they left. Brilliant tactics, I'll admit. "But not brilliant enough," I say aloud. The others look at me and I explain to them my train of thought.

    "Even in stealth mode, we can still hear their ships," Akira says. "They just turn invisible. They haven't perfected cloaking yet."

    "Yes, I noticed that," Jerall says. "Even when idling, there is still that noticeable hum. I think that if they do try this ambush technique, then we could ambush them."

    "Maybe we could even capture one of their ships," Amon says hopefully.

    "It is possible. I heard about a group of people in Germany who were able to do it."

    "If the leftover German Army can do it, then so can we."

    "Agreed," Akira says. "Jerall, we should explain this to your best fighters."

    "Yes," he says with an agreeing smile. We stand behind Jerall as he address those who live in this underground city. "Send word to the other underground cities. It's time to take back what was once ours!" The crowd agrees. "Those who are the best fighters and medics are to come along with us. Those who can travel quickly and stealthily, move from city to city. Humanity will take back our world from them!" The crowd cheers. "You have 15 minutes to get ready and then we deploy."

    After those 15 minutes, Akira and Jerall are leading us as a scout group to point out their ships. There's a couple scouting around, but that's all we can see for now. Akira gives me the go-ahead to climb up to the ship's level and I aim my rifle. There's a heavy buzz in the air. It sounds like an entire fleet. With one perfectly aimed shot, I kill the pilot and the ship falls to the ground. There's what sounds like an alarm and suddenly dozens more ships appear. That's when the others make their move. Dozens of us fire our weapons and shoot down more of their ships. It takes what seems like an eternity, but it turned out to only be half the day, we eventually shot down the final ship. We won this battle.

    There were cheers followed by the funerals for those we lost. The next day, using what resources we had, including the three ships we were able to commandeer, Jerall gave us permission to live on our own accord while he stayed and began to rebuild. We have some of their technology now. Jerall was going to begin some intense studies on their ships and weapon systems.

    "Move on from city to city and spread the word," Jerall told us. "Mankind has to know of our victory today. I'm going to stay and rebuild. It's time for us to come up from underground. We will no longer hide. We are going to fight back. We have some of their technology and weapons. This victory will begin the construction of a new world." After some final parting words, we left Jerall. Akira said that we would travel west. We know how to beat them, and now it's time to share this knowledge with the rest of the surviving world.

5: Entry 4: June 14, 2059

    We camp for the night in a small cave. Takara and Aeron scout the shallow cave to make sure that there's no sign of them. Thankfully, we're the only ones in here. Amon and I set up the tent and Akira consults a map that Jerall gave us.

    "We're 317 kilometers from Jerall. The next city should be another couple days from here," he says.

    "I think we really should try to find a way of faster travel," Amon says. "It'll get us to city after another in half the time."

    "Well, if Jerall can get those ships running, then who knows? We could be able to get one for ourselves," Aeron says.

    "Hell yeah."

    "It could make our life easier," Takara says from the mouth of the cave. "I'm game if you guys got a plan to get one."

    "Everyone, quiet," Akira says. Yeah, that hum in the air. It's them. We all get down as a few of their ships fly by. I watch as the ships scan the ground and suddenly, there's the sound of weapons firing as one of the ships fires at the others. We all gasp as we witness this betrayal. "It must be piloted by humans."

    "It has to be," I say. We watch as they climb out of their downed ships only to be shot by the renegade ship. That's when it hits me as I just now notice something. "That's not just an enemy ship, it's one of their dropships!" It's a lot bigger than the scout ships. It's big enough to hold four scout ships. The drop ship lands and Akira looks through some binoculars.

    "Humans. Our side."

    "Should we go down there?" Amon asks. "They could take us to the next city."

    "Or they could kill us and take our stuff."

    "We never know until we go down there."

    "Any sign of trouble, we get away from them. I don't want any of us to get killed." A scout ship comes out of the drop ship as the humans load up some of the other ship remains. The scout chip comes toward our cave. We all hide in the back of the cave as the scout ship shines the spotlight inside. Then, some armed people come in, pointing their guns.

    "We know you're in here," one says. "If you show yourselves now, you have my word we won't kill you." Akira and Aeron step into the bright light. Takara and Amon do as well. I'm the only one who's hesitating. "Is that all of you?"

    "Kyu, come on. They won't hurt us," Akira says. I step out and behind Takara. I'm actually scared for the first time in a while. "This is all of us. You have my word."

    "Thank you. Now if you please, pack up your impromptu camp and board our ship. It'll be safer." Reluctantly, we agree to follow this strange person. What Hell could possibly await us?

    Much later, we're aboard the drop ship. The man is standing in front of us in a room.

    "My name is Rolf. We are from what remains of Scandinavia. After we took over this dropship, we decided that we use it to battle them from the inside. Also, there is one other thing that's on my mind: how is it that a group of mere children are still alive?"

    "We survive by moving on from one city to the next," Akira says.

    "I see. What city did you come from last?"

    "Kyoto."

    "Ah, you're Japanese."

    "Yes. Those who are in Kyoto were able to get ahold of some of their technology by shooting down some scout ships."

    "So they fought back."

    "We were all there."

    "Impressive. It's actually quite nice to see that we are not the only ones fighting back. First America, us now Japan. If the rest of the world continues at this pace, then mankind should have fortified cities within a few years."

    "Rolf, what are we going to do with them?" another person asks the man. Now I'm a bit worried again.

    "Nothing yet. We may need them. For now, we'll take them to Neo-Oslo."

    "Yes sir." The second man hurries back to his post and Rolf continues to stare at us.

    "We'll be safe in Neo-Oslo. I suggest you children get your rest."

6: Entry 5: June 20, 2059

    When we feel the ship land we know that we're in Neo-Oslo. Akira keeps us together and Rolf takes us to the boarding ramp. As we disembark the stolen ship from Them, I look around. Not sure how long Rolf has had Neo-Oslo set up, but it seems that Neo-Oslo is a booming city. There's a large number of people and a large number of resistance forces. The entire city is a fort.

    "Follow me," Rolf says, "and I'll take us to your temporary home." This temporary home that he speaks of is a rather nice room with beds and everything. "I'll let you and your friends settle here, and if you wish, we'll be serving food in the basement in a few hours."

    "Alright sir," Akira says.

    "Excellent." The smile on Rolf's face seems genuine, but I can only wonder if there's something darker behind his expression in his thoughts.