Nimix’s ship hovered in orbit silently like a monstrous bird. Barb looked out of the porthole in horrified silence. Thousands of grotesque ships filled the sky, landing ships poured from their undersides onto Earth below. The ISS went slowly by below, its silent frame crawling with alien shapes as flash fires burned from the oxygen lines.

She nearly fainted when she looked back to the ships. They were alive. They writhed and shook in massive convulsions as they gave birth to the landing craft crashing to Earth. She felt crazy. They couldn’t be alive. Nothing survives space. Nothing that humans knew about anyway.

There was a hiss behind her and Nimix stepped into the chamber behind her. Barb lunged at him in desperation, begging him to do something. She clawed at his face before he threw her off. To her surprise, his face fell off, revealing scales and a baleful red eye. She recoiled instantly away from him(it?).

“Beutifal, isn’t it?” the beast said simply, motioning to the porthole’s awesome view.