The lush blue-green Kentucky grass darkened as the sun’s rays became hidden behind the light fluffy white clouds of the warm Saturday morning. The large oak trees that surrounded the area shaded the grass and sidewalks with their shadows, making it appear even darker. An odd silence hung in the air, the birds did not sing, the crickets did not chirp, the bees did not hum, and the dogs did not bark. For those few moments when the sun was hidden by the clouds the area had grown immensely quiet, too quiet. Though, as the few moments passed, the sun’s rays returned and with it so did the noise of the surrounding animals. The dogs barked at the cars that passed their territory or the people that walked on the sidewalks. The bees hummed as the collected nectar from the flowers. The crickets rubbed their legs together, making the chirping noise loud and clear. The birds sang harmonious, decorative songs to one another. It seemed as if nothing had happened at all.
There were people though, that did notice the strange silent. These people were befuddled by what they heard and after a few moments of everyone just standing in place they began to move on with their daily activities. Most forgot what they heard or thought their minds were playing tricks on them. Others were more wary of what went on around them and studied the results of everything they did throughout the day. But the day came and went with nothing out of the ordinary happening during the rest of the day. So those that were cautious settled down and went about their daily lives as they would normally.
The next day, a man in his late forties awoke early Sunday morning to attend work. The balding man draped himself in a opaque bath robe and milky white slippers before heading outside to get the morning paper that delivery boy had just dropped off. He brought the coffee mug he held in one hand to his mouth and drank the hot, rather disgusting liquid that kept him up during the early hours of the day. Though he disliked the flavor he drank it because he knew without it he wouldn’t be as alert as he would with it. His mind raced with ideas of what to make his wife and kids for breakfast on the beautiful spring morning. Bacon sounded good, scrambled eggs too, maybe even some… squirrels? He took a double-take of what he thought had been a massive mass of squirrels. But he was right, they were squirrels, and they were headed straight towards him. “Oh my… god.” He said hugging the newspaper he’d just picked up close to him. “Honey!” He yelled as he ran inside to fetch his wife and the kids, this couldn’t be good. This just couldn’t be happening.
A few blocks away, nestled in a cozy little neighborhood stood a small two story house that didn’t look anything out of the ordinary. Cream colored siding with off-white shutters that decorated the windows. The front porch was small and made of cement. It had just enough room to fit a small bench in front of a large window that overlooked the front lawn. The garage door was open and inside were several bikes, rollerblades, there was a pile of shoes near the garage door and a large maroon colored suburban rested silently somewhere in the middle. The was a small garden that lined the porch and trailed along the sides of the driveway. Blooming flowers were decorative shades of pink, yellow, white, and purple which added to the cozy atmosphere of the house itself.
Behind the house was a steep hill. At the bottom of the hill there stood a trampoline and a wooden swing set. Past that, there was a small woods area that stretched throughout the rest of the neighborhood. Within the woods was a small creek and there was a bank that was made entirely out of clay. As one went further on through the woods they’d come to dirt paths where the foliage grew a bit closer together and then the woods ended. Past the woods was a large golf course that had many small ponds along the greenery.
Nestled inside were five children ranging from ten months to ten and the parents who’d surprisingly been married for the past eleven years, a rare occasion in America’s society nowadays. In addition to the family of seven, there was also a young yellow Labrador around five years old, Sage. The father of the household, Kevin, was currently cooking up breakfast. The aroma of bacon, sausage, and eggs filled the Drummond household as the children began to stir. The mother, Jackie, was nursing the infant Jack so he wouldn’t awaken the other children. Sage was outside exploring the neighborhood, able to roam free without a care in the world.
As the oldest of the children, Rachael, wok up she immediately got out of bed. She could smell the sweet scent of bacon and she followed her nose up the stairs and into the kitchen. She and her two year younger sister Elizabeth shared a room in the basement. They relatively got along better together than the other kids. The pair did everything together and were very much laidback even for children of their age. Rachael glanced at her brother Rex who was four; he was gobbling up the sausages and bacon their dad had just set on the plate. He did live up to his name, like the dinosaur, he usually only ate meat or junk food. “Could I have two eggs?” Rachael asked her dad as she sat down on one of the stools near the counter.
Kevin grabbed a plate and place two eggs on it before handing it to Rachael. “Thanks,” she said as she piled on some sausages and bacon before Rex could get his greedy little hands on any more. Soon enough Liz and Sarah joined her, each grabbing an egg and some bacon before stuffing their mouths full of food. It was like any other day; everyone was getting ready to go outside. Especially Rachael, who had plans to go hang out with her best buds Lindsay and Danielle who lived just down the street.
Everyone got changed and bid their farewells to mom and dad before beginning to head out the door. But each child stopped as they heard their dog yelping, barking, and growling at something just outside. The children piled out of the door and stood in sheer shock at the scene they saw before them. There were squirrels everywhere and they were viciously attacking their dog, Sage, who was trying to fend them off and protect her family. “Dad!” The children cried in unison as they watched their beloved dog defend them from these evil squirrels.
Their father came running out of the house at their cries, spatula still in hand. “Oh my…” He muttered astonished at what he saw. “Jackie! Get Jack in the car!” He yelled, herding the other children back inside. “Go get into the car and use the garage door,” he said as he raced down stairs to the safe which he quickly unlocked and pulled out his beloved guns. He took as many rifles as he could carry in one hand and grabbed as many boxes of bullets in the other. If this was war he was ready.
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Tiara awoke with a start, beads of sweat dripping down her face as she sat up in bed. Lightning streaked the black sky and seconds later thunder crackled. Her body was covered in sweat, her shoulder blade length brown hair clung to her face and she pushed it away gently as she grabbed the glass of water on her nightstand. Another dream, another horrible dream. After the glass of water on her bedside was gone she pulled her knees close to her, and let the tears fall. She loved it when she didn’t have any dreams, where sleep came and went and she didn’t remember a thing. This was more or less because her dreams weren’t just regular dreams; they were visions. Visions that would soon come true. Visions she had to stop. But how was she to stop a herd of vicious squirrels attacking her state, Kentucky, or possibly even the whole country?
Tiara grabbed a notepad and pen from the side table and wrote the dream in sketchy details. She wrote about the landmarks in her dream. She wrote about the family, about the dog, about the park, and about the silence. These were key points in her dream, and these people she had to meet, she had to find a way to stop what was bound to happen. She needed… help.
