I wake up to the annoying sound of my alarm going off. It’s supposed to be Saturday why in the world is my alarm going off. I open my eyes and gather my surroundings. It’s dark out still. This was odd, It hasn’t been this way for a couple of months. I check the time and it says it’s 1:37 am. As I was checking the time I noticed that it wasn’t my alarm that was going off. There is a notification saying “breaking news…” I unlock my phone. Having no clue what could be happening that is so important that I have to know. I’m a 15-year-old kid. I honestly don’t care about the news. I just assumed it was important. I clicked on the notification. It pulls up a long page stating that an experiment escaped from a nearby science lab. I live close to a college campus. It mostly teaches science majors. I didn’t think much of it, I thought it was just some rat with an ear on it and it was “of utmost importance to find it and bring it back”. I got out of bed to ask my mom if she knew about it.

She didn’t know what to do when the phone alert came.

She didn’t know what to do when panic overtook her mind, clouding her logical decisions.

“We are under attack. Lock your doors and bar your windows.”

Scampering off of the couch in something akin to shock, the girl nearly tripped as she flung herself up the steps.

Whimpers and yells of “mom!” ran out of her mouth at fast speeds as she turned the corners and pushed open doors, trying to find her mother.

Suddenly, mid-step, she became aware of the pinging.

It was coming from her phone.

“Let me in.” was being sent to her phone, from hundreds of numbers that weren’t familiar to her.

Releasing a choked gasp, the girl sucked in a deep breath before letting it out with a shudder. Her blue eyes filled with tears that were scrambling out at an alarming speed.

Pluto was sitting next to me on the couch with her head on her paws.
She seemed to be sleeping soundly despite the light from the lamp.
It was one in the morning and I was finishing a paper for my writing class.
The light from my laptop was harsh on my eyes and I was sure that I was going to have bags under them in the morning, but I was nearly finished and decided to power through.
I had the TV on so I could have a bit of background noise.
Without it, the room would be quiet aside from the ticking of the clock,
begging me to slip into bed soon.
I had the news on, but I wasn’t paying any attention to it.
There was really nothing to watch at this time of night,
but sometimes I would find a golden treasure of movies running on various channels.
There was nothing on tonight though, so it was going to have to be the news.
I never worked without background noise. It blocked my concentration with thoughts of the silence.

Something was buzzing. I rolled over drowsily, groping for the sleep button on my alarm clock.

Crash! I had made contact with my alarm clock but the buzzing continued. I groggily opened my eyes and found the source of the good-for-nothing noise. My phone was glowing red and buzzing loudly. An alert was flashing on the screen.

“We are under attack. Lock your doors and bar your windows.”

Suddenly I got a text message, then two, then three, they kept coming until there were hundreds of text messages on my phone. The texts were rolling in. I didn’t know any of the numbers but they all had the same message, “Let me in.”