In the heart of Sydney, Australia, a fleet of alien spacecraft descends from the sky, their sleek forms casting long shadows over the iconic Opera House and Harbour Bridge.  

People gather on the streets to gaze upward as pulsating lights suddenly appear, accompanied by a low hum coming from all directions.  

Breaking through the very fabric of space, enormous metallic objects materialize from another dimension. The humming ships crush buildings all over the city and begin to unfold, revealing the horror inside. The aliens, humanoid in form, standing over seven feet tall with arms, legs, and two eyes, begin to emerge from these strange crafts. At first sight of their menacing fangs and claws, life in the bustling city seems to explode into chaos and confusion, with cars burning and buildings falling.  

But within days, after the initial shock, the humans step out of hiding to see if they can learn more about these strange creatures. Perhaps they might even coexist with them?  

The aliens apologise profusely for the destruction to their buildings and present themselves as peaceful visitors looking to trade and share knowledge.  

However, eventually the facade of diplomacy crumbles from these extra-terrestrial predators. In its place, the truth: an insatiable desire for conquest and savagery. Society collapses into unspeakable terror. The invaders, with corrosive venom dripping from their fangs, their claws flaying flesh from bone, and their weapons turning humans into shrieking pools of liquified tissue, resemble walking slaughterhouses.  

As they destroy without mercy and pile bodies into macabre monuments to celebrate their supremacy, the streets quickly turn red. Those who die are the lucky ones, for the humans that survive the first assault are yet to suffer a worse fate. Hybrid breeding facilities crop up on the outskirts of the city as the aliens seek to create the perfect slave race. Through conquest of body and soul, the aliens breed their two races. Torn between species, these hybrid offspring become pawns in a brutal game of survival.  

Humans are decimated to only small groups of survivors. Those who endure can only hide and pray for survival. Few dream of ever fighting back, for the extinction of the human race appears imminent to all. 

But not to everyone. When the apocalypse first began, I was homeless, living out of a backpack. I returned to the cities now and then for supplies, but usually I preferred to live alone in the bush, like my Aboriginal ancestors once had.  

When my grandfather, a Mabarn, lay dying, he placed a crystal around my neck. He was a powerful spiritual leader. I accepted his gift without question.  

My grandfather revealed that the crystal was a Jawal stone from the Dreaming. The crystal embodies the spiritual essence and power of our ancestral beings.  

I did not realize the power of the crystal when I received it as a young child, but after the alien invasion, the Jawal stone started to pulse with otherworldly power. It began to guide me with knowledge I never knew I had. I grappled with sleepless nights and waking dreams as I witnessed the destruction of everything: humans being eaten alive and gunned down, the theft of our children, families torn apart. And one final secret.  

The crystal told me I could save everyone. 

I was torn. Should I save a country that had, centuries earlier, gone through another alien invasion, but one within the human nations; an invasion that had devastated our Aboriginal people and led to my grandfather’s illness, my own homelessness? Or should I stand by and allow yet another cycle of tyranny to claim even more victims? 

While I struggled to decide, the alien regime continued to grow. The remaining survivors were told to either embrace their supreme authority or face systematic annihilation. Nobody could be trusted. Collaborators were betraying their own kind in desperate attempts to survive, selling out resistance cells and delivering victims to appease their new masters. The resistance was fighting a losing battle, resorting to increasingly brutal tactics that blurred the line between defender and monster.  

Against my chest, the crystal continued to hum, waiting for my decision.  

I am guided to a rocky outcrop high up in the Blue Mountains. From here, I can see the sky is dotted with enormous metallic outlines of alien spacecraft in every direction. There is no escaping them.  

I step into a cave deep within the mountain. Inside, I am not surprised where the Jawal has taken me. The paintings my people had placed there thousands of years ago surround me. I can feel the power of the crystal in every cell of my body, a burning sensation again my neck. I rip it from my skin, raising it to the heavens. Songs erupt from my throat in a tongue I don’t consciously recognise: the language of my ancestors. 

Louder and louder, I sing. With a sudden burst of energy, a powerful light surges upward and out of me, creating a massive rift in the blue sky above.  

The aliens and their spacecraft disappear into the void. All gone, in less than a second. A profound silence hangs over the valley.  

So, my decision had been made. The humans would survive. Hybrid human-aliens would struggle on. I wondered how we would all fit into the puzzle that remained. I wondered what this new world would look like.