"" When I was eight, my world was invaded.
They came without warning, in great black ships that dwarfed the pitiful transports that my people had made to ferry us between our home and our only colony farther out in our own system. We had never seen such power, such brutal technology. We had dared to hope that we were not alone, but this was beyond anything we were ready for, and we knew it.
It was a small mercy that they didn't simply open fire on our cities, as some of our darker stories assumed they would. Instead, they broadcast an ultimatum, informed us that they expected their demands to be obeyed to the letter, and then sent a series of preliminary orders.
Governments and corporations toppled, daily life became chaotic, and by the time their ground troops started landing in their flat, boxy craft, revealing flat, boxy soldiers in flat, boxy armor, we were prepared to give anything just to pretend life could get back to normal.
They made slaves of us, in a way. Giving us just enough hope for a better life that we would work ourselves to death under their new system. We were bent to the whip of mining, drilling, harvesting, but also technical skills; data entry, code testing, market research. We learned things we wouldn't have known for decades. We improved our technology, as best we could while still meeting our species-wide quotas.
They took what they wanted, and eventually, the thrill of invasion wore off. Skirmishes had happened at first, but then they simply died away as people gave up, or saw that we were only slightly worse off than under our own corrupt politicians. The invaders similarly lost interest, pulling back to their ships and just collecting their tribute every so often, like bored gods.
When I was fifteen, hardened from the mines, we were invaded for the second time.
They came in sleek ships of gleaming metal, sensor and broadcast arrays turning them into gleaming pincushions of communication. We had never seen such refinement, such purity of design. We knew we were not alone, but we were still trapped, and this new species came to us as potential saviors.
Of course, we should have known that wouldn't be the case. They struck a deal with the invaders, to use our world as a comm relay for their great network. We would be forbidden to use broadcast technologies, for fear of interfering with their great machines that they planted out in the oceans. Their technicans came down in shining silver needles, to show off their shining metal bodies, as they built their monuments.
They took slaves as well, engineers and programmers and guards and even simple couriers. They were well treated, fed and paid as much as could be spared. But they were still slaves. The things they learned put them so far ahead of the rest of us that even those simple servitors would be gods to us, but some came back and started teaching, while we were huddled in our old cities at night.
Eventually, the new invaders finished their work, and, leaving a few token ships in orbit to bombard anyone who broke the broadcasting rule, they left. We had access to their network now, but it was a culture so alien that it threatened to destroy us as much as any missile from the sky. But we held together, old stories kept passed on by word of mouth, and we hoped for a day we could reclaim our world.
Hope is a dangerous thing.
When I was twenty six, mind full of alien words, we were invaded a third time, we were hardly surprised anymore. We knew now there was a greater universe out there, teeming with life. We just wished we would ever get to know it on our own, instead of seeing massive globular ships that drifted into our system. We had never seen such nightmares, such monsters, as these.
They, too, struck a deal with the first invaders. But the tribute they demanded was not one of hands or minds, but of flesh. Black boxy soldiers next to twisted unarmored growths shuttled down to our world day after day, stealing away people seemingly at random. They vanished from our lives; we could not bear to think of what they were used for. Food? Pleasure slaves? Something worse?
Of course it was something worse, as I found out when I was one of the ones grabbed one night. When the cost of keeping us for their experiments became too great, those taken were returned, myself among them. We had been first poked and prodded, then divided up, then my group had various compounds injected into our skin. Over the course of months, we changed, flesh warping into patterns we couldn't quite understand. Some went mad, but the rest of us kept alert.
Through the pain of the changes, when we weren't under observation, we watched. We asked seemingly innocent questions, we stole glances at monitors, we listened. We learned. We came to understand that we were being made into new forms for use as world-shapers in the service of these third invaders. Our group was declared a failure, though, and so, flesh drooping from missized bones, we were sent back.
Their ships left, leaving only a few behind to monitor their experiments, and conduct new ones upon stable populations. Before the century was over, it was said, our people's original form would be gone. Lost to the tides of history.
At the age of thirty three, broken from the mines, poisoned by the network, warped by the serum, my world, still my home, was invaded for the fourth time.
They came in a thousand ships in as many styles. Some were the size of the first invader's warships, bristling with firepower that could destroy a world. Some were spiked with communications gear and sensors and warp field projectors. Some were plated with living armor. Some were sleek, some bulky. Some shone like stars, some were blacker than the void of space itself. Some were all of these things at once.
We waited in our decaying cities and broken homes, to see what new injustice would be dealt to us, trapped in our own gravity well. Watching the sky through makeshift telescopes.
I was one of the ones watching, and so I was one of the lucky few who got to see a flat box of a dreadnaught ripped into pieces by a volley of weapons fire that showed itself as sparkling dots through my scope.
I was privileged to witness one of those bristling needleships smashed by plasma fire that burned brighter than their ships would ever shine.
I was allowed the distinct honor of witnessing a bulbous nightmare burst like a bubble under the combined might of a dozen different aggressors.
I was one of the ones that saw the first landers come down, and ran out to meet them.
Fear had left me years ago, along with hope and pride and faith in justice. But now, all of those came rushing back as I dashed through the streets to meet our new occupiers. I would serve them willingly, for what they had done. I would throw myself at their feet and bow and scrape in payment for the vengeance they had brought my people, brought ME. What would they look like? What would they demand? It didn't matter, all that mattered was that they couldn't be like the others.
I reached the landing point. A few others were already there, but most were still hiding in buildings. They, too, had given up long ago. And they hadn't all seen the new way of things, as I had. I watched as the lander opened, and a number of small beings swarmed out. Two arms, two legs, one head. White suits, with a simple red cross on the arm. Two of them spotted me, and headed my way, pointing. They carried cases. So many of them were carrying things, bringing more and more out of their lander. Weapons? Tools?
One of them reached me, and in perfect language, asked "Are you wounded?"
I couldn't speak. I was confused, stunned. They spoke like us. They wanted to know if I was hurt? Did they only want the healthy? "I... can still work.." I rasped out, twisted tongue slapping against split lips.
The two looked at each other. One of them retracted their helmet as they turned back to look at me. A mess of brown hair over pale skin stared down at me with a look that I have come to universally recognize as pity. "No... are you injured? We won't hurt you, we're here to help."
We're here to help
I laughed. I laughed and laughed and kept laughing until my damaged lungs gave out and I collapsed. I heard the medics shout over me, felt rough suited hands on skin that had long ago ceased to feel properly. And then I was unconscious.
When I was thirty three, I met my first human. When I was thirty six, my body had been restored through medical technology that would have cost our planet its entire treasury, if they hadn't simply given it to us for free. When I was forty two, I moved back to my hometown, finished with my second tour in the Human Armada, repaying our, MY, saviors by joining their campaign of liberation against an angry galaxy. By the time I was forty four, I had helped rebuild the old city library with the help of some of my new neighbors, who were kind enough to have brought some of their people's books to contribute to the whole. By forty five, I had devoured the stories they brought and gone in search of more. At forty seven, I finished co-writing a book with a long time friend I had met a decade and a half past. At forty eight, that friend and I were more than just friends.
Fifty six and our adopted children were growing up together with other new kids in our neighborhood. Fifty nine and we had a pet dog, imported from Earth. Sixty and I finally convinced her to let us get a pet bel as well. Another decade since then of memories, dreams, family, friends, and advancement. My neighbors are now from four species, my friends from a dozen more. Our world is rebuilt, better than ever, with the help of our galactic friends. I have traveled so much farther than I ever imagined, and seen so many wonders, but all of them come up short compared to the simple pleasure of knowing who's waiting for me at home.
The first human I ever met was a headstrong medic who visited the first lurani she'd ever met in the makeshift hospital they'd set up every day until he agreed to stop being such a grovelling fool. Thirty seven years have past since then, and I still haven't totally given up on the grovelling part. Happy Liberation day, my friends, and to you, honey, happy anniversary. ""