From above, the city lay silent. Hundreds of miles of custom-built habitat stretched across the world’s face like a massive stain. Every inch of the city had spent the last century bathed in light and hammered with endless sound and now it seemed to strain against the sudden vacuum. From high above, the city looked peaceful but eerie, like it had been inexplicably abandoned but left intact. Closer, the city gave lie to that appearance. Entire mega-skyscrapers were blackened pillars, marking fires that had raged unchecked. From closer, the rubble and wreckage from shattered buildings was visible marking where war had come to the city. Dropping below the towering skyline, the full truth of the story was revealed.
Corpses in the thousands choked every street, disturbed only by the unfortunate wounded and carrion eaters. Here in these canyons, the city trembled under the sound of it’s conquers. Gunships prowled the streets, gunning down any of the city’s silver-skinned inhabitants who were left. Violent skirmishes erupted between the teams hunting through the city and her proud inhabitants who were left.
Past the edges of the city, into the wilds that surrounded it, there was a different picture. Gunships raced back and forth, dodging the lighting-quick strikes of vengeful alien fighters who slashed the night sky in strikes of light and death. Below them, a desperate engagement was underway, golden-armoured aliens fought from every tree with weapons that hurled stars of sapphire into their camouflage-dressed enemies. Brief pulses of blue light shined from the invader’s guns, the electro-magnets hurling solid bullets through the air at the outnumbered aliens. Here and there among the great trees of the alien forest, brutal melees erupted, the aliens wielding weapons not seen on a field of combat since before the age of gunpowder. These warriors scythed through the invaders with blades of frozen mist, the metal both, strange and familiar, terrifying and beautiful to those who faced it. Behind these determined defenders fled the people of the city.
Heavy tanks rumbled down the roads toward the city, followed by armour personnel carriers and support vehicles. Columns of infantry marched with them, bearing grisly trophies taken from the aliens. Gunships and transports rumbled overhead, causing the ground to tremble with their passing. Watching it all was a pockmarked sign with flowing runes. To the invaders it meant nothing but to the former inhabitants it read: Welcome to Zavalla. To the historians of the future, it read: Welcome to the First Great War. (this last name is a work in progress to cliche imo)
