Two accidental immortals are fleeing the dying Earth with family and frenemies but get rejected by every planet at the local equivalent of gunpoint.
Excerpt:
Chapter 1. Noah.
Tomorrow’s my last birthday on Earth, if I make it alive. Though the Emergency Alert System estimates a high probability of the Eye Snatchers attack, the unbreakable troika—my wife, myself, and Rabota—decide to celebrate it anyway. We keep our weapons loaded, of course. Because we can be killed. Even Rabota can, though she won’t admit it.
Waiting for my wife, I stand by the only unbroken window in our house, watching the angry streaks of light traversing the darkening skies. The rest of the windows are boarded. Bullets, shrapnel, rocket fire, hurricanes, tornadoes, and acid rain pockmark the walls of the house across the street. Plywood boards barely cover up some of the battle scars. Most houses in the neighborhood look like that.
A busy sparrow, the leftover of a large flock, scouts the ground for bugs. I’m rooting for her.
“You’re luckier than I am,” I tell the sparrow. I hope she understands my accent, especially the “th” that sounds like “t.”
“When the Collapse comes, you’ll just leave the bugs alone and head for the stars. You have wings, don’t you? You don’t need to elbow others to get on a spaceship. I mean, elbowing is just a figure of speech. People kill each other for a space on board. And we have a family to save. They are coming over soon.”
The sparrow ignores me. Perhaps she can’t hear me through the glass. Perhaps she’s busy. Perhaps she’s too wise to engage with an old man.
Someone has written, “You are NOT welcome to the neighborhood” on the plywood in bold, red letters. All evidence points to Rosa, our neighbor. Who else would waste hard-to-get paint? I admire her spirit. Everything is falling apart; everyone is trying to seek sanctuary in the stars, and she still has time for sarcasm.