Parasitic invasion

An alien invasion struck the Earth. They didn’t arrive with lasers or warships or cutting-edge technology, they fell in a rain of stars, emerging from the meteorites. They are two-meter-tall creatures with skeletal appearances, four legs and four arms, large teeth, and a tongue that looks like a tree branch, with offshoots that can extend or retract.

Their modus operandi is to attack vulnerable or distracted prey, preferably those who are alone. They begin by devouring their victim’s stomach; once that’s done, they wait for the victim to die and then proceed to insert themselves into the body, compressing to fit perfectly. From there, they use their tongue to “connect” to the victim’s nervous system and take control over them and their vital functions. In this way, they gain access to the person’s memories and behavioral patterns, allowing them to disguise themselves without leaving a trace of suspicion that the victim has been replaced. When the creature reaches a certain stage of maturity, it seeks out another victim to devour and implants a small copy of itself inside. This is how they reproduce and spread.

It’s already been three years since the invasion began, and the governments of the world have not been able to stop the spread of the plague. Even though the world looks calm, with no constant wars or shootings, the healthcare systems across the globe have been the firsthand witnesses that the plague continues to expand. X-rays are frequently performed, in which it’s easy to see whether someone already has one of these parasites inside them.

The curious thing is that the affected people don’t show any visible abnormality, no scars on their stomachs, no strange behavior, and when they discover the truth of their condition, they fall into the same kind of mental crisis any normal person would. The victims placed under observation don’t show any hostile change in behavior; on the contrary, they suffer from depression, anxiety, and many have attempted suicide.

People constantly want to get X-rays to know whether they’re infected or not, but access to that kind of testing has been restricted because of how dangerous it is to receive X-ray exposure frequently, and also to avoid feeding the panic.

In my last scan, my results came back fine. There was nothing wrong inside me. But that doesn’t reassure me much, because those who were infected say they didn’t notice anything when it happened, they didn’t find torn clothes or bloodstains, which suggests these parasites are very careful not to leave any evidence. That’s why I’m afraid to sleep. I think it’s a fear we all share now: the fear of going to sleep and waking up the next day not knowing whether you’re already dead and carrying one of those parasites inside you.

Yesterday I was with my girlfriend. We hadn’t seen each other in a while and missed each other, so we arranged to meet. We sent each other our test results, showing we were clean, nothing wrong inside, that we were still alive and that the love we felt was real, not some sick imitation created by a martian bug.

We talked about a lot of things, catching up on our lives. We hadn’t been able to see each other often for a while because of the parasite panic, but in that moment none of that mattered. The only thing that mattered was that we were finally together. We both felt so relieved; we even thought about getting married as soon as possible, maybe even having children before cruel fate reached us.

Too bad that won’t be possible anymore. Things happened so fast I didn’t have time to process them properly. I looked away at the window for a second; when I looked back at her, she had already lunged at me. From her back the parasite’s arms burst forth; from her mouth came that branching tongue. Terror and grief washed over me, and when I tried to scream, no sound came out, instead, a purple, branching tongue emerged from my mouth. The two tongues touched, producing a spark, and then retreated back inside us.