It had been, all agreed, a busy week.
It was December, 2012, and despite the almost hopeful declarations of doom by the Mayan calendar enthusiasts, the world did not end on the 12th.
It ended on the 16th.
The doom sayers clung to hope on the 13th, putting the distinct lack of annihilation down to cosmic lag. By the 14th, nobody was paying them any mind and was instead doing all the Christmas shopping they'd neglected when they thought the holidays had been called off on the count of oblivion. Nothing was particularly amiss on the 15th, save for an increasing number of store riots, but that was only to be expected when WalMart declared buy two get one free on all electronics.
The meteors hit sometime around ten in the morning. They fell from the sky in a curtain of fire, raining down into the sea. Some meteorologists worried about adverse effects this might've had for the shore: tidal waves, tsunamis, the rains of fish that turn up every once in a while, but other, more sensible meteorologists called them out for catering to the media. Most of the rocks were disintegrated in the atmosphere, and the ones that did make it were the size of baseballs. There was a bit of infighting over this until the leviathan rose up from the deep and everyone forgot about the argument.
Satellites watched it happen, as did two cruise ships, a fishing trawler, and a castaway on a raft. Only the first ones, however, managed to catch it on camera.
The leviathan rose up from the waves. Water cascaded down its shoulders, its many eyes glowing yellow in the dim light. It opened its mouth to give out a roar when-
Dink
One of the meteorites hit it. The small rock bounced off the creature's shoulders. The leviathan shook its head, fanned out its fin-like wings, drew in a breath and-
Dink dink
It swiveled its massive head around to see what had happened, only for-
Dink dink dink
A tentacle came out from the water and tried to shield the creature's head.
Schrreeeesh
A chunk of flesh was torn off the tentacle as a particularly large rock hit it. For the next twenty minutes, meteorites fell from the sky and tore at the leviathan. They might have killed it, eventually, if one hadn't hit it squarely in the temple. Many yellow slitted eyes rolled back in their sockets, and the beast tumbled backwards into the sea, unconscious.
The resulting wave carried all three ships and the castaway several miles west, where they immediately began corroborating their stories and started calling news stations.
The hundred or so videos taken on all the cell phones were up on Youtube within the hour.
It was all over the news the next day. It had been all over the internet the day before, but news stations and papers were a bit slow on the uptake. Everyone was giving their opinion on the matter; scientists, theologians, zoologists, conspiracy theorists, politicians, Crazy Street People Who Shout Things- everyone.
The next day with filled with earthquakes. Reports later showed that there were no casualties. Buildings collapsed, roads cracked, hundreds if not thousands were left homeless, but no human life was lost.
People were still reeling from the shock of it all, but managed to scrape together a few relief efforts. The various governments set about getting medical aid to their constituents, only to find that very few people were actually hurt. Instead, focus was put on getting people places to stay. In smaller towns and villages, people opened their own homes up to their neighbors until something more substantial could be done. In bigger cities, temporary shelters were built for those who couldn't gain admittance into one of the overstuffed regular shelters.
The four horsemen of the apocalypse showed up on the 20th, followed closely in suit by an army of angels. Below, in the center of what remained of New Jersey, a large crack opened up and the forces of hell rose up.
One of the angels managed to blow on his trumpet, only for a giant wolf to come seemingly out of nowhere and eat him in one snap. Both armies froze, wondering what was going on. The horsemen, however, were rather single minded and kept on trotting, expecting the wolf to get out of their way. They were promptly eaten. Fenrir then found himself with a bad case of food poisoning and had to go have a lie down.
The forces of heaven and hell shrugged it off and took to the sky in a clash of flaming steel, feathers, bat wings, and arrows. They were almost immediately felled by bolts of lightning as Zeus -who had been in the middle of his nap- took offense to the noise. They tumbled down to Earth, the bolts striking them indiscriminately. By the time it had ended, only a handful of each army was left, the others having died or teleported back home. The remaining angels and demons weighed the benefits of continuing their own dispute while dealing with the Greek pantheon, found it ultimately not worth it, collected their wounded and went to go sit out the rest of Armageddon in a local Starbucks, where they shared mochas and pastries and complained about both of their bosses.
The second coming of Christ corresponded with the arrival of not one, but two different alien civilizations. The Centaurians from Beta Centauri and the Kthlg'har'har'akth'javal from the planet Tizzlef@r'zll%Kthlr^y, the first being stereotypical laser-wielding little gray men most people had come to know and love, and the second being horrendous, many-eyed, twelve-foot-tall tentacled monstrosities composed entirely of fire and scales. Both alien races had come to enslave Earth. The Centaurians because they had mistakenly interpreted various signals sent out as some sort of declaration of war, the Kthlg'har'har'akth'javals because they perceived humans as a species of adorably clever hypoallergenic pets that came in a wide array of colors and shapes.
The Centaurians, being as they were prepared for battle, saw Christ descending from on high and naturally assumed him to be some sort of weapon. they rammed him with one of their ships. The Kthlg'har'har'akth'javals, seeing what they thought to be a vile act of animal abuse, called them on it. Before any sticky green bloodshed could occur, Christ managed to talk them both down and invited them out to Denny's for lunch. They accepted and parked their armies behind the moon out of sight. The Centaurians because they thought there was some sort of official peace talks being held, and the Kthlg'har'har'akth'javals because- Aww look at da wittle hoooman! He's eatin' his foods wiff his wittle pawsies.
By the end of it, all three representatives had gotten thoroughly drunk and were swapping stories of their misadventures in the various dimensions.
By the 22nd, the hangovers had worn off and they all went back to their respective homes, having totally forgotten why they had come to Earth to begin with.
The only human beings who noticed were a handful of astronomers who'd watched in fascination as a fleet of starships swarmed around the moon like tiny bees, a few conspiracy nuts who were certain they saw little gray men staggering out into the parking lot, and the staff at Denny's, who were so jaded that they couldn't care even if you had paid them.
On the 23rd, a potential cure for cancer inadvertently created an army of zombies intent of devouring the flesh of the living. The outbreak was stopped by rednecks with shot guns within twenty minutes.
On the 24, every household, shelter, hut, tent, and cardboard refrigerator box in the world woke up to a small, festively wrapped box waiting for them. if there was a Christmas tree, the box would be sitting beneath it. If there was a Menorah, the box would be sitting beside that. If there was no holiday icon at all, the box would simply be sitting someplace where nobody could possibly miss it.
Inside the box was a note that simply read: "Have a nice holiday."
On the back was a forty-seven digit contact number. It could be dialed into anything phone-like - pay phones, cellphones, little toy plastic phones- and the call would go through without a hitch. When people called it (which they inevitably did), they would first be directed to an operator. The operator would ask them if they were sure they'd like to proceed. When they said yes (and most did say yes, eventually), they would be directed to Human Resources and someone would begin to speak to them. After the call was made, nobody could remember what had been said, but they did remember it as being the most wonderful thing they'd ever heard.
The number stayed active until midnight on the 25th.
The rest of the month when by quietly. As did the next. And the next. Despite claims that "everything had changed" and "the world would remember," people let things get back into a semblance of normalcy. Cities were rebuilt, the Simpsons still came on every night at six, the internet was thriving. Things were, for all intents and purposes, back to normal.
It had been, all agreed, a very busy week.