I watched them pull the shuttle down. Despite what anyone else could tell you, and despite how hard we all fought following that, we all knew it was over. That was the moment in which all was lost.

No one, not the worst predictor of doom, could have imagined how things would go wrong. And even if anyone had, which to my knowledge no one could claim, no one could have said it would happen so fast.

Even now, the cataclysm was so swift, we've barely established all the details. The first wave of engineered insects was released in Iowa, supposedly under controlled conditions and after all testing had showed the improved locusts to be amenable, docile, and less hungry for crops. For all the good the testing and controls did. In the defense of the researchers involved, I suppose, they couldn't have expected this. They never expected for everything to have the absolute opposite effect, nor did they expect the problem to jump species. Or else the locusts themselves changed and evolved so quickly that they were unrecognizable as locusts. The original researchers were still debating this point when we lost all contact with them.

Regardless, the net effect was to have an ever-increasing horde of varied types of insects that overwhelmed everything they encountered. By overwhelmed, of course, I mean devoured. At first it was just vegetation--all vegetation. All the crops went first. Then the leaves on the trees, then the bark, then eventually the trees themselves.

About the time the vegetation worldwide began to go, the insects began to change and become more vicious. Stinging and biting deaths became more prevalent, seeming to come quicker each time. With each generation, which again, increased in speed as time progressed, they became more lethal to animal life.

The people who had no secure shelter went first, along with the majority of the animals. The first reports came back that the insects were developing a taste for metal and glass. Around this time it was decided to try and bring the shuttle out for a last ditch attempt to get someone off world. The vehicle was covered before it lifted off and then continued to be swarmed, even as it lifted off. We thought we had managed to get ahead of the curve when the insects that covered the shuttle did not begin to eat it. Those changes must not have made it to our portion of the world yet. But the time it took to get the shuttle into its place to launch, crawling along at one mile per hour--that was agony. We watched the teams in their environmental suits spraying down the hordes of insects with all manner of poisons, desperate to keep the craft as clear as possible for as long as possible.

It even took off successfully. Even with that extreme rate of ascent, those that were not already on the craft or shaken loose were able to catch it, grab hold, and stay on. So many held fast that they actually weighed it down enough to change its trajectory. Instead of shooting straight up and out, the shuttle curved, and eventually lost power in one of its thrusters, sending it careening into the Atlantic.

It was shortly thereafter that the metal and glass devouring variety, or strain, or whatever you would want to call it--arrived. They had picked up concrete along the way somewhere, apparently. They would envelope whole buildings and, within hours, you would see the entire mass start to shift, then give way. Presumably any people inside had been long been consumed.

It was then we fled our last above ground building into the locked down underground shelters. We had to walk outside, in the equivalent of a deep diving suit, to the entrance of the airlock. It was thirty feet from the hangar doors to the shelter doors, and I barely made it. I could feel them piling on. I could feel them trying with all their considerable might to kill me. One set of mandibles worked at the joint of my suit at the right elbow to the point where I was certain it would break through. But it didn't. I was in the airlock and next I knew they were spraying me down with insecticide, which was even then losing its potency. The creature which had tried so hard to gnaw off my arm I had to stamp to death myself. Even coated with poison it writhed on its back, trying to right itself and continue its assault.

The last team to enter the shelter never made it. We watched in their helmet cameras as something large and monstrous loomed up out of the swarm and then, seemingly, slapped them down. This did not kill the team members--these new creatures seemed to serve no purpose other than to pin the humans down until the others could make it through their protective suits. We in the shelter listened helplessly as our colleagues were ripped apart on the surface.

It was impressive how they moved from eating vegetation to flesh to inanimate objects. Just as one food supply was extinguished, they would adapt and eat something else. The theory is that, with the planet's surface barren as it is now, they have developed photosynthesis. They don't seem to eat each other--at least not while alive. An entire type has sprung up to consume the dead, with another living off of the others' waste products. This new ecosystem changes so rapidly it's hard to have any serious study. But it's enough to say that they not only destroyed the ecosystem of the planet Earth as we know it, they then replaced it. They became it.

Somewhere in here we passed desperation and began to slip into panic. It was admirable how long we managed to hold ourselves together as we watched the surface of the earth lost. There seemed to be some thought that we would have time to come up with a solution, hidden beneath the surface as we were--but we could not even be spared that luxury.

A new form of burrowing insect had burst through into one of our supply closets and laid eggs in it. We found it in time, luckily, and burned it and its progeny, then sealed the breach. It would only be a matter of time before others would follow. Many others. Anything would be better than waiting here to die. Something had to be done.

We had decided to tunnel to the ocean. There didn't seem to be anywhere else to go. We were here at the Cape, we were close enough to the water, and we simply had to do something. The team was busy trying to adapt the burrower that had been used to hastily expand our shelter--it had been kept on hand in case we needed to create more room, I believe.

However, one of the team down here was able to use one of the utility tunnels to get out to the Indian River. Still in his suit, we were able to hear both his report and the ocean around him. Over the speaker came what seemed to be the unmistakable sound of whalesong. The room cheered. We hugged each other and fought back tears. We were going to make it.

Then his voice came through, repeating himself because he hadn't been heard. "Those aren't whales," he said simply. "Those aren't whales."