The Fifth Day
Science Fiction story
The Fifth Day
Earth, long has it been the planet where the existence of life been found. Light shed into its atmosphere from the origin, ninety-three million miles away. The first streak of light peered over the horizon in Sydney, Australia. Drew stood on the deck, sipping his morning coffee as the ocean glistens in front of him. Watching sunrise, the preferred manner to pleasantly start off the day.
‘Early morning news in the background’
News Anchor: Rise and shine, early viewers this is your 5AM news, we have some astonishing news to bring to you. Astronomers at the Keck Telescope Observatory in Hawaii have announced that they discovered a satellite within our solar system. It appeared yesterday, and since, has baffled scientist as it is planet-less but revolves in a 28 hour formation. Quite similar to earth, this is a major discovery. Stay tuned to us as we are following up on this story.
*Phone rings in the background*
Daniel: “Drew you saw the news just then?”Drew: “Yea... yeah I saw”
Daniel: “That’s pretty odd. They’re definitely not telling all of what they know”
Drew: “Of course, when do they ever. Look if you wanna look further into this, you can go do so, but I’m not.”
Daniel: “Oh c’mon... you’re one of the Hansen family? An entire family of astronomers, why let a brilliant chance like this slip!?”
Drew: “Dan, things happen for a reason. I’ll call you back later”
It’s not like anything special ever happens. We’re just a family of astronomers, we’ve been spending most of our lives gazing upon planets and stars. It’s no legacy, we’re just like everyone else. And today, is just like every other day since day one of August on a daily routine, out for a couple hours of observatory and enjoying my time off.
*Phone rings again*
Drew *mumbling*: My god, Dan I told you I was gonna call you back...*Picks up his phone*
Drew: Dan! This doesn’t concer-
Ken: Drew... it’s Ken.
Drew: Oh. I’m sorry, thought it was... someone else. Uhh, aren’t you in Cali?
Ken: Well yeah but I got called up last night about some unusual activities with this planet-less satellite. Arrived at the Keck just then. Don’t tell me you haven’t heard of it yet!
Drew: No, haven’t heard much. I’m going out very soon, we’ll talk another time.
Ken: You really haven’t changed, I’d expect your vacation to have changed something.
Frustratingly, Drew knocks over a tin box off the shelf spilling out documents.
Crouching down to pick it up, “The Empty Trajectory - 2015” caught his eyes. Unveiling the two century old document, his great grandfather wrote.
“Gravitational pull, setting things in motion, pulling objects towards the source. I can’t imagine how our moon would revolute without a planet. It’s an amazing discovery, some two hundred light years away however. The public must know about this...”
*Returning back to the phone call*
Ken: Drew stop mumbling... what’s going on?
Drew: Yea... hold on I’m gonna return the call.
*hangs up*
*Calling Daniel back*
Drew: Dan! Meet me at Sydney International in two hours. Pack everything necessary, we’re going now!
Dan: Whoa, whoa. Wait what!? What’s going on? Where are we going?
Drew: We don’t have much time, I’ll tell you when we meet there. We’re heading straight to Hawaii.
Dan: Huh? I thought you weren’t...
Drew: Dan don’t let me down on this.
*Hangs up*
My great grandfather documented about the existence of a planet-less satellite, and got the news out to the public in a race against another astronomer. However it mysteriously disappeared before the public could confirm it themselves, and his work, lost and forgotten. I had something to prove soon as I arrived at Keck. The following days, were a series of incidents no one would have seen coming.
Day one the asteroid belt was shifting direction. Day two, its planet revealed and structures were visible. Might it be our sister planet? Day Three, it was imminent something awfully strange was happening and it was posing a threat towards us.
The Fourth Day, NEO (Near Earth Objects) department announced that August 8th, 2218 might be the last day humanity’s presence be on Earth. Thousands of asteroids, some the size of Cruise Ships, just hurling its way towards us at speeds five times faster than a space shuttle.
The Fifth day, our government planned this way before hand but it would never fully work. The plan was clear, we were going up and weren’t coming back down. Cities burned, death toll impacting a quarter of a billion even before “Doomsday” arrived. Where were we going? No clue, there was no plan B, thousands of these launched but we would perish in space just as those that stayed behind.
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