When I observed Dayce approaching the car, he lacked his laugh and smile. I missed them already, fearing how little I would see those spectacles of joy in the coming future. He entered the backseat without saying a word. I had already come to the conclusion that I would let him confront the news first, so I merely continued to gauge his disposition. He remained in a contemplative state for several minutes into the drive, a sight that was so foreign for me to witness. The muteness seemed to grow between us with every sporadic glance I made to him in the rearview mirror, which happened as much as I was safely able.
Finally, after I thought he might be waiting to speak with his mother instead of me, he asked, “Are we going to get hit, too?”
I couldn’t help but grin a little, mainly because I was relieved to hear his voice, but also due to the manner in which he stated the question. It made me realize how simple the conversation could be. “No, Dayce,” I said with a lighter heart, making sure we locked eyes in the mirror. “Impacts like this are rare. It could be hundreds, maybe thousands of years before this happens again.”
“No one knows when it could happen, then?”
“Sometimes we can see it coming, but we have to learn not to live in fear of what could happen. I definitely wouldn’t be driving right now if that were the case. It wouldn’t be a healthy way to live.”
“So, you’re not afraid, Daddy?” he asked, his mood relaxing.
“Your mother wouldn’t marry a coward, would she? Her men have to be brave for her, Dayce, and then she won’t be afraid. Do you understand?”
“I understand.” He settled with a smile into the plush seats of the car. “I won’t make Mommy worry.”
This was the last conversation we had that day about the calamity. He was a resilient boy, and seemed, from my perspective, to be taking the tragedy rather well; better than I or his mother could have hoped. Taking what I said to heart, Dayce appeared to make his sole purpose to keep his mother distracted. Lizeth enjoyed the unusual amount of attention her son gave her. She listened with great diligence at everything he said, even wearing a wonderstruck expression that I found endearing. She made it seem as though he was disclosing a revolutionary new discovery to her, despite him just talking about his schoolwork or his favorite athletes. Dayce must have learned well from his father, seeing as Lizeth didn’t seem at all anxious after we had arrived. It was a good arrangement for them both. However, it was soon wearing on him. By the end of the day, his feet were dragging and he appeared to be in a constant struggle to keep his eyes open. He went to bed earlier than customary, though not without me hoping for him to have pleasant dreams that night.
None of us were aware of what was happening on the other side of Evon. We had severed any connection with the outside world after Dayce came home, so for some time we could pretend everything was the same as before. But once Dayce was asleep long enough for us to know he would not wake up any time soon, we knew we could not avoid it any longer. There was a subconscious uneasiness growing within me all throughout the day, and my qualms were actualized the moment I revived the television in my bedroom.
The dawn light was just beginning to shine on the blurry city horizon of Dorvale. It was recently confirmed that there was no direct strike on the city. The reputed asteroid impacted the nearby Gears Mountain Range roughly six miles away from the heart of Dorvale, though no one would have guessed it by the hectic scene. Helicopters soaring in the sky revealed the first murky images of the ruined cityscape, as the thick mists of dust and yellowish fumes were beginning to disperse in the strong winds. Most of the weaker buildings had collapsed in the shockwave, malformed into nothing more than piles of unrecognizable fragments. The ones that did manage to remain standing were almost a sadder sight to behold. The former embodiments of sanctuary were dusky and bleak, nothing but thin streaks of flashlights gleamed through their ruptured windows. There was a sense of stirring on the streets, where people were beginning to emerge out of the rubble that were once their grandest constructions. Hundreds of thousands were expected dead, which was the worse vision of all, even if it wasn’t shown in the images.
There was a spark of hope in all the despair and anguish. Countries from all parts of the world were responding to the disaster and sending in their support. Even acknowledged enemies of Valland were promising their assistance and expressing their condolences. Emergency services were already well underway, exposing themselves in every corner of the city in what was conceivably the biggest relief effort in all of history. It was inspiring to witness. It made Lizeth shed tears and nearly made me do the same. Well, maybe one eye may have accidentally leaked out a miniscule droplet of moisture.
We recognized we had to stop watching with the night creeping ever deeper. Whereas sleep was the furthest thing from our minds, Dayce was not, and we each foresaw we couldn’t face the day in general after a sleepless night, even if that appeared unavoidable. As we mutually came to this decision, the manner of the newscaster’s voice, who had accompanied us for most of the broadcast, abruptly changed from somber to ambiguity.
“I’m sorry to interrupt you,” he said to the crisis expert he was interviewing, “but I just received word that the first visual of the impact site on the Gears Mountain Range itself is about to be revealed to us. The clearing of the dust has finally allowed our helicopter to fly through.”
The scene then shown was difficult to make out at first. There was nothing but haze and distortion from the dust as it continued to fill the entire screen. It was like that for such a long stretch of time that I almost assumed the monitor had went to static. Even so, with neither my wife nor I taking more than two breaths between us, we could begin to see the vague outline of the mountain range.
“This is a live shot,” said the news anchor, his voice lingering in the background. A tremble of anticipation quivered his vocal folds, which I’m sure was felt by all watching. “I’m being told they will shortly exit the dust cloud and, if I’m correctly hearing this, we will then be able to see a live shot of… Is that right? Of the asteroid itself? Let’s give them a moment.”
In the course of that short period, my mind was completely controlled by the screen in front of me. In essence, anyone watching became a puppet to the impending future. I was able to see the uneven terrain ascending and the soil becoming more ridged as the video climbed the mountain peaks. Sharply, before it could reach the sky, the image stirred and focused on one particularly battered mountain. As the picture adjusted, my eyes roamed closer to the bottom of the jagged landscape and I was able to see something that was completely different from anything I had ever seen before. First off, at the base of this mountain, there was an immense crater reaching the neighboring mountains nearby, although that was not what caused me to suddenly struggle for breath. Within the crater laid the apparent asteroid, but it wasn’t what I expected to see in my naïve mind of mine. This object appeared intensely dark and oblong shaped. The video was not yet completely distinct, with billows of dust still haunting the screen, so I kept blinking my eyes thinking the image would transform into something more ordinary, but at every release, all remained the same.
The object was far larger than I had first supposed, and that was granting some of it was buried deep within the mountain’s foundation, with the exhibited portion being a third as long as the mountain was high, making it at least a mile in length. Questions were beginning to run through my mind like grains of sand in a sandstorm. How could that much of the asteroid survive such an energetic impact? And why, then, wasn’t the impact even greater? An object that massive should have released enough energy to level a continent, not just a nearby city. Before I could begin to say these questions out loud, I noticed that the asteroid I had been studying all this time was molded in an unnervingly consistent, rectangular shape.
I heard a voice say, “That’s a strange looking rock.”
It sounded so much like an echo that I originally thought I was hearing it from my own head, but a quick recalculation told me it had arisen from Lizeth. I had forgotten all about her in my trepidation. I wanted to look at her, but a magnetic glue forced my eyes to glare at the screen in front of me, hoping the image was all in my feral imagination. I needed it to be my imagination.
“Roym?” Lizeth uttered, with some concern in her voice.
Still I did not turn to her. I felt her eyes piercing me like a cold dagger, and while I could feel the grim puncture on my face, I continued to look onward. The rest of my body was absent, and everything around me was void and vacant.
“What’s wrong?” she asked me, with more nervousness than before, for she must have felt my anxiety by that point.
The sound of her acutely troubled voice must have revived me at last, because it was then that I finally turned to her. Her cocked head, pursed lips, and watery eyes revealed her distress, and it escalated when she saw my own face. I knew she was scared, I don’t think she had ever seen me like this before. I stared back at her, but nothing came out of my gaping mouth. I knew any word from me would have comforted her, but I could not form one. Nonetheless, I soon didn’t have to, since the broadcaster spoke for me, which I was grateful for, knowing I would have remained senselessly silent all night.
“That appears to be the… the object that generated the blast,” said the unconfident newscaster, saying every word with great carefulness. “Perhaps we can try to get the astronomer, Dr. Lynn, back on? She might be able shed some light on the image we are seeing.”
It was official. It wasn’t my imagination. The anchor struggled with every syllable he pronounced because he and I were thinking the same damn thing. He knew, just as I did, that the asteroid we were witnessing was actually not an asteroid at all. It was alien.