Scene 2: The World Ends With Who?

"Zach! Zach, you okay? Let me see!"

He pushed his mom's hand away from his face, complaining, "Mom, I'm okay! I'm not a kid anymore! See? Not even a first-degree burn."

Without a word, she hesitantly pointed to his right horn, which looked slightly charred.

He weakly finished, "…eeeeeexcept that eensy little flesh wound over there...which is amazing, considering how I've just been hit by three rocket blasts that were—MOSTLY STEAM! Mostly steam, Mom. It's not that bad…"

Still, she slung her arm under Zach's shoulders and helped him up. "Come on. Let's get you back to the house. We'll fix it."

The walk up the numerous hills was painfully slow, as Zach realized that he was in a little more pain than he thought he was. Only the gentle illumination from the dying fires up ahead showed them where to go. By the time they managed to reach the top, they received a nasty surprise.

The meteors had hit their house after all. Everything was charred and razed to the ground. Everything. Even both cars and a significant chunk of the driveway.

They both slumped to the ground, desperately trying to contain their shock and sadness. They've lived in that home ever since Mr. and Mrs. Bandrews first moved in. It was Zach's only home for as long as he could remember. It had all the game systems, family heirlooms, dinner dishes, furniture, and everything they ever had. And it was gone. Poof. Just like that.

After what seemed to be an eternity later, Zach finally asked, "…Mom? What are we going to do now?"

She quickly dried her tears and remembered her son's horn burn. "Where's your cell phone?"

"What? Here. Why?"

"Give it to me. We need to call an ambulance."

Just then, a deep voice from behind startled them. "Zach and Maria Bandrews? That won't be necessary. Come with us."

Zach and his mom spun around to see a group of men in black just standing there in a row. They briefly wondered how much time had passed since they saw the meteors leave. Enough time for these men to sneak up upon them, anyway. Without another word, the men helped the two of them to their feet. "Who are you people, anyway?" asked Mrs. Bandrews, clearly suspicious.

"Oh! Right. Forgive us for not introducing ourselves, ma'am," apologized the leader. "We represent the Task Force Team of the Lunar Observation Base. You may call me Mr. D. And don't worry, young man. We'll get that horn burn treated as soon as possible."

As they began walking, Zach turned around and asked, "Hey! What about Dosani?" He almost immediately regretted what he said. What would they care about a simple motorbike?

To his surprise, they didn't laugh at all. One of them replied, "Sure, we'll bring it along on the way up." He broke off from the main group, ran all the way down the hill to where the motorbike was lying, and lifted it with one arm over his shoulder. When Zach was through with being amazed, he asked, "Wait. 'On the way up'…? What does he mean?"

Mr. D directed Zach's gaze to the space shuttle up ahead, partly hidden in the woods. Zach looked at it more closely and said, "Heeeeey…! That's the—!"

"The same shuttle your father worked on?" finished Mr. D. "Hardly. A lot has happened in the past eight years, Zach. You'll see."

Zach didn't have time to think about that painful time. He had other questions on his mind. "Wait. We're not going to…?"

"Yes, our base on the moon. It's about what you just witnessed. Our scientists need answers, Zach. I'll leave it at that."

The rest of the Task Force Team took their places on the shuttle, while some helped show Zach and his mom how to buckle their special space travel seat belts. The medical technician of the group applied what seemed like a fast-acting pain-relieving solvent to Zach's horn, and wrapped it in a bandage. It was starting to feel better already. As the shuttle launched off from the ground and into the air, Zach couldn't help but feel a little queasy that they were going up to the place where those freaky meteors came from. Come to think of it, this was the very first time he and his mom were going into outer space. Part of Zach was still convinced that this was all a dream. His mom seemed to be taking it a little better; she stared out the window in awe at the shrinking cities outside.

They flew through the troposphere, then the stratosphere, then the mesosphere, and finally, the thermosphere, with the moon getting closer and closer. Zach remembered seeing pictures of the Lunar Observation Base before, but this time, it had a detail to it finer than what pictures could capture, even through the windows. It was more like a colony, with a giant tower sticking out from several little interconnected buildings that gleamed of steel. The tower itself had added support from two other tower-like structures, and the very top of the tower was a giant room with a massive window looking out onto everything, along with two Geolytian-like horns on both sides of it, probably for the purposes of catching radio frequencies. Their shuttle landed at the base of one of the support towers.

Mr. D led them through the connecting passageway that led to the support tower, where they went up elevators and walked along other passageways before finally coming to the Observation Room on top. Zach and his mom stared out in wonder at the complex array of holograms, technological readouts, computer monitors, massive telescopes that line the back wall, and all the scientific personnel running around the place, no doubt doing everything they can to collect data on that strange meteor attack.

One of the elderly scientists dropped what he was doing and came forward, asking, "Oh! Is that them?"

"This is them, all right. The survivors of the Meteo attack. Zach and Maria, meet Head Professor James Glierce, PhD." said Mr. D.

Zach was confused and a little suspicious at the same time. "Meteos? Wha—? Hey…" Did he just stumble upon top-secret withheld-to-the-public operation here?

His mom was a little more polite in this situation, but got straight to the point, anyway. "Professor, could you please tell us everything you know about these so-called…Meteos?"

"Certainly, ma'am," replied Professor Glierce as he waved for Mr. D and his Task Force to go back down the elevator. Eyeing Zach's horn bandage, he added, "And I'm sorry about your son's horn injury."

Zach groaned. "Why does everyone keep bringing it up…?"

The professor led them to his main computer and brought up a few images of the colored blocky meteors. He explained, "On Geolyte's surface, as well as the moon's, we've come across special types of rocks completely separate from our ordinary three classifications, which are—"

Mrs. Bandrews spoke up. "Igneous, sedimentary, and metamorphic rocks, right?"

Zach looked shocked. Even he didn't remember that fact. His mom raised an eyebrow at him and whispered, "If you'd paid more attention to your classes, you'd remember that!"

The professor didn't seem to notice that little exchange. "Correct. Now these rocks have properties that completely defy all those classifications. In many ways, they could be called molten rock…except that each one is infused with a 50% concentration of one of ten elements. These elements can be air, fire, water, soil, iron, electricity, grass, zoo, light, or darkness. All these rocks are the exact same size and shape. It's the elements that are different. We call these rocks, 'Meteos'."

Zach continued to stare at the pictures, especially the pink rock labeled zoo. "Why call them 'Meteos'?"

"Because when we first encountered them, the way they glowed looked like meteors that had recently landed. However, further studies have shown that these Meteos have played a vital role in forming our planet and its moon from the very beginning."

Mrs. Bandrews followed Zach's gaze. "The zoo element's pretty, but I'm not sure I've heard of it."

"It is indeed the least understood of all the elements. We believe that it has something to do with organic tissues that make up living things, but to be honest, even we are still figuring it out. Now where were we?"

"Freaky Meteos rain that tried to kill us," prompted Zach.

"Oh yes! Never before have we seen Meteos rain down in such concentrated amounts. We have observed that if they embed themselves into a planet's surface and stack themselves all the way up to its atmosphere…" He made a "poof" sound and a gesture suggesting the planet exploding.

Zach's jaw dropped to the floor as the professor brought up the images of those planets and the unfortunate results. Now he and his mom were really listening. Was that what could've happened to Geolyte? It sounded like there could've been way more than just their house that was burned to the ground. What was going on in here?

"And to make matters, much, much worse…" continued the professor, "is that we have determined who—or should I say, what—is unleashing those streams of annihilation. It is a planet made entirely of them. We call it Planet Meteo."

The two of them stood transfixed at the image of the molten, glaring eyeball of a planet shooting out the deadly streams. A thousand more questions popped up in their heads, but none of them knew exactly which to ask first. In fact, by this time, many of the scientists running around the area had stopped what they were doing to look at the picture.

"Now, if you're wondering why Mr. D brought you both up here, it's because we observed the general area of the attack and sent them to investigate for any survivors. You see, none of the planets attacked by the Meteo Streams have ever survived…except for ours. Why? What made them turn back? Did you two have anything to do with it?"

And with that, the two of them opened their mouths and blurted out the whole story.

"So let me get this straight. There were three fire elemental Meteos in a row, correct?"

"Mm-hmm."

"And they fused together, just like that?"

"Yep."

"And they sprouted rockets that launched them back into space, taking all the other Meteos along with it, and you two had absolutely nothing to do with it, right?"

"Pretty much."

The professor walked to the front of the room in front of the transfixed crowd of scientists. "So basically, if we somehow found a way to move the Meteos in a Meteo Stream so that three of the same element became contiguous, we could theoretically save ourselves from any future threats of annihilation from Planet Meteo."

Everyone cheered. Zach and his mom just stared in amazement. The scientists started shouting out ideas.

"We should make a battleship that does that!"

"With laser-precise technology!"

"Maybe even made out of the Meteos themselves!"

"Yeah, our research has shown that they're attracted to one another regardless of their elemental properties!"

The professor calmed everyone down. "Everyone! All your ideas are wonderful, and we should continue to work them out! After all, we still have no idea when Planet Meteo will launch the next attack. But first, I must settle one more thing…" He let the scientists run around again, now obviously eager to work on the battleship idea. "Zach, Mrs. Bandrews, thank you very much for your time and information. And since we've heard the report about your house, I would like to offer the two of you residence here on the Lunar Observation Colony. What do you say?"

Mrs. Bandrews thought for a moment. "We'd like to, Professor, but Zach is looking for a job, and I need to make sure—"

"Oh, jobs aren't an issue here, ma'am. He can assist with our research, join the construction or repair crew, you name it! We are always in need of more helpers, and I have a feeling we will be hiring many, many more people over the coming weeks."

Zach and his mom stared at each other in awe. Then to the professor, they both shouted, "We'll do it!"

Right then, they both remembered hearing something about how bad events can lead to good events, and vice versa. If they never believed in that saying before, they certainly did now. And besides, despite losing their whole house and both cars to the Meteos, it was pretty clear by this point that they could've lost way more than that.

To be continued…