Planet X (4 page)

“Don’t give up
just yet.” Stephen said, “It’s not over until the fat lady
sings.”

Sam chuckled
in despair, “I think the tsunami got the fat lady months ago.”

“Would you
stop sulking?” Stephen insisted.

“The world’s
ending and I have nobody.”

“You have me.”
Stephen asserted.

Silence befell
the room as Jessica shifted a bit uneasy and Sam gave Stephen a
profoundly perplexed look. Stephen knew the cat was out of the bag
and that he had to come clean, but telling the untold truth was
never an easy thing – no matter who or what the consequences.

“I didn’t save
you by accident.”

“What do you
mean?” Sam asked puzzled.

Heavy silence
befell the room as Stephen realised he could no longer keep the
truth hidden from Sam. He had tried so many times before to tell
Sam the truth, but simply couldn’t.

“I went
looking for my brother.” Stephen finally spat out, “Alex was my
brother.”

“What?” Sam
was dumbfounded.

“I heard
something that shocked me to my core on the day of the evacuations.
As they ushered my wife and daughter to safety, I saw two men
arguing with the army who wouldn’t let them in – they wouldn’t let
them in because they were gay… they were told the reason for the
bunker was to preserve humanity and repopulate – something they
couldn’t provide. I knew right then and there that my brother was
out there somewhere and that I needed to find him.”

“But you found
me instead…” Sam sighed, “You were too late.”

“I was too
late for my brother, but I could save you.”

“Why?” Sam
asked, “Why didn’t you tell me this earlier?”

“I’ve tried
many times before, but… I just couldn’t. I was ashamed that it took
the end of the world for me to reunite with my younger brother. And
I was too late…”

A tear ran
down Stephen’s cheek and he lowered his head; wiping the tear away.
Sam moved in closer and wrapped his arms around him. Sam was glad
he knew the truth. It meant that Alex was still with him in a way
and he clung to Stephen; imagining it was Alex and he could feel
the earth move under him like the day they met.

It took Sam a
while to realise that the earth beneath them was actually rumbling
and he let go of Stephen. The three of them slowly got to their
feet; staring down at the ground that rumbled louder and louder.
Their first instincts were to run, but where to? So they huddled
together in the clammy corner and watched as the shaking walls shed
cement dust with each rolling rumble.

A massive jolt
shook the entire building and they nearly fell over, but kept to
the corner as the room started shaking more violently.

They heard
their captors running outside the door and Stephen stumbled across
the shaky room towards the door; banging on it in desperation to be
freed.

“Hey!” Stephen
called out, “Don’t leave us here! Open up, you bastards!”

A deafening
fizzing, swooshing sound followed by screams on the other side of
the door answered his desperate plight and then Stephen stepped
back – realising that the safest place to be might just be locked
inside the bomb shelter.

INTERMEZZO

And the
third angel sounded, and there fell a great star from heaven,
burning bright as if it were a lamp… and the star was called
Wormwood… and many men died.
Revelations
8:10-11

And a fifth
angel blew his trumpet, and I saw Wormwood falling from heaven to
earth and it was given the key to the shaft of the bottomless
pit.
Revelations 9:01

And the sea
will rise over the city and its roaring waves will cover
her.
Jeremiah 51:42

CHAPTER
TEN

All was quiet
in the dark room that held them captive after the inexplicable
commotion outside died down. Sam and Jessica stayed back while
Stephen cautiously stepped closer to the door – afraid to see what
was on the other side. It’s been almost twenty minutes since the
earthquake ended and there hasn’t been a sound since making Stephen
fear the worst for the men on the other side of the door.

Cement dust
shifted in the silence as Stephen stepped closer to the cracked
wall. Sam and Jessica kept their distance in fear that the basement
would give way and crush them if they ventured too close to a
seemingly unstable wall.

“Be careful.”
Sam uttered.

Stephen didn’t
look back, but nodded as he fidgeted with his fingers and then
reached out towards the door. It was warm to the touch, and when he
pulled on the handle, the door opened as the charcoaled barricade
disintegrated.

The corridor
outside was charred black and filled with smoke, and when Stephen
stepped out he saw a charred body crumpled in the corner. Whatever
happened, happened quick and without warning. Their captors didn’t
stand a chance.

He gestured
for Jessica and Sam to follow him and they joined him out in the
opaque hallway; covering their mouths in shock and for the
smoke.

“Dear God.”
Jessica coughed, “What happened out here?”

“Just more of
Planet X’s aftermath.” Stephen avowed.

They made
their way out of the building; climbing over rubble and clearing
their way out into the street where the last bit of water drained
down a massive fissure that ran along the length of the street. The
city outside was littered with unearthed trees, upturned cars and
burning windows.

They glanced
up beyond the smoking buildings and windows with flickering flames
and stared up at the conquering presence of Planet X. Though it was
still millions of miles away from our moon, it was closer than the
day before and appeared to be at least a hundred times larger than
the moon – dwarfing it.

“That thing is
getting closer and closer each day.” Jessica said, “Though it is a
marvellous sight to behold, it’s a scary one.”

“And each day
brings new threats.” Stephen added, “Every day Mother Nature thinks
up a new way to try and kill us thanks to that bastard in the
sky.”

“I wonder what
it’s like.”

“What?”
Stephen asked.

“Up there.”
She said with a nudge of her head, “I can’t see anything except
clouds… do you think its surface is like earth’s?”

“Do you mean
–”

“Do you think
there’s life on Planet X?”

“Doubt it.”
Stephen said, “It theoretically only gets close to the sun for a
couple of months every three thousand years or so. It’s safe to say
that planet is a frozen graveyard.”

Jessica kept
staring up at the marvel that hung over their heads and wondered
what secrets the surface of Planet X kept. Could there be oceans
and mountains like on earth? What was hidden behind the veil of
clouds?

“Is it
possible?” Sam said in thought.

“What?”
Jessica asked.

“Is it
possible that the approaching presence of that planet could result
in flash firestorms breaking out?”

“Anything is
possible these days.” Stephen said, “Two years ago the idea of a
rogue planet was absurd and now it’s dangling over our heads.”

A rumble in
the distance made them all look east and they witnessed the top of
a building crumbling and collapse to the tenth floor. Though the
rest of the building seemed sturdy, it wasn’t a chance Stephen was
willing to take.

“We should
keep moving.” Stephen announced.

“Do you even
know where we’re heading?” Jessica asked.

“Further
inland – away from the rising ocean.”

Sam and
Stephen started walking away, but Jessica lingered for a moment;
wondering whether sticking with them was the best idea or a notion
that might get her killed. She stared up at the colossal planet in
the sky and shielded her eyes from the sun. There was another
object – a third object – in the sky that caught her attention and
intrigue… it looked like a moon.

“Guys…” She
uttered and they turned around.

She kept
staring up at the sky in disbelief – the rogue Planet X brought
along its own orbiting moon which was three times bigger than our
own moon and a pale shade of blue.

“Look…” She
said; pointing up at the sky.

Stephen’s
heart sank to his feet when he saw it. Planet X was worrisome
enough and now the realisation that it had an orbiting moon brought
even more complications – complications of an E.L.E… Extinction
Level Event – almost the same as the
giant-impact hypothesis
that earth collided with another planet, Theia billions of years
ago. If it should happen again, it would be the end of mankind
forever.

CHAPTER
ELEVEN

Fourteen
Months Ago

Jesse’s room
was a stereotypical eight year old girl’s room with pink walls, and
fairy curtains and soft, fluffy toys that decorated her bed of
oversized pillows as well as a big poster above her bed of the USS
John F Kennedy and though it didn’t match anything in her bedroom,
she didn’t care. She didn’t have many friends and spent most of her
time alone in her room playing with toys, but since she learned
about Planet X’s approach from kids at school, she was obsessed
with it.

Since then she
put away her toys for a laptop and a search engine to find out as
much as she possibly could about the thing that was threatening to
take away her future in the navy before it even begun.

It was a
Tuesday afternoon and just like every other afternoon, she sifted
through hundreds of videos on Youtube to find more information
about the illusive and deadly threat that was hurdling towards
earth from the darkest corner of space. Most of the videos were
homemade videos by people expressing their own fears, but she was
able to find a few documentaries and news clips as well. She’d seen
most of them, but every now and then she found a new video on the
subject, like she did that afternoon by clicking on a video by
Professor Black.

“This
thing
,” Professor Black said, “has been entering our solar
system every 3,600 years for millions of years and has brought
untold disasters with it every time. Calculations and evidence show
that Planet X, Nibiru or
Wormwood
, as the Christian Bible
calls it, passed by earth 3,600 years ago and caused the massive
flood God told Noah to prepare for. We know the flood happened and
we found evidence of the ark years ago, but we also found carvings
depicting that this planet was visible behind the storm clouds that
lasted for forty days.”

“As it enters
our solar system it has to go through the asteroid belt – sending
asteroids towards earth just like it did when it came around
millions of years ago. That’s right. We now believe that the
asteroid that killed the dinosaurs was knocked out of the asteroid
belt by Planet X.

“Planet X,
Nibiru or Wormwood – whichever you want to call it,” Professor
Black continued, “will pass by earth much closer this time and
bring along with it much more unprecedented disasters than it did
in the time of Noah. We’re taking about tsunamis, earthquakes,
shifting of earth’s poles and continental displacement. This planet
is a monster in comparison with earth and though it will pass by us
hundreds of thousands of miles away, its gravitational pull will be
so intense that we will feel it here on earth.”

Stephen
knocked on the door, but when he didn’t get a reply, he peeked in
and saw his little princess captivated by the video she was
watching on her laptop.

“Jesse, what
are you watching?” Stephen asked as he stepped in.

She didn’t
respond and watched the video with captivation; hanging off the
edge of every word Professor Black spoke.

“There is also
a possibility that this planet is bringing its own moon along for
the ride.” Professor Black said, “And depending on its orbital
path, it might slam into or graze earth—”

Stephen closed
the laptop much to her protest.

“I was
watching that!”

“You’re just
scaring yourself.” He said as he sat down next to her.

“We need to
know what to expect. We need to be prepared.”

“It’s going to
miss us.”

“Its moon
might not.” She insisted.

“You need to
stop worrying. You’re still a little girl. Worrying is my job.”

He ran his
fingers through her silky black hair and kissed her on the
forehead. He loved her so much and it broke him to see his little
girl worrying about things no child should ever worry about. He
knew there was no pretending that everything would ever be alright,
because things never will be the same.

He longed for
the days of butterfly kisses making the monsters in the closet go
away, but she was growing up faster than Planet X’s approach and he
knew there was no hiding the truth from her – no matter how
upsetting it was.

CHAPTER
TWELVE

The three
fugitives of fate stared up at the sleepy moon that not just added
a new degree of terror, but also an anomalous sense of ardour to an
otherwise callous and desolate city. It was a sight that needed to
sink in to be realised, but Stephen knew staying put would be the
death of them. Planet X might be closing in at a sluggish pace, but
it was clear that the moon’s orbit around its planet was much
faster – disaster could be upon them within a day or even less.

“We should get
going.” Stephen said once more; sounding like a broken vinyl
player.

Sam nodded in
agreement and nudged Jessica to follow them as they walked down the
street and away from Planet X; carefully crossing narrow and wide
fissures that split the city streets in half like veins.

They walked in
silence – each lost in their own thoughts of survival and
acceptance of the dire situation they were in. Sam glanced at the
broken display window of a toyshop as they passed it; reminded by
the fact that he’ll never have the adoption discussion with Alex –
something that made his heart ache with every step he took.