Chapter 1: Luna
It was like my life shattered. My friends were who knows where and my sister… That little idiot could be dead and the last thing I would’ve said to her was to put away the cereal…
I was walking back home from school when there was the brightest flash of light. A moment later, this wave of heat rolled over me and I heard this huge crashing sound. I could feel my head spinning for a second. I grabbed onto a telephone pole to stop myself from falling over.
After I had collected myself, I looked around. Everything seemed the same, but something was wrong. Very wrong.
I looked up and saw these colors flaring up in the sky. Greens, pinks, blues, purples. It was beautiful. They were the Northern lights… But that wasn't supposed to happen here, in New England.
I remembered a lesson in science last year, when we’d learned that the northern lights appeared where the magnetic field of the Earth was thinner.
“What the heck?” I muttered to myself. Something very big had happened.
Suddenly, an electrical wire above me exploded, sparks flying.
I ran for it. I ran until my breaths started catching in my throat.
Come on, Luna. Think. What happened? What the hell could change the fucking magnetic field of the Earth? I closed my eyes. The phrase CME came to mind. Colossal Mass Ejections. They were solar flares with the power to ruin our world completely. They would cut all the electricity in the world. And then poof we’re left in the dark.
I heard sirens getting closer as an ambulance sped by.
I started to jog, going closer to where people hung around. There, I saw buildings that had collapsed, burned bodies on the ground and electrical wires sparking wildly. I probably just missed the threshold of where the flare had done its destruction.
Then there were these people who were running around screaming their damn heads off. They had no idea of what happened or what to do. They weren’t thinking.
Think, Luna. Be prepared. My mind told me.
I ran into the grocery store and grabbed as many non-perishable items as I could. Apparently, other people had the same idea. Inside was crazy. People were fighting over cans of tomato soup and macaroni.
I ran out of the store, as fast as I could, after getting some cans of food, not feeling like getting attacked
Good. Now you have food and water. I thought. I’d also grabbed a knife which was hanging from one of my belt loops. Just in case.
I looked around for any familiar faces, but I found none. I just saw people walking around, looking lost, like me. But there were also people being violent.
Two men were attacking each other over who knows what. There were fights like that happening everywhere.
Seriously? We should be banding together! Not fighting!
My heart raced. Go somewhere safe.
My ‘safe’ place was the tiny forest in this city.
I stood on my tip toes and looked around. I could barely see anything through the tree branches. I hopped up and down, hoping that maybe being taller than four eleven for a second would help.
I noticed movement out of the corner of my right eye. I looked over and saw a tall person with a head of curly brown hair, someone easy to spot in a crowd, through the trees.
Is that… I thought.
I walked closer and saw that the boy was my age, sixteen, and was walking with two girls, the same age.
It is!
“Hey! Flint! Clio, Penny!” I called to the trio.
They looked over at me. “Luna!” they all said.
“Oh my goodness! You have no idea how glad I am to see you people!” I said, rushing over to my friends.
“Does anyone know what happened?” asked Penny
“I thought it was solar flares…” I said, not wanting to be right. “All the signs match up.”
“Yeah, I think she’s right,” said Clio. “Honors earth science coming in handy!” She wore that anxious, dimpled smile she had. When she spoke, it always sounded like she was laughing a bit. She had lightly tanned skin and sleek brown hair, which she wore in a ponytail.
“What exactly do we plan on doing?” asked Flint, playing with his rope bracelet.
“We should try to find the rest of our friends,” said Penny. “We should stick together.”
I nodded in agreement.
xXx
We spent an hour searching for our friends, but without any luck. We tried calling them, but the cell signal was gone.
“Guys, they take the T. We should check there,” said Penny.
The rest of us nodded in agreement, but Clio was frowning.
“What’s wrong?” I asked., starting to frown with her.
“Shouldn’t the T stations be flooded? They’re underground. So many structures broke and some of the lines go by water…” she said.
“We still need to check. We can’t just leave them there,” said Flint.
“Yeah,” said Penny.
“Let’s go, then…” I said with uncertainty.
We hustled to the station and started to go down the stairs. As we got down a flight, lukewarm water already started to soak our shoes. After getting to going down another flight, it was up to our knees. In my case, it was almost halfway up my thighs.
When I looked down to the ground level, I saw that the entire place was flooded. But that wasn’t really the bad part. There were bloated bodies floating on the water. There were so many, their hair splayed out around their heads, their mouths still open in a scream.
“There’s no way they survived down there,” said Flint, sounding defeated.
“I bet they found a way out,” said Penny, hopefully. “They’re smart.”
“Yeah,” said Clio, taking Penny’s hand in a comforting gesture, but she didn’t look as certain as Penny did.
I could feel the water quickly rising up my legs. In fact, by now, it was almost to my waist.
“Guys, we need to go to high ground. Now,” I said.
Penny cast a look at the flooded station and nodded.
We trudged up the stairs, through the water and started to go to the Hancock building.
And that’s when it happened. Another flash of light came over the world and then there was this crashing sound.
None of us had any idea what it was, but we ran as fast as we possibly could.
Water was rushing around our feet after a minute.
“Tsunami,” muttered Clio.
That only caused us to run faster. By the time we reached the Hancock building, it was up to our knees.
We ran to an emergency flight of stairs in the building and sprinted up them. My legs and lungs were burning. My body told me to stop and let it rest, but my mind told me to keep going. DO NOT STOP! It yelled.
We finally got to the top floor, coughing and gasping for air.
We shoved open the door and looked inside. There were a few businesspeople standing there, along some other adults, along with a few kids and teens.
“You’re here!” a male voice shouted. I looked over and saw that the speaker was Tomas. He was standing with Piers, Alexandria and Alice.
We beamed back at them. But my smile faded when Penny asked, “Where’s Devin?”
Our friends faces fell.
“He’s gone. He got swept away,” said Alexandria. Everyone in the room gave us sympathetic looks.
“Oh,” was all I could say.
“I’m sorry,” said one of the ladies standing there.
“We can’t do anything about it now,” said Alexandria, her eyes downcast, almost looking ashamed.
'We can only stay alive.' I thought.
