Ms. Johnson walked down a wide corridor and stopped in front of a door with only the word Principal on it. She took a deep breath and walked into the small, dainty room.

“Hello, Ms. Johnson was it?”

“Yes, Mr. Anderson,” replied Ms. Johnson. She quickly sat down on an uncomfortable red plastic seat.

“Well, I’ve called you here today because of your son. Ever since that little incident…”  The principal suddenly paused on the word incident.   “Ever since that little incident four years ago, he’s become an almost different person.” The principal started to tap his fingers. Little beads of sweat began to form on his forehead. “He was always smart and well liked, but now, well. He’s been acting very strange for a long time now. In all of his classes he’s been seen muttering to himself and constructing a device that looks otherworldly!”

Ms. Johnson suddenly stood up and said in an annoyed voice, “Well, thank you, Mr. Anderson, I’ll see what I can do.”

“Ma’am, I’m sorry, but this conference is not done ye-”

“Have a good afternoon,” said Ms. Johnson as the door slammed shut.

It was another beautiful Saturday afternoon. Birds were chirping, kids were playing outside, the ice cream truck went by slowly, playing it’s classic jingle and adding the finishing touch on this nice idyllic, suburban town. But for Jax Johnson, he partook in no such things. Stuck in his bedroom, he’d been fiddling around with a device that looked like the world’s most complicated TV remote. Around his room was a mess of unfolded laundry, strewn dirty plates, and crumpled blueprints. He heard a door open downstairs and quickly hid the remote under his bed.

“Hello?” asked Ms. Johnson.

“Hey,” responded Jax.

“How was school today, Sweetie?”

“Just like every other day, Bridgett.”

“Welp, I’m going to start making dinner; should be ready at six,” exclaimed Mrs. Johnson followed by the sound of the stove turning on.

That night after an uneventful dinner, Jax was lying on his bed and examining his remote under the moonlit sky. Tomorrow, he thought, tomorrow everything will change. That night Jax slept well for the first time in four years.

The next day nothing happened, at least until 4:21 pm. At 3:35 pm Jax sat in solitary on the roof holding his remote. He started contemplating whether or not to do it, but he had already passed the point of no return. He slaved away for four years, working, attempting to find and create technology that didn’t even exist. So finally, Jax pushed a sequence of buttons, and with his eyes beaming and sweat forming on his hands, started to wait. Jax waited and waited and waited for what felt like forever. Until suddenly the air turned cool, dogs started barking, and a sudden gust of wind almost threw Jax off the roof. Leaves started falling until a sort of mini tornado started to form. He felt like he was being watched. Cracks started appearing on the roof.

Jax scurried around, observing the terrain. Jax’s home was located at the edge of town on a steep hill. He could see the whole town, and to be honest, it was quite beautiful, but not right now. He slowly noticed that cracks were starting to appear all around, as though the houses and buildings were being removed from their foundations. In no time flat, the small town looked as if it was hit by an f2 tornado.

“No, no, this wasn’t the plan!” cried Jax, and suddenly fast as the devastation started, it stopped. Jax sighed a breath of relief, and although his work was a complete failure, at least it didn’t cause complete destruction. He always knew this was a potential risk. 

 Jax stopped climbing down from the roof at once. He couldn’t shake the feeling that he was being watched. From out of the blue a thunderous sound blasted through the air! Blue light filled everything, creating the smell of petrichor; Jax’s hair stood on end, and he started to disintegrate.

Jax awoke on a bed way better than his own. A king sized tempur-pedic memory foam bed to be exact. But Jax was extremely confused. Did he not just die? At the time he could feel his very molecules being pulled apart. Maybe this was the afterlife; if so the afterlife was incredibly like the previous life. No, if this was the afterlife he would be handed a shamrock shake by a morbidly obese angel baby or something. So where was he?

Even though he felt like he had the world’s worst migraine, he decided to explore a little bit. He was apparently in an extremely white windowless husk of a room. The color of the room was indescribable. It was almost the color of light reflecting on the snow, but somehow even more white. There was absolutely nothing there except for a bed and a tray filled with bacon lying on the floor. Then from the corner of his eye, he noticed a sliver of movement. Then it disappeared without so much as a trace. He stared intently at the sliver of movement for one minute… two minutes… There, it moved again! This time Jax observed that the thing quickly camouflaged itself after two minutes and 43 seconds. He could see that the thing was obviously observing the room, almost like it was a security camera. There was a lense, but it didn’t seem to be attached to anything. Things were getting far more peculiar.

Jax’s breathing became more rapid. His pulse rate was steadily increasing. He knew what was happening. He was getting hysterical. The fear of the unknown had always frightened Jax, but this, no, this was a whole different ball field.

With no other option, Jax decided to take a couple deep breaths and think. He was trapped in an extremely white room with a bed, a seemingly almost invisible camera, and some bacon. And just like any human in this situation, Jax did the reasonable thing; he started to munch on some crispy bacon. After three strips of surprisingly delicious bacon, he was slowly peacing it together.

The beams, the catastrophe in his town, the ridiculous technology, the foreign color of his room. This was no high-tech military base or dream! It seemed as if his machine had worked out somehow. Jax had finally reappeared on the alien ship that had imprisoned him four years ago!

Suddenly faint tapping sounds rang across the blank room. Tap. Tap. TAP. TAP. The sounds were getting louder, yet louder, until a strange cylinder opened up from beneath the bacon. A terrible blue strange head started to emerge from the cylinder. The alien was simultaneously the most beautiful and terrifying thing he ever saw. It had translucent eyes, blue skin, and legs that seemed to be reinforced with a strange amethyst colored metal. It had a spotted cloak that flowed even though there was absolutely no wind. The alien had arms with razor sharp talons and even opposable thumbs! But possibly the most incredible thing about the alien was its hair. It seemed to be mess of snakes, constantly moving around as though they had a will of their own. As Jax was staring profusely at the alien, he heard a mess of incoherent screaming. One of the other aliens armed with a spear pulsing with energy shoved a small cube at Jax’s throat. Jax instinctively dodged the cube, but the alien moved like a streak of lightning and powerfully jabbed the cube at his throat.

There was a brief flash of pain, and then the cube miraculously merged into Jax’s skin; his throat shined a brilliant blue and then snapped back to reality. As Jax was thinking about his last will and testament, he heard a handsome voice say,

“Hello, I’m sorry for that little fiasco.” He quickly pulled out his right hand. Jax hurriedly shook it. “I’m zero-fifteen, and welcome to The Andromeda 6.”

Jax proceeded to tour around the ship The Andromeda 6. While walking around the intergalactic spacecraft, he was amazed at the sheer size of the ship. In comparison his small cell was vastly inferior. There was artificial sunlight, trees growing indoors, and aliens of different color streamed around chanting, “Human! Human! Human!”

“Why do they seem so happy?” asked Jax.

“Well, because you helped us find Earth!” responded 015. Technology was all around them, high tech supercomputers strewn around. Awesome holograms considered only to be science fiction filled the room. Nonchalauntly, Jax looked around the room, and all of a sudden he seized a small disk while no one was looking. Jax surprisingly felt no remorse. He had been captured once before and needed to ensure no others fell to the same fate.

While Jax was deep in thought, he was interrupted by 015. “And that’ll conclude the tour! Your room is in floor 245 (The intergalactic emissary suite). Please enjoy your stay, and feel free to call for anything.”

Even though Jax wasn’t really paying attention, he could tell that 015 had purposely skipped a small room camouflaged to blend in. Jax made a mental note to check it sometime.

That night, Jax couldn’t sleep. He wondered how he could get home; he wondered if he would die here.  He wondered how insignificant the human race was if there were actual aliens. Jax wondered if there was any meaning to life. Jax often had thoughts similar to these, so he decided to change the subject. What was in that room, and what was so important the aliens needed to hide it away?

So Jax jumped down from his luxurious bed, landing on the balls of his feet like a ninja, and tiptoed to his door. But the moment he slowly creaked open his door, he saw how many defensive measures were set up on the spaceship. Guards, spotlights, even automated patrols! Jax was shocked! who in their right mind would install so many defensive capabilities?

While trying to come up with a solution, Jax fished around in his pockets (yes, he wore his pants to bed). He pulled out the little disk he pocketed from earlier. Etched on the machine was a language he could not decipher, but his throat started to tingle, and his head started to pulsate. He could read the text! It seemed to be a teleportation device. In fine print it said, “Teleport small items only (Do not give to children below 13)!” But no one reads the fine print…it appeared to be voice activated.

“Take me to the room.” Nothing happened.

Jax saw that a little scribble on the device said, “Be very specific!”

“Take me to the small invisible room located in the south west wing of the star ship The Andromed 6.” Oh no, Jax started to receive major Deja vu as he felt his molecules being ripped apart again.

He appeared inside of the room!  He could tell because almost everything was in a transparent filter. Jax gasped; this was without a doubt the biggest room in the ship. There were creatures stuck like lamb to the slaughter in tanks. There was also a gigantic machine in the middle of the room that seemed to be incomplete. No, now that he looked closer he could see that the creatures were humans. People were crammed together like sardines. Not only that, Jax recognized some of the people in the tubes. Those aliens had not only abducted him, but his whole town as well!

Jax was filled with white hot rage. His fury knew no bounds. His classmates, his mom, everyone! Jax grabbed the teleporter and went straight to the chamber of 015. This time Jax didn’t even mind the pain. “WHAT THE CRAP?!” Jax screamed at the top of his lungs, awakening 015 from his slumber.

“Jesus, Human, you scared me.”

Jax decided to cut right to the chase.  “Listen you blue turd, I’ve been into the room. I’ve seen the tanks filled with people. Now you’re going to help me release them or I’ll, I’ll bring you to Earth with me!” Jax quick drew the teleporter to show he wasn’t messing around.

“Alright, alright. I can see you’re aggravated, let me get you something to drink.” Jax instinctively punched 015 in the face.  “FINE.” 015’s calm and collected facade instantly disappeared. His voice was dripping with malice and his fists became clenched.  “Don’t assume you're a paragon of justice, sitting on top of your ivory tower! You know absolutely nothing about our race, our culture. Our planets are facing mass extinction! Millions of our kind die every month due to the plague! And the only cure? Human blood.  Would you not sacrifice 60,000 people in order to save trillions?” 015 paused to take a breath, hands shaking.

          “I, I’m sorry, but why didn’t you just ask the human race?” asked Jax.

“Do you not think we have tried? We’ve been here since the seventeen hundreds, attempting to establish a relationship with you. Man, perpetuated by it’s own fear of the unknown, has attacked us every single time. In this day it’s even worse. We’ve observed your media for some time now, painting us in a negative light, showing us destroying civilizations, while in reality we are more civilized than you monsters will ever be. You even treat your own species with moral disdain; how could you monsters ever understand?” 015 whimpered a defeated sigh and said in an extremely weak voice,“go.”

Shaken up, Jax hung his head low and teleported back to the prison room. With each step, Jax felt the weight of his actions. After a walk to the end of the room that seemed like an eternity, Jax reached a complex machine with mysterious wires and strange buttons, but at this point Jax had gotten used to it. After a couple minutes, Jax pressed a blue button tucked away on the far right of the control panel. The sound of compressed gas echoed throughout the chamber as people began to stumble out like zombies. Without a moment's hesitation, Jax helped out the hundreds of people, and after hours they returned back to the blue planet. But on the way back the only thing Jax could think of was what he had just done.

Far away in the depths of the universe, a spaceship drained of all hope floated along aimlessly. 015 was walking on the main deck, void of all hope. Suddenly he heard a crunch beneath his feet. His foot was covered in a warm red substance and glass. Blood, he thought. One foot away another vial of blood appeared, then another, and another, and another! They soon piled up into a mountain of vials. Included  at the top was a little spherical device that said, “Do not give to children below 13.”

-David Zhang