Five years earlier…
"Wake up, you lazy bastard!" Linda yelled. Her voice was sharp enough to cut through the thickest fog of sleep.
Daniel lay on the sofa like a lifeless figure, completely detached from reality.
"I said get your ass up!" Her voice climbed an octave. She began by tapping softly, then suddenly, it escalated into solid slaps on his thigh.
Every slap conveyed her rising anger.
"Your peers are out there doing something meaningful with their lives, while you're here sleeping your life away like a pregnant cat."
Daniel moaned, a quiet grumble of dissent.
He scrubbed at his eyes with the heels of his hands. The faint glow of the living room pricked his senses.
"Mom, what is it again? Can I just have a moment of peace in this house?"
Linda let out a weary sigh.
She just got back from the hospital after a double shift. It was quite obvious that she was very tired.
She had to cover for her coworker at the hospital who suddenly left due to a family crisis.
The sight of her son, a recent high school graduate with no job and no ambition, doing absolutely nothing, was the final straw.
"Peace? You want peace?" she retorted. She rested her hands on her hips.
"I told you to wash the dishes before I left for work. I mentioned the laundry as well. See this mess!"
Her hand motioned across the pizza boxes, precariously balanced on the table's edge, with plates piled up in the sink.
"Everywhere is rough and untidy. You spend the day doing nothing but eating and playing those ridiculous video games!"
Daniel at last rose to his feet. He nonchalantly ran his hand through his hair. "Ma, I didn't think…"
"Of course, I know you didn't," Linda shot back, as her anger reached its peak.
"You never do! Because if you actually had a brain to think, you wouldn't wait around for me to instruct you!"
Linda took a sharp pause, her eyes moving across the room as though looking for another fault to ignite her fury. Then her face changed from anger to worry.
"Where is your sister?!"
The question hit Daniel like a physical blow. His blood ran cold.
The video games, the nap, the chores... all of it disappeared.
Chloe!
"I'm so dead!" Daniel exclaimed, the words a choked whisper. He sprang off the couch, the remnant of sleep in his eyes disappeared and was replaced by a sudden rush of panic.
He hurried into his room to put on a shirt.
Linda, overwhelmed by hunger and exhaustion remained frozen. Her hands rested firmly on her hips while she observed her son struggling.
She didn't need to ask any further, she knew he had already forgotten.
Daniel dashed from the house, and over the street like a kid pursued by a dog.
Chloe recently turned thirteen. She was intelligent… almost too intelligent for her age. Consistently leading her class.
She was a beautiful girl, with long dark hair and kind eyes that observed everything.
Daniel arrived at Chloe's school. His body soaked with sweat, his breathing uneven.
The school seemed scanty and unusually quiet late in the afternoon. Then, he saw her.
She was sitting alone on a small bench by the security stand. Her posture was perfect. Her school bag placed neatly beside her.
She stared at the sand patterns with such focus that she seemed as if she was watching her favorite cartoon play out in the grains.
Daniel felt a surge of embarrassment upon seeing her because she appeared utterly drained and starving, much like an abandoned patient.
He took deep breaths before shouting her name through his dry throat.
"Chloe!"
Her gaze met his for a brief moment before a soft smile replaced her initial look of disappointment.
She stood up sluggishly as he approached, her small stature seeming helpless in his eyes.
He apologized deeply while leaning against his knees because he was out of breath.
"I'm so so sorry, Chloe. I…I was caught up with some activities that stopped me from arriving here on time."
It was a pathetic lie, and they both knew it.
Chloe, as quiet as usual, decided to remain silent. She approached him and wrapped her small arms around his waist in an embrace.
"I'm glad you came," she replied softly.
She expressed her joy regarding his arrival, with her tone.
The innocent words he spoke to her made his stomach twist with more guilt. Daniel spoke with a heavy voice while they walked home because he had brought her favorite chocolate.
He slung her heavy bag over his own shoulder and wrapped his arm around her, pulling her close.
Later that night, a fragile peace had settled over the house. After a dinner eaten in relative silence, the family gathered in the living room to spend the evening together.
As usual, that was the time they relaxed, discussed how their days went and occasionally gossip about anything and everything in their neighborhood.
Their current fascination was the new gay couple next door, whose garden they admired for its neatness and beauty.
Donald, Daniel's dad picked up the remote control. His moustache was well-shaved and his white beards were neatly trimmed.
He was a practical man. As a mechanic, his hands were often grease-stained. He had little time for trivial things.
Clicking the remote control decisively, he switched the TV channel from the football match Daniel had been concentrating on.
"Who's that?" Daniel yelled. "Who changed what I was watc..." His protest ended abruptly as he saw the control with his father.
He assumed it was Chloe. Occasionally, she'd hide the remote control just to tease him. As he met his father's stern, no-nonsense gaze, he quickly swallowed the remainder.
He sighed and collapsed back into the couch, grumbling quietly about the injustice of it all.
The screen changed to a news broadcast where a female anchor with a soft voice, yet serious-looking, was speaking.
"... reports are still coming in, but what we know is that astronomers across the globe are tracking an unprecedented celestial event."
The screen cut to an interview with a man with a lab coat, identified as Dr. Tariq Nadir, an astrophysicist.
He looked so sleep-deprived as he stood in front of a huge monitor showing complex diagrams on orbital paths.
"To be clear," he started. The gravity in his tone caught the focus of everyone. "...This is neither a comet nor an asteroid coming from our solar system."
Maintaining that serious expression he went on.
"Its hyperbolic trajectory indicates an object or being that may have wandered through the Milky Way for possibly millions of years."
Donald grunted from where he sat. "Fear-peddlers! They'd really do anything for ratings these days." He added a tut for more effect.
Linda shushed him gently, her curiosity piqued. "Let's hear what he has to say, Donald."
"What makes this event historically significant," the scientist continued, pointing to a simulation on the screen, "is its projected path.
This object which we've called 'XG-7', will expectedly pass directly between the Earth and the Sun in three days."
As he spoke, a dark, unlabeled planet was shown in the simulation, moving constantly along a path between the Sun and the Earth.
"Such planetary eclipse, caused by an object from outside our solar system has never been recorded in human history. Thus, we simply don't know what to expect."
Daniel who was sulking earlier, slowly leaned forward. The annoyance about his missed football match was forgotten.
Dr. Nadir spoke with a scary gravity, void of the usual media hype.
"Basically, it's just blocking the sun briefly, right? Like a big moon?" Daniel asked the room, facing no one in particular.
"It's nonsense." Donald scoffed. "Probably millions of miles away. They are just exaggerating trivial matters to scare people.
You watch, by tomorrow, they'll start selling 'XG-7 survival kits'." He chuckled at his own joke but no one else joined in.
The scientist maintained the seriousness in his face as the camera focused back on him.
"We are urging the public to remain calm, but also to be prepared for a potential atomospheric and gravitational anomalies."
The news report ended, and the channel cut to a commercial for a new brand of laundry detergent.
It felt strange how sudden everything returned to normal. For a few moments, the room was silent, and the cheerful jingle from the television felt completely out of place.
Chloe broke the silence. She had been sitting on the floor, cross-legged with a thick book open on her lap. She hadn't flipped a page since the report started. Her eyes were so fixed on the TV screen.
"I'm not going to school until this is over." Her small voice was firm.
Donald turned to her, his skeptical expression softening.
"Now, pumpkin, you heard the man. There's no need to be scared. Scientists are just excited about a new rock they discovered".
"It's not a rock," Chloe argued. There was no trace of childish fear in her eyes. "The man said they don't know what will happen. Something does not feel right."
Linda took a quick glance at her daughter's pale face then at her husband's dismissive face. A kind of maternal anxiety seemed to rise within her.
"I think she should stay home, Donald. I mean, just to be safe."
"Linda, you can't be serious," Donald sighed, annoyed. He looked over at Linda.
"I refuse to let my daughter miss school just because the media is doing what they do best. What are we teaching her? To hide everytime the TV tells her to be scared?"
"No. It's not that, dad. All I know is I'm not going". Chloe insisted.
Daniel watched the conversation. He was getting scared.
He had seen Chloe determined before. Usually, it was either about a complex math problem or a book she intended completing.
This was different.
It was a silent, unwavering conviction that felt bigger than her age.