“Well technically more like a crack in time and space…” Mira corrected herself as she started walking towards one of the monitors at the control panels.

“What does that mean?” I asked.

“That thing there defies all laws of physics and science, in other words…” She started busily typing. “They shouldn’t even exist.”

“But it’s right there, in front of us…” I said pointing towards it.

“Exactly!” She was too focused on the screen to look away even for a second. “It's an anomaly- a glitch in reality you can call it…”

She continued to type away as the crack buzzed and hummed in the back.

“Here it is!” She exclaimed cheerfully. “And damn…no wonder they wanted to hide this…”

“Hide what?” I replied.

“This rift…” she said. “They’ve been running experiments on this thing and look!”

She turned the screen around to show a screen full of scribbles I couldn’t understand.

“Ummm what does it say?” I think she forgot I couldn’t read alien.

“Oh oops- haha…” She awkwardly laughed to herself before continuing. “It explains these rifts were causing glitches in reality, people started to come across them… then boom!”

“Boom?”

“Yes- Boom!” She exclaimed as she motioned her hand to mimic an explosion. “Wait- not exactly BOOM!-but they started to experience the same symptoms- like some sort of virus…”

“Symptoms?” Is that why my parents were like that?

“Yep creepy smile, being non responsive- The virus would latch onto the host and take over their brain…” She clicked a button and a video popped on the screen. “Look what happens to each one…”

It was a screen filled with multiple different views of the town from CCTV cameras. Each one had a different person as they all seemed to suddenly collapse, and start coughing uncontrollably.

Afterwards, they would get up and dust themselves off. They all continued to go about their day as if nothing happened except for a brief moment, they all smiled. The same horrible smile on everyone’s faces. It was only for a split second but it was easy to notice.

“But why take all these people here?” It didn’t make sense, if this rift was what caused my parents to act strangely, why would aliens kidnap them?

“It looks like instead of closing the rift, they tried doing some damage control to keep it a secret…” Her expression seemed to darken. “You sly bastards- You would rather kidnap families then end up losing this chance…”

“What chance?” I started to feel anger, hatred towards these things. They kidnapped my parents when this could have been all avoided?

“The rift could serve as an important power source for them…” She continued. “So they kidnap and try to treat the victims. Problem is they don’t have a cure yet…”

Her words rang in my ear. No cure? That means there was no way to save them… Does that mean my parents are going to stay like that forever? There was no time to think as-

“Shit!” Mira suddenly yelled and banged her fist on the control desk. “The firewall just locked me out and alerted the whole system!”

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Alarms started blaring as Mira grabbed my hand .

“Well looks like we gotta run again!” We made our way through the door we came from and there were already guards running towards our direction.

“Here!” She pulled me towards the right, the only way that wasn’t filled with guards and we booked it. The guards were on our trail, their soulless faces were a pretty good motivator to keep running.

We made a right, then a left, continued straight, and turned right again. We kept going through this maze until Mira finally stopped us in front of this door.

“Okay, well here we are then!” She said in a British accent.

“Wait, you're British?” I asked. This was the first time I heard her speak in an accent.

“Nope, Japanese…” She replied as she started messing with the keypad. “But is this really the time to be asking that mate?”

“Why are you talking with an accent then?” I asked.

“Well I don’t know!” She was crossing a couple of wires together. “It’s just fun! I saw it on a show- Wait, why are you even so caught up on that?”

There was a small spark from the wires as the doors opened. “Like I literally crashed from space, spoke perfect english and the British accent is what bothers you?”

She had a good point. But wait did she say she was Japanese? That would mean she was human then. Unless an alien became a Japanese citizen? I mean she certainly did look human, that was no doubt. But I thought she was an alien all this time.

“So you’re human then?” We stumbled through the door, and Mira went straight for the keypad, closing the doors.

“Of course I’m human!” She said as she ripped a couple of wires to keep the door shut. “What, did you think I was an alie–”

She stopped mid sentence as she turned around to see the rift. The crackling static filled the room, echoing off the walls. The rift shined brightly, emanating its light throughout the room, as bright as the sun. Surrounding the rift was a crescent shaped machine.

“That’s the-” I was interrupted mid sentence.

“The rift…” Mira stood there, staring at it in awe. “Well kid, this is where the ‘BOOM!’ part comes in…”

Mira started to rip panels off the crescent shaped machine and started using her bracelet to scan it.

“What are you doing?” She continued rummaging through the wires and parts, as I stood watching.

“Rewiring some of this junk…” She threw some metallic pieces behind her. “And once we’re done BOOM!”

She came back up and threw her hands into the air again. “The whole thing collapses in on itself!”

“Is there anything I can do to help?” I didn’t really understand, but if it would help my parents return to normal then I wanted to be of use.

“Yeah…” She pointed to a panel that was closer to the rift. “Could you go over there and tell me what color the wires are?”

I nodded my head and ran over to the panel. But the closer I got to the rift the buzzing got louder and louder in my ears. It was bothering me. Something about the noise was messing with my brain, my vision. I was getting lightheaded until…

I don’t know what I saw. Moments from my past, my parents and friends, it was so vivid like I was reliving those moments. Every birthday party, my first day of school, those picnics. These moments were interrupted with scenes that I never saw before. An old grandfather clock standing alone in an abandoned house, a single red lily falling, and a hospital bed. But in each scene there was purple hair, purple eyes, a pretty smile, she was constantly there.

“Jae!” I was shaken awake. “You’re finally awake!”

“What happened?” I was on the ground, Mira was holding my head up. She looked like she was on the verge of tears as she pulled me in for a hug.

“I should’ve been more careful…” She held me tightly. Her body warmth and scent was really soothing. “I didn’t think you would come back!”

The room began to shake as the guards were trying to break open the door.

“What was that?” I asked again as Mira helped me up.

“You accidentally slipped through a glitch spot…” She said as she ran over to the panel I was originally heading towards.

“I wasn’t affected?” I felt my face for a smile but luckily there was none.

She briefly paused for a moment and looked at me. “You were…”

“I’m not smiling though!” I checked my reflection on a metallic sheet.

“For a moment you were-I’m sorry…” She looked grim, almost defeated. I couldn’t help but laugh horrendously.

“So I’m going to be like them?” I didn’t know why I was laughing but I was scared. I didn’t want to turn into one of those things.

“No…Not if I can help it!” She turned back and removed another panel. “There we go, that should be all!”

She grabbed my hand again and walked us over to a vent. The door couldn’t last any longer and was about to burst open. Mira kicked open the vent and before jumping yelled, “Geronimo!”

The ventilation shaft was angled vertical and was leading us deeper under wherever we were. By the time we landed we fell from the ceiling into another hallway.

“Where are we?” I asked as we looked around.

“Good question my dear Jaetson…” She looked around some more until she found a sign. “Yes that way!”

She started running as I was trying my best to keep up. Somewhere in between I yelled: “Where are we going?”

“The hangar!” She replied, “We have to get out of here when the rift explodes!”

“Explodes?!” So she rigged that machine to explode.“What about my parents?”

“Don’t worry!” She responded quickly. “The rift will collapse on itself, restoring reality and your parents will be safe…”

“Then wouldn’t we be safe too?” I asked.

“No, since we were in direct relations with the rift closing we would still be-” She stopped dead in her tracks as she looked back at me. “Oh no-”

“What?” I stopped too but not because I wanted to, it was more like I couldn’t move. “What is it?”

“Jae…” She had that horrified expression on her face. She pulled out something from behind her and held it in front of my face. It was a small mirror and in the reflection I stood there with that horrible horrible smile. “I’m sorry…”

“I couldn’t make it in time…”