Wednesday, 6:28pm.

“First contact with aliens!”

“What we know about Genofexians”

“Aliens! Should we be scared?”

“How to tell if your friend is a Genofex”

“Genofexians and Volons: Are They Connected?!”

There was no escaping the sensationalized news about first contact. Every journalism website was picking up on the story, but Skye could hardly fault them – it was easily one of humanity's most historical moments. Sometimes Skye found it difficult to go about his everyday routine with something so massive looming over his entire race.

He squinted his eyes shut and told himself to piss off. This was his space, his place to wind down and focus on relaxing, not on world news.

Although his phone was still blinking with one unread voice mail, he tossed it on his bed and sat down in his computer seat, opening up a familiar chat program on the computer. The other two users in his most frequented group chat were online: “Saviour Blue” and “I FUCK THE MUSIC,” namely, Wrench and Ray. His A-team.

“yo” Skye typed.

Wrench replied quickly with a simple “hey.”

Evidently, Ray was busy, as he gave no reply.

“what's up?” Skye asked.

He had to wait a minute for a response. “At the club with Ray. Prob can't talk much rn”

“right, you having a good time?”

“Wouldve been better with you.”

“Aww,” Skye said aloud. He was a bit disappointed he was missing hanging out with his friends, but there was something else that piqued his attention more than a party.

He spun his chair to face the right side of his desk, where he'd laid out an array of screws, wires, small pieces of electronics connected together, an elaborate brick of machinery he wasn't even remotely familiar with, and a cell phone.

“Youd rather work on your phone thingy than chill huh?” Wrench jabbed via chat.

Skye's heart skipped a beat. This was his chance to gush.

“i just feel like i'm getting really close to figuring something out!! i don't really know what though. but dude, i found out there's a continuous signal coming from somewhere that's affecting, like, all of miyatama. maybe more? don't know yet. but i THINK that could be what's making that message appear on everyone's phones.”

Skye turned on the cell phone on his desk. He tapped the messaging program and opened the only conversation he had on it: a very one-sided exchange with something named “madeakelor.” He scrolled up through the message history – filled with dozens of messages from him, from “hello?” to “test” to “fdhfsrbgd” – until he reached the top.

He glared down at the only message he ever received from madeakelor: nothing. A blank message stared back at him, sent almost four months prior.

“NERD SHIT” replied Wrench, rather uncharacteristically.

Skye laughed. “yeah, hi ray,” he typed back.

“haha fucker”

“c'mon, give the phone back to wrench.”

“hes at the door talkin to some lost broad tht just walked in lol”

Skye prayed the club was in a half-decent neighbourhood for the broad's sake.

He turned to his project while he waited for Wrench to return, if that was even going to happen. His current tasks involved a lot of hardware rewiring and working his way through black market hackware with no documentation. Highly illegal, including the strange electronic machine on his desk, but worried very little about being caught with it in a place like Lower Miyatama.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

None of it had any documentation; given the price he paid for it all, he felt a touch ripped off. However, he had the basics of it down; his whole setup couldn't magically trace someone's phone down to a location, but it could give him detailed information about what any nearby wireless signals were saying, their duration of transmission, strength, and a few other bits of various info.

And, as he'd explained to Wrench, some kind of radio signal was covering at least all of Miyatama. Although he didn't know when the signal started, he had a guess: four months ago, when “madeakelor” sent a blank text message to seemingly everyone he'd talked with since.

For Skye, it had grown from a curiosity into a fixation.

He exhaled a deep breath and looked back to his computer, minimizing the chat window to open up a video streaming website. He searched for “2200s classic Veirr league” and hit enter.

Tons of matching results appeared, so he clicked the first one that looked promising: a soccer match from the year 2278 between two relatively small teams, both hailing from Hallow's orbiting habitats.

It was nice background noise. Skye preferred having something other than the distant sounds of city life from outside, and Cassandra's cartoons in the living room weren't exactly the perfect substitute.

Occasionally, he'd hear Kaori walking around the house, probably preparing the rest of Cassandra's lesson. Their study time was the perfect opportunity for him to settle down for some quality time with his projects and online friends.

Knock knock. Someone was at Skye's door.

“Hey?” Skye responded as he quickly covered his tinkering project with a nearby sheet.

“Hi, it's me!” Kaori's smooth voice. “May I come in?”

“Oh, uh, sure!” He spun around in his chair to face the door.

“Hello,” Kaori greeted Skye with a smile on her face as she opened the door and walked in.

“Hey! Uh, sorry about the mess...” He anxiously looked around at the dirty clothes strewn about the floor.

“Oh, no no! It's not a problem.” She walked over to Skye's bed. “May I have a seat? I won't be terribly long.”

“Yeah! Go for it.” Skye cleared his throat as Kaori gently sat down on the squeaky mattress. “What's up?”

“Well... hm.” She lowered her voice. “It's about Cassandra. I... I have some... concerns.”

Skye raised his eyebrows. “O-oh? She's not misbehaving or anything, is she?”

“No, no! Nothing like that. Quite the opposite really; she's a joy to teach. But...” Kaori looked to the side. “I know this is not any of my business. And if I'm overstepping my bounds, please let me know, okay?”

“Mhm, sure.” Skye nodded.

Kaori leaned closer to Skye. “Have you considered... moving to a better place? As in... away from Miyatama?”

Skye looked down at his lap and took a deep breath. “I... yeah. It's been on my mind for a while. It's just... money's kinda tight and all, and...”

“I understand, totally. And I know it's not my place to say, don't get me wrong!” Kaori raised her hands towards Skye. “Times are pretty tough down here. You know I love Cass to bits, but I just think... Lower Miyatama is–”

Skye nodded again. “I get you, I do. It's... really not a great place here. Especially not for someone as young as her. I try to give her the best I can, but it's... it's not easy. I guess I don't have to explain why.” He gave a slight chuckle. “And! Don't worry about overstepping your bounds or anything. It's a valid concern. I don't like this place very much myself.”

Kaori smiled again. “I'm glad we both feel that way. And by no means am I telling you to go shove off, but... for her sake, as well as yours, I'm glad you're considering your options.” She put her hands on her lap.

“Yeah! It's... yeah. Not a problem. I'm definitely looking at my options, so... if anything comes up and we skip town, I'll let you know ahead of time.”

“Marvelous, marvelous. Because, even just today,” Kaori continued, lowering her voice further, “I saw a few shady characters off to the sides of your block. Now, don't worry about me! I know how to handle myself around these parts. But the idea of her getting hurt in some heinous act by this city's ne'er do wells... it terrifies me.”

Skye was already plenty familiar with the thought.

“...Likewise,” he replied with a sigh. “I rarely let her go outside, especially not on her own, for that reason. But that's not fair to her either... I get that. She deserves more than this place. So... yeah. I'm looking into it.”

Kaori flashed another quick grin. “I'm glad to hear it. Really. Oh, before I forget, one other thing! Not terribly important, but I'm curious... does Cass know about the whole alien encounter stuff going around the news?”

Skye chuckled. “Keeping that from her would be an effort in futility with how everywhere the news is. Yeah, she knows, but thankfully she's more excited than scared.”

“Good! I could see that being a fun conversation topic with her.”

“For sure! We don't talk about them often, but when we do, it's always an good time. She'll ramble for hours speculating all about them. So, be careful opening Pandora's box, there.”

They both shared a laugh.

“Duly noted,” Kaori remarked as she stood up. “Well I appreciate the chat, Skye! I have to go get Cass ready for some more grammar lessons, but thank you for being so understanding about my worries.”

“No problem! Any time. If you need anything else, you know where I am.”

“Thank you, thank you.” She stepped outside. “Oh – door open or closed?”

“Closed, please.”

Click – she gently shut the door behind her.

“Okay, girly! Time to put the cartoons away,” Kaori announced from the hallway.

“Aww,” Cassandra whimpered, just barely audible from Skye's room.

Skye's stomach ached from stress. Kaori certainly didn't intend to cause it, but it happened nonetheless.

He looked over to his bed, over at the blinking blue light still coming from his phone. One voice mail. He knew who it was from, and he knew what it was about. But he sat still, staring over at it.

Tomorrow, he promised himself. I can't keep putting it off.

He looked back at his computer. His friends hadn't replied back yet, so he carefully lifted the sheet back off his project. Time to focus, Skye.