Day One

"Sir?"

Everything was blurry. Or was it just moisture on the suit's fiber glass? Did I pass out? Am I even still alive?! Is this heaven? Probably, it's too bright. This can't be hell. Well, I guess it comes in handy when you tried saving the world and failed horribly. I thought at least God must have seen our efforts.

But wait, did someone just call me?

"SURVIVOR! Over here!"

I heard someone yelled. My blurry vision became clearer and clearer each second that passed by.

Clouds...

Clear skies...

A few birds gliding...

Hands,

quite a number of hands...

later on, I felt my body elevated. It felt like I was floating. I must've been carried by angels.

"Are you okay, sir? Can you hear me? Hold tight we'll get you down from here"

Wait, what??

Oh I get it, I guess I'm still alive.

And these are probably rescuers. We're like on top of a mountain or a hill. Though I wasn't quite sure how I ended up there.

Wait, I couldn't believe they weren't wearing any temperature regulating suit.

"What's happening?"

"W-why aren't you suited up?" I asked.

"Lay down, sir. It's gonna be alright. The weather, for some reasons no one knows yet, returned to normal. It's just like a normal sunny day." One of them said.

I couldn't believe what I heard.

"What day is it??" I asked.

"It's New year's day, sir. It's Year 2024." He replied.

"It worked?" I whispered to myself.

"It worked!" I couldn't believe it.

"Simon! Dr. Dave! It worked!!" I yelled to the sky while I laid down on my back carried by the rescuers on a stretcher. I laughed and I cried. An overflowing relief and happiness poured off my chest and out of my eyes. Their faces were question marks. They probably thought I went crazy after surviving the apocalypse.

In a span of two days, nature contained its anger and gave humanity another chance. The magnetic field gradually returned. That paved the way for the comeback of broadcasting and the internet. People started to share their experiences online. The damages were all over the news. Cities burned to the ground, erased from the map by the rising of sea levels, or sank deep into the ground by sink holes and earthquakes. Billions of lives were taken and millions of missing persons reported. People started to return to Earth leaving Planet Must to help build the planet once more. Some of which were the Zellwingers and their men. Some also chose to stay there fearing another catastrophe might appear.

The planet undergone a full reset. The government reinstated new currencies and funded the construction of houses and essential infrastructures.

Finally, policies that were more pro-environment were passed and approved. The population fell far below the replacement rate. The government encouraged people to build families and bear offspring. They assured a very affordable life for everyone.

I was finally reunited with the Zellwingers and Kate, the baby girl that got the Mars Migration ticket instead of me. They found me in Dr. Chan's place which was under repair at the time. The Zellwingers were back to being normal citizens but their men stayed loyal to them. We lived in a modest house in a government housing project.

Experts and the government worldwide investigated what happened. It was not long until they discovered that it wasn't a miracle that saved them.

It was a sunny morning of January 23, 2024. I was cooking breakfast when I heard knocks on the door.

"Hey, Ed. Can you get that?"

He didn't budge. He was in the living room sitting on the sofa as the watched TV with Kate. The door was literally a few steps away from him. Ed's a bit weird since the tragedy. He barely talks to me. I kinda get it. It may be because I ran and left them on that launch. So I just let it be and let him cool down until he talks to me again.

On the other hand, Mr. Zellwinger hadn't changed. Moreover, he was so happy to see me and even more proud when he knew what I have done. Even so, I decided to keep it all between us. I was just so happy we got to be together again and see the world healing.

"Oh, I'll get it!" He said as he went down the stairs.

"Father, I'll get it. Watch your step." Ed stood up hearing Mr. Zellwinger's rushing footsteps down the stairs.

"Good day, sir. By any chance, is Mr. Joe Madrid living here?" A lady wearing a navy blue suit and a black skirt asked. She was escorted with quite a lot of men also wearing suits and sunglasses.

"Uhm, Who are you?" Ed asked.

"The question is answerable by a yes or a no. Is he here?" Her voice was calm but intimidating and I heard it.

Perfect timing my adobo was about to be cooked. All it needed was just a bit of a simmer and it's good to go so I left it in the kitchen and joined the conversation.

"Hi, what seems to be the problem?" I asked.

"Do you know a Joe Madrid living around here?" She asked.

"Yes. That's me. How can I--" They didn't let me finish. They took us four and quickly hid us in a black tinted vans.

"𝑾𝒆'𝒓𝒆 𝒈𝒐𝒏𝒏𝒂 𝒅𝒊𝒆" I thought to myself.

"Hey! What the hell are you doing? You must have gotten the wrong person! Joe is a good person!" Mr. Zellwinger yelled at the lady.

"Relax, Sir. I'm not allowed to disclose any sensitive information but I can assure you that we're not here to harm any of you. The rest of the details will be discussed by him. "

"Him??" I asked.

"Who's him?? Hey!" Ed yelled.

Their mouths were shut. Not even a single look towards us. No matter what we say or do, they just look back on the outside of the car as if we weren't even there.

After almost twenty long minutes of asking with no answers, the car stopped and they let us out. We arrived at a remote location in the middle of a forest. Fresh cool air blew from the west. It was dark but it wasn't even close to noon. Enormous trees enveloped the mansion we stood in front of. Buzzing of insects, yelping of frogs, and shrieking of birds were the only sounds we heard as we walked towards the front door.

They gathered us in a spacious room. Well ventilated and also well guarded. The sofas brought about memories in Zellwinger's mansion before. I kind of missed that life for a second but when I thought of the troubles we had just to get to that point, I will always trade those soft cushions for the world's second chance.

"I'm glad you're all comfortable and well."

A voice echoed and broke the silence of the room. The man walking towards us was no ordinary man...

It was the president of the Republic of the Philippines. We looked at each other in awe of the quite turn of events.

Then suddenly I had a clue when I heard him say:

"Your life is in danger and you might even die..."

My heart skipped a beat.

"...If we hadn't found you first."

When I was about to talk, he stopped me.

"Let me finish. The New Earth Alliance or NEA, joined by all remaining countries, established just last January 8, 2024, conducted an investigation regarding what triggered the cure for the planet and how did it recovered at a very unbelievable rate. After only hours of searching for answers, a russian satellite drone found an unidentified flying object floating in the planet's ionosphere. It was unmanned and fully automatic. The russian drone was able to secure a copy of its program and was shared to the leaders of NEA. Guess who created this UFO?" He paused for a while for a very obvious question.

I looked him in the eyes.

"Yes. It was yours. Mr. Madrid" He continued.

So, they got a clue from the code embedded inside ML1. The tool I usually use to build codes contains a comment in the beginning that contains my name. I was so focused on building the program that I even forgot it was there.

"So how am I in danger? If I saved the world?" The million dollar question.

"Elon Must." He just said a name and finally got it.

Elon's Mars Migration went down the drain almost instantly overnight as soon as the people in Mars knew the good news. Property values crashed, interest rates and cost of living went up. They even went as far as giving away free citizenship just to gain back the lost population they had but none of it stopped the continuous drop in population.

From then on, I was known. Simon's and Dr. Dave's sacrifices didn't go unnoticed. I told the world their heroism; every detail. NEA turned the old WCE where Dr. Dave sacrificed himself as a heritage site where a giant statue of him still stands up to now. As well as somewhere five hundred kilometers above the ground, a floating grave was made in the memory of Simon and his unyielding bravery. It was also added to the list of the world's heritage sites as well.

Lastly, but never the least. The story of ML1 and how it was derived from Leona's ML. How her contribution buffered human salvation. A grave was prepared for her in the grave of national heroes in the Philippines.

I failed her. That was the least I could do.

Meanwhile, Kate's Grandmother miraculously survived. The military was able to pick her up as she was walking near bunker 8 during the apocalypse. She saw us on the news and contacted the government for her granddaughter. The local government reached out to us and they got reunited. I got the government to ensure them a peaceful and comfortable life.

We were under the government's protection. We stayed in that mansion for about a year. With the help of local and international investors, I was able to start my own company in April 2026. I called it 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘏𝘪𝘷𝘦.

As we commonly know, Bees are the top pollinators of nature. When Bees got extinct during pre-apocalypse era. The ability of nature to build forests and provide the essential balance of life on the planet decreased. Thus, contributed to the apocalypse. The Hive's purpose is to inherit the Bees' lost purpose; to help in the balance of nature and to help in the sustainability of life in the planet.

Moreover, we envision to increase human life's quality.

The Philippines became one of the most powerful countries on the planet. From being a third world to a first world country. The ML1 and its gathered impurities in the air paved a way to the discovery of a new energy source via the discovery of a new element called 𝘚𝘬𝘰𝘶𝘷𝘳𝘰́𝘴. It is formed when greenhouse gases are charged and compressed to a certain point. It then emits energy that can be harnessed to create electricity. We also made weather control possible, AIs that made human life easier, DNA scanning, Mind transplant, the neutralization of nukes, and so much more.

Honestly, never in my wildest dreams would I thought things would end up the way they did.

I was just lucky I guess.

and the rest was history.

[𝚝𝚘 𝚋𝚎 𝚌𝚘𝚗𝚝𝚒𝚗𝚞𝚎𝚍]