Around the world, panic starts to rage. The fragments or as they were called by the news “The Seeds” came out of nowhere. Asia, USA, Europe, Africa, Antarctica. No place was spared. Though the seeds didn’t do too much damage to their surroundings compared to what would be expected from space-bound objects falling onto our humble dirt sphere, the after-effects of their fall were catastrophic. Word of superhumans started to make rounds, and it wasn’t long before someone realized that the seeds and the superhumans were related in some way.

The government, of course, tried to retrieve the seeds, but by the time they got there, the seeds disappeared as if their existence had been a lie.

—————————————————————————————————————

I open my eyes. There’s no sound coming through my headphones, so I weakly raise my arm to rummage through my pockets to check my phone. I eye the headphone cords to see they’ve been damaged.

I mutter to myself.

“I literally just got these . . .”

The man in the front seat next to the driver turns around and eyes me. I can’t tell what type of emotion he’s trying to convey, but I’m not about to doubt someone who just pulled me out of that hellhole.

I stare back at him.

He’s a portly man with an unkempt beard and he looks to be maybe in his 40s. His dirtied white t-shirt with the words “Keep on chugging” and his brown cargo pants are an obvious telltale sign that he obviously doesn’t really care about hygiene, and also I guess . . . the disgusting smell wafting through my nose. Though that might just be the car.

“So I guess you did wake up after huh kid.”

Did he think I wasn’t going to wake up? If so why did he even pick me up? I know I read on the internet not to judge a book by its cover, but this smelly book was looking mighty suspicious right about now. I couldn’t help but be worried but I guess it’s kind of too late for that seeing as I was in a moving car.

‘I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt’

I put my phone back into my pocket and answer.

“Yeahh, I really appreciate the help back there, but uhhh quick question? What the fuck happened back there ?”

He smirks.

“That my son was a seed, you DO know what those are, right ?”

Did he just call me his son? Ah, whatever. I was too tired and in pain to give a fuck at the moment.

“Uhhh no? I just heard the words mentioned in a youtube video but I never bothered searching it up.” I reply.

He clicks his tongue and shakes his head in disappointment, and I could have sworn I heard him say something along the lines of ‘kids these days’. I can’t help but feel personally offended, but I guess I can’t say anything back.

I had been working nonstop to find a job for the last few weeks so the fact that something was going on outside was beyond me at that point. The workload had been so huge there were even some times where I forgot to eat, all because my father wouldn’t get off my back to find a job. Too bad I’m probably not even going to be able to do that seeing as apparently there are meteors falling from the sky, and oh I guess . . . my broken leg. Which speaking of I hadn’t even bothered to look at. I just didn’t want to know how my body would react if I saw a bone sticking out.

The old man continued.

“Well since we seem to have some time on our hand I guess I might as well explain it. You see about a week ago some of them there seeds, fell onto some other country, and they’ve been falling ever since. People are saying that this might be the end of the world so everybody’s been on edge. They’ve been causing quite a ruckus in the news so when me and my buddy here saw that ‘seed’ fall down nearby we had to go see what the ruckus was all about”

Well, it didn’t sound like total bullshit so I decided to believe him, but one thing was still bothering me about this whole thing.

“Why are they called seeds ?” I ask.

His smirk grew wider.

“Well, about that. Apparently, people who were caught by the impact of the seeds crashing started to gain superpowers, but those are probably just rumors eh Jake.” The old man said as he tapped his friend’s back.

They both started chuckling. Very creepily i might add, but who was i to judge. I didn't have the prettiest laugh out there either.

“Ah you’re probably right, there’s no way superpowers are real, and if they were it probably were it probably wouldn’t be for another thousand years, or something like that” I reply.

“hehe right.” The old man replied as his chuckle started to wear off.

I started to relax seeing as they just seemed like a good pair of friends looking to help people hurt by the crash, but one thing still seemed off. Why did they only pick me up? It couldn’t have been a space problem seeing as I was the only one in the back seat. So why? What was it he said when he picked me up?

‘one is alive and whole grab him and let’s get out of here’

Why was his tone so urgent if he felt like he was doing the right thing. Why did he only grab me? There couldn’t have only been me. All these questions were running through my head and no matter how I looked at it, I couldn’t figure out why he’d only grab me, so I bit the bullet and asked.

“By the way, why did you only pick me up ?”

The old man was silent for a few seconds, and then he turned to look at me. His dirty brown eyes stared into mine and for a second I felt like his presence was crushing me, but then . . . He quickly smiled and replied

“Well, that’s obviously because we can’t go around picking up damaged merchandise now can we.”

My head started to ache. What the fuck did he mean by merchandise.

I fell asleep again.