16 May 2327

Dear Mr. Thanos,

I hope you don’t mind me writing to you. My history teacher, Mrs. Wix, gave us an assignment to handwrite a proper letter to someone like people used to do back in the past. It seems a silly assignment to me. What’s the point of writing a letter that won’t be delivered? Mrs. Wix herself said letters are supposed to go into letterboxes and I don’t know anyone who still has a letterbox.

So I thought I could write to you. Father Pritchard, who teaches my Scripture class, says you see and hear everything in the universe, so maybe you’ll see this letter even without a letterbox. And maybe you could write back? It’d be heaps nice if you do, Mr. Thanos, ‘cause there some things I’ve been wondering about that only you can answer.

You see, my little sister got dusted two weeks ago. We were walking home from school and then, a block away from home, she just started to disappear. I ran home and got my dad (mum was still at work), when we got back there was nothing left, not even Kiara’s backpack. Dad got heaps angry at me, yelling that this was a stupid plank to play. He even threatened to wallop me if I didn’t tell him where Kiara was hiding. I couldn’t tell him that of course, but he refused to believe me until the news alerts on the comms came through that there’d been another dusting. Then he hugged me and burst into tears. That was heaps strange; I didn’t know dads cried.

Actually, the entire two weeks since have been strange. Dad’s been at home, barely getting out of bed. Mum says he’s extra upset ‘cause when he was little his own little sister and his mum (my grandma) disappeared in the last Dusting. And at school seven teachers are missing and a lot of kids, three from my class alone. There aren’t enough substitutes, so my class has been combined with half of a different class.

Father Pritchard says we shouldn’t complain about what’s happening or mention the dusted people, that the Dustings come because we are greedy and do bad things. And those that get dusted are particularly bad. I am not sure I believe him. This term I was doing a group assignment for our English class with a girl called Lisa Tam. She was heaps nice and she was dusted. I now have to finish the assignment off with Marco, who calls me names and sticks chewing gum under the classroom desks.

When I asked Father Pritchard about Lisa, he got real angry too (a lot of people’ve been angry lately) and told me to pray for forgiveness. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to be rude, but just to figure out how it works.

You see, my mum finally got my dad to agree to leave the house yesterday and go down to the beach. On the way there, we drove past the End-Dayers’ event of some kind. Dad pointed at them and said that they were right after all. There are no End-Dayers at my school and Father Pritchard doesn’t like talking about them, so I don’t know much about them. I think they believe you are the Second Coming, not sure. But essentially, they say that the world ended three hundred years ago back when the First Dusting happened and that you judged all of the living, then took all the good people to Heaven. Everyone remaining are failures.

Mum near slapped him for that. Like Father Pritchard, she always said the Dustings take the bad people and leave the good. Maybe that’s right. Half the population disappeared in the First Dusting, but since then the Dustings’ve been smaller. So maybe we are getting better and not as many of us are bad people. I mean, according to Mrs. Wix, before the First Dusting people were constantly killing each other and destroying the land they lived on — it doesn’t sound like a good place to live. But if so, how do you decide who gets dusted? Maybe Lisa did something bad at home, I suppose. But the worst I remember my sister Kiara doing was filching biscuits from the pantry without permission.

I’m sorry, I think I’ve rambled too much. I should probably start the letter from the beginning, but my hand is cramping (no one writes by hand these days, Mrs. Wix!), I think if I restart, I won’t be able to finish. Really, what I want to know is why do the Dustings happen? And what happens to the Dusted?

Please, I really need to know! I overheard my parents last night — mum is pregnant with my little brother and dad wants her to get rid of him, because there is no point in having children in a world where anyone could be dusted at any moment. I think she really did slap him this time. And now mum won’t speak to him and dad’s sleeping in Kiara’s bed. I think if I could tell them what really happens with the Dustings they’ll make up.

And I really hope you don’t mind me asking one more thing (if you do, I’m sorry). But no matter what happens to the Dusted, the next time you decide to do one, would you consider taking us all together instead? It makes people so sad when someone from their family or their friends gets dusted. I miss Kiara and I think wherever she is, she misses her family back on Earth too. Maybe you have your reasons for why this can’t happen, but I really do think it’d be better if everyone got dusted together.

Kind regards,

Ariadne Thornton,

Year 4, Coolangatta State Primary School

Coolangatta, Australia, Earth