Page 43 - The Muse 2019-20 Issue

overwhelmed yet felt hopeful by the fact that during all this crisis, people still were able to come together.
It had been a week after her arrival and there had been talk about an asteroid hitting earth. It had been all over the news and people were starting to worry. She was surprised by the news, as well as the other astronauts on the mission, since they would have seen the asteroid while they were in space. At work, she and the astronauts worked day and night trying to find out what this ‘asteroid’ was and where it came from. They couldn’t figure it out.
The whole world was beginning to become reckless. This asteroid was getting closer and closer to earth every day, becoming more visible to the human eye. All around the world, people were in
panic. Frantically, people tried to find a solution, but nothing was working. The various space organizations across the globe were trying to work together, giving each other information and directions on how to fix this. There was no concrete solution. No one knew what this thing was.
Finally, a camera was sent to space to try to take a closer look at the asteroid. As it got closer and closer, people started to lose hope in their own homes. Everyone had given up on trying to find a solution which in a way, made the asteroid come faster and faster. It got so close that people actually knew what it looked like. A huge, metal sphere. And that’s when it clicked for Joy. This was no asteroid, it was the machine - what she called, the wish machine.
Joy also realized that since people gave up on finding a solution for the asteroid, it had been traveling faster the last couple days. After putting two and two together, she realized that his machine wasn’t running on batteries or technology. It ran on hope - the hope of people. And the reason why the machine seemed off while she was in space was because it lacked its energy, its fuel. Ever since the war, the machine had been down since people had lost hope. Earth was in ruins and every day, people’s struggle to survive caused them to lack hope for a better future. They stopped desiring and this caused the machine to simply stop. The aftermath of the war had reached the point that the machine couldn’t even hold itself in place, and it simply started falling. This was no asteroid. It was the result of the lack of hope that used to bring people together.
Joy had to find a way to make her discovery public. She was able to get her team at the space center to get in touch with the leaders of other countries. It had been hard since no one was really on good terms after the war. After hours of dedication, the leaders finally decided to help Joy spread the news.
A couple days had passed, and Joy was now on international TV. She spoke for hours, and had a feeling that people were listening to her all across the country. She explained what she had seen in space, carefully choosing each word that left her lips. She ended the video by pleading for everyone to go outside and make a wish. Wish upon a star, as they were told to when they were little. Wish that all the chaos would go away, and that no asteroid would ever hit earth.
People listened. They obeyed. A couple minutes after the tape was aired, there were people outside, wishing upon their lucky star. She was outside, looking at the machine. She could not believe her eyes. It was going up. Joy shed a tear at what she thought was impossible. She looked around her and saw people - people coming together. People were hugging and celebrating. The world had come together for once in what felt like a lifetime. People embraced and supported each other.
The machine went back into space, and for the first time since the beginning of the war, people had united and worked together. People had been separated and ignorant for so many years and finally, they teamed up to fix something that felt irreversible. The world and its population had been restored. There was a magic feeling surrounding the whole thing, but Joy decided to keep it a mystery and think of it as a simple miracle. The war was over, and their home was no longer in ruins. The solution had been there all the time - unity, faith, and of course, their lucky star.
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