Zali! | Teen Ink

Zali!

March 31, 2014
By benjamin jones BRONZE, el paso, Texas
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benjamin jones BRONZE, El Paso, Texas
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I’m about to tell you a story that when it happened, let me walk away with a life lesson. One that most people already knew, but I didn’t take seriously. Every day, day in and day out, I’d wake up, go to school, come home, watch TV, and go to bed. One day I was bored with my life so I looked out my window and saw the most magnificent star. It stood alone in the night sky. So, I closed my eyes and said “I wish something…something…cool would happen”. You know what happened… nothing.
One night I was having one of my “legendary” nights of TV, when I heard a knock at the door. “Who is it?” I yelled.
“Open the door, it’s me”.
“Who’s me?” I responded.
“Sam,” he said. Sam and I had been friends ever since pre-k. He had not changed since then that’s why I liked him, and lucky for him he had been cool his whole life. When I opened the door Sam said “Come on… we’re going on an adventure.”
”What kind of adventure?” I asked.
“Do you remember the ghost story?”
Not again, I thought. Sam had an older brother who went to our school. One night he broke into the school. He was in the school’s massive basement, when he knocked over a stacked-up desk, it fell and crushed him. People have said they heard him talking. Apparently he didn’t know he was dead, so he searched the school for things of value and every once in awhile a laptop or TV went missing.
“So you want to break into the school to find a ghost. Is that right?” I asked.
“That’s about the gist of it,” Sam answered.
“I hope you know, if you weren’t my best friend, I would say no, but since you are, let’s get going,” I replied.
“Awesomeness! Get your A/V bag and skateboard and let’s get gone.”

When I came out, we took off towards the school. We went in from the ditch behind the school.
“Wait. Do you even know how to get in?” I asked.
“The basement has a window. It is covered by a piece of wood but I have a drill to get it off,” Sam said.
“Well, aren’t we ready for WAR!” I said in a jive way.
“You already know,” Sam said.
“Get your camera out and put it on night vision mode,” he continued. So, I set down my bag to get it. When we got in, Sam led the way with the camera.
We got to the window and Sam said, “Get the drill from my bag and take the wood off.” I took the board off and when we looked in, we saw old school equipment stacked up high forming a maze.
I dropped in first then Sam dropped in. We started working our way through the maze
“How old is the school?” I asked
“Like 150 years, maybe more.” I picked up a really old history book, looked at it and read that the newest president was Roosevelt.
We got to the door that led to the school. When we got in, it was pitch black. All we saw was the exit signs. We started our hunt. After two and a half hours of searching, we came up with nothing. We started making our way to an exit when we saw a flash of light outside. We were in the cafeteria when something crashed through the ceiling and crash landed in the kitchen. Sam started running to the crash site. We got there as it was opening and clouds of thick white smoke poured out of what looked like a ship. Sam turned the camera on and pointed it at the ship. Then we saw something dart out of it.
“Oh crap what was that!” I yelled.
“SHHH, it went in that corner,” Sam whispered while pointing the camera to a nearby closet. We rushed to the closet door. The vent fell out of the ceiling and something went into the ventilation system.
“What the hell was that?!” I yelled
“I don’t know but I got it on tape.” Sam said.
“Let’s get out of here.” I said
“No, let’s look at the ship” Sam said.
“No! Look flashlights!” I said pointing to flashlights coming towards the crash. We went out the back door. As we did I stepped on a sharp object that went through my shoe and foot. As Sam and I were running, he tripped and fell. The camera fell and broke. He got up and started running then he realized he forgot the camera.
“The camera broke!” Sam yelled.
“Leave it! Let’s go” I yelled back. We jumped the fence and ran as fast as we could

“Wait. What do we do?” Sam asked.
“I don’t know, let’s go to my house. It’s closer. I think I hurt my foot.” When I took off my shoe, my sock was drenched in blood. “Crap,” I said.
“What’s that on your shoe? ” Sam asked.
“The blood?” I asked
No, this.” Sam said while pulling off the pyramid.
“Oh, that. That is what ripped my foot open. Come on I need to get home.” I said
“Ok.” Sam replied.
We got to my house with my blood leaving a trail, it was fading but I was still there. We went to my room.
“Go get the first aid kit from the bathroom.” When he brought it back I patched up my foot. “Let’s hope my mom and dad won’t notice. Let me see that thingy.” I said.
“What do you think this is?” Sam asked.
“I have no idea. It has a bunch of markings, almost like a key. It came off that thing at school,” I answered.
“What do you want to do now?” Sam asked.
“Slee…Oh man! I left my bag there if they find it they will know we were there. We have to go get it,” I said.
“Why? They probably already found it,” Sam answered.
“No, it’s in the basement no one goes down there, and if they do it will be the last place they look. Let’s go!” I demanded.
On our way to the school we saw a lot of police. Every other car was a cop car. When we got there we saw that there were a lot of people at the school. “Let’s go to the cliff. We’ll get a better view,” Sam said.
When we got there, I took out my phone and used the camera to see the people at the school. “Dang, they just found the bag, and they found my name on the bag!” I exclaimed.
“What do you want to do now?” Sam asked
“I have no idea. Wait, look it’s that thing that crashed. They’re putting it in a tent.” I took a picture of it before they put it in the tent then my phone started messing up.
Three SUV’s started coming up the trail fast, and before we knew what happened they were on us and four men got out of each SUV. “Put your hands in the air and get on your knees.” Said one of the men. We did what he said because I had no plans to die that day. One man approached and handcuffed us. Then they took us to the school that they had turned into their base of operation.
They put us in the principal’s office that they had turned into an interrogation room. A man walked in and sat down across from us. “My name is General Isaac King.” King said.
“Well my name is Clyde and this is my friend Sam.” I said.
“Clyde?!” King asked. “We found a bag in the basement at the school with the name Clyde. Do you know anything about that? The bag also had the school’s name on it. We found a file in the school’s system, with your picture on it. Look you’re going to tell me everything you know and I’ll make sure you don’t get arrested for breaking and entering and interfering with a government investigation.” King said as an alarm sounded.
A soldier burst in and said, “General King we’ve got a problem”
“What?” King asked
“I don’t know but we found eight men knocked out! Come on!” King left. Suddenly, the vent fell from the ceiling and this creature dropped in.
“Let’s go! I’m here to help you!” and he darted into the hall and led us to the parking lot. He broke into one of the cars. “Get in and drive!” he urged.
“What? We can’t drive!” Sam exclaimed.
“HEY! STOP RIGHT THERE!” King yelled.
”I’ll drive,” I said while pushing Sam into the back. The solders hopped into the other cars that were chasing us.
“What do we do? Where do we go?” I asked.
“How were two twelve year olds able to escape from the army?” Sam asked.
“We haven’t lost them yet! TURN HERE!” it said.
“Do you have a name?” Sam asked.
“Just call me Zali. Left,” said Zali.
“Where are we going?” I asked.
“Get ready to tuck and roll. NOW!” Zali yelled as we jumped from the SUV to a nearby drainage ditch. The car rolled for a bit before it crashed and we started running in the opposite direction.

“Where is your house?” Zali asked.
“My house is closer,” Sam said.
“Ok, let’s go.” Zali said.

We got to Sam’s house and went in his room through his window to avoid his grandma who had fallen asleep in front of the TV. She has supersonic hearing when she sleeps so she would hear us coming in the front door and would tell his mom that he came in late. “You’re going to tell us everything that is going and why you’re here. RIGHT NOW!” I demanded.
“Ok, ok.” Zali started. “It all started about one earth year ago. My planet was under attack and my father was tasked with taking the final and most critical piece of a weapon that evaporates water. It evaporated all water—water in puddles, ponds, lakes, oceans, whole worlds of water in any state of matter; even water inside organisms. All this happened in a matter of minutes.
When my planet was being destroyed my father was rushing me to his ship. He always said he would teach me how to drive it but he never got the chance. He put me in the ship with the pyramid and then…my dad punched something into the autopilot navigation and hit the hyper-drive button. The force from the takeoff put me to sleep after… after my father was killed. When I awoke, I was crashing through your atmosphere; but I lost the pyramid when I crashed. He could find it if it stays in one place for too long. When he does he WILL do what he did to our planet to your planet.” Zali said.
“What’s his name?” I asked.
“Xaphan.” Zali said. “He once rebelled agents a great god, and was banished to our universe as punishment.” Zali said.


“Dude the thing that cut up your foot, where did you leave it?” It sounds like what he’s looking for,” Sam reminded me that I might have what he needed.
“Let’s go to my house,” I urged.
“Uh, that’s not happening.” Sam said.
“What do you mean?” I asked,
“We didn’t lose King.” Sam responded
“He’s found us.” We heard the solders shoot the door off its hinges with a shotgun. We jumped out the window and ran into the woods behind Sam’s house. Too bad they were only one hundred yards thick.

After we cleared the forest we were nowhere near getting away and there was a helicopter in the distance and it was closing in. “Let’s get under the bridge before they get here!” We barely got under the bridge as the helicopter passed over.
“What time is it?” I asked.
“4:20 a.m. Why?” Sam replied.
“Let’s get to my house. We need to get there before five when my mom wakes up. If she sees me coming in at this time, that’s it for me.” I said beginning to walk.
“On my planet we eat our moms on our eighteenth birthday.” Zali added
“Good to know,” Sam said.

We got to my house and went to my room at 4:48 a.m. “There it is.” Sam said. When we got the pyramid, we heard a thunderclap so loud it sounded as if it was next to my ear.
“Give it to me. Now I need my ship so I can get off this planet before it’s too late.” When we ran out, we found that King and his army had surrounded the house. They arrested us and took us back to the school.

When we got to the school the sun was peaking over the horizon. He showed us the ship. It was covered in the same markings as the pyramid. “You know what this is?” King asked Zali.
“It’s my ship.” Zali answered.
“Ok, now do you know what this is?” King asked pointing to a monitor.
“Oh no!” Zali exclaimed.
“What is it?” Sam asked.
“That is a real time image of a large object moving at a high rate of speed. As our planet moves it adjusts its course. That means it’s coming to our planet. It appeared almost instantaneously. This caused that strange thunder earlier. It also has markings similar to the ones on this ship. Now we need to know what or who it is and what their intentions are. We have tried to communicate with it, but no dice. At this speed it will be here at sundown. Today that gives us twelve hours.” King filled us in.
“That’s Xaphan.” Zali told me
“He is coming here for this. He will kill everyone on this planet if he doesn’t get it and enslave everyone if we do. Now, you need to fight or die.” While all this is happening, I’m just in disbelief. This just can’t be real! Then I blacked out.
When I came to I saw the clock read 12:39 p.m. Sam was in there with me. I grabbed a book lying on the table and threw it at him and said “Get up!” We went outside and saw that the ship was getting closer but responded to the messages King sent. Zali was right about what he would do. King was wrong about how long it would take him to reach us. Instead of twelve hours, it would take him eight hours. Seven had already passed, so we only had an hour. When we asked King about his plan, he said he didn’t have one. He said they shot a missile with an atomic warhead at the incoming vessel but it hit a force field.
About half an hour had passed and the ship was about the same distance as the moon; however, nothing happened. It just waited. When the sun went down, we were able to see how big the ship was. It was over two times the size of the moon. Finally, we saw it open and a smaller yet still very large ship left the mother ship. It came in and hovered over the city. Two F-16 fighter jets and AC-5 gunship came into view and started circling the ship. The gunship opened fire, when it did a small rail gun from the ship shot it down and took out one of the jets, and then shot the other one as it flew away.
Then a smaller ship carrying eleven aliens left the ship. When he landed he looked around and said “You have one minute to hand my key over or I will blow up your planet.” I saw that they all had tubes hooked up to a box. When I got a closer look I noticed there were exhaust pipes so I started filling them with sand and rocks. When I did the aliens started freaking out because they couldn’t breathe. The hoses came unhooked and they started screaming in pain, falling down dead. Meanwhile, we saw missiles launching from the ocean. Only two hit the mother ship but when they did they hit the fuel tank. So a bunch of explosions went through the ship blowing it up.
Then we saw the mother ship leave. “What just happened!?” I yelled.
“Life is delicate. Everybody on different planets uses different types of air. The air on earth was poisonous to them.” Sam explained.
“How did you know that? I thought you hated school.” I asked him
“Not when something dies.” Sam replied.
Why didn’t Zali die?” I asked.
“I can live anywhere. Hey! I can use this little ship to fix my ship and get this thing of this planet!” Zali exclaimed.
“What are you going to do with it?” I asked
“Throw it in the sun. It will obliterate it. Once that’s done… I don’t know.” Zali said.
”Why don’t you come back and stay with me? You can pass for a pet.” I invited.
“Are you sure?” Zali asked.
“Yeah, it would be fun. He can stay right General King?” I asked.
“Well… after we debrief him about everything. He will need a place to stay and I suppose your home is better than a military base in the middle of the desert. So, yes he can.” King agreed.
He is still here with me. It’s been about a year. The lesson I learned is not to overthink things. I’m sure there is more to take away from this story maybe something about friendship or perseverance, but I took away the lesson not to over think things.


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