Doomsday

Henry kicked the stone hard. Flying off its spot, it landed a couple of meters away. He was sitting on his skateboard all alone in his backyard. As he approached the stone to pick it up again, he absentmindedly stepped on it. And that's how he found the device. 

When the stone didn't go deep into the ground, he tried to dig a hole for it, only to find a weird device buried not too deep in the ground. Picking it up, he brushed the dirt off it. It was dark olive green in color and didn't have any visual display whatsoever. Fitting perfectly in his palm, he didn't understand what it did. Looking very old, it had three small holes and a red button.

He flipped it over, checking every side to see if it had something else. But that was all it was. Just a small olive box with a red button and a few holes. Not that interesting. 

So he did what his instinct told him. With his thumb, he pressed the button once and waited. But nothing happened. Annoyed, he pressed the button five more times rapidly before he finally got a response out of it. 

A noise came from the small holes. But he couldn't hear it as it stopped before he could understand anything. He tried again. After pressing the red button once, he waited with the device pressed to his ear. But nothing happened. 

So he pressed it again five times when the device finally made a sound. After concentrating his best, he realized the sound was not of a person. It was just frequency change noises, like the radio made in between changes of stations. 

Not happy with the outcome, he decided to take it back to his basement to tinker with it. During his summer break, all he had was time. 

Running at full speed, he sped past his grandpa in the kitchen. His grandpa looked up and called, ‘Henry! Wait.’ 

Henry turned around. Stuffing his newfound device in his pocket, he ran up to his grandpa. Holding a place of neatly sliced apples, he said, "Eat this first. You barely ate breakfast today."

"I had two pancakes! Said Henry, sitting on the couch."

"Yes, that's very little". Said Grandpa, walking past him and turning on the TV. The TV showed news of the day in the background as Henry's mind wandered back to his device. 

Grandpa, however, listened intently to the news. The main headlines that caught his eye and that of the reporters who did not have anything left to report were:

Nasa successfully made contact with a lost space mission from 10 years ago. In a rare event, a mission that NASA had sent to a faraway planet in search of life had tried to contact NASA. Everyone was ecstatic. 

"This could be our discovery of life on another planet!"

The following news report detailed Earth's history with alien spotting and UFOs. It interviewed people who were sure of the fact that aliens already lived among us. Following this, societies and committees were formed to convince the world of alien presence among us. 

A mad scientist with ties with one such alien support committee, is said to have lost a machine that can predict the end of the world. All one had to do was press a button and ask. How could it do it? Nobody knows. Maybe it was just a toy. But that toy is now lost. Worth millions, the device got lost soon after the scientist had found it. He believes it will make a sharp beep when it learns that doomsday is near. But only if someone asks. 

Completely uninterested in the news, Henry stuffed his apples in one bite and ran to the basement. The dusty room was the perfect place to find all the tools he’d need to open it. Not that he knew how to use them; he was planning on using a hammer. 

But on holding the hammer, he became hesitant. He put the hammer down and tried to press the button again ten times rapidly. To which it made a sound twice as loud as before. But it was still a high-frequency squeal of a radio. 

He looked around for a tool to help him open the device without damaging it. But there did not seem to be any opening. Contemplating taking it to the local repair shop, he decided against it. What if they broke it? 

Annoyed, he put the device on the table and went upstairs to bring some friends. Henry now had high hopes that the device was something rare and antique. He wanted to understand what it did and the implications of it before he brought it up to his parents. 

Upstairs, it started to get dark earlier than expected. The TV was playing in the background while Grandpa napped on the couch. Uninterested in the news, Henry went straight outside. Though if he’d stopped, this is what he’d hear. 

The refreshed news on the TV talked about the signals that NASA had received earlier. It seemed like the signals were that of panic. Unlike the patterns and codes NASA had used to communicate with it earlier, the signals coming now were erratic and infrequent. Coming in counts of fives and tens, it meant nothing, due to which the scientists concluded that the mission was compromised. 

In other news, some more people claimed UFO sightings in broad daylight. And to prove their point, they had clicked pictures of a round figure flying in the sky. Stirring up the conversation of alien life once again with full vigor. 

The mad scientist continued to holler about the end of the world, talking about the device that he claimed was left here by aliens themselves. That he had found and now lost. Crying in front of the camera, he showed a picture of the device. But as the TV flickered in the background, nobody at Henry's home saw the image. 

Returning home disappointed, Henry went back downstairs. Most of his friends had gone on vacations by now. And those who had not were not interested in an olive box he dug out of his backyard. 

Picking up the hammer, he went straight to the device but stopped again, inches away. Deciding to give the device one last chance to make sense of itself, he picked it up and pressed the red button ten times in quick succession. With each click the noise from it kept getting louder. But he did not stop. With the last click, the sound turned into a loud and shrill beep. 

Scared, he threw the device in the corner with all his strength to stop the sound. The device hit the wall and broke into pieces, stopping the sound immediately. 

Finally convinced that the device was probably too old or broken to be used, Henry left his basement, disappointed. 

Upstairs, the TV was still playing the news. Grandpa had woken up. He stood by the window. 

On seeing Henry, he called him," Hey Henry, come here! They spotted a UFO just above our home!"

"What?" Said Henry as he ran up to the widow. 

Cameras were everywhere, along with various news reporters telling their sides of the story while trying to get hold of witnesses. 

"If only I were awake, I too would have seen them." Said Grandpa, sighing. He went back inside and turned up the volume of the TV. The news channels were in a complete frenzy trying to make sense of the UFO sightings near his home. A reporter was now speaking to NASA. They had received a message coded in the same language as their lost mission years ago. 

The message was from the people who lived on that planet. They said they’d received signals from our planet, which they believe to be a cry of war. Why else would they use a machine they had personally delivered back to Earth to send weird signals? 

They tried to send signals to warn humans against war. But humans did not stop sending them war signals despite their best messages to maintain peace. NASA seems to have mistaken alien signals for their lost mission’s panic signals. 

The aliens said that they had let humans be, even after it made multiple errors because they considered humans as their small sibling and did not wish to interfere in their growth. But they now believe that humans are beyond the scope of improvement. 

The aliens were going to destroy our planet because it was now a matter of pride for them, after receiving several cries of war. And as for humans, it’s doomsday.