It All Started With Magnets

.19.

The next day

I was procrastinating. I knew I was procrastinating.

I had gotten off the comms with everyone after about an hour. They had wanted me to point out continents, wanted me to tell them everything about what they were seeing as they looked at my home planet and I had been more than happy too. Mainly because it meant I spent more time with them, even just through comms and it also meant I didn't have to contact earth right away.

When the conversation ended I told myself I needed to eat. Then once I had eaten, I told myself I needed to sleep. So I did. Now I was watching the last of my youtube videos upload and I blinked. Nasa had to know I was on their network. I had moved close enough to the ISS to pick it up the network name and the password they had given me prior worked. So I had decided to upload my videos. My youtube channel had grown... a lot. I was surprised but then again a part of me told me I was ridiculous for thinking it wouldn't after the stunts I pulled.

But still. I was procrastinating because I was well aware that Nasa was more than likely trying to contact me, if the green flashing light on my comm panel was anything to go by. Still my anxiety was nearly through the roof and if I acknowledged that green flashing light then that meant I had to return to reality. The cold, hard reality that I was facilitating first contact for aliens to my own species that I wasn't sure was ready for that as well as having to learn if my family was safe or not and who tried to kill each other with my inventions.

The last video finished it's upload and posted and I sighed, rubbing at my face as I stared at my laptop screen. I hated how cowardly I felt posting the videos rather than contacting Nasa right away. But I also knew that it was better to just wholesale upload it to the internet so they couldn't do a media blackout and hide what I found. Once a video was on the internet it was forever and watching my views climb rapidly on the video where I introduce the aliens I knew it was better that way. There was no chance to hide it.

I looked over my shoulder at the flashing green light and groaned as I got up from my table, grabbing my cellphone as I did so and shuffled over to the pilot's chair. I sat down and let out a heavy breath as I looked down over earth and flicked the comms on.

"-ed me? Calling on Roxanne Matthews, this is Houson One, do you read me?" The voice was calm and my eye twitched slightly at the use of my full first name. I thought I had convinced the scientists to call me Roxie. Reality was well on it's way.

I settled further in the chair and pressed the comms button. "This is Roxie Matthews, I read you."

"Glad to hear your voice, Matthews. We saw you have been on network since last night and were getting worried when we couldn't hail you." There was no inflection to the voice, the calling of a true air traffic controller. It was like that when I was back on earth before all of that happened. It had always made sense that Nasa and the astronauts probably needed that calm voice.

"Yah, I auto synced and then passed out. Needed the sleep." It was a teeny tiny lie but I didn't care. I had been avoiding reality and procrastinating, they could sue me if they were really that upset. I glanced at my phone, pinching my lips together. I really needed to contact my lawyers.

"Understandable. When can we expect you to come down for a debrief?" that threw me slightly and I blinked.

"Not even going to ask how the trip was?" I could help the slight sarcasm I had as I rolled my eyes. They probably wanted to get their hands on my samples.

"Negative. When can you return to HQ for a debrief?" The voice turned clipped and I stiffened slightly, my alarm bells slowly going off. Something wasn't right.